ghost of a memory
fifth year, 1976.
Even traipsing through time and reliving a new life in a relatively new world, death's long shadow clung to Adeline's heels. It shouldn't have surprised her, as her past or perhaps future had a way of always peaking its nasty head around every corner of relative normality. Though it seemed normal was never quite something Adeline Black, once known as Hermione Granger, would ever fully be. This particular shadow of death and horror that stepped into her sights was quite literally that, a ghost from her past that upset her relative normal start at Hogwarts School.
She had been linked in arm with Marlene, as the girl had outright refused any and all excuses Adeline had attempted to use to journey to the castle alone. It wasn't that she was against the girl's company, quite the opposite really. She had just expected the bright and bubbly girl to return to her other friends, though it seems the literal ball of sunshine and nervous energy had a solution for everything. Marlene thought it best that Adeline be introduced to her friends and ride with them in the carriages up to the castle, which wasn't exactly something Adeline thought she was ready for. To traverse alone never mind with others present.
Being so close to her old home, with the castle that held so many ghosts of her past and memories of both friend and foe was weighing heavily on her mind. That is without even acknowledging the nerves that followed her impending sort and coming face to face with one of the main puppeteers of all the things that went south in her short-lived life. Though Marlene was as stubborn as she was fiery in that aspect, and wouldn't hear any of it.
"Come on, Adeline. I want to introduce you to my other friends." The girl whined as she tugged the more reluctant girl with her towards the waiting carriages. "Plus, if you do get in Gryffindor then you'll already know everyone!"
Adeline couldn't really refuse the points she made there. Though like a moth to a flame of all things unnatural even by Merlin's laws, Adeline felt the prickles of goosebumps along her neck and arms, as she caught sight of the carriages. Every year at Hogwarts she had become accustomed to the sight of magically propelled carriages, never once thinking much harder on how they navigated the winding and bumpy ride up to the castle. Yet, she was forced to come to terms with it now, as she was faced with a large black winged, skeletal and horselike creature.
She knew of the creature of course, having both ridden and encountered them many times in her old life. Though in her new life, she had never personally witnessed death, never been forced to trapeze the tight rope shortly afterwards of trauma and grief that followed. Only her old self, Hermione, the almost extraterritorial part of herself, had ever encountered such horrors.
"The only people who can see thestrals...," A phantom of a memory spurred to mind of a strange girl with long, ice-like hair, and radishes for earrings. She had the brightest of blue eyes and a strange tinkling laugh like wind chimes. She was so free, so happy. "...are people who have seen death."
Adeline had to force herself to swallow the bile that had climbed from her stomach and upwards to her mouth. Noticing her sudden and momentary halt no more than meter away from the carriages, Marlene glanced at her oddly.
"What is it?" She asked, trying to see whatever it was that Adeline couldn't force herself to pull her eyes away from.
Adeline felt ill and slightly unsteady on her feet. It was all wrong, the people and the places—, but the memories most of all. She couldn't do this, why did she ever think she could do this? It's all too much. The memories, the people that potentially could never meet her, never see her, were haunting her even beyond the grave.
Harry and Ron— her best friends who had always loved her even during the hardest of days and nights. Ginny and Luna, the entire Weasley family that had never asked to be turned into soldiers and forced to march the streets of war again. Remus and Tonks—barely a year after their marriage and after welcoming a baby into their small and admittedly broken family, and all the rest of them. Her parents, her real parents, mind wiped and likely slaughtered in their beds if they had ever been found in Australia. Her Maman* and her beloved house elf, Mipsy. Death was all that ever seemed to come to those she loved and surrounded herself with, no matter the time or place.
"Adeline are you okay?" Marlene spoke but her voice sounded far away, miles away at the least. It was like she was being drowned out by all the noise billowing in Adeline's ears. Chants and memories of loved ones and friends, screaming and pleading with her that they hadn't wanted to die. That they didn't deserve for their life to be cut so short.
"You're white as a ghost..." someone spoke but Adeline couldn't think of who, she thought it to be Marlene but it was all wrong. The screams around her distorted her identification of it. "...Are you... hey? Can you ... me?"
The sudden blurriness of her vision, and the pounding of her heart in her ears deafened it. Her chest was beginning to ache and her palms felt slick and wet. She couldn't hear anything over the calls of anger, grief and mourning that were likewise covering her vision in silver phantoms.
"Adeline...!?"
Something touched her, something cold and ice-like clamped down on her hands but she couldn't see it. She couldn't see past the silver ghosts of her past, with black-like stains covering their shirt fronts, of severed heads, of soulless eyes that screamed and chanted horrible things at her. She hadn't wanted them to die, that had never been her fault, it had never been her plan!
