It's Hard to be Perky when You're a Malfoy

The Weasleys' worst memory

We wanted to herald in the New Year with fireworks but Lione and Gregory got into a fight when Lee tried to take them apart to 'improve' them and Gregory objected that they didn't need improving. Joseph and I tried to intervene but we all ended up squabbling and pulling them and setting fire to the table. This time it was McGonagall who gave us detention.

"Have you noticed we've been getting more detentions this year?" Joseph asked.

"We're obviously not cute and innocent ickle first years anymore," said Gregory.

Lione scoffed. "Since when were you innocent?"

"Since when were you cute?" Gregory retorted immediately then looked very angry at himself.

We continued using our tunnel and we were sure no one knew about it. But once, on an invisible midnight wander, we collided with another invisible person. I called out cheerfully,

"Hello Mad Eye Moody!"

We heard a quick intake of breath in response. We ran away giggling.

I saw Phillip around a lot. He'd smile at me or come over and talk to me and I'd find myself blushing as red as Gregory's hair.

Gregory was having a similar experience but not quite as pleasant. Every time he happened to spot Jacquenetta, unless he hid, she would fly into a shrieking French torrent and, if she had the opportunity, throw things at him. He began to spend mealtimes ducked over his food, trying to cover up his distinctive red hair so she wouldn't see him and he wouldn't get another croissant to the head.

A week after Christmas I trundled (that's a good word, isn't it) downstairs carrying a package Lione had yet to open.

"What's this?" I asked, dropping it in front of her. Lione groaned and averted her eyes as if it hurt her. "What?" I persisted.

"It's from my grandparents," she explained. "And it feels like cloth, which means they've sent me another dress."

I laughed. "I thought you liked dresses now. You wore one to the Yule ball, didn't you?"

"I know," she said. "But that was the Yule ball. And I picked that one out myself. This..." She glanced at the package, winced as if in pain and pushed it away.

"Fine," said Gregory, jumping to his feet. "I'll open it."

"No!" cried Lione, reaching out to stop him but he'd already ripped the paper.

Something that looked like a huge heavy piece of cloth fell out. Lione stared.

"What the... they've sent me the tapestry!"

"The tapestry?"

"My family tree tapestry." She opened it up and laid it out on the floor. It was full of names like a chain down the cloth, a chain that got considerably less near the end. "That's me." She pointed to one of less than half a dozen names at the bottom. Lione Davies.

"What does this mean?" Joseph asked, pointing to something written at the top of the tapestry and reaching for his study of ancient runes books.

"'Never Give up, Never Surrender, Never lose hope'," Lione quoted. "It's our family motto.

"Sounds... nice."

"No it doesn't," Lione countered.

"We've-" I stopped. Everyone looked at me. "We used to," I corrected myself. "Have one of these at home. But it was full of holes."

"See that's what normal strict Wizarding families do," Lione said. "Whenever someone does something the family doesn't approve of they get blasted. In my family they wait to see if the kids are any improvement on the parents. Ooh! Where's my Weasley?"

We all looked shocked as Lione started perusing the tapestry with sudden vigour.

"I'm right here," Gregory said, sounding hurt.

Lione gave him an odd look. "Not you, the Weasley in my family. All 'pure-blood' Wizarding families have at least one Weasley. There she is. Agatha Weasley, later Agatha Lazaro - absolutely horrible woman. And for most people the Weasley in their family is a ray of sunshine...."

As the new term started everyone was buzzing with excitement about the upcoming second task. I was starting to get nervous about the patronus lessons.

"If you're scared," Lione said, snatching my plate from under me and shovelling scrambled eggs onto it. "And there's no problem with being scared. These things are designed to scare you so it's normal to be scared." She plucked two pieces of toast from the rack, dropped them on my plate and pushed it towards me. "If you're scared, you don't have to do it. No one's going to force you if you don't want to." She handed me a knife and fork and looked at me expectantly.

I tried not to laugh.

When Lione gets a bee in her bonnet she tends to forget that anyone can do anything at all.

"I'm okay," I told her.

Lione jumped to her feet, walked down the table and returned with a pain au chocolat that she placed in front of me. As an afterthought she took up the plate of sausages and gave two to Asher. Gregory, who had been eating cornflakes, looked down at his milk soaked meat mournfully.

"No one should force you into anything," Kettle continued. "You don't have to do anything you don't feel like." She frowned and looked at Joseph.

"How many times have I said that?"

"You have never said those exact words," Joseph replied, precisely.

"But...?"

"But you have said words to that effect thirty-seven times."

"Thirty-seven times? In four months?" She turned back to me. "People should stop forcing you to do things.

"No one's forcing me to do anything. I'm fine."

