Unknown Savior
Chapter 2: The Inquisition
Disclaimer and Notes: see chap 1
"Who are you?" Lupin started.
"Ciaran Galein," came her emotionless voice.
"Who are your parents?" Lupin inquired.
"Sirius Black and Shavon Galein."
"How is that possible? Sirius never married or was that close to anyone." Tonks asked the others, who also looked very puzzled.
"Magic has its uses," Ciaran grinned though her eyes remained glazed over, "my mom took some of Sirius' sperm, no mean feat, froze it, and later in life, when she was stable with a home and job, put it inside herself. Thus having me."
"Why did she do that?" Tonks asked, a disturbed look on her face.
"She loved him, but he did not return her love so she decided to have a child of his so that at least she would have a part of him with her always."
"A Love Child without love…" Tonks murmured clearly flabbergasted at the extent of the girl's mother's obsession.
"I remember her," Lupin said quietly, "she always did like Sirius…"
"You KNOW her?" Moody almost roared, throwing his arms up in the air.
"I KNEW her! She was at Hogwarts with us, it was a long time ago!" Lupin defended himself.
"How old are you?" Tonks asked, ignoring the other two.
"15."
Tonks gave Lupin and Moody a surprised look, "same age as-"
"Harry." Lupin finished.
Moody just sighed, exasperated at them, "There are many children in this world that are 15, why is this a surprise or an omen? BE SENSIBLE!" He again gave an aggravated roar.
"What do you know of the events surrounding Sirius and this house? For that matter, how do you even know about this house?" Lupin asked, he threw his arms wide to encompass the house as he walked over to the fireplace, prodding it with his wand.
"My mother had been her once during the summer early on in school. She switched bags with Sirius getting off the train so that she would be able to see him during the summer. Dumbledore sent her a letter with Sirius' address that I found when going through my mothers' things. I know he is on the run for the supposed death of 13 people and for being a death eater. Since two aurors and one of his old school friends who happens to have been a Defense Against the Dark Arts Professor at Hogwarts are in his house, something must be going on."
"Are you involved in the Ministry at all?" Tonks asked.
"Yes," they all stiffened, "my mom used to be in the Department of Mysteries, it was the one thing she found joy in. But she quit when they accused Sirius. She said Sirius wouldn't go with HIM." Her derision of He-Who-Not-Must-Be-Named was clear to all of them, she had obviously been raised properly. "She gave up what made her happy and her reputation to stick up for Black. If I could get back at that place for what they did to her..." her anger was apparent.
"Do you believe your mom's views on Sirius?" Tonks asked again.
The girl paused considering before speaking, "My mother was very fair minded – she saw both sides of everything. But her one fault was that what she loved, she tended to have a blind spot for. While I would love to believe that my father was innocent, I need more proof than the hope that my mother and I share."
"What do you think of Dumbledore?" Lupin asked, his expression relenting slightly. Moody threw him a mean glare at his gentle voice.
"My mom respected him, others respect him, he has gained many distinguished awards. He seems sensible, honest, and genuinely caring about others. I've never met him, but I like what I know of him and I trust his judgment as much as I can tell."
"Harry and Voldemort, what are your thoughts on them?" Moody inquired, his blue eyes still fixed on Lupin.
"Well... Dumbledore trusts Harry. So I doubt that he is a head case or a show off as the paper makes him out to be. He-who-must-not-be-named was bound to come back," she shrugged. "Harry is just the first person he fought since he came back, and understandably. But He-who-must-not-be-named should be, and will be, stopped - for all the pain and hurt he has caused." Her determination was apparent in her firm jaw and clenched fists. But her strength could not totally penetrate the liquids' spell and her eyes remained foggy and staring.
Lupin walked across the room to look at her eye-to-eye. Leaning on the table, the clear, deep brown eyes and the foggy, half-closed black eyes locked. "Would you join a group against Voldemort, and even give up your life if need be to save Harry Potter and/or kill Voldemort?"
She did not hesitate in her answer or respond to Voldemort's name, "Yes."
"For which reason, to save Harry or kill He-who-must-not-be-named?" Tonks quickly interjected.
This time, she took a little bit before she answered. "To kill Him, I would without a doubt. But I don't even know Harry, I suppose I would, his position in this whole war seems an important one, so I guess I would."
"If you knew of a group like that, would you join no matter if the people in the group let you in or not?" Moody asked, his blue eye swiveled to fix intently on her.
"If they would not let me in I would follow my own path, to the same goal. But if they let me work with them, I could help them instead of possibly hindering them due to lack of information."
