Chapter Fourteen: Things Left Unsaid

"I don't understand."

Elizabeth's blunt statement hung in the air for several seconds with no reply except the crackling of the fire. Sirius looked at her wryly. "None of us did."

"But what could make her do those things? What was wrong with her?" she asked, her heart fluttering in her desperation for a definitive answer.

"You know." Sirius said simply. "It's part of you."

Elizabeth was about to protest when Sirius flicked his wand at the fire and propelled a burning twig out of the blaze and straight toward Elizabeth. She gasped and flung a hand up, barely having to think the word "Impedimenta" to make the twig stop in midair. She extinguished it and watched it fall harmlessly to the floor. Then she looked up at Sirius, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. "Why did you…?"

But he interrupted. "Where do you think you got the power to do that?" he asked. "The Ancient Magic has been considered extinct for years, and here you are, throwing Intoned Charms around effortlessly. Your mother couldn't do that. The most powerful witches and wizards within the past few hundreds years couldn't do that. Tell me, Elizabeth – where did you get that power?"

"I don't know," she half-sobbed.

"Yes. You do." When her only response was a violent shake of the head, Sirius continued. "From your mother you inherited the potential to master the Ancient Magic. From your father you received the power – the possibility of harnessing a talent long-buried."

She continued to shake her head, trying to ward off the obvious conclusion.

"And Elizabeth, there was but one wizard living in our time who accumulated enough power to make the revival of the Magic in you possible. One wizard who would go to any length to obtain more power…"

She was shaking her head so violently now that Sirius was forced to stop. He sighed, and tried a different tact.

"You couldn't live around Samantha Satine and escape talk of Intoned Charms," he began. "I used to think they'd poisoned her, that if she'd only left them alone, ignored the Ancient Magic flowing through her veins, that maybe she could have escaped what befell her. If she'd pushed aside the big picture, she wouldn't have been drawn into it all. But you can't avoid destiny, Elizabeth. You can ignore it, certainly – I did for years – but you can't escape it.

"And in the end, it makes it so much easier to just believe it. Because you see Elizabeth, in the end she'd poisoned me, too. I hated her obsession with the Ancient Magic, but that doesn't mean I didn't believe it. I knew there was something special about her. I knew that she was destined for something – I just never imagined it would be so terrible.

"You know that the purpose of the Ancient Magic was to maintain the forces of good in the world and attempt to stem evil. We lived in a time when the shadow of evil was spreading, and it looked as if it would soon overpower us. But then something remarkable happened: the Ancient Magic, which everyone had believed extinct, gathered around one of its own – a young girl with the power passed down in her blood and the innocent sweetness of pure good – and put forth one last effort to curb evil. Its strength was not great enough to outright conquer the movement of the Dark Lord, for you know the Ancient Magic's power became diluted as it was twisted for less than saintly purposes, but it found a different possibility – rather than destroy it, convert it. And who better for the job than your mother, the youngest and purest of the Satine line?"

Elizabeth shook her head. "I don't understand," she said flatly. She looked pleadingly up at Sirius, but immediately looked away again. She didn't like the almost maniacal glint in his eyes.

All he said was, "You know you do."

"I don't!" she spat vehemently, but she immediately proceeded to cry. "I don't want to," she added. The words seemed to tear out of her unwillingly, pulling with them a fiery lump of pain. She hadn't wanted to admit it. But now everything she'd been hiding from her consciousness over the past year was unlocked and poured throughout her body in a powerful rush. As its truth penetrated, she felt suddenly drained of energy, collapsing into weak sobs on the floor of the dreary room.

Just as she feared the misery would consume her, she felt warm arms lifting her from the ground and into a comforting embrace. She felt the tears from another face falling into her hair. I'm not alone, she thought, and slowly cleared her mind. I only know half of the story, something deep inside was reminding her, and here's my opportunity to learn the rest. She regained her footing and looked up at Sirius blearily.

"I've been dreaming about it for a long time, but I can never remember it when I wake up… I just feel sick to my stomach and I don't know why."

"The Ancient Magic has a way of protecting its enforcers from especially painful evil, but that is not always for the best."

"I suppose I could have remembered it if I'd thought about it hard enough, I just never wanted to."

"A hard admission to make. Can you make yourself remember it now?"

"Can't you just tell me? It's so much worse to watch it actually happen."

"Even I don't know exactly how he did it… that's why you were given the postcognition vision, no doubt. There will always be things she never told me, or never got the chance to tell me…"

"So all the difficult information is passed on through me?" Her tone started bitter, but ebbed into fatigue. Elizabeth sank back down into the armchair and rubbed her temples fervently.

"Tell me what you know first," she said after awhile. "I can feel the main idea those dreams were trying to tell me, but I've been holding them back so long that it's hard to recall the details."

Sirius sat very still for a moment, then abruptly stood up from his chair and sat down again on the worn carpeting in front of the fire. He beckoned Elizabeth to join him, and when they were both seated cross-legged directly across from eachother, he reached out his hands. She hesitated a moment before placing both of her hands firmly in his. He was looking at her now, with such a great solemnity that she felt nervous; but there was something else behind his stare, an eager thirst for truth.

"We're going to figure this out together," he said, still staring at her unblinkingly. I'll tell you everything I remember, and you fill in the blanks whenever something comes back to you from a dream, okay?" He smiled somewhat wanly. "I did this with your mother once or twice in seventh year while studying for our N.E.W.T.S.; she claimed that all the knowledge we'd learned was stored in our subconscious somewhere, and if we focused entirely on that one subject together, all the hidden facts would come pouring out. It always worked pretty well."

Elizabeth gave him a timid smile back. The thought that this method had been used before in much lighter situations, and by her mother no less, was rather comforting. She nodded, although her voice was hoarse, "I'll try."

