Chapter Eleven

All over the world, news was reaching those long forgotten creatures, only remembered as part of myth. Some not even remembered at all. Excited whispers could be heard through each of these groups.

Whispers about them.

The Stars.

Coming to give them back their place in the world.

That they would once more be able to be known once more.

--

A large eagle flew into the window of Callista's flat, making everyone in the room, jump, then snigger. The eagle quickly lost any dignity it may have ever had and hopped through the now open window and stuck it's leg out, ignoring the now hysterical Stars.

"Who's it from Callista?" Sirius asked, still chuckling sporadically as he made his way over to the unofficial head Star.

"It would seem we have a new ally in this silly little war. Our return to this world was not so secret after all."

"Why? Who sent it? Are they fun? Oh god, it's not the elves is it?" Sirius asked, looking at the letter in Callista's hand suspiciously.

"It is indeed from the elves."

"Damn. They're boring! Don't know how to take a joke!"

"Funnily enough, one of their requirements was to not have to deal with you. Apparently, the last time we met with the elves, you sent half of them into hysterics by shaving their heads in the night." Callista said calmly, reading the letter in her hands.

"Oh well. That's fine by me. I can't stand the flouncey, stuck up, pointy-eared freaks."

"I'm sure Regulus' mate will be delighted to hear about what you have to say about her kin."

"That's low Callie. Really low. Below to belt even. She'd rip me a new one!"

"Yep, so you had better keep your thoughts about the elves to yourself and stay away from them, hadn't you?"

"Yeah yeah. Can I go see Arcy? I want to meet the little human with my name! I haven't spoken to a Black in years! They actually do have a sense of humour! Amazing!"

"No. You've got to make plans with Deneb first. We have to wait for word from Regulus as well, before we can do anything else."

"I'm bored though!"

"I don't care. Go talk to Deneb!" Callista told him sharply, she watched Sirius huff and then walk off in the direction of where she last saw one of the younger Stars and then turned her attention back to the missive in her hands. She would have to reply and tell them of her agreement to their stipulations. Plus it would get Sirius out of her hair for a few weeks. How Dorea put up with him constantly, she didn't know. She wanted to kill him, and she had only been living with him for a month.

Sighing, she pulled a fresh sheet of parchment from the desk and started to pen her reply to the elves. Sirius was right in one respect. They had no sense of humour.

--

Arcas looked around him at the almost excited looks the audience were wearing. He couldn't help but think he should never have even bothered waking up.

A tall, bronze skinned man sneered at him and lifted up the large torch in his hand. Arcas gulped slightly and wondered if the man was going to do what he thought he was going to do with that torch.

"So, the Mighty Zeus! Show us your power! Save this mortal!!" The man, Arcas was pretty sure his name was Lycaon, but he wouldn't bet on it.

"Erm.. You do realise right that I'm not really his son. It was all a ruse." Arcas whispered, watching the torch wearily. Lycaon either ignored him or didn't hear as the next moment, the stone surface Arcas was tied to, was set on fire. "Please don't kill me! Zeus doesn't care about me!"

--

"Are you sure this is going to work?" A tall, dark haired woman asked sceptically, looking at her white haired companion.

"Of course it will work. My plans always work."

"Yes. Right. Aefen told me otherwise. This robe is itchy."

"Well I have a wedgy but you don't hear me complaining." The white hair female said, tugging on her robes.

"I think this is a ridiculous idea. No way is this going to work." The dark haired woman said with a sigh.

"Oh be quite Charlotte."

"That's another thing! Why Charlotte?"

"It's the nearest to your actual name. Now shush we're there." The woman said, before walking up the large castle, "Now, remember the plan. We go in, I'm Callista, you're my mate. Charlotte. They don't need to know that that's not actually Callista's mate's name, but he doesn't know that."

"I may have said this before, but this is not going to work." Charlotte muttered, shaking her head and then following the other woman 'Callista' into the castle.

"You know, security of this place is terrible."

"Not really, seeing that, as soon as we entered, Dumbledore and the heads of house knew about it."

