The Lady of (New) Avalon

Asteria's mood was not improved by the fact that Evans was actually waiting for her in the Common Room. Honestly, how much "help settling in" could McG possibly think Asteria needed? It wasn't like bloody first-years got help "settling in" — she was pretty sure she could handle locating the only bed in the girls' room that wasn't occupied without Evans's help, and she certainly wasn't in the mood to deal with her playing the perfect prefect and offering false sympathy about the whole bloody situation.

"Fuck off, Evans," she spat, stalking past the redhead toward the stairs that led to the girls' rooms.

"How about no? We need to talk, Black," she said, following her up to the fourth landing.

Asteria ignored her, throwing open the door a little harder than necessary. Hard enough that in the boys' room it would definitely have banged against the wall (assuming Pete hadn't piled his dirty robes in the way again). Here it didn't, because it ran into what appeared to be a giant, floor-to-ceiling curtain of undyed linen or sailcloth or something, one side of a narrow corridor running about three-quarters of the length of the room. There was another narrow corridor, barely wide enough to walk through without one's shoulders touching the walls, leading to the bathroom, and a couple of flaps pinned up — had they decided they each wanted their own tiny room? What the hell?

Or, well, she realised, reaching the end of the ‘corridor', that four of them wanted their own rooms, because it opened out into what was probably three-eighths of the room — the last quarter on the side with the windows, and about half on the other side — all the beds shoved to the inside wall and their wardrobes lined up against the "back" wall to make room in the nook by the window for a sofa and an armchair — occupied at the moment by Marlene, reading one of her smutty, lurid-covered romance novels.

"Black," she said coolly, glaring at Aster. "Can I help you with something?"

Aster rolled her eyes at the attitude. They'd been semi-regularly snogging for a while last year, even tried 'dating' for about a week and a half, which, given that they apparently had very different definitions of 'dating', had ended predictably terribly. Marley seemed to think that it included some degree of sexual and/or romantic exclusivity, while Aster still thought the whole point was going on dates — escorting her to Hogsmeade and sneaking out to have dinner in real restaurants and go to concerts and shite — not just fucking around.

There had been...kind of a lot of shouting, back in March, Aster didn't think they'd said more than a few words to each other in passing since they'd 'broken up'. (The whole experience was just...baffling, really — it wasn't like she'd ever even implied she wanted to be in any sort of exclusive relationship, but whatever.) Remus had sided with Marley, agreed with her that Sirius had been a prick about "breaking things off like that" — even though it was Marley who started getting all weird and insistant about fucking monogamy (they weren't married! and even if they were, who wasn't stepping out?) — it was a whole thing, but that was practically a fucking lifetime ago, how the fuck wasn't she over it by now?

"Apparently I live here, now."

"Oh, you do, do you? Because I don't see a bed for you, and if you think you're sharing mine, you are sadly mistaken."

"Still a crack-up, Marley. Seriously, McGee said the elves moved my shite already, where is it?"

She clicked her tongue in annoyance, threw a knockback jinx past Aster at the curtain halfway down the inside wall. It didn't move under the impact, the energy of the spell racing over the fabric until it dissipated or was absorbed by the enchantments on it.

"Damn it, Marley!" Evans shouted from the other side of it, appearing a moment later in the opening between the curtains. It seemed she'd been in the midst of changing into something more comfortable, because she definitely hadn't been wearing jeans under her school robes, earlier. That was the sort of thing most muggleborns, Evans included, were very careful not to do after they realised it marked them out as hopelessly foreign. (Aster, on the other hand, used to wear jeans and tee-shirts under her robes all the time — everyone knew she knew she wasn't supposed to, that was what made it rebellious. She should pop down to London tomorrow, look for muggle trousers that actually fit...) "What do you want?"

"If you don't want us knocking, don't silence us. I thought we all agreed you were going to deal with Black."

"We did, yes. Black didn't. She has every right to have a look around. If you don't want people wandering in, put up a bloody door."

"Maybe we will! Black, Evans. I believe you've met. You're her problem, not mine, so kindly bugger off."

"Such a sweet-tempered girl, I can't for the life of me think why I didn't ask your father to consider a betrothal contract." This time, Marley's jinx was aimed at Aster's head. She ducked it easily. "Alright, alright, I can take a hint."

She brushed past Evans back into the corridor — wider than the one to the loo, but not by much — ignoring Marley muttering something that might have been, "I'll believe it when I see it."

"So, where's my shite, then?"