"Alright then…" Sirius closed his eyes and took a steadying breath. "As I was saying, we were living in dark times back when I was your age. Voldemort's powers were growing faster than ever before, and it seemed that they were soon to reach their height. But before that could happen, the forces of good intervened. In some last attempt by Fate to save Tom Riddle from his evil path, he took one look at Samantha and fell in love, against all his intuitions."

Elizabeth closed her eyes. "It was in a bar…"

"Yes, in the Three Broomsticks on a Hogsmeade weekend our sixth year."

"Were you there?"

"No, I had tracked down Sarah to have a little talk with her. Remus was there."

"And?"

"He remembers what he looked like – handsome, he said, and only a little older than us… three, four years maybe…"

"That doesn't make sense."

"No, because Voldemort was much older, I know. But he had already gone to such lengths to reach immortality by then that it's hardly surprisingly that he could alter his appearance to how he looked as young Tom Riddle, before the evil tainted his features. Good research – blending into a Hogwarts crowd, scouting new recruits for his ranks. He used to have a habit of it in the old days, before his power completely went to his head. Dumbledore says Riddle had a surprisingly good sense when it came to detecting a witch or wizard's potential."

"But I mean, it doesn't make sense that he…"

"… fell in love with her? Ah, well, that ties into his talent, somewhat. He has his sensors open, receptive to new power, and was thereby fully susceptible to the radiant goodness of the Ancient Magic flowing from your mother. He had obtained an ancient form of dark magic, and was thus fully vulnerable to sensing ancient good magic, as well. And although most people could only see traces of it in her sweetness, Samantha, like all Satines, thrived in the power of the old."

Elizabeth wrinkled her nose. "I just don't see how one so evil…"

But Sirius interrupted. "The Ancient Magic was pure good until evil corrupted it; man is the same way. At his soul, he is good, and the more one glosses over that fact, the thirstier a part of man's soul becomes for the good it was created on. Most evil men can ignore this longing, however. Or some have substituted love with lust. But Voldemort was an extraordinary case. He had denied any inner good in him so profusely, that when Fate intervened to spark that part of him, the longing for good inside him was immensely strong. He was subconsciously drawn to Samantha and there was nothing he could do about it. The concept of love was in fact so rational to him that he probably didn't even understand what was at work. All he knew was that for a moment that day in Hogsmeade, he had encountered a girl he had to have."

"She didn't just go to him," Elizabeth asserted, more out of hope than knowledge.

"No, she didn't." Sirius smiled ruefully. "I love her for that. He attempted to grab her attention and she turned away. But that was, perhaps, the biggest mistake of all."

"Because she rejected him, and he always got what he wanted."

"Yes, and even worse, she rejected his love. So at that point he became aware that he had felt an emotion that he'd sworn off as the ultimate weakness. And not only had he succumbed to it unwittingly, but he had then been brushed aside."

"So he was determined to have her."

"He put a potion in a drink and had it sent to the table. No one noticed it being delivered, and, thinking it belonged to one of us at the table, Samantha never thought once about the goblet touching her lips. And we never even suspected it, until years later."

"But you saw its effects."

"Unfortunately."

"And that's when she did all those awful things?" Elizabeth asked. Sirius nodded, his eyes closed tight for a brief moment. "What was it? Hadn't love potions been banned?"

"Yes, but that wouldn't matter to Voldemort. But it wasn't a love potion, exactly. Her friends might have detected that. This was subtler. It altered her perceptions, exemplifying the faults of everyone around her while making her see the administrator as flawless."

"I don't see…"

"She became irrational. Ever little thing in a person that could possibly be construed as a fault appeared to her, even if she would have never considered it that way. Calling Lily a Mudblood, for example. Samantha would never have seen Lily's heritage as anything to be sneered at, but some people would, so the potion gave her their view. It was worse with her closest friends, because she knew us best, and could therefore find more instances for fault."

"And she already knew your flaws, but part of friendship had been accepting, and even loving them."

"But that was no longer the case. She withdrew from us, and felt lost and alienated. She needed someone to run to."

"So she started sneaking to Hogsmeade, where she met with a handsome young man to whom she could talk."

"He knew what she was going through, so he, better than anyone, could comfort her and give her exactly what she needed. On top of that, she saw him as perfect, such a sharp contrast from how she saw us that she couldn't help but start to fall for him."

"She wouldn't just give up on her friends, though?"

"No. Her perception and emotions were mangled, but she still had her reason, and her reason told her that there had to have been a reason she once loved us all so much."

"So she started reaching out to you again."

"Back and forth she went. One moment I thought I had her, the next she was pulling away with a revolted look on her face. But it gave us hope, Lily and I especially, that something really was wrong, and that Samantha could be saved."

"But that was another mistake…"

"It made Tom worry. His hold on her wasn't strong enough. He needed to capture her before she overpowered the potion."

Elizabeth hadn't noticed until now how their voices had been growing steadily quieter. "What did he do?" she whispered.

Sirius looked her full in the face, an intense burning behind his eyes. "Bound her to himself. She refused to tell me how."

"It was too hard to tell," she murmured, shutting her eyes to block his gaze. She could feel the edges of the vision that would tell her how it happened, they were pressing in on her mind. She wanted so badly to block them, but she could still feel Sirius's desperate gaze burning into her. It was gnawing away at him not to know…

"It was night," she whispered after a moment, finally giving into the vision and allowing it to wash over her. "She was lying in bed when she felt him calling for her…"

*~*~*

Samantha had gone to bed that night feeling dazed. Every spare moment of her time these days was being devoted to an increasingly rigorous study of Intoned Charms. She was exhausted. She had the heritage; she was so sure she could do it. "Yes, it's in our blood, Sam! But we don't have the power to invoke it!" Sarah had screeched at her two weeks ago in the middle of a crowded hallway.

"NO!" she had retorted, the blood rushing to her brain and making her feel intoxicated. She felt that way a lot lately… out of her mind, heady, giddy, confused… and powerful. Like there was a new source surging inside her. She was convinced that the more she studied the Ancient Magic, the more power she unleashed within herself. "NO!" she had cried again. "You just wait and see! I have the power! I can feel it!"

