AN: Check the first chapter for disclaimers

Vacation to France! Guess who we are going to meet? If you didn't get it right in the first try, what are you doing on this site? :P

Fun fact, in the first draft of this chapter I made an error by mentioning that Helen and Dursleys drove to France via the Chunnel. Can anyone tell why that was a mistake? Answer at the end of the chapter.

Now, enjoy the chapter...

The floo lit up and Helen stepped out into the foyer of the Diggory's home. Cedric was waiting for her and immediately greeted her with a hug and a kiss, eagerly eyeing her up. She was dressed in a wine colored fit and flare dress which had two layers. The inner layer was made of an opaque material which stopped a few inches above her knees and was sleeveless. The outer layer was a sheer net with small leaves pattern that reached upto her elbows and knees. She had accentuated the dress with short black heels and lipstick matching her dress. Her makeup was subtle but dark and her hair was done in an elegant knot. A clutch matching the color of the dress completed her look.

Helen thought the dress was perfect to meet your boyfriend's parents for the first time and would leave a good impression while showcasing her inclination towards modern clothing. Helen gave Cedric a once over as well. He was dressed like her, semi-formally, in a pair of gray chinos and a white and blue checkered shirt with his sleeves folded.

Once they were done inspecting each other, Cedric presented his arm to her and guided them to the living room where his parents were waiting. Amos and Catherine Diggory were waiting standing together next to the cozy looking sofa in the living room. Catherine, from whom Cedric had inherited his looks, looked delighted on seeing them together while Amos spectacularly failed to suppress a proud look on his face.

Diggory's were a 'light' family, that is to say, they were in the progressive block politically and used to have good relations with the Potters. However, Amos wasn't a Dumbledore lackey, as far as Helen knew, but he still tended to go with the majority of the progressives. He was also the Head of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures in the ministry, so his voice carried some significance. However, he wasn't the most pioneering of a man and rarely, if ever, put forward new ideas. Still, he wasn't an issue and was the father of her boyfriend, so she was going to treat him well.

Cedric took her up to them and introduced her, "Father, mother, this is Helen Potter, heiress to the Noble and Ancient House of Potter and my girlfriend." blushing slightly.

Helen had seen a slight twitch on Amos' face when her house's status was mentioned, and she could guess its cause. Diggory wasn't a noble or an ancient house, it was an Elder house and thus was very much below the House Potter in the hierarchy. Which meant that if Helen and Cedric were to ever marry, Cedric would have to take the name of Potter instead of the other way around, because Helen was the last of her line. That would mean the end of the house of Diggory, unless Helen decided to name one of her children as Diggory.

This was all conjuncture, of course, as she wasn't going to decide right now about who and when to marry, if at all. Despite that, Helen had a plan to help alleviate some of Amos' worry.

Cedric continued his introduction, unaware of his father's reaction and her resulting musing, "Helen, these are my parents, Lord Amos Diggory, Lord of the Elder house of Diggory and my father and Lady Catherine Diggory nee Collins, the lady of the house and my mother."

Helen gave them a curtsy, because of their status as Lord and Lady while she was only a Heiress, but not too deep, because of the difference in the ranking of their houses. For similar reasons, Amos gave her a slight bow, though he didn't need to and Catherine gave her a similar curtsy.

"Now that the formalities are done, please call us Catherine and Amos, Helen. After all, we are practically family now." Catherine gushed as she enveloped her in a warm hug, while Cedric blushed and Amos looked flabbergasted. Her own cheeks slightly pink, Helen hugged her back with a "Catherine, then."

Soon, they were seated, with Amos taking an armchair and Catherine sitting on the sofa, having directed the young couple to a loveseat, making them sit together. A house-elf had provided refreshments while Helen and Cedric were subjected to a hundred questions from Catherine, asking anything and everything about the couple.