Evans sighed. "In my section." She quirked her head back toward the doorway. "I told you we needed to talk."

"I'm listening."

"So am I," Marlene called, reminding them that, fake walls or no, they were still kind of in the middle of the room.

"Not here, come on." She led the way back toward an opening Aster hadn't noticed, pointing as she did to the door-flaps on the window side of the corridor. "That one's Christina — she snores like you wouldn't believe, so she gets her own section." It was absolutely tiny, the size of the salon-nook in Marlene's section — the bed, desk and wardrobe took up almost all of the floor space — which made it look untidier than it actually was. The busy, vaguely floral designs she'd painted on the inside of the walls didn't help, either. "And Ellie and Erin have the quarter opposite mine. Ellie wanted a little more privacy when they started going together." Aster peeked in to see what looked like two four-posters that had been transfigured into one much larger bed, a couple of desks and wardrobes. In contrast to Christy's section, it was unnaturally tidy, no dirty clothes or stray quills to be seen anywhere.

Evans waved Aster past her, into the quarter of the room which was apparently hers. "Prefects get double space, or what?" she asked, curious about the whole arrangement rather in spite of herself.

"No, we basically divided the room into eight when we split it up in third year. Katie and Mary decided that since I didn't have a window, I could have the extra floor space." She closed the flap, the curtain sealing automatically, leaving only a faintly glowing line to show where the ‘door' was.

Unlike the curtains portioning off the other spaces, which had rippled slightly as they walked past and stopped at the castle walls, Evans had covered the stone as well to create a sort of tent around the entire space, and enchanted the cloth to be stiff. The resulting walls had dozens of other enchantments painted onto them, the runes glowing with soft, silver light — two sets of silencing charms, though only the one stopping external sound coming in was active (Aster was guessing it always was, since that would explain why Marlene had chucked a jinx at the wall rather than just yelling), and a Somebody Else's Problem field centered on the door (explained why Aster hadn't noticed it when she'd walked in), a few protective charms and lock-out barriers, a one-way transparency thing so she could see what was going on out in the rest of the room if she wanted to, and some which were purely aesthetic, tinting the background cloth various shades of purple and blue. Asteria could believe she'd been working on it for at least a couple of years. There were little ambient magic siphoning arrays here and there, quartz crystals sewn into the fabric to store power and sustain the whole thing...

If she were inclined to praise Evans for anything — which she wasn't, on principle — she'd say it was really fucking neat.

Aster's trunk — packed by the elves, she hoped, because while Remus was reasonably good at organising shite she could never find anything when he did, and any of the other boys would have just thrown everything in as they managed to lay hands on it — was already there, waiting in the middle of the floor. They'd also brought in a second desk and wardrobe, and... "What the hell is that?"

"Bunk beds? Muggles have them in barracks and dormitories to save floor space." She looked up at the double-decker bed, cocking her head to one side and biting her lip as though trying not to smile. "They...don't normally have curtains. I didn't think to tell the elves that."

Okay...that might be less weird. Maybe. But as it was, the contraption basically looked like someone had literally stacked two normal four-posters on top of each other. Or, well, a normal four-poster on top of one with curtains charmed white, presumably because the red clashed with the walls. The posts might have been a little shorter than usual, so they'd both fit without hitting the ceiling, and she was sure the elves would have made sure the thing was sturdy enough not to fall apart and crush the lower bed, but... "Why the hell would you have them stack the beds in the first place?"

"I just said, to save floor space," Evans snapped.

"I fucking heard you, but this," Aster waved at the beds, "strongly suggests you think I'm going to sleep not only in the same dorm as you, but in the same quarter of a dorm, when clearly having my own space is an option. Why the hell wouldn't you just put up another wall?" she demanded, pacing around her trunk, which the elves had left in the middle of the floor.

Evans activated the enchantment to stop anyone overhearing them and flicked the curtains of the lower bed open so she could sit on the edge of it. "This is why I said we needed to talk."

"Well, you have my attention! Start talking!"

Evans's eyes flashed a bright, unnatural green, just for a blink — almost the exact shade of a Killing Curse, which was unnerving as hell. "Watch your fucking tone, Black, before I re-think offering you a truce."

"What makes you think I want a truce?!"

"Oh, you'd rather I kill you for trying to kill Sev?"

Aster snorted. As if she would stand a chance. "I wasn't trying to kill him — I was just trying to get him expelled for trying to break into the Shack. And I wouldn't even have done that if you, crazy bitch, hadn't ruined my entire fucking life."

