This summer has been the craziest of my life. I had my five year old sister and nephew over last week so I didn't have a ton of time to write. I also had an incessant plot bunny bugging me, so I had to get it out of my head.
I think I'm fully prepared to live life as normal again. As a warning, I am busy all of this weekend as well, so I'm not sure if I will be able to update on time. Independence Day and my birthday will also throw a wrench in my writing plans, but after that I think we're in the clear for quite some time, so I should be able to update as normal.
Anyway, enjoy!
Chapter Twenty
The Three Broomsticks was packed full of students enjoying their free afternoon away from the castle. It took a great deal of effort for Nessa to maneuver through the group of people in the pub while Remus ordered drinks. On her way through, she spotted the twins, Lee, and Tori sitting with Ron in the middle of the room, and Hermione, who appeared to be sitting by herself and going over a notebook that looked distinctly like the one she used for S.P.E.W.
There was another guilty twinge in her gut — she really should find more time to help Hermione with the group. She was the only other one who really took it seriously. If she could convince the twins to join, it might make things a bit easier — they were always surrounded by large groups of students and they had a lot of sway in the castle.
The only problem was she didn't exactly see how she would manage that when they were both so insistent that house elves were happy the way things were. Perhaps if she distracted George with snogging and then asked him…
She jumped when Remus appeared next to her again, and tried very hard to pretend that she hadn't been thinking about snogging George a second earlier. As if her friends hadn't embarrassed her enough already with the same conversational topic.
"Butterbeer with whipped cream and cinnamon," he said, handing her the drink in question and sitting down with a butterbeer of his own.
"Thank you," she said awkwardly, taking a large sip and keeping her gaze away from her boyfriend across the room.
Instead, she was forced to focus on everyone else in the room, all of whom looked cheerful and relaxed. Ernie Macmillan and Hannah Abbott were swapping Chocolate Frog cards at a nearby table, both of them sporting Support Cedric Diggory! Badges on their cloaks. Cho Chang and a group of her Ravenclaw friends were laughing at a table by the door. Even her own friends appeared to be in good spirits despite what they knew was coming next.
She wished she were in the same position at the moment. Or at least able to compartmentalize enough that she could think about anything except the anxiety in her gut. Every minute that ticked by seemed to increase the feeling minutely and she was sure that she would be entirely useless come Tuesday morning.
What would it have been like for her if Harry's name hadn't come out of the Goblet of Fire? For one thing, she could go back to worrying incessantly about her O.W.L.s to the point that she drove her friends insane and George was forced to hide her books around the common room to get her to relax for an hour before bed. That felt like only yesterday, and she suddenly wished it were the same again now. Because now, she didn't care about her O.W.L.s at all anymore. She simply did her homework out of habit.
She wouldn't be sitting here in a crowded pub with her godfather — she'd have been with her own friends, laughing about some ridiculous prank the twins and Tori had pulled on the Slytherins or telling them off for bothering Snape. Ron would have been sitting with her brother and Hermione, not hiding under his Invisibility Cloak to get away from the whispers and staring.
She'd still be talking to Cedric instead of ignoring him completely every time they passed in the halls and sitting at different tables in the library. She might still have been a bit anxious, knowing that he was going to face something potentially deadly on Tuesday, but it wouldn't be near as intense. She might even have studied with him or helped him prepare. She would have been cheering him on in the stands instead of wondering if she would pass out the moment the task started.
But none of that was happening at all. Instead, she was sitting at a table and forced to think about how much nicer it would be if she were anyone else in the world. How much calmer her life would be. Wondering how the dominoes had all fallen in this particular order and led her life into this sort of chaos.
"I can see what George meant."
Nessa's gaze shot from the cheerful students around her to her godfather. He looked perfectly calm as he drank his butterbeer, but he was watching her very closely over the rim of his glass. She had the distinct impression that he had been watching her for quite some time.
"Sorry?" she said, forcing herself to focus on having a conversation with him instead of her own misery. He had come all this way specifically to see her — it was rude of her to be elsewhere.
"You seem distracted," he said simply.
"George said I seem distracted?" she queried disbelievingly.
Remus chuckled.
"Not in those words," he said. "He's quite creative in most aspects of his life," She didn't even want to know what that meant, so she forced herself not to ask for the particular phrasing that had been used. "But he did say he's been having a difficult time getting you to relax."
She shot her boyfriend a guilty look at these words. He worked particularly hard to keep her positive and upbeat, and she'd been clingy lately because of it. He never complained, but she supposed it wasn't a particularly easy place to be, especially not for someone who worried about so little.
She probably should find a better way to cope with the immense feelings, but she hadn't quite figured out how to do that yet.
"It's been a rough start to the year," she said, keeping her voice as light as possible. "O.W.L.s are a bit more intense than I was expecting —"
"And Harry?"
She sighed heavily. It always came down to him, didn't it? She might have managed this year if he weren't always attracting trouble like a magnet.
"He's fine," she lied. He gave her a disbelieving look, and she sighed heavily, setting her drink down and leaning back into her chair. She needed a drink much stronger than this one. "He's about what you'd expect. We don't really talk about it."
Remus nodded thoughtfully, looking around the room casually.
"Is he staying in the castle?"
