CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX - Christmas at Grimmauld Place

The next morning, it was obvious that Harry didn't feel much better. Ron had left the room after saying a quick good morning, rushing downstairs to help Sirius and the rest with Christmas decorations.

"Breakfast?" Attuoria asked Harry when he woke up, handing him his glasses, which had fallen on the ground when he was sleeping.

"Yeah," he muttered. "I'm hungry."

They headed downstairs to the dining room, which was surprisingly empty. Everyone had already finished breakfast and were down in the basement gathering Christmas decorations.

Attuoria chewed slowly on a piece of marmalade toast as she watched Harry eat. He had a cold, distant look in his eyes. He was still worried that the others were scared of him.

She sat in the drawing room with him for the rest of the morning, neither of them talking. The snow outside was falling heavily, covering the streets with a layer of white. Attuoria found herself wanting to go out, to shove her hands in the snow and feel the icy flakes prick at her skin.

The last time she'd felt cold was over the summer, when she went to visit the dementors. She wondered how they were doing. There was only a month before she'd see them again.

Lunchtime came, and Mrs Weasley's voice echoed up to them from down in the dining room.

"Harry! Attuoria! Lunch is ready!"

Attuoria glanced at Harry, but he didn't move.

"Want lunch?" she asked.

He shook his head and stood up. "I'm gonna go upstairs," he said so quietly that it was almost a whisper.

"Do you want me to come with you?"

Harry shrugged.

The two climbed up to the fourth floor, and Harry pushed the door open to one of the rooms.

Inside was a large animal with the head of an eagle, the body of a horse, sharp talons on its front feet, and wings covered with feathers. A hippogriff.

"This is the hippogriff that saved Sirius in your third year, right?" said Attuoria, stepping into the dark room and letting the door shut behind her.

"Yup," said Harry, sitting down in the corner of the room. "That's Buckbeak."

Attuoria looked up at the large beast. It stared down at her with sharp yellow eyes. She stepped forward gingerly, scared to frighten it, but it didn't seem at all threatened. Buckbeak lowered his head towards Attuoria's outstretched hand, bumping her palm with his forehead gently.

"Well, he likes you." Harry tossed a dead rat into the air, and the hippogriff deftly caught it with its beak.

"Do you just plan on sitting here for the rest of the day?" Attuoria asked, stepping away from Buckbeak and sitting down at the wall opposite Harry.

Harry didn't answer, and just continued to pick at the dead rodents that lay around him. It almost reminded Attuoria of the pile of dead animals Eylense had collected for Hagrid. Buckbeak and Eylense would make a good hunting pair.

Buckbeak lay down next to Attuoria after swallowing the rat. She rested her arm on the large creature's back, gently running her hands through its feathery wings.

Unsure of how long they had been sitting there, Attuoria was staring at the empty fireplace on the other side of the room when she suddenly remembered something.

That day when Sirius came to talk to Harry through the fireplace in the Gryffindor common room, he mentioned that Mrs Weasley was on duty for the Order. She was guarding the door to the Department of Mysteries. No one mentioned which door Arthur Weasley had been guarding the day he got attacked, but Attuoria knew that it must've been the same one.

Snape told her a few months ago that Voldemort wanted to enter the Department of Mysteries to retrieve the prophecy that was going to be crucial for their future plans. This had also been mentioned over the summer, during the meetings at Malfoy Manor.

Last night, through Harry's mind, Attuoria could hear Voldemort's thoughts. There was something he desperately needed, but couldn't get.

The prophecy.

The prophecy was about Harry. It claimed that a boy born at the end of July would have the power to kill Voldemort. Voldemort wanted to see the full contents of this prophecy so that he could figure out how to avoid being vanquished.

But why was this prophecy so difficult to attain?

Voldemort wanted to break out his followers from Azkaban in January. He was rebuilding his army. When Attuoria asked why January specifically, why not break them out now, he said it was so that the Ministry of Magic could have a good start to the year.

Perhaps he was being sarcastic, because Attuoria didn't think the Ministry would take that as a good start to the year.

Then there was this "future plan" that Snape had mentioned. He said it was crucial for her to get close with Harry.

Glancing over at the dark haired boy, she decided she had done a pretty good job of getting close with him. She wasn't quite sure why Voldemort wanted her to do this.

Unless...

Attuoria let out a loud gasp, frightening both Harry and Buckbeak.

Did Voldemort want her to kill Harry?

She drew her fist together tightly, her nails digging into her palms. No. There was no way. If he wanted her to do that, he would've told her ages ago. Voldemort's plans for her would never involve killing. Voldemort needed her for different reasons, not to kill...

"Attuoria? Are you okay?" Harry's voice sounded from next to Attuoria's ear. "You look... Scared."

