CHAPTER 46

I sit in the library, parchment spread out before me, my hand aching from writing this ridiculously long essay for DADA. Part of me wonders what Snape would do if I just . . . didn't turn in this paper. Would he be over-the-top angry like he is when others don't turn it in? Or would he be somewhat lenient considering all of our weird understandings with one another? Who am I kidding—he'd still be furious. I'm just looking for a way to get out of writing this because I have no interest in it right now. I'm bored.

After having spent so long working on Occlumency and preparing to face the Dark Lord himself, these class assignments seem really trivial, but as accomplishing them helps keep up my cover of "normal student Charlotte Rodgers," just stopping really isn't an option. Have I mentioned my hatred for that lately? I'm not even a real student, and yet here I sit in the library, all alone at a table overlooking the grounds, working on an essay that won't even really affect my life. How could it? If Voldemort wants me at Hogwarts, I'll be at Hogwarts. There'll be some weird workaround to get me into the castle even if I'm flunking out.

So, let's just not do this paper, yeah? Let's just ignore it and pretend that I don't have to do it. After all, I'm not a real student. I lean back in my chair, cover my face, and let out a loud groan that I try to stifle the moment I hear it—can't be too loud in the library, you know.

"I remember not wanting to do my work either," a voice says.

I pull my hands away from my face to meet the familiar face of Madam Pince. Something about her reminds me of someone, but I can't quite put my finger on who that is. Heat rises to my face when I realize this is the first time we've ever spoken, and it's likely so she can reprimand me. "Sorry for the noise. I didn't mean to let that out."

She glances around the library. "Yes, please do stay quiet." I nod and prepare to go back to my work, but she doesn't leave, which prompts me to look back up at her. Her eyes are on my essay. "Defense Against the Dark Arts?"

"Yes?"

"With Professor Snape?"

"Yes?"

She nods, but her eyes become less than pleased when she sees that I have literally no more than three lines written. "It gets easier—classwork. Not easier in the sense of the workload or the difficulty of the work, but it gets easier to want to finish the work the closer you get to leaving this place. I struggled when I was your age. How is Professor Snape as a DADA professor? It was the position he's sought after for years. I'm glad Professor Dumbledore saw fit to appoint him to the post this year."

"He's a good professor," I say. Why is she speaking with me? "I wish I had been able to take more Potions classes with him. Probably would've gotten higher marks had I been in his class for more than a year."

"He always did have a knack for it."

"Potions?"

"Yes."

"Were you here when he was a student?"

"Yes."

I nod good-naturedly, then try to pointedly turn my attention to the essay. Whatever Madam Pince was going to say, she decides not to. Instead, she turns and leaves me sitting there, dumbfounded. What the hell was that? Does Madam Pince ever talk to any student? Was she expecting me to ask for help in researching something for this essay?

Not caring enough to think too hard about that, I gather some letter-writing materials.

Dear Mum,

Thanks for sending the money for the Apparition practice and tests. You sent much more than necessary, but I'm sure there's something in Hogsmeade I could spend some money on! Unfortunately, our next Hogsmeade weekend has been cancelled because of the student who was cursed last time, but perhaps I can visit briefly after I take the Apparition test.

I'm looking forward to seeing you again. I haven't been able to tell anyone about Christmas for obvious reasons, but I can't stop thinking about it and how much I enjoyed our time together. I will try to get some friends to play Pontoon with me so that I can potentially be a challenge for you the next time we have a chance to play.

I miss you.

Aurelia

As I roll this parchment up, Theodore Nott takes a seat across from. "Come to interrogate me again? Or insinuate that you know more than you should?" I ask.

