Chapter Six

Sanna stared in wonder as Clay led her through the double glass doors into the Hyperion atrium. She barely managed to stop her jaw from dropping. This... this building was amazing. It was even prettier than Malfoy Manor, which, in retrospect, wasn't hard considering the Manor had about as much charm as a Blast-Ended Skrewt. She watched as people stood talking, looking over files or travelling back and forth between the two ends of the room, disappearing into the small reception area where she saw a gaggle of people bent over a computer screen.

Her view of the room was suddenly restricted as a black t-shirt claimed her focus. She glanced up and stopped dead at who must have been Michael Harris, aka Mick, aka Tash's bestest Mick-shaped friend as she'd put it. Merlin, he was attractive. She stamped down that thought the moment it appeared and tried valiantly to look at him as objectively as possible. Tall, dark shaggy hair, deep brown eyes and those arms didn't look exactly like twigs from where she was standing.

She didn't have anymore time to think as he swept her up in a hug. As in her feet left the ground and she had no choice but to cling to him in the hopes that he wouldn't drop her on her arse sort of hug.

"Missed you, T."

"Missed you too, Mick." She still couldn't get over how weird her sister's voice sounded coming from her mouth.

"Hey, slayboy, stop hogging."

Mick set Sanna back down and the overwhelmed girl got her first glimpse of her mother and her mind kind of broke down. This glorious creature was her mother? Dawn Summers would have been called lanky in her youth but she'd grown into it and become sort of graceful. In a distant part of her mind that hadn't ceased function she noticed that Tash and herself looked a great deal like her mother.

Dawn drew her daughter into a hug and if either of them held on a little tight, the other didn't say anything. They separated and Dawn brushed the tears that had fallen from Sanna's eyes, oblivious that it wasn't the daughter she expected.

"So, how was camp?"

Sanna nodded, trying to gain some footing after such unbalancing emotions. "It was good. The activities were sort of boring but I met some cool people."

"Anyone in particular?"

She shrugged. "Just a girl and her friends."

Dawn knew her daughter was hiding something but let it drop. "Sounds fun. Any boys?"

Sanna laughed. "No, no boys, mu-mom." She cursed herself for the slip-up. Tash had it easy. Dad was said the same in both continents. Why couldn't America just say mum like civilised people?

"Sure, sure. I know that look. You've got your eye on someone." Rachael and Clay glanced at her and she shook her head conspicuously, not used to such intuitiveness. Charlie wasn't the most observant guy on the reservation. "Well, come on, I'll let you get settled back in."

Mick automatically picked up her bags and took the stairs two at a time and Sanna wished she could chloroform the butterflies dancing in her stomach because she was going to be lucky if she didn't lose her lunch all over the floor, especially after her first airplane ride. Speaking of lunch, it hadn't been that great to begin with. Why Tash hadn't just taken a Portkey to camp like a proper witch, she never knew.

Rachael and Clay grabbed an arm each and pulled Sanna up the stairs either side of the entrance, following Mick up another flight to the room Tash had instructed was hers. The first thing she noticed was the literal wall of photos opposite, or rather the lack of movement from what would be a moving wall in the Wizarding World. She knew that her sister went to school in Salem and they had moving photos but the majority of the photos seemed to be taken around the Hyperion, if the decor was similar to the atrium. She saw the gaps where the ones in her bag would go and she hoped that there wasn't rhyme or reason to how Tash had decorated.

Mick had dumped her bags on her bed and was lounging on it as Rach and Clay hovered behind her. Mick noticed and frowned. "You all right, T?"

"Hmm?" Sanna blinked and nodded jerkily. "Fine. Just acclimatising myself to civilisation again." Crap. She didn't think Tash had "acclimatising" in her vocabulary. Thankfully, Mick didn't seem to notice.

"How was the land of G-man? Tweedy and tea-like?" She felt Rachael and Clay freeze behind her and she wasn't quite sure how to translate Mick's slang into any sort of civilised tongue. She'd thought Tash mutilated the English language; Mick butchered it.

"It was... fine. Lots of tea and tweed. At least from the Gileses." She saw Clay nodding out of the corner of her eye and relaxed a little. She could so do this. She'd do it for Tash.

"Well, we'd better get unpacked. If it's all the same to you, I need to hang out with people who I haven't seen everyday for the last six weeks," Clay said drily as he left, Rach nodding emphatically in his wake.

Sanna glared at their retreating backs. Traitors. Leaving her in the same room as a charming boy who thought he was her best friend that she was not allowed to go near in fear of screwing up Tash's life. Bloody great.

"Tash?"

"Yep, all here. Sorry. I-I'm a little tired, I guess." She resolutely looked through Tash's photos, refusing to give in to the temptation to look at him. That didn't last very long. Her eyes scanned the photos and somehow they kept scanning to the other side of the room until they reached his face.

Mick shrugged and vacated the bed. Sanna couldn't help but notice how graceful he was and it was not FAIR. A boy should not be that graceful or pretty or anything that might lead her to jeopardise her identity as not Tash. "Right, I should let you catch a few winks. Ma needed my help with some demon prince called Barvain. Ever heard of him?"

