Saturday, 1 January 1994

Granger Home, East Farleigh, Kent

Unfortunately, three hours into the New Year and her latest fight with Hermione (she had got up to check the kitchen clock), it seemed Mary was not going to sleep anywhere. She was exhausted, but she couldn't ignore the anxious feeling of betrayal simmering in the pit of her stomach long enough to fall unconscious.

She was, therefore, still awake when Hermione came creeping into the room with her lamp, whispering, "Lizzie? Liz? Are you still up?"

She considered lying (or rather, saying nothing and pretending she was asleep), but when she heard Hermione's disappointed sigh, she sat up. "What do you want?" she asked irritably.

The older girl came nearer, setting her light on the coffee table, and curling up at the other end of the sofa. "I… I just wanted to say I'm sorry. I feel like we've not been talking half the time since we've got back to school, and I just… I don't want to start the year off on a bad foot. So I'm sorry. I know I should have told you. It just… I wasn't really trying to hide it, at first. It just… didn't come up, with the time turner, and then it had been so long I knew you would be mad at me for not saying something, so I just… kept it quiet."

"That still doesn't explain why you're friends with them in the first place," Mary said coldly.

Hermione sighed. "I don't know if I can really explain it."

"Try."

"Well… Lilian said she told you that we'd sworn a truce? Put all our differences behind us, on our honor, to end our little prank war?"

"Yeah, but she said it wasn't like forgive and forget, just move on."

"It is. Technically. But then I had to go fix their potions stores and they offered to let me in on their project with the Marauders' Map if I'd let them have access to it, and then I started spending more time turning, and so I ended up spending a lot more time with them than I'd really planned on, and somewhere along we ended up being more than just civil and… and… we're friends."

Mary didn't know what to say to that. It sounded so reasonable when the older girl put it that way, but she couldn't get over that they were still terrible people, for not even feeling bad about what they had done to her.

But then, maybe Hermione was also a terrible person. It was all three of them who had spearheaded the Conspiracy, after all. And hadn't they spent half the morning talking about how Hermione was learning the Dark Arts? She had hardly seemed bothered by any of it, all nightmares aside.

"Lizzie? Say something, please," Hermione begged, her face a shadow beneath her untamed mop of curls.

"What do you lot even have in common?" she asked grudgingly.

"Enchanting, mostly," the other replied, seizing the conversational lifeline. "We're trying to create a copy of the Map. And we've spent some time exploring. Snape told me about a room that isn't on it – you know that one where we had the Mabon ceremony? It's always there, but it takes the shape of whatever you need it to be. So we're looking for other rooms that aren't on it, and trying to find ways to add them. They're… they're really not so bad, once you get to know them."

"They still don't think they did anything wrong, though, kidnapping me! How can you be friends with them, when you know that's the kind of people they are?"

"They know what they did was wrong, they just don't regret it. There's a difference!"

"They – they know?"

"They've admitted that if they had known then what they know now, they would have got Snape, like you told them to. They just… don't apologize for things they're not sorry about."

"They still should," Mary pouted.

"I don't disagree with you," Hermione said, in a tone reminiscent of her mother. "I… I understand, if you can't be friends after that, even if they did apologize. But… They've been keeping me sane, Lizzie. Grounded. They make me laugh. You don't know how important that is, when you've spent as many hours as I have surrounding yourself with stories of horrible things and magical theory that pushes you to the edge of madness, and it's like, if you just go a little further, you might be able to see everything, grasp it all... It's scary. I… I don't think I could give that up, what they do for me."

The younger girl was afraid to ask what her friend's answer would be if she said it was them or her. "You know you don't have to do the research," she said instead, regretting having thought only moments before that the older girl was unbothered by what she had been reading. "If it's that bad for you, I mean. I know you have nightmares. You really don't –"

"If I don't do it, who will?" the Ravenclaw asked rhetorically. "Snape hasn't the time. Dumbledore keeps him so busy I'm surprised he has time to even review my summaries. And the Old Goat himself won't do it. Or if he did, he wouldn't tell us what he found out. Who else is there? And besides, I'd rather know. Now that I know all the awful things magic can be made to do, and how terrible it can be, I don't think I could stand being… being ignorant. Not knowing doesn't make the bad things in the world not exist. I just need some light in my life to balance it out, you know?"

Mary didn't. Or rather, she didn't know how the twins could possibly be that for her friend. She did understand how she hated the thought of not knowing what was out there. It was half the reason she wanted a copy of the Ravenclaw's notes. "You really like them?"

"I really do. They're sweet and funny and protective and so smart. And, well… please don't take this the wrong way, but it's nice to have older friends. I love you and Lili, really, I do, but they know so much more – and I'm closer to their age than yours already, and only getting further ahead."

It was awfully hard not to take that the wrong way, especially since she had never quite shaken the fear that she and Hermione were inevitably going grow apart ever since she found out how much the older girl was using the time turner. "So we're just little kids to you, now?" she scoffed, trying not to sound too hurt.

"No! Of course not! You and Lili are the first friends I ever had. You're practically a sister to me! I'm not going to leave you behind, or whatever you're thinking, just because I'm even older than you than I already was. I just… It's nice to have older people to talk to as well, sometimes. They have a different perspective. The twins, especially. It's…" She gave a small, strange laugh. "They help me relax. I help them be serious. It works. It's good for all of us." She shrugged, and Mary felt something within her shift, conceding defeat.

"Fine," she said.

"Fine what?"

"Fine, I don't care if you're friends with them. I'm not going to be friends with them, and I don't want to hang out with them, or whatever, but I won't stop talking to you over it," the younger girl grumbled. She was immediately engulfed in a hug, and had to fight off Hermione's masses of hair, prompting tickling and contagious giggles from her friend. When they finally regained control of themselves, she asked, very quietly, "You think of me like a sister?"

