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Chapter 37: Hell Hath No Fury

A strong sense of deja vu crashed over him. It was like being back in the conference room with Dumbledore and Grindelwald when he had first mentioned horcruxes — sitting stone still in a silence so deep, it would soon drown him.

"You two have met before?" The barest hint of amusement hovered at the edges of Vieilla's words.

While Harry gaped and groped for words, Narcissa did the last thing he expected from her. "We're close friends, Master Vieilla!" she said with a smile so sweet, most men would probably have swooned at seeing it.

The artificer's smile was slyer. "Are you now?"

Narcissa actually bounced on the balls of her slippered feet. "Oui, Master Vieilla."

Vieilla swept up from his seat in a single, fluid step. "In that case, I trust that you can see to him?"

Narcissa curtsied with the ease most men walk with. "Happily."

"Excellent," the artificer said. Harry reeled in his high-backed chair, searching for the bottom that had just dropped out of his stomach. "Summon me if the need arises."

The man moved smoothly around the long table before gliding past Narcissa and exiting the room. The soft sound made by the door latching resounded like a thunderclap. It seemed to echo through the conference room long after it ought to have been reduced to memory.

"Malcolm Renn." Narcissa conveyed every ounce of disdain Draco had ever brought to bear against Harry during their years of Hogwarts, all while maintaining perfect courtesy. "A man of many faces."

Harry cleared his throat. "You must have known Renn wasn't my real name." Hearing that defence aloud filled his face with warmth. It had sounded far stronger in his head.

"It's difficult deciding what you know when an unknown man strolls in carrying the genuine sword of Godric Gryffindor." It was a wonder so much venom could pour out at him while she maintained a masterpiece of impassivity.

Harry fidgeted underneath the weight of her stoic stare. "I did tell you it was real."

Finally Narcissa's nostrils flared. "Did you tell me you would be appearing in my enchantry uninvited, splinched, and covered in blood?"

"I… hadn't realized I splinched myself," was all he could get out while fighting down the flush of heat flowing up into his face.

"That's because I put you back together before transporting you to St. Mungo's." What was he supposed to say? "All I wanted in return were answers." Narcissa stalked toward the place he sat, looming larger than a mountain just before a climb as she stopped behind his chair. Like boulders her hands fell, pinning him in place via their tight grip on his shoulders. Boulders from a volcanic eruption, maybe. Harry swore that heat was blazing underneath her skin and boring into him. "I will have my answers now," she said as if passing judgement. "I will make sure of that."

Harry sat there, frozen while a hundred ways he could escape flashed through his mind. It would be so easy to flick his wrist and summon the Elder Wand. Even without it, he could probably have overpowered her. "Sign your name," he said instead.

Narcissa's fingers dug into his traps. "What?"

"Your name," he gritted out. "That contract's another nondisclosure. Sign it." Vieilla had left his blood quill on the table.

There was a short pause before the response came down from overhead. "Will you answer my questions if I do?"

Harry worked his jaw without producing any words. She had saved him, both the night he'd fled to her enchantry and with the killing curse she had shot at Riddle's back. "Some of them."

Nails bit through his robes and raked along his skin. "Some of them?"

"There are things I can't tell you," Harry gritted out. "Not even if I wanted to. I'll answer what I can if you sign that contract."

"Fine." The pressure lifted and Narcissa loped around the table. Harry massaged feeling into his shoulders while Narcissa claimed her master's chair and read over the contract in almost as little time as Vieilla had before adding her name.

Harry braced himself the best he could. "Ask away."

"What is your real name?"

Some semblance of the regret Dumbledore must have felt at the end of Harry's first year seized him. "I can't tell you."

Narcissa's mouth pressed into a thin line. "Why not?"

The first question, and I already have to lie. It made him guilty for reasons he could not explain. "Because I don't know myself."

"What do you mean you don't know your real name?" Each syllable was a slow stroke made with a sharp knife.

"I don't remember anything before this summer." Harry choked down a hot lump in his throat. Why was this so difficult? I need to be hard. "The first thing I remember is waking up inside a huge cavern and then panicking."

"And your first reaction was to cast Fiendfyre?"

"I remember some things," Harry said. "Names, magic, impressions of what my life was like — some details are there. Plenty of instincts, even though I don't remember where most of them came from."

"You must not remember how to lie convincingly." Narcissa's eyes were shards of ice poised to pierce his throat. "I did not sign my name in blood just so you could sit here and feed me feeble lies."

