Phoenix Song

I SOLEMNLY SWEAR THAT I AM UP TO NO GOOD: This story contains strong language and strong situations. If you are under the legal age of consent for your room (or space), house (or dwelling), block (or zone), suburb (or community), city (or township), state (or province), country (or continent), league of countries (or nations), planet (or any satellite thereof), star system (or sector), federation of worlds (or space bodies), galaxy (or star cluster), or universe (or that which transcends it), or if scenes of violence and/or sexuality confuse or otherwise irritate and/or annoy you, go read the story with the Inoffensive Politically Correct Fluffy Bunnies entitled "Everyone's Unique (Which Makes them Exactly Alike)" instead of this one. Furthermore, be advised that I do not own the Harry Potter characters, their origins or their destinies, nor do I claim to; my power is limited to characters of my own creation. Should any of J. K. Rowling's characters desire to return to her domain, they are free to do so at any time, provided their transit paperwork is in order and they have received the appropriate inoculations.

Author's Note: w00t! 1,024 hits! You guys are incredible! Thank you for reading!

FOURTEEN

A thousand thoughts raced through Aidan's mind in the stunned silence that followed, all of them bad. If, prior to Justin's reawakening, there had been some part of him that held onto doubt, held onto the hope that he would somehow be vindicated, that part was forever lost to the overwhelming sense of confirmation and despair afforded by Justin's accusing finger; lost to the undisguised loathing in his voice as he spat the word "perversion" at Aidan; lost to the look of unadulterated hatred in his eyes. Aidan felt as though he was sinking under a heavy weight of anguish, and he longed to get away from this place, but Ciarán held him resolutely, one arm wrapped around his shoulders. The older boy would not let him go.

He believes in me. He even risked his life to save me from Justin's failed curse, the curse that should have killed me. The inference was staggering, a foreign concept that his mind could not quite wrap itself around.

He loves me. The second word sounded hollow in his mind. He thinks he loves me. That thought his mind could readily assimilate, that thought worked. He thinks he loves me, but he doesn't know what I really am. I don't even know what I am, really, but Justin does, and he thought I should die for it. If Ciarán ever found out…

It was the worst sort of misery Aidan could imagine, to know that someone loved—or thought they loved—you for what they perceived you were, but that those perceptions were wrong, that once they found out the truth, they would despise you. What would it be like to lose the easy sense of camaraderie, so recently rediscovered? To never again feel the older boy pressed against him, solid and reassuring and inviting; to never again know the gentle caress of his lips? He felt as though he would collapse under the burden of sorrow such thoughts entailed; he would surely go mad as that which he valued most was taken from him, even as Justin had done.

Will that be me? he wondered, watching the Slytherin boy rock himself gently back and forth, murmuring the same phrase over and over as he held his upraised hands before him almost imploringly. It was not so difficult to believe, given how ready the grief was to overtake him, and he realized with a start just how thin the line between sanity and despair or madness and utter forgetfulness was even now, in his mind.

I have to confess.

"Let's get him back onto the bed," Madame Pomfrey directed presently, breaking the uncomfortable silence. Warily, Headmistress McGonagall lowered her wand and grasped the Slytherin boy by one hand while the school nurse took the other. Reduced from explosive mania to a bewildered daze, all of his energy spent just as suddenly as it had come, Justin did not resist their efforts in the slightest as the two women pulled him into a standing position.

"Up you go," said Madame Pomfrey, guiding the boy back into bed and tucking the covers around him. Justin's face had slackened; his eyes were blank and expressionless as they continued to stare at his hands; his murmuring had diminished to the barest whisper.

McGonagall's features had settled into their usual stern estate; when next she spoke, it was in a brisk, clipped manner. "I shall leave Mister Nash in your care, Poppy. You will inform me if he has any further episodes?"

The other woman nodded slowly, her own expression becoming more businesslike; buoyed in part, no doubt, by McGonagall's own. "It would help a great deal if I knew what the curse was that did this to him. It would give me somewhere to start, at least." She sighed heavily and turned back to her patient.

