At the wand shop, because Pavi had waited up for us, Peter and I began divulging the information we'd obtained. It was not horrible, given that the area had been lit only by a small bonfire. Still, I wished I had learned French at some point so I could have brought back more than descriptions of odd-shaped moles on people's foreheads and bad haircuts. You know, maybe listened in on a larger bit of the conversation. Peter had managed to catch what sounded like a name from one of the masked wizards: Blanchard.

I stiffened when he said the very English-sounding name. I knew Blanchard. He was one of the wizards who killed Octavius.

"Good," Pavi mumbled, blotting the notes he'd taken from our descriptions. "That's great. I'll get this to Aloys. You better get home," he added, looking up at me with those dark eyes. "That man's coming to pick up his wand tomorrow."

"Oh yeah," I said pathetically. That wand that I hadn't fixed yet. Guess I was going to be getting in to work early.

Peter and I split ways. I got home to Fluffy and Lily waiting up for me. Fluffy held out her leg for me, hopping in her excitement so that I had to pin her down to get the letter from her.

"She wouldn't let me take the letter off," Lily grinned at me, "sorry."

"It's from Remus," I said with a smile, passing half an owl treat to my feathery dork. "What are you doing up so late?"

Lily gave me a look.

"What did we do every full moon after you learned Remus's secret?" Lily asked in a pointed voice.

"We...waited up for them," I answered in a small voice.

"I'm hardly going to do less for you," Lily said primly.

I hugged her in a brief spat of gratitude. She hugged me back, and then leaned away to pull a pine needle from my hair.

Breaking into giggles, we both sat at the table. Slowly, the nerves that always wound up like springs when I had a mission began to unwind, leaving me relaxed and sleepy.

"I have good news," Lily told me. "My scores came in today."

"All perfect scores?" I teased.

"Almost," Lily said. Her grin was getting wider and wider. "I sent the scores out to everywhere I applied. I heard back from three of them."

"And?" I asked, trying to keep my own grin from splitting my face in two.

"I got accepted as an auror!" Lily squealed, grabbing my hands from across the table and squeezing them tightly.

I squealed with her, delighting in her happiness even as I wished she had taken the research position instead. Who was I to judge, though? As Remus had pointed out, I put my neck on the line somewhat frequently. I could hardly hold my friends back from doing the same.

As much as I wanted to stay up and celebrate with Lily all night, I took my letter and went to bed as soon as I could. I had to be up early to fix that damn wand, after all. In bed, I unrolled the letter so I could hear my boyfriend's voice in my head at least before going to sleep.

Genre,

Dumbledore found an 'in'. I'm leaving tonight. I wanted to say goodbye but when I stopped by the wand shop, Pavi said you'd already left. I don't know when we'll see each other again, or even talk to each other. I am so sorry. I wanted more than anything to see you one last time before I left…

I hope you're not too angry. I'll be thinking of you every second of every day. I'll be missing you even more frequently than that.

I love you, Genre, and I'm going to come back to you. This won't be like you've worried about. I hope you believe me. I just wish I could have kissed you and held you one last time before leaving, so I could tell you that in person.

Stay safe. For me.

Love,

Remus

Wishing desperately that I had waited for morning to read the letter, I cried myself to sleep. Peter and I must have just missed Remus, and Pavi hadn't even mentioned it when we were in the shop. No wonder he'd wanted me to go home, though. He knew the letter was waiting for me.

I moved through the next day in a daze, fixing the wand early as I'd planned, and then diving so deep into the part of me that created wands that Pavi couldn't even pull me out for lunch. The wand in my hands when I finally came to in time for Pavi to start locking up the front of the house was wild and scary. Obviously my subconscious had pulled on half-formed memories of totems my parents had taken Cadie, Stan and I to see in the Americas well over a decade ago. There were impressions of...not faces, but spirits maybe, in the wood. The core was something I'd never tried before - a mix of core ingredients that normally wouldn't mesh. Kelpie tail twined with unicorn tail, tying together a thin bundle of sphinx mane.

"That's...unusual," Pavi murmured, taking the wand gently from me. The tip of the wand flared in answer, growing stronger without pulse before fading to nothing. It was not entirely normal for wands to react before they'd had time to cure, but given the properties of the wand, I wasn't entirely surprised.

