Severus looked up from his work as Rachel apparated into the sitting room and then took a moment to put each piece of parchment into the appropriate folio. It had been a long time since he'd had the opportunity to indulge in research like this and he was exploring a number of different possibilities. He sometimes found himself up late into the night, an abandoned cup of cold tea on the table next to him while he theorized and wrote down ideas. It was remarkably freeing.
"How are you?" he asked as Rachel made her way to the sofa.
"Not too bad, all things considered. How about you?" she asked.
Severus looked her over. While she still had dark circles beneath her glasses from a lack of sleep, he wasn't surprised by that. Otherwise, he thought she looked fairly healthy. "I am well. Brewing for the apothecaries usually only takes about twenty hours out of my week, so I'm spending the rest of the time in research."
Rachel smiled. "That sounds nice. I have a bunch of projects that I'm working on, but I never get to spend as much time on them as I'd like. The Azkaban project takes most of my time. Going through three centuries of records is a bit time consuming."
"I imagine it would be," he said, noting that she seemed excited by the research rather than daunted. That was a good trait for a potions brewer who wished to invent.
"Can I ask you a question?"
"Of course." As usual, he had no idea what to expect when Rachel asked that, but his mind started to worry anyway.
"What do you know about Anyssa Selwyn?"
Severus nodded once. "I did hear that she took the Selywn seat, which was a bit unexpected, if I'm reading the situation right."
"That's what everyone says. They were expecting her brother Aaron to take the seat. Anyssa has been friendly with me so far, but Draco says she's…well, the word he uses is vile, but he might also be biased. Apparently she bullied him when they were younger," she said with a shrug.
Interesting. "Well, I think better Anyssa to take the seat than Aaron, at any rate. Anyssa has a more level head on her shoulders. When I had her as a student, she was intelligent, but she did not push herself. She was satisfied with whatever scores she could get without putting in extra effort. I never had any trouble with her, nor did I notice her associating with the children of other Death Eater families. However, given the situation, I think it's best that you remain on your guard around her."
Rachel rested her chin on her hand. "I wasn't planning on letting down my guard. I'm just not sure it makes sense not to talk with her either, especially if she talks to me first."
"You should likely still treat her with a baseline of respect, as you would any Wizengamot member, but expect her to attempt to manipulate and use you," he said.
"I expect that from pretty much any Wizengamot member, honestly. Everyone is being nice to me so far, but I am starting to see who will talk to who under what circumstances and I think people are preparing proposals in secret, just like I am."
"Good. Being aware is the first step of having a defense. I know you know to be cautious about handing out promises of votes, especially before you hear a full proposal and see how the rest of the Wizengamot is reacting to it."
"I know." She paused for a moment, her mouth twisting. "I think it's ridiculous that our government is run this way. None of it is about the issues we're actually voting on, it's about who is friends with who and who wants favors or support. Honestly, I'd expect that more from students than from grown adults."
Severus shrugged slightly. "Wizengamot politics is just a more advanced form of relationships and manipulations from what you saw at Hogwarts. And, to be honest, I'm not sure the muggle government is any better, from what I've seen and heard. Politics may just be one of those universal things."
"My uncle used to complain about the government when he read the newspaper. He didn't seem to approve of it at all," she said, her gaze distant.
"I think reading the newspaper and complaining about the government is another thing that transcends the magical and muggle divide. I'm not certain I know of anyone who does approve of their government, at least not most of the time."
"Can I ask you another question?"
"Yes, of course."
She was quiet for a long moment while Severus watched her.
"What do you know about the spells used to create magical portraits?" she finally asked.
"Almost nothing. Why?"
She shrugged. "They were very unpleasant but I'm starting to think I'm the only one who feels them that way as no one else seems to be concerned about it."
Severus frowned. "These spells hurt you? It was like how you feel magic from other spells?"
"I think the cause is the same, that I can feel the magic. But it was much more sustained and invasive. It didn't hurt. It just…I really didn't like it. I don't want to do it again."
For Rachel to refuse to do something outright must have meant the experience had been more difficult than she was saying. "Then decline to do any further magical portraits. It is your choice, no one can force you to do so. If they attempt to do so, refuse firmly and then leave."
"Okay. I can tell them that about updating my portrait in the future? I think they're going to want me to do it," she asked, looking at him now.
"Yes. They cannot force you to do it. Tell them that you don't want to, you don't have to explain why. If they try to force the issue, defend yourself appropriately." He wanted Rachel to be able to stand up for herself. If she could get anything from her time with the aurors, he wanted it to be that Rachel felt confident in defending herself in a variety of situations.
She nodded. "What's for dinner?"
"I have a shepherd's pie on the stove and some fresh bread," he said. He always tried to have an enticing meal for when Rachel came home.
"Sounds good. Are you ready to eat?"
"I am," he said, quietly pleased that she was asking to eat. Rachel had grown and recovered a lot in the past year, but he wanted her to continue make those strides.
Rachel dropped to one knee as the green light of the Killing Curse flashed in her direction. She tried the Stunning spell again, but the Death Eater shielded and then dodged the spell from Tonks.
"Damn it, who is that?" Tonks muttered.
"I don't know," Rachel said, casting combat disruption spells in quick succession to try to bring down the Death Eater's shield. She understood Tonks' concern. Most of the Death Eaters they fought went down far more easily than this, which meant this was someone with experience.
They had gotten separated from the team some time ago. Rachel wasn't even sure how long it had been or what had happened to the rest of the Death Eaters or the rest of her team.
Rachel ducked another Killing Curse and Tonks used her free hand to pull her back.
"Come on, let's get some cover, I'd rather he have more trouble trying to hit us than this," Tonks said.
Shielding as she got to her feet, she saw the Death Eater advancing. She dropped her shield and started casting again, trying to force the Death Eater back. She and Tonks dove in opposite directions to avoid yet another Killing Curse.
Rachel rolled back to her feet, grimacing at the fact that she was now damp and grimy, and tumbled directly into some sort of hedge. She did not want to test whether or not a hedge was solid enough to block the Killing Curse. Frustrated, she began casting the Tripping jinx at his feet, trying to get around his shield.
