ii. familial ties

Mrs. Weasley followed them upstairs looking grim, "I want you all to go straight to bed, no talking," she said as they reached the first landing. "We've got a busy day tomorrow. I expect Ginny is asleep," she added to Hermione and Matilda. "So, try not to wake her."

"Asleep, yeah, right," said Fred in an undertone, after Hermione and Matilda bade them goodnight and left into the bedroom door.

The door closed behind them with a sharp snap. The bedroom looked, if anything, even darker and gloomier than the rest of the house. The blank picture on the wall was now breathing very slowly and deeply, as though its invisible occupant was asleep. Matilda changed into her pajamas, braided her hair, and climbed into her chilly bed while Hermione threw cat treats at the foot of her bed to pacify Crookshanks, who was whining loudly at the door.

"Don't forget the lock," Ginny sat up from her bed, her eyes wide, no sign of sleep having ever consumed her.

Hermione's eyes widened, "Oh yes... I forgot."

She crossed to the door and bolted it.

"What's that all about?" asked Matilda.

"Kreacher," said Ginny as she turned off the light. "First night I was here he came wandering in at three in the morning. Trust me, you don't want to wake up and find him prowling around your room. Anyway..." Ginny settled back into her bed, pulling her heavy blankets up to her chin, then turned to look at Hermione and Matilda in the darkness. Matilda could see her outline by the moonlight filtering in through the grimy window. "What happened down there?"

It took a moment for Hermione or Matilda to say anything.

"Well, they didn't tell us much we couldn't have easily guessed," said Hermione after a long moment of lingering silence. "I mean, all they've really said is that the Order is trying to stop others from joining Vol-"

There was a sharp intake of breath from Hermione.

"Voldemort," Matilda said firmly. "It's a name, Hermione, just say it. We can't fear it. Not anymore."

Hermione chose to ignore Matilda's blunt tone, "Yeah, you're right," she said in a whisper. "We already knew nearly everything they told us, from using the Extendable Ears earlier. The only new piece was-"

"Shhh!" said Ginny, half-rising from the bed. "Listen!"

They fell silent. Footsteps were coming up the stairs again.

"Mum," Ginny whispered, and without further ado, the girls fell back into their bed and the room went silent. A few seconds later and they heard the floorboard creak outside their door; Mrs. Weasley was plainly listening to see whether they'd woken Ginny or not.

Crookshanks purred dolefully. The floorboard creaked again they heard her heading upstairs to check on Harry and Ron.

"She doesn't trust us at all, you know," said Ginny regretfully.

Matilda was sure she wouldn't be able to fall asleep; the evening had been so packed with things to think about that she fully expected to lie awake for hours mulling all over it. She wanted to continue talking to Hermione about it all, but Mrs. Weasley was now creaking back downstairs again, and once she had gone she distinctly heard others making their way upstairs, and her eyelids fell heavy.

The next thing she knew, she was curled in a warm ball under her bedclothes, sunlight poured in through the raggedy window.

Half an hour later, Matilda was dressed and with Hermione and Ginny entered the drawing-room, a long, high-ceilinged room on the first floor with olive-green walls covered in dirty tapestries. The carpet exhaled little clouds of dust every time someone put their foot on it and the long, moss-green velvet curtains were buzzing as though swarming with invisible bees. It was around these that Mrs. Weasley, Matilda, Hermione, Ginny, Fred, and George were grouped, all looking ratherpeculiar, as they had tied cloths over their noses and mouths. Each ofthem was also holding a large bottle of black liquid with a nozzle atthe end.

"Cover your faces and take a spray," Mrs. Weasley said to Harry and Ron when they decided to join them in the room. She pointed to two more bottles of black liquid standing on a spindle-legged table. "It's Doxycide. I've never seen an infestation this bad - what that house-elf has been doing for last ten years -"

Hermione's face was half concealed by a tea towel but Matilda distinctly saw her throw a reproachful look at Mrs. Weasley at these words.

