Chapter 03: Plans in the Making
Malcolm opened the door into the kitchen and let Morrigan walk in first. The members of the Order who had been able to make the meeting all turned and grinned at her. She automatically looked behind her. Malcolm was there, the question in his deep green eyes mirroring the question in her own. They shrugged at each other and took places leaning against the counter by the new window. Molly Weasley beamed at them, and they smiled back, identical polite smiles that told everyone they had no idea what was going on.
"Oh, Harry's so much.happier," Molly said, wiping a stray tear from the corner of her eye. Charlie, sitting beside his mother, patted her arm comfortingly, and she beamed at him, too. "He ran through here as though he didn't have a care in the world."
Morrigan, who still looked fatigued, smiled more naturally. "Step in the right direction," she said softly.
"He's a good kid. Hell of a wizard he's going to be once he gets a little more training under his belt," Malcolm said, and Molly beamed at him as well. He grinned back, leaned against the counter next to his sister, and they waited for the meeting to begin.
"How did he end up here, though? I thought he would have been with the Muggles this summer, because of the Charm," Morrigan half-asked, frowning slightly. "And how is it that we still have use of this house?" Her question, obviously carefully worded to avoid direct mention of Sirius and his death, was answered with silence for a long few minutes.
"Harry was with the Dursleys until a week ago." The voice came from near the fireplace, and as they all turned toward the ancient stone hearth, the figure of an old Wizard appeared beside it, blinking into view as soon as everyone's eyes were directed toward the fireplace. Albus Dumbledore, smiling at all of them, conjured up an easy chair-yellow, with orange flowers-and sat down, still beaming. "His aunt and uncle will be taking his cousin on vacation to Majorca this week, and they were going to leave him with Mrs. Figg. Although Arabella is a worthy lady, she can't protect Harry as well as we can here. Hogwarts would be even better, but school is not in session, and we aren't as prepared to handle things from there. Here, we can always make sure that someone is around to keep an eye on things." Dumbledore chuckled.
"As far as the house goes," Remus Lupin added, when it became clear that Dumbledore had finished speaking, "it was left in our care, so to speak, until Harry's of age. Harry wanted us to keep using it for Headquarters, as it's convenient and otherwise it would be vacant." Morrigan nodded. She understood without needing it spelled out for her that Sirius had willed the house to Harry. She knew that Remus, in his current state, avoided mentioning Sirius' name whenever possible. He had lost the two friends closest to him in the world, both indirectly because of Peter Pettigrew. It had been difficult to keep Remus from going after Pettigrew on his own after what had happened at the Ministry in June. She didn't want to reopen Remus' wounds by asking any further questions.
"A bit of a legacy, then," Morrigan said, and Lupin nodded with a sad smile. "Good place for all the kids to be together for a bit, at any rate," she said. This drew another smile from Molly Weasley. Morrigan smiled back, then looked at Dumbledore with an eyebrow half-raised. Bill saw Dumbledore give Morrigan a slight nod, and leaned back in his chair in time to see Morrigan ever-so-casually point her wand at the door and mouth the words for the Imperturbable Charm. Charlie, who had caught the action as well, grinned at Bill. They obviously weren't alone in knowing that Fred and George weren't the only troublemakers in the Weasley family.
"So he's here for the rest of the summer. There's a guard on, is there?" Malcolm asked.
Kingsley Shacklebolt, his smooth, dark head shining in the enchanted sunlight pouring in the window from the garden nodded and gave the Carricks a short description of the way things at Grimmauld Place were being run this summer. "Molly's usually here-she runs things at the house, and thank Merlin for it. None of the rest of us is what you'd call talented at keeping things together like she does." Molly Weasley blushed. Charlie gave her another pat on the arm. "The rest of us," Kingsley continued, "are in and out, but we're here as often as we can be. No one wants to take any chances after what happened in June."
"So why are you two suddenly here, after six months of carefully staying away?" Tonks wanted to know. Morrigan grinned at her, silently admiring the newly electric blue hair. Tonks grinned back at her friend.
"Well," Malcolm said, "we're back in the office for a while. Fudge," he said, and his face and Morrigan's took on identical expressions of dislike, "has been recalling people back to base, so to speak. But we held out as long as we could without looking suspicious. There's a lot going on out there that no one seems able to explain."
The entire room suddenly got very quiet, and Moody, Kingsley, and Tonks all leaned forward attentively. "You found out something about the new policy on bringing in prisoners?" Kingsley asked, eyes intent.
"It's more that we couldn't find out anything," Morrigan explained. "After we heard from you about the new policy, Tonks, we started looking for information. We've talked to O'Malley, Ralston, Whiting, Tunstall, Aarons, Gallagher, Dawlish, and MacInnes. No one's heard anything at all. And if anyone should have heard the reasons behind the switch, they should have. Now Moody's retired, they're the most senior members of the Department. And they've heard nothing." Morrigan looked around and saw various levels of understanding on the faces around the room, and backtracked.
Her eyes, Bill saw, took on that cold, hard look whenever she mentioned Cornelius Fudge. She explained, "Last week, Fudge started calling people back into the office from our Department, and as soon as they got there, he sent them each a memo. Long story short, all prisoners going to Azkaban are now to go straight to the Ministry, to be handed over to Ministry officials."
"Not to the Dementors?" Fred asked, from where he and George were leaning against the ancient dresser that held plates and cutlery. "Whose job is to guard and transport prisoners? Something big is up, then. There must not be any Dementors left with the Ministry."
"Exactly," Morrigan said with a nod. "I mean, to be fair, Fudge did announce in June that the Dementors had revolted. But he didn't exactly make it clear that all of them revolted, or where their loyalties had probably been transferred. Until last week, prisoners were still going to Azkaban. But there wasn't any corresponding memo about who was guarding the prisoners then, and there isn't one now. So no one knows why the changes were made."
"They've left Azkaban," George said slowly. "All of them. If there were any left at Azkaban, they'd be being kept pretty busy shuttling the prisoners around. It's not like you can tell one from the other, so they'd use the remaining ones as often as they could to keep up appearances, wouldn't they? They've got to be gone."
"It's the only reason we can think of that the policy has changed so radically and so suddenly," Malcolm agreed. He pretended not to notice Molly and Arthur Weasley looking surreptitiously at their twins, as though they'd never seen them before. "So we held out on going into the office as long as we could, in hopes that we could track down a Death Eater or two and take them to Azkaban, to find out what's going on."
Morrigan nodded. "Unless we'd actually been in to the office, we wouldn't have known about Fudge's new policy, right? But the last owl we got was starting to sound a bit impatient, and we didn't want to stay out any longer. People would have started to ask questions we don't want asked. Still, it's pretty indicative of the situation that they were willing to pull us off Douglas Marshall in order to come into the Ministry, isn't it?"
"Marshall," Tonks said, frowning. "We've been after him since Voldemort disappeared back in '81. You were after him, then? He's important. Killed so many Wizards and Muggles I can't even remember the total." She nearly knocked over her teacup, righting it only at the last moment. Charlie grinned at her.
"A total of thirty Wizards and Muggles," Moody offered, scowling. "And they pulled you off the case when you had a lead on him?" he asked, incredulous.
"Another day or two might have done it," Morrigan said with a nod. "But if he's where we thought he was, he's not going anywhere soon. So we came back in. At the moment, one Death Eater who's still underground isn't as important as finding out what's going on with Azkaban."
"If no one at the Ministry's talking, we're not likely to find anything out, are we?" asked Hestia Jones, frowning.
"Well, that depends," Malcolm answered, his eyes meeting Morrigan's for a moment before he received the tiniest of nods. "It's dangerous at the moment to seem to be asking too many questions at the Ministry. Fudge is hyper-sensitive to what he considers any failure to do what he says when he says it. With the major public reversal he had to put into motion last month, he's tightening down.
"He's very uncertain these days, and he's trying to keep everyone together and behind him. Which he has to do, considering the political position he's suddenly in. So trying to find too much out through normal channels is going to jeopardize everything we're trying to do. The more questions people ask about us, the less likely we are to be able to work within the system."
Morrigan nodded. "We considered trying to get an appointment with him and trying to read the situation, so to speak," she said, and Dumbledore chuckled. "But we've never really met with him, nor would we have any reason to. So it would send up a big red flag. It's not likely that anyone here could manage it without making him suspicious. That's as easy these days, from what we hear, as getting him to hide his head in the sand was last year," she added. Several people, Arthur Weasley included, nodded agreement.
"So we know what we can't do," Bill summarized. "What can we do?"
He watched her as she considered her reply. Her eyes had that serious, almost dangerous look again, but this time it was deeper, hidden behind her calm expression. This, he decided, was a Witch who didn't mess around when it came to getting things done. Despite his questions concerning what had taught her to fight so hard and so fiercely, he had to admit that he was interested in her. She was casual and fierce by turns, though to the casual observer, she was simply easygoing. She was very good at hiding her stubborn side, if you didn't watch her eyes. "We can go to Azkaban and find out," Morrigan said simply.
The storm of protests replying to that statement was immediate and would have gone on far longer had Dumbledore not cleared his throat loudly. "How would you go about that?" he asked, as calmly and politely as if he were asking the Carricks to tea. His blue eyes, though, were intent on them both, his expression grave.
"When we're in the office, our weekends are usually somewhat freer. So if we go somewhere this weekend, no one will ask any questions. Even if we're in the field, we can manage it, though the timing will be tighter," Malcolm said.
"Impossible," Moody said, scowling, his magical eye and his good eye glaring at the twins.
"Hardly," Morrigan answered, not intimidated in the slightest. "It's actually very possible, and the best way we have of getting any conclusive information. First, we've been there before. No one here but you has ever been there and really knows the layout of the place, Moody, or how it works. No one, that is, but Malcolm and I. We've been there quite a few times, and we know what we're likely to run into. If things are working like they should be at the prison, we can be there and gone before anyone knows it. If things aren't working as they should be, we know what to be careful of when we take a look around.
"Let's face it. It won't take long to figure things out," she said. "Either we show up and there are some Dementors there, or some sort of guard, or we show up and it's deserted. I don't think there are any other realistic options."
"It's still incredibly dangerous for the two of you. And what is it really going to tell us?" Hestia Jones asked. "Besides the obvious, of course." She frowned at the Carricks, clearly against the plan.
"Well, if every single Dementor has revolted and is gone from Azkaban," Fred put in, "then who's guarding the prisoners? We've got four Aurors in the room, and they're obviously not being asked to work guard duty."
"And we've got how many other people who work at the Ministry here," George continued. "If they're not guarding anyone either, then who is? And if no one is, where are they?"
"Exactly," Morrigan said, grinning at Fred and George, who grinned back at her. "Put simply, if the prisoners aren't in Azkaban and the Dementors aren't guarding them, we've got enormous problems.
"First of all, it likely means that what Draco Malfoy told Harry at end of term is correct, that things are more serious than the Ministry has implied, and that all of the Dementors have gone over to Voldemort's side. Second, it means that it's very unlikely that the Death Eaters from the Ministry attack last month are still in custody." She moved to the window and lit another cigarette, using her wand to make the smoke disappear. Molly Weasley, who'd been about to protest, settled back, somewhat mollified but still disapproving. When Charlie went over to borrow a cigarette, her lips thinned even more, but she remained silent.
"And third, it means that if the prisoners are still in custody somewhere, Fudge is up to something, isn't he?" Bill asked. Malcolm and Morrigan nodded. The rest of the room fell silent again, digesting that.
"Right. If they're being held somewhere, they're being guarded somehow. And if we're not doing the guarding, Fudge has got something significant up his sleeve, doesn't he?" Morrigan asked. This time, no one could mistake the look in her eyes. She clearly found Fudge a bigger threat than most of the Order considered him to be, and the cold cast to her green eyes suggested that Fudge would do well to keep on the up-and-up, or out of her way.
"So if we need to go to Azkaban," Moody said, and from his tone it was clear that he wasn't conceding the need, nor did he want the Carricks to make the trip, "we need to work out a plan. Which means you'll be here every night working on it with me," he told the twins.
Morrigan grinned. "You didn't think we'd make some crazy plan without the craziest one of all involved in it, did you?"