Harry made sure his breathing was in order before responding. "The official records—"

Narcissa's palm pounded onto the table. "Are not what I am here for!" A faint rattle filled the space between them even after she had shouted.

"I told you there are things I can't answer," Harry reminded her.

"Oh, silly me, I wasn't under the impression that a name is beyond my clearance level. So sorry, Oh Faceless One, I thought that signing two separate nondisclosures in my own blood would be enough for you!"

Anger prickled underneath his skin. I need to be hard. "You don't understand," he tried. "You—"

"Have been rotting in this stinking city while you galavant across the globe doing whatever it is that tickles your heroic fancy!"

"It isn't like that!" Harry could feel each drumbeat in his chest. "I've never gallivanted a day in my life!"

Narcissa made a dramatic gesture. "It's a miracle! He remembers! Praise be! The evil enchantress unworthy of an ounce of trust has cured the brainless bag of lies."

"Enough! You—"

"I'm so scared!" Narcissa swooned in her chair with a hand over her heart. "Big bad No-Name who's had such a hard life he can't bear to talk about it is getting mad!"

"You don't know the first fucking thing about a hard life, you pampered pureblood slut!" Veins stood out along Harry's arms as he balled his fists.

His head bounced against the high back of his chair and almost rebounded into the table. Stinging seared his cheek and blood boiled in his ears. She slapped me. Narcissa Black, the proud and perfect pureblood princess had lowered herself to laying hands on him.

Harry looked up, too stunned to speak, and saw that she was standing over him again, brandishing a finger in his face. "Don't you ever call me that again!" Her cheeks were a pink sheen creeping toward crimson and her shoulders shook with rage. "I have never let a simpleminded fool like you touch me! I would never lower myself to that. Not that I could whore myself out, even if I had no dignity and wanted to." Her brittle laughter bored into him and twisted something in his chest.

"Pampered pureblood, am I? A pampered pureblood who was trapped inside her own home because her parents cared more about preserving her for some pig with a pretty name than granting her a life. Pampered pureblood who finally broke free, all for Riddle to come around and fuck it up!" The sound of a curse on her tongue shocked him almost as much as being slapped.

"Pampered pureblood who had to lock herself up in this hellhole all because that filthy sack of scum did his best to rape her." Harry stiffened in his chair. "Did you not know?" She laughed again. This time it was a sound as empty as a freshly dug grave. "Oh yes, pampered, pureblood slut, shut up in Paris because her own father would happily turn her over to the rapist who tried claiming her. Pampered pureblood princess who waits on the whims of men, hoping she can one day live her life." Narcissa lurched away from him and leant against the table. Her chest rose and fell with each heaving breath she took, her hand shaking where it was curled around the table's edge to hold her up and steady.

Harry felt a large amount of tension flee from him and hated himself for it. Why was he more comfortable now after being slapped and screamed at than when she had merely stared at him? Was it because he was right in all of this? "I shouldn't have called you a slut," he said, calmer and more clearly than he had yet spoken to her.

"You don't fucking say!" Narcissa spat the words so fiercely, saliva splattered onto the floor.

Harry leant back in his chair. "I'm sorry for that part."

Narcissa released the table so she could straighten up. "For that—"

Harry levelled her with the kind of glare often earned by new recruits questioning their generals. "I wasn't thinking," he said when she faltered. "You touched a nerve and I bit back with the most insulting thing I could come up with. I'm sorry for that." Harry pressed ahead just as she was opening her mouth. "But you really don't understand. There's no way you can ever understand."

"Men and their brooding melodrama." The edge her words bore had dulled. "When will all of you learn the world doesn't revolve around your bollocks?"

"I could ask you the same thing. You want answers, princess?" Her eyes flashed, but she held her tongue. Something about his deathly calm must have been what kept her quiet. "I've never gallivanted around because I've never had the chance. All I've known is conflict. I feel more comfortable when you scream at me than when you stand and stare. I'm calmer fighting Riddle in the streets of Paris than I am around a group of strangers."

Narcissa was no longer panting. The colour in her cheeks was lightening. "Would you like to trade hairs and go about each other's business?"

"That would only make things worse." How he hated the bitterness in that reply. "I don't know what to do with freedom. Every time I relax, I feel like someone's going to die."

