Disclaimer: Harry Potter belongs to Joanne Kathleen Rowling and associates, of whom I am not one. This is a rewrite of a fic from 4 years ago.
Warnings: AU, mentions of child abuse, ongoing theme of drug abuse, some character bashing (but only such that it follows canon and canon trends), spoilers through Deathly Hallows, coarse language, some minor OCs.
Chapter 9: Help From the Shadows
Neville's parents had been tortured into madness, Crouch apparently had a son who participated, Snape really was an ex-Death Eater and spy… Hadley's mind was swirling with the new information she had accidentally come to learn in the pensieve. While it was interesting to know that Crouch was the father of a Death Eater – it certainly explained his change in Departments – what concerned her was Neville.
She'd never paid much attention to him. Like how she would be if not for her fame, he was a bit of a wallflower. He would sometimes join her, Ron, and Hermione for studying, more often now that she was his Herbology partner, but he didn't really hang around the other Gryffindors. He was timid, he always screwed up in class, but he worked hard. She'd heard he was friends with Ernie MacMillan but never seen evidence to support it. His work ethic would certainly get him to fit in better with the Hufflepuffs than the Gryffindors, anyway.
But knowing about his parents… it explained a lot. Hadley knew of Neville's Gran by reputation only, but she was apparently strict and not likely very affectionate. Not like the Dursleys, thankfully, but it explained a lot.
Dumbledore revealing that Neville had been the other child who could have been the one the prophecy spoke of though… that was a harsh blow. And she was almost glad it was her. If Neville had been the one Voldemort chose, would Hadley's parents be in St Mungo's right now? She didn't envy Neville's position any more than he was likely to envy her own.
As it was, with all that information flitting about in her brain, Hadley almost forgot that she was supposed to talk to Harry that evening. That maybe she had really seen something.
So it was with her mind in chaos that Hadley was dashing up to the seventh floor, trying to remember precisely where Barnabas the Barmy's portrait was. There weren't any classrooms on that hall. It was only because it was between the Gryffindor common room and the library that she had any idea where it was.
When she arrived, breathing a bit heavily, there was a room though. The door was a light wood, oak she thought, the doorknob brass. She had never seen it before; most of the doors in Hogwarts were from dark woods. It stuck out like a sore thumb.
Why had she never seen it? The Marauders' Map never showed a room there. Maybe it was a room that only appeared on certain days?
Rather than allowing thoughts to consume her once more, Hadley turned the handle and opened the door. What she found there was not at all what she was expecting. Ignoring the fact that walls which should have been stone were instead plaster, it was not somewhere she knew to be in the castle.
It was the living room of the London apartment she had spent the summer in, though more spacious.
The walls were the same warm red, the couches as worn and comfortable looking, complete with transfigured drink holders in the arms. The telly's stand was still across from it, though empty. The biggest differences were that there was a wall where the kitchen should be and that it was in Hogwarts instead of muggle London.
"Sweet Circe," Hadley stared in the room, blinking. Harry was seated on the couch, and turned his head around.
"That's right, you wouldn't know this place yet, would you? The elves call it the Come-and-Go room, though most wizards and witches who find it call it the Room of Requirement, I think," Harry shrugged and beckoned she enter. Hadley did so, closing the door behind her, and sat in the brown chair the door had been blocking her view of. It was just as overstuffed and comfortable as she remembered from that summer.
"What is this place?" Hadley asked, gazing around. It looked like their flat's living room. It felt like their flat's living room. But it wasn't. It was most certainly not, because if she went through the front door, painted brown on this side, it would take her to Hogwarts rather than the hall of their building.
"Like I said, the Room of Requirement," Harry was leaning back on the couch. There was some air about him that seemed almost ill at ease. Like he had a headache or – Merlin forbid – had emotions to express. "It makes what you need appear in the room. It can't break the elementary laws – no food or anything – but it's very useful. If right now you needed a book on Defensive spells it would give you one. If you wanted the room to look like the Gryffindor Common Room, it would change into that. I asked it for somewhere comfortable for us to talk. I might've thought of this room when I did, or it might have just plucked the location from my head."
Hadley wasn't sure what to think of that one and could respond with only, "I see." She wasn't sure she did. But she forced her still spinning brain to halt and brought things to the matter at hand. "You are a seer, aren't you?"
"I didn't used to be," Harry shrugged. "But now… hm, I've seen things that would make Snape's greasy hair curl. I suppose you guessed because I knew about all the tasks?"
