Chapter 45: Trip

"One chocolate fudge sundae, one scoop of vanilla, and one salted caramel with chocolate shavings," said Sirius, handing the ice creams to James, Remus, and lastly Ariadne in turn.

Truthfully, Ariadne couldn't remember the last time she had had an ice cream. Sure, she used to stop by Honeydukes with all the other upperclassmen on Hogsmeade weekends, but the closer she got to her NEWTs, the more frequently she skipped those excursions to take advantage of the relative quiet within the castle to study. Of course, she had been to Diagon Alley in September to purchase her school supplies for the year, but with a sky-high list of books to buy, advanced potion-making ingredients to restock and new supplies for her cat, getting an ice cream from Florean Fortescue's hardly made it onto the list of shopping priorities.

"Cheers," said Sirius with the typical glint in his eye, tilting his ice cream cone in their direction.

"When are we going to get a butterbeer?" asked James through a mouthful of ice cream.

"It's quarter past two in the afternoon, Potter," said Ariadne, rolling her eyes.

"Leaky Cauldron's off-limits, mate, sorry," answered Sirius, eating his ice cream in a way that Ariadne thought drew far too much attention to his lips…although maybe that was just her.

Ariadne tried to recall if she had ever been to Diagon Alley outside of the brief pre-term period when everyone rushed to buy their schoolbooks and supplies. Absent the throngs of Hogwarts schoolchildren and their parents, it turned out to be a much more enjoyable and interesting place to explore. Of course, as school-aged teenagers in the middle of term, Ariadne and the Marauders stood out, and they had had to take certain measures to disguise their truancy and blend in. Naturally, they had not worn their school uniforms for the excursion, opting for trousers, sweaters and neutral ties under their robes. Ariadne had even, in the rarest of occasions, shed her prefect badge. Sirius had then lightly touched up their ages using a handy spell adapted from an aging potion, without the requirement that they spend time actually brewing one. Their cover story was to play themselves off as recent Hogwarts graduates newly employed by the Ministry of Magic.

"We'll stand out at the Leaky Cauldron—they'll be suspicious of us looking like Hogwarts students," Ariadne guessed, as to the reason why they couldn't visit this essential wizarding establishment.

"Correct, and, well, James and I have previously had a…misunderstanding with the innkeeper," said Sirius evasively.

Ariadne sighed. Was there anywhere that the Marauders had not left a trail of mischief, devilry and long-held grudges?

"You terrorized the inn with some prank, and he banned you?" she guessed again.

"Something like that," answered Sirius cryptically, now swirling his tongue around his ice cream cone.

"I mean, why would you name your pub something like the leaky cauldron if you weren't all right with some leaky cauldrons," muttered James while nibbling his ice cream cone.

"Was that during one of your trips to buy school supplies in the summer, or during one of these…unauthorized excursions?" asked Ariadne.

Sirius grinned. "So you've picked up on the fact that this isn't our first time making a little trip to London from Hogwarts."

"It obviously isn't that," replied Ariadne.

"And how do you know?"

"Well, you had a pretty well-rehearsed plan for getting us here. And there is nothing that you neglect more than making a plan, Sirius Black, so I know that it's because you've done this before, not because you'd carefully thought it through."

"I prefer to learn through experience," said Sirius self-assuredly. He lowered his voice. "And you, my dear Ariadne, have benefitted from my…experience more than most."

Ariadne tried not to think too much about the particular experiences he was referring to, especially while her attention was still drawn to his mouth while he ate his ice cream. She had to admit, the method of getting from Hogwarts to London was brilliant in its utter simplicity. It was so stunningly simple, so glaringly obvious, that Ariadne couldn't believe she hadn't seen this loophole before. When she had opened her mouth to point out the self-evident obstacles to them traveling to London, she realized…there weren't any. Apparition in or out of the Hogwarts grounds was, of course, magically prohibited, but once they had left the castle and reached Hogsmeade, there were no such restrictions. Of course, the younger students, who constituted the majority of the Hogwarts population, had not yet earned their Apparition licenses, but as Sirius made abundantly clear, himself and the rest of the group were fluent in Apparition, even over longer distances.

Part of the plan was for Ariadne, Sirius, Remus and James to first stroll through the main thoroughfares of Hogsmeade, counter-intuitively making every effort to be seen. Sirius explained that this was in case anyone questioned their whereabouts; they could simply point to the many eyewitnesses who had seen them in Hogsmeade.

Despite their assurances that this plan had worked many times before, Ariadne struggled to wrap her mind around the fact that it was so simple to entirely leave school grounds in the middle of the term.

"Are you sure there aren't any apparition restrictions in Hogsmeade? Like an age barrier, for example, to prevent under 18s from apparating?"

"Not that we've experienced."

"You know that even if it's not enforced by magical measures, students leaving school grounds except to visit Hogsmeade on designated weekends with a signed permission form is prohibited by rule 76 of the school rulebook, right?"