The members of the Order present at the meeting were treated to the uncharacteristic, and frankly frightening, occurrence of Moody laughing heartily. Not a few flinched as his magical eye spun with mirth.
Morrigan looked at Dumbledore. "Do you think we should, then?" she asked, and after a pause and a heavy sigh, Albus Dumbledore nodded. Morrigan nodded, seeming satisfied rather than apprehensive. Malcolm's expression was similar. It seemed the subject was closed.
"So you're related to Harry," Molly Weasley began, and everyone in the room again turned toward the twins. Remus Lupin, who until now had remained silent in his corner, gave both twins a smile. They smiled back at him. He'd been the one to point them toward Dumbledore as the best means of contacting Harry.
"We are. Our mother and his were third cousins. We share a great- great-great grandfather, Douglas Malcolm," Malcolm said, bringing grins from almost everyone in the room as he had to count the number of greats on his fingers. He laughed at himself, and went on. "Douglas had two daughters. One married a Wizard and moved to Wales. That was our great- great grandmother, Angela. Angela married a Donovan, and their descendants were all Wizards or Witches." Malcolm shrugged.
"The other daughter, Susannah, married a Muggle and stayed in England; that was Harry's great-great grandmother. She became Susannah Evans when she married, and her descendants, until Lily and Harry, were all Muggles," Morrigan added. "Though there's always been a hint of magic about the family. There's Elven blood back beyond Douglas Malcolm, and even the Muggles-well, some of them, anyway-have a bit of talent at wandless magic."
"Harry's related to House Elves?" Fred asked, clearly amused. He wasn't the only one.
"High Elves, not House Elves. You probably haven't heard of them. They don't have anything to do with humans, especially Wizards. They're not hostile, like Centaurs, but they have taken pains over the centuries to keep their world entirely separate from the Wizarding world. You wouldn't see them on any Ministry lists," Morrigan said with a laugh.
Seeing that this didn't clear up the question, she went on. "There are basically three different kinds of Elves. High Elves, Common Elves, and Lower Elves. House Elves belong to the Lower Elves. Their main duties are to serve. Middles Elves are more like humans, and don't have much magic. The High Elves have the most powerful magic of the three, and they consider it their duty to.hmm. I suppose you could say that their duties are to safeguard nature. They live in remote mountain areas or deeply forested areas, and they use their magic to tend to nature-plants and animals and all that."
"You know an awful lot about them, considering they're not on any lists," Fred pointed out skeptically.
"Our grandmother is a Sylvan Elf, which is a High Elf from an Elven forest. She married a Wizard, and left the forest for a time." Malcolm grinned at Fred's surprise. "It happens from time to time. It's fairly rare."
"She married your Death Eater grandfather?" Charlie asked, drawing all eyes to himself, then to the Carricks again.
"She did," Morrigan confirmed, then grinned. "Talk about a culture shock. Straight from living with the Elves to living with one of the world's biggest gits." She shook her head. "Getting back to your question, Mrs. Weasley, she's the reason we never knew about Harry. Shortly after marrying our grandfather she realized that he wasn't the man she'd thought he was, and she took steps to protect her family from him.
"When our Mum was born, it was already clear that our grandfather was attracted to the Darker side of magic. When our Mum married our Da, our grandmother took them both aside and explained the situation to them. When our parents found out we were on the way, they moved from Wales to Scotland, where we were born. My grandmother performed a charm, something like a Fidelius," she said, her eyes meeting Dumbledore's, "to hide any knowledge of us from her husband."
"Sounds like he must have been a great guy," George muttered, making Morrigan laugh.
"You're not joking," she said, making him grin. "In any event, shortly after we were born, our Donovan grandfather declared himself openly in favor of Voldemort. And when Harry was born, my grandmother got a message from her father explaining that he'd read ominous signs in the stars. The two of them worked out a family tree, and discovered that we were related to Harry. And that Harry was in danger. They both assumed that he was in danger from my grandfather.
"To protect Harry from discovery, my grandmother re-cast her charm to include Harry's family. Unfortunately, our grandfather was only one avenue to finding and attacking Harry's family, as she found out after Voldemort killed Harry's parents and disappeared after failing to kill Harry, too. That same night, our grandfather disappeared.
"High Elves tend to look at things in the long view, and she never believed that Voldemort wouldn't return. She also knew her husband well enough to know that while he might have disappeared, he wasn't gone. So she made sure that her charm held.
"We found out about Harry last month, when we were going through some of our mother's old things at our Da's house in Inverness. The charm our grandmother had cast was only intended to hide Harry from our grandfather and his.err.colleagues, never from us. Last month we found the family tree our grandmother and great-grandfather had worked out when Harry was born. When we did, we sent a letter by Muggle post to Petunia Dursley. Who was, needless to say, less than no help at all. Once we discovered that she hadn't told Harry about us, we went to Remus," Morrigan said, nodding toward Lupin, "who directed us to Dumbledore, who told us to go straight to Harry."
"And Harry knows about you?" Arthur Weasley asked, sounding absolutely fascinated. "I mean, that you're related?"
"He does," Malcolm said. No one in the kitchen, though, had really doubted it. They'd seen Harry's face when he'd run through the room on his way to find Ron and Hermione.
It seemed that, for the moment, the Order was satisfied by what they'd heard. The conversation moved on to other topics. Various members of the Order gave reports on what they'd managed to learn as far as the Death Eaters they'd been surreptitiously tracking. It would have been more appropriate to say that they report what they hadn't managed to learn. Former Death Eaters everywhere were disappearing, going underground. In light of the Order's suspicions about Azkaban, this information was more alarming than not. Anyone who hadn't been certain about the potential benefit of the Carricks making the trip to Azkaban had become more open to the possibility after all reports were in.
Dumbledore adjourned the meeting within an hour, to allow people to get back to work. The meeting had been scheduled for the lunch hour both to allow Order members to attend, and to make their absence from work for an hour unsuspicious. Soon after the meeting was over, he made his way over to the Carricks and carried on a low, quick conversation with them. Morrigan asked him a question. He thought for a long moment, drawing the attention of the Weasleys who hadn't left for work yet and of Remus Lupin. After a while, Dumbledore nodded at her, and made his way back to Vanish his chair and head back to Hogwarts. Lupin Disapparated shortly afterward, frowning thoughtfully.
Fred and George made their way over to the Carricks, their mother still watching them as though she'd only just seen them for the first time. "So we're still up for the Wands on Friday night, right? Your friends' band is going to be playing?" Fred asked Morrigan.
"They'll be there, and so will we. Probably not as is, though. Dumbledore thinks, and we agree, that it's not a great idea for us to be seen in public with other members of the Order. So we'll be there, but in disguise," Malcolm answered.
"You're like Tonks, then?" George asked, looking deeply impressed.
"No one's like Tonks when it comes to disguises," Morrigan said. "It's just a simple Transfiguration." Fred and George still looked impressed, making her laugh. Bill and Charlie were equally impressed. Self- transfiguration was an incredibly difficult branch of magic. Neither of the Carricks seemed to be aware of this, if their expressions were any indication.
"Hell, if it's that easy, you should go all the way and become an Animagus," Fred said, grinning.
"Did we say we weren't?" Malcolm asked, one eyebrow raised. The twins looked surprised, then thoughtful. Morrigan laughed. Neither she nor Malcolm was an Animagus, registered or otherwise. Malcolm had learned over the past few weeks, though, that the Weasley twins were not as sophisticated as they liked to pretend-were, in fact, a bit gullible-and he loved keeping them guessing.
"So, we're working on something for Harry and the others to take back to school, to get in touch with us," Morrigan told Fred and George. "We'll probably need some help with it, so we'll be in touch with you, as it's in your line of expertise."
"Right. Well, you know where to find us, don't you?" Fred asked, grinning. The four of them laughed. "Just stop on by. We'll do what we can."
"Sounds like a plan," Morrigan said, nodding. "Probably next week, then." They said good-bye, and Fred and George Disapparated with loud bangs that had the Carricks wincing.
"A bit loud, aren't they?" Charlie asked, grinning.
"Stealthy they're not-at least not on the transportation front," Morrigan agreed cheerfully. "But Merlin knows they've got their strengths, and they know how to take advantage of them. Have you seen that shop? It's packed day in and day out. I shudder to think what the lines are going to be like once start-of-term shopping starts."
"You're not joking," Charlie laughed. "Good thing they really don't mind working hard when it's something they like to do."
"Right. I'd imagine their storeroom is packed to the brim and beyond, if what George was saying earlier was any indication," Morrigan said, and removed the Imperturbable Charm from the kitchen door while Molly Weasley was out of the room.
"Good move earlier. I'm sure that Ron and Ginny still have Fred and George's original Extendable Ears," Bill said with a laugh.
"I wouldn't doubt it for a second. Fred and George were showing me one this morning that doesn't have to be held to your ear, and disappears when someone comes along who might see it. The idea gives me nightmares, at least as far as this place is concerned. It might have its uses in other places, though," she said, thoughtfully.
"Listen, while your Mum is out of the room. We talked to Dumbledore about a way to keep Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, and their friends informed, without making them part of the Order. Everyone is still dead-set against allowing any under-age Witches or Wizards into the Order, and much as I sympathize with Harry and the others, I fully agree with that.
"Problem is, they're the ones most at risk. They're the ones who always end up in the fight. So we need a way of getting them information that doesn't conflict with what the Order's up to. We're thinking of kind of a junior Order, or whatever anyone wants to call it. Along the lines of what they're doing with D.A., if they keep that up. But not quite as many people."
"Makes sense to me. Count me in," Bill said, nodding. Charlie seconded his older brother's opinion. "They're too in the dark as it is, and if we can keep them informed, they'll find fewer ways to get in trouble, won't they?"
Malcolm laughed. "Well, that's the way Dumbledore thinks of it. I doubt, though, that they'll avoid getting into trouble just because they know a bit more about what's going on. What would be the fun of that?" he asked. Morrigan laughed, obviously in agreement. Charlie and Bill looked at the Carricks, then at each other.
"Lord, Bill, they're as bad as Fred and George, aren't they?"
"Actually," Morrigan said, as she and Malcolm moved toward the kitchen door, "Fred and George are strictly amateurs."
Looking a bit unnerved by that assessment, Bill and Charlie watched the twins leave the room and head upstairs to talk to Harry.
*
Having discovered that the kitchen door had been Imperturbed, Harry and the others had drawn up the Extendable Ears philosophically and retreated to Ron and Harry's bedroom on the second floor of the house. Ginny and Hermione sitting on one bed, Ron and Harry on the other. Hermione, Ron, and Harry held pieces of parchment in their hands. Ginny snorted impatiently and the others started a bit, then traded letters. Ron and Harry looked at Hermione's O.W.L. results, and blinked at her in disbelief.
"Sixteen O.W.L.s," Harry said, stunned. "Sixteen, Hermione! That's really good," he said. And insane, he added silently. "Congratulations," he added out loud, so that she didn't notice the pause after his words. Ron nodded.
"Sixteen," Ginny said slowly, clearly impressed.
Ron simply stared at Hermione, incapable of speech, then managed, "And all O's." He managed to make that statement sound like a compliment despite the barely veiled horror in his eyes. Hermione beamed, blushing slightly, either ignoring or simply missing the look on Ron's face.
"One Outstanding in Ancient Runes, two in Arithmancy, for the theory and the practical. Two in Astronomy, two in Charms, two in Defense Against the Dark Arts. Two in Herbology. One in History of Magic. Two in Potions. Two in Transfiguration." Harry looked up at Hermione, who was clearly torn between being pleased and being embarrassed.
"Oh, look, Ron," Hermione said, looking down at Ron's letter. "You got eight." This was, apparently, news to Ginny, who looked impressed again, despite herself. "Two E's in Astronomy, two in Charms, two in Defense, one in Herbology. And one in Transfiguration," she said, beaming at Ron. Ron's ears turned as red as a sunset. "That's loads better than you'd expected," Hermione said, approvingly, "and it's terrific, in Transfiguration, isn't it?"
Ron grinned, and looked at Harry's. His grin widened as he looked at Harry's results. "Ten, Harry, that's great. An E in Astronomy, one in Charms, two O's in Defense-no big surprise there," he muttered, "and one O, one E in Potions, Transfiguration, and Herbology." He gave Harry a mock- pitying look. "Think they made a mistake on the History of Magic, then?" Ron asked. Harry snorted.
