Hello, everyone. This is Draco Malfoy speaking for the very first time on Keily’s blog. Most of you must have been expecting her to write about the events at the Ministry earlier today—possibly even Severus could have been writing all of it. But no. I shall be writing it and we all have to live with that fact.
So lets begin at the beginning. Today was the day that Severus was to be executed. Keily had been acting strange these last few days since her trip to China Town. She looked very happy, cheerful and bright—like nothing was wrong with the world. She didn’t sigh, not even once. But one look at her face and I knew, that there was something bothering her. She didn’t tell me what it was, though I made a point to ask her about it.
But she would just smile, turning her ring (a new habit she was forming) while saying nothing at all. Sometimes she would bring my head down (I’m over half a foot taller than her now) and give me a kiss on the cheek, the way my mother used to do when I was younger--to say good-bye before I left for school. At the time, I thought that her monthlies had finally kicked in after being shut off for almost a year. I had thought that the stress of everything was finally coming down on her, making her seem madder than ever before…and not in the good sense either.
Thing is, Keily can be pretty annoying. But the way she annoys you, you can’t really get angry with her for it. It’s due to the fact that—before this whole War with everyone and their grannies business started—she was as loony as they came. She did the most incomprehensible things. Even by Gryffindor standards, she’d probably be considered too much. And I miss that.
All that Keily ever did afterwards was sigh, look towards the sky for something and be depressed. I hated it. It was like someone ripped her into two parts and took the good parts, leaving behind the leftovers that could barely keep themselves together. Then, I learned about her ‘other side’. It was incredibly aggressive. Headstrong, determined and completely filled with righteous rage. I’ve known her for a year. Keily’s the type of person who follows the winds of Fate—who would yield in favor of others—crushing herself so that the people around her could be happy. And never once have I ever seen or felt her know hate.
I guess, had she the right powers, she probably could have made a decent Jedi. But I have to say: after Mustafar, if Dooku had lived, she would have made an even better Sith. And she wouldn’t be one of those annoying villains who think they’re seductive little Force witches who laugh stupidly and croon to their masters. Nope. I’m proud to say that should Keily Shinra ever decide to become an agent of darkness (and possibly evil) she’d probably give Palpatine a run for his money. But that’s my not-so-humble opinion.
But it looks like she buried that aspect of herself again. For William’s sake and I don’t blame her. I wouldn’t want my son to see the darker side of myself either, especially one as scary as her’s had been on Mustafar.
She had decided, in the end, to leave William with the Weasleys (who will drop him off and then pick him up at Kenya’s) before we set off. Keily wanted to be there early, in case the Ministry pulled off some sort of foul-up. I could see it in the Daily Prophet headlines now. ‘Dark Lord executed half an hour early—angry mob storms the Ministry for the indignity of it all’. Or something like that. She also wanted to go to China Town again. At 8 in the morning. Nothing in China Town is open at 8 in the morning. But it was fine with me and she did have such a brave face on that I couldn’t say no.
In the meanwhile, I made my way to the nearest internet café so I could contact a few people. I had to go a bit further than I had originally planned, but I wasn’t kidding when I said that nothing in China Town is opened at 8 am. Once I paid for an hour’s worth of net time, I went straight to Kenya’s blog to leave a message. I had read that Kenya and Keily’s friends were quite willing to help with Severus’ escape, so now I made a time for us to meet so we could get him out.
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“Mother of Merlin! Keily, where did that dress come from?” I asked when I returned from plotting with everyone else about Severus’ escape. I had worried that a smirk or a secretive smile might have crawled onto my face when I met up with the older woman, but any chance of that happening was washed away when I did meet up with her again.
Keily smiled and twirled around. “I made it last year. I’ve kept it a secret until now.” She told me. She explained, as we made to go to a secluded spot, that the dress had been meant for the annual Halloween Masquerade and she had intended to wear it this year, since she missed it last year in favor of trying to track us down when the both of went missing at the time. I have to say that I have no words to describe how she looks.
I can agree with her. She’s never been beautiful and she will never be. It’s impossible for her. And it’s a bit of a secret, but ‘pretty’ always comes to mind when I look at her—especially when she smiles and I mean
really smiles. But don’t tell her I admitted that or she’ll never let me live it down. Lets hope she never reads this blog entry either. At the moment…
“Do you think white’s appropriate?” I asked. “Severus might get the wrong idea.”
