Prologue- PLEASE READ THIS OR YOU WILL NOT UNDERSTAND ANYTHING! - It's
Harry's sixth year at Hogwarts, and Professor McGonagall has left Hogwarts
on urgent business. Their new Transfiguration professor and Head of House
is Professor Lucinda Clarke, whom has been alive since the 1400's. She had
a curse put on her that forces her to outlive every single person who could
be considered kin. She only looks sixteen, because the curse causes her to
age slowly. She came from the Australian Ministry of Magic by Dumbledore's
request to replace Professor McGonagall.
*********************************************************************
Harry sat next to Hermione during Potions, a few days before the Christmas holidays, while Snape stood at the front of the class. "Now," he began, "I want to go over Healing Solutions again, because you all need to perfect it for your N.E.W.T's. You are all here because you possess some," he glanced at Harry, "talent in potions. We did this last lesson, so I will just go over the mistakes you made last time. Now, this potion," he said, holding up a vile of silvery white liquid, "is Potters. It doesn't include Ray of Moon, so this potion would do absolutely nothing for a sick person. This," he said, putting down Harry's and holding up another, which was more white then silver, "is a perfect example of a Healing solution. It." but he broke off, because the door to the dungeon was opened. "Hem, Hem." The class gasped, but all grinned in relief to see the Professor Clarke's face smirking at them.
"That was fun!" she said with a giggle. Snape didn't look amused. "G'day, Mr. Snape."
"Professor." Said Snape with loathing.
"Sorry, professor," she said with a grin, "but I was wonderin' if I could borrow Harry and Draco for a min? You should know, the headmaster supposedly talked to you about it."
"Don't be to long. You have less then five minutes."
"Ah, but this may take a while, you know.?"
"Fine. Potter, Malfoy, take your things and follow Professor Clarke."
"Cheers, Serverus. C'mon you two." She finished, waiting outside for them. Harry rose out of his chair; Hermione mouthing to him 'Whats this about?' and Harry shrugged. He picked up his books and crossed the room and out of the dungeon into the hall, just ahead of Malfoy. Professor Clarke was waiting for them with one of her I'm-too-sweet-you-can't-refuse-me smiles. Malfoy looked downright annoyed.
"Ok, then! Follow me!" she said with a grin, and she turned and led them back towards the school. Harry and Malfoy followed behind her, not speaking. A few minutes later they reached the Entrance Hall and continued to follow her towards her office, which had previously been Professor McGonagall's. She unlocked the door with an old key that she pulled out of her pocket, and held it open for them as they entered.
Her office looked very unique. Her desk was on the other side of the room, facing the door, and there were bookshelves and draws against unused wall. There were three couches in the middle of the room that were renaissance style, surrounding a coffee table. A fire facing the coffee table was roaring, making the room very warm. It had a lot of renaissance objects in it, ranging from a battle axe to a set of silver cutlery. They hung on the walls, which were covered in thousands of photographs that were all in black and white, which contained different people from different ages through time.
Behind her desk on the wall were at least fifteen photo's of the same people: an older woman, an older man, three handsome boys who seemed to be around the same age, 17, and four beautiful young girls, the oldest looking around 20, and the youngest looking 7, with twin girls in between looking around 16. These people were in many of the photographs behind her desk, and in most of the photo's they appeared to have aged, except for one of the twins, who didn't seem to have aged with her family at all. The rest of the photographs contained a variety of people, all of different ages in different times, and Harry noticed the only three colour photos on the wall nearest to him. One held a group of people, all looking very relaxed and laughing, another had an aerial picture of a large city, that seemed to be alive as people and various flying objects moved in and out of the frame, and the last one held a picture of Professor Clarke, looking still only sixteen, minus the black gloves she was never seen without, next to a young red haired man who looked about 20. They were in tatty clothing and looked very malnourished. They were standing in what appeared to be an endless desert, and they looked absolutely thrilled to be there. There was a small gold plaque under the photo, and as Malfoy placed his bag on the floor and flopped onto a couch in front of the fire, Harry moved in closer to read the plaque.
