AN: I think personally my favourite character in this series would have to be Sam, mainly because I love her relationship with James so much; they're platonic soulmates and that is just, if not more important, than the idea of romantic soulmates. I don't know if that makes me a little pig-headed seeing as my favourite character is one of my OCs but I went into writing about the Next Generation because I love James Potter the first so much and didn't think I could do him justice so I thought I'd muck up his grandson instead. Turns out I got way too into it and ended up trying to write a series *claps for me*.

I love Jayna's flaws and history, Lydjah's complexity, Lien's annoying but endearing naivety, Molly's honesty (bluntness), Sam's relationships (not just with James but with Lee and her parents and sister too), James' realism, Albus' wit and Scorpius' conflict. And I also love Lee's bitchiness and her on point batting as well as slipping in little bits and pieces from different older generation characters. So while I find Sam the most interesting, she's not necessarily the most fun to write.

Anyway; hmmm… Which country do you think each of the eight would most like to visit? I know this seems like the most random question in the entire world but I think it shows character understanding (or portrayal I suppose ;) ).

Chapter Twelve
Of Unusual Meetings (As Made Obvious By The First Sentence Of This Chapter) And New Desk-Mates

The meeting was quite unusual. When you thought about a terrorist group, you didn't imagine them sat in a well-lit room drinking weakly-made tea and gossiping in laughter-filled voices. You think of a damp dingy space with skulls on the walls and secrecy outlining every clipped word spoken.

I suppose the difference is perhaps that terrorists hardly ever believe themselves to be so. They think they are the only ones acting to keep the peace. This group does anyway.

The head of each department of the Night-Watchers finally quietened down as Alexis drew the meeting to attention. It had not taken him long to assume his brother's position of power. He didn't know if he was the only person in the room who had suspicions about his brother's cause of death but he did know he could not chance revealing them to anyone else. For all he knew, the Blackwoods' murderer could be in this very room.

For a second, his mind flickered to his nephew's wife. Celina Daviau. He'd learnt a lot after moving to this position of power, but he still didn't know everything. Had Celina known her parents were part of the Sang de Bourbe cannon fodder that made up this group? What had happened to Bernadette and Eugene Daviau? Was the fact that they disappeared two months before the attack on the Blackwoods a coincidence? Had Celina known something was up, which was why she made sure her two daughters were out of the house, despite it being a huge family gathering?

Then there were the attacks on his great-nieces. He hadn't sanctioned them, but then his power was only an illusion. All their instructions came from higher up, in the form of paper slips that appeared in the oddest places around his house. He knew the other Heads of Department received them too, though he assumed that they weren't all the same. Did Jayna really not suspect them? Had she thought the kidnapping in October was all just a big ruse to scare Harry Potter? Did she know who their informer was?

The informer told them that the attack in September had been ordered by higher up, because they all knew Jayna or Cararon had information on their eventual goal; the Secret, through Roland. What if that was a lie though, and the informer had just been taking Jayna and Cararon out in order to gain their wealth? He doubted his great-nieces were aware of it but their informer, while a teacher at the school, was also their late father's cousin, on Alexis' sister's side. And if that was true, was Alexis himself in danger?

Why had their informer sent one of his number into the grounds that Halloween? Was he trying to kill Jayna and Cararon again? If he hadn't received word telling him to stop the attempts on Cararon and Jayna's lives, why had he? And if he had received word, did their leader already know that it was Jayna who had started the trials?

He banished the questions from his mind. They weren't important now. He couldn't ask questions of the dead. Or of the living, as it turned out, unless he wanted to bring their mysterious leader down on all of them.

He hated having to work with Sang de Bourbes but their leader was right. They no longer had the numbers to fight on their own. Besides, conning the Sang de Bourbes into thinking that they had the upper-hand was quite fun. An unwanted thought came into his mind; what if they thought the same about him? But he got rid of it immediately; he knew where he stood on the hierarchy.

