Rating:
R
House:
Schnoogle
Ships:
Ginny Weasley/Harry Potter
Characters:
Harry Potter
Genres:
Action
Era:
The Harry Potter at Hogwarts Years
Spoilers:
Philosopher's Stone Chamber of Secrets Prizoner of Azkaban Goblet of Fire Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them
Stats:
Published: 04/17/2002
Updated: 01/04/2004
Words: 584,432
Chapters: 31
Hits: 808,247

Harry Potter and the Triangle Prophecy

Barb

Story Summary:
Harry's 7th and final year of school. In a time of uncertainty, the Muggle world has found a source of comfort and stability. Only Harry suspects that it isn't safe. Wizards are more concerned about themselves than Muggles since Voldemort's return, but are only Muggles at risk? Will anyone listen to Harry? He must decide whether to make a sacrifice that will change him--and the wizarding world-- forever.
Read Story On:

Chapter 14 - Tunnels

Chapter Summary:
Harry's seventh and final year of school. In a time of uncertainty, the Muggle world has found a source of comfort and stability. Only Harry suspects that it isn't safe. Wizards are more concerned about themselves than Muggles since Voldemort's return, but are only Muggles at risk? Will anyone listen to Harry? He must decide whether Draco Malfoy is ultimately friend or foe and discover the identity of the Daughter of War and get her help in defeating Voldemort; and finally, Harry must decide whether to make a sacrifice that will change him--and the wizarding world-- forever.
Posted:
12/16/2002
Hits:
25,465


Harry Potter and the Triangle Prophecy

Chapter Fourteen

Tunnels

The need of easy communication between the two banks of the Thames east of London Bridge had become
pressing at the end of the eighteenth century. As the construction of a bridge was out of the question on
account of river traffic, engineers of that time gave their serious attention to tunnelling schemes. In
1798 a Mr. Dodd proposed a 900-yard tunnel between Tilbury and Gravesend. In 1802 followed a scheme to join
Limehouse and Rotherhithe. A Mr. Vazie sunk a shaft to a depth of 76 feet below high water, and, aided by
John Trevethick, drove a small heading under the Thames for a distance of 1,100 feet. Then the bed of the
river gave way, water came in, the money available for the enterprise gave out, and the project had to be
abandoned. A vast number of suggestions for carrying the matter through were made; but the fifty-nine
selected for consideration by eminent authorities wilted under the verdict that an underground tunnel
which would be " useful to the public and beneficial to the adventurers" was impracticable.

--"The Thames Tunnel," Early Schemes for Tunnelling the Thames

Harry immediately whirled Sandy around and pulled her back to the far side of the bed, swiftly buttoning the open shirt (managing somehow to do so with his eyes barely open, since he hadn't been able to furnish her with a bra) and then pulling the sweater over her head and getting her arms into the sleeves. She was a bit awkward about managing her limbs, not surprisingly. When they came round the bed again, the facsimile of Jamie Potter, who was really a transfigured garden snake named Sandy, was wearing slightly baggy jeans, a white shirt and one of Mrs. Weasley's patented Weasley jumpers in a vivid shade of green that matched Harry's eyes (and his sister's eyes, as well).

Ron's ears were redder than he'd ever seen them, and Harry imagined that if he went to the wardrobe and looked in the mirror there, his own ears would match the Gryffindor decor as well. He smiled feebly at Neville, Seamus and Dean, who all looked very eager to hear how they were going to explain the girl in their room.

Harry decided to go out on a limb and tell the truth. Most of it, anyway.

"Um, you're probably wondering who this girl in our room is," he began slowly, speaking very clearly, as though they perhaps didn't speak English. Mostly, he was worried that it would come out as Parseltongue, but as he was trying to concentrate very hard on addressing the boys, and they didn't look baffled about his actual words, it seemed that they were hearing it as English.

Seamus crossed his arms and eyed Sandy in a rather annoying fashion. "You could say that, Harry. I don't even recognize her as a Hogwarts student, and she doesn't look old enough to be out of school. So she's either a witch from another country or a Muggle. Either way, you're in a bit of trouble, aren't you, Head Boy?"

For a moment, Harry wondered whether Seamus was trying to blackmail him, but he shook himself and went on with his explanation.

"Actually, there's a third explanation. The truth. I was practicing some spells from a book on doing magic with snakes. Sirius gave it to me after I got Sandy. Anyway, there's a spell to transfigure a snake into a woman, and that's just what I did. This is my snake, Sandy. That's why you heard us hissing at each other. We were both speaking Parseltongue. You've seen her a thousand times. You've just usually seen her wrapped around my arm, or warming herself on the hearth downstairs."

Dean snorted. "She looked a hell of a lot different then. Smaller. Greener. Less hair. Fewer arms and legs."

Seamus also snorted in laughter, and even Neville joined in. Harry could see that Ron was stifling his own laughter and suddenly felt quite alone. Blimey. I wish I had managed to turn her into my mum. They wouldn't be laughing at her....

"You expect us to believe that, Harry?" Seamus said when he could speak again. "How do we know that when you're hissing at each other you're not--just hissing? How do we know you're speaking Parseltongue?"

"It's the truth. Wait a minute--" He turned to his bedside cabinet and picked up the heavy book with the snake eating its own tail on the cover. He showed the three boys the exact spell he'd used, and they had to admit that it sounded like he wasn't lying--the book was open to that page, after all. However, after reading about how to do the spell, Neville looked at Ron and Harry shrewdly.

"That's a pretty thick book. Why, of all the spells you could have tried, did you decide on that one?"

Ron and Harry glanced guiltily at each other, swallowing. Harry had even said to Ron, You know what this was used for, don't you? Clearly, even Neville had worked this out.

Seamus, Dean and Neville were now laughing fit to kill. "We wondered why you were so attached to that snake, Harry!" Seamus choked out, almost helpless with laughter. "How convenient to be a Parseltongue! You can chat up any girl you can conjure from a snake!"

The three of them were leaning on each other, tears flowing from their eyes, they were laughing so hard. Harry felt very, very annoyed, and resisted the urge to throw around detentions or deduct house points. The last thing he needed was for McGonagall to get wind of this. (Although it was possible that he might get points for a well-done and complicated Transfiguration, he somehow doubted that she would fail to work out the usual purpose of the spell also.)

"That's enough!" he finally bellowed. "I cast the spell to last five hours. Ron and Jam--er--Sandy and I are going down to the common room to wait for the spell to wear off. Good night!"

He pulled Sandy to the door, her hand limp in his (did she not know how to use her mind to control her fingers? he wondered), and as Ron followed them out, he heard Dean say, "Weird. If I didn't know better, I'd say she's exactly what a sister of Harry's would look like."

"Maybe that's because Harry cast the spell," Neville suggested.

"Still--it's kind of weird," Dean said softly.

"Weird," Seamus agreed.

Harry groaned inwardly as they descended the stairs. If the other boys were saying anything else about this, he could no longer hear them, and he was glad that he didn't have Ron's super-sensitive werewolf hearing abilities. When the three of them reached the common room, it was deserted, for which Harry was grateful. He flung himself into a chair by the fire. Ron followed, and Sandy tried to, but she tripped over the rug and went sprawling.

"Ow," she groaned, as Harry and Ron helped her into an armchair.

"I am not accustomed to limbs," she told the two of them, awkwardly folding her legs under herself. "And having my eyes on the front of my head."

Harry ran his hand over his face after removing his glasses; he felt very weary. "Damn the three of them!" he said, then proceeded to use a number of choice profanities to describe what he thought of their interference. Harry put his glasses back on and saw that Ron was staring at both him and Sandy.

"What's the matter, Ron? I know, I know, you don't usually hear me using language quite like that....Somehow the occasion seems to warrant it....It isn't like you haven't got a foul mouth at times, you know...."

"You should hear what Harry says when others are not present," Sandy informed Ron. Ron's eyes went even wider. Harry frowned at him and wondered whether Sandy was going to make a habit of only using his first name. He wasn't used to it, and it sounded odd to him (although not quite as odd as looking at his sister and thinking of her as Sandy).

"What's with you, Ron? There's no way that you understood what she--"

"But that's just it, Harry! I can understand her! Everything she's said since we came downstairs has sounded like English!" His eyes were very round.

Harry looked at Sandy with his jaw dropped. "You can speak English!"

She put her hand to her throat. "I have a human's body, and it seems I can produce human speech."

"But you were speaking Parseltongue to me upstairs," Harry said, confused.

"You were speaking Parseltongue to me before that," she replied. "I was answering in kind."

Ron was shaking his head, smiling. "Wow! I finally get to hear Sandy speak. After all this time. Do you know what's going to happen soon?" he asked her eagerly.

She frowned. "I have the Sight because I am a snake, and all snakes have the Sight. But I am not in my snake form at the moment, so I do not know whether I have the Sight right now."

Harry was feeling even more irritated; now Ron was treating Sandy like a sideshow act. "How would you like it if I started talking to Maggie like that?" he said grumpily. "Bothering her morning, noon and night with, 'Read my fortune, Maggie, read my tea-leaves, Maggie, check out my aura, Maggie....'"

Ron grimaced. "All right, all right. You've made your point. What are we going to do now?"

Harry leaned back in his chair. "I'm going to get some sleep. I'm tired enough that sleeping while sitting up will be no trouble. Sandy, when the spell wears off and you're a snake again, can you do something to wake me?"

"I am sure I can think of something. Would it be acceptable if I also go to sleep now?"

Harry smiled at her. "Yes, Sandy, of course." She actually seemed to slither down the chair onto the floor (Harry reckoned that she didn't know how to move like a human) and stretched out on the rug before the fire. "What are you doing, Sandy?"

She looked up at him with his sister's glittering green eyes. "Going to sleep. This is how I am accustomed to sleeping when I am in this room." Harry nodded; it was true. He'd put her on the hearth many times for just that purpose. "However," she added, "I am not accustomed to being warm blooded. I am feeling perhaps a bit too warm...." In a trice, she had removed Mrs. Weasley's handiwork, and started to fumble at the buttons of the shirt. Harry was glad that she hadn't yet completely mastered how to use her fingers.

"No!" Harry cried out, jumping down onto the floor and putting his hands around her wrists so that she couldn't do anything. He glared at Ron, who had been watching her prepare to remove the shirt, his jaw hanging open again.

"Er," Ron said awkwardly. "Yeah! I mean--No! Don't take off the clothes." He sounded like he wanted to say this as much as he wanted to say, "No, please don't give me a million Galleons and tell me I'm the greatest Quidditch player who's ever lived."

"Thanks for your support, Ron," Harry said dryly.

"What?" Ron whined at him.

Harry frowned at Sandy. He had to keep reminding himself that she wasn't his sister. "All right, you don't have to wear this," he said, brandishing the pile of knitted green yarn. "But keep the shirt and jeans on. Okay? Otherwise--well, Ron and I could both get in quite a lot of trouble, and plus, I'd have to use that poker to blind myself, right after I beat the piss out of Ron with it." He tried to sound more light-hearted than he felt.

