The Pureblood Pretense

by murkybluematter

Harriett Potter dreams of going to Hogwarts, but in an AU where the school only accepts purebloods, the only way to reach her goal is to switch places with her pureblood cousin—the only problem? Her cousin is a boy. Alanna the Lioness take on HP.

12. Chapter 12

A/N: Hello, my wonderful, beautiful readers. This chapter is a record 14,900 words (cue confetti), but in the middle of the chapter there's a lot of theoretical academic nonsense about magic, so if that doesn't interest you, I'm terribly sorry (because I find it fascinating), and I'll try to put more action in the next chapter. As always, don't own, disclaim, etc, and thank you so, so much for reading. Also a special thanks to Failing Mentality for your helpful reviews on chapter 11.

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 12:

The next morning, Rigel, Draco, and Nott woke to the sound of brisk knocking on their door. They were content to ignore it for a while, as all the first-years had been up past midnight celebrating Draco's spot on the House team, but the knocking only got louder and more impatient, so they sat up and moved back their hangings, exchanging bleary-eyed looks and wondering that such audacious knocking existed in the world.

Nott checked the time, then cursed and flung himself back onto his bed. "Oh, Hell, no," he muttered irritably.

Draco and Rigel looked at each other, and Draco's eyes narrowed, "You're dressed. You get it." Apparently Draco's pajamas didn't count as 'dressed.' Rigel supposed this was her punishment for sleeping in her clothes. She rolled out of bed and shivered as her bare feet met the cold dungeon floor. She padded her way to the door and cracked it to peer into the hall, intending to tell the knocker to go away and then go right back to sleep.

Unfortunately for that plan, the person at the door was Pansy. She breezed past Rigel and cast the Lumos Charm swiftly, drawing a groan from Nott's bed and a sound of startled indignation from Draco when he caught sight of her.

"Pans!" he hastened to run his fingers through his hair and attempt to look dignified in his nightclothes, "You can't just barge into a gentleman's room first thing in the morning. And you!" he scowled at Rigel, "The reason you answered the door and not us is because you're already decent. If you let the person in, it defeats the purpose."

Rigel rolled her eyes, "I answered the door because you guys were too lazy to, and besides, a gentleman never refuses a lady."

"Not to mention the fact that a lady never gives a gentleman the chance to," Pansy said.

"Why are you here, Parkinson?" Nott's voice was muffled by his pillow.

"I'm here to get Rigel ready for breakfast," she said, as if her every motive was readily transparent.

"And Rigel can't dress himself because…?" Draco glanced pointedly at Rigel, "Oh, wait, he's already dressed, so please come back later."

Pansy gave Rigel's clothes a dubious once-over, "I'm sure he could, normally, but today we're doing introductions after breakfast, and I need him to look like a pureblood Heir."

"He is a pureblood Heir," Draco rolled his eyes, "So however he looks must be how one is supposed to look."

"Of course," Pansy said, "But visual clues will re-enforce his consequence for those who are too stupid to think for themselves."

"You're introducing me to stupid people?" Rigel asked.

"Well, no, but-" Pansy set her jaw and strode toward Rigel menacingly, "Since I'm the one doing the introduction, your image reflects on me. Is this how you thank me for going out on a social limb for you?" She gestured exasperatedly at Rigel's wrinkled clothes, which would have hurt if Rigel hadn't been planning on changing after she showered anyway—even she didn't wear the same clothes two days in a row.

"But breakfast doesn't even start for two whole hours," Nott said.

"Perfection takes time," Pansy said.

"I will let you stay as long as you stop quoting my mother," Draco groaned, "And be quiet so the rest of us can sleep another couple hours."

Nott cheered weakly and shut his hangings immediately.

"What about me?" Rigel gazed imploringly at Draco.

"Hmm, yeah, that's too bad about your beauty sleep," Draco settled back into his bed and closed his curtains as well, leaving Rigel at the questionable mercy of her other friend.

"Now, Pansy, I'm sure I can make myself presentable if you give me a chance," Rigel tried, backing away slowly.

"Well, after I show you what I want, you can try all by yourself next time," Pansy smiled the way one might smile at a precocious child, "Don't look so scared—this is going to be fun!"

. . .

Rigel was going to get Pansy a dictionary for Christmas, for in no way did the next two hours resemble fun.

First Pansy sent Rigel off to the shower, with instructions to wash everything but her hair, and gave her a set of clothes she was to change into after drying off. These weren't the clothes she would be wearing, of course. These were what Pansy called 'control clothes,' which would act as a passive backdrop for trying out various hair-styles and save the 'real' clothes from getting wrinkles or water-spots before they were ready to be worn.

Rigel showered. She scrubbed and washed and was generally grateful Pansy hadn't insisted on being involved in this particular part of the process. She carefully held her left wrist out of the spray, and when she was done she wrapped it with clean bandages she had hidden under the sink. The control clothes weren't too bad, loose and comfortable, with sleeves long enough to hide her new bandages, and when she opened the bathroom door Pansy was waiting with a basket of products so numerous they couldn't possibly all be for different things. She pushed Rigel back into the bathroom and onto the stool in front of the sink so she could wash her hair. Rigel actually liked getting her hair washed. It was strangely comforting. She was sure Pansy had put more than shampoo and cream rinse in it, but she had decided not to ask questions, and instead sat as passively as she could as Pansy rinsed, repeated, or whatever she was doing to her hair.

Once it was washed, Pansy arranged the short locks about her head and performed a charm that would keep the hair perfectly still as it dried naturally.

"Never let anyone use a heat charm on your hair," she told Rigel firmly, "It'll wreak havoc on your ends, and the texture is too wild to take a blow-out well."

Rigel nodded very seriously, and Pansy moved on to her nails. She took Rigel's right hand and started inspecting her cuticles, but Rigel snatched it back frantically. Pansy gave her a stern look, "You have to have clean nail beds, or no one will trust you."

Rigel raised an eyebrow in patent disbelief.

"It's true," Pansy insisted, "People associate cleanliness with trustworthiness, because clean money is less risk than dirty money, and people associate immorality with the unwashed masses."

"Some people associate immorality with Slytherins," Rigel pointed out, "That doesn't make them right."

"We're trimming your cuticles and that's that," Pansy said.

"Teach me how to do it, then," Rigel suggested, "It's too girly if I sit here and let you do it."

Pansy rolled her eyes, "Boys. Okay fine, I'll do one hand and you can do the other."

Rigel immediately presented Pansy with her right hand, grinning inside at how perfectly it had worked out (Rigel wouldn't have been able to use her left hand to do her right hand anyway). Pansy finished Rigel's right side and then watched her carefully work on her left hand. Rigel was sure to keep the sleeve covering everything but the fingertips of her hand as she worked, and in the end Pansy was satisfied, if a little bemused.

Next, Pansy attacked her eyebrows.

"Not a lot," she promised, brandishing the tweezers to make her point, "Yours aren't actually that bad. Just a few hairs off of each end so they look natural, but not messy."

Rigel grimaced through the whole thing, but she didn't go so far as to refuse. Pansy leaned back to inspect her work, and sighed, "I do wish your eyes weren't so flat." She suddenly blushed, as if she'd not meant to say that out loud, "Not that they aren't nice, Rigel. Just… I think I remember hearing that your father's eyes sparkled a bit, or something."

"It's okay," Rigel shrugged, "If you want, I'll put in eye drops right before you introduce me."

Pansy grinned at the idea, "I can see it now. Your lost-puppy look would be about ten times as effective if your eyes glistened every so slightly. I wouldn't even have to say a word."

"I thought I wasn't allowed to do that anymore," Rigel said.

"Well, not to us, but with the older Slytherins… particularly these two… it can't hurt to have an Ace up your sleeve," Pansy allowed.

At that point Rigel was allowed out of the bathroom so that she could sit on her bed while Pansy rummaged through her closet. Archie had all kinds of clothes, most of which Rigel hadn't even looked at except to hang them up when Draco scolded her about leaving perfectly good fabrics in the stale air of her trunk. Pansy squealed with delight when she saw all the different robes she had to work with, and she immediately began taking out different colors to hold up against Rigel's skin tone. Most of them worked fine, since she and Archie were of a color, but a few of the more outlandish robes drew horrified glances from her blonde friend.

"My dad has a disreputable sense of humor," she explained when Pansy came across a particularly garish robe of lime green with orange and yellow stripped trimming. It had flowers in a pattern along the border, but where the flower petals would usually be, there were fish heads instead. "He and my uncles have matching sets," she admitted, smiling wryly as she remembered the occasion they'd been commissioned for. Her father, James, had been forced to attend the wedding of a particularly boorish co-worker, and Sirius had seized upon the opportunity to make everyone think twice about inviting the Marauders anywhere. She had no idea why Archie had even packed them.

"Well, I suppose it would be an excellent ice-breaker," Pansy gingerly tucked the monstrosity into the back of the closet, "But not quite what I had in mind for today. Now this, on the other hand, should do quite nicely."

She held up a set of casual robes that looked regular-black to the shallow eye, but were in fact a very dark grey. They were perfect for weekend wear, but the material was a bit thin, so Rigel had avoided them so far. It wasn't that she had anything to hide in the chest department yet, just that she was afraid to wear anything that would make her look even more delicate. She had to admit, however, that the robes would strike a perfect tone of effortless sophistication. Pansy shooed her off to the bathroom to change once more, with strict instructions not to muss her hair (easier said than done while trying to pull robes on one-handed, but she managed), while Pansy decided on shoes.

