Previously: Minister Fudge took extreme measures to put an end to the problem that is Sirius Black. Albus Dumbledore thought about his past and conspired with Freyja Morrigan to subvert the Minister's efforts.

Chapter Fourteen:

Quidditch and Tutoring

The cold air burnt Kali's lungs and stung her skin. Her feet slapped against the frozen ground, sending shockwaves through her shins.

She ran along the edge of the Forbidden Forest, close enough to the treeline for the danger of it to add to her adrenaline, but not so close that she would get into trouble. Professor Snape had eased up on the detentions of late, and she didn't want to squander her newly found freedom by getting caught breaking the rules.

A light breeze rattled the branches overhead. Brown and leafless, they stretched toward the clear sky like grasping fingers, reaching for Circe only knew what. If Kali stared at them for too long, they turned into skeletal hands clawing their way out of shallow graves. She avoided that by concentrating on where she put her feet.

Pan trotted beside her, refusing to wander too far.

The tip of her wand peeked from beneath her left sleeve, the duelling sheath that Gran had bought her for her birthday digging into her forearm. It wasn't reassuring enough for Pan who seemed to think that if left unsupervised, Kali might take a detour and stumble across the Centaurs or Acromantulas or any of the forest's other inhabitants, half of which Pan had crossed paths with already.

Kali wasn't sure whether he explored the woods to satisfy her curiosity or if it was because this creature-filled forest reminded him of his first home. She didn't dare ask.

She put on a burst of speed but had to slow down once she passed Hagrid's cabin. At the castle doors, she jogged on the spot for a moment longer before she started her stretches.

Thoughts of forests and abandonment crept back into her mind, but before they took root, Pan's head snapped to the left, ears perked and eyes wary.

"What is it?" Kali asked.

Pan didn't answer with words. Instead, he sent her images and sounds and smells.

The sudden sensory input hit her like an angry Erumpent. She squeezed her eyes shut to shake off the nausea and headache, but Pan didn't notice. His unblinking gaze never left the forest. She muttered half of a curse before her brain caught up with what Pan had sent her: a scent on the breeze, a light thud of footsteps, a shadow moving between the trees.

The scent vanished before he could process it, wafting past long enough to tease, but not long enough to reveal anything.

It had been happening a lot since the start of term. If it wasn't a disappearing scent, it was padded footsteps on stone floors, fallen leaves and branches cracking under the weight of something out of sight, a prickle at the back of Kali's neck, a flash of something out of the corner of her eye.

At first, she had shrugged it off as being part of the haunted castle vibe that Hogwarts had going for it, but now she wasn't so sure. She was starting to think that she had a stalker, and not one of the human variety—those were easier to catch. Maybe it was just Peeves messing with her, but he had the attention span of a two-year-old. She doubted he would have managed to keep it up for this long.

"Do you want me to take a look?" asked Pan.

It went against every instinct he had to ignore a possible threat—the real and deadly kind—but whatever this was, it didn't feel dangerous. It didn't feel safe either, which was why she didn't want Pan going after it alone. As she had other things to do today, finding her invisible stalker would have to wait.

"Not if you want to eat before the game starts."

The tempting smells of breakfast wafted through the air, and, as always, Pan's stomach won out. He was the first through the front door and didn't complain when she took a detour to her dorm for a quick shower. The Great Hall was still mostly empty by the time they returned, with only the Ravenclaw Quidditch team huddled together, bleary-eyed, and a handful of others scattered at each table.

"What are you doing up so early?" she asked, sitting in front of Theodore Nott.

Theodore was her only third-year housemate who held neutral ground in her conflict with Draco and his merry band of blood elitists. Kali had assumed that being the heir to a noble, pure-blood family, Theodore would have favoured Draco, but outside of class, the two rarely spoke.

He glanced up at her and bookmarked the page he was at in a well-worn paperback. "I wanted to get an early start on homework, and yourself?"

"I went for a run." She passed Pan a piece of omelette before piling some onto her plate. "We don't have that much homework for next week, do we?"

"Those of us who want to attempt to keep up with you do." He removed his glasses and put them down on the cover of his book. His narrow blue eyes looked surprisingly humorous given that this was the longest conversation he and Kali had ever had together.

