A/N: Hi there, I'm back! :D The hopefully long anticipated second part of the trilogy, sequel to A Tale of Winter is here! I'm not going to comment much on canon for the sake of those who haven't read the book yet, (and what have you been doing that you haven't?) but I will tell you that I'm going to incorporate some elements of it into the story. Save for a few things, I really did enjoy the book, really.
Otherwise, things you need to know. I read over parts of the first book and cringed, I seriously should get a beta, and I have a feeling I may have some cringing here too, but nothing too bad. In that vein, all errors are mine. Also, school is reopening for me, so don't expect speedy updates, I'll try, but this is my third year at uni so don't hold out much hope. And last, today's my mum's birthday so I'm dedicating this entire fic to her. Heh... we'll see if that was a good idea.
Disclaimer: I gladly give props to JK Rowling, everything you recognise is hers. However, all original stuff is mine and I greedily lay claim to it. She can't have it, it's mine!
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Úlfhéðinn: Milo Potter, age 10, Squib
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"Oh you who are born of the blood of the gods, Trojan son of Anchises, easy is the descent to Hell; the door of dark Dis stands open day and night. But to retrace your steps and come out to the air above, that is work, that is labour!"- Virgil
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Chapter One
It was still amber. In the weeks and months since Connor had given me the mood ring, (on his birthday no less, and gift-wrapped, with a bright rainbow-coloured bow) it had changed colours numerous times so that I knew that it was working, but the predominant colour was amber. Amber, according to the guide booklet that had come with the Madam Astra's Magical Mood Ring (A Colour for Every Mood!), represented stress and strain, and was most noticeably present whenever I was with Connor for extended periods of time. No matter what he did or said or tried, it would not change, and we both knew why.
Rigel, who didn't, considered it karma and quite happily made a point of taking daily checks on its status. And the more time passed the worse he got, to the point that, as he, Connor, Aisling, Hortense and I made our way to Hogsmeade Station with our schoolmates to catch the Hogwarts Express at end of term, he said loudly, "I think it's about time you returned that ring, Magnolia, it's not working."
Connor gave no visible reaction, though Aisling and Hortense exchanged a glance and Hortense rolled her eyes. I looked up at Connor, not fooled by the blank look on his face, and replied stiffly, "There's nothing wrong with the ring, it was green this morning."
"Really?" asked Rigel, bending forward slightly so that he could look at my face and arching a brow. Had I seriously believed my tone would have put him in his place? This was Rigel Malfoy I was speaking to.
"Yes, really," I replied, trying to stifle a surge of irritation. "And when I argued with Kimberly about a few of my books she'd taken, it turned black."
As a matter of fact, it was already beginning to turn grey. Oblivious to this, Rigel shrugged and said, "I still say there's something wrong with it, it's always yellow."
"It's not `yellow', it's `amber', and you would find fault with it, nothing you haven't purchased or is not on a first name basis with the creator of is good enough," I said, with a hint of nastiness.
Unsurprisingly, he smiled brightly. "You know me so well."
Oh yes I did, we'd practically grown up like siblings though he proudly laid claim to the name "Malfoy" and I was Harry Potter's daughter. The circumstances of his conception may have been unclear and the subject of intense rumours to this day (for it had come about while his mother, Ginny Weasley, had been Draco Malfoy's captive in a cave by the sea for eight days at the end of the Second War) but there was no doubt that he was Draco's son. He had his grey eyes, high forehead and pale complexion, and also the Weasley's fiery red hair, in addition to broad shoulders, high cheekbones and a somewhat imposing height. And since Draco's mother, Mrs Narcissa Malfoy had won visitation rights in a still-hotly contested custody decision when he was five, he'd been sorted into Slytherin when he got to Hogwarts and he acted like a tamer version of him, no one doubted it for a second.
I rolled my eyes and tried to escape him by walking a little ahead of him and the others. Bad idea in the heat, I'd last had breakfast hours ago and was fast sweating through my internal water reserves. Not to mention that with my hair becoming frizzier with each step, I was seriously regretting the decision not to put it into that single braid Kimberly had offered to do. While I'd managed to inherit my father's green eyes, slight build and hair colour, and looked a bit like his mother, my hair was just like my Mum's, meaning long, thick and bushy. My big black-haired head could probably be seen for miles in the humidity.
