By the time Reilly arrived, squeezing her way out of the small tunnel, I was sitting on a tiny ledge barely large enough for me waiting for her, my green and silver beanie on my had (our agreed signal that I was not a fake). This tunnel was in the West wing, right below my Arithmancy lessons, a tunnel that I had begun to use with regularity after my discovery of it for my animagus transformations out of the castle. I looked at her, studied her haggard, pinched, gaunt-looking face, the frown lines on her forehead which had not been so pronounced when she had just returned from Durmstrang, and I felt my eyes soften, even though I made sure to look away so she did not see, and hand her the Hogwarts robes.

"You think I would've been Slytherin?" she asked brusquely as she took the robes from me and changed out of her own black work robes.

"Yes," I said simply. "But I chose it because teachers in the school are less likely to bother you if you are Slytherin. Fear of being punished by the Dark Lord."

"Mmm," she said vaguely, sounding as though she were only partially listening. "Makes sense. Thank you for the two-way mirror, by the way. Garrett and I use it regularly. It's the only secure means of cross-country communication. You can turn around, by the way."

I turned, and looked her over before nodding. "You look just like a Hogwarts student. But we better not let your true features be seen."

I pointed my wand and changed her cheekbones, made her eyes closer together, tried to make her look vaguely like a girl version of this Hogwarts boy I recognised so that she would look like a possible student of Hogwarts and yet not actually bump into someone who was an exact lookalike. Then, I stepped back, and conjured a mirror for her to see herself in.

Reilly nodded, and I vanished the mirror.

"Let's go then."

We began to clamber up the stairs to the seventh floor, where I made her stand back as I paced in front of the Room of Requirement thrice. Then, I opened the door and she followed me in.

I waded past the storage boxes, marble bust, twittering books, to the very end of the room, where the mirror was. Reilly had barely to take a single glance to certify it was genuine. She nodded, and stepped before it. Whatever she saw made her wince, and she quickly stepped back.

"You can change it?" Reilly asked. Even at Durmstrang, I was one of the rare few students with the capacity to learn Alchemy. She hadn't passed the test to take it, unlike me.

I nodded. Pointing my wand at the mirror, I focused on channeling my power into making the form, the end result. My Charms had always been weaker because Charms was about the process of enchanting something, but I had always been brilliant at Transfigurations, the focus on the big picture and the end result. Sure enough, the entire mirror surface began to ripple like the surface of the ocean, and then swirled in a circular motion.

"Put your hand through, slowly," I emphasised, focusing on channelling my magic into maintaining that glittery liquid surface. It was causing sweat to bead my forehead, even though the room had since my entrance fallen a few degrees in temperature.

Reilly nodded, and slowly extended her hand. She pressed through the shimmery surface, and her hand entered the hole in the middle of the swirling, tornado's eye. Then, she pulled out the hand, slowly, and out from the mirror came a young girl, looking terrified. I gritted my teeth as it got increasingly harder to keep the mirror in liquid rather than solid form.

"Hurry," I pressed out. Reilly nodded, and her hand was extended again, pulling out yet another child, who dragged another with him, and then another. It was a long chain of little children who tumbled out onto the Room of Requirement floor.

At last, just as my wand began to shake so violently I felt certain the mirror might shatter, Reilly told me to close the portal, and I changed it right back to solid form, sighing in relief.

"They'll only be here for a short while," Reilly promised. "Just a short trip."

"Are they all muggle born?" I asked, as I studied their T shirts, shorts, trousers, all forms of muggle attire.

Reilly nodded.

"That's what you've been doing then? Sneaking them out of the ministry?"

Reilly shrugged, looking tired. "What else could I do? Leave them to be sacrificed to the dementors?"

I shook my head. "Of course not. I can hardly believe that that's what the Ministry has been doing with the muggle born lists...Do you have to go tonight?"

Reilly nodded, her eyes determined, even though I could see the dark circles beneath it. "I can't be away from the Ministry too long. It would raise suspicions."

"It's fine. Antoinette and I will care for them," I said, looking down at the children, half of them still looking traumatised and shaken. "But when will the next people come to take them away?"

Reilly hesitated. "Not sure. I'll have to check. But they will probably contact you themselves. Via patroni."

I nodded in understanding. "What should I do with them now?"

Reilly bit her lip. "You could try to entertain them with muggle puzzles and things, I suppose. And food - they'll be needing food."

I hugged her goodbye, then tended to the children as she headed down to the passageway alone. Not too long after, Toni joined me as well, and winced in sympathy as she identified them each with the news. "That one, the death eaters killed her parents in their sleep. And that boy, there, he was tortured a little, but they managed to get him out."

