Chapter 1
George was sincerely trying not to laugh, in order to not disturb Professor Dumbledore’s beginning of the year speech.
But Quackity, at the Slytherin table, making faces all the way over to Sapnap, who sat next to next to Potter and his gang across the hall at Gryffindor, was making it really hard, and the faces the Gryfs’ were making back was not helping a single bit. Neither were the two blondes and Severus, sitting about a fourth of the table down from Quackity, viciously glaring at him.
Wilbur, who was sitting next to him, heard him snort, but he was able to cover it with a cough, gave him a concerned look. His hand came to pat his back, and he tried not to wince as the pressure made his injuries sting.
He’d have to go to Madam Pomfrey after he helps Wilbur, and the others get the younger years situated. Sitting still and focusing on their headmaster was much easier when he could daze off and pay more attention to his back and how much his palms hurt.
“With that, my dear students, I will give you my final words for your first night of a great year of learning to come! Good Luck!” With that, he sat down, and the feast appeared before them, and George wasn’t very appetized.
His stomach was always unprepared to be back at Hogwarts after a summer of small meals, and his brain was always unprepared to be back at Hogwarts after a summer of hatred.
He spent the next few minutes catching up with a second year he met last year, from what he saw, he was good friends with Tommy and Tubbo.
So, when Wilbur glanced at his – still empty – plate and sighed. After spending all five of George’s years at Hogwarts, he knew somewhat of the rough summers his friend has. He eyed George up and down and sighed. George was now happily chatting with Ranboo if he wasn’t mistaken. The lanky twelve-year-old was excitedly listening to George explain the new classes he’ll be able to take when he becomes a third year.
Wilbur quietly snuck a bread roll, some vegetables, and some of George’s favorite pudding onto his plate, then nudged him.
“You better finish that or I’ll tell Madam Pomfrey that she needs to force feed you your potions.”
“Wil.” George rolled his eyes.
“What? I want Ravenclaw to get the house cup this year, and we can’t do that with a stick-figure seeker. I don’t know what you mean.”
“Right, Quidditch.” George narrowed his eyes.
“Exactly.”
“That’s all they care about once you get older Ranboo.”
“Actually, I’m pretty sure that’s all that Tommy cares about now if we’re being honest.”
Twenty minutes later, it was safe to assume that everyone was ready to get to bed, especially the yawning firsties.
“Alright, Ravenclaw first years, if you could follow me and a few other Ravenclaw prefects up to Ravenclaw tower, we’ll give you a quick rundown of how things work around here!” Wilbur yelled down the table.
As the resident sixth year prefect, lined up to be Head Boy next year, he found taking charge came very easily to him.
His fifth-year counterpart, George himself, did not find it as easy. He was mostly a prefect for his punctuality and class placement (1st in his class, along with Lily Evans from Gryffindor, Remus Lupin not far behind them. Wilbur honestly thought Lupin would be right up there with the two of them if he didn’t spend so much of his energy pranking people with Potter’s gang.
So, George quietly stood next to Wilbur once all the first years gathered around, along with the other prefects, the only two that were missing were Head Boy and Head Girl, which had somehow been both Ravenclaws this year, and presumably off doing more important things, “Hello everyone! How was dinner?”
Quiet murmurs of full bellies and grumbles of sleepiness greeted them.
Wilbur hummed and nodded, “That’s what I thought, well, I’m Wilbur, I’m a sixth year prefect for this year, my counterpart is Pandora,” he nodded to the blonde standing beside him who pointed an airy smile towards the first years, then sent a little smile towards her friend, Xenophilius Lovegood, and Wilbur rolled his eyes, “your Head Boy this year is Gilderoy Lockhart, and your Head Girl is Alyssa Its.” Wilbur turned to find George slightly behind him, and gently wrapped an arm around his shoulder, “and this is George, he’s your fifth-year prefect, along with Tina Kit.” He gestured to Tina, who brightly grinned, offering a little wave to the group, on the other side of him with the hand that wasn’t around George’s shoulders
“Alright, now that everyone is introduced, we are going to head upstairs, I’m going to show you how to get into the common room, the dormitories, and a few other things. But, if you ever see any of these faces, you are more than willing to ask for help and any one of us will do our best to help out however we can! I’m sure you guys will meet Gilderoy and Alyssa soon, and you’ll be able to go to them for help as well. Follow me up these stairs please!” Wilbur started off, still with George under his arm, who sent the first years an encouraging smile, because he wasn’t sure he was being the most welcoming.
