Matilda Cerbus missed her mom. Yes, her mom was a bit of a lush. She was paranoid and overprotective, but it was still her mother.
Matilda was haunted by the sound of her mother screaming. The sound of her father's footsteps pacing through the house as he looked for her. The sound of his body hitting the floor when he finally gave up looking and ended his own life.
But in a way, Matilda was relieved. She had been raising herself since she started at Hogwarts. Bryony seemed to have all but given up with not having Matilda at home all the time anymore. It meant Matilda did the majority of the worrying over her mother. What if one day she came home and her mother had fallen down the stairs in a drunken stupor one night? What if she drank herself to death or was too depressed to get out of bed one day?
Matilda did miss her mother, but she was also relieved. She slept easier somehow. She had bad dreams sometimes, lots of times. But she would get through this.
No one seemed to understand this though. Rory and Neville least of all.
"I should have dropped Divination," Matilda said. Even though Rory wasn't taking the class anymore, Matilda still was going to take advantage of her best friend being a seer.
"It's fine," Rory said looking over the tarot predictions she'd written down. "I don't see any mistakes. Though these cards leave me a bit troubled about your decision-making skills."
"I can do it fine. It's just annoying," Matilda said as Rory slid the paper back across the table. "My decision-making skills are fine by the way."
"Are they?" Rory asked. Matilda nodded. "I chatted with Neville earlier."
Matilda could see where this was going. She let out a heavy sigh. "I'm glad you two had a friendly chat. He likes being friendly, doesn't he? I think that's all to do with his decision-making and not mine isn't it?"
"He's just worried about you. I worry about you," Rory said.
"No need," Matilda said. "You've got your own shit to deal with and mine doesn't even compare."
"I can still be worried," Rory said.
"People's parents die all the time, Rory. And yes I'm sad, but I promise what you're dealing with is worse than whatever I've got going on," Matilda said. She was exhausted with having this conversation, with Rory. With Neville. With Professor McGonagall. "I'm fine."
"How many times have I told you that I'm fine and you didn't believe me?" Rory asked.
"People repeatedly trying to murder you is not the same as my mum dying. We weren't even that close. You know that," Matilda said. She closed her textbook.
"Are you going?" Rory asked.
"Yes," Matilda said. She didn't want to be consoled anymore. She didn't want to talk about it. She'd just wanted to do her bloody homework. She just wanted things to be normal. Homework with Rory was supposed to be normal. Being with Neville was supposed to be normal.
She'd stayed at his house after the murder. She was glad he'd been there with her for that, but he'd put up a wall. Whatever had been between them before, had been halted for some indeterminate amount of time. Neville had told her that he didn't want them to try to figure out how to be together when she was also trying to learn how to live life without her mother. He would still be there for, always. But just as her friend. For now.
Matilda had accepted that, but why was everyone else deciding how long she got to be sad? Why were they deciding how she got to be sad?
"Mattie, just sit down," Rory insisted.
"No. I just want to be alone right now," Matilda said. Rory didn't chase her from the library. Matilda did want to be alone, but even in this huge castle, there were few places she could truly be alone.
She walked downstairs to Myrtle's bathroom. She wouldn't be truly alone, but at the very least Myrtle wouldn't question Matilda being angry and mopey in there. Misery loved company after all.
Matilda walked into the bathroom and was surprised to find, not Myrtle, but Draco Malfoy.
He'd been looking a bit stressed out these days, but right now he looked especially pale, except his bloodshot eyes. His face was damp, and the faucet in front of him was running.
Draco heard the door closed and looked over to her. He sneered at her. He'd regularly been letting his bad mood infect their Astronomy lessons and she'd told him off for it more than once. It had resulted in Slytherin and Gryffindor losing a fair amount of house points for being disruptive, but Matilda didn't care much.
"What the hell are you doing here?" he asked.
"I dunno if you noticed, but this is the girl's lavatory," Matilda said. "So the real question is what the hell are you doing here?"
Draco scoffed and turned the faucet off. "I'll get out of your way."
"You look like shit," Matilda said.
"You don't look so good yourself," Draco said.
"I always look good," she said. "Even if I feel shitty on the inside, I don't let it show. Never let them see you cry and all that."
"What've you got to cry about?" Draco asked.
Matilda almost laughed. "Are you joking right now?"
"You think I keep track of what's going on with your life?" he scoffed walking towards her, toward the door.
"My dad murdered my mum," she said. And she didn't know why she was telling Draco. But the words came out of her. "He tried to kill me too, but Aurors showed up before he could so he offed himself instead."
Draco looked stunned by this. "Shit."
