September 26th, 1992

Hermione was startled out of her concentration by the unmistakable sound of someone sitting down across from her.

She was at her usual table in the back corner of the library, sitting in her usual chair. The more consistent she could make her surroundings when she absorbed things, the easier the knowledge was to find later. Charissa was out of the castle at the moment, so she'd been sitting here alone. (She hadn't asked, but she assumed Charissa was out with her mother — it still annoyed her that magical families could do that.) It had taken her some time to properly focus on her reading as it was. She'd been so wrapped up in fury and guilt for a few days now, it'd just been so hard to concentrate. Her throat immediately started tightening, her fist unconsciously clenching, eyes tracking up to whoever had interrupted her hard-won focus, preparing to yell at them to—

Oh. It took hardly an instant for Hermione to recognise the tiny, wide-eyed, blonde-haired girl — one of Charissa's first-year hangers-on, the perpetually spacy-looking one, Luna Lovegood. Hermione wasn't entirely sure what she thought about her. She was very... Well, she was very strange. Not as noisy as the other first-years that seemed set on following her and Charissa around, so there was at least that. And definitely intelligent — Hermione had already noticed the girl could read and participate in the conversation around her at the same time, a level of multitasking she couldn't herself manage. At least not without messing up her recall. Hermione suspected she was significantly ahead of most of her year in magic theory, and might even know more than Hermione, honestly. But nearly half of everything she said made Hermione distinctly uncomfortable — alternating between aggravating flights of fancy and insights eerily personal. Honestly, Hermione thought she would be more comfortable if Luna just never talked ever.

Though, she guessed there was a little bit of a problem there, too. Much like Charissa, Luna had a habit of simply staring at people — though, unlike Charissa, her wide-eyed, observant expression wasn't even close to intimidating, almost even comical. She was weird, was the point.

Finished pulling a book from her bag onto the table — Hermione instantly recognised it as the first-year Transfiguration text — Luna glanced up to meet her eyes. 'Oh, hello, Hermione.' She sounded oddly surprised, as though she hadn't noticed Hermione at all on her walk over. But then, she sounded politely surprised to Hermione at least half the time, so that might not actually mean anything.

Hermione blinked at the other girl for a few seconds, before just shrugging it off as more peculiar, ah, Lovegoodness. 'Hello, Luna. Charissa's not here.' She wasn't entirely sure why she decided to say that.

'I know. She's talking to Lily about what everyone is doing to help Professor Lupin.' Luna cracked her book open, laying it down on the table — Hermione almost winced when she noticed the colourful doodling in the margins.

For a second Hermione was surprised Luna had referred to Charissa's mother by her first name. But, well, it was obvious Charissa and Luna had known each other before Hogwarts, and Lady Potter really didn't seem to like being called Lady Potter, so maybe that wasn't so strange. And then Hermione processed the rest of the sentence. 'Oh.' She hesitated a moment, absently playing at the corner of a page with two fingers. 'Erm, should I be doing something to help? It is sort of my fault...'

'It's Skeeter's fault.' Just for those three words, Luna's usual soft, drifting sort of tone was replaced by something flat and cold. But her voice was back to normal when she said, 'I think they have it all taken care of. Professor Lupin has far too many powerful friends for trying to defame him for no good reason to be a safe idea. At least since most of the werewolf laws have changed.'

She blinked at that. 'Werewolf laws?'

'Yes. Werewolves used to be considered creatures. They were reclassified as part-human beings in nineteen-sixty...' Luna made a vague, light frown, her face tipping upward, staring toward the ceiling in her peculiarly unfocused way. 'Sixty... Sixty... Some sixty... Sisisxsisisi—'

Hermione decided to ignore that. She had enough to be concerned about just with that bit of information. From both what she had read and what she had heard — mostly subtle comments here and there from Charissa's mother — she was not at all impressed with Britain's magical government. Much of what she'd learnt so far had dealt with muggleborns, for the obvious reasons. It wasn't all that long ago that muggleborns were treated as second-class citizens under the law, barred from a variety of careers, granted fewer rights and protections. Most of Europe had been much the same. While that was no longer the situation legally, it was certainly no secret that more discreet discrimination was still widespread. Charissa's parents had been quite clear about that, when they'd made their offer over the summer, explaining just how much being under the protection of House Potter could conceivably help her.

Charissa's mother had hinted things were a bit better on the Continent. While the improvements here had been achieved through legislation, fiercely fought for by Professor Dumbledore and his allies, the majority of the pureblooded elite on the continent had been purged some decades ago now. The infamous Dark Lord Grindelwald had been infamously ruthless, and nothing if not thorough.

But, as she knew, the situation was even worse for creatures. Theoretically, any living thing with intelligence at or near human capabilities was supposed to be classified as a being. Certain rights and protections under the law came with that. Not as many as humans got, but still more than creatures did. Those classified as creatures were, in short, animals, though with magical traits that necessitated hiding them from non-magical view — so, obviously, they were not given the same protections. Centaurs and merpeople were legally considered creatures, something she knew was controversial to the right sort of people. And, apparently, werewolves had only been moved from one class to the other three decades ago.

The thought just made her feel even worse for Professor Lupin. She couldn't imagine being shunted into an underclass of society — due to being a victim of a violent assault in childhood, of all things — that, until very recently, weren't even considered people.

Sometimes she wondered to herself if magical Britain wasn't a third-world country. Perhaps even compared to other magical nations.

But now Luna was staring at her again. She thought the girl might have said something to her, but she hadn't been paying attention. She should probably say something. 'I, er, didn't know that.' Ergh, wow. What was it about Luna that always made her feel like an idiot talking to her? Even when the quirky girl was just making something up — especially when she was just making something up!

