Dear Readers,

I am so sorry. I really don't know what else to say. I have a list of excuses that include poor physical health, poor mental health, other stories, school work/AS levels, music and my terrible worth ethic that sees me procrastinate over everything, but it's been over a year since I updated, which just isn't really acceptable, and the worst thing is that I keep promising not to leave it so long, and I just fail. So, I'm really sorry, and I promise that I will try my absolute best to give this story more attention, but I can't say that I'll keep it. Thank you to all of you who've read, favourited, alerted or reviewed, and if there are any of you guys that have stuck with my through the rest of the series, I am so sorry and grateful for your support.

I really hope you enjoy this chapter,
Sopphires.

Out and About

Rose was almost inconsolable. She sat, wrapped in her duvet, on her bed in the dormitory, shaking slightly and sniffling. No one really knew what to say to her. It was shocking. Hermione was a good person. She'd fought for equal rights for all magical creatures, and she'd helped abolish any long standing pure blood laws. It was insane to think that she was a criminal and sacking people because of their political preference, but it was what it was, and no one knew what to say or do. The entire castle was in shock, but beneath that came some more anger, slowly bubbling to the surface.

The moment that Harry had dropped the bombshell onto them, he had rushed into how that "they" – Caly presumed this meant his family – were going to do everything they could to get her released, but that the most important thing was to go on like nothing had changed, and that they would sort this out.

Needless to say, everybody had taken that with a pinch of salt and failed miserably at the whole "go on like nothing had changed" part. Caly wasn't sure whether she was meant to be dragging Rose out of the dormitory by her hair kicking and screaming, but she knew that, after trying to reason with her in a sensible manner, she didn't have it in her. Rose was struggling with the idea that her mum had done something wrong. Caly thought it was insane, but Rose's mentality of "you do something wrong so you get punished" was born from Hermione. It was complicated, for Rose, and Caly didn't really understand what was going on her friend's head, so she told the teachers that Rose was sick and brought up meals from the great hall every day.

"How's Rose?" was the immediate question from Al as she dropped down onto the sofa next to him and Scorpius. Caly shook her head.

"Not said anything," Scor ran a hand over his face, eyes tired and bags prominent. Caly examined him, taking in mess that was his hair and his slouched posture. Al didn't look much better, but there was a sharpness and focus about him that told Caly that he was doing okay.

"What have the paper's been saying?" she asked, eventually, because she couldn't think of what to say to Scor. Scor sighed, picking up the most recent Prophet.

"Well, there's a general consensus that she deserved to be punished, but it's a bit harsh." Caly and Al looked at him in disbelief. "What? This is isn't my opinion. I think it's a complete and utter disgrace that this can happen to such a hero – or, I suppose, heroine – but that's why people like it." Caly frowned for a couple of seconds before it clicked.

"They like the fact that she's been treated like an ordinary person," Scor nodded whilst Al's face scrunched up in confusion.

"But she's not! No one else would get this kind of sentence!" Scor shrugged whilst Caly slumped against the back of the sofa.

"That's not the point, Al. The point is that the illusion of equality is given. If people bang on about an equal and just society it generally means that there isn't one." Al let out a defeated sigh and glanced over at Roxie and Jay. Roxie gave them a weak smile whilst Jay rubbed a hand over his eyes and shook his head at something.

"Have seen Hugo around?" asked Caly, gently, and Scor and Al shook their heads.

"No, but I saw James talking to him and Lily and Billy so they've probably run off crying." Al gave Scor a half-hearted glare, but Scor just shrugged, face turning bitter as Caly watched him sympathetically. "I can't forgive him, Al." he continued in response to the silent look of disapproval that Al was giving him. "Not after…he was going to…" he broke off, screwing up his face bitterly and shook his head. "You can't ask me to do that."

"But I am," said Al, softly. "I am, please." Scor just shook his head.

"I'm sorry, Al, I really am…I know what you want, but I can't do it." He got his feet and walked towards the stairs to the boys dormitories whilst Al put his hands over his face in despair. Caly reached over to put a hand on his shoulder.

"It's okay, Al, you did your best."

"My best isn't ever going to be good enough, is it, Caly?" Caly closed her eyes at the defeated tone to his voice, and she shook her head.

"Your best is more than enough, just give it time…" Al sighed, rubbing his eyes and looking across at her.

"Do you think- do you think Aunt Hermione will be okay?" Caly shrugged.

"I don't know. I don't know that much about dementors." Al bit his lip, frowning, before his face lit up.

"You don't know much about them, but Hagrid does! Do you think we could go an ask him?" Caly stared at him with a slightly surprised expression.

"Look, I don't know that much about Azkaban, but I can imagine it's not something he's going to want to talk about." Al sighed again, shoulders sagging and yawning.

"You're right, I suppose I can ask dad…I know he's worked shifts there before."

"Not with the dementors," pointed out Caly, unhelpfully, and Al let out a groan, directing an annoyed look upon her.

"Caly, most of the time I appreciate everything you say, right now…" he trailed off, and Caly felt a smile spread across her face.

"Are you insulting me? I see that Scorpius really is a bad influence on you." Al broke into a grin, chuckling, and whacking at her shoulder in a playful manner.

"Shut up! I'll have you know I was perfectly able to insult before I met Mr Sarcastic."

"Okay," said Caly, nodding as she continued to smile. Al beamed at his apparent victory, and Caly struggled to keep a straight face. Eventually, a giggle escaped from between her pursed lips, and Al turned a shrewd look onto her.

"You don't believe me, do you?" he questioned, narrowing his green eyes. Caly, mouth pressed together though the smile still curving across her face, shook her head. "Caly!" he whined, smacking her arm.

"Al," she said, eyes lighting up in realisation, once they'd finished laughing. "your dad might not have worked shifts at Azkaban with the dementors, but Teddy is there right now, he'll know how she's doing!" Al looked at her with wide, shocked, eyes.

"Of course!" he exclaimed. "How could we forget?" Caly shrugged and watched him pull a blank piece of parchment towards him, snatching up Scor's abandoned quill. Caly peered over his shoulder as he began to scrawl onto it.

Dear Teddy,

I hope you're alright – though you're guarding Azkaban so I know that'll be hard – and I think you know what we want. Is she doing alright, Teddy? If you can't tell us anything because of whatever stupid rules Procurater has created, just tell her that we miss her so much and we all love her just as much – if not more.

Hope you stay well,

Al

He got to his feet, stretching, and smiled down at Caly. Caly smiled back up at him, not sure whether writing to Teddy would bring them anything they didn't already know, but maybe it would give Rose some peace of mind.

"I'm going to send this off right now," he said. "Maybe he'll have replied by tomorrow." Caly nodded, glad that his optimism seemed to have returned. She watched as Al dashed from the common room and then picked up the latest Prophet that lay on the table.

From Hero to Zero

At the beginning of the week Procurater took the shocking decision to imprison Hermione Weasley nee Granger, war heroine and former head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Mrs Weasley has lobbied for equal rights for part-humans and other magical creatures and was instrumental in abolishing the old pure blood laws, but, tonight, she will have spent five nights in a high security cell in Azkaban, guarded by the very creatures she worked tirelessly to keep away from the prison.

The Ministry spokesman says that Procurater stands by his decision and that he did the right thing to insure that we live in a just and fair society, but Percy Weasley, brother-in-law to Mrs Weasley, and who holds a high office in the Ministry, had this to say;

"This is a sham! It is ridiculous to that we are being forced to waste our time prosecuting Hermione and investigating her workings at the Ministry whilst the death eaters – many of whom she helped put in Azkaban with her testimonies before the Wizengamot – are running around free! The security around her cell is at the level of the average death eater which is a disgrace! It is an attempt to humiliate and discredit her by suggesting that she is of the level of those she spent her life fighting! I hope the Minister will see that the way he has treated her is completely unacceptable, and that he will – at the very least – remove her from high security and shorten her sentence!"

There are many people who agree with Mr Weasley's view that to treat her like a death eater is dishonourable, but the public is also glad to see that celebrity or not, they will still be punished and held accountable for their actions. In a poll in the 'The Prophet' support for Procturater has sky-rocketed, and the people agree that they would rather have too harsh a punishment than none at all.

In response to Mr Weasley's comment, Procurater's office released this statement;

"Mrs Weasley's imprisonment in high security is simply due to the fact that she is one of the most skilled witches in Britain and that she has intimate knowledge of Azkaban as she helped Schaklebolt's government redesign it in the beginnings of the peace-era. It is unfortunate that she is housed in the same conditions as the death eaters for a lesser crime, but she has been deemed a serious escape risk, and the Ministry must react to that in the appropriate manner specified in Mrs Weasley's own laws."

All in all the general mood of the public has improved as the recent spate of riots has come to an end, and the Ministry seem to have a firm handle on the situation. There is no news from the hunt for the death eaters, but it is believed that they are deeply undercover and any attempt to contact them could endanger lives.

Caly threw the paper back onto the table, rubbing a hand over her tired eyes. The Prophet seemed to be an accurate measure of the general public's mood, and it certainly did not indicate anything good. Sifting through the other pages, she didn't find anything about Hardingly or the Longbottoms and forced herself to think that no news might be good news.

Glancing around the common room, she noticed that Roxie was now slumped against the table where she sat with Jay and that Freddie was huddled with his friends but that they all looked far less enthusiastic than normal. Tiredly, she glanced towards the stairs and wondered whether it was worth the effort to try and get Rose to come down for dinner. It probably wasn't, but if she gave up trying than Rose would win, and, to some lesser extent and largely by default, Procurater would win too.

Getting to her feet and stretching, she cast one smile at Jay, who was watching her over the top of Roxie's head, and then headed for the staircase to the girls dormitory. Pounding up the stairs, she knocked on the doors before opening in it to see Rose, wrapped in her duvet, sitting on her bed and reading a book. She did not look up at Caly as she entered, and so Caly crossed to her side cautiously.

"Rose, are you hungry?" Rose shook her head, turning the page in the book, and Caly sighed in an exasperated manner. "Rose, you can't not eat – you're smart enough to know that." Rose shrugged.

"Not hungry," she grunted, and Caly had decided that she'd had enough. Plucking the book from her friend's hands, she fixed a serious expression onto her friend. Rose folded her arms, pursing her lips. "Caly, give me the book back." Caly shook her head.

"No, not until you leave this room." Rose stared at her, angrily, before shrugging and picking up another book. Caly let out a frustrated groan, rolling her eyes to the ceiling and chucking the old book onto her own bed, and took the new one from Rose.

"Have you spoken to Hugo?" she questioned, choosing a new tact of questioning that might encourage her to leave the room. Rose stiffened a little bit, looking away. "You haven't, have you?" Rose shook her head.

"No, alright, what am I meant to say? That mum's a criminal? That it's okay that she's in jail because we live in a just society?" Her angry gaze bored into Caly's, and Caly paused before stating the obvious.

"Maybe we don't live in a just society," Rose's mouth fell open in horror. "Rose, the government your mum has told you is fair and just doesn't exist anymore; Shacklebolt, Mr Finch-Fletchly, Uncle Harry, herself…They're all gone, and Procurater runs the show now. He does things differently, and he's…" Caly broke off, no idea where that sentence was going and not sure how to finish it now that she was thinking about what she was saying. Rose stared at her with wide, believing, eyes. "Remember what Harry said? Don't believe everything written in 'The Prophet' – Ginny works for them, but not that department." Rose stared at her, mouth hanging open.

"Caly, thank you!" she exclaimed, leaping forward and hugging her. Caly blinked in surprise before patting her on the back.

"Huh?" she said, dumbly, not really sure what she'd said. "Rose?" Rose sat back, eyes shining with some sort of manic light that made her a little bit nervous.

"You've just managed to connect all my disjointed reasons in my mind! Hugo likely isn't thinking those things! I've been trying to reason it all out, and you've just made it all coherent and logical! I have to go and speak to him! I'm a terrible sister!" With that she leapt up and dashed from the room. Blinking in bemusement, she turned around and stared at the door until she shook her head, shrugged, and made her way back downstairs. The moment she got there she was accosted by the Weasleys.

"What the hell did you say to Rose?" exclaimed Freddie. "She went dashing out here like a mad woman; eyes manic, hair wild and…well, actually, it was mainly the eyes that made her look crazy."

"What did you say?" demanded Roxie, shoving her brother a little. Caly shrugged.

"I was just telling her that maybe our society isn't just anymore because Procurater's in charge-" there were rolled eyes. "-because she didn't know what to say to Hugo. Then she just hugged me because all her reasons had become "coherent and logical", and then she went running off!" There was a moment before everyone shrugged and shared looks that said; "ah well, at least she's out of her room" as Al came walking in.

"Is Rose really running around?" he asked just as Scor came back down the stairs.

"Rose is running around?" Caly rolled her eyes, beckoning the boys towards her to explain it all over again.

At dinner Rose was sitting at the Gryffindor, glaring at her plate when they arrived. They dropped down next to her, looking at her with frowns, and wondering what had happened that had brought her mood down so quickly.