"Shit indeed," Matilda said tossing her school bag aside. "Nothing like a murder-suicide to spice up one's life. Or your dad working for a dark wizard I suppose."
She walked past Draco and took his place where he'd been standing at the sink.
"If it makes you feel any better, my dad definitely sucks more than yours does," she said.
"It's not a contest," Draco said. "But you're right. At least my father was somewhat respectable."
"No offense, but there's nothing respectable about who your father worked for," Matilda said.
"He did what he had to do to protect his family," Draco said, his face reddening. He stomped over to her. "You don't know anything."
"You're right. I don't know anything. I don't know what goes on in the mind of a deatheater. I don't know what goes on inside of a serial murderer. But I do know, my life has been totally upended by it," Matilda said. She turned to face him. "Unlike you, I do keep track of your family and I'm sure you've had the shittiest summer ever with the Ministry up your ass, raiding your house all of the time."
Draco looked like he wanted to say something, but didn't. So Matilda went on.
"We can love our parents even if they're fucked up," Matilda said. She let out a deep breath and then turned back to the sink. "Everyone keeps telling me to just let myself be sad, to feel the pain of that horrible thing that happened to me. But I did. And I want to move on from it, but people just keep reminding me."
"I know the feeling," he said. He reclined against the sink next to her.
Never in a million years did she think she'd be standing in the girls' bathroom spilling her guts to Draco Malfoy, but he was the first person who'd ever listened to her.
"They all keep saying I'm just like my father," Draco said. "Certain people mean it as a compliment."
Matilda couldn't believe it, but she was about to say something nice to Draco.
"The fact that you can even question whether or not he was a good person makes you better than he was," Matilda said. She looked at him again, and there was a softness in his blue eyes that she'd never seen before. How many people had told him he was like his father? Did he want to be like his father?
Harry was convinced that Draco was a deatheater, but this boy Matilda had just found crying in the bathroom was not deatheater material.
"You've got the same hair though," Matilda said.
And Draco smirked, not in that way he usually did where he was about to say something to be an asshole, but he smirked because he was amused. Matilda had almost made him laugh.
"Why are you in here?" Matilda asked.
"I don't want to deal with all the shit waiting for me out there," he said simply. "Everyone keeps trying to help me. But I don't need it."
"Is that why you dumped Pansy?" Matilda asked. "That's a step up for you, honestly."
Again he smirked. "Why are you in here?"
"I wanted to get away from everyone telling me I'm not dealing with things the right way," Matilda said. "Why is it bad to want to be distracted from something that fucked up?"
"Distracted?" Draco asked.
Matilda thought about Neville. She remembered those first two days after the murder where she stayed in his house, in his room, crying on his bed, crying into his chest. She'd never felt so safe. She wanted that back. The safety of him. THe distraction of him. But he'd put a wall up.
And remembering that gave Matilda the worst idea she'd ever had in her life.
"Do you need a distraction, Draco?" she asked.
He raised an eyebrow at her. "What do you mean?"
She closed the distance between them, a few short steps to the sink beside her. And she kissed him. Hands on his shoulders, kissing him like she meant it. And his hands came to rest on her hips and he was kissing her back.
Matilda didn't need to think about anything else, just kissing this equally fucked up boy in the bathroom.
He backed her slowly to a stall door and pressed her back against it. His tongue slid into her mouth. He tasted like apples and bad decisions. And Matilda didn't care. She pushed the stall door open and dragged him inside.
He locked it behind them.
Harry was exhausted Monday morning and thankful for his free period after breakfast to sit in the common room. He was vaguely reviewing his Defense Against the Dark Arts essay with Ron, but mostly he was relaxing. It was Monday after all.
The common room door opened and Rory and Hermione walked inside.
"Hey," he said sitting up from the couch. "Don't you have class?"
"Professor Babbling is ill, so I get an extra free period this morning," Rory said. She walked over and kissed him. Every time she'd kissed him the last two days, there was always the underlying wish for more. She lingered longer and kissed him harder.
"Excellent," Ron said. "Hermione, can you look over my essay again before class?"
Hermione sighed but plopped down next to Ron.
"Can you help me with something?" Rory asked Harry, holding out her hand to him. "Unless you want help with your essay as well. I don't want to bother you if you're studying."
"No, it's fine," Harry said taking her hand and getting to his feet. "These two will manage without me."
He grabbed his bag and followed Rory upstairs to her room. It was rare that she asked for his help, but he was happy to give it when he could.
"Potions I assume," he said as she closed the door behind them, locking it with a click.
She gave him a confused look as he sat on the bed. "What?"
