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Near Allonby in Cumbria, a hidden mansion on the B5300 overlooking the Solway Firth twenty-five kilometres south of west from Carlisle, suppertime…
"So they actually use those windmills to generate electricity?"
"Yes, Mother," Raven Malfoy said with an amused chuckle as she stood beside her mother Narcissa while they gazed out into the firth. Twelve kilometres just to the south of west from Solway Lookout — the summer home of the Malfoys of Avebury, inherited when that clan absorbed the ancient plots once owned by the Valances of Allerdale, who had been one of the original clans of the medieval Wizengamot and had gone extinct during the Dark Times of Magic — was a large energy farm filled with sixty pearl-white Vestas V90-3MW three-blade wind turbine generators, all set on a sandbar located almost in the middle of the bay where the River Eden and the River Esk emptied into the Irish Sea. "The power that particular place can generate would provide energy for over a hundred thousand houses." As the older woman gaped on hearing that — even now, years after the downfall of Voldemort, most of the pureblood gentry in Britain still found accepting the sheer number of normal humans living in Great Britain these days very hard to understand and accept — Raven then winked. "Atop that — according to the press releases — the amount of coal that wouldn't have to be burned every year because that wind farm is operating would be enough to fill every room in the house." Here, she nodded back towards the beautiful mansion house built in the Italian Renaissance style on the site where magical overlords of the northwestern frontier of England — both of Clan Valance and Clan Malfoy — had held court since the invasion of 1066.
Narcissa nodded. She had taken note of the construction of the Robin Rigg Wind Farm as soon as the first tower had been erected in the middle of Solway Firth the previous summer. Surprised to see windmills being erected in the middle of a bay full of water, she had tried to get some explanation as to why. She hadn't got far in her research, though. Thanks very much to her husband's actions before the Battle of Hogwarts, Narcissa was viewed these days by many of her countrymen with loathing…which bothered her a lot, though she never showed her distress in public, falling back on the hard lessons she had learned while attending Hogwarts from 1966 to 1973 as a member of Slytherin. That attitude hadn't been helped at all by her son's actions since he officially assumed the role of Marquess of Avebury on reaching his majority…and given Draco's disgust of everything "muggle" and his determination to force their society to revert to the way things were before 1997, any chance of learning more was often derailed by his threatening to enforce his will and the family magic he controlled as the clan patriarch on her. That didn't happen often, of course; Draco, for all his many failings, was devoted to his mother and didn't force himself on her as some pureblood lords drunk with the power of family magic had done to widowed mothers — especially widowed mothers who still looked quite attractive! — in the past.
Thinking about that, the youngest daughter of Cygnus and Druella Black could only smirk at the critical blindness her son often showed when it came to things he believed was totally under his sway. For all his intelligence, Draco hadn't learned a thing from all the times he butted heads with Harry Potter since the day they first properly met on the Hogwarts Express at the start of the 1991-92 school year. His pride — boosted to unimaginable levels thanks to his father pandering to Draco's every whim and desire — blinded him again and again to the fact that the orphaned son of James Potter and Lily Evans was far more Slytherin than he normally let on despite his being sorted into Gryffindor. And while it had been amusing to watch such schoolyard spats from a distance, it was now a gross liability and a potential dire threat to the future of her family. Being one of the families that made up the Seven and Ten in the Wizengamot placed the Malfoys at the very pinnacle of wizarding society…which, along with the many privileges such a position granted to all associated with it, also enforced an equal number of responsibilities on the shoulders of the family head.
Draco only cared for the maintenance of the privileges his position gave him.
That would surely lead to a disaster.
Especially now that there were new lords and ladies in the Wizengamot — bright people such as Hermione Granger and Lisa Turpin, for example; even if Narcissa had to act indifferent to them in public, she did admire their intelligence and forward-thinking attitudes — and the leaders of wizarding Britain were finally making moves to restore the mages of Meridiana back to where they should have been all along hadn't some mugalophobic morons in 1705 excluded them from ANY say in the running of magical Britain, which effectively turned Wales into a separate magical enclave independent of any control from the Ministry of Magic in London. Narcissa certainly had no complaints there. In the wake of finally meeting a daughter she NEVER thought she would ever know in this lifetime, Raven's mother spoke to the paintings of her son's predecessors as leaders of the clan about how they felt about people who had mastered their gifts at Britain's OTHER magical school. Many of those lords and ladies told her straight out that they never had problems with Meridiana alumni even if they were willing to trust normals more than Hogwarts alumni did, especially during the Dark Times of Magic.
Of course, once the shades of those people got the chance to meet Narcissa's daughter in the wake of a tearful reunion at the Leaky Cauldron the day before Bellatrix Lestrange was banished from Britain, they all loudly chanted their approval…especially after they learned that Raven had graduated from basic magical training egregia cum laude and had gained several worldwide-recognized masteries in scrying, spell creation, potions and warding after her three-year apprenticeship with Yomigawa Tsukiko ended with her being elevated to the coveted rank of Magistra Magi in 1998.
On seeing the young Terran-turned-Avalonian mage and assistant coach to the Chudley Cannons demonstrate her battle skills — which had been honed to a thought's breadth thanks to Tsukiko — in the mansion's duelling hall after the Act Concerning Amendments to The Ministry Governance Act (1705), 2010 was passed on Monday, some had even gone so far to openly lament that Raven hadn't been made Lucius' successor.
While Narcissa privately hoped that Draco would finally get over his insane paranoia concerning Raven and what she represented, she was planning for such an eventuality.
After all, clan by-laws did allow it in extreme cases.
Especially if any sort of treason against the Crown was involved.
"You have to be careful about that, Mother."
Narcissa perked before she blushed on sensing Raven's pale blue eyes lock on her. Even if she had known about the Avalonians since shortly after their coming to Earth en masse in February, their empathy and touch-telepathy still jarred the older woman from time to time. She then sighed as she fought down the outrage that had exploded from her heart on learning how far Draco had gone to censor news about his sister from their mother, such as threatening the staff of the Daily Prophet to keep Raven's name out of the first article revealing the truth behind people like Rose Potter, Charlotte Crabbe, Ariel Goyle and Cassiopeia Lestrange back in late February after the Liberation happened. Then again, I'm as much to blame for my own ignorance as he is, she lamented to herself before she sighed. I should have realized that my own daughter had also been rescued by Madame Holmes after I learned of Cassi, Ariel and Lotte.
"I won't have my family lose what we have because Draco is blindly adamant on following his father's path," she then stated. "It's a pity you didn't use the Praeda Bellica on Lucius when you finally struck him down at Hogwarts. If you did that…"
A tired sigh escaped the younger woman. "I've lived a simple life since I emerged from gestation in Manchester, Mother," she admitted as she moved to sit on the low stone fence that formed the inner boundary line of the wards that shielded their home from normal eyes; to those in the outside world not privy to the secrets of magic, Allerdale Manor was a decrepit ruin dating from the English Civil War, left as a slowly-disintegrating monument to a bygone era. "Alice supported me as much as she could — and as much as that damned DNA loyalty lock forced on her allowed her even if her father encouraged her to do what was necessary to give us our lives back — until I went to Meridiana. Once Sensei took me under her charge, she raised me in the traditional manner of a true samurai, one who follows the Seven Virtues without hesitation or question."
"Gi, yūki, jin, rei, makoto, meiyo, chūgi," Narcissa read each of them off in accented Japanese before translating, "Rectitude, courage, benevolence, respect, honesty, honour, loyalty." Her eyebrow then arched. "What of kō, chi and tei?"
"Sensei never agreed to the adamant adherence of filial piety that so many in the Orient believe to be proper," Raven breathed out. "Like Harry when he was with the Dursleys…" — she tried not to smirk on sensing the disgust her mother felt on hearing about THAT family — "…and like others who have had abusive parents, Sensei didn't have the best home life until she discovered her magic. A beautiful woman in Meiji-era Japan was simply a commodity for the lord of the family to sell off to a prospective husband to cement political or economic alliances. Sensei did not care to be treated as such and — when she got the chance — expressed her disapproval to her father quite viciously." As Narcissa laughed, her daughter added, "Wisdom depends on the ability of the warrior to learn from her mistakes. And caring for the elderly — like filial piety — depends on the person in question and what that person did. Does that person really deserve such if she or he has done others ill in the past?"
The older woman nodded. She did understand where Raven came from when she had struck her father down at the Battle of the Department of Mysteries in the late spring of 1996 and once more at the Battle of Hogwarts over a year later. Lucius — who should have sensed right away what Raven really was; when Draco's sister had been still-born in the spring of 1982, he had privately grieved for years afterwards — had always valued his family more than his loyalty to Voldemort. His bribery of Ministry officials after the Dark Lord's first fall to escape Azkaban ultimately was as much to ensure his wife and son would be able to live safely and in luxury as it was for him to stay clear of the Dementors. But he had gladly used lethal spells on his reborn daughter when the Death Eaters ran headlong into the Dark Lady of the Orient and three of her students — who also included Narcissa's niece Cassiopeia Lestrange — in the Hall of Prophecies in hopes of drawing Harry Potter clear of the safety of Hogwarts to strike him down. No doubt, that was because of how much purebloods feared and loathed the Lady Tsukiko thanks to what she did during the War of Liberation, the Malfoy matriarch mused. Still, once he HAD learned his daughter was alive and well, Lucius should have sent a missive apologizing for his actions against her. He didn't…which guaranteed that he would face Raven again at Hogwarts a year later, falling once more at her hands.
That Draco had done NOTHING to try to repair such a ghastly rift…
Narcissa jolted on hearing a soft chime. Her daughter reached into her jeans pocket — she was dressed in modern, trendy clothes that weren't too revealing even if she could still turn anyone who would be attracted to her into slobbering wrecks with just a look; I wonder how poor Ronald deals with all the stupid boys drooling like hungry animals when he's with Raven, she mused — to pull out a cell phone. "Malfoy," she called into it.
"We've got a problem, Raye," echoed in her ear.
