The Ambiguous Artifice

by murkybluematter

Harriet Potter's third year masquerading as a pureblood boy promises to be even more complicated than the last two. All she wants is to get through her studies unimpeded, but with pureblood politics, ancient artifacts, and adolescent hormones getting in the way... well, at least she's up to the challenge. Alanna the Lioness take on HP, book three.

8. Chapter 8

A/N: So…I'm told the explanations of magic and theory are interesting to a lot of readers. Here's hoping you still think so after this beast of an exposition.

The Ambiguous Artifice:

Chapter 8:

[RlRlRl]

Remus Lupin had wanted to teach since he was a lonely eleven-year-old watching prefects tutor the younger students in the Gryffindor common room. At the time, he'd been too nervous to ask for help himself, even though his potions marks could probably have used the boost, but although he didn't partake of the upperclassmen's services, he still admired their patience and generosity from his seat in a dimly-lit corner.

Even after he'd—somehow, miraculously—made friends with the kind of kids who sat in oversized armchairs in the center of the bright firelight, Remus often found his gaze drawn to the prefects and their charges. He'd known it was a foolish wish at the time—what were the odds that the Ministry would allow him to open a school for werewolves, after all?—but he found himself jotting down ideas in a small notebook whenever he heard a particularly well-phrased explanation, or whenever one of his professors gave them an especially creative project or activity.

A couple decades later, and that little green book sat proudly on the shelf behind a desk he'd never, even in his most fanciful imaginings, imagined he'd one day lay claim to.

The desk itself was piled high with parchment and notebooks of varying sizes and colors. The stacks were arranged somewhat haphazardly, though Remus knew about where everything was. None of the papers were homework assignments, in which Remus put rather little stock, having witnessed the half-baked and entirely dishonest way in which most of his own housemates had completed their assignments in school. Rather, the notes were his own, compiled on each student he taught, in all seven years, and all four houses. He kept tabs on which students answered questions correctly, which students helped their year mates by whispering answers to them in a tone they (mistakenly) assumed Remus couldn't hear, which students could rapidly cast shields, which students were reluctant to use offensive spells, and so on. He liked to think a good teacher would know his students well, from their strengths and weaknesses to their character traits and ambitions.

He tried to take time before and after classes to talk to students, ask them questions, solicit their opinions on how his classes and assignments were received, and address any concerns they had about their own performance in his class. He also made sure to keep a friendly expression on his face throughout mealtimes and in the hallways. Remus knew better than anyone how scary the dark arts could be, and he didn't want any of his students to be too scared of him to get the education they needed to protect themselves.

This was easier said, of course, with his furry little problem being common knowledge these days, but Remus could only do so much to mitigate others' prejudice. He had some reservations about being the poster-boy for werewolf integration in the workforce, but on the other hand, if not him, then who? It wasn't as though everyone he knew didn't already know about his condition—he'd long since stopped being too ashamed to tell people he met about it. And his face, while not as handsome as someone like Sirius' might be, was certainly a good deal more unassuming than that of Fenrir Greyback's, for example.

Imagining Greyback's face on a motivational poster for equal rights, perhaps with the man's abundance of hair neatly combed and braided, gave him quite a laugh, and Remus paused in outlining his lesson for the next day to savor the image.

Opening his eyes once more, he focused on the columns of names before him. Tomorrow he had the third-year Slytherins, in their last class of boggart-training until the final. He'd separated their names into groups of those students who no longer had any trouble with the boggart, those who needed a brief mental-psyching to get a handle on it, and those exceptionally brave students who, despite having enormous difficulties in grappling with their fears, returned each period to try again anyway.

It was somewhat difficult for him to commit even this basic information onto parchment, due to the confidentiality wards. The magic in the wards bonded to memories as they were created within them. Since they were keyed to Remus, they affected the way he remembered events he'd witnessed, but only when he attempted to use the information in some way. If he were just recalling a memory, it was perfectly clear. As soon as he attempted to convey information about the event in any way, even to himself, the recollection became vague. It was clear enough to sort the students into three simple categories, though.

He told himself not to feel surprised that Draco Malfoy's name, which had recently been moved to the middle group of students, had for a long time resided firmly in the latter column. If Archie likes him, he can't be much like his father, he told himself. He ignored the voice that suggested Archie's judgment of character might have been heavily influenced by his sorting. If I assume all Slytherins are pompous gits without the right to fears and uncertainties, I'm no better than Sirius.

He hadn't seen Archie very often since coming to Hogwarts, which he supposed was for the best, at least until the end of term. He had, however, seen him often in the company of his two best friends, Miss Parkinson and Mr. Malfoy. Miss Parkinson was a thoroughly brilliant witch, in Remus' estimation, and as charming as any pureblood heiress ought to be. Remus could easily see why her soothing temperament and playful wit had endeared her to Archie. Sirius' son had grown up around smart, even-tempered females, after all. His friendship with the Malfoy scion was…more puzzling.

It wasn't that the younger Malfoy wasn't perfectly polite. There were no hidden flinches or sneers when Remus called on him in class, which was more than Remus could say about many of his students. He was also quite intelligent, from what Remus could tell. He didn't run his mouth as young boys his age were want to do, and, when pressed, always had something insightful to say on a given subject.

Remus sighed, tapping his quill absently against the inkwell as he turned the problem of Draco Malfoy over in his mind. The boy was arrogant, of course, and not afraid to dismiss and scorn those around him when he felt their behavior warranted correction. He didn't know how Archie could stand such a high-handed friend, but he couldn't deny that Draco was a friend to Archie. He'd seen the proof himself, after all.

His mind took him back to the week before, the last time his third year Slytherins had faced the boggart, and the first time Draco Malfoy had beaten the creature on his own.

Remus couldn't help the slight grimace he gave when young Mr. Malfoy walked behind the screen. While boggarts were meant to be terrifying and upsetting to the victim, Malfoy's boggart was one of the few that disturbed Remus when he saw it. Most children feared the sort of monsters they'd heard about in bedtime stories, though a few of the more worldly students sometimes had a vague fear of violent criminals or losing loved ones or even simply failing important examinations. Mr. Malfoy's greatest fear, however, from what Remus could tell, appeared to be madness.

Remus was all too familiar with true madness: the utter loss of mental facilities so debilitating that one cannot even appreciate the horror except in retrospect, or, in the case of Draco's boggart, from an outside perspective. Why the otherwise confident and poised young man should fear such a thing, it was not his place to guess. His only concern was the difficulty Malfoy had in attempting to overcome his fear psychologically.

As the boggart assumed its now-usual image of Draco's doppelganger laughing and crying with hysteria, Remus readied himself to interfere if it, once again, proved too much for the young pureblood.

This time, something was different, however. Mr. Malfoy didn't flinch at the sight of his afflicted counterpart. He stood straight, his wand brandished with a sense of confidence that had been missing in his previous session. Remus began to relax, sensing, somehow, that he would not be needed this time.

"Riddikulus!" Malfoy snapped, silver eyes intent with concentration.

For a moment, Remus wasn't sure it had worked. The blonde boy on the floor didn't stop laughing or rocking himself insanely. Then something else stepped out of the shadows behind the boy and Remus tensed, surprised.

It was Archie. The image of his nephew wasn't perfect, but it was at least as solid as the boggart, and as Remus watched, the image of Archie came around next to the madly muttering Malfoy and sat down beside him. Archie put both arms around the other boy, and the rocking abruptly stopped. Slowly, the look of madness faded from the boggart-boy's eyes, and he looked over at the image of Archie that the real Malfoy had apparently conjured. Both boys on the ground smiled at one another, and the real Mr. Malfoy smiled down at them with a mixture of fondness and relief.

Remus snapped himself out of his surprise quickly. By the time the young scion looked over, Remus was smiling genially, as though nothing interesting had occurred. "Well done, Mr. Malfoy," he said, "Ten points to Slytherin for creative thinking. Get yourself some chocolate, and send the next student in, please."

The boy bowed his head in polite acknowledgment and turned on his heel without a word.

Remus banished the boggart back into its temporary home, wondering at what he'd seen. He had studied boggarts extensively before he decided to use them in his classes, and he'd never once heard of someone using the idea of another sentient being to affect their own fear. People always changed something about the boggart itself in order to make it less frightening. Changing the environment sometimes worked, too, but he'd never thought to introduce a new variable entirely to interact with a boggart. Remus was very impressed that Malfoy had come up with such a solution, and more than a little intrigued by the meaning of his choice.

Archie had a more devoted friend than he realized, Remus suspected. What sort of devotion that friendship would turn into, given enough time…well, he supposed that wasn't really any of his business.

-0

[HpHpHp]

-0

If anyone had told Rigel at the beginning of the school year that she'd find one of her electives as interesting as Potions, she might have given an indulgent smile to hide her dismay that someone could ever be so fundamentally misguided about the universe.

That was before she started Alchemy lessons with Albus Dumbledore. She wouldn't say it was more interesting than Potions—such a thing would be sacrilegious, at the least—but it had quickly become a very close second.

Alchemy was fascinating. Much like Potions, it was an exacting science that required an extensive range of knowledge about myriad, interlocking fields of magic. Alchemy at its most basic level involved small amounts of actual magic and raw ingredients, very precise Runic arrays to shape that magic, and Arithmancy equations to calculate and describe the amount and direction of the magic and ingredients involved. It drew on her understanding of Herbology and Magical Creature parts, which she had a vast repertoire of knowledge about from her Potions studies, as well as a comprehension of Runes, Arithmancy, Transfiguration, and even Astronomy in those alchemical reactions that were intensified or nullified according to the positions of celestial bodies at the time.

She found herself constantly surprised at the way one subject could be at once frustratingly complicated and yet beautifully simple. Input always equaled output in Alchemy, and with enough understanding of the values different ingredients and magical processes equated to, one could design a runic array that would enable almost any alchemical transformation one could imagine. Dumbledore never tried to make her memorize tried and true arrays, either; rather, he encouraged her to design her own rune circles and equations without a biased idea of what types of magic or ingredients should go into it. Often times her ideas were wildly inefficient or off the mark, but Dumbledore's Socratic style of inquiry-based learning, while slow, always made the eventual answer seem rooted in her mind like a truth that she'd always known, but hadn't noticed before.

The efficacy of his teaching methods more than made up for the Headmaster's other…oddities.

As she carefully copied down the rune sequence Dumbledore was etching with chalk onto the table, Rigel wondered what her friends would say if they knew she was taking private lessons from a Master of Alchemy in the same subject. Her friends, while often vocally disapproving of the Headmaster's muggle-loving ways, were still rather unsubtly in awe of the great wizard.

She also wondered wryly what they'd say if they knew he had an incredibly cliché secret passage in his office. Or that he sometimes curled his beard with his wand when he lectured.

She studied the carefully separated piles of ingredients lying in the center of the circle. Someday, Dumbledore assured her, she would know instinctively how much of this or that was necessary to effect a certain reaction, but for beginners it was better to clearly separate and triple-check the quantities of ingredients before attempting to 'jump-start' an array with the appropriate amount of raw input magic.

The reaction Dumbledore was demonstrating was relatively simple, in that it involved only raw materials that would be transformed into a compound material, with no left over raw ingredients at the end. Specifically, it was an array that would transform proportional amounts of wood and metal into a cubic wooden box. It was similar to an array they'd studied last week, but with pine instead of cypress.

"The magic coefficient on the pine is higher than the cypress coefficient was," she commented after a moment.

Every substance used in alchemical equations, from elements to organic compounds, had been given by wizards a magic coefficient that described the amount of magic needed to transform one unit of a given ingredient in an array with an order of complexity of one. Wood was fairly easy to transform, given its high level of innate magic to assist and its susceptibility to what Dumbledore called 'the idea of change' and which Rigel had renamed an ingredient's flexibility factor. Arrays were categorized according to levels of complexity, with each increase in complexity corresponding to an increase in factor of the magic involved in the change.

If you wanted to change one unit of wood into a wooden flute, for instance, you calculated the magic needed by multiplying the magic coefficient of the type of wood you used by the magical constant unique to the wizard powering the reaction, then multiplied that number by the factor of complexity, in the case of a flute a 2.5. The result was the number of seconds the wizard should imbue the array with magic in order to initiate the reaction. The actual transformation was all described in the runes that made up the array, and of course when you had varying amounts of varying ingredients the equations got more complicated, and that was without even touching on second- and third-order arrays that enacted multiple reactions simultaneously. Still, Rigel was new enough to the subject that even something as basic as the differences between magical coefficients was interesting to her.

"What about it?" Dumbledore prompted, reminding her of her question as she recalled herself from her musings.

"Does a higher coefficient mean that pine as an ingredient has less innate magic per unit than cypress? Or does it mean that pine is more resistant to transformation?"

"In this case, it is the latter," the Headmaster said, smiling vaguely, "But the answer is not important as long as you have the proportions correct. Why is that, Mr. Black?"

Rigel thought. "Whether it is more resistant to magic or simply containing less magic, the extra amount of magic on the input side will be distributed in the same way, acting on the material that requires the magic," Rigel said slowly, "So all you need to know is how much magic to add, regardless of why."

"Precisely," Dumbledore said, "It is a sad truth of our times in fact that many burgeoning alchemists do not bother learning the exact whys of various ingredients' magic constants, because that particularly tedious endeavor has already been undertaken by the unlucky wizards who invented the field."

Rigel thought that made a certain amount of sense, even if it seemed an incredibly lazy way to learn a discipline.

"Aren't the coefficients just averages?" Rigel asked, approaching a theory she'd been mulling over for some time, "When I make a potion that calls for eight ounces of beetle wings, I can tell by smelling the fluid they're preserved in how potent they are, and if I should add slightly more or less of any given jar. If you took pine wood that grew near an incredibly potent natural reservoir of magic, wouldn't its magic coefficient be slightly lower than the average for pine?"

"It certainly would," Dumbledore twinkled happily at her, "It will be many years before you are expected to be able to compensate for your ingredients in such a manner, however. Indeed, most students do not even think to ask such a question until well into their second or third year of study."

Rigel felt her neck grow hot at the indirect praise, and mumbled, "It's just how I would see a potion, so…"

"So there we see why Professor Snape's recommendation, as stingy as he is with them, is a necessary prerequisite for this subject," Dumbledore said agreeably, "At times I think that I wouldn't mind a few more students, but I cannot deny that no student Professor Snape has recommended to me has even fallen short of exceeding my expectations."

"There are other students, though," Rigel hazarded, setting down her quill for a moment, "In other levels, I mean."

Dumbledore smiled, "Just the one, at this moment. Mr. Albright, a sixth year Gryffindor. Are you acquainted?"

Rigel shook her head, "Not that I'm aware."

"Well, he is an exceptionally bright boy, and very keen on pursuing a Mastery in Alchemy when he graduates," Dumbledore said, a bit of pride seeping into his voice, "You might introduce yourself, if your paths cross. Although your place in this class is of course a secret, I am sure Mr. Albright would be happy to indulge a fellow…enthusiast, were you to seek his help on some of the more complicated concepts."

"I'll be sure to keep my eyes open for him," Rigel said, wondering if she could ask Percy to introduce her. As Head Boy, he had to know most of the upperclassmen in his House.

The lesson continued with her practicing calculations for different types of woods and metals in varying amounts. Dumbledore waved her off to History of Magic with a sandwich in hand and many interesting things to think about.

-0

[HpHpHp]

-0

Rigel and the other third-year Slytherins were on their way to the Great Hall for lunch later that day when they heard it.

Thump, stamp, thump, stamp! Boom! Boom! Boom!

"What on earth?" Tracy Davis gasped, echoing Rigel's thoughts exactly.

They all looked upwards reflexively, despite knowing the racket was at least two stories above them.

"Come on!" Theo said, picking up the pace, "Let's check it out."

They sped up to just under what might qualify as a run, and soon reached the staircase leading to the Great Hall, at which point the commotion became exponentially louder. Upon reaching the top of the stairs, they ran into a roadblock in the form of a large crowd of students pressed to either side of the entrance hall. Not tall enough to crane her neck over the tops of the other students, Rigel peered between heads and subtly shifted through the throng until she had a clear view of what was happening.

The Hogwarts suits of armor appeared to be on parade.

Blinking to make sure she hadn't stumbled upon a mass hallucination, Rigel let her eyes sweep the scene. A long line of suits of armor, some of which Rigel realized in retrospect had indeed been missing from their usual stations along the dungeon hallways, stretched along the Entrance Hall from the doors of the Great Hall to the grand staircase. She could see the cue extending up the stairs, winding about the landings and several more staircases before becoming lost somewhere in the upper levels.

The suits of armor were marching to a slow but steady beat of thump, stamp, thump, stamp! Boom! Boom! Boom! Every other step was accentuated with the thump of a pike or spear against the floor, and every fourth step was followed by resounding booms as the suits carrying swords crashed them against their shields as though banging on metal gongs. It made for an unholy racket, but most of the watching students were grinning even as they clutched their hands to their ears.

Rigel began to smile when it became clear, from the cheering students and disgruntled but resigned expressions on the staff members' faces, that this was not supposed to be happening. A prank, then—but how on earth had Fred and George pulled this off?

As the procession fed into the Great Hall, students began filtering in alongside them, eager to see what all the suits of armor were going to do next. Rigel followed along, catching sight of Pansy gesturing amusedly to a grimacing but nevertheless impressed-looking Draco just ahead of her. She caught up to them in time to hear Pansy say, "—and look, they've all got the house colors on!"

Rigel looked, and saw that the suits of armor, once through the doors, broke regiment one by one and sat down as though just coming in to eat lunch. As they sat, Rigel could see that each had a colored neckerchief tied to the bottom on their helmets that corresponded to the table he or she sat down at. More and more suits of armor marched in, more and more students pouring in along with them, and by the time the last suit of armor sat down at the Ravenclaw table, nearly every student in the school seemed to be crowded along the edges of the Great Hall, watching.

