Potter Professions

Harry arrived at 'Brest', the administration building, and found the door unlocked. Considering the time of day, he had expected it, but hadn't been sure because this school could as well have run a policy that would fit a prison. He entered the building and walked down the corridors until he reached the school office. The office door was wide open, so he went in.

"Good morning, Jeannette. Where can I find our dear boss?"

A disapproving stare told him that the sarcasm in his question wasn't lost on Jeannette, and that she didn't like it. A tilting of her otherwise silent head showed him the direction, a closed door not far from her desk.

Harry went to the door and knocked.

There was no reply.

The Headmaster knew that he would come; five minutes earlier, Harry had made sure of that by calling Jeannette in her office. Therefore, his not answering to Harry's knocking was strange, and Harry had a more-than-dim feeling that Monsieur le Directeur Fresnel was trying to discipline his new employee just for good measure.

In this case, Harry decided, he shouldn't lose any time not living up to his reputation as faked in his personal file. He opened the door and entered the Headmaster's office.

A large room. An expensive carpet. A large desk, and a man sitting behind the desk, seemingly busy with paper and an expensive-looking fountain pen. The man looked middle-aged, stocky, unremarkable, and balding; his head, where hair had once been, now run through by a polished, gleaming patch of skin.

He looked unpleasant when he lifted his gaze from the paper. "You couldn't wait for me to call you in, could you?"

"Well - " Harry flashed a false smile. "I wasn't sure if I'd failed to hear it. I didn't want to make you wait."

The mild sarcasm in the Headmaster's voice was replaced by a cold stare from his slightly protruding eyes. "You will address me as Monsieur le Directeur - and maybe we should play this little scene again, so you know how it sounds when I call, 'Enter!'"

Harry grabbed an uncomfortable-looking chair, moved it to the front of the desk and sat down. With another smile, genuine because it was small and cool, he said, "I don't think so, Monsieur le Directeur Fresnel."

"Then please sit down, Monsieur Pri'chard, and welcome to our school."

Harry's response was a slight bow as his mind readjusted his opinion of Fresnel, scaled him up a notch or two. At least the Headmaster wasn't afraid, wasn't one of those loud barkers who could be intimidated easily. So much Harry would grant him, and an acid-saturated sense of humour too.

In addition, the Headmaster walked with a light burden of politeness, as he confirmed a second later. Staring at Harry's forehead with the large discolouration, he asked, "Was it a similar hurry that earned you the mark on your face?"

His papers, as Harry knew, mentioned a 'severe facial injury in the line of duty,' making it mysterious enough to match the wildest story and the weirdest nonsense. Sounding casual, he replied, "You might say so, except it wasn't my own haste."

Fresnel waited another moment for his new teacher to reveal more. When this didn't happen, he opened a file that looked familiar to Harry: his personal file, carefully prepared by Ron. Staring at a sheet, the Headmaster said, "From what I can see here, you make friends quickly - "

"Really? That's funny, because I make enemies even more quickly."

Harry watched the expression in Fresnel's face as the man tried to decide whether this new teacher was really too dumb to recognize sarcasm or had simply countered one wisecrack with another. The file, as Harry knew, gave little information on this particular detail because it described him as 'efficient' while leaving open the question of whether this came from a working brain or a robot made of flesh and blood.

In other regards, however, the file left no doubt. Terry Pritchard was "difficult," to say the least. According to the papers, he had been a 'foreign affairs agent' in the services of the British government, and this term alone placed him somewhere between James Bond and a real estate agent of the diplomatic corps. But whatever his job had been, said Terry Pritchard had been called home after messing up thoroughly. The file gave a very decent but unmistakable hint that other men's women had played a role in this messing up.

---

"So what particular miracle," asked the Headmaster after looking up from the file, "made you come to a school for students with a handicap in their magical abilities?"

"Of all the alternatives that were offered to me, this one looked best." Harry showed another smile, this time an honest one. "And it was in France, which is a benefit that can hardly be overestimated - I mean, after you ever spent a day in British offices at home in England."

Fresnel showed no reaction to this remark, which might have been a plump attempt at flattery. But the paper made it clear that Terry Pritchard had had trouble readjusting to the unspoken rules of his home country. Having been assigned to an office for 'Strategic Analysis', he'd lost no time in crossing with almost every fellow employee there, ending up in a fistfight with his boss. Both opponents had left the office - Pritchard with paid holidays, his boss in the ambulance that took him, broken ribs and all, to the hospital.

"Monsieur Pri'chard, may I ask what experience you have in teaching?"

"Yes - er, Monsieur le Directeur." Harry let Pritchard's smile fade. "None might be the most accurate description. While it's true that I taught a few people manners, and quite successfully so, I wouldn't count that as a recommendation for a school teacher."

"Can you offer any recommendation, in your eyes or someone else's, for the job of a school teacher?"

