Chapter Ten: The Cloak

Evelyn...

   After he left, I stared at nowhere for a long time; questioning everything and everyone. First I hated myself, that I stuck myself in this ridiculous situation; then I hated Dumbledore, for he was the cause of it; then Mattheo, because he existed, and if he did not, none of the first ones would do either.

   Evelyn. You need to keep going. It is nothing you are not capable of. Calm down. And keep going. For Merlin's sake.

   Thanks to my stomach that made a hungry sound, because if it didn't, I do not know for how long I was going to stay in that petrified position, with my mind wandering around the world.

   So I left the dormitory; making my way to the Great Hall for lunch. When I entered the entrance, a bunch of eyes were now subtly upon me, with the whispering between the students, telling me that the news about me and Mattheo dating became official between the gossips.

   Ignoring the nosy gazes on me, I sat at the Slytherin table. Pansy wasn't there yet; nor were the Slytherin gang __ the puppets of Voldemort. But then right when I began to eat, Pansy came to the sight: she was walking grumpily towards the Slytherin table, with her eyes obviously looking for someone __ me, I assumed. Now that I was looking at her this way, she actually looked like a child, specifically at that moment, an angry one.

   After her eyes finally took a glimpse of me, throwing a grumpy glance at me, she strode over. And when she sat down next to me, she burst out right away, barking furiously. "You two kissed, and I had to hear it from Theo?!"

   "You were busy with Greengrass," I said haughtily.

   "What's going on with you?! Have you any idea what you are doing?!" She was yelling silently, though her voice was loud enough for the Slytherins to hear and stare.

   I closed my eyes, keeping my temper and my voice down, despite Pansy. "I have, Pansy. I know what I am doing."

   "You are dating your enemy. You are kissing your enemy. No matter." She looked around the Hall, at the staring and whispering Slytherins. "Do you know what they are saying about you?!"

   "We are in Hogwarts, Pansy. Everyone has got something to say about each other. Everyone has got something to gossip about." I rolled my eyes at my food.

   She released a sharp breath. "You could've at least told me!"

   My eyes squinted. "Right. I could have."

   "Why do you always find something to make everyone get angry at you?!" She gave me a soft look.

   My jaw tightened. I should not have said that.

   I looked around to see from the Slytherins and the Gryffindors, all were gawking. I thanked Merlin that she wasn't loud enough for the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws to hear, too.

   I pressed my lips together. "I didn't know how to tell you."

   She made a bitter, taunting sound. "Well, I'm not responsible for figuring out you've kissed your long-time enemy just with a GLANCE! So you should just open your mouth and tell me."

   Abandoning my thoughts, with a sigh, I started eating again.

   Even though she blew up an attention-seeking argument in the middle of the Great Hall, I was happy that it happened; because the sooner you would take the hard, the easier it would be.

   "Me and Theo are dating," Pansy said from the middle of nowhere, when she finally had calmed down __ though her expression was still pissed.

   "Congratulations," I said un-surprisedly.

   That startled her. "Why do you look like you already knew?"

   "I did not know, I had just guessed."

   She was staring at me in confusion; she was probably doubling if they were so obvious or I was a genius.

   "What?" My eyelids drooped lazily. "You two liked each other for years now."

   She frowned. "How did you know?"

   "Theo had told me he liked you, and you were obvious," I said shortly.

   She gasped, offended. "Theo had told you he liked me?! Why didn't you tell me?!"

   "You are my best friend, and he is my best friend too," I went on. "Making it the hardest thing I have dealt with."

   She pouted grumpily.

   "Where did Theo go?" I asked.

   "His __" She stopped herself from saying any further.

   "His Dark Mark alarmed?" I said the word she avoided to speak so calmly that she froze.

"It's only a word, Pansy."

   "Did you guess that one too? I mean, Theo's __ thing?" she asked.

   She got my mind into a battle: should I tell her that Mattheo was in my room, or should I not, or perhaps I could tell her when the whole Slytherin table would not hear.

   "No." I threw a sideways glance toward some of the Slytherins who were staring nosily; they hastily turned away. "I will tell you later."

...

   After we ate fully, I left Pansy for the library to study, and she did not argue any further.

   I left the Great Hall, and after some minutes of walking, I felt someone chasing behind me in the corridor; and the moment I peeked behind me, Hermione Granger, panting, caught up with my feet.

   I stopped, like a statue, my eyes locked on her as she panted heavily.

   "I have been looking for you the entire day!" Granger cried, still slightly breathless.

   I kept staring, perhaps I was waiting for a worthy thing to hear. "Should I explain myself to you?" I taunted.

   She looked around the corridor; no living soul was there, except us.

   "Harry told me to tell you that Dumbledore wants to see you at eleven o'clock tonight," she said hastily, and her expression looked as if she was practicing what she just uttered for the whole day. And I raised my eyebrows.