"Kreacher's really old, he probably couldn't manage -"

"You'd be surprised what Kreacher can manage when he wants to, Hermione," said Sirius, who had just entered the room carrying a bloodstained bag of what appeared to be dead rats. "I've just been feeding Buckbeak," he added, in reply to Matilda's confused expression. "I keep him upstairs in my mother's bedroom. Anyway... this writing desk..."

He dropped the bag of rats onto an armchair, then bent over to examine the locked cabinet which, Matilda had noticed,was shaking slightly.

"Well, Molly, I'm pretty sure this is a boggart," said Sirius, peering through the keyhole, "but perhaps we ought to let Mad-Eye have a shifty at it before we let it out - knowing my mother it could be something much worse."

"Right you are, Sirius," said Mrs. Weasley.

They were both speaking in carefully light, polite voices that toldMatilda quite plainly that neither had forgotten their disagreement ofthe night before.

A loud, clanging bell sounded from downstairs, followed at once bythe cacophony of screams and wails that had been triggered the previous night by Tonks knocking over the umbrella stand.

"I keep telling them not to ring the doorbell!" said Sirius exasperatedly, hurrying back out of the room. They heard him thundering down the stairs as Mrs. Black's screeches echoed up through the house once more: "Stains of dishonor, filthy half-breeds, blood traitors, children of filth. . ."

"Close the door, please, Harry," said Mrs. Weasley.

Matilda watched as Harry took as much time as he dared to close the drawing-room door; he was trying to listen to what was going on downstairs. So was Matilda who had taken a stance against the wall next to the door. Sirius had obviously managed to shut the curtains over his mother's portrait because she had stopped screaming. She heard Sirius walking down the hall, then the clattering of the chain on the front of the door, and then a deep voice she didn't quite recognize saying, "Hestia's just relieved me, so she's got Moody's cloak now, thought I'd leave a report for Dumbledore..."

Dumbledore. Harry and Matilda wore the same intrigued expression at the mention of the name.

But feeling Mrs. Weasley's eyes on them, Harry regretfully closed the drawing-room door, and together, he and Matilda rejoined the doxy party.

Mrs. Weasley was bending over to check the page on doxies in Gilderoy Lockhart's Guide to Household Pests, which was lying open on the sofa.

Matilda laughed. She hadn't thought about Gilderoy Lockhart since she'd gone into the Chamber of Secrets with Ron and Harry. She hated that guy, "We're not using that daft head's book as reference are we?"

Mrs. Weasley chose to ignore Matilda's insult.

"Right, you lot, you need to be careful, because doxies bite and their teeth are poisonous. I've got a bottle of antidote here, but I'd rather nobody needed it."

"Okay," Matilda sighed. "Guess we are."

Mrs. Weasley straightened up, positioned herself squarely in front of the curtains, and beckoned them all forward.

"When I say the word, start spraying immediately," she said. "They'll come flying out at us, I expect, but it says on the sprays one good squirt will paralyze them. When they're immobilized just throw them in this bucket."

She stepped carefully out of their line of fire and raised her own spray. "All right - spray!"

Matilda had been spraying only a few seconds when a fully grown doxy came soaring out of a fold in the material, shiny beetle-like wings whirring, tiny needle-sharp teeth bared, its fairylike body covered with thick black hair and its four tiny fists clenched with fury. Matilda caught it full in the face with a blast of Doxycide; it froze in midair and fell, with a surprisingly loud thunk, onto the worn carpet below. Matilda picked it up with a gag and threw it in the bucket.

"Fred, what are you doing?" said Mrs. Weasley sharply. "Spray that at once and throw it away!"

Matilda looked around. Fred was holding a struggling doxy between his forefinger and thumb.

"Right-o," Fred said brightly, spraying the doxy quickly in the face so that it fainted, but the moment Mrs. Weasley's back was turned he pocketed it with a wink.

"We want to experiment with doxy venom for our Skiving Snackboxes," George told Matilda under his breath.

Matilda turned to him letting out a long and tired sigh, "I didn't ask."

Deftly spraying two doxies at once as they soared straight for his nose, Harry moved closer to George and Matilda, and muttered out of the corner of his mouth, "What are Skiving Snackboxes?"

