Meraki

Chapter 8: Fortuity

Her initial decision to make Theodore wait on her answer does not entirely go to plan when she enters the Great Hall and hears a glimpse of a whisper about her and Theodore’s apparently already official relationship.
Despite the turn of events, she takes it in stride and goes along with what the universe planned out for her.

“There you are!” Theodore rises out of his seat at the table, in their usual spot in the middle of it.

“Everyone is talking, Ava,” he says sternly. Although he doesn’t mind the attention, he is confused above anything. While he hasn’t gotten his answer yet, the rest of the school seems to have it. The news travelled from one mouth to another, spreading throughout the castle fairly quickly. Avior is of course already a topic of interest, so to hear that the mass murderer’s daughter has a boyfriend everyone else naturally had to know. Especially when said boyfriend is also the child of a Death Eater. They have become quite the talk of the school.

“Like they are every single morning, Teddy, calm yourself,” she smiles and takes her seat next to him, pulling on his sleeve to make him sit down again. “I didn’t mean for it to happen, but I suppose this means I’m saying yes.”

Theodore clears up instantly. His frown smoothes out, his eyes light up and the corners of his mouth quirk into one of the gentlest smiles she has ever had the privilege to see on him.

“Really?” He asks and he is met with a confirming nod. “Really, Teddy.”

“That’s great!” He stares at her, and it is different from usual, before he clears his throat and leans down to pull a book out of his bag. “You left your book at mine last night,” Theodore places the large book on dragons in front of her, pushing her plate sideways to make room for it.

“Merci, I am planning on getting a dragon for a pet,” she explains, going on like nothing has changed while she reaches for a slice of toast. It catches him off guard for a moment until he realises that nothing much has changed with the switch of labels between them. The more he thinks about it, he isn’t sure what to do differently now. Besides, perhaps, kiss her occasionally.

“Wait, a pet dragon? How exactly do you plan on doing that?” 

“By getting a miniature one.” Avior answers like it is the utmost obvious thing ever. Theodore pauses, a moment in which he seems to remember Lorelei’s letter and it suddenly does sound like an obvious answer. “Right,” he says, “a mini-dragon.”

“I have a few favourites that I would like to have as a pet,” she tells him as she drops the book back into her own bag. “You drew stars around the title names of the dragons you like most,” Theodore states. “I saw.”

“Snooping around in my books, are ya?” She grins impishly.

“Always have. That is besides the point though, you aren’t in your Quidditch uniform,” he points out, tugging on the sleeve of her black cloak.

Avior scoffs. “Flint had us replaced by Hufflepuff to play Gryffindor because of the expected weather today.”

“Because of the weather?” Theodore repeats, not believing a word of it. “He’s scared if you ask me,” she adds her own two scents, “he didn’t train us well enough so he is scared a little bit of rain might get in our way— Not that I need training for that. I will play through fire falling down from the sky and still score a million more times than him.”

“I trust that,” he chuckles and lifts an arm to wrap it around her shoulders. “So let us move to the viewer’s position this day instead of a player’s one.”

Avior raises her eyes to the bewitched ceiling of the Great Hall, candles flickering under a perfect image of the outside weather; rumbling thunder, heavy rainfall and winds blowing harshly, motivated by the idea of one day pulling the castle from the ground.

———

The whole of the student body files out of the castle, towards the Quidditch Pitch. The youngest students are holding onto their umbrellas for dear life, trying not to let the wind break them while their friends attempt to use spells to reinforce the umbrellas. The rest of the students use magic to keep themselves dry and warm, with those that aren’t as skilled in such charms having to re-apply them every now and then.

There was no way of hearing even a gust of wind in the Slytherin common room with the windows looking out into the Black Lake instead of a gloomy sky, which Avior would have much preferred. Between a sky full of rain and the bottom of a lake housing a giant squid and plenty of other creatures, she would love to count every raindrop that coats the window instead of being unable to stare at glass that is entirely covered.

Remus once theorised that she might have had an awful experience with the sea in a past life when talking to Lorelei about his daughter’s inability to so much as look at the water from a distance. Maybe she had been a pirate who died tragically at sea, and the aggressive waves had been the last thing she had seen.
He sometimes likes to picture her spitting orders at her own crew whenever she tries to boss him around instead. She would have made a great captain.

The viewer side —which is almost the entire amount— of the students quickly fills the stands and this time around with the thunderstorm overhead, the crowd’s usually loud chatter is barely audible.

“There they are!” Avior exclaims when both teams walk out onto the field. Theodore is on her right, Tristan on her left. In front of them stand Juliette and Graham together, surrounded by even more friends of Juliette’s. Avior cheers along with the rest of the students upon the teams’ arrivals, even if they are both her rivals in the game.

“If they could only both lose!” Theodore yells beside her and she laughs.

“If we win the Cup then they technically have!” She says loudly for her voice to reach above the booming of thunder and clatter of rain.

“You know what I mean!”