McGonagall, however, was considering Aidan thoughtfully. "You cannot at all recall the words?"

Aidan slowly shook his head, not quite looking at the Headmistress as the heat rose in his face. Remembering his own outburst of a few minutes before, he perceived yet another lapse on his part, a lapse that felt intentional.

You don't want to remember.

It was Morgan's voice, Morgan's form visible in his mind's eye, and yet it was not. It was his voice; it was that deep, dark corner of himself that was hidden from the world—that had to be hidden from the world. Riddled with guilt and self-loathing, that part of himself was now given substance, now personified. You could if you really tried. Everything else came so easily, didn't it? Tell them everything. Let them all know what kind of person you are. Your boyfriend will be surprised, won't he?

"Does the lad know something?" inquired Madame Pomfrey with sudden interest, looking away from Justin to stare expectantly between Aidan and the Headmistress.

He would do it, though he knew the consequences. He would confess…

"Perhaps," McGonagall replied thoughtfully. "Without experiencing another episode, Mister Hayes, are you quite certain?"

Aidan shook his head mutely, not daring to open his mouth for fear of what might come out of it. That's right, lie to them, you're only proving what sort of person you are: a liar, without even the courage to admit your own transgressions.

"There may be a way," the Headmistress told him, seeming to come to a decision, and Aidan was grateful for the interruption. "Come with me, Mister Hayes. Alone, Mister Dwyer; this is a highly personal matter."

"O-okay," Ciarán said a touch uncertainly, withdrawing his hand from Aidan's shoulder. "I'll see you in a while," he said to the younger boy as the Headmistress led him from the room. In silence, Aidan followed the Headmistress down the vacant halls, the brisk click-click-click of her footsteps resounding from the stone walls and archways.

In two weeks, this hall will be filled with students, and where will I be? Locked away when they find out I attacked another student? Where do they lock dangerous people in the wizarding world? Do they have dungeons? He imagined himself locked away, chained to a stone wall while rats scurried in the dirt beneath his feet, even venturing so far as to climb over him. He shuddered inwardly. It isn't fair! I didn't want this power, I didn't want this life, I didn't want to l—to like someone and then lose them forever!

Somehow his mind kept coming back to that subject; it was a fear that outweighed every other fear in his mind. There were a hundred and one ways that he could lose Ciarán, if not more; so many, in fact, that it would have been a wonder if their relationship survived at all.

But it's not over yet, said a voice like fire in his mind, a voice grim with determination. It's hardly begun. And I'll hold onto it, whatever the cost. And you can rot, it added to the other part of him, the part that looked and sounded like Morgan.

"Quinquatria!" said McGonagall's voice.

Aidan's awareness resurfaced in time to witness the great stone gargoyle guarding the entrance to the Headmistress's office grind to one side, revealing the ever-winding staircase beyond. Once more, Aidan found himself being escorted to McGonagall's office.

Is she taking me to see Dumbledore? But what more can he tell me? Of course, McGonagall could have just wanted another private conversation in place where he couldn't run off. He was not certain if the gargoyle would let him out without her presence, but before he could wonder any further, his thoughts were distracted by the office itself, as the Headmistress opened the door and gestured for him to enter .

Only two nights prior, the office had been dank, dark, and thoroughly neglected, covered with dust and cobwebs; more like a tomb than an office. Now the curtains over the high windows had been drawn back, letting shafts of golden sunlight enter to stream over every wooden surface, which showed signs of recent polish. The antique desk in the center of the room had been cleared and organized, and the numerous portraits adorning the walls had also been cared for; no longer covered with films of dust, the occupants could be seen chatting animatedly with each other or snoozing quietly, their heads leaning against their frames. The ones who were awake smiled and nodded as Aidan and McGonagall stepped into the office, and she politely acknowledged them before turning to close the door behind them. Above the door, in the place of honor, the portrait of Albus Dumbledore smiled broadly as Aidan turned toward him, a meaningful look in his twinkling blue eyes.

