A/N: I don't really like the first part of this chapter, but I leave it to you, as always, to form your own opinion. If the next chapter is a bit late, don't be too concerned, I'm planning on getting the OotP video game this weekend and looking around for an IMAX theatre to see the movie. Somehow I better benefit from this Harry Potter obsession, or I'm going to be really sorry. Enjoy. :D
Disclaimer: Not mine, what, you think I'd be crazy enough to try to claim anything except the OCs? Why, and get sued for money I don't have? *blink*
*****
Chapter Seventeen
I would receive no news about the search for my attacker for the rest of the week. It appeared that once they'd been set on their respective paths, my parents and the Ministry had determined that I did not need to know anything more until they'd captured him, whoever he was. In fact, what I did learn was from the press, and most of it was speculation on whether Dad had actually vanquished Voldemort in the first place and more letters from concerned parents demanding my being sent home. I could then be forgiven for their silence making me rather upset. And it did not help that I was preoccupied with my conversation with Rigel.
The effect that it had on my relationship with Connor was immediate and irreversible.
Straight away, I found myself drawing away from his touch. When he caught up with me that lunch just before I went off to my next class, I merely smiled at him half a hallway apart and hurried away. I stuck close to Aisling or Kimberly between classes too, just to have an excuse to keep away from him. Then after classes ended for the day I excused myself from spending time with him altogether by claiming that I was really tired and needed to sleep. His reluctant acceptance of my excuse spoke volumes.
I did not sleep that night, but instead spent the time watching him in the library and the Common Room on the Marauder's Map. Before the night was up I knew that we could not continue like this.
I had no proof of wrongdoing other than my own suspicions and Rigel's word, both which counted for nothing without physical evidence. If I was to be sure of what I suspected I'd have to find the runes in the comic book, decipher them myself and follow their trail. This wasn't as simple as it sounded; I didn't have the key and even in the event that it turned out to be nothing I would have already alienated Connor for life by implying it. And then still he hadn't really done anything that would suggest "Dark Wizard".
He loved his father, of that I was sure; I would never forget the look on his face as he stood at the entrance doors clutching his bloodied body that morning. He'd risked severe punishment and his life to see him on the night of a full moon, a foolish thing to do indeed, but knowing that he was in Hogsmeade must have been a temptation too great to resist. Aunt Tonks had talked about Uncle Lupin being drawn to his son, but from what I'd learned it was clear that the attraction was mutual.
He was also a rather courageous person, in the vein of the "True Gryffindor" people often claimed my father to be. Sneaking out of school was one thing, but the night the Dementors attacked his decision to fight back was as immediate as it was unshakeable. And I was sure that, had he been there, he might have joined the Seventh Years fighting the Kappa.
When he'd learned of his mother's deception, he quickly forgave her, knowing that the child would be, and was most welcome. And his excitement at the birth of his little sister was undeniably genuine. He never spoke of it, but I was sure that he took great pleasure from the knowledge that the success of the comic book meant that his family didn't really have to worry about his father being out of work. Why else would he throw the Minister's job offer back in his face? Well, apart from the fact that he was also recruiting him based on his morphing abilities alone. Otherwise, he was always respectful, polite and willing to help, and took Rigel's, and others', torment with grace I could never hope to achieve. It was impossible that someone like that could be evil.
But then, the same could have been said of Lord Voldemort when he was Tom Riddle, according to Dad.
Every question I'd ever had about Connor had been answered in that one conversation with Rigel. About Rigel's statement on his Potions ability, about his ingenuity in the Dementor attack that allowed him to try to face them head on, about his trips to Malfoy Manor as a child and who had taken him. I even had an idea now of why Rigel didn't like him, and it was, for all intents and purposes, a good reason. Professor Trelawney had read her cards and seen it fit to warn me after all.
And he had bad qualities too, for with his courage came recklessness, a very liberal view of rules and the capacity to overlook the transgressions of others if they did not appear to harm. Rigel was right about Aunt Tonks being wrong about lying to Uncle Lupin, no matter if I understood her rationale.
