Remember Me

The dreams didn’t stop, even though Cassandra now knew why she was having them. She was replaying the moment when Slytherin left after the fight with Gryffindor when she slept, and though she knew it was coming each night, they still unsettled her.

And she knew Harry was still having nightmares, knew that Voldemort still penetrated his dreams.

Ron reported when Harry had these dreams to her and Hermione, as Harry was reluctant to share, to have people worrying over him. But even he could not conceal that his scar was hurting more and more often, and Cassandra could see fleeting glimpses of expressions pass across his face whenever that happened that were completely different to what Harry was feeling. Part of Cassandra found it funny - the serious tones they were discussing Harry in – yet she could totally understand why they were from the jumbled stories Ron and Dean had told her about last year.

And she was worried for him, worried that Voldemort could see into his mind so easily. Worried that he wasn’t even trying to put up mental barriers.

And worried that Harry seemed to be getting weaker.

“You’re freezing.”

“Merlin, Cass! I’m fine.”

“Don’t be an idiot; you’re like a bloody ice cube!”

Harry glared at Cassandra as she took his hand in both of hers and started rubbing it.

“I’m fine, get off…”

“Stick your hands under the fire or something, that’ll warm them up.”

It was in Potions, and they were starting to make Polyjuice Potion, which Harry, Ron and Hermione had exchanged smirks over. As for the first stage of the Potion, it had to be left to stew straight after you added the first ingredient, it was one of the easiest lessons that Cassandra had ever experienced with Snape teaching them.

“Blimey, you sound like my mum,” Ron told Cassandra over the heavy steam issuing out of his cauldron.

“I was just saying he’s cold!”

Hermione’s face appeared over the rim of her cauldron. “You really don’t look well Harry; are you sure you’re alright?”

“I’m fine!” he sighed impatiently. “Okay now?!”

Cassandra shrugged and hurriedly pretended to be looking up something in her textbook as Snape came their way. He could obviously find nothing to criticise, so swept away to the other side of the dungeon where he began to talk to Malfoy.

“That reminds me,” hissed Hermione. “Did you tell Grimstone?”

“Yup,” said Ron, stirring his cauldron idly.

“Good,” she said fervently. “I can’t believe what he was doing…at least it’ll stop now.”

“Yeah, Hermione, you’ve been saying about this for ages.”

“I notice you haven’t seemed that worried!”

“I have! I just haven’t been bringing it up all the time, that’s all!”

Ron and Hermione bickered for the rest of the lesson, and carried on as the bell ended, signifying the end of the lesson. Harry and Cassandra followed them wearily out of the dungeons, walking slowly as an onslaught of students sprinted to the Great Hall for food.

“You hungry?” asked Cassandra as they neared the Great Hall.

Harry shook his head.

“Good, me neither,” she said and steered him over to a window seat instead. As they sat down, she felt him shiver involuntarily and sighed. Harry would never admit he was in any discomfort apart from life or death situations she thought grimly.

“Where were you this morning?”

Cassandra grinned. “Girls bathroom. Did you know there’s a ghost that haunts there? I mean like, how depressing! She’s called Moaning Myrtle or something and I swear, she hated me from the moment I went in because I was smiling or something! So in the end I had to be really sad and stuff so she didn’t keep wailing, and we actually got on quite well! Had a nice little chat about how horrible her life was…well, it wasn’t nice actually it was kind of depressing, but what can you expect from a ghost who chooses to haunt toilets?”

Harry grinned. “Yeah, I know Myrtle,” he said.

“D’you have a ghost that haunts the boys bathroom? We could play match maker between the two of them.”

“No!”

“He’d be called something like…I dunno, Droopy Derek.”

“Or Depressed Derek.”

“Dreary Derek?”

“Why does his name have to be Derek? Why not something else?”

“What’s wrong with Derek?”

Cassandra’s face scrunched up into a wide grin as she laughed. She had her knees drawn up to her chest and her head laid on them, facing Harry, so didn’t notice at first when Dean came up behind her.

“Hey Cass.”

“Dean, don’t do that, I thought you were a Boggart!” She laughed as Dean’s face fell. Harry stifled a laugh. “Sorry, that was a ten year old joke, I know.”

“I was just coming to say that there’s a Hogsmede day next weekend so…” he paused as Cassandra cocked her head to one side, her silver eyes penetrating. “D’you want to come with me?”

Cassandra raised her eyebrows and smiled. “Yeah, alright.”

Grinning a little, she turned back to Harry. “C’mon, let’s go and see Ron and Hermione. See if they’ve stopped arguing yet.” She rolled her eyes and pulled him to his feet.

His hands were still freezing, like holding a cold rock in her hands, and Cassandra made a mental note to get sit down in front of the fire in the common room and make him stay there for as long as possible.

As they wandered through the corridors, they met Neville, who was perusing the front cover of the Daily Prophet, his face worried. Cassandra craned her neck to see what the article he was reading and experienced a cold, sinking feeling in the depths of her stomach.

Death Eaters Escape: Ten Of The Most Powerful Death Eaters Have Escaped From Azkaban

Cassandra turned to Harry and saw that he had seen it too.

“I knew it was going to happen,” he said, shaking his head. “Dementors probably held the doors open for them as they ran out.”

“They the ones you caught in the Ministry?”

“Yeah,” he said, his face shutting down as it always did whenever that subject was brought up.

Cassandra bit her lip, racking her brain for words. “Oh dear.”

Harry stared at her, then started to laugh. “You really don’t have any idea about them, do you Cass.”

“Too true,” she shrugged and they carried on walking back to the common room.