A/N: Do you know how many words use the letter 'o'. I'm finding out.

As I've mentioned in the past, my keyboard has issues. At first it only didn't want to capitalize anything. But now it seems to have issues with the letter 'o'. Doesn't want to put it in half the time. So I guess the time has come to break down and buy a new one. But why not the letter 'z'? I don't use z's that much.

My parents and I survived the hurricanes...., so far. Been a lot of fun. Spending weekends cleaning up my yard. Wondering when the power will come back on. Picking my dock off the beach. Fun, fun, fun.

(It is interesting to note I wrote this after Frances. Shortly there after, we were hit by Ivan and then Jeanne.)

As always,

Enjoy.

Disclaimer: People, seriously! I'm far to busy picking up yard debris to be plagiarizing anybody.

Also, please note I have yet to write a fifty chapter story.

CHAPTER FORTY-NINE A: HISTORY LESSONS

Katlin remained in her chair until after Dumbledore had left the room.

"Well," she said finally, looking up at Orion from under long lashes, "what do we do now?"

Orion extended his hand to her with an inviting smile. "We go for a walk."

"A walk?"

"Unless you'd rather hear all about your sorted past in a School Headmaster's office. I thought a walk about the lake would be better suited."

Katlin considered the offer, then finally reached out and took his hand, answering his smile with one of her own. "Much better suited." she agreed.

Katlin actually found herself grateful to feel the sun on her face as they stepped out of the front doors of the castle. The day was warm, but a light breeze made the temperature much more moderate than it really was. All in all, it gave a pleasant overall feel to the day. And for a few precious moments she could forget the present. Forget that for the first time in her life she wasn't even sure of who she was. Of where her life was headed, or what was suppose to happen next.

The feeling absolutely terrified her. Her life, what she remembered of it, was always well ordered. Controlled. Predictable to a certain degree.

But now, as soon as she felt she managed to get things into perspective, another memory invaded her thoughts and threw everything out of focus again.

A hand gently squeezed her's, drawing her out of her thoughts for a moment. She didn't look up at the man next to her, but answered his inquiry with a small smile nonetheless.

He was the one thing she did feel certain about. The one thing that all the others pointed back to. No matter what her thoughts, her feelings, her memories; of one thing she was sure. That through it all, she had loved the man next to her.

And that she loved him still.

She didn't remember all of their past together yet. Didn't know all they had been through or all he had done or how much he was a part of her current circumstances. But she told herself that in the end she was certain the answer would be that he had done it all because he loved her. The old wizard had certainly backed that up. And Orion had more than done what he could to prove it to her.

Katlin sighed quietly. Love was sometimes a terrible thing.

The hand gently squeezed her's again.

And sometimes it was wonderful.

She turned to him this time as she smiled.

"So what was so sorted about my past?" she ask as they headed towards the lake.

"Well, you're a Deatheater for starters." Orion offered helpfully.

Katlin frowned. "I know that." she stated.

Orion gave her a soft laugh. "Well, I guess the best place to start is, as they say, at the beginning."

"The beginning?"

"How we met."

"That should be interesting."

"Well, you remember part of it."

"I only remember a scene, Orion." Katlin pointed out. She sighed quietly as she stared absently ahead of her. "That's what everything is like. Small bits and pieces. Nothing to connect things together. As for our meeting, I only remember you grabbed me during a battle. By my hair."

"That's more than you remembered last time." Orion commented.

"But it could have been yesterday as far as I can tell." Katlin explained. "So, I think the best thing to do is to start as you suggested. At the beginning."

Orion sighed as he slowly took a seat under a large tree by the lake. Katlin seated herself next to him.

"We met during a battle between the Deatheaters and the Aurors." he began. "I never believed in the whole 'love at first sight' thing. Least of all when the person I was staring down at I was seconds away from killing."

"But you didn't kill me."

"And in my defense I would like to point out that I am also still alive. And yet for part of that meeting, I was staring down the business end of your wand, Love."

"So we just sat there.....no killing each other?"

