Backfire

CHAPTER 8

Black, White, and Grey

It was pretty late at night; Ginny was the only one left in the common room, sitting on the couch that faced the fire, knees pulled up close to her body. Her hands held the sides of the group picture they had taken during the D.A. meeting that night. She studied it, almost like she was memorizing it, as if she knew it would soon be taken away and wanted it clearly imprinted in her mind forever.

It was a wonderful picture, and the only thing she regretted about it was the absence of five of the original members: Fred, George, Lee, Angelina, and Alicia.

She smiled as her gaze graced the front row, all sitting on the carpeted floor of the Room of Requirement: the Patils on the far left, distinguishable only by the colors of their school ties; Ernie Macmillan and Justin were next, followed by the four beaming youngsters, Dennis, Betsy, Stephen, and Nadia. The kind faces of Hannah and Susan finished out the row.

The second row, seated on chairs behind the first, made Ginny's smile grow, though not until after her eyes had passed over Cho Chang and Michael Corner, who sat at the left end. Colin sat adjacent to Ginny's ex-boyfriend, with Neville smiling his friendly smile on the other side. Luna came next, eyes for once focused on the camera, her left arm linked closely with that of a contented-looking Ginny, who sat in the middle. Ginny's left arm was intertwined with Andy's, who in turn had his other arm around Nadine. Kerney sat next to Nadine, shooting skeptical glances at a grumpy-looking Zacharias Smith to round out the row.

The third row was standing behind the second, beginning with Terry at the far left. The Ravenclaw was seated next to Anthony, who was followed by Seamus and Dean as her eyes moved to the right. Then, next to their housemates, came the famous trio, Ron, Harry, and Hermione, arms around each other in an understatement of the deep affection and friendship they shared. To the right of Hermione stood Lavender, followed by Katie, and the eldest Ryan sister, Naomi.

Though she took pleasure in reviewing the entire group of students who had united behind Harry to form Dumbledore's Army, Ginny's eyes settled on the center of the photo, where she sat smiling between Luna and Andy.

As she watched the photo version of herself interact with her friends, she caught something she had not noticed at the time. The black-haired boy with bright green eyes who was standing directly behind her--with the smallest, but wonderfully satisfied smile--had his hands on her shoulders. Not clutching them or leaning on them, but laying them lightly, as if merely to let her know that he was there. Whether that had been his intention or not, she hadn't realized he was standing directly behind her until the photo came out, and hadn't the faintest idea that he had been the owner of the hands she'd vaguely felt on her shoulders.

The more she watched, the more she felt like laughing and crying at the same time. Ron and Hermione were alternately glancing at Harry (with concern) and at each other (with affection); Andy's arm was tucked securely around Nadine's small waist.

But most unsettling of all--though certainly not unwelcome--were Harry's constant and unsubtle glances down at the back of her own head. She cleared her throat to the empty common room as she watched the antics captured by the picture start all over again, failing to prevent tears from welling up in her eyes. She was in the process of taking a preemptive swipe at her eyes with the sleeve of her jumper, when she a shadow fall over the picture and felt someone leaning on the couch behind her.

Traces of someone's unique scent of exertion--one that had become very familiar in much higher concentration after Quidditch practice--told her immediately who it was, and she felt distinctly warmer than before he had made his presence known. Without glancing at him, she spoke quietly, hoping that conversation wouldn't disturb his marvelously close (but slightly unnerving) proximity.

"What are you doing up?" she asked casually.

"I could ask you the same question," he answered, standing up from where he had been leaning on the back of the couch, walking around to where she sat, and plopping himself down next to her on the cushy seat. His legs were spread out lazily in front of him, while hers remained tucked up close to her body.

"But I see you've been doing exactly what I've been doing up in my room," he finished.

Ginny finally turned to look at him, only to be met head-on with Harry's gaze, which was rather intensely trained on her. She looked back at the picture and sighed at her own silliness. Why was it suddenly so hard to look him in the eye?

"I love this picture," she admitted.

"Me, too," he agreed. "But it scares me." Ginny turned to look at him again, forgetting her self-consciousness of the moment before.

"Why does it scare you?"

He smiled grimly in a way that reminded her very much of Sirius and Remus.

"Moody once showed me a picture like this. But most of the people in it were either dead or missing, all on the orders of Voldemort. I don't want our picture to end up like that one."

"The original Order of the Phoenix," Ginny said in confirmation, remembering how Harry had known about her uncles. Harry nodded gravely.

"I don't want to think that someday someone could be talking about the Creevys like they do about your uncles; or point out Ron like Sirius; or--" he paused and glanced at her nervously "--someone else like they were my mum and dad, or the Longbottoms. I don't want this to be a record of good people who were murdered and tortured. That's why it scares me."

With a sigh he leaned back fully on the couch, and she thought that perhaps he'd closed his eyes. She confirmed that he had when she finally worked up the nerve to turn slightly to her left, secretly pleased that it gave her the opportunity to look at him indulgently and unobserved. The secret pleasure momentarily turned to horror as she leaned into his side and rested her head on his shoulder without thinking.

The horror was in turn converted to a somewhat frightening but simultaneously wonderful heat when he automatically adjusted to accommodate her and slid his arm around her small shoulders. Though his eyes remained closed, she could have sworn that she felt his face relax slightly at the shift in their positions.

They sat quietly for a long time and though she knew very well that there was a stark and dangerous world waiting for them outside the walls of Hogwarts, she wished that there was nothing else in the universe but her, Harry, and the cozy common room.

But, just as any girl would fear he might, the boy occupying her attention acted much like a typical boy would, and said something stupid.

"So," he began quietly and more bluntly than she ever would have expected. "What's the deal with you and the Head Boy?" he asked, opening his eyes and turning his head slightly to watch her. Ginny sighed. Well, it was nice while it lasted.

"Not you, too?" she pleaded, burrowing her shoulder further into his side to hide her face.

"Just curious, is all," he half-heartedly explained, perhaps realizing that his need to know had cost him the moment's contentment and comfort.

"The absolute last thing in the world I need is another brother, Harry," she reminded him. She bit her lip, hoping that he didn't read behind the exasperation in her voice.

"Believe me, I know," he replied, giving her right arm a little squeeze as he spoke. This mollified her somewhat.

"I'm not going to marry the bloke, or anything, if that's what you're on about." She couldn't help sounding at least a little patronizing. He chuckled.

"Glad to hear it," he said, giving the same arm a light affectionate scratch.

"Devon thinks I should," Ginny blurted out, once again wondering how her voicebox was proceeding without checking with her brain first. Apparently her subconscious was extremely curious as to what Harry had to say on the matter. He started when she said it, and cleared his throat a little before speaking.

"She reckons you ought to marry Baron Ramsey," he restated without humor. Talk of marriage at the age of fifteen--sixteen, for Harry--seemed to delight him just about as much as it did her. "The princess of the blood traitors and the Slytherin Head Boy." Ginny chuckled.

"I know, seriously, right?" she replied in an attempt to keep the atmosphere light.

"Your kids would be brilliant at Quidditch."

It was insane how such an innocuous comment could fill the room with such an awkward tension. At his off-hand observation she finally looked up at his face, and they must have both thought very same thing at exactly the same time, because they each suddenly looked away. The next logical step from the speculation about Ginny and Baron's hypothetical children having marvelous Quidditch genes was, of course, to substitute the best player Hogwarts had ever seen into Baron's place in the equation.

