Disclaimer: I'm not J.K. Rowling. I wish I were, because then I'd be very clever, and let's face it, very wealthy. Harry Potter and all related characters/places/ideas belong to her and she has generously shared them with Warner Brothers, Scholastic, etc. I'm none of these entities. I don't own any of this.

 Chapter 2- Warnings

Morgan McCarrick sat alone at a table at the Three Broomsticks. She had arrived very early to meet Evan for dinner, but it was just as well, because she was still seething after her conversation with Sirius. How dare he talk to her like that! As though he had any right to tell her what to do! She happened to like Evan Marakiv, he was one of the few people she could have an intelligent conversation with. It was true she had first started getting together with him to grate on Sirius, to get him back for ignoring her in favor of his friends one night. He had some secret with the Marauders and she wanted to get him back by having secrets of her own. It irritated all of them- Sirius, James, even Remus and Peter, to see her with Evan, who had fancied her all the way back at Hogwarts. But then she had discovered he was actually good company. He was not as repulsive as most of the people from Slytherin. Acerbic, bitingly sarcastic to be sure, but she enjoyed the banter and enjoyed being viewed as an equal.

A shadow fell across the table and she glanced up, expecting Evan. Her stomach gave an unpleasant lurch.

Rodolphus Lestrange didn't frighten her; he was a thug, but a simple one. It was her cousin, Bellatrix, who did. Even as a child, there had been something unnatural about the girl. She was clever, and darkly beautiful, but she lacked such basic qualities as compassion, empathy, and the ability to love, that she seemed inhuman to Morgan. That coldness frightened her.

Uninvited, and undeterred by the look of distaste on Morgan's face, Bellatrix sat down.

"Well, if it isn't my dear little cousin. Here all alone?" She sneered.

"Yes." Morgan replied coldly. She wasn't going to tell them who she was meeting. She didn't want them to hassle Evan as well.

"How's the Auror training going?" She continued in the mocking voice. "Learning to catch those bad, bad wizards?" She laughed. "It's a waste of time, don't you see that? The Ministry are a bunch of fools! They can never win against the Dark Lord! He's the most powerful wizard in the world!"

"He's not." Said Morgan quietly, but with conviction.

Bellatrix laughed again, an unpleasant sound. "I don't even have to ask what you mean by that. Don't you realize Morgan that the Dark Lord has powers your Dumbledore will never possess!" She leaned forward, her eyes glinting with a wild, unhinged kind of excitement, her voice breathy with fervor. "It's not too late Morgan. You can still choose the right side. The side your blood suits you for. You can still make your father proud. The Dark Lord will still accept you as his servant."

"I would sooner die."

"Then so be it!" Bellatrix stood so quickly she knocked over her chair. A few people looked around. "I gave you the chance." She hissed. "You've chosen the losing side, and you'll pay for it, you filthy little blood traitor!" She whipped around and walked out, followed by Rodolphus.

Morgan pushed her chair back suddenly, going to tell the bartender to give Evan the message that she wasn't feeling well, when she felt someone place a hand on her shoulder. She spun, reaching for her wand, thinking it was Bella again, but found herself looking at a tall man with close cropped dark hair. His hand closed on her wrist immediately, to keep her wand from pointing at him.

"Do you always greet your dinner companions by trying to hex them?" Evan Marakiv said quietly.

"Sorry." She replaced her wand in her pocket. "I thought-"

"I know. I was standing right there." He pulled the chair Bella had used upright again.

"How much did you hear?"

"Enough." He was speaking more gently than he usually did. "She's always been a bit mad you know."

"Yes, well, runs in the family."

Evan frowned. "You're upset. We don't have to do this tonight. Let me take you home."

"No, no, I'll be fine. Really." She gave him a weak smile. "It's not exactly the first time I've fought with a relative. I seem to be batting a thousand today."

He didn't understand the muggle sports reference but got the idea anyway. He raised his eyebrows inquiringly. She decided not to go into it. She didn't want to talk about her yelling match with Sirius since he had been the subject of it.

"All right, I will tactfully change the subject." Evan said, being unusually pleasant. "How are your classes going?"

"Another day, another book. Unimpressive."

"Yet you keep on with it?"

"It's what I want to do."

