Dumbledore sat behind his desk and though he wouldn't admit it, he was fiddling with the items on his desk, quills, parchment, scrolls. Shuffling them back and forth. He also didn't like to admit, though he suspected some of his teachers realised, that he was worried. The sequence of events leading up to tonight troubled him, which was an understatement of the highest order.
Sirius was dead. Harry was dead and Neville Longbottom taking the blame for that. And the Wizarding World was out for blood. So far no one had leaked Neville's name to the press but Dumbledore figured it was only a matter of time. And then the Ministry would do something stupid, like try to press charges.
He picked up a piece of parchment on his table. He had his security against that. He glanced at the name at the bottom and smiled. Who'd have thought Percy Weasley would go against the Ministry like this. Well, maybe Miss Granger for one.
Maybe he'd ask one more favour of Mr Weasley in light of recent events.
And he should really give Professor Trelawney a raise.
Harry sat at the end of the bed staring out the window. Dawn was sleeping, a huddled figure in the middle of the bed, the bedcovers tangled around her, her shield against the rest of the world.
He couldn't figure it out. Why was she doing this? She didn't even know him and she was willing to travel halfway across the world on his say so. And she never faltered. Ok, once. But that had been sorted. The only other thing that had put her off was the floos. He grinned at that. That had nearly stopped the journey before it had begun. But she persevered.
So brave. She'd have been in Gryffindor, definitely, he thought.
He settled back against the wall, as much as he could anyway, and closed his eyes. He couldn't sleep, so he couldn't dream, but he could remember.
It was a few hours later, he wasn't sure how long, when a noise outside the door disturbed him. It was just a thud, but he was immediately on his guard. He waited, but the sound didn't come again. He was just settling down again when he heard something else. A scraping. He frowned. Like a key that didn't quite fit in the lock.
When he saw the doorknob rattle he muttered an oath under his breath.
"Dawn. Dawn, wake up," he whispered urgently, she stirred. "Wake up, there's someone trying to get in."
"Wha-." She swallowed thickly. "What's wrong?"
When he told her she jumped out of bed. She grabbed her backpack and pulled a dagger out of it just as the door swung open slowly.
She was standing behind the door as it opened so she couldn't see who it was, but as they stepped into the room she gave the door a huge shove and sent them sprawling.
The dark figure tumbled into the room and Dawn seized the advantage. She jumped on him and started hitting him. Not really caring where the blows landed, she was too angry that someone broke into her room to take notice of anything else. It was only Harry's warning that made her look up and over her shoulder.
The door was open again and a second person stood in the doorway. He waved his arm and she was thrown against the far wall.
"Magic!" Harry warned.
i No shit, Sherlock. /i
"What do I do?" She asked.
"Keep quiet. Don't move." The newest person in the cabin said, thinking she was asking him. "Anything we want, we take, got that.
"Take my hand." Harry was saying. She reached out and gripped his phantom limb. "We'll have to cast a spell on them. I don't know how well it will work, you're too powerful without a wand but we can try stunning them."
"Worth a shot." Dawn muttered, watching as the pair were going through her bag and looking under her bed.
"The spell is 'Stupefy'"
She pointed.
The taller raised his head.
"Where's your wand, little one?"
"Don't got one!" She told him. Then before he could say anything else she yelled, "Stupefy!"
There was a flash of red light and the man was thrown against the wall. The other one went for his wand, but Dawn was quicker.
"Stupefy!" A second flash and another thud as the second one was thrown against the wall.
"Now I have two men lying unconscious in my room." Dawn giggled.
She brought up her right hand still pointed, i like a gun/i , and laughing blew imaginary smoke off the top of her finger.
"The name's Summers, Dawn Summers," she said, a la Sean Connery, Bond style.
"You're weird, ya know?" Harry said. "Scary, but weird."
She'd managed to drag the unconscious bodies of her attackers down the corridor some ways and was now back in her cabin, making sure they hadn't actually taken anything.
"Though I really should have checked that first," she said aloud.
Harry nodded in agreement.
"Well?"
"Naw. I'd everything well hidden." She slumped back on the bed. "Does working magic usually leave you feeling tired?"
"No!" He said, surprised. "Not unless I've done a lot of magic."
"Hmm…" She pulled the blankets over herself. "Just me then." She yawned. "We're going to be alright about this port-key situation right?"
He shrugged.
"I don't know will they let a minor travel without parental permission."
She thought about that.
"We'll just have to lie about that bit then." She didn't give him time to argue. "Night, Harry." He sighed.
"Night, Dawn."