"And you knew about Neville being good at Herbology, and last summer when Dumbledore visited, you…" she stopped, sighed. "I had help. You… know about Snuffles, right?"
"I wouldn't have expected him to know much about Seers, but I suppose from a family like his it makes sense. I was serious about the offer to let him stay at our flat, but in a few weeks he'll have his own home so there's no point anymore."
Hadley breathed out slightly. He didn't say directly, but he did say things that indicated he knew precisely who she was talking about, and knew things to come about Sirius. He'd seen terrible things… and Hadley didn't have the guts to ask what. It could be her own death, or the Headmaster's, or Voldemort coming into power… too many things to pick from. It was a relief to know that he really was a seer though.
"Tell me what you saw," Harry's voice broke her thoughts, and Hadley jolted slightly. Harry was leaned forward in his seat, looking interested, and Hadley couldn't help but meet his level of interest in the coming conversation.
As someone who never expressed, when he did it was hard not to take notice.
So she told him. She told him about how stifling hot it was in Divination that it had perhaps been a dream at first, of riding the eagle owl to a decrepit old house where she had previously dreamed. How Wormtail had taken the owl's letter, not noticing her small form, and what little she remembered of the conversation that followed.
Her only real indication it was real was her scar flaring up in pain afterwards.
When she finished speaking, Harry looked almost disconcerted. Like what she had seen she shouldn't have. Like how she felt, right then.
"You… aren't supposed to see like that," Harry shook his head, slowly. "Your scar is a link to Voldemort. When it works, you're supposed to see through his eyes." Hadley's blood ran cold when he said that. So he had seen eventualities where she could see through Voldemort's eyes. It hadn't ever happened. Twice now she had seen scenes from the perspective of an outsider with her proof of reality being her scar and Dumbledore's word that an old man in a small town had gone missing presumed dead over the summer.
If she was supposed to have viewed those scenes through Voldemort's eyes… what did it mean for her? It couldn't be that seeing ran in the family. Harry was her cousin from the muggle side. If there had been any magical Evanses, she would have been told. But it also couldn't be coincidence.
"Focus on the tournament," Harry said finally. "I'll make sure that the Headmaster helps you work this out after. But for now, focus on getting out of this mess alive."
Harry stood up and left quickly, leaving Hadley to sit and wonder what had happened.
Harry refused to think on it in the days following. Voldemort dreams were meant to be from Voldemort's perspective, but now that Hadley mentioned it, he remembered. He remembered the dream he had during the summer before fourth year with the old man at what he later learned was the Riddle Mansion. He hadn't been in Voldemort's then, but following this old war veteran from the outside. And how he had seen a vision not long before the fourth task.
It was only after Voldemort took his blood that the visions came to be through Voldemort's eyes – or Nagini's, he thought. Once, he had seen through the horcrux in Nagini. But the old man certainly hadn't been a horcrux, nor had the owl.
He wanted to wonder why it happened. He wanted to know why, when he and Hadley first had visions of Voldemort, they really were like Seeing was supposed to be rather than what they would later become. But he couldn't let himself think. He had NEWT exams, which he did intend to do well in, and the fourth task was approaching fast. He had to actually form a plan now, to use his knowledge of the future with real forethought. He had to save Cedric. And, if he could, capture Wormtail to let Sirius go. If Sirius was free and Hadley knew the prophecy early, then maybe Sirius wouldn't have to die and-
By the time the fourth task rolled around, Harry had increased his dosage beyond what it had been before Christmas, to half a phial with each meal. He was surprised, after getting out of his Transfigurations NEWT theory exam for the Great Hall to be reassembled for lunch, to see the entire Weasley clan – or, rather, half of it – sitting at the Gryffindor table. He tried to recall if that had happened for him, but couldn't. Though he was certain they had been at his bedside after the full events of the evening, and that was when they found out about Sirius, so it seemed likely. Dumbledore wouldn't have called Molly to the school just because her son's friend had been nearly killed five times that night.
Harry watched them as the other Slytherin seventh years went over spells likely to be on the practical. There had been record low exam stress incidences that year, or so Anne Davis claimed in the middle of the meal. A few students went to the Hospital wing, but only in the evening or between portions. Harry wondered if, had he not been drugged up to his eyeballs, he would have exam stress. Probably not, though other stresses…
He subtly tipped the half phial of light golden potion into his pumpkin juice when the others were suitably distracted by a frantic Ravenclaw turning a scone into a pygmy hippopotamus. He would wait to drink it, in case someone noticed, though they never did.
