I am a man
More sinn'd against than sinning. –King Lear 3.2.59-60
Neville was working in the greenhouse on Founder's Isle (it was both relaxing and an effective method of studying Herbology) when Sirius's dog Patronus informed him that Tyr Ulfhednar had arrived. He dropped his tuber in horror. Tonight was the full moon, and he had no idea if their island could handle a ravening werewolf. If Tyr hadn't found and used the cure, he'd soon find out the hard way.
At least there were a few hours until dusk, though not as many as he would have liked. If worse came to worse, though, he supposed they could store Sirius and Dudley in the Chamber. He darted to the castle proper, already wondering how to persuade them to stay in the dank, gloomy room.
The werewolf, a tough-looking man of average height with strong shoulders and iron gray hair, stood in Sirius's room with the Muggle and the Grim. His eyes flicked up, met Neville's. He rose. "Who're you?"
"Alexander Chamberlain, at your service." The pseudonym was no longer as awkward as it once had been, but it was still odd not to introduce himself as Neville Longbottom. "A friend of Pollux." He extended a hand.
Tyr considered, cocking his head slightly. Neville blinked but didn't look away or take down his hand. The wolf smiled approvingly, thrust out his own hand. "Tyr Ulfhednar, not exactly a friend of Pollux, but certainly an acquaintance." They shook.
"Where is Pollux?" wondered Dudley. The Muggle was sweating. Neville wondered if he, too, realized what day it was.
The Parselmouth was probably in the Slytherin common room with Blaise and Daphne, but he couldn't exactly say that. "I'll contact him. Sirius, while I'm gone, you can ward one of the cottages." He smiled sheepishly, turned to their guest. "That is, unless you've already used the cure."
Tyr's melancholy sigh was answer enough. Then his face hardened. "Before you do that, care to explain why this island is inhabited by an escaped murderer and his supposed hostage?"
Neville's jaw sagged. Tyr smirked. "We have newspapers in Livonia, you know, and no one has ever escaped Azkaban or its sister prisons. I wouldn't be surprised if they've heard of Sirius Black and his Muggle prisoner in Antarctica."
"He's innocent," the younger wizard explained.
"I see. That doesn't answer my question."
Neville's mouth felt like it was filled with cotton. "You're right, it doesn't." Why was he the one to answer these questions? Anyone would be better, even the sarcastic Blaise. Even Sisith could explain things more clearly, and he was a snake!
He would give anything to let Sirius or even Dudley tell Tyr why they were here, but the werewolf's cold gray eyes bored into his, testing him.
Miraculously, his voice was steady as he explained, "Pollux broke them out. He knew Sirius was innocent, and did not believe that any child, not even one who had abused the Boy-Who-Lived," Dudley flinched "deserved to be sucked dry by dementors."
Tyr's eyebrow quirked, "Does Pollux often make a habit of breaking accused Dark wizards and creatures out of confinement?"
Neville managed a tiny smile. "I think he does."
"And the rest of you?"
He shrugged. "We help."
And they did. Their roles in the prophecy were important: Neville to "reforge the broken chains," Daphne to "bring back the forgotten arts," Blaise to "speak and be heard," and Hermione to "discover the secret of the Spider and the Bee," but all their tasks only served to support Harry's. The four companions literally existed to help the Lightning Speaker defeat the Viper and Spider, break the ancient lies, and (most importantly, here and now) free the werewolves from the full moon. "We help," he repeated, very quietly.
The wizard, the Muggle, and the werewolf stared at him, not understanding his epiphany. He ducked his head, unable to quench a smile. "I'll go get them, Master Ulfhednar. Sirius, could you show him to one of the cottages and ward it for tonight?"
"Sure."
He Portkeyed back to the Chamber and ran up the stairs. A year ago, he would have been exhausted by the jog; now he was only a bit winded. He paused at the exit to view what Harry and Blaise had dubbed the "Myrtle Cam," a piece of mirror charmed to detect ghosts. The mirror was blank, indicating that the dead girl was away. A quick hominum revelio revealed that no humans were in the bathroom, so Neville darted through the bathroom and into the hall.