When she came back out, Draco had finally woken back up and was watching with amusement as Pansy scowled fiercely at a pile of Rigel's shoes, all of which were, apparently, rejects. Shoes were the only thing Rigel and Archie had kept their own, mostly because Archie's feet were two sizes bigger than hers, and it simply wouldn't have worked. She shut the bathroom door behind her and found herself the new focus of Pansy's ire.

"Just what are these things supposed to be?" the girl demanded.

"Shoes," Rigel said, biting back the word 'obviously' with difficulty.

"They don't match anything here!" she nearly wailed, "And they're bulky."

"They're protected against most types of acid," Rigel informed her, "Not to mention fire-proof, water-proof, and resistant to corrosion."

"Yes, yes, I'm sure they're very… serviceable," Pansy sighed, "But they don't go with the robes I picked out."

"I could wear different robes," Rigel said, though inwardly dreading having to drag another pair of robes on and off around her injury.

"No, don't be ridiculous," Pansy turned to Draco, "We'll have to borrow some of yours."

"You—what?" Draco stared at Pansy, "You want my shoes?"

"Not me, Rigel," Pansy said soothingly, "Just for the morning. I'll see them cleaned myself before they're returned, and of course you're welcome to demand a similar favor in return."

"I seriously doubt I'll be asking to borrow your shoes anytime soon, Pansy, thanks though," Draco rolled his eyes, "And I can see to my own shoe-cleaning."

"So you agree? Great!" Pansy nearly dove for his closet in her joy, "Because I noticed you wearing a dove-grey pair last week that would be just perfect…"

"If they fit," Rigel said quietly.

"He's right," Draco grimaced, "I haven't quite grown into my size yet, you see, and-"

"Oh, but these are tiny!" Pansy pulled out the shoes she wanted, but eyed them sadly, "They're almost as small as mine are. I'm not sure these will fit at all.

Rigel was actually surprised, for she had been expecting the opposite problem. One of the good things about her shoes was that they added the appearance of extra length and breadth to her feet, which were smaller than she thought a boy's should be. If Draco had small feet too, however, there might not be a problem. She reached absently to take the shoes from Pansy, along with the socks that had been approved for her outfit, and set to trying them on.

They fit almost perfectly, to Pansy's surprise and Draco's pleasure (it seemed he wasn't the only boy with small feet in their year). They were a bit wider than her foot, but the length was good, and even Rigel could see that they contrasted nicely with the dark robes.

"Oh, yes!" Pansy circled Rigel happily, "Now there's a perfect note of symmetry between your eyes and your shoes. Doesn't he look pureblooded, Draco?"

"He looks rich and refined, if that's what you mean," Draco shrugged, "I certainly wouldn't think him out of place at one of Mother's casual luncheons."

Rigel fidgeted uncomfortably while they discussed how pureblooded she looked. She had never felt her deception more keenly than that moment. The mirror she was looking into might as well have been a painting. She couldn't see herself anywhere in the grey eyes, the perfectly arranged curls, the elegant robes that Harriet Potter had always considered too impractical, and the shoes—oh, Merlin those shoes—which she could never take anywhere near a cauldron. For a moment she was terrified. Is this what it means to chase your dreams? Do you have to sacrifice your real self to find your would-be self? And even if you find it, and all your dreams become the facts of your reality, is there a way to get back to that dreamer unchanged? She didn't know, and that thought was enough to halt her thinking altogether.

"Will you take this charm off of my hair now, Pan?" Rigel asked, "It's making my head feel a bit heavy, I think."

"Yes, it should be dry by now," Pansy lifted the charm and used her fingers to tweak the positioning of a couple of the dark locks, "Perfect. I'm afraid there's nothing more for me to do."

Draco sighed as he helped Rigel put all her shoes back into her closet neatly, "I'm sure we'll miss you terribly, but don't let the door hit you on the way out."

Pansy sniffed, "Well, it's a good thing breakfast starts in fifteen minutes then, so you won't be bereft of my company for longer than it will take to wake Nott from his coma."

She gathered up her products quickly and the warning glance she sent Rigel as she paused by the door veritably dared her to change anything in her appearance before going to breakfast. Rigel smiled meekly. "Thank you, Pansy," she said as the blonde girl left.

"I can't remember which of us made friends with her first," Draco said after Pansy had gone, "But we are going to have a long seven years."

"Never dull, though," Rigel smiled, "And when people look at pictures of all the interesting things that happen in the next seven years, you can rest assured that we'll at least be the best-dressed ones in the frame."

Draco smiled ruefully, "I'm sure one day I'll appreciate that, but right now I just wish I could have slept some more."

"You?" Rigel raised an eyebrow, "What about me?"

"Again, what about you?" Draco grinned, "And instead of arguing about which one of us got less sleep this morning—"

"As if it's even up for dispute."

"—we should be waking Theo up so that he can enjoy the fresh dungeon air as well."

Rigel glanced over at Nott's bed, which was eclipsed by hangings that probably muted light and sound, and from which steady, sickeningly comfortable breathing noises were emerging.

"It is almost time for breakfast," she said.

"That's the spirit!" Draco grinned, "Practically doing him a favor, aren't we?"

Fifteen minutes later, Draco and Rigel met Pansy in the common room. Nott was conspicuously absent. After taking in Rigel's wide-eyed, shell-shocked look and hearing Draco mutter, "I thought he was a morning person," while brushing futilely at a singed portion of his sleeve, Pansy decided not to ask, and they all three headed for breakfast.

Rigel received several interesting looks from the girls in their grade over breakfast—the one from Bulstrode making her the least uncomfortable, as the solidly built girl seemed to be calculating something considerably less romantic than Davis and Greengrass were. Pansy kept sending her smug little see-how-much-difference-it-makes? smiles from across the table, and even Draco found the sight of their classmates ogling someone other than him to be a nice change.

When the post came, Rigel received her long-awaited reply from Archie. It was delivered by a Barn Owl, so she opened it right away.

Dear Rigel (I like the change by the way),

I was so glad to receive your letter! I did miss you, no matter how annoying I think you are, Rigel rolled her eyes. Archie was about as bad at pretending to be her as she was pretending to be him, and it's good that you're doing well at Hogwarts so far—though why anyone would want to go to that pretentious place I really don't understand. Rigel thought he was laying it on a bit thick there. I'm glad you've made friends already, and it was really brave of you to befriend a Malfoy after all dad and Uncle Sirius have told us about them. As for Marcus Flint, you did tell me about him, remember? I specifically recall you describing him to me as 'rough around the edges' but 'much nicer than he looks' when you told me about meeting him and his terrifyingly prejudiced father in the VIP box. You mentioned something about a troubled home life and a mother with a chronic illness (which was part of the reason you told him about your ambition to be a Healer after your own mum passed, wasn't it?), and said if I ever met him I should try and look past the surface, which you said is mostly just a front—am I remembering that right? Anyway, he does seem nice, so perhaps I'll send him an owl and see if we can't all become good friends.

My classes are going well, and my Potions professor was especially impressed with my understanding of the art (I bet yours was too, considering how much of my knowledge must have rubbed off on you over the years). I don't think I'll have any problems becoming a Healer here, and I hope you aren't too jealous of me—I'll share everything I learn with you over the summers, and it'll be like we're both in Healer training. I'm sure by the time you graduate you'll be able to pass the Healer Certification Tests with ease. I've also made a few friends—the closest of which is a muggleborn witch who's also from England, Hermione Granger. She's terrifyingly brilliant, but also very helpful and friendly, if a bit bossy at times.

Well, that's really all I have to report so far—sorry my reply took so long, I've been really busy settling in. Imagine I said something sappy and heart-felt about missing you, etc.

-Harry

Rigel smiled fondly as she folded up the letter and tucked it into her pocket. Archie was going to write Flint, it seemed, and hopefully he would cement an agreement from Flint to keep their secret indefinitely.

"Letter from my cousin," she explained when Draco and Pansy sent her politely questioning looks.

Draco frowned thoughtfully, "The Blacks are related to nearly all the old wizarding families, but I can't think of any with children old enough to write to who aren't here at Hogwarts. Did you mean an older cousin, who'd already graduated?"

Pansy coughed delicately, "I think perhaps he meant a cousin attending a different magical school."

"But Hogwarts is the best," Draco said blankly, "What family with connections to the Blacks would send their child anywhere else?"

Pansy sent Draco a meaningful look, at which he made a little 'oh' with his mouth and said, "Are they from the continent, then? You know, the Malfoys came over from France with the Norman Conquest, and a lot of old wizarding roots can be found in ancient European civilizations."

Rigel smiled a bit stiffly, "No, my cousin is not from the continent. My cousin attends the American Institute of Magic."

Rigel could see the exact moment Malfoy realized that the only British magical children who went to America were those who could not attend Hogwarts because of their blood-status. The blonde boy looked surprised, then faintly embarrassed, that Rigel had been openly corresponding with someone tainted by muggle. Pansy sighed at Draco's uncomfortable expression and Rigel's stiffly unapologetic posture, but wisely did not presume to interfere.

