Disclaimer – the plant is Ms. Rowling's, I just like to water it. I even
stole this disclaimer from someone else, because I thought it was clever.
I just water the plant until it starts saying "Feed me, Seymour – I mean,
feed me, Chelsea!"
Author's Note – sorry for the stupid Little Shop of Horrors joke, but I'm upset because my drama teacher said that, unless I found a magic potion to make me a baritone, I couldn't be the plant. Dammit. Okay, I hope you're able to understand this without italics. Paragraphs enclosed in little dashes like this --- are part of the dialogue from that summer when they were sixteen.
Chapter Seven Things Come Clear
"Pawns in the game are not Victims of chance."
—Sting
"Cambri," said Remus.
"Yes," said Cambri.
She looked exactly as he remembered her, exactly as she had the day she married Sirius. He rose from his desk and embraced her, his friend, almost his sister. Cambri hugged him back with surprising strength, and kissed his cheek lightly. "I missed you," she told him.
"I would have," Remus said mournfully.
Cambri laughed. "I know. I know you would have. Dumbledore probably put a Memory Charm on you once I was missing and presumed dead. You knew too much about me, and if they'd caught you ... It turned out they already knew about my memory-thing, but if they'd found out about time travel it would have been awful."
When Cambri had confided in Remus about her powers, who she was and where she came from, all those years ago, she'd told him that she was from a time twenty years in the future.
---It started out as an experiment, she had told him. The closest thing I had to a father had just died, and so I came back in time, thinking maybe it would help if I could see him again. And then I fell in love with him.---
---Sirius? Remus had demanded. Sirius was your father?---
Thinking: That has got to be some strange form of incest, even if they are the same age. Thinking: How can that be? She looks nothing like him.
--- No, my godfather, Cambri replied. I have a twin, and my twin is Harry Potter. James and Lily's son. But I left that time, and now I know why you're not allowed to travel back more than a day or two ... because I changed a few things, and now I can't get back.---
She had revealed more, to Remus's astonishment: Lily and James would be married and have a son. Sirius would be named godfather. The Potters were scheduled to die in five years, leaving their son behind with a scar, reminder of an encounter with Voldemort that he had survived.
In Cambri's time, there had been twins. Cambri had a curse scar too. Voldemort was alive because the Avada Kedavra had bounced, and an eddy of it hit the little girl hiding under the floorboards.
---I was already talking and doing math, Cambri explained, so they understandably didn't tell anyone about me. ---
Knowing Cambri now, Remus believed it. Sirius gave up Harry, handing him over to be raised by Muggle relatives. He rescued Cambri from the wreckage of the house and left her at a Muggle orphanage for a couple of days, in order to avenge the Potters. Then he was thrown in Azkaban for the murder. Remus was not entirely sure how this was supposed to have happened – or who would have believed it – and Cambri was very vague on the whole subject.
So Cambri ended up in foster care, and returned the wizarding world at the age of fifteen. She took classes with her own age students at Hogwarts and outshone every one of them in the class. Once again, Remus believed it. She said nothing of where she'd been for the intervening years – hadn't she'd gotten her letters? In answer, Cambri showed him slightly scarred wrists.
--- Handcuffs, she said shortly, and continued. ---
That summer, Cambri had moved through time, intending to come back soon. And she never had returned.
--- And now, she finished, I've changed enough that everything ahead is gone. We've started over. And the crucial difference is, Harry's twin isn't going to exist. I am. Cambri Terrangs. And if Sirius decides to grow up in the near future, probably Cambri Black. ---
--- So Lily and James are going to die? asked Remus, justifiably upset. And their son is going to live with some horrible relative?---
--- No, Cambri said grimly. No, I've changed enough for that. ---
But now Remus saw that she had changed almost nothing.
"Cambri," said Remus plaintively, "you told me you'd changed enough that the Potters would live. What happened?"
"I told James something I didn't tell Sirius," Cambri said wearily.
"You see –"
"First tell me where you've been," Remus interrupted.
Cambri sighed. "Order business," she said. "I was the only one who knew enough to keep an eye on Voldemort. I got a message from Dumbledore after the Potters died – stay in place. Probably didn't want to tell me about Sirius, though it would have made things a deal less complicated if he had. That was the last I heard from him.
