BLACK AND GREY

For the third time that single day, Marlene yelped when she made a mistake on the potion and made Anne jump away from the caldron to avoid being burned by the clearly acid bubbled that were spilling out of the table and down to the floor.

"ENOUGH!" said Slughorn. "Enough out of your two, Miss Sage and Miss McKinnon. We're changing partners, otherwise we'll have a death here before the semester is even over!" Slughorn looked actually worried for a moment as he looked to the people that he wished to change partners – put James or Sirius with Anne or Marlene would not work. A movement in green made him look. "Snape, my boy, can you change places with Miss Sage and leave her with Mister Black. Only you could deal with Miss McKinnon's... talents in potions."

Marlene laughed. "Thanks, Professor, but I'd rather vomit."

Sirius bark of laughter from the other side of the room was so loud that Anne gave little jump. James was trying not to laugh since Lily Evans was sitting right behind him, but snickered. Peter hid his face and Remus seemed suddenly very focused on taking dirty from underneath his nails and poke at Peter to remind him to stir the potion.

Anne poked the blonde with her elbow, chastising her with a hiss for silence. Still, Anne quite agreed with her, she didn't want to leave Marlene with Severus after the that new version of his was even less kind that the one she knew before.

"Snape is good in potions," Anne said. "You'll be fine."

Marlene looked at Anne as if she had betrayed her, but watched her walk towards Regulus without daring to look at Severus as he very against his will sat down beside the blonde girl, who rolled her eyes and looked at him as if waiting for him to say what she needed to do.

The red-headed girl was certainly more polite than Severus or Marlene. She gave a tight-lipped smile to Regulus and sat beside him, crossing her legs and patiently waiting as he put some of the books away so she'd have space on the counter to put her own book and notes. He barely glanced at her, just got up from his seat and carefully pushed the caldron more to the middle of the table so she wouldn't have to get too close to him.

"Good morning," he said in a small voice.

"Morning," she answered.

The table in front of her had Evan Rosier and the Elizabeth Fawley that Anne had seen talking to Regulus that day; they seemed close somehow, and Anne couldn't help but wonder why Regulus hadn't been sitting with her. In the table behind them were Remus and Peter, both working quietly, though she could feel Remus' eyes on her as she smiled at Regulus once more.

"My... rib is feeling great," he commented in a whisper. "Would you mind chopping the alihotsy leaves?"

"Not at all," she said, bringing the cutting board near her, still sitting as she chopped. "Why are we even doing a Laughing Potion? Isn't it, like, super easy or something? At this point in sixth year, I'd think we'd be doing something much more fun, like... Felix Felixces or something like that."

Regulus glanced up from his book.

"Not everybody is good in potions, Sage," he said. He took another glance, but this time to the table in front of them. He couldn't call her by her first name. "Have you done this one before?"

"No, just studied the theory," she answered. "I've seen people using it, though. A... friend of mine had terrible depression and –"

"What's depression?" Regulus cut her off.

She looked at him, surprised, knife freezing in her hand as she blinked to try and find the words.

"Um... It's... Melancholy, I suppose that's how you call it," she said. That seemed to make sense to Regulus because he hummed in acknowledgment and nodded. "Anyways, when he was so bad that we were afraid to leave him alone, we'd give him some – his mother would do it."

"What's his name?" he was trying to be pleasant, but that made Evan glance over his shoulder to Regulus. "Maybe I know him."

"You don't, I'm sure," she said.

"I do have friends in America, Sage. Is called social network, it's important deeper into the future and you should know that," Regulus answered.

Anne sighed.

"His name was George," she said. "He killed himself when I was fifteen after his twin brother died of an illness."

Regulus almost hissed in embarrassment as he understood that since that person no longer was in their world, then there was no way he could know him.

Anne was far away from the classroom again, hand moving to keep on cutting the leaves, but mind far away. She liked to remember Fred and George together, of course, as did most of the remaining Weasley family. After St. Mungus closed down to anyone that did not follow Voldemort's philosophy, Fred got very sick because of a cut he had on his leg; the fever came strong and the infection took him fast, but left everybody else suffering. George committed suicide a few weeks later and then Arthur disappeared in battle, his body never found.

Misses Weasley had been strong, she kept on taking care of everyone, resolving their problems so she wouldn't have to deal with the empty side of the bed and the empty bedroom across theirs in the Burrow. She only broke when Ginny came crying to her, a pregnancy potion in vibrant green as she plead for forgiveness. There was no forgiveness needed, because that child had been the one to make Molly admit she had been expecting someone else to be gone so she could follow.

She started taking Laughing Potions when she thought of death too much.

"I seem to have stepped over the line in our short conversations again, Miss Sage, I apologize," he said.

Anne looked up at him and shook her head, dismissing his apology as she got up from the seat and put the leaves into the caldron. She started to stir very slowly. When her eyes met his, however, she held her breath.

The intensity of his eyes was not something she had been expecting to see.