"Merlin, no. Who would ever do such a thing when someone is working on homework? Why would anyone distract a fellow student from something so pressing as"—he turns my DADA parchment toward him as if he isn't in the same class and assigned the same homework—"Protego Totalum? Snape's class, right?" His eyes rove around the room for a brief moment. "I'm hoping he eventually teaches the Protego Diabolica variation. My dad tells me that Gellert Grindelwald used it when fighting the Aurors off at his rallies. I don't know much about it, but it seems incredibly useful and powerful." He meets my eyes. "Supposedly, it creates a protective ring around the caster that incinerates enemies. Personally, I feel like that's something that should be taught, don't you? Considering the fact that the Dark Lord is back and the only line of defense before he takes over is a sixteen-year-old Hogwarts student . . ." He grins at me as if we share some secret.

"I'm taking my essay back now." I pull it free from his hand.

"That's not an essay, Charlotte. That's like, two sentences. That's not even a short-answer reply."

"Whatever. What do you want?"

Theodore reaches into his own bag and produces a piece of parchment, a bottle of ink, and a quill. "Who says I want anything?" I level my gaze at him. "Though your essay may only be two sentences, it's longer than mine. I figured I'd come over and work on my essay with you. Is that such a crazy thought? C'mon, we're in the same class and writing the same essay. Might as well either suffer together or help each other out."

In spite of myself, I find myself smiling, and try as I might to think of a logical reason why I shouldn't be totally fine with him sitting at the table working on homework with me, none comes to mind. As much as I'd prefer to do this by myself and send him away, allowing him to stay here with me without a fight might be the best thing for me right now. If he were to leave, chances are that I'd go back to wondering about Madam Pince and would get precisely two more words written in this essay. With him sitting across from me, I at least feel slightly more motivated to get more work done. Even if only by a little.

For the next hour or so, Theodore and I don't speak. We just sit silently at the table writing our separate essays, and though tempted to ask him more about what he said to me the last time we sat at a table in this library—I want to know more about what he knows about me—I decide that doing so might not be in my best interest. Considering he hasn't said anything about it ever again, it might be best to just . . . let it go? I mean, what else is there to do now? Make a strange situation uncomfortable by asking him about things I really should just leave alone?

I've just finished putting the finishing touches on my essay—that's a lie, I've just finished writing a bullshit paper that won't please Snape in the slightest and definitely needs to be proofread but probably will not be—when Daphne arrives. "Charlotte, time for dinner," she says as she approaches the table. "Nott."

"Greengrass."

"What're you doing?"

"Working on my essay with Charlotte."

She looks at me oddly for a moment before basically seeming to forget that Nott is at the table at all. "Ready to eat? I'm starving. It's been a day."

"Not a good one, I'm guessing, if your tone is anything to go by," Nott says.

Daphne glances at him. "Aren't we intuitive? C'mon, Charlotte. The others will be waiting." After giving Theodore a small nod, I leave with Daphne and head toward the Great Hall for some food. "Since when do the two of you hang out outside of class?"

"Since he came and sat there to work on his essay for Snape."

She nods. "What's his deal?"

"What do you mean?"

"I just haven't seen many rich pureblooded Slytherins hang around you."

"You and Astoria do."

"True, but Nott has never been . . . the friendly type." She looks over at me. "I'd watch myself around him if I were you. Not that he'd hurt you—I just think he wants something from you. I don't know what that might be, but he doesn't seem the type to make friends unless he thinks it can be advantageous for him."

"I'm not friends with him," I say with a small laugh. "I hardly know him."

Daphne laughs but still seems somewhat uncomfortable with the idea of Theodore spending any sort of time around me. She doesn't make another comment on the topic, however.

Later that evening, I sit in front of the fire in the common room, my friends all around me, feeling more at ease than at any other time in my life. Hogwarts is becoming my home despite all of my efforts to stop that from happening. I've never felt so safe, so warm, so happy. With the exception, perhaps, of Spinner's End. Whether I feel this way because of my friends or something else is unclear, but I truly believe they're only a part of it. This castle, this common room (even if it is in the dungeons), is home for me now.

And I couldn't be happier about it.

