A/N: Sadly, I've decided that Once Upon a Saturday will be on hiatus for an undetermined length of time, due to Rowling killing half my plot, if you catch my drift. I can't promise to continue working on it, and I am surprised to be putting anything on hiatus, as I thought I never would; I can honestly say that I wish she had gotten rid of someone else, almost anyone else. I am severely grieving this loss, which actually surprises me. I had not thought I would care as much about this particular character (though I knew that if she had killed certain people, I would never again be able to write them – Colin, for one, among others, Our Victim included. *snuggles Colin until the boy turns purple*)
Meanwhile, I will be using a lot of the material I had developed for this story on a different project, one which actually came to mind this morning as I struggled fruitlessly to wake up. Tempted as I was to post whatever I had written for this, I decided that it would be better to use it for some other use. I have several short stories which I've also been working on, including a fun piece with one of Rowling's best new arrivals, and a reflective Colin piece.
Enjoy the chapter, poppets. (I got pretty emotional while reading through this chapter, actually, when I was still contemplating whether or not to post it.) I hope it finds you well.
chapter vii; in which Harry is unexpectedly called to the Headmaster's office, Draco dodges confrontation, and we learn a little about Percy Weasley.
The summons came in the form of a folded piece of parchment sealed with the Hogwarts crest stamped into thick, dripping red wax. At the start of the Transfiguration lesson, Professor McGonagall dropped it onto Harry's cluttered desk with pursed, thinly set lips and hurried to the front of the room, stubbornly refusing to meet his questioning gaze.
Harry ran his thumb under the seal, breaking it with the customary satisfying crack of the hardened wax over his thumbnail. The sprawling handwriting was an immediate comfort; he read it slowly, leisurely, expecting a gentle invitation for tea at the end of the week, as he was accustomed to receiving every now and again from the old Headmaster.
But this note was far from gentle; as the ink scrolled its way down the page, the beautiful calligraphy spelled out a hasty and worried message, summoning Harry to the cluttered office as soon as he could get away. Dumbledore had not even taken the time to sign his name; his raggedly scrawled A.D. stood along at the foot of the letter.
Harry looked up at the professor at the head of the room, and she nodded with compassion and worry in her old eyes. He did not even bother putting together his things in a remotely neat order. Papers and empty parchment scrolls were shoved haphazardly into his bag and the heavy covers of his Transfiguration textbook, his quill between his teeth.
Ron and Hermione glanced up when he left, but had hardly noticed that he had received a note at all. As Harry all but scurried out of the room, they exchanged puzzled, careless shrugs.
Fawkes was at the height of his health, and his gorgeous foliage of orange and gold feathers glowed under the candlelight of the room. His long claws gleamed as he perched on the brass stand beside a window, the dark curtains of which were now drawn tightly closed, like the others in the room. He looked for all the world like some peacock of India painted with fire, from the delicate curve of his skull and long neck to the long, soft plumes of his magnificent tail which trailed down nearly to the floor.
When Harry reached the top of the moving staircase, having used the password enclosed in his note from Dumbledore, the phoenix looked up from his preening. His eyes were dark and glassy, like his talons and his beak; his small head tilted slightly to one side as he peered through the crack of the door at Harry. A soft, cooing purr sighed from Fawke's sleek throat, and Harry allowed himself a small smile.
Voices floated through the crack in the heavy door of the office, and Harry did his best not to eavesdrop on the Headmaster. But soon the conversation within swelled and grew louder, the voices more distinguishable and familiar in Harry's ears.
". . . and, then, is it really all that bad?" Dumbledore's voice asked, airy and old as it always was. "This school will remain standing as it has for much of the long history of wizarding Britain."
"The school does not worry me," replied a second voice. This was rumbling, verging on a growl, desperate and melancholically sweet to hear. Harry stepped closer, not for the words, but for the sound of that voice, so warm and soulful; the unpolished roughness of each syllable uttered by that voice was a warm caress down Harry's spine. The voice of Sirius, it seemed, was to Harry the closest thing to home he had ever experienced.
"What, then, is keeping you in my office every spare moment of your time?" asked the Headmaster. Concern spread through his voice, masked by the ancient timbre and comforting undertone of the voice.