Oh, the humidity. Summer had only truly come to Scotland some weeks before, bringing with it long hot days of brilliant sunshine and startling, sudden thunderstorms, the end of heavy, itchy jumpers, long cloaks and smoky fireplaces, and the anticipation of two months of no school, but the humidity had been there long before. And as Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry let out for the school year that morning, we were treated to the first taste of a predicted heat wave. Those who could had cast Cooling Charms on their clothing as soon as they were out the door, those who couldn't, which were basically most of the school, were forced to hurry down the path to the train station as quickly as they could without outright running.
Of course, I doubted anyone without humidity concerns were really worrying about it behind their sweat-drenched brows. There were a plethora of more important things to ponder, like no school for two months, actually going home after nearly nine, summer trips in the country or abroad, jobs they wanted or were forced to take, and yes, homework.
My family weren't going any further than the Burrow in Devon this year, but my grandparents were coming over from Nice for a fortnight in three weeks. The closest I'd come to vacation jobs so far were the odd paid chore around the house, baby-sitting my little brother and the younger Weasleys with Hortense and Aisling, and on one occasion, playing assistant to Aisling mother's, Luna Weasley, nee Lovegood, at The Quibbler on my father's birthday so my parents could spend it together. And apparently narrowly escaping death on numerous occasions during the winter did not exempt one from the need to complete one's syllabus before OWLS year.
Still, I had two whole months of relative freedom ahead of me, there was no rush.
"Hey, slow down!" called Rigel, realising that I was trying to escape him and attempting to catch up. "That's really childish, Potter. I was merely making an observation and giving you my opinion, you don't have to listen to me... I know you're not going to anyway."
I barely looked over my shoulder to glare at him. "Connor's right here, you're being rude and I don't want to hear it. I told you to keep me out of your feud and you're not listening."
Connor spoke up then. "You don't have to be offended on my behalf, just ignore him like I do."
I turned to argue that I did not want to ignore him, and that I was fed up of having an amber ring too, and that we really needed to sit down and talk about why the ring was amber again and how it could be fixed, when I collided with a small boy who I hadn't realised was walking close behind me. He stumbled out of my path, muttering, "Sorry, sorry!" as I hastily apologised, but then he stopped, looked up and immediately jerked away from me as if burned. I froze, hands suspended where I'd been helping him right himself, in shock, but with a look of disgust he scurried away, steadfastly refusing to take a backward glance. And as soon as he was out of sight my rage at Connor transferred to him and I felt myself shaking as I tried to stifle the urge to scream in frustration.
Who'd said that the last day of school was not a day for Potter-baiting?
The first to do it were the Slytherin first and second years who weren't yet afraid of Rigel but were stupid enough to think that Potter-baiting-as Rigel called the act of employing various means and methods of getting a rise out of me, due to my little brother's condition-was the general rule among the non-Gryffindors of the school. This was hastily brought under control, and after one of them foolishly did it in front of him. But then it began to pick up among the others.
I went home for the Easter break, at Mum's insistence, and when I returned it was suddenly a daily occurrence. As I wandered through the corridors on my way to classes or the Great Hall or out of doors, I would encounter suspicious looks, loud whispering and outright aversion. My fellow Gryffindors took care not to do it, to show House solidarity, but I knew that many of them shared the view that I was not to be associated with. Harry Potter may have saved all their skins in the Second War against Voldemort, but now that his son was a werewolf his family was something to be shunned and avoided. Now I truly understood how awful it was to have Rigel take daily verbal swipes at Connor, whose father, Remus Lupin, was probably the most famous werewolf in all of Wizarding Britain. And it hurt just that much more too when I thought that Milo was already having to deal with it whenever Dad or Mum took him out in the Wizarding world.
Eventually there were too many of them to complain about, many of them had already been raised on stereotypical ideas of werewolves and wouldn't see differently even if it was staring them in the face. And when my dear vindictive Potions Master, Professor Severus Snape joined the fray, moving from simply ignoring me in class to making a show of doing so in class, I resigned myself to suffer in silence. Dad and Headmistress McGonagall could threaten or talk to them all they wanted and it would change nothing.