Half an hour later Amos had come to their rescue, directing the conversation to Helen's new business. Catherine had immediately latched on to the exciting topic and had played another hundred questions to Helen about the new line of clothing, these ones Helen was happy to answer. Cedric's ability to direct the conversation towards helpful topics came in handy as well.

From there, the topic shifted to the recent headline about Sirius Black escaping Azkaban, something that had never been done. There was speculation in the papers that Black was going to come after her in revenge for his 'master' but Helen knew that he wasn't a death eater spy. Which left her confused about his motives. Her confusion was further enhanced when it was reported that he had been murmuring about Hogwarts during his last few days.

During lunch, the conversation had revolved around politics and the current political climate, with Dumbledore losing influence because of the Chamber of Secrets debacle. Helen confirmed during this conversation that Amos wasn't Dumbledore's man when he expressed his indifference about Dumbledore's falling star. He was, however, disappointed about the resulting loss of power of the Progressive block.

While eating, Helen had subtly switched a few drops of Catherine's and Amos' juice with a couple of potions hidden in her wand holster. The potions were a strong fertility potion and a mild ardour potion, which would increase both their libido and the fertility potion would take care of the rest. The fertility potion was very light pink in color, so it wouldn't stand out in the orange juice, while the ardour potion had a sweet taste, which also wouldn't be a problem. Helen wanted Cedric to herself, a spare child for the Diggory's would negate any potential political issues with their relationship.

After lunch, Cedric and Helen were left alone, so he showed her around the house. It was in Lancashire county, the nearest town being Bolton and the nearest city being Manchester. Unlike Potter Manor, which was surrounded by forest, the Diggory's home was surrounded by farmlands. The place wasn't too big but had a very cozy feel to it, very much the atmosphere of a Hufflepuffs home. Cedric ended the tour in his room and the couple sat together on Cedrics bed for a while, becoming increasingly playful with each other. Finally, Helen lost any sense of restraint and pushed him into his bed, falling on top of him. Fifteen minutes later their lips finally detached from the other as they gave each other goofy grins and unwinded together.

A few minutes later Cedric asked Helen about something that had been bothering him, "During the last few days of the year, something changed about the behavior of your year-mates in Ravenclaw. I couldn't pinpoint exactly what changed but something has happened, hasn't it? They were, I don't know, showing even more deference to you than they normally did."

He looked at her inquisitively, making Helen sigh. She had known this would happen, as Cedric was one of the few people outside of Ravenclaw who spent a significant time with her group, so he was bound to notice things. Even Daphne and Blaise had given them looks, but their occasional glances towards Padma during the train ride told her that they had probably guessed correctly. Helen looked down into Cedric's eyes and decided she could tell him about it. She started talking, explaining how last year Padma had given her oath to follow her after finding out about Voldemort still being alive, and then told him that the rest of her year-mates had done so as well this year along with Colin and Hermione.

Cedric had been surprised at that revelation but soon accepted it, realizing that Helen would need a support base whenever Voldemort resurfaced. He was contemplating the consequences of this, but was soon distracted as Helen started unbuttoning his shirt. Soon, her lips were trailing a burning path across his chest before they stopped at his left nipple and she bit down gently, making him gasp. As her fingers tried to memorize the contours of his chest, her mouth got busy sucking, licking and nibbling at his nipple drawing out gasps and groans from him.

She was unable to continue as he suddenly pulled her up and roughly captured her lips again, thrusting his hands into her hair. There was no gentleness this time, as he kissed her strongly, conveying his excitement. His tongue licked over hers and he sucked at her lips boldly, possessively. Helen gasped at his boldness and tipped herself closer, encouraging his ravaging hunger for her taste. His hands left her hair and roamed over her clothed body, fondling and squeezing her breasts and hips over her dress. Frowning to herself at the lack of skin to skin contact, Helen rose up and clambered on top of Cedric. She leaned closely down to his ears.

"You're mine." She hissed. Cedric nodded obediently, momentary fear flashing in his eyes. But, it was quickly banished as Helen tore his trousers off.

