A/N: Thank you all for the crazy amazing reception of this little series. I love you all so much for the reviews you've left! I was going to try and go the whole thing without bombarding you with author's notes, but I had to say that this chapter remains my favourite thing I think I've ever written. I hope you all love it as well.

Itch

May 1998

Bastard.

She stared at herself in the full-length mirror that she'd asked to be placed in her room years ago. It was necessary to make certain that every bit of her was covered at all times. The last thing she needed was for a student to see one of her scars. Some were easily explained—she'd been teaching children for a great many years now and was quite adept at constructing lies out of necessity. There were some things, however, that children didn't need to know—not that her opinions were shared by Albus, who had smiled at her request for the mirror as though she were an adorable teenage witch, wanting the thing so that she could primp in front of it before a date.

He'd known perfectly well why she had requested the blasted thing.

But she didn't need it now.

"Reducto," she whispered and then held up her hand, creating a wandless shield around herself. The shattered glass bounced off of the magic, her reflection falling to the ground in a thousand pieces.

"Missy Kitty gets bad luck," Winky said nervously from the corner of the room where she was setting up a small tea tray for the new Headmistress of Hogwarts.

Minerva smiled at the elf and then at the shattered mirror. "Actually, my bad luck has finally run out."

1940

"What's that, Mum?" Minerva asked as she stood beside her mother at the kitchen counter, a small step stool beneath her feet so that she could reach properly. She'd watched her mother peel potatoes her whole life and had never noticed the small scar on her thumb before. "Did you hurt yourself?"

Isobel swallowed hard. "It's . . . I'm fine, love. Finish washing the carrots."

Minerva frowned and let out a sigh of frustration. She hated not knowing things and had always been smart enough to know when adults were concealing information because she was too young. She hated when people spoke to her as though she couldn't understand when, in fact, she was quite adept at questioning thoughts and challenging ideas. It was why her father had asked her to just smile and nod her head when people from his congregation spoke to her.

"It's not mine," Isobel muttered in an attempt to appease her curious daughter. "It belongs to someone that once belonged to me. Someone magical. An old . . . friend who was a part of my life. You'll learn about it when you go to Hogwarts."

Minerva's eyes widened with delight. She rarely was allowed to talk about Hogwarts. It upset her father and he'd give her mother a strange look before frowning sadly and locking himself in his office. Her mum always said he just wanted extra time with God because he was confused about magic. Minerva had once tried to unconfuse her father by telling him that she could try and send an owl to God, since she'd never received a reply back from him when she prayed the way she'd been taught. Her father hadn't liked that idea very much, but he'd been kind enough with how he'd handled her suggestion, telling her that God didn't make owls to carry letters, that wizards did, and Minerva should go and help her mother weed the garden.

"Can't you tell me now?" Minerva pleaded with her mother.

Isobel looked out the window where her husband was teaching Malcolm how to properly chop wood for the fire. With Robert properly distracted, Isobel helped Minerva down from the stool, wiping her hands on a nearby tea towel. "Every witch or wizard in the world has someone called a soulmate. Someone that magic has deemed perfect just for them. Or at least . . . that's what my mother told me. She was a pureblood, you see, like I am, and traditions are . . . well, they can be very strange sometimes."

"Will I have one?" Minerva asked. "I'm just half."

Isobel smiled. "Of course, my love."

"Isn't Dad perfect for you?"

Frowning, Isobel shook her head. "Hearts and souls are different. I love your father, but I didn't love my soulmate. Arcturus was . . . his family was difficult. Some families don't take kindly to Muggles. It's why we must keep magic secret from them. Sometimes . . . sometimes magic makes mistakes. My soulmate didn't like that I wanted to leave the Wizarding world. He wasn't very kind to me when I married your father."

"Like your mum?"

Isobel nodded. "Yes, like my mum. She wasn't happy either."

"Are you happy?"

Caught off guard by the question, Isobel's eyes flickered briefly to her wand that remained in a long box, locked up on a high shelf above all their books. She hadn't touched it since Bobby was born. The baby had come early, and Robert had taken the children into town for ice cream to get them out of their mother's hair. She'd given birth on the bedroom floor, and the baby hadn't been breathing. Panicked, Isobel had wandlessly summoned the bit of hawthorn that she'd gotten when she'd turned eleven and spelled the baby's lungs clear of the fluid that he'd breathed in. That had been six months ago, and she'd never told a soul other than her daughter, who—from time to time—climbed the bookshelves to stare at the wand enviously, and had noticed that the dust patterns had changed.

