Chapter 28, The Calm In The Storm
Albus arrived next, and things got a bit chaotic. Apparently he'd been helping elsewhere by ending a dragon that Delphini was using for something. The fact that one could make such a casual comment about Delphini and a dragon clearly illustrated the insane amount of power the girl had due to whatever Voldemort did to create her. Albus had handled the demise of this dragon with the assistance of elf and Acromantula Aurors. Now that it was all over, he just wanted to hug his son, and Hydra understood that.
It made her wish her parents were here to hug her. "Everyone to Auror Headquarters," Gellert ordered suddenly. "There is work to be done that cannot be done in Muggle territory and the longer we are standing around here, the more unwanted attention we shall draw. Rodolphus, bring Arthur along. Everyone link hands. I have a Portkey."
Everyone made a hasty chain of linked hands, and soon they were in the British Ministry of Magic standing in the middle of Auror Headquarters. "I'll put on the coffee," A young, pretty Auror with short spiky blond hair and a lilting Spanish accent called. That must be Romeo's wife, Hydra realized. T. Valdez was her name. Hydra had heard Guillermo speak of her often. He liked his sister-in-law very much, and now Hydra could see why. Coffee sounded amazing! "Can I help," she called, hurrying over.
It felt as if everyone was talking at once, and she found herself swaying slightly on her feet. It had been a long day, with very little sleep, no energy draft and now that Delphine was dead, it was all catching up to her. She knew if she didn't start moving and keep moving, she was quite likely to fall asleep on her feet. This would be embarrassing,and she could not have that. "Thanks," T. Valdez replied cheerfully. "There are four pots, so I'll get the two on this side of the room going,and you see to those on the other side. Every Auror was out there, so they'll all need some coffee!"
Hydra busied herself with the making then the drinking of said coffee. It helped, but not enough. As long as she kept moving, the coffee could fuel her, but if she sat or stood still for too long, she knew the lack of sleep would quickly catch up to her. Shaking herself, she glanced around for something to do. Kereston, Gellert and Romeo were talking to Arthur, and it appeared that he'd advised them to go with terrorism for what had just happened.
Kereston Apparated away to go and deal with the various magical and Muggle governments who would need to be made aware. Kereston's departure paved the way for Hydra's own next course of action. Her friends at Hogwarts would be worried, and they would be wanting updates. She'd attend to that and then return. "Going to tell Sortia and the rest what's happened," she called to her twin. He gave her a thumbs up, and she Apparated away.
Once on Hogwarts grounds, she sprinted toward the castle, arms pumping as her hair blew in the fresh spring breeze. Stretching her arms and legs felt good, and the rapid movement served to wake her up, at least for the time being. Not until entering the castle, and having to pause and wonder where she should look for everyone, did it occur to Hydra that she had no idea what time it was. From the look of the sky, it appeared to be early morning, perhaps just after breakfast.
Unfortunately, this meant that everyone would be in class. Would she lose points for not being in class? Well hell, she hoped not, because Albus wasn't in class either. Not that he had a class, being Headmaster, but still. She wasn't about to sit down in Transfigurations class while so much was still happening in Muggle Washington! No bloody way was that about to happen.
As her friends were all in class, she decided to report the news to her head of house instead. Filius would be after news as much as anyone, and he'd certainly fill James, Sortia and Guillermo in on things personally if she asked him to. Hydra tapped on the door before she entered the charms class. Flitwick was demonstrating a charm for keeping one's quill pen eternally sharp to a class of second years, but he stopped when he saw her enter. She approached and pitched her voice to a near whisper so as not to be overheard by the class. "I have news." She had no idea how much the Ministry would want people knowing. Of course the fact that Delphini was dead would be publicized and celebrated, but all the ins and outs of it including Bella running down a bunch of Muggles who Delphini apparently had working for her,may be something that should not be spread to the general public. Hydra didn't care about Muggles overly much in most cases, and these were on the wrong side. Muggle or not, she had no qualms about the enemy being taken down. Other softer souls may disagree, preferring to see magical and Muggle criminals alike taking up space and tax galleons in prison. She found this ridiculous. Flitwick's eyes widened and he nodded once, before turning to the class.
