Chapter Nineteen: Cooperative
Levisham, North Yorkshire
21st December 2009, 1.59pm
With two hours to go before sunset on the winter solstice, Hermione stepped out of the fireplace in the small back parlour of the Horseshoe Inn at Levisham.
She took a deep breath of the warm scents of roasting beef and stale beer, before dusting soot from the shoulders of her cloak, and letting herself into the main room of the pub.
There were a number of patrons dotted around the room, most of them nursing drinks. They all seemed to be cut from a similar 'salt of the earth' cloth, and no one but the barman paid her any attention. He gave Hermione a cautious nod, and she smiled back at him, before looking around the room again. The smoke-blackened beams were decorated with horse brasses, and old photographs framed on the walls showed over a hundred years of village history.
She wondered whether a close inspection might yield the familiar, patrician features of the Blacks dotted in among the faces of the Muggles enjoying their fetes and carol-singing, but she didn't have time to linger. Andromeda had requested that she meet them at the Trilithon at half-past two, and according to the directions one the scrap of parchment in Hermione's hand, the mile-long hike to the site from the village was mostly uphill over rugged terrain.
Drawing her travelling cloak more tightly around her shoulders, Hermione made for the door, feeling the barman's eyes following her the whole way across the room before she let herself out into the clear, frigid cold of the moorland winter. The fresh air hit her lungs with surprising force, and she paused on the doorstep to exhale the memory of London's grime.
Across the narrow road from the pub a stand of trees stretched their naked branches towards the sky, cutting across the winsome glow of the sun. Hermione shielded her eyes as she squinted towards the horizon, which was already beginning to look faintly pink.
Even though she knew the boundary of the Black Riding was still some way away, already she could feel the faint tingle of strong magic against her skin; settling like a pleasurable ache at the back of her teeth. Most ancient magical sites had been incorporated into larger settlements, their power knitting into the environment until it became little more than a background hum, but here magic had substance, rubbing itself across the senses like a cat.
Hermione doubted she would even need to use Andromeda's directions to find the Trilithon, but she checked them anyway, turning right to follow the road northwards, and keeping an eye out for the footpath that would lead her onto the moor itself and into the unplottable hectares of the Black Riding.
The one warning that Andromeda had given her was not to stray from the path, as the land was a haven for creatures such as hinkypunks and redcaps. Magic like this attracted more than just the families who guarded it, and Hermione had been unsurprised to discover that the Black Riding had been the site of many ancient wizarding feuds.
"But then, the old families always did like to water their lands with blood," Andromeda had shrugged, as though this were an entirely normal thing to say.
Sometimes Hermione would find herself utterly furious at the gaps left by a Hogwarts education. What was the point in learning about the neverending pettiness of Wizengamot proceedings in the nineteenth century, when it would be far more interesting (and more helpful) to study ancient rites and feuds between the old families?
She reached a kissing gate that was half-hidden within a hedgerow of yew, threaded with yellowing hawthorn and spotted here and there by the bright red of holly berries. The branches crossed above the gate, forming an archway that appeared natural, though Hermione could feel the charms knitting it together as she stood beneath it and placed her hand on the oak gate.
A bolt of power jumped up her arm, and Hermione staggered slightly, though she maintained her grip on the wood, and suddenly she was standing in the fallow meadow on the other side of the gate, the hedgerow behind her, and a chill breeze threading its way through her hair.
"Well," Hermione remarked to herself. "That's efficient."
Standing in the meadow, she could see that a narrow path wound its way uphill between frozen clods of mud and grass towards a narrow cleft between two rising hills. Hermione recognised the long, low shapes as barrows, and shivered slightly even as she set off towards them, glad that she had thought to wear Muggle walking boots under her silvery robes.
Most people would elect to fly, she knew, but there was something deeply satisfying about the crunch of frozen ground underfoot, and though Ron and Harry liked to tease her about her aversion to brooms, Hermione felt a wonderful sense of peace descend as she listened to the sound of her footsteps, and the whistling of the wind as it blew uninterrupted across the frozen moor.
Living in London you learned to relish moments of quiet such as this, and as she neared the rise Hermione paused, closing her eyes for a moment just to listen, opening her palms towards the darkening sky.
Something tingled across her skin, and Hermione opened her eyes to see that it had begun to snow, though the sky above remained clear.
"Oh," she whispered, realising that the snowflakes were blowing from between the barrows, where the tall silhouettes of Andromeda and Narcissa had appeared.
"Merry meet, Hermione Granger," Andromeda said, stepping forwards and extending her hands to grasp Hermione's. "The Black Riding welcomes you."
"Merry meet," Hermione replied, resisting the urge to curtsey.
From behind her sister's shoulder, Narcissa gave her a sharp nod. "As the land welcomes you, so do we," she said. With her light blue eyes and impossibly blonde hair she almost looked carved from ice, and it really wasn't hard to see where Draco had got his looks.
"Erm," Hermione said. "Thank you?"
Andromeda smiled slightly, then turned, still leading Hermione by one hand. "Come on," she said. "We haven't time to stand here yapping. The pages of the year are turning."
"Endings and beginnings," Hermione murmured.
"Indeed," Andromeda said. "We thought that you would be rather a good candidate to complete our circle."
"Circle?" Hermione asked, surprised. She'd known that they wanted her there earlier than anyone else, but had assumed it was because they needed help setting up; and besides, she'd shown interest in the Trilithon.
