After a hurried breakfast, everyone had their trunks lined down at the bottom of the stairs, everyone had their jackets and scarves on to keep them warm form the chilly gray January morning. Everyone didn't really like the idea of going back to Hogwarts –with Umbridge still around – especially Harry and Carina.
Carina had an unpleasant sensation in her chest the moment she woke up; she didn't wasn to say good-bye to Sirius. She felt bad of leaving her father alone in his mother's house with a creature like Kreacher. She found her father drinking some butterbeer at the side as Mrs. Weasley busied herself with checking everyone if they had everything packed. Carina had squeezed herself from the chaos and went to her father.
"Excited to go back?" Sirius asked.
"No, not really." Carina said. "Umbridge's still there and I don't want to see that woman."
"It'll pass." Sirius smiled.
"I hope she gets lost in the Forbidden Forest and never return." Carina chuckled.
"You could always just lure her there and let the centaurs have her." Sirius smirked.
"Now that'd be plan to put in to motion." Carina chuckled. "I'm going to miss you, Dad."
"I'm going to miss you too." Sirius said.
Carina went to her father and wrapped her arms around him. Sirius placed down his butterbeer and patted Carina's head, he smiled at the sight of Emmanuelle's hairpiece on Carina. Sirius placed a kiss on Carina's head and reluctantly pulled her away to take a good look before she left.
"You're growing to a very beautiful young woman, Carina." Sirius said. "Your mother and I are very proud."
"Thank you, Dad." Carina said.
"Now take care." Sirius pushed back Carina's hair on her shoulder and held her there. "And remember not to get in to too much trouble." Sirius gave her a sly grin and a wink.
"Yeah, because my father's the innocent boy when he was in Hogwart." Carina chuckled.
Sirius chuckled heartily. "What's like without a little risk?"
"I love you, Dad."
"I love you too. Now go, before you miss the train!" Sirius led Carina to where the others were.
"I'd gladly miss the train!" Carina called back at him.
•†•
The first few days back to Hogwarts, Carina wanted to snap Snape in half. She hated that the man's been giving her – and Harry – a hard time, it was probably because of his and Sirius's exchange during the break, the two men were pointing their wands on each other's faces, ready to hex one another. It wasn't the best sight to see. Add to that, Harry had 'Remedial Potions' every Monday evening, so no D.A. meetings then. The only thing that actually made Carina's day was getting to see Roman and Theodore, and let all of her ranting out.
"I hate her." Carina muttered whilst she looked through the first volume of the book Practical Defensive Magic and Its Use Against the Dark Arts.
"All of us." Roman muttered.
"I can't breathe with this thing!" Theodore pulled down the necktie and loosens it a bit.
"Don't, she'll just use a spell it permanently stick it up your arse." Carina said.
"If she puts up another idiotic decree the students will probably start a riot." Roman said.
"I hope we do." Carina said. "Anyway... the next Hogsmeade trip is coming, want to go?"
"It's a date then." Roman muttered.
Carina and Theodore turned to Roman with a look. Carina had her brow raised at him while Theodore was just waiting for his next move on that.
"You do know that I'm talking to the both of you, thought, right?" Carina said.
"Of course." Roman sighed.
"Mail's here." Theodore said.
An owl came and dropped before the three, it was gray and very proud, it carried a letter and a copy of the Daily Prophet.
"It's yours." Theodore said.
"Yes." Carina said, taking the letter from Hester. She made sure to give her owl a treat before it left the table and went back the Owlery.
"Whose it from?" Roman asked.
Carina smiled when she saw the familiar penmanship. It was from Sirius.
"I'll read it later." Carina said.
"Well, I think you want to read this now." Theodore said, who had the Daily Prophet in his hands and reading the front page.
"What? Why?" Carina asked.
MASS BREAKOUT FROM AZKABAN
MINISTRY FEARS BLACK IS "RALLYING POINT"
FOR OLD DEATH EATERS
"Black? Not ---"
"CARINA!"
Theodore, Roman and Carina turned and saw Hermione, Harry and Ron calling for her. They too were holding a copy of the Daily Prophet and it seems that they read the article she was just about to read.
"I'll see you two later. Bye." She gathered her things then left the table and went to the Gryffindor table, leaving her copy of the Daily Prophecy to the two boys. Carina sat down beside Hermioe and took the other half of the paper for her to read with her.
"'We find ourselves, most unfortunately, in the same position we were two and a half years ago when the murderer Sirius Black escaped –" Hermione read.
"He's not a murderer!" Carina said.
