Cast yourself (you are the spell)

Chapter 39

Jade.

The name becomes slimy in her head, playing over and over again with deeply-rooted anger.

"Okay." Hope stands up, oddly calm. She can blame whatever she does next on the prank war, or Gryffindor-Slytherin rivalry. No one would have to know her true intentions, and Jade would have no choice but to let the pureblood strangle her after committing such an atrocity.

"Okay?" Josie knits her brows together and narrows her eyes. She stands up with Hope and pulls her closer by their hands.

"Give me her common room password," Hope says quietly, eyes on the door. The second Josie utters the password, she'll leave and find that unintelligent moron. She'll fucking give that imbecile her own black eye, and see how she feels about that.

"What?" Josie swallows, her face screwing up in confusion.

"I know you know it," Hope tells her plainly, her mind crowding with all the different thoughts on how she can kill Jade. "Just say the words, and..."

She breathes deeply, setting her eyes onto Josie's with reassurance.

"I'll handle it."

"Handle it?" Josie frowns, tugging her even closer. Hope brushes her fingers across the other girl's knuckles, silently urging her to let go and to let Hope do this. "How do you plan on doing that?"

The pureblood doesn't answer.

"It's late. Everyone is asleep," Josie continues, her eyes almost pleading. Hope huffs.

"I'll just kill her in her sleep then." She's not even joking.

The muggleborn only scoffs, not angry but taken aback instead. "No, you won't."

"Yes, I will. I shall defend your honor," Hope states with dramatic gallantry, and the look Josie gives her tells the pureblood just how much she thinks of that notion.

Whatever, she'll just threaten the portrait outside the Gryffindor common room to let her in, or she'll blackmail it out of an unsuspecting first-year. She doesn't truly need Josie for this part.

She pats their clasped hands one more time before moving passed the brunette, who pulls her back by the collar.

"Would you just sit down?" she hisses, causing Hope to bristle hotly underneath her attention. "I don't know what's with you, and everyone else, thinking that I can't protect myself or that I need people to 'defend my honor.' I can take care of myself."

Josie says it all in such a way that suggests her friends had reacted the same as Hope, in such a way that Hope thinks this isn't the first time she's given this speech.

The glare that Hope has been uselessly trying to keep on her face smooths out. She cracks a smirk. "Oh, so what you're saying is that we should both go kill her, together?"

A smile flickers against a corner of Josie's lips, very faintly, as if she's trying to remain serious. She can't for very long, however, and her face breaks out with laughter.

"That's not it at all," she giggles, sitting down with a shake of her head. Hope spares a single glance in the direction Pomfrey left before sitting down along side of her, so close that that their thighs touch.

"She can't get away with hurting you," Hope says gently, with an air of finality, once their laughter dissolves. "I won't allow it."

"Hope," the muggleborn murmurs very slowly, turning her head to connect their eyes. An odd expression crosses her face. "That's not up to you."

Hope swallows and nods, feeling like a child being scolded. How could she have forgotten that it wasn't her place to protect the other girl? How could she have forgotten that Josie isn't truly hers, and that she never would be?