Tony was glaring at the glass of champagne that an attendant had placed in front of him. Evey and Walden were slow-dancing – Evey must have drugged her husband to get him on the dance floor – and Tony was presently alone at their table.

He kind of wished that Morgana was here. She had the ability to make good conversation, when she was in a public place. At the very least Tony could have danced with her. Evey had offered earlier, but he'd declined. It would feel too weird. Too wrong.

Nana the dog pressed her muzzle against his calf, as though she was sensing his dark mood and trying to comfort him. Tony petted her absent-mindedly.

"Mr Dolohov?"

Tony felt a moment of panic. Nobody could possibly recognise him; Evey had helped him with his disguise and he'd been growing a beard at Morgana's request.

Command, request. Whatever.

He glanced at the boy who'd called his name, a ginger kid he'd never met before. Had to be a distant Weasley relative or something, but how had he recognised Tony? "Um…"

"Oh, sorry. It's me, Harry. Harry Potter."

Tony wanted to exhale in relief, but there was no air in his lungs. "Merlin, kid, you gave me a fright."

"Sorry," Harry repeated sheepishly. "May I…?" He pointed at a seat, and Tony nodded. "Thanks. I…have a question for you, if you don't mind." Tony didn't. He had nothing better to do. "Do you know what a Horcrux is?"

The word sounded vaguely familiar. Even before he could remember more about the subject, though, Tony felt a cold shiver run down his spine. "It's…" He frowned in concentration. Something evil. Something wrong. "Yeah, something about…splitting your soul in half and…creating an object that would…" The more he remembered, the more he wanted to forget. That was very dark magic. How did the kid even know about this?

And then the penny dropped.

An object that contained part of the soul, so that in the event of death… "Oh, shit," Tony whispered. "That's how he did it, isn't it? Voldemort. That's how he…" Tony gave Harry an appraising look. "How did you…?"

"Professor Dumbledore figured it out," Harry explained.

Right. That made sense. Kids Harry's age shouldn't have access to that sort of knowledge. "Well, kudos to Dumbledore. Did he happen to know where Voldemort was storing the other half of his soul, then? Is that the hush-hush mission you're supposed to take care of on your own, for some reason?" And if so, why was he confiding in Tony, of all people?

"We believe…that is, we know that Voldemort made more than one Horcrux."

Tony stared at him. His knowledge of Horcruxes was minimal, but he wasn't certain that it was possible… Then again, until this moment, he'd dismissed Horcruxes as nothing more than an obscure myth. "He divided his soul into more than two parts?" Harry nodded. "That explains a lot," Tony muttered. With only a third or less of his soul actually inside him, Voldemort's shifting moods and murderous tendencies almost made sense. "Um, not that I'm complaining, but why are you telling me this? I mean, if you're looking to fabricate some of your own, I have not the faintest idea…"

"No!" Harry exclaimed. "No, not at all. Never. I was just thinking that you were the most likely to know where to find the other objects."

"Kid, I didn't even know that he'd made them until you told me a minute ago."

"Think," Harry insisted. "Isn't there a Death Eater that Voldemort would trust enough to give them one of the Horcruxes for safekeeping?"

Tony chuckled. "If I were him, I wouldn't tell anyone about it. I mean, it sort of defeats the purpose, doesn't it? He created them in an attempt to make himself immortal, or to elude death, anyway." In Tony's mind, there was a difference between the two notions. "If anyone knew about the Horcruxes, Voldemort would always be vulnerable, and he would never allow that."

"But isn't it possible that he would have entrusted someone with a Horcrux without telling them what it was? Only that it was an object of great value to him, and that if anything happened to it, he would…kill the person in charge of keeping it safe?"

Tony considered that. "Yeah, sure, it's possible, though trusting any Death Eater with something so important is unlike Voldemort… I don't know. I'm sorry, but I'm not exactly the sort of person he'd trust at all, and my knowledge of what the more loyal followers were up to is quite limited." He paused. "Why do you have to do this alone, Harry? We could help." As far as Tony knew, the kids didn't know precisely what he was, didn't know about the immortal werewolves and vampires, but as former Death Eaters, Walden and Tony may still be useful.

Though Tony was proving to be rather useless right then.