"There is nothing which is so completely neglected that cannot be restored," the old man said, laying aside the book from which he had been reading. "Unless it simply does not so desire. But, as this is simply an office, and has no desires of its own…" He swept his hand in an arc and turned his beneficent gaze on McGonagall. "Of course, Headmistress McGonagall deserves the credit for doing the dirty work."

Aidan stared at McGonagall curiously, but the Headmistress only smiled softly. Whatever she had discussed with the former Headmaster after Aidan left was between the two of them, but the effect of their conversation had quite obviously been profound.

"I've heard some troubling rumors from the other portraits," Dumbledore continued, his kind look now replaced by one of solemnity. "They tell me a student has been attacked? That he seems to have lost the ability to cast a spell?" A sudden silence fell on the room; every portrait turned to face McGonagall. Even the sleeping ones had stopped snoring, though their eyes were still closed.

"And his reason," McGonagall answered, nodding.

"Curious. I would be most interested to know what sort of spell was capable of doing such a thing."

"As would I," the Headmistress agreed, looking significantly at Aidan. Almost as one, the other portraits turned to stare at Aidan and one or two of the sleeping ones snuck a quick glance when they thought he wasn't looking. Aidan felt very small; he had liked it better when the other portraits could not see him.

"Ah," the old man said, understanding. "You had a vision?" he asked Aidan.

Aidan nodded. "But—but I don't remember the curse," he mumbled. All the eyes considering him were disconcerting; he felt as though they were staring at him accusingly, as if they knew he was not being wholly truthful. One or two of the portraits whispered softly to one another, furthering increasing his discomfort.

"It is my hope that the Pensieve will help him recover that information," McGonagall told Dumbledore.

"Ah."

Dumbledore still had his blue eyes fixed on Aidan, and once again Aidan was overcome with the sense that the old man knew more than he was letting on. "The what?" he asked quickly, eager to distract attention from himself.

Dumbledore smiled gently. "A device that is most helpful when one's thoughts get in the way of one's thinking."

Aidan looked with alarm from the former Headmaster to the Headmistress. He had imagined she was bringing him here to talk, either with Dumbledore or herself—but hooking him up to a machine? "What does it do?" he inquired uneasily.

"It's a brain probe!" one of the portraits shouted maliciously. "Hook him up, Minerva, and let's find out what he knows!" Aidan blanched at the image of being strapped down and connected to a monstrous machine that could read his every thought. There were thoughts that he did not want read.

"It is nothing so crude, Eustace," Dumbledore said reprovingly to the offending portrait, whose occupant was a man in his middle years that had lost neither his boyish looks nor the associated temperament. "As you well know—although, unless I am mistaken, did not one of your descendents attempted to construct just such a device to recover his lost memories?"

"Only to land himself in Saint Mungo's a second time with no memory at all," Headmistress McGonagall added.

"Gilderoy was adopted," the man retorted sullenly. "He had to have been. No true Lockhart would ever be so thick."

McGonagall ignored him and turned back to Aidan. "There is no cause for alarm. The Pensieve simply helps a person to organize his thoughts, and if we are fortunate, it will enable you to recall the spell that was used on Mister Nash." She gestured toward what appeared to be a large stone basin resting on a small wooden stand on the far side of the desk.

Aidan did not relax. The basin looked harmless, but, of course, there was no telling with magical objects. Even as the book had shown him that hideous face before sending him out on an errand to devastate Justin's life, what might the Pensieve show to him? What could it do to him? If all of his memories were laid bare for everyone to see, they would all know what he had done to Justin, and what was more, they would know what Morgan had done to him. They would know not only how it had felt for him to hold the wand, how exhilarating it had been to see Justin crumple to the ground, but how he had never once resisted Morgan until the end, how much guilt the overwhelming waves of pleasure at the end had always brought him, knowing that it had felt good even as it had felt so wrong and yet he had done nothing, nothing to fight the man, which must mean, as Morgan pointed out, that he wanted it to happen, that he enjoyed it, that he was only faking the tears and the sorrow afterward to get someone to feel sorry for him.

