Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.

18: Pointing Fingers

" We are all crystal clear, then, about what is expected of us this afternoon?" Minister for Magic Kingsley Shacklebolt concluded as the assembled Aurors and Obliviators began to murmur to one another about the upcoming raid that day. When nobody voiced any questions, the Minister concluded: "Excellent. All matters relating to the Brunswick case will hence forth be discussed with me personally. We shall see to it that this man is caught swiftly and without a fuss so that the Auror Department might focus on more pressing matters." He paused to glance around at the crowd of witches and wizards before him, before giving a sharp nod, opening his mouth to proclaim: dismissed, only for the word to be cut off by the sound of a door behind him being flung violently open as a hysterical voice shrieked:

"...WON'T SIT HERE AND LISTEN TO THESE RIDICULOUSLY UNFOUNDED ACCUSATIONS!"

A murmured voice said something in return, only to be interrupted by the first voice shrieking:

"I DIDN'T GIVE HIM THE INVISIBILITY CLOAK!"

As the Aurors and Obliviators all turned to stare at the entrance tot he Head of Aurors' office, Rovena Luga came storming out into the office, only to swing around to look back into the room, shrieking:

"HOW CAN THE MINISTRY PUT YOU IN CHARGE OF A CASE LIKE THIS?! THE WORLD'S GONE STARK RAVING MAD! MAYBE IF THAT EXPLOSION HAD FINISHED YOU OFF THEY MIGHT'VE CAUGHT HIM ALREADY!"

A collective sharp intake of breath was drawn from the watching crowd at large, but the young witch merely gave a frustrated little shriek before turning and storming off towards the exit, seemingly oblivious to the people staring at her. As the double doors to the office swung shut behind her, the Acting Head of Aurors appeared in her office doorway, expression one of only mild irritation.

"I do believe that makes this interview terminated." she observed to nobody in particular, before glancing round at the assembled people, picking one at random. "Finn! Would you kindly send Pandora through to see me? Cup of tea might be nice, too..." And with that she turned stiffly around and retreated back into the office.

Out in the corridor, Pandora Lupin's silent contemplation of her shoes was abruptly interrupted by the sound of the doors to Auror Headquarters being flung open, and the girl looked up to see Rovena Luga come stumbling out into the corridor, her cheeks flushed vivid pink as she came to an abrupt halt, reaching to grasp fistsfuls of hair in her fists.

And with that, the witch burst into tears.

Pandora watched in astonishment, feeling her grandfather beside her reach to press a comforting hand to her knee, as Valbona Luga rose abruptly from her chair to rush over to her niece. The pair began a garbled exchange in their native tongue, and Pandora shifted uneasily in her chair, only to jump a little when the ahlf-giant's eyes widened quite madly and within the blink of an eye she had stomped across the corridor to throw the doors open again with a furious shout of:

"DORA!"

Pandora made to stand and rush after the Albanian, only for her grandfather's grip upon her knee to tighten.

"Stay put, Sweetheart." the werewolf murmured as Rovena Luga sucked in a deep, calming breath that seemed to do her unfathomable wonders, leaving her to hastily begin to swipe the tears from her eyes, and Pandora found herself positively glowering at the woman.

In return, Rovena Luga smirked.

After a brief pause, despite his warnings, Remus rose stiffly to his feet and went to peer around the office door, and, unable to stand the sight of Rovena for a moment longer, his granddaughter followed him.

"Congratulations," she hissed at Rovena as she passed. "You've got her wrapped around your little finger! If you think it'll do the blindest bit of good, you're wrong!"

"Bit like you and our dear Jeffrey, then." Rovena retorted under her breath, and Pandora sucked in a deep breath to snap something suitably venomous in return, only for Remus' voicce to call sharply:

"Pandora."

For a man who was really quite deaf, his granddaughter mused sourly as she strode after him, Remus seemed to catch wind of trouble with barely a few syllables.

Pandora followed Remus into the office and as they weaved their way through the cubicles and desks, none of the Aurors or other Ministry staff seemed to take the blindest bit of notice of them, for they were too busy staring in astonishment at Valbona's stormy beeline towards the Head of Aurors' office.

"Is anybody going to stop her?" Finn Grover uttered in an undertone to Albert Diggory as Remus and Pandora passed them, and the older Auror, no doubt recalling the last time he had drawn a wand on the three times National Duelling Champion, gave a rather uncertain:

"Well...!"

"I'm sure Tonks has it covered." Xander Pikket muttered, apparently recalling something quite similar, and with that they watched Valbona burst into the office, making the hinges shudder.

Dora Lupin did not so much as flinch at the intrusion. Indeed, she had been waiting for it.

"Let me get my wand, first." she told the furious half-giant as she leant wearily back in her chair. "It's bad manners to try and hex me if I'm unarmed, you know..."

"You make false accusations!" Rovena bellowed, face tinged purple in her rage. "You know it is lies!"

"It's a logical line of inquiry, Val." Dora insisted calmly. "You'd know that if you weren't utterly blinded by the fact that she's your niece..."

"She is a good girl!"

"She's a self-absorbed, opportunistic little liar, Valbona! Anyone with half a brain can see it! Everyone except for you, obviously..."

"You call me stupid?!" Valbona boomed, eyes widening madly, slamming her hands down upon the desk so that she could lean and glower down at the metamorphmagus. "How dare you!"

Dora sighed heavily, folding her arms across her chest.

"Come on, Val," she said imploringly, "don't be like this, you know how it works! If she's such a good girl, nothing will come of it! Let's not have a falling out over it, it's not worth it..."

"You threaten her!"

"I did no such thing..."

"You frighten her!"

"It's a bloody interrogation, Valbona!"

"You ruin her!"

"For Merlin's sake...!"

"Papers hear about it she be ruined! And it is all lies!"

"We don't deal with the press like that. Anybody leaking anything to the press will be sacked on the spot, we don't put up with that sort of nonsense..."

"She is scapegoat! You tell lies about her! So they stop telling bad things about Pandora!"

Dora felt white hot anger drain the colour from her face.

"Excuse me?" she said, hands reaching to grip the arms of her chair until her knuckles too were marble white. "What precisely are you accusing me of now?!"

Valbona opened and closed her mouth, apparently choking on her words.

"You...you not...not what I think!" she complained, drawing in a deep, composing breath so that when she spoke again her voice was the cold, blunt sound that Dora had associated with her during their younger years. "I trusted you. I save your life. I trust you with everything but you betray me!"

"Then you need to take a fresh look at the world and see it for what it really is." Dora insisted, reaching to snatch up her cane and setting about heaving herself up onto her feet, knees trembling in protest. "I'm not the one betraying you, Val, Rovena is!"

"No!"

"Yes. Do yourself a favour and stay well away from her, she's bad news..."

"That boy bad news! He force this trouble on her, it is not her fault!"

"You need to leave. Technically you're trespassing, I don't want you getting yourself arrested, you've stormed in here in front of the Minister for Magic, for Merlin's sake..."

"I not leaving!"

"Oh?"

"No! I not leave until you admit you are lying!"

"What good would that do?" Dora asked, struggling out from behind the desk and gesturing towards the door. "Come on..."

"Tear up papers!" Valbona demanded, gesturing to the paperwork upon the desk with a saucepan-sized hand that almost sent the parchment in question flying, and Dora failed to suppress a huff of laughter.

"Don't be ridiculous, Val."

"I mean it! You do it now!"

"Or what?" Dora wondered, entirely nonplussed by this threat. "Are you going to Obliviate me for good measure? I do wonder if that's what she's done to you, actually, because..." the Acting Head of Aurors was cut off mid-sentence when in one swift movement Valbona whipped the wand from her pocket and in one furious swipe blasted the papers to cinders with a loud bang!

Dora's mouth fell open in shock as the sound a small stampede sounded from outside and Aurors flooded into the room to investigate, their wands all drawn.

"You idiot...!" Dora whispered, staring at the papers' smouldering remains. "Are you out of your bloody mind?!"

