/𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐑𝐒\ [𝒔. 𝒃𝒍𝒂𝒄𝒌]

𝐟𝐢𝐯𝐞

"I thought how unpleasant it is to be locked out; and I thought how it is worse, perhaps, to be locked in." ~ Virginia Woolf

Artemis had yet to meet Harry Potter, but the Triwizard Tournament was stressing her out. It didn't help that Sirius and Remus were just as perturbed, and they showed it by pacing around the house and murmuring at random intervals, "I'm worried about Harry."  The first two tasks, however, had gone well from what Artemis had been told. She'd known from the start that he could hold his own- he had to be a smart kid. He was Lily's child. 

The third task had everyone on edge, though. Artemis and Sirius had been living together in Sirius's childhood home for nearly a year, and had fallen into a sort of routine. On the evening of the third task, they were cooking dinner together. They were the only two people in the house. Remus had chosen to spend the evening and his and Artemis's old house with a few Order members, receiving constant updates on the task from Moody. 

"We should go see him," said Sirius, flipping the fish in the saucepan. 

"Who?" 

"Harry." 

She  shook her head. "Absolutely not- you already snuck out once to see him-" 

"If I go as Snuffles, nobody will recognize me," he argued. 

"You're not going," Artemis said with a sense of finality. "Say you do go, and he gets himself in trouble- there's nothing you can do about that." 

Sirius pulled a face and moved to the sink to wash off the vegetables for a salad. "I could help him somehow." 

"What part about staying in hiding don't you understand?" 

He sighed and leaned against the counter, the vegetables forgotten in the sink. "The part where they trap and innocent man in the house where he grew up and tell him to 'lay low." 

"The rest of the world doesn't know your innocent." 

Sirius let out a dramatic groan and slid down the side of the sink to the floor. Artemis watched him with a would-be-disapproving-scowl, but she couldn't help laughing. He looked up at her. "Art, look me in the eyes and tell me you actually like being here all the time." 

"I don't," Artemis answered easily. 

"Then sneak out with me." 

Artemis waved her wand over the setup in the kitchen to make dinner cook itself, then settled herself on the floor next to Sirius. "This isn't Hogwarts," she said, resting her head on his shoulder. "If we sneak out, we won't just get a firm talking to and maybe a detention- If we got caught, you would go back to Azkaban and I would probably get carted off too for being an accomplice... again." 

Sirius sighed again, but he knew she was right. "Alright, then let's finish dinner and wait for news." 

"That sounds more like it." 

Artemis stood up and pulled Sirius after her. She'd forgotten, over the years, how much she loved cooking with him. They'd always been able to read each other's motions and coordinate their actions without a word, whether it was when causing trouble at Hogwarts, in battle, or just splitting up the work of making dinner. It didn't take words. They just did it. 

"You've got to meet him," Sirius said, putting a hand on her waist as he stepped past to put dinner rolls in the oven. "You'd absolutely love him." 

She smiled. "I know I would."

"I mean, he's just like James. Really. Just like him." 

It always blew Artemis's mind how easily he could talk about the people they'd lost. She and Remus, for years, had avoided the topic because it always meant tears or nightmares later on, but Sirius talked about them like they were still around. It was sort of nice, in a way. It made things feel a little more normal. 

"Is he really?" she asked mildly, taking over the salad Sirius had forgotten about. 

He started adding spices to the fish with reckless abandon. "I mean, he's smart, stubborn, and annoying as hell in the best way possible. He really is his father's son." 

"I'm sure I'll meet him at some point," she murmured. 

The truth was, she was a bit scared to meet this kid who supposedly was a spitting image of her dead best friend. She didn't know if she could handle seeing James's face with Lily's eyes. Sirius distracted her by getting bored of cooking and wandering over to put his hands on her waist and kiss the top of her head. "You sure we can't sneak out? I'll take you to this bakery up the street, you'd love it-" 

"No," Artemis said resolutely. 

He chuckled and leaned into her, wrapping his arms around her fully now. "Worth a shot." 

"Besides," she said softly, brushing a piece of hair from his eyes. "We've got better things to do." 

He pulled back and asked her a silent question with only his eyes. She answered it yes. He leaned in again, his lips brushing hers, and she pulled him down closer, kissing him like he was her only source of life left. In a way, he was. 

