Fandom: Harry Potter

Tags: SIOC

Summary: Vita Zabini has one goal for this life: know everything and give people free information.

The first Big Event in her existence was when she was born. Again, that is.

Vita was never quite able to remember who she was, when she had lived, or how old she had been when she'd died. The one thing she knew with certainty was that she had been a Muggle and now she was not.

She was born on a cold winter night, five days until Christmas, in 1979 as the younger of two fraternal twins. Throughout the pregnancy, Fausta Zabini had been told that one of the twins, the girl, seemed to be quite frail and weak. She wasn't expected to survive the birth, not like her brother who by all accounts was strong and healthy for a fetus. Imagine the surprise of both Fausta and every Healer in the room when the baby, only halfway out of her mother's womb, began to wail like a banshee. Fausta thought it was a blessing and named her after the life she was graced with.

Of course, by 1979, Fausta Zabini had already cultivated her renowned image as the Black Widow Witch. All her lovers or husbands died in mysterious circumstances, always after having signed away their worldly possessions and wealth to Fausta, and thus a previously unknown first generation pureblood witch was thrust into high society of Europe's Wizarding World. As ambitious and intelligent as she was beautiful, Fausta did not waste away her fortunes; she took stocks out of many high profile businesses, both Muggle and Magical, as well as owning many small businesses around the world.

One of the most prolific things she had done to turn Pureblood society on its head was the lack of House Elves she employed - and the massive numbers of so-called undesirables that she employed instead. From muggleborns to squibs, werewolves to vampires, Fausta had a strict non-discrimination policy for everything she did.

Vita sat in the dirt under the shade of an orange tree, reading from a book on the basics of magical theory. Every now and then, one of the orchard workers would pass by with equipment or baskets of fruits in their arms, greeting her in various ways as they went. She barely looked up from her book to return the greetings most of the time, so absorbed in her book was she. But that was how she was most of the time, and the staff of Villa Carideo di Isola di Capri were used to her bookworm ways.

She couldn't help it, wanting to be absorbed into the book until she knew it by heart and understood it in its complexities. Magic was such a wondrous, beautiful thing, and with the memories of a Muggle life in her head she saw it quite differently from a regular magically-raised child. In fact, her views on its splendor was more akin to a Muggleborn if anything. So as soon as she had gotten her hands on books - first in English, then Italian when she learned to read her native tongue, and then some - she had dived into learning.

At the age of five she had nearly read through the entire Zabini library, devouring book after book, day after day.

"My beautiful Vita," a smokey voice drawled, and Vita snapped her head up. "Hiding amongst the orange blossoms again?"

Fausta Zabini, her mother in this life, stood just outside the shade of the orange tree Vita's back was against. Her white sundress, with it's wide skirt that moved with even the slightest breeze, was in stark contrast to her skin, which was akin to dark chocolate. Her hair was in box braids today, thick and full down her back, and pulled away from her violet eyes. Vita thought her mother was the most beautiful woman in the world, and was thankful for inheriting most of her looks. Where Fausta's eyes were almost dark purple, Vita and her brother's were a green so dark they looked black until light shone on them, and their skin was only a few shades lighter than Fausta. Whoever their father had been, he had not been black, for neither twin had inherited their mother's natural hair, though theirs was thick with curls.

"Mama!" Vita grinned, dropping her book carelessly on the ground as she threw herself at her mother, pressing her face into her skirts and feeling her knees press against her forehead. "You're back! How was France?"

Fausta leant down, a kind smile on her face that made her even more radiant, and picked her daughter up to hold her on her hip, grabbing the book as well. "France was just as lovely as I'd seen it last. Pierre, unfortunately, is no longer among the living."

Vita thought back to the man Fausta had been seeing the past few months. Pierre Malfoy, a distant cousin of Lord Malfoy, had been a rich man who had fallen for her mother easily, and Fausta had seemed amused and fond of the man in equal amounts. Enough, at least, to become engaged to the man.

"How did he die?" she asked, simply because that was what she always asked.

Fausta sighed deeply, and started walking back towards the main villa through the fields, barefoot in the dirt paths through the orchards. "It was the saddest thing, the poor man had a heart attack. Quite uncommon for a wizard, but Pierre had always had low health. I hope he is happy, wherever he is."

Vita hummed in sympathy, and tried to listen past the sadness in her mother's voice. She, like everyone who knew of the Black Widow Witch of Italy, knew her mother had a hand in the man's death though there was never enough proof to even take her into custody. Her mother knew she knew, and seemed to find her attempts to ferret it out directly akin to a puppy attempting to dig for the first time; with fond pride and amusement.

"Pierre knew his time was coming, I think," Fausta continued. "He revised his will almost constantly. Sweet man he was, he left our family quite a lot."

Vita's eyes snapped up expectantly. "What did he leave us?"

Vita was still unused to the opulence and riches of her family, after spending a lifetime scraping by paycheck by paycheck in a cockroach-infested apartment. It brought her a thrill every time she thought about the mounds of gold in her family's possession, and pride that her mother didn't use it only for herself but to better the lives of those in need.

"Oh, nothing special," Fausta said in a lofty tone. "His Paris mansion, a vacation home in New Zealand, his personal assets...and his personal library."