Valbona, wand gingerly shoved back into her pocket, looked equally as shocked at herself. Nevertheless she managed to muster the fury to shoot Dora a scowl, insisting:

"You betray me. I hate you!"

"Boss...?" one of the Aurors called uncertainly as the Minister for Magic came to a halt in the doorway, flanked by Remus and Pandora, and Dora stared at Valbona for a long moment before giving herself a little shake.

"Auror Grover?" she said, with barely a glance sideways at the young Auror, who looked somewhat startled to be addressed.

"Yes, Boss?"

"Kindly escort Ms Luga off Ministry premises, she's trespassing."

Finn Grover looked positively mortified.

"Um...me, Boss?" he attempted to clarify, no doubt hoping that the Acting Head of Aurors had picked him by mistake, and Dora was about to sigh heavily when Valbona gave a booming huff of amusement, the sound positively dripping with arrogance.

"Him?" she said, sounding almost insulted, only for Dora to briskly insist:

"I don't give a toss which one of you does it, I want her out of here! Go on, hurry up!"

"I not leaving." Valbona insisted stubbornly, shooting the assembled Aurors a distinctly challenging look, and they began to mumble reluctantly to one another, looking around their ranks for a brave volunteer.

"Ridiculous." Dora grunted as Valbona began to chuckle, only for the entire room to go suddenly quiet when within the blink of an eye Dora had snatched out her wand and taken precise aim at Valbona's face.

Valbona, possibly yet more shocked than the assembled Aurors, stared at the wand, her eyes widening.

"Get out." Dora instructed simply, gripping the thin shaft of wood resolutely, and Valbona's face contorted into a scowl as she muttered:

"You wouldn't."

"I'll put you in hospital." Dora informed her bluntly. "Now get out."

Valbona gave an uncharacteristically uncertain laugh.

"You funny." she said, fingers toying with the opening of her pocket where she had stored her own wand a moment earlier. "Let me get my wand, yes? It rude to hex me when I am unarmed."

"By all means, draw your wand and crush me like a bug." Dora smiled, and as Valbona reached into her pocket, the Acting Head of Aurors wondered: "Do they really not have cockroaches in Albania?"

Valbona grinned.

As she watched the half-giant slowly draw the wand from her pocket and raise it to point at her grandmother squarely between the eyes, Pandora reached to grasp hold of Remus by the elbow.

"What are they doing?!" she whispered in panic as the two witches stared at one another challengingly, just as Albert Diggory leant towards Xander Pikket to whisper:

"What d'you reckon?"

"Tonks is a dead witch." Albert confessed, sounding ashamed, and on Xander's other side a witch muttered:

"Traitor!"

"Isn't somebody going to do something?" Finn Grover asked, and Xander muttered:

"Be our guest, Finn!"

Finn didn't move.

"Enough!" the Minister for Magic demanded, pushing past Xander and Albert to get to the front of the crowd. "Lower your wand, Ms Luga!"

"Don't." Dora whispered, leaning forward ever so slightly. "Don't move..."

Valbona too leaned forward until her wand was very nearly pressed against Dora's skin.

"What's she saying that for?!" Pandora complained, her heart beginning to thump against her chest, and Remus called uncertainly:

"Dora...!"

"Show me just how much you hate me." Dora goaded, causing Valbona's nostrils to flare in anger. "If I'm a traitor, teach me a lesson!"

"Tonks, enough!" the Minister snapped, coming to stand before the two witches, his own wand drawn. "Surrender your wand immediately, Ms Luga, and you may leave without a fuss!"

"Go on," Dora insisted, ignoring the warning entirely. "Show me!"

Valbona carefully drew back her wand, ready to strike.

"Stop!" Pandora cried, lurching wildly forward, only for both Remus and Albert to fling arms out to hold her back...

Valbona stopped. Slowly, the half-giant turned the wand carefully around in her fingers until the handle was pointing at Dora's chest, and then she held it out for the metamorphmagus to take.

The two stared at one another for a long moment, coming to some sort of understanding, and then Dora lowered her own wand, not reaching to accept the surrendered item. Instead she simply said:

"Get out, please."

And to the astonishment of the assembled Aurors, Valbona Luga did precisely that, leaving ringing silence in her wake.

The Minster for Magic contemplated the event, his expression grim, before he rounded on Dora and informed her:

"That was an utterly disgraceful display!"

Dora shrugged.

"I knew what I was doing." she insisted, sounding irked, only for the Minister to snap:

"Precisely!"

An apprehensive murmur ran through the crowd, only for the sound to die again when the Minister informed the Acting Head of Aurors:

"I'm having you up on disciplinary charges! The Wizengamot shall send you summons!"

"I don't have the time." Dora told him, apparently not giving a hoot.

"You'll make the time!" the Minister insisted, and she shrugged again and said:

"Alright then. I don't see what good it'll do..."

"I'll make a bloody example of you yet, Nymphadora!" the Minister snapped, and with that he turned and pushed his way back towards the door, pausing to utter to the Auror's husband:

"Your darling wife is the biggest thorn in my side since Dolores Umbridge, Remus!"

When Remus merely offered him a raised eyebrow, the Minister slapped the werewolf heavily upon the shoulder and muttered: "Don't look at me like that, I like her infinitely better!" And with that, he disappeared out of the door.

Dora pursed her lips tightly together in consideration until they very nearly disappeared from her face entirely, before she set off after the Minister, her pace stiff and faltering.

"Xander!"

"Tonks."

"I want Rovena Luga followed!"

"Right..."

"I want her every tiny move noted!"

"Alright..."

"I want to know every single thing she does! I want to know where she goes, who she sees, what she says...if she so much as bloody sneezes, I want to hear about it!"

"Yes, Boss."

"I don't want her left alone for a single second! Set up shifts! I want to see a rota drawn up within the hour!"

"I'll see it done."

"Good. If she thinks she can hoodwink me she's got another bloody thing coming!" As she shuffled past her granddaughter, the witch's tone softened momentarily to instruct: "You just take a seat, Pan love, and I'll be right with you." To the rest of the people crowded into the office she snapped: "Now get out of this office, all of you, and get back to work!"

Kingsley Shacklebolt collapsed down into his chair and, elbows upon the desk before him, buried his face in his hands. No sooner had he drawn breath to sigh, there came a soft knocking upon the door to the Deputy's office, and, knowing full well who was behind it, the Minister did not bother to look up as he called:

"Come."

Dora Lupin slipped non-too quietly into the room, pushing the door firmly shut behind her. The witch gazed at the Minister's despairing pose for a long moment before confessing:

"I feel like a scolded schoolgirl."

"It's a wonder you never got expelled." the Minister said, face still buried in his hands.

For once, Dora made no reply. She set about a slow, increasingly painful walk across the room to take a seat opposite him, frowning at the stiffness that was continuing to seep into her bones.

"You can't keep doing this to me, Tonks." the Minister complained wearily, finally looking up to observe her shuffling progression towards him. "We both know full well you're completely untouchable, I couldn't punish you if I tried! You mustn't let it go to your head, for Merlin's sake!"

"It's been in my head for years, Kingsley." Dora pointed out, quite unapologetic, "even when you could punish me I didn't much care!"

"When you were twenty seven or so I had the Wizengamot fine you for damages after you said Merlin knows what to the papers and you were in my office within the hour in tears. I could hit you where it hurt, back then..."

"Money's a miserable business." Dora agreed, easing herself slowly into the chair. "Or it was, back then. Now, though..." she trailed off with a hiss of pain as she slumped back into the seat, eyes screwed shut as her hand reached to clutch at her leg. "Now I don't need anyone to hit me." she decided through clenched teeth. "I just plain hurt."

Kingsley rose from his chair and came to stand beside her, reaching to press a firm, probing hand to her leg, making the witch wince.

