NOTE

Content warning for mentions of violence and one mention of rape. There are also frequent and potentially disturbing references to cannibalism.

70. Bonfire Night

Each night there came a vision.

On the night of the first of November, I watched as the Carrow siblings tortured and murdered an old man by the docks in Aberdeen.

On the second, I followed Walden Macnair and Thorfinn Rowle into a black earthen cave in the woods somewhere. Hieronymus the apothecary was tied up there. I couldn't quite make out their words as they interrogated him. He refused to respond and, to encourage him, Macnair amused himself with a small sharp knife.

On the third, it was Macnair and Rowle again, this time in a dark and ruined room somewhere, with a young muggle woman tied naked to the rotting floor. They tortured and raped her, and I couldn't close my eyes. I woke up screaming and Severus held me tightly against his body for hours.

On the fourth I sat with Rodolphus Lestrange in a dark old house by some strange icy sea. He was in hiding and alone. The vision was tame beside the others, but still disturbing. He kept laughing to himself and wringing his hands, and biting the scar of his dark mark until his arm was covered in blood.

I would wake up, sweating or gasping or crying, and Severus would soothe me while he searched my mind. Kingsley Shacklebolt became the recipient of these reports, by way of Severus's blue doe.

My vision of the Carrow siblings led to their capture four days later. The Ministry would do all they could to glean information from them about the possible whereabouts of the other seven fugitives, who remained at large.

I secretly doubted how much the Carrows would know. From my visions I'd gathered that there was no real organisation or communication among the escaped Death Eaters. And even if the Carrows did have information, it would take great effort and questionable methods to glean it from them.

The werewolf who had cast the dark mark in London had yet to give up a morsel of information regarding Greyback, and the Ministry had undoubtedly tried both Legilimency and Veritaserum by now. Evidently, the man was an impossibly powerful Occlumens, and managed to keep his silence even under the influence of the truth-telling potion. This, I supposed, was why Greyback had selected him for the task.

I kept waiting for one of my visions to show me Remus. But I never saw or heard him. I prayed he was somewhere safe, in the Black Forest of Germany perhaps, in some small warm house, with an old woman not unlike Agathe to take care of him. I thought perhaps I would hear his voice whispering to me again, but I did not.

All of this left me with a sense of anxiety so deep that I found it difficult to function normally during the day. I helped Agathe with the meals and with the chickens and goats, desperate to earn my keep. Her patience was unending, despite the frequent disturbances my visions caused in the grey hours of the morning.

I did not see Greyback again until the night of the fifth of November. I fell asleep unusually early from extreme and inexplicable exhaustion. Later I would realise that my intuition had pulled me under, so I would see what I had to see.

Two young children walked through the dark streets of a small town. I was pulled along behind them by some invisible force, bodiless and floating, with no ability to move of my own will. One was about ten years old, and the other a year or two younger. Both were dwarfed by baggy coats and boots so big they made the children stumble every few steps. They were walking away from the centre of the town, the light of a bonfire on their backs. They turned a corner into the cold darkness of another street, and the light disappeared.

The street was very dark but quite charming even so. A light snow fell, flakes softly touching the windows of the closed shops. The two boys looked woefully out of place. The smaller boy followed after the older, almost tripping over his boots.

"Where are we goin'?"

"Ye'll see."

"I'm hungry."

"That's where we're goin'."

"Wha'?"

"To stop bein' hungry."

The younger boy stopped for a moment in the middle of the street. "Yer not goin' to do that trick again, are ye?"

The older boy did not answer, but stopped in front of one of the shops. Painted silver letters adorned the display window: MILNGAVIE CAKES AND PIES. The younger boy watched the other with worry, and looked up at the dark windows above the shop. "What if they're in?"

"Ain't. Everybody's at the bonfire."

The older boy stepped up to the door and touched his finger to the lock. There was a faint clicking sound, and he opened the door. The younger boy stared. "Bloody creepy, that is," he said.

"Bloody useful. Come on…"

The two boys–the older one clearly an undiscovered young wizard–entered the shop and closed the door softly behind them. Five circular display tables stood on the wooden floorboards, stacked with boxes of pastries. Along the wall were tall shelves of pies,and beautifully frosted cakes sat in the display window. The younger one looked around, his eyes full of hunger and need, and guilt.

