Ticking of the Clock

The long staircases to the top floor seemed steeper now than they had a year earlier. Loup waited until all of the faculty should be tucked into their classrooms lecturing. She'd avoided this area of the castle. There were too many bad memories and it stank of failure to her. At the top of the last flight, her steps slowed and it took more resolve than she had thought to turn and head down the hallway. The door to Richard Lester's office was open, showing an office where no one spent any time now. Boxes of the now-deceased department head's possessions were stacked against the walls, reaching only two deep. Lester had worked at the school for many years, but there was little to hint of the man who had lived there.

Down the dark hallway she padded, slowing again at the next staircase to peer down at the doorway set at the first landing. That had been her room, a place where she had felt captive while Lester had lived before she had finally struck back. A glance back the direction she had come and she set herself back on her quest. The Defense Against the Dark Arts department's staff room was dark and empty. She checked carefully to make sure that no one lurked there and then slipped in.

There was nothing special about that particular room save its placement. Next to it was the library. After some debate, she left the door open, the better to hear anyone approaching. Systematically, she cast spells over the wall that separated her from the library. Each spell showed her a bit of the defensive structure that had guarded the contents. Years of work, much of it done as demonstrations to upper level classes, sealed the library from her. Breaking it was possible, but it would take time and would probably be detected. With Magda's biological clock ticking, there wasn't enough time.

With the imaginary clock counting away, she examined the main doorway and the elaborate carvings that surrounded it. The charms there were both tricky and humorous. She'd expected a lot of security around the room and was encouraged to find little that could not be broken with a minimal effort. A few detection spells, designed to see and record everyone entering and leaving disturbed her and there was a nasty paralysis spell that would not only thwart most invaders, but also leave them paralyzed for hours. Countering the paralysis spell would be difficult. In a deep niche created in the twining of carved leaves, something sparkled. The Exhibeo spell showed little that she could identify and, as she brought her wand in closer to try another tactic, the enchantment activated. Glowing letters spiraled out of the niche, spelling, "Go away! Private! No one comes in here except the best that ever was!" that then exploded into achingly white splats, blinding her.

Eyes squeezed shut, she staggered into the wall. The spell would no doubt trigger others and the last thing she wanted was to be caught there. She had no friends among the Defense Against the Dark Arts Professors and they would be certain to mention her transgression to the Headmaster. One hand sliding along the wall, she felt her way to the stairway and then leaned against the wall as she tripped down the stairs. It seemed a long way down until her shoulder bruised up against the thick wood molding surrounding a door. The scrape of her hands searching for the doorknob sounded loud to her, but not as loud as voices above her. Her hand found the knob, which she turned and pushed, falling into the room that she had lived in not so very long ago. Her first gasp of relief changed into choking. The room reeked. Her grimoires had saturated the carpet and drapes with their sweet, rotting smell and the staff had attempted to combat the odor with some sort of floral-scented cleaning substance. The combination was nauseating. She yanked her nose under her sweater then stumbled about the room until she found the window and forced it open. Not certain whether to curse her stupidity or laugh at the spell, she leaned out the window and waited for her sight to return.

The bells tolled for the next classes before she could see properly. With nothing to corroborate her guess, she deduced that the spell had to been set by Heiniger or maybe Berger. They both had twisted senses of humor. The hubris sounded more like Heiniger than Berger. The staircase outside shook as students thundered down for their next class and voices seemed pulled in both directions as friends called to each other. Stuck in the storage room, Loup ticked off choices. The doorway and one wall were too well guarded. That left two other walls, the roof and the floor below.

When all was quiet and her vision restored, she cracked the door, peered this way and that and took a long inhalation to scent for anyone. The dust in the room set off a sneezing attack. Cursing and sniffling, she tried again to find a way in.

The other side of the library turned out to be an outside wall. The floor below was divided between three classrooms, all occupied and all part of the Transfiguration department. Before she tried the floor below, other options had to be explored as well. The corridors played tricks, twisting and leading to places she didn't expect. A cold draft led her to a balcony. Standing there, wind piercing through her robes, discovering a way through the roof seemed dim. Halfheartedly, she tried stepping onto the railing to see if she could climb up. When her foot slipped, that idea was discarded. The roof might work, but the amount of effort seemed extreme and too dangerous.