The practical began one hour later, and it was just as boring waiting for the examiners to work their way to "P" as with any other exam. It didn't help that OWL and NEWT exams went on at the same time. The OWL students that year were a fairly large class by comparison, only a few shy of the numbers Hadley's class contained. It made the process long and tedious. Harry would rather be setting up, plotting, working.
But he couldn't do that anyway, he supposed. He had to make an appearance before the task began. He had to wish Hadley luck. Say something stupid about not kissing spiders maybe? He felt silly for remembering that riddle. It and the acromantula were all he really remembered of the maze anyway. But something about the sphinx's riddle stuck with him. Perhaps because it was right before the acromantula attacked him and Cedric.
There was only one spell Harry botched in his practical. Attempting to self transfigure his off-hand into a hippogryff's talon did not end well and had to be reversed by the rather odd examiner "Tofty". The same examiner Harry had had for his Divination practical – the man would think Harry was making things up until tonight, if all went according to plan. It was a guaranteed O in that case. "Barty Crouch will be found at the Tournament's end" indeed.
Other than the arm incident, the texture of the fabric on the chair Harry conjured was off, looking like satin but feeling like muslin instead. Everything else was just fine. Perfect even. He might scrape an E if the self transfiguration wasn't counted against him.
Then there was dinner. Harry didn't want to eat. He wasn't hungry any more than Hadley seemed to be across the hall. But he ate some mash, because Higgs looked at him when he didn't start grabbing any food, and it was irresponsible to drink Serenity Solution on an empty stomach. When dinner ended, Harry stood and went to Hadley first. Molly Weasley intercepted.
"Are you the cousin we've heard about?" Her smile was as kind as ever, though her eyes were a little flinty, looking him over to make certain he was worthy of being Hadley's relative, that he was someone who would take care of her until she could do so herself. Her hair was the same color he remembered, a bit more brown than Ron's, a "Prewett red" rather than a "Weasley red" as he had learned at Bill and Fleur's wedding.
She was, however, a lot more alive than last time. Her stomach wasn't ripped open from Bellatrix's cutting curse. Her arm wasn't broken. Her skin wasn't a pale, dead color.
It was a good thing, Harry concluded, that he had taken Serenity Solution only ten minutes prior. Otherwise he might have had emotions. He might have felt the relief he should have. He might have felt the sorrow and the pain and the bliss and collapsed crying into the arms of the mother he never had.
"Harry Potter, ma'am," he smiled a little. It would be pragmatic to make her think he was reserved rather than emotionless. He knew that, if he could feel, the idea of Molly Weasley not liking him would frighten him more than Voldemort ever did. "Mrs Weasley, right?"
"I am indeed," she smiled, "but you can call me Molly, dear." Harry thought that maybe that meant she approved of him, just a little. "Would you like to sit with us for the task?" Fred and George stood behind her snickering.
"Maybe," Harry dodged, "but I'm feeling a bit ill. I was going to wish Hadley luck before I go see Madame Pomfrey, in case I miss the start of the task."
It was easy, after that. Molly mothered, said he did look rather peaky and did he ever eat because he was thinner than Percy even. He gave his hint to Hadley, and escaped with the fewest blips of increased heart rate he could have expected when finally in such close proximity to a family of people who had loved him and died for it.
He did not go to the Hospital Wing, of course. Instead he took out his Cloak of Invisibility and shrouded himself in it, heading to the statue of the one-eyed witch that hid the passage to Honeyduke's cellar.
As he walked, he kept track of the time using Fabian Prewett's old Coming of Age watch. After Ron's lesson he still barely understood how to use it – they apparently told more than the time – but he could at least figure out when the task started. The walk was long. He didn't rush, so by the time he reached the end he supposed Hadley might be about halfway through. The maze was bigger on the inside than the outside after all. The Quidditch stands were high up though, so everyone would be able to see the outer edges of the maze, and maybe even a bit of the central clearing where the Cup waited. It was a big maze, and even if Hadley encountered nothing at all yet, he was certain she would not be at the end until he was ready.