The train slowed as it entered New York Wizarding station and Dawn was waiting by the carriage door with her one bag as it came to a stop. Even so she had to wait for the porter to unlock the door before she could disembark.
The station was packed as before but she was too tired to look around as she followed Harry's lead through the station. She stopped at the information booth and got the name of a hostel she could stay the night at as well as finding out more about the methods of travelling to England.
They used the floos again to get to the hostel and Dawn paid for a night and dropped off her bag. She popped into the bathroom on her way down where Harry directed her to do a Confundus Charm on the information on the inside of her passport so nobody would look at it too closely.
She left the hostel then, exiting its dark interior into the harsh October light. She looked up and down the road, and sighed. The magic she'd done the night before had drained her more than she cared to admit and a half a nights sleep on a moving train and her latest charm hadn't helped much.
"Where to now?" She asked the, supposedly, empty air.
"We need to find out how to get to England. What did the man at the information booth say when you asked? I couldn't hear over the intercom announcements."
"We need to arrange an international port-key pass. Takes a day or so, depending on the country of choice. We've to head to the Bureau of International Affairs. Excuse me, sir," she reached out to stop a passing Wizard.
He hesitated, looking slightly surprised that one so young would dare stop him.
"I'm looking for the Department of International Affairs?"
"The corner of Hargrave and Shubert." He said and left.
"Right, now where is that?" she asked his retreating back. But this was New York, even if it was Wizarding New York and the yellow cabs that were one of the most recognised symbols of the Big Apple were driving the cobbled streets. She hailed one and asked where and how far.
"Two blocked over that way," the cabbie drawled, pointing. "Need a cab?"
"Thanks, I'll walk." He just nodded and drove off.
It only took her about twenty minutes and the walk warmed her up. The building was non-descript and old-looking with a nice brass plaque giving the name of the building and the year it was built. She followed the signs as she went, leading to the International Pass office and when she got there to the European destinations desk.
It was startlingly quiet when she got there and the clerk was surprised when she told him she wanted to go to England.
"Haven't you heard of the trouble there?" he asked. She frowned.
"Rouge Wizard," he explained.
"I still have to go." He shrugged and pulled out some forms.
"Not my place to stop you." He pushed the forms and a quill over to her. "I'll need some ID of course."
She pulled out her passport, gotten by her mother just before the divorce when they'd all talked about going abroad on holiday, and handed it over.
The clerk's eyes nearly popped out of his head.
"Muggle?" he gasped.
She felt a shiver down her spine as Harry placed his hand on her neck and begun whispering the correct responses to her.
"Muggle born," she said. But he was taking something, a clear glass ball, out of his desk drawer. Without saying anything he tossed it to her. And without thinking, she caught it.
A red light popped in the middle and the clerk sighed.
"Sorry about that, you have no idea how many Wiccans try to pass through here." Dawn stayed silent as she handed back the ball. "Just fill out those there and I'll go see what port keys we have left."
He left her alone to fill out the forms and Dawn let out a sigh of relief as he did. She filled out the form as quickly as she could, writing in her dad's name and address for next of kin, thinking even if he did get some sort of correspondence from the Department that he'd pass it off as spam and bin it.
When she got to the part where she had to fill in her date of birth she added a couple of years like Harry told her to do.
She'd filled in the form and had been waiting a while before the clerk came back. He was smiling when he did.
"It's your lucky day!" He held up a brass key-ring for her to see. "A businessman cancelled his port-key at the last minute. Normally it takes at least three days to get one approved, five over the weekend. As long as everything checks out," he glanced over her forms and passport, not taking too long examining them Dawn noticed, "looks good. Your port-key will activate at five oh five, Sunday evening, taking you to our counterparts in London."
Dawn nodded and stood. He handed her the port-key and she left the building, trembling at her success.
She woke early. The sunlight drifted through the window, blinding her as she opened her eyes.
"Wakey-wakey!" Harry's too-cheerful face came into her field of vision. She groaned, trying to bat him away ineffectively. "Come on, we've got a busy day. Have to find you a wand."
"What time's it?" She groaned.
"Ten. Time to get up!"
"Ahh!" Dawn tried to pull the covers over her head to hide from both Harry's and the sun's gaze but Harry slid his hands over her face and she jerked back from the coldness and fell out of bed.
"Ha!"
Dawn poked her head up over the bed and glared at him.
"You're unusually cheerful today," she growled at him.
"Well, we're nearly home free, right? We just have to wait for the opportune moment and POOF!"
Dawn looked worried now.
"But not literally 'POOF', right?"
Harry laughed and didn't answer her.
"Right?"
They'd been to three wand makers in the one afternoon and none of them had been able to find Dawn a single wand that suited her. Some hadn't done anything when she waved them, even with Harry helping her, most had reacted badly, very badly.
