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Chapter 13
New Faces, Old Names – Part 2
Disclaimer: *going into rant mode* Why do I have to keep on saying that I don't own Harry Potter? I'm pretty sure that most of the world knows that *I* don't.
AN: Here's the meeting with the teachers and a little family reunion – of sorts.
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Snape eyed the creature that sat in front of him as he waited for the weekly staff meeting to begin. Off to one side he could hear giggling, but was choosing to ignore it. A long, lion's tail twitched slightly at the end as it lay curled around its haunches as it sat politely. The strange thing about it though was that it was purring.
His brows furrowed when he heard the giggles grow into a full-fledge laugh as Hagrid came into the staff room. The caretaker and Care of Magical Creatures instructor lent a jovial air to the meeting room when he caught sight of the Potions Master being stared down by the small creature in front of him.
"Never seen a kneazel before, Snape?" he bellowed. He laughed some more at the scowl that crossed the other man's face.
Snape never took his eyes off the small thing in front of him, even at Hagrid's remark. He refused to let the creature get the best of him.
"Circe." The whisper came from right behind him, almost startling Snape off his chair when the creature rose to all four feet and padded to one side of him. He could still hear the purring, and it was starting to disturb him. "Circe, I see you have the good grace to like Severus," the voice whispered again.
Snape turned to find Aeryn sitting next to him, the kneazel wrapped around her shoulders like a stole. She had a tiny grin on her face as she leaned forward. "Don't worry, your secret is safe with me."
One black eyebrow raised in an affronted arch. "I have no secret that you know," he deigned to reply.
"Then why does she like you and not some of the others here?" Aeryn whispered again.
Snape looked around and found that none of the others in the room were even paying attention to their conversation, especially when it became apparent that the battle between Snape and the kneazel was over. "Excuse me?"
"Oh, you're excused." The tiny grin grew wider. "Tell me, Severus, why did you ever think I wouldn't find out about you?"
Black eyes bored into her face. What was she talking about? Snape eyed her carefully when he noted his glare had no effect on her. "You wouldn't find out about my past? I'm certain that it is common knowledge by now that I have, at certain times in the past, betrayed both the Light and Dark sides of the war we are fighting."
Aeryn's face turned sad and the twinkle in her strangely purple eyes dimmed. She shook her head and gave him a fierce, serious look. "I didn't mean about that, Severus." Her voice was lower than it had been half a minute ago. "I was talking about the fact that the four of us trust you."
Snape's eyes snapped to her face from the floor where he had been glaring at nothing in particular. "What?!"
The room grew quiet at his exclamation, once again drawing everyone's attention to the Potions Master. He stared at them balefully when he noticed Dumbledore trying to hide a laugh inside a slight cough to turn the staff's attention to him.
"Thank you, Severus, for gaining everybody's attention."
Snape glared at the Headmaster, who's eyes twinkled merrily.
Dumbledore cleared his throat. "By now, you may have noticed we now have two former students here with us," he said as the rest of the staff looked at Harry and Draco, who smiled, embarrassed. "I have spoken with some members of the Ministry and they've agreed to grant them their licenses a little early, as they have demonstrated a great depth of knowledge. Earlier in the week they took last year's version of the NEWTS and passed with flying colors. In fact, both Harry and Draco gained twenty NEWTs. Marty took them yesterday and passed as well."
Flitwick spoke up. "But, how did they age so much?"
The rest of the instructors murmured their agreement with the question.
Dumbledore turned to Harry and Draco. "Will you please explain?"
Draco nodded. "The two of us were chosen to help protect this school. Since we were younger, it was felt that we wouldn't be able to withstand the amount of power needed to do so."
"Chosen to protect?" Sinistra asked. "As teachers we have also been granted this honor of protecting the school. Why would two students have been chosen?"
"Because the school chose us to be two of the new guardians," Harry answered.
The room sat in silence for a brief moment before many of the teachers started talking at once.
"But why did all of this happen? And when?" asked Professor Sprout.
"They will explain, Flora, if you ask them," Dumbledore replied. The rest of the teachers knew that he would not be the one who gave out the story. "Now, then. I would like it if you helped Marty, Poppy. She needs some hands-on training in healing. Marty knows the theory, but it is difficult to help with no practical experience. The other three are willing to help if you need it. All I ask is to let Aeryn know, as she will be substituting for Professor Steele for the next week."
