Resonance

Chapter 64 -- Just Visiting

Harry met Aaron in the Hog's Head. He had suggested meeting there mostly because he expected that it would be less busy on a Quidditch weekend. Harry found Aaron at the bar, talking gregariously to a stranger shrouded in a brown hooded cloak. Harry, a little alarmed by this, stepped quickly over.

"Hey, Aaron," Harry said casually, looking over the other figure, or what little he could see of him or her. "Who's your friend?"

"Oh, uh, I don't know his name," Aaron admitted. "I didn't catch your name," Aaron said to the figure. The figure simply shook its head.

"Aaron," Harry said, hitting the other man on the arm, hard enough to be noticed. "You haven't traded anything with this man, or played any games of chance, have you?" The figure turned its head as though to listen better but didn't raise it enough for Harry to see any of the face.

"He did suggest that for later," Aaron replied easily.

Harry stood dumb an instant. "Aaron, you cannot be this naïve. Please tell me you aren't."

"What's the harm in a game of cards?" he asked, sounding defensive.

"I don't even know where to begin," Harry groaned, half to himself. "Come on, let's get seats a little early."

"You don't want a butterbeer? I want to finish mine." He resisted Harry's pulling him away from the stained and greasy bar.

"Take it with you," Harry insisted, hauling hard enough to get the other to move off his seat and into the midst of the tables. He left him there and returned to the obscured figure still slouched at the bar. Leaning close to the hooded ear he said, "No gambling with Aurors."

The figure turned enough that Harry could see a pointed chin with a light brown, scruffy beard. "Who are you to order me around?" the man mocked in an oily voice.

"Harry Potter," Harry snapped. A glass smashed to the floor at the corner table.

After a pause the figure said, "Oh. All right then." Then after a pause: "He didn't have anything worth taking anyway." He held out his hand with something in it. Harry cupped his hands and caught the leather pouch that dropped into it.

At the door Aaron asked, "What did he give you?"

Harry held the pouch out. "Your wallet."

"Oh." Aaron accepted it, peeked inside, then pocketed it. At the gate by the lake he said, "That is really quite embarrassing. Why did you suggest meeting there?"

"Haven't you been there before? That place is always quiet and I didn't want to cause a stir."

"Well, you did that anyway," Aaron observed, sounding moody.

A few ducks swam in the shallows of the lake as they walked by, a long tentacle following stealthily. "You were a Slytherin," Harry said. "I assumed you could take care of yourself."

The stadium came into view over the lawn, banners alight in a stream of sunlight piercing the clouds. Other visitors were walking alongside now. Aaron quietly said, "Contrary to you, Potter, I've led a pretty protected existence. Not by choice." He took out his wallet again and looked through it before putting it back away.

Harry relented on his chastising tone. "Well, don't trust anyone who hides their face. That's a pretty straightforward rule."

"I thought he had a deformity or something," Aaron defended himself.

"That's awfully sweet of you to believe, but that usually isn't the case."

They reached the arch that led into the arena. Harry followed up to the visitors' section which was only sparsely populated this early. Aaron went right to the very front row and took a seat; Harry followed, enjoying the breeze, the sound of the banners snapping, the scent of the lake and freshly cut grass.

"Missing Hogwarts?" Aaron asked.

"Yeah," Harry replied, surprised by his companion's observation.

"I recognize that look." Aaron sat back and breathed in deep. "I considered flunking seventh year, just stay longer. Often later wished I had."

Grinning broadly, Harry teased, "Severus must have been glad to see you go."

Aaron sighed. "His threatening me was probably the reason I didn't repeat a year, just for fun. I'll never forget him telling me I should have more pride. I had barrels-full of pride, I just didn't care about some things."

"Grades."

"For example."

The game began soon after the teachers filed into their stands. Harry resisted waving until he saw Snape's eyes searching the stands in their direction. Snape nodded in return and beside him McGonagall waved as well. The teachers made for a motley assortment in their section with Flitwick about one fifth the size of Hagrid two down from him. Sinistra wore some kind of glittery gold band around her forehead and Trelawney's diaphanous robe kept trying to float over the edge of the stands beside her.

Finally the teams came out. The match was Slytherin against Hufflepuff, leaving Harry little dilemma about who to cheer for. Suze looked good. Only slightly taller than last year and just as thin, she moved like a razor around the pitch. The game went on a long time, making Harry wonder if they hadn't gotten a better Snitch just for the match. Harry didn't catch sight of it until Suze did and then only because she veered towards it. The final score of 220 to 20 left the Hufflepuffs slumped as they made their way off the grass.

"Should have held them scoreless," Aaron criticized sagely as they stood to depart. "The Keeper better get better than that before the next match."

Down on the grass Harry walked away from the departing crowds and into the arena, where the green-clad Slytherins were congratulating each other. Snape, towering over Suze, put a hand on her shoulder and leaned down to speak to her. Her eyes shifted to far away, bright with victory. Harry forced down a twinge of complicated jealousy just as Snape's eyes came up at their approach; at least, Harry hoped he had managed in time.

Snape's look did soften just a micron as he said, "Hello, Harry. Ah, Mr. Wickem," he greeted the other in flat, doubtful tones. To Harry he said, "Minerva is expecting you for dinner."

"All right, I'll meet you there." He congratulated an ecstatic Suze before the Slytherin team moved to the changing room and Snape joined the teachers congregating near the base of the tallest arena tower. Harry walked with his fellow Auror apprentice. When they were on the lawn and apart from the others, Aaron asked, "Do you get to sit at the head table?"

"I don't know," Harry replied uncaringly, because Aaron sounded jealous.

"Hogwarts dinner sounds nice. I have to go to dinner at my mum's."

"Again?"

"Every weekend," he grumbled.

Harry didn't think that so bad. "That's nice." Aaron gave him a vague look of disgust. Harry said, "I wish I had a mum to visit for dinners."

"Potter, are you trying to make me feel guilty for wishing the hedge-hags my Mum imagines in the shrubbery were actually after her?"

"No," Harry immediately denied, then thought again, "What?"

Putting on a falsetto voice, Aaron said, "So nice to have an Auror in the family, then I can call someone to clear the ferocious nymphs out of the hollyhocks." He quit the voice. "Honestly." They stopped where they needed to split up for Aaron to return to Hogsmeade.

"Do you want me to come to dinner with you next weekend?" Harry offered.

Aaron was thoughtful for a long time. "She would leave me alone about that then; just won't give it up. I'll let you know, I suppose. Give into that, who knows what she'll ask for next." Aaron headed off over the freshly mown green, looking glum. He turned and said, "See you on Monday, Potter. Have fun."

The teachers exited the arena, keeping a stately pace. When they came upon Harry, who stood waiting for them, McGonagall greeted him with, "Good to see you, Mr. Potter."

Harry glanced over the familiar faces, encountering one new one, an ordinary looking wizard with short brown hair. Harry's scrutiny drew him forward just as McGonagall introduced him. "This is our new Transfiguration instructor, Cathal Cawley."

