Effervescence | h.p.

i | xxxxv. forever young

When Lyra, Hermione, and Harry stumbled into the common room, it was early enough that they should be deep in sleep, but they had just returned from detention in the forbidden forest.

Ron had fallen asleep in the dark common room, waiting for Harry and Hermione to return, still under the impression Lyra lay sleeping in her dorm. He shouted something about Quidditch fouls when Lyra hit his head with a pillow to wake him. In a matter of seconds, though, he was wide-eyed as Harry began telling him and Hermione what had happened in the forest.

Harry couldn't sit down. He paced up and down in front of the fire. He was still shaking.

Lyra, on the contrary, was curled in on herself in a chair, attempting to warm her shaking body, even though she was almost certain her shivering was not a result of the temperature.

"Let me get this straight," Ron interrupted early into the retelling. "You said you went to bed and then proceeded to go to the forbidden forest and if no one had found out, you would, most likely, be dead right now?" he said to Lyra. "Are you crazy?! You should have told me, Lyra! Don't you trust me? Bloody hell, I would've gone with you!"

"I-I didn't want — nothing like that was supposed to happen," Lyra said quietly with a red face. She had started worrying more how Ron would react to her . . . monthly commitment. He had questioned her trust in him and she couldn't even say that she had told him her darkest secret.

"Ron, lay off her," said Harry, stopping his pacing momentarily. "She knows she shouldn't have done it, but we can't change it now."

"Right, of course," Ron said, shaking his head. He seemed unconvinced, but let it go for the time being as Harry resumed his pacing and story-telling.

"Snape wants the Stone for Voldemort . . . and Voldemort's waiting in the forest . . . and all this time we thought Snape just wanted to get rich . . . "

"Stop saying the name!" said Ron in a terrified whisper, as if he thought Voldemort could hear them from around the corner.

Harry didn't listen. Lyra sat up in her chair, looking at Ron as if he had grown heads.

Harry continued his personal mutterings as Lyra began speaking to Ron.

"Ron, you want him to stop saying the name as if he's tried to kill you for saying it," she said quite sharply. "You've never had him within ten feet of you shooting a curse at you! You have no reason to be scared of it!" she suddenly said loudly, angry. "If I don't have a problem with it, you can handle it."

"I have a right to not wanting to hear the name," Ron said strongly.

Lyra didn't like this on top of Harry's theorizing. So she did what anyone would do if they were annoyed; she fed into them.

"Oh, so according to you, Har-Bear, all I have to do now is waiting patiently for Snape to steal the Stone, pass it to Voldy, and give me the ol' killing curse, and let him kill me? Sounds like a great idea to me! — "

"Ly — " Harry started.

" — Goodbye future I've never had because of Voldy, hello Death! Oh, you'll never know how disappointed I was to be so, so, sooo close to you when I was less than two years old. But, I have a new opportunity! Thank you, Voldemort! My savior!" she dramatically said.

"Will you two stop saying the name!" Ron hissed.

"You don't get it, do you, Ronald? I'm not afraid of his stupid name! If I'm scared, it's to lose my life in school because he decided to target me when I was a baby!"

Hermione looked very frightened, afraid of Lyra's outburst, but she had a word of comfort.

"Ly, you won't die — especially in school. Everyone says Dumbledore's the only one You-Know-Who was ever afraid of. With Dumbledore around, You-Know-Who won't touch you. Anyways, who says the centaurs are right? It sounds like fortune-telling to me, and Professor McGonagall says that's a very imprecise branch of magic."