"Which I wouldn't have done if you hadn't fucking assaulted Sev after OWLs," Evans snapped, rising to stand far too close to Aster.

"I was bored, and he had that pantsing coming after that polyjuice stunt, don't even pretend you don't know what I'm talking about."

"Well in that case, I was bored at the party, and you had it coming because you're a twat." She glared at Aster for several long seconds — tempting her to just grab the bitch and bite her pouty lower lip because fuck me, fuck the world, let's make bad choices, it will be fun.

She managed to restrain herself long enough Evans apparently decided she wasn't going to respond. She whirled away back to her bed, long, unbound hair whipping across Aster's face as she did, which was just rude and incredibly dismissive, made Aster want to grab her arm and wrench her back around to smack her for her impertinence, see what she did then—

No, they were not going there again! Even if she had woken up covered in bruises and scratches and— No! Stop it, Aster! "I want you to tell Jamie you seduced me," she said. "If we're going to have a truce."

"Sorry, Black, I have a policy of not speaking to Potter if at all possible. We're going to have a truce because as far as I figure we're more or less even at the moment. Sev and I are willing to let that little werewolf incident go if you leave us the fuck alone until we all leave school."

"Sorry, Evans, I have a policy of not making truces with slimy, wannabe Death Eater gits and muggleborn girls stupid enough to date them even after getting called a mudblood in front of half the school."

"First off, Sev and I are not dating. Secondly, he doesn't want to be a Death Eater. And thirdly, we have more important things to do than play games with you, so this ends now — either with a truce or, I swear to fucking god, I will murder your crazy arse."

Didn't address the mudblood comment, Aster noticed. "Good luck with that," she scoffed. Evans's eyes narrowed, but before she could elaborate on her patently ridiculous threat, she added, "What do you have to do that's more important than playing games with me?"

Kind of a funny way to think of it. Funny for Evans, she meant. Aster was hardly the only Black who considered the kind of back-and-forth enmity they had — or that they had had, before Evans ruined everything back in September, escalating shite like a fucking crazy person — more of a game than anything. Though that probably did explain why she was such a good nemesis — Snivels would throw her off a fucking tower if he thought he could get away with it (which did kind of make it funnier to annoy him), but Evans didn't really want to end the game any more than Aster did.

"At the moment? Planning to humiliate Mulciber at dinner tomorrow."

That actually took Aster slightly aback. "Why? I mean, not that Ian's not an enormous wanker, he should be humiliated at dinner every night, but I presume he's been doing something specific to earn your gracious attentions?"

Evans rolled her eyes. "Not that it's really any of your business, but your little metamorphosis and your dear baby brother's communications with Cousin Bella have rather upset the focus of the recruitment attempts going on down in Slytherin. Reg told Sev that the Blackheart told him you're allowed to fight for the Light because, let's face it, most of the Headmaster's little after-school club aren't in it for the right reasons, so we've started a rumour that she wants a few more people to ‘escape' into Dumbles's ranks and act as spies. We were going to start pretending our friendship had completely collapsed in the hopes they'd back off if they thought they were getting somewhere and/or to stop them using me as leverage over him, but I've changed my mind."

What? It probably shouldn't surprise Aster that Reggie's little recruitment squad had been threatening to use Snivels's friendship with Evans against him, but for some reason it did. Maybe because she still wasn't over the idea that Snivels, slimy little dark arts nerd that he was, didn't want to join the Death Eaters, and had been so resolute in resisting them that they'd had to resort to that sort of underhanded shite, rather than sort of tempting him into it by offering research opportunities or something. Maybe an apprenticeship.

"Now we're going to continue to resist them — escalate shite, even, make it clear we're just as serious about this as they are — and if we can't convince them that continuing to try to recruit Sev by torturing him and threatening me is...let's say unwise, we'll be in a good position to reluctantly acquiesce to their demands, while arguing that we're perfectly placed to be accepted into Dumbles's club specifically because we've been so openly hostile to them for the past however many months, and in fact need to continue acting as we have done in order to secure that reputation, blah, blah, trust me, I can spin it. Sure, you and I know Old Snakeface probably wouldn't go for it, but it should sow enough confusion about whose side we're really on to at least let us get out of school without making any binding loyalty oaths to either side. Mulciber's just conveniently loud and stupid. Makes a good target."

