Harry sat on the wall of the keyhole garden in the center of the herb garden running his hands lightly over the lavender plants and inhaling their fragrance.

Professor Lupin had pulled over one of the rickety wrought iron chairs and was rocking back and forth on the uneven legs—gravel crunching underneath.

"Harry, you know there are bees on the lavender, right?" Professor Lupin asked.

"Yes—I can hear them." He didn't add that he could feel the miniature windstorms their wings stirred up as they moved around the blossoms… he wasn't worried about being stung… he even went as far as to consider that it might be a welcome distraction.

"Right. So, I owe you… well, a lot. An explanation to start."

Harry waited… he felt like he'd been waiting for nearly twelve years, though it had been less than a week since he met the Professor.

"Blimey. Harry. I…" Harry could hear Professor Lupin running his hands over his face and through his hair.

"Um. Where did you go… after… my parents were… killed?"

"What? Oh. Well, that's it… I really don't remember much. I mean, of course, I remember. It was one of the worst days of my life. Right up there with the day that I was bitten… "

Harry sucked in his breath. He felt a tingling in his arm—the memory of it being impaled by the Basilisk fang, the slicing stinging throbbing, the poison nettles of pain piercing his eyes. And then the creeping understanding of the irrevocable change that the sharp moment of agony rendered. The loss of his parents had been a lifelong ache that he was accustomed to—it wasn't a searing moment in his memory, but the bite… the bite… that he could understand.

"Everyone was celebrating—fireworks and parties everywhere—but my world had just fallen apart. All of my friends… every single one of them destroyed… one way or another… dead or worse."

"Worse? What's worse than being dead?"

"What's worse than being dead?" Professor Lupin's voice rose.

Harry thought of Alice and Frank Longbottom. Maybe that was worse than being dead. Being stuck in an in-between.

"I know it is hard to believe… but there are worse things than being dead. It wasn't just that my friends were destroyed—our entire friendship—everything before, every memory that I cherished, everything that I believed about them and myself was crushed to dust—it had all been a lie."

A thudding ache in Harry's chest that had been the size of a cherry stone was gaining weight and girth as he tried to wrap his head around this. He thought of his friendship with Ron—shaken as it had been by the changes forced upon him. Shaken, but not pulverized.

"But your friendship with my father and mother… was that a lie?"

"No, no. I didn't mean that. I have those memories… but I see them differently now. We had been deceived, taken in by a great actor. It has shaken my faith in my ability… to judge people. I thought I had… I thought I knew how to judge a person's character… but I… James and Lily… and Peter, too… we were wrong… about someone that we trusted with our lives. And with your life. Literally."

"So… it was Sirius Black? He betrayed my parents?" Harry had a hard time aligning this revelation with the boisterous, laughing boy who always had an arm slung over his father's neck. The clammy, nervous boy who hung around in the corners… he'd been the one Harry had a weird feeling about when he felt his form in the photographs. "It wasn't Peter?"

"No. It wasn't Peter. He killed Peter," Professor Lupin said with a hollow laugh that more of a sob. "Peter stood up to Si… to him—hunted him down… proved his Gryffindor mettle more than anyone could have ever guessed. Certainly, more than I ever… I have had to live with the regret, the shame for how I treated Peter… I never really accepted him. Sure, he was our friend, but I never loved him as I loved James and… well, that's just something I have to…"

"But where did you go after…? Why didn't you…? I mean, I didn't die."

"Harry, how I wish… but Professor Dumbledore assured me that you were safe… that he had a very safe place for you… where you would be loved and could lead a normal life… well as normal as possible… "

Harry let out a raspy breath.

"…and I was in no state to care for a baby… even if I'd been allowed to go near you… but no one… not even Professor Dumbledore permitted me to so much as see you. You see… they thought… they suspected… and as a werewolf, well, it doesn't take much… Professor Dumbledore has since apologized for not believing me… for thinking that I was the one who betrayed… James and Lily, you… but in the meantime, I was in such a dark place… I tried… I tried to join James, Lily, Peter. I didn't… I didn't want to live in a world where they were dead…"

Harry tried to draw in a breath, but his throat was tight and his chest burned.

