The Black Star

The Black Star

Chapter 1

***

July, 1995

"And I'm telling you! The Cannons would have flattened the Wasps if their bloody Beater hadn't hit Starrey! I mean, you can hardly win without a Seeker, can you?"

Sitting outside Florean Fortescue's Ice-Cream Parlour in the bright July sun, Ron was expressing his irritation about the failure of his favourite Quidditch team by ranting for good half an hour and gesticulating wildly with a spoon, making Harry, who was sitting next to him, flinch aside every minute or two. Harry didn't object, though, simply because he was too happy that he could be there with his friends instead of having to spend his holidays with the Dursleys. He had no idea as to how the Weasleys had convinced Dumbledore to let him stay at the Burrow where he wasn't protected by the Praesidium familiae - spell like with his blood relatives, but he was deeply grateful for their efforts, especially since his presence at the Burrow bore a certain risk for the Weasleys, too. But it seemed that despite the events at the end of the previous school year, the danger wasn't so acute because they had even been allowed to go to Diagon Alley by themselves.

Hermione frowned at this point and interrupted Ron's fiery speech. "Isn't it the duty of a Beater to hit his opponents?" she inquired.

Ron opened his mouth to respond heatedly, but Harry was quicker. Stuffing a left-over piece of cake into his red-haired friend's mouth in order to prevent him from further ranting, he turned leisurely to Hermione and explained with admirable patience, "Theoretically, yes, but not with their fists like it happened in this case."

Hermione nodded in acknowledgment, not really caring anyway, the main goal of her interjection having been to cut off Ron. As she saw him swallowing the piece of cake, she made up her mind about a matter she'd been thinking about since Ron had begun his tirade.

"I'm going to buy myself a Witch Weekly," she announced, rising from her seat. "Let's see if there are more reporters of the likes of our beloved Rita Skeeter." She grinned. "Maybe you already have a new girlfriend, Harry, who knows?"

Ron snorted. "Or maybe they finally found out what he really does in his free time. Enthusiastically reading Playwizard Magazine, that is."

Harry nudged him in the ribs, colouring slightly under Hermione's curious gaze. "I do not!"

"Do too," Ron said with satisfaction at Harry's discomfiture.

"Do not."

"Do too."

Suppressing laughter, Hermione rolled her eyes and went to buy her magazine with thoughts like "Boys.", "Immature." and such crossing her mind.

"Any similar action to this one of you and I will tell her who exactly wrote 'I love HG' on that desk in the History of Magic classroom," Harry hissed to Ron who paled.

"You won't."

"I will. I can be evil."

"Harry, please," Ron whispered frantically. "Don't tell her, okay? Please? You promised!"

His friend rolled his eyes. "Fine, fine. But see that you do something about that matter. I won't be watching you being lovesick much longer."

Ron's ear-tips went pink. "Yeah, well, I'm working on it, okay? Just let me do it my way."

"But if that way involves you boring us with Cannons-Wasps tirades and telling my secrets in public, then I won't play along. Understood?" Harry told him, still less than thrilled about Ron's handling of the situation.

"Yeah, loud and clear. Watch out, here she comes," Ron replied quietly, pointing to the left, whence Hermione was hurrying towards them, wearing a peculiar expression on her face.

"Look at this," she said as soon as she had reached them and put the magazine onto the table, pointing at its front page, which bore a single headline, accompanied by a picture.

THE COMEBACK OF "MRS. BLACK", the big fat letters read.

Ron and Harry stared.

"Mrs. Black?" Harry asked confusedly, associating the name with the only person he knew that had the same. "This hasn't anything to do with Si..., er, Snuffles, has it?" he added, dropping his voice so as not to attract too much attention from the other occupants of Fortescue's Ice-cream Parlour.

"He was also the first one I thought of when I read this," Hermione replied uncertainly. "But I don't know what connection..."

Ron moved the paper towards him resolutely and began to read the article inside it out loud.

"Stella Decartier, the well-known Head of Black Star, has returned to Britain last week, as her press spokesman informed us. Decartier, often nicknamed 'Mrs. Black' due to her relationship with the infamous Sirius Black, has lived in Canada in a sort of self-chosen exile for nearly 15 years, ever since Black's arrest in 1981."

Ron paused. "So there is a connection, and a very strong one at that, I would say," he commented, glancing at his friends who were listening to him in rapt attention. "What do they mean with 'relationship', I wonder?"