From where she was lying (half on top of Hermione, though it was unclear which of them was holding the other in place), she could feel the other girl nod. "Mm-hmm," she confirmed sleepily.

"Me, too," Mary whispered, as her own eyes finally drifted closed.

}{-}{-}{-}{-}{

When she woke, it was late. Light was already streaming through the window behind the Christmas tree, and she could hear the pleasantly homey sounds of Dan preparing breakfast. Hermione was still asleep. They had somehow managed to rearrange themselves so that they were both lying on their left sides on the couch, and one of the elder Grangers had draped a blanket over them. She squirmed free, and Hermione rolled over, burying her head in the crack between the back of the sofa and its seat.

The morning passed quickly. Mary had come to terms with it, but Dan and Emma still wanted to have a conversation about Hermione's friendship with the twins. Rather than get caught in the middle, the younger girl took the cowardly option of running off to take a shower as soon as Hermione entered the kitchen. She whispered "Good luck," as she passed, but her friend (her sister) had made her bed, as far as that whole situation went, and there was a vast chasm between tolerating her friendship with the red-headed menaces and helping defend it to her parents.

That afternoon, 'Don't call me Nymphadora' Tonks came over.

She rang the doorbell just a few minutes before Mary was expecting her, actually, and she didn't recognize the metamorph at first. She was wearing a muggle coat, tight black trousers, and a plump-cheeked, heart-shaped face. The teenager was halfway through telling the auror trainee that the Grangers weren't interested in whatever she was selling (politely, of course), when the older witch interrupted.

"Mary, it's me," she said, winking and changing that eye from brown to blue. "Can I come in?"

"Oh, yeah. Sorry, Tonks."

"It's no problem! Good to know I fit in alright with the muggles, you know," she replied cheerfully.

"Emma, Dan, Maia! Tonks is here!" Mary called. When she looked back, the witch had transfigured her coat back to a robe. She winced. "I should have mentioned – you can't do magic here. Maia got a nasty letter last summer because someone did a summoning charm – not one of us," she hastened to add. "A visitor."

But Tonks' mood was unflappable. "Shouldn't be a problem – wotcha, Maia!" she broke off, as the Grangers appeared. "Hi, Emma, Dan! Good to see you again."

"Hi, Tonks. What shouldn't be a problem?" Hermione asked, as Emma herded the lot of them toward the family room.

"Oh, I was just telling Mary, I had a poke around, before I came in. Your wards are quite good. As long as you don't make a magical disturbance large enough to spread beyond them, the Muggleborn Alert sensors shouldn't pick up anything unusual."

"We can do magic?" Hermione asked, sounding slightly outraged.

Tonks nodded. "I mean, no. Don't. Underage use of magic is dangerous, and you shouldn't do so unsupervised, even though your wards will stop anyone official from noticing," she said in a rather droning voice, then snapped back to normal. "Did Bill Weasley do them up for you? He always was a dab hand at making the magical currents flow normally around a ward system. I wouldn't have guessed there was a magical property here until I was about two houses down."

"He did," Dan said excitedly. "And Devon Troy helped work out how to keep the electricity working without spoiling things. We've even got phone lines running through. It's really very interesting stuff, wardcrafting!"

Tonks pulled a face. "Enchanting never was my cup of tea, I'm afraid. Always liked a bit more adventure than ward-crafters are likely to get. Never thought Bill had it in him to go off curse-breaking," she sighed. "Anyway," she pulled a flexible strip of leather with a knife-hilt sticking out of it from her pocket and handed it to Mary. "There you are! Bit scuffed up, but it should be fine. I can help you tune it, if you like, but you shouldn't probably be throwing it, anyway, and Flitwick'll skin you if you channel power into it in Dueling Club, so it's not that important."

"Tune it?" Mary asked, just as Hermione said, "Channel power?"

Emma laughed. "Have a seat, Tonks. I have a feeling this is going to be a long discussion."

"Not that long," Hermione protested, but they all sat regardless.

"You, ah… do know what you do with a dueling knife, don't you?" the metamorph asked warily, looking from one curious face to the next.

Mary shook her head. "Neville – Longbottom, that is – said that I should look into getting one. Something about versatility at close quarters? I was planning to ask when I went to the armory he suggested, but…"

"Oh, right! Well. Okay. Been a while since I've had this speech. I got to skip it when we were doing weapons training, on account of I've been fighting since I was about seven. I guess if I skip something and it doesn't make sense, ask, and I'll go back, eh?"

The others nodded, and Tonks' face slowly shifted back to its natural shape as she focused on explaining the use of the weapon. She held out a hand for it, and Mary reluctantly passed it back.

"This is a dueling sheath," the auror trainee said, stripping the leather from the blade. It looked as if she was pulling the eight-inch strip of polished metal out of nowhere. "It's worn so the handle or hilt is on the inside of the forearm, hilt toward the palm. It goes on your wand arm, and your wand goes on your off-arm, so you can do a cross-draw, like this," she said, demonstrating. "The dueling sheath is enchanted to protect the blade. It's stored in kind of a little pocket in space so it doesn't hinder your movements, and it's not affected by magic when it's sheathed. It's very, very important that you never take an un-sheathed dueling blade through the floo. The enchantments will react badly with the alchemy, and probably explode."

"Okay, the sheath is very important," Mary said, exchanging a wide-eyed look with the Grangers. "Got it."

Tonks nodded. "Second thing. You can't wear it anywhere other than sanctioned dueling events, unless you've got a license, and you can't get one until you're seventeen. Same as for proper wand-holsters, it's considered a concealed weapon, but the penalties are worse for a knife, because everyone's expected to have a wand on them somewhere. Third thing. This particular knife has concealing enchantments on the hilt, so if you do wear it under clothing, it won't affect the overlying cloth. That's illegal. So don't get caught wearing it with long sleeves."

