CXXII. SWEET NIGHT
21:79 ─❁────────── 31:80
◁ Ⅱ ▷
❝One day I'd wake up feeling more
But I had already reached the shore❞
༻───────────────༺
THEY SHOULD BE HAPPY, RIGHT?
They escaped Malfoy Manor, meaning they got part of their freedom back, so shouldn't they be happy? But how were they supposed to be happy when Dobby the house-elf, a friend, lost his life just saving them?
Was it worth to be happy of their freedom when it causd a life?
Either way, they weren't going to let Dobby's sacrifice be in vain. Everyone will remember his name as one of the few elves that out right defy their abusive master and wanted to be free. One of the first house-elf to live and die without a master.
Lucia looked at Dobby, who was being cradled by a tormented Harry. She watched helplessly as he pleaded and pleaded for it all to not be true, for it to be only some sick joke the world was playing on him. But alas, the world was once again against him: Dobby was gone, and they could never call for him to come back.
Feebly she observed from where she was as he rocked back and forth, body quivering violently, his voice saying, "Dobby... Dobby..." over and over and over... but he was already gone. She felt numb.
Dobby was gone.
Gathering up all her strength, she crawled forward to them, looking down at the brave house-elf that had just lost his life for them. There, she tried to contain all her emotion as much as she could, but when she glanced up at Harry, her heart broke the millionth times today. Tears welled in his eyes, tortured by the sight of losing another friend.
Lucia soon realised that they were no longer alone as coming out of the cottage and gathering around them was Bill and Fleur, Dean and Luna. Harry recoil from Lucia's embrace, trying not to seem as though he had just cried as he asked suddenly.
"Hermione? Where is she?"
"Ron's taken her inside," said Bill. "She'll be all right."
He nodded aimlessly before looking back down at Dobby. He stretched out a hand and pulled the sharp blade from the elf's body, then dragged off his own jacket and covered Dobby in it like a blanket.
As the sea rushed against the rock somewhere nearby, Lucia watched the sky with woe whilst the others talked, discussing matters in which she did not find all that interesting at that moment, imagining Dobby a happier life after death.
Dean carried the injured Griphook into the house, Fleur hurrying with them; now Bill was making suggestions about burying the elf. Harry agreed without really knowing what he was saying.
As he did so, he gazed down at the tiny body, and his scar prickled and burned, and in one part of his mind, viewed as if from the wrong end of a long telescope, he saw Voldemort punishing those they had left behind at Malfoy Manor. His rage was dreadful and yet Harry's grief for Dobby seemed to diminish it, so that it became a distant storm that reached Harry from across a vast, silent ocean.
"I want to do it properly," were the first words of which Harry was fully conscious of speaking. "Not by magic. Have you got a spade?"
And shortly afterward he had set to work, alone, digging the grave in the place that Bill had shown him at the end of the garden, between bushes. He dug with a kind of fury, relishing the manual work, glorying in the non-magic of it, for every drop of his sweat and every blister felt like a gift to the elf who had saved their lives.
"Tea?" Dean offered her at the back porch of the cottage, where she was standing idly, looking far off to the distance.
"Oh, no thanks. I'll pass," said Lucia hoarsely.
"I can't believe it... he's gone..." breathed Ron, coming to join the two.
They watched their friend and best friend dug deeper and deeper into the hard, cold earth, subsuming his grief in sweat. Truthfully, they would've helped, but she was well aware that he wanted time to himself for a moment. To gather his mind of what just occurred.
"How's Hermione?" Lucia asked absentmindedly.
"She's being look after by Fleur," answered Ron. "Hermione, she's strong. She'll get back up just in time. How're you feeling?"
"Barely managing," said Lucia quietly. "Barely managing..."
"We heard your screams, why aren't you resting?" Dean asked.
"Because I don't need to," Lucia fiddled with the red flower she had picked before, "Those screams... they weren't real. They were fake."
Dean's eyes widened. "What? But it sounded like you were in real pain —"
"I was acting."
"What d'you mean you were acting?" Ron gaped.