"I assume you wanted help with potions. The book. I don't think I'm much help to you otherwise," he said. He pulled the book from his bag as Rory crossed the room to him.
She took the book from his hands, opened it, flipped through a few pages, not really looking at them, and then dropped the book to the ground. She pushed Harry back on the bed and climbed atop him, straddling his lap.
"Okay," Harry said, grabbing hold of her thighs. "You didn't actually need help with school."
"No," she replied, leaning down and kissing him. Her fingers found their way into his hair and a chill rolled down his spine. Why was it always so lovely to have her hands in his hair? Even when they weren't fooling around, it felt divine.
Rory made him feel divine in other ways. Afterward, there was only the sound of their breathing as their bodies stilled. Rory's eyes were still closed and her breathing was heavy. He wiped sweat from her forehead and then kissed her lips.
"God, I love you, Rory," he said.
"I love you too," she said, opening her eyes. "And I love this."
Harry chuckled and kissed her again. "I do love this too."
He rolled away from her and they laid beside each other in silence for a few minutes.
"I feel a little silly," she said rolling on her side to face him. "I woke up this morning and this was all I was thinking about. I'm glad you were in the common room because if I'd found you in the corridor I'd have probably just dragged you into a broom cupboard."
Harry laughed. "I think you're a bit too classy for a broom cupboard."
"I thought I was, but I heavily considered it today," Rory said. She rested her head on his chest. "I love you. You're so wonderful to me. I'm so lucky."
He kissed the top of her head and gently let his fingers trail up and down her back.
"But I'm sorry if I'm distracted by your body for a while," she said.
"How horrible," he said. She laughed. "As long as you're happy, I'm happy."
"Euphoric is the word I'd use right now. By the time I go to bed later, I think I'll simply be 'happy' once I've calmed down," Rory said. She kissed Harry and sat up.
Harry tried not to stare at Rory the first time they'd been together, and even now he felt he might be being a bit disrespectful, but he looked her over. She was beautiful. Her hair was a mess, her bronze skin was damp with sweat, and the curve of her waist and her hips was so enticing. Harry trailed his fingers there. Goosebumps broke out over her skin. She giggled.
"You stop that," Rory said, picking up her bra. "You have class in a bit."
Harry contemplated skipping Snape's class and staying here with her, but he knew she would never hear of it. She was only here now because her teacher was ill. They could throw away a free period, but she would not skip class.
"You're so bloody beautiful, Rory," he said.
"I bet you say that to every girl who lets you see her naked," Rory replied.
"It's a short list," he said. He sat up and kissed her shoulder and then nuzzled into her neck. The smell of sweat and citrus still hung to her heavily and Harry inhaled her like a drug.
"Do you believe in soulmates, Harry?" she asked.
He thought for a moment. "I believe in you and me."
Her lips formed a smile. He kissed her cheek.
"I know you focus on the future a lot and all the things that might happen. But I know this will be forever," he said. She turned her head and kissed him properly. "You're my family, Rory."
Her face seemed to break a bit, and he thought she might cry. But she kissed him again.
"What am I going to do with you?" she said.
"Whatever you like," he said.
They got themselves cleaned up and dressed. Harry did not want to spend time with Snape right now. He was sure it would dampen his mood.
"I can walk you to class. I'm going to the library," Rory said.
"Always studying," he said.
"Actually, this is more like independent research," Rory said. "I want to see if there's any more information about seers that I haven't found yet."
"Oh!" he said. Rory had slowly been easing back into using her abilities. He was happy she was taking another step forward. "If you need any help, let me know. I'll happily help you look through things after class."
"You know, I kind of get the feeling that the two of us being alone in a room together is going to make us even less productive than we usually are," Rory said. Harry chuckled. He couldn't argue with that logic. "And honestly, I kind of want to do this on my own. Really lean into figuring myself out."
Harry understood. Heaven knew she'd spent too much time wrapped up in Harry's world. If she wanted her space, he would let her have it."D
"Don't stress yourself out about it," he reminded her.
"If I do get too stressed out, you'll help me unwind, won't you?" she said with a wink.
Harry let out a long deep breath. "You're going to be the death of me."
Rory was looking for information on seers during her free period.
Sort of.
She wanted to look up seeing with Spirit Boards specifically. She'd gone about it the first time on instinct, and that had gone as well as it could have. But she wanted to be able to be more precise. She wanted to be able to use the board unaided. She wanted to know how she could get in touch with her followers.
She shuddered at the thought. She had followers. It was not lost on her that one thing she knew about the Servants of Pythia was that they expected her to usurp Voldemort in some capacity. Rory was not interested in becoming the next generation's dark wizard, but she couldn't deny that learning to use her power, it would help.