Emmaline Prudence Lucinda Peacedale (1400 - ) &
Robert Daniel Clarke (1768 - 1848),
After escaping Botany Bay and the First Fleet to begin a new
Wizarding Community on this 'God-forsaken hothouse!' of
a country, 1789, along with seven other convicted wizards.
Harry looked at the photo. The man, Robert, was waving at him, his convict clothing hanging loosely on him. But what Harry couldn't understand was Professor Clarke. The school had been introduced to her and Dumbledore had said her name was Lucinda Clarke. But here her name was Emmaline Peacedale. She'd told them in Transfiguration when telling his class a little bit about herself that she'd never been married, because she didn't like committing herself like that to someone only to watch them die. So why the name change? He continued to stare at the photo when he noticed that Professor Clarke was standing next to him, looking into the photo.
"That's where Hidden City is," She said, and Harry looked harder as though a giant city was going to appear in the background, "took us nearly 40 years to get it running, with the John's always looking for us. John's being the police back then." She said to his confused face. She motioned for him to take a seat on one of the couches, avoiding the fact that he, Harry, had discovered her new kind of identity.
"Ok you two," she said, taking a seat on the couch that wasn't occupied, "I'm going to make this as quick as I can. Now, I'm going away a few days before the holidays, and the headmaster has asked me to take you two with me. Draco, sit up. Now, firstly I have to call into the Ministry and see Minister Fudge, so you will both accompany me there. Harry," she said, turning to him, "once we're there I'm going to leave you in the care of Arthur Weasley, Albus says you know him, and he'll accompany you to You- Know-Where, where you'll be joined by the rest of the Weasley's when the holidays start and a few other people. Ok, that's you done. You can head beck to your dorm."
"Where am I going?" Harry asked, "Am I going to The Burrow?" Malfoy gave a smirk. Harry knew he was dying to say something, and white hot anger fueled inside him.
"Ok, um, Harry, wait for me outside me office. I won't be a few minutes with Mr. Malfoy." Harry headed out of her office, the thousands of faces following him towards the door. He leant against the cool stone wall and waited for about ten minutes, after which Malfoy emerged from Professor Clarke's office, looking very pleased with himself. But for some reason, he looked, not as Harry had seen, where his smiles where always smirks, but actually truly happy. He looked absolutely ecstatic, and didn't even give Harry a second look as he headed towards the dungeons, a spring in his step.
"Harry? You still there? In ya' come." Came Professor Clarke's sweet young voice from inside. Harry moved back in, to find her with a grin on her face looking into one of the black and white photographs, which showed a group of girls playing by a pond.
"Ok, Harry." Said Clarke, pulling out her wand from her robes and locking the door behind him. She placed it back in her pocket. "You're going to the Phoenix Headquarters, because Albus feels you'll be safer there."
"How do you know about.?"
"Harry, I'm going to tell you something that you cannot repeat. Only a few people here know this. I'm going to give you ten seconds to think about why Professor Dumbledore asked me to come to Hogwarts in the middle of last year, just after your fifth year finished. Bear in mind that I come from the second most powerful Ministry of Magic in the World, and that I know about the Order. Actually," she said, turning to face him, "I'm part of it." Harry thought. It dawned on him a few minutes later.
"You're here to look after me?"
"Yup. Listen, Lucinda Clarke isn't actually me real name. And Albus didn't actually say what part of the Ministry I was from. Take a seat." She said, motioning towards the couch before her. Harry sat down. "Do you want a drink?" Harry said yes and Professor Clarke waved her wand around and two iced drinks appeared on the coffee table. Harry took off his cloak and rolled up the sleeves. He had a feeling that the room's temperature was raised to that of an Australian summer. He took a sip of his drink that Professor Clarke handed to him and felt instantly refreshed. She sat down next to him.