"I had to provoke her." Dora confessed, fidgeting as his fingers continued their examination, poking between the awkward metal braces clamped around the flesh. "I know it was wrong, Kingsley, and...and I'm sorry, but I had to do it."

"I know." the Minister muttered, resigned to this fact though quite distracted by his fresh concerns. "I had to know where I stand...where Valbona stands!" Dora explained bleakly, wincing again as his finger pressed against her knee. "Merlin...! I wanted to hex some sense into her! It's appalling! She doesn't deserve all this, she really doesn't! And...ouch!"

The Minister straightened up, his expression grim.

"You can't keep this up, Tonks." he informed the Auror seriously, folding his arms firmly across his chest. "You're worse now than when I saw you this morning..."

"I'm fine."

"Don't be difficult. You're impossible enough as it is!"

"Alright. Then I don't care if I'm fine or not!"

The Minister huffed.

"That's not being less difficult." he pointed out sourly, turning to return to his chair. "You've been to Mungo's, haven't you? What did they say?"

"That I'm a raving lunatic, I suspect. But we already know that, don't we?" As the wizard sunk back down into his chair, the witch asked: "Any news on Harry? When's he coming back?"

"Ginny wrote to me this morning. They suspect he'll be out of hospital in time for the Phoenix Day Parade. Whether or not he'll be fit to march is anyone's guess...whether or not you'll be fit to march is anyone's guess too!"

"I'll march." Dora insisted stubbornly, sounding quite appalled at any suggestion otherwise. "I've always marched, I've not missed a single Phoenix Day Parade since it began! Let me be the standard bearer again this year, give me the flag to lean on!"

Kingsley Shacklebolt gave a despairing chuckle.

"It's yours." he said, as if he were bestowing a distinctly grim honour. "Now get out of here, Tonks, I can't stand to look at you."

Dora made to stand, only for him to reach across the desk to grip her firmly by the arm.

"Get better." he murmured imploringly, and though she knew in her heart that it was a futile request she nodded nevertheless. When she rose from her chair a moment later, Dora found herself feeling even more grim than she had done when she had entered the office some minutes earlier. She had rather hoped to feel better, she recalled, only to feel as if there was a light on the horizon when the Minister told her:

"Send Remus in to me, won't you? I need sane conversation and a glass of fire whiskey."

In all the commotion, Dora had barely registered her husband's appearance in the office that afternoon. It felt rather as if she had not seen him for days, despite having sat and shared breakfast with him that morning. As she shuffled out of one office and back along the edge of the room towards the other, she felt an odd sense of longing settle itself in the pit of her stomach, and at the sensation the witch felt as if she would sigh and smile all at once.

After all, it had been some years since life had thrown Dora into a storm like this and perhaps longer still since she had felt such a desperate desire to find shelter by simply burying her face in the front of Remus' robes. She could recall returning home from raids or indeed at grim moments during the War, feeling as if the entire world was about to come crashing down upon her, and there he would be, silently waiting to envelope her in his arms and simply hold her...

The world had been unfathomably tranquil when viewed from a snug position like that, which was really rather naïve, Dora recalled, but somehow it did the trick.

It was a force of magic all by itself.

And when she found Remus stood just outside the office doorway, midway through a hushed talk about one thing or another with their son, Dora felt as if her sudden bout of longing had made her entire body feel weak.

"...it's a powerful tool, if the Ministry can use it effecti..." Remus found his sentence cut off as his wife wordlessly attached herself to the front of his jumper, her face buried in his neck, hair muffling his words.

"Back to word, Ted." the Acting Head of Aurors instructed vaguely, as if the words had slipped out of her mouth without even registering her son stood beside her, and she caught Teddy raising an eyebrow, despite not seeing him with her eyes. She simply knew his mannerisms far too well.

The Auror cleared his throat rather loudly and murmured:

"Yes, Boss."

Remus, his hands shoved deep into his pockets as if entirely unaware of the witch clutching at his chest, cast a surreptitious glance around the busy office, only for his wife to insist:

"Just hold me."

He hesitated, fingers toying with the lining of his pockets, only for her grip upon his jumper to tighten.

"I don't give a toss who sees us, just do it."

Wordlessly, the werewolf wrapped his arms tightly around her, and Dora felt burning relief flood over her from head to toe like molten gold coating the world in soothing, hopeful brightness. She felt her defences crumble and her composure slump and the relief of giving in and not having to try so damn hard to keep up appearances...

People were staring. She could tell, it was an easy enough assumption for really this was not the time or the place for crumbling or affection or to simply be natural. It was the place for stiff upper lips and acting slightly aloof, of creating an impression and sticking to it...

Really, it hadn't needed to happen like this, she could have waited a few seconds and dragged him into the office and slammed the door shut behind them...

Except she hadn't been able to wait that long. A few seconds seemed like a lifetime just then, and Merlin, the sight of him! She couldn't have waited, not if her life had depended on it...

She allowed her eyes to drift closed, shifting until her cheek was pressed to his chest as she breathed him in, revelling in the ever-familiar scent of old parchment and soap, his heartbeat drumming comfortingly against her ear. Her legs were sore and aching, Valbona had left her reeling and quite frankly she felt defeated. Except here she was, in her comfortable Remus-shaped bubble, letting the waves of emotion and despair wash over her in a place where they could not possibly harm her. Safe in his arms, she contemplated the mass of emotions and thoughts until she could acknowledge every last one of them, ready to step back outside the bubble and set all traumas aside...

She didn't quite want to leave the bubble, though. Not quite yet...

"Good day, darling?" Remus finally consented to murmuring some moments later, and his wife told him:

"Shut up."

She felt his chest rise and fall heavily, a slightly juddered movement as if he were not sure whether to chuckle or sigh and had wound up doing an odd motion half way between the two. There was no trace of humour at all in his voice a second later, however, when he informed her:

"Ted tells me the two of you have been on an outing this afternoon."

"We...yes..."

"You didn't Floo me."

"There wasn't time, we only slipped over there briefly. At any rate, you weren't at home, you were with Pandora."

Remus made a vaguely disapproving noise under his breath, apparently he could not fault her logic despite not agreeing with it.

"What's for tea this evening?" his wife wondered, making a random bid to change the subject, still clinging to him, and the werewolf in turn asked:

"What should you like for tea, darling?"

"That fish still alright in the fridge?"

"I should think so."

"Cod, was it?"

"Haddock."

"Better have that, then. And there should be some potatoes and greens left..."

"Haddock and mash, perhaps?"

"Yes, that'd be nice..."

"Um...Boss...?" An uncertain voice interrupted from somewhere over Remus' shoulder, and without withdrawing her face from the werewolf's chest, Dora sighed heavily.

"What is it, Rod?"

Auror Rod Hanslow cleared his throat awkwardly. It was as if he had never seen two people embracing before in his entire life. Dora was perplexed.

"Um...Xander says...er..."

"Yes?"

"He says what should we do about Ms Luga? The Other Ms Luga, I mean."

"Valbona?"

"Yes, do you want her followed too?"

"What?"

"I said do you want..."

"Yes, I heard what you said!" Dora snapped, feeling Remus' grip upon her tighten in an attempt to squash her temper. There was a long pause as the Acting Head of Aurors attempted to turn this idea round in her head. It seemed like a sensible thing to do, and yet...

She would feel like a traitor for sure, if she had Valbona followed. And the thought that it might be necessary was a painful one, it felt like prodding an open wound...

Sentimentality and feelings had no place in this decision, she reminded herself firmly as she felt the soft thudding of Remus' heartbeat against her ear. It might cloud her judgement.

It was a simple judgement to make, in the grand scheme of things. It simply came down to one question: Could Valbona be trusted?

Dora did not trust herself to answer.

At long last the witch drew back from her husband just enough that she could peer up at him, gaze imploring.

"What d'you think, love?" she asked, causing Rod Hanslow to shift his feet a little uneasily.

"Er, Boss..."

"Be quiet, Rod." the witch insisted, not so much as glancing at him. "Can we trust Valbona, Remus?"