She frowned; she hadn't understood this kind of dark humor when she was a snake, either; she was ever the literalist. "Why would you beat your best friend, Harry? Why would you have to blind yourself?" She put her hand on his brow solicitously, and Harry felt alarmed and disturbed; she was suddenly reminding him of Jamie a great deal, and he had to tell himself sternly that she wasn't Jamie, that as much as he liked talking to Sandy sometimes, he couldn't quite talk to her in the same way he used to talk to his sister, and he they all needed to just get some rest.

"Never mind. I wasn't being serious. Well, not completely," he added, not wanting her--or Ron--to think that it would be all right for her to disrobe.

She curled up before the fire, her head on her arm, and soon he heard the sound of his sister's deep, measured breaths, the way he had been accustomed to seeing her in repose in his other life. It was so strange to have someone who appeared to be Jamie sleeping on the floor near his feet, and yet--so not Jamie.

Harry stared into the fire for a while; he'd thought he was exhausted, but now, suddenly, his eyes wouldn't close. He looked over at Ron, and he wasn't very happy when he discovered that Ron seemed to be watching the way the clothing strained over certain parts of Sandy's borrowed body when she moved in her sleep.

"Hey!" Harry said softly, so he wouldn't wake her. "Put your eyes back in your head!" he whispered fiercely.

Ron jerked his head up. "Oh. I didn't realize you were still awake. I was just--blimey, Harry. You really had yourself a pretty sister," he said weakly. Harry grinned and looked at her fondly.

"Yes, I did. You made as big a fool of yourself over her in my other life, you know. I didn't put that in the Pensieve," he grinned, "but it was rather funny."

"Oh, I'm glad my appreciating a pretty girl is so amusing to you."

"Yes, and it might be quite amusing to Hermione, as well. Shall I go fetch her--?"

Ron started to get up. "No! No! Totally unnecessary!" Harry laughed. "You bloody sod," he groused. "Don't do that."

Harry was still laughing. "Sorry. It's too much fun."

He and Ron stared at the fire silently for a few minutes, before Harry dared to ask him, "So--how are you and Hermione doing?"

Ron grimaced and stretched his long legs toward the fire. "She's not happy, Harry. I keep telling her that she shouldn't take it as an insult or anything, that we haven't--well--"

"Consummated?" Harry ventured cautiously, not entirely certain he should be prying, now that Ron was revealing this to him.

Ron nodded miserably. "Yeah. I mean--it's not as though I don't want her. She knows I do. And I realize it's frustrating for her too. She tried to lecture me about that. 'Do you think it's just for the man, blah blah blah.'" He sighed. "But when I, er--" He looked uncertainly at Harry. "Okay, Harry--I think it'll be helpful to me to talk about this, but don't take it the wrong way if I look at the fire right now and not you, okay?"

Harry tried not to laugh. "Okay. No offense taken. What did you want to say?"

Ron gazed at the dancing flames. "Well, a couple of weeks ago--well away from the full moon--I--I offered to help her. With the--the frustration she's probably feeling. But she started to--well, to try to take things further, and I bolted. I'm just not ready for her to get me all worked up. Not that I don't start to get worked up when I'm getting her worked up...I mean...I don't know what I'll do. To her. And it's getting close to the full moon, now. It's worst the day before, but it's progressively worse every day leading up to that. Right now, I feel pretty--agitated," he admitted, and Harry saw his eyes flick toward Sandy. "It's a pity I don't have a snake..."

Harry looked at him, trying to determine whether he was serious. "You'd better not mean that. Do you want me to pick up that poker right now and--?"

Ron laughed. "Get a grip, Harry. I was just joking. I just--I just feel so crazed. It's only been a few months since I was bitten, too. I don't know how Remus has put up with this month after month, year after year. I can't describe it. Feeling like you want to shag anything and everything--you may think you've felt that way since you were thirteen--"

"--well, I wouldn't go that far--"

"--but your typical teenage hormone-fest is nothing compared to this. And I know she would want to help me if she knew about it, which is precisely why I haven't told her. I'd lose all control and take her up on the offer, and then I'd probably lose all control while I'm with her and she'd land in the hospital wing..."

"Oh, come on, Ron, you don't know that. And you're right--she would want to help you. You really ought to tell her, even if she doesn't spend the night with you. She's Hermione. You know what she does; she hits the books. If she knew you had this problem, she wouldn't rest until she'd found a solution. A spell, or a potion or--something."

"Something like shagging me..."

"Ron! Give her some credit! She's been running for over two years, she's been learning karate since the beginning of the summer, and she's put herself through the physical rigor of Animagus training. There's a considerable amount of pain involved in that, let me tell you. She's tougher--physically--than you think. You don't need to act like she's made of bone china. You never know--she might give as good as she gets."

Ron's eyebrows flew up. "Are you saying that she--she ever got a little rough with you, Harry? Or asked you to get rough with her?" A split second later, his eyes opened wide in alarm. "Wait! Forget I said that! Bugger! I'm so tired I don't know what I'm saying. If I ever do that again, remind me that you have been instructed by me, on pain of death, never to reveal anything that went on between the two of you physically...."

Harry smirked. "No problem. You don't think I would have told you, do you? Just because you asked? I'm not that stupid."

Ron started to smile at this too, but then the smile disappeared from his face and he said to his best friend. "Oh. My. God. If you and Ginny do get together, you--you'll eventually want to--to--"

Harry leaned back and groaned. He was afraid of this. "What's wrong, Ron? Train took a while to pull into the station?" Harry tapped his temple with his forefinger. "Are you shocked that I would want to do this? Or did you think that Ginny and I were going to be having knitting parties? At any rate, it's not like it's going to happen any time soon..."

"You're damn right. But we are trying to break up Draco Malfoy and my sister so you two can--can--" He sputtered to a stop, then ran his hand through his hair. "Bloody hell. Now you almost have me wanting her to stay with Malfoy."

"Oh, yes, that would be a brilliant idea. Then she could lose her will power again, as she almost did at the end of last term, and sleep with him instead of me."

Ron shot to his feet. "What? They almost--what?"

Harry shrugged, trying to be nonchalant. "She was excited about her O.W.L. results. They went to the greenhouses to celebrate--you figure it out. If Professor Sprout hadn't caught them in time--"

"Sprout caught them? Bloody hell, I have to make sure I send her a Christmas card."

Harry laughed at that, and then Ron had to laugh too, and sat again, shaking his head and running his hand through his hair some more. Then he froze. He lifted his head and sniffed, and cocked his head, clearly listening to something.

"You hear that?" he whispered.

Harry frowned. "Of course I don't, you prat. What is it?"

Ron cocked his head to the side again. "Someone's been listening to us," he whispered. "They're on the girls' stairs."

He crept toward the opening to the stairwell, and a moment later, Harry did hear something; he heard footsteps pattering on the stone steps, making Ron leap through the arched doorway and dash up the stairs after the eavesdropper. Harry ran for the stairs too, but he was far behind Ron, not having his speed, and when he discovered Ron on one of the landings outside a dormitory, he stopped and whispered frantically, "Do you know who it is?"

Ron turned around, a dreadful expression on his face. He swallowed. "No," he whispered. "But I know what year they're in." He pointed with his thumb toward the sign on the door.

Seventh Years.

Now Harry swallowed. "C'mon, Ron," he whispered. "We--we should go back down."

When they were seated before the fire again, Harry tried to reassure Ron. "It'll be okay, really..."

"No, it won't, Harry! She knows now. Oh, god, she'll try to help...."

"Will that be so bad? So she tries to help? You'd think it was a bad thing for you to--to sleep with your own girlfriend when she wants this, too. Remus said--" he swallowed; "--he said it really calmed him down--" Harry tried not to think about the fact that it was sleeping with his own mother that had calmed down Remus Lupin.

"Do you think I want to--to use Hermione that way? Oh, darling, time to do it, as it's that time of month for me. Give me credit for being just a bit more romantic than that...."

Harry lifted his eyebrow at him. "Romantic? You? Oh, it was very romantic to sleep with Parvati after you were set off by those Ravenclaw girls..."

Ron ignored him. "And there's something Remus didn't tell you that he told me. I mean, he was embarrassed enough that you found out about that at all, and that Sirius found out the reason why he was sleeping with--with your mum..."

Harry frowned. "I thought Sirius didn't know before he overheard the two of you talking."

Ron nodded. "That's what I thought, too. No; he was saying, that he would have liked to pretend he didn't hear 'that'--or I think he said something like that--because he was talking about the whole pre-full-moon madness. He didn't know that that was why Remus and your mum had originally--er--done it."

"Oh," Harry said simply, wondering how his godfather could have kept from him for the previous three years that his mother had slept with Remus Lupin while they were in school. Then again--he hadn't told him that she'd been Snape's girlfriend, either. He'd found that out from Snape himself. "So, you still haven't told me what did Remus told you."

Ron sighed and glanced at Sandy. "He hurt her. When they--when she helped him. The first time, he bit her and bruised her. He almost always scratched her up pretty badly. And once he--he broke her leg."

"He what?"

Ron nodded, miserable. "He was pretty upset about it, he said. And she forgave him. He felt even guiltier about that....He wasn't trying to scare me or anything. Okay, maybe he was a little. For my own good. And Hermione's. So I'll think, so I'll be careful. I don't want to hurt her, Harry. And I could. Really badly."

"That's why you have to tell her about this. So she knows what she's getting into, or she can go into research mode. Let her be who she is: Hermione, queen of preparedness. Don't shut her out."

Ron looked even grumpier. "Yeah, well, because of her listening in on what we were saying, she knows now..."

Harry shrugged. "How do you know? She might not have been out of the dorm for that long, or she might have been going to check on a first year or something. She might not have heard us at all. She can't hear as well as you, remember."

Ron didn't look convinced. "Trust me; in the morning, she'll be acting funny. She can't not give away that she knows about this. She's dreadful at that sort of thing."

"Just do me a favor, Ron, all right? Don't be cross with her and don't have a row over this. Let her tell you she knows. And if she's cross with you for not telling her straight out--just take it. Apologize--as difficult as I know you find that to do--and get on with your lives. This shouldn't be the roadblock you've let it become."

Ron made what Harry thought might be a noise of assent, leaning back with his eyes closed. Harry finally closed his eyes as well, hoping that his two best friends would be able to work things out, and before he knew it, something sharp was digging into his ankle, making him cry out in pain. His eyes flew open and he looked around, surprised to find himself sitting in a chair by the common room fire; he'd forgotten he wasn't sleeping in his own bed. There was a white shirt and a pair of jeans on the hearth rug, and Harry looked around in panic. She'd gotten undressed! He swallowed, seeing that Ron was still asleep. Bloody hell. She just doesn't get it.