"Ah, so," Draco cast around for something non-inflammatory to say. He valued blood and magic as any good Malfoy should, but he valued his friendship with Rigel, too, and everyone knew of her father's unfortunate political leanings, "So, that would be the Potter Heir, then? You two must have spent some time together as children, with your fathers so close in school."

"Yes," Rigel relaxed slightly when Draco didn't immediately hurl ugly slurs around. She berated herself for not giving her friend more credit. So far he had said nothing against her or Sirius, despite the reputation she knew the last two Blacks had in Slytherin House. She promised she'd give Draco a chance to be fair-minded before she assumed too much about his reactions to things, "Harry and I grew up together."

"Harriet Potter goes by Harry?" Pansy asked curiously, "What's she like? I've heard her mentioned in our tea circle, of course, by those who saw her as a baby, before the Potters and the Blacks stepped out of society." Rigel thought that was a very diplomatic way of describing how the Potters and Blacks (along with about fifty other Dumbledore-aligned families at the time) had angrily turned their backs on pureblooded society altogether in a politically-motivated snub known as the Great Split of 1981.

On Halloween night, 1981, Mr. Riddle had launched a secret coup of the Wizengamot—that is, he had gathered enough supporters from council members he allegedly bribed to call a secret meeting around midnight, while most of the light-supporting council members were out celebrating and therefore 'mysteriously' and 'unfortunately' missed their summons to the council. Using the absence of most of his opposition, Mr. Riddle had ruthlessly pushed through a series of laws, which included in their number restrictions against anyone schooled outside of the UK from holding high office in government or publicly-run companies in Great Britain, laws forbidding any witch or wizard with creature blood from voting in public elections or enlisting in any law-enforcement agency, and laws to keep the Wizengamot from overturning any already-sanctioned law with less than a three-fourths majority. The families whose council members had been excluded from the vote were outraged, and in silent, furious protest they had to a one cut the rest of pureblooded society (mostly consisting of dark purebloods) altogether. Never since then had any of the offended light families attended a social event hosted by the wife or child of one of the Heads of Family who had been present that Halloween evening. It was an incredibly sore point for most of the dark pureblood hostesses, who suddenly had half the attendees at their balls and luncheons, but Pansy managed to reference it casually, as if the Great Split had not affected her at all.

"Does she really have eyes as green as a serpent's finely polished scales?" Pansy asked.

Draco and Rigel turned disbelieving looks on her. Pansy's cheeks became ever-so-slightly rose-tinted.

"What?" she shrugged artlessly, "The Potter Heir was a baby last time anyone saw her, so all they can talk about is the color of her hair and eyes."

"But—" Draco broke off to suppress a snort of laughter, then raised his eyebrows, "Who says they're 'green as a serpent's whatever'?"

Pansy rolled her eyes, "Don't laugh, you know how my mother is. She thinks she's a tortured soul, but her turn of phrase rubs off on me every now and then." Draco nodded in understanding, but his eyes still gleamed with mirth. "Oh, just answer my question, Rigel," Pansy said.

Rigel cocked her head, wondering if she'd be able to talk about herself as if she were someone else. She found it was easier if she used 'Harry' or 'Harriet' to describe her real self, and 'Rigel' to refer to her alter ego, when she was trying to keep everything straight in her head. Not that Rigel wasn't just as much her real self… she hoped it would get easier in time, but worried that she'd have multiple identities by the time she was seventeen.

"Well," Rigel began, "Harry's eyes are definitely green. She takes after her dad's coloring, mostly, but everyone says her eyes are her mom's."

"Lily Potter nee Evans, right?" Pansy said, looking contemplative, "They say she was quite lovely."

"She still is," Rigel said evenly, "Aunt Lily is one of those people that never seems to age a day."

"My mother is the same way," Draco smiled. Then he paused, a small frown on his face as he wondered at the ease with which he compared Narcissa Black with a woman of muggle birth.

"The mark of true beauty," Pansy said wisely, "Were you and Harriet close as children?"

"Yes," Rigel said, hesitating before saying, "My Uncle Remus didn't have any children, so she was my only friend, before I met you two." Rigel thought that even from Archie's position it was true, if you didn't count Marcus Flint. They had been the only children of an age in their part of Godric's Hollow, since most of the inhabitants were elderly, like their neighbor Mrs. Bagshot.

Pansy and Draco looked torn between pleasure at being considered two of her closest three friends, and sadness at how isolated Rigel's life had been compared to theirs. The consequence of the light families stepping out of pureblooded society was that, without attending the teas and structured play dates designed to socialize heirs, their children consorted mostly with their neighbors and siblings, and didn't meet many other wizarding children until they came to Hogwarts.

"You must have been more like siblings than friends, then," Pansy said thoughtfully.

"We were," Rigel said, "Harry's like my little sister—or maybe older sister, the way she mothers me sometimes." Rigel was able to admit this easily. Archie needed to be mothered, in her opinion.

"Does she want to be a Potions Mistress as well?" Draco asked, curious about this unknown Potter despite himself.

"Sort of," Rigel said, trying to figure out how to set up their story in a way that wouldn't be contradicted later, "She does have a strong interest in Potions, but I think she's planning on applying that interest toward Healer studies at the moment. AIM has a fast-track program for getting a Healing Certificate. It's very competitive, and they drop students who can't keep up with the extra workload all the time, but Harry's very determined."

Rigel thought that was the best explanation. This way, if someone learned that Harry had been very interested in Potions before leaving for school, it was explained, and when Archie and Harry eventually switched their lives back, they would say that Harry simply decided Healing wasn't for her at the last minute. Archie would take the Mediwizard Exam under his own name once they'd graduated, saying that he'd been inspired by Harry's studies over the years, and decided to learn Healing on the side (easily accepted considering the amount of time Rigel would be spending in the Library while she was at Hogwarts). The trickiest part of the plan was convincing everyone that Archie was in fact Archie after he came back to claim his name and a generation of people in English wizarding society thought that Archie looked like Rigel. Rigel would have no trouble becoming Harry again, because no one from America was likely to connect the boy Harry Potter with the girl Harriet Potter, simply because none of them moved in the pureblood circles who would know better (being half-or-muggleborn). Archie's reappearance hadn't been entirely worked out yet, but Rigel was confident she could come up with something in the next six years or so.

"A Mediwitch? That's quite noble," Pansy said.

"Though it might be hard for her to get a good job here in England if she was schooled out of the United Kingdom," Draco added. Pansy sent him a repressing look, which he shrugged off, "Well, it's true, even if some people think it's unfair."

"He's right," Rigel said, "I think Harry will work something out, though." Like becoming a Potions Mistress and working for private development companies.

"Will she remain in America, then?" Pansy asked.

"Maybe," Rigel shrugged, "Even I'm not privy to all her plans."

"I thought you two were such close friends," Draco said. Rigel hoped he wasn't honestly jealous, and that the question had come out spitefully on accident.

"Well, you and I are friends just as much, and I don't know all of you guys' plans," Rigel said.

"Point taken," Pansy laughed, "And furthered by the fact that we definitely don't know anything about your plans, Rigel."

"What are you talking about?" Rigel finished off her tea neatly, "I want to be a Potions Master. That's really all there is to me."

Her friends exchanged dry looks, but then Pansy realized that people were beginning to leave the Great Hall and quickly removed her napkin from her lap so she could stand.

"Oh, let's get back to the common room quickly," she said, motioning for Rigel and Draco to leave their plates as well, "I told the people I want you to meet that we would be in the common room after breakfast, and we have to be there before them or we'll be seen as impertinent, making an upperclassman wait."

They got back to the dungeons with plenty of time for Pansy to settle Rigel's short, dark locks one last time and arrange the three of them in seats by one of the fireplaces with extra chairs around it, trying to strike a mood of casual repose (or so she said). "Now, I've known these two since I was a child, and their personalities can be a bit… well, I hope you like them, but don't take offense if they say anything needling—they like to provoke people sometimes."

Rigel nodded a bit apprehensively.

"Why am I here again?" Draco asked while they waited. He was sitting to Rigel's left on a low-backed couch, and Pansy was sitting in a chair that was placed cattycorner to the end of the couch Draco sat on. This left an open space next to Rigel on the couch, and placed her closest to the empty chairs that would be taken by the upperclassmen. This was supposed to show that Draco and Pansy weren't trying to hide or protect Rigel, and that Rigel was not afraid to be the closest open target for a group of more powerful (and possibly hostile) strangers. Rigel was glad she had Pansy to work all this out for her.

"You are here to lend consequence to Rigel's standing in society. What better endorsement for the debut of the new Black Family Heir than the presence of the Malfoy Family Heir?" Pansy explained patiently.

"You make it sound so mercenary, Pans," Draco wrinkled his nose, "There's something unsavory about social maneuvering."

"Those at the top of the social food chain can afford to feel that way," Pansy smiled wryly, "But others must reconcile themselves to the gentle game, no matter how repellant they find it to be at times."

"But you and Rigel aren't exactly bottom feeders," Draco said, "Why is it so important to push him into society right now?"

"It must be while he is at school, because when he is under his father's jurisdiction he can't participate in society unless Black Sr. allows it. School is a place of social neutrality, as it must be if students whose parents are at political odds are expected to coexist peacefully," Pansy said, "And the more Rigel presents himself to the other Slytherins openly, the less they'll have to form an opinion of him based on conjecture and hearsay. If we want our friendship with Rigel to be accepted, we have to show the people in our circles that he has nothing to hide."

