seemed empty with how silent it had fallen. Some of the remaining fireworks zoomed outside the window once in a while. Crookshanks purred quietly by the crackling fire, yellow eyes staring up alertly at the tensed occupants.

"So, let me get this straight," begins George. "Malfoy stole a book that may be written by your great-grand-someone and now he's blackmailing you every chance he gets."

"Not to mention," adds Ginny, "by stopping Umbridge from expelling you, he's using you to find out what Harry's up to."

"Tell me again, why we can't just get the book back?" asks Ron.

"Because he's made copies of it, hasn't he?" says Hermione. "Besides, even if we manage to get it back, he'd notice. It'll just be a matter of time before he'd have Margaret expelled..."

"Not really," Fred speaks up for this first time in over an hour, which in itself was extremely unusual for him. He looked up at Margaret, his jaw clenched, an unreadable emotion flickering in his eyes. "Not if you use your powers to convince him that he doesn't need the book after all, like you did to stop Umbridge from expelling us."

Margaret met his eyes blankly, any and all of her emotions masked.

It greatly unnerved her that Fred, George and Harry had eavesdropped on her conversation with Draco but she was more annoyed at herself for being so careless. That, on top of the argument she had had with Fred and George about Montague and the Vanishing Cabinet, it only added to the dispute they were suddenly having.

"I can't do that," she says with finality, leaning back on the red armchair she was sitting on. "I can't."

"And why not?" asks Fred, narrowing.

"Because believe it or not, he has resources we don't," she tells them. "Dumbledore told me that my ancestors were obsessed with magical purity because of the time they were known to exist in. Just as the Malfoys are. If there is anyone who knows the inner workings of the Toujours Pur system, then it's Draco."

"There is no 'inner working' to that," Harry speaks up. "It barbarity – the way they treat muggleborns. They merely want purity and think anyone else is unworthy. You can't be possibly proud of being from a family like that."

"Of course I'm not," Margaret snaps, equally irritated with him as she was with Fred and George. "I simply wish to understand what happened to my ancestors and to do so I've to know the way they thought. Why did they suddenly disappear without a trace? What was so bad about this world that they felt the need to move to another dimension altogether? Of course, Draco doesn't know any of that, nor do I plan on telling him; I just want whatever he can find for me."

The clock above the notice board struck midnight. Thankfully, the common room was entirely deserted as they spoke; silencing charms placed around the room by Fred and George to make sure no unwanted ears heard them. Ironic, truly.

Margaret noticed Hermione frowning to herself, and felt a twinge of guilt. "As far as I know, I come from a family of Squibs and Muggles," she says softly, causing Hermione to look up at her, "and I don't mind that. I don't care whether I'm a pureblood, a half-blood or a muggleborn; I never have. I just want to – I need to know if I have any family left in this world... In any case, I want to know what happened to them all those years ago. And if Draco can help me with that-"

Fred let out a forced laugh, cutting her off. He had heard enough of her blabbering for one day. It stopped making sense to him a long time ago. Nothing had to be so complicated...

"So he's Draco now, huh?" Fred spits out spitefully. "Well, have fun with Draco. Hope he's not as useless as the rest of us."

He shot to his feet, rounded the couch and made his way towards the portrait door. George made a move to follow him but Ginny stopped him by grabbing his arm and gestured at Margaret who had gotten up as well.

"Can't you trust me to make my own decisions?" she says, exasperated. "Do you really think I'd be so careless as to-"

"He's Malfoy, Margaret!" Fred exclaims, whipping around to face her, "How could you possibly think of trusting him?!"

"I have ways of making sure he doesn't lie to me!" she tells him truthfully. "Besides, is it not clear to you that I am using him as much as he wants to use me?! Maybe even more!"

"Yeah, maybe," Fred says, eyes alight with frustration. "Or maybe there is more!"

In all honesty, he had not meant to blurt that out like an insecure and doubtful little child. But he, Fred, was often impulsive and didn't usually put too much thought into things he considered simple. However, this trait was never used to hurt someone, and so he could not do anything but watch, mildly startled by his own words, as hurt spread across Margaret's face for just a moment. Only for a moment. Before she hid her emotions again.