"The fewer people who know, the better," Harry said quietly. "We don't want to alert Voldemort to our intentions. If he discovers that we know, that we're searching for the scattered pieces of his soul and looking for ways to destroy them, he will move them, and then it will be pretty much impossible for us to find them. It's going to be difficult enough as it is."

That was a good argument. "You will let us know if you need help, though, right? Anything, anytime. You're one of the few people who are welcome at the manor if you need a place to hide." Even Walden had said so. He wouldn't allow even Molly inside, but he seemed to trust the kids implicitly.

"Thank you." Harry smiled. "You've come a long way. I remember Ron when I first arrived at the Grimmauld place, two years ago. He was terrified of you. Well, he still is, I think, but he's the one who suggested I talk to you today."

"I appreciate that you trust me enough to ask." In the distance, Molly's daughter was glaring at them, arms crossed over her chest. "I think someone would like a word with you," he told Harry, who blushed when he caught sight of Ginevra.

The Chosen One sighed heavily, as though he was about to go fight Voldemort in a duel to the death right there and then. "If I die, you go look for those Horcruxes," Harry said resignedly. "But um…seriously, don't tell anyone about this. Please."

"Don't worry about it," Tony said, though Walden and Evey were and always would be the exception to 'don't tell anyone about…', no matter the circumstances. "I guess it's your cross to bear, lad. Good luck. Stay safe."

Harry nodded glumly as he dragged his feet toward the dance floor.

Evey studied the people whirling on the dance floor, some more gracefully than others, but all of them at least slightly tipsy and happy. She had not seen Mrs Weasley so relaxed in…well, forever. Hours ago, the Weasley matriarch had been about to explode out of sheer excitement and stress, and now she was doing a weird approximation of a jitterbug dance with her husband. Both of them were more than slightly tipsy.

It was a beautiful wedding. Not quite as awesome as Walden and Evey's wedding, of course – no event could ever hope to top that – but still pleasant. It was certainly good for morale.

Evey and Tony had started the wedding at a table with Luna Lovegood and her father, Xenophilius, with whom Evey had had a riveting conversation about the legendary crumple-horned snorkack while Tony moped in gloomy silence. After dinner had been served, the Lovegoods had invested the dance floor with everyone else, and Evey had offered to dance with Tony, if only to distract him. He'd turned her down, but that had not deterred her. She'd danced with a couple of distant Weasley cousins, then with Charlie, the only Weasley sibling she'd never met before. He was not a good dancer, but then again, neither was Evey.

She was enjoying herself immensely, and felt a bit guilty about it, admittedly, especially whenever her gaze strayed toward Tony, who had not moved from his seat all day. But she'd decided that, if he wanted to be a party pooper, it was his problem. She was not going to let him spoil her good mood.

When Walden had finally appeared later in the evening, Evey had asked him to dance with her - a bit of diversity after having danced with at least half a dozen ginger men. She'd always thought that the gene was quite rare, but every single Weasley seemed to have red hair.

Evey suspected that magic was involved.

Walden had been reluctant to comply, but she hadn't exactly left him a choice. One dance with her husband. How could he refuse her that?

When he'd satisfied her annoying demand, they went back to their table. Tony wasn't alone anymore – Remus and Tonks had joined him. Evey found out that the two of them had gotten married recently, in secret. Tonks positively glowed with happiness, but Remus seemed oddly glum, for a newly-wed. Perhaps he was just tired.

Evey adjusted Tony's wig before sitting down. He had had to come up with some disguise to attend the wedding. After Morgana had recognised him at Dumbledore's funeral, Kingsley had insisted. Unfortunately, Polyjuice potion did not work on Ancients, so Evey had picked up a few Muggle items instead. He was wearing a platinum wig (not the most inconspicuous colour, but he could always pose as a metamorphmagus), thick glasses, and he had let his beard grow over the last two weeks. It hadn't been done on purpose for the wedding, as far as Evey knew.

Maybe it was a Morgana thing.

Evey liked the new bearded look, in any case. It made Tony look less boyish.

The five of them had a very mundane conversation, glad for a break in business, especially after what had happened when they smuggled Harry out of his aunt's house.