"I was lucky I got the Malfoys instead of that lunatic of a woman. One thing that benefitted with the Carrows being in Hogwarts is that they taught us all about the Unforgivables and how to use them: The Cruciatus curse only works when the caster means it, and Narcissa probably rarely use the spell, so it didn't work. Because they don't have enough will to mean it," said Lucia, twirling the peony, "But I need to put up an act, right? Or else they would've sent me to Lestrange and kill me."
Lucia ignored their shock expression as she contemplated Narcissa and Draco's decision in 'saving' them. Was it really for Astoria and Erin's sake? Surely, they would not go out of their way to risk their own safety against Voldemort just for them?
Despite Draco somewhat being a change man from the bully and foul git he was, and having seen it first-hand his efforts in proving that, she wasn't so sure about his mother. In the end of the day, she only did it because of Draco. Who was to say that she couldn't change her mind?
But then again, that could be her paranoia and trust issues talking.
As the darkness had lightened a few degrees, Lucia joined Ron and Dean in approaching Harry, who was small digging a hole for Dobby.
"How's Hermione?" he asked when he noticed them.
"Better," said Ron. "Fleur's looking after her."
Harry had his retort ready for when they asked him why he had not simply created a perfect grave with his wand, but he did not need it. Lucia hoisted the elf that was snuggled in Harry's jacket from the ground and into her arms as the three jumped down into the hole he had made with spades of their own, and together they worked in silence until the hole seemed deep enough.
She soon handed Harry the house-elf gently before he wrapped him more snugly in his jacket. Ron sat on the edge of the grave and stripped off his shoes and socks, which he placed upon the elf's bare feet. Dean produced a woolen hat, which Harry placed carefully upon Dobby's head, muffling his batlike ears. Lucia dug into her pockets for her mittens, which she placed upon her fallen friend's hands in a benign manner.
Too caught up, she had not heard the others coming through the darkness. Bill was wearing a traveling cloak, Fleur a large white apron, from the pocket of which protruded a bottle of what Lucia recognised to be Skele-Gro. Hermione was wrapped in a borrowed dressing gown, pale and unsteady on her feet; Ron put an arm around her when she reached him. Luna, who was huddled in one of Fleur's coats, crouched down and placed her fingers tenderly upon each of the elf's eyelids, sliding them over his glassy stare.
"There," she said softly. "Now he could be sleeping."
Harry placed the elf into the grave, arranged his tiny limbs so that he might have been resting, then climbed out and gazed for the last time upon the little body. He forced himself not to break down again as he remembered Dumbledore's funeral, and the rows and rows of golden chairs, and the Minister of Magic in the front row, the recitation of Dumbledore's achievements, the stateliness of the white marble tomb. He felt that Dobby deserved just as grand a funeral, and yet here the elf lay between bushes in a roughly dug hole.
"I think we ought to say something," piped up Luna. "I'll go first, shall I?"
And as everybody looked at her, she addressed the dead elf at the bottom of the grave.
"Thank you so much, Dobby, for rescuing me from that cellar. It's so unfair that you had to die, when you were so good and brave. I'll always remember what you did for us. I hope you're happy now."
She turned and looked expectantly at Ron, who cleared his throat and said in a thick voice, "Yeah... thanks, Dobby."
"Thanks," muttered Dean.
"You were a wonderful friend, Dobby, thank you for all the teas and biscuits —" that was how far Lucia could say before she was brought into Dean's embrace as she cried silently in his arms.
Harry swallowed.
"Goodbye, Dobby," he said. It was all he could manage, but Luna had said it all for him. Bill raised his wand, and the pile of earth beside the grave rose up into the air and fell neatly upon it, a small, reddish mound.
"D'you mind if I stay here a moment?" he asked the others.
They murmured words he did not catch; he felt gentle pats upon his back, and then they all traipsed back toward the cottage, leaving Harry alone beside the elf.
He looked around: There were several large white stones, smoothed by the sea, marking the edge of the flower beds. He picked up one of the largest and laid it, pillowlike, over the place where Dobby's head now rested. He then felt in his pocket for a wand.