Vita squealed. "Really, mama?! Pierre had the most interesting collection of books of any of your partners! Are they already in the Villa Library?"

Fausta let out a deep chuckle. "Not yet, my darling. I've got a team of Curse Breakers going over it all first, never know what hexes are on those books."

Vita groaned, falling limp backwards to dangle in her mother's grasp as though the very life in her blood had failed her. "I still don't understand why anyone would hex a book, mama. Doesn't that defeat the purpose of having a library?"

Fausta shook her head, pulling her daughter upright as they reached the gardens behind the main villa. "It simply keeps people not of the family from reading them, most times. All the books in our library are warded so as not to show any information to those not a Zabini or sworn staff."

This was news to Vita, who had never had a problem with reading the books. But then again, she was a Zabini, so the hexes wouldn't affect her. She had seen many of staff in the library, reading and learning during their down-time. Was that not normal?

"Mama," she began. "What are other libraries like?"

"Well, for starters, I don't know much about other families' libraries," said Fausta. "They're well-guarded, and generally hold the secrets to understanding your family magic. I only know about the ones I've inherited, and they've always been hexed in some way."

Vita frowned. "Okay, but what about public libraries?"

Fausta rolled her eyes with a small smile for a moment, before realizing her daughter was looking at her seriously. "Vita, my love, the wizarding world does not do public libraries, not like the muggles. Magic is power, so knowledge of it is guarded zealously. Imagine if anyone was able to walk off the street into it - they could steal the books for themselves!"

Vita was floored, but nodded and hummed in agreement so as to not show her unease. It sounded like, to her, a way to control one's position in the world, to enforce a class system amongst pureblood versus muggleborns. If those without a family library hadn't a way to learn before starting school, they were probably vastly out-performed by their counterparts with family libraries.

Some of the staff, when she'd cornered them and forced her presence on them to understand who they were, spoke of the Zabini Villa Library with reverence, and nearly all of them were desperate for the knowledge within it. It was the same knowledge withheld from them before, just because they were muggleborns, or squibs, or non-humans.

It was distasteful, decided Vita.

An idea came to her.

"Mama," she said, catching Fausta's attention from a rose bush shaped like a pixie. "I'm going to open the first public, magical library. Everyone deserves to learn."

Fausta patted her daughter on the back with the book in her other hand. "I'm sure you will, darling."

From her tone, Vita knew Fausta didn't believe her. After all, she was just five. But Vita was determined, the idea solidifying in her mind. How would she fill the library? Fausta certainly wouldn't let her take the books from the Zabini Villa Library, though there were multiple duplicates in the shelves.

I'll copy them all down by hand if I have to , she thinks.

But what about other books? The Zabini Villa Library was comprehensive of many subjects, but even it had blank spots of topics and books. She could buy books, certainly, but bookstores in the wizarding world were all very generic and the same. It was rare when a new book would be published and sold world-wide; in fact, new books were usually limited in print, and sold for high prices. Many of the tomes in her family's library could be found nowhere else. Surely that meant there were other hidden treasures in the libraries of other families?

I can't just flounce in and take their books, either, she thought with a frown as Fausta contented herself in the silence to carry her daughter around the gardens. But then again…

Her Muggle existence may have been magic-less, but it had certainly not been boring.

I just won't ask for them . Vita decided with a small smirk on her lips, staring up at the clouds. I've always hated asking for permission.

Vita was bouncing with excitement as she paced between columns on the front porch of the main villa, dressed smartly in soft blue robes with her mass of curls done in an elegant up-do with a crown braid wrapping around her hairline. The high, tight collar of the outer-cloak itched against the nape of her neck, but it was a sacrifice she was willing to make for today.

Today was, after all, the most important day of her life so far. Today was the day she and her brother were getting their first wands, and they'd be going to Diagon Alley for the first time to do it! The age of six was a traditional pureblood age to get a first wand, though it had fallen out of style in the past century like most pureblood traditions. Only old families, like the Black's or Malfoy's, did it these days.

Blaise, who was sitting on the steps leading to the porch in his matching blue robes, patiently waiting for their mother, had been the one to spark this. Her twin had noticed Vita getting more anxious than usual lately about not being able to explore the practical side of her studying, despite how their nanny taught them everything from Potions to Arithmancy. It was rather unexpected of him to outright ask for something, usually content to let Vita lead most conversations, and so Fausta had immediately agreed to take the tradition up at his asking.

Thus, the spring of 1986, they had been woken earlier than normal by the main villa maids to get ready for their outing. The robes had been strange, as neither child was used to dressing to English wizarding norms; magical Italians were much more free with what they wore, more influenced by muggle fashion. Still, both child bore the heavy fabrics with an air of excitement.

A sharp crack in the air, like a gunshot or a truck backfiring, signaled their mother's return.

"Mama!" Vita shouted, spinning on her heel towards the sound and racing down the front steps towards Fausta.

Fausta caught her with strong arms when Vita threw herself towards the woman from the fifth to last step, spinning her daughter around in the air with laughter. "My beautiful little Vita! Look at you, all dressed up! You almost look like a proper Englishwoman!" Fausta peppered Vita's face with kisses, causing the girl to giggle helplessly in her mother's arms, a wide grin on both their faces. Then, her mother set the girl down and turned to the boy who waited three steps away with a quiet smile on his face. "My quiet Blaise, my lovely boy - come to mama, will you? She's missed you terribly!"