The sound of the whistle to signal the start of the match doesn’t even reach the crowd, but everyone cheers nonetheless for the start of the very first game of the year.
As it goes on, barely anyone can hear the commentary and even the game itself is hard to follow with the rain obscuring the view and ultimately the match. Those closest to the goal posts can tell better when there has been scored or if it was missed. Avior is biting her bottom lip in concentration at trying to follow the game, but also attempting to think of ways to play better in such weather. She would for one use charms to help her see better, one to keep her goggles clear from the rain. That would already help loads. When throwing the quaffle, she would have to keep the wind in mind and use it to her advantage.

“I can’t even tell what is happening anymore,” Theodore speaks up next to her, seeming rather lost while his best friend and now also girlfriend appears to be seeing a whole lot in the game.

After a while of losing track of time, the sound of Madam Hooch whistling reaches them, though only barely, and every player flies down to the ground one by one, each team huddling under a large umbrella.

“It’s not over yet, is it?” Tristan asks from her left side and she shakes her head. “A time-out, I assume!”

The sky is only getting darker and more aggressive. Gloomy clouds lowering rain down on them in extreme amounts with the occasional flash of lightning and roll of thunder.
Eventually the game resumes again with everyone on the edge of their seats, trying to keep up with how fast it seems to be going even in spite of the awful weather.

“What’s that?!” A student behind them shrieks and she isn’t the only one to notice. Black figures enter into the field, there are so many of them and they bring a horrific but familiar cold with them that not only seeps down into the bone, but it pierces one’s being as a whole. Goosebumps cover Avior’s skin and she is already reaching for her wand when voices all around her gasp and cry out in horror. A person is falling from the sky, their broom being swept away by the wind, right into the gathered dementors on the field. But it is Dumbledore who reacts in what feels like only a split second, shooting silver magic at the dementors which effectively drives them off, and slowing down the player’s fall.
Tristan is clutching his chest at the scene unfolding in front of them and the whistle is blown once more. The game has ended, the teams all return to the ground while the dementors have retreated.

“Who is it?” Avior gasps. “Who was that that fell?”

“Harry,” Juliette answers in front of her. “Dumbledore is taking him…”

Every pair of eyes is watching Dumbledore conjure a stretcher and float Harry Potter onto it, to then take him away in a breeze. Even his pace seems to have been magicked to speed up. Harry is motionless on the stretcher. The crowd is already moving to leave the stands in a rush and Avior along with her friends are pulled into the movement. She takes hold of Theodore’s arm, her eyes glued to Dumbledore and Harry until they are out of sight.

“Is he okay?” Theodore asks, she only just makes it out above the rain and thunder. “Pomfrey can heal anything,” she replies confidently.

———

While Avior wanted to pay Harry a visit in the Hospital Wing, she decided against it. They are not friends, even if they were meant to be family from the start. She isn’t sure if Harry knows how close her parents apparently had been to his, but she does know that he will probably not appreciate it if she shows up at his bedside. Some part of her wonders what it would have been like; she would have grown up with him, they could have been like best friends, maybe close to siblings the way she is with Juliette. That wonder is enough to relight the spark of anger towards the one man behind this ruined relationship before it even had a chance to form. There is a need to avenge the things that died before they were born.

The news of Avior’s first ever boyfriend eventually reaches the ears of her father. Remus thought he still had time until any of that would happen, until his daughter would start noticing others and seeing them in a different light. It was a foolish hope, because he himself knows all too well what it is like to catch feelings for one’s best friend.

He can’t help but feel the strong urge to guard his daughter’s heart. So strong, it is, that he catches himself scrutinising Theodore when the two of them reappear in his classroom again the following week. He then finds himself blaming his traitorous lover for forcing him to navigate this newfound world alone, the struggle of figuring out how to make out if a person is worthy of his baby girl, or how to protect her from things she has no clue about yet.

Days later is when he manages to bring himself to broach the subject, finding that he feels stronger about it than he thought with how he hesitated up until now.

“I’ve heard… something quite unexpected,” he starts off gingerly. He studies the way she scribbles something down on a rather long piece of parchment that is already filled with her writing. No matter what the supposed essay is about, Remus wants to read it simply to get a glimpse into what her mind has the ability to come up with. He pulls a chair to sit down opposite of her, at her table in the front of his classroom.

“Like what?” She mumbles absently, her eyebrows furrowing together lightly as she pauses and then continues writing, dotting her sentence at the end and then finally looking up at him. She lets go of her quill, devoting her undivided attention to her father.

Remus chuckles softly and swallows. “You and Theodore?”

To his stark surprise, a deep blush starts to form on her pale cheeks at just the mention of the boy’s name alone. While he wants to be happy for his daughter and he is, this has an entirely new kind of fear invading his very heart. Remus had never thought himself to be such a cliché father, yet here he is wanting to keep the boy as far away from his daughter as he possibly can. A more quiet part of him is afraid of what this could mean were she a bit older. And ready to go her own way with someone she has chosen for her heart, someone other than her own father. Remus suddenly realises that she isn’t as little anymore as he still saw her to be.

“He’s perfect,” says Avior. And honest to the stars, Remus thinks he might tear up.

“As long as you’re careful with who you entrust your heart to, Ivy.”

She leans forward with a smile so gentle, he selfishly sees more of himself reflected in her now. “Papa,” she says softly, “heartbreak definitely won’t be coming from it. You don’t have to worry about me, but I know you will anyway.” A quiet chuckle escapes her. “Teddy is one of the last people that would ever hurt me.”