Imagine the little Seekers such a union would produce!

Ginny was blushing profusely and internally chastising herself for thinking something so ridiculous. Of course, she hadn't the faintest idea that the other person in the room could possibly be entertaining the same thought. The next words were out of her mouth before she could stop them.

"She says Baron has passion," she added, almost by way of explanation.

Harry sat there, stock-still. Ginny was thankful she had resumed her position with her face turned toward the fire and away from his, though she still leaned against his shoulder. Her heart felt like it belonged to a chipmunk, it was beating so fast.

"Oh, well, that settles it then." He spoke almost bitterly, with much more feeling than she ever would have anticipated. She pinched his side teasingly and tugged on his t-shirt.

"Oh, don't get so grumpy. She said the same thing about you."

And for what seemed like the millionth time since the summer, she cursed her big sodding mouth for acting without her express permission. The implication--quite obviously not lost on either of them--was that, if Devon had said Ginny should marry Baron because he had passion, and she also said that Harry possessed the very same attribute, the logical conclusion would be that Devon had mentioned Harry as a matrimonial option as well.

Ginny was enormously relieved when Harry--who had tensed again when she'd spoken--relaxed against her and the couch. Even better was when he ventured to speak. Gadzooks, the boy was maturing before her very eyes! A year ago the poor bloke would have been helpless in a situation like this.

"Well, as long as I rate with the Head Boy, I guess that's okay," he said, lightly scratching the side of her arm again, with the hand of the arm that was wrapped around her.

Several minutes passed in surprisingly comfortable silence, at which point Ginny's eyelids began to grow heavy. She shifted next to him, causing him to stir in such a way that indicated he might have drifted off to sleep. She gave his side a squeeze and tried to rouse him.

"Harry," she whispered. He squirmed but did not wake up.

"Harry!" she hissed more insistently. He groaned with slight annoyance and peeked out of one eye, smiling slightly when he saw that it was her doing the waking, and it grew into a self-satisfied smirk when he noted that she was still half-tucked next to him.

"What do you want from me, woman?!" he asked jokingly, closing his eye again. She tugged on the arm that was still half around her as she sat up, making him smile, though his eyes stubbornly remained shut.

"We should go to bed," she insisted. She found his other arm and checked the watch on his wrist. "It's past one in the morning, Harry, and unlike some other gits I know, I have three O.W.L.'s to study for and only two more weeks to do it in!" His closed-mouth smile widened, and he finally opened his eyes as she persisted in tugging on his arm.

"I like it here," he said, as a small child might who is used to getting his way. Which was, of course, completely adorable seeing as Harry had never gotten his way in his whole life. Ginny finally stood up and Harry put out his arms for her to pull him up from the couch. "Besides, you've been studying for these things since the summer. You're going to be fine, Ginny."

She pulled him to a standing position. He stretched and yawned, and Ginny had to fight the instinct to reach out and touch his finely chiseled stomach when the bottom of his old Quidditch t-shirt rose slightly above the waistband of his pajama pants. Oh, for Merlin's sake.

To stop herself from staring, she busied herself with picking up the photo from where it still lay on the couch and turned toward the stairs to the dormitories, Harry following behind.

She stopped where the stairs diverged to the girls and boys wings of the Tower. Harry stopped when she did, and looked down at her expectantly. She in turn looked up at him, thinking briefly that she was still not used to how tall he had grown over the last several months. A small smile graced her face at the thought, before it was replaced again by the one that had made her stop in the first place.

"Can I ask you a question?" she said, after studying him for a moment.

"Sure," he replied, looking a little unsure at her rather serious expression.

"The power you have that Voldemort doesn't know about," she began quietly. Harry nodded for her to continue. "Do you know what it is?" Her tone was hopeful, and it was apparent that the hope was more for his sake than her own desire to get an answer.

"Dumbledore said he knows what it is." Harry followed this admission with a sigh, and ran his hand through his interminably messy hair. "He told me, but I don't know how the hell I can use it to kill him." Ginny bit her lip in consternation at Harry's visible distress.

"What is it?" she ventured calmly. Harry turned his eyes to meet hers.

"Love."

"Love?" He nodded and let out a grim laugh.

"Yeah. He said that it's the one thing that Voldemort doesn't know or understand, and therefore he underestimates it. And according to Dumbledore, I have it in spades." He paused, shaking his head and looking more worried than he had in a very long time. "Only, I don't. I grew up with people who have always hated me, I never knew my parents, Sirius is dead, Remus is far away, and the only relationship I've ever had with a girl was an unmitigated disaster. I don't know what he's playing at."

Ginny was determined not to cry. She took his hand in hers and squeezed it firmly, causing him to look her in the eye again. She wasn't smiling--who could, after what he had just said?--but her eyes were blazing with a fury and determination that transfixed him.

"I know you have it in you," she said, leaning in closer to whisper. "You just need to learn how, is all." She squeezed his hand again in reassurance, and stood up straight. He still looked concerned, but now that that concern was mingled with something else--hope.

"I'm going to need help," he admitted. She smiled.

"You'll have help."

"Okay." He rubbed his thumb lightly over the back of her hand before letting it go. "You need to sleep so you can ace your O.W.L.'s and shock the pants off of Hermione," he said, a small smile breaking the surface at last.

"Okay," she agreed, smirking back. "Night, Harry."

"Night, Ginny." And they went their separate ways to bed.

* * *

There were two days left until the Christmas holidays. Ginny had taken her O.W.L. in Transfiguration the previous day, and had done just swimmingly on the thing until she happened to look up from the teapot she was supposed to be transfiguring into a bunny, saw Harry walking past the open doorway to McGonagall's classroom, and turned it into a Labrador instead.

She knew that slip-up had likely cost her an Outstanding on the practical bit--even though she started over and proved she could perform the correct spell quite easily--but what was an O.W.L. grade when Harry had smiled at her and waved?

He had been walking with Remus and Dumbledore, which made her think he had been starting or ending one of his private tutoring sessions.

As to her exams, Professors Tofty and Marchbanks from the Ministry of Magic had concluded the testing session with approval--and McGonagall had nearly smiled. Both of the Ministry evaluators had apparently volunteered to oversee Ginny's exams, largely due to their curiosity that a student would consider attempting such a thing as sitting them early.

That morning Ginny had taken the written part of her Potions exam, and was quite positive that she had earned an 'O' on that one. Professor Snape had been lurking in the back of the room as she complete the question booklet, scowling more and more as Ginny's countenance brightened with every questions she knew. Which turned out to be all of them.

At the moment she was waiting to add the final ingredient to the last of the three potions she had been instructed to brew for the practical evaluation. Tofty and Marchbanks (and a still glowering Snape) had already taken up her stoppered vials of Veritaserum and Draught of the Living Death, and were now just waiting for her to add the last pinch of ground moonstone to the Pepper-up Potion that was simmering in her cauldron.

As the clock in the room struck four o'clock, she added the pinch and used a brass whisk to stir the potion nineteen times counterclockwise. It promptly turned the correct color, and she removed it from the heat. She filled her last vial with the concoction, stoppered it, and took it to the front of the room.

