Alone

Chapter 14

Blaise sighed. He had been sitting at the desk, trying to teaching Lucy about magic for the last four hours. To say he was tired and short-tempered would be an understatement. And to make matters worse, the girl was simply not cooperating.

"You can't make me!" she said stubbornly, for the twentieth time that hour, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

"Yes I can!" Blaise shouted back, his patience and anger finally snapping.

"I don't care who you are, but you can't seriously think that I would believe magic is real?" Lucy asked sarcastically. Blaise glared at her and ran a hand through his hair.

"It is real," he said softly, eyes flashing dangerously. Lucy snorted.

"Then how come I can't do it? Since I am supposed to be a witch aren't I?"

"I don't know why you can't do it! Maybe you don't want to! Has that thought even occurred to you?"

"Well maybe it would if you stop bellowing in my ear!"

"Well I'm not the one who started it!"

"Yes you are!"

"Are not!"

"Are too!"

"Are not!"

"Are too!"

"You sound like a five year old!"

"And you don't?!"

"Argh!"

Blaise threw his hands up in the air and buried his face in his arms. Lucy Campbell was impossible. Why his master even wanted her was a mystery to him. It had something to do with a letter her mother wrote her. All the answers were in that letter and Blaise wanted it. What would make a supposed Muggle like Lucy so invaluable to Voldemort?

"All right, we are going to try this again. You are a witch, magic exists and according to my master, you are powerful. Now would you please hold this wand and try a spell?" Blaise asked politely. Lucy glanced suspiciously at him, but did as he said. Maybe if she did this one more time, the idiot would get it through his head that she wasn't a witch.

"Lumos," she muttered, but nothing happened.

"See?" she asked triumphantly. Blaise frowned. This wasn't right. Lucy was a witch; Voldemort wouldn't get something as important as this wrong.

"Maybe," he muttered under his breath as he stared intently at Lucy.

Suddenly something occurred to him. Pointing his wand at Lucy Blaise smirked. He loved that look of fear in her eyes. After all, she had been pissing him off for the last four hours.

"Powers of Dark, I call thee! Break the shield, I ask thee! Release the power, I command thee!" Blaise chanted as a dark glow encircled Lucy. (A/N alright, alright. Dumb chant, I know. But I'm tired and I've got school in fifteen hours!)

"What the hell are you doing to me?!" Lucy screamed as the mist blocked her completely from Blaise's view.

When the mist cleared, Lucy still looked normal, though now Blaise could feel an aura of power surrounding her.

"Try the spell now," he said firmly, leaving no room for argument.

"Idiotic moron. Wouldn't know if it was day or night if someone didn't tell him," she mumbled under her breath as she picked up the length of wood again.

"Lumos," she muttered, but this time there was one big difference.

As soon as she said the spell, bright, white light burst from the tip of her wand and blinded the pair.

~~*~~

"So that's how you met?" Sirius asked. Derek nodded.

"It was pretty funny actually, how we started talking and being civil around each other," Derek said with a grin.

**Flashback Part2**

It was three months after Jake had moved in with Derek and he had shown no signs of becoming more than acquaintances with Derek.

Late one night, Derek stumbled into the room, drunk attending a party. Jake glanced over his book and glared disapprovingly at Derek, but didn't say anything. After all, he couldn't afford to offend the person that owned the house that he was living in. Ignoring the moaning Derek, Jake went on reading about the theory of law.

But he couldn't ignore the fact that Derek pitched forward, half conscious, towards the floor. Leaping to his feet, Jake grabbed Derek's arm and held on tight. Noticing that Derek looked like he was about to be sick, Jake dragged him to the bathroom.

No way in hell was he going to let Derek vomit all over his new clothes and the carpet, especially since when the question came in about who would clean the carpet, it would surely be Jake.

Jake got Derek to the toilet just in time. Wrinkling his nose and trying not to be sick himself, Jake gently held back Derek's hair as he made a mess of the toilet.

After standing in this rather tiring position for fifteen minutes, Jake dragged Derek, not too gently, back to his room. Derek groaned as his backside was dragged up the stairs by the blob thingy that looked remarkably like Jake's back. Groaning again, Derek let the darkness swallow him.

~~*~~

The next morning, Jake prepared breakfast and laid it out on the table. Usually, they each made their own breakfast, but Jake felt sorry for Derek, who by now probably has a killer hangover.

Stumbling into the kitchen and mumbling incoherently about evil mushrooms, Derek looked like he was about to faint at any second. Jake sighed and directed him, by the arm, to his chair and piled his plate with food.

"Eat," he ordered and Derek obeyed. Even in this state of mind, he knew better than to argue with Jake.

Afterwards, when Derek finally got complete use of his brain again, he started to wonder why Jake was being so kind. Maybe, just maybe, Jake was going to be friends with him.

**End of Flashback Part 2**

Draco paced his room nervously. Why, oh why did he open his big mouth and say that? He couldn't come up with a plan by tonight which, he noted with a glance at his watch, seemed to be only two hours away from now.

Groaning and sinking into his bed, Draco buried his face in his hands.

What was he going to do? He never should've provoked Jake. He didn't have a decent plan that didn't include getting everyone killed.

Jumping to his feet and pacing the room again, Draco sighed and went over plans in his head.

We could always just do as Potter says and walk up to the front door, Draco thought.