"Are ye sure?" he said to his brother.

The older one looked over at him sharply, refusing to allow his brother's guilt to infect him. Then he walked forward into the shop. "They're goin' to bin it all if people don't buy it soon. We'll just take one…"

They selected a pie from the shelf, and the moment the box was opened the younger brother gave up all sense of reluctance, and picked up a chunk of the pie in his hand, eating desperately and going in for more as soon as he was finished. The older brother joined in, and there was only the sound of their chewing in the darkness of the shop as the snow came down outside. The pie was destroyed within a minute, and the younger brother looked longingly at the shelf. "Can we take another?" he said quietly.

"'Course we can," said the older brother. He looked up at the shelves overhead, studying the small labels in the darkness. "What you want… cherry? Treacle tart? Blackberry?"

"Blackberry," the little boy breathed.

His brother gained confidence as the hard lines of hunger eased in his face, and snapped his fingers. One of the boxes began to hover off of the shelf high above their heads. The younger boy looked at his brother in complete awe, and caught the box in his hands.

They opened the box and began to devour the second pie, taking it only slightly slower this time. They didn't notice, at first, when a large, long-haired man appeared outside of the display window. He stood there looking in, not at the cakes, but at the two little boys, their fingers covered in blackberry pie.

Then the door opened, and a deeper darkness entered the room with the cold. Flakes of snow drifted in around the heavy black boots and the two boys froze, looking up into the face of Fenrir Greyback.

By now I had learned that I had no ability to change anything within these visions. But knowing this did not stop me from trying. I attempted to send my magic out of whatever part of myself was there, to warn the boys. But all of my efforts amounted to nothing. I felt my body twisting and whimpering in sleep, in a distant bed, in a distant cottage in Belgium. I felt Severus shifting quietly into alert wakefulness beside me, and willed him to let me sleep. Whatever happened. This one would be important. I could feel it.

Natural fear overtook both young children as they took in the sight of the large man. The shop began to tremble with the older boy's nerves. The cakes in the display window shook slightly, and the floorboards vibrated under their feet. "Stop it!" the younger brother urged, in a sharp and terrified whisper.

Greyback's eyes changed, then. At first I'd detected mere lust, for the young-boy scent he must have followed to this place. But now there was a certain amount of curiosity in his gaze. He looked at the older boy, and saw him for what he was. I watched him subtly inhale, and saw the curiosity harden into certainty as he smelled the boy's magic. Cold dread filled me as I saw Greyback change his mind, change his tactics and his goal. Whatever fate now awaited the brothers, perhaps a quick end would have been preferable.

Greyback stared silently at the children, and the children stared silently back. This was not a normal adult, they realised. He may not have seemed safe, exactly. But he would not call them thieves, would not have them punished. Greyback slowly put out his hand, and a red flame appeared, cradled in his palm. The older boy stared at him with a dark look in his eyes, and the younger boy looked at his brother in shock.

"I knew there were others," the older boy said. "I knew there were."

Greyback smiled. The younger boy seemed to see the wickedness that lurked beneath, but the older brother was already seduced. It was too late.

Greyback spoke, and he did so in a voice that did not match his body or his deeds. It was a low voice, and gravelly, but not evil. It carried experience and adventure and just a hint of danger. All the wild things that young boys dream of.

"You're hungry," he said. Shame crossed the boys' faces, and Greyback growled, almost soothingly. "I know what that's like."

There was a moment of silence, and I felt a violent shiver roll through my distant body. I sensed Severus's attentiveness, but he resisted shaking me awake.

Greyback stepped forward, extinguishing the magical flame and clasping his hands behind his back. "What are your names, boys?" he said, in the same seductive voice. There was the smallest, sharpest edge of roughness and darkness to it, from when it had fallen into disuse during his time in Azkaban. But it was still strong enough to have the desired effect.

"Gavin," said the older boy.

"Brian," said his younger brother.

"My name is Fenrir," Greyback said. Brian looked wary, but Greyback had Gavin's full attention. "I live with other people like you and me. I can give you food, and I can teach you what you do not know."

"I don't need a teacher," Gavin said, trying to hold on to a sense of independence which, in reality, was already lost.

Greyback smiled again. "There is much you do not know. It is your choice of course. I could leave now and leave you to your…" he sniffed the air. "Blackberry pie."

