"Again, I am so sorry. I had no idea that you were on our side because the last time I heard about you, you were a mass murderer on the loose," she apologized as Mrs Weasley fixed up Sirius' nose. Amethyst's scream had brought Mrs Weasley, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny and the twins into the living room. All of which were looking rather peculiar wearing handkerchiefs around their nose and mouth.
"It really is just fine. I just want to know where you learnt how to punch that hard," Sirius laughed.
"My dad is a police officer; he's been teaching me self-defence ever since I was young." explained Amethyst.
"Well, tell him that everything he's teaching you is working. You actually broke my nose," replied Sirius.
"So what are the two of you doing here?" Hermione asked Neville and Amethyst, raising her handkerchief up so her voice would not be muffled.
"We're here to help clean this place up," stated Neville.
"Thank god for that. It's going to be all hands on deck for a week or two so we can make this place a lot more livable," Mrs Weasley said, turning around and embraced Neville and Amethyst to both of their surprises. They had only known the woman since the end of the school year when they sat next to her at the third task of the Triwizard Tournament and had spoken to her. "It's good to see the both of you. Come along, we were just about to clear out the Doxys from the drawing room,"
"I'm are heading out now, Molly. Can you handle these two?" Tonks said motioning towards Amethyst and Neville.
"Oh, it'll be fine. Goodbye, dear," Molly replied.
"Wait, where are yo-" started Amethyst.
"Order business; you don't need to know anything else," her cousin said and apparated away but then apparated back and knocked over a lamp. "Please do not let Molly know that I told everything about the Order of the Phoenix or she will kill me," she whispered to Amethyst and Neville and then disappeared again.
Mrs Weasley lead the Hogwarts student's through the house and into the olive green drawing room where several spray bottles sat on a table.
"Everyone, grab a bottle. It's Doxycide so it should get rid of them all," Mrs Weasley said and she handed Amethyst and Neville cloths to wrap around their faces. "As I was saying before, I've never seen an infestation this bad - what that house-elf's been doing for the last ten years -"
"Kreacher's really old, he probably couldn't manage -" Hermione started as she gave what looked like a disapproving look towards Mrs Weasley.
"You'd be surprised what Kreacher can manage when he wants to, Hermione," said Sirius coming into the room with a cleaned up nose. When he started coolly conversing with Molly Weasley, Amethyst turned to Hermione and asked,
"Who's Kreacher?"
"He's the house-elf that works here. Everyone is much too hard on him and he's very misunderstood," the bushy haired girl replied.
"Misunderstood, my arse, Hermione," scoffed Ron. "Tell me, how many people have joined spew?"
"For the last time, it's S.P.E.W not spew. We actually currently have five but we have six if you include Dobby. And two of those members are Neville and Amethyst so I'm obviously not the only one that realizes that there is an obvious injustice in the treatment of house-elves," Hermione huffed and then walked away from Ron.
"She scared you into doing it, didn't she?" Ron asked Neville and Amethyst and they both nodded.
"I thought she would've hexed me if didn't I didn't say yes," Neville replied.
"She is absolutely terrifying when she puts her mind to something," Amethyst chimed in.
A noisy and echoing doorbell rang, triggering something to start a series of jarring yells.
"I keep telling them not to ring the doorbell!" Sirius said, sounding rather irritated as he rushed away from the drawing room.
"What's that sound?" Amethyst asked.
"That would be a painting of the ugliest woman to ever live," answered Fred.
"It's painting of Sirius' mother. It starts screaming if it's bothered. I'm surprised you didn't set her off when you screamed," George elaborated.
"Close the door, please, Harry," said Mrs. Weasley to Harry who was standing closest to the door.
Mrs Weasley turned her attention away from the yells from the painting and the conversation from the front door and focused on Gilderoy Lockhart's Guide to household Pests that was on the couch. Amethyst smiled as she remembered how Gilderoy Lockhart had been such a terrible professor and had no idea how to teach a class.
"Right, you lot, you need to be careful, because Doxys bite and their teeth are venomous. I've got a bottle of antidote here, but I'd rather nobody needed it." said Mrs Weasley as she stood in front of the window, indicating, to a green bottle sitting on the table. Amethyst lifted up the cloth covering her nose and mouth,
"Wait, what happens if the Doxys bite you?" Amethyst worriedly inquired.
"Well, if you get the antidote on time you'll just get this painful burning feeling in your blood," answered Mrs Weasley.
"And if we don't get the antidote?" Amethyst asked.
"Then you'll still get the burning feeling but you'll most likely pass out for a while. But you don't need to worry about that, it's unlikely that you'll get bitten," Molly reassured the girl. "Now, I'm going to open the curtain and when I say so, I want all of you to start to squirting the Doxycide. It should immediately immobilize the Doxys and then you can just chuck them into the bucket,"
The group of students all stepped closer to the window.
"All right - squirt!" Mrs Weasley quickly opened the curtain and then moved back to stand in line with the others.
