Chapter 6:

In the Hogwarts Express

Okay. Here is the next chapter, hope you enjoy it. Regarding what you are saying about chapters in the past: They will become necessary for you to understand certain moments when the story is not about Harry and Voldemort. Please trust I know what I am doing…

Hogwarts Express, Border of Scotland. September 2th,1991.

When Morgana sat next to the window, as Ron had 'relinquished' his seat to being next to Harry. He was obviously an awkward preteenager boy, it was obvious that he would rather seat next to a live lion than her. Right?

Morgana had been expecting that. She had been at school so long as to know how boys' minds worked.

What she did not expect was to slowly fall down looking at the forests. Her eyes narrowed slowly, looking at the shades of green in the foliage. The slow movement of the train did not help.

She loved the train, now. It moved slowly and the windows showed a beautiful landscape. Great Hills and lowlands as far as she could see.

She needed no sleep, really. She could go without any, with her energy sustained by her magic. But sometimes she could not help falling asleep.

When Helena had died, her pain had kept her awake for a few days. She could not help sleeping afterwards, her magic was strained in keeping her up; and with no food to make matters worse. Overall, she needed no food either.

She had not liked the Express at first, too. Had vociferously talked against the initiative; it was a Muggle creation, quite unsafe... If the tracks were to be destroyed... She would not go so far as to call it unsanitary as some wizards had, Muggles were quite clean; but using it would have been tempting fate.

Merlin however had liked it quite much. He said, the train had a steady movement and fascinating workings. He had paid for it himself, or at least most of it. And had spoken favorably about the machine.

Funnily enough, many wizards, who had spoken against; had began rooting for the change when Myredero Ambrose began upholding the Minister's idea. Why, Merlin had been greatly smug that afternoon…

She yawned for one last time, and fell asleep face staring at the window. Her eyes fell and her hand stopped her head from doing the same. But to her. That was not exactly the case...

She suddenly fell much awake, her eyes drifted to the seat looking for the children. But the seats were empty. Where had they gone?

For a minute or so, she had wondered... Had she fallen asleep for too long? Had neither Harry or Ron the decency to wake the priestess up? Had she missed Hogwarts' stop?

What a Chosen One... She thought sarcastically. She blinked at the window. Noticing scratch markings slowly appearing in the middle. Against her better judgement she edged closer to the window.

It shredded itself, breaking up, with a characteristical noise. Pieces of metal and glass fell to the floor, and the latter broke too. Morgana screamed and jumped back to the door, hitting it with her back. She saw the crack of the window expand bigger and bigger until it swallowed the seats. She turned and tried in vain to open the windowed door.

Not only it didn't budge, but there was no carpeted floor behind the glass, there was just an empty space looking right at the tracks. What on Earth is going on? She thought, turning away, the window was now an arm length to swallowing her too.

A thought assaulted her mind. Quite unsafe, wasn't it?

She turned back and yelped when she saw a bony hand turning the handle.

"He is not here!" A voice said. She turned around and saw the full moon appear on top of the forest. The door opened with a crash and Morgana, without thinking twice, she jumped through.

To an enormous cliff below. The sea crashed in waves to the rocks, and before she reached the water, she saw a small house on the cliff..

Merlin stared through the window in a amused sort of way. He had passed through the very same woods thousands of times. He knew that it was with Arthur once. Who knew? Perhaps just right there a thousand and a half years ago; he and the prince sat.

But then the forest had been cropped down by muggles and wizards alike. He may just be several kilometers out of mark relating to Camelot and the Britain of his youth.

"You know Ambrose." The boy drawled and Merlin huffed an annoying sigh. "If you were as smart as you want all of us to think you would not have made a scene in the station." The boy had a hand on a candy, a very expensive magical brand from London.

Merlin groaned. Crabbe and Goyle nodded, looking at each other. Merlin was ashamed to say he had actually bought from that ridiculous pricey café, the orange cake was just too good to ignore. Morgana however had a huge stash of desserts. Which The Warlock never dared to touch.

"They can think?" Merlin asked, sarcastically. This time the insult was not thin veiled enough for the huge boys to ignore. Crabbe growled and Goyle stood up going towards the Warlock.

Merlin narrowed his eyes, feeling both annoyed and exhausted. Should the two try anything they would, so definitely, fly through the window. And the goddess damn the repercussions of killing his classmates.

"Do not be stupid Goyle!" Draco barked. "You do anything to him and Myredero Ambrose will get your father fired!" Goyle sat down reluctantly, still glaring daggers at the Immortal.

Of course, he would. Merlin would use all the political power he had attained over the years to get the ministry to dismiss Mr. Goyle.