“George, go ahead and go to the infirmary, I’ll see you when you get back, everyone say goodnight George!” There were some shy goodnights from a few of the first years. Wilbur laughed and slightly pushed George towards the hallway with the infirmary. “Go on, I’ll feed Cat for you, and make sure he gets some love tonight!”
On the way there, he ran into the Slytherin prefects leading the first years down to their common room, the seventh year Slytherin prefect trailing slightly behind them, letting the younger one’s get a hang on their reigns of the firsties. Their dark yellow collars and ties catching his eye.
“Davidson.” He called to George, right after he thought he would be able to get away from the group, he had smiled at the eleven-year-olds, briefly glanced at the younger prefects, and he was hoping he would be able to completely ignore Malfoy.
“Oh, hello, Lucius, how was your summer? Didn’t get a chance to ask you earlier in the prefects’ cabin.” Oh, he should have just walked off, or slightly acknowledged Lucius, not started a whole conversation with him!
He just wanted to go to the infirmary and get healed then go to sleep. Another Slytherin prefect glanced back at them, his shaggy blonde hair dropping into his narrowed eyes. George couldn’t quite remember his name, but he thought he was in the same year as them, he saw him with Severus a few times even.
Lucius smirked back at him, and nodded for him to go on, leave him alone with George.
He wasn’t sure what he thought about that, but he didn’t think he wanted to be alone with Lucius.
“Good, Davidson-”
“You can call me George you know,” he didn’t mean to inturrupt the older, not to mention taller boy, but it was instinct, he despised his surname, and didn’t really want anyone to use it.
“Davidson,” the glare that was sent into his eyes scared him too much to ask anything else, “I hope your summer was well, I know you spent it in the filthy muggle world-”
“Well-“ the way Lucius spat the words out of his mouth, like they were last year’s milk, he really shouldn’t have interrupted him.
“Quiet! It’s a shame, really. For being so book smart, you’re pretty stupid when it comes to keeping your mouth shut. Then again, can’t expect much from a mudblood. One that’s queer at that,” George swallowed.
He had been facing this for four years now, why did he expect it to stop when the fifth year came around. He went to say something, anything to defend himself really. But the words wouldn’t come. He figured that’s probably for the best anyways.
“Owl got your tongue?” Lucius gave him a smirk; he hardly noticed the wand being slipped out of his pocket, too distracted by the nasty look being sent his way.
That was until he was sent flying into the wall, of course. A few more swishes of the wand drew cuts across his face. The sting in his back was enough for him to cry out. A swish of said wand slammed his head into the wall, spreading dots around his vision. Between the dots, Lucius’s face was very close to his, filling his eyesight.
Lucius was saying something, probably more awful insults, but the ringing in his ears blocked out everything, except for the quick, loud footsteps rushing towards them.
The blonde left his vision, and the shine of glasses and concerned brown eyes met his own.
His head cleared the smallest bit, and he knew he recognized the round-framed, messy haired boy in front of him, holding him up from completely crumpling to the ground. In the background, he saw a bit of a tussle, but the brunette snapped his fingers, and he heard him saying something. He couldn’t for the life of him figure out what it was, due to the fact that he was most definitely losing consciousness.
The ringing in his ears stopped, right as his eyes became too heavy to keep open, he heard two voices, overlapping.
“Come on, Georgie, stay awake.”
“Mate, we gotta take him to the infirmary.”
Wait! That’s where he was going, yeah, he tried to say that, but all his mouth could form was, “in-fir-ry,” Why was his face so hot? Was he drooling?