"Don't suppose they're going to eat our lunch?" Draco drawled into the momentary silence.

Before Rigel had finished smiling at the joke, there was movement once more. A suit of armor from the Hufflepuff table suddenly stood up and waved across the hall. A suit of armor from the Slytherin table, to everyone's surprise, stood and waved back, then gestured in an exaggerated 'come over' motion. The suit of armor from the Hufflepuff table got up, crossed the hall, and the other suits of armor at the Slytherin table scooted over and made room for it, patting it on the back in a welcoming way.

"What is that supposed to mean?" she heard one student mutter behind her.

Soon it was clear, however, as more suits of armor began abandoning the tables that corresponded to their neck cloths and sitting with 'friends' from other tables instead. Eventually, all the tables were completely mixed, and then the suits of armor began stomping their feet and pounding their hands on the tables in front of them all at once.

At first it sounded like noise, but slowly Rigel began to hear a pattern emerging. "It's the Hogwarts anthem," she said, smiling in appreciation.

"What?" Draco snorted, "No it isn't."

"He's right, Drake," Pansy said, cocking her head, "Listen… whether we be old and bold…"

"Or young with scabby knees!" several nearby people sang out excitedly.

Before long, everyone was singing along to the beat of the armored band. With a round of hearty laughter and cheers to finish off the final verse, the suits of armor stood as one, bowed, and then began an orderly evacuation of the hall, presumably back to their posts throughout the school.

As the clamor died down and students finally started to take their seats for lunch, a young voice cried out loudly, "I'm sitting with the Ravenclaws today!"

"Well I'm eating with the Hufflepuffs!" another voice answered.

Two small boys in Slytherin ties, who Rigel recognized as the second-year twins with the perpetually-sly expressions, darted from the crowd and raced to the tables they'd claimed without further consideration or ado.

"Oh, no," Draco muttered sourly. Rigel supposed it was rather obvious where this was going to go next.

A second later the Weasley twins separated themselves from the other side of the hall with matching grins and sat down firmly at the Ravenclaw table with innocent expressions. After that it was organized chaos as students from all Houses plopped down at whichever table suited their fancy, giggling and waving to friends across the hall all the while.

Draco headed determinedly toward the Slytherin table, but Rigel said lightly, "I think I'll go visit with some of my Gryffindor friends today."

"Not you, too!" Draco groaned, rubbing his head agitatedly, "What a mockery."

"It's supposed to be fun, Draco," Rigel said, shaking her head with amusement. "I suppose it's a good idea for some of us to sit at the Slytherin table, though—have to make the new additions feel welcome, right?"

Draco rolled his eyes and turned his back on her without another word. She did notice him smiling tightly at a nervous-looking Ravenclaw who'd taken his usual seat, though, so she guessed he wasn't as annoyed as he let on. In fact, she mused, weaving through the swarm of students, it was probably a lot of work for him to feel anything but excitement and enjoyment at the moment, with so many happy people about. She supposed she ought to be impressed at his tenacity, if nothing else. The headache probably helps, though, she allowed mentally.

When she passed the Weasley twins on her way to the Gryffindor table, she slowed down to give them a congratulatory grin. To her surprise, however, they both shook their heads at her in bemused defeat. Raising her eyebrows, she wondered who was responsible for this enormous prank if not the Weasley twins. Her mind went back to the incident at last year's going away feast. Fred and George had denied that one, too.

If there was a new group of pranksters in the school, they certainly knew how to put on a show.

-0

[HpHpHp]

-0

On Thursday evening, Rigel found herself with free time before her Astronomy lesson, and, since the weather permitted a walk, packed up her Healing notes and stopped by the kitchens to beg a mouse from Binny before heading out to the edge of the Forbidden Forest.

She had been devoting more time than usual to her Healing studies, and Rigel thought her extra attention was paying off nicely. It was much harder for her to Heal while she wore her suppressant ring, but she found the challenge engaging rather than frustrating, and the end result more satisfying when she had to work for it magically as well as mentally.

Archie was getting regular practice on humans at AIM, and while she couldn't match that kind of experience without turning all of her friends into guinea pigs, she could and did put her growing skills to use out in the forest. If Madam Pomfrey wondered how she practiced when she only had one class on theory a week with the Healer, she hadn't yet asked. Rigel didn't think practicing on animals was unethical—there were all kinds of injured animals in the forest, and if she didn't at least attempt to heal them, they'd likely be preyed upon by stronger creatures in the wood. In any case, one of the perks of magical Healing, unlike muggle medicine, was that as long as it was actual Healing, not potions, the magic worked just as well on animals as on humans.

When she reached the tree line, she began to walk along it. She preferred not to go far into the forest proper, seeing as it was technically forbidden, and usually there was no need to. Sure as clockwork, within ten minutes of her traversing the fringes of the forest a soft hissing voice caught her ear.

"Ssspeaker! Come thisss way!"

Following the familiar croon, Rigel soon came upon her frequent companion of the forest, Treeslider. He was getting quicker at scenting her out, she noted, or perhaps he had recently moved his nest closer to the forest's edge. The boomslang snake was a bit difficult to see in the setting light of the approaching sunset, but he wiggled in place until her eyes caught sight of his thin, green form. His eyes were disproportionately big on his head, and they seemed to gleam excitedly when she knelt down next to him.

"You have come again, ssspeaker," the snake swung his head back and forth approvingly, "You come with giftsss?"

"Of courssse," Rigel said softly, fishing in her bag for the mouse she carried. She set the cloth-covered bundle gently on the ground and uncovered the rodent with a little flourish.

"It isss ssso sssmall," Treeslider complained, poking the mouse morosely with his tail.

"You alwaysss sssay that," Rigel smiled with amusement, "Thisss wasss the biggessst one they had in the kitchensss."

"That isss becaussse your cassstle hasss too many moussse-killersss inssside," the snake bemoaned. Rigel had discovered that Treeslider had a generally poor opinion of any animal he might have to compete against in mice-catching, cats and owls included.

"If the moussse is ssso sssub-par perhapsss I ssshouldn't bother sssuplying them," Rigel said wistfully.

"That lacksss sssenssse, Ssspeaker," Treeslider assured her quickly, "You sssimply need more practiccce at sssupplying."

"Practiccce?" Rigel asked, "What am I to be practicccing for?"

"For your future nessstlingsss," the snake hissed out a laugh. "But of courssse you mussst firssst tempt a mate, yesss?"

"Definitely no," Rigel rolled her eyes, "To matesss and nessstlingsss both."

Treeslider hissed disapprovingly, "Life isss nothing without thossse thingsss, sssilly Ssspeaker."

"I have other thingsss in my life," Rigel said, "Sssuch as my reassson for coming. Have you any newsss?"

"Of sssick and dying creaturesss?" Treeslider curled and uncurled unhappily, "I sssupossse I know of one. But I do not think you ssshould be helping thisss one, Ssspeaker. It ssswiped at me asss I ssslid by earlier."

"I'm sssure it was merely jealousss of your ssstunning ssscales," Rigel cajoled, "Have you been sssunning yourssself recccently?"

"You noticcced!" the boomslang snake positively preened, stretching his body and turning his scales until they appeared to the best advantage, "A pity all creaturesss do not possssessss ssscales."

"I'm sssure the other creaturessss agree," Rigel said, ever-amazed by the vanity of snakes. "Can you take me to thisss poor, ssscalelesss, injured creature?"

"I ssshall," Treeslider poked his nose against the mouse once more, "You will hold thisss sssnack while we ssslither. I will eat it onccce you have sssettled."

Rigel gamely picked up the dead mouse once more and followed the snake through the undergrowth. Treeslider led her somewhat deeper into the forest than she was comfortable with, but Rigel knew from experience that her friend would be willing to show her the way out once he was finished eating, so she wasn't afraid of losing her way.

A few minutes later, she could hear a pitiful whining noise coming through the trees. As they rounded a particularly large trunk, Rigel caught sight of a huddled lump of fur shivering in the leaves. Suppressing the urge to coo at the wretched thing, Rigel approached the animal slowly, saying, "Hey there, little one." Its head snapped up and Rigel had to smile at the mournful look it gave her from its big puppy eyes. It was a baby crup, and when Rigel squinted at its neck, her suspicion was confirmed; a tattered yellow ribbon marked the crup as Hannah Abbott's.

"How'd you get all the way out here?" she murmured, reaching out her fingers for it to sniff sadly at. She sat down beside the little pup, and when it tried to stand and move toward her, she saw its left forepaw collapse beneath it. Before it could finish yelping, Rigel scooped it up gently and deposited it on its back in her lap.

"How long hasss it been sssitting here, Treessslider?" Rigel asked, wondering if Hannah was looking for it.

"Not ssso long, asss it hasssn't been sssnacked on yet," the snake said, a bit unkindly. "It isss ssstupid for wandering thisss way. Ssso many ssstupid animalsss in your cassstle, more and more wandering thisss way of late."

Ignoring the grumbling snake, Rigel got her wand out of her pocket and whispered a 'Lumos' to give herself some more light. The dying sun didn't penetrate the thick leaves very well in this part of the forest. She carefully extracted the crup's injured paw and examined it. There was sticky red blood covering the soft pad, and Rigel suspected the pup had simply stepped on something sharp. Still, she examined the joint and bones of its leg just for the sake of professionalism.

Once assured that the only injury was a flesh wound, Rigel began softly cleaning the blood away to look for the source. The crup whined as she revealed a fairly large gash between two of its toes. Shushing it absently, Rigel bent her mind to the task of Healing. As she ran her wand along the cut, she imbued her magic into the area around it. The flesh knit together under her watchful gaze, first into a bloody scab, then fading to light pink scar tissue before smoothing out into soft, unblemished skin. She debated trying her hand at re-growing the fur there, but decided she wasn't confident enough with that spell just yet. She might overdo it and end up making the poor pup look like a miniature wolf.

The crup attempted to lick her face happily as she stood up with it in her arms, but Rigel avoided its slobber while turning to see if Treeslider had finished his meal. The boomslang snake was nearly comatose with happiness, it seemed, curled around the awkward bulge in its stomach.

"I sssuppossse you want to ssset off onccce more?" he hissed, stirring blearily.

"Thanksss, friend," she said, following the sluggish snake toward the edge of the forest.

Before long, she could see the end of the forest up ahead. Night was setting in, with just a deep orange glow to break up the shadows.

"Sssee you nexxxt time, Ssspeaker," Treeslider said, swaying his way back into the forest contentedly. Rigel smiled after him. He was an amiable snake, despite how prickly he pretended to be.

As she emerged from the forest, a cracking sound further along the tree line cause her to freeze, listening intently. Anything big enough to make a sizable branch snap was something she should definitely try to avoid. Why would something that big be so close to the castle, though? As far as she knew, the greater denizens of the Forbidden Forest preferred to lurk in the deeper, darker expanses.

After a moment of intense listening, however, she heard a soft whistling noise coming from the same direction. Relaxing, she wondered who was taking a walk so close to dusk. Then she realized the person wasn't whistling a tune, but making the high-pitched noise to call something.

"I guess your owner is looking for you," she told the crup, scratching it behind its ears to keep it from leaping down. It would be better if it stayed off its foot for a day or so. "Over here!" she called out softly, starting toward the whistler.

There came the sound of rustling, and then the whistler rounded a tree just ahead of Rigel. It wasn't Abbott, to her surprise.

"Blaise?" she said, slowing to a stop, "What are you doing out here?"

"Rigel?" her friend sounded completely nonplussed, "I thought you were in your lab tonight."

Rigel shook her head, "I'm not always in there, you know."

"Apparently," Blaise said, a smirk on his dark face, "Searching for potions ingredients?"

"Just taking a walk," she huffed out a laugh, "I heard this one yelping, though, and got a little side-tracked. Were you whistling for it?"

Blaise's teeth flashed white in the growing dark, "Yes, I was. I didn't think I'd actually find it, but…" he trailed off, shrugging sheepishly. "I overheard Hannah crying at dinner. She's worried sick over this thing. Said this is the third time it's run off in the last month, but this time she couldn't find it anywhere in the castle."

"So you thought you'd find it for her?" Rigel asked, smiling slightly, "I guess you two are friends, now?"

"Something like that," Blaise said, frowning, "Is it injured? You said it was yelping."

"Ah, it was," Rigel said, now giving her own sheepish shrug, "I think it stepped on something sharp and tore its paw open. I healed the gash, but the fur will take a little while to grow back in, so you'll have to explain that to Hannah. Tell her to make sure it doesn't run around too much for the next twelve hours, as well."

Blaise accepted the crup gently, inspecting the paw for himself with serious eyes, "I will tell her. Thank you, Rigel. It was very kind of you to care for a lost animal so thoroughly."

"It wasn't any trouble," Rigel said, honestly, "I appreciate the practice for my Healing skills, and I think it would take a real monster to just leave an injured animal—especially someone's pet—alone in the dark."

"Such a thing takes less than you think," Blaise said, voice low. "Let us get back to the castle. It will be night, soon."

They made their way across the lawn toward the castle steps.

"You know," Rigel said tentatively, "You don't have to mention me. To Abbott, I mean. It might sound more impressive if you tell her you found it all on your own."

Blaise chuckled softly, "Do you take me for a liar, Rigel? And how would I explain the healed cut? I am no Mediwizard."

"It's an easy enough spell for anyone to learn," Rigel said, "So you could stretch the truth a little tonight and then learn the spell tomorrow. Don't you want to be her hero?" she added, nudging her friend playfully.

"If I told anyone I was getting love advice from Rigel Black, they'd laugh themselves into a coma," Blaise drawled, "I suppose I would owe you one for supporting the altered story?"

"Of course not, Blaise, we're friends," Rigel said, grinning, "I owe Abbott a debt, too, so it's in my interest to make her happy. Aren't you going to make her happy?"

"I'll try to," Blaise said, looking subdued once more, "It's complicated, though. Our families have been aligned for centuries, but because of something my mother did, there was a falling out between the members of the previous generation. Hannah and I ought to have been close, should have been raised together, really, but we hardly know one another. It is…difficult to vie with my instincts; they get closer to the surface every passing day."

"Is there anything I can do to help?" Rigel asked, worried because Blaise, cool, unflappable Blaise, seemed worried.

"No," he smiled, stopping on the top step in front of the Entrance Hall, "I thank you, but this age is notoriously difficult among my kind. I will come to terms with these things in time. I think…a closer relationship with Hannah will help."

"I'll teach you how to Heal a cut like this tomorrow," Rigel said firmly, "Just imply you learned it in order to have basic first-aid knowledge. It's a good idea, in any case, and a girl likes a guy who thinks ahead."

"What do you know about girls, Rigel?" Blaise raised an eyebrow.

"Well, Pansy once told me that ladies appreciate it when gentlemen think through their actions before taking them," Rigel said lightly, "I believe she was rebuking Draco for eating so many strawberry tarts that he got sick, but I think the sentiment is sound.

Blaise laughed, "If Pansy thinks something, it must be a golden truth. Her mind is razor sharp."

"It is," Rigel agreed, stepping into the castle and holding the door for Blaise, who somehow managed to look extremely suave cradling the crup, "Most people don't notice how smart she is, for some reason."

"The reason is Pansy is very good at what she does," Blaise snorted. At Rigel's quizzical look, he shook his head wryly, "Never mind, my friend. Thank you again for this. I'll see you back in the dorms later."

At the stairs heading down, they split ways, Rigel continuing down into the dungeons and Blaise making his way toward the Hufflepuff common room. She silently wished him the best of luck, and wondered vaguely if crup hair would be of any use in a potion. She had a goodly amount of the stuff stuck to her robes, now, and there was really no sense letting it go to waste.

-0

[HpHpHp]

-0

As Fall made headway toward Winter's embrace and the days grew shorter, Rigel found her days, quite contrarily, becoming longer. She tried to resist the temptation to use the time-turner more than she needed to, but there always seemed to be a need. Sometimes it was a supplementary book that she felt she really ought to read before the next Arithmancy class, other times it was an extra hour or two spent meditating in the quiet of the library, but whatever the reason it was always educational. At least, that's what she told herself when the guilt became noticeably insistent.

The less academic activities were necessary, too, she argued, to keep her healthy and mentally sound so that she could do well in her many classes—which was exactly the purpose of the time-turner in the first place, so she wasn't doing anything wrong. For instance, when she realized that she was only exercising once every real-time day, she made a point to add at least an hour of physical activity to every additional twenty-four hours of turned-time she lived. It wouldn't do to grow lethargic and weak, after all—that sort of unhealthiness lead to stress. In any case, Dueling was one of the subjects she considered an important part of her education, and staying in shape was critical to her learning in that field.

Sleep was also very important to healthy functioning, she told herself. If she were going to live a day twice, she might as well live the night twice as well, and use the extra turned hours to sleep. In this way, she could, for instance, live all of Thursday normally, sleep the night in her room, then turn back a full 24-hours to Thursday morning, work on brewing or studying in the room of requirement, sleep there overnight, then sneak back into her room in time to 'wake' with Draco for morning exercise on Friday.

All told, it was a very satisfying system. She felt healthy, mentally and physically, she was ahead in many of her classes, her extracurricular pursuits were progressing at a reasonable speed, Flint's assignments were completed in record time (from his point of view, at least), Krait had no complaints about the amount of product she supplied him, and she was closer to her classmates than ever.

There was no reason to feel nervous, she told herself as she approached Professor Snape's office door on Friday night. Snape was only going to assess her mental competency and emotional state. He would have no reason to take the time-turner away. She refused to give him one.

She knocked and waited to be granted entry. This was the first actual psychological evaluation Snape had gotten around to arranging, so she wasn't sure what to expect.

When the sharp bid to come in sounded from inside the office, Rigel entered with her most placid expression, a relaxed poise to her walk that Rispah herself had deemed 'serene.'

"Sit," Snape said, moving a stack of essays to the side of his desk. As Rigel did so, Snape pulled a folder from a drawer and opened it. Inside was a form that he drew out and placed before her.

