The muse was good for this story so I wrote randomly this afternoon. This sort of wrote itself, and it's a bit different than my usual stuff, so tell me what you think. Next chapters will have more humor and less mystery. Hopefully my creativity stays with me for updates on my other stories. I'm back in school and time is sparse, but I am not abandoning anyone! Hope you like this chapter! PLEASE REVIEW!

Orion ran a hand through his messy black hair. Heaving a sigh, he ruffled through the papers on his desk unhappily. Mr. Potter had been hinting recently that there was little work left for him in France and it might be time to start thinking about getting a transfer back to the UK. This pretty much confirmed that his last assignment would be finished in the next month. He had always known that working for the French Aurors was a temporary thing, but he was starting to question how temporary it really was. He had Lia here, he was building a life, and he's wasn't entirely unhappy either. He looked at a picture he had of the two of them at their favorite coffee shop where they had their first date. He glanced at the one behind it, of Murphy, James, Teddy, and himself when they moved into the Shrieking Shack.

Besides, returning to England would mean he would have to face James, who unfortunately hadn't spoken to him since Teddy had blown it about Lia. Orion hadn't heard from his best friend in over two months, and James had completely ignored him at Teddy's wedding despite the fact that they stood next to each other and sat at the same table all night at the reception. Maybe if he sent him a letter and apologized, invited him and Elaine over for dinner, rang his bell and begged for mercy on his knees…

"Black, class three disturbance in district ten," barked one of the senior Aurors handing him a set of papers and a portkey. "Take care of it." He was whisked away before he could protest.

Landing abruptly in a dingy street, Orion quickly took in his surroundings and pulled his wand out of his pocket. It was a muggle area, so he would need to be careful, glancing at the paper, he immediately knew why he was there. Using a spell that revealed magical beings in the area, he allowed himself to be directed toward the nearby warehouse. Casting a disillusionment charm as he tested the wards, he deemed it safe to enter, stealthily entering through one of the few windows and landing himself in a small office.

Taking a few moments to rift through the files in the room, he was glad that the French Ministry didn't require the use of search warrants in cases like these. He vanished the papers back to the office with a feeling of disgust for the people who ran this organization, allowing this emotion to help prepare him for what he knew must come next.

Holding his wand aloft, he opened the door of the office gently, knowing he was still disillusioned. Trying not to take in the gruesome scenery around him, he focused on observing the important things. There were by the looks of it in the office, only four wizards involved in the operation, and as luck would have it, all four of them happened to be in for work today. He heaved a sigh, would it have been too much to ask for one of them to have called in sick?

The first one, he immediately dismissed. He was young, too young, and seemed like he was more concerned with playing with the merchandise than anything else. There were two in a corner, one looking to be heavily into his cups, even this early in the day, and the other looked bored. Both were involved in a game of cards that had the look of having gone stale two days ago. Orion zeroed his attention in on the fourth, for this was obviously the brains and brawn of the operation, the silent observer who had stationed himself in the prime position of the room to see all. His eyes were brightly alert and Orion could almost hear the thoughts in his head from across the room. His wand was deceptively lax in his hand, and Orion knew that this was the force he would have to deal with first. Or perhaps last.

Sliding along the edges of the large room, the auror finally made it to the small card table. Still disillusioned, he silently sprinkled a clear powder into the two cups on the table after creating a mild distraction across the room involving a sudden appearance of a stray dog, that he happened to know used to be a crate. Now for the wait.

It wasn't five minutes before both men had drifted off into dreamland, leaving Orion to deal with the remaining two. Placing himself exactly half way between the leader, the ruthless looking brunette, and the much too young to be of any consequence blond, Orion shot off his first spell, a stunner that hit the blond successfully and knocked him out cold but also alerted the leader.

As Orion had expected, the man fired off three or four spells in his direction in rapid succession. He was good. Meanwhile, Orion had transformed into his canine form, looking now like the self same dog that had created the distraction earlier. Around him, the many inhabitants of the room were cowering in fear of the magic around them, and he slunk toward the man who was now on alert and just perhaps realizing that his other two cronies had been drugged.

