Oops!

'Lethifolds!' Leo burst out. 'In the name of Merlin, that's incredible!'

'Hold your Thestrals, Lucky. What's the big deal? So now we know there's some kind of feral curtain in the forest – so what?' Tracey let herself fall back on the sofa, her legs idly kicking the air.

'You don't understand, Tracey!' Leo sat, if possible, even straighter than usual as he took the book out of Harry's hands. 'This is a sensation!'

'What do you mean?' asked Hermione, taken aback by how excited the boy seemed.

'First of all, this book is amazing! I was obsessed with Lethifolds when I was a child, but I've never found so much good information! You don't understand! The book says it all: Even though the Chinese have been trying for decades, nobody really knows anything worthwhile about Lethifolds except that they never come out during the day and that they're weak to the Patronus. Look at the chance we have here!'

Leo stood up, pacing up and down, the book still in his hand. 'This is amazing! Harry, you told me you could do the Patronus, didn't you?'

And yet, Harry didn't answer. He was still sitting stock-still, as if he'd seen a ghost, still staring at the same place the book had been before Leo had snatched it away. When he spoke, it seemed as if his mind was far away, his voice even softer than usual. 'Leo? Knowing what we do as of now, is there something that comes to your mind thinking we you think back to when we fled from the forest that night? Something...about the howling?'

Leo looked down at Harry, puzzled, his excitement momentarily curbed. 'What do you mean? I don't think so. Why do you ask?'

'I see.'

'Harry, with your Patronus, do you think we could...?'

'Absolutely not!' snapped Daphne, flaring up at once, glaring defiantly at Leo. 'That's much too dangerous! Didn't you only escape by a hair's breadth last time? This is too risky!'

'We didn't know any better last time.' Leo, to Hermione's amusement, was almost whining at this point. 'If we prepare accordingly, don't you think we cou-'

'No.'

All faces, once again, turned towards Harry.

'I...I'm sorry, Harry? Come again?' asked Leo, his wildly gesticulating hands slowly dropping.

'I said no. We still don't have enough information, but even so I'm fairly sure I don't stand a chance against whatever is lurking in the forest anyway. This research is suspended – at least until we get back from the holidays.' To their incredulity, he suddenly stood up, and – this time – Greengrass really did fall from her makeshift throne.

'Ow! Harry, what gives?' she asked, totally bewildered and rubbing her back.

'I'm off to bed.'

'But the forest,' Leo repeated disbelievingly, his gaze flickering between the book and Harry.

'No – more – research. At least wait until we get back from the break.'

'But-'

'LEO!' Harry suddenly spun around, his voice freezing Leo's ardour like ice. 'No more research for now. Do you understand me?'

Leo sagged, the book hitting the floor with a soft thud. Then he sighed wistfully. 'Well, alright, but I don't understand wh-'

'Good night.' With one last nod but no further explanation, Harry's figure dissolved in the darkness of the stairs that led to the boys' dormitories.

'What just happened?' asked Hermione, studying the faces of their little research group.

Daphne looked relieved. Tracey was still lamenting her lost chance to get some more hot chocolate, Lethifolds apparently already far from her mind. Leo, by contrast, looked as if Harry had snatched all his birthday presents.

Everyone minus Tracey exchanged nervous glances. This wasn't at all what Hermione had expected when they'd ordered the book.

'Isn't it obvious?' said Tracey with a shrug, still making a comical face as she critically inspected her rather short legs she had stretched into the air. 'He's just realised something – something bad, and now he needs to check on it during the holidays. He's probably going to bury himself in books again. Also, most of this information didn't seem exactly new to him. Did you see his face? I know that look of his,' she concluded, kicking the air as if she were working out. 'That's the look of a guy who's rolled a big ball of snow down a steep mountain only to see it spinning out of control.'

This time, they all gaped silently at Tracey. The girl rolled her eyes, still lying on her back, kicking the air. 'What?!' she shot back at them all, looking inexplicably grumpy. 'I wouldn't have meddled if only you guys were a bit faster on the uptake!'

~BLVoD~

'Get up, Harry! You won't have time for breakfast otherwise.'