"Ok, I think you figured out that me name wasn't really Lucinda. You kind of gave me a look when you were lookin' at the picture of me and Bob in the Simpson, so I, it's the Simpson Desert, Harry. You should get an atlas and have a look some time. Anyways, I figured you'd ask questions and tell Miss. Granger and Mr. Weasley. She'd figure it out and I'd have to leave. My name is Emmaline Peacedale, and I was actually the Defense Ministress of Magic in Hidden City. At first, in 1827, I was Ministress of Magic down there, but I have always specialized in Defense Magic, so I switched. I've had over 500 years to perfect meself in different branches of magic, Mr. Potter, and I've worked along side Albus a few times. When he wrote to me, he asked me if he could enlist me help in protecting you, because there are many different types of spells that I've picked up on me travels, and lots of protection spells at that, so I came here, and when I asked you to stay behind in me Transfiguration class, remember that? When I asked you about your Parrot transformation? Well, as you went, I put a couple of spells on 'ya then, and a few more when we pass in the halls, and there are a few around the castle, and there is three on Gryffindor Common Room. Does that explain anything?"
"Uh, yeah, actually."
"Good. Now drink up. We'll be leaving in three days time, but we'll be leaving at night, so I want to see you with your wand in the Entrance Hall at 9:00 in the evening. Your trunk will be sent to Mrs. Weasley at The Burrow, and she'll take it You-Know-Where. Dumbledore thinks you'd be safer leaving for the Order a few days early, cause no one will expect it."
"Ah, ok. But why did you have to change your name?"
"Dumbledore felt it was necessary. See, some people in England know me as Emmaline, but others know me as Lucinda. These other people, well, let's just say that I'd rather not have them know me true identity. So, okay dokie then. In class please continue to call me Professor Clarke, but outside you can call me Em. Cool?"
"Yeah, that's cool."
"Bonza, Harry." She said, taking a sip of her drink.
"I don't mean to be rude," Harry began, "but who are all of these people?" Em looked around at the walls.
"These are all people that I've met, lived with, worked with.most of them are dead, but, well, what can you do eh? I've got pictures of where I've lived, where I've been, and I think there's one of me getting tried as a witch and burned at the steak, that wasn't very nice, see, problem was," she said, getting up and crossing the room to a small picture, Harry following to have a look, "I'd never had any formal witch training, and this was before I knew I was a witch but after I was cursed. So it was very hard to explain to me town crier that I wasn't a witch, after being continually burned for an hour and a half and not even singeing me hair." Harry looked at the photo, not sure what to say, but upon seeing Emmaline grinning sheepishly at the picture, Harry saw the humor in it and had a closer look. The slightly younger looking Em was screaming her lungs out, flames engulfing her and smoke billowing around the onlookers. Harry saw people running to and from where she was being burned, piling on more wood and hay. Em seemed to have lost her role as a teacher and Harry could see that she was just another teenager, like himself. "Tell you what," she said, "they were so excited that they'd caught a real witch. But after I wouldn't burn, they tied me to a chair, put rocks in me dress pockets and threw me in a pond. Now that was an experience!" She laughed loudly, and Harry listened in. "I sat at the bottom of that bloody pond for three days! Three days! Then me sister came and got me out. See, I was born in Salem, and I was first tried as a witch when I was 14. Me mum was a witch, and she told me after me third unsuccessful burning that I was one too. Strange, though, see, me whole family was magic, 'sept for me sister Helen. She was me twin. Though, after a few years she didn't look like me twin anymore." Em gave a sigh. Harry wasn't to sure what to do.
"So, can't you die until everyone in your family dies?"
"Yep. Well, actually, it's everyone that shares the same bloodline as me. And I've been around for yonks, so well, I'm gonna be here for a while. I tell you, though; I've been in adolescents for the last 400 years. And it's bloody annoying. I reckon that I'm gonna be sixteen for the next 50 years, then I'll turn 17, and then I'll figure out when me next birthday is." The rumble of students outside moving to other classes became apparent.
