HARRY:

The door closed, and just like that, she was gone. Worse than that, she was alone.

I lingered there for a moment, just in case, but when she didn't reappear, I made my way back up to the common room, anxiety making itself rather comfortable in the pit of my stomach. I mumbled the password and headed in the direction of Hermione and Ron, who were sitting in the corner in the middle of an intense game of wizard's chess and murmuring in low tones that stopped abruptly when I arrived.

"Is she alright?" Hermione asked in a soft voice as I sat beside her.

"I'd suggest moving your queen the one spot farther," I said, pointing to Ron's knight that was poised to strike if she committed to that particular play.

"Oh, right, thanks." She heeded my suggestion and glanced up sheepishly at Ron. "Maybe the two of us combined can beat you."

He grinned. "You can try."

"Anyway, yeah, she's alright," I said as Ron's knight took Hermione's knight instead of her queen. "Well, no, that's not the right word at all. But I guess, well..." I sighed, frustrated. "What do you mean by 'alright,' Hermione? What do you want me to say? It's a rather difficult question to answer."

"I just — look, there's no need to get cross with me, I was just wondering if something was wrong." She wilted a bit under my glare. "More wrong than usual, anyway."

I shrugged noncommittally. Obviously I couldn't tell anyone else about her family. That was her decision to make, whenever — if ever — she wanted to make that decision.

"Something at Mungo's shook her up," Ron commented as he swiped Hermione's other knight. "Have you noticed? Reckon that could be it?"

"I've noticed. Trust me, I've noticed." I shrugged again. "Might be that. I don't know."

Hermione sighed, clearly disappointed that I didn't seem to have any further insight. "I just wish she weren't so stubborn about keeping everything inside all the time."

"It's not like she's the only one," Ron muttered with an amused glance my direction.

"I do not!" I protested.

"Oh, right, sorry, my bad," he said in a tone that suggested he wasn't sorry in the slightest. "You keep everything inside until you physically can't, then you just..." He gestured toward the chess board with his chin as his queen decapitated Hermione's.

"I do not," I protested again, in a mumble this time. When Hermione turned to look at me, too, I crossed my arms over my chest. "Okay, maybe I do sometimes. Umbridge deserved it, though."

"Oh, certainly," Hermione said, turning back to the game with a much lighter tone. "We're not saying she didn't. We're just saying you have a habit of exploding after trying to keep everything inside for too long."

"Wish Lucy would explode again. Reckon it would do her some good," Ron remarked. "Checkmate."

Hermione grinned begrudgingly. "Just as well, really. We should start rounds soon." She turned to me and said in a low voice, "We talked to McGonagall about adjusting the schedule, now that we know Ron knows. We'll always patrol on the full moons, so we can get Lucy first thing in the morning."

"I can do that," I said, some sort of protectiveness or defensiveness or both surging in me.

"I was hoping you would say that, because..." She pushed the board out of the way and inched closer to Ron and me. After fishing around in her bag for a moment, she pulled out three pocket watches dangling from silver chains and held them out to us. Upon closer examination, the watch was frozen at midnight. "I charmed them to follow the lunar cycles," she whispered. "So 12 o'clock is the full moon, and 6 o'clock is the new moon — it only goes around once, twice would be confusing. I made six of these, one for each of us who knows, but I wanted the three of us to try it first just to make sure it works. So, if I charmed it correctly, the hand that would indicate seconds on a normal clock should start moving at sunrise tomorrow, once it's over for this month."

"Brilliant," I said, tucking it into my pocket. "I'll let you two know if it works."

"Little cruel making the chain silver, isn't it?" Ron asked.

Hermione huffed. "Don't be ridiculous, silver doesn't hurt werewolves, that's rubbish. Powdered silver and dittany are actually what seals werewolf-inflicted wounds, so really, if anything goes wrong, this could come in handy."

A thought occurred to me. "But she's allergic to dittany, so how...?"

"Not fatally allergic," Hermione replied with a shrug. "And, well, it's the only solution, so — "

"No, it's not," a fourth voice popped up, making the three of us jump. George sauntered over, flipping an Extendable Ear in his hand. "Experimenting with string-free Ears. Testing the range. Don't worry, only Fred and I have the other Ears," he added quickly when he saw the panic on our faces, wondering who else might have heard us, "but I had to make a nuisance of myself and butt in because I do believe I heard a falsehood."

