Thanks for the reviews on the last chapter!

This is mostly a transitional chapter, but that is because everything is winding up to go spang in a few chapters.

Chapter Twenty: The Earth Will Shake

Falco brushed dirt from his hands, and grimaced. As much magic as he possessed, as much useless time as he could avoid by bending it, the fact remained that some things could not be done save with manual labor. It was only a shame that this manual labor forced dirt under his fingernails and ground it into the creases of his palms.

He looked up sharply as a shadow passed overhead, then relaxed. It was only an owl, hunting prey. And why shouldn't it be? Evening was coming on.

Falco climbed carefully over the remains of a stone wall and slithered down a slight slope, then paused to look back. The moonlight gleamed faintly off—he could not call them ruins, not exactly. He would rather call them the remains of a house. It could be built up again, but for now, that would be counterproductive. Better to leave them exactly as they were, so that no one would suspect anything was wrong. Tampering with stones in a place where no one had a reason to come could attract the attention that Falco didn't want.

He was satisfied, for now. He had used a tactic of the Light, honesty, in approaching Harry and telling him what would happen if he didn't Declare. Now he had completed his use of a Dark tactic, done in subterfuge, to insure that Voldemort had a place to retreat to that would protect him from Harry's notice and Harry's magic. Falco was not entirely sure that the Dark Lord would trust him yet, or the promptings that Falco had tucked into his mind. But that was all right. For now, his current hiding place was certainly safe. Falco had prepared this one against his current hiding place being found out, which would happen sooner or later.

Now he would begin a tactic that was a mixture of Dark and Light, to keep the balance. He would let Harry know who was doing this to him, fulfilling honesty, but he would not let him know the purpose, fulfilling subterfuge. And the magic itself was as neutral as any magic could be, blending truth and deception together until the maker could not tell them apart.

Falco closed his eyes and separated his mind. On the surface of it, the sentry shard of consciousness floated, ready to alert him if anyone approached. Beneath the surface, his mind twisted and dived into the paths of Dark and Light.

The world ripped apart around him. He saw trails of dirt racing away, and black highways that climbed to the stars. He saw golden glowing steps that sang of Midsummer, and paved roads of white stone running in the brilliant light of noon. He touched the secrets of Dark and Light and felt them singing to him, trying to tempt him into Declaration.

Falco sighed. It may yet come to that, if I am to save the world. Depending on how slowly or quickly the Dark Lord recovered from his wound, it might yet come to that, yes. But Falco would do nothing hastily. He would study the situation, as he always did, and make sure that he didn't act out of temper. That was the problem with Harry, with Albus, with Tom—they all acted out of temper, and let their emotions control them. Falco had forsaken the need for such things long ago.

He walked along a black highway for a few paces, then leaped onto a golden staircase, and then down into a quiet place that streamed with gray mist. There, he lifted his hands and brought them together.

And a dream grew out between them. Dreams were said to be foretellings, visions of the truth to come, but they hid themselves in symbols and bedazzled the ones who dreamed them. Balanced magic, Falco thought. Neutral magic. He only wished there was more like this in the world.

He let the dream spiral up between his fingers, gathering strength and speed as he fed it power, and then hover in front of him. It looked like gray smoke aswarm with images, but most magic looked like gray smoke here.

Falco smiled, and breathed.

The dream turned and flew away, seeking Harry. Falco himself reunited the rest of his mind with the shard of consciousness that floated on the surface and grew sea eagle wings, springing for the sky. It was time for him to be on his way to his next effort to keep the balance.


Harry settled back in his chair and waited. He and Draco were both in NEWT Transfiguration, and this was the first chance he would have to see Henrietta teach—though he had heard only good things about her so far. Draco settled into the seat behind him, muttering and examining something. Harry turned his head, and frowned when he realized they were notes from the Animagus lesson they'd had with Peter last night.

"I don't think she'll let you study them in here," he whispered.

"She won't notice," Draco whispered back.

Harry glanced around the classroom, and raised his eyebrows. There weren't that many people in here. Hermione had qualified, of course, and so had Lavender Brown, Dean Thomas, and Seamus Finnigan. Harry recognized a few Ravenclaw girls from their year, but they understandably didn't try to catch Harry's eye. Zacharias sat in one corner, alternately pretending to read and scowling at Hermione's back. Hannah Abbott and Ernie Macmillan sat next to each other, but didn't say anything; Harry thought that must have to do with the Grand Unified Theory, since Hannah was Muggleborn and Ernie pureblood. Millicent had managed to qualify, but hadn't arrived for the class yet; Harry wondered if she'd overslept.

