i. The Lion's Fate

Lionsgate: Gravity

The night had gone cold as the hour wound deeper into the night. In London, the skies were eternally grey, even at night they didn't succumb to blackness, but with the misty sheen on the Muddy Duck Tavern's windows, the sky was now a deep shadowy colour. The soft rains had battered the streets into a bitter wasteland and pools of water lay empty, as the cabs and walkers had retreated to the warmth of their homes.

It was Dumbledore who opened the door as a terrible splash announced the disturbance of such a pool, the wind greeting him with a brisk upturn of his pointed hat. He was able to gracefully scramble for it and keep it on his head as the wind cackled by. A bundled up figure appeared at the doorstep, folding her umbrella and wiping her boots with the tip, who quickly rustled through the door. A waiter took her purse and coat, and she drew herself together, cheeks pink from the cold.

She made quite a pretty picture. Her new pink silk kimono spread a dazzling array of embroidery across her legs and poured gracefully into a puddle of fabric swirling around her feet. The obi clapped about her middle set off a prized concave waist, perhaps aided in optical effect by a hushed pink-to-white gradient sweeping about the center, and was held firmly in place by steel buckles at the back. The obijime was just for show; there was no way a decorated string of porcelain beads could bind several layers of interfaced silk to her chest. The obi ran from just under her breast to the hip ridges in her stomach and was twisted up in an elegant knot that forced her to sit on the edge of every chair, but luckily hid the clasps that truly held her obi in place.

But for all the modesty of her draping silk, the demureness of her hair coiled neatly into a stylish bun atop her head and the calm aura of pride that swept around her like an autumn wind, her true nature was poorly concealed. She held herself with the dignity and poise of a lady, but her eyes, hungry for action, lusty for life, turbulent in their cyan colour, sharply contrasted her stately demeanor. As proper and as collected as she appeared, inside she was roiling with energy, pleading to some silent god to release her from her bodily prison. Like lanterns in foggy windows, her ice blue eyes burned with the fervent stream of life, alive and thrashing with endless vigor.

Eleksis Flamel shook Dumbledore's hand, embracing him with the other. "Oh, Albus, it is wonderful to see you again. Thank you, thank you."

The old wizard's eyes twinkled brightly. "We are happy to have you, my dear. Come, come, have a cup of mead and sit with us."

Weird was an unfit word for Albus Dumbledore. Out of the blue, perhaps. Usually and exceedingly peculiar and altogether quite impossible to describe might cover it. Just maybe. Nevertheless, there was something about him that seemed to draw the respect out of anyone in his midst, and that took him places in life.

Eleksis greeted the others in the room politely as Dumbledore poured her a glass of a honey-coloured liquid with his wand. Minerva McGonagall was present, wearing a yellow cashmere cloak with matching shoes. Eleksis kissed her on both cheeks as they were close correspondents—McGonagall ran a Transfiguration Convention once a year that the Flamels were happy to sponsor. They grasped hands and traded compliments, and Eleksis moved on.

She knelt to embrace the sprightly Filius Flitwick, smiling immensely when he dropped a kiss on her hand. "So wonderful to finally meet you in person, Mr. Flitwick," she cooed, entertained by his appearance.

"P-P-Please, Filius will do," he said bashfully, watching, entranced as she moved to Pomona Sprout, who was equally rapt in wonder by the young-looking witch.

"My, oh, my," she said in a flighty manor. "The great witch Eleksis Flamel. Over six-hundred years old…"

"Rude to call my age out, you know," Eleksis said in a way that wasn't at all assertive, rather playful and laughing. "But yes, six-hundred and twenty-eight, though I prefer twenty eight."

"Right, of course, Miss Flamel," Pomona muttered quickly. Her cheeks were flushing in embarrassment, but Eleksis coasted right over it and said kindly, "I heard of your work with the mandrakes during the Riddle crisis. Good work, good work!"

