lomonaaeren

Thank you again for all the reviews! This is the last part of this installment; I’ll be updating the story with another arc between Samhain and the winter solstice.

Part Four

Hermione sat with her hands over her face, her breathing rapid and shallow. She had spent part of the day looking out for an owl until she remembered that she had asked Harry not to write to her.

And it was the right thing to do. Professor Dumbledore had indicated that. They didn’t know who the Death Eater was who had escaped Hogwarts. They didn’t know how much other help he might recruit for You-Know-Who. They didn’t know how much Death Eaters might be able to tamper with owl post.

Hermione knew that.

She knew, too, that Harry simply vanishing from Hogwarts the way he had done had given her nightmares. They hadn’t even known where he’d gone for a full day. Yes, Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy were Harry’s legal guardians and they had the right to do whatever they wanted with him, but Mr. Malfoy had thought it was a great idea to follow a genocidal warleader. What if they decided that Harry couldn’t come back to Hogwarts next year? What if they kept taking him out of Defense, even if Hogwarts had a good Defense professor in the future?

It had turned out to be a good thing that Harry wasn’t “Moody’s” student, of course, but Harry hadn’t made the decision for that reason. He couldn’t have known Moody was a Death Eater at the time.

And then when she and Ron had found out where Harry had gone, they’d been prevented from seeing him for weeks. How did that argue that Harry was making decisions of his own free will? Hermione had the bad feeling that Harry had been more independent-minded in the past. The Dursleys had been horrible guardians, but at least Harry hadn’t blindly trusted them the way he seemed to trust the Malfoys.

And she and Ron had had to hear about where Harry was from Professor Dumbledore. Not Harry himself. He hadn’t written them a letter until almost a week after the Malfoys had taken him to the Manor. Hermione didn’t know why. It could have been trauma, but maybe not. What if it wasn’t?

That was the whisper in the back of her mind whenever she looked at him now. Harry had seemed to have a good balance in the last few years of accepting that the Malfoys were his family but still questioning them, still being skeptical when they tried to offer him rationalizations about something.

Now he was just…

Falling into their embrace. Acting like Draco said funny things. Acting like Mr. Malfoy was someone he could reasonably trust the safety of children to.

Hermione took a long, deep breath and turned around to stare at the parchment on the desk in front of her again. It contained a list of answers to questions she’d sent Professor Dumbledore. Hermione had double-checked his answers with old history books and Daily Prophet editions that she’d asked Professor McGonagall to owl her, and…it all made sense.

The Malfoys had been behind a lot of different actions in the first war, not just Mr. Malfoy being a Death Eater. They’d funded legislation that had tried to make it criminal for Muggleborns to attend Hogwarts. They’d used Malfoy Manor as a base to shelter people wanted by the Aurors. Mrs. Malfoy’s sister had been a Death Eater, too.

Professor Dumbledore had told Hermione straight out that he was worried about Harry. Yes, Harry shouldn’t be so involved in the war when he was only fifteen, but the fact was, he was. And there was no protection to be found just because he was the Malfoys’ child instead of the Potters’. Voldemort obviously had still tried to kidnap him and use him.

Harry had killed someone, too.

He would need Mind-Healing for that, Hermione thought, brushing at her cheeks. Professor Dumbledore had said so, but it was something she’d thought of on her own before that. And Harry hadn’t said anything about getting Mind-Healing! Who was going to watch over him, if not her?

If not Professor Dumbledore? Even if he wanted to use Harry in a war, at least that would mean not sacrificing Harry to Voldemort or twisting him with Death Eater values or isolating him behind wards for weeks and depriving him of a Mind-Healer.

So Hermione was upset, and worried, and convinced that Harry needed to be prepared for his role, not shut away from it. Or turned neutral. If that was what the Malfoys were doing.

And he wasn’t writing to her. He had argued with her last time she and Ron had visited the Manor and sworn at her. Why would he do that if he was a friend?

Hermione had been fighting for words, trying to explain why the war was so important and why Harry talking to Professor Dumbledore was important in a way that didn’t use the exact same words Professor Dumbledore had said, because Harry would just reject those. He needed to hear the message, not get upset at the messenger. But she hadn’t managed before he’d yelled at her, and sworn at her, and then Ron had jumped in, and then they’d fought, and now Harry didn’t want to see her and they couldn’t write to each other.

Hermione hated fighting with one of her best friends.

But she’d hate dying at the end of his father’s wand worse.

What am I going to do?

Hermione took a deep breath and sat up, wiping away some of her tears. More fell, but she was determined now, and she turned away from watching the sky for an owl that wouldn’t come.

She had to survive. She had to keep talking to Harry and not cut him off completely, because then the war might be lost.

And she had to make sure that Harry survived, too, and got the Healing he needed. It would just take more time than she’d hoped.

*

Dear Ron and Hermione…

Harry crumpled up the parchment and threw it into the small bin beside his desk with a sigh of disgust. At least the bin Vanished things that fell into it, or it would long since have been overflowing. Harry leaned his forehead on his hands and sighed again.

