Maybe you could save my soul
From all the things that I don't know

So pray for me brother
I need redemption
I'm just a man
A man on a mission
I want no trouble
I want no trouble
I want no trouble
I want no trouble

Pray for me sister
Give me a mention
I got no faith
And oh, did I mention
I want no trouble
I want no trouble
I want no trouble
I want no trouble

"Trouble"
Imagine Dragons

~

GEORGE:

Though she wasn't fooling any of us, Lucy continued to insist she was alright, and since she did really seem to feel better once we left St. Mungo's, we didn't press her. Once we got back to Grimmauld Place, she seemed nearly normal except for the sickly coloration of her face, so we all exchanged subtle looks and shrugs as we followed her into the sitting room.

Lucy smiled at me as she turned around. "Do you have truth or dare with you?"

"Of course we do," Fred answered before I could even truly register the question. "Grab my arm, you can come with me to grab it."

She did, and the two disappeared with a crack.

"What the hell happened?" I asked the room at large. "Why is she like this?"

Harry shook his head and sighed. "Lockhart, Sloane, Mungo's in general, I think it was just too much for her."

"Lockhart—?"

But before anyone could answer me, Lucy and Fred returned, each with a bag in hand, and the game began.

Ginny went first, choosing dare, and she had to let me draw whatever he wanted on her arm with our seven-day semi-permanent ink. I, obviously, wrote "GEORGE IS MY FAVORITE BROTHER" in the largest letters possible.

For my turn, I chose dare too, and I had to peel my socks off using just my teeth. It was gross, of course, but I made it more fun by launching my socks at Fred's face once I was through.

Hermione was the first person to choose truth, and we all learned that she was more afraid of banshees than any other magical beast or being.

Ron chose truth as well, and we all learned that he once went an entire week without showering after losing a bet to Seamus, which was thankfully not a recent incident.

Fred went with dare, and he had to cram an entire piece of parchment in his mouth and leave it there until his next turn. (It was Lucy's idea, and I was sure she had done it just to avoid whatever Fred had in mind for her turn.)

Harry opted for truth, and when we asked who in the room he would most hate to see naked, he answered Ron because he'd already seen that on accident and he'd rather not repeat the experience.

Lucy decided on dare after a couple of seconds of deliberation, and she had to do her best Snape impression whenever she talked until her next turn. She committed to the role, taking her hair out of its ponytail so it hung like curtains around her face. I offered to make it greasy like Snape's and to turn her robes black if she really wanted to do a proper impersonation, but she said she'd pass.

We got through four rounds total before dinner, and it was a much-needed distraction from the unexpected heaviness of the day.

Even though Lucy looked a bit better, she was still clearly exhausted, so none of us were surprised when she said she was going to bed as soon as we were through with dinner. Once we heard her heading up the stairs, Mum turned to Harry.

"Is she alright? She looked a bit peaky when we saw you again."

"Yeah, Harry, what were you saying about Lockhart?" I asked. "Is that what rattled her?"

"Most likely," he replied with a nod. He turned to those of us who weren't there with the younger kids and began explaining that they'd gotten snagged by Lockhart on their way to the fifth-floor tearoom. His story was interrupted, though, by Lucy's distant voice.

"Dad?"

There was an unusual groaning sound above us, as if someone was crawling across the floor.

"D-Dad?"

Hermione looked up at the ceiling. "Why is she—?"

She was cut off by a strange whooshing sound, followed by a thud.

"It's all your fault! You know that, don't you?" someone new shouted.

Harry jumped to his feet, staring at the ceiling. "No," he gasped as he sprinted from the room, Remus on his heels with his wand drawn.

"Why does that voice sound familiar?" Ginny asked.

We all froze, listening to the voices as silence fell.

"I didn't want you to!" Lucy whimpered. "I was scared, and for good reason!"

"You should have just said so, then! If you had, maybe I would have listened to you and none of this would have happened!" the voice shouted back.

"I know, I know, I'm sorry!"

"You know what's going to happen now, right? Everyone's going to leave you? You're going to be alone in the world the second you graduate!"

All at once, I recognized the voice and realized what was happening. I apparated one floor above us without another second of hesitation.

