Malcolm was in deep, amiable conversation with Dr Riddle when Lyra and Hermione entered the Consulate Office. Dr Riddle's dæmon - who was a large anaconda called Nagini - seemed to be funning with Asta, Malcolm's dæmon, at their feet. She was entertaining the thickset cat by seeing how far her forked tongue could shoot out from her jaws, and whether Asta's paws were quick enough to playfully swipe at it.
So far, Nagini was winning.
Dr Riddle stood to welcome the two ladies as they entered his office, pulling up chairs and pouring them mugs of steaming tea, which was an unusual blend that was grown out in the tundra and mixed with the lichen and mosses that could be found in those regions. It gave the tea an earthy, bitter sort of note, but Hermione found she quite liked the unusualness of it. The tea was exotic, made her think of things other-wordly and stirred an excitement about where they were going next on her adventure.
Then there was Dr Riddle himself, who was a fascinating specimen of a man. He had a very unusual complexion, pale for the most part but not exactly white. It was a sort of emerald green, but so pale in hue that it was only after a very close look that the colour became visible at all. But, once noticed, it could not be unseen. Hermione was enchanted by him ... how could a man get green skin? Unable to contain her curiosity - and forgetting all the propriety Lyra had warned her to observe - she simply blurted out the question during a lull in the conversation.
Lyra bristled, Malcolm shook his head in admonishment, but Dr Riddle seemed perfectly jovial and at ease.
Hermione decided she liked him very much.
"It is an excellent and very valid question," Dr Riddle began in his disclosure. "And one few seem to ask. As much as I appreciate the respect intended, I am different. To not notice such a thing would be truly ignorant of the observer. And I am very pleased to see this young lady not only perceives the world around her, but also has the courage to attempt to understand it. Where I come from, Miss, courage is a truly vaunted virtue."
Hermione blushed and beamed at Dr Riddle for his validation of her. His voice was a little scary - almost a hiss as much as speech - but his glowing words quickly made Hermione forget all that. In fact, it only stoked her curiosity more.
"So, do you mind explaining how you came to look as you do?" Hermione asked respectfully. "I would really like to know."
"It would be my pleasure," Dr Riddle hissed.
The more he spoke in this manner, the more Hermione grew used to it. She reckoned that if she listened long enough she wouldn't even hear it as a hiss anymore. It would simply be an exotic accent. That settled the last of her nerves about him.
"You have been told, I'm sure, that I am not originally from this world?"
Hermione nodded. "Yes. Lyra, here, told me."
"I'm sure she did," Dr Riddle simpered towards Lyra, who seemed very unsure of the Witch-Consul. Pan and Asta were muttering furiously under Mal's chair and Hermione wondered what might have gotten them so animated, but she didn't have time to question it as Dr Riddle began speaking again. "Well, did she also tell you that, in my world, dæmons are in fact internal, and we don't see them at all?"
"She did," Hermione confirmed. "And I just cant imagine what that would be like. To not have my Pap close to me, to talk to, would make me very sad, I think."
"Indeed," Dr Riddle confirmed. "It is a huge advantage of this world to have such a blessing. To have one's very soul anchored and possibly even separate ... to advise and guide and assist. What a wonderful thing that is."
There was a trace of something darkly reverent, almost envious in Dr Riddle's tone. A sort of resentful malice that didn't seem in keeping with his general pleasant demeanour. It caused Hermione to falter a moment, but then the old joviality returned.
"So you see, it wasn't until I found myself in this world that I knew of such possibilities," Dr Riddle smiled, revealing oddly sharp-pointed teeth. "I was injured, barely clinging to life. Little more than shadow and vapour rather than a living, breathing man. Luckily, witches of the Northern Clans found me, nursed me back to health and told me about this wondrous place.
"I resolved to stay, then, and to offer my service to the Witch Clan as payment for their mercy in saving me. They were in need of a new Witch-Consul, as the incumbent man was old and sick, so I agreed to take on the position.