Well, that was true, Aster guessed. She'd kind of forgotten she'd asked a question, getting all caught up in the answer. "We?" she repeated. Because while it wasn't that weird that Evans might consider joining the Dark Wanker's little knock-off Miskatonic — Aster suspected that there were more Death Eaters doing research and shite than actual fighters — or at least let them believe that she was interested to avoid being separated from her precious Snivels, it was kind of weird that she'd think they'd consider her application. Generally speaking, the rule was no mudbloods allowed.

"What?"

"You, crazy bitch — you keep saying we. You don't think they're going to try to recruit you, do you?"

Evans gave her a far-too-innocent smile. "I think they will after Samhain, especially if I make it clear that I'm not letting go of Sev without a fight."

Asteria wasn't sure she wanted to know, but "...Why?"

"Come and see. I have an idea for the sacrifice of feeling, it should be interesting."

"You can't sacrifice something you don't have, Evans," she snapped, almost reflexively.

Evans gasped, a hand flying to her chest. "I can't believe you would say something like that! You're hurting all the feelings I don't have! I might cry." Aster snorted at the tone of false anguish. The crazy bitch smirked, dropping the act. "Somehow, I doubt Kore will consider me an inadequate sacrifice, no matter how little sympathy I have for my enemies."

"They're really letting you be an anchor?" Yes, Evans had been involving herself in the school rituals — the Slytherin House rituals, technically, though anyone who knew about them was welcome to attend — practically forever, but the people in charge of organising shite tended to be stuck up traditionalist purebloods like Cissy or Evan Rosier. Even if they did let her participate, the sacrifice of feeling was the last of nine, one of the major linchpins of the ritual. Supposedly the sacrifice tended to feel kind of numb and dead inside for a few days afterward, and being a focal point for that much power was always terrifying, but it was kind of a major honour to be asked. For people who were into that sort of thing.

"Why wouldn't they? Pandora and Narcissa are both on the organising committee, and I definitely remember seeing Cissa at Walpurgis, so." Right. Never mind. Aster had seen her at Walpurgis, too — Magic Itself chooses its host for the Unbinding, and for some gods-unknown reason It had taken a shine to Evans. She had ended up being possessed by Chaos and Choice for the better part of the evening.

There...wasn't any sort of lingering effect to that, was there? Because if there were, that would go a long way toward explaining how it could possibly have seemed like a good idea to kiss the crazy bitch again (violently snog her, whatever) a moment ago, despite all of the shite that had just happened because of the last time she'd done that...

"You do realise the rhetoric skews heavily against...people like you," she said, mostly to change the subject.

"No, the rhetoric — the actual rhetoric, not the light propaganda and shite kids here have built off of it trying to convince idiots with no interest in politics to join them — skews heavily against people like Ellie and Charity. Muggleborns who want to bring in muggle ideas and traditions rather than integrating properly. Muggleborns who make a point of seeking out real, capital-M Magic instead of just learning party tricks and treating it like a tool are theoretically fine. Your dear brother has been ever so helpful, providing us with a copy of the actual manifesto of the Knights of Walpurgis." There was a manifesto? Aster didn't know there was a bloody manifesto! (Reggie hadn't made up a fucking manifesto, had he? If de Mort hadn't actually written it himself, he was going to be livid when he found out.) "Especially with Bella undermining the local recruiters' assumptions about who they're supposed to be targeting and what the purpose of the war actually is."

"Fuck the manifesto! You really think they'd believe you'd go along with— You know they've been killing muggleborn kids and their families, right? That's what happened in Kensington last November." There had been a raid on a muggle primary school, over a dozen children fucking slaughtered, it was horrible. And she was pretty sure Bella had been involved — she hadn't denied it when Aster had been shouting at her, at Yule. (She'd have to try to remember that next time she started thinking Bella was her favourite cousin...)

Evans's bright green eyes grew hard, giving Aster the coldest, flattest stare she'd ever seen on anyone (except maybe de Mort, but he was literally a cold-blooded snake, he didn't count). "Principles are a luxury, Black, not a priority. I can't say I want much to do with either side of this bloody stupid war. I don't like Dumbledore's politics or de Mort's methods. But I will do whatever I have to do to get myself and Severus through this thing alive." Asteria shivered. Evans gave her a sunny grin, the cold darkness behind her eyes vanishing so thoroughly Aster could almost imagine she hadn't seen it. "I think they'll believe me."

Yeah, Aster did too. In fact, she was starting to believe Evans might actually be capable of plotting to kill her. She did still think she was bluffing — and even if she wasn't, Aster still doubted she'd succeed — but if she was already resigned to ending the game... "Has anyone ever told you that you're terrifying, Evans?"

