Chapter 1: Muggles, Murder, Monsters and Mercenaries
The front door banged shut, signaling Uncle Vernon's departure for work. Harry rolled over in bed and blinked at his slightly blurry bedroom. Yawning, he picked up his glasses from the bedside table. He stretched lazily, trying to ignore the fact that his nightshirt couldn't seem to keep up with his growth. Rolling over onto his back, Harry put his hands behind his head and stared up at the ceiling. He made no move to get up. He didn't really think about anything. He just stared.
If there was one thing Harry had plenty of, it was time to kill.
He'd been back at the Dursleys' for a week. They left him to his own devices - something he preferred - which largely included lying in bed staring at the ceiling, writing to his friends and visiting the sights of Little Whinging when he felt the need for a bit of excitement. The life of The Boy Who Lived is a glamorous one indeed, he thought dully.
Not that there weren't a great many things happening; there were. They just weren't happening to him. Hermione was traveling in Spain with her parents, Ron was leaving next week to help the twins set up their new store - much to the chagrin of his mother - and rumors were abounding as to what Voldemort was up to and where he would attack next.
But all of that seemed very far away from number four, Privet Drive. The magical world in general seemed very far away, and Harry couldn't exactly say that he was unhappy with the arrangement. Last summer, he had been nearly frantic, wanting to know what was going on and what the Order was doing to stop it. This year he just wanted it all to go away for a while.
If the rest of his summer was spent writing letters, staring at the ceiling and walking around Little Whinging, then that was just fine with him.
Harry waited until the digital numbers beside him read ten o'clock before rolling off the bed. After showering and getting dressed, Harry packed a bag with some of his snacks left over from the train ride home and crept downstairs, hoping to make it outside without Aunt Petunia or Dudley hearing him. His stomach growled as he passed the kitchen, with the faint smell of bacon and eggs tormenting him as he tiptoed across the entryway. He had a much larger appetite than he used to - not that the Dursleys cared, or felt the need to feed him any more than usual - but he found himself avoiding mealtimes anyway. He didn't particularly relish dinnertime with the Dursleys anyway.
Harry quickly opened the front door and dashed through, kicking it shut behind him. He trotted down the street and made for one of his numerous local hiding places: the library. The place had become one of Harry's favorite haunts in the past week; it was the perfect place to escape. It was quiet and he certainly wasn't in danger of running into the Dursleys there. Some part of him thought Hermione would be proud.
The librarian eyed him suspiciously, as she did every time he came in. She obviously expected him to start trouble. Teenagers did not exactly frequent the local library during the summer. Grabbing a stack of newspapers, Harry sat down at a table in the corner and began reading.
Harry hadn't started reading the newspapers because of any great interest in current events. In fact, if he had to be completely honest with himself, he just didn't feel the desire to make the commitment that reading an entire book would entail. So he leafed through, reading the stories that interested him, spending the most time on the comics and finally reading his horoscope:
Bring imagination to the table and good things will happen for you. Keep your mind open and try to see yourself as others see you. Don't let yourself become embroiled in the machinations of family members.
Well, at least it wasn't predicting a horrific death for him. It actually seemed fairly positive, as far as Harry's experience with astrology went. Maybe that was a Muggle thing. Having wasted much more time contemplating his horoscope in the newspaper than the average sane person probably should, Harry returned the papers and headed over to the park a few blocks away to enjoy his Chocolate Frogs.
He found a bench and munched contentedly, careful to open the package inside his backpack so that the charmed amphibians didn't draw unwanted attention. Harry watched two old men play checkers a short distance away. It wasn't until they finished and he turned his attention to some children playing a game of tag that he noticed the presence of another person on his bench. Another person who was staring at him.
It was a girl about his age, with long dark brown hair and blue eyes. When he stared back at her, she smiled. She was very pretty in a pale, angular sort of way. This made Harry slightly nervous. He didn't feel he came across very well with pretty girls, considering the whole foolishness with Cho Chang. He was much better with girls he already knew too well to find pretty, like Hermione or Ginny Weasley.
"You're Harry Potter, aren't you?" she asked.
"Erm, yes," he answered, startled that she knew his name. Was she magical? And if she was, what the bloody hell was she doing here?
She smiled wider and held out her hand. "Lucy Wexler." They shook hands briefly. Harry, embarrassed by the contact and the fact that his hand was slightly sweaty, dropped his eyes to his lap. Lucy didn't seem taken aback at all, though Harry found himself suddenly and uncomfortably aware of the fact that his hand-me-down clothes were far too big.
"I was instructed by one of the local matrons to steer clear of you at all costs, so naturally I thought I should make your acquaintance," she explained, sizing him up with her head cocked to one side. It was a movement that should have seemed affected, yet somehow she pulled it off. "You don't look disturbed."
Harry puzzled over that comment for a moment before he remembered his aunt and uncle's story to the neighbors about him attending St. Brutus' School for Incurably Criminal Boys. Only to the Dursleys would that be preferable to attending Hogwarts.
Unsure of what to say, Harry simply shrugged. It wasn't as if he could tell her the truth; she was a Muggle.
"What's it like there? Are there a lot of fights? Do you have to live in cells?" Her eyes twinkled and Harry got the feeling that instead of finding the idea of reform school repugnant, she found it fascinating.
"It's...ummm...it's all right," he answered. Aside from the Dursleys, when was the last time he'd spoken to a Muggle? Harry didn't know.
She looked disappointed with his answer. "I figured it would be pretty rough, like prison."
Harry thought back on his past five years at Hogwarts. "Oh, it can be rough, alright." He thought about Cedric Diggory and Sirius and Professor Trelawny's prophecy briefly before shutting them back in the box he usually kept them in. "It can be really rough." His voice reflected more bitterness than he'd intended.
Lucy blinked at him sympathetically. "School is bad enough as it is. Throw vicious criminals into the mix and it's got to be even worse than the kennel." She shook her head.
Harry shook his head a little, confused by the comparison. "The kennel?"