Not for the first time, Harry wondered if there wasn't some better way to wake up. Daphne stood in front of his bed, drawing back the curtains with as much noise as possible. Absentmindedly rubbing the sleep from his eyes, he sat up, moaning and cursing as if tax auditors had rung unexpectedly.

'When did you get to sleep?' asked Daphne, an amalgam of worry and amusement.

'When I left the common room,' mumbled Harry, too tired to think about his answer.

'How can you be that sleepy, then? Come on, I've laid out a smart set of robes, and a fresh towel is over there.'

Harry, despite himself and his recent progress, felt himself go rather red. 'Er, D-Daphne? You do realise Tracey was making fun of us the other day, right? That comment about my wife getting me every day and so forth...'

'Of course,' replied Daphne with infuriating tranquillity. Wordlessly, she handed him the robes she had chosen for him to wear (standard Hogwarts set with a well-hidden coat of arms of his family) and the towel, pointing in the direction of the bathroom. 'Off you go.'

Harry stared at her, wondering if this was the time to make a stand for the rights of men worldwide. When he saw the glint in her eyes, he decided that it wasn't. With a sigh, he took the outfit he had been ord- the outfit she had recommended him to wear. His eyes sweeping across the room, there was just one more question that weighed on his mind.

'Er, Daphne?'

'Yes, Harry?'

'Why is Yaxley lying on his bed, fully clothed?'

'Your roommates got a bit snappy with me.'

'So you decided that he'll have to take one for the team?' he asked, one eyebrow raised quizzically.

'Of course not,' she responded with a sweet smile. 'He was simply the slowest to dodge.'

Sometimes, Harry really couldn't help noticing strange likenesses between Daphne and Amy. At least Tori was sweet, innocent, and did as she was told. As he entered the shower, he couldn't help wondering how long that would last.

~BLVoD~

The castle was in a strange mood. Despite the staff's best efforts to brighten the last few days of school with a hint of festivity, the topic that seemed to be on everyone's minds these days was neither Christmas nor Yule; no, it was Lovegood's article in the Quibbler.

Prewett had, to Harry's grim delight, apparently spent an entire lesson with each class to painstakingly refute every single accusation made against his person, thus turning a very niche and fairly unpopular article in a shoddy old magazine into the hottest topic of the entire school. Over the course of three days, the number of Quibblers that arrived early in the morning increased exponentially. Prewett, adamant if understandably agitated, insisted that the truth will out. Harry, on the other hand, knew better: Truth only ever stood a chance if it arrived early. A bit of truth that arrived three days late to the carnival of lies was little more than a fancy attraction on the side.

At this point, the best Prewett could hope for was, in Harry's eyes, for the whole thing to blow over before most of Hogwarts left for the holidays. Otherwise, a bit of mildly annoying school talk could very well turn into a lot of seriously degrading society talk.

All the nasty whispering in the corridors felt quite invigorating to Harry, who didn't believe he would ever tire of Prewett's strained smile. Sadly, the prospect of the upcoming ball loomed over his malicious joy, to not even speak of the one nagging thought he'd tried to keep from his mind ever since that blasted book had arrived. It was as if someone was trying to ruin his mood now that he was genuinely enjoying Hogwarts for the first time.

'I'm really sorry, Harry. I can't believe I'm saying this, but my research takes precedence – even over the Black Ball,' Aenor had said with a rueful smile during their last meeting before the break.

He had made some remarkable progress with the barrier – at least Aenor seemed to think so. Harry was downright annoyed that the spell as a whole still eluded him. So far, Aenor had made him learn most steps of the magic separately, and Harry had managed that bit rather easily. Now, however, when it had finally come to the long-awaited bit of putting it all together, he soon realised that everything prior to that had been a walk in the park.

'Oh. It's no problem,' replied Harry hastily. 'I just thought – well...' Yet what exactly he thought then and there, words didn't seem to exist to express it.

'Disappointed you couldn't invite me over again?'

