Return of the Fudge Man
While the Aurors continue to (attempt to) stalk me (and sometimes Lupin and Snape) all over the castle, there’s a distinct lack of Umbridge sightings that I feel is a decidedly bad sign rather than a good one and I’m certain I’m not the only one who feels that way. Still, just her lack of immediate presence for the week after I’d shared tea with her has me relaxing enough to continue worrying over everything else. Like the three remaining Founders. And finding Wyn’s gallery. And how to ‘officially’ break the news to my nearest and dearest who don’t know my origins just who and what I’d been back in my first life and until I do, I can add worrying over how I’ll manage to keep going when they all inevitably bail on me.
While it’s nice to have the basilisk and Godric checked off my mental list of things to worry about, there’s still one snake (plus one badger) (also plus one raven) laying in wait and I can’t not feel that fact like the Sword of Damocles in a semi-permanent position hovering over my head and now every day that passes has me a little more on edge.
So, with Aurors still stalking and Umbridge still lurking in her borrowed office, I don’t get near enough time in my apartment de-stressing as I’d like, nor in the Room of Requirement taking my nerves out on dummies. It’s even difficult to justify too much time in Snape’s class after hours without an active project going on (because hell yes, Snape and I finished the full translator potion). And worse, Umbridge’s personal Aurors on premises having all but moved into the castle themselves, there’s not much need for Moody and Tonks to visit as often which is making all of us miserable, especially Lupin.
The downside to nothing happening is one I should’ve expected: There’s been no more cursing since Umbridge and her backup toadies have been here, ergo, their presence is obviously helping, right? I hate myself for a few minutes every day for sort of wishing something would happen to disprove the notion that Umbridge is helping anything at all.
But three weeks after Umbridge arrives, Fudge returns to congratulate Dumbledore, me, Umbridge and her toadies (but mostly congratulating himself) on all our/his hard work having secured the school. With me standing only four feet away, Umbridge doesn’t say much beyond a somewhat demure-sounding 'thanks' (that I absolutely don’t dead-eye stare at her through) (except that I totally do). But then Fudge is pulling me aside to inquire whether or not he can provide whatever’s needed for me to finish ‘this terrible business’. I’m halfway through trying to word ‘get rid of the toad and give me back my friends’ when I feel fate jabbing me in the side somewhat painfully and am instantly on high alert, slapping my hand to the wall and find the castle’s on high alert too.
“Miss Devons?” Fudge asks, peering at me oddly and it’s maybe his baffled worry that sends Dumbledore and one of the Aurors my way while I mentally say ‘fuck the secrecy’.
“Castle, give me a door towards the problem, please?” I command/request and beside us, a door simply pops into place in the wall, startling Fudge into gaping, but I just yank it open and stride through, breath catching because there’s no way this ends well. “Annie! Arty!” I holler, already bolting forward because sure, it’s just the covered bridge, but—
They turn, smiling, hands lifting to wave and with a resounding crack that jolts them both, the bridge begins to buckle and yeah, fuck the secrecy, I shadow-skip straight to them, tug them both in tight, turn and shadow-skip back to Dumbledore, who’s eyes are wide as the bridge collapses behind us.
“What—“ Fudge breathes out, pale and shaken.
“Jacklyn?” Annie rasps in my ear and yeah, I’m still hugging she and Arty both and finally let them both go so we can all watch with horror as the bridge crumples down to little more than gravel.
“Miss Devons,” Fudge says again, eyes very wide, but doesn’t seem to have anything more to say, so I ignore him, turning to Arty who’s pale with shock but alive and unharmed, then to Annie, who stumbles back a step from everyone with unease.
I look to Dumbledore too, and his expression is as grim as it’s ever been. “I need Moody back here,” I say bluntly, then tick my eyes to Fudge, including him in the statement. “If that offer of ‘whatever I need’ is still on the table, I need Moody to catch the things I don’t see and Tonks to bounce out-of-the-box ideas off of. Whatever set this off is still happening.’
Fudge blinks, open-mouthed, then seems to jerk himself into nodding. “Of course,” he wheezes, then blinks past me to the courtyard on the other side of the crevice. “Two seconds slower,” he whispers, lips pressing tight.
