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'He watched his star
And then he knew,
That sometimes
Beautiful things
Burn too'
-Ariana Dancu
||||
"Who's Christine?" Her voice echoed through the silence of the compartment, aside from the consistent rattles bumping them around. They didn't even capture all of what she said through the slight surprise of someone, let alone Adeline, actually speaking.
"What do you mean?" Ginny asked from her seat beside Adeline, with the golden trio crammed into the row across from theirs, rolling hills in the distance as they neared the school.
Her piercing grey eyes stared blankly at the wall behind the three, a frown etched upon her face, tucking a loose hair behind her ear. The three's eyes snapped to her at the mention of their old friend.
"Who is she?" Adeline repeated, not moving her gaze from Harry's uncomfortable expression, averting his own view to anywhere but her.
Ron, seeing as neither Harry nor Hermione were going to answer, sighed.
"She, uh," He cleared his throat, finally looking her in the eye, no matter how much they intimidated him. "She came to Hogwarts in First year—the same year we did. We were all really close to her, Ginny too. Christine joined us in all of what we did. She went with Harry to get the Philosopher's stone; she went to the Chamber of Secrets—everywhere. We did everything together.
"But then in Third year, she, uh... she betrayed us. She helped Peter Pettigrew escape, and she went with him. We haven't seen her since. Harry and Christine were the closest, but she was pretending the whole time. She just used us."
Her mouth opened ever so slightly in realisation, stringing the pieces together in her head.
"So Harry," She looked to him with a mix of gentleness yet determination, noticing how he slumped in his seat, wishing to be anything but the centre of attention. "You don't want to trust me because... you're scared of being hurt? Again? And technically you were hurt again that night in the maze so now you've built even more walls?"
Harry blushed, wiping his hands on his school pants nervously, biting the inside of his cheek. He nodded, ashamed, finally having the guts to meet her eyes.
"I promise you, that-that wasn't me. I couldn't control my actions. It was like... like there was someone else in my mind. It was like she was controlling me and I could only watch. Harry... please, you saved me. And all this time you've helped me so much—I would never want to hurt you. You helped me find my voice." Ad managed a smile at him, trying her best to form the proper words, the smallest of smiles slowly making its way to his lips at her sincerity. It was possibly the most she'd spoken at once. He was proud.
Turning to Ginny with hope written across her face, eyes soft and eyebrows lifted lightly, asking through expression if she said right, the youngest Weasley nodded, encouraging Adeline to go on.
"And... I was hoping if we all," She made sure to look at each of them in the eyes. "Could be...uh... you know, the people you smile at across the hall and talk to all the time and be around eachother as much as you can... I don't remember the word—"
"Friends?" Hermione spoke up, voice coming out slightly hoarse, as she had barely spoken, clearing her throat and speaking louder. "Is that what you mean? Friends?"
"Yeah," Ad looked to her lap, nodding. "I think so, yes."
The bookworm smiled warmly, though Adeline didn't see, and exchanged looks with the other two, the air shifting to comfort, unlike the tension of before.
"I think we'd like that too."
Ad looked to the three, grinning.
"So we're good?" She asked.
"We're good." Harry replied, smiling, though guilt still clawed at him in the back of his mind.
||||
The bony, pitch-black creature caught her eye immediately, stumbling back slightly into Harry, similar to when you spot a large spider you hadn't noticed before, mud clenching beneath her feet.
Grabbing Addie's arms to balance her, he too couldn't help but stare at the bat-like horse drawing the carriage, the others giving them odd looks as they climbed into the carriage along with a boy carrying an odd sort of Cactus.
"Don't worry, I can see them too." An airy voice spoke from the open carriage, Harry's attention snapping to the blonde, lightly dragging the still-staring Addie by the hand with him into the cart.
"You're just as sane as I am."
Silence followed her words yet she didn't seem to mind, maintaining the same expression as the others shifted awkwardly, gazes on their laps as the blonde girl looked over them all, taking in their appearances.
Adeline, however, didn't move her eyes from the being. Was it a Bat animal? Black skinny horse? Exoskeleton Pegasus? She really had no clue of what it was.
Thus, with her eyes trained and mind focused on the animal, she didn't notice the odd girl beside her hesitantly shift herself away from Adeline, but everyone else did. So as the Ravenclaw wouldn't catch Harry's glare, Hermione spoke, bringing the attention upon herself as the carriage started moving.
"Everyone, this is Loony Love—" The blood rushed to her cheeks as she swiftly recovered. "Luna Lovegood. What an interesting necklace."
"It's a charm, actually." She replied softly, Adeline finally focusing on the people around her. "Keeps away the Nargles."
Furrowing her eyebrows, she turned to Harry on her other side in curiosity, but he on, but he only shrugged.
"-are Nargles?" Ron muttered to Hermione, ears tinting red as his voice sounded louder than expected.
"No idea." She whispered back.
a/n:
Once again, thank you guys so much for 3k! That's honestly insane.
Thank you so much to all the people who vote,
Thank you so much to all the people who comment,
Thank you so much to all readers, even if you don't do the above two things! I APPRECIATE YOU
It means so much that anyone would ever really choose this book out of MILLIONS and actually read it!
I'm back from my 'intermission', and since I want to give you guys the best chapters I can and put justice to this story, I'll be updating this story every two weeks. This is so I can spend more time on them and get through better and possibly longer chapters!
So yeah, thank you guys so much and I'll see you all soon!!