Orion shrugged. "More or less. Chalk it up to mutual attraction."

"So what happened then?"

Orion gave another soft laugh. "I ended up getting reprimanded for letting a Deatheater escape. Got sent off to Austria on a currier assignment as punishment." Orion sank into a thoughtful stare for a moment. "I never did thank Bale for that assignment."

"You just said it was punishment."

Orion turned to her. "Oh, at first it was. I hated it. Sitting all day in a ski lodge fending off snowbunnies...."

"Ohhhh.....," Katlin cooed at him. "Poor man."

"...then freezing my arse off a good part of the night waiting for a currier to show up in the middle of the woods."

"Again, you enjoyed this?"

Orion gave her a wide smile. "Well, it improved immensely when you showed up in the same town."

"Me? What was I doing there?"

Orion looked wistful. "Filling my lonely nights with ecstasy for starters."

Katlin looked doubtful. "No. Seriously."

Orion nodded at her. "Very seriously, Love."

"That was a bit quick, wasn't it?"

"I told you, 'mutual attraction'. And the fact we were both bored out of our minds didn't hurt one bit either."

"Sounds more like a 'quicky weekend' to me."

"Darned expensive one for me then." Orion pointed out.

"Really?"

Orion carefully pulled her pendent out from under her shirt. "I bought you that necklace the first day I saw you standing outside the store admiring it."

Katlin quickly pulled the little pendent free and stuffed it protectively back under the neckline of her shirt.

"So where did we go from there?" she ask.

"Eventually each of us home." Orion answered, sensing for whatever reason she wanted to leave the current subject behind for the moment.

Katlin looked pensive for a moment. But she slowly turned her eyes back to him. "Did you ever meet your contact?" she ask.

Orion paused for a moment, fervently wishing he hadn't abandoned the previous topic so quickly. "No. I found him murdered in a field one night while I was waiting for him."

"I was there."

Orion nodded slowly.

"You thought I had done it. Or that I was involved somehow."

Orion sighed as he turned to the lake. She was remembering a good deal more than he thought she would. "I thought you were playing decoy." he replied with a touch of solemness in his voice. "But you more than proved that you weren't. To this day I still don't know who killed my contact in Austria."

"But you believed it wasn't me."

"Without a doubt."

"Why?"

"Because over and over you proved it to me."

"How?"

"We're getting to that."

"So, after Austria, we went back to our lives." Katlin prompted.

Orion nodded. "I honestly didn't know if I would see you again. All I knew was that I hoped with everything in me that I would. But you were......unhappy...with how we parted in Austria. At the time I wasn't sure if you had anything to do with the currier's murder or not. But when we returned to England, you sent the pendent back to me after the last thing I told you was to shove off."

Katlin took the news without the slightest show of emotion. "Well, I obviously forgave you." she replied with the slightest touch of curtness in her tone.

Orion considered the statement past a thoughtful stare. "I don't know that you ever forgave me." he replied finally. "We just more or less came to a mutual understanding."

"Mutual understanding?"

"We agreed that if we were going to keep seeing each other, there were going to be obvious problems we had to find a way around. The most detrimental to the relationship being that you were a Deatheater and I was an Auror. We had to come to some sort of agreement to keep us from spending our time together trying to prod information out of each other. So we came to the understanding that we never discussed what we did outside of our time together. 'Business', we called it. If one of us ever got too close to something, we simply stated that it was 'business', and the subject was dropped."

"Well, that was cozy."

"And it didn't always work."

"Why not?"

Orion sighed as he looked out over the lake again. "One night, after we had had what I thought was a very one-sided evening in bed, I ask you what was wrong. You told me a friend of yours had been killed."

"Kristen!" Katlin broke in suddenly.

Orion nodded. "That was her name. You told me she had been killed by Aurors."

"She wasn't killed by them." Katlin's whole demeanor changed to one of outright anger. "She was tortured to death by them."

Orion turned to her with a thoughtful look. "What do you remember about that?" he ask.

"That they paid." Katlin replied in a very satisfied tone.

"How?"

"I killed them. All three of them."

