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vii. My Favourite Version
Of You
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THE OXYGEN IN her lungs turns into such a heavy burden that she has to sit down, her face in her hands.

The others around her are deathly silent, and to Thea it's almost like they aren't there anymore. She forces herself to stay in the present, to think logically about this, about why the hell she isn't crying.

Jude's dead.

They just announced it on the radio.

He's gone.

So why isn't she crying?

"Thea –"

"I don't believe it."

"But they just announced it! They wouldn't have if – he wasn't – he wasn't –"

"You can say it, you know. They just announced he's dead."

"Exactly, T. If they didn't know for sure –"

"I know how they work, Hermione. They've got some kind of agenda behind everything, they don't just make things public because it's common decency."

"Why would Bellatrix let them talk about her son like that if it's not true?"

Thea laughs, dryly and harshly. "Bella despises Jude. She'd kill him herself in a heartbeat."

Hermione falls quiet, knowing she's not going to change Thea's mind now it's made up.

"I know I might sound crazy – please stop looking at me like that, Ron," she gives him a look, and the incredulous twist in his face drops.

"But I know what these people are like, what they do. They might have got in my head, but I got in theirs, too. There's a chance I'm being way too cynical, and he really is...gone, but I just... it doesn't feel right."

"I just don't want wishful thinking to skew your judgement, that's all," Hermione says quietly.

Thea looks at Harry now, whose eyes are trained dead on the floor. Her throat tightens, and guilt winds like a snake around her ribcage.

"Let's...stop talking about it now. That's just my gut feeling, it could be wrong, but...yeah." Harry's gaze meets hers for a moment, and she offers him a tiny, apologetic smile; she hates talking about her connections to the Death Eaters just as much. Or maybe it's just Jude. She isn't really sure. But the sentiment still stands.

"It's getting late. I'll take the first watch," Harry says, making his way out of the tent before any of the others can stop him. Thea exchanges a look with the other two, and calls after him.

"Wake me in two hours and we'll swap."

When he doesn't reply, Thea pulls on an extra jacket and crawls into the warmth of her bunk. She's still shivering, but she's so exhausted that she falls asleep anyway, her dreams packed with Jude's perfect darkness, Draco bleeding out a river on the floor of Myrtle's bathroom and just how red her hands might be at the end of all this.

When she stirs, she checks the small pocket watch on the side, to find it's just past four in the morning. She sees Ron and Hermione are now tucked in their beds, fast asleep, and realises with a frown that Harry will still be outside, alone and wide awake.

She brings her woollen throw with her and makes her way outside, sitting next to Harry, who startles. She smiles at him as she covers both of them with the blanket.

"I told you to wake me."

"There was no point, I wasn't tired, and you obviously were."

"Harry, I don't need you to baby me."

"I can't really go back in time and wake you up, can I?"

Thea tilts her head. "Well, technically –"

"You're insufferable."

She raises her eyebrows. "But you love me."

"You're alright, I suppose."

She grins. "You didn't deny that you love me."

Harry looks at her, his eyes soft and warm. "I think it's fairly obvious that I love you, T."

Her smile turns serious, and she feels like she might start floating, she's so warm. She leans in to plant a small kiss on his cheek, and when she's about to pull away, he takes her face in his hands and pulls her back towards him, kissing her right on the lips.

She turns her body to face him, kissing him back as much as she can, her arms wrapping tightly around his neck. This is all she's wanted for three months, and now she's got it, now she's got him back, she feels like maybe she can't get enough. Her head spins and her heart seems to expand, beating fast and pressing against her lungs, and it's almost like they're transported to another place, far away from here.

They break apart, and she meets his gaze, which seem to be a little hazy.

They stay there for a while, her head on his shoulder. Reality descends over her in a sort of slow tide, and she remembers where they are and why they're there. She clears her throat, begrudging having to spoil the moment.

"What are we doing next?"

Harry exhales, like he didn't expect her to speak. "Me, Ron and Hermione have said we need to visit the Lovegoods. We decided it when you fell asleep earlier. Xenophilius, Luna's father, he was wearing this symbol at the wedding, like a triangular eye with a line through it. It's been drawn in The Tales of Beedle the Bard, the one that Dumbledore left to Hermione."

