Chapter Two
The week with Marge at Privet Drive was absolutely the longest of Vanessa's life. She and Harry were both attempting to be on their best behavior around her, as they'd promised Uncle Vernon. Harry had somehow gotten Uncle Vernon to agree to sign their Hogsmeade permission forms if they were on their best behavior during Marge's visit. Nessa had not even considered asking because she'd assumed it wouldn't be worthwhile, but Harry's threat to let something slip to Marge seemed to get the job done. Although Nessa could get into Hogsmeade anyway thanks to the twins, she hadn't told Harry this (and wasn't planning on mentioning it either) and figured that if Uncle Vernon would agree to sign the form, it would make the ordeal much easier.
The Dursleys didn't seem to want to see much of them during Marge's visit, which both she and Harry were perfectly fine with. Aunt Marge, however, wanted them under her eye at all times. She was particularly nasty to Vanessa, insulting her posture and weight, calling her by 'bitch' instead of her actual name, and telling her aunt and uncle that it had been clear to her from the day she'd met her that there was something mentally subnormal about her. She had hinted on several occasions that it was all to do with blood. In the same way as dogs, she'd said, "if there's something wrong with the bitch, then there'll be something wrong with the pups…"
Her wine glass had exploded at that moment and Nessa stared at Harry in surprise. Marge had insisted that it was just a firm grip, but she highly suspected that her brother had lost control of his temper momentarily and used accidental magic. It had been some time since either of them had had random bouts of magic, not since they had gone to Hogwarts, but she could see the growing rage in her brother's eye as Marge had continued to hurl insults at her. Adding their mother into the mix seemed to be the final straw.
Despite her attentions on Nessa, she still found time to insult Harry frequently as well. She loved comparing him to Dudley, who she thought was a healthy weight despite his five chins, and spoiled him with expensive gifts. She always glared at Harry, as if daring him to ask why he hadn't received one, but this question had stopped being asked fairly quickly when they were younger. Not to mention that, unbeknownst to Aunt Marge, they had quite a lot of gold of their own and didn't really need to be presented with gifts from her anyway.
At long last, the final evening of Marge's stay arrived. Aunt Petunia cooked a fancy dinner and Uncle Vernon uncorked several bottles of wine. They got all the way through the soup and the salmon without a single mention of either of their faults; during the lemon meringue pie, Uncle Vernon bored them all with a long talk about Grunnings, his drill-making company; then Aunt Petunia made coffee and Uncle Vernon brought out a bottle of brandy.
The alcohol. That was what tipped the scales in the absolute wrong direction. Aunt Marge agreeing to have brandy, despite the fact that her face was red from all of the wine she'd already drank, was the first sign that Nessa ignored before hell broke loose.
Dudley was eating his fourth slice of pie. Aunt Petunia was sipping coffee with her little finger sticking out. Nessa and Harry clearly wanted nothing more than to disappear into their room, but Uncle Vernon's angry little eyes made it clear they needed to sit it out.
"Aah," said Aunt Marge, smacking her lips and putting the empty brandy glass back down. "Excellent nosh, Petunia. It's normally a fry-up for me of an evening, with twelve dogs to look after…" she burped richly and patted her great tweed stomach. "Pardon me. But I do like a healthy sized boy," she went on, winking at Dudley. "You'll be a proper-sized man, Dudders, like your father. Yes, I'll have a spot more brandy, Vernon…"
Harry sat closest to her — his eyes were glazed again, which likely meant he was thinking of the Broomstick Servicing Kit Hermione had given him again — and Marge's head jerked toward him, her eyes slightly unfocused.
"This one's got a mean, runty look about him. You get that with dogs. I had Colonel Fubster drown one last year. Ratty little thing it was. Weak. Underbred."
Nessa ignored the insults she was hurling in favor of thinking about how disgusting of a human Marge was. To drown a dog…
"It all comes down to blood, as I was saying the other day. Bad blood will out. Now, I'm saying nothing against your family, Petunia" — she patted Aunt Petunia's bony hand with her shovel-like one — "but your sister was a bad egg. It's a pity this one looks just like her — such an ugly little thing. You got the looks, Petunia, dear. But it happens in the best of families. Then she ran off with a wastrel and here's the result right in front of us."
