𝐀𝐑𝐂𝐀𝐍𝐄 ˚₊· ͟͟͞͞➳ 𝐧𝐜𝐭 𝐝𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐦 - 𝐡𝐨𝐠𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐬 𝐚𝐮

⇛ 𝐂𝐇. 𝟏𝟕

"it's so great to see you, yunhee dear."

"you too, mrs zhong. it's been too long." she let go of the woman she saw as a mother, smiling at her so brightly. it had been a while since she smiled like that.

yunhee's eyes averted to the large group of people sat around the long table. some were familiar faces, others were not. she recognised her old professors, lupin, moody; mark's godfather sirius, her friends parents and siblings, and best of all, her friends.

an even bigger smile broke out onto her face as she rushed over to them, bringing them into a group hug. she felt like she could cry in that moment.

"you don't know how much i've missed you all."

"we missed you even more, prefect buddy. we sent letters everyday, but we never got responses." jeno said, hugging her on his own this time.

"sorry, i told you guys not to bother. my parents probably threw everything out. i only got renjun's letter about sending a picture of my house." she explained.

"wait. yun, what happened to your face?" chenle asked, his fingers hovering over the red mark on her cheek, a bruise on her forehead and a small cut on her nose.

"nothing. i'm alright." she replied, keeping her smile on, but he looked unconvinced.

"mum." chenle called and in a second, she was pushing yunhee to sit on one of the seats.

"let's get your face fixed up." mrs zhong hummed as the others took their seats to wait for dinner to be served.

"yunhee, right?" a girl took the seat next to her. she realised it was the girl who had saved her from her her mum by apparating. that was why renjun asked for a picture of her house, so she knew where to apparate to. "sorry about the apparating. it takes a while to get used to. i'm renjun's older sister, jia."

"it's nice to meet you, jia." yunhee shook the girls hand after mrs zhong was done. she was hoping to become close friends with renjun's sister.

"yun!" someone screamed as they stomped down the stairs and crashed into her chair.

"aerin!" yunhee helped the girl up and was crushed in another hug as the younger girl fake sobbed.

"my baby yunnie." aerin cried, finally letting go to get a good look at her face. "who did this to you?!"

"i'll explain later." yunhee said, taking her seat again and aerin sat on top of her, squishing her. "mark, when did you get here by the way?"

"only a few hours ago." he replied, turning to face the adults again. "we were just talking about the ministry, but i still don't get what they have against me."

"show him." moody said as everyone else went quiet. "he'll find out soon enough."

kingsley shacklebolt, a man that was an auror and worked at the ministry of magic—chenle had told yunhee about him—handed mark a newspaper with the headline: 'the boy who lies'.

"he's been attacking dumbledore as well." sirius said. "fudge is using all his power, including his influence at the daily prophet, smear anyone who claims the dark lord has returned."