Draco glanced at Rigel apologetically, "But he does have things to hide."

Rigel shrugged. It was true.

"Well, what better way to hide things than by giving people no reason to go looking for them?" Pansy said, her head tipped reasonably to the side.

Draco sighed, "Whatever you say, Pansy."

They waited only another few minutes before Pansy stood gracefully and motioned surreptitiously for Draco and Rigel to do the same. They turned to face two older boys making their way toward them from a hallway across the common room. They were about the same height, but one was slightly taller. The taller one had light-brown hair cut close to his head and a firm, square jaw that gave him a stern aura most of the time. The shorter (though still quite tall compared to Rigel), on the other hand, had hair so black it was almost blue, and honey-colored eyes that sparked with humor as they flicked lightly over the first-years. He was thin and delicately built, looking like a playful shadow next to the rock-statue that was his friend, but he was almost beautiful, too.

"Mr. Rookwood, Mr. Rosier, how good of you to join us," Pansy stepped forward with a smile that seemed to be at least in part genuine fondness, "You have met Mr. Malfoy, I believe?" The older Slytherins nodded politely to Draco, who nodded back. "Then, may I introduce my classmate, Rigel Black?" Pansy turned her head to indicate Rigel, who kept her eyes cool and steady as she received their regard, "Rigel, this is Aldon Rosier and Edmund Rookwood."

"How do you do, Mr. Black?" Rosier, the slighter of the two, stepped forward to shake her hand easily, followed duly by Rookwood. Both handshakes were brief, but firm, and transferred a pleasant warmth despite the dungeon air.

"Very well, thank you," Rigel nodded to each of the older boys in turn, her face a mask of polite interest.

Pansy sat first, followed by Malfoy, then Rookwood and Rosier, and finally Rigel. Rookwood chose the single seat opposite Pansy, and Rosier the one on the couch next to Rigel. She tried to both sit straight and lean back enough for Draco to not feel excluded from the conversation (though he had made it clear he wasn't particularly interested in the whole affair), and Rigel was grateful her injury was on her left side, and was unlikely to draw the scrutiny of the upperclassmen. Everything else about Rigel was, apparently, fair game.

Pansy got the conversation started in true hostess style.

"I'm so pleased you found time in your schedules to sit down with me today," her words were formal, but she injected such emotion into each syllable that it was hard to doubt them, "It's been ages since we saw one another last, and I'm sure you're both quite busy now that the term is picking up."

"Not at all," Rookwood said. If a mountain had a voice, strong and staid, it would have been Rookwood's. He spoke with his eyelids half-lowered, and the effect was like a Transparency Charm had been cast over everything his gaze touched, "Indeed, I cannot think of anyone too busy to spend a few moments with you, Miss Parkinson."

"Though as lowly fourth-years, our schedules are hardly hard-pressed to accommodate anything," Rosier added, winking overtly at Pansy, who to her credit accepted their flattery and cajoling with aplomb, like a queen accepting a bow.

Draco laughed lightly, sounding much more engaged than he'd acted before the other two had arrived, "Oh, don't tell her that—she'll be expecting Rigel and I to be equally accommodating with our time, now."

"And why shouldn't you be?" Pansy asked, eyebrows raised playfully.

"Because you're impossible to live with if you get your way too often," Rigel said, thinking she might as well participate in the banter, since Pansy had gone to so much trouble to arrange everything.

Rookwood and Rosier chuckled, and Draco nodded earnestly, "He's right, you know. You really mustn't spoil our Pansy or she'll become entirely out of hand."

"A woman is always out of hand," Rosier said slyly, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees.

"Though she may never be long out of mind," Rookwood added, leaning back into his chair, as if in counterbalance to Rosier.

Pansy looked torn between pique at being singled out and relief that the ice was steadily breaking down. She settled for smiling good-naturedly and turning the subject once again.

"I take it your studies are progressing smoothly, then, if you've so much time to torment the female race," she said.

"They are," Rosier said, "Or at least as smoothly as can be expected before we settle into career paths."

"Are you considering anything in particular?" Rigel asked. It wasn't hard to project interest into her question; Rookwood and Rosier were interesting people so far, at least on the surface.

"I think I would like to pursue a Mastery in Experimental Theory at some point after graduation," Rosier said, "But Edmund is more interested in hands-on work, aren't you?"

"I find the minding of magical plants and animals to be more satisfying than Arithmancy and the like, yes," Rookwood shrugged, "As for a career, one of my uncles works on an International Creatures Reserve, so I'm applying for an internship there next summer. If it suits me, I might look towards working with Dragons or Hydras in the future."

"Those both sound like fascinating branches of study," Pansy remarked, "I hope by the beginning of my fourth year I have so clear an idea for my future."

"Don't worry if nothing strikes a chord your first year," Rookwood said, "The basics in every subject are fairly dull."

Draco smirked, "Tell that to Rigel. He had his future career picked out before he walked onto the Hogwarts Express."

Rigel fought a grimace at Draco's blunt phrasing. Perhaps it was a bit too confident to plan your life at eleven years old, but if you wanted something, in Rigel's experience, you had to take it. The world surely wasn't going to hand it to you if you just asked nicely.

"Oh?" Rosier ran his eyes across her features, an amused twist at the edge of his mouth as he spoke, "What will you do when you graduate, then?"

Rigel thought it rather gracious of him to ask what she would do, rather than what she wanted to do, and she answered him honestly, "I hope to pursue a Potions Mastery."

The older Slytherins exchanged a surprised look. Rigel wondered if they had been expecting her to say something like 'Auror' or 'Prank-Inventor.' When they refocused on her, their eyes had grown sharper, more intent, as if they were now engaged in the conversation fully.

"You have chosen a challenging subject to pursue," Rookwood noted, "The Potions Mastery is rumored to be the most difficult to obtain."

"Rigel is up to the challenge," Draco said. The sheer confidence he radiated as he spoke made her cheeks grow the tiniest bit warm.

"A glowing endorsement," Rosier said. Rigel couldn't tell if it was her imagination or if his eyes had really lingered laughingly over her pink-tinged cheekbones when he said 'glowing.' She didn't think he meant to mock her, though—at least not cruelly. The delicate boy simply seemed to have a teasing disposition, and Merlin knew she was familiar enough with those.

"And remarkably apt," Pansy threw in her support of Rigel as well, "Professor Snape has already begun giving Rigel extra tutelage."

This caused another fathomless look to pass between Rosier and Rookwood.

"Professor Snape is good friends with my father," Rosier said slowly, "And he does not share his talents lightly."

"It isn't nearly as exciting as it sounds," Rigel said, "At the moment Professor Snape just assigns me a lot of extra work."

"That sounds like Professor Snape," Rosier laughed.

"Still, that you have gained his notice at all is quite impressive," Rookwood said, not giving any of his thoughts away with his even voice and still-as-stone expression, "And that you have done so this quickly—well, you must have nursed this ambition for some time before coming to Hogwarts."

Rosier smiled widely, "Long-term ambition would certainly go a long way toward explaining your presence here in Slytherin."

"I wasn't aware that it needed explaining," Rigel said, arching an eyebrow as Draco sometimes did when he was pretending to be obtuse.

Rosier's smile never faltered, "Weren't you? Many, many people are curious about you, Mr. Black. They want to know on which side of the wand you will fall."

"If I do land on one side or the other, rest assured that it will be because I jumped," Rigel said.

"I like this one, Pansy," Rosier grinned, though he didn't take his eyes off Rigel's expressionless face.

"Yes, do bring him around more often," Rookwood agreed.

The upperclassmen stood, each nodding to Draco and bowing over Pansy's hand gracefully.

"Until we meet again, Mr. Black," Rosier favored Rigel with a sly wink while Rookwood just nodded politely.

"Good day, Mr. Rookwood, Mr. Rosier," Rigel nodded respectfully to each of them, then sat slowly back down on the couch once they'd walked away, extremely relieved that the meeting was over.

"Oh, that went so well!" Pansy beamed at her, "Aldon and Edmund have a lot of pull among the upperclassmen. You've made wonderful allies today, Rigel."

"I understand why you wanted me to meet them, but why did they seem so pleased to meet me?" Rigel asked.

"Everyone wants to bring éclat to their own family name, and the best way to do that, short of becoming distinguished through your own merits, is to make good connections. You, Rigel, have talent and ambition, not to mention a respected family name, and so there will never be a shortage of people desiring to connect themselves to you."

"But everyone in Slytherin is ambitious, right? Surely they'll all want to be the sought after, rather than the seeking?" Rigel said, a bit confused.

"No reason not to do both," Pansy shrugged, "Then you have twice the clout. Now we only have to hope Aldon and Rosier write to their parents about you. If that happens, their mothers will write to my mother and Draco's mother and we'll be practically ordered to be friends with you!"

"Oh, uh—good?" Rigel smiled tentatively.

"Yes, wonderful," Pansy assured her, "Not that we would have dropped you even if the whole House hated you—it's simply not done to treat friends so callously—but this does make life so much easier for us."