Despite his opinion on pretty much anything that went on in the Auror Department being worth plenty in most people's eyes, Remus Lupin had never been a particularly willing participant when it came to discussing his wife's work. Of course he and Dora had discussed the various goings on at Auror Headquarters most evenings when she had returned from work each day back before she had retired, but overall the Auror's husband avoided sticking his nose in or truly getting involved in Ministry business. After all it was, he would insist, the Ministry's business alone and it had nothing to do with him.

On the rare occasions that his own business did get tangled with that of the Minstry for Magic, there was usually an awful lot of trouble. The last time this had happened, Remus had managed to start a small-scale war and it had ended badly for almost everyone involved. Dora supposed it was no surprise that in the grand scheme of things Remus chose to keep his distance.

He looked reluctant to offer his opinion now, Dora could see it in his eyes, but nevertheless he consented to venturing:

"I think she knows whose corner she's fighting...perhaps she wishes it wasn't yours, but she knows it's the right place to be, deep down..."

Dora thought of the defeated way in which Valbona had attempted to surrender her wand, how slumped her shoulders had been as she had left the office some short whilte earlier...

"Tell Xander to leave her." she decided, finally looking sideways at Rod. "Following her would be a waste of resources, I'm sure she wouldn't do anything to threaten the investigation."

"Right..." Rod said, sounding rather disbelieving, but nevertheless he gave a sharp nod and turned to rush off, again muttering: "Right..."

"I hope I'm not as blinded by Valbona as she is by that infernal niece of hers." Dora told her husband wearily, and then, as if this thought had suddenly reminded her of something else, the witch turned to look searchingly around the room, catching sight of Teddy a short distance away, engrossed in some papers at his desk.

"That reminds me...Ted!"

Teddy dropped the papers down upon the desk and turned in his chair to offer his mother a questioning look.

"Yes?"

"Rally some troops, I want...five Aurors ready within the hour."

"What for?" Teddy asked, sounding weary at the prospect, and as she turned to head into the Head of Aurors' office, his mother told him:

"We're raiding the Luga residence."

"The Luga...?"

"Yes."

Teddy frowned deeply.

"I don't think we can get clearance for raiding a residential property in under an hour, Mum, it takes at least..."

"Don't be ridiculous, Ted!" his mother interrupted briskly. "I've already cleared it with Kingsley!"

"No you haven't..." Teddy mumbled, and the witch sounded incredulous to ask:

"You think if I did ask him he'd say no?!"

"Well no, but..."

"Well then! That sounds like clearance enough to me! Now go on, hop to it!" To her husband, she recalled: "Kingsley says there's fire whiskey waiting for you next door!" And with that, she disappeared into the office, the door swinging shut behind her.

Teddy slumped sideways until his could rest his forehead against his desk, and as Remus turned to look at him, the Auror's father heard him wonder:

"How do you put up with her, Dad?!"

Remus grinned.

"Miraculously, Theodore." the werewolf said.

Pandora Lupin watched her grandmother sink low into the high backed chair behind the desk, and

for a long moment there was silence as Dora stared into the backs of her eyelids.

And then the Auror said:

"Well, then. Here we are!"

Pandora chewed upon a nail to watch the witch open her eyes and lean to shuffle some papers upon the desk, before tossing them into the nearest drawer, opting for a fresh sheet of parchment instead.

"How are we then, love?" she asked her granddaughter, glancing up at the girl with an impressively bright smile. "Grandad behaving himself, is he?"

"Yes, Nana."

"Excellent. You keep a good eye on him, won't you? Merlin only knows what he gets up to when I'm not around! Shall we have tea? I did promise tea, didn't I?"

"Um..."

The office door sprung abruptly open, making Pandora jump. A passing Auror cadet also very nearly jumped out of her skin, and she seemed to become yet more alarmed when Dora called:

"Ah! Tasha, is it?"

The young witch turned reluctantly to peer into the office, eyes wide.

"N...no, Mrs Lupin..."

"Didn't think so, I picked a name at random." Dora confessed, sounding entirely unabashed by her tactics. "What's your name, then?"

"Elizabeth-Marie Allbright-Styles, Mrs Lupin."

"Bloody hell," Dora muttered under her breath, before informing the cadet: "That's quite a name, isn't it? Not that I can talk..."

"You can just...just call me Liz, if you like..." Elizabeth-Marie Allbright-Styles murmured, cheeks pink, and Dora offered her a grin.

"Liz it is, then! D'you know how to make a decent cup of tea, Liz?"

"Um...well I don't really...um..." Liz said, quite mystified by the question, only for Dora to inform her:

"I never qualified a single Auror who couldn't make a decent cup of tea, you know! If you can't make a decent cup of tea around here you're no use to anyone, I say!"

The Auror cadet looked quite horrified at the notion. Pandora wondered if perhaps she was a coffee drinker. Nevertheless the witch plastered a rather uncertain smile onto her face and mumbled:

"I'll just...just go and put the kettle on, then..."

"What a star!" Dora exclaimed brightly, "I'll have to tell Ms Wickes, she'll be very impressed, you'll have that Auror badge in no time!"

And with that the door swung shut again with a loud bang.

Pandora watched in silence as her grandmother set about printing the date atop the parchment along with a few other standard details, before reaching into another drawer to retrieve an empty folder made of green card.

"Here you are," the witch murmured as she carefully labelled the front of the folder, before reaching for a large stamp with a golden handle. After pressing the elaborate object firmly into a waiting tray of red ink, she stamped it down upon the folder, leaving behind the emblem of the Ministry for Magic. "Your own file! You're on Ministry records for good now, Sweetheart. Just like Grandad, Dad and I."

"Like a...a criminal record?" Pandora wondered, and Dora gave a soft huff, shaking her head.

"Nothing like it, love. The Ministry like keeping records, that's all. Dad and I are on their employment records, Grandad's on the Werewolf Registry and he and I are probably on some ancient list of Undesirables from back in the War...Merlin knows they've probably got a filing cabinet dedicated to our family around here somewhere. Me chucking a few more bits of paper into it isn't going to do anybody any harm, alright? Don't you worry about it."

Pandora fidgeted in her chair as the two of them lapsed into a silence only broken by the scratching of Dora's quill upon the parchment. After a while, Pandora found it quite unbearable.

"I...I don't suppose you...you've ever interrogated a member of your own family before."

Dora gave a vague chuckle, her brow creasing in concentration as she shifted the parchment upon the desk. When this was her only reaction, Pandora felt a sudden compulsion to reach across the table, grasping hold of the Auror by the wrist, stopping the quill in its tracks as she hissed:

"Nana...!"

Her grandmother looked up at her, dark eyes very nearly pinning the girl to the spot. It took a good moment for Pandora to gasp in a breath to confess:

"You're...you're scaring me. I...I'm scared!"

Dora dropped the quill. Pandora felt the Auror reach to take the Squib's hand in both of her own.

"Don't you be scared, Sweetheart." the witch whispered, fingers scuffing the girl's hand reassuringly. "I've never interrogated a member of my own family before, and I'm not about to start now, so don't you be scared. We're going to sit and have a chat, just like we always do. I'm your Nana, Sweetheart. I'm only ever here to help you."

"What if I tell you...what if I tell you horrid things?" Pandora whispered back, eyes widening at the thought.

Dora smiled. The little puckered lines and wrinkles about her lips vanished before Pandora's eyes.

"Grandparents are the masters of horrid things, Sweetheart." Dora said, drawing their entwined fingers towards her until she could rest her chin atop them. "The world is full of horrid things. If we didn't know all about them we'd never be able to hide them all from you. We're sugar and spice and all things nice, but you sprinkle those things on top to hide all we know underneath. You can tell me anything, love. Absolutely anything at all."

The two sat in silence for a long moment, and Pandora studied her grandmother.

