Aurora had always done little bits of magic here and there. She liked to make books go on fire when she was frustrated with the characters, and had more than once jumped out of a tree from a far higher height than was safe and come out perfectly fine. Arcturus said she was going to make a fine witch someday, and make the family proud.

The one thing she loved more than magic was dancing. Arcturus had hired her a private ballet teacher when she was seven, as her typical method of expressing her energy was by making things explode (accidentally) or by running around and getting muddy, neither of which he approved of. Aurora hadn't expected to love ballet, but she did. It was clean and precise and she knew where everything was meant to go and how it should feel.

She got to jump around, too, but it was refined, and her movements were stronger. More controlled. She knew Arcturus approved, and she liked to think her grandmother would have, too.

By the time she reached the age of nine, he had her helping him to brew remedial potions. "My hands aren't what they used to be," he said. He was right; they were withered and wrinkled and she noticed how they shook when he tried to hold anything. So she chopped things for him when they had to be chopped finely, and learned not to be grossed out by eels or fish eyes — that counted as whining, too. And she stirred things when they had to be stirred carefully, and Arcturus let her use his wand a lot since she didn't have her own.

"I promise I'll take you to get your own as soon as you get your acceptance letter," he told her. "Like every other witch and wizard your age."

But that was a great concern, too. Aurora still didn't know where she wanted to go to school. Durmstrang was interesting and she though their emphasis not only on the Dark Arts but on Alchemy was fascinating, but Beauxbatons' curriculum was a lot more flexible and also had a brilliant Alchemy course — Nicholas Flamel himself had studied it there. She spent days poring over books about the three great wizarding schools, making notes and comparison charts. Her mind was made up eventually after a lengthy conversation with Arcturus, who said that if she was still uncertain then she ought to go with the safest and traditional option of Hogwarts.

"If you wish to study the Dark Arts," he told her, "I'm sure you will find I am a more than apt teacher, and if not, I can certainly find one. And Alchemy you can study on your own terms, I have no doubt you will be able to."

So she'd nodded, and when she'd found out that both Draco and Pansy were going to Hogwarts, that effectively sealed the deal for her. "You will be in Slytherin, won't you?" Pansy asked her.

"Of course I will," Aurora told her haughtily, praying that she was right. "I'm a Black, aren't I?"

"My mother said your father was a Gryffindor," Draco said in a whisper, even though they were quite alone in the garden.

"Well, I'm not my father," she told him with a sharp look which had Draco shutting up immediately. "I will be in Slytherin. Perhaps if you ask such ridiculous questions, you'll be in Gryffindor, Draco. Or Hufflepuff."

Draco pulled a horrified face. "Don't say things like that! Can you imagine the shame?"

"Well, then don't you entertain the idea of me being in Gryffindor," she whispered back, quite frustrated. "I won't be."

Her eleventh birthday came first of any of them, on the twenty-seventh of September. "I bet you'll be the oldest in our year," Pansy told her. "I don't know anyone else with a September birthday."

"And I'm stuck with a birthday in June," Draco said gloomily. "It's horrid."

"You'll be eleven soon enough," Aurora told him with a smirk, tossing her hair over her shoulder. She'd wanted a large party, but Arcturus was getting slow now, and not doing very well at all. They'd employed two new house elves, Tippy and Timmy, to help care for him, but she was eleven now and she wasn't stupid. She knew he wasn't well, and he was even older than her grandmother had been.

"Can't you take me to get my wand now?" she asked him after Draco and Pansy had left. He'd retired to his bed, with Tippy and Timmy hovering worriedly around him. "I'm eleven!"

"Not until..." He coughed violently and Tippy's eyes widened in alarm as she scurried around to try and force some water down his throat.

"I'll do it," Aurora said, taking the glass and holding Arcturus up. She could feel him shaking. "It's okay."

"It's tradition," he said once he'd regained the ability of speech. "You don't get your wand until you get your Hogwarts acceptance letter."

"But we know I'm going to be accepted! You said so!"

"Yes," Arcturus said with a faint smile. He looked very white. "But tradition is tradition, Aurora. Keep your head up. The time will fly by. And I'll by better by the time you get your letter, I can take you and we can make a proper occasion out of it."

She nodded, and he squeezed her hand. "Now, go and ask Remy to make dinner for you. I'll see you in the morning."