That was the last Samantha had spoken to her sister.

It had been twice as long since she'd spoken to her friends. Former friends, she reminded herself.

What she really needed was someone to talk to. Someone reasonable and admirable, someone flawless enough that she wouldn't be repelled just to be near him. She knew where that someone could be found, but she had been so obsessed in her quest that she hadn't visited Hogsmeade in a little over a week. Nine days, somewhere in her brain whispered. Nine days since I've talked to him. I need to talk to him.

The longer she went without seeing him, the more the pain built up. She felt a terrible guilt about the things she thought about her friends these days, and Tom was the only one capable of soothing it. "You're too hard on yourself," he would say. "You're too good, Sam. It's not natural. I'm not one to scorn the Ancient Magic, but when it runs as thick as it does in your blood, it can act like a drug, meddling with your perception. I think the more you study the Magic, the better you can control what's inside you. Not only are you gaining knowledge, Samantha, but power and clarity. This new light in which you are seeing your friends is probably much closer to the truth."

The comfort of having an excuse was immense, and Samantha bubbled with pride at Tom's appraising reference to her heritage and the acknowledgment that she must be mastering it. Sirius had indulged her love for fairies, but he had never been truly supportive of her quest to learn Intoned Charms. But Tom…

Images of the two men rivaled for possession of her thoughts, back and forth, until –

"Argh!" Samantha cried, kicking her feet violently beneath her quilt.

She gave a few more futile writhes until she was hopelessly entangled in the covers, not settling until an aquamarine velvet pillow bounced off of her head and Lily's voice muttered thickly, "Now really, the goblin rebellions are nothing to lose sleep over."

Samantha paused – it was an old joke from first year, and Lily had undoubtedly let it slip subconsciously (as the girls hadn't spoken since the incident in the Entrance Hall one month ago), but the effect it had on Samantha was heart stopping. For a moment her raging thoughts were unexpectedly clear, and she found herself able to organize them into three simple facts:

Everything – her common sense, her perception, her heart – was telling her that Tom was the only one who could satisfy her needs and desires.

But something deeper – less logical, less tangible, yet somehow far purer – resisted. Like an undercurrent in her heart, she ached for Sirius.

She missed Lily.

In that clarifying moment, she knew each to be true, but just thinking about the first two made her head swim worse than before.

She focused in on the last. It was the simplest, and the most easily rectified. She could apologize right now.

She lay back on her pillow and gathered a deep breath for strength. But suddenly every thought was wiped from her mind and she shot bolt upright in bed.

Tom. He needed her.

*~*~*

Sirius gave Elizabeth a hard stare. "What do you mean, he was 'calling her'?"

She gave him a sour look in return as the question pervaded her concentration. "Kind of like telepathy, but more of a feeling, I suppose." When Sirius continued to look confused, she added, "It's one gift of the Ancient Magic to be able to sense things. You mentioned that sometimes she got feelings and just knew things, so this would be something of an advanced form of that. Only it was coming from Tom's dark magic, and not from any talent of her own." Elizabeth paused, and it was her turn to be confused. "But I don't understand how she could be so foolish as to just leave in the middle of the night," she wondered aloud.

Sirius shook his head grimly. "She wanted so badly to access the Ancient Magic, and she never could. She would've grasped on to any instance which could mean she'd developed the gift."

"She was blinded by a dream…" Elizabeth whispered, and for the first time she understood that her professors' warnings about Intoned Charms might have been warranted.

*~*~*

It was cold in the tunnel leading into Hogsmeade, but Samantha ran on, half-delirious from the burning desire to reach Tom. He needed her, she knew it, but the feeling was unsettling somehow. Not at all like she had expected a message from the Magic to be. And how had she developed that power so suddenly? But she couldn't think, she could hardly breathe, she no longer even knew where her feet were taking her… she just had to keep going.

After an hour or so, she slowed her pace, her mind clear enough to notice that she was far into one of the rolling fields on the very edges of Hogsmeade. Wet blades of grass shined eerily in the moonlight, and Samantha found herself wishing for the cover of trees.

Tom Riddle smiled as the young girl floated angelically toward him – in her flowing white nightdress, her hair falling in soft curling tendrils on her shoulders, her eyes sparkling oddly with the reflection of moon, and her bare feet grazing the dewy grass, she appeared a vision of innocence. If the Magic was going to plague him with feelings of relentless love, he was at least going to be in control of it. This girl would not make a fool of him again.

She wrapped her arms around his neck and he instinctively tried to soothe her shivering body. "Why am I here?" she whispered, and he could hear the fear in her voice. The excitement from her "instinct" to come had long worn off.

"I…" he faltered. His heart softened, beyond his control, and he caressed her back, almost hesitantly. The thought of losing her caused pain to more areas than his pride. "I get scared sometimes… I feel lost, and I just… need you. You're the only one who can calm me."

She peered up at him thoughtfully and smiled. "You know, I was just thinking the same about you."

"Good," he whispered into her hair. "Then you'll do something for me." She nodded slowly against his cloak as he reached into one of his pockets and pulled out a tiny object.

He placed it in her hand, and she stepped back to examine it in the moonlight. It was a ring – smooth and cool against her skin, made of dusted silver with three tiny emeralds side by side along the top. She looked up at him quizzically.

"So I can call you," he explained. "It's an antique, descended from the old Kingdom of Lilwalnia hundreds of years ago. It was said to belong to the Paranette family – see how it glows? It's infused with the Magic."

Samantha's eyes widened and she slipped it onto her finger unquestioningly. "You're wonderful," she murmured, looking up into his dark eyes wonderingly. She had never been given a gift so suited to her passions. He stared down at her, love pouring unrestrained from his eyes, basking in Samantha's radiant joy. But it lasted for only a moment, and she saw the struggle in his eyes before the adoration in them flickered out. They became dark, angry. Angry with who? she wondered.

"I have to go," he said, and Disapparated on the spot.