Cawley eagerly shook Harry's hand. "Honored to meet you, Mr. Potter," he said breathily, reminding Harry suddenly of Quirrell; although, the man didn't stutter at all.

"Likewise," Harry returned, trying to shake old memories.

During the walk to the castle, Harry found himself eyeing the new teacher as though trying to see through his disguise of normalcy. Snape interrupted Harry's visual interrogation. "Did you enjoy the match?"

"Yes," Harry replied, then in a low voice, he asked, "Did the headmistress approve you using a professional Snitch?"

Snape's eyes glittered. "She did authorize a slight upgrade in school equipment, yes." He walked with his hands clasped behind his back, looking almost relaxed.

"Making sure Suze gets her shot at going professional?" Harry teased.

Snape didn't reply, just kept walking, a smug look upon his face. Harry turned away with a grin and found Cawley disquietingly close at his shoulder.

"Mr. Potter, so very good of you to visit. The staff do so speak of you in such fondness."

"Do they?" Harry asked in disbelief. Glancing around, he found the teachers otherwise occupied in conversation, with Greer pointedly ignoring him, and Snape still looking straight ahead.

Cawley almost sounded hurt, "You sound surprised."

Harry considered all the times he had been caught, and not caught, at things that he had previously been assured would get him sent home. A little loudly he proclaimed, "Their memories must be failing." This perplexed Cawley more. Harry took the opportunity to ask, "So how long have you been teaching?"

"Just started," he proclaimed in excitement. "I studied for three years under a Yoruba witch in Brazil and I thought I was ready to move on, even though I rather fell in love with the country. Ever have a capiriñas?"

"No, can't say that I have," Harry replied, uncertain what that might be.

"Ah," Cawley sighed, apparently remembering one just then.

They had reached the Entrance Hall, but it was still an hour before dinner. Harry followed Snape to his office where he said he needed to do some work. As Harry closed the door behind him, he said, "I hope I'm not bothering you."

"Of course not, have a seat," Snape said in a welcoming tone he never used with students. Harry did so, clasping his hands over his stomach, relaxed. He wanted to ask if Snape had talked to Candide at all, but decided against it.

As Snape graded he asked, "So, what did you do in training this week?"

"We started on illusion negation."

Snape paused to look up. "Interesting. Are you learning to see through an invisibility cloak?"

"That's one of the last things. But few manage that, we've been warned. Right now we are working on detecting basic changes like color, size, or shape." Harry rethought that and asked, "Why, hoping I'll teach you?"

"Hm." Still marking with his green quill and flipping rapidly, Snape asked, "And is the topic presenting any challenge for you?"

"No, it's easy."

"That's good," Snape opined, although there was something odd in his tone.

"So what about this new teacher?" Harry asked.

"He seems acceptable, but I have not delved into that in any depth. I will have to at the end of the first term when he has a performance review."

Harry stared out the window. "He seems suspicious."

Snape lifted his quill and looked up with brows low. Very doubtfully he asked, "How so?"

Harry shrugged. Thinking aloud he said, "He seems too normal." Then he added after further thought, "No new Hogwarts teachers are ever what they seem."

"Few of the old ones are either," Snape pointed out. "Except perhaps Binns."

Harry chuckled.


They arrived early in the Great Hall. McGonagall insisted that Harry sit beside her with Snape on the other side of him. As they took their seats, she said affectionately, "It is very good to see you, Harry."

"Thank you for the invitation, Professor."

She leaned close. "Please, do call me Minerva. And how is your apprenticeship?"

They talked until the hall filled with boisterous students. McGonagall asked, "Shall I publicly welcome you?" she asked.

"Oh. That isn't necessary," Harry said. "I know everyone."

She smiled and a moment later platters of food appeared on the tables. Harry hadn't caught the signal and his stomach rumbling distracted him from wondering what it had been. The meal went quickly and soon the empty, soiled plates vanished. As things wound down, more students looked up at the head table, eyeing him he assumed, since McGonagall was always there.

As they waited for pudding to appear, a small student in a blue uniform hesitantly approached their table. He had a bushy head of curly brown hair that dwarfed his small face, although even its bulk couldn't compete with his wide eyes. The head table sat on a raised platform, forcing the boy to rock up on tip toes to peer up at Harry.

"Come on up, Mr. Van Eschelon," McGonagall invited.

The boy was so small he had to climb rather than take a large step up. Harry wondered that children started Hogwarts so young.

"M- Mister Potter," the boy managed as he clutched his hands together. He glanced back at the Ravenclaw table as though for advice. More wide eyes there and the smaller students made motions to urge the boy on. Harry tried hard to find a friendly feeling face to calm the boy's obvious fear.

McGonagall cut in smoothly. "Harry, this is Erasmus Van Eschelon, a First Year, if you had not recognized that."

"Hello, Erasmus," Harry said in the lightest voice he could manage.

Erasmus shot worried glances at Snape and the headmistress before saying, "We . . . uh, hi, uh, we wanted to welcome you to Hogwarts . . . "

Welcome? Harry almost echoed in disbelief.

" . . . and, uh . . . " Another glance back at the end of the Ravenclaw table where many small faces wore pained expressions. " . . . and we are really, really honored to have you here . . . "

Harry now realized that he should have allowed McGonagall to make a little speech at the beginning of the meal. The gap between himself and this dear place took a bounding spread as the student went on, leaving him less homesick and more adrift.

Erasmus' eyes dropped to where his feet fidgeted fiercely. Harry didn't dare interrupt and lengthen the boy's torment. " . . . and we think you are a really great wizard." He was speaking to the platform now but utterly unaware of it. "Well, and we all owe you a lot." His head finally lifted. "Well, that's what I . . . we wanted to say."

Harry wasn't ready for his turn in this. "Well, thanks. I appreciate that."

Released, a relieved and flushed Erasmus ran back to his table looking strung out, as though he had faced . . .well, Voldemort. Harry turned to his left. McGonagall picked up her chalice of mead and said, "In just over a month you have reached legend status around here."

Harry said, "At least the teachers-"

"I was referring to the staff," McGonagall interrupted him. "The students are yet another matter."

A bread pudding had appeared before Harry and he pulled it closer and picked up his fork. He didn't want to be a legend; he wanted to have this place, this first home, as a kind of refuge. He had forgotten that it wasn't static; that it had a life all its own. Beside him, Snape patted his arm. Harry turned to him and he said, "I do try to point out to them how truly awful you were at Potions, but they just get angry with me."

"I appreciate that," Harry said. The gap between himself and the room full of school chums had yawned too wide. He swallowed his first bite hard and pushed his plate away.

"All right there, Harry?" Snape asked softly.

Harry nodded. Very quietly, so that McGonagall couldn't hear, he said, "I didn't come here to terrorize First Years." After further thought, he added, "I didn't realize how small they were now."

"Same size as always. Some come smaller . . . such as you."

"I was smaller than him?"

"Yes."

Teasing, Harry said, "And you were still cruel to me."