Rolling her eyes, Matilda turned to Harry, "You had to ask?"

"Range of sweets to make you ill," George whispered, keeping a wary eye on Mrs. Weasley's back. "Not seriously ill, mind, just ill enough to get you out of a class when you feel like it. Fred and I have been developing them this summer. They're double-ended, color-coded chews. If you eat the orange half of the Puking Pastilles, you throw up. The moment you've been rushed out of the lesson for the hospital, you swallow the purple half -"

" - which restores you to full fitness, enabling you to pursue the leisure activity of your own choice during an hour that would otherwise have been devoted to unprofitable boredom. That's what we're putting in the adverts, anyway," whispered Fred, who had edged over out of Mrs. Weasley's line of vision and was now sweeping a few stray doxies from the floor and adding them to his pocket. "But they still need a bit of work. At the moment our testers are having a bit of trouble stopping puking long enough to swallow the purple end."

Matilda did not want to involve herself with the conversation that had somehow surrounded her, but she couldn't stop herself from asking, "Testers?"

"Us," said Fred. "We take it in turns. George did the Fainting Fancies - we both tried the Nosebleed Nougat -"

"Mum thought we'd been dueling," said George.

"Joke shop still on, then?" Harry muttered, pretending to be adjusting the nozzle on his spray.

"Well, we haven't had a chance to get premises yet," said Fred, dropping his voice even lower as Mrs. Weasley mopped her brow with her scarf before returning to the attack, "so we're running it as a mailorder service at the moment. We put advertisements in the DailyProphet last week."

"All thanks to you, mate," said George, patting Harry's shoulder. "But don't worry. . . Mum hasn't got a clue. She won't read the Daily Prophet any more, 'cause of it telling lies about you and Dumbledore."

Harry grinned. He'd told Matilda that he had forced the Weasley twins to take the thousand-Galleon prize money he had won in the Triwizard Tournament to help them realize their ambition to open a joke shop. But, their ambition had halted as Mrs. Weasley did not think that running a joke shop was a suitable career for two of her sons.

The de-doxying of the curtains took most of the morning. It was past midday when Mrs. Weasley finally removed her protective scarf, sank into a sagging armchair, and sprang up again with a cry of disgust, having sat on the bag of dead rats. The curtains were no longer buzzing; they hung limp and damp from the intensive spraying; unconscious doxies lay crammed in the bucket at the foot of them beside a bowl of their black eggs, at which Crookshanks was now sniffing and Fred and George were shooting covetous looks.

"I think we'll tackle those after lunch."

Mrs. Weasley pointed at the dusty glass-fronted cabinets standing on either side of the mantelpiece. They were crammed with an odd assortment of objects: a selection of rusty daggers, claws, a coiled snakeskin, a number of tarnished silver boxes inscribed with languages Matilda hadn't yet learned and, least pleasant of all, an ornate crystal bottle with a large opal set into the stopper, full of what Matilda was quite sure was blood.

The clanging doorbell rang again. Everyone looked at Mrs. Weasley.

"Stay here," she said firmly, snatching up the bag of rats as Mrs.Black's screeches started up again from down below. "I'll bring up some sandwiches."

She left the room, closing the door carefully behind her. At once, everyone dashed over to the window to look down onto the doorstep. They could see the top of an unkempt gingery head and a stack of precariously balanced cauldrons.

"Mundungus!" said Hermione. "What's he brought all those cauldrons for?"

"Probably looking for a safe place to keep them," said Harry. "Isn't that what he was doing the night he was supposed to be tailing me? Picking up dodgy cauldrons?"

"Yeah, you're right!" said Fred, as the front door opened; Mundungus heaved his cauldrons through it and disappeared from view."Blimey, Mum won't like that..."

He and George crossed to the door and stood beside it, listening intently. Mrs. Black's screaming had stopped again.

"Mundungus is talking to Sirius and Kingsley," Fred muttered, frowning with concentration. "Can't hear properly... d'you reckon we can risk the Extendable Ears?"

