After returning inside with Sirius, Éponine enjoyed the rest of her Christmas among the Potters and her friends. It was quiet with the exception of James singing Christmas carols and eventually, she joined in. For a short time, she allowed herself to forget about Regulus and all the events that had happened before. She had once read that even during times of war, muggles would ceasefire to celebrate the holidays. She couldn't ignore reality forever, but it was nice to have several hours where the greatest worry in her life was remembering lyrics to a muggle Christmas song that Lily had taught her the previous year.

And when the night festivities finally came to an end, mostly due to exhaustion, Éponine agreed to return to the flat with Sirius that evening. They departed through the Floo Network after James and Lily left first. She had kissed Euphemia and Fleamont on the cheek, wishing them a Merry Christmas one last time before lifting Toulouse into her arms, and stepping into the fireplace beside Sirius.

Upon her arrival, Éponine released Toulouse onto the floor, watching as he hurried off to explore the home, and then proceeded to step out of the fireplace. The flat had not changed much, if at all since she had left for the start of term. It barely looked like anyone was living there. She looked over at Sirius, who walked over to drop the presents they had recieved onto the sofa before he glanced over in her direction.

"You haven't been here much since I left, have you?" she asked him quietly. "It's like nothing has been moved."

"I've been pretty busy," Sirius said rubbing the back of his head. "And I don't like how quiet it is when I come back here. Usually I just end up staying with James and Lily, but I imagine they're getting tired of that. It's just kinda hard to be here alone. I get so used to you being here during the summer, even if I'm not here all the time, you're always here when I get back."

Éponine walked over and sat down on the sofa, grabbing the few presents and stacking them onto the small coffee table. She pattted the spot next to her, inviting Sirius to sit with her. He didn't need to be asked a second time as he glady took a seat next to her and allowed her to rest her head on his shoulder. Raising her wand, Éponine quietly lit a fire in the fireplace, allowing the warmth to pour into the sitting room as she closed her eyes.

"Can I tell you something and you promise that you won't get upset with me?"

Sirius peered down at her with a curious look, not sure if he liked the idea of making such a promise. However, he wanted her to confide in him, regardless of what it was.

"What it is it, Nin?"

She opened her eyes and stared at the fire. " When you were in hospital with James, I couldn't bring myself to believe what Regulus had done. I didn't think you or James were lying when you told me what happened, I just believed there was more to the story. I didn't want to believe that Regulus was lying to me, so...I..."

"Nin, please, don't tell me you-"

"I went to the Grimmauld Place to see for myself," she admitted to him, not daring to look in his direction as she spoke. "I thought if there was a chance of a misunderstanding that he would tell me and maybe, maybe I could save him."

It was quiet for a moment, and perhaps people would tell her one day that she was too honest, but Éponine didn't care. Even if it made for an uncomfortable situation, she always felt better after telling the truth. It was better than having it weigh heavy on her chest and fill her head with negative thoughts. And even though she had made Sirius promise her that he wouldn't get angry, she wouldn't blame him if he become upset because it was only a natural reaction.

However, he didn't become as emotional as she had anticipated but rather, remained mostly calm.

"What happened when you went there?" he asked. "Was he there?"

Éponine nodded her head. "It was just him and me. I gave him the chance to tell me what was going on, to see if it was all a big misunderstanding. And he told me that it wasn't. He told me he didn't want to be saved. He called me a blood-traitor, called me stupid...told me that he really did plan on hurting me. But I thought since he didn't, that maybe he was lying, that he was just saying all of it for show. Then he...he..."

"Nin, what did he do to you?"

With a swallow, she focused her eyes on her hands. "He hit me with the Furnunculus Curse and told me to get out. He said he was only granting me some mercy because of our past together."

Sirius shook his head as he sat forward on the sofa before he turned to face her. "Nin, how could you have done such a thing? You went there without telling anyone where you were going? What if you had been ambushed? What if Regulus decided not to extend any form of mercy? Do you realise how dangerous that was?!"

She didn't say anything right away, her gaze appeared distant as she looked over the flames of the fire again. Sitting back, her hands came to rest in her lap and then she let out a little laugh that was quickly followed by tears falling from her eyes.

