Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. Nope, not me.

A/N: Many thanks to the people that reviewed the last chapter. This one is longer... I think they'll be getting exponentially longer as I go along. Part V will probably be some sort of novel. Who knows? I had one comment say Part I was short and another it was too long. Interesting.

Cerulane - of course you can translate it! It makes me feel so important... and from what I can tell, you're doing a fabulous job on L'espace entre les é toiles!

The first part was dark. I think, overall, it will be pretty dark, though I'm trying to work in a bit of the lighter cadence I had with The Space Between The Stars as well. However, when you're working from TS Eliot, darkness seems to prevail. Especially when it's The Wasteland. And yes, I killed Dumbledore. I'm a vile assassin.

For those who read The Space Between The Stars - we have a bit of Aemilia and a bit of Helena on here. The conversation between Aemilia and Remus in the Minister of Magic's office is my favourite part of the fic so far. Ten points to anyone who can guess why...

Part II - A Game Of Chess

'What is that noise?'

The wind under the door.

'What is that noise now? What is the wind doing?'

Nothing again nothing.

'Do

'You know nothing? Do you see nothing? Do you remember

'Nothing?'

I remember

Those are pearls that were his eyes.

'Are you alive, or not? Is there nothing in your head?'

- TS Eliot, The Wasteland, Part II, A Game Of Chess

12 Grimmauld Place, April 1998

Remus Lupin, Minister for Magic, dressed in scarlet and gold robes, colours he had chosen as symbols of his office, felt strangely cowardly. A weakling wrapped in gold and scarlet, Gryffindor colours hiding the monster and the coward inside.

Well, no. Not strangely at all.

We shouldn't be letting them do this, he thought.

Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley were making some sort of presentation about possible strategy for the war. Neither were particularly good speakers - Ron would have sudden flashes of inspiration and start talking over Hermione, which would fluster her and make her lose her place - but even Severus, who, despite all that had happened, still loathed them both, was nodding in agreement every now and then.

The room that the Order of the Phoenix had used for meetings had once been so empty. Members were killed in the battles against Voldemort and the Death Eaters, and not everyone could return from beyond like Sirius Black had. No-one came to replace them.

Now the room was full... though the Order of the Phoenix had not grown.

Now Dumbledore's Army fought alongside them, advised them, helped them, led them. And Dumbledore's Army were... children.

Some of them were legal adults. Remus would give them that. Angelina Johnson, for one, had been in her seventh year when Harry had founded the Army. But so many of them were young, young, so young.

Not one of them was over twenty.

"We are here to fight," Harry had said.

And they had let them.

They had let them.

Sweet Merlin, Remus thought, what would Dumbledore say if he saw what his precious Order had become?

I think we are in rat's alley where the dead men lost their bones...

Aemilia's hand slipped into his. "Pay attention," she whispered, pushing a strand of black hair behind her ear.

"...and this, we think, is his weakest point," Remus heard Hermione say. "If we attack him here - and here -"

"No, no, we don't have the numbers to do that," Ron interrupted. "We've got to think about this almost like a game of chess, I think. Strategically, we need to do the unexpected -"

"The most unexpected thing we could do is have them attack themselves," Luna Lovegood chimed in absentmindedly, from where she was sitting beside Neville in a corner.

Remus saw Ginny Weasley's eyes widen. "No," she breathed. "The most unexpected thing we could do is attack them with people they thought were dead."

Neville brightened. "Hermione, is there any way that we can conjure - I dunno, golems, or something?"

Harry Potter stood.

The room fell silent. It almost always did when Harry indicated he wanted to speak. Dumbledore's Army had huge amounts of respect for him as their commander, and the Order as the Boy-Who-Lived - though Remus suspected that somewhere in there was a modicum of fear. Harry Potter was an incredibly powerful wizard.

"The papers," he said.

"What papers?" Hermione asked, notes for her speech forgotten.

"My parents' papers," Harry answered. "The one we had the lawsuit over. The ones Voldemort wanted. The ones about the magic of life and death."

Remus stood. "No, Harry!"

Harry turned his green eyes on him, and Remus was frightened to see how much coldness lay in them. "Why not?" he asked coolly.

Remus closed his eyes for a moment and exhaled sharply. "Harry," he said at last, "that's necromancy. I won't let you become a necromancer. I won't let you!"

"Even if it wins us the war?" Harry shot back.

"May I speak?" Helena Weasley said, handing her son to Bill and standing. She was wearing the white robe that indicated her status as High Priestess of the Arachniae.

Remus, who had been about to retort, closed his mouth. "Certainly," he acknowledged.

