Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any of the related characters, settings and other such stuff.


Sunlight streamed through stained glass windows. Great, tinted shadows of red and green, yellow and blue cast themselves across the large room, creating a warm glow of such varied hues to permeate the very atmosphere of the office. It seemed, all of a sudden in this phantasmagoria of morning tones, a very homely place. The small clutter of personal objects, scattered haphazardly around the room, the vast expanses of empty space between them casting an illusion more powerful than any magic and making the room seem all that much larger. As the sunlight began to hit these possessions, a small number of them would begin to move and turn and within a matter of minutes, as the rising sun cast the long shadows across the whole room, the office was alive with noise and motion, the sights and sounds of a working, living home.

For this room was home to the man who lay at his desk, his head pressed flat against the mahogany desk, his breathing deep and peaceful. It would be home for a little less than a year, if he what he suspected was true, and he had certainly thought before falling into his relaxed sleep that it would be a very good one. He had not yet seen the effect the morning light would have on his collection, nor how the hues of the house colours would gently saturate the air with warmth and a gentle sense of belonging. Still, he had known - known that his choice was right, known that this would be a very good place to stay indeed.

Some hours after the sun had begun to cast its friendly glow through the brightly coloured windows of his office, Tom Riddle began to stir.

He opened his bleary eyes and blinked away the feeling of exhaustion, pulling himself upright to a sitting position in his high-backed chair. He stretched, his back pressing against the comfortable velvet surface and he pushed gently, first with one shoulder-blade, then the other, finding the back cushion of the chair to be exceedingly comfortable. He shifted his posture, placing weight on each side of his pelvis in turn, before sitting back, closing his eyes, and sighing. He tilted his face up, resting the very top of his head against the back of the chair and smiled slightly. Then, suddenly, he stopped.

His eyes snapped open.

Something wasn't right.

He frowned for a moment, staring at the ceiling intently, before realisation dawned on him, a slowly approaching understanding that passed across his mind like the tinted shadows had his office. He snorted quietly and turned to look behind him, spinning on the chair.

"Hello Albus," he said curtly.

"Professor Riddle!" exclaimed the old man in the portrait behind him. It was a large portrait - much larger than any other in the room, although he couldn't see what the old man had done to deserve that - rimmed with ornate gold and painted in almost perfect likeness. The portrait's voice seemed pleased to see him. "I do like what you've done with the room."

"Done with it?" Riddle snapped. "I haven't done anything but walk in here. Who set up this stupid personalisation charm, anyway?" There was a quiet, subdued cough, probably from an older headmistress. Riddle's head snapped round to follow the source of the noise, only to note a small, inconspicuous portrait with a plain wooden frame, halfway across the room. "It's utterly ridiculous," he spat at her, temper rising. "Why would I want the four house crests..."

He was interrupted by a small cough behind him.

"Actually, Tom, most headmasters would have only one," came a snide comment. He recognised the portrait - Phineas Nigellus. His tutor had mentioned him. "It's set to pick up on the old house of the new head, and pick a colour scheme around that. With you, the charm has clearly confused itself."

"Clearly," Tom repeated icily. "Well, if you'll excuse me, I have a confused room to sort out."

He walked briskly to the room's centre and began to cast a series of transfigurations and charms. He began by covering the wall of portraits, despite their pleas of protest, with a thick, plain curtain. With a shudder he pulled the walls inwards, making the room smaller, less spacious. He got rid of the windows, replacing them with thick stone walls - and the room was plunged into darkness. Phineas Nigellus spoke up from behind the curtain.

"You know, some would consider creating a new light source before removing..."

Within moments, the office was covered with a glass ceiling, dome-shaped, surrounded by a ring of candles. Tom quickly cast a charm to conjure a lit chandelier only when it was dark, and to banish it as day broke. The result was a well-lit, small but comfortable office space, neither impressive nor exuberant, though he had made it octagonal out of a personal love of regularity. A quick charm conjured two doors on the angled walls behind his desk - one led to a door in the Library, connected magically; the other, to his bedroom. He put his wand back in his pocket after a quick flick to open the curtains. He let his predecessors (now situated on the three side walls of the office) see his handiwork, and let out a satisfied smirk and the looks of shock on many of their faces. He quickly checked the door to the Library - it worked, surprisingly, despite his work on spatial connection charms being in the very early stages of development - before turning to his bedroom. He needed a quick rest - transfiguring the room might not have been too difficult, but the door to the library and chandelier charms had really taken it out of him. He slammed the door behind him, ignoring Albus' call, and sat on his small, single bed. He sat and breathed, focusing his mind on the feeling of air flowing in and out of his throat, meditating to slowly recover his energy. He let himself relax and fell backwards, glad that the bed was both soft and warm.

