Hey, guys, we have a cover for the story :D Drawn by TigerMii (thanks a lot sweetie 3), here's the link:

foxmii. deviantart art/Recreated-Fire-Cover-569498291

Now, I know I've taken a long time to update, but I have good news (both things are related). You see, due to the nature of the final part of book 3, I wanted to have the whole thing worked out (and the annoying parts written) before starting to post, because I knew I'd have to tweak things as I advanced. This means you'll have a steady stream of updates for a while, now :D (because, yes, despite my best efforts this part is loooong xD)


Chapter 29: Trelawney's prophecy

Harry and Marco didn't leave the classroom for the entire Sunday morning. They didn't talk much, just stayed in the same position for hours and stared out of the now broken window. Harry wasn't even bothered by the cold breeze that came through it.

Long ago, as Portgas D. Ace, he hadn't cared much if he lived or died, not past how it would affect the people that —for reasons he sometimes had struggled to comprehend— had loved him. Not even an hour after he had felt for the first time that he truly wanted to live, he had died.

Now things were different.

He wasn't the son of a monster that most people thought shouldn't have been born; he was the son of good people that many had loved and still mourned. He had never, despite his relatives' efforts —or maybe because of them— felt that he was less than others or didn't deserve to live. The only true, unarguable parallel between his two lives was the fact that he had found people who loved him for who he was.

And Marco.

Marco, who had never doubted him even when Harry himself —Ace— had, who had waited for him longer than he could remember only to discover that Harry might have to die young again.

"There has to be a way," Harry said resolutely. He wasn't going to simply accept that Marco had to go through this crap again. "I mean, these horcrux things are one of magic's darkest little secrets, right? So they aren't well known, but that doesn't have to mean they can't be undone safely."

"Yes," Marco agreed, his head still resting against Harry's. "This book," he said, reaching for the discarded page, "is from the Middle Ages." He crumbled the page and put it in his coat pocket. "People have had centuries to study these things. I'll just have to keep looking."

Just then, Harry's stomach growled, reminding him that, despite how much he had eaten at the feast last night, over twelve hours was not an acceptable period of time without food.

Marco chuckled.

"Come on, go to the Great Hall. It's lunchtime already." He pushed Harry gently by the shoulders to prompt him to stand and, when Harry did, he stood up as well.

"What will you do?" Harry asked, turning to look at him.

"First of all, I'll drop by the kitchens and tell the elves about the window. They probably already know, but..." Marco shrugged, somewhat sheepishly, and Harry grinned. He probably hadn't even realized he had broken it earlier.

"And then?"

"I have some planning to do." He stepped closer to Harry and placed both hands on his shoulders, leaning down to kiss his forehead. "I won't let you die again."


Harry didn't tell Ron and Hermione about the horcruxes. He hadn't planned to hide it from them, but when Hermione had asked why he hadn't shown up for breakfast, he hadn't wanted to put this burden on their shoulders. They would insist on helping, maybe try to convince him to talk to someone —like Dumbledore, who already knew— and there was nothing they could help with. Hermione would delve into every Dark Arts book in the school, saying that Marco hadn't known about horcruxes when he read them and might have missed something, and Ron would help despite his dislike of the library. There was nothing in those books, horcruxes were only mentioned once, and Harry didn't want his friends to read the sickening contents in those tomes. They were still children, nowhere ready for that side of humanity.

And so, when Hermione asked, Harry lied. He kept mostly to the truth, to be as convincing as possible. He had left the party to go look for Marco, they had stayed up until late, had completely missed breakfast and Harry looked tired because he had barely slept. They didn't need to know he had slept before meeting Marco, instead of after as they assumed.

Harry's euphoria over winning the Quidditch Cup was completely gone, and he only put up a token protest when Hermione suggested they spent the remainder of the day studying.

Ron slipped away, but spending the entire afternoon frustrated over a potions essay sounded better than failing to enjoy himself while he remembered a burning fist pierce through his chest.