There were four of them in total. Today their meeting was being held at Justin's house, and while Alexis' skin had crawled with revulsion as he stepped into the thoroughly Moldu household he'd accepted the tea from Justin's snivelling wife with a hint of a smile. Justin Finch-Fletchley was an easy person to peg; too stupid to go into politics, suffering from PTSD after the Second Wizarding War which led to paranoia when he managed to produce offspring over whether his son would survive with all the 'nasty-scary-Sang-Purs' running around. His solution? Become little more than the leader of the cannon-fodder for the most dangerous organisation around today. It was Justin's department that had had to flee for the main part of the past year to hide from Harry Potter's team of Aurors, but there had been work to do in the meantime for the rest of them. Justin's department had the largest portion of their numbers, for obvious reasons.

It was simple really. The Sang-Purs were in the positions that required actual thought, and the Sang de Bourbes simply did what they were told. In order to avoid argument though, there were four heads of department, two of each side of the Nightwatchers. Genius. Alexis had a lot to owe to their leader.

He didn't bother with pleasantries; they all knew why he'd called this potentially risky meeting. He had news. "We are ze Nightwatchers," he began, "We are far and zey are few. We will 'ave our vengenance." The others joined his pledge as he finished and stood up to share his knowledge. "Jayna, my great-niece," He put slight emphasis on their relationship, staring at their spy as he did so, to make sure they were aware that should any harm come to the girl it would be Alexis as well as their leader that he was answering to, "'as informed me zat it's 'er zat 'as started the trials to ze Secret. Apparently Roland left 'er wiz enough information to find its location and begin ze trials."

"Can we trust this?" Harper Peters spoke up. Alexis swallowed the swift insult that rose to his lips at the sight of the smarmy Sang de Bourbe Auror who'd betrayed his team in order to become a Nightwatcher. Alexis didn't trust him at all, not that he trusted anyone except his wife. His motivations for becoming a Nightwatcher were questionable at least; Alexis had a feeling that their leader only let him in because they needed a mole in the Auror department. Harper freely admitted that he liked his boss, Harry Potter, but that he knew in order to break the people's faith in the so called 'utopia' the Boy Who Lived had created, the Chosen One needed to be killed.

Alexis' own motivations were much more pure; he wanted to save the world from the filth that had overrun it, and keep the old ways sacred. None of this technology rubbish. He'd brought his brother into it years ago, and had not been surprised when Roland ended up getting the top position over him. Roland was smarter than him; it was something he had accepted years before. Or perhaps he wasn't considering he was dead. He'd tried to bring his sister's husband in too but he'd refused. Unfortunately, the now-head-informer had overheard this conversation, and requested to join as soon as he was old enough. He joined the year Alexis and Roland moved their families to England, and his sister had refused to speak to him since.

"Jayna 'as no reason to lie to me."

"Unless the Potter boy and those other friends of hers have corrupted her." He retorted. Alexis bit back a curse. Had their informer told everyone in the Nightwatchers that Jayna had had to make some questionable choices in order to do her job?

"Part of Roland's plan was to 'ave 'er become friends with some Sang- Traîtres." At their looks of confusion he snarled slightly. "Blood-Traitors! Alors! Vous êtes betes comme vos pieds!" He didn't try to explain himself again as they seemed to realise they had been insulted.

"Fine. So we trust your niece and continue as usual?"

"Zere are many zings to do before we can claim ze Secret." Alexis allowed. The others didn't look happy, but the Secret wasn't their concern. Harper Peters was in charge of gathering information, Justin in charge of carrying out their plans, their informer in charge of gathering new recruits and Alexis in charge of actually planning their attacks, all according to their leader.

"If you'll excuse me, I have to get back before I'm missed." Caden Rossesson, their informer, stood and with a quick inclination of his head, left to resume his position as Charms Professor at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

The third-years, as was their habit now, met up in the courtyard for lunch. After they had discovered the kitchens there was no reason to eat in the Great Hall for the non-mandatory meal, where they couldn't sit together.