When her mother didn't answer, Minerva rephrased the question. "Would you be happier if you had your soulmate? Maybe he could convince Dad to let you use your magic."

1947

Minerva had known she'd had a soulmate for many years. At least a year before she'd even known what a soulmate was. Small scars had appeared all over her body at a young age but vanished before she had a chance to show her parents, or wonder where they came from. It wasn't always the way it happened, her mother had told her, but there was a strong chance that her soulmate would be waiting for her at Hogwarts.

Minerva desperately hoped that he liked Quidditch.

She didn't think that someone who was her soulmate wouldn't enjoy flying.

"Do you think he's very handsome?" Myriam Prewett asked when all the girls in their dormitory gathered together to discuss their futures.

Rolling her eyes, Minerva answered, "I don't care what he looks like, so long as he has a brain bigger than a nogtail's. As pretty as boys are to look upon, I do enjoy a good conversation." She thought of her parents, who rarely talked to one another when it wasn't about their children. She wondered if her mother's soulmate would have made her smile.

"We should all try it," Augusta Fawley suggested. "Let's all write a message to our soulmates and see if they write back."

Minerva blinked. Her mother hadn't told her about that trick.

They all scrambled for their quills and began writing on the skin of their arms. Emily Vane burst into tears when another girl wrote back.

"Soulmates don't always mean your future husband," Minerva said coldly, embarrassed over the dramatic behaviour of her roommate, though secretly, she hoped that her own would be a boy. A smart boy, a talented boy, who was kind and good and magically strong. Someone who would be her equal and not forbid her from using magic.

And perhaps . . . perhaps he could be a little handsome.

"Mine's writing back!" Melinda Edgecombe squealed. "Should I tell him who I am? Oh, I'm going to have fun with this. My own little secret!"

Not wanting to beat around the bush and play ridiculous games of hide and seek with her soulmate like some of the girls were doing, Minerva decided to be bold and write a simple introduction to whoever it was that magic had chosen for her.

My name is Minerva McGonagall.

It took several minutes, but right there, on the skin of her arm in tidy penmanship, her soulmate wrote back.

Hello, Minerva McGonagall. My name is Tom Riddle.

He was several years older than she was, a Slytherin, and Head Boy. She knew who he was. Everyone knew who Tom Riddle was. He was a smart boy, a talented boy, who was cunning and charming and magically strong.

And he was perhaps . . . perhaps just a little handsome.

But he was not good, nor kind.

His friends were cruel, and though he reprimanded their behaviour when professors were watching, Minerva noticed that he did very little to stop the oafs when only her eyes were on the Slytherin table. She watched Tom Riddle quite often, trying to remember what her mother had once told her about soulmates.

"Sometimes magic makes mistakes."

When Tom graduated, he wrote her a letter, asking if she would mind if he corresponded with her from time to time. She agreed, if only to get to know him better but frowned when his letters asked detailed questions about Hogwarts, about her friends, and about the pureblood families he left behind in Slytherin. He asked about Professor Dumbledore's day to day activities and schedule, and asked if she would look in on Headmaster Dippet and send him Tom's friendly regards and watch how the man reacted. Minerva gave him nothing but useless information, smart enough to know when she was being used. She wrote back, asking him about his life and his family and then told him about hers. Instead of sending an owl, he wrote a message that appeared on her arm in the middle of Transfiguration.

Your mother should not have married a Muggle.

"Professor Dumbledore, sir?"

"Yes, Miss McGonagall? How can I help you?"

Minerva cleared her throat, using every bit of her willpower not to cry. "I umm . . . I need some help transfiguring my . . . my skin."

The older wizard frowned at the expression she wore on her face. His eyes didn't twinkle like they normally did. "Your skin, my dear?"

She pulled back the sleeve of her arm, showing him the message. It had been sent in ink but would not vanish no matter what she tried. When she attempted to charm it away, it had come back, this time scratched viciously into her skin like a scar. A scar that stayed there. Tom's usually beautiful penmanship was ugly and . . . and angry.

