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So far... While at Grimmauld Place, Harry used his Occlumency training against Dumbledore which persuaded the headmaster that Harry is ready, and has earned the right, to be informed about the Horcruxes. All six young friends moved to Harby Port where Harry is planning a news sheet to counteract the deceit of The Daily Prophet. Now read on...
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Chapter 38
Chary Potter and the Order of the Phoenix Part 4
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~~~ Dream Home ~~~
Harry was up before sunrise the next morning, listing what else he needed to buy and reorganising the front room to make space for it all. Neville, asleep on the sofa in the next room, had been woken by the low rumble of furniture being dragged around despite Harry's trying to do it as quietly as possible.
"Harry?" he said bleary-eyed from the front room doorway.
"Sorry, Neville." Harry ticked off something in his notebook. "I'm done here for now. He started blowing out candles, but streetlights remained lit outside the window. How was the settee?"
"S'alright. Harry, what exactly are you planning?"
"Muggle stuff. You'll see. Another few days and we'll be ready."
They heard footsteps coming downstairs and Hermione glanced in the doorway as she shuffled by in her dressing gown and fluffy slippers. "Oh, the printer's going in there is it?" She yawned and proceeded down the hall.
Dawn was little more than a skyline glow so the kitchen was still dark. Hermione flipped on the overhead fluorescent, winced, then clicked it off and lit a candle instead.
"Don't know how Muggles stand those bright lights," said Neville as he and Harry joined her in a first cup of morning tea.
"Anyone for toast?" Harry took a loaf out of the bin and began cutting thick slices.
"My stomach's not awake yet," said Hermione, sleepily. "How long have you been up?"
"Not that long," said Harry. "Forty minutes, I guess." He stuffed some slices under the grill then dug the butter out of the fridge. "Ginny not awake yet?"
"No, she..." Hermione hesitated. "Oh, sounds like Ron coming down, anyway. Trust him to smell bread toasting a mile away!"
"Me and Ginny are going shopping again later. You can come if you want."
"Mornin'," Ron said gruffly as he entered. "Three please."
Harry sighed and shovelled the toast he had just finished onto a hot plate then dumped it in front of Ron at the table before cutting some more bread for himself.
Ron drew his wand. "Where's the rest of the candles?"
"There's a box somewhere if you can find it. You'll have to get used to Muggle lights, Ron," said Hermione.
"Shall I?" said Neville. He got up and went to the light switch by the door.
"Yes, go on. I suppose I'll survive," said Hermione, shielding her eyes with a hand.
They all blinked for a while in the glare. Ron buttered his toast and reached for the marmalade. Neville looked longingly at the slices that Harry was turning over under the grill. The freshly-toasted-bread smell was making him hungry.
"Yes, I might go to the shops with you, Harry," said Hermione, "get to know the area. Has Harby got a good market—?"
"Merlin! What happened to you, Hermione?" Ron painfully swallowed his morsel of toast.
"Oh, nothing. Just bumped my head."
"What? What's wrong?" said Harry turning around with fresh toast on a plate. While he was focused on Hermione, Neville took his toast and put more bread under the grill for Harry.
"Turn to the light, Hermione," said Ron. "Yeah, see? Side of your face under your eye is a bit bruised."
Harry frowned; he had suffered enough black eyes from his cousin Dudley to know what one looked like. His fingers bunched into a fist and he glared at Ron. "If I thought you..."
"Don't be foolish, Harry," said Hermione. She sighed then got up and went to the open doorway and looked out before closing the door and returning to the table. She took some time to do it and Harry had the impression she was delaying her answer. "It was Luna if you must know."
"WHAT!" exploded Ron and Neville together.
"Calm down, Ron. She was dreaming is all it was and her fist hit me."
Harry and Ron looked at one another. Neville had stopped munching Harry's toast and was staring at Hermione with his mouth open, waiting for an explanation.
"Look, it's not uncommon. Normally the body closes down while you're asleep but sometimes it gets out of its rhythm."
"But what was she dreaming about, Hermione?" said Ron.
"Your toast is burning, Harry," said Hermione.
Harry swerved around, grabbed at the grill tray and pulled it out with a groan.
"Open the window, Neville, would you?" said Hermione. "Let the smoke out."
"Back door as well for a few minutes," coughed Ron.