Samantha looked around, bewildered. Then she started running. Innately, she knew she wanted to be nowhere near this place. With every pounding step, she pushed herself on harder. The tension in her head was growing, her veins were throbbing so that she could see a shadow of each heartbeat before her eyes, and she began trembling so hard that she thought she might seize up and collapse. Just then she stopped mid-step, clutching her head, then her stomach, and finally sinking onto the ragged cobblestones. She couldn't see – she was blacking out – but she was brought sharply back to consciousness as a searing pain shot through her finger where the ring rested. Blinded by the glittering stars suddenly obstructing her eyes, she yanked the thin silver band from her finger and hurled it as far as her arm allowed.

The pain ebbed away, and she lay on the street, panting hard. When her head cleared and her muscles had relaxed, she sat up slowly and examined her ring finger in the moonlight. A livid red brand ran all the way around its base, exactly where the ring had been. Seized this time not by pain, but by sheer horror, she stumbled to her feet and ran without pause all the way back to Hogwarts.

When she finally staggered through the portrait hole and back into Gryffindor Tower, her mind was in such disarray that she was shocked she hadn't yet passed out from panic and confusion. She looked up and another jolt shot through her heart, for there was Sirius.

For a moment, she felt the same clarity of thought that she had experienced earlier in her dormitory and she knew, without a doubt, that this was the person she needed. But could she go to him? Did he still care for her? Shaking, she reached a hand hesitantly forward. He was inching closer, their fingertips were a fraction apart, she felt the warmth of his body… and recoiled. Something seemed to die inside her. "God, Sirius, don't you see?" she screamed, wild-eyed.

He stepped back, stung, but she wasn't looking at him anymore. She was looking at the hand that had reached for him, the hand that had an angry red welt branded into the flesh of its ring finger.

"I'm tainted," she whispered hoarsely, feeling a wave of self-disgust overriding her senses.

She gave a deep, dry sob and stumbled up the staircase to her dormitory, clutching her stomach.

*~*~*

Sirius was gazing, unfocused, at the worn carpeting. "So he conferred the spell through a ring," he muttered. "I've always wondered how he managed it."

"What do you mean?" Elizabeth whispered. "What happened? I saw it… but I don't understand."

Sirius didn't look at her. "It must have been one hell of a strong spell to brand her like that. Although it was temporary… I would have noticed…" he shuddered, then blinked away whatever memory he was picturing and met Elizabeth's gaze.

"He bound her to him," he said matter-of-factly, then gave a harsh laugh. "She was too strong to be captured by a simple potion."

"Because she was already coming back to you?"

"Yes. So he invoked a spell in the ring. I don't know exactly what it was, but she once described to me what it did. It could call to her, force her to him, and even force feelings of love for him within her. When he focused his power into the tie binding them together, she lost her own thoughts, her rationality…"

Elizabeth swallowed convulsively at the image of a young woman rolled in a ball on the floor sobbing as she battled to push the outside interference from her brain. She shook her head, then frowned. "But I thought she threw off the ring?"

"It was most likely only a transfer device. The spell made her feel like she was losing a part of herself, and he wouldn't want her in his presence when that happened, would he? Not if he wanted her to love him. So he gave her the ring, then activated the spell through it after she left."

"Did she realize what had happened?"

"Not until after we graduated. After that night, he became solely occupied on his ascension to power, and he forgot about your mother for a few years. She was the prize waiting for him once he had obtained some of the omnipotence he sought."

"So you never noticed anything more while you were in school?"

Sirius sighed. "Unfortunately, no. We had no idea that Samantha was still in danger, and she did everything in her power to forget about it. She convinced herself that she had seen the error of her ways, and that now that she was back with us, everything would turn out right."

*~*~*

The flames were what attracted Lily to the Hogwarts grounds at midnight on the last night of her sixth year. She pinned on her Prefect badge and muttered, "They just insist on making trouble up until the very last minute, don't they?" But as she approached the roaring bonfire, she saw only Samantha, gazing intently into the flames, her long, loose curls falling freely down her back.

Lily frowned, but then she looked into the flames and she began to understand, for there, burning brightly, were pages upon pages of research that Samantha had done on Intoned Charms and the Ancient Magic. There were the drawings of the mysterious boy, there were dozens of copies of Lady Sam's last few articles, there was the book she had purchased in Hogsmeade, On Reaching Greater Power.

Samantha looked up as Lily approached, and despite the eerie look of the light of the flames flickering off her face, she looked incredibly free. She smiled in a way that Lily hadn't seen in over a year, and it made Lily's heart glow. "So," Lily ventured softly. "You've given up on the Ancient Magic?"

Samantha closed her eyes and breathed in the warm early summer air, a look of purity on her face. "I'll leave the Magic to my ancestors," she said. "I'm happy with who I am, and who I have." After several more minutes of gazing into the flames, she whispered, "Thanks for never giving up on me, Lil." Lily just nodded and slipped her hand into that of her best friend.

"You know," Lily said a little later. "The Ancients used to do this all the time – build purifying bonfires to purge themselves of past mistakes."

Samantha raised an eyebrow. "Except they would dance around them to celebrate their moving on to a better stage of life." The girls exchanged mischievous grins, and soon their Hogwarts robes lay in a heap on the ground as they both danced around the flames in their light nightdresses, the bright sound of their laughter bubbling into the night.

In a window in Gryffindor Tower directly above the scene, Sirius Black gazed down, a content smile on his face. James, having just finished the last of his kitchen raids for the year, threw of his Invisibility Cloak as he entered the common room. When he spotted a glint (coming, coincidentally, from a Prefect badge, where it lay discarded in the grass below) reflected in the corner of the window in front of which his best friend was standing, he went over to join him. In the dark, he saw a bonfire glowing far below, and two figures with long flowing hair and wispy dresses twirling around it, barefoot. "What the…? Are those…?" he stared at Sirius, who was smiling at the girls fondly.

"Yeah," Sirius said. "Those are our girls."

