Girl Most Likely

"Hermione."

She barely looked up from her crowded desk. "I'm very busy, Harry."

"Yeah, I figured that was why you cancelled lunch." He cleared a space and put his bags down. "I bought you some sandwiches."

"Oh." She put her quill down. "Thank you … I'm sorry, I'll need to work while we eat." Hermione glared at the parchments around her. "It's chaos … they're threatening to go to the Muggle Prime Minister if the Ministry doesn't meet their demands."

"Do we know who 'they' are, yet?"

"I have people working on that."

"And the weather?"

"I have people working on that, too. In fact, one of them should be here right-"

There was a knock at the door, and a frowning, ruddy-faced man entered. "Madam Granger, I'm afraid these reports aren't-" He looked up and broke off, staring at Harry.

Hermione sighed. "Robert Pluit, this is Harry Potter. Harry, this is Doctor Pluit of the Department of Magical Meteorology."

"Ever so pleased to meet you, Mr Potter," said Doctor Pluit. Harry murmured greetings and returned Pluit's attention to his reports; this was a familiar routine, and judging by the tightness around Hermione's lips, one she wanted curtailed as quickly as possible.

"According to our Seers, Madam Granger, there will be no change in the current weather patterns. They've predicted increased in temperature of between one and three degrees per week, unless the spells are circumvented."

"And circumventing the spells?"

Pluit shrugged. "It's proving … difficult."

"I've contacted several experts," said Hermione, "but the earliest any of them can get here is next week." She shuffled through her papers. "I've consulted with several Muggle meteorologists. They don't understand the situation, of course, but their predictions are even greater than those of your department." She presented Pluit with a flimsy print-out from a Muggle computer. "You should know that I have much more faith in the Muggle calculations than your … prophecies."

"Madam, our Seers-"

"Doctor Pluit, Divination is an inexact art. Muggle meteorology is an imprecise science. Neither is perfect, but one is better. Consider that." She leaned back in her chair. "In fact, consider it quickly. Have you heard of David Goodman? He teaches Weather Magic at Durmstrang, but spends his summers in Britain. He uses Muggle science and old magic to create a - a hybrid magic, if you will. I've made arrangements for you and three of your Seers to travel to Goodman's home in the Orkney Islands."

"Madam, my family-"

There was a flicker of compassion in Hermione's eyes. "I'm sorry. They'll just have to do without you until you return. It should only be a matter of weeks, Doctor Pluit - and then we can all rest a little easier. I hope. Your briefing notes and orders are in this folder."

Pluit bowed his head and accepted the papers she offered him. "Yes, ma'am." He left quickly, without another word.

Amused, Harry said, "Ron always said you were dangerous. I like a woman with power."

"So does my husband," she said with the ghost of a smile.

"Well that was more than I wanted to know about your marriage … is all this stress good for the baby?"

"I'd rather be stressed now than giving birth in tropical heat in eight months' time. Though I can afford to take a step back, now. I don't have to single-handedly save England - just make sure the right information gets to the right people." She gave him a speculative look. "Is there something wrong, Harry?"

"Nothing. Just…" I seem to be having lustful thoughts about a fifteen year old girl, and I'm willing to risk your I-told-you-so if you can find a way to make it stop without letting anyone else find out… "You're busy."

"Too right. I need to save England from an unprecedented ecological and political disaster, while producing the next generation of Weasley offspring. I need a holiday."

"I could go."

"No, stay. I hate to cancel our lunch. What was it you wanted to talk about?"

Harry outlined the previous night's conversation. He briefly considered mentioning his own dreams, and decided against it. She might ask Ron to keep an eye on him - for his own good, of course.

"And you think it might be some sort of Dream Magic?" Hermione guessed when he was done.

"Possibly. It can be stimulated by any kind of magic, can't it?"

"Not precisely … the spells can be maintained through most forms of magic, but the connection is always created with a potion, or a series of potions. But it's almost unheard of in England these days."

"There's another option, anyway. It occurred to me this morning that a memory charm has this effect on some people. Dreams and so forth."

