Maybe James should have accepted Lyra's offer to come with. But it was fine. So what if this bathroom brought out some mildly nightmarish memories? And he really did want to get a proper look at what he was here for; Lyra had been rattled by this stuff, the symbols and the possible connection, the rest of Azkaban's horror, how that passageway in its first corridor had whispered something that they'd have preferred to never hear.

She had been okay with leaving this all alone, with pretending none of this could have a link to why they were here in this world, as if the whisper had been from some thing that had merely read her thoughts and found out a name Lyra hadn't associated with herself for over a decade, all without Lyra detecting the presence in her mind.

James knew better. She knew better too, even if she'd rather pretend otherwise. Whatever this was had the potential to be mind-shattering in its revelations. Something had brought them here sixteen years ago — the same time those runes had apparently popped up in Azkaban. He half wished he had asked Tom Riddle if those Norse runes were anywhere in the Chamber of Secrets before sixteen years ago; he didn't even know if they were in there now. All he had to go off of was some quick glance Lyra took while checking the Chamber for danger.

"Open," he hissed in Parseltongue before the last door. It was a bit difficult to learn from Harry, given the language sounded largely like fucking nothing. As the wall cracked open and the two halves slid out of sight, James took a deep breath and closed his eyes. It'd be fine. The basilisk was dead and there was nothing left to hurt him down here but his own mind — and perhaps evil runes.

Maybe he wouldn't die down here but maybe his mind would just melt glimpsing the edge of infinity. If all that Time-Turner business proved anything, it was that humans reallyneeded to stop messing with this shit. What chance did they stand against things beyond mere trivialities like, oh, time itself?

Briefly, because his brain hated him, he imagined some incomprehensible horror leaping out of the dark to suck his brains out of his ears like that one poor bloke Nicolas Flamel had mentioned.

Conjuring up a bravado that probably wasn't conducive to a long life, James shook his head and entered the Chamber of Secrets for the second time. Oh yes, it was quite dark here. Nightmarishly dark, he might say. Before the first time he'd been here, light hadn't touched the dust-covered Chamber for half a century; before Riddle came along, who knew just how long it had gone unnoticed, lying quietly in wait?

He held his wand high above his head and lit the whole Chamber quite brightly, the strength of it fading even the shadows cast by the pillars. This was the first time he'd gotten a proper look, now he thought about it. Up ahead, the basilisk lay dead and decaying. Behind it stood the tall statue of Salazar Slytherin, the face monkeyish, the stone robes coming down just short enough to show the enormous gray feet. At the back, pressing up against the wall, the stone heels came together to form a very narrow alcove of sorts; Lyra had said she had seen the runes there.

In the movie there had been some kind of pond, but here there had only been a smooth stone floor, the pools of water off far to the side. Near the center of the Chamber was a stain of old blood — his blood — like a faded watercolor.

His footsteps faded away into the shadow veiling the walls, the sounds silenced before they could echo. More unnerving than this, though, was the basilisk before him. Its scales half fallen off, it lay dead and decomposing, though only barely enough to convince him it was indeed finished. He wished he could tell his hammering heart that.

With each thump, a glimpse of the memory flashed in his mind: the all-consuming dark of the Chamber, the basilisk unfurling itself out of the shadows — what sounded like a thousand rusty chains grinding against the floor as its scales brushed harshly against the stone beneath — the all-consuming terror of knowing the death hurtling toward him —

And then he was back there again, unable to stop the memories from grasping tight every cog of control he had:

"Lumos Solaris!" he shouted, and though he turned his head and shut his eyes, the might of his spell fueled a light so bright and reaching that the inside of his eyelids became a sharp orange. The basilisk thrashed around in agony, though he remained unsure if he had merely pained the basilisk or blinded it.

If he had spent centuries in the darkness and then been confronted with that, permanent retinal damage was almost certain. But this was a basilisk, and such magical creatures were resistant to magic in ways logic really didn't follow. Even now, as the creature was dead and rotting, the darkest curses he knew would likely bounce off. He would know; he had a jacket, a jacket made of scales that could reflect any spell, scales which came from the basilisk —

He was flapping his raven wings wildly to fly to safety, settling on one of the many snake statues adorning the Chamber nearly to the point of obsession. There he transformed back, and below him the basilisk still reeled. James raised his wand.