"Doesn't the article explain further?" Harry asked a little impatiently and beckoned his friend to read on.

"Decartier's return leads to a row of interesting questions. Why has she come back? Why didn't she appear two years ago when Black broke out of Azkaban? Has she or hasn't she been helping him to escape and to avoid re-arresting? What is her work in Black Star really about? Do we now have to fear 'Mrs. Black' as well? Hold on to your Witch Weekly with the most exclusive information about the 'murderer's bride'!"

"Well, the writing style of this scandal sheet is really crappy, if you ask me," Ron remarked into the heavy silence that had descended on their table after he had finished reading.

Hermione was furrowing her brows thoughtfully, clearly attempting to figure out what the article meant and Harry was simply staring at the accompanying picture, as if he was trying hard to remember something. Nobody seemed to have heard Ron's last comment.

"Erm," he cleared his throat. "Any thoughts?"

***

One week before...

Stella Decartier woke up as the first ray of the morning sun fell on her closed eyes. Since this was a relatively nice way to leave the realm of dreams, she smiled lightly and tried to sit up. At this moment, however, her smile vanished about as quickly as a Snitch when you wanted to catch it. The reason for this sudden swing in Stella's mood was the fact that a booming pain in her head and a dull ache in her left arm kicked in, both results of her two-day journey over the Atlantic Ocean - on a broomstick. Stella, who was neither overly fond of Apparating the way from Montreal to London nor of taking the complicated journey by Floo, had chosen her favourite mode of travelling and had been faced with an interesting challenge by a colleague of hers: Would she master the way within 50 hours?

She had succeeded, but at the cost of travelling almost without making stops and therefore getting so exhausted that she had drifted off to sleep for a few seconds and had fallen off her broomstick, right into the icy waves of the Northern Atlantic Ocean, a few miles before the Gulf Stream, which would have been at least warmer.

The collision with the water surface had resulted in an arm injury which Stella couldn't classify more specifically (she just hoped it wasn't broken) and in a horrible headache. But Stella knew that she'd been, in fact, rather lucky. Falling down from 50 feet could have rendered her with a broken neck as well.

Somehow, she had managed to get back onto her broomstick and fly to her Glasgow flat where she now had to cure her injuries somehow. That was indeed a problem, for Stella was hopelessly anti-talented where Healing Magic was concerned. Her Healing spells had virtually no effect and considering the fact that Potions had been her best subject in school, her Healing draughts helped disappointingly little. Stella used to say that her anti-talent in this area of magic was a result of nature having forgotten some sort of fibre in her body; Sean Wraith, a colleague of hers and one of her best friends, used to say it was because she was too destructive a person.

Stella touched her bruised arm gingerly, pondering whether she should call Sean and tell him to get her into shape again, but finally she decided against it. She had been trying hard to conceal that particular inability of hers and the prospect of Sean healing her with a wave of his wand was too humiliating, even if he knew about her problems in this area of magic. Seeing a mediwizard was also out of question. The fewer people knew about her Healing anti-talent, the better.

Stella walked slowly over to the balcony and squinted into the morning sun that was bathing the roofs of Glasgow's buildings in warm, golden light. The scenery had changed surprisingly little over the past five years she hadn't been there. But that was irrelevant anyway. There were other, a lot more important things to focus on.

Like sleeping myself to health, Stella thought, yawning and staggered back to her bed. Business would have to wait until tomorrow.

***

Harry and Hermione raised their faces to look at Ron, who was staring at them expectantly, awaiting their opinions.

"Well," Hermione began slowly. "I don't think that woman is actually Snuffles' wife. I mean, the article doesn't explicitly say so and we would certainly have heard or read it somewhere by now if she was..."

"But if she lived that far away and maybe wanted to keep it quiet?" Ron argued but got interrupted by Harry.

"Snuffles would've told me if he was married," he said in an attempt to appear firm, but then his certainty wavered. "Wouldn't he?"

Ron lifted his shoulders, unsure what to say. "Well, maybe there just hasn't been the right occasion, you know. I mean, how often do marriages come up in letters with somebody who's on the run and in hiding? 'Dear Harry, I've started living off rats again, Buckbeak's fine, weather's horrible, oh, and by the way, I have a wife whom I haven't seen in 14 years...' Unlikely to happen, if you ask me."