"No, he's with Hermione," she said, nodding toward the table Hermione appeared to be sitting in alone. "He's under the cloak. It was hard enough to convince him to come at all when everyone looks at him like he's dirt on their shoes."
Remus made a noise of understanding, and she grimaced at him.
"The badges are a nice touch," he said conversationally. "Very inventive."
She snorted and rolled her eyes before giving him a hard look.
"Don't start," she said irritably. "They were Malfoy's idea apparently. Almost the entire school wears them now."
Remus chuckled as if this were amusing somehow.
"Some things never change," he said in response to her incredulous look. Setting his drink down on the table, he leaned forward and clasped his hands together. "Your brother is more capable than you give him credit for."
"Everyone keeps saying that," she huffed. "Do you all think that I don't know that?"
Remus raised an eyebrow at her. She could tell he was debating something in his head, weighing his words carefully to determine how well she might take them. She liked that very little — he was rational to a fault, and oftentimes that rationalization came across very blunt.
"You have a tendency of treating him as though he is a child, Vanessa," he said eventually. "He isn't one —"
"He is one," she said firmly, feeling her anger spike a little. "He's fourteen and he's been through more than people twice his age. He deserves a childhood."
"I agree," he said calmly, ignoring the harsh expression on her face. "But it helps no one to fixate on that. None of us want him taking part in this tournament, Nessa, but it's the hand he's been dealt. You have to trust that he knows enough to pull himself out of this."
She rolled her eyes at him, but said nothing. They'd had this conversation before — his belief that she worried too much, sacrificed too much to spare her brother the stress of his life, was always met with stony silence from her. His insistence that she deserved a childhood as much as Harry did swayed her very little. Her childhood was nearly over, as far as the wizarding world was concerned. In two years, she'd be of age, so as far as she was concerned, it was too late for her. Her brother still had time to worry about homework and staying up too late and breaking school rules — normal school rules like curfew or snogging in empty classrooms or forgetting his homework. Her brother deserved to be watching the tournament play out, enjoying the excitement of it, rather than risking his neck playing in it.
And maybe she did treat him a little bit like a child, overreacting any time someone so much as looked at him wrong, refusing to believe that he could handle this without her help, putting herself through the same sort of misery she was sure he was feeling when all she had to do was watch from the sidelines.
Maybe she was overprotective to the extreme. Maybe she was sacrificing more of her time and energy than was healthy. Maybe it was dangerous of her that there was nothing she could think of that would stop her from sparing him pain or misery.
She didn't care though. Her brother was her Achilles heel. He always had been.
"You've tried convincing me to see this way before, and it's gotten us nowhere," she griped. "Do we really need to get into this again?"
"You are very loyal, Vanessa," he said quietly. "It's commendable, but you walk a very fine line. There is very little that I imagine you would not give to keep Harry safe. There is very little that you would not sacrifice that would keep him from fighting altogether, even if it cost you your life. That's a very dangerous mindset to have —"
"So what is your suggestion, Remus?" she scoffed. "That I sit idly by and let him risk his life?"
"Of course not," he said seriously. "Suggesting that you let Harry deal with anything on his own would be wasted breath. He's your brother, and you've spent your life caring for him — you will help him in any way that you can. My only point is that you must learn to accept that he is not unable to help himself. You have raised him well, Vanessa. He is a good man; he has his head on his shoulders, and he is perfectly capable of keeping himself safe. I saw first hand what he is capable of last year. Help him prepare in every way that you know how, give him the confidence he needs to succeed in this, support him and his decisions. He needs you in the same way that you need him, but I implore you to remain rational. There are things coming that none of us can protect him from. Even you."
The words were ominous enough that she hesitated in arguing. Truthfully, her life meant very little to her when she considered the alternative was losing him in any capacity.
"What does that mean?" she said, a knot developing in her stomach.
"There are whispers, Vanessa," he said heavily, running a hand through his hair and looking exhausted. "Ones that can't be ignored. Strange disappearances, rumblings among the creatures that he was previously aligned with, I've even heard of some of the Azkaban prisoners rambling about what's coming."
"They aren't exactly trustworthy though, are they?" she said.
"Not on their own, no," he agreed. "But there is too much to ignore, and any information could be useful, no matter how far-fetched. If Voldemort returns, Harry will be his target, for reasons that I'm sure are obvious to you. Your unending loyalty to him could put you both in danger. Should Voldemort return, he will play on that loyalty if it means getting what he wants. He will stop at nothing to get his hands on you or Harry —"
"He has no interest in me," she said hesitantly. "He's always wanted Harry —"
"You are much smarter than that, Vanessa," Remus reprimanded. She had the distinct feeling of being scolded for getting into the cookie jar without permission. "He is interested in anyone and anything that can get him information on Harry. You are a minefield of information, moreso should he realize what lengths you will go to keep him safe."
"I can't pretend like I don't care about him," she whispered, staring in her brother's direction despite the fact that she couldn't see him. Hagrid and Moody were speaking with Hermione now, and she wondered if they knew her brother was there with them.
