Harry Potter and the Triangle Prophecy

Harry Potter and the Triangle Prophecy

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Confessional

An enclosed space was required to serve as an alternate to traditional confession whereby
the confessor would have the option of speaking to a priest face to face or in secrecy
from behind a panel. A wall was constructed to enclose an existing nave, which housed
a small confessional. The confessional was dismantled and reconfigured to create a
movable panel, which would serve as a link between the old and new forms of discourse.

--The Renovation of the Chapels of St. Ignatius Church, San Francisco

Harry opened the front door of Hog's End. He had expected Draco Malfoy to be on the threshold, but instead he was halfway down the drive, where Harry had seen him when he'd still been upstairs. Ginny seemed unsurprised by this; she took his hand after he closed the door and nodded at him. They walked toward Malfoy, who was behaving very oddly, his hands pushing at the air as though it was solid.

As they drew nearer, Harry's instinctive defensive reaction--sarcasm--rose to the surface. "Thinking of a new career, Malfoy? Not a bad idea--you wouldn't even need to paint your face white to be a mime, although that stuck-in-an-invisible box routine is rather old-hat, don't you think?" Harry wished his voice wasn't shaking, and he started to inch his hand toward the pocket where he kept his wand.

Malfoy stopped what he was doing and glowered at Harry. "For your information, there seems to be some sort of shield charm preventing me from getting any closer to the house. Convenient for you, eh? Worried that I'd hit you again? Where's that Gryffindor bravery?" he mocked.

"And for your information," Ginny said acidly, "Harry didn't know anything about the shield charm. My brothers did it, and they put one around my mum and dad's house as well. You don't think Percy, Fred, and George would do what they do for a living without some security? Plus George has Angelina and their kids to think of."

Malfoy crossed his arms and raised one eyebrow. "Can't you let me through? I just want to talk...I don't want to hurt anyone..."

Ginny smirked. "That's a lie. The only reason you're aware of the charm at all is that you are intending harm to someone on Hog's End property. That's why Harry didn't even know the charm was there. And that's why it's not letting you get any farther."

"It's not considered 'harm' to do what he's done to you? But then, I reckon you've been harmed by him that way before, so it hardly matters now, does it?" he sneered.

"What are you talking about?" she demanded, crossing her arms.

"Well, it's obvious that you snuck away here to get in some shagging!" he spat. "Couldn't wait until you got back to the castle? Is there a room in the castle you haven't used for that yet?"

Ginny's jaw dropped. "We--how dare you--"

Malfoy gave her a look of utter contempt. "Everyone knows about you two, after Potter's little 'suspension' problem. The staff wing! God, you've got nerve, Potter. You think you can get away with anything and everything, don't you? Of course, it was also obvious that Snape suspending you was merely for show, to get you out of the castle. To get you away from me, and possibly Mariah. We must protect precious Harry Potter at all costs, after all. Nothing must happen to our Harry," he said in an annoying sing-song.

Harry was looking at Malfoy with his mouth open. "Wh-what?" he sputtered, unable to put into words just how off some of Malfoy's accusations were. The problem was, they weren't all off. Especially the part about getting him out of the castle to protect him.

Ginny, however, had found a way to put her indignation into words. "For your information, this afternoon was the first time that we--" She suddenly realized what she was saying and stopped abruptly, turning deep red and looking away from him. Malfoy burst out laughing.

"Oh my god. Are you telling me it took him this long? That's just too funny. And here I--and everyone else in the school, I might add," he said, clearly enjoying the way Ginny was turning an even deeper red, "thought the two of you were constantly sneaking off to make the beast with two backs. Well, Miss Weasley, that'll teach you to throw off a Slytherin. At least your sister might possibly be enjoying some proper and regular shagging, with Snape. I still might be willing to give you a chance, willing to overlook your having been polluted by this," he said, waving his hand at Harry and making a disgusted face. "There might be some charms we could do to get his smell off you..."

Harry started to lunge at him, but Ginny pulled him back, hissing under her breath, "Don't. The charm will be broken."

"Oh, I'm so lucky Ginny is here to protect me from you, Potty," Malfoy drawled. "Whatever would I have done if she weren't?" He made a tragic face, then changed it abruptly into an evil grin. "Curse the pants off you, that's what. Wanker," he threw in for good measure.

Harry swallowed, wanting to curse Malfoy more than he'd ever wanted to curse anyone, but there was something in his eyes that was slightly disturbing, something that made his taunts sound a little less than sincere. He was hiding something.

"Why did you really follow us here, Malfoy? What's your game?" he said softly, watching his opponent's face very carefully, should he give anything away.

There it was--a frightened flash in the eyes, gone in a blink. "You'll never know now, Scarhead. Why should I--" He stopped abruptly, as though he'd almost said too much. Harry seized on this.

"Why should you what? What I'd like to know is why you should care at all about what Ginny and I do when we're alone together. You should be concerning yourself with Mariah--she's the one who needs you right now."

"I've done nothing but worry about Mariah!" he shouted suddenly. "Why do you think--" He stopped and bit his lip. "Never mind," he said quickly. "It's not as though you care about anyone but yourselves anyway...."

Harry drew his mouth into a line and stepped toward Malfoy, heedless of whether he might break through the shield charm. "But we do care. About Mariah. And--" He looked at Draco Malfoy, who suddenly looked very young and very frightened. "And we care about you too. I doubt that you want Voldemort to use that Obedience Charm on you any more than any of us want him to use Mariah's selkie skin to make her do awful things." Malfoy didn't answer him but had a skeptical expression on his face; he glared mistrustfully at Harry, who shook his head at him. "You know, we have more in common than you think." He grinned. "I found out a fair bit about the Founders when I was suspended. Sirius' mum knows a lot, things even Hermione couldn't find in the Restricted Section of the school library. According to Mrs. Black, I'm a descendent of one of Godric Gryffindor's daughters. Did you know that we--you and I--have both Malfoy and Gryffindor blood?"

Draco Malfoy stepped back and made a face at Harry. "Did Granger and Bell know that shagging made you insane and forget to tell the rest of us?"

Harry laughed, explaining to him that Godric Gryffindor's illegitimate son bore his mother's name, Malfoy, and that the daughters he had with his wife were also half Malfoy, because that was his wife's family name. Draco Malfoy looked like he wanted to spew.

"Are you telling me that I'm part Gryffindor? Do you think that's a way to get on my good side?"

Harry tried not to laugh at his expression. "And I'm part Malfoy. Well, going back about a thousand years. And the brothers who married Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff were named Weasley. Ravenclaw's son married the half-sister of Godric Gryffindor's son, remember. And she was half Malfoy. Back then, they all got along...."

Malfoy sneered at him. "They didn't all get along if you count Slytherin's bride shagging Gryffindor, and Slytherin cursing her. Not exactly what I'd call getting along."

"I meant once Slytherin had gone..."

Malfoy glared at him. "Just as you'd like me to be gone. Oh, you'd like it, wouldn't you, if I just turned down a direct order from the Dark Lord and dropped dead. You'd really love that! How convenient that would be for you..."

"No I wouldn't love that!" Harry said hotly, momentarily surprised to realize that he meant it. But he was still angry with Malfoy for being so stubborn.. "Listen, whether you like it or not, I saw what you were capable of in my other life, what sort of person you could be. You don't have to be this way! You could choose to be--"

"You have no idea what it is to be me!" Draco Malfoy hissed at him through clenched teeth. "Don't you dare tell me about choices! If I had a choice, do you think I'd--" He looked like he'd literally bitten his tongue; he turned away from Harry, looking down at his hands, which were shaking.

Harry had a sudden revelation. "What has he asked you to do?" he whispered fearfully. "He's done it, hasn't he? Given you an order. When was it? When you went away for your dad's funeral?" Malfoy turned; his eyes flared wide, as though Harry had hit the mark. "What has he asked you to do?" Harry demanded again, trying very hard to resist the urge to take the other boy by the shoulders.

Malfoy opened his mouth to say something, but this time Harry actually saw his teeth close on his tongue and bite down hard, drawing blood. Malfoy sank to his knees and a ribbon of blood dribbled out of his mouth and down his chin. All of Harry's hostility drained away as he lurched forward, breaking through the shield charm, and sank down with Malfoy, staring helplessly at him. Ginny was at his side in a trice. "Okay!" Harry said. "You can't tell us, I get that. He's put some spell on you, or it's part of the Obedience Charm--he could have ordered you not to tell, and you agreed, so even if you wanted to tell you couldn't...."

Harry felt awful, remembering how frustrating it had been when he'd agreed to follow Tom Riddle, how unnerving it had been when his feet seemed to move of their own accord, and how it had been even more unnerving when he hadn't been able to hurt Riddle, no matter how hard he tried.

"Is that why you followed us? You were coming to us--for help?" Harry whispered to him now. Malfoy still held his eyes wide open; he looked almost as though he was trying to nod, but he was quite incapable of doing anything to answer in the affirmative. He opened his mouth as if to speak, but a split second later, he was growling in pain as his teeth closed on his own tongue once more, and Ginny put her arms around his shoulders, her face white with fear.

"We need to get you to Snape," Harry said quickly. "He'll know what to do." Malfoy let him help him to stand, but they hadn't gone three steps together when both Harry and Draco let out howls of pain and sank to their knees again. Ginny was at a loss for what to do; she stared at the two of them, Harry holding his scar, feeling as though his head would burst in two, and Draco Malfoy holding his left forearm with his right hand, looking like he wished he could rip his own arm off to rid himself of the pain....

Harry had to close his eyes against the pain; it felt as though someone had taken a cleaver to his head and split it in two. Amidst the pain, however, some images were starting to become clear. He could see Voldemort pressing his wand to a man's forearm, turning the Dark Mark there deepest black, summoning his remaining servants. And then Harry saw who the man with the Mark was.

Wormtail.

He was in a chair, trussed up, immobile, his left arm lying along the arm of the chair. The soft pale skin of the inner forearm was facing up, showing the gruesome tattoo, the Mark of his servitude. There was a gag in his mouth and Harry could see that his eyes were wide with pain. Voldemort had made Wormtail his servant again, and he was once more finding him useful.

Suddenly, Draco shook them off and Harry opened his eyes, struggling to see what was going on in the world around him, all the while still feeling that excruciating pain ripping through his head. Draco stood and pulled out his wand; before they could do anything, he disappeared with a pop! Harry collapsed against Ginny, his head still aching; when he closed his eyes, he couldn't see Draco Malfoy, though. He wasn't with Voldemort. That was something at least. The question was--where had he gone?

Suddenly, the pain in his head subsided and he took deep breaths, feeling exhausted. He looked into Ginny's dark, worried eyes. "Snape." He grabbed her hand and started running toward the Three Broomsticks. Ginny struggled to keep up with him.

"But Draco's gone! How would he know--"

"He has the Mark too!" Harry reminded her as they ran. "He'll know where Voldemort is!"

