Dagger
Grace begins her first day of seventh year, finds assisting Kettleburn to be nearly unbearable, and sneaks Sophia into Hogsmeade.
The Great Hall seemed emptier in the light.
It was the way the sunlight streamed down from the enormous, breezy blue ceiling and struck almost nothing. There were only a quarter of the usual number of students sitting at the Ravenclaw table, although Grace was not sure if this was because so many of them had gone into hiding or if they had decided to head to the library for an early start on their classes. The Gryffindor and Hufflepuff tables were smaller and slighter than usual as well, with just a spattering of students scattered along the length of the counter.
Even the Slytherin table, which held the most students of any House, was somewhat sparse. As Grace walked along to the far end of it, where the seventh years sat clustered, she noticed, now and again, who had vanished over the summer: Colvin was gone, as she had found out yesterday during the train, and so Greengrass was sitting by herself at the very edge of the table. Wilkinson had vanished, too, although Grace did not think there was anything particularly spotty about his family tree. Even that funny fifth year who had tried to sell Grace expired Murtlap Essence last year had disappeared.
As she reached the end of the table, Grace swallowed down the thread of dread that had begun to puncture its way through her throat and sat down rigidly opposite Greengrass. This was not done out of pity or loneliness. Grace could have sat with some of the fifth year Slytherins (she had helped a few of them with a Potions project last year), or found Dirk Cresswell hidden somewhere in the Hufflepuff table, or even met Sophia Hornby at the Ravenclaw table. But she wanted to sit with Greengrass, because the events of last night—Regulus's desertion—still plagued her.
Greengrass started when Grace slid in across from her. But the startled look in her eye soon gave way to an unfathomable boredom. "Thank Merlin," she murmured more to herself than to Grace. "I thought it was Gamp."
An unintentional smile flickered across Grace's lips, but she forced it away quickly. "How are you?" she asked rather flatly, scooping some scrambled eggs onto her plate. "How was the train ride?"
Greengrass stared at her. The tines of her fork scratched against the porcelain of her plate. "The train ride…?" she repeated dryly.
"Yeah," Grace said resolutely. Her eyes flickered across Greengrass's pale, slight face. Her brows were thin and faint, and her eyes were so light they seemed almost colorless. If it weren't for the muted red of her hair, Grace might have thought the Prefect a ghost.
"How about we do without the dance this time and just cut straight to the point?" Greengrass sighed.
"Fine." Grace pursed her lips. "Did you actually tell Regulus my message, or did you decide in the end that it wasn't worth it because you weren't getting anything out of it?"
Because this was the only explanation Grace could summon. If Regulus had not come to meet her yesterday, that could only be because he had not been told. If Regulus had not come, that could only be because Greengrass had messed up—because she had told him the wrong compartment, or given him the wrong time, or forgotten to tell him entirely.
Greengrass raised a brow coolly. "How completely unoriginal," she drawled. "I told you I'd tell him, didn't I?"
"But did you actually do it?"
Greengrass's lips thinned out. "Of course I did," she said, and her voice transformed into something more surly. "If he didn't come to you, that's hardly my fault, is it? It wasn't as though you told me to convince him or anything like that. I told him you wanted to talk to him back at your compartment with the funny stain, and he promptly told me to stay out of it—"
"What?" Grace cut in, alarmed. "What do you mean?"
"He told me," Greengrass ground out slowly, "to stay. Out. Of. It."
"But—" Grace's brows furrowed, "—stay out of what?"
Greengrass's nostrils flared. "Well, he was hardly going to start opening his heart up to me, was he? I assumed he was referring to whatever spat you two have gotten into."
"Spat?" she repeated. They weren't in any sort of spat…were they? But they had barely even spoken during the summer; there wasn't any moment an argument could have emerged from. "What spat?"
"How should I know?"
Grace bristled. "I mean—" she stopped and willed herself to have the patience. "What exactly did Reg—"
"Ah, Miss Potter," an equally huffy voice called out.
Grace turned and found, to her immense displeasure, Slughorn with a stack of schedules held tightly in the crook of his arms. The old professor teetered in front of her for a moment, beady dark eyes flitting over her distastefully, as though she might have some sort of contraband hidden on her person.
"What?" she spat out, willing the old man to disappear so she could continue her interrogation.
Slughorn's lips thinned. "I hope you received my letter during the—"
"Yeah, I got it."
He paused. "I see," he said, "but you didn't reply—"
Grace was overcome with the urge to scream. "It didn't say I had to reply," she bit.
Slughorn stared at her for a moment longer, perhaps wondering if it was truly worth it to go down this rabbit hole with her, before deciding it was better to move on. He plucked out a piece of parchment from his stack and handed it off to Greengrass kindly.
"Here you are, my dear," he said, voice transforming from indignant to cloying in a matter of seconds. His dark eyes skimmed over her schedule. "Oh—I see Dumbledore has accepted your petition for Alchemy. Very nice, very nice."
"Yes," Greengrass said with heavy boredom, taking her schedule.
"I suppose that means I won't be seeing you in N.E.W.T. Potions," Slughorn sighed. "What a shame—I was rather excited to see what sorts of improvements you might make on the brewing times for Amortentia and Draught of the Living Dead. You still have an interest in Potions, I hope, given your father's business?"
Greengrass shrugged half-heartedly. "I think I would rather branch out into a different field."
"Oh, yes, of course, of course. Might I ask—"
Grace coughed pointedly, and Slughorn's gaze—dropping from delighted to distressed—traveled back to her. "Could I get my schedule?" she asked. "Sir?"
"Right, right," he said flatly, and promptly tossed her a paper from the top of the pile.
Grace grabbed it, and her eyes flew over the timetable hastily. It was almost the same as last year—Transfiguration, Charms, Potions, DADA—but no Divination. And although Grace had known this, had been told well in advance of the change, her heart still sunk at the thought of a year at Hogwarts without Divination.
While she still wasn't quite sure if she bought into the whole idea of fortune telling and a future set in stone, she did appreciate the comfort of Divination. She liked the way Vablatsky would fan out tarot cards in those knotted hands of hers, as though she were cradling destiny in her palms. Grace liked the security of knowing, even if what she knew wasn't exact, even if she didn't really understand what she knew.
Grace sighed to herself, and stuffed the schedule into her bag. She picked up her fork and levied a glance at the seat opposite hers, hoping to draw Greengrass back into their previous conversation, but found that the redhead had vanished.
Grace scowled, and stuffed a wad of scrambled eggs into her mouth. She chewed noisily, and glared stormily down at the other Slytherins seated along the long table. Slughorn was still waddling about with his stack of schedules, exchanging pleasantries with members of his Slug Club. Regulus—to her dismay and irritation—was packed alongside Rosier and Yaxley, seated in the very center of the Slytherin table, amongst a cluster of students from influential families, like Helena Selwyn and Anco Dolohov.
Grace tore her eyes away from the scene. As soon as she was satisfied with her breakfast, she rose from her seat like a whip and dashed off to her first class of the day: DADA.
She wasn't really looking forward to it. She was more apprehensive than anything. Spellcasting classes, like DADA and all the other classes Grace was taking this year, were classes that required students to have partners to practice with. And although there was still a shred of hope in her heart that Regulus might come back to her, might sit down besides her in DADA if she saved him a seat, she knew that the opposite was more likely—that he'd likely stick with Rosier and Yaxley till the very end, although she had no idea why.
She burst into the classroom like a tempest, unintentionally crashing into a student standing by the door and sending them both toppling down.
"Agh—sorry," she said, scrambling back up.
The student opposite her let out a groan of annoyance and rose at well. He was a full head shorter than her, with dark eyes and thin lips. Grace frowned tightly as she realized just who it was she'd bumped into: Irven Gibbon, a Ravenclaw whose pastimes included checking out books about the Dark Arts from the Restricted Section and bullying first-years in Hufflpeuff.
"Oh," she said, regretting her apology instantly.