They all seemed to have terrifying stories.

Toni and I slept in the Room of Requirement over Saturday and Sunday, and took turns in keeping the children company. They were still in shock, so they weren't loud, boisterous, or difficult to care for. They seemed to understand that they couldn't leave the room, and one of us would run for food while the other played or tried to keep the children company. One of the more mischievous ones cracked open my backpack, causing my school things to go flying out, but she seemed to take interest only in the comb and nothing else. In the end, I charmed my bag shut, but gently combed her hair, before turning it into a not-so-perfect braid.

After that, all the children wanted turns with me to comb and braid their hair, even the boys. I would hold them as they wept, trying to keep my eyes on more than one person at the same time, before I realised it was counter-effective because by not concentrating on each individual, the children would become even more starved for affection and attention, and more restless. Instead, I told the Room to not allow any of them to leave the room unheeded, and then focussed on each child as I held them, combed their hair, straightening little knots in blonde hair, black hair, even auburn hair, wipe away tears from cheeks that were pale or tan, dark brown or yellow, straightened their clothes, showed them to the bathroom, taught some of the younger ones how to get soap into their hair, how to avoid the eyes, how to properly clean themselves.

It was mentally gruelling, and by the end of Sunday, when the hawk patronus came to tell me to hook the mirror on again and get the children through to that specific location, I was both relieved and reluctant to let go of these children. Toni and I exchanged glances, understanding each other's feelings, but we waited until ten in the evening, the agreed-on time, then I Transfigured the mirror again to liquid, and Toni pushed the children through, one after another, kissing them on their way.

Once they were gone, we looked at each other. I was exhausted, but somehow the loss of the children was still painful. I reached out a hand to grasp hers, and she squeezed mine, as though passing between us a current of what we could not put properly words. Then, numbed with fatigue, we headed back down to our dormitories, both deciding on getting an early night's sleep for the next school day.

Taking care of little children became our routine on Saturdays and Sundays. On those days, Ginny took over the DA sessions. After that first Saturday, Professor Snape never told me to go to his office on weekends again. It did make me wonder if he was, even a little, involved in the smuggling and care of muggleborn children. It was also on those nights that I would return early to my dorm on the pretext of getting early sleep, but enter the other dormitory and slip into Daphne's chest of drawers a thin sheet of parchment.

It was on a Monday that things turned for the worse. I had started the day with a heavy heart, having written to my family to inform them that I could no longer return for the Christmas holiday. Toni had done the same. Then we went to Dark Arts, and our eyes nearly bobbed out of their sockets when we saw the little first years in our classroom, and the seventh years gathered in the back.

"What?" she breathed, staring.

Once the last student arrived, Amycus leered. "Burke, get up here," he ordered. He had long since dropped the "miss" prefix. I got onto the duelling stage. "And...aha! Mendel. Come on up."

A little midget of a girl looking barely older than the children I had just cared for over the weekend came up onto the stage. She looked terrified.

"Mendel was responsible for the problem over the weekend, wasn't she? Weren't you the one who placed the toad in my office?"

Mendel shivered, hunching over herself as though trying not to be seen. She was wearing pigtails, and looked too young to be involved in the Carrows' cruel and sadistic plans.

I felt a stab of sympathy.

"You, Burke. You will be casting the Cruciatus on her, as punishment for what she did over the weekend. Go."

I hesitated, looking in the crowd of seventh years. Theodore Nott looked slightly horrified, but Crabbe and Goyle looked eager.

I felt sickened.

"DO IT!" roared Amycus. I nearly turned on him and casted the Cruciatus on him instead, but I caught myself just in time, and pointed my wand at the girl, envisioning the words on a piece of parchment. The parchment fluttered into the girl's hands, but thankfully Amycus didn't seem to notice, because I took a few steps back, then walked toward the girl, saying aloud "Crucio".

A red light came from my wand, struck the girl, and she screamed, falling to her feet.

She seemed to scream forever before her voice faded into confusion, uncertainty. I pointed my wand away to make it seem as though I had stopped the curse, but that didn't seem to be enough for Amycus.

"Again," he said softly, smiling. I grimaced, but raised my wand again. "Crucio," I said, and once more a jet of red light came from my wand, and the girl screamed as though her organs were getting torn open, as though every part of her was being ripped clean out. Then when her screams died down, I pointed my wand elsewhere.

Amycus grinned. "Longbottom, how about you?"

I glanced at him. He glared at me heatedly, and from the stubborn tilt of his face I knew he would not do it, and in refusing get into even more trouble. "Professor," I said coolly. "I have discovered a pleasure for this. Let me refine my technique."