There were two in there. He had forgotten, lost track; he could not now remember whose wands these were he seemed to remember wrenching them out of someone's hand. He selected the shorter of the two, which felt friendlier in his hand, and pointed it at the rock.
Slowly, under his murmured instruction, deep cuts appeared upon the rock's surface. He knew that Hermione could have done it more neatly, and probably more quickly, but he wanted to mark the spot as he had wanted to dig the grave. When Harry stood up again, the stone read:
HERE LIES DOBBY, A FREE ELF.
He looked down at his handiwork for a few more seconds, his scar still prickling a little, and his mind full of those things that had come to him in the grave, ideas that had taken shape in the darkness, ideas both fascinating and terrible.
"How long have you been standing there?" he asked, not looking behind him.
"Not long, I just felt stuffed in there," said Lucia.
"You should be resting," Harry turned his head to face her and saw that she was fiddling with a flower with red petals that he could recognise was poppy.
"People keep telling me that, but I don't need to rest. Especially when barely anything happened to me,"
"But —"
"It was an act," confessed Lucia. "Malfoy's Cruciatus curse didn't work on me because him and his mother, low and behold, actually has a heart. There wasn't enough reason for them to use the curse, but I still acted as though it was being inflicted on me. I didn't want to..."
"You scared us all, you know that?" admitted Harry, bringing her into his embrace, cradling her head carefully as though she had actually gotten inflicted by the curse. He remembered the Cruciatus all to well, and it was painful. More painful than anyone can imagined. "Those screams..."
"I've had practices in Hogwarts too many time that I kind of nailed it now, you know, the role of being tortured?" Lucia joked dryly. "You could even say that I would've won the British Academy Film Awards, huh?" she sighed against his shoulder.
"Maybe even the Oscars," he managed, but it was half-hearted. "I know you didn't feel stuffed in there, what are you really doing out here?"
"I forgot to put this," she pulled away slightly from him and showed the flower, "and forgot that you were out her too. I was about to go back in, but I guess I just got caught up in the moment..."
"C'mon,"
Harry led her back to the grave, giving her the chance to lay down the small poppy flower upon the rocks that he had engraved with words prior. It seems as though she was admiring his handiwork for a flicker of a second before she set the poppy down and returned back into his arms.
"He's gone..." whispered Harry, a stray tear escaping from the corner of his crystalised emerald eyes, landing slowly on the grass they stood. "He's gone, Luce. He's not gonna come back — just like Sirius. Mum. Dad. He's gone -"
"Harry,"
"She's going to pay —"
"Harry," Lucia gently rest her hand on his shoulder, looking at him with a tearful gaze as he looked at her with the same gaze, only more dangerous. She squeezed his shoulder, "She will pay, but now's not that time for it,"
Harry broke underneath her touch, his forehead against her shoulder, soaking her jumper with wet tears that could not be held any longer.
"You know, my mum once told me that whenever you see poppies it usually means that hope will shine through the darkness you're currently in, bringing you peace in the time you're remembering," she traced comforting circles on the back of his hand as he stared up at the sky aimlessly, "Peaceful time will come for us, Harry. It may not be now, but it'll come. For us, and for you. Especially you."
"Why can't it come now?" Harry swallowed hard. "Why is death so obsessed with us all. Why does it take people that don't deserve to die?"
"Because death doesn't discriminate."
He had lost so much already, how much more did the world want him to suffer? It was already getting too bearable for him; this was no longer a trial of life. This was straight up torture.
Was it even worth living?
What are you saying? Harry thought incredulously. He can't just stop living when people needed him the most. He was no coward. Yes, he wanted nothing more than to finally rest with those he loves, but he couldn't just yet. Not until everything is over.
Until he is gone.
They were all sitting in the living room when he and Lucia entered the little hall, their attention focused upon Bill, who was talking. The room was light-colored, pretty, with a small fire of driftwood burning brightly in the fireplace. Harry did not want to drop mud upon the carpet, so he stood in the doorway, listening.