Gavin was conquered. I could see it in his eyes, and Greyback saw it too.

"Where would you take us?" he asked. "Where do you and these people live?"

"Not far," Greyback said. He smiled and held out his hands to the boys. "Take my hands."

"Tell us where," Brian said, his voice high and shaking. He clearly was not so willing to take a chance on this stranger as his brother.

"To the woods," Greyback said, his voice patient. "Just north of here. The world is not kind to those it does not understand. We hide there together."

Gavin approached, his large boots thudding against the floorboards in the silence. The wind moaned quietly and more snowflakes fell around Gryeback's shoulders, as though he were an angel. Brian was glued to his brother's side, and soon both young boys stood before Greyback, neither of them taller than his lower ribs. Gavin studied Greyback's giant, calloused hands, and hesitated.

"You'll bring us back," he said, "when we want to leave?"

"I promise," said the wolf.

I felt my body writhing as I made one last effort to get through to the children. But it was for naught. Gavin took Greyback's left hand, and Brian the other, and with them I was wrenched away.

The dense darkness of the woods surrounded me. It was snowing more heavily here. The deciduous trees lay bare and naked and dark, their arms contorted overhead. But most of the trees were still-lush pines, and the snow fell on their needles carefully, as though afraid to be pierced.

The boys were in shock. Brian toppled to his knees and was sick on the ground. Gavin managed to stay standing, though he looked extremely drained and dizzy from his first apparation. He gathered himself and then leaned over to help his brother up from the forest floor. Both were too stunned to ask what had happened, and how.

Greyback looked into the woods, his eyes deep and wired for the darkness, and waved his hand. At once a hidden camp was revealed. A small stone cave filled with firelight, under a small knoll from which many trees grew. At the mouth of the inviting cave stood a tall man with long black hair, and strangely delicate features for the size and strength of his body. He had a certain greyness in his face, and an insatiable hunger, which made me know at once that he was like Greyback, a werewolf hardened into cruelty and wickedness. His eyes flashed at the sight of the two boys.

"Magnus," Greyback said to him.

"Brother," Magnus answered.

"Take these two inside and feed them from our stores." Greyback looked down at Gavin. "I will come back for you shortly," he said to him.

The two boys went forward and waited by the mouth of the cave, while Greyback beckoned to Magnus, and spoke quietly to him, so the children could not hear. "Give them bread, not the girl."

"I finished the girl," Magnus said, and his eyes shone with satisfaction.

Greyback grinned. "Shame. But I had her heart. So you are forgiven." His gaze flickered back to the boys, who stood close together in the cold, Gavin watching the two large men closely. "Try not to frighten them," Greyback said. "The older boy is a wizard."

He drew back and looked at Magnus significantly. Magnus grinned, and then went to the boys, taking them into the warmth of the firelit cave.

Greyback turned and walked into the forest. I was pulled along with him, though I desperately wanted to remain with the boys, somehow believing that doing so would ensure their safety.

I felt my distant heartbeat pounding too hard for my chest as I fully understood the words the two werewolves had exchanged.

They had eaten a girl. Greyback had eaten her heart.

Some distance from Greyback and Magnus's cave, Greyback stopped and uncovered a second, this one pitch black and cold, no light emitted from its mouth. He walked down into the darkness of the earthen cave and I followed, terrified of what I would witness, but unable to look away.

It was very dark and hard to see, but I could make out the shapes of bodies well enough in the darkness. Thirty, maybe, but no more. Eyes shining out of grimy faces, half-naked, knees knobbly and bones showing beneath the weak skin and the dirt.

It struck me in a flash of intuition. I understood who these people were: a combination of people that Greyback had turned during the war, like the man I had encountered in London beneath the dark mark; people he had captured in the days since Halloween, but had yet to turn; and muggle children that Magnus himself had captured and turned or kept, while Greyback had been in Azkaban. I had never heard of Magnus during the war. He must have worked independently from the Dark Lord, and maintained ties with Greyback without making himself known to the Order and the Ministry as a dangerous man. The dark eyes of the muggle children in the cave spoke of difficult lives. Neglect and destitution, even before their capture. Magnus must have carefully selected children whose disappearance would not receive much attention, so that the witches and wizards who watched the muggle papers would not notice anything suspicious.

