Honest Lunar Raven: The length of your review brought a smile to my face! The Black family here is fun, and you'll see a lot of them as the story progresses. Sirius disagreed with his parents about the superiority of Purebloods over all others and about supporting Voldemort, but he still has a lot of the classic Black traits, not just the sexual weirdness. Wait and you'll find out more. Jen has them even more strongly than he does, and how she'll get on with Hermione…

As for the ritual Jen underwent, there are some benefits to having a magical core. She now has an extremely low resistance to magic cast on her, so spell effects last longer than normal unless she (or someone else) removes them. A strong Stunner, which should last hours, can keep her unconscious for days. Also, any potion that has to be ingested relies on the drinker's stored magic to work, so she is left with topical potions and healing spells when she gets injured. If she had her bones vanished like Harry did in canon, she would be screwed since Skelegrow is useless. There are a few other risks, and these are in addition to the fact that the history of the ritual makes anyone who attempts it more than a little suicidal.

How she survived… if you're thinking about the Horcrux, nope, that's not it. If it's something else you have in mind, then you are likely very close, though I hope you'll be surprised by exactly how it's revealed.

Disclaimer: Did Magical Britain ever recognize the contribution Lily Potter made to the first downfall of Voldemort? If not, I don't own the Harry Potter franchise; it belongs to J.K. Rowling, Scholastic Press, Warner Bros., and whoever else she sold the rights to.

Chapter 4
Faces from the Past

"Thanks. Quite a lot more was in the closet. Kreacher gave me Bella's old room and apparently everything she left in it."

The doorbell chose that moment to ring, and Sirius was more than willing to greet whoever was waiting outside and let Narcissa admire the nostalgic clothing. Once he opened the door, however, he wished he had stayed and listened to the girl talk.

"Can I help you, Lily?"

If Sirius said that he doubted one of the Potters would eventually show up at his door, he would be lying. He had been at odds with them since their first – and last – meeting in his room at St. Mungo's. Charles and Dorea Potter had taken him in after he ran away at sixteen, and originally he had thought it was because they were willing to stand up for those that needed help but had nowhere else to turn. After hearing that James and Lily had thrown Jen away like so much rubbish just like his parents would have done to him, however, he was now wondering if he had a place to stay that summer solely because Dorea had drawn on her Black roots and offered shelter to family.

It was either that or James had fallen so far from the morals of his youth as to no longer be worthy of being called their son.

So, while finding Lily here to talk to him was unfortunate, it was not unexpected. He felt he knew why she was here, as well. She wanted him to stop searching for Jen and instead spend his time training Daniel-the-Golden-Boy-Who-Lived.

"You can," Lily answered with a weak smile. "Sirius, it's time you gave up trying to gain custody of Jenny. She's probably happier at Petunia's home, anyway."

One for two.

"Besides, you've been out of the hospital for a month and haven't visited Danny once. He wants to become closer to his godfather after all these years without you; don't you want to get to know him?"

Can I call 'em or what?

"Funny you should mention that last part, Lily. I'm sure my goddaughter would have liked to know her godfather growing up as well. Her mother and father, too, for that matter."

Lily sighed; this was obviously not working out as she hoped. "Sirius, we've explained why we gave her to Petunia. If she were with us, she would be constantly shunted to the side because she didn't fit in. In the Muggle world, on the other hand, she'd be no different from anyone else. She's fine, she's happy, so please just let it go."

Sirius grinned, causing her to take a step back. It was not a happy or even mocking smile, but one that was almost feral. "I love how you still believe that she's safe with your sister."

"She isn't?" Lily's face showed only her confusion, but he was happy to hear a note of fear creeping into her voice. She gave her child to someone and then made no effort to ensure that little girl's happiness; she and James deserved all the pain that could be heaped on them for that.

"No, she isn't. The Dursleys' was the first place I looked. She hasn't lived with them since she was five."

