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Chapter Thirty-Four—Geas

Harry holds out his hand, and smiles as the dust and shards of glass that Blaise scattered around for him form into a little phoenix. It has transparent wings of shifting dust motes and a bright body.

“Wouldn’t the reflections from its body show up if it’s flying?”

“Only if someone is looking specifically for a phoenix like this.” Harry turns his palm towards Blaise. “Look how small it is. Do you think that most people would notice if it was flying overhead?”

“No. Or they might just think it’s an insect.”

Harry nods happily and feathers his fingers up the phoenix’s back. Feathers spring up on it in response, and the glass flashes gold. It takes a little more effort for Harry to hold the color, and he won’t make it permanent for any of these little practice toys. Ignis and Artemis are different kinds of creations, with bits of his magic permanently tied inside them—or a lot of his magic, in the case of Artemis.

The phoenix is a toy that Harry lets whirl back into the air when he’s done with it.

“Well done.”

Harry jumps and turns to see Aradia standing in the doorway of the practice room, which used to be a sitting room before Harry took it over. He smiles at her a little, thinking as he does that he really trusts her. Normally, he would notice a strange adult before they got that close. “Thanks!”

“I’m wondering if you would consider revealing the secret to one other person.”

“Mother.”

“Hush, Blaise. I’m thinking of it being someone who can protect him.”

“Well, it would depend on who it was, of course. Why do you think they can protect me?”

Aradia gestures towards the dining room. “Let’s eat while we discuss this.”

*

Aradia watches Harry thoughtfully as he finishes up his pudding. He’s grinning at Blaise in the moment before he hisses something to Artemis.

Aradia has been beyond hesitant about revealing his talent to anyone else. Parseltongue is one thing—rare, but not unheard of. But if anyone knew exactly what Harry could do with his magic…

Aradia doesn’t like to think what fate might befall him.

But now she thinks that Harry is butting up against the limits of what he can learn on his own. He can conjure and hold small creatures out of materials so common that he would be able to call one almost instantly to defend himself.

But more to the point, he might soon start getting bored and seeking out either more public places, harder challenges, or new creatures to make. And that’s the sort of thing that will reveal his gift to other people easily.

Aradia puts down her napkin, and Harry blinks and glances at her. “I want you to consider an apprenticeship.”

Blaise is watching them both carefully, but he doesn’t object. Harry is the one who blurts, “But don’t you have to be a lot older to be an apprentice?”

“I thought so as well.”

Aradia nods to Blaise, but keeps speaking to Harry. “Most of the time, but not necessarily. There are some talents that can be learned younger than others. For example, people with a special talent for Charms, or rather one subcategory of Charms, tend to start their apprenticeships at fifteen. Charms talent is the sort that can be dissipated if those gifted at it don’t start developing it earlier.”

“But I’m only thirteen.”

“Yes.”

“And you said that you didn’t think anyone else in the world could do what I do.”

Aradia smiles. “No. But I do know one person who can do something similar to it. They would oblige me by taking you on as an apprentice, if I asked them. And I think you would like working with them.”

“Who is he?” Blaise asks abruptly. “I’ve never heard you mention anyone like this before, Mother.”

“I know you have wondered why I spared Steel a few years ago.”

Blaise blinks, hard. Then he says, “And you really think that Steel would be a good teacher for Harry?”

“Yes.”

“Who’s Steel?” Harry interrupts, in the tone of someone who’s sick of being left out of the conversation.

Aradia can’t be upset about that. She’s the one who taught him to be upset about that kind of thing. “Steel was one of my targets several years ago. However, when I caught them, I realized that they had not committed the crimes I was stalking them for because of greed or one of the other motivations that would make them a suitable sacrifice. They are a vampire, and they had entered into a mutually beneficial relationship with several people, members of the same family. The family became greedy and tried to kill them for the ancient treasures they guard. They killed the family partially in self-defense and partially to keep their secrets.”

“They were—trading this vampire blood for money?”

“Yes.”

“And—why would they be a good teacher for me? I’m not a vampire. Right?”

