Heart Scars ||| Remus Lupin

Fourteen

"How's that mandrake leaf feeling?" James says as they walk around the library, he was grinning, clearly finding her discomfort funny. He was gathering transfiguration books as he scanned the isles.

"Just great." Adhara says as her and James take a seat at a table in the corner overlooking the quidditch pitch. She pushed the leaf around with her tongue a little.

She had homework, as well as him. He was also looking over the notes him and Sirius had taken while they were trying to become animagi.

"Have you talked to him, since he told you?" James asks casually. Adhara didn't know when they started to become so comfortable with each other, but it just happened. Everything with James felt natural, like she was talking to an old friend.

"We've patrolled four times together. We talk during patrols." She responds. It had been three weeks since Remus had told her his secret, and three weeks since James began to help her with the animagi transformation. He said that keeping the leaf in your mouth and not letting it show was the hardest part, but Adhara was doing surprisingly well.

"Did something happen?" He asks. He leans over to read something from her transfiguration homework, and then he jots it down on his.

"No, he's just been respecting my boundaries. I've been trying to keep my friends from figuring something out. They've become suspicious about where I go." She says softly. He hums distractedly as he looks over his homework with furrowed brows.

"How's things with Sirius?" She asks. He snorts and shakes his head, his curls moving in many different directions. You'd think having a father who made a hair potion would make his hair better, but he apparently avoided his father's potion like the plague, though.

"Both him and Remus are too stubborn to apologize first. It's been tense, me and Pete have been on edge trying to make sure they don't kill each other. I think they'll be fine. It's Remus and Sirius." James sighs, rubbing his face with one of his hands.

"Sirius has always been very prideful, one of his Slytherin traits." She shakes her head as she smiles sourly.

"Be honest with me. Let's say you had to decide where to put him, a house, where would you have put him?" He leans forward on the table as he speaks, his elbows propping him up. She contemplated his question for a moment.

"If we had mixed houses, I'd put Sirius in a mix of Slytherin and Gryffindor, but since there's not, I'd still say Gryffindor. Sure he's got plenty of Slytherin qualities, but they're just qualities, his Gryffindor ones make him who he is." She says, and James nods thoughtfully.

"You're very smart, you know that. Almost as smart as my Lily Flower." He smirks, and she rolls her eyes at his backhanded compliment.

"What's the deal with you two anyway?" She slides her potions work over to him, and he begins to copy it down with a dopey grin.

"She's warmed up to me slightly." His voice gets higher halfway through his sentence, and she raises her brows. He sighs.

"Fine, we can sit in the same room without her insulting me. Everything goes smoothly until I make a move, and then she freaks out and calls me words I don't even know." He whines as he slumps down in his chair. Adhara grinned at the thought of Lily Evans hurting the James Potter's ego.

"Have you tried backing off?" Adhara asks lazily as she doodles on her transfiguration book.

"I don't follow." He leans towards her across the table. They were about a foot apart, and Adhara wanted to laugh at his look of pure confusion.

"Look James, you've been driving her nuts for years. Try backing off, make sure you're seen around school with other girls, act like she's your friend. Then, she'll realize that she misses the attention and she actually likes you, for some odd reason." She flicks his forehead and he jumps away from her, muttering a string of curse words as he rubs his forehead.

"You think it'll work?" He asks excitedly.

"I know it will." She replies.

"Damn, you're going through em' fast, aren't you Ara?" Both her and James turn to see Evan. His blonde hair was messy, and he had a lazy grin on his face as he sauntered over to them.

"Real funny. What do you want?" She rolls her eyes as James looks between her and Evan.

"Alecto is looking for you, she commented on how much you've been gone recently. She seemed distressed when we spoke." He pulls out a seat and sits next to James.

"I spent all day with her on Saturday!" She exclaims. Evan just nods as he goes to look at James' notes. The Potter boy immediately closes the book on the animagi notes.

"Planning on doing something illegal?" He raises a brow as he throws an arm over the back of James' chair.

"Wouldn't you like to know?" James pushes his arm away, and Evan grins at him.

"Come on, Potter, we're cool now. You like Ara, I like Ara. We should make friendship bracelets!" Evan snaps his fingers and points at James. James glares at him, but Adhara could see his amusement written on his face.

"We should go." Adhara gathers her things and pulls Evan up. They turn and begin walking away as she says bye to James.

"Bye Jamsie!" Evan shouts over his shoulder as he waves at James. Adhara sniggers at the look of pure disgust on James' face.

Alecto was sitting moodily in their dorm when Adhara found her. She was lying on her bed, her long, red hair fanned out around her. She looked over when the door opened and closed, and she glared at Adhara.

"Look who finally showed up." Alecto turns on her side, facing away from Adhara. She slowly makes her way to Alecto's bed and gently sits down.

"Al, I'm sorry. I was in the library, what happened?" She rakes her fingers through the girls red waves, and Alecto's shoulders shake with silent sobs.

"It's happening." She whispers. She sits up and turns to Adhara, and she takes in Alecto's puffy eyes and tear streaked cheeks.

"What is?" Adhara asks, and Alecto lets out a loud sob and buries her face in Adhara's shoulder.

"I'm taking the mark, when I get out of school. My father gave me a choice. Get married to Caractacus Burke or take the mark. I had no choice, I don't want to marry him." She wails, and dread fills Adhara's stomach.

Voldemort was recruiting girls.

She had thought that she would be safe, since it only seemed to be boys who were joining Voldemort, other than Bellatrix. But Bellatrix had insisted that she join him, she practically begged her father to let her.

"It's going to be alright. You're going to be okay." Adhara kisses her forehead as Alecto sobs. Adhara just strokes her back and rocks her.

After about a half hour, Alecto had cried herself to sleep. Adhara lowers her to her bed and stands up, unsure of what to do with herself, or this news.

There was something in her, that part in the back of her brain that warned her when danger was coming, it was screaming for her to run. Run as far away as she could from everything, from Hogwarts, from her family, and most especially from the dark lord.

But Adhara Black was not a coward, and she would never leave her brother behind to fend for himself.