The conversation had also provided many more questions, like what was he up to with Camilla and whoever else he communicated with through the comic books? How far into the Dark Arts had they already gone? To what purpose could they possibly need to? And most important, to me at least, how many were involved?
Pondering this would give nightmares while I was still wide-awake. The most horrifying thought I'd so far managed being that, instead of Dark Wizards trying to prove themselves by killing me or Dad, this one was trying to get close to me. In that way he would better learn my weaknesses and strengths before deciding to do me in. If he wanted to know-though he probably already did-despite Camilla's best efforts and some noted improvement, I was still a long way from being a force to be reckoned with.
I resolved to pretend then, that all was fine until I could be absolutely sure. The next day I greeted him with a kiss and a smile and apologised profusely for leaving him the night before. His smile lit up his whole face as he waved it off and walked down with me to breakfast. By the end of the day I realised that this was a mistake and that I'd somehow managed to put up an invisible wall between us.
In addition to drawing away from his touch, I began to take a greater interest in his work, so that whenever I was with him I had to see what he was doing and whenever we were apart I would spy on him with the map. I stuck closer to him than I would normally, and found myself more than once overanalysing an exchange with a classmate or a teacher, or even a look across a hall. I barely knew his friends and he barely knew mine, which I previously had attributed to our being in different years and our relationship being so new, but now I wondered if there was a purpose behind it. And then at one point when he outright asked why I was interrogating him over a letter he'd been given by a Ravenclaw girl in his year, I jokingly lied that I was worried that he was cheating on me while wishing deep that that was the case.
I realised at once that this could not go on, and my conscience at last caught up with me, demanding answers for my behaviour. I had become the nightmarish clingy-girlfriend Witch Weekly warned against. The pang guilt that followed was so unbelievably real and painful I nearly cried.
On that stormy Hogsmeade day when I first caught his smile through the display in Honeydukes I hadn't really felt anything towards Connor Lupin other than embarrassment that I didn't know anything about him at all. He had known a lot about me, courtesy of his father, and was kind enough not to point it out. But in a few short weeks, he had managed to work his way into my consciousness so that the thought that he should do something that could break us up-as meddling in Dark Magic definitely could-actually caused physical pain. Absurdly, I fancied it more terrifying than having to endure another attack, but the wall was already up and until I got the truth either way, it wasn't coming down.
I was going to lose him, and that made me hate Rigel for telling me the truth. But there I had it, I never was one for letting things go, I just had to know.
To make matters worse I could not just approach him and demand answers as I would have of Rigel. The git was right when he said that Connor had ways of getting me to drop things, and his favourite manner was with a smile that was usually the prelude to a kiss. I didn't want those kisses now, no matter what I felt when I was with him, but they worked every time. And then I didn't know how to begin the conversation in the first place. I couldn't simply go to him and say, "Say Connor, you wouldn't happen to be a Dark Wizard-in-training, would you? I wouldn't have considered it, but after your Dad was attacked I overheard you and Snape talking and...."
This had to end. I was hurting us both, myself more than anything, and that I didn't want.
No one ever said that Connor, and Kimberly, were fools though.
It would be Kimberly who would confront me about it first. Of course anyone finding me in the dormitory gazing sadly out the window on a free Friday mid-afternoon would be concerned. Though it hadn't worked the first time around I had decided to avoid him again. Knowing that I had a boyfriend though, she marched right over to my bed and demanded, "What did he do? Is it Camilla? I wouldn't be surprised, everyone keeps talking about the way the two of them are-"
Without turning to her I shook my head, "No. It's not Camilla... and I'm not sure that he really did do... anything... wrong...."
I could hear the confusion and scepticism in her voice when she asked, "So why are you here when he's down there looking up the stairs like he really is going to risk detention trying to get up them?"
She sat down on my bed then and waited for my answer. I didn't give one at first, but just as she was about to speak again, I confessed, "He hasn't done anything wrong, nothing I could prove anyway and... well, I know I'm being stupid... but-"
Kimberly reached for my hand then, cutting me off, and said as sympathetically as she could manage, "And why
haven't you let your Dad and Rigel kill him yet? I mean, I know he's cute but that doesn't mean he should
get away with hurting you-"
"He hasn't hurt me. I told you he hasn't done anything wrong to me," I replied.