   She pulled something out of her bag, and after some seconds of trying to figure out what the object was, I realized, anything it was, it was invisible.

   "Dumbledore said you will need this for tonight. You know, you're not supposed to be out of your common room that late at night." She made an animalistic sort of sound then. "It's an Invisibility Cloak, if you don't know already," she added before handing me the Cloak.

   I held the strange cloth in my hands, touching it with my fingers and looking at it closely; the inside of the cloak was an ornate silver colour, and the other side of it was completely invisible. For me that I had never seen an Invisibility Cloak before, and had only read about it in many books, it was very interesting.

   "Who does it belong to?" I asked after inspecting the cloak until I was satisfied with it.

   "Harry."

   "Was he scared to talk to me himself?" I realized I had raised my eyebrows.

   She looked pissed off; she was looking at me as though searching for something to do other than punching or insulting me.

   "I'm just doing my job! Being an owl!" She obviously did not like the idea of being an owl. But with a breath, her expression returned normal. "I will take the Cloak back from you tomorrow."

   "I am not going to steal it. Don't worry," I said sarcastically, then I stuffed the cloak into my bag.

   How important or rushed this lesson was to put it at eleven at night, and make me sneak out in the curfew under an Invisibility Cloak that was Harry's, I had no idea. The only thing going on my mind was how to go missing at midnight without Pansy noticing; making her more grumpy than she already was.

   After a lot of minutes thinking and considering certain ways, I got convinced that either way, I should wait in the dormitory, and see if Pansy was going to come back late or early at night. And before that, because there was a long time left to eleven, I should keep living my own peaceful life.

   I went to the library like I was going to before Granger showed up, studied for at least an hour and a half, then put my head on the wooden table in the library; contemplating about anything my mind would come up with.

   I thought about how much I hated everything and everyone; Dumbledore, Sirius... But, let's be honest: I would not hate someone without no reason, and if they did nothing wrong to me. And, also, 'hate' was a great word for the feeling I had towards those people. I did not love them, I did not like them; I was sick of them.

   Probably the only people I liked were Pansy and Theo; and let's be honest, Professor McGonagall too, for she was there, where Dumbledore was supposed to be.

   Even though I knew Dumbledore was clever, intelligent, and powerful if you want to call him; was he really?

   Maybe my feelings were affecting my thoughts, which I doubted, but the mission he gave me to do seemed to me a little worthless; for a lot of reasons, one that I did not think of Mattheo as someone to slip anything.

   Even if he did slip anything, what was it for, what Dumbledore would do towards it, again, I had no idea.

   Mattheo had said they were Voldemort's puppets, and if we would look at it from another way, we were Dumbledore's puppets; me, the teachers, the workers of Hogwarts, and the Order of the Phoenix.

   But none were complaining; not even me.

   Now that I think of it, maybe the reason I accepted to obey was that I had nothing else to do; or perhaps, I wanted to prove myself, wanted to show them what I could do, what I could say... Something I always hid from everyone.

...

   I laid in my bed under the covers, pretending to be asleep; checking my watch every minute or so, I waited for the time to pass.

   Fortunately, Pansy had slept right when I needed her to, and Mattheo and Theo had not returned since they got summoned by the creature; so I had absolutely no problem to sneak out __ for the first time in my life.

   I was fully prepared to leave the dorm room when the clock hit a quarter to eleven and make my way to Dumbledore's study. Even though I was not really planning on not going, I was still thinking why would he put the lesson at eleven o'clock in the night, in the curfew __ because I would have never, ever sneaked out in the curfew on my own will.

   However, when it was the time, a quarter to eleven, pushing the covers off me, I climbed out of bed. I put the Invisibility Cloak on, and, trying so hard not to make a sound to wake Pansy, I left the room.

   After wandering for some quiet minutes in the dark corridors, I finally reached the stone gargoyle at Dumbledore's study. I whispered the password, and the statue leaped aside; the wall behind it broke apart to reveal the spiral staircase toward the headmaster's study. I stepped on the stairs, and when I reached the great door, I put the Cloak into my bag and knocked the knocker three times.

   "Enter." Dumbledore's soft voice came from inside the room. At that, I opened the door and stepped inside.

   "Kindly close the door behind you," Dumbledore said softly.

   Closing the door behind me as he said so, I walked further into the circular room. Dumbledore was sitting on his chair, with no desk in front of him; the desk was replaced with a chair for me to sit on, exactly like the last time.

   And Fawks, Dumbledore's Phoenix, was fast asleep on his perch. Which was not surprising at all, at this hour of the night.

   "Sit down, my dear." Dumbledore smiled at me sweetly.

   I walked over, sitting on the chair in front of him as I faced him unpleasantly. "How was your day?" he asked.

   "Ordinary," I said shortly.