"Rosie?" asked Al, cautiously poking at his cousin's arm. "What's the matter?" He glanced at James, who was sitting nearby, pretending that Scor wasn't there.

"James?" asked Caly, and James sighed, pulling out the map. He threw it onto the table and tapped his wand against it, muttering "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good" under his breath.

"Tell me if you can see Lily, Hugo or Billy on that." He said, and the three of them leant over it as Rose continued to stare at her empty plate. Examining the map with frantic eyes, Caly quickly came to the conclusion that none of them were on there. Al looked up with a frightened expression on his face.

"Where are they?" he demanded, staring right at his brother. James shrugged. "James you were talking to them!" James held up his hands.

"Jeez, what the hell is your problem? Everything is my fault isn't-"

"James," said Caly in a pleading tone of voice, staring at him with wide eyes. James glared at her before looking over at his brother.

"We were just talking about what people in the castle thought of Hermione and stuff. I was explaining what Azkaban was probably like and…" he trailed off, looking at Al's angry expression.

"What did you say about people in the castle?" James broke off, glancing over at Caly for support, but Caly wanted to know where Lily and the others were, and she wasn't in the mood for James' unhelpful behaviour.

"I said that they would likely hate them – especially if anybody here is the child of one of the workers that got fired." There was a pause before Al snatched up the map and dashed towards the high table. He tapped his dad on the shoulder even as Rose, Scor and Caly got to their feet.

"James," hissed Caly, tugging on his sleeve. James, huffing in annoyance, got to his feet. He followed them, shoulders hunched and posture slumped, to Harry who was standing there frowning.

"What's going on?" he asked in confusion. "James, what happened to Lily?"

"It's not my fault!" he exclaimed, throwing his arms into the air. Harry held up his hands, looking taken aback.

"James, I didn't say that. I'm merely asking what happened." Caly glanced around at all the curious eyes that were staring at them and tapped Harry's arm. He turned to Caly with a frown. "What?" Caly glanced around the hall again.

"Shouldn't we do this somewhere else?" she asked in a hushed voice, and Harry, noting that there were many eyes fixed upon them, nodded.

"You're right, come on." The six of them left the hall, James walking along at the back as slowly as he could. Rose had an anxious frown on her face whilst Scor kept looking between her and Al with calculating eyes. Caly chewed on her lip, trying to remember if James had told her whether there was anywhere on the map that didn't show up. Harry led them into a small room off the Entrance Hall before turning to them all. "Okay, someone speak slowly." Rose took a deep breath before starting.

"I went to speak to Hugo because I wanted to make sure he was okay, but I didn't know where he was so I asked James. James had seen them a little while ago. I asked if he knew where they were going so he pulled out the map, and we looked at it. We couldn't see them, but James said we might just have missed them – that they may be in the Great Hall which was a crowd of dots so we went there."

"But they weren't there," said Harry, nodding. "And they're not anywhere else?" he asked for clarification, and they all nodded. "Alright…" he looked around the room and took in all their serious faces. "James, go check the Room of Requirement, they could be in there." James nodded, turning around and dashing from the room.

"Dad, do you think she's missing?" asked Al the moment he was gone. Harry shrugged, shaking his head.

"I think it's Hugo we need to think about. I have a feeling that – at best – they may have run away together. How's Hugo been?" Rose sucked a huge breath in, turning her gaze away, whilst Caly and Al shared hopeless looks and shrugs.

"He's not okay, but I don't think you can expect that of him." All their eyes spun to Scor who was speaking in a very clipped tone of voice. "I think that people have been giving him a hard time, and I don't think he can hold his head up anymore…" Harry nodded in understanding, frown pinching his face.

"Alright, we need to establish if there is anywhere else they could be." Harry moved his wand over the map, seemingly siphoning off the dots until it was blank. He let out a snort of frustration, waving his wand so that it was peppered with dots once more.

"What did you do?" asked Scor, staring at the map with wide eyes that were curious and interested. Harry blinked between the map and Scor before offering him a smile.

"It's something Hermione worked out – a way to remove the dots excepting the ones you're looking for. It's a pretty complex spell, though." Scorpius nodded as the door burst open, and James came darting in, doubled over and gasping for breath. He held up a hand as Rose turned to him with her mouth open to ask a question. He put a hand against the wall as he attempted to breathe so that he could speak.

"They're not-" he wheezed. "Empty," he forced out, and Rose stumbled backwards into the wall, her face paling slightly.

"Uncle Harry, where are they?" Harry shook his head. His eyes scanned the map again as his frown deepened. Then he shook his head again.

"I'm sorry, Rosie, they must be off grounds. I'll get in touch with the auror office, we'll find them, Rosie, I promise." Rose swallowed, and Caly knew that her faith in the establishment had been shaken so badly that right now she would not believe that they would find Hugo.

"Rose, it's in their interest to find Hugo," said Scor with a hard tone of voice. Harry nodded.

"Yes, and the head of the auror office is a good person, Rosie, I promise. They can't have been gone long, and they can't be far away." Rose nodded, swallowing deeply.

"Okay, what do we do?"

"Nothing," said Harry in a completely serious voice, sending a glare around at all of them. "I do not want you running off trying to find them. It's going to be hard work stopping your mum – Al – and Uncle Ron, as well as Dudley and Veronica, from doing anything stupid; I do not need to be worrying about you four too."

"Hey, what about me?" asked James, raising a hand. "How come I'm not included?" Harry gave his oldest child a glare.

"I would have thought that you'd matured enough to know not to run off, James, clearly that is not the case." Scorpius snorted rather loudly – telling them all what they thought of the idea of James maturing – and Al rolled his eyes. Rose ran a hand down her face in annoyance or despair whilst Caly scrunched her face up as James shot Scorpius a venomous glare. Harry clapped his hands together, drawing their attention to him again.

"Aren't you meant to be alerting the auror office?" demanded Scor, eyebrow rising, and Harry rolled his eyes.

"Yes, but pull yourself together, alright? There's enough problems without you fighting amongst yourselves." The moment that Harry had left the room, James spun onto Scorpius.

"Don't talk to my dad like that – you ought to show him respect." Scorpius sneered at him whilst Rose shook her head, hopping onto a desk whilst Caly pulled a disapproving face, and Al leapt into the conversation before Scorpius could say anything.

"James, you've never shown dad an ounce of respect in your whole life! I think that that's really rich coming from you! And dad's right," he said, rounding on Scorpius who was smirking in victory. "we need to stick together in this, and that means you two need to stop fighting over nothing!"

"Al!" exclaimed Scor in indignation. "He was going to tell everyone what I did!" James rolled his eyes and swept from the room, allowing the door to shut with bang. Al let out an exasperated sigh, turning his glare on the only one of the two in the room.

"Scor, please let it go, for me; please." Scor rolled his eyes and shook his head.

"You can say that over and over again, and it won't change a thing until he apologises." Caly gave Al a small smile that told him to let it go for now and moved over to touch Rose's arm.

"Come on, Rose, let's eat something, alright?" Rose rubbed a hand over her face with an angry expression.

"If I'd just been less selfish!" she exclaimed, and out of the corner of her eyes Caly saw Scor's eyes take their predictable route towards the ceiling whilst Al moved over to Rose.

"Rosie, I was checking up on them, and there was never any indication that it was this bad. Now, come on," he seized her by the upper arm and pulled her to her feet. "food!" Rose let out a small laugh at Al's thoughts of food. Scorpius grabbed her other arm so that she was trapped between them, and Caly appeared by Al's shoulder with a small smile. Al wrapped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her closer to the other three. "We're getting through this," he insisted in a firm voice. "but we won't be able to do anything if we're all fainting from lack of food!" Scorpius snorted loudly at that as they barged their way through the doors.

"That's a startlingly accurate piece of logic, Al, is there something in the water?" The rest of them burst out laughing at that, Rose shaking her head in amusement.

"Scor, honestly, one day you're going to wake up and find out that he's got a lot more sense than you." Scor and Caly both laughed quite loudly at that; Scor in derision and Caly in amusement at the thought. Rose was smirking. Al scowled at them as he plonked Rose down at the table.

"Just you wait…I'll show you all."

"What?" questioned Scor. "Your index finger? I've seen that – got two myself as well." Al rolled his eyes as he dropped down next to Scor.

"Why do I put up with you?" he questioned, loudly. "Why do I like you?"

"We're in big trouble," said Scorpius as he collected The Daily Prophet from the post owl. He was staring at the front page, and Rose's cutlery clattered against the table as a bit of Al's bread fell from his now open mouth, and Caly looked away from James, who was pointedly ignoring them.

"Is it mum?" asked Rose, frown on her face. Scorpius looked up.

"No, but- Al, that's disgusting! Close your mouth!" Al sheepishly closed his mouth and swallowed down the mush of bread.

"Scor!" exclaimed Rose, impatiently, seconds from tearing the paper from his hands. Scorpius shook his head slightly as Caly examined Rose's tense posture and glanced up at Harry, who was sitting stiffly in his chair and staring at the paper with a tense expression.

"It's your dad, Rose," he said, lying the paper flat on the table, sweeping aside the dishes between them. "he defied orders from the Ministry to go after Lily, Hugo and Billy – they've denounced him, Rose. He's been called a vigilante…" Caly frowned, face creasing up in confusion as Rose snatched the paper off the table.

"Vigilante?" she demanded. "But he's not hunting criminals! He's looking for his son and his niece and nephew!" Scorpius shrugged.

"I know, but this is going to create one hell of a storm." Al sighed, frown pinching his own brow as he peered over his cousin's shoulder.

"But that makes it sound like Lily and the others have been, well, captured." Scorpius shook his head, sweeping a hand through his blonde locks.

"It's all about fear, Al, no one's said anything, but it's been implied… It's enough to plant seeds of distrust and doubts in people's mind." Something twisted at his face as he felt silent. Then he tapped the top of the paper. "I've said it before and I'll say it again; he's damned clever. Don't you see," he said with a slightly manic smile on his face, looking between Al and Caly. "he's sowing the seeds of destruction without actually doing anything! Fear and doubt is enough to tear this whole society to shreds." Rose shook her head, having not heard Scor's words, and raked a hand through her messy, bushy, hair.

"I can't believe that they'd just throw my family away like this… They've said that they've "dispatched a highly skilled team of trackers to find them" – it makes it sound like they're animals! They're three eleven year olds for crying out loud! They're not criminals or animals!" she ran a hand over her face. Scor let out a sigh.

"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself," he quoted in a soft voice. Rose tilted her head as she frowned at him.

"Where does that quote come from?" she asked. Scorpius frowned, intensely.

"I- I don't actually know…I think I read it in a book on something…" Caly bit on the inside of her lip.

"I do," she said, making them both jump in surprise.

"You do?" asked Rose in surprise. Caly nodded.

"Yeah, it's from Roosevelt. I think it might be his inaugural speech." Al frowned at her along with the other two.

"Erm, who is Rue-sa-velt?" he asked, slowly. Caly rolled her eyes.

"Roosevelt," she repeated. "he was a president of America, like, almost a century ago, or something. I once did a project on him for school." She frowned and then shook her head. "I don't know why I picked him, but I'm pretty sure what you said is something of his." Scor nodded.

"Yeah, that would make sense; I was reading a book on American history after our lesson on roads and their expansion across the countries." Caly frowned because that sounded like an incredibly dull topic. Rose shook her head suddenly.

"That's of little importance right now. I can't believe that my whole family are missing!" There was an awkward pause in which Scorpius raised his eyebrows and stared in disbelief at her. Caly pulled a face, looking at Al who looked down right offended.

"Um," he said, tapping her arm. "favourite cousin in earshot!" Rose blinked and looked at Al with surprise.

"Oh, no, I just- I meant-" she broke off, shaking her head. "Sorry…" Al opened up his arms, demanding a hug, and Rose, rolling her eyes, embraced him. "Since when were you my favourite cousin?" she asked, and Al snorted in disbelief.

"No one else could put up with your I'm-little-miss-goody-two-shoes-and-I-know-everything routine." Scor snorted quite loudly, head ducking towards his plate as he smiled. Caly smirked a little herself. Rose withdrew, shaking her head. Scorpius picked up the paper, rifling through it with a frown on his face.

"Anything else?" asked Al. Scorpius shook his head, slowly, though his face was pinched into an intense expression.

"There's no news on the death eaters, the Longbottoms or Hardingly, but…" Scorpius took in a shaky breath, and they all leaned forward with worried frowns on their faces. "It's…the street where Rachel lived…people have gone missing…some other muggle children…" he dropped the paper like it had burnt him, shoving it away and looking scared. Al snatched it up.

"Merlin's beard…" he whispered. "That can't be an accident," he said, and Rose shook her head.

"None of this is accidental…coincidence maybe, but not accident." Al frowned.

"Is there a difference?" Scorpius sighed.