Blaise was much more held-back in his affections, but he allowed his mother to kiss his face like she had Vita's. "Hello, mother. How was your visit to to Germany?"

Fausta sighed as though she was a dying woman, reaching out to straighten some of Blaise's hair, which the maids had slicked back with a bottle of Sleakeazy's. "Nikolaus Wӓgner is as irritating as he is rich - of which he is luckily so. I don't think I'll keep him long."

The blasé mention of her latest fly in the web floated past the twins with casual ease. Vita often thought she must have gone slightly crazy in death, to be able to brush the eventual murder of a man off so easily, but it was a boon to be able to. She might have gone truly crazy otherwise.

"Does he have a library?" Vita asked, curious.

"He does," Fausta smiled indulgently. "I've told him about your hunger for books, and he says he would love to meet you."

Vita rolled her eyes. "I'm sure he would."

Fausta laughed, and it was a cruel laugh. "Oh, my daughter, you really are mine. Alright, you two, we've got a big day ahead of us. Let's get to it!"

The apparition to Charing Cross Road, London, England, was disconcerting and nausea-inducing. More so than a regular trip due to the distance, but Fausta had forced anti-nausea potions down their throats before leaving in case it was too much for the twins. Vita, who felt as though she might vomit anyways, thought it had been in vain.

The anti-apparition wards around the Alley didn't allow for direct transport to the shopping district. There was too much of a chance you could splinch into someone else, and there were documented incidents of such in some of the history books Vita had read, so there was an alleyway near the Muggle side of the Leaky Cauldron most magic folk used as an apparition point.

The walk to the pub was fast, none of the muggles on the street looking twice at yet another strange group of people stepping out of the shadows. Vita assumed it was either a version of a Notice-Me-Not charm or simply the human mind learning to accept strange things as long as they had a pattern, like strange people walking around Charing Cross.

Blaise, Vita noticed, seemed uninterested as ever in the going-on's around him as they stepped into the pub. At least, outwardly, he did; Vita knew her brother practiced looking like a little aristocrat in the mirror, training his own reactions out of himself. She knew his tells, though, and felt him step closer to her slightly, nervous from the crowd. Vita reached out to grasp his hand, pulling him along behind her as she followed her mother. Blaise let her, keeping up with her easily.

They stepped into the back alley behind the pub and Vita watched with fascination as Fausta made a show of opening up the brick wall. With every inch of light that broke through the shifting bricks her eyes grew wider and wider until they were the size of saucers.

"Awesome," she whispered, squeezing Blaise's hand. "Come on, mama! Let's go, let's go!"

Notes:

- Vita and Blaise were born on December 20th, 1979, and they got their wands when they were five. Vita's was of cedar wood stained a deep brown color, the heartstring of a Swedish Short-Snout dragon, and is 13 3/4" long, and rather bendy. Blaise's wand is of elm wood stained black, with the heartstring of the same Swedish Short-Snout that provided the heartstring in Vita's wand, and is 9 1/2" long, slightly supple.

- Ollivander points out that dragon heartstring wands usually have dozens of siblings wands compared to unicorn hair wands or phoenix feather wands because the only way to get a dragon heartstring is for a dragon to die, so you can use the entire heart, compared to having to be gifted a unicorn hair or pheonix feather. Siblings suited to dragon heartstring wands usually end up with sibling wands.

- The main home of the Zabini family is in Villa Carideo di Isola di Capri, or Villa Carideo of the Island Capri, in the gulf of Naples. It was built for Fausta by her first husband, Vittore di Napoli, in an unplottable piece of land that stretches for 32 acres (.05 square miles) hidden amongst the mountain range seperated Capri and Anacapri. Villa Carideo (as it is generally called in place of the full name) is staffed by Muggleborns and Squibs who have all undergone unbreakable vows to Fausta to not reveal the secrets of the Zabini family or of Villa Carideo, and to, as long as their contract stands, never knowingly harm a member of the Zabini family. They have five full-time, in-villa housekeepers, who each have four maids to oversee. There are three groundskeepers: one for the orchards, one for the vineyards, and one for the main grounds and gardens. There is one household manager, who has a personal assistant. There is also the Household Nanny, Harmonie Melba, who oversees Blaise and Vita's education and daily life. Both Blaise and Vita have personal assistants (who are also bodyguards) who travel with them in day-to-day life.

- Villa Carideo is based off Villa Antinori Di Monte Aguglioni in Florence, Italy, previously owned by the Monna Lisa's family.

- Her first book heist is executed during a weekend stay at the Greengrass Manor in Ireland. The Lady Greengrass told her to read whatever she'd like in the library during her stay, so she proceeded to copy as many books as possible with the duplicating charm into her (charmed expanded) overnight bag. When she gets home after the weekend, she uses more stable enchantments to stop the deterioration of the copies.

- She uses her friendly personality as an excuse to visit all her friends with libraries. By the time it's time for her to go to Hogwarts, she's 'stolen' (copied) nearly three hundred books. She hides them away in secret spots in the library, the least suspicious place for her to be seen carrying books, and the one place most the staff leave alone for her.