There was, Jayna mused, always going to be a line between them and the younger four. It wasn't purposeful, but they all spent more time, through lessons, with their year groups. Besides, with the exception of Scorpius and James, though for opposite reasons, she thought that the four of them were also tied together through the generally bad lot they'd so far been dealt in life. There was something about Lydjah's past that the Ravenclaw had been hiding from her and she had suspected it for a while now. Jayna wanted to give her space though. She recognised a secret worth keeping when she saw one, even though she'd never really kept a secret of her own, at least not on purpose. What information was locked away in her hidden memories would come in its own sweet time.

Hopefully.

Sam was the last person to arrive. According to James she'd gone to have a shower. She quickly joined them, hair still dripping wet and dug eagerly into the sandwich that Lydjah had had prepared for her. Jayna wondered whether she should warn the Gryffindor that Lydjah had got another of her infamous colds-that-always-develop-into-a-chest-infection-because-she's-Lydjah-Merlin-Damn-It-Dawson, but Sam took it before she could. After swallowing the first mouthful she spoke. "I wanted to try out the broom before I thanked you for it, at James' insistence."

"I knew that she'd end up insisting on giving it back if she didn't fall in love with it first." Sam glared at him.

"I have not fallen in love with it," She said scathingly. At Jayna's slightly disappointed look she rushed on, "but that doesn't mean it's not absolutely amazing in every way." She gave Jayna a quick appraising look and then punched her lightly on the shoulder. "So even though you shouldn't have bought it and just looking at it makes me feel guilty, thank you. Really." Jayna smiled, rubbing her shoulder with a grin.

"No problem. And I absolutely should have bought it. I'm really, totally loaded you know." They all laughed for a few moments before Jayna's eyes lit up. "Please tell me you didn't miss double History of Magic to test out Sam's new broom." The opposite twins grinned wickedly at her.

"We didn't mean to miss both lessons-" Sam began.

"In fact, we went out early this morning but-" James continued.

"Then we decided it might be more fun to do some more exploring-"

"You know, for intellectual purposes-"

"And we ended up rather lost in the Forbidden Forest-" The two Ravenclaws groaned.

"And it took us-"

"Rather a long time-"

"In which we may-"

"Or may not-"

"Have easily found our way out of the forest-"

"And decided that History of Magic was boring as shit-"

"And so spent the next hour and a half swimming in the lake." James concluded. Jayna and Lydjah shared an amused, if exasperated, look.

"Sometimes I feel more like your babysitter than your friend." Jayna said. James pouted.

"Are you not even going to ask us if we found anything?" Jayna raised an eyebrow, clearly stating that he'd have to fly on his broom to the moon and back before she'd ask. James smiled at her.

Jayna didn't have time to move away from the tell-tale glint of mischief in his eyes before she was pounced on, slightly calloused hands tickling every inch of her that they could reach. She shrieked at him, curling into a ball of giggles, desperately swatting at his hands as the air was sucked from her lungs and laughs replaced it. "Potter!" She yelled. "Stop! Potter! Stop!"

"Ask me if we found anything." He panted, winded from dodging her uncharacteristically well-aimed kicks and shoves.

"No!" She yelled back defiantly. Seconds later, when his hands finally found the backs of her knees she was relenting in an instant. "STOP! I'll ask you!" She screeched. Sam and Lydjah were laughing almost as hard as their tall friend. James backed off. She glared at him as her giggles subsided. "Not that I give a shit, but did you and Andrews find anything in the forest?" James shook his head, like he was disappointed in her.

"As a matter of fact we did Blackwood."

"Oh?" Lydjah asked. Sam pulled a face.

"It's not anything that great. Just a weird looking pebble." James tutted at her and brought it out of his pocket, handing it to the glaring Ravenclaw. Despite herself, she turned it over in interest, examining how it caught the light in different angles. When she looked up, she could hardly see her friends anymore. Surrounding her, smiling down at her with tears in their eyes, were the ghostly figures of each member of the family she had lost.