Of course, knowing this did not make enduring it any easier.
The others quickly formed a semi-circle round me, with Connor taking my hand and giving it a reassuring squeeze, but Rigel was the first to speak. "Did you see his face?"
I shook my head, and then realising what he'd asked, said, "You can't have him hunted down and beaten."
"Whatever gave you the idea that I was planning something like that?" asked Rigel, feigning offence.
"I heard about Jeffrey Clark and Albus Horne," I replied.
He scoffed. "I had nothing to do with that. Those two knew that Ravenclaws aren't allowed in the Slytherin dungeons outside of classes."
I narrowed my eyes at him. "They were going to see Professor Snape about homework."
"He wasn't there and they knew that, they were intentionally invading our territory," he replied, casually looking around us for sign of the boy. "To Slytherins that is considered an act of aggression and it must be treated as such."
"You are impossible," I replied, trying my best to suppress a smile. I couldn't help but like it when he acted chivalrously; it was a rare but wonderful sight.
He smiled broadly, but then it was replaced by a frown when Connor asked, "Maggie, where's Ophelia?"
"Oh!" I exclaimed, slapping my forehead as I realised that I'd forgotten my owl again. For all that she'd done for me in the short time that I'd had her, I had been a rather awful owner to the little pygmy owl. She'd been my rescuer during the worst attack last winter, but since then I'd constantly forgotten her in the Owlery, instead choosing to use a school owl before remembering well after I'd sent it off that I had an owl of my own. Coincidentally I almost never visited her, or took her out about the castle like the other owners did. Just before I left home after the Easter break, Mum had joked that she didn't expect to see me at King's Cross with her in hand. Apparently, I was going to prove her right.
Rigel interrupted, scowling. "What is it with you, Lupin? Your girlfriend was just treated to a bit of werewolf bias-something I know you're more than familiar with-and you're busy talking about owls?"
Aisling swatted his arm, and he at once swatted her back. She made to attack him again, this time drawing her wand, but Connor arrested her movement by lifting free his arm over our heads and gently dangled Ophelia in her little gilt cage before me. "Don't worry, I've got her. But keep this up and the next time you'll remember her is when we're on the train and pulling into London."
Rigel, glowering at Aisling, said, "Oh, your hero."
I ignored him, deliberately choosing to turn to Connor to retrieve my owl. But he lifted her out of my reach just as my hands grazed the cage door, and said, "What do you say?"
I grinned. "Give me the owl or I'll hex you into next year?"
"No...." He shook his head, grinning as well. Out of the periphery of my gaze I saw Rigel rolling his eyes and miming retching. This continued until Aisling grabbed his arm and finally shoved him well ahead of us.
"Come on, idiot; let's go... nothing for us to see here...."
"Then is it, hand over the owl before I kick you in the gut?" I asked, struggling against a broad smile so that I could glare at him.
"No...." He shook his head again, then leaned forward and kissed me gently.
I pushed him away laughing. "It's too hot for that!"
He lifted both eyebrows at me, and when I scowled, at last surrendered Ophelia, saying, "Honestly, I swear you'll forget your head next. What will you do without me?"
I glared at him again and then made a show of checking her over before, satisfied, beginning to head off after the others. As he hurried to catch up, I called over my shoulder, "Carry on in blissful ignorance and forgetfulness. I'm looking forward to two months of doing nothing."
The others had made it to the station and were now on the platform with their luggage, boarding the train one by one. Most of our schoolmates were already there, and I strongly suspected that if we didn't hurry there wouldn't be an empty cabin left. At the start and end of the school year there rarely was, but of course Aisling and Hortense would make sure that we got one. I wasn't really as close to them as Rigel, but technically we were family. This did not stop Rigel from standing on the platform staring back at Connor and me with an expression of utmost impatience and irritation though.
