Dreamwalk Blue

CHAPTER SEVEN -- EVERYBODY COMES TO RICK'S

Ilsa: (to Rick) I wasn't sure you were the same. Let's see, the last time we met was -
Rick: (finishing her sentence) La Belle Aurore.
Ilsa: How nice. You remembered. But of course, that was the day the Germans marched into Paris.

Rick: Not an easy day to forget.
Ilsa: No.
Rick: I remember every detail. The Germans wore grey. You wore blue.
Ilsa: Yes. I put that dress away. When the Germans march out, I'll wear it again.

(from casablanca, 1942)

It was the end of world.

It was her every childhood nightmare, and then some, come to life.

Men lay like matchsticks, discarded in an open field, burnt and bloodied, the scent of sulfur and blood heavy on the air. Behind her the sea ran red. She stood on an abandoned cliff-top, the Atlantic crimson and grey in the early morning sun, while a salt-scarlet breeze whipped insistently at her hair.

Then suddenly the sea dissolved, and she was trapped in a room -- long, low, dark and walled in grey concrete. Sobs, bloodstains and the sour smell of fear soaked the floors and air.

What is this place?

She wandered blindly through the dank corridors, the sounds of muffled, unspeakable human cruelty behind every door. Fire, steam, electricity and the vomit-sweet smell of baking stones assaulted her senses. How she knew what lay beyond those empty-eyed doorways, she couldn't say. But the knowledge sat like lead in her chest and she just barely resisted the urge to run.

I am a witness. Someone must see this, must speak for those who can no longer speak themselves.

At the end of one very long hallway, a door yawned open before her. Compelled, she walked toward it, through it, closing her eyes against what she feared she would see.

It was a room like every other in this place. Only here, the cold, grey concrete walls were covered with a soft, matted material -- soundproofing to muffle the evidence of this barbarity from the world.

There were deep grooves in the grey matting, looking, from where she stood in the doorway, like abstract art. She moved closer, reaching a hand out to trace those complex marks. Realization dawned and she jerked her hand away.

Handprints.

They were human handprints, dug deep in the soundproofed wall with scrabbling fingers and jerky death convulsions. Almost against her will, she lifted her hand again and placed it against a particularly clear indentation. It was half the size of her own hand; tiny, delicate fingers had made this print.

A child's hand.

She dropped to her knees, retching, trying valiantly not to be sick on that hateful concrete floor. Sweating, freezing, she wasn't sure how long she remained that way, kneeling with one hand still pressed against the matting.

Recovering herself, she struggled to her feet, using the wall as leverage. When she looked, she realized her own hand had left its print there among all the others.

The scene shifted around her and changed just perceptibly, until, looking up, she realized that she was no longer trapped in those dark, underground rooms. Instead, she found herself in London -- only it wasn't her familiar London -- it was an alien city, filled with noise and neon.

She followed the press of the crowd around her, the scream of automobile traffic nearly deafening her, before she realized that someone was screaming -- a wail of desolation and betrayal that chilled her to the core. It was a death rattle, a shriek and a challenge all at once.

Afraid of what she might find, she made her cautious way around the corner onto a side street. A crowd had gathered there, around a dark-haired, young man. His face was grey, ashen with grief and his eyes unfocused.

The street was crowded, the press of people claustrophobic around her. Close, too close. They needed to get back, to get away from that boy with the blank eyes and trembling hands. Fire and death were waiting in the shadows unless they got away from this place.

She grabbed hold of the arm of a passerby. "Don't go any closer. You have to believe me." The man shook her off without a backward glance and kept walking.

She stood, letting the people pass her by like flowing water. Then the scene around her went perfectly still, the screaming, neon noise giving way to a moment of absolute silence. There was magic in the air. She could feel its dry electric spark in the twilight, crackling in her hair and skittering across her skin. The entire street seemed to take a breath as one, preparing. A street lamp above her head shattered, sending slivers of glass and wire into the crowd. The flashing neon lights flickered and died with a soft, silken sigh. The headlamps on traffic-jammed cars dimmed, and the street descended into gloom. People stood as though transfixed, and waited for fate and the moment to do with them as they would.

Just as the silence reached its breaking point, stretched taut, sharp and dangerous like piano wire, she felt a hand descend on her shoulder... and June woke with a cry, starting so violently that she knocked a vase of delphiniums from her night table.

June reached out with a trembling hand and switched on her lamp. The light flared to life, chasing shadows to the corners of the room. Blue-purple blossoms lay in a puddle of water and shattered glass on the floor beside the bed. June took a deep breath and gathered the blankets more firmly around herself.

She'd been dreaming since Albus left -- deep, vivid, technicolor dreams that left her breathless and trembling, chill-boned even in the summer heat. She told herself the dreams were the product of her troubled spirit -- she was afraid as she'd never been before, afraid for Albus, afraid for the whole world. But something deep within told her the dreams were that, but also something more.

So, she spent every night fighting sleep, only to wake to the silent shadows of pre-dawn still, and wish fervently that she wasn't in her bed alone.

I miss him, she admitted sheepishly to herself. Here I am, a grown woman, afraid of my own dreams... But, she knew that her imagined terrors were only a pale shadow of what he could be facing at that very moment. All I want is to know that he's all right, she thought, and then hated herself for thinking it. No matter what happened, she had to be stronger than this.

Flinging the bedclothes off, she swung her legs out of bed and padded into the kitchen to make a cup of tea. As the water began to boil, she leaned against the windowsill, half-listening for the kettle's shriek, and watched the moon. It was very bright tonight, bathing the world in white light.

She wondered if Albus was awake and if he could see the moon, then cursed herself for a fool. The kettle wailed and she pulled herself away from the window, firmly pushing all thoughts of dreams or war, or love or weakness, out of her head.

***

By the light of a blessedly full moon, Albus could just make out the silver thread of the road stretching away into the purple hills before them. The scene tonight was ironically peaceful -- a cool, August evening, well-lit, with only the slightest pleasant breeze.

But there was menace in that stillness. Even the owls had ceased hooting -- the forest on either side of the road seemed to be holding its breath in the moonlight.

It's too quiet, Albus thought wryly.

Seward paused beside him, a cautioning hand outstretched. "Stay here. I think there's someone up ahead."

Albus scooted back into the shadow of a gnarled pine tree by the roadside and waited. This journey onto the war-burdened continent had been both better and worse than he'd expected. Better because they had actually made it here to Albania, an outcome that had never been certain, and worse because living the reality of this war had hit him like a slap in the face.

Surprisingly, they'd gotten as far as Crete before running into any real trouble. After that, Apparating was out of the question. The local wizards had set defensive wards all through the countryside, intending to trap anyone unfriendly who might try to come through. An ill-placed Apparation could have ended their trip abruptly with a particularly nasty breed of splinching. The magical landscape was as pock-marked and barricaded as the physical one, making their progress slower than they'd anticipated.

Coming up through revolution-torn Greece, they'd managed to avoid the fiercest of the guerilla fighting, but still had to move cautiously, skirting towns and traveling only at night.

The tiniest rustle of the underbrush was his only cue that Seward had returned. He emerged next to Albus, keeping his head down and motioning that the other man should do the same.

"There are five of them, just up ahead." Seward waved carefully in a direction slightly to the northeast. "Resistance fighters by the look of them." He hefted the Luger he'd taken from a dead German soldier two days before. He nodded, and Albus started carefully forward.

When they reached the bend in the road the five men were waiting for them.

"Kapitulloj juaj arme," the leader said, pointing his weapon in their direction. Getting no response, he tried again in German. "Waffen runter!"

"Wir sind nicht Ihre Feinde," Seward replied, with only a trace of an accent. Seward moved forward, placing the Luger on the ground, and stepping back, arms spread wide.

The exchange continued for a moment before an agreement seemed to be reached. The leader stepped out of his chosen shadow, and Albus realized he couldn't have been much more than sixteen.