Snape crossed his arms and leaned back haughtily. "You should not have taken it so personally."

Harry pushed his chair back and shook his head. "Think I'll go visit with some friends," he said eagerly. He stepped along the staff table and around down to the Gryffindor table. Overhead, above the thousands of floating candles, the ceiling raged in darkening blue without a single cloud. At his approach Ginny brightened and made space beside her. Harry quickly fell into conversation with her, the Creevey brothers, and the others he knew well. He was greatly relieved to find them the same as before, if not a touch taller and bolder.

~ 888 ~

Harry's training the next week was difficult and wearing. They learned countless illusion charms, some for things as large as a building that required many witches or wizards work together by combining their magic. Harry had assumed that this would make a spell easier, the way having someone to help carry a couch made that easier, but it didn't. In actuality it made the spell much harder because the other person's magic was much more likely to disrupt your own. Getting the spells to combine rather than interact required intense concentration.

Vineet participated only marginally, since he was still working on control. But he was suprisingly good at adapting his own magic to another's. Most of the time during training, he had a variety of Hogwarts First Year tasks before him, some transfiguration, some charms. He patience seemed to be growing thin finally. While the others packed up for the day, Harry went over to Vineet's corner to try and cheer him up a bit. Unfortunately Rodgers followed suit, so Harry toned down his own reassurances. "You look frustrated, Vishnu," Rodgers observed. He gave Vineet space to respond which went unused. "Do realize that we will give you a lot of time and help to work this out." He sounded unusually concessionary.

Vineet frowned as he stood and collected the various half destroyed little objects into a box. "I am not accustomed to lacking discipline," he explained unhappily.

Rodgers turned to Harry. "Anyone at Hogwarts specialize in teaching attenuation that you know of?"

"I can ask," Harry said eagerly. "I'll owl right now, in fact."

Rodgers nodded, looking unhappy about having to ask, which Harry attributed to the communication going through Snape. When they were alone, Harry said, "Vineet, go a little easier on yourself." When Vineet appeared surprised, Harry explained, "I read you like a book, you know."

"The possibilities seem to have closed as fast as they have opened," Vineet observed.

"Everyone's going to help," Harry insisted. "It will work out. Someone at Hogwarts will be able to help, or Headmistress McGonagall will know someone who can." Harry wished a bit that Dumbledore were still there to help, but squashed it immediately.

Vineet picked up his things to depart. "You are all being very kind."

In the corridor Harry went down to the end and around to where the large Department owl cage sat. He dropped his bag, and examined the quill provided in the tin beside a pile of scrap parchment. It felt cold and strangely slippery and he knew from that feel of it that the bird that had given it was dead. Wondering at such a pointless skill, he opened his bag and took out his own quill. After brushing some scattered downy feathers aside, he leaned over to write to Snape in the small space before the cages.

When the short letter was finished he put it in an official envelope. As he penned the address, an unfamiliar voice approached down the next corridor. He slowed to listen to what sounded like someone speaking to themselves.

"Ay, the Ministry wouldna made the Bludger rule change if it hadna been for that incident in Yorkshire." "Overreacting, I'd say." "As usual." "Hey, can we see the Department of Magical Games and Sports?"

"That's down a few levels." That voice Harry recognized: Mr. Weasley. "We'll get to it if you wish. Not really much to see . . . although the trophy room is nice, except uh, last year, when the trophies all went invisible in protest over not getting polished up for a while. They're all there now though . . . we're pretty sure."

Harry fanned the envelope to dry the ink and grinned at that

"Eh, what's the male squad then?" The strange voice asked and the footsteps stopped.

"What? Oh, that's Ms. Tonks. Uh, I mean, she changed the sign again. It is supposed to read Magical Law Enforcement Squad." Harry hadn't noticed that vandalism and grinned more as he opened the cage to hand over his letter to whichever owl seemed more eager to take it.

"Eh, the Auror's office must be here as well, then?" "Oh, dark wizard hunters." The voice said, still sounding a bit double on the personality.

"Yes, just around the corner," Mr. Weasley explained, sounding the tour guide again.

The other voice dropped lower. "Oh, does that mean . . . Harry Potter is here?"

Harry's eyes went to the ceiling. The footsteps were moving again "Well, yes," Mr. Weasley was saying, sounding confused. "He's in training with us." Harry glanced at the distance back to his own corridor, then thought he should say hello to Mr. Weasley and his guest. Torn, he shut the cage door and the remaining owl tried to peck him before he got his hand clear. The other owl had gone out the other side of the cage and into the darkness of the ventilator shaft leading to the roof.

"Ooh, what's 'e like then?" "Dangerous, eh?"

Harry shook his head, still hoping that someone at Hogwarts knew something about teaching attenuation. Everyone here at the Ministry returned a strange stare when asked as though the notion of reducing ones magic had never before occurred to them.

"He's very nice. Really," Mr. Weasley insisted. They were about to turn the corner. Harry toyed with the notion of taking his wand out, then decided that would be childish, although potentially amusing.

"Oh," Mr. Weasley said, coming to a halt. "Ah, hello, Harry."

"Oh, you're funnin' us-" A very redheaded, freckle-faced man of about thirty stopped and let his mouth fall open. He stood beside another identical man who looked equally surprised. An older, rotund woman in a pink coat with a huge purse in her arms stood beside them.

"Hello, Mr. Weasley," Harry said.

"How are you, my boy? This is my, uh, Great Aunt Milli and her grandsons Vincent and Cuthbert."

"More Weasley twins?" Harry couldn't help asking. The very notion unseated him.

Mr. Weasley smiled. "Well, yes, but . . . much better behaved then, uh, Fred and George."

"I would say," came the haughty proclamation from Milli.

The stunned and perhaps fearful expressions hadn't relaxed on the twins.

"Just sending an owl, then?" Mr. Weasley asked, clearly to change the topic.

"Yep." Harry was tempted to add, thought I'd drop my Death-Eater father a note, just to rattle the highly rattleable a bit more. "Nice to meet you all," he said automatically. "I should get going home."

"'Course, my boy. Family picnic this weekend if you'd like to come." While Harry tried to formulate a reply, Mr. Weasley added, "There'll be a Quidditch match or two, of course."

"Oh," Harry said, solidifying his decision at that prospect. "Great. I'll try to make it."

One of the twins found their voice. "You're . . . you're coming to Arthur's house?"

Feeling cruel, Harry said reassuringly, "I promise to only invite one Death Eater along."

"Oh, can Se- . . . I mean, uh . . . " Mr. Weasley struggled, while his relatives gaped for real now at both of them.

"I doubt he's available, but I'll owl him," Harry stated easily.

Mr. Weasley recovered himself. "All right, then. Love to have him." He gestured for the aunt and twins to follow. "Still lots to see." The troupe followed slowly, eyeing Harry as they passed. Mr. Weasley said, "And here are the Auror offices, right here." As they made it to the lifts his voice carried back, "Goodness, with our luck we may even get to meet Madam Bones." Harry put his quill away into his bag and shouldered it, waiting for sound of the lift to descend and take the whispering away.