"That's—"

"It might be ridiculous, but it's not melodramatic," Harry preempted her. "The truth is that I don't think the world has ever turned according to what I've done or what I want. I think it just keeps turning and dragging me along." When had he ever been allowed to choose anything important? "You complained about your parents and the way they treated you. I'm sorry about that. I hate anyone who mistreats their kids, but I would trade you all of it."

"It's easy saying that." Though no longer fraught with wrath, her words were every bit as bitter as his own. "Everyone thinks it's easy; beauty, money, wits, magic — what don't I have that people want?"

"I'm not saying your life's easy." Is any life ever easy? Sometimes he wondered what the point of living was if it always came with so much pain. "You just don't understand. You say it's easy for me to say I'd take your life? I think it's easy to sit and bitch about restrictive parents when you can remember them." No sound poured forth from Narcissa's parted lips. "I would trade you everything. All my secrets, all my power, everything I've ever known. I would give you all of it if it brought my parents back."

"I—"

"I would give you everything I've ever had if the fighting would just stop." The faintest hint of a tremor touched his voice. I need to be hard. "I would give you everything you ever wanted if I could just live a life that didn't make me sick and hateful." The Elder Wand was ice cold inside its holster. "But we can't all have everything we want." It was as if he was eleven once again, staring into the faces of his family swimming behind silver glass, so close yet worlds away. "All we're guaranteed is pain. The best lives are the ones that have the least of it."

Harry looked into Narcissa's stony face and felt the anger swell in him again. Maybe she has a point about men and melodrama. What had he been doing, spouting off at her as if she would understand? Like a child failing to see why no one saw things their way.

He stood without making a sound. "Have Vieilla owl me when the enchantments have been figured out."

"Wait!" His hand paused just inches from the doorknob. "Sit back down." Narcissa's voice called out to him, as soft as silken sheets. "Please."

Please… The word reverberated through him, shaking loose a score of his most haunting memories.

Please…

Matted clumps of bushy hair had clung onto Hermione's raw scalp in a dark basement strewn with strands of hair and streaks of blood. "Please," she had whispered in a rare bout of lucidity. "Harry… please."

Although the conference room he shared with Narcissa was both bright and warm, he could feel cool wind stirring the silver hem of that cloak he had been trapped under the night Dumbledore had died. "Severus…" his mentor had pleaded in a rasping, broken voice. "Severus… please."

"I'm sorry." It was hard to say what surprised him more, Narcissa Black apologizing or him being in the high-backed chair with no memory of getting there. "I let your barb offend me. It should never have earned that kind of rise. I started talking without thinking. I'm sorry… for everything. It's been a long month."

"I am too." It was strange how much he meant it, how sharply the guilt was stabbing at him. "I shouldn't have snapped and I shouldn't have ranted. It's been a long couple of months for me too."

Had it been anyone except Narcissa, he might have called the way she looked at him from underneath her lashes bashful. "From the beginning?"

Harry ducked his head and sighed, then looked up again. "All right."

Narcissa reached across the table from her place sitting in the second chair. Harry clasped her hand. Her skin was smooth like he remembered, but not so cool this time; more like sunbaked marble than moon-soaked seastone. "Narcissa Black," she said. "I'm a recognized master in the field of enchanting and a daughter of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black."

"Harry." It was the closest thing to truth that he could give her. "Just Harry. No fancy names or titles. I'm just trying to do what I think is right."

Narcissa held his hand for longer than he would call normal before releasing it. "I should probably thank you."

"Let's call it even and start over, shall we?" She briefly pursed her lips before smoothing out her face and nodding. "All right, then. Ask your questions."

Puzzlement played across her face for the span of several seconds before she snapped back to the present. "How did you steal the artifacts from Riddle?"

"I left dinner early the night of Yule and dealt with his defences — I'd been studying them for weeks whenever I could get away with it. I was only able to study the wards outside the gargoyle though, so the ones in his office tripped me up. It was a near thing."

"Just like that." Narcissa looked him up and down, as though he might be hiding lies beneath his cloak.

"It usually is just like that," he told her. "There usually aren't great stories behind these sorts of things. They just… happen."

"Why did you steal them?"

"I've known for a while Riddle was up to something," Harry answered. "I've watched him take my friends and change them." A shadow fell across Narcissa's face. Andromeda, he realized. She must have seen it too. "I had a lead that Riddle might be behind the attack on those muggles on Samhain and that he was planning more. I hoped that if I could steal the artifacts, he might do something stupid and expose himself."