"Hm," James nodded in approval. "They're beautiful."

"They sure are."

*~*~*

"With the burning of those books, it felt like we'd been granted a new start," Sirius smiled, remembering. "Samantha shelved her interest in the Ancient Magic and came back to us whole-heartedly. It was a little too passionate at times, but we never paid it much mind then. We were just as eager to have everything back to normal as she was to forget everything she'd been through. I guess that's why none of us ever talked about it. A mistake, I see now, but we were just kids living in dark times, grasping to keep everything as normal as possible."

"What happened then?" Elizabeth asked.

"Well," Sirius smiled. "We had a wonderful summer. And then seventh year began – James and Lily received their Head Boy and Girl badges in the mail, which was a shock to all of us, as far as James was concerned, anyway. Back in fifth year, Lily and Samantha had been equally in line for the position of Gryffindor Prefect, and when Lily got it, people used to joke that it only meant that Sammy would pull ahead and win Head Girl. She could be very persistent, your mother. But sixth year dragged her down… but I'm getting off-track."

Sirius shook his head. "Anyway, seventh year was when the dark activities really began to affect people's daily lives. We couldn't avoid them anymore. On more than one occasion, Samantha would wake up sick in the middle of the night, and we would learn of an attack the next day. We just figured it was the good magic running in her veins that made her especially sensitive to the Death Eater's attacks. But other than that, seventh year was one of the best I can remember. We all grew closer than ever before, and we made enough memories to last a lifetime.

"All too soon, we graduated. James went off to begin Auror training, and Lily, who by that time was inseparable from him, went along. I wasn't sure what I wanted to do with my life yet, and I was, after all, only eighteen, so I started working at Quality Quidditch Supplies in Diagon Alley to make some money. Sammy went back to her family home to spend some time with your grandparents, and then to help prepare for Sarah's wedding. There was a lot of work to be done there, seeing as half the guests would be magical, and half of them Muggle. Samantha did all the preventative charmwork, and at one point Albus Dumbledore himself commended her on it and asked if she could help with a project the Order of the Phoenix was putting together.

"And so after Sarah's wedding, Samantha threw herself into the Order. James and Lily were already members, and I left my job to become one as well. The resistance force was full under way, and the war was escalating, but we hadn't reached a climax yet. There was still time for regular life – I still went out with Samantha almost every night, and she even had time to start researching her family history again. She would never go back to her obsession of the Ancient Magic, but she was bound to prove that the Satines really were descended from the great Paranette family of Lilwalnia. There was just the small glitch that Princess Ellianne Paranette, last Full Empress of the Ancient Magic, had been assassinated at seventeen before giving birth to any heirs. But like I said, Sammy was determined. She just knew there had to be a continuation of the family line, that the child would have been put in hiding as soon as the threat to her mother was known…"

"I know," Elizabeth interrupted. "Aunt Sarah continued the search for years after Samantha died. But what happened?"

"Before we knew it, James had proposed to Lily and another wedding was under way. The Order was strong, we were happy and celebrating, and we all had real hope for a future without the shadow of the war."

"And then?" Elizabeth asked, hating to voice the words.

Sirius sighed. "And then he called to her, one last time."

*~*~*

Good old Satine intuition, they called it. Sirius used to make fun of her for it. "You just use that as an excuse for being a know-it-all!" he would exclaim gleefully. "It's a family gift that I'm always right, so shut up and listen to Princess Samantha!" he would mimic in a high-pitched impression while James, Remus and Peter laughed. Lily would always crack a smile when he would add, "At least Lily admits to being an insufferable know-it-all. You, Miss Pretension, try to disguise it under a different name."

Samantha would laugh. "Well, my intuition told me you were in desperate need of some care, so I was about to kiss you just now, but perhaps you're right – maybe I am just imagining these feelings and it's really just some psychological problem after all…" At which point Sirius would interrupt and beg heartily for her to follow her intuition.

It was a game that never annoyed Samantha, and that gave Sirius a certain amount of pleasure, because deep down, he was extraordinarily proud of his girlfriend for her incredible ability to sense things, and teasing her about it was the easiest way to announce it to the world. But under the pride, there was also a measure of fear. Sirius loved magic, but the myths of the Ancients seemed overwhelming to him – fate, destiny, the power of the Old Magic – they were all so abstract and frighteningly powerful. Whenever Samantha used the word "destiny," he shivered. Perhaps he had picked up some of her ability, because just hearing the word spoken made him feel that destiny would not be very kind to him

There were times when Samantha found her "Satine intuition" to be the very worst kind of curse as well. She had been mostly happy, and rather stabile ever since her night of illness in the common room sixth year, and now, a year after graduation, life seemed to be going well. Yet there was always that feeling, ever persistent and growing, that she hadn't escaped. The horrors of her sixth year hadn't been conquered. Far from it, they were out there waiting for her. And being able to sense this, having this looming feeling of dread hanging over her, made her angry. She began to hate the power she had inherited from her family – "the gift of intuition, the last remnant of the Ancient Magic possessed by families centuries ago," as the books said.

She was paging through such a book now, slowly at first, scanning each page, looking for an answer. But the more she flipped past without finding anything, the faster she went. She couldn't control the anger bubbling up inside of her, the hatred at this family that had cursed her, the blood in the veins that was the bane of her existence. "Sirius, this has to end." She turned the pages faster. "No, don't give me that look; I'm serious this time." The voices in her head wouldn't quiet – they pushed against her, screaming in her mind. "Will you listen to me? Please, Sirius! I'm rational, I swear! For once in my life, I can see clearly!" The pages turned faster, and she could no longer read them, the tears in her eyes were so thick. "You don't understand now, but you will… please. Siri, please. Don't look at me like that. There's no other way. Sirius…"

A sob tore in her throat as one of the worn parchment pages ripped off in her hand. She pushed the book away and let her head fall into her knees as she shook with violent sobs. He hadn't listened to her. He wouldn't let her go. She hated her family for making her leave him, and she hated Sirius for what he made her do next.

