A Good Match

Arithmancy was Phineas' favourite subject.

It was a well-kept secret of his that he wasn't actually all that good at magic. He led his class in most subjects anyway, because he studied hard and excelled at the theory behind spells, but casting magic didn't come to him intuitively like it seemed to for his classmates. So Arithmancy, which he was taking to N.E.W.T. level, had always been a welcome break in his timetable, a class where his quill was more important than his wand. Phineas liked classes like that. He was taking Potions, Astronomy, Ancient Runes and History of Magic for the same reason, though he'd never stoop to dirtying his hands with Herbology any longer than he had to, so his sixth subject was Transfiguration.

Anyway, he genuinely liked Arithmancy, and often stayed up late at night to do extra credit assignments, but that wasn't the reason why he was beaming as he came into class the first lesson back after the Easter holidays in his sixth year.

He'd known Livia Malfoy for a long time, though the boys in his group rarely interacted with the Slytherin girls in their year. Now Phineas wondered whether Julius Malfoy had engineered that deliberately, anxious to keep his friends away from his sister, but at any rate it was as if he'd met her for the first time that evening at Malfoy Manor when he'd taken Elladora to Livia's coming-of-age ball.

She'd looked so different in her shimmering, diaphanous silver-grey robes, her smile brilliant and charming, her voice warm and sweet. Phineas had danced one dance with her towards the end of the ball, and now... he wanted more.

His only objective in attending the ball had been to scout out potential matches for Elladora. She was young, of course, but beautiful and elegant enough to carry herself well anywhere, and to Phineas' surprise it seemed she and Julius had taken to each other immediately. He didn't doubt that Elladora could hold Julius' attention until she came of age, and so by that measure alone the ball had been a success.

Phineas hadn't expected to find a girl for himself the same night.

Livia was in his Arithmancy class, sitting with Mirabelle Mulciber and talking quietly as she took out her books. Even better, Julius wasn't in this class. Phineas sat down in his usual place, and as he was pulling out his roll of parchment from his bag, Livia turned in her seat so that her long blonde hair fell over one shoulder, and caught his gaze. She flashed him another glorious smile, her grey eyes sparkling, and then turned around again as the professor came in to start the lesson.

Arithmancy was Phineas' favourite subject, but he found it hard to concentrate that day.

-B-

The evening before she headed off to her third year at Hogwarts, Iola crept into her mother's room.

"Mama?" she whispered, too softly to wake the ill woman if she happened to be asleep. The pale head on the pillows stirred feebly. "I need you to sign my Hogsmeade form. I'd ask Phineas, but it says it has to be a parent or guardian..."

"I'll sign it, Elladora," Mama rasped.

Just as soon as Iola's spirits had risen, they fell again. "Iola," she said. "I'm Iola."

"Whatever you say, dear," Mama said, in that tone that meant she wasn't really listening. "Here you are."

Iola took her time taking the slip of parchment back from the skeletal fingers. She was staring at the bedside table, which was a shrine to Little Sirius. The moving photographs showed the child sleeping, writing, curled up with a book... He had a strikingly sweet face, framed by dark curls like Elladora's and Iola's, but that wasn't what caught Iola's attention. None of the rest of them were there, in these photographs their mother held dearest. None of her living children. For the first time, Iola felt a flicker of Phineas' anger.

"Thank you, Mama," she said quietly, and slipped out to finish packing.

Her low mood went mostly unnoticed the next morning. Elladora was in high spirits, because she'd been chosen as one of Slytherin's new prefects, whereas Phineas was sulking because he hadn't been made Head Boy.

"Really, Phineas, I don't know what you were expecting," Elladora said, after Phineas Apparated them onto Platform Nine-And-Three-Quarters. "They always choose one of the previous prefects as Heads."

"Well, if I were in charge things would be different," Phineas said grumpily. He pointedly Levitated Iola's trunk onto the train with his wand, leaving Elladora to fend for herself. "And I don't see why Julius Malfoy is so much more responsible than me."

Iola had been hearing that name a lot over the summer. Unsurprisingly, Elladora began hotly, "I think you're very hard on poor Julius—"

"What's all this, then?" drawled a new voice. Iola was sure she heard Phineas mutter "speak of the necromancer" under his breath, but her attention was drawn by the newcomer: a tall blond boy she vaguely recognised as one of her brother's friends, a Head Boy badge gleaming green and silver on his chest. His smirk faded to a tender smile as soon as he saw Elladora, still struggling to heave her trunk up the stairs and into the train. "Oh, please, Miss Black – allow me."

Elladora blushed like a rose, but stepped obligingly aside for Malfoy to direct the trunk onto the train with a flick of his wand. Iola couldn't help but feel a twinge of envy. She could do that spell perfectly well, but just because she wasn't of age she had to use brute strength or her brother's kindness to move her things. And her strength was rather more reliable.

That being said, Phineas was being quite kind today. He exchanged curt greetings with Malfoy, and after Malfoy and Elladora had gone off to the prefects' carriage, Phineas put a hand on Iola's shoulder and guided her down the train into an empty compartment. He lifted her owl-cage into the baggage rack without needing to be asked and then said with an amiable smile, "So what new classes are you taking this year, Iola?"

