Astra

LIV - The Champions

"WHY DO YOU INSIST on doing this anyway? It makes no sense to celebrate your deathday!" exclaimed Astra as James told her to set up the kitchens as if it was his birthday.

"It does if you died on Halloween!" said James gleefully.

"You can't even taste the food," Astra pointed out.

"But you can. And you probably would get hungry if you didn't eat. Do you know where Reg is?"

"No!" Astra immediately yelled. "Do NOT invite Uncle Reg!"

"Why not?" asked Luna from where she was sitting, pleasantly watching the conversation that she couldn't even see.

Astra huffed and went back to the cake she was mixing, deciding that the house-elves already had enough work for the Halloween feast that night. "He'll start talking about House-elf rights again, and I've had enough of that from Hermione. I'm just glad I was able to keep SPEW a secret otherwise he would be bothering me all day!"

"House-elf rights?" asked James.

"You don't want to know," Astra grumbled in response. "Where's Lily?"

"Getting Marlene and Dorcas. And she was going to get Regulus but I suppose that you don't want to invite him because of this 'house-elf right' thing and 'spew'."

Astra nodded in confirmation and asked Luna to get the flour. "So, who do you think is going to become champion?" asked James, swooping around the kitchens and getting bored.

"Some Slytherins are saying Warrington, the Hufflepuffs are saying Diggory, and the Gryffindors have Angelina Johnson. I don't know if anyone is entering from Ravenclaw, but those are the ones that I know of. This morning, Fred, George, and Lee tried entering but got completely wiped out, nice long beards and all." Astra chuckled at the memory. "And then almost everyone from Durmstrang put in their names, and a few from Beauxbatons."

The topic moved on from there to the Quibbler, to which James looked questioningly at Astra, probably confused about her friend choice, but the girl in question was enthralled in the conversation, making James smile softly.

Eventually, the party started with dead people arriving from all around the world, mostly including the previous Order of the Phoenix, where Astra and Luna were the only people alive, frantically trying to avoid Regulus.

***

Astra waved goodbye to Luna, who had to go to the Ravenclaw table for the Halloween feast, before taking her usual seat and waiting for Hermione, Harry, and Ron.

"Hello! You're Astra Black, aren't you?" came a hyper voice from behind her. Turning around, she saw Collin Creevey, one hand holding onto his little brother and the other clutching his camera.

"Yes?" she responded questioningly. Usually, Colling was only there for Harry, and she had never spoken a word to him before.

"The daughter of Sirius Black?" Astra huffed. Of course this was what he wanted to talk about.

"Yes."

"That's really cool!" Astra's head snapped up in shock. Nobody had ever reacted to the daughter of Sirius Black as 'cool', but then again, Collin was usually excited about the smallest things.

"Um... thank you?" Collin looked like he was going to say more, but Harry, Hermione, and Ron had just arrived, allowing Astra to turn back around and focus on their conversation.

"Where were you?" asked Harry immediately, as if he had been wondering that the entire day.

"The kitchens," Astra responded, hoping he wouldn't ask more details. He still looked suspiciously at her, but Hermione started talking about Hagrid and his skrewts, allowing Astra to pretend to be interested.