Her teeth chattered uncontrollably as she scanned along the outside wall of the castle, counting back until she was certain that she knew at where the library was. Three large windows marked what she thought was the room. Statues dotted the outside irregularly. There were empty pedestals to either side of the windows. Her hopes began to sink. Too regular. Something must be there. In answer, the wind screamed and it began to snow. Loup drew her robes tightly around her, still looking for an answer. A particularly fierce gust swept a chunk of snow off the roof and the icy mass bounced against the empty plinth where the statue would have been. The soft glow shown briefly. Wards.

The bells tolled again, reminding Loup that it was lunchtime and, at last, there was something to be happy about.

Damp from the snow and freezing, she raced down the stairs to the Great Hall. The air was heavy with the smell of yet another meal of wurst, cabbage and potatoes. Her enthusiasm waned, but not enough to miss the meal. As she shoved her way onto the end of the bench, her appearance caused some odd looks.

"Lousy day to hunt," Wronski observed briefly before he returned to reading a magazine.

Haken's scrutiny ended with a slight "hmph" before he resumed eating.

The icy glare of Gregorov chilled her more than the storm had. It took a long time to conjugate the verb, but she stumbled through, "Please pass the bread" in horribly accented Russian. If she looked hard enough, she could see the anger leak away slowly. One stupid mistake, she mused, accepting the bread, and I'm suspect forever.

The hour for lunch ended with the sound of benches scraping. Loup sipped her second cup of coffee, lost in the puzzle of the library. Gregorov had thawed over the last half-hour until he deigned to ask about the status of tomorrow's homework. There was an uncomfortable pause before Loup had to admit that she hadn't started it yet. The pale eyes squinted as they ticked over her, looking for a sign that she was planning something he didn't approve of. Probably not satisfied at her innocence, he rose from the bench, a lingering hand on her shoulder the only sign that she had regained any shred of trust.

As the plates were clattered onto platters and the detritus of the meal cleared away, she tried to figure out a way into that protected room. Nothing seemed obvious. Nothing that wouldn't alert someone before she found the book and got out with it.

"Few would expect a bird to care."

The sound startled her, causing her to drop her mug. Coffee splattered in a steaming arc around her as the mug bounced off the table. With a large drop hanging from her nose, she spun around towards the voice. Gilles de Rais shook his head as he stared down at her. "You are a fool. It is not wise what you do."

She tried to form a pithy reply, but none came. She knew she was a fool. Frustrated at herself, she picked up the mug and refilled it.

A soft shuffle of fabric came from de Rais' direction and a crisp linen handkerchief was offered with one wave of a black gloved hand. "Use it."

Hesitantly, she took it, half expecting a trick. De Rais mimed with delicate movement that she should dab at her face. The snowy white handkerchief came back dotted with coffee-colored spots.

"It will not help," de Rais said. "You will need to look in another place for an answer."

Dejected, she silently agreed with her mentor. Sounding as defeated as she felt, she asked, "What would you suggest?" The empty hall gave no answer.

By late afternoon, the storm blew itself out. The sky was dark with the pledge of a renewed attack, but the wind no longer howled. Loup stood against the curtain wall and stared up at the castle, trying to figure out how to get up there. The anti-Apparition spells deprived her of a quick answer. Levitation spells were too slow. Climbing the walls was suicide. She would need to get up to the windows, look for an unwarded spot or break the wards there, get in, find the book and get out. Out. Another problem. How to get up there and then get down.

"I have searched for you today. Where have you been?"

Loup winced when she heard Magda. "I've been trying to do some research."

"Ah. Did Yuri offer to help? He can be kind, as well you know." Magda, muffled in a long coat and wrapped in a brightly-patterned scarf could barely be seen.

Rocking back on her heels, Loup took a long last look at the block stone walls. "There's a book up there that could help. Yuri won't."

Magda shielded her eyes as she followed Loup's stare. "In the library? Why do you not borrow it or study it there?"

"Restricted section. DADA. I don't have the authorization. Could you get one?"

"I? No. Is there no way to get into the library? Is it well protected?"

"Very. The best bet might be through those windows, but I haven't figured out how to do it yet. I might be able to find a way through the floor, but I have to wait until the Transfiguration classes are over." Loup turned towards Magda and shrugged as if in defeat.

"You could fly," Magda suggested.

"The levitation spells are too slow and hard to manage on yourself. You could help."

"No. You do not understand. You could fly. A broom."

Closing her eyes, Loup had a vision of spiraling into the ground atop a broom, screaming the entire way down. "You could do it."

