Harry Potter and the Crystal Fire

Chapter 01: Unexpected Developments

The kitchen was filled with tension. Bill and Charlie sat around the table in the kitchen of Number 12 Grimmauld Place and stared at the girl, who was standing with one hip leaning against the counter, looking back at them calmly. Bill and Charlie, neither of whom had any idea why they had been asked into the kitchen, exchanged an uncertain look and simply waited.

"Is it okay to smoke in here?" the girl asked, and Charlie nodded. The girl walked over to the back wall of the kitchen, tapped a brick with her wand, and a window appeared.

Charlie stared at her, surprised. Bill looked downright shocked. He'd been in and out of Number 12 Grimmauld Place for over a year now, and he'd never known there was a window in the kitchen. Through it, enchanted sunlight--it had to be enchanted; it was raining steadily outside--poured into the kitchen from the back garden, which now appeared to slope down toward the basement kitchen. "How'd you know that was there?" Charlie asked, looking hard at the window.

"It wasn't there," she said with a shrug. "But this place is gloomy as all hell. It needs a little cheer." Turning to the newly-created window, she opened it a crack, then performed a quick, quiet Silencing Charm before lighting a cigarette and beginning to speak.

"I was fairly sure none of you knew about Ron and Percy," she told Bill and Charlie, who both shook their heads; they certainly hadn't known. "So I thought it was best to tell you in person. Heaven only knows whose owls and which Floos are being watched these days."

"I'm glad you came in person. It's not such an easy thing to discuss any other way," Bill said, his tone neutral. "I mean, being as it's about Percy." The great prat, he added silently, and knew Charlie was thinking the same thing.

"I can only imagine," the girl said, with a sympathetic look that made both Percy's brothers feel easier. "It would be difficult enough, without things heating up the way they are. The great prat," she said with something like disgust, and made Bill and Charlie grin. She waved her wand and a blue ashtray shaped like a rabbit appeared on the windowsill, which she tapped ash into carefully before continuing.

"I met Ron in the twins' shop in Diagon Alley," she continued. "I'd just stopped in because I'd met Fred and George earlier in the summer and took a chance that they'd be in. Ron was there, and it was just there in the front of his mind."

"What exactly was there in the front of his mind?" Charlie asked, because he wanted it all spelled out. He'd known Morrigan for a while now, and knew that she was top-notch at her job, but sometimes her mind worked too fast for him to follow. Her arrival had been somewhat confused, as she'd hoped to find his parents there, and she'd got a bit flustered at the sight of Bill, shirtless, who'd only just woken up to get the door. She'd covered it nicely, but Charlie had been too amused at the sight of his normally composed friend drooling over his big brother to pay much attention to what she'd actually said.

"He's been getting owls from Percy," she said, and there was a thunderstruck silence. "Six or seven by now." Bill cursed under his breath, and Charlie scowled. Used to Charlie's fierce-looking scowls, Morrigan didn't take this one personally. "He got the first one during the school year last year, and the others since."

"Did you catch what they said?" Charlie asked when it appeared Bill wasn't going to ask anything yet.

She grinned. Bill, occupied with the fact that Percy was contacting his youngest brother after months of silence, still noticed those bright green eyes and the way they sparkled when she smiled. "Did you doubt it for a moment? I wouldn't be bothering you with it if I couldn't tell you more than that.

"He was really interested in what Ron's career plans are. Had loads of, err, sage advice," she continued. "That, and Percy warned Ron against sticking around Harry too much, as Harry was trouble. Capital T," she said, sounding unwillingly amused.

"The stupid git," Charlie murmured. "What's he butting in for now? Couldn't he have just stayed in his denouncing-the-family stage?"

"Right," Morrigan said drily. "You thought you'd get that lucky?" she asked, and Charlie had to laugh.

