Life After Death - An Erica Black Continuation (4)

Fourty Five

"Willow, I need you to go upstairs and pack both your trunks, I am sure Remus would be happy to help you if you ask him. Charlotte, get started on tidying up, Regulus, you as well please. I will be in my study if anyone needs me." Erica Black stood at the top of the stairs, looking down at the bottom to the other members of the household, lowering her wand from her throat and turning to walk away.

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Remus Lupin sat, folding clothes as the eldest daughter of his God-daughter, laid across the floor, separating coloured ribbons into piles. He looked up, watching her with amusement,
"I thought we were supposed to be packing your trunks?"
"We are.." she replied absentmindedly "this is the first step in the process, you continue to fold and I will sort and soon enough the clothes will be..." she trailed off for a moment before sitting up suddenly, "Done!" she grinned at the man and stood, bringing small piles of ribbons over to her bed, placing them on the covers sorted by colour.
"How so?" He grinned, she reminded him a lot of her mother at her age
"This way, the clothes do not get the chance to muddle themselves. You tie them together in their sets and then all you need do is pull out what you want and you can be certain it contains all you require." Remus nodded, a faint smile on his lips,
"That, is very clever, a good system developed at a young age will spare you a lot of time in life"
"Lottie doesn't care for it all that much, she says I'm tedious and that I over complicate everything. She does not appreciate order in the same way I do." sighed Willow, placing a full Ravenclaw uniform on the bed and tying it safely together with a piece of blue ribbon, she did this three more times before repeating the process with four sets of Gryffindor uniform in red ribbons. The middle age man watched as she wandered back and forth between their dressers and her bed, wrapping up pyjamas in yellow ribbons and casual clothing in green. The two of them spent the next two hours filling two large trunks and two small backpacks with everything the twins would need for a three day trip to Romania and their first term at Hogwarts.

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"Lottie. Please. A little help." Groaned Regulus Black as he glared across the room to the girl who sat, sprawled upside down on an armchair with her legs kicking the air carelessly whilst he cleaned up. She didn't move from her seat but turned her head to the man;
"What if I don't want to go back?" she sighed. He paused and his expression softened,
"To Hogwarts?" he asked, "Why wouldn't you want to go back to Hogwarts?"
"It's so... structured and boring, I'm no good at school anyways" Charlotte sighed
"I seriously doubt that. You remind me a lot of Sirius actually. Now, he can never know I said this but my brother was always the most clever man I knew. He wasn't very good at school per say, except for Defence Against the Dark Arts of course, he was exceptional at that, but his ability to plot and scheme was incredible. He had no issue with his mind, it was merely how he utilised it.. and, of course, how he didn't." Explained Regulus, moving over to sit in the chair besides her's.
"I just.. None of it interests me" She huffed, throwing her head back in frustration.
"Then what does? There must be something. You're going into your third year, what electives have you selected?" He pressed, wanting her to find something so she wouldn't feel quite so low and he wouldn't have to clean alone for the rest of the afternoon.
"Divination and Care of Magical Creatures"
"And how do you feel about those?" He asked, she thought for a moment before speaking,
"Divination is just the best of a load of bad options, it's boring but at least it isn't difficult like the others and I don't know, Care of Magical Creatures could be kind of cool.. I like going to Romania with Charlie and seeing the dragons and mum used to bring in all sorts of creatures to show us when we were kids. Besides, I'm sick of theory, all our classes are theory and they're just dull."

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Erica Black sat at her desk, flicking through old photographs, trying to decide which to bring with her to hang in her office at the school. She looked up as the door creaked open and her father poked his head in;
"Hey.. Can I come in?" he asked timidly, jumping slightly when a sharp voice cut though the silent room. "Well, if it isn't my eldest son. Just as useless a parent as a child, I see." sneered Walburga Black from her portrait.
"grand-mère!" hissed Erica, "That is enough! Sure you can, come in." she smiled tightly at her father who nodded gratefully as let himself in and sat in the chair opposite her.
"French, huh?" He chuckled, easily recognising the language from his own childhood.
"yeah," She shrugged "Remus taught me a little bit and then she taught me the rest once I had moved to number twelve" Her father's brow furrowed slightly;
"What were you doing, living there I mean, what happened to the cottage?"
"Oh, it was still there, in fact, it's where I lived with the twins until recently. Mooney started doing more work for Dumbledore and I'd finished Hogwarts so he thought it best I was somewhere a little less isolated " She shrugged, she'd never thought too much of it if she was honest, she was a child and it was a decision that had been made on her behalf.
Sirius thought briefly before speaking, "So you'd spent two years in that house before I came?"
"Oh! Nono, I left Hogwarts early and studied my final two years remotely, I had been living in Grimmauld Place since I was thirteen." She corrected him but his confusion only seemed to grow
"Thirteen? What were you doing alone at thirteen?"
"Well, I found work as an editor for Gilderoy Lockhart in between school work for the first year, then once I'd graduated, I continued to work in that position until the summer of 92 then I found work, also as an editor, for other authors and I continued to do that until a few months before I- well, you know... The whole time I helped Kreature around the house, I cooked, I took care of Remus whilst he was around. I read, I went out. I had a life before you all moved in." She explained.
"You say that as if it ended when we moved in" Sirius laughed lightly, but his smile dropped when his daughter looked at him and said nothing