"Think of it like this; these actions are planned, but their timing is coincidence, see? The kidnappings happening at the same time as your family disintegrating – for want of a better word – is a coincidence, but the individual actions themselves are planned." Al nodded in a vague motion of understanding what had been said.

"I never thought that I'd say this, but let's just go to lessons, maybe they'll be less depressing."

As it turned out, Al was surprisingly right about lessons being less depressing. It was still boring as hell considering that they would rather be anywhere but in a slightly cold classroom with the wind battering the windows and a teacher droning away like more important things weren't happening outside the castle. They struggled to focus on anything more or less pressing than what had happened to Rose's family which meant that not even Liann's most intense stare could force them to work properly.

Professor Annah delivered a long rant to them in Ancient Runes about the power of choice and freedom and how they were inextricably linked to prophecy and fate. It was interesting at the beginning, but by halfway through most people had dropped off to sleep, or were at least occupying themselves with something more worthwhile. Rose had pulled out another book whilst Caly was desperately trying to finish her Charms homework with the help of Scor and Peter.

Professor Flitwick was very understanding of their inattentiveness, though he did beam widely at the sight of Rose in his lesson, and he let them simply read the textbook at the back of classroom. Scor fell asleep at the very end of the lesson, and Al simply rolled his eyes and patted the blonde head whilst Rose and Caly giggled as his face had fallen into the freshly made notes that he'd been taking – imprinting blue words onto his face.

Whispers followed them as per usual, but people seemed to be inclined to leaving them alone except for the Slytherins, who jeered in their faces and were openly jubilant about the fact that Lily, Hugo and Billy were gone. Caly also couldn't help notice that the portraits and ghosts seemed a little bit more cheerful now that the three young Gryffindors were gone. She hoped that Rose didn't notice though because, whilst Al was being purposefully upbeat, Rose walked with a heaviness in her step that Caly hadn't seen in a long time. Scorpius just seemed to be struggling to walk straight regardless of the situation, and Caly knew that he was not going to be getting much sleep for a long time.

"This is getting out of hand." Harry turned away from the windows that overlooked the grounds to take in Minerva's posture. The tough headmistress, who was currently overseeing her third generation of Potters and Weasleys, was slumped in her seat, looking defeated. Harry understood that. This was not the worst situation they had been in in a long shot, but the enemies they were facing were so faceless. Their problems lay in the complicated psychology of an angry mob of civilians, the death eaters, Hardingly and three first year students. How were they meant to navigate all of that?

"There'll be a resolution," piped up Flitwick, looking firmly around at the other teachers. Slughorn patted away the beaded sweat forming on his forehead and looked up at Harry for assurance. Professor Sprout shook her head, removing the hat from her head, and Hagrid stood silently in the corner. Harry knew that his experiences in Azkaban were haunting him. He, himself, was trying not to imagine what Hermione was suffering – all that they had been through would be lapped up by the dementors.

"But at what cost?" murmured McGonagall, shaking her head as she pursed her lips. Harry looked back out of the windows, heart yearning to run out of the grounds like he would have when he was younger to find his daughter. His baby girl was lost somewhere in a world that she did not understand, no matter how grown up she believed that she was.

"We should focus," said Professor Sprout, looking around at all of them. "on our students." Harry sighed and moved over to the desk, glancing up at the snoozing portraits. Dumbledore and Snape were both apparently dead to the world.

"How are you holding up?" asked McGonagall, turning to her ex-student and current co-worker with sharp eyes. Harry pursed his lips and shook his head. He was focusing on not thinking about his feelings because they wouldn't get him anywhere. He'd handpicked and trained all of the aurors; they were good people that did their jobs well, and he knew that he could put his faith in them. Sloane was a good friend to him and had been giving him whatever news that she could.

"Fine," he said, nodding and trying to give them all a smile. "I trust that they'll get them back, and Ron will come to his senses…Hermione is very strong, and she's innocent – that's what Sirius said got him through." There was a moment of silence in which the others nodded in agreement. "Though, I have to admit that I'm furious. I just- what they've done to Hermione…" he trailed off, shaking his head. His best friend – his sister – was sitting in a dingy cell in Azkaban whilst he resided in the comforting warmth of Hogwarts. She was living in a cell that she'd helped to design to make it a hellhole, and there was nothing he could do. He couldn't alleviate her suffering. He couldn't even see her.

"It's a great injustice," said Slughorn, shaking his head with a grave expression on his face. "Such a talented, wonderful girl…" His eyes seemed to mist over slightly as he continued to shake his head. "To be subjected to that after all that she's given…terrible, terrible."

"Yeah it's terrible," grunted Hagrid, stepping forward with a light in his eyes. "but we know Hermione. Brightest witch of her age – heck, still probably best witch in Britain at the moment. She can handle this. She'll come out of this even stronger. We got to worry about them kids." Harry looked over at his old friend and felt the strength that had been draining from him as he taught class after endless class as the wizarding world that he'd fought so hard to protect seemed to be falling back to pieces return.

"Hagrid and Pomona are right," said McGonagall, talking over the oppressive silence as Harry tucked in his chin and hid the tears that were building in his eyes because he had forgotten what it felt like to truly lean on someone that he could fully rely on. "as worrying as the rest of the world is we need to keep our mind on the students. We'll offer what support we can to bring Lily, Hugo and Billy back, and we need to work out what to do about Hogsmeade."

"Run it," said Harry, instantly, looking back up because this was a subject that was relatively detached from him. "they deserve a break out of the castle." There was a pause in which the other teachers considered it, but Harry knew they were going to run with it. He knew that his word held great sway for some reason that he couldn't quite get; at the moment he was so emotionally compromised that it was off the scale. He may be pressing it all down inside of him and ignoring it for the sake of others, but he was really only thinking about his family: Al and the others deserved their first trip into Hogsmeade.

"Alright," said Professor McGonagall. "let's get the word sent out. Weekend after next, though, for the Quidditch game, and to give them time to organise some more security." Harry managed a small smile as Professor Sprout, Flitwick and Slughorn got to their feet. Professor McGonagall shook her head, and Harry saw her glance up at Dumbledore's silent frame. He understood why Dumbledore wanted to keep as far out of their affairs as he could allow himself – he was technically dead after all, and Harry could understand why he said that decisions that would affect the living ought to be made by the living – but they needed him right now. They needed something that was bigger than all of them. Dumbledore still seemed to be that.

"Teddy's replied!" exclaimed Al, dropping down onto the sofa next to Scorpius. Rose, who was curled in an armchair and reading a children's book, looked up in interest whilst Caly threw down her quill onto her unfinished Transfiguration essay, and Scorpius ran a hand through his hair as he yawned. "and Hogsmeade is going ahead."

"I beg your pardon?" said Scor, arching an eyebrow incredulously, whilst Caly blinked, completely taken aback by the fact that they would allow them all to go into the village in a time like this. Al nodded seriously, mussing up his hair in an almost unconscious gesture.

"Yeah…apparently…" he shrugged, and Caly looked at Scor, wondering how he would feel if they went to Hogsmeade without him. Rose cleared her throat quite loudly, though, stopping them from entering that conversation. Al jerked, breaking eye contact with Scor, and looked up at her sheepishly.

"Right…um…letter from Teddy. It doesn't say very much. He just said that your mum is holding it together and that he's not really allowed to see her properly, but that she wants you to know that she loves you very much. She wants you to stay safe, and to not let it all get to you because she's going to be fine." There was a silence in which Caly personally thought that it was a little bit late for Rose for to believe that last statement. Rose swallowed and sniffed heavily, nodding a little.

"Okay, nothing else?" Al shook his head, dropping the piece of parchment onto the table and shooting his cousin an apologetic look.

"I'm sorry, Rosie." Rose shook her head instantly.

"It's fine. It's all fine." Caly stared at her in disbelief, and Scor arched an eyebrow, leaning forward slightly in his seat.

"Rose, no one expects you to be fine. You can't be fine…" Rose shrugged.

"I know, but what other choice do I have than try to be fine?" Clay sighed at that, looking at her two other friends for support. Al shrugged a little, face saying that he had no idea what the answer to that question was, whilst Scorpius sighed, tense expression on his face.

"Rose, I don't think that's the answer, but I agree with you – we don't seem to have any other choice in the matter." Al nodded as Caly sank back into the sofa, silently agreeing with Scorpius and hoping that Rose didn't take it too far, though, and just really pretend she was okay when she wasn't.

"Just let us know if you're not, though," said Al as if he had read Caly's mind. "no lying. Deal?" Rose looked at him with a tired expression before nodding.

"Deal."

Their deal with Rose was either completely unnecessary, or already broken, because she said absolutely nothing about how she felt to them after that conversation, and whenever one of them brought up the subject, she'd just say "fine" with a shrug like they were all so stupid for asking her that. The only time she showed any real emotion was frustration when Hufflepuff comfortably beat Slytherin, putting Gryffindor in a worse position to get to the final play-off. There was zero news on where any of them were, although the Prophet liked to keep on reminding them of the story every day like they could have possibly forgotten by saying that they didn't know where they were (and then recapping the first article about how they'd run away) and then saying that Ron was still looking (plus recap about how he'd disobeyed) and that Hermione was still in prison – surprise, surprise – with a another recap of an earlier article about why she was there.

The atmosphere in the castle was also monotonous with almost everyone returning to normal with mostly careless expression about the whole thing – they'd run away and who cared and maybe this would mean the Death Eaters wouldn't come here. The only first year that seemed really bothered was May Wood, who appeared to be without friends now that they were gone, and the portraits and ghosts were still remarkably happier in their absence, for reasons that Caly couldn't really blame them for. That meant it was literally just their family that seemed to be worried about, and missing, them. They soon fell into the habit of meeting once a day, even if it was brief, just to get away from the other students and their rolled eyes and sighs at the Potter-Weasley's melodramatic nature.

"Where's James?" asked Roxie, looking around as the rest of the family began to take seats in the empty Transfiguration classroom. For some reason, all eyes fell onto Caly, and she shrugged, wondering why everyone expected her to know where James was.

"I don't know, I haven't seen him since breakfast." Fred huffed, crossing his arms and glaring at the door, presumably in preparation for when James came in.

"This is getting ridiculous," he grumbled. "he's acting like he doesn't even care!" Scorpius rolled his eyes at that and muttered;

"Why doesn't that surprise me?" underneath his breath, getting a kick and angry expression from Al in response. Scorpius huffed, crossing his arms, whilst Molly took a step forward and put a calming hand on Fred's shoulder.

"Don't get angry at him, okay? He loves Lily, we all know that, but he's well, James…" she sighed. "He never acts like he cares, but he always does." Caly nodded at that, even though she disagreed with the first part of the statement because James did show that he cared, but the second half was true – James always cared about his family, he was just terrible at showing it.

"Mols, we know that," said Dom in a soft voice. "but right now, we need him – we've got to stick together. There are people after us, and it's a tired statement, but we really are stronger together – united we stand, and divided we fall."

"Man, Dom, when did you get all depressing?" came the casual voice of James Potter as he stepped into the room, letting the door slam closed behind him and casually leaning against the wall.

"Err, I don't know, somewhere between my little cousins nearly dying and then going missing and then Death Eaters breaking out and my aunt being arrested and then some other my other little cousins going missing." James rolled his eyes.

"Whatever." Caly felt her eyes bug open as he shrugged, shocked by just how casual he was being because this was his little sister, and heard angry growls from the rest of the room.

"What do mean "whatever"?!" yelped Al. "Lily's missing whilst there are people that want us dead out there! How can you just shrug that off?" James rolled his eyes again, crossing his arms.

"Look, I would have thought that you of all people, Al, would know not to count against a couple of first years getting out of a sticky situation – you were all fine."

"Are you insane?!" exploded Rose as Caly put her head in her hands, wincing and trying not to remember everything that happened in first year whilst Al let out a strangled yelp and everyone else seemed to be frozen in a mixture of shock and horror. "Scorpius died, James, he died! How does that count as "fine"?! If it wasn't for some fluky life debt stuff, he would be six feet under!"

There was a heavy silence when Rose stopped speaking. Caly cautiously took her head out of her hands and saw that Al had grabbed onto Scorpius' hand, for whose benefit Caly wasn't entirely sure, and had a furious expression on his face with tears in his eyes. Scorpius looked pained by the memory whilst Molly, face pale and shocked, had caught onto Freddie, holding the angry boy back, and Dom had placed a cautionary hand on Roxie's shoulder, the two of them sharing wide-eyed looks. James was still leaning against the wall with his careless expression.

"You all missed the point," he replied, when everyone was looking at him.

"I don't care," snapped Fred in response before anyone else could speak. "I – we – gave you a second chance, and you haven't just blown it, you've torn it to shreds! Get out. Scorpius was right, you don't understand family, and you can't be a part of ours until you do." James stood there, face frozen in its dismissive expression, but Caly could see the fear and shock that was in his eyes. No one said anything. Al had closed his eyes, bracing his forehead with his fingers and clearly trying to stop himself from crying, and Scorpius reached over to give him a hug, glaring at James. "Get out!" spat Fred, and James, throwing him a disgusted glare, threw open the door and stormed out, letting it slam behind him again.