Ginny closed her mouth with a snap when she heard that, and sped up, keeping pace with him now. When they reached the pub, it was like they were swimming upstream, there were so many people running out the door. When they finally managed to slip inside, they found Snape on the floor next to the table where he'd been sitting; his head was in Maggie's lap and he was clutching his left forearm through his robes, which he had not pushed up, so his Mark was still concealed. His face was dripping with sweat and he was even paler than usual, if that was possible. Harry assumed that, like Draco Malfoy, he had screamed when his Mark had been activated by Voldemort, and that was why the pub patrons had fled. Harry crouched before him, putting his hand on his shoulder; he remembered how painful it was to have the Dark Mark and to be summoned by Voldemort, and hated thinking about Snape experiencing that now. But--because of Snape still having the Mark, they might be able to find Voldemort.

He made sure he kept his voice low, because of the remaining people in the pub, backing away in fear. "Malfoy felt it too, and he Disapparated!" Harry whispered urgently. "Do you know where Voldemort is, where he wants the Death Eaters to go?"

Severus Snape swallowed and lifted dark pain-filled eyes to Harry, nodding grimly.

"Little Hangleton."

Harry clamped his mouth shut. Of course. He nodded, then said, "Have you been feeling this much? Has he been summoning Death Eaters often? For some reason my scar hasn't been hurting...."

Snape drew in his breath and pressed his hand to his forearm again; when the pain seemed to subside he said tersely, "No, this is the first in months. But--intelligence reports have said that his lieutenants were carrying on most of the work for him. Malfoy, and another." Bagman, Harry thought, picturing his face again just before he was sucked into Limbo. "He seemed to be--worried about something, and keeping his distance from Britain....I think that since Stonehenge, he's come back."

"He might have been worried that Dumbledore would--would try to use his scar again, to get at him," Harry whispered. Snape nodded.

"You're probably right."

Harry realized that, in a way, what Dumbledore had done had worked. It had driven Voldemort away for fear of Dumbledore doing that again. "Which meant he was too far away for me to feel anything in my scar when he was feeling a lot of emotion...."

Yet again, Snape grabbed his arm, followed by him uttering a stream of some of the filthiest swearing Harry had ever heard, although it was under his breath, very deliberate and even. Harry made a face, horrified by the pain he knew was coursing through Snape.

"Doesn't he usually stop by now?" Harry whispered. He remembered falling out of the sky when he was flying as a golden griffin, in his other life; after a while the extraordinary pain had ceased. But very abruptly, Harry didn't need Snape to answer him--he knew.

It was Harry's turn to cry out and grab his scar; he collapsed against the table leg and squeezed his eyes shut in pain, seeing Voldemort again and the trussed-up Wormtail. Others had arrived in the meantime; they were in what seemed to be a large drawing room with elaborate moldings from which gilt was peeling in curling strips; an enormous overmantel fronted a cold fireplace. There are so many Death Eaters there already, Harry thought. Why is he still summoning them?

But a moment later, he found out why; he was still waiting for a very particular Death Eater.

Draco Malfoy.

When he entered, Harry noticed him right away. Malfoy was trying to hide in the rear of the crowd, near the door, but Voldemort saw him immediately; the nervous crowd parted, exposing Draco and allowing Voldemort to cross the room and survey him critically.

"So," the peculiar high-pitched voice said slowly; "we've decided not to die today."

Malfoy nodded, visibly shaking. "I--I knew you would keep your word, M'Lord. You said you would--"

"You thought you would bargain with me?" the red-eyed wizard suddenly said, interrupting. Draco Malfoy froze. His mouth worked soundlessly as he tried to formulate a response, but a moment later Voldemort was pouring out that cruel, high laugh. "Of course I will keep my word, to a loyal Death Eater. As your father was, in the end. Although I fail to see what you see in that girl you go to such effort to protect....She comes from bad blood. You know she does," he practically spat.

"She's--she's pureblood. Please, M'Lord--" Draco whispered. Something like a smile split Voldemort's gruesome visage in two.

"It is right here." Harry recognized Macnair, the Ministry executioner; he brought forth a bulky parcel wrapped in brown paper and string. With a suspicious look, Macnair handed the parcel to Draco, who seemed very relieved to have it.

"But!" Voldemort cried suddenly, his voice cutting the air like a machete. "That is yours now. It is your property. I order you not to give it away." He stared meaningfully at Draco Malfoy, who swallowed and nodded.

"Yes, M'Lord. I shall not give it away. It is mine."

One corner of Voldemort's mouth curved up in a sinister half-smile. "As you are mine, Moon Child."

In the chair, the trussed-up Wormtail squirmed suddenly, shaking his head and staring with wild eyes at Draco; he was gagged, so he could not speak, but urgent high-pitched grunts were trying to get past the gag. Voldemort merely pointed at him and he suddenly sagged; it seemed to Harry that he was still breathing, but it was difficult to tell. Draco Malfoy was biting his lip and regarding Peter Pettigrew nervously.

"Yes, M'Lord," he said to Voldemort, still shaking slightly. "I am yours."

"Aaah!"

Harry's scream hurt his throat. He gazed up at the ceiling of the Three Broomsticks; for some reason he was lying on the floor and he was very cold and wet. Hermione and Ron stood over him with pitchers; evidently, they'd both thrown ice-cold water over him. Harry took off his glasses and saw that they needed a new Impervius Charm.

"What was that for?" he demanded angrily, running his hand down his face and blinking the water out of his eyes.

"What do you mean, what was that for?" Hermione asked him, incredulous. "You were screaming non-stop and holding your scar--"

Harry's brow furrowed. "I was?" That explained the throat pain. He tentatively touched his scar, which was hot and tender. "I saw--I saw Malfoy. With Voldemort and the Death Eaters. Macnair gave him something and Voldemort said that Malfoy was his and Malfoy agreed," he said very fast, trying not to speak too loudly.

Suddenly, Ginny appeared from the vicinity of the bar carrying a bottle of butterbeer. She stopped short, staring at Harry, soaking wet, still on the floor next to Snape, whose arm seemed to have ceased hurting. "What did you do?" she demanded of Ron and Hermione.

"He needed more than butterbeer, Ginny," Hermione said sheepishly.

"Yeah," Ron agreed, giving Harry a somewhat hostile look. "Besides--considering what I know about what the pair of you have been up to, that was very satisfying," he added rather smugly, his nostrils flaring.

"Ron!" Maggie said angrily, as though she'd had years of practice at being his older sister and not less than a year. "You've no business--"

"And you do? Have business messing about with their private lives, I mean," Ron added.

"This isn't the time!" Snape snarled at them both suddenly; Maggie scowled at him. He ignored her and turned to Harry. "You saw him," he said softly. It wasn't a question.

"Yeah. I--I could see Malfoy! With him! He went there. I--I think I must have been screaming because he--he had been putting Cruciatus on--on Wormtail--"

"He has Pettigrew?" Snape said quickly, sweat beading on his upper lip. Harry nodded.

"I'll put a silencing charm on myself. If Voldemort does something in anger again, I may be able to find out more," Harry said, starting to aim his wand at his own throat.

"No, Harry, let me," Hermione said. "I know something that will keep you from hurting your throat; a silencing charm will just keep us from hearing you scream." He nodded and let her put the charm on him. He climbed back into his chair and they sat around the table, Ginny holding his hand tightly, her face very pale. But after a few minutes, it seemed that nothing more would be communicated to Harry through his scar. He shrugged and nodded at Hermione, pointing at his throat, and she took the spell off him again.

"I guess it was too much to hope for," he said. "Of course the one time I'm hoping to have my scar hurt, so I can see what he's up to, nothing happens...."

Ron looked a bit embarrassed by his earlier reaction. "Sorry, Harry." He also looked sheepishly at his sister. "And you too, Ginny. I'm--sorry for--the way I reacted." He was very red and Harry could barely hear him, his voice was so soft. "It's not like you didn't tell me repeatedly that I should prepare myself...."

Harry nodded, his arm around Ginny. "You know I love Ginny very much, Ron? And that I would never hurt her?" Ginny looked at her brother with large hopeful eyes and Ron nodded, tight-lipped, as Hermione took his hand in hers and gave him a gentle smile. Maggie was also watching Ron closely.

"I know, I know," he admitted at last. Heaving a great sigh, he said, "I reckon we should cut our visit short and go tell Dumbledore what happened. With Malfoy."

"Right," Harry agreed. Snape nodded at him and the six of them rose to leave. However, they hadn't gone more than a few feet down the High Street when a searing pain ripped through Harry's head again; Voldemort wasn't done....

A man whose face he couldn't see was on the floor of the same room he'd seen earlier, writhing in pain while Voldemort trained his wand on him; Harry could see the amber light crackling and he put his hands over his ears to avoid hearing the man's unearthly cries. It did no good, however, for Harry wasn't really hearing the man's anguish through his ears.

At length, Voldemort lifted his wand and demanded of the spent man at his feet, "Tell me why I no longer have my dragons! Tell me why I no longer have my dementors! Tell me why you Apparated back here instead of staying at Stonehenge to fight!" Spit flew from his mouth as his voice rose on an infuriated shriek, and out of the corner of his eye Harry was aware of the man, no longer being cursed, scuttling backward on all fours, like a crab. The assembled Death Eaters backed away, widening the circle around him, but Harry was focusing on Malfoy, whom he had spotted in the crowd, no longer the focus of Voldemort's wrath.

However, despite the fact that he was off the hook for now, Draco Malfoy stepped forward. He didn't flinch from Voldemort's eerie red stare.

"What is it?" he spat impatiently.

Draco Malfoy whispered, "Harry Potter."

Voldemort's odd snake-like face started twitching madly; a tic suddenly made his right eye wink uncontrollably. "What about him?" he snapped at Malfoy, who looked utterly confident in what he was doing. His father had been in Voldemort's inner circle and he appeared to be ready to take up that position now.

"I have it on good authority that it was Harry Potter who told Dumbledore how to get rid of the dementors, and that he also turned the dragons, M'Lord," he said, his voice clear and cold, sounding rather pleased about telling Voldemort this. "He spoke to them."

Voldemort stared at Malfoy and walked toward him, his already-inhuman features twisted in an expression of utter confusion. "He spoke to them?" In the process of walking toward Malfoy, he happened to step on the Death Eater he'd just been torturing. When the man cried out in an oddly high-pitched voice, Voldemort turned and pointed his wand at him again, once more pronouncing the dreaded incantation with a chilling casualness.

Harry's screaming seemed (at least to him) to go on forever. Finally, he opened his eyes and blinked up at the five people crouched around him.

"What was it?" Snape breathed, his dark eyes anxious.

"Malfoy," Harry croaked, barely able to speak. "He's--he's telling Voldemort that it's all my fault. The dragons being gone, and the dementors, too. He--he doesn't seem like such a reluctant Death Eater these days," Harry added, trying to let go forever of his memories of Draco Malfoy from his other life. The boy who had been biting his tongue, trying to tell them what was going on, might as well have not existed.

Ron was turning deep red with fury. "That little ferrety bastard. When I get my hands on him--"

"Let us concentrate on returning to the castle at this time, Mr. Weasley," Snape said sternly, helping Harry to his feet. "The headmaster should be told about all of this."