The Cedric boggart kept shouting. "You're not even arguing, because you know I'm right! You know I was your only chance, and now I'm gone just like everyone else! Nobody is going to be there to save you the way I always was!"

Lucy was on the other end of the hallway, tears streaming down her deathly pale face as she stumbled backwards. Stumbling toward her was the familiar silhouette of Cedric. I yanked my wand out of my pocket.

"That's not true," I snapped. "Riddikulus!"

The boggart whirled on me, and Harry sprinted past me, catching Lucy just as she crumpled.

Rather than becoming a dog, though, Boggart Cedric fell backward onto the ground. The Hufflepuff robes gave way to Gryffindor, the brown hair gave way to red.

Fred. Dead, on the floor in front of me.

It's just a boggart, George, pull yourself together—

"Riddikulus!"

The Fred boggart jumped up and made a ridiculous face at me. I laughed, and it disappeared with a pop.

Remus bounded up just behind me. "Boggart?"

"Boggart," I confirmed.

"Didn't think to apparate," he panted under his breath. "I'll go tell everyone to stay downstairs for a bit, if you and Harry have this under control?"

I nodded, and he disapparated as I followed Harry and Lucy. He had managed to pull her into the girls' room, where she was sitting on the floor with her back to the wall and her head in her hands.

"It's gone," I said softly, crouching next to Harry in front of her. "It can't hurt you."

"Thanks, George," she whispered. She didn't lift her head.

"You know it's not true, right?" Harry asked.

Lucy's only answer was a choked sob.

"Lucy." I reached forward and lowered her hands, tipping her chin up so she locked eyes with me. "Nobody blames you. And I mean nobody."

She didn't answer, just inhaling and exhaling shakily as she searched my eyes for something. I wasn't sure quite what. She nearly always had that same piercing look, but there was something she needed to hear.

Harry inched closer and lowered himself to the ground beside her. "You're never going to be alone, Lucy," he said.

Bugger, yep, that's it, that's what she needed to hear.

"Bloody hell, yeah, Cub, we're never going to just leave you to fend for yourself," I added quickly. "Sure, Fred and I will have the jump on you when it comes to graduating, but you'll still have the others there with you and you'll catch up with us in no time."

"It's just... we had a plan." Lucy stared down at her hands, tears still slipping from her eyes. "And now that plan is gone, and so is he. If I had told him not to do the Tournament, he wouldn't have done the Tournament. He asked me what I thought, I had so many chances to say I was scared, but I never did because — because he was so excited to finally be doing something because he wanted to do it and not just because Dad wanted him to do it."

Harry and I exchanged a brief glance. I couldn't remember her ever talking about the Tournament like this when I was around. She'd been worried about it, obviously, but I had never realized the circumstances surrounding Cedric entering were so complicated. From the look on Harry's face, I guessed she'd never really talked about it with him either.

"It's not your fault, Cub, it was still his decision in the end even if he did ask for your opinion," I said.

She squeezed her eyes shut. "I miss him."

Harry reached forward just as everything caved in, and Lucy clung to him desperately, her weak sobs muffled by his shoulder.

In that moment, I realized something important. As much as I cared about Lucy, I knew there was something special about Harry. They always looked to each other when something happened for better or for worse. They had been in the trenches together for years, from dementors to Dolores and everything in between. They were stronger together, always had been. What they had was special, always had been. They could have each other.

I would be the protector. I would do whatever I needed to do to get Lucy and Harry to where they were in that moment: together. They were going to do something, be something, those kids, and I knew in that moment that they absolutely needed each other to get there.

I ruffled Harry's hair as I pushed myself to my feet. "I'm going to go make sure there aren't any other unpleasant surprises lurking nearby," I said softly. "Come and find me if you need anything, alright?"

"Will do," Harry replied, but we both knew he had it under control.

"We're not going anywhere, Lucy," I said as I reached down and brushed a couple of flyaway hairs off of her forehead, which was certainly still feverish. "Just rest as long as you need. We'll be here whenever you're ready."

She managed a small nod, still clinging to Harry. I slipped from the room and closed the door behind me before apparating back downstairs.

"Harry's got it handled," I reported to the group in the kitchen. I glanced at Fred. "Want to help me make sure there aren't banshees hiding in anyone's beds?"