Lily stood frozen in shock for a moment before she whispered. "You can't be serious."

"I am, and I am. Still think she's fine and happy?"

"This is no time for jokes! After eight years, she could be anywhere!" She tried to run into the house only to bounce off his chest. "Sirius, let me in so I can Floo call James! All three of us will cover a lot more ground than you can by yourself!"

"Sorry, Lily, I just can't do that. I have company over." His smile by now was positively shark-like. "The family is getting to know my goddaughter."

"You found her, then?" Sirius saw the relief in her expression but remained unmoved. He didn't know if the emotion was real or deception; the love she displayed whenever she had looked at Jen as an infant had certainly revealed itself to be false. "Don't scare me like that, you big prat. When did you find her? Where, for that matter?"

"Yes, day before yesterday, and in Wales. I believe that should take care of your questions, so I bid you good day." He moved to close the door, but her hand stopped it.

"You said you were introducing her to the family," she repeated slowly. "Who, exactly?"

Ah, yet another chance to tweak her nose. "She was with Narcissa Malfoy the last time I saw her." He slammed the door to and locked it, relishing the panic stretched across her face. Drawing his wand, he cast a silencing charm to end the frantic bangs and shouts of his name coming from the other side. With a spring in his step, he walked back to the sitting room, but before he could enter, his brain made sense of the mutters he could hear coming from inside.

"...that's the case, what do you propose we do? It's a rare talent; she should continue to develop it, not repress it."

Narcissa's words worrying him, he entered the room and immediately spotted the sitting women. "What's going on?"

At Narcissa's prompting, Andi explained, "I think Jen might be a Legilimens."

What? Legilimency was a unusual talent, either restricted to members of certain families or discovered and homegrown by the rare innate Legilimens, almost always Muggleborns. Jen's neither of those, so how would she learn it?

"Why would you think that, Andi?"

"When we were looking around her room, I felt a brush on my Occlumency shields. It immediately withdrew, indicating someone who knows what they're doing. Dora hasn't learned how to do it and didn't appear to notice anything, and the only other person there was Jen, so…"

"Assuming that is the case," Narcissa cut in, "this is a good thing. I had planned to teach her Occlumency this summer, but if she can use Legilimency, I doubt I need to worry about it. Her shields should already be stronger than they would be if she only now started."

"I don't like it," interjected Andi. "She uses Legilimency, has powerful wandless magic, and yet says she spent all her time with Muggles? This doesn't add up."

Narcissa whipped her head around to glare at her sister. "She doesn't say she spent her time with Muggles, she did. I know that; I certainly saw her with them often enough."

Ignoring that reference to the woman's perversions, Sirius put himself in the middle of their little spat. "A witch tutored her for several years. She told me when I first met her," he elaborated to their questioning glances. "That's the only reason I haven't locked her in her room with the textbooks for the first three years' classes."

"Maybe she did, but Legilimency and wandless magics are not standard fare at any school I've heard of, and with good reason." Andi crossed her arm and eyed her younger sister. "They are far too dangerous to be wielded by a teenager."

"Yet Jen uses them and is perfectly fine. Obviously there isn't an issue, Andromeda," Narcissa retorted, leaping to her feet. "Your concern is noted but unnecessary."

"Why don't we just ask her where she learned them?" Sirius calmly suggested. It's no wonder why these two could ignore each other for almost twenty-one years.

"Fine, let's go, then," Narcissa snapped as she stomped out of the room.

The library Jen and Dora had retreated to was only a short walk down the hall from the sitting room, which Sirius had never been more thankful for than he was today. If the two women on either side of him did not reconcile soon, they would probably hold another decades-long grudge, and his hopes for a fresh start of the Black family would end before they could even begin.