'Speaking of things you don't know—' Hermione tried not to flinch at that. '—you shouldn't be reading that book.'

Hermione glanced down at the book in front of her. She'd finished her homework for the week — and most of the next — so she'd been working through her supplemental reading list. Talking to Charissa's mother had intensified the nascent interest she'd already had in runic magic, so she'd decided to start researching the subject before she started going absolutely crazy holding back curiosity. She did that, sometimes. It was the third year text for the Ancient Runes class — at least, she thought it was. She'd asked one of the Ravenclaw prefects, found it in the library. 'I shouldn't?'

In that same, level, floaty voice, Luna said, 'No.'

'But, it's the third year text.' Even she thought that was a flimsy excuse. It wasn't a very good textbook, but she'd thought that about virtually all of their class texts so far. She'd been starting to suspect for some time now Hogwarts might not be as good of a school as they liked to claim to be. In the privacy of her own head, of course — she doubted many would take kindly to the critical opinion of a thirteen-year-old muggleborn.

'Yes. It was written by Professor Babbling for the class. Without her lectures to go with it, you don't learn everything. And it's not presented very well. Not much more than a dictionary and grammar, really.'

Hermione glanced down at the page she was at, thinking to herself. That description really was accurate. In third year Runes class — and fourth year too, she suspected — they were essentially taught to read and write in the old Nordic runes. Not just the phonetic runic alphabet, which was still used enough in magical Britain Hermione had taken a couple hours to teach it to herself quick, but the logographic script created in the same time period specifically to craft enchantments. Symbols representing meaning, not just sound. At least, mostly meaning — there were runes solely or variably used for grammatical purposes only, sometimes a couple runes from the alphabet squeezed in for irregular inflectional endings. While there was apparently a little room for rule-bending, scripted enchantments generally had to be grammatically correct in the language the script was native to, so they had to learn a form of Old Norse too — though the previous professor had done it in Old English, Babbling preferred Norse. Half the textbook was mostly composed of rune after rune after rune, a short, dictionary-like entry providing the pronunciation, meaning, and sometimes a couple quick examples of how the rune was commonly used in magic. The other half was an analytical overview of Norse grammar. There was a little more to it, but not very much

It had already been niggling at the edge of her thoughts that this might be a completely useless way to try to learn the Nordic runic script — or, more particularly, exactly how it applied to the use of magic. Luna was only confirming her suspicion.

'I guess you have a better book in mind, then.' She hoped she didn't sound annoyed. At least, not annoyed with Luna herself. She was a bit frustrated with how much time she'd wasted flipping through this useless thing, no reason to offend Luna, not her fault.

But if she did sound annoyed, Luna didn't seem to notice. 'Oh, yes.'

Hermione waited a moment, but the girl just kept staring at her, smiling in her usual vague, inscrutable sort of way. 'Which one, exactly?'

'Oh!' the strange little girl said, her eyes lighting up, as though she'd just understood what Hermione had been getting at. 'Right. I'm sure the library has it. One second.' Luna reached into her bag and pulled out—

Hermione couldn't help staring at the little thing in Luna's hands. It was a dragon. A Swedish Short-Snout, she guessed, judging by the glimmering blue of the scales and the size of the wings compared to the rest of the body. But the thing was tiny — Luna's two hands cupped together could almost enclose the entire thing. Even newly hatched, no breed of dragon was that small. It almost looked alive, though. She noticed the slight movement of its chest from breath, the occasional tiny twitch in tail and wings. But it couldn't possibly be a real dragon. That would just be ridiculous.

Luna set the tiny thing, which appeared to be sleeping, on the table, gave it a little pat, then got to her feet and started wandering off. After a second of hesitation, staring at the diminutive creature Luna had left behind, she decided to follow, only catching up as Luna reached the particular section populated mostly with texts dealing with runic magic. Luna stepped up to the corner of one of the shelves, slipped her wand out of a pocket, and touched the tip to the shining wooden surface. 'Ailbhe Greengrass, On Thought and Magic.' A soft, golden light ran across the surface of the bookshelves, emanating from where Luna's wand touched and racing across every surface all the way up to the ceiling, all the way down to the opposite end of the hallway. Luna waited a moment, but nothing happened. She passed her wand to her opposite hand, then repeated her request, touching her wand to the opposite shelf.

This time, the glow was redirected halfway across, gathering into a single rectangle near the ceiling. Slowly, the sizable book was drawn off the shelf, cradled safely in an embrace of golden light. The light returned to Luna, the book gliding through the air toward her. Luna took the book with a bright, 'Thank you,' then turned to hand it to Hermione.

But Hermione was too busy staring at Luna to take it. After a few seconds of meeting her perpetually unfocused eyes in silence, Hermione finally found her voice again. 'How did you do that?'

Luna blinked at her — once, slowly. 'You ask the library for a book, and it'll give it to you. It wants to help people learn. Have to be at the right shelf, though. It only helps if the book can hear you.'

That was a peculiar way of putting it, but Hermione figured Luna was trying to say there was an enchantment on the bookshelves that would provide to anyone any book within range of the enchantment when prompted correctly. It wasn't a perfect system — she would have to know exactly which book she wanted, and which exact shelf it was on — but it was definitely better than awkwardly levitating books off shelves she couldn't reach, as she'd had to do a couple times.