"I'm happy I can motivate you to improve your grades."

He smiled, revealing two front teeth that were longer than the rest. "It's been bad enough always coming in third after Draco and Granger. Now I'm not even in the top three. My father will be disappointed."

The notion didn't seem upsetting to him, but it was always hard to tell with the high-borns.

"I'm sure you'll manage to make it up to him."

He hummed and fiddled with the bent corner of his book. "I was thinking you could tutor me."

Kali paused with a goblet of pumpkin juice halfway to her lips.

Theodore smoothed the paperback's cover and met her gaze with a slow blink and no hint as to why he would endanger the neutrality he had been holding on to since the start of term.

"Maybe he wants something else, and this is his underhanded way of asking for it," Pan piped in, still munching on his breakfast.

Or perhaps he had surmised that Draco would make for a terrible teacher, and with a choice left between Kali and a Gryffindor Muggle-born, he knew which option would do the least damage to his reputation.

"You have some serious trust issues, did you know that?"

"You were thinking it too."

He wasn't wrong, but she wasn't going to let paranoia get the better of her. "I could do that," she said aloud.

Theodore's shoulders dropped an inch, and the muscles around his eyes loosened. "Good. Are you busy this evening? Say at seven o'clock?"

"Seven," she agreed. "The library shouldn't be too busy then."

Students trudged, walked, and skipped into the Great Hall, bringing with them the excited chatter and over-abundance of House pride that only existed on game days.

From what Pan had overheard from Draco, Kali knew that today's match would decide whether Gryffindor stood a chance in the school leagues. If they lost, they would be out of the running for the Cup, which explained why so many people wore Ravenclaw blue. The Slytherin team had gone over the top in its show of support, with robes charmed to match the Ravenclaw House colours and a large bronze eagle painted over each of their backs.

Having both of her mothers as well as one of her grandfathers obsess over Quidditch had not imparted upon Kali an appreciation for the sport. A bad fall from a broom when she was young hadn't helped with the matter, and Leilani's accident had cemented Kali's opinion. She didn't hate it, but she couldn't get very excited about it either.

A commotion by the door drew her attention. She spotted Harry, decked in his Quidditch robes and surrounded by a guard of honour made up of the boys from his dorm. They stood tall, chins raised and smiles bright, casting glances at the broom slung over Harry's shoulder.

It took Kali a long second to figure out what the fuss was about. One couldn't grow up in a household filled with the Quidditch-obsessed and not pick up a thing or two, especially when it came to broomsticks.

The broom resting upon Harry's shoulder was a Firebolt, a recently released, state-of-the-art racing broom that was the envy of any Quidditch player and quite a few non-Quidditch players too if the swell of excited muttering that overcame the Great Hall was any indication.

Kali chanced a glance at the Slytherin team and saw only wide eyes and gaping mouths.

"I don't see what all the fuss is about," said Blaise as he and Daphne slipped past the group of Gryffindors and sat on either side of Kali. "It's only a broom."

"Not just any broom," said Daphne, her lips parted as she stared at the Gryffindor table. "It's an aerodynamic masterpiece."

Kali looked over at Daphne and Blaise leaned around Kali to do the same. It took Daphne a moment, but she eventually felt the eyes boring into her and glanced over. Her shoulders scrunched, and redness flooded her cheeks.

"What?"

"Since when have you been a fan of Quidditch?" Blaise's voice drawled with every word, but Kali didn't miss the undertone of surprise.

Daphne shrugged, her shoulders touching her ears. "It's a good sport."

"Do you play?" asked Kali.

Daphne shook her head, lowered her gaze, and mumbled her answer. "No."

She wouldn't look away from her plate, and her shoulders seemed tense enough that they might snap in two, so Kali dropped the subject for fear that her friend might hurt herself by trying to avoid it.

Pan scoffed. He snatched a piece of bacon while no one was looking, scarfed it down, and turned into a peregrine falcon. "This is an aerodynamic masterpiece. That thing over there is an abomination. Humans weren't meant to fly. It's unnatural."

"You're just jealous that you're not the centre of attention today," she said as Blaise and Theodore started discussing homework from last week.