Emma snorted. Dan looked appalled. "Aren't you supposed to be some sort of law enforcement officer?" he asked.

"I am," Tonks agreed, clearly not offended in the least. "You can't buy them like that. Well, I could, or a Hit Wizard, but most anyone couldn't. Except they were only made illegal about fifteen years back, because of the war. As long as she doesn't wear it under long sleeves, there's no apparent difference between that and any other blade. And she doesn't have any reason to be wearing it outside of a dueling tournament at all, right?" The last word was clearly directed at Mary, along with a hard look.

She nodded quickly. "Definitely. I'll be good, promise!"

"I don't know that I like giving children concealed weapons, anyway," Dan grumbled.

"Daniel," Emma said sharply. "We've talked about this."

"I know we have, Emma, but there's no Second Amendment here, and even if there was, Beth is thirteen."

"I was shooting when I was five, Dan. The girls are plenty old enough to understand the need to be careful."

Dan looked over at the young witches (both of whom were nodding frantically), and sighed. "That doesn't mean I like it," he grumbled.

"Besides, Dad, our wands are way more dangerous than any knife," Hermione said, obviously failing in her attempt to be helpful.

"I know that, sweetie, and it's not reassuring in the least," her father said, ruffling her damp curls.

Tonks looked at the adults hesitantly before she asked, "Shall I go on?"

Dan sighed and nodded. "Best have all the safety information up-front."

"Yeah, well… Anyway. The illegal thing also includes if you wear it on your ankle or thigh or anywhere else under your clothes. Just don't. Like Dan said, I am going to be an auror, and it'll look pretty shitty for all of us if you get caught with an illegal knife I gave you.

"Next thing is tuning. You do, or can, use magic directed through a dueling blade. It's not really spellcasting, though. It's basically channeling your intent and your power into the blade to enhance its natural properties. It's technically dark magic, and it's not allowed in IDC duels. But if you ever get in a real fight for your life, it can make the difference. If you want to learn, I can teach you over the summer."

"I'll think about it," Mary said, with a quick look at the still-moody Dan. She was almost positive that that sounded like something she did want to learn, though.

"Right, well. That's one thing tuning is good for. Wands have their own magical frequency, that has to match your magic in order to work properly. Knives have to be specifically brought into alignment with your own magic to channel it efficiently, usually once a year, unless you're using it all the time. If you are, that will keep the alignment attuned to you. The other thing is, when you tune your knife, you create a sort of bond between it and you, which makes it much easier to summon it wandlessly, say, for example, if you get disarmed or throw it at an opponent. Which is dumb and flashy. I don't recommend it." The young auror flushed slightly, and Mary wondered if there was a story there.

"I think we can skip that, for today, then," she decided.

"I'll re-tune it to myself, then, so you can't channel anything accidentally," Tonks said, pricking a finger and tracing several runes down the blade. The runes sank into the metal, and the blade glowed darkly for a moment.

Tonks acted as though this was perfectly normal, though Hermione's eyes narrowed suspiciously and Emma asked, "Is it supposed to look so…?"

"Creepy? Not always. New ones will glow brighter, but they get darker the more times they're tuned. This one is a couple hundred years old. It was my mother's Aunt Walburga's before it was hers, so don't get it confiscated," she said sternly to Mary, albeit with a smile.

"Are you sure you want to lend it to me?" she asked hesitantly.

Tonks just shrugged. "You're as much a Black as I am, and I have others that are more in line with my style. I like a bit more curve to the blade," she explained, sketching a slightly different shape with her hands against the straight edges of the one resting on her knees.

"Oh! Speaking of Lizzie being a Black," Hermione interrupted. "Do you know what Bellatrix Lestrange looked like?"

Tonks was briefly thrown. "Um… sure. Why?"

"Case of mistaken identity at St. Mungo's," Mary explained, flushing slightly, and wishing Hermione would shut up.

"I was just wondering if the resemblance really is as strong as people say," the older girl shrugged, nodding at Mary.

The metamorph laughed. "I can see it. The structure of the cheekbones, nose, and forehead is similar, but Bellatrix's eyes and chin are different." She shifted her own face to demonstrate, the cheeks becoming a little thinner, eyes a little deeper-set, an almost-invisible dusting of freckles fading away. Her irises, normally one blue and one green, grew deeper in shade, from blue through purple, until they were dark enough that Mary couldn't see the pupil. "Let's see," she muttered. "I think she used to wear her hair like this," riotous, black curls were whipped up with a flick of a charm, "but she'd never be caught dead in this…" Tonks' bright blue overrobe and wildly patterned tunic were transfigured to resemble a corset over a loose-sleeved, plain, black blouse. "Oh, and by the time she was my age, she was already a Death Eater." She cast an illusion on her left arm, a skull with a snake emerging from its mouth. The entire process, from start to finish, took less than a minute. She glowered at the other three for a few seconds, then grinned. "Mad-Eye, my mentor in the Aurors, you know, he said I'm pretty spot-on until I open my mouth," she laughed, apparently oblivious to the shock the others were expressing in regard to the transformation. "Of course, that was after he nearly cursed me through a wall, so I don't prank him anymore."

"Could you switch back?" Mary asked. She was finding it highly uncanny, sitting across from the face of an infamous Death Eater who could be her older sister.

Tonks obliged, returning to her usual face and cancelling the illusion of the tattoo, though she left her clothes transfigured.

"Does that hurt?" Hermione asked. "I got turned half-cat with Polyjuice once, and it was really painful."

"Feels a bit weird," Tonks admitted. "But I wouldn't say it's really painful. It's more like the animagus transformation than a potion or curse transformation. Self-transfiguration, you know? But anyway, well… I've completely forgotten what I was going to say. Want a demonstration of how a real knife-fight goes?"