"Right," Harry said, laughing, because he hadn't even answered half of the questions on the History of Magic exam before falling asleep in the middle of the test, "about as big a mistake as they made on the Divination marks," he added. Harry didn't have to make as much of an effort as usual to forget the dream of Sirius being tortured by Lord Voldemort that had forced him out of the exam. He and Ron got to laughing so hard that they nearly fell off the bed. Hermione did her best to look disapproving; they'd failed their Divination O.W.L. so badly they might as well have not taken the exam at all. Their laughter, however, was irresistible. It was, she thought, as though they had momentarily forgotten what had happened at the Ministry in June. Relief had her laughing nearly as hard as Ron, Harry, and Ginny.
"Meeting's over," Harry said, hearing voices downstairs, coming up from the kitchen. The others stopped laughing quickly, untangling the Extendable Ears again and letting them loose. There was, at first, only a collection of voices, none talking about anything remotely interesting-a meeting at work, someone's children, Hestia Jones' new job at the Ministry. Then, when the sound of the front door opening and closing, and locks turning, announced the departure of most of the Order members, the Ears began to pick up other voices.
Harry recognized the Carricks' voices and Ron's oldest brothers' as well. He looked at his friends. They stared back, eyes wide as they heard the Carricks, Bill, and Charlie talking about beginning a sort of junior Order, so that Harry and the others could be informed about the dangers they seemed inevitably to face when they were at Hogwarts.
"Oh, now that would be nice," Ron commented, even as the others shushed him so that they could hear more clearly. It wasn't that they didn't agree with him wholeheartedly. It was simply that he spoke too loudly for them to hear anything through the Ears at this distance. When the kitchen door opened and closed, though, they all stared at one another, the beginnings of smiles on their faces. Finally, someone understood and was willing to help them.
The Extendable Ears had just been returned to various pockets and drawers when they heard footsteps on the stairs. Harry had the uncomfortable thought that the sound was purposely loud, then forgot it with the knock on the door.
"Do you really want to start a junior Order?" was Ron's question, which he could barely contain until the Carricks had been invited in and the door had shut behind them.
"Extendable Ears are working well, I see," Morrigan said drily, and Ron turned red to the roots of his hair. Malcolm grinned. Morrigan laughed. "Well, be certain to let Fred and George know they're still good after all this time." She grinned at Harry, who grinned back.
"You'd be Hermione," Morrigan guessed, turning to a girl about six inches shorter than Harry with thick brown hair and books piled around her on the bed. "And you'd be Ginny," Morrigan continued, grinning at a girl with Weasley-red hair and bright brown eyes. The girls nodded. "I'm Morrigan Carrick, and this is my brother Malcolm. Cousins of Harry's," she added casually as they all shook hands. "Ron, you hadn't met Mal yet. Mal's been asking me questions about Hogwarts Quidditch I couldn't answer, not being a Keeper myself. You'll have to fill him in, if you don't mind."
Harry and the two girls grinned as Ron looked as though he'd been handed a sack full of galleons. Ginny moved over on the bed to make room for Morrigan, and Harry scooted over on the other bed so Malcolm could sit down between Harry and Ron. Morrigan pointed her wand at the door and spoke a Silencing Charm.
"Why does your wand put out silver sparks? I've never seen a Silencing Charm that's silvery," Hermione said curiously.
"Oh, right, normally it would be blue, wouldn't it?" Morrigan asked. "But my magic works a bit differently, I suppose, so all my spells come out silver. It's just always been that way. Doesn't matter what wand I use or anything, it just does it."
"Cool," was Ron's opinion of this, and Harry nodded.
"Well, it can be cool. But when you're the only one whose wand sparks silver, it's kind of a dead giveaway," Morrigan pointed out, and they had to agree with her.
"Da always told her it was the Elven blood thing," Malcolm said, and every eye in the room, save his sister's, was on him in a flash. Not having seen anything strange about his statement, he didn't even notice until Harry cleared his throat. Then he looked up and saw four pairs of eyes on him intently. "What?" he asked, looking surprised.
"Mal, don't be a git. You know damned well almost no one has ever heard of High Elves. They're thinking we're related to Kreacher or something." Morrigan was having a hard time holding back her laughter.
"Oh, right," Malcolm said, the twinkle in his green eyes giving him away. "High Elves, not House Elves. High Elves aren't on the Ministry lists, so I doubt you'd have heard of them. Long story short, House Elves are the lowest order of Elves. High Elves are the highest order. They stick to themselves and they've spent centuries avoiding most humans. We have High Elf blood on both sides of our families, and it comes out more strongly in some people than others. Mor got a strong dose, I got a weaker one." For which he was grateful. Elf blood carried as many disadvantages for humans as it did advantages.
"And that's what makes your wand spark silver?" Hermione asked, frowning intently.
"Elven magic is different than Wizard magic. Elves don't use wands, and elves don't use spells the way Wizards do. The best our Da could figure was that the way the Elven blood and Wizard blood mix together makes doing ordinary Wizard magic a bit different." Morrigan shrugged. "Works just as well as the colored sparks, though, so I'm not complaining."
Hermione grinned. They looked over as Charlie and Bill appeared in the doorway and walked through. As they passed through the Charm, their outlines grew silvery for the briefest of moments, then they were inside the room and the doorway was transparent once again.
"Looks cooler in the dark," was Malcolm's only comment, and Ron and Harry laughed. "So what do you think about another Order?" he asked. Knowing they hadn't missed anything important, Charlie and Bill took seats on the room's only two chairs.
"I like the idea," Hermione said, surprising her friends. "I mean, we need as much information as we can get, don't we? And it's hard to get the kind of information we need when we're at school. I mean, if we had more information we could manage to work things out before they become crises, couldn't we?"
"Well, when you're lucky that's the way it works, anyway," Morrigan said. "Hard to be lucky all the time. But we're," she began, indicating Charlie and Bill as well as herself and Malcolm, "of the opinion that the more information we can get you, the better.
"That doesn't mean that we'll be letting you in on everything. Professor Dumbledore has made it clear that while you're to get more information, you won't be getting all of it. He's of the opinion that you need to know more, but that you have enough to worry about without being involved in the day-to-day business of the Order. And he's right," she added. "You've got school to worry about, and you're not of age. No one's going to be in favor of you getting into dangerous situations when you can only use magic to defend yourselves." Harry, who had looked about to protest before her last statement, subsided with a sigh. He knew she was right. He didn't have to like it.
"So we're working on a way for you to get in touch with us without using the Floo or owls. No telling what's being watched these days, or by whom. We'll be getting help from Fred and George on that, and we should have it by the time you all are ready to go back to school. Let us worry about that," Morrigan continued, and got nods and relieved grins in return.
"What about the junior Order thing, though?" Ron wanted to know. "It wouldn't make sense to have everyone in D.A. in the Order, too. Too many people, too many risks."
"You're absolutely right," Malcolm said, nodding. Ron looked enormously pleased by this, though he tried hard not to show it. "Obviously it wouldn't make sense for us to tell you who to invite. But it would make sense for you to discuss it together, then talk to us. We might know something that could help, if you're wavering on anyone."
"Well, the four of us, of course," Harry said, nodding at Hermione, Ginny, and Ron. "And Neville, definitely."
"And Luna," Ron added. "She helped out an awful lot at the Min.in June," he amended quickly, carefully not looking at Harry.
"And we can always add more later on, can't we?" Hermione asked, clearly not meaning it as a question. "I mean, six is a good start for now. It's manageable."
"You wouldn't really need to meet all that often," Bill added, "so it wouldn't get in the way of school or Quidditch or even D.A."
"D.A.'s going to be harder to manage this year, though," Harry said a bit glumly. "We're running out of things we know how to do, and it's not so easy to learn the more advanced things out of books. I mean, we can study up on hexes and things, but that's not going to help us actually practice things."
"Well, you might find it easier than you're expecting," Morrigan said. "You don't think that, now Professor Dumbledore's back, it will need to be as secret, or as difficult to ask for help, do you?"
Harry brightened at this. He hadn't really thought about it. "You don't think a teacher would take it over, do you?" he asked, not liking the idea of having the leadership of D.A. taken away from him after he'd managed it for almost an entire school year.
"I don't know why they'd want to, since you already have a Defense class," Morrigan said reasonably. "But maybe you could have kind of an unofficial adviser or something. You'll have to work that out."
"Yeah, that's great," Ron said, then his face fell. "So all we have to do is worry about making it through Potions-I mean, Ron and Hermione have to worry about it, I'm not going to be in N.E.W.T. potions, so I'm never going to make Auror."
Morrigan grinned. "Well, Mr. Weasley, your moments of self-pity are over. Because Mal or I will be tutoring Potions until you go back to school, and you're in the class. An hour or two a day, weekdays, until you go back. Professor Dumbledore is working on something for the school year, and I don't think you'll be left out there, either. So you actually have the best of it, don't you? You get to take the Potions N.E.W.T. and you don't have to see Professor Snape in class."
The effect this had on Ron was nearly pathetic to see; Bill and Charlie realized that Ron's O.W.L. marks had bothered him far more than he'd let on. Realizing that he still had a shot at Auror, and that he could still share Potions with Harry and Hermione, cheered him up so much he was nearly dancing. Charlie looked at Bill. Bill looked at Charlie. They both nodded. Ron's career talk would be coming as soon as they could corner him without it looking suspicious. Bill wondered how many other things Ron had gotten good at hiding over the years. He fully intended to find out.
"You don't have to go back to work?" Ron asked Bill, looking strangely hopeful.
"Not today. Had a half-day coming, so I took it," Bill explained.
"And you don't have to go back to work?" Harry asked the Carricks. They shook their heads. "Because the garden is pretty big, really," Harry continued. "We could play Quidditch."
"Hermione? You up for Quidditch?" Morrigan asked.
Hermione laughed, shaking her head. "I'll keep score, thanks."
"That would make the teams uneven," Malcolm said, shaking his head. "No score-keeping allowed. You need to be our Chaser," he said decisively. Hermione, who normally would have avoided playing at any cost, was not proof against the sparkle in those green eyes. She nodded. Ron whooped happily, and he and Harry dug around for their brooms. Ginny and Hermione went to go get theirs, and Bill and Charlie, after some mock-sighing, Disapparated home to get their own broomsticks. The Carrick twins did the same, and met the others in the kitchen, looking for the doorway out to the garden.
"Tenth brick up from the floor, tenth brick from the left," Morrigan told Harry. As his eyes focused on the correct brick, the door appeared in the back wall of the kitchen, just as it had earlier. "Just have to know where to look," she said cheerfully, and Harry opened the door.
After they'd all gone through to the outside, Morrigan sighed. "This just won't work for Quidditch," she said, and Ron's and Harry's faces fell. Even Hermione looked a bit disappointed. After a straight week of rain, they'd been looking forward to getting outside.
Morrigan slid her wand out of the sleeve of her robes and considered a moment. She shook her head and put the wand back. Disappointed, Harry and his friends turned to go back inside. "Don't want to play anymore?" she asked. They turned back around, and gasped. The weed-choked, derelict garden with its crumbling brick pathways and crooked trees was gone. In its place was a lawn of emerald green, about 100 feet long and 50 feet wide, with a set of three hoops at either end. "Watch for the ceiling," she warned. The ceiling, about fifty feet up, went from enchanted sunny sky to black almost before she'd spoken, which made the ceiling far easier to see, as it was now different from the enchanted sunny-sky walls. Somehow, the sunlight was still there, filtering gently through the dark ceiling, as bright as ever. Harry and Ron mounted their brooms and kicked off, followed quickly by Ginny.
Hermione was looking a bit uncomfortable. "I'm not that good a flyer," she confessed softly to Morrigan, so that no one else could hear. "I tried and tried, but I never seemed to get the hang of it."
"Let's see, then," Morrigan said, and watched as Hermione flew her broom in an unsteady circle. When Hermione had touched down again, Morrigan was grinning. "Well, if you don't let the broom know who's boss, you won't fly it much steadier. Just think of it as.hmmm," she said, thinking a moment.
"Think of it as Fred and George testing their products on unsuspecting first years," Charlie suggested. "You've got to take charge. That's all."