Ron clamped his mouth shut. Through tight lips he managed to squeeze out the grudging words, "Yes, sir." He glanced irritably at his older sister, as though dying to demand of her how she had agreed to marry Snape, but he held his tongue.

The walk to Hogwarts from Hogsmeade had never seemed longer; Harry was itching to change to his griffin form and fly ahead, possibly taking Ginny along for the ride, but he forced himself to walk. He didn't want to risk changing back when he was in mid-air. Voldemort's fury could rip through his scar again at any moment, and if Ginny were riding on his back, she'd be in danger, too. He glanced at her, walking by his side. She gave him a small smile and laced her fingers through his.

"Just think about--earlier," she said softly. He knew she was trying to help, but he shook his head.

"I wish I could, but--no," was all he said. The perfection of the afternoon had been shattered by their seeing Draco Malfoy outside Hog's End, and everything had been downhill after that. He could wallow in thinking about their first time together, but that would be selfish and counterproductive. They had other things to worry about now.

Such as Draco Malfoy angling to take his father's place at Voldemort's side.

When they finally reached the castle, Harry dragged himself up the stone steps, feeling like all of his strength had been sapped, and waited for Ron to open the heavy door. Filch was waiting in the entrance hall, a parchment in hand; he'd been sitting in a wooden chair, tipped back on the rear legs, snoring loudly, his feet on a cupboard door (the same cupboard, Harry remembered, where he and Ron had stashed the drugged Crabbe and Goyle when they'd impersonated them using Polyjuice Potion). When Ron closed the heavy door, Filch jerked awake and his chair came crashing down on the stone flags.

"Wha--what's going on? What are you lot doing back from Hogsmeade already?" His eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Thought you'd get up to some mischief in the castle, and try to use being in the village as your alibi, did you? Well--oh, erm. Hello there, Professor Snape," he said awkwardly, jumping to his feet, worrying his parchment between his fingers, having just noticed the Potions master standing behind Ron (they were roughly the same height). The switch from bossy to servile was so sudden Harry wondered whether he might get whiplash. He felt like telling him that he'd forgotten to tug on his forelock--not that he had one anymore.

"We have returned because we have business with the headmaster. So if you would please mark these students as having returned, I would appreciate it. We don't have time to waste," Snape said tersely. Filch nodded, examining the parchment closely.

"Right, right, o' course, Professor Snape...." Harry felt jumpy and nervous as he waited for Filch to check their names off. But instead of just passing them, he peered over the top of the parchment with suspicion. "Was they all in the village with you and Miss Dougherty, Professor Snape?" he said slowly, with that creak in his voice that made Harry's stomach clench.

"Yes, yes. Be quick about it, man!" Snape told him, his voice rising.

Filch perused the list once more, then raised his eyes to Snape's, a smug smile (of sorts) twisting the corners of his thin, bitter mouth. "You might be interested to know, Professor, that none of them signed out proper-like before leaving the castle. And that she--" he said more loudly, pointing a bony finger at Ginny, "didn't even have leave to go to the village at all!" He looked at Snape with large glaring eyes, reminding Harry absurdly of his own cat, Mrs. Norris, with her lamp-like eyes.

Ginny's jaw dropped. "Of course I had leave to go to the village! I just turned seventeen!"

Hermione stepped forward now, a little white. In a shaking voice, she said, "I'm afraid this is partly my and Harry's fault, Mr. Filch. As Head Girl and Boy, we took it on ourselves to take extra security precautions, and so we left the castle a different way. We didn't want to be seen going to the village in broad daylight....But right now we really need to see Professor Dumbledore. Surely all of this can be worked out later...."

But he pointed at Ginny again. "That still doesn't excuse her for being out of bounds! Only students who are of-age were supposed to go, and she's not of-age!"

"Yes, I am!" Ginny argued hotly, stepping forward, unafraid. "I told you--I just turned seventeen. A few days ago. When was the list made? It might not be up-to-date...."

"It was magically made this morning by the headmaster himself. It has the names of all of-age students as of today!" he snapped back, glowering with maniacal glee. "Now, if I remember correctly, Professor Snape, this piece of baggage--" Ron started forward angrily and Harry reluctantly joined with Hermione in pulling him back; "--was already in a spot of trouble for sneaking around in the night with our Head Boy." He gave Harry a good hard glare. "I believe this time, for being out-of-bounds again, suspension is in order?" he finished, raising one eyebrow and looking very hopeful. Ginny's jaw dropped.

"But I've done nothing wrong! I am seventeen!" Ginny shrieked, her voice cracking. "Ask my parents! They'll send my birth certificate...."

"Mr. Filch," Snape said in a low, dangerous voice, "we have urgent business with the headmaster and we can take up this issue with him. He has the Registry in his office. Rest assured, if Miss Weasley was not cleared to go to Hogsmeade, her punishment will fit the crime. However, we do not have any more time to waste upon trivial matters!"

Filch's mouth was as thin as Harry had ever seen it, but he finally stepped back and let the six of them pass. Harry put his arm around Ginny's shoulders as they ascended the marble stairs; she glared over her shoulder at Filch, still quaking with rage.

"Someone must have enchanted my name off the list, as a joke!" she spat. "I can't believe the lengths to which some people will go...."

"If that was Malfoy's doing," Ron growled out, "he has yet another thing to answer for--"

"We don't have time for this!" Harry told them both as they reached the corridor with the gargoyle guarding Dumbledore's office. "Snape's right! We have more important things to worry about."

Ginny ducked her head as Snape gave the password and the wall opened. "Yes, you're right, of course," she whispered, sounding contrite. "I'm sorry, Harry...."

He nodded to her as they stepped onto the rising spiral stairs; when Snape knocked on Dumbledore's office door, they were admitted by a Dumbledore who didn't look the least bit surprised to see them. Harry couldn't contain himself and started speaking immediately.

"We came back because we have to tell you about Malfoy. He's with Voldemort. He was summoned, through his Dark Mark, and he went to Little Hangleton. They're all there! If the Aurors and operatives are going to get him, all they have to do is--"

"Harry." Dumbledore looked over his half-moon spectacles at him, very calm. "Breathe. Did you think for an instant that we do not have spies amongst the Death Eaters? I am aware of the meeting and expect a report afterward. As for anyone going there to apprehend Voldemort and his followers--that has been tried. Unfortunately, Voldemort has made the house unplottable, so it is impossible for anyone to find it who has not specifically been summoned through the Dark Mark. And while we do have operatives who received the Dark Mark to aid in their spying, they are vastly outnumbered by loyal Death Eaters. It would be suicide for them to try to take on Voldemort and his loyal followers without significant support. They are more valuable as spies than as corpses."

"W--well," he stammered, "but you should know that Draco Malfoy is there. And he's serving Voldemort willingly."

Dumbledore sighed. "Is there anything else, Harry?"

Hermione's jaw had dropped. "What do you mean, is there anything else? Didn't you hear what Harry said?" she practically squeaked.

Dumbledore nodded placidly. "Yes, I did. As for Mr. Malfoy going to Voldemort when he was summoned....did you really think that I would have allowed a Hogsmeade weekend if I didn't have a rather good idea of where Voldemort and his Death Eaters would be on this day? And did you think that I would allow Mr. Malfoy--but not Miss Kirkner--to go to the village without reason?" He raised an eyebrow; she gaped in surprise again.

"So--so you planned for him to go to Voldemort? And gave him a way to do it?" Harry said, incredulous. "Is--is Malfoy spying for you?" Harry's heart leapt into his throat; maybe Draco was doing the right thing after all. But Dumbledore shook his head.

"Alas, Harry, I can only hope. I thought it best to trust to Mr. Malfoy's judgment and allow him to make his own choices. Besides, if he were given a potion or placed under Imperius and questioned about whether he is in league with me....well, by my keeping my distance, he can answer quite truthfully that we are not in cahoots. I have faith in Mr. Malfoy; he has shown before an ability to think independently and to do the right thing. His father would not have gone to Azkaban otherwise. I have operatives to report today's events to me concerning Mr. Malfoy. As you and he are not on the best of terms at the moment, I think you should leave this to me," he said with finality.

It was Harry's turn to be indignant. "But--but my scar was hurting and I saw him! He was telling Voldemort that it was all my fault. The dragons, and the dementors. I tell you, he can't be trusted!" He couldn't believe that Dumbledore was just sitting there, calmly telling Harry to get his nose out of something that concerned him to this degree.

Dumbledore, to his surprise, nodded. "You may be right, Harry, you may yet be right. But at this point I need to give him the benefit of the doubt. I knew you were quite safe in Hogsmeade, with the Death Eaters off at their meeting in Little Hangleton, and with Professor Snape nearby. It's not as though I am not concerned with your safety--"

"It's not my bloody safety I'm worried about!" Harry said weakly, unable to understand how Dumbledore could be so calm. "It's--Malfoy is a Death Eater. A willing Death Eater. When he leaves that meeting and returns to the castle from Hogsmeade, are you telling me you're going to let him walk around here freely like nothing is wrong?"

Dumbledore stood. He looked very stern now. "I have already said that this is under control, Harry. If you do not trust me--"

Harry closed his eyes, shaking his head. "Of course I trust you! It's just that--"

"Then trust me," Dumbledore said quietly, his blue eyes looked very hard, not twinkling at Harry at all. Harry had never felt more frustrated in his life.

"I beg your pardon, headmaster," Snape said suddenly, waving his hands at Harry, Ron, Ginny and Hermione. "I did not mean to question your judgment by bringing them here--"

Dumbledore gave him a small smile. "Quite all right, Severus. I understand entirely. However, I do have some letters to write, so if you will all excuse me--"

"But what about my birthday?" Ginny said, stepping forward.

Dumbledore gave her a kind but perplexed look. "Pardon me, Miss Weasley?" Ginny explained to him what had occurred when they'd returned to the castle, and Dumbledore frowned, looking quite mystified at this. "Now, that is very odd, very odd indeed. You weren't on the list, you say?" Ginny nodded vigorously. He crossed the room to a tall bookcase full of enormous leather-bound books, the shelves reaching up into the dark recesses of the tower.

"Accio Registry!" he said calmly, holding his hand above his head. A very large black book appeared to be hurtling down from one of the upper shelves, and Harry was certain it would strike the headmaster on the top of his skull and kill him. However, it flew neatly into his gnarled, outstretched hand, and he carried it to his desk, laying it across the parchments already there. On its cover it bore a large Hogwarts crest, the gold looking like real gold, the silver on the Slytherin crest like actual silver. The black leather was ancient and cracked, dark tan scars all up and down the spine. Dumbledore opened it to the middle of the book and a cloud of fine dust arose from the vellum pages, causing them all to begin coughing convulsively. Dumbledore waved the dust away with only minor irritation evident on his face, clearing his throat as he did so.

"So sorry. We had a small spate of babies in January and February, but no new magical children since then. I expect we'll have some in a week or two, however. The longest stretch I can ever remember whilst I've been headmaster was from March to September of nineteen-seventy-five. Voldemort's influence, no doubt. And of course, only the last pages of the Registry are dust-free, though I do try to air it out from time to time...."

