Aria was with Healer Smith and Madam Pomfrey in the hospital wing when the doors banged open and Hagrid hurried in, a body in his arms, weeping and groaning. Aria spotted lots of blood as Hagrid settled Draco Malfoy onto a bed.

"What happened?" Pomfrey demanded, rushing over, and waving her wand. Parts of Draco's uniform disappeared to reveal a long gash in his arm. Aria felt queasy seeing that much blood.

"Insulted Buckbeak," Hagrid answered, as if that explained everything.

"And who's Buckbeak?" Pomfrey asked.

"A bloody beast!" Draco moaned.

"Language!" Pomfrey scolded. "Just because you are injured does not give you the right to use such language in my infirmary."

"It's an 'ippogriff," Hagrid answered. "I's just introducin' the third years to 'em when Mr. Malfoy insulted Buckbeak."

"A hippogriff?" Pomfrey cried, summoning potions and bandages. "To third years?"

Aria glanced at Healer Smith who looked as concerned as Pomfrey sounded.

"What's a hippogriff?" she asked.

"It's a cross between a horse and an eagle," Healer Smith answered. "Thought to have first been bred by the ancient Greeks from a griffin and a horse. They're very proud creatures, easily insulted. Not exactly the sort of creature you introduce temperamental teenagers to."

Not for the first time, Aria was glad that she had opted not to take Care of Magical Creatures. She would stick with afternoon tea at Hagrid's and the danger his rock cakes posed, but not whatever other animals he deemed fitting to show third years. She still remembered Norbert.

Madam Pomfrey was now lecturing Hagrid.

"—and don't get me started on that textbook you chose! That is a professional level book, NEWTS level if you must, but for all the years? I have had to fix no more than two hands and three ankles so far because of that book and it's only the second day of classes!"

"Professor Dumbledore approved—"

"Then I shall have words with Dumbledore!"

Aria's eyes widened and she imagined what that confrontation would look like. Draco was starting to look like he was not as near death's doorstep as he had been when Hagrid first brought him in. Madam Pomfrey was now tying off bandages around his arm and setting it in a sling.

"Take this," she ordered, handing Draco a potion. "It's just a simple Blood Replenish potion. I'd like to monitor you for the rest of the day." She flicked her wand, and a set of hospital pajamas flew over. Another wave of her wand as she stepped away from his bed and a set of curtains encircled his bed.

"How's our resident troublemaker?" Madam Pomfrey asked Healer Smith after shooing Hagrid out of the hospital wing.

"I'm the most well-behaved student ever!" Aria insisted.

"Trolls? The Philosopher's Stone? Basilisks? Dueling in the trophy room?"

"Neither of those are my fault. I just keep being in the wrong place at the wrong time."

Madam Pomfrey sniffed. Healer Smith finished writing something down in Aria's health file and handed it over to Pomfrey.

"Her core's started to slow it's growth," he told the mediwitch. "It's still larger than a normal thirteen-year-old's . . . I'd put it at the size of a fifteen-year-old. Miss Bourne, have you noticed any accidental magic on your part? Especially during high emotion or extreme duress?"

"Not really," Aria answered. "I mean . . . if I get angry sometimes things will rattle or fall over or a wind'll pick up, but otherwise nothing like what use to happen before Hogwarts. Nothing's caught on fire or randomly floated."

She wondered if she should mention the wandless magic she had been practicing over the summer with Fawkes' urging, but in the end, decided not to. She was, after all, only doing it to get around the Trace on her wand. Briefly she wondered what Fawkes was up to, she had not seen him since just before Professor Lupin had been kidnapped.

"Keep giving me quarterly updates," Smith told Pomfrey. "While her core is still large for a child her age, it's no longer rapidly growing so I don't think too much concern needs to be given, unless it's found that she's overpowering her spells in class or something like that."

"Overpowering?" Aria questioned.

"Wixen with powerful cores sometimes overpower the spells," Smith explained. "Gentle, delicate spell work is hard for people like that. It may be an issue for you, instead of accidental magic, it may not. It all depends on your temperament and ability to temper and control your magic."

"Overpowering may be just what she needs if she's going to go off battling monsters in the corridors," Pomfrey cried.

"I did hear about the basilisk," Smith said. "I'm only sorry I wasn't able to come and take a look at it. It truly must've been a once in a lifetime sight!"

