☆
"hey, astra!" james called, running up to the slytherin in the hallway as she stood with sophia. "the hogsmeade trip's this weekend, you wanna come in a carriage with us? and your mates, of course."
"yeah, okay." astra shrugged.
"don't you have detention?" sophia inquired.
"yeah, but i'll just leave that and go another time. i'm not spending half my saturday with filch and his fucking cat." astra hummed and sophia nodded as if to say 'fair enough'.
"you got detention? what for?" james chuckled.
"i punched salem." astra answered.
"what for?" james grinned.
"do i need an excuse?" astra joked.
james gave a small laugh, "definitely not. i have to go. i'm, uh—"
"trying to prank snape?" astra smirked and he nodded. "get him good this time. the water bucket on the top of the classroom door was really bad."
"whatever, still got him." james grumbled in mock annoyance, waving happily as he walked away from her to find sirius, remus and peter.
"i don't know how you don't see it." sophia mused. "you both clearly like one another romantically."
"he doesn't like me romantic, soph." astra scoffed. "and i don't either."
"keep telling yourself that." sophia giggled.
an arm suddenly came around astra's shoulders and lips touched her cheek causing her eyes to widen. sophia hadn't seen fear flash in astra's expression until just then, confusing and worrying her. the pair looked to see aurora standing beside astra with a beaming smile, "hello."
"hi." sophia replied, haven't having really spoken to her even though they were in the same house.
"aurora." astra greeted, her voice a little tight. "soph, could i meet you outside after class?"
"sure, i'll bring some food." sophia agreed, sending aurora a small, slightly warning, glance as she walked away from them.
"astra black, getting me all alone?" aurora flirted, trailing her fingers across astra's robes.
astra caught her hand, gently pushing her off of her, "i said i didn't like being touched. especially when i have no idea you're there and about to touch me."
"i know, but i thought—"
"you shouldn't have. i said i didn't like it, you should have left it at that." astra stated firmly. aurora seemed shocked. "look, you're very sweet, and i like you—"
"exactly, i like you, too!" aurora grinned.
"no, you like me in a romantic and sexual way. i like you in a strictly platonic way, and i'm sorry i don't feel the same, but i can't force myself to." astra apologised. "i really thought i did when we went out to the parties, but i think it's partly because i'm not ready for anything like this just yet. especially with next year being our N.E.W.T.s."
"oh. okay. i understand." aurora muttered. "thank you for explaining it to me. i hope we can be friends."
"me too." astra replied and aurora gave her another smile. it was genuine, astra could tell that much. aurora left, finding one of her ravenclaw friends leaving their class, joining them on finding their next lesson. "that went surprisingly well."
astra meant it when she initially thought she may have liked aurora. she hadn't really experienced love minus platonically and brotherly, so differentiating her feelings between platonic and romantic for aurora had been confusing, but she realised it was platonic and she didn't want to feel as though she had used aurora when she had simply been confused.
after that, astra made her way to DADA, striding into the class and over to her seat beside phoenix, sharing a small hello with her friend before he began to ramble about how the ravenclaw he'd been seeing finally asked him to be his boyfriend.
"you have to tell us his name, you can't keep referring to him as 'the clever fitty', love." astra chuckled.
"he's quite shy, to be honest." phoenix hummed. "i'll see if he wants to come to hogsmeade with us this weekend. is that okay?"
"yeah, that sounds good. oh, by the way, we're sharing a carriage with james, sirius, remus and peter." astra informed him.
"since when?" phoenix quizzed.
"about 5 minutes ago. james asked and i just said yes. we'll probably end up going to the three broomsticks and meeting there either way." astra shrugged.
phoenix nodded, "that's very true. i'm guessing you want my butter beer foam."
"of course i do. it's the only good part." astra replied matter-of-factly making phoenix grin wider.
"shut up, the pair of you at the back!" the teacher, professor grimm, snapped, coming out of his office. a few people glanced back at the two friends causing phoenix to pull a face at them.
"merlin, he gets angrier every lesson. i heard his eyebrows are permanently in that position now." phoenix whispered causing astra to snigger.
"be quiet!" professor grimm demanded, slapping a stick he liked to threaten his students with on his desk. "now, today, you'll be trying to produce a patronus charm. professor dumbledore would like you to have this skill mastered by the end of this month. i, however, do not think you will be able to since it seems you would rather muck about with parchment! mr. potter, will you stop making paper birds attack mr. snape!" many people began snickering at that as james held his hands up in mock defence, placing his wand down. "push your desks to the sides of the room, we'll need all the space the classroom can offer."
phoenix and astra both pushed their chipped and carved table to the car corner of the room, everyone else doing the same. soon, a large portion of the room was blank of anything but dust. professor grimm glared around the classroom with a grimace on his face, making sure phoenix got most of that glare as he whispered to astra that their DADA professor had a sixth finger, which he then bit off himself and ate. astra didn't believe it, but clearly found it amusing as she forced back a laugh.
"form a circle." professor grimm ordered and they did so. "mr. whitehall, swap places with someone on the opposite side of the circle, seeing as though you don't understand the meaning of shutting up."
phoenix mouthed his words mockingly, earning slytherin -10 points. remus caught his attention, pointing at james subtly and phoenix got the idea, swapping places with james. the black-haired gryffindor seemed none the wiser as he sauntered over to astra, giving her a smile, his cheeks flushing slightly when she returned it.