- The Sorting Hat puts her in Slytherin without a second thought. She's slightly sad because she'd heard that Ravenclaw had a library in the tower. She vows to sneak into it. (Which she does. Multiple times. Their password is a riddle, hellooooooo? She's learned that if she can defend her answer and convince the enchanted knocker, almost anything can be an answer.)

- She and Blaise are at odds a lot of the time regarding things like bloodtraitors or the war. Vita lives by the philosophy that "neutrality in the face of evil is complacity" while Blaise lives by the philosophy of "I don't want to die so I'm not getting involved."

- HPatPS year: She doesn't interact with the Trio because she's a Slytherin and they're Gryffindors and the trio is eleven/twelve and under the impression that all Slytherins are evil. When the troll invades the castle, she does not go to save Granger because she's not friends with Granger and didn't even know Granger was in danger. She finished her year out normally with above average grades, pissed off about Dumbledore's favoritism, with a small portion of the Hogwarts library stolen.

- The summer of 1992 she runs into Granger in France, where's she's escaped to for the day out of boredom. (Harmonie will be pissed off when she gets back.) She interacts politely with them at first, introducing herself as a classmate to Granger's parents, who fuck up her plan to leave fast by assuming she's a friend of Granger's and dragging her along for the day with them. It's awkward all around, but by the end of it she and Granger are much less hostile towards each other. (Granger realized that she can't judge every Slytherin based on Draco Malfoy and Pansy Parkinson, and Vita thinks Granger can be nice when she's not lecturing you in class.) Throughout the summer, Vita continues to visit her friends to steal from them.

- HPatCoS: She runs into Granger on the train, who is worried about Potter and Weasley #6 not being on the train, and makes the girl take a breather by letting her sit in her compartment with Blaise, who is comically horrified (but on the inside just annoyed) at the the bushy haired girl in their compartment. She endears herself further to Granger by handing her a book on advanced magical theory the girl hadn't read. When, on Halloween, the Chamber opens, Vita is terrified that Slytherin's monster will be able to tell she was once a Muggle. She confesses this to Blaise, who takes it in stride - by gluing their hands together, which takes hours in the Infirmary to undo, and then by simply following his sister everywhere in an effort to protect her. (This is how he finds out about the book stealing, which he is horrified by at first because he's been raised with no other ideals than that knowledge within the family is practically sacred, but after a few weeks of fighting he gets over it.) She starts practicing Occlumency with Blaise. When Harry Potter is vilified by the school as the heir of Slytherin, she decides to follow Granger's example (because to her, Granger seems to have a lot of common sense compared to magical folk, and thus when she doesn't know what to do in regards to a magical situation, she follows Granger's cue (or Blaise's if he gets the chance to react first in front of her.)) and doesn't believe any of it. When Granger gets petrified, she visits her whenever she thinks she won't be seen, and is thankful that Potter kills the monster later that year. (She also gives Granger a copy of all her notes that Granger missed, which is met with tears and a tight hug, to Vita's surprise and slight discomfort.)

- Summer of 1993: Sirius Black has escaped from Azkaban, but that's not really something Vita is focused on. She owls back and forth with Granger more so than any of her 'friends' (aka, book hoarders she's stealing from). Granger finds out that purebloods (who aren't 'bloodtraitors' who adopted the practice of respecting the Trace) have a way to get rid of the Trace every summer rather than let the charms build upon each other [My theory is that every wand when sold from Ollivanders has no Trace on it, and that the spell is cast on the wands of students leaving school, but that most Pureblood families have ways passed down to get rid of it every year. My theory with the Trace is that the charm is weak when first cast, which is why Dobby doing magic in the same house as Harry was able to set it off, because when its weak it doesn't connect to the magical signature of the castor as easily, but every time it's cast on the wand the charm gets stronger, so by fifth year a person would only get a letter if they were the person to cast a spell, not if the person two seats away at their dinner table did.] and demands it be done for her wand, to Vita's amusement. She invites Granger over to Villa Carideo for two weeks during the summer and undo's the trace then. Granger loves the Zabini Library. When Granger goes to stay in the Leaky Cauldron with the Weasleys and Potter, Vita makes a point to go visit and drag Blaise along with her. At first, only Granger interacts with them without suspicion - even the adults. It pisses Vita off to no end that even adults would judge a child based on their House, but eventually they all settle down, kinda. Enough that they could eat at the same table civilly, at least, and for Ron to stop saying shit like Slimy Slytherins aloud instead of in his head.