Underneath her Cedric's hands started bunching up Helen's dress, pulling it higher and higher until her thonge was the only thing covering her below the waist.

Helen's hands took hold of Cedric's erection, causing a gasp of pleasure to emit from his mouth. Taking advantage of the opportunity, Helen plunged her tongue deep into Cedric's mouth.

In response, Cedric's fingers slowly slid downwards and hungrily grabbed her panties. However, their activities were cut short by a shout from Catherine, calling them downstairs for tea. Cedric groaned in disappointment and slowly removed his hands, allowing Helen to feel some last waves of pleasure. Helen looked at his disappointed face with twisted amusement and gave him a peck on the cheek, promising they would finish what they started later.

XXXXX

Instead of taking magical transport, Helen and Dursley's were going to drive to Paris. The whole journey took about six hours, including the time on the ferry, only because they had left very early in the morning to avoid the traffic in London. They reached their hotel at 10:30, for a late breakfast or an early brunch. After eating, Helen left her relatives to their own devices, letting them enjoy their vacation and went to the magical district of Paris, Montmartre.

The wizarding community in Paris was incredibly glamorous, the entire district was much more spacious compared to Diagon Alley of London or the magical shopping districts of Liverpool. Helen spent a few hours looking around and buying a few things before she made her way to the ministry building. She went to the department of Education and checked out the place where she would be writing her OWL and NEWT exams for potions in a few days, which she had arranged as soon as she had heard about the job in Paris. It was the reason they had come early after all. Her NEWT exam was scheduled to happen on the day after the show as her OWL result had to be declared before she could write the advanced test.

Both the shows, one earlier in London and one in Paris went quite well for her and the next day Helen was confident she had aced the exam, just like her OWL. They were staying in Paris for a couple of more days till the result was declared, so she decided to enjoy the beautiful city as well as visited a few nightclubs, relishing the dancing and the press of bodies. On her last night she hooked up with a cute couple in one of the popular clubs, going to their apartment for a night full of passion. She ended up doing everything with them except for full intercourse with the guy, despite this, everyone involved had fully satiated their carnal desires by the end of the night.

Next morning after a late lunch, they drove to Lyon, where they stayed for a night and next day left for the French Riviera, where they would be meeting the Grangers in Agde, who were on vacation there. Both parties were booked in the same hotel and the Grangers met them in the reception, the family already sporting a light tan from all the sun. After putting their luggage and changing into proper attire, a skimpy orange G-string bikini with black borders and strings and small triangles covered her breasts, with a sheer black sarong and a wide straw hat and a handbag, Helen left with Hermione and Dudley to the beach, while the Grangers and Dursleys got acquainted in an open roof lounge.

Helen quickly sent Dudley away to enjoy himself and pulled Hermione to the beaches more famous than the others. Hermione, who was also in a string bikini, but with much more coverage, and a pair of white shorts contrasting with the black of her swimwear and a pair of goggles, was already blushing, already aware about the beaches. But Helen had noticed that she didn't have any tan lines so she had probably been there already. They spent a few hours getting a tan topless, after rubbing lotions into each other's body of course, chatting about their holidays so far, before redressing to go for lunch.

The next week was spent mostly in the same vein, with lots of sun, swimming and general lazing around. After the first day, the group rarely hung together, with all the couples spending time away from each other and Dudley going stag, sometimes chatting up with a few girls their age. Helen and Hermione would spend their lunches with the Grangers, when the elder couple would ask them about the magical world, their culture, politics, sports and on occasion would slip in a question regarding their relationship.

Evenings and dinners were spent going on dates, going on romantic walks by the beach, having picnics, watching the sun set or candle light dinners. Later in the night, either Helen or Hermione would sneak up to the other's room, and would only go to sleep well after midnight.

On Helen's Birthday, they had hired a yacht for the day and had spent the whole day on the sea, enjoying the sun and cool breeze. Lunch included fish they had caught themselves and cake. In the afternoon the men had taken over the back of the boat to teach Dudley how to fish, while the women had lied down on the front deck to relax in the sun. They had returned after dark, with Helen and Hermione having shared sweet kisses while watching the sunset.