He wanted to say so many things, but he wanted to say different things to each of them.

Then Harry could feel himself blushing, and he was glad that Healer Letham wasn’t there, because she might have objected to the way Harry hit himself in the forehead with one palm.

Then write a letter to each of them separately, idiot.

Harry took out another fresh sheet of parchment, dipped his quill in the ink again, and began to write. This time, the words flowed easily.

Dear Hermione,

I’m sorry for yelling at you. I’m angry that you won’t stop lecturing me. I did get Healing. I didn’t disappear. I just went home with my parents. Would you really have thought that Ron disappeared if he’d been kidnapped and then Mr. and Mrs. Weasley came and took him home?

I used to be the exception, I know. I still sort of am, with my scar and Voldemort being after me. But I’m not an orphan who doesn’t have parents anymore. I don’t have to rely on Professor Dumbledore, and I don’t want to, and I don’t understand why you or he can’t just tell me what’s so important if it really is.

Father’s turned against Voldemort. He really is. He had his left arm cut off and regrown to get rid of the Dark Mark. Maybe that doesn’t excuse him being a Death Eater in the first place, which I agree was really dumb. We can talk about that. But you can’t just assume that Dumbledore is the one I should listen to when I have a father.

Mother helped me during a ritual we did that I can’t talk about in detail. She held me, and I know she would have given everything for me not to be there, but I had to. But she’s not the kind of evil woman I used to think she was. She didn’t even torture Sirius Black to death when I thought she would. She used a spell that he could heal, and he ran away. And she hasn’t insisted that he be put on trial for kidnapping me even though I know she’d like to. She isn’t all good, but she’s not terrible, either.

I just don’t know why we have to agree on everything. If I admit that Dumbledore has his good points, can you admit that my parents have some, too? For me. I don’t think you have to like them. You just have to accept that they didn’t kidnap me and didn’t forbid me to write to you. I didn’t speak to anybody for three days, that’s why I didn’t write to you.

Harry finished writing the letter with a great rush and stared for a long moment at the blotted letters on the page, then shook his head. Yes, it was what he wanted to say to her, but he really couldn’t send this letter, because he couldn’t tell her about the Horcruxes and he didn’t want to tell her the details of his sessions with Healer Letham.

But he had said it, and part of him was relieved.

Ron’s letter was easier.

Dear Ron,

I’m sorry for snapping at Hermione the way I did, and then telling you that I didn’t want to see you for the rest of the summer. I think I was more angry at her and then I started yelling at the both of you.

But I didn’t get kidnapped by my own family, and I need her to stop acting like I did. And maybe we need to talk by ourselves, because if you’re going to get angry at me because I’m angry at Hermione, then we won’t be able to talk about what really matters.

Do you actually trust Dumbledore? Do you just say that you do because your family does? Or because Hermione does? Because I don’t. Whatever is really important could be something he said to me in a letter. Or he could send a Patronus! Tonks said that they could be used as messengers, and I know he has a Patronus, and I bet he knows how to do that. I don’t think a Patronus can even be intercepted, so he wouldn’t have to worry about it being dangerous or unsafe.

I really need you lot, but I can’t tell you everything. I think that’s going to drive Hermione mental. I hope it won’t. I hope I won’t lose you. But I’m going to have to keep secrets for a little while, at least. Can you accept that? I hope so.

Harry put down the quill and considered the letters for a moment. Then he drew his wand and lit them on fire.

Part of him wanted to keep them, but the last thing he needed was some “helpful” house-elf finding them and sending them off to his friends. Dobby might, if he found them in Harry’s desk when he was cleaning.

And in the end, what mattered was that he had said it, to parchment anyway, and now he could step back and consider his next move.

*

“You’re sure?” Lucius asked quietly.

Narcissa nodded and leaned back in her seat on the other side of the fire. “Quite. I tracked all the transactions in Bellatrix’s vault over the years, and there’s only one that could be a Horcrux.”

Lucius reached out and held her hand for a moment. His own trembled with eagerness. Narcissa smiled at him, and for a moment, her eyes shone like a hunting leopard’s.

Lucius had been the one who had decided that they ought to consult Bellatrix’s vault for possible Horcruxes. Bellatrix had filed a will that said Narcissa should have her vault if she died, and the goblins were prone to using such documents as stand-ins for those who were imprisoned in Azkaban, as well. As long as Narcissa didn’t try to take money from the vault, she would receive the notices of any deposits and any claims on it, and a detailed list accounting for both money and artifacts.

And artifacts were exempted from the rules concerning coins.

“A golden cup, double-handled, with an image of a badger on the side,” Lucius whispered.

Narcissa smiled at him. “Yes. It is probably an artifact of Hufflepuff’s. The living Horcruxes would be different from the usual run of them, of course, and the one in Henry was accidental. And the diary was probably a childhood treasure. But otherwise, what did the Dark Lord think worthy of him, but the greatest and most priceless treasurers?”

