Set in the summer after Harry's 3rd year at Hogwarts.
Latest story update when this was uploaded: the Futile Facade chapter 1
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters or places from Harry Potter, Song of the Lioness or the Rigel Black series.
Harry leaned casually against a wall in the small courtyard behind Leo's apartment, expertly eyeing his row of third floor windows on the opposite wall. Since Leo had finally taught her how to scale a building in the first week of the summer holidays, she'd made the climb many times. Still, it wouldn't do to get complacent and rush into this without making sure all the hand and footholds she needed to use were still in place. She had learned this the hard way three weeks ago when Leo had moved the dustbins several feet from their usual position and unscrewed part of the drainpipe just to teach her that particular lesson. Since then she had taken to casing the building before every ascent as though it was her first time. Leo kept making small changes to keep her on her toes. Only last week he had vanished the bars in front of one of the second story windows she always used as a handhold and replaced them with an illusion. Harry had only notice because a bird had flown through what looked like solid metal. So for today she had read up on a series of screening charms that would tell her if the façade had been tampered with. So far it all looked innocent. Too innocent. Harry narrowed her eyes at the third story window that was halfway open, all but asking her to break in. It led to Leo's living room and was her favourite point of entry. It would be just like him to lay this kind of trap. Make it easier to access physically and then ward magically against intrusion. Harry sent a quick ward detection spell at the window. It soared through harmlessly without triggering a response. Harry frowned. Even if the window was not warded specifically, the other wards in the apartment should be activated when Leo wasn't home. And she had checked to make sure he was at the Phoenix before coming here.
She had to get into his apartment today if she didn't want to let him win the game this week. Technically she had four days left but she usually didn't go to the alleys during the weekends, spending the time with her family, and with the Quidditch World Finals on Monday and not knowing how long the game would take, she preferred doing this today. They had started playing shortly after Leo taught her how to break into a wizarding home. Once a week they would break into each other's apartments and steal something. Some weeks they set specific targets the other had to search for, other weeks anything would do. When both of them had taken something, they would swap their possessions back. If one of them hadn't managed to steal anything or was caught breaking into the other's apartment, they had to buy their things back with ice cream, lunch or tickets to a muggle movie. In a way it was like the game Rookwood and Selwyn used to play though Harry had never actually found out what a forfeit in that game cost. Over the last month she had learned a lot about setting and breaking wards and detecting hidden spells. She had already found out how useful those abilities were for someone who shared a house with pathological pranksters. She'd noticed and quietly disabled the confetti charm on one of her birthday presents and the look on Uncle Sirius' face as he tried to figure out why she hadn't vanished in a cloud of coloured paper shreds had been priceless. Though nothing compared to the look on Leo's face two weeks ago when she'd managed to trap him in a circle of holding wards she'd hidden under her living room carpet. She'd kept him in there for nearly an hour and bargained a week's worth of extra knife fighting lessons out of him. She already got lessons from Marek but there was a reason Marek hadn't beaten Leo yet despite challenging him five times this year already. When she'd finally let him go the King of Thieves had sworn revenge which was why she had to be extra careful today.
Two days ago Leo had stolen the potions book she was currently reading. It was a fascinating treatise on the current state of research on the Wolfsbane Potion, covering all important stages in its invention sixteen years ago as well as any changes made since and how the different versions of the potion varied in their effects. It wasn't even her book. It belonged to Calum and Harry needed to finish reading it soon so she could return it and discuss it with him before she had to leave for school again. The only reason it had been at her apartment at all was because her baby sister Addy took great exception to things that kept her families attention off her and Harry had been concerned for the books safety. Personally she blamed her Uncle Sirius, who watched the girl most days, for spoiling her sister rotten. She had taken to bringing anything she wanted to work on undisturbed to her apartment in the Lower Alleys. No point in letting the place she'd been paying rent on for two years straight go to waste. It was supposed to be a backup in case the ruse she and her cousin had been putting on since they started school three years ago was ever uncovered. But there was no reason not to use the place in the meantime especially since it would lend credence to the story that she'd been living there since the age of twelve if people saw her using it from time to time. Of course Leo had already been helping her support that story for the past two years by coming over to make some noise every now and then to give the impression the place was inhabited. And it actually had been inhabited for the first six months of the year. At the beginning of summer Flint's mother, who had gained a lot of confidence away from her husband, had gotten her own place and moved out again. Harry had visited her for tea a few times, which would support the tale of 'Merriam' being her aunt, who had lived with Harry until she got back on her own feet.