"Certainly, Monsieur le Directeur." Pritchard's smile returned. "I get along with kids, and I don't beat them."

Fresnel raised his eyebrows. "You mean, you beat only grown people?"

"That story in my last job, huh?" Harry alias Pritchard snorted. "Well, he had it coming, that's all I have to say."

"He was your boss, wasn't he? So tell me, Monsieur Pri'chard, how can I recognize when I have it coming?"

Harry produced a polite chuckle that sounded terribly artificial in his own ears. "That was a good one, Monsieur le Directeur, ha ha ... No reason to worry, it's not a habit of mine."

"Speaking of habits ..." The Headmaster made a pause and looked at Harry as if Terry Pritchard should already know what he was going to talk about. "You seem to have a talent of getting into trouble when - erm, seeking your private pleasures. You'd be well advised not to play such games here - French police might not be quite to your taste."

"Police?" Pritchard looked bewildered. "I don't know what you're talking about, Monsieur le Directeur. I play this particular game as a business to mutual satisfaction, and only with volunteers, if you get my bearing. Otherwise - this is France, and without getting into detail, let me tell you that these things never would have found their way into a French personal file."

Fresnel dropped the file and leaned back in his comfortably upholstered leather chair. "Be that as it may, Monsieur Pri'chard, I don't want trouble, that's all. Don't be unpleasant, and you won't find out how unpleasant I can be, that's what I always say."

Terry Pritchard narrowed his eyes, then looked down at his shoes when he said, "Yes, Monsieur le Directeur."

The Headmaster seemed satisfied, however not nearly as much as Harry, whom nobody would have called a good actor. But as long as it worked with tricks as simple as bending your head ...

"So let's come to your professional qualification. English shouldn't be a question with your origin. Sports - what about that, how did you come to this qualification?"

"Self-defence and other arts of weaponless combat, Monsieur le Directeur."

"Ah well, that explains the two broken ribs, huh?"

Terry Pritchard let out a genuine laughter. "Trust my words, Monsieur le Directeur, I can scale quite well. Could have been more, could have been less. Anyway, that's not what I have in mind to teach in my classes."

"How reassuring." Fresnel exhaled dramatically while putting his right hand on his heart - in Harry's eyes a very French gesture. "So Monsieur Jacquot and Madame Clément, the teachers in charge of class schedules, don't need to keep any restrictions in mind?"

"No, Monsieur le Directeur."

"Very well - maybe you'll turn out more successful here than anyone would have believed, huh?" The Headmaster was alone to chuckle as his guest's eyes narrowed again, more than ever before.

Apparently satisfied with this very personal insult, Fresnel added a more general one by saying, "Then let's come to an end - after all, I have business to do. How's your magic?"

"Good, I'd say. Why?"

The snappish tone in Harry's voice hadn't been artificial at all - the Headmaster's last remarks had provided him with enough fury to compensate for his poor skill in playing roles. Also, omitting the title in his last reply had been a purposeful act. Now he watched as, for his senses seemingly in slow motion, Fresnel grabbed for a wand to point in his direction.

His response came immediately and in what he himself would have called real-time speed. He drew his own wand, pointed it toward the figure behind the desk, and called, "Expelliarmus!"

When the other wand had landed in his free hand, he stood up and walked the step to the desk, then put the wand down there. "Voilà, Monsieur le Directeur - test passed, I'd say, wouldn't you agree?"

As if forgotten, almost by accident, his own wand pointed at the spot between the Headmaster's eyes.

When Fresnel nodded, more watchful than afraid, Harry stored his wand. While preparing for his appearance, he had made sure to remove the black tip his original wand had gained in his second wand duel with Voldemort. Such a two-coloured wand would gather too much attention for sure.

And besides - while his fame in the wizarding world had faded, certain details were always good for creating myths. Like a wand with a black tip.

* * *

The paralyzed state of Esmeralda's mind didn't fade. Since that fateful conversation on a three-legged stool, her mind refused to process what her senses registered. Consequently, the events didn't reach her memory, so they weren't stored for something anyone else could do: remember forever the first days at Hogwarts.

Right after the Sorting, she had sat at the Gryffindor table. People had talked to her - students, teachers she knew because they were friends of her parents. She had probably eaten; she could remember her hunger after the long time of waiting for the Hogwarts Express but she couldn't name a single course.

Later that evening, she followed other girls to a dormitory, through a picture that showed an overweight woman who asked them something. It was a password, except that Esmeralda was at a loss to say it. And her roommates - they had names, faces, voices, but Esmeralda couldn't recall their names to save her life.

What she remembered best was the familiarity of this paralysis. Even without clear pictures of the previous events in her mind, she knew that she had encountered similar states at two occasions. One was during the immigration from Mexico into California, when her parents were killed. The other was the kidnapping and subsequent delivery in a linkport at the time when her first adopted parents were killed. It always had been an act of unbearable separation from someone close.