"There's more, isn't there?" Bill asked, managing to look away from her. She was a pretty thing, he thought; tall and slim with waist-length copper-colored hair and those big green eyes. She wore faded jeans and leather sandals with a white tank-top under her black robes. From where he sat he could count about six silver hoop earrings in each ear, and sterling silver rings on each finger and at least two of her toes. With an effort, he dragged his attention back to where it belonged.

"It was all jumbled. I'm not a Legilimens. I can only pick up senses of things, and even that I can only do when someone's really upset or worried. It's a bit like a strong intuition, I suppose. But the general idea seemed to be that someone at the Ministry wants Ron on board next summer," she said with a sigh. "At least that's my take. Try as I might, I can't imagine Percy simply offering Ron the chance to work at the Ministry next summer out of the goodness of his heart. My guess is that someone told him his career would take off like a rocket if he could get his little brother to join the ranks."

Bill and Charlie considered this. "Why?" Charlie asked.

Friendly as always, Morrigan rolled her eyes. "Use your head, will you, Charlie? It's a little concept called baiting a trap."

Bill's eyes darkened with instant fury. "Who?" he demanded softly.

"I've no idea," she said, and shrugged. "Like I said, I'm not a Legilimens. But I'll work on it. Mal and I," she amended, "will work on it." She sighed. "We've been out of the office for a while--we're normally in the field. But we'll be in and around London for a while, so I'll check things out. I don't want too many people hearing about it until I can find out more. The more people know we're looking into it, the harder it will be to find anything out."

"Right. But what can we do about it now?" Bill wanted to know.

She smiled at him like he was a student who'd asked the right question and lit another cigarette, then tossed her pack to Charlie, who caught it gratefully. Charlie and Bill each took one, and lit up, grinning.

"Well, at the moment, Tonks and I can see what we can find out from our guys. We know a lot of people at the Ministry, and they know a lot of people. There might be something floating around the office. If there is, we'll find it. We're naturally suspicious bastards," she said, making Charlie laugh.

"You're an Auror, then?" Bill asked, trying hard not to sound incredulous. If he'd ever seen anyone who looked less like an Auror, Bill couldn't remember it. Even Tonks had a sort of toughness about her, underneath the cuteness, a kind of street-smarts that made it obvious she could take care of herself despite her off-the-job clumsiness. Morrigan looked like--Bill thought a moment, trying to be diplomatic, and failed--she'd be helpless against anything more challenging than a drunken House Elf.

"I do my damnedest not to look like one. Hurts the success rate when you walk down the street and everyone can spot you from a mile away." She shrugged, obviously not too concerned about her appearance. "Getting back to Ron, though. The two of you can help out," she said, and her eyes changed in an instant, from laughing to serious. Bill thought that he might have been wrong about her helplessness after all. He wasn't sure he'd want those eyes looking at him the way she was looking at the cigarette in her hand right now. There was something dark and cold in them that suggested she'd learned to fight the hard way. And maybe not always the fair way.

"Talk to Ron," she said, and the brothers looked up at her, startled. They'd been hoping for some important task. Looking at them, she rolled her eyes. "Honestly, you two, he is your brother, why can't you just talk to him?"

"Don't we talk to him every time we see him?" Charlie asked, indignant. "It's not like we neglect him or anything, is it?"

She simply sighed. "You just don't understand." Shaking her head a bit, she blew smoke toward the open window and wished at least one of the two oldest Weasleys had been a girl; then maybe it wouldn't have been so difficult to explain.

Searching for words, Morrigan looked around at the kitchen. "Good Lord is this place ever depressing," she said, frowning at the walls. "Did Sirius really spend ten months cooped up in this place?" she asked Charlie, who nodded although he knew it had been a rhetorical question. "They'd have had to take me to St. Mungo's," she muttered, making Bill grin. "Is the portrait of his old lady still here?" she asked.

"No one can get it off the wall," Charlie said. "We even set Moody on it. No dice."

"Does she still scream at everyone who passes?" Morrigan wanted to know.