Alastor Moody's death had been a hard blow, so soon after Dumbledore's murder and Snape's betrayal. Harry had also lost his pet owl. Evey petted Nana, who was asleep at her side. She didn't know what she would do if the dog ever came to harm.

Eventually, they ran out of positive, cheerful topics of conversation. There were depressingly few in those dark days.

There was an awkward moment of silence that lasted a few minutes. Evey glanced at Tony. A few months earlier, he would have broken the silence with a silly joke. He was so different now. Jeanne's death had changed him. He was more…mature, somehow. As if he'd suddenly realised that he was in fact 40 years old, and not 20, which was how old he looked – and forever would.

It made her sad to see him like this. Tony being morose made everything bad that had happened in the past weeks look even worse.

Evey had hoped that dating Morgana would magically make Tony happy again. Instead, he'd become ever more distant as the days went by. They'd met three times since their first date and, every time, Evey attempted to know how it had gone. She never received a full sentence as a reply.

Walden was right. Maybe she was smothering him. She should give him some space, leave him grieve in peace. He would talk when he was ready. Hopefully.

"So," Tonks said eventually, and bless her for it, "any idea what you'll be doing in the months to come? I assume your…training is complete by now," she added to Evey.

"I daresay it is, but I don't plan on asking Mrs Weasley's permission to finally get something done."

Tonks's smile faded. "Considering the present context, we could use all the help we can get. I'm sure Molly will understand that. You're as ready as you'll ever be."

"Right. Well, Walden and I have a few ideas, of course, but we haven't settled on anything yet. We've managed to recruit some vampires, maybe a dozen in total, but most werewolf packs still refuse to openly declare themselves against Greyback and Voldemort. We have a few rogues and four small packs, but only a handful of them are trained wizards. Same with the vampires. For now, we've asked them to spy on known or alleged partisans of Voldemort, and the wolves will let us know right away if they hear anything about Greyback." She sighed. "It's not much, I know. I thought we could visit the Nāga, but Walden says it's pointless. Even if she consented to support our cause, which is unlikely, how would that help us? If she attacked Voldemort, she would probably destroy all of Great Britain in the process."

"So it's true?" Tonks said with obvious excitement. "Walden really saw one of the Great Serpents? Sirius told me about it, but I wouldn't believe him. How big was she?"

To Evey's surprise, it was Tony who replied. "Larger than three black hebrideans, and she's often considered to be the smallest of them all." He hadn't seen the Serpent himself, but Walden had had to recount the story a thousand times, Evey knew. Tony may not share Walden's enthusiasm for magical creatures at large, but dragons fascinated him. "The World-Eater is said to be the largest, but no one knows if he actually exists or if he's just a legend. Then there's the Vesuvius, who lives under his namesake. He's considered the most active of the Seven." Evey was listening avidly, as was everyone else at the table, but apparently the sudden attention bothered Tony, because he cleared his throat in embarrassment, as though he was afraid of sounding like a nerd, just like his brother. "Anyway. I'm fairly certain that they're all dormant right now."

"I think we would know if they were awake," Evey pointed out.

"The Nāga told me she wanted to take a very long nap," Walden said. "That she'd wake up when her brothers did."

"You know, according to ancient myths, the awakening of all seven Great Serpents is a heralding sign of the end of the world," Remus said, not very seriously.

"You should broach the topic with the Lovegoods," Tony muttered.

"Aw, come on!" Evey exclaimed. "They're good people. Bit eccentric, but in a good way, you know?"

"If you say so," Tony said unconvincingly. "Oh, I actually thought of something last night," he went on, leaning forward on the table. "What if we sought out the Questing Beast?"

Evey stared at him. "That...thing from the Arthurian legends? Why, is it real?"

"Of course it is," Tony replied impatiently. "What do they teach you in school these days?"

"Well, we studied Merlin for hours on end, down to the colour of his underwear, but Professor Binns only vaguely mentioned Arthur. All my knowledge on the subject comes from my Muggle life, I'm afraid. And, um, as far as I can remember, the Beast Glatisant was born of incest, and revealed itself when Arthur slept with his sister. And it didn't actually do anything. So…I'm not sure how that helps us," Evey said dubiously.

The four others burst into laughter at the same time. It was good to see Tony laughing, although Evey would rather it wasn't at her expense. "What's so bloody funny?" she said sullenly.