Eleksis didn't hear the murmur of thanks from the witch. She rounded on the last of the group, a tall, snakelike man with greasy black hair. His skin was pallid and moist, his eyes drawn up in a rather unflattering manner. He bowed respectfully to her, his cloak swishing softly, but he otherwise made no move for her hand. "Lady Flamel. So nice to see you."

"Lying through your teeth, as always, Severus," she said, words iced with spite. The look that crossed her face was one of repugnance and distaste and she quickly dismissed it. Frowning gives people wrinkles.

Snape didn't mind. He was not on cordial terms with Eleksis ever since she had discovered that he had been reading her thoughts when she had come to speak to the graduating class ten years ago. She had now trained herself in Occulemency in efforts to block him out, and currently, she was successful. If he pressed hard enough, he might have been able to penetrate the furled coils of her mind, but she would know about it. Basically, it wasn't worth it.

"Shall we begin?" Dumbledore said happily, motioning for them all to sit down. Pomona helped Filius up onto the couch and handed him his teacup and tray. Dumbledore, still smiling like a hyena, adjusted himself until he sat comfortably upright. "Miss Flamel? You have a proposal for us?"

She took a quick sip of the mead. She expected the routine zip that coursed through her body when she first touched the liquid and decided to take another before plunging into conversation. "I do. I have, in my household, the last surviving heir of Godric Gryffindor."

The women immediately choked on their mead. Severus, who hadn't taken a glass, shot her a look of obvious doubt. Filius had nearly spat all his out and dropped his teacup, but instead he spat the mead back into the cup and shuddered in his chair.

Eleksis had expected them not to believe her. After all, Godric's line had disappeared five hundred years ago when the esteemed heir Roy Gryffindor vanished without warning. The other relatives, eager to rid themselves of the media nuisance, let him slip away and dissolved into the wizarding peasantry. Godric was like Adam of Man; you could probably trace yourself back to him through hook or crook, anyhow.

"Yes," she said nonchalantly. "Roy and Aurore Gryffindor vanished during the Gryffindor family Lineage Scandal, but Aurore was with child. They fled to Indochina and started a coffee farm with the Muslims on Malaysia. Three generations later, with a man named Stollexius Gryffindor, they re-entered with wizarding community; meaning, of course, he closed the farm and moved to Sicily. I know this based on local history and myths among the Malaysian people, including one that said Stollexius could transform himself into a lion, and the fact that his wife, Mia, was burned at the stake for witchcraft."

"Ahh, I see," Dumbledore said with an enlightening glint in his eyes. "This Stollexius was an Animagus."

"Precisely," chirped Eleksis. "I made contact with Stollexius after his move to Italy and convinced him to remarry for the sake of Godric's lineage. He did not remarry, but had an illegitimate son by a pureblood witch, Menessa Bennett, named Benjamin. Henceforth, I have been able to secure pureblood marriage arrangements up until this century, at which point only one remains."

"Only one?" Minerva said with a dubious quirk of her eyebrow. "How can that be—only one descendant of an age-old family?"

"I've traced the lineage down through the eldest son. Recently, the latest one and his immediate relatives have perished in the Death Eater attacks, since the Dark Lord has picked up their trail." She looked slightly offended, as if all her centuries of searching had been diminished in wonder since a fledgling terrorist organization could root out the heir in a matter of months. "The return of Gryffindor's heir could spark unwanted morale for the wizarding populace, something the Dark Lord does not want. I found the child thirteen years ago, and raised and trained her in my household."

The room was completely silent. Eleksis could sense questions brewing in their heads, but she merely took a breath and returned to speaking. "My proposition is this, Albus: you take the girl, school her and protect her for two years, then we release her to fight the Dark Lord alongside the other Aurors."

Albus scratched his head. Eleksis poured herself a small dose of mead. "Don't worry, Albus. She's more than capable—I trained her myself. She's already Apparition-certified and she's developing quite a Patronus."