"You tried to kill yourself?"

"Not… yes… no… well, I was making very poor choices that could have led to my death… I was very self-destructive. I didn't take poison or anything along those lines, but if I had died then, it would have been entirely my own fault. No wonder they wouldn't let me near you. It took me a long time to get through it… to come back to the land of the living. I'm very sorry, Harry, that I wasn't here for you. That I didn't know that you were living with your mother's sister. I talked to Professor McGonagall…"

Harry inhaled quickly and felt a little dizzy.

"Let me assure you… she didn't tell me anything… nor would Healer Jordan—they are both very protective of you and your privacy. But I can guess… from the tenor of their answers… from your expression… you haven't had the warm, loving home that Professor Dumbledore implied. You haven't had anything near the normal life that he promised. And I'm finding that I'm having a hard time forgiving him for that. Maybe if I had known… well, but that hippogryph has flown."

Harry let his head hang—it was too heavy to lift. Some of the sand that had weighed him down earlier starting to blow into through the cracks and gather in the corners.

"I have to go back to the Dursleys in a couple of weeks…" Harry said so quietly that the rustling of dried leaves in the courtyard corners was almost louder.

"Why haven't they come to family visiting? I gather that it isn't the loving home that you deserve, but surely they should be here… to learn how to… I don't know… make sure they are doing all they can to help you adjust to your blindness."

"It's okay… it's better that they aren't here. They have a hard enough time with one freak…" Harry blurted out before he was able to clamp his teeth together.

"Freak? Do they really call you that? Because you're blind?"

"No, because I'm a wizard. They hate that I'm magical…"

"Oh, Harry. How long has this been going on?"

"Er… my whole life? Except I just thought they hated me… until I got my Hogwarts letter and I learned about magic."

"You didn't know before that? Dumbledore never told you when he visited you?"

"No, what do you mean? Dumbledore has never visited me… Hagrid came to give me my letter when I turned eleven—took me shopping in Diagon Alley—it was the first time… for magic. First time I knew, or saw it, or anything."

"Dumbledore never visited you? You were living with Lily's sister for all those years and he never came to check in on you?"

"No, I never met him before I started at Hogwarts."

"I thought he was looking in on you—making sure you were okay…" Professor Lupin got really quiet.

Harry felt something wet thud against his thigh and wondered if a bird had just crapped on him, but then other drops started hitting him on his head, back, arms, and shoulders until Professor Lupin cast a shielding charm that kept the rain off of them—the rain hissed as if it were hitting a hot skillet.

Harry reached out to feel the shield tentatively expecting it to be hot, but it just felt charged and prickly.

"Why does it hiss?"

"The energy—zaps the rain. Does the noise bother you?"

Harry shrugged, "It's kind of distracting."

"Here—I can make a different kind of shield—a quieter one… I like the way it looks—little sparks—but the noise is kind of annoying after a while."

The sound of the rain against the shield virtually disappeared. Professor Lupin and Harry sat in silence for a while. Harry felt the shield again to see if it had a different texture—it was softer, almost spongy.

"Harry, I'd like to try to explain my actions a bit more… When I took this job at the Center, I had no idea that I would find you here… I wasn't at all prepared… when Healer Jordan approached me to work with you… I mean, I knew that you'd be among my students at Hogwarts in the autumn and I was trying to brace myself for that… for what I would say to you when I met you there… but I didn't know you'd be here at the Center. And I wasn't ready. And it was a terrible blow… to learn of your… accident. And…I'm afraid I haven't handled the shock very well. I'm sorry."

The silence stretched out between them lurid with the scent of lavender and the rain splashing on the paving stones and leaves in the tree above them. Harry was gaining a better sense of the size of things—with the rain pinging against the different surfaces.

Harry imagined that Professor Lupin's hair must be standing on end with the number of times he was passing his fingers through it. At the same time that he felt sorry for the man who was clearly anguished and apologetic, he also felt a stab of anger.

"Well, it wasn't an accident. It's not like I tripped or something. Riddle was trying to kill me."

"Riddle?"