Dumbledore frowned. "Minerva, I feel it is very important that I ask you . . . do you know the identity of your soulmate?"

With tears in her eyes that she tried to blink away, she nodded. "Please, sir. Can you make it go away?"

He sighed. "I will teach you how."

He'd shown her the charm to vanish the marks, and she'd smiled with the greatest relief. She wouldn't admit such a thing to her Head of House, but she'd actually been quite afraid to return home to her parents with those words written on her skin. Her mother would have cried, and her Muggle father would have refused to allow her to return to Hogwarts. She sometimes had nightmares that he'd taken her wand away too.

Dumbledore smiled proudly at her, telling her how very talented she was at Transfiguration. "I have a project I'd like you to think about, Miss McGonagall," he said with a twinkle back in his eyes. "How would you like to become an Animagus?"

Her eyes lit up with intrigue and delight. "Could I really?"

He grinned. "Absolutely. It's not up to you, of course, but what kind of animal do you see yourself as?"

She stared down at her arm, skin clear once again and there was a flash of something powerful and perhaps a little dangerous in her gaze. "Something that can kill a snake."

1953

She flew so very high, the wind stinging her skin as she fought to deter the Slytherin Seeker. She was a Chaser herself, and Captain of her team, but a foul unseen by the referee had left the Gryffindor Seeker injured on the ground and their backup had become deathly ill the day before the game. They were up enough points that as long as her team could score a few more goals before Slytherin caught the Snitch, they'd still win, which was why she was doing her best to knock the sneaky little snake off course.

The Seeker twisted in the air when a flash of gold flew between them in the opposite direction, and Minerva turned her broom around, aiming it right after the Slytherin. She was close, so very close to being able to edge him to the side when something, like lightning, struck the end of her broom, rattling her own trajectory and snapping the wood in half midair.

As she fell, eyes wide, she briefly thought about shifting into her Animagus form. Cats always land on their feet right? she thought as the ground rapidly grew closer. Could she safely shift over sixty feet in the air?

No.

Like a pull to her magic that felt like a nasty itch inside of her, Minerva looked to the Slytherin stands as she continued falling, and she could swear that she saw him. Tom. He was smiling. She could almost feel the claws of her Animagus form pushing their way out the tips of her fingers in a rage. Before she fully collided with the ground, there was a soft pull of magic, slowing her descent, but not enough to prevent injury.

When she woke in the hospital wing with a concussion and several broken ribs, there was a vase of flowers next to the bed. Confused, she winced as she reached for the card next to them and frowned at the familiar script.

I could teach you to fly without a broom.

1956

Despite falling in love with Dougal—a Muggle, just like her mother had done—she couldn't bring herself to settle down and marry the man. He'd make her put her wand away, certainly he would, and Minerva couldn't bear the thought of it. Not only did she know that she couldn't live without magic, but she'd been offered a position within the D.M.L.E. Tom Riddle, she was certain, was up to something, and she was bound and determined to find out what it was. Being trained by Aurors would help her. Unfortunately, Tom had all but vanished from the face of the earth, nowhere to be seen. Every now and then, she thought about writing to him, but she couldn't bring herself to do so. Whatever he was doing, she didn't trust him. Marks appeared on her body from time to time: Dark scars from duells and burn marks from cursed items. She couldn't very well prove it, but she felt like there was something Dark inside of her; there were scars inside of her soul that she couldn't pinpoint or vanish away.

It kept her awake at night.

When Albus Dumbledore, now Headmaster of Hogwarts, sent her an owl telling her that Tom had resurfaced—at the school of all places, asking to teach the students there—she'd panicked. Writing back, she told her mentor to not reconsider his decision in rejecting the request. Tom could not teach students. She feared especially for the Muggle-borns. Dumbledore had written back, and she could almost see the smile in his words there on the parchment.

Minerva, I'd be pleased if you would come to Hogwarts instead.

She didn't teach Defence Against the Dark Arts, but Transfiguration was a perfect fit.

November 1981

Gone. He was gone.

She cried tears of joy for herself and the world, and tears of sadness for little Harry Potter, who'd lost everything. She stared at Albus, silently questioning the man as he placed the baby on the doorstep of the awful Muggles that she'd been observing all day long. The mark on the boy's head had drawn her attention, and Albus made some nonsensical comment about scars coming in handy. She tried not to look bitter as she mentally calculated the number of permanent marks on her own body that Tom Riddle had given her through their unwanted connection.

