Hello! It's me! *breaks into an Adele song*
Sorry for that. It's quite late here.
I would like to apologize for the lack of updates. My semester has been craaaaazy. Between studying and working, I barely have a minute to myself, and when I do, I'm usually too tired to write or update. So, sorry about that. But I must say my lack of update has also been due to the fact that I wasn't sure people were reading and interested in this stotry still - but I still have hope that there are some of you out there, so I'm updating for you. I will honestly try to update more often during the holidays. Pinky promise!
I hope you like this chapter. There's a lot coming from the books, but I believe it's important material to cover. Anyway, I'm going to stop talking.
Thank you for everyone who is reading, I really do appreciate it. And a bigger thank you to everyone who follows/favorites/reviews. You guys are my gasoline.
Okay I'm done. I love you guys! xx

wildest dreams
VOLUME II

CHAPTER SIX

The next day at breakfast, I was sitting alone with the twins in the kitchen – the three of us had woken up late.

"Got a letter from Lee last night," said George.

"Oh! How's he doing?" I asked, excited to hear about him.

"Good. His Dad got tickets for the Chudley Canons match last week – said it was brilliant."

"I bet it was," I muttered. "I wish I could go to more matches. Oliver's sent me an invitation for a Puddlemere United one a few weeks back – but I was in South America."

"Oliver, oh Oliver," said Fred suggestively.

I gave him a solid nudge in the ribs, shaking my head.

"Well we'll have the Cup back this year," said George, carefully ignoring his brother's remark. "We have to win, no choice. It's our last chance."

"Ooh, I can't wait for some good old Gryffindor/Slytherin rivalry," I nodded, smirking at the idea.

"Be careful with that" said Fred. "Last time I saw that look in your eyes you ended up in the Hospital Wing with a concussion…"

"Hey, guys."

We all turned to the door – Bill had just entered.

"Hey, Bill!" I smiled.

"How was it?" he asked, pointing the empty flask beside me.

"I'd rather not talk about it, or I might vomit," I said flatly.

Bill smiled. The antidote to Doxy venom had not tasted like anything when I had taken it at the apothecary – probably because I had been only half-conscious. But when I had taken it a few minutes earlier, it had tasted worse than my uncle's cooking – which was pretty awful.

"Well I have some news that might cheer you up."

"What?" asked Fred.

"You've not asked Fleur not marry you, have you?" said George. "Because Ginny will kill you."

"No," said Bill, shaking his head – I noticed how he had blushed. "They're going to get Harry. Tonight."

"Finally!" I breathed out.

"Who's going? When?" asked George.

"Just a few people from the Order. After sundown. Now, I need to get to work, will you let the others know?"

We didn't even have time to reply that Bill had already disappeared. I raised an eyebrow.

"He sure is in a hurry to get to work."

The twins snickered.

"Yeah, right. To get to work."

I rolled my eyes, chuckling, imagining Bill running to Gringotts – and to his new and very charming blonde-haired coworker. It was so weird thinking about Bill fancying someone like her. But life was full of surprises.

"Well, it's about time they go and get Harry. It's been ages since the whole Dementor thing," said George.

"Yeah. I reckon he's going to be furious, too, when he realizes everything they've been hiding from him…"

"Well, he's got every right to be, if you ask me," I muttered.

The twins nodded, and continued eating their porridge. Because of my accident the day before, I was excused of chores – Molly wanted me in bed, and nowhere else. Therefore, I spent most of the day exactly there, re-reading my Magical Law book and writing a letter to Angelina, telling her what had happened. Sirius visited me during the late afternoon, and we played a few games of Exploding Snap. I had nearly beat him for the third time when Molly entered the room.

"Are you feeling better, Addy, dear?" she asked, smiling.

"Much better, Molly."

"Good. Now, Sirius, can you come and give me a hand with dinner? We'll eat a little late today, because of the meeting, but I still want to get everything ready…"

"Of course, Molly."

He stood up from my bed, giving me a wink before following Molly downstairs. I wanted until I couldn't hear the creaking sound of the stairs – and ran upstairs, where the twins were busy cleaning the room where I had been bit. They were quite excited to hear there was going to be a meeting that night – that would be a good time to put the Extendable Ears to use.

Right before dinner, we sat down at the very top of the stairs – I had, right after we left the dining room, settled one of the Ears next to the door – and proceeded to try and listen to the meeting. However, we couldn't hear anything.

"Do you reckon Dumbledore found a DADA teacher?" asked George after a while.

"I doubt he has" I said. "After what happened to the others…"

"I wish Lupin would do it this year – he was the best of the whole bunch," sighed Fred.

"It's not like the 'bunch' in question was really hard to beat…" I replied, arching an eyebrow.

"Anything but Lockhart, that's all I'm asking."