She did not miss it. "Well if he didn't hurt you, what did he do that was so wrong that you can't be in the same room with him? 'Cause I'll tell you, I can pretty much forgive anything if I'm being snogged by Connor Lupin."
I opened my mouth to answer, then shut it again, deciding it was better not to. Logic was on her side anyway. Then, sighing, I turned and slid off the bed, and said, "You're right, he hasn't done anything wrong to me. I'm such a goody-two-shoes thanks to Mum and Dad... it's nothing. I should go talk to him."
Understandably confused, Kimberly scrambled off the bed and caught up with me just before the door. Blocking my path like Rigel had done, she said, "That's it? You're upset with him, you come up here to hide, I ask you what's wrong, you give me nothing, then you decide that you're being silly and you're going to see him again...? What did I miss here? Oh right, you can't me nothing!"
"I'm sorry," I apologised half-heartedly. "But you gave me advice anyway."
I left her in my wake stammering and swearing in frustration.
But Connor was no less suspicious. The moment I was down the stairs he hurried over from the sofa and said, "We need to talk."
"About?" I asked, pretending to be confused.
He didn't buy it for a second. "Can we go somewhere to talk?"
I stifled a sigh, knowing that I was partially in the wrong, and led the way out of the Common Room. But Connor, in a move that did not at all help his case, stopped us before the stairs when he stepped over to a statue just down the hall from the Gryffindor Tower entrance, tapped it twice with his wand and it rolled away to reveal a secret room. I looked in at it in surprise, I didn't remember seeing that on the map, but then I wasn't often looking for hiding place. He smiled encouragingly though and I followed him in.
The statue had barely slid back into place behind us again before he turned to me, nervously running his hands through his hair and said, "Just tell me the truth... do you really like me? I mean, you're not just... with me because I kissed you... are you?"
I looked at him stunned, and mildly offended that he would think that. Then again I had resolved earlier this week to pretend to be his girlfriend as normal until I sussed out his dark (mind the pun) secret. I replied, "I'm sorry...?"
He flushed magenta and swallowed nervously before stammering, "It-it's just that-that I... well...." He stopped, took a deep breath and replied, "It seems that you've been avoiding me since Wednesday. And well, I was worried that you, well, that you didn't like me anymore or you didn't at all and you were just trying to get rid of me. Because, I could take it, you know... you could tell me that it's over and I'd accept it."
He appeared so genuinely anxious, the look in his eyes suggesting that he'd die if I confirmed his fears though he tried to keep his face calm and confident, that I had to wonder how I could have ever considered or connected him to anything evil. He stood uneasily, eyes desperately searching my face for the smallest sign of hope while forcing his hands to his sides as if to prevent himself from reaching out to me and, I imagined, either begging or strangling me.
I shook away the last thought and smiled. Instead of reassuring him this seemed to worsen his fears, for now he looked truly crestfallen, and I hastily grinned and said, "Oh, no Connor, I still do like you. It's just that... well, with all that's happened to me in the past few days... I needed some time to myself. I know I should have said something, but...."
I allowed my sentence to trail off as he smiled brightly, relieved, and then leaned forward to kiss me. But with his lips just a hair's breadth from mine, I put my hand to his chest and stopped him. He immediately stepped away, confused, and understandably so, but before he could question my actions, I plunged, "Rigel told me something... too, that might have... well, it had me wondering."
His face fell quickly, and I thought I caught a hint of anger in his darkening irises, but he said nothing, allowing me to ask, "Professor Snape took you to Malfoy Manor when you were younger?"
I hoped that it sounded purely innocent, and that he'd respond unlike the last time when I'd asked if the OGB was giving him private lessons. He did, but not exactly as I'd hoped. In fact he asked, clearly suspicious, "Was that why you were acting so weirdly yesterday, and then avoiding me Wednesday and today?"
