Title: Ripple Effect

You'd be surprised just how far a single act in the throes of hate can go to change a person's life. A single, spitefully spoken word could bring a person to the depths of despair, a single action could spawn a lifelong vendetta, a single thought could bring down an empire.

When Andrew Joshua Talon spitefully threw away every last Hogwarts book in his home, wishing that he had never been involved in the world of magic, he would never know just how far four of those books would travel and just how much the world would change because of it…

[Picture Emily Rose (Haven; SyFy) when you think of Jessica.]

[Picture Marisol Nichols (24, Day 6) when you think of Aurora.]

Chapter 10- Awake

Harry James Potter was a lot of things, not all of them positive.

He was not, however, oblivious neither was he unobservant.

He couldn't be; not after years of being treated like dirt and being hunted on top of all that.

So, as he watched the interaction between Aurora and Blackhorn, his mind whirred as fast as it could, processing everything it saw and coming to a conclusion:

'That was a lot of bargaining over someone who, just minutes ago, was little more than a suspected criminal.'

Then:

'If that means what I think it does then the Dursleys will wish they'd kept their grabby paws on me.' Then, he gave a little mental snort. 'Of course, that would mean that they would have had to have seen me as a normal boy and heaven forbid that!'

He was brought out of his thoughts by Blackhorn's gravelly voice; "… the room is yours till the signatures dry," after which their goblin hosts left the room.

"Are the implications of what just happened as tremendous as I believe?" Audrey asked the instant the door clicked shut to which Aurora sucked in a deep breath and then let it all out in a single whoosh.

"Honestly? Maybe even more so."

That response had Harry's full attention. "How come?"

He watched as a storm of emotions washed over the dark skinned woman, interspersed by bursts of controlled calm, before her features arranged themselves into a weary look.

After dragging a chair back to join them, Aurora essentially collapsed into the plain looking piece of furniture and sighed tiredly.

"Do you remember when I told you about the Wizarding world's version of Hitler?"

Both Harry and Jessica nodded, eager to know just what had brought that look of brokenness to such a confident woman.

"Well, we typically avoid saying his name, he was that terrifying, but I believe that you Harry, of all people, need to know."

Something didn't seem right to either of the two inductees to the Wizarding world. Harry was, as far as either were concerned, as fresh a face as his guardian to the magical world yet he was already a famous persona to the extent that people had tried to impersonate him. Now, with the bomb Aurora had just dropped, both their minds came to, dissimilar yet equally terrifying conclusions.

"He's the reason Harry's an orphan." Audrey gasped, horrified.

On the other hand, Harry's words were delivered in a flat tone, belying none of the shock and fear that ripple through him as various dreams, shards of memories and seemingly random daydreams coalesced into a single statement. "I destroyed him."

Even through her own pain, Aurora was impressed and a little shocked at how swiftly they had come to such accurate conclusions but she decided that the answers to her own questions could wait till a later time. As such, she simply nodded in response to both. "His name… was Voldemort…"

Olufunke Abimbola Sinistra, nee Olugosi, was a woman few dared to challenge, be it verbally, mentally or magically.

At the advanced age of a hundred and forty six, she, along with Augusta Longbottom and Olenna Tyrell formed the trio of women that not even the minister of magic, not even Dumbledore, would approach without damned good cause.

A Nigerian-born witch, Olufunke was considered to be the middle of her counterparts' extremes; possessing the cold fury of Dame Longbottom yet capable of the sort of subtly destructive scheming that the Queen of Thorns had perfected as a youth.

Yet, like her counterparts, she rarely surfaced without cause, choosing instead to be the guiding rudder to her family in the wake of the War.

That was why, when she Flooed the Headmaster of the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, asking that her granddaughter be given a leave of absence until the beginning of the term in September, McGonagall knew that something was off.

"Come now, Minerva, Aurora has been a diligent worker for the duration of her work with Hogwarts." The elder sounding quite put out by the assistant headmistress' complaints. "You know that I would never have called her off if it wasn't a matter of pressing House business and I'm damned certain that the old coot would have agreed with me if he was there."

"But he is not, Lady Sinistra." McGonagall tried again to get the woman to see things from her perspective though she had a sinking feeling that she was making little to no progress. A tiny, very much Scottish, part of her was cursing (only verbally, though) Dumbledore and the ICW for their really shitty timing, never mind the fact that the meeting had been scheduled almost a month ago. "And as the assistant headmistress-"

"You have no spine? Yemoja uphold me, girl where's that backbone you used to have?" Funke cut in brusquely, her patience gone. "In Dumbledore's absence, you are the head of the damned so act like it. Aurora will not be available until the first of September. Deal with it."

And with that, she cut off the connection.

"Sweet Mother, what happened to that girl?" The elder scowled as she crossed the fireplace to rest in the seat opposite her granddaughter. "She was such a spitfire when I taught her."

Aurora smiled amusedly at her grandmother, filing the memory she had just seen under her 'Possible Patronus Fuel' mental catalog. "Maybe old age has mellowed her out?"

Funke just arched an eye brow at that as if to say 'have you seen me recently?' "You have no right to talk. Barely a quarter of her age and you can't take advantage of a possible deal."

'Yup,' Aurora thought as she concealed a slight grimace. 'Should have seen that one coming.'

Grandmother and granddaughter were quiet for a while until the elder finally broke the silence.

"You've never asked me for something like this, Aurora. What's going on?"

Thinking back to the conversation that she'd had with Harry and Jessica less than two hours before, the dark skinned professor could only reply; "It'll be easier to believe when they get here, Maami…"