"What is it, Ari?"
Hearing Raven's nickname for Ariel Goyle, Narcissa smiled…before she tensed on seeing a thunderous look cross her daughter's face. As the older woman automatically reached for her wand, Raven blinked as she listened to her friend's words before she nodded in understanding. "Right. I'll confirm it the instant my brother comes back from wherever the hell he is now, then get back to you. Thanks, Ari." She cut the connection and calmly — TOO calmly, Narcissa mused — put her phone away…before a litany of curses in Latin, Welsh, Japanese and Ariadnian exploded from her lips.
As Narcissa was fluent in the tongue of ancient Rome and passingly familiar with both the native languages of Wales and Japan — as she herself had never travelled to Nerio, her only exposure to the native tongue of the academic city-state of Ariadne was when she overheard Raven speak on her cell phone to friends she had made there; among them had been members of the city's famous Mage Knights like Emily Sevensheep and her lover Beatrix Monroe — she had little problem understanding what Raven was saying…even if it was unbelievably vulgar. After a couple of minutes of hearing that — Narcissa couldn't help but blush as Raven questioned the ancestry and sexual preferences of whatever fellow just earned her ire in graphic detail and literate Latin — the younger woman took a deep breath before she gave her mother an apologetic look. "Sorry about that."
"What was that all about?!" the older woman asked.
Raven gazed out to sea. "Daywalker vampires. Theo Nott is making an alliance with them to find some way to kill off every Avalonian on Earth."
Narcissa's jaw dropped in stunned disbelief on hearing that. Taking a moment to compose herself, she then weakly asked, "Is Draco involved in this?"
A curt nod answered her. "Yes."
Hearing that made the older woman wince as she felt yet another small part of her die. Dear Merlin! Is this EVER going to end?! she moaned to herself…
Knockturn Alley (off Charing Cross Road in the City of Westminster, London), Hundings Helpful Healers (on the site of Borgin and Burkes), an hour before nightfall…
"So how was your last transformation, Kieran?"
"Just like becoming an animagus, I assume," Kieran Harper stated with an amused smile as he gazed on Rose Potter. "Of course, I'm not blessed with that wonderful telepathy of yours, Rose, so I really can't say," the former Slytherin seeker added.
Harry's sister grinned as she dispersed the scanning pentagrams she summoned to help in her examination of her current patient. Watching over this process was the owner and namesake of Hundings Helpful Healers, Master Healer Lamicho Hundings. A member of Hogwarts' NEWT class of 1973 and the Viscount of Dengie in the Wizengamot, the native of Bradwell in Essex became one of St. Mungo's star specialist healers by the time the First Purification War ended. Lamicho was called back to his alma mater to consult in the aftermath of the Battle of the Astronomy Tower at the end of the 1996-97 school year. An expert on all forms of lyncathropy who studied ways of improving the Wolfsbane potion on his spare time — natural for a Ravenclaw alumnus — he was summoned by Poppy Pomfrey to help a dozen students who had been scarred by a rampaging Fenrir Greyback and a horde of werewolves who accompanied the Death Eaters to Hogwarts in hopes of slaying Albus Dumbledore and Harry Potter. Once he got there, he was stunned to see the Boy-Who-Lived's mysterious sister — one of nearly a hundred witches who had been given new life thanks in part to the Curse of Helga Hufflepuff and the help of an unknown benefactor in the mid-1980s, then forced to attend Meridiana in Wales to learn her magic before she was apprenticed to the Dark Lady of the Orient in the spring of 1995 — using what appeared to be pure essence of monkshood on the victims' wounds. Horrified to see Rose use such a ghastly poison, Lamicho tried to push her clear before he found himself facing Harry Potter's soulsword…just as the bleeding wounds on Kieran Harper's arms dissolved into faint pink scars. Once that was done — and confirming that the other victims were showing some recovery — Rose then gazed in amusement at the older healer. "I use ruby meson as a base for all my potions," she calmly explained before she admonished her big brother for drawing a soulsword of all things on a healer.
Both Poppy and Lamicho felt like ten types of idiot after hearing that.
Since the Battle of Hogwarts, Lamicho had taken his family fortune and opened a private clinic for werebeasts of all types in Knockturn Alley on the site of Borgin and Burkes; the magical curio shoppe was destroyed midway through Death Eater Season along with many neighbouring businesses as a way of delivering a fatal blow on Voldemort's support base. Much to the outrage of many traditionalists of the Wizengamot, the healer gladly and frequently consulted with Meridiana alumni such as Rose Potter when it came to special cases or helping develop a final cure for lyncathropy…which was actually brought to Earth from Nerio during the Middle Ages as a perverted variation of a neurological degenerative disorder that often struck various canine therianthrope tribes on Mars' sister planet. While such actions were seen as violating the letter of the Ministry Governance Act of 1705 and other laws that forbade any commerce with Meridiana alumni, Rose countered that by stating she was working for FREE; she was wealthy in her own right due to her working as an apprentice healer at both Meridiana and in Ariadne…and her healer's oaths forbade her from rejecting potential patients for any reason. When that was countered by a bill proposed by Draco Malfoy in 2002 to forbid ANY transaction of any sort with Meridiana alumni on pain of loss of magic and family fortune, that was shot down by a HOWLER from Buckingham Palace! To the horror of ALL the members of the Wizengamot save for people like Harry Potter — he had been the one who warned the Queen about this latest lame attempt by Voldemort's allies to take back the reins of power they effectively lost five years earlier — the Crown declared that if the leaders of wizarding Britain couldn't get their acts together and start accepting their countrymen who went to Meridiana as having equal rights under the magical Constitution of the Realm, the Separation Act would be done away with and the magical lords of the United Kingdom would be absorbed into the House of Lords.
One didn't need to be Rowena Ravenclaw to guess what might have happened next.
But now that such restrictions had been chased away on Monday…
"Rose?"
Rose looked over as the privacy curtain blocking off the examination suite she was using parted to reveal Charlotte Crabbe. "Hey, Lotte! What's…?" Her voice then trailed off as she felt the billowing outrage from her old classmate's heart. "What?"
Charlotte handed her cell phone over. Rose looked at the screen before she scowled, then passed the device to Lamicho. On seeing what was there, the master healer gaped in horror. "Merlin! What are those idiots planning to do?!" he demanded.
"Start a war they can't win, Uncle Lami," Charlotte answered. Lamicho had been the one who delivered her late brother Vincent at St. Mungo's in the summer of 1980…and had also tended to a distraught Helena Crabbe when she miscarried her unborn daughter shortly after Voldemort's first fall. On meeting Charlotte for the first time in 1997, Lamicho gladly adopted her as spiritual kin with Helena's private approval; he himself had yet to find the right witch to marry as his work always consumed him. "Our sisters have made too many inroads with various vampire covens; whoever is leading this on the daywalkers' side won't get any support from people like Vlad Ṭepeṣ and Lucien LaCroix."
"Why are the daywalkers targeting your sisters, Lotte?" Kieran asked.
"They're afraid that we'll transform every Terran on the planet into Avalonians, thus making us all 'crystal-bloods,'" Charlotte stated…
…before Rose's cell phone beeped the warning that a multimedia message had just been sent to her. Taking it out of her pocket, Harry's sister brought up the new message on the view screen…and then she gaped. "Uh-oh!" she breathed out.
"What?!" the others in the room demanded.
"Rave just did a memory-scan of her brother," Rose reported as she tapped controls on her phone to bring up a holographic image. "Look at this."
An image appeared over the visual display. It was that of a raven-haired man appearing to be in his twenties, possessing dark hazel eyes. He was dressed quite conservatively even if his clothes wouldn't be seen as being too out of fashion for modern normal British society. While his skin was pale, it wasn't the ghostly white indicative of his being one of the undead. On seeing that image, Charlotte gaped in disbelief. "Oh, my God! That's Adam Sewell! What the hell's he doing still alive?!"
"You know this fellow?!" Lamicho demanded.
"He was the man many say was responsible for provoking the American Civil War in the 1860s, Uncle Lami," Rose reported. "His real name's unknown; 'Adam Sewell' was the alias he used when he was living in Mississippi before the war started."
"He probably got chased out of America by the Rail-Splitter during the Score and Four," Kieran commented as he stood up and moved to put on his shirt.
"President Lincoln destroyed him in 1863, just before Gettysburg," Rose reported.
Silence.
More silence.
Still more silence.
And then…
"Bloody hell!" Lamicho moaned out…
The Leaky Cauldron, fifteen minutes later…
"My, my, my…"
"How could this be possible, Mister President?"
Abraham Lincoln blinked on hearing that question before shaking his head. "I really wish I can answer that for you, Healer Hundings," the nigh-immortal vampire hunter calmly stated as he handed the cell phone back to Rose. "I critically wounded him with a punch to his stomach. My fist had my silver pocket watch wrapped around it, so I know he was badly hurt. We were crossing the Little Pipe Creek west of Union Bridge in Maryland at the time. Confederate raiders under John Mosby had set the bridge alight to prevent us from making a delivery of silver bullets needed to take down the vampires secretly fighting under Robert Lee's command." He smirked. "It was a trap to catch and destroy this man. He had been identified as the leader of his particular faction by Mollie Bean; if you haven't heard of her, she's a North Carolinian normal-born who first encountered him just after Fort Sumter and became an undercover agent for the Department of Magic even if she disguised herself as a man and fought under Robert Lee in the Army of Northern Virginia until she was 'exposed' as a woman after her capture in February of 1865." He then smiled in reminiscence as he recalled the tomboyish raven-haired magical federal marshal — Mollie was an alumnus of the Salem Mistresses Class of 1856, having graduated sixth in a class of fifty-four with masteries in potions and charms — who had served for two years with Company "D" of the 47th Regiment, North Carolina Infantry before her "capture" and "exposure"; it had been child's play for Lincoln's future successor, then-Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant, to arrange for Mollie to disappear from Castle Thunder sometime after her "incarceration." "Of course, all the charges of her being a spy, much less her being insane, were falsified," he then added before getting back to his main story. "As for the silver used to wipe out the vampires under Lee's command, the Department of Magic arranged to have it directly apparated from Washington to Gettysburg so George Meade's troops could use it."