"Is she okay?" Someone called, she barely heard it over the figures of silver, staring at her, shouting at her, with blackened tears running down her cheeks as a sole figure cut through the paths.
She couldn't breathe. Not a single puff of air made it to her lungs because she recognized that dress and she recognized those curls and small smile. Adeline felt tears burn her eyes at the sight of her burned and nearly unidentifiable. Her mother shimmery and mist-like, but still so tragically beautiful.
"What's going on?"
Adeline wanted to scream and she wanted to cry, but the words wouldn't make it past her lips, instead only a dry-sounding sob. It hurt, it hurt so much and she couldn't breathe. Her chest was aching, burning with need for oxygen but for just a moment she couldn't feel it as she stared at her soulless and dead mother, glaring at her as if the entire ordeal of her accident was solely Adeline's fault.
"Black! What are you—,"
"I got this McKinnon."
There were hot tears running down her face now, her chest still tight and her mouth panting in the hopes of air filling her lungs. It burned and ached so horribly to see even now, a ghost, a corpse. She could not even remember the last time she had saw her mother, much less spoken to her in person. It had to be near a year ago now. It ached, she would give anything to see her again, to be held in her willowy but still tight grips. To even argue about something as mundane as where to place the herbs that spring.
Seeing her now was painful and burned so deeply, she was sure to have blisters left along her insides. Adeline half thought she was being buried alive, much like her mothers empty casket in the Black Family's personal Cemetery. No air in and no air out. Her vision fading more and more as she went.
"Adeline...Adeline!" Someone was calling her name. She knew them but she couldn't see them beyond the blurred dark clothes and hair. She half thought it to be Harry, but it couldn't be him, it simply couldn't. She was literally years in the past before he was born. He wasn't even an idea much less a thought yet. But the dark hair that swam between the dots of blurriness, the doting sound of the boy's voice... it was very much like Harry's when he was worried for her.
"Addy, I need you to breathe okay?" The person was closer now, close enough to touch if she reached out with shaky and sweat slicked hands. But she wouldn't, no, she couldn't. She didn't want this to all be part of a dream or imagination.
If anything she wished for this person to be real and help her her but she doubted that would come true. She had always dealt with things on her own, especially now. She held too many secrets and cards to her chest to ever fully accept another's help. It was simply too dangerous to do so. The last thing Adeline wanted was to get another person killed for trying to help her. Like her Maman*, like Mipsy.
"Addy, Just breathe for me."
She tried to speak but her mouth was dry and she couldn't do more than gasp out a rough and barely coherent, "I can—can't."
"It's okay," the stranger mumbled and up close her vision still was spotty but she could make out the person eyes now. They were grey, not a bright and vibrant green like Harry's had been, but silver—almost like that of a full moon on a clear night.
She couldn't dwell much on the colour or how much her chest was aching and her feet were starting to sway, as soon the boy was grabbing her shaking left hand and tightly holding it over his chest. "...follow me alright in through your nose and out through your mouth. Once and then twice. And try to match it mine."
She tried, Merlin and Morgana above did she try, but her lungs refused to cooperate. So much that she began to mumble out and babble inconsistencies on how it wasn't working. What was likely supposed to calm her down was only elevating her panic and fear of not being able to breathe.
Instead of giving up, or shushing her like one would a child, the boy's hand only tightened and pressed her open and shaking palm harder against his beating chest. There she could feel the thrum of his heart and the slow and steady rise of his left lung. The slippery material of his robes screamed aristocracy and old money, and paired with the silver eyes and calming tones. Adeline could only string one coherent thought to get her between her panic on who her impromptu saviour was.
"Do you feel my chest? My heart and lungs?" he shot off in a quick but soothing tone. But Adeline couldn't hope to answer when all she could manage to blearily come to terms with was who this person was that was offering her help.
"Regulus?" The name coming as more of a question then a statement like she had intended it to be.
"Yes," he replied succinctly, as if that answered all the questions that normally would be running rampant along her mind.
But instead all she could think of was the thestrals, and Harry, how she had killed and hurt so many people. How this was all her fault and that she wasn't ready to face this. To face Hogwarts and her past, and the ghosts that haunted so many of her best and worst memories. To see the people she failed time and time again at saving in nothing more than fleeting memories. It was her fault. It was all her...
"—but Adeline I need you to breathe with me alright?"
"I can't," she gasped out, her hand moving to clutch at his robes, her other hand reaching up and pawing at his other side. Trying desperately to clutch onto the only solid thing she could feel and grasp at the time.
Don't leave me, she wanted to tell him. Please don't leave me like this. I don't want to go—I don't want to see it anymore, her mind screamed at her. Please, please don't let me go through with this horrible idea. I'm not ready. I'm not ready!
