In The Shadows² ★ Draco Malfoy

*Hogwarts Express

The Weasley household was tense for a while after the world cup. Remus had shown up at dawn the day after basically, and had been obsessively checking on Briar every minute to make sure she had no wounds or injuries from last night. He flooed home ever night and back in every morning.

Meanwhile Mr Weasley and Percy were nearly always at work now, even on weekends, to deal with Howlers and complaints and the investigation of who was the cause of the attack.

The young people in the house however had found time to go to Diagon Alley and retrieve all their school supplies for the upcoming year, and that night was the first night Briar slept well since the attack

She was sat in the bay-window of Ginny's room that night when a sleek black owl suddenly perched on the windowsill. She glanced behind her to check Ginny and Hermione were still asleep before untying the roll of parchment on the bird's leg

Lupin,

I'll be honest, I don't know why I'm writing this. Maybe I felt bad for calling you a half-breed, or maybe because I said the death eaters would come after you. Either way I wanted to check you were alive. We'll talk when we're at school

- Draco Malfoy

That note had been the most unexpected thing Briar had received, but since she got it she had been sleeping better 

On the day before they were due to return to school the house had livened up again, mainly because Mrs Weasley had distracted them from the World Cup by badgering all of them about making sure all of their stuff was packed for school

On September 1st she didn't let any of them leave their rooms until she had checked all of their luggage 

Mrs. Weasley had braved the telephone in the village post office to order threeordinary Muggle taxis to take them into London."Arthur tried to borrow Ministry cars for us," Mrs. Weasley whispered to Harry and Briar asthey stood in the rain-washed yard, watching the taxi drivers heaving six heavyHogwarts trunks into their cars. "But there weren't any to spare. . . . Oh dear, theydon't look happy, do they?" 

They didn't like to tell Mrs. Weasley that Muggle taxi drivers rarely transportedoverexcited owls, and Pigwidgeon was making an earsplitting racket. Nor did ithelp that a number of Filibuster's Fabulous No-Heat, Wet-Start Fireworks went offunexpectedly when Fred's trunk sprang open, causing the driver carrying it to yellwith fright and pain as Crookshanks clawed his way up the man's leg. 

The journey was uncomfortable, because they were jammed in theback of the taxis with their trunks. Crookshanks took quite a while to recover fromthe fireworks, and by the time they entered London, Harry, Ron, and Hermione were all severely scratched. 

So everyone was relieved to get out at King's Cross station and they hurried towards Platform 9 3/4 to get out of the rain. 

Briar's smile grew immensely when she saw the gleaming scarlet Hogwarts Express waiting for them ahead. Remus had gone through the barrier with them and helped her and Ginny put their luggage into a compartment together. Henry met them there and was immediately asking millions of questions about the World Cup, and the girls promised they would answer them all when the train started moving

They then went back down onto theplatform to say good-bye to Mrs. Weasley, Remus, Bill, and Charlie, who had come to see them off 

Remus pulled his daughter to one side quickly and placed his hands on her shoulders "Briar, I want you to promise me that you'll look after yourself this year"

"Of course I will, dad," she chuckled "I won't go chasing any more criminals into the Forbidden forest I promise"

"Briar," He sighed "Those aren't the only dangers at Hogwarts, you know that. Last year I could help you but now I can't. So please, please promise me, for me and Sirius, that you won't go looking for trouble and that you'll keep yourself safe"