At the head was a crest the she was familiar with, having seen it on a politely-worded letter addressed to Harriet Potter not long ago. The parchment was from the Department of Mysteries, and it appeared to be an evaluation form specific to those who had access to time-turners. There were places at the top for the subject's name, age before using the time-turner, reasons for use, frequency of use, noticeable side-effects if any (including signs of obvious aging, which was a check-box of its own), and so on.

Rigel filled in the top portion herself, then passed it back to Professor Snape, who she supposed was the 'evaluator' responsible for conducting the psychological interview and reporting in the blanks that made up the latter half of the form.

"To clarify, you have noticed no obvious side effects from your usage of the time-turner, including but not limited to disorientation, dizziness, nausea, loss of memory, or a sense of the surreal?" Snape asked, sounding very much like he was reading from a particularly dull essay on frogsporn.

"None," Rigel said, "It works just as you said it would, Professor."

"Good," Snape scanned the form for a moment, then looked at her piercingly, "You noted that you use the time-turner five hours each day? Including weekends?"

"Approximately," Rigel said, lying through her teeth, "On days like Tuesday, it's closer to nine or ten once I include time spent doing homework and preparing for lessons, but other days, like weekends, I don't need to turn as much to keep up with work."

"Are you adjusting your sleep cycle appropriately to account for the differences in awake hours?" Snape asked, frowning.

"I am," Rigel said, "The sleep-cycle adjusting potion turned out to be very easy to tweak, so I can lengthen or shorten my sleep cycle day-to-day." Not that she needed to on those days she decided to repeat the nights as well.

"Do you find you have difficulty staying awake in classes that you've doubled-up on, or at the end of a very long day of turned-time?" Snape asked.

"Not at all," Rigel said, "Unless you count History of Magic."

At Snape's sharp look, she dropped her small smile and coughed apologetically. It had been a mistake to make a joke, apparently.

"Can you remember what you were doing on Wednesday at eleven in the morning?" Snape asked after ticking another box on the form.

"I was in Transfigurations, taking a quiz on the different methods of animate to inanimate transfiguration," Rigel said, "I was also with you in Lab One, re-brewing a Memory-Restoration Draught for the third time."

"Very good," Snape said, moving his quill down the form, "Is there anyone who might have noticed your use of the time-turner thus far? Anyone asking suspicious questions or making accusations pertaining to your workload or schedule?"

"Not that I know of," Rigel said, "The only class someone might notice a discrepancy in is Magical Theory on Tuesdays. There's only Hannah Abbott and Anthony Goldstein in that section with me, however, and they have no reason to mention me to anyone, much less my housemates."

"Your friends don't notice your disproportionate amount of schoolwork?" Snape asked, one eyebrow raised.

"I'm known amongst my peers for having academic interests beyond classwork," Rigel said carefully, "No one thinks it odd anymore that I study all the time. It helps that they're all busy with elective work, too."

Snape inclined his head and moved on, "Do you feel at all disconnected with reality or tempted to abandon your present life to one of quiet solitude in the folds of time?"

"Excuse me?" Rigel blinked. They couldn't be serious.

"Just answer the question," Snape said, sounding aggrieved, "And in the future expect that anything pertaining to the Department of Mysteries will be cryptic and likely eccentric in nature. Many believe they are intentionally anomalous."

"Ah, no," Rigel said, her lips quirking, "I don't feel at all tempted to retire from reality."

"As you appear to be in good health and of sound mind, I am concluding this interview unless you have anything relevant to add," Snape said, poising his quill above the signature line expectantly.

"Go ahead, sir, I just have one question—purely for curiosity's sake," Rigel said.

Snape finished off the form with an impatient scratch and jerked his head in invitation for her to speak.

"What would happen if I did show signs of obvious aging?" Rigel asked, "Would I take a de-aging potion to compensate?"

Snape tilted his head considering, "Possibly. I'm not sure what the standard procedure is, but you are unlikely to necessitate it. At this point you should be no more than nine or ten days older than your classmates. Unless you greatly speed up your usage, you are unlikely to experience an acceleration in aging significant enough to cause notice."

Rigel nodded, knowing that with the Modified Polyjuice in effect no one would notice even if she aged twice as quickly. She would notice, of course, as her monthly courses came more often than 30 days now, but she had decided that was actually to her advantage. Now the symptoms that came along with her period, like fatigue and stomach aches, wouldn't be noticeably regular. If anyone thought to count the days she was tired or, in the case of someone like Remus, smelled slightly off, it would seem largely random.

It was interesting nevertheless to consider the possibilities; she wondered how common time-turner usage was, that there were procedures in place for all possible contingencies. If she did find out how the Ministry handled accelerated aging, maybe she could make use of their method when the summer came and her Polyjuice needed to be reworked.

Snape dismissed her after asking a few questions about her new electives, and Rigel bade him goodnight as she stepped into the hallway.

A few minutes later for Rigel, she passed through hallways lit by the mid-day sun. She wasn't worried about anyone seeing her on the way to the room of requirement—all her classmates were down in Herbology at the moment. If she hurried, she might finish the rest of the Blood Replenishers for Burke's order before dinner.

-0

[HpHpHP]

-0

Saturday morning there was a great deal of ruckus in the Great Hall. It was always noisier on the weekends, with everyone more relaxed and optimistic about the day, but Rigel thought she could detect an extra level of exuberance in the air as she stirred raisins into her oatmeal.

"What's all the fuss about?" she asked, addressing the table with a gesture that encompassed all the laughing, shouting kids around them.

"You're kidding, right?" Theo asked, a smile tugging at his cheek.

"You know he isn't," Millicent said, rolling her eyes.

"I appear to have missed something obvious," Rigel said to no one in particular.

"It's the first Hogsmeade weekend!" Theo said, a full grin now stretching his features, "And we're third years, in case you've forgotten. We get to go!"

Rigel had known that third-years had Hogsmeade privileges, but she'd somehow never applied that knowledge to herself. She'd been to Hogsmeade before, of course, but she supposed it would be a nice break from the Hogwarts grounds. She could restock at the apothecary, too, which would save her from needing to owl-order supplies before the winter break.

"You did get your permission slip signed, right?" Blaise asked, gazing shrewdly at her.

Rigel felt her heart thud as she realized she had no idea whether Sirius had signed it or not. She vaguely remembered Archie commenting on it as they went through one another's school papers on one of the long summer afternoons. She recalled that he'd set it to the side, but… "I think so," she said slowly, "I guess I should look for it."

"Your father probably mailed it in. That was part of the directions," Draco said, chuckling a little. He didn't seem to be feeling the strain of so much excitement around him, though Rigel thought he was merely getting better at hiding the effects his gift had on him at the same rate he was getting better at controlling it.

"Maybe," Rigel said, hoping that was the case. It would be a shame to miss spending the day with her friends because she'd been too absent-minded to ask Archie about a simple form.

"Just ask Professor Snape if he received it," Pansy suggested.

"Right," she said. Catching sight of Snape getting up to leave the hall, Rigel wiped her mouth with a napkin and hurried to stand. "Be right back," she said.

Snape, noticing her approach with his usual inability to miss anything in his sphere of perception, stopped just outside the doors. "Yes, Mr. Black?" he said, "Are you not eager to be away with your friends to Zonko's and its ilk?"

"I am," Rigel smiled, knowing that most of his sardonic tone was affected in this instance, "I came to double-check that you'd received my permission form. Can I infer from your question that I am allowed to go?"

"You may," Snape said, one eyebrow raised aloofly. "Your father didn't tell you he'd sent it in?"

"He probably did," Rigel said, affecting a sheepish shrug, "I must have forgotten. Thanks, Professor Snape."

She left at his nod, returning to her friends. She didn't notice her Professor's puzzled frown following her back to the Slytherin table.

"So you're coming?" Draco asked as she sat back down.

"Apparently," Rigel said, "Where should we go first?"

"Shopping first," Millicent said, looking excited, "Then the Three Broomsticks for lunch. Then more shopping."

"Why are we going again?" Draco asked, nudging Rigel conspiratorially.

"To hold things, apparently," she said, playing along.

"That's what you get for going stag," Theo said, radiating smugness.

"What's that supposed to mean—you've got a date?" Draco demanded. "Is that why you've been acting like a peacock all morning?"

"I haven't!" Theo protested. Seeing Draco's smirk and Rigel's own admittedly curious look, he added, "Blaise has a date, too."

Theo's bid, while clumsy, was certainly effective.

"Blaise?" Draco nearly choked in his surprise. Rigel privately thought he ought to stop relying on his gift to tell him things about the people around him—clearly he was missing more concrete observations if he was caught that flat-footed. Even Rigel could tell Blaise was dressed especially nice that morning. She hadn't put much thought into the information, but Draco would have, if he'd noticed.

"I asked Hannah to meet me at Wizards' Waifs," Blaise said, smiling slightly, "I thought her crup's ribbon looked a little frayed, and offered to replace it with a yellow collar from the shop. It's hardly a date."

Rigel ignored the small puddle that had just formed in her gut, suspecting that if she dwelled on it her face would look something like Millicent's, which was currently doing a silent impression of the word 'awww.'

"That's very sweet, Blaise," Pansy said, seeming impressed.

"Thank you, Pansy," Blaise said, "It's not nearly as sweet at Theo's date, though. Where were you taking Padma Patil, again? Madam Puddlefluff?"

"Puddifoot's," Theo muttered, looking distinctly less smug. Rigel thought it served him right for trying to throw Blaise to the thestrals like that.

"I'm sure you'll have a lovely time," Pansy said, not quite stifling a smile.

They finished breakfast and set out toward the carriages with grins all around. Rigel couldn't remember the last time she and her friends had done something novel. She could see why the weekends at Hogsmeade had become such a successful tradition.

Millicent, Draco, Pansy, and Rigel took a carriage together. Millicent and Pansy set about planning which order they should visit shops in, taking into consideration such things as likelihood of crowds at various times, leaving heavier purchases for after lunch, and so on.

Draco insisted they visit Spintwitches Sporting Supply. "Where do you want to go, Rigel?"

"Oh, didn't I tell you?" Rigel said airily, "I actually have a date—"

"Very funny," Draco deadpanned, not looking the least bit impressed.

"It isn't entirely outside the realm of possibility, Draco," Pansy said, a sly smile on her face, "Rigel is quite good looking, and very smart."

Draco snorted, "Like that's the issue."

"I think I'm insulted," Rigel said lightly.

"You aren't either," Draco said. Damn empathy. "Tell me you're interested in someone romantically and I'll eat my tie."

Rigel had to concede that point to her blonde friend. She certainly had no interest in romance of any kind.

When Draco continued to stare at her, she raised a questioning eyebrow at him. He shook his head as though dispelling a ridiculous thought, and said, "You don't care where we go, then?"

"Apothecary," she said quickly.

"We might have guessed," Pansy said, not unkindly.

"Zonko's," she added, knowing Remus might ask what she'd picked up in town when he saw her next. They didn't interact much outside of class, just friendly waves in the hall and the occasional quick exchange between classes. It helped that Remus and Archie had never been as close as Harry and Remus were. It also helped that Remus seemed to be keeping a professional distance in deference to his new position.

"Okay," Millicent said, looking a bit taken aback but jotting it down dutifully, "Let's go there first, then, before the crowd."

Rigel wasn't sure they were entirely successful in beating the crowd, considering how many people were inside of the joke shop when they approached, but there was room enough for the four of them to squeeze through the door, at least.

She didn't really need anything from Zonko's, since the twins supplied their own pranking materials, so she browsed the shelves with an eye toward sending Archie a care package. Her cousin really ought to be rewarded for all his hard work this semester. He didn't have a time-turner, after all. Even if he was only learning the classes she was 'officially' taking, he still had a full plate.

She picked up a few tins of colored sneezing powder that turned invisible upon contact with skin—at least until that skin came into contact with water, at which point the powder condensed into a colored goo that was nearly impossibly to scrape off. She also snagged a couple of barrier buttons, remembering how effectively Patil had used one against her last year. After a moment's consideration, she picked up a packet of teacher-trackers as well, recalling that Archie and she had used the packet they'd picked up for her birthday trying to track the neighbor's collection of cats. Archie was convinced they were the ones who ate the miniature pies he and Lily had set on the window ledge to cool. Rigel personally thought James the more likely culprit, but it had been fun attempting to prove otherwise.

"Rigel, look at this," Millicent said, holding up a bag of sleeping dust with the familiar Marauder logo on it. "Does this stuff work? I have trouble sleeping before big exams, sometimes."

She peered at the dust inside the see-through bag, then smiled ruefully, "It works—a bit too well to use for a good night's sleep, though. Sirius tested that one on m—ah, on my cousin Harry. She slept for two days straight."

"They drugged her?" Pansy asked, looking slightly aghast.

"Not really," Rigel said, shaking her head. "It's not ingestible. You just blow it in someone's face and they fall asleep standing up. It's actually a very complicated stasis spell that my uncles tweaked to look like sleep, though. It doesn't dehydrate you or make you hungry, even. You wake up feeling like no time has passed."

"That's…a bit intense," Millicent said, slowly putting the pouch back on the shelf.

"They probably toned it down before selling it," Rigel said, distractedly. "Most of the things my cousin and I see at home get much tamer before they hit the stores. The two-day version of sleeping powder probably got submitted to the DOML developments division, now that I think about it."

"Your prankster uncles develop weaponizeable wizardtech for the Aurors?" Draco asked quietly.

"Well…" Rigel looked away from the display of trick wands and caught the mildly astonished look on Draco's face. "Is that not a common thing for inventors to do?"

"All wizards who work in experimental magic need a special permit to even attempt projects that might have dangerous uses," Draco said seriously, "It's extremely difficult to obtain one, though. The hoops the Ministry makes people jump through are ridiculously involved."

"Really?" Rigel hadn't known that. As long as she could remember, experimental magic had been a normal part of her family's everyday life. Her mother tested experimental products and spells that her company was contracted to certify as safe, and her uncles all had a hand in designing and reworking Marauder products. When James and Sirius casually discussed which versions of what products would be safe to mass distribute and which would have potential for Auror development, it seemed natural to her. Was experimentation truly so uncommon in the wider Wizarding world?

"How can you not know that?" Draco asked, frowning. "I suppose it's easy for the Head Auror to get permits for his joke products. Never mind all the witches and wizards whose applications get turned away by the screening board every year simply because of the nature of their magical heritage."

Dark wizards, she realized he meant. She didn't bother pointing out that James, Sirius, and Remus must have obtained permits long before James and Sirius became distinguished Aurors. The Marauder line was well over a decade old, after all. Instead she asked herself: was it true that ancestrally dark witches and wizards would have a more difficult time obtaining permits to experiment with potentially dangerous spells and potions? Probably, she acknowledged mentally. Was that unjustified, though? She didn't know.

I don't know a lot of things, she thought tiredly.

"I'm sorry for speaking so casually about it," Rigel said after a moment of reflection. "It was such a prominent part of my upbringing that I didn't think to question it before now."

"That makes perfect sense, Rigel," Pansy said smoothly, placing a hand on both Draco and Rigel's arms, as though she could physically diffuse the tension between them. "I had noticed that you never thought it extraordinary that you and your cousin both began experimenting with potions at such a young age."

Rigel blinked, not having thought of that, either. Experimentation always seemed the natural aim of any study of magic, potions included. Why explore a field without the eventual intention to improve it? If you weren't going to contribute anything, why join the dialogue of progress in the first place?

"I suppose," she said, speaking slowly as she tried to work out where the disconnect was, "I must have been too close to the idea to see how unusual it was. As far back as I remember, my cousin and I have read Potions journals and Medical periodicals, and the important articles are always about improvements to the field and newly developing methodologies. All of the adults I grew up with worked in spell development. Even mom, before she passed." Seeing the regretful expressions on her friends' faces, she hurriedly summoned a smile, "So, I really never imagined doing anything else with my life. The more I learn about magic, the more sure I am that everything is connected, that all branches of magic bleed into one another and can be used to advance other fields in surprising ways. I—" she broke off, realizing that she had been speaking a bit too forcefully, saying things she hadn't even known she believed until they spilled out.

"Now I get why you took Magical Theory, at least," Millicent said, smiling bracingly, "Though how you noticed being the only one in there is beyond me."

"There are three people in my class," Rigel said, feeling stupid as she finally woke up to the implication that only three out of about fifty students were even interested in spell-development and the theory of how magic worked across disciplines. And she knew Anthony Goldstein, at least, was only taking the class as a required pre-requisite for the NEWT-level curse-breaking elective.

Draco seemed to thaw a bit at her obviously abashed expression. "Only you could be so entirely oblivious, Rigel."

"Thanks," she said wryly, "I guess that's what I have you guys for."

They left Rigel to pay for her goods with a promise to meet up in Scrivenshaft's in a few minutes. She wasn't yet up to the front of the line when a whirlwind of freckles blew in from behind a large display of fake crystal balls that showed a person's wildest dreams coming true.

"Rigel Black—"

"—as we live and sneeze!"

"The Weasley Twins—in the flesh!" she gasped, affecting a dramatic lurch, "I see the rumors of your early demise were wildly exaggerated."

She was surprised to see a serious grimace exchanged between the two before Fred said, "Not so exaggerated, if you ask some."

"What do you mean?" Rigel asked, shuffling over to make room for them in line, after smiling apologetically to the trio of young Gryffindors in line behind her.

"We're old news," George sighed, leaning his elbow against Rigel's shoulder despondently, "Dried up. Forced into early retirement and replaced by a brighter, younger model."

"But not prettier," Fred said solemnly.

"Right," George sighed, "Probably not prettier."