Nessa kicked Harry under the table when he opened his mouth angrily. She didn't mind the insults so much. Marge didn't know a true fact about either of her parents, so what she said about them hardly mattered. The things she said about her were so normal at this point, she hardly took any notice. After all the years of being with her aunt and uncle, it wasn't as though she had much self-esteem to begin with.
"This Potter," said Aunt Marge loudly, seizing the brandy bottle and splashing more into her glass and over the tablecloth. "you never told me what he did?"
Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia were looking extremely tense. Dudley had even looked up from his pie to gape at his parents.
"He — didn't work," said Uncle Vernon with half a glance at the two of them. "Unemployed."
"As I expected!" said Aunt Marge, taking a huge swig of brandy and wiping her chin on her sleeve. "A no-account, good-for-nothing, lazy scrounger who —"
"He was not," said Harry suddenly from beside her. The table went very quiet. Harry was shaking all over. She set her hand on his knee and squeezed until her nails dug in. If Harry noticed, he didn't pay her any mind.
"MORE BRANDY!" yelled Uncle Vernon, who had gone very white. He emptied the bottle into Aunt Marge's glass. "You, both of you," he snarled at them. "Go to bed, go on —"
"No, Vernon," hiccupped Aunt Marge, holding up a hand, her tiny bloodshot eyes fixed on Harry's. "Go on, boy, go on. Proud of your parents, are you? They go and get themselves killed in a car crash (drunk, I expect) —"
"They didn't die in a car crash!" said Harry, who jumped out of his seat.
Nessa jumped up next to him, trying to push her brother back away from the table.
"Harry, don't!" she whispered frantically in his ear. "She isn't worth it!"
"They died in a car crash, you nasty little liar, and left you to be a burden on their decent, hardworking relatives!" screamed Aunt Marge, swelling with fury. Nessa tried desperately to drag her brother away, but he would not budge, his eyes flaring in anger. "You are an insolent, ungrateful little —"
But Aunt Marge suddenly stopped speaking. For a moment, Nessa thought that she had just lost her train of thought and was considering a new avenue of verbal abuse to spew at him. She seemed to be swelling with inexpressible anger — except the swelling didn't stop. Nessa watched in horror as her great red face started to expand, her tiny eyes bulged, and her mouth stretched too tightly for speech — next second, several buttons had just burst from her tweed jacket and pinged off the walls — she was inflating like a monstrous balloon, her stomach bursting free of her tweed waistband, each of her fingers blowing up like a salami —
"MARGE!" yelled Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia together as her whole body began to rise off her chair toward the ceiling. She was entirely round now, like a vast buoy with piggy eyes, and her hands and feet stuck out weirdly as she drifted up into the air, making apoplectic popping noises. Ripper came skidding into the room, barking madly.
"NOOOOOOOO!"
Nessa watched in horror as Uncle Vernon seized one of Marge's feet and tried to pull her down again, but was almost lifted from the floor himself. A second later, Ripper leapt forward and sank his teeth into Uncle Vernon's leg.
Before the madness had subsided, Nessa felt a hand grab onto the back of her oversized T-shirt — it had once been Dudley's — and drag her out of the dining room before anyone noticed they were gone. It was Harry.
"Harry, what the hell?" she said frantically. "What did you do?"
Harry was not listening to her. The cupboard door burst magically open as they reached it.
"Grab your stuff. We're leaving," he said, seizing his trunk and heaving it to the front door.
"Leaving?! Leaving where? We have nowhere to go!"
But he was already sprinting upstairs, completely ignoring her. She swore violently and dragged her trunk to the front door beside his and took the stairs two at a time to join him. He was filling a pillowcase with their books and his birthday presents. Nessa didn't argue — she wasn't sure at this point if it was because there was nothing that would convince him to stay or because she wanted to get the hell out of there herself.
She shoved Peanut, who yowled angrily at having been woken up, into her carrier. She grabbed Archie's cage and dashed back downstairs just behind Harry, just as Uncle Vernon burst out of the dining room, his trouser leg in bloody tatters.
"COME BACK IN HERE!" he bellowed. "COME BACK AND PUT HER RIGHT!"