“…I had…wanted to wear this for him on Halloween, truthfully.” She admitted, surprising me. Whenever Keily wears a costume, she wears it for the joy of it. Just as well as she does for the dropped jaws and shock value. “I wanted to invite him to the Masquerade—Oh, just as friends, though…I wouldn’t want anyone to get the wrong idea, too…”
I looked at her and saw that she was downcast for the first time in the last couple of days. I didn’t want to ruin the surprise for her (not to mention bring out Keily’s other side), but I couldn’t help the words that tumbled out of my mouthed after we had reached the alley across the street from the phone booth.
“I’m sure you’ll get the chance to.”
“Huh?” She looked at me funny.
“Nothing.” I said quickly.
She shrugged and entered the booth with me, entering the number. “Besides…I’m also wearing this, because, from where I come from, white is the colour of sterility and death.”
“Oh.”
So she gave up on Severus. So much for the power of love. Then again, looking back on days gone by I can understand that it would be too hard for them. And if I knew my own godfather well enough, he’d probably give up as well. Well, I am not going to have that. I am
not going to lose my godfather and I am going to give Keily back her
real smile. I am going to make damn well sure that those two stay together and that they’ll be happy, damn it.
So, as the booth went down into the Ministry and I checked my muggle style disguise (magical ones would have been easily detected) in a compact mirror from the small handbag that Keily decided to carry. Oh, I was still dressed as any normal wizard would be, but my hair had been cut short and temporarily dyed black the other day (eyebrows included). Keily also gave me a pair of contacts (these lenses that you stick in your eye—took us the good part of early this morning to get those buggers in) to make my eyes to match hers. With a creative use of make-up on Keily’s part (she was in a fine arts school for twelve years and learned quite a few tricks with make-up), she actually got me to look like I could be related to her.
After my initial check-up of my disguise, I finally decided to put my plan into action. I clamped my hands over my mouth and began to put on the biggest show I could possibly ever put on. She grabbed hold of me, wondering what was wrong. I told her that I couldn’t take it…I couldn’t bear to see Severus as he was. I faked being sick so when we got to the lobby, I was rushed to a bathroom instead of checked by security. Along the way, I ate a Puking Pastille—courtesy of Weasley Wizard Wheezes’ Twin owners. Eating it reminded me that I was working with Weasleys…Ugh.
Once in the privacy of a stall I puked my guts out. I took my bloody time of it and it really wasn’t very pleasant, but for the happiness of my family I’m ready to do just about anything. Even work with a bunch of Weasleys. At least I don’t have to deal with
Weasel. The family itself, I can tolerate, but
him. Sometimes I wonder if marrying pure is such a good idea. I’ve heard what it can do to families from Keily when she went on a haemophilia induced bleeding spree in January. I don’t want to die from a paper cut just because my father married his cousin or something, thanks.
I could hear Keily telling the guard that I was going to catch up with me soon enough. She had a meeting to attend. She led the man away as he wanted to escort her to the elevator at least. I hoped he wasn’t hitting on her, because I was going to hex him if he was!
Left alone, I quickly stuffed the antidote down my throat and cleaned myself up. The things I do for love. It was time to go and meet up with my ‘partners in crime’. Hey, I’m already a wanted man. I might as well have myself be wanted for
something. I think busting out Severus from jail qualifies.
It was surprisingly easy getting through the Ministry to get to where we needed to. It only showed how cocky and arrogant the current Minister was. I can understand why Potter has such distaste for the man. You’d think that someone as paranoid as Scrigemour would have stationed more men for the execution of a man that could have been Voldemort. I snorted as I thought about yet another headline for the Prophet. ‘Scrigemour, True Chosen One!’ I wanted to start vomiting again.
There were guards—Aurors—standing guard at Severus’ cell (I had to fight from cringing when I saw him), but they were taken care of by the other Terrible Twins, Elrohir and Elladan who seemed to have come out of nowhere. Their speed and stealth were brilliant!
“Anyone else coming?” I asked as we searched the guards for their keys. Severus—who, I think had been sleeping at the time—abruptly demanded what we were doing. We ignored him though, thinking that he was just overwhelmed. He was scheduled to bite the big one soon enough.
“Rinnalaiss was supposed to join us.” Elrohir (or possibly Elladan?) answered.
“However, we decided that it would be best if she remained behind.” Elladan (or was it Elrohir?) added. “The lesser amount of people, the better. We can move much quicker and not draw as much attention. And our counterparts—“ He smirked at this. “—are busy creating the mother of all distractions. Oh. And thank you for the directions. This Ministry of yours was rather easy to find.”
“No problem. If I know besotted people, they’ll thank us for this later.” I said, finally able to smirk. Things were going as planned. I took the keys (finally) and let Severus out of the cell…and he didn’t seem too pleased about it. In fact, I almost didn’t dodge a wandless hex aimed at my head.