"You mean the Animators?" Rigel asked, not having to feign a sympathetic grimace. The suit of armor prank had been the talk of the school for at least a week. Somehow a rumor had been started that the group responsible for the prank was called Animators Anonymous, characterized by the trademark of animated objects used in pranks. No one knew whom Animators Anonymous consisted of exactly, but the current running theory supposed them to be a group of highly talented upperclassmen with some kind of agenda. Their two displays so far did seem a bit grandiose for mere pranks, Rigel had to admit.

"It's not that we can't appreciate talent when we see it," George said, rubbing an ear agitatedly, "But we aren't ready to hang up our hats just yet either, you see?"

"You've got something in the works, then?" Rigel asked, leaning in to keep her voice from being overheard.

"Might have," Fred smiled, eyes twinkling in a way Rigel knew from experience meant trouble. "You interested?"

"If you need the help," Rigel said, smiling back. "I know how difficult it can be to… execute in your advanced age."

"Just for that, you can be surprised," George said, laughing.

Rigel chuckled uncomfortably, "I was just joking, George. I'd love to help out."

"No, no, we wouldn't want your smart little motor-mouth to rust, hanging out with the geriatric folk like us," Fred cut in, smirking deviously, "In fact, we'll include something extra special just to keep you on your toes, Rigel."

"Oh, there's really no need," Rigel said, falsely ingratiating.

"Anything for our puppy, right Gred?" George simpered, a proprietary hand guiding her forward a step as the line moved.

"Anything but mercy, Forge," Fred said, his arm looping around George's on her other side.

Rigel just sighed, knowing she had walked right into whatever they had cooked up. Once she'd paid for her armful of gags, the twins waved her off with matching maniacal grins. She set out for Scrivenshaft's with a slight specter hanging over her head, resigned to spending the rest of the week looking over her shoulder. At least she could rest assured they hadn't planned anything for today…probably.

-0

[HpHpHp]

-0

Although Rigel had been to Hogsmeade many times in her youth, she'd never actually eaten at the Three Broomsticks. It was the most commonly used flooing destination in the village, but she didn't know anyone who frequented the pub for its fare. Her dad and his Auror buddies met up at the Leaky Cauldron every now and then, and she knew from overhearing him talk about his work that seedy folk were known to congress at the Hog's Head. There were also a few music bars that she'd heard of (and been forbidden from setting foot in before she turned seventeen), but as far as she knew the Three Broomsticks wasn't an overly popular destination as far as pubs went. She supposed the largest bulk of the Three Broomsticks' business must come from Hogwarts students.

Not that such a business model was unsustainable, Rigel thought wryly as her friends tried to scout a table around lunchtime. It was a large establishment, and it was barely noon, but the main dining room was already brimming with students—even a few Hogwarts staff members.

Through the sea of black robes came a friendly voice.

"Oi! Silver snakes! Over here!" Adrian Pucey called out from a large table by one of the windows.

"He can't possibly be talking to us," Draco said, looking away in embarrassment.

"Oh he's definitely talking to you three," Millicent said, "Don't you know what people call you behind your backs?"

She started toward the table confidently, leaving Pansy, Draco, and Rigel to exchange looks of mild discomfort in her wake.

"I really thought such an uninspired moniker would have died off by now," Pansy said, her mouth in a moue.

"People are much too impressed with their own incredible lameness," Draco grumbled, "Silver snakes indeed."

Rigel shrugged, "At least it's alliterative."

Apparently her comment wasn't deemed worthy of dignifying, for her companions abandoned her on twin sighs without a backwards glance, leaving Rigel the last to arrive at the round, wooden table. Apart from Pucey and Millicent there were several upperclassmen Rigel recognized, including Rosier and Rookwood, as well as the sixth-years Lucian Bole and Peregrine Derrick. She claimed a seat between Pansy and a dark-haired girl she assumed was Pucey's date, judging by the way his arm was slung around the back of her chair.

Rigel thought the girl looked familiar, once she got a good look at her profile. It was Asian in set, and very pretty. She couldn't put her finger on it, however, until the girl turned to her and said, "It's been a while, Rigel—or is it Reggie?"

"Miss Chang," Rigel said, smiling to hide her embarrassment, "You look exceptionally well, today. It seems this past year has agreed with you."

"Careful, Rigel, that's my date," Pucey said, "I'll feel intimidated if you don't explain how you know each other now."

Dismissing the idea that a fifth year like Pucey could ever be intimidated by someone as unassuming as herself, Rigel simply shook her head. "We met in the Library in my first year. It's a credit to Miss Chang's memory that she was generous enough to remember me."

"How could I forget the boy who appeared in my mind to save me from the sleeping sickness?" Chang said, shaking her long hair back with the sort of effortless grace that Rigel had never managed when her own hair had been long.

"I'd forgotten," Pucey said, though his interested glance told Rigel he probably hadn't. "Rigel must know a great many people for similar reasons."

"Not so many," Rigel said sweetly, "Those two weeks blend together after so much time; I almost didn't recognize Miss Chang, even though we'd met outside of a mindscape as well."

"Under circumstances I am forbidden from explicating, if my memory is as good as you say," Chang's voice was even sweeter, and Rigel suppressed a wince as Pucey looked even more curious.

"That was so long ago," Rigel deflected, "How have you been lately, Miss Chang?"

"Just Cho is fine," the fourth-year Ravenclaw smiled, "We are old friends, after all. I've been well, though, as you noted earlier."

"Good," Rigel said, smiling lamely as she glanced around the table for a distraction. The last thing she needed was for someone to press for details surrounding her and Chang's acquaintance. It was embarrassing enough that the Raven knew Rigel had resorted to dressing up as a redheaded Gryffindor in order to gain Library privileges in her first year.

Her eyes met the golden irises of Aldon Rosier across the tabletop and Rigel wasn't sure if she should be relieved or more apprehensive. He smiled slowly at her and Rigel groaned internally. Much more apprehensive, then.

"Speaking of the sickness, you never did tell us how you cured it, Rigel," Rosier said, bringing the attention of the rest of the table to rest on her as well.

"Not much to tell," Rigel muttered into her butterbeer, "It wasn't even a real sickness."

"It was real enough to me," Chang said, shuddering, "I still get nightmares about that sludge invading my mind. You shouldn't downplay it, Rigel."

Rigel grimaced apologetically, but it was Rookwood who said, "Rigel is ever reluctant to tout his own accomplishments. Perhaps you would be so kind as to relieve our curiosity, Miss Chang? If the ordeal brings you no pain to speak of, of course."

"Rigel really never explained his methodology to any of you?" Chang seemed quite taken aback, "It was all we talked about in the Ravenclaw common room for weeks. By pooling together information from all the first and second years afflicted we were able to come to a fairly good understanding of the sickness and its cure." She smiled sheepishly, saying, "I suppose that's a Raven for you, though."

"Our first years were reluctant to recount their experiences," Bole said, looking said first-years over with veiled speculation. Derrick placed a hand on Bole's forearm in a subtle admonishment, and, to Rigel's surprise, after glancing at his fellow sixth-year, Bole reduced his gaze to a gentler curiosity.

"It's not anyone's business," Millicent said, crossing her arms and tilting her head in open challenge, "And Rigel obviously didn't want the attention he was getting. Encouraging gossip and speculation would have been beneath us, as his friends."

Draco nodded at Millicent's words and Pansy raised her chin proudly in agreement.

Rigel felt something warm blossom in her stomach at such a staunch defense. Theo and Blaise must have gone along with it as well, if none of the upperclassmen were any more well-informed about the sickness than they had been two years ago. She truly didn't deserve her friends' loyalty. When Draco glanced at her with a knowing smile tugging at his lips Rigel belatedly tamped down on the feeling as best she could. Having amazing friends was all well and good, of course, but there was no need for them to become smug about it.

"I didn't realize you wanted the cure kept quiet, Rigel," Chang said, apology in every syllable, "None of us would have talked about it if you'd asked—it's the least we owe you."

Now she felt like a churlish villain. "It's all right, Miss—Cho, I mean. I don't talk about it simply because it seems uninteresting to me. I wouldn't deprive the Ravens of satisfying their curiosity—I have learned my lesson on that count, at least."

As she'd intended, the reference to what Chang had told her about the enduring tenacity of a curious Ravenclaw drew a relieved laugh from the older girl.

"Then you no longer intend to deprive the rest of us, either?" Rosier asked smoothly.

Noting that the older Slytherin was rather like a dog with a bone on this subject, Rigel decided to give in as gracefully as she could while backed into a corner. There shouldn't be any harm in telling people now, anyway, over a year after the clamor about the sickness had died down. "What exactly do you wish to know, Rosier?"

He raised a reproving brow at her use of his last name, but still smiled crookedly. "Everything, of course," he said, "But let's start with the ability apparently unique to you that allowed you to, as Miss Chang put it, appear in her mind."

"I can enter people's magical cores," Rigel said bluntly, thinking a simple answer would be less interesting, "That gave me the access needed to bypass the sickness' primary defense. After that, the Mind Healers did the actual curing."

Rosier blinked slowly, "I'm not sure I've ever heard of such a thing. Edmund?"

Rookwood shook his head, "Nothing comes to mind. I'm no expert in the mental arts, however."

"It shouldn't be possible," Bole said, drumming fingers on the table in thought.

Chang leaned forward earnestly, "It's true. Rigel came into my mind through my magical core, and exited the same way. It's the same for all the afflicted students we interviewed. The Mind Healer used the mists to gain entry, we think, but Rigel did something different."

"It isn't possible to enter someone's mind at any point except the mists," Bole argued, sounding certain, "Such a thing would redefine Legilimency completely, undermining the defenses that every Occlumens uses almost without exception.

"I don't know what any of you are talking about," Millicent said flatly, "But Rigel wasn't using Legilimency. That's the point."

"That's incredible," Rosier said, "Is it a natural gift, like your Parseltongue?"

Rigel shook her head, "I don't think so. Maybe. It's not something everyone can do, but I can't just do it without thinking about it, like Parseltongue. It's not that kind of ability."

"It's still very dangerous," Rookwood said, his deep voice rumbling as he lowered it, "It makes sense that you wouldn't casually admit to such a thing."

"Why not?" Chang asked, tilting her head, "It saved us. It could be used in other ways, too, to help people. Rigel's gift should be celebrated, and explored, surely."

Pucey grimaced slightly, "No offense, Cho, but this is why you aren't a Slytherin. The good Rigel did with this ability isn't the point—the problem is the harm he could do."

Chang reared back, looking stung, "Rigel…wouldn't do anything bad with it. Would you?"

"Of course not," Pansy answered for her, sighing, "But the potential for harm will be more important than Rigel's assurances, to some. It's fine if it's just Hogwarts students who talk about it—most have seen the good things Rigel can do with his talents. If it became common knowledge that a dangerous, poorly understood new ability had manifested in a traditionally Dark family tree, though…can you understand why discretion is the wiser choice for Rigel?"

The dark-haired girl nodded slowly, "I didn't think…well, I suppose even though knowledge is inherently innocent, it can sometimes be used for less savory purposes than academic understanding. I won't speak of it so freely in the future, Rigel."

"It's really all right," Rigel said, concerned that her friends were making too much of this, "It's not as dangerous as it sounds. I can't enter a person's core without leaving myself completely vulnerable, mentally and physically. It requires deep meditation, and the transference of my conscious away from my mental defenses. So it's not as though I can just enter someone else's mind on a whim. Learning Legilimency would be more useful, honestly. I think its only purpose would be in Healing, as a matter of fact."

She told herself that its use in bypassing the magical binding Riddle jr. had placed on her was incidental, with circumstances unlikely to reoccur.

"If you think others will see it that way, you are an optimistic fool," Bole said, frowning.

Rigel shrugged, "It's been so long since the sickness, I didn't think others were even thinking about the incident, still."

"Unanswered questions have a way of hanging about," Rosier said, "But this conversation has been ever so demystifying. I find myself less interested in you already, Rigel."

He could not have sounded more insincere, but Rigel smiled gamely at the upperclassman in any case. "Thank you, Aldon."

"Why don't we speak of more entertaining things?" Pansy suggested, drawing the attention away from Rigel, finally. "Does anyone have plans for Samhain?"

"I plan to eat my weight in pumpkin pasties," Millicent said. Everyone chuckled, and the atmosphere around the table relaxed.

"We're having a pumpkin-carving contest in the Ravenclaw tower," Chang said, perking up, "My friend Marietta and I are going to enter our jack-o-lantern. We've been trying to charm it to cackle like a hag, but so far it only chuckles heartily like St. Nickolas."

"You know, I happen to be an expert in Charms," Pucey said, leaning into the girl's space and speaking directly beside her ear, "Maybe I could help you out sometime before Saturday."

"That would be cheating," Chang protested, though Rigel noticed she still smiled shyly at the table.

"Edmund and I have a wager on whether we'll see a prank that night," Rosier said, eyes alight with mischief, "I think the Animators won't miss a chance to give us another show, but Edmund believes the Weasley twins have been biding their time for an answering prank, and will seize on the holiday as an opportune moment."

"Any insider knowledge, Rigel?" Pansy asked, a playful smile in her cheeks, "You're an accessory to many of their pranks, if I'm not mistaken."

"I'm not at liberty to say," Rigel pretended to sniff, "A prank's real value lies in the element of surprise."

"In that case, I'm going to spend Saturday evening making sure Rigel doesn't get into trouble," Draco said, smirking, "He has abominable luck with Halloween for some reason, and there are certain kinds of surprises I've had quite enough of."

"Last year had nothing to do with me," she argued, feeling cold at the memory of that debris-scattered hallway and Neville's stiff, motionless form.

"Not for lack of your trying," Draco scowled, "This year if something happens I expect you to run away from the trouble, not toward it."

"I wish you hadn't said that," Rigel sighed, "Now Fate is going to make things difficult."

"Poor, star-crossed Rigel Black," Rosier drawled.

That would make a very accurate caption for her life, at times, Rigel thought sourly.

That afternoon, their group left the pub and ambled their way through the rest of the shops on their list. Her friends seemed to have forgotten the serious conversation they had over lunch, but Rigel was having trouble letting the implications fall to the back of her mind. She had thought speculation all but died out concerning the events of her first and even second year. The incidents that had faded to only background importance to Rigel's mind still seemed to merit concentrated interest in others', however. Should she be worried that she was still the object of many people's curiosity? It was natural to wonder, she supposed, and things probably seemed more fascinating to people who didn't understand all the underlying facts, but should she work harder at seeming inconspicuous? It couldn't hurt to try, surely. She didn't know what more she could do, though. Her day-to-day routine was about as boring as she could make it—for someone with a complicated double-life and a time-turner, that is.

-0

[HpHpHp]

-0

On Wednesday morning, Rigel received a packet from Archie with several letters enclosed. She tucked it into her bag to go through later, guessing at least one of them was an order list from Krait. He was due to start transitioning some of his stock to winter-appropriate potions like Cold Cures and Warming Solutions.

When she took a moment after lunch to sift through the packet before time-turning back for her morning potions lesson with Snape, Rigel noticed that in addition to the letter from Krait, there was one from Leo as well, and a very thick envelope with Archie's handwriting on the outside. Inside that envelope was a letter from Archie himself, and a letter that seemed to have come from the Department of Mysteries. Suppressing a groan, Rigel ripped open Archie's letter quickly, wondering what the Ministry could possibly want from her now.

Hiya Cuz!

How's Hogwarts? I bet it's cold already. Just know that while you're bracing yourself for winter's worst up there, Hermione and I will be basking in Fall's gentle embrace for a few more months.

Thanks so much for the notes you sent me—with things so clearly explained, I understand a lot more about that potion I mentioned now. It's really gotten my Potions teacher off my back. Some people are just easily pleased I guess—not everyone, though. Remember that annoying request I got a little while ago? It seems my reply wasn't quite enough to appease them. What do you think I should do now? You know I value your input in these sorts of things—I just hate disappointing people.

I know Halloween is coming up, and all I'll say is be careful! Your luck is rotten this time of year, so try to do as many boring, harmless things as possible. No broomstick-riding or dragon-baiting for at least two weeks.

Everything is going swell, here. The amount of classwork we have this year is a little amazing. I'm afraid some of my extracurricular studies may not get my full attention until the winter holidays. I've still found time for a little side project though. You can't see it, but I'm winking at you very smugly. Just wait until you see what I've been working on—it's gonna completely change the way you see me. As in, I'll be so awesome you don't even recognize me.

Stay warm! And try to send more letters to your dad, will you? My parents mentioned he seemed kind of distracted, since we left for school.

With love,

Harry

Rigel tucked Archie's letter away with a frown and opened the letter from the Ministry next. To her relief, it wasn't anything threatening. The Department of Mysteries thanked her for the notes and samples she'd sent, and politely requested notes and samples on any similar potions she had been experimenting with. She wondered if they'd gotten wind of the Modified Weightless Draught Harry had given to Thompson during her internship. It was possible the Guild's Safety Division colluded with the Ministry at times. Or perhaps they wanted the counter-potion, she thought wryly.

To be on the safe side, she decided to send samples of the Modified Weightless Draught, the Shield-Disrupting Potion, the Hair-Changing potion she'd been working on with Archie, and the few other shaped-imbuing projects she'd started working on peripherally in between the internship's conclusion and her thirteenth birthday. She thought it was a bit rude to ask for a potioneer's notes and findings on projects that hadn't been vetted and published by the Guild, but for all she knew this sort of thing was common when dealing with experimental fields.

Judging from what Draco had said in Zonko's, Rigel was probably lucky no one had demanded she get licensed for the potions she experimented with over the summer. It probably helped that the only potions she'd been working on so far weren't dangerous. The Department of Mysteries could have the Modified Weightless Draught and the pranking potions if they really wanted them. Maybe when they saw how juvenile the rest of her work was, they'd stop pestering her and research the subject themselves.

Putting that letter aside as well, all the while mentally setting aside time-turned hours in the Come and Go room to compile her notes yet again and see about re-draining her magic so she could shape-imbue once more. It was going to be a longer week than usual, she thought with only a small amount of irony.