Of course, Carlos wasn't out of the world. The following morning during breakfast, she saw him. There was a faint memory that she had tried to have breakfast together with him, and that some people had told her she couldn't do it, but she didn't even remember if these had been students or teachers.

The situation with Bolo didn't improve matters. Reaching the dormitory with the dog, she'd found herself confronted with complaints from another girl, or maybe two. They'd said they would talk with the Head of Gryffindor because pets beyond a certain size belonged into cages or whatever.

Had she been fully awake, Esmeralda would have earned her first detention for attacking a fellow student, or maybe two.

Had she been fully awake and clever in addition, she would have awaited this talk and its outcome with all calmness of the world - Head of Gryffindor was Hermione Krum, the same who had hosted Esmeralda's two older siblings until some days ago.

When she tried to enter the breakfast hall with the German shepherd, she was told this wasn't allowed, at least not during the meals. Yes, she could take some food as tidbits for the dog, to be fed outside or in her dormitory. She did it in the dormitory, only to earn another complaint from a roommate.

---

Entering the first classroom of the morning, the fog in Esmeralda's brain lifted a bit because the teacher was Remus Lupin, the same who'd been at Jamaica during holidays, where Sandra and Héloise had taken care of the Lupin children. Seeing Esmeralda's face, Remus told her she might talk with Donovan, the son of the Lupins, who was second-year in Ravenclaw and who could tell Esmeralda and Carlos better than anyone else what a separation into two different houses exactly meant. This advice reactivated her brain's power sufficiently to follow the teacher.

The course was Charms. The man who, until the day before, had been Remus for Esmeralda, told the class that his nominal title was "Professor Lupin," that he didn't mind being called "Mr Lupin," and that they all could save time by calling him "Prof."

The students responded with murmuring and beaming and anticipation. Esmeralda wondered if she would be confused enough the first time to call the teacher "Premus."

Then they learned that the first two weeks had a different schedule than the rest of the year. During this fortnight, which almost resembled a seminar, the first-years would exclusively be taught magical courses, to set the basics. Only afterwards, conventional courses like English or Math would regain their rank in the regular schedule.

Then they learned elementary spells like the one that made the tip of the wand glow, thereby providing light in the dark. Professor Lupin darkened the windows, raising ahs and ohs from the students who were successful with their spell, and more desperate sounds from the others.

Esmeralda had no trouble whatsoever making the tip of her acacia wand glow. However, the only thought that filled her mind was lunch as the first chance to see her brother again and talk with Donovan, as Lupin had recommended.

Before the noon break, she met another teacher with a face she'd seen before, as a guest in Carron Lough. It was Samantha Snape, the teacher for Care of Magical Creatures and also the wife of the Deputy Headmaster. She guided the students outside, made them sit on the grass, and asked, "Which of you have pets? Hands up for every pet."

The woman's drawl almost raised a smile on Esmeralda's face, which would have been the first since her arrival in Hogwarts. Her arm went up.

"And which of you have left them at home? Hands down for every poor pet that wasn't brought with you."

Esmeralda sent a glare toward her roommates who had complained about Bolo while keeping her arm in the air.

"Okay - fetch them and come back to us!"

Esmeralda didn't waste time, and was the first to reach the school building. Unfortunately, and very embarrassingly so, she had to wait at the stupid picture with the overweight woman because she couldn't remember the password. Then someone on his way downstairs opened it from the inside, and moments later, still panting, she reached the group that was waiting outside with Bolo at her side.

The teacher came over, winked at Esmeralda as the only sign that she had recognized her, and bent down to stroke the German shepherd.

The girl to the left of Esmeralda said, "What do all these pets have to do with magical creatures? And why is this dog allowed in a dormitory? He stinks!"

Without removing her hands from the German shepherd, the teacher replied, "My name is Prof, sweetheart, in case you forgot. And what's your name?"

"Natasha Palmer - er, Prof."

"Well, Miss Palmer, there are so many creatures around, sometimes it's imperative to take care, and sometimes it's imperative to beware. I like to start this course with popular animals to show how terribly wrong we can be to judge an animal's character by its appearance."

The woman put one hand under Bolo's chin so that her fingers could remove the chaps, thereby exposing impressive teeth. "This dog, for example," she continued, "has an intimidating exterior yet he's the best guardian one could imagine in the bedroom of young girls."

Natasha Palmer wrinkled her nose. "But he stinks."

"Does he really?" The teacher grinned. "A wet dog stinks, that's true, so maybe we should start our course with a spell to dry rain-soaked fur, huh?" She sent a glance to Esmeralda, then turned back to Esmeralda's roommate.

"Otherwise, a dog doesn't stink. There's a very fine smell, and even to notice that, you'd have to come very close to the fur. Actually, it's the other way around - from a dog's perspective, we humans stink because we're carnivores, but did you hear that dog complain about you?"

Natasha opened and closed her mouth, too baffled to protest. Her glance, though, made it clear that she might not know what a carnivore was but thought it very bad manners to give her such names.