One of them hit and the Death Eater stumbled for long enough for Tonks to hit him with the Stunning spell. Rachel reflexively followed up with the Incarcerous spell.
"Nice one," Tonks called.
Rachel untangled her robes from the hedge and righted herself. "Took long enough."
"Let's see who we got," Tonks said, taking a look around before coming up to the fallen Death Eater.
Rachel kept her wand trained on him as Tonks pulled down his hood and yanked off his mask.
"Well, well. Look who it is," Tonks said, sounding pleased.
"Thomas Rowle. I went to school with him," Rachel said. She didn't think she'd even spoken to him while she was at Hogwarts, but she'd been aware of him because she'd been warned that his father was a Death Eater.
"Maybe he'll be able to tell us where his father is, that would be a very good catch. I'm going to push to interrogate him tonight. Hopefully he can give us a location and we can organize a raid before anyone realizes we have him," Tonks said, sounding eager.
"Where do you think everyone else went?" Rachel asked as she looked around. She couldn't hear the sounds of anyone fighting, so either they'd gone much further than she'd realized or the battle was over.
"Let's go find out. You bring him, but be prepared to drop him if we encounter more Death Eaters," Tonks said, turning back towards the village.
Rachel nudged Thomas in the leg with her foot and then retrieved his wand from where it had fallen from his hand when he'd been stunned. With that pocketed she felt safe enough to move him. She used the Hover charm and wondered if she could learn a charm with her left hand and then still be able to cast with her wand in her right hand. At the very least, she thought it was worth experimenting with, even though Severus had told her that no one used two wands.
They had already cast the Muffling charm on themselves, so they were creeping silently through the dark back to where the attack had taken place. They had arrived just as the Death Eaters had broken through the wards.
Back closer to the house they found the rest of the team and a small pile of Death Eaters.
"How many got away?" Tonks asked.
"Four," Johansen said. "Jonas is injured, but is still capable of fighting, we were waiting for you before we called to disburse."
"Let's bring everyone back to the MLE with us," Tonks said. "Look who we got."
Johansen came closer and nodded once. "Rowle. If we act quickly, maybe we can get his father. You and Rachel go ahead with him, bring in Shacklebolt. He'll decide if we're calling Robards and the reserve team."
Rachel quickly looked over the rest of the gathered team. Jonas was holding his hand against his arm and someone had conjured him a bandage. Everyone else looked alright.
"Alright, grab him and let's apparate back to the back entrance, I'll let you bring in the rest," Tonks said.
Rachel put Rowle back down on the ground, having learned the hard way that if she apparated someone while using the Hover charm, the person would fall to the ground on the other side. The only thing she could say in her defense was at least the Death Eater had been unconscious when she'd done it and she'd made Johansen nearly fall over laughing.
She grabbed onto Rowle's shoulder and apparated both of them to the floo point that the MLE euphemistically referred to as the back entrance. It was a small Ministry outbuilding that the MLE used for allowing its members to come and go more easily and for allowing them to more discreetly transport prisoners.
"I'll take him," Tonks said, bending down to grab Rowle around the waist.
Rachel appreciated that. She had learned quickly that she was not big enough or strong enough to go through the floo carrying an unconscious person. She flooed into the aurors entrance of the MLE just behind Tonks and found Auror Walsh on duty.
"Tell the healer we have a minor injury that needs to be taken care of. Johansen is bringing the rest of the team in along with three more Death Eaters," Tonks told Walsh. "I'm taking Rowle to an interrogation room, Rachel, tell Shacklebolt to meet me in room two."
"On it," Rachel said. She hurried ahead and found Kingsley's office door open. She knocked and he looked up.
"Problem?" he asked, standing and drawing his wand.
"Tonks has Thomas Rowle in interrogation room two, she'd like for you to join her. She's hoping to find out where his father is before the ones who escaped report that we have Thomas."
"Got it," Kingsley said, hurrying past her.
Rachel exhaled and took a better look at her robes and clothes. She was filthy and she was still damp. She cast a few drying charms to get rid of the damp problem, but she was going to have to give her clothes to the House Elves to take care of the rest. A few spots could be taken care of with a laundry charm, but given that it looked like she'd rolled in mud and road dirt, it was better just to wash everything.
She turned at the sound of voices and found the rest of the team coming in. Johansen in the lead. "Shacklebolt is with Tonks and Rowle?" he asked.
"All of them are in interrogation room two," Rachel reported.
"Alright, let's get these three to the cells. Jonas, go see the healer. Taylor and Collins are with me," Johansen said, moving through the room with the prisoners.
Rachel had only been down to the cells once and she did not particularly want to go there again. She'd found them disturbing for reasons she couldn't quite put a name to.
She went over to the board with the Death Eater names and found Thomas Rowle's name and put a line through it. That was one fewer capable Death Eater on the loose.
"That one was a little rougher," Ron said, as he and the rest of the team came closer.
"They had a few people who knew what they were doing," Miles said. "How long were you fighting Rowle?"
"A long time. I think he was drawing us away from the group purposefully," Rachel said.
"Do you think he recognized you?" Draco asked, looking worried. "It's not exactly a secret that you're on the auror team."
"Hard to tell. It didn't feel like he was particularly targeting us, we were just the ones who were closer to him," Rachel said.
"It's abnormal behavior though," Miles said.
"How so?" Ralph asked.
"Rowle's smart enough that he should have apparated away instead of being caught. Something kept him fighting, and he should have stayed with the group. Something was going on there," Miles said.
"Whatever it was, at least it wasn't like at Hogwarts," Ron said.
Draco nodded in agreement.
"What was it like at Hogwarts?" Ralph asked. "You meant the battle at Hogwarts?"
"It was bad," Draco said shortly.
Miles nodded, looking grim. "We all watched a lot of people die that day. It won't be that bad again. The Death Eaters don't have the numbers for that sort of battle again. With the four we nabbed tonight, that means we've caught sixteen in the last three months. Rowle is the first big name, though we know there are others we want who are orchestrating the attacks. They're out there somewhere."