Thea pauses, a frown creasing her forehead. There's a small twinge of uneasiness in her stomach at the mention of the Lovegoods. It brings her cousin to the front of her mind, and everything else associated with Eden.

It brings back Jude.

"OK. Well. We should go sooner rather than later, right?"

"Yeah, we're going tomorrow. Early," he replies.

Thea looks at him. "Then you'd best get some sleep."

He's about to argue with her, but she simply gives him a look and takes out her wand. He kisses the top of her head before trudging back into the tent. Thea sighs, pulling her blanket right up to her chin, training her eyes on the sun that's just rising in the corner of the still-dark sky.

The next day, they Disapparate onto the top of a hill in Ottery St. Catchpole, The Burrow clear and almost taunting on one of the many, rolling, green hills scattered before them. The wind blows hard around her, pulling strands of blonde from her braid so they catch in her eyes. The four of them pause for a moment.

"It's weird being this near, but not going to visit."

"Well, it's not like you haven't just seen them. You were there for Christmas," Hermione snaps, and it's now that Thea is ignited by an anger so strong that it's like she might scream.

"Hermione, we didn't go to the Burrow," she sighs.

Thea storms down the incline so fast that she almost trips, but she's too stubborn to slow down, and marches ahead of the other three for hours. Eventually, they Disapparate to the next cluster of hills, her anger not cooling in the slightest. She and Ron know they made a mistake. They don't need to keep paying for it.

"Aha! That's got to be Luna's house, who else would live in a house like that? It looks like a giant rook!"

"It's nothing like a bird," Hermione says, as she, Thea and Harry finally reach Ron, gasping for air and exhausted.

Thea can't resist poking Harry in the side, where he's rubbing at a stich.

"Aren't you meant to be an athlete?" She asks, grinning.

She earns herself an indignant look, and a mutter of "piss off", as they make their way towards a small, run-down gate at the front of the house. Thea strains her eyes to read the three signs swinging haphazardly in the icy breeze.

'The Quibbler. Editor: X. Lovegood.'

'Pick your own mistletoe.'

'Keep Off the Dirigible Plums.'

"What's a dirigible plum?" Thea asks.

Ron points at a bush, with orange, radish-like plants dotting it. "Those."

"You'd better take off the Invisibility Cloak, Harry. It's you Mr Lovegood wants to help, not us."

As they make their way through the gate and up the path, Thea's stomach starts to weigh down and twist, and for a moment she's terrified she might vomit. Her eyes scan over the overbearing fruit and plants and trees seeming to be staring at her, and she feels so unwelcome she stops suddenly, Ron crashing into her.

"Thea, what are you doing?"

"I don't like this," she says quietly, just as Hermione bangs loudly on the door, and it swings open within seconds.

"Come, it'll be fine," Ron says in her ear, rubbing her arm softly to console her, before pushing her forward a little.

She breathes in and carries on, reaching for his hand and then dropping it as they reach the front step, her nerves jolting within her.

"What? What is it? Who are you? What do – Theabel Vincent. What do you want?"

Thea can't say anything, but, "It's Cindercroft."

"How could you come here? What is it that –"

Xenophilius stops in the middle of his sentence when his eyes land on Harry.

"Hello Mr. Lovegood, I'm Harry, Harry Potter."

Thea's jitters only intensify when she watches Lovegood's eye train hard on Harry's scar, and she's so desperate to drag him away from the man that her hand reaches forwards and seizes his, just in case.

Harry glances at her quickly over his shoulder, then turns back to the man before him.

"Would it be OK if we came in? There's something we'd like to ask you."

"I'm...I'm not sure that's advisable. Rather a shock...my word...I....I'm afraid I don't really think I ought to –"

"It won't take long."

"I – oh, alright then. Come in, quickly. Quickly!"

The slam that Xenophilius shuts the door with makes her jump about a foot in the air. She really wants to leave, but she knows Harry won't until he's got what he wants.