"Well, as long as that's settled, let's do something productive with the rest of our morning, shall we?" Draco stretched as if he'd been on the couch for hours, rather than ten minutes or so, "We'll go get our books and meet you at those tables over there in five minutes, Pansy. I want to get this History assignment out of the way before lunch."

Rigel finished up her own homework assignments with Draco and Pansy, and after lunch she took leave of them to study up on Potions and Adolescent Magical Theory (aka work on Flint's homework) in the Library.

She was using her Ravenclaw disguise today, which involved the brown, twig-like wig and the same pair of common round glasses. In this disguise she walked with extremely poor posture, head down so the coarse strands of hair fell into her face, and shuffled along slowly between the stacks. She thought briefly that if she ever did get discovered and summarily thrown out of Hogwarts, she could at least run away to the muggle world and take up acting for a living.

She had done most of Flint's assignments on Saturday morning (and had been pleased to see that Flint included the old, graded assignments in his letter so that she could be sure she wasn't making the same mistake twice), but she was stuck on an essay about Vanishing Theory. It was incredibly complicated, and all the passages she read about it seemed to confuse her further. Just when she would start to wrap her head around the idea, a contradictory concept would crop up, and she'd have to change her understanding in order to reconcile it. Rigel stared morosely at the thick book on Theoretical Transfiguration in front of her. She was sure that Transfiguration was one of those subjects that was extremely cumulative, and that jumping five years ahead was probably impossible for anyone with less than a genius level intellect (which she certainly did not possess).

Rigel packed the half-completed essay away and replaced the books, deciding that now was the time to take Percy Wesley up on his offer of intellectual enlightenment. Without his help, she didn't think she'd be able to ever finish the essay before it was due on Thursday.

She left the Library and made her way quickly to the Gryffindor's Tower. She had taken to moving quickly through the halls since Friday's incident. She didn't go exploring alone anymore (though she still planned on taking walks with Pansy, but honestly, Pansy knew a lot more defensive magic than she did), and she told herself she wouldn't run errands late at night or early in the morning unless she really needed to.

She made it to the Fat Lady's portrait without incident, and, deciding it would be somewhat rude if she got the password off the Map, Rigel knocked several times on the Lady's opulent frame. Moments later, a girl with blonde, curly hair and a curious expression cracked the portrait and stuck her head out.

She eyed the blue and white tie Rigel had purposely left on after stowing the wig and glasses in her bag and said, "What's up?" in a polite, but not exactly friendly tone.

"Is Percy Weasley in there?" she asked, "He told me to ask for him here if I needed help with some books I was reading."

At the word 'books' the curious expression left her face and she gave a bored nod, "Yeah, come on in, kid," she pushed open the painting and Rigel climbed carefully through the opening. "Prefect Weasley is over there by those tables," she gestured to a group of study tables that were tucked into a niche between two sets of stairs. Percy sat alone at one of them, up to his shoulders in various books and running ink-stained fingers through his fireball red hair, "He's been in a right state since lunch," the curly-haired girl informed her, "So good luck."

Rigel thanked her and headed over to where Percy had barricaded himself into a corner. He seemed to be writing an essay—that or he was just making scratch marks on a sheet of parchment.

"Percy?" she spoke quietly, but he still jumped as if she'd shouted and gaped at her.

"What? Who—oh, Rigel, hello," he sighed heavily and rubbed hands against his face, knocking his horn-rimmed glasses askew, "How are you?"

"Very well, thank you," she surveyed the books Percy had stacked about him, recognizing a few on sight, "Working on a Potions essay?"

"Yes," he scowled down at the mess of ink and parchment before him, "Or I was before Potions decided to become Ancient Mesopotamian, "Dratted books don't make any sense." He shook his head briefly, then refocused on her, "I'm sorry, did you come for help with something? I need a break from this anyway."

Rigel moved a pile of crumpled parchment from a chair and sat, saying, "I was hoping you could explain the theory behind Vanishing things to me. It was mentioned in a book I was reading about Invisibility Spells and so I looked it up, but I don't understand parts of it."

"Oh?" Percy looked interested, "That's very advanced theory. We're only just now getting into it, in fact." Rigel tried not to fidget guiltily. "What are you having trouble with?"

"I don't understand where things go when they are vanished. The book says they go 'into non-being,' but what is that, like another dimension?" Rigel asked.

"Non-being is a kind of theoretical place from which all of being comes out of. It's not really another dimension, since other dimensions are just a different kind of being, but rather it's the opposite of things that are. Vanished objects don't exactly 'go' there, but they become the opposite of being—that is, they un-become. And once they aren't a being anymore, they are a part of non-being, do you see?" Percy raised his eyebrows expectantly.

"Not really," Rigel frowned, "If they don't exist anymore, then how is it possible to get the objects back by unvanishing them?"

"Well, it's all theoretical," Percy began slowly, "And you don't really have to understand the physics of it to grasp the theory. Basically just realize that you aren't destroying whatever you Vanish—it's not that kind of un-becoming. More like you're giving it the property of lacking presence in this world. It's still the same as it was before you vanished it, only it doesn't exist here anymore, so it's considered non-being in that sense. The key is in distinguishing between non-being and non-existence. An object in non-being exists, it just doesn't exist in being at the moment. That's why you can retrieve a vanished object, and even a vanished person, if you know how."

"So, if anything, a vanishment is conditionally temporary?" Rigel asked.

"Yes, that's usually the case," Percy nodded.

"I'm confused about another thing," Rigel said, and when Percy gestured for her to go on, she continued, "I've read that in Apparition, for example, where a wizard vanishes and unvanishes himself in two different spatial locations, it's possible for the wizard to splinch himself, without killing himself, which suggests that the connection between vanished parts of an object must survive the vanishment—do you think it's possible that it might work the same for linked charms?"

"How so?" Percy asked, apparently intrigued.

"I mean, if you vanished an object with a link to something in this world, like say you vanished one of the monitoring orbs the Healers use while it was still linked to the person it was monitoring, and then you unvanished it two hours later. Would you have data for those two hours? Would the orb continue to work as a linked object in non-being, if it remains unchanged in non-being?"

"Well, I don't know why it wouldn't, but you should ask Professor McGonagall in class if you really want to be sure," he said.

"Would you mind asking her for me? I don't want to come off as showing off by reading ahead," Rigel ducked her head embarrassedly, and Percy chuckled.

"Well, certainly. I'm quite curious myself."

"And another thing," Rigel smiled apologetically, but she really wanted to figure this all out before she tried to finish Flint's essay, "Also to do with Apparition. It seems to me that Apparition is just the vanishment and unvanishment of a person, but with different spatial dimensions used for the revanishment than were used in the original vanishment.

"That's one way to look at it, I suppose," Percy acknowledged, "Go on."

"So if we consider that an object's location is the result of its intersection point on the spatial-temporal grid, then if it's possible to vanish something across the spatial plane, shouldn't it be possible to also vanish things across the other?" Rigel said.

"You mean time travel?" Percy tilted his head amusedly.

"Yes. Could you vanish an object into the past, for example?"

"I don't know, Rigel. If it were banishing we were talking about the answer would be a definite 'no,' but you are correct in saying that vanishings aren't limited to moving through consecutive points. It might be that Apparition only works because the wizard is the vanished object, and therefore able to unvanish himself in a different spatial location. I'm not sure if you could send an object across a temporal barrier, because you'd have no control once it was vanished. It's possible to unvanish things usually only to the place they vanished from, though I suppose without any controlling parameters a vanished object could reappear anywhere…" he trailed off, thinking hard.

"And a wizard would have to be impossibly powerful to vanish themselves across that barrier, wouldn't they?" Rigel asked.

"I should think so," Percy said, "but I'll ask McGonagall about that too, if you like."

"Yes, thank you," Rigel said, "I'm very interested in figuring all this out."

"Well your grasp of it isn't bad so far," Percy said kindly.

"Thank you. I think I understand it much better now," she said.

"No problem," he smiled, "I actually think I understand it better after helping explain it. And," he said ruefully, "Anything is better than wading through this mess," he gestured to the scattered notes in front of him.

Rigel's eyes traced over the table, taking in the mountains of books and splatters of ink. She could have left. She could have walked away right then and Percy wouldn't have begrudged her for a moment. He would never expect recompense for helping her, Gryffindor that he was, but as she sat there, taking in his pained and hopeless expression, she knew that she had to at least try to help him in return.

"What's the essay on?" she asked, her tone casual in case it turned out to be a topic she couldn't actually help him with.

"Potion Fusion," Percy sighed, "Professor Snape assigned everyone two Potions, and we're supposed to imagine we have a friend who needs to take both at the same time and figure out what needs to be changed about the dosages and ingredients in order to make them both compatible and effective. It's a nightmare, and Professor Snape always gives me the trickiest assignments because he thinks I'm an 'uppity, fact-grasping, know-it-all.'"

Rigel raised her eyebrows at the insult, and Percy flushed sheepishly, "That's what he wrote on my last paper."

"Ah," Rigel took another look at the books on the table, "Well, the first problem is that you're reading Bonagage," she said, "That fool hardly ever gets anything right."

Percy looked at her like she'd grown horns.

"I read Potions Journals," Rigel said, "And the general consensus among the academic community is that Bonagage is a blithering idiot who wouldn't know knotgrass from fluxweed if he had to wipe his ass with them. If you cite him in your essay, Snape probably won't even read it."