"You can," his voice cut through her minds ramblings, his face slowly coming back more clearly with every blink of her eyes, the dark spots fading but not disappearing but her breathing still hitched and her hands still shaking like autumn leaves in the wind.
"You can," Regulus assured her once more, stronger and more confident than the last. "Now I want you to tell me five things you can see."
"S-See?" She stammered like that of a child just learning her words. Her voice most obviously shaky and hoarse.
"Yeah," he assured her, his voice still calm and in rhythm with each inhale and heart beat that thrummed beneath his robes and her shaking hands. "Anything you see."
She blinked once and then twice, as she tried to steady her gaze and force herself not to look past him and at the many things she knew to be just beyond his silhouette. She had walked this path a hundred times with Harry and Ron. She knew what was there, she just needed to focus in and see it.
"The grass..." She managed to form through her swollen feeling tongue, the bright green catching her sights swift under her feet, before listing a few things just off to the sides of them, the mounds of soil under new saplings of evergreens most prominent. "The dirt and trees."
Then her vision swam again with black dots and her breathing hitched once again as her eyes fell to the carriages in the distance. Don't think about them—don't think, she hastily snapped to herself as she forced her eyes to look beyond the skeletal horses and all the horrible things that they reminded her of.
"You," she finally settled on, her hands clutching tighter to his robes, to Regulus Black, her cousin. Mainly to assure herself that he was really and truly there, that he wasn't just another figment of her imagination. Another horrible memory meant to haunt her.
"The night sky," she added lastly after a moment, with a quick glance to the sky to prove that it truly was staring to bleed into night from dusk, with the stars slowly twinkling and blinking into existence. Though her eyes soon landed back on to Regulus, her hands slowly lessening in their hold and she held his silver eyes in an unyielding stare. The thrum of his heart beat and lungs acting as a balm to her erratic nerves.
"That's good," he replied, slow and calm like all his others. "—that's really good. Now, four things you can feel."
Slowly she forced herself to breathe, the action causing her lungs to fill with air but hiss in pain as she exhaled in a hurry. She wanted to hold onto that oxygen that she so craved for another moment more but she couldn't, as she swiftly battered out in a half-state of awareness.
Regulus. All she was seeing was her cousin, with his strangely cold eyes and blank expression.
"The wind." She stammered out, just as a cool breeze casted chills down her spine and across the backs of her legs.
"Your lungs and heart," she added feeling the steady thrum beneath her finger tips. On a last ditch effort she recalled the feeling of his robes, the ones that her hands still clutched tight but no longer in a death grip, but still unable to let go to an appropriate hold.
"Your cloak as well," she huffed out as she forced another breath of air down her windpipe. She added half heartedly in the hopes that details might make it easier, more real and solid for her mind to understand. "...it's soft, maybe silk lined."
"Your doing great," Regulus assured her, his lips tilting in an almost smile. Adeline felt as though slowly she could inhale more air upon each breath that she forced herself to take. "Three things you can hear."
"People talking," she stated, hearing the hushed chatter of laughter and people around her but not close, entering her ears. Another solid thing to make her grounded to see it wasn't all in her head, though it was barely recognizable amongst the swelling of her own pulse in her ears. Loud and deafening in its never ending cycle of erratic beats. "M-my heart beat, laughter too."
He nodded now, her eyes now able to clearly see the barley there dusting of freckles across his cheeks, and the mole on the edge of his jaw. "Now, two things you can smell."
She exhaled slowly this time, her chest no longer aching as horrible as it was before. This time Adeline was able to answer without pause, without thinking too long on her reply. "Your cologne, and the-the grass."
This time he did smile, though it was soon disappearing as if he was not used to action, as he gave her the last instructions to whatever technique he was using to calm her. "And one thing you can taste."
Adeline liked her lips, the cracks from the drying pants she had been exhibiting earlier leaving an acrid taste on her tongue, but still among her teeth she could faintly recall a sweetness from her earlier splurge with Marlene Mckinnon on the train. It was at the thought of the train ride and her sudden friend that Adeline finally was able to answer, with her breathing now even and her heart mostly steady in it's thrums in her chest.
"Sugar Quills," she breathed out, "I had Sugar Quills on the train."
"That's good, Adeline," he stated, and slowly she removed her hands from the fronts of his robes, grimacing at the creases she had formed in them from her grappling before, as he added on without pause, "...you did great."
She nodded unsure of what else to say, and feeling the beginnings of a embarrassment colour her cheeks and ears at her sudden freak out. Adeline knew that if any of the family where to catch wind of her sudden predicament that she would be on a train straight back to the manor and given tutors instead. Mainly to uphold the values of the Black family image of power, wealth and strength, rather than her appealed dwindling mental health. So instead of stammering out excuses and apologies, Adeline flipped back to who she was supposed to be and asked a rather harmless and unimportant question which was not at all relating to what had just happened.