* * *

The hall was deserted at three o'clock in the afternoon, as Ginny made her way back to Gryffindor Tower. She had just finished the practical portion of her Defense O.W.L., having gotten the headmaster to secure a promise of strictest confidentiality from the examiners before she would show them her Patronus.

Conjuring the silvery version of Harry-with-wand-and-sword had elicited three sets of raised eyebrows--and Ginny herself was intrigued by the fact that something had surprised the headmaster.

All in all, Ginny was pleased that she would probably be awarded two O's and an E for her exam grades, walking the path back to the Tower with a self-satisfied smile. Tomorrow she and Harry, her brother, and Hermione would all be heading back to Spinner's End.

She wondered briefly whether Herpo missed his old home at all, but swiftly decided that the kitten seemed to be happiest wherever Harry was.

Deserted halls at Hogwarts were nothing new to a girl who had a habit of being out her dormitory after curfew, but it was somewhat odd to see the halls empty during the day. But the too-quiet, placid atmosphere didn't last long. As she walked past an empty classroom, a loud "Ouch!" resonated out into the hall. Ginny stopped to listen, recognizing the pained voice instantly.

"Oh, poor Loony. Did that hurt?" another voice mocked. Ginny knew that voice, too.

"What do you want, Olivia?" Luna asked in her eerily calm voice.

"Not much," the Slytherin answered sarcastically. "I don't like how friendly you are with Sheldon Wilde." Ginny had to control herself to keep her anger from setting off any accidental magic. While it would be brilliant to scare the pants off of Olivia that way, it wasn't worth the risk of being discovered. She took out her wand.

"What's wrong with Sheldon being my friend?" Luna asked in a voice that projected naïve and honest curiosity. Ginny knew better than to believe Luna was either naïve or curious about the subject of Olivia's interrogation, and smirked in appreciation of her friend. Olivia didn't have a clue who she was dealing with.

"You're not just friends with him, though, are you?" Olivia insinuated. It was clear that an answer wasn't required. "He was near enough to asking me out until you started getting in the way. Now he barely even talks to me." Ginny had to swallow a snort of laughter. She knew quite well, from both Roman and from Sheldon himself, that the younger of the Wilde brothers was not the slightest bit interested in Olivia Flint.

Ginny decided it was time to make her presence known.

"Oh, come on, Olivia," she said, walking into the room and fiddling with her wand where the other two girls could see it. Luna's eyes twinkled. "You know Sheldon Wilde wouldn't touch you with a ten-foot broomstick. I reckon you just wanted to have a go at Luna because you're all bent out of shape about something else."

Olivia's face hardened into a look of pure loathing.

"Speaking of getting too friendly," she said acidly, completely ignoring what Ginny had said. "What do you think you're doing with Baron Ramsey? As if the Slytherin Head Boy would ever look twice at a poor, dirty little blood traitor like you." She wore a satisfied smirk. Ginny rolled her eyes.

"Baron's my friend," Ginny replied calmly, "and if he pays more attention to me than he does to you, it might be a hint that you're the undeserving one, not me." Ginny took enormous delight in watching Olivia seethe. It was almost as much fun as watching Snape.

Olivia didn't have a comeback for that one and, in what could only be explained as a desperate lapse in judgment, she made the grave mistake of reaching for her wand.

Ginny--who easily could have out-drawn Olivia and blasted her across the room before the other girl could say "jealousy"--restrained her instinct to curse Olivia first. She didn't want any spell damage she caused to appear unprovoked. Not that it would matter if Olivia ratted her out to Snape, but it was the principle of the thing. Luna stepped back to avoid the fray she could see was coming.

Olivia sent a cutting hex slicing across Ginny's cheek. Ginny flinched, but wasted no time in exacting her retribution. Consecutive shouts of Diffindo! and Dolere! accompanied by the appropriate wand movements in quick succession sent Olivia crashing back into a row of desks, but only after slicing her cheek and snapping the largest bone in her arm like a toothpick.

Ginny felt vindicated, but her satisfaction was interrupted by the sound of footsteps rushing down the corridor--someone must have heard Olivia shriek. Ginny turned to Luna.

"Quick!" she hurried her friend. "Hide in that supply cupboard! I don't want you to get in trouble!" Luna hesitated out of solidarity, by an insistent glare and a hissed "Go! Hurry!" from Ginny sent her quickly into the closet. Ginny dropped to the floor to make it look like she had been knocked down as well.

Professor Wrightman entered the room briskly, but with the same rigidly graceful stature she always had. Spying the somewhat crumpled form of Olivia Flint, moving and whining on the floor, she turned to the artificially sprawled Ginny.

"Miss Weasley," she asked in a stern voice. "What is the meaning of this?!" Ginny turned to face her teacher, whose eyes revealed how much she had not been expecting to see a considerable slice running--and bleeding--across Ginny's left cheek.

But Ginny knew her own injury would matter very little when it came down to punishment. It was quite evident which one of them had taken the brunt of the spells cast, and it sure as hell wasn't going to be her.

"Get up," her teacher ordered her. "Go straight to the hospital wing to have your cheek mended, and then go straight back to your dormitory. I will see you in my office at eight o'clock tonight for detention. Forty points from Gryffindor."

Ginny's expression made no secret of her outrage at such a high penalty, particularly when she had come between Luna and the heinous little skank on the floor. She pointed to Olivia, who was now sitting up, cradling her disfigured arm, but smiling nastily.

"Aren't you going to take points from her?" Ginny yelled indignantly. "She cursed me first!"

"I will deal with Miss Flint, I assure you," Professor Wrightman answered, but Ginny got no comfort from her assurance. Olivia looked delighted. It was Ginny's luck that the only professor wandering by would be a sodding Slytherin.

"Yes, I'm sure the punishment will be as bloody fair as can be," Ginny smarted back. In Ginny's experience at Hogwarts, Slytherin teachers always let their students get away with the trouble they made. Why would Professor Wrightman be any different?

Before her teacher could scold her or ratchet up her punishment any further, Ginny stormed out of the room. She didn't go to the hospital wing--though more out of spite for her teacher than because she didn't need healing--and was glad that no one dared speak to her as she stormed through the common room and up to her four poster.

* * *

At seven o'clock, Ginny decided to get something from the kitchens before detention, since she had been sitting in her room, brooding, all through dinner. She walked grumpily back through the common room, thinking that Harry must have come back from his private lesson, as he was watching her with his brow furrowed at what could possibly have made her so out of sorts. She hoped he wasn't going to follow her under the cloak or something. Though it would be such a Harry thing to do.

Luckily, he didn't--not that she could know for sure, since if he was following her under his invisibility cloak, she wouldn't be able to see him; but she had a hunch that she'd have gotten a feeling if he had.

Unluckily, she hadn't been nearly as hungry as she usually was for dinner, and had only taken 15 minutes to eat. Not wanting to return to the scrutiny of the common room, she reluctantly decided to go ahead to the Defense professor's office. You never know, she thought with no small amount of disdain, maybe I can start early and get out of there sooner.

With the increased intensity of her O.W.L. studies over the past few weeks, the intriguing knowledge of Professor Wrightman's intimate connections with both Harry's mum and Sirius had been pushed to the back of her mind.