"Might be worth it," said George. "I could sneak upstairs and get a pair -"

But at that precise moment, there was an explosion of sound from downstairs that rendered Extendable Ears quite unnecessary. All of them could hear exactly what Mrs. Weasley was shouting at the top of her voice.

"WE ARE NOT RUNNING A HIDEOUT FOR STOLENGOODS!"

"I love hearing Mum shouting at someone else," said Fred, with a satisfied smile on his face as he opened the door an inch or so to allow Mrs. Weasley's voice to permeate the room better. "It makes such a nice change."

"- COMPLETELY IRRESPONSIBLE, AS IF WE HAVEN'T GOT ENOUGH TO WORRY ABOUT WITHOUT YOU DRAGGING STOLEN CAULDRONS INTO THE HOUSE -"

"The idiots are letting her get into her stride," said George, shaking his head. "You've got to head her off early, otherwise she builds up ahead of steam and goes on for hours. And she's been dying to have a go at Mundungus ever since he sneaked off when he was supposed to be following you, Harry - and there goes Sirius's mum again -"

Mrs. Weasley's voice was lost amid fresh shrieks and screams from the portraits in the hall. George made to shut the door to drown the noise, but before he could do so, a house-elf edged into the room.

Except for the filthy rag tied like a loincloth around its middle, it was completely naked. It looked very old. Its skin seemed to be several times too big for it and though it was bald like all house-elves, there was a quantity of white hair growing out of its large, batlike ears. Its eyes were a bloodshot and watery gray, and its fleshy nose was large and rather snoutlike.

The elf took absolutely no notice of Matilda and the rest. Acting as though it could not see them, it shuffled hunchbacked, slowly and doggedly, toward the far end of the room, muttering under its breath all the while in a hoarse, deep voice like a bullfrog, "Smells like a drain and a criminal to boot, but she's no better, nasty old blood traitor with her brats messing up my Mistress's house, oh my poor Mistress, if she knew, if only she knew the scum they've let in her house, what would she say to old Kreacher, oh the shame of it, Mudbloods and werewolves and traitors and thieves, poor old Kreacher, what can he do..."

"For Merlin's sake, a dramatic little thing, aren't you?" laughed Matilda as she watched the house-elf move around the room continuing to mumble to himself. "Your mistress is long dead. As is most of House Black."

Kreacher's pale eyes widened and he muttered faster and more furiously than ever.

"A daring thing the girl says in the home of Kreacher's Mistress. Oh, she would have her head. So many strangers ─ blood traitors," the wrinkled and old elf turned to Matilda it's pale eyes stopped dead on her and his mumblings slowed. "Striking. Such a striking resemblance."

Matilda's dark eyebrows furrowed as she turned to face the others in the room. They seemed just as perplexed as herself, "Odd."

She quickly stepped away and went to stand beside Ginny on the other end of the room.

". . .and there's the Mudblood, standing there bold as brass, oh if my Mistress knew, oh how she'd cry, and there's the new boy, Kreacherdoesn't know his name, what is he doing here, Kreacher doesn't know. . ."

"This is Harry, Kreacher," said Hermione tentatively. "Harry Potter."

"The Mudblood is talking to Kreacher as though she is my friend, if Kreacher's Mistress saw him in such company, oh what would she say -"

"Don't call her a Mudblood!" said Matilda and Ginny together, very angrily.

"It doesn't matter," Hermione whispered, "he's not in his right mind, he doesn't know what he's -"

"Hermione," said Matilda, eyeing Kreacher with great dislike. "He knows exactly what he's saying."

Kreacher was still muttering, his eyes on Harry.

"Is it true? Is it Harry Potter? Kreacher can see the scar, it must be true, that's that boy who stopped the Dark Lord, Kreacher wonders how he did it -"

"Don't we all, Kreacher?" said Fred.

"What do you want anyway?" George asked.

Kreacher's huge eyes darted onto George.

"Kreacher is cleaning," he said evasively.

"A likely story," said in the doorway.

Sirius had come back; he was glowering at the elf from the doorway. The noise in the hall had abated; perhaps Mrs. Weasley andMundungus had moved their argument down into the kitchen. At the sight of Sirius, Kreacher flung himself into a ridiculously low bow that flattened his snoutlike nose on the floor.