"Where's Marlene?"
Regulus didn't seem at all surprised by the sudden subject change and looked almost relieved to jump at the topic switch, as his mask returned of blank features and cold stares, as he went to straighten out his collar.
"She just left us for a bit." He replied simply, now moving forward to readjust the cuffs of his robes, "I didn't think you'd want her to see any more than she had to."
Feeling her ears burn even brighter at the admission, Adeline purposely avoided his gaze, as she went to straighten her own sleeves and wrap her cloak more tightly around her herself. "Thank you, your assistance was much appreciated."
"Of course."
" I just..." she stammered not sure what she was going to say at all, before her mind spluttered out a rambling sentence that truly had no use being vocalized at all. "I don't know what came over me, truly. I really should apologize."
"Not necessary." Regulus huffed, as he prodded at the inside of his cheek with his tongue in what Adeline could only assume to be a nervous tick of his own. Then as if suddenly suffering from his own sensibilities of the matter, Regulus uttered out in a quick paced ramble of his own, "Are you feeling better or do you want to do it again?"
"No! No, I'm fine." She quickly assured him, though her stomach began to twist in coils at the thought of even going near the thestrals and carriages again. If only seeing one from a distance could send her into a spiral, what would boarding one do to her seemingly fragile mental abilities? Nonetheless she forced herself to shove her feelings and fears far down as she instead replied, "I need to get to the carriages. They're waiting for me."
He nodded once before edging to turn away. "Of course."
"Regulus," she called just before he could truly walk away from her, her hand grasping once more at his sleeve before he could fully turn away from her and she could talk herself out of saying the following words. "Just...thank you. Truly."
"You needed help." He stiffly supplied as he offered a nonchalant shrug before adding a tone lower than he had before. Almost as though he were sharing a secret rather than a common sensibility of duty to their House. "And you're family, we should stay together. Especially in times of distress."
Adeline knew there was something more to what he was saying with those words and she wanted to curse herself for immediately thinking of Sirius and how he had time and time again abandoned their family in such times.
She swallowed the lump forming in her throat as she pulled her hand away. "Of course."
"Owl me if this happens again." He said lastly, taking her by surprise at the sudden look that glinted across his face. Akin to sympathy but not quite as strong, perhaps concern would have been more fitting in description. "I have some potions that help when it gets truly awful."
She nodded her agreement despite knowing she most likely wouldn't. Mainly so she wouldn't put another person in danger by getting too close to her. She had already ruined so many lives by inducting them into her riddles of secrets and labyrinths of half truths and past.
"I will."
With nothing else to be spoken between the two, Adeline watched as Regulus Black peeled away from their bubble of exclusivity and rejoined the masses heading towards the carriages. With one last deep breath to stiffen her resolve, Adeline followed closely behind and purposely kept her eyes trained on anything but the omens of death that had brought her to such a spinning halt only moments prior.
line break
Thankfully Marlene hadn't wandered far from where Adeline had last seen her, still perched near the carriages and the thestrals—though with a gaggle of her friends surrounding her too. Adeline made a point to focus on the girls surrounding her recently made acquaintance rather than the creatures barely hidden in view behind them. There was a red haired girl, though not a bright and orange colour like Ginny's or Ron's had been, but deeper—more candy apple than unripe strawberry. There were two others, one with chaotic ringlets held in a loose-looking lopsided bun on the top of her head that looked to be bored out of her mind standing next to the others, and one with barely chin-length ink coloured hair. The ink haired girl and redhead were deep in discussion as Adeline walked up, though she was soon snatched up by Marlene who all but dragged her closer with an arm tightly looped into her own to help her board the carriages with them.
Introductions went quick, though even without them Adeline would have been able to place all three of the new girls. One glance at the mirror-like of eyes of her dead best friend were all she needed in confirmation that she was sitting directly across from Lily Evans. It was sitting across from her that Adeline noticed simpler things that Harry had received from his mother, like his thin nose and her laugh—specifically in the way that her smile became tighter on the one side as it quirked upright and revealed a barely-there dimple.
"Lily is prefect this year, incase I didn't tell you earlier." Marlene rambled as the carriages finally started to move upwards to the school.
"And in Gryffindor like me and Emmeline," she added before playfully teasing with a roll of her blue eyes, "—neither are on the quidditch team though, becuase they suck."
"We do not," the girl with her hair pulled loosely from her face in a lopsided bun huffed automatically with a roll of her eyes. She met Adeline eyes with a quick glance, startling the girl when she noticed they were not an ordinary color but instead a blue so dark in pigment they appeared indigo. It took a second for Adeline to recall the name Marlene had introduced her as—, Emmeline.