In spite of himself, Harry crept toward the door, stopping where he could see his godfather standing in front of Dumbledore, who himself sat on the edge of one of his dusty old armchairs.
Sirius sank to his knees shortly, clinging with his calloused hands to the heavy fabric of Dumbledore's robes so much like an infant clinging to the hem of his mother's dress.
"Albus, you're not strong enough," he pleaded brokenly. "Please let someone else, someone younger, to take your place?"
Dumbledore smiled, the utter desperation visibly painful in his wet blue eyes. The flat of his withered old palm he rested gently on the crown of Sirius' head, his fingers petting the smooth strands of the younger man's hair in a show of comfort and soothing.
"Ah, Sirius," he replied quietly, regretfully, "you are more innocent than even I give you credit for." His old brow furrowed deeply, as though some great battle was playing itself out within his heart. "It would give me great comfort and relief to send someone else – if only it were as easy as that. But I believe you know as well as I that, indeed, I am the one who must go." He paused, patting Sirius' hand on the hem of his robes. "You see, Sirius, the decisions we make in life are not always for our own good, but often for the good of others. How else would the world continue to turn?"
Dumbledore repeated again, as much for his own comfort as for Sirius', "I must go. No one else."
Harry felt his stomach tighten, and Fawkes cooed sadly from his perch. The boy stepped backwards, his eyes still unable to leave the image of a heartbroken Sirius Black clutching so desperately at the robes of such a frail and delicate man as the old headmaster appeared to be at the moment, with such an aura of ominous distress in his features.
A tear, silver in the dim light which seeped through the drawn curtains, sprang from the corner of Sirius' dark eye, digging a path down his rugged cheek. Dumbledore, murmuring a small prayer to comfort the man, chose this moment to look up, catching Harry's wide-eyed gaze. He beckoned with one gnarled finger for Harry to enter the chamber, and reluctantly the boy obeyed the silent command.
He then turned his attentions back to Sirius, speaking in a tone so low Harry wondered if he was supposed to be able to hear the words passing between the two men. "I promise you my safety, Sirius, and the safety of Harry and of you and of Remus, but I can promise little else at the moment. Stand up; Harry is here, and he needs both of us to act as adults right now."
Sirius got to his feet, wiping hastily at his eyes with one hand. "Harry," he said, smiling through the water in his eyes. "Good of you to make it."
Dumbledore smiled kindly, rising to his feet and patting Sirius on his broad shoulder. "Harry, I have something to tell you, and I hope it will make you more comfortable with the events which are occurring too quickly even for my liking." He paused, but the warmth shining in his eyes did not falter. "Would you like some tea? I've a few biscuits somewhere, as well, if you prefer."
Harry shook his head. "I would rather get back to class as soon as I can, Professor. No offense," he added quickly, "I just don't want to have to make up work for Professor McGonagall. . . ."
"Yes, of course," said the headmaster. He cleared his throat, sitting down, and he gestured for Harry and Sirius to do the same. Once the three of them were comfortably seated, he continued, "I asked you here today to explain a few things. To make you more secure, I suppose, though this will also sooth my own nerves somewhat."
His expressed sobered. "Harry, I am quite hesitant to leave this school, what with the Death Eaters' activity of late. It worries me to have to leave you in a place where I cannot get to you quite quickly if I need to. I'm sure you realize by now that we have always had you charmed, that we have cast spells to locate you more easily – " Harry had felt that the adults around him had done something of the sort, but hearing it said aloud, knowing that no one had ever directly told him before, startled and worried him slightly. " – And it is all for your safety, you must rest assured. No matter where you are on these grounds, I have always been able to be by your side within seconds.
"But once I am stationed at the Ministry, it will become more difficult for such precautions to be made, as I'm sure you realize." He paused, studying the boy's face for a moment. "You're wondering why I am telling you all of this. Harry, I understand that this entire situation is either too immense and worrying for you to have realized yet, or you are already more apprehensive than any seventeen-year-old young man should have to be. That is why I asked you here today, Harry; because I will be placing those same sorts of spells on you which have always been placed on you, with the exception that these new spells will tie you directly to both Professor Black and Professor Lupin, both of whom are just as worried as I am. If possible, more so than I.