"I think I overheard a hag in the drawing room plotting to murder us all tonight, so I reckon we should check it out," he said with a grin in response, jumping up and grabbing his wand. As soon as we left the kitchen, he dropped his voice to a mumble. "She alright?"

"She's got Harry, so she will be. Figured I'd let him do his thing while we did ours."

Fred nodded. "Sounds good. I wonder where that boggart was hiding all this time."

"I suppose we can ask in the morning, or Harry might get it out of her tonight." I sighed. "I didn't realize she was so afraid of being alone. I thought by now she'd know we would never let that happen."

"Yeah, and with brains like hers, she'll get snatched up by the Ministry and be just fine. Like our darling brother Percy, except she won't be a git."

"She will never be a git," I agreed with a laugh, "but the Ministry? Lucy? She would hate that. I could see her gallivanting from dragon sanctuary to dragon sanctuary. Or—" I froze in place.

"Or what?" Fred prompted.

An idea was forming, a bloody brilliant idea, bursting into my mind in vibrant colors. It was one of the best ideas I'd ever had, I reckoned.

"Or what?" he repeated impatiently.

I grinned and turned to him. "Freddie, I think we're going to need a bit of help around the shop this summer from the girl who always believed in us."

"I think you're right," he replied with an identical grin. "Mate, that's one of the best ideas you've ever had."

We started walking again, going from room to room as we discussed the logistics of it in low tones nobody else would overhear. And even once we retired to our bedroom late that night, we were still talking about it. Fred fell asleep first, leaving me awake with visions of a summer well spent dancing in my head.

No more having something we wanted to tell her only to realize she was a thirty-plus minute walk away.

No more walking half an hour to get to her house, hoping she'd be able to escape with us for a little while.

No more worrying about whether or not she would alright once we had to take her back.

And, most importantly, no more chance of her being kidnapped from Ottery St. Catchpole while we were in London, completely unaware that something that horrible could even happen.

We could have a flat, the three of us. Working in the shop by day, talking and tinkering and laughing and lightening the world around us by night. Sure, it would be hard work, and we'd have to get the shop up and running before getting Lucy formally involved, but it just felt so right. When Harry had given us the money in June, he'd asked us to make Lucy laugh again. We'd been somewhat successful as time had gone on, but what better way to make someone laugh than to throw her in the middle of a Weasley-run joke shop?

I fell asleep that night with a smile on my face.

~

At first, my dreams reflected the excitement still stirring inside me even in sleep. Various flashing images of the three of us bickering and laughing over a cauldron, of Fred and Lucy tossing fireworks back and forth, of Lucy helping me charm Fred's leg hair purple as he slept on the floor with a half-finished box of Ton-Tongue Toffees next to him. It was whimsical and wonderful, and I couldn't wait to start working toward making it a reality.

Then my subconscious remembered everything from the last summer, starting with that one night.

The flash of light at the entrance of the maze.

The way Lucy was the first to know something was wrong. Everyone was cheering. She alone knew something was wrong. She launched herself forward onto the grass, racing toward Cedric and Harry. Screeching to a halt six feet away.

That was when people started to realize something was wrong. Fleur screamed. Dumbledore started yelling.

"We have to get to Lucy," I muttered to Fred, and we started shoving through the crowd.

Harry started yelling, too, but we couldn't make out the words over the roar of the spectators.

We reached the stairs just as Lucy sprinted away. At the base of the stairs, Snape tried to stop us and tell us to go back to our seats, but Dumbledore stepped up behind him and laid a hand on his shoulder.

He fixed us with his intense blue eyes. "Follow her and bring her to my office, please, boys."

We nodded, panic climbing as we ducked past Snape and hurried away.

But those precious seconds had cost us. We couldn't find Lucy. She had disappeared into the night. In my panic, I couldn't remember the incantation for the tracking spell. Fortunately, Fred did.

"Appare vestigium!" he hissed, and golden footprints appeared, heading toward the lake.

We started running at top speed in their direction. We ran even faster when the most heartbroken scream I'd ever heard split the night.

"Lucy!" I shouted. "Lucy!"

"Lucy!" Fred echoed.

We called her name until we spotted her on the shore of the Black Lake. She looked so small. So small.