Leo's letter wasn't very long, but the tone was more restless than she was accustomed to receiving from the laidback alleyrat persona he generally adopted.

Harry,

How's school? I hope you're enjoying the warmer weather over there, because it's already turning bitter here in the alleys. Everyone at the Phoenix sends their regards, and my cousin in particular wishes me to tell you how dull she finds the crowd these days. I daresay your good manners have spoiled Rispah for our court's somewhat lackluster refinement. Marek challenged me again this week—I made him regret it this time, though, so he ought to lay low for a while if only to avoid the embarrassment of explaining why his eyebrows have been singed off. I know if you were here you'd have grown them back for him or some such soft-hearted nonsense, so it's probably best for my reputation that you remain so far away.

That's not the only reason I'm glad you're gone, though. We had a real scare the other night, and it wasn't some roughed-up alley dogs looking for trouble like last summer, either. The Ministry conducted a night raid all through the lower alleys—biggest raid we've seen in years, easily. My ears tipped us off ahead of time, naturally, so our people were all well prepared, but the Aurors hit Borgin and Burkes pretty bad. Krait won't tell you this, but his place almost got burned down in a bout of very sloppy crossfire when one of the local covens didn't take too kindly to an unscheduled Ministry intrusion. He's just fine, and his stock was barely singed, but the fact that the Ministry is desperate enough to provoke the Nightwalkers worries me. Whatever they were looking for must have been ugly, and something tells me they haven't found it yet. Wish I knew what it was, Harry. I'd hand it over just to save the alleys all the hassle.

Everybody's on edge, here, and even the folks over on Diagon and down Craftsman Alley are all riled up like a nest of hornets. With this cold weather coming in, it'll quiet down quick, but the winter brings all kind of other problems, of course.

Look at me, whining about my day to you like some tired old man. I just wrote to say I hope things are going well for you, whatever you're up to now.

Stay safe,

-Leo

Harry folded the letter ponderously, wondering at the serious nature of her friend's correspondence. Harry knew Leo's work in the alleys was complicated and often dangerous, but the older boy didn't usually talk about his troubles with her. He must be more overwhelmed than usual, she supposed. It certainly sounded as though things were getting out of hand. A raid on the entire Lower Alleys? The scope of such a thing would be incredible.

She wondered if her father had been involved. He was the Head of the Auror department, so it would make sense. She privately hoped he hadn't been responsible for the damage to Krait's shop, but she knew that her hopes were irrelevant. Part of having friends in the alleys meant that the people she cared about wouldn't always all be on the same side of certain situations. She consoled herself with the knowledge that at least it wasn't any different than what she was doing at Hogwarts, making friends both with prominent Dark scions and children of Light families, too. And she wasn't the only one straddling a dangerous line. Archie and Leo led double lives, too, and Bill Weasley come to that. At least she was in good company.

Speaking of good company, she thought sourly, I've stalled long enough.

She definitely hadn't been avoiding Professor Snape. Their interactions outside of classes were entirely civil, and the psych evaluation had gone nicely, she thought. There was just something about their interactions in class that had…changed in the weeks since his discovery and subsequent disapproval of her suppressor ring. It had taken several days for him to give up attempting to dissuade her from its use. Eventually he'd settled for tossing out sarcastic, biting comments whenever a particularly difficult potion gave her dampened magical core a strenuous workout, and even though she thought he would come to accept her right to make the decision she had in the end, she was getting tired of wondering when they'd settle back into the more casual mentorship relationship they'd had before things had gotten so out of sorts.

Steeling herself against the passive vitriol she knew would be coming her way momentarily, Rigel reached into her robes and pulled out the pretty golden chain. She wondered why all the adults she knew were so inclined to assume they knew best for everyone. Maybe if she used the time-turner often enough, that ever-vaulted maturity that supposedly came with age would help her understand. Judging by examples like James and Sirius, however, Rigel suspected that the problem with her lack of comprehension wasn't a difference in age but rather a completely antithetical system of beliefs and experiences.

Resigned to simply viewing the world differently than most people, Rigel turned the hourglass over in her hands, and blurred through space once more.

-0

[HpHpHp]

-0

Halloween morning dawned quietly, but Rigel knew it wouldn't stay that way. Everyone was ecstatic about the upcoming feast, and since it was Saturday they had the whole day to enjoy the festivities. The castle was decorated lavishly, with cobwebs strung up artistically in nearly every available corner, suits of armor charmed to moan eerily if someone got too close, and even transfigured bats that swooped in droves out of nowhere every now and then to scare a group of students silly.

The Great Hall was only modestly decked out at breakfast, but everyone knew it would be a treat to see later that night when the elves got through with it. They ate lightly, anticipating a very heavy meal that evening, and absolutely no one felt like discussing schoolwork, so they laughed and joked and forgot about being students for a while. The mail came and went with little festivity, but long after the owls had left, just as the meal was winding down, a large origami flower fluttered in through the doors on a gentle breeze.

The flower twirled and danced above students' heads, and one by one people tapped their friends curiously on the shoulder, craning their necks to see where it was headed. It looped around the hall twice before making its lazy way toward the Slytherin table. When it began to spin in place above Rigel's head, she tried not to groan aloud. Whatever it was, it was sure to be troublesome.

The paper flower stopped spinning after a moment and softly floated down to land in her lap. Rigel glanced up to see the eyes of the entire Great Hall upon her, several hundred curious students and staff members, and she knew that she couldn't just pretend it had disappeared. She picked the origami construction up gingerly and opened it as the hall held its collective breath.

Inside, in standard dicto-quill writing, were just three words: Sorry In Advance. The words were followed by a pair of smiley faces, and Rigel didn't even have time to curse the Weasley twins' good names before people all over the hall were gasping and pointing in flurried commotion. She looked up and saw several dozen paper flowers fly in through the doors from the Entrance Hall, swirling through the air in a dizzying spectacle. More and more origami flowers floated into the room, filling up the space above their heads.

One by one the other flowers, too, seemed to find a certain recipient and come to a slow spin before stopping and gently falling into the chosen person's lap. Rigel looked around, and couldn't help but be amused at the excitement and confusion on the students' faces as everyone—actually every single person that Rigel could see—eventually received a paper flower.

Murmurs and bits of laughter broke out as students began unfolding their flowers and reading the inside. Rigel leaned over the table and asked, "What do they say?"

"What did yours say?" Millicent asked, looking bewilderedly down at her flower.

"Something ominous," Rigel grimaced, a little worried now.

"Well mine says, 'Your history of magic essays speak eloquently to the problems facing our society, even though everyone knows Binns doesn't even read them. For going beyond expectations, you deserve a…sticker.'" Millicent shook her head, "It's signed 'all the dead famous people' and there actually is a sticker taped in here that says 'excellent effort.'"

"What?" Rigel let out a little laugh in sheer disbelief, "I don't get it."

"Mine says, 'Thank you for re-alphabetizing the biographies section in the library when you noticed they were mixed up, love, Madam Pince,'" Blaise said, looking torn between confusion and unease.

"I don't think she wrote it," Theo said, his cheeks a little pink, "Mine says, ah, 'It takes a true gentleman to sit in Madam Puddifoot's for three hours and not stare at your date's cleavage even once. Our hats off to you—the gentleman's club. P.S. she's not the one.'"

"It can't possibly say that," Pansy said, her lips twitching, "A gentleman? You, Theo?"

"I can be," Theo muttered, looking very embarrassed, but also a bit pleased.

"What does yours say, Pans?" Draco asked, an odd expression on his face as he looked down at his flower.

Pansy glanced at Rigel with a quizzical expression, "Mine is from Rigel, supposedly." Rigel blinked at her friend in surprise. "Here, it says, 'your charm and generosity cast a light on all who meet you' and it's signed 'Rigel Black.' Did you write these, Rigel?"

Rigel shook her head slowly as her friends turned to look at her, "No, I didn't. I mean, I agree, Pan, but I'm afraid I didn't write these."

"So you didn't write mine, either, I take it?" Draco asked, still looking at his.

"No," Rigel said, "I had nothing to do with this prank."

"Why, what does yours say, Draco?" Blaise asked, a sly expression on his face.

Draco haughtily folded it up and placed it in his breast pocket, "Wouldn't you like to know."

"Did everyone get one of these?" Millicent asked, awe in her voice, "I mean, there's hundreds of students in Hogwarts, and the staff have got them, too."

"And how do they know these things?" Theo asked, coughing, "I mean, they're right about Padma, but I didn't talk to anyone about that date."

They were not the only ones who seemed perplexed. All around them students seemed to be debating the issue.

"It thanks me for telling off that third year for not washing his hands before leaving the bathroom, and it's signed 'the hygiene police,'" one prefect from the table next to them was saying, "But how could anyone possibly know that? And why would they thank me for something so ridiculous?"

"Mine says 'you're a ray of sunshine in the mornings even on double potions days—"

"Don't know how they heard about my extra credit assignment for McGonagall—"

"—must have been watching me practice if whoever wrote this saw the improvement in my barrel rolls—"

"—signed the 'kindness elves'—"

And on it went. Rigel couldn't help but be amazed at how much time and detail had gone into the scope of this prank. It had to have been the big one the Weasley Twins had been working on, especially as they made good on their promise to embarrass her by sending her flower in all alone ahead of the rest. She wondered why her flower had said 'sorry in advance' instead of just 'sorry,' though. She'd gotten it after being embarrassed, after all.

She might have continued to wonder, if a Ravenclaw girl with long, scraggly blonde hair and enormous eyes hadn't walked up beside their table and said, "You're Rigel Black, right?"

Rigel turned away from the table to say, "Yes, that's me. Have we met?"

"Not yet," the girl said, smiling vaguely, "I'm Luna. I just came to thank you for the flower."

"The…" Rigel looked down at the paper flower in the girl's hands. Surely they didn't.

"I'm not sure who told you about my search for the Crumple-Horned Snorkack, but your words of encouragement are very touching," the Ravenclaw girl smiled serenely once more, and left.

Rigel turned back to her friends with a sense of dread, "I didn't write that one, either."

"Do you think whoever did this signed your name to any more?" Pansy asked, tentatively.

Rigel didn't have to answer, as not a moment later a group of Hufflepuffs all came giggling to their table and thanked Rigel profusely for "such kind, insightful words" and asked her where she'd come up with "an idea so thoughtful and creative." No amount of protestations convinced them that Rigel wasn't the one responsible, and they left with lilting laughter at her helpless expression.

Nor were they the last. It seemed a very large number of flowers had come with her name attached to them, and for some reason, likely because Fred and George thought it would embarrass her more, it wasn't any of the funny or casual praise that her name appeared after. It was inevitably the most sincere, softhearted messages that were attributed to her, and all throughout the day random people she didn't know smiled at her in the hallways or gave her puzzled but friendly expressions from across a room.

It did not help that her friends were openly amused at her expense as the morning went on.

"It isn't funny," Rigel groaned after she once again failed to convince a pair of sixth-year Gryffindors that she knew nothing about their love lives, despite the apparently touching messages of encouragement they'd received in her name.

"It's pretty funny," Millicent said, leaning back on the blanket they were all sharing. It was chilly out on the grounds, but they all agreed they'd be missing the sun when winter really set in, so the six of them were bundled in scarves, watching some first-year Hufflepuffs trying to rake up a pile of leaves without getting too close to the Whomping Willow.

"The whole school thinks I'm some kind of misty-eyed do-gooder now," Rigel sighed, burying her face in her knees as yet another group of curious students stared at her while crossing the lawn.

"Just think of it this way," Theo grinned, "You could pull any guy or girl in the whole school right now. I heard they're calling you 'Romantic Rigel' already."

"Please tell me you made that up," Rigel closed her eyes against the mortified heat in her face.

"Do I strike you as the creative type, Rigel?" Theo asked.

"Everyone is going to think I'm a crazy stalker, too," she realized, already picturing the suspicious looks. How on earth had the Weasley twins managed to get information on the whole school, anyway? Didn't they have better things to do?

"No one thinks you're a stalker," Pansy said bracingly, "Most of the people smart enough to be wary of whoever knows so much about them are also smart enough to realize that you would be too smart to sign your name to the information if you were smart enough to obtain it in the first place."

"Oh yeah, that much is obvious," Theo said, laughing at Pansy as the blonde girl wriggled her nose in response to his teasing.

"It is," Pansy insisted, "So Rigel really only has to worry about all the people who aren't smart enough to figure that out. Those are the ones who think you're a great big pile of goo."

"Thanks, Pan," Rigel said, "I feel much better."

"It's not that bad," Draco said, smiling, "Remember when everyone thought you were setting Slytherin's monster on unsuspecting Hufflepuffs? That was worse."

"All attention is bad attention," Rigel grumbled, "Just when people were starting to forget about that mess, too."

"I really hate to break this news to you, Rigel," Blaise said, affecting a mournful expression, "But no one is even close to forgetting about that mess. You should embrace your celebrity status with grace. Use your fame and—well, just fame so far, as you haven't got a fortune yet—to raise awareness for good causes."

"And whatever you do, don't sleep with your manager," Theo drawled.

They all laughed, and Rigel supposed she could see the humor in it—but that didn't meant she was going to take this lying down. The Weasley twins were absolutely going to pay. The only questions were when, where, and how much they would squirm before Rigel was satisfied. It seemed she would be writing to Archie about more than shaped-imbuing this week. She needed his expertise to pull off something truly…appropriate. The punishment should fit the crime, after all.

-0

[HpHpHp]

-0

Despite the eyes that followed her and the burning need to strangle a couple of redheads, Rigel was relatively relaxed as she entered the Great Hall later that night for the Halloween feast. She'd spent most of the day mortified and exasperated, it's true, but on the other hand, the worst was now over. Her annual Halloween bad luck had to have been used up on the prank and its aftermath, which meant for once she could enjoy the rest of the holiday in peace.

All right, maybe peace wasn't quite the word to describe the orgy of sugar consumption going on against a backdrop of cheesy horror that was the Halloween Feast, but she was determined to have fun, at least.

She was a little late getting there, as she'd stopped by to check on Remus beforehand, so her friends were probably already seated. She didn't think they'd begrudge her tardiness this year, though. It was the first night of the full moon, and even as Rigel, she couldn't quite quell Harry's need to make sure everything was in order with the Wolfsbane potion. She could tell he was bemused by 'Archie's' newfound interest in the subject, but she credited working with Professor Snape on the modifications last spring to explain it. All thoughts of her uncle faded from her mind, however, as she gazed at the revelry around her.

Thousands of candles hovered above their heads, and yet each was no brighter than a flickering will-o-the-wisp. The semi-darkness added to the excitement and mystery of the event, and everywhere along the house tables various dishes and goblets glowed orange, green, and yellow. The ghosts were enjoying themselves this year, as well; the laughter and chatter were interspersed with the occasional shout of fright as one of those silvery forms suddenly burst up through a table or swooped down from above.

Before sitting down with her friends, however, she made a beeline for the Gryffindor table.

"So there I was, between a river and a very scratchy place, when—Rigel!" Fred laughed nervously as she oh-so-casually dropped into a seat beside him, "What brings you to our humble table tonight? Finally figured out the pumpkin pasties are sweeter over here?"

"They can't be as sweet as that lovely flower I received this morning," Rigel said, "If only I knew who to thank."

"All right, nothing to see here, people," George said loudly, jumping up from his own place next to Fred and taking Rigel's elbow with an insistent flourish. "Let's have a chat, then, eh?"

He and Fred together towed her toward one of the many arched windows that stood in a long row along one side of the hall. When they were sufficiently away from prying ears, Rigel took back her arms and folded them in open displeasure. "Do you know how many people think I'm a sappy, naïve twit right now?" she asked.

"No one thinks that," Fred waved her words aside with an air of supreme unconcern.

"Everyone loved the flowers, Rigel," George added, smiling winningly.

"That's not the point," Rigel said, eyes narrow, "They're associating the flowers with me, which means every time they talk about the prank, they're talking about me. You know I hate attention—"

"We did apologize for it," George cut in.

"In advance, even," Fred nodded sagely.

Rigel huffed out a laugh against her will, "Some advanced notice. Wasn't sending me the first flower bad enough? Why link me to all those notes?"

"Not all of them," George rolled his eyes, "Only the really nice ones. It's a good thing if people think you're nice, Rigel."

"We are your PR team, after all," Fred added, grinning, "You've already won them over with your mysterious healing abilities and your daring monster-slaying nerve. That's Ravenclaw and Gryffindor taken care of already! This is about getting Hufflepuff to your side. Now, you've got the whole school in your corner!"

"Except all the Slytherins wondering how I got so much personal information on them," Rigel groaned.

"Which was not easy, by the way," George sighed.

"Besides…um…" Fred scratched his head, "House loyalty?"

"Slytherins," Rigel said.

"Right. Well, we'll win them back with our next prank, then," Fred said brightly, "It'll have to be something really sneaky."

"No more tying me to pranks!" Rigel tried to sound firm, "I'm not running for president of the school."

"Although you would certainly bring a lot of charisma to the job," George said, voice thoughtful.

"Why not take credit for it yourselves?" Rigel sighed, "You put all that effort into it, even getting all the flowers to somehow go to the right people—"

"Modified the spell Ministry officials use to send inter-departmental memos," Fred said.

"Dad was ever so nervous about teaching it to us," George recalled.

"Can't imagine why," Fred shrugged.

"—and all that time spent digging up dirt on people—"

"Not dirt!"

"More like daisies, really."

"—so why put my name on it?" Rigel finished, exasperated.

Fred and George exchanged a long look.

"You're right, it was a lot of work," George said, inspecting his fingernails, "We had to eavesdrop on all the biggest gossipmongers, break into a few teachers' student files, go undercover in various common rooms, follow, ask about, and basically investigate every single person in this entire school. But it was worth it! Did you see people's faces today? No one can believe the amount of work that must have gone into this—everyone is impressed, whether they appreciate pranks or not. Even Percy looked vaguely approving today."