"English," he said, with a heavy, slurring accent. He motioned to the gun on the ground, and spoke to Seward again in German. Seward nodded and bent cautiously to reclaim the weapon.

"English," the boy repeated, nodding as if he'd expected it. He turned to the others, still hidden in shadow and said something Albus couldn't understand.

"Come with us, English," the boy said, motioning for them to follow. Seward holstered the Luger and followed.

Albus caught his arm. "Are you sure this is a good idea?"

"I think so -- they may be able to help us."

Up close the Resistance fighters proved to be nothing more than a band of malnourished teenage boys, not one of them over seventeen from the looks of them. They were dressed in patched and dirty clothing, obviously stolen from dead German soldiers, and armed with clean but notched submachine guns.

The boys led the two men to a clearing, where two more boys waited with an overburdened pony and a handful of knapsacks.

The leader said something to them in Albanian -- obviously an all-clear because they relaxed their holds on their guns, but still watched the two newcomers warily. One of the boys patted the restless pony with his free hand, while the leader spoke again to Seward in German.

After a moment, Seward said, "Come on then. We're going with them."

"Going with them? Really?" Albus eyed the boys as they fingered their guns nervously.

"Just play along with whatever I say, right?" Seward replied shortly, and turned to catch up with the leader.

They walked for ages, moving steadily upward, above the sea-eroded cliffs and into the craggy mountains. Albus kept his focus on Seward, occasionally favoring the other man with a questioning look. Seward pointedly ignored him, choosing instead to pepper the leader with questions in German.

After around an hour had passed, Seward dropped back to speak quietly with Albus. They had come over a rise and were gazing down at a glacial gash in the rocks filled with frigid, black water. On the far side of the little valley, a series of caves gaped in the rock face.

"That's where we're headed," Seward said, indicating the caves with one hand.

"Where are they taking us?" Albus whispered.

"To their leader, of course," Seward replied with a wry smile. "Relax, Dumbledore. These guys hate the Nazis almost as much as we do. Petrit," he indicated the boy he'd been speaking with, "tells me they're taking us to meet their boss. Hopefully there will be beer."

They hiked wordlessly across the valley, skirting the edges of the bottomless lake, the moon reflected across its obsidian surface. A network of expertly camouflaged trails led up to what appeared to be the largest of the caves. There was no sign of any life until a sentry materialized from the scrubby brush beside the path.

The sentry spoke briefly to the boys, sized Seward up and then allowed them to pass. They entered the cave swiftly and quietly. The air inside proved several degrees colder than the outside, clammy and chilled. The hairs on the back Albus' neck pricked up as a draft from a cross-tunnel wafted across their path. Their path emptied out into a large central cavern, lit carefully by strategically placed electric lights. It was even colder in this room.

Crates lined the walls of the cavern, covering every available space except where a few tunnels branched off into the bowels of the cave. A crude table sat in the center, fashioned from roughly-cut boards. A group of people bent over this table studying a large map. The one in the center of the group looked up severely at their approach.

"Ah," said Seward, beside him. "There's the boss."

To Albus' very great surprise 'the boss' proved to be a girl of about eighteen, petite and refined-looking even in such desperate surroundings. She regarded the two newcomers imperiously and spoke to the boys in haughty Albanian.

Seward and Petrit engaged in a rapid, but lengthy discussion in German, which the boy related to the leader in Albanian. She crossed her arms and replied sharply, her gaze fixed on the pair of them.

Petrit turned to them again. "Alba wishes to know why you have not brought us the supplies we were promised."

Seward appeared completely unruffled. "Tell her they're coming. We ran into heavy German fire and..."

The boy cut him off, speaking quickly in German.

"Tell her..." Seward began. "Oh, hell. Explain that... wir haben vor unsere Versprechen einzuhalten, aber wir mussen auch auf die Deutschen achten. Euere Lieferung kommt mit dem nachsten Abwurf.

This seemed to satisfy Alba for the moment, because she nodded dismissively and turned to speak to a young man standing next to her. Petrit came forward and spoke softly to them in his laborious English.

"You are to be fed, then I am to show you where to sleep."

They followed him to a small cave to the right of the main cavern. A low table was set with benches that looked as though they'd been hastily bound together from torn branches and hastily split logs. Albus sat down carefully, half-afraid the whole affair would collapse under his weight. The table was laid with heavy brown bread and a pitcher of clear but suspiciously pungent liquid.

Petrit sat down with them, looking exhausted.

"You okay, kid?" Seward asked, between mouthfuls of the bread. Petrit nodded wearily and poured himself a tin mug from the pitcher.

"How is it," Albus began a bit tentatively, "that you are so skilled with languages?"

"I am not sure I-" the boy began.

"He means, who taught you English?" Seward put in helpfully.

The cloud cleared from Petrit's face. "Ah! I understand. I had der Lehrer...tutors... as a boy." He paused, searching for the next phrase. "I know some Latin and French as well -- but it was...a long time ago." He grinned unpleasantly. "I am better at the German than any of the other."

"Handy," mumbled Seward.

Albus picked up the pitcher and poured his own drink, slugging it back thoughtlessly.

"Hey! Easy on that stuff!" Seward exclaimed, laughing.

Albus managed not cough, but his eyes watered a bit. "And here I thought you were the one who wanted beer," he rasped.

Seward grinned wryly. "Beer sure, but that stuff... if you're lucky it'll only blind you." Seward stuffed the last of his bread into his mouth and stood. "Come on. You look beat -- and Petrit's about to faceplant it into the table."

The boy led them away again, Albus stopping to grab another crust of bread from the table and shoving it into a pocket. The narrow corridors and connecting caves blurred together for Albus -- he'd never find his way out of here on his own should the need arise. He fervently hoped it didn't.

"You will sleep here," Petrit said, not unkindly, stopping before a small cave and pushing aside the worn blanket that served as a curtain over the entrance. "Tomorrow Alba wishes that you show to her where the Americans are expected."

"Of course," Seward replied, inclining his head politely toward the boy.

"Americans?" Albus hissed, as soon as Petrit was safely out of the room.

"Yes. Apparently, there are some American intelligence agents due to drop in here as well." Seward flopped down onto one of the pallets and stretched his arms above his head. "The Americans seem to have at last got over their fear of our communist friends out there."

"Communist?" Albus knew just enough about Muggle politics to understand that Britain and the United States were less than fond of this particular political system. Though he'd never completely understood why. On the face of it, it sounded like a wonderful idea.

Seward grinned. "Yes, our hosts are rising up against the overclasses like good little socialists." He snorted. "In this case, the oppressors happen to be the Nazis, so I wish them all the luck in the world."

Albus sat on the pallet across from Seward. "I don't pretend to understand half the things Muggles find to fight about." He shook his head.

"What do we do tomorrow?" he asked after a moment, leaning back onto the scratchy straw.

"We help," Seward replied, his voice muffled a bit as he shrugged out of his field jacket and draped it over himself like a blanket. "That's what they think we're here for anyway."

"You didn't set them straight?"

Seward favored Albus with the sort of look one might give a slow child.

"No, I did not. It's much safer if we're who they expect us to be, understand?" Seward rolled over, trying to get comfortable, then sat up. "I've told them we're from the SOE, but that we aren't the help they were waiting for. I don't want them to call off the search for those agents while there's still hope. If anyone asks, we parachuted in, but missed our drop point by about 20 miles. Got that?"

"Why lie to them at all? Do you think they're dangerous?"

Seward laughed grimly. "I know they're dangerous, but that's not why I spun our little story." He leaned back on the pallet wearily. "You wanted to get us near Fier, right?"

"Yes," Albus replied.

"Well, these caves they're operating out of are about 12 kilometers from Fier, and I'd guess conceal a passage to the ruins at Apollonia."

Albus looked up in surprise. "How did you figure that out?"

