Chapter 59 ~ Revenge Opportunities.

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A week after the day of Theon's gift-giving, Maxine and Rose were heading down the hill in a howling gale; one begrudging, one eager and both frozen. The weather was awful and chilled you to the bone, invoking the kind of shivers that took hours to leave your body and turning you away from the outside - well, everyone but Rose had been turned away from the outside. Maxine's friend had insisted on checking the unicorn in the care of magical creatures enclosure, giving her an excuse to pet and fuss over the animal - and had taken Maxine out with her. Maxine herself was unsure of how she had been persuaded. Perhaps it was the fact that she had been to tired to argue as Rose hauled her out, suffering from a bad nights sleep due to disturbing dreams the night before. Possibly because her sub conscious actually thought the fresh air might do her some good after she had appeared to have hallucinated. Or maybe it was just because she had had no time to object.

They reached the enclosure by the gamekeeper's hut (a hut which was empty due to the fact the roof had collapsed in the high winds) and Maxine stood back as Rose went forward to the fence and the unicorn came over, recognising Rose and seeing the handful of feed the girl held out. Maxine wasn't awestruck as she saw the creature - Rose had also dragged her down there after the beast had first been wheeled in - but she was wary. Maxine, unlike so many of the fifth years, was not taking Care of Magical Creatures. She had considered it, but her practical skills and confidence in the department were low, and whilst she enjoyed studying from the book, she tended to stay away from magical creatures. 

Rose, however, noticed her standing back and wouldn't let it pass. A budding Magizoologist who was confident in every area of the subject, she didn't seem to realise that Maxine wanted to keep away from the creature and grabbed her friend, who was in the world of her mind again, standing there, and with a sharp tug, pulled her nearer to the fence and the unicorn.

"Wait - Rose - wha-" Maxine protested as she was pulled before her friend cut in.

"Stroke it. Go on." Rose grinned and nodded at the unicorn, one gloved hand still gripping Maxine's arm, the other eating out to rub the unicorn's forehead.

Maxine pulled away. "I'd rather not." She admitted, looking at the animal, not with fear, only hesitation. "I'm-"

"Terrified? Scared? Weak? Stupid? Uncooperative?" Suddenly Maxine's sentence was filled in with snide adjectives, the source of the voice known to her only to well and located behind the two of them. Rose looked behind and her face became serious, but Maxine exhaled in preparation before turning to face the spiteful caller. She was tired and could and not in the mood for a pointless debate with a bully.

James' face brought other anger, though, as he stood there, surprisingly alone but the same maddening jeer on his face. But Maxine, trying to cool herself down, simply said in a calm voice. "James, don't start this again. Just go."

But James obviously wasn't going anywhere. "You think you an order me around?" H advanced menacingly, laughing bitterly. "Who do you think you are?"

"Your sister." She retorted quietly. "You've already expressed your hate for me, James, and I can see anything between us has gone, but don't dig yourself a deeper hole."

She knew she was baiting him, though, and he rose to that bait. "I've already expressed my hate for you, huh? Well, you'll find that I have a lot more things to say about you, things that will-"

"Well we don't want to hear them." Rose stepped in, seeing Maxine was beginning to boil. "Either you go or we do."

James noticed Rose as she spoke and sent her look of warning. "Don't you get involved in this. Your choice to befriend Lestrange is your own choice, a bad one, but you're an ok person. Now stay out of it."

Rose, though slightly taken aback at being called an 'ok person' by James, opened her mouth to continue, but Maxine was already speaking again. "James, I don't need your opinions on my friends, I need you to go. Piss off, now."

"No." James was getting hot and angry now as well. "No. I will not 'piss off'. Not until I've given you a piece of my mind."

"And I am this close to giving you a piece of mine." Maxine snapped back threateningly. 

James leant back and crossed his arms, laughing snidely. "Really? Go on, then. Give me a piece of your mind."

Rose, seeing where it was going after witnessing many sibling quarrels between Maxine and James before, tried to intervene, opening her mouth to speak. But Maxine answered straight away, heart burning as she finally let go.

"Ok, James, here's what I think of you." She spat coldly. "You are a spiteful, arrogant, egotistical piece of shit. One time, you and I were friends. But it's never going to be that way again, is it? Because your mind has been warped by prejudice and by your own sick nature. You think Slytherins are bad? Take a look at yourself. If tat's what you judge them for, then you should belong to the house. You blame others for your failures and one day, you have no one to turn to except the people who brainwashed you."

James stared at her, face frozen as the bitter words poured from her mouth. Maxine realised she was being like him now, but there was no turning back. With smoothness, she added after a pause:

"Now - do I have to ask again, James? Piss off."

"After what you've said?" There was a choke cause by anger in his voice, eyes glinting dangerously. "Oh no, I'm going to stay here and-"

"Then we'll go." Maxine had had enough, turning away as she said it and taking her friend by the arm, Rose following her movement. She felt ashamed for saying what she had said, but he driven her to it. Did she mean it? The look on his face, though mainly fury, when she had finished, had contained hurt. There was nothing to do now though, only to go. The feud would never be over unless he relented. "Goodbye, James."

James watched her go with further fury, hurt that he had certainly felt replaced by anger. As she walked away calmly, though burning inside, he grew more and more enraged by the second.

"You bitch!" His shouts carried in the wind and Maxine barely stopped herself from flinching. "One day, you'll pay, one day!"

But his last cry Maxine did not hear, this time the gale benefiting her and blocking out his angry reputations of the words. She was gone quickly, into the trees with Rose, down to the snowy lake. James still screaming after her.

"YOU BITCH! ONE DAY YOU WILL PAY! YOU WILL-"

"Oh yes she will."