The explosive curse he flung ricocheted off the scales like it was nothing, tearing apart a pillar instead, but the snake statue he stood upon did not deflect the serpent's great tail as it shattered the stone into pieces, sending him flying to the ground with force.

Sometimes James thought he still felt that blow in his back, even after whatever Madam Pomfrey had done. And there near the far end of the room was his blood, dried now. It was there where he had assumed he was going to die, where death would snatch all the answers to his questions before he could ponder them himself. What a mess it was. And now here he was, a morbid curiosity simmering inside him.

Then the basilisk struck again, sinking its sword-like fangs into his body, the venom tearing apart his blood and skin as if on the molecular level. In a display of mad genius as he was being thrown about like a rag doll, his legs landing in the basilisk's mouth, he Transfigured both of his shoes into porcupines. And choking and reeling, the basilisk released him and he fell to the ground, where he lay trying not to scream.

Poisoned, bleeding out, with little sensation of his legs and a great big snake hissing and spitting all over the place as it tried to dislodge the irritant in its gullet, another mad thought came to him as he searched desperately for ideas: the duel between Dumbledore and Voldemort.

And with a strength he didn't know he possessed, he raised his wand — great torrents of water came bursting from the pools around the Chamber, crashing against the basilisk with the command of his wand; it filled the serpent's mouth, its nostrils, covering it all until it was nothing but a vague blur behind water.

When it was fully encased, he froze the sphere and charmed the ice Unbreakable. It turned out, for all their terror, basilisks still needed air to breathe.

James glanced at the giant corpse. It was very dead. It reminded him of those photographs he occasionally came across, of hunters posing with lions or bears or loggers standing beside felled thousand-year-old redwoods; such majesty, such beauty in wilderness, extinguished for nobody to appreciate ever again.

The whole fight had been very quick indeed, as fights in the magical world usually were. And whatever this had been, James thought looking at the snake, it had still seemed for nothing. What had it all been for? Did one deserve praise for destroying a threat that would have never been awoken?

He looked up at Slytherin's face, as if it held answers. Its stone jaw hung low, allowing passage to within, but he didn't think he cared enough to explore whatever lay in that darkness.

Sighing, he Vanished the dust and grime before him and after some steps stood between Slytherin's stone feet. And into the very stone there, on Slytherin's ankles and the wall behind them, were carved various symbols, harsh and jagged and inexplicably unsettling.

And in one spot, right above the narrow alcove where the stone heels met the wall, the Norse symbols, which he had dabbled in a good few times since that night at Azkaban, to refresh his memory.

Ancient Runes taught non-magical languages, and magical ones, symbols that only magical people could comprehend. But the alarm bells going off in his head were screaming that these may, if not themselves, lead to something which even magicals could not understand.

Seek the Elders.

James ran a hand through his hair. It was difficult to explain the sheer surreality of becoming a part of a world meant to be fictional, and being maybe a step closer to finding out the who and why only strengthened the feeling.

But he took that step closer anyway, carefully maneuvering himself into the alcove to better examine the letters. As he tried to twist himself into the tiny gap, though, he stumbled and landed hard on his palms.

Ignoring the stinging sensation on his hands and muttering unkind things about various people and their mothers, he looked up, facing complete darkness. He waved his hand in front of him, expecting stone walls to support himself with, but his hand passed through nothing but darkness. James Summoned his wand back into his hand and stood back up — as well as he could being hunched over, at least. He shined the light over the arched passageway, which cast long shadows on the walls.

James brushed his fingers over the jagged symbols; it looked less like they had been chiseled into the stone and more like they had been gouged out, with the edges sharp and brittle, the depth of the symbols uneven. He recognized them, from Azkaban, from those seven archways. He remembered those whispers from the deep, the voice that seemed to know names of people that didn't yet exist in this world, and might never exist.

There were far more of the symbols, here, arranged in some sort of sentence structure. A message from someone, or something; whether it was directed at him and Lyra, he couldn't say. He stayed as still as he could, his heartbeat almost loud enough to echo in the complete silence of the chamber, wondering if he was hearing whispers in the dark or if it was merely his blood rushing through his ears.

Nothing stirred. This place was dead, just like its sole prior occupant.