At the thought, she involuntarily relived a memory from first year, when she'd knocked a couple books off the shelf trying to do exactly that, sending them thudding down on top of her. She took On Þought and Magic: An Introduction to þe Graffic Arts from Luna with one hand, rubbing at the phantom pain on the top of her head with the other. At least Charissa hadn't been around when that had happened. That would have been embarrassing.

November 15th, 1992

Charissa tapped her wand twice against the stone wall, crossed her arms behind her back, and settled in to wait.

It had been simple enough to convince Sorcha Selwyn to tell her where to find the Slytherin common room. The third-year had been there plenty of times, mostly visiting cousins, and had been perfectly willing to give the poorly-kept secret up. This section of wall didn't look that different from any other to her. Sorcha had said residents of the house and all prefects and professors could see on the wall the coat of arms of the long-dead Noble and Most Ancient House of Sylþeris — the House the Founder had been born to, the name changed to Slytherin after centuries of linguistic drift — but anyone else had to count paces down the subterranean hallway if they wanted to visit. Apparently, tapping twice with her wand as she just did would alert those inside she was here, but Sorcha had warned her it might be a couple minutes before anyone bothered to open the door. If they did at all — apparently, some of the upper years had once decided they didn't want a Ravenclaw around at the moment, no matter that she was just visiting her cousin, and they'd just left Sorcha standing out there until she'd given up and gone back.

Thankfully, Charissa didn't have to wait too long. After hardly a minute, a section of the wall about two meters square simply vanished, as suddenly and smoothly as though it'd never been there to begin with. A warm, green-blue glow seeped into the hall, but all Charissa could see of the common room was an indistinct blur — a privacy charm of some kind, she assumed. She did see the boy standing just inside, arms crossed over his chest, just fine. The badge on his chest told her he was the sixth-year prefect, but she didn't recognise him. 'Can I help you, Miss Potter?' His voice when he asked was perfectly polite, but giving an ever-so-slight impression that he would really rather not help her if he could.

Putting the same faux-respectfulness on her own voice, she said, 'I was only hoping to meet with my cousins.'

The older boy considered that for a moment. 'Which ones?'

She supposed that was a legitimate question — she had a few cousins in Slytherin at the moment. 'The Gaunt twins. Are they in?'

He winced at that, and it took everything Charissa had not to smirk. She'd heard from a number of people — and, more recently and explicitly, Jasmine — that Hesper and Alexis had a tendency to make nearly everyone around them dreadfully uncomfortable. To be fair, bonded twins almost always did, but she still found it amusing how uncomfortable this sixth-year was just with the thought of a couple of first-years. 'Yeah, you might as well. Make a nuisance of yourself and permission will be retracted. Directly.'

Implying they'd force her to leave, either magically or physically. She just nodded though — that was much as she'd expected. The boy stepped out of the way, and she walked into the room.

Two things happened as she crossed the threshold. One, whatever charm was obscuring the common room dispersed, and she could suddenly see. She instantly decided she preferred her own common room, but it wasn't a terrible place. Most of the walls and floor were covered with dozens of tapestries and rugs and carpets in smooth greens and blacks, dozens of armchairs and couches and tables strewn about seemingly at random. Several fixtures of silvery metal were attached to the walls at regular intervals, enchanted lamps emitting a steady, orangish light. There were also two fireplaces, one to her left and the other to her right, but they were currently empty — she assumed because, though it was a bit cool, it wasn't quite cold enough to need the warmth. Almost the entire back wall across from where she stood looked to be glass, holding back a murky mass of blue-green she assumed was the lake. She hadn't thought she'd walked that far from the main body of the castle, but distances could get a bit inconsistent in magical structures, so she decided just to ignore that.

The second was a hissing voice, sounding almost unnervingly close to her left ear, slightly behind her, whispering only, 'Welcome, Speaker,' before stopping. Charissa tensed for a moment, physically restraining herself from jerking around to look for the source, before forcing herself to relax. Probably some enchantment, put there long ago to personally welcome any Parselmouth walking into the common room. Not that she'd be mentioning that to anyone. Mum had suggested long ago she do her best to keep the fact she was a Parselmouth a secret, and she was pretty sure she'd done well with that so far. As far as she knew, only Mum, Dad, her brothers, Dora, Remus, Sirius, Peter, Frank, Alice, Neville, and Gwyneira knew. Basically, the people who were around her enough keeping it from them would be more difficult than not — with how snakes liked to follow her around when she was in the forest near home it'd be almost impossible to hide it.

She'd thought at the time that hiding it was a rather peculiar thing to do, but by now she knew enough to understand why. Parseltongue didn't actually have any connection to questionable magic at all — in fact, in the region of the world most agreed the talent originated in it's associated with healers — but enough people think it did it was worth the effort to keep it a secret. Which was pretty easy to do, so long as she remembered not to talk to anything that even looked vaguely snake-like. Almost had an accident once, when she'd been lounging by the lake after exams last year with Hermione and Neville, but Hermione had blasted the poor thing away with a shriek before she could slip up.

Charissa shook the thought off. She wasn't here to look around, or stand in the middle of the room thinking to herself like a crazy person. After a moment of looking around the room, she spotted who she thought were probably the Gaunts. Two smaller figures, definitely first- or second-years, were sitting at a table by the lake wall, but she couldn't see too clearly from here. Not that she'd be able to see their faces too well if she were right next to them, anyway — one was nose-deep in a book, the other bent over the table, probably writing. Might as well check.

She was maybe a dozen paces away when one of them — a pale, black-haired boy, sitting sideways in an armchair so his feet were stuck over the side, book open just before his face — glanced up at her for a second. He then went right back to his book. The instant she got close enough for polite conversation, the other straightened, turning around to face her with a slightly crooked smile. 'Charissa Potter, right?'