When he saw her amused expression, he felt compelled to defend himself. 'What? No! It's never dull with you around, I'm willing to you give you that. But I don't really mind either way,' he said, trying to sound more confident than he was. 'I've been looking forward to having a few days off in our library at any rate.'

Aenor laughed loudly, stepping around her desk to tussle his hair like she'd done a few times before. 'How about this: if your grandfather decides to continue holding the ball each year, you'll have the pleasure of my company next year, alright?'

'I'll think about it, Miss Rose, in case I don't have any other arrangements, obviously,' he returned with a cocky grin.

'Then it's a deal, Mr Black.' She was already on her way back to her treasured desk, when she suddenly stopped, looking back over her shoulder, one finger to her lip. 'Oh, and Harry?'

'Hmm?'

'Don't do anything reckless while at home.'

Gratified to see some Hufflepuffs bent excitedly over a truly battered-looking edition of the Quibbler, Harry eventually entered the Great Hall, still pondering Aenor's cryptic words. What could she have meant? 'Don't do anything reckless.' Is something supposed to happen?

Prewett, Harry noticed, sat at the teachers' table, prodding his food with little fervour, his skin looking somewhat waxen. With a smug grin, Harry walked in the direction of his excitedly chattering cousin with a new spring in his step.

Prewett can't be up to anything, can he? No, he'll be glad when this whole thing's blown over.

It was good, Harry decided, to walk across the hall without anyone pointing or craning their necks. Dragging Prewett into the mud had definitely been the best decision he'd made at Hogwarts yet – or at the very least the most satisfying one.

Does Aenor know about the Lethifolds? But how could she? They aren't letting anyone leave the castle. In his mind, he revisited a few instances of Aenor casually demonstrating her rather unsettling mastery of magic. Okay, I guess if she really wanted to, she could, but even then ... they're here at Hogwarts, aren't they? How could that be related to home? Maybe it's something political? I would've heard – surely!

Harry sighed, resigned to put the thought out of his head for the time being. Maybe Aenor was just being Aenor, Merlin knew witches could be incomprehensible at times. Most of the time, he corrected himself as the chatter at the table came to a sudden halt the moment he arrived.

'Er, hello?' His voice trailed off in the suddenly gaping silence.

'Harry!' Daphne cried out, making space for him and yet somehow mysteriously failing to meet his eyes – something she was usually quite keen to do under any circumstance.

'Talking about me, by any chance?'

Hermione looked embarrassed, pointedly opening a book, Tracey defiant – but, as it were, he wasn't dependent on their cooperation. Unblinkingly, he stared at Daphne, pleased to see her determination melt like wax on fire. However, just when she was finally about to give in, and opened her mouth with an apologetic grin, Tracey's slim hand shot over her mouth from the side.

'This isn't the time to spill, Daphy! Harry, this is girls' business, keep your nose out!'

Harry's eyes wandered from his cousin to her best friend and finally to the Muggle-born witch who had been staring at the same line in her little notebook for about thirty seconds now. He could always pressure either her or Daphne into answering him, but was this really worth it? Tracey would probably get complicated over it. And he really had enough on his plate; he didn't need to add to it over something so irrelevant.

'Alright, suit yourself.'

Relaxing a bit, he sat down and started looking around for some food to catch his interest. With amusement, he observed Hermione's eyes finally vanquishing the sentence she'd been staring holes at. Tracey, too, reluctantly let go of Daphne, who still looked rather torn.

'So, er, what are you planning to wear at the ball, Harry?' asked Tracey in a transparent attempt to start a conversation.

Harry rolled his eyes. Had he really just dodged one girly topic for another? 'I don't know. Robes, I expect?' he added with a grin.

Tracey snorted. 'My fashion advice: don't go starkers! On the other hand, we sure could use a laugh, and you never know; maybe some truly desperate soul might even appr- OW!'

Suddenly, Tracey was rocking in her seat, holding her leg. Hermione was, once again, trying to scale the indomitable line of puzzlement. Daphne was staring ahead, looking quite innocent.

'I think,' said Harry, coughing politely, 'that I might adjust my attire to my companion – provided I still find one, naturally.'