"It's impracticable." Lily Evans sniped back in what seemed to be playful annoyance, before continuing on. Only to be interrupted by Marlene seconds later. "—Brooms are for cleaning, not for breaking your neck doing ridiculous tricks and fly—!"
Marlene waved her hand as if to dispel the idea manually.
"Pish-posh," she hummed exasperatedly, with a tilted grin pulling at her lips before glancing to Adeline, "You see what I have to put up with? Bookworms the lot of them."
Adeline did her best not to chuckle outwardly at the girls teasing back and forth.
Despite her words it was obvious to anyone who looked at the seemingly odd grouping of girls that Marlene cared deeply for each and everyone of them. She obviously admired and adored them in other, more simple ways. It was easy to tell in how she poked and prodded at them with half grins and soft eyes, even in the way she touched the others arms and shoulders. Marlene was tactile with each of them in a way the screamed a deep sense of comfort and knowingness to each individual person. As if she had learned over the years through both trial and error what each person needed and felt receptive to in the ways of being shown care.
"Though Alice is dating the keeper," Marlene continued onwards, almost as though she had a specific word count to hit before they arrived at the castle.
"I told you about him, yes?" Marlene asked almost rhetorically, before plowing on. Adeline just nodded feeling a bit overwhelmed at the rate of information flowing from the blonde's mouth.
"So at least she's not completely hopeless." Marlene shrugged before sharing on a high note with a noticeable grimace, "Though having her trying to run statistics and Arithmacy on our scores, assists, outright wins and predicted outcomes last year was enough to do my head in."
"Alice is riding with Frank up ahead by the way, you can meet her at the castle." She stated, which then had Adeline's noticing that the ink haired girl that previously had been included in their little group was not in the carriage with them. Adeline felt a sliver of shame for not having noticed when the girl had snuck away but soon dispelled it.
"I think I told you about her earlier on, but she's not a Gryffindor." Marlene added with a short huff of air in between. "Alice is friends with us more than her own housemates truthfully. She's actually in—,"
Adeline was half-wondering if Marlene was always so chatty on the rides up to the carriage, before seamlessly cutting into her tirade.
"Ravenclaw." Adeline stated in answer with a short grin before repeating back what Marlene had told her of the ink haired girl on the train. "An honorary lion I think is what you said about her earlier, as she spends more time in your common room than her own."
Marlene was beaming at her as Adeline let her thoughts wander for a moment to how drastically different Marlene and her friends were from her past life. Friends in general, especially Marlene as whole, was completely contradictory to those of Ron and Harry. In the past she was more often than not bickering with Ron or instead given the silent treatment. A silent treatment that was once six months long in her third year. Between that and attempting to talk Harry out of ludicrous theories on what Draco Malfoy was up to, there was little to no time to discuss simple gossip between the three of them. Even Ginny wasn't one to show and tell all that she knew about their peers, nor would she ever try to attempt to do so in less than a ten minute carriage ride up to the castle.
"Exactly," Marlene replied in likeliness with a slanted grin. It was obvious that the blonde girl was pleased that Adeline had actually paid mind to her words on the train and not simply tuned her out.
"See, you're already great with names, Adeline." She mentioned with the same brightness of before, disclosing with a slight blush of embarrassment. "It took me a whole week to remember Lily's and we were bunk mates at the time. I only knew Dorcas'" —She added here more for Adeline's benefit than the others in the carriage who seemed to be having a silent conversation themselves with only there facial expressions "—that's the girl in Slytherin who's a good one—, last name for like three years until our fourth year potion's assignment that ended in disaster."
Adeline chanced a glance at the other two girls, in the hopes that they could give her some clarity on what assignment Marlene was sure to begin rambling on about, they however offered her no help. As expected, the glance at the others with blatant confusion flew completely over Marlene's head as the blonde began her newest conversation topic of interest.
"To this day, I don't know what Slughorn was thinking when putting us to together to create a shrinking solution," She huffed with her hands fidgeting in her robe pockets, "...my nails still don't grow in straight and I doubt that Dorcas has grown so much as an inch since she tripped into our table and splashed our half-made potion all down her robes." She paused guiltily, "Dorcas was laid up in the hospital forever because of it."
"Morgana's Magic, Marlene," The red haired girl, Lily finally spoke, with a snicker falling from her thin lips "Take a breath already, you're going to faint if you keep nattering on."
Adeline couldn't help but chuckle as the blonde girl went a bright red at the assessment. She truly had been speaking for over two minutes all on her own with no sign of stopping, though the Black heiress assumed that to just be her typical behaviour at this point. Though a pale and slightly freckled hand was soon outstretched to Adeline in a delayed greeting.
