Harry had pretty much resigned himself to never being completely rid of the media – their ability of making his life difficult transcended space and time.

Fair enough, they'd called him a liar and the Undesirable No. 1, calling him the patron of orphans and Squibs wasn't the worst they could do. There was this one article insinuating he was unfit to be taking care of children – although Aaron's mum was a journalist for the Prophet, she wasn't the chief editor to censor the contents. The office atmosphere probably wasn't at its all-time high when the article undermining her son's project came out.

That hardly put a stain on the positive feedback they'd been getting, though. Their chat with Sarah in the library hadn't escaped the gossipers and the rag made a soul-stirring story out of it.

The war was gradually leaning to Grindelwald's side, and Harry realised most of the Wizarding Britain was desperate for any good news.

Just a bit longer, he thought, helplessly waiting for Dumbledore to interfere. He could see the toll each new attack took on him – the usually passionate professor had become broody, Harry believed he even caught a glimpse of him looking downright miserable once or twice.

He could understand Dumbledore's objectors, the voices asking why the strongest Light wizard, the Supreme Mugwump and the Chief Warlock wouldn't do anything, but he could understand Dumbledore's perspective, too..

If he imagined having to face Tom in a duel to death after what they've shared in this past year… Merlin, just the thought of it made his stomach churn. Every spell he'd send his way would have broken his heart all over again. Every incantation fallen from the his foe's lips would remind him how they used to smile at him.

He wondered if his torturous wait had been similar to Dumbledore's after he'd found out Harry had a horcrux attached to himself, and their positions had been reversed completely… In any case, he felt the urge to give the older wizard a hug every time he'd seen him those days.

That aside, though, Harry was very excited about this year's Christmas holiday. Sarah would be coming with them to give Custodarium a try, so Harry had been planning big – cook nice meals, decorate the common areas and the tree together, play games, build snowmen, go on trips, help her with homework… Everything he thought would make for a nice Christmas time. Tom would participate, of course, but he apparently had projects of his own.

"Can I borrow your Invisibility Cloak tomorrow?" Tom asked out of the blue one December night while they were on one of their progressively more rare rendezvous in the Room of Requirement – disappearing unnoticed for a prolonged period of time during the days became more difficult, and after having slept in their own bed at the end of the summer, nothing felt quite as right.

"Er, sure, what for?"

"Have you ever wondered how the Hogwarts professors know who to send the letter to?"

"…I just assumed it had something to do with the accidental magic?"

"Yes, that was my initial thought as well, but we know the Ministry has no way to detect magic on a countrywide scale. If that were the case, wouldn't you have been doomed the moment it had fallen? Flashes of magic in the middle of the woods would have surely caught their attention."

"That's… true."

"Even if you use a wand to do magic before you attend Hogwarts, it won't get reported, so the Trace isn't something every magical child or wand inherently has. I believe it's a charm or a set of charms, and that it's cast on the first-years at some point after they board the Hogwarts Express in September and before they get off it in December.

"But that's beside the point. Hogwarts has a way to know the names and addresses of all the magical children on the British isles, I want to find out what it is and how to replicate it."

Harry's eyes widened, "…To get to children like us in time. That's genius!"

"Not just that – we could use it to bring some order to the wizarding child protection in general and get the demographic data. You can refuse to attend Hogwarts, but how many children do that? For what reasons? Magic is rare and dangerous if not cultivated, to the individual and to the Statute of Secrecy – magical children should be checked up on regularly before they start Hogwarts and possibly given a choice to leave the Muggle world early if their circumstances are harmful."

"Yeah, that makes sense." Harry took a moment to process that. "Wait, why does that remind me of the 'take Muggle-borns away, Obliviate the parents' policy you talked about last year?"

Tom shrugged unapologetically and raised his hands in faux surrender. "You caught me. But you also just said it makes sense."

"No! I mean, it does, but… Argh, that's cheating! You bloody manipulator!"

