Tuesday 3 November 2020

In which the narrator's sojourn at the Ministry of Magic is concluded.

"Nott," said Potter, coming into my cell without warning. A strange sensation passed over me, as though I'd stepped outside myself for a moment, as though I'd been here before but was now on the outside looking in. "You're free to go."

"Huh?" It was the middle of the night and I'd been napping; getting a proper sleep here was all but impossible as it was never fully dark.

"The terms of your release are as follows: you'll report to my office on a weekly basis, in person or by Floo. The team have been briefed in, so you just need to present yourself here. Your slot is Thursdays at 9am I believe."

"What, like I'm on parole or something? You can't do that – you haven't charged me with anything!" It struck me then: he'd hexed me. He'd fixed me with a spell as he'd walked in, and I'd felt it but not known what it was. He'd probably be tracking all my movements, listening to all my conversations, maybe even tuning into my thoughts.

"I think you'll find I can, Nott. Miss your appointment and the team will come and find you. Attica Jones will be looking after your case."

Weekly meetings with the scary young Auror who could see into my head. Wonderful.

"You are to inform Ms Jones of your planned whereabouts each week, and you are not to leave Great Britain under any circumstances. You must only use spells on the Ministry's approved list. Nothing illegal, and nothing experimental."

"What?" I'd expected the Ministry to monitor my use of spells and bring me back in if I did anything illegal, but tracking my movements and preventing me from doing experimental magic seemed extremely unfair.

"You heard me. No illegal or experimental magic. Each week Ms Jones will review with you the places you've been, the people you've come into contact with and the magic you've done. She will also monitor your potion intake. Misuse of controlled potions will be taken very seriously."

"You have got to be joking." I said.

Potter frowned. "Most of these things are already illegal. Stop doing them, or go back to prison."

"Experimental magic isn't illegal."

"The kind you do is."

"I could... er... tone it down."

"I don't think so," Potter said. "You are well aware of the fact that even tweaking existing, approved spells can do a great deal of harm. Don't think we won't notice things like your Imperius-variant Cheering Charm."

"That's not what I'm about," I said. "Not really. It's just that magic is by its very nature fluid and loosely defined."

"Not for you," Potter said. "Not anymore. Here. This is what magic is for you now." He carelessly tossed me what I took to be a pamphlet.

"What's this?"

"The Ministry-approved spells list," said Potter, suppressing a smirk. "Enjoy."

I wanted to throw it on the ground, to stamp on it and spit on it, but unfortunately, I was going to need it if I wanted to stay out of Azkaban. I reluctantly stuffed it into my trouser pocket. It was worryingly thin.

I rubbed my eyes and said, "Well, I hope I'm getting my wand back at the very least."

"You will," Potter said. "Although owning a wand is also a privilege that can be revoked. You'll get it back when you leave Ministry premises – I'm going to escort you out. You can have your shoes back now." He threw them down to me, along with my belt and my tie.

"I'm not going to attack you, Potter," I said, amused. "With my wand or with my shoes."

"You gave it a good go when we brought you in," said Potter.

"I was taken by surprise," I said, trying to recall Ms Mbewe's particular way of phrasing it as I loosened the laces and tugged my shoe open. I was definitely going to have to have a chat with her about this probation business; it sounded as though it would be no fun at all. "Your home invasion recalled a deep-rooted trauma from my past."

"You don't really remember losing your mother, do you?"

"Oh, like you don't remember losing your parents?" I said, pulling on the right shoe, wincing slightly as the movement reignited the pain in my left arm. "I heard them kill her, you know. Third year, when the Dementors were guarding the school, I heard it all. I was only a year old at the time, so I didn't know I had these memories. The Aurors didn't know what they were doing... they heard movement, one of them panicked... They realised their mistake almost immediately. I was in her arms when they killed her. I started crying... they couldn't get me to stop. So I do remember. And I know you know what that's like, because you kept passing out any time a Dementor came near you."

I tied the lace and looked up at Potter, who seemed stricken by something.

"What?" I said.

"Did you... did you ever go back and see... how your mother died?"

"Why would I do that?" I said, shocked.

"I dunno," said Potter. "Forget I said anything."

"Merlin's beard," I said. I was piecing it all together: Potter's expression, what Ms Mbewe had told me. "You went back to Godric's Hollow, didn't you? On the night of your parents' murder. You saw everything."

"I had to," Potter said. "I had to let it happen."

"Why would you watch it, though?" I asked, tugging on my other shoe. "Hearing it is bad enough."

"My parents had to die to stop Voldemort. The least I could do was to bear witness to it."

"Why though? It's not going to benefit anyone, seeing it. And obviously it's going to fuck you up."

"At least I don't use it as an excuse to go around cursing people," Potter said. "To be honest, I'm surprised that you even sank that low. Here's your ring."

"Oh," I said. "I didn't think I was going to get that back."

"It's yours, isn't it?"

"Yeah," I said. "But it celebrates people you think are scum."

"I don't think that," Potter said. "Your mother was... respectable."

"Is that the best you can do?" I said with a sneer.