"And I couldn't leave. Every time I was going to come home for a while, something came up. I wrote letters to Sirius, and reports to Dumbledore, and some to you – but somehow they didn't get through. Maybe some killer bird was shadowing me and killing my owls, I don't know. I didn't think anything of the fact that I didn't get anything back – it might have revealed my position, after all."
Remus was massaging his temples. "I remember now," he said abruptly. "Dumbledore put the Memory Charm on me for while you were gone. It was strong, but it was temporary – and being back here – it wore off."
Cambri nodded. "That makes sense. Anyway, five years passed like that. Five years. I was too deep undercover to even get news. And then I was caught – by two faithful Death Eaters. I know I changed something there ... I don't know how they knew to find each other ... one of them was supposed to be pretending to be on the Ministry's side, the other was supposed to be locked up and under the Imperius Curse ... But that doesn't matter. They knew that Voldemort couldn't be really dead – and they had a certain journal, in which Voldemort had preserved himself at sixteen. The same journal that Harry and Ginny had so much trouble with. They knew about my memories, God knows how. And they wanted me to bring him back, so that the life-force of Lord Voldemort could dwell in Tom Riddle. Doubtless they expected great rewards. Anyway, I escaped them, stayed undercover for another four years – until this year. I've been staying close to Harry this year, to protect him."
Remus's mind was working furiously. "All right," he said slowly. "That makes sense. But – who's Dominic? You were talking to him earlier –"
Cambri laughed delightedly. "I knew someone was listening, but he didn't believe me. When you called him Nicky in class I was almost sure."
"How does he fit into this?"
"Oh," said Cambri. "I just picked him up along the way, about four years ago. He doesn't have any parents, and he was an awfully cute seven- year-old." Suddenly she stopped with a gasp. She was gazing at the Marauder's Map, which lay on Remus's desk. "Moony," she said sharply. "Look."
Remus looked. Then he jerked his head up. "I'm going," he said, and ran out the door.
The prospect of a reunion with Sirius was more than tempting, but there was something Cambri had to do first. She went in search of Nicky.
Author's Note – for more on Cambri's pre-time travel life, read Sulwyn of the North's "Fading into Something."
Author's Note – sorry for the stupid Little Shop of Horrors joke, but I'm upset because my drama teacher said that, unless I found a magic potion to make me a baritone, I couldn't be the plant. Dammit. Okay, I hope you're able to understand this without italics. Paragraphs enclosed in little dashes like this --- are part of the dialogue from that summer when they were sixteen.
Chapter Seven Things Come Clear
"Pawns in the game are not Victims of chance."
—Sting
"Cambri," said Remus.
"Yes," said Cambri.
She looked exactly as he remembered her, exactly as she had the day she married Sirius. He rose from his desk and embraced her, his friend, almost his sister. Cambri hugged him back with surprising strength, and kissed his cheek lightly. "I missed you," she told him.
"I would have," Remus said mournfully.
Cambri laughed. "I know. I know you would have. Dumbledore probably put a Memory Charm on you once I was missing and presumed dead. You knew too much about me, and if they'd caught you ... It turned out they already knew about my memory-thing, but if they'd found out about time travel it would have been awful."
When Cambri had confided in Remus about her powers, who she was and where she came from, all those years ago, she'd told him that she was from a time twenty years in the future.
---It started out as an experiment, she had told him. The closest thing I had to a father had just died, and so I came back in time, thinking maybe it would help if I could see him again. And then I fell in love with him.---
---Sirius? Remus had demanded. Sirius was your father?---
Thinking: That has got to be some strange form of incest, even if they are the same age. Thinking: How can that be? She looks nothing like him.
--- No, my godfather, Cambri replied. I have a twin, and my twin is Harry Potter. James and Lily's son. But I left that time, and now I know why you're not allowed to travel back more than a day or two ... because I changed a few things, and now I can't get back.---
She had revealed more, to Remus's astonishment: Lily and James would be married and have a son. Sirius would be named godfather. The Potters were scheduled to die in five years, leaving their son behind with a scar, reminder of an encounter with Voldemort that he had survived.
