"Ro..." Aquila said, though his voice was hoarse and weak as he lay on the ground in front of Rowena. She knelt over him, feeling a pulse that was steady, if nothing else. With what seemed to be amazing effort, Aquila lifted his right arm to his temple, wand in hand, and a silvery substance started spilling out, connected to his wand like a raindrop falling slowly from a leaf. "Flask," he added, and Rowena suddenly understood what was going on.

She stood up quickly and made her way to the cabinet she had visited before, when she was here last with Rhys. She was greeted by row after row of memories, but on the far right, she found a small collection of unused flasks. Grabbing as many as she could hold, just in case, she knelt on her father's right side and held one out, guiding his wand when he seemed incapable of keeping it as steady as he needed to.

One flask filled, she switched to a second as he reached again to his forehead for more. "Please don't be dying, Papa," she whispered. "I need you to stay with me."

The last of the memory dripped from his wand and his arm flopped uselessly to his side. "I'll stay. You can't stay... go look. Now."

Rowena had no intention of leaving him there alone, his eyes shut again, and so close to death. She quickly Flooed for a Healer to come and stay with him, giving the address. "Thank you; come right in when you get here. You'll find him alone in the master bedroom. Please take him to the living room to work on him, so you'll have more room," she said, and knew she needed to disappear quickly. The moment a Healer promised to come, she was up and pouring the closest memory into the Pensieve.

When the whirling stopped and the scene reformulated around her, Rowena recognized it as similar French countryside to what she saw on her last trip into the Pensieve. However, instead of seeing Morgana, it was her father and a young version of herself who were walking along the Seine. Rowena jogged to catch up with the pair, estimating her younger self to be about seven. She had no memory of ever being in France.

"Can we go home yet, Papa? I miss Buttercup, and Soren." The young girl was holding her father's hand, trusting as they walked along the muddy shores.

"Almost, sweetheart. We just have to find your mum. I know we'll find her soon."

She sighed the over-exaggerated sigh of a child. "That's what you said yesterday, Papa. And the day before that. And I'm hungry!"

"I know you are. I am, too. And we'll get to eat soon." They stopped walking, and he squatted down so he was eye level with her. "Do you see the steeple up ahead there?"

"What's a steeple?"

"It's a triangle at the top of a building, with a cross on top."

The elder Rowena made her way beside them, watching her younger self scour the landscape. Finally, her eyes went from squinted with concentration to wide open. "I see it, Papa! I see it! What does it mean?"

"It means there is a village nearby, where we can find some food. We'll walk there now. Do you think you can make it that far?"

"I guess so."

"Keep your eye on the steeple, Ro, and you'll watch it getting bigger and bigger. When you're right underneath it, you'll have to look up and up to see the top. The bigger it is, the closer we are."

The young girl's face fixed with determination and she set out across the marsh, her father following dutifully beside. Rowena followed them, cautiously, as though they could see her intruding on this memory. Now having a set destination on which to focus her hunger, Rowena chatted happily with her father, seeming almost lighthearted. Beside her, Aquila's eyes never lightened, or showed the hint of a true smile. Before too long, however, a figure approached, a tall young man with dark hair and dark eyes. He moved cautiously, apprehensively, searching the pair with narrowed eyelids and furrowed eyebrows. "Qui êtes-vous?"

For a moment, Aquila's face changed to recognition, then panic, before settling in to the kindness of a stranger. "Je m'appelle Aquila, et ici c'est ma fille, Rowena. Et vous?"

The man dismissed the question with a wave of his hand. "Ça ne fait rien, monsieur. Est-ce que vous connaissez une Anglaise qui est nommé Morgana?"

"Qui? Morgana? Non, monsieur, je ne connais pas personne du ce nom. Je suis désolé. Mais bonne chance!"

The man continued past the pair, a limp in his gait, his face confused. Rowena's limited knowledge of French told her that her father just lied, denying that he knew anyone named Morgana. Rowena could understand his intentions in lying; she wanted to deny all associations with the woman as well. But there was still something she couldn't figure out.

Why this memory? Of all the things Papa had to offer her as he lay on the floor, why had he given her this memory? To show how he'd lied? That didn't seem right, didn't seem enough. The Frenchman, however, seemed familiar to Rowena, like she had seen him somewhere before. The recognition made no sense; this was a memory ten years old. Even if she had seen him recently... except. Except this wasn't the first time she'd traveled to the French countryside via Pensieve.

Behind her, sure enough, a mad woman was approaching the strange Frenchman, hair matted, dress dirty. "Où est la Baguette du Sureau? Je sais que vous sait!"

Aquila and the young Rowena were about 500 feet ahead of Morgana and the Frenchman, and Aquila pulled his daughter into the reeds along the shore. "Papa! I'm hungry, why are we stopping? It's all muddy; I'm getting dirty, Papa, and there could be bugs."

"Shh! We need to stay extra still, Ro, okay? Keep looking at the steeple. Focus on the steeple."