"You've a right to mourn who you want," Potter said. "Whatever they did. You've clearly also discovered that you can turn the circumstances of people's deaths to your own advantage, but I don't know why I expected better from you."

"It's funny," I said lightly, slipping the ring onto my finger, relieved to feel its familiar weight there. "There have been so many times I've thought that I was at my lowest ebb, only for things to get worse."

"They could have been worse still," Potter said. "For all of us, but for you in particular."

"Well, quite," I said. "And for you. How come you're letting me go?"

"Not enough evidence. Malfoy wouldn't testify against you, but I suppose you know that," Potter said, looking at me narrowly. "You'd be in Azkaban now if he had." I wanted to ask about Granger, but maybe even Potter didn't know she'd spoken with me.

"No trial, then?" I asked, standing up. "Is that how you do things these days?"

"No," Potter said. "You're letting your imagination run away with you. Of course you would have had a fair trial."

"Not like some people though," I said, staring at him hard. "That girl you brought in..."

"News travels fast round here. How did you know about that?"

"My lawyer told me."

"I'd like to know where that woman gets her information from," said Potter, through gritted teeth. "That was highly confidential."

"Search me," I said, popping my collar and draping my tie around my neck. "I'm only paying her. It's true, then? And this girl, is she really... you know... the Dark Lord's daughter?"

"That remains to be seen. We're still trying to work out who she is – she doesn't exist officially at all. She's a shadow, a ghost."

"What does she look like?" I asked offhandedly, tying a half Windsor knot.

Potter dug into his pocket and handed me a mug shot. I was too tired to conceal my surprise that I actually did recognise her.

Potter was looking at me closely. "You know her, don't you?"

"Not well," I said. "A while back she was hanging around me, always turning up wherever I went, wouldn't leave me alone." I had the image of her in my mind but couldn't think how to explain it to Potter. She'd made it clear what she was offering, but putting it into words would have sounded too crude. I looked him in the eye, willing him to see the image that floated to the surface.

"You turned her down?" He sounded slightly disbelieving.

"Well, I mean, she is attractive," I said. "But she was obviously only interested in me for my magic."

"And you have a problem with that?"

"I suppose it was flattering," I said. "I'm just not into that whole thing. Why would I be interested in someone who wants to exploit my power, rather than develop their own?"

"She was an accomplished Dark witch," Potter said. "Quite exceptionally so, given her age. I guess she hid that from you then?"

I shrugged. "She seemed quite unremarkable to me."

"Perhaps she wanted you to underestimate her."

"Indeed," I said. I shuddered, imagining what she might have done if she'd been able to get me into a vulnerable state. "She didn't quite succeed in that. She knew far too much about me and I found that extremely disturbing. To tell you the truth, I started thinking she might be an Auror."

"Sounds like you had a lucky escape," Potter said. "She doesn't seem to have been prepared to just attack you."

"Interesting," I said. "I wonder though."

"What?"

"Those rumours about me having a Time-Turner," I said. "Do you know where they came from?"

"I have ears on the ground," Potter said. "You know I can't tell you who they are."

"I know," I said. "But I think she wanted you to bring me in. She could have fed them information. Got you to do her dirty work. "

"Why would she think that breaking into the Ministry would be easier than attacking a reclusive former convict who had been widely reported as having lost all magical power?"

"Didn't you break into the Ministry when you were a kid?" I retorted. "How hard can it be? And I just walked in here when... the day I turned myself in." I started out flippant, but I couldn't keep it up. I hated remembering that time in my life.

"You didn't get out again too quickly, did you?" said Potter, although his tone was sombre too. "Well, they're all going to be after you now."

"Who?"

"Anyone with a serious interest in changing the past. That's probably quite a lot of people, I would have thought."

"I can look after myself," I said.

"We took you in without any problems," Potter said coldly. He opened the cell door and stood back, indicating for me to leave, ready with his wand in case I tried anything. I hadn't intended to give him any trouble, although the pomp and seriousness of his gestures the made me wonder for a moment just what I could hope to get away with.

"How's your cheek?" I asked as I sauntered past him, deliberately casual. "Is that going to be a permanent scar?"

"Have you looked in a mirror lately?" said Potter, close behind me.

"There were thirty of you."

"Twenty-seven," Potter replied, the door clanging shut behind us. He steered me down the corridor, occasionally jabbing me with his wand as if to remind me who had the power here. "And that's what you'll be up against, if someone with the necessary influence decides they want you. They will send as many people as it takes to trick, bully or torture you into giving up the secrets of time. Or bending it to their whims."

"So what are you saying, that I'm better off going to Azkaban?"

"Well, you might be safer there. This way."

"The Dark Lord found Grindelwald at Nurmengard, and killed him when he refused to help. Frankly if that's my fate I'd rather spend whatever time I have left in comfort at home."

"I hope I'm wrong," Potter said. "But I also hope you're ready for them."

I had never particularly liked duelling, but for the first time I realised how vulnerable I was now that the fact that I had made a Time-Turner appeared to be common knowledge; I had not planned for this. I wondered how much a pair of security trolls would cost.

"I've modified your memory," Potter said. "To take you out of the way of temptation. You won't remember how you made the Time-Turner."