Her grin only grew broader. "Surprisingly rarely. Anyway, that's just a backup plan. Plan A is to hold off the recruiters long enough to get our NEWTs and get the fuck out of Britain. I hear the Americas are nice." Yeah, Asteria just bet she did. Those east coast river valleys by the sea in particular. "So, Sev and I'll be too busy making the baby Death Eaters' lives hell to play games with you."

It didn't really take much time for Aster to decide, "Alright, I'm in."

"Excuse me?" That look of mild, offended outrage made Evans look uncannily like Narcissa, Aster thought. She wondered for a moment when the two of them had been spending so much time together for Evans to be mimicking her expressions, before realising that Cissy probably had that look whenever she happened to see Evans and Snivels together in the library or whatever.

"I'm in. I'll take your truce and work on torturing the wannabe baby Death Eaters instead of you."

"I wasn't asking for your help, Black," she said, all snide and sarcastic.

"I'm not really offering to help you, just to leave you alone—"

"And Sev."

"Yes, yes, and your beloved Sev. And also informing you that I'll probably be spending my newly free time giving the baby Death Eaters hell because, well, why shouldn't I rub it in that I've actually been encouraged to oppose them? I still don't want to share a bedroom with you, though."

"Well, you're going to have to, at least for a few nights."

"Why?"

"Obviously it takes time to make more walls."

"What's the big deal, just move that one in," the wall between her and Marlene, "move my bed out, and that's that!"

"A, I would have to adjust half of the enchantments on the walls to a smaller space, B, I like having a little elbow room, and C, we'd still need to make a new wall to put between you and them."

"A, tough titties, B, see point A, and C, why?"

Evans gave her a look as though she was being intentionally stupid. "They don't want to live with you any more than they want to live with me. We talked about it ages ago, what we'd do when McGee finally realised you're a girl now, and they decided that since I have the most floor space and I said I didn't see why everyone was being so weird and uncomfortable about you suddenly being female, I have to deal with you."

Aster was torn. On the one hand, it was weird as hell that Evans didn't think it was weird she'd become a girl — the overwhelming majority of everyone she'd spoken to in the past two weeks thought it was, the other muggleborns unanimously. But on the other hand, she suddenly found she needed to know what the politics were within her new dorm, because she'd been under the impression that Evans was generally popular and well-liked by their year-mates. But then, Evans never had actually said why she had her own little cordoned-off section of the room, either, so... "What do you mean, they don't want to live with you?" Her eyes narrowed as though she thought Aster was taking the piss. "Seriously, I thought you were all friends."

"Um...no? Definitely not. I mean, we're friendly, but, well, I kind of get tired of dealing with their stupid gossip and petty problems, and I... You know how sometimes you feel like you have to act a certain way because everyone expects you to, and if you don't they'll hate you — or worse, be afraid of you — and dealing with that would be way more tedious than just pretending you are whatever they want you to be, but that doesn't mean it's not still exhausting and annoying and just generally kind of miserable?"

"...Maybe." Aster was more familiar with that feeling than she liked to admit. The idea that she and Evans were very similar in certain ways had occurred to her before, but she didn't care to admit that either. "But that's why you wouldn't want to live with them, not why they wouldn't want to live with you."

Evans rolled her eyes. "Yeah, well, you may have noticed, I'm not a nice person."

Aster's lips twitched in an involuntary smirk. "You don't say."

She shrugged. "You'd be surprised how many people believe the façade. I'm surprised how many people believe the façade. Anyway, I actually did share with everyone until...about halfway through third year, I guess. And, um...it's possible I don't always do a great job censoring myself and keeping up a mask all the time. I can pretend to be their friend, but I'm not. Not really. And after two years actually living together? Yeah, they figured it out. When we started splitting the room up after Yule for Erin and Ellie they, um...kind of came to a consensus on the fact that I'm, ah...a bit weird and vaguely disturbing, and everyone would really be more comfortable if we had our own space. By which they meant if I had my own space and they didn't have to deal with me when I'm not in the mood to deal with them. And I mean, they're not wrong, I like it better this way, too, and they clearly felt bad about basically kicking me out, but." She shrugged, giving Aster a tiny, self-deprecating smile. "Still kind of stings a bit."

"Aw, see, now you ruined it."

The self-deprecating smile twisted into confusion. "What?"

"You were being all sincere and sympathetic, and then you had to go implying that they hurt the feelings you don't have. All sympathy points rescinded for lying so obviously."