"Harry," Dumbledore finished, "I do not mean to alarm you. If there is anything you need, anything which worries or frightens or concerns you, I am just as close as I always have been, merely less often accessible, perhaps. If you wish to express a concern, just speak with your godfather or with Professor Lupin, and they will contact me immediately. Or you may always send an owl, of course. But you've already thought of that."
Harry pinned a smile onto his face, the same smile he used with Ron and Hermione. "Thank you, Professor. It means a lot to me. May I return to my lesson, now? Professor McGonagall will want me back as soon as possible."
"Yes, of course, Harry." He eyed the boy with some suspicion in his pale eyes, and asked, "You're quite alright with this?"
"Yes, Professor." Dumbledore only nodded, skepticism etched in the lines of his face.
He got to his feet and walked toward the door, past the magnificent phoenix, whose head he patted fondly. The bird cooed, sending a warm trill down the length of Harry's spine.
"Oh, Harry," said Sirius softly, as though he had just remembered something very important. His tone was more hollow than ever before, subdued and mellow. "I'm having supper in my apartments with Professor Lupin tonight. Would you like to eat with us, instead of in the Hall with everyone else? It might give you a chance to ask any questions you might think up later in the afternoon."
The smile returned to Harry's face. "Sure."
"Six o'clock, then?" Harry nodded. "As always," Sirius murmured, smiling, though the expression did not reach his eyes. "See you then, Harry."
He left the office feeling no better, no worse than when he had entered. Seeing Sirius in the state he had, in a way, had sobered him – though he felt as though he had been serious since the beginning of time by this point in his life.
Arabella Figg was growing rapidly older, and she was beginning to feel the rust in her bones at long last.
As a child, she had attended Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, a fifth generation student and the only child in her family. She had no cousins, no other relatives her age. She was the last Figg, and therefore the sole heir to the many riches of an old, respectable pureblood family. Arabella had been lean and strong as a child, always tall for her age, always eager to show her knowledge of dueling charms for sport.
When she was seventeen, Arabella had gone to work for the Ministry, and they had spent six months training her as an Auror. She had been a revolutionary, one of the first lady Aurors wizarding Britain had ever seen.
Arabella had witnessed firsthand the fall of Grindewald.
In the comforting peace that followed, many of her friends and acquaintances speculated that she would settle down and try to produce an heir for her fortunes. They reassured themselves that, though she was older than most brides as she neared thirty, she was quite pretty and a very loving woman; of course she would have no trouble finding a husband.
But Arabella had no intention of settling down. She was eager to see the world, to travel and meet new and exciting people. She wanted to help those with not a Knut to their name, to share what grace she had been given as the child of a wealthy widower in London.
So she bought a ticket on a high class ocean liner bound for Africa, and she became an assistant nurse in a tiny wizarding hospital on the coast of Madagascar.
As soon as her missionary impulses subsided, she went to work again for the Ministry. She worked peacefully as an active Auror on duty for many years, until July of 1981.
The tiny village of Godric's Hollow was shocked and appalled at the events which occurred there, of the brutal murders of James and Lily Potter.
The Potters were a lovely young couple, very handsome, kind, and popular with everyone they met, and both were Unspeakables with the Ministry. They met when they were stationed to work together, Arabella had learned over tea with a fellow Auror, an excitable and enthusiastic woman called Carlotta Plunkstone, who had always felt that the Potters would do great things in their time.
Arabella had only met them once, at a Ministry ball held that Midsummer's Eve, but she had known even then that Carlotta was right when she had prophesied the grand role to which they had been fated.
In the days following Voldemort's heinous acts that perfect evening in late July, rumors churned forth proclaiming the Potter's infant son, Harry, a hero, declaring that the child had brought about the fall of the greatest Dark wizard since Grindewald himself. They said that the child was special, that he was an anomaly and a miracle.
But Arabella Figg did not believe it. How could a baby, just days away from his first birthday, have stopped such a powerful wizard? She did not believe it, nor did she want to.