---

This scene raised Esmeralda's spirit sufficiently to remain calm for the rest of the morning. Then, at lunch, sitting at the Gryffindor table, she let her eyes wander to locate first her brother and then Donovan, the boy who should explain to them what to expect.

Someone waved at her. It came from the Ravenclaw table, and an instant later, she saw the face that belonged to the waving hand. It was Donovan.

This settled, Esmeralda continued emptying her dish. Strange as it seemed, suddenly her stomach had remembered that she was made of flesh and blood and bones, all of which demanded food.

She let her mind drift and imagined herself, along with Carlos and Bolo and Dona Gata, leaving Hogwarts to wander through the wilderness of North England, on a journey to Carron Lough. It was completely unrealistic, what with their porties that would work half a mile from here, but somehow she was still chewing when suddenly two boys stood behind her seat: her brother and Donovan.

"Hi, Esmeralda," said Donovan. "It's great to see you here at Hogwarts. And it had to be Gryffindor for you, hadn't it?"

"Hello, er, Don," replied Esmeralda, just in time remembering what Sandra had reported, that the old nickname "Donnie" was no longer appreciated by the boy. "This house stuff is just what we'd like to talk about. Where can we talk?"

"Outside, I'd say" - Donovan grinned - "if you ever finish your lunch."

"Just a minute." She looked at Carlos - and next second, she made a face. She had planned to tell him he might use the time and fetch Bolo, but the path to the dog was doubly locked for her brother - because he was a Hufflepuff, not supposed to enter Gryffindor Tower, and because he was a boy, not supposed to enter girls' dormitories. It was maddening.

She filled a dish with a decent amount for a German shepherd and gave it to Carlos. "Here, wait for us just outside."

Then she went upstairs to fetch Bolo, and some minutes later, she was sitting in the grass outside, together with the two boys, and feeding the dog one bite at a time.

Carlos said, "So how is it with the houses? How much do they separate us?"

"How much?" Donovan had to think about this unfamiliar question for a moment. Then he said, "There isn't anything that you don't know yet. You have classes by houses, and you have meals by houses, and in the evening, if you aren't outside like now, you're sitting in the common room of your house. So what else is there?"

"Why can't we sit together in the evening?" asked Esmeralda.

"But you can!" Donovan, who apparently could well imagine hours without his younger sister Deirdre, looked a bit confused.

"Where?"

"Oh - in the Great Hall, in the Entrance Hall, outside - "

"Can we be together in Gryffindor Tower? Or in Hufflepuff Tower?"

"Dunno ..." Donovan shrugged. "Probably so, only I never tried to visit someone in another house. Why should I?"

Esmeralda felt close to losing patience. She didn't think Donovan was stupid, but he just had no idea of what united her and Carlos, and that exasperated her.

"And the meals? Can we sit together? I don't care at which table."

"Well - it's not forbidden," explained Donovan. "But it's not done either. You would cause so much trouble, other students would look at you and ask you whether you've lost track of where you belong, or something like that."

"So it just doesn't work, huh?"

"Right." Donovan grinned. "Your house is your house. My mother says it's much more open than in her time, but I guess she means how the students think of students in other houses. Hufflepuff, for instance" - he looked at Carlos - "she says that in her time there was a lot of teasing. Today - well, it's more of a joke if you say, 'Stupid Hufflepuff'."

Esmeralda couldn't find anything funny at such a remark. Moreover, she couldn't find any additional reason to waste another hour here. She grabbed for her porty.

Donovan saw it. "Doesn't work here in the school. There's a protection field."

"No," explained Esmeralda, "I'm going to use it as a phony. Or does that field prevent phony calls, too?"

"No, of course not. Who are you gonna call?"

"Our father," replied Esmeralda. "I'm going to tell him that he must come and get us out of this school, and to a school where Carlos and I can sit side by side, in classes and during the meals."

* * *

Cho stared at her husband. "That must be a joke," she said, "except that you aren't exactly famous for your humour in such matters."

Harry kept silent.

It drove her almost crazy. She knew that this silence was his method of avoiding a reply that wouldn't improve the atmosphere either, but the knowledge didn't help - not getting an answer destroyed her composure quicker than any insult she might have imagined.

"Lost your tongue?" she snarled. "Maybe as a bonus to this magnificent mark on your - "

"No."

She made her eyebrows rise in mock astonishment. "Ah, Monsieur le Professeur feels like responding! Such an honour for this stupid little Chinese. Then please, tell me - are you simply mad or is this an elaborate attempt to provoke me?"

"You might be surprised to hear that certain people, at certain moments, do certain things without wasting a single thought on you. In other words, they aren't interested in provoking you, they aren't interested in entertaining you, they aren't interested in you at all ... at certain moments."

Harry's voice sounded calm; a neutral observer might have called it well-tempered. But Cho knew him long enough to notice the unnatural flatness which revealed the fury inside him.

