Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter NOR any of his friends NEITHER any of his enemies. It's hard to admit, but when I'm done with them all, I have to return them to Joanne K. Rowling in an original wrapping and unharmed.
I make no money, I mean no harm.
Patchwork
Shadows
There was something truly magical about how the pace of the days changed after the first week of school. As if it proved the timetables were correct (they always had been before) and every Muggleborn was really a young wizard or witch (as they always had been). The first years were still struggling to find their way around, but even they felt at home. As if they always had been at Hogwarts.
After the Quidditch teams held their try-outs and enrolled new members, the first Hogsmeade weekend was planned and Hagrid announced his first special lesson for the last September weekend, everything settled down. Even Minerva, although still with more to do than she could comfotably handle, noticed how things became easier.
And still, the yesterday evening's mail didn't learn how to handle itself.
The Headmistress returned to the letter from the Ministry. It was a request, really - and not very polite. It had arrived late in the evening and had been put aside at once. Minerva tapped the parchment with her quill, leaving sharp dots across the letters. She stood up and started pacing the office, eyes gliding over frames of the portraits, as if she daren't look at her predecessors. But she couldn't avert her eyes quickly enough from Dumbledore's portrait, and she couldn't not notice how peacefully he looked.
She couldn't keep asking advice from dead people all the time.
With a soft feline sound she sprung from the top of the stairs, changing into her Animagus form almost immediately. The world around her shifted - colours changed - voices unpickable by a human ear echoed in her head - a range of smells drew a fourth dimension to lead her around.
The cat slipped through a small opening into an alcove behind a statue in the corridor. A smell of alcohol made her back further in the shadows - Professor Trelawney was at the Headmistress' door, knocking loudly. The cat suppressed an urge to hiss and the Divination Mistress finally left, a little unsteadily. As the echo of her steps died out, the cat ran down the corridor in the opposite direction.
A large group of students was leaving the Great Hall after lunch, chattering and filling the stairs with the energy of the youth. The cat easily evaded them, using pathway only accessible to small creatures. There she met Mrs. Norris, who hissed at her in a hostile manner - Filch's cat never really liked this strange being and the fact that this cat didn't seem to suffer from getting older only added to the heat.
"Ginny!" The cat looked around. There she was - the youngest Weasley - red hair framing her face with that old, tired look which really had no place there. And here came Neville, briefly hugging her.
"How are you? I haven't seen you since... well," he cleared his throat, "I can't believe we both live in the same castle." Ginny laughed and drew a little away from him.
"I'm fine," she replied. "How about you?" To human eyes, Minerva mused as an awkward conversation continued, everything might seem alright - but to her feline senses, it was clear the girl was anything but alright. She didn't even smell right. The tragedy of her family - the loss of the one she loved - it was still within Ginny, forced to remain contained, threatening to break her. But Neville, of all people Neville, would notice that, too.
As the two friends walked down the corridor, the cat ran in the opposite direction. When passing the Muggle Studies classroom, she stopped for a while. Tisha's voice sounded from behind the door as the young woman was lecturing. The cat purred contently. Tisha seemed to enjoy teaching and most of her students seemed to enjoy her class. Granted, the subject was optional, so Tisha didn't have to teach so many students absolutely uninterested in it. But the Headmistress still awarded herself a mental pat on the shoulder for this new professor. Good job, Minerva, mission accomplished.
Her next stop was the Defense Against Dark Arts classroom. It was clearly a practical lesson. She could hear Moody barking instructions over a somewhat uncertain murmur of incantations. She ran away when she felt the touch of his magical eye on her fur. Oh, that eye! At least, in her cat form, she could feel it looking at her.
The castle was offering her passages inaccessible to humans, as if it were a living being at her service. She let it lead her - she really had no plan to go by - and concentrated on the pleasant workout as well as everything the castle seemed to want her to see.
"There, hold him like that - don't be afraid, this doesn't hurt him - see his ears? That means he's happy." A bunch of Gryffindors, mostly first-years, were standing at large windows not far away from their tower. Elizabeth Jorkins was showing one of her schoolmates how to handle a kitten. Minerva made a mental note to introduce her to Hagrid soon. The large groundkeeper, although as friendly as ever, was treated with something between respect and fear by young students. But Elizabeth had a lot in common with the half-giant, that much Minerva could tell.
Elizabeth blushed as the owner of the cat thanked her, while two remarkably wild boys used the opportunity to cheer and dance madly in the corridor, and the students parted, some of them going into their common room and the others heading outside. Minerva jumped up on the now vacant windowsill and looked out of the window. Hagrid was crossing the grounds, Fang in tow. There were several groups of students at the lake, mostly sixth and seventh years - and miraculously, some of them were even reading books.
She lightly jumped off of the windowsill and took a roundabout route towards the Entrance Hall. She picked up fragments of student's conversations and found them comforting. Everything was working fine.
A group of students walked up from the dungeons and two Gryffindor girls joined another girls waiting for them under the Marble Staircase.
"So?" one of the waiting girls cried out.
"Per-fect!" one of those coming from Potions lesson replied. Minerva recognised Romilda Vane. They had to be talking about her new "true love". Poor boy, Minerva thought.
The girls giggled and started asking Romilda about the boy in question. The black haired witch laughed happily and leant on the wall.