"I think Henrietta is going to notice," he told Draco.

Draco sighed and slid the notes back inside his book just as the door opened and Millicent arrived, panting. Henrietta was right behind her. Harry studied her face, then shook his head slightly. The glamour was perfect. Henrietta looked happy and approachable in ways she never had as herself, and even her walk seemed different, as if she'd Transfigured one leg to be slightly longer than the other.

Millicent sank into a seat behind them. Draco said something Harry couldn't hear, snickering, and Millicent responded with a snarled insult.

Then Henrietta stepped up to the front of the room and claimed all their attention. It was hard not to look at her, Harry found. He wondered if she had used a subtle spell, or if this was just the effect she usually had when she wasn't sitting in the middle of an alliance meeting and wanted to make herself look as if she were an obedient follower.

"My name is Hilda Belluspersona," said Henrietta. "You will, of course, call me Professor Belluspersona. You will also be on time for class." She didn't glance at Millicent, but she didn't need to, Harry thought; plenty of other people were doing it for her. "I understand that, last year, your Transfiguration education may not have given you all you need to know. This time, it will. I believe in demonstrations. I will Transfigure people in this class, and challenge them to change themselves or others back. I will change you back if no one can manage it by the end of the class, but that means ten points from the Houses of both the Transfigured student and the ones who tried and failed."

Harry blinked. Well, yes, that is rather different from the way McGonagall taught.

"We will begin with a revision of some basic concepts," said Henrietta. "I find myself doubting that you learned what you needed to know last year." She arched an eyebrow, and then turned and waved her wand at the board. Harry blinked again as it Transfigured into a gigantic scroll, with great golden lettering that everyone across the room could easily read. Hermione's quill scrabbled and scratched furiously as she scribbled the notes down.

"First," said Henrietta, "Transfiguration is the art of envisioning. You must know how many limbs a turtle has, and that it has a head, when you attempt to transform a teapot into one, but more than that, you should know the very pattern of the shell. You should know the gleam in its eye. You should be able to see how its toes splay, and the way it walks." She turned around and gave them all another severe look. "I suspect this was not taught to you last year, either, so we will be having lessons in learning how to see.

"Second, Transfiguration is the art of knowing limitations. Attempting to change a small creature into a large one will only exhaust you, and leave the creature in a half-transformed state. The Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes in the Ministry has a sub-committee devoted only to undoing botched Transfigurations. They are constantly busy. I will not have it said that any student who passed through my class made more work for them. Do you understand me?"

Harry found himself nodding along with all the rest. She's even sterner than McGonagall, but she does make her point. He couldn't remember if he'd known what Henrietta was saying before. Perhaps she simply explained it more clearly than McGonagall did, or the rotating team of other professors, McGonagall, and NEWT students who had taught Transfiguration last year.

"Third, Transfiguration is the art of common sense. It may be useful to turn the ground into ice beneath your enemies in battle—but, on the other hand, if you rush onto the ice without remembering to change your shoes into skates, you will have problems. Combined with the first two lessons, Transfiguration can be wielded as weapon, as tool, and as art. Otherwise, it will fail you, but the failure lies in yourself and not your wand." Henrietta's eyes glittered intensely, making her look the most like herself of anything Harry had seen so far.

Harry wrote the pointers frantically onto his parchment. I'm glad Edith did decide to go to France with a tutor after all. She would be terrified if she were here.

"There is one more note that I feel compelled to give you," Henrietta said, drawing her wand. "I know that some students are interested in becoming Animagi. If you intend to do so, you will study in private under myself, Headmistress McGonagall, or an approved and registered Animagus. This class will not include instructions on achieving a private animal form."

Harry looked around enough to surprise a look of disappointment on Hermione's face, but all the others seemed to have expected it. Draco just looked smug, anyway, despite the failure of his expectations that Henrietta wouldn't mind them studying their notes from Peter in her class.

"Now, we will begin with a small demonstration." Henrietta nodded to Harry. "If you will come here, Harry. I shall Transfigure your hand to wood, and let the others try to change it back."

Harry nodded and stood up, grateful beyond words that Henrietta didn't intend to favor him above the other students just because they were in an alliance together.


Peter smoothed his robes down and wondered if he could confide his intense nervousness to anyone. Minerva, perhaps, but she was so busy that she didn't have time for a private talk right now. And she had had faith in his teaching abilities when she hired him, so she would only tell him that of course he would be a good Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, insist he stand up and go teach, and then shove him out her office door as she turned her attention to something else.