“I know,” I murmur, squeezing Arty’s shoulder gently. “Arty? You okay?”
Arty, the smallest first year ever, blinks back at me with his big brown eyes that would look perfectly at home on a baby seal and then he all but tackles me in a hug while bursting into tears, which has Annie straightening and hurrying forward and I help transfer his grip to Annie, who turns and rushes them both back inside, all without looking at me even once. Fuck.
Dumbledore strides back to the still-open door, settles his hand on the stone wall beside it and orders the newly vacant walkway cordoned off, both Fudge and (oh, yay) Umbridge now watching with no small amount of bafflement when the castle provides.
“I’ll need to run a reverse echo,” I murmur to Dumbledore on his way past and he offers a short nod. “And…” he frowns at me when I falter, but I sigh and then spit it out. “They are not safe here right now. None of us are. Not even fate could warn me til the last second and the castle a second after that, meaning this was either spontaneous to the point of insanity or something premeditated and likely still in progress.”
“You're sure it’s him, then? Or, them?” He asks, but we both know that answer already.
“Yeah,” I nod anyway. “I'm sure.”
***
It takes Moody and Tonks all of ten minutes to arrive and the second they’re filled in, follow me to the bridge’s covered entry, it’s magic looking just as secure as it ever did, just minus the bridge.
“So, reverse echo?” Moody prompts and I nod.
“Like a regular echo, but instead of following a subject or event forward, it rewinds further back and takes three or four times more magic to pull off. But once it’s rewound enough, you can restart a regular echo and watch it normally. No joke on the amount of magic, though. If you do it yourself, keep someone on hand to haul your exhausted butt back home after,” I warn seriously.
I start the reverse echo, my vision on as much as I can manage and see the very second the magic all but spontaneously deteriorated, hence the crumpling without obvious cause, then shadow-blink down into the crevice to rewatch it from below, but there’s nothing— or… not nothing. I shadow-blink to a small shelf on the cliff, and peer closer. There’s a small glass phial stuck under the center strut, glowing a barely-seen grey that suddenly brightens, then darkens, seems to slowly blink with nothing-ness and that’s—
“Are you trying to get yourself killed?” Snape demands from beside me, swaying in the breeze on a broomstick from... somewhere.
“No, but since there seems to be a phial of magic-corrupting nothingness, which should be impossible, that just took out the bridge, I feel—“
“Like you’re going to pass out,” he cuts in, frowning and veering closer, then jerks his head back over his shoulder. “Get on.”
I do, but only because he’s mostly right with the extra little dots now dancing in my vision, but I direct him back up under the past bridge so I can full-vision memorize all the patterns of anti-magic going on while it vanishes a second time.
It’s not until we’re back at the cordoned-off bridge entry with Moody and Tonks that I realize my nose is bleeding and I barely have a sprinkle of magic left enough to stop the flow.
“Remember when I said I like my friends a little bit crazy? I like it twice as much when they don’t nearly give themselves magical strokes,” Tonks gripes, using her wand to clean up my face and robes and once done, finally asks. “Did you see what did it?”
“The equivalent of magical anti-matter,” I sigh. “Trixler, could you bring me a big glass of the green ick, please?” I slur out, then grin exhaustedly when he cracks in at my side, his smile dimming when he gets a good look at me, even as he’s handing the full liter of ick over.
“Mist—“ he stops, suddenly remembering. “Miss Jacklyn, Is you alrights?”
“I’ll be fine,” I promise, squeezing his shoulder. “Go on back before you get cold, okay? I’ll try to come by tomorrow for hot chocolate.” He offers a small smile and a nod and cracks away, somehow leaving Umbridge in his place (not a fair trade off, at all), though ten feet back and scowling from the entry door. “Yes, Ms. Umbridge?” I say politely, then rudely guzzle half my ick without waiting for a reply.
“We both know you are responsible—“
“Well now, how’s that, exactly?” Tonks demands, almost looming over Umbridge with a scowl of her own. “She’s meant to stop disasters and did. You’re meant to keep the kids safe, and didn’t. She’s responsible for saving two students and nothing more!”
Umbridge splutters with outrage (nevermind that Tonks is absolutely right, in a way). “Watch your tone, Miss Tonks,” she half-hisses, “or you’ll be looking for a new job without a single reference!”
