Anchovy and Egg Scones

I jerked forward in my seat, staring at the bloke with messy black hair that had just entered Cain's office. Al leaned against the wall casually, all traces of annoyance vanished from his face. Had I imagined his disgruntled tone? He raised an eyebrow, and I realized with a flush that I was staring at him with my mouth dropped open. I coughed, shut my mouth quickly, and turned to Cain, who had by now sat back in his leather armchair and was doing that evil overlord thing he does by steepling his fingers thoughtfully (I think he gets the habit from all those Muggle mob boss movies I catch him watching during his lunch break).

"Cain, this is Al. The Ministry's decided I need a babysitter," I said, rolling my eyes. I could feel Al's scowl boring into my back, but I refused to turn around. "Al, Cain. Cain, Al," I continued. This was a bit surreal. I'd never thought these two would ever meet…they were both such prats. I kind of wanted to see them go at it. Maybe they'd start bellowing – Cain about "young 'uns" and Al about ambition or something like that – and hitting each other.

Cain glanced at Al before sighing, rubbing at his temples.

"God, I swear they get younger every day. Next thing you know the Ministry will be sending babies that aren't even toilet trained yet out into the field," he said.

"Oi! He's older than me! What are you trying to say?" I protested. He gave me a pointed look.

"You're a Ravenclaw. Figure it out," he returned.

I narrowed my eyes, my fingers twitching as I contemplated bringing out good ol' OBTS.

"Aren't you supposed to be preventing her from committing violence?" Cain asked, looking at Al. I felt Al approach, and he shrugged, glancing down at me for a second before meeting Cain's eyes levelly.

"No, only protecting her from it," he answered coolly. I frowned; something about the way he stood, his fingers adjusting and readjusting their grip on his wand…

The door banged open, revealing one disheveled looking Dominique Weasley.

"Oi! You guys aren't having a row without me, are you?" she demanded. There was a dark coffee stain at the bottom of her white blouse. I exchanged a brief look with Cain before shouting hurriedly, "Your turn!" Then I leaped to my feet, grabbed Al's sleeve, and pulled his surprised form off to the fireplace towards the east end of the room.

"We're going to 11 Wickham Drive to see Anna Zabini," I said under my breath, taking a handful of floo powder from the porcelain platter on the mantle and pressing it into Al's hand. He glanced over my shoulder, paled slightly, and nodded, stepping into the fireplace.

"Adel-" came Cain's voice warningly from behind me. I stiffened but didn't turn around. From the looks of it, Dominique had gotten into the coffee again. Caffeine didn't settle right with her – it turned her into a hyperactive, violent, jittering mess of a person. Unfortunately for us, Dominique loved coffee. The last time it had happened Cain had dropped her off unceremoniously in my office and escaped quickly. This was just payback…and looking out for my own sanity (I had needed several cartons of ice cream to recover from the last time). Cowardly? Yes. But I'd never claimed to be a Gryffindor.

Ducking my head to get into the fireplace, I called out, "Don't worry, Cain! I'll find old Ben!"

Just as the emerald flames roared to life around my body, I heard a muffled shriek from the office. I winced; Cain was going to kill me when I got back. Hopefully I'd have found old Ben by then…maybe that would distract him from killing an innocent girl.

Maybe.

When I arrived, Al was sitting rigidly on the paisley couch situated in the center of the sunny living room with a mildly terrified expression on his face. He kept rolling his wand between his hands nervously, darting quick glances at the front door. Anna, who was seated on an armchair a few paces to his right, kept attempting to offer him some pastry covered in powdered sugar. I'd spoken with Anna before to let her know that I was going to visit today, but she obviously hadn't been expecting a Potter spawn to tumble through her fireplace.

A half-strangled laugh burst from my throat, betraying my presence to the duo. Darn. Well, it was nice while it lasted. I reluctantly climbed out of the (uncomfortable) fire grate, dusting stray ashes from my trousers and ignoring Al's accusatory glare.

"Hi, Mrs. Zabini!" I said cheerfully. Anna made a move to get up but gave up after two seconds, gesturing helplessly at her swollen stomach with a short laugh.

"Hello, Adela! Please, call me Anna," she said. I moved to sit down on the couch but, seeing Al's glower, thought better of it and plopped myself down on the armchair opposite Anna's.

"So, I'm sure you know why we're h-" I began.

"Scone?" Anna interjected brightly, holding up the exquisitely decorated platter of golden pastries. I shrugged.