"Freddie," began Molly in a whisper, eyes wide. "I get why you did that, but-" Fred shook his head and buried his head in his hands.

"Merlin's beard, what did I just do?" Caly looked around at the room at all the stunned faces, everyone clearly lagging in shock and horror, and made for the door, chasing after James in desperation, praying that she could fix this.

"James!" she yelled, sprinting after the receding brown head that was storming down the corridors. "James, wait!" The figure stilled, and Caly let out a sigh of relief, beginning to slow down as James turned around.

"What do you want?" he demanded, sour expression on his face. Caly exhaled, shrugging and not at all sure what to say.

"Come back," she said, holding out her hand. "Just tell them. I know you love your family, James, I know you care about us."

"Then why didn't you say anything?" he asked, face cold, and Caly looked down, heart skipping a beat, because she couldn't really answer that – shock didn't seem like a good enough excuse.

"I was surprised," she tried anyway. "and why didn't you fight it?" she looked back up into his hazel eyes that were doing their best to hide his hurt but were failing.

"Because I shouldn't have to, Caly, I shouldn't have to." Caly exhaled heavily at that, agreeing that that statement was true, but it would be easier if James could actually just show it.

"I know," she whispered. "but maybe you should just remind them…?" James stared at her flatly.

"I don't see the point – Fred has made it very clear that they do not want me." He made to turn around, face taut, and Caly felt like she might just burst into tears because this was so sad – James thought that his family didn't want him, but they did! She wasn't entirely sure what to do because she knew that James wasn't going to just be talked into going back and confessing his love for his family so she ran the last couple of steps to James and threw her arms around his neck, legs kicking off the ground and burying her head in his shoulder, trying to tell him through this one hug how much they – or at least she – cared about, and thus wanted, him.

"Caly, what?" questioned James, once he'd regained his balance having stumbled back a step or two, in confusion, but Caly didn't say anything or let go, legs going down so that she stood a little on her tiptoes.

"I want you." James sighed at that but patted her on the back before straight out hugging her in return.

"Yeah, well, that's just you – you're the nice one."

"Al's lovely, and so is Rose, and all of them, and they want you – that's why they're all angry because they can't see what they want in you."

"That's the problem, isn't it," said James, pulling back and putting his hands on Caly's shoulder, looking down into her face with a soft smile. "I'm not what they want me to be, and so I have to go. I'm not going to let them break me."

"James, it's not a fight!" she exclaimed in frustration, and James gave her a soft smile that was tinged with patronisation.

"Yeah, it is. So go back and tell them, family's about love and acceptance, right? So it's about time that they accepted me." With that, James gave her a final pat on the shoulder and walked off. Caly didn't bother to protest and just sighed heavily, wondering why James had to make everything so complicated, and she couldn't believe, but she'd let him get away without making him explain why he was acting so casual. Damn him!

"Caly," came a hesitant voice, and Caly spun around to see Al stepping out from behind a statue of armour that he'd been hiding behind. She winced, trying to give him a smile but not really able, and Al sighed, walking over. "what's going to happen?" Caly shrugged.

"I think James is under a lot of pressure," she said, not really sure where these words were coming from, but it was her best guess given all the evidence she had. "and he's reacting to it by shrugging it all off and being immature." Al raised his eyebrows in question, asking her to explain more, and Caly shrugged, helplessly. "Well, think about it – everyone's putting pressure on him to grow up and be mature and responsible (which is definitely made worse by Uncle Harry being here and expecting that of him), and he clearly doesn't want to for whatever reason, so you get that…" she gestured vaguely in the direction of where James had walked off. Al sighed and slumped against the wall.

"Perfect…" he muttered, running a hand over his face. "another problem."

"Hey," she said, walking over to him and putting a hand on his shoulder. "it's not your responsibility." Al stared at her with an incredulous expression.

"Right, and who's going to take responsibility for it? Sure as hell isn't going to be James. Oh, wait, let me guess, you will." Caly rolled her eyes.

"No, I just meant that if you have to worry about someone, you should worry about Lily, and let James figure this out on his own. Fred didn't want to do what he did, which means that he's going to talk to him, or at the very least Molly will."

"Okay…" muttered Al, and Caly smiled at him, which garnered a huge one in response. "let's go find Rose and Scor and try and work out the best way to get Rose to not seclude herself in the library like a loner." Caly snorted at that, shaking her head.

"We are never going to manage that."

As it turned out, Caly was completely right about Fred and Molly talking to James, and although the outcome didn't culminate in a happy family reunion – more of a grudging acceptance – it was better than where they'd been in the classroom, which was the only thing that mattered. Caly didn't exactly know what had been said and done, but she did notice that James was always on time to their impromptu meetings. He didn't say anything, and he and Scorpius didn't look any closer to reconciling than since they'd argued, but it was better that the others were at least talking to James, even if they didn't know what was up with his attitude problems, or what they could do to change it. Still, and especially as there was no new news, stable-not-so-great-to-bad wasn't so bad.

"Are you okay, Rose?" The morning of Hogsmeade had finally arrived and, after Caly had peeled her eyes open, she noticed that Rose was standing by the window, fully dressed, peering up into the weak November sunshine.

"Yeah," she said, turning away from the window. "you?"

"I'm fine," said Caly, getting to her feet. "How long have you been awake?" Rose shrugged.

"Couple of hours." Caly blinked at her in unabashed surprise.

"How did you not wake me up?" Rose shrugged again, staring back out of the window as she lost interest in the mundane conversation.

"I don't know…" Caly bit down on the inside of her lip.

"We'll find him," she said and Rose shook her head.

"We won't do anything," Caly sighed.

"I know, I meant…" Rose let her eyes flicker shut.

"I know what you meant." Caly nodded, not sure what to say to her.

"Good," she replied, eventually, and, when it became apparent Rose did not want to continue their conversation, began to get dressed. Rose remained standing by the window as she did, and Caly hoped that whatever she was thinking about wasn't upsetting her too much. She did her hair up and pulled out her scarf and gloves.

The two of them walked out of their dormitory and down the steps to meet up with Al and Scor. Scor, unlike every other person in third year or above, did not have his winter cloak or any extra layers with them. He looked a little bit sour, but was clearly trying to contain his disappointment in favour of making sure that both Rose and Al enjoyed themselves today. Caly shot him an appreciative smile that he just shrugged at.

"We'll buy you lots of sweets," offered Al, softly, and Scorpius rolled his eyes.

"Yes, because sweets will make everything better," he replied snappishly. "Sweets will right all the wrongs of the world. What are we doing with man in charge of our fate?"

"Scor…" said Caly in a warning tone of voice, not impressed with his sarcasm. Rose simply shook her head.

"There's a reason that we have people in charge; they're meant to have brains."

"Yes, but the reality is that that's quite a small percentage of people." Al simply rolled his eyes at his pessimistic view point whilst Rose turned to him with a glare.

"I may have said "meant to", but that doesn't mean I agree with what you just said." Scor raised an eyebrow challengingly.

"Really? So, if that's the case why do you think that most people in the Britain seem stupid enough to believe every word that The Prophet writes?"

"Because they want to believe it. They want to think they're right."

"Which begs the question why is what The Prophet's writing apparently right?" They dissolved into an argument whilst Al rolled his eyes and moved around to Caly's side.

"Do you think Lily and the others are okay?" he asked in a soft tone of voice. Caly, glancing briefly at Rose, nodded.

"I think they ran away – I don't think they've been taken – and so I think they've gone somewhere that they can get food and protection." Al's face crinkled into a frown.

"But why hasn't anyone seen them?" Caly shrugged.

"Maybe they're not in civilisation, but near it." She shrugged again, and Al nodded, understanding that she was simply guessing. Al sighed, messing up his dark hair, and sighed again. He was clearly attempting to say something, but couldn't quite find the words.

"Lily's behaviour has been…bothering me all term, and I think Dad's right about Hugo running away because of what happened, but Lily…I can't help but wonder whether this isn't all about attention…?" Caly shrugged again.

"I think only she knows why she's doing this, Al. I get the impression that…maybe they're not settling in as well as, maybe, we did it."

"But that's so weird!" exclaimed Al. "I mean, you had someone who wanted to kill you, and Scor was hated by, like, everyone – more than they might be being by some people." Caly nodded.

"Yeah, I'm not saying that it makes sense, Al, but…James had made a name for himself, you've made a name for yourself…Now there's a third Potter? No one really cares in the same way, do they?" Al nodded.

"That's true, but I just…I hope this isn't our fault…" Caly shrugged.

"I suppose we won't know until we see her again." Al looked down into her eyes with watery ones of his own, and Caly knew that the thought of being responsible for his little sister's suffering and unhappiness was unbearable for him. "Either way, you have to be strong for her." Al nodded and glanced away once more as they came down into the entrance hall. Harry was standing by the door and gave the four of them a knowing look, daring them to try anything. Scorpius gave them a weak smile as they came to a standstill.

"So, I guess this is where I leave you all. Try not to have too much fun without me." Al gave him faint smile whilst Rose rolled her eyes in a tired manner at his humour.

"I don't think that that would be possibly," she replied dryly. Scor glared at her.

"Now, really, sarcasm is the lowest form of wit," he mimicked her high voice, and Caly giggled whilst Al his hid laughter. Rose landed a punch onto his shoulder.

"Stop it!"

"Don't spend the day moping!" added Al, and Scor gave him a mock salute with two fingers and a little grin on his face. Al returned it as he pulled his cloak a little tighter around his shoulders. "Alright then, let's be off." Caly looked once more at Scor's pale face and was satisfied that he would find some way to entertain himself.

"You guys be good! Don't get banned!" They all laughed at that, Al draping himself between the two girls after they'd fished out their permission slips and made their way to the door.

"There aren't going to be any attempts to smuggle Scorpius out of the castle, are there?" asked Harry, lightly. The three of them shared amused smiles.

"If there were you know who we're emulating," said Al, grinning cheekily up at his dad. Harry rolled his eyes.

"Your mother was right, I am a bad influence." He glanced around and then put his hands tightly on Al's shoulders. "You three stay together and stay safe – stay in the main part of the village, alright?" There were nods from the three third years, and Caly smiled up at him in attempt to reassure him that nothing foolish would happen.

"Don't worry, dad," said Al, casually. "we've got Rose with us; she's a human nag-worry-bot." Harry allowed himself a snort of laughter.

"Alright, kids, have fun." They nodded as one and made their way out into the cold. There was a chilly November wind that had been plaguing the castle all week that slapped their faces and ruffled up the hair and cloaks.

"Where should we go?" asked Al, calling above the wind with his teeth chattering. Rose wiped some hair from her face and called back;

"I think we should leave that for when we get there! Let's just focus on making it through the grounds!"

"Why don't the coaches run?" demanded Caly, and Rose shrugged.

"Maybe because of the large time frame that we can leave in!" Caly stuck her hands in her pockets and decided that was a stupid reason.

"I think my feet are going to freeze off!" complained Al after five minutes of walking down the well kempt, frosty, grounds. Rose rolled her eyes.

"Honestly, Al! Try and enjoy the freedom that we're getting! Think of Honeydukes!" Al let out a low moan at that, and Caly frowned at him in a disturbed manner. Rose rolled her eyes again. "It's Albus' idea of heaven," she said. "It's just full of sweets and chocolate! I think Al would live their forever if he could – he threw a temper tantrum once when Aunt Ginny said it was time to leave. The proprietor ended up bribing him with chocolate frogs so that he would leave. We laid a trail of frogs all the way out of the shop." Caly laughed in amusement.

"Like Hansel and Gretel?" she said with a smile on her face. Rose nodded.

"Yeah, like that."

"Who are Hand-sell and Get-el?" asked Al in confusion, lolloping closer to the two girls and leaning in so that he could hear them properly. Rose and Caly shared well-practised eye rolls.

"Hansel and Gretel," said Rose slowly. "They're characters in one of the muggle fairy tales that mum used to read me."

"It's one of the Grimms fairy tales," added Caly. "The common version is that the evil stepmother convinces the father to send the children – Hansel and Gretel – into the woods when they run short of food, but they know and lay a trail of pebbles and follow it home. So when the family gets hungry again the father takes them out into the woods and Hansel, 'cause he couldn't get any pebbles, lays a trail of breadcrumbs." Al frowned in interested confusion.

"What happens then?" Caly shrugged, amused by his interest in the tale.

"Well, a bird eats the crumbs so they're lost. Then they stumble across this house made of gingerbread-"

"What?" demanded Al, bursting out into incredulous laughter. "In the woods they find a house made of gingerbread! That's insane!" Caly and Rose shared a long suffering look.