"...lucky that Ginny's on holiday. If she'd been at Hogwarts, they could have taken her before we reached her. Now we know she's safe too."
"What happened?" Lucia immediately asked, heart beating rapidly against her chest at the mention of Ginny.
He looked around and saw the two standing there.
"I've been getting them all out of the Burrow," he explained. "Moved them to Muriel's. The Death Eaters know Ron's with you now, they're bound to target the family — don't apologize," he added at the sight of Harry's expression. "It was always a matter of time, Dad's been saying so for months. We're the biggest blood-traitor family there is."
"S-So they're safe then," Lucia swallowed the anxious lump in her throat. She couldn't imagine the Weasley, specifically Mr. and Mrs. Weasley and Ginny, three of whom were there whilst she was so deep in her own misery, in danger. They've became her own family before she could notice it.
"How are they protected?" asked Harry.
"Fidelius Charm. Dad's Secret-Keeper. And we've done it on this cottage too; I'm Secret-Keeper here. None of us can go to work, but that's hardly the most important thing now. Once Ollivander and Griphook are well enough, we'll move them to Muriel's too. There isn't much room here, but she's got plenty. Griphook's legs are on the mend, Fleur's given him Skele-Gro; we could probably move them in an hour or —"
"No," Harry said, and Bill looked startled. "I need both of them here. I need to talk to them. It's important."
Lucia heard the authority in his own voice, the conviction, the sense of purpose that had come to him as he dug Dobby's grave. All their faces were turned toward him, looking puzzled.
"I'm going to wash," Harry told Bill, looking down at his hands, still covered in mud and Dobby's blood. "Then I'll need to see them, straightaway."
Once Harry left, the rest turned to Lucia for answers, but she merely shrugged her shoulders. She was in no position to tell them what had occurred in Harry's mind when she, too, didn't know what entirely goes on in his mind. She took of her boots and set it beside the door before saying, "C-Can someone show me to the bathroom?"
"Come, I'll show you zhere," offered Fleur at once.
She sat on the tub of water in the bathroom distractedly without sense as she fiddled with the peony locket on her collarbone. This was the first bath she had in peace, and overall, she missed it. The feeling of tranquility without any worry that someone would peak or find her and undoubtedly kill her, it was nice. She lowered herself into the body of water and combed through her damped hair in wonder. What would their next step be?
Surely, they were not going to stay here for long, it would be nice but also futile. She guessed they would make their next move once Hermione recover from being tortured, but she wondered when that would be.
From her own knowledge of recovering from torture, it took her about a month or so and even then she still needed time to adjust...
She sighed and lay back against the tub, wondering... wondering... wondering...
"Mama!" a small ebony-haired girl giggled as she ran around the living room, happy. "Papa... Papa's chasing Lucia!"
"Oh, for goodness sake!" a woman with prominent ebony hair came rushing out of the kitchen, hands on her hips just in time to see her husband and daughter playing around roughly as her mother sat in the middle, minding her own business while watching television, eating her pandan cake. "You both stop, or else you'll tri —"
She spoke too soon.
There was a rather loud thud before soft wails could be heard resonating around the living room. Mawar shook her head and approached her husband and crying daughter, the cries made her heart ache. "I told you..."
Ah-Ma tutted. "See, I warned you both, look what happened!" she said, consuming her pandan cake.
"Okay, Ma, you're not helping," scoffed the man, before he hoisted up his loving and sobbing daughter into his arms, cooing to her soothingly as he he pressed kisses. "I'm sorry, Stellina. I didn't mean to chase you..."
"Papa... meanie!" sniffled Lucia.
"Yes, Papa is a meanie," said Ah-Ma, nodding. "That's why, Melati, you should have gone —"
"Ma," warned Mawar, shaking her head. "Just because you don't like Rian, doesn't mean you can kidnap Lucia away,"
"A grandmother's wish," scoffed Ah-Ma, before she went into fits of curses in Hokkien.
"MA!"
"Yes, yes, I was just joking," said Ah-Ma, pinching Florian's, and Lucia's cheeks before she sauntered away, singing, "Pandan cake... my sweet pandan cake..."