A moment ago, it might have given her some satisfaction, enough to scale down her own style of conversation. Unfortunately, his remark had scored a hit. She snapped, "These are my children as much as yours. If it's about switching from one school to another, I have a saying - "

"That's why I'm here," he interrupted her, "to talk with you - "

"And that's your only reason?" she interrupted the interruption. "Until recently, you called this bloody castle home!"

"I still do." A light sneer played around his lips. "But occasionally, I'm off, and sometimes, I'm off for a longer while - except that I can be found on the continent rather than on an island, to list one difference between you and me."

She tried to read his expression, to understand what he implied ... Was he doing it on purpose? Or was it just -

"But to come back to the point, no, I'm not mad. Carlos and Esmeralda want to leave Hogwarts because that stupid hat sorted them into two different houses. They asked me for help - it's as simple as that."

"Not quite," corrected Cho. "Leaving Hogwarts is one thing. Sending them to that school in Brest is something else, and it's a step I'm not willing to take."

"Why not? That's what they want."

Again, Cho examined her husband's expression. He couldn't possibly be so naive as to expect that this half-baked idea from two eleven-year-olds with an unclear dream about following their adopted father's example would find her approval. She felt like she was listening to a blackmailer, one who used euphemisms to express his demand and gain her support.

After a moment of silence, she said, "They've heard too many stories about Harry Potter, the hero. They want to join his newest adventure. But that's not going to happen, because I don't agree. End of discussion."

"Oh no. It has only just begun."

The temperature had dropped quite a few degrees in Harry's voice. Cho stared at him with some consternation. The growing storm didn't come unexpected - since her memory had made the connection between the mark in Harry's face and the mark in the face of a local wood cutter on Vancouver Island, she had been waiting for it. However, she had expected a tornado rather than a blizzard, a pulling off balance rather than a freezing in place.

As if there was any balance left right now.

"Whatever's going on at the Ecole Gênés can't take too long to be figured out," continued Harry in an almost dismissive tone. "A few months at the maximum. We can afford it, they can afford it, and it will give them something they didn't have before - it will balance out some differences between them and our biological children."

---

Balance again ... Cho knew what Harry was talking about. Sandra and Gabriel had superior magical powers while Esmeralda and Carlos were ordinary children, so to speak, who sometimes might feel inferior to their adoptive siblings. But she wasn't ready to accept the argument, for matters of priority.

"In case it didn't register, let me spell it out for you - I don't agree. Is this clear enough?"

"In case it didn't register, let me remind you - I promised them I would help, and I'm going to keep my promise."

"As if you couldn't help by sending them to a normal school! Beauxbatons would be a choice, joining Gabriel at the Goblins' school would be - "

"One of these schools will be the eventual choice, that's right." Harry's voice grew more steely. "After a period of some weeks or months during which they encounter the adventure of their young life - "

Cho opened her mouth to protest, to remind Harry that several sets of killed parents might qualify for life-time adventures even better, or worse - too much. But Harry had anticipated that.

" - an adventure that's worth its name, one where people don't get killed."

"I recall there being some suicides."

A ghostly smile appeared on Harry's face. "So you listened more attentively than you let on, huh? Don't worry, the beauty of this plan is that I'll never be farther from them than by a few steps or minutes. That's closer than I could be in any other school, and it'll be a smoother transit for getting used to boarding school."

Almost choking on her own anger and frustration, Cho replied, "What's the sense in arguing? You're not going to let go of this crazy idea, and I'm not going to agree. It's an impasse."

"Is it?"

A cold feeling crept up her spine. "What do you mean? If you decided to do what you want, no matter what I'll say, what's the point of having this conversation?"

Harry sighed wearily. "You are confusing - no, I guess we both were confusing two things that should be kept separated. One is the issue of Carlos and Esmeralda, and the other is our own problem. If we can - "

"Forget it!" A short and bitter laugh escaped Cho's throat. "One of them makes me furious, and the other drives me crazy. If you can distinguish them, then you can do more than I. No way, José."

Harry looked calm. "In this case, you were right in one statement. There's no sense in continuing this conversation, because I only wanted to discuss our children with you. I had no intention of starting the big clean-up of our relationship."

Cho stared at her husband in disbelief. "You're cutting me off from this decision?"

"Decision? What decision?"

The calmness was fading even in Harry's face. "It was the bloody hat's decision to put them into separate houses. It was their decision not to accept this separation, and it was by some accident that my job at that school in Brest and their refusal to stay at Hogwarts coincided. For reasons you know well enough, I'm not going to play the family dictator, and I'm not going to let you play it."

"So they can do what they want, and you just nod and say, 'Fine?' And you call that education?"

At these words, an expression appeared in Harry's face that would have scared smaller souls than Cho's. He hissed, "Don't tell me what's education ... And don't tell me anything about who can do what."