The elder Rowena was torn between staying to see what her father did and going back to hear what she heard already. Eventually, she turned her back on her father and watched her mother and the Frenchman. He sounded desperate, pleading with her. "Non, je ne sais pas! C'est vrai! C'est vrai!"

From here, the memory was new to her. She remembered how beforehand it had taken on a hollow, echoing quality. There was none of that echo now, and the scene was different. Before, her mother sounded innocent and sweet, and Monsieur DuPont had thrown her into the river, where she was unable to swim. None of that was happening. Morgana's arms were raised above her hand, a wand at the ready. "Dites-moi maintenant, s'il y a valeur dans votre vie."

"Je ne sais rien!"

"Menteur!" Then barely a pause, not enough time for the man to respond, and Morgana's wand was raised, fury in her eyes. "Avada Kedavra!"

"No! Mama, no!" Rowena couldn't help her cries, couldn't help it as she rushed forward toward the dead man, having completely forgotten her inability to change what had already happened. She knelt by his side, tried to touch him, to save him, but her hands passed through his lifeless body. "I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry," she whimpered.

Rowena's attention was off her mother for full minutes as she nearly lost her sanity attending to the dead man, but when she turned to look at Morgana again, there was something different about her somehow, like some of her own sanity left with the murder. "It's here somewhere, I know it, the damn liar," Morgana said. "I know it's around here somewhere."

Soon, Morgana was on her knees on the edge of the river, digging in the mud until her fingernails bled, hair wilder than ever, the blood from her fingernails and knees dripping into the Seine, leaving red streaks that traveled downstream, fading pink. Rowena was tugged away from the scene by some invisible force, and as she turned, she saw her father again walking with young Rowena toward the steeple. The young girl's face was vacant and free, staring ahead, not once looking backward toward her mother.

"Will we be there soon, Papa? To the steeple? I'm still hungry."

"Yes, sweetheart," he said, pulling a strand of hair behind her ear. "We're nearly there."

"I wish I had a mother to bring with us," she added, distant, like an afterthought.

"I know, I know. I wish it, too," he said, and with that, Rowena faded from the scene and found herself face down on the floor of his bedroom again. Her breathing was fast and shallow and she sat down, trying to calm herself. She needed time to think, to figure out why this memory was so similar to and yet so different from the first French memory she'd found.

"Did you hear something?" a voice called from the living room.

"Nah, it was probably just the wind," came another voice.

"Still, shouldn't we make sure? This man looks like he was attacked in some way. What if the attacker is back?"

"Then we shouldn't be the ones to find him. We're just here to Heal the guy and move on."

A sigh. "Fine. He's nearly stable anyway."

Rowena's heart beat against her and she worried for a minute that she would be found, confused as the attacker rather than the person trying to save her father. There was no time to think, after all; she needed to leave before the Healers found her. It seemed his dying wish was for her to see those memories. But if the conversation she overheard was any indication, he was nearly stable. Still, there was more Rowena needed to know; she grabbed the second flask and poured it into the basin.

Morgana was alive and in the living room. A young Rowena was nowhere to be found, so the elder Rowena wasn't sure of the time frame. Surely it was earlier - or much later - than the memory in France, though. Morgana did not look nearly so frightening, her hair tamed and silky still, pulled back in a bun at the base of her neck. But still her face was set, determined.

Aquila stood across from her, arms on the kitchen counter, a fight in his eyes Rowena hadn't seen in years. "No, Morgana. You're not going back."

"Yes, I am. I have a lead for the Elder Wand, and I need to pursue it."

"All you've cared about from the day we got married is the damn Elder Wand! What about our daughter? What about Rowena? Are you just going to let her grow up thinking you were never around? She loves you, you know."

For an instant, for a moment Rowena could barely quantify except in the clarity of the memory, Morgana's face grew sober, almost regretful. "She'll be better off not knowing me, thinking I might have been a good mother if I were here." Then, finished speaking, her face again took on a maniacal quality, and her eyes, put out by one sane thought, turned fiery again. "There are more important things than that silly girl, anyway, Aquila. Look at the way she's afraid of a Kneazle! After only one scratch, too. I'm searching for immortality. Don't you get that? I thought you of all people, heir of the Potters, would understand!"

"And I thought you loved me - not just my name. I suppose all of us are mistaken at some point," he spat at her. "The ancient people used to think that immortality was attained through having children, you know."

"The ancient people are dead. I have no intention to join them."

"Have it your way, then, but if you're going to leave, you will never come back here again."

Her eyes were wild, her mouth curled into a twisted smile. "If that's what you want, that is perfectly fine by me. But you know you don't mean it, Aquila. You know you don't. You still love me!" It was an accusation, a challenge to be met, but Rowena's father couldn't face it. He looked down, walked away, refused to answer.

"Rowena, come here, darling," he said, moving into the living room. "There's no need to be scared of Tiffany."

