Obliviate my Destiny {Book 5}

19. All yours; no control

Christmas was fast approaching but recent events had dampened spirits. Hagrid was on the run, there was no word whether he was dead or alive. Countless DA members had been caught at the party and tortured—and no word had come from my brother or Gennie either.

"I'm looking forward to Christmas; I'm not sure why everyone is acting like the Grinch who stole Christmas." Cole said to me one day in mid-December as we hung up wreaths of holly and tinsel around the room of requirement. "I loved that book, like Seuss is a genius."

"Considering many people want to kill us—and expose me, I'm not surprised." I snapped, and Cole's smile dropped, and the tinsel unravelled. "Sorry—I'm, just a bit tense."

"S'okay, I am too. Madam Pomfrey can't get a lot of my medication in, I'm getting half the dosage I should be, makes me more sensitive and crazy in general." Cole sighed, his high mood plummeting to sadness as we tried to fix our mistake. "But it's like an escape, you know?"

"I know," I replied, my mind not all there, stretching to the possibility of living until Christmas. I'd see Lacey again, finally get to talk to her about all of this—none of her letters were allowed through—and possibly try and get some reins on Hollie.

"So you still haven't worked out who's the mole?" Cole raised an eyebrow. "I would have thought you might have."

"So many people have betrayed me, yet it hurts just as much." I sighed. "I—I just don't' know who it could be. Who hates me?"

Of course, the obvious answer was Voldemort, then Cameron and the gang of death eaters. But my friends, my DA allies, they all seemed to like me. A poisonous voice in my brain whispered: well you thought Mark loved you, look where that turned out.

"I don't know man, but it's been like a month and nothing's happened. It might have been Cameron trying to scare us."

"That's not true and you know it." I said sharply, and finally we pinned the holly above the fireplace.

"Yeah, but it's nice to dream isn't it?" Cole said with a far-off smile. "Now, I don't know about you, but I need to finalise the food arrangements for tonight."

As a way of sending off the last week of term, we were throwing a DA Christmas party. We had pooled our money together to get the decorations, but we still needed decent food—the house elves stress was impacting on the food's quality—and Cole believed the solution was in this room, even if the party wasn't for two weeks.

"Hermione said you can't make food with magic." I pointed out, a pang in my chest at the thought of her. "So how are you going to fix that?"

"I'm not going to ask the room to make us food, I'm asking for the solution." Cole said with a Cheshire cat grin, running across the room, and sitting cross-legged on the floor. Placing his hands on the floor with his eyes shut, looking vaguely as if in prayer he spoke: "Oh mighty room of requirement that has given us refuge from evil toads and death eaters we ask you of one thing. We need nice food that doesn't taste sad for our amazing Christmas party which will have much swag."

I waited for a sign, the floor splitting or the ceiling raining with mince pies and alchohol—but nothing happened. Cole continued in his poisistion, looking as if he was trying to lay a large egg. After a moment, he opened his eyes, looking delighted.

"It worked!" he cried, and leaping upwards, he gave me a kiss on each cheek.

"Uh, it did?" I chuckled. "Cole, there's no food here."

Gently spinning me around, he pointed at the portrait that had always been over the fire. It was of a young girl in a blue dress, I'd never paid it attention before. But now—it was actually moving. The girl was giving Cole a serene wave like there were old friends.