For a second, Charissa was confused — the girl looked like so many other people she'd met it was disorienting, like her brain couldn't decide for an awkward second who this was, or if she even knew her at all. But with how inbred most of the Noble Houses were, she guessed that really shouldn't be surprising. They all looked pretty much the same. And by they, she realised she was including herself. She consciously decided not to be surprised Alexis knew her name. They had met before, of course, but it had been years ago, and she didn't really remember. 'Yes. Alexis Gaunt?'

The girl nodded. 'We can honestly say we didn't expect you to come down for a visit.'

Charissa noticed that Alexis didn't bother introducing Hesper and, more interestingly, the conspicuously plural pronouns she used. For some reason no one quite understood, the partners in multiple births — twins, triplets, and so forth — were born with a peculiar mental connection to each other. While she gathered it wasn't exactly the same in every single case, it wasn't at all uncommon for one twin to know where the other was at all times, what they were doing, even thinking and feeling. In extreme cases, such people even had trouble conceptualising themselves as distinct personalities. This could often be severely unnerving for everyone around them, which likely had something to do with the once ubiquitous practice of immediately killing all but one of the children in the event of any multiple birth — once ubiquitous in Britain, anyway, certain other cultures didn't have the same stigma. She suspected that still happened all the time, but it wasn't exactly something people talked about. It was possible for twins to intentionally break that bond if they chose to, or for it to happen unintentionally through an argument or some trauma affecting one or both. As far as she knew, once the bond was broken, it was gone forever. The Patils had broken their bond early in first year, she knew — Padma had been so withdrawn the first weeks because she'd been recovering from the event. She was pretty sure the Weasleys were still bonded.

From what she'd heard of the Gaunts, they most certainly were. She'd also come to suspect, almost entirely from what Jasmine said complaining about them, that they were even one of those extreme cases.

But here she was thinking to herself like a crazy person again. Maybe she hadn't been getting enough sleep lately. She'd have to start enforcing an early bedtime for Hermione, so she wouldn't have to stay up so long. Even in her head, that sounded weird. 'There was something I had to talk to you about.'

Alexis cocked her head a little, an eyebrow raising. 'Oh?' Then her expression shifted, and she turned back to her parchment, scribbled down another line. Charissa had to suppress a shudder when she realised what was happening right in front of her. Hesper was reading from a book, a title she recognised as one containing descriptions of hundreds of simple charms. Alexis was writing down what she knew with a glance were incantations and wand movements, the script looking almost identical to the notebook Charissa herself still carried. Hesper was going through the charms, Alexis writing down the ones they thought were worthwhile, all without saying a single word aloud.

It took her a moment to shake off her disquiet, find her voice again. 'I needed to talk to you about Jasmine Palmer.'

Annoyance flickered across Alexis's face. 'She go complaining to you already?'

'She didn't ask me to intervene, if that's what you mean.' Not that Jasmine had known this was something Charissa could intervene in without too much trouble — she didn't quite understand how society operated yet. She also didn't know Charissa and the Gaunts happened to be...third cousins? She thought it was third cousins, through the Gaunts' great-grandmother Lycoris Monroe née Black. Could be really confusing keeping track of all this sometimes.

'So, this is where you ask us to leave her alone?' The question was casual, as though Alexis didn't really care too much one way or the other.

'I thought I might.'

'What's it to you, anyway?'

'She's my cousin. I've been charged with looking out for her.'

Alexis gave her a slightly confused, doubtful sort of look. 'Thought she was muggleborn.'

For a second, Charissa just sighed. Not that she really expected this part of the conversation to be all that bad — compared to the other Dark Houses, and despite their unnervingly unsavoury reputation, the Gaunts had been surprisingly reasonable when it came to muggleborns the last few decades. Having to clarify this just made her uncomfortable, she wasn't really sure why. 'Yeah, she is. She's my mother's sister's.'

'Ah,' Alexis said, nodding. She seemed to consider a moment, staring a little above Charissa's right shoulder.

'We give half.' The interjection surprised her for three reasons. One, it had been Hesper speaking, for the first time in their little exchange. Two, he'd spoken in Parseltongue — Charissa had had no idea the twins were Parselmouths. Three, he'd spoken in Parseltongue right in front of her. After a second of thought, she decided that wasn't too weird: if she weren't a Parselmouth herself, she doubted she would have noticed over the light background chatter of the common room, he had been so quiet. She'd been given reason before to suspect she could understand Parseltongue more distorted and at a much lower volume than English — since it worked by a process more magical than phonological, that was to be expected. After a moment, she thought of a fourth reason: Hesper and Alexis obviously lived so deep in each other's heads, she wasn't sure why Hesper had bothered speaking aloud in the first place.

Alexis nodded again, seemingly ignorant of Charissa's reaction to Hesper Speaking. 'How about this: we won't promise to leave little Jasmine completely alone — if we don't tease her when she does something worthy of teasing, why, that just wouldn't be fair to everyone else. But, we will stop going out of our way to target her specifically. That seem fair?'

Yes. That was the exact concession she had expected to come away with. Only time would tell if the twins would actually hold themselves to it, but it would have to do for now. 'Sounds perfectly fair to me.'

'Alright, then.' Alexis's crooked smirk was back, giving her face a slight, predatory cast. Trying to hint she wanted Charissa to go away now, she figured. 'Was there anything else?'