"So you're technically a teenager like the rest of us?"
"According to the curse, yes. If you're going by records, yes. If your going by muggle records, no. See, I was sent to Australia for practicing witchcraft, with about ten other people. I was on the First Fleet! But me and the others Apparated into Cook's office and destroyed our records, and put a bloody big memory charm on the ship so that no one could remember that we were there. Once we landed, we got as far away as possible and built Hidden City. Pretty neat, huh? According to Muggle records I don't exist! Which is why I sometimes go by the name of Lucinda Clarke, 'cause I know for a fact that there is a muggle somewhere in New South Wales that has that name. So I just pretend to be her if I have to." She turned to face Harry, her teacher face back on. "Albus wants you to feel that you can talk to me, because he reckons we're in the same boat. Don't look at me as a teacher; look at me as a friend. Cause a little blue bird told me that you don't have to many people you can talk to 'bout stuff round here."
"Hermione?"
"Maybe. But seriously, I know how it feels to not have someone to talk to. If you get angry about your Godfather, then please come talk to me. Cause trust me, I've dealt with death a zillion times over." She finished, draining her drink.
"Thanks." Said Harry. "Are you always in here? Your office, I mean?"
"Pretty much."
"Who else knows you as Emmaline?"
"Albus, Minerva, Serverus and Mr. Malfoy."
"What?" Harry asked, stepping back, "Do you mean Draco Malfoy?"
"Yeah. I've known him for a while. You know those people who know me as Lucinda? Well, his family is one of them. But I told him a while ago, because he's a friend who isn't dead. But, he can't tell anyone that my name isn't Lucinda, cause if he does he will suffer a long, slow, painful death. A nasty incarnation I picked up.around. But I known him since he was 9."
"Oh. Ok." Said Harry, rather rejected.
"Anyways, just bring your wand along, and in a few days you'll be at headquarters enjoying Christmas."
"Are you going to be there?"
"I'll rock up a few weeks after you do. I got some, err, old friends I gotta see while I'm over there. Now, you got a class to go to and I got students to flirt with.only kidding!" she said with a laugh at Harry's shocked face. He smiled, finished his drink and left Em's office feeling slightly lighter, as she grabbed a few books and headed out a bit after him.
Harry sat next to Hermione during Potions, a few days before the Christmas holidays, while Snape stood at the front of the class. "Now," he began, "I want to go over Healing Solutions again, because you all need to perfect it for your N.E.W.T's. You are all here because you possess some," he glanced at Harry, "talent in potions. We did this last lesson, so I will just go over the mistakes you made last time. Now, this potion," he said, holding up a vile of silvery white liquid, "is Potters. It doesn't include Ray of Moon, so this potion would do absolutely nothing for a sick person. This," he said, putting down Harry's and holding up another, which was more white then silver, "is a perfect example of a Healing solution. It." but he broke off, because the door to the dungeon was opened. "Hem, Hem." The class gasped, but all grinned in relief to see the Professor Clarke's face smirking at them.
"That was fun!" she said with a giggle. Snape didn't look amused. "G'day, Mr. Snape."
"Professor." Said Snape with loathing.
"Sorry, professor," she said with a grin, "but I was wonderin' if I could borrow Harry and Draco for a min? You should know, the headmaster supposedly talked to you about it."
"Don't be to long. You have less then five minutes."
"Ah, but this may take a while, you know.?"
"Fine. Potter, Malfoy, take your things and follow Professor Clarke."
"Cheers, Serverus. C'mon you two." She finished, waiting outside for them. Harry rose out of his chair; Hermione mouthing to him 'Whats this about?' and Harry shrugged. He picked up his books and crossed the room and out of the dungeon into the hall, just ahead of Malfoy. Professor Clarke was waiting for them with one of her I'm-too-sweet-you-can't-refuse-me smiles. Malfoy looked downright annoyed.
