Thalia's POV: December 22, 1997

I woke up alone.

The dorm was empty. Piper and Alex were at the safehouses. Daphne and Millicent had both gone home for the holiday, and Pansy was probably with her friends. So then where was Reyna?

I sat up in bed. Ugh. What time is it? Since we slept down in the dungeons, there weren't any windows to see if it was light out or not. I looked around the room for some sort of clock. Realizing there wasn't one, I grabbed my wand off the nightstand.

"Alakazoo, alakazam, what time is it?" I said jokingly while waving the wand around. It sparked. And sparked again.

My bed might have caught on fire.

"Aguamenti!" I shouted, and a little spout of water came out of the end of my wand. It wasn't enough. "That usually works, what the hell?! Aguamenti!"

Another little spout of water. I managed to get most of the fire, and just whacked the rest with my pillow until it went away. I flopped back down on the bed. That was embarrassing.

I must have fallen back asleep because the next thing I knew I was being gently shaken awake. I opened my eyes a little and saw Reyna.

"Good morning, Thalia"

I sat up and looked around. Someone, probably Reyna, had turned on the lights. Reyna was sitting on the edge of my bed, wearing jeans and a purple Camp Jupiter sweater over a white collared shirt. She was holding a single chocolate cupcake with chocolate frosting, rainbow sprinkles, and a singular yellow and blue candle on top. Reyna took her wand out of her pocket and tapped the candle to light it. Then, she started to sing.

"Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday dear Thalia,

Happy birthday to you!"

She held out the cupcake, and I closed my eyes to make a wish. I wish for us to succeed on this quest. I blew out the candle.

"Thanks, Reyna," I smiled.

She smiled back at me. "Of course."

"Do you know what time it is? I can never tell down here,"

"Almost lunchtime," Reyna answered.

"What? I slept that long?"

"It's your birthday. I wanted you to get some extra rest," she explained, handing me the cupcake. I took a bite. It was my favorite- a double chocolate cupcake with a chunk of cookie dough in the center, topped with rainbow sprinkles.

"This is my favorite cupcake! How did you know?" I asked with chocolate still in my mouth.

"Annabeth told me after we decided to stay here for the holiday. We wanted you to have a good birthday."

Of course she did. I grinned. "That's very Annabeth of her."

"Jason wanted me to put staples in the cupcake,"

I snorted. "That goober. Also, you know I'm immortal, right? I don't age, so my birthdays don't really count anymore."

She tilted her head to the side. "Technically none of us are aging right now, and it's all pretty confusing what with the time travel and everything. I just thought we could use a reason to celebrate."

"Well, you thought right, I guess. This place is so depressing. I can't wait to end this war and let these people lead normal lives again. This place was probably so cool before the war happened."

We talked for a few minutes before I suggested we go down to the Great Hall for food. Reyna agreed, and I set the rest of the cupcake down on my nightstand and grabbed some clothes to change into. I went into the bathroom, brushed my teeth, and put on black jeans, black boots, a Green Day hoodie, and my silver Hunter jacket. "Let's go to lunch," I said as I walked back into the dorm.

Reyna picked up the leather messenger bag she used to carry her school books. I grabbed my cupcake to eat on the way, and we talked and laughed the whole time. She told me about how she went to the kitchen to bake cupcakes instead of going to breakfast, and about the house elves asking if she knew Jason Grace and Leo McShizzle, who went to the kitchen to make brownies sometimes.

"Of course he told them his name is McShizzle," I chuckled. "Also, the audacity of my baby brother not to bring me a brownie! How very rude!" I said in my best British accent, making Reyna laugh. We told stories about Jason the whole way to the Great Hall. I told her all the cute baby stories, and she told me about all the Camp Jupiter adventures.

"He was the one who showed me around when I got there," she remembered.

When we finally reached the Hall, everyone was seated at the staff table. All the teachers (minus one Snape, who was probably in his office like always) sat on the left side of the table, with the Carrows at the very end, and the students sat on the right. Besides us, there were seven students who stayed for the holidays. Six of them were Slytherins. At the end of the table sat Vincent Crabbe, Gregory Goyle, Blaise Zabini, Pansy Parkinson, and Draco Malfoy. There was an empty space between Blaise and the two other students, a pair of sisters who I'd met in detention. Sixth-year Slytherin Eloise Blackley and third-year Raveclaw Elisabeth Blackley. They looked really similar, with the same dark brown hair, green eyes, and a light smattering of freckles, but Eloise's hair was cut into layers and Elisabeth had bangs and was several inches shorter. We sat across from them, which placed me next to Malfoy.