Being a major donator on the Ministries of Magic around the world, he doubted any of them would ignore him. They couldn't afford it.

Latin American Ministries depended on him real bad. And African ones would fail if it was not for his intervention. Merlin truly wished he could do more, but even he was not powerful enough to dismantle the system.

He just turned away back to the window, he hoped the attendant selling food arrived soon. He was really starving.

Morgana had three types of visions, those that showed the future and those that showed the past, but also there were those that made no bloody sense at all. This dream was shaping to be one of the last. And those were the worse kind.

She hit the water with so much force that she lost her breath, it pummeled her head and she felt the freezing cold as the steady liquid hit her, as she swam up, she saw a dragon reflected in the lake. But looking up she saw nothing.

Not the train or the dragon, the sky was red, but the water was black already, black and real cold. She swam to the shore, and as she climbed out she saw a formed marble piece on the middle of a tiny island in a bigger lake.

She breathed loudly, the water was so cold... So, cold. That it hurt her to breathe. And it was summer…

She scolded herself; the old Morgana had been stabbed, poisoned, betrayed and forced to live without eating properly. That she would now suffer so much because of being wet, regardless of how cold it was...

This was real, whatever it was... She did not just see it, she was feeling it. And she did not like it. Not at all.

She turned towards the left, she knew this place. An enormous and majestic castle stood alone... The hundreds of windows shone with interior light. She knew the number by heart: 7373 windows. And there were in all 15097 stair steps. She had after all designed the bloody place. (1)

Hogwarts? How did she? But then thunder flashed and Hogwarts crashed, breaking as if in slow motion. She gasped, running towards the castle, thinking only of saving her home and all the survivors. If there were any.

But then there was no castle when she finally got there, the pieces of it had edged on the ground, hard rock standing out the grass. Eerily she shuffled around, the remains had formed a cementery? Fitting, perhaps.

If she had stopped and think she would have realized that she was dry and that she could not look back. No matter how much she would try.

And then she felt watched, there was someone looking at her from a broken house at the end of the row... The world had changed once again.

Godric's Hollow? Was she dreaming? Was it a nightmare or something else? She had not seen anything in such a long time... Her thoughts had even wandered if she had lost her power. She had wished it was the case, being a seer was such a burden.

She could force visions using crystals and such, but dreams like those she had when she was a ward had not hit her in half a millennia.

And Godric's boyhood house, she had not visited since James and Lily had died. That 31st had been the last time Morgana had been there. Never again. Oh, she had done it before, Gryffindor land was a famous place.

She made special efforts to avoid those places that held only pain, and having arrived to late to save them both had caused her great pain indeed. She had tried, but the Fidelius Charm was old magic and she was not a secret keeper. She could not get in. Not until it was too late.

If this was anything but a vision then her powers seemed not to have gone. They seemed to be getting stronger, if anything... She had never felt her visions, only seen them. Like a movie on that tridimensional system she had recently seen, or those plays, of those Merlin really enjoyed.

Posteriorly she was a true and powerful seer. So she read tea leaves, predicted using the stars, use crystals; even crystals not from THE cave... They were not so strong as those taken from that place, but it also made her sad, so; she also felt some little things.

When she had been a Muggle, she would say 'phone'... And it would ring. Or 'Come in.' And someone was about to knock the door.

It was instinctive. And it drove Merlin crazy. There was a surprise birthday party fiasco, which Merlin had planned for her, with astonishing detail but Morgana had seen coming. But she had misunderstood the thing, people sneaking on her and jumping out, could have been anything; so she had enchanted the room to defend herself.

The resulting magic had nearly killed everyone inside, and Merlin had not been pleased. From that time and on Merlin's parties were announced to her with years of anticipation. And no more surprises for her, anyway, too bad; as she liked surprises as much as the next bystander.

She edged towards that building where Lily and James had lived in. She had been there when the grass was green, the hedge trimmed and it was done. In fact, to add insult to injury, she had been Lily's maid of honor.

She loved Lily Evans. And she had liked James Potter well enough.

They both had died in there. The house was just like she remembered it, resounding with Dark Magic, broken and dusty. She felt acute pain, why had she allowed it to happen. Lily had been her one true friend in a very long time.

Her hand grabbed the old house, and then it was not a house but a tower. Dark and Imposing, it was old and she knew it well. The Dark Forest, the same as the Forbidden one, in Hogwarts. Just much deeper.

Nobody would ever found it. Ever.

Merlin and her had made some efforts to keep anyone away from it. Illusions... Traps... The warlock and the witch had made shields to keep the evil in. And the humans out. The tower could not be seen and to enter, one had to go right through a mountain wall.