Escaping Honeyduke's was harder than he thought. First, the trap door was stuck – a box had been placed on top of the trap door, despite the charms on it to prevent just that – and then the front door was locked with a spell more complex than Harry could counter. The owner was probably at the Task, come to think of it. He had to settle for escaping through a window, which ate up some time as he tried unlocking spell after unlocking spell until he realized it was held in place by a meter-long dowel.
Five minutes later, Harry apparated to the graveyard, or near it rather. He didn't want to be given away by the crack of apparition, after all. He hiked the rest of the way, silencing the squeaky gate and making his way to what he thought was where Hadley and Cedric would appear. He could see Wormtail tending the fire until the base potion, the bundle of squirming blankets near a head stone obviously Voldemort's current, hideous form.
Hadley was nowhere in sight, nor was Cedric's dead body. Good.
So he waited.
There was a distortion of light three feet to Harry's left, where two bodies fell to the ground. Harry didn't hesitate. He could see in the moonlight which was Cedric, the one that landed partway correctly and grabbed him, wrapping him up in the cloak with him, though they both barely fit, and stunning the other boy before anything could happen. A featherlight spell and a short jog later, and he was apparating away again.
Hadley would be fine. He had been fine after all, and Hadley was basically him with different anatomy. She would be fine. He had to save Cedric. He had to save Hadley a summer of guilt and worry. If he could save Cedric, she wouldn't suffer.
If he had saved Cedric, back then he never would have suffered, but he hadn't and Cedric died and what Harry needed was absolution. He needed to save Cedric. He needed to stop all the death that followed him. He needed to get rid of everything, every guilt and pain that ever plagued him. He needed –
Harry dropped Cedric's stunned body to the ground outside the Hogwarts gates and pulled a fresh phial of Serenity from his pocket, taking a quick swallow. He rolled up his invisibility cloak, dropped it to the ground and composed himself.
He was Harry Potter. He did not feel. He could not feel. He had saved Cedric. It was okay.
"Ennervate," Harry intoned, his holly wand waving over Cedric's prone body. The younger boy – and wasn't it odd to think of Cedric as younger than him, because Cedric had always been the heroic, popular, good guy type Harry could aspire to be – jolted, looking around, then up. His wand was out, but Harry quickly disarmed him.
"Where are we? What did you do to Hadley?" Cedric's tone was deadly serious. He was getting up, looking mad, looking defensive.
"We're outside Hogwarts' gates, and I never did anything to Hadley," Harry answered quickly. He could tell that Cedric was about ready to hit him, and wanted none of it. He hadn't been hit physically since the last time Dudley caught him, and that was years ago. It hadn't been pleasant. "The cup was a portkey to Voldemort, set up by a follower. He set up the whole tournament so that Hadley would win and be used in a ritual. I just saved your life. You weren't supposed to be there. You would have been dead for three minutes by now if I hadn't taken you away."
"How do you know that then?" Cedric wasn't looking any less hostile, though he seemed to have recognized where they were. Harry almost pitied him for his emotions. The fear he must feel from the sudden kidnapping. The confusion, the betrayal, the anger… all of it. Harry couldn't stand to feel all of that. "Are you a… a Death Eater or something?"
"I saw it, you can talk to Dumbledore if you don't believe me," Harry shook his head. He had to dissuade Cedric now. Cedric, unlike Harry, didn't have a "seeker's build". He could do some damage if he decided to hit Harry. Harry did not need to be damaged. "Voldemort would have said 'Kill the spare', and Hadley would have seen you die. She would have brought your body back, when she escaped, and cried once the shock wore off. Your parents would have cursed her one day, then apologized the next when she tried to give them your share of the winnings. I saved you so she wouldn't feel guilty about not being able. All she'll think is that the portkey didn't grab you, that maybe she grabbed it a half second before you did, or you realized what was wrong and let go."
"Then why not save her too? Or instead? You… you're Harry Potter, right?" Cedric was squinting at him in the low light now. "I heard you were related, her cousin or something. Why the hell not save her?"
"This has to happen, I haven't seen anything where it hasn't that turned out any better," which wasn't a lie. Harry was very careful not to lie. Tell half truths, omit things, even answer a question with the answer to a different one, but he didn't dare lie. Wizards had too many ways to sniff out lies. "We'll go back to the field and warn Dumbledore. I've already seen what happens there. Hadley will need some medical attention, and someone needs to warn him about Moody."