"It likes you," I told him wearily, letting my head slump to my hand.

"You okay?" he asked me, putting the wand gingerly in a nearby box.

"I don't know," I told him honestly.

His big hand landed on my shoulder, patting it awkwardly.

"I'm sorry," he told me after a minute. "I didn't want to say something in front of the creep last night. Didn't seem fair."

"It's okay," I told him, not even bothering to defend Peter.

"Let me know if you need anything." He walked up the stairs, leaving me amid splinters of wood and loose hairs with wild-grown mint.

Lily must have heard the news from James, because I got a similar reaction from her at the flat. I tried to smile, telling her we should celebrate her new job (with James, who had appeared from her bedroom), but then my smile collapsed into more tears and sobs. None of it was made any easier by James's presence. In the end, we stayed in and celebrated and mourned together.

There was an attack that night in the village just north of our flat. A silvery owl patronus announced it to us from one of the members of the Order, and then disappeared. James and Lily would have gone to join the fight, but they were under strict orders not to go running towards trouble until they were fully trained aurors, and their training didn't start until the next week. For once, James listened to orders - maybe because he was afraid of screwing up his big chance at the future he wanted. I was under no such orders, though, and a spot of trouble seemed just the thing to keep me sane.

When I returned to the flat, it was to find a very disapproving Pavi waiting with an equally disapproving Lily and James. Still, I didn't apologize. I did listen to their lecture with a stony face, including Pavi's rant about how I shouldn't make my friends worry so much that they woke my employee up and dragged him out of bed, and wasn't I supposed to be the responsible one, not him?

"I don't know what you want me to say," I finally interrupted their lecture-in-triplicate with a shrug.

"That you won't do it again!" Lily exploded. "That you're sorry for worrying us!"

"This isn't healthy," Pavi added in. "Your boyfriend went on a mission. You know who else goes through that? Everyone involved in a war. Being stupid doesn't bring them back."

That, more than anything else, finally broke through the fog of hurt that had been clouding my mind. You know who else went through that? My grandmother went through that. How selfish was I, acting like I was the only person who had ownership of heartache?

I spun on heel, and slammed the door shut to my room so hard that two books fell from the shelves. Maybe they were right, but I didn't have to like it.

"Honestly, Genre!" Lily snapped from the main room.

I scooped the fallen books up, suppressing a sneer at the titles: Werewolves and the Witching Hour, and Love Rushes. Why Octavius would have shelved these side by side was beyond me, but there they were. The sad truth was that I knew I was being a total prat, which was entirely unfair when my friends were just looking out for me. But what they didn't understand was that I hadn't even put myself in danger - all I'd done was cast shields to help people dart from building to building. None of the Death Eaters cast anything deadly in my direction, though my shields had deflected one or two curses. I didn't even stick around to help the Ministry cast memory charms on the muggles. That's how little I'd helped.

A shroud of shame smothered me that night while I tried to sleep.

In the morning, I tapped lightly on Lily's door, half-hoping she wouldn't answer it. In a way, I got my wish - James's tousled hair and hazel eyes greeted me instead of my roommate's.

"Come to slam some more stuff around?" James asked snarkily, crossing his arms over his bare chest. He blocked my view of the room.

"I came to apologize," I said, though I had to grit my teeth against the desire to point out that I'd slammed one thing (my door) and it was my flat, after all.

"I'm not sure I want to hear it," Lily's voice said mulishly from behind the door.

"Well, I'll say it anyway," I said louder to be sure Lily heard everything I had to say. I took a deep breath, and then let it out. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry I went off like that without you, I'm sorry I came back and snapped when you and James and Pavi were just trying to help me. I'm sorry I've been such a dead-weight friend lately."

James's expression softened a little, and he glanced over his shoulder. Lily didn't reply.

"I'm going to work," I told them. "I'll be home. If you're still angry at me, that's fine. I understand."

Neither said anything, so I left to go apologize to Pavi also.

Pavi, unlike James and Lily, was quite vocal about his rejection of my apology. In fact, he reenacted the entire lecture from the night before, tossing in more cuss words than I even knew (although I think some of them may have been in another language). I let him get it off his chest, and when he stormed into the front of the shop, I didn't follow.

