Crying
“Oh my God!” said Giselle and Halle in unison.
Millie gasped; she had been thinking the exact same thing. Giselle and Halle turned to her and they locked eyes in a three-way look (which is very hard to do) and realisation struck.
They could read each others’ minds.
Their surprise, however, was cut short as Albus Dumbledore unfolded himself from the burnt hole. In his hand he held the shabby, woebegone school hat.
Millie hadn’t even noticed he had gone. One minute he had been standing right in front of her, the next minute he was coming through the portrait hole.
Giselle gasped. Her dad was for real. They were truly going to be changing houses, if not only for a few days.
“Please assemble into lines according to your year. You will be sorted into Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff … or Slytherin,” Harry added with distaste and a grim look upon his face.
The first years did this readily, tripping over themselves in the haste to obey Harry. Dumbledore gazed solemnly over the rims of his half-moon spectacles at the remaining years that were standing stubbornly together in a mass, hard looks on their faces.
“We’re not taking the chance of being put into Slytherin,” said a blonde haired boy Giselle vaguely remembered seeing at the ball the year before.
“Yeah,” piped up another girl. “What happens if they are mean to us?”
Giselle smiled inwardly. This girl was only a second-year. Obviously she hadn’t had enough encounters with the Slytherins to realise they could be more than ‘mean’.
Halle spoke up cautiously. She wasn’t usually one to join in on crowd conversations. This, however, wasn’t a normal conversation.
“Obviously, as first years, you aren’t all too familiar with what the Slytherins are capable of, although some of you have experienced some ... erm … deformities at the hands of them …”
She glanced at a small boy who had only recently sprouted a pair of parsnips from his ears and continued. Millie felt herself nodding off, and rested her head on Giselle’s shoulder.
This is incredibly boring. Besides, we already know the Slytherins are evil at heart.
Too right, Millie heard Giselle say darkly inside her own head. Millie started unknowingly and knocked Halle’s arm. Halle glared at her and continued on with her long winded speech.
“As I was saying, Uncle Ha- Professor Potter, Slytherins and Gryffindors don’t mix. It’s as simple as that. Even back when the school was first built, it is said in Hogwarts: A History that Salazar Slytherin and Godric Gryffindor didn’t get along. The mistrust and hatred is in our bloodlines for some of us, and generations of disgruntled feelings are usually hard to mend, surely you must know this,” she ended matter-of-factly. Harry frowned at her tone and her implied message. She was too much like her mother and father.
“Remind me again why I thought it would be a good idea for you all to know our House’s history?” he asked lightly, breaking the tension.
It was time for a joke to be shared in Millie’s opinion.
“Because, Sir, Halle’s mother is very insistent when it comes to reading about the goings on at Hogwarts behind the scenes.”
It was an in-house joke. Hermione was very passionate about letting the Gryffindors know just how spoiled they were.
I believe her exact words were, “Girls you really should appreciate just how spoilt you are, having all your fires lit and common room cleaned!” Halle thought in her mind to Millie and Giselle. They all giggled inwardly and turned back to Harry.
It was if a link was passed between the three girls for a moment, and when they stopped thinking, the connection was broken.
A slight brush of air was all it took to lift some of the ashes and the acrid smell of burnt furniture up inside Millie’s nose. She sniffed then sneezed loudly. The other students gathered around her glared at her disapprovingly. Harry had just been explaining something important.
“The Slytherins will not be able to hurt you if you get sorted into their house. Their wands, without their knowing of course, will be bound from performing any hexes, charms and harmful spells on fellow students, unless the situation warrants self-defense, though I doubt anyone will need to defend themselves from anything,” he said firmly. Groans came from a small group Halle recognised as seventh years. They had been hanging out to hex the Slytherins from day one.
Millie butted in. “But what if they have been reallyawful? Can’t we hex them even a little bit?”
Harry’s eyes flashed at his niece and she fell silent. She had stepped over the line. Harry was all for a little joke towards the Slytherins, but going as far as threatening them was way below the belt.
“Back to the matter we were discussing before you all became as stubborn as Abraxan Horses, the Sorting,” he said calmly.