"B-But A-kong said pandan cake is for old people... I-Is Ah-ma old?" tears began welling Lucia's eyes once more, causing Florian to panic. "Is she going to die?"
"What am I supposed to say, Mawar? Am I supposed to lie?" he turned to his wife for help.
"Lying isn't setting a good example..." said Mawar slowly.
"Ah-ma's old?!" cried Lucia, looking between her parents in panic.
"O-Okay, she isn't old. She has an old soul, and A-kong was just playing with you," said Florian with a small smile, making Lucia ceased from crying.
"Oh," Then tears began to well her eyes once more.
Florian and Mawar sighed. "What is it now, Stellina?"
"I-I fell!"
"And Papa said he was sorry, Lucia," said Mawar soothingly, tucking locks of her daughter's hair began her ears. "Papa's now sad because Lucia's sad,"
"P-Papa meanie... but Lucia don't want Papa sad..." sniffled Lucia. She wiped Florian's nonexistent tears.
Florian breathed a small laugh.
"Papa won't be sad if Melati is happy," he said. "How can Papa make Melati feel better?"
Mawar rolled his eyes. "You two have fun," she said, backing out of their ridiculousness. "Make sure to not set the house in fire, please,"
"Mama's very pessimistic, but that's fine. It's understandable after what happened last time..." Florian grimaced at the recollection of what happened last time: They were no longer allowed within the kitchen. "But tell me, Fiore, what do you have in mind?"
Lucia stared at her father ponderingly, before she smiled.
"Princess! Lucia wants to be princess!" she said jubilantly, causing Florian to smile warmly.
"But you're already Papa's princess?"
Lucia cupped Florian's cheeks together, looking into his hazel eyes sternly. "Tiara..."
"Nothing's going to make you think otherwise?" sighed Florian.
"Nope!" she popped the P in the end of her sentence before she breaks out into fits of giggles. "Lucia let Papa sorry if Papa gives Lucia her tiara!"
"But it isn't yours though," said Florian amusingly, bringing her along his journey to his studio upstairs. "It's Papa's,"
"But Lucia's prettier than Papa?" said Lucia, genuinely confused as she tilted her head to the side.
"I... should've seen this coming. You have me as your father," laughed Florian, as he creaked the oak door open, revealing a large room within this small and cosy cottage.
This had and always been Lucia's favourite place to play in, for whenever her father was to spend his rather boring day as an unemployed, yet rich individual, she would also get to contribute herself into her father's works for fun. Unlike the whole cottage, this room had a variation of vibrant colours on the walls to the point where it was possible to not have fun it. There were various of tools and items on the wall, even musical instruments that would be played by the said woman to her daughter. It was as though they were transported into another dimension.
They approached the display in the middle of the room cautiously, and Lucia wiggled out her father's grasp and waddle her way toward it, wanting to immediately touch it, but Florian was quick to grab her hand before she could do so.
"Papa..." Lucia looked up at Florian with pouty lips and large eyes, causing Florian to flinch. "Lucia wants to wear it..."
Florian cursed under his breath.
This was the same tactic he had used on her mother once.
"I am well aware that you want to where it, Stellina, but it isn't for you to wear," said Florian tenderly. "I made one tiara for you, didn't I? It's in you room. That's the model I made of Rowena Ravenclaw's diadem."
"Ro... Ro... Rowen?"
Florian shrugged his shoulders sheepishly. "Eh, close enough,"
He hoisted Lucia off the ground and placing her on the chair, before making his way back to the meticulously beautiful diadem with a blue sapphire shaped like an oval at the center of it and etched upon it's surface was words that could not be identified by the little girl who could barely read.
Lucia peered over the chair curiously and in awe as her father came back with the diadem in hand, setting it down in front of her on the table. It was hard to retrain herself, but the little girl knew better than it was just a mere trick that her father would try on her before snatching it away and hide it somewhere she could never see it again.
Florian smiled. "Have you ever heard the story of Rowena Ravenclaw's lost diadem?"