Merlin's good hell, did he hate when she did that...

"Yeah, maybe there is," she states indifferently, much to Fred's surprise. She holds up her hand when he goes to speak, "No, no, you've said enough," she says, smiling bitterly. "Yeah, maybe there is more between me and Draco than just finding out about my very old family. Maybe I want to give him a chance, or maybe I even think he can change!"

In her recklessness, she had said something she had stopped herself from even consciously thinking about for months now. It sounded so absurd coming from her that she herself was stunned silent for a heartbeat.

"Merlin's beard, Margaret, you can't be serious!" exclaims Ron suddenly, earning looks from his friends that he ignored. "He is Malfoy! We all know he's nothing more than a bully, and people like him don't change in a night!"

If anyone knew why Harry suddenly looked down at the hearthrug, troubled by Ron's truthful words, then they could not have believed that it was because he was suddenly reminded of his father, James Potter; or the version of his father he had seen only hours prior in Snape's Pensieve.

"Exactly!" Margaret exclaims, whirling around to face Ron and the others, a sudden wildness igniting within her at the mention of bullying, "People like him don't change! Maybe I just want to believe in the impossible. Or – I don't know, maybe because when I see him I see myself! Me, who had the perfect parents and the perfect brother who would all trust me blindly! Me, who didn't think it to be a big deal to push someone down the stairs, who didn't think it was bad to tease someone until they ran off crying! You know why? Because I didn't care! My life was perfect, why would I care?!"

She paused to take a deep breath, briefly taking notice of the shocked expressions of her friends at her sudden outburst. She shook her head to herself, chuckling humourlessly.

"But then it did change, didn't it?" she continues bitterly, no longer shouting. "Everything began changing with... these," she lifts up her hand, crimson threads of her powers wrapping themselves around her fingers before disappearing. "I wished to force everyone away and realised... that they didn't care about staying. I was of no use if I was incapacitated. Three weeks I was in the hospital after my fourteenth birthday... and not even a single person I called friend showed up," she admits, scoffing slightly.

"It didn't matter then, mostly because I was trying to avoid my idiotic brother, who didn't know about my sudden superpowers and was persistent to spend time with me. I didn't want to hurt him, so I kept pushing him away until he too, was gone forever... And suddenly nothing was perfect anymore, or permanent. I didn't understand why everything was happening the way it was... I didn't understand why I was being punished so cruelly."

It was then that Margaret blinked, crashing back into reality.

She noticed that random objects around the common room had started levitating in the air – something that only happened when she was having a nightmare. She supposed this was not much different; she was unconsciously losing her halt on her powers... But she couldn't be blamed; she never wanted them to know, even in the slightest bit, what kind of person she used to be. She could not bear to see their expressions so she looked to the ground, smiling tearfully.

"What does that have to do with Draco Malfoy, I hear you ask?" she says with pretence cheerfulness. No one had asked that, for they were too busy reeling with surprise at her sudden revelations.

"Everything," she answers herself. "Maybe it's because I know what's in store for him. Maybe it is because I want to believe in the impossible. Maybe I think I'm going to see the warning signs in him that I missed in my own behaviour and want to stop someone from going down the same path... Maybe it's not even that complicated.

"But I can't help it, can I? I know too much and I feel too much. Maybe I think too much too," she says, finally turning to look at Fred again, who stared back at her with remorse. He hadn't meant to trigger this for her... She smiled sadly.

"Maybe I just want to make sure I don't end up missing something and messing up the future for all of us... All I know is that I want to do the right thing... for once in my life, I don't want anyone to get hurt. And I can't do that if I keep Draco out of the picture. I was hesitant in the beginning, sure, but... if the opportunity presents itself, I'm not going to turn it away... Whether you want to trust me or not, that's up to you," she adds softly.

Margaret stared at him for a moment longer but almost as though she did not see him. Then she wordlessly brushed past him and out of the portrait door, not caring that it was past midnight.