The colour littering the furniture and the walls blinds her, and makes her head spin to some other place as they follow Xenophilius into the living room

"Why have you come here? Why have you brought her?" Xenophilius jabs a harsh finger in Thea's face, and her heart begins to race, but she refuses to drop his gaze.

"Mr Lovegood, what's that?" Hermione exclaims, making Thea jump again. She's so on edge, there's a buzzing in her ears, taking over her brain. They shouldn't be here...especially not her.

She can't place why, but she just knows. It's like a sense, a sensation eating away at her, pleading with her to get them all out. She knows something's going to go terribly wrong, but Harry's way too stubborn, so she knows she'd just embarrass them, upset Mr Lovegood... although, just her presence seems to have done that. Maybe it's her likeness to Lyra? There's a small whisper in her mind that tells her it's way deeper than that; it's about her, this time. The look Mr Lovegood gave her; it seems to have disrupted the very flow of her blood, the stream of her thoughts, so they're disjointed and going to the wrong place, to a place where she can't make any sense of them. The oxygen in the room is sparse, and she feels like she might be breathing in the colourful paint splattered on the walls rather than the air, and it's clogging her lungs...

"Are you referring to the sign of the Deathly Hallows?"

Thea startles again, when she feels Hermione kick her gently, and she's sucked back into the room.

"The Deathly Hallows?"

"That's right. You haven't heard of them? I'm not surprised. Very, very few wizards believe. Witness that knuckle-headed young man at your brother's wedding, who attacked me for sporting the symbol of a well-known Dark wizard! Such ignorance! There is nothing Dark about the Hallows – at least, not in that crude sense. One simply uses the symbol to reveal oneself to other believers, in the hope that they might help one with the Quest."

"How's it so little-known if they aren't Dark?" Thea asks, her eyes trained hard on Lovegood, who's cradling a cup of something and stirring sugar in it.

At the sound of Thea's voice, he startles, his eyes whirling around the room faster, as though searching for an excuse to get them to leave.

"I'm sorry, I still don't really understand." Harry says, and she watches in slight amusement as he attempts to force down whatever's in his cup. Thea looks at her own mug sitting on its own on the table, and reaches for it to hide the shake in her hands and to steal its warmth. She has never wanted to leave a place so badly before.

"Well, you see, believers seek the Deathly Hallows," Xenophilius answers, his eyes flickering between Thea and Harry's scar, that's just peeking out from under his hair.

"But what are the Deathly Hallows?" Hermione asks.

"I assume that you are all familiar with 'The Tale of the Three Brothers'?"

"Yes," Thea says, along with Hermione and Ron, while Harry says, "No."

Thea drowns out the reading of it as she allows herself to travel indulgently into her childhood. She's suddenly on Lyra's lap, who's reading The Tale of the Three Brothers to her, while Thea clutches at her other hand and grasps a chocolate bar in her other. She feels a surge of longing and seems desperate to stay in that memory, to be still clung to her mother, the version who cared for her. It's this memory that forces Thea to accept that she does miss Lyra Cindercroft, she misses her with all of her heart; she wishes the woman was still here to braid her hair, and sing her lullabies and make her juice. Her heart feels like it shatters all over again when she remembers that the woman died as Lyra Vincent, in the clutches of her older sister. In the clutches of the darkness that stole her.

It's this that settles on her shoulders like a boulder. The ghosts that have been haunting her are at the forefront of her mind, and are tightening themselves around her like chains. But mainly, all she can think of is Eden, of how the girl will probably go the same way as her aunt, and maybe, it's Thea's fault. If only –

Thea snaps from her head and her eyes find Harry, who's deep in discussion with Lovegood. It's like the fog clouding her vision disappears, and all she can see is clear. She might yearn for the others sometimes, might sometimes feel so guilty she wishes she could tear the memories of them from her brain, but she made the right decision. In fact, she's not so sure there ever was a choice. She just found where she belonged. She comes to, realising Mr Lovegood is gone, and takes her chance.