But a reckless rage had clearly come over Harry. He kicked his trunk open, pulled out his wand, and pointed it at Uncle Vernon. Nessa shot forward, dropping Peanut's carrier — the cat was positively livid now — and grabbed onto her brother's wrist.
"Harry, for God's sake, you can't hex him!" she said loudly in an attempt to get through the rage in his head.
"She deserved it," Harry said to their uncle, breathing fast. "She deserved what she got. You keep away from me — from us."
He fumbled behind him for the latch on the door.
"I'm going," he said. "I've had enough."
And in the next moment, he was gone through the door. Nessa gaped after him and swore violently again, grabbing Peanut's carrier and sitting it on top of her trunk and pulling it out to follow her brother. The street was dark and quiet, the sky black and completely clear, stars twinkling above her. Her brother was several feet ahead of her, but she made no attempt to engage him. He was hot-headed at the worst of times, and she'd long since learned that he was better off to let the emotion fade before she spoke to him.
Not to mention, her current mental state was racing quickly toward panic. They had nowhere to go. She wasn't likely to turn back around and go back to Privet Drive. For one thing, neither her or her brother would want to take the hit to their pride. Maybe after the Hogwarts school year, when the entire thing had blown over and been mostly forgotten, maybe they would go back then. But certainly not tonight.
The Weasleys were in Egypt still, which really, I mean what were the chances they'd want to deal with them anyway because God only knew what kind of trouble Harry was likely to be in. Unless, she told the Ministry it was her…
They wouldn't be able to tell which of them it was. Only that magic had occurred within their residence. They'd certainly ask. She could tell them it had been her. Harry already had enough on his record at Hogwarts and she was squeaky clean. Well, unless you counted her friendship with the twins and Tori. She supposed that could be guilty by association, but she'd never gotten caught with any of them doing anything untoward, so the logic still stood.
Yes, that's what she'd do. She'd tell them it was her. Harry could stay at Hogwarts, she'd end up with a warning, and they could stay with the Weasleys when they got back.
Great plan, Vanessa, she thought in irritation, but what are we going to do tonight?
She swore and tried valiantly to catch up to her brother. She managed it only when they had gotten several streets over and he collapsed onto a low wall in Magnolia Crescent. She dropped next to him, pleased to see that she was not the only one panting from the effort it took to drag her trunk. She didn't say anything still — she'd let him say something first. That way she knew she wasn't liable to set him off again.
After ten minutes alone, he began shivering and she could tell that the panic was setting in. She shivered too, wrapping her arms around herself. They had no money, Harry had sent Hedwig off to Ron's when Aunt Marge had come, and it was cold. The only money they did have was in London, which she knew they couldn't make it to. God, maybe she should have just tackled Harry to the ground and forced him to stay with their aunt and uncle. The fight would have been horrendous, but they wouldn't be out here in the cold, dark night.
Harry suddenly shot forward and began digging around in his trunk.
"What are you doing?" she said wearily, sitting up to glimpse what he was grabbing.
"I'm getting dad's cloak," he said, rifling through the trunk.
"What? Why?" she said in alarm. "What good is that going to do? Besides, what if a Muggle sees us disappear into thin air? I think we've got enough problems to be worried about, don't you?"
"Look, a bit more magic couldn't hurt —"
"That's horrible logic!"
"- so I can just bewitch the trunks to be featherlight, tie them to my broomstick, and we can fly to London. I can drop you off at the Leaky Cauldron and then —"
"Drop me off?" she said irately, jumping to her feet and pushing him away from his trunk. "What the hell does that mean? Where would you be going?"
"I — well, they aren't going to let me back into Hogwarts. I'll just disappear, you know. Live like an outcast."
Nessa stared at him, mouth agape, trying to determine if he was being serious. He looked grim.
"Do you hear yourself?" she said, slowly. "That's the most insane plan I've ever heard. You can't run away from this, Harry. For one thing, you're underage. Every time you use magic, they'll know where you are. That's going to complicate things, I expect. I mean, maybe you could get me on board with the flying plan, but the rest of it is insanity."
"Well, do you have any bright ideas, then?" he said, angrily.