I noticed that the little boy I had seen in my first vision was not there. I couldn't help imagining the end he must have met, alone in the cold of the night. Had Greyback eaten him? Recalling the way Greyback had bitten him until he bled, I thought I knew the answer.

Among the adults I recognised Matthias Favre. He was sitting beside a very emaciated man with long dirty hair. I remembered how he had told me about a werewolf friend of his, turned by Greyback during the war, who he had not contacted in many months. This must have been that man. Magnus must have captured him early on, and now Greyback had used him to lure Favre into his clutches.

There was another captive that I somehow knew, but couldn't place. A thin young man with brown hair and freckles. His eyes were closed, and he looked half-dead.

And in the corner, in a huddle of sleeping children, was Phoebe Elson. She was the only one awake, and her eyes shone out of the darkness, full of vengeance. Far away, I felt my body give a violent jolt of anger and pain.

I looked around urgently for Remus, but he was not among the miserables, tied up and paralysed from hunger and darkness.

"Father!"

The plea came from a very thin man, who sat at the edge of the cave. This must have been one of those that Greyback had turned during the war. I saw, beneath the subservience in his eyes, extreme affliction and a wild, doomed hope.

"Father!" He spoke in a rasping voice, and as he continued to speak, his voice became weaker, a desperate coughing forced out after every few words. "When will the time come! When will we be let out, to serve you? Do you not think those of us who share your… abilities… should be allowed the fresh air? These mere humans are lower than us, do you not think so?"

Greyback looked at him silently, and the captives who were awake and aware enough to sense the change in the air grew smaller, shrinking against the earthen walls. When Greyback spoke his voice carried the same deathly softness he had used with the boys.

"Come here, my child."

The man struggled, and stood. His body was emaciated and trembling. His hands were bound, as were his feet, but he managed to shuffle across the dirty ground, cowering before his master.

Greyback touched the man's shoulder and brought him close. "The moon is almost new," he said quietly, but loudly enough for the others to hear. "In a few days it will grow stronger. Then the time will come. But we must be patient."

The man was trembling, and finally his composure and his false unctuousness slipped away from him like a heavy old skin. He cried as he spoke. "But father, we are all starving!"

Greyback snarled, and in a single motion, snapped the man's neck. All strength left his body and he slumped to the ground in the centre of the cave. Weak screams and cries sounded in the small earthen space, particularly from the younger children, as Greyback set the dead man's body on fire, and then extinguished the flames. The body lay steaming and smoking on the ground. The children quieted, and now a dreadful greed and hunger entered their eyes.

"Food," Greyback growled. Then he turned and left the cave, and my bodiless presence followed him before the awful, desperate feeding could begin.

I followed the monster back through the woods to the other cave, where Magnus was sitting by the fire with the two boys. They were holding fistfuls of bread and eating ravenously.

"Gavin," Greyback said.

The older brother looked up. Greyback gestured to the outside of the cave with a movement of his head, and Gavin stood up and went to him. Magnus was now looking at Brian hungrily, lasciviously, and Greyback gave Magnus a significant look that clearly told him not to touch the boy. Magnus understood, and the wicked shine in his eyes reluctantly dulled.

"Come with me," Greyback said to Gavin. The two of them set off walking, Gavin hurrying to keep up with Greyback's strides. They walked around the back of the cave, and Greyback knelt down on one knee, so he could look at the boy eye to eye.

"Would you like to stay here?" he asked.

Gavin nodded his head.

"Good," Greyback said. He laid his hand on the boy's small shoulder and squeezed it. His tone darkened, the next stage of the young boy's seduction. "I can make you extremely powerful. I can give you abilities and strengths that muggles put in children's books and call fiction."

"Muggles?" Gavin said.

"People who cannot do what you and I can. Like your little brother."

Gavin furrowed his eyebrows, but he understood. He looked at Greyback with eagerness and longing in his eyes. Greyback smiled, and hidden from the boy in the depths of his dark, craven, soulless body was a thirst for blood and cruelty that made my heart turn to stone. "Let me tell you about the world you belong to."

I came awake with a gasp, as though rising from water after nearly drowning. Severus was sitting on the edge of the bed, watching me and clasping his hands tightly to keep from touching me, from waking me. The moment I opened my eyes he leaned forward to take me into his arms. He held me against him tightly, but I couldn't make my arms move to reciprocate. I was still shaking, too deeply shocked to be sick, though I desperately wanted to.