"Your friends," Narcissa said with tepid care, "how much have they changed?"

"It's hard to say," Harry admitted. "I had a row with one of them, though I'm actually not sure if that was Riddle's fault. Her and another started competing for his attention around that time. That's basically destroyed their friendship."

No scrap of what she was thinking swirled through Narcissa's eyes. "So that's why you've been after him?"

"It's part of it. There are other reasons I can't tell you. I'm sorry. I think that night in Paris proves I really am against him, if that's any comfort."

"That, the artifacts, and the solstice." So she knew about the solstice. It made him wonder what else she had pieced together. "I know you're against him. It's just… well I understand why I want Riddle's throat torn out. My sister's no more than his puppet these days and he…" Narcissa swallowed and did not go on.

Harry leant forward in his chair and sought out her eyes. "I will kill him, for what it's worth."

"Is that what these are about?" Narcissa gestured to the founders' trinkets. "Do you think they might be useful?"

"Not really," he admitted with a sigh. "It would be stupid not to make sure, though. I need every advantage and I know there are all sorts of rumours about Ravenclaw's diadem, at the very least."

Narcissa sniffed. "Don't tell me you seriously believe them?"

"I know magic can't just make someone a genius," Harry told her. "It is enchanted though, and most rumours come from somewhere."

Narcissa trailed her fingers along the tiara's band. "I think I'll examine this one first, if you have no objections."

Harry cocked an eyebrow. "I assumed Vieilla would look them over. Aren't you his apprentice?"

"I am his apprentice only so long as I'm stuck in this infernal city." Some of her fire had returned. "I will be looking these over for myself. Alden Vieilla can bite me if he has a problem with that."

I wish him the best of luck with that. Something told Harry the artificer would be in need of it. "That's fine by me. Like I said, I don't actually expect anything to come of it."

Narcissa folded her hands atop the tablecloth. "What I would like to know is why you apparated through my wards looking like a butchered carcass."

"Ah, that." Harry adjusted the collar of his cloak, scolding himself for not planning his answer to that question in advance. "I tried attacking Riddle's manor."

Narcissa tilted her head and looked at him like he was slow. "You what?"

"Not up close," Harry said with an affronted frown. "I cast Sgriosfàile from outside his ward line."

"Cast what?"

"It's kind of like Fiendfyre, but with air."

"I was under the impression Fiendfyre was unique," Narcissa said.

"It's the most well-known from a set of four spells," Harry explained. "There's one for each element and they all work a bit differently. The elemental incarnations of hatred, they're called."

"I'm still confused," Narcissa said after a short pause.

Harry scratched his head. "It's hard to explain. It's like the air—"

"Not about the spell. About why you would attack Riddle's manor so openly."

"For the same reason I stole the artifacts; the stakes had just gone up a bit after the solstice. A bit of that too, I guess. I think a part of me hoped to get him back for torturing another friend of mine."

Narcissa wrinkled her nose. "You and Potter?"

Harry dragged his right hand through his hair and shook his head, as if to clear it. "It's complicated."

"Uh-huh." Narcissa waited until it was clear no elaboration was forthcoming. "You haven't explained why you apparated into my enchantry."

Harry grimaced. He had hoped the information about him attacking Riddle's manor might have been adequate distraction. "I wasn't really thinking."

Just for a second, the corner of Narcissa's mouth tugged up. "You have me questioning how often you do think."

"It was the last place I'd been." Harry found himself fumbling for the proper words. "It—"

Narcissa waved a hand. "That's good enough. I understand." Why did she sound amused? How had her mood changed so quickly? "I won't waste a question asking why you infiltrated Riddle's ranks. I imagine the answer is the same." There was a long pause. "What are your plans after Riddle has been dealt with?"

To get back home. There was another monster who was in desperate need of killing. And so it goes on. As it always would, so long as any version of his nemesis survived. "I don't know," Harry said.

"You should consider it," Narcissa told him. "Your talents are well-suited for prestigious and well-paid positions." Harry merely nodded, unsure what else to do or say. "Why did you flee from St. Mungo's?"

Well, shit. It was not as if he could tell Narcissa a dream about her had unmanned him. "I was worried what you might ask and was in no state to answer anything."

"I understand completely." She could not have said more plainly she knew he was lying, yet once again there was amusement in her tone.

