DISCLAIMER: I know, you know, we all know, that I own zip.


(A/N) This chapter's mostly talking and explaining. Hey, you need to know somehow!



CHAPTER THREE: CURIOUSER AND CURIOUSER




"Okay. No. No way. No way this is happening," Lili said flatly. "So you're telling me that you've just brought us about 20 years in the future to help our kids defeat my sister?"

"That's right, Mother." Aramis smiled at Lili.

"I need a beer," she muttered.

"Earth, you don't drink," Draco pointed out.

"I need one anyway. All right, now that's just freaky. And who's your father, anyway? I mean, I'd like to know who I end up having a kid with."

Aramis looked downcast. "Sorry, Mother. I can't tell you. When you were seventeen, you didn't know who you'd end up marrying. But I will tell you this: my father is here, now."

"So I end up marrying either Harry or Draco," she mused, ignoring that the boys were glaring at each other as if they could kill through eyes alone. "Because we all know that Ron and Hermione-"

"Shut up, Grey!" came a call from the other side of the cauldron. Lili chuckled. Quieting quickly, though, she took a good look at Aramis.

The girl couldn't have been more than fourteen. She was petite, slender, no more than maybe five feet, with silky black hair and cool silver eyes. Her hair fell to her shoulder blades, and her skin was pale, with only a slight touch of pink in the cheeks to show she wasn't a walking corpse. She looked so much like Dana that Lili found it hard to believe that it wasn't her sister there, playing a strange joke on her.

But it was the eyes that made her so different. Large and silvery, while Dana's were black. Dana's eyes had always held that hint of cruelty, ruthlessness. Self-confidence and arrogance. Aramis's eyes had their fair shares of the ruthlessness and self-confidence, and maybe a touch more arrogance than necessary. But there was no cruelty. And it changed the whole personality.

Aramis was looking at Lili with something like desperation, waiting for something. Lili sighed. "You look so much like my mother and sister," she murmured, and Aramis's face lit up at this recognition. "When did you last see your parents?" she asked Aramis, her normal businesslike manner returning. Get the facts first, be emotional later.

"Perhaps eleven, twelve years ago. I was around two," Aramis answered quickly. "It was a year after Dinarsae took power, and you had been leaving to go fight Dinarsae. All I remember is a flash of your hair, and father's eyes. Father always had very distinctive eyes." Harry and Draco were now quietly arguing over who had the better eyes. Lili rolled her own.

"Shut up, you two!" she snarled back at them, and they both fell silent, looking somewhat sheepish. Muttering softly to themselves, they turned around and left. Lili slowly turned back to Aramis and frowned slightly. "Aramis, I know that you're thinking of me as your mother. But the me that's here, now, isn't really your mom. I've never known you. Hell, I'm only seventeen. I can't be your mother." She said this last sentence with special emphasis, and the younger girl's face fell.

"I know," she whispered. "But knowing-"

"And believing are two different things," Lili finished. "I know. But honestly, I'd make a sucky mother. I have no patience, kids hate me, I'm a perfectionist. You'd never survive with me." Some tiny voice in the back of her head whispered softly to her **She just wants her mother, you know. Come on, give her this one little thing. You'll be trying something new, anyway.**

Lili glanced at Aramis's downturned face. The brilliant silver eyes were gazing at the ground, where one foot was slowly tracing a pattern in the dirt. "Aw, hell, Aramis. Ignore me. Come give your mother a hug." The girl's face shone, and the seventeen-year-old mother and thirteen-year-old daughter embraced. **Fuck you, conscience,** Lili mentally muttered. Still, she admitted, she hadn't been around for her new daughter's Terrible Twos phase. Oh boy, she could remember Dana going through that...

Dana. Her sister was an evil witch. Scratch that, sorceress. And it was now her responsibility to kill her own sister. **This day just keeps getting better and better,** she thought. She let go of Aramis and looked the shorter girl in the face. "Aramis, why exactly did you call us? Why didn't you just fight Dana with other people, or fight her yourself?"

Aramis looked slightly embarrassed. "Rhiannon and I, we're not powerful enough, Mother." Lili mentally groaned at being addressed as such. "The Mages were the most powerful group in wizarding history, with few exceptions. You were not at the height of your power, true, but you were still much more powerful than any other witches or wizards. And yet you were defeated. So we decided to bring you back from when you were at your zenith, and ask that you fight Dinarsae."

Lili nodded slightly. "And you and Ri- Rhi-"

"Rhiannon," Aramis supplied helpfully.