"What is that, Professor?" Hermione asked, her hand over her mouth and her eyes squinting against the dust that still permeated the air.

He smiled at her. "It is the Registry, Miss Granger, in which a magical quill wrote your name--as soon as you had one--on the day you were born. It is the Registry wherein all magical children's names appear, if they are born anywhere in the British Isles, whether into Muggle families or wizarding ones. When each of you was named by your parents, the quill wrote that name in the pages of this book, and it is to this book that I go every year to cast the spell to send Hogwarts letters to our new first years." He turned over most of the pages now, leaving only about twenty pages at the end. More dust rose into the air, but they had all covered their mouths by now and were holding their eyes very nearly closed against the pervasive dust. "And," he went on, "it was to this book that I went this morning to cast a spell creating a list for Mr. Filch of all current students who are of-age. Let us go to the year nineteen-eighty-one, to determine what might have gone wrong with my spell. I am sorry if I caused you any inconvenience, Miss Weasley. I have never had a problem with this spell before, when helping Professor McGonagall prepare the Hogwarts letters...."

"I--I'm not saying it was you, Professor," she said quietly. "I reckoned--someone else charmed my name off the parchment. As a bad joke...."

Dumbledore nodded as he turned a page. "Yes, there are some who would find that amusing. That could very well be what occurred, but first we must eliminate--" He ran his finger along some writing on the yellowed page and stopped, peering through his spectacles, then over them. "Hm. Well. Mystery solved. That was easy enough." He looked up and smiled.

Ginny could barely contain herself. "What? What happened?"

"Mr. Filch was correct," Dumbledore said quite pleasantly. "However, in that you were under the impression that your birthday had already--"

"What?" Ginny cried. Hermione echoed her a minute later, and Ron and Harry also began talking at the same time. Dumbledore tried to calm them with his hands, but it was some minutes before the room was quiet again.

He finally turned to Ginny and said simply, "I am afraid, Miss Weasley, that you are not yet seventeen years old."

"But--but I--" Ginny was at a loss for words.

"You can look right here, if you like. You are still the first person in your year to be born in April, as you can see. But according to the Registry, the date is the seventh, not--when did you say you thought it was?"

"April first," she whispered, staring at the book.

"Ah," he said, nodding wisely. "No doubt the twins took great advantage of that at times?" he suggested, a lopsided smile pulling at the corner of his mouth. Ron guffawed.

"At times! The twins loved that she had that birthday!" he said; then his face fell. "But how could we all have thought her birthday was the first when it's--when?"

"The seventh," Harry said slowly, looking at the yellowed page where a magical quill had written, not quite seventeen years earlier, Virginia Annabel Weasley.

Dumbledore peered at Ron; he seemed quite stern. "Are you saying that your own mother was under the impression that the birthday was on the first, not the seventh?"

Ron started to nod, then said, "Well, unless she was just--just making it up. But why would she do that?"

"The Prophecy!" Hermione said suddenly. They all turned to stare at her. She pointed at Maggie, who turned white. "The Prophecy Trelawney gave! Bill went to that Centaur, who told him the Daughter of War would be in his family. He thought that meant the sisters he already had, and so did Pettigrew. That's why he was supposed to kill them. I mean--you and your sister, Maggie," she said to Ginny's older sister now, who was starting to return to her natural color. "And for a while I thought it was Annie--Nita, that is," she corrected herself. "But--if Ginny's birthday is the seventh--that makes her a three! And even without that--her name is also a three. I worked it out after we got back from Stonehenge. Until then, I never knew Ginny's middle name!"

"A three?" Ginny squeaked. "What?"

"Arithmancy! Your birth number! The fourth month added to the seventh day makes eleven. Add that to nine and one, the first two numbers in the year you were born--ten, in other words--and you get twenty-one. Add to that the last two numbers in the year you were born--eight and one--and you get thirty. Add the three and the naught in thirty and you get--three. Your birth number."

Ginny swallowed, then looked at Harry for reassurance. He put his arm around her. "I'm the Daughter of War?" she whispered. "But--but I thought--because of my birthday--"

"But that wasn't your real birthday!" Hermione said, still very excited. "Oh--don't you see what this means? He can be defeated! We know everyone who's in the Triangle! Harry's the Lion, Ginny's the Daughter of War--"

"And Draco Malfoy is the Moon Child," Harry said bitterly. "Yeah, he'll probably be extremely cooperative about bringing down his favorite person right now and helping his least favorite person--me--to do it." He avoided Dumbledore's eye; he didn't feel like another lecture on the need to give Malfoy the benefit of the doubt.

"So--why did someone want everyone in our family to believe I had a different birthday?"

"Probably to protect you--" Hermione began. To Harry's surprise, Snape chimed in now.

"Pettigrew," he said simply. They all turned to stare at him. He'd been gazing at the Registry; now he lifted his dark eyes and said, "On the night that--that your parents were killed," he said to Harry, "I learned from Crouch that the Secret Keeper, the one who had betrayed them, also knew the identity of the Daughter of War. I thought he meant Sirius Black...." He looked at Maggie and she grasped his hand, her eyes looking moist. Suddenly Harry had a very vivid memory of what he'd seen in Snape's Pensieve, Barty Crouch, Jr. laughing and telling Snape that they'd come to Godric's Hollow to see 'the show.'

"And after Sirius went to Azkaban, you probably reckoned that she was safe, whoever she was," Harry added. Snape nodded. "So--are you saying that he's the one who changed Ginny's birthday? Wormtail? And that it was to protect her?"

"I think that may very well be the case, Harry," Dumbledore said quietly, nodding at him.

Harry tightened his hold on Ginny while she continued to stare at the Registry page with her name on it. When she was only a baby, seven months before Harry was orphaned, Peter Pettigrew had tried to protect Ginny. Had he been afraid he would be ordered to kill another Weasley girl? Was he worried that he'd have to kidnap her and make her disappear, like her older sisters?

Only one person knew the answer to that--and he was Voldemort's prisoner.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Harry was waiting for Draco Malfoy in the entrance hall when he returned to the castle that day, but before he could say anything, Snape had come striding up the dungeon stairs, saying to Malfoy irritably, "It's about time you got back. While you were gone, Zabini got into an argument with a third year and hexed him. Bulstrode tried to discipline Zabini, and now she's in the hospital wing. Zabini is now in my classroom scrubbing stains off the tables and floors using Muggle methods, watched over by Mr. Filch. I can't spend all day babysitting in the common room. Get down there and make certain no more arguments escalate into full-scale attacks. If you need to so much as go to the loo, make one of the sixth- or fifth-year prefects take over. Understand?"

"Even if it's Mariah?"

Snape looked like he wanted to hex the smirk off his face. "Use your judgment, Malfoy," he responded, as though he doubted that Malfoy had any. "What do you think?" His lip curled in a sneer and Harry fought the urge to cheer, clenching his jaw almost painfully to prevent himself from making a noise.

Draco Malfoy looked levelly at his head-of-house. "Yes, sir," he said laconically, not sounding disrespectful, exactly, but certainly not as respectful as he had been of Snape in the past. His eyes slid over Harry for a split second before he preceded Snape down toward the dungeons; before he left, Snape glared at Harry and gestured toward the marble stairs. He was dismissing him. Telling me to bugger off, basically, Harry thought discontentedly, as he dragged himself up the stairs, away from Draco Malfoy.

Ginny, to Filch's great disappointment, did not get suspended. Mr. and Mrs. Weasley and Bill brought her birth certificate to the school and it was plain to see that the '1' on it had previously had a small, faint cross-piece on the top, when it had been a seven. Ginny's parents were quite shocked that they had been tricked all those years ago.

However, Bill told Dumbledore and Harry--and his parents and Ginny, for the first time--that he'd thought it very peculiar that his mother had written to him and Charlie about Ginny's birth a full six days after it had taken place. He still had another old letter, dated the fourth of April, in which his mother had said that the baby wasn't born yet. Bill had never asked his mother about this, as the thought had also occurred to him that they might be protecting Ginny, because of the Prophecy. Over the years, Bill had forgotten that he'd ever wondered about the reason for the discrepancies in the letters; he'd left home to work for Gringotts in Egypt just after finishing Hogwarts, and until the Quidditch World Cup, he'd seldom come back to the Burrow except for Christmas holidays. He was never around when it was Ginny's birthday, and in any case didn't think of it as having a precise date; he had usually sent presents from Egypt for Ginny, the twins and Ron all in one package. He confessed that he didn't even remember Ron's precise birthday, smiling sheepishly at his mother. She promised that she wouldn't tell Ron.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It was very strange to Harry that life basically returned to normal the following week. There were so many new things in his head which had to be pushed aside in favor of prefects' meetings, Quidditch practice (the final was the first Saturday after the Easter holiday), N.E.W.T. revision and Dueling Club meetings. He hadn't had the nerve to call for an Elven Army training session since Dobby had died, but Ron and Hermione told him that he needed to do this, for himself as much as for the elves, and he reluctantly agreed. He promoted one of the other elves to Dobby's former rank, trying to maintain his composure as the small figure saluted him and then started taking the troops through their paces. He'd wanted to cry on Ginny afterward, but the tears wouldn't come, and instead she'd simply cradled his head in her lap by the shore of the lake.

Spring was in full force as the holiday approached, and it felt strange to Harry that he was going to be returning to Ascog again already, having just been there for his suspension. But to his surprise, he learned that he was to spend his holiday in Hogsmeade; Sirius' sister Ursula, her husband and the three children were going to the Isle of Wight with Sirius' parents, and only Cassiopeia and her husband, Floyd, would be staying at Ascog Castle. Sirius himself would be flitting about Britain on business for Dumbledore.

"Unless you want the company of just my charming oldest sister and her husband for a week...." he started to say to Harry as they walked down the stairs toward the Great Hall for breakfast; he affected an expression of extreme innocence. Harry was aghast.

"Er, no, I'll take Hog's End, thanks. You're sure I'm invited?"

"By Percy himself, and considering what your relationship used to be with his wife I think that's a pretty clear sign of welcome, don't you?"

Harry grinned and nodded. It would be good to see Katie again, and it probably wouldn't be too difficult to get Ron and Ginny to visit from the Burrow. Hermione would be staying with her parents, so they wouldn't get to see her during the holiday, but you couldn't have everything. And the twins were always good for a laugh. It promised to be a fun holiday. Maybe he'd be able to get his mind off some things that had been plaguing his nightmares, such as the sight of the people who'd been burnt by the dragons, or the sight of Draco Malfoy stepping up to Voldemort and saying smugly, Harry Potter....

But some of his expectations turned out to be quite wrong. Ron, Ginny and Hermione were also staying at Hog's End. Ron would be sharing the room that had been Harry's in his other life, and Ginny and Hermione would be sharing what he thought of as Jamie's room. However, the fact that Hermione was around for the holiday meant that Harry had to think about something that hadn't been plaguing his nightmares at all, although he certainly had the impression that Hermione thought it should have been.

N.E.W.T.s were almost upon them.