"But I just..." I paused. "Fuck. You did do it, didn't you, Potter? You took away my memory."

"For your own good," Potter replied. "And for the good of the entire world."

"Give it back," I said.

"I'm not going to do that."

"It's part of who I am."

"Not any more."

"Please."

"No."

"Memory charms can be broken."

"I know," Potter replied. "But this makes it harder."

"They'd have to torture me."

"Yes, I know."

"No, I mean, they'd have to torture me if they wanted to know how to make a Time-Turner. There's no other way of getting the information out of me. It's buried in me, but my conscious self can no longer access it... so they would have to take away my conscious self."

"Exactly."

"Unbearable physical pain: it destroys the self. And people who have experienced enough pain to reveal their unconscious... they don't come back from that. It unleashes everything. Every thought, every fear you ever suppressed, they all return at once and you can't push them away. They burn through you, come to the surface and then... you're just a husk. My father was an expert in this type of magic. He taught the Dark Lord everything he knew about extracting information from unable or unwilling subjects. He tried to teach me, but I wasn't a good student. It's horrible, horrible magic. Potter, please don't do this to me."

"It's done," Potter said. "You can stay in Azkaban, if you'd feel safer there, but the memory charm stays."

"I will never go to Azkaban by choice," I said flatly.

"If you're kidnapped, we'll know," Potter said. "We'll find you. The consequences of that information being extracted from you don't bear thinking about."

"I could stall them," I said. "But they'll know that I don't know. They'll hurt me."

"They'd hurt you anyway, most likely," Potter said. "And we'll be trying to find you as quickly as we can. But this way you can't be tempted to tell them, and it won't be your fault if you do. I'm sorry, but you brought this on yourself."

"How is this for my own good?" I said irritably.

"More than one person told me I should kill you," Potter said abruptly. I stared. I didn't dare ask if Granger was one of them. "And they're right. The safest thing to do would be to kill you and ensure that nobody ever learns how you created the Time-Turner."

"But..." I prompted.

"Actually, there are no buts," Potter said. "It's definitely the safest thing to do. It's expensive and boring to keep tabs on you all the time, and risky if that fails."

"How come I'm still alive then?"

"Because we're better than that," Potter said. "We have to be. Hermione Granger's Ministry of Magic and my Department of Magical Law Enforcement do not kill convicted criminals, let alone suspects whose guilt has not been formally proven."

"But you can entomb people in Azkaban for life without a trial?"

"No," Potter said. "We don't do that either. Delphini Riddle... she will have a trial. Due to her profile – her claim that she is Voldemort's daughter, her case will need to be handled sensitively. Proceedings will be more private than usual, but the trial will be fair."

"How can I know that?"

"You'll be invited to attend."

"Me?" I said, surprised. "Why do you want me there?"

"You need to see the consequences of what you've made. To see what someone would do to get it, and the uses they would put it to. Your supervisor will arrange everything."

"Do I have to go?" I said.

"Yes. I think it will be good for you."

"A lot of people have had a lot of different ideas over the years about what's good for me," I said neutrally.

"What about you? Do you ever think about that?"

"Of course I do," I said.

"You've done a pretty good job of messing things up," said Potter. "Not content with screwing up just your own life, you've wreaked havoc on the fabric of time itself. You must be so proud."

"And you," I said. "Have you taken steps to secure the Time-Turner you got from Malfoy? Properly this time?"

"It's taken care of," Potter said curtly. "Don't trouble yourself about it. But tell me, what hold do you have over Malfoy?"

"What do you mean?" I said. "I haven't spoken to him since before I was sent to Azkaban."

"Well, he wouldn't give any evidence against you, even though he could have on condition of strict anonymity. He could have put you away."

Good man, Draco, I thought. I said, "It's not anything sinister. Draco and I have known each other for a long time. You can't expect people to turn on their friends."

"I'm not sure that's how he thinks of you. It would be one thing," Potter said. "If I thought it was simple loyalty. But you were never really friends, were you? And I think you're a scary person."

"Me?" I said, snorting with laughter.

"You, and the people you've employed. Your law firm has a bit of a reputation: destruction of evidence, witness intimidation."

"Those are just rumours."

"That doesn't mean that they aren't true. The rumours about you turned out to be very true."

"And yet, you're letting me go."

"Unfortunately, we live in an imperfect world."

"Can't you make people give evidence?" I said. "Subpoena them?"

"We can do that, yes."

"But you're not," I said. "You won't make Malfoy do it, even though you could grant him immunity from prosecution for all of the illegal things he's had his hand in. Why not?"

"Draco didn't want to do it."

"Draco?" I said. "Since when have you been on first name terms?"

"He must have his reasons," Potter said, ignoring me. "I'd like to know what they are."

"You didn't ask him? Seeing as you're such good friends now?"