He fetched Hermione first, mostly because she was the easiest to find. This close to exams, she spent almost as much time in the library as Madame Pince did. Despite that, though, she practically ran out of the library when Neville told her Tyr was back.
"Too bad we don't have that Marauder's Map Sirius and Remus were talking about," Neville noted.
"I know," Hermione sighed. "I wonder what happened to it?"
"It's probably still in Filch's cupboard. Maybe Harry could stage a retrieval."
He'd meant it as a joke, but Hermione thoughtfully chewed her lip. "I don't like the thought of taking it," she sighed, "but if something happens at Hogwarts, we'll need every weapon we can get."
Neville's jaw tightened. He didn't like to admit it, but Hermione was right. "Or we could have Padfoot and Moony make another," he suggested.
"I like that idea better," she confessed. "And perhaps we could convince them to make something like that for the Isle." She nodded slightly, relegating that idea to a distant corner of her mind. "I'll go check the Slytherin common rooms. You get Saysa."
"Are you sure that's safe? You're Muggleborn, and you know how a lot of Slytherin purebloods act around Muggleborns."
"You're a Gryffindor," the Ravenclaw retorted, but she stopped moving.
Fortunately, Daphne Greengrass solved their dilemma by walking around the corner, nose buried in their Transfiguration text.
Neville practically jumped on her, knocking her book aside. Ears burning, he fumbled for it, trying to catch the tome before it hit the ground. He managed to stop it, but only barely. Mumbling apologies, he passed it to its owner.
The Daughter of Frost accepted it, arching a cool, mildly amused brow. "I take it you were looking for me?"
"And Blaise and Harry," Hermione acknowledged. She kept her voice light and casual, conscious of the portraits surrounding them. They were Dumbledore's spies, each and every one of them. Her agile brain scrambled for a code that only her allies would understand. "We think we've made a breakthrough with that one Better than Binns sheet, the one about Livonian history."
The other girl's expression didn't change. "Too bad that breakthrough didn't come two weeks ago when the Latvians broke into their Ministry."
"I know, but better late than never."
"I'll go tell them," Daphne promised. We'll meet you there, her eyes declared.
"Thanks."
It was quite a crowd that came to hear the werewolf's tale: the prophesied five (in their Fae forms), a basilisk, a clan of black garter snakes (who had moved to Founder's Isle in March), an escaped convict, three Hebridean Blacks, a Norwegian Ridgeback, and Dudley Dursley.
Tyr's eyes met Harry's. "You were right," he announced without aplomb. "There is a cure for lycanthropy- at least there was three hundred years ago- and Thiess did track it down." A bitter smile twisted his face.
"When I arrived in Livonia, the first thing I did was travel to Jurgenburg. I tried to find the building where Thiess's trial took place, but it didn't exist anymore. After asking around for a bit, I hunted down the local Ministry outpost. Unlike us, they have several Ministry offices besides the one in their capital, and Jurgenburg is large enough to merit its own outpost. They founded that particular branch back in the fifteen hundreds, so I reasoned that they would have the transcript from Thiess's trial.
"By then people had started to notice me, so I took work there. That managed to satisfy the locals' suspicions. Besides, Pollux's thousand Galleons wouldn't last forever, and as an employee I'd have access to places civilians weren't allowed- namely the archives. Thanks to the Language Lozenges, no one realized I was a foreigner, so they trusted me implicitly.
"In February they finally allowed me into the historical records. I searched for hours- it nearly got me fired for sluggishness- before admitting to myself that there was no mention of Thiess.
"It was all too possible that the records had been lost or destroyed- the trial was three hundred years ago- but something told me that wasn't right. Other documents from the same time period or even earlier were in perfect condition, so why wasn't this one?
"The other werewolves say I'm paranoid. Maybe I am, maybe I'm not. In this case, though, my paranoia paid off. One of my co-workers from the records department told me that Thiess's trial was stored at the main building in the capital.