"Ok, then! Follow me!" she said with a grin, and she turned and led them back towards the school. Harry and Malfoy followed behind her, not speaking. A few minutes later they reached the Entrance Hall and continued to follow her towards her office, which had previously been Professor McGonagall's. She unlocked the door with an old key that she pulled out of her pocket, and held it open for them as they entered.
Her office looked very unique. Her desk was on the other side of the room, facing the door, and there were bookshelves and draws against unused wall. There were three couches in the middle of the room that were renaissance style, surrounding a coffee table. A fire facing the coffee table was roaring, making the room very warm. It had a lot of renaissance objects in it, ranging from a battle axe to a set of silver cutlery. They hung on the walls, which were covered in thousands of photographs that were all in black and white, which contained different people from different ages through time.
Behind her desk on the wall were at least fifteen photo's of the same people: an older woman, an older man, three handsome boys who seemed to be around the same age, 17, and four beautiful young girls, the oldest looking around 20, and the youngest looking 7, with twin girls in between looking around 16. These people were in many of the photographs behind her desk, and in most of the photo's they appeared to have aged, except for one of the twins, who didn't seem to have aged with her family at all. The rest of the photographs contained a variety of people, all of different ages in different times, and Harry noticed the only three colour photos on the wall nearest to him. One held a group of people, all looking very relaxed and laughing, another had an aerial picture of a large city, that seemed to be alive as people and various flying objects moved in and out of the frame, and the last one held a picture of Professor Clarke, looking still only sixteen, minus the black gloves she was never seen without, next to a young red haired man who looked about 20. They were in tatty clothing and looked very malnourished. They were standing in what appeared to be an endless desert, and they looked absolutely thrilled to be there. There was a small gold plaque under the photo, and as Malfoy placed his bag on the floor and flopped onto a couch in front of the fire, Harry moved in closer to read the plaque.
Emmaline Prudence Lucinda Peacedale (1400 - ) &
Robert Daniel Clarke (1768 - 1848),
After escaping Botany Bay and the First Fleet to begin a new
Wizarding Community on this 'God-forsaken hothouse!' of
a country, 1789, along with seven other convicted wizards.
Harry looked at the photo. The man, Robert, was waving at him, his convict clothing hanging loosely on him. But what Harry couldn't understand was Professor Clarke. The school had been introduced to her and Dumbledore had said her name was Lucinda Clarke. But here her name was Emmaline Peacedale. She'd told them in Transfiguration when telling his class a little bit about herself that she'd never been married, because she didn't like committing herself like that to someone only to watch them die. So why the name change? He continued to stare at the photo when he noticed that Professor Clarke was standing next to him, looking into the photo.
"That's where Hidden City is," She said, and Harry looked harder as though a giant city was going to appear in the background, "took us nearly 40 years to get it running, with the John's always looking for us. John's being the police back then." She said to his confused face. She motioned for him to take a seat on one of the couches, avoiding the fact that he, Harry, had discovered her new kind of identity.
"Ok you two," she said, taking a seat on the couch that wasn't occupied, "I'm going to make this as quick as I can. Now, I'm going away a few days before the holidays, and the headmaster has asked me to take you two with me. Draco, sit up. Now, firstly I have to call into the Ministry and see Minister Fudge, so you will both accompany me there. Harry," she said, turning to him, "once we're there I'm going to leave you in the care of Arthur Weasley, Albus says you know him, and he'll accompany you to You- Know-Where, where you'll be joined by the rest of the Weasley's when the holidays start and a few other people. Ok, that's you done. You can head beck to your dorm."
"Where am I going?" Harry asked, "Am I going to The Burrow?" Malfoy gave a smirk. Harry knew he was dying to say something, and white hot anger fueled inside him.
"Ok, um, Harry, wait for me outside me office. I won't be a few minutes with Mr. Malfoy." Harry headed out of her office, the thousands of faces following him towards the door. He leant against the cool stone wall and waited for about ten minutes, after which Malfoy emerged from Professor Clarke's office, looking very pleased with himself. But for some reason, he looked, not as Harry had seen, where his smiles where always smirks, but actually truly happy. He looked absolutely ecstatic, and didn't even give Harry a second look as he headed towards the dungeons, a spring in his step.