"Indeed we did, er... I'm afraid you have me at a disadvantage. I do not know your name or indeed, who you are."

"Ah, sorry, I'm Callista, and this is my mate, Charlotte." 'Callista' said, grabbing 'Charlotte's' arm and tugging her closer to her.

"Ah, am I to assume you are here to visit your son?" Dumbledore said with a twinkle.

"Yes. Could you please tell me where he is?"

"Ah, he should be in his rooms. I'll take you there if you would like."

"That would be very nice, thank you. Last I heard from Arcas, you had offered him a job here and help to find his mate. How is that going for you?"

"Ah, I do believe that young Arcas has not yet found his mate. Such a shame." Dumbledore told them. 'Callista' elbowed 'Charlotte' when the latter growled softly.

"Indeed it is."

--

Arcas sighed yet again in boredom. He hated Fridays, he had almost nothing to do on Fridays. He only taught one class, first years at the end of the day. So far, he had read four books and rearranged the furniture in the rooms he shared with Remus. He still had two hours to go.

He was just considering going to the kitchens to bother the House Elves, when something made him sit up straight. He had no idea what it was, but his muscles felt strained, as though tensing to jump. Something was outside of his rooms that was making him feel this way, and it was getting closer.

Just when he thought he would explode, there was a knock on the door and Arcas jumped about a foot in the air. Blushing brightly when he realised what he had done, Arcas pulled himself together and walked to the portrait entrance to let who ever it was, in.

"Headmaster! How may I help you?" Arcas asked, smiling widely at the strange old human.

"Ah, Your mother and her mate have come to visit. I thought I would take them to you personally." Dumbledore said, moving aside to let Arcas see the two women behind him.

"Oh, of course. Mother! What are you doing here? Come in! Would you like to join us Dumbledore?" Arcas asked politely, moving aside to let the two strange women into his rooms.

"No no. I have some things I need to do. I'll leave you to catch up. I'll see you later at dinner. Please try to make it to your class on time."

Arcas nodded and smiled, watching to headmaster walk away until he was out of sight, then closed the door and turned around to face his visitors with a frown on his face.

"Alright, Reg, does my mum know you are impersonating her?" Arcas asked with a frown.

"Ah, well, um... Do you not want to know who is with me?"

"Of course I do! They're putting my teeth on edge! I also want to know what Aefen thinks of this?" Arcas asked, hands on his hips and making Charlie think of his mother.

"Ah well, no Aefen doesn't know about this, but Arcas!"

"No buts! You wait until I tell Aefen about your new drag queen look! In fact, I bet Deneb and Vega would love to hear this. So who is you've managed to con into this?" Arcas asked, an amused smirk on his face.

"Ah, well Arcas, please say hello to Charlie. Your mate." Regulus said, bowing to Charlie dramatically.

"My mate? Did you just say my mate?" Arcas asked faintly, not taking his eyes off the now male Charlie.

"Yup. So, I'll leave you two kids to catch up, I'm going to kip in one of the beds. I haven't slept for nearly a week now. Catch you later! Be good Charlotte!" Regulus said with a quirky smile, before leaving the room and Arcas and Charlie to stare at each other in uncomfortable silence.

"So..."

"Yep..."

"You teach here?"

"Yeah. War History." Arcas said, sitting down on a chair and signalling for Charlie to do the same. "He does know that my mother's mate is Alethea right?"

"I think so. He mentioned that it wasn't really her name. So... I assume you've met my youngest siblings." Charlie asked as he sat down on the chair next to Arcas.

"Ah, yes I've met them both. Unfortunately I've had a disagreement with both of them. Though for completely different reasons."

"Oh dear. What did they do?" Charlie asked, jumping when a House Elf arrived next to him.

"Mr Master Star Sir! Yous be eating soon? Yous be missing lunchtime. Will you and Mr Master Star Sir's mate be wanting food?" The elf asked, looking between the two mates anxiously wringing its hands.