Taking a risk, Orion began barking, in the direction of the door, having cast a spell earlier that would cause the door to slam, the wizard seeing and hearing the dog and the door immediately abandoned his position of relative safety that overlooked the entire room and began sprinting toward the door. As the man's wide back turned to him, Orion transformed back into himself and cast his most powerful stunner at the man who fell with a heavy thud.

Spending the next five minutes tying up all four of the criminals, he bundled them together to a portkey that would take them directly, with plenty of paperwork, into high security custody. In his opinion, their ilk should never see the light of day again. This done, he looked around himself miserably. What a mess for the obliviators and the muggle relations department. All these poor women, he thought looking at the squalor around him and the dozens of frightened eyes observing him and his wand with apprehension. If there was one type of criminal that Orion despised above all others, it was the kind that exploited muggles, and at the top of that list was the muggle women traffickers that sold these women into muggle and wizarding slavery abroad. Whenever he heard of cases like this, which had admitted were rare, he couldn't help but think of what he would do if something like this happened to Lia, a defenseless muggle woman against Wizards twice her size with magic on their side to take advantage of her. He couldn't stand the thought without going into a rage, and thus pushed it aside.

The healers would arrive any minute now with the obliviators, but before he left, Orion could resist a massive scorgifying charm in an attempt to make the situation a little less horrible for the many victims who would soon be more horrified than even now. As the bubbles glided over the surfaces and materials of the room, cleaning even hair and clothes, Orion cleared his throat loudly.

"I'm Special Agent Black with French Law enforcement," he said in French before repeating himself in English. "Medical personnel and other staff will be here shortly to care for your needs, please do not be afraid, we are here to help you recover and return to your families and former lives. Any of you who are physically injured, please wait for someone to come to you, those of you who are fit and able, please assist the Medical staff in locating these people. Does anyone know how many there are of you?"

"One hundred and thirty seven," said an older woman who seemed to have stood up and exuded a role of leadership.

"Dear Merlin," mutter Orion heaving a sigh as he heard numerous pops indicating that the healers and obliviators were arriving. "I'll be leaving now, and I wish all of you the best now that this nightmare is hopefully near over for all of you."

"Sir!" said the older woman. "Are you one of them?" Orion knew what she was asking but merely replied.

"All you need to know is that I'm one of the good guys."

"Healer Black! Healer Black! I've got another one over here!" Antlia rushed over to the pile of rags where a young woman, no more than a girl really lay cuddled up. Someone had obviously tried to pack the wound on her head with dirty rags to stop the bleeding, but the cut was deep and now infected. There were bruises on her bared arms, and one looked to be broken, jutting at an angle abnormal to human anatomy and swollen as to resemble a distended balloon.

Muttering spells and flicking her wand, Lia fought back tears at the thought of what these defenseless women had gone through before today. Some claimed to have been in the warehouse for weeks, and if what one of them had said, the warehouse had been absolutely filthy along with all of its inhabitants until the auror on the case had somehow cleaned everything. Impressive cleaning charm if she did say so herself.

"Black," rasped the woman she was helping.

"Yes, I'm Dr. Black, I'm going to help you," she said gently as she dabbed potion on the infected wound. It would take much longer to heal now that the infection had progressed so far. It was a miracle the woman was alert.

"He said you would, he said you were the good guys," said the girl with a slight smile.

"Who said that?" asked Antlia, trying to distract her patient as she prepared to set the girl's arm, which would be painful.

"Your husband, the officer who saved us," answered the girl, wincing but not crying out in pain as Antlia set her arm. Perhaps it was from habit, or perhaps she was just strong.

"Oh, he's not my husband," answered Lia as she bandaged the arm tightly.

"You said your name was Black, his name was Black, I'm sorry, I saw your ring," answered the patient. "I just assumed. You're both so nice too."