Morrigan nodded, grinning. She'd heard the story of the twins testing their wares on the first years from Fred and George themselves. She pointed her wand at Hermione's broom and said, "Noncadero." The silver sparks surrounded the broom for a moment and Hermione looked at Morrigan questioningly. "Keeps you from falling off until you're the one in charge," Morrigan said simply. "It won't last long, but it's easier to get the hang of bossing your broom around if you know you're not going to be drinking any Boneset anytime soon."
Grinning, Hermione kicked off from the ground, and before long was zooming along with Harry, Ron, and Ginny at the opposite end of the garden.
"You're a fraud. There's no such spell," Charlie said, raising an eyebrow.
"Not for Wizards, anyway," Morrigan said simply. "But I'm not going to go around doing all sorts of wandless magic and give them any ideas, am I?"
"You did it with the garden," Bill pointed out.
Morrigan grinned. "Caught that, did you? As long as they think I did it with my wand while their backs were turned, that's good enough."
Laughing, the two oldest Weasley brothers and the two Carricks mounted their brooms and kicked off from the ground. Charlie conjured a Quaffle, and the game began.
***
Unable to sleep, Harry wandered downstairs around midnight. Everyone else in the house was sound asleep, and though his body was tired, his mind was racing. He'd decided to get something to eat, still too used to living with the Dursleys not to take advantage of the opportunity to eat whenever he was hungry. He walked into the kitchen, and found Morrigan and Malcolm sitting at the kitchen table, playing Wizard's Chess.
"Pull up a chair, Harry," Malcolm invited. Harry got himself butterbeer and a leftover piece of pie from dessert, and sat down at the table as Morrigan's queen moved into place and Malcolm's king fell over, shattering into a dozen pieces of what looked like ivory against the dark wood of the table. "Oh, come on," Malcolm complained. "Never saw that coming. So we're even, then?" he asked his sister, who nodded. "One more," he said, and waved his wand at the chess set, which reordered itself on the board, the pieces restored to their original condition. "What's up, then?" Malcolm asked, grinning at him.
Harry grinned back. "Couldn't sleep. There's too much floating around in my head," he said with a sigh. "Everyone else is asleep or gone home," he said.
"They'll do that to you, late at night," Morrigan told him. Harry laughed.
"So about the junior Order thing," he said. Two wands pointed at the kitchen door, and two voices said, 'Silencio!' in unison.
"Sorry. It was suggested that perhaps some people in the house wouldn't be crazy about the idea," Morrigan said by way of explanation. "Go ahead. You were saying?"
"Well, how would it work? I mean, you can't tell us stuff about the real Order, because of the Fidelius Charm. So what can you really tell us? Is it just a way to shut us up?" Harry watched as one of Morrigan's pawns struggled melodramatically with one of Malcolm's pawns, finally knocking Malcolm's pawn out of the way and giving a victorious little hop.
Morrigan laughed, unable to help herself. Then she looked at Harry. "It's not just a way to shut you up. Harry, keeping all of you too much in the dark last year ended in catastrophe. Everyone is aware of that," she said, and Harry didn't even have time to feel the guilt he always felt when he remembered what had happened at the Ministry last month. "And as we were saying earlier, it's not your fault, or any one person's fault. But having made the mistake, we all have to work on making sure we don't repeat it. So, though it goes against the grain for most of us, we're going to let you in on more of what's going on."
"How does it go against the grain?" Harry asked, a little irritated.
"Harry, you're not of age. And you mean a lot to a lot of people. Of course it goes against the grain to give you information that might put you in danger. Don't be stupid," Morrigan told him, her voice gentle to take the sting out of her words. "You can only do magic to defend yourself. By that time, it could be too late. You know that. You've been in enough situations over the last five years to understand it." One of Malcolm's pawns took one of Morrigan's, and spun in a triumphant circle before settling back onto the board.
"Well, it's still stupid. I mean, I'm the one who gets stuck trying to kill Voldemort. Why should anyone have a problem telling me stuff that can help me do that?"
"Harry, you're being obtuse. And feeling sorry for yourself, though I can't really blame you," Morrigan said with a sigh. Harry scowled. "You're the one who gets stuck trying to kill Voldemort. That's a given. And it isn't fair, because you're too young to carry that kind of burden. Nevertheless, it was given to you, and it's yours to either drop or carry, as you choose." At the look of shock on his face, she smiled and shook her head sadly.
"You're the one Voldemort marked as his equal, the only one who can kill him," Malcolm explained. "That doesn't mean you have to try. It means you have the choice. Try or not. It speaks volumes about you that you never considered just chucking it all and walking away. No one can force you to take it up."
"But then he'd win," Harry protested.
"Sure," Malcolm agreed. "And again, it says a lot about you that the thought of him winning makes you take the difficult path. No one says it to you, but they're well aware of the weight you're carrying around. Problem is, it's as difficult for them to acknowledge it as it is for you to carry it around in the first place. No one wants to think that a sixteen-year old boy has to shoulder that kind of burden, Harry. But given the circumstances, they don't have much choice but to accept it."
"So I could just walk," Harry mused. His eyes moved to the chessboard, noted without interest that Morrigan was winning at the moment, then slid back up to meet hers.
"You could. But that's a choice that carries consequences, too. You know what would happen if he won. You know what would happen to your friends if he won. And what would happen to you. You have to weigh that against the cost to you if you fight."
"Wise advice that should have been given to him long ago," came a voice from behind them. Albus Dumbledore stood near the fireplace, smiling sadly at Harry. "And not so long ago as well," he added.
Harry shrugged. "Doesn't much matter, I suppose," he said slowly. "I can't just walk away. You knew that," he said, his eyes on Morrigan slightly accusing.
"I suspected it," she corrected him. "But sometimes, even though the choice is hard, it's easier to accept knowing you made a choice to begin with."
Harry thought about that for a bit, then decided to file it away for future consideration. He looked over as Dumbledore sat down and Morrigan and Malcolm lit cigarettes. "I still don't see how it's possible that anyone could let us in on stuff the Order's doing without breaking the Fidelius Charm," he told Dumbledore, frowning a bit as he tried to work it out.
"They couldn't," Dumbledore said simply. "But they can tell you what they've found out, as long as it's not discussed in the Order first." He watched as one of Malcolm's knights fell to Morrigan's bishop with soft but dramatic groans, smiled, and looked up at Harry.
Harry's frown didn't disappear. "But how can we be sure that it'll stay safe?" he asked.
"Another Charm," Morrigan explained, and Dumbledore nodded. "It won't be a Fidelius. I'm not Albus Dumbledore. I can't perform a Fidelius and have the energy left over at the end of the day to do a whole lot else." Dumbledore's slight nod was agreement enough for Harry to believe it. "But I can work a similar charm. Elven magic," she explained. "It works differently. When a Wizard performs magic, the power for the magic comes from the Wizard. That's why you have to be powerful to produce a Patronus, for example-at least if you're going to expect it to help protect you against something awful. Not everyone can produce a Patronus, especially in a crisis. A Fidelius is even more tiring, over time. The Elven version, for me, is somewhat easier. And a Secrecy Charm has the additional benefit of going on even if something happens to the Secret- Keeper."
Harry decided not to think about that. Having just found two cousins he'd never known existed, he wasn't going to think about losing them just yet. Morrigan watched the emotions play across Harry's face, sympathy in her eyes. Every time Harry came to a point where he had a grip on things, yet another punch was thrown. And the hell of it was that there was no way to really protect him from the punches. He just had to make it from one to the next as best as he could.
"So you'd work the Charm, and you'd be the Secret-Keeper?" he asked. Morrigan nodded. "Is that safe?" he asked.
"As safe as it gets," Malcolm said. "None of the rest of us is accomplished enough at wandless magic to even try it. And Morrigan is as trustworthy as you can get." He said it simply, without trying to convince Harry. Harry considered that. He remembered that she'd been honest with him even when it wasn't comfortable, earlier today, in the garden. He remembered her honest assessment of Sirius' actions, and the pain in her eyes that had told Harry that it had hurt her to be so candid about Sirius' failings when she'd just lost him, too. He didn't think that Sirius, who'd been on the run and in danger of his life, would have befriended her if he'd sensed anything at all untrustworthy about Morrigan. And, Harry thought, she hadn't turned Sirius in. She'd been an Auror, she'd met a man wanted by the Ministry, and she hadn't taken him back to Azkaban.
Finally, Harry nodded. "So how do we go about setting it up?" he asked.
Malcolm looked at him closely. "You're not just trying to get out of Potions tomorrow, are you?" he asked.
Harry laughed. "We'd need a headquarters, wouldn't we?" he asked. "We couldn't meet here, or at school."
Morrigan and Malcolm grinned at each other. They looked at Dumbledore, and Dumbledore grinned back. "We're working on that," Morrigan said. "I think you'll be pleasantly surprised."
Deciding that it was easier to trust them than to try and figure out what they were thinking-they were worse, in some ways than Fred and George-Harry nodded. As Dumbledore and the Carrick twins discussed procedures and rules for the junior Order, he began to yawn. By the time they'd gotten to discussing communications between the junior Order members, Harry was sound asleep, his head on the table. Dumbledore took his leave, Malcolm carried Harry back upstairs to bed, and Morrigan got down to work. She and Malcolm, on unofficial guard duty that night, stayed up discussing security and communications between the junior Order members until Molly Weasley made her sleepy way into the kitchen to start breakfast the next morning.
"Coffee, dears?" Molly asked, wondering how on earth the twins could look so alert after having spent all night on guard and the previous day engaged in Order business and a rather fierce-looking game of Quidditch.
"Oh, that would be lovely," Morrigan said, gratefully. "We got to talking and never even noticed the time. We've about time for a quick cup, then we're off to work," she said cheerfully.
"You'll be exhausted in no time," Molly said, half-severely.
"We'll manage," Malcolm said, smiling. "It's desk work for the next four days. We're luckier than your husband-it's when we're out of the office that our days get truly crazy."
Molly smiled and sent three mugs floating over to the table. "He has his days, true enough," she admitted, then sighed. "More often than not, these days."
Morrigan nodded. "I wonder if people realize just how difficult he has it," she said thoughtfully. "He's got to hold his entire Department together, make Fudge believe that he's following the company line, so to speak, and work for the Order on the sly. It's no wonder your children turned out as well as they did, with the two of you as parents."
Molly's face darkened, and her eyes showed the pain that she rarely admitted to anyone. "All but one," she said sadly.
"Oh, he's dedicated enough, isn't he?" Morrigan asked. "Granted, he's taken a different path, but he's young, and ambitious, and he hasn't really been tested. His vision's a bit shuttered now. He's new to the Ministry, new to the real world, really. And it's easy enough to make mistakes when you're starting out. But Mrs. Weasley, I've met all of your children. You and your husband did an amazing job teaching them what's really important. There's still hope for Percy yet. He hasn't arrived at the real crossroads yet, has he?"
The door opened, and Arthur Weasley, looking tired and angry, walked into the kitchen. "He's passed the crossroads and gone down the wrong road," he said with uncharacteristic curtness. Apprehension flickered in Molly Weasley's eyes, along with grief.
Morrigan appeared to consider that. "He's missed a turn or two, true," she said, "but he's still got more than a few opportunities to find the right road." She seemed, Molly thought, to be speaking from personal experience rather than about Percy, who she didn't know well at all. "We're not quite at the final turning, are we?"
Sitting down at the table, a mug of coffee floating over to sit in front of him, Arthur Weasley mulled that idea over. He sighed heavily, the anger melting off of his face. "I surely hope not," he said. "I surely do."
"Don't we all," Morrigan said, her tone comforting. "Speaking of which," she added, on a brighter note, "Charlie mentioned something yesterday about Daniel Carey wanting in on the Order."
Arthur Weasley's face brightened, as he nodded and told his wife about their old friend, a classmate at Hogwarts, who Charlie had run into in Diagon Alley the day before, after the impromptu Quidditch game. In the middle of the story, the twins left to go home and change for work. Molly Weasley's eyes, grateful, followed them out the door as her spirits lifted. Rarely did Arthur look so much like his old self as he did now, talking about their old friend. Even fifteen minutes after she'd gotten downstairs, the day was looking up.