Lucius snorted. “Then perhaps we should be looking for the diadem of Ravenclaw.”

Narcissa didn’t smile. “We might need to.”

Lucius shuddered, and for a moment, they sat in silence. Lucius contemplated the length of the quest they might need to undertake if Ravenclaw’s diadem, so long lost, was one of the Horcruxes.

Then he hardened his heart. He would do much worse than that for Henry. And he would continue, as well, to read Healing research, to look out for ways to remove the Horcrux from his son.

Henry would not die. He would be not merely the Boy-Who-Lived, but the boy who continued to live, and continued, until he died of old age in the fullness of time.

Lucius would accept nothing less.

*

“But if you’re not allowing me to write to him,” Sirius said, scowling at Albus, “how am I supposed to persuade Harry back to our side?”

Albus sighed in what sounded like exhaustion and set aside the cup of tea Kreacher had made for him. (At least he’d been wise enough to check it over without either Sirius or Remus telling him to). “You will have your chance to speak to him, Sirius. I came to—to ask you to step in as our Defense Against the Dark Arts professor for this year.”

Remus drew his breath in sharply. Sirius reached out and clasped his best friend’s hand without taking his eyes from Albus. He knew how it had to hurt Remus, to hear the job he’d wanted so badly given to someone else.

“I don’t have the qualifications,” Sirius whispered. “Albus, you have to—”

“You have an Outstanding on your Defense NEWT, and all the practical experience in battle with Death Eaters that I could wish,” Albus said, his smile dragging down his face like chains before it vanished. “And if it is not you, Sirius, then the Ministry will appoint someone. I hurt to imagine whom Cornelius will think an appropriate choice.”

Sirius swallowed. Albus was right. Even Sirius, distant as he was from the Ministry, had heard the rumblings about how Fudge was scrambling to achieve a stronger political position. Apparently people who disliked him were trying to put either Amelia Bones or Rufus Scrimgeour forwards as his replacement. Fudge would do something that he could claim was a “show of strength” in response.

“I don’t think Harry took regular Defense lessons last year,” Remus said. “Any more than he did with me. Are you sure that having Sirius in the position will force Harry to interact with him?”

“Not force,” Albus said, giving Remus a gentle smile. “Never that. But there are any number of corners where a Defense professor might stand talking to an older student or a portrait and be overheard by a curious student creeping around with an Invisibility Cloak. Or any number of places we could have supposedly private conversations where such a person could find us. Or any number of philosophical lessons we could pass onto his friends to pass on to him.”

“It sounds too indirect to me,” Sirius said. “I should—”

“You know that he’ll probably just refuse to talk to you,” Remus said quietly. “I admit, Albus, this sounds like a weaker plan than your normal ones. But for it to work, it would have to be indirect. Harry is too set and unforgiving.”

“And it’ll have got worse with that family of his around him,” Sirius said darkly. He wished to Merlin that Harry could see sense. Yes, Sirius had kidnapped him and ended up putting Harry with abusive Muggles by mistake, and he was sorry for that. But living up to the legacy of a Potter, embracing it, would still be better than embracing the legacy of a family who had willingly followed You-Know-Who.

“Yes, I’m afraid it will have.” Albus leaned back in his chair. “I am sorry, Remus. I wish I could bring you back. But there are too many as set against you as Harry is set against Sirius.”

Remus smiled in a way that didn’t reach his eyes. “Don’t worry, Albus. I understand. Are you going to accept, Sirius?”

Sirius closed his eyes. In one way, he didn’t want to. Why shouldn’t he just seek out his godson if he was going to talk to him? Sneaking around and talking loudly at random students and portraits didn’t sound very Gryffindor.

But on the other hand, what other option did he have? Cissy and that bastard husband of hers would keep Harry away from him completely if they could. And Albus was right about letters to Harry being too easy to intercept.

“All right,” Sirius said. “I accept.”

*

The darkness parted easily around him. He strode through it and towards the cauldron that was smoldering silently, the fire underneath it sending curls of smoke up towards the heavens.

Barty bent down and carefully inspected the fire, then nodded. It would take perhaps another five hours of controlled burning to completely render the Augurey corpse to ashes. This ritual was in every way longer and more tedious than the one that would have taken place if Barty and not Pettigrew had been in the graveyard.

Barty’s jaw trembled, and he fought back the madness that would consume him if he let it. This was for his Lord. He had to think about his Lord, not about killing. He closed his eyes and meditated for long moments until he had his temper under control.

Then he reached up and touched his forehead, where his Lord’s spirit resided. His Lord’s spirit murmured back to him, There will be chances in the future. We will go to Hogwarts. We will find someone to take over or subvert. The person will get us to the Potter boy.

“Yes,” Barty whispered.

And Lucius, the traitor, will be punished.

Barty nodded fervently.

You will wield the wand that does it, my loyal one.

Barty smiled.

The End.