- HPatPoA: the Dementors affect Vita like no other, because every time they come close, she's reliving the worst experiences of her life, aka, her death. It feels like she's died every time one comes too close, and the flashbacks are terrible. She died in a horrific plane accident, too, which only makes it worse. (Side note: Vita doesn't like heights. She forces herself to use brooms, though, because magic broomsticks, helloooooo?) She is the person to unfortunately tell Harry that Black is his godfather, because she interacts with the trio more this year and has all the pureblood gossip that Ron, as a Weasley, doesn't. She, like Hermione, takes as many classes as possible. Dumbledore initially wanted to block her getting a Time Turner (not that Vita knew this), because she's a scary smart Slytherin with, to what seems like to the outside eye, an insatiable hunger for magical power. Kinda like a certain Dark Lord when he was their age. So he's like, "idk man, maybe she shouldn't get a device that holds power over time." But McGonagall (surprise!) is the first to be like "yeah, no, you're wrong." and does it anyways. [I don't pick Snape to be the first because Snape has shown himself to be nothing but a jackass to little kids, and, in my opinion, probably wouldn't initially stick up for the kid. He might do it after seeing McGonagall, because then he'd be like "wait. Yeaaaaah. She does deserve a time turner if a little gryffindor is getting one too!" but he wouldn't do it out of the kindness of his heart.] Unlike Hermione, who uses it strictly as told, Vita uses it left and right to do shit. Don't want to go to class? It can wait a couple of hours, I gotta finish stealing books! Need to eat multiple dinners, study in a place she won't run into herself, or just take a nap? She's set up spots around the castle where, depending on the placement of certain objects outside the vicinity, she'll know if a future self/past self is already in there and won't cause a paradox! She also starts learning the Patronus charm, but in secret because she doesn't realize Potter is getting lessons from Lupin that she could then demand to have as well to diminish the idea that Lupin is practicing favoritism. Also, yes, she knows he's a werewolf. There's dozens working on the orchards at home, all of whom she's friends with because she's made it a point to make sure her mom doesn't accidentally become a slaver with the staff. She can recognize a werewolf. So does Blaise. Neither of them give a shit. Buckbeak doesn't even have to get a trial because as soon as Vita gets wind of it from Hermione (and Malfoy, who boasts about it in the Common Room) she's owling her mother to take the hippogriff in to their stables at Villa Carideo. Hagrid cries when he tells her his friend won't get decapitated, and that he's welcome to come visit during the summer as long as he owls ahead so she can help him find the Villa. The day comes when the handlers come to pick Buckbeak up, but when Vita leads them to Hagrid's, Buckbeak is missing. Over the course of the next few hours, she's very confused, and is, coincidentally, in the Infirmary when the trio and Snape and Black are brought in. She's roped into Harry and Hermione's time adventure, is told that Black is innocent (which, when coming from Hermione's mouth, Vita doesn't hesitate to believe, to both Hermione and Harry's shock.) Since they've got time before they've got to find Black, Vita convinces them to go watch Hagrid's because she wants to know what happened to Buckbeak. They then warn the trio, who were visiting Hagrid when they should've been in class, thus the hiding, when the handlers and Vita start coming. But then Vita's like, wait, Buckbeak hasn't disappeared. But I can see myself about to come- oh great, I'm stealing Buckbeak. So she steals Buckbeak, and doesn't really know why. They then go to see what Harry believes to be his parents saving his and Black's life, but in reality is Vita and Harry's patroni. (Vita's is a magpie that attacks the dementors like it's swooping season in australia) Then they break out Sirius like Dumbledore originally implied to do, and Vita realizes she can send Sirius to the villa but that since it's unplottable, Buckbeak won't be able to find it, nor Sirius, so she goes with them. Hermione and Harry are against the idea, but Vita reminds Hermione that she also has a Time Turner and that she'll see her the next morning at breakfast like usual. It takes them, going at Buckbeak's top speed with very few breaks, nearly eleven hours to get to the Villa. She finds her mother in the gardens and convinces her that Black is innocent and to let him stay. None of the staff can break their vows to snitch if Fausta declares it to the staff as a Zabini secret, and Fausta relents on the fact that Sirius is to be confined to the main house and the gardens, not allowed to venture further. Her mother apparates her back to Hogsmeade, where she uses a broom and her time turner to go back to the hours before breakfast and sneak back into the school. Hermione finds her the next morning to ask if it went alright - it did - and to tell her that Lupin was resigning before he could be fired on basis of being a werewolf. Which, like most things, pisses Vita off. She owls her mother to beg (Fausta is slightly annoyed with her with all these requests, but also doesn't have the heart to say no to her only daughter when she's only trying to do good in the world.) for Lupin to be offered the position of a part-time, in-home housekeeper at the villa. Lupin, who was told by Harry that Sirius was given sanctuary at the Zabini's, (which, when Vita finds out, will piss her off because he can't go telling people!) takes the offer instantly.

- Summer of 1994: hanging out with Sirius and Remus, stealing books from people, getting into trouble in Capri with Blaise, and, then, the World Cup. Quuiditch is the only sport Vita has ever cared about, of course she makes her mom buy them tickets at the top box. She brings enchanted glasses that show what she sees on a mirror with her so that Sirius and Remus don't get left out, and is excited to see Hermione, Harry, and the Weasleys. Malfoy, not so much. She'd dedicated days within a night once earlier that summer at a pureblood sleepover at the Malfoy's to stealing their entire library using her time turner so that she'd never have to go back to his manor. She slept for three days afterwards when they got home, having abused invigoration potions to get through the night. Of course, when Death Eaters attack everything turns into chaos, and she feels lucky she didn't have her glasses on because she's not sure Sirius would be able to hold back from running to stop them. She owls Hermione after to check that she was okay, to her relief they all were.