She laughed shortly. "My boarding school...or my former boarding school, to be exact. It's a highly snooty all-girls affair full of self-important debutantes that I've had the good sense to get myself kicked out of. I call it the kennel because the entire purpose of the place is to train us to look exquisite and breed with the correct sort of male in the hopes of producing desirable offspring with the proper balance of impeccable bloodlines and the ability to bore people to death at fifty meters." She shrugged. "The kennel."
Harry found himself smiling at this strange girl. "What did you do to get kicked out?"
She grinned at him. "I took a liking to the incorrect sort of male. Got caught out after curfew in a very unladylike situation."
Harry felt his face warm at the implications of that statement. Of course, she thought he was a juvenile delinquent, so obviously she thought that he was also the incorrect sort of male. Harry realized that this girl, unlike his classmates - unlike Cho Chang, for example - hadn't the slightest idea what he really was. She thought he was a violent criminal. In fact, she seemed especially intrigued by the idea that he was a violent criminal, which he found rather odd and probably not entirely healthy.
If occurred to him that no matter what sort of grandiose lies he made up about himself, she would believe him. He was a juvenile delinquent, after all.
He was a bad ass.
The role was certainly preferable to being The Boy Who Lived And Is Going To Kill Voldemort Or Be Murdered Like a Chump. He felt suddenly lighter somehow, with the weight of Harry Potter-dom off of his shoulders. He actually found himself grinning back at Lucy Wexler, struck by the headiness of his newfound persona. Leaning a casual arms across the back of the bench so that his hand was very nearly in contact with her shoulder, he asked in his best British James Dean voice, "What would your parents think about you talking to someone like me?"
She leaned a bit closer to him, close enough for him to notice that she smelled like flowers and that her eyes were a pale blue, shot through with gray and a bit of violet. "They would absolutely flip," she assured him. Lucy looked briefly thrilled at the possibility before she scowled and stuck her tongue out, withdrawing from him a few inches. "Except they wouldn't."
"Really?" He was thrown by her abrupt mood changes.
"You have to understand; they're both psychiatrists. They're programmed specifically not to flip...at any time...under any circumstances whatsoever. They'd probably just give me a mind-numbingly boring lecture on the importance of making mature sexual decisions." She rolled her eyes.
Harry coughed. Actually, he choked, but he managed to pass it off as a cough. "S-s-sexual decisions?" He couldn't believe he'd just said the word 'sexual' to a girl. Of course, the Harry Potter she thought he was had probably said the word a thousand times. Hell, he'd probably had sex. The mere thought made Harry want to bounce around in his seat like a little kid.
"Well, you see," she said in a mock serious voice, apparently imitating her parents, "this is a very important age in the development of a young woman. She needs to find ways to express herself sexually in a manner that takes into account both her emotional maturity and her physical safety, and this person I've never heard of once said this and that other person I've never heard of said that and blah, blah, blah."
At the mention of physical safety, Harry thought about Cedric Diggory and Sirius. Two people had already died because of him. Four people, if he counted his parents. Remembering them brought on a wave of depression. "Maybe you should listen to them," he advised Lucy.
She leaned in toward him conspiratorially and he found himself forgetting about Cedric and Sirius and instead being fascinated by a faint sprinkling of freckles across her nose. "Harry, they sent me here for the summer to stay with my sister while they get a divorce. What makes you think they know what the hell they're talking about?"
"I guess you have a point," he breathed.
She drew back and slapped him playfully on the arm, grinning. "See? Emotional maturity."
Harry just blinked at her. He had a feeling that referred to something that had been said earlier in the course of the conversation, but he couldn't for the life of him remember what it was.
"Now, let's go show you to my sister. You'll freak her out, at least."
Vancouver
Thera woke up suddenly to a loud ringing sound next to her head. It was a telephone, but it wasn't hers, and she sure as hell wasn't going to answer it.
"Bruno," she said loudly, poking the bundle of covers next to her. It groaned faintly. "Bruno," she said again. "Your phone is ringing."
"So answer it," the answer was muffled into the pillow.
"I'm not answering your phone," she said, mildly offended. "I barely even know you. What if you have a girlfriend? What if that's her and I answer the phone and she's a raving lunatic who decides to come over here and murder us both in our bed of sin and depravity?"
"I don't have a girlfriend." The phone continued ringing, and Bruno's voice was slightly more awake.
"Well, your mother, then. If I answer the phone and it's your mother, then I'm going to have to tell her that I think you were a good lay, but I'm not really sure because I can't remember anything after you gave me those pills..."
"Fine, goddammit!" He threw back the covers and rolled on top of her so that he could reach the phone. "Yeah?...What?!...Oh, shit, Toby, you're kidding me..." He was alert now, climbing over her to sit on the edge of the bed and run a hand through his sleep-matted hair.
Deciding that this had nothing to do with her, Thera got up to brush her teeth, dodging the occasional empty beer bottle courtesy of Bruno's bohunk idiot friends. She was well into brushing and trying desperately to ignore the brownish tinge to the sink when Bruno appeared in the doorway, wearing a sweatshirt and unbuttoned jeans.
"Listen, I gotta go," he said apologetically. "My brother flipped his car last night and all hell is breaking loose."
Thera rinsed her mouth and spat. "So you're kicking me out?"
Bruno looked suddenly uncomfortable, which she found cute. Part of the reason she'd taken an interest in him in the first place had been because she could make him squirm at the drop of a hat.
"Well, don't make it sound like that..." he started.
Thera simply held up a hand. "It's perfectly fine. Just let me get dressed and you can drive me home." She went back into the bedroom and started gathering her things.
"Actually, my cousin Toby's picking me up and we're going the opposite way..." he said sheepishly.
She turned around and fixed him with a stare. She crossed her arms very slowly, drawing out the moment to make him suffer a bit more.
"So you're telling me," she said icily, "that not only are you kicking me out, you are also allowing me to find my own way home? How terribly generous of you, Bruno."
"It's not like that..." There was a whiny edge to his voice, and Thera knew she had him.
"Your thoughtfulness and desire to put others above yourself is unsurpassed in the history of mankind."
"I'll call a cab, okay?"
