CHAPTER THIRTEEN

THE FIRST DAY BACK

Rose went back to Hogwarts before her father and Uncle Harry came back from their job, despite what he had promised her. She had gotten a letter the day before they were supposed to leave saying that it was taking longer than they'd thought and to have fun at school. She also received a letter from Mrs. Malfoy asking about Scorpius's Christmas, which made Rose feel very uncomfortable to be caught in the middle of. She had declined to mention the wedding at all in her reply for fear of revealing anything about how she felt. She couldn't believe that it hadn't gone away in a few days like she'd thought it would. Rose had told herself that it was just the dancing and it didn't really mean anything, but when she caught herself staring at him reading in an armchair in the living room and thinking about the color of his eyes she had to admit there was something to this. She made every effort not to let him know, however, and thought she was doing rather well until breakfast the morning before their first day of classes.

"What are you looking at, Weasley?" Scorpius asked her from across the table, and she was so startled that she barely managed to think of an excuse.

"…You have a bit of jam on your chin," she sputtered, and he wiped his mouth and shrugged to her relief. She shook her head and kept her gaze firmly away from him for the rest of the meal. After breakfast, however, while they were walking to Defense, Scorpius came up to her and looked around nervously.

"Hey, Weasley, you still have that stone, right?" he whispered.

"Well, yes, I still don't know what it is, though," she said.

"Well, er, I think we should tell Al about it," he said.

"Er, okay, if you want to. You have to make sure he doesn't tell James though. We don't need everyone getting involved in this, and you know that always happens once James finds out," she reminded him.

"Yeah, I just think he should know. He'll feel left out if he finds out later."

"I know."

"All right, then, do you want to tell him or should I?"

"Could you just tell him tonight? I don't want to cause a scene."

"Right. Sure."

The rest of the day passed rather slowly until she made the usual 'bathroom' excuse and turned the Time-Turner back, running just in time to make it to Ancient Runes. After class, she approached Madam Babbling, thinking that if anyone could tell her what the symbol was, it was her, and the old woman smiled at her politely. "What can I do for you, Rose?"

"Er, I was just wondering, madam, if you had ever seen this before," she asked, and produced the spare parchment from the woods before. Babbling looked at it closely and shook her head slightly.

"Well, no, I haven't seen this particular symbol… it may be a sigil of some kind, a combination of symbols…"

"Do you know anything about what kind of symbol it is?" Rose asked.

"It looks rather… Anglo-Saxon. It's most likely made of Futhorc Runes, so the ones we're studying currently, though I couldn't tell you which ones. It seems like a symbol that came from somewhere in England or perhaps Scotland though. Rather medieval, though that's just because it's a runic symbol. Does that answer your question at all?"

"Er, I suppose. Thank you," she said, and the woman smiled apologetically.

"I'm sorry I couldn't be of any more help, Rose," she said. "Where did you find this symbol, may I ask?"

Rose thought for a second. "I was reading a text from the library, I forget which one, but er, it was in some of the footnotes and I was just wondering what it meant."

"Well, it could be the author's signature of some sort. I'm sure it's nothing too important, or they wouldn't have been so cryptic," Babbling said, smiling.

"Right," she replied, trying to sound content. "Have a good day, Professor."

"You too, Rose." Rose ducked out of the classroom and shoved the parchment back into her bag, disappointed at yet another waste of time. She walked to the Great Hall in a rather foul mood.

After dinner, she was talked into going to a chess club meeting by Aidan and ended up only getting to the common room at around 9:00, where she found Scorpius and Al deep in conversation in the corner. She avoided it entirely, suspecting what they were talking about, and sat down at a table on the opposite side of the room with Emma, Tyler, and Roxanne.

"Where's Min?" she asked. "I thought she'd be with you."

"She's probably fighting with Harry," Roxanne said, rolling her eyes.

"Or they're in some broom closet somewhere," Emma said.

"It's always one or the other," Tyler remarked.

"True," Emma said, laughing.

"I just can't believe they're still together," Rose said. "I didn't think it would last."

"Well… define 'together'," Roxanne snorted.

"Right," Rose said. "Have, uh… have Scorpius and Al… do you know what they're talking about?"

"No idea," Tyler said, shrugging. "Could you help me with my History of Magic essay?"

Rose glanced over at Scorpius and Al, figuring she would become very involved soon enough. "All right."

Tyler's essay took quite a bit of attempting to teach the subject matter before she finally just gave up and wrote it herself while he sat back, a little too pleased with himself. By the time they had finally finished, it was around 10:00, and Rose sat in a corner and read intently until people started to go up to bed. She was about to go up herself, being the last one left in the common room, when Scorpius and Al came quickly down the boys' stairs. Rose put her book down and sat up nervously. "Hi," she said. "What were you guys talking about earlier?"