She excused herself from the table and headed for the door.

Across the hall, Harry's smile shone brighter than she'd seen it in months. His mood had been rocky since his last Quidditch game. Not even discovering that Sirius Black was his godfather had sent him into such a gloomy state, but all it took to raise his spirits was a new broom. It was useful information to know.

Pan followed her from the Great Hall, and when his flight got wobbly, he changed into a cat and trotted beside her.

People loitered in the entrance hall, waiting for the match to begin. Kali veered toward the dungeons to grab a library book she needed to return as well as another jumper, but Pan's hearing caught the sound of suspicious whisperings.

"It's given me an idea." The voice came from a dark alcove halfway down the steps to the dungeons. "What if we hid some in the Ravenclaw team's robes?"

Kali and Pan shared a look and edged closer.

"We could put a timer on it and have it go off right before the match," someone answered.

"That way, it isn't cheating. We won't have interfered with the game, only given them a bit of a fright."

Kali stepped in front of the alcove and spotted Fred and George Weasley wearing their Quidditch robes. In their hands, sat small crates filled with tiny bottles that tinkled like fairy bells when either of the boys moved.

"You two must have a talent for Shrinking Charms," she said.

The twins jumped like startled cats. They would have dropped their crates had they not clutched them between both hands.

Wearing matching outfits with matching expressions of shock and surprise, it was near impossible to tell Fred and George apart. Pan could do it by scent, but when he wasn't around, Kali's sense of smell wasn't good enough to make the distinction. There were slight differences in their speech and actions that were barely noticeable most of the time but more reliable for when she was alone, except when they were too far away or were deliberately mucking up their mannerisms. Right now, she had to rely on Pan because the twins weren't giving her any hints.

"What do you mean?" asked George, lowering his hands to a less noticeable height.

"The crates." Kali nodded toward the ones in Fred's hands. He closed his fingers around them. "They're filled with bottles of Butterbeer."

Fred peered at her with narrowed eyes. "What's it to you?"

"Nothing much, although I disagree. Putting those in the Ravenclaws' pockets and unshrinking them before the match would definitely count as cheating, and cheating is wrong." She felt the need to remind them.

"Ohh," Fred cooed and ruffled her hair. "The Slytherin on our shoulder."

"Piss off," she said, shoving him away and rolling her eyes. "Do you two have an underground trading business or are you that sure that Gryffindor will be celebrating after the match?"

"We have a Firebolt on our side," said Fred.

George grinned. "We can't lose."

Kali looked from one cocky smirk to the next. "Have you seen the Ravenclaw line-up for this game? Their Keeper may not be brilliant, but their Seeker is."

"Not as brilliant as Harry," said George.

"You haven't seen him play properly yet," said Fred with a confident nod. "That last game doesn't count. There's a reason he was the youngest player Hogwarts had seen in a century."

"Not everyone seems to think so." She leaned against the alcove's side. "I've seen a few people place bets against him."

The clandestine betting ring at Hogwarts was something to behold. Run by the Ravenclaw seventh-years, it was nearly as old as Hogwarts and covered everything from test results to Gobstone matches. Every teacher in the school knew about it, but either it was too much of an ingrained tradition to put an end to, or they'd tried and failed and somewhere along the line given up.

"It's a wager they'll lose," said Fred, mirroring her position. "What about you, Black? Who are you betting on?"

She pushed away from the wall and, with a shake of her head, started down the stairs. "Like I'd tell you."

The moment she turned a corner, the twins' whispering started up again.

"What are the odds one of them ends up in prison?" Pan asked.

"They're harmless."

"My tail hairs are still blackened from that 'harmless' explosion of theirs. Do you know how difficult it is to fly with singed tail feathers?"

She let him rant as she headed to her dorm and then to the library. If she was quick, she might have time to peruse the shelves and borrow a few more books.

She took three different secret passages to get to where she wanted to go. The last one wasn't much of a shortcut, but she went down it anyway.

She had done well since school began, discovering all kinds of secret corridors and hidden rooms, but as it had turned out, she knew very little when compared to the hive of information that the twins shared. Pan had lost count of the number of times he had spotted them popping out of walls and jumping out from behind tapestries and statues. The frequent jump-scares were another reason he wasn't Fred and George's biggest fan.