"Didn't the wizards of the southern states go with their states?" Lamicho asked.
Lincoln shook his head. "When the Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution in 1787, those who were in on the secret of magic also advised the Executive Committee that wrote the magical clauses — the Magical Constitution, not to mince words — to that document. Since there were so few magicals in the thirteen states at the time, it was ultimately decided that there would only be ONE federal Department of Magic to serve as their governing body; no state-level magical departments were allowed. Because of that, almost all American magicals living in the southern states chose not to side with the Confederacy. Most took a 'wait and see' posture; they had problems with the way the Department of Magic ran their affairs, but weren't willing to launch a rebellion against Washington since the Magical Marshals — our version of your Corps of Law Aurors; Mollie Bean was one — swore a binding magical oath to both the normal and magical side of the Constitution in all its aspects on being called to service. They spent a lot of their time between '61 and '65 cleaning up the evidence of vampire battles. By the time Gettysburg happened in the summer of '63, many of them were also helping slaves flee those who wanted to use them for food."
The others nodded. "So how could he have survived being gut-punched with a silver-coated fist, then falling into the burning wreckage of a bridge?" Harry asked.
"He was said to be five millennia old at the time of the Civil War, Big Brother," Rose noted. "He could have picked up some magic along the way."
"The nŏksbae, maybe?" Charlotte asked.
People gazed at the newly-ennobled Viscountess of Saxmundham. The word "nŏksbae" was applied to an ancient Korean ritual that had been used by magicals of all stripes in the Land of the Morning Calm since the days of Tan'gun-wanggŏm over four millennia before. What happened when one moved to create a nŏksbae was that a dying magical would shear off a portion of his/her soul containing all his/her memories, then gift the fragment to a worthy heir; this would ensure that the knowledge of all aspects of one's clan magic would be passed on from generation to generation. However, unlike the rituals needed to create a horcrux, the nŏksbae was never meant to keep the dying magical alive; to do something like THAT was seen as a gross affront to the Lord of Heaven and would bring His Disfavour upon the idiot stupid enough to do such a thing. Eventually, trade with Nerio allowed the nŏkspotchep'um concept to be developed during the early years of the Three Kingdoms period; this eventually allowed the concept of magical portraits to be developed. Harry himself learned of both the nŏksbae and nŏkspotchep'um processes thanks to Mun Aesup, a woman descent of a family that had served the various rulers of Korea from the days of Tan'gun's court in the long-lost city of Asadal near modern-day P'yŏng'yang.
Rose and Charlotte, of course, learned of that concept via Yomigawa Tsukiko.
"Or maybe a horcrux," the Man-Who-Won mused. "If Adam's both a vampire and magical, he would have the power and the skill to create such a thing."
Lincoln nodded; he knew through friends about what Tom Riddle had done to render himself effectively immortal. "And the blood-lust, of course," he added.
The others grimaced on hearing that. "What can we do, sir?" Kieran Harper asked. The young werewolf — who, along with others who had been nearly killed by Greyback and his friends in 1997, volunteered to trial run anything people like Lamicho Hundings and his co-workers developed in hopes of finding a final cure to lyncathropy — had come to this meeting in a show of support to the woman who had made his life much more bearable over the last twelve years. While he wouldn't openly court Rose for many reasons — the least of which being that she was not soul-bonded by Avalonian traditions; even if she was effectively a "Terran-turned-Avalonian," Rose was bound by whatever genetic imperatives her DNA forced on her, the drive to seek out one's marei'cha being one of them — he did see her as a friend; the idea of ANYONE threatening Rose Potter would have every lyncathrope in Great Britain seizing what weapon they could to seek out and kill the monsters contemplating such a ghastly thing. "If Malfoy and his friends support this, that's treason against the Crown! Are they trying to lose their magic?!"
"That's probably why Nott made a deal with Sewell, Kieran," Harry noted. "Vampires don't acknowledge any sort of normal or magical authority over them even if it falls on the various national magical ministries to keep them under some decent control except when they're demon-possessed and become the responsibility of the Slayers. All Nott and his friends have to do is indicate where potential targets could be located, then step back and let the vampires go to town. It's no wonder they went after the Schwarze Mädchen. If they were trapped in that cave for all these years…"
"A big smörgåsbord of magical power, all for the taking," Rose muttered.
The others nodded before a contemplative trill escaped Lincoln's lips. "Maybe…"
"What?" Harry asked.
"Mister Potter, I once heard Mollie tell me of a process by which a virgin witch could call down the power of Magic Itself on an enemy," the former lawyer said, his hazel eyes twinkling in amusement. "Given that those poor ladies were just REBORN as Avalonians, it stands to rights that they are all still quite 'pure.'"
Harry gaped at him before a smirk crossed his face. "Right…!"
"I don't get it," Kieran said.
"Lad, it's simple," Lamicho stated. "In first year at Hogwarts — usually during the first broom-riding lesson — witches have their hymen painlessly shattered to ensure that their virginal blood would never be used in any dark ritual. That also happens at Meridiana as well, also during the first year of studies." He indicated Rose and Charlotte with a wave of his hand. "That's been standard procedure since well before the Separation Act was passed. You don't WANT to know what sort of power a dark wizard could muster up from a virgin's blood." He sighed. "Could it be done, Harry?"
"I think so," Harry stated before shrugging. "Well, if Theo and his friends think they can get away with this, they're sorely mistaken. Just have Brigadier Gibbon declare the Vindictam Sanguinis on behalf of her command and Magic itself should support that call."
"Persuade them to not kill them, Harry," Charlotte stated. "Make them use Gonebren."
Lamicho and Kieran paled on hearing that name. While dealing with such a ghastly thing as treason against the Crown was one thing, the very THREAT of the Maze Among the Rocks — even if it was not directed on them — was enough to make even the most liberal traditionalist soil themselves. "Then I'll need to speak to the Queen to get the keys," Harry breathed out.
"May I offer my services?"
People looked on Lincoln, who had an amused smile on his face. Harry blinked before he nodded, grinning in turn. With that, the vampire hunter pulled out a cell phone to dial a series of numbers. A moment later, a voice called out from the speakers, "Yes? Who is this?"
"Good evening, Elizabeth," the former president said. "Did I interrupt something?"
A surprised gasp answered him. "Abraham Lincoln!" the woman on the other side of the line cried out with delight. She then pause before saying, "Wait! Your signal's coming in as clear as daylight! Where on Earth are you calling from?!"
"I'm in London right now, staying at the Leaky Cauldron."
Silence.
More silence.
Still more silence.
Then…
"I assume Harry Potter is with you?"
Lincoln smiled. "With his delightful sister and Ms. Crabbe, plus friends."
"Come here at once," the Queen ordered…
Aboard the Freedom alongside the Avalon bioroid factory, an hour later…
"Tea service!"
Luna Lovegood gasped on hearing that cheerful voice before she smiled as a pretty woman appearing to be about eighteen or so, possessing long, straight dark brown hair and dark brown eyes, came into the room. In her hand was a small tray with a tea kettle and a couple of cups, plus all the trimmings. "Thank you, First Sergeant Mitchell."
Regina Mitchell smiled. "You know how to read normal rank insignia?" the only American member of the Black Maidens asked as she placed the tray down on a table located in the middle of the observation bubble the magical naturalist from Devon had come to so she could gaze on the incredible scenery around her. Regina was currently dressed in a surplus pair of battle dress without any sort of insignia save her family name on a tape over the right breast pocket, U.S. ARMY on a tape over her left breast pocket and metal pin rank insignia on the flaps of her collars displaying the three chevrons over three rockers surrounding a hollow diamond insignia of a first sergeant.
"Well, given how much you all must have felt betrayed when you were freed of the Führerprinzip oath, I don't think it's right to address you as 'Hauptscharführerin der Schwarze Mädchen und Hauptwachthexe der Magische Reichsarmee.'"
The older woman giggled before she poured some tea. "You must think I'm crazy," she admitted as Luna took up her cup. "Bright young American witch coming over to Europe to fight in a magical war supporting the Nazis of all people! I'm not one of the Volksdeutsche that flocked back to the Fatherland to support the Führer and his cause in their time of need. My ancestors came with the first migrants to Plymouth on the Mayflower, fought to free our land from Britain in the Revolutionary War and fought for the Union in the Civil War." She sipped her tea. "I had friends across the 'pond' who persuaded me that Master Gellert was doing the right thing. All the mugalophobia that was rampant across Europe at the time just sickened me. Just because my father was a lawyer and my mother was a socialite doesn't mean my magic was different than someone who could trace their magical ancestors all the way back to the time of Merlin."
"True," Luna mused with a nod of understanding before sipping her tea. "I've done a lot of extensive studies on all of you girls, especially all the non-Germans and non-Austrians who flocked to Master Gellert's side. You always were at your best when it came to fighting the Soviets, weren't you? I assume it's because of the various 'red scares' that ran rampant across America after the October Revolution."
Her host nodded. "Yes. Supporting one's fellow citizen is one thing; it's a simple act of Christian charity in the long term. But the forced collectivization of whole societies out of some master economic plan — to say anything of denouncing religion as the 'opiate of the masses' — is something different. I've never liked communists and I never will. I couldn't understand why was it so many Americans flocked across to fight as part of the International Brigades to support President Azaña in Spain when the Caudillo moved to overthrow the Second Republic." Before she became one of the Black Maidens, Regina Mitchell had been part of a group of magicals assigned by Gellert Grindelwald to protect the fighters of the Condor Legion against Spanish wizards and witches who supported the preservation of the Republic, much less whatever foreign mercenaries were fighting at their side. "Given how much Iósef Stálin was manipulating things behind the scenes from his offices in Moscow, it was pretty obvious to me." She then wryly smirked. "Then again, Adolf Hitler wasn't so much better…though we never found out the real truth of it until after the bastard shot himself dead."