Lione looked doubtful and absentmindedly folded down Gregory's collar. Gregory slapped her hand away.

"Will you leave me alone, girl!" he cried (but not too loudly in case a certain French girl overheard him)

"Was I doing it again?" Lione asked.

"Yes," we chorused, "you were doing it again."

***

Everyone in the class was bigger than me. I know that's both not really relevant and really to be expected seeing as they were all seventh years and I was short anyway but it was a big deal to me. I felt so awkward walking in there, my head much lower than all of theirs and everybody who actually noticed me giving me confused looks. Colubra was in that class and he gave me a surprised look when he saw me. Professor Delacour entered, saw me, and smiled.

"Today we're going to be trying patronuses out on the closest thing we can get to a real dementor," she announced. "This is Lucy." I waved slightly. "She'll be assisting me. Lucy, can you come here."

Professor Delacour placed me at the front of the class, right in front of the notable box of Barry the Boggart which rocked slightly. She organised the rest of the class into groups and a set of students lined up beside me.

"Ready?" asked Professor Delacour, standing by the box.

"Ready," I said.

She pulled it open and dived out of the way. Rising like a mist, the dementor slid out of the box and glided towards me. I felt chilled to the bone as the terrible creature under its black cloak came forward. Suddenly the room was full of shouts and light. All kinds of creatures came from the wands of the students beside me jumped towards the dementor and there was a woman in a heap on the floor with her skirt covering her legs and her long red hair covering her face but I could tell she was crying. A man was standing over her, holding her wrist like a weapon and screaming something I couldn't understand.

"Lucy?"

I blinked. "Yes?"

A couple of seventh year Gryffindor girls were crowding round me.

"You all right?" one asked. "You went all funny for a moment."

"I didn't like it either," put in the other. "Made me feel all cold inside. Got me thinking about-" she stopped.

"I'm fine," I said.

Now that I looked around I could see the whole class had come to a halt. Colubra was standing a little way away, watching me - and that made me feel better. That may seem odd and you might be wondering why he didn't come over to check I was okay and be more brotherly. The thing is that's not my brother. I see Colubra as my ultimate safeguard who'll watch over me. I know he'll never let anything happen to me so if he's still watching then clearly nothing is happening. If something was happening, that's when he would intervene. So I was obviously still safe and sound.

"We can stop," Professor Delacour offered.

"No," I said. "I can do it."

After the lesson the two Gryffindor girls, both oddly named Phillipa, insisted on escorting me back to the tower. We had to take the long route because of a couple of stink bombs dropped in the Study of Ancient Runes corridor that I later learnt were Joseph's work. Apparently Professor Binns had been covering his class and he had got the feeling that if he didn't do anything he would lose the will to live. This sparked off a conversation in which Phillipa A told me she had once been the victim of the sock eating pillowcase we released in the dormitories. I decided not to tell her it had been us.

***

The next day it was our turn. None of us had yet managed to make a proper Patronus although most of us had managed a weak wispy type thing. Strangely Laura - although Gregory constantly pointed out that she should be the best after all Harry Potter could do a corporeal Patronus when he was thirteen and Laura was fourteen so she should catch up- and that's usually when we would hit him. Or at least look over his shoulder call out "Oh, hello Jacquenetta" - and Joseph were the best, their Patronuses being strongest and clearest. Joseph rarely stopped being smug about that.

"Right," said Professor Delacour. "We'll do this four at a time. Lucy, if you come forward you can have a go this time, but hold back next time. If there's anyone, for any reason, who wants to sit out feel free to do so. It's nothing to be ashamed of. You won't even get extra work; you can just have free time."

Everyone looked at each other but wither no one wanted to miss out on the lesson or no one wanted to admit to any reason why they should sit out because everybody stayed put.

"Concentrate on the happiest thought you can and say Expecto Patronum."

I thought of my happiest memory - one that I'm not even sure it actually happened exactly, I should check with Starsy one day. It's of us in the prankster room. Talking, laughing, and discovering new treats in the pile. Lione and I are looking at the plaque with all the names on. It's just so happy, so content and the great thing is it happens too often - sort of. Lione once told me that her happiest memory is when I threatened to shove rice pudding in Gregory's face. Joseph's has something to do with his little sister Caitlyn and Gregory never told me his.

Lione, Joseph, Robert and I were the first group. I had to stand forward so the boggart would concentrate on me. Barry came out of his box and glided toward us. I concentrated, raised my wand and, hearing the echo behind me, yelled,

"Expecto Patronum!"

