AN: As per usual, standard Fanfiction disclaimers apply to this chapter

Once again, yes some is from the book, no it's not highlighted, random formatting changes to highlight quotes tends to knock me out of the story, but the quotes are there because things are relatively similar to canon.

Chapter 8

By the next afternoon, Snape was dead. He had been found by the merfolk, looking like he had gone several rounds with the squid or a bear before trying to swim away on broken limbs and drowned. That or something had dive bombed him into the lake from quite a height.

Smith was in the hospital wing, with a full set of broken ribs and a jaw to match. He had been found at the bottom of the grand staircase, though nobody quite knew how he had ended up there, or if they did, they weren't telling.

Nobody seemed to know why the students had been locked in their common rooms the night before, only that whatever had happened, the professors had been up all night searching for something and twelve students had been killed rather brutally.

While several people knew that Megan had been involved in the fracas, they were staying quiet on what might have happened. Ayesha had, once Megan had arrived back in the Hufflepuff common room, barely let go of the older girl since.

Patting the girl's back, Megan looked up as the doors to the hall opened, revealing a rather pale-faced Tonks, along with Potter and Lovegood. Those were the people most recognised.

Several people also recognised Susan's aunt, who looked exhausted. Only a few recognised Tomas Jones, Megan's father, dressed in a decent suit under a long coat. One leg had a heavy pistol strapped to it, while the other a long knife, on his back rested two long swords. Unlike the other adults, he looked calm, dark hair pulled back into a short tail, shadowed eyes and a slight five o'clock shadow notwithstanding.

"Ah, Amelia, welcome back," Dumbledore stated as he rose from his throne at the staff table. "What can I do for you?"

"You can explain why the Auror I released to teach your students was trying to get into the Ministry in the middle of the night, and in the middle of a battle," Amelia replied sternly, not looking happy at all. "You can also explain why less than two days after the Battle at the Ministry, we received word that twelve students under your watch were apparently killed along with one of your professors."

Dumbledore blinked several times. "H-how?" he managed after several moments of gaping.

Tomas pulled a phone from his pocket, waving it cheerfully. "SPECTRE received a few calls about it," he replied, "and about something else." He turned, looking over at the Slytherin table. "Mr Hunston, I'm sorry to tell you that your family, including your cousins, aunt and uncle, are under arrest for soliciting a minor and pursuit of paedophilia. Depending on what evidence is found and presented to the court along with their statements, they may well be seeing the inside of a prison cell for several years."

"WHAT?" Hunston yelled. "YOU CAN'T DO THAT!"

"Actually, as part of the agreement to allow the magicals to maintain their independence, they were supposed to follow the laws of the country they were part of," Tomas replied dryly. "That means, Mr Hunston, that a thirteen year old is far too young to marry under British law, under most countries' laws actually, which in addition to everything else recently means Her Highness has renounced the agreement made in 1945 after the last world war. As part of that, SPECTRE has the right to act as law enforcement for the magical society within the British Isles. I believe Mr Fudge has an appointment scheduled very soon with the Prime Minister, if not the Queen. He is unlikely to enjoy said meeting."

Amelia sent a sour look at Tomas before turning her attention to Dumbledore again. "Once again, Dumbledore, what, precisely, were you hoping by sending one of my Aurors into an unknown, hostile situation like that?" she asked. "Does this have anything to do with your little vigilante group?"

"Perhaps it would be better to discuss such things in my office, Amelia," Dumbledore suggested after several moments of hemming and hawing.

The feeling of her phone vibrating in her pocket distracted Megan from Amelia's reply. Pulling it out, she checked the message she had just received.

"Received your report on action two days ago, passed it to your father," the text said. "Your mother was amused and annoyed that you finished the Malfoy family, she wanted to herself. Your sister is annoyed at missing out, but has had her own encounters to deal with. –Cmdr. Glenn"

Looking up, Megan arched an eyebrow at her father, who nodded slightly to her before following Amelia, Tonks and Dumbledore from the room.

"Jones!" The call drew her attention to Potter, who was approaching the table. "Thank you," he said, once he'd gotten close enough. "For what you did the other day," he added.

Megan nodded slightly. "No problem," she responded.

He turned to leave before pausing and frowning, seeing the Slytherin table for the first time since he had gotten back. "What happened to Malfoy? I would have thought he would have come to try something by now."

"He kind of got dropped on his head," Sally-Anne commented dryly.

After a moment to let things settle, Lilith added, "off the Astronomy Tower."

Potter blinked. "What?" he asked, turning to them.

"He's dead," Megan explained. "Him, his butt buddies and a number of others who decided it was a good idea to cause trouble." Shrugging, she took a swig of her drink, glancing over at the Ravenclaw table to see what was going on there. Nobody seemed to be moving from the table, so she turned back to Potter. "Him, Crabbe, Goyle, Nott and some others took it badly that their parents received Darwin Awards at the Ministry of Muppets. They found out exactly why their 'rents got said awards by getting a set themselves. I've had a limpet since," she continued with a shrug.