"How did it feel?"
Regina blink. "The oath?"
"Yes."
A tired sigh answered her. "When I took it, I believed I was doing the right thing. You've met Master Gellert, haven't you?" At Luna's nod, Regina shrugged. "He needed the support of the Party to press his own goals, so he had no choice but to play along with what Himmler suggested. He hoped that when it was all over, the oath would be relaxed and we could carry on with our lives. So we did it. When we took the oath, we swore our magic to the service of the Führer and the cause of National Socialism. Fortunately for us, Hitler didn't care to send us to America to fight Raeburn and her friends, not like he did the Übermenschen." As Luna nodded, the Massachusite witch added, "But when the oath bond was lifted away from us, the memories…!"
Tears filled her eyes…and then she gasped as Luna came over to embrace her. Chuckling in pained thanks at the show of support from the English pureblood witch — who, if this was anytime during Grindelwald's War, Regina might have killed without a second's hesitation if Luna had the ill-luck to get in her way — the American turned to give the other woman a tender kiss on the lips before allowing Luna to pull back. "You went through it, didn't you?" she asked before sipping her tea. "Tsukiko-sensei let you touch the Tsūshō, didn't she? When she was training your friend?"
"She did," Luna admitted before sipping her own tea. "Tsukiko-sensei was given carte blanche clearance by the ICMC to do everything she could to prepare Harry and all those who were ready to support him to deal with what Prophecy dumped on his head when he was a newborn baby. Professor Dumbledore had been humiliated by Sensei at the Department of Mysteries; she used a soulsword to shatter the loyalty lock the Elder Wand always forged with the person who had won it in battle, so he wasn't as powerful as he might have seemed before that fight…not to mention what his later encounter with the Resurrection Stone and the horcrux within it did to him. He wasn't given his positions as Chief Warlock or Supreme Mugwump back after Cornelius Fudge and Dolores Umbridge did their best to publicly discredit him, so he couldn't do a thing to stop Sensei. Once he was out of the way, Sensei brought in Nekane and we took off from there."
Regina grimaced. "I read about what that Umbridge bitch did. Nasty piece of work."
"Yes, she was…but the Hollows dealt with her quite thoroughly."
The Massachusite nodded. H.M.P. Gonebren had been opened at the command of King George VI after the start of hostilities in 1939 to serve as a prisoner of war camp for members of the Magische Reichsarmee captured in the field. While none of the Schwarze Mädchen had the ill-luck to be sent to the Maze Among the Rocks, many of their brothers-in-arms weren't so lucky…and would emerge from that hellhole as pale shadows of their former selves, consigned to long-term care at Germany's equivalent to St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries, Magische Krankenhaus Kentigernus in modern-day Göttingen. Then again, even if the Hollows were born from the vengeful spirits of normals slain over the years by evil wizards and witches, they had all been British when they were living corporeal beings. Patriotism and loyalty to the Crown was one of the things that marked the Hollows as a whole; the creator of Gonebren was obviously someone who view that type of loyalty as right and proper.
"So how did it feel to you?" Regina then asked.
"I wasn't as affected by it as others were the day it was brought to Hogwarts…"
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry (on the north shore of Loch Eigheach west of Kinloch Rannoch in the Council Area of Perth and Kinross, Scotland), Wednesday 4 September 1996, after supper…
"So how does it feel to have your sister back, mate?"
Neville Longbottom seemed to glow like the morning sun as he and other members of the Defence Association made their way down a familiar seventh floor corridor in the academic wing of the ancient castle above the main library. "It's like a little slice of Heaven, Ron!" the future Marquess of Holdenhurst stated as he, Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger led a troupe of fifty students to the place where the painting of Barnabas the Barmy teaching mountain trolls how to perform ballet hung opposite the hidden doorway to the Room of Requirements. "When Harry invited me to come down to Grimmauld Place to meet Grace, it…" He shook his head. "Well…"
Ginny Weasley and Lavender Brown reached over to squeeze his shoulders in a show of support. "How did your grandmother react to it?" Hermione asked as people stopped, all noting that there was a visible door in the wall where the Room's entrance was.
Ron went over to try the door before he noted it was locked. "Harry?!" he called out after knocking on the door several times. "You in there?!"
"Just a sec', Ron!" came back from inside the Room.
As the others relaxed, they turned their attention back to Neville and what he was saying. "Gran was just beside herself, 'Mione," he stated before he sighed. "She's a little sad, too. Grace can't say a thing about who it was that gave her life back; neither can Rose, Raven nor Cassi, much less Lotte, Ariel and all the others. Uncle Algernon tried to find some way to get that secret out of her, but couldn't do it. It's no magical oath; it's something WORSE than that!" As people gaped in shock at him, Neville shook his head. "I can't imagine what it is, though."
"How many was it altogether?" Zhāng Qiū — known to her friends by the more common English reading of her name, "Cho Chang" — asked.
"Ninety-seven," Luna Lovegood reported; she had interviewed Rose Potter, Raven Malfoy and Cassiopeia Lestrange for the Quibbler in mid-July. "You-Know-Who and his people wiped out all the unborn children of Rhosan Green back in 1979 because none of their parents would bow to him. All — including magical quintuplets born of the Meretrices of Wye — were brought back to life by whomever saved Grace, Rose and the others." She sighed. "Such a pity that the Roll Book here didn't pick up on any of them. They simply had no choice but to go to Meridiana to learn their magic."
"Why do people have problems with Meridiana?" Colin Creevey asked. "I've read about the Thousand Master and Ala Rubra. They saved everyone on Nerio from the Mage of the Beginning. They'd be Gryffindors if they came here! What's wrong with them?!"
Many of the others nodded. "It's all because of power and influence in the Wizengamot, Colin," Susan Bones answered. Now ennobled as the Baroness of Bute thanks to the death of her aunt Amelia weeks before, she still had a haunted look on her face because of what happened to her last surviving relative at the hands of the Death Eaters. Atop that, she — like many of her brother and sister Hufflepuffs — was still outraged over what happened to their housemate Sally-Anne Perks just before the Easter holidays when it was revealed that she had formed a soul-bonding with the eldest of the Meretrice quintuplets, Libera, who had graduated with distinction from Meridiana a year ago and was now working for the Special Operations Division of the British Library. "Meridiana alumni have never been shy about dealing with muggles, though I once heard that they only select people with some sort of magical potential to form pactio bonds with. A squib can work just as much as a fully-trained witch, wizard or other magical."
"Stupid!" Colin's kid brother Dennis spat out with a shake of his head.
"Indeed, Young Master Dennis, it is grossly foolish. But we endure."
People gasped as they snap-drew their wands and scanned around…
…just as an invisibility screen was dropped to reveal a smiling woman possessing the dusky skin indicative of African or Mediterranean ancestry, though she had rusty red hair tied in a long braid to her hips and stormy grey eyes. She was dressed in very fashionable civilian clothes. There was no sign of a wand anywhere on her person. "Oh, hello, Libera," Luna said with a smile as she slipped her wand away.
Hearing that name, the Hufflepuffs all grinned as they relaxed, nodding to the wife of their former housemate. "Greetings and felicitations, Lady Luna," Libera Meretrice said, a noblewoman's prim tones echoing in her voice. "And by the way, my friends, you all showed excellent reflexes. I'm sure you'll learn many things now that the International Conference is taking direct interest in the affairs of this poor land."
"How did you get here, Lady Libera?" Alice Tolipan — one of the two Slytherins who had joined the D.A.; her family, despite their being "pure" by British standards, utterly didn't care at all for racist monsters like Dolores Umbridge — wondered.
"A special compensation issued by the International Conference for the duration of the current emergency, Mistress Alice. It grants us unfettered access to the castle," Libera stated as she knocked on the door to the room. "Is all ready, Lord Harold?!"
"It's open!"
Libera opened the door and waved the others inside. They all walked in…and then stopped on seeing the small crowd of Slytherins standing close to the head of the room to both sides of Harry Potter. Among them were several of Harry's own year-mates: Pansy Parkinson, Daphne Greengrass, Tracey Davis, Millicent Bulstrode and Blaise Zabini. "What are you guys doing here?!" Luca Caruso — he was the only other Slytherin of the original D.A. — immediately demanded. "Harry, did you…?"
"I did," Harry stated before he gazed on Ron. "And no objections from you, alright?!" he sternly declared, which made the youngest Weasley son wince on sensing the cold tone in his best friend's voice. "Now's not the time for that garbage! These people here have all proved to me their willingness not only to join the Association, but not to betray us to Voldemort and his friends." Ignoring the mass chorus of winces from the other students on hearing the Dark Lord's battle name, Harry pointed to the onyx black crystal about the size of a rugby football on a frame brazier in front of him. "Last year, we were a bunch of amateurs driven by a righteous cause. This year, we won't fool around. You all read what happened in the Department of Mysteries. You all read what the ICMC decided to do because of Voldemort." Again, he ignored the winces. "We've got a very simple choice before us this year. We either make it very clear to the ICMC that we can guide our society into a better future…or we better get ready to face the modern version of the Moscow Magical Front." As the magically-raised present all croaked in shock on hearing that dire statement, Harry crossed his hands behind his back. "And as Libera there can tell you because she got it straight from the Queen herself, if we lose ICMC recognition, you can kiss the Separation Act good-bye!"
"Merlin! That's can't be true!" Lavender gasped.
"It IS true, Lavender-chan," a woman coldly stated from nearby.