"Muggles are funny," Tony said. "How do they even come up with these things?"

"I'd never heard that one before," Remus said with a smile.

Tonks was wiping tears of laughter from the corner of her eyes. "Arthur slept with his sister!" she said in a choked voice. "Oh, thank you, V. I haven't laughed like that in a long time."

"Yeah, everyone knows that Arthur was gay," Walden said.

"With all those cute knights around the Table, can you blame him?" Tonks chuckled.

"Are you going to tell me the true story, or bury me under the weight of my own ignorance?" Evey said crossly. It wasn't her fault if Muggles made up silly things like that, burn them!

"Alright, alright," Tony said with a placating gesture. "It's like this: the Questing Beast, as its name suggests, is the object of a quest."

"What quest?"

"No, I mean the Beast is the quest. That's the thing, see. If you find the Beast, and manage to capture it, it must grant you a wish. Arthur, the real one," he clarified with a smirk, "used it to obtain Excalibur."

"But there's more to it," Tonks went on. "To begin your quest, you must follow the path from Avalon, until you reach the Beast's lair. Then it will leap out of the shadows and flee, and you must hunt it down from there."

"According to the manual, three people must set out from Avalon," Remus continued in a tone that reminded her that he had been a teacher, although briefly.

"Wait, there's a manual?" This was ridiculous. They were pulling her leg, weren't they?

"Yes, at Avalon. Merlin left instructions, etched in stone," Tony explained.

"But Avalon…where is it? Glastonbury?" Evey wondered.

"At least the Muggles got that right," Tonks said with a laugh.

"Mmph." Evey turned to Remus, who was perhaps less inclined to make fun of her. "Why three people?"

He counted off his fingers. "One to be granted a wish, one whose future must be foretold, and the last to kill the Beast, for it must die before it can be reborn."

"It's said that if more people set out to find the Beast, terrible things will befall them and their companions," Tony said mysteriously. "But that's just legend, not fact."

"So…wait. Has anyone actually done this before? Successfully? They caught the Beast, got their wish, and were left alive to enjoy said wish?"

"In truth, many people have tried to track the Beast over the years, since Arthur and Merlin devised the proper way to go about it, but few have managed to accomplish it, admittedly," Tonks said. "I think the last person to do it was Newt Scamander. He merely wanted to study the Beast, though. His wish was that the Beast would keep still while he sketched it. Loony, that bloke was," she added with a shake of her head.

"Is," Walden corrected her. "Newt Scamander is still alive. And still loony," he added with a smile.

"Well, if what you're saying is true about the Questing Beast…" Evey glanced at Tony. "Maybe it's worth a shot. That's actually a good idea."

"No need to look so surprised," Tony grumbled. "I regularly have good ideas, you know."

"We'll discuss it at length tomorrow," she decided. "I assume there's some kind of warning in the manual that says 'be careful what you wish for?'" Evey went on wryly.

Remus nodded. "Obviously. And if you're intent on this endeavour, you had best be prepared. Tracking the Beast could take days, even weeks, and the path to reach its lair is said to be perilous."

"Of course it is," Evey said. "Wouldn't want it to be too easy now, would we? Where would be the fun in that?"

They briefly interrupted their conversation for the cake ceremony. It looked ridiculously delicious. Tony glared at every slice as if it would somehow make them less poisonous to him. If they ever got out of this war alive, he vowed, he would seek out the Questing Beast once again just to demand to be able to eat again.

He'd had other ideas regarding potential allies or other things that might help the Order (and Harry's very special quest), but this was the one that seemed the most likely to succeed – and the less likely to get them all killed. When the others were done with their piece of cake, however, Tony couldn't help but bring up the next item on his list. He had already discussed the possibility with his brother, when Evey wasn't around, because he had a bad feeling that Evey would not be on board with this.

"How about the Elves?" he said casually. They all frowned at him, of course, except Walden. His brother just looked annoyed with Tony for broaching the topic.

"What, the house elves?" Evey said, obviously confused. "From Hogwarts? I mean, they're quite helpful, but they don't look like warriors to me," she said dubiously.

"They could make us sandwiches while we're fighting," Tonks said with a grin.

