/𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐑𝐒\ [𝒔. 𝒃𝒍𝒂𝒄𝒌]

𝟐.𝟞.𝟣

She swatted him away, laughing, and then jumped. "Oh!" she said, setting a hand on her stomach. "She's moving!"

"What?" Ted moved forward and placed his hand on top of Andromeda's. She lightly slipped her hand out from under his and guided it to where the kick had come from. They sat in anticipatory silence for a few seconds, and then Ted's face lit up. "It kicked me!" he said gleefully.

Andromeda laughed and leaned forward, her lips inches from Ted's. "I've never heard anyone that happy to be kicked before," she said before closing the gap between them, kissing him sweetly. When they broke apart, she smiled and looked back down at her stomach. "I just can't wait to meet t- whatever we end up calling it," she said, and leaned in to kiss him again. "Though we won't be calling it Andrew, no matter what."

~

The changing of scenes made Harry dizzy every time it happened, and he was getting used to it now. He never expected it when it happened, but he knew it was coming when the people in the Pensieve started shimmering like reflections on water and his own body felt like it was bending in weird ways.

When everything re-surfaced, Harry was standing in the courtyard of the school with snow falling softly all around him, though he couldn't feel the cold wind that whipped over the grounds and ruffled the hair and coats of the few students milling about in the courtyard. Among them, he quickly picked out the bright red hair of Lily Evans, standing arm in arm with Marlene. Artemis and Mary were a few feet away, shivering in their cloaks. Artemis had her wand out and kept pointing it at the ground, muttering incantations and occasionally sending showers of sparks into the snow. Harry took a few steps closer to try and see why this memory was important enough to Artemis for her to share it with Dumbledore and pass it down to him.

"It's not working," Marlene muttered, her breath sending clouds into the crisp air.

"Shut up," said Artemis, more harshly than she probably meant to. She waved her wand again. "Incendio."

Lily raised an eyebrow as red sparks showered down onto the ground and melted some of the snow, but no fire appeared. "That's a difficult spell, Art. Just wait until it's warmer out, you know?"

"Incendio." A little flicker of fire appeared at the tip of the wand and then disappeared. Harry watched a slow smile spread across Artemis's lips as she tried again. More fire this time. "I'm getting it," she said, her excitement hardly contained.

There was sound overhead; a whooshing noise that made all four girls look up in confusion. Then, a snowball hit Mary square in the face. "Haha! Gotcha!" James cackled, leaning down low over his broom and swooping down to spray the girls with snow. On the back of his broom, Sirius clutched the sides of James's cloak as if for dear life and squeezed his eyes shut.

"What the- bloody hell!" Art shouted, brushing snow out of her hair. "What was that for?"

On a second broom, Remus and Peter soared down towards them, Remus steering and Peter pelting everyone he saw with snowballs. "Snowball war!" Peter squealed as Remus accelerated and followed James and Sirius back into the sky.

James pulled his wand out and pointed it at the fresh powder. "Bombarda!"

The snow around the four girls exploded into the air and rained back down on them, soaking them and covering them in white. That was enough for Artemis. She pulled out her own wand and started making as many snowballs as she possibly could. Harry felt a small smile grow on his face when Lily immediately drew her wand to help and Marlene and Mary worked together to put up a shield. "The brightest witches and wizards of their age..." That's what he'd heard about his parents and their friends.