Kingsley came out of the interrogation room and shook his head at them. "We're on stand down for the night. Wherever Rowle Senior is staying is under the Fidelius charm."
Rachel supposed they should have suspected that. "Do you know if Thomas recognized me? During the fight?"
"Not that I know of. Why?"
"His behavior was strange. He lured Rachel and Tonks away and then they had an extended fight instead of him apparating away," Miles reported.
Kingsley's frown deepened. "I'll make sure we ask the next time he's interrogated. We need to know if their intent is to start targeting you. You're dismissed."
Rachel sighed and they began the walk back to the floo.
"What sort of fight were you in? A mud fight?" Draco asked.
"I dove out of the way of the Killing Curse and wound up in a hedge."
"That explains the leaves in your hair," Ron said.
Rachel grimaced and began trying to use her fingers to comb out her hair.
"Leave it until you're in front of a mirror, you're making it worse," Draco said.
"Ugh. I need to shower. And then we have to be here at eight. I might just stay up tonight," Rachel said. Getting in an extended battle had left her a little restless.
"Don't see why you can't. We won't be on call tomorrow and you don't have the Wizengamot until Saturday," Miles pointed out. "I don't usually go back to sleep after we go out."
"Aren't you still picking up shifts with the MLE patrol?" Ralph asked.
"I am, but we're all used to working on low sleep over there. Even with our recruiting efforts we are badly understaffed. I barely got Cole to agree to my transfer to the aurors and the only reason they did it was because the aurors are even more understaffed than the patrol is."
Rachel wasn't sure how to fix that problem. The qualifications to join the MLE patrol were far lower than joining the aurors, but they still needed basic skills in defense to join. "Maybe the MLE Patrol needs a team like this, where people who aren't usually qualified can join with training?" Rachel suggested.
Miles shook his head. "We already dropped the qualifications. It's not a matter of people not having the skills. People saw the MLE Patrol get slaughtered and no one wants to join if they think it's a death sentence."
"Even though the war is over?" Ralph asked as they reached the floo.
"In the minds of the people, it won't be over until the Death Eater attacks stop. Then maybe we'll be able to recruit. Goodnight everyone," Miles said.
"Goodnight," they chorused.
"Any luck with Rowle?" Walsh asked.
"Fidelius charm," Ron said.
"Damn it," Walsh said, shaking his head. "I'd like to know where the Death Eaters are learning that. It's not a common spell. It's not an easy spell."
"Rookwood?" Rachel suggested.
"I'd like to know who they trust enough to keep that secret. Death Eaters aren't the most trusting people," Draco pointed out.
"Everyone has got to trust someone," Ron said. "Goodnight."
"Goodnight," Rachel said. Draco did have a point. If the Death Eaters were trusting each other enough to use the Fidelius charm, that was new. And concerning.
They flooed home and Rachel took off her shoes in the hallway so she wouldn't track mud everywhere. "I'm going to shower. Goodnight."
"Goodnight," Draco said quietly.
They climbed the stairs and Rachel took off her dirty clothing in the bathroom and dropped them into the hamper. She realized she was shaking, and she didn't think it was from being cold and damp. That had probably been the most dangerous fight she'd been in since the battle at Hogwarts. She had lost count of how many times the Killing Curse had been cast in her direction, but she was also kind of used to it. Or at least she thought she was used to it.
She exhaled. She was alright. She would shower and put on clean clothes and then distract herself for a little bit. Everything was fine.
"How are you today, Rachel?" Minister Scrimgeour asked once Rachel was seated inside his office.
Rachel was still wary of being summoned by the Minister, but she was willing to play along for the time being. "I'm doing well. How are you?"
"Well enough to be getting on with," the Minister said. "I hear you and Auror Tonks got into quite the battle the other day."
She couldn't help but be curious what sort of information the Minister was gathering about her. Surely he had better things to do than keep track of the minutiae of what the auror teams were doing. "Thomas Rowle said he recognized me. He was trying to lure us away from the main fight in order to kill us." It was a little disconcerting. Tonks had told her yesterday after they'd interrogated Rowle again. But Rachel supposed that was part of the job and that they wouldn't have caught Rowle if he hadn't been willing to stay and fight.
The Minister nodded. "Are you certain you want to continue on with the aurors? No one would think less of you for stepping down."
"I'm fine with being on the auror team, at least for the time being. So far we haven't encountered anything outside of our ability to handle."
"May I speak frankly?"
"Yes, of course," Rachel said, wondering if he hadn't been speaking frankly until now.
"You are more important than you perhaps realize. You are a symbol of hope to our nation. A symbol of triumphing over impossible odds, which is exactly what we need right now as we find our feet again. For you to be killed by the Death Eaters now would be a severe blow to the morale of the nation and the Ministry, not to mention what it would do to your family and the people who love you," the Minister said, his gaze focused on Rachel. "Amelia and I believe that the Death Eaters will continue to target you and will perhaps stage more attacks trying to lure you out. Thus far the attacks have been focused on muggleborns and people who opposed the Death Eaters during the war, but we may see them gathering more skilled Death Eaters specifically for the purpose of killing you."
Rachel considered that for a moment. She didn't want to put more people in danger, nor did she want to die. "I think it makes sense to watch and see what happens next. We have the opportunity to capture some of those Death Eaters who might otherwise not join the battles. If we start encountering situations where the auror team is overwhelmed because I'm there, then at that point it might make sense for me to resign my position."
The Minister nodded. "You're correct that we have to think of the safety of the entire team when considering this. For the time being, we can see if the Death Eaters are escalating. I suspect they will learn from Rowle's capture."
"I'm not sure why Rowle stayed. He kept trying to kill us, but he had the opportunity to apparate away when Tonks and I both dodged a Killing Curse, but he didn't take it. He should have."
"People are not always logical. They can get caught up in the moment and make poor choices. One of the things we try to do with auror training is to drill our people so that they make consistent choices that are predictable to their teammates."
After all the training they did last year Rachel could certainly understand the value of that.