"Voldemort, but the murdering sixteen-year-old version of himself that he'd stuck in a diary to pick off muggle-borns… you know that he got Moaning Myrtle killed and then framed Hagrid's pet for it?!"

"What? That's why Hagrid was kicked out and had his wand snapped? Voldemort went to Hogwarts? Really? Wait. What?" Professor Lupin had launched himself out of the chair and it clattered to the stones. He set it up again and was pacing around the small garden—gravel crunching under the soles of his shoes. The shield moved off of Harry, clearly following Professor Lupin around, and drenching Harry as it moved away in a cascade of rain.

"Oh, sorry, Harry. Here…" Harry held out his hands thinking Professor Lupin was handing him something, but then discovered he was performing a drying charm after he moved the shield back over him. Harry let his hands fall to his lap.

"Voldemort… what was his name at Hogwarts?"

"Tom Riddle."

"And Dumbledore knows about this?"

"Yeah—he taught him. It was fifty years ago."

"But the article…"

Harry huffed.

"Right. Well, I imagine that the article was not fussed with the facts… if it is anything like Skeeter's usual steaming pile of mountain troll shite."

Harry barked a dry laugh at that… remembering the stench of the mountain troll.

"Oi! You sound like James when you laugh like that," Professor Lupin said. "I didn't think I'd ever hear that again…"

It was a long time before Professor Lupin cleared his throat and quietly asked, "Can we start again? I'd like another chance if you're willing to give that to me."

"Chance for what?"

"To be there for you…"

"Er. Okay. Sure."

"How about we do something…" but the professor paused, clearly distracted by something.

Harry turned his ear in the direction of the gate to the courtyard garden. Someone had walked in tentatively… he heard a staff on the stones, scattering gravel. He waited for a second, trying to suss out who it was… Godric? Aminah? Fitz?

"Er, Professor Lupin? Harry? Are you out here?" It was Aminah. "Oh, it's raining!"

"Yes, we're over here, Aminah," Professor Lupin called to her. "We have a shield from the rain."

"Can I speak to you both?" Aminah said as she walked toward them.

"Of course. Would you like a rather rickety chair or would you like to sit next to Harry on the garden wall?"

"The garden wall is fine." As she neared, Harry stretched out his hand, found her arm and guided her to the seat next to him—making sure the seat wasn't wet first.

"I'm really sorry to interrupt your conversation, but Healer Jordan said you were out here. And I just needed… well, I need a favor," Aminah said, shaking the raindrops off her head so that Harry felt a fine spray.

"What is it?"

"I showed my mum the letters from my dad—did you tell him, Harry?"

"Er, no. I didn't."

"Well, so I had a thought after our lesson on Thursday that maybe my dad was forced to do what he did to me. There was something funny about the last letter he sent me… he didn't sound like himself. So I asked Gemma to look at the handwriting—she's an artist and I thought maybe she'd be able to see if something was off… and she did find something. Healer Jordan helped us enlarge it and she held my hand and traced it over the letters so that I could see it, too—and there's really a difference. Even Healer Jordan thought that maybe there was something to it. But my mother… she doesn't want to believe it. Maybe the thought of it is too much. I don't know. I don't really understand," Aminah said as the despair in her voice became more entrenched.

She paused and Harry listened as she rubbed her hands together as though trying to warm them.

"But, Professor Lupin, I was hoping that maybe you could take a look at them? You're the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor… and maybe if you see something in them, you could talk to my mother? I want to talk to my father… and she won't let me. I mean, I understand why she's scared. I'm scared, too."

"Sure, of course, I'm happy to look at them. Harry?"

"Oh, well, I should go find Neville and his Gran. They came to spend time with me here," Harry said, taking the cue and getting up.

"Harry—I'm sorry. I'm interrupting your conversation with Professor Lupin."

"No, it's okay. We were done, really."

"Harry, I'll catch you later. We can continue talking…" Professor Lupin said, getting up as well and grasping Harry's shoulder.

"Sure, okay," Harry said and shook out his staff and spoke over his shoulder as he walked toward the door that led to the corridor, "I hope you figure things out, Aminah. That'd be good."