'No, thank you.' She suddenly thought of a way to wipe that smirk off Alexis's face and, in the instant afterward, the urge to do it exploded a thousandfold. For a moment she fought the impulse, but the effort was completely pointless. It was just too funny. With the slightest of efforts, which always felt to her vaguely like consciously refocusing her eyes, she slipped into the right frame of mind, and said, 'Sleep well, little ones.' Hesper looking up from his book with a snap, both faces dominated by eyes and mouths widened with shock, both of the Gaunt twins stared up at her. She smiled at them for just a second before turning around and heading for the exit.

Charissa was absolutely certain that was going to come back and bite her in the arse one day. But, for the moment, remembering the looks on their faces kept a smirk stuck on her face all the way through her walk back to Ravenclaw Tower.

April 9th, 1993

Charissa hated seeing other people cry. It might make her seem cold and uncaring, but it always made her uncomfortable. She generally kept her distance from people when they were upset, staying away until they'd managed to collect themselves, and usually did her best to avoid the topic afterward. She didn't like it.

So today came as something of an uncomfortable surprise.

She'd learned a while ago that if she wanted to be alone at Hogwarts, nearly the only way she could manage that was to hide in her room. For the last hour or two, she'd been sitting in her bed, a book open propped up against her legs. When Dora had found out her monthlies had started — Charissa had absolutely no idea how — she'd dropped by to give her a stack of books with her usual cheerful teasing. Some fiction, some not, some perfectly innocent, and some, well, not. Not-innocent enough she'd decided to hole up in here if she ever felt like reading any of them. Which wasn't very often, but Dora was still teasing her about it through letters, so she figured this was probably one way to get her to shut up.

She'd been right in the middle of one of the, erm, not-so-innocent passages when she heard the door click open. Her heart skipping into her throat, she folded over a corner of the page, slammed the book closed, and slipped it under her pillow. And took a moment to curse Dora in her head.

A couple seconds after the door closed again, one of the curtains around her bed — they hadn't had any first year, but they suddenly appeared in second year, for some reason — whipped aside, revealing Hermione standing there. Hair somehow even frizzier than usual, eyes bloodshot, streaks down her face. Without saying a word, Hermione moved to sit, settling in with her legs crossed at the foot of her bed. She set the book she was carrying down before her, splayed open, then crossed her arms, staring down at the sheets in silence.

Okay. This was weird. And very uncomfortable, but she'd try to ignore that for now. Couldn't exactly escape very easily when she was already in the location she usually escaped to. 'Er, Hermione, what—?'

Hermione cut her off with a wavery glare, removed one of her hands from her side to tap noisily at one of the pages. 'Run the granite-bag!' she nearly shouted in a tight, fractured voice.

Charissa blinked, then glanced down at the page. She didn't recognise the book offhand, but she saw it was probably a list of jinxes, hexes, and the proper counters for the same. The page Hermione was pointing at was one on babbling—

Oh.

A few seconds later, Charissa had recovered her wand, and lifted the babbling hex from Hermione. She immediately asked, 'Do I make sense now?' With Charissa's nod, Hermione let out a heavy sigh of relief, her face falling into her hands. 'That was awful.'

By now, Charissa had stopped being confused long enough to start putting the pieces together. Her discomfort at Hermione's discomfort was rapidly retreating, replaced inch by inch with growing rage. 'Who hexed you?'

Hermione peeked back up at her from behind her fingers, a hesitant sort of expression suddenly crossing what Charissa could see of her face. She had to ask a second time before Hermione would say anything. 'It doesn't matter.'

'Hermione...'

'I'm mostly used to it by now. He's been bothering me about once a week since the beginning of first year.'

That really, really wasn't making Charissa less angry.

Hermione seemed to realise that, but it was only making her more frantic. 'No, Charissa, it's fine. If I just avoid him, or don't go off alone, nothing happens. He doesn't even use that word in front of other people.' Charissa felt her jaw clench when it occurred to her what word exactly Hermione was referring to. 'I think he doesn't want it getting back to you.'

'Smart boy.' Her voice had come out far more harsh than she'd meant to, so she took a moment to breathe in and out through her nose, trying to force herself calm enough her throat would stop squeezing against itself. 'Tell me, Hermione.' Didn't sound like it'd worked very well.

With a grimace, she hesitated, but after a moment finally groaned out a name. 'Draco Malfoy.'

On the one hand, Charissa wasn't exactly surprised. Draco might not have ever been quite as vocal about it around her as others — she assumed because he knew how she felt about Mum — but she'd always known he'd absorbed quite a bit of pureblood supremacist sentiment from his parents, their friends (though his mother was half-decent, she guessed). But on the other, she was completely furious. Or, at least, she assumed she was. Her chest and throat were so tight it was suddenly a bit hard to breathe, her fists had clenched all by themselves, enough they were starting to hurt. But her head was oddly clear. All she noticed was a placid, icy sort of focus, a chill slowly spreading through her veins. It was weird. 'What else has he done?'

Uncertainly at first, but with growing confidence, Hermione told her. Ever since the beginning of first year, insult after insult, taunt after taunt, shoves and jinxes and hexes in the halls. Only when Charissa wasn't around to hear it, see it, when there weren't any witnesses to report it later. As Hermione got better at avoiding him and his cronies, especially with her larger social circle starting this year, Draco had made up for it by using worse hexes, switching from taunts to threats.

But Charissa had stopped hearing what Hermione was saying by now. The cold had expanded, intensified, until she felt she'd somehow been transmuted into nothing but frozen fire. Hermione's words reduced to nothing but subtle flickering in her crystallised ears, she thought nothing, she saw nothing, only shook with a wintry fury she felt too small to contain, as though the cold would only grow until—

'Charissa!' For a long, lurching moment, she felt oddly disoriented, as though they world around her had lost all sense of continuity, jerky and twisted. But then reality snapped back into making sense, and Hermione was kneeling right in front of her, gripping her shoulders. Hermione let out a sigh — Charissa absently noticed the pale ghost of her breath — released her to sit back again. 'You were really scaring me there.' She pulled out her wand and, to Charissa's further confusion, fired a few warming charms into the air at random.