"I'm Lily Evans, in case that wasn't clear." The red haired girl introduced simply as Adeline carefully shook her hand. She couldn't help but notice how the girls nails were painted a startling Slytherin green in contrast to her red hair and lined robes. "...Gryffindor prefect, and room mate's with Marlene." She added soon after taking back her hand and placing it comfortably along her lab. "Perhaps you'll be joining us there?"
"I'm not sure truthfully," Adeline answered back with her most polite smile, despite the anxiety pooling in her gut.
"I'm Adeline Black," she continued much like the perfect heiress she was expected to be, taking care to cover the slight French accent that held tightly to her tongue whenever she was nervous or unsettled. "The fifth year transfer from Beauxbatons."
"Well, whichever house you're in I'm sure will be a great fit." Lily replied with a welcoming grin, which was an exact replica to that of her son that nearly had Adeline shocked still. Though it soon passed as the red haired girl soon began to fire off questions much unlike her not-yet existing son. "...But you'll have to tell me more about your old school. There's so little information on the other Wizarding schools—they're so private."
"I, of course, know the basics from the few books Severus was able to find in his own home when we heard of a new student joining our year," Lily stated soon after, which had Adeline quickly following along in what the girl did manage to cleave about the other Wizarding schools. She herself felt she knew very little about them as a Muggleborn in her past life, at least until Viktor Krum had arrived for the Triwizard Tournament in her fourth year and explained what little he knew in contrast.
"...but nothing substantial outside of a relative location, each school's individual sorting system and what I believed to be quidditch stats for some was available." She continued on, "There was nothing of significance stated in any books otherwise. No ciriculumns, classes , layouts, nothing."
Adeline nodded in agreement, before saying with a shrug that would have had her aunt shrieking about the unbecoming-ness of such a gesture.
"They're very private and most of the knowledge is transferred down through word of mouth more than anything, like family recipes really." Lily nodded along with wide eyes as if captivated by the little knowledge Adeline did offer to her. Unable to help herself, the dark haired heiress added on seemingly as an afterthought "...and the statistics and scores wouldn't have been about quidditch for Beauxbatons but were likely in regards to our gliding team competitions."
"Gliding?" Marlene interrupted in question with wide eyes, just as Lily started to reply in likeliness and skipped right over the sports aspect and instead settled right into asking if Adeline had any written works back at the manor she could lend out for research purposes.
"A lesser known wizard sport," she replied for Marlene's sake before adding on, slightly unsure on how to explain a pastime that had become one of her favourites despite her slight fear of heights, "it's like... acrobatics intertwined with rhythmic dancing on a broom. It's quite popular in France."
Marlene eyes all but bulged at the explanation, though she was unable to comment more on it, as Adeline quickly turned back to Lily to answer her inquiry about possible books back at Black Manor.
"I doubt we have any books that say much of interest about the other Wizarding schools," Adeline paused. "And even if we did, it's highly unlikely my Aunt Druella would be willing to send them through the owl post. Plus she would likely curse me for even thinking on lending them out to someone without her direct approval."
Lily gaped at her in shock before mumbling out in seemingly shock, "I, well, that's rotten luck."
Thinking she had perhaps waded into hot water with her words, Adeline quickly tried to change the subject to something not centred around her or her family. It would be in her best interest not to go about blasting her family business to her newest friends and inciting a trauma bonding session or worse, an intervention on her behalf that she would need to snip at the root. The last thing she wanted was the authorities to go digging around in her memories and sum up her existence to nothing but more spilled Black ink and genetic madness that resulted from possible childhood abuse and manipulation.
Which was very far from the truth seeing as before her mother passed she was the one person Adeline had truly trusted with everything. She was the one constant person always in her corner and offering her chances to be and do better herself as both a child and a witch.
"Marlene never mentioned a Severus earlier," Adeline brought up slowly, unsure of what else to ask the three girls, though equally confused on how Lily became associated with him. "Is he one of your friends?"
Emmeline snorted most unladylike next to her, barely managing to cover it up with a feeble cough, when Marlene all but pounced on the subject change. Lily looked seconds from glaring holes into the side of the blonde girls head from her not so... polite description on what Severus was to the lot of them.
"Severus is Lily's charity case of a best friend since first year. He's in Slytherin but one of the rotten sorts, though she refuses to see it," The swift glance to Lily from Marlene had Adeline instantly wishing to backpedal on her question. Even more so when Marlene did so much as pause when continuing her scathing review of the boy. "They live near to each other—, that's how they met, and he truly is horrid. Even with his deadbeat Muggle father and his mother being three sheets to the wind most days as an excuse."
"Marlene!" Lily snapped coldly, "I didn't tell you those things to spread around to anybody like gossip!"
"It's not gossip if everyone knows it Lily," Marlene fired back, with her ears reddening just a smidge from frustration at her friend.