Scorpius looked at her pointedly while Al stared at her. "You have a stone… that brings people back from the dead… and you didn't tell me?"

"We wanted to wait until the right moment," Rose said. "And we had to be totally sure you wouldn't tell James."

"Why can't I tell James?" he asked indignantly.

"If James knows, so does everyone," Scorpius muttered.

"All right, well, I don't tell him everything!"

"Yes you do," Rose said quietly.

Al looked as if he was going to argue further, but then decided against it. "Well, anyway, I know now, so I want to see it."

Rose looked up at the staircases nervously. "You're sure no one else is awake up there?"

"Well… we didn't see anyone," Scorpius said.

"All right, fine," Rose sighed. She dug around in her bag until she found the stone sitting at the bottom and handed it to Al. He tentatively reached out his hands and took it.

"That's the symbol from the cave," he said.

"We know. We've been trying to work out what it means," Rose explained.

"How does it—how does it work?" Al asked.

Rose and Scorpius glanced at each other. "Er, I was just looking at it… I turned it around a lot, maybe that's it?" he offered, and Al frowned. He flipped the stone around in his hand a few times and almost immediately a man appeared in the room, with the same strange ghostlike presence as Scorpius's grandfather had. Rose stared intently at the man, who looked around intently at the room.

"It hasn't changed much at all," he remarked. He looked down at them and smiled widely, and Rose blinked. She hadn't noticed until then, but he looked remarkably like Uncle Harry. Al was staring in shock at him, and it clicked in her mind then.

"You're James Potter, aren't you?" she asked, hearing the awe in her voice as she said it. He looked like he was going to respond to her, but before he could do so, he flickered suddenly away. Rose looked over at Al, who had dropped the stone. "What—pick it back up!"

"I—I can't, I…" Al stammered. "I just need a minute." With that, Al ran up the stairs and was gone. Rose groaned and picked the stone up off of the ground.

"We could get him to come back. I mean, he's your family too…" Scorpius suggested.

Rose shook her head. "We shouldn't really do that without Al."

"You're probably right." Scorpius sighed and sat down on the couch with her. "Well, that was a little disappointing, honestly."

"He's just nervous," she told Scorpius, and he nodded.

"Well, yeah. It's his granddad that he's never met, and a war hero as well. No wonder he's nervous."

"Think we should tell James now?" Rose asked. "I mean, if his namesake's—"

At that moment, the portrait hole swung open and Rose hurried to shove the stone back in her bag. Professor Rudomin came through the door looking very grim. When he saw Rose, he walked slowly over to her and Rose was suddenly filled with a kind of inexplicable dread. She glanced nervously at Scorpius and said, "Hi, Professor…"

"Miss Weasley, is your brother awake?" he asked quietly.

"Uh, no, I don't think so, why?"

"Mr. Malfoy, could you please get Hugo for us?" Rudomin asked Scorpius, and he got up hesitantly and hurried up the stairs to the boys' rooms.

"Is something wrong?" she asked. Rudomin sighed.

"I'm afraid so. I'd rather wait to let you know until your brother is here."

Two silent, tense minutes later, Scorpius came back down the stairs dragging a very groggy Hugo behind him. "What's going on?" Hugo mumbled.

"I'm sorry to tell you that your father has been injured while on an Auror mission in Cardiff. He's been brought to St. Mungo's Hospital and Professor McGonagall and I felt you would like to be there with your mother."

"What? What happened?" Rose asked, feeling panic creeping into her thoughts. She had always known this could happen, but it never had until now, and she was much more affected by it than she had thought she would be. Hugo looked as if he was trying as hard as he possibly could not to cry and she pulled him over to her side. He grabbed her hand so tightly she thought it might break something, but she let him.

"I don't know much, I just know to bring you to Professor McGonagall's office, where you'll be able to take a temporary Portkey to and from the hospital."

"Um… okay, then, let's just go," Rose sighed, and Rudomin started to walk towards the door. Scorpius stopped her when she started to walk.

"Hey, are you going to be okay?" he asked.

"I'm fine, Scorpius," she said shortly. She didn't have time for this at all, especially the way she felt when she really looked at him, and if she really had to think about it, she might start crying and then Hugo would start crying and she just couldn't handle that.

"You don't look fine," he said.

"I'll be back tomorrow," she said, and practically pushed past him, trailing Hugo behind her.

"I'll wait up for you," he called after her, and she slammed the door behind them.