"I wasn't. It does sting, in a way to go Evans, you tipped your hand again sort of way. Though, only a bit, since I do like it better this way, and I didn't freak them out badly enough that they actually started shunning me or something. You can keep your sympathy points, though. What the hell would I do with them?"

"Good question. Same thing we do with House points, I guess?"

"Tell people they're a Tool of the Man and ignore the egregious numbers you lose?"

"Yep. Though, if you want, I'll make you a Pity Cup at the end of the year. It'll have glitter on it. Sad glitter."

Evans giggled.

After a second, Aster realised she was laughing, too — i.e. actually sharing a laugh, with Evans. "Hey! Stop that! I know I'm fucking hilarious, but did you forget we hate each other?"

"But...sad glitter..." Evans took a deep breath, biting her lip to try to stop herself smiling. "I'm good, I'm fine. But I don't really hate you, hate you," she said, changing the subject in an apparent bid to get a hold of herself. "You're infuriating and do all sorts of shite to hurt the only person I really care about, so I mean, kind of, on principle, but I don't know, being enemies with someone for five years, I kind of feel like I know you — a hell of a lot better than I know any of them—" She tipped her head toward the rest of the room. "—and it's... The fact that I want to slap you most of the time doesn't mean I don't get you, and that means a hell of a lot more to me than just being nice. Like, obviously we're not friends, but..." She shrugged.

Aster snorted, trying not to laugh, and then gave up, high giggles filling the space around them. "The word you're looking for is nemeses. We're nemeses."

"I'm not a bloody comic book villain, Black."

Aster was obviously missing something. "I...never said you were?" She was only vaguely familiar with the concept, Gudgeon had brought a small collection of the illustrated muggle stories back with him after Yule first year, but she'd never actually read them.

"Yeah, well, real people don't have nemeses."

"Don't be stupid, of course they do. What else do you call the enemies you don't actually want to eliminate?"

"...Is that actually a thing? I mean, yeah, obviously that's a thing, I don't want you dead or anything—" Ha! She knew it! Evans was totally bluffing! (Not that it mattered, she wasn't going to back out of their truce now that she'd agreed to it.) "—but no one else goes around talking about having nemeses."

She was pretty sure it was...though...maybe not? Now that she mentioned it, Aster wasn't sure she'd ever heard anyone outside the Family use it like that... "I...think so? It might be a House of Black thing." Really, that was just as likely as Evans never having heard of people having nemeses because she was muggleborn. Actually, it might be more likely, because now she was thinking about it, she couldn't think of hearing anyone outside the House refer to nemeses, either. She was pretty sure Bella was the one who'd explained the concept to her when she was seven or eight. "Actually, it's probably a House of Black thing. Whatever, point is, nemeses are...kind of like rivals, or opponents in a game. Not friends, but life would be boring without them."

Evans shrugged, nodded. "Fine, nemeses. But we have a truce now, anyway, so I may want to smack you most of the time, but I don't have to pretend to be nice to you and I do like having some space to move around in in here, plus I'd rather not go through the hassle of adjusting all the enchantments in here for a smaller area."

"So, to be clear, you'd actually prefer to share a room with me rather than have your privacy?"

"I prefer to not feel like I'm fucking suffocating because the room is taller than it is wide and there's about eight square feet of unoccupied floor space. I will let you have your own space if you want it, McGee would give me hell if I didn't, but yes, I would rather share."

"If you put in a tent floor and ceiling, you could expand it back out again," Aster noted, looking around at the fabric walls.

Evans's eyes went wide. "I could! Hell, we could expand the whole room out, make room for a proper circle in here! I mean, I'd still have to adjust all the enchantments, but it might be worth it. We could do it over Yule, when everyone else goes home."

"What, seriously?"

She nodded eagerly. "Why not?"

"Oh, well, living inside an unanchored space expansion charm is generally a bad idea, you know, in case they collapse." Most of the time all the shite inside them would just be crushed together, but sometimes they failed in really spectacular, multidimensional ways, so anyone inside wasn't actually physically injured, but they might starve to death before they figured out how to get out. "And casting other magic inside them makes them more unstable. Also, I'm pretty sure if you evoke anything in the castle, you'll ping the wards, so putting a circle in here would be fucking stupid."

Evans pouted. "It was your idea!"

The put a circle in your dorm room part wasn't. "Yeah, I have a lot of ideas I tend not to think through before suggesting them, or just going ahead and doing them. See, me now being female and thereby getting myself exiled to your little pariah-dom." She let herself collapse to sit on her trunk, suddenly tired of pacing, trying not to think too hard about the look on Jamie's face saying, No, I know it's important to not... I won't treat you like a girl. Fucking liar. He wouldn't be able to help himself.