"She was covered in basilisk blood, that is a once in a lifetime sight," Pomfrey retorted. "And I've no desire to repeat the experience."

"Neither do I!" Aria assured her. "I just want a nice quiet school year. Best behaved student here, remember?"


The third year Slytherins and Gryffindors made their way into the first DADA of the school year. Pansy was fawning over Draco, insisting on carrying his school bag while his arm was in its sling.

Professor Lupin leaned against his desk at the front of the classroom, a calm smile on his face.

"Welcome," he greeted them. "I am Professor Lupin. Normally, your Defense class would consist of a lecture before a practical lesson, however, this morning an opportunity came about that it simply too good to pass up. Can anyone tell me what a boggart is? Yes, Miss . . ."

"Granger." Hermione put her hand down with a grin. "A boggart is a shapeshifter that like's dark spaces. Places like closets or cupboards. No one knows what it truly looks like because it shapeshifts to be whatever a person fears the most."

"Correct, someone has read ahead. Five points to Gryffindor. A boggart is one of the creatures we will study more in depth later this year. But one took up residence in a cupboard in the staff room recently and I've managed to keep it around for the classes to practice defeating it. So far, each class has managed to subdue it, but on banish it completely. Can anyone tell me how to banish one? Miss Bourne?"

"Laughter," Aria said, working to recall what she had read in the textbook. "Laughter weakens it but can also defeat it. But it has to be a lot of laughter, right?"

"Indeed. So, we are going to practice trying to banish the boggart today. Now, when you are confronted with a boggart, the incantation you will use to dispel it is Riddikulus and you must not only say it exactly, but you must also think of something funny as you say it, otherwise the boggart will remain shifted into what you fear the most."

The class practiced saying the spell several times. Aria thought she overheard Draco mutter something about the class being ridiculous. Millicent did say that she thought Professor Lupin's robes were ridiculous.

Once he was pleased with everyone's pronunciation, Lupin had everyone line up and led them towards the staff room. There, he split the class into several groups, taking in one group at a time to confront the boggart. Aria found herself in a group with Harry, Dean, and Neville. They were not the first group. Everyone had to wait in the corridor for their turn.

The first group was Hermione's group. She had been partnered with Parvati, Fay, Crabbe, and Goyle. She and Parvati came out in high spirits, but Fay did not appear amused. She looked a little angry compared to Crabbe and Goyle's uneasy looks.

"I think Fay's more embarrassed about her fear than anything," Parvati whispered to Aria and Lavender. "Her deepest fear is heights."

"Makes sense why she did not like flying class," Lavender whispered back, "and why she prefers to stand closer to the middle of the astronomy tower instead of near the parapets."

The second group that came out included Ron, Blaise, Theo, Daphne, and Millicent. Apparently, Aria found out, Millicent had a deep fear of dogs and Ron's was, no surprise, spiders. His successful cast of Riddikulus had made the spider-boggart roll around the staff room. Similar to Ron's, Daphne's had been bugs while Blaise's was an erupting volcano. Seeing as he had family in Italy where that was a possibility, it made sense. Theo, however, had come out of the staff room pale faced and shaking. No one had been willing to even hint at what his deepest fear was.

When Aria's group was finally called in, her heart had picked up a little speed and her stomach was clenching. What would her boggart be? Her mother's still body? As a child she had had a few months of nightmares after her mother's death. Or a basilisk? Or whatever specter she had encountered trying to steal the Philosopher's Stone in first year?

Professor Lupin smiled at them from one side of the staff room, closest to a phonograph playing an upbeat tune that reminded Aria of jazz, but she was certain there was an instrument or two that did not sound like any instrument she had ever heard in her life. Did wizards have musical instruments that Muggles did not?

Aria's gaze went around the staff room This was probably the one and only time that she would be allowed into the staff room. She remembered sneaking into the staff lounge at her primary school to help Robert, Samuel, and Tommy with a prank. This staff room was easily twice the size of the Muggle one, with large windows letting in a large amount of natural light. Bookshelves lined one wall and there was a shelf of magical trinkets whirling and whistling softly. There was even a corner with a piping hot tea service and finger food near a large unlit fireplace. Squashy armchairs were placed in front of the hearth. It all looked so cozy.

"Come over this way," Professor Lupin said, waving the group over to where he stood beside a wardrobe. It shook a little.