"Sweet Circe," Gibbon said, lips splitting into a wide sneer. "Haven't they figured out what's wrong with you yet? At least learn some manners, Potter. You can't just fit yourself into other students." He held his arms aloft and began to shudder, putting on a rather poor imitation of one of Grace's paroxysms.
Fury curled in Grace's heart like a beast. "Yeah, keep doing that, Gibbon," she ground out. "See what happens."
Gibbon snorted. "What're you going to do? You haven't got your brother this time around to threaten students into keeping quiet."
Grace's jaw clenched. It wasn't as if she'd asked James to go about flashing his Head Boy badge and taking fifty points away from any student who so much as glanced at her after she experienced a paroxysm in the middle of Charms last year.
She racked her mind for some sort of retort—don't you ever get tired of being such a knobhead, Gibbon?—when a different voice cut in and said quite resolutely, "Oi, take a hike, Gibbon."
Grace didn't have to turn to know who it was. She knew that voice—somehow both firm and casual, somehow concerned and disaffected. Besides her, Davey Gudgeon stared down at Gibbon with a hint of disgust.
Gibbon shifted for a moment, eyes darting over Davey, before thinking better it. Davey's mum was, after all, a member of the Wizengamot.
"You're all right?" Davey asked when Gibbon wandered away to sit besides a friend in the back of the classroom.
Grace's eyes flickered up to his face—to the cleft in his chin and the deep green of his eyes and the gentle flop of his brown hair against his forehead—and she bit back a groan. The day had only just started up, and it was already shaping up to be one of the worst she had ever experienced. Losing Regulus to someone as thick and boorish as Yaxley? Being teased by someone as dense as Gibbon? Having to exchange pleasantries with her ex-boyfriend? Merlin—was Hogwarts worth any of this trouble?
"Right as rain," she said flatly, and made to move.
Davey stopped her. "I figured they'd stop, you know, the…" his eyes roamed back to Gibbon, and he took a momentary pause before shaking his head. "Merlin—sorry—I don't mean to dredge that all back up. You're fine, yeah?"
Grace wanted to vault herself off a cliffside, but she nodded anyway.
"Good, good…"
This time, Grace let out her groan. Davey was tall and kind and entirely too handsome for his own good—all qualities Grace had liked very much back in fifth year—but he was also much too passive and indirect and, Merlin, this was just not at all the ideal first day back Grace had been envisioning.
"Was there something you needed, or…?" she said shortly.
"Er—well, no—but—" his eyes flew around the room once more, and he caught onto Regulus sitting besides a bored Yaxley. Davey's shoulders relaxed, and he gave Grace a strong smile. "I was wondering if you'd like to be partners? Jay dropped out this year, so I haven't got anyone to work with."
"Yeah—well, actually, I've got..." She swung her eyes about the room as discreetly as possible. She knew Regulus was out of the question, so she looked around for Dirk or one of the nicer Ravenclaws. Unfortunately for Grace, she could not find Dirk and everyone expect for Greengrass, who was sitting by herself in a corner, was partnered up. "I told Greengrass I'd partner with her," she said weakly.
Davey's brows rose. "Oh, I see…yeah, sure." He began to back away. "I'll see you around, then?"
Merlin, she hoped not. "Maybe."
With that, she turned on her heel and practically flew to Greengrass's little workbench at the side of the classroom.
"Oh, Salazar, not again," Greengrass groaned when Grace sat down besides her. "Look—Black didn't tell me anything. We literally only exchanged one sentence with one another. I didn't press him for anymore, and—" her expression shifted from irritated to sour, "—you know what? I don't know what I'm trying to convince you of. What does it matter what I say? You won't believe me anyway, will you?"
Grace's eyes swept to Regulus. He had entered a hushed conversation with Yaxley. Grace could make excuses all day long—that Regulus was simply doing this out of politeness, that Yaxley had chosen to sit next to Regulus and not the other way around—but the plain truth of the matter was that Regulus did not want to move. He was leaned towards Yaxley, huddled into himself. If he wanted to escape, he would have looked to Grace.
"No," Grace said, shifting back to Greengrass. A sliver of guilt wormed into her heart. Greengrass, after all, had no reason to lie. "No—I believe you. I'm just trying to figure this out is all, and—"
The door to the classroom thudded open, and the new DADA professor strode inside. It was the tall, slim woman who had been speaking to Dumbledore the night before at the Start of Term Feast. Her hair was sleek and brown, and pulled back into a tight bun. Her lips were dashed with red, and there was a faint scar starting at the edge of her jaw that trailed up to her ear.
"Good, you're all here," she said approvingly. "My name is Emmeline Vance. You likely remember the introduction the Headmaster gave last night, so I'll skip the pleasantries and get straight to the point." She leaned against the edge of her desk. Her dark eyes swept over the class. "Today," she started slowly, lingering over the huddle of Slytherin pairs, "we will begin practicing the Patronus charm."
Greengrass raised a brow but didn't say anything. A few Ravenclaws exchanged uneasy, confused glances. Grace felt the reaction wasn't exactly uncalled for; Patronus charms, after all, weren't on the curriculum.
"It is my belief," Vance continued, "that this war will not end anytime soon. You are in an extraordinarily difficult situation in that you will be thrown into the war upon your graduation. And I do not mean that you will have to fight in the war; I mean you will have to exist in it. You will have to survive it. My hope is to teach you defensive spells throughout this year and give you the necessary skills to ensure your survival. So—" she waved her wand effortlessly, and a silver-lined fox appeared from the tip of it, "—we will begin with Patronuses."
Grace's gaze followed Vance's Patronus. The white fox trotted around the professor's feet, its sharp eyes glancing from student to student. It was not exactly solid, but it was not entirely airy, either. A trail of bluish-white light followed when it moved.
Vance went over the basics of the Patronus—the use, the wand motion, the incantation—before having the class divide into pairs to practice the spell. Grace glanced back at Regulus, and found that he had turned fully to Yaxley, wand already out.
Her heart sank.
"Clever of her," Greengrass murmured quietly.
Grace looked to her. "What?"
"Clever of Vance," she clarified.
The furrow in Grace's brows didn't lift. "What do you mean?"
Greengrass gave her a very unimpressed side glance. "You know—I never imagined you'd be so dull."
Grace scowled. "You obviously think you're very smart for having figured something out, so just come out with it."
Greengrass rolled her eyes. "Last night, Dumbledore said Vance used to work in the Auror Office for a few years, meaning she's an ex-Auror. He's obviously hired her to weed out any students who might have joined You-Know-Who." Her gaze flickered back to Vance, who was correcting a Hufflepuff's wand posture. "And she's certainly taking that job very seriously—Patronus charms? Those with…ill intent can't produce one, so…"
Grace's frown grew deeper. "Hold on—you think there are students here who have joined You-Know-Who? Students in Hogwarts?"
"Hogwarts isn't impervious, you know," Greengrass said severely.
"I mean—but still—" she spluttered out, "—why would You-Know-Who want some rotten teenagers? That's mental."
"Of course it's mental. He's mental."
"Less talking and more practicing!" Vance called out as she strolled amongst the pairs. "No, Higgins—the wand movement must be more fluid…"
Greengrass turned away from Grace and sliced her wand through the air. "Expecto Patronum," she said rigidly.
Nothing happened.
Grace swallowed a snort. "You should make an effort to at least seem happy, Greengrass."
The redhead glanced at her. "And you should at least make an effort," she said disapprovingly. "You haven't even got your wand out yet."
Grace rolled her eyes, and pulled her wand from the far reaches of her knapsack. The old thing gleamed silver under the faint light. She twisted the wand lazily between her fingers, skimming through the ocean of memories in her mind. The happiest ones almost always involved Hogwarts—sneaking into secret tunnels with Dirk or stuffing herself silly in the kitchens with Regulus or getting James caught in the trick step in the Grand Staircase. She grasped at each memory as soon as she could conjure it, held it steadfastly in the center of her mind, and cast the spell.
But nothing happened.
