A/N I've decided I should really update more, considering I'm on chapter twenty-four, and have only published eight of them. So, here you go, hope you enjoy and don't forget to review! :) xxx
[Disclaimer (which I've forgotten): all rights to J. - anyone non canon is mine.]

Chapter Eight

Cleared of all Charges

The entire time they walked upstairs, Mrs Weasley followed behind them, making them unable to talk about what they'd just learnt.

"I want you all to go straight to bed, no talking," she said as they reached the first landing. "We've got a busy day tomorrow. I expect Ginny's asleep," she added to Hermione, "so try not to wake her up."

"Asleep, yeah, right," said Fred in an undertone, after Hermione bade them good night and they were climbing to the next floor. "If Ginny's not lying awake waiting for Hermione to tell her everything they said downstairs, then I'm a flobberworm. . . ."

"All right, Ron, Harry, Amara," said Mrs Weasley on the second landing, pointing them into their bedroom. "Off to bed with you - Tally is probably asleep too, Amara."

Fred rolled his eyes.

" 'Night," Amara, Harry and Ron said to the twins.

"Sleep tight," said Fred, winking.

Amara felt Mrs Weasley's gaze as she walked down the hallway to her and Tally's room. She closed the door quietly and waited for the footsteps on the stairs to fade and be replaced by creaks above.

Tally was not asleep. She was sat crossed legged on the bed in an oversized sweatshirt and shorts, brushing her silvery hair.

She watched Amara intently as she flitted around the room, putting her shorts and top on. She did not speak until she was mimicking her on her own bed.

"Well?"

Amara explained everything to her in a hurried whisper, scared that Mrs Weasley would come up to check up on them. Once she'd finished she turned off the light and climbed into bed, facing Tally in the darkness.

"What do you zink ze weapon iz?" Tally asked. There were whispers from the next room, and Amara guessed Fred and George had joined Ron and Harry.

"No idea," said Amara. "D'you think Dumbledore has it?"

"Probably," said Tally. "From what I 'eard of 'im, I'm guessing he does."

Their conversation was cut short when Mrs Weasley climbed up the stairs to check they weren't talking.

Soon enough, Amara heard Tally's slow breathing, and she joined her in the lull of sleep.

-OOOOO-

She was awoken by Fred and George the next morning. They both jumped on her bed and threw pillows at her.

"Mum says get up," Fred said, jumping and Amara groaned. "Breakfast is ready and there's loads of stuff in the drawing room. Tally's already up."

Amara groaned and tried to roll over.

"Go away," she said, her voice muffled.

"Nope," said George. They threw another pillow.

"Geroff!" Amara said and sat up. "What if I hadn't got any clothes on, huh?"

"Better for us," said Fred without missing a beat. It was lucky Amara had trained herself not to blush anymore, so she got a pillow and chucked it at him. Fred, caught off guard, toppled off the bed.

Amara and George laughed all the way to breakfast.

There was a reason they hadn't tackled the drawing room yet: it was so disgusting, Amara wished she had never stepped foot in it. There were olive green walls with horrible tapestries, dusty carpets and horrible moss-green curtains.

Mrs Weasley had given them cloths to tie around their mouths and given bottles of spray. Amara, Fred and George had been told off for spraying each other and taking the mick of their peculiar appearances.

They didn't start until Harry and Ron walked in, both looking rather tired.

"Cover your faces and take a spray," Mrs Weasley said to Harry and Ron the moment she saw them, pointing to two more bottles of the black liquid that Fred, George and Amara had squirted at each other. "It's Doxycide. I've never seen an infestation this bad — what that house-elf's been doing for the last ten years —"

Hermione's face, if Amara could see it properly, would definitely be reproachful at these words.

"Kreacher's really old, he probably couldn't manage —"

"You'd be surprised what Kreacher can manage when he wants to, Hermione," said Sirius, who had just entered the room carrying a bloodstained bag of what appeared to be dead rats. "I've just been feeding Buckbeak," he added, in reply to Harry's inquiring look. "I keep him upstairs in my mother's bedroom. Anyway . . . this writing desk . . ."

He dropped the bag of rats onto an armchair, then bent over to examine the locked cabinet that was shaking.