James released a shaky sigh before turning back to the darkness. He crawled through the passage, his hand pressing against the ceiling, and soon the restrictive tunnel gave way. He looked up, pointing his wandlight in the same direction and, with a sensation of nervous awe, he realised the ceiling must have been taller than the Chamber proper.

"Lumos maxima," he intoned again, lighting up this strange place in all of its glory. With a sinking feeling, however, he noted the old stone looked strikingly like the one that built Azkaban. At least there were no dementors here.

Above him was a large, circular island, supported by five thin stone bridges that connected to the walls and held up by a single ornamented pillar from beneath. There were no stairs, nor any evidence of ropes and pulleys, and he sincerely doubted Slytherin could fly as Voldemort was able to do. James approached the pillar instead, brushing his hand over the stone.

"Oh," he said. "Oh."

A spiral groove had been cut into the stone, all the way from the floor to as high as James could see. If not for the not-at-all subtle snake motif he might not have connected the dots. Slytherin must have been some sort of snake Animagus (though James preferred to imagine it was actually a legless lizard) and the grooves were there for him to climb up the pillar which, in a time when no self-respecting witch or wizard would be caught riding a broom, would have denied anyone but a small selection of Animagi entry. Unfortunately for Slytherin, James was one of those few Animagi.

He fluttered up to this floating stone island, morphing back into human form as he landed. There was a circular stone workbench at the center, surrounded by shelves. Some of them were packed with books, though only a few were well-preserved. James pulled on his gold-lined dragonhide gloves before reaching out and picking a very impressive leather-bound tome from one of the shelves. The title was written in Latin. He hated Latin.

The other shelves, though, were filled with far less pleasing things. Various potions ingredients, some of which he recognized from Snape's classroom, and others… well, he didn't feel inclined to have staring contests with the stuff inside the jars. Others were filled with harvested organs. It was only after he saw pickled genitals that he was sure some of them were human.

Jesus Christ…

James slowly turned to the book he was holding in his hand, and a dark corner of his mind wondered if it was bound in human skin. He put it back on the stone table, trying not to think too hard about it.

In an attempt to look at anywhere but the cursed shelf, his eyes settled on a large wooden chest. He approached, his wand held wardingly in front of him, reaching out with gloved fingers. The surface was covered in rot. Kicking it with his foot, it didn't even slightly budge; the wood was thick, maybe inlaid with some metal.

"Alohomora," he murmured, to no effect. Not that he was expecting it to work. He sighed out his nose and wracked his brains for possible Anti-Anti-Unlocking Charms that he might be able to use.

The Unlocking Charm was one of the oldest spells since the development of wand magic. Despite its name, it didn't have to work on locks, after all; it could work on chains, door bars, and even barricades — it simply applied to concept of being unlocked, and any physical object that by purpose denied entry to a witch or wizard could be outmaneuvered with this single handy spell.

The natural consequence of such a development were magical countermeasures. And the natural consequence to that was more Unlocking Charms, until it developed into a magical arms race that continued even to this day. Nowadays, some wizards and witches dedicated their lives to creating the most formidable enchanted locks, commissioning works for wizarding nobility, banks like Gringotts, and places like Nurmengard might have hundreds such locks, if the rumors were correct.

Unfortunately for any sod who'd commissioned themselves an expensive lock, James had the skeleton key. Namely, a dagger made of goblin-wrought silver and imbued with basilisk venom, which could destroy just about everything. He unsheathed the dagger and, careful not to let it touch him in any way, aimed it at the keyhole and shoved it in. Iron parted like paper with a godawful screech.

James yanked the lock off; it crumbled in his hand, turning into a puddle of rust. James poked the chest itself; no fireballs, no bolts of lightning, no withering curses like Dumbledore. James hooked his gloved fingers under the lid and pulled.

It groaned and shuddered as centuries of disuse came peeling off in the form of dust and flakes of rust. Waving the dust from his face, he peered inside. There was a painted wooden box, with runes written into them. Some sort of forerunner to Arabic? It would make sense, if Slytherin was indeed Moorish, as some suggested. It didn't look like anything they studied in Ancient Runes but, then again, Hogwarts placed the most emphasis on Germanic and Romance-derived magical languages since that was what was most commonly used in northern Europe.