It was widely known that he didn't like my boyfriend, and not just because I had a boyfriend. He and Connor Lupin, though cousins through his father and Connor's mother, Nymphadora Tonks-Lupin, were bitter enemies and had been since childhood. Supposedly fed up of Rigel's harassment one night at the Burrow, Connor, a Metamorphmagus like his mother, had morphed some extra hair, longer nails and teeth and wearing a rug like a pelt, scared the living daylights out of him. As that night was the full moon and so Connor was over because of his father, (not to mention that Connor was a sturdier version of Uncle Lupin with grey-blue eyes and dimples) and Rigel did not yet know that werewolves were made and not born, it didn't take much to convince him that Connor was a werewolf too. The two had actively hated each other since, and nothing I could say or do would change that.
Just because I slowed a little, allowing Connor to catch up with me, and then asked, "Are you excited to see your new house?"
The Lupin home had had the unfortunate honour of being the stage for the final act of the attacks last winter and in the process had been burnt to the point that it could no longer be safely inhabited. Of course the way it was reported in the press to this day, one would think that I was the primary target. I wasn't; Arthur MacNicol, who was a werewolf and the mastermind behind them, was after Connor.
Allegedly under the orders of Fenrir Greyback, the most feared and hated werewolf in all of Wizarding Britain, and even before the Second War, he'd staged a series of increasingly violent attacks during the winter to get to Connor. I was merely a diversion. Greyback-who had bitten Uncle Lupin when he was a boy after his father, John, had offended him-had learned during the war that Uncle Lupin had been attempting to infiltrate his "pack" as a spy for the Order of the Phoenix against Voldemort. Greyback, who had assumed that Uncle Lupin had merely been taking his rightful place amongst his equals, and not fighting to the save the same society that often shunned and oppressed werewolves, took personal offence and ordered all able-bodied werewolves within the region to make him pay. Or as he calmly told the Wizengamot when he was brought before them to answer to the new charges: "Lupin calls himself our equal but did nothing to help his `brothers' after the war. He prefers to be treated like a dog by a society that knows he's no ordinary man and resents him for it. He tries to be their equal, to fit in with them, bowing to their scorn while his true equals are forced to steal or starve. And he is just like us, more than he knows, look at his wife... how young, how supple still.... He betrayed us, so I told them to find his son, and while his father watches, rend him limb from limb."
Aunt Tonks, an experienced Auror and war hero, not known for frailty, fainted when she heard him. Uncle Lupin likes to say now, if I hadn't been there that night-MacNicol's own fault for using me as a diversion to get to them-he just might have succeeded.
Instead I'd saved Connor and his newborn baby sister, which had earned me a medal from the Ministry and an award for Special Services to the School, from Hogwarts. But I could not save my little brother. In a move that I knew she would always regret, my mother had decided to bring my younger and brother sister to Hogsmeade after they'd learned of the last attack at the Lupin house. She had thought at the time that it would have been good for me to see them and know that I was safe. But that was a terrible mistake. Milo was nearly killed by MacNicol, who'd found a way to transform into a full werewolf outside of the full moon and used this to advantage to escape the Aurors who'd come to our rescue, and so became one in turn. And then I, as well as my younger sister, mother, our friends, my parents' colleagues and half of Hogsmeade village got to see my father kill Arthur MacNicol.
He regretted that too, but only just a little.
In the weeks and months since that night a lot had changed for all of us, and my brother in particular, but for Connor's family at least, it was for the better.
With their house gone they needed to get a new one. No easy task given his father's condition, the need for security and peace of mind for all involved set a number of obstacles, and then there were the Ministry regulations to deal with. But then my father managed to get the Minister for Magic, Rufus Scrimgeour, to admit that there were no real legal restrictions on a werewolf buying a home. The "laws" were actually proposals that had never officially been passed in the Ministry and therefore, and he said this working his jaw in the manner of someone sucking on a lime, "Mr Lupin and his family could live wherever they want." My Mum found them an agent, and then she and Aunt Tonks went house-hunting with Aunt Ginny and Grandma Molly and found them a new one not far from ours in Godric's Hollow.
Expectedly, this had displeased Rigel greatly.
Connor did not reply at once then, when I spoke, but as we got to the station at last and climbed the steps to the platform and steaming train, he replied, "I'm actually kind of nervous. I know-knew the old house inside out. All our memories were in it, the good and the bad, and everything from Dad's parents' marriage to our lives now. And now it's gone, and this new house is just... well, new."
I snorted. "What did you expect? New house, new stuff-mostly-new memories to make. And especially with Zoe, who's new too."