The heated air made her feel a bit uncomfortable, contrasting awkwardly with the cold still inside, but she did her best to ignore that. 'What happened?' She noticed her own voice sounded oddly unsteady.

Hermione gave her a slightly odd look. 'Accidental magic.'

'Really?' She hadn't done accidental magic in years. Beyond early childhood, it only ever happened when a person was extremely upset. She hadn't thought she was taking it that badly.

'Yes. You were making it really cold, and you were—' Hermione suddenly broke off, pulling her bottom lip between her teeth.

That was curious, but Charissa decided not to ask. It didn't really matter so much, really. Charissa took in and out a long breath, then did it a few more times, until she was a bit less shaky. The cold hadn't gone away, but she felt a little more like herself. And, with her capacity for rational thought suddenly returned, she knew immediately what she was going to do. 'Well,' she said, doing her best to sound casual. 'Dear Cousin Draco isn't going to be doing any of that again.'

Hermione didn't say anything but, just for a second there, Charissa thought she looked almost afraid.

April 10th, 1993

Charissa couldn't remember if she'd ever actually spoken to the Headmaster before, either before or after she started at Hogwarts. She'd certainly never been in his office before. It was probably one of the busiest rooms she'd ever been in, little enchanted devices all over the place twittering and clinking, probably enough to give her a headache if she stayed here too long. Professor Flitwick didn't seem any more impressed than she was, actually. He was standing to the side of the Headmaster's long, parchment-strewn desk, giving one of the tables laden with noisy artifacts a hooded, disgruntled look. She had to concentrate to keep the smirk off her face.

The two of them weren't alone in here, of course. Professor Vector, Professor of Arithmancy and Head of Slytherin, was seated on the corner of the Headmaster's desk. The young woman's dark hair was tied back rather messily, as though she hadn't really paid that much attention to it, and her stare was completely absent of expression. And, of course, the Headmaster of Hogwarts, High Enchanter Albus Dumbledore. Gazing over his folded, wrinkled fingers, diamond-hard eyes seemed to burn blue across the air between them, in contrast to the visibly neutral cast to his aged face. The High Enchanter wasn't happy with her.

She almost made a little nervous swallow, but she managed to catch herself.

The High Enchanter nodded at the single chair a short distance before his desk. 'Have a seat, Miss Potter.'

Charissa slipped over, walking as smoothly as she could make her legs go. Hardly a second after she'd sat, Professor Flitwick was moving over to the side of her chair, facing the Headmaster. For a moment his hand was on her shoulder, and she looked up to see a halfhearted smile cross his face for a second. She understood that well enough: he wasn't entirely happy with her either, but he would be taking her side for this conversation anyway. Good. She wasn't sure she'd be able to defend herself against all three Professors at once.

Apparently, the High Enchanter understood as well. She suspected he wasn't as happy about it as she was. 'Before we get into the repercussions of your actions, I thought you'd like an opportunity to explain yourself.'

That just made Charissa annoyed again. Dumbledore had already decided Charissa had done something worth being punished for. True enough, what she'd done would have been very far out of line if she'd done it just in the hallways or something, but in the particular context they'd been in, 'I didn't do anything wrong.'

'Didn't do anything wrong?' asked Professor Vector, a single eyebrow tracking upward. She somehow sounded more amused than anything. 'I have a student in hospital looking more overcooked sausage than second-year boy.'

Since Charissa couldn't bring herself to answer — mostly because she was worried she would burst into laughter if she opened her mouth — Flitwick clarified for her. 'I think what Miss Potter means to say is she didn't break any rules. Since Draco's injuries were sustained during a meeting of the Duelling Club, within the bounds of a properly-arranged duel, it is the strictures written by the Club that apply. The charm she used is permitted by those strictures.'

'Those rules are rather broad,' the High Enchanter said in a casual sort of tone. 'Should we allow Duelling Club members to severely harm each other, perhaps even kill each other, as is possible within those rules, with no repercussions whatsoever?'

'Ignem circueundum isn't particularly dangerous.'

Professor Vector looked surprised for a moment. 'She did all that with an elemental circueundum? She released it inward?'

Charissa and Professor Flitwick both nodded, almost in unison. 'The way she released the rings into young Mister Malfoy was both clever and effective, yes—' She'd say so, took her two hours of practice to get it right. '—but it wouldn't have worked against almost any fourth-year. I know for a fact Mister Malfoy can manage a perfectly functional flame-freezing charm — if he'd had the presence of mind to cast that, instead of surrendering into that fatal moment of panic, he would have been perfectly fine. All what you are trying to do here amounts to, Headmaster, is punishing Miss Potter for winning a sanctioned duel against a boy who isn't nearly as talented with a wand as he seems to think he is.'

By now, it was taking absolutely every bit of concentration Charissa had to keep herself from smirking. She'd known she liked Flitwick for a reason.

'We are not here to debate whether what happened was or was not strictly allowed.' Charissa frowned at that — hadn't Dumbledore tried to argue that point only a few seconds ago? 'The issue is that it was inarguably inappropriate. Miss Potter,' he said, finally turning again directly to her, 'the charm you used on Mister Malfoy put him through no small amount of pain, far and away more than was necessary within the context of your sanctioned duel. Surely you must see how this degree of cruelty is concerning.'