"I can fly, but I am not adept at burglary. I had not thought you were."

"I'm not a thief!" Loup retorted. "There are times things must be acquired. If you want me to do the memory work, I have to know how to do it. Right now, I can't promise anything. I don't suppose you'd like to wait until next month? I might be able to convince someone to get the book for me by then or find someone else who could walk me through the spells."

Small shoulders hunched and seemed to shake. Her voice thick, Magda seemed close to sobbing. "You do not understand how important this is to me. Each month, I cry. I do not mean to ask a great deal from you. You have already been so kind to me. I, I do not deserve to ask this of you."

A bit thick, Loup thought as Magda's hand brushed away tears. "Look. I'm trying to help. I'm strong enough, but I've never done this kind of work before. I think I can take care of short-term memory, but I don't think I can plant anything deep. This would only deal with the here and now, right? If so, then I can probably learn what I need to know from the text."

"You believe you can get in from the window?" Magda stepped back to get a better look. "There is a ledge one could use to stand on. I do not believe it is large enough for two. Perhaps one person alone could accomplish this."

Loup pushed her hair out of her face and shuddered, not from the cold but from the vision of spiraling to her death on the broom. "There must be a better way."

"Soon, it will be dinner time and everyone will be in the Great Hall. It should not take so very long, no?"

With the persistent vision of crashing repeating in her imagination, Loup found herself being dragged across the grounds towards the Quidditch pitch.

The brooms were stored in five different rooms in the stadium. The ones reserved for the four divisions were ignored in favor of the ones kept in what Loup thought looked like a posh club. The coaches and referees had created a comfortable room, complete with overstuffed chairs, enormous couches, a fully stocked bar and an assortment of provocative photos of women wearing remnants of Quidditch gear and doing things with their brooms that made Loup blush. All the years she had lived in Paris in an area close to some of the most sordid clubs in le quartier magique and she'd never seen quite that pose.

Magda ignored the décor in favor of a large armoire that loomed next to the door to the pitch. The petite woman selected a pair of brooms from the locker and turned to find Loup staring at the floor. "Here, this will do nicely. It is fast and very maneuverable."

The thing Magda handed Loup did not look anything like what Loup considered a broom. It was black, the shaft crooked at an odd angle where hands might grip and the brush part looked as though a band of brass had been compressed around the straw, but it wasn't straw. It smelled odd. Sniffing it cautiously, Loup thought she detected the smell of ozone or maybe it was some other chemical. The scent made the small hairs at the nape of her neck stand in alarm.

"Do you know the cushioning charm?" Magda's voice telescoped away as she exited onto the field.

Cushioning charm? Loup started in alarm. A charm? She had thought you just sat on the thing and it flew. She wasn't quite certain how to carry it. The balance was different from any household broom she'd handled in some unimaginably distant past. Those were for cleaning; this thing was for a modern art museum. With the not-straw brush bashing against her heels, she followed Magda out onto the shadowed pitch.

Practices were over for the day. The field was empty and rapidly being eclipsed by the shadows of the stadium walls. The first stars had begun to wink overhead, amused by the spectacle of Loup trying to copy Magda's easy mount onto the broom. Long coat and all, the smaller woman looked as though she was ready for a fashionable jaunt. Loup's massive black cloak tangled and bunched around her until she flung it away in frustration.

Imitating the simple kick-off should have been simple. Perhaps it was the lack of faith that ruined it, but instead of rising like a bird, the evil-looking black broom with its frightened black-clad sorceress stumbled into the soft turf to leave an ugly gouge there. With clipped impatience, Magda tried again and again to get Loup into the air. As the last of the daylight blinked into the starry darkness, Loup managed to rise a few feet off the ground. The broom shook bone-joltingly as Loup, draped full-length over the handle, clung to it. For something all of the students spoke of as better than anything they had ever experienced, it felt like hell to her. Craning her neck, she could just make out the dark shape of Magda effortlessly circling the long stadium.