It wasn't anything to get upset over. Most of the class were waving their wands to and fro with nothing to show for it. Some had, of course, managed to produce a few faint spirals of silver.
"I'm not doing the wand motion wrong, am I?" she asked Greengrass unsurely after she had tried the Patronus charm for the fourteenth time.
"No," Vance said, stepping between the duo.
Grace shrunk besides Greengrass. The professor seemed somehow taller up close, and her dark eyes were sharp and all-consuming. Grace avoided her gaze hastily.
"I would say this is simply a matter of practice," Vance began, "but the truth of the matter is that the Patronus charm has very little to do with practice. It is tied intrinsically to emotion. Those who get the hang of it instantly are often those who are more attuned to their emotions. It is for that reason that some witches and wizards find the spell difficult."
Greengrass's frown grew deeper with every word Vance said. Grace, for her part, was beginning to wonder if any of her memories were truly happy.
"Er—it's probably that I've got to think of a better memory then, right?" she asked the professor unsurely.
"I find that memories don't quite cut it for me," Vance said, and gave Grace a small, quick smile. "It's usually a small detail that does it for me—the way the light hits a particular surface, or the smell of a freshly baked pie. It doesn't even need to be something you actually experienced. It could be, for instance, a dream—or a hundred memories collapsed into one. Do you understand me?"
Grace nodded. "Yeah, I guess."
"Yes," Greengrass said at the same time.
"Good. Why don't you try that? I'm sure you'll be able to conjure something." With that, Vance crossed over to another pair.
Greengrass scowled after her. "What sort of Defense technique is that? Dream up a memory for the Patronus charm? That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard."
"I don't think she literally meant a dream," Grace defended half-heartedly. "I think she just meant that we can think of anything—even things that haven't exactly happened, or didn't happen the way you remember. Why don't we just try it?"
Greengrass grumbled to herself, but brought her wand back up all the same.
Grace waved her wand through the air. Her thoughts swayed in her head, like the gentle roll of the ocean surface. Memories flashed through her mind: She thought of the gleam of James's smile and the light in Lily's eyes, the bruising hugs they gave her before departing to some remote cottage in the South Downs for their honeymoon. She thought of the gentle tug of violet over the golden sky, the sweep of sunset, the tilt of the planet as it went on and on. She thought of herself in the center of all this, quiet and contented.
"Expecto Patronum," she said.
A wisp of silver emerged from her wand, dissipating quickly into the air. Grace's mouth broke into a wide grin, and she turned, abruptly and without quite thinking, to her side—to where Regulus must be—but there was only Greengrass. Her shoulders fell slack, and her lips receded back into a familiar grimace. Her eyes danced around the room for a moment before landing grumpily on Regulus's slight form.
He was still with Yaxley, of course. He had not yet mastered the Patronus charm, but he was, along with quite a few others, producing strong coils of silver light.
"I think that's the hundredth time I've caught you gawking at Black."
Grace's eyes snapped back to Greengrass. Her lips pressed into one thin line. "I don't gawk," she managed after a moment of steely silence.
"You don't lie very well, either," Greengrass said immediately. Her pale eyes flitted away from Grace lazily, wandering over to where Yaxley and Black stood. Her head cocked to the side slightly. "I don't exactly blame you. It does make you wonder, doesn't it?"
Grace's eyes didn't leave Greengrass's side for a moment. The taller girl was acting very sly again, and Grace would be damned if she let herself seem utterly daft again.
"What makes me wonder?" she asked suspiciously.
Greengrass looked back to Grace sharply. "How Rosier, Yaxley, and Black rarely leave each other's sides nowadays," she said matter-of-factly. "They hardly talked before this year."
The curiosity in Grace died in an instant. "Of course it makes me wonder," Grace snapped. "Why do you think I was hounding you about Regulus during breakfast?"
Greengrass's gaze didn't drop like how Grace expected it to. Grace's voice could be a harsh, blistering thing when she wanted it to. But Greengrass didn't sidle away from Grace; she didn't tear her eyes away hastily or seem even remotely sorry to bring up the touchy subject. Instead, Greengrass's eyes—somehow simultaneously shallow and chasmic, like a mirror—searched hers almost stubbornly.
"It isn't a spat, is it?" she said at last, and she sounded almost mournful.
"No," Grace said. "At least—I don't think it is. I don't remember doing anything."
"No," Greengrass agreed, and her tone was the softest Grace had ever heard. Her eyes finally left Grace's and skirted over the stone floor for a moment. Her fingers skimmed over the wood of her wand thoughtfully. "Well—I don't think there's any point wallowing about it," she said simply. "If he's abandoned you, then there's no point lending him another moment's thought, is there?"
Grace stared at her. She knew Greengrass was trying to be helpful, but this wasn't the sort of advice she was looking for. In fact, she wasn't looking for advice at all. She was looking for answers. She was looking for action.
Grace didn't like to sit around and think. She liked to get up and do.
And—besides—what sort of advice was this? No point in lending Regulus another thought? How could Greengrass say such a thing? Of course Grace would think of Regulus. She didn't particularly like all the thinking she'd been doing—the wrestling of ideas, the wave of questions flooding her mind—but she'd do it if it meant she could figure out what was wrong. She'd do it, because she knew he'd do the same. She'd do it, because it was Regulus who'd always drag her out to Quidditch games when she was feeling surly and it was Regulus who'd read her books in the quiet of the Slytherin common room and it was Regulus who'd calmly talk sense to her when she was feeling overwhelmed with school work and St. Mungo's visits.
"No," Grace said at last. "No—that's not right. There's more to this. He wouldn't just… You don't know him, not like I know him."
Greengrass's brows rose ever so slightly, and the taut, tentative thread of friendship that had begun to unravel between them collapsed.
"And yet," Greengrass said icily, "you're just as clueless as I am—perhaps even more so."
The wonderful thing about seventh year was how many breaks Grace had been allotted between classes. The terrible thing about this particular year was that she had no one to spend them with.
She had searched for Dirk in Charms and Transfiguration, but the gap-toothed, curly-haired boy was nowhere to be seen. She was beginning to think that he had dropped out of Hogwarts, too, although she didn't quite like lending the idea much thought. She partnered with Greengrass for her other classes, but this was more out of a begrudging necessity than anything; they certainly weren't going to start hanging out after classes together.
Grace slipped further into the loveseat by the dim heath of the Slytherin common room. Her legs were hooked over the edge of the couch, and her head was nestled against a large throw pillow. Her dark hair almost melted into the deep emerald fabric. She stared up at the ceiling—a strange grey-green color that strongly resembled mold—forlornly.
"Everything is wrong," she sighed to herself quietly.
The Slytherin common room had always been rather noiseless, save for the occasional rustle of papers or the sweep of a shoe against the carpet, but now it was empty, too. There were only a couple of students scattered about, and Grace wasn't interested in talking to any of them. What sort of conversation was she going to strike up with someone like Dolohov or Snyde, anyway? Nice weather we're having. Say—how do you feel about the attacks on Muggle-borns?
Grace snorted to herself and shifted further into the seat, burying her face into the pillow. If James and Lily were still here, she would have sought them out. She'd pester James in the Gryffindor common room or badger Lily into helping her with assignments in the library. But now that those two had left Hogwarts—and so many others with them—who was Grace supposed waste time with?
Usually, she'd have Regulus to spend time with between classes. He'd be frantically writing in all the due dates for his projects and essays into his planner while Grace knotted together Gamp's shoelaces from the other side of the room. Or he'd be reading the assigned chapters from their textbooks out loud while Grace nodded off by the floor of the hearth. Or they'd be squabbling over whether to play Exploding Snap or Wizard's Chess. Whatever it was they ended up doing, they just wouldn't be doing it alone.
Grace groaned to herself when she felt something scratching at the cuff of her sleeve. "Sod off, whoever you are...can't you see I'm busy?" she muttered, shifting over and cracking open an eye.
It was not a student, as she thought. It was a cat—black and sleek and bright-eyed.
