lyra | harry potter

twenty-six | never lose sight

FLEUR HAD JUST FINISHED LYRA'S HAIR AND MAKEUP when Ron hollered for she and Hermione from downstairs. There was a certain urgency in his voice that had Lyra immediately leaving Bill's room, joining Hermione as she left Ginny's. The two of them hurried downstairs and stopped dead in their tracks when they saw the new Minister of Magic, Rufus Scrimgeour, standing right there in the Burrow. Ron and Harry stood in the room, as well.

"What in bloody hell—" Hermione smacked Lyra in the arm pointedly, causing the blue-eyed girl to stop and clear her throat. "I mean... Hello, Minister. To what do we owe the pleasure?"

"Funny you should ask... Ms. Burke." There was a certain sort of judgment in his eyes as he looked at her scrutinizingly. "Mr. Potter asked the very same question. Though I think we all know the answer to that."

Exchanging glances between each other, the four friends sat side by side on the couch as Scrimgeour set a cloth bag down on the coffee table. For a moment, they all stared at it in confusion. "And this would be...?" Harry asked, his eyebrows furrowed together.

"Don't be coy, Mr. Potter," Scrimgeour told him distastefully. He set his sights upon Ron. "Mr. Weasley. Would you say you were close to your former Headmaster?"

"Dumbledore? And me?" Ron asked in surprise. He shrugged. "I dunno. I was just another Weasley to him. He was always polite—"

"And you, Ms. Granger," the Minister cut Ron off, losing interest in his response quickly. "How would you characterize your relationship?"

Hermione frowned. "We were friendly. Not close like Harry, but—"

"What about you, Ms. Burke?" He asked the Slytherin girl. "My sources say Dumbledore is the one who sheltered you when you ran away from your family. You were close, then?"

Lyra didn't like the way he was looking at her. Harry didn't like it, either. "We were just about as close as every other student he helped," Lyra answered almost patronizingly. "But just for your information, Dumbledore wasn't the one that sheltered me when I ran away. Not that it's any of your business."

Scrimgeour's jaw clenched. "On the contrary—"

"What's this all about?" Harry demanded, cutting him off and taking his attention off of Lyra. 

"This." The Minister pulled out a folded piece of parchment and let it go. It unraveled itself and floated in the air, revealing itself to be the Will that Dumbledore had left behind. "Despite the fact that none of your friends appear to have been particularly close to their recently-deceased Headmaster, he saw fit to remember them in his Will. Now why do you suppose that would be?"

The four of them exchanged glances again. "No idea," Harry answered honestly.

The Minister scoffed. "Come now. You don't expect me to believe—"

"Are you here to interrogate us aimlessly, or do you plan on carrying out Dumbledore's Will any time soon?" Lyra cut him off in annoyance. He'd only been there for all of ten minutes at most, and she'd already decided she didn't like him. There was just something about him that made her want to cringe.

His jaw clenched, and he shot her a glare, but nevertheless began to read the Will. "Herein is set forth the last Will and Testament of Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore. 'First, to Ronald Bilius Weasley, I leave my Deluminator, a device of my own making, in the hope that when things seem most dark, it will show him the light.'" Scrimgeour handed Ron a small silver object from the cloth bag, and the Weasley boy eyed it curiously.

"Dumbledore left this for me? Brilliant." He smiled, but then hesitated. "Er... what is it?" Ron pressed a small button, and suddenly all the light from the lamps in the room was sucked inside of the object. Startled, Ron clicked the button again, causing the light to return to its rightful places. He grinned. "Wicked." Lyra leaned over to get a better look at it, and Ron held it out slightly so she could.