Chapter 43

For disclaimer and author notes please see chapter 1.

1989-07-31 16:30 UTC, Kithurst Close

While these momentous things were going on, the kids had been having a reasonably good time, all things considered.

The first hour, when they had Luna for company but the others had not yet arrived, was spent in getting to know each other. Hobby had spent a fair amount of time with Harry and Hermione, giving them little tidbits of information on most of their future friends - nothing negative, and mainly sticking to facts and hard-to-refute opinions. The only mildly negative thing he had said was that Mrs Weasley tended to think her way was the only way, and attempted to enforce it on anyone and everyone, not just her own kids, though she meant well and had a good heart.

(As for Luna, since hopefully Luna's mother would not die this time around, she may not be the dreamy, other-worldly, being that his Luna had been. So he had merely said she was lovable, sweet, not a mean bone in her body, and very intelligent. Also that she was often lonely, and really had no friends except Ginny. He hadn't mentioned nargles or snorcacks though - let Hermione discover those animals herself, he had chuckled to himself!)

So Hermione had welcomed the girl warmly. Truth be told, it would be good for her and Harry to have other friends; God knows they did not have many close friends in the local school they were going to, and that was before they had realised they would not see any of them past the 90-91 school year.

(She did get a little shock when Luna turned to her, and whispered, "I am soo glad you were with him. God alone knows what would have happened if he was alone". She just smiled hesitantly, and allowed Luna to change the subject immediately. They had not told anyone of her part in the unexpected rescue from Dolohov, and in fact very few people knew she existed, far less that she was also with Harry at that time. Reserving judgement for now, she resolved to ask Hobby next time she saw him).

Luna had a little knowledge of the muggle world, but most of the toys and games in Harry's room were new to her, as was the TV and VHS player. To Harry's immense delight, she had started with the TV to ask her first questions. Harry was happy to demonstrate, but it had taken all of Hermione's persuasive skills to convince him that they should watch his favourite movie after all the other kids were here, and they had all exhausted both themselves as well as all the games they had planned. So Harry settled on one of the cartoon movies in his collection - something that you didn't have to watch till the end if you found other things to do.

Once Luna had had enough of the TV, she spent some time learning about some of the muggle games; Scrabble especially took her fancy quite well. The two girls played for a while, with Harry watching, and it seemed as if she would be quite the contendor if they could continue.

Pretty soon, though, the other kids had arrived, within a few minutes of each other. First was Mrs Weasley and her four children, then Daphne, then Neville, then Susan.

Sirius had welcomed Mrs Weasley cordially, but somewhat informally - this was intentional. He had offered her the choice of hanging out with the kids, or joining him and Pandora in the drawing room, mentioning that a few other parents were expected. She had chosen to go with the kids. (It was very surprising to Hobby, watching this, that Molly and Pandora greeted each other quite formally, and after that made no attempt to socialise, as one might expect of two witches living so close to each other. Was it only Luna and Ginny that were friends? Of course, the intellectual gap between Molly Weasley and Pandora Lovegood was pretty wide, so maybe that was the reason. He couldn't call this a difference, per se, since it may well have been the same in his timeline also).

As soon as Sirius had introduced Mrs Weasley to the kids (including a casual, throw-away, remark to the effect that Hermione was a muggleborn) and left, she took over. She was the only adult in the room, but even without that, she was used to her husband and children (well, most of them anyway) obeying her commands without complaint.

She saw Luna and Hermione playing Scrabble. Ginny, since she knew Luna, gravitated to them, while Ron and the twins engaged Harry in conversation. They started chatting - at first a little stiffly, though it got better quickly. They almost literally lived in different worlds, but, unlike adults, this was more a conversation maker than a conversation breaker - children could afford to be curious without worry. And once again Harry found himself explaining the TV and showing a movie. Wisely, he decided not to risk Hermione's wrath, so he stuck to the cartoon Luna had been watching.

Meanwhile, Hermione and Luna were explaining Scrabble to Mrs Weasley and Ginny. While Ginny was fascinated and admiring (there were several words on the board that she had never heard before), it was clear that Mrs Weasley was not impressed.