“I know,” Remus sighs. “He’s a good boy.” He smiles, and she can clearly pick apart the sad undertone to it. But he knows he can’t keep her from growing up. There is something bittersweet about it; he gets to watch her flourish into the magnificent person she already is and will further become, and at the same time it only means that they are getting closer to her leaving the little world he has with her only. His daughter is all he has. The thought of one day not living under the same roof with her anymore is enough to feel like his heart is being torn out.

“But let me press this very clearly, that you can always tell me everything,” he adds, “anything at all. About him, or outside of the matter. I know you might think and believe that you are old enough to take care of everything yourself, and maybe you can for the most part. But as your father, I don’t ever want to lose my sight on what is happening to you. Secrets are the last thing I ever want from you, Ivy.”

“I promise that you won’t have to find out about any secrets of mine because I won’t keep them from you,” Avior says, a tone of honesty and sincerity to set it in stone.

“I love you,” she then says. “I love you. I love you. Three times for good luck.”

The unexpectedly strong emotions nearly get to him right then, but he keeps himself together in front of her.

“I love you more than I have ever loved anyone, cariad.”

She raises herself out of her chair, leans her hands on the table’s surface to lean over it and kisses his cheek. He isn’t sure what he ever did to be lucky enough to have her as his daughter.

“What were you writing there?” Remus asks out of a well of curiosity that could get close to matching hers.

“Snape gave me an assignment,” she starts to explain quickly, ever passionate about her knowledge and the thirst to make it grow. “I asked him to teach me how to brew Wolfsbane and he doesn’t think I am capable, so he gave me an essay to write. A detailed step by step of how to brew it, where each ingredient comes from, how to harvest, grow or forage for said ingredients, and so on. I’m almost done with it.”

It doesn’t take a genius to know that she isn’t only wanting to learn how to brew such a complicated potion simply for the sake of learning. She has long made it her quest to master the skill of Potioneering, but this goes beyond that. Remus knows she is doing it for him.

“I admire you in ways I have never done with anyone. Any parent would probably try to dissuade their child at this age to even think of creating at such a level, but I trust you and your intellect.” He smiles cheekily, “You got that from me, don’t ya think?”

“Absolutely,” she agrees wholeheartedly, with a grin full of pride.

Remus then goes on to watch her finish the never ending essay as she only continues to add more and write more. She tells him small facts about certain ingredients or why the steps are performed in a specific way. When she was born, he hadn’t thought forward enough to moments like this, where he would be learning from his child rather than the other way around. Gratitude fills him all over again, for having a daughter so smart and willing to share intelligence with him. From the moment she came into this world, Remus has felt like he gained a forever friend.

November and another full moon pass by quietly, without so much as a kick. Besides, perhaps, Ravenclaw gaining a victory in Quidditch over Hufflepuff.
Talk about Avior’s new haircut has long faded and despite its purpose having been to cause a distraction and to cut off at least one tie to the bad apples of her family, it has only fueled her reputation and the image she holds in the eyes of the other students.

She isn’t helping it much, though. Even less so when the boy that had left her the note about her being like her father on his wanted poster lands in the Hospital Wing because of a rather nasty idea of a supposed prank of hers. The boy immediately claimed it was her doing in a panic, but there was no proof to trace it back to her when she carefully erased her tracks while executing it.
Avior merely shrugged when Eliana asked her about it. She had only placed a tiny explosive potion in his school bag to destroy his books, she told Theodore, and it wasn’t her fault that it got in contact with his clothes and burned through them, causing severe blisters on his hands and arms. He was the one to happen to reach for his bag at the wrong time.
Yes, it might have been a small potion of her own creation to cause a reaction of the sort, but had she meant for it to happen? Avior shook her head no when Theodore asked, while her eyes glittering with satisfaction told him otherwise. He might have praised her for getting back at him, but Juliette definitely did not agree.

“I’m disappointed in you, Lune.”
The words feel like a knife being dug into her heart and twisted. Avior was smiling when her sister came to find her after her last class on Friday, but the smile quickly drops and makes place for the scowl she is seen sporting more and more often.

“Am I missing something here?” Theodore glances uncertainly between the two girls.

“That boy with the burns?” Juliette says, giving him a sharp look that truly resembles the title of older sibling and Prefect all in the same.

“If you were in my shoes for even just a day you would understand,” Avior claps back swiftly and her short hair flutters momentarily. This softens Juliette’s expression ever so slightly, because she knows she doesn’t understand what Avior is going through and she probably never will. But to react in a violent way is so unlike the girl she grew up with.

“I know you must be—” “Julie, je t’aime, but I’m not suffering. I’m not hurt, I’m nothing but sick of these people staring either in hatred or fear as if I have anything to do with a twisted person such as Sirius Black.”
She has started to walk away from the classroom’s door with her boyfriend and sister quickly following as she speaks.

“But don’t you understand that you are only feeding that view they have of you by lashing out?”

That is a very clear and obvious point to be made and every logical part of Avior knows she is right. In spite, it sets her off to think the opposite way too.

“Maybe they should be afraid then,” she replies, “it is only their own delusions that have them as terrified as they are.”