"Cliodna?" Grace said, startled.
The slight kneazle-cat was balanced precariously on the top of the loveseat, pawing down at Grace's arms and mewling pathetically. Grace was fairly certain this was the first time in seven years that the cat had willingly come to her side.
"Hullo," Grace greeted, twisting over and scooping Cliodna into her arms.
Cliodna purred, and gently laid her head against the crook of Grace's elbow. Her paws clawed at the front of Grace's robes.
"This is strange," she commented absently, and made a mental note to take some Clear-Head before she went to bed so Regulus's cat wouldn't unintentionally trigger a paroxysm. "What are you doing out on your own?"
Cliodna let out another whine, and Grace relented into petting her. She scratched Cliodna at the nape of her neck and the cat let out a deep and contented purr. Grace looked around the common room, hoping to catch sight of Regulus's mop of dark hair, but he wasn't in sight at all.
"Is he ignoring you, too, then?" Grace asked.
Cliodna let out something that was a cross between a purr and a growl.
A smile flickered across Grace's face. "I'll take that for a yes." She stroked Cliodna along her back tenderly. "Fuck him, then, right? I mean—honestly—has he got so much on his plate that he can't be bothered to give his cat a pet and say hello to his best friend?"
Grace raised a brow at Cliodna, who simply nestled deeper into Grace's arms.
"Greengrass told me I should just forget it, but how can I? Something's definitely wrong. If he's hanging around Yaxley and Rosier and he's not paying you any attention and—oh, you know, I haven't seen him slip away to the library once since we got here?" Grace shook her head. "Something's not right. And it's just—well, I know Regulus hasn't asked me for my help, but what if it's one of those situations where he needs my help but can't ask? I dunno…"
Grace let out what must have been her thousandth sigh of the day. She did not know much about what was happening; she did not know why her last year at Hogwarts was starting off so sourly or what was going through Regulus's mind or how to even help Regulus, if she could, but she did know she couldn't just give up—not yet, at least.
"He's being a knobhead," she told Cliodna smartly. "I won't tolerate knobheadery, but since it's Regulus…I'll give it till the end of the week?" She glanced down at Cliodna, and saw her warped reflection in the deep black of the cat's eyes. "What do you think?"
Cliodna mewled in response, and rubbed the side of her face against Grace's arm.
"Yeah…" Grace said absently. "It's just…I can't forget it, you know? I can't just—not with him. And I know he would do the same if the roles were reversed. I know…"
She knew the old Regulus would do the same, but the question at hand was if this new, post-summer Regulus was the same one she had known these past six years. If he was, then she had to help him. If he wasn't…then perhaps there was some truth to Greengrass's words.
Grace secured Cliodna in her arms and hurled herself up and off the couch. "Do you want to live with me in the girl's dormitory?" she asked as she padded away from the fireplace. "It's much cleaner there, I'm sure."
There was a moment of silence, and then Cliodna let out a soft, sleepy purr.
Grace smiled. "Yeah, that's what I thought."
In Grace's fifth year, after Sirius had run away from home, she and Regulus developed a pair of spellbound sheets—two spare pieces of parchment that were magically linked to one another. No matter the distance, no matter the time of day or the length of the message, whatever was written on one sheet would be immediately transported to the other. It was something Grace came up with to stay in contact with Regulus when he went home for holiday alone.
When Regulus could stand to see Sirius, when he was less surly about the affair and his parents had gotten over it all, there was no longer any need for the spellbound sheets, and so they had tucked them away between the pages of some or the other textbook and promptly forgot about them.
Until today, of course.
"It's got to be this one," Grace muttered to herself as she pulled out yet another sheet of parchment from the annals of her trunk.
Her bed was strewn with parchment she had gathered—crumpled papers with half-written notes, torn scraps from scrolls—in her haste to find her half of the spellbound sheets. The sheet she had pulled out was one of the few left and was completely unblemished; there were no wrinkles or stains. It looked like it had been torn from a brand new scroll of parchment.
Grace grabbed her quill and dipped it hastily in the ink pot that rested precariously on top of her pillow. She pressed the nib against the paper, and drew a haphazard loop. She pulled her quill away and watched carefully as the ink faded deep into the paper and disappeared entirely.
Her face split into a grin. "Yes!" she said, and replaced her dripping quill for one of the ink pens Lily had bought her for her birthday. She grabbed a textbook to hold the sheet over as she wrote and snagged her knapsack from besides her trunk before leaping out of bed.
"You'd best clean up this mess, Potter!" Fuentes called out furiously as Grace sped out of the dormitory.
"Later!" she yelled back, taking the stairs down two at a time.
She dashed out of the Slytherin common room all while balancing the textbook and sheet in her arms. She dragged the tip of her pen over the parchment wildly, trying to squeeze in all that happened this week, trying to make this past week as riveting and captivating as possible so Regulus would have no choice but to read and respond to her.
Hello—I hope you haven't lost your half of the sheet, or I'll be really upset about writing all this for no reason at all.
First off, are you okay? I mean you seem fine, but you haven't been talking to me, which is, quite honestly, a little hurtful. Does it have to do with Yaxley and Rosier? Is your mum having them keep an eye on you or something, because, if so—we can definitely sneak past them. I could trick Yaxley and Rosier in my sleep.
Grace brushed past some students, and put aside her sheet in lieu of maneuvering herself through the Hogwarts courtyard. She was heading to the penned-off section on the outskirts of the Forbidden Forest, where Professor Kettleburn was hosting his first class of the term.
Grace was caught between dread and overwhelming apathy at the prospect of assisting Kettleburn. The dread was because she hardly remembered anything from Care of Magical Creatures. She did not have any of her notes from third year (she was fairly certain she'd thrown them into the Great Lake after exams). She had hoped Regulus might help her find some books about magical creatures in the library that could help her brush up on the topic, but she had not exactly heard from Regulus recently, had she?
And that was where the apathy came into play. Regulus's strange and sudden behavior was the foremost thing on her mind, the mystery that plagued her endlessly. She could not find it in herself to actually care about assisting Kettleburn.
Grace glanced down at the sheet, and found that all she had written previously had disappeared into the parchment. She struggled to remember where she had left off but soon decided to just write about the moment:
By the way, I've got to go help Crazy Kettleburn now. Wait—I don't even think I got to mention that to you on the train! Since Divination's been cancelled, I'm down a class, and Slughorn very kindly (this is entirely sarcastic, as you've probably figured out) has arranged for me—
"Grace!" a bright, jubilant voice called out.
Grace started, and her pen dragged along the parchment jaggedly. Dark ink struck the yellowed paper, leaving a dagger of black in its wake. Grace let out a defeated sigh as her words and the stain vanished into the paper.
Sophia Hornby, with her hair in two tight plaits and a beaming smile plastered to her lips, bounded up to Grace. "Hello—I didn't think I'd see you out here. Have you got a class by the forest, too?"
Realization dawned on Grace. "Oh, Merlin," she murmured. "You aren't going to Kettleburn's class right now, are you?"
Sophia's brows rose. "I am—how'd you know that?"
"Well, there was a bit of an issue with my schedule this semester, so I'm helping Kettleburn with his third-year section—"
"This is the best news I've heard all week!" Sophia squealed. "This is so fantastic, Grace! Golightly, Green, and Preston will faint at the sight of you. Oh, I can't wait. Are you going to be grading our assignments, Grace? Can you give Golightly a T?"
"Er—well—"
"Oh," Sophia continued, "can you also take away those points from Gryffindor now? Have you made up with your Prefect friend? I can just imagine the looks on their faces when we march up to them and tell them they cost Gryffindor fifty points—for real this time, though—"
"Alright, how about we slow down for a moment," Grace interrupted. "I dunno if I'll be grading assignments, but—well, I hope I won't be, because it sounds like a drag—but if I do, I doubt I can just hand out Ts to your worst enemies willy-nilly—"
"Golightly is not my worst enemy," Sophia said immediately. "Preston is."
