Cored

Chapter 28: Seen and Heard

She landed in the familiar kitchen and noticed it was oddly quiet. Nothing was stirring or cleaning itself. There was no tea kettle hot on the stove. It felt incredibly wrong.

Katherine looked around but didn't see anyone. When she noticed the door was open, she walked out into the garden.

"I'm sure they'll find her, Angelina," she heard a voice she thought was Fleur's.

"Yeah, Ang, she can't be far." Audrey, maybe? Katherine walked around to see if her guess was right.

She saw the three women sitting on the ground, facing away from the house and out towards the hills.

"I just don't know that I'm doing this right, you know? Maybe I should have insisted that she stayed with us. Or I should have set up an alarm or something. What if this is all my fault?"

Katherine was about to call out and tell them she was fine, but she stopped when she heard what came from Fleur's mouth next.

"You're doing the best you can, Ang. It would be enough with your history with George to make this situation complicated, but to have dated Fred as another woman was pregnant with his child? There is no road map for that. You've been so kind to her, so graceful—it's all anyone could ask of you. More than, really."

"I don't know how you do it," Audrey continued. "Percy's been beating himself up since she arrived. He's always felt so awful about choosing the Ministry, now he's convinced himself he could have fixed everything if he would have stuck around. He feels even more guilty about how Fred died. He won't say it, but I know he is having nightmares about the Battle of Hogwarts again. How you manage to carry it all, I'll never know."

"And Bill's a mess. He wants to get to know her, of course, but it's just a lot to come to terms with. Not to mention that Fred would have found out about her right after the Yule Ball? No one can blame you for being a bit thrown."

"I don't hold any of it against her," Angelina said, shaking her head. "I couldn't. As soon as I saw her, I just—I was so glad she was here. So glad that we had this piece of our family back. She makes George so happy. I just want to make sure she doesn't feel smothered, or like I'm trying to step into Evie's shoes. And I want to give her time with George, let them get to really know one another. She's incredible, though. Wicked smart, thoughtful, funny when she wants to be—the other day she came over for dinner and her and George had me laughing so hard I thought I'd burst. She can do some astonishing magic, too. You heard Molly talking about the lights? And I've never once heard her say a spell out loud."

"Ginny can't stop talking about her," Fleur noted. "Even Ron's really come around. And Charlie with that owl? It'll just take time, but everything will feel normal after a while."

"If they find her," Angelina said. "Ugh, what if something happened to her?"

Katherine turned around then, not wanting to listen anymore. She felt her blood pressure rising, the static growing like steam inside of her. There was too much to take in, too much to process, too many people worrying about her. She walked into the kitchen and breathed deeply, screwing up her face. She remembered what McGonagall had said about the Patronus being able to send messages, so she conjured Nestor into her hand.

"Can you tell all the Weasleys that I'm fine? I don't know where they are looking for me."

The woodpecker rubbed his head against her still shaking fingers before taking flight. She saw him separate into a whole flock, all heading in different directions.

Hermione came out of the floo then, dusting the soot from her skirt before walking to Katherine.

"Where is everyone?" she asked.