A few minutes later he sat up, worst of the magical exhaustion dealt with, and he turned to his desk. There was already a small pile of books sitting at the side and he sighed as he recognised the task before him. He only had a few more weeks until term started and he had yet to find any of the things he had needed; he sincerely hoped the Hogwarts library would serve him better. Closing his eyes briefly, he pulled himself off the bed and wandered over to the desk, dropping onto the stall that stood next to it and pulling the first book and a roll of parchment over to him. He picked up his quill, dipping it in ink, and began to make notes as he flicked slowly through the heavy, ancient, dust-filled tome. It crossed his mind, once or twice, that it had been years since anyone had read this particular volume, but he brushed the thought aside impatiently. It was, after all, no surprised that anyone would avoid a book of such dark magic and, besides, the author's style was overly dull. He wouldn't have cared if the book were by Merlin himself, the choice of words was archaic and the detailing nothing short of non-existent.

It took him an hour or so to find the information he had been looking for, with a further mind-numbingly dull hour of copying charts and diagrams, lists and instructions. He was, eventually, done; he set down his quill and flipped the book closed with a satisfying thud. His eyes flicked to the cover. Oh. It was written by Merlin. Figures.

He allowed himself a moment to stretch, before pulling the ancient book on early magical theory towards him, as well as a pile of his own papers from previous note-taking exercises. He sat and compared his notes, making corrections and furiously slashing lines through work he deemed incorrect, cross-referencing everything against the magical theory every once in a while when his own impressive knowledge of the subject was not enough.

'Add one pinch of powdered mandrake root,' he scribbled above one set of potions ingredients, before drawing five extra runes in an already complicated pentacle diagram. As he finished the last stroke of a rune off with a satisfying flick, he heard his door creak open slightly. Within moments, his wand was in his hand, his desk charmed to look as if he had been reading a simple novel, or doing paperwork, or whatever the viewer thought was most appropriate. He turned to face the door, only to find his intruder was nothing more than a house elf, laden with brightly coloured clothing and carrying a tray of warm drinks and food.

"Dobby thought Mister Riddle sir would like something to eat and drink," squeaked the elf, looking hopefully up at Riddle with his large, pleading eyes. Riddle sighed.

"Thank you... Dobby, was it?" he inquired of the eccentrically-dressed elf.

"Yessir," the elf replied, his high pitch squeal of a voice suddenly also very fast, too. Riddle smiled; it seemed even the elves were frightened of him, and he had done nothing to them yet. Word must travel quickly. The elf shuffled closer to him and handed him the tray, before bowing slightly and scurrying out of the room as fast as his little legs could carry him. Tom grinned - his reputation could be very, very amusing at times.

He stood up himself, walking out to his main office and setting the tray down on his desk. He could afford to take a short break, he decided, and anyway, it wasn't as if he hadn't got much time. Indeed, he had until the first of September, which was... He consulted his calendar. A little less than a month. No hurry at all.

The tray itself contained a great many interesting items from the kitchens. Aside from the strong pot of black coffee and the small teapot, there were three small bowls of various soups, a selection of bread, a platter of sliced cheese and meats, a banana and, to top it all off, a pork pie. Nobody could ever say that Tom Riddle was extravagant and he was often very pleased to remark that a small, deceptively plain meal like this would always be better than any hog roast or steak. It was, perhaps, an overstatement, but Riddle honestly believed that there was no meal better than a simple soup, bread, cheese and cold meat lunch.