"My turn," Harry said. Something had to be done to turn the tides; Narcissa had grown too smug. "Why did you bring me to St. Mungo's, and why were you waiting there the next morning?"

Narcissa licked her lips before responding. "I wondered whether you had clashed with Riddle. I was worried he had connected the two of us. If he had, my plan was to attach myself to you."

"Is that all, then?" Harry asked, unsure what he had been hoping for.

"Just one more thing," Narcissa said with deceptive sweetness. "Never call me princess again."

Harry surprised himself by laughing. "I'll keep that in mind. Good enough?"

"It will do." Narcissa offered him her hand again. Harry's fingers tingled when they touched hers. "I'm holding you to that promise."

A frown dragged at Harry's lips. "What promise?"

"You told me you would kill Riddle. I will hold you to that." Narcissa's grip was as unyielding as an iron clamp. "And if I can, I'll help you do it."

James laid back on the conjured sofa and inhaled the scent of her. It reminded him of summer sunshine and of fresh cut grass, of a gentle breeze and wildflowers. Her weight on him was comforting, a woven blanket that fit him like a glove. That bright red hair he so admired fanned out from her head's place on his chest and tickled underneath his chin.

No matter how long they lay there, he continued to look at her and to breathe her scent, hoping that the sight and smell of her would reassure him this was not a dream. Worse, he worried she would disappear. What had he done to earn this beyond making an arse of himself more times than he could count?

"Open your fucking eyes!" Sirius had shouted at him. "The whole school sees it. Everyone but you. You're too tied up in your fantasy to step back and see the bigger picture."

Over and over that memory assaulted him. Every time he made progress bolstering his confidence, it would swim up and drag his hopes beneath black depths and drown them. There was no avoiding that soft voice whispering in the back of his mind each time he recalled the confrontation, asking whether Sirius might have had the right of things. The most infuriating part was that he had yet to come up with any way of disproving Sirius's stance.

That doesn't matter, he told himself for the hundredth time. It's not all about proof. What had his father said when James had first been made a prefect?

"Being a leader is like living life. Your opinion is the one that matters in the end. That sounds great when you're a kid or when you don't have power, but then you grow up and there's a lot of pressure. There are a hundred different arguments floating all around you and you have to choose which ones to listen to and which ones to ignore."

"How do you do it?" James had asked.

"You choose and hope." His father had ruffled his hair. "All right, there are some things you can do. You usually find out which people you can rely on and weigh their opinions more heavily than the others. And you do listen. Remember that, James."

"What if their opinion's stupid?" he had pressed.

That had earned another chuckle. "You don't have to agree, but you should listen."

Sirius was hardly the most reliable perspective. Had he not insisted upon leading Snivellus to the forest clearing where Moony had been waiting out the full moon? Had James not been right to try and talk him out of it?

"James?" Lily lifted her head off his chest and peered into his face. "Are you okay? You went really stiff and got this distant look."

"I'm all right, Lils." James rubbed small circles on her back until she let her head droop down onto his chest. "Just stressed, is all."

"Oh." There was a short pause. "I'll wait until another day, then."

James's waistband stretched as his heart sped up. "Wait another day for what?"

"I was just going to ask you something. It was silly. It's okay."

"No, it's all right. Go ahead." He liked when she asked questions, even when they came in place of other things he had been hoping for.

Lily lifted her head again. She was nibbling on her bottom lip. "Any time I've seen pictures of your dad at events and such, he's always wearing the same ring. It looks like it's made from iron, except it almost seems to glow red. Is that just the lighting of the photos?"

"No." James's parents had taught him not to banter lightly when it pertained to his father's ring, but this was Lily Evans, the most mature, responsible girl whom he had ever met, and it's not as though it was a sensitive question. "It's enchanted. Something about the enchantments is what causes the lighting. I'm not sure how, though. That's never really been my area."

"Enchanted?" She looked up at him from beneath red lashes. "Is it really made from iron?"

"I think so. It does look like iron."

Lily continued nibbling her lip. "It must have been really expensive."

James frowned. "Why would it have been expensive? It's just iron."

Lily let out a long sigh. "It's not just iron, James. Iron is highly sought after for enchanting."

"Really?" Casting his mind back through the years, no mention of iron's value came to him. "There's just so much of it, I wouldn't have guessed — well, supply and demand."