“Now wait just a—“ Moody huffs, glaring at the toad, but I’ve got this one.
“Not while I require her help she won’t,” I growl out, pleased when the toad flinches and shoots me a wary look. “Unless you’ve spontaneously become the Minister, lady, you have no authority to revoke any Ministry help.”
“You can’t—“ Umbridge splutters, face flushing red.
“I can,” I snap back, “by order of the boss you’ve apparently forgotten is here today, where the castle will be all too happy to show him detailed evidence of what you’ve been up to, including any and all memos, letters, and missives you’ve written, hearth conversations and verbal orders given to your henchmen and, of course, anything uncouth you yourself have been up to. Unless, of course, you’d like to keep debating it until he comes back and sees the evidence for himself?”
Umbridge’s flush has now drained entirely, leaving her pasty white again, lips flapping soundlessly and stamps her foot once before she scurries off while Moody and Tonks smirk at her retreating back. Lupin pokes his head out the door a moment after that, grinning at Tonks, smiling at Moody, and finally frowning at me and frowning harder at the lack of covered bridge.
“Where’s Severus?” He asks, frowning harder and I blink and look around because... yeah. Where did he go?
“On a fly-around the castle with Dumbledore and Fudge,” Moody grunts, then ticks his head inside while he hauls me to my feet, then lets Lupin and Tonks keep me upright as we shuffle back in. “There a pensive in the castle?” Moody demands. “I’ll need to see what—“
“Dumbledore’s office,” Lupin cuts in, then frowns at me. “Sure you don’t want to catch a nap first? You look mostly dead,” he points out.
“Flatterer,” I deadpan, and Tonks snorts. I conjure a straw for my drink and the act hardly makes me dizzy at all while I slurp up the very last, then grin when Trixler cracks in a half-second later, swaps one drink for the next, straw included, then cracks away again. “Five star service,” I decide, then focus as hard as I’m able on my drink so I don’t see how many students are staring and muttering, even if I can’t help but hear them. Interestingly enough, they all think it was me who got hurt on the bridge rescuing Annie and Arty.
“May as well be the truth,” Moody mutters from my side where he's taken Tonks' place, eyebrow dancing at me. “Want me to talk to the other two?”
“No!” I blurt, then cringe while Tonks cackles and I give Moody an apologetic look, but his lips are twitching, the ass. (He knows he terrifies most children.) “Tonks, I think. She adores Annie too.”
Tonks spins and stares at me with horror as she paces us backwards. “That was Annie out there?”
“And Arty,” I murmur, nodding and queasy all over again at how close it was. Two seconds. “Annie wouldn’t look at me as she left,” I sigh softly. “I shadow-blinked them both out before the collapse, then got all authoritative with Fudge. She knows I’m no student.”
“Ahh, damn,” Tonks sighs, nodding. “Lets take a peek at what we’re looking for an’ I’ll go track ‘em down,” she suggests as we reach the Headmaster's office entry.
“Hospital wing,” the gargoyles guarding the door supply, then slide themselves aside to let us enter.
“Thank you,” I murmur to them when Lupin hauls me past and onto the… escalator?
The stairs are in motion today, spinning round and round upward and I sigh at how easy it is sometimes here. I’m pretty sure I doze off the second I’m both sitting and done with my drink, because I’m definitely jolted awake when Dumbledore, Snape and Fudge come stomping through the door, already mid-argument and somehow, sound like they’re all three arguing for the same thing and maybe don’t realize it?
“—their safety, but—“
“—ing about this clearly!”
“—recommended, and I agree!”
I flick my eyes to Moody, then to his ever present walking stick with my eyebrows high (they’re not even half as tired as the rest of me) and Moody smirks, gives the clashing statements another ten seconds to peter out on their own, then thumps the floor with a pulse of what feels like a wash of pure ‘calm’. Dumbledore, Snape and Fudge all blink in silence while I raise an impressed eyebrow at Moody.
“Please teach me that,” I mumble into the silence, still only half-upright in the chair and still only half-awake.