"Ooh!! Elf Three! You forgot the Sparkly in my title! But don't worry about it. I don't want anything to eat though, I'm not sure about Charlie however. Can you bring me a mug of boiling water please?" Arcas asked with a bright smile.

"Oh yes!! And Mr Master Sparkly Star Sir's Mate? Would you like anything?"

"Um... Can I have a glass of pumpkin juice please?" Charlie asked, blinking when the House Elf bowed lowly and then popped out the room. "Can I just ask?"

"Mmm? What is wrong?"

"What's with the Mr Master Star Sir?"

"You missed the Sparkly as well." Arcas said with a grin, "And I got bored one day and decided to annoy the House Elves. We don't have them back at home, but I remember when they were more than submissive little slaves for wizards. You do realise that the weakest of House Elves probably has more magic in it's little tow, than the most powerful wizard? I tried to annoy them into showing the fire I so admired in their ancestors! So I keep adding a name into the title they give me."

"That's sort of mean, don't you think?" Charlie asked, lips twitching with a smile.

"Maybe." Arcas said, smiling mischievously.

"So, what happens now?" Charlie asked eventually, taking his pumpkin juice from 'Elf Three' with a smile and thank you.

"Well... You have a couple of choices. First, you can stay here and be my envoy to this... Place. Second, you can become a Star and get your own... Place. Third you can come live with me at my own... Place and finally, you can reject the bond and leave both of us to die horrific and slow deaths." Arcas said in a creepily cheerful voice.

"Er... Well the last one is out. What happens with the first? And how exactly do we cover the bond? I mean, how do we fulfil the bond?" Charlie asked, seemingly searching the air for the correct words.

"Ah, well see, no one will explain that to me."

"What do you mean?" Charlie asked, now looking at his somewhat tiny future mate suspiciously.

"Well I know that the two mates have to um... well actually, this is where I get lost. It was once described to me as lying together, but well... That sounds neither productive nor fun. So maybe I misinterpreted it."

"Ah." Charlie's face flamed bright red as he realised just how naïve his mate was. "Well, maybe we should cover that at a later date and in the mean time, we could discuss what we want from this."

"Okay. What do you want?"

"I don't want to leave my dragons, but I also want to be able to look out for you."

"How do you know you will like me?"

"I don't. Maybe we should spend a bit of time together after the bonding, to see if we do get on, then we can decide what to do on a more permanent basis."

"That sounds like a good idea." Arcas agreed with a nod, he then smiled widely and hopped out of his chair. "I have first years to teach soon! Want to come? Charlotte?"

--

It was later in the day, during dinner that a large eagle owl swept in through the high windows of the Great Hall and landed in front of one Ronald Weasley.

"Who is it from?" Seamus asked from beside him. Ron shrugged and tugged the letter from the angry looking birds foot.

"No idea. Oh." Ron said, reading the letter and then looking up at the staff table, seeing Professor Orsini sitting next an attractive, though somewhat masculine looking woman with dark red hair.

"What's wrong?" Ginny asked, looking at where Ron was looking. "Does that woman look familiar to you?"

"No. I have a detention though. For the time I disagreed with Orsini."

"Well that's not fair. Surely you can talk to Dumbledore about it! With what he did to Ginny, I'm sure Dumbledore will understand." Hermione said, looking at the bandages and burn cream on Ginny's arms and face.

"What did he do to you Gin? You never did tell us everything. Surely he's not allowed to burn his students! Did you speak to Dumbledore?" Ron asked, trying to be the concerned older brother.

"Oh, well I touched him and he burnt me. When I went to Madam Pomphrey, she told me it was my own fault! I don't understand why it was my fault! So who do you have detention with?" Ginny asked, face red as she avoided any other questions regarding her burns.

"It says here that I have to report to Professor Lupin for detention with him and Professor Black." Ron said, wrinkling his face up in disgust.

"I wonder why them and not Professor Orsini himself." Hermione said, spearing a potato thoughtfully, which amazed Ron somewhat, as he didn't know it was possible to spear anything thoughtfully.

"Hmph, I'm going to see if Dumbledore can get me out of this."