"He wasn't that bad!"

"That's because you fancied him, like all the bloody girls in school…"

"I didn't! I'm just saying, I'd rather have a fraud as a teacher than someone who has bloody You-Know-Who on the back of his head!"

"Point taken."

"Shut it!" said George, pointing the Ear. "Harry's arrived."

We listened to Molly and the others greeting Harry – who went upstairs a few seconds later. The meeting went on – now that the people that had been getting Harry were back, the conversation would probably be more and more interesting… the entire Order seemed to be present, after all… until a loud voice rose from downstairs, and then we definitely couldn't hear anything.

"Is that Harry?"

We all bent down to get closer to the Ear – but we didn't really need it. Harry's voiced echoed through the whole house.

"Blimey, he sounds mad."

Fred was right – I couldn't heard what Harry was saying, but he sounded very angry.

"Let's find out what bothers him so much," said Fred.

"Maybe we shouldn't," I hesitated.

"Why?" replied the twins.

"Can't you hear him ? He's mad, I reckon the last thing he wants is to be asked questions by you two. We should give him some space! Just for him to get a hold of everything, you know…"

The twins stared at me, and then glanced at each other.

"Won't do."

I knew what they were going to do before they did it – but I still felt my stomach turn as George grabbed my hand we all Apparated in Ron's room with a loud crack.

"Stop doing that!" shrieked Hermione.

"I'm sorry, I tried to stop them!"

"Hello Harry," said George. "We thought we heard your dulcet tones."

"You don't want to bottle up your anger like that, Harry, let it all out. There might be a couple of people fifty miles away who didn't hear you."

"You two passed your Apparation tests, then?" asked Harry.

He looked sulky and tired – I couldn't blame him.

"With distinction."

"It would have taken you about thirty seconds longer to walk down the stairs," sighed Ron.

"Time is Galleons, little brother," replied Fred. "Anyway, Harry, you're interfering with reception. Extendable Ears – we're trying to hear what's going on downstairs."

"You want to be careful," said Ron. "If Mum sees one of them again…

"It's worth the risk, that's a major meeting they're having."

Ginny entered the room – she was smiling at Harry.

"Oh, hello, Harry! I thought I heard your voice."

I smirked. She turned to the twins.

"It's no go with the Extendable Ears, she's gone and put an Imperturbable Charm on the kitchen door."

"How d'you know?"

"Tonks told me how to find out. You just chuck stuff at the door and if it can't make contact the door's been Imperturbed. I've been flicking Dungbombs at it from the top of the stairs and they just soar away from it, so there's no way the Extendable Ears will be able to get under the gab."

"Shame," sighed Fred. "I really fancied finding out what old Snape's been up to."

"Snape?" asked Harry, eyes wide. "Is he here?"

"Yeah," nodded George, closing the door. "Giving a report. Top secret."

"Everything's top secret," I muttered.

"Git," added Fred.

"He's on our side now," said Hermione.

"Doesn't stop him being a git. The way he looks at us when he sees us…"

"He helped Addy with her bite!"

I snickered.

"Well – it's not like he was reassuring about it. He basically told me I was going to die if I didn't take the antidote" I said, sitting on one of the beds next to George.

"Wait, what?" asked Harry. "What bite?"

"Doxys," I answered. "They're all over the house. Point is, whatever side he's on, doesn't mean we have to like him."

"Bill doesn't like him either" nodded Ginny.

There was a short silence – Harry seemed to have calmed down – he sat on the opposite bed and asked about Bill. We told him everything about everything after that – about the whole thing with Percy, about Dumbledore, and the Daily Prophet. We only stopped when we heard Molly coming up the stairs – the twins and me Disapparated back upstairs. We tried to hear the conversation as most of the Order left the house – but without success. We therefore went downstairs to dinner, feeling a little bummed out.

Molly asked us to help her carry everything to the table – of course, Fred and George refused to do it normally, and so spilled the Butterbeer everything, almost broke the kitchen table in two and nearly stabbed Sirius in the hand.

"FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE!" yelled Molly. "THERE WAS NO NEED – I'VE HAD ENOUGH OF THIS – JUST BECAUSE YOU'RE ALLOWED TO USE MAGIC NOW YOU DON'T HAVE TO WHIP YOUR WANDS OUT FOR EVERY TINY LITTLE THING!"

"We were just trying to save a bit of time!" said Fred. "Sorry Sirius, mate – didn't mean to –"

But Sirius was laughing – so I was, and so was almost the rest of the table.

"Boys, your mother's right," nodded Arthur. "You're supposed to show a sense of responsibility now you've come of age…"

"… none of your brothers caused this sort of trouble!" continued Molly. "Bill didn't feel the need to Apparate every few feet! Charlie didn't Charm everything he met! Percy –"

Silence filled the room as Molly stopped dead in her sentence. I stared at her – she suddenly looked incredibly frightened and sad. I felt my heart break a little – and my rage against Percy grow even harder – that stupid, careless git!