Harry arrived home exhausted, he had diverted to do some much needed shopping, and even though he was rather beat, he wandered outside in the low evening sunlight to check the front garden. The roses, small and wildish, were blooming yellow and faint pink. Rather than weed or trim, he sat down on the rarely used stone bench and leaned back against the ivy-covered wall of the house. After the last few days training, just staring at the tree limbs rocking in the breeze, the birds flittering about, the cars going by, seemed a worthwhile way to spend some time.

Harry thought he heard something by the side wall, a high-pitched kind of chattering. He sat straight and looked that way in concern. A few leaves shifted as though something passed under them and then stilled. A bit alarmed by the thought that, in his exhaustion, he had let something through from the dark plane, even though he didn't sense it otherwise, Harry took out his wand and watched the shadowed areas of mulch between the plants for any signs of movement.

"Hey, Harry," Elizabeth greeted him. "I was thinking you might be out on a nice day like this."

"Huh?" Harry asked, startled and worried about her safety.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

Harry leaned forward to look around the plants better, wand still at ready. "I thought I saw something."

"Probably just a gnome."

Harry stood and stalked over to the corner of the stone wall. "A gnome? This garden doesn't have any." Harry thought he saw another leaf move so he issued a narrow blasting curse at it. A squeal sounded and a tiny figure, like a mutated potato, came barreling out, shaking its fist at him before stalking off. Embarrassed, Harry dropped his wand hand to his side. "That's the first one I've seen."

"My mum has a heck of a time with them. That and fire salamanders, and iridescent bottle beetles. But that's because she insists on using magic to garden. Since you don't, I'm surprised they come around."

"What?"

"They aren't attracted to gardens where no magic is used. Didn't you know that?"

Harry put his wand away. "I didn't know that. I used a little the other day."

Sounding overly knowledgeable, she said, "If you stop, the magic will fade and they might lose interest again."

Harry watched the leaves of ivy move in a line as something crawled around under it. "Maybe I'll do that. It was just one Scourgify." He turned to her finally with his full attention. She was wearing all pink today, jumper and long pleated skirt; it was a bit much on the eyes. "How are you doing?"

"Good. Just one more piano lesson before term starts. How are you doing?"

Harry shrugged. "It's too quiet," he admitted. "I'm not used to being alone, I guess."

"I don't like being alone either," she volunteered.

"Sorry," he said, shaking himself. "I'm behind on my reading and really need to catch up, so I should get back to that."

"Cheers then," she said, "All right if I write you from school?"

"Of course. I'd like that."

She smiled and put her hands in her skirt pockets and walked away.

~ 888 ~

"You're in luck, Harry," Tonks said when he arrived for his field shadowing on Friday. "It is so busy today, we have to go out on a call. Here," She handed him a little wood-framed piece of slate; a thin white stick adhered to the frame by a charm. "You should have one of those in case we get into trouble."

Harry barely got it pocketed before she grasped his arm and the Ministry flickered away. They stood in a field, a few sheep grazed near the far fence, considering them curiously. Harry waited to be told where they were but knew not to ask. Tonks was too distracted to give details and led them quickly away after glancing at a crumpled parchment. She pulled her wand out and unfolded her sleeve down to hide it. Harry followed suit, glad to have worn long sleeves. His heart beat faster, just holding his wand in the middle of the unknown.

She stepped on the electrified fence and gestured for Harry to step over. He turned and did the same for her. They walked along a path beside the field until they came to a round stone house. A brooding old village was visible over the crest of a green hill. The front door of the house was ajar. Tonks circled the structure once before pushing the door open and stepping inside. Harry followed behind and felt as though he moved through an invisible curtain. The air felt strangely oily and clingy. He breathed in, expecting to smell it, but all he smelled was yesterday's stew and old candle smoke.

Tonks stepped through the first arched doorway on the left and stopped. When she moved aside, Harry saw what had attracted her in that direction. A witch lay on the floor, grey robes spread behind her as though she had fallen in the middle of dancing. Her black hair obscured most of her pale face.

"Is she . . .?"

"Dead? Yes." Tonks stalked around the room like a bloodhound, looking at everything without touching anything. As she roamed, she went on, "You can tell when you walk in. That oily feel to the place. Look for a wand in the other rooms. Don't touch anything."

Harry recovered from the surprise of Tonks stating exactly what he was sensing. As he turned away, Tonks cast a few spells, one of which made the floor glow white with ghostly dark footprints, hundreds of them. Harry longed to stand and watch spells that they had not yet learned, but he did as he was told and hunted around the main room for a wand. There were a lot of figurines around the place, of cats, bats, rats and a few birds. All of them tall and elongated; some functioned as candlesticks and had old wax adhering to them. He didn't find a wand.

Voices sounded outside the front door. Harry rushed that way and found two children before the front step. Their conversation abruptly stopped at his appearance. They were dressed as Muggles but Harry was certain they recognized him. Thinking quickly, Harry asked, "Were you here earlier?" They immediately became evasive, eyes shifting. "Did you see someone here?" Harry then asked.

The boy and girl looked at each other. The boy reluctantly said, "We didn't see anyone today. But the witch who lives in the forest there . . . " He pointed to a dark range of trees in the distance. "She was here yesterday and there was a big fight."

"What are your names?" Harry asked. After a hesitation they gave these up and Harry forced them into memory. "Go on home," he said. "We may have questions for you later." He waited and watched them depart with many curious glances back.

Inside Tonks was still at work. "What'd you find out?" Harry relayed what he had learned and she commented, "Kids often have the best memories and they notice everything. Wand?" Harry shook his head. She put her hands on her hips and surveyed the body. "Could be a good thing. The person who killed her may have taken it. Ollivander always remembers and it makes for good evidence, although circumstantial. Let's seal the house and check out this lead before taking her in. She isn't going anywhere."

In silence Harry followed her outside where she put a strong, but short-lived, barrier on the small house. "Have to love stone," she commented. "Holds spells so nicely once you find its resonance."

Harry almost asked when they would be learning barriers, but swallowed it for later. They walked down the road a quarter of a mile to the copse at the end of the sheep fields. It was a nice day for a walk, but Tonks was spending it watching the ground around the way, casting the occasional spell to reveal footprints.

A small path led into the trees just beyond the stone wall. Darkness enveloped them as they entered. Within the trees it was starkly quiet and the air ripe with leaf decay. It wasn't far to the shack, which looked all the size of a large privy on the outside, but inside went on for room after room of dusty clutter. The sliver-shaped hole in the shack door was replicated hundreds of times around the walls, letting in curved shafts of dusty light.

Tonks circled around and came back a while later and huffed, "Nothing."

On a table, a box had been knocked over and some gaudy jewelry had tumbled out. Harry reached for a bracelet that, unlike the other silver things, wasn't tarnished. He tilted it to see the diamond cut pattern on its surface.

"Harry, are you touching things?" Tonks asked, part surprise, part chastisement.