"Arithmancy," said Iola, and was glad to see an approving grin light up her brother's face. "Divination, and Ancient Runes."

"All good, respectable classes," Phineas said, nodding. "I'm glad you're not bothering with Care of Magical Creatures. It simply isn't ladylike, mucking about in the mud."

"Actually," Iola said timidly, "I thought Muggle Studies looked quite interesting, too..."

She was expecting an explosion. Instead, Phineas shook his head almost sympathetically. "I know it's sort of morbidly fascinating, Iola, learning about Muggle stupidity, but you must think of how it looks. Muggles... they aren't like us. Some people aren't even sure they're human. You can't disgrace the family's name like that."

Of course, that was Phineas: always putting reputation first. How could she explain what she was thinking to him? She wasn't sure she knew it herself.

"Yes, Phineas," she said instead, and then steered the conversation into less dangerous waters. "How... how come you're..."

"Sitting with you today?" Phineas asked with a slight smile.

Iola nodded, heart in her throat. He'd never paid her so much attention before.

Phineas shrugged. "I didn't really feel like sitting through Malfoy's posturing," he said. His tone was mild, but there was a sharp undertone to his words.

"Elladora seems to like him," Iola ventured.

"Oh, I don't deny he can be charming," Phineas said. "And it'll make a good match for her. But he's insufferable sometimes."

"A good match?" Iola repeated. "But Elladora's only fifteen!"

"That's not too early to start thinking about these things," Phineas said. Then he smiled at her. "Don't worry, Iola. It's early days – she won't be leaving us any time soon. And it isn't proper for a younger sister to marry before the elder."

Iola sagged back against the seat of the train in relief, barely noticing his admonishment ("Sit straight, Iola"). She was only just thirteen, far too young to be thinking about eligible matches and betrothals and everything her older siblings spoke of from time to time. She just wanted...

She wanted to have friends, real friends like Elladora's, friends with whom she could giggle and share secrets and visit over the holidays. It wasn't that she didn't get along with the girls in her class, exactly. It was just that she wasn't like them. Perhaps she was too aloof, or too quiet. But she didn't have any inclination to seek them out and sit with them on the train ride.

Then again, neither did Phineas. The boys in his dormitory were allies maybe, companions, but not friends. There was something reassuring in that.

-B-

Phineas never stayed angry with her for long. Elladora didn't think he was capable of it. So she wasn't surprised when, late one evening at the start of term, he came downstairs to where she was working in the deserted common room and sat down beside her – not saying anything, just waiting.

To show him there were no hard feelings, she started to roll up her parchment, the fifth-year prefects' schedule she'd been writing up for Julius, when her brother put a hand on her wrist, leaning over to examine it. He raised an eyebrow. "Shouldn't that be Head Boy work?"

"Julius is doing the sixth and seventh years," Elladora told him. "I offered to do this one. He doesn't want to work with the Head Girl much, of course."

Phineas nodded emphatically. "Quite right too. I don't know what Professor Mole was thinking, appointing a Mudblood. No decent Head would ever allow it."

"So you see," Elladora said slyly, "it's probably for the best that you aren't Head Boy, or you'd have to work with a Mudblood."

Phineas looked at her in surprise and then grinned. It made his thin face shed years. Next to Julius Malfoy, her brother could hardly be called good-looking, with his straight flat hair (so unlike the mane of curls Elladora wrestled with each morning) and sharp nose and narrow shoulders. Still, there was something arresting about Phineas, a quiet confidence in those clever dark eyes that made people listen when he spoke.

"You aren't really angry?" Elladora asked now.

"No," Phineas assured her. "If it works out... I'll be glad. He's from a good family." Then he brushed away a tendril of hair that had fallen across her face, and added almost tenderly, "I want you to be happy."

-B-

As soon as he'd turned seventeen, Phineas had revamped Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place. He'd hired new human servants: a nurse for Mama, a ladies' maid for Elladora and Iola to share. The house-elves must have grown in number too, though they were so unobtrusive Iola barely noticed them – she could only tell they were there because the rooms were cleaned quicker than they used to be and dinners were more elaborate.

More importantly, Phineas had unlocked all the rooms that had been closed for as long as they could remember, and now they took tea in the parlour and sat together in the drawing room, rather than roaming the dark corridors. The décor had changed too: the old black drapes had been replaced with shining green and silver, the bedspreads changed to match. On Iola's suggestion, Phineas had even put new silver taps in the bathrooms, engraved to look like snakes. House pride never hurt anyone, after all.

But the most impressive addition to the house was the ballroom: huge and sweeping, it took up most of the ground floor. Iola didn't know how Phineas had managed to magically extend the house from inside – she'd heard it was frightfully expensive – but she was glad of it. Now it didn't matter that they didn't live in a fine country manor.