I was being childish, and I knew it, but I didn't care. The fact that Potter and Draco had developed some kind of closeness, after Draco had deliberately shut me out, stung. My ex had previously bemoaned my lack of maturity, and though I was most definitely not going to concede that point, privately I knew that this was an entirely fair criticism. But I also knew the reason: the isolation of my youth after the murder, followed by my ten years in prison. While Draco, Potter, Granger and everyone else were out living their lives, meeting people, starting families, I was staring at the same stone wall, thinking the same tired thoughts. I might as well have been petrified for ten years. No chance of catching them up, but with a Time-Turner, I could go back...

"All he would say on that was that he didn't want to," Potter said. "But I think there was more to it than that. He told me about you, off the record."

"He did, huh? What did he say?"

"That you're a freelancer. That you worked for his family, making specialist Dark objects to order."

"That's just hearsay. It's not true." Well, not the "to order" part, anyway. Despite what Granger thought, I wasn't some magical hack churning out whatever gaudy Dark crap some rich aristo had a passing yen for; I only made stuff that interested me. I wondered why Draco had told Potter that, and yet had still refused to testify against me. As difficult as he had made things for me, I couldn't hate him. And, it seemed, he didn't hate me either. Maybe he knew he could have turned out like me, had things been not so very different.

"You love your work, don't you?" Potter said.

I looked at him.

"I know you're not going to answer that," he said. "And you don't have to. But I could see the way you looked at the Marauder's Map. I understand what draws you to it."

"You love your job too," I said. "The thrill of the chase, the spells you get to use..."

"It's not about the spells," Potter said sharply.

"Don't pretend that you don't love getting to use spells that are normally illegal."

"They're a tool," Potter said. "They're not a perk and they're not a pleasure. I don't like to hurt the people I bring in. You of all people should know that."

"Tell my ribs that," I said. "You might not have enjoyed it, but you did hurt me."

"It was legitimate force," replied Potter. "Had you come quietly it could have been avoided."

"All the interesting people you get to meet in your job," I said. "Where would you be without people like me?"

"There will always be people like you," Potter said. "You're just one of the hydra's many heads. Replaceable. I stop you, another head grows."

"Ever-changing and eternal," I said slowly, Snape's slow monotone tolling through my head even after all these years. "Unfixed, mutating, indestructible."

"You remember that lesson too?"

"Defense Against the Dark Arts, Snape, sixth year? How could I forget?"

"The way he talked about Dark Magic... like a lover... it shocked me. But you... you must have felt vindicated..."

"It's more complicated than that," I said. "Remember what I was struggling with. Trying to be the wizard my father wanted me to be, and failing miserably at it. But it didn't matter in the end. My father was injured in St. Mungo's but I was fine. It took me a while, but eventually it dawned on me that I could carry on the traditions I wanted to, in the way I wanted to. That I had no obligation to the past."

"You're still obsessed with Dark Magic," Potter said. "You're just like Snape."

"Not Dark Magic," I said. "That's an extremely problematic term."

"It's all illegal for a reason. Like I said, you're a scary person. I could understand Draco being afraid of you."

"Afraid of me? I seriously doubt that," I said. "Do you know how long we've known each other? Did you know he used to call me Snotty when we were about six, and try to bully me into doing his homework while we were at Hogwarts?"

"That was a long time ago; you've changed a lot. Although I can't imagine anyone actually getting you to do their homework for them. Ever."

I grinned. "No."

"Look, without Draco's testimony, I know we can't prove anything," Potter said. "I'm a man of my word, so I'm letting you go. For now."

"That sounds ominous," I said. I didn't mention the hex he'd fixed me with.

"We will be watching you very closely," Potter said. "So think of this as a chance to clean up your act. Unless you're missing the comforts of Azkaban?"

I stopped walking, and turned to face Potter. I saw him raise his wand, but I was too angry to let this go unsaid. "Decades in solitary? Cold gruel, rotting blankets and a grate in the floor to piss in? You think it's funny to treat human beings like that? You're proud of how you treat your prisoners?"

"It's not as bad as it was," Potter said defensively.

"It's still not humane. I don't care if it's better than it was, if you are the Head of Magical Law Enforcement, and your best friend is Minister for Magic, you're responsible for how you treat prisoners. You know, the thing that makes me most angry is that most of it would be so easy to fix, if you cared. We're wizards. You could charm the cells to keep prisoners clean and comfortable, but you can't be bothered."

"It's not about being bothered. How can we tell the wizarding public that the people we incarcerate may have better lives than they do?"

"We'd still be stuck in a cell," I said. "We still lose our freedom. Is that the punishment, or is feeling the kind of despair that means you can lie in your own filth for years without caring an essential element?"

"It's not as bad as it was with the Dementors," Potter repeated.

"That's not a high bar," I said. "Look, at the moment I'm just asking why you can't fix the filth bit, not the despair. But if you think it would affect your standing at the Ministry, well, that's definitely more important, isn't it?"

"Most prisoners aren't as badly affected as you were."

"But nobody noticed, and nobody cared. You have a duty of care to the people you incarcerate, you know. It's not some joke." I turned on my heel and resumed our march down the corridor.

"I never said it was," said Potter quietly from behind me.

"Take it seriously then," I said. "You said to me once that you can tell a lot from how a society treats its criminals, and yet you've just sent an orphaned young woman to be buried alive in Azkaban for the rest of her days."