He could probably talk to Harry, but since he had Harry in his first Defense class in the next few minutes, that struck him as a bit of an unfair tactic.

He told himself to move away from the mirror, that no one would notice a few creases of worry on his face amid the lines that age and worry had already put there, and then found the perfect excuse as someone knocked on the door. Peter felt his breathing ease as he approached it, grabbing the list of names and his textbook on the way. Someone had probably come to him with a problem, and now that he was out of the Sanctuary, he found it easier to help other people than to think constantly about his own fears. They ran in circles, anyway. Peter had to break the circle before he could do anything productive with them.

He opened the door, and blinked. Connor stood there, staring anxiously up at him. Connor's name was also on the list in his hand, and Peter would have expected him to be already hurrying to the classroom.

"Connor?" he asked.

Connor swallowed and nodded. "I know Defense is about to start," he said. "I—can I speak to you on the way? It's about something important that I know I can't discuss with Harry yet."

"Of course." Peter locked the door to his quarters behind him with a nonverbal spell, and then began walking up the corridor. Connor struggled to keep up. He was in that awkward stage of growth where his torso seemed to have finished but his legs hadn't quite settled yet, Peter thought.

Connor still wasted almost a quarter of the journey—Peter had timed the distance between the Defense classroom and his own quarters very precisely yesterday—worrying his lip between his teeth. At last, though, he said, "I had an argument with Harry over Malfoy yesterday."

Peter simply nodded. That much had been obvious to anyone who watched the boys' faces in the Great Hall last night. "What was the argument about?"

"Malfoy came into my room and started insulting me about how loudly I was packing," Connor said. "I, um, I said some things that were probably really insulting, about how I would have thought he would get used to the way halfbloods packed, seeing as he was already sharing the house and a bed with one. I told him to stop being a hypocrite, and that everyone else could see the way he crowed about pureblood superiority was a sham, since Harry is his boyfriend. Harry came in and got angry at me, and told me that I had to apologize to Malfoy, not him. I didn't want to, though, and so I didn't say anything. Why should I offer a fake apology?" Connor now scowled, and had left off chewing his lower lip entirely. His mulish expression reminded Peter forcibly of James, and the way he would look when he was sixteen and having a fight with Sirius. Sirius was much more likely to laugh it off, though, or play a prank on James and use that to get him to laugh. James did this kind of thing. "I think apologizing should wait until I really mean it."

"That's true," said Peter solemnly. They were almost at the classroom now, but he saw students still pouring into it, so he felt comfortable taking Connor and urging him gently to the side. He told himself it was not because his vision had blurred and his stomach felt shaky. It was only coincidence that this would delay his getting into the classroom for a few minutes more. "But you might want to consider the situation more closely, Connor, and whether you can offer a true apology based on other things."

Connor folded his arms. James in miniature, Peter thought, and gently tucked away the pang that memory brought him. "What other things?"

"Draco did something childish," said Peter. "But you reacted in a childish fashion. Given that you didn't start the fight—"

"I didn't—"

"You might be able to say that you were sorry because of the way you reacted. You're the more grown one, aren't you?" Connor nodded fervently, of course. It was Peter's private opinion that Draco had managed to file off more of his own warts than Connor had, but that the ones left were uglier than Connor's, and Harry made it worse by indulging his boyfriend. It wouldn't do to say that to Harry's brother, however. "So the way you reacted is unworthy of you. You can apologize for that. And you can apologize for letting something so silly as an insult about your packing rattle your composure at all. Those are both things to feel sincerely sorry for."

"But," said Connor, and stopped.

Peter waited, careful to show no signs of impatience, though the time when he should begin the Defense class was getting close. He had mastered this art in his seventh year, when he had managed his own slow, painful transformation from fawning sycophant to his friends to someone stronger and better. Neither Sirius nor James had been the kind of person who responded well to the slightest sign of disinterest.

"But," Connor said, every word dragged out of him as if on a fishhook, "Parvati said that it was Harry's fault. That he should have made sure we reconciled right then and there, instead of leaving the issue to fester between us."

Peter smiled. "And what would you have felt if Harry had urged you to reconcile right then and there?"

Connor ducked his head, in that way James had when he didn't want to admit he was wrong. His fringe fell over his heart-shaped scar, and he looked like any ordinary teenage boy, angry and sullen.

"Connor?" Peter prompted after a moment.

"Pushed," Connor told the floor.

Peter nodded. "Exactly. Harry might have asked you how you felt, but if you tell him nothing, then I think he's right in assuming that you have nothing to say to him yet. It's rather like the situation with Severus—"

Connor looked up with wide, horrified hazel eyes. "I am nothing like Snape."