Hermione felt that the holiday would provide an excellent opportunity to revise and to get in some Transfiguration, Charms and Defense Against the Dark Arts practice in the garden at Hog's End. Harry hadn't been thinking about N.E.W.T.s at all; he'd made only a half-hearted attempt to keep up with his reading while he was suspended. And Hermione bringing up N.E.W.T.s caused Ron to spiral downward into depression again.

"Bloody hell, Hermione, do you think anyone in their right mind is going to give me a job when I finish school anyway?" They were eating breakfast at the Gryffindor table on the Saturday that marked the start of the holiday; after they were done eating they were to get one of the carriages to the village. "What do I need a single N.E.W.T. for? Y'think that'll make any difference? Everyone knows I'm a werewolf. That's like getting negative N.E.W.T.s. You think Lupin didn't do well on his tests in seventh year? You think Dumbledore would have hired him if he'd failed everything? But it didn't do any good, did it? You see anyone else queuing up to hire him?" He toyed with some eggs with his fork, viciously stabbing a clot of yellow and white and stuffing it into his mouth.

"Ron, that's ridiculous! Why are you being so defeatist? Are you telling me that after making that speech during the Order of Merlin ceremony--"

Ron frowned. "Yeah, well, there's something I haven't told, er, anyone...." he said softly, furtively, looking around at the rest of his housemates, chattering excitedly to their friends about their plans for the holiday.

"What?" Hermione snapped. "That you have mood swings? Sorry, Ron, but that was true before you became a werewolf," she acidly, pouring herself some orange juice.

Harry bristled at her tone. "That's friendly," he said, deciding it was better to criticize her himself before Ron did and the two of them had a row.

"Sorry," she mumbled, reddening. "I just meant that--"

"Listen, there are a load of werewolf-haters out there," Ron said in a whisper, leaning over his food to speak to them. "Since I got the O.M., I've--I've been getting these letters--they make the ones you got with the bubotuber pus look like love notes...."

"What?" Hermione practically shrieked; Ron looked like he wanted to put a permanent silencing charm on her.

"Will you shut up?" he whispered fiercely to her. "I'm only saying--"

"Were they anonymous or do you know who wrote them?" she asked quickly, whispering.

"Some of each," he said, sighing and eating more eggs. "Listen, it doesn't matter, " he said as he chewed. He swallowed and said, "I let Nita--and you--get me all worked up about werewolf rights and such when I made that speech. Don't know what I was thinking. Things are never going to change," he said morosely, staring at his empty plate.

Hermione put her hand on his arm sympathetically. But she was still on her N.E.W.T. kick. "Then you can make them change by performing brilliantly on your N.E.W.T.s!" she said jubilantly. "Think of it. It'll be like thumbing your nose at all of those ignorant people. Or anyone else who's ever been biased against werewolves."

"You mean like me? I didn't used to be the most enlightened person in the world about this, remember. What am I supposed to do to get people to understand--bite them all and turn them into werewolves too?" he grumbled.

Hermione shook her head. "Of course not," she responded, as though Ron had been serious; he glanced at Harry and rolled his eyes. But Harry was starting to see her point.

"Ron--remember how I felt about showing Snape I really could do Potions? How I put in all that extra work to do it? Well--think of it that way. And anyway, we'll all be together for the holiday. We can suffer together," he laughed, punching Ron on the arm lightly. Ron laughed for a moment, finally smiling at Harry.

"Yeah, I reckon. Misery loves company, after all," he said darkly. He playfully punched Harry back, but he evidently wasn't thinking about keeping himself under control and Harry fell hard against Neville, who promptly ended up with the left half of his face in his porridge. Harry tried to extricate himself from Neville's arms and apologize profusely, but from Neville's other side Parvati Patil had arisen and was now closing on Ron.

"Ron Weasley! What do you think you are doing? Using Harry to attack Neville is hardly constructive if you're feeling jealous!"

Ron looked at her with his mouth open, clearly utterly baffled. "Pardon?" he managed to say weakly after a moment's silence.

Neville was still wiping the porridge from his face as she pulled him to his feet. "Are you claiming that you didn't know we've been a couple since Valentine's?" she demanded of Ron, glaring at him.

Neville was more than a little disheveled, porridge staining the front of his robes. He finally straightened up and pulled out his wand; Ron actually cringed, not knowing what he was up to, but Neville was calmly cleaning the rest of the porridge off his robes. He looked quite pleased with himself, putting his arm around Parvati afterward. "I used to think you were a bit clever, Ron, but now I'm not so sure," Neville said smugly, although it sounded false; Harry knew that Neville looked up to Ron. Neville grinned at his girlfriend, who gazed up at him with satisfaction on her face. "Parvati is coming to visit me, Gran, Uncle Algie and Aunt Enid during the holiday. We have to go now. Bye!" he said cheerfully, as he and Parvati left for the entrance hall. Ron was still staring at them in amazement. Hermione reached out with her hand and closed his mouth with a snap.

"If you really didn't know about them, I can hardly accuse you of paying too much attention to your ex-girlfriend, but honestly, Ron! If you're that attentive about your N.E.W.T. revision, you will get a negative number," she sniffed, returning to her food.

"Hang on, what just happened here? If I'm up on what's going on with the pair of them I'm paying too much attention to Parvati, but since I'm clueless, I'm an idiot?" He shook his head, putting his arm around Hermione's shoulders. "Is it my fault that I have such a brilliant, beautiful girlfriend that I'm distracted from noticing anything else in the world--other people, homework, revision...." He gave her a sly smile and she laughed.

"You're good with the blarney, at any rate. Too bad there's no N.E.W.T. for that."

"That's where you'd be wrong," Ron said breezily, stealing a piece of bacon from Harry's plate. "Harry and I call it 'Divination.'"

All three of them laughed, and across the table where she'd been talking to Ruth Pelta, Ginny smiled at them. Harry was glad to see that Ron had come out of his depression fairly quickly. But suddenly, Ginny's cheerful expression changed to one of apprehension; she seemed to be looking past Harry across the vast hall. He turned to see Draco Malfoy glaring at him; Malfoy looked away first, turning to Goyle to say something with a snide curl of his lip. Harry still did not turn away and Malfoy met his eyes again briefly before striding out of the hall, Mariah, Crabbe, Goyle, Nott and Zabini in his wake.

Ever since the day in Hogsmeade, Mariah had been feeling remarkably well again, and Draco Malfoy had made a great show of walking with her everywhere, their arms about each other as though they'd been surgically attached. His former cohorts, plus Nott and Zabini, were also much in evidence. Mariah no longer seemed interested in being Ginny's friend, and indeed, snubbed repeated overtures Ginny made to her. Ginny had been rather hurt by this, but Harry had reminded her that Mariah's first loyalty was to Draco Malfoy; if Malfoy had told Mariah she could no longer be Ginny's friend, that was that.

There was a crackling in the air, a palpable tension whenever Draco Malfoy walked into the same room as Harry, who felt like he was waiting for something to happen, but he didn't know what. Oddly, Malfoy kept his distance, sneering at Harry from afar, as he and his clique cut a wide swath through the corridors, laughing whenever anyone complained about being bumped or jostled. And yet Malfoy did not retaliate with magic; in general, apart from his attitude, his behavior was beyond reproach. Harry would have loved to find a reason to at least give him detention, but Malfoy did not present him with any opportunities. Would that change once he was no longer in the castle? Harry wondered. When the cat was away, would the dragon play?

Harry had no doubt that he'd be safe at Hog's End for the holiday--along with everyone else who lived there--but would Hogwarts be safe from Draco Malfoy?

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny walked down the stairs to the Hog's End drawing room, where George, Angelina and little Rufus and Rowena were waiting for them. Percy and Katie were working, and Fred and Lee were off on company business. While they'd been unpacking, Ron had challenged Harry to a game of wizarding chess, and Ginny wanted to hear Hermione play a new cello piece that she'd written. They were all gabbling in a friendly mishmash of a conversation when the front door suddenly opened to reveal Nita Anderssen, looking quite nervous. They stopped talking abruptly and Ron and Ginny went to their sister, as she was clearly distressed.

"I'm sorry to barge in; P-percy gave me the password," she stuttered nervously. "I came to see Harry." Her siblings turned to him in surprise. He frowned and finished descending the stairs, Hermione behind him, lugging her cello. Before he could say anything, Nita said, "You need to come with me. To St. Mungo's. Your aunt has been asking for you. And--someone else I think you should see first."

He was shocked. "Aunt Petunia is finally talking? Thank god! But--who else?"

Her mouth went very thin. "Rodney Jeffries. In a way--"

Ginny, Ron and Hermione gawped, and he felt no less surprised. "Erm--are you sure it's safe?" he ventured.

"Well--that's a very good question at St. Mungo's, these days. But I contacted your headmaster first and we worked it all out. I've come in an ambulance, so I can smuggle you in. We don't want there to be a record of your visiting. It's really not safe at St. Mungo's just now. We'd thought that the Death Eaters who surrendered at Stonehenge might be like the ones who surrendered at Gringotts, that they might turn around and pull a fast one, so we had loads of guards outside their wards. Instead, it turned out that many of them were under Imperius, they weren't real Death Eaters at all, and--and--"

Ginny put her arm around her sister's shoulder. "What?"

Nita swallowed, looking very grim, but not crying. "Five so far--all of whom said they'd been under Imperius--have been murdered in their beds by other Death Eater patients, although pinning down just which ones is proving very difficult. And on top of that, my senior refused to believe it was other patients--whose injuries were self-inflicted, it turned out, so they could be near the others. One of them nearly got me when I came to do my rounds." She pulled up her sleeve, revealing a long scar on her right forearm which seemed to be in the process of healing still. She looked a little smug. "Idiot! He didn't expect to get a doctor who'd been to Durmstrang....I've seen it all...."

Hermione and Ginny were horrified; Ron appeared justifiably proud. Nita looked at Harry seriously. "Disguise yourself again, to play it safe. And only you can come; I can't be conducting a crowd around the corridors--it would be too conspicuous. I'll put you on a stretcher and levitate you. As you'll be arriving in an ambulance, that will be best. The driver doesn't even suspect that we're not here for a genuine patient, so I'll actually be levitating you out of the house, if you don't mind. And even if you do," she added.

Harry shook his head. "No, no. That's all right, I don't mind. Security is that bad at St. Mungo's right now?"

Nita sighed. "That's not all that's very bad, but I don't really have time to get into details. Come on--we need to hurry."

"Why? What's the rush?" Ron wanted to know.

"If I had time to say, we wouldn't need to hurry!" she said irritably. "Harry can fill you in when he gets back. But right now--"

"That's fine," Harry said quickly, understanding that sometimes explanations took too much time. He closed his eyes and concentrated on growing out his hair and beard. When he opened them, he saw Nita looking at him in shock.

"Well! That's convenient, isn't it? I didn't realize that was how you'd done it....Well, it doesn't really matter, I reckon." She waved her wand and produced a simple stretcher, floating in mid-air in the entrance hall. Harry sat on the edge tentatively, then laid down fully on it, his body very rigid, feeling invisible bonds pressing down on him. She waved her wand again and a sheet appeared, covering him up to the neck. Ron opened the front door and she guided the stretcher to the ambulance in the drive; the doors flew open and Harry floated inside. He felt the stretcher attach itself to the floor immediately.