"The boggart is trapped within this closet," Lupin told them as the wardrobe shook again. "I'll call each of you up to face the boggart. The rest of you will go stand by that table over there." He motioned to one of several square tables with chairs scattered around the place.

The first to go was Dean. He stood several feet from the wardrobe while Lupin flicked his wand, opening the door just a crack. For a few seconds nothing happened. Then the door burst open, and an object came flying out, landing on the floor in front of Dean, causing him to gasp and take a few hurried steps back. Aria felt a little sick seeing the shape the boggart had taken, a single hand that scuttled about on its fingertips, the hand clearly severed from the rest of the nonexistent body as blood poured down the wrist and around the fingers.

Dean managed to point his wand at the advancing hand and stutter out a Riddikulus. Immediately the severed hand morphed into a set of animal balloons that popped while playing crazy sounding music. Aria could not keep the surprised laugh from escaping. Dean grinned, even though it was clear that what he had forced the boggart to turn into was not generating the needed laughs to get rid of it, he had still managed to successfully transform the boggart.

"Excellent!" Lupin cried, waving Dean back. "Longbottom, you're up."

Neville shuffled forward, losing a little of the new confidence he had started carrying himself with. The boggart morphed from musical balloons to that of a tall man with a severe thin face. His hair was receding, and he looked down his pointed nose at Neville.

"What sort of Longbottom are you?" the boggart-man demanded. "Nothing but a squib. Not at all like your father. It's your mother's genes—"

"Riddikulus!" Neville's voice came out a bit panicked, but nonetheless sharper than Aria had ever heard it. The boggart-man stumbled back, his black wizarding suit morphing into an Edwardian-styled dress and a large hat grew on top of his head, a familiar hat with a vulture attached to it.

Everyone burst out laughing at the sight of the man in Lady Longbottom's clothes. The boggart shuddered briefly, and Neville scampered back with a flushed, pleased look on his face.

Professor Lupin motioned Aria to come forward. The boggart-man in a dress immediately morphed into a towering basilisk. Aria gasped; it was so life-life! Even the smell was there! She heard swearing behind her from the boys before she plucked up her courage and pointed her wand at the boggart.

"Riddikulus!" she shouted. The feeling of her magic traveling through her appeared as it had begun to do throughout the summer as she had practiced wandless magic, shooting from her wand. Even though Riddikulus gave off no sparks or color, she just knew that magic had shot out of her wand quickly and efficiently. The basilisk hissed as it began to shrink into a tiny neon pink garden snake wearing a birthday hat. Balloons were attached to the snake, and it began to float. Aria burst out laughing, the image in front of her so random and so strange that the only reaction she could give was laughter. The tiny neon creature began to hiss angrily, but the hissing came out high-pitched and sounded more like an angry kitten than a snake.

"Oh, that's excellent!" Professor Lupin laughed. "Excellent job, Miss Bourne!" She skipped back to Harry, Neville, and Dean, a grin splitting her face. Harry stepped forward this time, his own laughter dying as the boggart immediately shifted into the floating specter of a dementor. The temperature in the room dropped. Aria could not see her breath though, and knew that if this were a real dementor, she would be able to.

Still, the boggart-dementor seemed to have the effect of a dementor on Harry, as he could not beat back the dementor. In fact, after unsuccessfully trying to cast Riddikulus twice, he crumbled to his knees covering his ears with a cry. Professor Lupin immediately stepped between Harry and the boggart. The creature shifted to a shining white orb before Lupin casually cast Riddikulus and sent the now deflating white balloon back into the cupboard.

"Mr. Potter?" Professor Lupin knelt in front of Harry. Aria, Dean, and Neville hurried over. "Mr. Potter, it is gone now."

"I felt like the real thing," Harry muttered. Professor Lupin pointed to the tea set in the corner of the room. Aria hurried over, finding that it was actually hot chocolate and not tea, and poured Harry a cup which he eagerly accepted. Some of the color returned to his cheeks after taking several sips of hot chocolate.

"You should all drink some," Professor Lupin told them. "Dementors are nasty things, even a boggart-one leaves minor aftereffects." Aria, Dean, and Neville all had a cup.

"Why don't you take him to Madam Pomfrey?" Lupin suggested to Aria once the hot chocolate was consumed. "Just to be on the safe side. I don't like how the dementors seem to overly affect him."

"I can hear a woman screaming," Harry muttered. "No one else seems to have that problem."