Well, maybe I could be. If the common room were in the towers.

The flame crackles merrily while the first-years play Exploding Snap and the other three of us do our reading homework. "So, you've been going to the Apparition lessons, yeah?" Ella directs this question at me.

"That's right," I say, closing my Transfiguration book, glad to have a distraction from this homework.

"I never asked what it was like!" Astoria suddenly exclaims.

"It was easy."

"Easy?" Grant says. "Are you serious? It took me forever before I got the hang of it, and you're saying it was easy?"

"Well, it wasn't difficult."

"I've never hated anyone as much as I hate you right now," Daphne deadpans.

I lean back against the sofa and cross my arms. "You act as if I care."

Grant and Daphne smile at one another. Then Daphne opens a Chocolate Frog that she had been hiding in her robes. "I'm wounded, Charlotte." She bites off the frog's head. "You wound me with your words."

"And yet you still act like I care."

She then hands Grant one of the other Chocolate Frogs from her pocket and hands it to Grant. "We're forming our own group now," he says as he takes the frog and moves to the spot on the floor just in front of Daphne. "Because we hate you."

I narrow my eyes at the two of them, then, not removing my gaze from them, pick my book back up and open it again. I turn my attention to the page and say, "I don't care. Enjoy your little group of two."

Before they have a chance to reply, Draco walks up to us. "Can I speak with Charlotte for a moment?" He smiles at Astoria.

Then we leave the common room—there is roughly an hour before curfew.

"Has something happened?" I ask him as he leads me to an unused classroom and waves his wand at the door. This doesn't seem like the kind of thing he'd do—pulling me away from my friends in front of everyone isn't the most subtle way of having a private conversation with me. "Draco—"

"Nothing's happened, and that's the problem," he whispers frantically. Disgruntled, he begins pacing around the room, taking deep breaths and wringing his hands together nervously. "Hogsmeade weekend is coming up, and it was supposed to be done by then!"

"Draco—"

"He never got the poison, Charlotte! He never got the poison!"

"What—"

"And I'll have to face Rosmerta, what if she knows, Charlotte, what if she knows? What if Fenrir didn't get to her or didn't do it properly or purposefully mucked it up? She's bound to tell someone, Charlotte, and where will that leave me, where will that leave me?"

I rush forward and take him by the shoulders. "You need to calm down and explain to me what's going on."

"The Imperius Curse," he breathes. "I used it on Rosmerta to get her to give a poisoned mead to Slughorn for Dumbledore—"

"That's the long way around an issue."

"—and Dumbledore hasn't been poisoned yet, Charlotte! Do you know what this means?"

"That Dumbledore hasn't dr—"

"It means that filthy Slughorn never even gave Dumbledore the mead! It was supposed to be for Christmas!"

"But—"

"And unless Fenrir Greyback changed Rosmerta's memories—"

"Why do you think he wouldn't have changed her memories?"

"Because I don't trust him! He's a bloody werewolf!"

I bite back my sudden anger. "You don't trust him because he's a werewolf? You think he would sabotage the Dark Lord's plans because he's a werewolf? Draco, you have got to get over your prejudice against anyone who's different than you, anyone who's not a pureblood!"

"Charlotte—"

"Shut up!" He flinches, his eyes widening in surprise. "You're worried about going back to Hogsmeade because you're afraid Greyback the werewolf hasn't modified Rosmerta's memories, but it's ridiculous to think he would fail to assist in the Dark Lord's plans, don't you see that? Not because he cares so much for you but because he wouldn't betray the Dark Lord because the punishment for that wouldn't be worth it."

Draco nods slowly, trying to calm himself. "You think I'm being stupid, don't you?"

"Well . . ." He half-laughs, and I grab his forearm. "You'll be fine." No, he won't, stop lying to him. Draco will never kill Dumbledore. "Besides, have you become so obtuse that you pay no attention to anything ever?"

"What?"