The next day, Helen and Hermione had gone to a nearby village, riding rented cycles, where there was a famous private magical beach, property of the Veela community that called the village their home. They had no trouble getting to the place, as this was a strictly females only beach, with no men allowed. Once they reached the beach, they realized why. The beach was full of extremely beautiful, blonde haired and blue eyed Veela of all ages from young kids to a few elderly women. There was a smattering of a few normal human witches, but they were rare in the sea of blonde.

Shrugging to themselves, Helen and Hermione laid down their towels, removed their clothes and relaxed while looking at the beautiful veela enjoying their day. It was only a few minutes later when Hermione was hit by a beach ball on her head. Helen laughed at her bewildered girlfriend who looked around to find the perpetrator, when she spotted a young veela, maybe 5-6 years old rushing towards them.

She spoke in a melodious bird-like voice, "Désolé, mademoiselle. Puis-je récupérer le ballon s'il vous plaît?"

Hermione replied grumbling, already disarmed by the cuteness overload, "D'accord, mais soyez prudent."

The cute little girl nodded "Merci" and then frowned before asking in the same language, "What is wrong with your hair?" directing the question to both of them.

Before they had to answer the awkward question though, a vision of beauty came behind the girl and started scolding her in french about pestering strangers before turning to them. She was probably only a few years older than them and had typical Veela features.

She also spoke in a melodious voice, different from the younger girl, but still beautiful, "I'm sorry about my younger sister's rudeness. She has never been out of the enclave so she hasn't seen any other type of hair than that of a veela."

Helen smiled in understanding and replied in french, "No problem. Girls her age should be curious." Then her smile turned to a flirtatious smirk, "In fact, I'm thankful to her curiosity as it has led us to meet a beautiful lady. Hi, my friend here is Hermione and I'm Helen." She offered her hand for a shake.

The Veela gave a chiming laugh before taking her hand and shaking it, "Nice to meet you Helen and Hermione. This little devil is Gabrielle" as she wrapped an arm around the grumbling young girl's shoulders, "and my name is Fleur Delacour." Gabrielle's eyes widened at the name Helen.

"Are you Helen Potter?" She asked. Helen shot exaggerated glances over her shoulders and leaned in very closely, looking directly into Gabrielle's eyes.

"Can you keep a secret?" Helen asked, Gabrielle nodded eagerly in response. "I am, but you're not allowed to tell anyone, okay? It can be our secret." Helen whispered. Gabrielle nodded eagerly as Fleur rolled her eyes, then the Veela sisters walked away.

XXXXX

During the last few days of their stay in Agde, Andrew called up to inform her that he had gotten her a magazine shoot happening in Milan in a week's time. Helen had accepted and had written to a friend in Italy, asking if she could stay for a week and had gotten an 'of course' in return. The day after the Grangers returned to England, Helen had Petunia call up Andrew, telling him that Helen would come with a family friend and that she was giving her written consent to allow Helen to participate in the shoot, as she would not be able to come to Italy because of some Business trip. Having covered the legal issues, Helen sent them back and walked around till she found a secluded spot.

Once alone, she took off a bracelet she was wearing, pointed her wand at it, concentrating and intoned 'Portus'. It started to glow light blue and within seconds she vanished from France. She landed on top of a hill overlooking the Italian city of Genoa, having known of the place from Voldemort's memory. After performing a 'point me' charm she turned into her animagus form and flew due west, along the coast. After flying for a while she reached the outskirts of Varazze, a small town in the province of Savona and changed back to her normal form in a secluded area.

She spent some time roaming around the picturesque place before making her way to the address she was provided. It turned out to be a beautiful two-storey modern villa, situated on the rocky coast overlooking the sea, some distance away from the town. Helen detected a mild diversion ward over the place, which would keep any curious muggles away with only those with strong will or those looking specifically for the place would be able to find the place.