"Anyway, please continue making an assessment of the situation and speak with Amelia or Auror Shacklebolt about any concerns you may have. I know they are keeping an eye on things as well. And now, the real reason I asked you here. This is your invitation to the Wizengamot Christmas Ball. We're holding it at Amelia's this year and I wanted to assure you that security is well in hand despite it being a fairly large event," the Minister said, handing her an envelope.
"Thank you," Rachel said, accepting the envelope and thinking that most of these invitations were probably not hand delivered.
"Can we expect Mr. Nott to join us again?"
"I'm not sure," Rachel said.
"Just let your clerk know who you are bringing and he will inform us. We are ensuring everyone who arrives is listed as invited as we want to ensure that we are in control of who is there. It will make a tempting target for the Death Eaters, but Amelia, Gawain, and I all believe that they do not have the numbers to risk an attack," he said.
"I assume a fair number of the MLE will be in attendance?" she checked.
"We will have MLE patrol guards on every entrance and aurors spread throughout the event," he assured her.
Rachel nodded. Given how many Death Eaters they suspected remained free, it might be a tempting target, but they would easily be outnumbered by people there who were willing and able to fight. "Thank you," she said again.
"Of course. Is there anything I can help you with?"
"Not at this time. I have a proposal that I'm working on that I will tell you about, but I want to finish the preliminary stages first," she explained. She wanted a full set of data and a tentative plan before she showed her work to anyone else.
"Amelia said you had something in progress about Azkaban. I'll tell you upfront that you will need to be very convincing. This will not be a popular proposal," he warned her, his lips moving into a brief frown.
"What's popular is not always what's right," Rachel said. "And I intend to be convincing."
"Good. Just have my clerk make an appointment with me when you're ready to show me what you've got," he said.
"I will," Rachel said. She suspected that if she could convince Minister Scrimgeour that Azkaban was wrong, she could convince almost anyone. "Was there anything else?"
"That's all for today. I will see you on Saturday for the Wizengamot meeting," he said.
"I'll see you then," Rachel said. She let herself out of his office, went down the hall and down the stairs, back into the Wizengamot chambers and to her office.
Inside she sat down and opened the invitation. The Christmas Ball was on Christmas Eve and it was written that the invitation was for her plus one.
The people at the Minister's dinner may have not said anything about her attending with Theo, but with this many people at the ball, she was sure it would make the newspaper this time. Could she really do that to Theo?
"Why the long face, my dear?" Monty asked. "Bad news?"
"Just the invitation to the Wizengamot Christmas Ball," she said, setting it aside and looking at Monty. "I suppose that wasn't a problem for you, you could take your wife."
Monty smiled. "Effie and I attended many of those balls, yes. I took the Snow family seat when I was thirty three and my father had passed. He died young. There was an accident. My mother did not want the seat, so I took it. I was an only child as well. By then Effie and I had been married for five years, so we always attended Wizengamot events together. Now, did you take a young man with you to a dinner with the Minister? Did that not work out?"
"I took Theo with me. And it was fine. But this is a big event. If I take Theo with me here, people will think we're dating," she explained.
"That will be true of whomever you take," Monty pointed out.
"Yeah, but I don't want to hurt Theo. He…he said that he likes me. I don't know if that's still true or not, but he said so two years ago."
Monty stroked his chin as he watched Rachel. "I think, perhaps, the simplest solution would be to ask him if it would hurt him. Do you trust him to be honest with you?"
"I do. I don't think Theo has ever lied to me. But I'm worried that even asking him will hurt him," she explained.
"I do not think it would be a great hurt. Shouldn't he be given the choice of what to do? Unless there is someone else you would like to take to the ball?"
Rachel found that there really was no one else she would want to take to the ball. She trusted and cared about all of her friends, but she wanted Theo to be there. What did that mean? "No, there's no one else. I mean, one of my other friends would probably come with me if I asked them, but I want it to be Theo."
"Have you considered the idea that you like Theo?" Monty asked. "I know affairs of the heart aren't easy. It took me a good six months to work up the courage to ask Effie out. And I know James dithered over Lily for years."
"How do you know when you like someone?"
"I think that's a difficult question, because it's different for everyone. For me, when I spent time with Effie, I felt at ease. I felt like I could talk to her about almost anything. I wanted to spend time with her and I kept finding myself making excuses to see her. I felt like she understood me like no one else did," Monty explained.
She sat and considered that. She did feel some of those things about Theo, but she also felt some of them about all of her friends. She cared about them, and while she felt differently about her relationship with Severus than she did with her friends, it included some of the same elements. She thought if anything was different about the way she felt about Theo, it was that she felt he understood her more. She felt like she had shared something with him that she hadn't shared with the rest of her friends.
"I don't know," she finally said.
"That's a perfectly acceptable answer. Give yourself time. If you want my advice, which is why I'm here to begin with, warn Theo that if he attends with you that people will think you're dating, and then ask if he wants to go with you. Trust him to answer honestly, especially if you feel he's been honest with you in the past."
"I do trust him," she said. "I just don't want to hurt him. Or use him."
"Then trust him to let you know if this is hurting him," he said. "You can even ask him."
Rachel nodded. She supposed if she did want to go to the ball with Theo, she did have to ask him. And if he said no, she'd have to figure something out. And if he said yes, she supposed she had other things she needed to figure out as well.
Rachel was looking for the Snitch and was glad it had stopped snowing even if she was still cold. It was their last practice of the year and the reserve team was playing the main team. And while Rachel was looking for the Snitch, more importantly she was keeping track of Glynnis and the Bludgers. They'd taken to attacking her during training as a way to help her be more prepared to play in rough games. While Rachel did appreciate that - she did not want to be slammed by another Seeker again - it made playing a little more nerve wracking than she was used to.
She dodged an incoming Bludger, flew down to the Beaters so that Meredith could take it from her, and then resumed her search. It was already dark outside, though the stadium lights pushed back most of the gloom. Rachel was managing not to shiver so far, but she was ready for the game to be over with. She loved flying, but she was ready to be somewhere warm and she was ready to sit down for dinner with her friends and to have a quiet evening.