"Sure, thanks. They look delicious," I said, taking one carefully from the top of the pyramid. I caught a glimpse of Al's horrified expression out of the corner of my eye and paused just as I was about to take a bite. The pastry hovered awkwardly in front of my mouth, my fingers getting sticky as my body heat warmed the powdered sugar.

"No," he mouthed. I lowered my hand slowly, looking down at the scone warily.

"You…you don't like it?" Anna asked, her voice trembling a bit. To my horror, her dark eyes seemed to be turning a bit red around the edges and were wet with unshed moisture. Oh no. I couldn't have her crying! I needed to convince her to appear at the trial, not banish me from her sights as the girl who made her pregnant self cry!

I shot a pleading look at Al, but the git merely shrugged and settled back against the cushions, watching our exchange with a slight smirk snaking across his lips. Prat.

"No- no! I just wanted to take a moment to – to enjoy the beautiful decorating!" I hurriedly said. I lifted the pastry and practically crammed it into my mouth, smearing powdered sugar all over my cheeks, nose, and chin. I took a deep bite, chewed a bit, then said through a mouth full of food, "Dewicious!"

She brightened immediately, absent-mindedly brushing away the stray tear that had fallen.

"Oh, I'm so glad you think so! I was trying out this new recipe for anchovy and egg flavoured scones, but you are the only person who seems to like them! I made a whole bunch, too. Oh! You should take the extras!" she said, then began shifting around in her seat to look for something.

"Now, I was certain I had a bag around here somewhere…"

Anchovy and egg? I didn't taste any…my teeth crunched down on something crispy. Immediately my mouth was filled with the oddest combination of sugar, fish, and egg.

My eyes bulged as I struggled to push down the overwhelming urge to gag. Not in front of potential witness…not in front of potential witness…

"I think I see a bag on the countertop over there," Al said. My eyes were watering now. She'd added at least a pound of paprika in this scone. Merlin, this was worse than the time Seth and I had added cheesecake to water and mashed it up with frozen bacon to form a slushie.

"Oh!" Anna said again. I was vaguely aware of her struggling to get up again.

"No, no, you must rest! I insist," Al said gently. Another (semi) hysterical laugh bubbled up in my throat; Merlin, this day kept getting odder and odder. Now Al was pretending to be all chivalric. Was I hallucinating? Was this a dream? Sir Archibald was bound to wake me up at any moment now.

"Oh, what a sweet boy," Anna simpered. I was practically drowning in the self-satisfied vibes Al was emanating.

"Oh, it's no problem at all. Adela can go get it – she's a spry twenty-one year old," Al continued.

"Mhuh?" I garbled through a mouthful of eggy slime. My tongue was numb by now, which was good. My stomach was also thoroughly in the "full out revolt" stage by now, which was not good.

"Yes, Adela, why don't you go into the kitchen and get the bag," Al said to me, his eyes boring into mine pointedly. Huh? His eyes flicked upwards as he clearly suppressed an exasperated sigh. Well, if he thought Numberita – or anyone's brain, really – could function at times of such duress he was sadly mistaken.

"Let's not make the nice lady wait, Adela," he said through gritted teeth. Oh! Numberita finally made the connection. He was giving me an opportunity to escape. I quickly got up, my eyes bleary, and promptly walked right into the coffee table, overturning a few scones onto my legs and spreading powdered sugar everywhere.

"Ermph!" I apologized before stumbling into the kitchen hurriedly.

As soon as I'd found the rubbish bin, I was doubled over it and hacking as quietly as I could.

After I'd gargled six times with water from the tap, I sank to the floor with a shuddering sigh. I vanished the food and, with a still rumbling stomach, grabbed the pink bag from the linoleum countertop and brought it to the living room.

Anna began stuffing (all of) the scones into the bag, and with each concoction that went in I winced.

"So…Anna…you visited the Vinces, right?" I said, desperately trying to distract her from her task. To my disappointment, she answered without a single break in her movements.

"Yeah, why?" she asked, humming a cheerful tune.

My mouth worked for six seconds as I struggled to come up with a way to say, "Yo, Anna. I need you to ignore your health and your baby's to come endure hours of trial and pointed interrogation from the defense to talk about some family you don't even remember is that cool with you" in a semi-sophisticated way. Oh, sod off. I was never good with diplomacy.

"Did you…happen to see anything there?"

"Well, I noticed ol' Vince's getting on in the years," she said.

"Did you see anything out of the ordinary with the house elves?"

She hesitated, putting the now-bulging bag down on the table.