Them opening up the curtain and squirting Doxycide at them, had obviously angered the creatures for they all started flying towards them. They were quite ugly little things. They had small hairy bodies, beetle-like wings, bulging eyes and a frog like a mouth with two rows of sharp teeth. Amethyst began to paralyze a few of the Doxys but then gave a yelp of surprise when she felt one getting tangled up in her hair. Luckily for her, Ginny realized that the venomous creature was caught in the poor girl's hair and squirted the Doxycide onto the creature causing it to fall to the ground like a doll. An ugly doll but a doll nonetheless.
"Thanks, Ginny," Amethyst said in relief.
"No problem," replied Ginny. "You know, I'm really glad that you and Neville are here,"
"Really? Why's that?" asked Amethyst suspiciously.
"Last night, the others were allowed to find out about everything to do with this Order thing and I wasn't allowed to listen," Ginny said indignantly. "So now that you and Neville are here, I'm not the only that's being kept in the dark. I've got a fair idea from all the snippets I've heard but all three of us could try and figure out what's going on,"
"Um, sure. Of course, we should do that. I really want to know what's going on," Amethyst lied, plastering a fake smile on her face as she scrunched up her nose.
"You already know everything, don't you?" Ginny asked. "You're a terrible liar. Don't think I can't tell; you scrunch up your nose when you lie. I realized that last year when you told Ron that his dress robes didn't look too bad,"
"I don't scrunch up my nose when I lie," Amethyst said, scrunching up her nose.
"Tell me Amethyst, do you know?" hissed Ginny. Amethyst looked around to make sure that Mrs Weasley wasn't listening.
"Yes, yes, we do. Tonks and Remus explained it to us last night because we wouldn't shut up about it," whispered Amethyst.
"We? Us? Does that mean Neville knows?" Ginny interrogated and Amethyst nodding. "Bloody hell, basically everyone but me knows. Wait, can you tell me?"
"What? No! I promised not to tell anyone and that includes you. Why can't you get one of the others to tell you?"
"I tried to get Hermione to tell me last night and I tried to get Fred and George to tell me this morning but Mum is keeping a very good eye on us and they're all scared that she'll kill them if they tell me,"
"I can't tell you, Ginny," Amethyst said.
"I'm going to find out sooner or later, Amethyst," Ginny said and she walked off to possibly go and interrogate the others about the Order of the Phoenix.
The matter of getting rid of the Doxys took them until a bit past noon. During their time of exterminating the Doxys, Amethyst had warned Neville that Ginny may try and get answers out of him.
Mrs Weasley gestured to the silvery cabinets with snake-like patterns on them and said, "I think we'll tackle those after lunch." Amethyst took a closer look at the cabinet and saw that it was filled with the oddest of things. It was crammed with jewelry boxes, daggers and a range of silverware. Her observations were interrupted by the echoing doorbell. As soon as Mrs Weasley went answer it, everyone rushed to the window to see who it was.
"Mundungus!" said Hermione. "What's he brought all those cauldrons for?"
"Probably looking for a safe place to keep them," said Harry. "Isn't that what he was doing the night he was supposed to be tailing me? Picking up dodgy cauldrons?"
"Yeah, you're right!" said Fred, as the front door opened; Mundungus heaved his cauldron through it and disappeared from view. "Blimey, Mum won't like that..."
"Who's this Mundungus person?" question Amethyst.
"He's a crook," Neville answered. Everyone around him looked surprised at this knowledge so he elaborated. "Gran's reported him to the Ministry a few times,"
"Hm, makes sense. Mum's always yelling at him for trying to sell some shady stuff here," Ginny said. Right at this point, Mrs Weasley started yelling which startled them all.
"WE ARE NOT RUNNING A HIDEOUT FOR STOLEN GOODS!" Mrs Weasley's voice exploded from downstairs. Amethyst found it hard to believe that the warm and friendly woman was able to get so angry.
"- COMPLETELY IRRESPONSIBLE, AS IF WE HAVEN'T GOT ENOUGH TO WORRY ABOUT WITHOUT YOU DRAGGING STOLEN CAULDRONS INTO THE HOUSE -"
"She must be extremely mad," Neville whispered to Amethyst.
"You don't say," she replied.
"The idiots are letting her get into her stride," said George, shaking his head. "You've got to head her off early otherwise she builds up a head of steam and goes on for hours."
"You're obviously speaking from experience," Amethyst commented.
"Course, Fred and I have learnt that trick for the best," George replied.
As Sirius' mother began screaming again which drowned out Mrs Weasley's screams, George went to shut the door but was stopped by the entrance of a house-elf wearing something that looked like an old ragged pillowcase. Its skin was shriveled like a prune and its eyes were watery and bloodshot.
"... smells like a drain and a criminal to boot, but she's no better, nasty old blood traitor with her brats messing up my mistress's house, oh, my poor mistress, if she knew, if she knew the scum they've let into her house, what would she say to old Kreacher, oh, the shame of it, Mudbloods and werewolves and traitors and thieves, poor old Kreacher, what can he do..." the house-elf was talking to himself as if Amethyst and the others were not even present.