"Good morning, Professor McGonagall," Reyna greeted her favorite teacher.

"Good morning, Miss Ramirez-Arellano," the professor replied. "I need to speak with you and Thalia after the meal, please." We told her we would. I liked Professor McGonagall. She didn't use my last name after I asked her not to, and she cared about her students a lot. The tone of her voice worried me though. What did she need to tell us?

There was a spread of food on the table, including various sandwiches, fruits, and vegetables which I started putting on my plate while I said hello to Eloise and Elisabeth. I knew a little about them. Their mother was a Death Eater named Moira Blackley and their father was a potioneer who supplied the Death Eater army out of his shop in a place called Knockturn Alley. They didn't agree with their parent's views in the slightest. Eloise had been dating a muggle-born student behind her parents' backs, and that student's whole family was now in hiding because of the new laws.

We didn't talk about any of that today, though, because that wasn't really the best topic of discussion around our present company. Instead, we spoke about wizarding music, which was a topic that had piqued my interest for months. In the middle of our conversation, Malfoy turned toward me and nudged my arm.

"Oi, Grace," he said.

"I've told you, it's Thalia. I don't use that last name." I corrected.

"Thalia, then. Why are you staying here? Didn't your brother leave?'

"Not sure why it's your business, but I chose to stay because I wanted to. Simple as that."

"Oh. Alright,"

I wasn't sure why he'd struck up the conversation in the first place, and I don't think he knew either because no one said anything after that. Thankfully, Blaise Zabini saved us both from the awkward silence. "Alex left too, right?" he asked. He and Alex had formed an unlikely friendship, which had led Alex to become "friends" with the rest of Blaise's friend group.

I nodded. "Yup,"

Reyna then asked a question to all of the other students. "What did Hogwarts used to be like? Before the war?" I shot her a look, unsure of how that question would go over with the Death Eater babies.

Surprisingly, Malfoy answered first. "It was amazing, most of the time. We could do almost anything we wanted. And there was Quidditch,"

"Quidditch?" I asked.

Malfoy looked baffled. "How do you not know what quidditch is?!"

Shiiiiiiiiiiiit. "Uh, it's not very popular in New York. Jog my memory?"

All of them started explaining the rules while I ate my lunch. It was like the three-hoop version of basketball, but with seven players to a team including a goalie, and two people with baseball bats that they used to smack around sentient metal dodgeballs. Also, the whole thing was played on flying brooms.

"Yeah, no thanks. I'll pass." I said after swallowing the last of my sandwich.

"What? Why?" Eloise asked, confused. "Do you just not like sports?"

"I like some sports, the good ones, and I could probably watch Quidditch but there's no way in hell you'd catch me playing it." I looked at Reyna. "Remember the last time I got on a broom?"

Me, Reyna, Percy, Annabeth, Jason, and Nico had snuck into the Quidditch pitch a few weeks ago because we wanted to practice fighting away from prying eyes. Nico was trying a new technique called shadow-fighting, where he would shadow travel to dodge an attack and then appear behind the attacker and sneak attack them. This worked for a while, and he wasn't getting that tired because he was traveling short distances. When he did get tired, though, he messed up and accidentally shadow-traveled into a closet. No one knew where he went until we heard him shouting.

"Jason, I think I'm back in the closet,"

Jason started cracking up and went to find him.