"Well, you remembered there was three of them. How did you kill them?"

Katlin started to answer, but stopped as she thought about the question. "I....I'm not sure." she answered finally. "I just know that I did." She slowly turned her eyes to him. "I did, didn't I?"

Orion nodded again. "You told me Aurors had killed Kristen. Over the next week I tracked down the men responsible. And when I found them I gave them to you to do what you wanted with."

"You did?!" Katlin ask in surprise. "Why!?"

"Because they were worthless." Orion answered. "Less than animals to the Aurors. But had they been turned over to the Department, the worst they would have gotten was a few months in Azkaban. Your friend deserved more than that from the men who had taken such a sick pleasure in killing her. And so I took the three of them and gave them to you. And you did indeed kill them."

"But they were your people." Katlin said in a soft, almost awed voice.

Orion shook his head. "I would never associate myself with someone capable of doing such a thing and taking pleasure in it."

"You kill Deatheaters." Katlin replied in a slightly harder tone.

"I do my job." Orion replied. "And I don't do it for sport. But if you want to start drawing lines, Love, tell me you never killed an Auror."

Katlin paused, then turned slowly to the ground. "This is that 'business' we never talked about?" She ask finally.

Orion nodded slowly. "And you see why? We can't. There's no answer to it. 'We are what we are', you used to say."

Katlin turned slowly to the ground, thoughtfully trying to take in all she was being told.

A slight pressure on her shoulder caused her to look back up.

"Are you all right?"

Katlin paused, then nodded with a small smile. "So what happened after that?"

Orion sighed quietly. "A lot." He replied after thinking for a moment. "But the most important thing, at least to us, was that every day we simply fell that much more in love with each other. And everything went very well for a while. We managed on some level to separate our work from our private lives together as well as keep it a secret from everyone else. And so the relationship between us continued to grow."

"But something happened."

Orion nodded.

"What you told me," she said softly. "About Voldemort. That was what destroyed us."

Katlin was sure that Orion would agree with her. But instead he turned to the ground, then slowly shook his head. "No. That only contributed, Katlin."
"Then what? If we loved each other so much, what could have destroyed that love?"

Orion's face took on a very pained expression. "I did." he answered plainly.

"You?"

"I told you already. My....feelings for the man. My jealousy of him. Of your relationship with him. That was what destroyed us in the end. What had caused me...to do things I never thought myself capable of."

"So how did we get from there to here?"

"You decided to let Dumbledore place a Memory Charm on you. So that you would forget everything I had told you. But past even that, you allowed him to erase everything that had anything to do with me or our time together."

"So that was the first Memory Charm?"

Orion nodded.

"And the second?"

Orion took a deep breath. "Well, after the first Memory Charm, we just seemed to keep running into each other. First it was at a restaurant, then in a battle. I caught some major flack from my superior for that one."

"That one?"

"You were one of the Deatheaters crossing my path in a fight the other month, and I let you go. Orin Bale, head of............"

"I know who Orin Bale is, Orion."

"He found out." Orion finished. "So I had to come up with a good story about 'whyyyyyyyy'." Orion's voice suddenly trailed off into silence as he stared up at her. "Uh-oh."

Katlin gave him a very condescending smile. "What else?" she asked.

Orion sighed. "Look, I'll tell you what. Let's just have you kill me now, nice and quick like."

"And I'm beginning to get the idea the last thing I want you to have is a nice quick death. What did you tell Orin Bale was the reason you let me go?"

Orion paused as he tried to find the right words. "I told himmmmmmm...........that you were..........well,.....sort of my........informant."

"Really?" The word was drawn out long and low. "And why, pray tell, was I your informant? Or was I just handing out secrets for free?"

Orion decided it was best to get it over with quickly. "Sex."

He swore he had never seen anyone get so still in his life. He doubted the woman sitting next to him was even breathing any more.

"What?" The slowly drawn out word sounded as cold as a breath of artic air.

"Fair is fair." Orion added quickly. "And I wasn't the one to play that hand first. You already sold me out to Voldemort with that one."