What surprised him was that the house elves knew his preferences without him ever telling them. He had never really made a study of the small creatures - though the girl in the photo before him would urge him strongly to understand their magic - and so was not sure if such powers were natural to them. What he did know was that house elves never wore clothes - certainly not a large collection of multi-coloured socks. He mulled over the thought in his head, but could not come to any conclusion other than Dobby having been freed at some point; he reminded himself that he should ask the little elf about this at some point. In the meantime, he was more than happy to sit in his office and enjoy the meal in front of him, savouring each mouthful, glad to take a break from his notes, however short that break may be. As he slowly sipped on a spoonful of firecrab soup (a rare, exceedingly spicy dish that he would have to instruct the house elves not to cook again, whether for the whole student body or simply for himself) an idea came to him. He swallowed a mouthful of the blistering hot liquid, enjoying the explosive taste as it poured down his throat, before chewing thoughtfully on the soft cube of meat that remained. As he chewed, scalding juice squeezed out from the meat itself, sending an involuntary shiver down his spine.

The firecrab meat was so overwhelmingly full of taste and spice that, for a moment, he almost forgot what he was going to say next.

"Albus?" he asked eventually, when the spicy taste had been drowned from his tongue with a mouthful of coffee.

"Yes, Tom?" replied the old man happily, glad that Tom no longer seemed angry with him. Tom still refused to turn around and face him.

"How much does Harry know about Horcruxes?"


Ginny had shut herself up in her room. She wasn't locked in - her door was always slightly ajar and she showed no signs of stopping her family if they walked in. On the first day, she didn't react, barely responding if she was brought food and water, not responding at all to any kind of human touch or spoken word. Everyone was certain that she was scared or worried, and the family came to the natural conclusion that she was in shock after the attack. It was some time before anyone realised that it was not herself, or her family's safety, that had her so worried. Eventually, they realised that the shock of Harry leaving had taken its toll.

It was Bill who first realised. He remembered knocking on her door during their second day, and pushing it open with one arm when there had been no response. In his other arm, he carried a tray of cold lunch and soup that Molly had made; while Ginny refused to leave her room, Molly and Muriel insisted that she would still be well-fed. Her brothers took turns carrying trays of food in and making sure she ate as much as she could, trying to get her to talk.

Bill stepped in quietly and shut the door behind him, looking over at his younger sister who sat on the end of her bed, her head in her arms.

"Hey Ginny," he said softly. His sister nodded in recognition. His lips twitched slightly in a smile and he moved to sit next to her, leaving the tray on a bedside table. Wrapping one arm around her shoulders, he leaned down to her level. "Are you ok?"

"Mmm," she replied, her tone suggesting an affirmative. Bill sighed.

"Really, Ginny? Mum's been worried sick."

"Isntmeshnedbewrdfr," Ginny mumbled. Bill sat confused for a moment, his curse-breaking skills not quite enough to aid in translating teenage mutters. He hummed questioningly, trying to provoke a response. It didn't work.

"Pardon?" he asked eventually.

"It isn't me she needs to be worried for," Ginny said, softly and quickly. Bill quickly understood.

"You're worried about Harry, aren't you?" he asked, not really needing an answer. She nodded, biting her lip. Bill pulled his younger sister into a hug, tight and comforting. After a minute or two, he pulled her back up to a sitting position, and pulled over the tray, trying to get Ginny to eat. "Here, Ginny, have you ever tried firecrab soup..."


By the third day, Ginny was speaking to people who came to visit properly, exchanging questions and answers and having civilised conversations. She did not seem quite herself, though, as if all the energy behind her personality had suddenly vanished and a usually powerful, intense person had become very meek and quiet. It was her emotional response, or lack thereof, that made her seem quite so disinterested in the world around her. She simply stopped showing signs of emotion, choosing instead to hide behind a mask of indifference, her features blank and her eyes lifeless. She showed no sign of enjoying the food she was given, or of feeling sad when Molly tripped and fell. Ginny simply remained utterly devoid of any kind of emotion and while her mother could see only the improvement in her daughter - the conversation, the movement, the life - there was very definitely a darker side to Ginny's behaviour, a side that was slowly driving the rest of the family sick with worry.

Bill sighed to himself as he climbed the stairs to go to bed late in the night on the third day. This war, these death eaters, had denied him his honeymoon, something he tried not to be bitter about. He knew that Fleur was trying, too, but she didn't have a younger sister who had gone into some kind of depression to keep her mind occupied. He knew that she was beginning to get upset that her honeymoon had been taken from her and did everything he could to make it up to her. Still, she was not impressed enough.

"When I was leetle," she said softly as Bill walked to his side of the bed and slowly, sleepily, began to change, "'I 'ad always wanted to visit Italy for ma 'oneymoon. Eet seemed like such an ideal place."

