Fearless

“Aye, Harry ---” A voice shouted from where the door was, I sat up in the bed, letting the arm that was wrapped around my upper body slip down to my lap causing the person that belonged to the arm stair in their wake, they sat up as I rubbed my eyes of sleep, looking towards the body next to me. We stared at each other for a moment before with wide eyes, two people cleared their throat causing us to jump.

“Look, James,” Regulus laughed as he pointed a finger towards my direction. “Hunt, slept with someone before you!” Regulus laughed uncontrollably, I could feel heat rushing towards my face. James reached over toward Regulus hitting the back his head in irritation.

“Why are you in Harry’s bed?” James said sensibly while raising an eyebrow. I cleared my throat as I whistled. Tenebrarum ruffled his feather before landing on my shoulder, I looked towards James and Regulus to see that James held a serious expression, standing rigged in the doorway while Regulus held a cheeky grin, leaning against the door frame.

“It isn’t like we did anything,” I spoke, rolling my eyes as James continued to glare across the room at Harry. I pushed past them, moving towards the room next door with my brothers following closely behind me.

I laid back on my bed, I could feel the presence of my brothers in the room, the door shut but none of us bothered to say anything. I could feel the bed lower on either side of me.

“I don’t want you by yourself with Harry Potter,” James was the first to speak, his voice flowed out from my right side. I didn’t bother to say anything. I knew he wasn’t finished. “It’s not like I don’t like the bloke, it’s just what if the Nott’s found out that we were speaking to the boy who lived,” Regulus must have mouthed something towards to make him seem like he didn’t care about muggle-borns or half-bloods though I did shutter at the thought of Melissa’s parents or her brother finding out.

Though I didn’t live to please the Nott’s as James didn’t in fact I didn’t give two shits about what they thought of me or who I hung out with. I sat up in my bed slowly turning towards James with a frown plastered on my face, he must have seen something in my eyes because he shuttered.

“I’m not going to stop hanging out with Harry Potter because the Nott’s won’t like him,” I hissed before turning to Regulus, his eyes widened. “And you, if you ever make another comment like that about me, I will slice you up into tiny pieces and feed them to a wolf,” I pointed towards Regulus before flopping back down on the bed.

After the accident with Harry, it took me, Regulus, and James several days to get used to our strange new freedom. Never before had we been able to get up whenever we wanted or eat whatever we fancied. We could go wherever we pleased, as long as it was Diagon Alley.

I usually roamed Diagon Alley by myself as Regulus and James stayed back at Leaky Cauldron. Diagon Alley is a long cobbled street that was packed with the most fascinating wizarding shops in the world, I felt no desire to go back to the Leaky Cauldron stuck indoors all day nor stray into the Muggle world.

As I was wondering the street I stopped at the shop, Quality Quidditch Supplies, I was curious to know what the crowd in in the shop was staring at, I edged my way inside and squeezed in among the excited witches and wizards until I got a glimpse of a newly erected podium, on which was mounted the most magnificent broom I’ve had ever seen in my life.

“Just came out --- prototype ---” I looked to my right noticing the messy dark haired wizard, he looked of towards me with a grin Harry’s eyes shone with admiration -- we turned our eyes back towards the beautiful broom.

“It’s the fastest broom in the world, isn’t it, Daddy?” squeaked a boy younger than me, who was swinging off his father’s arm.

“Irish International Side’s just put in an order for seven of these beauties!” the proprietor of the shop told the crowd. “And they’re favorites for the World Cup!”

A large witch in front of Harry and I moved, and I was abled to read the sign next to the broom:

THE FIREBOLT

THIS STATE-OF-THE-ART RACING BROOM SPORTS A STEAM-

LINED, SUPERFINE HANDLE OF ASH, TREATED WITH A

DIAMOND-HARD POLISH AND HAND-NUMBERED WITH ITS OWN

REGISTRATION NUMBER. EACH INDIVIDUALLY SELECTED BIRCH

TWIG IN THE BROOMTAIL HAS BEEN HONED TO AERODYNAMIC

PERFECTION, GIVING THE FIREBOLT UNSURPASSABLE BALANCE AND

PINPOINT PRECISION. THE FIREBOLT HAS AN ACCELERATION

OF 150 MILES AN HOUR IN TEN SECONDS AND INCORPORATES AN UNBREAKABLE BREAKING CHARM. PRICE ON REQUEST.

Price on request. . . I didn’t like to think how much gold the Firebolt would cost. I’d never wanted anything as much in my life while besides to know who my parents were. I gripped Harry’s wrist, pulling him out of the store before he could buy something he probably didn’t need.

There, were, however things that we needed to buy. I pulled him towards the Apothecary, letting his arm fall from my hand. Harry showed me the ingredients that I would need for potions, afterwards he took me to get my robes from Madam Malkin’s Robes for All Occasions.

“Where to next?” I questioned walking out of Madam Malkin’s Robes for All Occasion, Harry grinned at me pointing down the cobblestone road.

“Flourish and Blotts,” I followed him down the cobblestone road with a grin plastered on my face, knowing that I was disobeying James orders to not be alone with Harry.

I stood there in shock, my mouth gaped slightly in the bookshop window there was a large iron cage behind the glass that held about a hundred copies of The Monster Book Of Monsters. Torn pages were flying everywhere as the books grappled with each other, locked together in furious wrestling matches and snapping aggressively.