James picked up the box, spinning it in his hands. A lot more solid than the chest it was in, and much cleaner too. Some sort of preservation magic at work, then. He carefully shimmied the dagger in the brass lock and popped it open, to find a bundle of cloth. Specifically, cloth-of-gold. He hesitated, before peeling back the cloth to take a peek.

His eyes widened slightly as he took in the dagger. It was made of black stone, not particularly impressive in its appearance. The hilt had a carved grip in the shape of two intertwining serpents, and the blade itself looked quite dull. The problem was the runes, though. It reminded him of that damned statue he'd given to the Unspeakables. The taste of decay and rot that seemed to invade his mouth, that reminded him of that statue and Azkaban.

He tucked the box and the leather-bound book into his school bag before looking down from the edge of the platform; he spread his arms and dropped off the side, the wind whistling in his ears as he plummeted headlong into the darkness, his clothes fluttering around him and his school bag floating near his feet; at the last moment, his arms morphed into wings, his hairs into feathers, and the lethal jump turned into a controlled glide from which he landed easily back on the ground.

As he left the chamber, he glanced again at the stone door, adorned with blind snakes, and then back through the Chamber towards the statue, now shrouded in darkness once more, and towards the forgotten words carved into them. Perhaps they were some warning that hadn't been heeded? Or perhaps a desperate plea from the past? He might never know.

Ignoring a simmering dread in his gut, he spread his wings and flew back up the pipes, and began making his way back to the Room of Requirement. He'd store the dagger there, for now — if the Diadem had survived in that room for so long without hurting anyone, then so could this.

"Stark."

James froze in his tracks, as the rhythmical (if off-beat) thumping of Moody's fake leg came closer and closer. He slowly turned around with his hands in plain view, so as not to have the twitchy professor set him on fire. Moody must have noticed his caution, because he snorted, amused.

"You do have a reputation, Professor."

"You've got something in your bag." Moody's real eye did not break eye contact, but his fake eye swiveled to punctuate his point. "Do you even know what's inside?"

James waffled, unsure if he should be revealing this to Moody, but in the end the man was highly valued by Dumbledore. Besides, despite his initial hostility, Moody had grown to become a not quite friendly but at the least a sympathetic ear; after all, he hadn't gotten all those scars either without being stupid sometimes, as Moody put it.

"I found a couple of things," he said. "A book and a dagger. I wasn't going to stab anyone with it, of course."

Moody snorted. "Aye. For that you've got that sword you like to swing around. No, the fact that it's a dagger isn't the problem. It's the fact that it looks like a dagger-shaped void to my eye." Moody raised a gnarled hand to the left side of his head, pointing at his fake eye. "I can see through anything, Stark. I can even see through enchantments, I can even see through gold. That thing? Just pure black."

"Why?" said James. "Have you seen anything like it before?" Moody began walking away; James followed.

"A few things, and none of them good. I heard you found something similar… a snake statue, so they said. Where do you keep finding these bloody things, Stark?"

"How do you know about that?" said James. "And you didn't tell Dumbledore, did you?"

Moody glared at him. "Do I look like Dumbledore's sidekick to you, boy?"

James wisely decided to keep his trap shut.

"I have my ways," Moody said. "I know people. I've worked with plenty of them."

Moody's room and office were located at the end of a less-traversed corridor somewhere on the second floor. It was the last two rooms before a dead end. However, if he remembered the Marauder's Map correctly, one of the pillars would spin to reveal a hidden passage that led either directly to the Headmaster's office or to Hogsmeade. Seemed just like Moody to have chosen this spot, despite being so out of the way.

"Don't touch anything," Moody said gruffly, holding the door open for James with his staff. James nodded idly as he stepped inside; Moody's room was spartan, with a bed in one corner, a single bookshelf, a dresser, and a chest at the foot of his bed; no windows, and no decorations on the walls. The one oddity was the potions workbench in the other corner, with a cauldron bubbling away on a flame.

Moody pulled out some sort of device and began scanning the room. James stoically withstood Moody's assault as he and his bag were poked by the whining device, and then Moody limped around his room, checking under his bed and behind his shelf. After a minute, Moody grunted in not quite satisfaction — more like acceptance, really — and put the device away.

"Why am I here?" said James, looking around. Not even a chair to sit on.

Moody conjured a chair for both of them; unlike Dumbledore's preferred furniture, Moody's chairs were simple, straight-backed wooden chairs. Moody crashed down onto his chair, stretching his leg with a groan of relief. James sat opposite him. Moody jabbed his wand at the doorway; a dozen different lights flashed across the surface of it, none of them spells that James recognized.