'WHAT?!' yelled Daphne, suddenly looking extremely interested. 'You still don't have anyone? But we thought- How about we...' Then, her face fell. 'Aw, shit! The old crone won't allow it, will she?' she asked glumly.

'I'm afraid not,' answered Harry, looking apologetic. 'Maybe I should ask Amy? Or Dora, possibly?'

'I'm amazed Tonks still lets you get off with calling her that,' said Daphne with a half-hearted grin. 'Last I heard, she's doing some kind of nonsense drills with the Aurors. And Amy's all set to torture Draco at the ball again.'

Harry sighed, leaning back. 'Darn! Well, I suppose I'll have to ask around... I don't want Tori at the ball yet; she's far too, well, let's go with impressionable, and even then there's still the matter with your grandmother.'

'Don't worry, Harry! I'm sure there will be quite a lot of girls who won't mind going with you. I've been reading up on the Black Ball. Did you know there actually are books about it in the library? It's got quite the history! Incidentally, I told Tracey only this morning that some of the Ravenclaws seem a bit friendlier now that Prewett's taking the heat. You could always ask Patil, I suppose. Not the Gryffindor one, obviously, but I somehow don't think Padma would reject your offer...' Hermione levelled a small smile at him, finally putting the book down.

Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Daphne's horrified look as she stared at Hermione as if the Muggle-born had drawn her wand on her. 'Er, no! We don't need to make this more complicated than necessary, do we?' Daphne blurted out. 'Yes, how about this? You just go with Tracey.'

'With Tracey?' asked Harry, taken aback.

'With him?' Tracey looked as if she'd been told sweets would be bad for her health. 'Why? I don't want to!'

'Could you excuse us for a second, Harry?' Offering no explanation, Daphne dragged her best friend into one corner of the hall, where they started a heated argument, by the looks of it.

'What's going on?' asked Harry, looking from Daphne and Tracey to Hermione.

'I, er, who knows,' said Hermione vaguely, once again opening her book. Harry idly wondered if the binding would take damage from the strain at this rate.

Two minutes later, a thoroughly pleased Daphne and an equally grumpy petite witch at her side returned to the table.

Meeting Harry's baffled gaze, Daphne elbowed her best friend in the side.

Tracey turned to look at him, her face religiously blank. 'I have just had a change of heart,' she incanted in a voice so dull that it might well be used as a blunt instrument. 'I would be very pleased if you would grant me the honour of being your partner for the ball,' she continued, staring straight ahead as if reading a script. The muscles near her lips gave a bit of a nervous twitch. 'Please,' she added, rolling her eyes.

Harry was impressed. That had to have been the most insincere request he'd ever received. Speaking as someone who had to deal with politics for years, that was saying something. Then again, if Tracey was truly so much against it, this might actually turn out to be quite fun.

Harry smiled, doing his best to look immensely delighted with this development. 'Of course, Tracey. You do me great honour,' he said, flashing his most charming smile. 'I am so very pleased to accept.'

Tracey looked horrified, quite plainly having predicted him to say no.

'Well, that's settled, then,' said Daphne, ignoring her friend's desperate, if non-verbal, plea.

'What about you, Daphy?' quailed Tracey. 'You said you wanted to go so badly!'

'Oh, I'll just ask Leo to reconsider. I'm sure he won't mind.'

Tracey slumped down on the table. 'Oh. Great.'

'So?' asked Harry with a good-natured smile. 'What shall we be wearing then, Tracey? Gosh – I'm so looking forward to this. Do you have some shoes with high heels? Could be a tad awkward to dance with you otherwise,' he added innocently.

'I'm so going to get you for this, Harry James Black,' muttered Tracey through gritted teeth.

~BLVoD~

Being woken noisily by Daphne, sleeping through breakfast, realising that his cousin had already packed his entire trunk, and trying to hide his embarrassment over Tracey's roaring laughter, the day of their departure from Hogwarts passed in the blink of an eye.

It was a very strange blink, though, Harry had to admit. Their departure from the ancient castle resembled nothing less than a parade with a guard of honour, nearly five dozen Aurors flanking their cavalcade. He had the strange urge to wave at them from within the coach.