"Harry? You still there? In ya' come." Came Professor Clarke's sweet young voice from inside. Harry moved back in, to find her with a grin on her face looking into one of the black and white photographs, which showed a group of girls playing by a pond.
"Ok, Harry." Said Clarke, pulling out her wand from her robes and locking the door behind him. She placed it back in her pocket. "You're going to the Phoenix Headquarters, because Albus feels you'll be safer there."
"How do you know about.?"
"Harry, I'm going to tell you something that you cannot repeat. Only a few people here know this. I'm going to give you ten seconds to think about why Professor Dumbledore asked me to come to Hogwarts in the middle of last year, just after your fifth year finished. Bear in mind that I come from the second most powerful Ministry of Magic in the World, and that I know about the Order. Actually," she said, turning to face him, "I'm part of it." Harry thought. It dawned on him a few minutes later.
"You're here to look after me?"
"Yup. Listen, Lucinda Clarke isn't actually me real name. And Albus didn't actually say what part of the Ministry I was from. Take a seat." She said, motioning towards the couch before her. Harry sat down. "Do you want a drink?" Harry said yes and Professor Clarke waved her wand around and two iced drinks appeared on the coffee table. Harry took off his cloak and rolled up the sleeves. He had a feeling that the room's temperature was raised to that of an Australian summer. He took a sip of his drink that Professor Clarke handed to him and felt instantly refreshed. She sat down next to him.
"Ok, I think you figured out that me name wasn't really Lucinda. You kind of gave me a look when you were lookin' at the picture of me and Bob in the Simpson, so I, it's the Simpson Desert, Harry. You should get an atlas and have a look some time. Anyways, I figured you'd ask questions and tell Miss. Granger and Mr. Weasley. She'd figure it out and I'd have to leave. My name is Emmaline Peacedale, and I was actually the Defense Ministress of Magic in Hidden City. At first, in 1827, I was Ministress of Magic down there, but I have always specialized in Defense Magic, so I switched. I've had over 500 years to perfect meself in different branches of magic, Mr. Potter, and I've worked along side Albus a few times. When he wrote to me, he asked me if he could enlist me help in protecting you, because there are many different types of spells that I've picked up on me travels, and lots of protection spells at that, so I came here, and when I asked you to stay behind in me Transfiguration class, remember that? When I asked you about your Parrot transformation? Well, as you went, I put a couple of spells on 'ya then, and a few more when we pass in the halls, and there are a few around the castle, and there is three on Gryffindor Common Room. Does that explain anything?"
"Uh, yeah, actually."
"Good. Now drink up. We'll be leaving in three days time, but we'll be leaving at night, so I want to see you with your wand in the Entrance Hall at 9:00 in the evening. Your trunk will be sent to Mrs. Weasley at The Burrow, and she'll take it You-Know-Where. Dumbledore thinks you'd be safer leaving for the Order a few days early, cause no one will expect it."
"Ah, ok. But why did you have to change your name?"
"Dumbledore felt it was necessary. See, some people in England know me as Emmaline, but others know me as Lucinda. These other people, well, let's just say that I'd rather not have them know me true identity. So, okay dokie then. In class please continue to call me Professor Clarke, but outside you can call me Em. Cool?"
"Yeah, that's cool."
"Bonza, Harry." She said, taking a sip of her drink.
"I don't mean to be rude," Harry began, "but who are all of these people?" Em looked around at the walls.