Questioning looks flew through the air, Moody waved the unspoken question away, "She is too young, if we let her in, then we may as well invite Potter, Granger, and Weasley. They have good if impulsive heads on their shoulders too." Lupin nodded in agreement and Tonks hesitatingly did too.
"But should she stay here? Should we tell her of-?" Tonks broke off.
"Well we can't throw her out now can we? Memory charms can be broken. That has been proven many times already. Lets keep her here for now under our eyes so we know where she is and what she's doing. We'll wait before we decide anything. We'll talk to Dumbledore about this first. Lets wait until she comes around first." Moody again decided. "Tonks, will you get the floo powder out please?"
Tonks quickly got up, knocking over several chairs along the way, and started to burrow around in the cupboards, knocking even more things over in her search.
Once the blankness disappeared from Ciaran's eyes, she shook her head and gratefully accepted Tonks' offer of a new cup of tea. Tonks stopped looking for the floo powder and quickly readied a new cup of tea, which she gave her. Moody continued to stare at Ciaran and Lupin had sat down at the table and put his head in his hands. Ciaran sipped at her tea and gazed at all of them over the rim with her dark eyes.
"So, do I pass the test?"
"Yes," Lupin answered, he pushed back his chair and marched across the room, his arms folded this time, staring at the dancing flames his wand had provoked earlier, "So far," he quickly added at Moody's glare.
"What about my father?" Ciaran asked, ignoring the added comment.
Although the faces remained the same, the atmosphere immediately began to become melancholy. Tonks came over and sat beside her, "He was innocent." She said in a whisper.
Ciaran frowned. "Was? Did he suddenly turn or is he-" she stopped speaking. Tonks shook her head before looking down. Ciaran sat rock still and tried to cope with the information. She started to whisper, to herself almost but maybe it was to them as well, "Dead? The man that my mom loved is gone? My father? Where will I go now?" The teacup started to rattle and her hands shook. She quickly set the cup down and clasped her hands in her lap. She straightened her chin and looked at them all. Her blank mask was back up from the slip the news of her father's death had given her. No doubt she had placed much on the hopefulness he would take her in as she had nowhere else to go.
"Thank you for your hospitality. I must be going. Will you please undo your bonds and give me back my things?"
Moody practically roared at her, "And where do ya think you will go? Huh? Where? "
Ciaran remained obstinately staring blankly at them and said coolly, "I will find a place."
"Yeah on a muggle park bench most likely, the easiest place for Voldemort to find you!" Again, Ciaran did not react to the name of the Dark Lord hounding them. He need not have added 'and us', they were all thinking it. But Moody had just opened his mouth to roar some more and start what promised to be a full-blown argument that Fred and George would have been very sore to have missed seeing, when they heard a rap on the door. Moody silently clumped his way to the door grumbling about late night arrivals.
He returned a few minutes later with Mundungus Flecher behind him. Dung entered the room, stood, and gaped at the sight of Ciaran. "Sarah? What're you doin' here?" he asked blatantly confused.
"Sarah?"
"You know her?"
"What!"
The exclamations of Tonks, Lupin, and Moody overlapped in the carrying confusion.
In the resulting conversations that overlapped everyone managed to gleam the facts that Ciaran knew Dung, in the guise of Sarah Mortis. 'Sarah' had gotten Dung information on a good deal on pots while he had gotten her information about people that Sarah had seen when she staked out 13 Grimwauld Place – none of whom were Sirius Black. Dung got the pots and was quite happy, but it had taken Sarah quite a bit of time to figure out what was going on.
She heard about how close Black was to the Potters and Dumbledore before he became a death eater, she also heard about how Black had 'escaped' from Dumbledore. It all did not sit quite well with her gut, (or maybe it was the fact that she was not eating much, she had to limit her spending with how little money was left from her mother). So had staked out the place and the people to figure out what was going on first before barging in to try and find out about her father. The house was the only lead she had as to where her father was now. As she was sure he probably wasn't there. She had found out in that course of time about members who were rumored to be on Dumbledore's Phoenix team, although no one was quite sure what that was.
They were all steaming mad once they all figured out what had happened, well, all except Dung. Ciaran was mad about some of the false information and her year of painstaking stake-outs and information gathering and the rest were mad about the pots deal that had apparently caused Dung to leave some sort of 'duty' to get them and that a mere girl had been able to get so much information from him. The only reason Dung was not killed on the spot was Tonks pointing out that it HAD taken Ciaran a year of doing nothing but stake-outs and gathering information to find him since she had nothing else to do and no place to go.
"Well how was I suppose to know he'd get them while he was suppose to be doing something!" Ciaran threw up her arms amid the babble, still mad about the false tips Dung had given her. Finally after 10 minutes Moody placed a silencing charm on the whole kitchen. When everyone had calmed down enough he removed the spell and said in his croaky voice, "Well, this is a surprise. Now lets sort this all out now." Tonks groaned but did not protest.