At this a smile formed on Connor's lips. His baby sister had been born some six months earlier during the height of the attacks, and though most people, including myself, often wondered why our parents had decided to provide us with siblings, he was of those who anxiously desired them. He spoke of almost nothing else when I asked after his family nowadays.
"I can't wait to see her," he said, still smiling at the thought. "Mum's said that her hair's gotten longer, but it's still black. Of course, if she'd been like me it would have been changing the moment she was born. And Dad says they've started her on solids, but the change in diet means that she no longer has to cry when she needs her nappy changed. I just want her to start crawling. Then the real fun begins."
Having been too young to remember this with Milo and Mackenzie, I merely nodded and said, "See, it won't be too bad."
He conceded with a nod, and then apparently remembering something, leaned closer and whispered, "In fact, I've heard that I'm getting a studio to work in. I lost a lot of work in the fire, and thankfully some of it could be replaced, but my own studio.... It was really kind of cramped in my old bedroom."
"There you go, lucky you," I said, sincerely, but at the same time wondered what exactly he meant by the word "work". Did he mean the work for his now internationally best-selling comic book, of which no one knew he was the author Romulus Kveld-Ulf, Úlfhéðinn, or his super secret and highly illegal attempts to find a cure for the werewolf curse?
I voiced neither thought in question though; posing it in that format was guaranteed to cause a row. And specifically the same row that meant my mood ring would always be amber. It could not be helped, I liked it better when my concerns were merely whether it was a good idea to put me into his comic book as a character (which he did, turning me into the white she-wolf, Thora) and not whether his own mother would one day have to arrest him for meddling in the Dark Arts. It was all well and good putting one's talent to good use, entertaining others and making money for one's future and family. And even finding a cure had its merits, for not only his family would benefit. But the method, using a form of magic which sole purpose was to harm, which often exacted terrible prices for those who dared to use it... that was something else entirely.
Connor Lupin was never the innocent, helpless victim Fenrir Greyback and Arthur MacNicol had assumed him to be.
Rigel jerked me from my thoughts then. "You know, we don't have all day. It's hot, we've got a long ride ahead of us, and the train does have a schedule. It's not going to wait on two slackers."
I glared. "So why aren't you on it?"
"Because I don't feel like getting yelled at for leaving you behind," he replied.
"Connor's with me." I said pointedly.
As usual, he ignored this. "Get on the train, Potter. Aisling and Hortense have already found us a compartment and I paid Aisling five Galleons to make sure Camilla joins us."
"That's a waste of money," said Connor, smirking.
"To you, of course it would be," said Rigel maliciously, and with that, he turned and boarded the train. You'd think he didn't know about the comic book. But then it was better this way, I guessed, to keep it all a secret.
I looked up at Connor, but he merely sighed and let me lead the way aboard.
An hour into the ride and we were seated, myself, Connor and Camilla Longbottom facing Hortense, Aisling and Rigel, intensely bored and wondering why no one had thought to bring a chess board of Exploding Snap cards. I know Aisling had a chess set, but it was locked up in her trunk and no one was willing to get out our trunks from the overhead compartments just for that. The snack trolley wasn't due for another hour at least, everyone was generally giving our cabin a wide berth since they'd learned I was in it, and since we'd all stopped reading the papers months ago there wasn't even the crossword to pass the time.
There had been a moment of fun though, when first we entered the cabin. To our surprise, (or maybe it was the money, Connor strongly suspected the money) Aisling had actually somehow persuaded Camilla, the very beautiful daughter of our Herbology professor, Neville Longbottom, to sit with us. A tall, slender girl of sixteen with sleek, waist-length black hair, bright grey-green eyes, dark red lips, and an aristocratically pale complexion, with a reputation for haughtiness, as well as academic excellence and ambition, Camilla out-did the part-Veela Hortense for the title of Hogwarts Head Beauty. And Rigel had been in love with her from the moment he'd first laid eyes on her.
Uncle Lupin described it as watching my grandfather, James Potter, chasing after my grandmother, Lily Evans, all over again, cute and hopelessly amusing; Connor, reeling from his father's use of the word "cute", had described it as pathetic.