"That looks more like an English exam than a game. Don't you think you should play something more... enjoyable?"

She got a blank stare from Luna, and a grin from Hermione. "Oh we are certainly enjoying ourselves, Mrs Weasley!", she said.

"That may be, but proper witches and wizards should play wizarding games!"

Hermione's mother entered just then. Quickly introducing herself to the matronly woman, she then asked her, quite innocently, "Mrs Weasley, did Sirius not mention that this was a muggle dwelling?"

"Oh yes he did, Mrs Granger".

"Well, as you know we - my daughter, my husband, and I - are new to this world, but we're trying to learn as much as we can. I'd like to understand what is considered proper and what is considered improper for a witch or a wizard. I presume, from what you said, that going to a child's birthday in a muggle house is proper enough, but playing the games that happened to be in that home is not, then?"

Molly Weasley spluttered. "Well, that's... that's not the point. A home is a much bigger thing, you can't simply change it. Games-"

"So, a muggle home is not proper, ideally? That is, if Sirius would move to a magical home that would be more proper? Does he know this? Should we tell him?"

More spluttering. She dared not presume to tell Lord Black anything like that. In fact she dared not call him by his first name, while this muggle woman apparently was comfortable doing so. "No no, that's not- that would be- that would not be appropriate-"

Mrs Granger would not let go. Adding a confused expression on her face, she said, "Oh Mrs Weasley, I'm even more confused now! Is that because Sirius is, as you just called him, a Lord? If he weren't a Lord, would it be appropriate to tell him his home is not fit for a proper wizard?"

Mrs Weasley grasped at the straw, because she was not quite smart enough to completely let go of her original, misguided, statement. "Yes, that would be appropriate. Lord Black knows what he is doing, but other wizards might not".

Hermione and Harry had been watching this, and enjoying the take-down. Hermione had beckoned to Harry as soon as it started, and Harry had excused himself from the group he was chatting with and come over. (And the boys in his group would not have come even if he had asked them! Three of them for obvious reasons, and Neville because he was still a bit shy).

Hermione decided to stir the pot a little. "Mum, I'm even more confused now. In the muggle world, we use proper, at least in this context, to indicate a level of traditional behaviour that only the upper crust seem to be able to maintain, and that lesser people are not held to. If Sirius is a Lord, and it's OK for him to live in an improper residence, why is not OK for lesser wizards to do so?"

Mrs Weasley was staring goggle-eyed at Hermione, probably flabbergasted by the rhetoric.

Hermione turned to her. "Mrs Weasley, does the wizarding world hold more important people to lesser standards? Is that the cause of this confusion on the part of my mum and I? Because I assure you it's the other way round in the muggle world".

Mrs Weasley was getting visibly annoyed. First this girl speaks like no child she has ever heard, and now she was questioning her. Really, it even seemed as if the girl was making fun of her in some subtle manner! How dare she?

Speaking over Hermione, she queried Mrs Granger. "Is this considered proper in your world? Children questioning adults in this manner?"

She expected Mrs Granger to hang her head, or rebuke her daughter to save face. Or maybe both.

What she got was this: "Oh absolutely! As long as they are polite and stay on topic, it's excellent for their self-confidence, their reasoning skills, and their ability to make judgements based on available facts. Plus, adults are not always right you know, we're often focused on the wrong things, can't see the wood for the trees. Why, I do believe many of us are outright prejudiced sometimes! So it really helps to have a child's view on things".

Mrs Weasley decided she could not afford to respond. She gave the two Grangers a disgusted look, and then, muttering to herself, went and sat in a corner, brooding. She didn't even interfere when things got a little noisy during one of the more active games.

The kids had fun though. By the end of the evening Daphne, Susan, and Neville at least had managed to connect quite well. Daphne and Hermione also spent some time with each other, mostly playing Scrabble, alternating with Luna. Susan watched, but she also spent time with Ron and his brothers - they seemed to be really funny guys, and she had no experience with that kind of thing so she had fun.

Harry mingled with everyone, as befitted the birthday boy, and generally had one of the best birthdays. Ever, he thought to himself.