"She's dead," Harry said, feeling a slipperiness on the metal that seemed to vibrate with something of its recent and frequent wearer.

"What?" she asked, stepping over to him across the crowded floor.

Harry held up the bracelet as though that might clarify. "The owner of this is dead." Tonks didn't reply right away, just studied him. "You don't believe me?" he asked.

"No, I believe you. I didn't know you could tell that."

Harry turned the bracelet in the light. It had a row of little blue stones along the median, one missing. "I didn't know regular objects could be radiant," he said.

Tonks put her hands on her hips and looked around the room again. She pulled out her little slate and jotted something on it with annoyed motions before stashing it back in her pocket. "Well, where is she?"

Harry, forgetting to be silent, and thinking aloud said, "Maybe that was her at the cottage."

Tonk's face twisted in an intrigued manner. "You're right. We don't know who that is." She glanced around the cluttered room. "Wonder if there's a photo around here."

"Who would keep a picture of themselves around?"

"Maybe if someone else were in it. Someone handsome," she said suggestively. With the both of them looking, it only took a few minutes to find a small silver frame with a very old photograph of three people in it: a woman and an older couple, posed like parents behind her. "It will have to do." She grasped his arm and they reappeared before the cottage. A man paced before it, agitated. A few others, including the boy and girl who had come to the door were also standing in the middle of the lane, looking skittish. They all stared at Harry as he and Tonks approached the house.

"Do you live here?" Tonks asked the man.

"Yes, but I can't seem to get in." He sounded annoyed.

"That's because we sealed it. You didn't contact the Ministry?"

The man shook his head, looking mystified. Tonks pulled out her sheet and frowned at it. The man took Harry in for the first time. "Are you really Harry-"

"Yes," Harry replied.

"What's going on?" the man asked.

Harry silently waited for Tonks to reply.

After hours of questioning and evidence collection they left the Reversal crew in charge of clean up and returned to the Ministry. Harry wrote out reports while Tonks dictated because she insisted his handwriting was better than her dictation quill and besides he could amend as he saw fit while writing. Indeed, Harry discovered when she reviewed the first report, she didn't really care what he wrote, nor that he left off his observations about the bracelet.

It was eleven by the time they had finished and Tonks was yawning an average of once a minute. She took the parchments from him and stuffed them into folders. "So, what do you think?"

"About . . . what happened?" Harry asked.

She sounded deceptively casual, as though she may be testing him. "Yeah. Bit of a conundrum. Tell me what you think happened."

"I thought we weren't supposed to guess," Harry hedged.

"Hypothesizing, as long as you are willing to throw it away at the first sign it is in error, is all right." She waited.

Harry rubbed his brow and said, "Uh, there were different versions of what the fight was about, but maybe the witch, Belinda, set Mr. Doormouse up by going into his house and killing herself there." After he had said it, he wished he hadn't.

Tonks appeared thoughtful, however. "Fits the facts, as unlikely as it seems. Any other theories?"

Harry shrugged. "Someone else who knew they were fighting yesterday set Doormouse up and killed Belinda there to set him up. He seemed honestly confused although I didn't particularly like him."

She took her feet down off the desk and rubbed her eyes. "And he didn't seem like he had had a Memory Charm, which is one way to show up at a scene of your own crime." She yawned. "I remember back when I thought this was the start of the evening around this time. Must be grown up when you look forward to going to bed."

Harry blamed the long day for his finding the insinuation in that. The thoughts that followed were not conducive to criminal reports. He rubbed his eyes too.

"Harry?" she prompted, voice lower than her professional one. Harry froze on the cusp of even more distracting thoughts until she went on, "Any other strange skills you're hiding from us?"

With a glance around her desk and the nearby ones Harry pointed at her blotter, "That's cursed. The door is cursed. Rogan's tread cleaner is cursed. Your earrings are cursed. . . why are you wearing cursed earrings?" he asked in confusion.

She fingered the left one. "They're charmed for beauty," she countered.

Harry examined each of them again. "No, they're cursed."

She plucked one of them off and held it up. "No wonder I look so bad in them. How can you tell that so easily?"

"Things just feel wrong, sliperry and unclean and I'd like to get away from them or get them away from me."

"Hm. Good skill to have." She tossed the earrings with a musical clinking into the rubbish bin. "Others?" She asked in a tone that implied she expected he would hold back if given the chance.

She knew him too well. "Can we talk about the other over a drink?" Harry asked. "A Hagrid-sized bucket of mead sounds really very good."

"No," she replied.

"Damn." He swallowed. "Promise you won't kick me out of the program?"

Her face shifted to half-amused and she propped one foot back up on her desk. "What? You're still seeing Voldemort in the afterlife?"

"Not exactly."

Her propped up foot hit the floor. "Not. Exactly? What are you seeing?"

Harry, reluctant, but feeling obedient, said, "I see the Dark Plane. And once I time-travelled with my mind I think . . . " He trailed off because her expression of shock was too much to talk through.

"What exactly is the Dark Plane? It's been awhile since I've heard that term." She sounded befuddled and it hurt to have her of all people be so about him.

Harry quoted the book for lack of a better description, although he found the description lacking, "It is the alternative existence for the most evil subset of creatures. You know, like Lethifolds, or the Shetani, or Black Skanks. Things that crawl out of the cracks in the wall but you don't know how they do that. They do it by entering our world, our plane, at that point."

She stared at him thoughtfully. "You see these things? Is this because of the Dementors--because you were part of them?"

"I don't see the Dementors in the Dark Plane. Mostly I see Shetani, which are African demons and apparently plentiful." To assuage her odd look, he quickly added, "But I only see them when I'm very angry or I'm in an expertly-diagrammed node." He left off about fearing that they could enter this world through him; he couldn't bring himself to say it.

She put the files together on the desk and handed them to him. "If it gets out of control, tell someone, all right?"

Harry straightened the files a bit more before carrying them away. "Yes. Of course," he agreed.

Being in the file room reminded him of past filings, so when he returned to the office he asked, "What's happened with Lockhart?"

She was chewing on a sweet from her desk and held one out to him. "No one's seen him," she replied around the chewy stuff in her mouth. "Surprising really, given his mental status before." She pushed the drawer closed with her knee and hooked her cloak around her neck and made it turn hot pink to match her hair. "Some posters are up, no owls yet that have led anywhere. I'll let you know if anything comes up, since you have a personal interest."

"Thanks," Harry replied, wishing he could be a little more involved and not have to wait to be told things.

~ 888 ~

The next morning, Harry rose very early, just after dawn, ate a bite and dropped a quick note to the Weasleys saying he wouldn't make the picnic, dressed warmly, and went immediately out to the back garden to uncover the bike. A narrow-minded determination had overcome him from the day before and he had to take action. He pulled the map out of the pannier and flipped through it. County Devon was easy to locate, and Godric's Hollow was just off the best route. Devon was also dauntingly large. More determined than dissuaded by the size of the task he had set himself to, Harry stashed the map into his jacket pocket and stood the bike up off of its stand.