He didn't get better. Christmas was a solemn, subdued affair. Arcturus couldn't get out of bed, he was shaking so badly, and they ate dinner in his bedroom, Aurora sitting nervously in an armchair. "Shouldn't you go to St Mungo's?" she asked him quietly.

"No," he croaked stubbornly. "No need for that."

"But you're unwell!" Tears welled in her eyes that she tried to blink away. "I'm worried about you!"

"Don't make a fuss, Aurora," he told her. "And don't cry."

She sniffed, and tried to wipe her eyes on the sleeve of her robe. "I'm not," she muttered. "It's the pollen." He thankfully did not point out that it was December.

"I'll get better," he told her. "Once Winter's over I'll be much better, you wait and see." He smiled, patting her hand. "I'll send you to your Aunt Lucretia tomorrow, she'll be happy to see you."

She knew that meant he was too tired to deal with her. Heavily, she finished the rest of dinner and crept back to her own bedroom to read a book she'd snuck from the library about the Dark Arts, and went to sleep still sad.

"I'm worried about him, too," Lucretia told her in the morning. "He's only getting older. But you are almost at Hogwarts age, and he doesn't want you worrying about him. Keep your head up, Aurora. Don't cry now."

"Can you speak to St Mungo's?" she asked quietly. "They might be able to help more than the house elves!"

"My father doesn't trust St Mungo's healers," Aunt Lucretia said. "Or the Ministry." She patted Aurora on the shoulder. "It'll be alright. How about you have a go on Ignatius' old broom?"

Arcturus started to get marginally better in the early Spring, but Aurora could tell everyone was worried. This was happening too soon. He was Lord Black, Head of the House, and the title should have descended to his eldest son, Aurora's grandfather — but Orion Black was long dead, one son missing and the other imprisoned, and everyone agreed eleven was far too young for a girl to take on the role as Head. They agreed Lucretia would take on the role until Aurora came of age, and held a ceremony so that the family magic recognised Aurora properly. She hadn't been brought into the family in the traditional way, but she was their future now.

Politics became a key part of her curriculum. Her tutors were Arcturus and Lucretia, and occasionally Cygnus and Cassiopeia Black, teaching her the composition of the three counsels of the Ministry — the Wizengamot legal court, the Legislating Assembly, and the Minister's Inner Council. She memorised the big names, the different factions, and her family's position hovering on the verge of the Conservatives and the Moderates. These lessons were to prepare her to be Head of the House, should the worst happen. She learned more etiquette than she had to, and was tested during dinners with older wizards from the Assembly — Abraxas Malfoy, Arum Keith, Edmund Bulstrode — and their wives or, occasionally, heirs. Questions were asked about her mother which were deftly avoided, and each time Arcturus would remind her that the word 'mudblood' held no meaning unless she let it, and that she was defined by being a Black, not by anything else.

"Rise above it," he told her, "there will come a day when nothing will matter but your own words."

He seemed almost fully recovered by late Spring, as he had promised, and as the time for Hogwarts letters came nearer - with Pansy's birthday and then Theodore Nott's and then Draco's - Aurora found herself forgetting all about her worry from last year. She spent more time outside, running around in the garden, flying on Uncle Ignatius's old broom which he had kindly given to her. Climbing trees felt like nothing now. She was getting too tall for the height to scare her.

"I do hope we get to share a bedroom," Pansy told her as they sat under the tallest tree. "Daphne Greengrass and Millicent Bulstrode both want to share with me, but I'd much rather be with you."

"Oh, I hope so too," Aurora said. "As long as we're both in Slytherin."

"You aren't still worried about that are you?" Pansy asked her shrilly. "Of course we'll both be in Slytherin."

She nodded but that worry remained. Her father hadn't been in Slytherin, and he was the greatest shame of the family. If she didn't make it in... "And besides," Pansy said, "I won't let you not be in Slytherin. The other houses make their students sleep in dormitories! With four other people! Imagine that, you could be stuck in with any old Mudbloods and blood traitors."

"My father was a blood traitor," Aurora said uncomfortably. "And my mother..."

"Yeah, but they were Gryffindors! You're not going to be a Gryffindor!" Pansy sighed huffily and got up. "If you're going to be moody then I'm going home. Stop worrying so much."