"Shhh! 'said Fuge that last night. 'Nor do we think the two breakouts are unrelated. An escape of this magnitude suggests outside help, and we must remember that Black , as the first person ever to break out of Azkaban, would be ideally placed to help others follow in his footsteps. We think it likely that these individuals, who include Black's cousin, Bellatrix Lestrange, have rallied around Black as their leader. We are, however, doing all we can to round up the criminals and beg the magical community to remain alert and cautious. On no account should any of these individuals be approached.'"
"They think my father let these criminals out? They think he'd let my mother's murderer out of Azkaban?" Carina said.
"I don't believe this..." Harry snarled, "Fudge is blaming the breakout on Sirius?"
"What other options does he have?" Hermione said bitterly, "He can hardly say, 'Sorry everyon, Dumbledore warned me this might happen, the Azkaban guards have joined Lord Voldemort – stop whimpering, Ron – 'and now Voldemort's worst supportters have broken out too.' I mean, he's spent a good six months telling everyone you and Dumbledore are liars, hasn't he?"
"I hate it that they're blaming my father for these things." Carina muttered.
"It's not that they know the truth, Carina..." Hermione said solemnly.
"Then the Order should fix it! They should've started another trial of clearing my father's name so they could stop blaming him for rubbing as this – I hate that every time I open the Daily Prophet and see his name at the front page and it's involved in the disasters that's happening!" Carina said.
None of them spoke any more of Sirius after Carina's hushed outburst. Instead they turned their attention to the other article that involved Broderick Bode, entitled Tragic Demise of Ministry of Magic Worker, where it said that Bode had died some weeks after his accident in the workplace because of the Devil's Snare that was at his bedside table and was believed to be a harmless Flitterbloom.
"Bode..." Ron said. "Bode. It rings a bell."
"Who?" Carina asked.
"We saw him." Hermione said. "In St. Mungo's, remember? He was in the bed opposite Lockhart's, just lying there, staring at the ceiling. And we saw the Devil's Snare arrive. She – the Healer – said it was a Christmas present..."
"You saw Lockhart?" Carina snorted. "How come interesting things happen when I'm not around?" Carina asked, recalling that she had asked to be left in Grimmauld Place when they visited Mr. Weasley in St. Mungo's.
Hermione and Harry gave her a look saying that wasn't important at the moment.
"Right. Sorry... anyway, the Devil's Snare?" Carina muttered.
"How come we didn't recognize Devil's Snare? We've seen it before... we could've stopped this from happening..." Hermione said.
"Who expects Devil's Snare to turn up in a hospital disguised as a potted plant?" Ron said sharply, "It's not our fault, whoever sent it to the bloke is to blame! They must be a real prat, why didn't they check what they were buying."
"I doubt that it's just careless buying, Ron." Carina said, "besides, I don't think anyone could put Devil's Snare in a pot and not realize it tries to kill whoever touches it – this was murder... a very clever murder..."
"Carina's right." Hermione said, "If the plant was sent anonymously, how's anyone ever going to find out who did it?"
"I met Bode." Harry said. "I saw him at the Ministry with Mr. Weasley..."
"I've heard Dad talk about him at home! He was an Unspeakable – he worked in the Department of Mysteries." Ron said.
They looked at one another for a moment, then Hermione pulled the newspaper back towards her and closed it. She glared for a moment at the screaming and thrashing – and some laughing manically – photos of the mad ten escaped Death Eaters on the front, then leapt to her feet.
"Where'are you going?" Ron asked.
"To send a letter." Hermione said. "It... well, I don't know whether... but it's worth trying... and I'm the only one who can..."
Hermione then left with her things.
"I hate it when she does that." Ron grumbled as he, Carina and Harry got up from the table and made their way out of the Hall, "Would it kill her to tell us what she's up to for once? It'd take her about ten more seconds – hey, Hagrid!"
Upon seeing Hagrid, Carina noticed that he was still heavily bruised as he had been the day be came back from his mission to the giants, and there was a new cut right across the bridge of his nose.
"All righ', you three?" He asked. He tried to muster a smile but came out with a pained grimace.
"Are you okay, Hagrid?" Carina asked him.
"Fine, fine. Jus' busy, yeh knw, usual stuff – lessons ter prepare couple o' salamanders got scale rot – an' I'm on probation."
"You're on probation?" Ron said very loudly, that many students passed by looked their way. Carina stepped on Ron's foot for his loudness, Ron wince and pulled his foot out of her painful heel (just an inch heel). "Sorry – I mean – you're on probation?"