Loud shouting from the upstairs hallway answered her question. She grimaced. "Sounds like Moody," she said philosophically as she heard shouted phrases like "One-eyed traitor" and "Misshapen freak of nature" raining down the staircase. She laughed when she heard Moody's reply, a growl of obscenities that was as eloquent as it was coarse. "Yep. Definitely Moody."

Loud thumping footsteps approached from the direction of the staircase. The kitchen door banged open and Moody came in, his wooden leg beating time against the wooden floor. He stopped short when he saw Morrigan. His expression made Bill and Charlie stare at him. If the Wizard who had just walked through the door hadn't been Mad-Eye Moody, they would have described him as beaming.

"Morrigan! Good to see you!" Moody said cheerfully. "As you can tell, the old bat is still here, hanging on the wall."

"Right," Morrigan said drily, walking over to give Moody a hug. "Da says hullo. And Mal should be along sooner or later," she said. Moody's smile, if possible, widened. It was a measure of her toughness, Bill thought, that the rather alarming sight of Moody smiling didn't make her run away screaming.

"So I'm just wondering," Morrigan said to Moody. "Did any of you ever try a Silencing Charm on her?"

The silence was loud and thunderstruck. They'd done everything they could think of to try and dislodge the portrait of Sirius' mother, but no one had ever actually thought of just making her inaudible. Morrigan rolled her eyes and walked out of the kitchen and up the stairs. The men heard "Copper-haired half-breed blood traitor of --" before the shout stopped in mid-stream.

"Oh, she's good," Charlie said with a laugh, shaking his head. "Really, really good."

"Logic," Moody said, turning his frightening smile on Charlie. "The girl's always been logical. And very, very smart. Hell of an Auror, she and her brother both. Some of my last trainees," he added, which explained his glaring pride. Charlie and Bill grinned at Moody, who sat down with a relieved sigh.

"She didn't go to Hogwarts, did she?" Bill asked, thinking he would have remembered her.

"No, she went to Caerdys. It's in Wales. Small school, almost no one's heard of it. Played Seeker, " Moody added. "Wasn't as good as Charlie, but not many are," Moody added, somewhat grudgingly.

"Don't know for sure if I could have beaten her," Charlie said neutrally. Bill wished he hadn't, as this comment only brought Moody's ferocious smile back, brighter than ever.

"Get that ugly eye off of me, would you? I know damned well you're swiveling it toward me," came Morrigan's voice through the closed door, just before she opened it. Moody chuckled, well pleased, and the magical eye sped around to the front of his head just in time to catch Bill and Charlie trying to hide smirks.

"Caerdys," Moody told her. "I was telling the boys why you went to Caerdys."

"Oh, did you tell them about my grandfather the Death Eater, then?" she asked mildly, raising an elegantly arched coppery eyebrow. Her tone was light. Her green eyes, though, were cold and hard, like dark emeralds.

Charlie and Bill stared. She grinned at them and shrugged. "Well, he was on my mother's side, wasn't he? Seems that side of the family runs to nutters now and again," she explained with a laugh. Her eyes, though, were dark and cold.

"Well, Brandon Donovan was a nutter, no doubt," Moody agreed with her. "I don't think it was your mother's entire family," he said, by way of reassuring her.

She laughed, and her eyes cleared. "Well, there are the Muggles," she reminded him. "You know how bad those Muggles are," she added, and Moody chortled.

"She's related, distantly, to the Dursleys," Moody explained to Bill and Charlie, who stared at her, open-mouthed.

"Right, well, only very distantly. My Mum and Harry's Mum were third or fourth cousins. Like you guys and Tonks," she explained when they had no reaction whatsoever.

"Does Harry know you're all related?" Charlie asked, still trying to get his mind around that fact.

Morrigan snorted. "We sent that woman--" Bill and Charlie needed no clarification as to who 'that woman' was; Harry's Aunt Petunia was the stuff of legend around their house--"a letter by Muggle post a month ago, when we were looking through some old stuff of our mother's and found the family tree. Asked her to explain to him and tell him we'd be around for a visit this summer. You tell me if he knows."