Adjusting her backpack slightly, Helen entered the property and rang the doorbell.

XXXXX

Blaise opened the door to find Helen Potter standing on his porch, wearing casual muggle clothes of a loose pink top with noodle straps, brown shorts and brown high top sneakers, with a small backpack over one shoulder. His face lit up with a bright smile and he welcomed his friend with a tight hug. As he pulled back he spoke, "Benvenuto in Italia! Benvenuto in casa mia," knowing she spoke Italian.

Helen replied with her own huge smile, "Grazie! Hai una bella casa."

He took her hand and pulled her inside, taking her bag from her. He gave it to a house-elf that appeared when he called and instructed him in Italian, "Take this to the guest room you prepared earlier and bring refreshments to the patio."

Turning to Helen he continued speaking in the same language, "Come, I'll introduce you to my mother," and pulled her towards the back door.

He led her outside through the door and out to the terrazza where his mother was relaxing. On spotting them enter, his mother got up from the deckchair she was lounging on, and stepped forward with a charming smile.

Blaise made the introductions, "This is my mother, Adrastia Zabini. Mother, this is Helen Potter." Blaise momentarily regretted inviting Helen to his house, suddenly realising the implications of introducing the two most dangerous women he knew to each other. He felt a cold drop of sweat slide down his back when he saw an identical cat like gleam in the two women's eyes. His mother gave Helen a calculating smile, "Welcome to our Home, Miss Potter," purring at the end as she presented her hand for a shake.

Helen took it and replied in a sensually insinuating voice, "Thank You Ms. Zabini."

"Please call me Adrastia."

"You may call me Helen, Adrastia." Blaise's dread increased ten fold when Helen purred back his mother's name.

XXXXX

To call Adrastia interesting would be a massive understatement, to call her dangerous would be like calling Basilisk just a venomous snake. As Helen changed into her Chemise for bed, she remembered her conversation with the woman earlier in the day.

*Flashback*

As she entered the patio, Helen saw Adrastia Lounging beside the pool on a deckchair. The woman was exceptionally beautiful with almond coloured skin, she wore a black one-piece swimsuit and a pair of sunglasses. Adrastia had suggested that the pair should relax on deckchairs, while Blaise swam in the pool, then the inevitable conversation arose.

"So, Helen, tell me, how exactly has a fourteen year old girl, no matter how talented, come to own the latest and the most exciting business in Diagon Alley?"

Helen had been expecting the question and deployed her pre-prepared answer. "I've always been interested in fashion. So imagine my horror when I entered the Wizarding world to find everyone wearing ghastly robes with monotonous designs. When I met Madam Malkin during a party last year, she was very much interested in my dress, which was of a muggle design and we decided to work together to bring wizarding fashion to the modern times. When Professor Lockhart got wind of our idea, he joined forces with us as well, as he too shared our goals. He provided us the initial capital as well as a man's perspective and became a major partner in our joint venture. His brave but untimely death caused us a lot of grief but we carried on his work." Helen ended with a fake wistful smile.

Adrastia spoke "I'm sure his death was quite a shock for you, Helen. I'm sure you were very surprised when his will was so beneficial towards you, you must have left quite an... impression on him..." Adrastia gave Helen a knowing look and Helen responded with a slight smile.

"He was a great help for me, in many ways. I'm sure you understand that feeling, when someone's time is at an end." Helen stated, taking the opportunity to give Adrastia a knowing look in return. Both women shared a hearty chuckle as if they were old friends and the conversation swiftly moved onto what had brought Helen to Italy. Helen explained about her career as a model in the muggle world and how she had a shoot for a magazine starting tomorrow. Adrastia agreed to take her to Milan and act as a family friend.

*End Flashback*

From there they changed topics and Helen asked about the political scene in Italy, which too had several noble houses of its own, Zabini being one as well. Helen already knew it but Adrastia painted a picture for her, describing magical Italy as a culturally liberal but stricter country where the ministry had more power than the noble houses, unlike in England, where the Wizengamot carried far more weight.