"She was psychotic," Potter said. "And my faith in reformed criminals has been severely shaken."

"It turns out that there aren't a great deal of opportunities out there for Death Eater's sons," I said irritably. "Especially those who've done time."

"What does anyone owe you?" Potter said.

"If you're going to take that view of it, Potter, what do I owe them? I've done nothing wrong; I've kept to myself since my release, and I've harmed nobody." Potter gave a skeptical laugh, which annoyed me beyond belief. "You just let me get on with it, didn't you? For all that you profess to feel betrayed by my actions now, where were you when I was released from Azkaban?"

"You never said you wanted my help," Potter said.

"What did you think would happen? That when I didn't sail into a thrilling new career, I'd come to you and we'd chat about it? That you'd invite me home for Sunday lunch, and your family would welcome me with open arms? Please. I knew it was going to be hard. I knew that there would be people who held things against me. But I really did try to go straight after Azkaban, I just couldn't do it on my own."

"What about now?" Potter asked.

I laughed shakily. "Well, now I guess I've got you in my corner. Or breathing down my neck, which amounts to the same thing, more or less."

"You think I'll help you?"

"No," I said. "Probably not. You didn't help me before, and you've less reason to now. You'll just be there to watch me fail and send me back to prison." We had emerged into the Atrium; it was deserted. The only sound was the splashing of the fountain.

"You could still become a good man."

"You think I could be a good man? After everything I've done?

"Of course. That's what I want for you. It's never too late. Had Voldemort repented I would have lain down my wand against him; his tragedy was that he never did. But I don't trust you. How can I?"

Trust. I turned over what Potter had said in my mind, and then spoke. "You placed enormous trust in that Time-Turner, you know that?"

"We didn't really have a choice," Potter said. "Voldemort would never have been defeated if we hadn't gone back."

"But you used it, all five of you together," I said incredulously. "And with your kids. Do you have any idea how dangerous that was? You know what splinching is? Think of that, but spreading your limbs and organs across time as well as space. You'd never put them all back together."

"It worked fine," Potter said.

"You were lucky," I said. "I say that with no false modesty. How many people do you think that Time-Turner was tested on? I'll tell you: one. Plus a couple of elves. You took a serious risk."

"That was some powerful magic in that Time-Turner," Potter said. "I realised I'd never seen you at the height of your powers. I guess I'd last seen you when you were, well..."

"Yes?"

"How do you want me to put it?"

"Oh, use whatever euphemism you want. Depressed, depleted, tapped out, enfeebled if you're feeling cruel. Just don't act like whatever was wrong with me was so awful as to be unspeakable."

"You wanted to keep it a secret."

"At the time, yeah. But I was not in a good place, and I didn't realise then that denial was half the problem. I don't know what I thought would happen if the truth got out, but I had to learn the hard way that you tell people and it's not got the same power over you. I don't care who knows I was pretty near zero back then. That's not who I am now."

"Well, I have to say... it's impressive, in a way. To go from being impotent-"

"Yeah, watch it, Potter."

He cracked a mischievous smile, and continued, "-to creating a piece of magic like that Time-Turner... Lazarus. You're a powerful wizard. I just wish you'd decided to use your abilities for good."

"How long have you known?"

"Long enough. I'd have figured it out more quickly if Stan Shunpike hadn't been bragging around town that he was the infamous Lazarus."

"Can't ask for a bigger compliment than that. God, will that idiot ever learn?"

"Even before I was sure it was you, I could see the trajectory you were on. Your magic has been getting darker and darker since you left school. Didn't I warn you, in Azkaban?"

"I didn't think I'd get any of my magic back then."

"But you did. And your magic got darker still."

"I don't hurt people. I'm curious about magic, I won't deny that, but I don't hurt anyone."

"Look, I know you have this thing that you think magic isn't really Dark if it's not violent, but maybe you should think again about what is and isn't violent. People have died because of what you made."

"That boy, you said. Craig…?"

"Craig Bowker. And maybe, I think, someone else. Someone you know… knew."

I looked at him in horror. "Who?" I asked, but I already knew.

"Lucius Malfoy," Potter said. "We think that she was trying to steal the finished Time-Turner from him, or trick him into giving it to her, but her plan went awry and she killed him."

"Lucius…" I said softly, thinking of all the times I'd seen him on platform nine and three quarters, the times my father and I had been for tea at Malfoy Manor, the kindness he'd shown me when I was getting back on my feet after my release from Azkaban. Potter steered me past the fountain, over to a line of red boxes.

"That's not the worst of it. You could have ended the world," Potter said. "Your invention could have ended the world."

"Your son could have ended the world," I said. "And it's not the magic you use, it's what you choose do with it that matters, surely?"

"He didn't know what he was doing," Potter said. "He's only fifteen."

"I went to prison for ten years for something I did when I was fifteen. I didn't even choose to do it."

"You can't keep blaming your father for everything, Nott," Potter said. "In."

He shoved me into the red Muggle-made box. A telephone box, I knew from my time living among the Muggles, although I tended to feign ignorance about such things. The sides felt tight, as though they were physically squeezing me in.