"But Snuffles doesn't seem the type to have married young," Hermione objected. "And back then he was, what? Barely twenty. She was more likely just his girlfriend. I mean, do you remember the time in The Three Broomsticks when we found out that Dumbledore, McGonagall, Hagrid and Fudge falsely thought that Snuffles had been the Secret-Keeper? If this Decartier woman was so important, then they would have certainly mentioned her in some way."

"I suppose you are right," Harry replied, but he didn't sound convinced.

Having drawn a hand through his hair in a slow motion, he glanced up sharply. "I have to talk to him."

Knowing that he meant Sirius, Hermione pointed out reasonably, "But you don't know where he is, do you? Owl him."

Harry nodded, seeing sense in her remark. Sirius could be anywhere in the country, fulfilling orders Dumbledore had given him. Out of lack of something to say, Harry began to examine the picture on the page which showed a woman, apparently Stella Decartier, when suddenly a shadow fell on the trio and a voice resounded behind Harry's back.

"Ah, yes," Florean Fortescue said and the trio jumped at the sound of his voice, having been completely enthralled in their conversation. They glanced at him with surprise mingled with curiosity as he went on, pointing at the picture of the woman.

"Stella Decartier. I used to be friend with her father, so I remember her well. Sad story... and a prime example which confirms that love makes indeed blind. She had never believed in Black's betrayal... always claimed he was innocent, despite all the evidence that was against him...," he trailed off, shaking his head in a pitying manner and then turned away, continuing to charm off the glasses and cutlery left on the other tables.

However, his input hadn't given the trio any more clues, though it was interesting to learn that Stella Decartier considered Sirius innocent.

On what account,Harry wondered.

It wouldn't have been just love-blindness, as Florean Fortescue had claimed. Harry looked at the picture in Witch Weekly again, tuning out his friends' voices, who were puzzling over Fortescue's statement. The photo was black and white and therefore showed both her hair and eyes as plain dark. Harry assumed they were originally brown. There was nothing outstandingly memorable about the woman's features and yet Harry had this strange feeling in the back of his mind that he had already met her. But if she hadn't even been in Britain for more than a decade?

Squinting at the photograph, he tried to remember. Who was this woman?

Suddenly, recollection hit him and Harry knew the name she had once told him to call her. Silver.

Stella Decartier was Silver.

***

1971

It seemed as if every single inch of Platform 9 ¾ was covered by people, trolleys, owl-cages and trunks in various sizes. In short, the typical scene of September 1^st presented itself to the observer's eyes.

"Hey, Sirius, would you be so kind as to help me?" James Potter called out to his raven-haired friend, shaking his head impatiently while trying to push his trunk into the train without much success.

Fortunately, Sirius had heard him, which was no mean task to accomplish in the buzzing of the crowd and went over to give James a hand, wearing one of his soon-to-be-considered-as-a-trademark lopsided grins.

"What's up, Jamesie-boy? Have we possibly overestimated our muscles?"

James groaned, but Sirius wasn't interested in troubling him further. While helping his friend pushing the trunk into the train, he was scanning the crowd for a flash of bright green.

There it was. Sirius grinned with satisfaction as he spotted Severus Snape, the target of his and James' previous joke. The two of them had known Snape from wizarding elementary school they had all attended, despite the fact it wasn't obligatory, before Snape had left to receive private tuition and they had never got along. That's why in James' and Sirius' opinion, Severus had been a wonderful opportunity to test a new Zonko's product, Sander's Super Slimy Substance, which had turned his head a brilliant shade of poisonous green after making contact with Snape's head thanks to Sirius. It also had the effect of making Severus look even more sour than before, but let's face it, with such a substance on the head, who would look pleased? Now, he was apparently looking for his parents to turn his hair back. James and Sirius sniggered without a shred of sympathy for the guy and made their way inside the train.

Lily Evans had been one of the first people on the train and had settled down in an empty compartment, feeling slightly dizzy with excitement. She supposed that she should be feeling nervous because there was a whole new world waiting for her but in fact, there had never been anything she had looked more forward to than to discovering the world of magic. Lily had never been one to fear new things, quite the contrary. She loved to face challenges and this was possibly going to be the greatest one in her life. Taking out the book with information about Hogwarts and the wizarding world in general she had got by owl post, a rather novel experience for her, she tried to run through the major differences between the world as she was used to it ("Muggle" sounded a bit weird to her) and the magical one.