   "And, how is your relationship with Mr. Riddle going, if may I ask?"

   "It is progressing." I stuck my nose in the air.

   Dumbledore moved his hand, and my eyes locked on the small part of his right hand that was revealed; it was completely dead now. The hand looked as though it had no living soul in it, no blood, no nerves. I wondered if he could even move it properly. "Your hand?..."

   "Oh, Evelyn." I knew he wished that I had not noticed his hand. "I understand you are curious, but, believe me, it is a very long story. We Do not have the time to discuss it now. But I assure you, it is nothing to worry about." He smiled.

   "I am not worried." And it was true.

   "Well, then. So, anything else you wish to tell me, anything you have found out?"

   I considered for a second before answering. "He has not slipped anything yet. All I know is that he has the Dark Mark, and that the Death Eaters had a meeting this afternoon."

   "Very well, Evelyn. I shall kindly ask you to, from now on, if you find out anything about the matter you are working on, let me beware immediately. Which means: I want you to come straight to my office when you understand there is going to be a meeting."

   My eyelids drooped, my jaw clenched. For Merlin's sake, I swallowed the words I was thinking of speaking.

   Not getting an obedient answer, Dumbledore nodded at my silence. "So, anything else before we start the lesson?"

   "They are doing something. Working on something," I went on. "I do not quite know what, but, there is something off. They all suddenly disappear whenever they do not have classes or when they are not eating."

   "You mean, our young Death Eaters?" Dumbledore asked.

   "Yes. Mostly, Draco Malfoy."

   "Well, thank you, Evelyn." He nodded. "Shall we start, then?"

   This time, I nodded.

   "So, this time, I want you to do it with your eyes open. Eyes open, however, try your best to not make eye contact with me."

   I nodded again. I took a deep breath; my eyes focused on Dumbledore, but not his eyes. My mind was emptied of emotions or thoughts; like that, I waited for Dumbledore to seek the thoughts that did not exist.

   Dumbledore's eyes were fixed on mine, and I finally felt a spark in my mind. A couple of blurry images began to move around my head, but, this time, you could not tell what or who they were. I took another deep, calm breath, and forced Dumbledore's presence out of my mind.

   Stop. Go away. Go away. Leave.

   And there, the already blurry images fully disappeared; my mind was left empty, and my emotions controlled and calm.

   After some seconds of sheer silence, Dumbledore released a sharp, weary breath. I knew he was not trying to intrude my mind anymore, but I knew I still was not supposed to loosen my grip on my thoughts.

   Even though it looked so effortless from the outside, it was not effortless at all; because only I could feel the thin layer of sweat on my skin, the dizziness in my head, or the heated air in my lungs. And, even though Occlumency was not quite hard, it was absolutely exhausting.

   "That was highly impressive of you. Very good. Indeed, very good." Dumbledore nodded in approval, smiling kindly. "I am very surprised. And very impressed."

   I could not help, I was satisfied with my success. Even though my face remained expressionless, I was smiling in my head. The only thing I could be sure my face was showing was tiredness.

   "It is indeed quite late, you shall go to your sleep. But, before you leave, I think, I am afraid your next lesson might take place with Professor Snape instead of me." He nodded to himself then. "Oh yes, you might need yet another lesson. And you also need to keep doing the homework I gave you," he added with a soft smile. "And, if by any chance, I was gone when you wanted to tell anything important about your mission, you can count on Professor McGonagall, then Professor Snape, and then, surely, Harry."

   My eyes narrowed. "I thought Professor Snape was a Death Eater?"

   "Ah, Evelyn. He is more trustworthy than half of the professors you might know. And, I shall tell you a little secret, since I very trust you, and I want you to be sure on the person you might need to put your trust in, he is, Professor Snape, doing the same job for me as you are doing. You are spying on the son, while he is spying on the father."

   "He is a spy?" I asked, frowning.

   "Oh yes. But, my dear Evelyn, this is the kind of secret that you are not supposed to tell anyone about. When I say anyone, I consider Harry, your dear father, even Professor McGonagall, and anyone at all. So, this stays only between me and you, and Severus himself."

   I nodded.

...

   When I walked through the dark corridors, under the Invisibility Cloak, my mind wondered: what if he, Snape, was actually Voldemort's spy, not Dumbledore's, but Dumbledore didn't know it, for Voldemort was clever too. However, being suspicious of Snape was completely pointless.

   A lot of thoughts and questions were going on my mind, which I had to not pay attention to. For instance: how was Dumbledore's injury actually caused, or why would he be gone.

   And then I thought of Mattheo, probably still far away from Hogwarts, taking orders from his creature father. I was not pitying him, but the thought of him being subservient __ similar to what I was now around Dumbledore __ left a foreign feeling in me. Which I buried deep down immediately, because, whatever the kind of feeling it was, I was not supposed to feel it.