"I thought I could Floo..." I said weakly. Since Azkaban I'd hated small spaces.

"It's not secure," Potter said, piling in behind me. "I need to take you off Ministry premises before you get access to magical items again."

"Well, this is cosy," I said, still feeling slightly panicky from the enclosed space but also annoyed because he'd pushed me right into the telephone and it was digging painfully into my back. Potter closed the door behind us and suddenly I realised that I hadn't been in this sort of physical proximity to another person in several years. It was electrifying. Potter's eyes were almost on a level with mine; I was so close I could see where he'd missed a bit shaving. "Maybe a little too much?"

"I've been inside your head, Nott," Potter said and I felt a jolt of panic. His face was mere inches from mine. I was a little bit taller than he was, but thinner and frailer, the damage that time had done to my body all too apparent. Although I was fairly sure I was smarter than Potter, and more knowledgeable, there was no doubt that he would beat me in any physical fight, Muggle or magical. "It doesn't get more intimate than that."

The box began its shaky ascent with a grinding, scraping noise. Potter continued to hold my gaze. Maybe he could hear my thoughts right now.

"I don't blame my father for anything," I said. "I loved him. I know he wanted the best for me. I wouldn't be half the wizard I am today without him pushing me to do more, to ask for more from myself. But that. Killing that Muggle woman. I wouldn't have done that without him forcing me. You saw it, you know the experiences that shaped me... but sometimes the most regrettable decisions you make are the ones you don't even realise you're making at the time. It was my father's idea, but it was my fault. I've had to accept that in order to make my peace with it."

"Glad to hear it."

"Your son is fifteen, and he chose to break the law. He didn't have a plan, just the hubris to believe that he alone could fix the world."

"You want to show a bit more respect when you're talking about my son," Potter growled.

"Chip off the old block, though, isn't he? Rushing in, making a plan on the hoof, dealing with unintended consequences as and when you need to, that's kind of your style, isn't it? The prototype Time-Turner was safe before it was seized. The gold one was safe with the Malfoys. But as soon as you get hold of it, everything goes wrong. Admit it, Potter. You didn't know what you had."

"You didn't either. You can't contain something like that. And you sold it. "

"That was my mistake," I said. "But enough of the mistakes are yours."

"You don't care, do you? You've created this terrible, powerful thing, and you don't care what happens to the rest of the world because of it."

"That's not true," I said.

"Creating the Time-Turner was an act of breathtaking arrogance. Professor McGonagall told Al that bravery doesn't forgive stupidity. I'll admit it, that's a lesson I could have learned better than I did. But ingenuity doesn't forgive stupidity either. Always think. Think what's possible. The damage you could have unleashed... our world came so close to destruction... Making that thing was bad enough, but to send it out into the world... Of all the selfish, stupid things you could have done, there cannot be many that would have surpassed this."

"I know," I said. "I do get that." Potter stared at me. "It was magic too potent for me or for anyone else to control. Maybe you think it's Dark magic because its power could so easily get out of hand, like the Fiendfyre that killed Vincent Crabbe. But unlike Fiendfyre, a Time-Turner is not a bad thing in and of itself. It's just a strong force, that can be used for good or for ill. Like any powerful magical object, it can be used to do awful things, and," I hesitated, "It can do a lot of damage, even when the people using it mean well. I'm willing to believe that your son meant well."

"How magnanimous of you," Potter said. "I wish I could say the same for you, but I seriously doubt it. Do you know what you put me through, as a father? Do you even care?"

"I didn't mean to put you through it," I said.

"The last few weeks have been the worst of my life," Potter said. "I thought I'd lost him."

"I'm sorry you went through that," I said. "Really I am."

"You can't imagine what it was like," Potter said. "Not if you don't have kids."

"I can imagine," I said. "I know I can't know what it felt like to experience that but… I can imagine it. And I'm sorry. There are a lot of reasons I don't have kids, but one of them is that I'd be scared to."

"If you met the right person…"

I shook my head. "Someone who wanted kids wouldn't be the right person. I've got no faith in the future." We had arrived at the surface. It was dark outside, and cold. It had been August when I'd been taken in, and I was not dressed for the chill November pre-dawn.

"You preferred the past?"

"Not overly."

"You don't want to carry on your family, your traditions?"

"Like murder, and torture?" I said testily.

"You would't…"

"No, I wouldn't teach a child to kill. But maybe the world doesn't need any more Notts, either. I'd be a terrible father. And existence seems like a big thing to foist on someone who doesn't necessarily want it. How could I look that kid in the eye, knowing I'd brought him or her into an increasingly unstable world? I couldn't even say that it was worth it for me."

Potter gazed back at me.

"You didn't undo what you did," Potter said. "You could have."

"Mmm," I said non-committally.

"I'm sure you must have thought about it."

"I never went back there," I said. "How could I trust myself not to undo it? I'm not that reckless."

"You were reckless enough to make the Time-Turner."

"It was... purely an academic project."

"You weren't tempted?"

"Of course I was tempted. Haven't you been listening?"

"So you do miss the past then?"