During her recent research into home security Harry had also found a charm to discourage thieves by simulating the presence of an inhabitant through activating lights in different rooms in the early hours of the evening. So far the lighting was just random though theoretically the spell could be adapted to record and simulate the normal movements of the residents. Of course for the spell to get those movement patterns she actually had to spend some time in the evenings in her apartment first. Still, having random lights was better than nothing for the moment and it wasn't as though the spell would discourage anyone who was serious about breaking in. After all, one Hominum Revellio charm would tell anyone who bothered with it that the apartment was, in fact, empty. She thought there must be wards against that, too, but she hadn't been able to find any so far.
The problem with spending time at the apartment was that now it started to contain things she actually cared about, raising the stakes in her game with Leo. In retribution for him taking her book Harry planned on finding his favourite crystal dagger, even if she had to spend the whole day searching his place. She wanted her book back for the weekend. With her parents home to shower Addy with attention she was reasonably sure she could read it at the house without having it shredded. She had to be careful however. Leo was probably counting on her getting impatient and making a mistake. With a slight frown Harry shot another ward detection spell at the window. Still no tell-tale flashes in response. Maybe she was doing it wrong? She repeated the spell at the apartment below. Immediately lights flared, outlining windows, floor and ceiling in a multitude of different coloured lights.
"Nothing wrong with the spell." Harry muttered wryly to herself. Perhaps Leo was hiding his wards? If this was a basic ward detection spell it made sense that there were safeguards against it. She picked up a small pebble off the ground and carefully levitated it toward the window. It got through without any trouble. If there were wards on the window, they seemed not to be triggered by inanimate objects. Had Leo just forgotten to set the wards today? It hadn't happened before but there was a first time for everything. Or maybe he'd just gotten home while she'd been standing here, staring at his back wall.
Only one way to find out. Harry pushed off the wall and walked determinately toward the opposite building. She had checked for everything she could think of. She was as well prepared as was possible, now it was time to see if that was enough. Leo spent most of his time out on the streets so it was highly unlikely that he'd returned to the apartment but if he had she'd just have to be sure he didn't notice her. There was no rule in their game against breaking in while the other was home as long as you managed to avoid detection. She scrambled on top of the nearest dumpster and cast a light sticking charm on the soles and tips of her shoes for better purchase. Deciding that the open window afforded her the chance to try a new way, she climbed the rain pipe all the way to the top, then gripped the drip rail tightly and sticking her feet to the wall shuffled along until she was right above her point of entry. In case Leo was actually home she cast a muffling spell before carefully lowering herself onto the open windowpane. As soon as she could get a foot on either side she pressed her feet against the window glass and let go with her fingers, bending her knees until the sat on top of the window, straddling it like a broom. She carefully bent to the side until she could look into the apartment. Nothing to see. She listened for a moment but all was silent. So she gripped the top of the windowpane tightly with both hands, bracing one foot against it as she placed the other foot on the sill. She slowly shifted her weight onto that foot before she dared release one hand to reach for the inside of the window frame and pull herself over. Harry allowed herself a self-satisfied grin as she sat down on the inside windowsill and released the sticking charm from her feet before dropping to the floor in a silent crouch. This was no time to let her guard down. The fact that there had been no wards at the windows worried her. It might mean Leo was trying something else. Perhaps he had transfigured some of his furniture to act as guardians like the suits of armour at Hogwarts were want to do against intruders. Come to think of it she was probably lucky the dustbins hadn't tried to eat her.