The teachers' eyes looked at the DADA teacher, who stared impassively at Aeryn. Seeing no reaction they turned their attention back to the headmaster.
"I will be giving the announcement about the dueling club at dinner tomorrow night." Dumbledore looked around the room. "If there is nothing left to talk about, then I think this meeting is adjourned."
Snape stayed in his seat, waiting for the room to clear out. He didn't feel particularly happy about what Dumbledore was planning. Even now he still had flashbacks to the dueling club that Lockhart had tried to start and he had been roped into it. Potter had stolen the spotlight back then.... He rethought that. In the seven years he had been teaching The Boy Who Lived, he had rarely ever seen him at least try to take the spotlight, and that was only on the Quidditch pitch.
"Severus?" He looked over to see Aeryn still seated next to him in the now empty room.
"What is it?" He snapped back at her.
"Did you do any more research on that potion?" She was eyeing him curiously as she waited for his answer.
Snape gave her a steady look. "No. I regretfully did not have time to devote to the project. However, the ingredient that we were waiting for did arrive last week."
Aeryn jumped out of her seat, startling the sleeping kneazel on her shoulders. Snape eyed the blond woman carefully. He shot a glare at her, which didn't seem to faze her at all. Instead, her eyes twinkled remarkably like Dumbledore's when he was greatly amused. Dark thoughts briefly passed through his mind as he stared at her, willing for her to leave his presence. He was in the mood to sitting brooding for a while without having to move.
"Do you mind?" he finally asked in an icy voice.
"Don't mind if I do," Aeryn said. She raised one eyebrow at him before looking over the various books that were shelved haphazardly on in a bookcase on the far end of the staff room. "Actually, I wanted to ask you a question. First, I need something to eat." She turned to the fire a couple of feet from where their chairs sat and said something Snape couldn't quite hear.
Aeryn stopped as a tray appeared through the fire. Standing up, she grabbed a hold of it and spoke through the fire once more, "Thanks, Dobby!" She turned and set the tray on one corner of a desk she transfigured from her chair and pulled another chair up to it and sat down in that.
"Here you go, Severus. I don't mind if you share." She picked up a small plate of toast and the jam, ignoring the slight huff of frustration that escaped Snape. Eyeing her warily, he cautiously sat down in his chair and grabbed a fork. Stabbing into a random piece of meat he watched her spread the jam on the bread.
"What do you want," he demanded to know.
"How far have you gotten on that Silmaron potion?" Aeryn asked the question again, more seriously than she had a few minutes ago. Her eyes weren't twinkling like they had. Instead, they were fiercely intent. "I've been trying to ask you for the last week, but you've been avoiding all of us, other than helping Granddad with the testing." Aeryn sighed softly. "I don't mean to be annoying, but I want to restart what we began working on."
Snape's eyes narrowed for a minute as he watched her eat in an absentminded manner. He knew she was serious about this. "Very well. After breakfast tomorrow."
She gave a cheeky smile. "I'll make sure to wake up extra early to be bright and cheerful when the time comes, Severus!"
He opened his mouth to answer but she was already out the door. The trait to leave in the middle of a conversation – and leaving without giving him the chance to say anything more – was definitely inherited from Dumbledore.
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Harry had eyed the DADA teacher all the way through the staff meeting. Ever since they had gotten back from the room, most of the teachers hadn't known about their reappearance. The strange thing about Professor Steele was that she still seemed unconcerned for her younger sister to pop back so suddenly. No emotion had shown across her face. Only her eyes had given a reaction. They had shone that strange gold color that they had when she looked at him.
There was something he could do until tomorrow morning. He was starting to get a bit impatient to see Ron and Hermione, enough that it was driving Draco mad. Marty and Aeryn weren't as familiar with his habits – even after sharing that same room for two years.
He walked into the library that had been attached to the suite. The four of them had decided that they would enhance it with several of the books they had studied in the room, which had led to a lot of laughing as they remembered some of the things they had tried. His mind drifted from the book he was searching for to what had happened those first couple of weeks they had been in the room.