"I'm not asking you to," he said calmly. "Harry has many people who care for him, myself included. We will all sacrifice to keep Voldemort from regaining power or from hurting him in any way." The words made her insides settle a little — she knew this was true. Even if she took herself and Remus out of the equation, he had Sirius and the Weasleys and Hermione to fall back on as well. His support system was not small. "I am only asking that you think before you act on his behalf. Hexing Lucius Malfoy and offering yourself as champion in Harry's place are very dangerous positions to put yourself in —"
She huffed in irritation — no one in the entire world could keep their mouths shut about anything, could they?
"I'll concede about Lucius Malfoy, but if I could have taken Harry's place in the tournament then —"
"You are of no use to Harry dead, Vanessa," he said bluntly. "The choices you will have to make should Voldemort return will be much more difficult and much more dangerous to you. I need to know that you can make those decisions without putting yourself at risk."
She eyed him for a long time. She could lie and say that she could, but she didn't think she would be able to. She had considered several scenarios in the event that Voldemort returned, and all of them ended in her brother living a long life — none of them had really considered if the same would be true for her. If he died, she would die with him, and that was just simply not a universe that she wanted to consider.
The world was a much better place with her brother in it, and that was it.
"Do you think he's going to return?"
She knew that he had picked up on her subject change without answering his question. He was not stupid — on the contrary, he was one of the smartest people she'd ever met. There was a disappointment behind his eyes, but he answered her anyway.
"I do," he said honestly. She flinched; they weren't the words she wanted to hear. "The atmosphere outside the castle is…it's much like it was before when he was gaining power. Dumbledore seems to agree, although we're still unclear on how he's going to do it."
Nothing about this visit was making her feel better at the current moment. It was really just adding to the stress that she'd already felt, and she was tempted to make her excuses and go back to the castle to hide for the rest of the day. There was nothing really like staring at her ceiling and thinking of every worse case scenario until she couldn't sleep. Instead, she sighed heavily and looked at him miserably.
"I thought this visit was supposed to make me feel better," she muttered.
The serious expression he'd been wearing broke into a grin that looked decidedly wolfish. She wondered idly if his more wolfish characteristics had developed after he'd been bitten or if it were because he had bitten that his features and height had changed.
"I think we both know that my chances of lessening your anxiety are quite small," he said kindly. "I'm not a miracle worker."
She snorted and rolled her eyes.
"I can see why you and Sirius ended up friends," she said seriously, but jumped on the opportunity to talk about something that might turn the conversation to something far less depressing. "Have you heard from him lately?"
"I have," he said soberly, frowning out the window. "He seems very intent on speaking with Harry tonight. I tried to advise against it, but — well, he isn't the easiest man to reason with, truth be told."
Nessa hid her grin behind her glass and tried not to mention that it sounded distinctly like someone else she knew.
"Harry is excited to talk to him," she said as a way to relax him a little. "I think it's the only thing that's really gotten him through the last several weeks."
Remus sighed heavily.
"Yes, Sirius is excited to see him. He's having a hard time accepting that he's on the run, I think," he said truthfully. "And he still hasn't heard from Tori."
Nessa didn't look away from him when he met her eyes, a clear question on his face. She wasn't putting herself in the middle of that situation. Tori hadn't spoken about him, and she'd changed the subject any time that she'd brought it up. Nessa wasn't sure where she was in her head, but it wasn't her business to be an owl between her and her father.
"Do you know what he wants to talk to him about?" she said instead.
"Probably about the same things I wanted to talk to you about," he said simply. "The whispers we've been hearing, to be careful. I'm sure he's interested in how he's feeling about the task. Although I take from your demeanor, he isn't feeling great about it."
She sighed — so much for talking about something that didn't stress her out.
"Maybe if we had some idea of what he was facing," she said in frustration. "But they aren't supposed to know anything. I've seen Cedric and Krum poring over books in the library, but none of them have any idea what they're facing, so I'm not sure that would help much. Besides, getting Harry into the library is about as easy as pulling teeth."
Remus chuckled.
"James was the same way," he said nostalgically. "I couldn't get him into the library to save my life. Did they give them any clues as to what it might be?"
"No," she said petulantly. His lips twitched in amusement, but he refrained from laughing. "They haven't told them a single goddamn thing. I don't know how to help him if I don't know what he's up against."
The words had come out sad and desperate, and Remus leaned forward to place a hand on her shoulder in comfort.
"Harry will figure this out, Vanessa. We're all here to help him, and Dumbledore has assured me over and over again that he cannot be hurt," he said gently. "None of us will rest until he is safe. Have faith in that."
She took in a slow breath and nodded at him, smiling in thanks.
"Everything is just…so chaotic, Remus," she admitted. "I can't focus on anything anymore. The school hates us, and they keep wearing those stupid badges everywhere. Murton has been a real bit — piece of work," she amended hastily. She was entirely certain he knew what she'd been about to say, but he didn't say anything as she unloaded her feelings on him. "Harry's got the task, me and Cedric aren't talking, Tori's pretending like she isn't a mess over Sirius, and Ron won't speak to Harry. Plus I have O.W.L.s. And Madame Pomfrey keeps telling me that she's going to shove a Calming Draught down my throat soon."
"She's got a wonderful bedside manner, Poppy," Remus said when she paused to take a breath. Nessa snorted and gave him a look that conveyed her own annoyance with the matron as of late. She was learning a great deal from her, but the older woman truly had very little patience. "She is, unfortunately, very good at her job however. Don't push yourself too hard, Vanessa."