All of this could be easily accomplished as soon as she found the damn Snitch. She caught Glynnis sneaking up on her out of the corner of her eye and changed patterns, flying low again to interfere with the Chasers. She flew directly in front of Valmai, forcing her away from a pass and allowing Gwendolyn to grab the Quaffle. Seekers were allowed to interfere in plays like that as long as they didn't touch the Quaffle, but most Seekers preferred not to get involved in what the Chasers were doing. Rachel didn't mind. She was fast enough to keep them from hitting her accidentally and the reserve team's Chasers actually needed the boost against the main team. Also, it got Glynnis off her tail at least for a moment.
Rachel sped up and looped around the pitch, forcing Glynnis to either take a tight turn with her or break off pursuit. Glynnis broke off, not wanting to chance a tight turn when they weren't after the Snitch. Most Seekers would do the same. Rachel had used her speed advantage at Hogwarts, but hadn't really learned to use her size advantage until everyone she was playing against was a fair bit bigger than her.
Of course, her size advantage could also quickly become a disadvantage, but she was learning to work with that too. She turned again and dove, knowing that Glynnis would follow that time. She'd never really pretended to see the Snitch at Hogwarts either, it hadn't really been necessary and it wasn't a play the other Seekers at Hogwarts had favored either. It was more common in the League and Rachel had learned that it paid to put the other Seeker through their paces before a real chase for the Snitch.
Abandoning the feint after Glynnis dove, Rachel flew up again at speed, feeling the cold wind pushing against her face and making her eyes water. Now she was well above the main game and she should have a few minutes before Glynnis was willing to come after her again. She relaxed her eyes and looked around. With the stadium lights, it should be even easier than usual to see the Snitch glimmering.
With a sigh of relief, she spotted it. She flew back down, intended to look like she was going to interfere with the Chasers again, and then, seeing Valmai and Wilda with the Quaffle, she decided to actually interfere. She waited until Annika and Alwene were in position, disrupted a pass and let Annika take it, then she sped off as if she was going for another turn. She could feel Glynnis approaching from above and Rachel took off for the Snitch, glad for the lead.
She flattened herself against her broom when she heard the whistle of a Bludger coming in her direction and then turned abruptly to follow the Snitch. This was an advantage of being light - someone with another three stone would have to take a much wider turn at these speeds or risk being pulled off their broom. She sensed Glynnis approaching as they dove and Rachel pushed for speed in a move that was probably unwise while approaching the ground but it gave her just enough time to grab the Snitch and roll away before Glynnis could slam into her.
Panting, just a little, Rachel pulled out of her roll and managed to slow down enough to circle and land. Sometimes she thought that being an auror was not the most dangerous thing she was doing and that she was going to maybe have to discourage Severus from coming to see her play. Reading about the game in the newspaper was one thing, seeing it live was a whole different thing.
Glynnis landed and looked at her. "You are a massive pain in my ass, you know that?"
Rachel smiled. "I do try."
"Good, keep it up," she said before walking away.
Cadie landed next to her. "And there's the infamous Snow recklessness taking the Snitch. I was wondering if we were going to see that."
Gwendolyn landed and Gwenog landed nearby as well.
"Infamous?" Rachel asked.
"I've heard about some of your games at Hogwarts. I asked around, actually. Apparently you nearly killed yourself by almost plowing into the stands at one of your games," Cadie said with a smile.
"That was an accident," Rachel said, though she had been hoping that particular incident wouldn't leave Hogwarts.
"I want you to train on pass interference with the main team," Gwenog said. "Not many Seekers are quick enough to get away with that, but it's clear you can. You've played Chaser, right?"
"I played Chaser for a year, but I can't anymore," Rachel said.
"Why not?" Gwendolyn asked.
Rachel rested her broom against her shoulder and held out her hands. "Tremors. I need both hands on my broom most of the time. I can manage to grab a Snitch, but I can't stay stable and pass a Quaffle or score, not in a game at these speeds."
There was a strange silence for a moment, the distant sound of the rest of the team messing around reaching them.
"I suppose it's fortunate you can play at all," Gwenog said. "When we're back in February, I want you to train with the Chasers of both teams for pass interference."
"Alright," Rachel agreed, glad for the subject change.
"Get your asses over here!" Seren shouted.
Rachel grabbed her broom and they walked over to join the rest of the team.
"Now that everyone is here," Seren said, pausing to give them a look. "Good work overall. The season wasn't perfect. We can do better. We will do better next season. Take a long break, rest, and we'll come at it fresh in February. Have a good holiday and no one break anything or do anything stupid, for Merlin's sake."
"You love us and you know it," Cadie said.
"Merlin knows why," Seren said, but she smiled. "Now go away. Go be someone else's problem for six weeks."
Rachel smiled and thought that it was weird how cozy she felt with the Harpies already. They were a little rougher than her team at Hogwarts, but she could tell that everyone cared about each other, even if they did try to kill each other on the pitch.
"Why?" Rachel asked as she retrieved her mail on Sunday morning. She had already read the newspaper's rehash of the Wizengamot meeting yesterday and she was tired of the news as a whole. The muggle protection act debate had continued to drag out and Rachel was certain she'd seen several people who strongly wished to hex each other.
"What now?" Draco asked.
Rachel came back to the breakfast table and tossed the copy of Witch Weekly onto a spot that was free from dishes and plates. "The front cover. Nobody said anything to me about the front cover. They didn't mention they were covering the Order of Merlin stuff."
"Well, I hate to say it, but it's not surprising," Theo said.
She sat down in between Millie and Hermione and looked down at what remained of her breakfast. "Maybe not, but they could have told me."
"They could have, which would have been better," Hermione agreed.
"It's not a bad picture though," Millie said, leaning in to look.
Rachel looked at the cover again. It was her receiving the Order of Merlin and nervously smiling at the audience as they applauded her. She looked young. She didn't really look like that, did she?
"I think it's a nice picture, though I'd understand if you didn't want to share that moment with everyone," Neville said, also standing up to look.
"What about the article?" Draco asked.
