Over the next few days, and over several hundred miles from Airhaven, the aviatrix Anna Fang would search for, find, then rescue the poor wretches Tom Natsworthy and Hester Shaw. They had, indeed, survived the fall from London, though Hester was badly injured on account of the crossbow bolt that had pierced her above the knee, making their progress in pursuit of London slow and laborious.
Despite that, and despite the hideous scar that spilt her face in two, Hester eventually told Tom her story.
And what a tale of woe it was. Her mother had found a piece of Old-Tech in destroyed America called MEDUSA. Several years previously she'd found documents and paperwork referring to the device in a devastated military bunker and it was only a matter of time before she unearthed a physical specimen. Shaped like a dented metal football, Pandora Shaw had no idea what the device was designed for, but she knew it would be of great worth to someone, it would make her fortune.
She could not have foreseen that the discovery would cost her and her husband their lives, and leave their only daughter as a mangled ruin of a girl. But more than that, she would never have thought in a million years that the man who inflicted this misery would be her old friend Thaddeus, a man she'd once been so close to that there was a very good chance that he was actually the father of her beloved little girl.
But this is exactly what happened, as Hester blurted out to Tom one evening, while they sat huddled in the sheer-walled trenches made by the ruler-straight caterpillar tracks of London, which was now a dwindling mountain in the distance. She had a tendency to just randomly tell Tom parts of her story, and at other times be equally sullen and silent, when she would snap at him for trying to make conversation.
Tom didn't really know what to make of her. He was just incredibly guilty for throwing away the rags of his shirt, which could have helped re-bandage Hester's bloody wound, and for being responsible for making her lose her supply pack in London which had a first-aid kit, and for being so deceived by Valentine who was the cause of all of this.
Because it was the adventurer's fault that any of this was happening, as Hester explained. He had turned up at Hester's family home one evening when she was just eight years old. She'd crept up to the attic, after hearing a blazing row taking place about this MEDUSA thing ... and that's where Hester Shaw saw Thaddeus Valentine murder her mother in cold blood ... blood she could still see splattered over the star charts that Pandora had so painstakingly drawn. The edge of Valentine's sword only managed to cut Hester's face, when he noticed her watching and lunged in her direction, but he must have thought he'd killed her because he didn't come down to finish the job.
This allowed Hester to escape, passing the dead body of her father, passing the dead bodies of their slaughtered dogs, all victims of Valentine's blade. Hester escaped in her father's skiff, living in the Out-Country and remembering only fragments.
"It was as if, when he cut my head open, some of my memories spilled out," Hester told Tom. "But slowly, I began to remember. That's when I swore I'd find Valentine. Kill him, just like he'd killed Mum and Dad."
Tom was distressed by the story, and vowed to help Hester return to London. He childishly believed he could find a way to get the story out, to bring the law down on his former hero. But as Hester pointed out, Valentine was the Lord Mayor's favourite and considered above the law in London. Even so, Tom had to get back home and still wanted to believe that there was good in people.
This was a belief soon to be severely tested, as a little town called Speedwell picked them up, their Mayor Orme Wreyland drugged Tom and Hester with narcotised food and vowed to sell them as slaves at a nearby trading cluster. Luckily for them, Hester was a wily and worldly sort, breaking them out of the holding cell and escaping into the melee of the cluster, just as the gas balloon of a single airship, The Jenny Haniver, took up moorings at the air-quay in the bows ..."
Back on Airhaven, Harry and Hermione could only fret about poor Tom and hope that he was alright. They both knew that this was something way out of their depth; if the much-renowned Thaddeus Valentine was involved in a potential murder scandal in London, and if dangerous agents of the Anti-Traction League ... which Anna Fang and Captain Khora clearly were ... had entered into battle over the fate of Tom and the girl assassin, then mere Apprentice Historians like Harry and Hermione were better off keeping themselves on the fringes and not getting involved.
Such reckless heroism was likely to get a person killed.
So they both resolved to take care of each other and only offer help when or if it was needed. If there was to be a war between the Traction Cities and the static powerhouse of Shan Guo in the East, then it would soon consume the entire Earth. Both Harry and Hermione agreed that they'd rather live a little of their lives first, rather than being drawn in by their good intentions and getting killed at the tender ages of eighteen and nineteen respectively.
To distract themselves from worrying about Tom Natsworthy, they turned their minds back to the mystery of Hogwarts, A History. Hermione had taken to carrying the book around with her, so Harry bought her a little bag in which to stow it. Red leather, and with a picture of an otter embossed into the flap, it was the ideal mode of storage for this most mysterious item.
And there was something about the bag that Hermione said 'spoke' to her, not that she could describe it any better than that. Harry didn't press for more details; his girlfriend liked the bag, it would make her happy to own it, so Harry parted with some gold and enjoyed the beaming smile and chaste kiss he received as reward, which made his outlay more than worth it in his opinion.
The next task was to see if Airhaven had anywhere that could assist Harry and Hermione in unravelling this mystery. Amidst the collection of cafes and stalls were a number of shops selling trinkets, antiques, and wares for the air-trade. Hermione was just musing over a pair of silk curtains for their bedroom window in the gondola of The Jily Harmony, when her eye was caught by a brightly coloured shop next door.