The objects that were floating in the air due to her accidental telekinesis slowly settled themselves down in the original places. The playing cards, some candy wrappers, an ink bottle, and a few extra quills slowly right themselves back on a table to the side; a jug of water, some rolls of parchments, a few books, a few Headless Hats set themselves back down on the coffee table as well.

It was then that the lot of them truly remembered that Margaret did, in fact, know the future.

They hadn't put much thought into it until now, which was plausible because they did not truly understand how her future-knowing worked other than 'she was from the future hence she knew the future'. Especially since Margaret kept so many things to herself, it was easy to forget that she was not as stuck to the present possibilities as they were.

Hermione, on the other hand, was the first one to have connected the dots and having understood the underlying meaning of Margaret's words; as she was the only one who knew of her tattoo:

"The semicolon between the arrow signifies suicide awareness... Because semicolons are used when a writer wants to end a sentence but decides against it. It's a continuation after a brief pause. Just like that, when a person wants to end their life but decides against it."

For the first time in her life, Hermione Granger wanted to be wrong...

Fred recalled the time when he told her that he would not want to know the future. It was true. His present was fun; it was more or less perfect.

Perhaps it was that which made it easy to forget that Margaret did, in fact, faced not just the present which she was new to but also the future which only she knew. He had seen her mask slip when she had visions, and he stopped himself from wondering how bad their futures really were. He was only sure about one thing and it was that no matter what happened, he and George would try to make it as pleasant as they could.

And suddenly, he turned on his heal.

"Oi!" says George, breaking the silence and snapping them out of their daze. "Where're you going?"

"To find her!" says Fred over his shoulder, turning around to face them but continuing to walk backwards. "We can't just go off to bed like nothing happened!"

"Don't you think she'd want to be alone for a while?" asks Ginny, her voice cracking slightly. There were tears in her and Hermione's eyes. "Maybe you should wait till the morning..."

Fred shook his head, brows furrowed in worry as he paused by the portrait hole. "You lot can talk to her later, but I swear on Merlin's pants if I don't go after her, I might just lose my mind... and her..."

George thought it was a bad time to smile, but he couldn't help it.

Fred slipped out of the door, ignoring the Fat Lady's complaints and just hoped to whatever entity out there that Margaret hadn't teleported off to somewhere as he lit his wand nonverbally. It was moments like when he had to ask whining, half-asleep paintings if they had seen a dark-haired girl in Gryffindor robes, that he missed the Marauders Map.

To his relief, he found her sitting on a window ledge on the fifth floor about ten minutes later, her back facing the corridor as she looked at Hagrid's hut by the edge of the forest and the remaining fireworks in the sky still whizzing out of control.

"...Hey, pumpkin."

Fred noticed her quiet sniffles as she wiped her cheeks with her sleeves when she heard him.

"Can I join you?" he asks softly.

Margaret shrugged. "It's a free country," she says, her voice strained.

"Sorry," says Fred, bowing a little even if she couldn't see him, "May I join you, princess?"

"You're so corny," she mutters, a small smile lifting on her face as she patted the space next to her.

She felt him approach her, the light from his wand growing brighter the closer he came before he muttered "Nox" and it disappeared. He did not sit next to her as she had expected him to, but instead stood a little behind her. She did not turn to face him yet.

"I'm sorry-" they begin together before chuckling.

"I'll go first," says Fred quickly but softly. "I'm sorry... I didn't mean to- well, I didn't think it would be – that you were thinking about the future. Which is stupid really. Not that you were thinking about the future! I mean, me not realising that you were thinking... about the future. That is stupid. Basically, I'm stupid... No, wait, no- Oi! Don't laugh at me, you meanie, I'm trying!"

However, Fred did not have any qualms that she was laughing at his utter incapability to apologise properly; he considered it an achievement that he had made her laugh.

"Oh, Gred," she mumbles, chuckling, as she turns in her place to grab his hand and pull him closer. He complied immediately, wrapping his free hand across her collar to hug her from behind.