"Which is why you shall go to Madam Pomfrey," Lupin stated, ushering them towards the door. "You are, obviously, excused from the rest of class the both of you."

Aria and Harry hurried off, letting Dean and Neville relate to their friends where they were going while Professor Lupin called the next group into the staff room.

"Who do you think the woman is?" Aria asked.

"I don't know," Harry answered. "But you believe me?"

"I wouldn't ask if I didn't. Just 'cause I can't hear her doesn't mean you're not hearing her. Think it's a memory that you can't remember?"

"Isn't that a contradiction? A memory I can't remember?"

"I don't know. It sounds like something you should talk to Professor Snape about."

Harr groaned.

"For once I'd like to have a normal year where I'm not the only one having a weird experience," he complained. Aria glared at him, punching his arm.

"I killed a basilisk last year," she retorted. "You just had to suffer being called the Heir of Slytherin for a few months."

Harry rubbed his arm where the punch had landed.

"Right," he muttered. "Sorry. For once I'd like to have a normal year where we aren't having a weird experience."

"Better," Aria muttered with a sniff. "Though no chance this year what with dementors and Sirius Black about now is there?"

Harry paused to knock his head against the stone walls. Aria cackled as several first years passed by with looks of alarm.

"It's okay," she called after them, "it was just a really hard Defense class."

The first years did not look reassured.

"Don't scare first years!" Harry admonished, flopping onto a nearby bench. Aria shrugged, about to give him some more sarcastic advice, only to have Percy come around the corner and stop short seeing them.

"Shouldn't you two be at Defense?" he asked. Aria thought it better not to ask how he knew their schedule.

"We finished the lesson and were dismissed," Aria told him. "Boggarts. Once we fought it off, we were dismissed. There were a few people left with Professor Lupin."

"Exciting. I hope we get to do that in NEWTS," he said. "So, what's got you looking do down, Harry? Was it your boggart?"

"It was a dementor," Harry admitted. "And I completely failed at fighting it off. Like even though it didn't feel as awful as the dementor on the train, I could still feel all the happiness disappear and I can hear this woman screaming. I just don't know what memory it's from."

Percy hummed, sitting next to Harry.

"Is it just screaming or does this woman say something?" he asked, gently putting a hand on Harry's shoulder. Harry's face paled a little.

"She . . . she says, "not Harry, please not Harry" and then I see a flash of green light," Harry answered. He let out a shuttering breath as if he were releasing some great secret. "It's like . . . this might sound odd . . . but I think that green light kills the woman."

That . . . that was . . . Aria could not describe how she felt. She simply plopped down on Harry's other side and hugged him. As usual he was pretty stiff at first, but eventually, he leaned against her and lifted his arms to hug the arm that cross in front of him.

"Thanks," he whispered.

"That's really awful," Percy murmured, now stroking Harry's head. "I'm sorry that that's what the dementors make you think of."

"But I don't know where the memory's from!" Harry cried, disentangling from Aria to turn more fully towards Percy. "That's what so upsetting – besides the screaming and pleading and death. I don't know who the woman is!"

Percy was quiet for a minute.

"I think you should tell someone," he finally said. "Professor Snape specifically, but maybe even McGonagall. Someone who would've been close to your family when you were little. My best guess is, is that this is a very early memory. I've been reading up on dementors. There's a theory that dementors can make you remember things that you've otherwise forgotten. Either because our minds have . . . locked things away . . . or because we were too young to remember something."

"You think Harry might've been a little kid?" Aria questioned.

"Or whatever he's remembering is too painful that his mind's locked it away. I'd pick Professor Snape though. Not only is he your head of house, but he's also rumored to know a thing or two about mind magic. If anyone's going to help you – besides Professor Lupin in getting rid of dementors – it's gonna be Snape."

Harry nodded.

"Okay, thanks, Percy," he murmured. Percy patted his head with a soft smile before leaving the two in the corridor.

"You know," Aria said thoughtfully after a minute, "I don't know why people are so uptight about Percy."

"You didn't spend a summer living with him," Harry teased, "but you're right. People are a little harsh on him. He's just so unlike any of the other Weasleys. And Mrs. Weasley kinda makes it his responsibility to look after the twins."

"That'd made anyone a rule-follower," Aria replied. "Though I think that says something else about Percy too. I'd have just killed them by now. Thrown their bodies into the river."

"You're scary sometimes, you know that?"

"Why, thank you!"