~Astra~

I bit my lip, standing over Colette's bed. It was dark, and she was fast asleep, thank Merlin. She looked so peaceful, almost pleasant. I didn't know how she could sleep. I'd been having nightmares every night since Albus and I had made it back a week and a half ago. Wren, Mr. Potter, over and over. All my fault.

I was hesitating, I knew, standing here in the dark. I needed to leave, but I suddenly wasn't so sure I wanted to do this. Even though I had to. I was scared. I was a coward, really. But I'd made so many wrong decisions lately, and I needed to make a right one, no matter how much I wanted to do anything else. Because I wanted to wake her up, make her talk me out of it. It would be that easy.

She's going to be so angry, I thought, as I hoisted my bag over my shoulder and turned away. At least I wouldn't be there to see it.

The door made no sound when I opened it. I'd put a silencing spell on it earlier in the afternoon, just in case. The hall was dark and empty. One by one, I walked by each door. Teddy and Toire's room, Charis's room, both dusty and empty. Aunt Andromeda didn't go in there anymore. Then her door. I could faintly hear her snoring through the wood. I blinked, trying to keep my eyes from getting misty. This was to keep the ones I loved safe, I reminded myself, to try to make things right somehow.

I walked down the stairs, carrying my shoes in one hand. The house was dark, still, familiar. It felt very safe, like an old friend reaching out for me. Like it wanted me to stay. I rolled my eyes. Now I was projecting my feelings onto a house. I just needed to get this over with.

I set out two notes on the kitchen tables. One for Aunt Andromeda, an apology and a thank you and an I love you and the bare minimum of an explanation. The other for Colette, an apology and a begging for forgiveness and the best explanation I knew how to give without really telling her anything at all. The last thing I needed was for her to follow me.

I glanced around the kitchen one more time. It hasn't felt right without Teddy and Toire around, anyway, right? I reasoned. That wasn't working too well. I shook my head, then opened the cabinet next to the fireplace. Aunt Andromeda kept an extra flask of Floo powder around, for emergencies. I thought this qualified.

Lighting a fire was easy. The crackling scared me half to death; the sound seemed enormous in the empty silence. But I waited, and didn't hear any movement upstairs, so I stepped in, tossed the Floo powder down, and whispered, "To the Hog's Head."

I got caught in cobwebs when I stumbled into the pub. The bartender gave me an annoyed glance as I coughed on the dust and tried to wipe cobwebs out of my hair, but otherwise no one seemed to mind me much. The pub was not quite deserted, I saw, glancing around. A few witches and wizards were cuddling up in secluded corner booths. One or two people seemed to have thoroughly drowned their sorrows at the bar, and were still calling for more. And there, at a table right in front of me, was a cloaked wizard with a grim smile on his face. "You ready?"

I sagged with relief. Half of me had wondered if James would really go through with this. "Not really."

He shrugged. "Me neither."

"They're going to be so angry, James," I whispered, sliding into the seat across from him and pulling my cloak forward so it covered more of my face.

"I know." He pursed his lips. "But you know we can't bring them."

"You're lucky I'm bringing you," I said. Somehow, the joke didn't lighten the mood at all. 

James sighed. "We're the only ones who need to be doing this."

"You have the Cloak?"

He nodded, patting his bag. "You have money?"

I nodded. Colette and I had gone to Diagon Alley earlier that day. She'd asked what I'd needed to go to the bank for, and I'd refused to tell her. I think she'd probably been worried that I was losing it, going back to the scene of my older nightmares because I kept reliving the newer ones. That wasn't true; I'd walked through the chamber outside my vault with my eyes closed. Oh well. She'd put the pieces together in the morning, surely. "Colette's going to be pissed."

"I know. But they'll forgive us, okay? This wouldn't have worked if we'd told them."

I knew he was right. It had been my idea not to tell them. That didn't make it better.