The doorway was adorned with twisted shawls, beads and multi-coloured lights which flashed in sequence. There were large question marks, swirly symbols, depictions of the sun, moon and stars, and the large, square window was tinted black to mask any view of the interior. Hermione's eyes lit up as she read the shop name above the window.
"Madam Trelawney, Mystic of the Skies! Palm-reader, fortune-teller and esoteric book seller!" Hermione read excitedly. "Ooh, Harry, let's get our fortunes told!"
Harry frowned at her. "I can tell you your fortune, my love ... you're going to cost me more of mine by wasting time on this charlatan!"
"Oh, it's just a bit of fun, honey," Hermione laughed. "We know there's no truth in it, but let's see what rubbish this Madam Trelawney can come up with from her crystal ball! Maybe she'll predict that thing you've been dreading happening in October."
Harry frowned in confusion. "What thing I'm dreading?"
"Nothing! That's the point!" Hermione chortled. "We can expose her nonsense for a bit of fun, then we can laugh over it while you treat me to lunch! Please?"
"Oh, alright," Harry conceded. "You can get your fortune told and I'll have a look at the books. How about that?"
"Deal," Hermione nodded eagerly. Then she pushed on the door to the shop, which opened with a little tinkle, and led Harry inside.
It was stiflingly hot in the interior. It was dark for the most part, with an eerie red light coming from a curtained table just to one side of the jumble-laden payment counter. Harry looked at shelves groaning under the weight of glass globes and crystals of quartz and citrine and amethyst, while Hermione sniffed at wicker baskets full of exotic herbs and strange, aromatic powders. Other shelves were lined with frayed, dusty books with titles that Harry struggled to read in the dark.
Luckily, there was someone who knew each title by heart.
"Which arcane art takes your interest, young one?" an ethereal voice asked from the shadows at the back of the shop. "Potion brewing? Curse casting? Or are you looking for crystals to improve your virility?"
Harry turned to see a comically-dressed woman gliding towards him. She was bedecked in more of the scarves and shawls that were pinned around the doorway to her shop, wore a long flowing skirt and had huge glasses, with lenses so thick that they magnified her eyes to startling proportions. Harry was startled by her appearance and took a step back in concern.
"I was wondering when I'd see you, young aviator," Madam Trelawney began in an echoey voice. "Oh, and don't worry about the Erased Mirror."
"What mirror ..." Harry started to say, before turning and accidentally knocking one off the shelf, watching forlornly as it smashed at his feet. He hoped it wouldn't cost him seven years of bad luck, like the superstition said. "Oh! I'm so sorry. I'll pay you for that."
"I said don't worry about it," that haunting voice replied, genially.
"But how did you know?"
"The Gift of Inner Sight is not always a Gift," Madam Trelawney hushed. "But it is always there."
"So you knew he was going to smash it?" Hermione asked, joining them from the other side of the shop.
"I did," Madam Trelawney nodded. "But the thing that will really spin your grey matter later on is this ... would he still have broken it if I hadn't said anything?"
Harry and Hermione swapped puzzled looks.
"So, you have come to seek your fortunes?" Madam Trelawney went on dramatically. "You are in the right place, dears, the right place. What form of divination do you seek? Tarot? Tea leaves? Looking for signs in the entrails of mutilated bats?"
"Palm reading, the sign outside said," Hermione replied, looking faint at the idea of butchering a bat in the name of hoodwinking the public.
"Ah, a most ancient and noble art," Madam Trelawney exclaimed. "Come, young aviatrix, sit at my table and I will tell you your path."
"Excuse me, but, how do you know we are aviators?" Harry asked, as Hermione pulled out a chair at the little table. "Did you see that, too?"
Madam Trelawney gave Harry a sympathetic, almost pitying look. "My dear, you are aboard Airhaven ... if you are not an aviator then you are a ghost, and I am imagining this entire episode!"
Harry frowned crossly, feeling distinctly stupid. Hermione gave him a consoling sort of grin and Harry stalked off to look at the books again.
"Ah, now, let me see," Madam Trelawney began, pulling her glasses to the edge of her nose and turning Hermione's hands in her own. "You have good, strong lines here, Miss. What would you like to know about your Path ... fame, fortune, romance?"
"I already know about that," Hermione swooned, quirking a look over at Harry, who was still crossly examining the old books. "Tell me about my career. What will I do?"
"Very well," Trelawney nodded. She peered in closely. "You have an interest in the past ... of reviving things that have come before."
"Well ... yes, actually," said Hermione in surprise.
"Your future will be all about your past," Trelawney continued. "So let's take a look at that. My, my ... this is curious. Very curious ..."
"I'm sorry, but ... what's curious?"
Madam Trelawney looked up, her eyes crimson from the light of the shining ball on the table. "I have read many palms, Miss Aviatrix, and I have not seen many like this before ... not seen many whose line into the past goes quite as long as it does into the future."
"And mine does?" Hermione hushed.
"It does. In fact, it goes so far that it almost comes back on itself. Do you know what that means?"