Percy blinked several times before resolutely pushing the book in question away from him.

"Could I, ah, borrow those Journals sometime?" he asked politely.

"Sure, but for now, what Potions did you get?" Rigel scooted her chair closer to peer at the prefect's notes.

"Skele-gro and Blood Replenishing Potion," Percy said, "You, ah, know much about Potions, Rigel?"

"Yeah, I like Potions," she said easily, "What have you worked out so far?"

"Well, the biggest trouble is with the bloodroot from the Blood Replenishing Potion, which reacts badly with the skullcap flowers in Skele-gro, and the huge amount of nettle leaves needed for Skele-grow, which tend to explode when placed in dragon bile. Unfortunately, Blood-Replenishing Potion is brewed on a dragon bile base," Percy pursed his lips, "Also, the ginger and the cayenne used in Skele-gro to burn infection away are blood-thinners and circulators, both of which would be very bad to give to someone who's possibly bleeding, having suffered a wound they'd need to take Blood Replenishing Potion for."

"Hmm, this is a tricky one," Rigel tapped her finger against the table unconsciously, "What have you tried tweaking?"

"Well, at first I thought I could use willow bark instead of bloodroot for the Blood Replenisher, but willow bark needs to stew for over an hour, which is too long to leave the vervain in without rendering the whole thing undrinkable. I can't just leave the vervain until last, either, because it has to go in at the same time as the hypericum flowers, which must go in straight after the St. Stewart's Bane in order to bond properly to the dissolving stalks," Percy said all this in a wearily defeated kind of a way.

"Why not use a different pain-killer besides willow bark?" Rigel asked.

"Any of the others that I've come across so far have reacted violently with the trillium, which I can't take out of the Skele-gro without causing the drinker's muscles to cramp around the growing bones and make them re-grow crookedly," Percy said.

"What about feverfew?" Rigel flipped through one of the herbal indexes on the table, but she couldn't find feverfew listed in it.

"Is that an anesthetic?" Percy frowned, "It's not in any of these."

"Yes, it's a rather hairy flower that grows in southeast Europe," Rigel said, "It'll work as a pain killer if you use enough of it—you need about three times as much feverfew as you would bloodroot, but it would go easily with the skullcap flowers, I think."

"You're sure about this?" Percy glanced at her apologetically, "You seem very bright, but Professor Snape already hates me…"

"What have you got to lose?" Rigel smiled slightly, "Incidentally, feverfew also prevents platelets from clumping, so it's really quite perfect for a Blood-Replenishing Potion."

Percy laughed, but wrote it down nonetheless, "Alright, Rigel, what else have you got for me?"

"Well, I think you should consider replacing the ginger and cayenne with oatstraw," Rigel said.

"Oatstraw?" Percy's lips twisted wryly, "Something else that's definitely not in any of these indexes. What does that one do?"

"Well, it's a non-inflammatory, which never hurts, and it's rolling in calcium and other vitamins. It will act as a thickening agent, but you can combat that by adding twice as much chimera milk. Seriously," she added as Percy hesitated once more, "Cows eat oatstraw all the time, so you know it's good for bones."

"I'll be sure to tell Professor Snape that," he shook his head, scribbling away, "But what will burn out infections if we take the ginger and cayenne out?"

"We already added feverfew to the Blood Replenishing Potion," Rigel said, "Even though the Skele-gro itself won't have anything to ward off infection, if you're giving them to the person at the same time, it won't matter."

Percy smiled slowly, "That's… brilliant. Except for—"

"The nettle leaves," Rigel grimaced, "I know. They're as important to the Skele-gro Potion as the dragon bile is to the Blood Replenisher. You could maybe mimic the effect by adding about two tons of rosemary."

"But the rosemary would mix with the St. Stewart's Bane and make the person vomit both Potions back up, so it's useless," Percy said.

"Yeah," Rigel frowned, "Professor Snape really does hate you."

Percy snorted. "Could be worse. I heard he gave Oliver Wood Amortentia and Wolfsbane."

"… in what situation would you ever have to administer both Amortentia and Wolfsbane at the same time?" Rigel wrinkled her nose, "It would have to be a werewolf who was drinking it or the Wolfsbane would just poison them, and you'd have to be insane to want a soon-to-be-wolf to fall obsessively in lust with you on the night of the full moon."

Percy laughed loudly, causing several people in the main common room to turn and stare at the unusual sight, "I'll tell Oliver to write his essay on that. It's not like Snape doesn't already give him hell for being the Gryffindor Quidditch Captain."

They flipped listlessly through the ingredient indexes, throwing out suggestion after suggestion, until Percy shut his book and laid his glasses down on top of it, massaging his forehead, "I just don't see how you can take the nettle leaves out of Skele-grow. It's impossible."

Rigel sat up straighter, thinking over what Percy had just said, "Maybe you're not supposed to," she said slowly, "Maybe you just have to alter the nettles so that they don't react with the dragon bile."

"But in doing that you would also be stripping the nettles of any regenerative properties they have, which is the entire point of keeping the nettle leaves," Percy said.

"What if it was like a Vanishing Spell, but opposite?" Rigel said excitedly.

"What?" Percy put his glasses back on to stare confusedly at her.

"Temporarily conditional!" Rigel grinned. It was the perfect solution.

"Explain," Percy demanded, quill poised over his notes.

"When a person drinks Blood-Replenishing Potions, what happens to the dragon bile? It gets rejected and drained from the stomach almost immediately, so at most you have about two minutes that the nettles are dangerous if reactive. We coat the nettle leaves with ephedra oil, right before we put them into the base. Ephedra oil is non-reactive, extremely mild, but it disperses naturally—"

"When it bonds with dissolved mullein root!" Percy was grinning now, too, "So we add whole stalks of mullein root to either of the Potions, and when the Blood Replenishing Potion is ingested, the dragon bile will be drained out before the mullein root fully dissolves, and by the time the ephedra oil is gone and the nettles are active again, there's no dragon bile left to react with! It's genius."

Rigel smiled as she watched Percy become completely embroiled in his notes, and waited patiently for him to remember her presence.

"Perfect, it all works out perfectly," he muttered happily to himself, "Rigel—oh! Rigel," he turned back to her, "I don't know how to thank you, but this is—"

"It was no trouble," Rigel said, "I like Potions, and you helped me a ton with that Transfiguration Theory."

"Still," he said, practically beaming with excitement, "I'm gonna show Professor Snape this time, and I couldn't have done it without you. Any time you need help with anything, day or night, just come find me."

"Thanks, Percy," Rigel nodded seriously.

"Oi! Percy!" someone called frantically from the portrait hole, "You better get down to the fourth floor! Your brothers—"

"Oh, Merlin, what have they done now?" Percy stood immediately, glancing distractedly at the cluttered table.

"I'll look after your stuff for you until you get back," Rigel offered.

"Will you? Thanks, Rigel," he straightened his robes briskly and headed off toward the portrait hole, "One of these days I'm going to owl mum about those two…"

Rigel pulled out the Transfiguration essay she was writing for Flint and decided to finish it up there, so that she could mail Flint his finished assignments while she was already near the Owlrey. She used the barricade of books to hide her awkward usage of her left hand to pin down the parchment as she wrote, and thirty minutes later she had completed the essay on Vanishing Theory, stowed it in her bag, and had settled into perusing the Potions books on the table, a couple of which she hadn't read more than once.

She was starting to wonder if Percy had been caught up in some horrible prank gone wrong, when she was pulled from her reading by a familiar voice.

"Strange place to do your homework, isn't it?"

Rigel looked up in time to see Lee Jordan claim the seat across from her casually.

"These are the study tables," Rigel pointed out.

"Uh yeah—in the Gryffindor common room," Lee laughed, "You're really something else, kid."

Rigel raised her eyebrows, "If you say so."

"I'm not the only one," Lee leaned back until his chair was balanced on the back two legs, "The twins talk about you all the time."

"Do they?" Rigel said in a bland tone of voice.

"Yeah, but that's the Weasley Twins for you," Lee shrugged, "Always going on about their newest discovery. They get tired of things pretty quickly, though—well, everything except one another, I guess."

"And you, too," Rigel said, "You've been their friend for years, haven't you?"

"Yeah, you'd think," Lee said, staring across the common room listlessly, "Sometimes, I don't know. They keep secrets with each other; hide things from me."

"Everyone hides things," Rigel said, "Don't you?"

Lee looked startled, as if he'd never considered that he had things he kept buried as well.

"Hmm," his gaze drifted over to the fire, "Still, when it comes down to it, twins only ever look toward each other."

Rigel said nothing, not wanting to put more of her opinions into the middle of what was obviously a complex and touchy friendship. It turned out she didn't have to say anything, as Lee stood up just as inexplicably as he'd sat, and said, "Don't let them wear you out," as he walked away. Rigel was left feeling very unsettled—for about five seconds.

At that point she was set upon by the tricksters themselves. They led the way through the portrait hole like grand-standers, triumphant grins drawing knowing smirks from the other Gryffindors. Percy came stumbling in behind them, looking drawn and exasperated. The eldest Weasley headed straight for the study tables, ignoring his brothers' attempts to cajole him into accepting their sincerest apologies. It was then Rigel noticed that Percy's prefect badge was spitting confetti with every third step he took.