"It's not always about supply and demand," Lily pointed out. "Sometimes things are valuable enough that we make sure there's a supply of them. Have you ever wondered why iron is used so much in construction-type work; buildings, machines that will be under heavy loads, and so on?"

"Not really," James admitted. "I always just thought it was one of the strongest metals and was good for building and all that."

Lily laid her palm against his chest and began rubbing from his breastbone to his collarbone. A trail of warmth spread from the places where she touched him. "It's more than that. Iron holds magic better than any other metal. Enchantments tend to be stronger and last longer when placed on iron. They're really hard to cast on it, though, because its durability means more power and precision is needed for the magic to take hold."

"So if they put structural support charms and whatnot on iron, they don't have to recast them or strengthen them as often?"

Lily squeezed his shoulder. "Exactly. Iron used to be cheaper for the muggles. A lot of witches and wizards used that to get it for less gold. Since the order has taken over the prices have skyrocketed on both sides. If your dad owns an enchanted iron ring…" She lowered her eyes.

James tightened his grip on her. "Hey, what's wrong?"

"I don't know." Her face was buried in his chest, her voice muffled.

"Lils." He stroked her hair and coaxed her head back up. "What's up?"

"Your family is just so rich and influential. Your mother's a Black and the First Lady, and your father's the most powerful man in Britain, and I'm just a nobody. I worry that they might not accept me. It's not like I bring anything to the table."

James's heartstrings twanged. "Hey, don't talk like that. You're the brightest witch I know. You'll be raking in the aurums one day, whatever you do after Hogwarts." She offered him a tremulous half-smile. "It's not that big a deal," he insisted. "My parents always told me I could marry whoever. And besides, my dad never bought the ring."

Lily's eyebrows scrunched, then un-scrunched as she blinked. "He didn't?"

"It was a gift from the Emperors. The big five governors got them — you know, the ones on the High Council; Laurier, Viallo, Muhindo, Zheng, and Dad."

"A gift from the Emperors…" Lily looked awestruck.

James could not help but grin. "I've always been pretty proud of it. It makes me realize how cool my dad is. It's easy to forget sometimes, you know, being a teenager and all."

Lily lowered her head again. "I don't really know what that's like. I don't remember much about my parents."

"Oh shit, I'm sorry Lils, I wasn't thinking." James wanted nothing more than to tear his own hair out over the lapse.

"It's all right. It's just weird hearing you talk about realizing what your father's really like, and how cool he is. Not knowing and all, I just wonder what they're like sometimes."

James removed his arm from her back long enough to scratch his hairline. "What what's like?"

"It's nothing," she muttered. "You probably wouldn't want to hear it."

James hugged her tight against his chest. "I want to hear anything you feel like telling me."

"Are you sure?" Her bottom lip was still wedged between her teeth. "It's just… it's a bit of a criticism of the empire."

"Dad doesn't agree with everything," James said, briefly drawing back his arm so he could wave his hand. "Mum doesn't agree with most things, to tell the truth. I'm not sure how much you follow politics and all that rubbish, but the Blacks have always been against the empire. It was a real shock back when Mum and Dad got married. Caused a bit of a scandal, actually."

Lily breathed amusedly into his collarbone. "I wish I could have seen their faces."

"Me too. Mum used to joke she'd never forgive Dad for not having Grandpa's face from the night when he told him made up into a portrait." Lily giggled, then fell silent. "So?" he prompted. "I promise I won't be mad." He could feel her thinking as the seconds ticked, so he let the silence reign.

"I was talking about my parents," Lily said at last, "wondering what they're like. Then that just got me thinking… well, sometimes I wonder if it's really best, taking muggle children from their parents."

"They have to know what they're getting into, don't they?" James asked.

Lily's eyes sparked with something hot and fierce. Not anger. It was a positive emotion, just one he could not place. "I'm not sure they do," she said. "They all got on well enough for centuries."

James turned that over. "I'd never really thought about it. It's just kind of been the way of things as long as I remember."

"The headmaster was raised by muggles for most of his childhood," Lily reminded him. "It wasn't until he was already an up-and-coming prodigy studying at Hogwarts that havens were institutionalized."

"Didn't Riddle go around for years doing speeches about how the muggles who raised him were awful and how his life got so much better once the emperors took over?" James countered.

"True, but not all muggles are like that." Lily's lips tugged down. "I don't remember them well, but I know my parents weren't."