"Yes!" Mary said at once, then turned to the adults. "Can we? Please?"

Emma shrugged and looked to Dan. He sighed. "I suppose it wouldn't hurt to see what the kids are going to be learning eventually. In the garden, maybe?" he suggested.

Tonks laughed. "It's just illusion – I couldn't really show you in person without a decent partner, but yeah, if we go outside, I can scale it up."

Hermione led the way out onto the back porch, and Tonks set to weaving an elaborate construct, semi-transparent, and obviously only about half-scale, if the size of the people were anything to go by, even taking up most of the garden. Two witches, one of them a much younger-looking Tonks, faced off in the middle of a large, circular platform. "This is from the summer of '86," Tonks explained. "So I would've been thirteen. The other girl is Jas Neikopf. She's a couple years older than me, on the European Dueling Circuit, now."

The witches bowed, drawing their weapons, and circled for a few long moments, casting spells until it became clear that Tonks was far outmatched when it came to wandwork. She dodged two curses, and closed the distance between them with a duck and roll. Mary gasped. She didn't know if she could pull that off, and she was way more coordinated than Tonks, most of the time.

But apparently when she was focusing on a fight, Tonks was much more sure of herself. Illusion-Tonks deflected a slice toward her unprotected wand-arm, batting it away almost casually and letting the sharp metal slide past her as she turned, effortlessly, and struck at the other girl's midsection. Neikopf leapt back, putting enough distance between them that she could use her wand again.

The duel progressed slowly in a similar vein for nearly five minutes, with Tonks, younger than Mary, she realized, shielding and dodging, hardly bothering to send any curses, and focusing on closing the distance between the girls, and Neikopf doing everything she could to keep the younger, smaller girl away. Mary had to say, on the whole, despite the fact that Tonks was using more defensive spells, Neikopf seemed to be moving more defensively. The reason why became clear near the five-minute mark, as Tonks managed to duck under her guard and stab the older girl deeply in the right knee. She fell, unable to support herself, but still fighting, sending spell after spell to drive the young Tonks off.

Still, with her mobility hampered, it was only a matter of time until Tonks reduced her to holding a shield, closing in with her knife and casting bright-red stunning spells to keep her opponent from doing anything other than keeping her shield in place. When she was close enough, she abandoned the stunners and started carving into the shield itself, her blade glowing blue as it bit into the magical barrier. Just when it seemed that the shield was about to cave, flickering around the edges, Tonks stopped. Neikopf dropped her spell, sweating and shaking, and Tonks helped her to her feet.

"What happened at the end, there?" Dan asked, as the real Tonks dispersed the illusion. He was obviously interested, despite his reluctance to see the girls taught to fight.

"Jasmin surrendered. Cutting that shield open is what it looks like when you're channeling magic through the blade. You're enhancing the basic properties of the knife: in that case, its ability to cut through things, which wouldn't normally include magic. Not that you'd be doing anything quite so drastic at Hogwarts. This was at an outside gym."

"That was awesome!" Mary enthused. Hermione's eyes were bright and interested as well, and the Slytherin was certain her friend was about to let loose with a veritable flood of questions, but before she could, Tonks spoke up again.

"Bloody hell, I've got to get going. Plans for tea. Owl me, though, yeah? Closer to the summer, and we'll set up a time for me to show you a few tricks!"

The younger witch agreed wholeheartedly. She didn't even care about the power-channeling: she just wanted to learn how to move like that.

Monday, 3 January 1994

Wizengamot Chambers, Ministry of Magic, London

The day after Tonks' visit marked the beginning of the last event Mary had planned for herself over the Yule holiday: attending the first Wizengamot session of the year. She floo'd from the Grangers' to the Urquharts' in time to join the Urquharts for dinner on Sunday, and spent the hours between the end of the meal and bed catching up with Catherine.

There was little of note that she had not included in her letters, but the older girl did give her a stern talking-to about rejecting the opportunity presented by Daphne's tea parties. Apparently Lilian had taken her sarcastic comment to the effect that she and Catherine should just run Mary's life slightly too seriously, and had owled the Urquhart witch asking her to intercede on Lilian and Daphne's behalf. Enough time had passed for Mary to admit that she had, perhaps, overreacted, and that she should apologize and continue to attend the 'networking events' – or at least she decided it had after nearly an hour of disappointed lecturing on the advantages of making such connections. She agreed to at least 'make an effort to repair [her] damaged relationship with House Greengrass' once they had all returned to school, just so Catherine would let it go. Thankfully, that worked, and the conversation turned to more pleasant topics, such as Slytherin's reception to her patronage of Dave (as yet unchallenged since September, which Mary was quite frankly becoming suspicious of, since she knew there were those who did not approve, and their quiet could mean nothing good) and the possible origins of the mysterious Firebolt.

On Monday morning, she rose bright and early and, with the assistance of one of the Urquhart house-elves, donned the fancy robes the Urquharts had bought for her birthday, so many months before. The elf, Rubie, styled her hair, using some powerful elven magic to render it perfectly straight and biddable – at least long enough to be elaborately braided and pinned into place. By the time she was ready to go, she hardly recognized the strange and exotic young woman in the mirror, with her shifting robes, hair coiled like a nest of tamed serpents, and a hint of a proper figure, under the influence of the corset. She tried not to let the fact that she looked more like the dancing photo of Bellatrix Black than her usual self take away from the fact that she actually looked really good.

Catherine was apparently anticipating her makeover (if one could call it a makeover when there was no makeup involved), because she snapped a photo of Mary before the younger girl had even descended the main stair. She nearly turned an ankle in her heels at the flash, but her tutor was entirely unapologetic. She demanded another, proper picture once they reached the dining room, and Mary obliged, on the condition that she received a copy, for the benefit of all those like Hermione who thought she never dressed up. Who knew when she would be so well put-together again?