"Right. Well, she's not good at following directions, from what we understand," Charlie said helpfully.

Morrigan laughed. "Not good at much," she muttered. "But anyway, we suspected when we didn't hear back from him that she hadn't told him, so we got in touch with Dumbledore. He said that next time we were in from the field we should find Harry and introduce ourselves."

"So how long have you been in the Order," Charlie asked. "You weren't here at the meetings last year."

"We've been in since last Christmas," Morrigan said. "Mind you, that's secret. Wouldn't do for all the members of the Order to be known, would it? So don't go blabbing," she said, the grin on her face indicating she was teasing them. "But we're really pissed to have missed the fight and all," she told them, a shadow seeming to pass over her face as she spoke. Charlie seemed to understand it, and Bill made a mental note to ask his brother all about it when they were alone.

"So what are you doing here if you're supposed to be a big secret?" Moody asked Morrigan.

After a moment, she lit another cigarette and, having met Bill's and Charlie's eyes and got two nods in return, she explained. "Ron's been getting owls from Percy at the Ministry," she told Moody. "And it seems that someone wants him working at the Ministry next summer."

"Baiting a trap," Moody said immediately, and Morrigan nodded; that idea was not new to her. Surprising Bill and Charlie, Moody didn't seem irritated to have been pre-guessed. He seemed, if anything, ready to burst with pride.

"That's my guess," she continued. "We'll work on finding out what we can at the Ministry this week--Mal and I are in from the field for the time being."

"Good. What's the problem, do you think Ron's actually interested in working with that git?" Moody asked her, his tone nearly jovial.

Morrigan laughed. "Not for a moment. But he's at a difficult time, isn't he, and I wanted to talk to these two about how to head off a problem later."

Moody settled down to listen, waving his wand for tea. "Talk away," he told her, obviously not about to move.

Sighing and rolling her eyes, Morrigan settled back against the counter and gathered her thoughts. Her expression that made Moody's gleeful smile return for an alarming moment.

"Look," she said again, blowing smoke at the ceiling. "Like I said, Ron's at a tough time right now." When Bill and Charlie looked skeptical, she rolled her eyes again, to Bill's secret and Moody's not-so-secret amusement. "Do you have a clue?" she asked, a slight edge to her voice, and Bill's amusement faded.

"He's our brother," Charlie pointed out, his tone a bit stiff. "I think we'd know."

"Right." She was clearly unconvinced. "You'd have a clue. When was the last time you really talked to him?" She didn't wait for an answer; that hadn't been her point. "Look," she repeated. "He just got his O.W.L.s back. They're all right, but not good enough for all of the N.E.W.T. classes Harry and Hermione are going to be taking. So they won't be together as much as they were. Harry's probably going to be playing Quidditch again this year, so Ron's going from the guy who saved the Quidditch Cup last year to playing second fiddle to Harry, who plays Quidditch like he was born to do it." She seemed to have quite a bit of information about Hogwarts and what went on there, Bill thought, for someone who hadn't gone there. He wondered what her sources were.

"I don't think you can really understand it, either of you. You're the two oldest. He's the youngest brother of seven kids. And he's always been in someone's shadow. Ron's always wanted to make his own way, and for him, that's probably going to have to wait. If he makes Head Boy next year, he'll be following you," she said, nodding at Bill, "and, well, Percy." Her tone indicated that, in her opinion, following Percy in anything was reason enough to not want to make Head Boy. "If he doesn't, that's been done three times. If he leaves school in the middle of the year, that's been done twice as well. So he's stuck a bit, marking time until he leaves school.

"That's bad enough, but he could get through that if he felt that you guy were interested. But what I'm getting from him is that he feels a bit like a leftover. And he thinks you guys are too busy now to worry about stupid things like what N.E.W.T classes Ron's going to be in."