But then he noticed that the shirt on the floor appeared to be buttoned still, and he felt another sharp pain on his ankle.

"Ow!" he said this time, bending over to look down, finding Sandy looking quite like herself again, a small green garden snake. She'd found a way to wake him. He hadn't realized she had such sharp teeth, as she wasn't a carnivore.

"Wake up, Harry Potter," she hissed, evidently having decided to go back to using his first and last names. He checked his watch before picking her up, then held her before his face.

"Thanks, Sandy. All of the trouble about us having a strange girl in the dorm aside, this does seem to have worked. It isn't four thirty yet and you've woken me up in time to do what I need to. Thank you."

"You're welcome, Harry Potter. It was rather interesting to be a human for a little while, but I think I am glad to be a snake again. It is what I know."

Harry nodded. And he'd been a snake for a while--a Slytherin--but now that he was a Gryffindor again, he felt much more comfortable. It was what he knew.

"Right. I can put you on my arm again, if you like. To keep you warm."

"Thank you, Harry."

There was that first name again. He tried not to reveal to her that this disconcerted him. He let her wind around his upper arm and then left Ron sleeping in the armchair while he crept up the stairs to the dorm, to get his map, since he'd forgotten it earlier in his haste to get away from the other boys. When he returned, he shook Ron until he woke.

"Wha--? Harry? What the hell--?"

"We're going to find out what Malfoy and Mariah Kirkner are up to, remember?" he told his sleepy friend. Ron yawned hugely and rubbed his eyes with his large fists.

"Oh. Yeah. Right." One word sentences seemed to be all Ron could manage at the moment. His eyes were half-lidded and his beard had grown ridiculously thick over the few hours he'd been sleeping. He appeared to be waking from a winter-long hibernation.

Harry looked at the map carefully, trying not to let his eyes close from weariness. There were a variety of dots moving on it--the people who were on for the third shift--and then he saw that there were two dots moving in the Slytherin common room labeled Draco Malfoy and Mariah Kirkner.

"There they are!" he said, feeling more awake now. They watched those dots travel through the dungeons and up the stairs to the entrance hall, where they were to report for duty. Harry checked his watch and noted that they were right on time--slightly early, even. The collection of dots milled around the entrance hall for a while before dispersing; the people from the third shift returning to their quarters, and the people on the fourth shift proceeding to fan out to patrol the castle corridors.

Harry and Ron saw Draco and Mariah go up the stairs to the library. ("Figures they'd pair off," Ron mumbled.) They walked back and forth the corridor outside the library, as though trying to appear to be patrolling, then went back down to the entrance hall, after which they descended the stairs to the dungeons.

"Blimey!" Ron said, indignant. "They're going back to their house! They're going to duck their patrol shift!"

But Harry noticed that they took a turn that didn't go to the Slytherin common room; he knew it didn't because he'd actually lived there for almost six years, whereas Ron didn't pick up on this, having only been there once, when he was disguised with Polyjuice Potion.

"No, they're not," Harry told him, pointing at their route. "They veered off here."

They watched the moving dots some more as they proceeded through the maze of the Hogwarts dungeons. "Where are they going?" Ron asked, frowning. A couple of times, Draco Malfoy and Mariah Kirkner appeared to be moving through solid walls; they were walking through passages that were not marked as passages.

And then Harry remembered, when he and Ron and Hermione had been bound to the trees in the forest and they didn't yet know that Malfoy was laying an elaborate trap for his father, Draco had said, "My dad was already in the castle, waiting down in the dungeons. He let us out.....you aren't the only one who knows secret passages out of that place..."

"Of course! This could either be a passage my dad and the others didn't know about when they made the map, or else it was created by someone after they made the map. If they made the map in fourth or fifth year, this passage could have been made as early as their sixth or seventh year. It's a way Slytherins probably use to get out of the castle. Of course they'd have ways to sneak about....they're Slytherins." Harry wondered why he didn't remember these passages from being a Slytherin himself, but he reckoned it was possible that the difference in the time lines may have meant that a crucial person who knew the secret didn't pass it on to the younger Slytherins at some point, and knowledge of the tunnels was lost.

Ron nodded grimly. "You're right, Harry. It makes perfect sense."

They continued to watch the dots move through what appeared to be solid walls, and then, through what appeared to be solid earth outside the foundations of the castle. "Must be a tunnel," Harry said, watching intently. The tunnel seemed to be leading to a spot near the lake; Harry could only judge the route it was taking by the movement of the dots, as the passage wasn't charted on the map.

"Huh?" both he and Ron said in unison when the dots appeared to be in the lake.

"That must be a pretty deep tunnel," Ron said, "to go under the lake."

They stared and stared at the map, and at length, the dots were under the earth by the shores of the lake again. Draco and Mariah stayed there. And stayed there.

"What are they doing? Do you suppose they're--"

"I don't know," Harry replied, swallowing. Ron paced, his hands combing his hair again.

"I wish they weren't in a damn tunnel. I wish I could just go over to the window here and look out, and know what they're--"

Ron froze, staring out the window at the grounds. Harry frowned. "What?" he asked his suddenly-silent best friend.

Ron said, "Be right back," rather abruptly, before sprinting up the boys' stairs. Harry walked to the window where Ron had been and couldn't believe his eyes. "Here," Ron said breathlessly, practically making Harry jump; Ron had been both swift and silent, and he was now thrusting Harry's Omnioculars at him, raising his own pair to his eyes and adjusting the focus. Harry lifted his as well, and now he saw, much more clearly, Draco Malfoy and Mariah Kirkner on the shore of the lake. When he'd thought they were underground again, they were actually on the shore of the lake.

They were just finishing taking off their clothes.

"Blimey!" Ron exclaimed, never taking his eyes from his Omnioculars. "It's bloody cold out for that, don't you think? Although I reckon they could have put a warming charm on a area where they are. Like when Hagrid had that golden griffin here. And--oh, my--"

Harry wondered whether he'd missed something important now. He scanned the area around the two Slytherins. "What? What?"

"Oh, it's just that--you can tell Mariah's a runner. I mean, that she--she tries to stay fit..." Ron swallowed. The Omnioculars seemed welded to his hands and face.

Harry resisted the urge to threaten to tell Hermione about this comment, as he also found himself (despite his original intent of being dispassionate and clinical about this exercise) mentally cataloguing Mariah's physical charms and didn't feel like having Ron threatening to tell Ginny. He couldn't have cared less about Draco Malfoy; Mariah was far more interesting....Harry also swallowed. He kept his Omnioculars trained on them so that it would record them and provide proof of what they were up to (he told himself). But as he watched Mariah and Draco, finally seeing them do what he'd suspected they'd been doing for some time, it seemed that his heart was beating very loudly. His head was pounding along with it. He noticed that Ron's breathing had become ragged, and Harry reckoned that if he tried to remove the Omnioculars from Ron' face, he would wind up being put through the wall by a very upset werewolf.

Abruptly, Mariah and Draco stopped kissing and touching each other and stood, picking up their wands and waving them over their clothes. The garments leapt into neat bundles, and appeared to have a sheen on them, as though they'd been encased in some clear waterproof material. Each bundle seemed to have a two long ribbons attached to it, and, still naked under the three-quarters moon, both Draco and Mariah put their arms through the ribbon loops and walked toward the water holding hands, wearing the bundles of clothes on their backs, as though they were going hiking. Harry and Ron were shocked when the pair leapt into the water, which was sure to be nearly freezing. Some bubbles rose to the surface where they had jumped, but their heads did not reappear immediately.

"What the hell are they doing?" Ron exclaimed before Harry hushed him. He sounded far more upset about not being able to see Mariah anymore than about the possibility that the two Slytherins could catch their death swimming in the frigid water. Then something occurred to Harry.

"Wait a minute, Ron. Where do you suppose the tunnel brought them up to the surface? First they were underground, then under the lake, then on the shore of the lake. Are there any bushes near the shore? Something that could conceal an opening to a passage?"

Ron scanned the landscape again. "Not really. Not where they were, anyway. There are some rocks and shrubbery farther along, though."

They were silent for a while. Harry checked his watch. They waited some more, one of them always watching the water. Harry checked his watch yet again. He swallowed. "Ron. I think we'd better go find the patrollers. Especially the teachers. Or maybe I should just go straight to Dumbledore..."

"Why?" Ron said, still looking through the Omnioculars.

"Because it's been over five minutes since I checked my watch the first time after they went into the lake, and it was at least three or four minutes before that that they jumped in. They've been in there for almost ten minutes, and there aren't bubbles rising to the surface anymore, like when they first went in. We need to do something."

Ron finally tore his eyes away from the Omnioculars and checked the map. "Snape and McGonagall are on."

"Really?" Harry asked, checking the map. "It's supposed to be Sprout and Vector. Oh, well. I suppose the students aren't the only ones who change shifts. Where did you see them?

"Here, by the library. Wipe the map and put it in your pocket."

"Right," Harry agreed. In a half-minute, they were out of the portrait hole and sprinting toward the library. When they arrived in the corridor they wanted, they spotted Professors McGonagall and Snape about to descend the stairs to the entrance hall.

"Professors!" Harry cried out breathlessly. They whirled in surprise. Professor McGonagall looked very concerned.

"Potter! Whatever is the matter? Are you taking Weasley to the infirmary?"

"No, Professor," he panted, trying to get enough air into his lungs. "We--we were awake in our dormitory--" His eyes slid toward Ron's, so he'd know to back him up on this. "--and I happened to walk to the window for a drink of water from the pitcher, and I saw--"

McGonagall stepped toward him, concerned. "What?"

Harry swallowed. "Mariah Kirkner and Draco Malfoy jumped into the lake. And they didn't come up. We waited and waited, but it's been nearly fifteen minutes now, maybe longer...."

Snape actually grew paler, and Professor McGonagall looked horrified. Without a word, they turned to the stairs and started descending rapidly, Ron and Harry right behind them. Snape had already opened the heavy front door of the school and they were all about to run outside when a familiar voice behind them made them freeze.

"A bit cold for that, isn't it?" came the laconic drawl. "Are we patrolling outdoors now, as well?"

They all turned in surprise. Draco Malfoy and Mariah Kirkner were standing at the top of the dungeon stairs. Snape gave Harry and Ron a sharp look and pushed the front doors closed again. Harry gawped at Malfoy and Mariah. They were alive! But--how?

McGonagall's mouth had gone very thin and Harry didn't like the way it was twisting about one bit. "How is everything, Mr. Malfoy, Miss Kirkner?" she asked them, one eyebrow raised.

Draco Malfoy shrugged. "We were down in the dungeons. The Slytherins seem to be behaving themselves at the moment, you'll be glad to know, sir," he said to his head-of-house. "Thought we'd check upstairs next."

Harry's jaw dropped. "But---but you jumped in the lake! The pair of you! We thought you'd drowned!"