"Easy for you to say," she muttered. "And Rita Skeeter is poking around now…did you see that article she wrote about Harry?"
"I did," he said, lips twitching. "I can only imagine how Harry felt about that."
Nessa gave him an exasperated look.
"He's very sensitive about people thinking he cries about our parents every night, so don't bring it up," she warned. Remus hid his grin behind his mug.
"Noted," he snorted. "Rita Skeeter can be handled — just stay clear of her, and don't give her any reason to dislike you. If you think what she wrote about you in that article was bad, it's nothing compared to what she writes about people she despises."
Nessa believed him, if only because the woman didn't appear to have many friends within the Wizarding World. Nearly everyone talked about her as if she were a cockroach in their home — impossible to catch and even harder to kill. She had no interest in knowing what it would be like to get on her bad side.
"As for the other things, Ron will come around when he sees Harry competing, and the school will come around as well. Jealousy is a powerful emotion, and Hufflepuffs aren't well known for their bravery. I'm sure this is quite the big deal for them."
She knew that too, but she didn't care. It was childish, was what it was. They might change their minds about Harry after the task, but he could still lose a limb before that happened, and she'd never forgive them if that were the case.
"I think we'll all feel quite a bit better once the first task is behind us," he said with a heavy sigh.
She picked at her nails, afraid to ask him the question that she'd most wanted to ask him since she'd seen him again.
"Do you think that he can win?"
Remus didn't answer for a long moment, weighing his options in his mind's eye.
"I do," he said finally. "I knew your parents very well, and neither one of them would have taken this lying down. I think it's safe to say that they passed that particular trait down to your brother. He'll persevere, just as he always has." He gave her a long look. "And you will protect him, just as you always have. There are very few people who intimidate me as much as the two of you."
It was very similar to what George had told her, and it soothed her a little to know that he wasn't the only one who seemed to think that Harry stood a chance in this competition. Her friends might lie to spare her the worry, but Remus was honest to a fault.
It didn't exactly make her feel a ton better about Tuesday, but at least she could try to get some sleep this weekend, knowing that there were people who believed in her brother. He could use that at the moment.
"Now tell me about Cedric," Remus said abruptly.
She knew he was changing the subject, but she didn't care. She sighed heavily and unloaded her frustrations with her friend anyway, his words sticking with her even as she got lost in the conversation with him.
He'll persevere, just as he always has.
"Where in the hell is Harry?" Tori snarled in irritation.
Nessa really wished she'd quit asking; it was making it difficult not to be anxious about the fact that he wasn't here yet, and her incessant questions were making it harder to ignore.
Harry had been so excited to speak with Sirius that she didn't believe that he'd have blown the entire thing off. No, if he wasn't here yet then whatever Hagrid had had to show him in the forest couldn't be anything good.
Maybe it had eaten him…
"I don't think anything ate him," Fred snorted, making her realize that she'd spoken aloud.
"Don't say it so casually, mate," George warned. "It's Hagrid we're talking about, innit?"
Nessa couldn't tell if he was joking, so she threw a pillow at him in reproach just to be safe. Based on his laughter, she assumed that he had been.
The twins were the only two of them who appeared calm in the current situation. It was ten till one, and they were waiting — quite impatiently — for Sirius to appear in the fireplace. Nessa kept looking at it as if it might explode in front of her, ready to jump out of her skin the moment she saw his face looking back at her.
Tori was pacing behind the couch, muttering to herself in a vicious tone. Something that sounded distinctly like "Pull yourself together, Victoria. He's just a man," over and over again. Nessa had not had the heart to ask her about her feelings about the entire thing before they'd all met in the common room when everyone had gone to bed. She was feeling distinctly like she should have now because she wasn't entirely sure that her best friend was going to survive the encounter, but it was a little too late to get into the entire thing now.
She really should be better about being selfish about her own feelings lately…She was falling to pieces around everyone, and ignoring them as they did the same. She was a horrible friend at the moment.
A problem for another moment, perhaps, because she was too busy worrying and watching the clock above the mantle as the minutes ticked by.
Where in the hell was Harry?
She bounced her knee rapidly, looking around the room anxiously. The room was in semi-darkness; the flames were the only source of light. Nearby on a table, there were a pair of Support Cedric Diggory! badges that the Creevey brothers had been trying to "improve." They glinted in the firelight, making the words on them twinkle at her like they were mocking her. They now read POTTER REALLY STINKS.
Because she was crazy, she growled under her breath, stomped over to the table, and chucked both of them into the rubbish bin. Fred watched her with raised brows, and snorted indelicately.
"So much for Lupin calming her down, eh?" he said to no one in particular. "You're flying off the handle, munchkin."
She sent him a rude gesture that sent him into a fit of laughter and started grumbling to herself.
Seeing Remus had calmed her to some degree — it was nice to see him in person, to know that he was doing well, and was there to help her through this. It often felt like she was in the entire thing alone, even though she, logically, knew that that wasn't true. It also helped to know that he had such faith in her ability to protect Harry and Harry's ability to protect himself. Her friends were naive sometimes, blinded by their childhoods, and didn't always see things in the way that she needed. They were the kind of positive that wasn't always realistic, but Remus had been jaded from a very young age. He'd experienced enough heartbreak, fought in a war and lived, been betrayed and mocked, and seen the ugliness the world had to offer; he had the sort of realistic opinion that she needed at a time like this when the world felt like that all around her.