Malcolm opened the door into the kitchen and let Morrigan walk in first. The members of the Order who had been able to make the meeting all turned and grinned at her. She automatically looked behind her. Malcolm was there, the question in his deep green eyes mirroring the question in her own. They shrugged at each other and took places leaning against the counter by the new window. Molly Weasley beamed at them, and they smiled back, identical polite smiles that told everyone they had no idea what was going on.
"Oh, Harry's so much.happier," Molly said, wiping a stray tear from the corner of her eye. Charlie, sitting beside his mother, patted her arm comfortingly, and she beamed at him, too. "He ran through here as though he didn't have a care in the world."
Morrigan, who still looked fatigued, smiled more naturally. "Step in the right direction," she said softly.
"He's a good kid. Hell of a wizard he's going to be once he gets a little more training under his belt," Malcolm said, and Molly beamed at him as well. He grinned back, leaned against the counter next to his sister, and they waited for the meeting to begin.
"How did he end up here, though? I thought he would have been with the Muggles this summer, because of the Charm," Morrigan half-asked, frowning slightly. "And how is it that we still have use of this house?" Her question, obviously carefully worded to avoid direct mention of Sirius and his death, was answered with silence for a long few minutes.
"Harry was with the Dursleys until a week ago." The voice came from near the fireplace, and as they all turned toward the ancient stone hearth, the figure of an old Wizard appeared beside it, blinking into view as soon as everyone's eyes were directed toward the fireplace. Albus Dumbledore, smiling at all of them, conjured up an easy chair-yellow, with orange flowers-and sat down, still beaming. "His aunt and uncle will be taking his cousin on vacation to Majorca this week, and they were going to leave him with Mrs. Figg. Although Arabella is a worthy lady, she can't protect Harry as well as we can here. Hogwarts would be even better, but school is not in session, and we aren't as prepared to handle things from there. Here, we can always make sure that someone is around to keep an eye on things." Dumbledore chuckled.
"As far as the house goes," Remus Lupin added, when it became clear that Dumbledore had finished speaking, "it was left in our care, so to speak, until Harry's of age. Harry wanted us to keep using it for Headquarters, as it's convenient and otherwise it would be vacant." Morrigan nodded. She understood without needing it spelled out for her that Sirius had willed the house to Harry. She knew that Remus, in his current state, avoided mentioning Sirius' name whenever possible. He had lost the two friends closest to him in the world, both indirectly because of Peter Pettigrew. It had been difficult to keep Remus from going after Pettigrew on his own after what had happened at the Ministry in June. She didn't want to reopen Remus' wounds by asking any further questions.
"A bit of a legacy, then," Morrigan said, and Lupin nodded with a sad smile. "Good place for all the kids to be together for a bit, at any rate," she said. This drew another smile from Molly Weasley. Morrigan smiled back, then looked at Dumbledore with an eyebrow half-raised. Bill saw Dumbledore give Morrigan a slight nod, and leaned back in his chair in time to see Morrigan ever-so-casually point her wand at the door and mouth the words for the Imperturbable Charm. Charlie, who had caught the action as well, grinned at Bill. They obviously weren't alone in knowing that Fred and George weren't the only troublemakers in the Weasley family.
"So he's here for the rest of the summer. There's a guard on, is there?" Malcolm asked.
Kingsley Shacklebolt, his smooth, dark head shining in the enchanted sunlight pouring in the window from the garden nodded and gave the Carricks a short description of the way things at Grimmauld Place were being run this summer. "Molly's usually here-she runs things at the house, and thank Merlin for it. None of the rest of us is what you'd call talented at keeping things together like she does." Molly Weasley blushed. Charlie gave her another pat on the arm. "The rest of us," Kingsley continued, "are in and out, but we're here as often as we can be. No one wants to take any chances after what happened in June."
"So why are you two suddenly here, after six months of carefully staying away?" Tonks wanted to know. Morrigan grinned at her, silently admiring the newly electric blue hair. Tonks grinned back at her friend.
"Well," Malcolm said, "we're back in the office for a while. Fudge," he said, and his face and Morrigan's took on identical expressions of dislike, "has been recalling people back to base, so to speak. But we held out as long as we could without looking suspicious. There's a lot going on out there that no one seems able to explain."
The entire room suddenly got very quiet, and Moody, Kingsley, and Tonks all leaned forward attentively. "You found out something about the new policy on bringing in prisoners?" Kingsley asked, eyes intent.
"It's more that we couldn't find out anything," Morrigan explained. "After we heard from you about the new policy, Tonks, we started looking for information. We've talked to O'Malley, Ralston, Whiting, Tunstall, Aarons, Gallagher, Dawlish, and MacInnes. No one's heard anything at all. And if anyone should have heard the reasons behind the switch, they should have. Now Moody's retired, they're the most senior members of the Department. And they've heard nothing." Morrigan looked around and saw various levels of understanding on the faces around the room, and backtracked.
Her eyes, Bill saw, took on that cold, hard look whenever she mentioned Cornelius Fudge. She explained, "Last week, Fudge started calling people back into the office from our Department, and as soon as they got there, he sent them each a memo. Long story short, all prisoners going to Azkaban are now to go straight to the Ministry, to be handed over to Ministry officials."
"Not to the Dementors?" Fred asked, from where he and George were leaning against the ancient dresser that held plates and cutlery. "Whose job is to guard and transport prisoners? Something big is up, then. There must not be any Dementors left with the Ministry."
"Exactly," Morrigan said with a nod. "I mean, to be fair, Fudge did announce in June that the Dementors had revolted. But he didn't exactly make it clear that all of them revolted, or where their loyalties had probably been transferred. Until last week, prisoners were still going to Azkaban. But there wasn't any corresponding memo about who was guarding the prisoners then, and there isn't one now. So no one knows why the changes were made."
"They've left Azkaban," George said slowly. "All of them. If there were any left at Azkaban, they'd be being kept pretty busy shuttling the prisoners around. It's not like you can tell one from the other, so they'd use the remaining ones as often as they could to keep up appearances, wouldn't they? They've got to be gone."
"It's the only reason we can think of that the policy has changed so radically and so suddenly," Malcolm agreed. He pretended not to notice Molly and Arthur Weasley looking surreptitiously at their twins, as though they'd never seen them before. "So we held out on going into the office as long as we could, in hopes that we could track down a Death Eater or two and take them to Azkaban, to find out what's going on."
Morrigan nodded. "Unless we'd actually been in to the office, we wouldn't have known about Fudge's new policy, right? But the last owl we got was starting to sound a bit impatient, and we didn't want to stay out any longer. People would have started to ask questions we don't want asked. Still, it's pretty indicative of the situation that they were willing to pull us off Douglas Marshall in order to come into the Ministry, isn't it?"
"Marshall," Tonks said, frowning. "We've been after him since Voldemort disappeared back in '81. You were after him, then? He's important. Killed so many Wizards and Muggles I can't even remember the total." She nearly knocked over her teacup, righting it only at the last moment. Charlie grinned at her.
"A total of thirty Wizards and Muggles," Moody offered, scowling. "And they pulled you off the case when you had a lead on him?" he asked, incredulous.
"Another day or two might have done it," Morrigan said with a nod. "But if he's where we thought he was, he's not going anywhere soon. So we came back in. At the moment, one Death Eater who's still underground isn't as important as finding out what's going on with Azkaban."
"If no one at the Ministry's talking, we're not likely to find anything out, are we?" asked Hestia Jones, frowning.
"Well, that depends," Malcolm answered, his eyes meeting Morrigan's for a moment before he received the tiniest of nods. "It's dangerous at the moment to seem to be asking too many questions at the Ministry. Fudge is hyper-sensitive to what he considers any failure to do what he says when he says it. With the major public reversal he had to put into motion last month, he's tightening down.
"He's very uncertain these days, and he's trying to keep everyone together and behind him. Which he has to do, considering the political position he's suddenly in. So trying to find too much out through normal channels is going to jeopardize everything we're trying to do. The more questions people ask about us, the less likely we are to be able to work within the system."
Morrigan nodded. "We considered trying to get an appointment with him and trying to read the situation, so to speak," she said, and Dumbledore chuckled. "But we've never really met with him, nor would we have any reason to. So it would send up a big red flag. It's not likely that anyone here could manage it without making him suspicious. That's as easy these days, from what we hear, as getting him to hide his head in the sand was last year," she added. Several people, Arthur Weasley included, nodded agreement.
"So we know what we can't do," Bill summarized. "What can we do?"
He watched her as she considered her reply. Her eyes had that serious, almost dangerous look again, but this time it was deeper, hidden behind her calm expression. This, he decided, was a Witch who didn't mess around when it came to getting things done. Despite his questions concerning what had taught her to fight so hard and so fiercely, he had to admit that he was interested in her. She was casual and fierce by turns, though to the casual observer, she was simply easygoing. She was very good at hiding her stubborn side, if you didn't watch her eyes. "We can go to Azkaban and find out," Morrigan said simply.
The storm of protests replying to that statement was immediate and would have gone on far longer had Dumbledore not cleared his throat loudly. "How would you go about that?" he asked, as calmly and politely as if he were asking the Carricks to tea. His blue eyes, though, were intent on them both, his expression grave.
"When we're in the office, our weekends are usually somewhat freer. So if we go somewhere this weekend, no one will ask any questions. Even if we're in the field, we can manage it, though the timing will be tighter," Malcolm said.
"Impossible," Moody said, scowling, his magical eye and his good eye glaring at the twins.
"Hardly," Morrigan answered, not intimidated in the slightest. "It's actually very possible, and the best way we have of getting any conclusive information. First, we've been there before. No one here but you has ever been there and really knows the layout of the place, Moody, or how it works. No one, that is, but Malcolm and I. We've been there quite a few times, and we know what we're likely to run into. If things are working like they should be at the prison, we can be there and gone before anyone knows it. If things aren't working as they should be, we know what to be careful of when we take a look around.
"Let's face it. It won't take long to figure things out," she said. "Either we show up and there are some Dementors there, or some sort of guard, or we show up and it's deserted. I don't think there are any other realistic options."
"It's still incredibly dangerous for the two of you. And what is it really going to tell us?" Hestia Jones asked. "Besides the obvious, of course." She frowned at the Carricks, clearly against the plan.
"Well, if every single Dementor has revolted and is gone from Azkaban," Fred put in, "then who's guarding the prisoners? We've got four Aurors in the room, and they're obviously not being asked to work guard duty."
"And we've got how many other people who work at the Ministry here," George continued. "If they're not guarding anyone either, then who is? And if no one is, where are they?"
"Exactly," Morrigan said, grinning at Fred and George, who grinned back at her. "Put simply, if the prisoners aren't in Azkaban and the Dementors aren't guarding them, we've got enormous problems.
"First of all, it likely means that what Draco Malfoy told Harry at end of term is correct, that things are more serious than the Ministry has implied, and that all of the Dementors have gone over to Voldemort's side. Second, it means that it's very unlikely that the Death Eaters from the Ministry attack last month are still in custody." She moved to the window and lit another cigarette, using her wand to make the smoke disappear. Molly Weasley, who'd been about to protest, settled back, somewhat mollified but still disapproving. When Charlie went over to borrow a cigarette, her lips thinned even more, but she remained silent.
"And third, it means that if the prisoners are still in custody somewhere, Fudge is up to something, isn't he?" Bill asked. Malcolm and Morrigan nodded. The rest of the room fell silent again, digesting that.
"Right. If they're being held somewhere, they're being guarded somehow. And if we're not doing the guarding, Fudge has got something significant up his sleeve, doesn't he?" Morrigan asked. This time, no one could mistake the look in her eyes. She clearly found Fudge a bigger threat than most of the Order considered him to be, and the cold cast to her green eyes suggested that Fudge would do well to keep on the up-and-up, or out of her way.
"So if we need to go to Azkaban," Moody said, and from his tone it was clear that he wasn't conceding the need, nor did he want the Carricks to make the trip, "we need to work out a plan. Which means you'll be here every night working on it with me," he told the twins.
Morrigan grinned. "You didn't think we'd make some crazy plan without the craziest one of all involved in it, did you?"