- HPatGoF: She knows about the Triwizard Tournament through her mom, and has already resolved that she doesn't give a fuck about it. She continues last years habit of taking multiple classes, and no teacher seems to mention the fact that she should have turned in the time turner the year before. No one mentions it to Hermione either, who she knows still has hers. When Halloween comes, and Durmstrang and Beauxbatons come, she still doesn't care. By now she's amassed over two thousand books that she's stolen. She's been slowly siphoning money from her trust vault into a separate, personal vault that her mom can't touch, and uses the money to buy an abandoned cathedral before the school year starts: this is where she'll build her library. The cathedral is in Florence, Italy, and she has it warded up. She is one of the few, along with Hermione and Blaise, to believe Harry didn't put his name in the Goblet. The strife between he and Ron, and Hermione's strained relationship with the both of them because of it, causes Harry to gravitate towards the two Zabini's simply because they're the only other friendly people, which helps grow their friendship. She helps him practice magic for the first task, and is slightly cold towards Ron for a few weeks after he and Harry make up. When the Yule ball is announced, she originally doesn't plan to go. There's no girl that she wants to go with in the school, seeing as she feels kinda gross with the idea of dating a girl her physical age when she feels mentally older. She supports Hermione on having a date and not wanting to disclose the identity of him, because she trusts Hermione, and thinks Ron is a jackass for being so rude to Hermione and saying she was making her date up. When Ron then asks her, then, to go with her instead of Hermione, she tells him no and then explains that she's gay. She then says that if he and Harry are so desperate for a date, why not go together? The Wizarding World has much different views on same sex relationships than the muggle one due to magical advancements in procreation. They take her advice, realizing it was true, and go together, to the Weasley twin's catcalls. She spends the ball up in Ravenclaw tower, quietly copying books while a girl named Luna reads in a corner. She likes Luna, and befriends the girl. When the fourth task happens, and Voldemort is resurrected and Cedric is dead, she realizes that she's going to have to wait a little longer to open her library to the public.

- Summer of 1995: Hermione seeks out Vita at the villa, seeking advice. She's scared for her parents, knowing what happened to the Muggles at the World Cup last year, knowing that the war is coming back and she'll be right at the center as Harry's friend. Vita, who hasn't got as much common sense as she thinks, thinks the best idea is to erase her parents' memories and send them away for their safety. (She and Hermione are more similar than they think.) She does it for Hermione, sending them to Canada. She convinces her mom to let Hermione move in, (Fausta is realizing that the Zabini reputation for war neutrality is about to end as she takes in even more strays) and Dumbledore finds them during a day out in Capri to ask Hermione to come to stay with the Order of the Phoenix at the Weasleys (Dumbledore hasn't had contact with Sirius and Remus like in canon bc they're not on the run and are on unplottable land so they can't be tracked down. So instead of the Order HQ being Grimmauld Place, they but up a Fidelius at the Burrow and set up there. Dumbledore, who has slowly come to the idea that Vita isn't Tom Riddle 2.0, suggests Vita (and Blaise, by association bc Vita isn't going anywhere without him, not that Dumbledore realizes this until Blaise is also at HQ) can come too, and also to pass on the invitation to Sirius and Remus. Hermione goes to stay with them, and Vita comes to visit (with Blaise) whenever Remus and Sirius go for Order Meetings. Vita doesn't give a shit about Dumbledore's rules about not owling Harry information and just. Fucking. Shows up at Private Drive one day. Like hey, Harry, Dumbledore says I can't owl you so I thought I'd just come in person. How's it going? So yeah. Then the Dementor shit happens and Harry is nearly expelled, and though Vita assures him that if he were actually expelled she would sneak him into the villa and set him up with private tutors and a new wand, his spirits aren't raised much. This is the summer Fausta teaches Blaise and Vita to apparate illegally. Vita has her library set up and keeps filling it - avoiding the homes of Voldemort-associated families when she steals - throughout the summer.

- HPatOotP: Umbridge is a fucking bitch. The moment she finds out the chick is using blood quills she snitches to her mom, who throws the biggest hissy fit and uses all her connections to get the woman out of Hogwarts. When the Board tries to keep Umbridge by saying they don't have a replacement, Fausta offers herself. She's got the education for it, after all, as she'd spent her youth before her first marriage making a name for herself as a world traveler getting into trouble wherever she went, and got O's on her DADA NEWT's. So, to the students, it seems almost overnight that Umbridge is thrown out of Hogwarts during the winter holidays and Professor Zabini takes her place. The D.A. stays a club but since they don't have a teacher sponsor (and who would sponsor Harry Potter's club in this political climate? The Ministry has started sending auditors to make up for Umbridge's loss) they stay secret. Marietta Edgecombe doesn't have the chance to snitch so they aren't caught. Blaise and Vita are, at first, the only Slytherins in the group, before they start bringing in the muggleborns and halfbloods that are in Slytherin and refuse to discriminate or tolerate discrimination against their House. Tracey Davis is one of the first. When Voldemort starts sending Harry visions, and Mr Weasley nearly dies, and Snape gives shit lessons, Blaise takes it upon himself to teach Harry Occlumency the same way he did Vita (mentioned before that he "trained his reactions away" aka he was learning occlumency secretly when he was six, lmao). Still, one slips through that Sirius was captured. They go to Fausta first, to find out if Sirius was still at the villa, but according to the housekeeper who she asked he'd been out all day. Harry confesses what his visions were and his fears, and Fausta takes it upon herself to go to Dumbledore. Unfortunately, Harry gets another vision while she's gone and decides to go after Sirius himself. There were different people this time with him because they didn't need to have Umbridge tricked away, thus the people who head to the Ministry to break in are: Harry, Hermione, Ron, Vita, Blaise, and Luna (who was with the thestrals and refused to be left behind). Sirius dies. Voldemort is revealed. Vita kills Bellatrix Lestrange. (she's been reading books and books on magic since she could turn a page, and she's got the creativity to use even a simple Wingardium Leviosa to kill. While she's distracted, cackling about the fight between Voldemort-Harry-Dumbledore, Vita kills her by using a simple gluing charm and gluing her esophagus shut. She dies of asphyxiation, though she throws a nonverbal curse at Vita before she dies that hits her and rips her intestines out. She barely survives.

