Author's Note: In celebration of the fact that I am now completely finished with my junior year of college (YAY!), I am posting the rest of this story. Which means I'm posting two chapters and an epilogue. They're short, but I'm a wee bit anxious to finish this story and get on with the sequel. Enjoy!

March 17, 2019

For two months, he had avoided her.

He'd not written her a single letter, he'd avoided the places on campus he most strongly connected to her, and under no circumstances did he so much as look at that black leather-bound journal.

Alana Montblanc wasn't the only one suffering from an influx of guilt.

The more of her journal he read, the more Harry Potter realized how horribly he'd misjudged her. For eleven years, he had been so consumed by bitter hatred that he had never stopped to consider her side of the story. He had been as bad as the papers, perfectly happy to cast himself as the victim, the tragic hero so terribly betrayed by the villainous femme fatale that was Alana Montblanc Malfoy.

Only now was he starting to see that the story was more complicated than he'd known. Yes, she was still the one who'd facilitated his defeat, but Harry suspected that there had been more forces pressuring Alana than he'd thought, that the situation wasn't a simple betrayal.

For eleven years, he had avoided her out of anger. Now, he avoided her out of guilt. He'd been so horribly mistaken about Alana so far; what else about her had he gotten wrong?

However, though he tried his hardest to ignore her, she refused to be forgotten. He found himself thinking of her frequently, wondering how different she was from the woman he remembered.

Oh, he remembered. How he remembered. Memories of Alana could be- and were- triggered by anything. Meetings with the Governors or the Minister of Magic conjured memories of department meetings he and Alana had attended, and how they'd write each other notes to keep themselves awake. Walking through the halls reminded him of times he'd passed Alana while walking to class, or passing her in the Ministry halls, having an entire conversation in one glance. And at night… well, suffice it to say that even his dreams weren't free of her.

Sometimes, he wondered if he was under some sort of spell. When he thought that, his mind would always stray back to a memory of a Halloween dance, when an old man's spell had pulled Harry and Alana together for a single dance.

For those who appear similar to you may be the ones wearing the most clever masks of all.

For years, Harry had thought that Dumbledore had been trying to warn him that Alana wasn't to be trusted. But now he knew that, as usual, Dumbledore's meaning had been much more convoluted.

Indeed, Alana's mask was had been the most clever of them all. Her mask was created of the preconceptions of the person looking at her, and like a mask, those preconceptions concealed what was really underneath. Beneath her mask, what appeared to be similarities to Harry proved in fact to be profound differences. Alana wasn't like Harry at all; she was wonderfully, gloriously different.

The mask had finally been pulled from her. For years, Harry had thought the mask was her true face, had in fact needed her true nature to be hidden from him. But now he had once again stripped her mask away, was now beholding her true face.

They no longer danced around each other, each hiding behind their own mask. They stood before each other, unmasked, staring at the other's true essence.

He was close now, so very close to the center of the mystery. The final mask was about to be lifted from Alana. He could avoid her no longer.

I was surprised when you asked me for my help in defeating Voldemort. But perhaps I should have expected it- after all, I did have the contacts behind enemy lines. And I was one of the enemy, so who better to plan a war with?

Whatever your motives, I was secretly pleased that we were in it together. If I tried hard enough, I could almost pretend it was the old days, that none of the mistakes of the past had been made, that we were 19 and on top of the world and certain of victory. The moments where I could convince myself of that were the happiest I'd been in quite a while. I needed that happiness so much that I was willing to go through the despair that inevitably followed when I was reminded that those days were very much dead.

For all the build-up and preparation we put ourselves through, the end of the War was decidedly anticlimactic. For weeks we had schemed, conceiving and discarding plans, arguing over minutia. Then it finally came… and just like that, it was over. No trumpets blaring fanfares, no bells and whistles. Maybe it's for the best that it ended so quietly; the time for this ending was long overdue, and when it came it felt as though it had been there all along, and we just hadn't realized it.