Nana Dora had never entirely looked her age. Her hair was snowy white, just like it ought be, Pandora had always supposed, and yet it was entirely the wrong shade of white to have come about thanks to age. Years of life had not sapped the colour from each individual strand. It was too pure a white, too bright and too vibrant to belong to somebody old. It was the sort of healthy, shiny white that might come out of bottles bought by eccentric teenagers. It was simply...young.

No doubt Nana Dora had made it that way.

Carrie often commented that Dora had aged sporadically during her forties and fifties. She hadn't managed to make it all seem quite natural, which Pandora supposed was tricky. Nobody was quite sure what a fifty year old ought to look like, they ought not look too old or too young, but the exact parameters were fuzzy. Having reached seventy, however, Pandora felt her grandmother had gotten ageing down to a fine art. It was probably easier, now. It was acceptable to just look plain old. With the guidelines a little more pronounced, Dora seemed able to age consistently. Indeed, it was bordering on graceful.

Looking at photographs from her grandmother's youth, Pandora had found it difficult to believe that Nymphadora Tonks could ever have looked like somebody's grandmother, least of all a respectable one. But looking at her now, Pandora thought she had all the most important elements that went together to make an altogether pleasing whole. She had a kind, smiling face that could frown very disapprovingly should the need to do so present itself and her eyes were dark and twinkling with some sort of hidden mischief that would put any naughty grandchild to shame. She was happily oblivious to much of the world her grandchildren thought of critical importance, she was as loudly opinionated as any self-respecting person over the age of sixty could be, both her mind and her tongue were as sharp as razors and yet she was an altogether very cuddly and warm figure that made Pandora think that when it came to Nana Dora one could possibly get away with absolutely anything...and yet at the same time nothing at all...

Her entire appearance was a ploy that never fooled her grandchildren in the slightest; she was rather thin and altogether fragile to look at, indeed with her cane and leg braces one might expect a strong gust of wind to finish her off. But Dora was, as her long-running joke with Valbona Luga suggested, a cockroach. Like all granparents she was made of iron that never rusted, weather-beaten stone that refused to be worn down. She was indestructible and any moment that Pandora thought otherwise was simply an illusion because a world without Nana Dora probably wasn't any sort of a world at all...

Of course everyone left the world one way or another, it was simply difficult to comprehend until the event itself seemed entirely imminent. Until then, Nana Dora was a cast-iron pillar of Pandora's existence and could be wholly relied upon to do her job:

To be Pandora's grandmother.

"Tell me about Jeff, Sweetheart." Dora said, grip upon the girl's hand loosening as if waiting for Pandora to snatch her hand away, but Pandora did not move. "Tell me what he was like, before all of this happened."

Their hands came to rest upon the desk between them. Pandora stared at them.

"He was...he was just...nice. He was very nice. And kind...he was always very kind."

"Did everyone at SEWS like him?"

"Oh yes, everyone thought he was wonderful. He had time for everyone, no matter who you were. One minute he'd be...he'd be chasing the children around the hall pretending to be a dragon and...and the next minute he'd be sat in the corner with old Edgar talking how things used to be better in the good old days! He could talk to anyone, Nana. Everyone loved him."

"Was he particularly close to anyone? Did he have any...favourites?"

Pandora felt her face warming. She opened her mouth to speak, but no sound came out. She found herself forced to try again, managing a feeble:

"M...me. Me...I was...his favourite...he used to...to say I was his favourite."

Dora's face remained entirely unchanged.

"Anyone else?"

"Um...Rochelle, I think. She was always there, she'd live at SEWS if she could, they'd been friends ever since it started."

"Rochelle...?"

"Selwyn. She told me she was a Selwyn, she didn't like her family much. She said they were...they were a bunch of tossers."

"And she and Jeff were close."

"Yes, they were close I think. They were just...mates. They had a laugh with one another, he used to encourage her with her hobbies, that sort of thing."

"Did you like her?"

"Me? Yes, she was nice...she and Hallie were more my age than a lot of the others so...we'd stick together."

"Hallie...?"

"Just Hallie. I don't know her other name. She spent quite a lot of time with some of the boys more our age...they all fancied her, she's very pretty."

"Did Jeff fancy her?"

"Of course not!" At her exclamation, Pandora felt her face flood with colour, but Dora barely raised an eyebrow as there came a soft tapping upon the office door.

"Come!" the Acting Head of Aurors called, reaching to push aside the papers upon the desk, and it occurred to Pandora that she had not been taking notes.

Liz came shuffling into the room, carefully levitating a tray of tea in front of her.

"That's lovely, thank you Liz!" Dora said, tone instantly brightening as the tray slowly lowered itself down onto the desk, the china tinkering softly.

The office door was abruptly thrown open again, this time without invitation, making both Liz and the tea tray jump. The lid flew off the teapot into the air, expelling scalding hot tea in its wake and Pandora winced in anticipation as Liz gave an involuntary little squeak of horror to see the burning liquid promptly splash itself down the front of Dora's pristine robes. As a blur of scarlet robes came bounding into the room, there came the unmistakable sound of smashing chine as the teapot's lid succumbed to the pull of gravity, shattering into pieces somewhere near Dora's feet.

"Boss!" Rory McDermott exclaimed as he came to a skidding halt at Pandora's elbow, quite oblivious to the chaos he had caused. "There's news from upstairs at last, Jasmine said I should come straight and tell you..."

"RORY...!" Dora half-shrieked, the name ground out through clenched teeth as she fought against a curse to feel the sudden scalding heat seeping through her robes, and Rory froze, at last looking down at the mess of spilled tea and milk amongst the debris of upturned cups and saucers and a wayward milk jug.

"Oh..." he said, instantly deflated.
Liz, meanwhile, her face ashen with horror, appeared to be suffering some form of nervous breakdown.

"I...I'm just...I'm so, so sorry, Mrs Lupin, it was...it was just a...I mean I didn't mean...I'm just so clumsy, I'm so sorry..." she babbled, voice muffled from a horrified hand clamped to her mouth, and as Pandora shuffled back in her seat to avoid the steady drip of tea that was beginning to accumulate in a puddle by her feet, Dora was forced to suck in a deep, calming breath.

"No harm done, Liz love." she assured the trembling cadet, shooting her a pitying look that calmed the young witch's nerves enough to give her the sense to give up trying to speak. "Happens to the best of us. Especially when we have imbeciles like Rory here running around the place like somebody's shoved a wet start firework up their rear end that means they're completely incapable of remembering to bloody well have the manners to knock on the door!"

Rory went pink.

"Sorry, Boss." he mumbled, eyes upon his shoes, and Dora promptly heaved herself up out of her chair and yanked the damp robes from around her, tossing them over her shoulder. They fell in a sorry looking heap upon the floor and, after observing the damp patch upon her newly exposed blouse underneath, Dora gave a heavy sigh and sat back down again. She set about attempting to salvage the tea, causing Liz to rush forward. Rory simply looked on, his expression forlorn.

"L...let me..." Liz began, fumbling with a cup and saucer, and Dora shot her a grateful but rather pained look as if the whole scenario was beyond ridiculous.

"Thanks...that's great, that's fine, just...leave that, it's fine. Thank you, Liz. You best pop back to Jasmine, hadn't you? She'll be wondering where you are."

Liz left in a rush, but not before babbling half a dozen more apologies on the way. Once the door had swung shut behind her, Dora promptly slumped back in her chair, reaching to press a hand across her eyes. For a long moment there was peaceful silence, before the old Auror said:

"Rory?"

"Yes, Boss?"

"Don't call me that."

"Er..."

"Please."

"Alright. Yes...erm...Tonks?"

From beneath her fingers, Dora's brow creased, deep in thought. After a while she asked:

"Rory...what precisely did Harry, Jasmine and the rest of you say to the younger ones when you told them I was coming out of retirement?"

Pandora watched Rory's face scrunch up a little as he thought about his response, keen to say the right thing. After a moment he settled on:

"Um...nothing, really!"

"Nothing? You must've all said something."