The flight gave Harry a lot of time to think as he skirted along just below the low clouds. He grew short of breath up here, but it didn't make him dizzy as flying higher could. Below him the hills stretched out in a mutely colorful patchwork with the occasional spot of glowing green where the sun managed to cut through. Flying silent and fast, Harry arrived over his first stop in just an hour and a half. Using a broom compass, he had kept his path straight and direct and that helped the time rather a lot. He landed hard on a remote two-track, that from the air he could see connected to a narrow blacktop road that led into the village. Even as he rode along the ground, he kept the bike silent, not willing to destroy the peace of the place. It was a rather nice day, he considered as he parked at the end of the street that led to Polly Evan's property. Just enough breeze moved the leaves in the alcove of shrubbery where he left the bike. Before going along the grassy path, though, he walked back down the narrow lane and knocked on Pamela's door. No one answered and the gardens felt quiet as though the next door neighbors were out as well.

At Mrs. Evans' house the door was answered promptly. "Harry dear. I did so hope you would drop in," she welcomed him. "Come in, come in." Big pots were boiling on the stove and a metal loop of cage with hinges sat on the small counter beside it filled with steaming empty glass jars. "Just putting up a bit of jam, don't mind me." Her beefy arms raised another cage out of the boiling water and she set these on the small, stained table across from the stove. "And how are you?" she asked as she worked.

Harry shrugged but then realized she wasn't looking. "All right. Rough day yesterday," he confessed.

"Girl troubles?"

"Murder," Harry returned.

"Oh my. What exactly do you do, young man?"

"Do you know what an Auror is?" he asked, very happy to be free to explain. She shook her head and shifted a pot full of bright red soupy strawberries to a different burner. "It is a dark wizard hunter. A magical law enforcer."

"Is that what you do?" she asked in surprise, pausing to retie her apron.

"I'm in training to do that. Takes three years. But we have field work days where we follow a full Auror on duty and sometimes, even though they try to keep their assignments easy while an apprentice is with them, they can't always manage." Harry remembered that oily feel of the house and rubbed his cheek as though to clean it off. "After battling Voldemort all those years, they're short of Aurors at the Ministry."

He watched her use a metal funnel to pour some preserves into each of the many, many jars. She was efficient at it, as though well practiced, and her arms, while they looked soft and fleshy, were apparently quite strong because she didn't rest them until the pan was empty. Using the same cage contraption, she lowered little metal lids into the boiling pot and shook it. While she waited for these, she considered him thoughtfully. "Surprising occupation for you to have. I don't remember your father nearly as well as your mother. I suspect he would approve. I don't know about Lily though."

"They aren't here to complain," Harry pointed out.

"No. Tragically, they are not." She raised the cage and using a clean, though worn, white towel, placed each sterilized lid on a filled jar, adjusting them so the seals were perfectly aligned. "So what did happen that night we lost James and Lily?"

"Voldemort came."

"That the one whose name some wouldn't say? I remember your father complaining about something like that."

"Yes."

She dipped screw top rings into the boiling water next, then stirred the other pan filled with what appeared to be blueberries, presumably destined for the remaining empty jars. Harry's mouth watered at the thought. "What did this Voldemort want with Lily and James anyway? What could they possibly have done or had that would have driven this . . . wizard to such destruction?"

"He didn't want them. He wanted me."

She looked doubtful. "A baby?"

Harry laughed lightly. "There was a prophecy that said I would destroy him. Well, actually that someone born at the end of July of parents who kept defying him, would destroy him. It could have been another boy that I know, but it wasn't."

"And you did destroy him?"

Harry nodded.

She used a towel to pick up each jar and tighten down the lid and then set them on the far end of the counter in a little warm, bright red line. "And rather than settle down into some well-deserved peace and quiet you are out chasing murderers."

"Essentially. Peace and quiet makes me nervous."

She laughed this time. "Ever since you visited, I've been going back over those days. At my age memory makes for pretty good company, even ones that ended up tragic. I remember your mother as so full of life. Headstrong. Wouldn't take no from anyone when she wanted her own way, brought everyone around to her thinking instead so they forgot they had disagreed in the beginning. She and Ed, my husband, were playmates on and off as children. Ed knew she was a witch and when we met and he was writing to her at that school, he told me. I'd never been so surprised." She chuckled. "I was jealous of her, I think, I remember it made me feel better to believe her beauty and ability to get her own way was some kind of magical trick. Thinking back, I don't think it was, actually."

Harry stood silent, watching her finish up the blueberries. He had been drawn into her memories and didn't want to return to the present until he had to. Eventually all the jars were sealed and lined up, except one that was only a quarter full. She set that one on the table. "We'll just have to eat that now."

Over toast, heavy with butter and runny blueberry topping, she asked, "So you are out from under that terrible prophecy now, right?"

"Yes, thank Merlin."

She chuckled and shook her head. "Well, I'm sorry you missed the girls. They went on a shopping expedition for the day."

Harry wiped his hopelessly sticky mouth and fingers. "I'm glad we got a chance to talk, though." He glanced at the time. "I should get going, I have to go to Devon."

"On broomstick," she asked, sounding half teasing.

"On motorbike . . . a flying motorbike. Did you ever meet my godfather, Sirius?"

She thought a long time before shaking her head.

"A friend of my father's from school. Anyway, he died a few years ago and left me this wonderful bike for my eighteenth birthday." He stood up and tried to collect up the dishes before being waved off.

"Sounds like just the right toy for a boy like you," she teased and followed him to the door. "Come again soon, Harry. And bring that guardian of yours."

"You're certain?" Harry asked.

"Yes, of course. Come for dinner when everyone is here."

Harry tried to imagine Snape in that environment, then shrugged. "Owl . . . or write and let me know when," he corrected himself.

"No pet owls here," she teased and waved goodbye as though he were already at the end of the property.


The remaining flight to Devon went by very fast and again he landed on a deserted narrow lane, this one surrounded by trees. After canceling the disillusion charm, he pulled out the map again and studied the road network into Exeter. He memorized his route and pulled away, remembering at the first turn that he had better adjust the Roar knob for realism.

Harry rode in the thickening morning traffic, feeling confident about his riding as he steered between two cars slowing for a stoplight. More people were rising and getting on the roads as he journeyed toward the city center. So many of them. Feeling daunted, Harry pulled into the car park for one of those chain restaurants Dudley had always begged to be taken to. He parked in the corner and closed his eyes, trying to let the fatigue from rising early pull him into a doze.

"You all right there?" A voice very close asked.

Harry jerked straight and looked at the scruffy man in faded coveralls getting into the car two spots down.

"Oh yes. Thanks. Just, uh, resting my eyes. Late night."

"Yeah, I know 'bout that. Nice bike."

"Thanks."

The car pulled away. Harry pulled out the map and held it open in his lap before dropping his head and trying again. No one bothered him this time as the familiar haze of green pulsed into his mind. A light wind tickled past in the vision in a different direction than the real one tugged his jacket. Harry woke up completely, stretched his neck and tried again. That in-between state was hard to maintain, but he wasn't going to give up. This time he got a glimpse of something dark and ephemeral in that world, off to his left, a little distance away. Uncertain if direction meant anything, he started the motorbike up again and rode northeast, intent on finding out.