Marco's first impulse had been to barge into Borgin and Burkes and demand Borgin to find the entire list of books that Albus had removed from the restricted section decades ago, but he didn't. First of all, that would draw a lot of unwanted attention and suspicion, not to mention that Borgin would catch on his desperation and might even get a stupid idea in his head.

Instead, Marco selected another book from his list, put on a set of sombre black robes —black seemed the most appropriate colour to wear right now— and headed for the shop on Monday morning, early enough that most businesses had just opened, but late enough that people had already started their shifts at the Ministry of Magic or St. Mungo's. It was the least busy hour during the day, the best to shop calmly without attracting attention to himself.

Borgin's eyes opened in terrified recognition when Marco walked in, but he schooled his expression immediately. If there was something Borgin had learnt from their previous meetings, other than the fact that Marco was dangerous, it was that Marco had a lot of money to spend.

The real reason this shop had stayed open for so long was the owners' willingness to deal with rich, dangerous people.

Borgin smiled his simpering and entirely fake smile. Marco nodded in greeting and approached the counter.


Now that there were no more quidditch practices to occupy most of his free time, Harry divided that time between studying and training.

The exams had seemed far away until, suddenly, they were upon them. Everybody —even Fred and George, to general amazement— could be seen studying at one point or another, though perhaps no one's obsession reached the level Hermione's did, even though Percy wasn't far behind.

Harry wasn't particularly bothered by his exams, he would be fine if he simply passed them, no need for great grades, but the nerves permeating the school were contagious, and he found himself worrying like everybody else.

As exams came closer and closer, the common room and the library grew increasingly packed with students, until eventually Marco suggested that they studied in the room of requirement, where they could simply ask for nearly any book they needed —extreme Dark Arts book were an exception, Marco had informed Harry in annoyance. Fred, George and Ginny joined them.

The sight of five teenagers studying at the mess hall of the Moby Dick was so amusing that Marco even took a picture. Back in the day, there would have been mock dismayed comments at the sight.


The same day the exam calendar was published, Hagrid received a letter informing him Buckbeak's appeal would be held the sixth of June, and there would be a member of the Committee and an executioner present. Later that day, Malfoy, who had been mostly silent since his defeat at quidditch, made a mocking comment about Hagrid.

Harry cast a curse to give him haemorrhoids.


Finally, exam week arrived and nerves —in some cases even terror— took hold of the student population.

Transfiguration was the depressing first exam for the third years. Their task had been to turn a teapot into a turtle, to varying degrees of success. The shell of Harry's turtle had still been made of porcelain, and he wondered how much that would take off his mark. They had to cast a cheering charm on a partner for their Charms exam, which resulted in Ron laughing for an hour straight before he could cast his charm because Harry had the bad tendency of overpowering his incantations when he was nervous.

The next day it was Care of Magical Creatures, Potions and Astronomy. Hagrid was understandably depressed over Buckbeak's upcoming execution, and had clearly spared no thought for the exam. The students were given a flobberworm and told that, to pass the exam, they had to keep it alive the entire hour. Those things were better off left alone, and that meant the students had an hour of doing nothing. Harry, Ron and Hermione took advantage of it to check on Hagrid. Harry failed miserably in his attempt at a Confusing Concoction for Potions, and could see Snape giving him a zero even before the time was up. As for Astronomy, the only annoying part of the exam was that they had to stay up very late that night to do it when they had more exams tomorrow.

Wednesday was for History of Magic, where Harry used the information Marco had researched for his essays, and Herbology in the greenhouse, where they were subjected to the sun and the not-so-friendly magical plants. Not that Harry had any problem with said plants, because most magical flora seemed as scared of him as they had been his first day. By now, Professor Sprout was more than used to this occurrence, and she had learned to adapt her evaluation of Harry's knowledge to circumvent the plants' reactions to him.

Thursday was the last day of exams. Defence Against the Dark Arts in the morning and Divination after lunch.