Hermione bit her lip. "Tell me again what she said about Burke, the day you questioned her."

"She said that she'd never met the man. In all the years before he disappeared, when he lived in the same house as Borgin, she never even laid eyes on him. He's always been reclusive - a silent partner, you might say - but surely he wouldn't hide himself from a thirteen-year-old girl?"

"I don't think he did," Hermione said softly.

"Maybe he didn't hide anything. Maybe he showed her too much."

"Do mean that in a sexual sense?"

Harry froze. "I - no. Or at least, there's no evidence. If there is a memory charm, then whatever's under it - I don't think it's that … sort of thing. But I expect that she'd be able to tell us an awful lot about Borgin and Burke's business practices. How much do you know about memory charms?"

"Quite a lot, actually, through Neville. For one thing, the traditional method of breaking one is a good round of Cruciatus. There are … better methods now, of course, but they're not always effective. Memory charms vary in form, depending on the caster and the subject, and the strength of the charm … brain structure is the key factor…"

"So you'll help?"

"Of course. Why wouldn't I? I might have time now… tonight. I'll steal a few hours tonight."

***

The mood at the dinner table was tense, but only Lilith felt fear rather than anticipation. Potter cooked, displaying a familiarity with the Muggle kitchen appliances that surprised and impressed her. Weasley and Granger retreated to the lounge room for a quiet, intense discussion. Lilith watched them for a moment, then returned to Harry.

As if reading her mind, he said, "You should have seen it when we were at school. Even before they were going out, it was like no one else existed. Arguing is like a hobby for them."

"It doesn't look like they're having fun."

Harry paused, concentrating on the carrots he was slicing. "The quiet ones are the worst," he said finally. "And they have a lot on their minds at the moment."

"Weasley hates me. And he hates that Granger has only left her office to help me."

"That's … a simplification."

"Is it?"

They were saved from further discussion by the entrance of Lisa Turpin, teasing Harry about his overreaction to a milk concoction brewed by Marion the night before.

"Does everyone know about that?" asked Potter. "Honestly, for the best Aurors in Britain, you lot are awfully gossipy."

"We're a close-knit group, Harry. Or at least, that's what the Daily Prophet says, and who am I to argue with the Daily Prophet?"

Harry hissed, and Lisa started laughing. Feeling the beginnings of a migraine, Lilith retreated to the dining room to wait for dinner.

Her headache was no better after she'd eaten, but it was no worse, either. She'd feared that the perceptive Granger would notice her discomfort, but Hermione was fixated on the intellectual riddle before her. It was Harry who gave her a reassuring look, which was no comfort at all. Lilith felt like she'd been stripped bare, and they hadn't even begun.

Granger found a piece of parchment and enlarged it so that it covered half the dining room table. She enchanted three quills, each charmed to write in a different colour, and turned to face Lilith.

"Right. Our first task is to create a map of Lilith's brain structure … or more precisely, track the physical effects of magic on her brain."

Lilith bit her lip, determined that the Gryffindors should not see her fear. Turpin was a Ravenclaw, she recalled, but she regarded Lilith with the same muted hostility as Weasley. Lilith ignored them, looking past Granger's shoulder. Potter met her eyes, but looked away, his expression unreadable.

So I'm alone, then? Lilith thought. Fine. It's really nothing new.

But not even anger could distract her from the fear, and when Potter met her eyes again and gave her a small, reassuring smile, it melted away.

The lecture over, Granger returned her attention to Lilith. "Don't be scared," she said.

Too late.

Granger began to chant quietly in Latin and Arabic, and the world around Lilith became very hazy.

She was twelve, almost a third year, accompanying her father to Diagon Alley. He was newly promoted, and wore his new authority with a slight discomfort, like a man wearing a cloak too large for him. A stranger caught her eye, calling out to her. He said he was her uncle, but then her father pushed her away, lingering to speak to the man in icy, bitter tones…

An owl arrived in the middle of the night, carrying a letter. Carrying freedom, of sorts, advice on how she could slip away from her guardians unnoticed for short periods of time.

