A Marauder's Guide to Falling Forever

Chapter Nineteen

When the blue moon rises high at the seventh hour you will know what to do. Cassandra's enigmatic words from so long ago drifted into her thoughts.

"It's a phenomenal sight, isn't it?" Dumbledore had only just arrived and was staring up towards the sky where her attention was diverted. Marlene pulled her eyes reluctantly away from the moon to look back at him.

"Albus," she said quickly. "I need to go."

"You're not going anywhere without a coat!" Sirius was behind her, his own jacket nowhere to be seen. "Come back inside and tell me what in Merlin's name is going on."

"I can't." Marlene looked to him with wide eyes, both pleading and apologetic. "I can't tell you. I need to go."

"I'm coming with you then," he said sternly; it wasn't a question so much as a command.

"You can't – I can't –" she sounded ridiculous even to her own ears, but her adrenaline was soaring at astronomical levels and she wasn't thinking clearly. She knew what she needed to do.

"Your presences will be missed this evening." Albus gave a nod of his head, conveying his approval for Sirius to join her. "Please keep me updated when you both return."

"Your coat Marlene," Sirius said wearily. He motioned for the two of them to return to the house where a dazed James stood staring out at them from the entrance.

She shook her hear vigorously, "There's no time for that. It's almost seven."

"You're not making any sense, Marlene," he said with high levels of irritation.

"Take my hand Sirius." She reached out to clasp his and the warmth his had held earlier was long lost amidst the frozen air surrounding them. She closed her eyes and hoped with everything in her that she would not splinch them both. And then they disappeared, freshly fallen flakes beginning to fill the space in the snow where their feet had been seconds prior.