She continued as if he hadn't spoken. "Yes, truly a king among men. Why, I personally think it's a travesty that there isn't an annual holiday in your honor."
"I'll pay for it! I'll pay for the cab! Just lay off, will you?"
Thera held out a hand. "Thirty."
"It's not...why..." he spluttered, knowing very well that it wouldn't take half that much to get her home. "Fine," he conceded, handing over the cash. "Are you always like this?"
"Bruno, you know very well that I told my mother I would be gone all weekend. On the basis of that information, she's made arrangements with a certain male friend that most likely involve me not being in the apartment. This change of plans displeases me."
"It displeases you? Who talks like that?"
"I do," she said simply.
"So don't go home then. Go somewhere else." Bruno watched with appreciation as she got dressed. "And why are you so worried about you mom anyway? So you come back early. What's she going to do, kill you?"
Thera thought that over for a moment. "Doubtful, but not improbable."
Bruno shook his head, getting a strange look on his face. Thera was familiar with the look. She'd seen it plenty of times before whenever men like Bruno were faced with the force of nature known as Reina Castelar: a mix between lust, distaste, worship and sheer terror. Only her mother was capable of producing such a combination in another human being.
"Your mom's...weird," he finally said.
"Yes, I know." Poor Bruno had come into contact with her mother at the Mars Bar down the highway. Unfortunately for him, Reina had been in fine form that night. Thera had just been tagging along, another mother-daughter excursion. Reina liked to take her daughter bar-hopping; she felt it gave them a forum to bond. Thera had a feeling that this method for raising a teenage daughter was probably frowned upon by you average child psychologist, but then Reina believed that shrinks were for Muggles.
Actually her exact words had been something along the lines of: "If any of them bothered to yank their heads out of other people's psyches for a moment and notice that there was a magical world, they'd promptly put us all in straight jackets."
Thera had to admit it was a fairly good argument.
Her cab arrived before Toby did, so Thera kissed Bruno perfunctorily and got inside, staring at the drab landscape of tract houses as they slowly turned into an equally drab landscape of apartment buildings.
Thera closed her eyes and lay her head back, remembering Zihuatenejo. They'd been there for almost a year when they'd learned of the Dark Lord's return. Thera even remembered where she was when she heard the news. She had long frequented the same waterfront restaurant - one she'd picked for no particular reason out of a long line of them - and out of boredom had offered to translate the menu for the restaurant owner into English, in order to entice the nine million bloody tourists who swarmed in every year.
Her payment: two plates of shrimp and free cerveza for life.
Thera had to admit she'd done a damn good job, too. 'Shrimp with garlic' had become 'Succulent fresh bay shrimp smothered with garlic and slow-cooked in the style of Vera Cruz.' And then Reina had rushed in, looking paler than usual.
Her mother had said three words: "We're leaving. Now." It was one thing to be an ex-Death Eater on the run from a relatively underfunded and disinterested Ministry. It was quite another to be an ex-Death Eater on the run from other Death Eaters, not to mention the Big Man himself.
And so here they were in Vancouver. They'd stay a few more days, and then they'd be off to some other weekly rental in some other city. Thera had a feeling this was going to go on for a good long time. The Dark Lord showed no signs of taking up the olive branch anytime soon.
The cab pulled up to her building and Thera paid the man, tucking the remainder of the money into the pocket of her jeans. Not desiring to walk in on Reina and the carpet salesman in flagrante delicto, Thera knocked on the apartment door before opening it with her key.
"Hello?" she called, poking her head inside. "Minor entering, so put some bloody clothes on." Nobody answered, but the bedroom door was closed, indicating that the two were probably sleeping. Thinking it probably best that she go as long as possible without being discovered, Thera tiptoed over to the sofa, where she dropped her backpack and kicked off her shoes before heading to the bathroom so she could towel off.
If she hadn't been trying to keep quiet, she probably never would have heard the squish her foot made as she passed the kitchen. As it was, she paused and looked down at an ugly dark red stain that had spread across the linoleum floor and soaked into the hallway carpet.
A wave of cold swept over her and her muscles literally locked up. The apartment now seemed almost unbearably loud in its silence. Thera tried to breathe, but her lungs had stopped working properly. She didn't want to look into the kitchen. She'd seen enough horror movies to know that it would be a very, very bad idea to look into the kitchen, but she couldn't stop herself.
There was blood everywhere; it had collected into a large pool on the floor and was splattered all over the cabinets, the walls and even the ceiling. Looking through the doorway, Thera couldn't see the entire room, only half of it, but she could see the top of someone's head on the floor and a hand - a man's hand - flung out next to it.
It's not my mother. It's not my mother. It's the carpet salesman.
Sickness rose up from her stomach with such force that Thera had to bend at the waist and concentrate with her whole body to keep it from coming up. She had to keep her head straight. She had to find Reina.
Thera forced her feet to move back into the den, moving awkwardly, still halfway bent over, trying to call to her mother. No sound seemed to be coming out. Something warm touched her lip and she realized that she was crying. Finally reaching the bedroom, Thera used the door-jam to straighten up. Leaning her head against the closed door, she whispered, "Mum?" There was no answer.
After some amount of time, Thera saw her hand moving toward the doorknob as if it belonged to someone else. She was afraid that she knew what she would find inside. She fought back another wave of sickness, remembering the kitchen, remembering that guy when she was little who'd gotten shot in the street. It was amazing how much blood one person had inside of them. Swallowing, she turned the handle and pushed open the bedroom door.
An alarm must have gone off somewhere, because the noise was overwhelming. It took her a moment to figure out that she was the one making the noise. Thera knew she had to get to Reina. She had to help her mother, to check for a pulse or something, but she couldn't make herself go into that room. She couldn't make herself touch that thing on the bed. She couldn't look into those wide, staring eyes and see all the rips and holes in her mother's body and the bedspread soaked through and the puddle on the floor. In some section of her brain, Thera knew already that there was no possible way somebody who looked like that could still be alive.
Thera's hand slipped off the doorknob and she fell forward into the room. The jolt to her knees as they hit the floor awakened something in her. In the space of an instant, the young girl had all of her wits about her again, and they were screaming in unison, Run, you fucking idiot!