"It's alright," she said.

He looked away.

"Did you... loose a lot of people before coming here?" he asked, voice going no louder than a whisper. Nobody was hearing them. "You didn't come here just because of a wedding, you came here to run of something worse – if a wedding was truly involved, which I do not believe to be, it was just the last drop, but not the storm itself."

Her lips twitched as her smirk could not be hidden anymore.

"You're too smart for your own good, Black."

That brought a chuckle from his chest as he looked down in modesty, a bit louder than he expected. Some students looked at them since Regulus' laugh was quite rare to be heard – among those people was Sirius Black, who poked James' ribs.

"Mate," he whispered.

"Wait, I'm busy with the wings," James answered.

Lily Evans looked up, almost laughing from his joke, but the she saw that he was seriously grinding up the Billywig wings with focus on his face. Sirius, however, had stopped stirring and was watching someone across the room. Lily followed his eyes to see Anne pushing some hair away from her face and putting it behind her ear, focused on her own potion, but Regulus was whispering something to her; a smile on her lips as she giggled, hand flying to her mouth to muffle it.

"Mate, I'm serious."

"I know you are," said James, tired.

"No, not Sirius. Seriously," Sirius insisted. "Mate, my brother is proper flirting with Anne."

"What?!" James exclaimed so loudly that Lily almost dropped a quill inside the caldron. "Where? Oh, fuck!"

"Language, Mister Potter," said Slughorn three feet away from them, passing through tables to have a check.

"Sir, Professor!" called James. Slughorn stopped beside them, hands on his hips. "You need get Anne away from him, sir. Look at them, look! He's flirting with her!" Slughorn looked at Regulus and Anne. She seemed a bit tired from stirring the caldron, so he put a hand on her back and took over, vigoursly stirring. "See? He can't do that, she's my –" James stopped himself.

Sirius was now watching James as if he had two heads.

"Your --?" Slughorn encouraged him. "Are you and Miss Sage together, Mister Potter, because I believe it to be too personal to –"

"Cousin," James said. "Once removed," he added. "She came to live with my parents."

Slughorn looked white in the face. "I see," he said, uncomfortable.

The Potters were powerful, of course, but a Sage with Potter blood and the main-ramification of the House of Potter standing behind her, she was near to a nobility inside the school and the British Wizarding World, though her blood status would bring her down.

"You didn't tell me this," Sirius hissed at James.

"Because I shouldn't have told anyone at all," James hissed back. "If this could stay between us, Professor, I'm sure my father would be delighted to explain the situation in more detail with a dinner."

Manipulation. Anne had taught him well.

"Of course, Mister Potter. Do tell Lord Potter I'd be delighted," said Slughorn. "However, I cannot do much for our little... problem. Miss Sage and Mister Black work well together, as you can clearly see. This class is about getting students to their best potential, but I think I can only do so if Sage and Black are together."

And that was the end of the conversation James did not wish to have.

Dumbledore was not happy with the newest addition to the story, but he was doing a good job hiding it from James, because the boy – although guilty – left the study looking quite pleased with himself, but Anne remained.

"You're free to go, Miss Potter," Dumbledore repeated.

Anne did not move from her chair.

"I do not wish to move," she said. "You had no right to talk to James that way, you implied, more than once, that it was a stupid decision. He was trying to protect me."

"A not so wise decision," Dumbledore said. "It was not a decision made out of protectiveness; it was a decision made in base of jealousy. It was a terrible idea to have him know the truth behind your existence."

"You'd rather lie to him?" Anne asked, laughing with the irony. "No surprise there, Headmaster. All you do ever since I met you is lie, lie, lie. You can't fool me. I know too much about you to let it go."

"It'd be smart to stop this conversation while we still have control," he warned.

"I don't want stop this conversation. I know shit you'd be very inclined to kill me if you knew that I knew, and the most amusing thing is that you just can't," she laughed. "You can't kill me because you need to win and you can't do it without me, so I fear nothing that will come from you."

"You told me everything already –"

"Did I?" she asked, raising her eyebrows. She frowned soon after. "Are you sure?" the condescending tone made Dumbledore's cheeks go a bit red in anger, but his face expression did not move. "Do not underestimate me, Professor, it will not go well to you, I can assure you. James Potter did what he thought it was right to help me because he knows Regulus Black to be involved with the pureblood philosophy and here's one thing of the many that I didn't tell you: I need Regulus. He's the one to know before anyone else about the Horcruxes and when it was hidden."

"You're using him," Dumbledore commented, though he didn't seem too surprised.

Anne got up from the chair slowly, pretending to be too busy with the simply task of fixing her skirt to answer him right away. Her mind was looking for answer, but she wasn't sure herself if Regulus black was a tool to her plan – perhaps at first, but now... he just looked like any other kid to her.

"Yes," she answered.

Dumbledore's lips twitched as soon as their eyes met.

"You think yourself a much better liar than you really are, my dear," he said. "You like him."

