𝐁𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐞 𝐀𝐦𝐞 | 𝐇.𝐏.

𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐫 𝟕 - 𝟖

We had been walking up these stupid, useless, completely unnecessary hills that served absolutely no purpose to anyone for half an hour, and Weasley still wouldn't admit that he had no idea where we were going.

Once it was decided and agreed upon by everyone that we were paying a visit to the Lovegood's, we needed to figure out how to get there. None of us knew the exact location, but Weasley knew it was somewhere near the Burrow because "his parents would always point vaguely in the direction of the the hills when they talked about them."

Hence the current hill problem here. All four of us were sweaty, annoyed, and walking on aching legs when Weasley stopped at the crest of—you'll never guess—another hill. It was so sudden that Hermione slammed into his back, and they both ended up bright red in the face.

"She can't still be mad at him, can she?" Potter leaned over and mumbled to me.

"She's always mad at him," I replied back quietly, a small smile on my face.

When Weasley had composed himself again, he cleared his throat and said, "This has to be it."

I followed his gaze to what could only be explained as a ginormous, black cylinder. I squinted, and it almost looked like a chess castle. Hermione looked at him skeptically, still not wanting to believe he was right, and he scoffed.

"Come on," he complained. "Who else would have a house shaped like a huge rook?"

"He has a point," Potter said. Hermione shot a glare at him, and he shrunk back a little next to me. I nearly laughed.

"Well, only one way to find out," I said, and led the way back down the hill to the blessedly flat promise land ahead of us. I didn't even care if this was actually the right place or not, I just had to sit down somewhere before my legs gave out, and there had to be a chair in that house. This single fact motivated me to not collapse as we continued.

The closer we got to the rook/house, the more I noticed. There was a stake right in the middle of the front yard with three obviously hand-painted signs tacked to it. The first read "Editor of the Quibbler," the second, "Pick Your Own Mistletoe," and the third, "Keep Off the Dirigible Plums."

"I think our hunch was correct," Potter grimaced, following the winding path up to the front door and then pausing momentarily. He looked back at us, swallowed, and knocked. Immediately the top half of the door swung inward, and Xenophilius's face appeared before us.

For once I was glad of the manners my mother had pounded into me as a child, because I certainly would have gasped out loud if she hadn't. Xenophilius Lovegood was looking a little rougher than he had at the wedding, to say the least. His hair was frizzy in some areas and stringy in others, his face was drawn tight and wrinkled, and he was wearing grimy striped pajamas.

"What is it?" He asked, taking in all of our faces quickly. His whole body froze when he saw Potter. "What do you want?" He demanded frantically.

"Mr. Lovegood," Potter began slowly. "I'm Harry Potter. We- we met a few months ago."

"Yes," Xenophilius breathed. Or maybe wheezed was a better word. He sounded like he had just been punched in the gut.

"We want to speak to you," Potter continued carefully, like he was talking to a fussing baby. "Could we come in?"

Several emotions flashed across Xenophilius's face, all too brief for me to make sense of. "Y-yes," he stuttered. "Of course. I'll- yes. Come in." He turned away like he expected us to follow him, then laughed weakly when he realized we couldn't and opened the bottom half of the door for us. 

"Of course," he muttered, sounding like he was speaking more to himself then us now. "Open the door for the guests, they'll want to come inside for a spell. Just for a spell, and then they're gone." He walked back into the house again, still whispering inaudibly under his breath. I shared an uneasy glance with all three of them before stepping over the threshold into the strangest room I had ever seen.