1989-07-31 18:30 UTC, Kithurst Close

Hobby did not go to Ollivander. Instead, he decided to ask Nick and Penny first, and if they didn't know, then go to Ollivander.

But before even that, now that Kreacher was on floo-guard duty, he needed to go take a look at the kids room. Because the Phantom was still - to people like Molly anyway - someone to be feared, or at least someone to be suspicious of, he switched back to Hobby. This was also to prevent awkward questions if one of the visiting adults decided to come to the kids' room.

By this time, Hermione was bored. The games were fine, but there was a huge wavelength mismatch between Harry and Hermione on the one hand, and the Weasleys, Daphne, and Susan on the other. Neville, mainly due to the fact that he and Harry had met before, though not in the muggle world, was not so badly off, and Luna, sweetheart that she was, would be comfortable anywhere as long as no one was mean to her.

So, after some not-so-successful attempts at various games (like musical chairs, statues, and so on), she had caved and given Harry the green light. He had beamed at her for letting the party move from "games" mode to "movie" mode, and instantly popped in his favourite movie.

She did like the movie they were watching - for the first two or three times she had seen it. But Harry absolutely loved it, and it only took one new person in the audience before he felt he had an excuse to trot it out. She, on the other hand, needed a much longer gap between one viewing and the next in order for her to be able to enjoy it.

(It hadn't helped that Hobby told her - in a whispered aside the last time they had watched the movie - that Harry was a bit like the protagonist of the movie, at least in the sense of jumping into dangerous situations without a plan. So now she had even more reason to worry when Harry invariably chose that movie to watch!)

What made things worse was Harry liked to mouth the actors' lines before they actually spoke. She had to glare at him each time he mouthed "son of a bitch" to the on-screen Belloq, though that didn't really stop him - he just grinned at her! And of course, the line "I don't believe in magic", always got them chuckling.

Finally, a bit over half way into the movie, Ron Weasley caught a line spoken by Marion - the whole place is slithering - and he and his brothers fell about in laughter. Harry and Hermione had never had any prejudice instilled in them (even Sirius would not try to malign Slytherin House as a whole, not after what his own brother Regulus had done to redeem himself), so they just waited patiently, Harry's finger on the pause button, for Ron to calm down.

Some few minutes after this, Hermione noticed Hobby beckoning to her from the door. She grabbed the opportunity to get up and walk out of the room so she could chat with Hobby for a while.

"How's the party going, Hermione?"

"It's going well, Hobby. Where did Kreacher disappear to suddenly, and why is he not back?"

"I think Sirius suddenly realised the floo does not have a password, so he put him on floo duty. Anyway your mother and Mrs Weasley are both here, which should be more than enough supervision", said Hobby. "And speaking of... how is Mrs Weasley behaving?"

She giggled, before she sat down, had him sit down, and told him the whole story.

Hobby had a good laugh too. If it weren't for the seriousness of the events in the other part of the house, which - thank God - the kids did not know, he would have loved to stay here with the kids. Maybe watch a little TV. See Luna happy and laughing gaily. See Hermione and Harry without a care in the world.

But an elf-man's gotta do what an elf-man's gotta do, he thought.

1989-07-31 19:00 UTC, location unknown

"Hello Hobby, is the party over?", asked Penny.

Nick and Penny had left shortly before 4pm, when the other guests were expected. Pandora was family, but the others need not know of their involvement with Harry and his family, or indeed even that they were in the country. In any case, Penny was still keyed up about Dumbledore possibly having murdered her god-daughter, even if it was in some other timeline that they would now be taking extra pains to prevent.

"It's winding down. But something happened. We got attacked, but the attacker got taken down so fast the kids don't even know something happened, so don't worry."

"Who was the attacker?", asked Nick. He did not need to ask who took the attacker down.

"Arabietta Edgecombe, from the ministry's floo network department. We don't know yet what her grudge was, but in my past life she was known to be a sympathiser of the death-eaters, and her daughter ratted us out to Umbridge at one point", said Hobby.

"Actually", he continued, "she's a good example of the problem of dealing with all the sympathisers in the ministry, and there are supposed to be many of them - I don't even know who they are or how many. We'll need a way to flush them out".