"No electricity, moving pictures, loads of owls..."

She didn't notice someone entering the compartment and jumped slightly as the person spoke up.

"Don't forget vanishing rooms and changing stairs," said the dark-haired girl and grinned as Lily looked up curiously. "Muggle-born, eh? Don't worry, they usually settle in soon enough, from what I've heard. I'm Stella Decartier, by the way," Stella went on, extending her hand to Lily who shook it.

"My name is Lily Evans. Nice to meet you. Are you a first year, too?" she asked as both girls took place opposite each other at the window.

Stella nodded. "Yes. But fortunately, my parents told me some things about Hogwarts as they attended it themselves, so I won't be totally lost. I guess it will be much more difficult for you, huh?" However, she smiled to give Lily courage, although she didn't seem to need it anyway.

The red-haired girl had an air of self-confidence about her that Stella wouldn't have expected of somebody who had just been put into a completely new world for them. But she liked Lily's behaviour because it was similar to her own. New things were interesting, that was her philosophy and Lily seemed to be the type to share that view.

Stella watched as the other girl peered out of the window and then waved to a couple dressed in Muggle clothes with a sullen-looking girl who seemed to be about 13 standing beside them.

"Your family?" Stella inquired and Lily nodded happily, exchanging smiles with her parents who were looking quite nervous, in stark contrast to their relaxed daughter in the compartment who was about to head into a completely new world for her.

Still smiling, Lily sank back into her seat and fixed Stella with her green gaze. "What about your parents?" she asked amiably and got curious as Stella's face became closed-off.

"They... we've said our good-bye's in the station hall," Stella muttered quickly in a tone that discouraged further questioning. She found Lily nice, but didn't feel like explaining why exactly her parents rather avoided the British wizarding public.

Lily just raised her eyebrows imperceptibly, but as she didn't want to pry, she went back to her book. Stella skimmed through the crowd with her eyes, trying and failing to discover a familiar face. But then again, after having lived in Canada since she had been two years old up until June that year, she would be unlikely to know British magical people. Except for...

Stella's gaze stopped when it reached two boys who were heaving a large trunk into the train. She didn't recognize the messy-haired one with the glasses, but the other boy looked quite like Aeneas Black on the photos her parents had shown to her. They had been good friends at school and had maintained some contact even during the Decartiers' forced stay outside of the British islands and that's why Stella knew a few things about Sirius Black. Her parents had spoken very enthusiastically about him which had had the immediate effect of making Stella dislike him despite having never even met him. Strictly speaking, though, that wasn't completely true because they had supposedly played with each other as little kids, but Stella couldn't remember, thus it didn't count for her. She hadn't been very pleased to learn that they would be starting at Hogwarts at the same time and now she hoped that they wouldn't be in the same house, at least. Because in that case, her parents would certainly want them to be friends and Stella wanted to choose her friends by herself.

Sirius, on the other hand, didn't know about Stella because his parents had never mentioned her or her family to him after the Decartiers had moved away. Their contact had been better kept hidden. Whether or not this knowledge would have affected him the way it had influenced Stella's opinion on him would have certainly been interesting to know. But since their point of view was similar when it came to choosing friends, it's likely that he would have anticipated their meeting with the same unfounded prejudices and antipathy the girl did.

Stella was startled out of her reverie by a sudden question from Lily.

"Are there any other schools for witches and wizards or is there just Hogwarts?" she asked, the idea having appeared in her mind after learning the size of her future school, which couldn't possibly be large enough to offer a place to every magical child worldwide.

"Er...." It took Stella a moment to focus properly on the question. "No, there are more of them, of course," she replied with a smile in order to make up for her earlier taciturnity. "In Europe, the largest save Hogwarts are Beauxbatons Academy in France and Durmstrang whose location is kept secret. Apart from those, there are a few other magical schools, but much smaller ones, like La scuola della magìa in Italy and the Akadémie mágie in Prague. I don't know about Asia and Africa, but there is a wizarding school in Peru and some are in North America, for example the Salem Institute."

"I see," Lily nodded in acknowledgement. "And what about..."

At this point, she was interrupted by two boys rushing into the compartment.