Suddenly she was calm herself, as though she had reached the eye of the storm. "Do you mean something in particular?"

Silence.

"I know that you've been in the Vancouver Resort! Sitting at the bar, dressed like a wood cutter - and I didn't recognize you, which is pretty much what you wanted, isn't that so?" Her voice turned shrill. "And I can't help thinking that it's that scene that's running in your mind, because - "

"Stop it!" Harry rose. "I told you, I'm not ready to discuss our relationship today."

"Why not? I might have very interesting news to tell."

"You think so? You really think you can tell me something I don't know yet?" Air popped into the space that had been occupied by Harry's body an instant before.

Cho fought the urge to scream out her fury, for not being able to tell him what she had in mind. A moment later, bitterness welled up in her. Condemned without a hearing ... She should return to Vancouver Island on the spot - ready to commit any crime of which she wasn't guilty yet.

* * *

Harry glanced around in this room he hadn't seen for many years. It looked different from what he remembered ... Smaller, which was normal because his main memory dated back to a time when he'd been a boy of eleven. And more orderly, which was normal as well, considering the room's resident since a few years.

And, of course, the biggest change - there was no longer a phoenix to welcome him, to fly over and sit on his shoulder. Fawkes had left with his owner.

He was at Hogwarts, sitting in the Headmaster's office. Except that the new Headmaster was a Headmistress, Minerva McGonagall, who sat opposite him and beamed.

"I'm more than pleased to see you, Mr Potter. After all these years!"

Despite himself, Harry felt a boyish grin creep into his face. "Hello, Prof - please call me Harry, otherwise I'll start wondering which rule I broke this time."

Professor McGonagall, Head of Gryffindor in his time, nodded in confirmation but didn't stop beaming. "That's true, Harry - although I'd be somewhat disappointed if your visit had to do with ordinary business."

That shook him. "What? Er, sorry, Prof."

McGonagall laughed. "Think back, Harry - whenever we met or talked outside classes, it was because of something irregular. Although I have to admit that it was me who started the habit, when I picked you as the Seeker for the Gryffindor Quidditch team."

He smiled. "Yes."

The old lady flushed a bit. "I owe you, Harry, because from you I learned that rules are only good if you know when you have to break them."

"That wasn't me!" he protested. "That was Professor Dumbledore more than anyone else. By the way, how is he?"

"He's an old man, and happily so, enjoying the quiet evening of an eventful life. And you, Harry? How is your family? I'm afraid we haven't seen as much of them here as we hoped."

Harry felt his own cheeks flush. "I'm sorry, Prof, but you know, with both Sandra and Gabriel things developed not quite as expected by anyone - "

The Headmistress' raised hand stopped him. "I know," she said. "It was more of a joke - of course I have my own sources of information about the most remarkable student who ever left Hogwarts."

Seeing the uneasiness in his face, McGonagall grinned. "I didn't say 'most famous,' mind - this title goes to Voldemort for sure because people will remember him longer than they remember you."

Harry looked relieved. "That's okay. I really prefer not being recognized in the streets."

The witch sobered up a bit. "Is that the reason for the changes in your face, Harry?"

"Er - yes and no, Prof." He felt his cheeks heating again. "Until a few days ago, I looked normal, because even so I could go unnoticed most of the time. This appearance" - he pointed at his forehead - "is a kind of mask, that's true, but for another reason."

Harry had planned to talk about his primary issue first and hadn't known in advance how much he should tell the Headmistress about his plans. But he continued by telling her his and Ron's plan, all the time feeling a tiny bit dishonest because the issue of his own children was still pending.

---

When he paused, after explaining that he would spend some time as a teacher at the French school, Professor McGonagall smiled warmly. "That's so typical of you, Harry ... And of Ron too, by the way. At any rate, I'm sure you will solve the mystery in time. Even today you give me reason to be proud of you."

He felt miserable. "Hold it, Prof - once you've heard me to the end, you won't be proud any longer."

"That's hard to believe, Harry."

"Then listen to this, Prof. I have to take Carlos and Esmeralda away from Hogwarts."

The smile faded from the Headmistress' face. "Why?"

"Because of the Sorting Hat." He explained how his children were sorted into different houses, how they had called him, and what promise he'd given them in advance.

McGonagall looked disappointed. "But ... They'd have different dormitories anyway. Why can't they visit each other? Aren't the houses open to guests?"

Harry shrugged. "They talked with Donovan, the son of Remus and Almyra. According to what he said, the houses seem as closed as they were in my time. What might look natural to me is considered an outdated system by Carlos and Esmeralda. You know, both Sandra and Gabriel made huge efforts to join classes with their respective friends, Héloise and Michel. Carlos and Esmeralda are closer than most biological siblings - "

McGonagall nodded. "I know their story, Harry."

"So you know why I can't break my promise. Maybe it's just a little while - rumour has it that someone from Gryffindor and someone from another house can spend a lot of time together ..."

