Arc Two: Chapter Ten

It had been the first week of school and, Ophelia was not feeling too great. With the help of Lauder, she was able to get where she needed to be without a hassle but, the stares were not very comforting.

It was already hard enough to ignore the growing exhaustion Ophelia faced when she had to go to classes. Her teachers were all informed about her condition and took very seriously.

Some even to seriously, Mr Humber their new and soon to leave DADA teacher was very cautious about not ever stressing Ophelia. In class, he would make people do practicals that did not involve any running or serious strain on the body. Ophelia knew he was keeping an eye on her and tried to keep it hidden. Although he was falling at it. Really badly.

Ophelia and Bella had already noticed early on from the very first lesson that Mr Humber tried keeping Ophelia seated the whole lesson. Ophelia had to be honest that she did not mind as much as she thought she would have.

Due to her condition, she was always easily tired and needed to go to the hospital wing every morning to improve her physicality. DADA was always at the end of the day this meant that Ophelia would be dead tired by then, physically.

To speak the truth Ophelia appreciated the kindness her professor showed and hoped he would fare well after Hogwarts. Therefore, like a 'normal' student she had her father send someone to investigate Mr Humber.

Looking at the results it seemed that the kindness truly came from his heart and not greed. Mr Humber was a father of three, two sons and one daughter. He was a side branch of a pureblood from France, his mother came from the Selwyn pureblood family and married out of love.

Mr Humber married a pureblooded french teacher of alchemy at Beauxbatons. Mr Humber had always been good at DADA and became an Auror for the French ministry when he came out of school. He had metal to his name for catching the reaping kidnapper. The reaping kidnapper was an old male wizard that with the help of his sister kidnapped several little boys which they would sell to magical families so that the ones that could not have children used these to cover up for them. There was a high demand for young boys from the ages 0 to 6 higher than that were not wanted.

People often got away with 'adopting' such children because during the ages 0 to 6 wizards are able to adjust the appearances of children by a potion. It was an illegal potion that used to be sold at Borgin and Burkes for a hefty price.

they would make modify the potion with the use of hair strands. The more hair strands of you 'mother' the more you look like you 'mother'. Couples often changed the amounts of hair strands until they got a splendid specimen. After that, they would have the child's memory modified so that it would seem like they were always like that and was born in the family.

Although this took a long time and was a hard process lot of people did it and faked pregnancy results and birth certificates. The younger the child the better.

After the Reaping kidnapper was caught, Mr Humber was rewarded with several french medallions and a left amount fo money from the French Ministry of Magic.

It was the end of DADA class on Friday afternoon and Ophelia had a small gift for Mr Humber. She waited until everyone left even Bella.

"Ms Black, what can I do for you?" Mr Humber said nicely.

"Professor Humber, I would like to gift you these crystalized cherries as a gift for looking out for me," Ophelia said and before the professor could bring another word in she left the classroom.

there was no need to ponder on given gifts. Ophelia left the room and send Bella and Lauder back. This time she wanted to have a stroll around the castle as the sunsets alone.

Taking a deep breath Ophelia reflected on her actions and how she needs to set her real plan into motions. The time has come.