"What?" asked Hermione, leaning in eagerly.
"It means that your mortal energy is infinite ... like a circle ... with no beginning, and no end."
"In plainer Anglish, please?"
"It means that your soul has existed in this realm before. Perhaps many, many years ago ... perhaps many times before!" Trelawney whispered theatrically. "This body is just the latest incarnation of your being."
"I don't understand that," Hermione frowned in her doubt. "How can that be?"
"When the body dies, the spirit moves to the next realm, the realm beyond sensory perception, and there it stays for eternity," Trelawney explained in a patient air, as if describing finger-painting to a three-year-old. "But yours has not. Either that ... or it has somehow been pulled back."
Harry, hearing the exchange drop in tenor, crossed the room and caught this last bit of the conversation. "What nonsense is this? Spirits being pulled back? What are you talking about?"
Trelawney snapped her head up. "Nonsense, is it? You, boy ... you are the same. I can feel the energy in you, too. Let me see your palm."
Harry, reluctant but eager to prove this quack nothing more than a fraud, extended his arm. Trelawney grabbed it and looked close.
"Yes! I see it ... right there!" she exclaimed. "Your life lines are identical! How bizarre! I have never seen the like before!"
"Seen what?" Harry demanded.
"A matching pair!" Trelawney cried. "Your lines are in the same space, on the same hand. Not only does that mean that you have lived before, it means that you lived together before! You may be in these bodies now, but this is not the first time you have existed together."
Harry and Hermione blinked at each other a moment, both keen to brush off the claims of this batty old woman, but also equally unsettled by the confidence with which she spoke.
"What does that mean, if it were true?" Hermione demanded briskly. "How could that even be possible?"
"By no natural or arcane process that I know of," Trelawney told them in a dark voice. "But there are areas of science and engineering that have been known to meddle with such abominable notions."
Harry laughed at that, sure now that he had rumbled the fraud. "What? Are you suggesting that we have been resurrected? Do we look like Stalkers to you? They are seven feet tall, iron-armoured killing machines. Last time I looked in the mirror, I didn't have a shiny exo-skeleton and razor-sharp claws leering back at me!"
Trelawney narrowed her eyes. "Be that as it may, but science advances at a worrying speed all the time. Are you afraid to test it?"
"Absolutely not," Harry spat in derision. "Do your worst."
"Tell me your earliest memory," Trelawney asked. "Something vague ... the first song you heard, the first injury that required a stitch, the place where you made your first friend."
"Well, that's easy, I ..." Harry volleyed out immediately, but he halted in his tracks as the memories refused to come. They were there, he could tell, but it was like trying to dig through a hundred layers of an overloaded trunk that he couldn't reach the bottom of. He looked to Hermione for help, but her crinkled frown suggested she was struggling just as much as he. Her new, third eye looked distinctly cross. Trelawney wore a look of triumph until Hermione suddenly shot her eyes open.
"Ooh, I have one ... I used to go snow-skiing with my parents when I was little!" she exclaimed. "We stopped after I was accepted as an Apprentice to the Historian's Guild. They are dangerous Anti-Tractionists and didn't approve of my moving to London. I'd almost forgotten that."
"And where did you used to go snow-skiing?"
"Andorra, mostly," Hermione replied with confidence.
"Andorra? Is that right?" Trelawney quirked. "Isn't that the country that we now call Taured? Hasn't that been the name of the country for at least a thousand years?"
Hermione blinked hard. "I ... I really don't know."
"Didn't you just say you were an Historian?" Trelawney barked in taunting mirth.
"Well, yes, but my speciality isn't in cartography," Hermione scowled. "I studied archaeology."
"Then I suggest, before you start digging up the Earth for historical relics, you try delving into your own past first," said Trelawney. "There is a lot of it and, if I am right, there is something mysterious there that will tell you a lot about these memories you are both missing."
"Speaking of things that are missing," Harry cut in before he could stop himself. "Have you ever heard of something called Hogwarts?"
Madam Trelawney turned to Harry, beaming widely, as if he had brought her a birthday and Quirkemas present on the same day.
"Heard of it? Why of course I've heard of it!" Trelawney cried out gleefully. "Who hasn't heard of the famous school of witchcraft and wizardry?"
Witchcraft? Wizardry? Harry almost wished he hadn't asked. He'd nearly been on the verge of believing the wild claims this old trickster had been making.
"Famous?" Hermione asked. "We've never heard of it, so how have you?"
"My dear, there is a whole world outside of the Historian's Guild of London, a world that your city would happily repress until there is no knowledge of it left," Trelawney replied darkly. "To those of us immersed in the arcane, Hogwarts is an Eden ... a dream we hope will one day return, like the great heroes of the old sagas.
"But for me, that connection is personal. You see, I had a great relative who once taught at the school, and it was from she that I have received the gift of Inner Sight. Stories were passed down orally ... from grandmother to mother, mother to daughter ... over generations, never to be forgotten.
"For who could want to forget the tale of the great Sybil Trelawney ... the witch who predicted the rise of the legendary Dark Lord slayer, Harry Potter - The Boy Who Lived?"