"Parts of it. It's complicated. Life is for the most part… better since the Dark Lord was defeated. But I'm not going to bullshit you and pretend it's been great for me, because it hasn't, and you already know that. There are winners and losers to these things. I lost, on several counts. I had to learn to accept that, but it hasn't been easy. I wish things had been different, you know?"

"Hurting yourself in your cell… that sleeping potion... you're still not OK, are you?"

"A lot of people use that potion," I said vaguely.

"If Williamson hadn't found you…"

"Would have solved a load of your problems, wouldn't it?"

"Hey, no, that's not the right way to look at it."

"That sleeping potion, am I going to get that back?"

"No," Potter said. "We needed to run some tests on it. There wasn't enough left after that to be worth keeping."

"It was literally just sleeping potion," I said, an edge to my voice. "You know it costs eighteen sickles to fill a prescription at St Mungo's now?"

"It's addictive, that stuff. And all that other Class A rubbish we found at your place. It'll kill you, you know."

"I've never been happier in my life," I said, and this was true for my adult life, although it wasn't saying much. I'd never been able to produce a corporeal Patronus, but after the night I'd first travelled back in time and met myself, I had a memory that was happy enough to get some real power behind it, and more importantly, a lot more compassion for myself, a person I'd seen through new eyes. The spell had still taken me a while to master, but eventually, rather than the usual silver mist, a small bird flitted from my wand and hopped over to greet me. A robin, like a cheery visitor from another world, my brighter, more innocent self. They say that only the pure of heart can cast a Patronus, that the Dark wizard Raczidian was devoured by silver maggots when he attempted the spell. I'm not sure why I considered it worth the risk, but here it was, proof that I was not so bad.

"You could have fooled me," Potter said. "You're an addict."

"I've gone two months now without it," I said, shivering slightly in the cold. "Without anything. But it's been hard. I still need it sometimes. You don't get over something like that. I think about her every day, but... I've made my peace with what I did, more or less. Some people might think that I had no right to do that, and for a long time I thought that too. But what good does it do to spend my life consumed with guilt and regret? It won't bring her back."

"No," Potter said. "But instead you decided to flout some of our most important laws."

"I get it," I said. "You don't have to keep flogging a dead hippogriff. The Time-Turner was a mistake, and I regret it. Not just being caught with it, not just the trouble that's poured down on me since you brought me in back in August, not the fact that I'm going to be looking over my shoulder for the rest of my life, no, the actual making of the Time-Turner, I regret that. The legacy I want to leave isn't one of destruction, terror, and death, even indirectly. You were right, I did do it because I'd lost my magic and had something to prove. The world as we know it was nearly destroyed so that I could demonstrate to myself the extent of my powers. It was narcissistic, and it was stupid. Happy?"

"So you don't mind that we took the memory."

"I didn't say that. Just because I regret something doesn't mean that I want to undo it or forget it. I mean," I said, with a humourless laugh, "If that was the case I'd have to throw out my entire existence, pretty much."

"You'll be safer without that memory; we all will."

"I won't be able to produce a Patronus anymore," I said sadly.

"That was the memory you used? It made you that happy?"

I shrugged. "Slim pickings, I guess."

"That's pretty sad."

"You're telling me."

"There are other things in life, you know. Magic... money.. you can't depend on them."

"Money has never been the issue," I said.

"I suppose not," Potter replied. "But what about friendship, family?"

I laughed bitterly. "Well, that's something I know I can't depend on. My family are all dead, and I have no friends to speak of."

"You are lonely, then." It wasn't a question.

"I don't require a great deal of human companionship," I said evasively.

"But you get even less," Potter said. "You've no one to talk to, no one to confide in."

"I have my elves."

"No one you would see as your equal," said Potter. "Your elves wait on you hand and foot. They practically worship you."

"So?"

"So there's nobody looking out for you who will also criticise you," said Potter. "Your elves can't tell you how detached from reality you've become. Maybe they can't even see it."

"I'm not detached from reality," I said, nettled.

"How do you explain the extraordinary risks you've been taking then? In all my time as an Auror, I've never seen anything like it."

"I may have disregarded a few rules," I said. "But it's not as though the Ministry's never had Time-Turners."

"Not like that. Those only went back an hour. And even those, the Ministry decided that they were too dangerous. If you go back more than five hours, you start disturbing the fabric of reality."

"The Ministry Time-Turners only went back one hour per turn. So by your logic, six spins is Dark magic, but five is fine. Is that really where you want to draw the line?"

"None of it is fine. We recognise that now. It may seem ridiculous to you, but that kind of power needs to be controlled, " Potter seriously. "You make it sound petty, but it's important."

I rolled my eyes. "The Muggles have weapons that could end the world. Did you know that?"

"Of course," he snapped. "But they control those weapons."

"Barely," I said. "And can we trust that that will always be the case? Surely you've noticed the discord that's been spreading among the Muggles for a while now? Climate changing, disease spreading, political unrest, fires, storms, violence, death."

I caught his look of surprise, so I went on, seizing my opportunity.