It would help keep her safe from Voldemort putting anything else into her, and keep her from divulging information against her will. Maybe she'd even be able to help keep Harry safe from Voldemort.
That was her goal. She wanted to feel safe. She had not felt safe for a single second since she'd left the Ministry. Being with her dad and Sirius helped. Being with Harry helped. But they couldn't always be with her. She'd gotten one letter from her dad since he'd gone and she otherwise knew nothing about how he was doing. She exchanged letters with Sirius frequently and was getting to know him better than ever, but he wasn't with her.
How many nights since she'd gotten to school had she talked to Harry in her mirror before she fell asleep?
And now she wasn't even taking Defense Against the Dark Arts. She wasn't even learning to defend herself. She had to learn to protect herself somehow.
Seeing came naturally to her. She was good at it. It had made her see terrible things, but she'd also saved people with it. She'd saved Harry. She could save herself too.
She was perusing a shelf on magical artifacts when she felt a hand on her shoulder.
She nearly jumped out of her skin and was stunned to see Dumbledore standing there.
"Professor, you startled me," she said, attempting to catch her breath.
"Apologies," he said, his voice as calm and steady as always. "I should have announced myself."
Once Rory processed that she was not in fact in danger she spoke again.
"Don't see you in the library very often," Rory said. "Ever, actually."
"Every once in a while I like to take a walk through the school, and keep an eye on things," Dumbledore said.
That made sense, but Rory didn't entirely believe that's why he was here.
"What is it that you're looking into today?" Dumbledore asked.
"Just wandering, really," Rory lied. "Waiting for something to jump out at me."
"Does that happen often?" Dumbledore asked.
"When it's important, I guess," Rory said. "I don't always know that when it happens though."
Dumbledore scanned the shelves in front of them. "Are you hoping something about magical artifacts jumps out at you?"
"Maybe," Rory said, trying to be casual.
"Would this have anything to do with your Talking Board?" Dumbledore asked.
There was no point in lying any longer, at least to Dumbledore. "Is it bad to want to know more about how they work?"
"Not at all," Dumbledore said. "But we should always exercise a bit of caution when exploring the unknown."
"Maybe you haven't noticed, I'm nothing but cautious these days, Professor," Rory said. "Can't even be approached in the library by my headmaster without thinking my life is in danger."
Dumbledore pondered this for a moment, which Rory thought was odd because by now everyone in The Order at least knew about her touch-and-go anxiety.
"Professor McGonagall told me about your decision to stop taking Professor Snape's class," Dumbledore said.
"As much as I detest him, he wasn't the reason I dropped it," Rory said. "I just prefer not dissociating in the middle of class."
"Perfectly fair," Dumbledore said. "Might I trouble you for a sheet of parchment and a pen?"
"Uh, sure," Rory said opening her school bag. She ripped a sheet of paper from a notebook and handed Dumbledore a pen. He went to the nearest table and began to scribble way on the page.
"How are things going with Mister Malfoy?" Dumbledore asked.
"We're not exactly friends, but he tolerates me, which is more than he's done in the last five years," Rory said.
"Excellent," Dumbledore said. "As I said before, I'm sure you'll be a positive influence on him." He lifted the pen and paper and handed them back to Rory. "Give this to Madame Pince. I'm sure it will be useful to you in your studies about your abilities, but this is permission I'm giving only to you. Use it wisely. I trust you'll use it responsibly. Seems only right that I give you this considering my private lessons with Harry."
She looked at the sheet of parchment in her hand.
I grant Aurora Lupin free access to the restricted section. No materials are to leave the library and must be returned before the library closes every evening unless given additional written permission. No guests are allowed to venture with her into the restricted section.
-Professor Albus Dumbledore
Rory stopped herself from swearing in surprise and looked up at the headmaster.
"Why?" Dumbledore said before Rory could pose the question herself. "Your skills are beyond that of the two Divination teachers I have on staff. If there is information here to be gained to help you safely learn to manage the things you can do, I do not want to keep you from it."
This felt like a trick. If it was, she would figure out what he was up to later. Maybe he was just trying to get into her good graces.
"Thank you," Rory said.
"I trust that whatever you learn, you'll do some good with it," Dumbledore said. "Sometimes when people are allowed to walk through a door, they decide to use it for their own gain, to the detriment of others."
It was a loaded statement. Rory could feel it. She remembered their conversation at the end of term last year. She was a liability. In Voldemort's hands, she was dangerous.
"I would never do that," Rory said.
"I should hope so," Dumbledore said giving her a polite smile. "Enjoy the rest of your day. I'm sure we'll speak again soon."