"You mispronounced 'logic' and 'Slytherin'," Tom grinned and kissed the pout away. "I've done a lot of asking around and invested a lot of candied pineapple, but I finally managed to find out what the artefact looks like and where it's kept. Now, if only I had a safe way to sneak in and analyse it…"

Harry huffed and rubbed his eyes in frustration. "Oh, okay, fine! But I'm going with you."

xXx

There was a catch: the artefact was locked up in a small windowless tower that was only accessible from the Deputy Headmaster's office – in other words, Dumbledore's office.

Getting the password for the main door was a matter of waiting under the Cloak after classes, it was getting into the small tower that posed a challenge. For one, the entrance was hidden – it could simply be hidden behind a bookshelf, but for all Tom knew, it could just as well appear in the middle of the wall or ceiling.

He could come here later and try to find the opening mechanism himself by chance, but he was a true Slytherin, so…

Bang! Thud! A sudden loud noise coming from above. Dumbledore jolted from the his desk with a worried frown. The poor wizard was probably worried the war had finally caught up with Hogwarts, but Tom wasn't feeling too sorry about that; he still didn't like the man.

Harry had thankfully not realised this minor flaw in the plan when he agreed to it. They planned for Tom wait under the Cloak inside the office while Harry watched for Dumbledore from the outside. Once the professor entered, Harry would go to the broomshed, Disillusion himself and his broom – since he'd be outside and far enough from any possible witnesses, this usually imperfect camouflage would suffice. He'd fly to the small tower and Accio random things that are likely to be inside: a lamp, a bookshelf,… until he hears it crash against the wall and the pull of the spell snaps. Then he would swiftly retreat.

Tom could do it wordlessly from inside the office, but he'd risk accidentally Summoning the same type of item from this room instead and give himself away – he wasn't the type to risk anything unnecessarily when a safer alternative presented itself.

Dumbledore cautiously approached a wall. Tom followed him as closely as he dared under the Cloak, heart thumping in his ears from the adrenalin of it.

There were several beasts carved into the stone bricks around the office, the professor was now facing a dragon.

"Draco durmiens nunquam titilandus."

The dragon's eyes flashed with red light. Dumbledore reached up and… tickled the dragon, apparently not asleep anymore. It would have been quite comical in another setting, but the gravity of both Dumbledore's face and the situation gave no room for amusement.

Similar to the way the door to the Room of Requirement would appear, the outline gradually drew itself as a crack in the wall before some parts protruded and other caved in to form a door. Dumbledore went inside, but Tom didn't follow – he had what he needed and used the opening to slip out of the office unnoticed.

xXx

"Aniseed Twists," whispered a voice from no visible source. Fortunately, the only nearby portrait of The Athenian Philosopher was fast asleep and there was no one else to wonder at the peculiar occurrence.

Tom and Harry both crept into the office later that night, after Tom's prefect patrol. Walking around Hogwarts snuggled to each other to fit under the Cloak was nice, Harry decided, especially since they usually had to be careful not to act too intimate around each other.

"Draco durmiens nunquam titilandus."

Tom tickled the stone dragon, and a door revealed itself. Behind it was a narrow spiral staircase. Upon ascending, they found a small round chamber. Apart from the bare necessities, like the wall candle sconce Harry had successfully Acioed earlier, there was nothing but an open ancient-looking tome and a quill resting in a holder above it, both resting solemnly on a stone pedestal.

Harry stepped closer and ran a hand across the yellowed page. There was something written on it, so he shifted the Lumos to be able to read it. A list of dates, names and addresses, written in neat cursive. The last entry was from 8 December 1944.

"Curious," Tom said beside him in a low voice and began shuffling through the pages until he reached the 1926 entries. Sure enough, "31 December 1926 – Tom Marvolo Riddle, Wool's Orphanage Room No. 7, 46 Jeffrey's Road, Clapham, London" sat at the top of the page.

He browsed the list of their classmates a while longer, studying the addresses. Harry looked at him questioningly.

"It wasn't room no. 7 when this entry was made, and I know for a fact that Dalamar hadn't moved to London until 1935," he explained, "Either the book self-updates, or this is the most accurate piece of Divination I've ever heard of."