"I'll be riding up front," Nita told him as she closed the doors. "We'll be there in a blink." With the doors closed, the back of the ambulance was dim but not pitch dark; some light bled through the partition separating him from Nita and the driver. He heard her get into her seat and close the door, and then the magical motor started up, making the vehicle vibrate violently. They left the house's drive and turned onto the cobbled street, and a moment later Harry felt a terrific jolt accompanied by a loud bang! He realized that his heart was beating very fast and he wondered just what kind of viper's nest he was about to enter. It seemed that St. Mungo's was a very dangerous place these days.

He closed his eyes when the ambulance doors were opened and kept them closed while Nita levitated his stretcher into St. Mungo's. He felt her hand on his brow briefly, and he realized she was smoothing his hair over his scar. He didn't dare open his eyes, but it didn't feel like they'd gone far when he heard her speak briefly to someone who seemed to be a guard; a moment later he felt a breeze from a door opening, and the stretcher was moving again. He opened his eyes very slightly, looking at the room through wary slits.

Only one other patient was in the medium-sized room, although it had two beds. Harry dropped his jaw. It wasn't Jeffries at all. He tried to sit, but was still strapped down.

"Oh, sorry," Nita said quickly, removing the binding spell. Harry was up in a trice, walking over to the bed and staring at the man lying there, who slowly opened his eyes.

"Hello, Harry," he said softly. Apparently, Harry's disguise did not fool him; he put his hand up to his forehead and realized that his hair had fallen away from where it had hidden his scar. Harry turned to Nita.

"Are you sure this is Jeffries? Why does he look like this?"

She crossed her arms, a look of disapproval on her face. "He'd been using someone else's appearance. The potion wore off after we brought him in." She glanced at the door. "I'll be in the corridor, to make sure no one else comes in. I'm not so sure about some of these guards...."

"Thanks," Harry said to her, nodding. She nodded back, reminding him again of a female Percy, the light glinting off her spectacles. After she had gone, Harry turned back to the man before him. He looked up at Harry with anguished eyes, a tear starting to trickle from one eye. "It's gone, Harry. All gone...."

"What's gone?" Harry whispered.

"My magic."

Harry pulled up a chair and sat by the bed. "You mean--you can't heal people anymore? Are you certain?" He thought of the people he'd seen Jeffries help. "Maybe you just, erm, need to believe that--"

He shook his head. "The--the dementor. It put its mouth on mine...." He shuddered. "It wasn't long enough for it to get my soul, but it was long enough to--" He couldn't finish; he looked green, perhaps from remembering the dementor.

"You're quite sure? You're a Squib again, like before the Westminster attack?" He nodded. Harry shook his head in wonder. "I don't understand how you ever went to Hogwarts if you were a Squib, even though you did get expelled because of it...."

He sat up a little, frowning and curious. "How do you know that? Did Bill tell you?"

Harry was confused. "Bill? You mean Bill Weasley? No, it was the Grey Lady who told me. The Ravenclaw ghost at Hogwarts. Bill Weasley?" he said again, perplexed.

"Bill was one of my best friends at school," he sighed. "And Alex Wood and Jack Richards. Bill and Alex were in Gryffindor; Jack was in Hufflepuff with me, but he and Bill had been good friends when they were younger, before Hogwarts."

"I met Alex Wood!" Harry said, remembering Bill introducing him at the stadium in Wales. "At a Quidditch game. He came with Bill."

He nodded. "Bill was always a very loyal friend. He could have been a Hufflepuff. Did you tell him about me? Should I thank him for you not telling everyone else who I am? I was hoping that after I healed you, you would decide to protect my secret, but I wasn't completely certain that you would...."

"What?" Harry was baffled. "Bill and I never--your name didn't--what?" he said again.

He gave a rueful laugh. "I think we're talking at cross-purposes, Harry. Didn't you realize that I was Rodney Jeffries at the wedding, in August? Wasn't that why you were so upset to see me there?"

Harry shook his head, remembering his shock in walking into the Spinnets' drawing room and hearing the familiar voice singing Gilbert and Sullivan. "No! I thought you were Roger's cousin!"

"I am Roger's cousin. And that alone upset you to that degree?"

"No, not that alone. In my other--" Harry stopped and looked toward the door, which remained shut. He'd been about to tell about changing time, and he wasn't so sure he should. He turned back to the bed. "Erm, I know someone, see, who--who changed time. It's been changed back, but when they changed it, Voldemort never fell. You know, back when I was a baby. And I was never 'The Boy Who Lived.' Another world was created because of that." He swallowed, thinking again of the people left behind in that world, of Jamie and his brothers, of the Draco Malfoy who'd been his friend. But thinking of Malfoy made him shake himself back to reality--the real Malfoy was here, in this world, and he was not Harry's friend. "And you--you were in Azkaban in that world. But ghosts, see--they remember both worlds. Some ghosts at Hogwarts told me more about this other world. It was awful, but not just because of Volde--because of You-Know-Who. The Ministry's reactions were so dreadful....Muggle-borns were banned from going to Hogwarts, to 'protect' them. All of the werewolves the Ministry could find were rounded up and put in detention camps, so they couldn't join You-Know-Who. The Squibs were put in camps, too, but that was supposedly to protect them, like with the Muggle-born students. That included you, I reckon. The Squib camps. But you--you didn't stay there. You went to Azkaban for some reason. I don't know why. You were in solitary confinement, too. And yet--you were a Squib. I don't think you ever became magical in that world, but then, I could be wrong...."

He sat up even straighter now, his eyes wild. "What?"

"Yeah, I know. It's really weird...."

"No," he said, his breathing erratic. "It's--I've dreamed about that--being in a camp--"

"What do you mean you dreamed about it?" Harry demanded.

"What do you think it means? I thought--I thought--I don't know what I thought," he said helplessly. He closed his eyes, then opened them and tried to start again. "In my dreams, I was taken to a camp with other Squibs, by Aurors. It was awful; they claimed it was to protect us, just like you said. Whenever I awoke from one of these dreams--I didn't realize it was actually another life that I'd lived. I thought it was just a kind of--warning. That's why I was glad not to be a Squib anymore, and why I was trying to help people find the magic in themselves. The first time I had the dream, I thought, in a way, being a Squib is sort of like being in prison, watching all of the magical people walking around, free to do whatever they want....It never occurred to me to interpret the dream literally. And I thought that when I truly succeeded, when I had helped as many people as possible tap into their own source of power, of magic, the dreams would stop. No one else would feel shackled, the way I did when I was a Squib. But instead, it seemed the more I worked toward my goal, the more I had the dreams." His eyes had a distant look.

"I began to keep a dream journal. In the dreams, I was the ring-leader of a group trying to escape from the Squib camp. I was the only one who'd been to Hogwarts, so I knew the most about magic. The rest knew some, because of having one magical parent, like me, but some had two. Many had magical siblings as well. Still--I knew the most. I'd actually had five years of Potions, which was necessary for us to brew a sleeping draught to knock out the guards, so we could escape. Getting ingredients was devilishly difficult, not to mention a way to brew the potion. We had small coal-burning stoves in our barracks, for heat, and they also let us make our own tea. We had to use a teapot to work on the sleeping draught. Our barracks had the smelliest tea in the camp," he said softly, smiling at the memory. "I'd also seen the most wands, so I was able to give advice to the people whose job it was to make fake ones, on the sly--we had to swap the guards' real wands for phonies, as a back-up plan, in case the Potion didn't work....

"I had these dreams over months and months; I wrote them all down, trying to work out what they meant. I thought that my biggest problem was working out what it meant that one of my closest friends in the camp turned me in to the authorities." He shook his head. "He just--betrayed me. To get a reward. The next thing I knew, in my dream, I was being carted off to Azkaban. They put me in solitary because they didn't want me telling others about the Squib camps, which were supposed to be a secret."

Harry was shocked; he had no idea that people, ordinary people in this life might possess buried memories of the other world he'd created. It made sense, though; if ghosts knew, those memories had to be somewhere in the minds of the people before they died. It simply seemed that, for most people, the memories were too deeply buried to be easily accessed before death made it all clear, so they came out in dreams, which the dreamers naturally disregarded as nonsense, or--in this case--regarded as omens.

"So that's why you were in Azkaban," Harry breathed, relieved to finally know. "And in solitary. You sang Gilbert and Sullivan incessantly, because you hated it, and the dementors had sucked all of your happy thoughts from you. You wouldn't answer me until I called you 'Buttercup.' You sang that damn song constantly. And then, at the Spinnets', when I walked into the room you were singing that song and I recognized your voice right away...."

His eyes widened. "You! You were in my dream! I couldn't see you very well though....I certainly don't remember you having a scar."

"I only have the scar because of You-Know-Who trying and failing to kill me. That didn't happen in that world," Harry reminded him.

"You said your name was Harry. You were in Azkaban too!"

Harry realized he'd slipped up; he grimaced. "Right. It--it was actually my mistake that created the new timeline," he admitted. "I had to escape from prison to put it right."

"Yes, I dreamt about the alarm being raised, after you escaped," he said, nodding. "I remember thinking, when I was writing about the dream the next morning, in my journal, there's someone who wasn't letting himself be held prisoner, who took control and went out to meet his destiny. And I decided that I wanted to be like that; I wanted to break out of my prison, to stop feeling trapped.. I--I didn't know it was you." He laughed. "I didn't know I was making Harry Potter my role model!"

"Well, that's why I--I reacted the way I did when I arrived at the Spinnets' for the wedding! I knew you'd gone to prison in my--erm, in that other world. Which meant to me that you were potentially a criminal in this world."

"And so you didn't trust me." A cloud moved over his face "I understand now. And here I thought you recognized me as Rodney Jeffries, even though this wasn't the face you'd seen when we met in Surrey," he said, pointing to himself.

"So--what should I call you?" Harry wanted to know.

"You can call me Geoff. My last name is actually Rottenham."

"Your mum didn't change her name?" The letters from Alicia had said his mother's name was Bronwen Davies.

"Mum and Dad never married." He shrugged. "It was never important enough to them; they would have had to get fake papers for my mum, since as far as Muggles knew, she didn't exist. I know people in mixed marriages do it all the time, but they didn't want the bother. We never stayed in one place long enough for it to matter, anyway."

"Because of your dad being an itinerant actor," Harry prompted. Geoff nodded.

"Moving around made it easier to hide that my mum was a witch. Plus, she was often on the careless side, and we frequently had to dash from a village just after she'd been a bit, erm, imprudent about her magic. I reckon the Ministry cleaned up after us, but I don't really know. They never managed to catch up to my mum, or work out that it was her causing the problems. Since she didn't have a permanent residence."

"And then they assume, if they do know where you live, that just because someone's done magic at your house, that it had to be the resident wizard," Harry mumbled, thinking of the letter he'd received from the Ministry after his first year.

"Well, I wouldn't know about that," Geoff said, shrugging. Harry was still baffled about a lot of things.