"Of that I have no doubt, Eleksis," he said, a troubled expression gracing his wrinkly features. "Other wise you would never have asked it of me. My qualm is this: we are presently hosting Harry Potter on Hogwarts grounds, partially for protection, and if we place another, ah, hot-ticket item on campus, the danger factor may multiply exponentially. The parents of the other children would be especially worried."

"You have kept Gryffindor's secret until now," piped up Minerva. "Why not finish training her, change her name and let her in to the wizarding community?"

"She is probably aware of who she is, up to the point where even a Memory Charm couldn't part it from her brain," Albus said. "All a Death-Eater would have to do is comb through her thoughts." He inhaled sharply, holding the breath for a moment before letting it seep through his lips. "Now I understand why you have come."

Eleksis set her cup down and folded her hands in her lap. "There is another reason."

They listened intently; Eleksis bowed her head as if in shame. "I am a dying woman. Nicholas and I have enough Elixir to last us through the century; after that, we are naturally viable. I expect our health to plummet in the first year we come off it, and death is predicted in the second, if not, third year. My time has come. I cannot successfully shield her any longer. My social resources are thin and I have no one left whom I trust enough to effectively secure her future, at least until womanhood."

She turned to Albus. Over the rim of his half-moon glasses, he could see the blur of her face, unfocused in the light. Her eyes, even without the aid of lenses, were clearly blue, and he could read the worry in them from a mile away. Sighing heavily, he looked at McGonagall, who dropped her gaze to the floor. "I suppose there is nothing we can do at this point. The Dark Lord will kill her, or she will waste away in the darkness. And I have no intention of muddling your life by forcing you to keep her away, Eleksis. Minerva?"

McGonagall gave him a pleading look, but he didn't concede. "Oh, I suppose. We'll take her into Gryffindor this semester—"

"Oh, no, I'd rather her be Sorted, just like any other student," Eleksis pronounced in a prim fashion. The satisfaction swept about her like a blizzard. "She is to be a Hogwarts pupil, not a celebrity. It was the paparazzi that chased the Gryffindor family away in the first place."

"Yes, I can see to that. She'll be Sorted with the rest of the first years in front of the entire school on the first day. I will request, as assistant headmistress, that she come to Hogwarts before the rest of the students to explore the grounds. Having her wandering places she shouldn't be—"

"Minerva, she is a normal student, as Eleksis outlined," Snape said, finally pouring a healthy cup of mead. "She should come by the train as all other do, sail across the lake with the lanterns, and, as mentioned, be Sorted alongside all other first years attending Hogwarts."

"Severus is right," Pomona said, closing her eyes and nodding placidly. "She is a first year."

"I don't see why all this is necessary," McGonagall said. She was evidently flustered after being shot back twice. "She is the last heir of Gryffindor! She will be placed in Gryffindor. She older than the rest of the first years; she'll feel stupid marching in with them—"

"Minerva, she wants to attend Hogwarts, and I hope that she receives everything Hogwarts has to give, knowledge, tradition, and all."

And that was the end of it. Eleksis had won. She thanked each of them by name and rose to her feet. The fabric from her kimono that she had pulled back to sit now swept elegantly back into place, the rustle of fine silk ushering her towards the door. She hailed a maidservant and sent for her things.

"What is this child's name, Mrs. Flamel?" Minerva's eyes appeared over the rims of her glasses, the chains holding them in place jingling as she stood.

"Audrinne Gryffindor," Eleksis said after a moments pause. "Audrinne."

McGonagall tapped the air lazily with her wand. An envelope morphed out of the tip, which she caught primly in her hand and handed to Eleksis, who tucked it in her obi. "Thank you, Minerva."

As she embraced her, Eleksis whispered in her ear, "There is one here who will turn her against herself. Please, watch over her."

Minerva couldn't help but smile. Eleksis had indirectly admitted that she knew Audrinne was bound for Gryffindor. But the request startled her. As cryptic as it was haunting, Minerva felt a twinge in her gut that told her there was an ounce of truth in it. "She will be safe, Ellie, I promise you," she whispered back, pulling apart. "Wonderful to see you, Eleksis. Keep in touch."