“Here, James, I’ll carry him, you open doors for m- “his brain gave up, and he fell asleep.
-
“Sap, Peter, you guys cover for us, we’re gonna go set up some shenanigans, and we don’t need Evans getting on our cases.” Sirius asked, James waiting for him by the entrance of the common room.
Peter immediately nodded, ready to take on the task, Sapnap, however, looked a little weary.
“What kind of shenanigans?”
“One’s that we’ll leave you out of.” Sirius knew exactly what Sapnap meant by that. He didn’t mind that his four roommates were troublemakers, he just usually wanted to laugh at them, not be the one being laughed at.
“Who else will you leave out of it?” Sapnap raised an eyebrow at him, and a little lightbulb went off in the corner of Sirius’s brain.
“George, Karl, and Quackity.” Sapnap gave him a thumbs up, and walked away. “Peter, you know the drill?”
Peter nodded, and Sirius walked away, towards James. They laughed and trotted down to the infirmary to wait for Remus to show up there. They almost got there, when they heard yells down the hallway, and mutters, they glanced at one another, and took off, ready to help with whatever it was.
The stupid blonde hair Sirius saw, with someone against the wall, didn’t help at all.
In fact, it made Sirius even angrier.
“Malfoy.” Sirius murmured to James and rushed over to rip the twat away from whoever it was he was tormenting now.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw James crowding close to the boy against the wall.
“You Prick! Why don’t you mind your own business and go back to your slimy Slytherins where you belong!” He grabbed his dear cousin’s stupid boyfriend by the robes and threw him away from the three of them.
Looking away from the slithery piece of – never mind, he saw James’s fingers snapping in front of the boy’s eyes, presumably trying to get him to stay awake.
Now that he had a better look at the boy’s face, he recognized him as George Davidson. Sapnap’s Ravenclaw friend, book smart and quiet, from what he’s seen, but according to Sapnap he could be quite loud; not too bad on the eyes either, his dark hair falling over the cut on his forehead, his different colored eyes slowly closing.
“James, we have to keep him awake,”
“I know, you wanker, I’m trying, come on Georgie, stay awake buddy.”
“Mate, we gotta take him to the infirmary,” He looked over the several cuts across his face, his hair covered the one on his forehead, but there was one across his eyelid, the bridge of his nose, on the other cheek, on his lip, all of them bleeding quite a lot, dripping from the corner of his mouth and down his chin.
It was truly a gruesome sight, seeing a face as pretty as George’s dripping with blood.
George mumbled something, and Sirius started to grab a hold of his arms to keep him from falling, not confident in James’s ability to do it, should George collapse.
“Here, James, I’ll carry him, you open doors for me,” As soon as he went to pick up George, he went completely limp.
Sirius liked to consider himself the strongest of the group, and not that George was particularly heavy, in any case he was actually pretty light, even compared to James’s scrawny arse.
But when George decided it was the best time to completely give up and pass out, he was just barely getting a good grip on the boy, trying to position him to have him cradled.
So, Sirius was a bit embarrassed, and he would never admit, but he completely dropped him.
James didn’t even notice, so George’s head smacked a little too loudly on the stone floor, with a thick thud.
“Sirius!” James hissed, as he tried to get him readjusted.
“Shut up, you tosser, I’m trying my best here.” Again, George was pretty light, so picking him up was pretty easy. He tried his best to keep his head secured, gently, “open that bloody door.” He grumbled to his friend.
“Sap’s gonna kill us.”
“Why? We didn’t do anything, ‘cept save his Georgie, that is.” Sirius squinted at James.
“You know Sap’s not gonna see it that way.”
“Yeah, but we’re the one’s taking him to the infirmary.”
The two of them continued chatting as they made their way to the hospital wing.
As they walked, Sirius could feel through George’s robes. The clearly roughly wrapped bandages that were around his ribs, the raised lines across his back.
If he focused enough on his hands, he could almost feel that his robes were... damp? He didn’t want to think about what that could mean.