Bill thought about that, and though it wasn't easy, he got a handle on his resentment. She was right, at least in some ways. He'd never even considered how difficult Ron had it, coming at the end of a line of brothers.

"It's not that it's a big deal now, right?" she asked, seeing Bill's expression change. "But it could get to be one. Because if he starts to feel like...Percy," she finally managed, her dislike evident in her tone, "is the one who really, really cares about what he's going to be doing when he leaves school, he's vulnerable to the trap. And it's easy for you two, given what you're up to these days, to get distracted by things that seem more important."

Bill nodded. It made sense. He didn't have to like the idea of being so distracted by what he was doing for the Order that he all but ignored his younger brother, but given events of the past year, it wasn't out of the question. "So you should talk to him," he told Charlie. "You guys have got Quidditch in common, don't you? From me it would just sound stupid."

Charlie's eyes met Morrigan's, and they both laughed. "Be serious, Bill," Morrigan said softly. "Any one of your brothers, Charlie included, would give their left arm to turn out like you did. Except for that middle one, of course, but I've met him, and I think he was born a prat."

Bill looked at her as though she was mad. "Get out," he said, entirely serious.

She laughed. "I'm serious," she said. "You're the oldest brother. You were Head Boy and managed somehow to pull it off while still remaining cool. You went to work for Gringotts, you're a curse breaker--which, by the way, is keeping with the cool factor--you won't let your Mum cut your hair despite the fact that she's a hard lady to say no to, and you either are or were dating Fleur." Charlie, ready to laugh, looked away, and Bill had no doubt that he was one of Morrigan's many sources of information.

Bill's freckles disappeared under a flood of embarrassed colour. "Were dating," he said. "And I still think you're mad."

She just grinned at him. "Ask Charlie. Hell, ask Fred and George why they left school. Ask Ron who he wants to be like most in the world."

Bill looked at Charlie for support. Charlie just grinned. "Sorry, big brother. She's right. You started the trend. We're doing our best to keep it up."

Bill rolled his eyes. Moody laughed, sounding more amused than he looked. Of course, that happened every time he was amused, given the magical eye and the missing parts of his nose, so it wasn't particularly remarkable. "This is ridiculous," Bill muttered.

"I think both of you should talk to him, at once," Morrigan said, taking pity on him and turning the subject a bit. "But you need to do it in such a way that he doesn't realise that you know about the owls from Percy. If he knows you know about the owls, he's going to think one of two things."

"Yeah, for one he'll think we think he's too much of a git to realise Percy's a prat," Charlie said.

Morrigan grinned. "Exactly."

"What's the other one?" Charlie asked, when she didn't continue. She raised an eyebrow at Bill.

"He'll think we think that the Ministry would never want him except that he's Harry's friend," Bill said after a moment, and got another nod.

"So how the hell do we just randomly start a conversation like that?" Charlie wanted to know.

"Hell, I don't know. Tell him...tell him it's the Weasley brothers career talk. How the hell do I know what would work?" Morrigan asked, clearly exasperated with Charlie.

"We didn't do that for Percy or the twins," Bill thought out loud.

"Well, Percy wouldn't have listened," Charlie pointed out, "and the twins never gave us a chance at it, did they?" He frowned. "You didn't do that for me, you sorry bastard," he told Bill, and they both laughed.

"How does Ron know that?" Morrigan pointed out, and they stopped laughing. "He would have been too young to really remember, wouldn't he?"

"That could work," Bill mused. "It really could."

A knock on the kitchen door had them all turning around. Moody's magical eye slid back, and he gave Morrigan an odd sort of grin. "Come on in, Potter," he said. Bill and Charlie, having had their fill of being told how to handle their relatives, prepared to watch the fun as Morrigan had the tables turned on her.

Harry stormed in the door like a tornado in action, a tall, skinny 16-year old with round wire-rim glasses who hadn't quite started to fill out his lanky frame. He was wearing baggy jeans and a baggy long-sleeved shirt, and if he noticed Bill and Charlie sitting there, he didn't say anything. Nor did he make any mention of Morrigan's presence.