"Er—yeah, who is Preston?"
"He was with the others when Golightly gave me those awful antlers—"
"Oh, you mean that tall kid?"
Sophia's lips tugged into a sharp frown. "Yes. He's my worst enemy."
"Merlin," Grace muttered under her breath. "And here I thought this would be easy..."
"No—no it'll be fine," Sophia assured. "Preston wouldn't dare kick up a fuss in class when there's a professor around."
The problem was, of course, that Kettleburn hardly counted as a real professor. He was more concerned with his own side projects and pets to truly be invested in teaching. Grace was almost certain he'd retire in a few more years, probably after he lost another limb.
Grace never had time to voice these concerns to Sophia, because the duo reached the small gaggle of third-year Gryffindors and Ravenclaws scattered along the pen Kettleburn held classes in. Sophia glared sharply at Preston as she joined a huddle of Ravenclaws. Preston, in turn, sneered at Sophia.
Grace sighed to herself, and headed over to the front of the fenced-in section, where Kettleburn was handling an ashwinder with his bare hands. The man seemed much the same: his greying hair was just as shabby and unkempt, and his right eye was firmly concealed with a ragged eyepatch.
"Hullo, Professor," Grace called out hesitantly, approaching Kettleburn's work area.
The man spun around in surprise. The ashwinder curling up his arm hid its face behind his hand. "Oh—hello, there—er—"
"I'm Grace Potter," she said flatly. "I'm supposed to assist you during class. I think Slughorn talked to you about—"
"Right!" Kettleburn let out a long breath, and his shoulders fell slack. He clapped his free hand against Grace's shoulder. "Merlin, am I glad to see you. I was just about to cancel class. See—I've got to get this little feller back to his family—" he removed his hand from Grace and jutted a thumb at the ashwinder, "—as soon as possible. But now that you're here, you can go on and teach the class, and I can go."
With that, Kettleburn gathered a small toolkit from his workbench and began to limp away from Grace. His peg leg rattled unsteadily against the ground with each step. Grace stared after him for a moment, dumbfounded, before finally catching up with the events at hand.
"What?" Grace said, alarmed. She twisted around and caught up to Kettleburn, who was hurriedly hobbling away into the Forbidden Forest. "What do you mean you're leaving? You've got a class to teach!"
"No, no—you've got a class to teach."
"I—what—no, I'm just a teaching assistant," Grace spluttered.
"Yes, and you'll be teaching," Kettleburn said rather pointedly. He stopped by the edge of the forest, and turned the ashwinder to his other hand. It wound over the length of his wrist, and snuggled its head firmly between the crook of his thumb and forefinger.
"But what am I supposed to teach?" Grace whipped around wildly. There was nothing set up by the workbenches. The tables were completely bare, save for a few scorched wooden boxes gathered haphazardly on Kettleburn's work table.
"I wouldn't worry too much about the details if I were you, Potter." Kettleburn waved his free hand lazily. "I'm sure you can wrangle together some wandering cockatrices. Or if you're feeling lazy, I've got a few fire crabs in those boxes over there—"
Grace gaped at him. "You mean the wooden boxes? You put the fire crabs in wooden boxes?"
"Huh." Kettleburn scratched at the back of his head. "When you put it like that, it doesn't sound so great, does it?"
"No, it really doesn't."
He made a face. "Ah, my head's been addled ever since I ate some erkling tongues. I suppose it's a good thing you'll be teaching the class today instead of me, eh?"
"Er—"
"Well, good luck," he said plainly, and disappeared into the brush.
Grace stared at the part in the shrubbery before cradling her head in her hands and walking back to the gaggle of third years. They had devolved from their pairs and were now gathered in one large clump in the center of the work station, loudly pointing and whispering at where Kettleburn had vanished.
"Think he's finally decided to live in the wild?" one of them said as Grace approached the group.
"Maybe he's just gone to take a dump," another shrugged.
"What happened?" Sophia asked eagerly.
"Er—so, Professor Kettleburn—" Grace swung her eyes over the third years, "—is a little busy right now…so I'll be teaching you lot about, er, fire crabs. Do any of you…know about them?"
There was usually at least one know-it-all in every year, and Grace hoped desperately that that student was present today. She peered over the confused third years, dark eyes roving from student to student, waiting for one of them to raise their hand and spout out a list of facts about fire crabs.
Unfortunately, no one did.
"So…" Grace began, sidling over to Kettleburn's workbench. One of the wooden boxes was shuddering violently. "These buggers are rather volatile, so try to be careful. Er—they're from some island—can't really remember which—" several students were snickering, but Grace pointedly ignore them, "—but I'm sure it'll say in your textbook—"
"We don't have a textbook," a Gryffindor girl with blonde curls and a bored look in her eye said.
Grace faltered. "Oh. Right." Kettleburn had never assigned a textbook, but Regulus had gone and check out five different books about magical creatures on Grace's behalf when she was in third year so she could complete her assignments. "Well...I'm sure the library has some—"
"When are we going to see the fire crabs?" a Ravenclaw cried out from the back. "We've been waiting around here for nearly twenty minutes now."
"You're being very rude, Holly," Sophia told off immediately.
Holly's eyes burned. "I'm being rude?" she said. "I came here to learn, not to sit in a forest and have some random seventh-year make excuses—!"
"Technically, we're outside the forest, not in it—" another girl butted in.
"Whatever!"
"Alright, alright!" Grace snapped, quieting the students. "Let's pass out some fire crabs, shall we?"
She marched over to Kettleburn's workbench and opened one of the wooden boxes. A small crab with a glossy red-black shell and sharp pincers looked up at her with beady black eyes. It clicked its pincers rapidly, and Grace winced at the ringing sound.
She fluttered over the box for a moment, trying to decide the best way to pick the creature up and show it to the rest of the class. As long as she avoided the pincers, she'd be fine, right?
Grace gingerly grabbed the fire crab from the behind. It waved its claws around frantically, but thankfully Grace's fingers were out of the way.
"Right—so this here is a fire crab," Grace said, waving the creature over the heads of the students.
"No shit," Preston said, eliciting a few giggles from the class.
Sophia gasped. "You can't just say words like that in the middle of class!"
Preston rolled his eyes. "Well, you shouldn't be acting like such a prat in the middle of class, and yet here we are—"
"Grace!" Sophia shrieked. "Preston is being a git. Can't you assign him detention?"
"Er—"
"You can't assign me a detention if you two are on a first-name basis with each other," Preston protested. "There've got to be rules against that sort of thing. It's like favoritism or—or nepotism or something—"
"I refuse to believe you know the meaning of the word 'nepotism,'" Sophia bit.
"What? You can't just say that! That's—that's prejudice is what that is!" Preston hurled back.
"Prejudice!" Green agreed instantly.
"Merlin's pants—would you all shut it?" Grace cried out, drawing the bickering voices to a hush. "Does anyone know anything about these stupid fire crabs, or—?"
"I know you shouldn't be holding it like that," the blonde Gryffindor muttered.
Grace faltered and stared at her unsurely. "What—what do you mean?"
"Well, you don't want its bottom pointing at you, do you?" she responded easily. "Fire crabs fart out the flames, don't they?"
"Oh, fuck," Grace said, and immediately switched the fire crab toward the other direction, all while trying to keep the pincers from grabbing at her.
Unfortunately for her, she pressed a little too hard against the fire crab's underside, and as soon as she had swung the fire crab around, it let out a tremendous burst of fire. The flames shot off far into the sky, but Grace and the students could still feel the sear of the fire.
"Agh!" Grace said, and immediately dropped the crab. It skittered away and into the long grass.
Her eyes stung against the intolerable heat, and she quickly cast a cooling charm over the area. Several students let out a breath of relief. Grace's eyes swung over the small crowd, hoping that no student had been grievously injured, because that would be very hard to explain to Slughorn.
"I'm being burned alive!" Golightly screamed.
When Grace glanced at him, she saw that there was a small flame flickering along Golightly's sleeve.
