It has been a while since I updated this, but I am not giving up yet. Just need to work out of some of the plot holes without punching new ones.

Lonely Hearts

Minerva stepped into the Hog's Head and wrinkled her nose at the overwhelming stench of goat. It was not a place with a busy clientele, but it would suit her better than the popular Three Broomsticks. Less chance of running into a colleague or student here. She called for a tankard of mead and selected a seat well away from the bar. All the better to nurse her heartache alone. He was getting married. It was her choice, was it not? Muggle- wixen unions were tricky things. She had seen how things turned out for her parents. She could not risk it. What if he rejected her for being a witch, what if he turned and fled?

"Steady there, Missy…" Aberforth looked up from wiping the bar top as the glasses vibrated in response to Minerva's magical surge, fuelled by her tumultuous emotions. Minerva apologized and took a deep breath to regain control. The glasses stopped shaking. Aberforth watched the young teacher from the corner of his eye as he pottered about the tavern. Finally, the young witch finished her mead and left.

It was dark outside. Perhaps it would not be remiss of him to close early. The bell jangled. Aberforth looked up. His breath hitched at the graceful form that stepped through the door. Dark curls peeked out from under the hood. A pale, delicate hand reached for the clasp of her cloak. The cloak was deep red, putting one in mind of blood or red wine.

"Polly?" he croaked.

"Non, pere bouc," a musical laugh but with an obsidian edge that was absent from his beloved's.

"Severine. Little Red Riding Hood. Beware that you do not run into the big bad wolf."

"I have, too many times… a glass of your best, sil vous plait? Has my parcel been?" the witch removed her heavy woollen cloak and hung it from the hooks. Beneath, her dress was widow's black. "This weather – brr…" she waved her hand and the fire flared back to life from the embers of the hearth.

Aberforth grunted and placed the box of ashwinder scales on the tabletop, where it was quickly secreted away in Severine's likely Extended reticule.

"So what brings you to Hogsmeade this New Year's Eve?" Aberforth asked.

"Can one not visit an old friend before one's wedding?" Severine tossed back the shot of whiskey he poured. Oh, they were never romantically involved. Under Severine's lady-like demeanour lurked the guttersnipe who had opened the door to him when he arrived at Perenelle's pension gravely wounded. Aberforth always knew Polly was the only woman for him. Severine declared she would sooner wed a zombie than Aberforth Dumbledore for all the trouble he gave her and Madame Flamel.

"A Prince this round, eh? I do hope he survives the honeymoon…"

"This one will last, trust me. The stronger wizards tend to burn out first," the minx waggled her brows cheekily. "Cheers to the new year… and the memory of Apollonia Rosier."

Aberforth bit back a curse. How could she know? Had he been so delirious back then when she tended his injury? Severine's jet-black eyes bored into his. A smile on her lips. Legilimency, of course. The House of the Jaguar was rumoured to have an affinity for the mind arts as much as blood magics. He flushed red at the thought the witch was rummaging through his private memories. He snapped his shields down.

"Old Comte Rosier. We had his townhouse Cleansed over Yule. Kicked the old man out into the streets while we were at it. It's going into Prince hands now, Louis' uncles – Benoit and Alois. Ah, the summer of 1899. I cut my first throat that year. Perhaps you remember it for something else."

"My sister died…" Aberforth tore his eyes away from hers.

"Non, you and your brother fell in love. Both affairs ended in heartbreak." Severine had gleaned that much from her time with the Flamels. "Both of you were in Paris that fall and never sought each other out. The Flamels do talk to each other, and I listen. There was a child the following year. I could not be sure if it was Apollonia's or her twin's. The Valkyrie Alex launched her own coup then. By the coming year, all were dead – so we thought."

Aberforth made a choked sound. Tears prickling at his eyes. Polly smiling at him, dreaming of a future with children – with him and his children. She had been so convinced they would have a son. They had even started tossing up names for the child – Aurelius had caught Polly's fancy.

"They would have sent the child across the water to hide it. The old Comte would sooner kill both mother and child for his disgrace. Her sisters will rise to protect… just like their mother before… There was another family who had a son to be hidden away… The prince and the pauper. Mistakes made, but blood never lies."

"Wretch! Tell me the truth now! Does Polly live, and her child?" Aberforth lunged for her, but the witch spun out of reach and summoned her cloak.

"Such a temper, pere bouc! Speak with the Flamels if you will. The child lives for now. I hear he has a protector," she raised her wand and etched in glowing lines the sign of the Deathly Hallows. "Fare ye well this coming year!"

With a sharp crack of Disapparation, she was gone as the clock chimed in the new year. He had recognized the sign – seen it on the letters Albus so treasured, letters from that boy. Albus had alluded to such a child at his last visit. He had thrown his brother out for overstepping himself.

Theseus was not coping well with losing his fiancée. More than once, Newt had been summoned to some pub to pick up his brother. Newt missed Leta too, but he had his creatures to think of, care for. Travers had taken Theseus off active Auror duties – a possible petty punishment for the debacle in Paris, leaving him to stew in his thoughts of what could have been.

Newt sighed when he Apparated to Theseus' new townhouse and found his brother passed out at the front door. The townhouse was meant to be Theseus and Leta's new home. The couple had furnished it in preparation for a life together. Now Leta was gone. Theseus wanted to put it up for sale, but he did not have the heart to, so soon after losing Leta. Seeing his elder brother crumble and fall prey to drink and despair hurt. Newt always looked up to brother, even though they had different ideas of what they wanted out of life. Working full-time in the Ministry at a desk job would drive Newt nuts. He preferred the wild and the company of his beasts.