Neville peered out briefly into the gathering dawn. The light spilling out from the door barely reached the side wall, a few paces away. He turned his head. Scribbles could be faintly seen coiled up in the shadows at the far end of the garden. Neville shivered in the cool air and started to draw back inside. Harry squeezed past him, and, with the butter knife, scraped some of the blackened surface off his toast into the backyard, then took it back in to the table to butter it.
"You're not going to eat that, are you?" said Ron.
"Sure, why not?" said Harry. "What about you, Hermione? Hungry yet? Can't we tempt you with some delicacy?" He grinned and waved his unevenly-scraped, black-scorched toast in her face.
"I'll do a poached egg in a bit. Is there still any fresh bread left? Enough for a slice or two?"
"Yeah."
The three boys munched their toast quietly for a while.
When Ron had finished a slice, he reached for another and drew a deep breath to speak. Hermione frowned, rose slowly to her feet, and went to get an egg from the fridge.
"What was she dreaming about, Hermione?" he said.
"Don't know. Nothing important, I don't suppose."
"Important enough for you to close the hallway door?" Ron's eyes narrowed.
"Erm... her Occamy. I think she was worried if it was settling in." Hermione glanced at Neville. "You know all about it, don't you, Neville? I mean, it's used to you isn't it?"
"Yes, Scribbles is fine. Just seen her at the far end."
"Would you go and see if she's alright?" said Hermione. "For Luna? She's probably worried about nothing but, you know..."
"Well... yes, of course."
Neville wrapped his arms around his shoulders in an effort to keep warm and went out the still-open backdoor.
"Listen," said Hermione in a low whisper to the other two, "don't you dare tell Neville, but we think — Ginny and I — we think that Luna's..."
"What?" said Ron.
"We think she's sweet on Harry."
It was Harry's turn to almost choke on his burnt toast.
"Well," explained Hermione, "we were wondering if deep down she felt guilty she didn't do more to protect you in Parry's."
"What!" said Harry. "How could she have?"
"I know but... well... she muttered your name in her sleep and was moaning, sort of... 'no! no!' and her arms were flailing about like she was fighting off your enemies. She's devoted to you, you know."
She fell silent as Neville came back in.
"Scribbles is asleep. She's fine; you can tell from the colour of her crest."
"Good. Good," said Hermione, rising to poach her egg. She glared back at Harry and Ron as if to signal them with her eyes to keep their mouths shut.
Harry went to help her. "What about Ginny?" he mouthed.
Hermione nodded and whispered back. "Okay. She understands."
Harry snorted air out of his nose, unsure what to make of it all.
Your toast is cold, Harry," said Ron. "Shut the backdoor would you, Nev?"
Harry sighed and went back to the grill but Hermione was buttering the last of the bread. He stuffed his cold burnt toast in the microwave and waited a few seconds for it to heat up again.
"You're not really going to eat that now, are you, Harry?" said Ron.
"Sure, why not? This is luxury where I come from."
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~~~ Night Flight ~~~
It was two midnights later before Harry was prepared.
"Itsss a pleasssant evening, Missster Potter," hissed Scribbles as she revealed herself to the startled young man.
"Hello... erm... Scribbles. How are you?" he said hesitantly, with a sideways glance at Luna who was attaching large, bulging saddlebags to the creature.
"Asss welll asss can be exssspected," she hissed.
Although it was a mild night, Luna was wearing a chunky long-sleeved sweater with thick navy jeans and heavy-duty yellow socks. Harry began to have reservations about his thin tee shirt as he contemplated the journey ahead. Luna swung her leg over the position where Harry would have expected shoulders to be on a horse and she held on to a thick leather collar that was attached to the creature. With some apprehension Harry climbed on behind her.
"Where do I..."
"My waist, Harry and huddle up or you'll be cold," said Luna.
He glanced nervously up at the dark windows of the house to see if either Neville or Ginny were still awake, then complied.
"No, that's not huddling is it Harry?" whispered Luna, softly. "That's fingertips at ten paces. I promise I won't break. Hug me tight or you'll fall off! Put your arms right round my tummy nice and firm and lean on me to keep my back cosy. If you snuggle your head into my hair it will help keep your face warm during the journey."
"Erm... right..."
Apart from a faint rustle of leaves, silence then descended upon them; Harby Port did not have a vigorous night life. Even Hedwig and Squeegee remained quiet where they roosted together in the big tree.