I grabbed her shoulder. "We're here, Cub, we're here."

Fred nodded. "We're here."

She didn't acknowledge either of us, staring straight ahead with glazed-over eyes as she trembled violently beneath our grips.

"Dumbledore asked us to follow you and bring you to his office," Fred explained softly. "We should go."

Finally, a tiny nod. We hauled her to her feet as I looked up the hill to see what the situation was.

"Fred, it looks like they're emptying the stands."

He gently tugged Lucy's hood up over her head.

"Just so nobody tries to bother you, Cub," I said.

She nodded again, so we started heading up to the castle. She was so unsteady on her feet it likely would have been easier to carry her, but the last thing we wanted to do was attract any more attention. My head was on a swivel, my eyes searching the darkness for any hidden threats, my ears on high alert as I listened for anything or anyone approaching. But nothing happened, and we reached the entrance to Dumbledore's office without incident.

We'd only been sitting against the wall for a minute or two when a massive black dog — Sirius, I later learned — approached. I was afraid of it for a moment, but then I realized how silly it was to be afraid of dogs when something so horrific and violent and shocking and earth-shattering had just happened.

Cedric, dead.

Cedric, who would have been Head Boy.

Cedric, who was already prefect and Quidditch Captain and Trainee Healer and Triwizard Champion.

Cedric, who made sure nobody had to sit alone two days in a row in any of our classes.

Cedric, who turned the other way with a subtle wink and smirk whenever he saw us setting up a prank.

Cedric, who was the first to help the second someone needed it.

Cedric, who had a bright smile and contagious laugh.

Cedric, who always knew how to help Lucy even when the rest of us were lost.

Cedric, dead.

What did a world look like without Cedric in it? For Lucy, for Hufflepuff, for Hogwarts?

If not even Golden Boy was safe, what did that mean for the rest of us?

Eventually, Dumbledore arrived with Harry, who was covered in sweat and dirt and even a bit of blood. Harry didn't meet anyone's eyes, not even Lucy's, which was yet another indication that something inconceivably horrible had happened, something beyond Cedric dying.

We helped Lucy up and walked her over to the others.

Dumbledore leaned close. "Make sure every entrance is secure. I take it you two know what I mean by every?"

Fred and I nodded. We knew the ins and the outs of the school as well as he did at that point, thanks to the Map.

"Be back in a bit, Cub," Fred said as we released her arms. "You're in good hands now."

With that, we set off again into the night.

"Reckon we should borrow the Map from Harry?" I asked.

"We know it by now," Fred muttered. He drew his wand. "Hopefully we can deal with anyone we encounter, or at least make enough noise to alert someone who can."

We avoided the primary corridors of the castle, especially the ones leading to the four common rooms, but there was chaos everywhere we turned. Even in the hallways without people, the portraits were shouting back and forth about the murder of Cedric Diggory, the prefect who always struck up friendly conversations and genuinely seemed to care about whatever they had to say. In the hallways where we did come across people, nobody was alright. Some were crying, some were pacing back and forth, some were throwing punches or spells or both at the stone walls, some were simply staring into space with shocked expressions. Even Cassius Warrington, notorious sixth-year Slytherin bully, seemed torn up.

"Wait, Weasleys—" he said in a choked voice as we ran past.

We stopped, half-turning around. "Yeah?"

"Is Diggory really dead?"

I couldn't bring myself to say it. That would have made it too real.

"Yeah, mate," Fred replied, his own voice cracking. "He is."

Warrington swore loudly before stomping off. Fred and I exchanged a heavy look before we kept going.

We didn't find anything or anyone worrisome, but we were glad we had checked regardless. We each added a couple of protective enchantments where needed, both trying not to think about anything that had happened until the job was done. By the time we returned to Gryffindor tower, the common room was empty. It was late, very late. Though the room itself was empty, the sound of muffled sobbing in the dormitories reached our ears.

Fred and I exchanged one more heavy look before making our way up to our own dormitory. Angelina flung herself at Fred, and Alicia sprinted forward and latched onto me.

I blinked. Lee and Kenneth were in the dormitory, too, but Alicia had chosen me. If the world hadn't been ending, I might have felt something about that. But it was, so I didn't.

"Where were you?" Angelina asked, nearly hysterical.