"How did you get through five years of Hogwarts? How did you even get Sorted? "

"It's true that I wasn't on the list of students to be Sorted," he said, nodding. "I still didn't know at that point what my mother had done, giving me her old letter with just the first name changed. She meant well, she really did. They let me put on the Sorting Hat, but it told me I didn't belong there. I thought--I thought I would die. So Dumbledore had a talk with it--what was said, I don't know--and he had me put it back on. It didn't really say anything else to me; just put me in Hufflepuff."

Harry was amazed. "So--Dumbledore knew you were a Squib, and you hadn't received a letter, and he let you stay? How did you get the work done when--?"

He shrugged. "It's not as hard as you might think. Year after year, I did fine on my written exams and assignments, and my work in Astronomy, Herbology, and History of Magic was all tops. I didn't even do badly in Divination--plenty of students don't have the Sight and don't get poor marks as long as they make up their star charts and memorize what all of those shapes you see in the tea leaves mean...I did well in Muggle Studies, too, obviously. Even Potions didn't pose much of a problem. Oh, I worked hard. The only classes that I didn't do well in were Charms, Transfiguration, and Defense Against the Dark Arts. One-third of my classes, and the most important ones. But none of those teachers ever failed me outright--just gave me barely passing marks--so I continued on as a Hogwarts student. It didn't hurt that Bill, Alex and Jack were also helping me fool the teachers. Bill's wandless magic was just amazing, and this was before fifth year.

"However, when it came time for my O.W.L.s....I just couldn't perform in the practical tests for those three subjects. And while that didn't cause me to fail when I was younger, it did hurt me on the O.W.L.s. The practical tests are very important, as you know. I received two for Potions, and one each for Astronomy, Herbology, History of Magic, Divination, and Muggles Studies. Now, normally, seven's not bad. But you're not allowed to not get a single O.W.L. for Charms, Transfiguration and Defense Against the Dark Arts. Did you know that? Probably not. It very likely hasn't come up as an issue with anyone you know because most people will get at least one of those. However, I didn't get a single one, and Dumbledore had no choice but to tell me that I couldn't stay on." He sighed. "He was really very nice about it, and didn't punish Bill, Alex and Jack for helping me cheat all of those years. Dumbledore actually asked me for forgiveness; he called letting me stay at the school a 'little experiment.' He offered me a job, too, so I could stay at the castle if I liked. But I couldn't bear the thought of seeing my friends go on with their last two years of school while I shoveled manure in the greenhouses or followed Hagrid around the grounds. I thanked him, but declined.

"Of course, after I left Hogwarts, I discovered that I wasn't qualified to sit for the exams that Muggles take when they're around sixteen. I hadn't had a proper Muggle education."

"But--what did you do, then?"

Jeffries--Harry realized he was starting to think of him as Jeffries, not as Geoff, Roger's cousin--looked a bit dodgy. "My mum paid for some papers for me, to let me pass in the Muggle world. We made up the name Rodney Jeffries and invented a school history for me. I started living in libraries wherever we went, studying all of the subjects Muggle children are learning from the ages of eleven to sixteen, trying to catch up on my education so I could function in the Muggle world. I finally enrolled in a Muggle college, and eventually I was able to take A-Levels. Sometime in there--I think it was a year or two after I left Hogwarts--I was with my mum when she received her Daily Prophet, and it was all over the news that You-Know-Who had killed your parents, but you had lived, and his power was somehow broken after he tried to kill you. A couple of years ago when I was visiting Mum and Dad, I happened to see another copy of the Prophet, saying you were a champion in the Triwizard Tournament. It had pictures, so I knew it was you the moment I saw you, when you came to see me in Surrey...."

"Yeah, about that," Harry said anxiously, sitting forward. "Those people who worked for you--when it was on the news that they were missing, I thought you--you'd done something to them." He watched Jeffries closely as he answered. But Jeffries just shrugged.

"They're fine. I put memory charms on the lot of them and sent them on their way. After what happened with your aunt, I started to have second thoughts about what I was doing....The problem was, I was relatively new to performing magic, see, since it happened to me so late, and I certainly didn't learn about memory charms at Hogwarts. I overdid it. Some of them were wandering about for some time before they were found. I didn't realize what I'd done. I was quite surprised to find out they were almost all missing. As far as I know, they've all turned up now. That sort of thing doesn't get huge headlines, does it? Just disappearances." Harry nodded in agreement, but he wondered why Jeffries had second thoughts.

Harry moved his shoulders, feeling his shirt brushing against his back; he remembered what a relief it had been when his burns had been healed. "You--you healed my burns. Much faster than the poultice. Why?"

Jeffries' mouth was very thin. "I was actually here at St. Mungo's that day because Mum and I had come to visit Fleur. Roger had asked us to check on her, and specifically--well, I think he hoped I could help her. I hoped I could, too. I knew she was going to have Roger's child." He ran his hand down his face, looking anguished. "But I couldn't get through to her. She was just--not here enough, you know?"

Harry nodded, remembering his visits to Fleur. "I know," he whispered croakily.

"We had signed in as Bronwen Davies and Geoffrey Rottenham, because the parchment is charmed to react if you don't put your true name. Mum explained to them that because I was a Squib, I didn't need to turn in a wand. After I tried and failed to cure Fleur, I felt so frustrated, and then I found out where you were. And I thought, maybe if I healed you, you wouldn't tell anyone about who I was, and I could still do some good....So I healed you, and others; I worked my way through the wards that day, in fact, until my mum decided it wasn't safe to stay any longer. I found out later that I caused a bit of an uproar amongst the staff." He grinned. "I may be a hardworking and loyal Hufflepuff, but I'm also a bit of an anarchist, I reckon. Must come from being brought up in a caravan and living all over the place."

Harry laughed for a moment. "It's such relief to know that you meant well. I was afraid there were all sorts of ulterior motives, that you were really--I don't know. My best friend reckoned, as soon as things started going bad at Stonehenge, that you were in league with Volde--I mean, You-Know-Who. I told him that you might not have known about what was going to happen."

His face dropped again and he buried his face in his hands for a moment. When he raised his eyes to Harry once more, he looked more anguished than anyone Harry had ever seen. "It's true, Harry, that I didn't know about the dragons and dementors. That was a complete surprise to me. But--but I knew that Death Eaters were going to come. I knew it was a trap. I did that--laid the trap. It was completely deliberate. Your friend was closer to the truth than you were, in a way." He was speaking very softly now. "I started up again, traveling around, having larger and larger meetings, because--because of You-Know-Who. But you have to understand!" he said quickly, when he saw the look of fury blossoming on Harry's face. "It was to protect my family!"

Harry stood and backed up in disgust. "What? Are you actually saying--"

He bowed his head. "Yes, I am. You see--it all started with Roger being recruited by You-Know-Who...."

"I know about that," Harry said quickly, his sympathy for Jeffries having abruptly evaporated. "I know about the way he was supposed to trick Alicia into marrying him--"

"But he couldn't do it!" Jeffries said quickly. "Roger wasn't bad at heart, whatever you think. And he was in love with Fleur. He told Alicia everything, and she--sweet girl!--agreed to help, to assure that our family would be safe."

Harry crossed his arms and surveyed Jeffries from the foot of the bed. "I know all about that, too."

"All about it? Really all?"

Harry narrowed his eyes. "How do you mean?"

Jeffries looked at the door very nervously; it remained shut, but Harry instinctively turned to look also. "Please, Harry. Listen to everything I have to say. I want someone to know all of this, just in case...."

"Just in case what? Just in case you pull another disappearing act?"

He shook his head. "No. I told you, I can't do magic anymore. The dementor--" He shuddered and hugged himself tightly, squeezing his eyes shut. When he opened them, Harry relented a little, returning to his chair by the bedside.

"Why do you say that it all started with Roger being recruited?" he asked, trying to keep his voice level.

"Because Roger had to do what he told him to, in order to keep the family safe. And to protect Fleur and the baby. And Alicia and her parents. He had no choice. He told me--there was even a Slytherin boy he'd gone to school with who'd been killed by his own father for refusing to become a Death Eater. All he wanted to do was play Quidditch...."

Harry nodded, remembering. "Yes. Marcus Flint. I never would have credited him with having the sense to not be a Death Eater, but he turned out to be all right after all."

"At the expense of his life," Jeffries reminded him. "Roger was terrified of that happening to us, his family. We don't have a large family--it's just my mum and her brother, Roger's dad. And my dad and me, and Roger's mum and--well, there used to be Evan, too, of course. Roger was doing everything he could to keep everyone safe and he felt that what happened to Evan was all his fault. That's exactly what he didn't want to happen, so he agreed to do everything he was told. But then--he was told to marry Alicia. This was before Evan died. But he was in love with Fleur....

"I was visiting for Christmas, over a year ago; he was going back and forth on whether to tell Alicia what was really going on. He didn't want to deceive her, nor Fleur. He really didn't, but he was stuck. I wanted to talk to him because of having been changed by the Westminster attack. I wanted some advice. I knew my mum would be biased. I thought--Roger's level-headed. He's a smart bloke, Head Boy and all that. He might have some ideas.

"And he did. He--he came up with the idea of using me to attract a load of followers, Muggles and witches and wizards who were Muggle-lovers. A way to deliver victims to You-Know-Who, although he didn't tell me that right off. He just said that I should do what wizards aren't usually allowed to do--use my power for good. He said that wizards have to worry about the Ministry of Magic, but I wouldn't need to. Of course, he was wrong about that. The Ministry's been dogging my footsteps from the very start. But what I didn't know back then was that he was hoping to beg off marrying Alicia in exchange for giving You-Know-Who a lot of victims through me."

"Which didn't work," Harry said grimly, now feeling a lot more charitable toward Jeffries than toward Roger Davies.

Jeffries made a face. "Of course it didn't work. First off, I chickened out and tried to disappear, after what happened in Surrey. Plus, Roger didn't get the purpose, at first, of his marrying Alicia."

"The purpose?"

"You know, getting her Muggle father into Parliament, then discrediting him and getting someone else to take his place. To get power in the Muggle government."

"Ah," Harry said, nodding. "Are you sure of that? That Roger didn't know, I mean."

"Well, as I said, he didn't know at first. He found out in time to carry out his orders, of course. That was before Roger took Alicia's father's place, using Polyjuice Potion, shot the majority whip and then pretended to try to kill the bloke who replaced the whip. Had to have someone who was known to have witnessed Mr. Spinnet doing the murder, after all. He was the spitting image of his father-in-law when he was committing the murder, so it was perfect; Spinnet's fingerprints were on the gun, it was clearly him on the security tapes, and the surviving would-be victim could testify to his identity. And Spinnet's only alibi was that he was asleep in his office. Roger had actually stunned him. After it was verified in the press that the bloke Roger had wounded could testify against Spinnet, Roger shunted him to the side, hid him away, and began impersonating him using Polyjuice Potion. He even testified against his own father-in-law at the trial...."

Harry's jaw dropped. "He was Clive--erm--what's the name--?"

"Clive Metford. Yes. The real Mr. Metford was being hidden in his own house, a prisoner. Luckily for Roger, he was a single man, no wife and children for Roger to deal with. Very neat and tidy."