"Harry?"
"Mmm...?"
"Where to, Harry?" said Luna.
"Oh, yeah, uuh... The roof of the Daily Prophet main office in Diagon Alley, London."
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~~~ The Cat Burglars ~~~
"You're sure this is it?" whispered Harry. He tested the strength of the loft floor with his shoe.
"Oh yes, you can tell from the windows outside," said Luna cheerfully.
"Ssh..." Harry put a finger to his lips but it was not visible in the darkness.
"Harry, all the windows are dark except for the night editor's office at the far end. All the printing is done in another building."
"Ah, right." He looked at his watch.
Luna's smile was also invisible but he could hear it in her tone. "We have plenty of time — nearly two hours until the six o'clock shift comes in."
She lit her wand and held it down next to a stout oak beam that protruded up the full length of the attic floor. It illuminated her face spookily from below. "It's exciting, isn't it, Harry?"
"Erm... yeah," he said nervously.
"Do you know how to bewitch this?" she said, studying the folding ladder stacked above the trapdoor. "It looks very complicated."
"Doesn't need magic, Luna. Here, let me..."
He eased open the trapdoor and a slight rush of ink and leather smells wafted up to them. As quietly as he could, he lowered the steps. "I'll go first."
Luna had doused her wandlight as she followed him down and Harry stared around by the faint light from the window. "The room's bigger than I thought. Point me, Luna."
"That's probably the desk, the large fancy one."
Harry was startled when she lit her wand again but it was a mere glimmer, and she cupped it with her other hand as she held it over one of the neatly-arranged desk trays. The same light picked out the gold lettering on a name plaque in the middle of the desktop:
BARNABAS CUFFE, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
"All the copy goes in here," said Luna, pointing to the out tray on the left. "Everything must end up in this. But sometimes it must become covered by new pages pretty quickly so you won't be able to see them all in time."
"Leave that to me," grinned Harry. He leaned over the out-tray and looked upwards, sighting along the great beam.
"Hover me up, Luna."
He took a tiny black metal cylinder from his pocket as he rose.
"What is that, Harry?"
"Security camera."
"You're going to hide and take photographs?"
"Not quite.."
He vanished a narrow hole through the beam, poked the camera's cable up to the loft above, then inserted the tiny camera deep into the space. He finished it off with a matt cover that left a discreet hole for the lens. After he descended and lit his wand light for a few seconds, it looked like any other knothole in the oak. When he turned out his light, the hole was lost in darkest shadow.
"Put something in the tray, Luna."
"Oh, what shall I put? There's a really nice paperweight here but its ticklish. Shall I tell it to lie still?"
Harry sighed. "No, with writing."
Luna giggled up at him hovering above. "Don't be silly, Harry; paperweights can't read. By the way, there's a hole nearly worn in the sole of your right shoe."
Harry grimaced and pointed. "What are those over there?"
"Oh, yes, lovely! It's got a picture too!"
Harry went back up to the loft, plugged the camera into a laptop, waited for a few moments then stared at the little screen. His own face stared back at him.
WANTED FOR TREACHEROUS
AND BLOODY MURDER!
2000 GALLEONS REWARD!
Harry blinked for a few moments then adjusted the focus to look at the fine print:
Rewards not applicable overseas. In cases of dispute, the Ministry reserve the right to deduct all costs and their word shall be final. They shall not be held responsible for any unreasonable claims of any kind or in case of doubt their judgement shall decide. They reserve the right to change these terms without further notice.
"That's perfect, Luna!"
He twiddled around with the remote pan-and-tilt to see how much he could adjust if the tray got moved about, then, satisfied, he unplugged the laptop and connected the camera to the satellite dish apparatus he had assembled earlier. By the time he had finished and tested it once more, Luna was with him and hoisting up the steps. "It's very clever what can be done without any magic at all," she mused.
"Did you put back the wanted poster?"
She smiled at him and nodded.
"And the paperweight?"
"Yes, Harry. It's just how it was when we came."
"Good, we'll make a cat-burglar out of you yet, Luna. Always remember," he said solemnly, "no matter how hungry you are, never open a new packet of biscuits and never take more than three from an open packet and it must be more than half-full. Nobody notices you then; you're like a little mouse."
"I'll remember that."