"Sometimes I wonder what they teach you at that school," Narcissa sighed, echoing Hermione's thoughts so exactly that she was too surprised to respond. "The ancient Yule rite demands a casting by a magically powerful number. Of course, a seven is always preferable, but since we find ourselves reduced to the status of beggars -"
"Cissy!" Andromeda said warningly, and Hermione saw Narcissa roll her eyes.
"- we cannot allow ourselves to make a fuss," she finished, just as they finally stepped between the barrows, and the Trilithon came into view.
It was clearly ancient: the dark grey stones were so weathered that what would once have been neat, straight lines had been worn to rough edges. The structure fairly exuded magic; had Hermione not been wearing a travelling cloak she would have expected to see the hairs rising along her arms.
She stood listening for a moment, as though the magic were a tune on the air, and suddenly realised that she could discern gaps in the melody of the enchantment, and turned to Andromeda.
"It's not fixed yet," she frowned, and Andromeda smiled delightedly, turning to Narcissa.
"I told you," she said. "Perfect."
"Don't gloat," Narcissa sighed. "It doesn't suit you."
"I don't understand," Hermione said. "I thought it was a Yule casting you needed me for?"
"Yule for beginnings," Andromeda nodded. "The perfect time to complete the rite."
"And what does the rite involve, exactly?" Hermione asked. Her eyes had caught on rust-coloured handprint at about head height on one of the posts.
Narcissa gave her a considering look over her shoulder, before she opened her hand to show a faint, pink scar across her palm.
"Our blood raised these stones," she said, her low voice carrying easily on the wind. "And our blood remakes them."
"Blood?" Hermione asked, looking instinctively to Andromeda.
"Spells of making and unmaking," she said distantly. Her dark eyes raked the skyline, before coming back to focus on Hermione. "You have a grasp of biology, I assume?"
"Bio- yes?"
"And they say Muggles know nothing." Narcissa raised her eyebrows. "Why is it, do you think, that a rite of beginning would demand a circle of witches?"
"I - oh," Hermione said. "Oh."
There was so little published research on exactly how magic was manifested in the human body, and though the inclusion of blood as an ingredient in so many dark spells and potions suggested it played a key part, she had never found a reliable source on the matter. Of course, it wasn't hard to see why the old Pureblood families would extend their protectionist agendas if curses such as the Invocation of Loyalty had once been commonplace.
"Of course," Narcissa sniffed, "some of the less traditional families found their own ways to work around these things. The Parkinsons, Carrows; the Fawleys, families like -"
"The Fawleys?" Hermione interrupted sharply, remembering Daphne's words.
His mother was a Fawley, wasn't she?
"All dead now, with Emilius gone," Andromeda nodded sadly.
"See what happens when you do not properly invest yourself," Narcissa muttered, her tone dark.
"What would a workaround involve?" Hermione asked, trying not to sound too eager, as her mind went into overdrive.
"Why would we concern ourselves with such things?" Narcissa asked. "If they were content to sully their magic with goblin-made trinkets then that is their business."
"Those diadems that Mama bought for us are goblin-made trinkets," Andromeda remarked drily.
"Precisely," Narcissa said. "Trinkets. Which is why -" she produced her wand from her robes, and Hermione held herself against her flinch "- we will be wearing these tonight."
"Well," Andromeda sighed, accepting the woven circlet of holly. "Teddy will be disappointed not to find us bedecked in jewels."
"I'm sure that he will recover," Narcissa said as she handed Hermione a circlet.
"What time are the others arriving?" Hermione asked, as she placed the holly gingerly on her head. It was going to get awfully tangled, she could already tell.
"Sunset," Andromeda replied, glancing towards the deepening lavender of the eastern horizon. "So we should make a start."
"Yes," Hermione nodded. She could hardly do anything now, she reasoned, and she would tell Harry and Ron what the older women had said about the Fawleys when they arrived.
For now, she turned to the Black sisters, who were watching her expectantly.
"Cloak off," Andromeda said helpfully, and Hermione's hands flew to her neck as she undid the clasp and let it slide to the ground, leaving her dressed in robes of silvery silk that matched Narcissa and Andromeda's.
"Well at least you had the sense to go to Twilfitts," Narcissa said. Hermione almost thought she detected a hint of approval in her voice.
"Chop chop," Andromeda said, beckoning Hermione forward. She was holding something pale in her hand that Hermione realised was a sharpened deer's antler.
"Is that for -"
"Ritual," Andromeda smiled. "It doesn't hurt, I promise."
Hermione nodded, her gaze lifting to the Trilithon. Up close, it seemed even bigger, and she could that what she had thought was a patch of reddish moss was actually a rust-coloured handprint. "How much of my blood do you think it'll need?" she asked, her voice sounding smaller than she would have wished.
"Enough," Narcissa said cryptically.
"We didn't measure how much we gave," Andromeda said, rolling her eyes at her sister. "We just kept going until the stone seemed sated."
"Sated?" Hermione felt a prickle of unease, and instead of answering Andromeda nodded towards the handprint.
"Stopped absorbing," she said, smiling when Hermione's eyes widened. "Shall we get started?"
A/N: So it wouldn't be a Sally story without some ancient ritual magic, would it? Apologies for my absence, I had to work unexpectedly and it completely screwed up my writing schedule, although seeing as my last holiday fic was finished in March, I'd say we're doing alright to have made it this far. A very merry Christmas to all of you (and happy holidays to those of you who celebrate other things); your response to this story thus far has been the best present a girl could ask for.