Peter ignored him, because that wasn't the point right now. "Who is upset with whatever Camellia said to him, but won't tell Harry why. Nor will he tell Harry about his dreams. He wants the perfect understanding that can only come when Harry knows all the nuances and details of the situation, but to have that perfect understanding, he would need to give the words away. He doesn't want to." He nodded at Connor, whose face had folded up into another scowl. "That sounds to me like what you're doing. You have a perspective on the situation that Harry doesn't. But for him to know what that perspective is, you need to talk to him. Otherwise, he has only your actions to judge by."

Connor muttered something that sounded uncomplimentary, though Peter couldn't tell whether it was aimed at him, or Harry, or Draco, or even Snape, and then ducked into the Defense classroom. Peter shook his head and focused on the task at hand, but part of his mind remained on Connor's predicament even as he strode to the front of the room, dwelling there with both amusement and sympathy.

Why would anyone think that someone else could understand their mind perfectly if they don't speak that mind?

He placed the textbook on the desk, smiled at his students, and found that most of his nervousness had blown away like mist. That always happened. Focusing on someone else's problems was a good thing, though Harry hadn't yet learned the balance he needed to when doing it.

"Welcome to NEWT Defense Against the Dark Arts," he began. "My name is Professor Pettigrew…"


"Because she just arrived at the school today," said Harry, pushing open the door to the abandoned classroom where McGonagall had told him that Syrinx was waiting to meet him. He hesitated a moment, considering whether he could add what he wanted to say next, and then decided to, because if he couldn't joke with Draco, who could he joke with? "Obviously."

"She should have arrived at the start of term like everyone else," said Draco, and didn't seem to notice the whine his tone was taking on. "Why wouldn't she have?"

"Why don't we ask her that?" Harry said, and stepped into the classroom.

The girl sitting on a chair and looking out the window turned to face him. Harry scrutinized her carefully. He would have known at once that she was a Gloryflower, he thought; he had never seen hair that golden and curly on anyone who wasn't Laura or her niece Delilah, one of three children of prominent Light families Fenrir Greyback had bitten. Her eyes were green, however, not the yellow typical of pureblood Light families. She also had only a few bells in her hair, while both Delilah and Augustus Starrise, trained as war witches or wizards, had worn far more. Harry supposed it was because she hadn't yet completed her training.

She rose to her feet and bowed. Harry took in the efficient movement, the way her eyes regarded them without challenge or surprise, the lack of emotion on her face, and felt a tension he barely noticed most of the time relax. She's like me, or Doncan. Trained as a guardian. Capable of putting aside personal emotion and doing what needs to be done.

"Hello," he said. "You're Syrinx Gloryflower?"

"I am, sir." Syrinx examined him right back. Harry wondered what exactly she was seeing. "Come to swear to you."

Harry glanced back at the classroom door. Draco stood there, staring at Syrinx as if he were trying to cope with the sudden and unexpected change from—whatever he had been expecting. Behind him were Michael and Owen. Both had their arms held out so that the lightning-shaped scars on them were prominent. Harry winced and looked back at Syrinx.

"You understand the constraints of doing so?" he said softly. "That you must swear oaths to me, but that you can't simply attack anyone who threatens me? That this is a test of judgment and rationality?"

"Of course I do, sir," said Syrinx, a faint frown crossing her forehead. "That is part of the reason I wished to come and serve you. A trained war witch would never react out of emotions as irrationally and hastily as a Death Eater, but I am not yet fully trained, and I need more testing."

"Forgive me," Harry said, "but the only war wizard I knew well was Augustus Starrise, and he did not impress me as a paragon of rationality."

Syrinx's face cleared. "He would not, sir," she said. "His anchor broke."

"Anchor?" Harry didn't know that much about what war witches and wizards trained to do, but it sounded as though it were more involved than he had imagined.

Syrinx nodded. "Many war witches choose an anchor, sir, unless they're truly able to go through life alone. That person becomes an image in their minds, a reminder of their duty, their restraint in moments when they might lose their temper. Augustus Starrise's anchor was his sister. When she died, then his rationality broke, and he used his training for purposes it should not be used for.

"I don't know yet if you would make a good anchor for me, sir, because I do not know if you are likely to survive the war. But I wanted to swear to you. I wish to help defend you. As my training continues, I may come to see more in you than I see at present. And if the war finishes and you are still alive, then I will approach you and ask you to do me the honor of becoming my anchor. From the tales my cousin Laura tells of you, you are already someone I can admire." She drew a knife smoothly from a pocket of her robe, where it had rested without Harry noticing it, and laid it along her left arm, watching him all the while.