Yeah right and then get chopped to pieces, another voice said sarcastically.

Draco shook his head. He was not going to get in a fight with the voices in his head again.

What could we do? There are no secret passages Lucius didn't know about and as soon as Potter steps into the manor, Voldemort will surely know. If there is a passage, then it would be - wait a minute. Maybe there could be a way into the manor after all, Draco suddenly thought. Maybe he could make up a plan by that night after all.

~~*~~

Jake kicked off the ground hard and enjoyed the feeling of the wind as it whipped through his hair. He found his old broom in his school trunk that had been brought for him by a house elf. Apparently, Dumbledore had never destroyed his things, but rather, kept it safe for him.

Jake almost jumped with joy when he realised that his Firebolt was still in top condition and the temptation to go flying had been too strong.

So now here he was, flying through the air, leaving all his problems back on the ground. God, how he missed flying. Up in the air, he was free, free to do what he wanted and free of everything that weighed him down when his feet were on the ground.

Doing laps around the field, Jake didn't notice that students had gathered at the windows to watch him fly. Most had never seen anyone who flew so well. Well, some of the seventh and sixth years remembered one person that had flown like that. And that was Harry Potter. But this couldn't possibly be Harry Potter, could it?

~~*~~

Derek stopped telling the story and looked into the fire. Sirius looked like he was about to laugh. The mental image of Jake dragging a drunken Derek up the stairs was hilarious. Derek sighed in mock anger and glanced towards the window before transferring his gaze to Sirius.

Suddenly he whipped his eyes back to the window. Was Jake flying? It wasn't that Derek had anything against Jake flying, but flying on a broomstick? And not telling him? With all the attacks and things, Derek would've had a heart attack if he had gone to Jake's room and found him not there. Derek would've thought Jake had been kidnapped or something worse.

Standing up and yanking open the window Derek stuck out his head.

"What the hell do you think you're doing Stevens?" Derek shouted, oblivious to the stares he was getting from the students. Jake stopped at the sound of his best friend's voice. Looking sheepish he grinned at Derek.

"Hey Derek," he said as Derek scowled.

"Don't hey me! What do you think you're doing?" he asked.

"Uh, flying?" Jake stated the obvious. Derek glared.

"I thought you were up in your room brooding and instead you're flying around, on a broomstick. You want to give me a bloody heart attack?" he asked. Jake grinned.

"Aw, I didn't know you cared," he said, pretending to wipe a tear away from his eye. Derek's scowl deepened.

"Shut up and get in here Stevens," he ordered.

"Sir, yes, sir," Jake said, saluting Derek. Derek rolled his eyes.

"The least you could've done was tell me. Don't you think that maybe I would like to go flying as well?" he asked as Jake raised an eyebrow.

"Uh, Derek, did you forget that you're afraid of heights?" Jake asked tenderly. Derek's fear was something you had to tread pretty lightly on. Derek hated being reminded that he was afraid of anything.

"Just shut up and get your arse in here NOW!" Derek bellowed as Jake flew towards the ground hastily. Jake knew he shouldn't have reminded Derek that he was afraid of heights. It would've been much funnier to see him scream like a girl.

~~*~~

After much shouting on Derek's part at Jake's behaviour and how he should always to tell somebody when he was going anywhere, the rest of the time to the meeting passed quickly.

"I mean, you could've at least told me that you were going out. What if I'd checked and hadn't found you in your room? I would've thought you had died or something," Derek continued to rant as the pair made their way to Dumbledore's office.

"You're like a mother hen, did you know that?" Jake asked innocently. Derek stopped talking in mid-sentence and sent an indignant glare towards him.

"Are you implying that I'm a chicken?" he asked in a dangerously soft voice. Jake tried to stifle laughter. Honestly, he did. But with the look on Derek's face and the fact that Derek thought that he thought he was chicken, which Jake was not implying, made it kind of hard.

"No, I was implying that you were a rooster," Jake said sarcastically, after he controlled his laughter.

"Well, I suppose that's better than a hen," Derek muttered as Jake smiled evilly.

"I meant one of those old, cranky, always hopping on one foot roosters," Jake informed him and ducked just in time as Derek took a swing at his head.

No one had ever seen Jake run so fast from Derek in an attempt to save his life.

~~*~~

"Jake Nicholas Stevens! You get your arse back here so I can kick it into next week. How dare you call me a rooster? How dare you imply that I'm-" Derek suddenly stopped as the members of the Order turned to face him with curious and amused looks on their faces. He thought he heard Jake snicker, but as soon as he faced him, Jake's face was a mask of pure innocence.

In his anger to run down Jake and punch the daylights out of him, Derek hadn't realised that they had climbed the stairs to Dumbledore's office until the Order had turned to face him.

"Well," Draco began before Derek cut him off.

"One word out of you Malfoy and I swear, you won't live to see your next birthday. Oh and Jake, as soon as I get my hands on you, I'm going to personally give you to Voldemort on a silver platter," Derek threatened as Jake waved his hands dismissively.

"So Malfoy," Jake started with a smirk. "Do you have your oh, so brilliant plan, that you were sure you could come up with by now?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact I do Potter. While you were playing with Muggle Boy I was actually doing something useful that as I said before, requires the actual use of brain cells," Draco retorted smoothly, watching with satisfaction as Derek bristled at being called Muggle Boy.