He was trying to make her feel guilty — Charissa recognised that instantly. If she'd told herself a week ago she was going to be setting Draco on fire today, she probably would have expected herself to feel at least a little bad about it. But she didn't. She really didn't. She doubted burning like that would have been at all pleasant, but he would be unconscious for most of the healing process anyway. He'd only been in pain for, what, six seconds? Compare that to the year and a half he'd been tormenting Hermione and, yeah, she didn't feel bad about it at all. 'No, sir, I don't. I think he just got what was coming to him.'

A few seconds passed in silence, filled with nothing but shock from all sides. Looking distinctly displeased, his voice lower and slightly harsher, Dumbledore said, 'Care to explain, Miss Potter?'

So she did. She repeated everything she could remember from Hermione's recitation of all the ways Draco had bullied her. Every jinx, every insult, every everything. As she went on for what felt like minutes, she noticed that chill start settling over her again, but she ignored it as best she could, just kept talking. Eventually, Professor Vector held up a hand. 'Stop.' Casually, her face still blank, she slipped off the Headmaster's desk, walked to the opposite side of Charissa's chair from Flitwick, then turned back to the High Enchanter, her hand resting a few inches from Charissa head on the back.

Dumbledore gave her a very peculiar look. 'Septima?'

'Yeah,' Professor Vector said with a casual, lilting tone, 'I'm switching sides. With this new information, something very important should have crossed your mind — last spring, Lord Potter announced this Hermione Granger was under the protection of his House. I would be astounded if young Mister Malfoy is not aware of this. And as I'm sure you know, Mister Malfoy's continued abuse of Miss Granger amounts to a minor assault on the dignity of House Potter. Which means Charissa here, acting on behalf of her father, could have done far, far worse to Draco, and still have law and tradition on her side. The Wizengamot would quite likely censure you if you punish her. If not, House Potter and many of their allies would do so independently.'

Somehow, Charissa had managed to completely forget about that angle. Should anyone ask her about this in future, she decided to switch her defense from didn't break any rules to defending the honour of my House — much better. Dumbledore, though, didn't seem at all pleased. He was hiding it behind his usual impassive facade, but his eyes were still burning. 'I suppose they might.'

'And I suppose that's all we have to talk about, yes?'

'Not quite.' For a short moment, the High Enchanter only stared at Charissa, wrinkled old head slightly tilted. 'You are aware Hogwarts has some of the more powerful and sensitive wards in the world, Miss Potter?'

Okay. She had no idea what this was suddenly about. 'Yes, sir.'

'Were you aware a record is made of any use of dark magic within the wards, time and location noted very precisely?'

Nope, still had absolutely no clue what he was getting at. 'I suspected there might be something like that, yes.'

'Where were you yesterday, at five twenty-six in the evening?'

'Erm...' She figured out what he was implying easily enough — the wards must have recorded dark magic being used in the room she shared with Hermione and Morag at that time. After a moment of thought, she decided she had been there then. She'd been there most of the afternoon, actually, but that would have been right around when Hermione had come to get a counter-hex from her, if she remembered correctly. She hadn't really been doing any magic at all, though she had apparently had that accidental magic episode. If Dumbledore was assuming she'd been practising dark magic or something, that would at least explain why he'd been so hostile to her since she'd walked—

Oh.

She had the sudden, sinking suspicion the dark magic the wards had detected was that episode she'd had. Could accidental magic even be dark? Whatever, details, look it up later. All she'd done was make it a bit colder. Cold enough she'd been able to see Hermione's breath for a moment, yes, but she didn't think that— Well, not all she'd done. Hermione had almost said something else before breaking off, and Charissa had never asked what else had happened. Now she was a little scared to.

This was just...

Shite. Not good.

Somehow, she wasn't sure exactly, she kept herself mostly calm, not letting out how suddenly terrified she was, how very much she needed to talk to her mother. 'I was in my bed, reading a book.'

'Which book?'

'A novel. Gift from my cousin Dora.'

'Oh? What kind of novel?'

'Well, it was Dora who gave it to me, so the rather, ah, amorous kind.'

From nearby, she heard Flitwick shuffle with sudden awkwardness, an repressed but unmistakable snort of laughter from Professor Vector. The High Enchanter didn't seem so convinced. He kept staring at her, meeting her eyes steadily, his own almost flaming where they were set into his face. Shimmering blue looked to burn across the air between them, and then, so suddenly her stomach jolted, the world around her seemed to shift, and those hard blue eyes were burning into her, and then Augí was with her, spitting with feline fury, and her head was fracturing in lines of white fire, and she thought she would explode—

And then the world unshifted, she was back in her chair in front of the Headmaster's desk. For long seconds, all she could do was breathe, fast and deep, almost choked away by her throat constricted with tears of pain. Because her head hurt. A pain running through her eyes, through her sinuses, so deep into her skull she knew she shouldn't be able to feel pain there at all. It was a stinging agony, throbbing fire and crackling lightning, hurt so horribly she couldn't see straight, so horribly she was sure she would vomit with it at any second. Over the next moments, the agony lessened, from thought-obliterating to simply mind-numbing. Somewhere along the way, she realised someone had an arm around her shoulders, their opposite hand running down her hair, muttering soothing nonsense at her. Flitwick.

Professor Vector was speaking. 'Your claim that no student before has been affected so terribly by your illegal use of mind magics on children doesn't exactly placate me.' Charissa was pretty sure she'd missed some of the conversation.

'I assure you, Septima, I only intrude where I feel I have justification to be concerned.'