"It's a children's story," said Rose like she was talking to a slow toddler. "anyway, an old lady lures them in with the promise of food after she finds them eating the house. Then she looks Hansel in a cage and makes Gretel clean, but she's blind so Hansel tricks her into keeping him alive because she thinks he's too thin to eat. Then, one day, she decides she's going to eat him, and Gretel too, and tries to trick Gretel into falling into the fire, but Gretel throws her in instead. They steal the witches money and head home – I think they get help from somewhere, but I don't remember – and they live happily ever after off the witch's money." Al shook his head from side to side as he laughed.

"That's brilliant! Are there lots of these stories?" Rose rolled her eyes.

"How come you never wanted to listen to them when we were kids?" Al shrugged his shoulders carelessly.

"I don't know…I wanted to sleep at night or hear scary stories about the war or about crazy things dad did at school, not these random tales." Rose cast him a disapproving look whilst Caly leant forward and said;

"Yes, Al, there are lots from all over the world."

"Do you have a favourite?" he asked, and Caly paused, thinking hard.

"I guess…" she said, slowly, and then caught the expectant look on his face. "I don't know if you'll want me to tell it; it's not exactly got a happy ending like the one you just heard." Al rolled his eyes.

"How predictable," Caly snorted before sighing.

"Well, it's called the Little Match Girl, it's by Hans Christian Andersen, and it's basically about a poor girl on New Year's Eve who's trying to sell matches in the freezing cold. She can't go home because she's afraid her father will beat her for not selling enough matches, but she's so cold she lights her own matches to keep warm. She has nice visions of Christmas and food, and she sees a shooting star in the sky and thinks of her grandma. She keeps lighting the matches because she sees her Grandma and when she runs out she dies from the cold." Al's cheerful face had fallen.

"You were right; I didn't want to hear that, can you tell me another happy one?" Caly glanced over at Rose who shrugged.

"It passes the time well. How about one of the love ones? Sleeping Beauty maybe?" Caly nodded in agreement as Rose's eyes darted between the two of them.

"I've never read this, mind," said Caly. "I've only ever seen the film which definitely has a happy ending."

"That's fine with me!" exclaimed Al, leaping in the air slightly at the prospect of a happy ending. "I'll take the happy film ending just fine." Caly rolled her eyes.

"Well, basically, it's about this princess that's born and the parents invite all the fairies to the christening – please don't ask what that is because I'm not a hundred per cent sure – but forgets one, and she gets really angry over that…"

Children's fairy tales, or at least the Disney adaptations of them that Caly had seen as a child, occupied their walk down from the castle to village. Al was fascinated, and Rose had read most of them herself so between them they could describe most of the classics. Some of them Al knew, or had at least heard of, but others baffled him like The Wild Swans because he was severely confused as to how nettles could make someone turn from a swan to a human.

The village was genuinely quite amazing, once Caly had mentally removed all the aurors that were there for security. There were hoards of students in the streets, and each window display was bright and colourful despite the gloomy atmosphere. There were products bouncing around in the windows and warmth spilled out of the shops if you walked close enough, inviting people in.

She was more than glad to step inside Huneydukes and bask in the warmth that it provided. Al dashed between the displays with a look of childish glee on his face that managed to make both Caly and Rose smile. Al scooped up various amounts of sweets into his arms, and Rose moderated his collection. Caly went around and looked at some of the more unusual sweets like the blood lollipops and jelly eggs that hatched gummy insects on the tongue that attempted to crawl out of your mouth.

They spent at least an hour tasting free samples, examining new products and debating about whether it would be possible to make a chocolate phoenix that burst into flames after a bite had been taken from it and melted back into an egg before developing back again to be eaten once more. Caly thought that it was ridiculous, Al thought that it would be brilliant, Rose thought that it was a health hazard and the proprietor had been both interested and highly amused.

Eventually, though, Rose dragged them out, and they stumbled along the high street through the strong winds. Al and Rose began to bicker about where to take Caly next, and Caly simply kept quiet, waiting for whatever store that would be shown to her.

"Oh!" exclaimed Rose, coming to an abrupt stop in the street. Al, who had been halfway through telling his cousin that there was no point going to the post office, closed his mouth with a frown. Caly stopped walked and brushed some hair from her eyes.

"What?" asked Al, looking concerned, and Caly couldn't blame him because she was scanning the surrounding area for any sight of anything that could be dangerous or was, at least, a worry. However, she couldn't see anything at all, and so looked back at Rose.

"I need new beaters gloves! I won't be a moment!" and with that, she dashed towards Quality Quidditch Supplies. Caly groaned as loudly as she possibly could. Al laughed and grabbed onto her hand to drag her into the shop. Caly was mildly annoyed that she had to stand in a shop that was filled with models that zoomed around her head, not to mention the posters shouted at her and the brooms and different Quidditch robes were incredibly boring. However, she stood there patiently, until…

"Hey Caly!" Caly almost screamed in shock as she leapt off the ground, spinning around to stare into Scor's grinning face. Her heart was pounding, and it wasn't helped by the fact that Scorpius had only taken the cloak off his head.

"Scor…" she hissed, heart thudding and still feeling fear coursing through her. How the hell had he gotten out of the castle? Why was he taking the ridiculous risk of coming out here? She could feel panic welling up inside of her because was there something happening at the castle.

"You could say that it's nice to see me," he quipped, and Caly glared at him, whacking at him because how could Scor be stupid enough to come out here!

"What are you doing here?" she demanded, frown on her face and unable to understand why he was here and taking the risk and putting himself in danger when so many other people that they loved were in danger.

"Caly, who are you talking to- Scor!" Al's eyes bugged wide open. He looked shocked and horrified by the fact that Scorpius was there. "What the- what the hell are you doing here?" he exclaimed. "How are you here? And why would you-"

"Guys, we need to-" Al clamped his hands over her mouth to stop Rose from screaming. Rose looked like she was about to explode with anger and fury. She threw off Al's hands and slapped Scor straight round the face. His pale cheek coloured up scarlet, leaving a mark of Rose's wrath on his cheek. Scor's mouth dropped open as Caly's face slackened, not having pictured violence as Rose's thing, and he raised a hand to touch his cheek with spindly fingers.

"Rose…" gasped Al, and Rose simply reached forward, snatching at the air until she had grabbed onto the cloak and pulled it over his head. She then attempted to frog-march an invisible person out of a shop without attracting suspicion. Al and Caly flanked them in an attempt to make it look normal, and Rose dragged him into the gap between two shops and pulled the cloak back from his head.

"What are you doing?" she demanded, whole posture stiff from anger. Caly, herself, was torn between being angry at Scor and kind of happy because Al was grinning like their world wasn't coming to pieces around them like it often felt. Scor held up his hands.

"Look, this wasn't my idea, but…" he trailed off, shrugging. "I kind of agreed with it." Rose looked like she wanted to tear into him, but Caly held up a hand because that interested her.

"Whose idea was it?" she asked, frown on her face. Rose's head cocked in curiosity, and Al's went wide as it didn't seem that those two had zoned in on that fact, having been more focused on the fact that Scor had agreed with it. Scor let out a breath that clouded the cold air and looked at Al.

"James'…"

Scorpius took a couple of steps back up the marble staircase as Harry looked at him and nodded before letting them leave. Glancing around the teeming hall, his eyes were met by James' brown ones. He was staring up at Scorpius with narrowed eyes from his position with his three best friends. They were moving towards the door as Scorpius frowned down at him in confusion, not knowing what he wanted. James held up a finger to his friends and darted round them, running over to him, checking over his shoulder that his dad wasn't watching him.

"Scorpius," he said, darting up to him. Scor took a step backwards up the stairs, mistrust in his gaze. James held up his hands, remaining rooted to the spot two steps down. "Okay, you don't trust me, fine, but here-" he reached into the folds of his cloak and pulled out the dirty piece of parchment that was the Marauders Map. "-take it." He added, gesturing up at Scor with it. Scorpius frowned down at him, unsure what trick this was.

"Take it?" he repeated, slowly. James rolled his eyes and glanced around, making sure his dad's eyes did not latch onto them and became suspicious.

"Yeah, take the map…get into Hogsmeade." He took two steps upwards until he was standing on the same step as Scor, looking levelly into his eyes. He put a hand on his shoulder. "It would mean the world to my little brother." Scor swallowed, gingerly taking a hold of the parchment. He looked up at James with narrowed eyes.

"Why don't you ever do nice things directly to your brother?" he asked in confusion. James let out a snort, smiling.

"Because then I wouldn't be a good brother; he knows I care, and he knows that I'd do anything for him and Lily…" He squeezed Scor's shoulder, releasing his hold on the parchment and glancing round once more. "Now, there's a passage that's not on this map yet. I can't work out how to put stuff on – I'm good at charms, but other people's magic is confusing – but I reckon you could do it someday. There's a passage that was built for the elves; it runs straight from the kitchens into the Weasley's Wizards Wheezes." Scor frowned at him.

"Doesn't that mean that everyone knows about it?" James shook his head.

"No, no, no," he said with a grin. "They don't use it, see. It fell into disuse years ago, I don't think dad knows – Aunt Hermione does, but I think she's forgotten about it. I only found out by accident. It used to be blocked up, but we cleared it out and it's stable." Scor could feel excitement building up inside of him.

"So, how do I get in?"

"You get into the kitchens by tickling the pear. Then you go to the fireplace, and the candle in the wall bracket on the left is a lever; pull down and a stone will slide out of place, but bear this in mind; it's-"

"Built for house-elves?" he guessed, and James nodded.

"It widens up in the middle, but the beginning and the end you'll have to go on your front."

"James!" hollered Colin, suddenly. "Stop teasing Scor for being left behind and get moving!" All eyes swivelled to them, and Scor pulled his expression into a disdainful one just in time for it to be convincing.

"I've got a couple more choice phrases left!" he called back. Harry looked like he wanted to intervene, but some Hufflepuff seventh years descended on him with their forms, and he hurriedly turned back. "Yeah, so that's it."

"Wait!" said Scor, catching his sleeve. "How do I get through without the house-elves noticing?" James rolled his eyes.

"Yeesh! Do I have to tell you everything? I thought you were meant to be the smart one!" Scor rolled his eyes back at him and gave him an impatient glare. James shook his head, slightly. "Alright, the house-elves aren't that hard to deal with. They're out cleaning and stuff now, and there's some eating in the great hall. The others won't be a bother, they're lovely. You just go in, ask for something, pretend to leave and then whip the cloak on."

"And they won't notice the stone sliding out of the wall?" James shrugged.

"Most of the time they don't. Anyway, remember the cloak." He gave Scor one more pat on the shoulder and began to bound down the stairs. "Oh, and one more thing; keep the map when you're done, eh? Might help keep you guys out of trouble," Scor gave him a small smile and a nod. James winked at him before dashing down the stairs, taking the last three in one giant leap, and ran over to his friends. Scor turned around, slowly, tucking the map away and leisurely moving back towards the common room.

When he was three floors up and he was sure that no one was watching him, he broke into a run, flying up the stairs and along corridors, taking a couple of short cuts that delivered him before the portrait of the Fat Lady in just over five minutes. He took several deep breaths before blurting out the password. He darted through the common room, sparing the lonely looking May Wood a small smile before dashing up the staircase to the boy's dormitory. Pushing open the door to his and Al's dorm, he flew to Al's trunk, leafing through his possessions until he took hold of the magical cloak. He stuffed it, along with his hat, gloves and scarf, into his pockets before leaving the dormitory again.

He flew back down to the second floor, and then loitered by a painting of several men with their heads on spears as he noticed an auror standing at the edge of the corridor, staring down, and managed to engage them in an argument about whose death had been the gorier when Harry walked past. He looked between the arguing heads and Scorpius with a frown.

"Entertaining yourself?" he asked in an amused tone of voice. Scorpius shrugged.

"I asked them about how they died, and they're a little divided on the details." Harry snorted in amusement.

"Don't hang around too much on your own, Scor, some students might be out to get you." Scorpius nodded.

"Of course, sir." Harry narrowed his eyes at his politeness and then glanced at the auror that was lingering at the end of the corridor, eyes on the door. He nodded and gave him the briefest of winks.

"Good homework by the way," he muttered, and Scorpius snorted to himself, allowing a small smile to appear on his face, and nodded at Harry as he began to walk away. After some long minutes of talking to the portraits, the auror left, and Scorpius darted down the staircase.

He turned down the corridor that led to the Hufflepuff common room and stopped by the painting of the fruit bowl. Tickling the pear, the door handle appeared, and he swung it open and looked into the bustling Hogwarts kitchens. There was a veritable army of house elves dressed in disturbingly bright clothes. They were wearing a mismatch of muggle clothes, mainly meant for children, and none of them seemed to have noticed him. Whipping on the cloak, he stepped out of the doorway in time to step aside as they noticed the open door.

"The door is being opened!" squeaked one in a high pitch voice.