"Well, Molly, I'm pretty sure this is a boggart," said Sirius, peering through the keyhole, "but perhaps we ought to let Mad-Eye have a shifty at it before we let it out — knowing my mother it could be something much worse."

"Right you are, Sirius," said Mrs Weasley.

Their tones were oozing with forced politeness, which proved that neither adult had forgotten their argument the night before.

The doorbell sounded and Mrs Black started up again.

"I keep telling them not to ring the doorbell!" said Sirius exasperatedly, hurrying back out of the room. They heard him thundering down the stairs as Mrs Black's screeches echoed up through the house once more: "Stains of dishonour, filthy half-breeds, blood traitors, children of filth . . ."

"Close the door, please, Harry," said Mrs Weasley.

Harry took a long time shutting the door, and they all strained to listen about what was going on. But Mrs Weasley was staring at Harry's head and he obviously felt it, as he closed it then after.

Mrs Weasley bent over to check the page on doxies in Gilderoy Lockhart's Guide to Household Pests, which made Amara remember her old Professor that she had forgotten about.

"Right, you lot, you need to be careful, because doxies bite and their teeth are poisonous. I've got a bottle of antidote here, but I'd rather nobody needed it."

She straightened up, positioned herself squarely in front of the curtains, and beckoned them all forward.

"When I say the word, start spraying immediately," she said. "They'll come flying out at us, I expect, but it says on the sprays one good squirt will paralyze them. When they're immobilized, just throw them in this bucket."

She stepped carefully out of their line of fire and raised her own spray. "All right — squirt!"

It was quite entertaining squirting the doxies. Amara and Ron had one of their daily competitions (it was becoming some sort of daily ritual) of who-could-spray-the-most-doxies and they soon got into it.

"Fred, what are you doing?" said Mrs Weasley sharply. "Spray that at once and throw it away!"

Amara looked: Fred was holding a struggling doxy between his forefinger and thumb.

"Right-o," Fred said brightly, spraying the doxy quickly in the face so that it fainted.

Amara turned away and resumed her spraying of the doxies that flew out at her. She managed to squirt three doxies at once and throw them in her bucket, whilst Ron trumped her with four.

The de-doxying of the curtains took most of the morning. It was past midday when Mrs Weasley finally removed her protective scarf, sank into a sagging armchair, and sprang up again with a cry of disgust, having sat on the bag of dead rats.

The curtains, which now lay limp and damp, no longer buzzed, but looked even worse than they had before. The doxies lay in the buckets underneath with their black eggs. Crookshanks was sniffing them eagerly, and Fred and George seemed eager to check them out.

"I think we'll tackle those after lunch." Mrs Weasley was pointing to the glass fronted cabinets either side of the mantelpiece. Amara was not looking forwards to sorting all sorts of junk out: daggers, claws, snakeskin, weird silver boxes and a glass bottle full of blood.

The horribly loud doorbell rang for a second time, and everyone looked at Mrs Weasley.

"Stay here," she said firmly, snatching up the bag of rats as Mrs Blacks screeches started up again from down below. "I'll bring up some sandwiches."

She left the room, closing the door carefully behind her. At once, everyone dashed over to the window to look down onto the doorstep. They could see the top of an unkempt gingery head and a stack of precariously balanced cauldrons.

"Mundungus!" said Hermione. "What's he brought all those cauldrons for?"

"Stole them probably," Amara said.

"Looking for a safe place to keep them, I'm guessing," 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 cauldrons through it and disappeared from view. "Blimey, Mum won't like that. . . ."

He, Amara and George immediately crossed to the door and stood beside it, listening intently. Being the smallest, Amara had to go lower down, with Fred at the top and George in between. Mrs Black's screaming had stopped again.

Amara faintly heard Mundungus, Sirius and Kingsley's voices below them.

"Mundungus is talking to Sirius and Kingsley," Fred muttered, frowning with concentration. "Can't hear properly . . . d'you reckon we can risk the Extendable Ears?"

"Might be worth it," said George. "I could sneak upstairs and get a pair —"

He did not need to in the end, for at that second there seemed to be an explosion from down below as Mrs Weasley found the stolen cauldrons. Her loud shouts carried all the way up the stairs, and probably could be heard in the attic.