Why the Ministry couldn't just organise a dozen Portkeys was beyond him. Had Dumbledore maybe done something to better counter the Lethifold menace?

'So what are you going to do this Yule, Honey?' asked Tracey randomly, playing with the enormous bobble of her garishly yellow hat that even now had a thin film of ice and snow.

'Homework!' answered Hermione excitedly. 'I just hope I have enough time to do Professor McGonagall's essay justice!'

'Who would have thought,' mumbled Daphne. 'Don't you have anything more fun to do, Granger?'

'But school work is fun!' protested Hermione earnestly, rubbing her hands to get the cold out of her limbs.

Daphne just stared at the girl, her expression clearly suggesting that she considered the Muggle-born a lost cause. 'Fancy that!' she replied with more tact than Harry had expected.

'What about the stupendous amount of Potions books you've been ordering since last year, Sweetie?' asked Tracey in a treacherously casual sort of voice.

'That's...different!' snapped Daphne. 'I just...Well, it's different!'

'Fancy that!' returned Tracey haughtily, shrieking mirthfully as she evaded Daphne's casual swipe.

The train ride was as boring as ever. Harry refused to partake in their chatter and banter, his mind wandering to both Aenor's strange words of farewell as well as Leo's blasted book. Trying to hide his nervousness, he stared outside. Now that they'd left Scotland behind them, one could occasionally make out faint rays of light struggling to penetrate the overcast sky.

To their surprise, even London was coated in a thick blanket of snow, much to the public's dismay. Muggle-London, it seemed, was woefully unprepared to face snow as high as one foot.

'See you next year!' Hermione waved enthusiastically at them, her parents standing behind her.

Harry waved back, making it a point to be overwhelmingly well-mannered towards Hermione's mother, just because he knew it annoyed both the Muggle-born as well as her father.

To his slight disappointment, it was – again – not his grandfather who waited for him but, rather, the Lestranges. Rodolphus was a haggard-looking man whose floppy brown hair hid his erratic eyes and gaunt, angular face.

'Harry!' he boomed in his loud voice, shaking his hand firmly. 'I hope you've kept an eye on our brood?'

'Did you tell him to do that?' asked Amy suspiciously. 'He's forbidden me from getting myself expelled!'

Rodolphus grinned, or rather, one side of his mouth curved a bit. He clapped Harry on the shoulder, making him sink a few inches into the snow. 'And you better stick to that if you know what's good for you! Our ancestors will turn in their graves if my eldest daughter fails to get her OWLs.'

'And they won't be alone in their graves,' added Bellatrix threateningly, looking her children up and down. 'Harry, I'll drop you off. I'll be seeing the both of you later,' she added, nodding towards Leo and Amy.

Amy shrugged, whereas Leo returned a curt nod. The Lestranges, Harry reflected grimly, shifting a bit in the snow, weren't exactly the warmest of parents.

Bellatrix held out her hand, and Harry, knowing what to expect, took it.

He had, by now, more data available to compare the thoroughly uncomfortable sensation of apparition than he would have liked, and it always had a distinct sensation to it, depending on the person in question. It had always perplexed him that Bella's magic, for all her, well, honestly slightly unhinged ways, felt incredibly smooth. She was, he reminded himself again, not someone you would want to have facing you down with her wand.

'Your grandfather is home, but apparently busy over arrangements and upcoming meetings. Cissy and I will be having a look every other day, just to see that things are in order. Also,' she said, gazing at him sternly, 'we will continue where we left off with your lessons.'

Harry was about to open his mouth when she continued mercilessly, 'And don't even think about talking back! You're still wet behind the ears when it comes to real duels. We haven't even touched the surface with curses; we'll find something that suits you yet, you better believe it!'

Harry sighed in a defeated sort of way. Witches were troublesome. 'Yes, Auntie.'

'Good. Was Amadina any trouble?'

'Not really,' answered Harry, stepping over the threshold of their Welsh mansion, smiling slightly at the sight of the little town and its magnificent castle nestled atop the small island. Peripherally aware of Bella's disbelieving look, he decided to clarify, 'At least much less than I expected. She's been positively virtuous – by her standards at least.'