"Just pat it out—"
"I'm on fire—!" Golightly repeated frantically.
"Sweet Circe—just—oh, forget it. Aguamenti!" Grace roared, and doused the entire class in a torrent of water.
"Oh, come on!" Holly cried out.
"I'm drowning!" Golightly wailed desperately. "I'm drowning!"
"You're not drowning," Grace said, voice hard. She pocketed her wand and surveyed the group of sopping wet, thoroughly put-out students. She kneaded her forehead in her hands for a moment. "You know what? I reckon you lot have learned enough today. Class is over now. Go home."
Most of the class immediately began to stalk away from Grace and the others. A few remained to shoot her dirty glances and skulk around.
One of them marched right up to her and stormily announced, "The only thing I learned today is that this was the worst class ever."
"Good, because you lot were the worst students ever," Grace snapped in response. "Just bugger off, why don't you?"
As soon as the majority of students had cleared off, Grace began to kick at the soft dirt, trying to locate the fire crab she had dropped.
"I think it went to the forest," Sophia said.
Grace sighed and flopped down onto Kettleburn's workbench. "Great," she grumbled. "That's just what I needed. I'll just—you know what? If I close the box—" she did just that, "—hopefully he won't realize it's gone. And hopefully some bigger thing will eat that crab before it sets the entire forest on fire."
"Maybe Kettleburn can catch it if you tell him?" Sophia suggested.
"Yeah—no, I'm not going to tell him anything about this. He'll probably forget the second I tell him, anyway," Grace said, gathering herself and her things. She rose from the workbench and shouldered her knapsack.
"Where are you going?" Sophia asked, alarmed.
"Back to my dormitory, so I can forget about this awful experience," Grace told her absentmindedly as she rummaged through her knapsack for the spellbound sheet.
"What? Really?" Sophia said, frowning. "But it's such a nice day out, and classes are finally over for the day, and there's so much time before dinner…"
Grace pulled out the sheet, and she frowned as her eyes scanned over the blank paper. Regulus had not responded to any of her messages. This wasn't exactly distressing. After all, it'd barely been an hour since Grace had written on the sheet to begin with. And it could be that Regulus didn't even have his half of the spellbound sheets; he might have left it at home, or it might be stuck somewhere deep in his trunk, between wads of spare parchment.
There could be any number of excuses, but none of them made Grace feel any better. She could not help the sinking in her heart. Here was yet another path to Regulus that had resulted in a dead end.
She stuffed the sheet back into her bag.
"…or if you don't like being outside, we could stay in the castle! I brought a lot of board games with me from home. Some of them are Muggle board games, though. I dunno if you've ever played any of those, but they're really quite good! The pieces don't move on their own, but my dad charmed my set of Cluedo to act out the murder, and—"
"Actually," Grace sighed, "I'd rather not play any games."
"Well…we can do something else, then?" Sophia tried.
Grace struggled to keep her frustration inside herself. It coiled tightly within her chest. She didn't want to sit inside of Hogwarts or outside of Hogwarts. She didn't want to be at Hogwarts at all, where vigilant Vance was patrolling the hallways and where Gibbon was sneering at her general direction now and again and where Greengrass was offering her not-helpful advice and where she had to see Regulus frolic about with his new friends. She wanted to get away from the disaster that was her seventh year, but where could she go?
"Oh," Grace said softly, eyes lit. "I've got an idea."
Sophia smiled. "You do?"
"Yeah—how about you meet me by the statue of the one-eyed witch on the third floor after dinner tonight?"
"So this tunnel is supposed to lead right to Hogsmeade?" Sophia asked as she followed Grace through the narrow passageway.
The tip of Grace's wand was emitting a white light. She swung it over head, lighting the stone of the tunnel. She squinted into the distance. She could just see the curve of the tunnel as it meted out into the Honeydukes cellar.
"Yeah," Grace said. "It's been here forever. I reckon some students must have built it while the Founders were still around, so they could sneak out of school without getting caught."
Sophia ran a hand along the wall. "Are there more tunnels like this one?"
Grace shrugged. "Probably. There are a couple James—my brother—found and showed me, but I dunno how many."
"We should find all of them!" Sophia suggested immediately. "It'll be cool—like a little project just for ourselves. My dad and I do things like that all the time—building bird feeders and pressing flowers and stuff. Except this is much better, because we'll be exploring. I wonder if anyone in Hogwarts has ever found all the secret tunnels and hideaways. Probably not, right?"
Grace couldn't help but smile at the enthusiasm. "Probably not," she agreed as they reached the end of the tunnel.
She pushed open the trapdoor, and hauled herself up before pulling Sophia up after her. Grace dusted herself off and glanced about the room. It was dark and shadowed, save for a sliver of light coming in from the open door up at the top of the stairs. The cellar was filled to the brim with loads of boxes and packages of neatly wrapped suites. Grace nicked a parcel of Honeydukes' new line of sweet and sour candies. She tore open the top of the packet and popped one of the candies into her mouth.
She grimaced as the taste of what seemed to be pure lemon concentrate hit her tongue. "Oh, no—that's a stinker for sure," she said, and spat out the sweet.
"How do we get out of here?" Sophia asked, marveling at the rows of stored candies and chocolates.
"Up the stairs," Grace said, pointing to the staircase hidden at the very edge of the cellar. "But before we go, we've got to disguise ourselves."
"Disguise ourselves?"
"Yeah, like…here—let's just fix that over your head…like this…" Grace settled the hood of Sophia's cloak over her head, letting the front of it flop well over her eyes, hiding her face from sight. "And try to hunch over a bit more, so people think you're just some small old woman instead of a kid sneaking out of school."
"Er—alright—like this?" Sophia curved her spine and hobbled forward.
"Yeah, that's good," Grace approved, and moved towards the staircase.
"Aren't you going to disguise yourself, too?" Sophia called out.
"What? No, of course not. I'm of age. If anyone asks what I'm doing out of Hogwarts, I'll just tell them I dropped out."
Sophia craned her neck upwards and peered at her. Her hood fell down her head. "Can't I just tell them the same?"
"No, because you're only thirteen years old, and—keep your head down," Grace insisted, tugging Sophia's hood back over the top half of her face. "Just don't bring attention to yourself, alright? Once we get out of here, you can act any way you want. I just don't want the Honeydukes clerk to catch a hold of us."
With that, Grace hurried up the stairs, pulling Sophia alongside her. They burst into the main floor of Honeydukes. A few shoppers stopped and stared at the strange duo—the hovering seventh-year who was suspiciously moving a large bundle—but Grace didn't pay them any mind, choosing to dash out the front door as quickly as possible.
Once they were out in the main street, Grace eased up and slowed her pace to a leisurely stroll. Sophia did the same, and shrugged the hood away from her face. She blinked up at Grace, taking in the small town.
"Hogsmeade is nice," she said appreciatively, casting a longing glance the Three Broomsticks. She pointed at the window of the inn, where Madam Rosmerta had put up an advertisement for a two-for-one deal. "Can we go there?"
"Er—it would be best if we didn't, actually. Madam Rosmerta—she runs the place—probably knows Hogwarts students aren't allowed to be in Hogsmeade this year, so she'd definitely tell Dumbledore if she saw a thirteen-year-old running about—"
"What if you charmed me to look older?" Sophia cut in. She ran a hand through her neatly plaited hair. "We could make my hair grey, and add wrinkles to the corners of my eyes and—"
"It'd just be easier if we went over there instead," Grace said, and pointed to a different inn down at the end of the street.
Sophia followed her line of sight, and wrinkled her nose. "There? But it looks like a dump."
It did. The sign at the front of the inn was falling off, and the paint was chipping off the walls. The windows were dusty and in need of a good wipe, and the door was fixed against its rusted hinges so insecurely that Grace was almost certain that a slight breeze would be enough to knock it down from its frame entirely.
"Yeah, it does," she agreed. "But no one at the Hog's Head is going to rat us out. The owner is Dumbledore's brother, and the rumor is that they haven't spoken to each other in years."