"We went to check every entrance," I replied. I stroked Alicia's hair in an attempt to comfort her, but my mind was elsewhere. The world was ending, surely the world was ending. Cedric, dead. "Dumbledore asked."

After that, the dream faded away to nothingness, and I opened my eyes just as the sun was beginning to rise. I rolled over and buried my face in my pillow, thoughts of that night still swirling in my mind.

I'd had a number of long days in my lifetime. Long nights, too. No night, however, felt quite so long as that one, where the six of us sat in almost silence, suffocated by the shock and grief and trauma of it all. We dropped off one by one after sunrise, but I was the last one awake. I had been scared to fall asleep, not knowing if someone else would be gone by the time I opened my eyes again.

~

Lucy was awake far earlier than I would have expected, Remus and Sirius too. She was already laughing by the time I walked in, and Sirius was looking rather proud of himself for it as Remus shook his head with a resigned smile.

"Morning, Cub," I said, tugging on her ponytail as I walked past her and started fixing up a cup of coffee. "What could possibly be this funny at seven in the morning?"

"Morning, Georgie. Sirius falling off his broom into the Black Lake in the middle of the night, that's what," she answered with a giggle.

I raised my eyebrows at him, about to make an attempt at a witty remark, but he was already defending himself.

"Marlene fell in first!" he declared. "We were both a tad drunk, too, it's not like we would have fallen while sober!"

"A tad," Remus repeated dryly with an accusatory sip of tea.

"Okay, maybe a bit more than a tad—"

"What is a bit more than a tad?" I wondered aloud as I summoned two mugs into my hand. "A smidgen? I want to know exactly how much alcohol was involved before I start taking the mickey out of you."

"Go on and take it, it's yours," Remus said, sipping his tea again with an altogether mischievous look on his face.

Sirius swatted his arm. "Shove off, Moony, who's side are you on? Oh, speaking of Moony, what did you call dearest Lucy, George? Cub?"

"Oh, yeah." I grinned as I set the mugs on the counter. "Well, she hated the nickname 'Little Diggs,' so we had to think of something."

"'We' meaning George and Fred," Lucy explained. I paused for half a second as I reached for the coffee grounds. George and Fred, not Fred and George. It sounded foreign, unusual. Not like it was wrong, necessarily, since we were both still mentioned. I shook my head and kept going. "The Quidditch Captain my first year stuck with Little Diggs. Cedric seemed perfectly content with just calling me Lu, and Harry started doing it too. Why they've stuck with Cub all these years is beyond me."

"You're still just our little lion cub," I replied, going to pat her head as I walked past her to the other end of the kitchen. "So small, so young."

"For your information, Weasley, I am significantly taller now than I was a year ago," she spluttered.

"Oh, I know that. You barely reached my elbow when we went to the Yule Ball together, and now you're just barely over it."

Lucy scanned the table for something to throw at me to no avail. "Shove off, I was taller than that! I am taller than that!"

"What was that?" I used one hand to cup the ear facing her as I walked past her again with the needed ingredients in my other hand. "I can't hear you from up here."

"Don't test me, Weasley, I will march upstairs and grab the Beater bat you and Fred gave me out of my trunk. I'll grab Ginny's too, for that matter. How humiliating would that be, being clubbed by your own Christmas gifts to us?"

I turned and looked at Sirius. "Do you hear anything?"

"Nope," he replied with a shrug. "Do you, Moony?"

To my surprise, he shook his head immediately. "No, nothing at all."

"Oh, thanks a lot," Lucy huffed, smiling regardless. "Very funny, you can all stop now."

I promptly turned around and started dumping cinnamon into Fred's mug.

"I hope you know you're all insufferable!" Lucy announced with a laugh. "All three of you!"

The door opened and shut as I started sprinkling mint into my mug.

"Calling someone insufferable who isn't me for a change?" Harry asked as he entered the kitchen. "What a pleasant surprise."

Lucy huffed. "They've earned it. They're acting like they can't hear me."

"Are you a coffee man, Remus?" I asked, deliberately not looking at Lucy or Harry as I took a seat at the table and waited for the coffee to be ready.

"No, I prefer tea, I'm afraid."

"Pity. How about you, Sirius?"