He looked at me in surprise. Part of him seemed to want to not satisfy me by chasing me away. Another part of him seemed eager to let me give it a go. After all, if I got good at this, I could join his squad, the special Inquisitorial squad that Crabbe, Goyle, all the death eaters' children were in. And I was a Burke. I was still Sacred Twenty-eight, one of the oldest and most prestigious families in society.

"Professor, my father was a coward, a fool. He ran during a time of momentous change, when he should have submitted himself to the Dark Lord and won my family glory. But I will not. I will reinstate my family to its former glory. Give me that chance," I licked my lips, as though I was eager to please, and tried to give him the look like I admired him, even though every bit of me was sickened by how sycophantic I was acting.

He nodded, smiling benevolently, as though doing me a favour. "Why don't you try Kirk? Get up here."

The girl picked herself off the ground, doing a masterful performance of being in severe pain, nearly collapsing on the ground as she got off the stage. Kirk took her place nervously, and I thought quickly how to inform him of the same because I could not risk the same trick. Then, glancing at Amycus, I realised what I could do. I looked Kirk, willing him to look me in the eye. As I said, "Crucio", I felt my mind connect with his, and the words "SCREAM" was transmitted across.

This boy was a bit slower on the uptake, but a few seconds after the red light collided with him he too was screaming like there was no tomorrow, falling to his feet, all of that. I might almost have believed I was performing the Cruciatus if I hadn't already checked the spell I was casting in my head, the intent.

I went through nearly all the first years before the bell rang, then I bowed at Carrow and strode straight out of the door, trying to look as entitled as possible. But then I felt myself rising into the air, my legs flailing, then I slammed headfirst against the wall. Turning on the ground, I saw through black spots in my eyes Neville was glaring at me, his wand pointed at my chest. My heart.

"How could you," he asked, looking furious and betrayed. "HOW COULD YOU!"

I was still coughing, my breath having been tossed out of me the moment he slammed me into a wall, and then again when I collapsed onto the floor, choking on my own saliva.

But then his wand jerked out of his hand as well, and I looked up, seeing Antoinette somehow standing before him. "Shut up," she told Neville. "Come with me, both of you. Don't draw attention to yourselves."

Neville looked enraged, confused, a whole lot of emotions warring across his face, before he finally agreed to follow Antoinette. Toni led us into a classroom nearby, and locked the door. Neville's eyes nearly popped to see all the first years in the classroom. Then the sound of applause.

"What?" he asked.

Toni rolled her eyes. "You are so daft," she told him. "You. Mendel, am I right? Care to explain?"

Mendel grinned, now looking not at all injured. "She slipped me a bit of parchment. Told me to scream. I think she was casting a tickling charm instead. I had to fight so hard to scream and not laugh. I think it made my pain look more real."

Neville frowned. "That's not possible. We all heard you say the Cruciatus."

"That was not the Cruciatus," said Kirk, looking equally pleased with himself. "I've felt the Cruciatus. Crabbe casted one on me before. I think I was his first, because it was mild, but it was still painful. This didn't even even hurt."

"She slip you a piece of parchment too?" Neville asked incredulously.

"No. She told me telepathically." Kirk said. The rest of the first years agreed, and they applauded again. I felt my cheeks heat, even though the clapping actually made the headache more unbearable.

Toni chased the first years away with the warning not to tell anyone else about what had happened in Dark Arts, and they all agreed. Then, once they were all gone, we were alone in the classroom again, and I spoke up.

"Neville, I want to teach you how to fake a cruciatus," I said. "I can't protect you forever."

"Protect me?" Neville repeated, confused, a look of bewilderment and absurdity on his face, and hurt pride.

"Amycus is going to force you to do the Cruciatus on them very soon. I told him I liked it because I knew you would refuse, and then you'd get trouble and have the Cruciatus on you instead. But if you can say the Cruciatus but nonverbally cast another spell instead, that should do the trick. I would recommend the tickling charm. The colour of red is very similar."

Neville shook his head. "Are we not going to talk about the telepathic thing? That's not possible."

I looked at him flatly. "It is, if you know Legilimency."

"You can mind read. You were reading the first years' minds?" He looked increasingly horrified and incensed.

I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. "I used legilimecy to tell them to scream. I didn't read their minds. If anything, they were reading mine."

The bell rang, and Toni and I exchanged looks. We were both due for Charms.

"Whatever. I'll teach you tonight. See ya," I quickly ducked out of the classroom and started sprinting for Charms, with Toni on my heels, leaving Neville alone in an empty classroom.