Harry had been looking forward to the Defence exam; this was the first year they actually had it, both previous years the teachers hadn't even lasted long enough to evaluate the students, and Professor Lupin had told them it would be a practical one. As it turned out, it was an obstacle course where they had to face some of the creatures they had studied, and Harry found himself grinning through most of it. It felt like going on a small adventure.

When he had to face the last of the creatures, a boggart, Harry instinctively cast his weak patronus at the pretend dementor before remembering himself and using the riddikulus spell instead. The dementor tripped on its robe and fell face down.

When Harry approached, Lupin gave him a knowing grin for his little slip, but then announced he had full marks ("In this case, the first spell would have worked, too," he told Harry).

Harry grinned, gave Marco —up on one of the tree branches— a thumbs up when Lupin wasn't looking, and decided to wait for Ron and Hermione.

Ron advanced well until the hinkypunk, which managed to confuse him and made him sink into the swamp. Harry privately thought Luffy would have fallen for that, too, and chuckled. He sobered up before Ron could see him and patted him sympathetically on the back.

"That was good," he assured Ron. "You'll pass for sure, don't worry."

Ron grumbled something in response.

Ron's bad mood over his results all but vanished at the end of Hermione's exam.

Hermione did great throughout the course and reached the last point: the tree containing the boggart. She went in, and soon after came out screaming.

Harry and Ron lurched forward, as did Lupin, and Marco jumped down from the branch. Aware of how horrible an encounter with a boggart could be, Harry placed a comforting hand on Hermione's shoulder while Lupin asked her if she was alright and what had happened.

"P-P-Professor McGonagall!" she gasped, a trembling hand pointed at the trunk. "Sh-she said I'd failed everything!"

They were horrible friends. There was no other way to describe them when Harry and Ron burst out laughing. In his phoenix form, Marco couldn't laugh properly, but he was shaking and happy trills left his beak every now and then.

Professor Lupin gave them all a disapproving look and proceeded to calm the distraught Hermione.

When Hermione was finally calm, she, Harry and Ron headed back to the castle. Hermione gave them the cold shoulder and they tried to apologize, but it was difficult to sound sincere when they were still trying to repress snickers.

They sobered up quickly when they saw none other than Cornelius Fudge standing at the top of the entrance steps, staring out at the grounds. He seemed startled for a moment when he saw them, as if he had been lost in thought and hadn't noticed their approach. A snide corner of Harry's mind expressed surprise that Fudge had the necessary capabilities to become lost in his thoughts.

"Hello there, Harry!" he greeted him. "Just had an exam, I expect? Nearly finished?"

"Yes," Harry answered, shrugging. He was about to say they had to go when Fudge continued.

"Lovely day," he said, looking around. "Pity... pity..." He sighed, a little theatrically in Harry's opinion, and looked at him. "I'm here on an unpleasant mission, Harry. The Committee for the Disposal of Dangerous Creatures required a witness to the execution of a mad hippogriff. As I needed to visit Hogwarts to check on the Black situation, I was asked to step in."

"Does that mean the appeal's already happened?" Ron interrupted.

"No, no, it's scheduled for this afternoon."

"Then you might not have to witness an execution at all!" argued Ron, who had taken up Buckbeak's case after the trial with great zeal as compensation for having forgotten about it. "The hippogriff might get off!"

Right then, two men came out through the castle doors. One was very old, the kind of man that seemed would crumble to the ground any minute; the other was tall and looked strong, and Harry's trained eyes immediately zeroed on what he had strapped at his waist. An axe. And he was eagerly running a finger over its blade.

They had brought the execution weapon.

Harry set his jaw and clenched one fist.

So much for justice, he thought bitterly.

The old wizard squinted towards Hagrid's cabin before he spoke in a weak voice.

"Dear, dear, I'm getting too old for this... Two o'clock, isn't it, Fudge?"