"Ah, lots of space here and beautiful company as well," Sirius commented and grinned as the girls raised their eyebrows at his words. "We can stay, buddy," he added, turning to James who smiled a little apologetically.

"Hi, I'm James Potter and this is Sirius Black... I would ask you to excuse his manners, but nothing can possibly excuse him, so I'll rather save my breath."

Lily introduced Stella, who wasn't looking all too friendly because of her earlier-mentioned prejudices towards Sirius, and herself. Then she began to watch with interest as Sirius settled down, pulling out a monstrous, blood-coloured lollipop and starting to lick at it.

"You do know that those are supposed to be for vampires, Black," Stella remarked in a patronizing tone, wanting to sound superior.

However, Sirius didn't let himself be troubled by her tone in any way and went on licking calmly.

"Are they really blood-flavoured or do they just look as if they were?" Lily asked, turning to Stella.

But it was James who answered her question. "No, they really taste that way, I've been told. I bet Sirius a Galleon that he wouldn't eat a whole one, but it seems he's gonna win," he said, sounding slightly frustrated. Clearly, there weren't many things Sirius Black wouldn't eat.

A little while later, a small, light-haired boy stuck his head into their compartment and asked shyly whether there was a place free. He was beckoned in and after the standard procedure in which he introduced himself as Peter Pettigrew, a first-year like everyone else in that compartment, the newcomer sat down next to Lily, opposite the two boys.

Sirius continued to lick at his lollipop serenely and Peter watched him with fascination mingled with ill-guised distaste and suspicion.

"Are you a vampire?" he blurted out suddenly and the others hid their grins at his question.

"Uh-huh," Sirius responded, completely unperturbed.

Peter's eyes became round and disbelieving. "Really?"

"Yeah," Sirius nodded calmly, successfully managing to hide a mischievous grin. "After I'm finished with this, I will suck you out until you look like one of those crumpled Egyptian mummies, you know, nothing but skin and bone and maybe a little flesh in between."

Peter frowned at that detailed and flowery description, pressing himself against the back of his seat.

"You're having me on. He is, isn't he?" he asked, turning to Lily who smiled at him comfortingly.

"Of course he is. I don't think they would allow vampires at Hogwarts," she said to reassure the boy who accepted her answer, albeit reluctantly.

After all, he had heard from his parents that the Headmaster of Hogwarts was very eccentric. The idea of him admitting vampires to Hogwarts wasn't so unlikely.

The rest of the journey passed rather quietly, not counting Sirius' and James' escapades which consisted of trying to do some magic (with moderate success), accidentally letting drop a Dungbomb which almost set itself off, scaring away the witch with the snacks trolley as a result.

"Well, this is bloody brilliant," Stella commented, annoyed. "Now I can spend the whole ride without food, thanks to you two." She glared at James and Sirius, crossing her arms in front of her chest, which, however, didn't have the intimidating effect she would have liked.

"You will survive it," Sirius replied in a way that suggested he wouldn't much care if the opposite happened.

He couldn't really be blamed for his attitude anyway for Stella had displayed her antipathy for him from the very beginning and therefore Sirius didn't feel compelled to be friendly, not that he ever did.

Stella sighed morosely and let her gaze wander over the scenery outside the window. It wasn't food she was craving, but a special sort of sweets - sugarquills, namely. They always had a calming effect on her and generally tended to cheer her up. Now, the absence of sugarquills meant bad mood. Stella realized that this might not be quite her day.

However, as the sky was turning darker and the train was approaching its destination, Hogsmeade Station, the gloom lifted itself from Stella's mind and got replaced by excitement. She was looking forward to Hogwarts, and felt very curious about the Sorting. Lily and the others seemed to feel much the same way, becoming increasingly fidgety and doubling the amount of glances thrown out of the window.

Finally, the train arrived at Hogsmeade Station and the crowd of students poured out onto the platform like a torrent of water, dragging Stella along, who was beginning to feel very tense. She didn't like crowds, the great amount of people in a small space, the buzzing and the smells making her feel nervous and somewhat sick. Therefore she didn't try to push herself through all the people as a large man ordered the first years to come over to him. Instead of following his command, Stella pressed herself against the train, shutting her eyes and waiting until the crowd dispersed. If she had opened her eyes, she would have noticed a brown-haired boy around her age standing some feet away from her doing pretty much the same - avoiding the throng of students.