Harry relaxed some more. He appreciated how honest she was, and her reasoning made perfect sense to him. Syrinx was a solider. That much would have been clear even if she didn't call him "sir" all the time.

He understood people like this. He had been one until a short time ago, and in his better moments, when he could plan and think instead of simply acting on his feelings, he still often was. He almost envied Syrinx her duty, that everyone accepted her commitment to her path and wouldn't try to talk her out of following it. If things had been different…if no one had found me out…

But things had changed, they had found out, and Harry had long since reconciled himself to the consequences. He watched as Syrinx cut her left arm, and listened to her words, her voice clear and strong, her eyes fixed on him and never wavering. He didn't think he'd seen her blink yet. He wondered if part of her training as a war witch included imitating cats.

"I pledge my loyalty to you," she said, "as the Sunrise Guard did, as the Horns of the Morning did, as the Bringers of Hope did." Harry supposed it was only reasonable that she would choose the names of companions of Light Lords and Ladies, rather than Dark ones, as Owen and Michael had. "As guard, as courtier, as courier, as running hound, as whatever you need me to be, then I am yours, for the honor of serving someone so honorable."

"The pledge is accepted, and to you I return guarantees of protection, loyalty, and constancy. While I live, you shall never lack for a guardian, a champion, or a friend." Harry gave the oath with more confidence than he had when he delivered it to Owen and Michael. Then, of course, he had not expected such a swearing, and he had wondered why anyone would want to accompany him in the first place. Now he was used to it. Besides, he understood Syrinx's reasons better than most. If it was part of her path, then of course she would do it.

"An honor to be beside you, sir," said Syrinx, smiling for the first time. Harry had the feeling that it wasn't something she did often. "The oath is true." She shifted her arm, and the white lightning bolt scar appeared where the cut had been, a moment ago. She slipped the knife back into her pocket, drew her wand, and tapped the cut, murmuring a spell Harry hadn't heard before. It Vanished the blood.

"Have you been Sorted?" Harry asked her, wondering if he would share a House with her as he did with Owen. Michael was in Ravenclaw, and spent most of his time with that House, so far, when he didn't join his brother in guarding Harry. Draco hadn't yet noticed that Michael's eyes followed him quite a bit of the time. Harry wondered why not.

"I have," said Syrinx. "The Hat placed me in Hufflepuff. Understandable, of course, as I value hard work and loyalty." Draco snorted. Syrinx didn't even look at him. "Did you have a command for me, sir?"

"Only to familiarize yourself with Hogwarts, for now," said Harry. "I wouldn't want you to be left behind in your classes, or to get lost if I should need you in a hurry." Those were words he wouldn't have, quite, dared to speak to Owen and Michael, but he would have appreciated them when he was still mostly a guardian, and he knew they were the right ones for Syrinx. Her face brightened into another pale, distant smile.

"Yes, sir," she murmured. "I am in sixth year, and have passed my OWLs, but I would not mind more time to know the school." She bowed her head and kept it bowed for a long moment, then turned and strode to the door. Draco made another sound in his throat, but Syrinx didn't look back at him as she vanished.

"She was strange," said Draco flatly.

Harry shrugged. "That must be what someone in the throes of the war training is like, Draco. I know Augustus had violent emotions, but his anchor was broken. Delilah has emotions, but she's passed through the whole thing." He took Draco's hand and squeezed it, wondering why Draco looked so desolate. He had told Draco, and meant it, that there was no way Syrinx could have more of his attention than his partner did, sworn companion or not, and having met her, Harry wouldn't have wished to interfere in her training the way that excessive attention would have done in any case. He liked her and wished her well, and the best way to do that was to let her go about her business in the shadows. "We've met someone in the middle."

Draco grunted for a moment, staring at his feet, and then looked up abruptly at Harry. "I'm going to study my notes on Animagus training," he said. "Are you coming?"

Harry shook his head. "I'm afraid not. I have to talk to the werewolves again." He restrained a sigh. He would have preferred it if the pack had chosen Camellia alpha, or let him appoint her. But they had wanted to keep him, and Harry had accepted the responsibility. He couldn't complain now. At least he had taught them the Rosier-Henlin phoenix song spell, so they didn't have to rely on owls to communicate with him. They did want to talk to him every evening, though.

"Hmm," said Draco, and turned his back. Harry took him gently by the shoulder.

"Are you all right?" he asked. He would not let his bond with Draco become the morass his bonds with Snape and Connor had of late. For both his sake and Draco's, Harry intended to talk about what was bothering them.