She froze, absolute terror shattering her to her core. The nightmares were bad enough; now she was having hallucinations?

"Jayney, you've grown up so much…" Her father whispered. Devin stood next to him, smiling at her like he didn't quite understand what had happened but that he'd missed his sisters.

Her father looked different from how she'd last saw him; younger, less tense. She looked around for any of her grandparents but didn't see them, and she felt a little sick. Somehow she knew it was because she didn't miss them. Which made her an awful person. Oceane, her cousin reached a hand out to her, to wipe the tear that had slowly fallen down her face but her fingers passed through Jayna's cheek. Oceane had always looked up to her, revered her as her brothers hadn't, because of the bigger age gap. She should be in Hogwarts, should be laughing with Jayna and making new friends.

"It's ok." Oceane whispered. Jayna dropped the pebble with a sob. Instantly the ghosts vanished. Her friends stared at her in shock. Jayna felt bile rising in her throat.

"Put that- that thing back where you found it." She spat, abandoning her lunch and running from the courtyard, the confused calls of her friends bouncing off her like her skin was a shield.

It wasn't. Inside, she was cracking.

By the time lunch was over, Jayna had calmed down, but she was still relieved to have a lesson without any of her friends. Not unusually, Lydjah had skipped class due to her current cold and it was with guilty thankfulness that Jayna announced to Professor Elswood that she was stuck in her bed. Jayna did not know whether she was stuck in bed at all, as she hadn't been to Ravenclaw tower since her embarrassing escape from her hallucinogenic sandwich, but given that the other girl hadn't turned up, despite her friend's disappearing act, she assumed that was the case.

Magical theory, despite not having any practical work in it at all, was quickly becoming one of Jayna's favourite lessons. Behind Defence Against the Dark Arts of course. And Charms. And Arithmancy and Potions and Spanish. But before Muggle Studies and Transfiguration Study of Ancient Runes and History of Magic and Astronomy. And miles before Horrbology (she was quite proud of that one). It was everything that she'd wanted History of Magic to teach her; not about the wars and struggles and scientific discoveries that Wizards had made but about the why. Why the five exceptions to Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration existed. Why flicking to the left didn't work when flicking to the right did with certain spells, and vice versa with others. Plus she could show off a lot when they studied wand woods, as it had been a hobby of hers in years past to understand what they all meant.

All of her new options subjects were brilliant; she only wished that she could take even more. Trying to decide what to do for NEWTs was going to do her head in, especially as there were only more options at that point.

Isla Odell plonked herself down in Lydjah's usual seat, smiling nervously at the vaguely spaced out Ravenclaw. "Jayna? Can I sit here for today? I- er-"

"You broke up with- erm- thingy what's his name?"

"Isaac." Isla said, with a slightly sad smile.

"Of course you can. Though had you not broken up with him my answer would have been the same." Isla's smile grew. "Why did you break up with him though? From what Sam says, the other Gryffindor girls have him high up on their 'obsess over' list." Jayna asked, strangely curious. Perhaps because Isla could see the genuine curiosity in her eyes, despite the potential insult, she found herself answering her question.

"Isaac is gorgeous sure. And he's nice enough too I suppose, and it's not even that he's stupid, or he has bad friends or anything. I just couldn't see it clicking with him. I was with him for what, five months? And not a single stirring of feelings flickered up. I didn't think it was fair to him or myself to continue as if there was ever going to be."

"How did you know that you didn't click? Is there some kind of sign?" Jayna continued to get her book out of her bag as she spoke, mostly concentrating on convincing herself that she was only asking from curiosity. Isla laughed.

"Sounds like you've already found a person you click with." Jayna couldn't help but smile; there was something infectious about Isla's laugh.

"Try convincing him of that." Jayna sighed. Isla grinned.

"He'll come round eventually. They always do."