"Whoa," Sophia breathed. "Dumbledore has a brother?"
"Oh, yes," Grace said sagely as she swung open the door of the shabby inn and allowed Sophia to enter first. "Bathilda Bagshot herself told me."
"Bathilda Bagshot?" Sophia tested. "That name sounds familiar."
"Yeah, she wrote your History of Magic textbook."
"Oh," Sophia said, and nodded enthusiastically. "Yes—I know her. You've met her? Truth be told, she doesn't sound very interesting to me. Who writes five volumes about the same troll war? Doesn't it get sort of boring writing the same thing over and over again?"
"Sophia," Grace began gravely, "I've been saying the same thing for years now. Come on—let's get some drinks, and we can talk all about how frightfully dull Bathilda is."
Grace led Sophia up to the counter, where an old man with a bushy, deep grey beard was sat wiping a filthy glass with an even filthier rag. He glanced between the two girls wearily.
"Hullo," Grace said cheerily, slapping down a couple of Galleons onto the counter. "Two Butterbeers, please—"
"Can I have hot cocoa instead?" Sophia asked Grace.
"Cocoa?" Grace repeated. "In this weather? It's still pretty hot out—"
"Is Butterbeer cold?"
"Yeah, there are chilled Butterbeers. Haven't you had any?"
"They don't have Butterbeer at my mall."
"Well, of course they don't. That's a Muggle mall, after all."
"Oh, right." A beat passed, and then: "But suppose I don't like the Butterbeer. I know I like hot cocoa, so shouldn't I get that?"
"Wouldn't you rather a cold drink?"
"Like what?"
"Like—er—" Grace glanced unsurely at the bartender, "—what sort of drinks other than Butterbeer have you got?"
He stared at them for a long moment, dark blue eyes dancing between the two students. At last, he said, "Shouldn't you two be in school?"
Sophia froze.
Grace let out a loud, drawn-out laugh. "School? Ha—very funny—er, how about we just get two Butterbeers to go, eh?"
The bartender gave them another suspicious look, but took the coins Grace had offered from the counter and passed over two dusty bottles of Butterbeer. Grace grabbed them in one hand, and dragged Sophia out of the inn with the other.
Once they were back out in the street, amongst the huddle of passersby, Grace passed Sophia a bottle. She snapped open her own and clinked it against Sophia's.
"Cheers," she said, and took a large gulp of the drink.
Sophia took a cautious sip and beamed. "This is good!" she said, and immediately began to chug down the bottle.
"Er—yeah, it is," Grace said, eyeing the girl apprehensively. "Just don't swallow it all down in one go, okay? You might get sick."
"Sure," Sophia said agreeably and slowed down. She walked alongside Grace at a relaxed pace, eyes lingering over the row of little shops. Her gaze traced over the broomsticks on display at Spintwitches Sporting Needs. "This is so nice," she said dreamily. "I wish they hadn't cancelled Hogsmeade trips this year."
"Yeah…although I suppose they've got a good reason for it. If something were to happen in Hogsmeade, it'd be tough to get all the Hogwarts students to safety. But, hopefully all this war business will end soon, and you'll get to go on Hogsmeade trips next year."
Sophia smiled. "Yeah, that'd be nice. But won't you be gone next year?"
"If Old Sluggy doesn't keep me from graduating, I will be."
Sophia didn't laugh like how Grace expected her to. Instead, the young Ravenclaw heaved a sigh. "Yeah—so then I guess I'd have to go to Hogsmeade alone—"
"Surely you've got some other friends?" Grace interrupted, glancing down at the girl. "You were with some of the Ravenclaw girls during Care of Magical Creatures."
"Yeah, but only because we're in a study group together. We share our notes for exams. It's not like we're really friends." Sophia sighed. "It doesn't help that Moaning Myrtle's still following me around…"
Grace winced. She'd meant to go speak to the Bloody Baron about that, but amidst all the drama with Regulus she'd sort of pushed it to the back of her mind.
"Er—right, sorry about that," Grace said hastily. "I'll talk to the Bloody Baron about reigning her in when we get back to Hogwarts."
"Okay," Sophia said somewhat gloomily, "but I'm not sure how much that will help. I feel like even if Moaning Myrtle stops calling me terrible things, it won't make much of a difference in the end because the others won't stop. Preston and his friends will still call me Horrible Hornby and do irritating things like levitate my notes out the windows and—"
Grace bit the inside of her cheek. "You know what I think you should do?"
Sophia glanced up at her. "What?"
"You're obviously much more clever and talented than those prats," Grace started. "You've just got to show them how much more clever and talented you are than them, because once they realize that, they'll know that they're not a match for you."
At least that was how it worked in Slytherin. If someone hurled an insult your way but you could shut them up with one witty, well-levied remark, then there was no chance on earth that they'd ever want to cross paths with you again. It might be different with Gryffindors, but Grace felt that once Preston and his friends realized exactly who they were messing with, they'd stop.
Sophia's brows were furrowed. "But how should I show them that?"
Grace shrugged. "You could challenge them to a duel?"
"To a duel?"
"Yeah. Flitwick hosts the Dueling Club. You could ask him to officiate a match, and then you could challenge Preston and kick his arse."
"But I've never been in a duel before," Sophia started worriedly. "I'd have to learn all the rules, and then I'd have to practice, of course. And—oh—what if Preston refuses to duel with me? Then what?"
That was a fair point.
Grace and Sophia passed by the brightly decorated windows of Madam Puddifoot's tea shop. There was a cherub tucked into the corner of the display, and he was dressed in a horrendous but intricate assortment of pink doilies.
Grace pointed at it. "We'll threaten to stuff him into that outfit if he refuses to duel you."
A smile flickered across Sophia's face. She opened her mouth to ask another question, but she never got to say it because the windows shattered.
It wasn't just Madam Puddifoot's. It was every shop that was lined down the street. Every single one, at the exact same time, had the windows splinter and explode. Shards of glass rained down from every level of each building.
Grace felt them thud against the back of her robes. She shrunk into herself and dropped down to the cobblestoned street in an instant, pulling Sophia down with her. Screams littered the air—high and frantic and thoroughly distressed. Grace's heart beat against its cage rapidly. She lifted her head from the ground, and inched forward discreetly, trying to understand what had happened. Was it a charm gone wrong? A potion that hadn't been brewed correctly?
Grace felt Sophia tug at her robes, and she glanced down sharply at the young girl. Sophia was getting up from the ground, dusting off stray fragments of glass from her robes.
"There," she whispered, gaze trapped at the opposite end of the street.
Grace looked further down, and saw a half-dozen figures descend down the street. Their cloaks were a deep black and whipped wildly in the wind. Their faces were obscured by silver masks. One of them was shouting spells with an outstretched wand, presumably causing the breakdown of the shops that lined Hogsmeade.
She had seen them before—in newspapers, in photographs from James's Auror files. She knew what this was.
"Come on," Grace said hurriedly. Her voice was shaking. She gathered Sophia up. "Come on—we've got to go—"
"Morsmorde!" one of them cried out, and an enormous green apparition appeared over Gladrags, the shop opposite them.
Grace didn't stop to look at it, but several others did. They stopped and pointed at it. Some drew their own wands out, others began to Apparate out of the town. Hogsmeade was awash in jets of red and green lights. Grace silently cast a shield charm over herself and Sophia as they sped along towards Honeydukes.
"Is that—is that—" Sophia's voice trembled.
"Don't think about it. Let's go—just—we're going, we're going," Grace said, although she was mostly saying the words for her own benefit.
They sped over the rubble of the street. Grace kept looking over her shoulder despite herself. She could not help the hammer-beat of her heart, the creeping feeling that any moment now, at a single turn of her head, she would find one of those cloaked figures behind her, wand brandished in the air.
"Where are we going?" Sophia panted besides her.