"Show me," Moody ordered, and James frowned. He pulled on his dragonhide gloves on again (Moody nodded approvingly) before he carefully removed first the book, and then the box.

Moody leaned forward slightly to read the cover, and snorted in disgust. "On the Creation of Anti-Humans. Where did you find this?"

"In the Chamber of Secrets."

"Hmph. As if we needed any more proof that Salazar Slytherin was a no-good cunt."

James glanced at the book. "What are anti-humans?"

"Exactly what it sounds like. Some idiot studying immortality accidentally created a lovechild of a dementor and an inferius. Fucking alchemists." Moody looked at him. "And the other thing?"

James placed the box on the table, and Moody scowled. He waved his wand over it for a good three minutes before he accepted the dragonhide gloves from James; pulling them on, and flexing his fingers briefly, he popped the box open and unfolded the gold covering. He stared. James grimaced at the sight.

"You really do stumble upon the strangest things, don't you, boy," Moody muttered. "I'll take it off your hands."

"What are you going to do with it?" said James.

"As I said. I know people."

"Unspeakables?"

Moody glanced at him. "I couldn't say."

He snapped the box shut, and limped to his chest; inside, James caught some glimpse of a strongbox that Moody put the dagger into. Unlike Dumbledore, Moody wouldn't budge, being as stubborn as he was, so instead James turned to examine the cauldron. A dark blue liquid was simmering within, not something he really recognized.

"Ah, the Elixir of Infinity," Moody said, seating himself on his chair again. "I'd wager not even that Potions Master of yours knows about this one."

"You couldn't have chosen a less pretentious name, I'm sure."

"I wasn't the one who named it. I can follow instructions well enough, but I'm not the creative sort. Unless it's firewhiskey. I can mix that with just about anything."

James snorted. "So what's this do?"

"Oh, curious, are you, boy?" Moody leaned forward with a gleam in his remaining eye, and James knew he'd fucked up. "There are a few mugs in that cupboard there. Go grab a pair, fill it halfway, and bring it back. You'll want to be sitting down for this one."

"Sitting down?" James stared at Moody. "Are you inviting me to go on a trip?"

Moody only gave a smirk in response, one that twisted his scarred face into an even more frightening visage than usual. James sighed. Every single Defense professor he'd had so far was batshit insane in their own way. With his luck, next year might be Umbridge. He Banished the dust off of two mugs — at least they were unlikely to have been used this entire year, given Moody never drank from anything but his flask. He held the empty mugs out to Moody for inspection, who nodded in approval.

"Can never be too careful," Moody said.

"Constant vigilance," James sighed.

"Now you're getting it."

James dipped the mugs into the liquid, and drew them back out; he shook off the excess drops before handing one to Moody. James sat in the opposite chair again, and they knocked their mugs together; Moody downed it in one go, and James tried to do the same. It tasted like rubber. Smacking his lips in distaste, James set the mug down on the floor, underneath his chair.

"Tastes like arse," Moody said, and James grunted.

Moody crossed his arms under his chest, still holding his wand in one hand, and closed his eye. Even as his fake eye continued to whiz about hysterically, James heard soft snores coming from him after a few minutes. Weirdly enough, this might have been the first time James ever saw Moody asleep.

James stood up and stretched, before walking the length of the room. Strange; it seemed that the sun had gone down before he'd noticed it, dipping below the mountainous Scotland horizon. He walked over the window, only for the walls and floor to crumble around his feet with each step he took; the masonry turned to dust as they were sucked into a maelstrom of immense size beneath him, but somehow James continued to walk upon nothing without trouble. He peered out the window, and the glass had vanished at some point, giving a perfect glimpse of the edge of infinity.

His eyes witnessed the full length of the electromagnetic spectrum; colors exploded all around him as stars came into the world in an orchestra of light. The universe spiraled into existence around him, clusters and superclusters forming like the winding roots of a tree, the galaxies glittering as stars exploded and died. He saw everything, and eternity felt like only a moment.

Then, in the corner of the growing universe, a darkness erupted; or, perhaps it was more accurate to say, something consumed everything in that region. From the void crawled out a wyrm of darkness, a complete absence of light and everything to ever exist, and the galaxies cried out in pain as it sunk its venomous fangs into the roots of the cosmic tree.