She hadn't wanted false platitudes or optimistic smiles, and he hadn't given them to her. She appreciated him all the more for it.
Plus, he'd forced her around Hogsmeade after their more serious conversation in the pub, dragging her through Honeydukes, pointing out items at Zonko's that her father had been partial to, regaling her of stories about her parents. He'd been very adept at keeping the conversation light for the remainder of their trip, and it had been hard to dwell too much on her problems when he was so calm and carefree.
But, of course, life always came crashing back down, and it was doing so now. Hermione had told them that Hagrid had asked Harry to come with him at midnight to show him something in the forest. He wouldn't say what it was, and Hermione had tried to convince Harry not to go because it might make him late for his meeting with Sirius, but he hadn't listened. Nessa could have killed him, but Hermione had advised that it seemed important before she'd gone up to bed. She'd told them that Sirius had asked to speak with Harry alone, and that they shouldn't wait up here, but Nessa had merely looked at her like that was the stupidest thing she'd ever said to her.
Except now she was listing all of the creatures that lived in the Forbidden Forest in her head and wondering what could possibly be so important to show him in there.
Werewolves, vampires, Acromantulas, trolls, thornbacks…
"This isn't exactly what I meant when I said I wanted to meet alone."
Tori swore under her breath, whirling around to stare at the fireplace with an expression of fearful anticipation. Sirius's head was sitting in the fire, and if Nessa hadn't seen the same thing occur at the Burrow over the summer, she might have screamed bloody murder.
He looked different from the last time she'd seen him. Last summer his face had been gaunt and sunken, surrounded by a quantity of long, black, matted hair — but the hair was short and clean now, his face was fuller, and he looked younger, much more like the photograph she'd seen of him in the photo album she kept upstairs. She gaped at him for a long moment, both because he was sitting in front of her and because his resemblance to Tori now was particularly striking.
"Sirius," George said, sitting forward on the couch eagerly. "How are you?"
Sirius wasn't listening — Tori's words had caused him to tilt his head in her direction, and he was staring at her with the sort of awe he'd had the last time he'd seen her. Tori was staring at him like a deer in headlights, completely frozen in place.
"Victoria," Sirius said, his voice cracking with an emotion that made Nessa's heart squeeze in her chest. "You haven't — how have you been?"
Tori looked like she might bolt. Or start crying, and neither option seemed particularly good to Nessa, so she stepped closer to her best friend and laced their fingers together. Tori jolted as if she'd been electrocuted and tore her gaze away from her father to look at their hands.
"What's this about, Sirius?" Nessa said, dragging the man's gaze to her instead, and giving Tori the opportunity to breathe through her panic. Tori squeezed her hand hard, trying desperately to keep her panicked breaths from sawing out of her too loudly.
Sirius snorted, giving Nessa a passing glance, his eyes alight with amusement and concern.
"Always nice to speak with you, Vanessa —"
"Don't call me that."
He smirked, but nodded in acquiescence.
"I've come to check on Harry," he said as if this were obvious. He eyed her up and down again and frowned. "How are you doing?"
Nessa reared back in surprise at the question. She didn't know why, really — if he was as close with her father as she'd been led to believe then he would obviously care for her as much as he did for Harry. But, truthfully speaking, she hadn't been the kindest to him the previous summer — not because she didn't like or appreciate him, of course, but because her best friend could not quite handle the love and adoration he directed at her, and she'd been deflecting his attention onto herself instead.
"I'm fine," she lied eventually.
Fred and George shared an exasperated look, but before either of them could rat her out, Sirius had snorted again, giving her a disbelieving look.
"You're a horrible liar," he said bluntly. "Although, I can't say I blame you. I didn't want to say too much in my letters, but the tournament concerns me a great deal. Someone appears to be having a nice go at getting Harry killed, and the fact that they did it under Dumbledore's nose…it was a very risky thing to do."
She hated hearing it aloud, she really did. He'd said it in his letter before, but somehow hearing him voice the words made them more tangible, more real. Her heart thundered in her chest and her mind raced for something to say that didn't feel anxious or overbearing.
"You need to be careful, Nessa," he continued before she could. "Just because they're targeting Harry doesn't mean they have no interest in you."
"What does that mean?" Tori demanded from next to her, straightening angrily.
Sirius seemed momentarily taken aback by her inquiry. It was the most Tori had said to him at all, and certainly with more conviction in her tone than their previous encounters had been. He recovered quickly, clearing his throat and saying, "She has knowledge on Harry that could be useful. She knows him better than anyone else, even Ron and Hermione. She's not safe just because she isn't the primary target."
"Remus said the same thing," Nessa said before Tori could retort. The twins and Tori turned to stare at her as if she'd done them a personal wrong by not sharing this information with them. "I'm not concerned —"
"You should be," Sirius said firmly. "They will use you to hurt him —"
"She would never tell them anything about Harry," Tori snorted. "She'd die before she did that."
"Perhaps, but if this is really who we suspect, they have ways of extracting that information," Sirius said, his tone harder than Nessa had ever heard from him when he spoke to his daughter. "And if they can't, they will certainly make her wish she was dead."