She was six, about to go to school for the first time. Her father spoke to her, urgently and softly.

"We are different, you must have realised it by now. It is very important - it is imperative - that you not tell the Muggles about magic. I know you can keep secrets, Lilith…"

He touched her face, briefly. He rarely touched her, and the caress was awkward, though gentle.

She was younger still, crying into Aunt Arabella's shoulder after a nightmare woke her.

These were normal memories, that she sometimes recalled deliberately. Not that she cared to.

Granger's incantation became louder, more insistent. Lilith's sense of separation increased. Something nagged at her, a quiet voice and a whisper of scales. A woman singing a lullaby. Her father speaking to Arabella. A classroom - Defence Against the Dark Arts - Professor Lupin lecturing on basic hexes and jinxes. Margie Leary laughing, laughing at her, and the satisfaction of drawing her wand on the stupid Gryffindor. Her father's fury. His figure melted into Potter's, but when she looked more closely, Harry's green eyes had become part of a different face, younger and colder.

I am-

"I am your father and you will-"

A diary and a little girl-

A laughing, blushing woman on the front page of a newspaper-

Two frightened boys, no more than sixteen, brave in spite of their fear. Ron's face was pale and hard beneath the blood, bruises and freckles, but the other boy had a maturity beyond his years, in spite of the lingering puppy fat-

Her uncle, laughing, throwing a comment at someone she couldn't see-

A potion - a plan -

The colours were too bright, and a stab of pain shot behind Lilith's eyes. She groaned, and the spell was broken.

"What?" Granger demanded, "what did you see?"

"N-nothing - nothing - the light, it's too bright, my head-"

"Nox," said Potter, and the lights dimmed. She relaxed, just a little, but didn't take her hands away from her eyes. "What happened?" he asked.

Lilith was too nauseous to speak, but Granger said, "I have no idea. I couldn't seem to break through the barriers."

"Barriers? Are they natural?" asked Weasley.

"I can't tell. Some people just create them, and some kinds of spells … I suppose it might even be hereditary."

"We really don't know much about the effects of magic on the pathways of the brain," said Turpin pointedly. Granger snorted, probably irritated that the ignorance of the world at large, and herself in particular, had been brought to light.

"Genetic factors are something of a mystery, too," she said.

Lilith drew her knees up to her chest and curled in on herself, unwilling to listen to the scientific analysis of her brain. Potter touched her shoulders.

"Are you alright?"

"Migraine."

Without taking his eyes from her face, he said to Weasley, "She needs a dose of the Analgesic Potion - you remember the sort. Where do you keep it?"

"Bathroom."

Weasley's footsteps seemed to echo through her mind, but that was only an illusion.

Harry removed his hands from her shoulders and watched until Weasley returned with the Potion. The dose was smaller than she was accustomed to taking these days - she suspected that Potter knew it too - but she said nothing as Weasley helped her drink. The pain receded, and she was able to open her eyes. Turpin helped her upstairs in silence.

Lilith could feel Potter's eyes on her back as she walked away.

***

As soon as Lilith was out of earshot, Harry said, "What did you get?"

Hermione handed him the parchment. It was covered with random squiggles and lines. Harry couldn't make heads or tails of it, and said so.

"Of course not," said Hermione impatiently, "it's meaningless."

"We haven't exactly been following magical psychowhosit, love," said Ron, sounding tired. "You'll have to explain it a bit."

"Psychiatry. And there's not a lot to follow, yet. Just a lot of theories, old legends and new diagnostic charms. Neville is forging new ground, just creating a baseline will be a lifetime's work." Hermione led them into the kitchen and put the kettle on. As they waited for it to boil, she explained, "Even Muggles don't know much about the human brain, or the relationship between the physical brain and the human … mind. Personality."

"Soul?" asked Lisa, returning from upstairs.

"If you like. Magical research into this area is even more primitive than the Muggle, given the state of mental health care in magical Britain. The Americans are a few steps head of us here, though Neville is helping us catch up. But the current theory is that exposure to magic changes the structure of the brain itself. Using magic magnifies this. Different forms of magic work in different ways."