The tree shifted, the branches swayed, and the limbs drooped as if held down by a great weight; and then a single eye, a black hole, looked at James. James attempted to reach out to the Eye of Providence before all its stars were extinguished like dropping fireflies, but he was smitten down by a bolt of lightning; pain wracked his body, ripping into him, tearing him apart at the atomic level, turning him into cosmic dust. And still he reached, for some reason, towards that eye, with an inexplicable terror that if he didn't do something, the world would end and he with it.

Then he opened his eyes.

"Morning, lad," Moody said. "Here."

James blinked, focusing his eyes, as he was given the same mug he'd drunk from before. Instead of some mysterious blue potion, though, there was an amber liquid whose pungent smell revealed it to be firewhiskey. James raised an eyebrow at Moody, who was sitting opposite him on a small table digging into a chunk of beef in a manner reminiscent of a nature documentary he'd watched involving a leopard and a particularly unlucky antelope. Moody was weird as fuck, but James couldn't think of any other professors who would serve him booze and fairly expensive booze at that, so whatever. He took a sip of the firewhiskey and met Moody's eye.

"I lied, it's not morning," said Moody. "But you were out for some time. You just missed dinner."

"Great," said James. "How come you didn't miss dinner?"

Moody shrugged. "Everyone reacts differently the first time. I had the elves save you some." He gestured to James' plate with his knife, which was loaded with ham, potatoes, peas, parsnips, and Yorkshire pudding, as well as a couple of slices of carrot cake for dessert. James picked up his knife and fork and decided to tuck in. Moody was watching James; he was tilting his head to his right side as he chewed, since some Death Eater had reportedly blown a chunk out of the left side of his jaw two decades ago.

"So," said Moody, after swallowing, "what did you dream of?"

"I saw a basilisk," James said quietly, as he speared a piece of gravy-covered parsnip with his fork. "It was poisoning a tree. Or something."

Moody grunted, before tossing firewhiskey down his throat and slamming the mug down on the table. "I'll confess something, lad. The folks that made that potion used it for Divination."

James swallowed his peas. "You mean I saw the future?"

"Or the past. Or the present, but very far away. Or you just had an ordinary nightmare," said Moody. "There's a reason why that woman Trelawney doesn't teach N.E.W.T. students. Divination's a steaming pile of shite most times. There's no way to accurately assess anyone in that field."

"You have something mean to say about every staff member, don't you," James said, and Moody gave that smirk again.

"In any case, seems to me like you were just having nightmares," said Moody. "Given your experiences with basilisks. Shame. I was looking for something interesting."

"Like what?"

Moody grunted. "An old colleague dreamed about having dinner with her family, once, except her aunt wasn't in her usual spot. Next day, she learned her aunt got into a Floo accident and never came back out."

"What — how is that interesting?"

"'Spose I'm curious about things my eye can't see," said Moody with a shrug. "It's useful, but it doesn't show me the future."

"And what did you dream of?" said James.

"I dreamed of eating a hearty slice of shepherd's pie," said Moody. Then he smirked, gesturing at his plate. "And what do you know. Shepherd's pie."

James rolled his eyes. Finishing off the carrot cake, he excused himself from Moody's quarters and returned to Ravenclaw tower. Lyra was not present, as far as he could see; probably off in the Room of Requirement or in the library, doing whatever she did in her free time that wasn't drugs. James walked past the rows of bookshelves lining the Ravenclaw common room, the spaces in between lit by warm golden lamps. Between the shelves, students either studied or chatted, and Luna waved from the floor where she was swinging her feet in the air and drawing her interpretation of a crumple-horned snorkack. James waved back with fondness before he continued on.

"James," said Moe, calling out from between a pair of ceiling-height bookshelves. "Where were you?"

"I was with Moody," said James, sitting down opposite him.

Moe looked at him. "I remember that time you tried to flirt with McGonagall, mate, but I think even you can do better than him."

James recoiled. "I'm offended. You know me better than that."

"If you say so. Vicky was looking for you."

"For what?"

"Dunno. Maybe 'prefect business'," said Moe.

"I told you…"

"I know, I know," Moe said. "You're not gay, are you?"

"What?"