"Is Ron around?" he asked Moody in a tone that could most kindly be described as cranky.

"Haven't seen him," Moody said cheerfully. "Tea?" he asked.

"Oh." Somewhat deflated by the absence of Ron, Harry seemed to slow down a bit. "That'd be good, thanks. Hi Bill. Hi Charlie." He gave them a preoccupied grin and suddenly seemed to notice Morrigan standing near the window. "Hi," he said. "I'm Harry."

She laughed. "Right. I'd guessed that. Should I bow or just treat you like any other Wizard?" she asked lightly, blowing smoke out the window.

Caught off-guard by her casual attitude and the decided lack of staring at his forehead, Harry grinned at her. "Oh, just go for the normal thing. It'd be a nice change," he told her.

"I'm Morrigan Carrick. Nice to meet you," she told him. They shook hands. Bill, watching them both, noticed that they had the same deep green eyes, though Morrigan's were slightly uptilted at the corners.

Harry looked at Morrigan more closely. If he noticed that her eyes looked very much like his own, he said nothing.

"Are you here for a meeting?" Harry asked, because he couldn't think of anything else to say.

"Actually," she answered, her tone casual, "I was here to meet you." It wasn't entirely accurate, but she could hardly tell him the precise reason she'd come. "My brother was coming along as well, but he got delayed. It seems we have a great-great...well, I never remember the exact number of greats, but we have a great-however-many-times grandfather in common."

Harry didn't know anyone else who would have brought up such a subject to him, not as directly as Morrigan Carrick just had. That was enough to have him interested in what she had to say, though he still wasn't sure he trusted her. He avoided looking at Moody, sure that electric blue magical eye would be staring at him in its usual disconcerting manner. That left Bill and Charlie, or Morrigan to look at. His eyes went between the three of them. Bill looked amused but relaxed. Charlie, his mood as friendly as always, was grinning at Morrigan and Bill. Morrigan seemed entirely at home.

Harry thought hard while trying not to appear to be doing so. She'd got inside Grimmauld Place, which meant that she was there by Dumbledore's invitation. And that meant that she was probably an Order member. Moody didn't seem at all suspicious of her, which was unusual in and of itself. In fact, Moody seemed to be enjoying her company, which was stranger still. He decided, for the moment, that if Dumbledore and Moody, and Bill and Charlie, trusted her, he could let down his guard somewhat.

"So you just happened by, and you decided to pop in and say hello?" Harry asked. He hadn't meant his tone to be combative. It just came out that way, the same way so many things coming out of the emptiness inside him had since June. There seemed to be a hole inside him, where Sirius' death had hit hardest, that had filled up with anger during his time with the Dursleys this summer. The anger seemed to come out whenever he failed to consciously try and prevent it.

Morrigan looked at him, amusement in her green eyes. "Hardly, Harry. You'd know as well as anyone here that things at Grimmauld Place don't work that way."

Harry was not amused. "Well, why did you come by, then?" he asked, his tone edging over the line into hostility. Despite his earlier intention to let down his guard somewhat, the anger, like fire, had caught a spark and was fanning itself into a rage.

Morrigan's left eyebrow went up at the edge in his tone. As clearly as if she'd spoken aloud, he read her expression as a suggestion that he take a deep breath and try to calm down. He ignored it. Though his intentions had been good, his anger was melting them away like a candle flame melted wax. "I just thought I'd pop in and say hello," she told him, her tone cooler, somehow conveying disappointment in him. That only made him angrier. What right did she have to be disappointed in him? She didn't know what he'd been through.

"Oh, right," Harry said sarcastically. Bill and Charlie looked at him, surprised. They'd seen him angry--everyone who'd been in or out of Grimmauld Place in the week since he'd arrived had seen him angry. But they'd never heard this tone in his voice. No one but Ron, Hermione, and Dumbledore had ever heard Harry speaking like this, his tone like a newly sharpened knife. Harry could feel their eyes on him, and made an effort to ignore them.