“Well, that, er— certainly helped,” Fudge admits with a tired sigh, then conjures a squashy chair of his own while Dumbledore settles into his desk chair where Fawkes can nuzzle him lightly before retreating to his usual perch. Snape just settles onto the arm of the chair I’m sprawled in like it’s all normal. (Between Snape and I, it sort of is.)
“Indeed,” Dumbledore sighs, nodding to Moody, Tonks, Lupin and I. “We found four more,” he says bluntly. “Three near entry points, one on the back of the Great Hall.
“And the castle can’t seem to register they’re there at all,” Snape adds, frowning.
“Magical antimatter,” I mutter, fighting my way upright. “Pensive? I can show you the pretty, pretty, terrible, horrible magic in motion. I’ll warn you, though, it’s pretty freaky, visually.”
“Oh dear,” Fudge says softly, wide eyes set on me. “What happened to you?”
“Over-stretched my magic a bit,” I huff. “I’ll be fine after a meal and a nap.”
Dumbledore gives me (and my clearly over-magicked self) a disgruntled look, but keeps silent for now. (Good man, he’s learning.)
But the pensive comes out, it’s current contents emptied and refilled with that last half-hour of magical use, but I do use a tiny, teeny, (secretively large) bit of magic to (temporarily) pensive the whole room, more or less, so we can watch from our seats as fate gave me a hearty nudge that almost everyone exclaims at when they all jerk in place.
“Sorry, meet my inner fate meter,” I huff. “If you felt the jolt and now feel the urgency, you’re feeling fate. Or, what fate feels like to me when it needs my attention right the hell now."
“That’s what fate feels like?!” Fudge exclaims, but is also half-entranced with the whole scene, my hand slapping the stone, feeling the extra panic of the castle— “Merlin’s beard, it is protective, isn’t it?” And everyone exclaims at the visual of active shadow-blinking, hauling Annie and Arty close in and blinking back to Fudge and Dumbledore's side.
“You suuure you won’t teach me?” Tonks pouts from Lupin’s side.
“The next memory I pull up will be three hundred and nineteen lifetimes ago and you can watch shadow-splinching in real time,” I warn, but she rolls her eyes and waves the idea off.
"Why is everyone gray?" Lupin asks, frowning.
"Souls, auras, that kinda thing," I shrug. "It's the way I retrained my brain, so I don't glimpse anything people would rather I didn't. And here,” I explain as I’m shadow blinking from cliff to cliff, then higher to the shelf on the cliff side and pull up the full magic spectrum, “is what caused it.”
“That’s how you see the world?” Moody demands, his human eye wide and his other zipping everywhere, trying to record it all.
“When I need to,” I agree. “Organized chaos, but beautifully so. Until… now.”
And we all watch, sickened and disturbed as that phial blinks, brightens, darkens and—
“Merlin’s beard,” Lupin heaves out, looking ill. “If those two had still been on the bridge—“
“Yeah,” I agree softly, queazy, then let them watch the rest until Snape comes swooping in and the scene ends, the vision dissolving like vapor. “And so… None of us are safe here,” I repeat, “until we track these idiots, lock them down and toss the key.
“Cornelius—“ Dumbledore murmurs, a plea in his tone.
“Albus—“ Fudge cuts him off, already nodding. “It could’ve been two students falling to pieces and not only a bridge.”
Dumbledore relaxes again with a sigh and his own miserable nod, then looks to me. “Have you any ideas on how to proceed with neutralizing the phials?”
I purse my lips, thinking. “Well… it’s basically a liquid curse, best as I could tell. So… in theory?” Yes? But this is all new— it’s essentially potion-based—“ I cut myself off, suddenly queasy with realization.
“Miss Devons?” Fudge asks worriedly, seeing my distress. “Are you alright?”
“It’s basically a curse version of the Landry solution,” I finally choke out and Dumbledore’s head whips over to stare and Snape stiffens at my side, but still settles a calm hand on my shoulder when I drop my face into my hands and groan.
“Oh dear,” Fudge says again, softer now. “I’d heard someone finally solved it… should we be contacting them for assistance? Whatever you need, the Ministry will do its level best to provide.”
I start a soft and slow litany of curses in Klingon that I’d be screaming if I wasn’t so damned tired while Dumbledore explains my boredom-busting, puzzle-minded brain candy, but I'm mildly comforted by the slow thumb Snape is rubbing against my shoulder, just out of sight of anyone but Moody.