Phoebe. Greyback has Phoebe.

"That was a bad one," Severus said, his voice deep and calming, only the slightest fissure hidden inside of its strength.

"Look," I said, my voice trembling but firm. "Look right now."

He put his hand on my head, and at the first sign of his presence inside of me I pushed the images from the vision forward, desperate for him to see.

Severus's breath stuttered from the intensity. "Slowly," he said.

I moaned weakly with the effort, still shaking and clenching my eyes shut. I did my best to go back to the beginning.

To the boys walking away from the bonfire.

The light on the backs of their giant coats.

My mind finally relaxed around the space the vision held, and Severus slipped inside.

My eyelids fluttered as he absorbed each moment. This time around I noticed the significance of the painted letters on the bakery window. MILNGAVIE. Our first clue.

Only now did I realise that the young man I'd noticed in Greyback's cave, but been unable to pin down, was the boy who I had met months ago in a muggle bookshop in Edinburgh. The boy who had given me The Odyssey. Only now did the implications of the vision hit me full-force. Greyback and Magnus were holding all of those captives and waiting for the next full moon. When it came, they would turn the ones who were not werewolves already. What would follow? An attack?

Severus held me tightly as the vision came to an end. I recalled the haunting eyes of Phoebe Elson, and the dead man. At this very moment, somewhere in the north of Britain, he was being consumed, down to the bone.

"They have to find them, Severus," I said, unable to stop shaking. "They have to find them. Phoebe…"

It was still not yet midnight, but I knew I had no chance of sleeping more. Severus and I were both wide awake, and we crept downstairs in order to avoid disturbing Fleur, Agathe, and the children.

We spoke together to Severus's patronus, explaining the events of the vision as well as the important clues as to where the lair might be located. Milngavie was a small village just north of Glasgow, and Greyback had told Gavin and Brian that they were going to the woods just north of there.

Kingsley responded quickly. Aurors would be dispatched at once to the forested area around Loch Lomond, to begin the search. It was possible, in fact quite likely, that Greyback had lied to the boys. But at least they had a place to start.

We sat there in the darkness on the cabriole sofa, the black shadow of the piano filling the room, and listened to the ticking of the clock in the kitchen. There was no news for a long time, and we knew that the aurors were struggling to find any sign of the magically protected camp.

"Did you know him?" I asked Severus quietly, after many minutes. "Greyback?"

Severus's face was extremely guarded, but his voice carried a deep and sour distaste. "We certainly crossed paths," he said. "He was the most sadistic of all. Apart from Voldemort. I didn't take much pleasure in his company. And he had... his own aims."

"Aims?"

"He wasn't explicit about it. But it was clear to us all that he wanted to raise an army of his own. To... turn as many as he could. Voldemort did not encourage it. But, clearly..."

I nodded my head, feeling mildly ill, and fell to tracing the small flowers on the upholstery fabric as my mind wandered down unpleasant paths.

I couldn't stop remembering Phoebe's eyes in the darkness.

I thought of how I had first met her; how I had introduced her to the world of magic in that small room in a London orphanage. Our exchange was a world away from what had passed between Greyback and Gavin.

I feared for the boy. Greyback would not hesitate to corrupt his abilities. And I knew without a doubt that Greyback would try to shape the young wizard into a dangerous henchman. He would lead his magic down a dark path, and when the moon was full, he would turn him.

But that must not happen!

I prayed that the danger would be put to a stop, that the captives would be found and saved, before the full moon came.

I began to tremble again, hating this feeling of helplessness. I wanted to do something about it!

"They wouldn't know a thing about it if it weren't for you," Severus said suddenly. He must have sensed what I was thinking.

I knew his words were true, but they didn't console me. It wasn't enough. Sitting here and having visions wasn't enough.

I stared out the window in frustration, feeling the weight of everything I had lost in the past few days alone. I remembered the sense of purpose I had felt in the classroom. The moments of joy I had shared with the students. Now Hogwarts and everything it represented seemed far away, in the past, completely inaccessible.

Phoebe had known the good side of the magical world for two short months. Would she ever know it again? Would Gavin ever get the chance to know it?

In my anxiety I found myself reaching for Severus's hand and gripping it tightly.