Ego and pride were the only things keeping her on the broom. Slowly, she pushed herself back until she sat upright. The broom stopped its shuddering. Encouraged, she tried leaning back a bit to change the attitude and the broom shot upwards. The acceleration was not what she expected. Instead of lazily climbing, the far-too-engineered broom was built for racing, not touring, and it screamed upwards into the night. Terrified by the height and frozen by the icy wind that pierced her clothing and made her eyes water, Loup desperately tried to recall how to stop it. The best she managed was to swing it into a circle and blaze around the pitch. All she wanted was to get off the damn thing and walk away in one piece. Magda screamed instructions, but all she could hear were sounds, not words. Angling the handle down was a huge mistake. The ground instantly appeared before her and a savage jerk upward sent her hurtling back into the skies. I'm going to die on this thing, was the thought that kept repeating. Gripping the handle with numb hands, she leaned forward again until it leveled out, streaking again around the pitch. Squinting, she hung on, hoping that it would wear out or run out of magic.

The broom bounced hard into something that gradually gave, stretching like a huge sail until someone grabbed the handle and forced the broom with its whimpering rider down onto the ground. Dismounting was accomplished by rolling off and Loup grabbed tight into the turf to convince herself that the wild ride was over.

"She has never been on a broom before and you gave her a Peregrinus 6 to learn upon?" The voice sounded familiar, but Loup's nerves were too shot to identify it. She could hear Magda mumble a reply, but all that Loup cared about was being on the ground and not feeling the air stab at her eyes. The owner of the familiar voice tossed her cloak over her and slowly warmth returned.

She heard a soft, thudding sound and a furry shape appeared, light in the dark. "Little wolf?" Gregorov asked after he had shifted. He asked no other questions as he drew her close.

* * *

"No. I won't do it. I'm never getting on one of those things again." Loup leaned against the sink and folded her arms tight across her chest. "Once was enough."

"This time," Magda said reassuringly, "I will find an easier broom. There are others that the children learn upon. I had thought that you would be able to handle that one."

"No."

"You said that you needed the book. You said that the only way in would be through the windows." Magda, who had been drinking a cup of coffee, slammed the mug down on the table where she sat. "I thought you my friend and that you would help me."

Loup looked away, trying to understand what the boundaries of this rather new-to-her term really meant. For her entire career as a dark mage, she couldn't recall ever having anyone who was truly a friend. It wasn't safe. Wasn't wise to put that much faith into someone other than yourself. She'd seen friendships suddenly come apart once money or ambition got in the way. Acquaintances, yes. Lovers, a few, perhaps too few. Peers, certainly, but friends, no. Magda had done many little favors for her over the last few years. The little woman had remembered her birthday; brought soup when she had caught a cold; tried to smooth out the various problems with the others when her arrogance and sharp tongue had caused problems and had interceded when Gregorov and she had come close to leaving each other. How much was owed?

"I will help you. Isn't there another way? Why a memory charm? Can't you just put the glamour onto yourself and seduce him that way?"

"Paul is different from most men. I suspect that he would prefer to woo rather than seduce. I have not the time for courtship. I want a baby, not another husband." Slightly mollified, Magda refilled her mug. "I know you do not understand my need. My sister and brothers all have children. I see them when I visit. They are so sweet and they bring so much joy to their families. I want that joy as well. Ludwig only sees his own needs and seems to care little for mine. If he does not wish to be a father, then let me be a mother."

"Not understand" was an understatement. "I want to help," Loup said wearily. "I just don't know how yet. If it's just having him want to have sex, that shouldn't be difficult. There are any number of spells that could be used. That's easy. You could start today if you're willing to let me cast those sorts of spells."

"You have done that sort of thing before?" Magda quirked an eyebrow and leaned back, an arm draped over the chair next to her.

Looking decidedly uncomfortable, Loup nodded. "I've worked a lot of spells that convince people to do other than what they want to do. The Imperius Curse is what springs to mind when most people think about that sort of thing, but there are many other ways to achieve the same result. I never liked the Imperius, it tends to make the subject look glazed and they can sometimes shake it off. It's a nice show of power." Loup started to warm to the topic. "For many of my clients, I've used something personal from the target and then, with a few drops of blood from the client, since that's probably the best binding agent, I can tie the target to the client. The actual manipulation of the target's will depends on what the client needs done. The whole love/lust/avoidance/celibacy spectrum is one of the easiest to achieve since baser instincts are always at the surface." She took a deep breath, preparing to continue her lecture but Magda interrupted her.

"No. I understand what you are saying. It is an option. Still," Magda looked uncertain, "I feel that having a memory to tie the act to would help. Especially with Paul, as he seems so innocent to me."

Inwardly, Loup groaned. Magda had built a pretty picture around the Potions teacher.