"Honeydukes," Grace answered immediately, craning her neck back, eyes darting over the horizon, making sure there was enough distance between them and the invasion. "Into the tunnel, and back to Hog—agh!"
Her foot caught under a fallen brick, and she lost her momentum, tumbling over the rest of the street. She twisted around and tried to catch herself from falling, but to no avail. She spun downward, the hilt of her palms hitting roughly against the stone of the street. Her head tumbled against the ground, and then her back—and then, finally, it stopped.
She landed in a pool of broken glass, but it didn't hurt in the slightest. It was as if she'd landed in a field of soft flowers and damp grass instead. She patted the ground. The shards of glass felt very real—solid and jagged along the edges. She ran a finger down the length of one, and felt a sting as it sliced against her skin.
"What…?" Grace mumbled.
"Grace!" Sophia said urgently, catching up to her.
She gave Grace a hand and helped her up. Grace rose and dashed over the final length of the distance. Honeydukes itself was largely untouched, but so were most of the shops along the end of the little town. Grace hurried down the stairs and into the cellar. Once she was at the trapdoor, she pushed Sophia into the tunnel, followed behind, and closed the hole behind her. Her wand flew over the entranceway frantically as she muttered every possible sealing charm she knew. This was the only passageway Grace knew of that led from Hogsmeade straight into Hogwarts, and she would kiss a banshee before she allowed a single Death Eater the chance to use it to sneak inside the castle.
The cracks in the trapdoor melted away entirely, melding perfectly into the surrounding stonework of the building. Grace let out a long breath, and slumped against the crook in the wall. Her eyes flickered to Sophia, who was staring wide-eyed at the sealed entrance, arms wrapped tightly around herself. Her hands were trembling.
"I'm sorry," Grace said uselessly. "Dumbledore banned trips to Hogsmeade for a reason. I should have realized. I'm so sorry." The words sounded so empty and hollow, but Grace didn't know what else to say. "I—let's just get back, yeah?"
Silently, Grace began to lead Sophia back through the winding tunnels. The tip of her wand was lit, casting long shadows against the walls. Every now and then, Grace glanced back at the young girl. She was no longer shaking, but she seemed deep in thought. Her arms were still clamped tightly around her body.
"Thanks for the Cushioning Charm, by the way," Grace said lamely as they neared the mouth of the tunnel. She could just make out the silhouette of the one-eyed witch statue.
Sophia looked up at her and blinked. "The what?"
Grace glanced down at her. "I was falling, but you put that Cushioning Charm."
"No, I—no, maybe it was the Hog's Head bartender?" Sophia offered just as they reached the threshold of the tunnel. Her voice was quietest Grace had ever heard. "He came out when we started running…"
Maybe it was him, but Grace couldn't summon the energy to lend it much more thought. She reached the end of the tunnel, and stepped into Hogwarts. The statue of the one-eyed witch closed behind them, and Grace glanced around the bare corridor. There were a few distant torches hung onto the walls, but it did little to ease the shadows of the long, desolate hallway. She took the first step forward, and the echo of her shoes against the stone floor only served to make the emptiness of the castle more pronounced.
Sophia followed behind almost mechanically, and Grace began to lead her to the Hospital Wing without quite thinking. It was for the best, really. Perhaps there was some wound the younger girl had suffered but didn't notice in the heat of the moment. Besides, Grace could use the calm yet stern bedside manner of the old matron right now.
"I—I've seen them before, you know."
Grace stopped short, and Sophia collided into her back. Grace twisted around to the Ravenclaw. "Sorry—what did you say?"
"I've seen them before, the Death Eaters," Sophia said again, and this time her voice was drawn out, tight and tired. She blinked up at Grace, and seemed to age twenty years in the span of a second. "There are a lot of Muggle-borns in my town. My mum's one, too. They came there in the middle of the summer last year. I was out in the park. I knew they who they were, because I've read all the Prophet articles—even the really bad ones that Dad tries to hide—so I hid in the hedges. But the others didn't, and—and they took—" tears pricked the corners of her eyes, and Grace wanted to reach out and pluck the story right from the young girl's throat, have Sophia forget whatever memory it was that was causing her such distress, perhaps even Obliviate the moment as it unfolded from her mind, "—they took little Harris and spun him around in the air and made him scream and—and then someone got Harris's dad, but they just put him up in the sky, too, and by the time the Aurors got there…they were both just in the grass, and they weren't moving…."
Grace's hand trembled as it grasped Sophia's upper arm. "I'm sorry," she forced out after a moment. Her voice was cracked and world-weary. Her mouth was the driest it had ever been. She was parched of words, too tired to summon something better to say. Perhaps there wasn't anything better to say.
"We should have moved after that. Mum wanted to, but Dad said that would be like giving in," Sophia sniffled out after a moment. She rubbed furiously at the tears that escaped her eyes. "He said it'd go away soon, that the Ministry was dealing with it…but if they're coming to Hogsmeade that means they could come to Hogwarts, doesn't it? What if they come here, Grace? What are we supposed to do?"
Grace swallowed thickly. She remembered those faraway summers she spent at Uncle Charlus and Aunt Dorea's, the late night games she pestered cousin Ollie into playing with her and James. She remembered the grim slope of her father's mouth and the teary red of her mother's eyes when they'd gotten news of her uncle and aunt's passing. She remembered the day she got the owl about Ollie—how sunny it had been, how unlike a day for death. And she remembered the day James had gotten his letter of acceptance from the Ministry, too, the day he was supposed to begin their Auror program, the day he was supposed to throw himself into the war.
Silence ballooned between the two of them. The hallway seemed to grow longer and darker.
"I want to go home," Sophia said at last.
The words Hogwarts is home were on the tip of Grace's tongue, but they didn't seem particularly true anymore.
Grace pressed against the thin cut along her finger. "Me, too."
A/N : I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Sorry for the long break I took, but I honestly won't be able to pump out chapters as quickly as I have before. I have this story planned out to the very last detail, but writing it all is very time consuming and now that I'm back at college and working part-time, it's very difficult to find time to write anything at all. I do intend on finishing it though, so please bear with me!
Thank you for all the faves, follows, and reviews! Please keep reviewing and letting me know what you think; I love hearing your insight and encouragement :)
dragonsnot : Thank you for your reviews on Flying and Falling! They were wonderful to read! I'm so glad you found Grace's shenanigans funny, and I'm immensely honored that you felt Grace's condition was handled well.
Reticulated : (This is for your review on Flying!) I'm so glad you enjoyed the story and characters. I do agree it's sort of difficult to stomach the jump from first year to seventh year. I debated for a long time over whether or not I should jump to Grace's sixth year instead of seventh, but decided seventh was better simply because James (and co.) would be out of Hogwarts. (Mild spoiler: There will definitely be at least two sequences of memories played out that should help bridge the gap between Grace's first and seventh year.)
Dreambeliever13 : Wow, thank you so much for your review and compliments! (I don't know if you've already read Flying or not, but it gives a lot more background and somewhat pertinent info/insight into OCs and minor characters!)
madxmaddie : So happy to hear you've taken a shine to Grace and are enjoying the story! The confrontation is coming…
QueenAnarchy2.0 : Again, thank you for the wonderful review and the lovely compliment about the pace! And thank you for that little tidbit about the stages of grief; it's actually very useful. You're right; most of Grace's friends have graduated already. Many students and their families have gone into hiding this year, so an assumption I was leaning towards is that there are generally just less people for Grace to socialize this year to begin with. That being said, there still are other students she can hang out with (familiar face coming up in the next chapter!), but she's sort of hyper-focusing on Regulus because of his incredibly strange behavior. When you mentioned dating, I got sort of conflicted, because I was planning on introducing her history with Davey Gudgeon later on. After thinking it over, I decided it might be less jarring/random if I introduced him now, so thank you for that! I'm so glad that you're finding Sophia exciting and interesting! Grace has not met Kreacher, but Regulus has mentioned him. I'm happy that the PM made you happy! I love the questions and how you engage with the story; it makes my writing feel very worthwhile. :)