As soon as he realised that she was really there and not a trick of the heat, Rigel abandoned all pretence of the Malfoy snob he usually projected at school, and joyously pushed past all of us to slip into the seat beside her, grinning stupidly. When Connor and I entered though, Camilla got up and sat beside us, and immediately began a whispered conversation with Connor that made me slightly uncomfortable. I knew she didn't really care for Connor beyond friendship, and that the two had been close friends for years, but she was very, very beautiful.
Though, given the longing look in Rigel's eyes at that moment, I couldn't blame her. It was very disturbing.
In time though, the conversation ended, and we were all left in an uncomfortable silence, watching the sunlight stretch further and further across our laps in our thankfully air-conditioned cabin, and staring blankly at one another and out the window, as the Express travelled closer and closer to London. After a while I was quite surprised to discover that one could tune out the sound of a train running over its tracks altogether, that breathing could be quite noisy, and that though you spent years in close quarters with people to the extent that they were family, it was quite unnerving to be confined in a space with them. And with the door to the cabin closed, we didn't even have the excuse of other peoples' conversations for our silence. We really could not find one thing to say to each other.
At last, Camilla stood and announced, "I'm going to find Father."
She left without a backward glance.
Rigel watched her go dejectedly, and then turned to the rest of us. "Why'd you let her leave?"
Hortense beat Connor to the punch. "She doesn't like you. Let it go."
Rigel scowled. "Just for that you're not invited to the wedding."
Now Connor laughed out loud. "What wedding? She wouldn't marry you if it was a choice between you and a Blast-Ended Skrewt."
Rigel looked up at him. "Speaking from experience?"
Connor just sighed, rolled his eyes and looked out the window again. I looked down at my feet, trying desperately to avoid blurting out: "You can't marry her because she's your cousin. Granted she's your second cousin and this kind of thing doesn't seem to matter to old pureblood families like the Malfoys, it matters to her... and Hortense's right, Camilla doesn't like you...."
Well, Nike Slytherin, the secret daughter of the Dark Lord Voldemort and his most faithful lieutenant, the very married Bellatrix Lestrange, really, but the adoption papers and birth certificate in Uncle Neville Longbottom's possession said she was `Camilla Longbottom' and so she was. As it so happened, the only ones who did know the truth were Uncle Neville, my parents, Uncle Ron, Connor's parents, the Order of the Phoenix, a few members of the Wizengamot, Severus Snape, and me. And I only found out by perfect accident and was immediately sworn to secrecy.
Aisling spoke up then. "Say Connor, now that you're in Godric's Hollow, does that mean we'll be seeing you at the Burrow more often?"
Rigel, who just happened to live there with Aunt Ginny and Grandma Weasley, snapped round to look at her. "What?"
Hortense rolled her eyes. "Grand-mére told his Maman that she'd be more than willing to take him and Zoe when it's the full moon, now that they're closer and all that. And since Milo's... well, she expects Lillie and Mackenzie to be over too. She wants to turn it into a monthly event during the holidays, have everyone over so that we don't have to think and worry...."
She trailed off looking at Connor and me, and I asked at once, "What did Aunt Tonks say?"
"That she was very grateful, as she already sends Zoe, but that Grand-mére would have to ask Connor," she replied.
I at once turned to him. "Are you going to come then?"
To my surprise, he asked, "Are you going to go?"
I looked at him, puzzled. "If Mum and Dad want to send me to the Burrow I'll have to go. Mackenzie definitely has to, and they don't like separating us now so.... How can you ask that?"
"I just thought that you would have wanted to see for once what your brother has to go through every month," he replied, simply.
In my peripheral vision I saw the others look at him in open astonishment, three pairs of eyebrows vanishing into their matching fringes. I too was stunned, but said, firmly, "Of course I'd want to be there for him, but your Dad is the only one with him those nights and when they can Dad and Aunt Tonks spend most of the night patrolling, making sure they don't get out and hurt anyone accidentally. It makes no sense for me to stick around... for what? Just to see my little brother suffering? Mackenzie told me how Mum looked last month."
"Suffering? With Wolfsbane?" interrupted Rigel then, cutting across Connor's response.