Sanna shook her head mutely. Crap, they didn't think of that. Tash helped as much as she could with the research and Sanna had next to no knowledge of demons. They didn't cover them in Defense Against the Dark Arts, only mythical creatures. Oh well, they'd deal.

Mick nodded and waved as he left, calling back, "I'm glad you're home, T."

Sanna sat on the bed and sighed. Well, that hadn't been a total disaster... right?

* * *

Dawn interrupted Sanna sometime later while she was studying the photos. Quite a few of them were of Tash, Rachael and Mick goofing around. Others were of Scoobies, taken candidly while they were working or talking with others. There was one that particularly caught her eye: it was of the Summers women, dressed up to go out, Tash in a gorgeous strappy, knee-length purple dress with a corsage on her wrist. Prom, or whatever it was called. Whoever had been taking the photo had made the Summers' laugh and this was the result. It was breath-taking.

She hadn't quite figured out why Tash would be home for prom, until she saw the photo next to it. Tash and Mick, dressed in a suit, standing side by side, arms slung haphazardly around each other. For a brief instant, Sanna was slightly jealous of her sister but dispelled the thought as silliness. They were best friends, of course they were comfortable with each other.

"No matter how long those photos are up, you always look at them," Dawn said from the doorway. Sanna jumped and turned towards her mother alarmed. "Sorry, didn't mean to scare you."

"Of course." Dawn gave her a strange look so she hurriedly continued on sarcastically. "I bet you did it just to make me jump."

Dawn shook her head with a smile and changed the subject. "I was wondering if you wanted to go out for dinner. Celebrate coming home."

Sanna grinned. "Sounds great. Can we go now?"

Dawn laughed. "Hold your horses, kiddo. I've got a few things to finish up but give me half an hour?"

Sanna could only nod.

* * *

An hour later, the two of them were just sitting down at a restaurant that the Scoobies ate at regularly. The staff had become accustomed to the weird things that popped up around their customers. "Sorry it took me so long," Dawn apologised, looking hassled. "Andrew would not shut up."

"Does he ever?" It was meant to be sarcastic but it came out closer to curious.

"Not when he's breathing."

There was a pause. Sanna bit her lip and practically spewed out, "What was Dad like?"

It gave Dawn such a fright that she almost knocked over her water. "Sorry?"

"I was just... wondering. What was Dad like?"

Dawn blinked, seemingly stunned.

"Mom?"

"Sorry, you just caught me off guard there for a second. Your dad? He was... something else. I met him while I was travelling in Romania and we kind of hit it off. We moved to England to be closer to his family. His huge family, by the way. None of this adopted stuff we've got going on. He was the second eldest of seven. Crazy, huh?"

Sanna nodded, impatient. She already knew this but she couldn't rush Dawn. If she did, she might not get everything.

"He was a decent person. The kind that isn't so common anymore. His whole family were decent people," she said, frowning, as if troubled by something.

"Can I ask why you guys divorced?"

Dawn laughed bitterly. "Sometimes I don't even know. We were young, me especially, and I don't think we knew how to compromise and things got out of hand and, Goddess, we both said some things, terrible things and it kind of went belly up."

"Do you ever miss him?"

Dawn looked at Sanna, really looked, and for a moment the Weasley thought the gig was up. "Why do you want to know?"

"I can't know what my dad was like?"

"Well, of course you can, but you've never taken an interest before."

Sanna played the sympathy card. "It's just what some kids at camp were saying..."

Dawn stiffened. "What did they say?"

"N-Nothing bad. They were just talking about their dad and I got curious, that's all."

Dawn visibly relaxed and smiled softly. "Do you want to know more?"

"If you don't mind?"

"Nope, but you're getting the edited version."

Sanna made a disgusted face. "Mom, gross."

Dawn laughed and threw a bit of her roll at Sanna. "Not in that way, pervert."

"Other pervert."

* * *

This wasn't going to work, this wasn't going to work, this was SO not going to work. What had they been thinking? What had she been thinking? It'd had been her crazy idea and now whatever bad things happened were going to be blamed on her. Oh, because there would be bad things. She was her mother's daughter and bad things always happened, except instead of Tuesday, she seemed to have inherited Thursday because she hated Thursdays with a fiery passion.

She landed on her backside on the ground as the Portkey she'd been holding had stopped none too gently in front of the Burrow. She sat there for a moment, wincing before scrambling up and dusting herself off. She glanced up at the building and paused, any thoughts of Charlie were sidetracked momentarily by what must have been the Burrow. Wobbly was definitely one way to describe it. The rooms seemed to be sticking out of the side of the ramshackle house at random and there were some that had to be held up by magic. There was no other explanation.

And inside that towering ramshackle house was her father. Her father. Her dad. The man who had married her mother and separated her from her sister. No, she told herself. That wasn't fair. Mom had as much of a say in it as he did. The blame gets pointed at both of them.

She patted her pocket to make sure her wand and shrunk luggage were still there before taking a deep breath and walking quickly toward the door. She didn't see any doorbell or knocker of any kind so she knocked and before her hand could even retreat, the door sprung open and Charlie Weasley stood there grinning at her. "Sanna."