Back in the time they had even considered destroying the old tower. But something stopped them both, it was unique but no entirely odd or difficult for them to feel the same instinctual message from the Old Religion.

So they decided against it.

She would go in and cast purifying spells on it. And Merlin would re-do the shields, the repelling and the illusions.

Perhaps it was due now. They had done it every hundred years or so, and the time was not there yet, but she would convince Merlin, it had to be done.

But the tower seemed not so old anymore, it seemed quite new. As she saw it, the chiseling was new, or at least remade. As Morgana scratched it with her hand someone hissed, and as she turned she found herself in the air, high into a sky full with black thunder clouds. And then she was screaming, as she fell, and as she woke up, the scream became gasping and shrill.

The red eyes haunting her...

Merlin blinked away, there was something wrong.

Morgana was not there. She had suddenly and virtually disappeared, he tried to focus on her again but she was missing still. Startled, he jumped up, leaving to find her. Whatever had happened between them, there was a powerful sense of loyalty.

"Ambrose!" Malfoy screamed after him. "Where are you going? Ambrose!" But Merlin ignored him. Whatever he had felt in the Old Religion, he hated the boy. Spoiled Brat.

He saw Hermione on the way, and she caught up to him. "Martin, are you alright? You look pale..." She asked. Merlin nodded. She had changed to her Hogwarts uniform before anyone else, including prefects, but he could not judge her. She was obviously excited.

"Yeah, fine. I do not like train travel much." He lied. But it was not exactly a lie, he had been a slightly dizzy the first time around, and the second, and the third, and the next... The train was fascinating and all, but seeing it work had not the same as being on it while it did.

So after avoiding it for quite a long while, he had chosen to support Ottaline Gambol's attempt. He really could not say 'no'. When she had sought his help herself, and all but begged him for support.

"But they are amazing. You know that the Hogwarts Express was adapted in 1827, it was the greatest gamble of a ministry of magic in the time." Hermione said. Almost as if quoting a book, perhaps she read more than him.

"Yeah, I know." Merlin grinned, for a moment forgetting about Morgana's disappearance. "My family was a major donator for it's doing. We did it so, because we thought that it would reduce Pure-Blood Resistance to the idea." Hermione's eyes widened. Merlin knew that that was not in any book; perhaps he could teach her a lot of interesting things she would like. And perhaps even she could teach him too.

Hermione seemed even more surprised than before. "So you know how many innovations has it gone through?"

"Three if I remember correctly…"

"Seven, with the ones made to prepare it." She corrected. Looking a bit smug.

Merlin smiled. "Well you see… There you go." He laughed. "I did not know everything. But Myredero, could give you a run for your money." He had never counted those made to prepare it, truly they had been four just as she had said. Heck, he had paid for them.

Hermione beamed. "So I can meet him?" Her eyes were filled with excitement and awe.

"I would say yes, perhaps I will invite you to Ambrose Manor." said Merlin. "I reckon he would not mind." And then he did not mind even a little bit. He would enjoy having her there.

Only there was the insignificant problem of how to introduce her to himself. Maybe he would figure that detail out eventually, and even throw a party.

The girl just stared with a dreamy smile. "Great." Merlin chuckled, she seemed really excited. He should re-read his diary, and some history books. You know… to prepare.

She saw a boy in the end of the line and gasped. Martin turned around, "Martin, I gotta go. I was helping Neville here to find his toad. " The boy was a bit lumpy, brown haired and brown eyed. He seemed to have been crying, or something.

Neville swallowed. "His name's Trevor." He said with more than one obvious amount of shyness.

Hermione Granger stared at the boy, whatever the name was, the toad was no dog and would never listen, as they had no ears… But she seemed to avoid saying it, and just looked annoyed. "Alright. Martin if you see a toad…"

He promised he would call them if he did. Hermione walked to the next stall. And he just walked on ahead, until he saw Harry and Ron, they were talking, of something with fast childish urgency. And Morgana laid in front, sleeping with a frown. He sighed out in relief.

Now that she was there he could indeed feel her. But in an almost absent way, or at least her magic was. Merlin knew exactly what it meant. But sadly there was very little he could do...

Morgana's visions did not occur as often, but other seer related powers did. She was growing in strength of magic. And when visions came, her premonitions were much, much worse that they had been in Camelot. Her powers had grown.

As had his. Consequences, Merlin supposed, consequences of their very long life.

Every fifty years or so, their powers grew in might. His Dragonlord trait had evolved too, first in Parsel-tongue and then in what he called Lizard-Speech. Now he felt like soon enough he would end speaking Lion or something.