Aradia has to smile. About some things, Harry is still so innocent. “No. But Steel can form their blood, and that of others, into shapes and guardians that I have never seen anyone able to do before. They are always visibly made of blood and cannot function outside Steel’s presence or with any degree of sentience, the way your creations can. Still, they come the closest to someone who would be able to offer you an apprenticeship and teach you more about the true limits of your gifts.”

Harry’s eyes sparkle. Aradia looks from him to Blaise, who is biting his lip in a way that Aradia knows.

“It is about time that you begin your own apprenticeship, Blaise.”

Any trace of jealousy fades from her son’s expression as he leans intently forwards. “I thought I was doing that already. That you were teaching me the ways I would need to track down sacrifices for the Suns.”

“I have been teaching you that, but it is not the same thing as the skills you will need to make those sacrifices. Stealth, tracking, lying in such a way that you can fool a Legilimens, weapons.”

“But—you don’t want to teach them to me, Mother?”

“Of course I do. But you were too young before you went to Hogwarts, and now you will be away from me a majority of the year. I have it in mind to give you a mentor who can reach Hogwarts more easily than I can.”

“Who, Mother?”

Aradia smiles.

*

“You understand my arguments for casting this particular spell,” Albus says, sweeping his eyes over the professors seated before him.

Most of them nod. Bathsheda looks bored, but she is, by most things more concrete than Runes. Severus’s face is stormy.

“Yes, Severus? You wanted to say something?”

“You wish that the geas will be obvious if someone asks us about Lupin’s monthly illnesses and we’re choking on our tongues?’

“I trust you to avoid situations where the question would come up.”

Severus gives Albus an incredulous look. Albus ignores that. It’s time for Sirius and Remus to return to Hogwarts, and to have a home base. Albus is determined to discover a way to break Tom’s curse in the coming year so that Remus can have a stable job. And Sirius will have a chance to connect with his godson this way.

It’s the least Albus owes them, when they’ve given up family and home and even their country for years to hunt down what Albus can now confirm are Horcruxes and not another method of immortality.

But since Sirius told him that Harry and Mr. Zabini now know Remus is a werewolf, Albus needs some method to stop their tongues.

“You are doing a great deal, and asking many other people to suffer a great deal of inconvenience, to oblige one person.”

Albus sighs. “I do the same thing when I ask people to keep in mind Neville’s situation, or some of the other conditions that afflict our students, like bloodline curses. I am afraid that you will have to put up with it, Severus.”

Severus says nothing, but settles back with the storm still in his face. Albus holds back a second sigh, since it would probably just ignite another argument. He so hoped that Severus would learn to be more patient and compassionate during his years as a professor. It is one reason that Albus decided to ask him to be a teacher at Hogwarts, instead of taking up another role such as brewer for the hospital wing.

But if one plan for Severus’s redemption has failed, Albus has others.

“What does happen if one of us chokes on our tongue in front of a student?” asks Aurora, twisting her hands together.

“You will come up with some excuse, I know, Aurora,” Albus says soothingly. She probably only worries in the first place because the full moon falls under her purview, as the Astronomy professor, and she assumes students in her class are more likely to notice Remus’s episodes coinciding with the lunar phase.

Aurora doesn’t look reassured, but she nods.

“I think the idea is wonderful,” Minerva says, and her glance darts around the meeting like a hawk scouring for prey. “To know that we will not blurt out a secret that would make Remus so unsafe in the face of prejudice? One of our own former students? We needed such a geas years ago.”

Her eyes linger on Severus. Albus just shakes his head at her. He didn’t bind Severus with a geas when he discovered Remus was a werewolf thanks to Sirius’s foolishness. He simply made it clear what the consequences would be if the news was spread around.

Minerva sniffs and subsides. Albus lifts his wand and begins to cast the geas that will keep anyone who has the knowledge from blurting out that Remus is a werewolf.

And if he adds an extra layer of binding to the spell so that students will be less curious about Remus’s absences from class, well, it is the least he can do when he has been unable to make the strides in the Wizengamot that he wanted to give Remus and other werewolves a better living situation.

From the glare Severus is giving him, he can probably sense the extra touch to the geas. But it doesn’t matter. In the end, Severus will do as Albus asks. His own oaths ensure he can do no less.