"He doesn't need it," Remus muttered with an exasperated look.

"It tastes like poison anyway," Sirius remarked, "but he's right, my natural enthusiasm for life is enough to sustain me."

Remus choked on his tea laughing, and Harry and Lucy laughed across the table at his reaction. I seized advantage of this moment to show Lucy the true meaning of insufferable.

I grinned. "Say, have you heard that Lucy and Ginny are the newest Gryffindor Beaters?"

"I have not!" Sirius leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. "I was never on the Quidditch team myself because that would have been dreadfully unfair to the other teams, seeing as I was truly spectacular on the rare occasion I had a bat in my hand."

"Oh, don't flatter yourself, Pads, you were just too lazy to be bothered with all of the workouts that Quidditch practices entailed," Remus said with a roll of his eyes. "Lucy and Ginny are learning from the best, I'm sure?"

"Obviously," I replied. "Lucy's dead awful at it, though, if I'm being honest with you. Couldn't hit a single Bludger if we put it on a tee in front of her and gave her a bat the size of the one-eyed witch statue."

"Is that so? Such a shame. Whatever will you do?"

I heaved a massive sigh. "We might have to replace her with Dobby if she doesn't get her act together."

Both Remus and Sirius managed to keep a straight face, but Harry and Lucy started laughing.

"Did I show you what Dobby got me for Christmas?" Harry asked.

Rather than answering him, Sirius decided to ignore him the way we were ignoring Lucy. "Tell me, George, how did it feel punching a Malfoy across the face?"

"I'd been wanting to do it for years, so I'll admit it was quite nice. I'm sure Harry would tell you the same, if he were here."

"I am telling you the same, because I am here—"

"Though, if I'm being honest," I continued in a louder voice to drown out Harry, "Harry throws the worst punches I've ever seen."

"In case you've forgotten, I was the one who gave him that black eye—"

"He was flailing like a bowtruckle in the breeze."

"I knocked the wind out of him, too, you were mainly cussing him out while I was throwing the punches—"

"Maybe one or both of you could teach the poor boy how to throw a punch before we head back to Hogwarts, you never know when Malfoy will strike again, that little ferret bastard."

Sirius began cracking up, and Lucy tried to seize advantage of the break in the steady stream of words.

"What did Dobby get you for Christmas, Harry?" she asked.

Harry snorted. "A painting of myself."

"Oh, I'm sure it's lovely. If only he'd hung it up in the Room of Requirement instead of those golden ornaments with your face."

And just like that, we were paying attention to Lucy and Harry again.

"Wait, what?" I asked. "Golden ornaments with Harry's face? Why didn't I see those?"

And just like that, they were ignoring us.

Harry grinned. "I still think 'Happy Ho-Lucy-days' has a nice ring to it."

"And 'Have a Very Harry Christmas' doesn't?" Lucy fired back.

Sirius started cracking up again as Remus and I exchanged an amused look.

"I'd love to see the painting," Lucy went on, "but I think it would be better if my gift from Dobby stayed firmly tucked away."

"What did Dobby give you? If it's a painting too, we can hang them up side-by-side in the hallway, he'd be thrilled."

"It is a painting, but not of me. Apparently Luna told Dobby that we loved the mistletoe so much we didn't want to take it down—"

"MISTLETOE?" Remus, Sirius, and I all burst out in unison.

Neither fifteen-year-old was expecting the volume with which we exploded, so the game of ignoring each other finally ended.

Lucy flushed. "Yes, mistletoe. Dobby decorated the Room of Requirement for our last D.A. meeting of the year with massive ornaments of Harry's face and whatnot, so we took those down, but Luna arrived before we could start removing the mistletoe and she pointed out that there was a strand of it above us so we obviously both jumped back out of the way. Luna must have thought we were worried about nargles but otherwise unbothered, though, because Dobby sent me his own artistic interpretation of mistletoe." She sighed. "I knew I should have tried to vanish it the way I vanished the one ornament with my face and not Harry's."

"Wait, how did you vanish that?" I asked, cocking my head. "I thought your wand arm was the one in the sling, that's why you switched back to the verbal essays instead of the written ones."

"It was," she confirmed.

"Wait, sling?" Remus asked. "What happened?"