Perhaps in a thousand years he would be able to talk to every animal existing. That would be interesting, he could get cats to follow Morgana, as she was allergic. Payback. It would be fun.

Their connection to animals grew too. At first animals just walked close to them, and eventually they began bowing. Normal animals first, next, Magical.

Which had been sad too. Dragons, Unicorns, every powerful portent of the old religion had began to lessen. Becoming weaker, lesser that they had been. As they grew, the other portents fell.

Dragons were the worse, he could no longer speak to them as equals, they would heed his orders but they would never give advice like Kilgharrah did.

Unicorns had become less pure, Trolls bigger and more stupid, the Questing Beasts were now truly extinct (not that that was seriously a bad thing ), and Serkets had not been seen in a thousand years (again, no complains!). And some spells had been lost entirely to the world.

Merlin had not heard of the Great Dragon, he had just gone, the goddess knew where, to do she knows what...

The Warlock knew that he was alive somewhere, and that he would come back when the time came. Merlin knew that should he die, he would feel it in the air. Or he hoped that was the case.

He never did call the Dragon back, he supposed Kilgharrah would show up when the time was right. And Merlin was willing to wait forever should it be necessary, he just hoped he would not have to.

And he did not feel like opening those scars just yet.

When Morgana had woken, with a shrill cut off scream she had expected the boys to notice it. But, to her surprise, they didn't, so busy they had been on their talks...

She looked out the door, and sighed in relief when she SAW the carpeted floor. And unsurprisingly Merlin out there, too. He probably had felt her vision happening and come to check up on her. So sweet.

'Are you alright, Gana'? ' He asked her in her mind. Aware that Harry and Ron were watching she looked away from the door.

'Worried about me, Emrys?' She teased. He frowned, looking annoyed. 'Relax, Merlin. I am fine.' Years of Visions had made her more capable of letting them go. Too bad she did not have her diadem anymore, as it made her power grow.

It was not that she was so smart, but her knowledge was great. And priestess were meant to follow that.

He let out a mental sigh. 'Was it bad?'

'Awful' She growled. 'But let's talk later, shall we?' Merlin nodded and took off. Obviously feeling her distress and annoyance.

"Chocolate Frogs have cards, inside them, you know, to collect - famous witches and wizards. I've got about five hundred, but I haven't got Agrippa or Ptolemy." Ron was saying. Harry was unwrapping the chocolate frog's card, Morgana raised her head to stare.

She could not see the man or woman in the card, but Harry half-grinned.

"So this is Dumbledore!" Harry said, loudly. Morgana felt a spasm of pain, he had looked just like James as he said it.

She tried not to think of the Auror and his wife, her friends; or of her visions for that matter. Or any thing that brought pain and grief that she would never be able to control. And becoming angry or stressed out of it was a mistake, as far as she was concerned.

So, even when this vision she had just have made her very queasy, of the moment. She would ignore it. It was not the first time she had managed to change her visions, it would not be the last.

But now, tomorrow, a year or a hundred, they would all die. And she wouldn't. Merlin wouldn't. They were surrounded by so many people, but they were alone. No one would ever understand. No one would last enough to do it.

"Don't tell me you'd never heard of Dumbledore!" said Ron. He looked surprised, shocked but then he just bit his lip and asked. "Can I have a frog? I might get Agrippa - thanks -"

Harry turned at her, and blushing, asked her if she would like one too. She smiled at him, and nodded, thanking him. She opened the wrap and took the chocolate in.

She loved Chocolate, it had not existed in her time. So when she had first taste it, she had truly enjoyed the sweetness. As she did still.

She turned the card back, she often ignored it, as Harry read his card, and blinked. Merlin would love this. The picture was that of a very old man, he had shining blue eyes and wore a blood-red long cloak. With a white hood in the background. His hair was silver, and long and he had a huge beard.

She was staring at Emrys.

Harry turned the card out as he finished reading and his eyes widened. "He's gone!"

"Well, you can't expect him to hang around all day," Ron answered. "He'll be back. No, I've got Morgana again and I've got about six of her... do you want it? You can start collecting."

Morgana blinked again as she saw the card and her picture. She did not look even remotely like that! Her hair was not brown, and she never wore it like that! And she never would have, what an awful style.

Well, it was brown now... And she had used it brown for a while, as she had used red, and blonde, and black. And once, even, silver.

"In, you know, the Muggle world, people just stay put in photos." Harry said. Morgana nodded; she would have to take Ron to the movies someday.

"Do they? What they don't move at all? That's weird!" Morgana giggled at Ron's amazement. For her moving and talking portraits that could think were weird. Thank the goddess that only magical people could be immortalize that way. She would hate if someone was to make one of Arthur's.