"Honestly, Perce," Fred was saying when they came within earshot, "That spell was meant to hit Cynthia Bradford, the Slytherin Prefect, not you."

"And that makes it better?" Percy scowled, "You can't just go around pranking prefects for no reason. How does it look? My own brothers, the biggest source of insubordinate machinations—"

"Woah, woah, Percy, who said we did it for no reason?" George said from Percy's other side, "It's not out fault we're involved in the— Rigel?" George looked pleasantly bemused to see her sitting at a study table in their common room.

"Puppy!" Fred cried cheerfully, bounding over to snag a seat next to her at the table. George wasted no time in claiming the seat on her right side, leaving Percy to sit across from them.

Instead, Percy just sighed and began packing up his notes and books, "May as well finish this in my dorm room for all the work I'll get done with these two around. See you, Rigel, and thanks again."

"The gratitude is all mine, Percy," Rigel said, "Until we meet again."

With a short nod, Percy trudged off to the fifth-year boys' staircase.

"So what could a first-year Slytherin possibly be helping our brother the perfect prefect with?" George asked curiously.

"And don't you dare lie to us, for Fred and I always know," Fred said.

"Percy and I have a mutual understanding," Rigel said loftily, "And since we are newly discovered allies, I feel it my duty to ask if you really did make his prefect badge belch confetti on purpose, because that was quite an ingenious spell."

Fred and George laughed, both shaking their heads in synch.

"A happy accident," Fred said proudly.

"The target, not the spell," George clarified.

"Why were you pranking Slytherins?" Rigel put on a sad expression, "Am I not entertainment enough for you?"

"Perish the thought!" Fred put a hand to his mouth in abject horror, "We were performing an odious duty, and nothing more."

"Haven't you heard?" George smiled enigmatically at her, "Slytherin and Gryffindor are involved in a prank war, so our services have been enlisted. It started Friday night. Any guesses why?"

Rigel frowned, "Surely not…"

"Regular martyr, aren't you?" Fred teased, "We heard you were viciously set upon by a cowardly Gryffindor while innocently walking through the dungeons past curfew on Friday night. The Slytherins are apparently so up in arms (or whatever the snakey equivalent of arms is) about it that they've sworn revenge against any and all Gryffindors who cross their path."

"Hence, the prank war," George said, shaking his head with amusement, "As if they needed to come up with such an elaborate ex—"

"We don't know for certain it was a Gryffindor."

"—…cuse."

"Are you saying you really were attacked?" Fred frowned and sent a troubled look at George, whose face was suddenly very blank, "We thought they just wanted a reason to have a go at us, and made up a sympathetic story about a first-year being attacked unprovoked from behind to keep the Claws and Puffs from ganging up on them."

"Oh, well…" Rigel shrugged, "It really might not have been a Gryffindor."

"But you were attacked—again," George's eyes were icy and flat.

"I guess," Rigel said slowly, "Yeah, it was pretty clearly an attack this time. I kind of wish I knew who was doing this."

"You 'kind of' wish you knew?" George repeated, "Rigel, you need to take this more seriously. How many times have you been targeted—be honest."

"Um," Rigel tallied them up in her head. There was the first incident, where she broke her wrist, the one where she got trapped in a trick stair and dung-bombed, and then the stinging hex. "Three, I think."

"You think?" Fred prompted.

"Well, I sort of thought someone was following me between classes one day, but they didn't shoot a spell at me," she said, wondering if the 'blonde butterfly' Zabini was talking about could be her attacker.

"Merlin, Rigel," George took a deep breath, then let it out slowly, "Okay. First of all, you have a stalker."

"And second of all," Fred said, equally serious, "We're walking you back to your common room tonight."

"Tonight?" Rigel craned her neck to try and see outside of the alcove, which had no windows, "What time is it?"

Fred and George both cracked amused smiles, and Rigel felt like all must be okay in the world as long as the Weasley twins could still smile. It was much more reassuring than a hundred concerned glances could ever be.

"It's nearly seven-thirty," George told her, "How long did Percy chain you to these desks?"

"Leaving the chains thing alone for now, it was long enough to drive my friends mad with worry," she sighed, "I can't believe I missed dinner again."

"No problem," Fred grinned, "We'll stop by the kitchens on the way down."

"Can we stop by the Owlrey, too?" she said, "I have some letters I'd rather mail while I'm already in this part of the castle."

"Better you go with us, anyway, considering how steep the Owlrey stairs are," George said, "But first we want to check on your wrist."

Rigel offered up her left arm for their inspection. It was strange to be letting people handle it after a long week of training herself to keep it out of sight. Fred unwrapped it carefully while George checked the range of motion and feeling in her fingers.

"It looks like it hasn't healed much," Fred shook his head regretfully, "So either something is preventing your body from fixing itself or the injury's been treated so roughly in the past week that your body can barely keep it from worsening."

They stared at her expectantly. She fidgeted.

"Oh, Puppy, what did you do?" Fred 'tsked' reprovingly.

Rigel rolled her eyes, "It wasn't my fault." She explained about getting stuck in the trap stair (the twins had never heard of a trick stair on that particular stairway either), then about the g-forces from Flying lessons and helping Draco practice, then getting hexed into a wall after hours of jostling it in detention. "And that's not to mention that crazy Hufflepuff girl body-checking me into the railing on the Owlrey steps," Rigel scowled.

"What Hufflepuff?" George asked.

"Abbot, something Abbot," Rigel said, "She ran smack into me when I was heading up to mail a letter. My wrist felt as horrible after that as it did when I first broke it."

"She didn't see you on the stairs?" Fred asked carefully, his eyes focused on her wrist, but his lips pursed suspiciously.

"She said she wasn't looking. I wasn't either, because of the wind. She just came barreling out of the roost," Rigel shuddered, "Girls are heavier than they look."

"That's sort of strange, isn't it?" George glanced at Fred, "That you ran into her right before you were attacked coming back from the Owlrey?"

"I… guess it was a weird coincidence," Rigel blinked suddenly, "You know, she is blonde."

"Blonde?" Fred chuckled, "I know it's not as attractive as red hair, but being blonde isn't actually a crime."

"Zabini said the person—well, he said butterfly, but I'm pretty sure it was a person— who was following me on Thursday was blonde."

"Well, blonde or brunette, you need to be more careful with that wrist," George cast a numbing spell and Rigel sighed involuntarily as pain that hadn't even been registering faded away abruptly. It surprised a smile out of her, and Fred and George exchanged another one of their looks.

Come to think of it, a lot of people send silent messages with their eyes while I'm around. Draco and Pansy, Fred and George (though they probably do that anyway), Rookwood and Rosier (again, probably not me), and even Neville and Ron have done it a few times.

"When the pain gets bad like that, find one of us to re-cast it for you."

"Yes, Dr. George," Rigel quirked her lips wryly.

"You mean Dr. Fred," Fred corrected as he conjured her a new bandage, "I'm Dr. George."

"Whatever you say, Fred," Rigel gathered her book bag and stood.

"This one's clever, Forge," Fred sighed.

"Didn't you see the tie, Gred?" George tugged playfully on Rigel's blue and white necktie.

"Oh, very nice," Fred eyed it appreciatively, "You can't even tell it's a charm. I was wondering how you'd managed to stay in one piece by yourself so long in the Nest. I must say, it's not quite as impressive once you know the trick."

"Hear that, George?" Rigel said, "You've shattered the illusion."

"I'll buy him a new one when I'm rich and famous," George smiled easily.

They headed off to the Owlrey, Fred and George taking their role as bodyguards a bit too far and scaring the wits out of Lee Jordan as he came around the corner toward the Fat Lady's painting. He declined their invitation to join them cheerfully, saying he was headed to a game of exploding snap with Angelina Johnson, and after that the twins refrained from shooting fire-crackers at anyone they came across unexpectedly.

When they reached the base of the West Tower, Rigel stopped.

Would you two mind waiting for me down here?" she asked, hoping she didn't offend them.

"How can we stop the heartless miscreants from toppling you down the icy—"

"They probably won't be icy in mid-September."

"—and treacherous stairs, if we aren't on the stairs with you?" Fred raised his eyebrows as if to say obviously.

"How about we wait at the top of the stairs, and just cover our ears while you reveal the secrets of the universe to your owl?" George offered, "You can even blind-fold us, if you like."

"It's not that I don't trust you guys," she started, but Fred cut her off good-naturedly.

"It's fine. Everybody has secrets, Rigel."

She smiled, recalling her words to Lee not at hour before. I guess everyone here really does have secrets. And there was me thinking nondisclosure was such a crime. She thought about Flint, and his apparently sick mother, then she thought about Binny the house elf, and the sort of secrets she kept so gladly. Probably even the teachers had secrets. Even the ghosts. And it seems like most people are okay with that, here. How interesting, that muggles often feel so entitled to know the truth about everything, while wizards accept that there can be true meaning expressed in spite of secrets kept. Perhaps wizards are used to looking into the great mysteries of the world and not asking any questions. Or maybe, Rigel thought wryly, we've been naturally selecting for sneakiness, hiding from the muggles all these years.

"Personally, I wouldn't trust Gred either," George stage-whispered, "But I'll keep a close watch on this rascal."