"wave your wand in this motion." professor grimm ordered, his depressive features depicting how much he hated all of them. the class followed his order. "now, when producing a patronus charm, it is necessary to think of the happiest memory you have. patronus charms are used to fight of such creatures as dementors, which you know can suck your soul right out of your body leaving you an emotionless, pitiful shell of a person." the class all glanced at one another at his dark descriptions. "they can also be used to send messages if you have the ability to produce one powerful enough. think of a memory."
the class seemed to turn silent as they all thought of happier times, forgetting the approaching war. some students even began to smile to themselves at their simple thoughts and memories. astra, however, had no idea what to try and think of. she couldn't remember a time when she'd been completely overcome with joy. of course she was happiest when at hogwarts with her friends but there was always letters and howlers from her parents ruining the small moments. and the small moments that weren't ruined by her parents were either ruined by salem malfoy or the oncoming potential war.
astra glanced across the room at her twin who was smiling down at the floor, sending a subtly glance to remus who couldn't fight the small grin that came across his own face. clearly they'd kissed and made up. her eyebrows furrowed and james looked at her, concerned she was in pain from her facial expression.
"are you alright?" james whispered.
"i can't think of anything." astra muttered back.
"what about meeting harley, phoenix and sophia for the first time?" james asked.
"they didn't like me." astra mumbled.
"are you sure they didn't like you or did you just make yourself think that?" james inquired.
"probably the second. but also the first." astra hummed. "what're you thinking of?"
james shrugged, "being home. either at my parents or here. my mates. it can be more than one thing."
"but every good thing was interrupted with a bad one." astra told him.
"what about something when you were younger? before you came to school." james offered. "what did you and your brothers do?"
"we, um... we weren't allowed to do much together. i had a lot of lessons." astra said.
james scoffed, "like what?"
"french, ballroom dancing, table manners. basically how to be 'a proper lady'." astra made her accent posher as she said 'a proper lady'.
"not one memory of you all together?" james asked, a little mortified at the thought of her empty childhood.
astra smiled slightly, "actually, me and sirius used to tell regulus how things worked when they were complexly different. he asked us how door locks worked once and we told him that mini wizards and witches were inside of the locks and they turned little things inside the mechanism to lock the doors when we went to sleep. he started leaving sandwiches at the doors for them when we went to bed. kreacher ate them because i said he could; our parents never gave him much food. he left the sandwiches until he came to hogwarts and realised it was spells that locked the doors and we didn't use the muggle ones."
james noticed as she spoke of her brothers, her smile widened even if she didn't notice it. he gave her a grin, "try that one."
"yeah, i will. can you do one? a patronus?" astra questioned.
"yeah." james nodded like it was nothing.
"what is it?" she asked, still a little surprised he could actually perform the advanced spell.
"a stag." he beamed.
"ah, matches your animagus." astra muttered and he looked at her with wide eyes. "i forgot you didn't know i knew. i would've thought sirius would've blabbered it with that massive mouth of his."
"you kn—"
"i won't tell anyone, darling. don't panic." astra smirked.
"everyone, be quiet." professor grimm spoke up, deciding that was enough time for everyone to have found a happy memory in their head. "the actual spell is expecto patronum. repeat it." the entire class said it in unison. "right, try it now. remember the wand motion and try and perform it."
"it's not a lot of motivation." astra hummed.
"might as well have just said, 'do this and fuck off'." james whispered back as the class began to try the spell.
a few silver wisps came from people's wands but no one had progressed much more than that. james hadn't actually tried, not wanting the attention immediately. he also knew astra didn't want the attention anywhere near them, especially not with salem in the classroom, sending her smirks every so often. he was still unsure why malfoy seemed so smug whenever he caught astra's eye, hadn't she broke his nose only two days ago?
suddenly, a large, scruffy dog was pounding around the room, leaving a blueish-silver trail as it ran around. everyone looked to sirius, who was grinning at his patronus, which stopped in front of him, it's tail wagging before it approached remus, jumping on his hind legs. it then fizzed into nothing in the air.
"it seems mr. black is the first to succeed." professor grimm hummed in a bored tone from his desk. "the rest of you, carry on. you've got the rest of the lesson."
"salazar, this is so fucking irritating!" astra hissed as another minuscule silver wisp came from her wand.
"it's okay, it's a hard spell." james assured.
"but it's such an easy reason for it to work. i'm so pathetic, i can't even think of something happy." astra muttered, brushing a hand through her hair in thought.
"maybe try something you want to happen." james suggested. "or something that's going to happen. and if it doesn't work, you've got time to think of something or create a memory."
"i could try that, i suppose." astra muttered and tried to think of what she wanted to happen.
she wanted to leave the black family. she wanted to be able to see sirius in the holidays, go where she pleased when she wanted to. she wanted to be able to smile without being told when and where she can. she wanted to put her elbows on the table when she ate. she wanted to wear leggings and shorts around the house. she wanted to burn corsets. she wanted to listen to muggle music and learn about their technology in a comfortable environment without being tortured or belittled. she wanted to be viewed as a woman and not just an object to be used and ordered around by men. she wanted to marry who she fell in love with, not a prejudice arsehole who couldn't take no for an answer.
she wanted to be free. that was all she wanted. astra wanted to be her own person for the first time in her life. the thought of freedom was her biggest temptation, yet it should be her reality. freedom was the only thing astra wanted more than anything else in the world. the status, the money, the fancy clothes, the balls, the respect of others... she'd give it all to have freedom.
but the thought of freedom wasn't enough to overcome astra with joy as she knew her desire was less likely to happen than if she grew 7 heads overnight.
{2286}
also aurora's character has a point, i promise it wasn't just random lmao
i'm stuck with choosing astra's patronus, but i have three in mind, i even spent like half an hour reading about the different animals and what they mean to find ones i could relate to her 😭😭