"Actually, Ron, Muggle pictures came first." Morgana grinned. "We wizards just copied them. Adding Magic to the mix." Ron blinked. She was doing her best not to burst out laughing, Merlin would love the card, really…

"Really?" The red head asked, looking shocked. The Weasley family were good folk, but they probably had been taught that Muggles had copied everything from Wizards.

Which mostly was the other way around.

"Yes." She laughed. "The first of them, only did repeating motions over and over again." Morgana shook her head. "Got boring, very soon." The very first time she had seen one, of Merlin; it nodded, bowed and winked; in that order.

She still would not let Merlin live that one down. When he talked to her, sometimes she would do it and he would get very annoyed. It was amusing.

"Who did you get?" Harry asked her. He seemed to be losing some shyness. Morgana had that effect on people mostly boys. They became inhibited in front of her.

Morgana laughed softly, before answering. "Myredero Ambrose."

Merlin did not know what to do. Anyway, he could help Neville Longbottom find his toad, alongside Hermione. Or return to Draco, in turn. Normally the choice would be hanging out with the good crowd. He hated bullies, he could not stand them.

But the Old Religion wanted something out of Draco, and he should find out what... Even if the Malfoy had been a pain in the backside. But had Arthur been any different after all? Both were proud, indifferent and believed the world belonged to them.

And Arthur could send Merlin to the stocks, Draco had no power over him. He had the upper hand this time. And then nobody would blame him if he turned Draco into a snail. But still he could do better…

So he shook his head, and drawing out his wand. Pointed at the hallway and mumbled. "Accio Toad." The creature swam in the air and he grabbed it, taking care not to hurt it. Too bad he could not talk toad yet. Whatever Lizard-Speech would help on.

He scratched, Trevor, was it?, in the head and whispered to it. "Should we find your owner now?"

And after that, Draco. Right? That would be fun. He muttered a couple of hexes to use on Crabbe and Goyle. Maybe he could turn their bodies into chocolate and the problem would take care of itself... He chuckled, now that was an idea! But still he could not do the same with the little Malfoy Dragon.

Ron gasped and jumped next to her. "I knew they would make one for him! I knew it!" The fact that it was silver only made it better. Of course they would eventually, Morgana thought, it was a wonder he did not have one.

Harry Potter looked at the back from his seat, and asked, "Can I read it?" He seemed most interested in the cards. Muggleborns often did. The term had had it's first using in 899, Merlin and herself had been shocked, to hear it. And in 923 it was the official term.

Now the term was insulting in the true meaning.

Anyhow, Harry had been raised a muggle himself. Morgana hoped that it would be a good insensitive for Wizards to be nicer to Nomaj as they called them in America.

"Sure." said Morgana and she passed it to him.

"Read it aloud, Harry." Said Ron. The black haired boy nodded and cleared his throat.

MYREDERO AMBROSE BURGUN

VOTED MOST MYSTERIOUS WIZARD ALIVE

Myredero's mistery begins with his age, born September 2, 1591; he is 400 years as of this year. Myredero's been around plenty, and he is a famous Historian, Magic Theorist and Politician. He is now known by his masterful defeat of Cain Gruasame, arguably the most deadly of You - Know - Who's disciples never caught. Myredero, now believed to be one of the most powerful Wizards alive; was voted Most Mysterious Wizard by The Prophet's readers in September 2, 1991, his birthday.

Ron was nodding. "Yeah, dad talked about it. Apparently this guy had managed to disappear without going through trial. Very few managed that."

"So he was very powerful?" Morgana asked. Wandering just how much attention had Merlin drawn to himself

"'A known dangerous duelist.' Dad had said." Ron almost whispered. Harry stared at the picture. "And Ambrose defeated him easily." The awe on his voice obvious.

Morgana knew how much in awe was the wizarding World to the Ambrose family. She had a feeling that deep, very deep inside they knew who Myredero was.

And she hoped eventually, they would know for real. She had wanted to reveal herself, she had gone through enough, acting, dressing and lying. It had lost its magic, pardon the pun.

Harry's eyes widened at the picture, the aged wizard grinned, and he gasped. "I know him!" He croaked. "I sat next to him on Gringotts' cart. And I saw him fight a Wizard in Diagon Alley!"

Ron's eyes widened. "Bloody Brilliant!" Morgana smiled. Merlin what have you done? And then they were all grabbing another Frog.

A'N

Invented numbers. Nothing official, should you find a canonical source saying otherwise, I will gladly change it. Hope you like it. Review!