"Wha- Moody? Mad-Eye Moody? Our defense instructor?" Now Cedric was looking at him like he was mad. Harry realized, belatedly, he'd entirely skipped out on that bit. "But that… oh. Oh. Dumbledore said Moody was the one to take the cup to the center of the maze. He… but he's Mad-Eye Moody! He caught most of the Death Eaters in Azkaban! He can't be…"
"Moody isn't Moody, that's all I can say," Harry shook his head. "We need to warn Dumbledore."
Cedric stood silent, and Harry let him think. He wondered, in the back of his head, how much longer until Hadley escaped. Long enough to reach the field, probably, if Cedric was in any condition to run. He hadn't seen any injuries, but who knew? The maze was brutal, after all.
"I'll warn Dumbledore, you make sure Hadley gets out alive from… whatever you let her walk into," Cedric stated finally. "I barely know her, but she's your family. Get her back to Hogwarts so we can split the victory, the winnings, everything, understand? It was a Hogwarts win, and it's going to stay that way." His gaze was like stone under the moon's wan light. Harry wondered if he had ever been this stubborn. He couldn't remember, and he'd never seen Cedric so determined, but as Cedric said, they barely knew each other, in this reality or any other.
So Harry nodded.
"Tell Dumbledore I sent you, he'll believe you after that," was all Harry said before turning, scooping up his cloak, and disapparating.
The sound of his apparition was covered by many others as black cloaked figures appeared throughout the graveyard. Harry crept forward, careful of his feet and hoping Nagini wouldn't detect any taste in the air that didn't belong with all the other scents to obfuscate things, and he waited.
When Hadley landed, she thought there was a second thud. She thought she had heard Cedric's breath near her ear, and a mutter of unrecognizable syllables, but when she dragged herself on her hands and knees, there was nothing. Cedric wasn't there, only a rather menacing graveyard, old fashioned and overcrowded with crosses, angels, and the occasional larger statue for some rich family.
She was almost relieved that Cedric hadn't been pulled along. There was no way this was part of the task. No, definitely not. She had the cup, it was just two feet away, laying on its side and shining brightly with both inner light and the reflected moonlight.
Using the nearest gravestone to help her to her feet, Hadley stood to properly survey the area. Her probably-broken leg screamed at the weight she placed on it, so the gravestone became her crutch as she turned slowly to see if she could figure out where she was and how to get help. A glimmer of light to her right caught her attention and, as she turned to face it, a call of "Petrificus Totalus!" rang out.
She was stiff as a board and fell to the ground again before she could even think to dodge.
From there it was the stuff of nightmares. Knowing Peter Pettigrew had shared the beds of two different young boys did not in any way abate Hadley's fear when his fat, sweaty face appeared near her, when his grubby hands started dragging her toward a cauldron. His nails were long and ragged, digging into the ankle he had taken to drag her by, only accentuating the pain in that leg. Her head bounced on rocks in the ground, lumps in the thin grass, a tree root or two, and he only withdrew his wand – only she knew it wasn't his because she remembered Ollivander's description of Voldemort's wand all too well – to levitate her over a steaming cauldron.
She feared he was going to drop her in. Use her as potion ingredients and boil her alive. Or maybe he was a cannibal now. She'd heard male rats ate their own young. Or was it that they were like some animals that ate any young that wasn't theirs? Maybe she was the main ingredient in his stew he was making.
It was almost a relief when she was instead hit with a rope spell that tied her to the large grave stone looming over the cauldron.
Then it really started. The bones torn from the grave at her feet. Wormtail cutting off his own hand, the one that was missing a finger, the only definitive evidence that he was Wormtail. And then using that same knife to cut deep into her left forearm, where he thankfully missed the artery that might have killed her if it was cut.
A mass of blankets was opened to reveal a writhing, sickly pale, and altogether disgusting creature that could only be Voldemort. She never got to see him in those dreams, but she wasn't surprised by his form. Only disgusted. She wanted it to die in that cauldron. To drown. But Dumbledore had said Voldemort wasn't truly dead, so maybe now he still wasn't truly alive either. Hadn't Firenze said that unicorn blood made one live a "half life"?
Voldemort would survive this, she knew, and worse, he would be the stronger for it.
Worse, she would find, was that he would made whole again, and it was her presence that was instrumental to this. He was strong enough to call his Death Eaters, to talk to them, to prove exactly how alive he now was. To call them out for betraying him, and cast the Unforgiveable torture spell on them to prove a point.
That Voldemort was back, and he was strong, and he was in charge of them once more.