"Harry," she whispers as she reaches him, just about to climb the stairs. "I really think we should go. I have a really, really bad feeling about him. Did you see the way he looked at me? I've never seen someone so...terrified before."

Harry frowns, and says "Soon."

She thinks he's about to say more when Hermione calls to him. "Harry, what are you doing? I don't think you should look around when he's not here!"

Thea lets him carry on climbing the stairs, making her way over to Ron and Hermione to repeat to them what she'd said to Harry.

"People do desperate, dangerous things when they're scared," Thea whispers, her eyes flicking to the stairs from the kitchen as she hears Mr Lovegood make his way back up, as Harry joins them from the stairs from the next floor above, to Thea's right.

"Mr Lovegood, where's Luna?" Harry says.

Thea's heart drops to the ground when the man in question freezes.

"I – I've already told you. She is down at Bottom Bridge, fishing for Plimpies."

"So why have you only laid that tray for four?" Harry pauses for a moment, that's thick and heavy on Thea's chest. "I don't think Luna's been here for weeks. Her clothes are gone, her bed hasn't been slept in. Where is she? And why do you – hey! Get off her!"

Thea lets out a screech as Xenophilius drops the tray to the ground, the pieces of shattered pottery flying out and littering the ground, before he snatches her by her hair and drags her into a death grip, his wand trembling terribly under her chin. She thrashes about in his arms as he speaks quietly, all three of the others' wands on him.

"Theabel... you are the Hedge girl's cousin, aren't you?"

"Yes. Why?" Thea spits, elbowing him hard in the stomach, "Get off me, you lunatic!"

"My Luna couldn't stop talking about her. And they took her. I am afraid... I am afraid that their relations have gotten her hurt...and well, I am sure...they would give her back, for a priceless offer..." whilst he's distracted, looking at Harry, Thea kicks him hard in the shin and pushes him off her.

"Eden wouldn't do anything to hurt Luna," Thea says firmly, managing to wrestle her way from the weak man's grip, and march her way over to her friends, her wand now out and her ire boiling like something deadly within her.

"Harry, look at this!" Hermione says, seizing a copy of the Quibbler from the floor. The rage within Thea bubbles over at the sight of Harry's picture plastered across it, under the words Undesirable Number One.

"The Quibbler's going for a new angle, then? Is that what you were doing when you went into the garden, sending an owl to the Ministry?" Harry demands, his voice icy.

"They took my Luna. Because of what I've been writing..." He spins on his heel and jabs a quivering finger in Thea's direction. "...because of your people. They took my Luna, and I don't know where she is, what they've done to her. But they might give her back to me if I – if I –"

"Hand over Harry?" Hermione says.

"No deal. Get out of the way, we're leaving." Ron says, his voice rough and his face stony.

Thea rounds on Xenophilius, daring to go right up to his face. "Luna would be ashamed of you. I hope you know that."

She's about to turn, when his hand latches hard on her wrist, and he forces up her sleeve, his eyes landing on the words scribed there.

DEATH EATER.

"You must not leave. They will be here any moment. I must save Luna. I cannot lose Luna. You must not leave. They have been saying a lot about you, Theabel. That you are one of them. Maybe it's time you returned home... so that Luna can too."

"Don't make us hurt you. Get your hands off Thea, and get out of the way."

"HARRY!" Hermione shrieks, which curdles Thea's blood so it sinks to the bottom of her body.

The broomsticks soaring past the windows are blurs, but it's evident who they are.

"Relashio!" Thea uses her wand in her free hand to shoot a Revulsion Jinx at Xenophilius and scrambles away from him while he's distracted, falling into line beside Hermione, who glares at her.

"That was stupid, why would you go back up to him –"

"Not really the time, Hermione!" she calls, just as Harry bowls all four of them onto the ground and out of the way of Xenophilius' Stunning Spell, that ricochets off the huge, strange-looking horn on the window sill that had alarmed Hermione earlier.

The monstrous explosion is so loud that she worries it might have deafened her; her ears ring in agony as she squeezes her eyes shut and covers her head with her arms to stop the shards and fragments flying everywhere from blinding her, or knocking her out, as she lies uncomfortably under Ron's torso and Hermione's legs, who she thinks are screaming.