"It's my job to know this stuff." Seward levered himself up on one elbow. "Look here. You just follow my lead. We'll help these poor sods out for a week or two till they find their SOE agents, or until they can radio for other help. And meanwhile, we can have a nice look around those caves. They win, we win -- we just have to bend the truth a little bit. I trust you don't have a problem with that?" There was the hint of a challenge in the last question.

Albus met Seward's gaze without flinching. "I don't have a problem with it at all."

***

The courier had the look of a man built for this sort of job -- nondescript, medium build, dressed in a ubiquitous dark suit of indeterminate cut. A company man. He carried with him an air of quiet confidence and soft menace that put June ill at ease.

They were gathered in Martin Bulfinch's dark, quiet office, curtains drawn, a single lamp casting odd shadows on the heavy wood-paneled walls. The courier sat patiently in a high-backed leather chair by the fireplace, while the Minister of Magic and his advisors held a council of war. A secretary hovered around the assemblage, refilling teacups and rescuing stray papers from the carpet.

June sat a little apart from them, away from the fire and opposite the quiet Muggle. It was not June's place to argue matters of policy, though occasionally Bulfinch asked her opinion. Today she fervently hoped he did not. Some thought the tide of a war hung in the balance here, others that a way of life was threatened. For her part, June thought they were both wrong -- and that was not a position she wished to champion publicly. It was arrogance to presume that, magic or no, the relatively small wizarding population could sway the outcome of the war. It was also arrogance to think that the loan of a handful of mediwizards to the Muggles would topple a millennia-old society.

The Minister stepped to the center of the room, waving his wand to remove the silencing charm that had been in place around the conference table.

"Gentlemen, my mind is made up." June recognized the steel in Bulfinch's tone, and knew that any further arguments would be fruitless. "In truth, my mind was made up long before we entered this room... but you have had your say and I thank you for it."

One or two of the men looked ready to object, but the Minister silenced them with a glance and faced the emissary from the Muggle Prime Minister. The man stood, abandoning the chair by the fire, and inclined his head respectfully to Bulfinch.

"I thank you for your patience, Mr. Pym," the Minister began. "But, as I'm sure you understand, this is a rather delicate matter for us."

"I'd say it's a rather more than a delicate matter for all of us," Pym replied, a hint of ironic humor beneath his tone. "I take it you have reached a decision then, Minister Bulfinch."

"Indeed, we have. Again, I thank the Prime Minister for his continued support and discretion with regard to the wizarding community. It is an alliance that does honor to us all." Bulfinch paused, holding the moment expertly like the seasoned politician he was. "You may tell the Prime Minister, Mr. Pym, that we will offer every assistance in the liberation of France."

June started abruptly, the shock surely apparent on her face. She folded her arms across her chest, and regained control of her expression. This was an unexpected move, indeed. She, and, she suspected, everyone else in the room, had expected Bulfinch to offer a token -- a few mediwizards or an Auror or two -- a diplomatic offering, but nothing more. This was... this was a gamble -- a gamble that, dependent on its outcome, would either make Martin Bulfinch a hero or a traitor.

The courier was clearly shocked as well, though he hid it admirably. "Thank you, sir. I will relay your message to Mr. Churchill at once." The hint of what might have been a smile played at the edges of Pym's mouth. "I imagine, sir, that he will be glad of the help."

Bulfinch nodded in return and Pym left.

The door had barely closed behind him, when the assembled advisors broke into frantic speech again. Bulfinch held up a hand for silence.

"It's done. There will be no undoing it."

One man, a battle-hardened politician and old school friend of Bulfinch's, leaned across the polished table and said evenly, "Martin, I don't think you truly understand the precedent you're setting! Yes, there are terrible things happening in this Muggle war, and, I'll grant you, the everyday witches and wizards would like to see us offer humanitarian aid... But this is a dangerous path! If we intervene this once, where will it end?"

"Your opposition has been duly noted, Franklin. If this blows up in my face you have every permission to come say 'I told you so.' Now, gentlemen, if you'll excuse me. I have to prepare a statement for the press... June?"

"Yes, sir," She grabbed up a quill and parchment and followed him over to his desk, as the others left the room in a swish of cloaks and robes.

"Shall I set up a conference, sir? Or would you prefer to address the people directly on the wireless?"

Bulfinch didn't answer. When June looked up from her parchment, she found him regarding her carefully.

"You don't approve, do you?"

She laid her quill and parchment on the desk, and folded her hands in her lap. "In all frankness, sir," she replied. "No."

"Why?" he said, placing his hands spread wide on the desk. There was no challenge in his voice, simply an intellectual kind of curiosity.

"Because, sir, this is too little, too late. We ought to have committed ourselves to this fight immediately or stayed out of it altogether."

"I agree with you," he replied, surprising June. "Unfortunately, the nature of this office doesn't always allow to me to follow my own convictions alone. I have a responsibility to the people."

"I understand that, sir. But sometimes what the people want is wrong -- we only need to look to Germany to see that."

Bulfinch smiled ruefully. "Don't judge the German people too harshly, June. There but for the grace of God go we ourselves."

"Do you really think such a thing could happen in England? I don't believe it."

"Not England, June, but us. We -- wizards and witches. We're not so very different from those everyday Germans, with our pride, our subtle superiority. If ever we were to produce a Hitler, I'm afraid of how we would react, of the havoc we could wreak on the world."

"Do you believe that? Truly?"

Bulfinch rose from his chair and walked to the window. He pulled the heavy scarlet curtains aside and let in the late afternoon sun. "I'm afraid I do. And that is why this must be done. We have to grow, June. We can't stay this way forever -- no good will come of it. It's a changing world, and one in which we have to re-think our place."

"I don't disagree with that, sir. I'm more concerned about how this looks. Every tin-pot dictatorship in South America has declared war on Germany now that the outcome seems certain -- is that how you would have history remember us?"

"You forget, June," Bulfinch said, with a touch of bitter humor. "History will not remember us at all." He sat back down behind the desk, steepling his fingers. "Or, if it does, it will be only the history we write for ourselves, to be read by our 'kind.' The only posterity we have to fear is that which we control."

He paused for a moment, still staring out the window on to the sun-drenched square, the ancient marble buildings looking very solid and immovable. June, unable to think of a response, waited in silence.

"All right then, to business." He leaned forward, and rested his elbows on the desk. "No conference. I'll go on the wireless myself; it will be better that way. We should also be sure to have some photographers handy at the recruitment center, be sure the public gets a nice glimpse of those bright, young volunteers."

"Yes, sir." June paused. "Who will we be sending?" she asked hesitantly, the images of massacred Muggle soldiers from her dream coming to her unbidden. The conflict that had plagued her since Albus left squeezed her heart again. She sat very still and hoped it would pass. It didn't. I should be doing something, she thought. I should have done something long ago, but I've been afraid. We've all been afraid.

"Mediwizards mostly, but we will take all volunteers. We won't be sending them to the front, June," he said, as though reading her thoughts. "Most of them have never even seen a gun, so what good would they be? We'll send them in as support troops -- medical personnel, supply, reconnaissance. And, of course, the WWN will want correspondents," he added, almost as an afterthought.

"I want to go," June heard herself say, before she had a chance to think it through. "I wrote for The Daily Prophet once, I can do it again."

Bulfinch looked up, surprised. "June, don't be silly..."

"Sir, I'm serious about this." She returned his gaze evenly. "The WWN will need people there. Send me."

"Absolutely not, June! I need you here, now of all times... and besides you're..."

"A woman? There are plenty of Muggle female war correspondents," she countered.

Bulfinch shook his head. "If you insist in this, you know I won't stop you. But please think it through first -- it will be very dangerous."

"Yes," June said, swallowing. "It will be very dangerous. But we've been spectators for too long -- I'm weary of it." She closed her eyes briefly. "I'm tired of sitting in safety while others risk themselves for the things they believe in, for what's right."