"Stand up straight," said Sirius impatiently. "Now, what are you up to?"

"Kreacher is cleaning," the elf repeated. "Kreacher lives to serve the noble house of Black -"

The haggard house-elf's eyes slowly lingered to Matilda. She only took a step closer to Ginny, shielding herself from the empty gaze.

"- and it's getting blacker every day, it's filthy," interrupted Sirius quickly.

"Master always liked his little joke," said Kreacher, bowing again, and continuing in an undertone, "Master was a nasty ungrateful swine who broke his mother's heart -"

"My mother didn't have a heart, Kreacher," Sirius snapped. "She kept herself alive out of pure spite."

Kreacher bowed again and said, "Whatever Master says," then muttered furiously, "Master is not fit to wipe slime from his mother shoots, oh my poor Mistress, what would she say if she saw Kreacherserving him, how she hated him, what a disappointment he was -"

"I asked you what you were up to," said Sirius coldly. "Every time you show up pretending to be cleaning, you sneak something off to your room so we can't throw it out."

"Kreacher would never move anything from its proper place inMaster's house," said the elf, then muttered very fast, "Mistress would never forgive Kreacher if the tapestry was thrown out, seven centuries it's been in the family, Kreacher must save it, Kreacher will not let Master and the blood traitors and the brats destroy it -"

"I thought it might be that," said Sirius, casting a disdainful look at the opposite wall. "She'll have put another Permanent Sticking Charm on the back of it, I don't doubt, but if I can get rid of it I certainly will. Now go away, Kreacher."

It seemed that Kreacher did not dare disobey a direct order; nevertheless, the look he gave Sirius as he shuffled out past him was redolent of deepest loathing and he muttered all the way out of the room.

"- comes back from Azkaban ordering Kreacher around, oh my poor Mistress, what would she say if she saw the house now, scum living in it, her treasures thrown out, she swore he was no son of hers and he's back, they say he's a murderer too -"

"Keep muttering and I will be a murderer!" said Sirius irritably, and he slammed the door shut on the elf.

"Sirius, he's not right in the head," said Hermione pleadingly, "I don't think he realizes we can hear him."

"He's a blood purist, Hermione," Matilda rolled her eyes.

"He's been alone too long," said Sirius, "taking mad orders from my mother's portrait and talking to himself, but Matilda is right, he was always a foul little -"

"If you just set him free," said Hermione hopefully, "maybe -"

"We can't set him free, he knows too much about the Order," said Sirius curtly. "And anyway, the shock would kill him. You suggest to him that he leaves this house, see how he takes it."

Sirius walked across the room, where the tapestry Kreacher had been trying to protect hung the length of the wall. Matilda and the others followed.

The tapestry looked immensely old; it was faded and looked as though doxies had gnawed it in places; nevertheless, the golden thread with which it was embroidered still glinted brightly enough to show them a sprawling family tree dating back for as far as Matilda could tell to the Middle Ages. Large words at the very top of the tapestry read:

The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black"Toujours Pur"

"You're not on here!" said Matilda, after scanning the bottom of the tree.

"I used to be there," said Sirius, pointing at a small, round, charred hole in the tapestry, rather like a cigarette burn. "My sweet old mother blasted me off after I ran away from home - Kreacher's quite fond of muttering the story under his breath."

"You ran away from home?"

"When I was about sixteen," said Sirius. "I'd had enough."

"Where did you go?" asked Harry, staring at him.

"Your dad's place," said Sirius. "Your grandparents were really good about it; they sort of adopted me as a second son. Yeah, I camped out at your dad's during the school holidays, and then when I was seventeen I got a place of my own, my Uncle Alphard had left me a decent bit of gold - he's been wiped off here too, that's probably why - anyway, after that, I looked after myself. Well, I had a roommate some of the time. Ros-" Sirius stopped short, eyes growing wide. "But, I was always welcome at Mr. and Mrs. Potter's for Sunday lunch, though."

"But... why did you...?"

Harry barely was able to get out words.