Sirius casually reached over and turned off the stove. "Care to join me upstairs?" 

She laughed and took his hand, letting him lead her towards the kitchen door. "You're such an idiot." 

"I happen to love it when you call me that." 

When they were halfway up the stairs, and Sirius had paused on the landing to kiss her again, the back door swung open and they were harshly interrupted by the screams of his mother. "Half bloods in my home! Filth! Get out! Get out!" 

"I'm going to kill her," Sirius muttered. 

Artemis set a gentle hand on the spot just below his neck. "She's already dead." 

As whoever their visitor was made their way down the hall, Sirius gave her a longing look, then kissed her hand. "I'll kill her again. And we'll continue this later." 

Someone cleared his throat from the bottom of the stairs. Remus was standing by the banister, eyebrows raised at the two of them. "Sirius, your mother's calling for you." 

Sirius jumped down the stairs, and on his way to the painting, muttered in Remus's ear, "You're interrupting something that was about to be really hot." 

With a mild look on his face, Remus shrugged and motioned for Artemis to meet him in the kitchen. "I have news," he said, gesturing for her to sit down.

"Wait for Sirius." 

"Well, yeah, obviously." 

"You just interrupted something that was going to be really romantic." 

Remus collapsed into a chair and ran his hands through his hair. "First of all, I don't want to hear about your sex life. It's gross. Also, you're going to want to hear this." 

Sirius joined them once Walburga had quieted down, and jumped onto the counter, plucking a piece of chopped carrot from the bowl in the sink and popping it into his mouth. "What happened?" he asked, his voice suddenly anxious. 

Remus's expression darkened considerably. "Voledmort's back," he said, not meeting their eyes, "And Harry just fought him." 

The reaction was instantaneous. Artemis was out of her seat, staring in shock at Remus, and Sirius had already grabbed his coat and thrown a second one to Artemis. "Where is he?" he demanded. "Where is he now?" 

Remus stood up too and took the coat from Artemis's hands, calmly hanging it on the back of one of the chairs. "He's safe," he said, reaching for Sirius's coat too. "But there's more. The man we thought was Alastor Moody was Barty Crouch Jr. taking polyjuice potion. That's why we haven't heard from him much- not because he was teaching at Hogwarts." He held up his hand when Sirius and Artemis started to fire more questions at him. "The real Moody is safe, if a little banged up. He's at St. Mungo's now." 

"Harry fought Voldemort himself?" Sirius said, still aghast. 

"Singlehandedly," said Remus. "And how he did it will most likely remain a mystery to us. I've been told to alert the Order. We are, for all intents and purposes, at war once again." 

A deadly silence fell over the room. Sirius sank into the chair Artemis had been sitting in. "Fuck." 

"Yeah," said Artemis, unable to think of anything more profound to say in that moment. "Fuck." 

Remus nodded and sat again. "Yeah. Fuck." 

"Where is Harry now?" asked Sirius. "Really?" 

For a moment, it looked as though Remus was wary to tell them, but he rubbed at his temples and gave Sirius a relenting look. "Hogwarts. He's being taken care of as we speak. Believe me, the kid is no stranger to the hospital wing by now. Apparently he heals quickly." 

"We should've been there," Artemis said, surprising both Remus and Sirius. 

"Art, you're supposed to be the sensible one here." 

She shook her head. "No, I mean we all should've been there. None of this should've happened, we should've been able to-" 

"I know," Remus interrupted. "But this is how it's happening now. Harry's going to need us, all of us. He'll be coming here later this summer- actually, a lot of people will be. You can expect this place to get a lot more crowded."

Sirius perked up at this. "Tell everyone we've got enough space for whoever wants to stay to stay. Give first dibs to the muggleborns and half bloods, they'll be targeted first anyway, and it would make my mother roll in her grave." 

"Thank you, Sirius," said Remus. He stood up. "Can I trust you to not to do anything stupid? I have to go alert the rest of the Order." 

Artemis gave him a small smile and crossed the room to stand with Sirius. "Don't worry, I'll keep him occupied." 

"I'm going to throw up," Remus said matter of factly. "Just don't leave this place."