"These are all people that I've met, lived with, worked with.most of them are dead, but, well, what can you do eh? I've got pictures of where I've lived, where I've been, and I think there's one of me getting tried as a witch and burned at the steak, that wasn't very nice, see, problem was," she said, getting up and crossing the room to a small picture, Harry following to have a look, "I'd never had any formal witch training, and this was before I knew I was a witch but after I was cursed. So it was very hard to explain to me town crier that I wasn't a witch, after being continually burned for an hour and a half and not even singeing me hair." Harry looked at the photo, not sure what to say, but upon seeing Emmaline grinning sheepishly at the picture, Harry saw the humor in it and had a closer look. The slightly younger looking Em was screaming her lungs out, flames engulfing her and smoke billowing around the onlookers. Harry saw people running to and from where she was being burned, piling on more wood and hay. Em seemed to have lost her role as a teacher and Harry could see that she was just another teenager, like himself. "Tell you what," she said, "they were so excited that they'd caught a real witch. But after I wouldn't burn, they tied me to a chair, put rocks in me dress pockets and threw me in a pond. Now that was an experience!" She laughed loudly, and Harry listened in. "I sat at the bottom of that bloody pond for three days! Three days! Then me sister came and got me out. See, I was born in Salem, and I was first tried as a witch when I was 14. Me mum was a witch, and she told me after me third unsuccessful burning that I was one too. Strange, though, see, me whole family was magic, 'sept for me sister Helen. She was me twin. Though, after a few years she didn't look like me twin anymore." Em gave a sigh. Harry wasn't to sure what to do.
"So, can't you die until everyone in your family dies?"
"Yep. Well, actually, it's everyone that shares the same bloodline as me. And I've been around for yonks, so well, I'm gonna be here for a while. I tell you, though; I've been in adolescents for the last 400 years. And it's bloody annoying. I reckon that I'm gonna be sixteen for the next 50 years, then I'll turn 17, and then I'll figure out when me next birthday is." The rumble of students outside moving to other classes became apparent.
"So you're technically a teenager like the rest of us?"
"According to the curse, yes. If you're going by records, yes. If your going by muggle records, no. See, I was sent to Australia for practicing witchcraft, with about ten other people. I was on the First Fleet! But me and the others Apparated into Cook's office and destroyed our records, and put a bloody big memory charm on the ship so that no one could remember that we were there. Once we landed, we got as far away as possible and built Hidden City. Pretty neat, huh? According to Muggle records I don't exist! Which is why I sometimes go by the name of Lucinda Clarke, 'cause I know for a fact that there is a muggle somewhere in New South Wales that has that name. So I just pretend to be her if I have to." She turned to face Harry, her teacher face back on. "Albus wants you to feel that you can talk to me, because he reckons we're in the same boat. Don't look at me as a teacher; look at me as a friend. Cause a little blue bird told me that you don't have to many people you can talk to 'bout stuff round here."
"Hermione?"
"Maybe. But seriously, I know how it feels to not have someone to talk to. If you get angry about your Godfather, then please come talk to me. Cause trust me, I've dealt with death a zillion times over." She finished, draining her drink.
"Thanks." Said Harry. "Are you always in here? Your office, I mean?"
"Pretty much."
"Who else knows you as Emmaline?"
"Albus, Minerva, Serverus and Mr. Malfoy."
"What?" Harry asked, stepping back, "Do you mean Draco Malfoy?"
"Yeah. I've known him for a while. You know those people who know me as Lucinda? Well, his family is one of them. But I told him a while ago, because he's a friend who isn't dead. But, he can't tell anyone that my name isn't Lucinda, cause if he does he will suffer a long, slow, painful death. A nasty incarnation I picked up.around. But I known him since he was 9."
"Oh. Ok." Said Harry, rather rejected.
"Anyways, just bring your wand along, and in a few days you'll be at headquarters enjoying Christmas."
"Are you going to be there?"
"I'll rock up a few weeks after you do. I got some, err, old friends I gotta see while I'm over there. Now, you got a class to go to and I got students to flirt with.only kidding!" she said with a laugh at Harry's shocked face. He smiled, finished his drink and left Em's office feeling slightly lighter, as she grabbed a few books and headed out a bit after him.