"I guess that's fair." Merlin, how had he never heard any of this talked about before? "I guess muggles are just people. There are plenty of bad wizards, too. Sirius's Mum and Dad are real nasty bits of work. He's practically lived with me the last couple years."

"Exactly, and it gets more interesting." Lily had clearly spent long hours contemplating all of this. The surprise he felt at that revelation needled him. Stupid git, he chided himself. Of course she has. "Name a great muggleborn or muggle-raised witch or wizard since the Surrender?" she asked.

"Bloody hell, Lils, you know I'm not that kind of smart." James laughed lightly. "I'm good at figuring things out and doing magic, but I've never been able to memorize things like you can."

"I can't name one."

That brought him up short. "Really?" She bobbed her head. "What about before?"

Lily tossed her head and sent her red curls spilling across his left arm. "There are loads. Emeric the Evil — oh, don't give me that look. He might have been awful, but are you really going to lay there and tell me he wasn't brilliant?"

"It's just not a pleasant thought," James muttered. "Who else?"

"Paracelsus—"

"Sweet Merlin, Lils. I know they were brilliant, but naming a load of dark tossers isn't going to convince anyone."

Lily thrust out her chin. Oh, Merlin, I've done it now. "Paracelsus was not dark. That's ridiculous. Magic isn't light or dark. It's the people who cast it that's the problem. Anyway, Paracelsus wasn't that bad." He must have looked skeptical because she huffed right in his face. "He wasn't!"

"All right, all right, I believe you," James told her. "I thought he was into necromancy and all sorts of stuff."

"Paracelsus was an alchemist," Lily explained. "He was a rival of Nicholas Flamel's. Flamel had already created the Philosopher's Stone, so Paracelsus wanted to do one better. He wanted to create life."

"Did he do it?" James felt a bit foolish for asking; all he really knew was that the old bloke had a chocolate frog card.

"Kind of." Lily pursed her lips. "He created what he called a homunculus. It wasn't really life since it didn't have a soul, but he did create the body. Paracelsus boasted about how he had found a way to transport souls into the new vessels before their bodies expired, but he died before they could be proven and most people just assume that he was bluffing."

"All right, all right. The bloke's a bit creepy, but he wasn't evil," James conceded. "Can you think of others? Muggleborns who turned out brilliant before the Empire, I mean?"

"Oh, Merlin, James — there are so many. Johannes Kepler blended magic and muggle technology so well, his work is cited as a catalyst for the Statute of Secrecy. Hector Barbosa is a notorious mind mage and an elementalist; some say he created some incredible air and water-based spells that have been lost to time. Giambuono de' Medic helped found Gringotts, Skanderbeg won against impossible odds when fighting against the Ottomans, Hennig Brand was an alchemist who discovered things like phosphorus—"

"All right, all right. I get the point." James stroked her hair, pondering what she had told him. "Can you really not think of any since The Surrender?"

Lily shook her head. "The headmaster is recognized as the last great muggle product." She scowled. "At least by those who don't just pretend him being raised by muggles doesn't matter just because he's a descendent of Salazar Slytherin."

"But the names you mentioned — didn't some of them live, like, hundreds of years apart?"

Lily took on a determined look. "I can keep going. Give me a century."

"No, no, I get it," James said, holding up his hands in mock surrender. "It's just weird."

"Is it?" Lily challenged. "Muggleborns were mistreated before The Surrender. That's awful and all, but it meant they had a chip on their shoulder, something driving them. Now they're just a bunch of kids who have to adjust to new homes and are thrown into a world without much emotional support. The havens do their best, but they're no substitute for family. That sort of thing's important."

"I've never really thought of it that way." A smile spread onto James's face. "Not that it'll last long. You'll break that trend. I know you will."

Lily beamed at him. "You think so?"

James touched his lips to hers. "Definitely. And hey, you can tell all this to my Mum and Dad over the summer." He gave her another gentle squeeze when he felt her tense. "My mum loves debates. She'll at least listen." He winked down at her. "And hey, if you impress her enough, maybe they'll let you see the ring."

The smile he received was brighter than any he had seen since they had started dating. "I would love that, James."

"Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned."

— William Shakespeare

A special thank you to my high-tier patron, Cup, for her generous and unwavering support.

PS: The next chapter will be out in one week. Remember that chapters can be read early on Discord, YouTube, and P*T*E*N! All those links are on my profile, and if any give you trouble, use my website's homepage. That site can be found via a generic Google search of my pen name.