Malfoy looked at Harry as though he thought he was mad. "Um, having a little trouble telling your dreams apart from reality, Potter? Or should I say fantasies?"

Harry turned, wide-eyed, to McGonagall and Snape. "It's true! They--they--" he sputtered, realizing that he couldn't say in front of McGonagall that they were using the Marauders' Map to track Draco Malfoy and Mariah Kirkner. If it had just been Snape, he would have, as Snape knew about the map, but with McGonagall present....

She raised an eyebrow at Harry and Ron. "Yes? Do you have anything remotely plausible to say concerning why you two are out of Gryffindor Tower? Because it is starting to appear that you were out of bounds, learned that Professor Snape and I were nearby, and to avoid discovery, decided to feign an emergency." Her eyes looked back and forth between them, peering over her square-rimmed spectacles. "Please tell me if there is a legitimate reason for your being here, as Mr. Malfoy and Miss Kirkner both appear to be in the pink of health, as well as being dry as bones." They were not, however, even close to being as dry as Professor McGonagall's comments, Harry thought.

Then he took a good look at them; there wasn't a drop of water on them, and even their clothes were immaculate, not remotely creased, as they would be after being bundled up. Harry caught Mariah's eye, which he saw had quite a mischievous glint in it. She gave him a half-smile and ran the tip of her tongue over her bottom lip.

She knew he'd been watching.

Suddenly, a very clear mental image of her body leapt into his mind, and he felt himself grow warm and redden. Professor McGonagall took this as an admission of guilt.

"I don't know what you've been up to, but Head Boy or not, I cannot make exceptions to the rules." She sighed, as though she'd dearly love to, but had no choice; she looked at Snape out of the corner of her eye. He had his arms crossed and was looking triumphantly at Harry and Ron, just like when they were younger and he'd caught them in a bit of rule breaking. "It does not appear," McGonagall continued, "that Mr. Weasley needs to go to the hospital wing, as I thought might be the reason for your being out of bounds, and no one else seems to be having a medical emergency either--" she added, glancing at the Slytherins.

"--Although when I die, Potter, I'll make sure you're the first to know--" Draco Malfoy added with a smirk that faded as soon as Professor McGonagall gave him that gimlet eye. He cleared his throat for a moment and let her continue.

"--so I have no choice. Twenty house points will be taken from each of you for being out of bounds, and detentions will be arranged. Now--I will personally escort you up to Gryffindor Tower and I don't want you to come out of there until the last patrol shift is over. Is that understood?"

"Yes, Professor," Harry and Ron said in unison. Harry noticed that Ron had been very, very quiet since Malfoy and Mariah had shown up. Now he saw that Ron was looking at Mariah with narrowed eyes, but this time it didn't seem lascivious. His nostrils were flared as well, and Harry saw the wolf's red glow in his eyes. Harry wished Ron was like Maggie and could project his thoughts into other people's brains; he would have given all the Galleons in his Gringotts vault to know what Ron was thinking. Then Harry noticed Snape looking at Malfoy and Mariah rather suspiciously, and he wished that he was the one escorting them upstairs, so he could speak to him privately, let him know about the map, about the secret passages in the dungeons. Harry had no doubt that he'd believe him and Ron. But that would have to wait.

When they reached the portrait of the Fat Lady, McGonagall turned to them; she'd been utterly silent while walking upstairs. "I don't know why the two of you were wandering about at this hour, but I should think you would both want to be well-rested for your practices today, and for your match tomorrow." She smiled indulgently now. "I know that no matter whether Wales or England win, you will both make us all proud," she added quietly. Harry felt very small. Some Head Boy I am.

Harry and Ron said goodnight to her and reentered the common room. They picked up their Omnioculars from the windowsill and climbed wearily up to their dormitory. Seamus, Dean and Neville were snoring peacefully behind their bedhangings. Harry and Ron fell into their beds without disrobing or pulling the hangings closed, and Harry fell asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.

The dreams started not long after he fell asleep....

He was swimming in the lake during the second task....Mariah Kirkner and Draco Malfoy were the ones tied up and being held hostage, though, not the four who were under the lake during the real task. He tried to untie them, but he couldn't loosen their bonds, and when he put his hands up to his neck, his gills were gone, and he felt his lungs swiftly and painfully fill with water, while they grinned at him and laughed and laughed, bubbles emerging from their mouths, their eyes wide with mirth....

He awoke, gasping for air, as the morning sun shone in the windows of the tower room.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"Forty points?"

Harry and Ron sank down in their seats at the Gryffindor table. Hermione's cheeks were quite pink. "I can't believe that when you were both supposed to be getting a good night's sleep, instead you were out of bounds and busy getting forty points taken away from Gryffindor. You're not in first year anymore, Harry. You're Head Boy now--"

"But Hermione--" Ron started to say.

"And you!" she said abruptly, turning to him.

"What?" he said, a defensive tone in his voice. Hermione looked like she wanted to hit him and kiss him at the same time. She turned back to her plate and stabbed some eggs rather viciously. Harry was feeling a bit off his food and had a full plate that he'd merely picked at.

"Oh--nothing," she bit off, sounding like she had quite a lot to get off her chest to Ron, but that she hadn't quite been pushed to the breaking point. Harry wasn't sure Ron would want to be around when she did reach that point.

A number of students around the Great Hall seemed to be looking in Harry's and Ron's direction, giggling and pointing. Orion Pierson was sniggering behind his hand and then whispering something to a boy sitting next to him, making Harry wish he wasn't Sirius' nephew, so he wouldn't feel guilty upbraiding him for being rude. The seventh-year Hufflepuffs were red-faced with laughter, and Hannah Abbott seemed to be making kissing faces at him before turning to her friends, who were hooting and squealing uproariously. Lovely, he thought, and she's a prefect, too. The Slytherins looked very smug about something whenever he glanced their way, and the Ravenclaws looked even more superior than usual, and yet also highly amused about something he'd evidently done, as they were all breaking into grins when they noticed him glancing their way. What's wrong with all of them? he wondered. He understood the other houses being gleeful about Gryffindor losing points, but that didn't explain why the first year Gryffindors were in convulsions, nor why the other students in his own house were also looking like they were going to burst. He met Ginny's eye for a minute, and was surprised to see that she was looking embarrassed, instead of being in convulsions, like the other students. She turned deep red and looked away from him, pretending to be interested in something Ruth was saying. Ruth met his eye then, and a secret smile tugged at the corner of her mouth; she looked like she was trying very, very hard not to laugh.

Harry ignored all of them, bending over his plate to speak to Hermione across the table, sotto voce. "Hermione--we probably should have told you what we were up to last night, but I want to fix that now. Hurry and finish, then come with us so we can tell you how we got forty house points deducted. I think we need your brain to help us work out a bit of a mystery."

She brightened at bit at that, and Ron gave him an approving smirk. The way to get on Hermione's good side: flatter her brain. And making a groveling apology for any misdeed was also usually a good move.

The three of them sat in the anteroom off the Great Hall after breakfast, Harry and Ron taking turns explaining the problem with getting Ginny to personally witness some misdeed of Draco Malfoy's so she'd have to break up with him out of pride. Then they explained why they'd turned Sandy into a woman...

"Oh, yes! I nearly forgot about that when I heard about the forty points. It's all over the school this morning, you know. Neville, Dean and Seamus started telling everyone as soon as they came downstairs." Harry groaned; that explained all of the tittering in the Great Hall. "Apparently you two were still sleeping after your nocturnal jaunt. What is this spell?" she asked grumpily, with a glance at Ron. "The wizarding method of not having to go out and buy inflatable dolls?"

Both Harry and Ron flushed. "She looked like my sister Jamie, if you must know," he informed her. "Although practically no one in this life knows about Jamie, so I can't very well explain, 'Oh, I was missing my sister and thinking about her when I cast the spell...' It wasn't like I was about to do anything with her, even if I weren't interested in Ginny, and even if she looked like someone else. Especially as she's really Sandy. What do you take me for?"

Hermione waved her hand at him impatiently. "Yes, yes, you have a point. It's just that--well it does look very bad, Harry. You can't deny that."

He grimaced. "I know, I know." He wondered how soon the hubbub about that spell would die down, and whether any teachers would get wind of it.

Ron's eyes narrowed now, looking at her. "You're saying you didn't know about this until this morning, when the other blokes came downstairs and told everyone? You weren't on the girls' stairs last night eavesdropping on us while we were talking?"

Hermione looked very confused. "Eavesdropping? Last night? I slept the night through. What are you talking about?"

Ron was looking at her very intently. Then he turned to Harry with a sigh of relief. "She's telling the truth."

Harry shook his head in wonder. "How do you know?"

"I can see when the blood vessels around a person's eyes are carrying more blood. I can sense in general the way a person's blood is flowing through their body. That's what happens when someone's lying--the thing about the eyes. And there's no change with her."

Hermione put her hands on her hips. "First--stop talking about me like I'm not here. Second--where on earth did you learn that?"

Ron shrugged. "A Muggle magazine I read when Remus and I went into London to register me as a werewolf. They have medical magazines in the reception area--Muggle ones--so it doesn't look suspicious, in case any Muggles wander in off the street. They can't use Muggle-repelling charms on the office to keep them out because a number of werewolves are Muggles. It was a very interesting article, about how Muggles are trying to create these machines to work out where people's blood is flowing when they're doing various things, like complex calculations or singing or lying. When they're lying, it turns out that it goes to the blood vessels around the eyes. Almost as good as Veritaserum, sounds like, if you have a good way to detect that that's where the blood's gone." Hermione looked at him in amazement.

"Wait," Harry said suddenly. "We're getting sidetracked. So--if Hermione wasn't the one eavesdropping on us, who was?"

Ron shrugged. "That leaves Parvati or Lavender. Whoever it was ran into the seventh-year dorm."

"Did you hear anything last night, Hermione? Hear one of them get up and leave?" Harry asked her.

She widened her eyes and shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe. In the night, one of us will usually get up to use the loo. But not always. I was dead tired last night. I don't know if one of them got up or not."

"Oh!" Ron cried. "I almost forgot, Harry. Last night, Malfoy and Mariah were definitely lying."

"No surprise there. Blood vessels around the eyes?" Harry asked.

"Not only that, but they smelled of the lake. Very strongly. And they smelled of something else, too...."

"What?"

Hermione and Ron both looked at him as though he was daft. "What do you think, Harry?" Ron said. "They reeked of sex."

"Oh," he said softly.

"Poor Ginny!" Hermione said. "Explain to me again why she won't break up with him, when she doesn't love him, wants to be with you, and she knows he's cheating on her?"

Harry sighed. "She's afraid he'll go running off to serve Voldemort and try to kill me," he said in a monotone. Hermione nodded.

"And well she might be. This is Malfoy we're talking about. Someone who thinks nothing of putting his own father in prison, even if he did richly deserve it."