There was a foreboding silence following these words, and Nessa tried to ignore the way they had the ability to make her want to be violently ill.
"My concern is for Harry," she said softly. "At the moment, he's the only one of us in immediate danger."
Sirius sighed, looking exhausted, and a hand appeared so that he could rub at his eyes.
"He is my immediate concern as well, but I want all of you to be aware of what's going on around you. Even the smallest whisper, I want to know about. Things are looking…odd out here."
"What do you mean?" Fred said, brows furrowing.
Before he could answer, the portrait hole swung open. Fred and George shot to their feet to block the view of the fireplace but it was only Harry, pulling off his Invisibility Cloak and nearly out of breath. All of them relaxed and blew out a breath of relief, but Nessa swelled angrily.
"Where have you been?" she snapped. "You're late —"
"Sirius, is he —" The question halted immediately when the twins stepped aside and he could see Sirius's face in the flames. There was a momentary shock before his face broke into the first smile that Nessa had seen from him in days. Her anger deflated immediately and she could have thrown herself through the fireplace and hugged Sirius for that alone. Harry scrambled closer to the fireplace and fell to his knees in front of the hearth. "Sirius — how're you doing?"
"Never mind me, how are you?" the older man said seriously.
"I'm —" For a second, Nessa was sure he was going to lie and say that he was "fine." A lie if she'd ever heard one, but whatever he saw in Sirius's face seemed to pull something out of him, and her brother was talking more than he had in days. He told him about how no one believed he hadn't entered the tournament of his own free will, how Rita Skeeter had lied about him in the Daily Prophet, how he couldn't walk down a corridor without being sneered at — and about Ron, Ron not believing him, Ron's jealousy…
"...and now Hagrid's just shown me what's coming in the first task, and it's dragons, Sirius, and I'm a goner," he finished desperately.
Nessa had been on the verge of tears as he unraveled in front of her, unloading everything she knew he'd wanted to talk about but been too proud to do before now, even with her. She'd been heavily debating hexing every student in the school one by one when the last of his words slammed into her like a freight train.
"Dragons?" she said loudly. "What in the hell do you mean it's dragons?"
Tori had gone pale at the thought, not something that gave Nessa much hope and Fred and George were gaping at him as if maybe they'd heard something wrong.
"Dragons we can deal with, Harry, but we'll get to that in a minute — I haven't got long here…I've broken into a Wizarding house to use the fire, but they could be back at any time. There are things I need to warn you about."
"What?" said Harry, looking and sounding distinctly like he was losing faith that his life could get much better. Nessa didn't blame him…Surely there could be nothing worse than dragons coming?
"Karkaroff," said Sirius, surprising Nessa entirely. "Harry, he was a Death Eater. You know what Death Eaters are, don't you?"
"Yes — he — what?"
"He was caught, he was in Azkaban with me, but he got released. I'd bet everything that's why Dumbledore wanted an Auror at Hogwarts this year — to keep an eye on him. Moody caught Karkaroff. Put him into Azkaban in the first place."
"Dumbledore doesn't believe that he had anything to do with Harry's name being in the goblet."
There was a long, shocked silence from not just the people in the room, but also from Sirius. All of them turned to look at her. Harry stood from the ground angrily.
"You knew about this?" he snapped, his eyes flashing dangerously. "You knew what he was and you didn't say anything."
"Dumbledore told me not to say anything —"
"That's never stopped you before," Tori snorted, looking angry herself. "That seems like a bit of information that you would have passed along."
"He specifically asked me not to say anything," she repeated, rolling her eyes. "He didn't even want me to know in the first place, but he assured me that he didn't think Karkaroff has anything to do with this."
"How sure was he?" Sirius inquired from the flames.
"Pretty sure," she said vehemently. "And he's a hard man to fool —"
"But he is only human," Sirius reasoned. "He can be fooled — he has been before. I want all of you to keep an eye on him anyway."
"Dumbledore doesn't believe that he has anything to gain from this," Nessa argued. "And I don't think I disagree with him. You should have seen him — he was furious that Harry's name had come out. He's certainly afraid of Moody, but I don't think that was an act."
"I can't believe you kept this quiet," Harry scoffed.
"You have bigger things to be worried about, Harry —"
"You're always telling me not to keep secrets from you, and you do the same to me —"
"That's different!" she exclaimed indignantly. "Your secrets could get people killed for God's sake. I have no reason to believe that Karkaroff is a danger to you or anyone else. He was released for a reason —"
"He did a deal with the Ministry of Magic," said Sirius bitterly. "He said he'd seen the error of his ways, and then he named names…he put a load of other people in Azkaban in his place…He's not very popular in there, I can tell you. And since he got out, from what I can tell, he's been teaching the Dark Arts to every student who passes through that school of his. So watch out for the Durmstrang champion as well."
She didn't entirely believe that Karkaroff had seen the error of his ways, but the rest of the words made her even more sure that Dumbledore had made the right judgment in this case.
"If that's true, then I seriously doubt that he had anything to do with this," she said to Sirius. "What does he have to gain from entering Harry's name? His school gets no recognition, no glory, if Hogwarts has an extra chance at the trophy. There's no guarantee that Harry would die or be injured anyway, particularly not with Dumbledore judging the tasks. And if this is some elaborate scheme cooked up by Voldemort, it doesn't sound like he'd be met with open arms by his followers, does it? It's a risky game for him to play."