Damn he was observant, and quick. I hastened to reassure him, and cut off his train of thought before he completely cottoned on, saying, "No! Well, not exactly, it had nothing to do with that... he just... well, I was upset and he made it worse. (I mentally apologised to Rigel) So you and Snape, what, is he your godfather or something?"
Still looking at me with suspicion, he replied, "My mother wanted me to learn to brew Wolfsbane, she asked him to help me. But some days when I came to Hogwarts for his lessons he was going to the Manor and he'd take me with him. What did Rigel tell you? That I'm some kind of fraud because I want the life he has, and that I secretly hate my father for not being born a bigoted pureblood bastard?"
I couldn't be sure that he meant Rigel or his father and paternal grandfather, so I replied, "Hey!"
He refused to clarify. "I don't want his life. I'm well on my way to being able to afford something comfortable, legitimate. I don't hate my father for being a werewolf. It's not his fault and he doesn't go around attacking people. I only went to the Manor because I was seven and Professor Snape can be... scary."
For no good reason at all, I snorted, and put my hands to my mouth, mortified. "I'm sorry; I didn't mean to do that...."
He did not look amused, lifting an eyebrow at me, but when he spoke I could hear the smile in his voice, "You think Professor Snape being scary is funny? Or is it my choice of word...?"
I had to suppress a grin this time, and he let the smile through, and said, "I like to see you laugh."
He was making it very difficult for me to distrust him. And this time when he made to kiss me, I didn't stop him.
Of course, once again he'd gotten me to drop the issue.
*****
We would never see the Slytherin versus Ravenclaw match. On account of the heavy fog alone odds were pretty high that they would have cancelled it anyway... had my attacker not stormed Gryffindor Tower in the middle of the night.
How he got into the castle in the first place would be explained in time to come, but when he finally made his presence known, he did it with a bang, or rather, "BOOM!"
Still wide awake, I was startled right off the bed when I heard it, the sound that would later be identified as that of the Fat Lady's portrait being blasted away. At the time though, I sat upright on the ground, clutching at my comforter while stifling an "Ow!" at the shooting pains in my bum wondering stupidly what it was. A second later I began to get frightened, aided by my roommates all sitting up as well, alarmed and demanding, "What was that?"
Then, my breathing constricted in my chest and my heart began to skip beats, as I replied, "I-I I don't know...."
CRASH! BOOM! CRACK! And then the sound of breaking glass, paper being torn and cushions pulverised. Shortly thereafter there came the panicked and horrified screams, shrieks and shouts of our Housemates as they were shaken awake and realised that we were under attack.
"What the hell? Has Peeves lost his mind?" demanded Kimberly, stumbling off her bed to go to the door. In the dark bedroom, though I could not see their faces, I knew that the others weren't thinking Peeves the culprit. And Cass confirmed it when she said, her voice trembling, "Kimberly... Kimberly come away from the door... don't go to the-"
The loud klaxon wail that followed cut her off and someone screamed, "He's coming up the stairs!"
Now I flew off the ground, snatched my wand and raced to the door with Kimberly. She nearly collided with me on her way back for hers, but when she got to her bed, Bridget was waiting and held her to it. "Don't go Kimberly, let Lillie...."
With outrage that made me feel a thrill of pride, she screamed at her, "Let me go you stupid twat! Lillie's in trouble! I'm not going to stand here and let someone get her!"
"They could come after us next!" snapped Jessie, then slapped her hands over her mouth and hastily apologised through them, "I'm so sorry, Lillie... I...."
Kimberly finally shrugged off Bridget then and hurried over to me, saying, "Since the alarms went off it means that it's a boy-man and he can't come up the stairs. If we stay up here we're safe... but I mean, I used to walk up slides when I was little... he could do the same thing. Maybe we can stop him before he gets up...?"
I nodded, and opened the door to run out into the hall, not caring that I was just in my pyjamas and barefoot, but was stopped in my tracks by the sight of most of the other Gryffindor girls, including Aisling, already there. They were running up and down the hall in the dark, the only lights coming from the wands of the prefects and a few others, and everyone was shouting. It was a loud confused message of: "Go back to your rooms! He can't come up the stairs! Come see! Come see! He's trying to come up the stairs! Where's Magnolia! Go back! Come on!" And still over that all was the klaxon wail and, curiously, the sound of furniture being destroyed again in the Common Room below.