Only the best students out of Hogwart's were taken into Auror training, and for the first four years of her education Morgan had been only mediocre. She had learned early in her first year that she could pass her courses without ever opening a book, and she did so until she hit fifth year, and realized she actually had ambition. She managed top scores on her OWLS and NEWTS, stunning most of her peers and a good number of teachers, who had assumed she was just rather slow.

"I admire your ambition at least." Evan admitted. "If not your ultimate goal." "As you never tire of telling me."

"I don't agree with Bellatrix, on more things than this, but I do think pursuing this particular career path is putting yourself in unnecessary danger. You don't seem the type to throw yourself on a sword Morgan. You're too practical to be a martyr."

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

"Morgan, there's something I wanted to mention to you." Evan said carefully as they strolled along the main shopping street in Hogsmeade after dinner.

"Sure." She was only half listening, looking in windows as they passed. Those blue robes would look excellent on me.

"You're very close to some people in the Ministry, aren't you? With some of the Aurors?" He got her attention with that.

"If you mean the Potters and the Longbottoms, then yes, we're close. I'm not well acquainted with the more senior Aurors." She said guardedly.

"I need to tell you something. But I can't tell you where I heard it from. I can't go to the Ministry directly because they won't believe me, but they'll listen to you." He was speaking casually, as though they were talking about the weather. "There's a traitor inside the Ministry. Among the Aurors. No, I can't give you a name because I don't know that." He added quickly before she could ask. "But I know it from someone who is in a position to know."

"You mean someone close to Voldemort."

He winced. "Would you please not say that."

"Fear of a name only increases fear of the thing itself Evan."

"And enough reason to be afraid I say. I don't want to be involved, you know that, but since you are I felt I had to warn you. Your friends, tell them not to trust anyone. There is at least one spy among them, maybe more."

"Why are you telling me Evan? Why do you care?"

"I don't care what happens to the Potters, or the whole rest of the Ministry for that matter." He glanced sideways at her. "I care what happens to you." He said that last part softly, a little hesitantly. The quality of his voice, along with the look, made her uncomfortable.

"Evan-"

"You don't have to say it McCarrick. You've made your feelings perfectly clear. And you know what mine are, but I'm willing to settle for your friendship, for your company. At least for now."

Morgan took that at face value, and ignored the menacing quality of the ending.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Evan Marakiv walked into the Hog's Head tavern reluctantly. He'd never liked the grimy place or the sort of people you were likely to encounter there. There were few people in there tonight. Two men hunched over a table having a muted conversation Evan knew he was better off not knowing about, and a witch in tattered robes at the bar appeared to be drinking herself into a stupor. He approached the bar, careful not to lean on it for fear of transferring its layer of filth to his robes.

"Whaddya want?" The barman muttered quickly, as though wasting more than one breath on the question wasn't worth it.

"Firewhisky." He didn't drink heavily, but he hadn't had anything to drink at dinner because Morgan hadn't, and he was feeling irritated by the whole evening. The barman looked at him closely, as though distrusting his impeccable appearance, and then slammed a shot glass down in front of him, and didn't even glance at the money Evan paid him. He moved away to the other side of the bar.

Evan tossed back the drink and thought about Morgan McCarrick. He'd always thought she should have been a Slytherin. Aside from the fact that she came from a family whose members were generally in that house, she was smart, and ambitious. She had a certain willingness to disregard rules. But she was unbendable on her disapproval of the Dark Arts, and that was where they disagreed. Evan thought the Dark Arts had their place. He was practical, he didn't want to be involved in this conflict. Whichever side won was the side Evan would be on. He didn't see the point in dying for either.

"Did you tell her?" Said a low, urgent voice behind him. He turned and looked at the man.

"Good evening to you too." He said with false cheeriness, knowing his companion was not one for pleasantries.

"Marakiv, don't waste my time."

"Me?" Evan dropped the pleasant manner. "I believe you insisted on seeing me. I assure you I wouldn't come in this vile place of my own accord."

"You were always an elitist. Did you tell her?"

"Yes, I told her."

"Did she believe you?"

"I think so. McCarrick doesn't give away much." He finished his drink. "I'm not doing this again. If you have anything else to tell the Aurors do it yourself. I'm not your messenger boy Severus." He started to walk away.

"You'll do it Marakiv." Sneered Snape. "Because she's your weakness. Sirius Black's little cousin is your Achilles heel."