"However, in order to become part of this world - and to avoid suspicion from others - I had to endure the Witch Trial. It brought my dæmon to the surface, and I saw her for the first time. It was an agonising experience, not only to bring Nagini into the open, but also to separate from her at the very start. And the process ... changed me, too, in the physical alterations you can see. The cost of becoming part of this world, from the limited one I left. The pain in my heart I shall never forget. But, it was the correct choice, for all the benefits outweigh the sacrifice I made."
"You think it was worth it, then? The separation?" asked Hermione, her perspective tempted to change by Dr Riddle's admission.
"Oh yes, very much so," the Witch-Consul replied eagerly. "I would recommend it to anyone. You lose none of the deep connection to your dæmon, and while there is a period of hurt and melancholy, the joy of reunion more than makes up for it. And the net result is the swathe of benefits that being separated brings. Why more people don't engage with the process baffles me. I feel more whole now than I ever did in my previous life."
"Wow," Hermione blinked, digging her fingers into Pap's trembling fur to still him. This sounded intriguing, and if it wasn't as bad as Dr Riddle said, maybe it wasn't such a frightening thing after all.
And in that moment, Hermione Granger thought it might be quite the brilliant thing, to become a witch. She wondered if it would suit her. She rather thought she might like to try.
Dr Riddle turned to address Malcolm once more, to resume their previous discussion. "So, Dr Polstead, you were saying about applying for a transit visa to the Polar Observatory?"
"Yes," Malcolm confirmed. "I was there, you know, when the gateway was opened, and I am welcome back any time. I consider it one of the greatest achievements of my life's work, and I wish to show my ... wife and child ... the reason that I was away from them so, so long during its construction."
Dr Riddle turned his thin eyes to his guests and surveyed them intently.
"A family? I would never have guessed," Dr Riddle sneered. "Your daughter doesn't look very much like either of you."
"I adopted her when she was very young," Lyra cut in briskly. "She was my niece's - the poor girl fell accidentally pregnant on her first teenage birthday. I agreed to take Hermione as my own, so the girl could live her childhood. Mal and I married some years later. Ours is an ... unusual family unit, but the bonds between us are strong."
Hermione opened her mouth, as if to argue, but then her breath caught shockingly in her lungs. For Pantalaimon had stealthily approached and actually touched her hand! Rubbed his head up against her fingers, where they were dangling at the side of her chair. The breach of this unspoken, most-intimate of barriers silenced Hermione where she was.
And she understood immediately. There was something not right about Dr Riddle and his dæmon! She hadn't noticed the violation Pan had committed by touching her. Every dæmon Hermione had ever met would have been alerted to it, as though a rend had been made in the very fabric of the air itself. Something was wrong here. And Hermione noticed then that Mal had made up a story about being married to Lyra, and Lyra had immediately jumped on it and embellished the tale, with a false history about a non-existent niece.
Then it struck her. They were trying to deceive Dr Riddle.
Hermione couldn't understand why, but that wasn't important. All that mattered was that they were, and Hermione had been on the verge of undermining it! Pan had no choice! He partook in this willing break of established social etiquette to silence her, before she gave their ruse away. Hermione may not have understood what was going on, but she was nothing if not loyal.
She trusted Lyra, she was starting to trust Malcolm, too. They were in this together. And if they wanted to hide something from this Witch-Consul, it was her job to play along, so they could get from him what they needed.
Hermione cleared her throat and turned to Lyra. "Mummy - can I go out and play by the harbour? It's ever so stuffy in here with all these furs on. Please can I?"
Lyra flicked her head to Hermione. Her eyes glazed over a moment, as though they were melting for some reason, but she gathered her wits about her quickly.
"Okay, sweetheart, but don't go out of sight of the window," Lyra swooned back. "No further than Pap can get back, if he needs us to come and rescue you from Slavers or Tartars!"
"Okay, Mummy, thank you!" Hermione beamed. She leapt up, swooped down to kiss Lyra affectionately on the cheek, then darted out of the door into the cold air.
It was only when they were clear away from the Consulate that Pap emerged from Hermione's jacket, became an Arctic fox, and turned to Hermione in deadly seriousness.
"I cant believe Pan touched you!" Papageno gasped out.
"He had to, Pap! I nearly did something very silly!" Hermione cried shrilly.