*

“What?”

Harry wants to crumple up the letter from Professor Snape and fling it across the room. But in the end, he holds it out to Aradia. She reads it with her eyes narrowing, her head tilting in a way that makes her look a lot like an eagle getting ready to strike.

“A geas,” she says at last. “I see.”

“So we can’t even tell people that Lupin is a werewolf to get some of our own back?” Blaise asks in disgust.

“No, you cannot.” Aradia is smiling slightly as she lays the letter back on the table. “But that means that you will need to be even more subtle in your revenge, my darlings. Lure Black and Lupin close in the belief that you wish to know them and then turn on them, as you have been discussing.”

Harry bites his lip and nods. Yes, he can see that it would be an advantage if looked at it like that. And if Aradia isn’t worried about the impact that the geas might have on their minds, then he isn’t, either.

It’s still annoying.

“Why are Lupin and Black so special?” Blaise mutters.

“I did actually look into that.” Aradia folds her hands on the table. “It seems that they were part of a special group of students who were all inducted into the Order of the Phoenix while still in their seventh year. Your mother was also one of those, Harry, and it seems that she and your father were thrown together so often, it is unsurprising they married. Given that they are dead now and that another of their number was a traitor, Albus seems to feel that he owes the remaining ones some special debt.”

“So that was why he personally placed me with the Dursleys?’

“I do not have absolute confirmation of that. But perhaps.”

“Then I suppose that I will have to approach them more subtly. Make them break connections with me or do stupid things and think it’s their idea.”

“Now you are being appropriately subtle.”

Harry grins at her, and then turns his head and blinks. One of his creatures he placed at the boundary of Aradia’s wards to warn of trouble in case Lupin and Black turn up again is sending a gentle alarm into his mind. Harry concentrates and closes his own eyes.

He used an enchantment of will on the last creature that should mean he can see through its eyes. Should. He didn’t yet test it from this distance.

He gets a blurry impression of a tall figure in a cloak before something strikes out of the cloak and smashes his little dust-and-glass creation to pieces. Harry grunts. There’s a small shock of pain in the middle of his stomach, as though someone’s stabbed him there.

“Harry? Are you all right?”

Harry nods at Blaise, and smiles at him reassuringly when Blaise looks as though he’s going to get up and come around the table. “Yeah. Just, one of the sentinels that I left near the wards was destroyed by whoever Aradia’s latest visitor is.”

Aradia sighs a little. “Harry, I told you that you didn’t have to do that.”

Harry shrugs.

“As it happens, that is Steel, your possible mentor.”

Harry perks up. That at least explains why the figure noticed his creature. He turns around and watches the entrance to the dining room eagerly, and Steel sweeps through less than a minute later.

They’re tall, is Harry’s first impression of them. They fling the cloak back, and Harry can see that they have shiny grey skin that really is the color of steel. Their eyes are bright and insect-like, and their hair is made of what seems to be looped strands of metal. They nod to Harry and Blaise and then bow to Aradia.

“You have called upon me, and I have responded,” Steel says, in a soft, melodious voice that does have a buzzing undertone. Maybe really old vampires get like that, Harry thinks.

“Yes. I wanted you to consider taking my foster son, Harry Potter, on as an apprentice.”

The vampire turns around and considers Harry. Harry lifts his chin and tries to look eager and interested and non-threatening and interesting all at once.

“You are the one who made the small creature by the wards?”

“Yes, um. Mr., Miss Steel?”

“Yes, you may call me Steel. I have little use for mortal titles. It is good that you have a talent like that while still mortal. The price I paid to become a vampire and weave creations out of blood was not worth it.”

Harry burns to ask why, but he doesn’t think Steel would answer. “Aradia said that you might be able to teach me to do it better.”

“What is another example of your skill, Harry Potter?”

Harry reaches down and takes Artemis out of his pocket. She’s sleepy since she ate a mouse just a few hours ago, but she coils obligingly around his wrist and rears up to look at Steel, her tongue flickering out. “They smell like metal,” she complains.

Steel goes still, staring. Harry gets ready to move out of the chair if he has to. Aradia trusts Steel, but it’s possible that even Aradia could get fooled or not know how a vampire would react to the sight of a magical snake.