Even though I tried to stay focused all day, I couldn't stop the self-pity that leaked down my spine. Everyone was either mad at me or gone - and those that were gone would probably be mad at me, too, if they were here. And it was all my own damn fault. Since when did I make hasty decisions to put myself in harm's way? Merlin, I was even angry at myself!

Pavi brought me a mug of tea that afternoon. He didn't say anything, and still glowered at me, but I took the tea as the peace-offering it was and gave him a watery smile that he didn't return.

The chimes we'd affixed to the front door tinkled merrily. Pavi strode through the door that separated the workroom from the front of the shop, and I nursed the tea. Except - just two seconds later (while Pavi spoke with someone I couldn't hear through the door), the doorknob to the back door started jiggling. Someone was trying to break in.

Several thoughts streamed through my head in a jumbled mess: I could disapparate, which would leave Pavi to deal with a potential thief or murderer; I could go for help or call for Pavi; or I could stay and fight. With not enough time to figure out the best course of action, I dodged into the corner by the staircase and cast a disillusionment charm on myself. The slick, oily feeling of raw eggs slipped down my entire body. The lock quietly disengaged, and someone stepped in.

I stood as still as a statue, heart tripping all the way up to my tongue. With the sun bright outside, I couldn't make out the person's features until they stepped in cautiously. Another shape stepped behind the first one, blocking the light from outside. I nearly choked on a gasp, so desperate was I to keep it in.

It had been about two years since I had last seen Cadie and Stan. They'd always seemed to look mature to my eyes, perhaps because I'd been blinded by my role as younger sibling, but now I saw that they had still been children the last time I saw them. Cadie was nearly skeletal now, with sharp, angular bones alongside stringy muscle. Her face was gaunt, leaving large hollows beneath her cheekbones, and dark shadows around her eyes. Where once she'd had skin like mine, fair and even-toned, now it was leathered and browned by the sun.

My eyes darted helplessly to the shape behind her. To my relief - and also sorrow - it was not Stan. It was Richard, tall and thin and a little dirty, with an odd jagged line from his eyebrow to ear. Was it a tattoo? If so, it was a weird one.

"Where should we start?" Richard whispered. Cadie cast her eyes around the room, passing over me in the shadows. If I moved, I risked them seeing the ripple in the air.

"Start at the desk," Cadie whispered back, pointing at my work table. Richard headed over to the half-finished cup of tea, placing his fingers against it.

"Still warm," he whispered in warning.

Cadie nodded, scanning the cabinets and shelves around the room. What was she looking for, I wondered? The only paperwork Pavi and I kept in the cabinets was receipts for the wands we'd sold, price-points for ingredients to help with pricing our wands, and my plans for new wands. A suspicious thought crept into my mind. I twisted my wand nervously in my fingers, wondering if I had it in me to curse my sister and old friend. Or was that purposefully putting myself into danger, which I'd just promised my friends I wouldn't do?

"It looks like her handwriting," Richard said from the table. My eyes flicked back to him. He was holding up some of my wand sketches with notes jotted down in the margin. "At least, I think it does."

Richard fumbled in his pocket, finally pulling out a worn parchment that had been folded many times over and appeared to have taken a dip in some mud at one point. His fingers, which were shaking, struggled to unfold it. I couldn't see it clearly from here, but I knew what it was. They had saved one of my letters, from before I realized they were criminals. He was comparing the handwriting.

Cadie continued opening and closing cabinet doors quietly. I didn't know exactly what she was looking for.

"It's definitely her," Richard confirmed a moment later.

"Good," Cadie said absent-mindedly while she pulled out some of my ingredients and checked in the various tins and boxes. "I thought it might be."

Richard continued rifling through the work-table drawers and organized stacks.

"Nothing?" Cadie asked.

"Not yet," Richard replied.

The tinkling of the chimes out front rang again. Both Cadie and Richard froze. Cadie turned to face the door, her wand held near her ribs. From here, I could see the silhouette of a dragon tooth she'd gotten tattooed behind her ear.

"Stand our ground?" Richard murmured.