"I know. But I thought kissing Lyra was a bit much."
"I had to!" Hermione shrieked. "I had to make the scheme look convincing. I nearly ruined the whole thing. I had to make amends."
"She liked that a lot. Did you see how she smiled when you did it?" Pap began cautiously.
"No, I didn't," Hermione admitted. "But I think she likes a bit of affection, that's all. Her eyes are so sad most of the time. It was nice to see a bit of life in them. Odd that a hug and a kiss from me did that, but it was still nice that she was happy for a second."
"Maybe she always wanted a child of her own," Papageno mused.
"What makes you say that?"
"Well, we had to pretend to be a family to get onto the boat, now Lyra's made up a whole story about adopting you," Pap pointed out. "Her stories are all the same. I know Pan said Lyra's not as imaginative as an adult as she was when she was a girl, but even so. In all of her ruses she plays a mother ... your mother."
"But I already have a mother," Hermione frowned in her puzzlement.
"Yes, but Lyra doesn't have a daughter, does she?" Pap went on. "And now she's looking after you, which is like pretending to be a Mum."
"What are you getting at, Pap?" Hermione asked briskly. "If you have a point, come to it quickly."
"I'm just saying, perhaps we shouldn't be so familiar with Lyra," Pap argued. "If she secretly wanted to have a little girl of her own, but couldn't for whatever reason, she might be living that life now. With us. We don't know what that might mean, or what she might do."
"You aren't making a lot of sense!" Hermione scowled. "Where has this suspicion come from? Lyra has been nothing but nice and lovely to us since the beginning."
"Yes, exactly ... the beginning. Where she found us, happily let us use her illegal truth-reader, told us you are going to fall in love, and now she's taking us across worlds. She said herself that her long lost love is in another world. How do we know she's not just using us to get there?"
"A-are you saying ... that you think she lied to us?" Hermione asked in a tiny voice. "Do ... do you think I wont fall in love?"
Her voice was so needy and heartsick that Papageno became an ermine again, to wrap comfortingly around Hermione's little throat.
"Of course I think you'll fall in love," Pap soothed. "You have so much love to give that lots of people will probably fall in love with you, and you will fall back in love with one of them. I just don't know why that has to be with a strange boy in a far off other world. But Lyra told you that, and it turned your head on a sixpence. And now I can see that she lies very easily, and we know adults always have their own agendas. I just wonder if she's lied to us."
"Who else has lied?" Hermione queried, trying to stop her heart from sinking at the very real possibility that Papageno was utterly right, and that they'd committed to a journey that might not be about her at all, might not even be based on truth at all. It was enough to make her sick with worry.
"That Witch-Consul lied," Pap began darkly.
"About what?"
"About his dæmon, for a start."
"What about her?"
"She isn't a dæmon at all - she's a real snake!"
"What!" Hermione gasped in shock. "How could you tell?"
"She didn't smell right," Pap explained. "And not only that, but she had a dæmon, inside her. Just like Dr Riddle. Their dæmons are still internal - they are just pretending they're not."
"But why?"
"I don't know, but I think that's what Mal and Lyra are trying to find out, because Pan and Asta knew as well. I could tell."
"Or maybe they just want to make contact with the Witches, and get us to them, without letting on to Dr Riddle that they know the truth about him," Hermione mused worryingly. "Oh, Pap - this is so confusing! Why do grown-ups play these sorts of games with each other?"
"I don't know, but I think maybe we should learn how to play," Pap replied lowly. "It's too late to turn back now, but at least we can be prepared going forward."
"But who can we trust, Pap?" Hermione moaned. "I so like Lyra and Mal."
"We trust each other, as always," Pap returned stoutly. "We stick together, and when we know more, we can decide what the truth is. Then we can make a final decision on who to trust or not."
"Okay. But Pap, I'm still going to find my Mr Potter," Hermione declared firmly. "I don't know if anything we think is true anymore ... but that ... it just feels right. I have to see it through now."
"I know, and I agree," Pap smiled supportively. "And I'll be right here with you when you do."
"Come on," Hermione huffed pointedly as she stood up. "Let's go back to the others ... and see if they've all quite finished lying to each other yet."