"WE ARE NOT RUNNING A HIDEOUT FOR STOLEN GOODS!"

"I love hearing Mum shouting at someone else," said Fred, with a satisfied smile on his face as he opened the door an inch or so to allow Mrs Weasley's voice to enter the room better than it already was. "It makes such a nice change."

"— COMPLETELY IRRESPONSIBLE, AS IF WE HAVEN'T GOT ENOUGH TO WORRY ABOUT WITHOUT YOU DRAG- GING STOLEN CAULDRONS INTO THE HOUSE —"

"The idiots are letting her get into her stride," said George, shaking his head in despair. "You've got to head her off early, otherwise she builds up a head of steam and goes on for hours. And she's been dying to have a go at Mundungus ever since he sneaked off when he was supposed to be following you, Harry — and there goes Sirius's mum again —"

The fresh shrieks from Mrs Black drowned out the shouts from Mrs Weasley's rampage.

Giving up, Amara tried to close the door, but Kreacher entered before she could do it completely.

". . . Smells like a drain and a criminal to boot," he was muttering as he walked around the room. "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 in 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. . . ."

"Hello, Kreacher," said Fred very loudly, closing the door with a snap.

The house-elf froze in his tracks, stopped muttering, and then gave a very pronounced and very unconvincing start of surprise.

"Kreacher did not see Young Master," he said, turning around and bowing to Fred. Still facing the carpet, he added, perfectly audibly, "Nasty little brat of a blood traitor it is."

"Sorry?" said George. "Didn't catch that last bit."

"Kreacher said nothing," said Kreacher, with a second bow to George, adding in a clear undertone, "and there's its twin, unnatural little beasts they are."

". . . and there's one of the Mudbloods, standing next to the beasts - and the other one standing as bold as brass! Oh if my Mistress knew, oh how she'd cry, and there's a new boy, Kreacher doesn't know his name, what is he doing here, Kreacher doesn't know . . ."

"He's Harry Potter," said Amara pointedly.

"The Mudblood is talking to Kreacher as though she is above him, if Kreacher's Mistress saw him in such company, oh what would she say —"

"Don't call her a Mudblood!" said Fred, George, Ron and Ginny together, very angrily.

"I don't care," said Amara. "He's obviously a bit damaged in the head -"

"We care," Fred said angrily, glaring at Kreacher.

Kreacher was still muttering, his eyes on Harry.

"Is it true? Is it Harry Potter? Kreacher can see the scar, it must be true, that's that boy who stopped the Dark Lord, Kreacher wonders how he did it —"

"Don't we all, Kreacher?" said Fred.

"What do you want anyway?" George asked.

Kreacher's huge eyes darted onto George.

"Kreacher is cleaning," he said evasively.

"A likely story," said a voice behind Harry.

Sirius had arrived back into the drawing room. He was glaring at Kreacher as it he hoped he'd die in front of his very eyes. The noise from the hallway had gone; Mrs Weasley and Mundungus had moved somewhere else.

Kreacher flung himself into a ridiculously low bow that flattened his snout like nose on the floor.

"Stand up straight," said Sirius impatiently. "Now, what are you up to?"

"Kreacher is cleaning," Kreacher said again repeated. "Kreacher lives to serve the noble house of Black —"

"— and it's getting blacker every day, it's filthy," said Sirius.

"Master always liked his little joke," said Kreacher, bowing again, and continuing in an undertone, "Master was a nasty ungrateful swine who broke his mother's heart —"

"My mother didn't have a heart, Kreacher," Sirius snapped. "She kept herself alive out of pure spite."

Kreacher bowed again and said, "Whatever Master says," then muttered furiously, "Master is not fit to wipe slime from his mother's boots, oh my poor Mistress, what would she say if she saw Kreacher serving him, how she hated him, what a disappointment he was —"

"I asked you what you were up to," said Sirius coldly. "Every time you show up pretending to be cleaning, you sneak something off to your room so we can't throw it out."