And what did all of that mean? What kind of a person did that make him? What would they think of him when they found out? What would they do to him?

Unconsciously, Aidan took a step back, away from the Headmistress. "I can't," he told her, shaking his head. "I can't."

"Your secrets will be safe," Dumbledore said quietly from behind him. "Only the thoughts you choose to place in the basin will be made visible."

Aidan glanced uncertainly at the old man, who was regarding him calmly. The other portraits looked on curiously.

"Will they be able to see as well?" Aidan inquired.

Dumbledore's portrait shook its head. "No. They will know only what you wish to tell them, as will I. Thoughts in the Pensieve are visible only to those in its immediate presence."

Aidan nodded, feeling somewhat reassured. Only the Headmistress would see, and with any luck, she'd only see the part of his vision pertaining to the curse itself. "Okay."

Dumbledore smiled encouragingly.

McGonagall had already taken the Pensieve down from its stand and placed it on the desk. As Aidan approached, he could see that the basin was filled with a silvery substance that seemed to alternate between a liquid and a gaseous state; at times it would undulate gently like the surface of a pond, and at others it would seem to hover like a gentle mist over the interior of the bowl, constantly changing shape.

"What is it?" he asked curiously, leaning closer to the basin despite himself. Although the material was silver in appearance, he noticed it reflected nothing of its surroundings, not even his own face peering intently into its depths.

"The essence of thought," the Headmistress answered. "Now, I want you to close your eyes and concentrate on your vision. Try to remember what you saw."

Aidan took a deep breath and complied. Once again, the ease with which the sensations returned him was disconcerting. He did his best to separate his awareness from the vision itself, but it was just as difficult as before. He heard the pattering of the rain against the pavement, saw his breath mist in the air as he waited for Justin to emerge from the shop, felt the anticipation of knowing what he had set out to do.

Something firm brushed his temple; startled, Aidan opened his eyes to see McGonagall drawing her wand away from the side of his head. A silver thread, like a strand of spider silk, trailed from the tip of her wand, swaying gently in the unseen crosscurrents of air. Carefully, the Headmistress drew the strand of thought down into the basin with her wand; it stretched but did not break until her wand touched the shimmering surface of the bowl's contents. At once, as if stirred up by the new thought, the silvery substance began to swirl about, and a gleaming shape emerged, resolving itself into a familiar form.

"The library?" the figure of Ciarán snorted. "You could've asked McGonagall."

"That was afterward," Aidan explained to the Headmistress. "Before we went into Hogsmeade."

McGonagall nodded. "It can be difficult to focus at first. Try again."

Aidan sighed and closed his eyes once more. It was only natural, he supposed, that the older boy was on his mind; Ciarán seemed to dominate his thinking lately. He's a whole lot more pleasant to think about than the rest of the things going on in my mind. He shook his head. Concentrate. The vision…

He watched in his mind as Justin emerged from the shop, staring at the rain with some concern before finally deciding to brave it. He followed him, dashing from building to building, from one overhanging eave to the next; unseen, unheard, and unexpected.

Until the last street corner, when he knew he would strike. He tapped Justin on the shoulder and stepped back into the shadow of the overhang, so that Justin would not see his face, hiding so that the boy would not immediately recognize him.

McGonagall brushed his temple again with her wand, and Aidan opened his eyes. The pool of thought was still rotating; as McGonagall touched the tip of her wand to its surface, another figure took shape.

Aidan's mouth went dry as he recognized it. Oh, no

It was himself, at six years of age, huddled and trembling, trying to look as small as possible and looking with fear at something unseen. From somewhere beyond the Pensieve, Morgan's voice could be heard softly calling his name.

"Aidan! I know you're in there. I won't hurt you."