Harry repeated this for many dogged hours before being forced to stop for an early dinner. His neglected stomach complained bitterly as he waited at the counter of a snack shop for his order to be assembled. He took it over to a table beside a forlorn city tree at the corner of a quiet side street. A group of children in rough clothes were playing football with great enthusiasm and much shouting. A car approached and they quickly collected their ball and stood as an honor guard might while the vehicle rolled past before returning to their game as though uninterrupted.

Harry closed his eyes and let himself doze. The shadow, which he found more easily this time, didn't seem any closer. Sighing, Harry bundled up the paper from his meal, tossed it in the rubbish bin, and decided on a walk down the shop-filled street he could see across the nearby large intersection.

Putting Avery out of his mind for a while, Harry wandered along, looking for things his friends might like, or that even he might like. Most of the shops were full of discounted and disarrayed things, but at the corner a display rack of fingerprint-marred sunglasses caught his attention. Excited by a sudden notion, he hunted through the rack for the nicest pair with mirrored lenses and found a very stylish pair with bright mirroring and a nice aerodynamic shape. He paid for them plus a hard-sided case in which to store them. Humming happily to himself he walked on, determined now to have a good look around.

The beginnings of sunset were showing themselves on the sky when Harry finally returned to his motorbike. The long flight home seemed too much at that point. It occurred to him that London was closer. Hermione had offered to let him stay at her flat on many previous late evenings. In his mind Harry took her up on the offer as he rode the bike out to a deserted narrow lane lined with stone walls and twisted the altitude throttle.

As he approached the lights of London, Harry strengthened the Obsfucation charm upon him and considered that he also knew where Tara's place was. After circling down over the right area, he had to find the underground stop and then follow along above the rooftops to her street. Buildings were odd things from above, covered in looming metal structures of unfathomable purpose and great hazard to someone flying low. He carefully circled her building and decided which windows must be hers. Orange light filled the curtains inside. Harry carefully lowered the bike to window height and pulled out the Roar knob just a tad. This wasn't sufficient to generate any movement of the curtains and it attracted glances from below that looked puzzled before looking away. Harry pulled out his wand to make the Obsfucation charm on the bike itself as strong as possible while allowing her to see him. "Tara!" Harry shouted.

After a long pause the curtains moved and then moved aside. She looked down through the glass, so he shouted again. Her eyes came up and went wide. She worked the window open and demanded in shock, "What the devil are you doing?"

"I wanted to see you," Harry explained. "Want to go for a ride?"

She looked down and back up at him, gauging the distance to the ground. "Um. Why don't you park that and come up instead?"

"Okay," Harry agreed amiably.

"Harry you are crazed," she said as she let him in the building door.

"Why?"

"Why? What if someone saw you?" she demanded.

"No one but you could," Harry said.

At the door to her place, she said, "No? You can do that?"

"Yep, Aurors need to do it all the time so they can see each other but no one else can easily."

She sounded satisfied as she said, "Oh." Her place was three rooms. She gestured that he should take a seat at the table. "I was just making tea; do you want some?"

Harry felt sleepy from the long ride. "Sure. Thanks."

She pulled her hair back before she checked the flame under a kettle already heating on the stove. "You startled me."

"I didn't mean to," Harry said, just thinking that if he didn't return home tonight that no one would know.

She pulled out cups and milk. "You know, Harry, I wouldn't have thought of myself as old at twenty-two, but I think I'm too old for you."

"Why?"

"Because you should date someone who wants to go for a midnight ride on a flying motorcycle. I think I'd have to work myself up to that."

Harry watched her rinse the cups with tap water and considered that Ginny probably would go with him. He could fly up to Hogwarts and even if McGonagall were standing there ready to give her a month of detention, she would hop right on. Tara took out a box of tea bags, revealing a row of boxed pasta, one of which tried to fall out when the cabinet door was opened. Harry said, "People without house-elves eat a lot of that."

She smiled as she poured kettle water into the cups to heat them before shaking them out into the sink. "Yes, we do."

As he sipped his tea, Harry considered what his friends had said about dealing with someone else's guilt. He wasn't sure he could wait it out, nor did he know what to say. "I like you a lot," he tried. Her eyes dropped. Wrong thing to say, but that meant there might not be a right thing.


Harry tried to take the roads to Hermione's flat, but it was far too tedious to wait for even the light nighttime traffic and streetlights. He pulled into an alleyway, did a quick spell to check for lurkers, applied several layers of Obsfucation and Illusion charms to himself and the motorbike, and took off straight into the air. At nearly roof level and accelerating, he clipped the right handle on the metal bar of a curved guard for the permanent ladder that led to one of those metal monstrosities so many roofs had. The loud clang echoed up out of the alley and the bike tilted crazily when the handlebars twisted with the blow's force. Fortunately for Harry his excessive acceleration upward bought him enough time to right things and only the rubber wheel squealed eerily against the sheet metal of a large exhaust hood as he managed to get level.

Breathing heavily, he hovered just above the dark roof until he recovered himself and his heart slowed down. Probable headlines in the Muggle paper flashed before him Mystery Flying Motorbike Crashes in Central London or more hopefully Foolish Hotroder Rides off of Five-Story Building. Flying now with paranoid and meticulous care, Harry steered his way eastward, very grateful the bike was behaving normally despite the mishap. When he arrived near his friend's flat, he patted the empty front tank to express his appreciation for its hardiness and dipped lower to land where the light was least concentrated.

Hermione greeted him at the door, very pleased to see him.

"Gotta beer?" Harry immediately asked, forgetting to say much more than hello.

She laughed. "Sure. I think so. I shopped just yesterday. Good thing you didn't drop in before then; even the mice have been complaining about the empty kitchen."

Crookshanks winked his glowing eyes from his usual perch atop the bookcase. Harry closed the door behind him and toed his shoes off. "Thanks," he said, accepting the cold bottle she handed him. After a refreshing swallow he asked, "Doesn't your cat get them?"

She was quickly straightening the room. "You mean the mice? No. Turns out he makes friends with them, pushes catfood under the counter for them if you don't watch him. It was only Pettigrew he thought worth hunting."

"Good Crookshanks," Harry praised the furry thing as he passed under its watchful gaze. He dropped into a worn squishy chair and tried to relax. Hermione watched him take another sip of beer before giving in and getting herself one as well.

Harry leaned his head back and stared at the ceiling a long minute before remembering that he was a guest and should probably not fall asleep. "So where's Ron tonight?" Harry asked. Hermione made a small face in reply. "Something going on?" Harry then asked, looking for more subtle clues this time.

"Nothing new." She scoffed and looked unhappy and tapped the bottle with her fingers. "It's just that he won't consider moving out of the Burrow. We have little . . . ongoing arguments over that, and since we had one after the picnic, so he didn't want to come over."