She shrugged and Theo picked up the magazine and started flipping through the pages.
Rachel sat and worked on centering herself with her breathing like Torey had taught her. She just had to tell herself that this wasn't like the other articles. She had expected this one to happen. She had prepared for it. Witch Weekly wasn't going to say anything bad about her. At least, she didn't think they would. As much as she didn't want the attention - she didn't want to imagine people around the nation reading this - she knew that it was going to happen with or without her consent, and that it was better for her to take some control over it and use it to her own ends. It was still hard seeing it happen.
"Not bad. A little…" Theo trailed off as he looked at Rachel. "Well. I think you have to keep in mind the intended audience."
Rachel sighed and held out her hand and Theo passed the magazine to her.
The picture accompanying the article was of her in her Harpies uniform holding her broom. She looked nervous here too, but a little older. Maybe she needed to wear makeup. Would wearing makeup make her look older? Maybe she'd write to Daphne for help. Daphne and Pansy were the only people she knew who knew about this sort of thing and Pansy wasn't an option right now.
The article wasn't terrible, but Rachel immediately saw what Theo had meant about the intended audience. The style was completely different from the Daily Prophet. It was almost like the article was trying to have a conversation with her. It described Rachel as being a kind and caring person who had acted to save Hogwarts and then Britain. Thankfully it glossed over pretty much all of the war stuff, only quoting what the Minister had said when he'd given her the Order of Merlin. The rest of the article was on a more personal level. It included some of the answers that Rachel had given to Daphne, and Rachel was pleased to see that her quote about wanting understanding about muggles and healing cultural rifts was included. They also mentioned her position on the Harpies team, her role in the Wizengamot, her work on the auror team, and told about the spells and potions she'd invented last year.
Overall it was probably the most flattering article about her that she'd ever seen. As much as Rachel disliked the idea, she thought she would interview with Daphne again for an article when it was time for her to start pushing her Azkaban proposal. She wasn't sure how well an informative piece on Azkaban would translate to the more fluffy Witch Weekly writing, but she thought she could give it a personal spin without touching on her own issues. "Not bad," she said, passing the magazine to where Hermione was reaching for it. "They still could have warned me about the cover."
"They could have," Millie agreed. "I want it next."
Rachel returned to her breakfast and thought about the day. It was Sunday, so she was free until she was on call after dark. She didn't feel a particular drive to go anywhere, though she had been meaning to leave the house more. She had several projects that she could work on and at some point she needed to brew another cauldron or two of her modified Dreamless Sleep potion. Ginny and Luna would be home from Hogwarts next week and Rachel was looking forward to seeing them. She'd missed their Hogsmeade weekend yesterday because she, Draco, and Neville had been with the Wizengamot until five in the evening.
There was one thing she'd been putting off doing and she couldn't put it off any longer. She needed to talk to Theo. If Theo didn't want to go to the ball with her, she'd ask Millie. She knew that Neville was going with Hannah and Draco had invited Padma. Apparently he'd asked Pansy first and she'd refused to go anywhere near the Wizengamot. Rachel couldn't blame her.
Hermione passed the magazine to Millie. "It seemed fairly accurate, at least. Did they really ask you what your favorite color was? And where you shop for robes?"
"Yes, they did ask me that," Rachel said, meeting Hermione's head shake with a smile.
"I think it's funny," Millie said. "And sadly, better than the Daily Prophet."
"I don't know why Scrimgeour hasn't cleaned out the Daily Prophet offices. They make him look bad," Draco said.
"Maybe that's why he hasn't done it," Theo suggested.
"He wants the illusion of a free press?" Hermione asked.
"Anyone who pays attention in magical Britain knows we don't have a free press," Draco said.
"You'd think a press controlled by the government would be more flattering to it," Neville said, setting the newspaper aside.
"Maybe it's just like the situation with our History of Magic and Defense teachers. There is just no one else?" Rachel suggested.
"Oh, how hard is it to write a news article?" Hermione asked, sounding frustrated. "There has to be someone who wants the job that would do a better job."
The thing was, Rachel didn't know anyone who did want the job. She'd never heard anyone at Hogwarts say they aspired to write for the Daily Prophet. Maybe it was a reputation problem, like the Defense position used to have. People didn't want to write for the Daily Prophet, because it was such a bad newspaper, so it remained a bad newspaper. Though, the comparison wasn't quite right - most people hadn't wanted the Defense position because sometimes the curse was deadly. They were lucky to have gotten Gemma.
"I think we're going to have to accept that some things we can't fix. If Scrimgeour can't fix it, I don't know how we're supposed to," Theo said.
"It's not exactly something we can act on in the Wizengamot either," Neville said.
"Why not?" Hermione asked. "Other governments have laws about what newspapers are allowed to do."
"I thought a free press was supposed to be a good thing?" Draco asked.
"It is! But having laws about what newspapers can do can actually encourage a free press," Hermione said.
"Like what?" Draco pressed.
"I don't know," Hermione admitted after a moment. "I don't know that much about it, I just know that it happens."
Rachel mentally added it to her list of problems to work on one day. If she could figure out what had gone wrong with the Daily Prophet, and looked at how other places ran their newspapers, maybe she could figure out how to fix it. That could be after Azkaban and sleeping potions, and maybe alongside House Elf and werewolf rights, but before figuring out a way to fix the History of Magic position at Hogwarts. She also needed muggleborn equality somewhere in there, but she didn't have any ideas on how to proceed with that at the moment. At least she'd have plenty to keep her busy for the next fifty years or so.
"What is everyone doing today?" Neville asked.
"I'm meeting with Susan in about an hour to do a review, and then I have dinner with my parents at six," Hermione said.
"Nothing, but I'm on call after dark," Draco said.
"Dinner with Severus at six, and I'm on call after dark," Rachel said.
"I'm just here today," Theo said.
"I have dinner with my parents at six too, joy," Millie said. "Otherwise I'm here."
"I'm meeting Hannah for lunch, otherwise I'll be here," Neville said.
"Here, for your collection," Millie said, passing Rachel back the magazine.