Neville, Ron and Ginny gargled on hearing that familiar voice as another invisibility screen was dropped, revealing seven people dressed in the white-and-red kimono and hakama uniform of Shintō shrine maidens. "Good evening, minna-dono," Yomigawa Tsukiko stated, not reacting as the door into the Room slammed shut while she walked over to stand close to her new student, stopping to gaze on each of the D.A. As she did that, her apprentices moved to stand off to either side of the Slytherins…save for Rose Potter, who — much to the private delight of all the other D.A. members — embraced her brother from behind, resting her chin on his shoulder. "Amazing as this sounds to me even now, Harry-kun has convinced me you all have a modicum of talent when it comes to magical combat. Since Severus-dono is going to do everything he can to sabotage your studies in his class this year — yes, even to those such as Pansy-chan and her friends who have joined you today — in hopes of giving Voldemort-dono's people a chance against you all, it is up to my friends and I to help you gain such competency in magical combat that you will be have a chance of surviving a duel with Alastor Moody."
Jaws dropped in stunned shock. "We can't be THAT good!" Parvati Patil exclaimed.
"Parvati-chan, don't undersell yourself," Tsukiko calmly stated. "I couldn't help but overhear Colin-kun speak of Nagi Springfield in the corridor outside. Does anyone know why he was given the nickname 'Thousand Master?'" On seeing a chorus of confused looks respond to that question, the Dark Lady of the Orient smiled. "Tell them, Grace-chan."
"Hai, Sensei," Grace Longbottom said with a grin. Possessing the same hair and eye shades Neville had, she was lean and muscled. The sharper-eyed of the D.A. were quick to note that Neville's sister carried herself with a very confidant demeanour that told anyone that she could thrash a dozen opponents without breaking a sweat. "Some say that Nagi Springfield is the master of a thousand separate spells, hexes and jinxes. That's a lie; he actually dropped out of Meridiana before he would have graduated and been granted the rank of Discipulus Magi…though as to what he might have picked up when he was out seeking his fortune, that's never been confirmed." As people gaped at her, she smirked. "Some claim that Nagi made pactio bonds with a thousand women to boost his magic. I can't confirm that one way or another, but it is the common practice of people like myself to keep the pactios to a very dull roar." As people laughed on hearing that, Grace shrugged. "What I CAN confirm about the man is this: He is a master at magical combat, a shrewd tactician and strategist, one hell of a great swordsman and he's taught himself to think on his feet. That's what we all intend to help each and every one of YOU become before we're finished with you." She pointed to her brother, then Hermione, then Ginny, then Luna and a few others.
"You think the Death Eaters like my father are scary?" Raven Malfoy added. "They're only scary if you LET them be scary! The average combat skill of someone who fights for Tom Riddle — from what Rose, Cassi and I saw in the Department of Mysteries — is, for the most part, utterly pitiful!" As people gaped in disbelief at her, the platinum blonde with the light blue eyes smirked. "What they have going for them is the ability to kill and maim without wanting to stop. That's it!" She made a wave of her hand towards the brazier holding the dark crystal in front of Harry, causing it to levitate. As people goggled, Draco's sister smirked. "Did you know that save for Riddle himself, NONE of the Death Eaters have any skills in what you call 'wandless magic?'"
"We'll be getting an expert in wandless casting here soon," Harry reported as Raven placed the brazier on the floor. "She's actually Nagi Springfield's niece Nekane; she was a classmate of Rose's at Meridiana and is currently apprenticing to become a basic magical teacher at the school. By the time we leave school in June, we are ALL going to be able to cast wandlessly and without spoken words. Sensei's already started with me. It's not as hard as you might think it is; it's actually learning how to master the same type of accidental magic you all experienced before your first year here." As people gaped, he smirked. "Riddle's idiots won't be expecting anything like that."
"Much less using the so-called 'unforgivable curses' on the Dark Marks those idiots wear," Cassiopeia added. "You probably heard how I killed my uncle Rabastan back in June. I'll admit that I used the Morsmordre Avada Kedavra on him." As people gasped in shock on hearing that, Bellatrix's daughter grinned. "But he tried to kill me first even after he and his brother both clued into who I was, so I had the excuse to take him down. And I targeted his Dark Mark even if the curse ultimately killed him; it's not my fault that he allowed that idiot Riddle to bind his very LIFE to that mark!" She then sighed as the others in the room all grimly nodded in understanding. "Even if he was an evil little shit, he was still my uncle. I couldn't muster the hate or anger necessary to strike him down directly…but I could turn my hate and anger on his Dark Mark. I despise what that damned mark ultimately means…and with that, I can destroy it and whatever idiot stupid enough to get himself or herself branded with it. After all, it's only a magical construct! Do your laws protect something like that from the Killing Curse, to say anything of the Cruciatus Curse or the Imperius Curse?!"
"Of course not!" Terry Boot snapped.
"Good," Tsukiko declared. "Minna-dono, I will be very honest with you all. If I had my army from the War of Liberation at my side right now, I could conquer Britain in less than a WEEK! Why?! Because — no thanks in part to your esteemed headmaster! — you've been allowed to believe that whatever happens beyond the walls of this castle is no different than what you've dealt with inside this castle! That's been happening for YEARS now! You can't allow yourselves to be ruled by the same type of combat ethics your parents' generation tried to use against Voldemort-dono the first time around. That's what got six thousand innocent people killed before Harry-kun's mother struck the fool down in 1981. Neville-kun and Harry-kun both can explain to you all in graphic detail where that primrose path ultimately leads to! If you tried the same stupid idiocy THIS time around, you've lost before the first spell is cast." She then smirked. "However, I do realize that you've had to endure very sloppy instruction in your magical defence and other classes over the years, so it's time for some shock therapy to get you all into the proper mood." She then gazed on the brazier in front of Harry before nodding. "Show them, Harry-kun."
"Hai, Sensei."
And with that, he reached over to place his hand on the onyx surface of the crystal held in the brazier. As people watched, his skin turned nearly white as a croak of mind-numbing horror escaped him, his eyes tearing as pure AGONY crossed his face. Before Hermione or Ron — much less Pansy or Daphne — could move to pull him away from that thing, Rose's hands shot out as she effortlessly formed a bubble of energy around her brother to ensure they couldn't touch him. As people watched wide-eyed, Harry — after what seemed like an eternity; it was actually only ten seconds — then gasped as he pulled his hand away, his eyes flooding with grief and horror as he gazed on the dark crystal before him. After a moment, he dropped to one knee and bowed his head to the crystal. "Never again!" he solemnly whispered. "Never again…!"
"The Tsūshō…!"
Eyes locked on Luna, who was staring in wide-eyed awe at the crystal that had hurt Harry so. "What is that, Luna?" Neville demanded as Rose moved to comfort her brother.
"Before she launched the War of Liberation in 1939, Tsukiko-sensei went on fact-finding missions across Asia and Africa to see for herself — and EXPERIENCE for herself — what the magicals of the various European colonies lived like," the daughter of the owner of the Quibbler reported. "While she was travelling, she couldn't ignore the simple fact that too many innocent people were SUFFERING because of those magical loyalty locks the ministries in London, Paris, Brussels and the Hague — and yes, Rome, Madrid and Lisbon, too — forced on people who never wished our ancestors ill-will and only wanted to live their lives in peace and happiness, to say anything of practising their own type of magic without any unreasonable restrictions from the old ICW. At least the ministries in Tōkyō and Washington never did that to the Koreans, Taiwanese or the Filipinos. Over time, Sensei began collecting memory copies of magicals subjected to that in the Tsūshō." She indicated the black crystal that had so easily dropped the "Chosen One" to his knees. "Before she launched her first attack into Indochina, she made EVERY warrior who fought with her army touch the Tsūshō…so they would understand deep in their hearts the REAL reasons they were fighting."
People gaped as they stared wide-eyed at the Tsūshō…just as Harry got back to his feet. Taking a deep breath, he wiped his face clean before he gazed on the other D.A. members. "You want to be in the Defence Association this year?" he hoarsely declared, his green eyes flashing with iron determination. "You want to stop being one of the wizarding sheep that Voldemort and his friends want you to be? You want to learn how to survive and make sure your families survive?" He pointed at the crystal that served as a physical reminder of a horrible time in the histories of millions across Asia and Africa. "Touch that first! If you can't bring yourself to do that, don't bother wasting my time or Sensei's time."
The other members of the D.A. save Luna gaped in stunned disbelief at him…
"…there were a lot of people who were quite reticent on touching the Tsūshō…but they wanted to live even more, so they did it," Luna finished. "Zhāng Qiū had, by then, got over the loss of Cedric Diggory and — before the start of her last year at Hogwarts — met up with Kathleen Johnson, one of the Avalonian-Britons who had been created as auxiliary observers for their Niphentaxian masters; she was based out of Glasgow. They didn't bond until after the DNA loyalty lock on pure-born Avalonians was broken back in February by the Earth Angel." She nodded as Regina scowled on being reminded yet again about what her newly-adopted countrywomen had endured. "Of course, Kathy knew about Qiū's magic…though since Qiū believed Kathy was just a normal Terran, she was obliged under the Statute to stay quiet about her powers. These days, both run a branch of the Technomancy Shoppe in Bonham Alley, Glasgow's magical shopping district."
Regina nodded. "You care for her, don't you?"
"I do," Luna admitted with a smile, realizing that the Massachusite witch's newly-gifted empathy was picking up her feelings for her former housemate. "Qiū was always called by a really warped version of her name by most of the people at Hogwarts, 'Cho Chang.' There was no respect to her being ethnically Chinese. No decent attempts at trying to say her name properly…to say anything of using proper Oriental naming order! This was the very same thing people like Lì Sǔ, Mun Aesup and her siblings endured when they went to Hogwarts. It was just disgusting!" She breathed out. "When I showed her how much I was willing to respect her and where she came from, she became an adopted older sister to me, protecting me from those of my housemates who didn't care for the way I look on the world and did horrid things to me like stealing my personal belongings and hiding them from me. In turn, I comforted her and helped her recover from losing Cedric like she did." A wicked look then crossed her face. "Of course, when I went back for my OWL year after Tom Riddle's return to corporal form was exposed to the general public, Tsukiko-sensei was willing to put some nasty hexes and jinxes on my belongings, which left quite an impression on my tormentors."