She was brought out of her thoughts by a knock and Blaise's voice asking permission to come in. She waved her hand at the door, opening it, as she continued to comb her hair before turning in.

As he entered the room, he gave her attire an appreciative look, before closing the door. 'This should be interesting' Helen thought before, turning her attention to him.

After contemplating for a minute, he spoke up, "All the Ravenclaws from our year have either made an unbreakable vow or given an oath to you."

Since it wasn't a question, she didn't answer and only raised an eyebrow at him. Since she hadn't denied it, he understood anyway and finally asked, "So which is it?"

Helen decided to answer, wondering where he was going with this "the latter."

"An oath then," he said and again fell silent, looking at her with narrowed eyes. She continued brushing her hair, watching him think and let whatever this was play out.

Finally he asked, "What did they pledge to do, if I may ask?"

Helen looked into his eyes for a while before she leaned back in her chair and switched over how her legs were crossed. His eyes flicked to her bare thighs and got a look of desire just from that small act. Now knowing where this was going she told him the wordings of the Oath everyone had taken.

He slowly pulled out his wand and intoned the words, but surprised her by adding 'my body' after ' my magic' and 'my life'. Once she accepted his oath he stepped forward, took her in his arms and kissed her.

As he pulled back after a few seconds, Helen spoke, "My, my, aren't we confident? With that much forwardness, perhaps you should have been in Gryffindor."

Blaise smirked at her, "Are you objecting?"

Helen smirked back, "Do you hear me object?"

Nodding at the implied meaning he leaned forward and kissed her again, this time his tongue invading her mouth as his hands started roaming under her robe. A few minutes later, when the said robe was discarded, leaving her only in her chemise, Helen pulled back and said, "Pleasant as this is, we will have to continue it at a later date, as I have a photoshoot tomorrow. And muggle cameras can see the smallest of details."

Blaise disengaged after giving her another kiss and gave her a bow, "Più tardi poi, mia bella padrona. Buona notte," and left.

Smiling at his antics and words, Helen got into bed and waved her hand to turn the lights off.

XXXXX

Helen was not going to appear on the cover or something. A young American actress by the name Sarah Michelle Gellar was going to grace the cover. Instead, Helen was going to appear in an article about skin and hair care during summers. The shoot was spread over two days, one day outside where Helen would appear in the sun in various attires at multiple locations in the famous city. The second day was in a studio where she would be using many products and home remedies used to protect yourself from the sun.

As Helen stepped out, wearing a red summer dress, a wide cream colored sun hat and cute brown velvet ankle high boots with short heels, the photographer directed her to lean against a pillar facing up with her eyes closed, seemingly enjoying the sun rays.

XXXXX

On returning to England, Helen didn't bother going to Holland Park and instead went directly to the Manor, having asked Tinny to get her stuff from the Dursley's. She checked her mail and found a letter from the Master's Council, accepting her application for mastery in Potions. After she had gotten the result of the Potions NEWT exam, she had mailed a copy of it to Severus. He had, in turn, nominated her application to the council. Now, she only had to fulfill the not so insignificant requirements set by the council before she could attain her mastery.

She left the rest, including her Hogwarts letter as well as a long, slightly curved parcel unopened and proceeded to the basement to prepare for her next ritual. Ever since she had done the Nahuatl body strengthening ritual with Troll's blood she had been extremely strong. So strong, in fact, that she sometimes felt like that muggle comic character, Hulk or something. However, her strength far outstripped her agility and reaction speed. Not to say they were bad, for daily workouts had given her excellent attributes, but they were nowhere near her strength.

She was going to remedy that now. The ritual she was going to perform was a Japanese one, which was used to be performed by magical samurais in Japan, and would improve her reactions to match her strength while making her body more agile. Fortunately for her soul's balance, there was no sacrifice involved in this ritual, so it wouldn't wreck her commitment of not using dark magic till her balance was restored. Her Patronus had started taking a kite shape these days, vaguely looking like her raven, so she was making progress and didn't want to ruin it.

