Star Girl | Cedric Diggory

|*| Sixty Seven |*|

"Hell no. This is a dream, a bloody bad dream at that. This isn't happening. Nope, nope, nope!"

"Aquila, stop denying it," Nash instructed her that night. After a dinner filled with Aquila lying about pledging to the Dark Lord, she and her brother Apparated to his house where she'd be spending the rest of the summer. "There's no use anymore."

"You can't be one of them," Aquila said. She was still in denial, even after everything that happened at her parents' manor. She had told them that after her seventh and final year at Hogwarts, she'd pledge her allegiance and join the rest of her family. However, she didn't mean it, and she planned on simply running away.

"It had to happen, Quil," Nash said, sitting down next to her on her bed. "It's inevitable."

"Maybe for you," she said, "but not for me."

"What can you do?" he asked. "You can't run away-"

"Yes I can!"

"They'll find you! No matter what you do, they'll find you in the end. You need to accept this, Aquila. The sooner you do, the sooner this conversation will end."

"How could you, Nash?" Aquila asked, tears falling from her eyes. "How could you do this? How could you join people like them?"

"Aquila-"

"I thought you were on my side, Nash!" Aquila yelled, standing up. "I thought that you of all people would put up a fight, try to resist them-"

"You can't resist them!" her brother yelled, standing up.

"Yes, you damn well can!" she yelled. "And I'm going to!"

"It's impossible, Aquila!" Nash yelled. "I implore you to see reason!"

"Nothing's impossible," Aquila said. "People thought it was impossible that I would be sorted into Slytherin-don't deny it; you did-and people thought that a Slytherin and a Hufflepuff wouldn't end up together, but both of those things still happened! They happened, and people said they couldn't! You say I can't resist the Death Eaters; I say that's the biggest load of rubbish I've ever heard! Nothing is impossible, so stop saying that it is!"

Nash took a few slow breaths of air. He wiped his eyes with his hand and sat down onto the bed. "You know," he said, not looking at anything in particular, "Mum and Dad always say how I'm this perfect child, the prime example of what a Whitman should be... but, the truth is, I'm not. I've got the lowest position in my office at the Ministry, and, let's face it, I've got one of the crappiest jobs in general. Improper Use of Magic... all I do is run around, stopping fourteen year olds from accidentally blowing up their homes... I'm hardly the prime example of anything..."

"That's not true-"

"Hush up; I'm not done," Nash instructed. "You, on the other hand, are the strongest person in the goddamned world. You're strong and brave and determined and kind and loyal and optimistic, and that's exactly why I had my doubts about your Hogwarts House. The truth is, Aquila, I never thought you'd be in Slytherin, and I never thought you'd be in Gryffindor either."

Aquila was quick to connect the dots. "You... you thought I'd be-"

"A Hufflepuff, yes," Nash finished. "And I was scared for you; you know how Mum and Dad feel about Hufflepuffs. I was horrified when you were getting Sorted. I practically bit off all of my fingernails. I silently begged that you'd be in Slytherin because you didn't deserve the scorn from our parents if you weren't.

"I was worried when you started hanging out with Cedric and Ethan too. I was worried that somehow word would get back to Mum and Dad, and you'd get in trouble for it. You didn't deserve that, and I knew when you got home this year that you'd get shit for dating Cedric. That's why I didn't tell you about... about it when we were at the King's Cross. I knew you had enough to deal with.

"I'm scared now too, Aquila. I don't want you to be a Death Eater no more than you want to be a Death Eater. You don't deserve this. You deserve the world, Aquila. You deserve to sit outside all night and gaze at the stars. You deserve deserve to be happy because all you do is make others happy. You shouldn't be forced to join in on something you want nothing to do with. You deserve to be with your friends; you deserve every happiness in the world."

Nash wasn't finished, but he was slightly crying. He had to stop to wipe his eyes with his robe sleeve, and Aquila didn't say a word. She knew he had more to say, so she let him say it.

"And," he continued once he collected himself, "if you need me, I'll help you. I'll help hide you from them; I'll get you away from here. I'll... I'll buy you and your friends tickets to Timbuktu or someplace You-Know-Who won't find you. I'll make bloody sure that you're happy and well, and you've got a window to look out of to see the stars every night because you deserve that. And I'll do whatever I have to, break however many rules necessary, to get you just that. Because I love you more than I can say, and I need to be more like you."

Aquila didn't know what to say. She had no idea that's what her brother thought, and now that she knew, she promised never to raise her voice around him again. He deserved just as much happiness as she did because he helped her.

"I love you too, Nashy," she said, wrapping her arms around her brother, letting him cry onto her shoulder. "And I know you want to protect me, but it's like you said: I can't refuse them."

"But you said-"

"I know what I said, and I stand by that," Aquila announced. "But, at the same time, you're right, and there's no denying that. I can't stop it, but I can prolong the time before it."

"What are you going to do?" Nash asked.

"After school's done," Aquila said, "I'm going on a very long vacation. I'm going somewhere You-Know-You won't ever think to find me."

"Where?" her brother asked.

"America. The land where eagles like me can fly free."

|*| MERICA |*|