"I definitely don't have a collection," Rachel said, getting laughter from some of the rest of her friends.
"You should. If it was about me, I would," Draco said.
"Isn't that a little narcissistic?" Hermione asked.
"Not any more narcissistic than keeping a photo album," Draco said.
"It would be weird to keep a photo album if all of the pictures in it were of yourself," Millie said.
Rachel shook her head and stood up. In truth, she had kept the Quidditch Monthly issue with her debut Quidditch photos and the potions journal with her article. She supposed she could keep this with them. It definitely wasn't a collection though.
It still felt weird to just leave her dirty dishes on the table, but both Kreacher and Dobby got very upset if she washed her own dishes. They didn't even want her to move them over to the sink. She paused at the owl perch to pet Gladys and to give her a bit of bacon that she'd broken off for her. She figured eating bacon couldn't be any worse for an owl than eating mice and Gladys seemed to enjoy it.
She went upstairs, stashed the magazine with her other magazines and took a look around her room. She thought she'd spend a few hours on sleeping potions research, then brew after lunch, then do some work on her book after that, have dinner with Severus, and then practice wandless magic and read for a while when she was on call. But first, Theo.
Hearing footsteps on the stairs, she peeked out, and luckily enough, it was Theo. She stepped into the hallway. "Can we talk, when you have a minute?"
"Sure, I think I know what you want to talk about," he said.
"You do?" she asked, wondering if she was that transparent.
Theo shrugged. "I mean, I could be wrong. That does happen on occasion."
"When was the last time you were wrong?" she asked, half teasing.
Theo smiled. "I turned Master Jorgensen's work table into smoke the other day."
Rachel laughed. "What were you trying to do?"
"Trying to do an unspelled phase shift conversion of a lump of wood that was on the table. Apparently it just took wood to mean any wood in the vicinity and took the table too." Theo came closer. "Your room, or mine? Or the library?"
"My room is fine," she said, stepping back inside. Once Theo was inside she shut the door. "What did Master Jorgensen think of that?"
"He just smiled and told me to conjure him another work table, so I spent the rest of the afternoon looking up how to get a table that looked roughly like the one he'd had," Theo said, taking a seat on the end of Rachel's bed.
Feverfew got up and came to investigate him, her head moving up and down as she sniffed him.
"You know, I'm not a hundred percent sure your cat approves of me."
Rachel sat down on the end of the bed as well. "She likes you well enough, she's just interested because you're not usually in this room and she thinks of this room as hers."
"I suppose I should have asked her if I could come in." Theo was watching Feverfew back, a little cautiously.
Feverfew meowed.
"I can invite whoever I want into this room, it's mine too," Rachel told her.
Feverfew gave Rachel a look that told her exactly what she thought of that.
"Anyway, you wanted to talk about the Wizengamot Christmas Ball," he said, moving his attention from Feverfew to Rachel.
"Yes." She paused while she searched for the words she wanted. "I don't want to hurt you."
"You're not going to hurt me."
"People will think we're dating if I bring you to this."
"Let them think that, I'm not worried about it. Are you worried about my family reputation if people think you're dating me?" he asked.
"No. Not at all," she said, wondering how many people knew that Theo's father was a Death Eater. She hadn't seen anything about it in the newspaper, but that didn't necessarily mean a lot. "It doesn't make you uncomfortable? People thinking that?"
"No. People know we were friends at Hogwarts. It's easy enough for me to tell anyone who asks that we went to the ball as friends. I think you're making this a bigger problem than it needs to be."
Maybe she was. She didn't want to ask Theo outright if he still liked her, but Monty had told her to trust what Theo said. If he said it wasn't a problem, maybe it wasn't a problem. "Alright. Would you like to go to the ball with me?"
"Yes, I would," he said easily.
"Thank you. I'd really rather not navigate this on my own," she said.
"It will be a big event, but it will be like the Order of Merlin thing where you just make a little small talk, greet people, and just be polite. There will be some dancing, but if you want, you can just tell people who ask that you're there with me and they'll respect that," he explained.
She hadn't even considered other people asking her to dance. She did not want to dance with other Wizengamot members - most of them were at least twice her age! "Okay, thank you."
"It will be fine. It might even be fun. Remember the ball at Hogwarts, and you were all worried about it, and it was fine?"
"I do remember. And it did go better than I expected it to," she admitted.
"It will be just like that, just with more appropriate music and without a dozen teachers chaperoning us." He nodded, meeting her eyes, as if willing her to believe it.
"I suppose I better get used to this sort of thing."
"Probably a good idea. From the sounds of things a lot of social events stopped during the war, but they'll start picking back up again and you'll be invited to a lot of them. You're too young for any of the women's tea groups, but there will be other opportunities. You'll be expected to take part in guild events once you're an apprentice too."
Rachel nodded. She thought she could manage the Potions Guild more easily than she could manage the Wizengamot. The Potions Guild didn't want anything from her.
"Are we alright?" he checked.
"We're fine. I almost feel like I sort of fell into all of this. In some ways I'd rather just be doing a mastery, even though I know I signed up for everything and that a lot of what I'm doing is important."
"You are doing a lot. You still look like you don't sleep."
"I sleep. Honestly, being on call does not really affect my sleep that much. I'm sleeping more than I was sleeping at Hogwarts," she said. "And I'm way less busy than I was at Hogwarts."
"Which only goes to show just how crazy our last two years of Hogwarts were. Last three years?" he said with a shrug.
"Something like that," she said. Looking back, they had pushed themselves a lot, but she also felt she couldn't have done it any other way.
"At least now we can just sit down some of the time. We learned a lot, but I'm really glad to be past that point in my life now. My mastery is fairly intense while I'm there, but it's nothing like Hogwarts. Master Jorgensen keeps telling me to stop trying to do everything at once and just focus on one project at a time."
"I don't think I know how to do one project at a time," she said ruefully.
"Me neither. Now I just have a project for my mastery and then other stuff I do here. It's nice to just have a weekend off."
"It is. I wonder how long it will take for us to take that for granted."
"You haven't had the weekend off. You were flying Friday evening, at the Wizengamot all day yesterday, and then you're on call tonight," he pointed out.