"It's so much better than animating a bunch of fruit, anyway," Fred said, sniffing.

"But it's not us, Rigel," George said, his voice softer now, "No one takes the Weasley twins seriously. If we'd signed our names, the messages would have been treated as a joke—as something insincere, when they weren't. Somewhere in the midst of this prank we actually got to know the entire school, and the notes were supposed to be heartfelt."

"Which no one would believe, coming from us, but which people might believe coming from the notoriously serious and soft-spoken Rigel Black," Fred said.

"People are going to figure out I didn't do it pretty soon," Rigel said, frowning.

"But the prank will still be associated with you, like you said," George pointed out. "The name Rigel Black in turn will be associated with kind words, thoughtful notes, etc, don't you see how it's a win-win?"

"It's a lie," Rigel said, still troubled. She didn't want to be known for anything, as Rigel Black.

"Lies aren't always bad," Fred said.

She found that she couldn't argue with that without being a complete hypocrite, so she simply shook her head, "Well, I guess you win this time. You really got me good," she added with a wry smile.

"No less than you deserve," George said, smiling once more, "Calling us old men like that—the nerve."

At Rigel's disbelieving look, Fred said, "Well, okay, we were going to use your name all along, but after Zonko's we didn't feel as bad about it."

Rigel chuckled softly, "Fair enough. I'll let you get back to the feast, now. Sorry for getting my back up about all this. I ought to know better how to be a good sport, with my family."

"All's forgiven," George said, slinging an arm around her shoulders.

"So this means we've got the green light on the next one, too?" Fred asked, adding his arm on top of George's.

Rigel ducked out and turned to favor them with a droll look, "Sometimes our friendship worries me."

She left to the sound of twin laughs and wove her way back to the Slytherin table to join her friends. From the flickering of the lanterns on the tables, it looked like she'd get a seat just in time to hear Dumbledore's Halloween speech.

"So was it the Weasley twins who wrote those things, Rigel?" Millicent asked as she sat down, apparently having seen her talking to them.

"I asked them, but they denied it," Rigel sighed for good measure, "Who knows?"

"I heard Professor McGonagall's said 'you look hot with your hair down' and was signed 'the bedroom fairy,'" Theo said, waggling his eyebrows.

"That can't possibly be true," Draco scoffed, "McGonagall would still be livid if someone sent her a note like that this morning."

They all turned to look up at the Head Table, noting that Professor McGonagall was looking much too fond of the children beneath her gaze to have been the recipient of such a message. Rigel found her eyes drifting over to Professor Snape, who was seated in between Flitwick and an empty chair that was probably meant for Pettigrew, since he appeared to be the only Professor not yet present. She wondered if Snape had gotten a flower that morning, too, or if the Weasley twins had simply been too sane to attempt to give him one. Rigel closed her eyes for a moment to pray to any gods who might be listening that Samhain that if Snape had received a flower it wasn't one of the ones with her name on it.

When she opened her eyes once more, the Headmaster was standing before them, smiling genially.

"Welcome, everyone, to this year's Halloween Feast!" he said, gesturing to the hall with both hands, "Let's have a cheer for our magnificent house elves, who have put their hearts into the decorations once again."

There was a loud round of approval from the students, although Rigel noticed that most seemed to be applauding the house elves ironically, rather than in any true spirit of gratitude. She made a mental note to visit the kitchens tomorrow and tell Binny what a nice job they'd done.

Dumbledore waved his hands, and said, "Yes, yes, marvelous. This month's jack-o-lantern carving competition was judged this afternoon by our Head Girl, Miss Clearwater, and I hope everyone finds the time to stop by the Library before the weekend is out to see the first prize and runners up on display. Thank you to all who participated, and congratulations to Mr. Oliver Wood, whose Quidditch-inspired design has won him twenty galleons, and ten points extra credit towards his Transfiguration mark."

There was another short round of applause, but before it had a chance to die down, the air was split with a horrible, deafening screech. Students everywhere hunched over in pain as what sounded like a thousand screaming banshees rent the hall, echoing and filling their heads with white-hot vibrations.

The sound cut off all of a sudden, and Rigel looked up, still slightly stunned, to see Dumbledore brandishing his wand as something like a silvery bubble expanded to encompass the entire hall.

"Students, remain where you are," the Headmaster called over the confused and frightened yelling, "Filius, Severus, with me."

The old wizard, flanked by his Masters of Potions and Charms, strode quickly out of the Great Hall. As the three of them exited the periphery of the silver bubble of magic Dumbledore had cast, they all three cast what Rigel assumed was muffling charms on their ears.

"What could make such a noise?" someone wondered allowed.

"Merfolk," Pansy said quietly. Rigel turned and caught her friend's worried expression, "There would have to be hundreds of them above water-level to make such a sound, though. What could they possibly want?"

"Something desperately," Blaise said, frowning, "It hurts their voices to speak above ground, so if they're clamoring for something so loudly, it's got to be important."

"THE GIANT SQUID'S GONE MAD!"

Everyone spun to look at the small boy who was standing at one of the windows and waving his arms wildly, "IT'S ATTACKING!"

"What in Merlin's name—" Draco got no further as students all around them erupted into panicked screams. The prefects attempted to restore order and McGonagall was shouting something from the Head Table, but everywhere Rigel turned there was mass confusion. Students got up and ran to the windows to see what was happening, Theo and Millicent among them, and before Rigel could figure out what was going on, Draco collapsed sideways into her, his head in his hands.

"Shit," was all Rigel could think to say as her friend shook uncontrollably against her side. She wrapped one stabilizing arm around Draco and used the other to dig her ever-present bag from under the table and thrust it into Pansy's lap, as hers was currently half-occupied with an armful of slumping Draco.

"What's wrong with him?" Pansy demanded, her fear etching grooves of worry beneath her cheekbones

"Later," Rigel said, already rummaging for her potions kit, "Hold the bag open for me."

Pansy did so without further questions, angling it toward the light of the nearest glow-lamp so Rigel could find what she was looking for. A few moments later, a Calming Draught and a Suppressant Potion she'd taken to carrying around just in case found their way to her fingers and she thrust them at Pansy wordlessly. The blonde girl mechanically uncorked them and, with Rigel's help, they forced the potions down Draco's throat in quick succession.

It took almost half a minute, but soon Draco's eyes were fluttering back open and he was gasping for breath against Rigel's shoulder.

"Can you hear me?" Rigel asked, feeling a bit useless as she rubbed his back the way Lily used to rub hers when she had a stomachache.

Draco nodded, then winced, rubbing his forehead, "Thanks."

"Draco, are you all right?" Pansy asked, her soft tone belied by the sharp concern in her eyes.

"I'll be fine, as soon as we get out of here," Draco said, grimacing as he pulled away from Rigel and sat up, "What's going on?"

"We aren't sure yet," Rigel said, trying to make sense of what everyone was shouting around them.

Blaise appeared out of the mass of hysterical students just then, sliding onto the bench next to Pansy and speaking quickly, "Dumbledore's gone down to the lake with Snape and Flitwick. The Giant Squid looks like it's trying to climb out of the water for some reason, and the merfolk seem to be arguing with the Headmaster over something. No one really knows what's going on, but the Professors look like they've got the squid under control, for now."

"That's good," Pansy said, visibly regaining her composure, "I'm certain this will be resolved in short order. When Professor Dumbledore makes his way back here to release us, we can—"

She was cut off by a cry of, "THE CENTAURS HAVE REVOLTED TOO!"

"That's it!" Draco growled amidst renewed shrieks and shouts, "We're going to get over there and see what's going on."

"Good luck," Blaise scoffed, "I barely got back here."

"Rigel, Pansy, V-formation shields on my count," Draco snapped, pushing someone aside so he had room to stand and snapping his wrist to deposit his wand into his hand.

Rigel and Pansy nodded, standing as well with minor difficulty. Rigel shouldered her book bag, just so it wouldn't get lost in the confusion, and palmed her wand as well. With Draco in the point position, they all three cast simultaneous physical shields, with Rigel's and Pansy's angled 45 degrees to either side of Draco's, creating the 'V' the formation was named for. Draco had taught it to them in their dueling lessons the previous week, and Rigel supposed they'd see if it was useful in a crowd.

The three of them, standing tightly together, began slowly pushing their way through the crowd. They had to be careful not to walk too quickly, as the shields would be doing all of the 'pushing' and they didn't want to hurt anyone, so it took a couple of minutes to displace enough people to carve a path for themselves to the windows, but eventually they reached their goal.

Looking out the window over the moonlit lawn, Rigel almost wished they hadn't.

The Black Lake was in turmoil. Water churned and frothed as a myriad of tentacles swarmed out of the depths and attempted to climb the shore. She could see Professor Snape and Professor Flitwick clearly by the light of their wands as they worked in tandem, sending spell after spell at the giant squid in an effort to contain it. Rigel couldn't imagine why the squid would be trying to get out of the lake, unless there was some sort of danger within. Was that why the merfolk had abandoned their submerged city and come to congregate on the surface as well? She could see Dumbledore shouting at a merman whose pearlescent crown glinted in the moonlight. The merman appeared to be shouting back, along with dozens of other merpeople, who were brandishing their tridents and pointing long, webbed fingers toward the castle.

"Maybe something dangerous has gotten into the lake," Pansy said, squinting through the window between Draco and Rigel.

"That doesn't explain what the centaurs are doing," Draco said, shaking his head.

Rigel turned toward the forest, where a massive heard of the proud four-legged beings swarmed along the edges, clearly agitated. They didn't seem nearly as distressed as the merfolk, but there was something certainly sinister in the way they moved, slowly but steadily, along the tree line toward the castle.

"Where is Peter?" she could hear McGonagall's voice cutting through the panic and looked over to see the older witch standing not far from Rigel and her friends, "Where is our Magical Creatures expert?"

Rigel thought that was a very good question, and sighed at the dramatic irony of Fate when she heard Professor Trelawney's distinctive voice say breathlessly, "He has not emerged from his chambers all day, Minerva. I shall go and seek him out!" She scurried away toward the Entrance Hall, looking quite pleased for an excuse to get away from the commotion.

Professor Sprout squeezed by Draco to reach McGonagall, panting, "Poppy is working in the dungeons tonight, Minerva. She'll need to be notified in case Severus or Filius require medical attention when this is through."

"Go help her ready the infirmary," McGonagall said briskly, "First find Professor Binns and request that he inform the Fat Lady of the trouble and tell her to stay in her frame in case we need to evacuate the students."

The Hufflepuff Head of House bustled off with a curt nod, and Rigel couldn't help but wonder at the Deputy Headmistress' forethought. How many such emergencies had she dealt with, exactly? Thinking back over the last two years, Rigel allowed that it had probably been quite a few.

Rigel turned back to watch the merpeople, some of whom were now struggling to get closer to shore, but seemed to be having trouble moving past the writhing tentacles that had once again escaped the professors' control.

"Dumbledore seems confused about what the merfolk want," Pansy noted, "It's not as though they can all actually get out of the lake, after all, so you'd think the Headmaster would be doing something about whatever's bothering them."

"Maybe they don't know what the problem is, either," Draco said, "The odds of the centaurs and the merpeople both becoming agitated at the same time…what are they doing now?"

He was referring to the centaurs, who, without any apparent reason, suddenly split their ranks into two, those in the center galloping toward the edges while those on the fringes of the herd dove quickly out of the way. Then, through the wide path that had emerged in less than a few seconds, came a swarm of stampeding giant spiders headed straight up the lawn toward the castle.

"What the—" Draco broke off with a quiet grunt as the boy next to him panicked, pushing his way backwards from the window violently.

The spiders were advancing quickly—faster than Rigel had seen anything that big ever move. She supposed eight legs gave quite an advantage in speed.

"They're coming this way!" People were screaming all around them.

"Barricade the front doors!" she heard McGonagall shout, her voice magnified over several times. Rigel saw Professor Sinistra, Professor Burbage, and Madam Hooch rushing out of the Great Hall to help bar the Entrance Hall doors, but as she turned back toward the rushing spiders, she had a sinking feeling they weren't going to head for the traditional entryway. They looked too mindless, too rabid.

"The windows," Rigel muttered, seeing those multi-jointed legs and easily picturing them scaling stone walls. She looked around the hall frantically, but to her dismay she could not see a single staff member nearby. McGonagall must have run to assist the others with the entrance doors.

"What?" Draco asked, distracted.

"The windows," Rigel said, more forcefully this time, realizing someone needed to take over command inside the hall, "They're going to climb the walls."

The students around her who'd heard all surged backwards away from the glass with varying degrees of horror. Only Pansy and Draco stayed composed.

"What do we do?" Pansy asked, gripping her wand tightly.

"Barricade them, same as the doors," Rigel said quickly, "Let's use the tables."

"EVERBODY AWAY FROM THE WINDOWS!" Draco bellowed in a way Rigel had never imagined him doing, but it was certainly effective. All along the wall students scurried backwards. "EVERYONE PUSH THIS TABLE UP AGAINST THE WINDOWS! NOW!" he shouted, motioning for those around the closest table running parallel to the windows to help him push it.

"It's too heavy," Rigel said, seeing the way even a dozen students' straining muscles barely convinced the heavy tables to slide a few feet toward the windows. "Clear everyone out of the way."

Draco and Pansy cast shield charms and carefully expanded them to press all the students packed between the table and the wall toward the ends of the hall and out of the way, even pushing some over the top of the table to the other side, shouting, "MOVE IT! NOW!"

While they worked, Rigel closed her eyes and tapped into her core with urgency. It stirred willingly enough, or at least the part of it she had access to with the suppressor on did. She briefly considered taking the ring off, but then realized any spell she tried with her magic beyond her control would probably blow up in her face.

"Rigel!" Pansy called, drawing her back from her moment of doubt. The space between the long house table and the wall of windows was vacated. It was now or never.

She let the flow of magic consume her, sweeping out from her wand to encompass the entirety of the enormous table in an overpowered levitating charm, and asked, called for her magic's help with this task. As she wove the magic, a window on the left side of the hall burst inwards, glass tinkling to the ground as a long, hairy leg hooked itself through the frame. Amid the screams, Rigel let her magic pulse forward, catapulting the table in one swift movement forward over her own head, turning it mid-leap so that its sturdy wooden top flattened itself against the windows with a deafening crash. Food flew everywhere, covering the floor and her head. She ignored it, pinning the table in place with sheer willpower, checking to see that it was long enough to cover all the windows along the hall. It was, but it wasn't quite wide enough, she realized with a grimace. About a foot of space was left between the upright edge of the table and the top of the arching windowpanes.

Window after window cracked and rained glass inwards as a multitude of legs grasped for purchase on the outer wall of the castle. Rigel was starting to sweat with the strain of the magic she wielded, but in the background of her concentration she could hear prefects attempting some form of order now that students were more concerned for their own personal safety than for satisfying their curiosity.

"Younger students toward the back of the hall!" she could hear Percy Weasley shouting. "Those who know 'Evanesco,' get rid of this glass!"

A stunner flew over Rigel's head and impacted one of the furry legs feeling its way around the small opening above the table. The leg curled back immediately, but as other students began similarly stunning the legs they could get a good shot at, Rigel heard a bellowing cry shout, "No! Don't hurt 'em!" from behind her.

Hagrid, she realized, and hoped for his sake that the spiders weren't being seriously injured as they dropped off the castle walls to the lawn. She doubted the stunners would keep the spiders down for long, in any case—Acromantula were notoriously spell-resistant. Rigel had other things to worry about, however, as her arm was beginning to shake with the amount of magic running through it to keep the table in place. She could feel her core's available magic beginning to dip below comfortable levels.

"I need help," she called over her shoulder, "Can anyone do a really strong levitating spell? Or a sticking charm?"

Twin voices called out from the crowd loud and clear, "We can do it!"

Rigel glanced behind her, careful not to disrupt the magic keeping the table up, and was more than a little shocked to see two small Slytherin boys break away from the chaos. They rolled up their sleeves and came to either side of her. "We'll make the table take some of the weight," one of them said. His twin nodded seriously, and they both held their bare hands out toward the table.

Rigel wondered what on earth they were going to do without wands. A few moments later, however, she could feel the toll that the table had been taking on her magic lesson, then lighten to an easily sustainable level. She looked over to see the young twins rigid with focus. One of them spared her a grin, though, and said, "What, like it's hard?"

"You're the Animators," Rigel said quietly, her lips tilting up in a smile as it clicked, "And you're both actual animators, aren't you?" Animation was quite a rare gift, as she understood it, and unusual to have manifested before their cores had finished developing. They must be either incredibly talented or naturally powerful. Rigel was lucky to have such effective help with the barricade, though she wondered if animation became more difficult the larger the object to be animated or if it took more skill than endurance. She would have to ask when this was all over.

"Mums the word," the one on her left said cheekily, as though he knew what she was thinking, "Literally, though—we get it from our mum's side."

They both laughed before focusing completely on the table once more.

Rigel was beginning to wonder what had happened to all of the professors when McGonagall came tearing up beside them with her wand out, "Can you hold it, Mr. Black? The Entrance Hall is being pummeled, and we can't spare the staff until it's completely warded. Just our luck the warding expert is outside with Albus," she added in a growl Rigel didn't think she was meant to hear.

"We've got it for now, Professor," Rigel said, panting just a little.

She nodded sharply, then turned to survey the crowd, "Argus! Argus where are—oh!"

Filch appeared a moment later, a shaking kitten in his arms that Rigel had heard he'd taken to calling 'Miss Norrie' in remembrance of his old familiar. "Yes, ma'am," he said, standing at attention.

"All prefects are to prepare their houses for evacuation. The upper levels may not be secure if these spiders climb any higher, so Gryffindor will go with Hufflepuff to the basement common room—no, don't argue! This is no time for house secrecy. The Ravenclaws will bunker in the Slytherin dungeon, as well. Send the Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs first, with the Head Boy, then the other two houses with the Head Girl."