The members of the Order present at the meeting were treated to the uncharacteristic, and frankly frightening, occurrence of Moody laughing heartily. Not a few flinched as his magical eye spun with mirth.
Morrigan looked at Dumbledore. "Do you think we should, then?" she asked, and after a pause and a heavy sigh, Albus Dumbledore nodded. Morrigan nodded, seeming satisfied rather than apprehensive. Malcolm's expression was similar. It seemed the subject was closed.
"So you're related to Harry," Molly Weasley began, and everyone in the room again turned toward the twins. Remus Lupin, who until now had remained silent in his corner, gave both twins a smile. They smiled back at him. He'd been the one to point them toward Dumbledore as the best means of contacting Harry.
"We are. Our mother and his were third cousins. We share a great- great-great grandfather, Douglas Malcolm," Malcolm said, bringing grins from almost everyone in the room as he had to count the number of greats on his fingers. He laughed at himself, and went on. "Douglas had two daughters. One married a Wizard and moved to Wales. That was our great- great grandmother, Angela. Angela married a Donovan, and their descendants were all Wizards or Witches." Malcolm shrugged.
"The other daughter, Susannah, married a Muggle and stayed in England; that was Harry's great-great grandmother. She became Susannah Evans when she married, and her descendants, until Lily and Harry, were all Muggles," Morrigan added. "Though there's always been a hint of magic about the family. There's Elven blood back beyond Douglas Malcolm, and even the Muggles-well, some of them, anyway-have a bit of talent at wandless magic."
"Harry's related to House Elves?" Fred asked, clearly amused. He wasn't the only one.
"High Elves, not House Elves. You probably haven't heard of them. They don't have anything to do with humans, especially Wizards. They're not hostile, like Centaurs, but they have taken pains over the centuries to keep their world entirely separate from the Wizarding world. You wouldn't see them on any Ministry lists," Morrigan said with a laugh.
Seeing that this didn't clear up the question, she went on. "There are basically three different kinds of Elves. High Elves, Common Elves, and Lower Elves. House Elves belong to the Lower Elves. Their main duties are to serve. Middles Elves are more like humans, and don't have much magic. The High Elves have the most powerful magic of the three, and they consider it their duty to.hmm. I suppose you could say that their duties are to safeguard nature. They live in remote mountain areas or deeply forested areas, and they use their magic to tend to nature-plants and animals and all that."
"You know an awful lot about them, considering they're not on any lists," Fred pointed out skeptically.
"Our grandmother is a Sylvan Elf, which is a High Elf from an Elven forest. She married a Wizard, and left the forest for a time." Malcolm grinned at Fred's surprise. "It happens from time to time. It's fairly rare."
"She married your Death Eater grandfather?" Charlie asked, drawing all eyes to himself, then to the Carricks again.
"She did," Morrigan confirmed, then grinned. "Talk about a culture shock. Straight from living with the Elves to living with one of the world's biggest gits." She shook her head. "Getting back to your question, Mrs. Weasley, she's the reason we never knew about Harry. Shortly after marrying our grandfather she realized that he wasn't the man she'd thought he was, and she took steps to protect her family from him.
"When our Mum was born, it was already clear that our grandfather was attracted to the Darker side of magic. When our Mum married our Da, our grandmother took them both aside and explained the situation to them. When our parents found out we were on the way, they moved from Wales to Scotland, where we were born. My grandmother performed a charm, something like a Fidelius," she said, her eyes meeting Dumbledore's, "to hide any knowledge of us from her husband."
"Sounds like he must have been a great guy," George muttered, making Morrigan laugh.
"You're not joking," she said, making him grin. "In any event, shortly after we were born, our Donovan grandfather declared himself openly in favor of Voldemort. And when Harry was born, my grandmother got a message from her father explaining that he'd read ominous signs in the stars. The two of them worked out a family tree, and discovered that we were related to Harry. And that Harry was in danger. They both assumed that he was in danger from my grandfather.
"To protect Harry from discovery, my grandmother re-cast her charm to include Harry's family. Unfortunately, our grandfather was only one avenue to finding and attacking Harry's family, as she found out after Voldemort killed Harry's parents and disappeared after failing to kill Harry, too. That same night, our grandfather disappeared.
"High Elves tend to look at things in the long view, and she never believed that Voldemort wouldn't return. She also knew her husband well enough to know that while he might have disappeared, he wasn't gone. So she made sure that her charm held.
"We found out about Harry last month, when we were going through some of our mother's old things at our Da's house in Inverness. The charm our grandmother had cast was only intended to hide Harry from our grandfather and his.err.colleagues, never from us. Last month we found the family tree our grandmother and great-grandfather had worked out when Harry was born. When we did, we sent a letter by Muggle post to Petunia Dursley. Who was, needless to say, less than no help at all. Once we discovered that she hadn't told Harry about us, we went to Remus," Morrigan said, nodding toward Lupin, "who directed us to Dumbledore, who told us to go straight to Harry."
"And Harry knows about you?" Arthur Weasley asked, sounding absolutely fascinated. "I mean, that you're related?"
"He does," Malcolm said. No one in the kitchen, though, had really doubted it. They'd seen Harry's face when he'd run through the room on his way to find Ron and Hermione.
It seemed that, for the moment, the Order was satisfied by what they'd heard. The conversation moved on to other topics. Various members of the Order gave reports on what they'd managed to learn as far as the Death Eaters they'd been surreptitiously tracking. It would have been more appropriate to say that they report what they hadn't managed to learn. Former Death Eaters everywhere were disappearing, going underground. In light of the Order's suspicions about Azkaban, this information was more alarming than not. Anyone who hadn't been certain about the potential benefit of the Carricks making the trip to Azkaban had become more open to the possibility after all reports were in.
Dumbledore adjourned the meeting within an hour, to allow people to get back to work. The meeting had been scheduled for the lunch hour both to allow Order members to attend, and to make their absence from work for an hour unsuspicious. Soon after the meeting was over, he made his way over to the Carricks and carried on a low, quick conversation with them. Morrigan asked him a question. He thought for a long moment, drawing the attention of the Weasleys who hadn't left for work yet and of Remus Lupin. After a while, Dumbledore nodded at her, and made his way back to Vanish his chair and head back to Hogwarts. Lupin Disapparated shortly afterward, frowning thoughtfully.
Fred and George made their way over to the Carricks, their mother still watching them as though she'd only just seen them for the first time. "So we're still up for the Wands on Friday night, right? Your friends' band is going to be playing?" Fred asked Morrigan.
"They'll be there, and so will we. Probably not as is, though. Dumbledore thinks, and we agree, that it's not a great idea for us to be seen in public with other members of the Order. So we'll be there, but in disguise," Malcolm answered.
"You're like Tonks, then?" George asked, looking deeply impressed.
"No one's like Tonks when it comes to disguises," Morrigan said. "It's just a simple Transfiguration." Fred and George still looked impressed, making her laugh. Bill and Charlie were equally impressed. Self- transfiguration was an incredibly difficult branch of magic. Neither of the Carricks seemed to be aware of this, if their expressions were any indication.
"Hell, if it's that easy, you should go all the way and become an Animagus," Fred said, grinning.
"Did we say we weren't?" Malcolm asked, one eyebrow raised. The twins looked surprised, then thoughtful. Morrigan laughed. Neither she nor Malcolm was an Animagus, registered or otherwise. Malcolm had learned over the past few weeks, though, that the Weasley twins were not as sophisticated as they liked to pretend-were, in fact, a bit gullible-and he loved keeping them guessing.
"So, we're working on something for Harry and the others to take back to school, to get in touch with us," Morrigan told Fred and George. "We'll probably need some help with it, so we'll be in touch with you, as it's in your line of expertise."
"Right. Well, you know where to find us, don't you?" Fred asked, grinning. The four of them laughed. "Just stop on by. We'll do what we can."
"Sounds like a plan," Morrigan said, nodding. "Probably next week, then." They said good-bye, and Fred and George Disapparated with loud bangs that had the Carricks wincing.
"A bit loud, aren't they?" Charlie asked, grinning.
"Stealthy they're not-at least not on the transportation front," Morrigan agreed cheerfully. "But Merlin knows they've got their strengths, and they know how to take advantage of them. Have you seen that shop? It's packed day in and day out. I shudder to think what the lines are going to be like once start-of-term shopping starts."
"You're not joking," Charlie laughed. "Good thing they really don't mind working hard when it's something they like to do."
"Right. I'd imagine their storeroom is packed to the brim and beyond, if what George was saying earlier was any indication," Morrigan said, and removed the Imperturbable Charm from the kitchen door while Molly Weasley was out of the room.
"Good move earlier. I'm sure that Ron and Ginny still have Fred and George's original Extendable Ears," Bill said with a laugh.
"I wouldn't doubt it for a second. Fred and George were showing me one this morning that doesn't have to be held to your ear, and disappears when someone comes along who might see it. The idea gives me nightmares, at least as far as this place is concerned. It might have its uses in other places, though," she said, thoughtfully.
"Listen, while your Mum is out of the room. We talked to Dumbledore about a way to keep Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, and their friends informed, without making them part of the Order. Everyone is still dead-set against allowing any under-age Witches or Wizards into the Order, and much as I sympathize with Harry and the others, I fully agree with that.
"Problem is, they're the ones most at risk. They're the ones who always end up in the fight. So we need a way of getting them information that doesn't conflict with what the Order's up to. We're thinking of kind of a junior Order, or whatever anyone wants to call it. Along the lines of what they're doing with D.A., if they keep that up. But not quite as many people."
"Makes sense to me. Count me in," Bill said, nodding. Charlie seconded his older brother's opinion. "They're too in the dark as it is, and if we can keep them informed, they'll find fewer ways to get in trouble, won't they?"
Malcolm laughed. "Well, that's the way Dumbledore thinks of it. I doubt, though, that they'll avoid getting into trouble just because they know a bit more about what's going on. What would be the fun of that?" he asked. Morrigan laughed, obviously in agreement. Charlie and Bill looked at the Carricks, then at each other.
"Lord, Bill, they're as bad as Fred and George, aren't they?"
"Actually," Morrigan said, as she and Malcolm moved toward the kitchen door, "Fred and George are strictly amateurs."
Looking a bit unnerved by that assessment, Bill and Charlie watched the twins leave the room and head upstairs to talk to Harry.
*
Having discovered that the kitchen door had been Imperturbed, Harry and the others had drawn up the Extendable Ears philosophically and retreated to Ron and Harry's bedroom on the second floor of the house. Ginny and Hermione sitting on one bed, Ron and Harry on the other. Hermione, Ron, and Harry held pieces of parchment in their hands. Ginny snorted impatiently and the others started a bit, then traded letters. Ron and Harry looked at Hermione's O.W.L. results, and blinked at her in disbelief.
"Sixteen O.W.L.s," Harry said, stunned. "Sixteen, Hermione! That's really good," he said. And insane, he added silently. "Congratulations," he added out loud, so that she didn't notice the pause after his words. Ron nodded.
"Sixteen," Ginny said slowly, clearly impressed.
Ron simply stared at Hermione, incapable of speech, then managed, "And all O's." He managed to make that statement sound like a compliment despite the barely veiled horror in his eyes. Hermione beamed, blushing slightly, either ignoring or simply missing the look on Ron's face.
"One Outstanding in Ancient Runes, two in Arithmancy, for the theory and the practical. Two in Astronomy, two in Charms, two in Defense Against the Dark Arts. Two in Herbology. One in History of Magic. Two in Potions. Two in Transfiguration." Harry looked up at Hermione, who was clearly torn between being pleased and being embarrassed.
"Oh, look, Ron," Hermione said, looking down at Ron's letter. "You got eight." This was, apparently, news to Ginny, who looked impressed again, despite herself. "Two E's in Astronomy, two in Charms, two in Defense, one in Herbology. And one in Transfiguration," she said, beaming at Ron. Ron's ears turned as red as a sunset. "That's loads better than you'd expected," Hermione said, approvingly, "and it's terrific, in Transfiguration, isn't it?"
Ron grinned, and looked at Harry's. His grin widened as he looked at Harry's results. "Ten, Harry, that's great. An E in Astronomy, one in Charms, two O's in Defense-no big surprise there," he muttered, "and one O, one E in Potions, Transfiguration, and Herbology." He gave Harry a mock- pitying look. "Think they made a mistake on the History of Magic, then?" Ron asked. Harry snorted.
