Echo | Harry Potter - George Weasley

Chapter 59: The Order of the Phoenix

When Shaye arrived at Grimmauld Place, she tried to look as normal as one possibly could while dragging along a trunk behind them with one hand and carrying an owl cage with the other. It was nearly dark outside and the sunset was a beautiful shade of deep orange in the sky. 

It had been difficult for Shaye to convince her mother to let her go back to Hogwarts for her fifth year, but in the end, Elise had agreed so long as Shaye promised to keep her head down and not go looking for any trouble. Shaye had made the promise; a promise she knew she would break. 

Shaye didn't like lying to her mother, but the ease and comfort it brought to Elise's face was worth it in the end. Shaye told herself over and over that everything would be okay, so long as her mother wasn't worried about her. 

Walking down the sidewalk, Shaye's eyes drifted from the house numbers when she noticed a familiar man with shoulder-length black hair standing a few units down. He looked much more put together than the last time Shaye had seen him—combed hair, clean skin, tidy clothes—but there was no doubt it was Sirius Black.

"You got my letters." Sirius seemed relieved when he spotted Shaye. "I was worried when you didn't answer."

"Not answering letters has kind of been my thing this summer." Shaye shrugged it off.

Sirius nodded. "So I've heard. Your friends have been worried. They think you may have left the country."

"For a day or two after my father's funeral, I thought that maybe we would," Shaye said. "It was hard to convince my mum to let me come here, let alone go back to Hogwarts this year. She's scared."

"As she should be." Sirius placed a hand on Shaye's shoulder and lowered his voice slightly. "There are some things about your father that I think you should know. But I'll tell you later. First, let's head inside."

As Shaye turned toward the row of side by side, skinny houses, she spotted the number 11 on one and 13 on the next. "I thought your letter said 12." she cocked a brow.

"It did," Sirius said before muttering something under his breath. All of a sudden, numbers 11 and 13 began to shift away from one another, a completely new unit appearing between them out of thin air. Number 12 Grimmauld place rumbled as it slid into view, the windows taking form on the second story at the same time that a balcony materialized. 

By that point in her life, Shaye had been so many truly unbelievable things that she didn't even blink at the way the new unit of the building popped up between the two as if it had been there all along. 

With a wave of his arm, Sirius gestured Shaye inside. "Everyone is already here except for Harry," Sirius said as he climbed the steps to the front door and pushed it open. "He's gotten into a little bit of trouble this summer."

Shaye gasped. "Trouble? Is he okay? He didn't mention anything in his letters."

"He's fine," Sirius assured her as the two stepped into the house. "Just a little incident with underage magic use outside of school. It'll be cleared up in no time."

"I hope so." Shaye set her trunk to the side and placed Erwin's cage on top of it. 

The entranceway to the home was a long, narrow, dimly lit hallway with picture frames on the wall. The wallpaper was peeling in some spots and the few lamps that provided light flickered on and off.

"It's not much," Sirius ushered Shaye down the hallway toward the room at the end where faint voices could be heard, "but it's safe."

With that, Sirius squeezed past Shaye in the hallway and pushed open the door to what looked like the kitchen. It was much brighter inside that room but from where she was standing, Shaye could only see Sirius and a small, grumpy-looking house-elf as it rushed out of the kitchen, through Shaye's legs and out of sight.