We'd been home for a week since school got out. The whole time had been spent planning and preparing. Honestly, this was our best thought-out plan of all time. I'd withdrawn a ridiculous amount of galleons from my vault, then had it all exchanged for muggle money. James had managed to get a muggle phone and had found someone selling a reasonably priced truck in the next village over. We were picking it up and paying for it tomorrow. James claimed he knew how to drive. I wasn't sure I believed that, since there was no way he'd had time to get a driver's license since we'd been home, but he probably at least had more experience than I did. His family actually owned a car, unlike mine.

We'd decided to go with a muggle car because it was a little more under the radar than a broom. The Floo network could be tracked, portkeys were too difficult to figure out, and I had sworn off apparating for the rest of my life. A muggle car, though, would be pretty reliable. Besides, any wizards searching for us probably wouldn't even think of that as an option. 

The biggest hole in our plan was what we were going to do after disappearing. Our only clear goals were to rescue Wren Predatel and keep away from everyone else we loved, so that they wouldn't be in danger. Stillens wanted to kill me, and would hurt anyone who got in his way. 

Unfortunately, neither of those goals really gave us an idea of what we could practically be doing. Keeping away from people was easy enough; we could run off to France, or South America, or literally anywhere. We'd talked about that, and both decided against it. Disappearing couldn't mean giving up the fight against Stillens. I still wanted to take him down. We just weren't quite sure how we could do that on the run.

Rescuing Wren was another difficult thing. Though I did know where the manor was, and I'd broken into it once before, I knew it would be far more difficult to accomplish a second time. Even more difficult would be getting Wren out once we'd gotten in. She'd already run away from them once, and I was sure they would take every precaution to make sure it couldn't happen again. 

Our plan for tonight was to get two rooms at the Hogshead. James had given the bartender a fake name (Hubert Dursley, to be exact), but the man was so old that even if James had told him who we were, I wasn't sure he would've remembered. When he led us up to the rooms, right across the hall from each other, he told us three different times that breakfast might be in the morning, and we shouldn't worry if we heard a goat running past our room in the night. It was safe to say that he wasn't going to be a problem. 

As the old man hobbled back down the stairs, I smiled nervously at James. "How are you feeling?"

He didn't smile back. "All right, I think."

"We could still change our minds, you know."

"Do you want to?"

 Of course I did. I wanted to go home. I didn't want to run off. I was going to get smeared for it at school, I was sure. Maybe it would even make the papers, since everything I did always seemed to. Even worse, I didn't want to leave Albus and Colette. But there was a war going on, and it didn't matter what I wanted. Staying was selfish. A lot of people would get hurt. I tilted my head. "Do you?"

James considered that for a moment. Instead of answering, he asked, "Are you scared?"

I took a deep breath. "Of course I am. Are you?"

"Of course." He smiled grimly. "I don't think we have a choice, though. Not really."

"No," I echoed, nodding. "I guess we don't."

"It'll work out. I can feel it." James patted my shoulder. "See you in the morning."

"Goodnight." I smiled over my shoulder as I walked through the doorway of my room.

The Hogshead was definitely not a five-star hotel. The room was so small that the only thing keeping it from being considered a closet was the narrow window looking out over an alley. The door hit the bed when it was open. There were hooks on the wall, probably meant to hold my things, but they looked like a particularly strong draft might blow them off. I brushed the cobwebs out of the corner and set my bag down there, instead. After thoroughly shaking out the sheets to dislodge any spiders that might be hiding in them, I climbed into bed, hoping to fall asleep. 

No such luck. I tossed and turned for what felt like hours, then gave up and stared at the ceiling. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw one of two things. The first was Mr. Potter, green light hitting his chest, life leaving his eyes. I saw it again and again and again. Heard myself saying the words. Sure, yeah, Nico Jasper had been in control when I'd said it. But I could've stopped him, couldn't I? I could've thrown him off. I should've been able to. But I wasn't strong enough, and now Mr. Potter was gone. And it was my fault. 