"The next day, I went to my superior and requested a transfer to Riga. She was sorry to see me go, but I wore her down over the next few weeks. In late March, the paperwork was completed and I moved to my new job.
"The main building was larger than Jurgenburg's, so it took me a while to find the records section." He scowled. "And it took me even longer to realize that Thiess's trial wasn't there either."
"What?" interrupted Neville.
Tyr glared. The Gryffindor blushed. "My apologies."
The werewolf resumed his narrative. "It turns out that sensitive records, the ones they pretend don't exist, are stored elsewhere. This is mostly because the Livonians share a capital with the Latvians, and they and Estonia are constantly squabbling over whether or not Livonia is really an independent state. They're even more paranoid than I am, and with good reason- they've had problems with Latvian spies trying to prove that Wizarding Livonia should be annexed like Muggle Livonia was." He scowled. "But that's getting off-topic.
"Over the next few weeks, I managed to learn that Thiess's records were hidden in a secret room in their version of the Department of Mysteries. By then I was getting impatient- I'd been searching for this cure my entire life. So instead of waiting, scouting, and planning like an intelligent person would do, I slapped together some half-baked scheme and broke into the Ministry earlier this month.
"To make a long story short, I was interrupted by a team of Aurors on my way out. Fortunately, I'd already found the records on Thiess, so it wasn't too much of a tragedy. They chased me, I fought back, escaped to Kuressaare, laid low until the search died down, and finally came here."
His audience was nearly bursting with impatience. "What did you find?" Harry demanded.
Tyr met his eyes, unblinking, face calm and cold as flint. "Thiess was banished. But instead of immigrating to Estonia or Latvia where he at least knew the language, he came to the British Isles. He died a year later in a failed attempt to rob the Department of Historical Artifacts." The werewolf glanced outside, acknowledging the sunset and impending moonrise. "You'd better leave. I can give you a more detailed report in the morning."
"Yes," agreed Hermione. "Besides, we have somewhere we need to be, right, Pollux?"
The Parselmouth nodded. In the excitement over Tyr's return, he'd almost forgotten what else happened on the full moon. "We'll be back around noon," he decided. "Give you a chance to sleep in. You'll need it."
"I always do," Tyr acknowledged. His mouth curled into a smile. "But soon that will change."
"Ere summer's end," Blaise murmured, eyes distant.
The werewolf arched a brow. "That a prophecy?"
"I don't know," he admitted. "I hope so."
"Harry, what's the Department of Historical Artifacts?" wondered Hermione.
"I'll tell you later," he promised, staring worriedly into the sunset. Behind him, the full moon dominated the eastern skies. "Besides, we should wait for Saysa." They'd left the basilisk back on Founders' Isle in case Sirius's hastily erected wards broke. If Tyr's feral wolf-self escaped, she would petrify him. The humans would revive him in the morning with their stash of restorative draught (because with a basilisk keeping them company it would be foolish to not have any antidote to Petrification).
"Sorry," the witch mumbled, embarrassed.
Harry drew the rowan bow, aimed, and fired; two more arrows followed in short succession.
Hermione forced herself to remain patient. After all, she was witnessing a ritual that hadn't been performed for centuries, so it was ridiculous to obsess over some obscure Ministerial office. Still, she knew what would happen in the ritual- she'd gone over it in great detail with the others- and hadn't heard one thing about the Department of Historical Artifacts. Not knowing nagged at her, made her squirm with impatience.
She forced her attention onto Harry, who had just finished circling the dead rath. He was chanting now, sibilant words in a dead tongue. Saysa had translated it for them back in November, and Hermione had memorized both the original text and its English meaning. She mouthed the words with him, not daring to speak lest her voice disturb the ritual.
The chanting Parselmouth raised his arms, and the ones observing him flinched. They knew blood was necessary, and that they themselves might have to give blood for this spell, but no one liked watching a friend deliberately harm himself.
Blood rained down on the ground, followed by the silver athame.