The Minister reached over and laid a hand on her wrist. "I admire your convictions, June. Just be sure you're honest with yourself about why you want to do this."

June sat up, holding herself very straight, and met his eye. "This is the first path in a long time that seems perfectly clear to me. I'm going to France."

***

Night fell on the empty castle, long shadows creeping up the wide expanse of lawn, casting taffy-pull silhouettes on the neatly-trimmed grass. Metis knew she would miss the empty cool of the summer -- these hushed, shaded corridors and the solitude of the glassy lake. Once September approached the halls would fill with noise and laughter, breaking this fragile tranquility.

In the west the sun finished its slide behind the low mountains, painting the purple sky with dying fingers of red and gold, before vanishing. Metis sat, curled in upon herself, in an ornate windowseat, leaning her face against the cool panes of the high window.

Torches guttered in their sconces on the wall, and she knew she should make her way back down to the dungeons, and to Tom, before someone happened by and realized she was here. She privately thought that the handful of staff members in the castle must have been turning a blind eye to her presence. There was simply no way they could not know. But, if that were so, she was glad for their indulgence.

Silently, she slid down from the windowseat, pausing to retrieve a slim volume that lay face down on the cushion as she went. She slipped down the long corridor, passing through the golden circles of light cast by the flickering torches.

The path grew steadily darker as she went further down into the dungeons. She'd often wondered why Salazar Slytherin had chosen the dark and hidden places of the castle for his own. An uncomfortable voice in the back of her mind would whisper the answer on these occasions, a reason that she should not have known -- and didn't wish to know.

At the door to the Slytherin common room, Metis whispered the password -- another piece of knowledge she was never intended to possess -- and slipped inside. Tom was where she'd left him, on the low sofa before a fire burned nearly to embers, books strewn across the floor and hearth.

She stood in the doorway for a moment watching him, watching the red-gold glow of the fire reflect on the curves of his face, lined with concentration and oblivious to her presence. Metis leaned against the carved wood of the doorjamb, memorizing the line of his profile. Tom looked up and caught her eye. Something unspoken passed between them, something in his gaze powerful enough to make her catch her breath.

Tom beckoned to her from where he sat, surrounded by sheaves of delicate parchment, and she crossed over to him immediately. His shirt-sleeves were rolled up carelessly, his hands stained crimson with ink, and he closed his arms around her carefully, trying not to mark her clothing with it.

Metis looked down at his hands, clasped together in front of her. The red ink on his hands had sunk into every ridge and cranny of his skin, marking his knuckles, painting the clefts and v's and whorls of his palms and fingers -- like war paint, like a marked man.

"I need your help," he said softly, gesturing toward a small, blank book that sat beside an unstoppered inkbottle. "I want part of you to be in this as well. How could I capture myself without you?"

"What are you doing?" she asked, looking over the books and parchment.

"Creating the future," he said, and she could hear the proud smile in his voice.

"With a book?" she asked, closing her eyes and breathing in his scent.

"Isn't the future usually made with a book? Or maybe that's the past." He held her more tightly, resting his chin on the top of her head.

"Don't talk in riddles," she replied, smiling a bit at the pun.

Tom tipped her face up and kissed her softly. "I thought that was why you loved me."

"Riddles? You're more than that, and we both know it."

"Yes, I suppose we do." He smiled. "But let's see if we can capture some of my riddles tonight, put them into these pages for safe-keeping."

"Safe from what?"

"Or from whom."

"Or from whom," Metis agreed. "What secrets do you have hidden in here?" She let one hand drift to rest on the book, the other reached up to stroke his temple. Tom leaned in to her touch and sighed.

"You know everything about me. There are no riddles left that you don't have the answer to."

"But I still don't understand them all, Tom. I have the answers but I can't always make them fit."

"Yes, you can. You just aren't ready yet, are you." He turned her face toward his a bit more roughly than was necessary. "There are times, I confess, when I wonder whether you ever will be."

Metis opened her mouth to speak, to deny it, but something in Tom's eyes stopped her. Her words, she saw, would be meaningless for him tonight. They'd reached another crossroads, another trial of her loyalty -- and loyalty meant action. She would not be able to speak to or soothe him tonight. So instead, she stretched out one hand and plucked the stained quill from his fingers.

"Then show me," she said softly. "Whether I'm ready or not. When has that ever mattered?"

He laughed softly, his breath on the back of her neck. "When indeed?" He reached around her and pulled the insignificant-looking, leather-bound book between them.

"Tom? What is this? It looks like-"

"A diary?" He smiled, looking feline in the firelight. "And so it is -- after a manner. But it is so very much more. It's my flesh, blood and bone. It's my spirit and yours -- that's why I need you now. Everything depends on it."

"Everything?" she echoed, looking up into his eyes, gone dark and flat with some desire only marginally connected to her.

"Do you want to know how much this means? Do you want to know why it is desperate and vital that this be done? I can show you, if you'll believe."

"I've already told you that it doesn't matter if I'm ready to believe..."

He grabbed hold of the wrist of her hand holding the quill. "You may not be ready, but you must believe. This can't work if you don't. Be afraid -- of the future, of fate, of me -- but believe what I have to tell you, or everything we hope to have is lost."

Shaken, Metis nodded mutely, gripping the quill so tightly in her fist it seemed likely to snap.

Tom held her gaze with his eyes. "All right then." He snapped her wrist painfully sideways, causing her to drop the quill. He reached out and scooped a small, silver dagger from the low table with a deft hand. He twisted her hand around, exposing the soft, creased skin of her palm, and slashed the tiny blade across it. Metis bit back a gasp, realizing belatedly that the wound did not hurt. The little knife, sharp as a surgeon's scalpel, left a clean, painless line of red through the center of her palm. Tom let go of her, turning his left hand palm-up next to hers. An identical cut divided his hand neatly into perfect halves.

They sat that way for a moment, staring at one another over their bloody hands. Then Tom grabbed her hand in his, pressing their palms together over the cheap, black book. "Believe in me," he whispered. "I can't do this without you. I need a willing soul for this magic, I need someone who loves me. You love me, don't you?"

"Yes," Metis whispered, blinking back tears of pain.

He squeezed harder, their blood mingling and dribbling onto the starched, white pages of the diary...prick, prick, prick with needles and pins...red droplets on snow white and hair black as midnight, like childhood bedtime tales of glass coffins and embroidering queens.

Three drops of blood and three wishes for my daughter, Metis thought. Make her skin white as snow, her hair black as ebonwood and her lips red as blood...my blood, her father's blood... Perhaps Tom would cut out her heart and put it in his jeweled box. Maybe he would eat it on a silver platter, and stay young and so, so beautiful, a wicked king with eternal youth and a magic mirror. Metis looked down at the red, red blood mingling with scarlet ink and sinking from sight. He bled her till her vision went green and shadowy. She swayed and thought she would faint, but Tom held her firmly with that one strong hand gripping hers, committing her to this irrevocably.

Ready or not, she thought giddily, before the green world turned to black and silver swirls.

When she came back to herself, Tom had her head cradled in his lap. The diary lay balanced precariously on his knee, its pages white and unmarked. She lifted her right hand and inspected it. Tom had healed the wound expertly and effortlessly, not a trace of it remained.

"If only," Tom breathed, stroking her hair. "If only I could find another you for the other me. He'll need her if the day ever comes... I wonder if fate would be so kind? To offer up another like you, willing to offer me your blood and soul. There must be another, there has to be, or the spell wouldn't have worked. I just hope he can find her."

"Tom, I don't understand. You said you'd show me what this was all about."

"I will," he said softly, helping her to sit up. "Come. Sit with me and write in the book. I'll show you everything." The world still spun dangerously as he pulled her against him, wrapping her cold, stiff fingers around the quill, helping her to dip it in the inkbottle. Sighing, she allowed him to turn her toward the diary, his arms strong around her, his right hand clasping hers as she held the quill. And they began to write.