"Write me a page long essay on the various ways this charm can be applied. You shall be graded on the amount of uses you can find for it."
"But professor!" A red haired girl in Hufflepuff robes waved her hand desperately. "How many uses can one have for a quill pen! You write with it. That's all."
"Untrue," a small blond Gryffindor boy called out. "You could tickle someone with the feather!"
"Yes, but it doesn't need to be sharp for that," the Hufflepuff girl replied condescendingly.
"Hey but you could jab someone in the eye with it," a dark haired Slytherin girl said.
"Or in the throat," a Ravenclaw boy with frizzy red curls seated at her side called excitedly.
Hydra kept from laughing with difficulty as the impromptu discussion unfolded. Flitwick's lips twitched a few times, and when the final boy spoke, he shook his head, at last giving a small chuckle.
"While you are all thinking, which is good, you aren't thinking in the proper direction. I did not intend you to focus only on quills. I intended you to focus on what the charm does."
"Oh, like using it to sharpen other things," the dark haired Slytherin girl said.
He nodded. "Precisely. Though now that we've uncovered it, half the point has been given away," Flitwick complained.
"He said point, get it... Cause we're talking about sharpening?" The Ravenclaw boy with the frizzy hair snickered, jabbing the Slytherin at his side in the ribs with an elbow.
"Write your essays," Filius said. He gave the class an amused smile before turning toward the door, gesturing for Hydra to follow him out into the hall. As soon as the door to the charms class closed behind them, Flitwick spun his wand, causing the air to shimmer in blue around them for an instant. Hydra recognized the charm as a shield of silence with built in guards against the use of magical eaves dropping spells. "Well," he said, regarding Hydra expectantly.
"Everyone is fine and she's dead," Hydra said in a rush. Though she planned to give him all the details, she wanted to get the important bit that may have him most worried out of the way at once. He should at least be spared from worrying.
"Everyone is fine," Filius asked incredulously. "Grindelwald's shields are very good, but Delphini had a disconcerting way of unraveling magic. It was unlike anything I have ever seen!"
"Yes, well I don't really know for sure if every single Auror survived, but everyone that we know personally is fine. I didn't see any dead bodies. Gellert did take her skills into account,and had elves and goblins helping too, remember."
Filius nodded. "Yes, yes. It's just... so hard to believe it's all over at last." He blinked, then shook his head as if to clear it, wiping at his eyes. "Finally... Finally!"
She nodded and reached impulsively to give her head of house a hug. Flitwick hugged back hard, then stepped away. "Now I am beyond eager to hear every single detail! What happened?" Hydra told him everything. When she got to the bit where Bellatrix drove the Muggle car he nearly choked. His eyes grew round in fascination when she explained that many believed the Muggle who had given over said car was some representation of Arthur. "Fascinating," he breathed. "I shall be eager to meet him so that I can form my own opinion." When Hydra described how Wulfric had gotten Delphini from behind with a sword in the back, Flitwick let out a gleeful cheer, clapping his hands together ecstatically. "At last it is over!"
Hydra nodded grimly. Though he'd already expressed the sentiment earlier, she understood just how difficult it was to believe after this entire surreal, horrifying situation. "It is finally over. She is dead along with Whatever Voldemort made her for. Whatever it was, it shall never come to pass. We won. We finally won." Filius gave her a quick hug, thanking her for coming to share the news. "I must return to my class now, or they shall be running amuck if I am gone much longer, and all the houses shall lose points."
"Do tell Severus and my friends what happened, won't you?"
"Of course," Filius promised. "I'm sure Albus has at least written Severus that all is well by now, but I shall give him along with Sortia, Guillermo and James all the details that you have shared with me. I shall take them all aside at lunch."