"Yeah, well, people are stupid about the weirdest things."

"I've noticed. Apparently making disingenuous passes at Walters is less acceptable for Asteria than Sirius."

"Why? He has to know you wouldn't do him anyway." Evans paused. "You wouldn't, would you? I mean, even you have to have some standards."

"Clearly not, since I did fuck you. But no, I wouldn't. He's...really boring, honestly. Kind of amusing to fuck with his head, you'd think he'd be used to me by now, but no."

Evans gave her a wry smirk. "So I meet your standards for not boring?"

Asteria nodded, her face growing slightly warm at the hazy, drug-addled memory. "Don't get too full of yourself, there — it's not a high standard. Anyway, I got kicked out because apparently it's even weirder just being myself as a girl than when I was a boy, presumably because they're uncomfortable fancying a fucking weirdo. You?"

"Ah... I think you'd say I'm too dark? I mean, the girls would have other specific reasons if you asked them, but it really boils down to me being more aligned with dark politics and interested in traditional holidays and high magic — they're all progressives or muggleborn, so that alone is weird — and occasionally not catching myself before saying something like, oh, I don't know, I prefer the baby Death Eaters being openly racist over Dumbledore being a patronising, paternalistic arse toward muggleborns and muggles." Aster had to wonder what Dumbledore had done to insult them this time. He did manage to put his foot in his mouth periodically, Evans wasn't the only muggleborn who didn't really like him, for all he tended to support muggleborn rights and muggle protection legislation (though they tended to be in Ravenclaw). "Or, why do people hate wilderfolk? They can't help who their parents were. Or, why are basic first-aid charms restricted spells? I'm sure I can think of dozens of ways to hurt people with any other class of charms, too. And generally being a coldhearted bitch — how did you put it? a selfish, manipulative demonic entity incapable of human emotion?"

"I wouldn't have said that if I'd been in my right mind, you know."

"You don't have to apologise," she sniggered. "Honestly, I kind of like it. Slightly hyperbolic, maybe — I'm not actually a demon or a complete psychopath — but I probably wouldn't be willing to share a room with you if you hadn't said it."

"Just to be clear, I'm not apologising, I'm just saying I wouldn't have actually said it."

She shrugged, apparently neither surprised nor bothered. "And I'm not saying you didn't deserve to be slapped for saying it in the middle of the Great Hall, just, it's nice to know at least one person in this fucking school doesn't expect me to put on a bloody show. Well, two, counting Sev, but we've known each other since we were five. I can't lie to him." Yes, Aster was certain Snivels being a legilimens had nothing to do with that. "So, since it's not feasible to actually live inside a space-expansion charm, I'm sticking with, yeah, I'd rather share."

"You're sure?"

"Would I have said it if I weren't?"

"Well, the way I see it, you're the one who doesn't want to put in the work to readjust your enchantments and the one who's worried about feeling all claustrophobic if we cut this room in half." Not that Aster wouldn't be kind of uncomfortable herself, but she didn't normally spend much time in her dorm room, anyway, and Evans had admitted it first, so she could definitely use it as leverage. "So, if I agree to share, I'm really doing you a favour."

Evans's eyes narrowed. "I'm interested to hear where you're going with this."

"Where I'm going with this is, since I could have had my own space and you're the one who wants to share, I'm not going to make any efforts to accommodate you. I'm going to act exactly like I would if I had my own room. And you don't get to bitch and moan and be all, put some bloody clothes on, Aster or I didn't say you could borrow my towel, Aster—" Her lack of regard for the concept of personal possessions was probably the thing her former roommates had found second-most-weird-and-annoying about living with her, back when they'd first moved in together — after her complete lack of modesty (which was the most weird) and her inability to keep a normal sleep schedule (which was the most annoying). In her defense, everything at home had belonged to the House, with the exception of like, your wand (and anything else specifically enchanted to be used by a single person). Towels were definitely communal property. "—or stop waking me up at four in the morning because you've lost a bloody shoe, Aster."

Evans was clearly trying to maintain a serious expression, but there was definitely a degree of amusement tugging at her lips. "I don't care if you wear clothes or not, but I'm not adjusting the warming charms in here if you get cold; you can borrow anything you want as long as I get it back eventually, in the same condition it was when you took it; and if you wake me up at four in the morning, I'll probably hex you before I'm conscious enough to stop myself."