Sally-Anne smirked at her. "You didn't exactly try to lose her," she pointed out. "You keep calling Ayesha, 'Cutie', so you must care about her somewhat." She smirked before turning back to Potter. "Snape's dead as well, drowned apparently, though I heard something about broken bones and claw marks so he might have been on the toothy end of something."

Blinking again, Potter turned towards her. "Really?" he asked. "Snape's dead?"

Nodding, Sally-Anne shifted slightly. "We don't know how, but from what Malfoy apparently said before he got tossed, he was behind us winding up in the Ministry and behind Malfoy's attempt at Megan. Someone took offence," she said with a shrug.

Megan nodded when he looked at her before frowning slightly. "Oh, while I think about it, the Headmaster wanted you for something. Apparently something to do with the crap the other day," she said. "Might be worth getting everyone in since they were all put at risk, they might as well learn why."

Potter frowned thoughtfully. "Professor Dumbledore only wanted me though," he said.

"Well you could reveal things after," Megan admitted. "I doubt there'll be much OpSec needed, not unless there's supposed to be another Riddle about with an army of minions." She shrugged, leaning back slightly to stroke Ayesha's hair gently. "Considering he got put down, I doubt there's too much left we'd need to worry about anyway."

When Potter blinked blankly at the girls, Sally-Anne and Lilith giggled before Sally-Anne enlightened him. "She means 'operational security', basically keeping things secret outside those that actually need to know."

"Oh," Potter responded before looking towards the exit to the hall and back again. "Uh… Jones?" he asked. "Since you were there… would it be alright if you came with me to see Professor Dumbledore? You-you seemed to know what was going on better than I did," he admitted, looking down. "And you were right about Sirius."

Megan nodded. "Sure," she responded. "Oh, and talking of Sirius, he should be alright, at least he should be getting medical attention in SPECTRE custody. Might take a while to get through to the trial, but he'll at least get one soon according to the papers."

"I-I saw," Potter responded, giving the girls a nod before heading back to his own table.

The next few days were interesting ones between the Battle of the Ministry, the confirmed (finally) death of Riddle and the discovery of several more artefacts he had used scattered throughout Britain by SPECTRE.

From what the online news reported, those artefacts included a diadem found at Hogwarts, a ring near a town called Little Hangleton, the amulet with Black and a snake found in a raid on Malfoy Manor, where Mrs Malfoy had apparently turned Queen's Evidence and several dead Death Eaters had been found bitten by the aforementioned snake.

There was also a good deal of speculation about the final fate of Sirius Black whose trial was scheduled for the end of the month in a magic suppressing courtroom in London. The fact a supposedly dead man by name of Pettigrew had turned up alive at Malfoy Manor certainly pushed the evidence towards him being innocent.

The non-magical national papers (mostly the gossip rags) thoroughly mocked the DMLE under Crouch for their blatant uselessness dealing with the Death Eaters and their inability to handle criminals properly.

They also mocked the Ministry under Fudge and Bagnold both in its corruption and the Wizengamot under Dumbledore for how badly they had handled things both online (through the laptops and phones everyone but Hannah Abbott in the Hufflepuff fifth year girls owned) and in the papers that were sent to Susan.

The magical news (such as it was) decried everything it could, whined piteously about the loss of independence 'undeserved', bitched about the 'muggles' holding Black and the survivors of the Ministry battle.

The Prophet (and several European papers) also spent a lot of their publication space crying about 'many old family lines wiped out'.

As if Riddle hadn't done worse.

There had also been a lot of blatant anti-'muggle' rhetoric involved.

That bit had lasted about three issues over two days before someone had words with the chief editor of the paper.

Interestingly the Quibbler, written by Lovegood's father, supported the non-magical papers. It even had interviews with people who knew what was going on in the non-magical world.

Finally, several days later, Megan met Potter, Harry he had insisted, at the gargoyle in front of the stairs to Dumbledore's office. She had been reading the news on her phone when he finally got there, along with the memes that were showing up in certain corners of the Internet about what was going on in Britain.

One of the funnier ones involved a screenshot of The Witcher 3 when Yennefer cast a raven to attack someone, with the Dark Mark superimposed so that the raven was tearing up the snake.

Looking up as Harry approached; Megan eyed the gargoyle for a moment before turning to Harry. "So you have a way past that?" she asked, indicating the statue. "Because I'm fairly sure it's not going to break a stone shell and start wandering come sunset." She slipped her phone back into her pouch.

"Uh…" Harry responded, momentarily nonplussed. "The note I got mentioned something about Professor Dumbledore enjoying 'Mars Bars' or something like that," he said.

When he mentioned the well-known (non-magical) chocolate bar, the gargoyle animated, hopping aside with a good degree of alacrity to reveal a set of stairs leading upwards.

"That works," Megan commented dryly. Turning towards the stairs, she headed up them, Harry following her.

The pair soon reached Dumbledore's office and slipped inside to find it full of gizmos, gadgets, animated paintings and other things.

"Ah, welcome Harry, welcome," Dumbledore said benevolently before blinking. "Miss Jones… I don't recall requesting you be present for this meeting."