***

"Have you gone and utterly lost your bloody mind?"

The late afternoon sun slanted sideways through June's bedroom window. Hayden stood in front of the sheer, white curtains with an expression of complete shock on his face. The harsh August sun dappled shadows around his feet on the parquet floor as he began to pace.

"I asked," he said again, "if you've lost your mind. You must have lost your mind, because there is no other explanation for your sudden desire for a walking tour of France."

"They have jeeps," June pointed out mildly. "Though I imagine there will be a certain amount of wal-"

"How can you bloody make jokes about this?" Hayden crossed away from the window, looking extremely agitated. "Listen, darling. I understand that we're all being noble now, and stepping in the save the poor, misguided Muggles from blowing themselves to all hell... but when they say 'do your part,' every normal person knows it's a lot of twaddle. And if you insist on being helpful, couldn't you be content with organizing an armament drive? Or donating silk stockings to make parachutes?"

"Hayden. Sit," she said firmly, pushing him into an overstuffed chair and heading to the bar to mix him a drink. She returned with a pair of stiff gin and tonics, and perched herself beside him on the arm of the chair.

"Drink." She shoved the glass at him. He took it almost unwillingly, scowling at her as she clinked their glasses carelessly together. He frowned, but tossed it back anyway, slamming the empty glass onto a nearby side table. He tossed the stub of his still-lit cigarette into the tumbler in a fit of pique, causing the residue of gin to sizzle and fizz.

"Feeling better?" June inquired blandly, getting up from the chair and beginning to pull clothes from her bureau.

A heartbeat later, Hayden pushed himself out of the chair. He glowered at her like a sulky little boy, scuffing his polished shoes against the floor and shoving his hands into his pockets.

"You aren't going. You can't go. It's nothing less than insanity." Pulling his hands from his pockets, he followed her to the bed, where she calmly placed a stack of folded underthings into her bag. As she turned to the dressing table, Hayden took the clothes out again and tossed them onto the bed.

"He's done this to you, hasn't he?"

"Who's done what to me, Hayden?" June asked, feeling a bit weary.

"He. Him. Mr. Goody-goody Professor Bloody Gryffindor." Hayden lit another cigarette and inhaled fiercely. "This is all his fault," he said, pointing at June with the lighted cigarette. "He's the reason you've taken leave of what's left of your senses."

"Hayden, really..."

"No." He shook his head and began to pace. "You used to be sensible -- appropriately selfish with a nice, healthy sense of self-preservation. A totally reasonable and understandable creature. I never had to worry about you selflessly haring off to bandage war wounded, or try to feed starving tribesmen, or otherwise run about getting yourself killed... and then this great swot comes waltzing in with his ill-cut robes and so-called 'morals' and you go right off the deep. Like a bloody lemming."

"That is just about enough, Hayden."

"Do you even know what a Muggle war looks like, darling? Do you? I bloody do and it is not somewhere you want to be."

"Hayden..." she began, softening. "I know what you must think... What my going must be reminding you-"

"No." The word fell like lead between them - heavy, dark and flat. "No. I don't wish to talk about that." He tossed the cigarette stub half-angrily into June's potted aspidistra, and turned to face the window. Sighing, June turned in the other direction and headed toward the sitting room.

"June."

Something in Hayden's voice stopped her. She paused in the doorway and turned to face him. He crossed the room, stopping in front of her and laying his hands on her shoulders.

"Do you love him?"

June took a deep breath, entirely unsure how to answer.

"Don't lie to me," Hayden said, his handsome face serious. "I'll know. You can't lie to a liar, darling, they always know." He paused, looking intently at her face. "Are you in love with him?"

June closed her eyes. "I don't know."

When she opened her eyes again, Hayden was watching her with an expression of mild surprise. "You really don't know, do you?"

"I love him. I think I've always loved him. But I don't-"

"None of that now," Hayden said softly. "I shouldn't have asked. I've no right to ask."

He pulled her into a quick embrace then released her, looking down at her with something like real affection in his clear, hazel eyes.

"Come on. If you're determined to be suicidal, I might as well help you pack."

***

Life in Albania, Albus discovered, was very hard. He and Seward tried to do what they could for the ragtag band of rebels who'd adopted them. They would sneak off whenever they could, using magic to snare wild fowl, using their wands to divine edible mushrooms and roots hidden in the thick underbrush or beneath the hard, frosty ground. It was more food than the rebels had had in months, and they seemed the better for it. Petrit lost his haggard, glassy look, and Alba ceased nagging them about the supply drops.

This group, they'd learned, was a small, local cell of the Partisan resistance, committed to fighting not only the Germans, but the Albanian Nationalist forces who often allied themselves with the Nazis. The first firefight Albus ever witnessed left him shocked and speechless. These young men and women -- children, really -- had disabled a German panzer, handily captured and interrogated the crew and appropriated the Nazis' clothing and supplies for their own use. Albus never asked what ultimately happened to the German soldiers. Seward would only have scoffed, and Albus decided he was likely better off not knowing.

The violence disturbed him, but he knew these people hadn't any other real option. He'd seen the swath the Nazi's cut through this countryside, leaving a wake of burned villages and hanged bodies. In the face of such brutality, he was amazed at the courage shown by those who dared to resist. He had never seen such devotion and grim determination in his own kind. He began to wonder if there was something fundamental lacking in wizardkind, or perhaps, he decided later, the complacent and prosperous witches and wizards of Britain had simply never been tested. Part of him wished for that testing, to force open the closed minds of his society, to give them all an appreciation for the peace and plenty they took so for granted. But mostly he knew better, knew that any such test, no matter how positive the result, would come at a price few should have to pay.

Albus lay awake on his pallet in the chilly cavern, buttoning his borrowed Nazi field jacket up to his neck and trying to resist the temptation to use a warming charm or two.

He sensed rather than saw Seward sit up on his own pallet. "Get ready. It's about time," he whispered. Albus was more than ready.

They crept out into one of the ragged corridors, their hands firmly on the wands both kept in convenient pockets. Fumbling their way in the dark, they crept stealthily through the pitch black, skirting the dimly lit areas where guards kept watch through the night. The two men had looked long and hard for an abandoned passage from which they could start their search for the supposed passage to Apollonia. Legend held that the ancient Greek magicians had constructed a network of underground roads to their city on the plain, and legend, when it came to the magical world, was usually correct.

Using advanced scouting spells, they'd made very good progress over the weeks, setting up a series of portkeys that covered short hops from cave to cave. Using this method, they could cover 20 kilometers and two mountain peaks in one night.

Three days ago, they'd stumbled across a flat, leveled wall in the natural rock. A few quick spells had revealed centuries old writing across the front. Albus hadn't been able to decipher it then, but now they were returning with several volumes of containing the runes and writing favored by Greek sorcerers in the Balkans circa the 10^th century BC. Seward shook with barely-controlled mirth when Albus told him matter-of-factly that he had brought quite a few magical texts along. Pulling one of those texts out now, he flipped through the yellowed and care-worn pages until he found the correct incantation. He nodded to Seward, who pulled his wand from a pocket of his field jacket. Seward brought the wand up, flourishing it with more impatience than grace. Silver sparks spilled from the tip, settling across the blank wall to reveal the edges of a door. The cracks in the stone glowed pulsing silver as Seward moved away to give Albus room.

Stepping back a bit, Albus balanced the book on the open palm of one hand, stretching his other toward the now-revealed door.

"Annon edhellen, edro hi ammen! Fennas nogothrim, lasto beth lammen," he said loudly, clearly, feeling the familiar thrill of power thrum through him.

The ancient door swung easily open. Seward grinned up at him. "If the rest of it's this easy, we'll be damned lucky." He paused. "And if those books of yours keep coming in handy I'll take back what I said about them."

"But you didn't say anything about..." Albus began, following him through the door and into the darkened corridor beyond.

