Ink and Parchment ~ blood and bone

22: what happens in the common room stays in the common room II

"If I ever see him" Eliza says slowly "I think I'll kill him"

The words settled heavy over them. Blaise has never been scared of Eliza, she's his friend, his family. But looking in her eyes as she declared her murderous intent he feared for whoever decided to make themselves an enemy of Eliza Potter. For he was sure they would not survive it.

*

Oh Blaise don't you think you've outlived your usefulness

The words of his boggart echoed about his head, even all these hours later.

Oh Blaise don't you think you've outlived your usefulness

The crooning words of his mother, her warm palm on his cheek as she invites him for tea. It makes him shake with fear, his legs bouncing underneath him as he tries to sink further into the couch staring at the flame as if his fear could be devoured like kindling.

No child should be afraid of their own parent.

And yet here he was.

"What are you doing awake?"

Blaise jumps at the sound, heart pounding viciously before he realised it was just Eliza. Just Eliza standing in front of him in her pyjama pants and a quidditch jersey he was sure used to be Draco's. Her voice is soft as if she didn't want to startle him and even in the dim light he can see how tired she was.

"Don't worry about it" Blaise says instead of burdening her with yet another truth "I simply couldn't sleep knowing I wasn't going to be dreaming of you" he finishes with a wink. It would usually make Eliza laugh, or at least smile which Blaise always took as a win but instead her brows furrowed further and she came to sit next to him on the sofa.

"Is this about your mother?" she asks because Blaise really is just that transparent isn't he?

"I'm scared" Blaise says finally because it's easy to admit these things to Eliza, easy to confess in the dim light between those hours of morning and night.

"That's okay"

That's okay.

Not 'it will get better' not 'everything will be fine' not 'you'll get through this' but 'that's okay'

It's okay to be scared, he's allowed to be scared and Blaise never knew he needed someone to say that to him so badly.

Blaise physically slumps, something loosening in his chest as he leans onto Eliza. She doesn't say anything else but she doesn't leave either. She just sits with him until his panic fades, until he feels his eyes start to droop.

He blearily blinks when he feels something poke against the tip of his nose.

"Did you just boop my nose?" Blaise asks groggily and looks up at Eliza from where his head is resting in her lap.

"Yeah" Eliza says with a grin "I did"

Blaise laughs softly and he falls asleep happily, feeling safer with Eliza than he ever had at home.

And that's more than okay.

*

Remus could admit to himself that Eliza Potter was one of the biggest reasons he had agreed to come and work at Hogwarts. He loved teaching and finally being able to have wolfsbane for his transformations was wonderful but he couldn't lie and say the thought of seeing little Eliza again was what convinced him.

Except she wasn't anything like he expected.

The other teachers raved about her, charming, charismatic, intelligent and modest. All the best pieces of Lily and James. But she was also aloof, she had a close set of friends and she was friendly when she needed to be but no one had any doubts that she was naturally rather detached.