I turned away from Connor to him. "Mum says he's been having a hard time of it, everything was fine until his first transformation. They stayed with him all day and then before moonrise Dad carried him out to the shed that Uncle Lupin usually transformed in...." I clenched my jaw at the sudden tightening in my throat, and found that my eyes were already burning with the beginnings of tears. My voice broke as I continued, "And then Uncle Lupin had to hold him back as he pounded on the door after Dad locked him in. He was hoarse and catatonic for nearly a weak afterwards."
Scepticism was quickly replaced with horror, unusual for Rigel to display but there nonetheless.
Connor went further. "Wolfsbane might preserve your mind, but it doesn't stop the pain of the transformation nor the frightful reality that you're a little boy becoming a wolf and your Dad's outside and can't come in to help you unless he wants to risk becoming like you as well. Dad says that it's also very dark and cold in there sometimes, and then there are the old chains his parents used to lock him in.... (I snapped back to Connor at the mention of chains.) I'd not be surprised if Milo has nightmares about it, Dad did, and so I don't think he'd mind too much if his brave big sister came by and watched over him too."
I asked, "Is that why you don't visit the Burrow often, because you're helping your Mum watch over your Dad?"
At this he flashed a sheepish grin. "It's not so much `helping', because legally I'm not supposed to be there, as it is keeping her company."
"If you're not supposed to be there, how could Magnolia be?" asked Rigel. "Cousin Nymphadora's an Auror and no one really cares what she does, but her Dad's kind of hard to hide. He'd probably lose his job if anyone found out."
Connor looked at him. "Please do not call my mother by her given name, I know she's an adult and it's kind of silly, but she detests it and has kindly asked to be called `Tonks'. Besides, no one's going to tell, and it's not like she's going to be there every month. I'm not usually, outside of school."
Though he did not say it, both Rigel and I knew what he meant. Those times when Connor was not with his parents he was usually in the company of Professor Snape, former Death Eater-turned-Hogwarts prisoner, and my aforementioned nemesis, the most hated Potions Master in all of Hogwarts' history. (Rigel and I called him the OGB, or Old Greasy Bat, and he definitely deserved it.) And the subject of those visits, learning to brew the Wolfsbane potion, had unwittingly spawned Connor's more dangerous clandestine extra-curricular activity with the Dark Arts. The man was vile, and though he had risked his life to save my father, and then my little brother that night last winter, I would probably always hate him.
He only helped my father because he had been in love with my grandmother Lily.
Aisling's confused question then, "Where do you go when you're not at your parents' or at school? I
didn't know the Tonkses were still alive...?" was lost in the cacophony that rushed into our cabin when
Camilla unexpectedly returned and quietly resumed her seat beside me. Not expecting an explanation for this though,
Aisling began again, "Connor? Are your grandparents still alive?" But just then Rigel spoke again, and her
question was lost.
"Say Camilla, since I hear the cubs may be coming to the Burrow for the holidays, should I expect to see you
too?" He gave her his sweetest smile.
She rolled her eyes and looked back out into the corridor. Aisling turned to him then. "Didn't I hear that Bijou Zabini might be coming over to meet the family?"
"What?" he asked, at once distracted.
We all looked back at him at this, including Camilla, and Aisling said, "While I was going down to see Professor Patil this morning, I overheard Bijou telling a few of her friends that `I don't really want to but Mother insists that I visit at the Burrow after I visit Mrs Malfoy this summer. You know you have to get to know the family, all of them if you want this to work out.'"
Rigel suddenly looked rather ill.
*****
Platform Nine and Three-Quarters at King's Cross station in London was packed, what with school out and all the students back and their parents trying to get to them. But it was more so today because Harry Potter's daughter was finally coming home, "months after a series of violent attacks that culminated in the destruction of a family's friend home and the discovery that she was not the intended target. Tragically, also months after her younger brother, Mr Potter's only son, Milo Harry, had been bitten by a werewolf, becoming one as well."
The reporters jostled with the other parents and students for position to get the best shots of me and the others as we greeted our parents. The temperature in London, though, was several degrees higher than that in Hogsmeade, and I was not surprised to feel a trickle of sweat race down my back as I struggled through the crowd to my parents. One had to be insane to be here without a good reason.