Dumbledore nodded and conjured up the familiar three legged stool. Millie and Halle felt Giselle stiffen at the sight of it, just like she did every year. Halle found her hand and squeezed it hard. It wasn’t going to happen again.
Dumbledore tapped the hat lightly with his wand, waking it.
It made a few snuffling sounds, and the rip near the brim parted and burst into a gloomy song.
Four came together
One fateful night
Together they pondered
On the Magical's plight
A school they created
A House for each
Students to be mediated
Students to teach
Helga said Magic's a tool
It is for all to use
An Artesian's module
Hufflepuffs are you
For Rowena Magic is learned
For careful study
A Scholar's concern
In Ravenclaw you'll fit nicely
Salazar sees Magic as an art
A thing to be manipulated
The Strategist at heart
To Slytherin thou sorted
Godric's insist Magic is a weapon
The weak it should protect
Those with this Soldier's notion
To Gryffindor are select
Four houses united and strong
Hogwarts will be your home
With this I end my song
Soon thy magic will be honed
Millie glowered at Harry from under her fringe. He wasn’t going to split them up. Harry’s look matched her own as he put the hat on the head of an anxiously awaiting first year.
“Ravenclaw!”
The first year ran back to her friends and smiled at them apprehensively. They hugged her and welcomed her back into the circle. Another little girl from the same pack walked trembling up to Dumbledore and Harry, who gazed at her kindly, as they placed the hat on her head.
“Hufflepuff!”
The little girls face fell and crumpled. She looked as though she was going to burst into tears at any moment.
Millie’s breath caught in her throat. She had just seen the little girl’s best friend’s face. She was crying also, as she had just been sorted into Ravenclaw. Surely the Hat wouldn’t split up the three girls?
Millie numbly heard other people’s names being called and the many sobs of their friends as they were sorted into either Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff, but what she didn’t hear was anyone being sorted into Slytherin. Her heart lightened considerably, and she felt Giselle squeezing her hand exceptionally hard. She knew what she was thinking, and gave her a reassuring squeeze back and a lopsided smile as her name was called by Harry.
“Millicent Weasley! Up here please!” he called loudly over the din of Gryffindors.
Millie sat down lightly on the stool hoping to God she wasn’t going to be the newest Slytherin.
She felt the Hat touch her hair lightly. She squeezed her eyes shut as though to squeeze out the voice she knew was going to seal her fate.
“Hufflepuff!”
Well, at least for a few days anyway. Hufflepuff wasn’t so bad, she thought brightly, There’s only Renee and Stacey, and they’re perfectly okay. She saw Harry smiling at her and she smiled back.
She heard Halle’s name called and gave her a thumbs up. Halle returned the gesture confidently, but when the Hat touched her head, her face fell considerably.
“Ravenclaw!” the hat called.
Millie and Giselle’s hands flew to their mouths. This was the first time in years they had been spilt up. They looked up to Harry and Dumbledore’s faces and they weren’t smiling as they had been after Millie’s sorting. They were looking in wonder at Giselle who was now perched on the stool, tears cascading down her face, for she had just been told what house she was to be in.
“Slytherin!”
The tears tumbled down her face as she sobbed loudly, her chest heaving dramatically. She was the first Gryffindor to be made a Slytherin, and by the look on her father and Headmaster’s faces, the last. The Sorting was over, and she was the only person to have to suffer the Slytherins.
She needed to escape. She ran out of the common room, leaving behind a staring group of muttering Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs. She pushed Millie and Halle’s hands out of the way as she climbed out the scorched Portrait hole, out into the darkness of the Castle.
* * *
Her chest heaved. She could feel her lungs begging her to stop and let in some air. The cool night air felt good on her tear-streaked face, its cooling touch reassuring her and calming her. It was time to visit her brother, she decided.
She set off to the Herbology greenhouses at a run.
When Giselle got there, Sirius was writing something on a pad of paper. She knocked lightly on an already chipped terracotta pot, winced slightly as she felt it crumble under her touch, and heard it fall tinkling to the mossy greenhouse floor.