“Snape, calm down.” One of the elf lords said placatingly. Severus seethed.
“Calm down? Calm down? Do you have any idea what you three have done?”
“Rescued you?” I answered, sounding just a little unsure. What could he have been so angry about? But I didn’t have enough time to wander. Severus (continuous) shouts were beginning to draw attention from the rest of the department we were in. We had to get out of there before we were all stuck inside a jail cell. I nodded to the twins and one of them knocked out Severus in mid-rant. Sorry, godfather.
We had taken Rinnalaiss’ advice on what to do in order to get Severus out. We didn’t want to go through all of the trouble, so we used the most prominent ideas. Mainly the Weasley Twins making the biggest distraction in the history of Wizards around the world so we could sneak off with…uh…’Severine’ who’s currently passed out from going into labour.
Yup. We’re dressing up Severus Snape who is trapped inside Voldemort’s body…as a pregnant woman. Of course, I had a bit of charm work to do on him before we left. Elrohir (Elladan?) for one reason or another had a wig handy, so we stuck it to Severus’ bald head and began the task of transporting…er…’Severine’ to the elevator so we could escape, quite innocently, through the lobby.
“And what of Keily? You didn’t tell her about the plan…” Elladan said, frowning a little.
“I’m sure that once everyone realizes that he’s gone, she’ll leave right away. She’s sensible like that.” About as sensible as a fruitcake, but I trusted her common sense. I was sure that she was going to leave after we had left.
I should have realized that it would be quite difficult, considering that I had enlisted the
Weasley Twins into creating the mother of all distractions to pave our way.
There was pandemonium everywhere in the lobby. Well, that’s one way of putting it. Another way would be that somebody had unleashed every single one of the Weasley Wizard Wheezes products upon the unsuspecting people inside the Ministry. Fireworks were flying overhead, multiplying no matter how many times someone tried to diminish them. Dungbombs were being dropped out of nowhere—people were puking, bleeding straight from the nose—people falling into waist deep swamps…
And it only got worse.
I don’t know if the Weasleys asked them or if they came on their own, but I think I was reliving the ends of my fifth year and sixth year all over again--in fast forward. Things were crashing down from the ceiling, pillars were being broken and I think blasters were being shot, too. Hopefully on stun. One wizard is bad enough, but I refuse to be responsible for the deaths of many people.
The elf lords and I, upon seeing all this, did our best to get out as quickly as possible. With all that was going on around us (dear lord, the Megatron’s troops came as well) no one really cared who or what we were as we ran like madmen to the emergency exits. I heard a nearby scream as a pillar that was hit (hey, you bloody Asgardian, we’re running here!) fell with a crash to the floor. But I steered myself away, only worried with what was important at the time.
I should have gone back.
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It’s nighttime in London when we managed to get Severus back to the Order of the Phoenix’s headquarters. Just as it is still nighttime that I write this to you now. I thought that everyone should have the right to know as soon as possible, the end result of everything we did today.
Severus is still unconscious and being holed up inside the attic with Headmistress McGonagall looking after him with that werewolf, Lupin. Potter is off Horcrux hunting with Weasel and Granger for the next little while. The elf lords left for Rinnalaiss’ property for some well-earned rest. As for myself, I was smugly lying on a daybed inside the parlour in my mother’s ancestral home, waiting for when Keily returned from the Ministry.
I imagined her looking completely frazzled, annoying and put out. Not to mention angry. The size of the swamp was enough to cover half of the lobby and I’m quite sure that the dress that she had worked so hard on must have gotten dirty. Well, small price to pay to be reunited with someone you love, I suppose. I wonder if I could do the same for my father? Although, I know many here won’t agree to it, so maybe I shouldn’t think about it…
At about half past eight, I got fed up with waiting and decided to go and find her myself. It shouldn’t be taking her that long to get there. It would be the only place she could get to. I knew Keily to be directionally impaired, but once she knows a route, she won’t forget it that easily. Just as I was about to leave, I find myself suddenly being assaulted by an owl—a strange black one of a species I didn’t know existed. It pecked my head incessantly before dropping an envelope onto the floor and flying away just as fast as it came. What in the world had that been about?
Shaking my head, I saw that the letter was addressed to me, so I cut open the strange looking seal on the back. Like a star falling magnificently from the sky, Keily’s ring fell from the folded parchment. I stared at it for a long while, dreading what the ring without its owner could mean. My hand shook terribly and I was scared of reading the letter in case it informed me of something horrible. But eventually, I had to and subsequently, so did Severus.
I don’t think I’ve ever heard or seen him cry before.
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Yuuko's Letter