"I would like him to have fond memories of a woman so that it would not affect him in the future." Magda looked up coyly and smiled. "It is what I would like to have tried first. Would it be so very difficult to at least try for me?"

* * *

Try Loup did. Tried to get into the Transfiguration classrooms at lunch only to find that there were students still in all of them. From the hallway, she could see some hideous mistakes from the day's lessons. Some were humorous such as the feathered book, but the thing that quivered on the teacher's desk in the first classroom made her gag. The smell reminded her of a particularly noxious dark spell.

She ascended to the top floor again to look for any weaknesses. Lester's office was now empty of the boxes that had been there and a piece of paper was on the desk. The corridor was empty. The other Defense Against the Dark Arts professors' offices were all shut tight. Skulking to the door, she worked an Exhibeo to check for any spells. An old glow, greatly tattered, hinted at an old spell, possibly her own to check for Lester. It bore the look of a broken piece of work. She shifted to the wolf and slunk under the line where the spell would have checked for motion. The piece of paper had a list of names. She recognized two from a previous list, a list of applicants for the position that was to have been vacated when Jessup retired. The old man complained loudly about having to wait yet another year to retire. Now, the Defense department needed to hire not one, but two professors or reorganize and shuffle class loads around to fit a smaller staff. Very unlikely. Giving up positions in a department was unheard of, a loss of prestige. None of the names stood out, but the question next to one made her wrinkle her forehead in confusion. What would the phase of the moon have to do with an interview?

Shifting back, she crept out the door and padded down the hallway to the staff room to check again for any weaknesses. The wall provided an exercise in frustration. The warding was very good and quite thorough. The stones in the wall were all quite firm. No hidden passageways, no trick doors, no illusionary walls. All in all, a very strong wall even without the enchantments there. The door to the library filled her with trepidation. Far more cautious this time, she inspected the wall leading up to the door, all around the door itself (avoiding any inviting dark places in the stone carving decorating the jamb) and the wall beyond all yielded nothing she could use. The best she could think of doing was to run in when someone else entered, hoping to fool any spell set.

It took less time to find the hall that led to the outside balcony that time. The weather was much better. Enjoying the false winter sunshine, she leaned this way and that, trying to get a look from different angles, but to little avail. The roof was steeply pitched and icy glinted dully in patches. With little effort, she excluded the roof as an option. Her stomach rumbled, reminding her that the lunch hour was almost over.

A dispirited Loup trudged down the staircase and stopped again to see if the Transfiguration classrooms were empty. The last had a few early students chatting in it, but the other two held nothing but furniture. Spurred by the knowledge that she only had a few moments, she ran through her spells and swore when both rooms' roofs showed the same level of warding that the walls had. The last classroom undoubtedly had the same defenses.

As the bells tolled and the students tromped upwards to their classes, Loup fought her way against the flow until she pushed through to the main hall. Nothing was working out right. She wandered into the Great Hall, hoping to get some lunch and was told that she was too late. Not even lunch. As she turned to leave, someone yelled for her. She didn't have to turn; she recognized the voice and any chance for the day to improve vanished when Bette, the kitchen manager, reminded her that she needed to earn her keep in the kitchens.

Several hours later, Loup was released from drudgery. Dinner would be in two hours and she still had grading to complete for the next day. Grumbling to herself, asking what else could go wrong, tempted fate.

Halfway down the front steps, she nodded a greeting at Rolf Haken who held out a hand to stop her. "I did not realize that you wished to learn how to fly." Haken, always smiling, seemed helpful. Loup took a step back and half hoped that Bette would call for her again. Rolf Haken didn't belong at Durmstrang. He had crafted an image of a harmless professor of the Introductory Dark Arts, taught children and seemed endlessly interested in everyone. Loup was one of the few who wasn't fooled. Haken found that disconcerting. One person who might question was annoying, but Loup had pointed certain things out to her mate and, if Gregorov knew something, then Siegfried Kessler knew it as well. "Come. Practice is over. I have an hour to help."

They held each other's eyes, each waiting for the other to back down. Pride, always Loup's downfall, won. "Thank you. I don't think I'm ready yet for the black one that Magda loaned me."

"Ah, no. While that model is very swift, it is not the one to begin with. I feel that a Nova 3 would be more to your liking." With a squint that suggested either malice or amusement, Haken turned away from the castle and they began the long walk to the pitch.