"Let's eat," declared Bill.

"It looks wonderful, Molly."

We all sat down at the table, feeling a little awkward.

"I've been meaning to tell you, there's something trapped in that writing desk in the drawing room, it keeps rattling and shaking" said Arthur to Sirius. "Of course, it could just be a Boggart, but I thought we ought to ask Alastor to have a look at it before we let it out."

"Whatever you like."

"The curtains in there are full of doxies too," said Molly.

"Don't tell me," I muttered.

George smirked at me.

"I thought we might try and tackle them tomorrow."

I raised an eyebrow – I would make sure they would do that without me. I had had enough of Doxies for a lifetime. Slowly, the silence was filled by the rattling of the plates, and the conversations were getting louder and louder. I was soon listening to Mundungus Fletcher's stories about his 'business', as he liked to call it – maybe Dung was a tosser, but he sure was funny.

"I don't think we need to hear any more of your business dealings, thank you very much, Mundungus," said Molly when Ron nearly fell off his chair from laughter.

"Beg pardon, Molly. But, you know, Will nicked 'em orf Warty Harris in the first place so I wasn't really doing nothing wrong –"

"I don't know where you learned about right and wrong, Mundungus, but you seem to have missed a few crucial lessons."

I choked on the sip of the Butterbeer I was taking, burying my laughter in my hands. I glanced at Fred and George – their faces were buried in their goblets. As soon as Molly left the kitchen, we all roared in laughter. The atmosphere at dinner was light and fun – everyone was talking and laughing. It was really late when we all finished eating. I was talking with Lupin about the Ministry when Molly decided it was time for bed.

"Not just yet, Molly. You know, I'm surprised at you," said Sirius, looking at Harry. "I thought the first thing you'd do when you got here would be to start asking questions about Voldemort."

I felt a cold shiver run through my spine – all the conversations died out, everyone stared at Sirius in silence. It was like a Dementor had entered the room.

"I did!" replied Harry. "I asked Ron and Hermione but they said we're not allowed in the Order, so –"

"And they're quite right," said Molly. "You're too young."

"Since when did someone have to be in the Order of the Phoenix to ask questions? Harry's been trapped in that Muggle house for a month. He's got the right to know what's been happen –"

"Hang on!" suddenly cried out George beside me.

"How come Harry gets his questions answered?" said Fred.

"We've been trying to get stuff out of you for a month and you haven't told us a single stinking thing !"

"'You're too young, you're not in the Order'," said Fred, imitating his mother – I probably would have laughed in another context. "Harry's not even of age!"

"It's not my fault you haven't been told what the Order's doing," said Sirius. "That's your parents' decision. Harry, on the other hand –"

Molly interrupted Sirius, a uncharacteristic harsh look on her face.

"It's not down to you to decide what's good for Harry! You haven't forgotten what Dumbledore said, I suppose?"

"Which bit?"

"The bit about not telling Harry more than he needs to know."

The argument that followed between Sirius and Molly was almost dizzying to follow – they kept throwing arguments at each other, back and forth, without any pause. It was clear both of them were convinced they were right – and both of them weren't ready to let go. It was only when Lupin stepped in that Molly and Sirius sat back in their chairs.

"I think Harry ought to be allowed a say in this," said Lupin. "He's old enough to decide for himself."

"I want to know what's been going on," said Harry.

There was short silence.

"Very well. Ginny – Ron – Hermione – Fred – George – Addy – I want you out of this kichen, now."

The previous silence was instantly broken.

"We're of age!" exclaimed the twins.

"So am I!" I cried out.

"If Harry's allowed, why can't I?"

"Mum, I want to!"

"NO!" yelled Molly. "I absolutely forbid –"

"Molly, you can't stop Fred, George and Addy. They are of age," said Arthur calmly.

"They're still at school –"

"But they're legally adults now."

"I – oh, all right then, they can stay, but Ron –"

I glanced at the twins, grinning from ear to ear. We all clapped in each other's hands – there it was! We were in, finally!

We came out of the kitchen after what seemed like ages. My head was buzzing with the new information we had learned – none of this had ever felt so close, so real. As they spoke of armies, corruption, murders and weapons, I couldn't utter a single word – the lump in my throat prevented me from doing so. None of us spoke – only Harry kept asking questions. At some point, I grabbed George's hand, squeezing it, just to remind myself that he was right there, right next to me.

Molly followed us upstairs to make sure we all went straight to bed – but I knew I wouldn't be able to sleep, so after slipping on my pajamas, I bid Ginny and Hermione goodnight and quietly went up to Fred and George's room.