The small figure of himself made no reply, but hunched itself further against an invisible wall, eyes squeezed shut.

"If you won't come out, I'll have to come in."

The tears were streaming down his young Aidan's face as he heard the voice draw closer. He knew what was coming, and so did his older self.

"Gotcha!"

The figure dissolved. Aidan stared at the spot where it had been, overwhelmed with sorrow.

"Sometimes the Pensieve uncovers memories long forgotten," said McGonagall softly. "Perhaps it would be best if we did not continue." She was looking at him with sympathy.

"No," said Aidan, drawing a shaky breath. "I'll try harder. Sorry."

"There is nothing to apologize for. The mind is a complex mechanism, and it is difficult to predict how it will react in a given situation, what connections it will forge between ideas."

Aidan nodded, closing his eyes once more. It was challenging to organize his thoughts; the grief kept lapping at his concentration like the waves against the shore, carrying it away before it could solidify. Finally, with a great deal of effort, he was able to summon his vision to the surface.

"Do I know you?" Justin asked in the vaults of his mind.

Aidan made no reply, grasping his wand tightly in his hand and leveling it at the boy.

Panic-stricken, Justin fumbled for his wand. "What're you doing?"

"Good-bye, Justin."

Justin gaped as he recognized Aidan, but it was too late.

Even as Aidan was about to bellow the terrible words, his mind registered the light touch against his temple that brought him back to reality.

"That will do, Mister Hayes."

It seemed to take an enormous amount of time to pull away from the memories; when Aidan opened his eyes, the figure of Justin had already emerged from the silvery center of the Pensieve, horror-stricken and terrified as an unseen voice thundered, "Rendan Fortes!" The figure doubled over and crumpled before vanishing.

The Headmistress frowned. "Odd. I'm unfamiliar with that spell." She took up a quill from the desk and scratched the words of the spell onto a spare bit of parchment.

"We can't take the suspense any longer!" a voice called. "Did you find anything out from the lad, Minerva?"

"Indeed?" McGonagall remarked loudly. "To what suspense would you be referring, seeing as you've been 'asleep' this whole time?"

"She has you there."

"Oh, stow it, Dilys."

"Patience, Phineas."

"You can be patient, Dumbledore; I choose to be informed."

"Then allow me to inform you that unless you find some patience, you and Sir Cadogan will be sharing the same wall space," McGonagall said shortly.

"Take your time, Headmistress; I've nowhere to be today."

"How extremely generous of you," McGonagall replied in a tone overflowing with irony, returning to her study of the words on the parchment. "Rendan…fortes," she muttered to herself. "The Latin is horrible. But then, I don't suppose the person who designed this spell was concerned with anything other than its effect. It is clearly meant to strip a person of their magical ability, although how such a thing is possible is beyond my comprehension."

Aidan remained quiet while the Headmistress scowled at the words as if angry that they were not revealing their origin and purpose to her. He was afraid to speak up, lest the Headmistress ask him any questions that would cause him to slip and admit his own part in the attack on Justin; he knew if McGonagall regarded him with the same expression she was using on the parchment, he would be hard-pressed to not reveal everything. Part of the difficulty rested on the fact that he wanted nothing more than to do just that, to rid himself of the awful burden of concealing such a secret. The only thing that prevented him from so doing was the thought that it would all be over if he did so; he would be locked away and he would never see Ciarán again.

"Perhaps one of us might be of some assistance," Dumbledore suggested at length from his portrait.

"What?" McGonagall blinked. "Yes, of course. I apologize." She turned her attention back to Aidan. "Thank you, Mister Hayes. That will be all for now, I think."

As the Headmistress escorted him to the door of her office, Aidan felt a momentary sense of relief that was quickly dispelled by fear as he noted the anxious and eager expressions on the many faces of the portraits. Only Dumbledore looked patient and serene; he nodded slightly at Aidan as the boy passed through the doorway, and then the door was closed.

