invisible string! → ron weasley

ix. the first battle

⋆☆.* ✧✰ .✦⋆*☆

SINCE THE CHANCE ENCOUNTER at St. Mungo's, Neville made it a point to avoid Kates as much as he could. Every time she tried to talk with him, he'd murmur an excuse and rush off, barely even making eye contact. She knew it would pass soon enough, but she still hated not being able to talk with him, not to mention she felt bad enough as it was for what happened to his parents.

A few weeks after their return to Hogwarts for the term, Kates set down her toast and retrieved her copy of the Daily Prophet, which had just been dropped by an owl moments earlier.

"I don't understand why you read that rubbish," said Seamus, just as he did every time she received her copy. She would have called him on it, but she had a feeling it was him trying to make up for his beliefs earlier that year.

"It still has news in it," she remarked, as she did every so often when she felt the need to give him a reply. She began to unroll the parchment. "I just look past all the rubbish. They still report all the big stories, even if their opinions are loads of..." But she trailed off, her eyes catching the headline and the images that were displayed beneath it.

"I suppose," shrugged Seamus, who was far too interested in his eggs and sausages to notice her reaction. "I reckon it's good for us to know if anything big's happenin'—" Dean elbowed him, looking across the table with concern.

"Kates," he said. "What is it?" When she replied, it was quietly, as if her voice had been scared away.

"There was a mass breakout at Azkaban." She stared at the paper for a moment more, then suddenly handed it across the table and looked around the Great Hall, rather alert. She, of course, was searching for Neville, and found him just as he set down his own copy and left the hall.

Without a word to her friends, she rushed after him, grabbing her bag and jogging to catch up.

"Oi, Nev," she called after him as she turned down the same corridor he was walking through.

"Kates, I could really do without the sympathy right now," he said, and it hurt her heart to hear him so sad and quiet.

"No, that's not—" She cut herself off, then skidded to a stop. "She's my aunt," she blurted, and that was enough to make him stop. He faced her, and she took a few steps toward him so she could speak without raising her voice. "Bellatrix Lestrange, she's my mother's sister. I despise most of my family, but her? I feel ill every time I think about her, and I've never even met her."

"You're nothing like her," said Neville quietly, still upset but calm enough to try and comfort her.

"I know," she sighed. "But I'm terrified, Nev. Terrified because I've already been threatened by one family member and I don't even want to know what would happen if we met, and terrified because I know...I know what she did to your parents and I don't want her able to do anything like that to anyone else. I know this won't make you feel better—it might even make you feel worse, but I had to tell you that I know, and that I'm sorry." She let out a breath afterward and felt a tear fall down her cheek, but she didn't make an effort to wipe it away. Neville, whose own eyes were glassing over with tears, only nodded, then pulled her into a hug. "I'm with you," she whispered.

"Thank you, Kates."

Since then, the pair spent more time together than they used to. Whilst their circumstances were different, they were alike enough that they felt understood around each other. Kates would go to the greenhouses with Neville and he would go up to the Astronomy tower with her; they may not have been interested in the same things, but they each loved hearing the other talk about things that brought them joy.