"Look, that's a reasonable question," said Moe. "You have the Ice Queen of Ravenclaw wrapped around your finger and you're just not doing anything about it!"

James looked at him with a frown. "You're sounding like Roger Davies."

"And what does it say about you that I find myself agreeing with him?"

"No, you don't," said James, his lips twitching. "You'd never agree with him."

"Oh, yeah?"

"I remember in first year when we first learned the Color-Changing Charm you changed his robe colors every day for a month because you couldn't stand being in the same house as him," said James, and Moe cackled as he rocked back in his chair. "Oh, and that time you pretended to be him and handwrote letters to every pretty bird in the school asking them on a date to Madam Puddifoot's on the same date and time?"

Moe wheezed. "Nobody believed it was him, but nobody forgave him anyway."

"And then you got depressed after seeing just how many girls showed up."

Moe's face sobered instantly. "Yeah."

"Shame he's actually a decent human being with an exceptionally pretty face," James muttered.

"Despite my best efforts, he actually has a fair few friends. More than you or me, probably."

"That's not an impressive achievement," James pointed out. "I can count the number of close friends I have on my hands. For you, you could get seven of your fingers chopped off and it would still be enough."

"What," said Moe, holding up three fingers, "Lyra, Larissa, and you?"

"You're including your thumbs, mate. They don't count." James raised a single finger. "Lyra." He put it down. "That's about it, really."

Moe sighed. "I wish I were as popular as him."

"Just get on the Quidditch team. Hogwarts girls love their Quidditch boys."

"Quidditch is a fucking blood sport," Moe muttered. "Dad tried to get me into this one Persian sport… you know lacrosse, yeah? Now imagine the balls are sentient like in Quidditch and you're not playing on flat ground, but hundreds of flying carpets each with their own will."

"That sounds fucking amazing."

"You'd think so, but everyone's so violent. I saw some kid my age — I was thirteen back then — he got knocked off a carpet thirty feet high and broke his arm. Then some other kid got the ball hurled at his face and yeah, it's small, but it's like solid iron! He broke his front teeth. Not knocked them out, snapped them." Moe shuddered. "Bloody hell, man. I don't understand why anyone likes sports, Muggle or magical."

"It's weird," said James. "The Wizarding World has sports, but none of them actually involve effort. Can you imagine if you were playing basketball and Jordans actually made you jump higher?"

"Basketball?"

"Not important. But seriously, exercise. Half the school doesn't even walk to class; they take their bloody brooms."

"Lyra," Moe supplied.

"Definitely Lyra. And Davies. How is this school not filled with beached whales?"

Moe sighed again. "Lyra got lucky with her genes. Have you seen her mum?"

"Of course I've seen her mum. She lets me call her 'Auntie Narcissa', you know."

Moe groaned. "Why do you get all the best things in life? You don't deserve them."

"I don't deserve them? That's rich, coming from a trust fund baby."

"Piss off. Ice Queen, Auntie Narcissa, and every time Snape gives you detention you go running off to Mummy Vector and she rips into him in the staff room like a she-bear until he just gives in. You live a privileged fucking life, I hope you understand that."

Moe's tirade was interrupted by Victoria's arrival. She took a quick glance around, and spying James sitting in between one of the bookshelves with Moe, sat down next to him, an advanced copy of their 5th year Transfiguration material clutched in her arms.

"James," she said, her tense words tinged with a hint of relief. "There you are. I looked for you all over but I couldn't find you, and you weren't in the Mystery Room either. I need some help with Transfiguration work." She pursed her lips briefly. "If you can, please. If not… I suppose I could go to my sister for help."

She hid it well, but her distaste of that idea was plain to see. Across the table, Moe raised a single eyebrow very, very slowly; James ignored him and turned to Victoria.

"I don't see how I could help if McGonagall couldn't," he said, and Victoria stilled.

"I… I didn't ask her," she said. "I thought she might be busy."

"And you thought my time was less valuable."

She turned slightly pink. "I — if you're busy —"

"I'm kidding," said James quickly, as Moe raised his other eyebrow. "What did you need help with?"

"About Manton's Laws of Human Transfiguration…" Victoria trailed off as she opened the book, trailing her finger to where her bookmark was located. "Laws three and six. They seem contradictory, and I can't get my head around it."