"I'm not worrying," Aurora told her, also standing up. "I'm just considering all of the potential outcomes."

"You talk like you're old," Pansy muttered. "Be fun!"

"I am fun!" Aurora protested. "I can climb trees!"

"Proper fun." Pansy rolled her eyes. "Not tomboy fun. You're almost at Hogwarts now, Aurora. You have to be a lady, like me."

"You're not a lady," Aurora said. "And you're younger than me! I can be a lady whenever I want to be."

Pansy stuck her tongue out to prove her point and Aurora giggled, linking their arms. "I will be in Slytherin," she said decisively. "I promise."

Aurora's Hogwarts letter was due to arrive on July the fifteenth, according to her estimations. She was counting down the days, and watching the skies eagerly for any important looking owls that might be coming her way. "And it will definitely come?" she asked Arcturus anxiously, standing by the window as he lay quietly in bed. The Summer had brought another bought of illness, though he insisted it would pass and she had nothing to worry about. "You're sure? My name is definitely on the list?"

"Quite sure," Arcturus said with a wheezy, strained chuckle. "Come and sit down now, and fix your skirt." She did so hastily, checking her hair was alright in the window's reflection before she hurried back to sit by Arcturus' bed. He was looking pale, even paler than usual. He didn't say anything for a very long while, and Aurora knew he felt worse than he let on. She'd heard the house elves whispering, and Aunt Lucretia had been visiting an awful lot recently.

She wondered where she would end up if he did die soon. Perhaps Aunt Lucretia would take her in, or Draco's mother, who was after all, still a Black by blood. Or maybe Draco's grandfather Cygnus — he was, after all, her great-uncle by her mother's side. Her mind wandered to the Potters, what her world would be like if they were alive. She wasn't sure if she'd like it. She wouldn't know Draco, and they were all blood traitors, blood traitors who had picked the wrong side and paid the price. That was what Arcturus said any time she asked. She supposed if they were still alive, it would mean her father had never been a spy and given them over to the Dark Lord and gotten caught committing murder. She'd still live with him. Maybe he'd even have gotten his place back on the family tree. She was currently just floating somewhere on the bottom, like a stray leaf.

"You look upset," Arcturus said, drawing her attention back to him. "Don't worry. You will get your Hogwarts letter. I promise it."

"What if I don't? And what if I don't get into Slytherin? What if... What if I end up a Gryffindor, too?"

"You'll still be a Black," he told her croakily. "You won't go the same way as your father. I know you won't. You get to choose. I have every faith that you will be brilliant no matter what you do. Just don't let anyone else define you."

"Wha if people talk about me? What if they say — what if they say mudblood? Or blood traitor? What if I don't matter?"

"Then you make yourself matter." He grasped her hand tightly. "Remember what I have taught you. Know your worth, dear. Your mother and father don't matter — you may yet be the best of us. And I love you, no matter what. I will always be proud of you." She nodded with a lump in her throat. "Don't cry, Aurora."

"I wasn't going to!"

He nodded, closing his eyes. "Don't cry."

He squeezed her hand and then didn't let go. He had gone quite still, and Aurora thought... He wasn't breathing. "Arcturus?" she asked frantically. "Arcturus! Arcturus!" She wrenched her hand from his grip, quite horrified, and put her ear to his chest. He wasn't breathing. He wasn't breathing. Her eyes filled with terrified tears. "Arcturus! Tippy! Timmy! Help!"

With two loud cracks the house elves appeared in the room, both quite frantic. Timmy disappeared and came back with a very white-looking Aunt Lucretia, who promptly ushered Aurora from the room. "Arcturus!" she said, heart pounding. "He — he wasn't breathing!"

"I know," said Aunt Lucretia, who looked like she was trying very, very hard not to cry. "I know, Aurora. Go to your bedroom. I'll come and find you later."

"But Arcturus—"

"There's nothing you can do for him. I need to be in there."

"But he—"

"Aurora!" Her voice broke. "Stop arguing, do as I tell you, and go to your room."

She didn't see him again that night. Aunt Lucretia came in to tell her that he had died, there was nothing they could do, but he was peaceful, now. She would stay with her until they could go home to Uncle Ignatius' house and then they'd take care of her.

In the morning, Aurora's Hogwarts letter came by owl and she tore it up and cried as it went on fire.