"The Hogsmeade trip was canceled due on account of Katie Bell nearly—" I stop short. "It was canceled."

Draco actually laughs. "I'd forgotten! How had I forgotten?"

"Because you've been distracted, and with good reason."

His laughter dies. "I'm so afraid."

"I know. I am too."

My dear cousin and I stay there silently in the comfort of each other's presence until curfew, when we have to return to the common room. None of my friends ask about where I've been, and I doubt they'll ever know how much I appreciate that.

I stay quiet until the first-years and Grant leave the common room to go to sleep. Astoria glances at me, then at Daphne who is watching me closely, and says, "Should I be worried?"

"About me or about Draco—or about me and Draco?"

Her lip twitches in a smile. "All of the above?"

"You don't have to be worried about me. As for Draco, he's struggling with some things right now. And as for me and Draco, hell no."

She laughs, sounding relieved. "I'm sorry if—"

"Don't apologize. It's good to know you care about him. He certainly needs it right now." I stretch my legs for a moment. "Are you going to bed any time soon?"

"Are you?"

"No."

"I was planning to wait on Draco. We're supposed to meet down here later."

I smile, and Daphne says, "Should we leave?"

"That's not necessary unless you just want to."

The three of us begin a game of Exploding Snap, students slowly but surely trickling out of the room. We've only been alone for fifteen minutes before I hear footsteps on the stairs of the boys' dormitory. "Astoria, I've—" Draco comes to a stop when he sees me. "You're not alone."

"You're very observant. I have an appointment and need to leave anyway." This catches all three of them by surprise. I take out my pocket watch. "In fact, I should be going."

"Where?" Draco asks, a small laugh in his voice.

"I'm allowed to have secrets, you know." I give them a weak wave before exiting the common room. The last thing I see as the door closes is Daphne heading up the stairs and Draco and Astoria sitting down on the sofa.

Really, I should have stayed just a short while longer because I'm early—I didn't want to be in there with Draco and Astoria right now—so it's no surprise that Snape is not at our normal meeting place, and it's also no surprise when he does not answer the knock on his office door. I wait just a moment before cracking open the door and peeking in. "Professor?" I whisper. His back is to the door, and he's standing over that same cauldron he wouldn't tell me about the other day.

"You're early, Rodgers, should you not be waiting in the common room for the proper time?"

I clear my throat and enter the office. "I probably should, but there is a budding friendship happening and I refuse to come between them right now."

Snape chuckles. "You can have a seat until it's time for your patrol."

"Can I help you instead?"

"No."

"What are you brewing?"

He's quiet for a moment. "Felix Felicis—Liquid Luck."

"What do you need luck for, Professor?" I slowly walk over to where he stands.

He glances at me. "Why are you not in the chair like I told you to be?"

"It's interesting to watch you brew potions." Snape tightens his grip on the edge of the table. "I mean, I got used to it over the break, you know." Makes me wish even more that I had done better on the Potions O.W.L. so I could know more about the subject and be able to speak with him with more understanding. "What do you need good luck for?"

"I have my reasons."

"Vague."

"Go have a seat."

I wave my wand and Conjure up a chair—bless my lessons with McGonagall—and sit down beside the cauldron. I straighten my legs and cross my ankles. "I don't know when it'll happen, but Draco has attempted to poison Dumbledore."

Snape stops stirring the potion and turns his full attention to me. "Explain."

"In a really long and convoluted way he has tried to get a poisoned mead to Dumbledore. He doesn't think it made it to the headmaster because it was supposed to be a Christmas thing."

"So who has the poisoned mead now?"

"That's the million-dollar question, Professor." His brow furrows. "Never mind. I don't know who has it, but Dumbledore obviously does not."

"How did he try to get the mead to the headmaster?"

I can't tell him what Draco told me, so instead I say, "Another great question to which I do not know the answer."

"You're telling me there is a poisoned mead somewhere at Hogwarts?"