“Flourish and Blotts window isn’t usually displayed like this,” Harry stated with a laugh. “It’s usually displayed of gold-embossed spellbooks the size of paving slabs.” I nodded, pulling out my booklist out of my pocket at the same time Harry had done. I groaned as my booklist read: The Monster Book of Monsters was listed as the required book for Care of Magical Creatures.

We entered Flourish and Blotts, the manger came hurrying towards us with a forced smile.

“Hogwarts?” he said abruptly. “Come to get your new books?”

“Yes,” Harry and I stated at the same moment.

“Get out of the way,” said the manager impatiently, brushing us aside. He drew on a pair of very thick gloves, picked up a large, knobbly walking stick, and proceeded toward the door of the Monster Books’ cage.

“Hang on,” said Harry quickly, “I’ve already got one of those.”

“Have you?” A look of enormous relief spread over the manager's face. “Thank heavens for that. I’ve been bitten five times already this morning ---”

A loud ripping noise rent the air; two of the Monster Books had seized a third and were pulling it apart.

“Stop it! Stop it!” cried the manager, poking the walking stick through the pars and knocking the books apart. “I’m never stocking them again, never! It’s been bedlam! I thought we’d seen the worst when we bought two hundred copies of the Invisible Book of Invisibility --- cost a fortune, and we never found them. . .Well. . . is there anything else I can help you with?”

“Wait, I need one!” I said with a sweet grin plastering my face, the manger glared at me before sticking his hand quickly into the cage then beating one of the books with the walking stick before grabbing it, tying it with a belt next to the cage and handing it to me with another glare.

“Can I help you two with anything else?”

“Yes,” Harry informed him politely, looking down his booklist, “I need Unfogging the Future by Cassandra Vablatsky”

“I need that one too!” I said happily though the manager just dismissed me.

“Ah, starting Divination, are you?” said the manager, stripping of his gloves and leading us into the back of the shop, where there was a corner devoted to fortune-telling. A small table was stacked with volumes such as Predicting the Unpredictable: Insulate Yourself Against Shocks and Broken Balls” When Fortunes Turn Foul.

“Here you are,” said the manager, who had climbed a set of steps to take down two thick, black-bound book. “Unfogging the Future. Very good guide to all your basic fortune telling methods --- palmistry, crystal balls, bird entrails ----”

I wasn’t listening, and neither seemed Harry. My eyes had fallen on another book, which was among a display on a small table: Death Omens: What to do When You Know the Worst Is Coming.

“Oh, I wouldn’t read that If I were you,” said the manager lightly, looking to see what we were staring at. “You’ll start seeing death omens everywhere. It’s enough to frighten anyone to death.”

But we continued to stare at the front cover of the book; it showed a black dog large as a bear, with gleaming eyes. It looked just like the one I had seen before the Knight Bus had picked us up.

The manager pressed Unfogging the Future into my hands.

“Anything else?” he said.

I nodded as I told the manager the books that I needed while Harry nodded agreeing with us, later that day I sat on my bed staring down at my feet wondering what it would be like to be a Hogwarts student.

After a few days I sat in the Leaky Cauldron having lunch with Regulus and Harry, then we made our way through Diagon Alley, jumping when two voices shouted towards us.

“Harry! HARRY!”

A girl and boy where waving their hands at Harry, they were both sitting outside of Florean Fortescue’s Ice Cream Parlor --- the boy held fiery red hair, a very freckled complexion, with blue eyes, a long nose, he was very tall and lanky. I watched closely as his eyes connected with mine, his eyes and ears became notably red --- the girl was quite pretty, with bushy light brown hair with dark brown eyes with rather large teeth both of them were waving frantically at Harry.

“Finally!” the redhead, grinned at Harry as we all sat down. “We went to Leaky Cauldron, but they said you’d left, and we went to Flourish and Blotts, and Madam Malkin’s, and ---”

“I got all my school stuff last week with Hunter,” Harry explained, he waved his hand indicating towards Regulus and I.

“I’m Hermione Granger!” the girl with the bushy brown hair smiled as she waved towards us. “And that’s Ron Weasley. It’s nice to met you!”

“I’m Hunter Black and this is my twin brother Regulus Black,” I grinned as I indicating towards Regulus who sat next to me.

“Hunter?” Ron snorted as he stared at me with laughter in his eyes. “Isn’t that a boys name?” I could feel myself clench, I was sick of being asked that. Regulus quickly gripped my clenched fist.

“Yes, it is,” His eyes widen at my tone before turning back towards Harry who was laughing silently to himself, Hermione’s frame was also shaking in amusement.

Ron cleared his throat indicating for one of his friends to speak.

“How come you knew I’m staying at the Leaky Cauldron?”

“Dad,” said Ron simply.

“Did you really blow up your aunt, Harry?” Hermione asked in a very serious voice, I rolled my eyes with a soft laugh that Regulus only seemed to heard.

“I didn’t mean to,” Harry said, while Ron roared with laughter. “I just --- lost control,”

“It’s not funny, Ron,” Hermione sharply said. “Honestly, I’m amazed Harry wasn’t expelled.

“It isn’t really that bad,” I started off with a smirk crossing my face, shouldering into Regulus who smirked back. “I once blew up my foster father’s Ministry car,” Hermione, Ron, and Harry stared at each other in amazement.

“Who’s your foster father?” Ron questioned, I grinned at him with one raised eyebrow.

“Theodore Nott,” Regulus mentioned as the three of them looked at each other with surprise.

“You mean the Slytherin family, Nott?” Hermione questioned. I nodded as I sat my elbows on the table with a smile.

“Yup. They raised my brother James, Regulus, and I"

“Oh,” was all that was spoken.