"Well, you didn't seem very interested in the real reason, did you?" Morrigan said, raising both eyebrows at him now. "You just want to score some points. And I'm not interested in playing along with you. You've been through a lot, I'll grant you that. But if you want to be treated like anything but a sulky child, it's high time you learn not to act like one."

Harry's head came up at that, his green eyes blazing into hers. "You don't know anything about it," he told her coldly. He could feel anger, like cold fire, beginning to course through his veins. It pounded in his head, impossible to ignore and even more impossible to control.

"If you say so," she said with a shrug. She turned back to Moody and began discussing something about the Department of Aurors at the Ministry of Magic, completely ignoring Harry. Moody, who didn't seem to notice anything out of the ordinary, asked questions and offered advice as if Harry was no longer in the room.

Harry simply stared at her, unable to believe that she'd dismissed him so easily, and so neatly. And, he realised, so completely. She wasn't looking at him when she thought he wouldn't notice. She had simply stopped noticing him at all. Harry was torn between anger and confusion. Hadn't she wanted to talk to him? Hadn't that been the reason she'd come to Grimmauld Place? What was going on here?

"Er...so, Harry," Charlie said, trying to help him out. "Any news about Quidditch yet?"

Harry, startled, looked at Charlie. "Um, no," he said, fighting to focus on what he was saying. "Umbridge won't be back, of course. But there's been no official word about the ban being lifted." Harry had been banned from playing Quidditch for life by Professor Umbridge, last years' Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Hogwarts High Inquisitor, and, for a month or so, Headmistress of Hogwarts. He was fairly sure that the ban would be lifted now Umbridge was no longer at Hogwarts, but no one had told him so officially yet.

"Doubt you have to worry about that," Charlie said with a shrug. "But your captain's left school, right? And you've lost your Beaters."

"We can only hope," Harry said fervently. The two Beaters who had replaced Fred and George, Charlie's younger twin brothers, had been so awful the team would have been better off without any at all. Charlie grinned along with Harry, noticing that Harry's grin slipped as Morrigan and Moody kept on discussing the Ministry, still not seeming to notice that Harry was even in the room.

"Heard they were pretty awful," Charlie offered, to try to keep Harry's mind on topic.

Harry snorted. "One of them knocked himself out with his own club during practice," he said. Charlie's laughter was genuine on hearing that. The idea of knocking yourself out with your own beater's bat was funny enough. But he'd also seen Morrigan's expression when Harry had spoken. She was listening, all right. She just wasn't going to give Harry the satisfaction of knowing it.

She and Moody finished their conversation, and began walking out of the kitchen. Harry stared after them, dumbfounded.

"Well, Moody, I've got to be getting back to things," she said, and Moody chuckled at her for some reason Harry didn't comprehend. "Bill, nice to meet you. Charlie, good seeing you again. I'll be in touch. I've got to run." Then her eyes, bright and piercing, slid over to Harry. "Unless, that is, you've decided you might want to hear about how the whole thing came about, Harry." Her voice had lost some of its coolness. Harry had no doubt that it would come back in an instant, if he didn't manage to control his anger this time around. "It's your choice," she said with a shrug, waiting for his answer.

"Yeah, I guess I might as well hear it," Harry said. "Why not?"

She seemed to be restraining herself from rolling her eyes with difficulty, and she took her time in answering. As Harry waited for her to decide one way or the other, he fought against the anger he felt rising again. She seemed to be waiting to see whether he would, or could, master it. He struggled for control, the effort showing on his face.

Apparently approving of the fact that he was trying so hard, she walked back into the kitchen, gestured him into a chair, and looked at him. He looked back, doing his best not to glare up at her. With a nod that acknowledged his effort, she leaned against the counter again and gathered her thoughts.