"Well...well Harry called all the Aurors and all the cadets into the office and he said...he just said you were coming out of retirement, I suppose."

"Did he say why?"

"Well yes, he said he felt the department would value your expertise and years of experience at...at a time like this and the department leadership could use an extra pair of hands."

"And that was it? He didn't say anything else to anyone?"

Rory fidgeted, puffing his cheeks.

"Well...well he did say you were one of the finest Aurors he'd ever had the honour of serving with...?" he recalled hopefully, only to frown when Dora again asked:

"That's all?"

"I don't know what you want me to say, Tonks." Rory confessed, and Dora finally came out from the refuge of her hand to complain:

"Rory, either every Auror and cadet to enter this place since I retired is about as wet as my robes over there and has the backbone of a bloody jellyfish, or every last one of them thinks I'm some sort of Hungarian Horntail on steroids! If it's the latter somebody must've...must've said something to give them that impression!"

"Oh!" Rory said, brightening up now that it all seemed perfectly clear and simple to him. "Well that's easy enough to explain..."

"Is it?" Dora asked, quite taken aback.

"Oh yes," Rory said with a snigger. "You see for the past Merlin knows how many years, every time Jasmine catches anyone doing something they shouldn't, she always starts whatever it is she's got to say about it with: You best count your lucky stars Tonks is bloody retired, because if she wasn't...!"

Dora's hand returned to her eyes.

"Merlin..." she muttered despairingly. "I'm not that bad, surely!"

"Only when you're retired and not here to prove otherwise!" Rory declared, as if this might be some consolation. "Nobody's going to go around saying: That's some great work you've done there, if Tonks was still here she'd give you a great big smile and a pat on the back now, are they? What would be the point of that?"

Despite his sound logic, Dora groaned.

"What d'you want to show me, Rory?" she consented to asking wearily, and for a moment Rory looked confused, before his face lit up with comprehension.

"Results from Magical Substances' examination of the letterbomb fragments." he announced, holding out a file that had been tucked away under his arm.

Dora accepted the file, reaching to draw the wand from her pocket with her free hand. She took a moment to dry the remnants of the tea from the desk, leaving it to evaporate in great bursts of steam with a vague wave of her wand, before she pushed the tea tray aside.

"Anything interesting?" she asked Rory as she slapped the file down upon the desk and opened it at the front page, eyes scanning keenly down the forms and notes within.

"Yes and no." Rory said, folding his arms across his chest. "They've isolated the key ingredient used, it's some sort of terrible acid, victim didn't stand a chance. But they don't know what the substance actually is, exactly. They've not seen it before, they think perhaps it's Muggle."

Dora drew out a few photographs that had been paper-clipped to a page. She stared at them, lips pursed in consideration for a long moment, before concluding:

"Well it's certainly distinctive to look at, whatever it is." Tossing the photographs back down upon the desk she decided: "We'll have to give that some consideration...anything on the victim, yet? Other than the obvious."

"We're working on it."

"Good. Thank you, Rory."

The wizard gave a sharp nod before turning on his heel and striding towards the door, only to pause and mumble:

"Um...Tonks?"

"Um, Rory?" Dora said, looking up to offer him a raised eyebrow, and he gave a huff of almost-amusement before clearing his throat before mumbling:

"Sorry I didn't knock."

He disappeared back out of the door before Dora could reply, and she sighed heavily, reaching to retrieve a cup of tea. As she leant to set it down in front of her granddaughter, Pandora looked down at the photographs, a series of petri dishes containing small blobs and droplets of a gritty yet metallic substance, coloured a very distinctive shade of burnt orange. It was quite like nothing Pandora had ever seen before, but there was something entirely vicious about it, it's surface marked with tiny craters and bubbles as if it were burning through the dish it was set upon.

"Looks like horrible stuff." the girl observed darkly, and Dora swept the photographs back into the file.

"It looks very effective, yes." Storing the file away in a drawer, the witch reached for her own cup of half-full tea and wondered: "Now then, where were we?"

Pandora felt no desire to help remind her.

"Why don't you tell me more about SEWS?" Dora suggested, sipping at her tea. "What you all used to get up to there? How often did it run?"

"Jeff opened up the hall almost every evening." Pandora recalled, heart sinking to her shoes at the recollection of just how happy and carefree things had seemed back then. "But most people only came once of twice a week. Except Rochelle and me, of course. We were there all the time."

"And what sort of things did you all do?"

"Well we did all sorts of things. We um...we had Hobby Day once a week."

"And what did you do on Hobby Day?"

"Everyone came and shared their hobbies...helped each other with them, that sort of thing. Jeff said it was important for us all to have hobbies...something that we could focus on and work at...something fun that we could also be proud of. Rochelle was learning to knit, some of the children were learning to play sports, Hallie used to teach some of the others how to play the guitar."

"And what about Jeff?"

"Oh Jeff tried everything and anything...he tried knitting for a couple of weeks which Rochelle thought was hilarious! But his main hobby was...was shooting. Archery, I mean. He couldn't share that at the hall but one week we all went off to an archery range and he tried to teach us all how to shoot a bow."

For the first time since they had started, Dora reached for quill and parchment.

"What was the name of this archery range? Do you remember?"

"Um...it was in Epsom. Near the race track. We went there on a coach from London...I don't remember what it was called..."

"Was Jeff a good shot?"

Pandora, recalling the grim sight of Jeff sat in the woods with the pistol in his lap, felt a lump rise in her throat.

"Yes." she whispered, gaze dropping to her lap. "He was a very good shot."

"He must've practiced an awful lot."

"Yes...that's what Rochelle said when he was teaching her to hold the bow properly. He said he went there every week. If he wasn't running SEWS he was...he was at the archery range. Or...or with Rovena, I suppose."

"Did Rovena know he liked archery?"

"I don't see why she wouldn't. He talked about it often enough."

Dora scribbled a few more notes upon the parchment before tossing the quill back down upon the desk. She yawned widely, settling back in her chair again, and as Pandora took another sip of her tea the witch said:

"Can you tell me anything about Pan's Army, Sweetheart?"

Pandora set her cup back down upon the desk and gripped it with both hands.

"I...it had nothing to do with me, Nana..."

"I'm sure it didn't, love. But do you know anything about it?"

"N...no, the...the first I heard of it was when we saw the...the Daily Prophet! It's...it's Jeff's idea of a joke! A...a sick one!"

Dora hmmed in consideration for a moment, toying thoughtfully with her teacup, before musing:

"I don't know that it's a joke at all, love. I'd not be making jokes, if I were Jeff Fawley. I'd want to be taken wholly seriously, after all."

"I guess..." Pandoa mumbled, wanting desperately to lean forward upon the desk and bury her face in her arms. She felt the desire increase tenfold when Dora concluded:

"You are...important to him, Pan. Somehow in that warped, dreadful mind of his, you are important..."

"He said when I saw him in the woods that...that he'd never hurt me. He said he'd never hurt me, Nana, because he...he loves me. At least he thinks he does...except he...he doesn't know what love is, how can he?"

Dora sighed, reaching to rake a hand through her snowy hair.

"He feels a whole range of things, I'm sure." she admitted, failing to hide a note of revulsion in her tone. "I'd hesitate to give it all a name but I'll tell you now, Sweetheart, it isn't love..." she trailed off, toying with the corner of a sheet of parchment. Pandora watched her nervously, dreading what might be asked next, only for Dora to ask:

"Does he know about the baby? Did you tell him when you saw him in the woods?"

"Of course not, Nana!" Pandora cried, shuddering at the mere thought. "I'm not crazy, you know!"

"Alright," Dora said, holding up a hand in self-defence. "Alright, I'm just checking. I need to know these things, that's all."

Pandora found herself wondering about what else Dora would consider to be information she 'needed to know', mind racing at the prospect of confessing all manner of private things, all those shameful, intimate little moments that Pandora and Jeff had shared over the weeks and months that they had known each other, all the silly lies and thoughts and feelings, all those forbidden dreams...