"I don't think that will be a good idea." Hermione said, "What did you even do to him? I hear that he doesn't very often give out detentions. You must have upset him quite a bit."

"Yeah Ron, and he gave you detention with Black and Lupin. Only thing worse than that is Filch or Snape!"

--

Arcas and Charlie made their way back to Arcas and Remus' rooms after dinner, in which many members of the student population stared at them, and Charlie invented a whole new shade of red to match his dark hair. Arcas actually thought it was quite becoming.

"So then, I was wondering, and of course, I spoke to Remus, and he said that you would be able to explain mating to me. Will you?" Arcas asked, as they walked through the portrait into his rooms.

"Erm... well, perhaps I could explain it, but um..."

"Are you alright?" Arcas asked, moving to sit next to his mate.

"Well... It's just a little uncomfortable. What do you know about mating?"

"Erm... Nothing?" Arcas said, blushing lightly and refusing to look at a horrified Charlie.

"Where are Remus and Sirius?"

"They have detention with your brother. As for Regulus, he'll be out of it for a day or so."

"Okay, well in that case, sometimes, it's better to learn by doing, but in this situation, I'm not sure that rule applies quite so well." Charlie said, rubbing the back of his next uncomfortably.

"Oh. So what does it involve?"

"Well normally, erm... two men decide they would like to spend some time together, occasionally it's a lifetime. Well anyway, sometimes they um... decide to er... consummate their relationship by erm... having sexual intercourse." Charlie explained, groaning when it appeared that Arcas had no idea where this was going.

"Sexual intercourse? I think I might remember soldiers from old wars and battles discussing this. Never saw it happen though."

"Well no, it's rather a private affair. It's very enjoyable, if you do it right and with someone you trust."

"Right, so we will be having this erm... Sexual Intercourse?" Arcas asked with a shy smile.

"Well, I... erm... I suppose yes, we will. However, first we should get to know each other. For example, I'm Charlie Weasley; I work with dragons, because I love dragons. They are pretty much my life."

"There were some beautiful dragons before the Great War. A lovely ruby red one that somehow managed to breath black flames that were quite hard to put out. They got killed off, except for Tertius. Unfortunately he was Draconian, and thus had only half the blood of the Atlantian Black Ruby."

"How come they became extinct if they were as dangerous as you are making them out to be?" Charlie asked, on the edge of his seat to learn something about Dragons that he didn't know.

"Oh well, see, they may have had a fire that was nigh impossible to extinguish, but well, they were only three feet long once full-grown. They were the smallest of Dragons."

"Ah. What other Dragon races do you know about?" Charlie asked, He was beginning to sound like a small excitable child.

"Oh, well you can always come to my fourth year classes. They are learning about the Greta Dragon Races of the War."

"Ah, see, this is another thing we need to discuss. I've been away from my Dragons for far too long now. I need to know that they are all right and being looked after. So really, I can't stay here for too long.

--

The weekend had nearly finished, and students of Hogwarts school were finishing last minute essays in preparation for their classes the next morning. The castle was almost completely silent for once, which gave the castle a strange eerie feel to it.

Of course, nothing good lasts forever, so no one was really surprised when three men barged into the Great Hall, two of them hollering something about new pranks.

"Bill? What are you and the twins doing here?" Ginny asked, standing and running over to her oldest brother.

"Oh, we came to say hello to Sirius and Remus. Well technically, Fred and George came to speak to their investors, I just tagged along."

"Oh, well they are probably in their rooms seeing as it' not their day to watch over Study Hall."

"Right, any chance you know where that is?"

"Yeah, Try Sirius' rooms first, his are on the second floor. It's the only portrait there, so It should be too hard to find." Ginny told him, smiling at her brothers before moving back to the table and her homework.

"So then?"

"Shall we go"

"To Sirius' rooms?" Fred and George asked.

"Yep, maybe he will know where Charlie is." Bill muttered quietly, before leading the way out of the hall and making their way up the stairs to where they hoped Sirius' rooms were.

After only a few minutes, they finally found the one portrait that they assumed were Sirius' rooms.