Sirius looked up and his face broke into his trademark, easy-going grin, and his uneven eyeteeth poking out over his lip. His teacher’s robes were soiled and muddy, and Giselle thought she saw a twig poking out from underneath his collar. He swept a lock of unruly hair out of his face and wiped a few beads of sweat from his forehead.
“It gets real humid in here, even at night, you know?” he said, still smiling his crooked smile.
Giselle grimaced inwardly. Only Sirius would use such bad grammar. How she longed to correct him. Instead all she did was nod her head numbly and walk over to some Venomous Tentacula seeds, which shuddered violently when she reached out to touch them with a slender finger.
Sirius’s smile faded a bit and he followed her over to the tray, pulling on some thick dragon hide gloves as he did so.
Giselle looked questionably at them and went to say something, but Sirius took a finger to his lips and Giselle closed her mouth.
Carefully, he put one hand downwards into the tray.
“Quickly, come on … hurry up,” he said impatiently.
Immediately three pods fastened themselves onto his glove-clad finger. His brow furrowed as he one-handedly recorded his findings in his messy scrawl on his clipboard. He shook his hand violently and they fell to the ground shaking and rattling.
“Geez…” he muttered under his breath.
Silently, Giselle crouched down and went to pick them up and found herself knocking heads with Sirius who fell back and rubbed his head.
“Damn. Could have used those brain cells,” he scowled playfully.
Giselle only smiled sadly and slipped the seeds back into the tray where they promptly started to wrestle.
Sirius got up and pulled off his gloves. He bit his lip and glanced back at the now motionless seeds to the notes in front of him.
“What do you think, Gis? Might be a bit excitable for seedlings … Gis?” he said trailing off and stroking the stubble on his face.
Giselle took a deep breath and sighed.
“Giselle Hortensia Potter, what in the name of Merlin is with you today?” he exploded striding over to her and fitting the crook of his elbow into hers. Sirius Potter hated being kept in the dark, and it was up to him to find out exactly what was wrong with Giselle.
He steered her out of the greenhouse into the fresh, cool air. Giselle felt it hit her face and she enjoyed the contrast it had to the heat of the greenhouse.
She breathed in the deep, sweet scent of jasmine deeply. She took her arm out of the hold of Sirius’s and wandered over to a mossy log near Hagrid’s hut, Sirius trailing after her.
It was a place she had come to ever since she was a first-year. A smaller than average first-year, she thought wryly.
Sirius was still watching her intently, his untidy black locks falling over his intense green eyes. There was no mistaking Giselle for his sister. They had the same fine bone structure of their father, and the same determinedness of their mother. A determinedness that he was going to use in his favor.
He walked over to Giselle who was playing listlessly with a jasmine flower. She brought it up to her cheek and rubbed it softly. Sirius bent down next to her in the pretext of picking a flower, but instead sat down next to her. She turned her back to him, and he fitted the flower into the nook behind her ear.
She turned to him and Sirius was surprised to see tears forming in her almond eyes, so very much like his own.
“Slytherin,” she choked out, the tears starting to tumble over. “I’m in Slytherin.”
“Oh, Giselle,” Sirius murmured, reaching forward and stroking her hair. “You don’t belong there, and you know it. Don’t think on it Gis, don’t think on it for a minute.”
Giselle smiled softly, the tears in her eyes still evident. Sirius was struck by sudden inspiration.
“Why don’t you have a little chat with grandmother?”
“Grandma Lily? That’s possible?” she choked, her hair falling across her face.
“You betcha!” said Sirius with a cocky grin.
Wendy sat crying in a dark empty corner shrouded in darkness, no light coming in from the tiny barred window high up on the stone walls where she could see the last of the sunset creeping its way across the lawn, its blood-red colouring coming through into her prison.
She was sitting in the same bent-over position she had fallen in when Avery and Nott had thrown her bodily from in front of the crackling fire of Lord Voldemort’s quarters. They had thrown her with such force into the basement that when she hit the concrete floor, the skin was ripped from her knees and a stinging pain forced her to bite into her pale, thin lip as blood flowed freely from the wounds, the colour blossoming brightly onto the hem of her ragged skirt. It pooled on the floor, making clouds of dust rise as drops of blood hit the floor of the once great Riddle House.