The Nova 3 broom was a scraggly affair. Unlike the evil-looking black broom, the Nova 3 looked very much like a broom. Straight wooden handle, straw bent in all directions and it was sticky with what smelled to be apple juice. Not at all like the thing of speed and fear, this was friendly, non-threatening. Rather ratty.

In the last hour of sunlight, on a field that was still being used for practice, Haken loudly and very helpfully taught Loup how to fly. Degrading would be the term for the exercise. Her temper grew black as her eyes as he made her practice taking off, landing and circling around the goal posts - all at the slowest speed possible. Embarrassing though it was, she needed to fly slowly. It looked simple when the experienced ones flew, but finding your center of gravity and keeping balanced was hard work for a tall novice. Her toes repeatedly dragged on the ground despite Haken's cheerily yelled reminders to keep her ankles tucked. Humiliated, but hardly humbled, she finished the lesson with a stumbled landing that was celebrated by ragged applause. Apparently, the news of her "lesson" had been leaked and a small audience had assembled.

It was hard to look Gregorov in the eye, but he sweetened the awful experience with a hug. Kessler opted to grind her inability in as he casually demonstrated some tricks on a broom that could barely be seen beneath him. Point taken, Loup leaned heavily on her mate and tried to ignore Kessler's loudly delivered advice.

* * *

Homework seemed to swell all of the folders. The sheer mass of the stuff weighted her spirits as she read through the assignments of two days' past. Gregorov graded tests while Loup tried to focus on the essays that she had coerced her mate into assigning instead of the easier fill-in-the-blank work he had used before. The answers all seemed inane to her. Little depth of knowledge of the topic or originality shown from the first three papers. A third of the way into the fourth, she realized why. They were all the same essay, a little rewording here and there, but essentially the same. Large "0"s were blazoned across those. With little conversation and a lot of sighing, she worked her way through two classes' worth of homework before her eyes itched too much to read.

Gregorov had finished his evening's work earlier. The tests had all been carelessly stuffed into a folder and then shoved into his satchel. Kessler had brought a chessboard and the two men now sparred over their pieces. The game seemed stalled. Kessler's bishop was in danger, but so was one of Gregorov's rooks. Loup leaned on an elbow and watched as pieces were directed across the board until she dozed off.

The room was dark and much colder when she awoke. Stiff and chilled, it took a few moments before she realized that she had fallen asleep. Rubbing her arms to warm then, it occurred to her that she'd been left to sleep there. Fine thing! He could have woken her. Suspicions crept in. Why had he left her? Had they gone hunting without her? Had Kessler taken Gregorov to introduce him to a pretty seventh-year? All of her insecurities flared as she looked for the most damaging reasons to explain her current location.

Feeling very abandoned, she walked out into the hall, seeing only a row of shut doors and hearing only silence. Alone. Abandoned. Unwanted. The worst case was surely the correct one. Gregorov's rooms were next to the staff room, but the short journey seemed very much the longest one. Instead, she grabbed up her cloak. The sagging wooden door screeched in protest as she yanked it open. Leaving the door ajar, she stepped away, planning on taking a short walk to reopen the internal debate to convince herself yet again that she wasn't wanted there and should leave and go…nowhere.

Snow crunched softly as she walked away from the Dark Arts building. The sky was ablaze with stars blue-white against the black sky. No wind stabbed. On nights like this, she could feel the mountain live. Tracking game would be hard, but all the sweeter if she could chase and catch a rabbit. Even mice were wonderful prey when the air was this crisp. Paris' attractions dimmed as she threw her head back and inhaled, sorting out the scents of rabbits, one of the many cats that haunted the castle, a few owls and the older scents of humans that blanketed everything. Humans. The pleasure dimmed as she remembered that one human needed her help, one who cared to call her "friend".

The black wolf ran hard over the campus to the despised stadium. There, she shattered the locking spell on the doors and stormed back to the broom lockers. The plain little broom was hauled out and taken outside. It might be for children, but it was more than she wanted to fly upon as it was.