"Thanks, Harry!"

Harry used his staff to locate the handle by sliding it across the door in an arc, then pulled open the heavy wooden gate and entered the corridor. It took him a second to figure out where he was in the hallway as it wasn't a logical location—it was a magical Egress. It made him wonder where the herb garden existed in the geography of the world.

oO0OooO0OooO0OooO0Oo

Harry had caught up with Neville and his Gran and sat through a rather dull yet depressing lecture about the rights of disabled wixen led by Ms. Midgeon. Neville's Gran seemed to be fired up by it though, so he supposed it was a good thing they went, but he wished he hadn't had to sit through the whole thing. It sounded as though there were quite a few laws passed by the Wizengamot, but no way to enforce them and so a lot of businesses got away with denying people access to things that they had a right to by wixen law. Hogwarts was one of the institutions that regularly made things hard… though Ms. Midgeon conceded that recently they'd been doing a better job. She sniffed as if she didn't trust that trend as far as she could throw it, though.

After the lecture, Harry and Neville were nibbling on the biscuits that were set out with the tea when Neville nudged Harry with his elbow.

"What is it?" Harry asked.

"Professor Lupin's coming over here with th… th… that pr… pr… pretty gi… gi… girl who has a flying carpet—what's her name again?" Neville said. "And I think it must be her mother with her."

"Aminah."

"Harry, Neville." Professor Lupin greeted.

"Harry, this is my mother—mum, this is Harry. He's been … well, a very good listener."

"Hello, Harry, it's nice to meet you," a woman with a warm, though aristocratic voice greeted him, grasping his offered hand in a firm and wiry grip—he was expecting more of a soft, light touch based on her voice. He returned the greetings, introducing Neville as well.

"Harry, I was wondering if could you come with us?" Aminah asked.

"Where are you going?"

"Professor Trelawney—the divination professor from Hogwarts—has agreed to visit with us—she doesn't like to travel, so we're going to meet her in her classroom at Hogwarts—she's an expert graphologist. I'd like her to look at the letters," Professor Lupin explained.

"Why do you want me to come with you?" Harry asked surprised and then flushed when he realized how rude it sounded.

"Because you helped me figure it out… and you believe me," Aminah said quietly but with intensity.

Aminah's mother let out a nearly inaudible sigh.

Neville was nudging his arm and then Harry realized that he was making a sign over and over again on it, but he had no idea what the sign was.

Harry tried to sign, "What?" back to him as subtly as he could. It seemed rude to speak another language in front of people who couldn't understand it.

"Uh, well… Neville?"

"That's okay. Harry, I was trying to tell you that Gemma and I are going to work on signing some more. Obviously, I need more practice."

"Sure, okay."

"Neville, actually we were hoping that Gemma would come with us as well—do you know where she is?"

"She's going to meet me in the Braidwood room. I'll go get her."

"Neville, would you like to come, too?" Aminah asked.

"If it's all right? I don't want to intrude."

"It's all right—you're a good friend to Harry and Gemma trusts you."

"I'll just tell my Gran. I think she's still talking Ms. Midgeon's ear off about the backward ways of the Wizengamot."

oO0OooO0OooO0OooO0Oo

On the way to the O&M room, Harry figured out that Aminah and her mother were not talking. As they stood awkwardly in the corridor while Professor Lupin fidgeted with the panel, the silence felt heavy and uncomfortable.

"Hmmm. The room is being used right now—we can't use this Egress. We'll have to go to another one," Professor Lupin informed them.

Harry was relieved to hear footsteps approaching them and he was pretty sure it was Neville and Gemma. It was and Aminah reminded her mother to cast the Scribunt loqui charm so Gemma wouldn't be left out of the conversation.

"Do any of you know another Egress that we can use? This is the only one that I'm familiar with," Professor Lupin said apologetically—the papers fluttering in the air by his mouth.

"Great, let's use that one," Professor Lupin said while both Harry and Aminah had started to speak. Gemma must have jumped in with an idea immediately.