After the newness of the room had worn off, they had found that they didn't necessarily crave food. Well, their bodies didn't, but sometimes their minds would trick them into wanting food. The founders had then instructed them about the manna they had eaten, and also how to cope with it – after all, their bodies were essentially in stasis. The only thing they really needed was sleep, since their brains needed to rest.
It was funny how they reacted in the real world. All four of them had been comfortable sharing the same room, but it was a lot different now. Harry laughed as he remembered waking up this morning and heard Draco mumbling something about a teddy, which the other man had vehemently denied when they were eating breakfast. He made a note in the back of his mind to ask some of Draco's friends about that little tidbit when he got the chance.
Finally, he found the book he was looking for. Settling down into a comfy chair in a corner of the room, Harry read for a while before his thoughts strayed back to Professor Steele. Aeryn had said that she was going to talk to her sister for a little, to both see how she was doing and to get the materials that she would need to teach next week.
From everything he had seen so far, from regular classes to the extra help he had been receiving up until the winter holiday, he was starting to think that she wasn't acting quite herself. Aeryn had tried to talk to her before the meeting, but the older woman had barely said more than two sentences to her before taking a seat. Professor Steele had also been watching Aeryn when she talked to Snape. The DADA teacher hadn't wanted to come to their rooms to see it, either.
Harry wondered if his thinking was a little skewed from knowing that his former DADA teacher was a full-blooded elf, but he knew that it couldn't be just that. He was more inclined to think a little higher of her for actually coming to the school to teach in the first place. Aeryn had told them that most elves looked down on the entire human population, and it didn't matter if had magic or not. Human magic was far less powerful than Elven magic, and since it needed the use of tools in it – wands, tarot cards (Harry had snickered at this and thought Draco had as well) – it was considered sub par. Elven magic was wandless in its entirety.
That had intrigued the other three, and they had wanted to know if she could teach it to them or if they couldn't do it at all. Aeryn had agreed to teach them, especially as the founders had found the subject to be well worth the effort. Elven magic *was* powerful, and anything that they could use within the boundaries they had set for themselves to defeat Voldemort would be put to use.
In the end, only Harry had been able to produce anything worth going further for. Salazar had then suggested that somewhere in his family he had an Elven ancestor. Elven magic was in the blood. It wasn't like human magic, where it could be in a muggle-born person, or totally disappear in a person who was from a pureblood family. Helga had told them that one of her childhood friends had been from a family that was descended from an Elf, and their wandless magic had been much better than most other's.
From that their discussion had led them to different types of wandless magic. Aeryn and Harry had shown Draco and Marty what they had been doing before the Dementors had come. It wasn't Elven, but it was much harder than they had been doing. Godric had admitted that he had been too lazy to practice, so he had joked as the rest of them worked hard – at least until Rowena had tried to banish him from the room for a while. That incident had also been the turning point in how they worked together. Up until that point, it had been the founders teaching the four of them. Now it was a joint learning experience as they tried to move beyond certain points in magic.
They knew it was very likely that Voldemort had studied at lot of wandless magic when he had undergone his transformation from Tom Riddle into Voldemort. There was almost fifteen years between the disappearance of the Head Boy and the first strike by the Dark Lord, a lot of time in which to gather a lot of information and put it to use. The transformations he underwent also indicated a strong background in the use of wandless magic.
All of that was why he was looking at the book in his hands. It was supposed to have been written by a wizard that had been captured by some elves more than seven hundred years ago. The elves had wanted to study human magic, and as time went on, the wizard had learned a lot of what made Elven magic so unique. Skimming through the book, Harry saw that there were several things in it they had discussed when talking about Elven magic.
Aeryn had told them that this magic was untraceable by human magical means. This had led to the suggestion by Draco that Tom Riddle may have met with some more of the unscrupulous elves in eastern Europe, where it was believed Riddle had transformed into Voldemort. Aeryn had shot down that theory, since elves that tried to work against nature, i.e. using Dark magic, were no longer considered elves. Their bodies would undergo a horrific transformation. The end result was an orc, like the creature she had brought into the last DADA class before Christmas.