“Ava,” Theodore butts in now as well, while the three of them descend a staircase. His tone is questioning her, signalling that he thought about it and logically, he can’t make sense of it. “Isn’t that what you don’t want them to be?”

“Then I’ve changed my mind. They can feel whatever they want to feel about me. The moment they cross me, I’ll cross them. It’s quite simple. I don’t understand the fuss, Julie.”

Juliette isn’t the only one to be disappointed by her actions. She has gone to talk to Remus about it in a moment of concern for his daughter, afraid that she might start taking it all the wrong way. He hadn’t yet heard about the older student having ended up in the Hospital Wing for the reason he did, and he had been unpleasantly surprised by it. While he had no part in it directly, Remus felt a strong sense of guilt for his daughter’s way of handling things. In a way, it makes him feel like he has failed in raising her properly while at the same time, he is failing at protecting her from harm like every loving parent would want to do.

The next day, when she is not wearing a Slytherin uniform but instead dressed in straight black jeans and a thick maroon jumper under her warm winter cloak, Remus leans some of his weight onto his cane as he watches her leave the castle to visit Hogsmeade with Theodore, Eliana and Terenzio Norelli. An odd form of a gut feeling makes him want to have her stay behind, to keep her close where he can see her and not let her leave the safety of the castle’s grounds.

“I’ll have to leave you guys later in the day,” Avior tells the other three, “because Julie and I are meeting with her mother.”

“Should we wait on you?” Theodore asks, but she shakes her head. “I will meet you back at the castle after.”

Terenzio Norelli is of Italian descent, like Theodore. The two boys met when they were young children, through their fathers and their pureblood connections. It was only fate for them to become friends and end up in the same dormitory at school. Terenzio is a close friend of Eliana’s, truly her only friend outside of Avior, and possibly even closer to Irene and Tristan. Him and Eliana have known each other almost as long as the boys have, and Avior can’t help but feel envious of the years Eliana has spent with her Theodore. Until she reminds herself that she is much closer to him herself and that they are dating now. No one else could be any closer, right?

Eliana is much more talkative with Terenzio; lively and energetic. While he is quite the opposite with his stoic personality; never showing much more than nothing. Although with his closest, he is attentive, more so than he is with anyone else. He seems to be genuinely interested in all they have to say.

“Tristan is missing!” Avior comments when there is finally a moment of silence between the other duo as well. “We almost have our year of Slytherins together, if only he had been here… Well, if you don’t count the ones that don’t matter,” she adds under her breath.

“I quite like Lamont,” says Terenzio calmly, choosing to ignore her comment, knowing that it includes Irene as well and also aware of the fact that the two girls truly can’t find a way around Irene’s view of her.

“Oh yes,” Avior nods, leaning her head forward to look at him past Eliana at her side, “he actually is very nice. Then so, we are missing two of our people.”

“And Everett?” Theodore mentions. “Have you two still not made up?” Just the name has her sighing loudly.

“What happened?” Eliana asks curiously and Terenzio seems a little more interested than the usual disinterest that he has in everyone else.

“A prick is what he is.” And that is what it is left at. Everett Rosier isn’t mentioned again, nor are any other students or friends that are absent. Separate conversations start up again with Eliana bringing up an old memory between her and Terenzio, while this time Avior has Theodore retell her the details of their first and second kiss all over again. She loves to hear it all from his perspective.

“It was impulsive the first time,” he starts off with a chuckle, “but the second time too, honestly. Because of what Everett said and the way you reacted. I thought it meant something— that there was more to it than it being just some random comment of his. For the longest time I thought he had a crush on you, but then he said that and I threw it all out the window, including my doubts.”

“How brave you are, Teddy,” she grins, revelling in reliving the memory, still very recent. A month of their being an official couple has already come to pass and she still blushes every time he kisses her even if it is no new concept to them anymore. Their gloved hands are entwined and she feels everything the lovesick teenager she is.

“I have braved the horrors of potential rejection to get another kiss from you, Stella.” The name isn’t new on its own, but it has gotten a different meaning since a month ago. Now, it suddenly has her blushing profusely. Enough for her to bury her nose into the scarf wrapped around her neck that used to belong to Theodore.
This is a whole new Avior, one that he hasn’t seen before any of this started. He enjoys getting reactions out of her that are the opposite of the usual boldness and arrogance that everyone is so used to getting from her. The girl that others fear turns into a person of the softest kind in a special way for him alone.
Snowflakes fall down on them, coating the world in even more white and sticking to their hair, eyelashes and clothes. Avior glances at the side of his face and it has her stomach fluttering. He is infinitely more handsome in the snow, she has decided that much. When she looks away again, it is his turn to admire her for a few short seconds. Avior used to either allow her hair to hang down and float freely behind her, or put it in two long braids when going to Hogsmeade. Since it is now entirely too short for either, a big part of it is now hidden by her Slytherin beanie.

“You look pretty,” Theodore breaks the silence that grew between them— never uncomfortable. She raises her eyes to his once again, her cheeks and nose a deep red from the cold, and maybe in combination with the compliment.