"This isn't my fault, Harry," she snapped with an eye roll, shivering again and looking around the neighborhood anxiously. She did not like being outside at night. "But, yes, actually. Not to get to London, mind, but they won't know which of us did the magic. Only that someone did. I can tell them it was me —"
"No! You could be expelled!" he said loudly. She shushed him desperately.
"I have a clean record at Hogwarts, Harry. Telling them it was me makes the most sense. Unless you wanted to be expelled?" Harry only gaped at her. "Right, so, I guess that's that then. We just need to figure out how to get to London. I'd really prefer we didn't have to use the broomstick, honestly —"
"Get behind me," said Harry, suddenly, pointing his wand at something behind him.
Nessa did not ask any questions. The tone in his voice was enough to convince her not to argue. He was looking at the gap in between the alleyway in front of him.
"Where's your wand?" he whispered.
"In my trunk," she said. "What is it?"
"Get your wand. There's something over there."
She kicked her trunk open in the same way that he had earlier and grabbed her wand from where it sat at the very top, in the wand case that Tori had gotten her for Christmas the year before. She pointed it directly in front of her, squinting her eyes desperately to see what Harry was seeing. Her heart was pounding. God, she really hated being out at night.
"Lumos," Harry muttered, and a light appeared at the end of his wand, almost dazzling them. She muttered the spell herself and held her wand high over her head and the pebble-dashed walls of number two suddenly sparkled; the garage door gleamed, and between them, she could see, very distinctly, something hulking in between the houses. Something very big, with wide, gleaming eyes.
Harry panicked and took a step backward. He tripped over his trunk and his wand flew out of his hand as he flung an arm out to break his fall, landing hard in the gutter.
There was a deafening BANG, and she threw her hands up to cover her eyes against a sudden blinding light. She screamed and dived out of the road and onto the pavement, hitting Harry in the stomach as he rolled from the gutter onto the pavement himself. Harry groaned.
"Sorry," she whispered guiltily, looking up to see whatever vehicle had nearly plowed them over.
Her jaw dropped. Before them was a violently purple, triple-decker bus, which had seemed to appear out of thin air. She was entirely certain that this vehicle would not be found anywhere near Little Whinging. Gold lettering over the windshield spelled The Knight Bus. A conductor with a purple uniform leapt out of the bus and began to speak loudly to the night.
"Welcome to the Knight Bus, emergency transport for the stranded witch or wizard. Just stick out your wand hand, step on board, and we can take you anywhere you want to go. My name is Stan Shunpike, and I will be your conductor this eve —"
He stopped abruptly, having just caught sight of the two of them sitting on the ground. Nessa kicked her trunk closed and latched it tightly, keeping her wand gripped tightly in her hand. Harry scrambled next to her to grab his wand. The conductor continued to eye them oddly. He was only a few years older than her — eighteen or nineteen at best — with large, protruding ears and quite a few pimples.
"What were you doin' down there?" said Stan, dropping his professional manner.
"Fell over," said Harry.
"'Choo fall over for?" sniggered Stan.
"We didn't do it on purpose," said Harry in annoyance at the same time that Nessa said "You nearly ran us over!" in the same tone.
Harry, suddenly remembering what they had been doing before he'd fallen over, whirled around to look at the alleyway. Nessa did the same, but saw nothing.
"'Choo lookin' at?" said Stan.
"There was a big black thing," said Harry, pointing uncertainly into the gap. "Like a dog…but massive…"
He looked back at Nessa, who was looking as uneasy as he felt. Turning back to Stan, she watched in irritation as Stan's eyes moved to the scar on Harry's forehead.
"Woss that on your 'ead?" said Stan abruptly.
She'd been opening her mouth to tell him to mind his own business when Harry spoke, "Nothing." He flattened his hair over his scar hastily.
"Woss your name?" Stan persisted.
"Neville Longbottom," said Harry quickly. Nessa's head snapped to his in surprise. "So – so this bus," he continued quickly in an attempt to change the subject, "did you say it goes anywhere?"
"Yep," said Stan proudly, "anywhere you like, lon's it's on land. Can't do nuffink underwater. 'Ere," he said suspiciously again. "You did flag us down, dincha? Stuck out your wand 'and, dincha?"
"Yes," said Nessa quickly. "Yes, we did. How much to get to the Leaky Cauldron?"