"I'm not." Attuoria said briskly, immediately straightening up and shaking all the thoughts out of her head. She had no business thinking about these things now. Voldemort wasn't even going to be contacting her until after the holidays. Her focus right now should be on Harry's mental wellbeing, as well as Christmas.

"I've never seen you scared before."

"I wasn't scared," Attuoria said again, brushing Harry's arm off her shoulder.

"You know, it's okay to -" Harry's sentence was cut short by a knock on the door.

"You've been hogging Attuoria all day!" It was Fred. "Can I please have her, now?"

Harry beckoned towards the door. "Go, then."

"You sure you'll be okay?" Attuoria asked, standing up.

"Yeah. Just go."

The moment Attuoria pulled the door open, Fred grabbed onto her arm, yanked her out of Buckbeak's room and dragged her down the stairs.

"Why the rush -" they had stopped on top of the last staircase in the house, the one which led down to the entrance hall. George was standing at the bottom of the stairs, a pile of Christmas items next to him.

"Attuoria!" He waved towards them. "Sirius told us we could decorate these elf heads on the wall."

Attuoria glanced at the wall next to the stairs. There was a row of plaques, each with a shrunken house-elf head mounted on it.

"Wanna help?" George asked, holding up a small Santa hat.

"Sure."

The three of them got to work, placing red hats onto each elf head, and giving each of them a long cotton beard. Once they were done, they stepped back to observe their work.

"You know what would be fun," said Fred, "is if we messed with these elf heads."

"What do you mean?" asked Attuoria.

"Dunno. Something that annoys the people that walk up the stairs." Fred answered.

"Good idea," said George. "Like -"

A loud, clanging bell noise interrupted them. Immediately, a portrait hanging at the entrance hall began screaming. It was an ear-splitting shriek, so loud that Attuoria had to press her hands to her ears. Even then, she could still clearly hear the wailing scream of the word "MUDBLOOD".

Mrs Weasley rushed out from the dining room nearby, an apron still wrapped around her. Sirius followed suit, bounding straight towards the screaming portrait. The black curtains that were originally covering it had flown open, and Sirius pulled it closed with all his might. The screaming ceased.

The front door opened, and in walked a snow-covered Hermione.

"Hermione!" Everyone exclaimed at the same time.

"Hey," she greeted with a smile, brushing the snow off her beanie. "Dumbledore told me to come here for Christmas. What happened with Harry? Is he alright? How's Mr Weasley?"

"Arthur is doing fine, thanks for asking, dear," Mrs Weasley said warmly. "You should go up and talk to Harry. Do you guys know where he is?" she turned to the three kids at the staircase.

"Oh yeah," said Attuoria. "He's upstairs in Buckbeak's room. Fourth floor."

"Thanks."

As Hermione disappeared up the stairs, Fred and George turned to each other with an excited look in their eyes.

"You thinking what I'm thinking?" said Fred.

"I'm thinking we should get Tonks." said George.

"Why Tonks?" Attuoria asked.

"Because she probably knows more magic than us." George explained.

"More magic than you two, maybe, but I've got a few things up my sleeve." Attuoria shrugged. "What spell are you guys looking to do?"

Both boys hesitated, glancing at one another.

"What spell do you think we could use to make the heads talk, but only when you walk by them?" said Fred.

Attuoria glanced at the Christmas elf heads on the wall. After Fred and George had mentioned it, the heads looked like they were begging to be charmed in some sort of way.

"I guess we could always try a modified Caterwauling Charm," Attuoria suggested.

"A modified Caterwauling Charm? That's genius!" Fred exclaimed, jumping up slightly and clasping his hands over Attuoria and George's shoulder. "Wait, but how do you modify it?"

The three of them stared at the wall in silence.

"It would be a sort of spell creation, wouldn't it?" said George.

"I suppose so." Attuoria had never thought about creating a spell before. It sounded very tempting. "We'd have to go through a good amount of experimenting."

"But do you think you can do it?" asked Fred.

"Probably."

Creating a spell that would cause an inanimate object to come alive only when someone is near - it was a Caterwauling Charm combined with a form of Transfiguration. Simple, yet complicated.

"Well then," said Fred happily, "if you do come up with a spell for this, we could use it in school. Forget Filch, I think we all know who needs a little taste of our tricks."

George grinned, turning towards Attuoria. Looking into his eyes, she heard one word from his thoughts: Umbridge.

"You in?" he asked.

"Well, I did promise Hermione that we'd give Umbridge the worst year of her life, and make her regret ever coming to Hogwarts, so I don't suppose why not," Attuoria said with a smirk.

Fred flashed her a wink and hooked his arm around her shoulder.