"You can see from the dust that nobody ever comes up here. Still..." He cast a concealing charm over the trapdoor then, after another few moments thought, hid the satellite dish too, then they slipped away up to the roof to find Scribbles waiting patiently for them. Now the deed was done and the pressure was off, the flight over the rooftops might seem more enchanting...
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~~~ Magical Distribution ~~~
A blue-grey pigeon glided down towards the burnt toast scrapings in the backyard of 148 Overpool Road. It approached cautiously, head bobbing, the beady eyes bright and vigilant. Much further down the garden, a large patch of tall horseweed suddenly swayed in a silent, vigorous downdraft.
"What the Merlin's stinkiest armpit is that?" cried Ron, pointing out the kitchen window with his fork. He observed a bleary-eyed Harry and Luna dismounting stiffly from a strange, snake-like beast.
Neville glanced out. "Oh, you can see her now? That's just Scribbles. Occamies are half bird, half serpent — but don't tell Scribbles that. Remember we spoke about her yesterday? She's revealed herself to you at last. That means she's comfortable with you."
"Yeah, but..."
As Harry and Luna moved through the coarse, scrubby weeds to find the rough path to the backdoor, the creature half-opened its wings and rocketed forward like a sinuous jet fighter straight past them. In one smooth movement it lifted, snapped its jaws, and took the pigeon from the air as it attempted to flap away. A single feather drifting away in the morning air was all that remained to mark the end of the drama.
"Remind me not to take a pee out there," murmured Ron to himself.
Ginny came thundering down the wooden stairs like two Graphorns late for a stampede and raced into the kitchen. The back door squeaked open on rusty hinges and she greeted Harry with an eager kiss. "Everything go alright?"
"Yeah, pretty much." He saw Hermione appear in the parlour doorway.
"Did the picture come through?" he asked her.
"Yes. Not much to see so far except an elbow." She watched as he and Luna sank cautiously down onto the hard chairs before the table and poured themselves tea. "Harry, you still don't realise how impossible it will be for us few to distribute the news, let alone collect payments."
"Payments? It'll be a freebie, Hermione."
He took a big swig of tea as he swerved around in his seat. "Neville, did you find out anything?"
"Yes, but—"
"Er... why are you wearing Ginny's frilly apron?" It was too early in the day for Harry to smirk and he'd been up most of the night.
Neville's cheeks flushed a little. He took off the garment and hung it up on a peg then took out his wand. "Oh yeah, washing up duty."
He carried out a complicated flourish and incantation and a greenish vapour swirled out from his wand tip and sank forlornly to the floor. "Sorry... hang on..." He braced himself to try again; this time the green mist formed what was clearly an owl shape. It fluttered silently to the top of the kitchen cabinet.
"I'm getting better at it but that's not the problem; we're going to need thousands." He looked across at Ron who was taking his plate to the sink to be washed.
"Yeah, Dad's making copies for us of all the British addresses, Squibs and all, as well as quite a few overseas." Ron turned on the tap briefly then left his plate in the basin.
Harry pursed his lips. "Let's have a practise run." He looked around but Luna anticipated him and ripped three sheets from the shopping list notebook.
"Luna, write down this address on each one," said Harry. "Can you do two more owls, Nev?"
The conjuring took him even longer this time but Neville eventually had three owls pooping on top of the cabinet.
"I can't do it, Harry," said Luna after a couple of attempts. "The Fidelius makes my hand shake and the ink smears."
"Ah... right. I'll have to do it then." Harry scribbled down the address at Overpool Road three times. In the background, he could hear Ron and Luna laughing together as they tried to write the address themselves. It came out all shaky and garbled.
They attached the three sheets to the owls and told them to go there. Within the same minute, all three had swooped back around the house, descended into the backyard and flew in through the glass of the closed window.
"It works, but imagine us tying thousands and thousands of owls every day?" said Neville.
"It won't be every day, Neville," said Harry. "We don't know how often yet."
"Even so..."
"Show me that spell again, Neville," said Hermione. She watched his flourishes carefully. "It's a variation of the general phantom spell, isn't it?" Neville nodded. Hermione looked thoughtful. "So, it's in the group of intention magic."
"The what?" said Ron.
Hermione sighed. "Ron, we did this in Charms, months ago. They're the ones where there's no visible target to aim at with the wand nor any special incantation to name a target — most of the conjuring spells are in that group but you don't spell out every detail in the incantation do you because there are trillions of possibilities. Spells like Obliviate are in that group too — your intention defines exactly which memories to hide. There are fourteen subgroups plus—"
"Yes, yes, so...?" said Ginny, impatiently.