The teen was unable to eat much, sitting uncomfortably upright at the edge of her chair, partly out of fear for her clothes, partly due to the corset, and partly because, when faced with the prospect of spending the entire day in Lord Urquhart's company, her appetite had fled.

All the fun of fancy clothes and taking photos aside, she was distinctly nervous about making what was very obviously intended to be a public appearance, and doing so escorted by an intimidating old man whom she had never spoken more than a handful of words to directly. Catherine said that it was nothing to worry about, but Mary couldn't shake the fear that she was about to embarrass herself or the Urquharts in some irredeemable way.

Nevertheless, she followed the stolid old wizard, equally well dressed, into the floo, as expected. They made their way through the bustling Ministry Atrium and a tangled, maze-like warren of corridors on the second floor to the small office that was, apparently, his, or possibly the Urquhart family's (she didn't care to speak up and ask). They laid off their outer robes there (the ones that protected their proper robes from the soot and bustle of traveling), and then, much as Neville had escorted her through his family's house, Lord Urquhart escorted her into the Chamber of Governance.

"Steady on," he murmured to her as they found the box that was the Urquharts' 'seat,' for which she gave him a grateful smile.

The Chamber of Governance was a large, five-sided room, though not a proper pentagram. One wall was long and straight, and the other four created a sort of half-circle around it. The 139 Seats were arranged in seven tiers, with eight in the first tier (two per side), and more for every one higher. The Urquharts', as one of the oldest houses outside of the three remaining Most Ancient Houses, was in the second tier. House Potter was somewhere in the fourth tier, according to Lord Urquhart. The tiered Seats surrounded a small, semi-circular stage, the Floor, which had a floating lectern situated near one of the empty Ancient Seats. There was a large chair off to one side of the Floor, and a row of desks along the back wall, only three of which were occupied.

Only about 110 of the seats were active at the moment, but that was still an awful lot of wizards, especially since nearly every booth had more than one occupant (most had three or four) and there was, as Professor McGonagall had noted, a small press section, on the opposite side of the Floor from the desk. Mary spotted the Malfoys' distinctive, blond hair at the far end of the fifth tier, and Professor McGonagall waved at her (discreetly) from the McGonagall Seat in the third, somewhat nearer. There were a number of other teens present, but no one Mary knew particularly well.

Zacharias Smith was a few Seats down. He gave her a cocky smirk and a nod before bending his head to listen to something a very short witch was telling him. His grandmother or great-grandmother, perhaps. Susan Bones was in the first tier, off to the Urquharts' left, with her aunt Amelia, the head of Magical Law Enforcement. She looked incredibly bored. Mary knew that she was technically the head of her House in the same way Mary was, and wondered if she had been to one of these things before. Neville was in the first tier as well, with his grandmother in her ridiculous hat. He looked just as terrified as she felt, and uncomfortable in his dress robes.

A clock somewhere began to strike the hour (ten), and Dumbledore, the Chief Warlock, paraded onto the Floor to call the session to order. In striking contrast to his Welcome Feast Speeches, it was a rather lengthy, droning performance. There was something formulaic about the antiquated phrasing that made Mary suspect he couldn't just say something like 'harpsichord, terrycloth, capital, let's get on with it.' All in all, as silly as that would be, she thought she would have preferred it to taking a full five minutes to say 'Welcome back, I hope you've all had a good holiday. There's not much on the agenda for the day, but we will address that in a moment. Now the Secretary will take roll for the Minutes.'

A fussy-looking old wizard with a monocle took his place on the Floor, and Dumbledore settled himself into the chair, looking for all the world as though he was ready to take a nap. Mary soon felt like taking a nap herself, as the Roll was called to establish a quorum:

"Who stands as representative for the Most Ancient House of Black?"

"Mr. Blake Wilkes, duly appointed solicitor and proxy for Madam Walburga, Acting Head of House Black, Mr. Secretary!"

"Noted. Who stands as representative for the Most Ancient House of Bones?"

"The Honorable Amelia Bones, Regent and proxy for Heir Ascendant Miss Susan Bones, Mr. Secretary."

"Noted. Who stands as representative for the Most Ancient House of Longbottom?"

"Madam Augusta Longbottom, Regent and proxy for Heir Ascendant Master Neville Longbottom, Mr. Secretary."

On and on it went. Mary noted that "Mr. Angus McGonagall, proxy for Heir Ascendant Miss Mary Potter," would be casting her vote, and wondered if she might be able to meet him at some point. She knew that he was Professor McGonagall's brother, and he had sent her a brief note welcoming her back to the magical world ages ago, but she had never spoken to him.

After the last of the Seats had announced their representatives, the Secretary turned to the Representative of the Ministry of Magic (Senior Undersecretary to the Minister, Dolores Umbridge), the Official Scribe (Willow Tomlin, Head of the Ministry Department of Records), and introduced himself (Wizengamot Secretary and Master of Order, Jonathan Buchanan) before turning the Floor back over to the Chief Warlock.

Dumbledore proceeded to list the topics on the agenda. They ranged from boring (Proposal to Discuss the Formation of a Committee to Consult on the Safety of Magical Minors in the Care of Public Institutions in Magical Britain, the United Kingdom, and Ireland) to deadly boring (Recognition of Transfers of Lordship since the Conclusion of Previous Session). The only one that Mary thought sounded interesting at all was the "Report on Progress of the Construction of the Quidditch World Cup Stadium," and it was scheduled for the very end of the day, right before "Concluding Remarks."

