"Briar Lupin had dreamt, predicted, foreseen death more times than she cared to admit. If she actually remembered all of the times it had occurred, at least."
Sequel to Blue.
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CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
"GUESS WHO—?"
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SEPTEMBER ENDED LIKE IT had begun; Briar had fallen asleep, a couple inches away from a deck of tarot cards, and woke up and quietly packed them away, the noise from the shop below yet to begin. October would've been Briar's favourite month if her honorary aunt and uncle hadn't been killed on the month's finale. So, whilst everyone else began to prep and preen for Halloween, Briar thought about James and Lily. Especially the fact that she was nearing their age.
But, Briar reminded herself, she'd never reach their age. She'd never reach twenty. She'd be a teenager for eternity. Briar would die aged nineteen, whereas Fred would die aged twenty. He'd die with a nice even number. Briar was stuck with the last year of adolescence.
The school term meant that the shop was mostly filled with adults and squib children being forced to stay in the society by their wizard parents. Briar found that unfair. She helped out a bit at the shop, now that she wouldn't risk talking to a customer and them saying, "You're the one that stuck all those fireworks in the school toilets!"
She'd probably get that in her obituary. Briar Lupin, Anarchist, Tackler of Witches/Bitches, the One That Stuck Cherry Bombs into the Hogwarts Toilets. Charming.
Letters from Livvy came in weekly. They were compiled with different sorts of writing instruments — ball-points, quills, fountain pens, pencils... — which made Briar guess that he wrote them over the course of the week. He talked a lot about the Divination classes, and the new Potions teacher, Slughorn. Apparently Slughorn liked Harry. Apparently Snape liked his new position, too, the little git.
But, with the exception of the letters, and the twice-daily trips to her parents and littlest brother, Briar was bored. The monitors had dulled down. Nothing but white noise could be heard on any of the ones that sat near dark magic. The one Trelawney had was a long-shot, and that didn't work, which Briar wasn't surprised about. But, the monitors no longer felt useless. And that damned hourglass was beginning to piss her off.
Briar had gotten Teddy one of the bouncy-balls that predicted false futures from Fred and George's shop, and therefore planned to visit their house. Her house, maybe. She didn't know if she'd class it as her house anymore.
That day, her disguise had been something simpler — literally just a hoodie. It was raining, so it didn't look odd having her hoodie's hood sitting over her hair, and her coat hood sitting on top of that.