"I always am, Minerva. Thanks you, Misters Flitwick and Snape. And Pomona."

She looked flattered to be called by her first name. She rose, hand on her heart, flocking to Eleksis' side. "Yes, Mrs. Flamel?"

"Do go easy on Audrinne. She tried her hand at Muggle plants…killed them all, even the cactus. Try not to hold it against her that she's less nurturing than a desert. I can't imagine how awful she'll be with magical ones." She winked and smiled happily.

"I…I'll see what I can do," Pomona said. "Merlin, I'll make a good herbologist out of her, if it's the last thing I do."

"You're too kind," Eleksis said, slipping into her quilted silk coat. She took the stylish baklava from the maid, hugging Albus before thumping it on her head, and sprang out into the street, wand in hand. Before the door had closed she had Disapparated, and the party in the tavern dispersed silently to enjoy their summer.

----------

Audrinne Gryffindor was, indeed, beautiful. In her face were so smoothly blended the sharp features of her mother, a commanding and proud businesswoman of French descent, with the soft blood of her father, a handsome man from the western side of Italy. She seemed to have lost his Apennine black hair colour: instead, long tresses of stark blonde poured from her delicate scalp onto slender, skinny shoulders, and at last ended just over the budding thrust of her bosom. She had bristly black lashes that arched elegantly away from her face and high cheekbones that sloped obliquely into the button of her nose. It was an arresting face, infused with a formless radiance that lit her features with a lovely glow, spreading a gracious layer of splendor from scalp to chin.

But perhaps her most renowned facial trait were the burning tigers that blazed on either side of her nose. Her eyes were a warm gold; it is impossible to argue yellow, as yellow gives off a sickly, pale flush, unlike the rich furls of radiant amber she had bundled around opaque pupils. She had not consciously realized the power in her eyes and she used them senselessly on passersby, the women of which were offended and the men completely smitten. Perhaps it was better that she left the power relatively inert; she was capable in every other manner.

Presently, she was due to call on her matron, Eleksis Flamel, who was entertaining several guests in the Flamel's teahouse, the Lionflower. She, clad in green American Eagle capri sweats and a 'modified' t-shirt—meaning she had ordered a bigger size and cut the neck wider so it would drip over one shoulder when she stood still—would be coming from her dance class about six blocks away. She stuffed her things in her dance bag, checking to make sure she'd gotten both of her pointe shoes; it was a complete disaster the last time she'd been in a rush and left one behind…she had just broken her new pair in so it was critical she held on to them.

After a moment of reckless driving, she found herself on the bamboo walk to the teahouse. The Lionflower certainly looked out of place in downtown Manhattan; amongst the routine bustle of the city, the screaming horns and pedestrians, the pistol shots on the blacktop, and the soft revving of a thousand Mercedes were the quaint two acres of land styled like metropolitan Kyoto, Japan. The teahouse had the pitched roof of a Shinto temple and the sliding rice paper doors painted with the Kanji symbol for 'magic lover' complete with a cobbled front walk framed by decorated bamboo shafts inscribed with foreign prayers. The atmosphere instantly became calm, as if the rush of the city was immediately cancelled at the initial border; after the first few feet up the walk, the world transformed, molding into the shapes and colors of some distant universe: one of peace, quiet, and beauty.

It was completely in character for Eleksis, Audrinne always thought. Eleksis had been fascinated with the pleasure districts of Japan ever since she was…well, you couldn't call her young, but she had liked them for a long time. She had taken to wearing geiko kimono and adopted several of their customs, three of which she forced on Audrinne: music, singing, and especially dance. Eleksis was addicted to beauty, and, somehow, Audrinne always felt like Eleksis was trying to satisfy her thirst by enrolling her foster daughter in dance. Audrinne loved to dance, but the Noh and Kabuki style dances—the ones popularized by geiko in feudal Japan—were so boring and symbolic that she wanted to hang herself. While she took lessons in those from the co-mistress of the teahouse, she took modern and hip-hop downtown.