"I am," said Draco firmly, and that was that.

"Will you let Michael go with you?" Harry asked quietly. Perhaps it was silly, but he couldn't forget that Shield of the Granian and the Unspeakables had aimed at Draco first.

"If he must," said Draco. Harry saw Michael's eyes light up. He shook his head, and watched as his sworn companion followed his boyfriend away.

"My brother has a crush on your partner, you know," Owen said, when he was obviously sure that both Michael and Draco were out of earshot.

Harry nodded to him. "I know. But Draco hasn't realized it yet."

Owen raised his eyebrows. "And you don't mind?"

Harry tipped his hand back and forth. "It's not that I don't mind, it's that—I don't know, that I trust Draco? I can see him flirting with Michael to make me jealous. I can't see him seriously returning Michael's affections. I'm sorry, he's your brother and wonderfully level-headed, but—"

"It's more than all right," Owen said calmly. "You and Draco have between you a version of what was between our parents."

Harry swallowed, nodding. He still missed Charles Rosier-Henlin. Owen had told Harry about finding his father's charred bones. He had worked a spell that killed himself and two Death Eaters, one of whom was Karkaroff. Owen could only guess why, but said that a threat to his children from Karkaroff would have done it.

"Did I tell you," said Owen, "that our mother is pregnant again?"

Harry laughed, his mood turned around again immediately. "That's wonderful! If you did tell me, I can't remember."

"She is," said Owen. "She conceived just before the battle, so the child won't be born until next year, but Michael and I will have a little sibling at last. It was something our parents wanted—badly."

Harry questioned Owen more about Medusa's pregnancy as he went back to the Slytherin common room to communicate with the werewolves in relative privacy. It made a wonderful distraction from Connor, from Snape, from the fact that he knew Camellia would plead with him to come back for a visit this weekend, and from the fact that he had so far received only cold refusals from the Department for the Control and Suppression of Deadly Beasts in response to his attempts to help them.


Draco was now aware that Michael Rosier-Henlin was staring at him. They were alone, and Michael wasn't standing behind his older twin the way he often did.

What Draco hadn't figured out yet was why. The reflected glory of the Malfoy line? The reflected glory of being Harry's partner? The fact that Draco was beautiful and confident, and knew both things?

They sat at a table in the library while Draco studied his notes on envisioning one's Animagus form, something he was still infuriatingly unable to. Most of the tables around them were crowded with students doing homework. Draco sniffed. He'd moved that out of the way already, so he could concentrate on more important matters. You would think that all of them except the first-years would have noticed by now that the professors always give more homework the first week of the year, and adapted accordingly, instead of waiting until Friday afternoon.

Draco yawned and stretched his arms above his head. It gave him the perfect excuse to almost close his eyes, but keep them open just enough to see where Michael's stare went. Sure enough, it slid up his arms. Draco concealed a smirk. It's solely the way he evaluates me, then.

He leaned back, and scowled slightly at the notes. Michael immediately leaned forward. "Is there something you need help with?"

Draco tilted his head, letting his hair slip down his cheek. "Well. You see, I'm studying to become an Animagus, but I can't seem to master envisioning the transformation, even though I did well enough at Transfiguration on my OWLs. I wondered if you knew any techniques that might help me. You did attend Durmstrang, after all."

Michel hesitated, then nodded. "There's one thing we learned that might be useful," he said. "Maybe a Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher here mentioned it, but we learned it in the regular Dark Arts courses."

Draco moved his tie around as though he were hot, revealing his pulse point, and reveling in the way that Michael couldn't seem to take his eyes off it. "What is it, then?"

"A—meditation, or a cousin of it, so that the Dark Arts don't corrupt your mind," Michael whispered. His dark eyes had gone wide, and he didn't seem to realize how obvious he was being. Draco concealed his amusement and delight. Harry still regarded him too rarely with looks of sheer physical desire; he was more interested in what Draco said and did and thought. "We would separate out what we wanted to see from what was actually there, inside our heads."

"I ought to be able to make use of that," Draco mused. "I've studied my own thoughts enough, to understand my possession gift."

"Possession gift?" Michael's eyes widened further.

Draco nodded. "Yes. A rather wonderful gift, I think, though not one that I can brag about. I can read the thoughts of others, and control their bodies if I want." He drawled that out, watching as the fascination on the other boy's face simultaneously deepened and became mixed with panic. "It was what finally convinced my father to confirm me as magical heir."

Michael blinked. "I—I see."