Pan left her side and returned to the Great Hall when she arrived at the library. The Hogwarts librarian didn't appreciate fur or feathers near her books. It often seemed that she would prefer to keep people away from them as well.

Kali greeted Madam Pince with a smile, and the librarian gave her a stiff nod in return.

Leaving the borrowed books on the return pile, Kali stepped over to the Charms section. This week, her curiosity led her to a shelf of books on healing spells. She leafed through a few before selecting three hefty tomes that covered everything from boils to missing limbs.

There was still time before the game started, so she heaved her pile of books to her favourite spot: a window seat on the mezzanine, hidden in a nook of the Muggle literature section.

She was halfway through the introductory chapter of one of the easier spell books when a loud snap and a flash of light broke the stillness.

Blinded, she toppled to the side but caught herself with one hand while the other grasped her wand. The book thumped to the floor at the feet of a small, mousy-haired boy holding an old-fashioned Muggle camera.

The boys stared at her as though he were the one caught off guard.

"At least you've finally learnt to go for your wand when something dangerous and scary rounds the corner," Pan said with a snigger. He was pilfering food from the Gryffindor table, and his sudden screeching laughter startled the girl next to him who spilt her orange juice all over herself and him.

"Serves you right," she muttered, trying to get her heart rate back under control. She loosened her grip on her wand and pointed it away from the child. "Who are you?"

"Colin Creevey," he said breathlessly. Taking a tentative step forward, he picked up her book and handed it to her.

"I didn't hear you coming." Which wasn't surprising since he looked like he weighed less than her three new books did.

Colin's eyes were wide, with fright or wonder, Kali couldn't say. "Is your father really Sirius Black?"

Chest aching and expression guarded, Kali gave a slow nod. Colin started talking a mile a minute.

"He's been all over the news, even in the Muggle world. I'm Muggle-born, and I told my dad—he's a milkman—that you started going to school here, and he said to stay away from you, just in case. But you looked so peaceful just then, and I think that if I send him this picture, he won't be so worried any more. What do you think?"

Kali blinked, trying to catch up. "Sure?"

His grin split his face in two. "Thanks. Hey, are you not going to watch the match? It's Ravenclaw versus Gryffindor today, and Harry Potter has this really great new broom, so Gryffindor's bound to win, even though my friend Jake in Hufflepuff says that they'd have to win by loads if they want a shot at winning the Cup. But I'm not worried. I know Harry can do it. Which team are you going to cheer for? Most of the Slytherins are supporting Ravenclaw, but you're friends with Harry, right? So you'll be on Gryffindor's side today?"

His excited chatter died down as he waited for an answer.

Her eyes fell to his camera, her mind returning to his silent footsteps. The accusation fell from her lips before she could reign in the hard edge of her tone. "Have you been—Where outside earlier this morning?"

Colin took a step back. His mouth pursed into a confused pout, and his eyes widened further. "No. I left Gryffindor tower with the Quidditch team and went straight to the Great Hall."

"Right." She rubbed her eyes with one hand and let out a breath. "Sorry."

His frightened frown fell away. "That's all right. I'll see you at the match." He waved as he left, leaving Kali alone.

Her posture slumped, and she ran her hands through her hair, letting out another long breath, this one shakier than the last.

"You thought he was the stalker?" asked Pan, still licking himself clean from the orange juice mishap.

"I don't know." She gathered her books and glanced over her shoulder at the path leading to the rest of the library. "No, not really. It's just …" She didn't know what it was exactly, but this stalker issue was getting to her more than she had led herself to believe.

Pan sent her a jolt of reassuring thoughts. "I get it."

"Good because I don't."

She checked the books out at the front desk and considered borrowing a page from Fred and George's book by shrinking them until they fit into her pocket, but she didn't doubt that Madam Pince had placed magic detection spells on every book in the library. So instead, she ran to her dorm with the heavy books clutched to her chest.

It was quarter to eleven by the time she sprinted into the entrance hall where she found Daphne waiting for her. Kali slid to a halt, and Daphne caught hold of her arms to steady her.