Hermione narrowed her eyes at him and looked around for the traitorous Ear. Once she found it, up against the wall and hiding in a shadow, she held it up to her mouth as if to whisper something and smirked at George. He lifted the fake rubber ear to his own, raising his eyebrows expectantly.

"GIT!" she shouted.

George yanked the Ear away, genuinely startled for a moment, then shook his head and grinned. "I'm the git? Really, Granger?"

Hermione smiled. "Anyway, as you were saying? Is there something about it in those healing books of Cedric's she has?"

"No." George joined our informal circle, grabbing the Ear from Hermione's hands and pocketing it for safekeeping. He lowered his voice. "We just used a good old-fashioned episkey on the bite marks she had in August. It did the trick."

"That's not possible," she said slowly. "It doesn't work like that."

"Well... it did," he said equally slowly. "Closed up right away, then she chugged the wideye potion and took a shower and we headed back. She did say she normally healed bites by herself, but — "

Hermione slapped a hand to her forehead and dragged it down her face.

"What is it?" George asked after a moment. "I'm just repeating what happened in August. Well, the relevant bits anyway."

"Nothing, nothing," she said in a voice that implied there was, in fact, something. She bit her lower lip. "I just have a bit of research I need to do, I suppose. I'm going to run my bag up to my dormitory before reporting to Professor McGonagall for rounds. I'll meet you down there, Ron. Good night, George, good night, Harry."

And with that, Hermione straightened her prefect badge, drew her wand, and headed in the direction of the girls' dormitories, leaving the three of us boys rather confused in her wake.

"Well, that was enlightening," George quipped after a moment. "Any chance she gave either of you an extra watch? I want one."

I shook my head. "Guess you'll have to wait until tomorrow. All three of us will be needing ours tonight."

"I should start heading down to McGonagall's office," Ron muttered as he pushed himself to his feet. "Can't have Hermione coming down and seeing me still talking to you buffoons."

George grinned. "I'm afraid buffoonery is genetic, Ronniekins, so if I'm a buffoon, that makes you one, too."

"Better a buffoon than Bludger bait," he said in response, a rare comeback. "I'll leave that to you and Fred."

"Bludger bait, eh? Why don't you wait and see where all of the Bludgers go at our next practice?"

"Oh, shove off." Ron pushed on George's head and ruffled my hair as he headed toward the portrait hole. "Good night, buffoons!"

"Night, Ron," I chuckled, fixing my hair and sighing. I pulled the watch out of my pocket and showed it to George. "This is what you'll be getting tomorrow after the fact, assuming this works. And, well, knowing Hermione, it will."

"Oh, it will," he said with a roll of his eyes. "Brilliant magic, that. Good idea."

I nodded. I stared at the face of the watch, at the hands frozen at midnight. "I just wish it could, you know, actually help. I want to be there, I want to help."

"Take it from someone who has been there..." His voice trailed off. George shifted so he was sitting on the opposite side of the chess board. He wasn't meeting my eyes, but I could see that his face had paled ever so slightly. He shook his head. "Harry, there's... well, I guess what I'm trying to say is be careful what you wish for. I know you want to be there and help, and I do too, but it wasn't easy being there even though we weren't the ones who... who, you know."

"I mean, I saw Professor Lupin transform," I said. "It was hard to watch of course, but it was over fairly quick and he didn't seem to be in too much pain and — what?"

George was shaking his head. "It's not like that, Harry. Lupin's in his thirties. He's done this probably three times as much as Lucy has, maybe more, so he's more used to it than she is."

I froze. "What are you trying to say, George?"

"I'm not speaking in riddles." He glanced up at me for the first time. "I get it, I know you want to be there, but... be careful what you wish for."

"Well, now I just want to be there."

George shook his head again. "She's not going to want you there. You have no idea how much she protested us being there, right up until the moment we closed the door behind her. She's going to fight with everything she has to keep you as far away as possible because she won't want to worry you or scare you. Or, in her mind, worse, make you feel sorry for her."

"Well, I'm already plenty worried for her and plenty scared for her and plenty sorry for her, so I don't know why she'd fight me," I muttered.

"She cares about you," he said simply. "She thinks she's protecting you."

"I care about her, too, and I don't need protection."

"Tell her that, not me. I already know that. Now come on, I'll beat your arse at wizard's chess so we can both take our minds off of it all. There's nothing we can do about it right now."

I nodded. "Right. But one more thing, before we play."

"Mhm?"

"I'll be the one beating your arse, Weasley."