“Ohhhh dear,” Fudge says yet again. “I see.”
I finally stop hiding and pull my hands from my face. “I need sleep, before anything else,” I say bluntly. "If I dip any more into my personal magic reserves, you'll get to meet my far less pleasant self that you'd gleefully chuck off the owlery roof. So, sleep first."
“Sleep and food,” Snape adds, squeezing my shoulder gently.
“And food,” I agree, nodding once. Then I pause, cringing. “Actually, I need to see Annie and Arty first, if they’re up for it,” I murmur to Dumbledore, who nods, then head-nods toward the door.
Snape gets me vertical, but it’s Tonks who accompanies me down and away, letting the others confer and after seeing the clock tower through the window, am amazed to discover it’s only just past lunch time. It feels like two a.m., at least.
Annie’s sitting on the edge of Arty’s cot in the hospital wing, where they both look worried, but steady. Pomfrey waves Tonks and I through and Annie’s instantly tensing up and looking away while Arty spots me and beams, not a tear in sight.
“Hey guys," I greet exhaustedly but with a smile. "Has either of you… ever heard of a fatemaker?” I ask, letting Tonks ease me down onto the next cot over and Arty’s wide, baby-seal eyes shake along with the rest of his head.
“It’s a stupid name,” I say first. “Because fatemakers make nothing. We're more like fate fixers; fate sends us in when it worries something will happen that will break not just a society, but sometimes a whole country, or the world. On rare occasions, an entire reality, and there’s millions of them.
“Whoa,” Arty breathes out, wriggling in place to apparently hear the story better, but Annie just cocks an ear to listen while staring at the unused visitor's chair.
“So when fate put me here, it decided I'd need to be a student to find the problem, fix it before that problem could cause too much damage, and make sure it couldn’t happen again,” I sigh. “And… having fixed almost more realities than I can count, I can say that this one, here at this school, has been my favorite… and that, I will swear my own magic on, is at least half because of you, Annie.”
This has her head jerking up, surprised, then cautiously hopeful, tucking a long strand of red hair behind her ear.
"You're easily one of the best people in the whole school and hands down, the absolute best Hufflepuff." Arty nods vigorously, grinning wide and Annie flushes with a watery smile.
It’s easy after that, being as honest as one can to a fifteen year old, though Arty’s just as thrilled to be hearing the (very, very abridged) story while Tonks goes through the whole ‘it’s a secret because—‘ routine that has Annie and Arty nodding seriously but I answer as much as I can, safely, until Annie’s parents come rushing in through the door, scooping her up for a tight, family hug that Annie yanks me into while telling them I saved she and Arty by warning them ‘just in time’. Then Arty’s parents also come in, Dumbledore and Snape on their heels and I get a second round of parental hugs until Snape nags Pomfrey into nagging me to eat and then sleep while Dumbledore herds everyone else but Tonks out to give me some space to rest.
I’m not sure what’s showing on my face when I'm finally done eating, but it’s got Tonks, sprawled over Arty’s vacant bed, eyeing me with a frown. “What?” She finally demands around a bite of one of Trixler’s amazing cookies.
“Action and reaction,” I finally sigh, nuzzling into the pillows, drowsy and a bit dizzy. “I start on a counter curse and minutes later, someone’s actually cursed. I start on another, and in hours, the same thing happens. I help solve a tricky theory and now… someone’s weaponizing it.”
“That’s not on you,” Tonks huffs, glaring a bit like she knows I don’t quite believe that. “At all.”
“Maybe not,” I sigh, “but sure as hell feels like it.”
***
Snape has replaced Tonks by the time I’ve woken, but he’s laying atop the bed covers on the cot on my other side, eyes slitted open like a cat that’s still ninety percent asleep. My internal clock tells me it’s six a.m. and the castle’s mostly-empty, nearly all the parents of students having retrieved the students yesterday, Moody’s keen eye checking everyone, parents and students, for curses on their way out, which is smart. Those remaining will be leaving by train and escorted by Aurors back to Kings Station along with any staff not actively helping with either curses or arming defenses, which is to say, Vector is staying along with Snape, Flitwick, McGonagall, and Dumbledore, along with the house elves, Filch and Hagrid.