And that's exactly what she did. She spun around and ran straight into him.
"Ha!" he said. He was a portly young man with bad teeth and short brown hair. He was wearing black robes. Wizard's robes. It made sense. She should have known it immediately. No mere Muggle could overpower her mother, which meant only one thing.
The Dark Lord had found them.
The man grabbed her upper arms and seemed to be trying to drag her toward the front door. He was intent on his task and fortunately didn't know that his charge had spent a large portion of her life fighting off people a hell of a lot bigger and meaner than he was, often with an even more offensive lack of dental hygiene.
Thera kneed him directly in his shamefully unprotected balls and ran out the door of the apartment. She had to get away; she couldn't get to the wand in her backpack, but she could at least outrun him now. She heard him croak, "The daughter!"
It was just her fucking luck that he had a partner. Thera saw another black robe at the far end of the hallway. There was no cover in the hall, so Thera had no choice but to sprint for the stairway door. In the end, she almost made it. Her hand was on the knob when he yelled, "Stupefy!" and she hit the floor without a sound.
Lowering his wand, Theodore Nott shook his head and silently wondered which human resources genius in the Death Eater leadership had decreed that every assignment needed to be a training opportunity. Marcus Flint came waddling into the hallway, his hand cupping his privates and a pained look on his face.
"Requirement One of being a Death Eater: you should be able to physically subdue a ninety-pound teenage girl," Nott commented, gesturing to the teenage girl in question. "She almost got away, you know."
"It was a lucky shot," Flint said, his voice slightly strained. He made his way over to Thera and kicked her soundly in the ribs, then promptly groaned and sank to his knees as the movement reaggravated what was already aggravated quite enough.
"Oh, now, don't damage the goods," Nott admonished him.
"They're already damaged!"
"I meant the girl," Nott replied, very slowly and clearly. "On the bright side, she may have rendered you incapable of procreation."
Flint blinked up at the older man in incomprehension tinged with worry. "Rendered me what?"
Nott patted him on the head. "Don't worry your fuzzy little head about it, just remind me to introduce her to Crabbe and Goyle Junior when we get home. Now help me Apparate her out of here."
"Where are we taking her?" Flint asked, grabbing one of the unconscious girl's arms and unceremoniously rolling her over onto her back.
"Malfoy Manor."
The Research Institute for Ancient and Irrelevant Spells, Curses and Hexes
Near Muir Woods, California
The tapping on the window finally progressed to the point that Vivian could no longer ignore it with any believability, so she put down the article she'd been revising and slowly counted to ten before sliding open the latch to reveal David's deathly white face peering out of the darkness. He smiled at her crookedly, looking far too much like his old self for comfort.
"Go away, David. You're going to frighten somebody."
"Oh, come on. I barely ever see you anymore."
"That's because we're divorced, David," she said patiently. "People generally get divorced because they don't want to see each other anymore. I mean, don't you think this is getting a bit pathetic?"
"Invite me in, Viv. We just need to talk this out," he pleaded.
"David," she sighed, "there are too many wards on this window for a simple invitation to suffice, and for the last time, we have nothing more to talk about."
"Viv, I know things got a bit touchy there, but you didn't need to throw the whole relationship away. And now I hear you're leaving the Institute - and congratulations on your new job, by the way, whatever it is - but I don't want you to go." He sent her another smile that tugged at her heart. "I still love you, you know."
Vivian refused to turn soft. One of them had to be the adult in this situation, after all. Of course, asking one of them to be the adult in this situation was much like asking a goblin for a lower interest rate. "Changing the status of your mortality is not generally considered a healthy way of putting the spark back in your marriage," she replied sharply.
He frowned. "Why are you always so judgmental? This has been incredible for my self-esteem. Vampirism is the best thing that's ever happened to me. If you'd only agree to..."
"Not a chance in hell," she interrupted.
"So instead you're just going to run away? That's your idea of being mature? That's all you ever do, isn't it?"
"I'm shutting the window now. Goodbye, David."
"Wait! I don't even know where you're going!" In a heartbeat he was the old David again, crooked smile, puppy dog eyes and all.
"That would be the general idea," she answered, shutting the window firmly and walking back to her desk. After a few minutes, David gave up and left.
The beginning of the end of her relationship with David had come on the wings of a letter from Albus Dumbledore almost a year earlier. They were enjoying a typically cool Northern California summer evening on the roof of the Institute when a strange owl dropped a parchment in her lap. Without waiting for a response or even a treat, the owl headed back off into the darkness.
"Who's it from?" David asked casually.
"I haven't any idea," she answered, unwrapping the parchment and laying it flat on her lap.
The letter had been classic Dumbledore:
Dearest Vivian,
I hope this letter finds you well, broadening the horizons of young American minds and deepening the wizarding world's understanding of spell composition. It has been many years since we have spoken and it pains me to break our silence with such terrible news.
You see, Lord Voldemort has returned.
The details of this event are - I fear - impossible to fully impart in written form, but I feel that you understand the purpose of this letter.
Let the Phoenix rise again.
Albus Dumbledore
Vivian had just taken a sip of wine, which she promptly choked on. Her first instinct was to look around, as if a group of Death Eaters might have snuck up behind her while she was reading.
"What is it?!" David asked, visibly alarmed.
She used her brief coughing fit to debate whether or not she should tell him the truth. Then she looked at the letter again and saw the postscript:
P.S. Don't worry about others seeing this parchment. It is enchanted to only be readable to you. By the way, we are in need of a Defense Against the Dark Arts professor for next term, if I can possibly persuade you to take the job. Please send your reply on the back.
It was a good thing the parchment was enchanted, because David at that very moment was looking over her shoulder, trying to see what had caused such a reaction from her.
"What's wrong?" David was obviously concerned.
Vivian had a theory that in every failed relationship - retrospectively, of course - there was always one last moment where it could have been redeemed, where a choice was made that eventually destroyed it for good. Vivian realized later - retrospectively, of course - that David asking her that question had been that last moment, and she had made a choice that eventually destroyed her marriage. Strangely enough, at the time, it had been relatively painless, even easy.