"See? I knew we'd come up with something over Christmas." he said to George, the two of them wearing wide smiles on their faces.

Attuoria was just glad she'd made them happy.

***

On the morning of Christmas Day, Attuoria awoke to Fred prodding her on the shoulder.

Since Hermione was staying at Grimmauld Place for Christmas, she and Ginny occupied the bedroom on the first floor. Attuoria was supposed to stay in another spare bedroom, but the twins had other plans.

"Mum, can Attuoria please stay in our room?" Fred had begged Mrs Weasley, who didn't look very happy about it.

"Yeah," George had piped up. "The spare bedroom is so lonely and schlumpy, we don't want her sleeping there alone. What if she gets scared?"

Attuoria had to bite her lip to stop herself from laughing. Her? Getting scared? Of what, the dark?

"I don't think Attuoria wants to share a room with you two," said Mrs Weasley, carefully choosing her words. "She won't be able to get any sleep at all."

"We'll take good care of her!" said Fred, remaining adamant. "Really, mum, we will!"

Mrs Weasley had her arms crossed in front of her chest, a stern look on her face. George seemed to understand what his mother was thinking and quickly whispered something into her ear.

She let out a huff after hearing what George had to say. "Fine. But no funny business. Attuoria, are you sure you'll be okay?"

"Anywhere is fine, really, I'm not too picky."

Mrs Weasley sighed and gave Attuoria a small smile. She knew that this kind hearted mother was thinking about Attuoria's "homeless childhood" backstory.

"If you need anything, please don't hesitate to ask. I want you to be comfortable in this household."

"Of course. Thank you, Mrs Weasley."

So on this brand new morning, as Attuoria's eyes slowly adjusted to the light, she saw Fred's face in front of hers.

"Merry Christmas!" he said cheerfully. "Check out the gifts!"

Attuoria sat up and saw three piles of presents sitting on the ground in the bedroom. George was already on the floor unwrapping some of his.

"Happy Christmas!" said George, waving a large blue sweater at her. "Remember these? Mums made them again!"

"Aw, she's too kind," said Attuoria, climbing off the bed towards the last untouched pile of gifts. "Are these really all for me?"

"No, they're for Errol," Fred said jokingly.

"Oh." Attuoria stopped in her tracks. She really thought they were hers. It made sense, who would be sending her gifts, anyways? It's not like she had sent anybody else a gift. Although she probably should have. "Who's Errol?"

"I was just kidding," Fred laughed. "Those are yours. Errol's our owl. A bit of a wally, that one."

"Oh!" Attuoria exclaimed, feeling slightly more excited. "They're really mine?"

"Yes, now hurry up and open them!" George urged, fighting back a laugh.

She plopped herself down on the ground and reached for the parcels. The first one was a small glass spinning top from Harry. It was a Sneakoscope, used to detect suspicious activity nearby. He had written a small note along with it, saying "Since you never seem to get scared, if this lights up, spins, or whistles, then you should probably beware. Who knows, it could save you some day (assuming it works)."

Attuoria chuckled, placing it next to her. She doubted that a simple, toy-like machine was going to have that big of an impact on her life.

Ron gave her a pack of Drooble's Best Blowing Gum, with a reminder for her not to swallow it. Hermione bought her a very beautiful eagle-feather quill that matched Harry's, as well as a small leather-bound notebook. Inside the notebook on the very first page, Hermione wrote a short message: "Diaries are helpful for keeping track of your feelings - you should try! It's rather therapeutic."

Staring at the blank pages of the notebook, Attuoria suddenly felt melancholic. The pages reminded her of the way she was in the past: empty. She almost felt bad for the notebook, for how little it knows about the world. Without any content, the notebook was useless.

Just like herself. The Spiritual Dimension had enough Nightmare Demons to go by. Her disappearance doesn't affect anyone or anything. Other demons simply filled in her place for her.

But down here, in the mortal realm, she had worth. She was a friend, an ally, a human.

"You alright?" Fred asked gently, resting a hand on her shoulder. "You've been staring at that notebook for an awful long time."

"Oh, yeah," said Attuoria, shaking out of her thoughts. She shut the notebook and placed it aside, next to the Sneakoscope. "I was just thinking about something."

"Well there's no time for deep thinking now," said George, pushing all his gifts to one side and pulling on his new jumper. "It's Christmas! Put your sweater on!" He glanced over at Attuoria.

"Oh by the way, those mittens are from me." He pointed at a pair of grey and blue woolen mittens. "I noticed you had to borrow mittens during that first Christmas we spent at Hogwarts, so I asked mum to make them. They're technically still from me."

"Thank you!" Attuoria said heartily, picking them up. They fitted her hands perfectly.