- Summer of 1996: Hermione stays at the villa for half the summer, with the Weasleys the other half. The Battle of Seven Potters, but with the Zabini family as well, as Fausta has joined the Order and refused to not give information to the children who are at the center of the fight no matter what the adults do, so Molly Weasley really doesn't like her. She didn't like her before, anyways, when Fausta was simply the Black Widow Witch. Vita is bedridden most of the summer, and because Remus is still at the villa too, he's usually with her. Which means, when Tonks comes to visit him, she visits Vita by default. They grow to be friends. She's the maid of honor AND best man for their impromptu wedding in Capri, which she gets out of bed for. George loses his ear, Mad-Eye dies, blah blah blah. Vita meets Andromeda Tonks, sister to Bellatrix, who she killed; Andromeda doesn't hold it against her. (Earlier in the summer, Harry finds out Sirius made him his heir, and that he's got some sort of house called Grimmauld Number 12 in London and a House Elf who hates everyone. Nobody suggests using it for an Order HQ because it never came up before and now that Sirius is dead and Harry's grieving, Dumbledore doesn't even think to ask.)

- HPatHBP: Slughorn is Potions Professor, Snape is DADA's because Fausta quit because she discovered she hated teaching. Why are all children but her own idiots? Fausta doesn't know. Anyways, Harry still finds the Potion's book and then Hermione and Vita have their first fight. They disagree on what Harry is doing; to Hermione, it is cheating, but to Vita, it is taking advantage of all his resources available and commendable. They don't speak to each other for weeks before calling a truce between each other to simply not talk about the book. Vita doesn't know if she can tell Hermione about her library, and that hurts her, because Hermione is one of her closest friends. She does convince Harry to let her copy the book so she can study it. She finds the book fascinating, but also knows most of what was changed to the potions in the book already due to private tutors as a child and her mass amount of book knowledge that supports all the notes in the book. Harry, obsessed with Draco, gets a knock upside the head by Vita who thinks he's going through a gay crisis. And if he wasn't then, he is now. (When Harry examines his feelings, he realizes he's bisexual...and is in love with…both Hermione and Ron...cue the angst.) Then Dumbledore dies as Death Eaters invade the castle, Vita and Blaise fight to protect the castle alongside the DA and order. Harry shows them all the fake locket, and Vita (who has practically memorized genealogies about Wizarding families, knows the gossip about who was on what side of the war, and spent her summers hanging out with Sirius and learning about his life) knows instantly who R.A.B. is. Harry tries to say that Hermione, Ron, Vita, and Blaise shouldn't come with him on the Horcrux hunt, but they're all pretty quick to be like "Nah bro u stuck with us" and Hermione steals books from Dumbledore's office! Vita is so proud.

