COLORS ϟ SIRIUS BLACK [1]

IX. CHANGES

COLORS ϟ SIRIUS BLACK

IX. CHANGES

ROBB'S FAMILY WAS DEAD. Just like that, a split second he was dancing the night away with the beautiful Clara Green— then the next moment, gone. Gone was the happiness, gone the naivety, gone his childhood. All of these things were over.

After the majority of the Hogwarts student body found out about this news, the trip back home was a comparatively sombre one. Everyone seemed to be in mourning, perhaps not over the family specifically but over the fact that they weren't safe, none of them were.

The death of the Martins marked the first killing of a non-muggle/muggleborn family by 'you-know-who'. People assumed they were targeted because they supported muggleborns. Students walked in clusters, many feared walking alone at night, all having received letters from their loved ones, warning them of what came out at night.

To Clara Green this news was most alarming, her mother was a muggle, and although this fact was not well-known ( most people heard her last name and assumed that she was a pureblood as her father came from an upper-class pureblood family ) she still carried the fear of her mom dying on her mind, almost always. She found herself always writing letters home and feeling unsettled and scattered until she heard back. Her friends would often find her curled on the ground, asleep after talking to her parents through the floo network.

Lily had found her way back into the group and had distanced herself slightly from Snape, the shock of what was happening in the world around them brought together the most unlikely of people. It was shocking to see Lily be in the same compartment as James without screaming, but they put up with each other to be there for Clara who thought of them as her family. Peter, Remus, Marlene, and Anne were on one side of the compartment playing Exploding Snap. They were laughing but their smiles were slightly forced and their laughs sounded short, as the Martin family was on everyone's minds.

Clara was sound asleep, her head resting on Lily's lap, who was sitting as far away from James as possible. Clara's feet rested on Sirius' lap as he chatted with James ( and as he tried to figure out what to do with his hands, did he rest them on her foot or...? ). Lily's stomach dropped as she watched her good friend sleep, she smoothed her hair and felt guilty. Lily Evans was anything but stupid, so she knew it was Severus who had rattled her friend, that he had gotten himself wrapped up in the wrong business. But they had been friends for so long and if she left him, what other good influence would he have? It was a flawed idea but Lily felt that she owed it to him to turn him into good, to turn him toward the light.

The red-head wasn't the only one worried for Clara, Sirius was also throwing multiple glances at her angelic face— albeit more subtly. At least he thought it was subtle until Marlene narrowed her eyes at him and neglected to play the card game for a bit as she moved over toward Sirius and James' side of the apartment.