"So this phantom spell takes its form from the caster's intentions — a bit like the Room of Requirement does. Look, let me try..."
She held up her wand and thought for a moment. "I visualise my intention then make the general incantation and wand movement..."
A smoky-green owl burst forth and settled on the floor in a corner of the kitchen, blinking while it worked out its surroundings before flying up to join the existing three on the cabinet. Hermione lifted her nose and a little superior smile touched her lips which she quickly tried to hide with a guilty look at Ron. He grinned at Harry.
"Is this going somewhere, Hermione?" asked Harry, impatiently.
"Definitely!" said Hermione, smirking broadly now despite herself. "Watch..."
The owl spread its wings again and flew out through the wall.
"Now where's it gone?" said Ginny.
"Just wait..." said Hermione as she looked towards the window, slightly apprehensively. After two or three minutes waiting, she scowled.
"Where has it got to...?"
"What were you trying to do?" said Harry.
"I simply visualised an owl with this address already attached," said Hermione, "It should have worked..."
She got up and headed for the front room and the others followed. Harry grabbed more toast to take with him and rested the slices on top of his steaming teacup. By the time he had arrived, Hermione was already at the keyboard of the desktop PC they had set up; soon she was tapping away.
"This is to be the address list." A form appeared on the screen. "Until we have proper addresses I'll just type our own address in three times..." She click-clacked away more firmly at the keyboard; a frown appeared and grew as she did so. "Oh, of course, the Fidelius charm won't let me. That's why my first owl couldn't find its way back. Harry, would you? I'll delete them after."
Harry took her place and typed in the Overpool Road address in the first three places.
"But where do all the cards go?" said Neville, peering at the computer case. How will you get thousands in there?"
"Erm... They kind of get... shrunk really tiny, Neville," said Hermione.
"Magic, you mean? But how will people read them? I thought—"
"No, it's not magic, it's erm... electronics. Look don't worry about it, okay? This machine can hold zillions of addresses."
She took out her wand again. "Right..." She stood thinking a little longer and more carefully this time before flourishing her wand.
Three owls exploded from her wand tip causing her to squeal and fall back onto Harry's lap but she was up in a moment, looking towards the front room window as the owls sped out through the glass onto the street, took a turn around the rooftops, then swooped back in again.
"How, Hermione? How?" frowned Harry.
"Simple. I visualised three owls that would each take the next address on the list and depart. If I can visualise it, then so be it. I can just as easily imagine thousands of owls — or rather, a sufficiency of owls" — a smug, happy smile shaped her lips — "each with our news sheet attached. Once we put the real addresses in that Ron's dad's getting us then it will be fine."
"Wow! That is brilliant, Hermione!" said Harry, "though... does that mean we didn't even need..." He looked at the broadsheet printing press that dominated the room.
"Oh, we'll still need the press!" said Hermione. "We need to review what a printout will really look and feel like — the monitor is not enough, especially for something this big — and also, we simply cannot conjure a copy out of nothing. I mean, we know what an owl is like, but each edition of our news sheet will need a physical master copy we can examine before we can visualise it. Anyway, we want printed copies for ourselves, don't we."
"It's not tiny print at all," said Ron after he had retrieved and unfolded one of the phantom sheets — but it's green and erm... translucent, and feels rather flimsy."
Hermione rolled her eyes. "But that's corrected with the standard colour and visual substantiveness wand flicks isn't it?" Only Luna did not stare vacantly back at her — but she was playing with one of the phantoms that was roosting inside the open stationery cupboard.
"Look," said Hermione, "Neville and I only did it green for quickness, right, Neville?"
"Erm... yeah... for quickness."
"After all," she laughed, "everyone knows green is the shortest, simplest flick." She turned thoughtful for a moment and began musing to herself as she stared at her wand. "I don't think we should make the owls absolutely solid-looking though. I mean, people will think we're trying to deceive them. And some of the news sheets won't last more than a few days so if they see they're phantom they can read them within a few hours or make a copy or whatever."
Hermione paused. "How about a sky-blue translucent owl and a nice solid cream newspaper with a phantom caution footnote? That's fair. Of course, it would take quite a good wand movement but it will be easy with practice and at the most it will only be once a day — probably much less."