The closet in question was full of weird broomsticks. Percy sat on one of them, pretending like he was flying. Then he started actually flying. His broom lifted off the ground and shot upward. Thunder boomed in the sky. Dad was not happy about Percy's little joyride. Annabeth and Jason hopped on their own brooms and managed to get him down. Everyone started taking turns on the brooms. It took a lot of convincing, but I did too. I sat on the broom and gently kicked off the ground. I didn't know whether to squeeze my eyes shut to avoid looking down or keep them open to see where I was going. I shut them. I was moving forward slowly, and I could hear my friends telling me to open my eyes. When I did, I saw that I was barely four feet off the ground. Instinctively, my hands put pressure on the handle and I leaned forward. I started moving faster. I leaned to the left, then to the right, gradually speeding up. The wind started whipping through my hair, and I could hear my friends cheering me on. I pulled the handle back towards me the smallest bit, and I drifted a little higher. I didn't look down. I flew around the pitch, getting higher and faster by the second. I was good at this. Really good. I heard Jason call my name, and I stopped. How did I know how to brake? Good question. I didn't. The broom just slowed down. And I looked down. Gods of Olympus, what the fuck have I done? I was almost a hundred feet in the air. My heart dropped into my stomach. I grabbed the broomstick for dear life. It took everything in me not to scream. I don't know if it was sibling telepathy or instincts or whatever, but Jason was at my side almost in an instant.

"Thalia, I'm going to get you down." He told me, trying to calm me down. I couldn't move. "I'm not going to let you fall. Hold on to my shoulders." He wrapped his arms around me. "Grab on in three, two, one." And somehow, I managed to pry my hands off the handle. I wrapped my arms under his and grabbed his shoulders so tight I might have drawn blood. He picked me up off my broom and onto the back of his. I squeezed my eyes shut the whole way down to the ground, and when I got off the broom I fainted. It was one of the most embarrassing moments of my life.

I was remembering it in vivid detail, and I could tell Reyna was too. "I do remember that," she agreed.

"Are you just a bad flier?" Pansy asked kind of passive-aggressively.

"She's actually really good," Reyna corrected.

I looked down at my hands. "I'm just not very good with the... heights part.' I admitted. It wasn't as humiliating to admit as it normally would be because these guys didn't know that my dad is the Lord of the Sky, but it was still embarrassing.

"Me too," said Blaise. I looked at him.

"Really?"

"Yeah, I can fly pretty well, but if I get over ten feet up I freeze."

Pansy rolled her eyes. "Quidditch was nice to watch, but you know what I miss more? Hogsmeade days."

"Hogsmeade is the village, right?" Reyna asked. Pansy nodded.

"I've never been," Elisabeth mentioned quietly. We all turned to look at her. "You get to go starting in third year, but we aren't allowed to go anymore so I never got to." She was upset, and it reminded me how young she is. Thirteen. That's barely a year older than I was when I was turned into a tree. Elisabeth hasn't had a single normal year at Hogwarts. From what we've learned, Voldemort returned right before her first year, and the war started the summer before her second.

Eloise squeezed her little sister's shoulder. "I'll take you there one day, Lissa, in the summer, maybe. I promise."

Elisabeth smiled at her. "Thanks, Ellie."

I raised an eyebrow. "What's so great about this village, huh?"

"It's the only one in Britain that is exclusively populated with magical people! Not a muggle in sight, anywhere in the village," she enthused.

"And it's got Zonko's," Blaise added.

"And Honeydukes," said Crabbe and Goyle at the same time.

Reyna and I listened to them talk until the meal ended. They seemed like mostly okay people, if you overlooked the whole 'Blood Purist' thing. Before I stood up, I made sure no one was looking as I wrapped a sandwich in a napkin and stuffed it in my jacket pocket. Reyna did the same, hiding one in her bag.

As everyone was getting up from the table, Professor McGonagall motioned for us to follow her. We made small talk on the way over there. She asked us how we were adjusting to the school, how we were keeping up with our classes, how our holiday was going, but I could tell her heart wasn't in it. She had news for us, and it definitely wasn't good.

Inside her office, we sat down in the two chairs in front of her desk. The room was decorated so that it seemed full, but not cluttered. Everything seemed to have a purpose and nothing was out of place. Except for the desk. It was covered in papers and quills and ink jars and metal instruments of unknown function. It reminded me a bit of Annabeth's cabin back at camp. Everything orderly except the workspaces.

"Girls, you may be wondering why I brought you here today," she began, and we nodded. "Well, the Order has been in contact and I've received some unfortunate news."

"Are our friends okay?" I asked, extremely concerned.

"Most of them, yes."

"Most of them?"