I nuzzle back under my covers and do an internal check of myself to find it’s all systems go again and fate’s giving me a hearty shoulder squeeze in a ‘you can do it!’ sort of way that will never not be weird. Best bonus: Umbridge has already been sent out and away and the castle itself is thrilled to have her gone, even if a whole host of her Aurors (and not even I can think of those handful as Moody’s or the Ministry’s) will be staying, but the castle, stronger than ever, has every intention of watching them all like hawks. Thanks to the pensive and it’s recollection of the curse phial, the castle can now track those too and discovers six more for Moody and company to collect; the Founders have been busy.
So now it’s time for me to get busy too. First on the list? Breakfast.
***
Breakfast starts out a somber affair, the Great Hall has been cleared but for two tables where the remaining students and staff alike carry hushed conversations like it’s a wake and not a school and it hurts to see it shutting down, regardless of how long. While I get a few curious and uncertain looks from a few of the remaining students, there’s two that are thrilled to see me.
“Morning Jack!” And “Morning Lynn!” Are chorused as I approach and I smile a bit and settle in next to Fred and George with a quieter greeting of my own.
“Morning, guys. No Percy today?"
"Left yesterday with his best mate Ivan," George says chipperley.
"I'm surprised you two are still here. Your parents--"
"Anniversary vacation," they chorus back.
"Some private little island in the Caribbean," George adds. "They were sure all this cursing business was done, though."
"The Ministry's sending someone out to track them down," Fred explains, shrugging. "And we're staying with Jordan for the weekend."
"Taking the train, then?" I ask while scooping eggs, toast, and fruit onto my plate.
“Unfortunately,” Fred grouses, drooping.
“We’d rather be staying,” George adds. “It’s not as if we won’t be back once this is settled.”
“Yeah, we could help!” Fred insists. “Bill will be here; he’d keep an eye out.”
I blink. “Your eldest brother? He’ll be here?” I ask, interested.
“Well, yeah,” George huffs. “They’re bringing in the best of the best to help with whatever curse is on the loose this time.”
“And Bill’s got a gift for it,” Fred insists sincerely.
“With a bonus of: you’ll have another Weasley met to add to your running tally,” George huffs, giving me a wink and I freeze for a second.
“So… Charlie wrote you, then?” I guess, smirking, and then I’m so, so glad I asked because Fred smirks back and then settles a single photograph on the table between us.
Charlie is using the baby dragon as a pillow, because the baby's already big enough to be used as a pillow, but in this case, it’s outside in the sun and the dragon’s lifted one wing to shade Charlie’s head while Charlie scratches the babe under the chin with one hand while the other is flipping a page on whatever book he’s reading.
“Oh… my… gods,” I choke out, smiling wide. “Definitely too big to use as a scarf now. Has he named him yet?”
“Sir Davey,” they chorus together, grinning back.
”He’s been knighted?” I ask with a grin.
George nods. "For acts of adorable bravery, but they put it to a vote; two more votes and he'd have been Sir Thunder."
“Bit early in the year for thunder,” Snape says from right behind us and yes, even I jump (because damn but he's sneaky), then glare lightly as he settles in beside me, but I can’t stop the grin as I snatch Charlie’s photo up and all but shove it at him.
“His scarf outgrew him,” I mutter with a snort and Snape’s lips twitch up.
“He was the size of a kitten three weeks ago,” he huffs, surprised, then hands it back.
I hand it back to Fred, who’s staring at me like I’m nuts for being so casual with a Professor, but I ignore it. “So is there a story for that name? Sir Davey's a bit unusual.”
“Yeah, I guess a few new dragons arrived and hadn’t gotten the ‘people aren’t snacks’ memo and wreaked a bit of havoc at the camp, right up until the babe swooped in, put himself between Charlie and one of the newcomers and tried to spook it with a baby roar, only, not such a baby voice came out. Little rocks on the ground just bouncing ‘round everywhere and the new one did turn tail. Little one looked so proud, Charlie said,” Fred snickers and George picks up the story.