When the Headmistress smiled sympathetically at these words, Harry felt like a liar.

"... but in the meantime, there's no choice. And what's more, Prof, they want to join me at that school in Brest. They want to show up there in their own kind of disguise in order to help me, as they said ..."

Seeing the expression of disbelief on McGonagall's face, Harry finished quickly, "... and, well, Prof, I wanted to ask you for help in that matter."

She swallowed. "You can't be - " She stopped herself, then started again, "Of course you're serious, always have been." She sighed. "What do you expect from me?"

"Well, Carlos and Esmeralda must be declared magically handicapped in order to qualify for that school, that's obvious. In addition to this, I thought it would be best to specify that they are children who lost their parents - it's true, in a way, and that their being in an English school is quite accidental. After all, their mother was French, their father Spanish - okay, so he was Spanish-American, but no point in mentioning that - therefore they would feel more at home in a French or Spanish environment. Something like that, Prof - together with Ron's help, it should be no problem."

"Children without parents, huh?" McGonagall looked unhappy. "Are you setting them up on purpose?"

"You mean by presenting them as somehow unprotected? But they aren't, Prof - I'll be around all the time, it would take me a few seconds to reach them in case of an urgency."

The Headmistress kept silent for a little while. Then she looked up. "You don't know what you're doing to me, Harry."

"I'm sorry, Prof - I told you that you wouldn't be proud of - "

"No, you don't understand." For McGonagall to interrupt him, it really had to be something that went deeper than losing two famous students. After another short silence, she said, "For years, I had the opportunity to watch how a man I deeply admired was setting up a young boy. That man had the best reasons of the world, but prima facie it was the opposite of what a teacher and Headmaster was supposed to do. That boy was you, Harry, and the outcome is known history."

He waited silently for her to continue.

"At some point during those years, or maybe afterwards, I developed a kind of envy, what you might even call jealousy. I said to myself, 'Some day I'll have the opportunity to do something similar, and if the day arrives, I hope I will have learned my lesson from my own teacher.' I swore to myself to jump over my own shadow, should I be offered the chance."

"I wasn't aware, Prof. If I had known ..."

McGonagall mastered a little smile. "Maybe it's good you didn't know, Harry. Just between you and me, I'm scared in the proverbial sense of my own recklessness, but you being the one who asks me, who's giving me this chance - I take it as a good omen. Sending your children to that school is madness, somehow, but ... What's your wife's comment on that plan?"

"Erm - calling her angry would be a euphemism."

McGonagall looked almost pleased. "In a strange sense, that's an even better omen, Harry - I remember the day when she was shouting at me - at me! - for setting you up. All right - I'll help you, and bite my nails only if nobody's around."

"Thank you, Prof." Only with some effort could Harry manage a smile of encouragement. For him, McGonagall's final argument had all ingredients for backfiring any moment. Keeping silent now made him feel like a liar more than any word he'd said, or swallowed, during the entire conversation.

Even so, he wasn't going to shy off.

* * *

When Carlos came down to the Great Hall for dinner, something made him look to the passage that separated this hall from the Entrance Hall. A man was leaning against a pillar there, a man with a familiar-looking discolouration on his face. His father.

Carlos started to beam, his step speeding up to hurry over. Next moment, he slowed down again and tried to look cool and bored - the figure had made an almost imperceptible gesture that indicated he was to avoid being noticed.

He reached the figure. "Hi, Dad." The words came in a whisper; Carlos was proud that he could produce them without moving his lips.

His father motioned him around the pillar, out of sight from the Great Hall. "Hi, Carlos. Please tell your sister that I'll wait outside, near the lake, for both of you."

"Okay." Excitement rose in Carlos. "She'll be downstairs within the next five minutes - "

"No, have dinner as usual, and let her have her own dinner. Tell her after the meal, then come out to meet me." After a short smile and a gentle push on his son's shoulder, Harry headed for the exit.

Carlos watched him leave for another moment, exhaled deeply, and strolled back to the Hufflepuff table. He sat down, waiting for the dinner to start and for his excitement to calm down.

Their father was here. For him and Esmeralda, the meaning was obvious. Having been called for help, Harry had come to take them to another school. Carlos didn't believe that their father could talk the Sorting Hat into another arrangement. So it could only be another school.

The one in Brest?

Carlos himself had been the one to express the idea first, that he and Esmeralda would join that school as students in disguise. At the time, it had been little more than a joke. But Esmeralda had caught on to the idea. She had emphasized it, and when she had called for help the other day, she had mentioned it as if it were the only feasible alternative to her being stuck in Gryffindor while her brother was in Hufflepuff.

Carlos wondered how much he liked the idea, now that it seemed to come true.

He wasn't scared. Their father would be there, and besides, he didn't get scared easily and even less so since the events which had lost him his real parents, when he'd had the opportunity to see things to be really scared of. But he was concerned.