"I'm not scared of her, Daddy," the young girl said as the elder Rowena made her way into the living room. She was very close in age to the Rowena from the last memory - perhaps only weeks apart. She sat curled in a chair, her legs close to her chest, pressed against the back far away from the Kneazle.

"You're not?"

"Well, only a little," she admitted. "But I'm more scared of Mama."

"Why are you scared of Mama?"

"I think she's going to hurt me. I don't remember much about her, except when she comes around I always get scared and then my mind goes blank and I don't remember things for awhile. I don't like it. I want her to leave."

Aquila moved to sit beside his daughter on the chair, picked her up with the grace that comes with practice, and set her gently on his lap. "She'll be gone soon, Ro. It will just be you and me again, like before."

Rowena's face was serene as her father stroked her hair and they rocked back and forth, father and daughter. These moments were ones Rowena remembered ten years later. These moments that made her fond of her father as a child, and admiring of him as an adult. But seeing it now as the comfort that came only between lies and deception shed a light on him she wanted to burn out.

"Aquila? Leave the child alone and come back here a moment, please," Morgana called, and to Rowena it sounded like she was putting on a show of domesticity for her daughter.

He got up, patted young Rowena's head, gave her one last glance from the threshold between the kitchen and the living room. He made no such attempt at the airs of kindness. "What do you want, now?"

"In all honesty, I only came back from France at all to give you one thing. It is the only possession that ever mattered to me." Aquila smirked and rolled his eyes, and the look was so familiar it could have been Rowena's mirror. Like her, he must have been thinking about the possessions she didn't yet have - the Elder Wand, the Resurrection Stone - possessions that meant more to her than her daughter's well being and, later on, her daughter's life. Morgana pulled a book from her satchel on the counter, a book that was worn and old already, a book Rowena, looking on, found most familiar. "Keep this book close to you, after I am gone. Read it to Rowena, tell her the stories of the Bard. My own mother used to read them to me, especially Harry's story, and they brought me comfort and hope. Maybe they will bring Rowie the same. If I never see you or her again, I hope you can keep this book and remember me."

Aquila nodded and took the book with more reverence than Rowena would have liked. Maybe it was true, what old sages said, that love destroys logic. It made her want to shun love, seeing what it had done to her father. He tucked the book under his arm without bothering with any sort of goodbye to his wife and joined Rowena again. He knelt down beside her in the chair and raised his own wand to her forehead, producing an empty flask from his pocket. Did he always keep them there? Were they readily available in case of emergency? And why did they bother to save her memories?

She succumbed to his treatment with the ease of habit, and once her eyes were fuzzy from his Obliviate, he cuddled beside her on the chair. "Shall we read?"

"Okay, Papa."

"Once upon a time, there was an evil man who went by the name of Voldemort..."

The memory faded to black and again Rowena was on the floor in her father's room. She forced herself to remain still and calm while she listened to her house and hoped for silence. The voices of the Healers were gone, and she felt something like safe. She sat up and leaned against the side of her father's bed, clasping her knees to her chest like she had as a child. Why these memories? Of all the things her father wished to tell her, why did he choose these two things?

She had already seen a version of the memory from France before, although surely he didn't already know that. But the differences between the two were striking. The hollow, far-away feeling from the first memory wasn't, then, due to age. The second memory, her father's own, seemed more true, and made more sense with what she already understood about her mother. But why were they there? If it was, indeed, after the second memory, why had they sought her out again? And why had her mother killed a seemingly innocent man?

The questions haunted her, made her sick to her stomach. But the second memory set was just as confusing. From what Rowena had seen earlier, these visits and obliviations were almost commonplace in their household. What made this instance so special that he wanted her to know about it? Was it truly the last time Morgana visited before she died? Rowena didn't know what to believe about when Morgana died anymore. If it was, why was it so important? All she did was torment her husband and hand him a book. Nothing more.

Exhausted from speculating about the memories, Rowena decided it was time to check on her father. She got up and went down to the living room, and Aquila was there, in the very same chair where he first read to her from Beedle the Bard. Someone sat beside him, but she could tell it was not a trained Healer who sat with him. Still, she recognized him immediately. "Rhys? What are you doing here?"

"I spent all night worrying about you," he said, holding up a glass of water for Aquila to drink. "Something didn't feel right. I kept re-reading that note and thinking about how your papa normally writes you and it didn't click. I knew something had to be wrong. I left Hogwarts as soon as I could and Apparated here."

She knelt down beside him, awkwardly gave him a hug, then pulled away immediately. "Um, well, I'm glad you came. Obviously, I guess. I don't know what I would do now without you. Were the Healers still here when you arrived?"

"Yes. I said... I said he was my uncle and you let me know he needed help. When they told me no one else was home when they found him, I worried about you. But he needed me to stay, so I did."

"I was in the Pensieve. He was knocked unconscious, fighting something within him, and when he woke up, he gave me two memories and told me I needed to look at them right away. I thought- I thought it was his dying wish."

"Why did he give you the memories?"

"That's the thing," Rowena said, sighing, as the red glow of sunrise came through the windows. "I have no idea."