"Eleven Sickles," said Stan. "but for thirteen you get 'ot chocolate, and for fifteen you get an 'ot water bottle an' a toothbrush in the color of your choice."
They both shoved some money into his hand and then helped him carry their trunks onto the bus. There were no seats; instead, half a dozen brass bedsteads stood beside the curtained windows. Candles were burning in brackets beside each bed, illuminating the wood-paneled walls. A tiny wizard in a nightcap was sleeping at the rear of the bus and muttering about pickling slugs.
"You 'ave these two," said Stan, sliding their trunks under two beds that were right next to each other, right behind the driver, who was sitting in an armchair behind the steering wheel. "This is our driver, Ernie Prang. This is Neville Longbottom and — woss your name again?"
"Victoria Hastings," she said immediately when he looked at her curiously.
"Right, this is Neville Longbottom and Victoria Hastings, Ern."
Ernie Prang, an elderly wizard wearing very thick glasses, nodded to them. Harry nervously flattened his bangs again and sat on his bed. Nessa opted to sit next to him instead of on her own.
"Take 'er away, Ern," said Stan, sitting in the armchair next to Ernie's.
There was another tremendous BANG, and the next moment, Nessa was being hurtled toward the window, squished between Harry and the wall. She screamed at the immediate increase in speed and held desperately onto the railing of the bed. She looked out the window and noticed they were on a totally separate street already. Stan was watching their stunned faces with great enjoyment.
"This is where we was before you flagged us down," he said. "Where are we, Ern? Somewhere in Wales?"
"Ar," said Ernie.
Nessa could hardly believe what she was hearing. How in the hell was that possible?
"How come the Muggles don't hear the bus?" said Harry.
"Them!" said Stan contemptuously. "Don' listen properly, do they? Don' look properly either. Never notice nuffink, they don'."
Nessa would have come to the Muggles' defense, because there was clearly some sort of magic at play here, but she was too busy trying not to lose her dinner. The speed of the bus was making her feel horribly motion sick, and Ernie was driving very erratically, clearly not having mastered the use of a steering wheel. They kept mounting the pavement, but it didn't hit anything; lines of lamposts, mailboxes, and trash cans jumped out of their way as the bus approached and back into position once it had passed. She was going to be sick.
Stan disappeared and came back with a faintly green witch wrapped in a traveling cloak. She seemed to realize that Nessa was having an equally difficult time and smiled at her sympathetically.
"'Ere you go, Madam Marsh," said Stan happily as Ern stamped on the brake. Nessa tried to withhold her scream this time by clamping her eyes shut as the beds slid a foot or so toward the front of the bus.
Madam Marsh clamped a handkerchief to her mouth and tottered down the steps. Stan threw her bag after her and rammed the doors shut. Nessa jumped hastily over to her own bed before she could get squished by Harry again. There was another loud BANG and they were thundering down a narrow country lane, trees leaping out of the way.
In order to distract herself from the churning in her stomach, she laid down and tried to breathe slowly. It did not help.
"That man!" Harry said suddenly. Nessa shot up in a panic, wondering what he was seeing now. "He was on the Muggle news!"
Stan was holding a copy of the Daily Prophet and the front page showed a photo of the same man they'd seen on the news that morning. He looked worse in this one — he was clearly shackled and was screaming, deranged, into the camera.
"Sirius Black," Stan said, nodding. "'Course 'e was on the Muggle news, Neville, where you been?"
He gave a superior sort of chuckle at the blank look on their faces, removed the front page, and handed it to Harry.
"You oughta read the papers more."
Harry held the paper up to the candlelight and looked over at her expectantly. She shook her head and closed her eyes again, swallowing compulsively.
"You'll have to read it to me," she said quietly.
Harry grimaced and read:
BLACK STILL AT LARGE
Sirius Black, possibly the most infamous prisoner ever to be held in Azkaban fortress, is still eluding capture, the Ministry of Magic confirmed today.
"We are doing all we can to recapture Black," said the Minister of Magic, Cornelius Fudge, this morning, "and we beg the magical community to remain calm.
Fudge has been criticized by some members of the International Federation of Warlocks for informing the Muggle Prime Minister of the crisis.