A dusting of snow had fallen and covered his brother. Newt cast a warming charm and unlocked the door. He dragged his brother inside and levitated him onto a sheet-covered couch. Theseus had retained his bachelor rooms near the Ministry, but Newt was not looking forward to dragging him halfway across London to get there, even by Side-along. He had gotten into the habit of carrying sobering potions before heading out to look for his brother. He uncorked a vial and poured the foul-tasting concoction down Theseus' throat making him splutter.

"What the hell, Newt!" Theseus coughed and started shivering. Newt cast a stronger warming spell and a drying spell on their wet clothes. His brother looked painfully gaunt and pale.

"Mother is worried about you and sent me to check… You did not come home for Christmas…"

"Leave Mother out of this. I am doing fine."

"Are not. Father received word from friends at the Ministry about your performance…"

"So I punched Travers! I need to be out there hunting Grindelwald, not parked in the records room… Any news from Professor Dumbledore?"

"You are so loaded with whiskey you can barely hold a wand straight now. How is that stopping Grindelwald?"

"Leta's dead!"

"I know…but we have to move on. She would not want to see you drinking yourself to death and wrecking the rest of your life…" Newt blinked tears away. He mourned Leta in his own way. He loved Tina, but there would always be a soft spot in his heart for his misunderstood Slytherin schoolmate. Dumbledore's silence after their return from Paris was troubling. Perhaps the professor was busy researching how to break that blood pact?

After the runaway success of his first book, Newt was asked to continue his research and produce a second book on magizoology, one that would require him to venture into the exotic wilds of Asia and South America. It irked him that he would soon have to leave his brother to fend for himself, or risk losing the support of the Ministry and his publishers for a second book.

"Master Newt!" a droop-eared house elf popped into being. "It is Missy Snake…"

Newt groaned. He really did not have time to deal with this. He gave his brother one last look. Theseus was dragging himself in the direction of the bathroom. Newt hoped he would be better after a bath. Once he had dealt with the emergency at home, he would return to check on his brother.

Pandemonium reigned when he Apparated into his basement with Loppy. The air was filled with the screams and screeches of his creatures, The cause of the commotion was the large snake coiled up almost apologetically on the deck of the Kelpie pool. Bunty was halfway up the stairs, pale and shaken.

"We were just feeding the Kelpie when she just changed… do be careful…" Bunty called out after him as he hurried down the steps to the pool.

"Nagini?" The snake raised her head at his voice. She flicked her tongue. There appeared to be a slight hint of recognition in her eyes. The Kelpie snorted and reared out of the water, triggering the snake to bare her fangs at it.

They thought they had her transformations under control. It seemed they were wrong. Newt worked to calm both the spooked Kelpie and the snake while Bunty and Loppy worked at calming the other residents of Newt's basement. There was no way he could get Nagini up all the steps in her snake form. All they could do was wait out the transformation.

Nagini had been assigned to the category of beast by the Ministry of Magic when they applied for her identity papers, much to their outrage. The Ministry was not sure if she was a magical being and she lacked the papers to prove it. As a highly dangerous beast, she was placed in Newt's custody as he was the country's foremost magizoologist. She had to be contained. This was an awkward situation and Newt was glad Tina accepted his explanation as to why he had Nagini living in his townhouse basement. He had created a small bedroom in the basement for his newest resident and sought help from Bunty and Tina on how it should be furnished. They ended up with a cosy bedroom done in blue with an ensuite bathroom next to the hippogriff pen.

Yusuf Kama had disappeared off into the shadier corners of wizard society, no doubt at Dumbledore's instruction. Before he left, he had promised to send the Scamanders news on any families afflicted with the same blood curse as Nagini, or any experts in the field. Dumbledore had promised to do the same. So far they found nothing.

On his part, Newt had consulted St Mungo's best healers but there had been no record of such a blood curse encountered in Britain within living history. The only recorded case that was similar involved a family cursed to turn into birds and that lineage had died out by the mid-18th century.

Nagini could be the last of her line. She had spoken of a mother, who had turned into a snake and left her behind. With each transformation, the risk was higher – that she would lose the human part of herself and become a vicious, mindless beast.

It preyed on her, the troubled emotions building up and fuelling the next unplanned transformation. Nagini was also skittish about most men. She trusted Credence, and perhaps tolerated Yusuf. The black wizard had acted as a gentleman with her. It had taken a good month for her to trust Newt. Travers' loud bullying ways unsettled her and triggered a transformation in the Ministry lobby when they were trying to sort out her papers. Travers was not amused he had to spend a week in St Mungo's after getting bitten. Bunty accompanied Nagini much of the time she was in Newt's basement. Nagini worked well with the occamies, ashwinders, and runespoors. They likely recognized her as a sister snake.

Eventually, they would need a stronger pen than Newt's basement. In her beast form, Nagini was too powerful and unpredictable to allow her to escape. Newt could manage some parseltongue to calm her in her beast form, but he was not a born parselmouth. Despite his best efforts, there were still some nuances in the language he was unable to convey. He had been experimenting with the same force-field he used with the Sudanese Obscurus. It was not ideal as it would confine Nagini to a small space for the duration of her transformation. If only…

Having assured himself that his creatures were safe, and Nagini sufficiently calmed down, Newt sent Bunty off for the night.

"I will wait until she's back first, if you don't mind… poor duck," Bunty offered. She had dragged out a chair which she placed at the top landing of the stairwell, giving her a good view of the large serpent. Newt mumbled his thanks and swallowed a yawn. He motioned for Loppy to Side-Apparate him. Perhaps he could spend the night at his brother's. He did need to check that Theseus made it to his bed.

A letter from Tina was waiting on the mantelpiece. He picked it up and slipped it into his pocket. Perhaps he might have a chance to read it at Theseus' place.

Author's Notes:

I like portraying Newt as being a generally protective caring person (Hufflepuff).