"But he can't love her," Ron said, running his hand through his hair. "He's shagging Mariah. He's a bastard and deserves whatever he gets."

"Yes," Hermione reminded him, "but Harry doesn't deserve to be killed just because Malfoy is cheating on your sister. Don't be stupid." Ron bristled, but she went on. "At any rate, it sounds like you two should curb your nocturnal ramblings for a while. I'll see whether I can manipulate both my own schedule and Malfoy's and Mariah's in order to get something incriminating on them at a time when I have permission to be out of Gryffindor Tower," she said pointedly. "In the meantime, you might find this interesting, Harry. My parents sent it in the owl post this morning."

She handed him an article cut from the London Times; it was about Rodney Jeffries. All sorts of people were interviewed about how much they loved him, from priests to doctors to members of Parliament and several European royal families. Scotland Yard--once investigating him--was even providing protection to Jeffries free of charge. Harry shook his head. There was something not right about this. He wondered now why Jeffries had healed him in St. Mungo's....Perhaps it had merely been to get Harry on his side? Or perhaps he thought Harry would tell people who had healed him, hoped there'd be some good publicity to come out of it. Harry was glad now that he hadn't told anyone. He'd originally thought Jeffries sounded very well-meaning and altruistic in the letter he'd written to Harry, but now he had a rather uneasy feeling at the thought of anyone knowing about that. He thought about telling Ron and Hermione, but decided it wasn't the right time.

Once "time" crossed his mind, he checked his watch. "Ron--we have to go. We need to get our gear and meet Sirius and Remus in the Great Hall in half an hour."

"While you two are off flying about chasing Quaffles and catching Snitches, I will do something useful and try to figure out where those tunnels are that you say Malfoy and Mariah used," Hermione said. "Where's the map now?"

Harry withdrew it from his pocket and handed it to her. Then he whirled in surprise as a very smooth and familiar voice said from the doorway, "Good. I was half afraid that you had lost that, Mr. Potter, although it does explain why you assumed that Miss Kirkner and Mr. Malfoy were in danger early this morning."

Snape stood in the doorway, his deep voice slightly amused. Harry stuttered. "Oh, I--I'm so glad you're here, Professor! I wanted to tell you last night, but--"

He held up his hand. "I knew you would not frivolously run about the castle claiming that someone was in danger. When you lie to cover up your rule-breaking, you are not usually very good at it, but you never invent emergencies, I'll give you that," he added, making Harry flush. "Plus--Miss Granger may need some assistance from someone who is intimately acquainted with the dungeon passages...."

Ron looked a little hostile about this. "You're going to be wandering around the dungeons with Hermione, looking for secret passages?" Harry wasn't sure whether it was bothering him because Hermione was his girlfriend or because Snape was, technically, his older sister's boyfriend. Harry had the impression that Ron would have been far more comfortable going back to the way they'd all thought of Snape when they were younger, as some sort of evil neutered Potions-teaching machine.

"Well, Miss Granger and Miss Dougherty and I." Ron looked like he was breathing a little easier, having heard that. "It seems--prudent--to have someone with your older sister's talents along."

Harry nodded. "Right. Good idea. But may I ask sir--why?"

Snape fixed him with an intent gaze. "Mr. Malfoy has a charm on him which could very well make him the most useful weapon the Dark Lord has. And I am not completely certain where Miss Kirkner's loyalties lie, except that they undoubtedly lie with Miss Kirkner--if she is controlling her own actions..."

Harry's eyes opened wide. Of course! Lucius Malfoy had put girls under Imperius to try to control Harry--Voldemort might have had someone put Mariah under Imperius to try to control Malfoy! On the other hand, that might mean that Malfoy wasn't completely responsible for his actions, which made it harder for Harry to condemn him....Damn, he thought. If he turns out to be blameless.... His thoughts were whirling about this new and unwelcome thought.

Damn.

"If there is a way for either of them to leave the castle undetected, I believe I should know about it, for security reasons. Don't you?" Snape added, raising an eyebrow.

Harry nodded again. "Good point. Well," he said, not really wanting to leave now, "Ron and I can go off to Quidditch practice knowing that the question of the tunnels is in good hands." He gave Snape a small smile, feeling inordinately rewarded when one corner of the Potion Master's mouth lifted in an almost smile.

"I'll take that as a compliment, Mr. Potter. You should go to meet Remus and Sirius now, the pair of you," he said brusquely. "You might also want to inform them of what the three of us will be doing. In addition, I will tell the headmaster, and then he can tell Professor McGonagall what is occurring, and that I am to oversee your detentions," he added, nodding at Harry and Ron. "That will give us additional time to study the question of the tunnels, if we do not learn all we need to today, and since you will be under my supervision, if anyone else comes across us, you will have adequate alibis this time." Snape turned to look at Hermione impassively.

"Miss Granger--wait for me here. I will go to fetch Miss Dougherty."

He left immediately, his robes billowing out behind him, and Hermione stood to kiss Ron on the lips and Harry on the cheek. "Have a good practice, both of you, and don't worry. Leave it to us to find out how they left the castle."

"Too bad you're going to be in the dungeons with Snape and Maggie," Harry told her, smirking. "They may try to find a way to shake you after a while. Use tact; if it seems like they want to sneak off to snog, try to think of a good reason why you have to excuse yourself..."

Ron was aghast. "That's my sister you're talking about!"

"Sssh!" Hermione hissed at him, even though they were the only three in the room. "That's not supposed to be common knowledge, remember?"

"Snogging Snape," Ron said with disgust, making Hermione and Harry exchange amused glances; Ron had never been in Snape's Pensieve and seen Harry's mother with Snape in the dungeon and under the oak trees that used to grow near the greenhouses. "Are you trying to make me get sick right before a practice?"

Harry and Hermione laughed, and they were both still laughing as Harry dragged Ron from the room so they could get their equipment and prepare to meet each other on the field of battle.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Harry hadn't been so tired and sore since the day he had tried out for the Welsh team. At least the Bludgers were being hit away from him by his team's Beaters now. The final practice before the match had been a scrimmage with the witches of the Holyhead Harpies, the current League champions. For this, Erica Welsh had played in the Seeker position on the Harpies; Harry had grown to like Erica quite a lot, and Owen as well. The two of them were both very sweet together and perfectly able to set their marital relationship aside and be quite businesslike (which sometimes meant quite antagonistic) at a moment's notice. And yet--their marriage didn't seem to suffer at all for this. From what Harry could tell, it was largely through Erica's connections that they were able to get the Harpies to come in and play them to give them some formidable practice before the match with England. He'd caught the Snitch three times during the practice and Owen was convinced he was ready for the match. Erica had studied the style of the English Seeker and had tried to imitate him as much as possible, so that Harry would know what to expect. She'd caught the Snitch twice.

When he and Sirius arrived back in the Hogwarts entrance hall just in time for the evening meal, Harry thought it was quite possible that he could eat everything that appeared on the Gryffindor table. Unfortunately, that would mean fighting Ron for all of the food; he seemed to have the same sort of rigorous practice experience Harry had had. Harry couldn't help feeling that that didn't bode well for the Welsh team. He grimaced while shoveling his food in, watching Ron's face as he chewed nonchalantly. He and Ron had already agreed that there would be no hard feelings no matter whose team won, but the fact remained that only one team was going on to the quarter-finals.

Suddenly, a shriek rent the air in the Great Hall, rising even above the normal hubbub of meal-time. Harry turned in alarm to see Pansy Parkinson run screaming from the Slytherin table, her hair afire with magical purple flames. Quicker than thought, Will Flitwick, who was at the far end of the Gryffindor table with the other third years, and closest to Pansy, cried, "Fluvius!" and sprayed her head with a stream of water from the end of his wand. By the time Harry reached them, Will had turned off the water, and Pansy was a sopping mess, her singed hair clinging to her head, making it look rather small and accentuating her piggish turned-up nose.

"What--what happened?" Harry asked her, perplexed.

Pansy screamed in frustration. "It's--it's that Mudblood harpy again, that's what happened!" she cried before turning on her heel and stalking out of the Great Hall, probably to go to the hospital wing. Harry turned to see where she was pointing, and saw--

His Aunt Petunia.

He groaned inwardly.

"Thanks, Will," he said to the younger boy, who nodded and gave Harry a small two-fingered salute before rejoining his friends at the Gryffindor table. Harry thought that perhaps he would suggest to Snape that they relax the rule about the Dueling Club being for fourth years and up; Will seemed to be very good at thinking on his feet, and Harry hadn't been especially happy with the new students who'd been trying for the open positions since the term had begun in September.

He walked to the Slytherin table and stood next to his aunt; she was eating with an ersatz air of calm. There was a no-man's-land around her where no other Slytherins sat. She did not acknowledge Harry's presence.

He cleared his throat in a vain attempt to get her attention, and when that failed, he put his hand on her shoulder lightly and said, "May I speak to you, please?" He didn't especially want to call her "Aunt Petunia" in front of the Slytherins, so he didn't call her anything at all.

He glanced up at Snape, at the head table, and received a small nod; he didn't want to deal with his new middle-aged student (she was older than he was), and was glad Harry was taking her in hand. Harry hoped he could take her in hand. It was very, very strange how the tables had turned; all of his life, she'd had ultimate power over him, the exception being when his uncle was making them all drive across the country to avoid his Hogwarts letters--even Aunt Petunia had had no control over the situation then, Uncle Vernon being utterly in control of the family's movements--and yet completely out-of-control at the same time.

She looked up at him with a rather surly expression in her eyes, and Harry was jolted by how much it reminded him of his mother. She'd never reminded him much of his mother when he was younger, except when she was singing to Dudley--but then, he hadn't really known anything about his mother, and now he had fifteen years of memories of her, memories of growing up with her and being disciplined by her, of fighting with her and making up with her. His aunt rose and followed him out the door of the Great Hall.

"Aunt Petunia," he began in a low voice, once they were standing in the entrance hall; "did you set Pansy's hair afire?" He felt it wisest to get straight to the point and not beat around the bush.

She practically pouted. "That girl is the stupidest little ninny I've ever had the displeasure to know. If she doesn't have her hair set on fire more often, she'll be completely insufferable by the time she's twenty."

Harry sighed, remembering the Pansy in his other life trying to get her father to consider Harry for a job in his department at the Ministry, so she could be near him. "Look, I'm not the biggest fan of Pansy Parkinson either, but there are a couple of things to consider. First--trying to keep Pansy from being insufferable is probably a lost cause." He couldn't stop himself from smirking just a little, realizing that he and his aunt probably actually agreed on something--a general dislike of Pansy. "Second--even if someone is incurably insufferable, you can't just go about setting their hair on fire. I don't care how many people you dislike--and you're probably going to dislike a lot of Slytherins, as most of them aren't at all fond of Muggle-born witches and wizards--you can't just curse or jinx or hex anyone you please. There are rules."