They walked around the corner to the Mont Blanc room, though it was being used, too. Finally, they were at the Braidwood room where Gemma had her BSL lessons. Harry could smell a hint of burning wood and taste something metallic in the air wafting across the hall from the workshop. He had an urge to peel off and go make something—feel it taking shape under his fingertips, but reined it in. Aminah wanted his help and it had taken her a really long time to confide in him. He didn't want to blow it, even if the stony silence from her mother was really unnerving. It was very different from Gemma's silence—especially since Gemma wasn't silent at all. Whenever they stopped, she'd place her hands under his and signed, telling him about the room or the people.

He was certain that the temperature of the Center had risen by a few degrees with all the extra bodies and he was glad to have a reason to escape to the cool halls of Hogwarts.

Soon, they were passing through the Egress into an unfamiliar corridor in Hogwarts, though the aroma enveloped him as lovingly as the old tattered blanket that was his one security in the cupboard under the stairs. And it was not cool as Harry had hoped. Instead, it was stifling hot and humid.

Harry's shirt started clinging to his back as they climbed a narrow, spiraling staircase plastered with portraits and paintings. A rivulet of sweat made a passage from his temple, past his ear, and then down the back of his neck. The first portrait had a group of giggling women with swishing skirts that rustled as they tittered and their giggles seemed to set off a chattering that reminded Harry of the nesting birds on the beach that had risen up in alarm as they walked onto the beach that morning.

The group's sudden arrival and progress up the stairs caused a stir among the painting's inhabitants—they must have been starved for company and entertainment because, by the time they reached a small platform at the top of the stairs, the echo of voices down the spiraling staircase was cacophonic. Harry's head was beginning to ache as much as his calf muscles. It had been quite a climb. Aminah's mother was breathing heavily—her breath rattling a bit and he wondered if she'd been recently sick. Neville, too, seemed to be struggling with the long climb.

Harry kept expecting Professor Trelawney to speak to them, now that they'd reached the top of the stairs—but they didn't seem to be in a classroom. For one thing, it was a very tight and barren space—it seemed empty of furniture.

"Are we in the right place?" Aminah asked.

"Yes, there's supposed to be a ladder—I haven't been this way in a long time, but the ladder should still be here," Professor Lupin said. As he said it, Harry heard a noise on the ceiling. He cocked his ear toward it trying to figure it out.

"Ah, here we go. Hmmm. I'll go first. Harry, Aminah—this is a ladder that has descended from a trap door in the ceiling. It's about twenty-five feet up with rungs about every foot and a half."

Gemma led Harry over to the rope ladder that was swaying as Professor Lupin climbed it.

"Isn't there an easier way to get up to this classroom?" Harry asked, more worried about Neville and Aminah's mother than himself.

"No, this is it," Professor Lupin called from high above.

Harry sighed and reached for the next rung while trying to find the bottom rung with his right foot, then started climbing. It was a strange feeling to be hanging in the air, not really sure of how much farther he had to go. He started counting the rungs—if it was 25 feet and 1 ½ feet between rungs, then a little maths would help him figure out how close he was to the top… that and a strong odor of burning incense coming from the hole in the ceiling—that also infused the rope of the ladder he was climbing.

At about rung thirteen, Professor Lupin called to him in a voice that was so close that he nearly lost his grip, "That's it Harry—you're nearly here."

The rope swing was moving with the weight of another body on the ladder below him and it was taking all of his focus to stay on the ladder—especially with his sweaty palms making his grip slippery. He reached up for the next rung and found Professor Lupin's arm that grasped his tightly around his forearm and pulled him up through the trap door so that he was sprawled on his belly on the floor. He crawled to his knees—feeling in front of him to make sure he didn't run into anything with his head as he found a place to sit at the top of the ladder. It was even more swelteringly in this room on top of the tower, despite a cooling breeze that drifted in from cross-ventilated windows. The aroma was sweet and pungent and reminded him of a shop in Diagon Alley, but he couldn't put his finger on the name, but he visualized lots of small brown boxes containing stones and lumps of dried herbs.