"Right," Harry said, laughing, because he hadn't even answered half of the questions on the History of Magic exam before falling asleep in the middle of the test, "about as big a mistake as they made on the Divination marks," he added. Harry didn't have to make as much of an effort as usual to forget the dream of Sirius being tortured by Lord Voldemort that had forced him out of the exam. He and Ron got to laughing so hard that they nearly fell off the bed. Hermione did her best to look disapproving; they'd failed their Divination O.W.L. so badly they might as well have not taken the exam at all. Their laughter, however, was irresistible. It was, she thought, as though they had momentarily forgotten what had happened at the Ministry in June. Relief had her laughing nearly as hard as Ron, Harry, and Ginny.
"Meeting's over," Harry said, hearing voices downstairs, coming up from the kitchen. The others stopped laughing quickly, untangling the Extendable Ears again and letting them loose. There was, at first, only a collection of voices, none talking about anything remotely interesting-a meeting at work, someone's children, Hestia Jones' new job at the Ministry. Then, when the sound of the front door opening and closing, and locks turning, announced the departure of most of the Order members, the Ears began to pick up other voices.
Harry recognized the Carricks' voices and Ron's oldest brothers' as well. He looked at his friends. They stared back, eyes wide as they heard the Carricks, Bill, and Charlie talking about beginning a sort of junior Order, so that Harry and the others could be informed about the dangers they seemed inevitably to face when they were at Hogwarts.
"Oh, now that would be nice," Ron commented, even as the others shushed him so that they could hear more clearly. It wasn't that they didn't agree with him wholeheartedly. It was simply that he spoke too loudly for them to hear anything through the Ears at this distance. When the kitchen door opened and closed, though, they all stared at one another, the beginnings of smiles on their faces. Finally, someone understood and was willing to help them.
The Extendable Ears had just been returned to various pockets and drawers when they heard footsteps on the stairs. Harry had the uncomfortable thought that the sound was purposely loud, then forgot it with the knock on the door.
"Do you really want to start a junior Order?" was Ron's question, which he could barely contain until the Carricks had been invited in and the door had shut behind them.
"Extendable Ears are working well, I see," Morrigan said drily, and Ron turned red to the roots of his hair. Malcolm grinned. Morrigan laughed. "Well, be certain to let Fred and George know they're still good after all this time." She grinned at Harry, who grinned back.
"You'd be Hermione," Morrigan guessed, turning to a girl about six inches shorter than Harry with thick brown hair and books piled around her on the bed. "And you'd be Ginny," Morrigan continued, grinning at a girl with Weasley-red hair and bright brown eyes. The girls nodded. "I'm Morrigan Carrick, and this is my brother Malcolm. Cousins of Harry's," she added casually as they all shook hands. "Ron, you hadn't met Mal yet. Mal's been asking me questions about Hogwarts Quidditch I couldn't answer, not being a Keeper myself. You'll have to fill him in, if you don't mind."
Harry and the two girls grinned as Ron looked as though he'd been handed a sack full of galleons. Ginny moved over on the bed to make room for Morrigan, and Harry scooted over on the other bed so Malcolm could sit down between Harry and Ron. Morrigan pointed her wand at the door and spoke a Silencing Charm.
"Why does your wand put out silver sparks? I've never seen a Silencing Charm that's silvery," Hermione said curiously.
"Oh, right, normally it would be blue, wouldn't it?" Morrigan asked. "But my magic works a bit differently, I suppose, so all my spells come out silver. It's just always been that way. Doesn't matter what wand I use or anything, it just does it."
"Cool," was Ron's opinion of this, and Harry nodded.
"Well, it can be cool. But when you're the only one whose wand sparks silver, it's kind of a dead giveaway," Morrigan pointed out, and they had to agree with her.
"Da always told her it was the Elven blood thing," Malcolm said, and every eye in the room, save his sister's, was on him in a flash. Not having seen anything strange about his statement, he didn't even notice until Harry cleared his throat. Then he looked up and saw four pairs of eyes on him intently. "What?" he asked, looking surprised.
"Mal, don't be a git. You know damned well almost no one has ever heard of High Elves. They're thinking we're related to Kreacher or something." Morrigan was having a hard time holding back her laughter.
"Oh, right," Malcolm said, the twinkle in his green eyes giving him away. "High Elves, not House Elves. High Elves aren't on the Ministry lists, so I doubt you'd have heard of them. Long story short, House Elves are the lowest order of Elves. High Elves are the highest order. They stick to themselves and they've spent centuries avoiding most humans. We have High Elf blood on both sides of our families, and it comes out more strongly in some people than others. Mor got a strong dose, I got a weaker one." For which he was grateful. Elf blood carried as many disadvantages for humans as it did advantages.
"And that's what makes your wand spark silver?" Hermione asked, frowning intently.
"Elven magic is different than Wizard magic. Elves don't use wands, and elves don't use spells the way Wizards do. The best our Da could figure was that the way the Elven blood and Wizard blood mix together makes doing ordinary Wizard magic a bit different." Morrigan shrugged. "Works just as well as the colored sparks, though, so I'm not complaining."
Hermione grinned. They looked over as Charlie and Bill appeared in the doorway and walked through. As they passed through the Charm, their outlines grew silvery for the briefest of moments, then they were inside the room and the doorway was transparent once again.
"Looks cooler in the dark," was Malcolm's only comment, and Ron and Harry laughed. "So what do you think about another Order?" he asked. Knowing they hadn't missed anything important, Charlie and Bill took seats on the room's only two chairs.
"I like the idea," Hermione said, surprising her friends. "I mean, we need as much information as we can get, don't we? And it's hard to get the kind of information we need when we're at school. I mean, if we had more information we could manage to work things out before they become crises, couldn't we?"
"Well, when you're lucky that's the way it works, anyway," Morrigan said. "Hard to be lucky all the time. But we're," she began, indicating Charlie and Bill as well as herself and Malcolm, "of the opinion that the more information we can get you, the better.
"That doesn't mean that we'll be letting you in on everything. Professor Dumbledore has made it clear that while you're to get more information, you won't be getting all of it. He's of the opinion that you need to know more, but that you have enough to worry about without being involved in the day-to-day business of the Order. And he's right," she added. "You've got school to worry about, and you're not of age. No one's going to be in favor of you getting into dangerous situations when you can only use magic to defend yourselves." Harry, who had looked about to protest before her last statement, subsided with a sigh. He knew she was right. He didn't have to like it.
"So we're working on a way for you to get in touch with us without using the Floo or owls. No telling what's being watched these days, or by whom. We'll be getting help from Fred and George on that, and we should have it by the time you all are ready to go back to school. Let us worry about that," Morrigan continued, and got nods and relieved grins in return.
"What about the junior Order thing, though?" Ron wanted to know. "It wouldn't make sense to have everyone in D.A. in the Order, too. Too many people, too many risks."
"You're absolutely right," Malcolm said, nodding. Ron looked enormously pleased by this, though he tried hard not to show it. "Obviously it wouldn't make sense for us to tell you who to invite. But it would make sense for you to discuss it together, then talk to us. We might know something that could help, if you're wavering on anyone."
"Well, the four of us, of course," Harry said, nodding at Hermione, Ginny, and Ron. "And Neville, definitely."
"And Luna," Ron added. "She helped out an awful lot at the Min.in June," he amended quickly, carefully not looking at Harry.
"And we can always add more later on, can't we?" Hermione asked, clearly not meaning it as a question. "I mean, six is a good start for now. It's manageable."
"You wouldn't really need to meet all that often," Bill added, "so it wouldn't get in the way of school or Quidditch or even D.A."
"D.A.'s going to be harder to manage this year, though," Harry said a bit glumly. "We're running out of things we know how to do, and it's not so easy to learn the more advanced things out of books. I mean, we can study up on hexes and things, but that's not going to help us actually practice things."
"Well, you might find it easier than you're expecting," Morrigan said. "You don't think that, now Professor Dumbledore's back, it will need to be as secret, or as difficult to ask for help, do you?"
Harry brightened at this. He hadn't really thought about it. "You don't think a teacher would take it over, do you?" he asked, not liking the idea of having the leadership of D.A. taken away from him after he'd managed it for almost an entire school year.
"I don't know why they'd want to, since you already have a Defense class," Morrigan said reasonably. "But maybe you could have kind of an unofficial adviser or something. You'll have to work that out."
"Yeah, that's great," Ron said, then his face fell. "So all we have to do is worry about making it through Potions-I mean, Ron and Hermione have to worry about it, I'm not going to be in N.E.W.T. potions, so I'm never going to make Auror."
Morrigan grinned. "Well, Mr. Weasley, your moments of self-pity are over. Because Mal or I will be tutoring Potions until you go back to school, and you're in the class. An hour or two a day, weekdays, until you go back. Professor Dumbledore is working on something for the school year, and I don't think you'll be left out there, either. So you actually have the best of it, don't you? You get to take the Potions N.E.W.T. and you don't have to see Professor Snape in class."
The effect this had on Ron was nearly pathetic to see; Bill and Charlie realized that Ron's O.W.L. marks had bothered him far more than he'd let on. Realizing that he still had a shot at Auror, and that he could still share Potions with Harry and Hermione, cheered him up so much he was nearly dancing. Charlie looked at Bill. Bill looked at Charlie. They both nodded. Ron's career talk would be coming as soon as they could corner him without it looking suspicious. Bill wondered how many other things Ron had gotten good at hiding over the years. He fully intended to find out.
"You don't have to go back to work?" Ron asked Bill, looking strangely hopeful.
"Not today. Had a half-day coming, so I took it," Bill explained.
"And you don't have to go back to work?" Harry asked the Carricks. They shook their heads. "Because the garden is pretty big, really," Harry continued. "We could play Quidditch."
"Hermione? You up for Quidditch?" Morrigan asked.
Hermione laughed, shaking her head. "I'll keep score, thanks."
"That would make the teams uneven," Malcolm said, shaking his head. "No score-keeping allowed. You need to be our Chaser," he said decisively. Hermione, who normally would have avoided playing at any cost, was not proof against the sparkle in those green eyes. She nodded. Ron whooped happily, and he and Harry dug around for their brooms. Ginny and Hermione went to go get theirs, and Bill and Charlie, after some mock-sighing, Disapparated home to get their own broomsticks. The Carrick twins did the same, and met the others in the kitchen, looking for the doorway out to the garden.
"Tenth brick up from the floor, tenth brick from the left," Morrigan told Harry. As his eyes focused on the correct brick, the door appeared in the back wall of the kitchen, just as it had earlier. "Just have to know where to look," she said cheerfully, and Harry opened the door.
After they'd all gone through to the outside, Morrigan sighed. "This just won't work for Quidditch," she said, and Ron's and Harry's faces fell. Even Hermione looked a bit disappointed. After a straight week of rain, they'd been looking forward to getting outside.
Morrigan slid her wand out of the sleeve of her robes and considered a moment. She shook her head and put the wand back. Disappointed, Harry and his friends turned to go back inside. "Don't want to play anymore?" she asked. They turned back around, and gasped. The weed-choked, derelict garden with its crumbling brick pathways and crooked trees was gone. In its place was a lawn of emerald green, about 100 feet long and 50 feet wide, with a set of three hoops at either end. "Watch for the ceiling," she warned. The ceiling, about fifty feet up, went from enchanted sunny sky to black almost before she'd spoken, which made the ceiling far easier to see, as it was now different from the enchanted sunny-sky walls. Somehow, the sunlight was still there, filtering gently through the dark ceiling, as bright as ever. Harry and Ron mounted their brooms and kicked off, followed quickly by Ginny.
Hermione was looking a bit uncomfortable. "I'm not that good a flyer," she confessed softly to Morrigan, so that no one else could hear. "I tried and tried, but I never seemed to get the hang of it."
"Let's see, then," Morrigan said, and watched as Hermione flew her broom in an unsteady circle. When Hermione had touched down again, Morrigan was grinning. "Well, if you don't let the broom know who's boss, you won't fly it much steadier. Just think of it as.hmmm," she said, thinking a moment.
"Think of it as Fred and George testing their products on unsuspecting first years," Charlie suggested. "You've got to take charge. That's all."