"Well," Seward said easily, in that half-serious tone that Albus had come to know so well, "at least not out loud."

Seward was first through the door as usual, one arm outstretched to keep Albus behind him. Albus sighed. As much as he liked the other man, the secret agent routine was starting to wear thin. Outside with Nazi soldiers and Nationalist spies lurking behind every tree, Albus understood Seward's rampant paranoia. But here in the caves, the only danger likely to befall them was of a magical variety -- and that Albus could handle.

"Ow." Seward grunted and stumbled over something in the darkness. "Can't see a bloody thing..."

"Here," Albus said. "Perhaps this will help." He swished his wand through the half-light, conjuring a globe of cheerful yellow light.

In the flickering, hazy light from the globe, Seward grimaced, looking as though he wanted to say something. But instead, he nodded and moved on ahead. They crept carefully along the passage, moving ever downward, the globe bobbing along before them like an oversized firefly.

"Keep that thing under control," Seward said shortly. "If there's anyone down here, I'd rather we didn't alert them to our presence."

"I'd wager that entrance hasn't been-" Albus broke off at the look on Seward's face, and reigned in the globe with a sigh.

Their journey continued on for hours. Albus glancing occasionally at his watch in the meager light, realized that dawn was fast approaching the world above them. But still the trail continued, down into the bowels of the mountain. Albus began to worry that the path had led them wrong, and that this wasn't the road to Apollonia after all. He walked on, lost in these doubtful thoughts for longer than he realized, before Seward stopped up short.

"Hey!" Seward called in a loud whisper. "Hey, come look at this."

Albus moved forward, the globe bobbing against the wall at Seward's side, and joined him in looking at a section of wall carved with archaic runes.

"Any idea what it says?" Seward asked. "Because if it's a sign saying 'Beware of Dragon' or 'Here be Hippogriffs,' I'd love to know before we go any further."

Albus stepped back, considering the passage carefully. "I think it's a poem, or a song. I can't be sure. The language is very old, a dead magical language, same as the writing on the door back there." He bit his lip and began to translate as best he could.

The world is grey, the mountains old,

The forge's fire is ashen-cold;

No harp is wrung, no hammer falls:

The darkness dwells in Durin's halls...

"Well, I wonder what that means," Albus mused, producing a quill and parchment and beginning to scribble notes. "There appears to be more of it on the far wall... You don't suppose it could refer to the legends of Mi-"

"Later," Seward said, firmly. "After we find Apollonia. Like I said, unless it says 'Death to all who enter here' I can't get too worked up."

Seward practically had to drag Albus away from the verse, but in the end he gave in. They moved on in silence, until at last the path began to angle upward. A breath of air from somewhere above stirred across them. Albus took a grateful breath and picked up his pace.

Albus kept alert as they went, watching for any more evidence of possible Ardan writing on the walls. So intent was he on this that he nearly slammed into Seward as he rounded a corner.

Seward stood stock still in the middle of the path, staring ahead in disbelief. "What the-?"

The path stopped abruptly not ten feet from where they stood, flush against an imposing stone wall. A decorative entryway arced in the center of the wall, intricately carved with nesting serpents. Directly beneath, where the entrance itself should have been, the door was bricked in. Heavy squares of blackish-grey stone were laid in, mortared together with some kind of heavy tar, utterly blocking the way.

Without really thinking about it, Albus crossed the distance and began running his wand over the thick stones. He could find nothing, no runes, no handle, no openings of any kind...

"There has to be something here -- a key, a spell..." He traced a hand along the grooves, where the stones fit together.

Seward joined him beside the door. "Did you ever think, maybe the instructions are carved on the other side?"

That idea had not occurred to Albus, but it made sense. He sighed, and said, "You could be right. But I'll keep looking. I can't imagine the Apollonians would have made it impossible for anyone to get in this way."

Seward raised an eyebrow, thinking, no doubt, that in his opinion it was entirely appropriate to keep people out.

Albus continued to run his hands over the stones, wracking his brain for inspiration. What did he really know about Apollonia? Not much, beyond what he could find in history books, and those who had since explored the city's ruins hadn't had much to add. So much of the city's lore was still the province of legend -- the sort of thing the house elves used to tell him in stories at bedtime... And then he remembered. It was a half-forgotten scrap of story he recalled from drowsy winter evenings, but the memory of it stood out as sharp and real as the sense-memory of eiderdown and warm milk.

Only a friend can enter the secret city, little one. Many may approach, by plain, by seas, by sky, but only a friend of the city may enter by the stone-wrought gate.

He laughed, causing Seward to look up at him oddly, and stepped back from the door. It was probably futile, but worth a shot.

"Mellon," he said softly, reaching out to touch the stone again.

The rough-hewn bricks dissolved beneath his touch, vanishing like grey mist. Seward, leaning forward against the stone, nearly overbalanced, but caught himself. The two stepped gingerly through the door and found themselves on a wide ledge high above the plain.

Stretching out before them, green and white against the dawn, stood Apollonia.

***

June had been to France many times as a child. She remembered Paris only vaguely as a city filled with bright lights and unfamiliar scents. Her clearest memory was of sitting in a cafe on the Boulevard des Capucines with her father, and being allowed to drink coffee for the first time.

That France -- the sophisticated, genteel country that she recalled from childhood -- no longer existed so far as she could see. It had been replaced by a scarred, shell-shocked landscape, and she shuddered to imagine what they would find once they reached Paris.

Not for the first time, she marveled that they'd made it this far. It seemed like an eternity ago that she'd been sitting beneath apple trees in Valognes, waiting impatiently for the military to decide it was safe enough for her to travel.

She'd been a little surprised at the Muggle attitude toward women -- she'd always known the wizarding world had some strange, anachronistic ideas about gender equality, in some ways extremely progressive and in others very old-fashioned. But she'd assumed that the Muggles, with their technological achievements and love for science and logic, would have already overcome those out-dated ideas. She'd never been more wrong. The military officers were friendly, solicitous even, but kept her very firmly in her place the whole way across the Channel and during those weeks at the camp in Valognes.

Ostensibly she was reporting for the BBC and London Daily Herald, and nobody assumed differently. And so, she was treated just like any other female reporter -- which was to say she was flirted with, told to stay put and then ignored for days at a time.

That behavior had gone on until she'd been on the verge of risking her cover and sending owls to the Prophet and the Minister with pleas for help. Luckily, word had come down the day before that Allied troops were converging on Paris. In the elation that followed this news, a sympathetic PR officer had assigned June and her partner a jeep and driver, and warned them not to get killed.

As it was, she didn't anticipate encountering any other wizards before reaching Paris. Most of the wizarding volunteers indeed worked either as scouts or medical personnel. The scouts were far ahead, using their magically enhanced stealth and sight to clear a path for the forces converging on Paris. The mediwizards and witches were days behind them -- caring for the wounded left from the liberation of Brittany.

And so today, they bounced along in an American army jeep, driven by a terminally cheerful private called Sullivan, who was every inch the middle American farm kid. Sullivan -- who, they'd discovered over the course of the trip, had played football for the University of Nebraska before the War -- was broad-shouldered and grinning, with hair the color of late-harvested straw and an infectious laugh. He could talk a blue streak, dodging land mines and abandoned German tanks with apparent unconcern.

"I can't wait to see Paris!" Sullivan continued in his affable voice. "No one I knew had ever been farther than Kansas City-MO before this business got started. Some good's got to come of it all, I suppose. I promised my mom I'd get my picture taken in front of the Eiffel Tower and send it to her..."

In the passenger seat, June listened politely, nodding at the appropriate places and making occasional inquiries after Sullivan's enormous family. In the back seat, Freddy Parker, a Daily Prophet photographer and June's grudging partner, tried futilely to strap down their equipment, which kept sliding around every time they hit a rut in the road.

"You know, Freddy," June said, turning her head slightly so he could hear. "All the rope in the world won't protect your cameras if we run into real trouble."