Dance where she got to toss her chest out and twirl around was the best kind of dance. Modern dance was quirky and strange, but it was exhilarating and artsy. There was lots of jumping and falling, throwing her neck back, arching up to the ceiling, and swishing in circles, all things she loved. If she was tired and sore by the end of the dance, then she was more than satisfied. That's why her passion for hip-hop had grown as she had gotten better: each move was energetic and provocative, but not forceless and slutty.

Now she was faced with a decision. She was fifteen minutes early. She could add ten minutes, since Eleksis never called in as soon as she arrived. That gave her almost half an hour. She smiled wickedly to herself, and turned on her heel, sprinted across six lanes of clogged traffic, down an alleyway, and stopped, excited, at a grimy blue door leading down a narrow hallway, crammed with velvet curtains and miscellaneous other things. She weaved through it expertly, her ears catching a thundering beat reverberating from somewhere in the mess.

'The way you look at me, I'm feeling you…'

She dropped her bag and snatched her pointe shoes from it almost angrily. The speed that consumed her was spawned directly from her craving for that mustic—she crammed her feet into her shoes and flexed her toes, feeling them lock into a tapered tip. She grabbed her bag again and started running.

'Ring the alarm, the club is jumpin'…'

She sprang into the room with a panicked expression on her face. The girls in the room had already started dancing, their hands straying from their waists straight in the air, then sweeping down as the dropped to shimmy backwards. A group of black boys hung limply on the boom box that was blaring Ciara and Chamillionaire's Get Up and they didn't spare her a sideways glace. Their eyes were transfixed on the dancers on the cracked stage.

She could care less about them. She watched the girls closely, tracking their movements, and jumped beside the closest once before sliding into position. At last! Happiness flooded her as she popped her butt out and sank to the floor, springing up and flicking her head so her hair would scatter into a wide arc. The music slowed into the bridge, and she continued, just as vigorous without the speed. But the other girls had broken down and they folded out, eyes on her, trying to catching the move again.

'Spicy just like hot sauce…'

Audrinne used her pointe shoes. She pirouetted in a close circle before dropping back to earth and popping her body to the side. A dancer joined her. Then another. They drew together, shaking, dipping, flinging, a whirlwind of arms and hair. The joy flowed through the room like a winter wind. As the song ended, they mutually moaned before sinking to the floor, panting and spent.

"We thought you wouldn't show so we started without you," Maria said. "Please don't be upset."

Maria was the best dancer out of the other girls. She was Spanish and she practically wore the country on her face; her eyes were dark and her skin tan, sporting a full head of black hair. She looked like the stereotypical Spanish beauty, but when played alongside her dance, she was something else, something earth breaking…

Two of the girls Audrinne didn't recognize, but three we quite familiar. Kasci, the Asian girl who worked as eye candy at a low-profile nightclub, was there in her favourite blue sweats, and it looked like Corinne was borrowing Kasci's green shorts. Corinne was dreadfully thin, almost in a fashion that was uncomfortable to look at. Her skin wasn't completely black, but she was certainly of colour, and that helped add a bit more substance to her frail body.

Brooke, however, was definitely plus-sized. Despite her extra weight, she always dressed attractively; she didn't try to squeeze into smaller sizes, she wore shirts with ruffles or dark colours, and she never wore shirts with words. This may have reflected her character in the slightest as she was very quiet. Audrinne liked to think she spoke in her dance.

"Let's do another," Corinne said between gasps of air. "I have Fergalicious on another CD."

"Pull it out, then," Maria said, walking towards Audrinne with her hands on her hips to catch her breath. "Audrinne, can I speak with you for a moment?"

They drew aside and huffed and puffed together for a moment before Maria asked, "So did you get into the school?"

Maria was not harmlessly curious about Audrinne's schooling. Maria was a witch herself—that's why she was as good at dance as she was. Maria had graduated from Beauxbatons two years ago and moved to America to continue dancing, and ever since she'd met Mrs. Flamel and her daughter, she had inexplicably stuck around instead of enrolling in Julliard or auditioning elsewhere. Perhaps it was because New York's wizarding community wasn't fully established yet, and if she went anywhere else, she'd be totally alone.