It was, of course, much to her surprise that the Ministry had placed her in indirect care of the child, the only witch within a given radius on whom Harry could depend for safety against the magical evils of the world. She lived across the street from the child's horrible Muggle aunt and uncle, his mother's sister and her husband.
Of course certain precautions had been made with her tiny house, so that the Muggles would never see any strange goings on around the woman. Of course she was to be on unfaltering guard at all times, keeping her eyes open for any sort of unusual behavior in the neighborhood around Harry and herself. Of course the Ministry had placed spells over the child and his entire home, on those Muggle relatives of his, to keep them well out of harm's way.
Of course, Arabella had been fascinated with the child from her first meeting him.
The Dursleys, the aunt and uncle, left Harry with her for weeks at a time when they went on their annual extended holidays in Spain or France. They left Harry with her nearly every weekend when they took their spoilt and disagreeable son on day trips to all sorts of comfortable Muggle places, zoos and museums and shopping centres and cinemas, all sparkling with the shiny glass and metal and plastic that so embittered wizards against Muggles.
He had been a creative child, though not especially graced with any unusual genius or gifts, and quite eager to see things. He had played with his animal crackers, imagining all sorts of wild adventures for the graham cracker creatures before dunking them into his milk and gnashing them between his teeth; he had always enjoyed their final imagined breath as he swallowed "what was left of them," as he said.
Until the Muggle world and his wicked cousin had squelched it out of him, Harry had been curious about Arabella and her many funny knick-knacks, her crystal balls and odd herbs on the windowsill and strange-looking jars lined up in the study, their labels dry and curling on the edges. He had crinkled his tiny, round nose at the ancient, dusty smell of cats and the stale cakes she sometimes fed him (she had yet to learn everything about Muggle baking, but showing any hint of real Magic around Harry, she had been warned, could have spelled disaster), but never had Harry Potter refused a nap on her ancient, dusty sofa in the parlor, which smelled of cats and stale cake.
Now the Ministry was expecting terrible things from Voldemort once more, but Arabella was feeling her old age and she could no longer sensibly ignore it. There would be no Auror work available to someone her age, not this time.
Arabella Figg would just have to sit at home, listening to the news on the Wizarding Wireless, as she never had done before.
The library was forgivingly empty the afternoon on which Draco first tutored Harry for Muggle Studies, as he had been assigned that first day which Harry had been in class.
As Draco had left the Slytherin Commons that day, Blaise had sidled up beside him, eyebrows raised into a fiery red hairline of curls, an innocently curious smile tucking the corners of his mouth and dimpling there. Draco had tried to ignore him; but Blaise simply would not hear of it.
"Where are you going?" he had asked, following the blond boy into the damp dungeon corridor.
Draco had sneered as haughtily as he could manage, replying, "Nowhere. I was hoping to be alone in my travels, but apparently that's too much to ask for in this day and age, isn't it?"
The redhead had all but giggled. "Oh, Draco, you're so witty," he had purred, "and terribly, sinfully handsome."
"Oh, stop it, Zabini, or you'll soon be sounding just like Pansy. I really must be going."
Blaise had then cornered him, trailing a slender fingertip over Draco's forearm. Cold shivers had spread down Draco's spine and into his hairline at the nape of his neck, through his limbs and tingling in his toes and fingertips, traveling throughout all of his veins and nerves and back again, finally centering in his loins. Silently he had cursed himself that such a simple action could cause him to react so.
Draco had nearly cringed outwardly as Blaise had pouted, his lower lip full and pink, his lashes fluttering over eyes made from blue crystal. He had obviously sensed Draco's discomfort, and his pupils had expanded; he had leaned forward and kissed the corner of Draco's perfect mouth.
"Meet me later," he had said, his voice barely above a husky, tempting whisper. His eyelashes had fluttered, and Draco had leaned away.
"I'm not sure I can promise you anything," he had replied coolly. Blaise's expression had flared. "But I will sit with you at supper, alright?" Draco had sighed lightly. "I really must be going."
Blaise had clucked his tongue, rolling his eyes. "Fine. Supper it is. But you owe me," he had added, jabbing a pretty finger at Draco's nose. "And I won't forget – I'm not Pansy, remember."
"Yet, anyway," had muttered Draco, turning away quickly.