We had never held hands quite like this, as a way of showing affection. He had only held my hand to guide me, or to make me listen to him. I looked up at him, worried that he would reject my touch. But he accepted it, and pressed my hand tightly with his own.

We stayed that way until the sky grew blue.

Later that morning, after breakfast, it began to snow. Teddy was awake, and he looked out the window at the large flakes, his eyes wide and full of excitement. His hands made grabbing motions as he spoke to me, and I knew he wanted to go outside and feel the snow. His decisiveness reminded me painfully of that day in Diagon Alley. I had to struggle through heartache in order to pick him up and carry him out the kitchen door.

We played under the trees for an hour, Teddy's cheeks pink from the cold, his laughter carrying through the soft snow. He held flakes in his small hands and watched them melt, and I showed him how to catch snowflakes on his tongue. His hair turned a soft grey-white.

I was able to connect to a sense of innocence as I watched him, and let myself forget my age and my circumstances for a short time. He walked through the mud, slipping and laughing, and tried to converse with the two goats, who bleated and licked his face. Teddy babbled back to them, giggled, and turned to face me.

I recoiled and gasped, my heart hammering. His eyes had changed. The pupils were horizontal, mimicking the eyes of the goats.

I had never seen Teddy change anything but his hair, and the suddenness of it disturbed me. I pressed my palm against my chest and tried to correct my frightened expression, seeing that the smile had melted from Teddy's face at my unexpected reaction. He began to wail in confusion, and I picked him up and held him close, feeling awful, but still incapable of completely erasing the fear from my blood.

Teddy slowly calmed again to the sound of my gentle humming, my gentle apologies. To my relief, when I next looked into his eyes, they were perfectly human.

That night I had no visions. I woke three hours after midnight, the sky black and dark outside, to find Severus gone.

It was not the first time I had been left alone in bed by the one I had fallen asleep with. This time there was a note on the bedside table. I picked it up and squinted at it in the darkness.

Stay here. Please.

I folded and unfolded the note again and again in my hands as I stared out the window at the continuing snow. I had known this would happen, sooner or later. But I had not anticipated my response to Severus's departure. Rather than a sense of resignation, and a will to remain in safety with Teddy, I felt compelled to follow Severus.

I was certain that he had gone to Scotland to join the others in hunting Greyback. I was not angry with him, but I found it unfair that I was expected to stay put, to have visions, and to be otherwise useless, whilst he was taking part in the fight.

I knew it would be wrong to leave Teddy in the care of Fleur and her grandmother. Leaving so suddenly would be disrespectful, after the compassion and patience they had shown me.

But I knew deep down that I had already made my decision, and there was no undoing it.

Very quietly, I put on my warmest clothes, and the travelling cloak I'd had the instinct to put into my carpet bag back home. I would need to travel light, and would carry nothing more than my wand. My hand dug into the bottom of the carpet bag and closed around the tiny drawstring pouch which held Remus's mother's ring. I considered it for a moment, but then decided not to bring it. It would constantly remind me of Remus, and I didn't have the strength to carry that emotional burden.

I crept down the stairs, and found a quill and parchment in the piano room. I left a note for Fleur and Agathe, saying only that Severus and I had had to leave, and assuring them that the house remained safe and protected. I apologised for leaving them with the burden of Teddy.

Perhaps it was the time of night, but a sudden anxiety gripped my stomach, and a sense of foreboding came over me.

I thought again of the small drawstring bag, hidden in the darkness upstairs. What if something bad happened to me? Teddy, then, should know about the ring, and what it meant.

I pressed the negative thoughts from my mind–they were surely irrational–but still I added a sentence at the end of the note.

The ring in the carpet bag upstairs belongs to his father.

By the door I slipped on my boots, and tied the laces firmly. Then, as silently as I could, I stepped outside into the bitter cold of the night.

Snow was falling all around the house, and lay upon the fields, pale in the darkness. My breath clouded in front of me as I walked out into the snow, slowly, until I felt myself pass through the faint vibration of the protective barrier. I exhaled in relief. Part of me had expected Severus to have done what he had in Grimmauld Place. But of course he hadn't. He'd learned from that mistake.

The snow muffled the sound of the wind and the long night stretched out before me, empty and cold. I turned and looked once more at the small house, and the sheltering trees. And then I was gone.

NOTE

Thank you for reading! As ever, I would love to hear your thoughts.