In all honesty, Vivian wasn't sure why she'd done it. Maybe somewhere deep inside she'd always resented that David had never really chosen a side in the first war, that he'd just stayed out of it. Maybe she'd thought him a bit of a coward. Maybe she'd felt guilty for not loving him the same way he loved her and used that as an excuse not to involve him in an extremely dangerous situation. Maybe she'd been in so much shock at the idea of Voldemort's return that she hadn't been able to think rationally. And maybe it was a combination of all of those things.
For whatever reason, when she faced the ultimate choice between whether to trust or not trust David, she sat back and lied straight to his face.
"Nothing's wrong. I was just surprised to hear from Professor Dumbledore after all these years, that's all."
"Oh," he said, laughing, relieved. "Jeez, Viv, you nearly scared me half to death."
And yes, she probably should have realized right then and there that if she didn't trust her own husband, then perhaps the relationship wasn't exactly in the best shape, but Vivian had never been one to turn down a convenient excuse for pussyfooting around when it presented itself.
Voldemort or no Voldemort, she couldn't rejoin the Order or return to Hogwarts then, because she still owed the Institute another year's service. This meant that she had a whole school year left before she had to go throw herself into the fray. So like a big fat coward she had waffled and covered up and told herself she was just waiting for the right moment to break it to him. And Vivian knew very well that she would have gone on like that until the last ugly minute if she could have gotten away with it.
Instead she'd been pushed into action when the straw had broken the proverbial camel's back. In other words, Remus Lupin's head had appeared in her fireplace...and been seen by her husband.
She'd been reading in her office when she'd felt David's presence in the doorway. He hadn't said anything, which meant he was angry. David had too much class to hover without justification. Things had been relatively pleasant between them at that point; the knock down drag-out arguments characteristic of the first few months after Dumbledore's letter had devolved into a sort of war of attrition. But when David had finally spoken, his voice had been cold and impersonal. The war was over.
"Remus is calling for you." That's all he'd said before turning and walking away.
She'd called to him, but she only heard the front door slam in response. David hadn't come back that night. The next time she'd seen him, he'd sprouted fangs and was floating in mid-air outside her window giving her a lecture on the pros of vampirism. That had pretty much sealed it for Vivian, David very literally not being the man she married any longer.
The silly thing was that Remus had only been peeking in periodically, trying to catch her and let her know that the floo network at Hogwarts was being watched by the Ministry's new High Inquisitor, and that she should only contact the Order only at Grimmauld Place. Their entire conversation had been business; there had been nothing to be jealous of, but then David had always been remarkably talented at jumping to the wrong conclusions.
Of course, David jumping to the wrong conclusions when it came to Remus Lupin was probably justified. After all, Remus was the only man his wife had ever loved.
Hong Kong
At last, at long last, Fox would be leaving this cursed city. Out of the blue, her team had been ordered back to the home office to be briefed on a new assignment, and Fox couldn't be happier. She couldn't stand urban environments, with their constant noise and scurrying people and cheesy billboards. She needed nature to be content: trees and grass and streams and animal noises. With nothing but car horns in the background every second of every day, Fox had become a bit difficult, or as Gautham had put it, "an evil, maniacal, sadistic, short-tempered bitch." Needless to say, she was not the only one happy to be getting reassigned.
Of course the city had suited Amina just fine, since she'd grown up in the city. Gautham hadn't minded it; but then, Gautham didn't really mind anything. When he had called Fox an evil, maniacal bitch (and he'd called her far worse in his wittier moments), he'd meant it as a mere observation, offering up the words in the same tone of voice he might use to order lunch. Being partnered with two females for the past eight years had given Gautham the patience of Job and a very keen awareness of what day of the month it was.
The Hong Kong assignment had been a fairly insulting one, in any case. Whoever was shelling out the money for their services could have found dozens of qualified candidates by walking into any less-than-reputable wizarding pub and offering a free round. Their charge followed the exact same schedule everyday, right down to the poached eggs and slice of ham he ate for breakfast. He lived alone and had a cat and could be considered a prime candidate for the dullest sentient being on the planet.
So they'd been in town for over a month, bored out of their heads. For this reason, it took them forever to pack up their gear. Uneventful jobs had a way of spreading belongings out to a startling degree, as equipment was taken out entirely for the sake of amusement. Half of it hadn't been necessary for the job in any way, but playing with the omnioculars was far preferable to reenacting The Music Man, which they had actually done once in a very low moment that nobody felt the need to ever discuss again.
"Did The Cardinal say anything about the new job?" Amina asked Gautham. As the operations specialist, he was the only one who kept in direct contact with headquarters.
"Not a word. I think he actually went out of his way not to say anything about it."
Amina groaned. "This is all your fault, Fox," she said for the millionth time in the past month. "You just have to go and turn a cut-and-dry assassination into a bloodbath, and we get stuck watching some guy who flosses twice a day. Our next job is probably baby-sitting his kids."
"First of all," Fox argued, "that guy was going to cause trouble if I didn't put him out of commission. Second of all, it was your job to tell me that the goddamn police had arrived and thirdly, I don't think The Cardinal has any kids." Fox checked each of her swords carefully before sliding them into their individual sheaths and packing them into the carrying case.
"Do you have any new and improved reasons for holding to that belief?" Gautham asked, yawning.
Fox thought for a moment. "Because he seems to think of all of us as his children. He trains us, he disciplines us..."
"I know you've used that one before," Amina interrupted. "Reason disqualified."
"It's really shameful how little we know about our own boss," Gautham replied evenly. "We'll have to drop broad hints as to when he's going to invite us over for dinner and Pictionary."
"Pictionary?" Amina asked. "People actually play Pictionary?"
"Yes, they do, and I'm absolutely unbeatable at it," Gautham answered stoutly. "Okay, girls, what's this?" He made rapid hand gestures, as if drawing something in the air.
"An epileptic seizure?" Amina asked.
"Fish!" Fox called from the other side of the room. "It's a fish, right?"