They all sat down started the finagling and bargaining. At one point Lupin said in his quiet voice, "Why don't we ask Dumbledore now?" Moody nodded his grizzled head and Tonks got up to pick up the box she had finally found amid a pile of the crockery she had broken. Dung just slid down further in his seat. So the floo was brought out and soon Dumbledore's head poked through the fire. Ash swirled around his ancient face making it look as if he had become part phoenix and was burning up.
"What has happened here?" Dumbledore's swift eyes had quickly taken in the red faces, Dung's slouched position so only his dirty forehead showed above the table, and the stranger. Moody quickly told the tale and Dumbledore listened attentively. Dumbledore did not fail to notice how Ciaran stiffened at hearing how much information she had given. "Well, that is a mighty interesting tale!" He exclaimed, "My dear, Ciaran, correct? Well, yes, Moody's right, we can not just throw you out like this now."
"Moody, you are certain she is the daughter of Sirius? Have you tried the Parentus Charm?" At Moody's red-faced no, Moody quickly got up and preformed the charm, "Vidimus Parentus!" A pink and a blue streamer flew from the tip of his wand and swirled around Ciaran. She pushed the bench back, but still couldn't get up. Her face showed she was scared but she quickly covered it. The streamers swirled faster and faster around her until they formed a golden nebula surrounding her. Her long black hair flew around her in the resulting breeze. But her face remained calm and expressionless with the exception of her eyes widening slightly. Abruptly the two ribbons of light sheared off and formed two ghostly figures of Ciaran's parentage to her right and left.
The pink figure on her right was of a woman. She was about 5' 6'ish and had hair down to the bottom of her back. Her face was warm but sad and looked distinctly Irish. "Shavon…" Lupin breathed.
The blue figure to her left was of Sirius Black. He was considerably younger and much less sorrowed. There were no lines around his eyes and the lively light was still there in his twinkling merry eyes. "Sirius!" Tonks sobbed, her throat catching on the name of her favorite cousin.
There was no doubt that she was the daughter of Sirius Black.
"Well, then, that settles it! Ciaran my dear, you are to stay here at your father's home and the Black Mansion. Lupin, Tonks, Moody, can you all stay here with her for now? Maybe we can get her into Hogwarts come next term." He smiled indulgently at the happy look that had quickly crossed Ciaran's face. She had been on her own for a long time and had to keep her emotions in check that whole time, but she was still a girl of 15.
"For now, we must tell her a little of what goes on here. Ciaran, do you know the truth about your father?"
"I know he was innocent, and that he is dead." Her face again took that eerily blankness that reminded all of them of how much time she had spent on her own amid the streets.
"He was innocent, a different friend of the Potters was the one responsible for their death. He just died a few days ago in a fight against Voldemort. Sirius gave us this house to use as a base of operations since he was sequestered here in hiding, he could do little else. So this is the meeting house for a group called the Order of the Phoenix, we fight Voldemort, and that is all I will tell you and all you will be told. Do not seek information beyond that. If you need to know it, you will be told." His gray eyes turned steely as he gazed at her. "At this time, information is a deadly gift."
"You mean he was here when I was trying to figure out what was going on?" He face still gave nothing away, but Dubledore's eyes softened.
"Not all the time, and if you didn't realize that than that's a good sign to our hiding abilities!" He eyes grew serious as he locked eyes with her, "Don't dwell on it my dear. You did a very smart thing by figuring out what was going on her before you came."
He then looked around at the group assembled before him over his half-moon spectacles. "Now I must leave, we will discuss this to a greater length later, but for now - Welcome Ciaran and I hope you like it here." He said, his attention refocused on Ciaran, and with a 'pop!' he was gone and they were all staring at the fire, a distinct let down in the room after such a powerful presence had gone.
Ciaran knew she was good at weaponry and magic, and that he quick wits helped her, but it was not until she met Dumbledore did she truly get knocked down a few pegs in her self-esteem.
"Well then, time for bed! I'm beat! Come on Ciaran, I'll show you to your room!" And Tonks gave Ciaran a friendly smile before untying her legs and handing her back her stuff that she grabbed from Lupin and leading her out. Moody, Lupin and, and Dung followed soon after.
Well, that's 2! Enjoy! Oh, as for the parents charm – it should be latin for to see parents.
Preview of 3: Ciaran and Tonks talk – about A LOT. More about what Ciaran knows of Sirius is revealed and Ciaran decides to do something…
Please leave your thoughts and reviews!
Kit ;)