"Where have you been?" Daphne asked.

Kali rubbed at a stitch in her side. "Library."

Daphne's smile softened the worried lines of her brow. "Where else. We're going to be late."

"Sorry." Kali hooked her arm with Daphne's, and they started toward the Quidditch pitch. "You could have gone ahead without me and spent some quality, one-on-one time with Blaise."

"I don't love Quidditch that much."

Kali snorted a laugh. "Don't let Blaise hear you say that."

They passed a group of students lounging in the grass, playing Gobstones. Kali looked over at Daphne. "But you do love Quidditch."

Ducking her head, Daphne nodded. "I find it exciting."

"Yet you don't play."

She ducked her head further. "It isn't ladylike."

Kali's eyes rolled before she could stop them. The wizarding world had ground to a halt in 1692 with the enactment of the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy. Without Muggle influence, progress had taken a backseat and feminism had yet to spread among the pure-blood crowd.

"My mums played professionally," said Kali.

"I know, but—" Daphne stopped in her tracks and dragged Kali to a halt beside her. "Wait. 'Mums'?"

Daphne's arm squeezed around Kali's, and Kali tried not to wince at the sudden tightness.

"My mother and her wife."

"Wife?" Shifting on the path, Daphne rolled a pebble beneath her left foot, her hands hidden in her sleeves, the loose fabric balled between her fingers. She cast glances left and right and cleared her throat. "As in girlfriend, right? As in a girl who was your mother's friend?"

Kali dislodged her arm from Daphne's grip and flexed it while frowning at her friend. "No. As in, the woman she was married to."

Colour drowned Daphne's pallor, and her features froze in a wide-eyed expression. "Oh. Your mother was …"

"Gay."

One advantage to the wizarding worlds' poor lawmaking was the abundance of loopholes. Where Muggles had made sure for centuries to define marriage as the union between a man and a woman, the wizarding world hadn't had the homophobic foresight. But legality did not mean acceptance.

With dread settling like a rock in the pit of her stomach, Kali asked, "Is that a problem?"

"No." The word came out too quickly at too high a pitch. "Of course not. I've just never met anyone who … who had two mothers."

The ball of dread turned into squirming worms. "That you know of."

Daphne's gaze dropped back to her feet. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to upset you."

Which somehow made it worse. "I know."

Silence stretched between them with only the Gobstone players' cheers and boos and the rumble of hundreds of people in the Quidditch stands filling the void.

Kali had spoken very little of her mothers since arriving at Hogwarts because very few people had asked her about them. Sirius Black cast a large shadow, and, in the UK, neither Asherah Morrigan nor Leilani Kalakaua could shine through it.

Daphne shuffled her feet and finally looked up with a strained smile. "I guess your mothers let you play Quidditch all the time."

The olive branch didn't lessen the sting, but Kali took it regardless. "They would have been happy if I had, but I prefer keeping my feet on the ground."

"That's probably for the best." Daphne locked their arms once more and started down the path. "I don't think Draco would cope with you joining the Quidditch team and stealing his spotlight."

"That's almost reason enough to do it."

Daphne laughed, and Kali joined her, and for the time being, any trace of tension vanished.

The Gryffindor common room, spacious as it was, wasn't designed to accommodate so many people. Not only were the Gryffindors laughing and shouting, celebrating their win, but quite a few Hufflepuffs and even Ravenclaws had crowded in too. Kali couldn't help but notice that she was the only Slytherin as she struggled to manoeuvre through the throng.

It had been a tense match with both the Gryffindor and Ravenclaw teams playing at their best, but Harry had caught the Snitch and his teammates had scored just enough points to keep them in the leagues.

Thrilled as she was that Harry wouldn't be downtrodden for the next few weeks, the best part of the match, in Kali's opinion, was when Draco and his goons had walked onto the field dressed as Dementors only for Harry to send a corporeal Patronus galloping straight at them. Draco had looked like he'd wet himself, and that was a memory Kali would cherish until the day she died.

The party was still going strong several hours after the match. From the way the Gryffindors had yet to stop cheering and dancing, it felt as though they had already won the Quidditch Cup. But one person wasn't joining in the festivities.