———

After having filled a bag with Zonko’s products and sweets from Honeydukes, including Drooble’s Best Blowing Gum, the four of them decided to have a butterbeer each as a final treat on top. Then Theodore, Eliana and Terenzio left to do more shopping while Avior stayed behind in the Three Broomsticks, where she agreed to meet with Juliette and Lorelei. Snow continues to fall outside and she is staring out of the window, excited to drag her friends outside for a snowball fight the next day like she does every year when it has finally snowed enough. Her fingers tap absentmindedly on the tabletop to a rhythm only she can hear with an already empty glass in front of her.

“Do you happen to be waiting for someone?” Her head snaps up upon recognising the voice of Lorelei Greengrass; her aunt, not by blood but more family to her than her own blood has ever been. Avior jumps up out of her seat, nearly knocking her chair over, and throws her arms around the mother. “Hi!” She breathes, her nose buried in the blonde locks of Lorelei.

“Hi, sweetheart,” she greets her, returning the embrace tightly like only a mother can. “I missed you,” Avior mumbles and then lets go to admire the woman’s beautiful features. When she was younger, she always wished to look like her once older. Lorelei is in every way the magnificent woman that Juliette has taken after. Speaking of which; Juliette stands next to them with her golden smile. She has her curly hair in a ponytail, only accentuating the features of her face; much softer and rounder than Avior’s. Like Avior, she isn’t wearing her school uniform, but instead dressed in a pastel pink jumper on top of light blue jeans.

“Come on,” she urges the mother and daughter duo to sit down, “I’ll get you some butterbeers.”

With two hot glasses of the drink, Avior sits back down a few minutes later, getting thanked by each.

“Remus didn’t come?” Lorelei asks after taking a sip, to which Avior shakes her head. “He is quite tired.”

“How is he doing apart from that?” Her motherly concern extends to her friend as well, even if they are both the same age. Ever since becoming a mother, Lorelei has started fussing over every loved one around her. Her husband used to smile at even the smallest hint of it, always having brought up her ‘mother’s instinct’ whenever she would show it.

“He’s well,” Avior smiles brightly, “he is the best teacher I have ever had— though it might seem biased coming from me! But other students are really happy with him, too.”

Lorelei smiles just as proudly. She had been surprised when Remus told her about his new position as a teacher at Hogwarts; he had never seemed particularly interested in the field. But it was hard to come by a job as a werewolf, so he gratefully took the chance Dumbledore granted him with both hands.

“I never doubted him to be as lovely a teacher as he had been when he tutored others in school back then,” she sighs, dreaming of those old times that weren’t even too long ago. Everyone was still alive back then, she thinks sadly to herself. Everyone was still free, no traitors and no deaths yet.

“Maman,” Juliette suddenly perks up, “Lune has a boyfriend now.”

The gasp that escapes the mother makes it seem like she was just told that Avior is getting married at her young age instead. She instantly reaches over the table to grab the girl’s hands, beaming with excitement and joy like never before.

“You do?” She whispers. “Who is it? Does he treat you well? Oh, Eve, you only deserve the very best of the best.” Avior feels strangely touched by Lorelei’s response, almost in the same way and on the same depth as when Remus ultimately told her the same thing.

“Theodore,” she tells her, and her heart skips a beat as she speaks of her sickening crush and darling boyfriend all in the same, “and he is the very best. He is my best friend before anything.”

Lennox Mulciber was her best friend too. It was only a silly crush at first, Lorelei has told them the story of how they fell in love before. Then he suddenly showed hints at having the same feelings for her. Before they knew it, they were in love. But before that happened, their parents had arranged to marry them. It is only luck and fate for them to have truly loved one another. They still do. Lorelei secretly imagined it to have been her husband that escaped Azkaban instead of Sirius Black. She knows Lennox would have been motivated by love; for herself and their daughter. It would have been different. It makes her wonder how Sirius escaped and why Lennox couldn’t have done it too.

“I’m so happy for you, darling,” Lorelei speaks, seeing so much of her younger self in Avior’s glittering eyes. The innocence of feelings at their age is nothing short of nostalgic to her. She wishes she could go back to that time.

———

——— BY ORDER OF ———
THE MINISTRY OF MAGIC

Customers are reminded that until further notice, dementors will be patrolling the streets of Hogsmeade every night after sundown. This measure has been put in place for the safety of Hogsmeade residents and will be lifted upon the recapture of Sirius Black. It is therefore advisable that you complete your shopping well before nightfall.
Merry Christmas!

Avior pushes her hands further into her pockets, reading and rereading the notice plastered on the wall of the side of the Three Broomsticks, like dozens more all throughout Hogsmeade. She left Juliette to spend some more time with her mother, alone. The air is cold and crisp, but Avior doesn’t feel it as her eyes zone in on the name of a man that has never been less of a father to her than ever before. A large spot of black moves in the corner of her eye to her left, having come from the alleyway next to the Broomsticks. She drops her gaze to look at the black dog that has appeared beside her, quick to recognise it to be the dog she met the previous visit.

“They don’t affect you as much, do they?” She asks softly. As if an animal can read. “The dementors, I mean. Maybe you shouldn’t be out after dark either.” Her hands itch in her pockets to bring the dog back to the castle with her, but she knows that it is no option. Avior pulls one hand out and gently pats the dog on his head where he sits calmly next to her.