Draco had still tried to argue about Riddle meeting with such a creature, but Salazar had shot down that theory. He had told all of them that an orc only followed their own way, or if necessary banded together to fight and then separated once again. Even a powerful human such as Riddle would have not been interesting enough to keep an orc from killing him.
Harry jumped as the door to the library shut loudly. He looked over to find Aeryn walking towards him at a fast clip. "What's the matter?"
She snorted as she slumped into the twin of the chair Harry was seated in. "El couldn't be bothered by me, not even enough to give me the things I'll need for class on Monday."
A black eyebrow went up as green eyes widened. "She didn't want to talk to you?" he asked, surprised.
Aeryn shook her head. "No." A scowl crossed her face before she stared out the window at the half-moon that lay near the horizon. "My own sister can't even say more than two words to me, even after I've been missing for a month."
"What about your dad and brother?"
She looked at him quickly before turning back to the window. "I owled them this afternoon." Aeryn shrugged her shoulders. "Maybe El found that out and she's mad at me for being the last one to know I'm still alive."
Harry doubted that, but he didn't say anything. Instead, he leaned back into the chair and went back to his book. He didn't understand how families were supposed to work, but he was determined that after Voldemort was gone he would start trying. Until then, he had enough on his hands.
He had almost finished the chapter he was reading when he heard Aeryn sigh. Looking up, he saw that she had curled up in the chair and was still looking out the window. She had a frown on her face.
"Aeryn? What's the matter?"
She looked over at him, her face sad. "I was just thinking about my family. What if old Voldie found out about Ray? I mean, we know he can't stand Granddad, so what if he decides to take out his family?"
Harry leaned forward, shocked. He hadn't thought of that angle before. "I don't know. We should tell Dumbledore about that, so that your brothers and dad can be alert to anything out of the ordinary," he suggested.
Aeryn looked skeptical. "Aedyn already does that. I'm not worried as much about him as I am about Ray. The school's pretty well protected – much like Hogwarts is, so I'm not worried about Dad in that respect. Ray goes to a day-school, so he goes home every night. He's much more vulnerable than the rest of us."
"Day-school? For secondary education?" Harry was puzzled. For something as important as a magical education they went home each evening?
"Yes," Aeryn answered. "He goes to Salem Academy, which isn't all that far from Boston, so most of the students just Floo there. Ray and his mother's family live in Salem, so he basically just walks there."
"What about protection? I mean, people don't think it strange about the school?"
She shook her head. "In the US, you still have to complete a basic Muggle education. Part of the school is enchanted, and that's where a student learns their magical education. Salem, in particular, is one of the best, since it's the second-oldest school in the States. Only the school were Aedyn and I went is the oldest. Bradsford Magical Academy."
"Bradsford..." Harry remembered Hermione saying something about the school, but he couldn't think what it was exactly. It had something to do with dragons. He asked the question floating in his mind.
Aeryn laughed. "We're called the dragons because there is a pod of Opaleyes not far from the school. They like the mountainous terrain where the school is, so if they are out, the students are in."
"It wouldn't be good if a student got ate, huh?" Harry chuckled at his joke as Aeryn joined him.
"No. It wouldn't." Aeryn looked behind him at the clock. "Thanks, Harry. I didn't mean to pull you from your book, but this helped."
"No problem," Harry replied. He stood and stretched, still holding on to the book. "About ready for bed?"
Aeryn nodded. "Yes. I'm going to start working again with Severus on that potion after breakfast, so I want to make sure I get enough sleep."
Harry shook his head as the two of them crossed the empty hallway into the large bedroom. He thought that she was braver than most people, trying to put up with Snape's horrible temper. He certainly wasn't up to that much courage.
Quickly getting ready for bed, he laid down and looked at the canopy stretched over the four posts of the bed. The gold material seemed to shimmer in the moonlight that had found its way through the curtains of the bed. Mentally tracing patterns in the cloth, Harry tried to calm his excitement in finally seeing his friends again. He just hoped that they would take the news as well as Remus and Sirius, although he wasn't sure about those two taking it as well. Even Dumbledore still didn't know what they could do.
AN2: It's vacation time, so it will be two weeks before I can update again. All this week I will be far from a decent telephone line, but it means being on the jet-ski!