"Most of a weekend off," she amended. That was more than enough for her.
"Well, what did everyone think?" Hermione asked as the credits to Les Miserables finished playing and the lights rose in the cinema.
"How did they make everything look like that?" Ginny asked.
"Still just sets. They built the places to make them look like they supposedly looked during the French Revolution. All of those names we just watched were people who were working on different things in the movie to make it look and sound right."
"They cut out Eponine and Gavroche," Rachel said, thinking that it was an odd decision. Eponine was important to the story. She even had her own song in the musical. "And it wasn't a musical."
"I think there's a musical version recorded out there somewhere, we'd have to look. And the director probably wanted to cut as much as he could. The movie was nearly as long as the musical anyway," Hermione said.
"How did the man playing Javert jump off the bridge? Obviously they didn't really kill him," Theo asked.
"Likely they had him connected to some elastic rope and had him jump a short distance onto something soft, and then someone who looked like him made a longer jump onto something soft, and then they edited the film to make it look like he really jumped," Hermione explained. "Do we want to go home or go out for dinner?"
"Let's go out to dinner," Millie said. "I still say Les Miserables is depressing, even if they make it look all fancy."
"It was fun to come anyway. I didn't expect it to be so big. Maybe we can see something else in the summer," Luna said.
"We can come see something else," Hermione agreed as they began moving as a group. "And we can go see something on stage during the summer too. I looked, but tickets are more expensive right now because of the holidays, but we can see something less expensive in the summer. If you want something really strange we can go see Starlight Express."
"Dare I ask what really strange involves?" Draco asked with raised eyebrows.
"It's a musical about trains and all the actors are on roller skates and the theater is a roller rink," Hermione said.
Draco looked blankly at Rachel.
Rachel shrugged. "Do magical children not have roller skates?"
"We have ice skates," Ginny said. "We used to go skating on the pond behind my house in the winter."
"Same idea, but with wheels instead of a blade," Hermione said.
"And they sing about trains?" Draco asked.
"Yes, while pretending to be trains. On second thought, let's try something that isn't Andrew Lloyd Weber for our first go around," Hermione said as they left the theater.
Rachel tugged her jacket closed against the winter chill. She'd transfigured her old winter cloak into a black wool muggle jacket, but it had buttons instead of a zipper. She hadn't figured out how to do a zipper yet.
"What do you think, Draco? Neville? Do you want to see more movies?" Hermione asked.
"I liked it for the most part. It's different when it's so big in front of you," Neville said. "I might want to see something less sad."
"I just think it's weird," Draco said. "I mean, I don't mind doing it, but isn't it a little bit silly?"
"How so?" Millie asked.
"All those people pretending to be someone they're not. And it's not a play, where they sort of acknowledge that they're pretending, these people are really pretending. And it's not just these people, the programs on the television go on and on, with all those people pretending too. I don't understand why so many of them are doing that," he said. "I don't know why so many of them would want to do that."
"Well, unfortunately the answer is mostly money," Hermione said. "They all get paid a fair amount for their work. And it's popular. I've never met a muggle who didn't watch television, at least some times. And the rental shop we go to that's filled with video tapes, hundreds of muggles every week come to take out a video tape to watch it. There isn't really anything comparable in magical culture, not that I've seen at least."
"And you have to remember how many muggles there are," Rachel said. "It may seem like there's a lot of people involved in television and movies, but really it's a small percent of the population. Most muggles aren't involved at all."
"How about the pub?" Hermione asked, pointing to a sign further down the way. "We have enough muggle money for a meal."
"As long as it doesn't rain on us again, that's fine," Ginny said.
"Works for me," Theo said, getting a nod from Neville and Luna.
"I'm fine with that," Rachel said. Better to eat out in the muggle world where no one knew who she was.
"So what is magical theater like?" Hermione asked.
"Usually there are two plays a year, a historic one in the winter and then a new play in the summer. There's a theatre troupe that performs them. That's all there really is to it," Draco said.
"I suppose I can see why the scope of muggle cinema and theatre would surprise you then," Hermione said. "In London alone there's usually a half dozen plays or musicals staged at the same time, all the time, and then there are cinemas everywhere that will always have something new playing. Alright, we're about to go into an enclosed place, let's be a little more cautious with words like magic and muggle."
The rest of the group looked a little nervous, but for the most part, all of them were getting a little more used to being out in the muggle world. Inside the pub they found a long table intended for groups and took seats and began looking at the menu. Rachel decided on fish and chips almost immediately and wondered if she could find a way for Kreacher and Dobby to learn how to make it. Then again, having fish and chips regularly would probably not be a great idea.
Once a server took their orders and everyone finished looking around at all the differences, everyone settled in.
"Any ideas what we want to do over the holiday?" Theo asked.
"Mostly just take a break," Ginny said.
Luna nodded. "Some quiet time would be nice. I would like to spend some time with my father and with all of you."
"I'm planning to do Christmas morning with my parents, but I was intending to come back for the afternoon. Do the rest of you feel like we can have that afternoon as a group?" Hermione asked.
"Sirius has invited us for dinner, but our afternoon is free," Draco said, speaking for the boys.
"I can come back for the afternoon," Rachel said. She was planning to go home for Christmas morning as well.
"Should work for me," Millie said.
"I can do that, but I'll need to be home for dinner," Ginny said.
"Same for me," Luna said.
"Good," Hermione said. "There's lots of things we can do while we have a little time off. Are you planning to spend the Easter holiday at Hogwarts?"
"Probably. Last chance for NEWT revision," Ginny said, shaking her head. "I don't want to think about NEWTs right now."
Luna nodded. "We're also planning some activities for the DA over the Easter holiday for those who choose to remain at Hogwarts."
Rachel glanced around, but their conversation hadn't attracted any attention. It seemed like they could talk about magic fairly freely in the muggle world for the most part. She exhaled and let herself relax a little as her friends chatted. It was nearly Christmas and the Wizengamot was in recess until January and she wasn't on call tonight for the aurors. It was good to take a little break.