"Or in Hogsmeade. Or maybe not either. He didn't go into detail about where it might be now."

Snape huffs and goes back to his potion. He does not speak again until it's time to walk with me to the entrance hall and hand me over to whoever is my patrol partner for the evening. "What're you going to do about the poisoned mead?"

He doesn't answer until we've left the dungeons. "I'll do my best to find it."

"But you won't give it to Dumbledore, correct?"

"You think me a murderer?"

"I think you a Death Eater."

"A Death Eater who helped the Dark Lord's"—he clears his throat and seems to change whatever word he was about to use—"the Dark Lord's chosen one to learn Occlumency so she can defy him, a Death Eater who is currently escorting the Dark Lord's chosen one to patrol with the Order of the Phoenix, which is the very group doing their best to thwart said Dark Lord."

"Touché."

We turn the corner, and I see the red hair of my patrol partner. My lips break into a smile. "Fred!" I call. He turns toward me and rushes forward, wrapping his arms around my waist and lifting me into the air. He kisses my cheek.

"Professor Snape," he says once he releases me.

"Mr. Weasley. Stay out of trouble."

"We're here to stop the trouble, sir," Fred says.

"Then I'll leave you to it." Snape nods at me once before going back to the dungeons.

Fred smiles at me, and we begin our patrol. "I've got something for you," he says a few minutes later. Then he reaches into his robes and pulls out a wrapped box that fits into the palm of his hand. "I had to shrink it so I could hide it without you noticing." With a wave of his wand, it grows four times its size. "Happy Valentine's Day. I know it isn't until tomorrow, but I won't be able to see you then."

"Should I open it now or wait?"

"Open it now!"

I do just that, handing the wrapping paper to Fred as I do so, and find a box with the picture of a handsome young man and a swooning girl on a pirate ship. "A Patented Daydream Charm," I say, smiling.

"For thirty minutes, you can enter a realistic daydream. I thought you might like it considering all the stress you must be under with your mother and your Occlumency and your constant battle to not join You-Know-Who's legion."

"Thank you," I breathe, tears in my eyes. I hug him tightly. "It's perfect." I then Vanish the wrapping paper from his hands, and Fred shrinks the box back down and takes it from my hand, then drops it in my robe pocket. I reach up and fondle the silver chain of the amulet around my neck. I can't give that to him. I just can't. "I wish I had something to give you."

"You don't have to get me anything."

"When I get out of Hogwarts for the next holiday, I'll give you something."

"You don't—"

"Something so you won't forget about me while you're off being popular in Diagon Alley."

Fred smiles and nods. "All right then. Oh, and speaking of the success George and I've had in Diagon Alley, we're trying to open up a branch in Hogsmeade."

"That's great news!"

"Which also means I'll be in Hogsmeade for the Hogsmeade weekends."

An image of Zoe laughing in her apartment flashes through my mind, and I'm suddenly sad at the prospect of not spending Hogsmeade weekends with her. Then I see Fred smiling brightly, and it goes away. "I would love that." I sigh. "Unfortunately, the next one is canceled on account of Katie Bell nearly dying last time. Did I tell you about that?"

He nods. "I heard about it from you and a few others. Word spread quickly. It's no matter. Have you got any plans for the Easter holiday?"

"None," I say, smiling to myself, assuming where he's going with this.

"Well, you're more than welcome to come spend it with George and me."

I nod. "That's fantastic. And I wouldn't be a nuisance?"

"Not in the slightest."

"Then I'll start making arrangements."

I have to tell Fred the truth during the Easter break. I don't have another choice in the matter. It's time—well past time. My duty is approaching quickly—only a few months away—which means I will have to come clean with him. I reach over and take his hand. Perhaps he will love me enough to forgive my constant lies; perhaps he will forgive me for keeping something as important as this from him; perhaps he'll even be supportive of me during this trying time.

I can hope.