Thea manages to clamber to her feet when the other two get off her, ducking away from the last cluttering debris raining from the imploded roof. Ron offers her his hand and helps her to yank herself up, loud voices breaking through the mist in her mind and ears.

"Homenum Revelio."

"There's someone up there all right, Selwyn."

"It's Potter, I tell you, it's Potter! And Theabel Cindercroft, she's up there too! It's Potter! Please...please...give me Luna, just let me have Luna!"

There's a scuffle downstairs, and Thea's heart starts to pound when she realises it's someone – probably Lovegood, from the sounds of the wails – fighting against all the rubble on the stairs to get up them.

"All right. Do you trust me, Harry?" Hermione whispers.

Thea glances at him as he nods.

"OK then, give me the Invisibilty Cloak. Ron, you're going to put it on."

"Me? But Harry –"

"Please Ron! Harry, hold on tight to my hand, Thea, grab my shoulder, Ron, grab my other shoulder."

Thea's heart is about to leap from out of her ribcage, but there's a strange calming sensation that comes over her. Hermione knows what she's doing. Thea has absolutely no reason to worry.

So she doesn't.

"Hold tight, hold tight...any second..."

Thea wants to vomit when Xenophilius' face, deathly pale and almost sick-looking, appears, and Hermione points her wand at him and shouts, "Obliviate!"

"Deprimo!"

Thea thinks maybe Hermione's shoulder will crack from how hard she's gripping it, as the four of them drop through the hole Hermione has just exploded in the floor beneath them. Thea just catches sight of two shouting men trying to shield themselves from the debris dropping from the ceiling, as Hermione twists as they fall and they are all pulled into a tight, compressing black.

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Now they've set up the tent in the new area and the protective enchantments, Thea is lay on her bed, the locket from her father wrapped tight in her hands. She's resorted to examining it rather than trying to pry it open, because she knows the latter option is a waste of time. She can hear the others past the curtains cursing Xenophilius, certain that the Hallows aren't real, and something about You-Know-Who going after the Elder Wand, and Thea is reminded of what Hermione had said to her when she and Ron returned.

You're just a spare part.

Groaning, she drags herself from her bed, throwing the locket round her neck and joining the others.

"Well, what's all that about Hedge and Luna's relationship?"

All three pairs of eyes turn to look at Thea, who freezes, her eyes wide and eyebrows raised.

"Do I need to spell it out for you? Really?"

Thea glances at Harry and Ron's clueless faces for a moment.

"Yes, of course I do. They're in love."

"You what?"

"I told you both!" Hermione says hotly.

"Eden came to an anti-Slytherin, anti-You-Know-Who and anti-Death-Eater gathering for Luna. Isn't it obvious?"

Thea catches Hermione's impatient look and they both roll their eyes in sync. Boys.

"Not really. Honestly, she's insufferable, Hedge, how she managed to get Luna to like her is beyond me."

"You don't know anything about her!" Thea exclaims, her face burning red and twisted into the most poisonous glare she can muster.

"I know enough!" he retorts, his ears as equally scarlet as Thea's cheeks.

"Shove it up your arse," she snaps.

"Give it a rest!" Harry shouts, rounding on the both of them, "I don't want to listen to this anymore!"

Thea rolls her eyes, "Right, fine. I'm sorry."

"Sorry," Ron mumbles.

Thea inhales, giving Harry an apologetic smile, that he returns the best he can. Gradually, they all turn to their own silent tasks. Thea ends up on the floor cross-legged, levitating and making her mother's locket do flips and leaps into the air, as Ron fiddles with the radio, having no luck with getting onto Potterwatch but refusing to give up. Harry sits staring into space and Hermione reads a book.

She thinks absentmindedly that this is the calmest they have all been in a while. She likes it.

She also knows it won't last.

Her mind drifts away as the lockets spins and glides like a ballerina around her head. She thinks about Lyra Cindercroft, and her need for her to be out there somewhere.

Even though she's not. Lyra isn't alive.

Thea isn't sure she ever was.