“But the little guy hadn’t seen the gigantic Hungarian that’d glided in like some huge dementor and was half-hidden behind the canteen tent that roared along with him and then flapped away before the babe ever even saw him; the babe spent the rest of the day strutting around like king of the castle.”
It takes a minute to cease giggling because that's hilariously adorable and yeah, the babe’s mentally a five year old now and probably enjoys a bit of responsibility. “That’s so sweet,” I croon, petting the dragon’s head in the photo. “Sir Davey beat Goliath. If you write Charlie back, tell him I said hi?”
Fred and George trade looks, but nod. “Sure,” they chorus slyly.
I narrow my eyes at them. “I know that look,” I say softly. “And it means sneaky things are afoot. Spill,” I instruct, leveling them both with my best ‘mom’ expression.
George’s eyes get a bit wide and a second later, so do Fred’s. “Nothing!” They insist, eyes wide.
I let my eyes narrow even more and crank the ‘mom’ factor up by three degrees and they both lean away from me and the whole thing’s ridiculous— until a familiar throat is cleared behind me. I tip my head up and back to find a smirking Charlie alongside who I presume is brother Bill, by his red hair alone, and I huff a silent snicker and scramble to get onto my feet.
“What on earth are you doing here?” I laugh into a brief hug. “And please tell me your adorably scaly child didn’t follow you,” I add more seriously.
Charlie snorts, shaking his head. “Sandy and Mac are playing mum; he’s fine. But Bill was on his way here, thought I’d join for a day and pick your brains a bit, because I do have questions. But! First, meet our brother Bill. Bill, this is Jacklyn Devons, dragon expert. Jacklyn, our eldest brother, Bill Weasley, curse-breaker.”
With his ponytail or without (and the added fang earring is oddly hot), Bill is just as absurdly cute as Charlie, I’ll give him that, but he’s also likely been told who he’ll be working with, so he shakes my hand once and adds a polite and professional ‘nice to meet you, Fudge said you’d seem young’ that has me snorting a smile.
"Wait--" George murmurs to Fred, so softly even I can only barely hear them. "Seems young?"
"Dragon expert?" Fred murmurs back, now equally suspicious-looking, but I just shrug at them both since fate isn't freaking out in my back brain; maybe all the Weasleys are fate-pre-approved?
Still, either for traveling or disaster-avoiding, we'll all definitely need the body/brain/magic fuel, we all sit to chat about Bill’s current assignment in Greece, though he’s happy to be loaned to help the school he’d pulled all seven years in while Snape keeps sneaking extra food onto my plate without my noticing, apparently, until Lupin and Tonks join the table and then it’s damn-near a party I can munch my way through— to find my plate piled full again.
“Really?” I sigh quietly at Snape, exasperated, then begin cramming it down anyway.
“You’ll stress work it off in two hours,” he mutters, looking mildly proud he’d found a way to keep me fed.
He’s not wrong about me working it off quick, so I don’t argue it this time and finish it in a focused ten minutes, then blink around when I realize silence has swept over our end of the table and everyone but Snape and Lupin watching me and look either amazed, disturbed, or impressed.
“Where do you put it all?” Fred demands, eyebrows high before George leans around him to add “You’re just so tiny!”
Tonks, just across from me, snickers a bit, but since she’s on her own second plate already, she holds her own tongue.
“Ooookay,” I mutter, blushing. “This isn’t awkward at all. Pick on Professor Lupin; he’s eating just as much!” I instruct, waving my napkin at him.
“But he’s not tiny,” Charlie points out, smirking. I glower at him a little until he ducks his head and hides a smile behind his cup when Bill elbows him in the ribs, rolling his eyes.
But I open my mouth to begin a snark-fest to distract them all and never get the chance when The Grey Lady startles all of us into exclaiming when she pops up out of the middle of the table with wide, upset eyes and stares at me, lips trembling.
“What’s happened?” I ask seriously and kinda wish I could hug ghosts like I could Peeves (if he weren’t so obnoxious) because Helena seriously looks like she needs one.
“My mother’s dead.”
My heart stutter-swells at the same time that my stomach sinks, but I don’t let my relief show because no matter the nightmare Rowena had been for me, she was still Helena's mom.
“Where?” I ask, my stomach already aiming lower because I’m sure I know the answer already.