"All of that may be true, but knowledge is power, and I want the three of you to have all of the information that you can," Sirius said firmly. "Until we know who did this and why, you need to be cautious around anyone you don't know or trust. He might not have great sway with the Death Eaters now, but Voldemort can provide him with protection if he helps him. That may be the only reason he needs to flip sides again."
"This is insanity," Tori muttered, shoving Fred aside in the armchair to sit next to him. Sirius eyed the two of them sharply when Fred rested an arm around her shoulders and pulled her into his side. Nessa sincerely thought that Fred might have a death wish because he grinned at him through the flames. She couldn't be entirely sure, but she could have sworn Sirius had growled at him in warning. "Why would Dumbledore agree to start up the tournament again if he knew that it would bring a Death Eater into the school? Does no one have any brains around here?"
Sirius snorted, but he was still watching Fred carefully when he spoke again, his voice pointed, "No. Clearly they don't."
Harry still looked very irritated with her, but he shared a grin with her, clearly understanding the meaning behind his godfather's words. Fred was still grinning as if he were watching a comedy special. Tori looked between Fred and her father with a scoff.
"Whatever testosterone-filled bullshit this is, you can stop now, or I'll hex the both of your bollocks off."
Nessa hid her laugh behind a cough because the two of them seemed to be sincerely underestimating this threat, and she sincerely doubted that her best friend was joking at all. Her tone hadn't really brooked room for an argument, but the two of them were still staring at each other as if they hadn't heard her at all. Sirius was glaring daggers, and Fred would have burst into flames if he'd been in the room.
George was looking between the three of them with an exasperated expression, and rolled his eyes to the ceiling.
"Can we get back to Karkaroff, please?" he said dryly. "I think we've got bigger issues to be frying than the two of them."
Fred's head shot from Sirius to his twin, but George wasn't looking at him. He met Nessa's eyes briefly across the room, and she shook her head inconspicuously; she hadn't told him anything about them at all. She'd promised she wouldn't. Fred frowned, but Sirius seemed to agree with George's statement for the time being, and turned back to look at Harry.
"Right, well, I want you all to be cautious around Karkaroff for the time being," he said again. "We know he's a good actor because he convinced the Ministry of Magic to set him free, didn't he? Now I've been keeping an eye on the Daily Prophet, Harry —"
Nessa was entirely certain that he changed the subject so abruptly because he suspected that she might argue, and he was right. She still didn't think that Karkaroff was acting, but this was clearly falling on deaf ears.
At any rate, the subject change worked for Harry.
" — you and the rest of the world," he said bitterly.
" — and reading between the lines of that Skeeter woman's article last month, Moody was attacked the night before he started at Hogwarts. Yes, I know she says it was another false alarm," Sirius said hastily, seeing Harry about to speak, "but I don't think so, somehow. I think someone tried to stop him from getting to Hogwarts. I think someone knew their job would be a lot more difficult with him around. And no one's going to look into it too closely; Mad-Eye's heard intruder's a bit too often. But that doesn't mean he can't still spot the real thing. Moody was the best Auror the Ministry ever had."
"Okay, so what are we saying here?" George said slowly. "Karkaroff is trying to kill Harry? What's the point? Would he even be brave enough to go against Moody in the first place?"
"No," Nessa snorted. "He could barely look him in the eye the night Harry's name came out of the goblet. But it doesn't have to have been him, does it? There's no telling who all is in on this."
"I've been hearing some very strange things," Sirius said slowly, nodding at Nessa in agreement. "The Death Eaters seem to be a bit more active than usual lately. They showed themselves at the Quidditch World Cup, didn't they? Someone set off the Dark Mark…and then — did you hear about the Ministry of Magic witch who's gone missing?"
"Bertha Jorkins?" Nessa and Harry said together.
"Exactly…she disappeared in Albania, and that's definitely where Voldemort was rumored to be last…and she would have known the Triwizard Tournament was coming up, wouldn't she?"
Nessa gaped at him — she hadn't even considered that. She'd worked in Ludo Bagman's department. Of course, she would have known. It would explain how Voldemort would have known — assuming this had something to do with him at all — that the tournament was taking place when it hadn't even been posted in the papers yet.
Her stomach dropped out. She didn't like this at all…not one bit. Tori met her gaze from across the room, and she knew without speaking that she was getting nervous behind her self-assured facade.
"Yeah, but…its not very likely she'd have walked straight into Voldemort, is it?" said Harry.
"Listen, I knew Bertha Jorkins," said Sirius grimly. "She was at Hogwarts when I was, a few years above your dad and me. And she was an idiot. Very nosy, but no brains, none at all. It's not a good combination, Harry. I'd say she'd be very easy to lure into a trap."
Great, Nessa thought bitterly. Goddamn it all.
"So…so Voldemort could have found out about the tournament?" Harry said worriedly. "Is that what you mean? You think Karkaroff might be here on his orders?"
"I don't know," said Sirius slowly, as if he were trying to see all of the pieces of the game in front of him, wondering how each move could impact the other. "I just don't know…Nessa is right about one thing though. Karkaroff doesn't strike me as the type who'd go back to Voldemort unless he knew Voldemort was powerful enough to protect him. But whoever put your name in that goblet did it for a reason, and I can't help thinking the tournament would be a very good way to attack you and make it look like an accident."