The pitch was inky black as she had always imagined the pits of hell would be. She got the broom up in two attempts and slowly circled the stadium, gaining altitude each time and hating every second. The damn thing was uncomfortable and ground into portions of her anatomy that warned of a stiff walk in the morning. Moving at what felt frighteningly fast and yet slow, she approached the castle. The top floor seemed to be higher than it needed to be. The broom hovered easily in front of the windows, a blessing. The curse came when she discovered the windows were all warded better than she had thought. Teasing the spells apart would take hours, if possible. Still, she tried. She pushed every breaking technique she knew that would subtly work the energy against itself, tried to slowly build an opposing force to neutralize it and then tried to contain it. Infuriatingly, the wards held and pulsed showily. Anyone approaching from that side of the castle would know of her attempted break in.

Loup sat on the broom, feeling bruised and angry. "Who am I kidding? This isn't what I do best." Even mumbled, it sounded loud. Strength was what she had and it would now be what she used. It wasn't elegant and it wasn't a spell per se, it was sheer power, destroying both the ward and the window in a shriek and crash. The noise!

In too far already, she flew in and landed clumsily. No time to be cautious or careful now, she illuminated the entire room with a wave of her hand. It wasn't a large library, but there were more than enough shelves to search through. Darting to the beginning of each row, she cast about wildly for titles that had the right look to them and saw none. All this effort for nothing? From outside the door, she heard shouts and knew time was almost up. The voices stilled and past experience told her now was the time to leave. Grabbing the broom, she raced for the door and then saw it. The book was enormous. Too large to fit in most of the shelves, it was crammed sideways onto a shelf in one of the cases in front of the librarian's desk. It was awkwardly large and heavy. She clutched it, trying to keep it against her chest as she straddled the hated broom and hopped ineffectually about in an attempt to rise. The broom seemed uncooperative. Jumping off, she rushed to the window and climbed onto the ledge outside. Her arms were full of book and broom and her eyes of the distance from the ground. Back wedged against the stones, she scooted as far as she could until the ledge ended.

There were people in the library now. Cautious, unsure of what was in there, they whispered to each other. They'd be at the window soon and she was certain she could be seen. The book was like an anchor, one more thing to worry about and would be evidence. Getting the thing far away enough from her body to concentrate on it cost valuable time. Then, the effort began of levitating it down. The binding creaked as it moved away and slowly began its descent. Too much noise behind her. A man's voice suggested looking out the window and Loup's patience ended. Instead of lowering it to the ground, she opted for an empty plinth a floor down and grimaced as it landed on one of its corners and plowed into the snowdrift there. Now, she thought, is the time I fall to my death.

Gripping the handle like her life depended upon it, which it did, she straddled the old broom and leapt off. It plunged down ten feet and then hovered in space, drifting towards the destroyed window and the men inside. Down would be too obvious as would away. Pulling up, she shuddered upwards, above the roof and then sloppily guided the broom to hide behind one of the turrets. No one followed. Occasionally, a light could be seen and voices rose and fell. The search seemed to end early, but it took a long time before she felt comfortable enough to fly the thing back to the stadium. Once there, much to her annoyance, she had to repair the spells she had broken. It was almost dawn by the time she was able to leave.

Her walk alone should have made her a suspect. Stiff and sore, she had an odd straddle-legged limp. It was a long trip from the stadium, made longer by her attempt to use the footsteps of others. The book would be safe where it was unless the weather changed and the clear skies told of a fair, cold day.

The door still stood ajar when she reached the building. Cold and aching, all she longed for was a warm bed, some sleep and a lot of coffee in the morning. Her bad luck was still not done with her. As soon as she stepped through the door, he was on her. "Where have you been? I have been awake hours." Gregorov stood in the doorway to their quarters, barring it.

"You didn't seem to want me to come to bed with you, so I went out." She tried to appear defiant, but instead sounded whiny.

"I? I did not want you to come with me? You were asleep. Snoring. I thought surely you would follow. Do you know what time it is?" Gregorov squinted at her and then pointedly sniffed, checking for a possible liaison.

"Almost dawn. It was a beautiful night. There were a lot of rabbits out there. We could have caught one, but I had to hunt alone."

"You could have woken me."

The game started. Any surefire gambit of winning quickly had already been attempted in previous encounters. She could already see the move and the countermove, ending in wounded egos or a stalemate. The game had evolved over the summer. At first, it was always Gregorov who had had to concede, giving in whether he held the weaker position or not. Winning the petty arguments was hollow at best. Over the months, she had slowly learned that wasn't as enjoyable as it had been and there were times to sacrifice to win later. "I didn't think you wanted me."

With a growl of pure exasperation, he reached out and grabbed her arm, drawing her in. "Little wolf, you are a lot of trouble."