He cast a diagnostic charm on the quill while Harry stared at the book pensively. "Wouldn't it say Staffa if it self-updated? You don't live in the orphanage anymore…"

"It could only be active up to a point, like when you read the acceptance letter," Tom frowned, "I know it's a stretch, but it's still more plausible than predicting the exact address years ahead. Actually, it would be quite controversial if you could just come up here and know the whereabouts of any adult wizard."

He reached up to hold the grey quill carefully in his fingers, taking a closer look, "Even more curious. This is an Augurey feather – it's supposed to repel ink."

True to those words, there was no inkpot to be seen on the pedestal. Harry thought hard to recall what he'd learnt in Care of Magical Creatures. "Augureys predict rain, right? Couldn't they predict other stuff, too?"

"Indeed, one wouldn't bother using an Augurey feather if they didn't need it for its magical properties… But such precision, there's no way…"

Tom cast a few diagnostic charms on the quill while Harry busied himself with going through the names and addresses. Were the people who declined the invitation to Hogwarts also there?

"It's not Divination," Tom said finally, eyes aflame with realisation. He turned to Harry.

"Harry, what do Augureys hunt?"

"Er, insects, I think, and they hunt for fairies in the rain…"

"Fairies!" Tom exclaimed triumphantly, "Why would they choose to hunt in the rain, when the visibility and the flight conditions are worse than usual?"

Harry knew this look, the one when Tom was trying to lead him to the answer through questions. It would be a great trait in a teacher, but a mildly annoying one in a boyfriend. This is what it must have been like for Ron to date Hermione – he could thoroughly sympathise. He tried to keep the exasperation out of his voice as he sighed, "Oh, just tell me."

If that had rained on Tom's parade, he didn't show it. On the contrary, he eagerly acceded.

"Because a storm is the darkest a day could get! Fairies are only out during the day, but Augureys hate good weather while they hunt, because the sunlight drowns all the other lights they can see and hunt for… the magical auras."

Now Harry's eyes were wide, too. "Wow, that's…"

"Quite a revelation, yes. The quill is heavily covered in amplifying and channeling enchantments which I can't decipher on the spot, but I believe they're meant to increase the radius of this particular magical property and focus it on the human magical auras… Although that doesn't explain how an Augurey feather writes without ink or how it knows the current addresses…" he thought aloud.

Harry glanced at the book. "Well, we already know maps can be charmed to record names and positions of people on their own…"

Tom raised a uncomprehending eyebrow, "We do?"

"Oh right!" Harry hit his forehead, chuckling at the confused look he got. He pulled the Marauder's Map out of the Cloak's pocket. Smiling smugly, he touched it with the tip of his wand. "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."

Ink blossomed across the parchment in all its black glory. Tom watched it with an amazed look on his face.

"What the… So this is how…" he breathed out, then he seemed to remember himself and huffed crossly, "For fuck's sake, Harry. Any other invaluable magical artefacts you just casually carry around that you'd like to share with the class?"

"It's just a spare piece of parchment," Harry winked and watched with glee as Tom connected the dots. "Besides, it couldn't be that rare – my dad and his friends made it in their fifth year."

Tom gave him a look and waved his wand at the Map, casting a set of diagnostic charms, then repeated the process with the ancient tome.

"Yes, the enchantments have some common attributes, though of course the ones on the book are far more complex and only follow the auras transferred from the Augurey quill. The area is massive in comparison, but the function isn't as demanding, and as expected, there's a timed cap to each entry…" he muttered more to himself than to Harry and cast some more charms, shimmering lines of various various colours springing out of the book and filling the air.

Harry ran a hand down Tom's back in a casual (yet rare) gesture of affection, smiling over his shoulder. "So, what do you think? Will you be able to replicate it?"

When Tom turned to face him again, there was a complacent smirk on his face. "I hope you're up for a wild Augurey chase, because we're going to ruffle some feathers over the Christmas."

Bloody hell, Harry should have known that someone who came up with "I am Lord Voldemort" and "Knights of Walpurgis" would be a pathological punner.