Draco smirked at him, and then looked back at his notes. "Now, what were you saying about this technique that you learned at Durmstrang?"

He listened carefully as Michael explained. It didn't sound that difficult, though it did involve giving thoughts their own shapes—as animals, as clouds, or as natural formations, mostly—and pushing them gently out of the way. It sounded a great deal like Occlumency training, in fact, at least the kind Snape had given Harry. Draco thought he could master it in no time.

He responded, but let his mind wander away, circling around the problem that had settled there for hours now: Syrinx Gloryflower.

He honestly didn't think Harry would be attracted to her. It wasn't her face he feared. It was her mind. She had been a guardian, a soldier. Harry had been like her. Draco had seen a too-familiar expression on Harry's face when Syrinx spoke up in that calm, austere manner she had. It was the look of longing he wore when he thought about how much he wanted to go back to being a defender, rather than a leader—the look he had worn last year when Voldemort cursed him to spend time in a dream-world he wouldn't want to come back from, and Harry had dreamed himself into a Hogwarts where everyone ignored him unless he could be of practical use.

Draco wondered if that would happen now. Syrinx might not mean to, but she shared a connection with Harry that Draco never would, rather like his brother, and she could nudge Harry back in the direction of his training.

Draco decided firmly that he wouldn't let that happen. It would be subtle, but he would keep an eye on Syrinx. At the same time, he would be starting his subtle plan to take revenge on Potter, and play with Michael.

I am going to be busy, he thought, as he gave Michael a warm smile and pretended he didn't notice his reaction. Good thing that my parents raised me to attend to several things simultaneously.


Lucius put the finishing touch on his letter and softly called Julius, the great horned owl he kept to deliver truce-dance gifts and other messages of extreme importance. Julius had consented to be Lucius's messenger to the Unspeakables without fuss. He seemed to find something important about flying directly to the most notorious, and dangerous, Department in the Ministry. He extended his leg now, and flew out the window of the Manor the moment Lucius finished binding on the envelope.

Lucius knew the answer would come in the form of another piece of gray parchment with an hourglass sigil, probably placed discreetly under his door, on the table beside his bed, or another place where Narcissa would be unlikely to discover it. He could not respond in the same way, and he did not know how the Unspeakables were reaching him so directly. He had to trust that they would not harm him.

He could feel himself smile, though he knew the expression would look more like a snarl to any observer. Or, rather, trust in the Manor's wards to protect me if they ever do try to harm me.

He hoped the Unspeakables would accept his latest offer. He had led up to this little by little, making reasonable requests he knew would be denied, asking questions he knew wouldn't be answered, and suggesting delicately that he feared for his life and influence over Harry if Harry discovered what he was conspiring at. The Unspeakables had responded as Lucius hoped. They would use what he had finally offered to distract Harry so thoroughly that he would be busy dealing with the consequences of the offer, not who had made it.

Lucius was sorry to do it; he would not have if the Unspeakables had not approached him, because then there would never have been the chance of Harry finding out about the torture of his parents and the subduing of Auror Mallory. And he knew that it violated the terms of the Alliance of Sun and Shadow, and if Harry found out, he would drain his magic.

But that only made it more exciting. And besides, with this person firmly removed from the Alliance, then Lucius's influence over Harry could only grow.

He let his gaze go to the front page of the Prophet, and narrow. The anti-werewolf hysteria had finally subsided enough, as they moved into the second week of September, for the news about the Grand Unified Theory that supposedly proved purebloods were inferior to Mudbloods to return. And now Thomas Rhangnara was suggesting that there really was nothing purebloods could do to control the magic in their children. In fact, he said, magic responded badly to most forms of restriction. It respected the choices of mothers, it respected bloodline to a certain extent and the place and time the child was born and a few dozen other factors, but it wanted to have its own will, too. It came especially to those individuals who showed through their lives that they valued freedom.

Ridiculous, Lucius thought. If that were true, my father would never have become magical at all.

But that only made him remember the claims that Abraxas was halfblood, infused with what Rhangnara chose to call "hybrid vigor," and that only made him murderous once more. Lucius rose to his feet and paced towards his library.

He knew killing Rhangnara would do little good. It was too likely to reveal him, and in any case, there were many other "research wizards" willing to claim the same nonsense that Rhangnara believed.

But Lucius knew a certain set of spells that could make Rhangnara retract what he had said. And some spread like a disease; those Rhangnara argued with would be more likely to begin believing his new version. Start a split in the so-far-united ranks of those studying the Grand Unified Theory, and others would doubt.

The spells were dangerous, powerful, and difficult to work properly, but Lucius intended to try them.