Harry kept her wand at the ready as she slowly moved along the wall, scanning the living room for signs of danger on her way toward the bedroom. If he didn't have the knife with him she was pretty sure that's where he'd keep it. She hoped he didn't have it with him. She hadn't seen it when she'd looked in on him earlier and she couldn't imagine where he'd hide it under his light summer clothes but on the other hand she couldn't really imagine Leo going unarmed. Still, if she didn't find it she'd just have to find something else he valued that much. She was passing the door to the bathroom, thinking about what else Leo would miss enough to encourage a fast trade-off when she was stopped in her tracks by a wand tip settling against the base of her skull. Something shimmered at the edge of her vision and the next moment she felt the blade of a very sharp knife on her throat.
Harry froze. This wasn't exactly how she'd envisioned locating Leo's knife. Her mind skipped back two years to the first time she had been in a situation like this, backed against a wall in a dark alley with a sharp and bloody knife at her throat. That time at least she'd been able to see her attacker. Though thinking back to that particular experience, she wasn't so sure that had been a good thing. Then she had frozen in shock, now however she was much better prepared and while she stilled her whole body, all muscles were tense in anticipation, senses alert.
"Drop the wand." The command was spoken softly, directly into her ear.
She knew exactly how well-honed the edge on Leo's knife was so Harry complied, forcing her muscles to relax, to appear non-threatening and taking care not to brush against the blade or startle the young man into movement until he released her. It might take a while though. Perhaps she shouldn't have gloated so much when she'd managed to trap him, he was sure to take revenge. Well, at least she might actually get her book back now that she'd forfeit the round by getting caught. Of course he'd make her pay through the nose but if she could spend the weekend immersing herself in the intricacies of Wolfsbane brewing, it might be worth it.
"Well, well, well, what have we here?" Leo's voice sounded muffled and strangely distorted, higher and slightly raspy. Was he using a voice altering spell to unnerve her?
Harry resigned herself to being on the receiving end of some serious gloating. She guessed she'd be standing here for a while. There was no way she'd be able to get out of his strangle hold while he had a wand and knife trained on her. Especially without a wand of her own. Or was there? Her magic didn't create the instinctive Depasco Shield anymore, hadn't done so since she'd started wearing a suppressor last year. The suppressor was gone now but her control on her magic was better than ever and accidental shielding a thing of the past – which was lucky or she might have disintegrated Leo. Since it was neither suppressed anymore nor caught in the bowls of a megalomaniac magical construct her magic's eager personality had surfaced again. It didn't act without her permission but it was there, ready at the edge of her mind, waiting for her call. A Fortis Shield could turn knives as well as magic. Harry had spent a lot of time researching that shield last summer as it was the spell she had used to create her Shield Potion. Imbuing shaped magic was done both wandlessly and non-verbally and she had brewed so many batches of that potion that she could form her magic into a Fortis Shield without a second thought. Though now she'd have to remember to cast it as a spell instead of releasing it the way necessary for imbuing as she was used to doing. The tricky part would be to create it skin tight between herself and Leo's weapons. Tricky but not impossible. The first step was to lull him into a false sense of security, make him think she was resigned to the situation.
"Turning off the wards is considered an invitation by all kinds of shady people." She drawled, only refraining from a careless shrug because, with a knife against her skin, any movement might make her bleed.
"That may be but it takes a special kind of shady to try and steal from the King of Thieves himself…" Harry was only listening with one ear as she turned her thoughts inwards, remembering the feel of the skin-tight shield Voldemort had trapped her in at the end of her second year at Hogwarts. She'd never cast the Fortis Shield without a wand but wandless casting shouldn't take more magic than imbuing. The real problem was that she wouldn't be able to pick up her wand again if she was encased in a shield repelling anything that tried to touch her. She'd have to leave her right hand unprotected. She carefully fixed the way she wanted to build her shield in her mind before she brought her senses outward again.