I had to do it, she attempted to console herself, there was no other way. He was so stubborn; he just wouldn't let me go. It had been as if he could not trust that it was truly Samantha speaking to him. As if he believed that if he just grabbed her shoulders and shook her hard enough, she'd be herself again, tell him she loved him, fall into his arms… she sighed. It wasn't like the past gave him no reason to doubt her. But she wasn't fighting a potion this time. She could still see his eyes, absorbing this fact. Perhaps that was why he had pushed so hard against it – he did not want to believe she was acting of her own free will.

Something was about to happen – that's how this had started. She had sensed it the other day, the overwhelming sense of danger washing over her, and she knew instinctively that it was time to face her past. She refused to involve Sirius in it. She had hurt him enough before, and now that they were growing so close, she feared that it might destroy him when he found out what had truly happened that night their seventh year. She unconsciously rubbed the now unmarked skin of her ring finger. It was foolish dream – she would find the solution in a book, conquer her past with one of her specialized charms, then run back to Sirius, reclaim his love and live happily ever after.

But she was still a child in so many ways, and she grasped onto the dream as her final hope.

And so, last night she had met with Sirius as usual. They had gone out to dinner, and just being with him had been enough to push her upcoming task to the back of her mind. It always gave her strength – being around Sirius, surrounded by his warmth and love and laughter. She had taken that strength and used it to steel herself for what she had to do – she had to end things with him until she could conquer the curse Tom had put her under, whatever it was. She knew it was not by accident that this was happening to her, and she knew that the reason for her role in it had something to do with her heritage, with a power that only she possessed.

"A curse was placed on the Ancient Magic when its powers were bent to the evil will of men, that it should degenerate over the years, souring from the greatest power imaginable to a weak shadow of its past potency. Although it will still act from time to time, no wizard will be able to control it until the resurrection of the line of Princess Ellianne," she had read in one of her books. Princess Ellianne's line – the line that everyone else claimed had died out with the princess's death. Samantha was positive that it was the intervention of the Ancient Magic that was causing her problems now, and she was determined to solve the secret of Ellianne's ancestors. The only way to conquer this was to find a way for wizards to access the Magic again.

In the meantime, she had happily consented to go on a walk under the starry sky with Sirius after dinner, where she proceeded to break his heart, as well as her own. But he would not listen to her cryptic warnings of "We can't be together now, please believe me, I'll explain when I can," and she had been forced to resort to something stronger.

"I don't love you, Sirius."

He stepped back, as if the words had physically wounded him.

"It was all a schoolgirl crush. Don't you see? A silly infatuation."

He flinched.

"I was trying to spare your feelings by telling you it's not safe for us to be together, but in truth, I can't stand to lie to you any longer. I can't pretend to love you just to spare you any more."

His breath became shorter, each word a sharp blow.

She still shivered recalling what she had done next. He had reached out for her, numbly, unable to stop himself, and she had released her final weapon. Feigning a look of disdain, she spat out, "God, Sirius, you're so clingy," a perfect imitation of that day in the entrance hall back in sixth year. It had the desired effect – Sirius recoiled, shook his head in bewildered disbelief, and stumbled off, clutching an object in his pocket. If he had looked into her eyes, he would have seen the untruthfulness of her words, but he was too shaken to look for the pain and love shining brilliantly there.

Samantha was sitting still with her eyes closed, Sirius's pain-filled face still hovering in her thoughts, when a new vision appeared. A little girl, no more than five, and with Samantha's eyes, her smile and her curls, was racing through the hallway of a house nestled in the countryside. Sunlight poured in through the windows, making the white of the girl's dress glimmer brightly, as she twirled her skirt and snatched a white sheet from a laundry basket. "Lookit!" she trilled, as a beautiful woman – Sarah – came running after her. Samantha marveled at how young and happy Sarah looked. "Elizabeth!" she laughed. "Come back here! I've only just washed those!"

The little girl, Elizabeth, giggled. She had donned the sheet like a long white veil. "Lookit!" she repeated, her cheeks flushed with excitement. She twirled again. "I'm the long-lost ancestor of Queen Ellianne!" She performed an elaborate curtsy, impressive for a child so young. "I am the Princess Elizabeth!" she cried regally. "Now hurry, find me a good place to hide before my enemies come and snatch me away!"

Sarah lifted the child from her waist and twirled her around in the air, before setting her lightly into the laundry basket. "Ah, you are a genius, Lady Sarah!" Elizabeth giggled. She pulled her 'veil' over her head and nestled into the sheets, as Sarah hoisted the basket to her hip. "No one shall ever find me here!" came Elizabeth's muffled giggle, and Sarah, smiling, patted the lump in her basket affectionately.

The vision changed and the girl, a teenager now, and resembling Samantha more than ever, was sitting on a rug in a dank room lit only by a fire, her hands clasped tightly in those of the man sitting across from her – Sirius. "She was cursed," Sirius was saying, and tears coursed down the girl's cheeks. His voice grew soft, comforting, and Samantha ached to hear it, even in a dream. "But she lives on through you."

Elizabeth bit her lip and nodded. "We'll figure this out," she said, and then she was leaving, Sirius watching her with a look of longing in his eyes. She ran through the tunnel connecting Hogsmeade to the Weeping Willow, and she soon reached Hogwarts, where she proceeded to the Hospital Wing. A boy lay on a bed there, a boy with James's hair and Lily's eyes. Elizabeth clasped his hand as more tears came to her eyes. "I'll figure this out," she murmured. "I'll end it. I promise."

Samantha woke with a start, and hugged herself to keep from shaking. She wasn't sure what to make of the vision, if it was, indeed, a vision. She'd never had one before – her powers had been limited to feelings of intuition, those feelings that she'd just been cursing.