“In her lab,” she murmurs, looking apologetic when my face goes cold.
“Grey Lady,” Dumbledore greets, striding over from seemingly nowhere at all with Moody on his heels.
Helena nods a sad greeting, but says nothing.
“Could you show me where that lab is, please?” Dumbledore asks gently, seeming as surprised as everyone else when she shakes her head, then turns to me.
“But I can show you.”
Aaaand there goes the rest of the blood in my face. “I inherited it, then?” I ask with a quavering voice, unsurprised when she nods. (Both Fred and George share wide-eyed looks with each other and I worry that maybe Fate isn’t worried enough about them.)
Still, this is unavoidable, so I blow out a slow breath, nod and get to my feet and now really, really wishing I’d skipped breakfast entirely with my stomach churning this much. But I’m as steady as I can be when I finally speak again. “I hate to ask, but could you show me please?”
She nods once, turns and sweeps half through Fred on her way to the door, leaving him pale and shuddering, even as he (and George, Bill, Charlie, Tonks, Lupin and McGonagall (who’d been following the whole sad scene from a ways down the table) scramble to follow Dumbledore, Moody, Snape and I, though McGonagall sacrifices her own curiosity to keep Fred and George in the Great Hall because thirteen is far too young for dead body viewing. (Unless you’re me, apparently.)
Snape’s glued to my side again, for which I’m thankful, because Helena leads us right back to the gallery hall where dozens of extra shades have all crammed into the surrounding paintings from damn-near every corner of the castle, all but overflowing with curiosity. Oddly, she doesn’t stop in the same place I’d last echo-seen the door but a few yards further down where the tapestry had been. Helena waves her hand at the newly blank wall, then sinks down into the floor and gone.
I stare at the blank spot, frown, then lay my hand on the wall with a mentally whispered ‘open’ to the castle.
And open it does, though only an inch and I push it forward slowly, too wary of what I might find— and yup. “Shit,” I breathe out when the room goes a little funny and then Lupin’s dragging me back while Dumbledore, Moody, Snape and Tonks all cautiously file in.
“Breathe, Jacklyn,” Lupin orders, a gentle pressure on my shoulder guiding me to sit on the floor, but watching both Bill and Charlie go a bit pale as they stare in at what looked like a scene from the worst of the best slasher movies I’ve seen over the years and now will never be watching another one. As in, not ever, probably, because— “Breathe,” Lupin repeats, this time with a gentle growl in the order, and I do. One slow breath after another and another until Snape’s back to hold up the gallery wall on my other side, shooting warning looks at the shades within complaining that he’s blocking their view.
“Any indication who did it?” I ask once the world’s done spinning.
“Not that I could see,” Snape answers quietly. “But Moody thinks it might’ve been…”
“Self-inflicted?” I finish, trying hard not to imagine that, but know it’s possible. “Yeah… there’s a curse for that,” I admit quietly, then clamp my mouth shut again and breathe. And breathe. And breathe through the thought that finally, that book has come back to bite us all in the ass, because that’s one of the curses I’d created that I’d been praying were never deciphered and now apparently have been. “This needs to end now,” I rasp. “This needs to be over.”
“It’s getting there,” Lupin murmurs just as Tonks and Dumbledore step back out into the hall, speak with Charlie and Bill for a moment, gesturing down to me, I’d assume, because both nod seriously and head our way.
“We’re supposed to keep you occupied,” Charlie says with a sad sort of smirk, already holding his hand out for me to grasp and I huff, but grab hold and let him haul me up.
“They’re going to take care of... what’s down there,” Bill adds, looking sympathetic, then a bit disgruntled as he eyes his brother. “And Charlie has questions about scales.”
I blink, then nod.
“Maybe he should meet the painter,” Snape suggests with a sigh, straight-faced.
I stare at him until he smirks, which makes me smirk, then snort and now both Charlie and Bill are giving us incredulous looks while Lupin snorts and heads back towards Tonks.
“I’ll stay and send a patronus when they’re done,” Lupin offers over his shoulder, but his eyes are twinkling in a way that says he’d heard that story.
“And here I thought teenage girls were terrible gossips,” I grumble at Snape, head-nodding back down the hall. “All you guys are so, soooo much worse.”