"R-Rona... Ravencaw's... lost... diadem?"
"Yes, Rowena Ravenclaw's lost diadem," he nodded, but the little girl shook her head. "Well, it all started centuries ago. The relic once, of course, belonged to Rowena Ravenclaw, one of the four founders of Hogwarts."
"Hoggy warts!"
"Yes, Fiore. Hoggy," Florian mused. "Now, this relic was known to enhance the wisdom of its wearer, which was what dear old Rowena's House's most treasured attribute, but it later disappeared from the face of the earth, and no one but Rowena knew what happened to her beloved diadem."
"But, Papa, you have it here!" Lucia said, pointing at it.
"Ah, this isn't the real thing, however it's something I have to study about it, you know? For a friend of mine." He said, booping his daughter's nose. "But you know, Melati, I would love to one day find the real one... It's somewhere in this world though, so that's impossible..." sighed Florian.
"No, no!" said Lucia, trying to stand up on her two feet, but her legs wobbled. She balanced on her own, showing her determination that made Florian chuckle lightly. "Papa!"
"Yes!" he shouted, going along with her.
"Lucia find Rona princessy for Papa!" she declared proudly.
Florian's gaze softened.
"Papa wants it, Lucia gets it! Papa watch Lucia!"
"Is that a promise then, Fiore?" said Florian, cocking a brow at her.
"Pwomise!" Lucia beamed, forcefully capturing her father's hand, and interlacing her whole (small) hand around his pinky finger. "There, pwomise!"
"Then if that's the case, I want you study the diadem, okay? There's something I left on it that would probably help you in your journey of finding it for Papa," said Florian in amusement.
Find it?... But where?... Where was the replica now?...
"Mama, can Lucia see Papa's diadem again?" Lucia said quietly, approaching her mother, who had been looking out of the window distractedly, eyes blotchy and red as she wore a black dress. She turned to look at her oblivious, and all she wanted was to cry.
"O-Oh," said Mawar, sniffling, wiping away the tears that were still trickling down the side of her face. "Of course, Melati,"
Lucia held her mother's hand tightly, leading her up the studio in which had become particularly dull ever since they dicovered Florian's body on the night of Lucia's birthday.
It took all her will and every fiber in her body to not fall to her knees and sob. He was gone...
Mawar felt a piece of her heart shatter along with Florian's soul. She had never felt such anguish and be in such agony before. She wasn't even given the chance to let him know that everything she did, was for his heart and soul.
And in turn, he wasn't given the chance to tell her that as well.
"Mama," Mawar broke away from her thoughts as she saw her daughter approaching her with the diadem in her, and before she knew it, Lucia had placed the diadem on top of her head. "Papa... Papa always said that Lucia is his princess, but Mama has and always been Papa's queen... even if Papa can't be here, Lucia will make sure that Mama is still queen..."
Mawar looked at her daughter and she couldn't hold back anymore: She cried.
"Oh, Lucia..." Mawar sobbed. "I'm so sorry..."
"Mama has nothing to be sorry for," Lucia smiled, patting her mother's back. "Lucia said too, but she mustn't cry! Not when Mama's crying!"
"It's okay to cry, love. It's okay..." Mawar sniffled, smiling a watery smile, as she took off the diadem from her head. "But Mama don't need a tiara to know that Mama will remain queen, love. Papa always said that he wanted you to have it, so why not have it?"
"B-But Mama..."
"You don't need to want it now, Mama understands, but Mama will make sure Lucia will have it. One way or another, because Papa wants you to have it," said Mawar. "Mama will make sure to put in somewhere Lucia will always find, there Lucia will have no choice but to accept it,"
Lucia looked from her mother and to the diadem, before tears welled her eyes.
Before Mawar could process, before she could even react, Lucia had thrown herself into her embrace, weeping into her shoulder.
"Mama, I want Papa! I want Papa back! I want Papa back!"
Mawar let out a shaky breath, closing her eyes, lips wobbling.
"Mama wants Papa back too... Mama knows Lucia..."