"He's in for interesting conversation," she dismissed. She couldn't let him know that perhaps they'd turn into good friends – he didn't need more leverage on her, he didn't need more bullets to his emotional manipulation gun.

He nodded, getting up from his chair as well.

"Younger Mister Black is indeed an interesting boy, very smart, but so gullible, don't you think so? He sees the world in black and white so often that is somehow surprising how interested he is in knowledge," Dumbledore said. His hands went behind his back in a polite posture as he watched Anne's cold eyes resting on his. There was no breech in her mind, no matter where he tried to go. He hid his frustration. "Perhaps you, Miss Potter, shall help him see the grey? Who better than a half-blood?"

"Gullible," she scoffed. "He's an abused kid."

"And so is Sirius, and he's far from gullible," Dumbledore said.

"No, he's just plain naïve with a terrible relationship with figures of power," she said. "Two different responses to the very same trauma. Why do you help one and not the other?"

"Because one came to me," he said.

"And is not your responsibility if you pretend not to see it, am I right?" she shook her head, a bitter smile coming to her lips. Green eyes flashed through her mind. "Don't worry, Professor, I understand. You did the same before."

"Your time has not—"

"I'm not talking about my time!" she cut him off, glaring at him. "You are well aware that you sent Tom Riddle back to a Muggle orphanage during the Second World War in the Muggle world? England was one of the most dangerous places in the world to the muggle population and you sent him back there without a blink of an eye. Why do you think he's so terrified of you?"

"I did what I had to do," he said. "There was nothing I could've done for him."

"There was plenty you could have done for the boy he was without turning into another adult that failed him time and time again!" she exclaimed. "Who Tom Riddle became is your fault, Headmaster. You failed him. I know he asked for your help before, he came to you and begged you not to send him back when he was in his first year and again when he was in the second – he came back very different when he was thirteen though, didn't he? That's when you actually started paying attention to him, not out of kindness or actual interest in his academic career; you paid attention to him out of nervousness and fear he would become exactly who he is now."

Dumbledore looked down, defeated by the memories that attacked him. The little boy on his knees, begging, pleading and promising that he'd do anything to not be sent back there, but Dumbledore did.

"Tom is more than evil," he said.

"Now, he is, indeed," she said.

"He had goodness inside of him, a great deal of it, but Dark Magic corrupted him and he was so easily manipulated – his magic was so strong and I overlooked his anger," he admitted. "I didn't expect him to act on the darkness he had."

"When the darkness is all you have left, you turn towards it. It's the warmest thing you have when everything else is empty."

"But he had more than darkness," he said.

"But you made him think he wasn't worth of his own light," she said. "I've been in his head before. He tried to invade my mind and I pushed back so hard I ended up on his – is dark there, is cold and lonely. I was terrified just like he was when two of the kids in the orphanage tried to kill him for the first time. First time... it happened more than once before he even reached eleven. And you sent him back there. This war – everything that I had to go through... all of these deaths I had to go through, they were consequences of your actions."

Dumbledore sat back down on his chair, breath disappearing from his lungs as he just stared at the girl, feeling his chest hurting and his stomach turning.

"He turned to Grindewald's basic ideas because he knew my story with him," Dumbledore confessed. Anne nodded, clearly knowing that too. "It is my fault, isn't it?" he wondered out loud, but Anne didn't answer. "You should go to dinner, Miss Potter."

She sighed, but turned towards the door to leave, stopping on the doorway and taking a deep breath.

"I came to you too," she told him.

Dumbledore looked up.

"I'm sorry?"

"I came to you, I told you things I feel like I cannot tell anyone ever again in my life," she answered. "I never told Harry out of your request and I agreed because I thought you were right, you said you'd fix it and you never did anything. I was never important to you, I was just Harry's sister, just another war casualty when time came to it, or – in good days – the leverage you had on Harry," she explained, taking another deep breath. "The day I agreed to keep my... suffering in secret was the day that I finally felt like I was protecting Harry. He had so much to be like Tom and I didn't want to give him another reason; I thought you were right, and perhaps you were, maybe Harry would've turned to revenge, but perhaps he'd have done something to protect me a bit better."

"You said you were tired of being protected by him, that's why you came here," Dumbledore said.

"I was fourteen," she said. "I had no one else, I had no support from anyone besides him and I had no friends besides his. Harry was all the protection I had, but it wasn't all that I needed – I asked you for help and you failed me too."

And with that, Anne turned around and left the room, closing the door carefully behind her.

She did not have dinner and she spent the night sitting in her bed, protected by silencing charms, crying her eyes out until dawn came and a new day had shined upon her, bringing the new once again.

Harry, Hermione, Rony, Sirius, Remus, Tonks, Fred, George, Ginny, Arthur, Molly, Luna, Neville, Draco, Colin, Davees, Kinglsey, Cho, Dean, Seamus and ever so many more that she lost in the past. Her future was dedicated to them.