🩵💛❤️

I clutched the small pocket watch in my hand as I rocked back and forth on my feet in front of where I knew the door was. It vanished from sight when she disappeared behind it, and it didn't reappear until she opened it the next morning. On one hand, I could reason well enough that it was to keep her safe, so no one would open the door to try to catch her or hurt her. On the other, I worried that one time, something would go wrong and she wouldn't open the door and no one would be able to get in and help.

But if she needs the help, surely the room would recognize that and reveal the door... right?

I glanced at the pocket watch. It was still frozen at midnight. Or noon. Or whatever it was. I realized I was holding my breath.

I released it in a relieved sigh when the tiniest hand of the watch ticked forward the slightest bit. It was over. I tucked it away, making a mental note to tell Hermione it worked, and waited.

A minute passed. Two. Three.

I glanced up and down the hall to make sure I was in the right place. I was. I was certain I was. So where was she?

Another minute passed. Two. Three.

Just when I was about to panic, the door suddenly appeared and creaked open. Lucy slipped out and closed the door behind her with one hand as she pressed her other hand to her nose, letting her sleeve completely cover the lower half of her face. When she turned to face me, her eyes above her hand were dull, almost lifeless.

"Hey," I said as casually as I could, crossing over to her in a single stride. "You alright?"

She nodded, not lowering her sleeve from her face. I realized when I got closer that she'd been crying.

"Hospital Wing or your dormitory?" I asked.

"Dormitory," she replied in a voice little more than a whisper that was additionally muffled by her sleeve over her face.

I reached forward and removed her hand, and, once again, her nose had been all scratched up, somehow. This time was even worse than the last. And it seemed like she knew that, because she covered it again and looked away from me.

"It's alright," I said without really knowing why I was saying it other than the fact that it was true. "As long as you're alright, or at least you will be, nothing else matters."

Lucy sniffled, then coughed weakly. "I'm alright. Just tired."

"And cold, I reckon."

"That too," she mumbled with a nod.

Surely enough, her forehead was cool and clammy. She leaned into my hand a bit, probably involuntarily, probably needing the warmth, so I slipped my scarf off and wrapped it around her shoulders.

"Might be a little damp from heading down to Hagrid's," I said apologetically. "It's still raining."

"It's okay," Lucy replied, her voice shaking a little less. "It's still warm. Did I miss anything last night?"

I grinned. "I beat George at wizard's chess. Other than that, no, nothing."

"Sorry I missed it," she said. "You'll have to do it again for me to witness."

"Sounds like a plan."

Lucy disappeared up to her dormitory once we reached the common room, and I headed up to mine to get my bag for the day. Ron was back from rounds, looking tired but nowhere near as exhausted as Lucy. The other boys in the room were beginning to stir, so we couldn't talk freely about Lucy, but he raised his eyebrows at me in silent question. I nodded, and he nodded, and that was enough for us. By the time I headed back down to the common room, Lucy was already there, and Ginny was there too, muttering drying spells as she pulled Lucy's hair back into a ponytail.

"I still say you should go down to the Hospital Wing to get it healed properly," Ginny was saying in between drying spells.

"It is healed properly," Lucy replied. "Hermione just worries too much, you know that."

"Well, yes, she does, but you should still — "

"It's not like I have Quidditch practice or anything that would risk me making it worse — "

"That's not an excuse to not have Madam Pomfrey at least look at it — "

"It's not going to hurt anybody if I don't — "

"It'll hurt you in the long run if you screwed it up, isn't that reason enough to — "

"What's going on?" I finally asked, dropping onto the sofa next to Lucy. "What happened?"

Ginny answered first. "She twisted her shoulder and is insisting she healed it up herself, but Hermione told me while Lucy was in the shower not to let her try to do her own hair today just in case."

"It's fine, honest," Lucy protested, crossing her arms over her chest. "Cedric fixed my shoulders for me plenty of times. I just did what he always did. I even double-checked the incantation before trying it."

Ginny snorted. "Good, congratulations, that's the bare minimum. Wouldn't want you using a spell for a broken ankle by accident, now, would we?"

Lucy laughed as Ginny tied off the ponytail and tossed the hair over Lucy's shoulder. "I'm not that stupid. Hermione's just worried about my magic still, but I know when a healing spell works and doesn't work. Not to mention, I trust my brother's books."

"I'm not saying you shouldn't, none of us are saying that. Just that maybe you should care a little more about, you know, not trying to act all tough and brave for our sakes when something might actually be wrong."