They found the girls in couches across from each other. Dora was sprawled out on her belly, frantically taking notes from what looked like one of the many dueling texts the library contained on scraps of parchment she had tracked down somewhere or another. Jen, too, was lounging quite relaxedly, running a finger over the pages of a much older book she had propped up on her crossed legs. He could just barely make out the title embossed on the cover facing the door. She's reading The Arte of the Succubus? She's going to be disappointed. He had snuck a peek at the book when he was a teen as well and had been surprised to discover that it was a primer on blood magic rather than the collection of erotica he had been expecting.

"Jen, we have some questions for you."

She nodded and summoned a sliver of parchment from Dora's pile to use as a bookmark. Sitting up, she placed the book on the table her feet had been resting on. "What kind of questions?"

"Your wandless magic." He decided to leave any mention of Legilimency for a private conversation. It wasn't wrong to know or even use, but many people were twitchy about having others potentially rummaging through their heads. Speaking of which, he thought as he raised his own shields. "Who taught it to you?"

Jen was still for a moment, then she sighed. "I knew I would have to tell you eventually, but I just hoped to avoid it a little longer."

And isn't that a wonderful way to start a story? The way things were going, he really needed to start casting Calming Charms on himself before questioning her about her past.

"Her name was Elsie, and she was an old witch from Haiti. She had to leave when her village accused her of using Voodoo; the officials there care more about punishing people than finding out if accusations are true or not."

Sirius nodded in understanding. Voodoo was, to the best of his admittedly sparse knowledge, sacrificial in nature and thereby classified as a Black Art, along with soul magic, necromancy, life alchemy, and a few others. The ICW as well as the other two multinational diplomatic organizations, the American Confederacy of Magical States and the Asian Conglomerate, all held even a single use of the Black Arts to be a capital crime with a mandatory death sentence. This Elsie character would not be the first witch someone had framed for that crime, but most never had the opportunity to flee like she had.

It's not like she had to worry about leaving anyone behind at that point. Just mentioning black magic makes people start lighting torches and picking up pitchforks. He could sympathize with her plight; the stigma of those darkest of the Dark Arts was something that never really went away. The Black family, for instance, had gained its current name by at one point having the largest collection of necromancy texts and practitioners in Europe, a reputation that even four hundred years later still commanded them respect and not a little fear from other Houses. It was also why the library had books on blood and enslavement magics, both of which were borderline black.

"After the Dursleys abandoned me in London, I spent a year living on the streets," Jen continued, jerking him back from his reverie. "She eventually found me, recognized that I was magical, and took me in. During the day, I would run around getting things she needed for her work, and then at night we would have lessons. I was her assistant for several months before I took a job at Candyland, which forced us to flip our schedules a little. Thankfully, by that point I knew enough that I could practice magic on my own while she just supervised.

"She wasn't the most highly educated person in the world, but she did her best to teach me everything she knew and encouraged me to learn anything else that caught my fancy. When she realized that I simply couldn't use a wand no matter how hard I tried, she even showed me what little she knew of wandless magic. She passed away last year."

"We are sorry for your loss," Andi said gently. "You said you helped her, but what was it that she did?"

"She was a folk healer, selling salves and potions to people who couldn't make their own and didn't have the money to pay for treatment at St. Mungo's. It didn't make her rich, but she was comfortable enough."

"Was she the one who taught you Occlumency?" Narcissa prompted.

Jen apparently caught the subtle undertones, and some emotion flickered across her face too fast for him to identify. "Yes, she was paranoid and constantly moved around to keep ahead of anyone who had pursued her to Britain. She wanted me to be able to locate them if they tried to follow me so I could keep her location a secret."

"Did she teach you any other… unorthodox… magics?" Considering she had mastered wandless magic and Legilimency by fourteen, anything was possible. Sirius wanted to know what other surprises she had up her currently missing sleeves.

"Just a few things. Teleporting, flying, scrying, and shapeshifting."

Teleporting is probably Apparation, and no child of James would be unable to fly a broom. I have no idea what scrying is, but shapeshifting…

"By shapeshifting, do you mean you're an Animagus?"