"Leave?" Sirius smiled bitterly and ran a hand through his long, dark, and unkempt hair. "Because I hated the whole lot of them: my parents, with their pure-blood mania, convinced that to be a Black made you practically royal... my idiot brother, soft enough to believe them... that's him."

Sirius jabbed a finger at the very bottom of the tree, at the name regulus black. Date of death (some fifteen years previously) followed the date of birth.

"He was younger than me," said Sirius, "and a much better son, as I was constantly reminded."

"But he died," said Harry.

"Yeah," said Sirius. "Stupid idiot. . . he joined the Death Eaters."

"You're kidding!"

"Come on, Harry, have you not seen enough of this house to tell what kind of wizards this family was?" said Matilda, the sarcasm clear in her tone.

"Were - were your parents' Death Eaters as well?" asked Harry.

"No, no, but believe me, they thought Voldemort had the right idea, they were all for the purification of the Wizarding race, getting rid of Muggle-borns and having purebloods in charge. They weren't alone either, there were quite a few people before Voldemort showed his true colors, who thought he had the right idea about things. . . They got cold feet when they saw what he was prepared to do to get power, though. But I bet my parents thought Regulus was a right little hero for joining up at first."

"Was he killed by an Auror?" Harry asked tentatively.

"Oh no," said Sirius. "No, he was murdered by Voldemort. Or on Voldemort's orders, more likely, I doubt Regulus was ever important enough to be killed by Voldemort in person. From what I found out after he died, he got in so far, then panicked about what he was being asked to do and tried to back out. Well, you don't just hand in your resignation to Voldemort. It's a lifetime of service or death."

"Lunch," said Mrs. Weasley's voice.

She was holding her wand high in front of her, balancing a huge tray loaded with sandwiches and cake on its tip. She was very red in the face and still looked angry. The others moved over to her, eager for some food, but Harry and Matilda remained with Sirius as she bent closer to the tapestry.

"I haven't looked at this for years. There's Phineas Nigellus... my great-great-grandfather, see? Least popular headmaster Hogwarts ever had... and Araminta Meliflua... cousin of my mother's... tried to force through a Ministry Bill to make Muggle-hunting legal... and dear Aunt Elladora... she started the family tradition of beheading house-elves when they got too old to carry tea trays.... of course, anytime the family produced someone halfway decent they were disowned. I see Tonks isn't on here. Maybe that's why Kreacher won't take orders from her - he's supposed to do whatever anyone in the family asks him..."

Sirius's voice dyed out lowly and his eyes grazed over Matilda's tight-knitted expression. She was hearing his words but it was clear that the little slipup wasn't caught as her eyes were locked on the tapestry before her. Eyes roaming over every portrait. She felt a weight fall onto her shoulders but couldn't place the feeling of familiarity that came along with the weight.

"I didn't know you and Tonks were related," said Matilda finally, bringing her eyes away from the tapestry.

"Oh yeah, her mother, Andromeda, was my favorite cousin," said Sirius, examining the tapestry carefully. "No, Andromeda's not on here either, look -"

He pointed to another small round burn mark between two names, Bellatrix and Narcissa.

"Andromeda's sisters are still here because they made lovely, respectable pure-blood marriages, but Andromeda married a Muggleborn, Ted Tonks, so -"

Sirius mimed blasting the tapestry with a wand and laughed sourly. Matilda, however, did not laugh; he was too busy staring at the names to the right of Andromeda's burn mark. A double line of gold embroidery linked Narcissa Black with Lucius Malfoy, and a single vertical gold line from their names led to the name Draco.

"You're related to the Malfoys!"

"The pure-blood families are all interrelated," said Sirius. "If you're only going to let your sons and daughters marry purebloods your choice is very limited, there are hardly any of us left. Molly and I are cousins by marriage and Arthur's something like my second cousin once removed. But there's no point looking for them on here - if ever a family was a bunch of blood traitors it's the Weasleys."

But Harry was now looking at the name to the left of Andromeda'sburn: Bellatrix Black, which was connected by a double line to Rodolphus Lestrange.

