Chapter 2
It's been a long day. Really long. And sitting here in front of Cornelius Fudge is making me question whether this day is ever going to end. I know he isn't going to do anything to Harry, he couldn't event if he wanted to. He needs him.
Harry is nervous and I get why, he doesn't want to be expelled. Even though I assured him that nothing bad is going to happen to him, he hasn't calmed down at all.
.Ah, you're worrying about the reaction of your aunt and uncle?" Says Fudge"
I can't help but snort, they must be furious, I can still recall the shade of purple morphing on uncle Vernon's face. "Sorry," I mutter when the minster's gaze falls on me for what I believe to be the first time this evening.
"Well, I won't deny that they are extremely angry, Harry," the man continues without acknowledging me. "but they are prepared to take you back next summer as long as you stay at Hogwarts for the Christmas and Easter holidays."
Harry makes a face, "We always stay at Hogwarts for the Christmas and Easter holidays," he says , "and I don't ever want to go back to Privet Drive."
"Now, now, I'm sure you'll feel differently once you've calmed down," Fudge says in a worried tone. "They are your family, after all, and I'm sure you are fond of each other – er – very deep down."
"Very deep" I mumble and, once again, am ignored.
"All there is to decide now is where you're going to spend the last two weeks of your holidays. I suggest you take a room here at the Leaky Cauldron and –"
"Hang on," Harry blurts out and I mentally facepalm myself because I know what he, in all his stupidity, is about to bring up, "what about my punishment?"
Harry got himself in a bit of a situation, he sort of blew up our aunt. Not that she didn't deserve it, she was saying super mean things about our parents and if Harry hadn't got to her first I would have done a lot more damage. Because we are both underage we're not allowed to preform magic outside of school. Harry won't get into trouble for it, I might've but he won't. Still, he shouldn't have brought it up with the minister of magic, that was just stupid.
Fudge blinks. "Punishment?"
"I broke the law!" Harry says. "The Decree for the Restriction of Underage Wizardry."
Shut up, Harry.
"Oh, my dear boy, we're not going to punish you for a little thing like that!" Fudge says.
"It was an accident! We don't send people to Azkaban just for blowing up their aunts!"
Called it.
"Last year, I got an official warning just because a house-elf smashed a pudding in my uncle's house!" Harry says, frowning. "The Ministry of Magic said I'd be expelled from Hogwarts if there was any more magic there!"
Fudge is looking a bit on edge, he definitely does not want to be having this conversation. "Circumstances change, Harry... we have to take into account... in the present climate... surely you don't want to be expelled?״
"Of course I don't," says Harry.
"Well then, what's all the fuss about? Now, have a crumpet, Harry, while I go and see if Tom's got a room for you."
No crumpets for me I guess.
I swear if I didn't know any better I'd think I've gone invisible. I check my palms just to make sure.
Fudge gets out of the parlour and Harry stares after him. "There is something extremely odd going on," Harry turns to me. "Why did Fudge wait for us here, if he wasn't going to punish me for what happened?"
I shrug, "I don't think he should be here at all."
"What do you mean?" Harry frowns.
"I mean, why would the minister of magic himself come all the way here to deal with underaged use of magic. Doesn't seem like the job recruiters his level of authority."
Fudge comes back, accompanied by that creepy innkeeper, Tom.
"Room eleven's free, Harry," says Fudge and then, to my surprise, turns to me. "I suppose you two don't mind sharing a room..."
"No," Harry and I say at the same time. We've been sharing a room for 13 years now.
"Very well then, just one thing, and I'm sure you'll understand: I don't want you two wandering off into Muggle London, alright? Keep to Diagon Alley. And you're to be back here before dark each night. Sure you'll understand. Tom will be keeping an eye on you for me." This is directed towards Harry, he couldn't care less what I do or where I go.
"OK," says Harry slowly, "but why–?"
"Don't want to lose you again, do we?" Says Fudge with a fake laugh. "No, no... best we know where you are... I mean..." He clears his throat and picks up his cloak. "Well, I'll be off, plenty to do, you know."
"Have you had any luck with Black yet?" I ask.
"What's that? Oh, you've heard–" I swear he looks like he could strangle me for bringing this up, and I love it. "Well, no, not yet, but it's only a matter of time. The Azkaban guards have never yet failed... and they are angrier than I've ever seen them." Fudge shudders slightly.
Harry nods, mostly to himself.
"Well I'll be off" Fudge holds out his hand and Harry shakes it.
Harry and I share a look, we both know it's better if he asks for what we both want. Surly, if I asked the man for a favor he'd refuse. "Er – Minister? Can I ask you something?"
"Certainly."
"Well, third years at Hogwarts are allowed to visit Hogsmeade, but our aunt and uncle didn't sign the permission form. D'you think you could?"
Fudge, to no one's surprise, looks very uncomfortable.
"Ah," he says. "No. No, I'm very sorry, Harry, but as I'm not your parent or guardian –"
"But you're the Minister for Magic," says Harry eagerly. "If you gave me permission–"
"No, I'm sorry, Harry, but rules are rules," says Fudge flatly. He just let Harry off the hook for using magic outside of Hogwarts, but I'm not going to bring that up. It seems that the minister is very particular with the rules he chooses to enforce.
"Perhaps you'll be able to visit Hogsmeade next year. In fact, I think it best if you don't... yes... well, I'll be off. Enjoy your stay, Harry."
I'm not even offended at this point.