"What about the noise?" Filch scowled, "Not enough staff to stick 'em all with deafening charms quick enough, unless you can do what the Headmaster done in here."

Another window pane crashed inward and McGonagall swore colorfully, "You're right, there isn't time. Too much exposure to the sound will damage their eardrums. And Poppy is still in the Hospital Wing…" More cursing. Rigel saw the twin to her right fighting a grin as he, like her, eavesdropped shamelessly. "All right. Here's what we do," McGonagall decided, "When the barricade is finished in the Entrance Hall, we'll—"

She broke off as a hysterical Professor Trelawney rocketed out of the crowd and collapsed in the Deputy Headmistress' arms.

"Sybill, what on earth are you doing?" McGonagall demanded, "Where is Professor Pettigrew?"

"Couldn't—not—trapped—" Trelawney broke off with a huge gasp of air and then slumped dramatically, "It's the werewolf, Minerva—he's loose."

"What!?" McGonagall lowered her voice to a near-hiss.

"The beast has trapped Pettigrew in his rooms, pacing outside the door and howling, Minerva. I barely escaped with my life. If only I'd had time to do a second tea reading this morning, I might have been able to prevent—"

"Yes, yes," McGonagall thrust the woman away from her impatiently. "That's all we need. If Remus has lost his mind to the wolf, then moving students in the hallways is out of the question, even in the lower levels. There's no way to track him quickly enough if he moves."

"Can't you send Hagrid to put him down or—"

At Trelawney's words, Rigel's focus slipped completely in blind panic. Put Remus down? They couldn't—

The table slipped two inches toward the floor as both boys beside her gave out surprised grunts. She struggled to get the magic back under control, but she was too numb with fear and helplessness at the mere thought of what might happen to Remus. A rogue werewolf was completely fair game, as far as the Ministry was concerned. He could be murdered, and it wouldn't even be considered a crime. And if he hurt someone defending himself, then his life would be forfeit anyway by default.

The table was vibrating now. "Hey," one of the twins glared at her, "Settle it down, Black!"

"Mr. Black!" McGonagall brandished her wand at the table and it stopped shaking immediately, pinned by fresher, stronger magic than what Rigel had been working. The two younger Slytherins slumped and stretched their arms out with relief.

"I'll take it from here, boys," McGonagall said, her mouth thin, "Thirty points to Slytherin. Now move toward the back of the hall, where it's safer."

The other two scurried off toward where the rest of the students were congregating, as far from the windows as possible, but Rigel stayed put. "You can't hurt Remus, Professor. I know he took his potion tonight—I watched him!"

"In case you haven't noticed, Mr. Black, the creatures of this school have gone feral tonight, regardless of their previous sanity, apparently," McGonagall snapped, stress in every line of her face. At Rigel's despairing look, she softened minutely, "I'll do my best to see he isn't harmed, Mr. Black."

Rigel nodded slowly, but in her mind she wondered how McGonagall could see to Remus' safety, when she was worried over the safety of all the students at the same time.

"Argus, when the barricade is finished I will send a patronus to Poppy telling them to ward off the Hospital Wing and remain there until further notice. They'll be safe enough," she said, half to herself, "If the students are to remain in here, however, we need to take more proactive measures. When the others are done at the front doors, we will set up a protective barrier around one half of the Great Hall. Keep the students behind it, then create a small opening and send Hooch and Sinistra out on brooms to attack from the air. By then Albus should have been able to do something about those thrice-cursed seamen…"

Rigel didn't think she needed to hear whatever McGonagall had planned after that. She had her own plan to execute.

Filch and Trelawney began herding all the remaining students into close quarters toward the back of the hall, opposite the doors to the Entrance Hall, clustered around the Head Table. Rigel saw a pair of pale-headed students bobbing toward her through the crowd, and slipped as casually as she could out of their line of sight. Draco and Pansy were not going to approve of what she did next.

She hunkered down behind the staff table, pulling out the Marauder's Map and searching frantically for Remus. Her uncle's dot was moving erratically back and forth outside of a door in the staff quarters, beyond which sat a dot labeled Peter Pettigrew. Rigel traced a shortcut with her finger that could take her from the first floor to that part of the castle in just a few minutes. All she had to do was slip through the door behind the Head Table and into the trophy room it connected to without anyone seeing her.

She worked her way surreptitiously through the crowd, and had just reached the small enclave containing the door when a large hand grasped her elbow and spun her around.

It was Rookwood, and he had a very forbidding expression on his face. "Your friends are looking for you," he said, voice tinged with disapproval, "Now would be a bad time to run off."

"I have to go, Rookwood," Rigel said, tugging on her elbow, "Remus is in trouble. He needs help."

"How can you help a werewolf?" Rookwood said lowly, "It's not safe."

"I have to protect him from himself," Rigel said fiercely, "If anyone else comes across him, they'll kill him, or he'll kill them, but I can help him. Let me go."

Rookwood looked torn, but his hand didn't release her.

"He's family, Rookwood," Rigel said, as imploring as she could, "What if it was Rosier? Or Selwyn? You'd do the same."

"At least let me accompany you," Rookwood bit out, obviously displeased with his capitulation.

"No, you need to stay here," Rigel said. At the upperclassman's warning growl she held up her other hand, "Pansy and Draco will try to follow me if they find out I'm gone. You have to be here to keep them from coming after me."

"You once again take risks that you yourself forbid others from taking," Rookwood said, shaking his head.

"Yes. I do," Rigel said. It was the truth, after all. She didn't have time to analyze it, however, "Keep Pansy safe, Rookwood."

He let her go with a sigh, "Keep yourself safe, Rigel."

Rigel nodded her thanks, then slipped through the door quickly, and left the older Slytherin behind.

Horrid, awful wailing greeted her ears as she left the protective barrier of Dumbledore's magic. Swearing silently to herself, she palmed her wand and called on her magic to deafen her ears as she ran through the gold-bedecked room. She rummaged in her bag as she ran, pulling out her ever-present invisibility cloak from its undetectably expanded pocket, then paused to carefully retrieve two bottles from her potions kit. One she uncorked and winced at before pouring all over the outside of her cloak. It was peppermint oil, undiluted, and while it was one of the strongest-smelling things in her kit, she also thought it would be one of the most disinteresting, at least as far as a werewolf's nose was concerned.

The other bottle she shoved in her pocket, along with a packet sealed tight with preservation charms that had an apothecary's logo stamped across the front. Barely remembering to vanish the food that had settled in her hair, she threw the cloak over herself, took out the Map once more, and followed it toward Remus' restless dot with steely determination.

When she reached the parallel corridor, she slowed, then crept forward, keeping to the shadows as she rounded the corner and caught sight of the wolf at the other end. It prowled back and forth before the door, snapping its jaws and scratching at the wood with a desperate fervor. This behavior was coupled with frequent flinches and shakes of the head. If Rigel weren't deaf, she suspected she'd hear the werewolf whining and yelping, so obvious was its pain.

Rigel pulled the bottle from her pocket and uncorked it quietly, silently praying that her research lived up to her expectations. Otherwise she would likely be wolf food before the hour was out.

Shying away from that mental image, she began to carefully pour the protection potion in as wide a circle as she could manage within the walls of the corridor. She held the bottle as close to the ground as possible so as to minimize the sound the liquid created as it hit the floor. She cast the circle clockwise, holding her breath as she walked closer to Remus and only relaxing minutely when she made it back to where she'd begun. She left a small opening between the start of the circle and the end, just big enough to keep the magic from connecting.

Her hand shaking slightly, she balanced what was left of the protection potion in her pocket while taking out the packet quietly. As she ripped the seal, she could see the werewolf's ears twitch in her direction, but after a brief glance, the creature turned back to the doorway it was stalking. She pulled one perfectly preserved bullfrog from its wrappings and set it down in the center of the circle before backing away swiftly.

The wolf bared its teeth in a challenge as it whirled, obviously having heard something that time, though how with all the merpeople's racket going on she didn't know. It hunched its forelegs menacingly. Rigel, from within the relative safety of the cloak, jerked her wand at the frog, making it flop wildly into the air and back down to the floor with a wet smack. The werewolf charged. She grabbed for the rest of the potion and waited breathlessly until its loping run carried the werewolf soaring past the potion line. She completed the circle just as the beast closed its jaw on the now-limp bullfrog, watching with acute relief as the barrier shone into place around the werewolf with seamless grace.

The wolf flung itself at the barrier, only to be pushed backwards into the center with gentle finality. Grinning, she removed her cloak and stuffed it out of sight as she quickly skirted around the protected circle and stopped, breathing deeply, in front of Pettigrew's door. There was a moment in which she could not tear herself away from the glowing eyes of the wolf, which shone with such hate and hunger as she had never imagined coming from a living thing. Then it passed, and she remembered her purpose, and threw her fists against the door violently.

"Professor! It's safe to come out! Hurry, Professor, they need you in the Great Hall!" she hollered and banged and scrabbled at the knob, but to her frustration received no response. She checked the map frantically, but he was definitely still inside. Perhaps the door was soundproofed? Or maybe the professor had been rendered unconscious by prolonged exposure to the merpeople's screaming.

In either case, she would have to open it herself. She could feel her magic running dangerously low, but all she needed was enough to overpower whatever locking charm Pettigrew used. She prodded at her core once again, feeling it stretch in a way that had become familiar to her after exhausting her magic so often in Professor Snape's lessons. With whatever juice she had left, she willed the door in front of her to open.

The wooden door flung itself inwards and slammed into the stone wall of the room beyond with a crash she could feel vibrating in the floor as she rushed inside. Whatever she was expecting, it wasn't for Professor Pettigrew to be sitting in a meditative pose on the floor, eyes closed in concentration and hands clenched tightly in his lap. She didn't have to say anything—the moment the door opened he jerked into awareness, grabbing his ears in a cowering flinch and causing whatever he had been holding to drop onto the floor and roll away under a chair.

He gazed around wildly, his beady eyes bulging as he took in her standing there. He began fumbling to stand, gesturing wildly and shouting something angrily.

"I can't hear you!" Rigel shouted, realized that even with that the professor likely wouldn't hear her over the merfolk. She gestured to her ears with a confused expression for emphasis, but received and even more confused look in response. "I deafened myself because of the…shrieking…" She stopped shouting and faltered at the impatient and uncomprehending look in his eyes. He wasn't holding his ears any longer, she realized, and he didn't appear to be in any pain, despite not having cast any muffling spell that she had seen.

Cautiously, she allowed the magic around her ears to dissolve away and smiled when she heard nothing but a bit of static that was probably a residual effect of the temporary deafness. "It's gone," she breathed out a relieved sigh.

"What is?" Pettigrew demanded, "What in Merlin's name are you doing, young man, barging into my rooms like—"

"There's an emergency, Professor!" Rigel cut him off, remembering the urgency of the situation once more. "The creatures on the grounds have gone mad. There are spiders attacking and the centaurs are amassing and—well, they need you in the Great Hall right away."

Pettigrew paled dramatically, staggering backwards a step and patting himself down frantically.

"Your wand is on the floor," Rigel said, gesturing to where he must have laid it while meditating.

"Wand…yes…" Pettigrew seemed incredibly out of sorts, but Rigel didn't think they had time for him to collect himself properly.

"Come on, Professor, you need to get to the Great Hall," she said insistently, picking up his wand, shoving it into his hand, and leading him as politely as she could out the door.

When he caught sight of the werewolf lying just up the hall, Pettigrew squeaked and dug his heels in with a lurch. "What is—Remus isn't suppose to be—"

"He's not going to hurt you," Rigel said, steering the plump professor around the protected circle firmly, "I'm taking him to the Hospital Wing so don't worry about Remus, just get going."

"I—you—it's not safe…" Pettigrew trailed off.

Rigel wasn't sure if he was talking about Remus or the walk back to the Great Hall, but she smiled reassuringly and prodded the professor gently in any case. "I'll be fine, just go."

Pettigrew whimpered a bit pitifully, but then bit his lip and nodded, "Yes, I'll…I'd better go." He hurried off at a shaky run, and Rigel turned back to the werewolf.

She circled the creature slowly, looking for any sign of sanity. It already looked calmer, and she wondered if it had been the merpeople's screeching that drove it so insane. If the pain was awful to a human, she couldn't imagine what it would be like for a werewolf's sensitive ears. It was the reason she thought he ought to go to the Hospital Wing, instead of staying in the corridor all night. She knew from Archie's books that eardrums were extremely delicate, and an injury there could easily become permanent and debilitating if not treated in a timely manner.

"Remus, are you in there?" Rigel asked, kneeling down outside of the barrier to look the werewolf in the eyes, "Can you understand me, now?"

The wolf looked at her, calm and steady, but made no motion of understanding or even acknowledgement. After a moment of doubt, Rigel rolled her eyes. If his eardrums had been damaged by prolonged exposure to mermish wailing he probably couldn't hear anything she said.

Rigel got down on all fours and looked at the wolf very seriously. She then tucked her body to the side and executed a clumsy roll along the floor. She got back up and looked at the wolf expectantly. It cocked its head at her. She rolled again, then gestured at the werewolf insistently. The creature lolled its tongue at her, then rolled gracefully inside the circle.

Either Remus had his mind back, or Rigel was the first person in history to teach a werewolf to do a trick. Weighing the odds in her head, she smiled and dug in her satchel for the bottle of ward-disrupter potion that would render the protection potion inert. Pouring it across one of the lines, she broke through the ward to wrap Remus in a tight hug. He was shaking and clearly exhausted, but he licked her cheek affectionately in response.

Rigel stood and, with Remus at her side, set out at a light jog for the Hospital Wing. She didn't know whether the rest of the castle was safe or not yet, so she figured she'd just take shelter behind the wards there as well until things died down.

The doors were sealed tight, so Rigel kicked on the wards in a parody of a knock until a voice on the other side called, "Minerva? Is that you?"

"It's Rigel Black, Professor!" she called back, "I've got a patient for you!"

"Mr. Black!" that voice was definitely Madam Pomfrey, "What on earth did they send you up here for?"

The wards parted and the nurse's stern visage poked through the open door. As the sight of Remus, however, she reared back with a gasp, "Mr. Black, get away from—"

"He's fine, Madam Pomfrey!" Rigel assured her quickly, "He's in his right mind, just hurt from all that noise before."

Concern for Remus quickly replaced any worry the woman harbored for Rigel's safety, and she waved them both in with a brisk arm before closing up the wards once more and shutting the door behind them.

Remus trotted rather calmly over to one of the beds and leapt up on it before anyone could direct him. Clucking to her self, Madam Pomfrey began running a scan over his head. Professor Sprout pulled Rigel aside while this was going on and said, "What's happening out there, Mr. Black?"

"The merfolk have stopped screeching," Rigel said, assuming that the Hospital Wing would be warded against noises as a matter of patient comfort and guessing they wouldn't have noticed the change. "The spiders from the forest were scaling the walls when I was last in the Great Hall, but Professor Pettigrew is on his way there now, so perhaps he can help them deal with that. I think the Headmaster and Professors Snape and Flitwick were still outside at the lake last I saw them. They've boarded up the Great Hall and the entryway, though, so I'm not sure anyone knows what's happening outside the castle yet."

"The students?" Sprout pressed, her faced lined with anxiety.

"All safe last I knew," Rigel said, "McGonagall seemed to have their protection well in hand."

"Thank you, Mr. Black," Sprout sighed, flexing her fingers agitatedly, "I just hate waiting here while my house is in trouble."

"Remus isn't a danger anymore," Rigel said, "You could make your way to the Great Hall, if you were careful."

The stout woman smiled, but shook her head, "Minerva has posted me here, so I'll remain until the all clear. Running about on my own without anyone knowing where I'd gone would just making the situation more chaotic."

Rigel tried not to wince, but had to wonder if Sprout had guessed she wasn't supposed to be 'escorting' Remus to the Hospital Wing, as it were. "At least send a patronus so Professor McGonagall knows Remus is here, and safe," she suggested, "I think his presence in the hallways was deterring her from evacuating the students underground."

Professor Sprout stepped away to do just that, and Rigel went back to Remus's bedside to watch as Pomfrey finished healing his ears.

"I'll have to do another diagnostic when he's transformed back," she said as Rigel took a seat beside her uncle, "But he should recover full use of his hearing once I'm finished."

"Good," Rigel said, finally allowing her body to relax. She ached everywhere from the strain she'd put on her magic, and as the adrenaline drained away she felt empty and stretched, like a sponge that had been wrung out too many times.

"You did well, Rigel," Pomfrey said, looking away from Remus briefly to give her an approving smile, "Other times I would scold you for what I suspect is another of your impulsive inclinations toward irresponsibility, but in this case…it's a good thing you got him here when you did. I don't like to think how debilitating this kind of injury might have been if it had gone unchecked even another few hours. The eardrums are troublesome enough, but the nerves that pass information to his auditory cortex are even more fragile than a human's. The overload put such a strain on his temporal lobe. Much longer and it might have resulted in permanent damage to that section of the brain. So, good job, Mr. Black." She fixed Rigel with a stern look, "But don't do it again."

Rigel ducked her head in a nod that was part acknowledgement, part avoidance. If she had to do it again, she absolutely would, in this case.

Some time later, Rigel was dozing, curled up in a chair by Remus' bed, where the werewolf was sleeping peacefully in the semi-darkness created by the curtain drawn around them. Rigel lifted her head when she heard a knocking against the Hospital Wing wards. McGonagall's voice came clearly through the curtain a moment later.

"All's well, Pomona," the Deputy Headmistress sounded tired, but satisfied, "Albus is repairing the damage done to the outside of the castle as we speak."

"What happened?" Madam Pomfrey asked, "What caused all this?"

"We don't yet know," McGonagall said, "The official story is that the ambient magic around the castle interacted with the wild magic of Samhain tonight and created a dark energy that upset the creatures around the castle, causing them to react strongly against the castle itself."