“You made her?” Steel’s voice is calm and precise, but edged.

“Yes. I tied up some of my magic in her and made her. I wanted a friend. And I also gave myself Parseltongue so that I can speak to her.”

“Demonstrate.”

Harry wonders privately why his Parseltongue would be so much more surprising than the rest, but he hisses obediently, “I’m showing Steel that I can speak Parseltongue, Artemis. Would you mind speaking it with me?”

“I speak it with you every day. Why should today be special?”

There’s silence when Harry finishes. He glances at Aradia, who seems to be calm, and is just sipping her tea. Blaise looks like Harry feels, a little worried, and like he might have to do something more than just speak the truth to Steel.

“Astounding,” Steel breathes at last, and Harry really does hear the breath expanded with those words. Most of the time, he thinks, vampires wouldn’t need to breathe at all. Steel turns and faces Aradia. “I am interested in teaching the boy. You were right about your description of him.”

“Of course I was.”

“Why did you think she was wrong?” Harry asks.

Steel turns back to him. “Because with such a large portion of your magic tied up in such a creation, I thought it likely that you would have become a Squib. I found myself skeptical that you would have managed to retain normal magic and the ability to speak Parseltongue and use wanded magic. But there can be no doubt.”

“Yeah. I am a weak wizard when it comes to wanded spells, though.”

Steel flicks fingers that chime a little, making Harry think that they have metallic claws on the ends of their nails. “I can teach you such power as will make the charms and cantrips you learn look like the child’s toys they are.”

Harry smiles, and smiles harder when he and Steel swear the formal oaths for Harry to become Steel’s apprentice. He might not be the strongest wizard, and he might need to spend more time mastering wanded spells after this than ever, but he’s going to be the strongest in the way that most matters.

*

“Mr. Potter, if you will come with me.”

Albus turns around. He can feel Harry and Mr. Zabini exchanging glances behind him, and he sighs. If Harry understood what was required of him, understood exactly why a person is not a good person merely because they have paid attention to him and sheltered him, Albus would not have to do this.

But Harry does not understand it, and so he has to follow Albus to his office and sit down in the chair across from his desk. “Don’t we have to go down for the Sorting and the feast, sir?” he asks, kicking his heels as he looks around.

Albus stares at him wearily. He has listened to so many pleas from poor Sirius this summer to contact the Zabinis and ask them to give him time with Harry, but he has declined to become involved. He thought that Sirius handled things wrongly in his conversation with Harry, and when he confronted Harry and the Zabinis at King’s Cross. But now, he wonders. How can someone act this cheerful when he ought to understand what those years apart from him cost Sirius?

“Do you know why I brought you here, Mr. Potter?”

“Probably to scold me about Black and Lupin.”

Albus pauses. Harry’s voice is sharper now, and his eyes are locked on Albus in a way that makes Albus want to speak defensively. He settles for folding his hands on the desk instead. “You hurt your godfather very deeply.”

“And he hurt me by leaving me with abusive Muggles.”

“Mr. Potter, they were not—they were your family.”

“What does that matter?”

“Five points from Ravenclaw for your tone, Mr. Potter.”

Harry just watches him. He’s retreated into his skin again, and his eyes are wild and green in a way that Lily’s never were. Albus finds himself sorely wishing she was here. Maybe she would have some idea of how to handle this recalcitrant son of hers.

“I left you at their house for safety,” Albus whispers. “There was no one else with a blood connection to you, and so many people who might have asked to shelter you could have been Death Eaters in disguise. Or worse than Death Eaters, the way the Zabinis are.”

Harry doesn’t react at all to the taunt about the Zabinis, which Albus didn’t expect. He just cocks his head and asks, “What about the Weasleys? Or the Longbottoms? It seems pretty easy to say that they wouldn’t have been Death Eaters in disguise.”

“Did you know that the Weasleys have seven children? I am a bit shocked that you think they should have adopted another.”

“And Augusta Longbottom? She only has Neville.”

“She needed to concentrate on raising him, not another child.”

“Just like Black had to concentrate on this quest you assigned him?”