There was very little Old Business to address – just another vote on an apparently ongoing debate about a law to restrict access to healing texts. The Representative from House Grey spoke on the necessity for not only fully licensed healers, but healers in training, midwives, and anyone who wanted to practice first-aid to have access to such texts, making the argument that such a restriction was tantamount to forcing the public to use St. Mungo's for the most basic of injuries. The Representative from House Abbott argued that the knowledge contained in most healing texts was too dangerous for the general public to have access to, making the argument that there is a reason Healers are bound by oath not to abuse their knowledge and power. The Representative from House Burke essentially called that dragon-shite, presenting the full Healer's Oaths, and pointing out that there was nothing in there about not using their knowledge when it came to anyone other than patients. The Representative from House Macmillan suggested that perhaps the Healer's Oaths ought to be changed, then, and Dumbledore cut off her speech, noting that that would be a new item to submit for the following session's agenda.

The Chief Warlock called for a vote regarding the law ("Should Proposed Legislative Act 1993-08-05-01, otherwise known as Menken's Law, be passed into the corpus of legislation, thereby restricting access to healing texts to those who have taken the Healer's Oath?"), and the Secretary officially recognized the votes. 'Nay' won by too-slim a margin to dismiss the proposed law, resulting in its being set aside until the following session as well, so that both sides could prepare new arguments.

After that, there was a break for lunch, and Mary was allowed to mingle with her fellow overdressed teens around a refreshment table. She exchanged formal greetings with Susan and Neville, but then went to try to talk to Angus McGonagall. She found him chatting with the Professor in a side-room, and they welcomed her warmly, the Professor practically purring over how well-turned-out she was, and Angus eager to discuss his management of her family's votes. Apparently he had read through the voting records of Charlus and James Potter (meager though the latter were), and was doing his best to keep true to the principles that seemed to have guided their hands, which Mary supposed was everything she could have asked for, though she was a bit uncomfortable when the conversation turned to the healing text issue – Angus had voted aye, while she thought she would have voted nay. Still, she was willing to concede that she had only heard one round of a debate which had apparently been going on for months, and therefore said nothing.

After lunch, the two Lords and one Lady who had taken over their family seats over the holiday introduced themselves to the Chamber. Mary did her best to pay attention, because she knew that she would have to do the same in just a few short years, but their speeches were incredibly florid and, Mary felt, deliberately obfuscating. Lord Schelling was obviously a Traditionalist, but she couldn't make heads nor tails of the other two. She did catch that Lord Westin intended to use the same proxy as his father had done, so his house's vote was unlikely to change.

The proposal she had expected to be boring, for the formation of a committee to consult on magical minors' health and safety, actually ended up being anything but. The long, dull item title on the agenda had effectively disguised the fact that it addressed at least one issue she felt rather strongly about: the way magical orphans were raised. She thought she would have been much better off throughout her childhood if there had been some sort of system in place to check up on her. It also applied to addressing student safety standards at Hogwarts, which, given her experiences there in the past two and a half years, she thought were rather lacking. She was sure there was some sort of ulterior motive, since the proposal was put forth by Lady Malfoy, but she didn't think it necessarily would address muggleborns who still lived with their families, so whatever that motive was, it probably wasn't anything to do with Emma or IMP. The blonde witch argued the necessity of the formation of such a committee with a surprising degree of passion, and as no one could refuse to participate without essentially voting against the wellbeing of magical children, the proposal passed, to the obvious irritation of the Headmaster.

Amelia Bones made a speech as the Head of the DMLE requesting the Wizengamot overrule the Minister's Emergency Order to place Dementors around Hogwarts, citing unsolicited attacks by the creatures on two residents of Hogsmeade and one stray muggle tourist who had been out for a day-hike to see the "ruined" castle. Her aurors, she said, were now more occupied keeping the bloody demons in check than with looking for Sirius Black. But they needed a four-fifths majority to overturn an Emergency Order, and they only managed three-quarters or so of the assembled voters. There didn't seem to be any patterning to those who insisted the thrice-cursed creatures stay in place, either. Some of them even had miserable teenagers sitting beside them, their votes no doubt cast to 'protect' those same children they were dooming to another cold, wretchedly depressing term.

The report on the progress of the World Cup stadium was decidedly unenlightening, though it was, at least, less traumatically dull and long-winded than many of the other points of the agenda had been. The reason for this was simple: it was presented by a no-nonsense young arithmancer, who discussed the finances and wizarding resources, and a dowdy, straightforward business-witch, whose company was overseeing the actual construction, rather than a politician. Everything was, apparently, going exactly as expected, and the stadium would be completed on schedule, ready to accommodate a hundred thousand rabid Quidditch fans from around the world come August.

Lord Urquhart shook his head at this, muttering about the sheer lunacy of inviting literally ten times the population of Magical Britain within the boundaries of the nation, and prophesying dire logistical problems, but Mary was excited. If she had her way, she would definitely be one of those hundred thousand in the stands.

The Assembly was dismissed by five in the afternoon, to reconvene in two weeks' time, and Lord Urquhart escorted Mary back to the Mansion. By that point, she was almost more preoccupied by the pain in her feet and her lower back than concerned about the chance she might make a fool of herself and her hosts, which probably helped her finish out the day without bollixing anything up at the last second. Well, she did actually get a heel stuck on exiting the floo, but by then she was safely out of the public view, so she still considered it a win.

On the whole, she considered it a horrid affair, on par with attending tea parties with her peers, if not precisely the same (hosting a tea party for the Professor—and Hermione—had actually been quite enjoyable, especially once the Firebolt revelation had broken the formality). She returned to the Grangers' with her photo, which Catherine had had developed over the course of the day, rather relieved that it was over, and looking forward to going back to her low-key muggle holiday.

It was not until Hermione, practically bouncing in anticipation, met her in the floo shed that Mary recalled she had promised to recount the meeting in every detail.

Friday, 7 January 1994

Hogwarts

Albus Dumbledore

"I believe that concludes our pre-term conference," Albus announced, clapping his hands lightly over the sound of his staff's frustrated muttering.