“Teddy was wrong about you, you’re friendly,” she smiles. He nuzzles his head into the palm of her hand and his tail starts to wag. Despite his size and rough look, he might be the gentlest stray dog she has ever come across. “Bref,” Avior sighs, “I can’t take ya with me.” The dog pulls his head away to look up at her, his tail now deadly still as he stares directly into her eyes. She slowly retreats her hand, wishing that she could see what the animal is thinking as he continues to stare, eerily still. There is something so entirely not normal about this dog. “Well then,” she mumbles and pushes her hand back into her pocket. She gives the poster one last glance, her gaze lingering on the name once again, before she promptly turns and leaves it and the dog behind.

Still, she is not left alone. Avior turns a corner and hears the gentle tapping of paws on the ground, snow cracking under the weight of the large black dog that follows her. She gives him a look over her shoulder to see him following at a small distance. While she attempts to ignore it, feeling like she is done for the day and wanting to leave Hogsmeade to start on her long walk back to the castle, the dog is still on her heels.

“Right,” she mutters when she glances back again and he remains a loyal follower. Avior stops and spins around in the middle of the path, not a single student in sight whichever way she looks. They are either all in Hogsmeade, or at Hogwarts. She is at a neutral in between, not really anywhere.

“Are you hungry?” Avior crouches down to his height. “Is that why you’re following me?” But the dog turns to the left and walks away, towards a bench off the side of the path she descended upon towards Hogsmeade earlier. She huffs out a breath and decides to follow him this time, brushing off the snow on the bench to sit down. He does the same, jumping onto the wood to sit next to her, and she lets out a laugh at how strangely human he appears to be.

“You just want a friend, don’t you?” Her eyes flit over his rather thin appearance and she wonders if he really isn’t hungry.

“I have a little cat, would you get along with her?” Avior stares ahead. The world is white for as far as the eye can see. She has always been a lover of snow and the cold. It reminds her of all of the snowball fights she and Juliette had as kids, all of the snowmen made that Remus and Lorelei would charm to move. Or Christmas spent together every year, decorating the tree. And, of course, not to forget wearing her beloved jumpers— or occasionally one of her father’s, though they almost fit as dresses on her.

“She is black and has green eyes. My papa said he picked her for me because she looks like me.”
None of her friends would be surprised to see her speaking to a dog as if he truly is a friend of her own, as if he actually knows what she is talking about and understands.

“But look at me,” she turns her head, on the same eye level as the dog, “she really does look like me! Besides one of my eyes, I suppose. I always thought my eyes made me look more like my papa… He is blind in one eye, you see? It is a different colour than the other, just like mine are… But I found out quite recently that, apparently, I have my uncle’s eyes.”

The dog tilts his head to one side and she could have sworn that he truly is studying her eyes with the way he stares at them so intently.

“I don’t think I mind,” she continues softly. “Auntie Lori told me that he was nice, before. She said they were close as siblings. The more I get to know about my family, the more questions I have…”
A gentle but icy breeze lifts the hem of her cloak and she crosses her legs over one another. She reaches out and brushes the snowflakes falling on the dog’s fur on his head with a single gloved finger.

“It makes no sense.” The more she talks, the more it sounds like she is speaking to herself. It wouldn’t be a first. When there are no listening ears around, she always has her own. “How could Sirius Black be labelled as a blood traitor and go on to do what he did?”

The dog scoots infinitesimally closer, a shift so little that it almost goes unnoticed.

“Which side was he deceiving?” Avior asks no one in particular. Maybe the stars are listening in on the one sided conversation, as invisible as they are throughout the day, hopefully they can grant her an answer one day.

“But if he betrayed his friends, could he have really been deceiving them? Voldemort? No…” she sighs, tracing little figures on the dog’s snout.

“I cut my hair because of him.” Avior pauses, her jaw clenching with the anger bubbling under the surface, ever present. No matter how often Juliette and her other friends tell her how short hair looks just as good on her, it angers her to no extent that she was forced to do this. Because, after everything, she blames her own actions on Sirius Black and every student that has any kind of opinion on her regarding him. “Others either hate me or fear me, or maybe a bit of both, they say I look so much like him. So I cut my hair,” she tells the dog frustratedly. “Part of me believes that only made it worse. Some can’t even look at me, that is how terrified they are.”

She chuckles dryly. A subtle crease has formed between her eyebrows as she furrows them together in the slightest. “At least those people leave me alone. I would rather they all be scared instead.”

He pushes against her hand that remains drawing in his fur to get closer to her and something tells her that he truly is listening.

“T’es mignon,” she comments, “but you don’t feel like an ordinary dog.”

In the way that Nyx looks like her, Avior believes that Remus would have picked a dog like this one had he gotten her a dog instead. With his black fur and grey eyes, he fits into their image perfectly.

“Anyways, I think my friends worry about me too much,” says Avior, before a small smile creeps up on her without much of her realisation. “One of them is my boyfriend now,” she tells him, “the boy that I was with the first time I saw you.” Her smile grows until she is laughing, flashing dimples and teeth.