Gautham sighed. "It was a 'P.' It was the letter 'P.' You two suck."
"I had a bad angle," Fox said defensively.
Gautham scratched his head. "Do you think that The Cardinal would be good at Pictionary?"
Over the years, it had become great sport to try to figure out how The Cardinal spent his time outside the office. They'd speculated on everything from his sexual proclivities to the color of the wallpaper in his bathroom to whether or not he even went to the bathroom. It only seemed fitting to speculate on his acumen at Pictionary.
"Well," Fox said slowly. "I would like to think that the man sending me around the globe on a whim could at least beat me at your average Baby Boomer party game."
"Well, he'd certainly have a better team, wouldn't he?" Gautham shot back, sounding very fakely petulant.
"His kids. I still think he has kids," Amina argued.
"Of course he does. He has two sons: one is a drag queen who performs under the name Bigga Dicks..." Gautham began.
"And the other's a squib named Morty, and his wife is morbidly obese..." Amina added.
"And he diddles goats regularly in order to assuage his yearnings and his favorite goat's name is Fanny and she's his favorite because she always lets him cuddle with her afterwards, etcetera, etcetera," Gautham finished. "Now, we should get moving. The portkey activates in fifteen minutes."
They managed to get all of the gear packed up with a good two or three minutes left, which meant that far too long a time was spent looking at each other, staring out the window, tapping their feet and glancing at their timepieces before the portkey finally activated. As one unit, they were launched forward with sickening speed, landing unsteadily in the entrance hall of The Cardinal's castle.
The castle was a sight to behold. Marble floors, chandeliers the size of elephants, real mermaids in a tank with a viewing window in the wall, the whole nine yards. It was designed to be intimidating, and it succeeded fabulously. They headed off to the right, past a dozen portraits, all of The Cardinal dressed up as various historical figures - Genghis Khan, Napoleon, Galileo, Joan of Arc - in order to ensure that you knew with whom you were doing business. Eventually they reached the end of the long hallway and Amina knocked on the solid, ancient-looking oak door. As always, the door swung open, gaining them entrance into The Cardinal's office.
One of the most feared and respected names in the wizarding world belonged to a closely-shorn old man with laser-like blue eyes that could alternately show concern, interest, calculation, or absolutely nothing. Fox, having grown up with a healthy distrust of light eyes and light skin, always felt at the height of awareness in his presence. Though he might as well be sitting on a throne for all the charisma and air of power about him, the man was in actuality lounging at a desk in a pair of jeans, an Oxford sweatshirt and bare feet. It said a great deal about him that his attire did not detract from his presence in the slightest.
"Ah," he said, rising from his desk as if he had been awaiting them. "I see you have arrived."
That much being abundantly obvious, they remained silent.
"Then let me tell you my reasoning for withdrawing you from your assignment so abruptly," he continued, oblivious. "You see," he sighed, as he began to pace in front of his desk, "I am in dire need of a team with exactly your specifications for an assignment which I have only recently negotiated."
There was the sort of pause in which any other group of employees would have questioned him as to the location, duration, or exact nature of the new assignment, or perhaps its urgency in comparison to the job they had abandoned in its interest. Instead of these questions actually being asked, however, The Cardinal simple continued.
"Classes at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry will be starting in six weeks. I would like the three of you to remain for the duration of this school year, perhaps even through the next."
The three of them glanced at each other in dismay. As a team over the past eight years, they had successfully assassinated six small-time magical dictators, captured eleven aspiring Dark Wizards, located and obtained numerous powerful magical objects and participated in at least a dozen run-of-the-mill heists for The Cardinal. And now, he was sending them to...Hogwarts. It was dangerously close to Amina's earlier prediction about babysitting his kids. Fox had the distinct feeling that her team was going to make her pay for this.
"Dumbledore is in need of a strategist and an operationalist who can help him ensure the security of the students." The Cardinal stopped pacing momentarily and nodded to both Amina and Gautham.
"As for your strongman," he continued, moving to stand in front of Fox, who kept her gaze centered serenely several inches above his head, "I have an extremely important job for you."
"Sir?" Fox prompted him.
The Cardinal resumed his pacing. "I suppose you've heard of Harry Potter?"
Fox held in her excitement. "Yes, sir." Could this possibly mean they were finally going to get a shot at Voldemort? Her palms itched just thinking about it.
"There is a prophecy involving Harry Potter and Lord Voldemort. I won't bore you with the details, but the basic gist is that one of them must kill the other one. I happen to think it would aid us greatly if the dead one ended up being Voldemort."
"Unfortunately, I'm not going to send you to fight him," he continued, smiling a little wistfully. "Though I'd like to see that battle. No, fighting Voldemort is Harry Potter's job and I would like you to train him."
Without thinking, Fox opened her mouth to protest, but The Cardinal cut her off by holding up a hand, which was probably a good thing. People who disagreed with The Cardinal had a tendency to disappear - at least until pieces of them started washing up on shore - and though Fox was immortal for all intents and purposes, she had no doubt that if anybody on the planet knew how to kill her, it was The Cardinal. All the same, there was no way she could teach an outsider the things she knew. It could fuck up the universe beyond recognition.
"Now, I realize that most of your training is inaccessible to him. I know you would never reveal your little secrets, nor would I ever ask you to. But I'm sure some of your more basic tactics with weaponry will be a sufficient education to prepare him to face your average Dark Wizard and his band of cronies."
Something occurred to Fox. Something decidedly problematic. "Dumbledore," she said softly.
The Cardinal's eyes flashed and he nodded to show he understood. He excused Amina and Gautham.
"Fox, please stay behind so that we can work on some of the details of your part of the assignment."
After the other two had glared at her and left the room, The Cardinal wasted no time in addressing her fears. "I realize that Albus Dumbledore will be at Hogwarts and I know the gloom-and-doom tales passed down about two Guardians being in the same place at the same time. I remember what happened the last time such an event occurred, and I assure you it wasn't pretty. However, it should also be considered that the last meeting resulted in two consequences. One of them, as we both know, is your creation. The other was Lord Voldemort."