"I still can't believe there's nothing else that can be done about the dementors," Minerva grumbled.

Albus sighed. "Miss Amelia and I gave it our best shot, but alas… unless I were to go so far as accusing the Ministry of putting the school under siege, I'm afraid there are no other options."

"Feels like being under siege," Pomona said, with a degree of snark worthy of Severus.

Aurora laughed aloud. "Write them an open letter, Mona. Wasn't Fudge one of yours?"

"You know perfectly well he was one of Slughorn's just as much as you were, missy."

"I prefer to think I'm one of Snape's," the Astronomy professor said, batting her eyes at the wizard who had taken over her house in her NEWT years in a parody of flirtation. Pomona ignored her, following Minerva and Rolonda out of the staff room.

"Detention, Sinistra, my office, after class," Severus drawled mockingly, but Albus could see a hint of suppressed amusement.

"You two are disgusting," Septima informed the apparently on-again couple. "What are D'Onofrio and Grubblyplank going to think?" She nodded down the table at their new colleagues, who were chatting obliviously with Filius, Poppy and Remus.

"They say transgression is the root of humor," the Astronomy professor smirked. "Snape has no sense of humor, therefore it follows that he has no inclination toward transgression, correct?"

"Why am I friends with you, you illogical heathen?"

"Because sometimes I indulge your need for mindless girl-talk?" Aurora suggested, then went on in a slightly higher, more girlish voice: "What do you think of Marzio, Tima? I fancy he's quite attractive in that reedy intellectual way."

Septima laughed. "You might have competition, Snape. Fair warning."

"I shall endeavor to suppress my anxiety regarding the insecurity of our mutual friend's fickle affections," the Potions Master quipped, excusing himself from the witches' conversation by alerting Remus to their impending meeting. "Lupin! A word before you run off to examine whatever useless creature you've brought into the castle now."

"Come on, Aurora, before he decides to poison you." Septima began dragging the younger witch bodily toward the door.

"Again? Has he said something to you?"

"Again? He's poisoned you before?"

The witches were out of Albus' earshot before Aurora responded, which was a pity, for he found himself intensely curious about that particular nugget of staff gossip. He hadn't noticed Aurora having been poisoned...

"Is Aurora a masochist?" Remus asked Severus as the others of his little group filtered out. "She doesn't seem the type, but she is in some sort of twisted little relationship with you, so, you know, I can't help but wonder…"

"Much as I would love to regale you with tales of my sexual exploits," Severus said, in a tone Albus recognized as the one reserved for messing with his fellow professors' heads. "I find that it is infinitely more amusing to me to leave you… unsatisfied. Much like Ms. Burbage."

Remus growled under his breath. "Watch it, Snape! You're still on thin ice with me after that stunt you pulled back in November!"

"…he says as though his paltry influence should convince me to consider his opinion." Remus was several inches taller than Severus, and broader across the shoulders, but that did not stop the smaller wizard invading the werewolf's personal space.

Thankfully Sybil, the last of the other professors to vacate the staff room, departed at that moment, so Albus was free to call up the privacy wards and head off the inevitable explosion.

"Severus," he said forbiddingly. The dark professor turned away from his posturing with a flourish of robes, alighting on the arm of his usual chair, rather catlike in his projected 'this is what I intended all along' attitude.

"Dumbledore," he mimicked.

"What is all this about?" Remus asked, pulling together a professional façade with obvious effort.

Albus smiled benignly at him. "I just thought that you might be interested to know that we have finished adjusting the wards to take into account the information you shared with us regarding Mr. Black's animagus form. The wards will now prevent dogs from moving in and out of the castle."

"Just dogs? Why not block animagi entirely?"

"Minerva," Severus pointed out succinctly, though that was not the reason.

"She could be added as an exception, couldn't she?"

Albus shook his head. "There is no feasible way to add a ward to detect an animagus in human form, and simply blocking all animals would hinder our feline population's movements in a way that I'm sure would quickly make the castle unbearable for its human residents."

"But he can still use his dog form to get onto the grounds, and then enter the school in human form, couldn't he?"

"Indeed," Severus drawled. "Thus rendering the waste of half my holiday nearly irrelevant, but our illustrious Headmaster has never been inclined to attend to my analyses of predicted costs versus theoretical benefits."

"Why is he even here, sir?" Remus asked, avoiding addressing his colleague directly.

Albus settled into one of his trademark conjured armchairs, and opened his mouth to speak, but Severus beat him to it.

"I am here because Salazar Slytherin was a paranoid bastard and included a key in the fundamental array for the school wards such that they cannot be altered without the conscious participation of the Head of Slytherin, thus I am to be involved in this farce regardless, and may as well be so from the beginning." He smiled cruelly. "I am also here because I am a far better legilimens than the Headmaster. I may not be able to enter your mind without your knowledge, but I assure you, I can divine whether you are attempting to… hold back any… pertinent information. Again."

"Enough, Severus. You are not here to further your ridiculous, juvenile feud!" Albus snapped, glaring at the young professor. "If you cannot remain civil, I will have to ask you to leave, despite your concerns for Miss Potter's protection."

He immediately regretted losing his temper, but even he was not immune to the effects of the dementors. Between their continued presence around the Castle and the passage of the Allied Dark's latest damnable proposal on Monday, he was in a rather poor mood, and Severus' attitude was not improving matters.

The dark wizard resisted his authority for a long moment, but eventually dipped his head in submission.