Morrigan nodded, grinning. She'd heard the story of the twins testing their wares on the first years from Fred and George themselves. She pointed her wand at Hermione's broom and said, "Noncadero." The silver sparks surrounded the broom for a moment and Hermione looked at Morrigan questioningly. "Keeps you from falling off until you're the one in charge," Morrigan said simply. "It won't last long, but it's easier to get the hang of bossing your broom around if you know you're not going to be drinking any Boneset anytime soon."
Grinning, Hermione kicked off from the ground, and before long was zooming along with Harry, Ron, and Ginny at the opposite end of the garden.
"You're a fraud. There's no such spell," Charlie said, raising an eyebrow.
"Not for Wizards, anyway," Morrigan said simply. "But I'm not going to go around doing all sorts of wandless magic and give them any ideas, am I?"
"You did it with the garden," Bill pointed out.
Morrigan grinned. "Caught that, did you? As long as they think I did it with my wand while their backs were turned, that's good enough."
Laughing, the two oldest Weasley brothers and the two Carricks mounted their brooms and kicked off from the ground. Charlie conjured a Quaffle, and the game began.
***
Unable to sleep, Harry wandered downstairs around midnight. Everyone else in the house was sound asleep, and though his body was tired, his mind was racing. He'd decided to get something to eat, still too used to living with the Dursleys not to take advantage of the opportunity to eat whenever he was hungry. He walked into the kitchen, and found Morrigan and Malcolm sitting at the kitchen table, playing Wizard's Chess.
"Pull up a chair, Harry," Malcolm invited. Harry got himself butterbeer and a leftover piece of pie from dessert, and sat down at the table as Morrigan's queen moved into place and Malcolm's king fell over, shattering into a dozen pieces of what looked like ivory against the dark wood of the table. "Oh, come on," Malcolm complained. "Never saw that coming. So we're even, then?" he asked his sister, who nodded. "One more," he said, and waved his wand at the chess set, which reordered itself on the board, the pieces restored to their original condition. "What's up, then?" Malcolm asked, grinning at him.
Harry grinned back. "Couldn't sleep. There's too much floating around in my head," he said with a sigh. "Everyone else is asleep or gone home," he said.
"They'll do that to you, late at night," Morrigan told him. Harry laughed.
"So about the junior Order thing," he said. Two wands pointed at the kitchen door, and two voices said, 'Silencio!' in unison.
"Sorry. It was suggested that perhaps some people in the house wouldn't be crazy about the idea," Morrigan said by way of explanation. "Go ahead. You were saying?"
"Well, how would it work? I mean, you can't tell us stuff about the real Order, because of the Fidelius Charm. So what can you really tell us? Is it just a way to shut us up?" Harry watched as one of Morrigan's pawns struggled melodramatically with one of Malcolm's pawns, finally knocking Malcolm's pawn out of the way and giving a victorious little hop.
Morrigan laughed, unable to help herself. Then she looked at Harry. "It's not just a way to shut you up. Harry, keeping all of you too much in the dark last year ended in catastrophe. Everyone is aware of that," she said, and Harry didn't even have time to feel the guilt he always felt when he remembered what had happened at the Ministry last month. "And as we were saying earlier, it's not your fault, or any one person's fault. But having made the mistake, we all have to work on making sure we don't repeat it. So, though it goes against the grain for most of us, we're going to let you in on more of what's going on."
"How does it go against the grain?" Harry asked, a little irritated.
"Harry, you're not of age. And you mean a lot to a lot of people. Of course it goes against the grain to give you information that might put you in danger. Don't be stupid," Morrigan told him, her voice gentle to take the sting out of her words. "You can only do magic to defend yourself. By that time, it could be too late. You know that. You've been in enough situations over the last five years to understand it." One of Malcolm's pawns took one of Morrigan's, and spun in a triumphant circle before settling back onto the board.
"Well, it's still stupid. I mean, I'm the one who gets stuck trying to kill Voldemort. Why should anyone have a problem telling me stuff that can help me do that?"
"Harry, you're being obtuse. And feeling sorry for yourself, though I can't really blame you," Morrigan said with a sigh. Harry scowled. "You're the one who gets stuck trying to kill Voldemort. That's a given. And it isn't fair, because you're too young to carry that kind of burden. Nevertheless, it was given to you, and it's yours to either drop or carry, as you choose." At the look of shock on his face, she smiled and shook her head sadly.
"You're the one Voldemort marked as his equal, the only one who can kill him," Malcolm explained. "That doesn't mean you have to try. It means you have the choice. Try or not. It speaks volumes about you that you never considered just chucking it all and walking away. No one can force you to take it up."
"But then he'd win," Harry protested.
"Sure," Malcolm agreed. "And again, it says a lot about you that the thought of him winning makes you take the difficult path. No one says it to you, but they're well aware of the weight you're carrying around. Problem is, it's as difficult for them to acknowledge it as it is for you to carry it around in the first place. No one wants to think that a sixteen-year old boy has to shoulder that kind of burden, Harry. But given the circumstances, they don't have much choice but to accept it."
"So I could just walk," Harry mused. His eyes moved to the chessboard, noted without interest that Morrigan was winning at the moment, then slid back up to meet hers.
"You could. But that's a choice that carries consequences, too. You know what would happen if he won. You know what would happen to your friends if he won. And what would happen to you. You have to weigh that against the cost to you if you fight."
"Wise advice that should have been given to him long ago," came a voice from behind them. Albus Dumbledore stood near the fireplace, smiling sadly at Harry. "And not so long ago as well," he added.
Harry shrugged. "Doesn't much matter, I suppose," he said slowly. "I can't just walk away. You knew that," he said, his eyes on Morrigan slightly accusing.
"I suspected it," she corrected him. "But sometimes, even though the choice is hard, it's easier to accept knowing you made a choice to begin with."
Harry thought about that for a bit, then decided to file it away for future consideration. He looked over as Dumbledore sat down and Morrigan and Malcolm lit cigarettes. "I still don't see how it's possible that anyone could let us in on stuff the Order's doing without breaking the Fidelius Charm," he told Dumbledore, frowning a bit as he tried to work it out.
"They couldn't," Dumbledore said simply. "But they can tell you what they've found out, as long as it's not discussed in the Order first." He watched as one of Malcolm's knights fell to Morrigan's bishop with soft but dramatic groans, smiled, and looked up at Harry.
Harry's frown didn't disappear. "But how can we be sure that it'll stay safe?" he asked.
"Another Charm," Morrigan explained, and Dumbledore nodded. "It won't be a Fidelius. I'm not Albus Dumbledore. I can't perform a Fidelius and have the energy left over at the end of the day to do a whole lot else." Dumbledore's slight nod was agreement enough for Harry to believe it. "But I can work a similar charm. Elven magic," she explained. "It works differently. When a Wizard performs magic, the power for the magic comes from the Wizard. That's why you have to be powerful to produce a Patronus, for example-at least if you're going to expect it to help protect you against something awful. Not everyone can produce a Patronus, especially in a crisis. A Fidelius is even more tiring, over time. The Elven version, for me, is somewhat easier. And a Secrecy Charm has the additional benefit of going on even if something happens to the Secret- Keeper."
Harry decided not to think about that. Having just found two cousins he'd never known existed, he wasn't going to think about losing them just yet. Morrigan watched the emotions play across Harry's face, sympathy in her eyes. Every time Harry came to a point where he had a grip on things, yet another punch was thrown. And the hell of it was that there was no way to really protect him from the punches. He just had to make it from one to the next as best as he could.
"So you'd work the Charm, and you'd be the Secret-Keeper?" he asked. Morrigan nodded. "Is that safe?" he asked.
"As safe as it gets," Malcolm said. "None of the rest of us is accomplished enough at wandless magic to even try it. And Morrigan is as trustworthy as you can get." He said it simply, without trying to convince Harry. Harry considered that. He remembered that she'd been honest with him even when it wasn't comfortable, earlier today, in the garden. He remembered her honest assessment of Sirius' actions, and the pain in her eyes that had told Harry that it had hurt her to be so candid about Sirius' failings when she'd just lost him, too. He didn't think that Sirius, who'd been on the run and in danger of his life, would have befriended her if he'd sensed anything at all untrustworthy about Morrigan. And, Harry thought, she hadn't turned Sirius in. She'd been an Auror, she'd met a man wanted by the Ministry, and she hadn't taken him back to Azkaban.
Finally, Harry nodded. "So how do we go about setting it up?" he asked.
Malcolm looked at him closely. "You're not just trying to get out of Potions tomorrow, are you?" he asked.
Harry laughed. "We'd need a headquarters, wouldn't we?" he asked. "We couldn't meet here, or at school."
Morrigan and Malcolm grinned at each other. They looked at Dumbledore, and Dumbledore grinned back. "We're working on that," Morrigan said. "I think you'll be pleasantly surprised."
Deciding that it was easier to trust them than to try and figure out what they were thinking-they were worse, in some ways than Fred and George-Harry nodded. As Dumbledore and the Carrick twins discussed procedures and rules for the junior Order, he began to yawn. By the time they'd gotten to discussing communications between the junior Order members, Harry was sound asleep, his head on the table. Dumbledore took his leave, Malcolm carried Harry back upstairs to bed, and Morrigan got down to work. She and Malcolm, on unofficial guard duty that night, stayed up discussing security and communications between the junior Order members until Molly Weasley made her sleepy way into the kitchen to start breakfast the next morning.
"Coffee, dears?" Molly asked, wondering how on earth the twins could look so alert after having spent all night on guard and the previous day engaged in Order business and a rather fierce-looking game of Quidditch.
"Oh, that would be lovely," Morrigan said, gratefully. "We got to talking and never even noticed the time. We've about time for a quick cup, then we're off to work," she said cheerfully.
"You'll be exhausted in no time," Molly said, half-severely.
"We'll manage," Malcolm said, smiling. "It's desk work for the next four days. We're luckier than your husband-it's when we're out of the office that our days get truly crazy."
Molly smiled and sent three mugs floating over to the table. "He has his days, true enough," she admitted, then sighed. "More often than not, these days."
Morrigan nodded. "I wonder if people realize just how difficult he has it," she said thoughtfully. "He's got to hold his entire Department together, make Fudge believe that he's following the company line, so to speak, and work for the Order on the sly. It's no wonder your children turned out as well as they did, with the two of you as parents."
Molly's face darkened, and her eyes showed the pain that she rarely admitted to anyone. "All but one," she said sadly.
"Oh, he's dedicated enough, isn't he?" Morrigan asked. "Granted, he's taken a different path, but he's young, and ambitious, and he hasn't really been tested. His vision's a bit shuttered now. He's new to the Ministry, new to the real world, really. And it's easy enough to make mistakes when you're starting out. But Mrs. Weasley, I've met all of your children. You and your husband did an amazing job teaching them what's really important. There's still hope for Percy yet. He hasn't arrived at the real crossroads yet, has he?"
The door opened, and Arthur Weasley, looking tired and angry, walked into the kitchen. "He's passed the crossroads and gone down the wrong road," he said with uncharacteristic curtness. Apprehension flickered in Molly Weasley's eyes, along with grief.
Morrigan appeared to consider that. "He's missed a turn or two, true," she said, "but he's still got more than a few opportunities to find the right road." She seemed, Molly thought, to be speaking from personal experience rather than about Percy, who she didn't know well at all. "We're not quite at the final turning, are we?"
Sitting down at the table, a mug of coffee floating over to sit in front of him, Arthur Weasley mulled that idea over. He sighed heavily, the anger melting off of his face. "I surely hope not," he said. "I surely do."
"Don't we all," Morrigan said, her tone comforting. "Speaking of which," she added, on a brighter note, "Charlie mentioned something yesterday about Daniel Carey wanting in on the Order."
Arthur Weasley's face brightened, as he nodded and told his wife about their old friend, a classmate at Hogwarts, who Charlie had run into in Diagon Alley the day before, after the impromptu Quidditch game. In the middle of the story, the twins left to go home and change for work. Molly Weasley's eyes, grateful, followed them out the door as her spirits lifted. Rarely did Arthur look so much like his old self as he did now, talking about their old friend. Even fifteen minutes after she'd gotten downstairs, the day was looking up.