She was also doing this ritual now, instead of waiting until Hogwarts restarted because it had a long adjusting period, taking anything from a fortnight to a month before the user had enough control to stop flashing around in a rush or blurring their hands while doing even simple gestures. She would have done it earlier in the holidays but her modelling commitments in the muggle world had interfered and it was only recently she had received all the ingredients required for the ritual, with all of them found only in Japan.

Before she started though, she went to the firing range to check on something. Recently, she had been reading up on more light based spells and had found a versatile one which could be used for multiple purposes. The 'light of purification' spell was Scandinavian in origin and could be used as a detection spell, a healing spell and a ward dispelling spell. It worked only if the target was corrupted with dark intent. For example, an injury caused by a dark curse was very difficult to heal without knowing the exact counter-curse. Instead, the 'light of purification' could be used to purify the injury of the dark corruption before healing it like a normal injury.

The reason this spell was not used more commonly was its obscurity as well as the inherent difficulty of the spell. In order to perform the spell one had to have a highly organized mind, i.e. a high level proficiency in Occlumency. Secondly, the power requirement was quite high for even the detection version of the spell. And finally, the intent. To perform the spell, one had to understand the corruption and have a desire to get rid of it completely. Which meant that the caster must have the knowledge about the curse as well as a will to cleanse it, a combination that was very rare to find. Helen could think of only two people who could perform this spell, Severus and Dumbledore.

She concentrated on her intent to be rid of a flesh eating curse, pointed his wand and intoned "lysav renselse".

An exceptionally pathetic beam of light came out of her wand, which was too dim and was barely half an inch wide. The beam was described as being as bright as the sun and from what Helen had read it needed to be a few inches thick at minimum. Helen knew that her ability, power or intent were not the problem. The problem was that her soul was still not in balance. However, she drew satisfaction from the fact that she produced something, no matter how minimal it was, which meant that her balance was slowly restoring.

Helen had realized that maintaining a balanced soul was quite a difficult task, especially for someone like her who enjoyed the thrill of having someone at her mercy. She had found through experimentation that the dark and light aligned magics had an accumulating effect on the soul. The more you performed them, the more they pulled you to either side. So, in order to remain in balance, one would have to perform an equivalent amount of both the aligned magics.

This was easier said than done, as the quanta of magic was not so easily quantified. Magic was not something that could be measured cardinally. It wasn't like, perform 10 dark spells, perform 10 light spells and viola, balance restored, no.

Magic wasn't completely ordinal either, but levels of alignment was the best way to describe the system. So, for example, if she performed a sacrificial ritual, it would set her firmly into the dark alignment and in order to balance it out, she would have to do something of equal significance, say for example, save someone's life by using her life energy. Helen would never do such a thing, so she had to kill the beast by a thousand small cuts, so to speak. Thus, she had been performing several small light based spells throughout the holidays and their cumulative effect would be similar to what was required. The work was tedious but necessary.

Helen performed the spell for several more minutes, before she moved back to start on her ritual.

I don't know Italian and only know a few phrases in French. Mr Google helped me translate, so blame him if I got anything wrong.

Désolé, mademoiselle. Puis-je récupérer le ballon s'il vous plaît? - Sorry, miss. Can I get the ball back please?

D'accord, mais soyez prudent - Okay, but be careful.

Più tardi poi, mia bella padrona. Buona notte- Later then, my beautiful mistress. Good night.

If your answer to the question in AN was that the Chunnel didn't exist back then, then you were correct. Reward yourself with a cookie. The Chunnel construction was completed in 1994 and it was opened in the same year, Helen and Dursley's couldn't possibly use in 1993, now can they? It's such an integral connection these days that I forgot it didn't exist back then.

Edited by 1saaa. I salute you Mister.