But now, as she stalked unhappily down to the woman's office for what she saw as an unfair punishment, she began to wonder on that subject again. How could she have been so unfair to Ginny when she had been friends with people like Lily and Sirius?

Then again, she was a Slytherin. Ginny didn't usually let herself fall into her brother's blanket disdain for that House, but it suited her needs tonight as she wanted to think about the woman as unkindly as possible.

But if she had seriously entertained any hopes of starting and finishing her detention early, they were dashed when she crossed through the Defense classroom and found the teacher's office in the back of it empty. She sat in the visitor's chair and looked around, becoming more disgruntled as she noticed that the arrangement and décor of the room revealed virtually nothing about the individual who occupied it.

Everything was obnoxiously--though tastefully--neat. Ginny would have been scared to touch things if she didn't completely resent being there in the first place.

But then something caught her eye--something that she had never seen before; something that she had only heard about from Hermione and the headmaster; something that made her forget to be so out of sorts for the moment.

She couldn't be sure, but as she stood from the visitor's chair and walked toward the side table on which it sat, she could have sworn it was a Pensieve.

Pensieves held memories, and the memories of this particular teacher might be particularly interesting to see. The part of Ginny that would always be wary and deeply suspicious of invasions of privacy--instilled in her by her experience with the diary--ordered her brain to sit back down.

But, at the moment, that part of her brain was being quite easily shouted down by the much bigger part of her that felt insatiable curiosity and the timely return of her anger at her teacher.

The Pensieve sat there, shining and mocking her--the answers to some of Ginny's questions, maybe even the key to learning whether or not they could trust this Gertrude Wrightman.

After all, hadn't it been said that Ginny took after the twins more than all her other brothers? It didn't take a genius to figure what Fred and George would have done in this situation.

Ducking her head into the stone bowl, Ginny felt like she was falling and falling until, at last, her feet caught ground and she stood in a room. Make that a glittery, golden, gigantic room with five people standing in a circle in the corner, the one facing Ginny obviously a young Gertrude Wrightman.

If Ginny had thought Gertrude Wrightman was poised and stunning at thirty-something it was nothing compared to the girl standing in this room. She was in her late teens, probably around Ginny's age, and aside from her ramrod posture and perfectly fluid hand motions, she had the same golden hair and pale blue eyes. She looked very much like herself, with only a detail changed. Ginny hesitated to call it age. Rather Ginny would say it was years. Yes, this Gertrude Wrightman lacked the years the older one had, not age.

The woman beside Gertrude who shared her pale eyes looked at the bloke to Ginny's right and said, "Hello, Mr. Black."

Ginny's gasp was so loud that she thought even a memory could hear it. Standing beside her was a young Sirius Black, a young version of Ginny's confidant and friend. Her dead confidant and friend. And damn but he was hot. Ginny shook herself. What was he doing here? How did Gertrude Wrightman know him?

"He is no longer recognized by the name," said the woman beside Gertrude. Ginny turned to glare at her and saw another shock: it was Bellatrix Lestrange. A younger Bellatrix. A beautiful in the I'd-Kill-My-First-Born-In-Order-To-Be-This-Perfect-Forever kind of way Bellatrix. But Sirius Black's cousin nonetheless.

This houseguest did nothing to endear Ginny to Gertrude Wrightman.

But even the shock of seeing Sirius's cousin could not keep Ginny's eyes from returning the painful sight of Sirius Black, alive and full of life, looking so angry that he might just blow something up. Yet he kept his cool façade up.

"Yet he is still recognized as a guest of the Wrightman family," the woman beside Gertrude replied. "As such, he deserves some respect."

It took a moment for it to click, but when it did, Ginny felt like an idiot. Gertrude Wrightman was of the Wrightmans. No wonder the Slytherins reacted to her the way they did. No wonder Draco Malfoy said nothing when Gertrude passed him in the corridor, never made a snide comment around her, seemed even to respect her.

No wonder Snape both respected and resented her, no matter how well hidden he hid the second emotion.

"Mrs. Wrightman, this is Lily Evans," Sirius said, gesturing to the redhead Ginny hadn't seen well. Ginny was nearly faint was her confusion and shock. What was going on here? Wasn't that Harry's mother? What was she doing with Sirius? What was she doing with Bellatrix and Gertrude Wrightman?

"Gertrude, right?" Lily asked. "I'm a prefect, too."

Oh. They didn't know each other.

But then, why was Sirius smirking like he was proud of Lily's response, like she had just said something clever? Lily looked like she was lying about something. Ginny had never met the woman, never seen her interact with anyone, but something about her said she was being false. Ginny doubted that she lied very often.

"Evans?" Mrs. Wrightman asked, looking at Lily with distaste. Now Ginny wanted to kick her.

"Yes," Lily said, smiling a completely wholesome and perfectly beautiful smile. "It's a very common name, like Smith or Jones. There are a thousand of us, all Muggle, of course."

Ginny laughed. Ha! Harry's mother was funny! And she had absolutely no qualms about confronting the matriarch of one of Brittan's most illustrious families. Ha!

Looking like she had just swallowed a hippogriff, Mrs. Wrightman told Gertrude that she and Bellatrix had to discuss the distribution of charitable revenue of orphanages, leaving the three teens to share what was most decidedly an uncomfortable silence. Ginny could only hope some sort of answers would come shortly.

"So, this has been really fun," Lily said dryly. Ginny smiled again. Seriously, Harry's mum was fantastic.

"What are you doing here, Sirius? You know you shouldn't--" Gertrude asked, staring at him. It sounded as if she knew him. Intimately.

"I received a letter from my mother today," Sirius said. He sounded simultaneously sad and furious. It was a tone Ginny had only ever heard him use when discussing Peter Pettigrew or the deaths of James and Lily Potter. Who was Gertrude to evoke such a tone?

"And then you left it open on your bed at the Potters," Gertrude added. Sirius looked questioningly at her. "James Potter has been waiting in the kitchen for over an hour for you to arrive."

"James is here?" both Sirius and Lily asked. Gertrude nodded.

"Do you want me to go and fetch him?" Gertrude asked snidely. Ginny had never heard her use that tone before. She was sort of happy to know that the woman was not impervious to emotion.

"Snide comments work for you, Gertrude," Lily said. "They go with the whole snooty-heir thing." Ha! Lily Evans was funny. How odd.

"If you could fetch him, that would be divine," Sirius said condescendingly.

"This was not my choice, Sirius," Gertrude said. Ginny was definitely confused as the scene shifted with Gertrude's point of view. She was leaving the room. "Nor was it much of a surprise considering current trends."

Gertrude left then. Ginny followed. But it was odd that Gertrude left because she immediately summoned a house-elf and asked that they bring James Potter to them. Why hadn't she stayed in the room with Sirius and Lily Evans and done that? She wasn't even listening at the door to hear their conversation.

But then James Potter walked into the room exuding an aura of--of something that Ginny couldn't quite name. He looked so much like Harry and yet Ginny knew that she could never mistake one for the other. Not only were their features distinct, but even looking worried and preoccupied, James Potter looked perfectly put together, perfectly on top of things, perfectly confident in his own abilities. The only time Harry looked like that was in the air, on a broom.

"You summoned?" James asked, obviously irritated with being summoned by a house-elf.

"Sirius is here."