Kimberly and I quickly decided that it was best to remain in our room after all, and were stepping back when Aisling and Hortense came struggling through the crowd, and Hortense nearly yelled in my face, "Get back in there and lock the door! Don't come out! Go! Now!"
She began to shove her way in, with me and Kimberly in the process, when all of the girls' dormitories were silenced by a shout from the boys'. Possibly realising that he would never make it up the stairs without being caught, my attacker changed tack and headed up to the boys, and most likely with the hope of finding a way in from there. Clearly this was no Hogwarts student, for he would have known there was none.
But the shout scared me more than the klaxon wail. Connor was in the boys' dormitories.
I pushed past Aisling and Hortense at once, then through my Housemates in the hall to the stairs. A prefect grabbed me at the top, a Sixth Year I didn't know, but not thinking clearly, I shrugged her away and stepped-then slid all the way down into the Common Room. I was barely standing upright when I was joined by Kimberly and many of the others, as well as the boys running down the stairs trying to get away. All was dark and chaos, heated and loud, hands, feet, wands, sharp and slippery debris and anxious thoughts of missing others, in other words, pandemonium.
I could never find Connor in this, I was sure of it.
Kimberly took the initiative to call for him then, but her shouts were drowned in the flurry of others from equally-worried siblings and friends. If this was the effect my attacker had been going for, he'd achieved it perfectly. Desperate, I looked up towards the boys' dormitories, hoping that Connor was already down and looking for me, and contemplated the risk of quick run up to check myself. But just then, finally, we were joined by Professor McGonagall, the other teachers and a few of the Aurors who had been reposted to the school after the Kappa attack, as well as a number of Ravenclaw prefects and their Housemates.
The Aurors and teachers, led by the Headmistress, came in wands drawn, there was a moment where we all stopped looking at them and then we all attempted to shout his location at once. Somehow or the other the OGB sussed that it was the boys' dormitories and led the Auror charge up them. And as they went, we followed, pushing and shoving in hopes of getting to see the capture for ourselves. One of the teachers turned round to shout us back down though, and it was at that moment that we heard the window being blasted away.
Everyone froze. Then surged frantically ahead for the stairs once more just as a series of colourful flashes swept past one of the Common Room windows, and someone called out, "He's getting away! He's flying away!"
I turned to head back, now desperate to see who it was if nothing else, when someone snatched me around the waist and spun me to face them. I screamed, at first in terror, then delight, as I recognised Connor, smiling happily down at me, and threw my arms round his shoulders, drawing him into a tight, but relieved embrace. I could feel his heart racing in his chest, and hear his laboured breathing against my ear, and feel the frightened shivers that rocked his whole body and know that he'd been just as worried about me. I didn't want to let him go ever again... but just then the OGB came down the stairs, pushed his way through the other students and pulled us apart.
When we looked at him confused, it was to hear Professor McGonagall's say, "Take Miss Potter to my office, Severus, and contact her parents immediately... and the Ministry...."
The others who weren't still looking out the window at my long-gone attacker now turned back to look at me. Their silence, more noticeable now that the attack was over, was more telling than any words they could have used. I turned to follow the OGB out, docilely, and then Connor grasped my hand and the OGB stopped.
"Not you, Mr Lupin. Not this time."
I turned to Professor McGonagall, making no attempt to conceal the tears that were forming in my eyes and were clearly audible in my voice, "Please ma'am... please...?"
She looked at me for a moment, and then nodded. The OGB marched us out of Gryffindor Tower without further protest.
Everything that followed happened rather quickly.