"We were just going to see Harry and Ron," George told me as I closed the door behind me.

I nodded feverishly, and took the hand he extended to me. A crack later, we Apparated downstairs, in the dark.

"OUCH!" yelled Ron.

"Keep you voice down, Ron, or Mum'll be back up here," sighed Fred.

"You three just Apparated on my knees!"

"Yeah, well, it's harder in the dark –"

"Sorry, Ron," I muttered, climbing down from the bed.

My eyes gradually got used to the darkness – I could see Ron looking quite annoyed. Unable to stop myself from smirking, I followed George to Harry's bed and sat down on it.

"So, got there yet?" asked George.

"The weapon Sirius mentioned?" said Harry.

"Let slip, more like," said Fred with a smile. "We didn't hear about that on the old Extendables, did we?"

"What d'you reckon it is?"

"Could be anything," shrugged Fred.

"But there can't be anything worse than the Avada Kedavra cruse, can there? What's worse than death?" asked Ron.

"Maybe it's something that can kill loads of people at once," said George.

"Maybe it's some particularly painful way of killing people…" muttered Ron.

"He's got the Cruciatus Curse for causing pain. He doesn't need anything more efficient than that," said Harry flatly.

I had heard the tremor in Ron's voice – I couldn't blame him. I felt as if the lump in my throat had fallen into my stomach like a rock, making me feel sick and heavy. We were all silent for a second. Ron was right – what could be worse than death ?

"So who d'you think's got it now?" asked George beside me.

His voice sounded strangely different – fainter than usual, maybe.

"I hope it's our side," said Ron.

"If it is, Dumbledore's probably keeping it," added Fred.

"Where? Hogwarts?"

"Bet it is! That's where he hid the Sorcerer's Stone!" said George.

"A weapon's going to be a lot bigger than the Stone, though!" replied Ron.

"Not necessarily."

"Yeah, size is no guarantee of power," nodded George. "Look at Addy, or Ginny."

"What d'you mean?" asked Harry.

"You've never seen Addy angry, have you?"

I shook my head, giving George a hard nudge in the ribs.

"Oi!"

"I'm right here, you bloody tosser."

"See what I mean?" said George, rubbing his side with a half-smile.

"Shh!" suddenly said Fred. "Listen!"

We all held our breath – someone was coming up the stairs.

"Mum," said George.

He grabbed my hand and suddenly, we were back in the twins' room.

"You reckon she's going to come up here?" asked Fred.

"Probably. You should wait a bit before going back, Adds."

I nodded, sitting down on George's bed. None of us spoke – I could guess that, like me, the twins were thinking about this weapon and what it could be. Not two minutes later, we heard Molly's steps in the stairs, and stop right in front of the door. But we were already in complete silence, and a few seconds later, we heard her go down the stairs, probably back to the kitchen.

"I should go," I sighed.

"And we should probably go to bed. Mum's going to wake us up early tomorrow and make us pay for arguing with her so much tonight," sighed Fred.

"At least we'll be able to attend the meetings now," shrugged George.

I stood up, rubbing my eyes.

"Goodnight, you two," I muttered as I walked to the door.

"Goodnight, Adds," I heard Fred say from his bed.

My hand was almost on the doorknob when I felt a hand on my arm – I turned around, my eyes landing on George's concerned face.

"Hey, are you all right?" he asked quietly. "You've been quiet all night."

"I'm fine," I shrugged. "Just tired."

"You sure ?"

"Yeah," I nodded. "I mean… all of this – it's kind of scary, don't you think?"

He nodded, his hand sliding down my arm to grab my hand.

"I mean – it just feels so real now. So much more real that it was. I'm just worried. Harry…"

"Nothing's going to happen to Harry. Dumbledore is –"

"It's not just Harry. It's everything, and everyone… Nobody's safe anymore. Nowhere's safe."

"Hey."

I looked up, setting my eyes deep into his.

"You're forgetting one thing."

"What?" I asked faintly.

"We're together. As long as we're together, we'll be fine."

I smiled softly, stroking his hand – and then, couldn't resist but pull him to me, sliding my hands around his waist, burying my head in the soft fabric of his shirt.

"You're right," I whispered. "I'm sorry."

"Stop bloody apologizing for everything. And try to get some rest, all right?" he said, stroking my hair. "You did almost die yesterday."

I chuckled, my hands on his back, and kissed him slowly. I wasn't even aware of the rest of the world anymore – not even of Fred on the other side of the room – it felt like we were suddenly alone in the universe. The rock in my stomach had turned into butterflies – George had that kind of effect on me, and I liked him even more for it.

I reluctantly pulled away from him, admiring his smile one last time before slipping out of the room into the dark and quiet hallway. Soon, I was back in my bed, rolling up the sheets around me, and fell into a dreamless sleep.