Hermione sat in a corner by the empty fireplace, attempting to read an enormous book entitled Home Life and Social Habits of British Muggles. She was making good headway considering the racket everyone was making around her.

Kali grabbed an extra bottle of Butterbeer from one of Fred and George's now fully-sized crates and carried it over to the nearly deserted corner.

"Need a hand with that?" she asked, plopping herself onto the arm of Hermione's chair.

Hermione looked up with bleary eyes and blinked a couple of times before she managed to focus. "What?"

Her hair fell around her face in a mess of coarse waves and thick curls, throwing shadows over eyes that changed colour with the light—from the reddish-brown of conkers to the dark bottomlessness of a black hole. Kali downed a swallow of Butterbeer and nodded toward the book in Hermione's lap.

Hermione followed her gaze. "Oh, no, I'm all right. Thank you."

"I'm heading to the library if you want to come with me." Kali used the edge of one of her rings to pull the crown cork from the second bottle and handed the Butterbeer to Hermione.

Hermione nodded her thanks and took a small sip. Behind her, on the mantle above the fireplace, a painted lion prowled in its frame. Its steady gaze remained on Kali with every turn as though it sensed that she didn't belong here. Kali ignored it and focused on Hermione, who stared at the crowd with a slight frown creasing her brow. Kali had to give her a tap with the tips of her fingers to get her attention back.

Hermione looked from Kali to the other students and nibbled on her bottom lip. "No, I should stay. I don't want it to look like I don't care that we won."

Kali could have pointed out that that was what sitting alone in a corner doing homework looked like, but she opted not to in case it came out sounding meaner than intended. "If you're sure."

Hermione nodded.

With a reticence that made her legs stiff and noncompliant, Kali slid from the chair's arm and headed for the portrait hole.

Stepping into the corridor outside the Gryffindor Tower felt like leaving a sauna. Kali hadn't realised how suffocatingly hot it had been in the lions' den until fresh air surrounded her once more. Her back hit the wall next to Sir Cadogan's portrait, and her eyes fell shut as the little knight called her a scurvy braggart and a rogue.

The Fat Lady had yet to resume her post after Sirius Black had slashed her portrait when she had refused to let him enter on the night of Halloween. That incident still had Kali reeling. If she thought about it too long, a sick feeling squirmed in her gut and bile burned her throat, so she endeavoured not to think about it at all.

She pushed away from the wall and started down the hallway toward the library.

As she walked past the Trophy Room, the sounds of angry muttering stopped her in her tracks. Glancing through the open door, she spotted Draco hard at work polishing an old trophy.

Professor McGonagall had been rightly furious after Draco's stunt during the Quidditch match and had handed out more detentions than Kali had ever seen her do in one go before. Evidently, the punishments had been effective immediately.

"Having fun?" asked Kali, startling Draco so severely that he fumbled with the trophy and dropped it.

"What are you doing here?" he spat, bending to pick up the award and checking it for dents.

She leaned against the doorway and glanced around at the many awards, trophies, cups, plates, shields, statues, and medals all kept in crystal glass displays. "Just passing by."

"Then pass by faster."

"Someone's in a foul mood," said Pan as he turned into a hummingbird and flew around the bottles of Butterbeer that Fred and George were juggling.

"I wanted to thank you," said Kali. "It was so nice of you to make a fool of yourself for everyone's entertainment."

Draco's pale skin took on a pink tinge. Kali thought that he might hurl the trophy at her face. He looked like he wanted to, but he merely tightened his grip on it, white-knuckling the delicate handles. He pressed his thin lips together, draining what little colour they had, and glared at her.

She grinned and turned to leave, but something caught her eye.

Prominently displayed on the left wall, beneath a sign that read: Hogwarts Awards for Services to the School, was a collection of small gold shields, each about the size of Kali's splayed hand. On one was the inscription, "T. M. Riddle".

Kali stalked closer, spotting similar shields with Harry and Ron's names engraved on them. She would have to ask them what they had done to earn those, although the Basilisk carcass decaying several hundred feet beneath the castle might have had something to do with it. She heard Draco move behind her, giving her a wide berth until he could see what she did.