'That girl's trouble,' said Bellatrix Lestrange, offhandedly aiming her wand at some dog from the village, grinning as it yelped in panic and hobbled off as far as its three remaining good legs could carry it. 'I wonder where she got it from.'

Once completely inside, Harry assured his aunt that he would be ready for her lesson the very next day, promising three times to refrain from ducking out of it.

As soon as Bellatrix had left, he dropped all pretence and his trunk both, rushing off towards the stairs.

He ignored the various portraits, running towards the library, past rows and rows of increasingly old and precious tomes, finally reaching the segment where each piece of their collection had its own glass casing. For a fraction of a second, his eyes lingered on a very special book in a gilded vitrine.

That wasn't the one he'd come for, though. No, the one that currently interested – and, more importantly, worried – him was the one in plain, cheap cow leather, near the very back. With a tap of his wand, the casing vanished, releasing the frail book with pages that seemed about to fall apart.

It had no title and no author; all they knew was that it had been written by some ancestor of theirs. His stomach felt leaden as he picked it up with trembling hands.

It couldn't be...

As fast as he dared to handle the fragile pages, he skipped to the part he'd studied just two years ago. Thankfully, some more recent family member had scribbled a translation of the passage in the margins.

'I have made the most incredible of discoveries! Finally, decades of research, thousands and thousands of Denarii later, the way forward has been illuminated to me. A source for their blood, which has cost me a hundred fortunes and lifetimes of luck to procure, shall be the catalyst of our union. Today, I will attempt the first summoning, using runic scripts to ensure our own safety. The village shall make a fine preliminary target for now. Everything is set. Come tomorrow, nobody will dare stand in our way!'

His eyes scanned the pages that followed, the diagrams, the sketches and designs, the incantations and intellectual rhapsodies, flying over them as fast and hungrily as ever.

The author was a verifiable genius, of that there could be no doubt. The use of charms Harry knew would only be publicised centuries later; flawless calculations, designs and drafts; the use of potion techniques that were still modern even by today's standards. In all honesty, Harry felt humbled, insignificant. And yet... And yet Harry couldn't quite shake the feeling that this, inexplicably, might have been a topic better left untouched. Some things – he had learned this lesson quite painfully himself – could never be understood. Some things, he knew, would always be alien to the human mind – dark and eternal.

'Bond of blood … mind of darkness ... potent Occlumency,' Harry muttered under his breath.

No matter how often he read the surprisingly short passages, he couldn't extract any new information. Was that a good or a bad thing? It worried him that the book had only so much to say about the object of its study.

His thoughts racing, he stared at the thick, ancient parchment, his eyes tracing the ink that had burned into the page just enough to be noticeable.

Hesitantly, he put the book back into its casing.

Then, he just stood there, as still and motionless as a monument to himself.

'No,' he whispered softly. 'Surely...'

With a start, he was off again, dashing madly towards the grand duelling chamber, his forlorn steps on the pristine marble echoing like drops of water in a vast cavern. His breathing grew ragged as he steadied himself with flailing hands by grabbing the nearest door frame. Finally, there it was! With all his might, he sprinted towards a certain spot behind a pillar at the far edge of the room.

There, softly glimmering in the darkness of the commonly abandoned chamber, in almost invisible blue-grey on the spotless marble shone four circles of, to his dismay, disturbingly familiar repeating runes.

Harry stared down at them, not daring to breathe, his heart hammering in his chest.

His eyes widened, and, in his slowly unfurling terror, he took the sleeve of his three-hundred Galleon robes and wiped with all his might at the scribbling on the floor.

Twenty seconds of sheer terror later, he dared to have another look.

The runes were still there, still undisturbed, still glowing in the permanent rune ink Aunt Narcissa had presented him on his fourteenth birthday.

'Oops!'

AN, Reference pointer: For those of you who don't quite remember or understand what's going on (which isn't so surprising given that the chapter this one refers to is more than half a year old), you might want to have a short look at chapter 11 (Thorns and Blossoms) again.