𝐔𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐥 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐬 𝐁𝐮𝐫𝐧 𝐎𝐮𝐭 {𝐃𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐨 𝐌𝐚𝐥𝐟𝐨𝐲}

| 𝐇𝐄𝐒𝐓𝐈𝐀 | 𝘭𝘦𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘩𝘶𝘧𝘧𝘭𝘦𝘱𝘶𝘧𝘧

"It's Draco," I said, hurriedly. "Angel's missing."

"Missing? How? Wait- Babe! What am I supposed to do with this... bird?" I could not hear the rest of his whining, already climbing the stairs two at a time.

Our quarters above the inn were small, but fit all it needed to. There was a large couch, and at the far end, a large bed that Neville kept neat every day. He did most of the housekeeping around here, anyway, while I busied myself with the paperwork and supervising during work hours.

It was a simple life, and I liked it. Every day was the same: rise at seven, have our breakfast, give the place a little sweep, and we would be ready to serve lunch by eleven. Maureen McKinley, our surly bartender, would be grumbling behind the taps, while Grimwald, a cheery thirty-something Hogwarts dropout, would be standing by the cleaned tables with his tray and tea towel, ever-ready to serve with a stupid smile on his face.

Our customers were a funny band of folk - witches and wizards of all sorts, haphazard warlocks, dwarfs and the like. I enjoyed the variety - it brought something different to the every day mundane.

Neville was a gem, helping me any way he could. He swept the floors, kept everything in order, and perhaps most important of all: he would always find the time to have a chat with the customers. This was what brought them back every time - our hospitality and acceptance.

This life had been so fulfilling that the war had become nothing but a distant memory. The danger we had been plunged into, the exploding walls, the screaming and crackling of spells had become a faded photograph in my mind. Our lives in the cosy inn were untouchable.

But all of that was thrown out the door with the arrival of Draco's letter. The Death Eaters were real, and they had been out to kill us, did not matter who. We had been nothing but sacks of meat that stood in the way of the Voldemort and Harry.

Neville and I had battled them. He had beheaded one of Voldemort's own Horcruxes, and I had set one of them on fire, smiled as I watched him burn. But all that meant nothing. We had merely been defending ourselves. But the Death Eaters, they had actually wanted to see us dead.

They were out there now, and they might have taken my best friend. Why? Because she had denied them a life by pushing Draco out of the way? Because her fantastical display of insolence almost killed one of theirs? But the rebounded curse had not harmed anyone. Barnabas still lived. Why was it such a big deal?

The truth was, I knew nothing. All I was certain of was that Angel was missing, and I would do everything in my power to find her.

⋇⋆✦⋆⋇

🤎

s u s a n

I leaned back in the chair, quill dangling loosely from my fingers. I would never be able to finish this book. Everyone had heard of a Chimaera, but writing about one, profiling it, and putting it all into words for an audience to understand was a near-impossible task in and of itself.

I glanced at the clock and sprung from my desk. "Shit!" I mumbled, racing to the kitchen. The place looking like a potion experiment had gone wrong, but I managed to find the two bowls after a lot of rummaging.

"Shit, shit, shit." I grabbed two chunks of meat from the freezer and threw them into the bowls, my hands stinging from the cold. I tapped my wand to the red hunks and said a warming spell. The meat began to defrost, but I did not bother waiting. The bowls were larger than the monstrous pots the Hogwarts elves used, barely fitting under my arms as I hurried to the backyard, as fast as I could without tripping.