"I have not seen the papers of Lily and James Potter," Helena said, "but I think it is safe to be at least reasonably sure that a lot of the information in them comes from the Libri of Life and Death, books that the Arachniae used to keep at Telae Domus until it was attacked by Voldemort, leading to their immolation." She took a deep breath. "I have read the Libri. The magic therein... it is eldritch magic. Wight magic. It is the magic... the magic beneath what we do here, I suppose. More basic. Elemental. But, more importantly, it is impossible to bring someone back from the dead permanently. It is possible to keep them here indefinitely by repeating the ritual, but... depending on the strength and depth of that person's soul, they will be weaker every time it is performed, until they eventually fade away. Nature takes precedence, and we cannot cheat her for long. Also..."

"Also?" Harry prompted.

"It would take a lot of energy to sustain them here," Helena said. "We would need to find the appropriate members of a coterie - unless Lily and James found a way of circumventing this issue."

Harry turned his green eyes on his godfather. "Sirius, the papers are in your vault. My parents left them to you." He did not speak the question. He did not have to.

Remus could see the struggle in Sirius's face. He knew that Sirius did not want Harry to have to fight, or any of the others. But... all that it would bring back... even if just for a while.

Dumbledore.

Lily and James.

Regina.

"Sirius?" Harry asked.

Sirius closed his eyes. "All right," he said hoarsely.

And we shall play a game of chess, pressing lidless eyes and waiting for a knock upon the door.

Remus bowed his head. Harry had pushed them from the edge now.

Would they fly?

§ § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § §

"Remus?"

Head bowed, writing furiously.

"Remus?"

Ink stains on his desk - on the Minister of Magic's desk. Black ink.

Dumbledore's body covered with black blood, like black ink.

"Remus?"

Three times is magic.

"Aemilia," he acknowledged hoarsely.

She came and sat beside him, taking his left hand in both of hers. "Remus, you're..."

He smiled weakly at her. "My nerves are bad tonight," he offered.

Her dark eyes were sad. "Yes, bad," she said softly.

He tried to offer her some comfort - but what comfort could there be when Dumbledore was dead and Harry Potter determined to become a necromancer? "Stay with me."

She nodded.

Silence.

"Speak to me," she said at last.

He said nothing.

"Why do you never speak?"

He could not.

"Speak."

There was nothing to say.

"What are you thinking of?"

He shook his head, trying to clear it. "What thinking? What?"

She was crying now, tears falling silently down her face. "I never know what you are thinking."

"Think," he told her.

For what else was there to think about other than the withered stumps of time?

§ § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § §

"You're... really going to do this, Harry?" Hermione asked timidly, when the leaders of Dumbledore's Army gathered after the Order meeting.

Harry squared his jaw. "Yes," he said firmly.

Ron sat down. "I think it's a brilliant idea," he affirmed.

I do, he added mentally. If you think about it like a game of chess... it's like getting a pawn across the board and having it turn into a second queen.

"It's just..." Hermione said. "Playing with causality... that's dangerous."

"So is going to war against Voldemort," Ginny spoke up.

"I'm just... uneasy," Hermione said. "That's all."

Hurry up please it's time.

Ron looked at her nervously twitching fingers, put two and two together, and thought he might have come up with five.

§ § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § §

"Hermione?"

He found her, later on, sitting on the edge of her bed, a book in her hands, but she was not reading.

"Hermione?"

She was crying.

"Hermione?"

Three times is magic.

Her shoulders were shaking. "Ron - Ron, I -"

He put an arm around her shoulders. "Hey, it's all right," he said gently. "I - I think I understand."

Hermione looked at him somewhat surprisedly. "You - you do?"

"You're scared of seeing her again, aren't you? Miss Lupin. Your... mum."

Hermione nodded glumly. "I -"

"You don't have to say anything if you don't want to," Ron reassured her.

"It's been hard enough patching up stuff with Sirius," Hermione said a few moments later, burrowing her head into his shoulder. "With her... because... well, because she never knew me as Hermione... it's... harder. It sounds horrible, but... but it was almost a relief when she died, because then I didn't have to deal with it any more. And now..."

"Now you do," Ron finished for her.

"Yes."

Ron realised, guiltily, that sometimes there were ramifications in the game of chess. To get your pawn across the board and make it a queen, he thought, sometimes you have to sacrifice other pieces along the way.

"I - I don't know what to say," he admitted.

"Just being here is enough, Ron. Thankyou," she said.

So long, Jerusalem.

Good night, ladies, good night, sweet ladies, good night, good night.

§ § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § §

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Part III, The Fire Sermon, should be out in a couple of days...