"Me?" Fred clutched Rigel's right elbow and batted his tawny eyelashes up at her (he'd bent nearly double to achieve that effect), "Don't believe these slanderous lies, Rigel, he's the one you have to watch out for—ask anyone! They'll all tell you Fred's the evil twin."

George shot Rigel a glance that was brimming with exasperated fondness, as if to say, Isn't he wonderful, in a rather strange way? Rigel grinned back, and Fred frowned as he caught on, "Oh, you already guessed I was Fred today, didn't you?"

"I'm afraid so," Rigel said.

They reached the top of the stairs and Rigel hurried inside while George and Fred took up positions on either side of the doorway like sentinels. She caught the eyes of a few owls while she pulled her missives from her bag and grouped them. She speed-rolled the new essays for Flint (she was keeping the old essays for reference) and also the letters to Remus, Sirius, and Archie (which contained highly-edited accounts of the last couple weeks). As she was handing the letters to her Uncles off to the first owl (she was sending Remus' with Sirius' because sometimes Remus traveled unexpectedly for his work), Fred began a particularly spirited rendition of A Cauldron Full of Hot, Strong Love. George joined in counterpart just as exuberantly, and Rigel realized they were trying to advertise just how much they weren't listening.

She sent the letters off (whispering to the owl that went to Flint, just in case), and jogged back over to the stairs.

"—I'll boil you u-up some—oomph !" Fred was elbowed in the stomach by George when he caught sight of her, "Oh, that was fast."

"Didn't want to leave you guys standing out here too long," she said, then stopped and leaned slightly away from them as the redheads broke into identical (and honestly quite alarming), self-satisfied smiles, "What? I hear the cold air isn't good for people of a delicate or disagreeable humor."

"A-ah, it's too late to insult us now," George linked his arm through her elbow carefully, avoiding her wrist.

Fred took up her other side, "We've already figured out you like us."

Rigel resigned herself to a life of friends and acquaintances. At the rate she was earning new ones, she'd never be able to get rid of them all.

Fred and George hung back as they reached the Entrance Hall, and Rigel got the distinct feeling that she was about to be tested. She ignored her escorts' growing smirks of glee as she turned down the basement corridor without prompt, but when she blithely turned abruptly toward a set of stairs that led to the dungeons (and away from the kitchens), Fred groaned dejectedly and Rigel couldn't suppress her sly smile anymore.

"What's this?" George took a finger and tapped Rigel's nose with it, "Gred, our puppy is having us on."

"So you do know where the kitchens are?" Fred perked up, "Good one!"

They laughed, and turned back until they reached the still-life painting of fruit, where Fred insisted she 'do the honors' and tickle the pear.

They were barely through the door when they were assaulted by house elves—well, Fred and George were, at least. They were apparently extremely popular with the Hogwarts helpers, and they mingled happily among the little elves, greeting many by name, bouncing some on their shoulders, and swinging others up onto tables so they could see them better. The elves laughed delightedly in their squeaky little voices and steadily presented Fred and George with offerings of food, which the brothers accepted politely and stuffed into a bottomless bag they seemed to have brought with them for exactly this purpose.

Rigel found a seat at one of the long tables and just watched the vibrant Gryffindors play like primary-school kids among elves at least thrice their age. After a few minutes, an elf she recognized plopped a huge bowl of strawberries down in front of her.

"You is liking these?" Binny smiled hugely at her as she plopped her tiny form on the bench next to Rigel.

"Binny!" Rigel reached over to hug the blushing elf, "Thank you, I do love strawberries. And thanks for the help with the you-know-what the other day."

"Do we know?"

"I don't believe we do."

Rigel cringed as Fred and George appeared over her shoulder without warning.

"Making deals with house elves, little snake?" George sighed despairingly, "I hope you got it in writing, because I have it on good information that Binny here is notoriously difficult to pin down when the blood starts flying."

"Mr. Wesley shouldn't be saying such things," Binny wagged her finger crossly, but even Rigel could tell that this was an old joke between them.

"That's right, Forge, we were sworn to silence, remember? You don't want to go the same way as the other guy, do you?" Fred shook his head mournfully.

"What other guy?" George asked.

"The one that disappeared the same week the elves started serving lumpy gravy."

"Eww," Rigel said, chuckling at the look of exaggerated innocence Binny was now portraying.

"Binny doesn't know what you is talking about," the elf said solemnly, "Binny is never ever serving gravy with suspicious lumps in it. Such a thing is being vicious slander."

Fred and George collapsed onto the table top with laughter, and Binny gave a dainty curtsey as she hopped off the bench.

"Is you wanting anything else?"

"We actually came here because Rigel missed dinner," George said, wiping at his eyes as he collected himself.

Several house elves in the immediate vicinity gasped with dismay and ran to get food for her as fast as their legs could carry them. Rigel watched with wide eyes as plates and plates of vegetables, fishes, fruits, nuts, breads, cheeses, and a pitcher of apple juice were piled in front of her. She thanked them and dug in ravenously.

"You a vegetarian, Puppy?" Fred glanced over the selection bemusedly.

"Yeah, though I don't know how they knew."

"The house elves know everything—devilishly clever, they are," George said, "At least this helps explain why you're so tiny."

"But you have to eat more protein," Fred said, grabbing a few hard-boiled eggs and putting them onto her plate, "Or you'll heal even slower."

Rigel shrugged agreeably, still eating. When she was finished they bade goodbye to the friendly elves, and Rigel promised to visit Binny again soon.

Fred and George walked her as far as the Potion's classroom, but there they had to stop. They already knew where the Slytherin common room was, of course, but they didn't think her House mates would take kindly to them coming within a twenty-foot radius of it, particularly in the middle of a prank-war. They were reluctant to let her walk alone even through the dungeons, though, and it showed on their faces as they said goodnight.

"I'm in snake territory now," she reminded them, "Perfectly safe."

"You were attacked in the dungeons two nights ago," George rolled his eyes.

"And I got away, because I had home turf advantage," she said, "Seriously, I'm a wicked fast runner."

"You shouldn't have to run from anything," Fred said softly, "Not at Hogwarts."

You'd be surprised how much there is to run from at Hogwarts. The past. The truth.

"Hey!"

The three of them turned to see Adrian Pucey and a guy she only knew on sight as Lucian Bole, beater for the Slytherin House team, striding toward them aggressively. Pucey was the one who had called out.

"What's a pair of griffins doing so far from their tower?" Bole, who had long black hair and a superior expression, sneered.

George rolled his eyes and Fred yawned dramatically.

"These guys bothering you, Black?" Pucey looked her over swiftly and relaxed slightly when she appeared to be in good health. Her left hand was completely hidden from view by George.

"No, no, they were helping me, actually," Rigel said quickly, "They heard about the attack on Friday and wanted to make sure I got back to the common room safely."

"You were going to lead them straight to our common room? You stupid—"

"Luc, they already know where it is," Pucey said reasonably.

"And they were just leaving me here, in any case," Rigel smiled oh-so-sweetly at Bole.

Bole 'hmm-ed' disagreeably, "You must have some nerve showing your face down here if you heard about the attack."

"Well, now," George lifted his hands in a helpless gesture that no one there bought for a moment, "It's not yet certain that it's a Gryffindor that wants to hurt our little snake."

"But if it turns out that it is," Fred grinned in a rather frightening facsimile of Snape, "We'll be the first to defect to the Slytherin camp."

"And perhaps we'll start a little campaign of our own on the side."

"Personalization is the key to a good Hell, I always say."

"Night, Rigel," they chorused, winking slyly at her and waving sarcastically to the other two Slytherins as they made their way unerringly toward the closest set of stairs.

Pucey raised his eyebrows at their departure, "Well, that's good to know, at least. You have interesting taste in allies, Black."

"I don't trust those tricksters," Bole said. Rigel noticed he looked a lot less scary than he had a few minutes earlier, and wondered how much of the other Houses' opinions of Slytherin could be attributed to the Slytherins' acting abilities, "But if they're as good as their word, they might be useful."

Rigel looked up at the two of them questioningly, wondering if she should go on ahead or—

"We'll take you from here," Pucey said, and Bole nodded.

It wasn't until they walked into the common room and Rigel realized she'd been out after curfew again—and this time she'd walked in with two upperclassmen practically playing bodyguards—that Rigel thought she really ought to stop attracting so much attention. She really was receiving more scrutiny than she'd planned on. Then again, probably it was always like this the first few weeks back, with everyone wanting to figure out the new kids and still restless from the summer. Probably things would settle down very soon.

[end of chapter twelve]

A/N: So, in the books obviously Rosier is dead and Rookwood in prison, but in this AU there was no outright war, so a lot of the purebloods that would have died on either side are still alive and had kids that went to Hogwarts (not Durmstrang or wherever convicted Deatheater kids would usually have to go). This helps explain why there are still so many kids in the school despite no halfbloods or muggleborns. Yes, Edmund is the son of Evan Rosier and Aldon is the son of Augustus Rookwood. No I'm not trying to supplant the entire HP universe with OC's, but there aren't enough upperclassmen Slytherins mentioned in the books, so I invented a few.

A/N: Also: forgive me for butchering herbal lore and/or physics for any one who's actually smart out there, and not just faking it like I am. I had a lot of fun writing this one, though I'll probably go back to 8000-ish words after this. Thank you, really, seriously, thank you for reading. It's an honor.