In Cambri's time, there had been twins. Cambri had a curse scar too. Voldemort was alive because the Avada Kedavra had bounced, and an eddy of it hit the little girl hiding under the floorboards.
---I was already talking and doing math, Cambri explained, so they understandably didn't tell anyone about me. ---
Knowing Cambri now, Remus believed it. Sirius gave up Harry, handing him over to be raised by Muggle relatives. He rescued Cambri from the wreckage of the house and left her at a Muggle orphanage for a couple of days, in order to avenge the Potters. Then he was thrown in Azkaban for the murder. Remus was not entirely sure how this was supposed to have happened – or who would have believed it – and Cambri was very vague on the whole subject.
So Cambri ended up in foster care, and returned the wizarding world at the age of fifteen. She took classes with her own age students at Hogwarts and outshone every one of them in the class. Once again, Remus believed it. She said nothing of where she'd been for the intervening years – hadn't she'd gotten her letters? In answer, Cambri showed him slightly scarred wrists.
--- Handcuffs, she said shortly, and continued. ---
That summer, Cambri had moved through time, intending to come back soon. And she never had returned.
--- And now, she finished, I've changed enough that everything ahead is gone. We've started over. And the crucial difference is, Harry's twin isn't going to exist. I am. Cambri Terrangs. And if Sirius decides to grow up in the near future, probably Cambri Black. ---
--- So Lily and James are going to die? asked Remus, justifiably upset. And their son is going to live with some horrible relative?---
--- No, Cambri said grimly. No, I've changed enough for that. ---
But now Remus saw that she had changed almost nothing.
"Cambri," said Remus plaintively, "you told me you'd changed enough that the Potters would live. What happened?"
"I told James something I didn't tell Sirius," Cambri said wearily.
"You see –"
"First tell me where you've been," Remus interrupted.
Cambri sighed. "Order business," she said. "I was the only one who knew enough to keep an eye on Voldemort. I got a message from Dumbledore after the Potters died – stay in place. Probably didn't want to tell me about Sirius, though it would have made things a deal less complicated if he had. That was the last I heard from him.
"And I couldn't leave. Every time I was going to come home for a while, something came up. I wrote letters to Sirius, and reports to Dumbledore, and some to you – but somehow they didn't get through. Maybe some killer bird was shadowing me and killing my owls, I don't know. I didn't think anything of the fact that I didn't get anything back – it might have revealed my position, after all."
Remus was massaging his temples. "I remember now," he said abruptly. "Dumbledore put the Memory Charm on me for while you were gone. It was strong, but it was temporary – and being back here – it wore off."
Cambri nodded. "That makes sense. Anyway, five years passed like that. Five years. I was too deep undercover to even get news. And then I was caught – by two faithful Death Eaters. I know I changed something there ... I don't know how they knew to find each other ... one of them was supposed to be pretending to be on the Ministry's side, the other was supposed to be locked up and under the Imperius Curse ... But that doesn't matter. They knew that Voldemort couldn't be really dead – and they had a certain journal, in which Voldemort had preserved himself at sixteen. The same journal that Harry and Ginny had so much trouble with. They knew about my memories, God knows how. And they wanted me to bring him back, so that the life-force of Lord Voldemort could dwell in Tom Riddle. Doubtless they expected great rewards. Anyway, I escaped them, stayed undercover for another four years – until this year. I've been staying close to Harry this year, to protect him."
Remus's mind was working furiously. "All right," he said slowly. "That makes sense. But – who's Dominic? You were talking to him earlier –"
Cambri laughed delightedly. "I knew someone was listening, but he didn't believe me. When you called him Nicky in class I was almost sure."
"How does he fit into this?"
"Oh," said Cambri. "I just picked him up along the way, about four years ago. He doesn't have any parents, and he was an awfully cute seven- year-old." Suddenly she stopped with a gasp. She was gazing at the Marauder's Map, which lay on Remus's desk. "Moony," she said sharply. "Look."
Remus looked. Then he jerked his head up. "I'm going," he said, and ran out the door.
The prospect of a reunion with Sirius was more than tempting, but there was something Cambri had to do first. She went in search of Nicky.
Author's Note – for more on Cambri's pre-time travel life, read Sulwyn of the North's "Fading into Something."