Stay - Mattheo Riddle

I should have listened to Sirius

Hi all! Before we get this chapter started I just wanted to address the whole 'age thing.' As you're all well aware, they are 14. I wanted to age them up but the only reason I didn't was so that I could make the other books as well and I kept the ages the same as the books just to try and make things easier for me so that I wouldn't mess up any timelines or anything. PLEASE FEEL FREE TO IMAGINE THEM OLDER! I also picture them to be around 16 at this point in the book, but I just wanted to make it easier for myself to keep track of everything and not mess anything up. If this upsets anyone, I'm really sorry. Again, feel free to picture them as whatever age you want. 

ALSO SUPERRRR LONG CHAPTER AHEAD

Kirra and Mattheo walked inside. She had been inside Dumbledore's office a few times before; it was a very beautiful, circular room, lined with pictures of previous headmasters and headmistresses of Hogwarts, all of whom were fast asleep, their chests rising and falling gently.

Cornelius Fudge was standing beside Dumbledore's desk, wearing his usual pinstriped cloak and holding his lime-green bowler hat.

"Kirra!" said Fudge jovially, moving forward. "How are you?" 

"Fine," Kirra lied. Mattheo stepped closer to her, Fudge noticed this and instinctively took a step back from the girl as he noticed the look that the boy was giving her. 

"We were just talking about the night when Mr. Crouch turned up on the grounds," said Fudge. "It was you who found him, was it not?"

"Yes," said Kirra. Then, feeling it was pointless to pretend that she hadn't overheard what they had been saying, she added, "I didn't see Madame Maxime anywhere, though, and she'd have a job hiding, wouldn't she?"

Mattheo was a prejudiced person... he had been brought up that way but he was getting better. Kirra made him better. She made him see that blood status didn't matter, nor did it matter if someone was half giant. He softly smiled at Kirra his eyes twinkling softly as he admired how caring she really was.

He couldn't really understand it. How someone could be so kind and caring to people that they hardly knew but it made him feel a certain giddiness... he was happy to have her, and happy that she made him see things differently than how the Malfoys had brought him up to view things. 

"Yes, well," said Fudge, looking embarrassed, "we're about to go for a short walk on the grounds, Kirra, if you'll excuse us . . . perhaps if you just go back to your class —"

"I wanted to talk to her actually Mr Fudge" Dumbledore said blandly

"Wait here for me, you two," he said. "Our examination of the grounds will not take long."

They trooped out in silence past her and Mattheo and closed the door. After a minute or so, Kirra heard the clunks of Moody's wooden leg growing fainter in the corridor below. She looked around.

"Hello, Fawkes," she said.

Fawkes, Professor Dumbledore's phoenix, was standing on his golden perch beside the door. The size of a swan, with magnificent scarlet-and-gold plumage, he swished his long tail and blinked benignly at Kirra.

Kirra and Mattheo sat down in a chairs in front of Dumbledore's desk. "Are you feeling better darling?" Mattheo asked her in concern, reaching over to grab her hand. 

She turned her head to face him, offering him a small smile... but he could see right through her smile. 

"You can tell me about it you know..." he said to her, his voice unfamiliarly soft. She nodded her head softly

"I know," she responded, "I'd rather tell you than Dumbledore but it'll probably just be easier to tell the two of you at the same time," she muttered to him. Mattheo nodded his head in understanding.