"Lucia..."
Lucia...
"Lucia!"
She woke up with a great start as she was pulled out of the water. She registered her surroundings and realised she was still in the bathroom and in the tub of warm water she was in prior from her dream. She slowly trailed her eyes around the room before connecting them with familiar emerald-green eyes that was gazing straight at her with concern.
"W-What's going on? Did something happen?"
"Did something happen? Lucia, I called you times and times again, but you didn't answer," Harry said breathlessly, and Lucia noticed the beads of sweat that covered his forehead. "Then Fleur told me that you were in here, but there was no answer and there would be no reason for you to not hear me. So, then when I assumed that something happened —"
"Oh, Harry, nothing happened to me," said Lucia, voice tender. "I guess just fell asleep..."
"That tired huh?" he asked sheepishly, rubbing his nape.
"I think we all are. But why were you calling for me?" she questioned, puzzled.
"Ah, well, we're going into question Griphook and Ollivander,"
"Already?"
"Better now than never, right? Hermione going to join too,"
"Is that really wise?" asked Lucia, idly combing through her damp hair that she had just noticed had grown in lengths over the time. She hadn't taken care of her hair in consideration while they were on the run in comparison to when she was in Hogwarts, making her internally shock at how long it had gotten. The longest it had been since years evem
No wonder people like pulling her hair...
Harry sighed and knelt down, "She insisted, but it seems that she's recuperating good."
"I'm glad," said Lucia graciously. "Well, I guess we can't just sit around and relax. We still have so many things to work out..."
He nodded. "Yeah..." he drawled when he saw something peculiar. "Hey, Lucia,"
"Hmm?"
"Did you forgot to take off the glasses or something?" he snorted, taking the half-moon spectacles that she had been wearing off from the bridge of her nose and displayed it to her, chuckling. Lucia blinked.
"No!" she gasped. "I forgot about it!"
"Well, things were hellish back there," said Harry, placing it down on the sink counter. "We should be glad that they believed you were as blind as me back there,"
"They were pretty stupid when you think about it —"
"Hem, hem,"
Widening their eyes in shock at the imitation of Umbridge, they turned to the doorway and saw an irritated looking Ron. Albeit he was closing his eyes — still irritated: The look on his face resembled someone that would no doubt try to knock someone off a skyscraper just out of anger of that said person... only neither Lucia nor Harry knew whom he was angry at.
That was until Bill came walking along the halls behind Ron and said casually, "Didn't knew you were that type of guy, mate," he said to Harry before he disappeared.
They blinked simultaneously. What was that supposed to mean?
"What does he mean by that?" Harry asked Ron, who was keeping his eyes hidden underneath his hands.
"What does he mean, he says — get out of here, Harry!" Ron yelled.
"What's your problem?" Harry cocked a brow, raising himself into a standing position, as though readying for Ron to pounce on him.
"My problem? My problem?!" Ron tried to navigate inside the bathroom without looking, almost hitting the wall before stopping... his back facing Harry. But he believed that Harry was right in front of him, which caused Lucia and him to share amused looks. "I'm not the one that's being indecent!"
And Harry took that quite personally.
"Indecent? Me?"
"Yes you! Who else would be inside a bathroom where their naked ex-girlfriend would be bathing?!"
Silence befell the room.
What did he say?
What.
Did.
He.
Say?
Seemingly in a trance, Lucia slowly looked down to her bare body. The gears in her head slowly moving before she finally registered what Ron had said and the situation, they were in.
Heat rose to her cheeks and instinctively she rose her gaze to Harry, who looked as red as Ron's hair, apparently frozen on the spot, eyes not looking anywhere but at Ron.
At once she reached for the curtains, but there was none. Oh my god.
A series of footsteps could be heard rushing down here, and just as she had thought things couldn't get any worse, Fleur was the one that had came to check up on them. She did not expect such scene.
"What iz going on 'ere —"
Fleur blinked, eyes gazing all around the bathroom; from the red Lucia's futile attempt of hiding herself by lowering into the tub, Ron's position, and Harry's seemingly frozen appearance, not even blinking, still in shock. And just in mere seconds, they were able to see fury written in her pale eyes. "Get out! Get out!"