Megan shrugged. "He did," she said, indicating Harry. "Though if this is something to do with Riddle or whatever he wanted at the Ministry, we should be the least of it. The other students who were caught in that mess and the leaders of the field teams who came to our aid should at least know what and why," she pointed out, moving to lean against a wall.

Dumbledore looked between them for a moment, seeing Megan's seemingly uncaring attitude about what he thought along with Harry's determination and sighed, shaking his head. "I suppose that is true," he admitted.

"Harry, I owe you an explanation," said Dumbledore, "An explanation of an old man's mistakes. For I see now that what I have done, and not done, with regard to you, bears all the hallmarks of the failings of age. Youth cannot know how age thinks and feels. But old men are guilty if they forget what it was to be young… and I seem to have forgotten, lately…"

Megan frowned slightly, listening to Dumbledore's tale, of how he had reluctantly placed Harry in the non-magical world to hide him, of how he had suspected the fragment of soul in Harry's scar, of a number of other things.

The confession did answer a number of questions about what had been going on this year, why the Weasleys were shuttled out before Christmas and why Harry had ended up knocked about during the exams.

"I can only guess what happened at the Ministry, seeing as I was unable to approach," Dumbledore admitted. "However, I can guess Voldemort's aim in possessing you. He likely hoped that it would have been your destruction. He hoped, when he possessed you briefly a short while ago, that someone, most likely me, would sacrifice you in the hope of killing him. So you see, I have been trying, in distancing myself from you, to protect you, Harry. An old man's mistake…"

Snorting softly, Megan shook her head. "It's more likely at that point that he was going for a last gasp, to try to take down Harry with him," she said, shifting slightly from where she was leaning. "I don't think he was expecting me to be the one to approach, nor that I'd cut open and purge the scar."

"Indeed he likely did not, Miss Jones," Dumbledore responded genially before returning his attention to the boy. "Sirius told me you felt Voldemort awake inside you the very night that you had the vision of Arthur Weasley's attack. I knew at once that my worst fears were correct: Voldemort had realised he could use you. In an attempt to arm you against Voldemort's assaults on your mind, I arranged Occlumency lessons with Professor Snape."

He continued the explanation further, revealing more about what had apparently been going on behind the scenes while Megan scanned the office idly, taking note of the curious occupants of the paintings around the room.

"Snape stopped giving me Occlumency lessons!" Harry snarled. "He threw me out of his office!"

"I am aware of it," said Dumbledore heavily. "I have already said that it was a mistake for me not to teach you myself, though I was sure, at the time, that nothing could have been more dangerous than to open your mind even further to Voldemort while in my presence –"

"Snape made it worse, my scar always hurt worse after lessons with him –" Harry plunged on "– how do you know he wasn't trying to soften me up for Voldemort, make it easier for him to get inside my –"

"I trusted Severus Snape," said Dumbledore simply. "But I forgot – another old man's mistake – that some wounds run too deep for the healing. I thought Professor Snape could overcome his feelings about your father – I was wrong."

"Considering what I heard before Malfoy ended up with a terminal case of dead," Megan cut in. "I think Snape was actively trying to hurt Harry," she continued, eyes locking with Dumbledore's. "I don't know everything, but Malfoy's squeals included mention that Snape was the one that provided the portkey that took us to the Ministry and he was the one that distracted you and the others from their attempted murder."

Dumbledore nodded heavily. "I can't say that I know what was going through Professor Snape's mind with the latter one, but he did have reasons to do as he did," he admitted. "Even then, as a spy within Voldemort's ranks, the fact he did that is part of why I find myself wondering just what he has been into these last few years."

He paused, looking at Megan. "I still am not entirely sure how your father and his people managed to find Sirius Black so readily when even Voldemort could not with the aid of the house elf, Kreacher."

Shrugging, Megan cocked her head slightly. "The obvious would be they questioned Tonks, since she attempted to get into the ministry."

Frowning slightly, Dumbledore looked over his half-moon glasses at her. "That may be, but the property was under Fidelius. Much as he might have hated it," he said, cutting Harry off, "I was trying to keep him alive when the ministry was attempting to kill him."

"They probably asked the right questions, from what I've heard, that spell is only supposed to be good for one secret at a cast, so asking something that has nothing to do with that particular secret would probably bypass it," suggested Megan. "I mean if they were after Black, why would SPECTRE ask about something like where your vigilante group hung out?"

Both males blinked several times at that, before Dumbledore paled and choked for a moment.

The next several minutes were spent with the old man focusing on Harry, letting Megan watch them both. She might not have been the best at reading people, but from Dumbledore's actions and tone, it seemed like he did at least somewhat regret whatever he thought Harry had been through. Some of the comments about her own actions and attitude in the mix simply made her snort in amusement.

Dumbledore even went over the last four years of Hogwarts, not things she knew, but some of what had happened to Harry. The comments about Harry's pursuit of squirrel into the 'forbidden corridor' were amusing. Honestly the traps hadn't been all that. She had gone through them with Lilith and Sally-Anne within the first month due to a seventh year sending Lilith into that corridor.

She'd broken her kneecaps for her later.

Still, a Cerberus, which anyone who knew dogs or Greek myth could counter, devil's snare was a plant, even not knowing it's intolerance to light, plants tended to burn prettily, the keys had been annoying, but the hinges were easy enough to pop, chess tended to rely on players, and there were multiple variants worth trying, trolls honestly were big and stupid, they tended to fall into traps children wouldn't and while the potions and fire had been interesting, once you realised there was only one set of twins in the mix, the rest fell into place quickly.

The real stone had wound up in a SPECTRE vault well before squirrel tried his first obvious attempt.

Not that she told them that. Not when the stone had allowed Sally-Anne the resources to continue the schooling without idiots screwing with her and Lilith to counter whatever genetic defect her family had.

The rest of the years were hardly any better for Harry, though why he fainted against the Dementors she still didn't know. Longbottom had at least as bad of a time and her life was possibly worse in some respects.

The Dementors probably preferred her after she had gotten the Patronus, since it saved their heads being mulched or their robes flamed among other things.

"I still don't understand," Potter's voice drew her attention back to the conversation.

"Voldemort tried to kill you when you were a child because of a prophecy made shortly before your birth. He knew the prophecy had been made, though he did not know its full contents. He set out to kill you when you were still a baby, believing he was fulfilling the terms of the prophecy," Dumbledore responded. "He discovered, to his cost, that he was mistaken, when the curse intended to kill you backfired. And so, since his return to his body, and particularly since your extraordinary escape from him last year, he has been determined to hear that prophecy in its entirety. This is the weapon he has been seeking so assiduously since his return: the knowledge of how to destroy you."

Megan snorted softly. "Well he wasn't going to get it even if he hadn't been counter ambushed and killed," she commented. "Part of what took us a bit in the Ministry was because Sally-Anne, Lilith and I rigged and blew every 'prophecy'," her lip curled at the word, "to dust. Most of them are either stupid vague or walk into nose first types."

"The thing that smashed was merely the record of the prophecy kept by the Department of Mysteries. But the prophecy was made to somebody, and that person has the means of recalling it perfectly."

"Who heard it?" asked Harry, making Megan frown thoughtfully as she watched.

"I did," said Dumbledore. "On a cold, wet night sixteen years ago, in a room above the bar at the Hog's Head inn. I had gone there to see an applicant for the post of Divination teacher, though it was against my inclination to allow the subject of Divination to continue at all. The applicant, however, was the great-great-granddaughter of a very famous, very gifted Seer and I thought it common politeness to meet her. I was disappointed. It seemed to me that she had not a trace of the gift herself. I told her, courteously I hope, that I did not think she would be suitable for the post. I turned to leave."

Dumbledore got to his feet and walked past the pair to the black cabinet that stood beside Fawkes's perch. He bent down, slid back a catch and took from inside it the shallow stone basin, carved with runes around the edges. From the look of it, Harry recognised the type, though Megan didn't, making her frown slightly. Dumbledore walked back to the desk, placed the Pensieve upon it, and raised his wand to his own temple. From it, he withdrew silvery, gossamer-fine strands of something clinging to the wand and deposited them into the basin. He sat back down behind his desk and watched his thoughts swirl and drift inside the Pensieve for a moment. Then, with a sigh, he raised his wand and prodded the silvery substance with its tip.

A figure rose out of it, draped in shawls, her eyes magnified to enormous size behind her glasses, and she revolved slowly, her feet in the basin. But when Sybill Trelawney spoke, it was not in her usual ethereal, mystic voice, but in the harsh, hoarse tones: "The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches… born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies… and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not… and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives… the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies…"

The slowly revolving Professor Trelawney sank back into the silver mass below and vanished.

Megan snorted softly. "Yup, both vague and worded to encourage an idiot to try something to either stop or start it," she said, drawing looks from everyone in the room, paintings, bird and all. "No indicator on who the 'dark lord' is for a start, and born as the seventh month dies? Even presuming you stick with the Gregorian calendar, the last week of July covers potentially one-point-five to two percent of the world's births averaged out. You consider there's like six billion humans on Earth, that's something like ninety to a hundred and twenty million possible people to go through."

"I do not believe there are that many, Miss Jones," Dumbledore said.

"Even limiting it to the local magicals, that's still six hundred thousand people meaning nine thousand to twelve thousand potentials," Megan pointed out. "Of course, that's presuming there's still a 1:100 ratio between magicals and non-magicals respectively in Britain, but even ten percent that, you've still a fair number of possible candidates for the 'one with the power to vanquish the dark lord'."

Dumbledore looked somewhat bemused for a moment before he pulled out a 'disappointed grandfather' look. "Even so, Miss Jones, this prophecy means specifically that the person who has the only chance of conquering Lord Voldemort for good was born at the end of July, nearly sixteen years ago. This boy would be born to parents who had already defied Voldemort three times."

Megan glanced over at Harry as he started having trouble breathing, frowning slightly at the boy.

"It means – me?" asked Harry, worry clear in his voice

Dumbledore took a deep breath. "The odd thing, Harry," he said softly, "is that it may not have meant you at all. Sybill's prophecy could have applied to two wizard boys, both born at the end of July that year, both of whom had parents in the Order of the Phoenix, both sets of parents having narrowly escaped Voldemort three times. One, of course, was you. The other was Neville Longbottom."

"But then… but then, why was it my name on the prophecy and not Neville's?"

"The official record was re-labelled after Voldemort's attack on you as a child," said Dumbledore. "It seemed plain to the keeper of the Hall of Prophecy that Voldemort could only have tried to kill you because he knew you to be the one to whom Sybill was referring."

"Then – it might not be me?" said Harry.

"I am afraid," said Dumbledore slowly, looking as though every word cost him a great effort, "that there is no doubt that it is you."

"But you said – Neville was born at the end of July, too – and his mum and dad –"

"You are forgetting the next part of the prophecy, the final identifying feature of the boy who could vanquish Voldemort… Voldemort himself would mark him as his equal. And so he did, Harry. He chose you, not Neville. He gave you the scar that has proved both blessing and curse."

"But he might have chosen wrong!" said Harry. "He might have marked the wrong person!"

"He chose the boy he thought most likely to be a danger to him," said Dumbledore. "And notice this, Harry: he chose, not the pureblood (which, according to his creed, is the only kind of wizard worth being or knowing) but the half-blood, like himself. He saw himself in you before he had ever seen you, and in marking you with that scar, he did not kill you, as he intended, but gave you powers, and a future, which have fitted you to escape him not once, but four times so far – something that neither your parents, nor Neville's parents, ever achieved."

Megan shrugged. "I wouldn't be too sure," she said. "Susan could've been a potential easily, she's born in the last week of July and her parents survived Riddle three times," she pointed out. "Besides which, I was the one that killed Riddle, his trinkets burst after I did things and he died." She shrugged, seeing Dumbledore looking at her.

"That should not be possible, Miss Jones," he stated. "The prophecy states that a boy born at the end of July will be the one to face Voldemort, and young Harry has escaped him four times."

"Eh, I can see two ways it'd apply, and let's be honest, just because something says 'he' or 'she' doesn't always mean that sex, it could be used as a generic," Megan pointed out.

Arching an eyebrow at her, Dumbledore shifted slightly. "How would the prophecy apply to you then?"

"Well presuming it actually talks about Harry here?" Megan asked. "It says 'either must die at the hand of the other'. There's a reason for the phrase 'the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing' being in circulation," she pointed out.

"How-how do you mean?" Harry asked.

Shrugging, Megan crossed to snag a seat, dropping into it. "It comes most likely from the Romano-Christian beliefs, between the bible comment about charity and the use of pictures showing people at the left and right of higher figures. A 'hand' can be someone acting for another, something that happened a lot in the medieval period, when the 'hand of the king' would be their advisor and gofer. Usually the right was the obvious one, the person being trusted in public to carry the king's law; the left was the assassin or blackmailer, someone who worked behind the scenes."

She shifted, arching her eyebrow at Harry, head cocked slightly to the side. "In acting to defend you and to lead your forces, I could have been your hand, allowing me to kill him."

"Is-is that possible?"

Megan shrugged languidly. "No clue, but it's a theory. The other one, you were never the one actually targeted by the prophecy."

"And yet it was Harry's name on the orb in the Department of Mysteries," Dumbledore put in. "He is the one marked by Voldemort, a half-blood chosen as equal and he, not you, is the one born on the death of the seventh month, July."

"Eh, maybe, however the start of the year has changed over the years," Megan pointed out. "Even right now, there're two straight calendars around using different year beginnings, much less the other types of year." Seeing Dumbledore confused, she shrugged again. "I was born at the end of May, which in the Gregorian calendar is the fifth month, however China starts their year around mid-February to mid-March depending on the moon, the tax year starts in April and the academic year is from September, which in itself was once the 'seventh month', hence the name.

"Interestingly, they say the borders between the lands of the living and the lands of the dead are weakest on one particular night, which was once New Year's Eve, that isn't the 31st of December, nor was it Christmas or the Yuletide, it was the end of the main harvest, October 31st, Hallowe'en, All Hallows' Eve," Megan continued, watching the pair. "My birthday is on the seventh month after, on May the 31st.

"The second point, born to those who thrice defied him?" she shifted again, frowning slightly. "My family put a major dent in his forces. Three hundred terrorists attack Plymouth across three incidents; my family was on the forefront of facing them. My parents fought off and injured Riddle each time. Maybe half a dozen of his goons escaped them alive.

"On point three, being marked?" Megan shrugged. "Eh, pretty sure Riddle's deciding to not try it with the non-magicals, primarily due to my parents, is telling in its own way. I'd not be surprised to find out, had he learned of my birth, if he had marked it as a big fat 'nope', 'not touching' because he knew my parents would kill him, and he probably knew any kids of theirs would be just as badass."

Dumbledore hummed thoughtfully, stroking his long beard. "That would not explain the 'power he knows not'," he pointed out.

Megan smirked. "Well… that would probably be either the fae blood in my veins or the fact I'm a rhyfelwr," she explained. "More likely the latter since I opened his scar up with a knife summoned with my abilities, cleansed the wound with water blessed by a former or current goddess, whose water it was, from the river she's the source of and put a round in Riddle's head with a rhyfelwr's weapon, something known to kill demons and their ilk."

"So Voldemort is truly dead?" Harry asked.

"Probably," Megan agreed. "The news said they found a necklace when they got Black, a ring out near some place called Little Hangleton, there was a crown, tiara or something like that here, hence part of why dad was here," she expanded, waving a hand. "They also found a snake when they checked Malfoy's place, along with someone called Pettigrew that was supposedly dead. There was some sort of cup in Gringotts, which the goblins found. Add in the scar and whatever necrotic crud was around in our second year… pretty sure he pushed beyond sanity and was honestly making himself more vulnerable."

There was an amused snort from somewhere in the office. "Even if his little trinkets kept him tethered rather than letting him pass, it wouldn't have done any good. That particular method only works for one's biological life, not after, and even then, they would be constantly suffering even if they somehow restored themselves," a female voice, one that sounded both young and much older than it should be, said. "Riddle certainly wouldn't count as even surviving whilst sans a body, which rather counters the last issue with the 'prophecy'. Though I imagine the nightmares and day terrors from his beatings and their likely successors would make him suffer very much."

While both Dumbledore and Harry looked around for the source of the voice, Megan smirked, feeling arms hook over her shoulders, for a moment, before a seemingly twelve-year-old girl with electric blue hair under a flat cap stepped around her seat. "Well now, a phoenix, I've not seen one of their kind in quite some time, most either left entirely or moved to inaccessible regions," the girl commented, moving to pet Fawkes, Dumbledore's phoenix.

Looking entirely nonplussed, Dumbledore watched Fawkes getting petted by the strange girl for a moment. "Excuse me, Miss, but who are you and how did you get into my office?"

"Getting in?" the girl asked an amused look on her face. "I asked Hogwarts, she was quite willing to help. She's kind of… enthusiastic about helping sometimes," she commented. "As for who I am." She grinned at Dumbledore. "Lyrene Tamar or Tamara if you want one of my older names," she introduced herself. "Just checking on Megan honestly, given the last couple of weeks seems to have been rather heavy on the fighting."

Looking at the two teens, she arched an eyebrow at them. "Actually, there's some things that might need discussing without students about if you're finished with your chat."

Dumbledore looked at Harry and Megan for a moment. "Well… I do wish to know what this 'rhyfelwr' is that Miss Jones mentioned and how it has to do with Voldemort's demise."

Lyrene grinned, cocking her head slightly. "That's easy, the rhyfelwr or rhyfelwr ysbryd to be more correct is a spirit warrior, a guardian whose role it is to ensure both natural and supernatural forces are kept from causing one another too many problems," she explained. "Megan is one, a young one granted, but she is also one of many. Most villages, towns and cities have at least two often many more, many of them help SPECTRE or PHANTOM at some point in their duties though their group is older by far." She shrugged, watching with the air of someone amused by the talk. "You could consider Megan a trainee currently, her great-great-grandfather is the one in charge currently."

"I… see…" Dumbledore said before sighing softly. "Very well then, Miss Jones, Mr Potter, you're free to go about your day. What is it you wished to speak to me about, Miss Tamar?"

Nodding to Lyrene and Dumbledore, Megan rose and left the room with Harry, the pair splitting to head for their common rooms near the gargoyle.

Notes:

Fidelius

I'm just going to start with an obvious one here, namely why the Fidelius was bypassed.

We know the way canon has the spell work is to hide a secret within the soul of a person, and that it can be given out via writing. We also know that it can seemingly have an effect on people who don't know about a place for another reason as seen by Harry in OotP.

That in mind, there's two things that can screw it around in general. Firstly, how does the spell react when the secret is no longer true?

For example the Potters, they hid behind Fidelius, but most people apparently know where they were hiding from the bit we see of their cottage in DH, so does that mean that the secret ending ended the spell or was it to do with the duel between Voldemort and James or the defence on Harry? It obviously wasn't Pettigrew passing the information along when he spent most of the intervening years as a rat.

The second issue with Fidelius is what about things not part of the secret?

As an example, the secret for the Black Townhouse is that 'The HQ of the OotP is at 12 Grimmauld Place' (paraphrased some). But what about someone looking for where the Blacks lived? What about if it was to do with Sirius' family members? What specifically stopped Kreacher from telling Narcissa that her cousin was at the family townhouse, which is nothing to do with the Order secret. Doesn't mean the last couldn't have been its own secret, but still.

The honest answer is we don't know. It's one of those spells that's inconsistent in its representation. We're told several things, but while a child might ignore the inconsistencies, once you start poking as an adult things come to light.

We're told the spell can take a locale out of the standard time stream in essence, but again, there's a lot of ways it can be breeched, just by someone poking along a train of thought, particularly if it's something unrelated whatever the secret is.

In essence, that is what I used for this. SPECTRE was looking for Sirius Black, not the Order. It isn't written, but it's likely on research and questioning Tonks about her cousin, it would have come out that his early years would have been at Grimmauld Place. Records would likely show the road's layout, the buildings that are supposed to be there and their numbers among other things.

Given that from how it's described and shown the Black townhouse is a terraced property with somewhat Victorian stylings, meaning it's potentially something built shortly after WWI.

In Winds, with the tech coming live from the relics, it's likely that the even if the style was kept, the house would be at least built ready to allow electricity, gas and water, probably phone as well with Internet following later.

Real world had the first three by the mid-20s and the phones were originally experimented with back in 1664, by 1915 there were commercial models rolling out in at least the USA and a cross Atlantic call by 1927. Gas was being altered in its systems by the 1920s, electricity started AC grids by around 1900 give or take a couple of decades and water/sewage was an issue seen as early as the 1500s in London.

There are also various satellites that could spot the place and street mapping services that might.

The spell would have a lot to cover up, and a group digging at it, particularly from an off angle, could well get around it. Something made even truer when most Order members in residence with Sirius would at least be taken into custody for at least an amount of time due to harbouring what many would think to be a wanted criminal.

The place couldn't really be a Headquarters to a defunct order.

That's the route I'm taking at least, looking for something unrelated to the secret and working through records more deeply eventually found the place after Tonks was questioned on her cousin.

The Prophecy

I'm probably going to reiterate a few things from the story here, so if you've read this far, please bear with it.

Prophecies are something that can often be used in literature to handle odd plot points or get a ball rolling. Even in mythology they are often something that sits back for things to happen and fallout to ensue.

Most prophecies seem to boil down to two routes, they're the vague ones that are only applicable after an event, never before and there are the type that encourage an event by being written to make people either try to make things happen or stop things from happening.

The baseline HP prophecy is leaning more to the latter, but does have some of the former. Most slide the scale in some way.

As it's written, well, there are at least a few other fanfics out there that make Dumbledore the 'dark lord' mentioned or make Harry/fem!Harry the true Child Who Lived while his/her sibling gets the glory.

I went a somewhat different route, making Harry the 'Wrong Boy Who Lived' in essence, which is usually done to Harry's sibling in that genre of story.

So how does it work in story? Well there are essentially two routes, as Megan mentions in the chapter:

Route 1 - Megan is the 'hand': This route is closer to canon in that Voldemort truly believed that Harry was the one who would be able to kill him and that everything else didn't matter. The thing is the term 'either must die at the hand of the other', and as mentioned a 'hand' can be a person acting in lieu of someone else.

Anyone who knows Star Wars EU before Disney took over will likely know that Timothy Zahn was one of the authors for it and he introduced a woman named Mara Jade, the Emperor's Hand. Specifically she would have been the hidden hand, or one of them, while Darth Vader was the obvious one; he was the one out on the battle lines, while she was the one slipping through palaces to poison annoying nobles.

In Megan's case it was the fact she led the fighting in the Ministry. She got them armour from her stores gained from mediamancy runs, she got weapons besides their wands, and she killed or led the killing of the first 12 Death Eaters encountered and then worked to get everyone out after calling SPECTRE in.

She also used a type of exorcism to purge Harry's scar and protected him from Voldemort, acting as both sword and shield to Harry.

Route 2 – Megan is the Prophesied one: This one is a little trickier to explain, but once again the prophecy's inherent vagueness sets it up for other interpretations. In this case, Megan, being born on the 31st of May, is born as the seventh month dies in some of the older calendars, particularly ones where the New Year was the beginning of November.

There are two points to that, first the fact the barriers between living and dead are weakest then (and if I recall there were some dances and festivals around for it before commercialism). May is seven months after. There is also the fact that calendars change. Even now we have two official calendars, the Gregorian one that most follow and the Chinese (notice they celebrate New Year sometime between mid-Feb and mid-March?) There are also different timings on other things, Easter drifts due to being a lunar celebration, tax years in at least some countries are April start and schools usually run from September in Europe.

The marking is the main sticking point besides the year. Megan, while scarred, doesn't have a mark from Voldemort, she wasn't attacked by him in the storyline.

Markings don't always show. The term 'some scars are mental/emotional' comes to mind. In this case, Voldemort led 300 of his followers against Plymouth during the first Blood War; they got their arses kicked so hard they wound up eating their own excrement.

Three runs in, each with around 100 followers and three times they were met by Megan's family specifically. Voldemort and maybe half a dozen followers a time got out, and he was injured by Megan's family. If there was a family he would steer clear of, it would be them. That transferred. Okay, yes this girl is a couple of months 'early', but she's also the daughter of people who kicked my followers' teeth in, hell no.

As for living while the other survived and power, well the power was last chapter Megan is a rhyfelwr ysbryd, a spirit warrior, in essence, a Karas. The living… he didn't. Voldemort was undead, not living, not even surviving in a real sense. Megan? She lived, yes there were plenty of troubles she's dealt with, but she lived and on the first real meeting, she killed him.

Tamara

Lyrene… she is both Megan's 'yurine' and the former hell nymph Tamara who was buried in the spring that is the source of the River Tamar in England. In Winds lore, that even happened somewhere around the end of the last ice age, or maybe the previous one and it took her a long time to manage to get her form back,

It was actually the Romans primarily that allowed her to extend her reach a good distance beyond her banks, as they and the locals worshipped her as a goddess. It wasn't until the 1920s she really had a chance to stretch out again properly, though she did try to aid those she could for the most part.

There are reasons why the devil never crossed her banks, and not because he thought he'd wind up a pastry.

She is also a very protective guardian to her chosen, more so towards Megan, though she isn't sure why. Something that Snape found out the hard way when he found himself on the sharp end of her big cat form.

Maybe people shouldn't have brought exotic pets around near her, nor released them on the moors she essentially controls.

Truth be told, Lyrene, like many gods, can take mortal form and one of them did wed a handsome soldier returned from the Great War, a soldier that she had a daughter with. Who became famous in the Second World War for captaining the Windsbraut, the Zephyr.

That daughter had children of her own in her time, with a German submarine captain, resulting in two boys, one of which became an Army Captain himself, and had a pair of children, a SPECTRE officer and a Navy Commander. The SPECTRE also had a pair of twins by a fae princess, twins with blue hair. One twin took her great-grandmother's ship's mantle, the other because her great-great-grandmother's guardian.

Zacharias Smith's Injuries

Let's just say, Mr Smith is rather badly blinkered to Megan's capabilities even when they're rubbed in his face repeatedly.

Claiming he told Malfoy about Megan and gave information about her while her friends and those who look up to her were about, particularly after a group come in to tell them what is going on outside and that Megan is under threat.

He made no friends that evening, and he probably got off lightly over all, in spite of the injuries he received.

Past Years for Megan

Most people have probably read Philosopher's/Sorcerer's Stone if they read this section of , so they know the traps.

Megan was a lot better trained than Harry, and Harry was a lot better off than his canon-self, so what happened in the corridor for Megan, Sally-Anne and Lilith?

While Megan was the one to claim the stone, the others got through with minor injuries, though without Quirrell in the mix the troll was up and about.

So let's go through the traps for a moment:

Cerberus – dog, Greek mythology, guardian of the underworld, anyone who knows dogs know they'll be a friend for a long time with food, and anyone up on Greek myth knows about the vulnerability to music. Lilith could probably music him to sleep or summon food.

Devil's Snare – self mobile strangle vine, plant, and hates light. Once again, while a bit more off the wall, it's a plant, fire is a major vulnerability to most plant species even without its extra light sensitivity. Megan likely flamed it

Flying keys and locked door – while there is certainly protection against the unlocking spell used, there's no known protections on the hinges, which could be popped with effort, or the girls could have done as Harry & co did and catch a key.

Chess set – While large and self-mobile, chess is a game with rules and most of who wins is the person who makes the better plays. It's likely that Megan as a navy cadet would have played chess and its variants before, allowing for some potentially unknown move sequences that allowed them to checkmate McGonagall's pieces

Troll – Big, vicious, but ultimately dumb as a brick. The girls likely spread out and made it run into walls until it passed out, or pulled a similar trick to the Trio in the book.

Potions – The most difficult puzzle for most magicals, however once you realise there is only one set of twins in play you can work things out. The clues specifically say there's only two nettle wine and that the ones just in from each end are 'twins once you taste them'. Having that you can eliminate two of the poisons quickly and knock out whichever of the last three is the mid-sized one, leaving the question of forwards or back.

Mirror – We don't know whether this was in place at the time or not, since around Christmas time it was up in one of the disused classrooms. We do know that getting the stone from it requires someone who wants to have the stone but not use it, meaning someone curious about what's there could potentially draw it forth.

The other years were somewhat off and on issues, with Justin being stoned by the basilisk in the second year. Megan didn't really get involved in the issue, though her quartet was leery of accepting that Harry's language skills made him the threat, just a possible suspect.

They were also probably more interested in laughing at Lockhart than swooning over him, Megan especially, given what she'd already faced by that point in her life.

Third year, however, was a pain. Megan's Bogart shocked the class (I mentioned it in the first chapter) as it was the demonic creature that attacked her school when she was ten. The guy was an 'army killer', meaning it could have done much worse than eat just the school had Megan and Sally not distracted it until their great-great-grandfather took it down.

They also had the Dementors around, which Megan would likely have had a bad response to, given her past, but she's also one who is likely to lash out. Her attacks on them probably made her something of a legend, or would have had they been seen. Very few can handle a Dementor's presence; fewer can fight one with anything other than a Patronus.

Fourth year was a quiet one for the girls all in, though they didn't involve themselves in the anti-Harry brigade that Malfoy started, in part because Malfoy.