"Sure, if you look like a model." Jayna said with a raised eyebrow, gesturing at her. Isla was very tall, very slim, with smooth dark skin and a small waterfall of curly black hair. She knew how to use a mascara brush, unlike Jayna, and could make even the uniform look wonderful on her perfect figure. Isla blushed prettily, swatting at Jayna's arm.

"Says you, Miss Cheekbones." Jayna snorted, and both the girls collapsed into giggles. "Besides, most girls would kill to be close friends with James and Albus Potter, let alone Scorpius Malfoy." Jayna rolled her eyes.

"They're not that great, honestly." Isla laughed.

"I must admit, while James is ridiculously attractive, I've never completely fell head over heels into obsession over him. He's a bit too cocky for me."

"Odell, you do realise you have only dated cocky blokes right?" Isla spluttered. "I bet you've already found someone you click with too. You just don't want to admit it yet. I'll get it out of you eventually." Jayna smirked. Isla blushed, only confirming Jayna's suspicions. She had the feeling that whoever it was that Isla liked, they weren't the type that her friends would typically approve of. Just then, Professor Elswood walked in. As the door opened and slammed into the side of the desk across from Jayna and Isla's, Laura Hackett's ink pot smashed to the floor, spilling ink all over Jayna's bag. "Fucking Merlin!" Jayna whisper-shouted under her breath. The Professor apologised hurriedly, siphoning the ink with his wand and then transferring it back somehow into Laura's newly repaired ink pot. Isla chortled quietly, the effort of keeping back laughter causing tears to run down her cheeks.

"Do you kiss your mother with that mouth Blackwood?" Jayna flinched, staring at Isla with a hurt look. "What did I say?" Jayna's expression cleared slightly.

"Are you a Muggleborn?" Isla frowned, looking confused.

"No, Halfblood. But I live with just my Muggle father."

"Oh." Jayna cleared her throat as Professor Elswood reached the front of the room.

"Sorry for the interruption class. I love how even though it's just the five of us; I'm assuming, Miss Blackwood, that Miss Dawson is ill?" Jayna nodded. "That only one of you wishes to sit where you can see the board. It's too much work to move now but next lesson I hope you would all be slightly closer. Now today will be-"

"Just a theory lesson." The class chorused, giving him half amused, half exasperated smiles that he continued to use the same pun every lesson.

"Correct. I would like you to read the passage on page 74 and then explain an example where this law applies to your partner." A quick silent plea to Laura sent her packing off to sit near Isaac.

"Why does it matter who I live with?" Isla asked, sounding only more confused. Jayna shrugged.

"I- er." Jayna coughed and turned to the right page in their books. "My mother perished with the rest of my family in an accident a year ago. I know it's stupid but mentions of her usually catch me off guard. I assumed you didn't know because you are out of contact with the magical world over the summer."

"Oh Jayna. I am so sorry, I didn't mean to-"

"It's completely fine." Jayna said, with a partially convincing smile. "You weren't to know."

"What was she like?"

"Sorry?" In all the time since it had happened, people had offered their condolences, their… Whatever the opposite of condolences was when they told you having your family dead in the ground was a benefit, their own heartbreaks, their silent support, even their blunt honesty. But no-one had asked her what her family had been like.

"Your mother, what was she like?" Jayna smiled, reading the passage with eyes that were only slightly tear-blurred.

"She was clever. Merlin, she was so, so clever. I mean, I'm top in a lot of my classes but she was insanely intelligent. And strong. Ridiculously strong and fiercely loyal. She drove me up the wall sometimes; I thought I'd have to become Minister for Magic before she was proud of me. I was wrong though; she just didn't say it a lot. She loved us kids… Loved us more than I think she knew what to do with. It must be hard having that much love but so rational a brain."

"You had siblings?" Isla asked gently.

"Still got one. My older sister, Cara, she's still alive and fuming in the Slytherin common room somewhere. But my brothers… They're gone, like everyone else."

"I'm sorry."

"Me too." Jayna paused. "It's ok though." Her thoughts drifted back to that stone, and the memory of her cousin's voice. "It's ok."