"But that's not why you are here", said Nick. He knew the discussion of Pandora's death and Dumbledore's role in it was still pending.

"Yes. Luna's mum is one thing. But something curious happened today when I was taking down Edgecombe, and I wanted to ask you if you knew enough about wands to tell me what happened and why".

"Well, we don't know as much as Ollivander does, but we know plenty. What exactly happened? Be as detailed as you can..."

"Wait", said Penny. "Understand that I'm postponing the Dumbledore discussion only because Sirius, Remus, and Pandora are not here, otherwise I could care less about some wand, over my god-daughter's life".

Nick gave her a sideways hug to show support. "That's true, but also, it's a more long term problem. Even if Sirius, Remus, and Pandora were here, we would not have taken any visible action right away".

Penny huffed. Hobby smiled.

"So, back to the wand thing", prodded Nick.

"Well, this woman who attacked us, she had her wand raised, and a reducto curse on her lips. Things were happening too fast for anyone else to react - Sirius was in no position to dodge far enough. We're talking split-second here. Only an elf could have done what I did - I just popped in front of her and grabbed the wand out of her hand".

"And then", he continued, "I made the mistake of staying there".

"Oh no, don't tell me a part of the curse hit you!", said Penny. Although to be honest he looked absolutely fine and not like he'd suffered any damage lately.

"No. The curse blew up her hand, and I was showered with bits of blood, bone, and assorted stuff like that. So now the question is, what the hell happened there, and does anyone know if it can be reliably repeated".

"Why would you want to repeat it?"

"OK here's my half-baked theory. The magic is collected from the body, and pools in the lower arm. The pool of magic is then shaped into a specific curse, and then it leaves the arm by way of the wand. All this happens in a split-second, at some point after the witch or wizard decides to use a certain spell, but before the spell is complete. Completing the spell is only opening the channel to exit, and that's when we see it."

Nick thought for a bit. "OK, sounds good so far, and certainly jells with my experience when I am casting curses. And if this is true, it means the already shaped magic now has no outlet, and it does its thing right where it has been left?"

"Something like that!"

"It should be easy enough to test, shouldn't it? Just use some benign spell, maybe a warming charm?"

"I wasn't sure, plus my physiology - who knows how it actually is inside, when I turn into a wizard."

"Which brings me back to my original question: why are you trying to repeat it? What's interesting about it?"

Hobby grinned maliciously. "Let's try what you said, first, please? Try a warming charm. Just for practice, don't hold the wand too tight".

Nick took his wand off the side table, pointed it at Hobby, and muttered the charm. Hobby pulled the wand out of his hand a fraction of a second before Nick completed the words.

Nick stayed in that position for a few minutes, then frowned. "I feel nothing", he said.

Hobby was surprised, and not a little disappointed.

"We know it worked once, with a reducto curse. Why doesn't it work with a warming charm?"

"Maybe it only works for curses? I can tell you the feeling I get when casting anything benign is at least somewhat different from what I feel when casting a proper curse".

Hobby turned into the Phantom and concentrated, wand out, for a bit. Nothing.

Either - as he supposed earlier - his physiology was different or he just could not focus sufficiently.

"You look very disappointed, Hobby", said Nick.

"I was hoping to develop this into a combat tactic, but I guess we can't actually test it. No one wants to lose an arm for an experiment!"

Penny wasn't too unhappy. "I would guess the days when we might have feared attacks by several death-eaters acting in concert, are behind us. Most of them are gone, and I suspect Edgecombe and her ilk - the dregs around the periphery - are all that's left".

"Don't jinx it, Penny", Nick said with a smile. "There are still a few of them out there, right, Hobby?"

Hobby just nodded. It looked like he'd have to meet Ollivander after all. For now, he filed this away as something to follow up later, and moved on to thinking about how to get the last of the sympathisers out.

Hobby said his goodbyes to Nick and Penny, and went back to Kithurst Close.

Additional AN: this time, two authors I really like, reviewed. Wow! And I learned about the inverse of Dunning-Kruger from the most erudite of all my favourite authors!