"Good," James said, not sounding nearly as surprised as Ginny was. But then, James had come here after reading some letter, hadn't he? Why had he expected Sirius to come over here? Who the hell was Gertrude Wrightman?

Gertrude looked steadily at him, then turned and faced the room. James looked at her and then at the doorway and began to walk forward. Gertrude grabbed his arm.

"Hey, I know you've never been a friend or really a big fan of me," James said, "but you have to know that I'm going in there and talking to Sirius sooner or later."

Gertrude looked at him. "In a minute more."

And so they waited the minute and then Gertrude walked into the room. Once again, it seemed to be in the middle of what might have been a very interesting conversation.

"I'd lose four classmates because they thought they were better than Dumbledore, that's what!"

"I see you've begun an interesting conversation in my absence," Gertrude said, and Ginny looked over at her, shocked. She never would have guessed that she and Gertrude thought similarly about anything. Ginny looked around, saw Sirius breathing heavily as he did after he yelled at someone in a fight and wondered how Lily and he could have been fighting about people dying.

Lily was not even glancing at Gertrude. In fact, she was staring at James and trying to calm her own breathing. It wasn't working. James was staring right back. Ginny wondered if they were always this mushy--staring at each other across the room.

"Lily? What are you doing here?" James asked.

"Apparently offering moral support to anyone who asks," Lily said. Ginny couldn't believe Lily was this sarcastic. "You?"

"Waiting to offer moral support to someone who never asks," James replied. Ginny knew he was talking about Sirius because that perfectly described him.

"What a coincidence," Lily mused, tilting her head to the side and glancing at Gertrude and Sirius, who were looking at each other. Ginny looked at them too.

"Do they want some privacy?" Lily asked.

"Yes, but do you really want to wander around this estate alone?" James replied.

"This estate?" Lily asked. "No. There are probably booby traps for Muggle-borns everywhere."

"True," James said, staring at Sirius.

"Sirius, would you like to speak in private?" Gertrude asked, looking at Lily as if for approval. Lily nodded, glancing around the room for a comfortable place to sit. Lily sat down on the ground. James followed suit.

Gertrude looked at them, shocked and vaguely uncomfortable, but couldn't seem to find the words to voice her disapproval before Sirius placed a hand on her lower back and pushed her out of the room. Ginny followed. She would have been giggling about Lily Evans except she was too shocked by how well these four seemed to work to care.

"Don't you have anything to say to me?" Sirius asked once they were in a study on the second floor.

"What would you have me say, Sirius?" Gertrude asked. "That I'm sorry? I'm not. This was your fault. You knew this would happen and still you made the choice to turn your back on your family."

"I didn't turn my back on my family. I moved out to dispute some of their decisions."

"And became scorch mark seventeen," Gertrude said. "Did you really think my father and mother would still approve a marriage between the two of us?"

What? Ginny's mouth literally dropped open. What?

"You could have told me yourself," Sirius said. "You could have had the decency to tell me."

"I only found out when James Potter appeared on my doorstep with your mother's letter in hand," Gertrude said, still so formal.

"What?" Sirius had been blind-sided by that, Ginny saw.

"You know how these things work, Sirius," Gertrude Wrightman said dismissively. "Why would I be consulted?"

"Because it's your future, you stupid girl!" Sirius yelled. Ginny stared, shocked. She doubted that anyone other than Sirius Black would dare call Gertrude Wrightman a stupid girl.

"It is my family's future, and an alliance which my parents will arrange as tradition demands." Her tone became so formal that it might as well have been a screaming fight, the way she was hurting Sirius.

"What if they chose Malfoy?"

"Lucius is already married to your cousin." Gertrude, Ginny thought, was missing the point.

"What if they chose Snape?" Sirius asked, and if Ginny thought she heard hatred in Harry's voice when he said Draco Malfoy's name, it was nothing compared to the scorn in Sirius' tone.

"Don't be ridiculous. You know he doesn't have the stature. Nor does Regulus, no matter what he now receives," Gertrude said. Ginny had to think a moment to remember that that was the name of Sirius's brother. "My parents will choose properly. No one lowly. No one without class. No one directly related to the Dark Arts. They will protect the name and the legacy."

It took a moment for Ginny to realize what about this conversation was bothering her, and then it clicked as Sirius answered and Ginny missed it: this was Sirius and Professor Wrightman as sixteen year olds, or thereabouts. This was them speaking as children, or at least people Ginny's own age. Yet she had never met anyone that spoke like this. Well, actually, Baron Ramsey did, but he was the exception rather than the rule.

"Leave your family," Sirius said. "They would feed you to the wolves if it increased their prestige."

"And I would gladly face those wolves if it helped my family survive," Gertrude said. Well, if that wasn't the dumbest thing Ginny had ever heard.

"Don't be so stubborn," Sirius said. "Would you join the Death Eaters for them?"

Gertrude glared. "Never. It would hurt my family's reputation and link them with a side that is going to lose, eventually. Tyrants cannot last forever."

"That's some twisted logic, Gertrude," Sirius snapped. Ginny agreed. What a selfish wench.

"It is what I need to do."

"Leave your family. Leave all of this behind. You don't need it," Sirius said, still angry, but also sort of begging, and Ginny hated Gertrude right then for making Sirius this way.

Though she had to say, if Sirius was trying to convince Gertrude to object to breaking off the engagement, she didn't think he was going about it the right way. Even Ginny could see that ordering Gertrude to abandon her family was not the best way to get his point across.

"You know I can't do that," Gertrude said. And despite the fact that she could see the answer coming, Ginny wanted to hex her. Couldn't she see the desperate honesty in Sirius' eyes as he looked at her? Couldn't she see that he was offering a way to keep her away from Death Eaters? "You know I can't do that, Sirius."

"You could."

"Sirius, don't ask this of me," Gertrude said. "My family and the tradition it represents--"

"Are nothing!" Ginny cringed. Bad move, Sirius.

"They define my life," Gertrude said. Sirius looked like he was about to say something, but when Gertrude shook her head at her, he closed his mouth. "Your family defined your life and without them you're falling apart." Given her experience with Sirius' mother--in her dreams and in the painting--Ginny begged to differ.

"I'm coming together as I should have the first time."

"It would be easier for you to reunite with your family than for me to leave mine." That was rather hard to believe, as Gertrude's family was surely as evil and horrible as Sirius'. Her mother and Bellatrix had seemed far too friendly for Gertrude's family to be anything better.

"You've made your choice already, then," Sirius said, anger flaring up again.

"I made my decision months ago, when I asked a girl to take a walk with me after curfew and she proved herself to be exactly who I always thought she was," Gertrude Wrightman said, and Ginny had no idea what she was talking about.

"You would really follow her?"

"Yes, and I'm on her side until the end of this mess," Gertrude said. "Will you follow her?"

"To death, I'd follow her," Sirius said simply. Ginny really wanted to know who they were talking about. She suspected that it might be Lily Evans, but that didn't make any sense. Why would Gertrude Wrightman follow Lily Evans? How could Gertrude follow Lily when she was so ready to give up her own life and happiness for her dark, bigoted family?

Sirius looked Gertrude in the eye for a long time and finally said, "I'll miss you, Gertrude."