He will be quiet, our family will be free from the taint of Mudblood heritage, and my influence over Harry will increase as Rhangnara's star falls. There is no battlefield on which I do not win.


Warmth. Darkness. Confinement. Comfort. She did not want to rise. Why should she? She was comfortable where she was.

But a prickle on her left side kept waking her up, like the sudden stab of a thorn through her flesh. She remembered the oath she had sworn, the debt she owed. She sighed, and at last she stretched her arms and woke.

Dirt shifted above her. Tendrils tore around her, birthing her suddenly back into light brighter than any she had seen in months. She shook her head and raked dirt out of her hair and eyes with carefully moving fingers. Her eyes watered and ran with the light, but they adjusted quickly.

Indigena Yaxley blinked and looked down at herself. She smiled slightly as she saw that the shadow of plants under her skin was no longer faint. Now she looked like a construct of blossoms, bushes, and leaves wrapped in a human form that could burst at any moment. The thorny rose wrapped around her wrist, the poison of which could kill in a few hours, had sprouted more thorns and dug in further, even as the petals turned a deeper blood-red. The flower rustled and lifted in response to her gaze. Indigena nodded. As if it had spoken to her, she knew how else it had changed. It was more sentient now, and the poison it delivered through its thorns would kill in a few minutes instead of a few hours.

That was a common trait of all the magic she bore, she found, when she examined the rest of her body. The long slumber underground had changed her, indeed, but not only physically. She felt more connected to the plants she had put into her skin, and to the great gardens and greenhouses of Thornhall, as if they and she together formed an ecosystem of their own. Her brown-blonde hair had streaks of vines, now, and she knew that her dark eyes probably had no pupil, only a drowning well into green. Thorns on thin tendrils wrapped her shoulders, glittering silver projections that slid into sheaths within her skin like claws. Indigena willed them to lash in front of her, and they did, with frightening speed and quickness, impaling the remains of the cocoon she had used to recover from Hawthorn Parkinson's blood curses.

The only part of her unchanged was the Dark Mark on her left arm, and it called her now. Her Lord had need of her. As Indigena was the only Death Eater he had trusted with the knowledge of his secret resting place, she wasn't at all surprised. The rest of the Death Eaters had probably died in the assault on Hogwarts. She suspected that she would die, too, before all was done.

But none of that mattered to the debt of honor she owed, and none of that mattered to the instructions her Lord had given her for this eventuality.

She spent a moment stroking the plants that had cradled her, giving them instructions to regrow the cocoon in case she ever had need of it again. Then she strode rapidly into her house, nodding in approval as she found it bereft of dust thanks to the house elves, and retrieved several objects.

One was a roll of parchment, with a Never-Ending inkwell attached to it. Indigena had often found need of it, and that would be especially true in the coming months.

Another was a Pensieve. Her Lord would want to study the battle, and whatever had happened afterwards, so that it could not happen again.

Another was a list of names. Karkaroff and the other Continental Death Eaters had made contact with many, many people in various countries of Europe who had shown some interest in supporting the Dark Lord. Not all of them had received Voldemort's personal approval to become Death Eaters, and not all would, Indigena knew. Some only wanted to join for money, or because they felt the Light was growing too powerful in their own homes, or because they were fearful of the sheer concentration of Lord-level power in Britain and wanted to disrupt it. But any number of them could be useful.

Another was the set of books she had found to have information on Falco Parkinson. He was an enemy to her and her Lord, no matter what he might do to aid them. Indigena was determined to stop him, once she found out what he had achieved in the few months she had been underground.

And last but not least was an ancient book her Lord had last discussed with her a few days before the assault on Hogwarts. Indigena did not know how her grandmother had come to have possession of it, but she had, and it had been treasured just as all dangerous and beautiful objects were treasured among the Yaxleys.

Its cover said Odi et Amo in tiny letters. Indigena blew the dust off it, and placed it carefully into her trunk.

Then she shrank the trunk and went to give final instructions to her house elves. It didn't take long. They were well-trained and obedient, and the more willing to serve her because Indigena had always treated them well. She didn't see the point to some of the mindless cruelties her peers indulged in.

Then she was on her way, stepping out of Thornhall to take in the wide sweep of moor beyond. It was a misty day in early September, the sun barely peering through a mass of silver. The primary colors were gray and green and brown. Indigena took a deep breath, smelled all the things growing, and felt her heart swell.

I will die, she thought, because everyone does. But first I'll live.

She walked a few steps on the moors, absorbing the sunlight and loving it, before she Apparated to her Lord's side.