The Enemy of my Enemy

The Declaration

I feel that this chapter has been anticipated since Third year. I hope you enjoy it.

This chapter contains flashbacks.

Detention continued the night after, and Teddie sat in complete silence with Harry and Umbridge, the only sound was the scratching of two quills. The pain in Teddie's hand continued to get worse with each word she wrote, but she refused to let Umbridge have the satisfaction of seeing her in pain.

After being dismissed the first night, Harry had stuck around outside the Defense classroom after, waiting for Teddie. He always waited down the hall a bit, as it seemed if Umbridge thought he was outside, she would keep Teddie back longer.

That night, when Teddie left the office, she smiled weakly at Harry and fell into step beside him as they walked back to the first available staircase that would take Teddie down to the Entrance Hall and him up to the seventh floor.

"How's your hand?" Harry asked.

Teddie showed him the words cut into her skin. "How's yours?" she asked.

Harry shrugged. "How are you healing it?" he asked.

"I run it under cold water every night before bed," said Teddie. "It always used to work when I fell down while growing up. Sometimes, someone in the street would use antiseptic spray or drops and then cover it with a plaster, but I don't really have those readily available."

"Have you told your friends?" Harry asked.

"Have you?"

He laughed and Teddie smiled.

They bid one another goodnight, and headed back to their respective Common Rooms

Just like the first night, Theo, Daphne, and Blaise were still awake when Teddie reached the Common Room. Instinctively, Teddie pulled her sleeve down to cover her hand and curled up beside Theo on the couch.

"How did it go tonight?" Blaise asked.

Teddie shrugged. "Did my lines, talked to Harry and then came back here," she answered. "How's the homework going?"

"We have plotted a few points for you to follow in the classes we share," said Daphne, sliding a few pieces of parchment across the coffee table. "It should get you part way through your essays, especially Potions and Transfiguration."

Teddie smiled and looked over the notes.

"I started on our Ancient Runes," said Theo. "You can just add your part beneath and we'll get the rest of Hermione tomorrow."

Teddie nodded.

"I finished labelling your Care of Magical Creatures sketch, too," said Blaise, happily passing back the picture. "You never mentioned being able to draw before."

Teddie blushed. "Yeah, if you call stick figures 'drawing'," she laughed.

"Well, it's a good thing we only had to draw a stick figure this time," Daphne teased.

They laughed quietly.

Teddie sighed and pulled her Potions book out of her bag and took a notebook and quill from her pencil case. "I'm going to start on my Potions essay, you guys can go to bed, if you like," she said. She mostly wanted to be alone so that they wouldn't see the scars on the back of her hand, given they would be hard to hide while writing.

"I still got some Transfiguration to finish," said Daphne. "I'll stay up, if you don't mind?"

Teddie hesitated. If she said she did mind then her friends would know something was wrong, but she also didn't want them to see her hand, she had convinced herself that they couldn't do anything to heal her, so why worry them by letting them see it?