Harry stood and paced, his mind reeling with the new information that when Clive Metford had testified at Mr. Spinnet's trial, it had really been Roger Davies. "That explains it!" he declared. "That's how he knew things. And the doctored photo--I'll bet it originally showed Roger, Alicia and her dad! He changed it magically so that it showed Metford in the photo!"

"You sound like you know a little more than you let on," Jeffries said, his eyebrows going up.

"Well, not know, really. Mr. Spinnet's lawyer is an old friend of my godfather's, and after the verdict she told us all about the trial. Considering that Alicia and her dad knew that Metford hadn't been at the wedding, it seemed logical to assume that magic was involved in changing the photo. What no one had worked out was that the real Metford had been replaced by a wizard. And I certainly don't think anyone thought he was actually Roger. Now, that woman who took Mr. Spinnet's place in Parliament--we suspected early on that she was a witch...."

It was Jeffries' turn to look shocked. "You did? How?"

"What do you know about that?" Harry demanded, gripping the foot of the bed.

Jeffries looked uncomfortable. "Well, see, when Roger was moving a bit slowly, still reluctant to marry Alicia, he was given someone to work with who was loyal to You-Know-Who, to keep an eye on him. He knew he couldn't step a toe out of line with her breathing down his neck. She also wanted to keep an eye on her son during the summer holiday, so she, well--she stuffed this Muggle family away in their own attic and took the mother's place in public. She wasn't always lurking around there though--she had other things to do, as well. Roger and I had told my mum what was going on, to get her help, as she's very shrewd. She was starting to worry that this witch was going to double-cross us, so she also volunteered to pretend to be a member of the Muggle family. She took the daughter's place. That suited this other witch just fine--she was still in the position of authority, even when they were pretending to be Muggles. And the witch was able to keep an eye on her son, just as she'd wanted. And you, as well."

"Me?" Harry was very confused.

Jeffries let a slow smile creep across his face. "Don't know as much as you thought, eh, Harry? Never wondered why you were working again at that estate in New Stokington?"

Harry's jaw dropped. "You mean--that witch was--was Narcissa Malfoy?"

"Also known as Joan Harrington-Smyth, M.P."

"Also known as Daisy Furuncle," Harry grumbled, understanding now how Mrs. Malfoy had come by some of her information.

"What?" Jeffries said, frowning. It was Harry's turn to look smug.

"There are obviously some things you don't know about your co-conspirators." He started to say something else, but froze when he had a sudden realization. "Wait--did you say your mother was masquerading as the daughter? As Felice Harrington-Smyth?" Jeffries nodded, still frowning. "But--but she--she shagged Draco Malfoy!"

Jeffries leaned forward, his eyes wide. "She what?"

Harry reddened. "I'm sorry. That's probably not something you should ever tell anyone about their mum, especially since your dad probably didn't--"

"Oh, it's not that. My mum and dad--well, when I was old enough, they explained to me that they'd always had 'something of an understanding,' shall we say. Which was very hard for me to take at first, but it's been years now, and I reckon I've just become numb to it over time. They never married, after all. But still! My mum was shagging a seventeen-year-old boy?"

Harry started laughing suddenly; he could see that Jeffries had no idea why. "Don't you see? It was all for Narcissa Malfoy's benefit. She was supposed to be keeping an eye on her son. I thought it seemed like they wanted to get caught. Your mum wanted them to get caught. By Draco's mum. She was thumbing her nose at her."

"Among other things," Jeffries said darkly. "I doubt she thought of it as a hardship."

Harry remembered girls like Niamh Quirke from his other life, and their reactions to Draco Malfoy. "You're probably right. But I think she wanted her 'boss' to find out, all the same." He started to laugh again, remembering Bronwen Davies from Alicia and Roger's wedding. If Draco Malfoy knew he'd really been shagging her.....

"So, I still don't understand how you worked out that Harrington-Smyth--the mother, that is--was a witch."

Harry had to wrack his own brain now; it had been so long, was having trouble remembering. But then an image of Draco and 'Felice' brought it back to him. "Oh! That's right. When we were in Sweden, for the broom race, Draco Malfoy told me that when he'd been meeting Felice--"

"My mum."

"Er, yeah. When they were--getting together one time, during the summer, he'd found some wizarding photos under a bed. Pictures of two little boys."

"Ah, right. Mum told me that to fill up her spare time during the summer, she'd taken some family photos with her to Surrey. She was going to organize them in albums. You probaby found old photos of Roger and Evan, when they were small. She was working on--on a gift for my Aunt Eve. A remembrance of Evan...." He made a face. "Clearly that wasn't all she did with her spare time...." Jeffries closed his eyes, then opened them again. "If only I'd have been able to stay out of sight. But with my mum right under her nose all the time, when I was ordered to start the Rodney Jeffries show again, I had no choice. And I have to say, I was very shocked when your aunt turned up. But she seemed very lost, nowhere to go, so I let her stay on. She's, erm, a bit bossy." Harry nodded, his mouth twisting. "Of course, we all had it easy before the Azkaban prison break." Jeffries sighed again.

"Why?" Harry wanted to know.

"Because before that, Lucius Malfoy wasn't running the show."

It was Harry's turn to be shocked again. "Lucius Malfoy!"

Jeffries nodded. "Right. His wife had him come to the estate in Surrey, and we had a big meeting. Me, Roger--who was still pretending to be Metford--his wife, and my mum. He laid into us, saying we were just sitting around, not accomplishing anything. I was supposed to be delivering real numbers, huge crowds of people to be manipulated and eventually victimized, but I was constrained by the fact that a lot of people still thought of my followers as a bunch of fringe weirdoes, and that I was regarded as a bit of a charlatan by both wizards and Muggles. We needed to make the Rodney Jeffries phenomenon mainstream, and that's where the Parliament connection was going to come in. But first, Malfoy had to get the point across to us all that he was in charge. So he--" Jeffries choked briefly.

"What?"

"He killed Roger. In front of us all. Just like that. He said how worthless he was, how it wasn't even his idea to recruit Roger in the first place, it was his son's idea. So Roger was just--gone. And Lucius Malfoy took Roger's place as Clive Metford...."

Harry's mouth went dry, remembering the way Cedric had just been struck dead, at the moment he was deemed unnecessary, the 'spare.' Disposable people. And in a way, it was all Draco Malfoy's fault. When he'd been trying to put his father into prison, he must have been feeding him the names of people who would make good recruits. Bloody hell, Harry thought; it was probably Draco Malfoy's fault that Flint was killed by his father, and that Penelope Clearwater's family was murdered. A newer, stronger hatred of Draco Malfoy was born in him, and he faced Jeffries with his jaw set.

"What then?"

"Well, I didn't really believe that he was completely in charge, as someone else had arranged for the dragons to disappear from the reservation in Sweden, hadn't they? They were used for the Azkaban operation, after all. Malfoy had still been in prison at the time. So there was someone else he was answering to, most likely, someone between him and You-Know-Who."

Harry nodded. "That was probably Bagman."

"Who?"

"Ludo Bagman. Works for the Ministry. Worked, I should say. Magical Games and Sports. He had business being in Sweden too, for the broom race. Dealing with the British racers and all."

Jeffries understood now. "Yes, that makes sense. But how do you know he's a Death Eater?"

Harry drew his mouth into a line. "He tried to kill me at Stonehenge, and he got sucked into Limbo with the dementors," he said shortly. Jeffries looked surprised, but didn't say anything more. Harry remembered the rogue Bludger at the Quidditch game--that had to be Bagman, too! And the way Winky had always been so convinced that he was a bad, evil wizard....she'd been in a position to see a lot of things when she'd been working for the Crouches, especially after Wormtail was using the Crouch residence as his base, to take care of Voldemort before helping him regain his body. I'll bet Bagman wasn't just trying to help me win to make money on a bet, Harry realized. That's what he used to think, but this made so much more sense. He was probably the back-up plan, in case Barty Crouch, Jr. had trouble helping me to win, and he thought that he might as well make some money into the bargain....

He remembered Bagman in Dumbledore's Pensieve, saying that he hadn't known he was passing information from the Ministry to Death Eaters. He was one of those who had walked free, one of those Barty Crouch, Jr. despised. Neither a truly loyal Death Eater nor a spy, Bagman would have had to work rather hard to get back into Voldemort's good graces. And after Barty Crouch was kissed by a dementor, Lucius Malfoy went to prison and Peter Pettigrew was captured, he had finally been the one Voldemort had turned to. He must have been the one to cook up the entire scheme, Harry realized; a scheme more complicated than the most complicated wizarding game....and games were, after all, Bagman's business.

"I'm sorry, Harry," Jeffries choked out now. "I did mean what I wrote to you in that letter, about wanting to help people....But I had to protect my family. Roger never meant for Evan to get caught up in anything, but as time went on, we all began to realize that we had to be in this together, looking out for each other, the whole family...."

Harry glowered at him. "I was trying to save my mother and sister by changing time, and it created a nightmare of a world. You know--you've seen it in your nightmares. My mother thought that it would be better for our entire family to die together than for any of us to bow to Voldemort." Jeffries cringed at the name. "The only reason he was defeated the first time was because she gave her life for mine. I think--I think a part of her knew he wouldn't actually kill her in place of me, that he'd still try to kill me after her. But I also think she thought we'd all be together in death, and that that was better than being together in life if it was a life serving evil. When I changed time, I discovered just how right she was." Jeffries nodded, his eyes moist.

"Yes, you're right, you're right, of course," he whispered. "But--but not many people are as strong as your mother was, Harry. Most people will do anything to protect the people they love, short of sacrificing themselves. If there's some way to avoid that--they'll do it." He lifted his eyes to Harry's again. "You should go see your aunt," he whispered. "She's like me--the dementor who attacked her managed to get her magic, but not her soul. She's no longer a witch. You should go see her," he said again, very quietly.

Harry nodded, having lost his patience with Jeffries. "What are they going to do with you?"

He shrugged. "I don't know. Probably prison, once they work out whatever the replacement for Azkaban is going to be. I won't be as much of a security risk as some, since I can't do magic. I reckon it's my destiny to go to prison in this world, too," he finished sadly.

Harry was about to agree with this, not feeling a bit sympathetic toward him, but suddenly, an enormous bird struck the window of Jeffries' room, the talons scratching against the glass making an awful sound. Harry covered his ears instinctively, shocked to realize, when he turned to the window, that he recognized the bird, which was pounding against the glass repeatedly. He ran to the corridor, expecting to find Nita, but she must have gone off on her rounds. There were two guards outside the room, and he shouted to both of them, "Get Dr. Anderssen! And any Aurors who are on duty! There's an Animagus Death Eater trying to get into the room!"

The guards, who appeared to be orderlies, both stood gawping at him. He thought first about how absurd his declaration must have sounded, and only secondarily about the fact that they'd seen him enter the room on a stretcher, as an apparently unconscious patient. Recognizing him for the threat that he was, they immediately stunned him.

Harry fell at their feet, face down, and did not know anything for a very long time.

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