Compared to the seventh years we came up with a rather pathetic mixture of vapoury wisps. Barry brushed them away easily. Professor Delacour hurried forward to push Barry away. I glanced at Lee who had gone pale. I opened my mouth to ask if she was okay but I realised she was looking at Joseph. If Lione was pale then Joseph was white as snow. His eyes were glazed over and he was staring into thin air. I touched his arm gently and he jumped.

"Are you all right?" I checked.

"What happened?" Lee asked.

"Did you hear screaming?" Gregory called out unhelpfully.

Everyone, including professor Delacour, shot him a dirty look.

Joseph smiled weakly. "I'm fine," he said. "It was... I just heard ringing in my ears, that's all." Everyone looked doubtful. "Can I have another go?" he tried.

"No chance!" Gregory called out again, barging his way forward. "I haven't had a go yet. It's supposed to be our groups' turn next."

"Calm down, Greg."

"Why should I?" Asher stamped his foot. "I want a go. Me!"

"You're acting like a two year old!"

"Am not!"

"Are too."

"You're all behaving like two year olds," cried Professor Delacour. "Come on, group one back up, group two take your positions."

Joseph, Lione and Robert walked away and Gregory, Laura, Anya and Samuel came to stand next to me. Professor Delacour released Barry again and my classmates shouted out their curses. And this was where we all got the shock of our lives. Instead of the fuzzy silvery things we were all by then expecting, something small but definitely furry and solid shot out of Gregory's wand at high speed and slammed straight into the Boggart Dementor. It happened so quickly none of us were certain what had happened until, mid flight, it moved slightly and we all realised that it had a tail. Everybody laughed with sheer delight at Gregory's success which, unfortunately, confused Barry. He stumbled backwards and sort of diagonally sideways for a while, fazed, and then turned on Gregory. The terrible dentist stalked towards him but Gregory raised his wand with violent speed. Gregory was obviously also thrown by his feat because instead of casting Riddikulus he shouted Expecto Patronum again. Although again, it moved quickly, this time the Patronus had nothing to attack, so we all saw it meander around the room before fading away. It was a fox.

I think I saw Professor Delacour step forward to put Barry away but we were all too excited to bring an end to the lesson quite yet. I jumped forward and forced the Boggart to concentrate on me again, turning it back into a Dementor. Almost automatically Laura, Gregory (who had to be dragged away by Laura since he had a sort of mystified grin on his face and was in a kind of dreamy state), Samuel and Anya backed away and Lione, Joseph and Robert came running forward. We continued like this, each group taking turns while Professor Delacour watched on in amazement. Gregory almost always managed to get his Patronus to appear. He failed on his groups' second go, which must have dulled his good mood because he didn't manage the next two times either. But after that it was almost every time. No one else came close to his level of success but we could tell our efforts were improving. The class overran by almost an hour (into our dinner - so we didn't miss any other lessons but did all come out of the class wondering why we were so hungry) before Professor Delacour stopped us. She congratulated us all and encouraged us to all have the chocolate cake that night.

As we walked out, each of us recounting how well we thought we did and what we thought our Patronuses were going to be and Gregory continuingly repeating about how he got his, I started to wonder whether my Boggart would and could always be a Dementor. After all, how could I look at them the same way now, after the best lesson ever? Despite it's shaky start.

***

We ran down the stairs, giggling. Gregory and Joseph were standing in the common room shushing us but beckoning us on. We threw our invisibility cloaks on and rushed out the door and down the stairs. On the way down we bashed so heavily into someone that the cloak actually slipped off me. I automatically turned around to apologise but there was no one there.

"Hurry up!"

Lione grabbed my hand and pulled me back under the cloak, we continued down the stairs until we reached the front door. It was open. Almost crowing with delight we ran outside and threw off the cloaks. Shushing each other but barely covering up our laughter we hurried down the path, past Hagrid's hut to where the Erumpets were being kept.

We stood in the shadows watching as keepers kept a close eye on huge, rhinoceros like creatures. Each with a horn that I knew could not only pierce anything but would cause whatever it hit to explode. Not for the first time I was thankful I wasn't a champion.

"They have to defeat those," I said aloud, but quietly.

"Yep," Greg replied.

"With only a spork," Joseph added with an evil grin.

We all leaned forward to look at him, Lione giggled.

"So then, folks," said Lione. "We four are not only the only four to know what's coming but the only to know all three champions. Joseph's Jack, my Robin and Lucy's Phillip."

"He's not my Phillip," I objected, blushing.

"Also," put in Joseph. "I don't like how you linked me to Jack in the same way you liked you and Lucy to Robin and Phillip."

"And he's not exactly your Robin, is he?" Gregory objected.

"What? Like you're my Weasley?"

Gregory blushed. "Look, shall we just come to a decision. Do we tell anyone what we saw here tonight?"

We all thought about it. "Nah."