The older woman shook her head. "You'll find bullies anywhere you go, Luna," she noted…before she tensed. "What on Earth…?!" she hissed out…
…as the familiar chiming noise of a materialiser echoed from nearby. Both turned as two columns of light produced two very familiar people to Luna. "Qiū! Kathy!" the daughter of the owner of the Quibbler yelped in delight as she rose up.
"Damn! Why'd you insist on us coming here THIS way, Kathy?!" Zhāng Qiū growled as she glared in annoyance at the dark-eyed twenty-something with the wavy auburn hair who had accompanied her here.
Regina was quick to sense that the protest from the Chinese-Scot was mollified by the love she felt for the Avalonian-Scot beside her. She was also quick to sense that Qiū herself was a Terran-turned-Avalonian; no doubt, that had been done right after the Liberation. "Because we don't have Star Flares available for civilian transport and time's of the essence, Xiánqī," Kathy Johnson said with a teasing smile as she gently grasped her bond-mate's hand, that making Qiū turn a fine shade of crimson.
The former Ravenclaw seeker and now technomancy mistress smiled as she raised her lover's hand up so she could courtly kiss it. She then turned to warmly embrace Luna. "How are you, Yuèzǐ?" she tenderly asked as she ruffled the younger woman's hair.
"Happy that good people have been brought back, Qiūgōng," Luna said as she kissed Qiū on the cheek before she moved to introduce her old housemate and her lover to Regina.
Hugs and kisses were exchanged before Luna excused herself to get more tea cups and supplies. "So how are you adjusting, sister?" Kathy asked as she gazed with concern at the Massachusite. "This must be horrendously disorientating for you."
"Not as much as it might be for some of my own sisters," Regina admitted as they relaxed in the chairs. "Much that the sheer scale of the technological gap between what I'm used to from the 1930s and 1940s and what you people have is quite overwhelming, I'm a big fan of Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon." Noting the confused look crossing Qiū's face, the older woman added, "They're science fiction heroes that appeared in pulp magazines and newspaper comic strips in the 1920s and 1930s, Madame Zhāng. They speculated on things like travelling to other planets and encountering alien civilizations long before rocket technology was developed by people such as Professor Robert Goddard and Wernher Freiherr von Braun."
"I know how you feel," Qiū admitted. "My family is quite modern as wizarding families in Britain come, yet some of the things our normal neighbours dealt with before I went to Salem to learn technomancy were totally beyond my understanding. Of course, being bonded to Kathy here helps a lot with all the things her sisters brought here in February." She scowled. "Though I still hate those bloody materialisers! They're just a damned accident waiting to happen! Mark my words on that!"
"Dearest, you can have accidents with the floo, apparition and portkeys," Kathy chided, her eyes sparkling with amusement. "Stop trying to focus Doctor McCoy too much."
Qiū stuck her tongue out…then moaned as her lover leaned over to devour it with her lips. By then, Luna came back with another tray full of cups and tea bags. Coming with her were two of Qiū's and Luna's sister Ravenclaws. "Hey, Qiū!" Lì Sǔ called out, grinning as the older woman's cheeks reddened to the shade of ripe cherries at being caught in such an act of intimacy with her soul-mate. "So your bond-mate forced you to risk having your molecules scattered all over the galaxy, eh?!"
"That's not funny, Sǔ!" Qiū snapped back…before she blinked on sensing bubbling amusement inside the hearts of her friends. "Oh, Merlin! What's going on?!"
"Hermione has discovered in Elizabeth Gibbon a sister hyper-intellect, Qiū," Luna said as she prepared tea. "After all the basic pleasantries were done away with, both began to debate everything under the sun." She giggled. "Did you know that the brigadier also used a time turner to sneak in some extra classes at Hogwarts when she was there?"
"Merlin! No way!" Qiū gasped.
"Elizabeth is a sister eagle, Qiū," Lisa stated before nodding her thanks as Luna handed her a cup of tea. "Right now, 'Mione's being bombarded with all the incredible applications the Schwarze Mädchen developed during the war for all five exceptions to Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration to help them survive in the battlefield. Sǔ, Daph and I were BARELY able to keep up with HALF of what Elizabeth was saying!" She shook her head. "It was a bloody crime when the Americans and the Soviets demanded that the Magische Reichsarmee and the Schwarze Mädchen unconditionally surrender after Hitler killed himself. All the knowledge and experience they have…"
"How do we get around the people who want their hides for what they did during the war, Lisa?" Sǔ asked. "There are still a lot of old folks who are carrying a huge grudge."
Her old year-mate nodded in understanding. "Well, if push comes to shove, they can all migrate to the States or Canada," Regina mused. "I know that I was formally exonerated for what I did by President Truman in 1950 when Tsukiko-sensei went to bat for me and explained why the ICMC passed that resolution wiping the slate clean for all of us."
The others nodded. "Germany, Austria, Italy and Spain are also places people like you can go to," Lisa mused. "You were all fully exonerated there. The Bundesmagieministerium in Berlin still has all your personal effects in storage, including your wands."
"But would they need them now?" Luna asked. "They didn't have the Neuwied Test back then, but it's clearly obvious to me that their magical levels have increased quite a lot. Look what happened to Qiū and you when you underwent your body-swaps."
Qiū and Lisa nodded. "What's the Neuwied Test?" a curious Regina asked.
"It's a way to determine total magical power and potential skill level," Sǔ explained. "It was developed in the early 1980s by a German unspeakable named Johannes Neuwied. Average score for wizards and witches is between 110-180 points."
The American hummed before she nodded. "We came up with something similar back in '41," she then reported before closing her eyes and concentrating.
Qiū, Kathy and Lisa were quick to sense their host sending out a mental summons. A moment later, a slender yet muscular woman about the same physical age as their host came into the room. Dressed in German combat fatigues with the dome framed diamond over two chevrons insignia of a Stabsfeldwebel on her shoulders, she was a tomboyish woman with pale blue-grey eyes and stylishly-cut auburn hair. "Is there something the matter, meine Kaiserin?" she teased with an amused twinkle in her eyes…though all the Britons in the room were quick to see that the newcomer was clearly in love with Regina Mitchell.
"Chris!" Regina snarled. "What did I tell you about calling me that?!"
"To keep doing it?" the newcomer teased.
An annoyed scream escaped the American as Luna clapped her hands in delight. "Oh, my! I'm so glad the Vinur Drekar found you girls!" she declared, making both Regina and her opposite number in the First Battalion, Christine Schultze, stare wide-eyed at her. "I know you'll just stir up all sorts of wonderful trouble for we mere poor mortals!"
"You actually LIKE us?!" Christine exclaimed. "After what we did?!"
"You all fought to make a place for normal-borns all across Europe, Sergeant-Major Schultze," Lisa stated. "I'm a half-blood. So is Sǔ here, not to mention Hannah and Susan. Qiū's a pureblood, but she's been raised to respect normal culture. Atop that, she bonded to Kathy here, who's ultimately an alien of all things! Daph's a pureblood, but she's pretty open to new things; you can't be an Unspeakable while being close-minded. Luna's ALWAYS respected all cultures regardless if they're magical or non-magical, much less human or non-human. 'Mione's a normal-born. The man who got rid of our last Dark Lord was a half-blood and normal-raised." She sighed. "You guys might not realize it, but you blazed a huge path for a lot of people in Europe even if the traditionalists you wanted to destroy have tried again and again to turn back all the changes that came in your wake every chance they could! We admire you guys. Luna's right; it's a wonderful thing you all are alive and well."
"I know Master Gellert will die a happy man now," Luna added as her eyes teared. "You were the most precious thing to him even when he wasn't obsessing about the Greater Good. You were the living symbols of the perfect society to him, one that accepted magical and non-magical — and by extension, metahuman and normal, human as well as non-human — as equals, living without stupid secrecy statutes that were shown to have long outlived their usefulness when the Steel Angels were all created in the 1920s!" She then gazed on Regina. "And the Immortals will be happy to know you all are alright."
The Massachusite combat witch blinked. "Carl…?"
The Devonian magical naturalist nodded. "He was there early this morning, escorting Tsukiko-sensei on her yearly visit to see Master Gellert. A lot of the others who were there at the Battle of the Gates — Duncan MacLeod, Robert and Angelina de Valicourt, Erno Jocszak and Alicia Mackenzie — were there, too; this was the first time since the sixty-fifth anniversary of that battle that they all were able to come together without worrying about people hunting their heads. Even Adam Pierson — who was a good friend of David Wisden — also came, as did Amanda Darieux."
"Where are they now, Luna?" Sǔ asked.
"They're still at Nurmengard. Since it's Holy Ground, they're safe from whatever silly fellow might be out there who'd want to go headhunting."
Groans escaped the others. "Frau Lovegood, that was not funny!" Christine moaned.
"Christine, be assured that I would never joke about something like that."
"Never mind, Chris," Regina cut in. "Do Special Test Nine on me."
The native of Braunschweig in Lower Saxony blinked before she raised her hand towards her beloved friend and whispered something in an archaic dialect of German. A moment later, a beautiful opaque parchment appeared before Christine. Gazing at it, she gaped for a moment before she stared at the American. "What was your last test result?"
"Group 5K. Why?" Regina wondered.
"Well, you're now in Group 9D," Christine reported, which made the native of Plymouth gape in disbelief. "Lieber Gott! What the hell happened to you, Regina?!"
"Wait a second!" Sǔ said as she drew her wand and began whispering an incantation.
A moment later, a ghostly parchment appeared before her. "Neuwied Test score for First Sergeant Regina Mitchell of the United States, Salem Witches Institute Mistresses Class of 1933, is 439 points," the Chinese-Briton from Sheffield in South Yorkshire reported.
Lisa drew out her dataPADD to bring up her notepad program. "Okay, got it, Sǔ! Also noting that in the Black Maidens Special Test Nine, First Sergeant Mitchell rates in Group 9D. Regina, can you do a test of your friend here, please?"
"Alright," Regina said as she waved her hand towards Christine. A parchment then appeared before her a moment later. "Group 9G," she reported.