- Summer of 1997/Deathly Hallows: at the villa, with Ron visiting frequently and using mirrors to connect to Harry, they plan their hunt. They'll head to Grimmauld Place to find the real locket, and then head back to the villa and figure it out from there. Fausta hasn't had a new husband or lover in months, too busy with the Order. When Harry goes to the Burrow, along with Hermione to help prepare for the Bill/Fleur wedding, Molly does her best to discourage any secret talking - she's not an idiot, she knows they're up to something - but Fausta covers for them (she lived through one war by ignoring those trying to make her pick a side, she won't let her kids' choice be taken from them by even a well-meaning helicopter mom). When the wedding is attacked, the five disappear to London and find Grimmauld Place. They convince Kreacher, who's practically mad because he's been alone in a house with Walburga Black's portrait for years, that they're there to destroy the locket. Kreacher, who is convinced this is his last chance to serve Master Regulus, gives them the Locket. And then abruptly dies. House Elves, after all, need family magic to survive. Though Harry inherited him, he never bonded to the Elf, and thus far Kreacher had been surviving on pure spite. He dies in peace knowing he finished the task set out for him by Master Regulus. They stay at Grimmauld Place, occasionally getting attacked by doxies or boggarts or yelled at by Walburga's portrait, while they try to figure out where to go next. Fausta sent a patronus saying not to come home, that the Ministry was searching the Villa for them illegally. Vita discovers the library and fangirls over it for hours, and Harry just fucking. Doesn't care. His friend likes the library more than him? More than Hermione? She can have it then. It's a touching moment for Vita, if not for Harry. They take turns wearing the Locket, and Vita reacts nearly as badly as Harry - she does, after all, have a lifetime's worth of mistakes and regrets and shame for the Locket to feed off of. She and Blaise start sharing a bed like when they were kids, because she starts having nightmares. Harry is dancing around his feelings for Hermione and Ron while Hermione dances around her feelings for Harry and Ron, and Ron dances around his feelings for Hermione while he's so oblivious to the idea of being gay that he mistakes his feelings for Harry as jealousy. Blaise is the first to notice it and tells Vita, and they make bets on when they'll get their shit together. Then they find out about Snatchers while out and about and have to apparate away after fighting, and they make use of Hermione's emergency bag, unable to return to Grimmauld now that the Snatchers know they were in the vicinity, if not the actual place. They don't starve because Vita isn't an idiot and remembers watching Naked and Afraid a lot as a Muggle, and just applies those ideas with magic. They need food? Accio fish, bitch. Sometimes it ends up with her being covered in a pile of fish, sometimes not, but it works. Ron storms off, and everyone suffers for the extra time with the Locket. Vita, pained by the angst and sadness, pushes at Hermione to tell Harry about her feelings so that they at least would have each other. Hermione and Harry commiserate over their feelings for Ron, the idiot, but take comfort in each other. They visit Godric's Hollow, and when Nagini attacks, breaking Harry's wand as well as Blaise's, Vita uses fiendfyre on impulse - burning Nagini and the house to the ground, getting the attention of muggles though she was able to control the spell enough to end it, but passes out for the effort. She wakes up back in the tent, everyone is in a bad mood. Then a few hours later Harry has a vision about Voldemort being pissed because Nagini was apparently a Horcrux, so their spirits are slightly raised. Unfortunately they can't use fiendfyre on the Locket - not yet, not until Vita is back to full strength because she's the only one with barely enough control to use the spell. Then, Harry follows a stag and finds the Sword of Gryffindor and Ron saves his life and the locket shows him Harry and Hermione making out, yes, but also talking about how much they hated Ron. Ron destroys the Horcrux, and Harry kisses him out of exhilaration, to Ron's befuddled enthusiastic consent. They return to camp and Hermione gets mad but in the end the three sleep in the same bed and take comfort in their tangle of limbs and sheets. Blaise owes Vita money because she bet him they would all get together before the war was out, while he thought they wouldn't. THen they get caught by snatchers at Xenophilius Lovegood's and it's not Hermione they take to torture, because Bellatrix isn't there to be like "oooh, mudblood!". Instead, there is Narcissa, grieving the loss of her sister, and Rodolphus, grieving his wife, faced with the teenage killer of her. They take delight in her revenge, and Draco watches in horror as Vita is carved up and tortured with Crucio. The word bloodtraitor is carved into her stomach. Dobby rescues them all to the Cottage, but there's no Bellatrix to throw knives, thus he lives to see another day. During her torture, Blaise was freaking the fuck out in the basement hearing his sister's screams, though the trio were close to the same level. They gather from Voldemort's mind visions that there's a Horcrux hidden in the Lestrange vault, and hey, what do you know, Rodolphus is missing a handful of hair that Vita snatched whilst fighting back during the torture. Blaise is the one to transform into Rodolphus to get into the vault, though he is loathe to do so, and the rest simply transform into randoms to follow and steal from Gringott's. They destroy the locket right after they escape - Vita does, that is, as offered by Harry because he thinks its good revenge. There is only one horcrux left (according to Dumbledore's information, which they don't know isn't true) and they make plans to go to Hogwarts because that's the most important place to Voldemort, right? So they do, and find that the D.A. has been smuggling muggleborns and half bloods and anyone targeted by the Carrows into the RoR - including Slytherins! The battle happens, Slytherins stay to fight for hogwarts, and people die. Who, you ask? Colin Creevey, Lavender Brown, and Fred Weasley - and Fausta, but not Remus and Tonks, because you know Vita saw them and followed them in the nick of time. Hermione and Ron destroy the diadem. Then Harry dies and comes back to life, Neville stands up to Voldemort himself (raising his wand against the Dark Lord, because there's no snake to kill but the biggest snake himself). Voldemort and Harry duel, Voldemort dies. The war is over.

- Epilogue-ish: Vita goes back to Hogwarts with Hermione and Blaise, finished her stealing of books as well as making copies of the Black Library, and opens up the Zabini Public Library of Magic. Hermione, Ron, and Harry get poly hitched, and Ginny and Blaise fall in love unexpectedly. Vita doesn't get married, she lives out her life as a librarian and world traveler like her mom before her.

A/N: this is the culmination of a day of writing nonstop until now, 4:40ish am. it's rushed and dumb and i really don't care. I saw Ocean's 8 yesterday afternoon and i wanted to write about a thief and then she just ended up stealing books and becoming a librarian. I feel like this is something I write about a lot, characters becoming librarians. I like libraries, can you tell. Comment if you want, I know I'm supposed to be working on "sepia toned" but tbh I haven't even started the fourth chapter...