'Rather thin justification, I feel. You claim dark magic was detected by the wards within the Ravenclaw student dorms, and assume Miss Potter was the culprit without evidence. It could just as easily have had nothing to do with her. She could just as easily have been the victim of any dark curse cast as the perpetrator! If any student had been injured by this alleged dark magic that would have been noted by the wards as well, correct? Was there any record of such a thing?'

'No, but—'

'Respectfully, Headmaster, there is no but. You don't violate the minds of children without their knowledge nor consent in pursuit of such flimsy allegations. If you had reasonable cause to believe someone was in imminent danger, sure, you could act then, but you had no such cause in this case. Whether or not dark magic was cast in her room last night is immaterial. That she wouldn't have even noticed your intrusion were she not bonded with an Iya is irrelevant. You just committed assault, Headmaster, and admitted to both of us that this was hardly the first time. I hope you're not so far gone as to not realise that.

'We'll be taking Miss Potter to Poppy now — hopefully she'll have an analgesic potion on hand that works with legilimency-induced headaches. If I were you, I'd spend the next while working on my apology letter to Lord Potter.'

By that time, Charissa hadn't recovered enough to walk on her own. The two professors debated a moment before Vector simply lifted her up out of the chair, one arm under her shoulders and the other her knees, and started carrying her for the door, muttering under her breath in what Charissa thought might be German. Every step she took sent shocks of pain reverberating throughout Charissa's skull, making her feel weaker and weaker with each second.

She passed out before they even made it to the hospital wing.

(Pulled from The Daily Prophet, April 19th, 1993)

High Enchanter Under DLE Investigation

During þe April Seventeenþ session of þe Wizengamot, Dame Amelia Bones, Director of þe Department of Law Enforcement, took þe floor to announce þe opening of an investigation concerning þe affairs of Albus Dumbledore, þe High Enchanter himself. According to Director Bones, þe High Enchanter on Wednesday pled guilty to a single count of unauþorised use of mind magic on a minor, and voluntarily paid þe eight hundred galleon fee to þe family of þe victim, identified publicly only as a twelve-year-old Hogwarts student. (All records, including þe name of þe child, are sealed under þe 1889 Privacy of Victims Act.)

According to verbal testimony collected by DLE officials from Hogwarts professors who witnessed þe act, þe High Enchanter, when confronted on what he'd just done, claimed to have done þe same wið oðer students a multitude of times over his term as Headmaster. Speaking to þe Wizengamot, Director Bones said, 'We hardly have þe resources to interview each student to have passed þrough þe school during þe High Enchanter's tenure. Þerefore, þe Department of Law Enforcement is asking anyone wið reason to believe þey or someone þey know has been mentally assaulted by þe High Enchanter to contact us, in person or by owl. Þe identities of all who come forward will be held strictly confidential for, at minimum, þe duration of þe investigation.'

After þe surprise announcement, þe High Enchanter took a moment to speak in his defence. 'I have always acted, and will continue to act, as I feel best for þe children under my care, wiðin þe bounds of auþority granted to me by my office.' Þe High Enchanter continued to say he had 'every confidence' þe investigation would in time be dropped wiðout severe charges ever being formalised, and þat he would continue serving in þe meantime.

While a motion swiftly following þe announcement to expel þe High Enchanter from þe Wizengamot failed, þe body officially censured Master Dumbledore by a nearly unanimous vote.

(Statements from Wizengamot members — page 3)

(DLE contact information — page 27)

It just occurred to me most people probably don't know how to pronounce these Gaelic names I keep using. Ha ha, whoops. I'll start putting those here when I use them, if anyone cares.

Ailbhe — "al-vuh" (IPA: [ʌlʲ.vʲə]), feminine name

[But it couldn't possibly be a real dragon. That would just be ridiculous.] — Don't worry, it's not. That would be ridiculous. It's basically the magical equivalent of a stuffed animal. Luna was going to talk about it in this chapter, but I decided to delay that conversation until a later scene. Just saying this here in case anyone gets the wrong idea.

Sorcha — "sore-huh" (IPA: [sˠɔɾˠ.xə] or [sˠɔ.ɾˠə.xə]), feminine name

Sylþeris (Συλθηρις) — In my cross-fic headcanon, Salazar Slytherin's real name was Silvahárr of Sylþeris. By the 1990s, the name had gradually changed to the canon version, but the original is still preserved in books and such for people to find if they care to look. Decided to change it because the canon name isn't at all historically appropriate. Did similar things with the other three Founders (save for Godric and Helga's first names, which are actually appropriate for the region and time period).

Babbling hex — The particular variety Hermione was hit with replaces most words with another in the person's vocabulary seemingly at random. There is a pattern to it, but seemingly. Which means the person can't reverse it unless they happen to be able to do it silently.

[were she not bonded with an Iya] — A familiar bond, or even a twin bond like the Gaunts have, provides some limited defense against legilimency. In Charissa's particular case, she isn't a good enough occlumens to notice the intrusion herself, but Augí is quite nearly immune to all outside mental magics, and he rather effectively fought Dumbledore's probe through her. Gave her a bit of a headache, but still.

Yes, Charissa is legit a parselmouth. No, she doesn't have a fragment of Voldemort's soul in her head — obviously, since Voldemort doesn't exist. I always found that a really terrible reason for her to have the talent, so it has nothing to do with it. (Dumbledore in my other fic still thinks it has something to do with it, but even Dumbledore can be simply wrong.) She was simply born with it.

That, ah, incident with Dumbledore kinda came out of nowhere. It wasn't planned. So, uh, whoops?

Until next time,
~Wings