"Yeah..." Hagrid said, "S'no more'n I expected, ter tell yeh the truth. Yeh mighp' not've picked up on it, bu' that inspection didn go too well, yeh know... anyway." He sighed, "Bes' go an rub a bit more chili powder on them salamanders or their tails'll be hangin' off 'em next. See yeh, Harry... Ron... Carina..."
Hagrid's probation became common knowledge within the school over the next few days. To almost everyone in the school – except for Harry, Hermione, Carina and Ron – hardly anybody appeared to be upset about it; especially Draco Mafloy, who had the guts to talk badly of Hagrid, which of course caused him to grow a ferret's tail at his behind in curtsey of Carina, during their Care for Magical Creatures class.
"Nice one." Ron chuckled.
"GET IT OFF ME, BLACK!" Draco yelled at her.
"And how are you sure that it was me, cousin dearest." Carina asked, innocently. "I'm just here, talking with my friends the whole time."
"Stop it!" Pansy said. "We're Prefects! We'll give you detention for this!"
"Even if I do, Parkinson, you'll still give me detention – but again, let me go back to my first statement. How sure are you that it was me?" Carina asked. "You got nothing on me."
"You're a bully!" A Slytherin girl pointed at her. "You enjoy tormenting people with your pranks!!"
"Let me clarify something for you and your airhead friends." Carina said, crossing her arms over her chest. Her statement gained a few laughs from the others, "A bully enjoys tormenting people, I the other hand enjoy giving said bullies –" she glanced at Draco and his goons. "—a taste of their own medicine... call it payback."
The ferret-tail-joke became the laughing joke in Hogwarts for the past two days, but Draco didn't find the prank very funny – obviously – and was looking for a way to get back at Carina for what she did, but every spells he's been trying to get on her usually just backfired. But there was one time when Draco stopped with his hexing and thought of giving her detention and had her doing lines saying 'I Carina Black, believe that my cousin, Draco Malfoy, is the greatest wizard there is.' But of course she didn't write that, instead she wrote: 'I, Carina Black, believe that my cousin, Draco Malfoy, is a big-headed moron who always cry for "Daddy".' And Malfoy couldn't do anyting abot it since she did do her lines, but just with a few alterations.
•†•
"So... what is the brightest star – aside from the Sun?" Roman asked. Again.
Carina groaned. "It's Sirius! If you're looking for the brightest star aside from the Sun, refer to my father."
"Right..." Roman listed it down in his parchement.
Roman and Carina were walking towards the Great Hall from the library, they've been answering the homework given to them by Professor Sinestra for the past hour, and Roman seem to not be doing so well. He's been asking Carina over and over about each question in their homework and it was getting on her last nerve, nonetheless, Carina was glad that things were back to the way they were with Roman. He wasn't avoiding them (her and Theodore) and was being his normal self again.
With Roman's side, it took him a bit of time to accept that Carina was never going to see him as more than her best friend. Now that he did, he was just living to the role of being a friend that she can count on – or call her brother. And he was happy with that.
They had just arrived at their Great Hall and sat down at their usual spot with Theodore. Carina smirked at Theodore whilst she got out her his gift for her last Christmas.
"I heard Malfoy about your lines in detention." Theodore mused.
"Very creative." Theodore said. "How'd Draco take it?"
"Obviously pissed at the fact that I got away from it – I mean, I did write down the lines." Carina said.
"Yes, and placed a spell so anyone who is not Draco can actually see what is written." Theodore said, "Smart."
"Is that a compliment I heard from Theodore Nott?" Carina raised a brow.
"Probably." Theodore said.
"I find it revolting to see you two being like this." Roman spoke.
"Oh shut up, Rom." Theodore said, "It was you who wanted us to get along."
"And we are getting along." Carina smirked, "Now stop whining and do your Astronomy homework."
"I see it's useful." Theodore nodded at the book on the table that Roman was now scanning to answer his homework.
"It is." Carina said. "I never got to thank you for it, it's really beautiful. Thank you, Theodore."
"No problem." Theodore said, "And thanks for the scarf, it was pretty handy."
"Yeah, helped a lot during the holiday." Roman said.
"No problem." Carina said. "Roman... the next brightest star is Canopus not – forget it..."
"Since when is... Lupus a star?" Theodore asked.
Roman dropped his quill and glared at Carina and Theodore.
"I'm not good in Astronomy, okay?"
"If you just stopped chasing your tail whenever we have Astronomy then maybe you would pass it." Theodore smirked. "Fleebag."
"Oh shut it, Birdie." Roman said.
"Will you two stop it? You're acting like children, honest." Carina said with a sly grin.
"And you're not an overgrown child, Fluffy?" Roman said.