The professor met my eyes. "I received word that Annabeth Chase and Luna Lovegood were taken from the Hogwarts Express and are now missing."

I paled. "W-what?" Not her. Please, not Annabeth.

Reyna looked ready to start a fight. "How did that even happen?"

"According to your friends, they went to the bathroom and never came back. Mr. Jackson and Miss McLean searched the whole train with help from the conductor, and the girls were nowhere to be found. The rest of your friends are secure at the safehouses, and we have Order members looking for Miss Lovegood and Miss Chase as we speak." Professor McGonagall explained.

I felt myself shaking. The air smelled like burning ozone. Reyna and the Professor noticed.

Reyna tried to stop it. "Thalia, breathe-"

The sky cracked. A deafening boom of thunder echoed through the air as a bolt of lightning struck the tower. The whole castle shook. I could feel the electricity sparking off myself. The world was tinged red.

Reyna tried to comfort me. "Thalia, breathe. Inhale, exhale. She's strong. They're both strong." So I breathed. In and out. Reyna placed a hand on my shoulder and then flinched back from the electric shock.

"Sorry," I apologized. Professor McGonagall was watching us with empathy in her eyes.

Reyna shook her head. "It's alright, Thalia." She put her hand back on my shoulder, the static now gone. I felt less shaky, and my mind started to clear. Right, her power is giving her strength to others. I then realized what I had just done. I can't believe I lost my cool again. I'm going to sabotage the whole quest if I can't control myself.

The professor cleared her throat. "You're a powerful demigod, Thalia."

"Thank you- wait what? Demigod? You mean witch, right?" Dam it. Why me?

"No, I mean demigod. Daughter of Zeus, correct?" There was a glint in her eyes, just like the one Annabeth would get when she had figured something out before anyone else. Oh, Annabeth. Look at the mess I've made.

Reyna scoffed. "That would be ridiculous. Gods aren't even real." I nodded to agree.

"I think my grandmother would say otherwise," the professor noted.

"Uh, who's your grandmother?" I asked nervously.

She somehow managed to make eye contact with both of us at the same time, which was a bit creepy but also super cool. Is it bad that I'm terrified of her but I also want to be her?

"My grandmother is Athena, goddess of wisdom and warfare."

"What?!" we exclaimed.

"My father was a demigod and my mother was a witch. Hecate blessed me when I was born. I am both forms of half-blood."

We stared at her in shock and amazement. Then, I started getting a bit dizzy. I held on to the arms of my chair for support, even though I was already seated.

Professor McGonagall noticed how unsteady I was. "I understand this is a lot of surprising information in a short amount of time. In hindsight, it might have been better to explain both of the topics we have discussed separately, but I'm afraid we didn't have time for that. I have quite a lot to explain. I know about the Greek gods and monsters, and where wizardkind truly gets their magic from." She reached under the neck of her robes and pulled out a very old and battered leather cord with seven colorful beads strung on it. "I spent a summer at camp before each new year at school. When I turned seventeen and came of age, Hecate visited me and told me the truth about where wizards and witches really came from. She said one day I would be an important bridge between the magical and mythological worlds, though I suppose they are one in the same. The magic cannot exist without the myths. I suppose the day she spoke of is drawing nearer. After- after Albus died, I prayed to every god and goddess I could think of, asking for help. For that, I'd like to apologize. I wasn't thinking. I should have known the gods would send demigods. I know how dangerous quests are. I've been on a quest before, and I've lost friends to them. My father once told me the story of a half-sibling who left on a special quest from Athena and was never seen or heard from again. I knew a girl who got a similar quest, and I never saw her again either. I wouldn't wish that on anyone. And now He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named has captured one of you, and I fear the possibilities of what could happen."

"That's... a lot to take in," Reyna said after the professor finished speaking.

"Annabeth did it," I mumbled.

"What did you say, Thalia?" Professor McGonagall asked.

"The quest from Athena, the one those half-bloods disappeared doing. They were following the Mark of Athena."

"Correct. How did you-"

"Annabeth was given that quest. She completed it. She got farther than any child of Athena had in thousands of years. And because of that stupid quest, she and Percy got dragged down to Tartarus. But they made it out. Annabeth is the smartest and strongest person I know. She will kick You-Know-Who's ass."