"WHAT?!" the Lower Saxon combat witch exclaimed. "That's almost as powerful as Frau Majorin Raeburn's friend from Québec! How's that possible?!"
"Sǔ, do the Neuwied Test," Qiū ordered. "We can start using that to draw up a comparison chart."
"Right."
Another diagnostic test was done, recording Christine Schultze's Neuwied score at 451 points, which Lisa recorded on her dataPADD. "But how on Earth is that possible?!" Regina then demanded. "We're good, but how could our power boost up like THAT?!"
"Probably the meson in your new bodies' bloodstream."
People turned as Hermione Granger walked into the room, accompanied by Elizabeth Gibbon and Margareta Hecht. Christine automatically turned around and clicked her heels together, bowing her head to her leader and friend. "At ease," the Yorkshire-born leader of the Schwarze Mädchen said with a nod of her head and a smile. "Hermione here did some tests using this new system that bright fellow from Bonn developed some years ago with the rest of us. It appears we're all Class 9s to one extent or another, with Gretta and I at the Class 9L level." As both Christine and Regina gaped in shock, Elizabeth gazed on her new friend. "My Neuwied Test score is 482 points, which is just eighteen points short of Sensei's score. Gretta's is 480 points even." She gazed on Lisa. "Master Unspeakable Turpin, are these scores made public for any reason?"
"No, Brigadier Gibbon. Even if the Neuwied Test is pretty popular, whatever results are made are always treated with all levels of confidentiality." Lisa then smirked. "No matter how much the stalebloods try to make it otherwise!"
Laughter escaped the others from Britain. "I see the descendants of die Schweine ohne Magie we wanted to destroy are still being collective pains in the arse," Margareta breathed out.
"Well, we're on a roll right now even if they're trying to trip us up every chance they can," Hermione noted with a grin before she sighed. "I've got some bad news."
"What?" Qiū demanded.
"Harry sent a message up to me. Raven Malfoy just confirmed that Theo Nott and a tonne of his friends — including Draco! — made an alliance with a group of daywalkers under Adam Sewell's leadership to find a way to kill off all the Avalonians using stolen magic. And yes, I'm as shocked as you are, First Sergeant, on hearing that monster is 'alive,' so to speak," Hermione said as she gave a wide-eyed Regina a knowing look.
"That's why we came up here," Kathy reported. "We got a message from Ariel Goyle about that very same thing."
"Why would they do this, Frau Granger?" Christine asked.
"Because they're afraid that the Avalonians will force-transform all the Terrans into 'crystal-bloods,' thus denying them their primary source of food, Staff Sergeant," the normal-born from West Sussex reported before she smirked. "Which would violate the spirit and the letter of the Earth-Avalon Treaty of Alliance and Friendship signed in March. And that, our wonderful friends will not do under any circumstances as it would be no different than what their former masters did to them for over a century."
"Is this demented son of a bitch in jail?!" Regina immediately demanded.
"Regretfully no, First Sergeant," Hermione apologized before she giggled. "But don't worry about it. You'd think that Draco would do everything to avoid being touched by his sister whenever he's in her presence!" she then added, which made the others from Britain laugh. "Their original targets were you and all your sisters; Sewell's friends in Germany discovered you were trapped in that cave on Nurmengardberg some weeks ago and decided they couldn't pass up such an opportunity to snare a lot of magic for their cause." As the Black Maidens among them all tensed on hearing that, Hermione smiled. "Pity that they never counted on the Vinur Drekar butting in like she did."
"'Vinur Drekar?'" Qiū asked.
"The Lóng de Péng'yǒu," Sǔ provided.
The older woman nodded in understanding; she didn't care for the Friend of Dragons being called simply "her" like the Daily Prophet had done right from the beginning, but didn't know the Icelandic term. "What will they do now, Frau Granger?" Margareta then asked. "If they're feeling so desperate to drive our new sisters off Earth, they've got to have some sort of backup plan ready to initiate at a moment's notice."
"You're right about that, Master Staff Sergeant," Hermione stated. "Their new target is Azkaban Prison. Time to strike will be Friday, most likely sometime before dawn to allow them to use their full powers since they won't be as strong when the sun's out." She sighed. "Twenty-two hundred and thirty-seven prisoners — all still with a lot of their magic available to them, even the ones who spent time at Gonebren during Death Eater Season — just sitting there and waiting to be taken. And with just a small Auror force there, it wouldn't take Sewell and his friends long to overpower then and whisk them away."
"What about the Dementors?" Elizabeth demanded.
"Wiped out of existence back in 1997 by a friend of ours when she blew the prison up with a hyper-charged mesonium bomb, Elizabeth," Lisa reported. "The goblins provided a guard force after Azkaban was reopened after the turn of the year in 1998 until our friend devised some interesting technomagic deterrents against break-outs."
"I doubt Aesup thought about stopping vampires," Sǔ mused.
"There may be a way to deal with them."
Eyes locked on Luna. "What do you mean, Luna?" Lisa asked.
"Thanks to Aesup's bomb, all of Azkaban Island is saturated with meson particles in the soil itself," the younger woman reported as her blue-grey eyes sparkled with both playful mischievousness and deadly malice. "And meson is just as deadly to ANY type of vampire as silver is."
"You mean lay a trap for them?" Regina mused as she crossed her arms. "Just like President Lincoln and the Department of Magic laid a trap for the vampire leadership who provoked the Civil War before Lee and Meade fought at Gettysburg in 1863?"
"Exactly," Luna affirmed with a nod. "All we need is to get the prisoners and the Aurors clear of the island before Mister Sewell and his friends come visit, then get Aesup to make another nice bomb to blow up once they're on the island itself."
"Um, Luna, she's out in deep space somewhere right now," Lisa reminded her.
The Devonian magical naturalist blinked before she pouted. "Oh, poo!"
POP!
Everyone gasped…before they looked up and gaped as a paper owl of all things fluttered over their heads in a lazy orbit just out of people's reach even if all of them save Kathy could use wandless magic to bring it down. As the others stared in shock at such a display of power, Luna giggled with delight. "Oh, my! I was wondering when she was going to do this again!" she said as she held up a hand, palm up.
The fluttering bit of origami came over to land on the outstretched limb…before it morphed into a folded sheet of paper. With that, Luna took it in hand and opened it to gaze on what was there…before she blinked. "Where's the message?"
A line of computer-type print then appeared, relaying words in English. [I DECIDED TO DO SOMETHING A LITTLE DIFFERENT THIS TIME, LADY LUNA. I TRUST ALL IS WELL WITH YOU?]
Luna gaped before she laughed. "Oh, my! She replicated the Speaking Paper Spell!" she declared, which made the others scramble over to gaze over her shoulders at it. "So why on Earth didn't you come here to talk to us in person?" she then asked as she gazed on the paper. "We're nowhere on Earth, so Lady Negako can't sense you."
[AFTER I JUST RESCUED YOUR BEAUTIFUL HOSTS THIS MORNING? MUCH THAT I DO UNDERSTAND THE CONCEPT OF LIFE DEBTS, I CARE NOT TO HAVE THEM SWORN TO ME, MY FRIEND.]
"Are you the one they call the 'Vinur Drekar?'" Elizabeth asked.
[INDEED I AM, WISE MISTRESS ELIZABETH. AS THE LADY LUNA AND HER COMPANIONS WILL BE ABLE TO EXPLAIN TO YOU, THE DEMANDS OF GIRI FORBID ME FROM REVEALING WHO I AM TO THE OUTSIDE WORLD IN GENERAL. I HOPE TO CORRECT THAT SOMETIME SOON, BUT I CAN'T SAY WHEN.]
"She's a practising Zoroastrian, Brigadier," Lisa provided. "What she did was just simply an act of mercy per the tenets of her faith. And she's quite honest about this whole issue that forces her to keep quiet about her name. All the dragons and other magical creatures she's saved over the last several months verify her honesty."
The leader of the Schwarze Mädchen nodded. "Alright, fair enough. So why are you contacting us, Miss? We're beyond grateful for you saving us, but…"
[MUCH THAT MY PERSONAL BELIEFS MAKE ME ABHOR VAMPIRES ON GENERAL PRINCIPLES, I KNOW THERE ARE MANY GOOD AND DECENT PEOPLE AMONGST THE UNDEAD REGARDLESS OF WHAT TYPE OF VAMPIRE THEY ARE. MASTER HUNTER ABRAHAM'S WONDERFUL TEACHER HENRY STURGES, FOR EXAMPLE, TO SAY THE LEAST OF THE UNDYING WARLORD OF BEAUTIFUL WALLACHIA HIMSELF. NONE THE LESS, WHAT THAT DEGENERATE MONSTER SEWELL AND HIS ALLIES PLAN TO DO CAN'T BE ALLOWED. THEY COULDN'T ACCEPT THE JUDGEMENT OF THE WISE MASTER AS DELIVERED AT THE EDGE OF MASTER ABRAHAM'S AXE DURING THE SCORE AND FOUR. SO BE IT. THEY ALL MUST BE MADE TO UNDERSTAND THAT THEIR KIND WILL NO LONGER BE TOLERATED IN THE NEW SOCIETY MY BELOVED ATARU AND HIS SIBLINGS HELPED CREATE FIVE MONTHS AGONE. THAT, I CAN DO.]
"Sister, you don't need to do that!" Kathy exclaimed. "You've already warned people about what will soon happen! Let the legal authorities deal with it!"
"We can deal with it!" Regina added. "We destroyed vampires by the cartload back in the war! Since these bastards wanted to steal our magic, we'll burn them alive!"
[NOBLE MISTRESS REGINA, HAVE YOU NEVER BEEN TAUGHT THE CONCEPT OF THE VENGEANCE OF BLOOD? CALL UPON THAT AND THE POWER OF MAGIC ITSELF WILL DESTROY YOUR FOES WITH EASE! EVEN MORE, MAGIC WILL NOT CARE WHAT YOUR BIRTH-STATUS IS.]
Silence.
More silence.
Still more silence.
And then…
"Oh, Merlin! That's perfect!" Hermione purred with delight.