Bill picked up the edges of the covers and slid underneath, scooting over to wrap one arm around her shoulders. She didn't turn - he didn't expect her to - but lay as she was, reading a French book intently. He kissed her softly on the cheek.

"Why Italy?" he asked, in a hushed whisper.

"Because eet always sounded so exotic," she replied after a long pause of quiet. It was a nice kind of quiet, the kind of quiet you get when you can hear the person you love's breathing and the quiet, gentle beating of their heart, and the air seems almost filled with their warmth and their love. "Eet 'ad 'istory and beauty. Eet seemed nicer than France, or England."

Bill pulled himself onto his side, wrapping his other arm around her waist and lying next to her, his eyes not leaving her face for a moment. Even now, even after all this time, she was so wonderfully perfect - and she loved him! He couldn't help but be overwhelmed around her, his thoughts chaotic yet calm, his whole being so confused that someone so wonderful could love him, even with his scars and his wolf-like nature. He blinked, dragging his mind out of the confusion and back to the conversation at hand.

"It does seem like the right place," he agreed, rubbing her side with his fingertips. She didn't move, continuing to stare at her book in concentration, paying him only the slightest bit of attention. "Perhaps we could go there after all this is over?"

Only then did she turn on her side to face him, her book thrown haphazardly off the bed. She took his face in her hands and kissed him, her lips soft and warm against his, her tongue softly - so, so softly - pressing against his mouth, searching. He opened his lips slightly, their breath warm and fast and heavy, her tongue now exploring his mouth and his toying with it.

After a moment, they broke apart, each slightly out of breath with and giggling, softly and childishly, into the night.

"I do not really care where ma 'ooneymoon eez," she whispered eventually, pulling herself closer to him and tracing a spiral pattern on his chest with ther finger. "Eet does not mattair, as long as I 'ave you."

Bill grinned, the absurdity and confusion of the situation overwhelming him once more. He wrapped his arms tightly around her.

"I would even," she carried on, her voice lower than a whisper - and Merlin, was she seductive when she did that! - "consider 'aving one 'ere."


Fred and George were very worried about Ginny, come the fifth day at Muriel's. Nobody had stepped outside the house since the wedding, knowing they were being watched and nowhere outside was safe, and they felt the stress of being cooped up inside was not helping Ginny's clear upset and nervous state. They weren't entirely sure what they could do about it, though, until help arrived in the form of an owl.

Ginny's sixth-year book list.

The Twins' idea was simple. If they could safely get the family to their shop in Diagon Alley, they could take Ginny out shopping for her school equipment whilst at the same time hopefully getting her some fresh air and cheering her up, taking her mind off this self-enforced confinement. They also hoped that they could use the opportunity to find out what was going on in the wider world - the WWN was not being particularly helpful, being heavily influenced by the Voldemort-controlled ministry.

The trip would serve to release not only Ginny's tension, but everyone else's as well. Nobody liked being cooped up in such a confined space, everyone sharing rooms (aside from Ginny, whose shaky emotional state in the first few days had earned her a room of her own, the twins and Charlie giving theirs up and sleeping on the sofas so that nobody else was disturbed) in a house that was far too small to accommodate such a large family comfortably. Molly had begun to snap at even the tiniest of things; Arthur, too, seemed pale and frightened a lot of the time, wondering what he would do once he returned to work now that his boss was, technically, Voldemort. Bill and Fleur seemed stressed - and rightly so, having missed out on their honeymoon. Indeed, the only person who seemed unaffected was Muriel, who seemed rather pleased to have so much company and excited that something interesting was happening, despite the desperate sadness of the situation. The Twins were certain that everyone would benefit from a trip to Diagon Alley and, since it needed to be done at some point, why not go sooner than later?

"Absolutely not," Molly Weasley said in a stern voice, turning back to the stew she was seasoning - even when she was technically a guest in someone else's house, nobody dared to cross Molly in the kitchen and tell her to let someone else cook.

"But mum, you have to admit..." started George.

"... everyone needs to get out," finished Fred. Molly eyed them suspiciously. She opened her mouth to respond, but George cut in.

"It would be great for Ginny. I think it would really help her."