Freddy leaned forward and whispered irritably, "You're right. I wouldn't need rope if you'd let me put a freezing charm on the luggage."

"You know the regs. We've got it better than most, besides. Now, shush, before poor Sullivan hears you and I have to put a memory charm on him."

"I'd like to put a silencing charm on him."

"Try it and I'll hex you."

"Oh, yes. Sorry, I forgot. Should I leave the two of you alone?"

"Oh, please do," June said, good-naturedly. "We can just drop you alongside the road with some of those nice German snipers."

"Oh, you're bloody funny, Lisbon. Bloody funny."

June was forming a witty retort to that when the road ahead of them suddenly exploded. The jeep swerved and they slammed headlong into a shallow ditch as a shower of earth and shrapnel rained overhead.

After an appropriate amount of time, they dared to raise their heads, scanning the road for any signs of further attack.

"You all right?" Sullivan asked, pulling his sidearm and glancing cautiously around them.

"Yes, yes. I'm fine," June replied. "Freddy?"

"Oh, I'm all right, but my wide-angle lens isn't going pull through."

Sullivan jumped out of the driver's seat and eased a little way up the road, alert for trouble. After a few minutes he jogged back to them, swinging himself up to stand on the side of the jeep. "Looks like a couple of stray Germans found themselves an old land mine. I don't see anymore of them around. I'll just take a quick look at the jeep to be safe, and we'll get out of here."

Pausing, he grinned at June. "Don't you worry, Miss Lisbon. I'll get you to Paris all right." He leapt nimbly from the jeep and began to inspect the tires and axle.

"Golly gee whillickers, you're pretty, Miss Lisbon," Freddy muttered under his breath. "Maybe you'd go to the malt shop with me once we get to Paris... Do you think they malt shops in P-" June elbowed him sharply in the ribs as Sullivan swung his large bulk back into the jeep.

"No damage done," Sullivan grinned as he fired the engine back to life.

The rest of their trip was comparatively calm. Freddy groused good-naturedly about his camera lens, Sullivan burbled on about the joys of American football and June half-listened to them both, watching the maimed countryside limp by.

Then in mid-afternoon, as June was fighting a losing battle against sleep even jostled as she was by the rough ride, they cleared the rise of a hill, and Sullivan let out a low whistle.

"Well, will you look at that," he said. June sat up, and gazed down into the valley. There, beyond a long line of tanks, trucks and troop carriers, gleaming green and silver in the morning sun, was Paris.

"I think," Freddy said, gripping the back of her seat and leaning forward, "they're expecting us." June followed his gaze to the road below where a crowd had gathered around the vehicles. "That's quite a welcoming committee."

They trundled down into the valley, joining the queue headed into the city. On either side of the road, crowds gathered -- singing, weeping, embracing crowds. The press of people on either side was staggering. They shouted for joy, tossing bouquets to the GI's and littering the ground before the convoy with flower petals thick as Palm Sunday. A pair of pretty teenage girls with flushed cheeks jumped onto the running board of their jeep and kissed both Sullivan and Freddy. Sullivan blushed scarlet. Freddy laughed aloud with the girls as they embraced June like a sister.

By the time they entered Paris itself, they were breathless and dizzy. Sullivan had such a broad grin plastered on his face that June feared he'd chip a tooth.

"This is it," he said, nodding to himself. "This is why."

June didn't ask what he meant, just nodded solemnly in agreement.

The streets of Paris were even more crowded -- it was untold pandemonium, and it was wonderful. They made slow progress through the crowds, everyone wanted to stop and shake their hands, but eventually the jeep pulled up outside the Hotel Scribe, where the correspondents had been billeted. Freddy and Sullivan hauled the equipment into the already overflowing foyer, while June lugged the duffel bags.

"Thanks, Sullivan," she said, as the young man jumped back into the jeep. "Good luck."

"You, too, Miss Lisbon," he grinned. "And Freddy, of course."

"Of course." She winked and planted a kiss on the private's cheek.

He blushed and drove off into the throng that crowded the streets. June went back into the hotel, nodding at the doorman who gave her uniform a once-over before allowing her in. Once in the lobby, she looked around for Freddy, but was stopped by a thin-faced man who flashed an ID at her and drew her aside.

Surprisingly, the man wasn't in uniform, but was instead wearing an understated charcoal grey suit. "Miss Lisbon?" he inquired, extending a hand. "Nice to meet you. I'm Gilbert Wynant from the Ministry of Magical Information. I'll be overseeing your broadcasts while you're in Paris."

"Nice to meet you, Mr. Wynant," June said, a little surprised. "How is it that I rate my own personal censor?"

His thin, melancholy face stretched into what, for him, must have been a smile. "No special treatment. You're just the only one here."

"The only one? How is that-"

"None of the other WWN correspondents have made it through yet. For the moment, Miss Lisbon, you are the voice of Paris."

***

"All right. We've got you set up in here, if you'll follow me."

Dazedly, June followed Wynant down a dimly-lit corridor in the Paris WWN headquarters... former WWN headquarters, she reminded herself, listening once again to the deathly still that hung over the place like a shroud.

She'd barely had time for a quick shower and change out of her field gear, before Wynant had showed up at her door. On their way over from the Scribe, they'd been shot at twice by snipers. All June wanted now was a stiff drink followed by a long nap. She certainly didn't want to be following Gilbert Wynant through this ghost town of an office.

The headquarters seemed trapped in a kind of suspended animation. Half-drunk cups of coffee littered desks all but hidden beneath four years worth of dust. Sheets of copy lay discarded in the haste of evacuation. The WWN correspondents had made it out of Paris half a step ahead of the Nazis. There had been no warning, no contingency plan. No one, it seemed, had ever believed that Hitler would truly take Paris.

"Luckily, the Germans couldn't find this place," Wynant was saying. "I can't imagine the trouble we'd have been in for if they had."

"Indeed."

"I'm serious," he said. "People back home may not realize it, but Hitler is very interested in magic. There have been reports out of North Africa that German agents attempted a break-in at a Gringotts excavation site. The Ministry doesn't believe the Germans knew exactly what they'd got their hands on, but still, they knew something was there-"

"Gil!" A youngish man in a shabby field jacket stuck his head out from one of the doors at the end of the corridor. "I'm all set. Get her in here."

"Coming, Ned," Wynant replied. "After you, Miss Lisbon." He caught the door and held it for her.

They entered the smaller of the buildings two studios. Ned, apparently, had gotten most of the equipment up and running, a familiar electronic hum filled the air. June blinked at the sound. After a month in the field, the noise seemed odd and out of place.

"Nice to meet you," Ned said, pumping her hand enthusiastically. "Come on over here and we'll do an equipment check before you go on."

"Go on?" June repeatedly slowly, turning to look at Wynant.

"Of course. Didn't I mention that?"

"No, you did not..." June began.

Wynant cut her off. "We have to go on tonight. The Ministry wants a report from Paris, and what the Ministry wants..."

"Mr. Wynant..."

"Call me Gilbert," he smiled, off-handedly.

"Gilbert. Look, Gilbert, I can't go on the air. I've been in Paris all of an hour. I don't have anything written. There's no possible-"

"The Ministry has faith in you. You're on in twenty minutes." He shoved a quill and parchment into her hands, and wandered off to brew coffee.

Ned fiddled with the various machinery, poking at dials and blinking lights with his wand, while June took a seat. She stared blankly at the parchment she held in one hand and the quill in the other. She was still staring when Wynant returned, precariously balancing three cups of steaming, black coffee.

June looked up as walked past. "What do they want? A news report? Or Murrow-style human interest?"

"Human interest. But not too human. Something to keep the morale up. You know, our brave wizards and witches at the front, helping to liberate the French people... nothing specific, though."

June sighed heavily and began to write furiously. After a few minutes, Ned sat down beside her, fishing a flask from inside his field jacket, and poured healthy shots of whiskey into each of their cups.

