Siriusly in Love

Ascella's Help

"Have you seen Delphinia Clarke?" Remus asked a tall, blonde haired Ravenclaw.

"Nope," he responded.

A few yards away, Marlene asked a short, plump Hufflepuff girl, "Delphinia Clarke, do you know where she is?"

The girl just shook her head and walked away.

The Great Hall had emptied, and the Entrance Hall was semi-crowded with students going their separate ways to get to their common rooms and Sirius, Remus, James, Peter, Lily, and Marlene asking any person who would stop and listen where Delphinia was.

When everyone but the six had gone, they came together in a circle near the base of the marble staircase.

"No one has seen her," Sirius said.

"One girl said she might've seen her go to the common room," James replied.

"But I already went up and checked," Peter said. "And neither Kim Cooper or Carri Wood said she's in your dorm."

"Mary, Alice, and Dorcas haven't seen her either," Lily said.

"Where could she be?" Remus said.

"I know where she is."

Everyone turned to look where the voice had come from. Near the door to the dungeons, where the Slytherin common room was, a tall, dirty blonde haired girl stood leaning against the door post, Ascella Clarke.

"Where the bloody hell is she?" Sirius asked stepping forward.

"Woah, back off Mr. StrongMan," Ascella smirked.

"Ascella where is she?" Lily asked from beside James.

"We're on first name basis now, Evans?" Ascella said condescendingly.

"Well obviously not since you just called her 'Evans'," Remus said. "Where is she?"

"Oh would the lot of you relax?" Ascella said laughing a bit. "She's in the corridor with the awful painting of that giant pig with a witch hat is."

"Why would she be there?" Peter asked.

"I don't know why my sister does half the things she does. I just found her, she told me to 'go the hell away', and I left," Ascella said. "Well, goodnight to you all."

And she went down through the door to the dungeons the echo of her footsteps dying once the door closed behind her.

"Well? What are we waiting for let's go!" Marlene said, and she set off at a fast pace down a corridor, the rest of the lot following after her.

A few minutes later, they stepped a foot down the corridor Ascella had told them, and sure enough Delphinia sat there clutching her hand and silently crying.

"Delph?" Lily said, his eyes widening when she saw tears.

Delphinia looked up, and sighed. "I take it dinner's over?"

Peter, who was standing closest to Delphinia, nodded silently.

"Great... just great. Well, I wasn't to hungry anyway, I mean stabbing myself didn't help with the appetite..." Delphinia mumbled. She began examining her cut hand, almost as if forgetting her friends were standing around her.

"Oh my gosh!" Marlene squealed. "What happened?"

"Episky gone wrong," Delphinia said, her lips pursed.

"You should go to the hospital wing," Remus said.

"No, I'm not going to worry Madam Pomphrey with a stupid cut hand, I'll just do it myself," Delphinia said standing to her feet.

"No you won't," Sirius said, startling his queue of friends, for he had been silent all the way to the corridor. "I'll help you, the rest of you lot get upstairs before Filch finds you."

"What?" James asked, clearly hurt he wasn't going to get to sneak past Filch if Sirius and Delphinia took until past curfew.

"Go upstairs, we'll be there in a bit," Sirius said firmly.

Slowly, Remus and Peter turned and began walking away. Lily and Marlene followed. James hesitated, glanced at Delphinia, then turned and walked out of the corridor.

Sirius watched until the back of James's head was out of sight before turning back to Delphinia, who was standing against the wall clutching her hand.

"Who did this?" He asked.

"Me," Delphinia whispered. "I told you, I stabbed myself, tried Episky, and it went wrong."

"I have see enough failed Espiskys, I speak from experience, and this is not it," Sirius said taking Delphinia's hand and examining it.

A fluttering feeling erupted in Delphinia's stomach. "I told you the truth."

"Fine... Episky," Sirius had pulled his wand out and now he was tracing it over her wounds, which were slowly healing themselves.

Once her hand was healed thoroughly, Delphinia made to walk away from Sirius, for she knew he would most likely ask about her knee and how it ended up like that. She wasn't ready to tell him.
But, Sirius caught hold of her hand (Causing more flutters in Delphinia's stomach).

Delphinia turned, and made eye contact with her best friend. "What?"

"You know you can tell me anything right?" Sirius asked, still holding Delphinia's hand.

"Of course I know... it's just... I'm not ready..."

"I understand," Sirius said. "Well we should go back to the tower."

"Yeah, let's go," Delphinia said dropping her hand from Sirius's grasp. She turned on her heel, and her dark hair flew in a sharp angle across her back.

Sirius chuckled. He put an arm around Delphinia's shoulder, and said, "I love it when you do that."

Delphinia smiled. "I know you do."

The two walked together back to the Gryffindor common room, where, both being so tired, fell asleep in each other's arms on the long maroon couch in front of the fire.