"Daddy."

They hugged and Tash couldn't believe it. This was her FATHER. She vowed silently then and there that she would do whatever it took to make sure their plan worked. She shouldn't have to miss out on having a father any more than Sanna should miss out on a mother.

They parted reluctantly and Charlie ruffled her hair. "So, did Teddy have to put his Beater's club to good use?"

Tash rolled her eyes. She thought Sanna had been overreacting with the no boys comment. "No, Dad. The boys were all very appropriate. Did you know Ollie sent Lachie? Yep, it's true. Got to hang out with the Scottish kid for a while."

Charlie chuckled. "I'm sure the Scottish kid loves being to referred to like that."

"You know he loves it."

"Charles Weasley, where have your manners gone? Are you going to leave your only child out there in the cold?" Something zinged through Tash. She wasn't an only child. Not anymore. But even that couldn't distract her from Molly Weasley's all-encompassing hug.

Tash almost teared up then but she fought the sensation down and reveled in the warmth her grandmother exuded. She'd never had more blood relatives than Aunt Buffy and her mother and to suddenly find out she was related to an entire clan of people was slightly overwhelming, especially when they all seemed like such friendly people.

"Now," Molly said, pulling back and bustling Tash into the kitchen. "We'll set you down and get you some lunch. Those camps never feed you properly."

Tash felt herself pushed down into a chair at the solid and slightly dented kitchen table and curiously ran a hand across it. She could almost feel the family history and the crazy events that made the dents. Charlie flopped down into the chair next to Tash with a put-upon sigh.

"Don't think I've forgotten about you either, Charlie. You never feed yourself properly when you're not looking after Sanna."

"Mum," Charlie started. "I'm 40 years old. I can take care of myself."

Molly paused in her lunch preparation and put her hands on her hips, eyebrow raised imperiously at her second eldest son. "Oh really? That's not what I hear from Ginny."

Tash watched as her father's ears flushed a curious shade of pink and almost glared. She hated when her ears did that and now she knew where she got it from.

"Dad?"

Charlie shook his head ruefully. "Bill, Harry and Ron came over and we got up to a little mischief." Molly snorted as she turned back to the bench, muttering under her breath about lying, ungrateful children.

Tash snorted. "I take it Firewhiskey was involved."

"It may have made an appearance."

Tash looked disapprovingly at her father and he held up his hands. "Don't look at me like that. I swear, Mum, you've got a little protegee here. Who needs soap when you've got Sanna?" Tash glared at him and stopped for a second to wonder at it. Here she was in a place she never knew existed with a man who she once thought didn't love her joking about getting drunk while she was gone.

"Grandmere?" Victoire. Bill's oldest. Inherited some Veela from Fleur apparently. Leggy, blonde hair, blue eyes and hardly a French accent to her at all, though she was fluent. Tash remembered Sanna teasing Teddy about her. The blonde finished descending the stairs and offered Tash a winsome smile. "Sanna. Welcome back. How was camp?"

Tash smiled, slowly getting into the groove of being Sanna. "Pretty cool, actually. There were a couple people you would've liked. You should come next time. I'm sure Uncle Bill could spare you."

Victoire shrugged gracefully. "It sounds like fun, but I'm not the one who'll be behind on her homework."

"Well I'm sorry Little Miss Prefect, I forgot all of us weren't a stick in the mud."

Victoire laughed and sat down next to her. "You're starting to sound like Dom, Sanna. We wouldn't want that."

Dominique Weasley. Victoire's younger brother. Sanna wasn't a fan. Tash snorted. "Who would?"

"You ready for the sleepover?"

"Of course, V. I'm always up for a little giggle and gossip."

Victoire raised a slender eyebrow. "V? Sanna, just who have you been hanging out with?"

"What? I can't give you a nickname?" Everyone had a nickname at Scooby HQ. It was in Tash's genetic makeup to shorten her friends' names. She was hard pressed to think of one person in the Scoobies or the Scrappies who didn't have a nickname, even if it was one they despised.

Victoire smiled. "Don't worry, Sanna. I like it."

Tash sighed with relief. Well, she'd fooled her father, grandmother and one of her closest cousins. This was shaping out pretty all right.

"Oh hey, Sanna?" Charlie turned from where he was heading upstairs and lingered at the base of the staircase.

"Yeah, Dad?"

"How do you feel like dinner?"

Tash's eyes lit up. "Sounds fantastic."

"Do you mind if someone joins us?"

"Not at all. Who is it?"

"Veronica."

The Weasleys in the room could attest to never seeing a face fall quite as quickly as Tash's then. "Veronica Aubrey?"

"That's the one. Are you sure you don't mind?"

A wall closed over Tash's face. "Nope. It's five by five with me."

Charlie froze. "What did you just say?"

Crap crap crap. Stupid recognisable Scooby speech pattern. "Five by five. I picked it up from a boy at camp."

Charlie didn't seem reassured by that and headed up stairs, keeping her in his sights for as long as possible.

Well, crap. This was unforeseen.