"Lestrange," said Matilda aloud. The name gave her an odd, creeping sensation in the pit of her stomach.

"They're in Azkaban," said Sirius shortly.

Matilda looked at him curiously.

"Bellatrix and her husband Rodolphus came in with Barty Crouch, Junior," said Sirius in the same brusque voice. "Rodolphus's brother, Rabastan, was with them too."

She looked back at the tapestry. Fingers followed over the golden and silver lines the tore across the sheet. Another name and portrait were burned out of the Lestrange line. From the looks, it was the brother of the other two, Rodolphus and Rabastian, a brother in-between the two.

"Who was this?" asked Matilda, meeting Sirius' grim gaze.

He shrugged, looking closely at the burn mark, "He died. Blood traitor who refused to stand behind his family's support to the Dark Lord."

Matilda's posture straightened as she folded her arms across her chest. She heaved a deep sigh. So much complication on this mere piece of fabric. So much hatred and so many secrets involved with it. It had to be a haunting nuisance to keep it lingering in the old house.

"The secrets hidden within this piece of cloth are maddening. I could study it for hours ─ days, even," whispered Matilda, her eyes lingering on the tapestry that Sirius had stepped away from, digging his hand far into his pockets. "Who knows the identities that have been burned away. So many people ─ their stories, lost."

"This family is full of darkness. Vile monsters, Matilda," said Sirius, his voice strong and stern as he turned to face her. "It is better for someone to be burned from its history than to live in it. Not being on this tapestry is a ticket to freedom. You escape the grips of the family tree."

"Your name might be Black, but you are not one of them, Sirius," said Matilda, so faintly that Sirius almost didn't hear her. "But you aren't what they were. You fought for better. You are better. And I'm sorry you suffered for so many years because of your name."

"I'm sorry too, Matilda."

"Hurry up, you two, or there won't be any food left," Mrs. Weasleycalled.

Sirius heaved another great sigh, cast a dark look at the tapestry, and he and Matilda went to join the others.

Mrs. Weasley kept them all working very hard over the next few days. The drawing-room took three days to decontaminate; finally, the only undesirable things left in it were the tapestry of the Black family tree, which resisted all their attempts to remove it from the wall, and the rattling writing desk; Moody had not dropped by headquarters yet, so they could not be sure what was inside it.

They moved from the drawing-room to a dining room on the ground floor where they found spiders large as saucers lurking in the dresser. Ron left the room hurriedly to make a cup of tea and didn't return for another two hours. The china, which bore the Black family crest and motto, was all thrown unceremoniously into a sack by Sirius, and the same fate met a set of old photographs in tarnished silver frames, all of whose occupants squealed shrilly as the glass covering them smashed.

Snape might have referred to their work as cleaning but in Matilida's opinion, they were waging war on the house, which was putting up a very good fight, aided and abetted by Kreacher. The house-elf kept appearing wherever they were congregated, his muttering becoming more and more offensive as he attempted to remove anything he could from the rubbish sacks. And though the old and grouchy house-elf was not kind to Matilda, he did seem to have a sort of soft spot for her. He never referred to her as harmful names but he stared harshly in her direction whenever Matilda was unlucky enough to cross paths with Kreacher.

Sirius would threaten Kreacher when he'd hear the offensive mumblings or catch sight of him picking from rubbish piles with clothes. But Kreacher fixed him with a watery stare and said, "Master must do as Master wishes," before turning away and muttering very loudly, "But Master will not turn Kreacher away, no, because Kreacher knows what they are up to, oh yes, he is plotting against the Dark Lord, yes, with these Mudbloods and traitors and scum..."

At which Sirius, ignoring Hermione's protests, seized Kreacher bythe back of his loincloth and threw him bodily from the room. And though she didn't protest aloud, Matilda was not a fan of the brutality either.

The doorbell rang several times a day, which was the cue for Sirius' mother to start shrieking again, and for Matilda and the others to attempt to eavesdrop on the visitor, though they gleaned very little from the brief glimpses and snatches of conversation they were able to sneak before Mrs. Weasley recalled them to their tasks. Snape flitted in and out of the house several times more, though to Matilda's relief they never came face-to-face; she also caught sight of her father, who still posed at the Ministry, and Professor McGongall, looking very odd in a Muggle dress and coat, though she also seemed too busy to linger.