Audrinne debated. She knew her matron had visited the headmaster and heads of houses but she wasn't sure whether or not she was accepted. Eleksis was a damn good silver tongue, but against Dumbledore, the greatest wizard since Merlin, it would be hard to say.

"I don't know yet," she said. I'm supposed to be dropping in the teahouse now, and I think that's when Auntie was going to tell me. Why don't you come for dinner? I'll say you took master class at the studio and we were released at the same time."

"Mrs. Flamel will know, she's Legilimate. Hopefully she won't mind," Maria said, gathering her things and turning towards the break in the curtains. Corinne and the boys called to them, but they waved goodbye, and vanished into the darkness.

They jogged up the alley and back through traffic. When they stepped on to the stones of the bamboo walk, the noise from the street evaporated. The serenity of the grove surrounded them, layering them in thick sheets of tranquility, stillness, and splendor. Smiles slipped silently across their lips. They had entered Eleksis' realm.

The rice-paper lanterns lit up as they approached the door. The insulated shoe racks stood to one side, both completely full, but the put their things in a larger cubby overhead. Audrinne and Maria knelt, as was custom, slid open the door, bowing to the floor before scrambling to the other side. They then repeated the motion—kneel, shut, bow—almost as a routine rather than a ritual. The other mistress of the teahouse was very keen on observing old feudal customs, including the no-shoe and door-opening policies of ancient Japan.

The mistress was working with the calculator at the ochaya desk. She barely glanced up and then suddenly double took a look back. "Audri-chan, you're mother excepts you to dance in five minutes. She's in the Lotus Room." Her head then dropped back to the ledger.

"Can you dance with me?" Audrinne asked Maria. "You know 'Cruel Rain' and 'The Lighthouse's Tale'—"

Maria was at the door in an instant, kneeling and shoving the door open wide. "Maria, if you have to go—"

"I need my pointe shoes."

Audrinne suddenly remembered that she had come her in hers; sure enough, the bottoms were scuffed and dirty. She cursed herself over and over. These were a brand new pair…

Maria returned from outside after several series of bowing and kneeling. She put her shoes on right there in the lobby despite the mistress' disproving stare from the desk. They rushed into one of the corridors in pursuit of the Lotus Room. The hallways were narrow and usually clogged with serving maid traffic; the maids carried trays of sake and sushi, or brought instruments into rooms for a musician to play once the patrons were drunk enough. Some even had to clean up the drunken messes made by excessive drinkers, but mostly they were runners. In the Lotus hallway, however, there were no maids, probably because Eleksis had ordered them to vacate that side of the teahouse so she could conduct business.

Maria grabbed Audrinne's arm. "No one is looking. I'll change us."

She muttered something under her breath, pulling her wand from her sweats. She twirled the tip at Audrinne in an artsy fashion—something was wrong. Audrinne felt like she was Apparating; she was being compressed around her middle and the air shot out of her lungs with a ragged huff. She rushed to cradle her dying chest and her hand met a soft silken fabric. Yes, of course, Maria had put her in a kimono. Maria was wearing an identical one of white and pink. The obi was rose and black, and their collars were red and black. "Good job, Maria-san. You even remembered the right collar colour."

"I practically live here," she whispered before kneeling to open the door.

"Maria! Hair!"

"Right!"

With another flick, their hair curled up elegantly into a bun framed by a braid at the top of their heads. Then Maria slipped the door open.

--fin--

Author's Note: Thanks for the read-through guys! I think it's awesome that people are actually reading this, it was an absolute pleasure to write. I'm practically dying to post it. Thanks again for your time

Technical Note: The songs 'Get Up' by Ciara and Chamillionare and 'Fergalicious' by Fergie and Will.i.am aren't around at the time of Harry Potter, but they are such awesome songs. Bear with me, people. heart