"What is that?" Regina asked.
"At Salem, do they painless remove your maidenhead in first year?" Qiū asked.
"Of course they do. Why?"
"Before that became common practice at our various schools, it was always possible to seize virgin witches to use their 'pure' blood for unspeakable rituals, Regina," Margareta explained. "To deter that, people discovered the power of the Vindictam Sanguinis and used it to save themselves from having their purity sullied. It's as devastating in its own way as the Praeda Bellica benediction; Magic Itself — as our delightful friend just indicated — acts as the judge, jury and executioner in this case." She then hummed. "Still, could we…"
"Not the vampires, Master Staff Sergeant."
Eyes locked on Hermione. "Who?" Lisa asked.
"Theo Nott and his friends," the normal-born from West Sussex coldly declared…
The Isle of Lundy, that moment…
"AH-CHOO!"
To be continued…
WRITER'S NOTES
1) The Vestas V90-3MW is a three-blade upwind wind turbine generator that uses pitch control and a fifty hertz doubly fed induction generator. As noted in its name, it can produce three megawatts of rated power. The tower holding this particular type of wind turbine normally is eighty metres in height; in Germany, towers for the V90 stand 105 metres. The rotors of the V90 span ninety metres.
2) Translations: Mugalophobic — Adjective of Mugalophobia, which is a combination of múgalos (literally "field mice") and phobia ("mortal fear") ("Múgalos" was the term used in the Greek Harry Potter translations to represent "muggles"); Egregia cum Laude — Literally "with outstanding honour," which is a step above Summa cum Laude ("with highest honour") and is applied to students who earned the same grade point average for an academic degree required for the latter honour, but did so while pursuing a more rigorous honours curriculum; Praeda Bellica — Spoils of War; Ariadnian — The demonym representing something of the independent academic city-state of Ariadne on Nerio; Vindictam Sanguinis — Vengeance of Blood; Volksdeutsche — Literally "racial Germans" (the term volks can also mean "folk" and then conveyed a meaning of superiority in both blood and civilization) this was a term used by the Nazi Party to indicate those ethnic Germans who lived in other countries (as specifically defined by Adolf Hitler in a 1938 memorandum, these were "people whose language and culture had German origins but who did not hold German citizenship"); Caudillo — Literally translated these days as "leader," this was the title bestowed to Francisco Franco y Bahamonde (1892-1975) in his position as dictator of Spain from 1939 until his death (though Franco did proclaim himself as such at the start of the Spanish Civil War in 1936); Massachusite — Traditional demonym for a native of Massachusetts (the official demonym is "Bay Stater"); Tsūshō — Crystal of Agony; Krankenhaus — Literally "house of suffering," this is the German title for a hospital; Kentigernus — The Latin name for Saint Kentigern (unknown date of birth, died 614), the patron saint of the city of Glasgow who is more commonly known as "Saint Mungo" (as an aside, the namesake of St. Mungo's Hospital is Mungo Bonham, a master healer who lived from 1560-1659 that was introduced in various Famous Wizarding Cards in the video games based on Philosopher's Stone, Chamber of Secrets, Prisoner of Azkaban and Order of the Phoenix); Morsmordre Avada Kedavra — As described above, this is an application of the Killing Curse on the Dark Mark, which (as I also specluated in the Icemaidens fanfics) would effectively kill the Mark's bearer; Xiánqī — Literally "my esteemed wife"; Yuèzǐ — Short for Yuèliàng de Háizǐ ("moon child"), a play-off on Luna Lovegood's given name; Qiūgōng — Short for Qiūtiān de Gōngzhǔ ("princess of autumn"), a play-off on the given name of Zhāng Qiū/Cho Chang; Bundesmagieministerium — Short for Bundesamt für Magische Angelegenheiten ("Federal Ministry of Magical Affairs"), the post-1949 West German (and after 1990, all-German) version of the British Ministry of Magic; Meine Kaiserin — Literally "My Empress"; Lieber Gott — Dear God; Die Schweine ohne Magie — Literally "the pigs without magic" (in German, calling someone a schwein is one of the worst insults one can deliver).
3) Negima character notes:
Emily Sevensheep and Beatrix Munroe, as noted above, became members of the Mage Knights of Ariadne; this happened during the "Magical World" story arc in Negima. Emily first appeared in the manga story "Magical Girl Yūe" (manga story #203) while Beatrix appeared in "Magical Girl Major Battle" (manga story #211). Their being lovers is my invention, by the way.
The actual background story of Negi Springfield's father, the "Thousand Master" Nagi Springfield, was never properly explained in the manga series; all that was told about him is based on a lot of biased speculation on the parts of people such as Evangeline McDowell and others.
4) Harry Potter character notes:
When I wrote the Icemaidens series, I made the Malfoy family natives of Cumbria, the most northeast county of England on the border with Scotland. However, thanks to the Pottermore website, it was revealed that the Malfoy family lives in Wiltshire in south-central England. To that end — keeping in mind how wealthy the Malfoys are — I elected to have them possess a summer cottage in Cumbria. This place is, in effect, Narcissa Malfoy's current retirement home.
Kieran Harper (his given name is my invention, based on the actor that would have portrayed him) is a minor character from Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince who was the reserve seeker on the Slytherin Quidditch team. The scenes from the film including him were cut in the final edit.
The final fate of Sally-Anne Perks was never discussed in the novels. She was part of the class list that JKR devised before writing Philosopher's Stone and was mentioned at the Sorting scene in that novel. However, in Order of the Phoenix, she was never called up to perform her OWL examinations. In both the Icemaidens series and in the universe of this story, I make Sally-Anne a normal-born native of Ross-on-Wye in Herefordshire north of the Forest of Dean, the daughter of a forester and a housewife, both of which are also officers in the Territorial Army. Of course, it was because of Sally-Anne's magic — as noted in The Icemaidens and the Philosopher's Stone — that penetrated the veil set up around Rhosan Green, which is where she met her future lover Libera Meretrice. In the universe of this story, however, Libera was attending classes at Meridiana when Sally-Anne was invited to Hogwarts; their encounter, as noted above, occurred during the latter's OWL year there.
Alice Tolipan and Luca Caruso were both people who signed the contract that saw them become members of the Defence Association AKA Dumbledore's Army in the movie version of Order of the Phoenix. Their house affiliations were not noted in the movie; their being Slytherins is my invention.
5) The Viscountcy of Dengie (Lamicho Hundings) is named after the Dengie Peninsula on the North Sea coast of Essex about fifty-five kilometres east-northeast of London. Lamicho's hometown of Bradwell — the town's full name is Bradwell-on-Sea is on near the peninsula's tip, where the River Blackwater flows into the North Sea.
6) Monkshood is one of the many names applied to a genus of plants known scientifically as Aconitum…or normally as Aconite. Plants of this particular genus are also sometimes known as Wolf's Bane. These plants are chiefly native to the mountainous parts of the Northern Hemisphere, growing in the moisture-retentive but well-draining soils of mountain meadows. While aconite has been used in traditional Oriental medicine — which Rose Potter would have learned thanks to Yomigawa Tsukiko — these types of plants are also very poisonous.
7) Fans of Harry Turtledove's 1992 alternate history novel The Guns of the South (ISBN 0-345-37675-7) will recognize the name of the magical marshal Abraham Lincoln spoke of when Harry Potter was visiting him: Mollie Bean (unknown dates of birth and death). In real life, Mollie disguised herself as a man and fought with the 47th Regiment, North Carolina Infantry for two years and was wounded twice in battle; it is suspected — but not confirmed — that she was at the Battle of Gettysburg on 1-3 July 1863. She was captured by Union troops on 17 February 1865 and later imprisoned in Castle Thunder in downtown Richmond, having been declared "manifestly crazy" and was later accused as a spy. The Richmond Whig later reported in its 20 February 1865 edition that other members of the 47th knew of Mollie and insinuated that she may have had sexual relations with one or more of them. Neither assertion was, however, based on any concrete evidence, Bean's own testimony or that of any other soldier in her unit. Those assertions, no doubt, influenced Harry Turtledove when he fleshed out her character as she appeared in TGoTS; there, she claimed she was a prostitute before disguising herself as "Melvin Bean" and joining Company "D" of the 47th (known commonly as the Castalia Invincibles) before Gettysburg.
8) The Mistresses Class at places such as the Salem Witches Institute is the equivalent of the NEWT Class at Hogwarts. The equivalent of those who leave Hogwarts with only their OWLs at other schools is most often called the Graduates Class.
9) I introduced both the Nŏksbae ("soul boat") and Nŏkspotchep'um ("soul replica") concepts in The Icemaidens and the Philosopher's Stone. Note that in the cases of Korean syllables that end in dual consonants as written in han'gŭl, only one of those syllables is normally pronounced. When it comes to the ks combination, the "s" is normally not pronounced unless followed directly by a vowel.
10) The name of Harry Potter's would-be girlfriend from his fifth year, Cho Chang, was rendered in the Mandarin translations of the novels as 张秋, read Zhāng Qiū. The family name literally means "archer" and is one of the most popular Chinese clan names. The given name means "autumn." However, it should be noted that Cho's English-based name (according to the Harry Potter Wikia) might have been derived from 惆怅, which is read "chóuchàng" and combines the terms "distressed" and "disappointed."
11) The German rank title name of Stabsfeldwebel literally means "Staff Sergeant." In the German Army, this is applied to someone that is equivalent to a master warrant officer/chief petty officer 2nd class in the Canadian Forces and has the NATO rank code of OR-8. Note that the rank title Hermione Granger used for Margareta Hecht here, "Master Staff Sergeant," is a near-direct translation of the German rank name Oberstabsfeldwebel, which has the NATO rank code of OR-9 and is equal to a Canadian Forces chief warrant officer/chief petty officer 1st class.
12) The Speaking Paper Spell mentioned by Luna here is my name for a magical version of text messaging using paper. I base this concept on the practice of using holograms with letters sent between mages in Negima.