And she found herself consumed in memories, of the way he used to smile at her, the way a single glance in her direction had conveyed a multitude of secrets, the way he would sigh with relief when the other members of SEWS had all left and gone home and the two of them were alone. She recalled his mental conflict, of the wonderful misery of forbidden love, the way he would hold her tightly and lament the need for secrecy. He would complain that nobody would understand them, that it was the two of them against the world, and Pandora had thought it all terribly romantic like some modern-day Romeo and Juliet...

And it was all just so stupid, she thought miserably, Nana Dora couldn't possibly understand it, after all when had Nana Dora ever done something that stupid? Never! That was when!

A handkerchief was being pushed into Pandora's hand, and with a blink the girl realised that she was crying, tears cascading down her cheeks. Before she knew it Dora had risen stiffly from her chair and stepped carefully around the desk with a wince and Pandora found herself engulfed in her grandmother's arm, her face buried in the front of Dora's blouse as the witch murmured:

"Just you hold on tight, Sweetheart. Everything's going to be alright."

Pandora simply sobbed, clinging to the witch with all her might, gasping in deep, desperate lungfuls of air and it was not for some minutes that she managed to calm down at all.

The smell of tea clung stubbornly to Dora's clothes, but as Pandora breathed it in she could still catch a hint of the strong, soothing scent of her grandmother's perfume of choice. Pandora had stolen a squirt or two of the golden liquid herself on numerous occasions over the months, especially when she had been off to SEWS for the evening or out on a day trip with Jeff and the others...

It had all been part of the silly little fantasy, she supposed, because...
"I wanted to...I thought we could...could be like...like you and Grandad, Nana."

"You what, love?" Dora said, sounding entirely baffled, and Pandora knew there and then that she had been right, her grandmother wouldn't understand at all. Nevertheless she found herself mumbling:

"Like...like during the war and...and nobody thought you'd...I mean everyone was just...you were...Grandad was..."
"Was what, love?"

"I mean...just...like...Grandad's so much older than you are! And...and nobody approved but you...you didn't care, you..."

"No, love."

"N...no?"

"No, no, no!" Dora's arms around the girl went horribly limp. Pandora could feel herself blushing the brightest of pinks.

"S...sorry, Nana..." she whispered, throwing her arms around the witch in an attempt to persuade her to tighten her grip again, for as soon as it had gone Pandora had missed it.

"Oh Sweetheart..." Dora whispered back, voice an octave higher than usual, and she was forced to cough to clear her throat to explain: "Grandad's age is irrelevant! It's my age that mattered! I was...I wasn't...I was twenty three years old when I met your grandad! I was seven years older than you are now! I...I had a job! I'd been a fully-fledged Auror for over a year, I fed and clothed myself and I...I paid taxes, for Merlin's sake! I was...I was a consenting adult, there...there wasn't a single shred of childhood left in me! Grandad had every right to...to want me, no matter what he says, there was nothing wrong with how he felt and...and it's true some people didn't approve of it but...but we had the blessing of everyone who mattered! And thank Merlin for that! There's nothing grand or wonderful about forbidden love, Sweetheart! It's a horrible, miserable thing and it's probably forbidden for a bloody good reason! In fact we're not talking forbidden love here at all! We're talking...it's...how Jeff feels is...is just...well...!"

"It's what, Nana?" Pandora whispered, dreading whatever word might come next, though she felt as if she had to hear it. She knew what it was, she realised, she knew precisely what it was, it was wrong or perverted or sick or something equally as painful, but she had to hear it, even if it would be like a punch to the stomach, even if it would make her feel so unbelievably ashamed that...

"It's...it's not how Grandad felt about me." Dora finished lamely, sounding slightly strangled as if she didn't dare say anything more hurtful, and with that she hugged Pandora fiercely.

Somehow, Dora's refusal to voice her true opinion was even more painful than the dreaded words themselves. Pandora felt as if she might just curl up and die.

"I'm sorry, Nana." she said again, in the vain hope that she'd feel less wretched, and Dora sighed heavily, one hand reaching to smooth the girl's mousy hair.

"It wasn't your fault, Sweetheart." she insisted firmly. "None of what's happened is your fault. The world is full of tricks and traps and we all get caught in them once in a while, especially when we're young. There are plenty of people around ready to...to take advantage of us if we...if we don't know any better. And that's not our fault, love. We're only human, we muddle through life the best we know how and we don't know anything much until we've lived a little first. Nobody's to blame for what happened except for Jeff. He knew what he was doing...he's perfectly old enough to know what is and isn't appropriate. He's old enough to know what he did was wrong. And nobody worth the air they breathe is ever going to suggest otherwise, alright? Now, you dry those tears of yours and let's...let's see what else we can figure out!"

"I d...don't want to talk about...about him anymore..." Pandora mumbled miserably, overwhelmed at the prospect of any further questions, only for Dora to give her a squeeze and tell her:

"Me neither, Sweetheart! I've had just about enough of him for one day, let's talk about something else!"

They spent the following half an hour drinking tea and exhausting the Auror Department's supply of custard cream biscuits, whilst constructing a list of all the squibs young and old that Pandora could ever recall seeing at SEWS. Pan's Army, Dora informed her granddaughter, if indeed it was an army in more than just name, would require soldiers, and all SEWS members were potential recruits or, failing that, targets for the increasing number of anti-squib attacks that had already began up and down the country in furious response to Jeff's attacks on wizards. Keen to stop any potential divisions within the community and halt any extremist behaviour on both sides, the Acting Head of Aurors wanted any particularly vulnerable squibs brought under Ministry protection. Pandora rather wondered where the Auror Department would find the resources for such a scheme, though she supposed something so fundamental as a lack of available resources was unlikely to stop somebody as determined and single-minded as her grandmother. By the time Pandora was struggling to recall any other names, Teddy had appeared in the office to announce that the Aurors Dora had requested for the raid on the Luga residence were ready and waiting for instructions, and all too soon Pandora had found herself back with Remus in the lift headed for the Atrium.

The Auror Department's early evening raid on the Luga residence made front page news in the next morning's edition of the Daily Prophet, but the newspaper's reporters had no luck gaining a statement from the Acting Head of Aurors upon her arrival at the Ministry that morning, for she was so infuriated by the outcome of the whole business that she refused to say a word.

Dora had sent the Aurors off to search the house from top to bottom, wholly expecting them to return to the Ministry with nothing to show for their efforts.

Instead, a beaming Finn Grover had deposited an invisibility cloak upon her desk at seven o'clock that evening and proudly announced:

"We found it, Boss!"

And Dora had slammed a furious fist down atop the garment and exclaimed:

"Shit!"

After some more colourful language, she had pointed out to the crestfallen group of returned Aurors that she had hoped not to find the cloak at all.

"She was supposed to have given it to Fawley!" she cried, scrunching the material up in her fist in frustration. "I was sure she had!"

"Maybe she still did." Teddy had reasoned, going some way to dampen his mother's fire. "Perhaps she knew we'd come looking for it and fetched it back from him."

"Then she really is still in contact with him on a regular basis." Dora had decided, convinced that Teddy's suspicions were correct. "We'll have to keep a very good eye on her."

One good thing had come out of it all, she had supposed as she had prepared to go home that night.

It seemed highly unlikely that Jeff Fawley still had access to an invisibility cloak...

Something overwhelmingly bad came out of it all the following evening, Dora discovered, with the arrival of the Evening Prophet at the dinner table at Ted's house, where Remus and Dora had joined the rest of their family for dinner.

Teddy, the owl delivering the paper having squeezed through the dining room window to land haphazardly upon his shoulder, was first to retrieve the paper and examine the headline.

His face turned white as a sheet.

"Merlin..." the wizard breathed after a good minute of horrified silence, and beside him his wife leaned to see what he was staring at...

Both Remus and Dora watched from across the table as the colour drained from Carrie's face too until the couple looked rather like a pair of marble statues...