"I did? How?"

"Treaks cornered you one day months before. Accused you in front of Voldemort and the other Elite of having an affair with an Auror. You countered him by telling Voldemort your seeing me was just part of a mission and that as long as you let me sleep with you, I was willing to sell out the whole Ministry, lock, stock, and proverbial barrel."

"Treaks?" Katlin ask. Orion was beginning to wonder if she had heard anything past the man's name.

"After that," Orion quickly drew her off the subject, "things just seemed to go from bad to worse. Again, with myself as the sole contributing factor."

"You seem very good at blaming yourself. What did you do this time?"

"Sier." came the simple answer.

"Sier?"

"Your 35 year-old medi-wizard." Orion reminded her as he turned back to the lake. "I just...every time I saw you, my soul would die all over again. I missed you beyond any pain I have ever felt in my life. I just honestly didn't know how I was going to keep going through it. Running into you it seemed at every turn, and seeing that...that look of utter ambivalence in your eyes. Having to accept all over again that you didn't know me. That you didn't remember me, our love, the time we spent together. None of it. And...suddenly I had this...this unhoped for chance.....dropped...right into my lap. I couldn't let go of it. I grabbed onto it for dear life and I just hung on."

"And pray tell," Katlin ask, unable to hide completely a small smile, "how exactly did you plan to keep that going? I mean, you said I agreed to marry you. Or marry Sier, at any rate. How did you plan to keep who you really were a secret from your wife?"

Orion gave a small, nervous laugh. "Love, I wasn't really thinking that far in the future. I wasn't, in fact, thinking much further than the altar. Just getting you there was my grand plan in life at the moment."

"So what became of that little scheme?"

"I'm not entirely sure. All I know is that you found some papers in my study with my name on them and did some fast addition, realized who I actually was, and set out to do....well, I guess what came naturally to you when confronted with an enemy."

"Kill you?" Katlin ask in a low voice. "I was going to kill you?"

"With a fervor few people ever manage to obtain in their lifetime."

"So what stopped me?"

"Bo."

"Bo?"

"Tall. Dark. Might be handsome, who knows?"

Katlin's eyes suddenly lit with understanding. "The Dementor!"

Orion cringed. "Boggart, Love. Boggart. Please, don't ever call him a Dementor. He takes serious offence at being called that."

"So he stopped me from killing you?"

"Stunned you, it seemed. And that was when the second Memory Charm was placed on you." Orion stared forlornly out over the lake. "And again I had to watch you taken out of my life, and again, by my own devices."

Katlin laid a hand on his arm. "You wanted me back, Orion." she said in a soft, consoling tone. "And you showed what you were willing to do to get me back. Just as you showed what you were willing to do to prove your love. The only fault you can place on yourself from what I can see, are your methods, not your intentions." she said with a small smile. "But I think this time you have it right. You placed the choice of my decision where it should be. With me."

Orion did his best to return her smile. "And have you made one?"

Katlin stared back at him for a moment. "I know you love me, Orion. You have more than proved that to me. And the only peace I seem to find in any of this is when I am with you. But I do not know if that is enough for me."

"Then what now?"

Katlin sat for a long time simply looking over the lake. Orion knew she was mulling over something, but he couldn't say for sure exactly what part of their discussion had her attention currently. But whatever it was, she was giving it a considerable amount of thought.

"Well?" Orion finally prompted her gently, almost afraid to break into her private debate, but anxious as well to know what her thoughts were.

Katlin shook her head slowly, continuing to stare over the calm waters. "I need to get away from here." she said finally. "I need some time to think."

"Where do you want to go?" he ask.

Katlin shook her head again. "I don't know. I just know I don't want to stay here."

"Well, I don't suggest you go to your apartment." Orion replied. "More than likely Treaks is watching it."

"Watching it?" Katlin turned to him. "Why?"

"You've been away from the lair for several days. He's likely wanting to know where you are."

Katlin turned back to the lake. "I'm not up to facing him right now."

"I couldn't agree more."

