Emily Potter - Book 5 - Order of the Phoenix

Chapter 5 - The Order of the Phoenix

Emily, who had expected a better welcome, noted how hard and bitter Sirius’s voice sounded at the mention of his mother. She followed Harry and his godfather to the bottom of the steps and through a door leading into the basement kitchen. It was scarcely less gloomy than the hall above, a vast room with rough stone walls. Most of the light was coming from a large fire at the far end of the room. A haze of smoke hung in the air like battle fumes, through which loomed the menacing shapes of heavy iron pots and pans hanging from the dark ceiling. Many chairs had been crammed into the room for the meeting and a long wooden table stood in the middle of them, littered with rolls of parchment, goblets, empty bottles of what she suspected to be Muggle wine and Fire whiskey, and a heap of what appeared to be rags.

Mr. Weasley and his eldest son Bill were talking quietly with their heads together at the end of the table. Mrs. Weasley cleared her throat. Her husband, a balding, red-haired man who wore horn-rimmed glasses, looked around and jumped to his feet. “Harry, Emily!” Mr. Weasley said as he hurried forward to greet them, and shaking their hands vigorously, “Good to see you both!” Over his shoulder, Emily saw Bill, who still wore his long hair in a ponytail, hastily rolling up the lengths of parchment left on the table. “Journey all right, you two?” Bill called, trying to gather up twelve scrolls at once. “Mad-Eye didn’t make you come via Greenland, then?”

“He tried,” said Tonks, striding over to help Bill and immediately toppling a candle on to the last piece of parchment. “Oh no – sorry – “ But before Molly could pick up her wand from the counter, Emily waved her hand at the fallen candle and restored it in its place followed by her mending the small burnt patch on the parchment. Tonks smiled gratefully at her, fascinated, “Wandless magic at your age? Aren’t you a bundle of surprises?” She said beaming at her.

Emily only smiled bashfully, averting her eyes from Mr. Weasley. She had never noticed how he had resembled Percy, not to mention when they wore the same glasses. It made her homesick somehow, and yet disappointed of her boyfriend’s choices. Before Bill stowed away the rolls of parchment, she caught glimpse of one with a drawing of a building plan of a rather large place. Emily, at first, thought it was the building plan of the Ministry of Magic but the thought of having that in the hands of whatever the Order of the Phoenix is...It was unsettling. What are they planning? Are they going to break in there?

Mrs. Weasley had seen her looking. She snatched the plan off of her son’s arms and sealed it closed with wax, “This sort of thing ought to be cleared away promptly at the end of meetings,” she snapped, before sweeping off towards an ancient dresser from which she started unloading dinner plates. Bill took out his wand, muttered, “Evanesco!” and the scrolls vanished.

“This is your ancestral home, then?” Emily blurted, looking around the kitchen, remembering the screaming portrait of Sirius’ mother. He mustered a kind smile, light in his eyes, “Sit down,” said Sirius, gazing at the twins, “Both of you.” Sirius filled them in with the history of 12 Grimmauld place: It had housed every witch and wizard that had the blood of the Black family, but have the faintest relationship with a Muggleborn then you are out. The Blacks were prejudiced when it came to blood purity; they had kicked out every relative that had any relations to what they deemed “scum”.

No one had lived in the house for 10 years, and since Sirius’ mother had died, it was now his. He had offered it to Dumbledore as headquarters for the Order of the Phoenix.

“There’s not much I can do for the Order of the Phoenix… or so Dumbledore feels.” There was something about the slightly flat tone of voice in which Sirius uttered Dumbledore’s name that told Emily that Sirius, too, was not very happy with the Headmaster. Emily felt a sudden upsurge of affection for him.