Harry turned around and left, soon followed by Ron and Hermione. They were arguing over what they had seen, but Harry was too furious to take part in it. If he spoke, he didn't doubt it would turn into a tirade that would only serve to work him up even further, and if he grew any angrier he might just decide to turn around and go beat that executioner up.

With the reminder of the upcoming execution, any excitement they had felt over the end of the exams vanished, and lunch was a bleak and depressing affair preceding their final exam. For Hermione, that exam was Muggle Studies; for Harry and Ron, Divination.

Once Harry and Ron reached the seventh floor, Neville told them Trelawney would see them one by one. As people came down from their exam, they all refused to tell what it had been, claiming something bad would happen to them if they did.

"That's convenient," Ron muttered with a snort. "You know, I'm starting to think Hermione was right about her: she's an old fraud."

"You just figured that out?"

Ron turned to look at him.

"I thought, with the… you know," he gestured vaguely with his hands, "she had to be the real deal, but now…"

Harry scoffed.

"Yeah, well, she's proved she can't predict shit voluntarily. I should have known from Marco's reaction when he learned I was taking Divination."

"We could switch next year."

"Nah. Muggle Studies is ridiculous, and have you seen Hermione's other textbooks?"

Ron grimaced.

"I'd rather stick with making up grim predictions."

"Me too."

Ron's turn arrived, and Harry wished him luck. He was the first person Trelawney didn't manage to intimidate into silence, and told Harry the exam was to look into a crystal ball. Sighing, Harry thanked him and waited for his name to be called, hurriedly trying to come up with an appropriately unfortunate prediction that would satisfy Trelawney and give him a passing grade. Harry had been left the last one —naturally— and, because all previous exams had taken a relatively long time, he agreed to meet Ron, and probably Hermione, at the common room once he was done.

After an unnecessary long wait —it wasn't as if she was doing anything— Trelawney called his name and Harry went up the stairs to the Divination classroom.

Trelawney was waiting, sitting on one of the cushions before a large crystal ball.

"Good day, my dear," she greeted him in that soft voice that tried to sound mystical but failed at it. "If you would kindly gaze into the Orb... Take your time, now... then tell me what you see within it..."

Harry repressed an exasperated sigh, approached the ball and squinted down at it to see if he spotted anything barely resembling a shape to use as a base to fake his way through the exam. There was absolutely nothing in the fog inside the ball, as usual, and he decided he would have to make it all up from the start.

He mentioned he saw an animal shape, and immediately realized his mistake because Trelawney was obsessed with relating the Grim to him. Before she could do that, he hurriedly said it was a hippogriff —the first thing that came to him, as Buckbeak had been at the forefront of his mind since his encounter with Fudge— and from there it seemed, just for the tiniest moment, that he might even pass the exam. Then again, to have Trelawney's approval would have meant saying that Buckbeak was dead or going to die horribly, something Harry refused to do. He accepted the very high likelihood of failing the exam and stubbornly stuck to affirming that Buckbeak was alive and not about to die.

Trelawney gave up when she realized she wouldn't be able to nudge him into saying something different and concluded the exam. Harry couldn't wait to get out of the classroom.

Which meant something had to happen.

He was halfway to the trapdoor when Trelawney spoke behind him, in a harsh and loud voice he had never heard from her before.

"It will happen tonight."

He turned around, eyebrows raised up in scepticism against his will, and saw Trelawney was sitting completely still, her eyes unfocused —a different kind of unfocused than her usual affected mannerisms.

"What?" Harry asked, barely holding back the exasperation he felt from showing in his voice.

She didn't seem to hear him, instead her eyes rolled back and Harry, for a fleeting moment, hoped she wasn't about to pass out on him or something. She didn't, she just kept talking in the same voice from before, as if her eyes weren't in a position that made Harry's own eyes hurt in sympathy.

"The Dark Lord lies alone and friendless, abandoned by his followers. His servant has been chained these twelve years. Tonight, before midnight... the servant will break free and set out to rejoin his master. The Dark Lord will rise again with his servant's aid, greater and more terrible than ever he was. Tonight... before midnight... the servant... will set out... to rejoin... his master..."