"I'm sorry too," she says, leaning back against him, "for what I said to you and George this morning about Montague... It was tactless and unnecessary-"

"Nah, it's fine," he says, letting go of her hand to lift up her chin to make her face him. "I shouldn't have called you stupid either... because you're anything but."

Fred's toffee brown eyes travelled over her features, a small crease between his brows.

Her cheeks and nose were rosy, and her eyes were reddening; not the scarlet that swirled behind her irises, but a telltale that she had been crying. And Fred wondered why a sudden heaviness in his chest materialized at the thought of Margaret crying; nor did he understand weightlessness that simultaneously occurred when she smiled up at him.

"It's okay..." she says, "Still, I'm sorry for accusing you like that. Especially since I knew it was going to happen-"

Fred blinked. "Wait, you did?"

The side of her lip quirked up in a small smirk. "I know a lot of things, Weasley."

"But which Weasley?" he asks almost automatically, feeling her shoulders shake against his chest as she snickered silently.

"George, of course," she says, eyeing him cheekily. "Hope you haven't told Fred about... us."

Fred widened his eyes and shook his head, playing along. "Fred's an unlucky prat for not being here!"

She grinned. "Promise you won't you say anything?"

"Cross my heart and hope to d-!"

"Live," she interrupts firmly; shrugging when he looks at her with a confused smile. "I'd rather have you live."

"As you wish, princess," he says, placing a kiss on the side of her head.

"You know, I liked them a lot," Margaret says as a glittering pink-and-silver piglet soared past the window. "They are quite creative."

"Why thank you," says Fred, attempting to keep his cheerfulness despite remembering that she had spent more time looking at the fireworks (that he and George had created) with Malfoy of all people. He tried his best not to let the bitterness rise, and thankfully Margaret did not seem to notice.

"I'm sorry for the sudden sob story, by the way," she mumbles quietly a few moments later. "I don't know why I said all that... especially when I've been trying to move on from it..."

"Don't bottle it in, Margie; let it out," says Fred, slightly teasing. She scrunched up her nose at that, pushing him playfully. He chuckled. "In all honesty though," he continues, "we don't mind. And I mean all of us, not just George and I. We all have changed over the years – we are changing. And so can you."

"So..." she trails off for a second, hiding her hesitance by shifting in her place to get comfortable against him, "So... you don't, erm, you aren't disgusted... that I used to, er, ridicule people...?"

If there was something Margaret hated, it was losing her composure. It made her seem vulnerable, more susceptible to get hurt. It made her seem weak. However, what she disliked more was coming off as insecure. The slightest visible hints of it in her behaviour made her want to run for the hills so that no one would notice.

"It wasn't like I teased helpless little kids," she adds quickly, "mostly my cousin sisters who bullied us right back. Also some idiots at school... Even though that is no excuse, I suppose. At times, I didn't even notice I was being what one would consider 'rude' because I got so used to acting that way at home and at school and everywhere else... The brazenness just became a part of who- who I was..."

Fred picked up on her agitation and began tracing patterns on the back of her hand with his thumb.

"You understand that you were wrong, pumpkin, and that's more important than what you used to do or what you used to be," he tells her reassuringly. "I've only ever seen you stand up to bullies, not bully others. You said you've been trying to become better, and from what I see, you're doing a damn good job at it."

Margaret stayed quiet as he kissed the top of her head again, taking in his words and allowing them to soother her, even if momentarily.

"However," mutters Fred a minute later, frowning, "I still don't understand what that has to do with Malfoy. But," he adds, "if you... I dunno, you know better than the rest of us – If you think he's important in what's to come, then... I trust your judgement."

Margaret turned slightly to look up at him, "Really?"

Fred gave her a crooked smile. "'Course. You look like you know what you're doing... sometimes..."

"Hey!"

"Joking, love," he grins, leaning forward to place a quick kiss to her lips. "Really, really," he whispers; leaning again to kiss her longer, smiling when he felt her smile against his lips.