To inaugurate the new ballroom, Phineas was holding a Christmas ball. He'd invited some of his friends from Hogwarts and their families, and Elladora had some of hers over too. At thirteen, Iola was deemed too young to attend, so she sat at the top of the stairs on the fourth floor and listened to the sound of revelries from downstairs. Elladora had been almost glowing with excitement as she made her way down to greet their guests, and Phineas had looked scarcely less happy. Iola wondered how much of that was down to the Malfoy twins.

She knew Julius Malfoy was intelligent and wealthy and his blood was as pure as could be, but it was still odd to see Elladora – her elegant, disdainful Dora – turned into a breathless, fluttering schoolgirl at the sight of him. Phineas was harder to read, but Iola didn't like the way he said Livia Malfoy's name, like it was a rare delicacy he was savouring on his tongue. And he spoke of Livia often these days.

She was resting her chin in her hands, lost in thought, when she heard a light creak on the stairs above her. Iola turned and then jumped to her feet with a gasp. "Mama!"

"Iola, dear," Mama said. She was wearing a white silk nightdress, and her wispy fair hair hung loose about her shoulders. She was shivering a little in the sharp December air.

Iola hurried to fetch one of her woollen shawls to wrap around her mother, and helped her to sit carefully down on the stairs. "I didn't know you were coming downstairs today."

Mama's smile looked painful, like it would crack the thin, delicate skin of her face. "Well, it is Christmas," she said. "I see Phineas has organised a ball?"

Iola nodded, but she couldn't think of anything else to say. How strange, that she should become tongue-tied in the presence of her own mother! But Mama had always been a stranger to her. It was Iola who'd made her ill, leaving her weak and bed-ridden. Iola had stolen her health with her birth. Little Sirius had taken something far more important with his death, though: Mama's spirit.

Mama was studying her closely. "You've grown into quite the young beauty," she murmured. "How old are you now? Fourteen?"

"Thirteen," Iola said. Irritation and delight were warring within her, but the delight took precedence. Her mother thought her beautiful. "It's... it's kind of you to say so. Elladora is prettier than me, though."

A bony hand brushed through Iola's curls. "He would be twenty now," Mama whispered. "He'd be the one directing all this instead of Phineas. Not a day goes by that I don't think of him, Iola."

Iola turned her head. Mama's face had just crumpled. She was crying noiselessly, without sobbing, just letting the tears pour down her cheeks.

"It'll get better, Mama," she offered helplessly. "The pain will get better some day." But would it? Little Sirius had been dead twelve years, and Mama just seemed to get frailer and sadder every time Iola saw her. "Come on," she said bracingly. "You should be in bed." She helped Mama to her feet, realising with a shock that she was taller than her now, and led her up the flight of stairs to her dim, quiet bedroom.

Immediately, the hired nurse started fussing over Mama, and Iola took the opportunity to slip back to her place on the stairwell. As she watched the guests in their glittering finery take their leave at two o'clock in the morning, their cheeks flushed from the cold and the dancing and Phineas' best wine, she felt, suddenly, very apart from all of them.

-B-

It was inevitable, of course. They'd been expecting it – maybe even anticipating it – for more than thirteen years, but why did it have to happen now? Phineas' N.E.W.T.s were coming up, and Elladora's O.W.L.s too. Phineas stared down at the letter from Sister Rose Blanchett, the nurse he'd hired last year, offering her deepest condolences on the sad occasion of his mother's death, and all he felt was irritation.

Was he supposed to mourn her? He would have to put on a show of grief, for appearances were everything in the world of an aristocratic pure-blood. That was one of the hard lessons he'd learned as a naïve child coming to Hogwarts, because his mother hadn't taught him how to behave in a manner befitting his station. He'd had to carefully study the code of conduct that came so naturally to his peers, because she hadn't taught him anything.

It wasn't that he hated her. She'd never been cruel to him – she just hadn't been a presence in his life for far too long. If he were honest with himself (and Phineas was always honest with himself, however much he might dissemble to others), Ella Black's death would change very little about his life, and so it was hard to grieve her passing.

She'd died on the eighteenth of March. On the twentieth, Phineas and his sisters were allowed to Floo home from Headmistress Mole's office. Nurse Blanchett met them in the drawing room – which she didn't really have permission to enter, but he let it pass under the circumstances – and as house-elves bustled around them, taking their bags and promising to cook lunch, the three of them headed upstairs to their mother's room.

She'd been tiny in life, and in death she was smaller still. The sheets had been drawn up over her face, but the shrunken outline of her body was clearly visible beneath them. Her fair hair looked almost white against the black silk of the pillowcase.

Seeing the body, Iola, who'd been red-eyed and pale since getting the news, started to cry again: heaving, gulping sobs that echoed in the high-ceilinged bedroom. Elladora's face was still and composed. She met Phineas' eyes across the bed, and in her own there was a silent question: What do we do now?

They had important exams looming terrifyingly soon. They'd left school a week before the Easter holidays, and now they were all alone in the great house Phineas had tried so hard to modernise. There would be a will to be handled, and maybe they should contact their mother's family, although Phineas knew nothing about them beyond their name. He was eighteen years old and responsible for organising a funeral.

It was easy to blame his mother for that, too.