Albus nods, holding his encouragement at bay. It sounds as if Harry understands, but he might not. Albus has been disappointed before. “Yes, exactly like. Both the quest and Mr. Longbottom are valuable in the war against Voldemort.”

Harry doesn’t flinch at the name, which is at least a point in his favor. But he leans back in his chair and gives Albus a complicated look before he says, “So I always have to think of myself as less important than other people, or what those people want to do. That probably sounds good to you, but I don’t know why you expected me to agree with it.”

“That is not what I am saying at all.”

“Okay. Then why should I understand all the choices of other people that put me last? And why do they just get to do whatever they want and think whatever they want?”

“The war is bigger than all of us.”

“Bigger than you?”

“Of course, my dear boy.”

“But you’re insisting that I have to respect your desires and wishes, and agree with you about everything, and dislike the Zabinis and accept the way Black acted just because you do.” Harry shakes his head and stands up. “No, I don’t have to.”

“You realize that there is a geas on the school that will prevent you from speaking of Mr. Lupin’s condition to anyone?”

“I’m not surprised.”

“You cannot blame him or reveal his secret as vengeance for—”

“I didn’t even mention him in what I said just now, but of course you ignored that.”

Harry turns around and stomps out of the office before Albus can reply. Albus sighs and leans back in his chair. He supposes he can see—some of what Harry is saying. He has not been raised to knowledge of the war’s importance and the placement of some people in it the way Neville has. He has not thought about it deeply for twelve years the way Sirius and Remus have.

But Albus did hope that Harry could get a little beyond his own selfishness. It is natural for him to feel the way he does. But the war will demand more sacrifices from all of them, and people who can move beyond that selfishness, their own limited perspective, will be valuable and must bear some of the burden of those who will never move. Lily and James were two such people.

Albus did so hope that their son would be one of them.

But it is just as well that he knows now Harry will not, so he does not make plans involving him.

*

“Mr. Zabini, stay after class.”

Blaise holds in his sigh. He knows he did well on the Runes summer assignment, and he paid attention to Professor Babbling’s lecture today.

Harry shoots him a sidelong look. Blaise shakes his head. No, he doesn’t know why Professor Babbling has singled him out.

Harry frowns, and Ignis stirs in Blaise’s pocket. Blaise shakes his head again. Babbling at least isn’t dangerous. They don’t need to chance revealing Harry’s secret.

Harry nods back and leaves the classroom. Blaise knows that he’ll be waiting not far outside the door.

“Do you know why I asked you to stay?”

Blaise holds back the sarcastic answer he wants to make. He knows that it won’t get him any answers. “No, Professor. Was there something wrong with my Runes work?” Mother’s taught him enough that there shouldn’t be, not when they’re covering such elementary concepts, but professors like students to admit they could be wrong.

Professor Babbling studies him calmly for a moment. She’s only a little shorter than Mother, with dark hair that’s braided on her head the way Mother’s is, and pale brown skin several shades lighter. There’s something about her green eyes that makes Blaise want to lift his Occlumency shields, but also—

Babbling smiles and holds out a hand.

Blaise blinks as he hears a thunk from behind him. He turns and finds a knife embedded in the wall behind his shoulder.

A knife that must have come from Professor Babbling, but which he never saw leave her hand, let alone fly.

Blaise turns back around with a breathless feeling in his throat. “You’re the mentor that Mother promised me?”

“Yes.” Professor Babbling’s smile is wide and wicked and transforms her face, which was perfectly calm all through class. “Who better to pass through the wards of Hogwarts than someone already added to them?”

“Will I learn about the battle applications of Runes?”

“You will, but I am not just skilled in that area.”

“What’s your real job?”

Professor Babbling smiles harder at him, and dips her head as if greeting someone who stands behind him. “Permit me to introduce myself properly. I am Bathsheda Babbling, Master, Fifth Class, of the Sapphire Order.”

“Sapphire Order?”

“Assassins who influence the course of the world’s history.” Babbling’s smile is so bright it’s almost painful to look at. “And in this case, I think it best to teach you the skills while setting you free of the oaths we would otherwise have you swear. It is a training even your mother never mastered. I look forward to seeing what you become.”