November 18, 2013

Alana glanced at Harry out of the corner of her eye as they stood in the cemetery of Riddle House, waiting. So much had happened in the last eight months, so much that she'd had no time to come to terms with. Being given her freedom, becoming a spy, getting her children back, learning Harry was alive, nursing him back to health, adjusting the relationship so it was appropriate for two people who "hated" each other… All of it melded together and faded into insignificance when it was faced with this moment.

Harry stood resolute, commanding, confident. He spared Alana not a single glance as he stared into the darkness and waited.

Without looking at her, he muttered, "Now."

Alana swallowed hard; this was it. The beginning of the end. She lifted her arm, jiggling her wrist to move her thin metal bracelets out of the way, baring her star brand. Bracing herself for the burning pain, she placed her wand to the brand and called the Dark Lord.

Alana stood tall beside Harry, trying to appear as confident as he, but beneath her calm exterior she was terrified. Voldemort would kill her for her defection, and two against six weren't good odds.

And then, suddenly, there he was. The end of the road that Harry had trod for so many years… the puppeteer of Alana's life… the goal they had sought for so very long.

"Well, well," Voldemort said softly. "So the prodigal returns, with the fugitive in custody. Well done, Alana."

Harry and Voldemort both watched Alana. This was the crucial moment. Alana had to choose a master; which side would she betray this time?

Alana closed her eyes, calling upon her magic. Since her release from Azkaban, she had re-taught herself what she had learned in Hogwarts, and had practiced until her skills were back to the level they had been when she was an Unmentionable. But she had not yet tried to use her power as a Wishgiver.

The moment for decision had come, and Alana made the only possible choice.

She opened her eyes as she began to glow white. "Yes, Voldemort, I have returned," she said in a voice that echoed and magnified itself. "But not to you."

The force of the magic was so strong that it lifted Alana into the air. She glowed as bright as the stars overhead, and bursts of silver sparks erupted around her.

Voldemort, now knowing himself to be betrayed, whipped out his wand and pointed it at Harry.

"Avada Kedavra!" both he and Harry yelled.

Once upon a time, they had stood locked in battle like this, their wands bonded. But that time, Harry hadn't had access to Alana's magic.

"Star light… star bright… first star I see tonight…" he muttered between gritted teeth, speaking the spell that connected him to the Star, "I wish I may… I wish I might… have this wish I wish tonight."

He dared to glance away from the connection between his and Voldemort's wands for a moment as his eyes sought Alana's. Though she had her hands full harnessing her magic and protecting herself from the Death Eaters, she turned her head to look at him… and nodded.

Harry wrenched his wand out of the connection, hurling himself out of the way and rolling behind a headstone as Voldemort threw a Body-Bind Curse at him. He raised his hand to catch the last of the connection that clung to his wand, screaming as it seared his hand. He clenched his fist, forcing the magic into a deadly ball of green. Then he stood.

"AVADA KEDAVRA!" he bellowed, lobbing the ball at Voldemort.

For a moment, time hung suspended. Voldemort was illuminated by the sickly green of Harry's spell; Harry was bathed in the silver glow of Alana's magic.

Then Harry was blinded by a burst of green, and deafened by a sonic BOOM accompanied by a blinding white light.

When his faculties returned, Harry found himself the only one left alive in a field of death. Voldemort and his followers lay scattered on the ground, dead and broken by Alana's magic.

Alana… Harry hurried to her side. She lay on the ground, her breathing labored, her lovely face twisted in an expression of pain. But she was alive, and she had helped him win.

Gingerly, he picked her up in his arms. "Come on, let's get you taken care of," he sighed.

No kiss, no declarations of love, not even an admission that he didn't hate her. Despite what she had just done, she was still a traitor, and tomorrow he would go back to hating her. He might be grateful to her, but this didn't change anything.

After all was said and done and the world knew you were alive, what was there for me to do but to distance myself from you? You had made it perfectly clear that you had no desire to have anything to do with me. You married Ginny almost before the world learned of your triumph, and threw yourself into catching the rest of the Death Eaters, reclaiming your position as the best Auror in the department.

The Ministry grudgingly thanked me for my role in Voldemort's death, but made it clear that England held no welcome for me. So I returned to the Malfoy Manor long enough to gather my children, and I left for exile in France. What more was left for me?