"That sounds a bit far-fetched," Pomona sighed, "Think the Daily Prophet will swallow it?"

"I do, as a matter of fact," McGonagall sounded as though she wished to roll her eyes, "I'm more concerned about some of the more perceptive students. They witnessed the ferocity of this incident, and aren't like to believe it was a simple accidental intermingling of strong magics that upset the creatures. The spiders, perhaps, even the merfolk, but the centaurs? They are intelligent beings, not prone to panic, and yet their chief claims there is a dark force within the castle that is agitating Fate itself. What are we to make of such a statement? There could be any number of old artifacts hidden around the school, but none of them have caused this sort of upset in the past. Why now?"

"There, there, Minerva," Pomona said consolingly, "Albus will sort it out. In the meantime we ought to focus on moving the school past this. I'm sure we'll have our hands full with night terrors and panicky parents before the weekend is out. How long do you think it'll be before Lucius Malfoy pays us a little visit?" This last was added with a distinctive bite.

"Not long enough," McGonagall sighed. "Well, I just came to inform you of the resolution and check on Remus. How is he? Did he regain his mind with the rest of the creatures?"

"We don't know," Pomona said, "What happened at the end? How did Albus get them to regain control?"

"It wasn't Albus," McGonagall said, "One moment the squid was thrashing, the spiders were climbing, and all hell was reigning, and then…they stopped."

"Just like that?" Pomfrey sounded skeptical.

"Yes," McGonagall said, "I've never seen the like. The spiders seemed to shake themselves, then they retreated into the forest, calm as anything. The squid settled right down, and the merfolk stopped screeching all at once, disappearing back into the depths. Albus tried to talk to the Mer-King, but he was no clearer than the centaurs, apparently."

"Well, what of Peter?" Pomona asked, "Does our resident expert have any explanation for this phenomenon?"

McGonagall scoffed quietly, "He came running in a few minutes after it was all over, mumbling something about Samhain and the full moon and tumultuous energies. I'd accuse him of hiding out the storm in his chambers, but I gather he was detained by Remus' presence in the hallway outside his room. Thank the gods no one was hurt in this mess."

"All students are accounted for, then?" Pomona asked, sounding relieved.

"All but one," McGonagall said, now with an annoyed edge to her voice, "In your patronus you intimated Rigel Black was here. For his sake I sincerely hope he has remained so."

Rigel figured that was her cue. She stood from the chair and stepped out from behind the curtain. "I'm here, Professor."

"Would you like to explain yourself, Mr. Black, or shall I guess?" McGonagall's eyes were tired, but very sharp.

"I saw that you had your hands full in the Great Hall, so I thought I'd better take care of Remus myself," Rigel said. At McGonagall's darkening look, she said quickly, "It's not that I don't think you could handle him. Just that…he's family, and other people might not be as gentle with a rogue werewolf. I couldn't let anything happen to him or anyone else because of whatever was making the creatures go crazy."

"It is not your responsibility to go running after werewolves, Mr. Black, even if they are your uncles," McGonagall snapped.

"In times of difficulty, anyone with the ability to effect positive change also has the responsibility to do so," Rigel said, tilting her head, "Godric Gryffindor said that. I had the ability to help Remus, and the opportunity, so I did. I didn't hurt myself or anyone else. And Madam Pomfrey said it was a good thing that I did. Remus was injured when I found him, and might not have gone to the Hospital Wing without prompting. With all due respect, Professor, I'd do it again."

McGonagall pursed her lips, but Professor Sprout burst into chuckles. "Ever thought you'd hear a Slytherin quoting Godric Gryffindor at you to get out of trouble, Minerva?"

The older matron suddenly smiled, making Rigel extremely nervous. "You're right, Mr. Black. It would be an affront to my house to do anything but give you twenty points to Slytherin for bravery and selfless nerve." Rigel smiled hesitantly, then gulped when McGonagall continued, "While I may not punish students for having courage in a crisis, however, you can bet that Severus Snape will see your little adventure in an entirely different light."

Rigel grimaced, realizing she would be lucky to break even on house points by the time Snape got through with her. He had a very poor opinion of her 'reckless stupidity' and all actions and inclinations thusly associated. "I should get back to my common room, then," she said, moving back to Remus' bedside to collect her bag, "Is it safe to return?"

"The students should all be heading to bed now, yes," McGonagall said, "And Mr. Black?"

Rigel turned at the door with a polite expression, "Yes, Professor?"

"Good luck."

Wondering how a woman of her age had time for a sense of humor after such an exhausting evening, Rigel pasted on her fakest smile and left the Wing. She passed a multitude of students heading toward their common rooms on her way back to hers. None of them took much notice of her, and Rigel though wryly that if one good thing came from all this, at least no one was talking about the prank anymore. And she had thought her bad luck used up that morning. Ha.

She reached the common room just as the last Slytherins were filing in, and she barely made it three steps toward the dorms when a now-familiar hand gripped her elbow and re-directed her. "This is becoming a habit," she told Rookwood as he led her across the room.

"The habit is yours," Rookwood said, "They aren't happy with you."

"I know," Rigel sighed.

"I advise you to sound contrite," Rookwood said.

"I'm not," Rigel frowned, though some part of her wondered if she should be.

"Pretend," Rookwood suggested, "Or it's going to be a long night."

Rigel nodded, "Fair enough. They're okay though, right?"

"See for yourself," the upperclassman said, releasing her when they reached the group of chairs and couches by their usual fire.

Pansy was the first to react, rising from the couch and bringing Rigel into a gentle hug.

"Hi, Pansy," Rigel said, "I'll glad you're all right."

Pansy released Rigel and gave her a steady look, then turned and reclaimed her seat without speaking. Rigel turned awkwardly to Draco, who took Pansy's hand when she sat back down, and didn't acknowledge Rigel's presence at all.

"Draco," Rigel said. No reaction. She turned to Theo and Millicent, who were frowning, but didn't seem quite as angry. Blaise showed no signs of upset, even smiling at her when she met his gaze, but Rosier leveled her with a glare. For some reason, this response surprised her more than the others. What did Rosier have to be so angry at her about?

"You seem to be in one piece," Rosier said, raking her with his eyes, "Wasn't the werewolf hungry tonight?"

"Don't talk about him like that," Rigel snapped, forgetting that she was supposed to be contrite. It was exactly the sort of careless thing people said all the time about werewolves, and it enraged her to hear it, bringing back the fear and anger she'd felt when Trelawney had casually suggested killing Remus to protect everyone else.

"Like what? Like a rampaging beast?" Rosier stood from his seat and towered over her. He kept his voice low, in minute deference to her sensibilities, she supposed, but his words belied the kindness, "That's what he was tonight, Rigel. Not your uncle, not your friend. Dangerous. If you can't tell the difference between man and wolf then you need a serious reality check. When Edmund told me where he'd let you run off to I wanted to strangle him, but after thinking about it I realized it's not Edmunds fault. It's yours, Rigel. You chose to place yourself in danger, knowingly abandoning your friends and allies to run off after an incredibly deadly magical creature without so much as a thought about how the rest of us would feel if you got eaten by a bloodthirsty beast—"

"Are you finished yet?" Rigel said, more coldly than she'd meant to. She just couldn't stomach Rosier's words at the moment.

"I am not—"

"I think you must be, because you're starting to repeat yourself," Rigel said, her face as blank as a wall, "Or didn't you notice you'd called my uncle, your Defense professor and one of the nicest, most intelligent men I've ever known, a beast, Rosier?"

"He may be all of those things most of the time, but tonight he was dangerous," Rosier said, gritting his teeth, "Edmund, what class is a werewolf?"

"It's a 5-X creature by classification," Rookwood said promptly.

"Why is that, Edmund?" Rosier asked.

"It rivals the Nundu for speed, the Manticore for strength, and the Lethifold in its appetite for human flesh," Rookwood said, unflinching.

"I know that," Rigel said, glaring at the two of them, "You think I'm some excitable first-year who's read about werewolves in books and thought, gee, wouldn't it be swell to get a real good look at one up close? I know what werewolves are. Better than you two, I daresay. I've also known Remus my whole life, so I know that if he isn't in his right mind it's because something is wrong, and he's in trouble, and when my family is in trouble I help them."

"You can't run off every time someone you know is in trouble," Rosier said, running a hand through his hair in frustration, "All it does is put you in trouble along with them."

"Better than doing nothing," Rigel argued, "And besides, I had a plan to help Remus; I didn't go tearing off in a panic without any way to actually help. I don't fling myself into situations I can't handle, contrary to popular belief. I'm careful. I wasn't in any danger tonight, Rosier. I took every precaution."

"Like what?" Rosier bit out, eyes narrow.

"I turned myself invisible. I doused myself with peppermint oil, too," she said, "He couldn't see or smell me."

"Is that why you smell like a candy-cane?" Blaise asked, chin propped against the armrest of his chair in casual indolence.

"Yes," Rigel sighed, realizing that some of the oil must have seeped through the cloak, "And Remus couldn't hear me, either, because the merfolk's screaming had already ruptured his eardrums. He had also taken the New Wolfsbane potion tonight, which means he was significantly weaker than a true rogue werewolf would have been. When I found him, he was hurt and confused and not dangerous to anyone." That was a bit of a stretch, but Rigel wasn't above lying to protect her loved ones.

She could see the hesitation in Rosier's gaze, so she pressed forward, her eyes imploring him to understand, "My cousin invented a potion this summer that can safely contain a werewolf. I have several vials of it. I didn't rush off without a plan, Rosier."

"I don't like it when you do dangerous things, Rigel," he finally said, blowing out a defeated breath, "None of us do."

"I don't like it when people I care about are in danger, either," Rigel said, smiling a bit, "If you could have stopped me going, or had some way of contributing something to help, you would have come after me, wouldn't you?"

"Yes," Rosier said, grimacing.

"Then you already know why I couldn't have stayed in that hall and done nothing," Rigel said. Rosier gave her one long-suffering look, then shook his head despairingly. He wrapped her in an unceremonious hug, which Rigel returned after only a moment's confusion. "Thanks, Aldon," she said, "I'm sorry I worried you."

"You aren't either," he sighed, stepping back.

Rigel stepped forward, standing in front of the couch that Pansy and Draco sat on. "Do either of you have anything to say to me?"

Draco glanced at her. "Would you listen, if we did?"

Her gaze softened without her impetus, "Of course. You're my best friends."

"You use that word, Rigel, but you don't live up to the equal relationship it implies," Pansy said, still not looking directly at Rigel.

"You mean when I do things on my own without consulting you?" Rigel clarified.

"It's not your independence that's the issue," Draco shook his head. "The fact that you told Rookwood, in advance of your leaving, to stop us from coming after you, implies something important. Do you know what?"

"Tell me," Rigel said, frowning.

"It means you didn't just not tell us what you were doing," Pansy said, "You knew us well enough that you anticipated what our actions would be when we found out, and then took that choice away from us by telling Rookwood to stun us to keep us from coming to your aid."

"I didn't tell him to—"

"You know that's how he deals with people he doesn't know how to deal with, though," Rosier pointed out, smiling now, "Remember the New Years Gala?"

She did, at that, though she didn't appreciate him bringing that up in front of so many curious ears.

"The point is this: If you have the right to protect Remus from danger, then we have the right to protect you from danger, Rigel. You telling us we can't help you is just the same as us telling you that you can't help other people." Pansy was looking directly at her now, "Don't you see that?"

Rigel thought for a moment. "Except you would have stopped me from helping Remus," Rigel said, "You would prioritize my protection over his, whereas I prioritize his over mine. We can't agree on a course of action when we want different things. In such a case, aren't I justified in seeking my own goals by circumventing yours? Why should I prioritize your ends over my own?"

"Because we're friends?" Draco suggested, more than a bit sarcastically.

"Because," Pansy said, giving Draco a disapproving look, "We exist outside of models in your mind, Rigel. You assumed that we would be a detriment to your goals, instead of entertaining the possibility that we could be an asset to you. By treating us as an automatic hindrance, you insult us as well as our friendship with you."

"I don't think you're hindrances," Rigel said, knowing she was explaining it wrong but unable to make the right words come out, "I only wanted to protect you and Remus."

"You only get to protect people who consent to be protected," Draco said, rolling his eyes, "If you try to force someone into a position of weakness, it's just demeaning. Insulting. Patronizing. Take your pick."

Rigel rather thought some people might just see it as someone caring about them, but she also had to admit she saw her friends' point. "I hear you, and I understand where you're coming from, but can't you also understand how completely wretched I would feel if anything happened to either of you because of something I felt I had to do? Risking a certain amount of danger to myself is my choice, but bringing you guys into danger by default because of an obligation of friendship—I couldn't justify that. It would be the height of selfishness and carelessness if I did. What would I say to your parents if anything happened? I promised to be a good friend to you. That means not making your association with me hazardous to your lives. If I did what you asked, invited you into trouble with me…how can I live with that kind of guilt? What kind of person would that make me?"

"A normal one," Theo said bluntly, "No offense, Rigel, but Draco and Pansy are right on this one. Yeah, it feels awful when your friends get hurt or into trouble because of something you did, but that feeling is part of what is supposed to deter you from being reckless. You're the kind of person who doesn't see consequences to yourself as a bad thing, so it's exactly right of Draco and Pansy to try and make you see the weight of your actions by involving themselves. If it's something you wouldn't want Draco and Pansy doing, it's something you shouldn't be doing, right? Unless you think you're better than or different from them."

There was a beat of complete silence as the group stared at Theo with varying levels of surprise.

"What?" the sandy-haired boy scowled, "I can be deep."

Rigel had to laugh at that, a low chuckle that brought her back from desperate hypotheticals and to a more even-keeled focus. "Okay, I guess I'm wrong about at least some of this," she said, rubbing her hair a bit sheepishly, then grimacing at the oil that stuck to her hands, "If I say the situation wasn't dangerous, I should have been willing to at least give you the chance of offering your help."

"Yes, you should," Pansy said.

"I'm sorry I took your choice away like an imperious prat," she added, willing to let the matter rest, at that point.

"And you're sorry you forgot the conversation we've already had about how our friendship means that your problems are our problems and your responsibilities are our responsibilities and vice versa," Draco said, folding his arms as he looked up at her.

Rigel winced, "And I'm sorry for that, too." She really would have to remember these things before she got herself into messes like this in the future. "When I'm in crisis mode, I react to things very quickly and coldly. I forget about people's feelings. I'll work on that, all right?"

"And we will work on not losing you in crowds right as crises are occurring," Pansy sighed.

"You should put a teacher-tracker in one of his shoes," Millicent said helpfully.

"Go ahead," Rigel sighed, "But can we be done fighting? I'm exhausted and I smell like a breath mint. I just want to shower and sleep."

"Rest up," Rosier said, smirking, "You'll need your strength in the morning when Professor Snape has his words with you. The only reason he's not here waiting for you is because he has, and I quote, 'more important things to do than waste my breath lecturing a deaf imbecile…for now' end quote."

She feared Rosier was, if anything, understating the good professor's ire. Their relationship knew only the veneer of amiability of late. Her acting in a way he would undoubtedly categorize as reckless and foolhardy would only worsen his disappointment. It saddened her that recently she had somehow become used to upsetting and disappointing people, when for so many years she had worked hard to please them. She wanted to repair the rift in her relationship with Professor Snape, but at the same time…harsh words would still be nothing in comparison with Remus' safety.

She couldn't call herself a hero in her own mind, though. Rigel hadn't been completely honest with her friends. She'd made it sound like the only reason she was worried about Remus was because he was family, and that did indeed play the major role in inspiring her to act. She couldn't deny that there was a cold, ruthless part of her that saw Remus' importance in terms of the greater whole, however. An incident in which Remus was injured or injured anther could prove disastrous for werewolves everywhere. All eyes were on Hogwarts right now in the arena of creature rights.

A werewolf incident at Hogwarts meant other things, too. A blow to Dumbledore's credibility, for instance, and therefore to the platforms he put forth and all the causes he championed in their world, muggleborn and halfblood rights included. Innocent people everywhere would have their lives impacted by such a thing. She couldn't deny that all of these things and more had also been going through her mind as she raced to stop Remus from breaking down Pettigrew's door. She thanked magic for Professor Snape's New Wolfsbane potion. It was probably the only reason the werewolf hadn't been able to shred through that barrier like tissue paper.

One of her last thoughts before going to bed that night, once she washed herself thoroughly and made a mental note to ask Binny if she knew a good way to get oil out of invisibility cloaks, was that she'd really have to do a trial with a full-strength werewolf before she marketed her potion for such protective uses. Still, she thought with a yawn, it had certainly been a preliminary success, all things considered.

The whole day had been a tentative success, in fact. She'd have to phrase it that way, at least, when she wrote to tell Archie what had happened. She certainly did have a lot of people worrying about her, for someone who had started out at eleven with the intention to remain completely unnoticed. Perhaps it was time to accept, as so many people kept saying, that anonymity was simply beyond her grasp.

For now, anyway.

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[end of chapter eight].

A/N: Soo that one was a doozy, eh? Nearly 30,000 words this time, whooo! Sorry it's a few days late. I swear that last scene just would not end. It makes up nearly a third of the whole chapter, actually. Sorry if it's a bit overwhelming in places. A big, heartfelt thanks to everyone who's still reading, and especially to you reviewers—I do read them! Even if long after you write them and move on with your life.

Also, there's apparently an honest-to-blog actual FORUM about Rigel! I don't know how such a thing is even possible, but if you want to discuss the characters, plot, future of the fic, etc, feel free to check it out, and a huge kudos to the fans who made that happen! I'm so amazed ^^.

And one final note, a lot of people ask if it's okay if they write stories or make art about Rigel and this series, and I say YES to every single one of you. If you have an idea for a spin off, a future take, prequel, sequel, picture, video, anything, please please do it! And post info about it in the forum or comments so everyone can read it (including me :D)!

Whew, sorry in addition for this epic author's note.

All the best,

-Violet