"This is the last one." Dawn said, staring at the run-down, shabby, shop front before her.
"Hey, don't judge a book by its cover," Harry said. "I got my wand in a place like this. Ollivanders. Used to think he could read my mind, because he knew my name when I walked in the door, you see." He chuckled. "Of course, everybody knew my name. Come on. It doesn't look that bad."
Dawn just spared him a malevolent glare before pushing open the door to 'Rushes - Finest Wands' and walking in.
A little bell tinkled as she entered but there was no reaction from the depths of the shop. She glanced around. As she'd come to expect now, the shelves were piled high with the thin cardboard boxes that housed the wands and, not so usually, above them was a balcony over looking the whole shop. There was no counter and Dawn thought the place reminded her of a second-hand bookshop. She walked along the narrow spaces between the shelves staring at the boxes but too afraid to even lift a finger to trace the air in front of the boxes.
And still she hadn't seen anybody. She could feel a presence though, could almost feel the curious stare watching her. She glared round but didn't see anyone and she didn't dare question Harry.
She stopped when she heard a voice.
"Pick one."
"What?" she stared up at the balcony above her. At the leftmost corner stood who she presumed was the storekeeper. He was younger than she expected, wearing a Muggle suit unlike the other Wizards she'd seen on the street who'd worn robes. "Mr Rushes?"
He nodded.
"Pick one," he told her again. She reached up her hand for the nearest box to her. "Not that one."
She glared at him but he only smiled and moved closer to her, trailing his hand along the banister.
"Feel the wand. After all haven't you been told by now that the wand chooses the witch, not the other way around. No," he held up his hand, Dawn froze, he wasn't looking at her. "Let her do it on her own," he said, looking straight at Harry, who had been about to place his hand along the base of her neck.
Dawn gasped.
"Find your wand, Ms. Summers," he said gently. She took a moment to calm herself. She didn't look back at Harry nor up at the wizard above, just moved slowly through the store, stopping once or twice but barely lifting her hand before shaking her head and moving on. Eventually she stopped. The boxes in front of her didn't look any different than the others but there was something, something right… right… there!
She pulled out one of the boxes and stepped back, jumping when the older wizard spoke from beside her.
"Good choice." He smiled. "A most unusual wand. Oak, 9 inches, with three drops of a Slayers blood, given willingly, bound with a hair from a vampires head. Also given willingly." He glanced up from under his eyebrows. "I've had this one for almost thirty years."
He slid the box apart and held it out for her. Hesitatingly, she reached into the box and pulled out the caramel coloured wand.
It fit.
It met every groove of her hand and as she waved it through the air she was rewarded with a soft sparkle of stars and a warm feeling spreading up her arm in response to the magic.
"Just remember, the wand chooses the witch, and always, it chooses for a reason." He took her through to the back where she paid and he sold her a wand holster, specially fitted.
She thanked him for his help and was about to ask how'd he seen Harry when he cut her off as if he knew what she was going to ask.
"Be careful who you talk to," he said, glancing towards Harry. "And trust your instincts."
With that he shooed her out of the shop. She stared in through the window but he walked away to the back of the shop again and he didn't look back.
"What, do you suppose, that was about?"
Harry just returned her astonished look with one of his own.
When Neville's Grandmother finally let him go to his room it had gotten dark outside and Neville couldn't see the neat drills in the herb garden anymore. He'd had a shower and was laying on his bed, trying to ignore the stabbing pains in his lower back and thighs from digging. Sure he was grateful to his Gran for keeping him occupied, it meant there was less time to brood on the forthcoming Monday when he be back in classes, but did it have to be such backbreaking work?
Now, though, with the silence of the body came the tumult of the mind. He wondered what the Ministry had released in the aftermath of one of the most controversial inquests of the century. He couldn't even check what the papers said because, like many others, his Gran had cancelled her subscription to the Daily Prophet since it became a tool of the Ministry, rather than of the people.
So he was left to ponder what would happen next. Would they know at school that he'd killed their most favoured class mate? Would they shun him like a pariah? Dumbledore had made it clear he was still welcome at the school, but would he feel that way come Monday morning? And what about Hermione? And Ron?
He sighed, pulling himself off the bed with a groan and pushing open the window. He leaned out a took a gulp of night air. The night blooming jasmine he'd convinced his Gran to plant, despite its purposes being purely aesthetic, perfumed the air. In the distance he could see the glow of the lights of London, like a beacon.
Feeling better, he left the window open as he lay on his bed and, gradually as his mind stopped turning over the possibilities, he fell asleep.