Sirius rummaged around in the cupboard of his office, looking for a small jar with a smudged label on it.
“Marjoram,” he muttered. “Right.”
He put it down on the ground with care and ducked back into the cupboard. “Candles … incense … think we’ll need anything else?” he asked, his voice muffled by the cupboard.
Giselle ran through the list she had seen in the library and nodded. She shivered in anticipation. A séance would be so exciting!
“Are you sure a séance is the right way to fix my problem?” she asked.
“Giselle,” came Sirius’s voice from the cupboard, “is anything at Hogwarts truly ever safe?”
Giselle laughed. Sirius pulled his head out of the cupboard and gestured to Giselle to follow him out into the garden.
“So, how exactly are we going to do this?” Giselle asked, stumbling over a tree root.
“Marjoram is a special herb used for traveling, more specifically the traveling of the dead. I’m hoping we’ll see one of our family members tonight,” Sirius said, stepping over the tree root carefully and continuing over to the grove they had been sitting in just half an hour before.
“Will it be a Weasley or a Potter, do you think?” asked Giselle.
“Well,” said Sirius, now setting up the candle in a circle, “it will probably be a Potter, considering the circumstances, but you never know. I just hope whoever this summons reaches will be willing to come.”
“What happens if they don’t want to speak to me?” questioned Giselle sitting down beside one of the candles. She picked up a stick and waved it around in the air to prove her point. “What happens if we get one of my more stubborn relatives? Then we would have wasted all this time gathering all the ingredients.”
Sirius thought about this for a moment as he set down the last candle. “I suspect one of our relatives is watching over us. It would only make sense for the ones who can see all our problems to offer their help to solve them.”
He leant over to Giselle and grabbed the stick she was now drawing in the dirt with. He carefully drew a pentagram in the centre of the circle of candles.
“The pentagram was seen as a gateway. The four points at the bottom represent Earth, Air, Fire and Water.” He drew each point as he said them and continued his little speech. “The fifth and topmost point represents Spirit. The hole in the middle is the entrance.”
He got up from his crouched position and dug into his pocket, screwing up his face. He found what he needed and walked over to Giselle.
Giselle got up and held hands with Sirius. She de-wrinkled the paper and read out the incantation in a clear voice:
Potter and Weasley descendants hear us thee
Into our world now you can see
Right now the veil is thin
Pull in back and please come in
A relative has troubles as you know
Help us, unravel and stop her woes.
She could hear Sirius’s voice mingled with her own, and then she watched, amazed as the center of the pentagram glowed a blinding white. The wind blew, sending her hair billowing up into the air and coming back down to touch her face playfully. She looked sideways and saw Sirius’s hair doing the same.
She saw wisps of smoke start to funnel upwards from the pentagram and spread out to form a thicker object. The silhouette of a young woman formed and both Sirius and Giselle gasped in surprise as they realised who it was.
“Giselle,” her voice whispered softly.
“Sirius,” she whispered again, turning to Sirius who was looking dumbfounded into the woman’s luminous green eyes.
“Grandma Lily,” Giselle whispered in awe staring at the figure swirling in the nighttime mist.
Disclaimer: the spell Sirius and Giselle used to summon Lily was based on a section from the Charmed ‘Season’s of The Witch, Volume 1’. It’s going to have nothing to do with the storyline of the book (for those people who have read it and have now got their hopes up)
Shout out to the nutty imp, (Meil) for providing her School Sorting Hat Song 3 for this chapter. I’m sure you all get the jist of it.
A/N: 1 … 2 … 3 … Aww! Lily came to visit Giselle!
Obviously, third time Lucky! Thank you to all my readers for being so patient!
Till then, Lurid.
Malicious Intentions by Lurid
Chapter Notes: Pre-HBP!*insert some year old rambles here about her appreciation of Dumbledore and how he’s not really dead and how it’s totally feasible that he’s alive in this, etc. etc.*
The spell ‘Liquidates’ will now be rechristened ‘Aguamenti’ as the canon version of the extinguishing spell. Dammit, I thought that spell was good, aye Nicole?