Then he spoke of his most loyal, who was at Hogwarts. His most loyal who had entered Hadley in the Tournament, and helped her in secret to make sure that she won. The servant who made everything before them possible, because the rest were too afraid.
There were three people who helped Hadley, or tried to anyway, in a real noticeable way. Bagman was dismissed out of hand. Sure, he had been incriminated in a Death Eater scandal not long before joining the Ministry, but he was Ludo bloody Bagman. He was harmless, and transparent. Fred and George revealed easily enough that he was a gambler – he had probably bet on her because of the low odds and high payout to fix his debt.
Mad-Eye was another, but he was Mad-Eye Moody. Crazy, certainly, but in league with Voldemort? Not bloody likely.
And then there was… Harry.
Harry, who "rescued" her from the Dursleys to gain her trust. Harry, who gave her the hints and tips that got her top marks in the first two tasks. Harry who not two hours ago had handed her the key to the sphinx's riddle, making it all the more likely that she would reach the cup first.
Harry was a Death Eater. And he had turned her over to Voldemort, likely with all the emotionlessness he had ever portrayed to her. He probably hadn't even thought he was betraying her. No one else could have given Hadley that much help from the shadows.
As Voldemort continued, Hadley stopped listening. The pain of the betrayal turned to rage, and then determination. She would escape. She would escape, and give Harry such a kick in the balls he would wish for the Kiss. She would tell the world what happened here, that Voldemort was back, that she was going to kill him and make Harry pay for betraying her like this and making Voldemort's return possible.
He had lied. He had handed her over to the one thing that could be called her enemy.
When Voldemort was untying her to duel, Hadley was a ball of determined rage, not even noticing the pain in her leg as she fell two feet onto the broken one. If her little tantrum at Ron during the Ball made him think "there's no fury like a woman scorned", she wondered what people would think of what she would do to Harry.
Best case scenario, justice. Worst case, torture. She didn't care either way.
Even Voldemort's Cruciatus couldn't bleed it from her, her will to live and see her vengeance meted out. Then their spells met, and shades of her family came out. For a few minutes, her rage was forgotten. The old man from her dream, and the woman who had been in the papers reported missing since summer, they came out first. Then Hadley's mum and dad left the wand that killed them.
She couldn't believe it.
Their voices were far away as they spoke, but they were still there. Telling her to fight, to win, how she could escape.
"You're right, I have to escape, I have to make this right," Hadley's face twisted as she forced another bead of light toward Voldemort. The Death Eaters were still scrambling outside.
"I know that face," her father's ghostly voice was serious. "That's Lily's 'someone's going to get it' face."
"Aimed at the wrong person," Lily's voice was more peaceful than in Hadley's one memory of the woman. Then again, when not faced with the prospect of dying, why wouldn't she be? "We can watch things, a little. I think I know what you're thinking, little dove. Don't jump to conclusions. Save your hatred for those who deserve it. Wait until you're sure. That boy only has the best in mind for you."
"But Mum-"
"Listen to her," the other woman said. "I was older than them, a few years ahead in school, but Lily Evans always had a good eye. Whoever it is, if she says they aren't to blame…" she smiled, shrugged. "You're Hadley Potter. Your mother had a reputation."
"We can distract him," Lily said. "We can distract him and you can escape. The portkey will work again. Just run and don't look back. Don't even pause to throw a spell."
"You have a guardian angel, dove," James smiled. "Let him do the work this time. Go!"
So Hadley ran, and she didn't look back, but as she grabbed the portkey, leg screaming in pain, she could hear Harry's voice shouting curses, and she wondered.
Author's Note: I gotta admit, having a deadline for myself – sometime before midnight Wednesday (though preferably before midnight Tuesday) every week – does get me writing. Which is a reminder to everyone who asks me to "update soon" that updates are always sometime on Wednesday. Could be the wee hours of the morning. Could be sometime in the middle of the day. But it will be out Wednesday, even if that means I realize I have four thousand more words to write and have to give up on Skyrim for the day (and I hate you all now because I have to give it back to my friend tomorrow. Now I'll never know how the Dark Brotherhood quest line ends). Stop telling me to update soon. It won't change anything except make me consider updating Thursdays instead, just to fuck with you (which is a terrible idea because I have D&D on Thursdays).
By the by, that's Pacific time (GMT-8) just like what the site runs on. So if you live on the east coast of the US or Europe or something… deal with it.