"Five minutes," he said with a wink.

June hastily gathered her scraps of parchment together and sat on the stool at the microphone. Wynant walked over, sipping at his coffee, and took a seat behind her.

"This is how it works," he began. "My bosses at the Ministry tell me the things we can't say. I tell you what you can say. Got it?" June nodded. "Now let me have a look at those notes."

Feeling slightly overwhelmed, she handed over the parchment for Wynant to look at.

"This looks all right," he said at length. "Just remember, no details about which military operations wizards are involved with, and nothing that could damage morale."

Ned began flipping switches. "Thirty seconds."

"Good luck." Wynant leaned back in his chair and folded his arms over his chest.

June arranged her notes in front of her, took a deep breath and faced the microphone. Ned nodded at her, and the "On Air" sign flared to life beneath inches of grey dust.

"Good evening. This is June Lisbon for the Wizard Wireless Network. Church bells are ringing here in Paris tonight. People everywhere -- young and old -- are singing and celebrating in the streets and cafes. There are phonographs in every window, and dancing on the pavement of the boulevards, and embraces between strangers made brothers by this shared joy.

"It's hard not to be swept up in the excitement, the raw emotions of relief and celebration. For those of us who have come late to this war... we can never understand, truly, the things done and felt here tonight. We can never claim this remarkable piece of history as our own -- it will always be theirs, the brave girls and the quiet men of Paris, who took their city back from the Germans before the Allied armies had to fire a shot. We who have stood quietly by and allowed these things for so l-" She was cut off by a flick from Wynant's wand.

"That's your first warning," he said blandly. "Please proceed a bit more carefully."

June nodded, and reached again for the microphone. "We who have not seen these things firsthand, can only imagine our actions in their places. We can only hope that we would prove so courageous, if tested.

"Some say that Paris is only a symbol -- and they are right. Paris is a symbol, an important one to our cause... because it is our cause now, as I hope every witch and wizard listening tonight understands. But to the people of Paris, it also is more than a symbol -- it's home. A home that has not belonged to them for four years, and one that they have now taken back. To rebuild. To start again."

***

"Well," Seward said, looking around awestruck.

"Mm-hmm," Dumbledore replied.

"Well," Seward repeated, shoving his hands into his pockets. "I'd venture a guess that this is it."

To the non-magical eye, Apollonia was a ruin of overgrown white marble and temples to half-remembered gods. But to those who could truly see it, Apollonia was a ghost city -- an empty metropolis that could have been abandoned only yesterday if not for the scent of long ages that clung to its pristine marble steps.

Historians were divided on the precise nature of the disaster that caused Apollonia to be abandoned millennia ago -- some blamed a magical plague, others a massive wizard battle with the Gaulish witch clans that had terrorized Europe from the 1st century BC up through the reign of Arthur Pendragon. But still others claimed the city's wisemen and sorcerers attempted a curse against the witches, a curse so massive it rebounded on the entire city, wiping out every living thing but leaving the buildings unscathed.

Standing at the head of the long avenue at the city's center, Dumbledore and Seward considered where to start. Stretching away from them, glinting white in the early morning sun, was the Odeon and smaller library building. Next to the temple of Apollo an abandoned Muggle archeological dig was marked out incongruously with raw, white rope. Even those mundane items seemed protected against the ravages of time and weather in this valley.

"Well, where to?" Seward asked, turning to look at Dumbledore. The other man was staring around him, wonder in his eyes.

"I knew what to expect, but I wasn't prepared for how real it all feels."

Seward managed not to roll his eyes. "That's great, Professor. We'll come back another time when 200,000 Nazi troops aren't just over that rise, and then you can dig to your heart's content. Right now, though, we need to find what we came for and get the bloody hell out."

"Of course, of course." Dumbledore smiled in that knowing way that completely undermined Seward's justifiable paranoia. Seward shook his head. All he wanted was to keep the both of them alive, and if he had to bully Dumbledore to do it, so be it. But the other man only smiled on these occasions and refused to be bullied.

I am getting soft, Seward thought testily.

"Come on then," Dumbledore said, tugging on Seward's sleeve as though he'd been the one dawdling.

Truth be told, Seward liked Dumbledore. It was hard not to. Anyone with that much enthusiasm for lost causes deserved some kind of respect. But, Seward admitted to himself, he'd like the Professor a whole lot better once they were safely back in England, and he didn't have to worry about one or both of them getting their asses shot off.

Dumbledore led them down the avenue to the impressive library building. It made sense to go looking for signs of Scoresby there. Hopefully the first time would be the charm for them. Seward was increasingly nervous about their presence here. So far the Germans had left most of the magical sites in Albania alone, but there was no denying Hitler's interest in the occult. Seward feared setting off some ancient magic that would alert the Nazi's to Apollonia's existence and bring the German troops down on their heads.

They walked across the city center and up the low, marble steps into the library, a high-ceilinged building faced by imposing columns. Seward made Dumbledore wait just inside the entrance as he scouted around inside. There wasn't much -- just a main room with two smaller rooms leading off to the east and west. The east-most room was empty, so they moved quietly into the one to the west.

The room was filled with scroll after scroll of ancient incantations, incantations that would be extremely valuable if they could ever be taken outside the city's boundaries. Many wizards had tried in the late nineteenth century when Apollonia had been rediscovered, only to find that it was impossible. Anyone trying to leave the city with one of its treasures got about fifty paces before finding themselves empty-handed, and the scroll or gold or piece of statuary could be found resting peacefully in its original location. This was the largest reason why Apollonia had been abandoned a second time and left to frustrate the digging Muggles.

Dumbledore was scouring the low tables and peering up at the walls. Seward, not knowing quite what to do with himself, folded his arms across his chest, leaned carefully against one of the tables and watched.

Dumbledore, on his second circuit of the room, looked disappointed. "Well, I must say there isn't much here, is there? I thought surely... Wait now, this shouldn't be here. This isn't Greek architecture at all... Oh!"

"What do you mean it shouldn't be here?" Seward asked, easing forward carefully to determine if Dumbledore had found something dangerous.

"This section was added later," Dumbledore said, running his wand over the polished, white marble. "They've tried to camouflage it, make it appear as old as the rest, but you can still see it if you know what to look for."

"So what does that mean?

"Perhaps there's something here, behind the wall." Dumbledore stepped back, examining the frieze intently, tugging at his beard with an absent hand.

"If this were an adventure story, there would be a secret lever or something," Seward observed, leaning back against one of the thick, marble tables.

"Well," Dumbledore began, "I hardly think that-"

"What?" Seward asked, drawing his wand and spinning to face the far door, which Dumbledore was staring at distractedly.

"Jack, you may just be right." He walked over to the entryway and stopped beside a statue of a man, carved from clean, white marble. "This isn't part of the original building either. It's much newer, but fashioned in the classic tradition. I wonder-" Dumbledore produced his wand and began casting several interrogative spells on the statue.

He looked up, grinning. "Just as I thought!" he said, and grabbed the statue by one outstretched hand.

The section of heavy wall came free, sliding easily to the side. Beyond it, a small, dusty alcove lay in shadow. Dumbledore walked over to it, conjuring his globe of light and peered around the small opening.

"This is interesting," he began and Seward rushed to cut him off before he got sidetracked by some fascinating piece of obscure architecture.

"What do those mean?" Seward asked quickly, pointing at a dozen or so runes scattered haphazardly across the white marble.

"Oh," Dumbledore said, breaking from his reverie. "Let's see." He thumbed through one of the dog-eared books he'd insisted on lugging with them. "Well, this one," he traced the topmost figure with his free hand, "this is the symbol for 'light'... and this one to right is 'wisdom' or 'knowledge,' the one in the middle is 'justice,' and... Oh, my!"

"What? You find a way in to Scoresby's little hidey-hole?"

"No... No, Jack. This is it. This is what we've been looking for."

***