"I wasn't really thinking about all that at the time," she told him, " I was thinking about saving him. That's all. It was stupid and dangerous, and I was lucky to get out of there with my life spared. But you said it yourself, Sirius, back in Hogsmeade, I'm naive sometimes. I always want to see the good in people. I guess I'm just destined to learn things the hard way sometimes. But I did learn my lesson. I'm so tired of being manipulated. I've grown a lot since I left all that behind, but clearly, not enough."

"I think you're being too hard on yourself, Nin. Yes, what you did was stupid and dangerous, but don't downplay your growth. What I said back in Hogsmeade, I wasn't entirely right, there was just a lot of emotions circulating at the time. But you were right, I do tend to see everything in black and white, and that isn't right either. You want to see all the good in people and I tend to only focus on the bad. We both need to find a balance."

"I guess this is a good starting point."

He settled back into the sofa as Éponine let out a yawn. She ended up nestling into his side once more and only a few minutes later, Éponine was sound asleep. Sirius grabbed a small blanket that rested over the back of the sofa and tossed it over them before closing his own eyes. And shortly after, Toulouse returned to the sitting room, finding both asleep and jumped into Éponine's lap to join in some rest.

The next morning, Éponine woke up to find herself no longer on the sofa, but in her own bed. Toulouse was asleep beside her as well, tucked into a small ball by her head. She pushed herself up, especially when she caught the faint whiff of smoke in her bedroom. There was the sound of shuffling outside of her door, which led into the kitchen, making her wonder if Sirius had attempted to make himself some breakfast or perhaps had forgotten he was making breakfast and allowed it to burn.

She quickly climbed out of bed, unsure of where she had left her wand but made her way out of the room to find Peter in the kitchen.

"Peter?" Her eyes darted to the small pan that was on fire, back to the short man that was panicking as he went to retrieve his wand from the table. "Wh-what-"

"Dammit, Peter, we leave you here for one minute and you already burned breakfast!"

Sirius came filing into the kitchen, and using his own wand to place the fire out. Behind him was James, Lily, and Remus, leaving Éponine beyond confused as Peter began apologising. However, Sirius turned to Éponine and started up with his own apology over the currently ruined breakfast.

"Er, no, it's fine," she said with a shake of her head, " I can fix up something. Had I known that we were having company this morning, I would have woken up sooner to prepare. I...did we talk about this last night and I ended up forgetting or-"

"No, Nin," Lily chuckled at her confused state, " this is was more of a last minute thing, so don't worry about it."

"Maybe we should all sit down to talk about this," Remus suggested looking at the others in the room and they all seemed to agree as they gathered around the kitchen table.

Éponine came to settle between Lily and Sirius, still puzzled by the gathering as it seemed there was something they wanted to talk about. And while they all seemed happy to see her, there appeared to be a rather serious tone to the air that left her nervous. She thought about what she had confessed to Sirius the night before, maybe they were all there to tell her how foolish she had been, but then again, that didn't seem like something they would do.

"Well, don't look so nervous, Nin!" James called her out.

"How am I supposed to look then?" she questioned in return. "You're all here and there's clearly something you all want to tell me, but you're not saying anything. Can one of you just tell me what's going on? Am I in trouble?"

Sirius' hand came to rest over hers and gave it a light squeeze. "Nin, you're not in trouble. We were waiting on someone else to show up before we started talking about this, but looks like they're running a little late. So, maybe we can just get started and when they arrive, we'll go from there."

"Okay, so what do you all need to tell me."

"I think you've had your suspicions," Sirius said, "with how I've been coming and going all throughout the hours of the night and during the day. I haven't been alone, all of us have been involved and I thought it would be best to wait until you were out of Hogwarts to tell you about what we've been doing. But after what you told me last night, there's no sense in keeping it from you anymore. I was always afraid that you were too innocent to join us but I think you're ready now."

"Ready for what?" Éponine asked. "What have you all been involved in."

"It's called the Order of the Phoenix, Nin."

Before Éponine could question anything further about the information she had been given, there was a knock on the front door of the flat, apparently their awaited guest had arrived finally. Rather than letting any of them get the door, she jumped up from the table and went to answer it herself. However, as she swung open the door, she was presented with one of the last people she expected to stand on the other side of the threshold.

Albus Dumbledore.

"Professor?" she whispered. "What are you doing here?

Looking over her shoulder, Éponine could see that the others had abandoned their chairs and had come to stand behind her.

"Ms Rosier," Professor Dumbledore greeted, " may I come inside? There is plenty I wish to discuss with you, but I only have little time to do so."

END OF ACT I

A/N: