Harry immediately cast a flame-freezing charm and other spells.

Some of them reacted with the electronics but didn't cause further explosions. When he was certain it the emergency aspect was done he turned and saw, to his horror, that the wounded and unconscious Royal Engineer was Rebecca Steilson, his friend and lover. He hit his badge. "Potter to Glen Lyon." The Glen Lyon was the ship monitoring Institute operations. "Emergency beam out for all personnel around me."

"We're two minute out."

He looked at the injured. "Bajorans are wounded but not critical." He hit the badge again. "Potter to Sutherland. Scan for downed Human near my position and beam to your sickbay!"

"Can you put your badge on the patient?"

Harry quickly took his badge off and slapped it on Rebecca. "Now!" She disappeared and in about fifteen seconds another Starfleet personnel appeared.

"I'm here because there are no other comm badges to communicate – Captain Forrester ordered me down. The other crew member is too far away." Harry had left the other security officer on the shuttle.

Harry nodded. "Thank him for me when there is a chance." He looked around. "Once we get the wounded out, the Glen Lyon will need to send down a team to find out what happened. The other Royal Engineers would be the best option."


Harry was transported up even as the Glen Lyon was transporting crew members down. The Botanical Institute was also alerted.

Harry went immediately to Sickbay. When he arrived, a doctor and a nurse were working feverishly on Rebecca. William was also there. "What's going on?" Harry asked quietly.

William's expression was hard. "Your quick action likely saved her life. She was bleeding heavily internally. She's also lost a hand – she will have to be fitted for a replacement."

Harry winced. "Won't that interfere with her abilities as an engineer?"

William replied, "Our medical sciences are quite advanced with such things. She will have to return to Earth for the best treatment – the Sutherland doesn't have the advanced treatments available there. They can, however, seal it properly so as to minimize deterioration."

The two watched for a few minutes. Rebecca's readings were stabilizing. Harry finally sighed. "We should go. She appears to be out of the woods and we really should find out what happened."

"I agree," William said grimly. "I think it's time for the Royal bastard to come out and play."

Harry gave a thin smile. "I'd like to see that."


The Sutherland and the Glen Lyon quickly determined that the damage was created by sabotage. How it was triggered was being determined – it was necessary to find out because no one could ensure the Bajorans on scene were innocent until they knew.

There was another complication. On board the Sutherland, while waiting for a report William was given a message. "Highness. We've been contacted by Deep Space 9." William looked at Captain Forrester. "A representative has arrived at Deep Space 9 and wishes to greet you officially on behalf of his government."

Harry had a bad feeling even as William asked, "Who is it and who are they representing?"

"Gul Dukat of the Cardassian Empire," Forrester said with a serious tone.

Harry started muttering sulfurously. William said, "Sir Harry? Is there something I should know?"

Harry suddenly realized where he was. "Er. Sorry, Highness. I have some past experience with Gul Dukat, or at least his shenanigans."

"Explain."

Harry did so, explaining why he could not respond officially. Forrester showed a bit of shock when Harry described how he and his elves had invaded and defeated a cloaked Bird of Prey that Gul Dukat had set them on him, wanting his elves. It was something Harry still smarted about.

William said, "I will have to ignore that officially, as you had to. His past position as Prefect of Bajor makes him an unpleasant thorn for both the Federation and Bajor." Harry truly wanted to protest, but his oath given to Queen Elizabeth compelled him to follow the Royal Heir. Only Charles could outvote William's word.

He hadn't known what how much of a chain he would take on when he had accepted his Knighthood. Harry learned that there were reasons Magicals had gotten away from giving an oath to the King. His loyalty was magically enforced.

It was only by sheer chance that neither Queen Elizabeth nor King Charles were interested in controlling him more fully. William, thank Merlin, seemed to follow his father's inclinations.

William thought about the report of the Cardassian waiting. "Inform Deep Space 9 that I am currently engaged in important matters and will not be available to meet with the Cardassian Representative for at least two days. And then have Commander Sisko emphasize my family's traditional vs. legal status as regards the Earth government. Suggest a more appropriate representative would be civilian, perhaps from the Detapa Council."

Forrester nodded. "Yes, Highness."


It took a day but the findings had been put together. William and Harry visited Rebecca, who was awake but recovering. Harry spoke, "I'm so sorry you have to go through this."

Rebecca was in decent humor. "I'm like Anakin and Luke Skywalker. I'll be okay once it gets replaced."

Harry chuckled at that – he had ignored that part of the films. "You'll be going back to Earth without a proper send off from me."

Rebecca gave him a friendly smile. "Neither one of us was expressing undying love, Harry. We both were having fun – quite a lot of fun – but we're no each other's one and only. Wouldn't you agree?" she asked.

Harry sighed. "I know. But it still is depressing."

"I know." Rebecca then gave a short laugh. "I might have to find someone with a different shaped tongue – you'll be hard to replace when it comes to certain activities."

Harry grinned, though it was small. "One advantage of that I learned years after I found I had that skill."

"I'll think fondly of you in the future when I daydream," she said with a cheeky smile.

"Good." He looked back and said, "William is waiting for me to finish. We're about to go speak to the Council of Ministers privately. With tensions high and with Gul Dukat or some other idiot waiting for an official greeting back on Deep Space 9, we can't broadcast what happened far and wide. But William is going to put his Royal boot up a few arses."

"Tell him to give them hell for me."

"I will."

Harry briefly kissed her and then went to William. "Your Highness, I believe you have a message from your Royal Father for the Council of Ministers?"

William smirked. "I do, Sir Harry. You, of course, will be there to ensure I am under the protection of a true knight."

"It will be an honor, Your Highness." Harry bowed.


Later that day, Harry followed Prince William Windsor of Great Britain on Earth. Both were wearing formal garb. Harry was formal battle robes with all awards and medals on display.

The formal greetings were tedious and detailed. Finally William asked, "I formally request the next portion become private as I wish to discuss matters my father deemed necessary to report to the Council of Ministers alone. Can this be accomplished?"

Minister Jaro magnanimously approved it for the entire council and even ordered the recorders to stop. He then looked at William.

William turned, "Sir Harry?"

"Of course, Highness."

To the shock of the Council, Harry retrieved a wand and cast numerous spells. Some had obvious effects – two windows closed – and others were not so obvious. He then nodded to William and stepped back to his shoulder.

"What was that, Prince William?" Jano asked.

"Sir Harry was making certain my comments are private." He looked at Harry. "And are we now private?"

"Only the Prophets themselves could listen in, Highness," Harry said with complete certainty.

"Good." He turned back to the Council. "Now we need to speak of the matter of sabotage against my people."

William then lit into everyone there, informing them how badly he and his father would react should anything similar happen again. He included pulling all funding from Earth for the Botanical Institute and removing all seeds that were not Bajoran.

Without waiting for them to reply (they were shocked at William's intense emotions) he then nodded to Harry who quickly removed the pricacy charms. "I thank the Council of Ministers," William said in his most friendly tone, "for the opportunity to discuss the accident privately. I am aware how important your time is to the care of your people and so I and Sir Harry will withdraw to allow you to properly manage your people and its recovery. Thank you."

William then turned and left, Harry followed behind. When they were outside Harry asked quietly, "Wasn't that a bit rude at the end?"

William gave a small smile, "Yes. If you noticed, they likely did as well."

Harry chuckled quietly, "I'm certain they did." He looked around. "Ready to go?"

"Yes."

Harry did something he rarely: He disapparated, holding William's shoulder to side-along him. They disappeared from the hall (shielded from transporters) and appeared in the Institute. Harry hit his badge. "Two to beam up." William hit his bracelet to allow it to happen.

The Bajoran Militia members on duty had seen the two Humans move into a passageway and then not reappear on the other side. It caused a bit of upset when no one could explain it. Even sensors had not detected any transporter effects.

William was curious. "The bracelet prevents me from being transported but you can take me with you own magic?"

Harry nodded. "I set the charms and made certain I or the elves could move you as necessary. The scattering field was a product of what we learned when we arrived into this timeline – the elves and I actually feel the transporter and, if we choose, can fight it. It took little tinkering to recreate that effect. Scanners read it as a scattering field, so that's what we called it rather than an anti-transport ward."

William sent a message for the Sutherland to return to DS9 and then turned back to Harry. "So you can set a 'flavor' if you will of energy which can be omitted from the ward?"

"Yes," Harry replied. "It's called keying someone in."

"Are transporters the same between ships or do they use unique energy signals?"

Harry was about to answer when he stopped. After some thought he said, "There should be no way to key in a particular ship. But then again, magic defies rationality. Possibly there's a way to 'tune' a transporter to a particular frequency and then set the anti-transport field to be immune or susceptible to that frequency. I'd have to talk to Miles and a few other engineers."

William nodded. "Something to research. For the moment, I can take my bracelet off." William paused. "What about my father? Our families? I kind of like the inability to be transported without permission for children."

Harry sighed. "Give me two days and let me see what I can put together."


It didn't take two days. It took a few hours.

Harry's magical database came up with family rings, something older families still used.

Harry contacted Miles. "How can I help, Sir Harry?"

Harry motioned to the replicator. "From what I understand, this ties in to a store of matter, right?"

"Yes."

"Is there any way to retarget the source location?" Harry asked.

"What do you mean?" Miles asked curiously.

"I want to make some items but they can't have quantum errors. From what I've been told, that requires matter made from that material – that is particularly true for dense elements."

"Right."

"So, I want to make items made from gold, but I want to provide the gold as source material. I figure I made certain that I provide more gold than I need and I won't have any troubles due to entropy."

Miles considered that. "We can probably do it. We'd have to sacrifice some transport enhancers to target a particular area."

"Will the Sutherland or the Glen Lyon have those?"

Miles waved him off. "I've got several, and I'm willing to provide them. They're the kind of thing that the Quartermaster department expects to have to provide regularly. You've helped us with supplies from Utopia Planetia – I'd say you're due."

Miles was shocked when the source location was a trunk. But with a bit of effort, it worked. Harry took a kilo of raw gold and, using it as the "source", he crafted a ring for the Head of House ring for Windsor, an Heir's ring with the crest of Wales, and twelve family rings.

The required runes were programmed directly in by the replicator. Harry then showed William how to get his father to key in the Head of House ring and family rings.

In addition, Harry made a Portkey Beacon. On a stone carved with wards, to be placed in the basement of New Buckingham, wards were included to allow family rings to be triggered by a codeword (Sanctorium) to move the wearer to New Buckingham. The family member had to be on Earth, but it would work from anywhere on Earth.

The ward stone was also "replicated" – the Federation replicator, with a hunk of raw marble as source, constituted a ward stone. It took an hour and enough energy to make it. The resulting ward stone, however, was without flaws. It was without incursions, with runes perfectly placed and shaped. A simple procedure to bind it by blood and it would be active.

Harry could only do a stone one foot cubed because that was the limits of the replicator, but Harry had high hopes for using it to create wards for ships. His ancestors could probably have never envisioned being able to "make" a stone, or "make" a ring without magic.

Harry kept the process to himself – it had far too many possible effects to become well known.

A replicator could re-order matter, but if it had the same matter with the correct molecular structure, it didn't have to re-order anything. It could just use the matter as it originally was. Normally, this was done on a limited basis because replicators were tied in to a bunch of matter stored for that purpose. Harry's replicator had to be tied in manually. It was in that particular process that Harry had taken advantage. The manual subroutine had been directed to a trunk which Federation technology read as a subspace field but which was an expanded space.

It was, Harry decided, distinctly odd.

Still, before William was scheduled to leave the system with his Engineers, the rings had been made as hard a ward stone. He was sending them back with William but Harry would make sure they were properly keyed in when he next visited Earth.

With Major Kira's assistance, William dodged a number of calls from Bajor once it was determined that it was mostly Ministers being pissy.


Gul Dukat returned without a member of the Detapa Council. William decided to meet him at Quark's. Sisko was nearby, as was Kira Nerys.

The confident Cardassian leader arrived at Quarks. Sisko, in a chair, spoke. "Gul Dukat. I see you've returned."

"I have. Is the Human Prince now available?"

Sisko motioned. "I do believe that is Prince William Windsor, right there, along with Sir Harry Potter."

"Another man I have longed to meet."

"Feel free." Sisko sat down.

Dukat asked, "Aren't you going to introduce me?"

Sisko shrugged. "Despite their diplomatic status, they are not 'holding court' as it were. If this was an official meeting, you would have brought a member of the civilian government." Sisko looked around. "Is there someone I've missed?"

"No," Dukat said with a smirk. "I felt the inclusion of a civilian member of the Detapa Council would not provide anything of substantive value, as this Prince William is not actually a ruler. Despite his diplomatic status."

"Right," Sisko said, giving his wide smile. To anyone who knew him, it was not something you wanted to see. But Dukat didn't know him that well. "As you say. Feel free to introduce yourself." Sisko nodded and deliberately took a sip of his drink.

Dukat looked at him for a long moment and then decided to move forward. He stopped near the table. "Hello. Am I correct in assuming I am addressing Prince William of Earth?"

William nodded. "Yes. Actually it is Prince William Windsor, Traditional Prince of Wales, Heir to the Hereditary Throne of Great Britain, Head of the Commonwealth. And you are ….?"

"I am Gul Dukat, of the Cardassian Military, former Prefect of Bajor, in fact."

"I see. How can I help you, Gul Dukat?" William asked mildly.

"Do you mind if I sit?" he asked.

"It's a free station … now."

Dukat sat down. "I heard you were inspecting the results of the work done by the reclamators you sent from Earth."

"My father sent," William corrected. "He was offended by the damage left when your people left at the end of the occupation."

"There was some small damage. Obviously there are conflicting reports as to how such damage occurred," Dukat said.

Harry spoke up. "And you think that somehow the Bajorans poisoned their own fields? 350 square kilometers?"

"And you are, I believe, Sir Harry Potter. You came from the wormhole, if rumors are to be believed."

"I came through the wormhole – I am from a different timeline. That is well known."

"Yes. Well. As far as how the Bajoran lands were poisoned … that is something that occurred before you arrived. I am certain that you only received a biased view of what occurred."

Kira Nerys, watching from nearby, sounded off. "His Highness listened to eye-witness testimony."

"Major Kira," Dukat said.

William spoke to interfere. "All of the repartee might be amusing but you came to speak to me?"

Dukat looked at William for a moment and then said, "Yes. I wanted to speak to the man representing the King of Earth who inserts himself into Bajoran matters."

William chuckled, "Your translator is malfunctioning or you are using terms that have numerous meanings. My father is of Earth and he is a King … he is not the King of Earth. He only is a caretaker for Great Britain and its people. As far as inserting himself into Bajoran matters … he's hardly the first. The Cardassians did so for close to a century. However, his Majesty received a request for assistance and even without that, his humanity demanded that he assist the Bajorans whose suffering he felt kinship with. Because of our own history, Great Britain on Earth has been able to provide some small succor to our Bajoran relations. For that opportunity we are grateful."

"Bajoran relations? I don't think I know what you mean?" Dukat said.

"I only meant that we are all, in a way, brothers and sisters. It behooves us, I think, to treat other sentients as kin from afar. On Earth we call it the Golden Rule: Treat others as you would wish yourself to be treated. If, in some distant future, Great Britain has need of something that Bajor might provide, we can only hope that they will do so with compassion and not reluctance, as we have helped them."

Major Kira said, "If I have any say should that come to pass, I will do what I can to ensure that our debt, even if you do not claim it, is acknowledged. Many Bajorans feel bonds of kinship and affection with the Humans of Great Britain on Earth."

William smiled. "I am glad to hear that." He looked back at the Cardassian. "And now you have met me. I will pass on your words to my father. Perhaps, in the future, we might discuss matters more closely. If you will excuse me, I have need of the refresher now."

William quickly left with Harry following. Dukat said, "I think I will wait. Perhaps we can have further discussion sooner rather than later."

Major Kira said, "As Prince William said … it's a free port. I, however, have duties to return to, as does Commander Sisko."

Sisko nodded. "Yes. Meal time is over. Good day, Gul Dukat."

Quark came over. "Would you like something to drink or eat?"

"I'll have kanar."

Quark nodded. "One kanar coming up." Quark paused. "I have a limited supply so it will be a bit more expensive than usual."

"How much?" Dukat asked. Quark named the price, and Dukat waved him to get on with it.

The Cardassian sat at Quark's drinking his kanar. It took nearly a quarter hour before he considered matters strange. "How long does it take this Prince to use a refresher?" he asked out loud.

A voice from behind said, "He was done with the refresher in two minutes. But he also had a ship waiting." Dukat stood quickly and saw Sir Harry Potter appear from the docking area. "Quark. A bottle of butterbeer!"

"Right."

Dukat said, "I did not see him leave."

Harry smiled. "He was assisted in doing so. There had been threats so I was in charge of his security until he left on the Sutherland. Which disconnected from Deep Space 9 just … four minutes ago."

Dukat pulled out a small device. His ship answered. "Did the Federation ship Sutherland just detach from the station?"

"Yes, Sir. It has already started vectoring away at full impulse."

"I see. Carry on." Dukat put away his device. "A pity. There were so many things I wanted to discuss with him."