Sometimes, however, the visitors stayed to help; Tonks joined them for a memorable afternoon in which they found a murderous old ghoul lurking in an upstairs toilet, and Lupin, who was staying in the house with Sirius but who left it for long periods to do mysterious work for the Order, helped them repair a grandfather clock that had developed the unpleasant habit of shooting heavy bolts at passersby. Mundungus redeemed himself slightly in Mrs. Weasley's eyes by rescuing Ron from an ancient set of purple robes that had tried to strangle him when he removed them from their wardrobe.

Matilda wasn't sleeping well. The bed was old and creaky. She missed her own bed. And the pit in her stomach kept her tossing and turning for most hours of the night. And she was seeing even less of her dad than she had been before coming here. He'd pass in once or twice a week. As much as he could. Matilda missed him terribly. Though, despite the many trials Matilda's been put through in this short amount of time, she wasn't lonely for the first time all summer. She was so busy that she barely had enough time to stop and think about feeling lonely anymore. And she was surrounded by her friends. Seeing Harry healthy was a bonus. Matilda didn't even mind sharing a room with Ginny and Hermione. And having Ron around again, despite neither speaking more than a couple of words to one another in a day.

Her worry for Harry returned, however, when Mrs. Weasley turned to him during dinner on Wednesday evening and said quietly, "I've ironed your best clothes for tomorrow morning, Harry, and I want you to wash your hair tonight too. A good first impression can work wonders."

It felt as if a brick had been dropped into Matilda's stomach.

Matilda, Hermione, Ron, George, Fred, and Ginny were silent as their gazes slowly moved to meet Harry. He only nodded and tried to keep eating his chops, but Matilda noticed that he couldn't even chew the food he placed into his mouth.

"How am I getting there?" he asked Mrs. Weasley, trying to soundunconcerned.

"Arthur's taking you to work with him," said Mrs. Weasley gently.

Mr. Weasley smiled encouragingly at Harry across the table.

"You can wait in my office until it's time for the hearing," he said.

Harry looked over at Sirius, but before he could ask the question,Mrs. Weasley had answered it.

"Professor Dumbledore doesn't think it's a good idea for Sirius togo with you, and I must say I -"

"- think he's quite right," said Sirius through clenched teeth.

Mrs. Weasley pursed her lips.

"Well," coughed Matilda, her utensils fell with a clatter. "I'm going, of course."

She spoke with a confident shrug. Once again, she wasn't asking permission. But the adults at the table seemed to miss the message.

"I know you care for Harry, dear, we all do," started Mrs. Weasley, her tone comforting and soft, while at the same time stern and orderly. "But I think it best you stay behind with the rest of us until the hearing is over."

"No thank you. I'm going," said Matilda with a smile and began eating, hoping to close the discussion.

Sirius cleared his throat, still angry, "It's not permitted. We can't go to Harry's hearing. Dumbledore made it very clear."

Matilda became furious. Since when did Dumbledore get to decide these things? She respected him, more than anyone, but he still was not her father. In fact, no one sitting around the dining room table this evening was her father. Who were they to have any say on what she does?

"When did Dumbledore tell you that?" Harry said, staring atSirius.

"He came last night when you were in bed," said Mr. Weasley.

Though Matilda's posture straightened as her mouth hung slightly agape. Dumbledore had been in the house and hadn't even asked to see any of them, to speak to any of them? She hated how much anger she felt toward him. She'd never imagined herself being so angry with the man she admired. It was a foreign feeling. And she hated it.

"Dumbledore was here?" asked Matilda, agitated. "And none of you thought to wake me?"

ϟ

AN:// another seemingly boring chapter.

These might seem like boring and uneventful chapters but this year is huge for Matilda's character development. A lot of these chapters where there isn't a lot happening have a lot of hidden gems.

Can you find any? Let me know.

I promise things will pick up soon.

xoxo