"He is the true hero," she said with a dramatic wave of her hand. "You wouldn't believe the stuff he knows."
"Everyone knows he knows stuff," one of the girls objected.
"It's not the same! Not at all!" Romilda cried. "I mean, Moody knows his stuff, and Flitwick, and McGonagall could turn you in a toad in a heartbeat, but Snape... Mmm." The sound Romilda made was absolutely inappropriate for a student. At least in Minerva's opinion.
Romilda pushed herself off of the wall and led her friends up the stairs. Minerva followed them curiously.
"Do I look good? I think he was, you know, checking me out." Minerva doubted that from the depth of her heart, although it troubled her how Miss Vane disregarded any reason in her madly-in-love state.
"You mean checking out how to get kicked out of the school?" It was the same girl who spoke up before - Patricia Pitty. She was a little overweight, but merry and smart. She used to be a lone girl mocked by the others - they called her Patty Pitty - until they found out she was the only one in the year who understood almost every lesson as soon as it was lectured. Romilda and her flock of silly girls accepted her, as they really couldn't keep their grades up without her help.
"That would be romantic," one of the silly girls commented.
"Sure, no job, nothing to do all day," Patty laughed. "Very heroic."
"You're just jealous because you don't have a boyfriend," Romilda frowned.
"You don't have a boyfriend either, just someone to fawn over. Oh, should you know how many fathoms deep I am in love," Patty proclaimed, raising one hand over her eyes. "But it cannot be sounded - my affection has an unknown bottom, like the bay of Portugal."
"What does Snapey have to do with Portugal?" Romilda threw her arms in the air in dismay. Patty rolled her eyes but didn't reply.
Minerva, who unlike the girls recognised the author, slipped into an elves' staircase and took a shortcut back to her office. As long as Patricia was around the girls, she would keep them within some limits - otherwise, knowing Romilda Vane, the crush could escalate into something quite ugly.
She didn't turn back until she was standing next to her desk in the office. She tapped a quill with her wand, cleared her throat and dictated, "Dear Miss Jones, I have to inform you that Miss Hermione Granger will not be able to attend any hearing at the Ministry regarding the events of this summer until the end of this semester. She is now a student of Hogwarts and has to concentrate on her studies. It is against her best interest and the purpose of this school to be disturbed during her final year at Hogwarts. Sincerely, Minerva McGonagall, Headmistress."
Hermione didn't have the slightest idea about having narrowly avoided yet another hearing at the Ministry. She was waiting with Draco and Neville for their Defense lesson.
Moody arrived with a five minutes' delay. He let them in the classroom, and quite uncharacteristically, cleared his throat before he started the lesson.
"We shall detour from the curriculum, although I'm convinced you won't be delayed by that for long. How much do you know about the shadow?" he barked. The trio exchanged confused looks. "Well?"
"Nothing," Draco said and added, as an afterthought, "sir."
"One would say your good friend Professor Snape would have informed you." He accompanied the comment with a sneer that, in Neville's opinion, could measure with the worst of Snape's.
"The shadow is a bit of residual dark magic that has been troubling this school since last April. I will show you a charm that can drive it away when it emerges."
"Um... what kind of residual magic?" Hermione asked.
"Dark Arts," Moody scoffed. "Now, this charm..."
"But what curse left it behind?" Hermione queried relentlessly.
"And what does it do?" Neville joined in. "What are its dangers?" Moody frowned.
"So far there has been no injury," he dismissed their questions. "You are about to learn to banish it."
"Banish it for how long?" Hermione asked. "It's clear that this... shadow keeps returning." Moody looked around the small group of students. They were all staring at him expectantly, wands in hands, but lowered.
"Sit down," he motioned. He waited until the scraping of chairs on the stone floor subsided. "Shortly before the final battle, a group of young Slytherins decided to show their appreciation to the Dark Lord." Moody trained one eye on the ceiling, the magical one turned at the door, and hobbled back and forth between the students' seats. "It is unknown what ritual they were trying to perform and highly uncertain what they hoped to achieve. They were killed, and for several hours, there was direct line to You-Know-Who."
Hermione appeared to have a question, but held herself back. Moody didn't acknowledge he had seen it, although he did fleetingly note how not spitting out questions and answers made her look somewhat prettier.
"That is how Death Eaters got inside Hogwarts that night. We managed to fight them off and close the connection, and we thought we were done." He paused for a moment, seemingly watching something behind him. "But after the second battle, after You-Know-Who died, the shadow started to show in the dungeons. Every night at first - although Headmistress herself devised the charm to banish it and administered it - then less and less often. End of summer, the thing was gone. Or at least we thought so."
He stopped at his desk and leant on it.
"Now, as for theories about it, I have none that hasn't been proved wrong."
"Which are?" Hermione asked, tilting her head. Moody considered her for a second, then hurled a number of latin words neither Neville nor Draco comprehended. But Hermione seemed to understand - her eyebrows drew up as she noted a long list with her minute scribble.
"I think I could..." she started, contemplating her notes.
"I think you could learn the spell already," Moody barked. "Get up and wands ready! I'll show you once, so pay close attention!" They hurried to line up in front of the desks. Draco shot a wry smile at Neville, who arched an eyebrow in question.
"Library?" the blond mouthed and grinned.