Lucy shifted in her seat. "I, er, was sleepwalking and fell into a lance."

"As entertaining as that story is, don't bother with it around me," Sirius said. "I think I know what actually happened."

"I don't." Remus cast a quick Muffliato Charm before leaning forward. "Was there a change of plan? You weren't in the Shrieking Shack, were you?"

Lucy shook her head, staring at her hand as she slowly drummed her fingers against the table. "Room of Requirement still. I still don't fully understand what happened, but I somehow overpowered the magic in the room that had been keeping me safe all those years and scratched myself."

Sirius and Remus exchanged a look rife with meaning.

"How strong is your wandless magic, Lucy?" Remus asked after a moment.

I blinked. Wandless magic? Lucy?

No one else in the room seemed surprised by the question, though.

Lucy glanced at Harry. "How strong do you think it is?"

"Er, in my opinion, very strong. I'd say the accidental magic is the more, er, interesting development, though." He looked at Remus. "It sounds like you know what's going on."

"I'm guessing it started close to the full moon?" Remus asked, looking at Lucy.

"Yeah, that's when it was at its peak. It started with sparks coming from my wand when I wasn't paying much attention, then it escalated bit by bit until, well, this." She rubbed her shoulder and glanced at me. "I vanished the ornament just by holding my hand out over it and focusing. I thought maybe it was just the Room of Requirement being nice to me after, well, everything, but—" She laughed humorlessly and looked back at Remus. "So you're implying this is a lycanthropy thing?"

He nodded. "There comes a time when our magic begins to function a bit differently. I'm sorry for not explaining this sooner, I didn't realize... well, I thought perhaps it would happen for you after the summer you had, but the exact opposite happened and you lost your magic almost entirely so I thought maybe it wouldn't happen for a while still since you're so young. I didn't experience it until after the first war ended." A shadow crossed his face as his voice cracked, but he glanced at Sirius and composed himself again. "I made all of the pipes in my flat explode when I heard the news about how it had ended."

"So what do I do?" Lucy asked after a moment, her voice scared and small. "What did you do?"

"Never do what I did," he replied solemnly. "I isolated myself. I ran away. I was afraid. Terrified."

Lucy and Harry exchanged a glance so quick I would have missed it if I had blinked.

Remus pursed his lips. "I wish there were a way to overcome or deceive the Trace so I could teach you a bit of what I know about controlling it, but the fact of the matter is that control takes time and patience. You can't control it indefinitely, though — you have to find release."

"Or release will find me?" she asked with a small smile.

"It will certainly find you," he agreed. "Let's just say I've become quite skilled with mending charms."

Lucy grinned, and I found my voice for the first time in quite a while.

"And to think, we started trying to teach you wandless magic years ago," I quipped, shaking my head as I smiled at her. "Little did we know that you should be the one teaching us."

"As soon as I figure it out, I'll let you know," she replied dryly, "and until then—"

Her threat was interrupted by the timer for the coffee going off, and everyone laughed when Fred walked in at that exact moment. Once we sat back down with our steaming mugs of coffee, I noticed that Lucy and Harry both seemed a bit relieved, and I was sure it was because of what Remus had said.

What he said about finding a way to overcome the Trace was interesting, in addition to everything else. It would certainly come in handy when Lucy was with us for the summer.

Especially if Lucy was proficient with wandless magic by then. Especially if she could teach us how to do it reliably, too. Restocking the shelves would be a breeze. Not to mention the potential for pranks, if a telltale wand wasn't necessary.

I smirked as I lifted my mug to my lips. The rest of Christmas holiday would be fun and very educational, if we had anything to say about it.

~

A/N: Hi everyone! I'm sorry this chapter is late. I ended up deciding to bump it back a day so that this chapter fell on the anniversary of Cedric's death, especially since the first two-thirds is so Cedric-centric. I hope you all enjoyed it!

Just as a heads up, Chapter 159 might be a day late, too. I started school again this week and will be working at a wedding almost all day on Saturday, so Chapter 159 might be heading your way on Sunday. Thank you for all being patient with me when life gets hectic, it means a lot to me.

Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to attend my philosophy class then watch Goblet of Fire and cry since it's June 24th. (He died in Chapter 69, if anyone is interested in reading that again today.) Love you all!