The second thing I saw was Wren. Pleading with me to kill her. Literally begging. I couldn't do that, either. What was worse was that I was the one who had gotten her in that situation in the first place. If it hadn't been for me, she would be safe at the Potters right now. But I'd forced her to come along on me and Albus's ridiculous attempt to rescue the children, and it had gotten her captured. I couldn't imagine what they were doing to her. Well, I could, actually, which was part of why I couldn't sleep. I didn't want to sleep.

I couldn't tell which of my dreams were real, and which were nightmares. I couldn't tell if they had actually happened, or might happen in the future, or were all just my fears manifesting themselves, a guilty conscience not letting me rest. I remembered them all. Every detail. Wren being interrogated, hurt, tortured, by her uncle and her parents and Zaria Hempsey and Magnus Caldwell. Every time I drifted off, I woke with her screams ringing in my ears. 

I hadn't mentioned that to James, because I knew it would just make him more upset. There was no point in that. It wasn't like it his fault Wren was there, anyway. As distressing as it was to see that over and over again, if Wren was really being hurt like that, I knew it was obviously a thousand times worse for her. At the very least, I deserved the pain of watching it second hand. Alone.

I couldn't have told you if I ever really fell asleep. When it was finally light enough for me to dimly see the opposite wall, I got out of bed. It wasn't even five in the morning yet. There was no way James was awake yet. I sighed, got dressed quickly, then hoisted my bag over my shoulder and headed downstairs. 

The bar was completely empty, except for a goat that was wandering through the kitchen. That probably wasn't worth bothering about. I settled into the booth in the farthest corner, pulling my hood up over my face, just in case anyone was looking. It was really annoying that cloaks weren't acceptable fashion in the muggle world. They were really good for keeping a low profile. James and I were just going to have to be more careful, wear oversized hoodies or something. Otherwise, we would risk drawing attention to ourselves. 

Last time I'd been here, it had been with Colette and Albus and Poppy. We'd been researching, planning, and honestly having fun. I missed all three of them already, which wasn't great. I had been hoping to get at least a week's head start on my feelings. Albus and Colette would be waking up in a few hours to find us gone. I bit my lip, shoving the guilt down. They would understand why we had to leave eventually, right? 

James came down surprisingly early. He tossed me an apple. "Ready to go? We've got about an hour's walk."

I wasn't ready. Not at all. I'd been thinking that all night, all week, forever. But I suppose I'd never been ready for anything that had happened to me since an owl flew down the Lewis's chimney on my eleventh birthday to give me my Hogwarts letter. Why on earth would I expect that to change now? 

I put on a serious face and stood up. "I guess this is happening."

"Oh, come on, where's your optimism?" James nudged me in the side. "It's a new day, and we're setting out on an adventure. At the end of all this, Wren will be safe and Stillens will be defeated. Just think about that."

Those both sounded completely impossible to me. But James was smiling, hope dancing behind his eyes. It wasn't enough to make me hope with him, but it was enough to force a small smile in return. "That would be fantastic."

"Will be," James corrected. "And you're right. It will."

~~~~

"Elli, what the heck was with that Act I thing?"

That's a very good question! I don't have a satisfactory answer, unfortunately, other than the fact that I enjoy experimenting with different literary elements like that little vignette and three act stories. I also liked the idea of having that vague little snapshot, since clearly none of the POV characters were there so you wouldn't be able to see it, otherwise. 

Just to be clear, I will not be answering any questions about that scene or any other vignettes that appear later. It's all relevant, so you'll figure out what's going on eventually. Just make sure you pay attention to the dates...

Question of the Day: What do you think of the cover?

Answer: It took me ages to make something for this book that I like. Literally. Like, I've remade the cover for this book a thousand times over the past few years. I like this one better than all the other options, but I'm not sure that it's necessarily one of my favorites from the series. 

Vote and comment!

~Elli

Word count: 2385