"Well, really, I had to, don't you know," said an irate Fudge. "Black is mad. He's a danger to anyone who crosses him, magic or Muggle. I have the Prime Minister's assurance that he will not breathe a word of Black's true identity to anyone. And let's face it — who'd believe him if he did?"
While Muggles have been told that Black is carrying a gun (a kind of metal wand that Muggles use to kill each other), the magical community lives in fear of a massacre like that of twelve years ago, when Black murdered thirteen people with a single curse.
Nessa grimaced. He certainly looked like the kind of bloke who'd have murdered people. There was no light left at all in his eyes. He looked as close to a vampire as she'd ever seen up close.
Thirteen people with a single curse, though? That took an insane amount of emotion to do. She'd learned during her studies at Hogwarts — outside of class time, that was, because the teachers did not mention it — that emotion and magic were heavily tied together. The more emotion one could put behind a spell, the more powerful it would be. Anger was a particularly powerful emotion to use. Clearly, if she took what happened to Aunt Marge as any indication. What could possibly push a person to that amount of rage? To kill thirteen people?
"Scary-lookin' fing, inee?" said Stan, who had been listening to Harry read it aloud to her.
"He murdered thirteen people," said Harry, handing the paper back to Stan, "with one curse?"
"Yep," said Stan. "in front of witnesses an' all. Broad daylight. Big trouble it caused, dinnit, Ern?"
"Ar," said Ern darkly.
Stan swiveled in his armchair, his hands on the back, to better look at them.
"Black woz a big supporter of You-Know-'Oo," he said.
"Of course he was," Nessa muttered.
"What, Voldemort?" said Harry. Nessa shot him in an irritated look. Who else would he have been talking about?
Even Stan's pimples went white; Ern jerked the steering wheel so hard that a whole farmhouse had to jump out of the way and Nessa had to swallow compulsively again and grip the railing tighter.
"You outta your tree?" yelped Stan. "'Choo say 'is name for?"
"Sorry," said Harry hastily. "Sorry, I — I forgot —"
"Forgot!" said Stan weakly. "Blimey, my 'eart's goin' that fast…"
"You-Know-Who?" Nessa prompted queasily.
"Yeah," said Stan, still rubbing his chest. "Yeah, that's right. Very close to You-Know-'Oo, they say. Anyway, when little 'Arry Potter got the best of You-Know-'Oo," — she tried not to look over at Harry as he spoke. She saw him flatten his bangs nervously again. "All You-Know-'Oo's supporters was tracked down, wasn't they, Ern? Most of 'em knew it was all over, wiv You-Know-'Oo gone, and they came quiet. But not Sirius Black. I 'eard he thought 'e'd be second-in-command once You-Know-'Oo 'ad taken over. Anyway, they cornered Black in the middle of a street full of Muggles an' Black took out 'is wand and 'e blasted 'alf the street apart, an' a wizard got it, an' so did a dozen Muggles what got in the way. 'Orrible, eh? An' you know what Black did then?"
"What?" said Harry.
"Laughed," said Stan. Nessa tensed and tried to beat back a memory of her own at these words. "Jus' stood there an' laughed. An' when reinforcements from the Ministry of Magic got there, 'e went wiv 'em quiet as anyfink, still laughing 'is head off. "'Cos 'e's mad, inee, Ern? Inee mad?"
"If he weren't when he went to Azkaban, he will be now," said Ern in his slow voice. "I'd blow meself up before I set foot in that place. Serves him right, mind you…after what he did…"
"They 'ad a job coverin' it up, din' they, Ern?" Stan said. "'Ole street blown up an' all them Muggles dead. What was it they said 'ad 'appened, Ern?"
"Gas explosion," grunted Ern.
"An' now 'e's out," said Stan, examining the picture of Black's face again. "Never been a breakout from Azkaban before 'as there, Ern? Beats me 'ow 'e did it. Frightenin' eh? Mind, I don't fancy 'is chances against them Azkaban guards, eh, Ern?"
Ernie suddenly shivered.
"Talk about summat else, Stan, there's a good lad. Them Azkaban guards give me the collywobbles."
Nessa did not know much about the wizard prison, but every person who spoke of it had spoken in that same fearful tone. She did not know what sort of hell they had in those walls, but she prayed it stayed far away from her and her brother.