"You'd think that after he started killing people they'd have removed this," she said, eyeing Tom Riddle's well-kept award.

Draco didn't say anything. When Kali glanced over her shoulder, she saw him staring at the little shield with something close to awe.

Jaw rolling, she shook her head and left the Trophy Room.

By the time she made it to the library, she was late, but she saved herself some time by knowing exactly where Theodore would be.

The library was huge, with tens of thousands of books, thousands of shelves, hundreds of narrow rows, and just as many places to sit, but humans are creatures of habit. Every student at Hogwarts had their favourite place to study. While Kali preferred the window seat in the Muggle literature section, Theodore could always be trusted to have his things spread out on one of the long tables among the dusty old law books that were seldom read by students.

His bag leaned against one of the chairs, but Theodore was nowhere in sight. She was about to start looking for him when she heard a creak behind her and glanced back to see him heading her way.

"I was starting to think you wouldn't come," he said when he was close enough that he didn't have to raise his voice.

She had to tilt her head back to look him in the eye, and she took a moment to process that information. She had been going to class with him for the last five months, yet she had failed to notice that he was a head taller than her. She blamed it on his lanky build; she had assumed that his height would match it.

"Sorry. I got side-tracked," she said.

"Shall we get started?" He waved her toward a seat, his long limbs moving awkwardly and his shins banging against the leg of the table when he sat down in front of her.

"Which subject would you like my help with?" she asked.

"Arithmancy." He pulled his book from his bag along with sheets of parchment and a quill.

Kali had nothing on her to fill up her side of the table. She could only sit and watch as Theodore set one item after another onto the table, all neatly organised. He either didn't notice or didn't care that she was woefully unprepared for this tutoring session.

"I don't understand the second exercise of the worksheet that Professor Vector gave us to do for Monday."

That was easy enough.

Kali spent the next three-quarters of an hour going over numerical formulas with Theodore, covering the entire worksheet that was due on Monday and a few of the previous ones too. He was a fast learner and eager to do well, but he struggled with some of Professor Vector's briefer explanations on when and how to apply each formula.

Madam Pince came to kick them out before curfew, and Theodore packed up his things as efficiently as he had unpacked them. Every quill and inkwell had its prearranged spot in his bag. Kali half expected to see labels pointing out what went where.

"Thank you for your help," he said, slinging his satchel over his shoulder as they headed for the door.

"It was no trouble."

He held the door for her, and she led the way to a stairwell that would get them to the lower levels.

"Would you mind if we made it a regular thing?" he asked. "Once a week or once every other week, whatever works for you?"

"I can do it once a week." Preferably during a weekday, then she might think to bring her bag. "How about Wednesdays?"

He shook his head. "The chess club meets on Wednesdays."

"Thursdays then," she said with an indifferent shrug.

He nodded his agreement, and they went down the next set of steps. "Do you play chess?"

"Sometimes. My gran says I don't have the patience for it."

"Your grandmother is Freyja Morrigan, right?"

Kali looked up at him, but his gaze stayed on the floor, watching for the trick steps. "That's right."

"I saw her name in that newspaper article last month, the one about your father."

She bit down a smile but couldn't hide the spring in her gait that had her skipping the next couple of steps.

It had only taken one article in the Daily Prophet to plant the seed of doubt. Now, at least once a week, a journalist from one newspaper or another added their theories about Sirius Black's innocence. Gran had told Kali once that doubt was the key to winning hopeless trials, and right now it was spreading like Fiendfyre.

"Maybe we could play chess sometime," he said when they reached the dungeons.

"Sure."

He headed for the common room, but at a grumble of complaint from her stomach for missing dinner, she stopped following, veering instead toward the kitchens. "I'm going this way."

"It's past curfew," he said, sparing a glance at his watch. "You'll get into trouble."

"Only if I get caught," she said with a smirk that bordered on a grin. She waved and went in search of food.

A/N: Sorry for the long wait! Summer got unexpectedly busy with friends and family all deciding now's the perfect time to move and an internship that had to take place mostly online.

Unfortunately, I don't know what my class schedule will be like yet, so this may be my last update for a while. I don't want to sacrifice quality (?) for speed.

I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and I'll see you when I see you!