"Then where can I go? I can't stay here. I can't go home. I can't go to the lair. That sort of ties down my options."

Orion paused for a moment, watching her continue to gaze out over the lake at the now fading sunset. "I have a suggestion." he offered.

Katlin turned to him.

"You could come to my home." he half-heartedly suggested.

He expected her to laugh at the offer. But instead she gave him a long, thoughtful look.

"Why there?"

"Because it's available, private, no one would think to look for you there, and it's safe."

"Safe?" Katlin ask skeptically.

"You can have a whole wing to yourself if you want. That should give you plenty of space to think."

Katlin continued to stare at him for a moment in silence. But finally she gave him a small smile. "When can we leave?"

Q&A

Nessie:

And you thought I was late last time!

My cats did very well through the past hurricanes. One they spent in the utility room. That was fun. The next, because it came at night and it was dark and windy with rain and all that, I kept them inside with me at my parents house.

Well, this chapter wasn't as short, but they will likely run this length t the end, which should be just a few more chapters.

I have a great deal of trouble with MWPP stories that exclude the W as well. It shows an incredible lack of imagination that the writer can't look beyond what they are given. Or at least what they are subjected to the most. They are told over and over that Peter was bad and evil, but Rowling has only mentioned a few times that Peter was indeed a Marauder and was the other three's best friend at one time. People just seem to conveniently forget that part.

I just don't get the tattoos. Maybe it was to make him look more menacing or so.

No mustache.

Your finger wagging has been noted.

Skahducky:

You'll never see the Memory Charm fail completely. That would simply take too long to write. I mean, consider it. Katlin is only remembering things in bits and pieces. Every time she gets a new 'vision', she has to weave that into her tapestry f the things she's already pieced together. This will take an incredible amount of time. And writing something like that? Phfffft. No way, folks. Not unless you want to see Family Relations around 2007.

It would be too easy to have the Memory Charm removed? Try to 'shitick', Dear. An easy answer to the problem. I don't do 'easy'.

'Memory Charms' was correct, Dear. Bo placed his spell on both of the Memory Charms. First on Dumbledore's, and then on his own when he made his Memory Charm 'just like the first one', as Orion told him to do.

Bo didn't have control over the Memory Charms, Dear. He sort of counter-acted them. He placed the first spell to counteract Dumbledore's Memory Charm on Katlin before she even got it. Then, when Orion ask him to place the second one, Bo specifically ask him, 'Do you want this to be just like the first one?' Orion said 'Yes'.

Sorry for the delay.

Sweets:

I'm sure that past the last two hurricanes you saw a bit more damage.

I hope things are going well with your father. He certainly has a lot to contend with. Have they made a diagnosis yet?

I was never sure what Rowling intended with Memory Charms. One assumes they were meant to last at least for a good deal of time, and if one's memory did return, it would be distorted at best. However, they had to keep placing one on the muggle at the World's Quidditch Cup game, so I have no idea how long they last.

But Katlin's situation is slightly different. Her Memory Charms are failing because they are being made to by another, more powerful spell. That being Bo's spell.

Indeed, Orion and Katlin have a very rare opportunity. That of being able to fall in love all over again. The question is, will they?

FEVER

Encaitarince:

Who doesn't love a good 'sick' story, Dear?

Frodgirl667:

Fever was a self-contained story and does not continue into, nor is it any part of, any other story.

FAMILY LIFE

bbartman79:

Not the first time I've heard this, Dear. It is a common criticism of the story. Such is life.

FAMILY RELATIONS

kitti:

Sorry, Dear. I've been threatened by better than you. I am working to get this story to post, but there have been serious delays. Namely Bonnie, Charley, Frances, Ivan, and Jeanne.

SIRIUSLY BORED

Padawan Jan-AQ:

Glad you liked it, Dear.

THE BONDS THAT TIE

Treskell:

I have only recently discovered Fanfictions new addition of C2 communities and am still trying to figure out exactly what they are. But feel free to put my stories there if you wish.

All reviews are as of 10242004.

And remember;

Am I ambivalent?

Well, yes and no.