Fox was confused. "Voldemort?" He was more ruthless and harder to get rid of than most of the other Dark wizards she'd met up with, but she couldn't see what he had to do with The Guardians, aside from the fact that he apparently had the good sense to be afraid of Dumbledore.
"You see, Voldemort was a follower of Grindelwald. Voldemort's obsession with immortality began when he learned that Grindelwald was a Guardian. His obsession grew stronger after Grindelwald was defeated, because he had witnessed first-hand that even those who are immortal are still possible to kill in some way or another."
"So Voldemort would like to be even harder to kill than a Guardian?" Fox asked. Yeah, good luck with that one.
"He's trying his best, and it's pissing a lot of people off, including me," The Cardinal replied seriously.
"How has he been trying?"
"Well, before Grindelwald was defeated, he trained Voldemort, groomed him in his image. He bonded them together with many different kinds of old magic. These bonds allowed Voldemort to...inherit, I suppose you'd say...some of Grindelwald's power, when Dumbledore defeated him."
"But that is not possible, is it?" Fox whispered. "And if it is, then how was I created?"
The Cardinal sighed. "You might want to sit down, Marian."
Upon hearing her given name, Fox sat down in one of the leather chairs in front of his desk. The Cardinal must be serious.
"There must always be twelve Guardians. This is why you were created when Grindelwald was defeated. But because some of his power was transferred to Voldemort, it took a little longer than we thought it would, and actually would have taken a lot longer than it did if things hadn't been helped along."
"How?"
"Dumbledore was able to use his own powers to direct the process a bit. He couldn't do very much, but he was able to get you here sooner rather than later."
"Why did he need to do such a thing?"
"Because it's unnatural for the power of a Guardian to reside inside a mortal being; to be blunt, it throws a great big wrench into the cosmos. A new Guardian was needed, because the power needed to be returned to its rightful owner, namely you."
Fox nodded to show she understood. "So in order to get my power back, Voldemort needs to be defeated."
"That's something that would have been true until October 31, 1981."
Fox remembered the date; everyone in the wizarding world remembered that date. "Harry Potter," she said shortly. "Voldemort transferred some of the power to him, didn't he?"
"Exactly," The Cardinal answered with a grim smile. "Which has thrown great big wrench number two into the cosmos."
Fox nodded slightly. "Hence the prophecy. So now it is my duty to set it right."
"Let's just say I think it would be a good idea for you to be nearby when the final battle occurs."
"All I have to do is be nearby?" Fox was skeptical.
"Well, it's a bit more complicated than that, but suffice it to say that the power will be transferred in its entirety to whichever one survives. Which is why it suits us well if that person is Harry Potter."
"Do I have to kill him to get it back?" Fox didn't like killing children.
The Cardinal smiled. "Nothing quite that extreme. The power can't be taken back by force, in any case. All Harry has to do is give it back to you and a lot of things that were going nuts in the world will be fixed: unemployment rates, hunger, boy bands, Leeza Gibbons..."
Fox raised an eyebrow. "How is Harry going to give the power back to me?"
The Cardinal just shrugged, his laser-like eyes flashing. "It's probably best if I leave that part of the explanation to Dumbledore. He has a better sense of dramatic timing than I do. Plus it's chock full of that pseudo-prophetic Guardian mysticism tripe that only makes sense to you people."
Fox nodded and rose from the chair; she knew firsthand that when you got into Guardian philosophy, most mortals' eyes tended to glaze over, which was probably for the best.
She'd almost reached the door when she heard The Cardinal's voice again.
"Fox?" he called.
She turned, relieved that he had gone back to using her professional name. In her mind, Marian would always be a skinny kid who spoke only in terms of cosmology and had a tendency to inadvertently blow things up. Marian had not been popular in grade school.
"It would serve you well to befriend the boy." he said neutrally, without bothering to look up from the parchment on his desk. "Just in case."
Fox nodded again and walked into the hallway, where a house elf was waiting to take her upstairs.
Ginny Weasley did not consider herself to be much like the rest of her siblings. Granted, they were boys and she was not, but she also felt a sort of distance from them that the rest of them didn't seem to have from each other. She had not inherited the Weasley temper. It was terribly difficult to anger her, and she didn't take offense easily. She had no patience for blustering and wailing over disappointments. If something went wrong, Ginny felt it was best to either rectify the situation or accept it. Being rather lazy, she generally chose to accept it.
And then there was the whole Chamber of Secrets fiasco. Ginny knew for certain that none of her brothers would have fallen on the outs with an evil diary. So far as she could tell, none of them had ever displayed the sort of emotional complexity that drove a person to pour out their feelings into written form. Oh, they were all nice guys and truly decent human beings.
But deep? Not in the least.
After her first year, they had tiptoed around her, looking uneasy, as if she had just recovered from a terrible disease that may or may not be contagious. They had all become decidedly more protective - if that were possible - and took to asking her how she was doing all the time in a tone of voice that suggested she might suddenly snap at any moment and go off on a killing spree. Eventually their attitude had loosened a bit, but to most of the students at Hogwarts she remained 'that girl who got possessed by You-Know-Who and set a giant snake loose in the school.' During the first year when most of her classmates were forming the cliques necessary for pre-teen survival, she had unfortunately been...well, busy being possessed by You-Know-Who and setting a giant snake loose in the school.
Ginny had never been particularly gregarious, and her reserve only heightened in the ensuing years. Having finally gotten over her ill-fated crush on Harry Potter, Ginny had begun to date, with middling success. Michael Corner had been rather clingy and annoying, and the fact that he threw such a fit over a Quidditch match certainly erased any regrets she might have had regarding their break-up. And though she suspected Dean Thomas had only gone out with her in the hopes of making Lavender Brown jealous, she'd been rather relieved to have a casual relationship. If her experience with Tom Riddle had taught her anything, it was that close, intimate relationships were extremely overrated. Love other people, but keep your own counsel where it counted.