Leo had stopped talking. In her concentration Harry had lost track of what he'd been saying. She didn't know how long the silence had already stretched. Nor did she have anything inconspicuous to say to him without knowing what he'd been talking about. He'd get suspicious any moment. It was now or never.
Harry took a deep breath. Then she sent a pulse of magic out of her body, a slight Repelling charm to create a little distance between their bodies as well as push off his weapons, immediately snapping the shield into place in the charm's wake. She followed through with a move he'd shown her to break a strangle hold. Normally she wouldn't have tried that while he had a weapon pointed at her, especially since he'd also taught her there was a countermove. But she had confidence in her shield and hoped he'd be too surprised to counter in time. He was. The next moment Harry was free and dived for her wand, tucking herself in tight she took a rolling dive along the narrow corridor. She silently thanked Uncle Remus for firing countless stunners at her during practice until she could roll with this precision otherwise she might have ended up crashing into a wall or doorframe. Harry came up and fell into a fighting stance, wand at the ready, left hand automatically moving toward the knife sheath on her calf, a satisfied grin spreading across her face as she looked up at Leo. Then she froze. With the skin tight shield in place around both her hand and her leg, she couldn't reach the knife. However that seemed to be the least of her problems at the moment, as she stared at the shrouded figure still looming in the bathroom doorway. One thing was clear: it wasn't Leo.
The figure was dressed in flowing summer robes of a dark and dusty grey that wouldn't draw attention in the alleys. The lithe movement reminded Harry of her friend but this person was both smaller and slighter than Leo and the bright eyes flashing at her from the shadow of the robe's hood were brown instead of hazel. A dark red scarf was wrapped around the head and covered the lower part of the face, making it impossible to look for any other recognisable features.
Harry was stunned. Someone had actually broken into Leo's apartment. Someone other than her. That explained why the wards had been off. She silently berated herself for not drawing this conclusion earlier. She had known it was fishy after all. The nerve of it! She suddenly remembered what the intruder had been saying: "It takes a special kind of shady to steal from the King of Thieves." Great. Harry gulped. Who was this? What did they want from Leo? And what would they do with her, now that she had interrupted them, witness to their crime?
Trying to calm her nerves, Harry drew in deep, slow breaths. Her wand had remained steady, pointed at the intruder the whole time. At least the many hours of duelling training had paid off. Even in her surprise Harry's reflexes had kicked in.
Her attacker hadn't moved. Probably they were just as surprised as she had been, shocked that she'd been able to free herself, and were now either recovering or trying to gage her reaction in order to decide on their next move. What should her next move be? She had to inform Leo. If there were people, other than her, breaking into his apartment he had to know. But how to inform him? Harry didn't know how to call a Patronus and use it to send messages. Usually when she wanted to talk to Leo, she just looked for him in the alleys. Or sent an owl or left a message at his apartment. All these methods worked but they weren't fast. She didn't know how to get him here now. He probably had some kind of notification tied to his wards that would inform him of intruders. But the wards hat been turned off. Without knowing how it had been done, Harry had little hope of enabling them again. Especially while still under thread from the other wizard.
Maybe she didn't need to inform Leo directly. If any of his subjects noticed something was wrong at his place, they'd tell him as quickly as possible. Harry just needed to make as much noise as she could while also trying to get away from her attacker. Or, better yet, detain them. Leo would surely like to know why they had broken into his apartment, what they'd been looking for. He'd want to question them. Harry had barely come to this conclusion when a read beam of light streaked toward her. The intruder had apparently gotten over the shock. She managed to get a shield up just in time, taking a step back for good measure. Leo's bedroom provided more room to manoeuvre than the corridor. Slowly backing up towards it, Harry kept blocking the spells her opponent shot at her. When she was through the door she ducked sideways, using the short reprieve to cast a Caterwauling Charm on the room. It would produce an ongoing noise loud enough to be heard down on the street. She could have used a Wailing Charm again but she still wasn't sure how to power it correctly so it would be heard by many without rapturing her eardrums again. Unfortunately the Caterwauling Charm reacted only to intruders entering the guarded area after it had been cast. So to set it off she needed to bait her opponent into entering the bedroom. Of course once they got here, she'd be stuck in this room with a probably very dangerous older wizard between her and the door. A wizard who'd be extremely angry and maybe even desperate to get away once the alarm went off. Harry hoped that it would, in fact, go off. While she knew the spell in theory, having read up on it at the beginning of summer, she'd never actually used a Caterwauling Charm – it would bring the kind of attention Leo and she tried to avoid when playing their little game. Well, now she wanted all the attention she could get. Harry settled into a fighting stance, shifted until corridor and intruder were back in her line of sight, and attacked in earnest.