She got up to go inside and make some tea, when she noticed the page she had mistakenly torn from the book, crumpled in her hand. She scanned it. "The kingdom was devastated after the death of their beloved princess… Years passed and Ellianne's story faded into legend… After seventeen years rumors began surfacing that Ellianne's betrothed, Prince Albert of the House of Quenn, was behind the assassination plot…In his murder trial he claimed that the princess had shamed him by marrying another man when she knew she had been promised to the House of Quenn from birth… at which point the Prosecution brought forth a young middle-class woman by the name of Elizabeth…

Samantha sat down hard, tea forgotten, and riffled through the book until she found the place where the page had been torn out.

… by the name of Elizabeth, a seventeen-year-old of questionable birth, adopted into the Lewis family as a baby. Neither side had much proof in favor or against the late Princess Ellianne, and Elizabeth Lewis, as a merchant-class orphan who would have been barely four months old at the time of the murder, stood little chance against the royal forces of Prince Albert. Miss Lewis, however, proved to be a formidable sorceress of the Ancient Magic, with powers to rival those of Ellianne herself, and in the times, such a gift was valued far above status. Miss Lewis's case rested on a series of Postcognition visions in which she claimed to have seen Ellianne, yet pure and unattached, being murdered by Albert for a single reason – sole power over the Lilwalnian throne. The prince was convicted on this evidence by a jury in clear awe of Miss Lewis's abilities.

Although Elizabeth Lewis's power in the Ancient Magic cannot be questioned, historians call upon the reliability of her evidence in this famous trial. Accounts left by other Masters of the Magic have recently been found, claiming that the visions described by Miss Lewis on the stand did not comply with their experience with the Magic. Later historians have also discovered strong proof that Princess Ellianne did indeed defy her betrothal and secretly wed another man. The question became, what reason would Miss Lewis have to hide the true circumstances of the death of a Princess she had never known?

Heart racing, Samantha ran upstairs and lugged down the trunk of books she had gathered on her family history, pulling out the research she had done for her family tree so many years ago. Lewis, Lewis… but there was nothing. The two branches of the tree remained severed – the top one ending with Ellianne, the bottom one beginning with Felicity Satine, but still nothing to link the two. Under Felicity's name, she had written, Kept her mother's maiden name, solidifying this surviving tradition of the Satine family to honor the power of the Magic passed on through its women.

Not to be discouraged, Samantha pulled out a second book and scanned it for Elizabeth's name… there! Elizabeth Lewis, most talented Mistress of the Ancient Magic of her time, key figure in the trial of Prince Albert of Quenn. Questionable parentage, adopted by the Lewis family of Lilwalnia… moved to Paris at the age of twenty to teach Intoned Charms at the newly founded Beauxbatons Academy, where she changed her last name to Sateen, a word of fairy origin, meaning 'blessed.' When she married Benjamin Whitten, she insisted on keeping her last name, but as it was never her real maiden name to begin with, authorities refused to legally recognize it. Old stories claim that her eldest daughter, Lady Felicity Whitten, later recovered the name after moving to Winchester, England, but as she died before being legally registered in England, no legal documentation supports this fact…

Half an hour later a dozen books lay strewn across the deck, but Samantha had found enough facts to finally evidence her case – that Princess Ellianne had given birth to a daughter, Elizabeth, and placed her in hiding (under the Lewis family) before her death, and that Elizabeth was indeed the founder of the Satine family name.

Samantha sat back in her lawn chair for a moment and took a deep breath. The discovery had left her somewhat winded. Idly, she conjured a glass pitcher and used her wand to fill it with ice-cold lemonade. She held the glass to her flushed cheek for a moment before taking a refreshing sip. A sudden thought made her leap up again and rush inside the house. She picked up the newly installed telephone (it had taken quite a lot of charmwork to get it to function inside the wizarding household, but it was necessary now that Sarah was living in the Muggle world), and dialed her sister's number.

***

Sarah was in the kitchen making lemonade the Muggle way (for the first time in her life) when the phone rang.

"Hello?"

"I'm going to name my daughter after her!" the voice on the other end said by way of salutation.

"After who?" Sarah asked. She did not have to ask who was calling – only Samantha would start a conversation like that.

"Princess Ellianne's daughter!" Samantha exclaimed with child-like glee.

Sarah, although exasperated by this comment, couldn't help but laugh. "Samantha, we've been through this. Ellianne never had a daughter."

"Oh, but she did!"

"Yes, I know you've been trying to prove that for years…" Sarah began patiently.

"But I've finally found the proof!" Samantha interrupted, and even over the phone Sarah could feel the truth of the statement. She silenced.

"I was just sitting here looking for a way to end the curse…"

"Curse?"

"That doomed the Ancient Magic to diminish over the years…"

"Ah, yes." Sarah was familiar with this theory, too. "Go on…"

"… because I can't be with Sirius until it's broken, and…"

Sarah interrupted again. "But I thought you were with Sirius?"

"No, I broke it off last night."

"Samantha!" Sarah was genuinely shocked. "Why?"

"Hush, Sar, I'm about to explain everything. Now, the Ancient Magic…"

"But Sirius! What happened?"

"I'm getting to that – it connects."

But Sarah was persistent. "You and Sirius were so perfect for eachother!"

Samantha, slightly annoyed at being interrupted, asked, "What's with the sudden concern? I thought you'd always disapproved of him."

"Well, I did at first, but I was wrong. He's a great guy; I can see that now. Besides, he really loves you, Sam. You'll be safe with him."

Samantha held the phone away from herself for a second and took a deep breath. When she came back on the line, she managed to control the tremble in her voice. "This is not about Sirius, Sarah. It's about a momentous discovery in the wizarding world's past!" Samantha breathed a sigh of relief – she could feel her enthusiasm flooding back to erase the cold brought on by Sarah's words.

She heard her sister chuckle softly on the other end of the line. "Alright, Sammy," she said. "Go on and tell me about this 'momentous discovery.'"

"Well, as I've already told you, I finally found the link…"

"Between Princess Ellianne and us, I know. But c'mon now, Sam, how's that possible?"