"We is not needing it to be!" came the reply, and Scorpius carefully navigated his way over the fireplace as they all continued to squeak to one another as they cleaned pans, prepared food, played games and darned clothes. He pressed his back to the wall, breathing as softly as he could as reached for the candle bracket. He took one look around the hall and, when he was almost sure no one was looking, pulled down on the lever.

It was a very tight fit, and he didn't take the cloak off until he had seen the rock slide closed. He pulled off the cloak and began to crawl along the tunnel. It was mildly suffocating, and he didn't exactly like the fact that he was crawling along on his hands and knees, getting dirt in his fingernails and wearing through the knees of his trousers, but he kept going on because he was excited, and James had apologised…in his own way that Scorpius was prepared to accept because it would end the fighting.

The walk was long and slow and boring. He illuminated the end of his wand and examined the Marauder's map as he went, taking in the immense detail that The Maraurders had poured into it. He did stumble over rocks and roots in the floor, but he stayed on his feet. It was fascinating to see the secret passages that he hadn't had known about and all the nifty hints about how to get them to open.

The dot on the map that captured his attention the most was Uncle Harry, who dashed around the castle in an alarmingly erratic manner, stopping to talk to most of the teachers and aurors in the corridors. He also went in and out of classrooms at apparent random choice as well as making the odd trip to McGonagall's office. Thankfully, he didn't go to the Gryffindor common room, though he did pop into the library once or twice. It seemed that he had an inability to stand still, and Scorpius hoped that he didn't notice that he was missing, or that he didn't go looking for him to talk about something.

He wasn't sure how long he walked for, but he did eventually reach a point where the ground began to slope upwards and the tunnel became narrower. He had to put the map back in his pocket and slither up the final part of the tunnel with the cloak on. He eventually banged his head on a trap door and managed to push it open after a couple of shoves. Poking his head out, he saw that he was in a cluttered basement which was thankfully deserted. He hopped out and kicked the trapdoor shut, throwing the cloak back over his head before climbing up the stairs into a backroom that was, once more, empty. He slipped out into the rest of the main shop and worked his way through the crowds, keeping an eye out for his friends. It was difficult to navigate the throngs of people, but he somehow made his way out onto the high street. He walked swiftly up and down, glancing in crowded shop windows until he spotted Caly standing in the window of Quality Quidditch Supplies. He sucked in a breath and pushed the door open a fraction, sliding through the gap and closing it as quietly as he could. No one noticed. He let out a faint sigh of relief and moved to Caly, seeing that she was not focusing on anything in particular, but staring in the opposite direction to him…How could he resist the chance to not scare her? It was too much…

"So you're friends now?" asked Al, once they'd taken in the story. Caly's mind had been overwhelmed by the conversation between James and Scor that she hadn't processed most of the rest of it because James had both managed to apologise to Scor and admit that he sort of cared about him, and that he really wanted to make Al happy, just by giving Scorpius a map – was that even possible to do?

"Yeah," said Scor, shrugging with a small smile on his face. "probably back to relative normal given that he gave me the map." There was a pause in which Caly allowed herself a relieved, happy smile because that was one weight off her shoulders whilst Rose continued to scowl and Al beamed as he comprehended what had been said.

"Yes!" he exclaimed, once he'd decided that it was all real and true. "Yes!" Al threw himself onto the mainly invisible Scorpius, causing the white-blonde boy to stumble slightly before giving Al a hug back, patting his shoulders. Rose deflated a little bit as Al stepped away from Scor, still smiling in a ridiculously wide manner. Caly let out a long sigh, knowing that Rose wasn't going to explode because it was exciting to have Scor with them – it sort of felt like it was normal.

"So," said Scor, looking at them with a mildly cocky smile on his face. "where have you been? Where are we going?" Rose gave him a glare whilst Al tilted his head to the side. Caly shrugged, pursing her lips because she had been waiting for that decision since before Scor had arrived.

"We can't go anywhere too crowded," said Rose, frown on face. "but we told Uncle Harry that we'd stay in the main part of the village…but you've got to keep the cloak on and crowds will make that difficult." There was a pause in which Rose continued to look worried about Scorpius' presence, albeit no longer slap-happy, and Al pulled a thoughtful expression.

"I know!" he exclaimed, suddenly. "We can go to the Shrieking Shack! Now that everyone knows that it's not haunted it's not that popular – we could hang out there and bring butter beer from the Three Broomsticks and stuff!" There was a pause in which Caly conceded that it was a good idea whilst Rose clearly pondered over whether it would constitute breaking the agreement they'd made at the door.

"Alright, but we're not going to spend long," she said. "we have to leave way before the time we're meant to be back." Scorpius rolled his eyes in sync with Al but pulled the cloak over his head in an obliging manner. Caly began to walk off, attempting to stay in step with him, but she heard Al grab onto Rose and stop her from walking off.

"Rose, please tone down the anger…for me?" There was a moment of silence, but Caly knew that Scor had frozen alongside her, waiting for Rose's reply. "I know you're going through a worse time and all right now, and Scor being here is frightening and scaring you, but…I feel ridiculously happy, alright?" He heard Rose sigh and guessed that she was giving Al a disapproving look.

"Okay…I won't nag…I have to admit it's nice for us to be together again as a group of friends having fun instead of being cooped up inside being depressed, but only if we don't get into trouble or danger." There was a pause in which Caly was sure that Al let out a squeal and hugged Rose before the cousins came wandering over to her side. "I suggest that we pop into the Three Broomsticks and grab enough butterbeer so that we can all have some without it looking suspicious before heading off to the Shrieking Shack…Scor, you're going to have to be careful." There was a pause before a pale hand shot of thin air, holding up a thumb to say that he understood everything.

They moved along through the cold streets of Hogsmeade at a quick pace. Caly could just about hear the rustle of Scorpius moving, but apart from that no one would ever guess that a fourth person had joined their party. Al had a very obvious spring in his step, but Caly knew that people would attribute it to being outside without people shouting and/or attacking him. He was pointing out all the different shop fronts that they hadn't been in, and Rose was giving Caly a blow-by-blow history of each one to a startling degree of detail.

The Three Broomsticks was a tight fit, and it only took Caly a couple of seconds to realise it would have been a better idea to leave Scor outside because there were so many people jostling into them and stepping on their toes, but once they were in it would be fishy for one of them to turn around, so they struggled through to the bar, and Rose ordered a large pitcher and told Caly about the history of the pub whilst Al collected take away cups and napkins for them. They surreptitiously poured Scor a cup and helped him slip into under his cloak before they took to the icy streets.

Caly drank the butterbeer in deeply and was delighted to find that it warmed her up inside. Al was grinning as he drank from his own cup, and Rose looked more relaxed now despite the fact that they were strolling up streets that were sparsely occupied by other people. There were a couple of aurors, but no one stopped them as it seemed clear that the Shrieking Shack, which was looming before them, was a perfectly natural place for them to go.

The four of them crunched up the grass towards the old building, Rose and Al filling her and the invisible Scor in on the time that they had come here as children, and James, as a mischievous seven year old, had hidden away in a hole in the wall and jumped out at Al, Rose, Lily and Hugo as they played at racing each other down the stairs, which had caused them to scream loudly and run away. James had chased them round the decrepit building, Ginny chasing him, as Harry, Ron and Hermione had sat in a bedroom and reminisced, and how the combined noises of two four years old crying, two six year olds yelling, James' howling and Ginny's shouting had led a family tourists to believe that the building was haunted by a family of ghosts that wanted to kill them. Apparently the youngest of the tourists, who had been five, had been permanently scarred for life and could not go near crumbling buildings for fear of being murdered.

Caly could feel strange excitement building up inside her as Al prised the door open because there was something so abandoned and forbidden about the building that made it undeniably exciting to be there. It didn't really make sense because they were completely allowed to be there, but the decrepit nature of the shack gave it an enticing aura.

However, the moment that they stepped into the building and looked up at its crumbling structure, Scor pulling off the cloak, with identical grins of excitement, it became apparent that they were not alone in the shack. There were the sounds of three voices, muttering in undertones and occasionally raising a little louder in urgency. Rose, Al and Caly as one snatched at the air in an attempt to hide Scor again, but the white-blonde had already thrown the cloak back over his head.

"We should go!" hissed Rose, eyes wide with fear as she stared at the place where Scor's head had been. Caly nodded, agreeing with Rose that it was absolutely not worth getting caught, but Al had taken a step forward, frown on his face, clearly attempting to work out who was upstairs in the shack. Rose reached forward to grab his shoulder, but Caly held up a finger, curious as to what Al thought he could hear. Rose scowled as Al continued to edge forward, blinking rapidly as he focused in on something.

Then he darted for the stairs. Rose threw her hands up into the air in obvious frustration and anger as Al made his way stealthily up the staircase, somehow managing to tread lightly enough to not make them creak – maybe he had lost too much weight, Caly wasn't sure. She made to follow him, but Rose grabbed her elbow and shook her head, probably guessing that if all three of them went up the stairs one of them was bound to make a noise and alert whoever was there. Al, however, beckoned them up with wide eyes. Caly, sending Rose a placating look, moved towards the stairs and darted up them as quickly and softly as she could, hoping that the brief scuffing noises could be attributed to rats or something of the sort. Rose (and presumably Scor, though, of course, Caly couldn't see) copied her, and they miraculously did not seem to make enough noise to alert the people on the second floor that they were there.

It was as they were creeping up the stairs again, and Caly was wondering how the Shrieking Shack was still standing and not a heap of rubble or at least a death trap after being left abandoned for so long, that the voices of the other occupants of the not-haunted-haunted-house became more distinct and, more importantly, more recognisable.

"I'll do it tonight."

"Are you sure? You nearly got caught last time."

"Well, I'm faster than you!"

"Don't start fighting!"

"Hugo?" breathed Rose in shock as Al turned around to look at them, all of them having frozen on the stairs, and nodded with wide eyes. Caly blinked once in incomprehension, unable to believe that all this time Lily, Hugo and Billy had been here, before Rose darted past her, generating a lot of noise, and into the room, Al by her side. There were relatively well justified screams as Caly followed them into the doorway, Scorpius whipping off the cloak and by her side, and looked into the room.

The large room in the Shrieking Shack, likely once a bedroom given that it had a king-sized bed in it, was less dusty than all the other ones in the house. The boarded up windows blocked any light from coming in and so the faint glow came from the fire that crackled in the hearth, which was ringed by three, large, faded armchairs. The floor was littered with wrappings and left over food, as well as clothes, books and pieces of paper that had spilled out of the three duffel bags that had been carelessly dropped onto the floor. The bed had a wound up mess of sheets and blankets on it that clearly spoke of its well use.

The biggest shock, by far though, was the fact that three first year Gryffindors were actually in the room, all wide eyes and guilty expressions on their faces, clearly taken aback by their appearance. Rose had wrapped her arms around Hugo and was squeezing him very tightly, if his gasping for air was anything to go by, and Al was hugging Lily, who was just blinking dumbly. Billy was standing off to one side near the windows, looking awkward and out of place, as well as horrified and shocked by their arrival.

"What were you thinking?" exclaimed Rose, stepping back and whacking Hugo's arm, as Lily threw off Al, and Caly and Scor cautiously stepped into the room, both of them probably wondering whether it was safe to be anywhere near Rose whilst she was this angry. Al had fixed a disapproving stare that he had clearly learnt from his parents onto Lily, green eyes so intense that she had to drop his gaze and look down at her foot, which was making awkward circles on the floor.

"The hell?!" exclaimed Al, clearly speechless as Caly looked back over at Billy, who was clearly trying to disappear into the faded wall paper. "Just- what the- what?!" he yelped, looking over at Rose for advice. However, he saw a sight that was slightly more troubling. Rose was clearly trembling from anger, body swelling as she tried to keep in her fury and her hair seeming to stand on end with static electricity. She was literally seconds from exploding in fury.

"Okay…" said Scorpius, clapping his hands and drawing everyone's attention to him. He strode up to Rose and pulled her back several paces so that she could diffuse before she went absolutely berserk.

"You're not allowed to be here," piped up Hugo into the tense silence. Scorpius arched an eyebrow, and everybody else, regardless of how angry or embarrassed, stared at him incredulously. Hugo went pink in the face.

"Okay, I think that just answered all our questions – they're idiots." Caly couldn't stop herself from snorting, and neither could Al, a natural smile quirking at his lips before he wrestled his furious mask back onto his face. "Rose, calm now?" Rose took a deep breath and nodded, striding back towards her little brother. She looked down at him, face much gentler.

"Hugo, why did you do this?" Hugo looked away, but Caly could see that there were tears glistening in his eyes, clearly understanding from that softly spoken question just how much his sister had missed him. Al looked back at Lily, frowning.

"Whose idea was this?" However, there was something about his tone of voice and posture, scarily similar to his mother's when she confronted her disobedient children, that said he knew exactly whose idea this was and was giving them an opportunity to confess and so lessen the punishment. Lily sighed.