"Whatever," the red girl huffed out at last before snidely stating more so to the blonde than the other two girls in the carriage. "And he's not a charity case, he's my best friend! Honestly, sometimes you act like such a child."
Apparently, that was the only thing needing to be said to start up the common argument for the two girls. What's worse this time around is that instead of calming the seas after Marlene had blown all the wind from her sails and walked away from the argument, she was now being pulled into it.
"I'm not a child your so-called best friend is." Marlene harshly spoke back with her nose scrunched and her cheeks quickly following suit to her ears in there reddened tinge.
"Tell me Addy—," she addressed the black heiress who truthfully wanted nothing to do with the conversation now-turned argument that she had incidentally started. "—is he truly a best friend if he sets a double standard for everything you do or say? Is he truly a good friend if he despises everyone excluding yourself, fiddle's about with anything and everything classified as dark, creepy and illegal by the ministry? What about if he purposely bullies students a year below him? Is it healthy to keep said best friend? Is it logical?"
Adeline assumed most of the questions were of the rhetorical nature and said nothing at all, which seemed the right course of action as Marlene only continued her rant further after such a short pause.
"Not to mention," she added on with her voice raising louder and louder ad she prattled on with disdain, "—how he treats her like dirt when he doesn't need anything from her at all!"
"He doesn't treat me like dirt Marlene!" Lily finally snapped back, not caring if she interrupted the fired up blonde girl or not. Adeline almost felt sorry for her when she mumbled back looking at a crossroads between tearing Marlene's head off or bursting into a fit of tears—though not ones from sadness but from anger. The type of tears that make your voice shake, your face red and your chest burn. "Y-You just don't get it at all!"
"What don't I get?" Marlene replied just as sharp and wounded looking, though the anger was still present— still simmering in her wild blue eyes and flushed facial expression. "He's horrible to you Lily and it makes me sick that you put up with his crap for years and years!"
Adeline was half tempted to break up the fight before blood or tears could be spilled from either girl when a sudden walk of magic blocked out all sounds from the two. A barely there shimmer of magic had emitted from thin air like a curtain separating Adeline and Emmeline from the feuding girls across from them with neither of the other girls noticing.
"Are you sure—," Adeline began to said with unease, as she glanced at the now silent yelling from the two past the curtain, though she never was able to finish as Emmeline took it upon herself to answer it.
"They've been stewing over this issue for months." She replied with a shrug, stowing away her wand to her robe pocket as she spoke. "Once they're all screamed out they'll apologize and everything will be right as rain once again."
"Actually?"
"Mhm," Emmeline hummed.
Before she could think better of it, Adeline asked the question that had been darting up and down within her mind since meeting Marlene in a similar situation on the train. "Are they always like this?"
"When Snape—, Severus that is, is brought into conversation, yes." Emmeline replied, tacking on the boy in questions first name for Adeline's benefit. Not that she needed it truly, having met the man in her past, but it was nice of her to do anyway.
"Marlene can't stand him," the dark curly haired girl stated as if it wasn't obvious to Adeline from the very beginning, "...and she doesn't understand why Lily keeps forgiving him for all the crap he's pulled over the years."
"Why does she?" Adeline couldn't help but echo. She couldn't fathom, if what Marlene said was true, why Lily who seemed to her like a rather intelligent and kind girl, would ever want to stay near someone like him. It would be one thing if he was only terrible to others and she never saw it, but obviously she had and still she kept running back to him. It was almost as if she liked the pain he put her through.
Emmeline pursed her lips for a moment before replying slowly as if she had be careful at which words and secrets she shared.
"Marlene isn't wrong, Lily should leave him to stew in his own anger and resentment before he drags her down with him... but it's Lily's decision to make that choice, not ours." When pausing Emmeline looked Adeline directly in the eyes as she added on, "Lily's our friend but in the end until she makes that final choice it's best to just accept his co-existence in her life."
Adeline had nothing to say to that so she simply nodded, letting her eyes wander back over to the shimmery magic made divide of the carriage. It stood still and it looked as though the girls on the other side were slowly working there way through the anger and past their possible fears. It was then that Adeline couldn't help but think that Emmeline was quite genius in her forced confrontation of the two. Despite her initial reservations on it, Adeline had to admit that it seemed to work awfully well at fixing whatever issue that Severus as a whole presented between both Lily and Marlene.
She was brought quickly from her musings of the girl next to her however, when Emmeline suddenly asked,
"You're not related to Sirius are you?"
And just like that, Adeline's previous relaxation and near comfort around the girl shattered as her guard slowly but surely raised. Whether the question and it's blunt ended ness or the way her tone carried neither dislike or amicability to the boy mentioned instantly put her on guard.