"Kreacher would never move anything from its proper place in Master's house," said Kreacher, then muttered very fast, "Mistress would never forgive Kreacher if the tapestry was thrown out, seven centuries it's been in the family, Kreacher must save it, Kreacher will not let Master and the blood traitors and the brats destroy it —"

Amara realised this was why she avoided Kreacher all the time, he was horrible and rude.

"I thought it might be that," said Sirius, casting a disdainful look at the opposite wall. "She'll have put another Permanent Sticking Charm on the back of it, I don't doubt, but if I can get rid of it I certainly will. Now go away, Kreacher."

It seemed that Kreacher did not dare disobey a direct order; nevertheless, the look he gave Sirius was of deepest loathing when he shuffled his feet out of the room. His mutters carried with him.

"— comes back from Azkaban ordering Kreacher around, oh my poor Mistress, what would she say if she saw the house now, scum living in it, her treasures thrown out, she swore he was no son of hers and he's back, they say he's a murderer too —"

"Keep muttering and I will be a murderer!" said Sirius irritably, and he slammed the door shut on the elf.

"Sirius, he's not right in the head," said Hermione pleadingly, "I don't think he realises we can hear him."

"He's been alone too long," said Sirius, "taking mad orders from my mother's portrait and talking to himself, but he was always a foul little —"

"If you just set him free," said Hermione hopefully, "maybe —"

"We can't set him free, he knows too much about the Order," said Sirius curtly. "And anyway, the shock would kill him. You suggest to him that he leaves this house, see how he takes it."

Sirius walked across the room, where the tapestry Kreacher had been trying to protect hung the length of the wall. Amara and the others followed eagerly.

The tapestry was of the Black family tree - there was intricate golden thread that linked the members which must've looked quite nice when it was new. But now it was very, very old and had been chewed in some places. Looking at all the names, Amara read some of the ones part the way down. Elladora, Cygnus, Pollux... Some names had been burnt off, but at the very top of the tapestry held the words:

THE NOBLE AND MOST ANCIENT HOUSE OF BLACK

"TOUJOURS PUR"

"You're not on here!" said Harry, and Amara looked down to see where Harry was looking.

"I used to be there," said Sirius, pointing at a small, round, charred hole in the tapestry, rather like a cigarette burn. "My sweet old mother blasted me off after I ran away from home — Kreacher's quite fond of muttering the story under his breath."

"You ran away from home?" Harry said, shocked. Amara was also curious of Sirius' life at Grimmauld Place.

"When I was about sixteen," said Sirius. "I'd had enough." Amara was shocked. Sixteen? She was sixteen in November! She'd never run away from her family. But then again, they weren't mad, controlling pure bloods either.

"Where did you go?" asked Harry, staring at him.

"Your dad's place," said Sirius. "Your grandparents were really good about it; they sort of adopted me as a second son. Yeah, I camped out at your dad's during the school holidays, and then when I was seven- teen I got a place of my own, my Uncle Alphard had left me a decent bit of gold — he's been wiped off here too, that's probably why — anyway, after that I looked after myself. I was always welcome at Mr and Mrs Potter's for Sunday lunch, though."

"But . . . why did you . . . ?"

"Leave?" Sirius smiled bitterly and ran a hand through his long, unkempt hair. "Because I hated the whole lot of them: my parents, with their pure-blood mania, convinced that to be a Black made you practically royal . . . my idiot brother, soft enough to believe them . . . that's him."

Sirius jabbed a finger at the very bottom of the tree, at the name Regulus Black. A date of death, 1979, followed the date of birth.

"He was younger than me," said Sirius, "and a much better son, as I was constantly reminded."

"But he died," said Harry.

"Yeah," said Sirius. "Stupid idiot . . . he joined the Death Eaters."

"You're kidding!"

"Come on, Harry, haven't you seen enough of this house to tell what kind of wizards my family were?" said Sirius testily.

"Were — were your parents Death Eaters as well?"

"No, no, but believe me, they thought Voldemort had the right idea, they were all for the purification of the Wizarding race, getting rid of Muggle-borns and having purebloods in charge. They weren't alone either, there were quite a few people, before Voldemort showed his true colours, who thought he had the right idea about things. . . . They got cold feet when they saw what he was prepared to do to get power, though. But I bet my parents thought Regulus was a right little hero for joining up at first."