The next day, once they had sorted out a viable, safe way of getting to Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes - Floo was out of the question as it would undoubtedly be watched and apparition was impossible with the new wards they had set up on Muriel's, so they settled for a portkey - the Weasley family stood in a small group in the very back room of the shop, surrounded by busy shop assistants and loud, explosive experiments. The atmosphere was crowed and chaotic, and the group all but ran for the door. They emerged from the back room into the main shop itself, an aura of calm falling onto them, as if they had stepped into paradise. Yes, the shop was noisy and crowed - rows upon rows of joke items and merchandise, most of it loudly advertising itself to the customers, and huge, colourful displays were surrounded by a bustling crowd of people, thick filling the air with their noise. But the noise here was less intrusive than the explosions and cracks of the research team, who by all means were making the quieter noise. Here, everyone was laughing, chatting, giggling and smiling. It was a very happy place, even in wartime, and the happiness was infectious.

Most of the family said their goodbyes to Fred and George, who stayed to catch up with their shop's takings and walk Muriel around the shop, as she seemed absolutely delighted with the work they'd done. They weren't sure if it was the days of confinement or the shop, but something had brought out Muriel's childish side in the last few days.


It was not, by any stretch of the imagination, Hester's best day. While she loved working in Flourish and Blotts, adored the vast expanse of high shelves stacked full with books on every subject known to wizarding Britain, the dusty, warm rooms feeling so homely and comforting - there was something that bothered her about working on inquiries. Hester had never been a "people person," often choosing the company of books and - dare she say it? - even muggle novels over her wizarding friends. So while she loved working in a bookshop, serving the customers was by far the least favourite part of her job.

At least today the customer she was serving seemed as much of a social recluse as her. He had large, dark rings under his eyes, that would have been concealed by a powerful glamour if Flourish and Blotts hadn't stepped up its security in the last days before the ministry fell and provided all staff with anti-glamour charmed glasses. His posture, though at first glance normal, was far from the impeccable standard his thick, rich, perfectly enunciated voice would imply. He slouched ever so slightly forwards, as if used to hunching over a desk. His right hand was curled, while his left was straight - she guessed he must write a lot.

"I need a copy of Ravenclaw's Bealucræftas Deorce, as soon as possible."

It was the strangest request she'd ever heard in the shop. The book dated back to... well, Ravenclaw and was written in a variant of Gaelic that very few people could still understand. Furthermore, it was one of the most detailed studies of dark magic that had ever been produced - why anyone would want to get a copy in times like these was anyone's guess. Still, she had dutifully checked their stocks and, out in the farthest reaches of the least-lit, poorest kept parts of the shop, found the one copy that had been ordered in so long ago nobody could remember why. She told the strange man that it would cost a great deal of money. In response, he merely placed a large bag on her desk, the resounding clunk informing her that the contents were more than enough to cover whatever costs the book would need. She gulped, stunned at his callous disregard for wealth, before reminding herself that at least he was not flaunting it, like some customers loved to. She loathed those customers, the ancient families like the Malfoys and the Lestranges. No, she definitely preferred this man's attitude to wealth.

Just behind him, the door opened. A bell tinkled somewhere in the shop and a crowd of people walked in. They were all redheads, excluding one blonde girl; Hester smiled, recognising them as the Weasleys. These were the kind of customers she could identify with, having never had any wealth of her own.

"We'll just need your name, for insurance purposes," Hester said to the young man standing before her.

"Tom Riddle," he replied smoothly.

It was at about this moment that Ginny Weasley showed the first emotion she had shown in days.


Author's Note:

This chapter has been a little more difficult to write. Throwing out the golden trio from narrating viewpoints has made me all that more aware of how much more difficult minor characters are to write. Hopefully I'm getting better as I go along and the next few chapters won't take quite so long to write!

In case you hadn't twigged on by now, this fanfic is not going to follow the golden trio themselves very much at all, focusing instead on Ginny, Neville and Luna (the silver trio?) and what they do at Hogwarts during Deathly Hallows. Of course, I've deviated heavily from canon with a whole new headmaster, so it will be no surprise that the year portrayed here will be very different to the one Neville talks about during the end of DH. The changes are probably all for the better.

Thanks so much for reading, and sorry for the delay in release! I hope the next few chapters will be up more often, as the summer holidays have finally started.

Edit: The book name "Bealucræftas Deorce" means "The Dark Witch-Crafts in Old English...