As they traded spells back and forth, Harry was careful to back up slowly so as to lure her opponent into the room without being too obvious about it. She had no difficulty holding her own, blocking curses and jinxes with ease before setting off her own, but she was also unable to gain an advantage. She was reminded of the few times in duelling club last year when she'd had a really challenging partner. Only this time, there was more at stake. She was painfully aware of the repercussions of losing, her mind flitting back to a night in a dark alley two years past, a blue vest and bloody cobblestones. At the same time she was reluctant to do anything too drastic as she didn't want to destroy more of Leo's possessions than were already falling prey to stray curses and rebounding spells.
Cancelling yet another full-body-bind, Harry stepped back once again and felt her legs touch the frame of Leo's bed. She was just thinking that she'd have to change tactics, as this position hindered her movability, when her opponent advanced and crossed the threshold of the room.
Even though she had been prepared for it, the sheer intensity of the yowling noise, which flooded the room as the Caterwauling Charm was set off, made Harry jump. Still, she fared much better than the intruder, who immediately doubled over in pain, clutching his head with pale hands, probably trying to close off his ears against the noise. Even over the racket Harry could hear a ferocious snarl emanate from her opponent and for the first time she considered the possibility that her attacker wasn't human. Oh he had to be partly human at least, to legally carry a wand, but being part creature and having more sensitive hearing would certainly explain this unexpected reaction.
Lost in those thought, Harry nearly missed the warning signs and only just managed to get out of the way when the possible-part-creature bodily lunged at her. She stumbled to the side, keeping her footing only thanks to endless hours of footwork exercises, and whirled around to point her wand at the attacker, who'd landed on Leo's bed on all fours and now turned to face her, hissing and spitting, in a tangle of sheets. Harry froze. The intruders head-scarf had come undone and now hung loosely around her head. Yes, she was female and Harry briefly wondered how she could have missed it, considering the quality of voice and thin frame. The tall young woman had long white blond hair that was braided back from her girlishly soft featured face but then hung untamed down her back, more and more strands escaping from the scarf. Her dark eyes seemed to flash red as she snarled again, revealing a row of pointed teeth that were definitely not human. This time when she lunged Harry was ready and quickly raised a new Fortis shield. Now that the Caterwauling Charm had been triggered, it would continue the racket until it was deactivated or the magic she had put into it ran out, which would probably take a while. Whether or not help was on the way wouldn't matter if she didn't live to see it arrive though. The noise was definitely making her opponent more aggressive. Hoping to diffuse the situation somewhat by putting some distance between the fight and what sounded like a whole nuisance of cats singing the Hogwarts Hymn, Harry backed up down the corridor again, heading for the living room.
Her opponent, who Harry thought might be part vampire, stalked her, rapidly firing off spells. Harry dodged them, trying not to trip over Leo's furniture as she moved from the corridor to the living room. She winced as chairs and picture frames were reduced to splinters by the curses missing her. The tea service was hit, sending shards of porcelain in every direction. Then the book shelve went up in a cloud of shredded paper, loose pages rained down all over the room, some of them catching fire. If this didn't end soon there would be nothing left of Leo's possessions. She didn't have time to dwell on this dour thought at the moment though. Diving out of the way of a curse she hadn't been fast enough to block, she went sprawling behind the sofa while the spot she had been standing on moments ago was reduced to a splintery crater. She let out a soft grown as she picked herself off the floor. She had fallen onto something in her pocket. Her hand moved to it unconsciously and for a moment she stared blankly at the small metal ball about half the size of a bludger.