"Was he killed by an Auror?" Harry asked tentatively.

"Oh no," said Sirius. "No, he was murdered by Voldemort. Or on Voldemort's orders, more likely, I doubt Regulus was ever important enough to be killed by Voldemort in person. From what I found out after he died, he got in so far, then panicked about what he was being asked to do and tried to back out. Well, you don't just hand in your resignation to Voldemort. It's a lifetime of service or death."

"Lunch," said Mrs Weasley's voice.

She was holding her wand high in front of her, balancing a huge tray loaded with sandwiches and cake on its tip. She was very red in the face and still looked angry.

Amara didn't really want to look at the tapestry anymore, so she joined the others in eating the sandwiches. They munched quietly as Sirius and Harry stayed over by the tapestry, talking quietly. Mrs Weasley soon made them come over, as they were all eating the sandwiches at top speed.

Tackling the glass cabinets was not an easy job. None of the objects seemed to want to leave their homes. Sirius got a bad bite off a snuffbox, which made his hand have a horrible crusty covering (Amara noticed George sneak the box away after it had been thrown).

They found an unpleasant-looking silver instrument, something like a many-legged pair of tweezers, which scuttled up Harry's arm like a spider when he picked it up, and attempted to puncture his skin; Sirius seized it and smashed it with a heavy book entitled Nature's Nobility: A Wizarding Genealogy. Sirius threw the book away afterwards too. There was a musical box that emitted a faintly sinister, tinkling tune when wound, and they all found themselves becoming curiously weak and sleepy until Ginny had the sense to slam the lid shut. They all had nearly fallen asleep before she had done so.

There was also a heavy locket that none of them could open, a number of ancient seals and, in a dusty box, an Order of Merlin, First Class, that had been awarded to Sirius's grand- father for "Services to the Ministry."

"It means he gave them a load of gold," said Sirius contemptuously, throwing the medal into the rubbish sack.

Kreacher tried to smuggle things out now and again, and when he was caught, Amara learnt curses and swear words she didn't know, much to the displeasure of Mrs Weasley.

"It was my father's," said Sirius, throwing the ring which Kreacher had burst into tears over into the bulging sack. "Kreacher wasn't quite as devoted to him as to my mother, but I still caught him snogging a pair of my father's old trousers last week."

-OOOOO-

Mrs Weasley made them work as hard as they had ever been pushed for the next few days. It was probably because they'd spent a fair few waiting for Harry to arrive, but now he was here she pushed them harder than ever. The drawing room clean-out took three days, then they went into the dining room on the ground floor.

The discovery of spiders the size of saucers lead Amara and Ron to abandon all attempts and seek refuge in the kitchen, because Amara kept getting pictures of Aragog and his children in her mind. They stayed in there for more than an hour, and only came back in when they assured them they'd all gone.

The china, which bore the Black crest and motto, was all thrown unceremoniously into a sack by Sirius, and the same fate met a set of old photographs in tarnished silver frames, all of whose occupants squealed shrilly as the glass covering them smashed.

Kreacher became even more annoying when they cleaned harder than ever. He kept trying to grab anything he could from the sacks, muttering even worse curses the more he got told off.

Sirius went as far as to threaten him with clothes, but Kreacher fixed him with a watery stare and said, "Master must do as Master wishes," before turning away and muttering very loudly, "but Master will not turn Kreacher away, no, because Kreacher knows what they are up to, oh yes, he is plotting against the Dark Lord, yes, with these Mudbloods and traitors and scum. . . ."

At which Sirius, ignoring Hermione's protests, seized Kreacher by the back of his loincloth and threw him bodily from the room.

Every time the doorbell rang and Mrs Black began to shriek, the group would hurry and try and eavesdrop on the conversations before Mrs Weasley cottoned on and made them carry on with their tasks. Many people kept entering the house still - more so than at the start of the summer - and Amara saw Jesse, Adrien, Amelia and the others several times a day.

