Melancholy || Harry Potter's twin brother

3: chapter four

The rain was pelting down onto the sturdy material of the tent, but the group were safe and warm inside. They were sat playing double rummy by lantern torch light.

"Do you think there will be another mystery at Hogwarts this year?" Hannah asked as she shuffled through her hand of cards.

"Crikey Hannah! We've got three weeks yet!" Ernie exclaimed, she pulled a face and hit him with her pillow.

"I was just asking, theres been something different happening for the past two years, I don't see why anything shouldn't happen this year." She said.

"Well for that we'll have to see, none of us are seers after all." Sirius pointed out.

"Well you do randomly collect information." Justin mused.

"That hasn't happened for ages though." Sirius replied.

"Oh yeah, what's going on with that?" Ernie asked, passing around a bag of sweets he had bought.

"Oh I don't know, it'll happen again at some point." Sirius shrugged.

"It might not, maybe you're free from it now." Justin said brightly putting some cards down.

"We can hope." Sirius agreed, realising he wasn't sure what his next move would be.

"Come on Sirius make a move, we haven't got all night." Ernie teased his friend, who laughed.

"Alright, alright." He rolled his eyes and made a quick decision that definitely would not help him win the game.

Daylight appeared quickly that morning over the steady silence of the sleeping group. Sirius, curled into Justin's side, head in the crook of his neck, knees resting against his friends side, was awoken by Justin, who gently shook his arm.

"Sirius you're squashing my kidneys." He said gently pushing his friend off him.

"Sorry." Sirius mumbled repositioning himself without even bothering to open his eyes. There would not be an early or even mid-morning wake up for the group, that was for sure.

The group slept in until noon and then sleepily handed around a box of frosties, sharing the cereal without much conversation. They were tired and still trying to escape the clutches of sleep.

"Hey, what do you guys want to do today?" Sirius asked, shoving a handful of frosties into his mouth.

"Theres a lake near here, so we could go swimming?" Justin suggested, taking the frosties from Sirius.

"Yeah that'll be fun." Hannah agreed. "Merlin I haven't been swimming for ages."

"Me neither, we can all swim right?" Ernie asked, they all looked at Sirius.

"Charming!" He scoffed. "I can swim by the way."

"Really?" Hannah asked.

"No need to sound so surprised." Sirius scowled. "Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon thought swimming lessons were a good way to get us out the house."

"Brilliant, were you on a team?" Justin asked.

"Yeah, I was on our Primary schools swim team." Sirius nodded. "Our Aunt and Uncle thought it was great because they didn't have to pay for anything and I was out of the house for entire days."

"Cool." Justin offered him the box of Frosties, Sirius took it, passing it to Ernie when he'd taken a handful.

"I haven't swam since." Sirius mused sadly.

"Good job we're going today then." Ernie pointed out.

^^^
When they were ready, the group ventured down to the lake, counting to three before running into the cold water together, splashing at each other and laughing. They were pushing and shoving each other into the cool water. It was unusually hot that day and they were glad of the cool water as the heat reached its peak.

"Guys! Look over there!" Ernie shouted from where he and Sirius had raced each other almost into the centre of the lake.

"What exactly are you pointing at?" Hannah shouted back, she was sat on Justin's back, as he tried to push her off into the water.

"Canoe hire!" Ernie replied. "There's an island in the middle of the lake, we could canoe out there for a bit."

"Do you actually know how to canoe Ern?" Sirius asked, Ernie splashed him.

"Of course I do!" He said, Sirius laughed.

"Sounds like a great idea!" Justin shouted back, the group was quite far apart, but they could still see each other.

"Come on, I'll race you back." Sirius challenged Ernie, who grinned.

"You're on."

The boys raced each other to the edge of the lake, making it back exactly at the same time.

"Justin who won?" Ernie asked, Justin frowned.

"Erm... it was pretty close." He replied. Ernie sighed.

"Rematch?" He suggested.

"What about our canoe?" Hannah interrupted him.

"Yeah come on Ern, we can race later." Sirius added. Ernie nodded.

"Fine, lets go." He agreed, the group wandered to the edge and got out of the water, walking along the grass to the canoe hire.

Their canoe was blue, and fit all four of them nicely inside.

"Okay, we need to be rowing in sync." Ernie told them, adjusting his life jacket. "Otherwise we won't get anywhere."

"Shouldn't be too hard, right?" Hannah asked them optimistically and the agreed. Unfortunately, rowing was not their strong suit and it took them almost two hours to get from the canoe hire to the island, and by that time they were exhausted.

They tied up the canoe and decided to go for a wander through the trees of the island they had found. The sun streamed through the gaps in the canopy of leaves and it was a lovely walk through to the other side. The wandered the shallows a bit there, looking across to the small village at the other side of the lake.

"Maybe we should visit there tomorrow?" Justin suggested.

"We could do, right now let's think about heading back, because I'm starving." Sirius told them all, they had to laugh at this.

"Yeah, come on boys." Hannah led them back through the trees where they found someone sitting in their canoe. It was of course Aro.

"I was wondering when you would return." He told them. Sirius groaned.

"What do you want?"

"I need you to return to Rome with me." He told them.

"What about all our stuff, and we need to give the canoe back." Ernie said to the others as though Aro couldn't hear him.

"Its sorted, Aro stepped off the canoe and snapped his fingers. The boat disappeared. "Come on."

"Why can't we have a normal summer for once." Sirius groaned.

"Quiet boy!" Aro glared at him. "When we get there I need your utmost attention."

"Oh Merlin, why?" Sirius groaned as Aro grabbed his wrist. Hannah took his other hand and the world around them twisted into nothingness and they jolted away from the beautiful lake they had been at.