"He's my first cousin," she spoke slowly, before adding with a slight furrow in her brow, "...as is his brother Regulus. Why?"
Emmeline hummed with a sly smile that had goosebumps rushing along Adeline's forearms.
"Curious is all." She replied at last. "You're difficult to place and I'm not sure which side of the coin you'll fall to. Heads or tails."
"Coin?" Adeline asked, not wanting to try and decipher yet another riddle placed in front of her.
Her life so far has been nothing but riddles and mockeries as it was what with her accidental time travel and timeline re-working. Even as Hermione Granger she has been forced to figure out all the tricky questions from simple logic clues in her first year to the gift of Beedle and the Bard from Albus Dumbledore on the cusp of her seventh year at Hogwarts. She would damned if she was asked to answer yet another riddle simply for the joy of it by some recent acquaintance main in a carriage ride.
"You know," Emmeline replied with a shrug before adding as if it were common knowledge. "... rebellious mischievous and loud like Sirius, or studious, reserved and antisocial like his younger brother."
Well," she paused as if hit by a secondary though, "you could also be mad as a hatter like Bellatrix but I think I can safely say that's not likely, or perhaps another rebel like the eldest, Andrea?"
"Andromeda," Adeline corrects instantaneously, unable to stop herself from feeling peeved at even the thought of being measured up like just another cardboard cut out to all her other relatives. Especially to Regulus and Sirius who had both in entirely different ways tried to make a name for themselves outside their noble last name.
Before she could truly think through her words in a way at which would make her family proud and vindicated to she stated with dagger like edge coating her tongue, "Does it truly matter to which side of your lousy metaphor I fall to?"
Emmeline went still like a marble carving once hearing Adeline's words, yet the young heiress didn't let herself shy away from speaking her mind. "Besides not only was your metaphor inaccurate but it was simply plain rude to try and compare me to my cousins. As not only did you insult them by calling one mad, and the other antisocial you made it clear in your bias as to which you would prefer me to posture myself after."
Adeline purposely paused in this moment before continuing on, stiffening her resolve further and forcing herself not to shake under the power and anger her words incidentally could incite from her relatives should it ever get back to them. If her grandfather even her a sliver of how she is dividing up the House Black, stating them as their own individuals with their own mind and own power she would be making a straight u-turn back to Black Manor and likely placed under a well cast imperious curse to keep her in line. Already she is inviting too many non-traditionalist ideas in his narrow-minded world.
"So before we have any further misconceptions about one another I would like to make myself abundantly clear," she stated off the bay. "I am not just my Ancesteral and Noble House standing or last name. I am my own person, just as much as Andromeda, and Bellatrix are their own, as is Sirius and Regulus. We may look and act similar at times with certain genetic predispositions but we are not the same, none of us—not even a little."
Adeline stared at em line, waiting for her reply though she never does end up receiving it as in stead the sudden fizzle of magic of the shimmering curtain dropping pulls her attention. Without a second though Adeline let's her eyes wander to both Lily and Marlene to see if any last damaging seems to have resulted from there sudden argument but if anything they looked better from
It. There was most definitely tear tracks on Lily's pale cheeks and Marlene's mascara was slightly smudged but all in all they were both smiling wide and acting as though nothing had happened. As if neither Lily nor Marlene had just been yelling and arguing with one another no more than a few minutes prior.
"What about Sirius, Emme?" Marlene suddenly asks with her brows doing a odd furrow together as lily rolled her eyes. Emmeline however does nothing in the way of replying to the blonde girl and instead sends a grin that teased at Emmeline knowing something that none of the others did.
"If you say so, Black." Emmeline replies, and Adeline has to force herself not to scoff at the use of her last name. As if calling her such was not necessarily an insult but probing some point that she has managed to make in her head. Like Adeline was and only ever would be a black—which she wasn't and never had been and the dark haired girl couldn't wait to show her up.
Before another word could be passed between the four girls, particularly from Marlene who looked moments from asking what she and lily had missed in their impromptu timeout, the carriage pulled to a swift and sudden stop. Adeline couldn't help the sudden rush adrenaline and panic weaving through her bloodstream.
She was officially back at Hogwarts, the place of both her fondest and worst memories, filled with ghosts from her past now walking the halls both alive and well or on the cusp of existing in less than ten years times. Thoughts of running through the halls with Harry and Ron jumped to mind after year end exams, likewise those of hiding in fear and crouching in shadows and against fallen structures on a makeshift battlefield. Though before she could truly think on any of this pesky thoughts at all, Lily rose from her seat and made a jump for the door while sighing out in nearly tangible relief.
"Oh, thank Merlin," the red haired girl exclaimed as she shoved the flimsy door open and made her way down the steps. "I've had to use the restroom since we pulled away from the station!"