Light erupted, engulfing the circle and drowning out the twilit shadows. It shifted through the primary colors before blazing white and vanishing.
There was an odd clicking noise, like keys shifting in a long-locked door. Hermione gasped. For a second, she tasted something wild and heady and spicy.
The faerie knight appeared, just as he had last time. Hermione met his gaze- and the world changed.
The serpent sight erupted into being, lighting up the dim world with colored brilliance. The knight shone with hues she had never seen before, shades that were impossible in the human world: something that might have been related to purple, oily mother-of-pearl, another like white blackness or black whiteness. Her eyes burned, and she quickly looked down at the rath.
Hermione's stomach lurched.
The ground was… swirling. Like a black hole or whirlpool, it sucked in light and color, disgorging something else, something magical and inhuman.
What had they done?
You have brought back the magic, Messenger of Truth. The not-voice filled her mind, pressing her ear drums out to make room. And in doing so, you have earned your just reward.
The knight reached out, grabbing at the invisible cords of color. It shifted, unnaturalness melting away. He dropped the light, and it moved- straight towards Hermione and her friends.
The witch shrieked, jumping backwards in a vain attempt to avoid the writhing tendril. Her companions, unable to see the invisible threat, gawked at her in amazement.
The beam hit them at the same time- but nothing happened. Hermione stared at herself, wondering what in the name of Merlin was going on.
The faerie knight spoke again, his not-voice tinged with amusement. Magic.
Hermione did not know if she came to understand his message on her own or if he had given her the information, but suddenly she knew what he was talking about. Her mouth formed a tiny o of astonishment.
Magic.
"Are you all right?" whispered Daphne. Her eyes flickered back and forth between the rider and her friend.
"I'm fine," the elder witch replied. "I'll tell you about it later." She raised her voice. "Sir knight, do you have enough vials for all of us?"
He did not reply, either silently or out loud. Instead, he walked over to Harry and handed him five crystal vials. Then he was gone.
"I hate the Fae," the Animagus moaned.
"Ditto," Blaise agreed. "They're…."
"Exactly." Harry turned to his Ravenclaw friend. "You all right, Hermione?"
She nodded, not trusting herself to speak. "I'm fine. It's just…" She shook her head. "Magic. Harry, that was magic. No, no, of course it was magic- you already knew that- but you don't know…." She shrugged helplessly. "When he looked at me- you know how I've been experimenting with replicating Saysa's sight, and I thought I had it under control- but I didn't. I saw it. I saw the magic, the portal- it was eating the world."
"What?" Her friends' appalled shrieks cut through the night like Harry's magic had cut through the worlds.
Hermione hastened to explain. "No, not eating the world, not exactly; it was more like it was sucking in all the world's used, decayed magic, like a black hole or whirlpool. And then it… it gave the magic back, but it was stronger, brighter, more powerful- and so are we."
It was obvious that no one understood. She hissed in frustration, both with them and with herself. "The Fae- they somehow renew our magic, make it stronger. No, I don't think it's our magic, exactly- more like the natural magic that exists in solstices and full moons, the kind we tap for rituals but can't really control. And because we were here when the rath revived, some of that power came into us." Her eyes were bright in the moonlight, though whether from fear or awe not even Hermione knew. "Every time we perform this ritual, we get stronger."
"Whoa." Blaise's exclamation was nothing more than a breathy whisper.
"At least," the Ravenclaw continued, "parts of us do- the parts more connected to the wilder side of magic- Neville's plant gift, your Seeing, my wards…. I don't know about the magic that needs wands, but that might be growing stronger as well."
Harry's face whitened. "What about-" He gestured frantically to his scar. "D'you think that made it stronger?"
Nausea bubbled in her stomach. "I- I didn't think of that. We should have Saysa take a look- she's more experienced with this than I am."
"If it did, you can't do this anymore," Blaise proclaimed. "It's already hard to get that Horcrux out; if it gets stronger, it'll be impossible."
Harry shuddered, looking almost as sick as Hermione felt. Merlin and Morgana, what had they done?