"It's just like I've always claimed!" Samantha enthused, and Sarah sat down on her couch, ready for a long explanation and feeling the warmth of her sister's enthusiasm radiating from miles away. "She was married in secret and gave birth to a daughter, who had to be put into hiding when the plot to overthrow the royal family was revealed."

"This is the daughter you want to one day name your daughter after?"

"Yes, they named her… Oh!" Sarah jumped at Samantha's sudden exclamation. "I have to go! I'm supposed to meet Kingsley in half an hour!"

Sarah laughed. "You're leaving early for a change… you're never on time."

"Oh," Samantha said distractedly, and Sarah could hear her searching for her purse. "I was planning on running a quick errand beforehand. I'll call you as soon as I get back, okay? Don't die of anticipation; I promise I won't take long! Bye Sar! Love you!"

"I love you, too," Sarah laughed as she hung up. She sank back into the couch, smiling as she imagined her sister showing up twenty minutes late for her meeting with Kingsley. She would apologize, protesting, "But I swear I thought I'd only be ten minutes in Madam Malkins, but they'd just got in a new shipment of these beautiful silk scarves…"

Kingsley would laugh, order her a soda water, and assure her not to worry about her tardiness. Samantha had that effect on people – her constant light-heartedness crushed any other feeling – annoyance, worry, fear, pain… Sarah slowly got up, and turned back to her lemons, humming a cheery tune.

Samantha, meanwhile, hung up the phone and sighed. The smile fading from her lips, she murmured the reply she had nearly given her sister during the pause in their conversation. "But he won't be safe with me."

She grabbed a pinch of powder and Flooed to Diagon Alley.

***

She was meeting with Kingsley Shacklebolt on business for the Order of the Phoenix – Dumbledore had recruited her because her expertise in charms would prove to be a great asset in a new project the Order had underway – a project she would learn about today. In an unprecedented bout of seriousness, Samantha decided to forego her visit to Madam Malkin's and head straight to the Leaky Cauldron. She could be early for once in her life for business this important

Her path brought her past Quality Quidditch Supplies, and she could not keep herself from slowing as she passed. Sirius still worked here on the odd hours when he wasn't on business for the Order. She wondered… but no, she wouldn't look. She turned away from the window display of dazzling Quidditch equipment and walked resolutely past.

But Sirius, catching a glimpse of her hair from behind the counter inside, could not as resolutely ignore her. He had missed something the other night, he was sure of it, and he was furious with himself for allowing his pain to blind him. Something was wrong with Samantha and he was not about to let his ignorance of it hurt her. "Teddy!" he called to one of the stores new employees. "Watch the register for me, will ya?" He dashed from the store before hearing Teddy's assent.

Once outside, he stopped in the middle of the Alley, staring at the shoppers lining the cobblestone street stretched out before him. There. He saw the swish of her periwinkle robes, the way the sun caught the golden highlights in her hair.

"Samantha!" he called.

She knew the voice, and she stopped dead in the road. He could see her struggling, and in the end she couldn't resist. She turned. For a moment, it felt like time had stopped. The stretch of road between them, the bustling shoppers, all evaporated, and it was just the two of them on the street. Samantha couldn't help it – she began walking towards him, and somewhere in the back of her mind she registered that the force pulling her to Sirius was just as strong as the calling Tom had once used on her, yet this was of her free will.

Sirius watched her advancing, and his hand fell subconsciously to his pocket, where the small box he had been carrying around with him for a week still rested. When she stopped suddenly, still a good distance from him, he knew she was about to pull back. She looked pale, frightened, and she was gasping, trying to leave.

He wouldn't let her. "Marry me!" he cried suddenly.

It was too much. She had built up the power to resist him, but the surprise of his pronouncement shattered it. Before she knew it, he had rushed up to her and enveloped her in his arms. She melted. "Yes," she whispered, and for a moment she allowed herself to believe that it was real. She broke into a radiant smile as he pulled the box from his pocket and opened it to reveal a glittering diamond ring. He slipped it onto her finger while she gazed into his warm eyes, basking in his love. He kissed her, and in that moment she truly believed everything would turn out right.

And then it was as if everything was happening in slow motion.

A burning pain, starting where the new diamond ring glittered, and where a thin emerald ring had once rested, shot up Samantha's finger and through her body, scalding hot. It was happening, just as she knew it would. In that moment, Samantha realized that she had fallen into the trap she had promised to avoid. She had sworn to herself that Sirius would not get hurt more than was necessary. She had broken it off with him for a reason, broken his heart once, before their relationship progressed to a point that would make it more difficult to let go. Yet here she was, back in his arms.

Except now she wasn't. Her body on fire, she was being pulled away from him, struggling to go back, grappling with the force pulling on her, desperate not to hurt Sirius again. But then she was running, crying, looking over her shoulder into his eyes, trying to apologize but unable to utter a word. The force propelled her onward, tearing down the street, but her gaze never moved from Sirius's face. She soaked it in, every detail of it, and just as he began to fade, she forced the words 'I love you' onto her lips.

She was gone.

Sirius remained standing in the street staring after her for a full five minutes, numb and motionless. He was roused by the bells of the communication device the Order had distributed to its members. Flicking it open, he saw Kingsley Shacklebolt's concerned face reflected inside. "Sirius," it said. "Do you know where Samantha is? She was supposed to meet me at the Leaky Cauldron ten minutes ago."

After a long, blank stare at the device in his hand, Sirius responded, his voice emotionless, "I don't think she's coming."

"Oh, I wouldn't say that," Kingsley joked. "You know Sam; she's always late. I was just wondering if you could tell me how late she'll be, since you're usually the one holding her up!" Sirius flinched, but Kingsley obviously didn't notice, as he chuckled heartily. "But if you don't know, I wouldn't worry. She'll show up eventually."

"Yes," Sirius murmured, grasping on to that hope. "She'll show up eventually."

Little did he know that 'eventually' would not come for three years.