“What would he think if he saw us now? He thought you would have bit my nose off that day! But look at you…”

He is cute, she would still argue with Theodore on that. Taking him with her to Hogwarts might not be an option, but there have to be other ways in which she can take care of the dog. She could feed him, make sure he is clean and has a warm place to sleep in.

“Stay right here!” She rushes up and away from the bench, already hurrying back to Hogsmeade as she calls back to the dog. “I’ll be right back!”

Avior goes off to buy some food for the dog with some of the money she still has left. She crosses paths with Asten Lamont, one of her housemates and also in the same year as her, waving to him and his twin brother, Elias, who is in Ravenclaw. They have eyes similar to hers in the way that they have a spot of green each in one eye, while the rest is a shade of grey close to white. It is the first thing that she noticed in Asten when they sat in a Potions class together and at eleven years old, she deemed it to be planned by the stars. She agrees with Terenzio, she also likes Asten. Though she hasn’t spoken to his brother as much, she is sure he is just as nice. The Lamonts are a big pureblood family, but none of them are like most other purebloods. They were raised right, Avior has said to Juliette before.

She returns to the dog who is still patiently waiting on the bench, holding a package containing food against her chest.

“I hope you like chicken and apples,” she announces, dropping the bag next to him. They look at each other. “I could cook the chicken for you, if you’d like,” Avior adds when the dog doesn’t react. He doesn’t seem even a tad curious to see what is in the package. Can’t he smell it?

“It is all yours…” Becoming slightly uncertain, she sits down, with the bag in between them. “Don’t you want it?”

Nothing more than silence from the dog, but he is only a dog after all. Avior’s gaze drifts back to stare out into space again. Snowfall brings a different kind of quiet. As if the layer of snow mutes the world by laying down a sheet of softness and cold. She enjoys a few more minutes of said silence in which the dog continues the stare at her.

“I should give you a name.” Her mind, already working nonstop to think up thoughts of every extent, adds the idea of a name now too. “Maybe one that goes with Nyx, my cat… Or maybe something to go with my father’s nickname Moony.” Avior smiles softly, “I love Moony.”

A sound close to a whine leaves the dog and she looks at him, alarmed. “Are you not happy?” She is quick to ask. In response, he nudges his nose against her upper arm and she releases a quiet but deep breath, lifting her hand to pet him.

“I could give you a name to do with the stars… I love the stars. That is one thing I definitely got from my family,” she states dryly. A prolonged silence follows as she mentally goes through each and every star and constellation she has memorised. Sirius would be an obvious option, as it is the brightest star in the sky and in the Canis Major constellation. If only it didn’t already belong to an escapee mass murderer.

“I’m named after a star too,” Avior tells him, “maybe I should just call you Star. Simple, but I like it. What do ya think?” She taps his snout and smiles. He doesn’t seem to dislike it, even though there isn’t much of a way to be able to tell if he even understands what she is saying to dislike it, so she takes it.

“Maybe I actually could sneak you into the castle,” she mutters upon realising her growing attachment to him— to Star. “I’m sure Hagrid would help me keep ya.”

It doesn’t take much for her to convince herself, so not even a minute later, she is holding the bag and walking by Star’s side to return to Hogwarts. As long as they go unseen when entering the grounds, it should be easy.

“This should work.”
Avior taps her wand on Star’s head, performing a perfect Disillusionment Charm on him to hide him from uninvited eyes. “Parfait,” she whispers triumphantly, tucking her wand away again.

“Keep on being quiet and no one will know you’re here,” she tells him, while they continue walking with the castle growing bigger and bigger ahead of them as they get closer. Avior stares off into the distance to her left where she can see black spots floating in the air. The dementors must be eager to roam Hogsmeade freely once the sun has set. She fights wanting to cast a Patronus just in case.
The snow doesn’t let up and only increases as they go on. Wind picks up too, having been whipping her hair around had it still been its original length. By the time they reach the castle’s entrance, her nose and cheeks are bright red from the biting cold.

“A hot butterbeer would be nice right now,” she grumbles, pulling her scarf over her nose even once inside. They make a slight detour to the kitchens where she leaves the raw chicken, but she keeps the apple.

“I prefer red apples over green ones,” Avior says to the still somewhat invisible dog next to her. She glances down when she starts to doubt if he is still with her and concentrates long and hard on the spot where he should be walking. Long enough to nearly walk into another student in the corridor as they all of a sudden stop right in front of her.

“Watch it!” She snaps and it effectively has the second year girl tearing up in an instant and running off when she turns around and realises who it is that walked into her. Avior can’t hold back a sharp laugh that echoes out around her and turns more eyes her way. “Pathetic!”

They reach the entrance to the Slytherin common room without any obstacles or any more students stopping them in their tracks. Avior mutters the password to the portrait and steps inside first, walking a few steps forward before she turns around, waiting and hoping that Star is still following her even further into the warmth of the castle. She leads the way to her dormitory, passing her housemates quickly. The room is empty aside from her and— Avior crouches down when she swears that she can hear the pit pat of his paws hitting the wooden floor. She holds her hand out in front of her. “Are you here?”

The soft touch of his matted fur comes into contact with her palm and a broad smile breaks out on her face. She takes her wand out to undo the charm, making him reappear as if someone just dropped a can of paint on him to give him his colour and ultimately his appearance back.