They're very concerned, he thought, the portraits fresh in his mind. For the first time, he gained some sense of what it was for a witch or wizard to face the loss of their ability, to be nothing more than a mere human being. He recalled the look of mute disbelief on Justin's face, the shock evident on Madame Pomfrey's, the uncertainty in McGonagall's eyes, and he understood. He would give away his powers in a second—they had caused him nothing but trouble ever since their manifestation—but, if he was instead forced to give up something, some part of himself he had come to rely on and take for granted, like his hands or his eyes…

Or Ciarán, he realized with a start. Yet it was true that the person who had first greeted him on arrival had been the older boy. It had been Ciarán who showed him around the school, introduced him to the other Ravenclaws, aided him in his encounter with Blair, come with him on a cold and stormy night though he did not know where or why. Even now, as he rode down the winding stairs, which had automatically reversed direction the moment he set foot on it, he knew he would find the older boy waiting for him in the Ravenclaw common room. Once again he found himself contemplating the loss of the older boy, and once again the thought was unbearable to the point of pain.

He pondered this as he made his way down the empty hallways, hardly noticing the route his feet were taking until a clammy, unpleasant sensation passed abruptly over his skin, causing him to shudder. He had just walked through a ghost.

"Sorry," he apologized automatically, turning to see which ghost it had been. Some of the Hogwarts spirits were more offended than others when a student simply walked through them as if they did not exist. Not that Aidan knew of any students who would willingly experience what he had just experienced; no one in their right mind actually enjoyed the sickening feeling of passing through something that was most definitely not dead.

"Unnecessary," the Grey Lady replied, waving one pale hand dismissively. "I, too, was lost in thought." She considered Aidan pensively for a moment. "They are saying"—she nodded at the portraits that lined the corridor—"that a student was attacked. That his power was taken from him."

Aidan nodded mutely. I suppose everyone will have heard about it by now.

"They also say that you were the one who discovered him."

Aidan nodded again, shifting uncertainly from one foot to the other. He did not know the Grey Lady well enough to know how to excuse himself politely; as a result, he had to wait for her to provide him with an opening.

The Grey Lady, however, seemed more interested in questioning him. "Yet he accused you of attacking him and attempted to use the unforgivable Killing Curse on you when he awoke."

"He was—delirious," Aidan mumbled. Her gaze was penetrating, but not in the same way as Dumbledore's. When Dumbledore looked at person in that manner there was still a hint of kindness in his expression, but the Grey Lady's expression was that of a ghost: impassive, veiled and inscrutable, neither benevolent nor malevolent. It might have set Aidan on edge except that there was an unexpected void in his mind where his feelings used to be, as if they had simply ceased to exist.

The Lady nodded slowly. "But he had reason to believe you would desire to harm him."

"Harm him?" Aidan repeated curiously. "I tried to save him."

"You tried to save him? You were present when he was attacked?"

"No. I was in the library. I had a vision," he explained. "It felt like I was there, but I couldn't change anything."

"A powerful vision," she observed.

"It was," Aidan agreed, feeling…nothing. There was no guilt, no accusation, no emotion; only intelligent reason. Something of her must have rubbed off, he thought with interest.

"Such a powerful vision usually indicates that the viewer has an especially strong connection to someone in the vision," the Lady said slowly.

"Well, I'd met Justin once before," Aidan answered abstractedly. "He and I didn't really get on." It was intriguing to feel so impassive, to be so far removed from all emotion that one's thoughts ran about unhindered, connecting and intertwining at will, forming new conclusions and seeing things that others, bogged down by feelings, did not. Aidan rather thought he would like to study the phenomenon, but the Grey Lady kept interrupting.

"Did you experience the vision from his perspective?"

Aidan shook his head. "No. I was the attacker." There was no need to explain further; she knew what he meant. "So you mean to say I know the attacker." He frowned slightly. "I thought I was the attacker, but if it wasn't me, who could it have been?" His mind, freed though it had been from all sense of feeling, seemed to have hit a brick wall. The answers were not coming; the connections were not being made as they should be. It might have been frustrating, if he could feel; now it was merely a challenge, an obstacle to be overcome.