"Remus," Albus went on, more kindly. "I simply must ask you again whether there is anything else – anything at all – that might be helpful in apprehending Black. Any favored haunts around Hogsmeade? Anywhere he might have felt safe lying low? Any way you know of that he might be able to enter the Castle – even if you suspect we already know of it. Goodness knows I still, on occasion, am surprised by the secrets this old building hides, and on the off chance that you are aware of something I am not…"

Remus looked from him to Severus and back again before he sighed, and began to speak. With only a few pointed prods from the Potions Master, he told them of the Marauders' adventures in the Shrieking Shack, the caves above Hogsmeade, and their explorations of the Forest, on both sides of the ward-line. He told them of his knowledge of the seven passages leading off the Grounds, and the thirteen passages from the Castle to the Grounds and the Forest, aside from the numerous openly recognized side-doors. He told them of a rather ingenious Map, drawing information from the wards, and a clever little self-replicating enchantment to create an accurate representation of the ever-shifting structure of the school. He even reminded them that there was a possibility Black was nowhere near the school, and had, perhaps, chosen to run after his failed attempt on the Tower, either to the old site of the Potter Manor, where he had once taken refuge from his family, or leaving the country entirely.

Unfortunately, none of this information was likely to be of much assistance. None of them truly believed that Sirius Black, one of the most stubborn, obsessive men they had ever met, would abandon any quest he had managed to fixate upon in his dementor-addled state, and in any case, the Potter Manor was long-since razed, a casualty of the War. The Shrieking Shack had been the first place he and Severus had checked after it became apparent that Black had escaped the Grounds, and there had been no signs that the structure had been inhabited since the '70s. The dementors had searched the entire area of Hogsmeade for several miles in every direction, including the caves.

The only realistic place for the fugitive to be hiding was the Forest. It had its own wards, of course, but they were oriented toward keeping dark creatures contained, not detecting individuals within their boundaries. The school's treaty with the centaurs forbade more invasive magical surveillance, and they had their own methods to counter attempts at scrying within their territory. Albus truly hoped that Black was hiding out in that area. The only alternative explanation he could think of for why the wards would not recognize him, even in animagus form, were he still on the Grounds, would be if his sense of identity and personhood had been so eroded by dementor exposure that he had 'lost his Name.'

One of the classic (and most horrifyingly dark) experiments in applied magical theory, from the early days of its systematic examination, involved carefully removing a wizard's capacity for rational thought, his memories, and his knowledge of himself, then testing the effects of this treatment on spells that depended on a sense of fundamental identity to take effect. (So much evil had been done in the effort to find what made a man human.) One of the conclusions had been that if a man cannot know himself – if he has no sapience – his fundamental identity is broken. He will not return to his natural shape if transfigured. He cannot cross the boundaries between planes intact. His name is no longer associated with his blood or his magic. Identity, the researchers famously stated, is not only a matter of biology. Their findings were hailed as Proof of the Soul.

No one knew what ten years and more in the presence of dementors would do to a man – there were a scarce dozen prisoners who had lived so long among them – but common wisdom (supposition following from the connection between memory and sapience publicized by the Soul Experiment and the sensations experienced after relatively short terms in the presence of dementors) suggested that they stripped a man's memories from him, from the happiest to the most vile, taking his identity with them, reducing him slowly to a soulless husk of his former self, a slower version of the Kiss. Before the effect was complete, he would become a mindless creature, capable only of the most negative memories and emotions, more dangerous, perhaps, than ever.

Not only was slow de-soul-ment a fate not to be wished upon anyone, but it also meant that there was the possibility that Albus could not depend on the school wards to recognize if and when he crossed them. And regardless, he could not insert a trigger into that recognition to alert him automatically if Black did cross the wards without potentially destabilizing a thousand years of accumulated additions laid on top of those fundamental boundary lines. He wouldn't have been surprised if the Marauders had interrupted one or more of the non-essential enchantments when they inserted their probe to create their Map (but those were always wearing out, breaking down, or interfering with each other anyway).

In any case, the Headmaster already had access to that same information, he just had to look for it. He was also aware of the passages in and out of the school, and a visual representation would hardly be helpful, even if Remus did have the Map in his possession anymore, or know where it was, which Severus' legilimency confirmed he did not, despite his suspicious hesitation at that question. It seemed that the former Marauder had brought him the only piece of information that would, possibly, be useful, of his own accord, so many weeks ago. He left the meeting when Albus dismissed him, looking back at the two men with a hint of betrayal, but Albus couldn't bring himself to feel guilty.

If, after all, the werewolf had brought him the intelligence regarding Black's animagus form at the beginning of the year, when he had first asked whether there was anything he knew that might help them to keep the students safe, they might have kept the escaped prisoner out of the school entirely. But then, he should have known better than to trust a Defense Professor, he thought bitterly, even if Remus had been one of his favorite Gryffindors, once upon a time. After all, Black had been as well.

Severus' harsh glare and snotty, "Earth to Dumbledore," recalled him from his brooding thoughts.

"Yes, my dear boy?" he answered, in the tone he knew irritated the prickly young wizard more than any other.

"I asked whether you intended to inform the Ministry of this new development, in order to aid their hunt for Black," the Slytherin (apparently) repeated himself.

Albus felt his eyes narrow as he responded. "No. And neither shall you, nor Mr. Lupin. Hogwarts will apprehend the fugitive, if he is in our territory, not the Ministry. It would only encourage them to further meddling in the affairs of the school, and worse – to loose those blighted creatures of darkness across the island with ever-more-tenuous excuses."

Whatever Severus might have thought of his reasoning was hidden behind flat, dark eyes, but he nodded without hesitation.

"I have a duty to keep the students safe, Severus," the Headmaster sighed heavily. "And I do fear that the Ministry will become a greater threat to us in the coming years than Sirius Black, by far."

The younger wizard scoffed at his melancholy musings. "In thirteen years of working for you, I have never once seen you fear for the students. Not that I care that the Great Albus Dumbledore is as human as the next politician, but if you're going to lie to my face, you could at least have the decency to make it believable."

Albus stared, taken aback, after the swirl of black cloth and insubordination stalking away.

What the hell was that supposed to mean?