Trelawney's head dropped forward, her eyes blinking repeatedly behind her ugly round glasses that resembled too much Harry's old ones.

You've got to be kidding me, Harry thought, his eyes wide. He would be extremely disconcerted right now if he didn't have the background information on her that he had, but, because he did, he was pretty sure he knew what he had witnessed. What is she, Voldemort's private seer?

"I'm so sorry, dear boy," Trelawney said in her usual voice, snapping Harry out of his inner cursing, "the heat of the day, you know... I drifted off for a moment..."

"Oh, yeah, okay," Harry half-stammered out, his mind too busy running over what he had just heard to pay her any attention. "If you're fine now, I'll be off."

He left the classroom thinking he had to tell Marco, Ron and Hermione about this, muttering all the way because, apparently, somewhere there was a Death Eater stupid enough to want to bring Voldemort back.

As he should have known, he didn't have a chance to mention what had happened with Trelawney, because as soon as he entered the common room he was informed that Buckbeak had lost the appeal.

The execution would be at sunset.

Hagrid had written to tell them, and asked that they didn't go.

Ron at first argued that they wouldn't be allowed to go with the security measures in place ("Much less you, Harry"), but they had the invisibility cloak for a reason.

There was no way they wouldn't go visit Hagrid.


"I can't believe you had this with you the whole year and didn't tell us," Harry muttered, pressing his ear to the closet Hermione had hidden them in while their past selves marched as silently as they could through the entrance hall and towards Hagrid's cabin. "We could've had so much fun…"

"This isn't for fun, Harry," she admonished him. "Professor McGonagall gave it to me so I could attend my classes, nothing else. It was bad enough that Marco made me use it to take extra naps, the last thing I needed—" she trailed off when she noticed the dark look that crossed Harry's face suddenly. "He's okay, I'm sure," she said, placing a hand on his shoulder and smiling, though she wasn't as sure of her own words as she would have liked.

Marco hadn't been at the hospital wing when they had woken up, nor had he arrived later with Professor Dumbledore, and now that the stress of trying to convince people who wouldn't listen of Sirius' innocence was over, she was acutely aware that Marco never left Harry alone in the hospital wing until he was assured that Harry was fine.

"Yeah, I know," Harry said, nodding. Just like Hermione, he didn't seem as convinced as he probably wanted to be. "He must've gone to try to locate Pettigrew or something."

"He could do that with haki?" Hermione asked, glad for the small change of topic.

"Yes. I think they're gone. What now?"

Hermione thought about it for a moment.

"I'm not sure. Dumbledore was really specific that we should come back three hours, so I guess he had something in mind. Maybe we should follow ourselves and see if something comes up?"

Harry smiled slightly, but suddenly he froze.

"Of course!"

"What?"

"Buckbeak! Dumbledore said we could save more than one life! And we know which one is the window to the office Sirius is in!"

Hermione grinned. Professor Dumbledore had really thought everything through before sending them back.

"Let's go, then," she said, but stopped before taking hold of the door handle. "Wait, just a moment. There's something you have to understand: you can't be seen."

"Why not?" Harry asked.

Hermione sighed.

"What do you think would happen if you saw your double and didn't know about the time turner?"

After she explained, they stepped out of the closet and crept through the deserted entrance hall, to the doors.

A year ago, Hermione might have been more worried about how to proceed from here, but with her life so full of strange and impossible things now —even using the standards of the wizarding world— she didn't argue when Harry suggested they ran straight for the Forbidden Forest. After all the training they had done this year, it wasn't even a straining effort for her.

To be continued


So, as you may have noticed, I'm going to work with both timelines at the same time. I didn't see the point of writing first one and then the other when we all know about the time turner.

Hope you leave me a review :)

And more on Christmas (or Christmas Eve, I haven't decided yet).