Fudge shakes Harry's hand again before leaving the room. Creepy Tom (as I've come to refer to him) is beaming at Harry, "If you'll follow me, Mr Potter," he says. "I've already taken your things up..."
creep
We follow Tom up a wooden staircase to our room. As we go inside I look around and notice our belongings, including Harry's owl, are all here.
"Hedwig!" Harry nearly yells.
Harry got Hegwig for his eleventh birthday from our school's gamekeeper, Hagrid. He gave us a birthday cake and took us to buy our Hogwarts supplies when we got our letters. He also gave me a beautiful black cat, as it was my birthday too. Sadly, I had to return it because the Dursleys did not allow it to be in the house and it kept trying to hunt down Hedwig.
"Very smart owl you've got there, arrived about five minutes after you did. If there's anything you need, Mr Potter, don't hesitate to ask." He leaves without so much as acknowledging me.
"Creepy git" I mutter with a shudder. "How are you feeling?" I ask my brother.
"Fine," he says flatly, stroking Hadwig's feathers.
I know Harry is a bit on edge, what happened today was... a lot... but I know that now that we are in the wizarding world he really is fine. Better than he's been all summer. I wish the Weasleys were here, I miss them all so much. Hermione, too. But I'll have to wait for them to come back from Egypt, that means I'm going to spend the last couple of weeks of summer with only my brother.
Don't get me wrong, I love my brother, but sometimes we don't really get along and a break is needed. We'll see how it goes, I guess.
"I think I'm going to bad, it's been a long day."
"Yeah, me, too."
——————————
It's been almost two weeks since we got to the Leakey Cauldron and I can't wait for the summer to be over. Harry is driving me mad, he can be so annoying sometimes. We spent most of our time together up until two days ago when I decided I've had enough of my brother and informed him that I was going to take a break from him until the Weasleys get back and we'll have a buffer to minimize our fights.
We haven't really spoken since our last fight, which started because I told him I wanted to go to 'Flourish and Blotts' instead of 'Quality Quidditch Supplies' again. Harry through a fit and told me I 'wouldn't understand it, because I'm just a girl' and then got mad when I used the words 'stupid' and 'incompetent' to describe his favorite players which I don't even remember the names of. Then, I decided it's time to go our separate ways, I walked away telling him I'll see him later and stocked off towards the book shop.
I'm now on my way to said book shop for the third time in three days. I decided it was better if I get the books I need a few at a time so I don't have to carry so much back to my room. Just when I am about to turn a corner leading to the shop I hear my name being called out.
"Charlotte!"
I stop walking and look around. To my great delight I see my best friend running towards me. "Hermione!"
We meet each other halfway and crash in a hug.
"Merlin, I've missed you!" Says the witch in my arms.
"I've missed you, too" I say, squeezing her tighter. We both chuckle.
Releasing Hermione, I look over her shoulder and notice the redhead behind her standing awkwardly a few meters away. I go to hug Ron, too.
"Hi, Char. How was your summer?" He asks and bands down to hug me.
"Alright. Not amazing." My summer was shit, but I don't want to ruin the mood. "How was yours? How was Egypt?"
"Great, and I'll tell you all about Egypt later." He says with a big smile on his face, "Where is Harry?"
I shrug, "Don't know, we've been taking a break from each other. But he's probably wondering around here somewhere."
"Should we go look for him?" Hermione asks.
"Suit yourselves," I really don't want to start searching Diagon Alley for my brother, "I'm not really in the mood to go look for him, he's been getting on my nerves lately. I was actually on my way to pick up my books for school."
"Well, maybe we can meet afterwards..." offers Ron, "We'll go find Harry and we'll all meet you at 'Florean Fortescue's' when you finish getting your books."
To be completely honest, I'm a little disappointed. I mean, it's no surprise that they would choose to go looking for Harry, he is their best friend, and I'm just his sister. Well maybe now I'm more then just his sister, but it hasn't started that way.
You could say I'm a bit insecure about my friendship with them.
"Sure," I walk past them "I'll see you later, then."
I start walking towards the book shop, a bit sad, but I tell myself it's fine, my friends are back and that's the important part.
I hear the bell above the door ringing as I walk through the door. I try to squeeze my way through the sea of people, most likely here to get there required books for the upcoming year. As I get to the stairs leading to the part of the shop where most of the books are, I here a familiar voice.
"Charlotte? Charlotte! Hi." Neville Longbottom, a boy in my year, calls out for me.
I quite like Neville, he is a sweet boy and he always sit with me in our common room when Ron and Hermione are on some adventure with Harry. Being around him is always so calm and it's nice to have someone to just talk about mindless stuff with. Even so, I don't really know if what we have is a friendship per say. Again, insecure.
"Hi, Neville, how was your holiday?" I turn around to face him.
"Alright. How was yours?"
"Uneventful."
Mostly.
"Are you here to get your books, for school?"
"Yes," I nod, "I actually already got most of them. I'm just here to get the book for Care For Magical Creatures."
Neville shudders. The book assigned for this year's class is a monster book, which means it's not very nice and it bites.
"I just saw Ginny Weasley, a few minutes ago, outside the shop." He says pointing with his thumb over his shoulder. I try to look but there're too many people inside the shop. "Did you know that the whole family traveled to Egypt for the summer holidays?"
"Yes, it was in the newspaper and Ron sent Harry some gift he got for him there." He said it was for the both of us but I found that hard to believe, not that I was expecting anything. "I just saw Ron too, so I guess the whole family is here."
Neville nods, "Well, I'll see you on the train in a few days, I have to get my books and a few other things and my grandma doesn't like spending too much time in Diagon so..."
"Yeah, it was nice seeing you, Neville. See you on the train." With that I go up the stairs to look for my book.