"Yes, Potter, I follow what the Muggles are doing. They scare the shit out of me. Even a reclusive former convict like me can see what's going on. There may come a time, sooner than you think, when we need to change something, for their good and ours. What if humanity needs a second chance? I understand that what I did was wrong, that the risks were too great, but what's the point in having powers like ours, and not understanding them? Of keeping ourselves ignorant, so that if and when we need to use a certain type of power, it's too late to learn how? Our Ministry, in its infinite wisdom, just decides it doesn't like the look of certain types of magic and won't be bothering with it any more. Who are they, to decide that? You think their definition of good and evil will matter when wizardkind has lost all its power and the world has been all but destroyed? The Department of Mysteries is a joke."

"They would never hire someone like you," Potter said.

"Do you think I don't know that? Do you think I haven't applied to be an Unspeakable, several times, only to be told that my background rules me out?"

"Your temperament also makes you quite unsuited for the job," said Potter softly. "You don't recognise or accept any limits and you like to keep secrets."

"I don't like to keep secrets," I said. "It's an occupational necessity. I want to discover new magic and I want to share it. Ideally, I'd be praised for it and paid for it too. But you've made it so that I have to hide."

"It would be dangerous to give you the privileges Unspeakables have. You think the rules don't apply to you."

"That's rich, coming from you," I snapped. "I guess I'll just play with my Ministry-approved toys then, while you and your family and all your pals are out stealing, cursing, maybe even killing. You are a hypocrite of the highest order, Potter, and you always have been."

"Are you saying that I abuse my privileges?"

"Yes, I suppose I am. But the worst of it is, you're oblivious to that fact."

"You've got some nerve, Nott," he said.

"Don't be like that. That map... tell me honestly, if you'd found it at my place... you'd have charged me with something for it, wouldn't you?"

"It wouldn't have been one of the worst things there, not by a long way."

"Even so," I said. "That map watches everyone at Hogwarts. Without their consent. You must know that's illegal, even in Muggle law, but you still have it, and you use it. You get away with using it, regularly, but if I had something like that you'd put me away for a good year or two. Other people's privacy, that's never mattered to you, not when your opportunities for magical surveillance have been at stake. How can you be anything other than a hypocrite?"

"After all I've done for you..." Potter muttered. He sounded livid.

"All you've done for me? All those times you haven't had me killed? Or those occasions when you deigned to treat me like a person?" I said. "I mean, I was kept in solitary confinement for ten years, and neglected to the point where I started to forget where and even who I was, catatonic and covered in my own filth, and nobody noticed that I'd stopped eating until I'd almost starved to death, but I know most people thought I deserved that and worse, so I guess I must owe you an unending debt of gratitude because somehow I didn't actually die."

"You did get out," Potter said. "You did get better. I fought for that for you. Plenty of people told me that you weren't worth it, but I believed you could change. I put my reputation on the line for you. I still bloody am.

"That's what this is all about, isn't it? Your reputation."

"No," Potter said. "Although I can't pretend I don't feel let down by you. You've deliberately broken some of our most important laws over and over again. Here," he said, thrusting my wand at me. "I can't believe I'm giving this back to you."

I took the wand from him; until this point I hadn't been certain I would actually get it back. It was my second wand, the one I'd purchased after my release from Azkaban: pine with dragon heartstring, thirteen inches, resilient. It felt warm in my hand, as though it belonged there.

"It was never about you. I didn't realise you had so much invested in me. Before... you barely knew me. I was depressed, I was an echo of myself," I said, quite honestly. "I really had lost my powers, you saw that. You don't have to feel as if you were taken in. The things I told you were true, for that me, at that time."

"You talk about yourself as though you were a different person then," Potter said. "But you're not. This is who you were the whole time. Cynical, calculating, manipulative."

"To be fair, Potter, I never exactly hid that from you," I said. "Maybe you saw in me what you wanted to see. That's not to say that the qualities you liked weren't there, or even that they aren't there still. But you knew I was a liar, to myself as much as to other people. Even my old wand had turned against me; black walnut does that, you know, stops working properly when the carrier practises any form of self-deception. And at the time I thought it was me, that I was defective. I was vulnerable then, and you're right, I did share a lot with you. But I understand things differently now."

"I know you better now," said Potter. "And I will be watching you."

"I don't doubt that," I said, preparing to Disapparate. "Take care, Potter."

The End

A/N: Thank you for reading. Thanks especially to xXMizz Alec VolturiXx, Cinder, Arwengeld and macsmackeroo for your reviews.

This story has been over four years in the making; I think I started it the day after the play was published thinking that 2020 was a reasonable deadline and that I could sprinkle in a few contemporary details to keep things fresh. And here we are and now it seems that maybe a Time-Turner could be more than just a cheap way to contrive a plot to bring all your favourite characters to the stage for a bunch of soliloquies on how things used to be. In fairness to the stage play it does kind of work when you see it live but I guess that's not really a thing any more.

I couldn't bear to leave this story on a low note, though, and I do keep going in the hope that things will get better: "There was no point worrying yet, he told himself, as he got into the back of the Dursleys' car. As Hagrid had said, what would come, would come… and he would have to meet it when it did."

Thanks again for reading. Stay safe and well.