Jen shook her head. "I'm afraid I don't know that word."

"It means you can become an animal." To demonstrate, he transformed into Padfoot.

She smirked. "Oh, you mean like this?" She then changed into a small black cat with milky eyes and meowed sweetly at him. For some reason, Sirius had the distinct impression that he had just been insulted.

"Awww!" Dora squealed, rushing over to pick her up from the couch. "You make such a cute kitten, much better than that mangy mutt! Maybe you should stay like this all the time. There's just one thing I'm confused about; what in Merlin's name is scrying?"

Since the teen's answers would be incomprehensible, Andi answered for her. "It's a type of divination, on that allows people to watch events occurring in another location through any reflective surface, like a mirror or a bowl of water. Scrying is the only form that is universally considered valid, mostly because anyone, not just Seers, can use it."

"Then why haven't I ever heard of it?"

"Because it is very difficult," Jen replied after leaping from Dora's arms and returning to her human form. "You have to pour magic into the reflection without using a wand, which does make it a wonderful tool for training wandless magic. That's why Elsie taught it to me. It's also the only way I can see again like I used to."

That took Dora by surprise. "What do you mean, like you used to?"

"I thought it was obvious. I was not born blind; I'm like this due to an accident."

"What happened?"

"My aunt and uncle didn't like me very much," she began softly, "so they forced me to do all the chores around the house while they spoiled their son Dudley. I was using a bucket of bleach to clean the laundry room floor one day when he ran over and kicked it into my face; that was the first and only time I can remember hearing Petunia scold him. I spent the next couple of days in agony because they refused to take me to the doctor. By the time I felt even a little better, the bleach had burned my eyes so badly I couldn't see. I've been blind ever since." Jen grunted as Dora wrapped her in a suffocating hug.

"That's horrible! Why were you there at all?" Narcissa demanded.

"I forgot that you arrived after we discussed that," Andi said. "Petunia Dursley is Lily Potter's Muggle sister. Apparently, the Potters think Jen is a squib." She scoffed. "Like a squib could use wandless magic or become an Animagus."

Jen shrugged. "What they choose to believe or not doesn't bother me. I'm used to not belonging anywhere."

Dora hugged her tighter, and Padfoot walked over and covered her feet like a giant fluffy blanket. The sisters looked at one another and joined the group cuddle on the couch.

"Don't worry about that anymore," whispered Narcissa in her ear. "You belong here with us now. Welcome home."

Sirius has a bit of a temper; we see it in OotP when he throws Kreacher out of the house, and I think the whole send-Snape-to-the-Shrieking-Shack as a student was also something he did in anger. When he's lashing out, not only does he not think about what the long term consequences of his actions are, he also shows another Black family trait: sadism. When someone pisses off a Black, the family makes them regret it and beg for death. Do you really expect anything else from people with their reputation?

Mind-reading vs. Legilimency: Snape says that they aren't the same thing, but neglects to explain how. Personally, I always found the term "mind-reading" to be ill-defined by itself; is it eavesdropping on the target's thoughts, examining memories, duplicating learned skills? With Legilimency being equally nebulous, I've decided that a wizard used Legilimency on a Muggle with strong natural mental shields, who felt what happened to him and created the idea of "mind-reading". Snape in canon is shown using it to look for memories, but fanon's wandless "passive Legilimency" can be used to hear surface thoughts. Raised primarily in the Muggle world, Jen will use the term "mind-reading" for a while, and since she doesn't need a wand, she does not recognize a difference in the active and passive forms.

Yes, Elsie was an actual black witch, not just an innocent old woman who was framed. Yes, so is Jen. No, she isn't going to reveal that to anyone soon, and definitely not to someone she doesn't trust unreservedly. No, when she flies, she takes more after her mother than her father. And no, she isn't an Animagus; Sirius can only turn into Padfoot while Jen turned into a cat just as a demonstration.

Silently Watches out.