Tony rolled his eyes. "Not the house elves, silly. The Elves, with a capital E. Tolkien's Elves."

"But…I thought all the portals to Middle-earth had been closed?" Evey said. "Precisely after they became Tolkien's Elves, if memory serves. They disliked being turned into a story for Muggles, and they considered that he had broken their trust by giving away so much information about their world. I mean, we all know he changed a few details, but still…that was a major breach in secrecy."

Tony nodded. He was quite the expert on the subject of breaching secrecy. "All true, but I have it on good authority that one portal remains. They couldn't close it, because it was…damaged. As a result, most people cannot go through it, from our side at least." Evey was frowning at Walden and him both in turn, a suspicious expression on her face.

"Only the dead can go through," Tony clarified.

"You have got to be joking!" Evey exclaimed. She rounded on her husband. "How long have you known that? How long have you been planning this?"

"And what is your source regarding that information?" Remus asked more calmly. "I've never heard anything about any remaining portal here on earth."

"The Dwarves," Walden said reluctantly, deeming it best to answer Remus's question first. "Some of them decided to remain here, instead of going back to Middle-earth when the Elves announced that they were closing all existing access points. Voldemort wanted me to find the Dwarves and learn all I could of their trade, but they refused to give anything away. They share nothing with outsiders; they're almost as bad as the goblins. But I got that information out of them, at least." He turned to Evey. "No one's been planning anything, love. It was an idle thought, alright? I mean, we could go through the portal, sure, but what would be the point?" he added, glaring at Tony.

Tony huffed in exasperation. "Isn't it obvious? You reported to Voldemort that a portal remained, so he knows about it, and he knows where it is. The Elves are immortal, or near enough, right? And Voldemort wants to become immortal. If he decides he wants to take a closer look at them…"

"Tonks!" someone exclaimed. They all jumped, as though they'd been caught red-handed doing something illegal. It was Molly. Her cheeks were a bright shade of pink. "What is this that I'm hearing? You got married?"

Remus and Tonks excused themselves to the trio and went on to apologise to Molly for not inviting her or anyone else.

That left Tony alone with Walden and Evey. As usual nowadays, it made him feel uneasy. He sought out a topic of conversation different from the Elves, since it obviously upset Evey. "I…had an interesting conversation with Harry, earlier," he said. He told them about the Horcruxes. Even Walden didn't know what they were, so Tony did his best to explain everything he knew, which wasn't that much. "So I was thinking…if we track down the Questing Beast, we could ask it to reveal where all of Horcruxes are, if there really are more than one."

Walden nodded. "Definitely a better idea than visiting Middle-earth."

"Well, we could do both," Tony said.

"But now we know for certain that Voldemort has no reason to find the Elves. It would be pointless," Walden said. "The Horcruxes?" he added when Tony scowled. "Voldemort has already made himself near-immortal. He has no use for the Elves, and that means they have no reason to be worried, and therefore absolutely no reason to come to our aid. Certainly not after Tolkien. For all we know, they'd kill us – well, me, anyway – when they realise where we're from."

"You don't know that for sure," Tony argued. "Maybe they miss us but are too proud to admit it."

Evey snorted. "That's adorable, but I doubt it."

"But isn't it worth a try, at least?" Tony insisted. "According to the Dwarves, the portal will send us to the Ford of Bruinen, at the same spot where Frodo supposedly defied the Witch-king of Angmar, in the Muggle books. That's, what, 20 or 25 miles from Rivendell?" Yeah, he'd already done some extensive research on the subject. He didn't know that from memory. "Even if we can't Apparate, because apparently magic works differently in Middle-earth, we could still reach the city in less than a night's walk. Then we'd talk to Elrond, or whatever his real name is, and if he refused, we'd be back home the next day. We lose nothing in the process, and we have everything to win." He looked at Evey. "I don't need Walden. I can go alone. You won't even notice I'm gone."

"Yeah, right," she said, shaking her head. "I'm not saying you're wrong, Tony, but we said we were a team, and that we would operate as one. I just don't like us being separated, whether or not Walden goes with you, not even for a few days. Anything could happen."

Before he could reply, a Patronus in the form of a lynx suddenly materialised in the middle of the garden, startling the guests.

After that, everything went pear-shaped.