"I know when a healing spell works and doesn't work," Lucy said again. She slid across the sofa and cuddled up against me. "Mm. You're warm."

"You're cold," I replied.

Ginny hopped over the back of the couch and landed on Lucy's other side, wrapping her arms around her. "Harry might be warm, but we all know I'm the hottest of us all, so it's only right that I offer my services as well."

Lucy laughed, closing her eyes and heaving a sigh. "Can we just stay here all day?"

Unfortunately, we couldn't. Ron and Hermione headed down to the common room a couple minutes later, and we all headed down to breakfast. Then our Monday began.

Despite her banter with Ginny that morning, and the way she'd laughed the day before, I could tell something was still bothering Lucy. Something new, anyway. It was hard to describe how I knew, exactly, I just... did. She seemed a bit better after being at St. Mungo's and Grimmauld Place. Well, a bit better after getting away from Hogwarts was the most likely explanation. She was smiling a bit more, laughing a bit more, bantering a bit more. On the surface, she seemed better. But there was something lurking beneath the "better" surface. I had no idea what it was, but there was a new distance to Lucy. I thought maybe it was just the dread of the days leading up to the full moon, possibly the significance of that particular moon, but even once the moon had passed, it was still there, holding her back. Whatever it was.

Just the same, she made it through the day alright. She was obviously exhausted, even with the wideye potion, but she managed not to fall asleep in class or anything like that. As promised, George and I had a wizard's chess rematch that night after dinner, and it was halfway through this that Lucy suddenly gasped.

We both jumped, alarmed. "What's wrong?" we asked in unison.

"Nothing," she said breathlessly. "Nothing. The Room of Requirement." She turned to me, eyes wide with excitement. "For the... club. The Room of Requirement."

"Are you sure, Lu?" I asked. "That might... not be the best idea. What if someone decides to get a bit of extra practice in on a night like last night?"

"They wouldn't be able to get in if I was already there. Think about it, this room would give us anything and everything we'd need. And it's perfectly soundproof, we could be as loud as we want, fit as many people as we want, and there would be no sign whatsoever that we were even in there!"

"That's brilliant, Cub," George said, pushing himself to his feet. "You can finish out this game while I tell the others."

"You just don't want to lose again!" I called after him with mock indignance.

"I would lose, but she stands a chance!" he called over his shoulder.

Lucy sighed as she took his place. "Not when I'm this tired, I don't. And don't you dare let me win, Harry James."

"What makes you think I'd do that, Lucy Madison?" I asked.

She wrinkled her nose. "It's better than Lucy Lucille, but I don't think that's it."

"I won't stop trying until I get it right, Lucy Christina."

"Keep trying, Harry James, keep trying." She pressed her right thumb to her mouth as she studied the board. "Oh Merlin, George Weasley, you've left me a mess of a game."

Before she could give the pieces a command, Hermione rushed over. "Lucy, you're brilliant, that's absolutely perfect. When were you thinking of having the first meeting? Next week? This week, even?"

Lucy pulled inside herself, metaphorically as well as a bit literally. She wrapped her arms around her legs, and her shoulders crept a little closer to her ears. She glanced at me, and gone was the amusement of mere moments before. It was replaced by anxiety, apprehension, and yet, a fighting fire as well. She was still determined to see this through. "W-We might need a bit of time to prepare a plan."

I nodded. "I agree."

Lucy turned back to Hermione and cleared her throat. "Next Friday? Is that alright?"

"I'll double-check everyone's Quidditch schedules," she muttered — a bit put out still, it seemed — as she glanced over her shoulder at Angelina, "but that sounds perfect to me."

"Alright." Lucy glanced at me. "Shall we get started with the planning? After I win this game, of course?"

I grinned. "Of course," I replied sarcastically. "Good luck, he really did leave you a mess."

My "Good luck" wish was misplaced. I was the one who needed it. She managed to beat me. George was delighted. I was offended.

But it was worth it.

She ended up being too tired to plan that night, but we agreed to set up camp in the corner of the common room the next night and put our heads together to try to figure out where to start. After she disappeared up to her dormitory, I pulled the pocket watch out and glanced at it out of curiosity.

The hand that signified minutes had already moved a bit. I watched as a "second" ticked by. I felt a pang in my chest and hurriedly tucked it away again.

Lucy was right. The moon never stopped. But, for that moment, she was safe and warm and probably already asleep in her dormitory, and I supposed that was enough. For that moment, anyway.