Remus Lupin wasn't as affected by the people as Stella was, but if he could avoid being pushed around, then why shouldn't he? His well-trained ability of making himself small and inconspicuous helped him now.

Due to this reluctance, Remus and Stella were the last to arrive at the boats that would take them over Hogwarts lake. Hagrid beckoned them into a boat which had no other occupants apart from them and then took another one for himself.

Finally, the little boats took off and floated leisurely over the smooth dark surface of the lake which was reflecting the stars above.

In the second to last boat, Stella and Remus were sitting opposite each other without talking, occasionally throwing glances at the other and flashing a small smile. At length, Stella got tired of the silence and cleared her throat.

"Hi, I'm Stella Decartier," she told the brown-haired boy pleasantly and extended her hand.

Shaking it lightly, he responded, "Remus Lupin. Nice to meet you."

He flashed a grin as something occurred to him. "Your parents must've been into Astronomy, from the sound of your name," he remarked, hinting at the Latin meaning of Stella - star.

Stella nodded, grinning back at him. "You bet. They wanted to call me Cassiopeia first, but my great-aunt intervened and told them they couldn't do that to a poor innocent child. Ha!" She snorted, grimacing. "Then she demanded to choose my name and do you know what she chose?"

Remus looked inquiring. Stella, on the other hand, appeared scandalised.

"Stella Leandra," she said with disapproval. "My name sounds like taken straight out of some trash romance novel."

Remus made a sympathetic face. "At least you're not called after a murdered Roman guy. Trust me, that's far worse."

His words made her grin again. "Your parents were into Latin, huh? Though of course my name's Latin as well, but yours..."

Remus gestured resignedly. "Dad's a Latin teacher," he said.

"That explains it," Stella replied wisely and then she smiled encouragingly, seeing Remus' vaguely gloomy face. "Hey, don't look like that! Your namesake was the son of Mars and his brother founded Rome."

The boy looked at her with one raised eyebrow. "He was killed by that oh-so-famous brother and I don't think it's so wonderful to be the son of the god of war."

Stella pulled a face. "Well, if you're determined to see the things so negatively..."

But Remus had been rendered in a good mood by their conversation and so he just laughed in response, causing Stella to follow suit. They didn't speak much after that, but it wasn't an awkward silence that descended on them, on the contrary. The little boat-trip would be remembered fondly by both of them in the future.

The following minutes passed very quickly which made the memory of them somewhat blurred. Having disembarked, the first-years were steered into the Great Hall for the Sorting and Stella found herself suddenly standing in a line with the others, wondering how on earth she had got there as the Hat sang its song.

Sorting, she reminded herself. You're about to get Sorted.

Feeling curious, she peered over to the stool where the Hat was lying, now silent again and scowled at the battered piece of headgear. This rag was going to decide over her future? Oh, dear. Stella barely heard a voice calling out alphabetically the names of the students before her and the Hat's decision on where to put them.

However, at Black, Sirius!, she snapped back into reality and saw a stern-looking woman with square glasses gesturing Sirius forward. Stella watched as he put on the Hat nonchalantly and sat down on the stool. The Hat seemed to hesitate a little, but then it shouted Gryffindor! and Sirius went to Gryffindor Table accompanied by cheers and looking rather pleased with himself.

Continuing the family line, isn't he? Stella thought, once again recalling her parents' detailed narration in which they had also mentioned Aeneas and Diana Black having been in Gryffindor. Stella's mother had been there as well and her father, Lucas Decartier, had been a Slytherin. Under different circumstances, Stella would've considered Slytherin as a good option, but as she had heard mostly negative things about the Snake House, she wasn't very enthusiastic about ending up there. Eleven year-olds were very likely to adopt prejudices from their surroundings or build up their own and Stella was no exception. Her father had seldom really talked about his House specifically when giving his daughter a little insight into Hogwarts life. The girl before her became a Ravenclaw and Stella realized she would be the next. As she hadn't had the time to feel nervous before, the anxiety hit Stella now head-on and as she heard her name being called out, only a reflex made her walk over to the Hat and put it on in a daze.

Immediately, the soft, incessant murmur of the other students' voices subsided and Stella was faced with velvety darkness that seemed to envelop her mind for a moment. Suddenly, a keen voice resounded, sending shivers down her spine.

A Decartier, hmm? the Hat said meditatively. Now where shall we put you?

***