"So Dark magic erodes the user's capacity for empathy," said Ron. "Aurors have known that for centuries."

"That's only legend, not a consistent observation. And it's impossible to quantify something like empathy-"

"Yes, but we know it-"

"Fine. Research suggests that the link between Dark magic and a person's capacity for empathy are linked. And conversely, certain healing charms increase it. Extended exposure to one spell, or one class of spell, leave their mark on the brain. In theory -though the average witch or wizard is exposed to a lot of different kinds of magic - we sometimes can track these changes, but as you saw this evening, that's not always the case."

"Why would this happen?" Harry waved the useless parchment at Hermione.

"Well, it could be that Lilith's brain was deliberately shielded. Or that she has unconsciously learnt to shield herself. Or it could be natural - some people are just - closed." Hermione fixed Harry with a piercing look. "You would be an interesting study…"

"Do I look like a guinea pig to you?"

"Not yet. But remember, I got the highest marks in Transfiguration for twenty years."

"Of course, there's one other possibility," said Ron carefully. "Maybe Hermione got the spell wrong."

She frowned, but didn't argue. "It's not my area," she admitted. "I've only ever done it twice before. But I got it right on both occasions, and I did a lot of reading this afternoon…"

The kettle boiled. Lisa rose to her feet and poured the tea, bringing the pot and cups over to the kitchen table. It was almost ten-thirty at night, and Ron dimmed the lights, so the house would not seem prominent in a sleepy suburb. The remaining illumination came from a small lamp, and the Guardian Potions.

"What classes of spells leave distinctive traces?" Lisa asked. "What about Imperius and Obliviate?"

"They tend to block off certain areas of the brain - the severity depends on how much is being Obliviated, or how long one is kept under Imperius."

"Or how strong the caster is," said Harry.

"Precisely. Now, Cruciatus disrupts all higher brain function, and rearranges neural pathways - the Killing Curse does the same thing, to a much greater extent, of course. That's how it can break through a Memory Charm."

"Provided it doesn't drive you mad first," said Ron. "Am I the only one who finds it significant that Eugenia Lestrange had a knack for both memory charms and Cruciatus?"

"Her Memory Charms were a lot more careless than her Cruciatus." Hermione shrugged. "Anyway, I'm more interested in Lilith's pre-natal exposure to Dementors. I'm not convinced there's a Memory Charm at all - this could all be the result of that experience."

"You mean it created a block?" asked Harry.

"Possibly … it's obvious that the Dementors had some effect. Lilith doesn't always seem present, emotionally. I'm not sure how to phrase it, and I might be completely wrong … she is very guarded, and I'm not always good at reading people." Hermione glanced at Ron, who completely failed to mention Gilderoy Lockhart. "But it seems as though she only exhibits an emotional response - a positive emotional response - in Harry's presence."

"So she's a sulky, infatuated teenager," said Lisa, "that doesn't make her special."

"Yeah," said Ron, "we see those all the time."

"I know, but … I'd like to see her interact with Professor Snape, actually. Someone who knows her very well."

"Could sell tickets. The irresistible force meets the immovably sarcastic object."

"Very funny."

"I'm serious! We'd make a fortune!"

"Back to the problem at hand," said Harry before the bickering could go any further, "what do we do next?"

"Well, that's up to you, Harry." Hermione sipped her tea. "I'm really only a consultant, after all - and an amateur at that."

"What about Neville, then? He's the expert, and a Muggle doctor, even if he's not a full mediwizard yet."

"I know … but there's a reason I never suggested calling him in before."

"How do you think he became the country's expert in magical psychiatry in the first place?" said Ron grimly.

"He wouldn't refuse to help," said Harry, "Lilith is a child - a victim, not a - I've never liked the concept of hereditary guilt."

Whatever Hermione was about to say was lost, for at that moment, the Guardian Potions turned red, and a muffled shriek came from upstairs.