"Thank you," Hydra said. Though she'd walked into the castle so as not to disrupt anything by simply Apparating in without even knowing what time it was, she Apparated out and back into Auror Headquarters. Everyone was still sorting what had to be done next, and it was a bit of general organized chaos. She found Albus and told him that she'd reported to Flitwick, who would report to everyone else. He was with Arthur and the Lestranges.
Her cousin Lyra was awake and as such, no longer being carried by her pretty boy boyfriend with the curly hair. She looked in such a dark mood that Hydra nearly decided not to introduce herself just yet, but after speaking to Albus, she couldn't resist touching Lyra's arm and giving her a slight smile. "Hi. I'm your cousin Hydra. Second cousin or something, I think, it all gets rather confusing.""
Lyra's dark look gave way to a warm smile, which changed the look of her jaw dramatically from belligerent to beautiful. "Hi! I met your brother while you were away." Her accent was as heavy on the Australian as her boyfriend's, which was expected considering she'd grown up there. Hearing a Lestrange sounding all Australian was a bit disconcerting for some reason. "I can't believe my bloody bio-parents kept me knocked out through all the interesting bits!" Lyra complained.
"Bio-parents?" Hydra couldn't help asking.
"Yeah, well the people who raised me are technically distant cousins, but they feel like my parents. I hardly know Rodolphus and Bellatrix, yet they demand that I call them Mum and Dad... So I call them Bio-Mum and Bio-Dad, you know, because they are my biological parents."
"She calls them that except when she forgets to," the pretty boy said, flashing an amused grin at Lyra. "After a few family heart to hearts, she's slipped more than once and just called them Mum and Dad."
"This is my boyfriend Cassius," Lyra said. "He's a total kiss-ass fan boy to my parents for some weird reason." She sighed, and gave her head of long dark hair a disgusted shake.
Hydra smiled politely, not really knowing what to say to that. "It's grand to have more young people in the family," she said.
"I know! I can't wait to get to know you and your brother as well," Lyra replied warmly. "With Delphini finally put out of our misery, we should finally have the opportunity for some much needed family bonding! Cassius and I were helping with fighting Delphini and her lot too, you know, so now we shall happily be at loose ends for a bit at least."
"I heard about what you do with the Auras or something," Hydra said. "But what does Cassius do?"
"I unlock things,"Cassius said cheerfully. "With magic!"
Hydra blinked, finding herself in a rare state of perplexed confusion. "What, like locks on doors or something?"
Cassius chuckled, shaking his head. "No, like spells, charms, hexes and the like."
Hydra felt her eyes widen! She'd never heard of anything like that before. "Fascinating," she breathed.
"Perhaps, but I hear you and your twin have some interesting tricks yourselves, being half elf and all,"Lyra said. Hydra blinked, running a hand across her face. She could feel her mixed features, Daddy Kreacher's nose, Daddy Regulus's cheeks, lips and chin. Her elf ears were bespelled to appear to the eye as human shaped ears. Even to Hydra's own eyes in the mirror, though if she touched them, they were as pointed and near bat like as any elf's ears ever were. Lyra surely saw the same small but perfectly human features that anyone else saw when looking at Hydra or Loughness, yet she still recalled that they were half elf. Even better, she recalled it with no judgement or distaste. "It is pretty sweet," she agreed with a grin.
"Your parents are... most unusual," Lyra said carefully. "It must have been interesting growing up with them." Cassius's lips twitched...
Hydra chuckled. "It definitely was that." The three talked for some time. The conversation flowed effortlessly from topic to topic. When Loughness and Rodolphus found them seated at a corner table in the back of Auror Headquarters with their third cups of coffee, several hours had passed. "We're heading home to Raven's Nest," Rodolphus informed. Raven's Nest was the name he and Bella had given to their manor. "Your parents are joining us there. Loughness went to Grimmauld at sunset to report to them so they would not worry. Now we're meeting at ours to continue sorting things in comfort."
"May I come along," Hydra asked. She wished to know what was happening next, and she wanted to see her parents.