"I don't doubt that. Unfortunately, if he finds out what she is-"

"He'll try to use the gods as a way to become immortal."

"Yes. Girls, I believe we have a lot to talk about."

***

We ended up telling McGonagall the entire story, not the watered-down partially true version we gave to Ginny, Neville, and Luna. We told her that we were the most powerful demigods of the future and that Hecate had sent us to prevent Voldemort from winning the war because that would bring about the extinction of wizards in this country. We also mentioned the fact that Roman and Norse gods existed too, which came as a bit of a shock, but the professor didn't interrupt us once. After we were done and she asked a few questions, we asked her not to tell anyone else what we told her. She agreed and asked us to leave while she thought about all this new information.

"I'll speak to you again soon. For now, I need to think."

We walked to the seventh floor in silence. During the meeting my brain had been processing the fact that McGonagall was a demigod, and now that I had made sense of it I was thinking about a whole other flurry of information.

Annabeth is missing. Annabeth is gone.

I was barely keeping it together. All I wanted was to scream, but I couldn't. All I wanted was to get the hell out of here and look for my little sister, but I couldn't. How did this happen? How could they have taken her? Why would they take her? What did she do? Did they somehow find out that she's a demigod? If they took Annabeth because they knew she was a half-blood, why did they take Luna? Was it because they couldn't leave a witness? Couldn't they just use a memory spell or something?

My mind was a raging river and I was struggling to keep afloat. Reyna pulled me to shore. By that, I mean she pulled me out of the way of the suit of armor I was about to walk into. I stared at the lance that almost impaled me, then at Reyna. "Thanks. Lost in my head for a second."

"I could tell," she said.

The suit of armor tilted its head down at us. "Got to be more careful, m'lady. Could've run you through!"

"Sorry, Sir Kelly," I apologized. This particular metal guy was one I had spoken to many times before while walking to the seventh floor. At first, I was surprised he could talk, but that lasted about five seconds. We had a strange sort of friendship. He was on the seventh floor, in an alcove by himself, whereas most of the other knights in the school were lined up along the walls of the lower floors. Sir Kelly got lonely, so he was glad whenever I stopped to talk to him on my way to the Room (which was several times a day at this point).

He started making conversation, but I wasn't in the headspace to be talking. Reyna handled it pretty well, though.

"Apologies, sir, but we just received some bad news so neither of us are feeling in the mood to talk."

He nodded. "Anything I could do to be of assistance?"

"Unless you know how to find a missing person, then no," I grumbled.

"Oh, dear," he mused. "Well, as the old headmaster used to say, "Help will always be given at Hogwarts for those who deserve it." I'm sure whoever's missing will come back to you, just you wait,"

"Thanks..." I muttered, and we resumed our journey. The Room of Requirement was just around the corner. When we reached the wall, I thought, I need to find Annabeth- no, wait. I need to see Neville.

A door appeared, and we made sure the coast was clear before entering.

"Neville, it's us. Reyna and Thalia," Reyna called out. Neville emerged from his hiding spot behind an armchair.

"Oh hey. Can never be too sure if there was a loophole for anyone else to get in, but I trust the Room." Neville was really good at using the Room. He could make it accessible only to our allies and have almost anything he needed. Except for food, because of 'Grump's Elephant Laws of Transformation' or whatever it was called.

I pulled the wrapped-up sandwich out of my jacket pocket and handed it to him. Reyna gave him hers. He took them with a smile, and then saw our faces.

"What happened? What's wrong."

"It's Annabeth and Luna. They were kidnapped. Taken off the Hogwarts Express." Reyna explained. "Professor McGonagall just told us in her office."

I didn't see Neville's reaction, because I had walked away. I need to be alone. A small door, just barely big enough to walk through, appeared in front of me. I went inside. It was a closet. There was a weird bird bath in the back corner and pillows on the ground. I collapsed to my knees and cried. I cried harder than I have in a long time. I can't lose another little sibling. Not again. Not when I wasn't there to protect them. A little voice in my head said: You got Jason back, so you'll get Annabeth back too. I just cried harder. I need her. I miss her. I could tell something in the room was glowing, even with my eyes closed. I opened my eyes. It was the birdbath. I got up and walked over to see that instead of water, there was a cloudy liquid. Call me crazy, but I thought I heard little voices coming from it, so I did the logical thing. I put my face in it.

