In The Shadow of Love

Chapter 46: Diane's Patronus

Diane sat with Poppy in the hufflepuff common room, gently petting one of the many cats that wandered around.

"So you can't make the patronus charm? Even when you're thinking about Ominis?" Poppy said curiously. She had produced her charm already, it had been easy for her, she had just thought of the moment she watched the snidgets hatching, a wild hare hounding around the room as her patronus.

"Yeah, I don't know what I'm doing wrong." Diane sighed unhappily. "I've tried so many times. I've probably tried it with every single thing I've done with Ominis so far."

Poppy let out a soft hum of thought. "Well, then I suppose you'll have to think of other moments. What other things have made you happy?"

"Getting my letter sure made me happy, but I already tried that... I tried when I first flew, I even tried when we freed the dragon." She sighed.

"I'd call that one more scary than happy, but yeah still happy." Poppy chuckled.

"I'm just not sure what to do at this point."

"Well... maybe try something else. Maybe not necessarily happy, but emotional." Poppy tilted her head curiously.

"Emotional?" Diane furrowed her brow in thought. "Well we all had a pretty deep talk recently."

You're safe now.

She remembered those words said to her so sincerely, dark brown eyes looking into her own. She looked away from Poppy, feeling suddenly very uneasy.

"Uh oh, I know that look. What's wrong?" Poppy said flatly.

Diane looked over to her with a small smile. She knew her so well. "I'm just... a bit conflicted about something."

"Go on." Poppy scooted closer to her.

"So Sebastian went to London with Hecat the other day, and he apparently snuck out to go to whitechapel." She rolled her eyes at how stupid that was. "He talked with some of the people I knew back in those days, including Danny."

"Uh oh." Poppy frowned. What had he gone snooping around for?

"He found out about... the time. Though Danny thankfully didn't tell him everything that happened. Just that his father roughed me up."

"Ah, so now you feel a bit awkward around him now that he knows?" Poppy guessed.

"No, he said... I was safe now." She frowned. "It gave me weird feelings. Like I felt I was safe. I haven't really had a feeling like that before since I was little. I feel safe with Ominis obviously, but it's... different?" She sighed in confusion.

Poppy let out a soft hum of thought. "Well, we both know he's pretty keen on keeping both you and Ominis safe, so that's nothing out of the ordinary."

"No, it... I don't know, it felt different this time. He's said it plenty of times before, that he'll keep both of us protected, but he'd never said it like that before." Diane frowned.

Poppy watched her for a moment before she gave a soft sigh. "Well, I think it would be a good idea if I went to talk with him."

"W-wait Poppy you don't need to do that!" Diane said defensively.

"Ooooooh yes I do." She said firmly. "You go get some lunch. Don't think I didn't notice you skipped breakfast." She gave Diane a critical eye, who shrank a bit that she'd been caught. She'd been too busy practicing to remember breakfast until it was too late. "Finals are coming up, so keep practicing before class. There's only two more classes until we have to take the OWLS so you have to figure this out quickly."