This particular talent, being concerned for his sister and for himself, had put him into Hufflepuff - so much he'd understood since the Sorting. And now ... Of course, it still could be any other school, Sandra's or Gabriel's or another, but there had been something in his father's face and voice and mind that made Carlos dismiss this possibility at once.

Would he miss Hogwarts? Hufflepuff?

After these few days, it seemed unlikely. But the time had at least been enough to give him an impression of a new quality - a life in which he shared hours with people other than his sister. Nice people, actually. And truth be told, the Gryffindors hadn't chased him off, hadn't even laughed at him - it wasn't impossible to spend an evening in Gryffindor Tower, provided someone let him in because the sympathy didn't extend to the point of telling him the keyword.

Not even Esmeralda had told him, nor had he told her the one for Hufflepuff Tower. House solidarity did strange things to twins, even to twins by fate rather than birth.

During the meal, he kept silent, listening to the chatter of his roommate Martin at the left and the replies from Kenzie, a snub-nosed girl opposite, who occasionally sent him a glance to check whether he would laugh about the same jokes. At least he noticed that much, between his own glances over to the Gryffindor table where he suspected a similar scene was taking place.

When the noise level in the hall rose again, indicating that more people had switched to chewing words rather than food, Carlos waited until he saw Esmeralda glancing over to him. Then he stood up and walked to the exit to the Entrance Hall after signaling his sister that he would wait for her.

---

It took a bit longer than Carlos had expected. Seeing Esmeralda coming around the corner, he also saw the reason for the delay - Bolo at her side, what else?

"That's just the right time to come with the dog," he said, rising from his seat. "Someone's waiting for us outside, at the lake."

"Who? Daddy?"

Another brother, toward another sister, might have made it a teasing game. Carlos could only nod. "Yes."

Girl and dog stormed forward; he followed. Outside, the German shepherd was busy sniffing along the way but only for a few seconds, then he caught something that made him run along the path, nose tight above ground. When they reached him again, Bolo was sitting there, receiving Harry's caresses as he watched them come closer.

"Daddy!" Esmeralda went into her father's hug, for just a few seconds before she asked, "Did you come to help us?"

"Yes."

"Can we come with you? To that school in Brest?"

"Yes." Carlos stared at his father in a mix of admiration and anxiety while Esmeralda hugged him again with seemingly undivided enthusiasm.

"But," said Harry.

"Huh?"

"There is a big but to this help. To come to that school, incognito of course, you must be handicapped, as you know. But you aren't handicapped. Not yet."

Carlos stared at his father in alarm. Not yet??

Esmeralda made it simpler. "What do you mean?"

"Very simple. You must lose your magic."

That did the trick. Esmeralda made a half-step backward to stare at her father in disbelief. "Lose our magic? You can't lose your magic ... And I don't want to lose my magic."

Carlos felt pretty much the same. Well, maybe not quite - Esmeralda loved every minute she spent using her acacia wand, while for him, it was just another class, not so different from Math.

"You can lose your magic," said Harry at this moment. "Of course not completely, you have to be handicapped, not a squib. And not forever, just for the time on this school. But otherwise that's the only way - we can't let you appear with some fake wands, because the first time you'd be forced to use another wand you'd reveal your true nature." He put his hands on Esmeralda's shoulders. "We can find another school for you, where you two will be in the same class, no problem there. Eventually, we'll have to do that anyway, because your time in Brest will be as limited as my own. But if you want to join me in this particular undercover work, your magic must be close to zero."

He looked at Carlos, back at Esmeralda. "So what shall it be?"

Had Carlos been asked first, he would have said, I'll do what Esmeralda is going to do. His father knew of course, and saved time and embarrassment by asking the girl first. However, there was no question about Carlos' own preference - for him, just staying at Hogwarts seemed more agreeable by the second.

Esmeralda exhaled deeply. "Brest."

From the outside, what happened then was rather unspectacular. They walked farther down the lake, out of the protection field around Hogwarts. Harry summoned them to Israel, to the place where the High Priestess rested in her lifetime-preserving environment while she wasn't needed. It was a crusader castle near the Lake Tiberias.

When Aram'chee appeared shortly afterwards, Harry explained to her what they wanted. The High Priestess looked at Carlos and Esmeralda, and when they nodded in agreement, she just touched them - smiling and reassuring them that the fever they'd get wasn't half as dangerous as the versions fourteen years ago, when Aram'chee and the Potter family had met for the first time.

After returning to the lake, they sat down for a few minutes, and Harry explained to them what would happen. The fever would probably start during the night, or the following morning. They would come through after two days or so, and afterwards, their spells would be nearly powerless. But the Headmistress, Professor McGonagall, knew what was going on, and she would handle the issue from inside.

For an instant, Carlos pondered the idea of asking his father how his mother had reacted to this plan. But he knew the answer, aside from a few details, and so it was his turn to save time and embarrassment.