"Not much and not for long. We were never more than acquaintances, brought together by our parents and united by our lineage," Gertrude said, in the same tone she would use to give them instructions in class. Even Ginny could tell that wasn't true. She wanted to shake this blonde, tiny, refined, distant girl. It was like watching someone in a Wronski Feint get closer and closer to the ground, knowing they wouldn't be able to pull up in time. It was like watching someone make the biggest mistake of their life. Why would Gertrude ever choose her evil family over Sirius? Why would she remain loyal to people who might become Death Eaters?

"We would have been great together," Gertrude said, relenting to what Ginny felt was the truth. "I was as upset about the contract breaking as you are, but I will see you again, if you stay beside her."

Sirius took two steps forward, placed his hands on either side of Gertrude's face, leaned down, and kissed her. It was a softer kiss than anything Ginny had ever seen, and it felt like an intensely private moment. Ginny was embarrassed to see it. When they came apart, Sirius stepped back and the two merely looked at each other.

"That was the first time you've ever kissed me," Gertrude said. Ginny was very surprised by that.

"It was the last time, too," Sirius said. "If you ever leave them--"

"I know," Gertrude said, and the room began to fade.

Annoyed, Ginny now found herself in a new memory. She looked around for Gertrude and found a slightly older version sitting in the last row at a church and a wedding seemed to be going on. Ginny looked around. There were a lot of guests. Ginny wondered if she knew the bride and groom, so she looked up at the altar and was shocked to see Sirius. Sirius Black had been married?

But no. He wasn't the groom. He was the best man, though he beamed as if this were his own wedding day.

James and Lily Potter walked down the aisle then amongst clapping and standing guests. A few whistled. Professor Wrightman merely did her close-mouthed almost-smile and nodded at Lily Potter as she passed her. Ginny spotted Peter Pettigrew in the front row. She saw Andy's parents to her right, though they were sitting a few rows apart from each other.

As the church began to empty, Gertrude Wrightman did not move. She stayed put as Sirius Black looked at her with one of the most smolderingly hot looks Ginny had ever seen. She stayed put as Peter Pettigrew glanced worriedly at her and left. She stayed put as Andy McGrath's mother came over and said hello.

"Hello, Christine," Gertrude said. "It's good to see you."

"You too." Christine smiled and nodded, sincerity etched all over her. Ginny instantly liked her and began seeing the resemblance between her best friend and this tall woman who glanced at Andy's father behind her (who was obviously waiting for her and trying to look like he wasn't).

"You're handling everything all right?" Gertrude asked. Christine looked back at her.

Christine nodded, glancing at Andy's dad again. "I have one more thing to fix."

"I hope it goes well," Gertrude Wrightman said.

"It will," Christine McGrath said before she turned around walked up to Andy's dad and kissed him on the mouth. Ginny's eyes nearly bulged out of their sockets. They had seemed like they were in a fight a moment ago.

"Are you going to the reception?" came a voice Ginny recognized to their left. She looked over and saw a much younger Remus Lupin.

"Hello, Mr. Lupin," Gertrude said, distant.

"I didn't know you were coming," Remus said and Ginny cringed for him. He should have just left.

"I was invited," Gertrude said, using the icy tone she used with people she did not like.

"Are you--"

"Please stop speaking as though we are friends," Gertrude said. "We were prefects together. Nothing more."

"I know you don't like or respect me," Remus said, "because I'm a werewolf."

"I dislike you because you're weak," Gertrude said, standing. "I don't respect you because you let being a werewolf rule your life."

"Blunt, aren't you?" Remus asked quietly standing also.

"You seek approval from everyone," Gertrude said, "and that makes you weak, makes you do things you know you ought not to do."

Remus towered over her and still looked like he was no match for Gertrude Wrightman. "I would never hurt Lily or James."

"It's odd that you mention that, now that we know there's a betrayer close to them," Gertrude said. How well did Gertrude know them that they would share that information with her? Or did she simply know, as she seemed to know everything else?

"Will you tell Sirius that you believe I'm the betrayer?" Remus asked.

"I don't know yet," Gertrude said.

"If you do, he'll believe you," Remus said. "He'll think you know it from a source and you will break nine years of friendship."

"Some things need to break in order to be fixed." Ginny thought that was rich, coming from the woman who abandoned Sirius because he broke from his family to stand up for what was right.

A hand on her shoulder, a scarily solid hand, pulled Ginny out of the Pensieve and out of the memory of a church and a scared Remus Lupin. Ginny turned to meet the eye of the person who pulled her out and was not surprised to see Professor Wrightman staring coldly at her, hating her almost for this invasion. Well, that was fine. Ginny wasn't feeling too generous at the moment and might well hate Gertrude back.

"How could you?" Ginny asked. The professor said nothing. "You turned your back on Sirius in his hour of need. You accused Remus of being the betrayer, setting in motion an entire stream of events that lead to the Potters' deaths."

"Don't you dare," Gertrude said, "accuse me of killing them, child. You have no idea what happened."

Ginny motioned at the Pensieve with her right hand. "I have enough of an idea!"

"Seeing snippets of memories from my head, taken out of context, is hardly a testimony of the past."

"You chose to stay with your dark family! You chose to accuse probably the best adult I know of the worst crime a person could commit: betrayal."

"How contradictory your statements are," the professor said. "You would have had me betray my family for Sirius on the one hand, and on the other you claim betrayal the worst sort of action."

"Don't twist my words!" Ginny snapped back. "You left Sirius to rot in prison as you stayed cozy with your family! If you know so much, if you have such great connections, how could you have thought he was guilty? How?!"

"For all of your power and experience, you are such an innocent," Professor Wrightman said dismissively, levitating her Pensieve and turning to leave.

"You left him to die! You didn't do anything! Are you truly that heartless?"

And while Ginny had expected and wanted this refined woman to spin quickly around and lose her composure, Gertrude Wrightman surprised her: she reached out and took her Pensieve from the air, turning slowly, so slowly.

"I had an obligation," she said simply.

"Oh, that's right," Ginny said sarcastically. "You're a member of the Wrightman family, aren't you? Had to abandon good friends for a Dark Arts-loving family."

"It was an obligation Sirius understood."

"No he didn't!" Ginny said, gesturing at the Pensieve. "He asked you to leave your family, asked you to do the right thing instead of the easy thing."

"Right?" Professor Wrightman repeated. "Right? Leaving them would have destroyed me. It nearly destroyed Sirius. He tried to kill a man just to channel his anger into something productive."

Ginny thought of the prank Sirius told her about, and how deeply he regretted almost making Remus a murderer.

"Would you find it 'right' to leave your family, Miss Weasley?"

Ginny started. "It's not the same! My family loves Harry. I would never abandon him, even if they did. And my family isn't a load of nutters."

"Nor is mine," Gertrude said, and Ginny knew she'd said something horribly wrong. "Nor was Sirius'. Have you met Andromeda Tonks? Have you met his uncle? Have you heard the story of Regulus, who joined the Death Eaters, realized his grave mistake, and died trying to run from them? You would condemn entire families based on a single person, condemn the Malfoys for Lucius when his sister abstained from magic in protest of the fact that he received the Mark."