"Why is he talking to himself?" asked Neville.
"It's just this thing that he does. He's always lurking around the house talking to himself," Ginny replied.
Fred shut the door and said quite loudly "Hello, Kreacher,"
The house-elf gave an exaggerated and fake sound of surprise and turned towards them with a face of disgust.
"Kreacher did not see young master," Kreacher lied and bowed to Fred. "Nasty little brat of a blood traitor it is." Kreacher said to the ground.
"Sorry?" said George. "Didn't catch that last bit."
Kreacher bowed towards George. "Kreacher said nothing, young master." and then again he muttered to himself. "And there's its twin, unnatural little beasts they are."
"He does know that we can hear him, right?" inquired Amethyst.
"Nobody's sure. The poor thing's been living all alone for so long,"
"... and there's the Mudblood, standing there bold as brass, oh, if my mistress knew, oh, how she'd cry, and there are new people, Kreacher doesn't know their names. What are they doing here?Kreacher doesn't know. How Kreacher's mistress would cry if she saw how these people of filth have infiltrated her grand place,"
"Kreacher, meet Neville Longbottom, Amethyst Goldstring and Harry Potter," Hermione said kindly.
Kreacher seemed furious at the way Hermione was talking to him.
"The Mudblood is talking to Kreacher as though she is my friend, if Kreacher's mistress saw him in such company, oh, what would she say -" Kreacher kept muttering to himself about how his mistress would not be pleased.
"Don't call her a Mudblood!" Ginny and Ron yelled at Kreacher.
"Aren't you a rude little thing? She was just trying to be nice to you; which is more than you deserve. It seems to me that you do not like any of us and you're obsessed with your mistress but there is absolutely no need for any use of that word," Amethyst stated, obviously quite mad at the use of such derogatory term. A term that had haunted her ever since Pansy Parkinson had used it against her so long ago.
"Must be another Mudblood," Kreacher said to Amethyst but still looking down. "Quick to be offended by such word. Kreacher can smell the dirt on her,"
Amethyst was about to retaliate but Neville pulled her back and shook his head. Amethyst continued to glare at the house-elf.
"It really doesn't matter," Hermione whispered. "He not in his right mind, he's been locked up for so long, he doesn't know what he's say-"
"Doesn't know what he's saying, my arse. He knows what he's saying, Hermione," Fred interrupted. At this point, basically all of them were glaring at house-elf for using such insulting words but Kreacher did not care for he had already turned his attention to Harry Potter.
"Is it true? Is it Harry Potter? Kreacher can see his scar, it must be true, that's the boy who stopped the Dark Lord. Kreacher's mistress always did think that what the Dark Lord was right. Kreacher wonders how he did it -"
Amethyst had to agree with Kreacher on this one. She was still unsure of how Harry had survived that night.
George asked Kreacher what he was doing in the drawing room.
"Kreacher is simply doing what he is supposed to. He is cleaning is mistress' place," At Kreacher's statement someone from behind them scoffed,
"A likely story,"
Kreacher threw himself at Sirius' feet much to the disgust of the man.
"Oh, stand up straight. What are you really up to Kreacher?" the man irritably.
"As Kreacher already said, he is simply cleaning his place. Kreacher lives to serve and be devoted to the Noble House of Black-"
"Black is right and it's getting blacker every day. The place is filthy," Sirius said. Sirius continued to insult Kreacher until he sent the muttering elf away.
Sirius lead the group of Hogwarts students over to a tapestry. It was old and yellowing but the golden thread glinted in the light that showed the interconnected family tree. All of them examined the tapestry and Harry realized that Sirius was absent from the family tree but Amethyst was not paying attention to Sirius' explanation. She had realized that there was a burnt face on the tapestry. The entire face had been charred but part of the name was still visible.
-dromeda
Was that Aunt Andromeda? Amethyst traced the thread with her finger and saw that it was connected to Bellatrix Lestrange and Narcissa Malfoy.
Bellatrix Lestrange
Amethyst knew that name. Neville had mentioned it to her back in the third year. On the day that Neville had finally explained what had really happened to his parents. If the burnt face was Andromeda, then why hadn't she ever mentioned her sisters?
"Uh, Sirius? Is this Andromeda?" Amethyst asked, pointing to the charred circle.
"Yes, it is," replied Sirius.
"Oh okay, I didn't know the both of you were related," said Amethyst.
"She was my favourite cousin but then again the others were Deatheaters," Sirius said.
"Were - were your parents Death Eaters as well?" Harry asked. Amethyst turned her attention back to the tapestry. Neville walked over to her and stood by her.
"What are you looking at?" he whispered.
"That," she replied pointing to the line connecting Andromeda and her two sisters. The two stared in silence at it and Amethyst leant her head against Neville's shoulder.
"Lunch," called Mrs Weasley's voice and they all hurried off to get something to eat.
Amethyst plastered a smile on her face but the thought of Bellatrix lingered in her mind.