"Okay, it was my idea. I talked them into it, but you don't understand!" she yelled, before any of the third years could jump in. "You don't understand what it was like for us! Everybody was giving us crap, and none of you cared! You act all caring and nice, but you're also so self-absorbed! And you think that we're all little and weak and pathetic! James was the only one that told us the truth! The rest of you just think we're nothing! You-"

Lily's shouting was cut off by Al grabbing her by her shoulders and pulling her against his body, pressing her face so tightly into his robes that she couldn't articulate. He had several tears running down his face, and he was taking deep, steadying breaths. Caly could feel her own eyes stinging painfully at the idea that Lily actually thought that about them, and so she could not imagine how it must feel for Al to hear his sister shout that at him. Glancing round, she saw that Billy was staring at his hands, Scorpius was looking down at the floor with taut expression on his face, Hugo was crying silently and Rose was squeezing her eyes shut, perhaps hoping if she couldn't see the world that it would magically disappear and undo all of what had been said.

"Lily," said Al, stepping back and crouching down, wiping away the tears and sniffing. "I'm your brother. I love you. If you really felt like that when why didn't you just come me? To any of us? We're all here to help, that's what older siblings do."

"We can't," said Hugo in a firm tone of voice. "We can't because you've got it worse. We all know that." He shook his head. "Lily was right; this was the best way. This way we were safe out of the castle, and we didn't have to put up with it, and you got us off your minds…It was better this way."

CRACK!

There was complete silence in the Shrieking Shack as everyone stared at Rose with rounded, shocked eyes. Hugo was gaping up at his big sister, one hand tentatively reaching up to his scarlet cheek, and Rose was breathing very heavily, hand still raised and prepared to slap again. Caly felt her eyes slide over to Scor and Al. Scor had arched an eyebrow and was wincing in a sympathetic manner that said that had really hurt whilst Al simply looked highly disturbed by his cousin's action of slapping two people round the face in relatively quick succession.

"Never, ever say that I am better off without you," she said in a furious voice as Al took a hesitant step towards her whilst Caly and Scor just made eye contact and communicated silently that they should probably leave their best friends to handling their siblings. She grabbed Hugo's shoulders. "Don't you dare, Hughie!" she exclaimed, beginning to shake him furiously, and Al ran over to her, tearing her away from the petrified looking Hugo, who had clearly never seen Rose lose control like that before. Rose took a deep breath, clearly trying to stem tears from flowing.

"Easy," he said, rubbing her back, and Caly desperately wanted to step in and say something, but she knew that she really shouldn't so, instead, she clenched her hands into fists and bit down onto her tongue, watching Lily share a guilty look with Hugo, both of them seemingly understanding the full consequences of their actions now.

"I'm sorry," muttered Hugo. "I'm really sorry. I just- we couldn't take it anymore. I didn't want to be at Hogwarts, and I wanted mum back, and I wanted you back…" Rose bowed her head in shame as Caly watched Lily fiddle with the sleeve of her cardigan.

"Okay," said Al, patting Rose heartily on the back. "okay, you know what? We're not going to have this conversation right now. What we are going to do is work out how to get you back in the castle, tonight. We've been worried sick about all of you, and I know Hogwarts has been hostile, but it's where we have to be, and you might not feel like it right now, but it is safe. I mean, imagine what would have happened if other students had come here. Imagine we hadn't found you, but some Slytherin six years had…" There was a moment of silence in which Caly shuddered to think what those oafs may have done to them if they hadn't found them.

"I think the answer to that question, Al," said Scorpius, breaking in after they'd all been suitably chilled and horrified. "is quite simple. I stay here with them, and then I sneak them back into the castle. The most important thing is a cover story for how you got back." There was a moment of silence in which Rose nodded, taking a deep breath and stepping away from Al, looking calmer.

"How did you get out?" asked Caly, finally, when no one seemed to want to speak or suggest anything. There was a moment of silence in which Al, Scor and Rose all looked at them, apparently having not thought of that. Hugo and Lily exchanged a look before sighing.

"We cleared out the tunnel from the Whomping Willow to here," admitted Lily, finally. Caly blinked, surprised and a little confused as to why no one thought to check that they hadn't gone through any of the secret passages.

"How did you do that?" asked Al, wrinkling up his face in confusion. "I mean, how did no one see you excavating a tunnel?" Lily and Hugo shared another guilty look.

"We kind of borrowed your cloak," admitted Hugo, looking sheepish. Al glared at his little sister, clearly assuming, probably correctly, that Lily had masterminded that scheme too.

"It's not like you were using it!" she exclaimed, defensively. "It was just sitting in your trunk." Al rolled his eyes.

"That's because we don't have the cloak to cause trouble or sneak around doing…things. Dad sent me the cloak to try and keep us safe. It's not a toy, Lily, or an aid to mischief makers – we have that for protection." There was a heavy silence between all of them, and Caly glanced over at Billy, noting that he had gone even paler throughout the conversation.

"Sorry," muttered Lily, pulling a face.

"Why didn't you take it now?" asked Caly, frowning because if she ever planned to sneak off anywhere the cloak would definitely be top of her list of things to pack.

"We wanted to," said Hugo, scratching his head. "but Al had moved it, and we didn't have time to look for it…" Al pinched the bridge of his nose, and Caly guessed that he, like her, wasn't sure whether or not to be relieved that they hadn't taken the cloak because if they had managed to be steal it then they'd never had found them, but they'd certainly have been safer with it.

"Okay," he said in a tone of forced calm. "okay, plan…Rose, Scor, I'm looking at you here." Caly looked between her two friends. Scor seemed to be waiting for Rose to say something, but she simply shook her head, clearly overwhelmed.

"Alright," said Scor, giving the first years a disdainful look that said he highly disapproved of everything they had done. "here's the story – you used the secret passage in the kitchens." Everyone immediately looked at him, frowning, confused as to why he hadn't just told them to tell the truth. Scor rolled his eyes, sighing exasperatedly. "Look, if you tell the truth then two things will happen; one, that a load of aurors get fired because they can't spot three eleven year olds digging in the grounds, or two, you tell them about the cloak and risk Procurater getting his grubby little hands on it." There was a horrified silence at the thought of that, and Scorpius looked smugly around at them.

"Good point," muttered Al. Scorpius shot him a smirk that said he was smarter than Al, and Al rolled his eyes and gave him a playful glare in return.

"Moving on," said Scorpius, pointedly. "so, you made it out through the passage in the kitchens, and that's how you're getting back in. You came back because…because…because you found out what had happened to Ron, and you got-

"What?" cried Hugo, looking alarmed, and Caly almost rolled her eyes because Rose had clearly not mentioned that for a reason. Scorpius pursed his lips, no doubt mentally kicking himself for slipping up, and Rose swallowed as all eyes flickered to her. Rose sighed, glaring at Scor, who held up his hands in surrender.

"Look, dad's looking for you, alright? Did you really think he was going to sit around and wait for you to come back? He's in a load of trouble for doing so." She held up a hand, firmly, stopping any questions as Lily and Hugo looked between each other with those wide, guilty eyes. "We are not talking about this now." Hugo deflated, and Rose turned back to Scor, who smiled slightly. "Carry on," Scorpius nodded, flashing them all a wider, charming smile.

"So you came back because you didn't want Ron to get into trouble. When we get into the castle you go straight to Harry and hope for the best, and before you ask, I shall be overseeing this entire plan so it cannot possibly go wrong." Caly allowed herself a snort, as did the others, and Rose, although she threw him a glare, actually looked a little reassured by that statement.

"Okay…" said Rose, nodding slightly and swallowing. "okay…so what? You wait here and then sneak them back in?" Scorpius nodded.

"Yeah, that sounds about right." Rose looked unhappy with that, and Caly couldn't blame her, but she also seemed to understand that it was by far the best plan they had.

"So which tunnel are you using to get back in?" asked Rose, and Scor frowned once before rolling his eyes.

"The one to the kitchens – it's too risky to be walking around in the grounds at night. There's four of us, and we need to get to Harry first. Besides, if the house elves see us they can corroborate our stories." Rose nodded, taking in a short breath through her nose, clearly trying to calm down.

"Okay, okay," she said, pinching her face into a blank expression. "we do Scor's plan. You should wait until the village has cleared; it's dark, and then go." Scorpius rolled his eyes.

"Rose, contrary to what the present company might suggest, not everyone in this room is an idiot." Rose huffed a little, folding her arms and giving him a glare that said she was not impressed with his attitude in regards to the whole situation, whilst Caly hid her smile with her fingertips. Al nodded in sage agreement, and the first years all looked somewhere between demure and outraged by the statement.

"Okay," said Al, taking a step forward. "let's just wait out time, and we're not going to talk about any of this," he said, gesturing around with a serious expression on his face before taking a seat on the dilapidated bed. "until we get back to Hogwarts. There's no point having the same conversation twice." He folded his arms and glared at all of them, and Caly shot him a comforting smile and moved to join him on the bed. It creaked ominously under her weight, but she crossed her arms, telling them all that there was going to be no more fighting. Scorpius shrugged a little and walked over to the bed too, climbing on behind Al and stretching out. Billy swallowed in a nervous manner and then sat down on the floor, crossing his legs and slouching forward, resting his cheeks in the palms of his hands and looking contemplative. Rose sighed, backing down and taking a seat in one of the rickety looking chairs. Hugo copied Billy, sitting down next to him, whilst Lily went and sat down in a corner, folding her arms and pouting.

"So…" said Scor, eventually, leaning back against the wall and resting his hands behind his head. "what are we going to do for however long this takes?" There was an awkward silence before Al turned to Caly with a small smile on his lips. Caly frowned warily, a little nervous and a little confused.

"Do you have any more of those stories?" Caly found herself smiling widely at that, a startled laugh breaking out of her at that unexpected question. She looked around at the others and shrugged slightly in response.

"I have more than you'll want to hear."

Caly told just about every fairy tale and myth that she had ever heard of/seen a film or TV programme of, or so she thought, during their agonising, highly tense wait to return to Hogwarts. Sometimes, and mostly unhelpfully, Rose and Scor would decide to interject if they knew the story and/or a variation thereof. She would have been expecting for Billy to input too, having grown up in the muggle world, but he stayed silent, staring at the floor most of the time with a thoughtful expression on his face. Hugo had managed to get relatively enthralled, but Lily had stopped pouting and turned to glaring at the wall, which was probably being particularly offensive towards her, with single-minded determination. Al had progressively shuffled closer to Caly during her story telling so that Al was pressed right up against her, and every time she looked at his intrigued, delighted face, it made her smile and laugh at the slight ridiculousness of his behaviour.

Rose dragged them away halfway through Caly attempting to accurately describe the legend of Mulan because she highly doubt that Disney had gotten it right at all with their film because she said that it was going to be getting dark soon, and they really were meant to be back before it was dark. They left Scor sitting in silence with the three first years, looking marginally perturbed about what he was meant to do with them until they went back, and hurried back to the castle, the tension hanging heavily over them all. Caly found herself looking around every couple of seconds, trying to make sure that no one was looking at them funny or suspected anything, even though she knew that would just make herself look more suspicious. She really hoped that everything worked out okay.

Scor poked his head out of the gap in the wall of the kitchen. It was completely dark in there, which made Scor smile because that meant no house elves were around, and then hopped out of the hole, muttering "lumos" under his breath and gathering the cloak around him. He held his wand up high and beckoned to the first years. Billy crawled out, followed by Hugo and lastly Lily, who looked distinctly displeased. Withdrawing the map from his pocket, Scorpius hissed

"I solemnly swear that I am up to know good" and held the light over the map, scanning for Harry's dot.

"There," whispered Hugo, reaching over and pointing to the dot that was pacing up and down the fifth floor corridor. Scorpius cursed under his breath at his position because there were aurors and teachers on all floors between them and Harry.

"Okay," he murmured to himself, eyes scanning the intricate mess of hidden passage ways. "okay…" Thinking carefully, he began to compile what looked like the safest route providing everyone stayed where they were, or thereabouts. "Alright, listen up this is the route that we're taking…"

It took about five minutes for Scor to go through the route, and tell them everything that they needed to do to make sure that the passages would work and such, but when he was done he could overlook the bored expressions and rolled eyes he'd gotten from them – or really Lily – because he was confident that they knew the route and what to do so that, if things went according to plan (which they never really did), none of them would get caught.

"You guys get yourself under that cloak," he said, pulling the cloak from around his shoulders and extending it to Billy.

"What about you?" asked the brown haired boy. Scor rolled his eyes.

"I'll be the distraction if necessary. Take the map and follow the route and make sure that Uncle Harry finds you first." Billy and Hugo nodded as one, and Lily rolled her eyes but fell into line next to her cousins without complaint, allowing the cloak to be draped around their shoulders. Scor deliberated for a moment before handing the map to Billy. "You take the lead, I'll follow behind – off you go." Lily threw the cloak over their heads, and the three first years vanished from view. However, he could hear them shuffling around and closed his eyes, telling himself to have strength and believe in the siblings, and cousins, of his best friends.