"Oh." Harry considered that sounded likely of Ron all right. "I wouldn't want to move out either, even to live closer to the Ministry. The ride in the Floo can be a little long and sometimes I swear I get diverted past some strange area where the fireplaces all smell like the have burnt offal in them, but I like living at home."

"That isn't the same, Harry." She sat back and looked at him, straight in the eyes, which Harry found disconcerting, or maybe he just wasn't used to it. "You just got a family. It'd be odd if you gave it up already. And besides you're alone now anyway."

Harry bounced his feet before crossing them at the ankles to stop it. "Yeah."

"Not liking it?"

"Takes some getting used to."

"I like it," she stated with relish. "I spent all evening just reading." With a wave, she indicated the stack of books on the cardboard box beside the couch which still served as a side table.

Silence descended again. Harry eventually said, "I could Floo home from here and come back for the bike tomorrow," although he didn't feel like getting rocketed and spun around for long minutes as tired as he was.

"You can sleep on the couch. 'Course it isn't the most comfortable."

"I can transfigure it into a bed." He eyed the space. "There's room, if you don't mind."

"I want to see you do that," Hermione challenged. She stood up and gestured for him to go ahead.

Harry didn't move. "What?" he asked, confused.

"I want to see you do that--a bed that lasts more than five minutes."

Harry shrugged, stood, and pushed the short squishy chair he had been sitting on out of the way. He pulled his wand out of his enlarged inside jacket pocket and incanted, "Dormilanequoris," while gesturing in wide wand sweeps. The couch stretched, shifted and flattened into an ordinary bed. It even had sheets, all tucked in with sharp corners. "Hey," Harry said, "I could use that spell to pretend my bed was made. Are there any bad magical side-effects to turning a bed into a bed?"

"Uh, I don't know. Where did you learn this spell?"

"Oh, Aaron, one of the other apprentices. We sometimes get left to ourselves when things are really busy and last week, we took turns showing off our favorite spells."

Hermione bounced her hand on the bed. "You've never done this spell before? This is the first time?"

"Well, I have a bed a home. The need hasn't arisen." He sat down hard, testing it. "Not bad. He said it would last six hours at least. 'Course he sometimes makes things up and says the opposite of the truth to suck people in, but, we'll see," he stated pleasantly, simply glad the spell had worked when challenged by his old friend.

Hermione was giving him a strong glare. "Harry, I can't believe you just did this spell for the first time!"

"Oh, come on," Harry retorted. "You who always got everything in class before everyone else."

"Well . . . " she hemmed.

"Now, for example, Flitwick never showed us how to detect illusions and you have a big charm to hide the four boxes stacked beside the bookcase."

Hermione rolled her eyes and picked up her wand off of the brown-board side table. She waved it. Tried again. And then finally got up to tap the invisible boxes directly, making them flicker into view. "Hm," she muttered, looking at her wand. "I was pretty proud of that. Took me an hour to get it right before my parents visited. I didn't want them to see I hadn't found space for everything I'd insisted on moving out. I didn't want to leave anything behind; it didn't seem like moving out if I did that."

She sat on the end of the bed. "What else have you learned?" she asked, sounding vaguely melancholy.

Harry, happy to show off a bit, crossed his legs on the bed and said. "Okay, this might not come out quite right, but watch this." Harry closed his eyes to concentrate, and tapped his chin while muttering, "Aspecticedo." He then rubbed his chin to feel if it had worked. A grizzly beard now indeed sprouted there.

"Hey, you look good like that," Hermione said. "Did Tonks teach you that?"

Harry scratched at the beard as though it were a rash. "Yeah, but she is too good at it to be really good at teaching it. Don't tell her I said that though."

She stared at her wand before stashing it away. "I haven't learned anything new in months. No, I learned a how to control a note-taking quill." More quietly, she added, "It's not really a spell though." She sighed lightly. "So what are you doing in London?"

Harry frowned and adjusted himself on the bed. "I stopped in at Tara's flat. She . . . wasn't really in the mood for my company."

"I'm sorry, Harry," Hermione said in sympathy.

"No. It's all right. I don't really know her all that well." He shrugged. "I still kind of like her though."

Even more sympathetically, Hermione said, "You flew all the way to London to see her?"

"No," he admitted, and only because this was one of his oldest friends did he add, "I was in Devon . . . hunting Avery."

Hermione gave him a level look. "Does the Ministry know you're doing that?" When Harry shook his head, she huffed. "Why don't you at least tell them?"

"I'm only a trainee. I'm not allowed to do anything."

She crossed her arms and appeared to be considering chastising him. "So, find out anything?"

"No." Harry tossed his wand in the air and caught it again. "I got my wand fixed and cleaned by Ollivander." He held it out. "Looks like new, doesn't it?"

"You're changing the subject."

"No, I didn't find out anything. I even went around trying to fall half asleep to sense him, but I couldn't zero in at all on him."

She picked at her nails a little nervously. "You . . . can see him though?"

"I think so."

A silent moment passed. "Does Severus know you are doing this?"

"I told him I wanted to." Harry put his wand aside on the cardboard box. "He told me to work through the Ministry."

"Which you aren't doing . . . "

Harry shrugged. "I'm useless at looking for him--even though I can sense him sometimes. Maybe he is still lying low."

Hermione looked vaguely uneasy as she considered that. She finally uncrossed her arms and stood up. "Well, I have to do some things in the morning. If you don't mind . . . it is a little late."

"No, that's fine," Harry said agreeably. "Thanks for letting me stay."

She shrugged and smiled, looking like her old self, which made Harry realize that for the most part, she didn't. With more emotion than it warranted, she added, "You're welcome anytime, you know. Why don't you use the toilet first?"

Later, when she went into the bedroom and closed the door, Harry slipped off his shirt, belt, and socks and got into bed. The transfigured bed felt very solid, not at all like it might change back at any moment. Deciding it was best to assume it wouldn't, Harry closed his eyes and tried to sleep.

The traffic noises outside kept Harry awake for a while before exhaustion took over. As soon as it did, Harry snapped back awake with a start. Footsteps sounded and Hermione opened her bedroom door. "Harry?"

"It's all right," he assured her. He rubbed his hair back a few times and felt it bounce back up in all directions. Remembering the sense of a shadow hovering, Harry said, "Avery is in London. He's much closer to here than I sensed him in Devon." He sniffled and lay back down. "Sorry to bother you."

She stood there in her frilly nightgown, the sound of her breathing eventually slowing to normal and falling silent. "Don't apologize, but please don't go after him alone."

"I'll come fetch you then . . . when I find him," Harry sleepily offered.

She snorted. "I don't think I'd be much use to you."

"Sure you would." Harry rolled over and curled up slightly. "You'd say, 'Harry don't be stupid--owl for someone else to help'."

Her laughter filled the darkness. A car went by and its lights traced over the ceiling and wall as it turned. "Good night, Harry," she finally said, and went back to bed, leaving the door open this time, making Harry wonder that everyone he knew thought he needed looking over while he slept.

---