"And you know what I told you last time, Mrs. Dursley," Hermione said sternly. Harry started; she was standing at his elbow and he hadn't heard her enter the hall. "I told you that the next time the consequences would be more dire than a scolding."

"What you told her last time?" Harry said to her, bewildered. "This has happened before?"

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Don't you read those parchments I put by your plate every day at breakfast? What do you think they're for?"

Harry swallowed, embarrassed. "Oh. Sorry. I thought they were just revised patrolling schedules or something."

"That's in there, too. But student incidents are also catalogued. You're supposed to know what's going on, Harry."

He was even more embarrassed now, and could see a smug glitter in his aunt's eye. That galvanized him into action. "Well," he said to her, "you heard the Head Girl. Not just a scolding this time," he said, trying to sound ominous, and instead sounding to himself like a small child play-acting at being a grown-up. He looked at Hermione out of the corner of his eye, seeing her mouth the word detention.

"This time, it means a detention!" he said to his aunt, as though he'd just thought of this himself.

"Detention!" his aunt exclaimed, evidently not having paid any attention to Hermione. "I'm a forty-three-year-old woman! I'm to have a detention?" she said indignantly. "And you're the one giving it to me?" she added, as though the animals had put all of the zookeepers into the cages at the zoo.

Harry lifted his chin resolutely. "Yes. At our last Herbology lesson, Professor Sprout was asking for volunteers for repotting the Mandrakes again. I think I'll tell her she has a new volunteer--you." His aunt scowled in a way that was not at all becoming. In fact, he thought, she looked rather like traditional Muggle depictions of witches when she did that. "I'll tell Professor Sprout that she is to have the help she needs, and she will tell you when to report to the greenhouses. Is that understood?" He did his best to make his voice very stern now.

She backed down from her defiant stance just a little. "Crystal clear," she said sharply, her tone also like cut crystal. She turned and walked up the marble stairs to the staff wing with an imperious air, and Harry knew it was going to be an uphill battle to discipline her.

Hermione patted his arm sympathetically. "You did all right, Harry. I don't know what I'd do if I had a disagreeable relative suddenly show up here with magical powers. But do start reading the parchments I give you, all right? I'm not writing out this information for my health."

He looked at her sheepishly. "Yes, ma'am," he replied, unable to keep the corners of his mouth from turning up. She punched him lightly on the arm.

"Listen to you. There will be plenty of opportunity to make me feel like an old woman in thirty years. You don't need to start before we're even out of school."

Thirty years. Harry wondered for a moment where they'd all be in thirty years. Where will we all be in one year, for that matter? There were times--especially during the Triwizard Tournament--when he wasn't completely certain he'd even survive school. He grinned at Hermione; he was tempted to tell her she was being awfully optimistic to think he'd be alive in thirty years, but he didn't do this. Instead he repeated the "ma'am" in a mischievous sing-song all the way back to the Gryffindor table, and when they sat down to eat their puddings, she suddenly flicked her hand toward Harry's lovely piece of apple pie, turning it into--a steaming pile of rotting tripe. Harry paused with a forkful of the stuff just in front of his open mouth; he thought he was going to vomit, but he swallowed and put his fork down, pushing the plate away. Orion Pierson, Parvati Patil and Lavender Brown were sitting across from him, and they recoiled as the plate of tripe came nearer to them. Orion even stood and backed away from the table, turning green. Harry turned and peered around Ron at a very smug-looking Hermione.

"Didn't you hear me say to her that you can't just hex anyone who displeases you?" he said, feeling a bit irked, as he'd really been looking forward to the pie.

"Oh, did I hex you?" she said in mock-surprise. "I though I hexed your pie. It's not exactly the same thing, now, is it?" she added with wide-eyed innocence before turning to eat her bread pudding.

Ron helped himself to a slice of cake, shaking his head at the pair of them. "I don't know...Is it going to be up to me to get the Head Boy and Head Girl to behave themselves? Who would have thought, six years ago, that of the three of us, I'd be the one most likely to be mistaken for an adult?"

But that thought was so ridiculous that everyone in hearing range suddenly erupted into laughter, and with a mouth full of cake, Ron looked about at them all, saying, "Wha--?" in such a thoroughly bewildered way that it only served to further fuel their laughter. Even the greenish Orion was laughing, and at the Gryffindor table, dinner ended in general hilarity.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Hermione had switched Harry's patrol schedule so that he would be on the second shift with Mariah, in place of the Ravenclaw fifth-year, Tamara Katz. He wouldn't be starting until eleven thirty, so he had ample opportunity to tell Ron and Hermione, sitting around the fire in the Gryffindor common room, about what Sirius had told him when they were traveling to and from Wales for his Quidditch practice.

Harry had started off showing Sirius the article from the Times, but Sirius had put up his hand to stop him, saying, "Look at the photograph."

Harry peered at the picture accompanying the article; he no longer found Muggle photographs very interesting, since they didn't move, and he hadn't really paid it much attention. Now he saw that a dark-haired man standing not five feet away from Rodney Jeffries, in a crowd of admirers, was Sirius himself.

"That's you! But what--"

"I'm only teaching part-time, Harry, remember. What do you think I've been doing with myself? There are two other operatives keeping an eye on Jeffries, as well. I have to tell you, though, so far, he seems too good to be true. It's also true that there's a magical signature in the area every time he's done a show; it's like he's activating all of the magical genes in everyone who's coming to see him, but in a sort of benign and generous way. I can't describe it. He makes everyone feel better about themselves, and people who are ill feel better as well, but from what I can tell, they're sort of making themselves better, he's releasing a power in them so that they have control over their own bodies in a way they didn't before. Maybe he's causing their bodies to secrete a certain hormone or something. I don't know what he's doing, precisely. We haven't encountered any more situations in which he's creating more wizards and witches, like your aunt. Technically, since Muggles look on what he's doing as an article of faith, the Ministry isn't classifying it as magic, as something that needs to be covered up with Memory Charms. Apparently there are Muggles who've done similar things in the past, without technically performing magic. There are things about it in the archives at the Ministry. And he genuinely seems to be helping people...."

Harry had nodded, his lips drawn into a line. It would have been a perfect time to tell Sirius about Jeffries healing him at St. Mungo's, but since he still suspected Jeffries of being up to something, he refrained from doing so. How could he justify being suspicious of someone who had healed him? He felt petty and small for not being full of gratitude to Jeffries and singing his praises at every turn, as his Aunt Petunia tended to do, but he just couldn't bring himself to do this. He still thought there was something very not-right about Jeffries.

"You're not being--being taken in by him, are you?" Harry said cautiously. Sirius looked thoughtful.

"I'm not sure that's how I'd put it. I'm not completely convinced the Ministry shouldn't be concerned, so we're observing him and trying to determine his motivation, but I have to say, Harry, that I'm starting to suspect that he's the least of our problems. We still need to get access to Gringotts and bring some life back to Diagon Alley. There's a very real danger at this point that the wizarding economy will never recover from the Diagon Alley attack. Dumbledore has some other people working on that problem, but I'm starting to feel like I'm on a bit of a holiday when I'm watching Jeffries, when I could actually be doing something useful if I were working on the Gringotts project." Harry had no response to that; he knew as well as anyone that the inflation in the wizarding world had hit crisis levels and that most people were buying anything they could from Muggles with Muggle money these days, instead of from wizards using wizarding money.

"And what's this I hear about you turning your snake into a girl because you're desperate, Harry?"

Harry groaned. "That's not why. Look, it's all your fault anyway. You're the one who gave me that book about doing magic with snakes."

Sirius laughed out loud. "My fault! Who told you to turn your snake into a girl? And anyway, you've had that book for nearly two-and-a-half years and never got into trouble with it before."

Harry rubbed his hand over his face wearily. "I never cast any of the spells in it before..."

Hermione was able, in turn, to tell him and Ron about what she and Maggie and Snape had discovered about the tunnels in the dungeons. "We found it!" she said excitedly, her face glowing in the firelight as the two of them leaned in so she wouldn't have to speak very loudly; they were all sitting on the hearth rug, very close to the fire. "It's amazing. We followed it clear to the edge of the Forbidden Forest; it comes up above ground about fifty yards from Hagrid's, under that fallen chestnut tree that's been rotting away all these years."

"How do you get the tree off the exit, then?" Ron wondered.

It's not really on the exit, it's obscuring most of it, though. And it's really like a rabbit warren down there. We could have been quite lost for ages if Maggie hadn't been leading us through. She just had these premonitions about which way we should go. We also used the Four-Points Charm more than a few times, to work out where we were. Terribly confusing. And there are times when it looks like a dead end but it really isn't; the continuation of the tunnel is around a sharp corner or under a hole in the wall that's obscured by a stone...."

Harry was shaking his head. "That may explain how Lucius Malfoy got Draco and Ron out of the castle in our fifth year, but that can't be the tunnel Draco and Mariah used last night. The tunnel they used didn't go near the forest; it looked like it went under the lake."

She shrugged. "Well, as I said, there's a huge network down there. The one they used must be one of the other branches we didn't take. We're probably lucky we found our way out again. The three of us were late to lunch and had to go to the kitchens for something to eat. We wanted to talk, in private, though, so we went up to Maggie's rooms with the food." She looked at Ron mischievously. "But you were right, Harry. Eventually, they did look like they wanted me out of there, like they wanted some privacy, so I pleaded massive amounts of revision and left them alone. In Maggie's rooms," she added for emphasis, grinning mischievously at Ron.

Ron had put his fingers in both ears and started singing the Chuddley Cannons' fight song rather too loudly. Harry grabbed a cushion he was leaning on and threw it at Ron.

"Shut up, you. She's just winding you up," he grinned.

Hermione shook her head. "It's far too easy, you know," she said, also grinning. But then she and Ron had these looks on their faces that suddenly made him feel like he was in the same room with two people who wanted him to disappear....

There wasn't anyone else in the common room now, so he excused himself, going up the stairs to the dorms, stopping on the landing outside the third-year dorm. The door was open and the boys were playing Exploding Snap. Harry thought that looked like a good opportunity to engage in an activity that wouldn't let him fall asleep, and he popped his head in, asking whether he could join them. Will grinned and invited him in, while the other boys looked nervous. Harry Potter, the Head Boy, was going to play cards with them. After a while, though, they had relaxed and were even teasing him for the end of his nose being slightly singed. They were, however, all yawning by eleven o'clock, and Harry suggested they turn in. Will smiled and nodded at him before he left, and Harry went back down to the common room.

Ron was in a chair near the fire. Hermione was curled on his lap, her eyes starting to look heavy-lidded as she gazed into the fire. Ron was fast asleep, snoring loudly. She lifted her head in surprise when she saw Harry.

"He's been asleep for about twenty minutes," she whispered. "Totally knackered, poor thing," she added, pressing her lips to his brow before standing. "I'm surprised you're still on your feet."