His plan worked better than he could have possibly imagined. The use of the secret passages, which were predominantly unsupervised (and when they were, they only looked up and down it once before moving on), despite being rather circuitous, meant that Scorpius didn't have to spend too much time lurking in the shadows or trying to find a decent hiding place. As a result of this good piece of fortune, it didn't actually take too long to reach the fifth floor, and as Scorpius cautiously peeked around the tapestry, he saw that only Harry was there.

"Uncle Harry," he hissed, stepping out from behind the tapestry. The auror's head whipped round, wand raised, and he deflated slightly when he saw Scorpius stepping into the light, although his eyes widened.

"Scorpius?" demanded Harry. "What the hell are you doing?" he exclaimed in an angry whisper. "You should be in bed!" Scorpius nodded.

"Yeah, I know, but I have something you'll want to see." Harry, frowning heavily, hurried over to him.

"What?" Scorpius turned to the tapestry, and it swung open, and the three first years filed out in complete silence, Billy holding the cloak and the map. Harry's eyes bugged wide open.

"Lily?!" he hissed. "Hugo? Billy? You're okay?!" he cried as loud as he could, and then he threw his arms around Lily, pulling his daughter close, and then caught his two nephews into a hug. "Thank God!" he said. He looked around hurriedly then, holding up a finger to stop them from talking. "Wait. Come on, we need to get you to my office – then you can explain everything." He let out a deep breath and looked around cautiously. "Scorpius, take the cloak and the map and get back to the dormitory." Scorpius nodded and accepted the artefacts that Harry had relieved the first years from. "Thank you," he added in a whisper, squeezing Scorpius' shoulder and smiling widely. Scorpius smiled, tossing the cloak over himself quickly, and then watched Harry shepherd the others away.

"So, on a scale of one to ten, how lucky are we?" asked Al as they all ate breakfast the next morning, and Scorpius yawned incredibly widely every now and again. Caly shrugged as she chewed on her banana whilst Scorpius arched his eyebrows incredulously and Rose rolled her eyes and looked at the ceiling, clearly waiting for the owls to arrive. "No, seriously, I know that our luck sucks, but you have to admit that this was incredibly lucky for us – no one got caught." Caly swallowed down her mouthful.

"From that perspective, you've got to admit that Al has a point."

"I don't think we should count our eggs before they hatch, or something," said Rose, and Caly snorted quite loudly to cut out any ensuing conversation.

"Sorry," she said. "but it's you don't count your chickens before they hatch. Eggs are only eggs before they hatch." Rose rolled her eyes.

"Whatever, I stand by my comment," she responded. Caly nodded in agreement. Al scowled a little at their pessimism, and Scorpius just continued to eat and take periodic breaks to yawn loudly.

"I guess at least some of my theory is going to be proven now," said Al, raising a hand to point towards the ceiling. "the owls are coming." All of them looked immediately up at the owls that were soaring gracefully into the Great Hall. "We'll get the news any minute now."

"Less," countered Scorpius with a small smirk as a tawny owl, which had a paper attached to its leg, swooped down and landed on the table before Rose. Rose hurriedly detached the paper and paid the owl as she unfurled it.

"What's it say?" asked Al immediately as Rose stared at the paper with wide eyes that didn't really give away how the situation was working out for them. Rose swallowed, setting down the paper so that they could all glimpse the headline:

The Runners Return

"I'm not sure I like where this article is going," commented Al, and Rose rolled her eyes, and Caly knew that she was skim-reading at an alarmingly quick yet accurate manner.

"What's it actually say?" asked Scorpius, leaning forward and trying to read the text. "My upside down reading skills are not quite up to scratch." This drew a little snort from Rose but Caly chuckled and Al outright laughed, easing the atmosphere. Rose put her finger next to the beginning of the article and began to read:

"Last night, there were surprise returns of the runaway trio of first years: Lily Potter, Hugo Weasley and Billy Dursely, as well as Ron Weasley, father of Hugo and uncle of Lily. It is unconfirmed as to when they came back, but it was well into the night when Weasley returned to the ministry. The children, who went missing a week ago, have apparently been hiding out in the Shrieking Shack this entire time – right under the noses of those that are guarding Hogwarts. Apparently, there was a secret passage out of the Hogwarts kitchens that led to the Weasley's Wizard Wheezes branch in Hogsmeade, which had been designed and commissioned by Hermione Weasley for the benefit of the house elves, but had been abandoned for many years.

In light of these events, serious questions are once more being asked about the security of the castle. Apart from the fact that three first years were able to sneak past the array of teachers and aurors that patrol the castle at night, one must seriously question how, and why, Hermione failed to mention to this tunnel when the security was being fortified. Naturally, there has been no word from the current inmate of Azkaban, and her family declined to comment, but this reporter would bet his wage on that the charge of purposely withholding this piece of information, and thus risking lives, will be added to the list crimes for her trial.

Procurater's office, however, did release a statement in light of the recent events early this morning:

"The discovery of a new passage way into Hogwarts is highly alarmingly, even though it seems to be new and unheard of, because this is an entrance/exit point that has been unguarded for a considerable amount of time. This endangers the lives of the students, but rest assured that action is being taken: I have sent some loyal members of the ministry to block up the tunnel, and there shall be guards around the kitchens, a place that has lower security. As far as Hermione goes then I would like to hope that there is a simple explanation for this mistake, but if there is not then I will not hesitant to take appropriate action against her."

In regards to Mr Weasley, he has been suspended because of his actions, which were in complete violation of the orders that he was given, and it is widely thought that he stepped outside the law in his desire to find to his family, and no matter how important family is, no one should be allowed to do that.

Head auror Sloane seems to have instigated this suspension and openly backed it in a brief interview that she gave to the Daily Prophet:

"I like Ron, but he needs to know that he cannot go against us and the government without there being repercussions. I admire his bravery, love and devotion, but I can't let him continue to work right now. If nothing else, he has the chance to be dangerous to other people if he maintains his reckless attitude. I think, right now, he's incredibly stressed over the situation – anyone would be – so I think that he needs some time to cool off some more, but after he's gone through some training, I want him back in my ranks."

Public opinion has remained relatively unbothered with these occurrences, seemingly having got over the Potter-Weasley craze that has captivated the nation for over twenty years now, but I do not doubt that if the outcome had been in anyway different, so would the reaction have been. I also think that the anger has gone, but is merely lying low at the moment. Who knows what's coming next; all this reporter knows is that he will be there documenting it."

There was silence between the four of them as the contemplated the news article. Caly wasn't entirely sure how to feel because it didn't feel like things had gotten too much worse, although there was certainly no improvement to the situation, especially as far as Rose's parents went. It seemed like things were relatively stable, which was reassuring.

"Well," began Scorpius, running a hand through his blonde hair. "it could be worse…" Caly nodded in agreement, glad that Scorpius had voiced her thoughts in his dry voice. Al sighed loudly and looked over at Rose, who had a very taut expression on her face.

"It's okay, Rosie," he said, reaching over to squeeze her shoulder. "at least they're all home safe." Caly winced at that as Rose turned to him with a furious expression on her face as Scorpius reached up to pinch the bridge of his nose, shaking her head.

"How is my mum "home safe", Albus? She's in Azkaban!" Al held up his hands, eyes widening and looking immediately apologetic and guilty for what he'd said.

"Sorry, Rose," he apologised, screwing up his face. "I didn't think it through!" Rose shut the paper with a huff, shooting him a glare.

"Of course you didn't," she muttered in an undertone, and Caly felt her eyebrows arch in shock at that, looking over at Scorpius, who had a shocked expression on his face.

"Rose, are usurping me?" he questioned in a horrified tone of voice, hand over his heart with an exaggerated expression on his face. Rose looked over at him, and when she saw the look on his face she broke out into a reluctant smile.

"Shut up," she grumbled, crossing her arms and giving him a pouty-glare. "I'm angry!" Scorpius rolled his eyes whilst Caly giggled and Al broke out into a beam at the sight of Rose not being truly angry at him.

"I hadn't noticed," he commented dryly, and Caly tried to laugh outright, and she could see that Al was doing a similar thing given that he was pursing his lips and trying to swallow the laugh down. Scorpius had arched an eyebrow and was staring at Rose with a pointed expression until she looked at him properly and finally smiled properly. Scorpius nodded in a satisfaction, giving her and Al the right to begin laughing out loud.

They were nearly finished with breakfast when finally – finally – the three first years entered the Great Hall. There were lots of stares and whispers at the sight of them, and they hurriedly sat down at the end of the table. Caly leant forward to take a better look at them and saw that Lily was sitting tall, projecting a proud air, whilst Hugo was on edge and Billy was hunched over his plate, looking like he definitely did not want to be where he was. She sighed, frowning, and knew that she had to talk to Billy – god knows, no one else seemed to bother doing it – because there was something definitely off with him.

"I need to talk to Hugo," said Rose, sighing and getting to her feet. "I just- I don't really know what to say…"

"You'll be fine," assured Al, leaning over and squeezing her hand. "and I'm coming too – I've got to talk to Lily." He ran a through his messy hair, and both of them headed down the table with muttered "I'll see you in a minute".

"You alright?" asked Scorpius the moment they were gone, and Caly looked at him with a frown, arching her eyebrows and asking him what he was talking about. Scorpius shrugged a little. "You tend to take responsibility for things. I just wanted to check." Caly felt her face soften into a grateful smile, reaching over and catching his hand, squeezing.

"Thanks, but I'm fine. I just need to talk to Billy – there's something going on." Scorpius nodded in a agreement, holding her hand back.

"Yeah, he does not seem particularly keen with the whole shenanigan. You might as well do so now because Al and Rose are taking the other two away." Caly nodded, casting her eye back down the table and saw that, indeed, both Al and Rose had taken their respective little sibling away with them, leaving Billy sitting on his own and not looking particularly happy in anyway.

"See you in a minute," she murmured, getting up from her seat and walking down the table, pausing to say hi to a couple of people, some of them asking what the hell had happened. Caly simply gave the most evasive answers that she could, mainly sticking to things that had been in the Prophet, or were easily guessable, so that she didn't mess up whatever story that Harry was using to evade attention.

"Hey Caly," said Billy in a rather morose voice as she sat down opposite. Caly smiled at him, putting her forearms on the table and clasping her hands, and tried to give off her most open and comforting air.

"Hey." There was an awkward silence after that as Billy stabbed his sausages and moved them around his scrambled eggs, and Caly waited to see if Billy would let her willing, or if she'd have to press.

Billy held his silence, though, with even his expression surprisingly reticent because it was impossible to read anything past the sad expression on his face, which made perfect sense given the news that they had received yesterday, and if he had even given the Daily Prophet a cursory this morning. He didn't want to say anything, and that meant Caly was going to have to prize him open for his own good. She could see that he needed to talk to someone because she could see that he wasn't fully behind this, not in the way that Hugo but specifically Lily were, and that meant he couldn't talk to them, and if he couldn't talk to them – his best friends – then he needed to talk to someone else, and Caly made it her business to be that someone else.

"Why did you do it?" she asked bluntly, and Billy looked up at her with wide eyes, looking alarmed.

"Well, we-" Caly shook her head and gave him a serious look that cut him off.

"No, I mean why did you do it? Why did you go along with it? I can see that you're not happy. Why, Billy, why?" Billy sighed and looked down at his plate, pursing his lips and clearly thinking everything through before shrugging.

"I don't know…I just- I guess, I was afraid…" Caly arched her eyebrows at then, surprised that that was what had motivated him. "and I know that we're not meant to be afraid because this is the house of courage and whatever, but," he shrugged. "I just didn't want to be excluded by them. The Slytherins have said that I was hanging on the edge – that they were so close to dropping me because I wasn't willing – and I don't want that to happen…" He shrugged again, and Caly smiled, reaching over and putting a hand on his shoulder.

"Billy, it's okay," she said, forcing him to look her in the eye, and he did, with a terrified expression on his face. "This is not the house of the brave, okay? We're all humans, and we do feel fear. In fact, we're frightened a lot of the time. Do you have any idea how frightened we were when you were gone? We thought you guys could be hurt, or trapped, or something… We were so afraid." Billy smiled a little bit at that, clearly hearing the honesty in her voice and reading it in her face.

"Right," he muttered.

"And don't listen to the Slytherins because they are wrong. I know how scary it is to feel like you're about to be dumped like you're not good enough – my parents abandoned me – but these guys are different. They've never done that, or given any indication that they will. Once they accept you into their fold and make you one of them then you can't get rid of them! You are not going to be abandoned, I promise." Billy stared into her face, and she could see that he was desperately clinging to her words and wishing that it was true. "Okay?" Billy smiled and nodded.

"Okay. Thank you." Caly smiled at him, sitting back in her seat and giving him a reassuring look.

"No problem," she got to her feet. "If you need me then you know where I am." Billy nodded, still smiling, and Caly walked away back towards Scorpius, knowing at the very least that she'd helped one person.