"No, I wouldn't!" Ginny protested. "But Sirius didn't abandon Andromeda, the rest of the Blacks did! Sirius still talked to her, and his uncle, and he was close with her daughter up until he died! I know what happened to Regulus, Sirius told me. But Sirius left so he wouldn't be put in the same position as his brother. His parents did that to him! It's what's going to happen to Draco because of who Lucius is. But I don't hate Draco because he's a Malfoy, I hate him because he insults my family, calls my friend a Mudblood, and gleefully prays for Harry's death."

"Don't claim to understand my life, Ginevra Weasley," Gertrude Wrightman said, jaw set, her back impossibly straight, eyes daring Ginny to say a word. Ginny glared right back at her. "You think you've seen darkness. You think you can judge me and the actions of an entire generation, but you can't comprehend what we've suffered."

"We?"

"An entire generation, torn apart by war and prejudice," Professor Wrightman said. Ginny met her gaze.

"I know enough to know that I would never turn my back on Harry. Never. I would never run, never hide, never avoid a war because it was too difficult."

There it was again, the eyes flashing. "You think you know so much because you confronted a sixteen-year old Tom Riddle."

"What?!" Ginny was shocked that she could possibly know that. Dumbledore had said no one would know. Who was this woman?

"I know about the Chamber of Secrets. I know about the comfort you must have found in the terribly appealing Tom Riddle and I know what you must have written in that diary to give him the strength to take your soul," Professor Wrightman said, not moving a muscle but still seeming to advance on Ginny. Ginny took a defiant step forward.

"I faced death at the hands of a young Voldemort and you think you can intimidate me?" Ginny asked abrasively.

"You think I avoided the war," Professor Wrightman said, still holding that damnable Pensieve. "I worked every day for Dumbledore, for the Ministry. I worked as an Unspeakable, protected from having to tell anyone of my work. Protected because of my rank and my profession."

"So you covered your own arse?"

"I did it for my children and my husband," Gertrude said, "because Sirius Black had done what I never would have imagined and sided with the Dark Lord. And he was in prison, but I knew he wouldn't forget the fact that I chose to push him away. I lived in fear of one of my closest childhood friends for thirteen years."

"How could you not know he was innocent, that boy who kissed you so quietly?" Ginny asked before she could stop herself. Ginny did not doubt that if Gertrude were a less self-controlled woman she would have slapped her.

"It's so easy for you. You only knew him as an innocent, but in a time when my friend killed his sister and his parents before taking the Mark, no one could be trusted. Not even an old friend. Especially not a Gryffindor, who seemed so innocent. So, Miss Weasley, when you ask why I suspected him, it's very simple: everyone was suspect."

"I don't believe you," Ginny said.

"You wouldn't," she said, "because you have been privileged enough to live in a world where the enemy kidnaps you and puts you in a dungeon, where the enemy wears a uniform to identify them as the bad ones, and can be distinguished by the numerous curses they shoot at Harry Potter. In my world, the enemy could be a best friend as easy as a stranger, a teacher as easily as a librarian. The only ones you could trust were family and I had an obligation to them."

"An obligation to support the Dark Arts and betray your friends? No wonder Sirius was sorted into Gryffindor, and you were put into Slytherin."

Gertrude looked at her with near-hatred in her eyes. "An obligation to protect them. If I could do the right thing simultaneously, I had no objection to doing so."

"You'd only have that obligation if you were--" Ginny stopped herself and stared at Gertrude Wrightman. Stared. "Merlin, you're the matriarch aren't you? You're the head of your family. That's why you were going to marry Sirius, who is the rightful head of the Black family."

Gertrude's non-response was enough of a confirmation.

"What the hell are you doing working at Hogwarts?"

"I'm doing a favor for the headmaster and simultaneously ensuring that a generation of Slytherins do not ruin the name of a House which deserves honor," she answered. Ginny shook her head at her.

"You head one of the richest and most powerful families in England. In Europe." Ginny was beginning to think this through. "It's perfect. Dumbledore, that old fox. He knew who you were. Knew you'd be--Everyone can't shut up about how fair you are, how you seem to demand the most of the Slytherins, how even Snape respects you. It's because you're the matriarch."

Gertrude said nothing.

"Did you know Lily Potter?" Ginny finally asked. "She was at your house with James Potter."

"I don't talk about her," Gertrude said, readying to leave again.

"Then you did know her. Then why--why don't you talk to Harry? Why don't you talk to Andy and Stevie? You knew their mother too, didn't you?" she said, remembering how her teacher's gaze had lingered so often on Andy's face. "Why didn't you take Harry in or contact him once he learned he was a wizard?"

"Because he was protected in his aunt's home."

"He was mentally and physically abused there, so what exactly was he protected from?" Ginny asked.

"Death," Professor Wrightman said simply. Ginny thought that was too much of a cut-and-dry answer, particularly coming from the woman who had scolded Ginny for seeing the world in black and white.

"There had to have been another way."

"Once more, your black and white world view won't let you see the truth of the matter. You see Harry's aunt as someone that hurt him and so she is evil, yet she keeps taking him back, doesn't she? He blew up his uncle's sister and still his aunt invited him back into her home and protected him with the magic she hates."

"It's not magic she uses."

"Her blood invokes old magic. She knows this. Still, she lets him come."

"She's not a good person."

"Are you sure?" Gertrude asked. "Can you draw a line between the good guys and the bad?"

"I can draw a line between the Death Eaters and the people who would fight for Harry," Ginny said defiantly.

Professor Wrightman continued to look at Ginny in silence and then said, "I have walked the line between the Dark Lord and the Order and have found both wanting."

"Then whose side are you on?"

"The side that I was convinced to join," Gertrude said, "by the one person who wanted for nothing and looked out for me, of course. The person who wrote to ask me to continue her work after she was forced to stay home. The one for whom I truly hated Sirius Black."

"You hated him?"

"As passionately as she ever loved him, as passionately as I ever loved him," Gertrude said. "That much I hated him for what he did. You claim to know what darkness is, but you have not seen your friends the day after they received the Mark from the Dark Lord, with a twisted smile on their face as the pain first hits and forces them to join him. You've not seen the joy in their eyes as they report that they have been ordered to murder your best friend. You've certainly never trusted someone with your life only to discover that they betrayed everything you ever thought they believed in.

"You seem to believe, Miss Weasley, that I should not have suspected Sirius Black of murdering anyone. But did you know that he'd killed men before, to protect Lily Evans and James Potter? I had no doubt then and no doubt now that if he had turned his loyalty to the Dark Lord, he would kill in an instant. That was Sirius Black's great gift: his fierce, unrelenting, and amoral devotion to those who had managed to gain his trust and love."

"How would you know? It was the thing you questioned most!" Ginny accused, but she was loosing footing, feeling overwhelmed by this conversation, and beginning to feel truly uncomfortable.

"He told me that I was right to question him."

"You spoke to him after he escaped?"

"Of course," Professor Wrightman said. "And he told me that you reminded him of Lily Evans and that seeing you and Harry together made him feel like he was looking into the past."

Ginny felt more uncomfortable. Professor Wrightman had spoken with Sirius? Before he died and after he was known to be innocent? They had talked about her?

"But I'll tell you something and then end our discussion with the number of detentions you will receive for this invasion of privacy," her teacher added.