"The Third Law," James read, "states that magic of the self resists incomplete transformations; the Sixth Law states that transfiguration of the body is partial by preference, to retain the identity of the self upon the changes."

"Exactly," Victoria murmured.

"Oh, it's easy. Manton's intentionally being vague and so is this textbook, is all." Victoria glared at him, so he hastened to explain. "The Third Law is trying to state if you turn your arm into a flipper, it needs to either become a complete flipper or remain a normal arm, and you can't have half-arm half-flipper abominations. The Sixth Law says that you don't need all your limbs to become flippers."

Victoria looked down at her textbook, and stared at the passages of text.

"I see," she said tiredly. "That was… simple. Thank you."

"No problem." James' lips twitched. "Are you studying for the O.W.L.s?"

"Of course," she said, almost offended at the implication that she might not be. "Aren't you?"

"Manton's Laws aren't on the O.W.L.s, just saying. That's a N.E.W.T. topic."

Victoria stared at him for a long moment, her blue eyes boring into his own. "And how do you know that?"

"Lyra took her O.W.L.s already."

"I beg your pardon?" Victoria exclaimed, at the same time Moe stirred and said, "What?"

"She took them at the end of last year," said James. "You didn't realize?"

"I — she —" Victoria took a deep breath. "How did she get permission to take them?"

"Advanced courseload, I guess? She wants to graduate early," said James.

"She attended all of our classes," said Moe.

"As much as can be expected from her," Victoria muttered under her breath.

"The professors have been giving us alternate work anyway. Besides, she skipped quite a few of them, as you said."

"She's been skipping quite a few of your classes every year," Victoria said flatly. "I don't know how you expected us to tell the difference."

"There's no need to be rude," said James, beaming at her in a way that he knew would infuriate her. "Been keeping tabs on Lyra's whereabouts, have you?"

"Shut up, James —"

At that moment, a ghostlike cat pounced into James' lap.

"James," the cat spoke with Lyra's voice, "meet me at the Room of Requirement. I need you to see this thing."

As the cat dissipated into shimmering mist that was blown away by an unseen wind, James stood up and stretched, grunting as he did so. "Well, I suppose I'll see you both later?"

Victoria grabbed his wrist. James looked at her, and her gaze wavered a little.

"So you know what's on the O.W.L.s, yes?" Victoria said. "So you can help me prepare for it."

"I mean, sure," James said. "But Lyra —"

"Can go hang herself," Victoria said, turning a furious red as she did so. "She's already finished with them. I need more help than she does, as much as I hate to admit it, so surely you'll stay with me. To correct this discrepancy."

James looked to her and then to Moe. "Er… I guess?"

"I just remembered I have something to do," Moe said, standing up, even as James was dragged back down into his chair. "Have fun!"

"You should be studying as well," Victoria said with mild disapproval, even as she cracked open her textbook once more. "I've doubts you'll graduate at this rate."

"Ouch," Moe called, even as he disappeared. "I'll see you later, Stark!"

"Yeah," James called back, still feeling a little disoriented. He turned to Victoria. "So…?"

"It's a good thing I found you today," Victoria said promptly, and pulled out a small notebook from inside her robes, and a ballpoint pen which she clicked with an air of professionalism. "You can tell me which subjects I'll have to revise and which ones I don't need to pay much attention to."

"Yeah. I should just let Lyra know —"

James slowly trailed away as Victoria met his gaze and rolled her eyes at him, slowly and deliberately. "Are you Malfoy's friend or House-Elf, James?"

James felt his cheeks warm slightly as he looked down at the textbook and flipped to the table of contents, angling it towards him to make it easier to read.

"Anyway," he said, still staring at the parchment, feeling Victoria's attentive gaze on him, "I think everything between chapter one and… thirteen will be on there. Maybe not fourteen…"

Victoria shuffled next to him, pressing against his side to better read the words. "Stop there for a moment," she murmured, and the silence was punctuated by the sound of her pen scratching against cheap paper, her elbow knocking against James' arm. "Okay. Continue."

"Right. Yeah, of course," James said, thankful that Lyra wasn't here or she'd say something stupid and cause another fight between her and Vicky while he watched helplessly wondering if he should just smother Lyra in her sleep already.

Or maybe he'd just let Vicky have her way with the dumb bint. Goodness knew Vicky deserved that opportunity.