"Of course," Rodolphus said. "We shall see you and Loughness at the Nest. Arthur is coming along with us." Hydra nodded, then Apparated to the stately front door of Raven's Nest manor. Though it was not far from downtown London, it still counted for the suburbs, set on a side street where the stately houses were a goodly distance apart from one another. There was a cloaking spell so that no one who may be watching from the street could notice people Apparating onto the porch as Hydra had just done.
When she rang the bell, the Lestrange house elf, Harold, opened it to her. He wore a long black tunic with ravens on, and sported a plague doctor mask because it strongly resembled the Lestrange family raven skull emblem. It served to hide the elf's face so one never knew what expression he had, but Hydra had gotten used to it so it was no longer disconcerting. The Lestranges had killed Harold's original master on one of their inside jobs for the Ministry a few years back. He'd asked to come and work for them as a result. Apparently he'd no love for his master who never treated him particularly well, but he did rather fancy the Lestranges even down to willingly wearing Bellatrix's weird idea of a suitable house elf uniform, plague doctor mask and all.
"Do come in," Harold said, holding the ornate oak front door open for Hydra. "Miss Hydra's parents are already in the library."
Hydra smiled and thanked Harold before heading in that direction. She heard Daddy Regulus speaking to Bella as she approached. Not wishing to interrupt, she stood quietly in the doorway, watching while everyone had their richly earned moment.
"And Bella, you crazy bitch!" Regulus reached across the reading table in the center of the library around which they were all gathered and dragged Bellatrix in for a tight hug. "You know absolutely nothing about Muggle cars! You could've gotten yourself killed, which would've been very inconsiderate to the rest of us. Loughness told me everything."
"Hey, I gave her all the basics in like...two seconds," Arthur interjected with a laugh. "She did great for what she was using it for. She didn't hit a single pole."
"That's Arthur, Dad," Loughness said excitedly.
"Hi there!" Arthur smiled at Regulus and Kreacher. "You are the first real vampires I have ever met. I was just beginning to adjust to the fact that elves, goblins, magic, and such are all real things, then Rabastan informs me that his weird cousins are vampires!"
"Rabastan Lestrange calling us weird is rather amazing," Regulus said with a chuckle. "It is an honor to meet you, Arthur." He bowed from the waist in an easy elegant gesture that said clearer than words that he also considered Arthur to be rather important as in The reborn Arthur!
"See, Dad? I told you it was probably really him," Loughness said. Regulus nodded, reaching to give Loughness a hug. "Indeed you did, son. And I can't say enough how proud I am of the part you played in all of this!"
Loughness looked as if he wanted to be uncomfortable with the hug but relaxed into Regulus's chest instead before hugging back hard. Apparently parental approval meant a lot no matter how cavalier he acted about it most of the time.
When Regulus at last released Loughness, Kreacher took his turn embracing his son. "Without Loughness's magic, Delphini may not have been fully destroyed for all we know. Kreacher finds it fitting that he and Master Regulus created that which took any final trace of Voldemort out for good, after what he did to us."
"As do I," Loughness said gravely. "I'd always take care of the fam, but now I've made my first step on the path to greatness!"
Bellatrix gave a snicker that she tried to pretend was a cough and Loughness grinned over at her.
"There's Hydra," Lyra called, and Hydra stepped into the room. "I was wondering where you'd got to. Come sit beside me. I saved you a seat."
Hydra smiled and headed over to her cousin, but daddy Regulus accosted her before she could get half way across the room. Hugging her, he swept her off her feet and spun her around. "Thank you for keeping yourself safe and helping out with Arthur, precious girl."
"I should've done more," Hydra muttered, feeling her cheeks flush. "I felt rather useless."
"Not at all," Regulus said firmly. "You were back up and we all have our strength. Playing within them and not forcing ourselves to be other than we should be is where our strengths are. You are a stabilizing force that we all need."
Hydra nodded, forcing herself to accept the compliment along with her father's words of wisdom as she embraced him in return.