Mum, (the bushy brown-haired, brown-eyed Hermione Potter nee Granger), Dad, (the messy-black haired, bright green-eyed, bespectacled and scarred Boy-Who-Lived, the Chosen One, the Man-Who-Triumphed, Harry Potter), Uncle Ron, (freakishly tall and broad, freckled, fiery red-haired and blue-eyed), and Aunt Luna, (waist-length, straggly dirty blonde hair, wide pale blue eyes that seemed to eternally hold a dreamy, faraway expression), Aunt Ginny Weasley, (shoulder-length fiery red hair, brown eyes, and short but sturdy build), Uncle Bill, (tall, fang tooth-earring wearing, red hair in a ponytail, face deeply scarred from werewolf attack during the war, and blue-eyed) and Aunt Fleur Weasley nee Delacour, (also tall, slender, waist-length silvery blonde hair and dark blue eyes), and Aunt Tonks, (today, cropped white-blonde hair dusted powder blue, honey brown eyes, same heart-shaped face and looking surprisingly tame in her crimson Auror robes) were all standing on the platform just a little way from them awaiting us. Ignoring the reporters, and pushing and shoving our way through our classmates, we hurried to their side, and, taking care to dangle the Ophelia's cage before her first, I shamelessly threw myself into my mother's arms and cried happily, "Mum! I missed you!"
She squeezed me tight against her chest and kissed my hair, while Dad grumbled beside us, "I'm standing right here, you know...." I smiled, let her go and hugged him at once. "That's more like it; let's remember who the important one here is."
Uncle Ron beat Mum to it. "Yes, me."
We all laughed, though Aisling and Rigel both rolled their eyes first, and then I said, "Let's go home, I've been dying to see my own room again. No roommates, no other peoples' messes or snoring or talking, and most important of all... no Kimberly stealing my books!"
Somewhere in the crowd I thought I heard someone call out, "Hey!" But then with all the pushing it could have been anyone, and Mum said, looking to Dad, "Oh, but we've got to make a stop first."
Dad frowned. "Yes, I suppose we do. But Hermione...."
She gave him a pointed look and his protest died. The others all exchanged glances, and then turned to their respective children and said: "Come on, come on, get your trunk, we have to go."
"We're taking the Floo home and dinner's waiting. Oi! Watch those sprogs, I'm coming through!"
"Come on Connor, we've got a surprise for you."
"Bye Harry, Hermione, Lillie!"
Connor dared to kiss me in front of my parents, and then gave my hand a last, firm squeeze before he following his mother off the platform. Aisling and Hortense waved, but Rigel hurried back to say, "If you're going to be visiting the c-Connor, you know you have to come with me to Grandmother's house for once, right?"
"What?" I asked, confused, and then realising what he meant, said, "That'll never happen. Again, my parents won't agree to it, and neither will Grandmother. However, I'm sure Bijou will be lots of fun."
"Just make sure when you pack your overnight bag you bring a gift, Grandmother is a stickler for etiquette," he replied, and then vanished into the crowd after his mother before I could respond.
I remained staring after him for a while, barely noticing the people bumping into me, or the reporters calling questions, and then rolled my eyes and turned back to my parents. Dad had been watching us, and asked, "What's this I hear about you going to Malfoy Manor?"
Mum spared me having to answer by saying, "Harry, remember we have a stop to make?"
"Oh right," he said and at once took my trunk and began to head off the platform. "We better make this quick, we're having dinner with Tonks and Lupin so they can show everyone the house."
Mum's voice was filled with exasperation as she replied, "We discussed this. This is important, Harry."
He did not turn back to her, but I knew that he was annoyed when he said, "I know, I know... but I think you're overreacting, Hermione, all we need to do is give it time and you'll see that."
My mother said nothing more all the way off the platform, out of King's Cross and to our car, but my mind was spinning. What were my parents talking about? I knew that it had brought them to argument in fact, their tones spoke volumes, but what was so important that it would make them argue?
Ah, I didn't need to know. I'd spent much of my winter break fighting for my life; I probably needed my summer break to be more silent and stress-free than anyone else. Parents argued all the time; it was a fact of life.
Fate, as usual, and my little brother had other plans.
On the bright side, my ring was now streaked with green.
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