She grabbed a towel that was hung on the wall and began hitting the two boys profusely without missing a beat, yelling, "Out! Out!" and "Casse-toi!" repeatedly as she brutally hit them. Harry was too in shock to even say anything as he was pushed out of the bathroom along with Ron, who was whining, "Bloody hell, woman! I did nothing wrong!" And before the door slammed shut, Lucia was able to catch some grumbling from Ron and a faint sound of a smack, following a whine of an "Ow!"
The veela descent panted, furious. "Boyz..." she glared at the door.
Lucia shrunk, still embarrassed by the whole situation. Harry had seen her naked.
That wasn't how she imagined their first time seeing each other naked would, she had expected it to be... romantic. Not this...
What was worse was the fact that he was not the only one, for Ron probably had caught sight of her body too. Well, Lucia thought, at least he had the decency to cover his eyes...
"I'm sorry, Fleur..." she said, sinking into the water in shame.
Fleur slowly whirled around and limped the hand she was holding to hit the boys prior, tilted her head. "For what?"
"I caused you trouble for such trivial thing,"
"Nonsense!" insisted Fleur, walking up to her and crouching down next to the tub. "A woman's body iz as sacred as zey 'eart. You are not at fault 'ere,"
But Lucia didn't look all that convinced.
"Ma petite sirène, you are beautiful as, how do you english call it? Ze stars above us," Fleur wrapped her hair into the towel turban and smiled down at Lucia, "And I am not even sure if 'arry seen you truly,"
Lucia smiled sheepishly. "This will be a bloody story to tell,"
"Indeed, it will!" Fleur giggled.
"Hermione's going to flip,"
And Hermione did. She was enraged when the two of them had came in, grumbling to one another before telling her what had occurred before they came in.
"I can't believe you two!" she shrieked. "You two disgust me!"
"It's not like it was on purpose!" Harry defended.
Ron scoffed. "I shouldn't be at fault here! I tried to tell him and demanded him to get out of there -"
"And what happened then?"
"He acted stupid!"
"I did not!" Harry sneered. "I didn't act stupid; I didn't actually notice that she was naked. One moment I was calling for her and she wasn't giving any signs that she heard me, so I got worried and barged in because she should've heard me from in there anyway!"
Hermione and Ron sent him an unimpressed look.
"It's the truth!"
"But you knew she was in the bathroom; what did you think she was doing?" Ron said incredulously.
"Look, that thought never crossed my mind. And mind you, I did knock, but she wasn't answering either way! So, I initially thought something happened to her and like I said, I barged in. And a good thing I did because she was asleep underwater! She could've drowned and no one would've known if it weren't for me!" Harry explained without stopping. He was not a pervert, and never would he be. The mere thought of himself even peeping on anyone disgust him, much less someone who he loves.
Neither Hermione nor Ron said anything.
"And then we started talking, an innocent and normal one. I didn't notice she was naked. Not once while we were alone in there. Not until Ron pointed it out, but even then, I didn't catch a glimpse of it,"
"Oh, so you would've if you weren't in shock?" Hermione raised a brow, scowling.
"No — Ugh, Merlin, Hermione! I would never in a million years would do that without her consent," said Harry, exasperated. "Can we just get back to Ollivander and Griphook? I'm sure Lucia would meet us there, especially if there's Fleur with her."
"I guess," sighed Ron, limping his arms to his side. "But you have to admit that it would be a story to tell one day."
"Don't you dare," Harry glared at him.
Ron merely grinned.
"You should be worried when Ginny gets a load of this," said Hermione simply, patting her best friend's back and walking pass him.
"You two better keep this to yourself!"
"Hah, like hell!" Ron chortled, running away before Harry could done anything.
Harry looked at their laughing retreating figures with exasperation. If Voldemort wasn't going to kill him, then he was sure that Ginny would... or perhaps even Astoria...
There was no way this would be kept a secret...
This would be the death of him.