Still, that seemed like such a cop-out to her…Voldemort didn't strike her as the type to want Harry dead by anyone or anything other than his own hands.
"Looks like a really good plan from where I'm standing," Harry said, grinning bleakly. "They'll just have to stand back and let the dragons do their stuff."
Nessa's stomach dropped out again, bile rising in her throat at the thought.
"Right — these dragons," said Sirius, speaking very quickly now. "There's a way, Harry. Don't be tempted to try a Stunning Spell — dragons are strong and too powerfully magical to be knocked out by a single Stunner, you need about half a dozen wizards at a time to overcome a dragon —"
Nessa had to sit down because — yep, there was the bile again. George laid a strong hand on her knee, but she could barely feel it through her growing panic.
"But you can do it alone," said Sirius when she tuned back into the conversation. "There is a way, and a simple spell's all you need. Just —"
But Harry held up a hand to silence him. Tori sat up straighter and the twins' heads had turned sideways to listen closely to the noise. Nessa's heart was thundering in her chest and she was afraid that it might beat right out of her. She could hear footsteps coming down the spiral staircase behind her.
"Someone's coming," Tori hissed, looking at her father in a panic. "Go!"
Harry scrambled to his feet, Fred and George pushing their way to stand next to him in front of the fire in order to block the view of the fire. If someone saw Sirius's face in the fire, they would raise an almight uproar — the Ministry would get dragged into it — they would all be questioned about Sirius' whereabouts — Moody might actually be successful in capturing him if he was as good an Auror as everyone said —
God, what had they been thinking letting him talk to them when there was an Auror in the school? Stupid, stupid, stupid —
It was Ron. Nessa saw Tori sag in the armchair with relief and the twins swore under their breath. Dressed in his maroon paisley pajamas, Ron stopped dead facing them across the room, and looked around.
"What are you lot doing down here so late?" he said.
"What's that got to do with you?" Harry snarled. Nessa met Tori's gaze and they rolled their eyes at each other at the exact same time — this felt like an impending argument between the two boys. "What are you doing down here at this time of night?"
"I just wondered where you —" Ron broke off, shrugging. "Nothing. I'm going back to bed."
"Just thought you'd come nosing around, did you?" Harry shouted.
Nessa was at her brother's side in a heartbeat, pulling him back from advancing on Ron. She could see the hatred burning in his face, and she didn't entirely blame him. He had so much to be dealing with as it was, and Ron interrupting Sirius when he'd been in the middle of helping him with the first task really felt like a slap in the face. For all of them.
"Harry, stop, he didn't know —" she hissed. Ron interrupted her, his face reddening with anger.
"Sorry about that," he said. "Should've realized you didn't want to be disturbed. I'll let you get on with practicing for your next interview in peace."
She rounded on Ron with her wand raised before she could even begin to rationalize the stupidity of her next decision.
"Flipendo!"
She watched him somersault in mid-air before landing hard on his bottom. George grabbed her wand arm and tugged it down angrily.
"Vanessa!" he snapped.
She might have felt guilty for hexing his brother, but the sparks in his eyes were met evenly with her own, and she was too busy glaring at the younger Gryffindor across the room. Ron was looking at her in surprise.
"Pull your head out of your arse before I have to do it for you," she snarled at him. "This argument is getting ridiculous. Either make up or this is going to have to get far more interesting."
"You might have a scar now, if you're lucky…" Harry said from behind her. She turned to growl at him in irritation for trying to make the entire thing worse. "That's what you want, isn't it?"
Ron didn't bother answering him. He merely scoffed at the two of them and went back up the stairs without another word, stomping loudly in his too small pajamas. Nessa waited for his steps to disappear before she rounded on her brother angrily.
"What the hell is the matter with you, Harry?" she snapped.
"Funny, I was going to ask you the same thing," George said to her, rubbing a hand down his face. She turned to glare at him, but Fred stopped them before the argument could escalate.
"He might have deserved it," he snorted. "We can all disagree on that, but —"
"He interrupted Sirius!" Harry exclaimed, as if there wasn't anything to disagree about at all. Tori rolled her eyes to the ceiling. "I need to know how to beat these dragons, and he —"
"He didn't know, Harry," Tori said, standing up and giving him a bored look. "I assume you didn't tell him, yes?" When Harry merely glared at her, she made a noise of agreement. "Right. Well, you can quit looking like that because I can help with the dragon. I talk to Charlie about them all of the time —"
"It's very annoying, actually," Fred added helpfully. Tori stomped on his foot.
"Their eye is their weakest point — everywhere else is protected by their hide and you won't get very far that way. I can teach you the spell."
"Can you teach it to him in two days?" Nessa asked her best friend worriedly. Whatever spell it was, she was sure it was far above Harry's pay grade, which certainly didn't make anything much easier.
"'Course I can," she snorted. "But I think we should all go to bed now before Nessa tries to make any more arguments more interesting."
The words had been confident, self-assured, as was Tori's usual, but Nessa had known her for a very long time. She didn't need to ask to know that Tori severely doubted that Harry would be able to learn the curse in time.