She looked up at their staring faces.
Harry was the first to recover. "Sounds... simple enough. Cream it is then. Okay, Luna? You're the editor."
"Absolutely lovely," she said, stroking the owl's feathers, "and so cute."
"But Harry, I still don't see where we'll get our material from," said Hermione. "It's all well and good getting advanced information about the Daily Prophet's lies, but how do we turn that into facts?"
"We only work on stories where we know or suspect the truth has been twisted around, people we know, especially." He frowned thoughtfully for a few seconds.
"Look, suppose the Prophet has an article saying er... Mr Ollivander was having an affair with... Rita Skeeter" — everyone laughed — "and erm... they quarrelled and he's buried her beneath Stonehenge, right? You refute that. You challenge the claim. Tell the readers that no proof has been offered and everyone knows Mr Ollivander is a man of a good character and it's evil to besmirch his good name with this fabricated story just to make a profit. If there's time you might ask him for his side of the story. Luna's dad has his finger on the pulse of the news; perhaps he might have some information too. Together, we challenge the nonsense openly; show it for the unverified nonsense that it is. Humiliate them like they humiliate others!"
"I'd want to know about the original source of Mr Lovegood's input," said Hermione, firmly.
"Yes, good. We need as much feedback from everyone as we can get."
Luna's eyes lit up. She abandoned her owl as it started to fade away and came over to join them. "We could ask the readers themselves!"
"What?" said Harry, furrowing his brows.
"We can ask the readers to tell us if outrageous lies have been spread about them and they want to say what really happened."
"Give them a voice! That's brilliant, Luna!" said Hermione. Then her face clouded. "Except they can't reach us. Harry can hardly publish our address, can he? That would be the most stupid waste of a Fidelius charm in history."
With a start, she remembered and deleted the Overpool address that Harry had typed into the computer. She sought out the phantom ones in the kitchen too and vanished them, then nodded to herself in satisfaction. The others followed her, watching and listening carefully.
"So, it' a nice idea, Luna, but I don't see how it can work," she said finally.
Everyone became quiet then, wondering if there was any way that readers might give them information without actually knowing where they resided.
Neville spoke up. "Gringotts, they do a comments thing."
Everyone looked at him, so he continued. "When you pay money into someone else's account then the form you fill in can have comments which Gringotts forward to you privately or you can collect. We could easily set up a new account for The Corrector."
"The what?" said Harry.
"The Corrector," affirmed Luna. "That's what we're calling our newspaper."
"Mmm... not bad." Harry murmured the name to himself a few times.
"But it's supposed to be free, Neville," said Ginny.
"You can pay zero Galleons into a Gringotts account; goblins treat zero as something, you know, or all their goblin arithmetic goes wrong. I've had loads paid into my account with comments."
"What did they say, though?" grinned Ron. "I don't owe you anything and here it is?"
Neville looked rather sheepish. "No, insults and so on. I mean, everybody gets abusive, snide remarks, don't they?"
Everybody looked at one another. Ron burst out laughing.
"I thought everybody got them," mumbled Neville, turning away to put on his apron and charm the remains of the breakfast dishes to scrub themselves. Luna joined him with a drying spell that ruffled his hair affectionately.
"So... first issue, what do we include?" said Harry.
"I think we should keep it simple in case anything goes wrong. Make it an introductory piece," said Hermione. "What our aims are and so forth."
"We have to at least warn them that You-know-who is back," said Ron.
"Absolutely." Harry nodded his head.
"And tell them that we're not standing for the Daily Prophet lying about people anymore.
"And invite readers to send in their own version of events," reminded Luna. "Poor Rita can't though, can she? It's very sad."
Harry sighed.
.
—oOo—
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Author's Notes
I nearly cursed my own foot with that full-size printing press not really being needed. Probably a big laser printer would have done. Still, I think I worked around it well enough. As for the editor's out-tray — I made that up. Actually, I made up this whole story.
I wish to credit J K Rowling with a few of the lines which are brief, fair use, direct or modified quotes from Order of the Phoenix (because I felt they were irreplaceable and the situation unavoidable) to preserve canon as closely as possible unless changed as a consequence of Chary's character.
Many thanks for all comments and reviews. These are most welcome and very encouraging. :)
- Hippothestrowl
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