Connor and I were taken to the Headmistress' office, as ordered, and left standing near the doorway while the OGB went to Professor McGonagall's desk and wrote out two letters, one to my parents, the other to the Ministry. A short while after he left to send them, Professor McGonagall arrived and offered us a seat and tea and biscuits. Connor did not touch his, and I barely drank anything, for each time I lifted my cup I found that my hands shook so badly that I just ended up sloshing it all over myself. Connor eventually took the cup away and held both my hands in his lap, while I stared listlessly out the window at the moonless night.
I assumed that the OGB would return with my parents, but when he did he was joined by the Minister for Magic who said when he saw me, "Why is she not dressed? And where are her things? Her escort is on its way."
"What?" Professor McGonagall, Connor and I exclaimed in unison.
He looked at us each, openly annoyed, "Surely you don't think I'm going to let this girl remain in the castle after this?"
"The Ministry has no jurisdiction over this school!" said Professor McGonagall, angrily. "If anyone is to make any decisions as to whether or not Miss Potter remains or leaves it will be me... and the Board of Governors of course."
The Minister was unfazed. "I've already consulted your Board of Governors, and they in turn should be communicating to the Potters that their daughter shall not spend another night in this castle. Not until we have the person responsible for these attacks in custody at least."
"What?" Professor McGonagall demanded, clearly enraged. "How dare you! How dare they...."
The Minister turned to me, ignoring her, "Miss Potter, please go and get your things. Do you have an owl? You may wish to get that as well, I'm afraid that you're going to have to leave Hogwarts until fur-"
"I will not!" I snapped. "You can't put me out, Professor McGonagall is Headmistress and as long as she says I can stay, I will!"
He arched an eyebrow at me, as if surprised and amused at my response, and said, "And what about your Housemates? Your (he looked down at my hands in Connor's) boyfriend here? I don't believe they share similar views on your situation. As a matter of fact, I doubt you'll find one among them who wouldn't prefer it that you were gone until this matter is over.... Save your boyfriend, of course, but you wouldn't want to risk his safety unnecessarily, would you?"
I remembered the way my Housemates had looked at me, and was concerned about Connor, but I wasn't going to be bullied. I said boldly, "My father's Harry Potter, this will never be over. What am I going to do, run away every time someone decides to come after me?"
His face suddenly went an unpleasant puce and he said angrily, "Unfortunately, this is not your or your parents' decision to make. There are over a thousand students in this school and their parents have to be catered to as well. If they say you have to go, like they have been saying for days now, then you're going."
The door to the office suddenly burst open behind us and my father charged in, took one look around, and demanded, "What the hell is he doing here?"
Professor McGonagall replied calmly, "I'm afraid I had to call him, Mr Potter. There are Aurors on the grounds and they would have had I not."
She made no attempt to look ashamed of this admission, or the unspoken one. Dad nodded to her and walked over to me, his expression softening with each step, before he said, "Are you alright, Lillie?"
I nodded, but said shakily, "He couldn't get into the girls' dormitories."
When he stood before me he quickly pulled me up into a hug, and then asked, "So it's a man then? Did anyone see what he looked like?"
Professor McGonagall replied behind us, "No, it was too dark and in the panic he started when he destroyed the Common Room, he managed to get through them unseen. He actually escaped through a window in the boys' dormitories."
Dad looked back to her, "I thought those couldn't be opened."
"He destroyed it, and then flew away on a broom or something he had waiting nearby. He's quite possibly long gone by now anyway," said Professor McGonagall, sadly. "I've had to move the students to the Great Hall...."
"Isn't the school warded?" asked Dad.
"He got through them," replied the OGB.
Suspecting that he was being ignored, the Minister said then, "Mr Potter, your daughter has to leave."
I fully expected Dad to refuse, so then was completely stunned when he said, "She will."
When I stepped away from him, out of his arms, to demand an answer, he said, "We have no choice, Lillie, we can't risk the lives of the other students. This person got into Gryffindor Tower." But as he spoke, with his back to the Minister, the OGB and Professor McGonagall, he winked at me.
I stared at him for a moment, and then nodded mutely.
Then he straightened and said, "Connor, why don't you take Lillie back so that she can get some of her things... don't worry, you'll have an escort. I'll come to meet you so we can leave."