Lia's brow came together a bit. She had never met Black, but she had always assumed things about him, and nice wasn't one of the traits she would have thought to attribute to him. Perhaps since he had a muggle wife, he was sympathetic to these muggles, imagining each one of them could have been someone like his wife. She never really gave him much thought though, even to the fact that since she married, they now shared a last name. How odd.

As much as he wanted to hurry home, the massive amounts of paperwork from the morning kept Orion at the office until his usual hour, but rather than the usual ride home, he turned his bike into a portkey and landed directly in the garage. Hurrying into the house, he rushed through the kitchen that was devoid of the normal smells and found himself in the parlor, holding Lia to him.

"I missed you so much today," he said pulling her to him and smelling the wonderful herbal smell of her hair that reminded him of a greenhouse or apothecary. He had been holding her almost an entire minute before he realized she was crying. "Are you crying?"

"I'm alright, I just, I didn't expect you home so soon, I had a horrible day at work, and I don't want to talk about it," she mumbled, still stunned that he was here.

"I had a horrible day too. There was a gruesome case, and I kept worrying about you, and I just had to…" he paused as she was crying even harder now.

"I missed you today too," she whispered as she held him tightly. It was moments like these that they both wished they could confide in the other. But it was also moments like these when they remembered just how much they loved each other and why they got married in the first place. It made all those awkward moments and secrets worthwhile to have your other half hold you reassuringly after a traumatizing day at work.

After the tears had subsided and they were finally content to let each other go, Orion realized what else was odd about his homecoming. "Would you like to order take out?" he asked, realizing that his wife had been too upset to even cook dinner.

"We have the dinner party with the Merchants tonight," replied Lia with a small frown.

"Are you going to be alright to go?" asked Ryan smoothing her hair gently.

"I promised Clara we would be there."

So an hour later, they were waiting for Clara or her husban

d Jacques to answer the door. Orion was dressed in his usual black pants, blue shirt, slightly askew tie, and slightly more askew hair. Lia was as usual the perfect picture of beauty and grace in a pale blue dress that reminded her of her Bauxbatons days.

As soon as the door opened, they were engulfed in a sea of muggles, being bombarded with greetings. Smiling, they both entered the room, the picture perfect couple that no one in the room would have guessed were practically crying in each others arms as they concealed dire secrets about their true selves from each other.

"I hear their stock is falling off into nothing," commented Jacques as he and several of the men stood in the study smoking cigars and drinking. "And interest on loans is going through the roof!"

"It's a bloodbath! How did you make out this quarter Ryan? Did you take a beating?" asked Jean.

"Actually I have goblins to guard all my money," answered Orion absently watching his wife causing the other men to laugh at his joke. Lia was sitting across the hall in the parlor with the other women and the many babies. He wondered if she wanted one. They hadn't really discussed it yet, but it was obvious she loved children. But what would he do when the child was magical?

"Lia, will you hold Viola?" said Claudia after the five month old spit up on her clothes.

"No… I…" Lia looked uncertain as Claudia dropped the child in her arms and flitted off to the loo. Lia smiled at the little girl. How would Ryan react if she became pregnant? She of course wanted children, at least two or three, but the idea of having to cover up accidental magic, or eventually send them off to school. What would she tell him? Could she ever broach the subject?

Smiling at the little girl, she contemplated what a child of hers and Ryan's would look like. Obviously it would have dark hair, silvery eyes, maybe a bit on the blue side like hers. She was sure it would be a much better looking child than the chubby wrinkley faced bald girl she was holding. But, she was sure as a mother, she would be biased no matter if hers was the ugliest troll ever born.

She looked up at Ryan across the haze of the cigar smoke in the study that slowly leaked out into the hall. She gave the baby a slight bounce on her lap and he smiled at her. Maybe a baby would be a good thing. Something to fill the canyon of secrets and silence that seemed to separate them.

Thanks for reading Please review! Inspire me to update this and my other stories faster!

Elaine