"Hey, you haven't even opened my gift yet!" Fred whined, snatching a parcel up from the pile in front of Attuoria. "You know what, I'll do the honours for you."

He ripped open the brown wrapping and handed her a large pack of toffees, the golden ones that they sold at Honeydukes.

"Now before you say anything," said Fred, holding up a finger to Attuoria's face as if to shush her. "There's no way you can eat so many toffees on your own. I know that. But then I remembered you've never had toffee-apples before, and so I thought, why not buy these so we can make toffee-apples together? And that brings us to this -"

Fred reached forward and grabbed a rather bulky brown paper bag. He unfolded the top and pulled out a bright red apple in one hand, and a pale green one in the other.

The look of joy on Fred's face was so pure that Attuoria broke out into a very genuine smile. Although this gift was less expensive compared to the others, he put so much thought into it, and remembered all the tiny details of the moments they've shared.

Attuoria threw her arms around his neck and planted a kiss on his cheek.

"Thank you," she said quietly as she felt Fred's arms wrap around her back.

George suddenly started clapping, startling the two slightly as they separated from their embrace.

"Rather corny today, eh Freddie? How many times did you rehearse that?" he said with a grin. Fred stuck his tongue out at his twin.

"Not as many times as you took to ask Alicia to the ball," Fred retorted.

"But you've got to admit, I pulled it off flawlessly."

While the twins continued to bicker, Attuoria reached for the two remaining unwrapped presents.

The first was from Mrs Weasley who had knitted her the same pigeon-blue knitted sweater with a letter 'A' on its front. It was soft and emitted a sort of warmth. Along with the sweater were some mince pies, which smelled very much like spices, but in a mouth-watering way.

The last present was a roughly wrapped, box-shaped package. Attuoria dragged it towards her, hearing it scrape on the ground. It seemed to move slightly in her grasp.

On top of it was a small envelope. She tore it open and saw that it was from Hagrid.

"Merry Christmas, Atoria! Since you like magical creatures so much, here's a Knarl that I found in my pumpkin patch. It eats daisies, so I've given you some seeds to start you off. Don't offer it any other food, it'll only ransack your stuff. I trust you'll be able to take care of it. Well, unless you don't want it, then you can just toss it into some garden and it'll be fine.

Hagrid"

Attuoria's eyes widened. Since when did she "like magical creatures so much"? Apart from Eylense, Norbert the dragon, that baby unicorn in the forest, and the bowtruckle from class, she didn't have that much experience with magical creatures.

She sighed. Who was she kidding, she could literally be Newt Scamander at this point.

Attuoria pulled the paper wrapping off and a small metal cage was revealed. Inside the cage was a brown hedgehog with a pale face, and white-tipped quills. It sniffed around curiously, it's glassy, dark eyes flickering under the light.

"YOU GOT A KNARL!?" Fred and George yelled, immediately crowding around her.

"So you're telling me we gave Dung six Sickles for a bag of Knarl quills when we could've just gotten it for FREE?" said Fred, scooping the caged animal into his arms.

"Hey!" Attuoria quickly snatched the cage back. "Who said you were taking its quills?"

Fred pouted, glancing at his empty hands. "Oh poo."

"What were you doing with the quills, anyways?" asked Attuoria suspiciously. "Making a laughing potion?"

The twins exchanged a glance.

"Well…" George hesitated. "Remember how we said we want to start a joke shop after Hogwarts? We've got the skiving snackboxes already -"

"Fainting Fancies, Fever Fudge, Nosebleed Nougat, Puking Pastille," Fred counted.

"- But we have so much more in mind." said George. "We've been working on many more products. I'm sure you've seen us use the Extendable Ears?"

"Yeah, that's how you guys heard what I said about Harry," Attuoria mumbled, but loud enough for them to hear.

"Er, yeah," George scratched the back of his neck nervously. "Things like this are always fifty-fifty, sometimes you hear things you don't want to hear."

"A small price to pay for information!" cried Fred, lunging towards the Knarl once again. But Attuoria quickly stood up, sweeping the cage away from his grasp and causing him to fall face forward on the ground.

"So what did you do with the laughing potion?" Attuoria asked.

"We made some laughing tea. You drink it and you start laughing." said George. "We haven't come up with a name yet. But we do know that the side effects of this tea include hiccups…"

Attuoria placed the cage on the bedside table next to Fred's bed. The Knarl was staring at her curiously with its round eyes.

Everyone she cared about had given her a gift this Christmas. It was only fair that she gave each one of them a gift as well. She decided that after their Christmas lunch today, while everyone else went to St Mungo's to visit Mr Weasley, she would go out and buy presents for everyone.

As well as a more comfortable living space for the Knarl.