With Harry Potter taken care of and the world repairing itself, Minerva walked into the Ministry of Magic—soulmate free—and marched her way right up to an old suitor's desk. The man blushed furiously and swallowed hard as she sternly lifted her chin.

"Elphinstone Urquart, I'll take that date now, thank you."

August 1991

Her husband had brought a light into her life for the few years she had him before he died. The scars on her body caused by whatever Dark Magic Tom had played with were still there, but she'd rarely felt them. As the years passed by, however, the ones deep down itched from time to time and she felt sick to her stomach when she wondered what they were. No scan at St. Mungo's could find anything, nor could any charm that Dumbledore cast on her. Steadily, however, she could feel it coming. Something . . . something awful.

"It shouldn't be here," Minerva said after the staff meeting was let out. Hagrid had been sent to fetch Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, and Albus had set off the rest of the staff to prepare security for the ridiculous thing. "The bank is more than equipt—"

"Hogwarts is the safest place—"

"Hogwash!" she snapped at him. "Harry Potter comes to school this year and you want to bring something like . . . like THAT in with him? Absurd. Have those lemon drops poisoned your damned mind?!"

He dared to twinkle at her. "Are you saying that you're unwilling to help guard the stone, Minerva?"

"Oh, I'll guard the bloody stone," she said in a huff, blowing a strand of black hair that had fallen from her bun. "I'll just go and . . . and . . . transfigure a chess set to guard the thing."

Albus smiled. "How delightful."

She pinched the bridge of her nose, feeling the headache coming on. "I was being facetious, Albus."

June 1995

The twisting feeling in her soul continued to itch and burn until it felt like a sick fire during the Triwizard Tournament that she brushed off as nerves. Making children fight dragons and grindylows. Honestly. She'd never learned to completely trust her gut, however, until Harry Potter popped back onto the Quidditch pitch with Cedric Diggory's body.

Minerva stood angrily watching as Albus ordered Arthur and Molly about, followed by Sirius and Remus. So many former students, former children of hers that had been led into war . . . and now another generation would be raised as soldiers. It made her sick.

She did her duty, however; she followed orders and helped Albus set things in motion to fight back. Tom Riddle and the Dark Magic he wielded could not be set loose upon their world.

Pacing the hospital wing, she looked in on the poor boy that Albus had been sharpening against a whetstone for years; the boy who was soundly asleep and surrounded by friends and Weasleys and a large black dog that kept watch at the foot of his bed. After hours of watching them all protectively, Minerva retired to her room and undressed for bed. She glanced once in the long mirror and felt bile rise up in her throat. There, scratched along her collarbone in a familiar script . . .

Miss me?

May 1998

Her throat hurt from screaming. The sight of Harry Potter dead in Hagrid's arms had finally broken her. She'd given up love with Dougal in order to remain in the Wizarding world, and she'd not had enough time to build a proper family with Elphinstone. Her students were her children. Remus and Sirius had been hers, and so had James and Lily, and she'd failed them all. But no more so than the boy—than Harry. Tom shouted out his victory, and she couldn't help but wonder when his voice had changed so much. Was it always so high? Was it always so cold?

"Harry Potter is dead!"

And she had screamed herself sick.

Bellatrix Lestrange was laughing and fawning next to Tom—next to Voldemort—and looking at the man with adoration in her eyes. Minerva had wanted to taunt the woman, and tell her what it really felt like to be the soulmate of a sociopath.

But Bella had died along with so many others lost to the war that Tom had selfishly started.

A war that Harry Potter had finished.

"Avada Kedavra!"

"Expelliarmus!"

The bang was like a cannon blast, and the golden flames that erupted between them, at the dead centre of the circle they had been treading, marked the point where the spells collided.

Minerva touched her chest where the Killing Curse had shot back against Tom. She could feel it. The only soul scar that she would ever treasure, sitting there against her heart. When Potter stood, but Voldemort did not, she felt the itch in her soul scratch itself away after years and years of aching torment. She smiled sadly in relief as she walked over, looking down at Tom's broken, mortal body, and made plans right then to destroy the mirror in her room.