It felt like my whole body fell into the thing. The cloudy stuff swirled around me, and I found myself at the edge of a field of tall grass and little yellow wildflowers. It was surrounded by forests, and I was leaning against one of the border trees. A little girl ran through the grass, picking the flowers and laughing. I remember this. That's- that's Annabeth. We had been staying in a shelter we had built that was hidden in the trees. Luke had gone into a nearby town to get supplies. Annabeth and I were bored and went exploring, stumbling across this secluded meadow.

"Thals, look!" Little Annabeth ran up to me, holding two flower crowns made of the long grass and the little yellow flowers. "I made these!" She placed one on my head, then her own.

"They're so pretty, Annie. How did you know how to make them?"

She shrugged. I reached over like I was about to pat her on the head and then messed up her hair, careful not to damage the crown.

"Hey!" she complained.

I laughed, got up, and ran into the field. She chased after me. She was fast, but I stayed just out of her reach. Until I didn't hear her anymore. I stopped.

"Annabeth?" I looked around, worried. Where did she go?

Suddenly, she pounced from the grass behind me, tackling me to the ground.

"Got you!" she grinned, messing up my hair as payback for earlier. I smirked. Her little strategy had tricked me, but I was still stronger. I escaped the pin and sat up, pulling her into a tight hug.

"Got you," I whispered.

She tipped her head up to look at me. "Your my favorite sister, Thals,"

"And you're my favorite sister," I bopped her on the nose. "Rematch!" I messed up her hair again and jumped up, tapping my wrist to activate Aegis.

"Bring it on!" she shouted playfully as she stood up and drew her knife. She used to love sparring. As we charged at each other, the clouds swirled around me once more and I found myself back in the weird closet room. I wiped away my tears, shook my head, and opened the door to leave.

***

A few hours later, I woke up in a hammock and looked around. Neville was in a hammock near mine, and Reyna was asleep in an armchair across the room. Neville was mumbling in his sleep. I got up and looked around to find a window that wasn't there before. Perfect. I looked outside. Based on where the sun was, it was around 6 in the afternoon. The window vanished as I turned around.

I woke my friends up a few minutes later. We sat in silence for a moment, and I was getting uncomfortable.

"Pretty shit birthday, if you ask me," I joked. I wasn't really joking, though.

Neville'r expression was like a brick wall. I couldn't tell what he was thinking. I'd never seen him like that before. "I was thinking, and I might know why they were taken. Well, Luna, at least. You know how we've been reading her father's magazine the Quibbler to get outside information?" We nodded. "Well, I was listening to Potterwatch and they said something about him not publishing an issue lately. His magazine is the number one public media source that promotes support of Harry. What if they took Luna as a punishment?"

"Well, shit."

"Yeah. My theory is they're holding Luna for ransom to get her dad to stop publishing. If I had to guess why they took Annabeth, it's because she was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I don't think they killed her, though, because they would have left her... body." he swallowed. "They probably took her alive as an extra incentive for Mr. Lovegood."

I was relieved. At least she's not dead. But she could be getting tortured, and that information didn't bring anyone closer to finding out where she was. "So, it's kind of like a 'if you don't cooperate, not only will your only daughter die, but so will this innocent girl' situation."

"Pretty much, yeah. Or, they somehow found out she's a demigod and kidnapped her for information. Not sure how they would know that, because only three people know your real identities, and none of them would tell a soul. That's for a fact. I know I wouldn't."

Reyna finally said something. "Based on what we know about the Carrows and Snape, Death Eaters like torturing people. If they torture our friends, the truth might slip."

Neville's face darkened. He walked over to the wall near the hammocks and pulled a picture off the wall. He brought it over to us. The photo was black and white, and definitely a wizard picture because all the people were moving. I recognized some of them, like Hagrid and Professor McGonagall, but most were unfamiliar. Neville pointed at two of the people in the front row.