Aster shrugged, nodded. Reasonable enough.

"How can you possibly lose your shoes, though? I know you can do a summoning charm."

"Do you not enchant your shoes to resist summoning? That's a basic physical security measure, Evans." Granted, usually only dueling boots were spelled so they couldn't be summoned, but Asteria's entire female wardrobe (including all of her shoes, her feet were noticeably smaller now) had been designed and constructed under Bellatrix's supervision, and Bella quite reasonably expected that she might be involved in a fight at any time, regardless of what she was wearing. She'd insisted on certain "basic" protections, which meant literally every piece of clothing Aster owned, barring a few now slightly-oversized muggle concert tee-shirts, had defensive enchantments worked in.

"That...seems slightly paranoid."

Aster winked at her. "It's not paranoid if they really are trying to kill you. Though, honestly, that's what I said. And then Bella lectured me for half an hour because dismissing what she calls perfectly reasonable defensive measures as paranoid is the sort of shite that gets you killed and she was paying for it and just go look at tiny hats or something to kill time while the nice little old tailor who may or may not be a Death Eater spells all your robes so someone doesn't ambush you in Hogsmeade and put a piercing hex through your heart before you realise you're in a fight, this isn't optional, blah, blah, blah."

Evans was clearly trying not to laugh. "I wouldn't have guessed the bloody Blackheart to be the overprotective sort."

"Protective, yes. Overprotective, no. I was also recently reminded that it is not and has never been her job to coddle me. She just doesn't want someone to assassinate me because they mistook me for her. We do look...kind of a lot alike, now."

"You do know your appearance barely changed, right? If you look like her now, you must have always looked like her." Well obviously, had she never... Oh, right, muggleborn. Even after five years, it was still kind of weird, thinking that there were people around who hadn't been raised around the Noble Houses enough to at least have a general idea of what they all looked like — Bella was notorious, it would be impossible not to have heard of her, but she didn't exactly have her picture in the papers very often. "But I thought you weren't on speaking terms with your family?"

Obviously she wasn't. Except Bella now, and Cissy and Reg when she couldn't avoid them. And it was more like shouting terms with Cissy, anyway... "Where did you hear that?"

She shrugged. "Sev, where did you think? Not sure where he got it from, but on the rare occasion he deigns to spread gossip, it's almost always accurate."

Probably Reggie. Prat. "I'm not."

"But you went shopping with Bellatrix?"

Aster pouted at her, annoyed that Evans had asked, and more annoyed with herself for mentioning her fucking shoes in the first place. Now she had to try to justify voluntarily spending time with Bella! "Yes. Because I was out of my fucking mind and thought it would be a good idea to ask someone I know through her if she could give me the name of a bioalchemist or something, and Zee pretty much just dragged me over to fucking de Mort's house, like, oh, no big deal, la di dah, just going to walk in on the fucking Dark Lord, now, whatever — I was, remember, out of my mind, and I thought that was kind of a bad idea. Not that she told me where we were going ahead of time. And then she left me there, because she was annoyed I woke her up in the middle of the night for something so very stupid."

"Mmm, I was wondering who did the ritual for you — I mean, it had to be a ritual, this sort of thing takes weeks with bioalchemy, right? And Sev says there's absolutely no way to fuck up a sex-change potion to make it permanent that wouldn't have killed you by now. So... How'd you do it?"

"Family secret," Aster said, very nearly automatically. That was pretty much the go-to response for avoiding admitting doing or knowing something illegal. Of course, everyone knew it was a cover, but they couldn't really prove it, so.

"Liar."

"You know, most people ask why I did it, not how."

Evans blinked at her. "I don't really care why you did it, though I kind of assumed it was because Potter doesn't go for blokes?" Aster felt her face grow warm again. "I mean, I definitely approve, if you can get him to be all ridiculously obsessive over you instead of me, more power to you, though I'm pretty sure you're not his type, y-chromosome or no."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Er...he's ‘in love' with the perfect prefect, muggleborn golden girl version of me, not me, me. And you're a hell of a lot more like me than that particular character. And Potter knows you. Maybe not as well as he thought he did if you turning into a girl overnight actually surprises him, but—" What, like Evans had actually expected something like this from Sirius? Bull-fucking-shite! Aster hadn't even known she was going to do it until about half an hour before she actually did. "—unless you're planning on pretending there's a dramatic personality adjustment that goes along with your little makeover, you're probably screwed."

That was...honestly an idea she'd never considered. A genius idea! "Evans, don't take this the wrong way, but I might love you!"