Sirius had then, with a very casual air, asked Ariadne where she kept her copy of the Hogwarts rulebook. Ariadne opened her mouth to answer before she realized that this could not be an innocent question. "And why would you want to know that?"

"So that I can throw it in the common room fire. Morrigan, I have never met a Gryffindor so obsessed with rules." Ariadne cast him an irritated look.

"But how is it possible that no teacher has even thought of this possible avenue for leaving school grounds, and created some kind of magical barrier to stop it?"

Sirius had actually turned around to face her to answer this, seamlessly walking backwards with his robes flowing around him in the chilly wind, and his eyes full of that intense gleam that she now found both concerning and, inexplicably, irresistible.

"Have you ever considered, Ariadne Morrigan, that no one besides a Marauder has simply had the audacity to try it?"

Then they quietly walked out past Gladrag's Wizard Wear, beyond the end of the street to the empty wild meadows at the foot of the hills that surrounded Hogsmeade valley. Ariadne had carefully tucked her prefect badge into her pocked, and they disappeared.

James, of course, had wanted to make a beeline for Quality Quidditch Supplies, but Ariadne insisted on getting some practical shopping done, while they had the rare opportunity of being in London. She and Sirius restocked on boomslang skin, horn of bicorn and lacewing flies at the apothecary, while arguing about whether extra-strength murtlap essence was actually more efficacious in healing solutions or just a marketing ploy to sell more expensive product (Ariadne agreed with the author of Advanced Potions-Making that the optimal concentration of murtlap essence was one-part essence to two-parts water; Sirius more unorthodoxly vowed that two-parts essence was faster-acting.) At the cauldron shop, Ariadne purchased a bottle of Potage's Acid-Repelling Protective Barrier to coat the inside of her best brass cauldron, and advised Sirius to do the same, considering the beating that their supplies were taking from the constant brewing of potent and often dangerous brews.

Sirius had had to drag Ariadne out of Flourish and Blotts ("How many more books on magical theory could you possibly read?") and then they amused themselves at Scribbulus trying out quills that boasted special features (Sirius favored one whose ink would turn invisible to all but the intended recipient of the writing; and James, a quill shaped like a broomstick.)

Ariadne felt something she couldn't quite place, but it was like she was…lighter than she had felt in weeks. Between their dangerous plot to infiltrate the group of student Death Eaters, and sorting through her confusing feelings toward Sirius, not to mention the unrelenting load of schoolwork that she was always managing, Ariadne hadn't fully grasped how much she was dealing with. And, despite being the cause of one of the aforementioned problems, she noticed that the one person who get her too feel more relaxed was…Sirius.

"Black," she began, almost hesitantly.

"Yes, Morrigan?" Sirius was strolling beside her with his hands in his pockets, looking more contented and cheerful than his usual brooding manner.

"How did you know to order me salted caramel chocolate ice cream?"

Sirius glanced at her sideways, with a unplaceable look that almost seemed apprehensive, like he was concerned that his answer might upset her. "Well, that's the flavor of the chocolates your dad always sends you."

Ariadne was so taken aback by this answer that she almost stopped walking.

"How…?"

"Well, like a regular witch or wizard attending Hogwarts school, you receive your mail every morning by owl in the Great Hall. It's not as though it's a clandestine event," answered Sirius briskly, even though she hadn't completed her question.

Ariadne was quiet for a moment. The level of attention that Sirius paid her, down to this minute, even intimate sort of detail (Ariadne had not spoken to him about her family much, besides their initial conversation about her blood status) betrayed something about his feelings toward her. Well, not betrayed, really, Ariadne thought. He had been pretty clear about they way he felt about her. But Ariadne realized that between their bickering and plotting, she hadn't paid attention to the signs of those feelings.

Sirius was still watching her, as though waiting for a reaction. Ariadne had absolutely no idea what compelled her to respond this way, but she began talking about her dad.

"My dad and I are really close. Not that my mum and I aren't, but as the wizard in the family, he taught me everything I needed to know about magic and the wizarding world. As you know, the Morrigans come from a long line of pureblood witches and wizards. Some even claim to be descended directly from Rowena Ravenclaw herself."

Ariadne dared to look over at Sirius. He was listening closely and hadn't said a word.

"Even though my father prepared me so thoroughly to be a witch, I'm half-Muggle, too. My entire mum's side of the family knows nothing about all this or Hogwarts. They think I've gone to some fancy preparatory boarding school. And coming from a huge family of wizards, my dad doesn't fully understand what it's like to be half. To be in two worlds."

Sirius nodded. "I can't say I can fully empathize, coming from a family so obsessed with pure blood that it expels anyone who even dares to speak to a Muggle…but I understand."

Ariadne just noticed his hand twitch from inside his pocket, as if her would have liked to reach out and hold hers. For a wild moment, Ariadne thought that she would have liked this, too.

She quickly tried to refocus on their next task: finding a restricted potion ingredient in Knockturn Alley.