So she hadn't told anybody much about her relationships, especially her family. She didn't see how it was any of their business, and frankly, if Ron suspected just how close she'd come to third base with Dean, his head would explode, especially since they'd been on his bed in the dormitory at the time. Ginny still wasn't entirely positive as to why she held back, aside from a general hygienic and proprietary distaste for sexual acts performed on Ron's sheets. It bothered her that she'd talked herself into sex for so long - hell, she'd practically been ready to go at it with Michael - and she hadn't followed through with it.
Well, that wasn't entirely true. After all, a girl could change her mind. What disturbed Ginny, what threatened to upend her carefully constructed serenity, what had made her decide to dump Dean one week into summer holidays, what had driven her to sitting in her room at The Burrow and brooding on a perfectly lovely day, was that she had developed a wholly confusing and entirely unwanted interest in Draco Malfoy. Not an attraction, she assured herself, just an interest.
The very idea made her want to put a pillow over her face and groan phrases along the lines of 'What's wrong with me?' She couldn't really resolve her own interest (obsession, whatever) to herself. Sure, she had always been interested in other people's lives - it had been one of the main reasons for her previous interest in Harry Potter. What could it be like to be the Boy Who Lived? What was it like to grow up with Muggles and not have any parents and survive a killing curse?
Unfortunately, it had also been one of the main reasons for her previous interest in Tom Riddle, too.
Curiosity is a double-edged sword.
And now, because she apparently hadn't learned her lessons the first two times curiosity had led her into embarrassment, trouble, heartbreak and near-death experiences, here she was brooding over Draco Malfoy.
Draco bloody Malfoy, of all people. She couldn't stop herself. She had no control over her mind when it came to him. What was it like to be in Slytherin? To have Death Eater parents and know how to do terrible illegal curses? What drove a person to be such a fantastic bastard? Why were his two best friends a pair of big, stupid gorillas? Was it about loyalty, or were they all just raised together and he never got around to dropping them?
And most of all, why had he let her escape?
That was the worst one, the driving force behind this ridiculous obsession. It was a pattern, a vicious circle. Harry Potter - who should have been an egomaniacal asshole - had shown up at King's Cross all apologetic and shy, and she was hooked. Tom Riddle - who was older and a Slytherin and should have mocked her and called her a silly little girl - had listened to her thoughts and given her advice (before he'd mocked her and called her a silly little girl and tried to kill her and all), and she was hooked. Draco Malfoy had performed one single, solitary act out of character, and she was hooked.
Why had he done it? Why had he let her escape? Had he known they were going to the Ministry? Had he hoped she would meet her end there? Or had he just let her go? And if so, why? Why? Why? The questions echoed around her head, bouncing off the walls until she was ready to tear her hair out.
And more importantly, why hadn't she told anyone?
When Harry and Hermione had asked them about the details of their escape from Umbridge's office, Ginny had let Ron, Luna and Neville take the lead, recounting in detail Neville's Impediment curse on Pansy Parkinson. Ginny herself had told the truth...to a point. "We all ran but Malfoy came back into the office, so I sent him a Bat Bogey curse and that was it."
When Harry and Hermione had left with Umbridge and it was only students in charge, there had been a sort of understanding passed around between she, Ron, Luna and Neville: we have to fight our way out. Malfoy had left the room to check on something and they knew that this was their best shot.
Luckily, some people just weren't very good at holding on to their wands. The only really good fighter had been Millicent Bulstrode, who after losing her wand had managed to scratch her face before Ginny had been able to get in a decent right hook. And then she'd grabbed the unconscious girl's wand and started to run for it when they heard Malfoy's approaching footsteps. Ginny had paused at the doorway and turned back, knowing that it was probably a good idea to take out Malfoy so they wouldn't have to worry about him.
And so Draco Malfoy had walked into Umbridge's office to find his cohorts cursed or unconscious, wand to wand with Ginny Weasley. Except he had never raised his wand. He had merely surveyed the scene around them before speaking to her.
"Nice work," he'd commented mildly before gesturing at her fleeing comrades. "Don't you think you should be joining them?"
Ginny had simply stood there, uncertain in the face of his indifference, her body humming with tension. Why wasn't he fighting her? Why wasn't he reaching for his wand? She'd started backing out the door, but she refused to run and let him curse her from behind.
"Gryffindors," he'd muttered. "Curse me and run, you bloody fool!" He'd held his arms out, as if offering himself up for sacrifice. But the trademark smirk had been absent. In its place had been...something else.
What had it been? She still wasn't sure. Sort of an imitation smirk, except without the arrogance and spite, almost as if he were challenging her. Almost as if he were only doing this to see if she had it in her to curse someone who wouldn't fight back.
And then she'd heard Ron coming back for her and she'd sent a harmless but disgusting Bat Bogey Curse at Malfoy. Ron had laughed as the blonde boy fought off the attacking boogers and then they'd run for it. And in those few moments, her entire world had come crashing down.
Of course, she couldn't have imagined how that incident would haunt her, bother her, keep her locked inside during perfect Quidditch conditions. Why? Why had he done it? Didn't he understand that Malfoys were Malfoys and they were bad and Weasleys were Weasleys and they were good, and that was just the way things worked? And what if those things weren't true? And if they weren't, then what else was a lie? And how could you tell the difference?
She hadn't realized how much she'd come to depend on the false sense of certainty and security she'd wrapped around herself since the Chamber of Secrets. She needed to know the rules. She needed to know who was who and how they were supposed to act and what categories they fit into. And then Draco Malfoy had come along and her legs had been knocked out from under her. Again.
Only this time, there were no understanding siblings and wise parents. Ginny hadn't even told them about the incident, because deep down she feared that even they didn't have the answers. And if they didn't understand it, then what the hell was she supposed to do? If there wasn't a way to fit Draco Malfoy into her worldview, then Ginny honestly didn't know what to do.
Did it mean that he was right? Did it mean that he was good? Or did it just mean that she was a bleeding idiot who over-analyzed everything and desperately needed to get a life? Either way, it didn't matter, because they were calling to her from downstairs and today was Ron's last day at the Burrow before he left to go stay with the twins and she'd be crucified if she missed dinner.
Sighing heavily, Ginny rose from the bed, slapped a cheesy grin on her face and went downstairs.