Then realization dawned. She and her dad had been tinkering on their invention again last night. After weeks of developing, this was the first viable prototype they had of the device. How could she have forgotten she had it on her? After all it was made for situations just like this though Harry had never expected to first test it under so serious circumstances. In fact, the only reason the prototype was with her and not at the DMLE was that she had been planning on using in on Archie when he came home from his internship in America in two days – though she'd told her dad she'd be using it on Sirius. Still thinking it had been Archie who'd spent the better part of a week trapped in a circle of her potion, her dad wouldn't want to risk evoking any flashbacks with such a prank. But she'd have to think of another welcome-home-prank for Archie. She needed the device now.
As the dust from the explosion settled Harry squeezed the ball to activate it and lobbed it toward her opponent with her left hand while also shooting a stunner at her for distraction. The woman deflected the stunner and chuckled darkly when the little ball fell short and started to roll away. Harry dodged her counter jinx and winced when she heard something else break in the bookshelf behind her. Frankly she hadn't thought there was anything left. Conscious of how vital it was that her target stay put in position, Harry released three Impedimenta jinxes in quick succession and while one was deflected and another dodged, the third got close enough to brush the intruder's shoulder and keep her frozen for a few seconds. It was enough. Before she could move again the little ball had completed the circle it had surreptitiously rolled around her, all the while releasing shield potion onto the floor. The Fortis Shield snapped in place, forming a barrier that could only be broken with the counter potion.
Harry doubled over, trying to catch her breath. She took a moment to concentrate and cancel the Caterwauling Charm that was still blaring in the bedroom. It left behind a ringing silence. She thought she heard a muttered "Thank Lilith!" from her prisoner.
She was still trying to calm her breathing when the door suddenly burst open. There stood Leo, flanked by Marek and Krait. All three men had their wands raised and surveyed the scene before them with puzzled incredulity. Harry gave a sardonic smile.
"Hey guys, nice of you to show up. Better late than never. Turns out I'm not the only one breaking into your apartment, Leo. Or were you teaching her to break and enter, too? In which case I apologise for the mess. I was really only trying to get my book back but I guess it probably didn't survive." She glanced sadly at the remains of the bookshelf. With so much damage done by curses and jinxes, she wasn't sure if its contents could be repaired.
Leo didn't answer. When Harry looked back at him he looked utterly shell-shocked. She couldn't really blame him, given the state of his apartment. She wondered how she'd react if she came back to her potions lab and it looked like a dozen nifflers had gone on a rampage there. His eyes kept flicking from Harry to the intruder, to his living room and back to Harry. Beside him Marek and Krait were having trouble keeping a straight face. Surprisingly it was the intruder who first broke the silence.
"You know him?" She asked Leo. Her voice sounded indignant as her chin indicated Harry.
This was too much for Marek, who broke down in giggles.
"Uhm." Leo was having trouble finding his voice. He elbowed Marek to shut him up before he tried again, rubbing his neck and looking a little sheepish.
"Natalia, meet Harry. Harry, Natalia. She's visiting from Bulgaria – she's the Queen of the Bulgarian Rogue actually. She's staying with me for a few days. We'll be going to see the World Cup together, to show international unity. Guess I should have mentioned that…"
A/N: This chapter has given me a lot of trouble. It was actually the first Harry/Rigel oneshot I started - back in December 2015 when AA ch.9 came out. But I kept getting stuck and Violet kept updating and giving us new information, contradicting things I had written... So now that the Futile Facade came out today, I thought I'd better hurry up and finish this before it becomes totally obsolete. Hope it'll tide you over till FF2 comes out ;-)