"Rhiannon, thanks, I'm horrible with names. You and Rhiannon, are you Mages, yourselves?"

Aramis shook her head slightly. "No. The Magery was never passed to us. But we do have special powers of our own. I myself am what was called a Siren."

"Weren't the Sirens those bird-women who lured sailors to their doom in Greek mythology?" Lili asked.

"Yes," Aramis nodded. "Through song. Their music was so enchanting, that sailors willingly threw themselves off boats to try and swim to them. All died. But that's not quite the point. A Siren is one who can work magic through song, like Song Charms. The late Mrs. Potter, Harry Potter's mother, was a Level-Four Siren. Though she had considerable talent, she could work magic only through the preordained Song Charms. Level Four is quite an accomplishment, though. There are very few Level Threes, and only a very few Level Twos in the last century or so."

"What's your level?"

"I am Level One," Aramis answered, flushing slightly pink. "I am the only known Level One Siren in the last five hundred years. My magic comes out in any type of song, not just song Charms. It is also much more potent. Allow me to demonstrate. Do you remember that old children's song, about the tree, and the branches and the bird and all those things?"

"Ye-es..." Lili said slowly.

"All right then. Listen." Slowly, Aramis took a breath, and singing in a low voice, she sang, "and the green grass grows all around, all around, and the green grass grows all around." A simple song, one they commonly sing in kindergarten classes, and yet the effect it had was amazing. From under Aramis's feet, a carpet of thick, lush green grass erupted; soft, rich, the kind that is wonderful to just lie on and stare at the clouds, completely ignoring the fact that there's a beetle crawling into your hair. The girl grinned cheekily up at Lili who smiled back.

"Wonderful! That is so great! You have talent for this, I can tell," she recalled the sort of praise her father commonly gave her when she succeeded at something. Her laid-back mother often didn't even realize. "But what is Rhiannon's extra gift?" she asked curiously.

"She is a Seer, a gift needed desperately in these times," Aramis answered proudly. Lili grinned and glanced over at the redhead. **Hermione's kid, the fortune-teller. Oh, the irony.**

'Well, that's wonderful. But Aramis, is there anywhere else we can go? This place is kind of creepy... where are we, anyway?"

"We are on the remains of the old Grey house. Your old home, Mother," Aramis said desolately. "As the place where she grew up, the house held a great power which could be used against Dinarsae-"

"Call her Dana. Your Aunt Dana."

"Yes, Mother. Well, it held a great power that had the potential to be used against Aunt Dana. Instead of leaving it, she destroyed the house. But the foundations held enough magic left in them to fuel your resurrection. And no, you can't bring anyone else here to help you, Mages are the only ones who can withstand the forces in Limbo without being trapped there."

"Limbo?"

"That white area you passed through. Most magical people would be trapped in there. Mages, however, have the ability to pass through Limbo unharmed. They can't be forced out of Limbo, though. That's why we had to lure you out with the white light."

"Lure?"

"Yes, lure. Didn't you go into the light? We thought, since they're the 'Warriors of the Light' light ought to make them feel safe..." Aramis trailed off.

Lili slung an arm around her shoulder. "Kid, remind me to have you watch Poltergeist."





(A/N) Um... please don't as about the title. Remember that 4-pound tub of jellybeans I mentioned? It's down to 2 pounds. OK, thank you to all the reviewers! Sorry, I know that one was mostly talk. But I needed some way to explain the whole situation, and I figured that Lili would be asking quite a few questions when something like this happened. There WILL be more action in the next few chapters. Also, to comment on reviews:

Ady: Thanks, I liked the idea of Dana as a villian (she's one heckuva lot better at it than MY sister would be, though). And, I have to suffer through calculus every once and awhile. As a freshman, no less! And, you are a sick and twisted individual. I cower in fear of the giant pumpkins. Go take a shower, you! ^_~

Marfresbo: I'm not all that sure that someone who punches out her best friend can be called a Mary Sue... Lili has some temper problems. In the version I'm rewriting of Warriors, her fear of heights is way heightened, too (no pun intended!) And the ending will be different from Warriors, I have it planned already. I'm not THAT uncreative!

Julia: Where on Earth did you get Ron and Lili from? Please, tell me. was it the notes that said it will be either D/L or H/L? ^_~

Lastly, my apologies to whoever I've offended in my review responses today. I'm PMSing. Sorry.


Luv y'all lots!

-M.W.