"Those are my parents." His voice was tight, like the words hurt him. "When I was a baby, right before the end of the first war, a Death Eater named Bellatrix Lestrange used the Cruciatus curse on them to get them to give up information. My parents didn't say a word. Bellatrix tortured them to insanity, but they never gave in. They've been in St. Mungo's for the past sixteen years, but no amount of healing magic can reverse the damage." The silence that followed was heavy. I looked up from the picture to see Neville staring down at it, his eyes wet with tears he was refusing to let fall. Reyna was looking at him too. He looked up at us. "Do you know what I would have done if I was them?"

He took our silence as an answer.

"I would have done the same damn thing."

He looked determined and angry. I could tell why. Voldemort had taken everything from him, his parents, his childhood, and now his grandmother was on the run. Neville had been through a lot, and he was still fighting. I was filled with respect for him.

He held the picture back up. "I've looked at this picture a lot. I know the names and the faces of everyone in it. And I know that most of them are dead now." He started pointing to people. "Marlene McKinnon. Dorcas Meadowes. Gideon Prewett. Fabian Prewett. Alastor Moody. Albus Dumbledore. Sirius Black. Lily Potter. James Potter." The names hung in the air like a thick weighted blanket laying over the room.

The people in the picture were smiling and talking to each other, unaware of the magnitude of what Neville had said, unaware that many of them would not be alive even months after the picture was taken. Neville's parents waved up at him, and he gave them a small smile, rubbing his thumb over their image. A single tear landed on the bottom of the photograph.

Neville wiped his eyes and stared at us again. "All of them knew what they were doing. They knew what they signed up for. And so do we. We're going to help Harry defeat You-Know-Who no matter what. We've been with him since the beginning, and we'll be with him until the end."

"Neville," I put my hand on his shoulder. "I probably shouldn't be saying this since I'm the leader of a group of eternal maidens, but you're probably the bravest man I've met in a long time." He tried to smile, but it didn't really work.

"I'm sorry I brought back painful memories. You didn't have to tell us that," Reyna apologized.

Neville sighed. "It's not your fault. I just feel so useless. Harry, Hermione, and Ron are out there somewhere and we have no way to help them. Pranking Death Eaters isn't going to end the war. Learning to fight is great, but it's not good for much unless we have someone to fight. I just-" His stomach gave a loud grumble. "Sorry,"

"It's alright. I think dinner might be over by now, but we could get you some food from the kitchens..." I trailed off because Neville's eyes were fixed on something behind me. I drew my wand and turned around, and Reyna did the same.

There was a painting on the wall. It was of a young girl in a blue dress. Her expression was friendly, with twinkly blue eyes and a soft smile.

Neville set the photo down on a small table that appeared next to him and he strode over to the portrait. We followed him.

"She looks... oddly familiar..." he mumbled. "I've never seen her before, but something about her is really familiar. It might be her face, I think."

"Her eyes are almost as blue as Thalia's and Jason's," Reyna noted. "But theirs are more electric blue and hers are like glacier ice."

Neville snapped his fingers. "Her eyes. That's it. Where have I seen those eyes before?"

A small thud on the ground answered his question. He bent down to pick up the book that lay on the floor. The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore. Neville stared down at the cover. Isn't that the old headmaster?

"Those are Dumbledore's eyes. That's who she looks like." Neville stated, looking back up at the girl, who was watching him with great interest. "Are you related to him?"

She nodded and held up her hand, beckoning him forward. Her painting swung forward, revealing a tunnel.

Neville, Reyna, and I looked at each other, coming to a silent consensus.

We climbed into the mysterious, dark, probably dangerous tunnel.

A/N: hiii! Sorry this chapter took so long :/ At the time I'm posting this, I have midterm exams next week and I'm crazy stressed. I wanted to get this chapter out sooner rather than later though.

I think the chapters are going to keep getting longer. I keep getting more and more ideas and inspiration! I love writing this story so much :D Hazel's birthday chapter didn't add too much to the plot, but this one added a LOT so it ended up being over 6000 words. I had this chapter the next few chapters planned out, but sometimes while I'm writing I get new ideas and the chapters end up being soooo long oh my goodness.

Also!! We are almost at 800 reads! Absolutely wild, so thanks everyone!

Anyways, sorry for another long A/N, and drink some water!

~sstar