Draco had abandoned Blaise in the dungeon corridors just as quickly, rushing as gracefully as he could to the library, which was, this afternoon, so mercifully empty.
Harry was sitting at a long, rectangular table at the far end of the library, one of the roughly hewn plank-and-board desks which few students used for its less than aesthetically pleasing appearance; its surface did not gleam like many others in the room. His bag was pushed against one leg of the table at his feet, and he was leaning on his left arm, his hand tangled in his hair as he casually read the first few pages of a textbook. Other books were stacked neatly in the corner of the table, and a thin roll of parchment paper, a bottle of standard black ink, and a nondescript brown quill were lying nearby, waiting to be used.
The desk was pushed up against the gates of the Restricted section of the library, the wall a few feet to its left home to a bank of tall, clear windows. Two large bookcases created a secluded nook for the table, and Harry seemed undisturbed in his studies.
With his bag of books slung over his shoulder, Draco made as if to walk casually up to Harry, to clap him on the back with spiteful cheer and greet him in a mockingly friendly manner, to pull out a book and begin their homework without a thought of anything but schoolwork in mind.
But as Draco walked up, he noticed the glisten of sunlight on the corner of Harry's glasses, a very small part of the larger, thicker beam of sunlight passing through the windows to his left. The same light seemed to ruffle Harry's hair, casting it unkemptly over Harry's pale forehead and the nape of Harry's elegant neck.
He noticed the soft curve of Harry's bottom lip as it was absently chewed by Harry's smooth, white teeth. He noticed the incredible length of the dark lashes curtaining Harry's eyes, and the way Harry's knee bumped lightly against the bottom of the desktop as he shifted slightly in his seat, and the fact that Harry had draped his robes over the back of the chair, wearing only his dark grey uniform trousers and his white shirt with its thin sleeves rolled up over the solid, round parts of his forearms, his red-and-gold Gryffindor tie hanging loose and untied around his neck.
Draco paused, feeling a very peculiar, almost familiar tug of something in his stomach, the lurch of a sudden gust of realization tickling the bottom of his heart roughly. It all made unfortunate sense to him then, and he wished he did not have to tutor Harry this afternoon, or any afternoon, for that matter.
Percy Weasley had always been the smallest of the Weasley boys. His older brothers, Bill and Charlie, had grown up quickly into tall, muscular men, their freckles no longer a picture of innocent, adorable youth, but a mark of ancestry. They had left Hogwarts knowing exactly what they had wanted to do with their lives; and Bill had left home to work for Gringotts and travel the world, while Charlie had gone on to study the dragons in Romania.
Percy had reached his seventh year at Hogwarts with much pomp and arrogant ceremony. He had proudly displayed his Prefect badges and top-notch O.W.L. marks, basking in the praise his mother bestowed upon him.
When he turned eighteen the summer after his seventh year, he had returned home to the Burrow, suitcases and trunk in neat order all around him, only to realize that he had not the faintest clue what he wanted to do with his life. And so he had done the only logical thing he could have done at the time; he had gone to the Ministry of Magic in London and had applied for a job there.
It had, of course, been the cowardly thing to have done. He understood that with his high marks and test scores, as well as his father's history with the Ministry, he had been sure to receive an offer.
When Mr. Crouch, Sr., had died so tragically, Percy had not only been heartbroken, but also overwhelmingly lost and confused. His family had not realized how important to Percy Mr. Crouch truly had been, "Weatherby" or not, and therefore no one gave him the proper comfort.
That spring, Percy moved out of the Burrow. He bought a flat in London, something simple but clean and pretty. He continued to work for the Ministry, directly assisting the man hired to replace Mr. Crouch, but his heart was no longer in his work; he no longer felt pride in what he did.
He ate simple meals, wore simple robes, and on weekends, he spent his time doing simple things; he shopped for new books, buying only when he had read everything else in his meager library. His life was a never-ending pattern of working, eating, sleeping, and working, on and on.
Nothing changed. He did not need it to change, and he liked his life the way it was. Simple. Unaltered. Predictable. Boring.
Until, that is, one overcast Saturday in October of his twenty-first year, when Percy Weasley was approached by a pretty girl in Flourish & Blotts.