"Depends," Cadie hissed. "Do you think it's just one person?

The door started to open. Pavi wasn't prepared - I knew that. Why would he expect an attack coming from the workroom when I was the only person here?

"Stupefy," I cried, lashing my wand out. I missed - I don't know if it was intentional or not - but it was enough warning for Pavi to pull out his own wand and just the signal Cadie and Richard needed to dodge out the door. Pavi saw just enough to go running towards the door after them. He did not, however, chase them past the door frame.

"What the Hades?" Pavi snarled, spinning this way and that. "Genre? Genre!"

"I'm here," I said, and then realized that he couldn't see me any more than Cadie and Richard had been able to. "Er…" I wracked my brain. "I can't recall how to get rid of a disillusionment charm. Help, please?"

After Pavi got me sorted out so I wasn't a reflection of the space behind me, we went and took a look at the door.

"They melted the lock from the inside," Pavi said glumly. "We'll need to get someone to fix that."

"I'm sorry," I said. This was just what my self-pity needed - my past to come up and kick me while I was already down.

"What are you sorry for?" Pavi asked gruffly, crouching and trying to peel the melted metal off the door jam. "You didn't melt the lock."

"I didn't do anything," I explained, trying to keep the guilt from my voice. "I sort of froze."

Pavi straightened, looking down his long straight nose at me.

"Did everything your friends and I had to say go right over your sodden head, Genre?" he demanded. "Do you think you're supposed to single-handedly take on every problem?"

"No!" I snapped back at him. "I listened! That's the problem - I couldn't decide what the right course of action was, and what would make you lot angry at me again! And it was my sister - I should have been the one to take care of it!"

Pavi sneered at me, a delightful curl of his lip that would put Sirius (who had perfected the sneer by our third year) to shame.

"If you were my little sister," he said in the iciest tone I'd ever heard, and then didn't even continue.

"You'd what?" I challenged.

Pavi glared at me, and then reached out quite deliberately and flicked me right on the nose - hard.

"What the heck is your problem?" I yelped.

"Sit down," Pavi said sternly. My legs sank, bringing me to sit on the stool while I held my hand over my nose. The flick had been hard enough to make my eyes water. "Obviously lectures from your friends aren't enough. So let's look at this from another point of view."

I opened my mouth to say something rude to him, but he held up a hand and I quieted.

"How many spies do you think the Order has?" he asked.

"How am I supposed to know?" I demanded.

"Three," he told me. "Funke, who is being watched by a ministry wizard in the castle walls, and by three different trackers outside castle walls; Aloys, who was ousted from France and has no connections here in England; and you."

He glared at me, daring me to say something. I kept my mouth zipped shut. After a moment, he continued.

"We all go along with your plans - letting you go to the refugee camps and drop off foe glasses and spy on Death Eater meetings - because someone needs to do it. We really don't have any options without sending someone in to become a Death Eater, and that's too dangerous. But what you're really needed for is delivering messages and picking them up because the rest of us can't do it without being seen. We have so few options for sending messages that can't be intercepted."

I shifted in my seat, crossing my arms over my chest uneasily.

"So each time you do something stupid, like running headfirst into trouble to help others - which is admirable but there were other people there helping already - you put the entire Order at risk."

"We're not talking about last night," I said, counting in my head to try to stop the acid from dripping from my tongue. "I'm saying that you - all of you - have sent me mixed signals so now I don't even know what I'm supposed to do. Stand my ground? Run to whichever big, strong wizard is nearest for protection? Hide?"

Pavi glared at me, his arms crossed over his chest. Maybe I didn't keep the acid from my voice as well as I'd hoped to. I stood from the stool.

"Last night was a mistake," I told him. "I realize that. I apologized. But maybe you and the others should figure out what exactly it is I'm supposed to be doing. Just know that I don't take to leashes well." Once, maybe, I would have appreciated the safety of a leash. But not anymore.

I went home after that. I didn't want to - what I really wanted to do was turn into a fox and disappear off into the wild for a while. But Lily was already mad at me and I didn't want to make it any worse. In the end, I was overjoyed to have returned home. I opened the door and walked straight into the open arms of Mary, who was paler than I'd ever seen her but had an excited shine to her eyes.