In contrast to the dark staircase and platform below, this room was dazzlingly bright and Harry closed his eyes against it as he found a little poof to perch on while he waited for his friends to climb the ladder. He hoped that Aminah's mother knew a cushioning spell in case Neville lost his grip and winced at the thought.

One by one, they clambered up into the smoky room, heavy with spicy scents and heat. Harry's eyelids were heavy; he stifled a yawn and then voice drifted across the room from a far corner.

He stood up and faced the voice; his knees a bit wobbly after the long climb. Professor Lupin jumped up and greeted Professor Trelawney affably and introduced her to everyone in the room. She brought with her a strong odor of pine resin that mixed strangely with the patchouli smoke and had an undercurrent of cooking sherry that was stronger when she spoke in Harry's direction. She seemed to totter a bit and Harry wondered if she was tipsy… but as Professor Lupin guided her around the room introducing her to each of them in turn, he began to wonder if was something else.

Why does she need guiding in her own classroom?

She was distinctly interested in meeting Harry and it made him very uncomfortable—especially as she held his hand tightly in hers and bent down with her nose nearly touching his as she greeted him—the sherry on her breath so strong he nearly gagged. His brow knitted together as he struggled to move back, but she had put her other hand on his elbow to hold him in place and then reached up, as strands of threads and beads tickled his arm, and touched his scar, making him jump. He pulled back, tripping over the poof he'd been sitting on and tumbling backward into a soft pile of poofs.

Neville and Gemma pulled him up and dusted him off (the fall had made a cloud of dust explode into the air around him and he sneezed several times).

Professor Trelawney apologized profusely and then Professor Lupin pulled her along to introduce her to Gemma, much to Harry's relief.

They settled around a table in the center of the room. Harry sat as far as he could from Professor Trelawney—she muttered in an otherworldly voice that unnerved him. He could still feel her fingers on his scar. No one had ever touched it before. People had stared at it. He could still recognize the silence as they paused and stared at it now, even if he couldn't see their eyes flick to it when they met him for the first time. But no one had ever touched it. His stomach clenched and he felt a bit of bile rising in the back of his throat. He wondered if he'd be able to ride a Gargoyle down from this tower if things got worse.

Maybe Juren would come if I called?

The letters were laid out on the table and Professor Trelawney had summoned a large magnifying glass that sent tremors through the oak tabletop as it was moved around the surface. Harry hadn't heard much from Aminah since they'd crossed the Egress and he hoped she was okay. She was sitting right next to Professor Trelawney, explaining her theory about her father. Her mother made occasional sighs and harrumphs as Aminah talked.

Neville sipped at the tea that Professor Trelawney provided—his teacup rattling in the saucer each time he picked it up. Harry felt too hot to drink tea. Gemma was sitting on Harry's other side, signing updates on the visuals—though there wasn't much to convey that Harry hadn't already figured out. He did find her light fingertips under his hands comforting, though, so he didn't let on that he didn't need the commentary.

Finally, there was a dramatic intake of breath.

"What is it? Do you see something?" Aminah exclaimed—hope and dread warring in her voice.

"Aminah Dear, I think you're right. This man is under the Imperius curse. See this descender here? Oh, right. You can't. Well, there's a struggle happening and it is as clear as crystal every time he writes your name. He is fighting it. Not only that—he's trying to send a message."

"What message?" Aminah gasped.

"See how these letters here are nearly carved into the parchment? I think spells something."

Harry listened as the chairs scraped across the wood floor and people jumped up to crowd around Professor Trelawney. They started spelling out the word together… C. R. Y. B. A. T. H. M. I. L. L.C. Gemma had jumped up and was snatching the pieces of paper out of the air as the people around her were saying the letters and then arranging them on the table and shuffling them around.

"What does that mean? Cry bath milk?" asked Neville.

"It doesn't mean anything," Professor Lupin said.

Then there was the sound of someone rapidly moving the papers around.

"Oh, oh!" said Aminah's mother and she sat heavily in a chair. "Oh, it can't be! Not that horrid man!"

"Ma, what is it?"

"Bill McCarthy, Aminah. It's Bill McCarthy. Your papa! He didn't do it! He didn't do it!" And she burst into frightening sobs.