He shrugged. "I have to be, don't I, if I'm to patrol with Mariah and try to get her to tell me about the tunnels, or her and Malfoy, or something remotely useful." They woke Ron with some effort so he could go up to the dorm and sleep in his own bed. Harry thought Hermione looked at him lying in his bed somewhat wistfully before she kissed him goodnight and left. Harry looked longingly at his own bed before leaving the dorm again; if he took a short nap, it wouldn't be short, he knew, and he had to be downstairs to patrol in less than half-an-hour, with Mariah Kirkner.

As he walked down the stairs and corridors to the entrance hall, an image of her from the Omnioculars came unbidden into his brain; although Hermione had been quite uninhibited at times when they were still having a physical relationship, Mariah was--well, she was the most sensual thing he'd ever seen, and he was growing increasingly unsure that anyone in their right mind could blame Draco Malfoy for not resisting her...

Professors Sprout and Trelawney had been on the first shift; McGonagall and Sinistra were taking over. Trixie Lewis and Ernie MacMillan turned up next, to sign off for the night, followed by Draco Malfoy and Tony Perugia. Mariah was already there, and Harry saw Malfoy glaring at her. He spoke to her softly while the other newcomers entered the hall, Kurt Harrison from Ravenclaw and Robert Jensen, from Slytherin, both fifth years.

"I thought you said you were switching to the first shift," Harry thought he heard Malfoy say to Mariah, his lips barely moving. Harry realized that Hermione must have told each of them the wrong thing, so they wouldn't be on together again, allowing Harry to get Mariah alone to pump her for information.

"I thought you were switchin' to the saicont," she replied, twirling her hair nonchalantly, looking at Professor McGonagall as though fascinated by her. Harry wasn't certain that her lips had moved at all (although it took him a moment to realize that she'd said "the second"). She wore those soft leather fingerless gloves on her hands again. Harry realized that, for all that he'd been wondering about those gloves, when he'd seen her in the Omnioculars without them, he hadn't exactly felt moved to refocus on her hands, look at them in close-up so that he could learn the reason for the gloves. He had, unfortunately, been somewhat distracted by the rest of her body....

"I'll patrol with Mariah," Harry told Professor McGonagall, who now knew about the reason for Harry's alarm the previous evening. He jumped in before he could be paired up with one of the fifth years. McGonagall nodded at him. Mariah looked at Harry, her eyes glittering with--what? Harry had seen that look before, in Hermione's and Katie's eyes, and when Alicia had cornered him in the Quidditch changing rooms to ask him to the ceilidh....For that matter, Mariah had looked very much like that when she'd asked him to the ceilidh, and when he'd encountered her in the corridor to the girls' Slytherin dorms in his other life. He had only one word for it:

Lust.

Harry swallowed. He felt his pulse racing as he recalled how difficult it had been to pull away from her, when he'd been standing near her in her thin nightdress. He shook himself as he followed her up the marble stairs, more images coming into his brain, images from the night before, Mariah writhing in the heat of passion....

Stop it, he commanded his brain. I love Ginny, I love Ginny, he thought repeatedly. That's the point--to get her away from Malfoy...

But it was becoming increasingly difficult to remember that that was the point of the exercise when he was near her, his head spinning, his body rebelliously responding to her presence. Harry practically shook from the war being waged within him, a war for control and dominance. The trouble was, he was starting to think that there was no way for him to lose, that no matter what happened, he'd come out a winner....

More than an hour had passed, and they were in the corridor leading to the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, where Remus Lupin had taught him to conjure a Patronus and Barty Crouch put him under Imperius and he learned that he was stronger than that, that he--

He couldn't take it any longer; his head was screaming that he had to have her, that he had to touch her, and he grabbed her shoulders, whirling her to face him, wondering if this was how Ron felt on the night before the full moon. Before he could say or do anything, however, she had taken one look at him and smiled triumphantly, taking his sweating hand in her cool gloved one and dragging him after her.

"Come with me," she said simply, as though he could do anything else, as though he wouldn't follow her to the ends of the earth. They went down, down, down into the dungeons, then along the passages that Hermione had told him and Ron led to the tunnel they'd taken to the forest. He thought he would throw her down on the ground at any second as they wound through the tunnels, but he went on, following her, unsure how many turns they'd taken or where they were going. The important thing, he thought, is that he was with her....

Finally, he heard an odd, watery sound in the passage ahead of them. There had been magical torches on the walls the entire time they were in the tunnels; the torches sprang to life as soon as they moved to within about twenty feet. Now he saw that the walls of the tunnel they were in had a strange light reflecting on them. The walls were damp stone, and the light danced on the stone in a peculiar way, making Harry frown. When they turned the corner, he saw the reason for the odd light; they were in an underground cavern which was a hidden entrance to the lake. He could see that the cavern ended about thirty feet away, a wall of stone that went down into the water. They were in a kind of air bubble with an underground harbor, the water lapping at their feet. Harry had no doubt that if they went in and swam past the stone wall, they could then go up and up until they reached the surface of the lake, outside in the frigid autumn night.

That was how Malfoy and Mariah ended up back inside the castle, he knew now. They jumped in, then swam to this cavern and walked back to the castle through the tunnels, after putting drying spells on themselves...

Then, through his fog, he remembered the amulet. He remembered that she'd said something about her brother....

"Is this how he did it? he choked out, almost blind with desire. "Your brother? How he got the amulet out of the lake?"

She turned, opening her robes slightly to reveal that she was wearing a diaphanous dress under her school robes which hid her body very poorly. Harry's mouth went dry. If she was trying to distract him, it was working....

"Aye. Munro was able to come doon here ta do it. No one had to see'im oop on the shore...."

"But," Harry said, his head in a fog, feeling like he was swimming through a haze, "how did he breathe? How did you breathe, and Draco, when you were in the lake last night?"

She smiled seductively at him, and he felt like fire was coursing through his body--in a good way. "It's a family cairse, connected to the amulet. Everyone in the family gaits it, but it's only passed on by the women...."

He was confused now, and wasn't sure whether it was because of how she was making him feel. There was sweat dripping down his face despite the cold, and his palms were damp and clammy. His senses were overwhelmed by her presence. He'd never felt quite like this before. "How is it a curse if it helps you to breathe underwater?" he said with some effort. "And--and what does the amulet have to do with it? It--it's cursed?"

But then she was putting her arms around him, and all he knew was that she was kissing him, or he was kissing her, or that they were devouring each other, his mouth open so wide that his jaw hurt and he didn't even care, she was liquid fire in his arms, her clothes were dropping away as though they were made of mist. Nothing mattered, just getting to her skin, getting down to his skin, touching and kissing her everywhere, feeling her lips and hands on him....

You don't want this. Not really.

His mind was only vaguely aware of this thought amidst the jumble of thoughts about desire and Mariah. But it was there.

She's not Ginny.

Harry pulled away from her suddenly, scrambling backwards over their pile of clothes. When had that happened? he wondered. How had that happened?

Sandy was the only thing he was wearing, and she wore only her fingerless gloves. He looked at her, still wanting her dreadfully, but suddenly, he had a very bad feeling about it. I have felt like this before, he remembered, but I was only fourteen, and my hormones weren't so--awake--and I'd never been with a woman....but I do know this feeling....

"What are you?" he choked out, desperate to do anything to prevent it progressing further, yet feeling more like he was fighting himself than her. "A veela? A siren? Are you part mermaid? What are you doing to me?" It was like being under Imperius--except that every time he'd been placed under Imperius, he remembered, he'd known it was going to happen. He'd been prepared, and he'd fought it--even the very first time, he'd fought it. With the veelas, he hadn't been prepared, but he hadn't been as mature as he was now, either, and while it had affected him badly, it wasn't anything like the way he was being affected now....

He also remembered that someone under Imperius who is being told to do something they want to do has a nearly impossible time of fighting it, they lose all of their inhibitions....

No, he thought stubbornly. I don't want her. I just--

He'd been doing so well....He hadn't thought about that much at all, hadn't dwelt on his physical relationships with Hermione or Katie, and he'd been the one to pull back that night in the common room, when he found that Ginny hadn't taken the potion....For a seventeen-year-old boy he'd shown remarkable restraint and fortitude. And then, last night, he'd seen Mariah by the shores of the lake, he'd seen the moonlight bouncing off her body....

He was sweating and shaking again. Damn damn damn. I know everyone in school thinks I'm a pervert because of the snake-into-woman spell, but I really don't want to do this....

"You shall be strong."

He blinked; Sandy's voice was like a bucket of cold water crashing down on his head, and he had never been more grateful in his life. You shall be strong.

He almost wept in relief; it was so good to hear her voice, to hear some words of assurance. Thank you, Sandy, he thought. He would be sure to give her profuse verbal thanks later.

Mariah knelt before him, putting her hand on his brow, touching his scar, something almost no one ever did. Even though her chest was practically in front of his face, he found that this was calming him, and as she looked into his eyes and stroked the jagged pink skin, he gradually felt more in control, even though they were both still without their clothes. His head suddenly felt remarkably clear, no longer clouded with lust. She's pulling back, he thought. She's doing it on purpose. Why?

"Ssshh," she said softly, still stroking his brow. "Calm down, so I can taill ye a story." He looked into her dark eyes, feeling lost in their depths, but he no longer had the sensation of his heart running away with him, he no longer felt like he would throw her down and attack her at any moment.

"All--all right," he whispered, his throat tight. "But--can we do this with--with our clothes on?"

She smiled warmly at him and waved her hand; her own clothes flew to her and she was very quickly clothed. Harry took a little longer, pulling on his trousers and shirt, not bothering with his tie, which he just draped around his neck. She leaned back against his chest, her body warm against his, as she began to tell her story, and he couldn't bring himself to push her away. Instead, he let her rest comfortably against him and he put his arms around her waist, his cheek on her hair, closing his eyes and breathing deeply, willing himself to stay calm as she wove her tale.

After a very little while, he no longer seemed to hear her accent....it was as though he was back in his other life, and spoke this way himself, with the lilt of Scotland, the sound of the Highlands; it was also the sound of the islands in the windswept north, where the sea was as black as obsidian and as cold as deep space....

A thousand years ago, the four greatest witches and wizards of the age fled north from persecution to found a school for young witches and wizards where they could learn about their abilities and hone their craft far from prying eyes and free of the peculiar prejudices of Muggle society. Here, in the Grampian Highlands, they found a beautiful valley with a glistening loch and a young forest nearby. They built a castle, very simple at first, with no moat but the loch and no defenses but their magic, and a village grew up nearby, where those who worked on the castle lived with their families. The Founders named their school Hogwarts, and named the village Hogsmeade. They sought out magical children from all over Britain, bringing them to the school to learn about who they were and what they could do. The population of the school grew and grew as they found more and more magical children, and the population of Hogsmeade grew as well, as more and more witches and wizards learned of the refuge in the north where they could be safe and live peacefully.