"I…why," her voice had dropped to a barely audible whisper.

"Well, there's this house elf. Daisy. I'm arguing a case for her emancipation on grounds of excessive abuse, and she mentioned that you might have seen her in an incident involving lemon cookies…?"

Tears began to overflow in her dark eyes, running smeared tracks down her olive cheeks. I froze. I was not good with crying people. I glanced over at Al; he was determinedly avoiding my eyes and looking outside of the window carefully. Well, right help he was. Why wasn't Rose assigned to guard me? She'd know what to do.

"Those…those lemon cookies were just so good," she finally gasped out.

I hesitantly got up and patted her shoulder a bit.

Finally she straightened, exhaling with one shuddering breath. Extracting a handkerchief from the pocket of her flowered dress, she straightened, meeting my eyes with a fiery determination.

"Gregory Vince abused that elf, even more so than is average. He kicked her down the stairs and upended a vase of flowers over her head. Then he shut her in a closet with his dogs – nasty wolf hybrids he got from Romania. I was young then and still trying desperately to salvage my relationship with Pureblood society. How naïve and stupid I was…" her voice trailed off and she let out a short, bitter sound.

Despite my horror at the description of the abuse, I felt some hope spark in my chest; she obviously felt strongly about it – maybe she would testify!

Seeing my hopeful expression, she let out another harsh sound and shook her head.

"I wish I could, Adela. I really do. But I wa…you see…" She straightened her shoulders again and lifted her chin defiantly, stray dark tendrils escaping from her bun to brush the pastel fabric behind her.

"I am a recovering alcoholic. I was drunk at the time of the incident. I may not know much about law, but if I know Vince, he'll have hired some bloodthirsty lawyers who will certainly know my background and-"

"Tear it apart," I finished wearily.

Her eyes softened, and a guilty expression came across her face.

Leaning forward to take my hands between hers, she said softly, "I really am sorry, Adela. I wish-I wish I could help."

I smiled slightly.

"It's all right. You take care of your baby," I said. Then a thought occurred to Numberita.

"But…on your trips there, did you happen to notice an old Muggle groundskeeper? His name is old Ben and I'm trying to find him."

She frowned, her dark brows furrowing in thought.

"Ben…Ben…the name doesn't really ring a bell, but I do recall a man puttering about the lawn as we left. He was old, maybe early eighties, with white hair and a stooped back. He always wore a pretty violet pinned to his coat. That's all I can remember, unfortunately."

White hair, eighties. My heart sunk; that pretty much narrowed down the pool to…well, it didn't. Well, the day was still young. I would try St. Mungo's next, and if that didn't work…no. I refused to let Numberita even consider the possibility of failure. Daisy was counting on me.

I smiled gratefully, hiding my disappointment, and thanked her profusely for her hospitality and help.

I stood, kicked Al's leg (gently, mind you) and jerked my head towards the direction of the fireplace. He stood silently, flashing a charming smile in Anna's direction. Of course, this lead to a new round of cooing.

I shot Al a glare. He smirked.

Prat.

Just as I was about to climb in the fireplace, Anna called out, "Wait! Don't forget the scones!" I winced before saying brightly, "Oh, of course! Thank you for reminding me!" I accepted the proffered bag gingerly and made sure to stomp on Al's foot on my way back into the fireplace.

Throwing down another handful of Floo powder, I shouted, "St. Mungo's!"

And with that, the whirling green flames swallowed me once again.

Author Note: Once again, I know nothing about law. Merlin knows what I was thinking when I made Adela became a lawyer. Anyway, thanks for reading! :) As always, I love reading reviews and would really appreciate any feedback :D I've written a few chapters in advance, so I'll be trying to keep up the old weekly update system for as long as I can (but I do have exams coming up and that will cut into my writing time :( ) Which brings me to the next point -

Please let me know your opinion on the following:

1)Update date - Friday or Saturday?

2) Review replies - through PM or through chapter?

I've also decided to respond to guest reviews here because I get some really amazing ones, and I always feel bad that I can't PM you guys and let you know how much I appreciate your taking the time to review. Should I do the same with all the reviews or continue my system of sending PMs?

Guest review responses:

Guest - haha I assume that review was an accident, but thanks for reading! ;P

Boo - aww, thank you so much! I fangirl whenever I see that people are reading it haha xD

Ann Oying - First off, can I just say that I really appreciate your pun? It took me a second to get it haha x] Second - DSJAGKALDGLDAKGLA thank you for reviewing! :) I also want a bacon alarm clock ;P