Tonks and Adrien joined them once for a memorable afternoon in which they found a murderous old ghoul lurking in an upstairs toilet (it took a long, long while to convince it to come out without attacking anyone), and Lupin helped them repair a grandfather clock that had developed the unpleasant habit of shooting heavy bolts at passers-by (Amara and Ron had had a near-hit when they walked past to test it had stopped). Mundungus redeemed himself slightly in Mrs Weasley's eyes by rescuing Ron from an ancient set of purple robes that had tried to strangle him when he removed them from their wardrobe (Amara had giggled before trying to help too).

They all were put off their food on the Wednesday evening when Mrs Weasley informed Harry that she'd ironed his best clothes and he needed a bath because of the Hearing the next morning. They all stopped their conversations mid-sentence to stare in horror at Harry, who avoided all eye contact.

Amara could not finish her chops after that, and instead listened with a queasy stomach of how Harry was get there.

"Arthur's taking you to work with him," said Mrs Weasley gently. Mr Weasley smiled encouragingly at Harry across the table.

"You can wait in my office until it's time for the hearing," he said. Harry looked over at Sirius, but before he could ask the question, Mrs. Weasley had answered it for him.

"Professor Dumbledore doesn't think it's a good idea for Sirius to go with you, and I must say I —"

"— think he's quite right," said Sirius through clenched teeth. Mrs Weasley pursed her lips. Her relationship with the man was already strained, so she did not say anything else.

Amara stabbed at her potatoes as Ron took her chops from her. What if Harry got expelled from Hogwarts? On any other occasion, she would've thought Fudge would let him off – but now, with him hating Harry, she had a horrible feeling he'd try to get him expelled.

-OOOOO-

Everyone was very preoccupied the next day. Even Fred and George didn't even joke around whilst they were cleaning in the morning. They were so inattentive of what they were doing, Mrs Weasley let them have the day off until Harry got back with his news.

So they hung around in the kitchen restlessly for the better part of the morning. Sirius paced; Hermione re-read her books; Tally and Ginny anxiously sat together (they were becoming inseparable); Ron ate a lot of food somehow and Amara sat in between the uncharacteristically quiet twins, biting her lip and watching the door.

Then, Mr Weasley and Harry appeared at the door.

"Well?" Mrs Weasley said breathlessly.

"Cleared," said Mr Weasley, beaming. "Of all charges – they tried to change the time to throw us off, trialled him in front of the entire court – but he's not expelled!"

There was a pause as this information processed in their brains. Then, suddenly, the kitchen exploded. Fred, George, Amara, Tally and Ginny jumped in the air.

Amara laughed as Fred and George started chanting "He got off! He got off!" And soon she, Ginny and Tally joined in.

"I knew it!" yelled Ron, punching the air. "You always get away with stuff!"

"They were bound to clear you," said Hermione. "There was no case against you, none at all. . . ."

"Everyone seems quite relieved, though, considering they all knew I'd get off," said Harry, smiling.

Amara turned away, grinning and went back to the dance with the others. Fred grabbed her hand and spun her round in a circle whilst George clapped, and Ginny and Tally danced with each other. Amara laughed as they carried on dancing and singing the war-type chant.

"He got off, he got off, he got off!"

"That's enough, settle down!" shouted Mr Weasley, though he too was smiling. "Listen, Sirius, Lucius Malfoy was at the Ministry —"

They ignored him and carried on the chanting.

"He got off, he got off, he got off —"

"Be quiet, you five!"

They speeded up their routine as their chanting got faster and slightly louder.

"He got off, he got off, he got off —"

"That's enough — Fred — George — Ginny — Amara — Tally!" said Mrs. Weasley, as Mr Weasley left the kitchen. "Harry dear, come and sit down, have some lunch, you hardly ate breakfast. . . ."

The rest of them sat down, the five of them sitting but still singing loudly. It was quite hard to sing and grim widely at the same time, as well as being given a mound of food as well.

" 'Course, once Dumbledore turned up on your side, there was no way they were going to convict you," Ron was saying happily as they continued to sing.

"Yeah, he swung it for me," said Harry.

"He got off, he got off, he got off!"

They started banging their cutlery against the table to make it louder.

"HE GOT OFF, HE GOT OFF, HE GOT OFF —"

"SHUT UP!" roared Mrs Weasley.