The forest offered only a light barrier, however, between the school and the Muggles who lived on the other side of the forest, and soon all four of the Hogwarts founders had met Muggles whom they loved and wanted to marry. Rowena Ravenclaw and Helga Hufflepuff had fallen in love with two brothers; they were wed in a double ceremony in the newly-erected village hall, and the entire village of Hogsmeade turned out to celebrate with them, as well as many Muggles from the other side of the forest. The party lasted for a week. At the celebration, Godric Gryffindor and Salazar Slytherin met twin sisters, childhood friends of the grooms. Each fell in love with one of the sisters, and soon another double wedding was being planned.

Gryffindor had a wonderful idea for gifts for their brides; they would each commission the village smith to fashion a protective amulet, a gold alloy for Gryffindor's bride, a silver alloy for Slytherin's.

The gold-colored amulet would be in the form of a golden griffin, which was Gryffindor's Animagus form and the reason for the surname he had taken; no one in his family had previously borne more than one name. When the wearer clasped the amulet, a feeling of calm would come over her, and she would feel her courage increase and know that she was loved.

The silver-colored amulet would be in the form of a basilisk, the king of snakes, as Slytherin was a Parselmouth and bore a snake on his coat of arms and as the symbol of his house, at the school. In addition to the feeling of love and calm that would come over the wearer of the amulet when she clasped it, Slytherin enchanted the metal of which the amulet was made so that, if she was truly in love with someone, she would be able to see that person clearly in her mind's eye, and know that he was safe--and faithful. He never wanted his bride to wonder whether he truly loved her, nor whether he was safe while traveling around Britain, seeking out students under the noses of sometimes-hostile Muggles.

The smith worked on creating molds for the amulets; Slytherin's would be carved with magic from the blackest, hardest rock that could be found, and Gryffindor's would be carved from the purest, hardest white marble. No human tools could carve with the precision of magic, no Muggle craft could begin to approximate the beauty of the work executed by the wizard smith. When it was time to pour the metal into the molds, Gryffindor put his magic into the gold metal, and Slytherin enchanted the silver metal, and when they had cooled, the smith opened the molds to reveal two perfect amulets, two perfect gifts for their brides.

Gryffindor presented his gift to his betrothed, and she loved it, but her sister was jealous; Slytherin had not given her the amulet he'd made for her yet, so she thought he wasn't as fine a catch as Gryffindor. Plus, she had wanted to be with Godric Gryffindor when the sisters had first met him and his friend, but she had settled for Slytherin. Even though she had agreed to marry Salazar, she still pined for Gryffindor, believing that her sister had made the better match, and when she saw the beautiful golden griffin amulet he had given her, she formed a plan to win him from her sister.

While her sister slept, she took the golden amulet from her and put it on, and went to see Gryffindor in his quarters at the castle, a luxurious suite draped with red hangings and warmly lit with magical torches. She seduced him, but he believed her to be his betrothed, as she wore the amulet he had given her. However, Slytherin had still not given his betrothed her amulet; he had been quite taken with it when the stone was opened and its craft was revealed to him. He had taken to wearing it himself, holding it tightly whenever he wanted to see his beloved, the woman he was to marry. He still planned to give it to her, but he wanted to wait until their wedding night.

The night that his betrothed met Gryffindor and seduced him, he held the amulet as he lay in his bed, and he saw the two of them together, saw them coupling against the blood red background of Gryffindor's suite. He knew it was not her sister he was seeing, even though they were twins; the amulet would only show him the woman he loved. He vowed vengeance on both her and Gryffindor, who had been close as a brother to him. He did not tell his bride or his friend what he knew.

More than a month went by, and the morning of their wedding day dawned. Slytherin went down to the shore of the loch with the black stone and the amulet; he held it one last time, seeing the woman he still loved. However, now he also hated her. It is possible to both love and hate the same person, you know. Weeping for a life he would never know, he put the amulet back into its stone mold and sealed it with magic, then flung it deep into the lake. He spoke to some water snakes and told them what it was, and asked them to tell the merpeople to look after it and to someday give it to someone who needed it, at their discretion.

He went to the village hall with Gryffindor; they were both arrayed in their wedding finery, and their brides were waiting for them. However, after the brides' father brought them to be wed, Slytherin had just reached for his wand, to wreak his vengeance, when his bride brought the proceedings to a halt and demanded that they speak in a side chamber, just the four of them. They moved to the chamber, and she revealed that she had a mark of passion that Gryffindor had left on her neck just a fortnight earlier, when she'd gone to him again. As they had already coupled, and she claimed that she was carrying his child, she said by rights she should be the one to marry Gryffindor.

Godric Gryffindor and his intended bride were shocked; he had had no idea that it wasn't his betrothed who had shared his bed, and she was furious with her sister for stealing her love. She admitted that she hadn't come to meet him, to sleep with him, that it must have been her sister, even though to lie would have put an end to it. She and Godric both knew that he should do his duty and marry the mother of his child, so, weeping, they both accepted their lot and agreed that Gryffindor would wed Slytherin's bride and Slytherin would wed Gryffindor's.

However--Salazar Slytherin had another idea.

"Duplicitous Muggle!" he roared at his betrothed. "I saw you with him! I used the amulet which you shall never have; it is now at the bottom of the loch. But do not think you are getting off so easily! As you have had two faces in this affair, so shall you have two faces evermore, and your children, and your children's children, until the end of the world!"

And he cursed her and changed her. Gryffindor and his bride were appalled; her sister wept over her, even though she had betrayed her and tried to steal her husband. For flopping on the floor at their feet was a sleek brown seal, in deep distress at the lack of water around her.

Slytherin left.

Gryffindor and his bride took her poor sister up north, keeping her as wet as possible on the way, and released her into the sea, which was now to be her home. The couple returned to Hogsmeade and wed quietly, and Gryffindor continued to run the school with the other two other Founders. Slytherin did not appear at the school for many months, although he regularly continued to send students to the school. However, in his travels around Britain, he only sought out magical children whose parents were also magical. Gryffindor, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff finally noticed this and summoned him back to the castle to discuss it.

They insisted that the school should take all magical children regardless of whether their parents were magical, but Slytherin declared that all Muggles and their children were untrustworthy and in turn didn't trust magical people, so it would be far safer to keep them out of Hogwarts. The others disagreed vehemently; after all, each of them had wed a Muggle. Only Slytherin had been betrayed by one.

The school returned to admitting magical children from all backgrounds, but Slytherin knew he could not tolerate this any longer, and he finally left. Legend says he went to France, but no one knows for sure, and those tales belong to another story, another time....

More than ten years later, a mysterious woman accompanied her son to the school after he received a letter inviting him to study at Hogwarts. She remained at the castle for the sorting ceremony, and saw that he became a Gryffindor. Godric noticed the lone, hooded figure standing in the rear of the hall, and he asked his wife to go to her and offer her a place at their table. When his wife reached the woman, she threw back her hood and revealed that she was the twin sister who had been cursed by Slytherin. The two sisters embraced in joy, for Gryffindor's wife thought she was never to see her twin again.

"The curse has been lifted!" she said to her sister in delight. But her sister shook her head.

"No. I am still cursed, and my children, too. But the curse is not what you think it is. He did not change me into a seal, but a selkie. I have never ceased to have a human's mind, even as I swam in the cold sea and fled from whales and sharks and the spears of men.

"But sometimes, I felt the need to shed my sealskin and stretch my legs on the shore, to walk as a woman once again, and one of these times, when I was close to giving birth to my son, a man who knows about these things found my selkie skin and took it, and by so doing, he took my soul and I was enslaved to him.

"However--what he did not realize was that he was actually my slave. A selkie can make men do things that a mere woman cannot. I had a power over him that even he has never suspected. I am empowered to do almost anything except make him give me my skin and my freedom back.

"So, we wed. And soon after, my son was born, the son of Godric Gryffindor. There he sits, in his father's own school, as he should be, and now that I have returned what I have stolen, I give him into the care of his father and relinquish my rights to him. I have a daughter who carries my curse and shall give it to her children as well, and I must return to her. Tell my son that I love him, but now it is his father's turn...."

And with that, she left. Her sister could not convince her to stay. She gazed at her nephew, who looked like the son she might have had with Gryffindor. They were happy; they had three healthy daughters. But she knew men, and they were rather silly about wanting sons. Well--now her husband had one.

She went to her husband and told him that it was his own son who had come to the school at last, and he wept for joy, and then sorrow, when his wife told him of her sister's life as a selkie held prisoner by her husband. They raised the boy, having him live with them even during school holidays, and the son of one of the other founders, Rowena Ravenclaw, was one of his best friends.

After he finished school, he and his friend traveled north, to see his mother, whom he missed. He hadn't seen her since he started school at Hogwarts. He had written to her by owl post and she had written back with directions. When he and his friend arrived, his friend was immediately smitten by Gryffindor's half-sister. She fell in love with him as well, and did not need to be enslaved, but gave him her selkie skin of her own free will, which meant that she could also leave whenever she wished. When a selkie gives her skin of her own volition, out of love, she is not owned.

Young Gryffindor enjoyed visiting with his mother and sister; he used his own selkie skin to swim in the sea with his sister, having never known the freedom of leaping through the wild waves in the open sea, just the tame loch at the school. He knew, however, that unlike his sister's children, his would not be selkies, for only the daughters in the family would carry on that curse from generation to generation.

He left his friend there to wed and live with his sister, but before he left, he broke into his stepfather's secret hiding place and stole back his mother's selkie skin for her, freeing her. He swam with her back to the mainland, and his sister and best friend waved to them from the shore, about to begin their new life together.

Their children were, of course, magical, having a wizard for a father. When their children were old enough, they sent them to Hogwarts, and it is a peculiar thing that, in this family, for generations afterward, all of the boys were sorted into Ravenclaw, but all of the girls became Slytherins, and were known for their cleverness and womanly wiles. In each generation, there was at least one girl, so the selkie traits were guaranteed to be passed on again and again and again....

Slytherin's curse lives on.

She sat up, and Harry stared at her. He noticed now how large and dark her eyes were; he'd thought they were enormous before, but he hadn't quite comprehended how the darkness almost entirely filled them, how there was almost no white to be seen, like an animal's eyes. Like a dog. Like Fang, or even Dunkirk. And like a seal.

He had no words, but just kept staring at her, his throat paralyzed. Finally, she looked down at her own hands and said, "Haven't ye aiver wondered about me gloves, Harry?"

He nodded, looking down at her hands. "Many times." What was she getting at? he wondered. "Why--why do you wear them?"

He'd finally asked, so she slowly pulled them off, her fingers long and slim and pale in the torchlight. Then she held up each hand, palms facing him, and slowly spread her fingers apart, the torchlight shining through the delicate webbing binding each of her fingers to its neighbor.



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