He hoped Remus wouldn’t be too banged up by the end of tonight, nights of the full moon were always the hardest. On all of them.
James was always happy to mother-hen over Remus in the morning, bring any and all classwork he needed for the next few days (even if he didn’t do the schoolwork himself) He knew that Remus cared about said assignments, so he was always more than happy to bring them to his friend. Plus, it looked good to Evans, which helped him get in her good book.
Well, it was supposed to, it hadn’t come into effect yet but surely it soon would. According to James at least. Sirius thought he was out of his right mind. Until James was willing to be nice to the slimy slug known as Snape, it probably wouldn’t happen.
Sirius didn’t care too much for this being the final reason of James winning over Lily’s love.
Anyone who is friends with the dirtball that is the reason for an unconscious boy in his arms, and that creep Dream, who is always just sitting on the side of their snaky little group, pretending to study, but just watching everything and everyone. The three of them were some of Sirius’s least favorite Slytherins.
“Madam Pomfrey!” James yelled as he opened the door, and the short witch came bustling out, “Ah, hello, lovely madam!”
“Oh, goodness! I was wondering where he was. Come along, dearies, set him down over here.” She directed them towards a bed, “George, dear boy, you were supposed to be here an hour ago.” She shook her head at him.
Sirius furrowed his brow, George was supposed to be here already? Why? She was wondering where he was at that? None of it made sense, but nevertheless, Sirius gently set him down on the bed, making sure his head was set comfortably on the pillow.
If he took extra care to cover him with a blanket nicely, that was nobody’s business, if he ignored James’s smirking at him.
Madam Pomfrey came over with a few potions, setting them down on the tabletop beside George, and taking her wand out of her pocket.
“I’m going to have to ask you two to step aside, you can stay and wait for Mr. Lupin, but when it comes to Mr. Davidson, I must ask you to sit in those chairs.”
She turned him over on his side, and gently unbuttoned his robes, shirt, and collar, stripping him, leaving him in only his pants.
Sirius felt a little bad for still looking, especially when George wasn’t conscious to say it was okay, but the way the white bandages across his ribs were nearly the same color as his skin, but when she turned him over to expose his back, the sight of the splotched red was a little worrying. Scratch that, the scars running underneath and all around were very worrying. There were several large t’s scratched across the surface of his skin, some old and scarred over, and some clearly freshly cut, and so, so many bruises.
So that was why his hands felt damp. Looking down at them, he could see how they had been turned into a faint pink, which for some reason he found he didn’t really mind.
Maybe it was that he got used to helping Remus, but all he wanted to know was how George was doing. The caked blood from the cuts on his face that transferred to his shirt, he didn’t even notice that, until she turned him over again and you could see where the red smeared across his high cheek bones and thin nose.
The nurse rushed around him, waving her wand and rubbing potions around, before turning him back around to his back, and rubbing new things across the marks on his chest and stomach, on more bruises and cuts. Then more on his face.
She turned, and packed her potions and wand away, to see Sirius staring straight at the jagged cuts across his chest.
“Mr. Black.” She said, clearly surprised, spotting James behind him, with a concerned face, “Don’t bombard him when he wakes, he hit his head pretty hard, so he might have some memory problems and confusion.”
She went to leave the room, presumably to go get Remus from his shack, which she had found out they had been going to and forbade them from going anymore. “Also, boys, if he doesn’t wish to speak about it, you are not to continue to ask about it, got it?” Madam Pomfrey seemed almost, protective over the Ravenclaw, she sounded stern and threatening, before she walked out.
Sirius glanced at James, what, in Merlin’s beard was going on with little Ravenclaw George Davidson?
How could he get hurt in such ways?
He wondered who else knew, or did anyone?
Did George have any Ravenclaw friends who noticed, because clearly this wasn’t a one-time situation.
Sapnap seemed very protective over George, was this why? Or did he not know at all, and just was that way?
Why did little George Davidson have so many questions around him, and why had Sirius never looked at him twice?