"Lily Evans would never have cursed her sworn enemy. Even when Death Eaters threw curses at her, her first reaction was not to fight back as Sirius did. Instead, she cast a shield and shoved a stranger toward a Portkey to save their life. That was Lily Evans. So while I could imagine that Sirius would betray me and go to the Dark Lord in order to hurt me by compromising her, I could not imagine someone betraying Lily herself. I could not fathom the idea that Peter Pettigrew would go to the Dark Lord and hurt Lily Evans.

"You accused me of running and hiding from the war because I was scared and wanting to protect myself. Instead, if you want to know the truth, I will tell you that I followed Lily Evans into that war and onto Dumbledore's side. Like her son, she effortlessly evoked loyalty and had she asked me anything, I would have done it. Which is why, when I received her owl asking that I protect my family and devote myself to her work, that I study the one door that couldn't be opened, I did it. I was there studying it when she died. I was there until this August, when Dumbledore offered me the chance to teach and protect her son.

"So, no, I did not cast a curse at the Dark Lord. I did not kill his followers. Instead, I kept my family name respected and created new spells for Dumbledore, and all of this I did because I trusted that Lily Evans would pick the winning side of this war, because I wanted her to win."

After barely containing herself throughout her teacher's bitter explanation, Ginny now took a deep breath and came right back, both angrier and calmer (though more chastened) than she could have believed possible.

"You seem to think I equate the Order with those who would fight for Harry, that I see the 'good' side and those who follow Harry as being the same, but I don't. Just like you followed Lily rather than Dumbledore, so I would follow Harry into certain death, but not the headmaster.

"And don't you dare tell me I don't know about darkness. So you think you know the details of the Chamber of Secrets. You told me the first week of school that you couldn't imagine going through the horror we went through at such a young age. Was that just a line? Were you just giving me the standard spiel like you gave Sirius all those years ago?

"Because I'll tell you, down on that concrete floor, with Harry fighting a basilisk, and Voldemort--yes he was already Voldemort then--taunting Harry about killing Lily, about his stupid Mudblood mother dying to save his life, lying there literally having the life being sucked out of me, feeling things you could never imagine in your entire, heiress, duty-filled life--don't you, for a second, think you can brush me aside as less than what you've gone through.

"You're right that I don't know enough about what your generation has endured. Before now, I only knew what Sirius told me. But you, in turn, know nothing about what we've gone through--nothing about what Harry, and I, and Hermione, and my brother have been through, about what Neville has gone through, about what we now know is coming."

And as she kept ranting, Ginny waved her hand vaguely in the direction of the door, her shouted "Colloportus!" not even breaking the stride of her passionate defense.

"Did you know that I can speak Parseltongue? That Voldemort left some of himself behind in me when Harry destroyed the diary? That besides his intelligence and his gift for Occlumency, he also left his craving for the Dark Arts and part of his cold, blackened soul? Did you know that, because I'm the first daughter in seven pureblood generations," and this, at least, got Professor Wrightman's attention, "that the temptation--and the fury--of Dark Magic are a hundred times worse for me than they would be for you or Professor Snape or anyone else besides Voldemort himself? That I might be the next biggest threat to Harry after Voldemort? That I have dreams where the pull of casting Unforgivables forces me to endure debilitating, soul-crunching pain that lasts for hours?

"So you'll forgive me if I tend to see this war in black and white. But don't you dare tell me about my generation. You may know about Death Eaters and your fucking duty to your family, and you may know worlds more about Lily Evans and Sirius Black, but you don't know a thing about me, or about Harry, or about what's going on; not really."

Ginny paused here, to catch her breath, and then remembered one last thing.

"And, no, I'm not Lily. And I don't want to be. I would never presume to aspire to what she must have been. Wanting to be her would insult us both--her because, as I understand it, she was amazing. Me, because I deserve to be my own person. But what's more, we don't need another Lily--partly because there never could be, but mostly because Harry is not his father.

"You may have noticed, in your brief acquaintance, that he's the opposite in every way. He needs someone who will speak up, who will fight for him because he would never take the offensive himself. Someone who will get in his face and constantly remind him that they believe in him completely, because he would never have the confidence on his own. Someone who will force him to realize that he can't be afraid of love, that even though he's been so badly burned in the past, he has to ante up and try again--not because the fate of magic civilization depends on it, but because his life depends on it. And someone who can show him that he doesn't have to be a slave to destiny, that any time he can spare actually living his life and planning for the future is still worth it.

"So whether you intended it as an insult or not, I could give a damn if you don't think I'm as great as Harry's mum. Just as you wouldn't care that I think Sirius Black was worth ten of you." She added sarcastically, "Guess I'm lucky you were never there to tell Harry how wonderful she was, since now he doesn't know enough about her to compare me. So, thanks for that."

There was a dead silence following her words, one that Ginny had not anticipated. One that had the older woman looking at Ginny through the fog of pale, aristocratic eyes.

"That's why you're taking your O.W.L.'s early," Professor Wrightman said.

"What?!"

That was her response to Ginny's rant? Ginny fumed. She obviously hadn't paid any attention to what Ginny had said.

"You're taking your O.W.L.'s early to help Harry, because you think he'll need as much help as he can get far sooner than Dumbledore does," her teacher clarified, still looking at Ginny as though she were a piece in a museum instead of a person. "I thought you were taking them to boast, but you told no one of your plans. I thought you were taking them to prove your worth, but you already knew you could pass them without effort. So I decided you were taking them to be close to Harry Potter."

That struck a bit too close to home and Ginny tried to buffer it. "I already see him enough."

"No, you don't," her Professor said, "but the reason you want to be near him is as much for protection as anything else."

"Of course I want to protect him," Ginny said. How could this woman ever think she wouldn't?

"Of course," her teacher repeated in a whisper, lowering her eyes to the ground and looking up again. "I've spent my time with you trying to refute Sirius' assessment of you."

"Why? Do you still hate him that much?"

"I still love Lily that much," she replied, surprising Ginny. She didn't seem the type to lay her feelings open to strangers. "But you are not what I expected to find, and it has been quite a while since I have been surprised by anyone."

"Maybe that's because you've apparently holed yourself up at work, studying a bloody door, instead of interacting with the world." Ginny was still feeling particularly upset about that.

"Perhaps you're right," Professor Wrightman said. "I have only barely fulfilled my social obligations."

"That damn obligation speech again."

"It's a part of my life as surely as it was a part of Sirius', but I don't expect you to understand," she said, and paused. "But I'd like to learn about your generation, about Harry and Andrew and Stephen. I would like to learn about you, first daughter of seven generations." She paused and for the first time, Ginny actually felt like her teacher had been listening.

"Because I don't know as much as I would like, and because we don't have to like one another to fight and work together," Professor Wrightman continued. But Ginny suspected it was something more, something about the other obligations that she had mentioned in passing: to maintain the respect of Slytherin House and to protect Harry Potter.

Maybe they could work together . . . at least in part, at least as long as they both strove to accomplish the same goal. Maybe Professor Wrightman could help Ginny with her Defense training and Ginny could help the older woman feel like she was protecting Harry, even if indirectly.

At least the exchange had ended civilly. But Ginny couldn't help noticing, as they parted ways and she headed back to the Tower, that despite all the references to Voldemort, not once had Gertrude Wrightman actually said his name.

She stored away the thought for another day, and made her way back to the common room, ready to start the Christmas holidays.

* * *