There was something about the way that he said "we" that made me look at him curiously, but then Connor took my hand and began to leave the office and I quietly followed. Before the door closed behind us I heard Dad turn to the Minister and say, "I don't like this, but you're right... we can't risk the safety of the other children. It's just a good thing it's the weekend, or I'd never gotten Hermione to agree...."
When we got back to Gryffindor Tower it was conspicuously and devastatingly empty. The Headmistress' order of evacuation had been heeded immediately and absolutely, but in their wake my Housemates had left their silence and it filled the room and me with a terrible sadness. But it also made it easy for me to go back up to the girls' dormitories, with a female Auror at my side of course, to pack my trunk. With no questions sent my way in rapid-fire succession, I said nothing all the while, but found myself steadfastly biting back my tears, as I refused to give in to my emotions and thoughts.
I didn't want to leave; it was admitting defeat to leave, it was wrong for me to leave before the school year ended. And then how long was I supposed to stay away? What if they never found my attacker, like they hadn't caught that Marcus Flint or Peter Pettigrew? What was I to do then? My father wasn't teaching me anything and though my mother was willing, she couldn't possibly give up her career to teach me magic at home. I didn't want her to do that, I'd been at school three years now but was only just getting used to being away from them.
Thinking of being home made me think of something else. I wouldn't be able to see Connor, Rigel, Aisling, Hortense or Kimberly again, or at least not until breaks. My siblings and the others would go off to school and I would be at home, put out because they couldn't find the person after me. It was only a matter of time before they forgot about me, and Connor, who knows what he could get up to... like get another girlfriend, and I'd been so awful to him in the last few days....
That did it; I couldn't stop the sob that burst out, or the others that came after. The tears flowed freely, blinding me as I packed my trunk, and eventually I had to sit back and cry a while before I could finish. My Auror escort said nothing all the time, nor attempted to comfort me, and for that I was most grateful. I didn't need comfort then, I needed to cry.
Once I was done I changed at once, taking care to wash my face, then donning my cloak, scarf, hat and gloves, checked around to ensure that I had everything, and allowed her to lead me out to the Common Room. My father was waiting for me there with Connor and the Headmistress, and once I was with them she continued with the other Auror out into the hall. My father gave me a sad smile and said, "We're taking the Floo home, and Connor here, has kindly asked to accompany us just to be sure you're okay. Professor McGonagall and I see no problem with that."
I looked over to him and smiled, then back to Dad and asked, "How long am I going to be home?"
"Only the weekend," he replied. "There's no way in hell someone is going to stop you from getting your education. Besides, I haven't told your mother yet."
Even Professor McGonagall smiled at that, and then he said, "Come on then. It's getting late."
Quietly, without a note to the others, or even a parting look, we went back to the Headmistress' office and Flooed home to Godric's Hollow. And me, Dad and Connor were barely standing in the living room, dusting the soot from our clothes, when Dad turned to Connor and said, "Call your parents and tell them we're coming through."
Visibly confused, Connor asked, "What?"
I took two quick glances around the lilac and cream-living room, immaculate save for Dad's boots by the sofa and Milo's chess board on the coffee table, and asked, "Where's Mum and Milo and Mackenzie?"
He replied to Connor, "We're going to your house. I've already spoken to Lupin and Tonks and they should have finished with the arrangements by now."
"Dad... you know, I don't think Mum will be that upset about you letting me come home," I said.
He smiled, "Oh she knows you're here, or rather, going there. But nobody else does."
Both Connor and I stared at him wide-eyed, realising what they intended to do, then turned to each other and smiled. And then while Connor went back to the fireplace to get the Floo powder, Dad continued, "If everyone thinks you've gone home, I expect him to come flying over here to get you. Instead he'll meet the business end of my wand and become an example to others who might have similar ideas. And all the while you'll be safe with the Lupins. Don't know why I didn't think of this sooner...."
As towering emerald green flames erupted from the fireplace with a deafening roar, and Connor stepped through to lead the way to his home, I turned back to Dad and smiled. I didn't care how long it took for him to come up with it, it was a great idea.
And a big mistake.
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