“Come on! Let’s clean you up!”
Taking her cloak and beanie off, throwing them onto her bed, she brings him to the bathroom where she locks the door in case any of her roommates come back, and then grabs the showerhead before she turns it on. Laughter echoes in the bathroom as Star seems all too excited to be getting washed throughout it, jumping around with his big size, splashing Avior over and over. She takes her time cleaning his fur, using the same magic she uses on her curls to take care of the knots and smooth it all out. Afterwards, she dries him and herself magically, to then make sure the coast is clear and let him out of the bathroom again.

“I like the Gryffindors’ windows more,” she tells him while rummaging through her trunk. “Being able to look into the depths of the Lake… I hate it. I can’t stand it, nor can I even look.” Finally, she pulls out one of her journals and then takes out her favourite pen from her school bag.

“When I was going to get Sorted, my papa and I both expected me to be a Gryffindor.” Avior gestures for him to follow her onto her bed and then closes the drapes around it. “He was one, y’know? And Sirius Black. The rest of his family, all of them were Slytherins. So in hindsight it isn’t that much of a surprise…”

Sometimes she still wishes she could have gone back and begged the Sorting Hat to put her in Gryffindor. It seemed so logical at the time that she hadn’t bothered asking for it, but she merely wanted the Hat to spit it out already. She fuddles with the corner of her journal on her lap.

“I was afraid he wouldn’t be happy with it —my papa— so I didn’t tell him for the first few weeks, until my friends convinced me to… And he was proud of me.” The familiar shine in her eyes returns at remembering the memory of reading that letter from her father. It is tucked away safely in a box back home, where she has kept every single letter she has ever received. The box is expanded magically, so she could separate them all in terms of who wrote them to her, sorted neatly.

“Almost every other student, if not all of them, will be going back home tomorrow for the break,” she awakens herself out of her thoughts, “so we will most likely have this room all to ourselves.”

Star has chosen to curl up in front of her by now, where she sits cross legged with her journal on her lap that she flips open to the first empty page after many filled with writing, stickers and small doodles of her own creation. Glancing up at the dog, it hits her that he could very well be really tired when she sees him with his eyes closed. She clicks her pen to start on a small and simple drawing of a dog. It looks rather silly and childish, but then she writes ‘Star’ under it and starts writing about reuniting with the dog she saw during her first visit to Hogsmeade this term. She writes about as many details as she can, until her hand starts to hurt and her writing starts to jumble together more. Then she shifts and Star’s eyes open at once.

He raises his head the second she moves to get up. “I’m going to put my pyjamas on,” she tells him and disappears through the drapes. Avior changes into one of her favourite pyjamas sets; a green plaid set of matching trousers and a button up. She glances at her watch and then sticks her head through the drapes when she realises that her friends might already be back.

“I’ll be right back,” she whispers to Star when, as if timed, she hears the door to the dormitory click open. Quickly pulling clean socks on and pushing her feet back into her Converse, she snatches her wand off of her nightstand to make the shoelaces tie themselves while she leaves the dorm in a flash, rushing and walking right past Mia and Lydia.

Avior waits on their usual spot on one of the sofas for Theodore to return. Her leg is bouncing up and down with borderline explosive excitement to tell him about the dog. He is leaving to go home tomorrow along with probably the entirety of Slytherin House apart from herself. With Remus here, there is no reason to go home to an empty manor. Decorating their own Christmas tree at home is something she might miss, but she only has a few more years left at Hogwarts anyway. After that, it will be Remus coming home from Hogwarts to spend Christmas with his daughter.
When Theodore finally comes back, he is still accompanied by Terenzio and Eliana, so Avior can’t tell him about Star just yet. All the while they converse, she mulls over the name some more, but she still cannot decide on a proper one, so she settles on Star for a little while longer. Perhaps she could ask Theodore to help her pick.

“Guess what,” she whispers to him when the other two have finally left to their own respective dorms. Theodore leans in immediately, always open to receiving her secrets and never to reveal them.

“I snuck in the dog we saw the other time,” Avior rushes the words out as she cannot contain herself anymore. “It was actually really easy. He is in my dorm right now.”

“Ava!” He hisses, but she cups his face and plants a hasty kiss on his mouth. “Shut up!” She whispers on the same volume as him, a beaming smile to accompany it and making it seem like she is saying something entirely different.

“He is so sweet, Teddy,” sighs Avior, “I think I really do want to keep him.”

The unexpected kiss has him taking a second longer to respond. “And how exactly do you plan on doing that?” He asks logically. She shrugs. “I’ll see as I go.”

They spend a few more minutes bickering about the situation and how complicated it might be to successfully keep him around without anyone else finding out about the presence of such a large and scary looking dog in the castle. The topic eventually died down when she effectively shut him up with another kiss and started about her spending Christmas at Hogwarts for the first time, and for once, not with him. They agreed to send each other their Christmas gifts and stayed up as late as their bodies allowed it. She was the first to get tired after today’s excitement and kissed him goodnight, promising to see him off the next morning. After that, she returns to her dormitory with a yawn, crawling into her bed where Star continues to wait patiently.

“Goodnight,” she whispers to him, a hair above a whisper.