"Can you think of no one?" the Grey Lady asked.

Aidan performed a quick mental inventory of everyone he had met over the past summer at Hogwarts—Shauna, Ronan, Aaron, and others whose names he could not recall, who were nothing more than vague faces seen briefly before the end of term—but none of them felt right as Justin's assailant. "No," he finally said, "I can't."

The Lady nodded and bent slightly so that she was looking Aidan directly in the eyes. "You were not the only one who went to Hogsmeade last night."

The brick wall crumbled as the image of a dark-haired, sodden boy rose up in Aidan's mind. Ciarán…

"Impossible," he said flatly. Somewhere, in some far distant corner of his mind, Aidan felt a twinge of emotion and moved to suppress it. Emotionalism would only cloud the issue, prevent him from discovering the true attacker.

The Grey Lady straightened up and said nothing.

Aidan's rational mind continued to churn away, ignoring the emotions building up like dark thunderclouds threatening to unleash a torrent upon it. It only made sense to suspect Ciarán; the boy had been in Hogsmeade after dark, he was known to the constable, and there was an uneasy sense of familiarity about the dark figure whose identity Aidan assumed in his vision. It made sense to suspect him, even as he had suspected himself, but to implicate him?

"He was only there to—" he began, fighting to keep control. To do what? Did he tell me? What was he doing there? Skulking about in a black cloak and waiting for the right moment to strike? Does that seem right?

Possibly—no! Absolutely not!

Despite Aidan's best efforts to snuff it out, the faint flicker of feeling spread rapidly, burning through the rational calm that had descended upon him. No longer did he feel the self-recrimination and doubt of before; the Grey Lady had taken that from him, made him see reason, and in the process, implicated the only one who really mattered. Now, he fought to stave off the panic of the realization, to drive it from his mind, along with its consequences, but his mental control had broken down, and his mind was reduced to a single thought.

Not Ciarán. It's not Ciarán.

But he was in Hogsmeade at the time the attack occurred.

No! I won't believe it!

"You're wrong," he whispered to the Grey Lady as he struggled to hold onto the one thing that mattered, the only thing that mattered, dashing aside the hot tears that sprang to his eyes. Ciarán was dependable, Ciarán was reliable, Ciarán cared about everyone—Ronan and Aaron and Aidan and everyone and he would never, could never attack another person.

Why else would he keep telling me that I didn't do it? Why else would I feel as if I knew the figure in my vision intimately enough to be the figure in my vision?

Stop it! he screamed in the vaults of his mind. He felt he would claw at his eyes if it would rid him of the image of Ciarán dressed in black, dripping wet as he came down the stairs from the Ravenclaw common room.

"You're wrong," he repeated louder, biting his lower lip to prevent it from quivering as all of his efforts failed and his world shattered around him. He bit down so hard his lip started to bleed, but he was beyond physical feeling, wrapped up in his emotions which were surging like the waves before a storm, alternating between disbelief and sorrowful acceptance. "You're wrong!" It came out as a hoarse plea; he was begging the Grey Lady to turn back the inexorable tide of reason that threatened to drown him, to take back her revelation and give back the Ciarán he knew, the sympathetic and sensitive older boy instead of the cold-blooded assailant. The tears flowed freely down his face; his whole body felt as if it was trying to cave in on itself with his every breath and all the world, all of life was misery.

"I'm sorry," she murmured.

Sorry? She's sorry! Sorry that she's taken him from me! Defiant anger did what she would not: picked up on the tiny strand of doubt that threaded itself through his mind and held on tightly. It could be a coincidence, nothing more than chance, how does she know anyway, she never leaves the castle, she doesn't know what it is to love someone anymore, to need them, or maybe she remembers and she's jealous…

"You're wrong," he said shakily, but with more conviction than before. "You'll see." Before she could reply, before she could take away the illusion he clung to, Aidan turned and fled.