The phoenix remained fixed to her arm as Regulus and Tom both stopped their brooms in the air beside Zia. Both of them were still, as if trying to figure out how best to detach the strange bird from her, but at the same time noticing that she was very calm and seemed not to be frightened by it. After a few moments of quiet, Tom spoke.

"What kind of bird is that, Mama?" he asked her curiously, his eyes focused on its talons.

"This is a phoenix, Tom," she told him.

"But in all the books we read about magical creatures, they were described as having red and gold plumage, not charcoal," he said, expressing the same thoughts that she just had brought up with the creature in question. It turned an eye on him, cocked its head and spread its wings, again showing the different colors. "Pardon, I didn't notice the other colors. However, all the same the book describes them distinctly as scarlet and gold. They make no mention of phoenixes of varied colors."

"Perhaps this is a type of phoenix that is even more rare than phoenixes are in the first place," Regulus stated, clearly interested in the bird in front of him. "It does have the typical shape of phoenixes, possibly excepting the talons which seem stronger than what I've seen in pictures. Dumbledore has a phoenix, perhaps he would know."

"Dumbledore is the man who is a teacher at the magic school, right mama?" Tom flew closer to her, now appearing reassured that the bird was no danger to her and so by extension himself, and reached out, clearly intending to touch it.

"Tom, you don't know if this bird would like you to touch it yet, do you? I think you might want to find that out before you try, just in case," Zia cautioned him, and he looked at the bird quizzically. It gave an unmistakable nod, and he stroked it very gently and carefully with two fingers. It closed its eyes. "And yes, that is Dumbledore. He's the one who is coming to see me."

"I get to meet him, right?" he asked eagerly, still petting the phoenix.

"Yes," she answered. "He'll be here tomorrow." Tom nodded and she could see the glimmer of excitement in his eyes. Anything new about magic was always sure to interest him. And someone who taught it, in his opinion, had to be a special kind of wizard. An elite. Someone with skills beyond the ordinary. He did not follow the "those who cannot do, teach" thought pattern of many people, to him it was "those who teach must do more." Zia knew this because he had mentioned how amazing teachers of magic must be. Hopefully he was not disappointed, although she couldn't see how he could possibly be disappointed by Albus Dumbledore.

"Well, now that we've figured out what kind of bird this is, and that it isn't dangerous to us, maybe you two would like to start learning Quidditch?" Regulus asked, breaking Zia's thoughts. A slow smile spread across her face. Quidditch. Of course she wanted to learn how to play, it was the unobtainable sport that muggles could dream of but could certainly never try. Well, she wasn't a muggle and she was ready to learn.

"Quidditch is the sport played on broomsticks with the three balls and the hoops, right?" Tom asked. She remembered him sitting on her lap, enjoying the moving pictures of players flying in formations, scoring goals, getting hit by bludgers, and catching snitches as he read about the sport out loud to her. She tried to keep his reading broad, so had bought the Quidditch book to give him something different to learn about besides magical creatures, spells, history, and a variety of muggle books that he enjoyed picking out of the used bookstores and bringing home to read.

"Yes it is," Regulus replied.

"Teach us," Tom replied swiftly, and Zia chuckled at Regulus' face, which showed clearly that he hadn't been expecting that quick of a response. As with flying a broomstick, the books had never mentioned Tom Riddle and how he got along with sports, including Quidditch. They made him sound more intelligence and cunning focused, pushed solely by his ambition and never distracted by something he could deem useless, like a sport. She knew he would have learned to fly at least, because it was a class taught at Hogwarts to all first years. But whether or not he enjoyed it, practiced it, or involved himself in any kind of sport involving it, were never mentioned.

Apparently, the way he was with her, Tom was fascinated by it. She tried to picture him playing Quidditch on a team at Hogwarts, and smiled to herself. She could see it. There was more joy in her Tom than the twisted version of him that appeared in the books. She could see that the ambition was still in him, and knew that when he decided what he wanted to be when he was older that he would pursue it relentlessly. But she knew that he'd take time to have fun and relax and do things like play Quidditch.

"Well then, I'll start out by teaching you about the balls and the players," Regulus said.

The rest of the day was consumed with experimenting playing in different positions on a Quidditch team, getting to know the balls, and getting better at flying in general. The phoenix relocated itself to a position on Zia's shoulder, but other than that could not be moved away from her. She wondered if the bird had been a special pet of Rowena Ravenclaw, and had missed the witch for all those hundreds of years.

After reading more out of their Quidditch book with a thoroughly tired but thoroughly pleased Tom, she tucked him into bed and went down into the kitchen. Regulus was sitting in a chair there, leaning back in it, his hair messy from the wind, chatting with Pozey the house elf. To his right was Tom Riddle Senior. She had finally agreed to let him inside of her own house, under the condition that little Tom be in bed and asleep for the night. Riddle was staring interestedly at the phoenix, which was perched on the back of the chair and seemed just as interested in him as he was in it. She wondered if it had ever met a muggle before.

"Thank you for today," Zia said to Regulus with a smile.

"Of course, I'm glad you both had fun," he said with a grin, the front legs of his chair hitting the ground with a thud.

"How much do I owe you?" she asked, walking to the drawer in the kitchen that held the box that held a lot of the money she had saved up. Some of it was in the bank, but she liked to have a little stash of it on hand as well.

"Owe me? For what?" Regulus asked her, raising his eyebrows.

"The broomsticks," she said. "You can't keep paying for things for us, it's too much. We've got a new house now, an extremely nice one, and I think that more than makes up for what happened. Alright? So how much do I owe you?" To her surprise, Regulus started to laugh.

"I didn't buy those," he said.

"Then who-" she began to question him, but was cut off by Tom Riddle Senior.

"I did," he said. She pulled out the box and began to undo the lock that secured it.

"Alright then, how much do I owe you?" Zia asked, undaunted.

"Nothing. They are gifts to you and my son, although it's not enough to make up for years of neglect," he murmured quietly. She sighed and put the box back. If that made him feel better, than she'd allow the broomsticks. But she didn't like having so many things paid for by others, it made her feel weak. Like she wasn't capable of taking care of her own son.

She thought about a lot of things that night, before she fell asleep. Money. Magic. Raising children. Time. Tom Riddle Senior and Regulus Black. Most of all she thought of her son. In the morning, she was shaken awake by both Pozey and little Tom, who were saying something that she couldn't quite make out. Slowly, as she woke up more, she recognized what they were saying and bolted out of bed.

"Albus Dumbledore is here."

Of all the days to oversleep, it would be this one.