Bill knocked and waited for the door to open, dodging out of the way of any pranks either of the twins tried to force down his throat.

"Hey! What are you three doing here?" Sirius asked once he opened the portrait, allowing the three brothers to walk into his rooms.

"We came to warn you about some plans of the Orders. There are separate order meetings which you and Remus are not a part of. For some reason though, we are. They are trying to keep Arcas away from his mate."

"What? Why?" Remus asked, coming into the main common area after hearing what Bill had to say.

"The only reason"

"That we were told,"

"Was for Arcas to focus"

"His energy on the war and

"Defeat VoldiePants for us!"

Sirius and Remus watched the twins in complete bemusement, before what they said sank in.

"What? Arcas doesn't want to join this war! Does Dumbledore know who his mate is?" Sirius asked urgently.

"Yeah, well, he thinks it is our brother, Charlie." Bill said, nibbling on his lip.

"He would be correct in that assumption." Sirius muttered darkly.

"Would you like to meet Arcas?" Remus asked suddenly, making the three Weasley's jump.

"Erm... Yeah, it would probably be best if we told Arcas ourselves. Where is he?"

"He should be in the rooms he shares with me. Last time I spoke to him, he was marking essays. Shall we go up to him? It's only the next floor."

"Yeah! Come on then!"

--

Arcas was indeed in his rooms on the third floor, but he wasn't marking any essays, instead he was trying to convince a disgruntled owl to give him the letter tied around it's foot.

"Surely that is not comfortable for you, I could take it off and let you rest your foot a little? No?" Arcas jumped away from a particularly harsh peck in his direction and glared at the owl.

"Having troubles Arcas?" Charlie asked, lips twitching with a smile as he placed his hand on Arcas'.

"It won't give me the letter!" Arcas said, still glaring at the owl, which was now looking particularly smug. Charlie sighed, breath tickling Arcas' ear and making his shiver.

"You just have to treat them like the superiors they are." Charlie said, taking the letter from the owl easily and handing it over to Arcas.

"How did you do that? Bloody stupid bird. It's not my fault you flew into the window!" Arcas grumbled, before opening the letter and reading it.

Arcas,

Included with this letter is a snippet from tomorrows DailyProphet. It is detailing a third faction in this war. I am writing to warn you, that soon, those who know you are not human at your school, will be able to to guess what race you are.

I hope that our decision to go public with our side will not put you at a disadvantage. Stay safe my son, and give my love to your gorgeous mate, Charlie. You will be seeing us very soon. Deneb, Vega and Altair are driving us all mad, wanting to see their 'Little Brother'!

All my love,

Callista

Arcas handed the letter to Charlie silently, and unfolded the small article form the next days newpaper.

Third side of the war?

by Elouise Folk

This reporter was shocked, when sometime after lunch yesterday, a large white eagle flew through my window and left a letter on my desk, leaving without waiting for a reply.

Imagine my shock when, when I opened it and read the letter, it appeared to be from an entirely different side of the way that no one had ever even considered before. The side of the war, wrote that they were the side that wished for equality for all magical beings, and not just wizards.

Headed by the Stars, which many of us, myself included, had always assumed were myth, they will be leading the WereFolk, Elves, Fae, Dragons and other creatures which we may have thought extinct or non-existent. Imagine my surprise when I found out they were neither.

The question now, is which side do you stand on? With a third side being introduced, peoples loyalties will be put to test. Will this mean even more distrust? Or shall we see it as a light in this time of darkness.

"Oh dear." Arcas said, looking up from the article to see Charlie looking at his in concern.

"What's wrong?"

"I think you should read this." Arcas said, handing the article over to his soon-to-be-mate. "Then I think we should discuss what we are going to do."

A/N – Merry Christmas, or Happy Holidays if, like me, you don't celebrate Christmas... Here's another chapter! I did tell certain people that I would try to get one up by the twenty-fifth! And I did! As well as moving the war on a new step! Yay! Angry Stars here they come! Tell me what you think!! Cheers!!