"What is it?" Imogen asked, making to lean to look at the paper, only for Teddy to hastily fold it in half, blocking the headline from view.

"Pan, love," Carrie said suddenly, turning to pick up a plate at random and push it into her daughter's hands. "Go and fetch pudding, will you? It's in the oven..."

"Nana's barely started her steak, Mum..." Pandora began, instantly suspicious, and her stomach twisted into nervous knots when Dora declared:

"Well I'm not all that hungry, to be honest."

As Pandora rose obediently from the table, Carrie added:

"Go and help, Imogen."

"No!" Imogen exclaimed, planting herself more firmly in her chair, and Carrie opened her mouth to argue, only for Teddy to mutter:

"Leave her, darling."

Pandora shuffled out into the kitchen and set about retrieving clean plates and cutlery for pudding, only to pause as she passed the dining room door again, listening intently...

A glance saw the newspaper had changed hands, and as Remus stared down at it, the other adults were engrossed in a rapid, whispered discussion that they seemed to be struggling to keep quiet.

"That Rovena Luga is a nasty little bitch!"

"Language, Imogen!"

"But it's true, Dad!"

"She's a vicious little shit, there's no doubt about it..."

"Language, Dora."

"What are we going to do? They'll be all over us..."

"They'll be camping on the front lawn by morning..."

"Parasites!"

"This is far worse than before, they never suggested Pan had actually done anything until now..."

"Exactly! We need to do something, and quick!"

The conversation was halted abruptly when Dora reached to snatch the newspaper out of Remus' hands.

"We can vanish this nonsense, for starters." she said, and there was such keen agreement around the table that there was promptly four wands aimed at the offending collection of paper, which disappeared within the blink of an eye...

...but not before Pandora caught a glimpse of the headline.

NAMESAKE OF PAN'S ARMY WAS FAWLEY'S TEENAGED LOVER, SAYS EX-GIRLFRIEND OF MINISTRY'S NO.1 TARGET...

Pandora dropped the plate she was holding. It smashed upon the kitchen tiles, but so horrified was she that she did not so much as flinch at her blunder as a horrible weakness seemed to attack her limbs, the ink words burning into her eyelids and sucking the strength from her legs...

Her family all turned to stare at her through the doorway, and after all exchanging a glance, Imogen leapt to her feet and dashed into the kitchen, ready to throw her arms around her sister.

"That newspaper will be bankrupt by the time I'm done fining them..." Dora muttered miserably as Imogen half-dragged Pandora towards the sitting room, and Remus informed the trembling girl's parents:

"We need to hide her."

"Where?" Carrie asked, eyes wide. "At...at yours?"

"No, not at ours. That's far too obvious." Dora said, snatching up her glass of wine and draining it in two large gulps. Setting it firmly back down upon the table she insisted: "She can't stay with family, that's too easy to trace, and they'll track down anyone magical given half the chance..."

"Less than half a chance." Remus muttered darkly. "But we don't want to resort to anything too drastic, it'd only worry her. She just needs...a change of scene!"

"She needs someone who could keep her out of sight if push came to shove...even if they didn't know exactly why...somebody you trust...someone...reliable." Dora finished, and Remus nodded firm agreement.

Carrie buried her face in her hands, and as Teddy reached to slide a half-hearted arm around his wife's shoulders the Auror frowned in brief consideration before deciding:

"I think I know just the person..."

"The fact of the bloody matter is," the voice on the other end of the phone announced frankly, "you're just completely unreliable!"

Cleopatra Clancy felt her jaw drop open wide.

The forty-something year old landscape gardener and part time self-proclaimed witch flopped sideways onto the sofa of her living room, narrowly avoiding dropping the phone to the floor.

"Are you taking the piss?" she asked as her wide-eyed gaze came to rest upon the ceiling.

"I never take the piss out of us, Cleo." the caller informed her simply. "This is extremely serious..."

Cleo reached to rake a frustrated hand through her messy dark hair, fingers snagging upon the frizzy curls.

"If you thought there was anything serious about the two of us, Craig, you wouldn't just be showing up here at random every few days for a quick shag! If you were at all serious about me you'd have...we'd be...well..."

"Oh come on, Cleo, be reasonable!"

"You'd not have married that snob of a wife of yours, you'd have married me!"

"You didn't want to marry me!"

"Yes but...but that didn't mean you had to go and marry HER!"

There was a long pause on the other end of the line, before Craig complained:

"I don't think you're being very fair, love..."

"I'm not being fair?!" Cleo cried, barely resisting the urge to throw the phone at the nearest breakable object. "You're the one shagging somebody else behind your wife's back! What's fair about that?! Leave the miserable old cow and be done with it, Craig! It's not fair on anyone the way it is!"

"You've been perfectly alright with it for the past two years..."

"I've never been fine with it! Not...not ever! God! You're just so...so...it's not bloody complicated, Craig, either you love me or you don't! So what if I didn't want to bloody marry you! I love you, don't I?! Couldn't that have just been enough?! Why did you have to go and get married to somebody else and...and make everything so messy and complicated?!"

Silence.

Cleo reached a clumsy hand sideways to yank a fistful of tissues from the near-empty box upon the coffee table, wiping savagely at her eyes. She was about to inform her lover that she thought he was in fact a complete and utter tosser when he whispered:

"You never say you love me. In fact...back before I married Harriet I...I don't remember you saying it even once."

It was now, Cleo realised, her time to be silent...

"Cleo...?" came the uncertain call a good minute later. "Are you...are you still there?"

Cleo opened and closed her mouth a few times, testing to see if sound might come out of it...

It didn't.

"Hello? Cleo? For God's sake, just..."

Cleo hung up and promptly threw the phone across the room. As it clattered to the ground, it's back cover springing off and leaving the batteries exposed, the dark haired woman buried her face in the nearest cushion.

Somebody knocked on the front door. Cleo silently cursed their timing, reaching to hug a second cushion to her chest.

It was probably her niece, she thought wearily. Ever since she had leant eighteen year old Delilah-Mae twenty quid to buy a new pair of shoes or jeans or whatever the hell the teenager had so desperately desired the previous month, Cleo's older sister's only child had been turning up at random every few days, asking for the odd bit of pocket money here and there.

Cleo wasn't entirely sure why she kept giving in and handing over the money. Her sister Bowie had been scolding her for doing so for the past week, but somehow Cleo didn't care. She was surprisingly fond of Lilah, despite the teenager having inherited her mother's obsession with hair and make up, she seemed to have some sort of deep held respect for Cleo. And since nobody else seemed to respect Cleo much at all these days, this was not something to turn one's nose up at.

Today, however, Cleo was not in the least bit interested in visitors.

"SOD OFF!" she shouted into the cushion, finding her voice disappointingly muffled, and when the visitor knocked loudly upon the door again, Cleo was forced to drag herself off the sofa and go to the door, shoving the crumpled tissues into the back pocket of her faded jeans as she went.

One glance in the mirror by the door told Cleo that she looked a mess, but nevertheless she reached to pull open the door.

She found herself face to face with a rather pink-faced Pandora Lupin.

"Oh..." Cleo said, having fully expected Lilah's platinum blonde locks and big, beaming smile.

"Hello Auntie Cleo." Pandora mumbled, shuffling her feet as her mother reached to lay a reassuring hand upon her shoulder.

Cleo forced herself to smile.

"Alright, kid?" she said, stepping aside to let both Pandora and Carrie inside. "It's been bloody ages, hasn't it?"

"It's been about a month." Carrie confirmed as they shuffled through the doorway. Eying Cleo rather critically, the squib's mother asked: "How are you?"

"Oh, fine. Fine, you know...same as ever!"

The two friends exchanged a brief one-armed hug as Pandora made a hunched beeline for the sitting room.

"What's wrong with Little Miss Sunshine, then?" Cleo wondered as Carrie stepped back to shrug off her jacket, and the look the wizard's wife offered her prompted her to conclude: "I don't want to know, do I?"