16 Blood of the Covenant

Harry 

A series of rustles, thumps, and muttered curses heralded Hermione’s arrival in the Knights’ Room, so that by the time she actually made it through the door, hair magnificently poofy and arms full of parchment, the room’s other occupants were all looking up. 

Hermione paused upon realizing she’d drawn so much attention. “I came straight here from the library, Daph, don’t give me that look.” 

“You have three quills in your hair,” Daphne retorted. 

“Do I? Bloody hell, I was wondering where they kept going.” Hermione dumped everything in her arms onto a side table and groped at her hair; behind her back, Pansy and Justin looked at Harry with What do we tell her? eyes. 

Harry shrugged at them. Talking about how to get information on the Dark Mark without alerting Theo or Draco to the research was going to be tricky, but Hermione could keep secrets, and honestly Harry was interested in what she’d say about their methods. 

In good time, too, because Hermione turned around and immediately paused to assess the room. Talking to Pansy and Daph alone hadn’t been too difficult, and it was Pansy’s decision to involve Justin, which Harry left unchallenged. “This looks rather like a war council. What’s going on?”

“What’s all that?” Daphne countered, nodding at the parchments Hermione had brought.

“I used the voting records you got me, did a trend analysis over the last ten years, and identified five whose support for that sedition bill was at odds with prior resistance to extending the reach of the DMLE,” Hermione said, dismissively, like that was something one could do on a quiet Sunday morning before trotting off to brunch. “I don’t know what exactly you should do with this, Harry, but it certainly can’t hurt.”

Harry grinned. “I can think of a few things. As for our war council, you’re not entirely wrong, although that’s stretching things a bit. We need to learn more about the Dark Mark without tipping off anyone who might reveal our research to Voldemort. Accidentally or on purpose.”

“Which explains why you asked me to look up vassal oaths. And why Theo and Draco aren’t here. Let me guess, you’re safe because sexism?” Hermione said, raising an eyebrow at Pansy. 

“In one,” said Pansy with a smirk that didn’t quite reach her eyes. 

Hermione sat down, moving rather slowly, her expression calculating. “You’re up to something manipulative, aren’t you?”

“How’d you get there?” said Harry, though he was pretty sure he knew. 

“Neville isn’t here.”

Yes, that was fairly telling. 

“I asked Theo about it, as a friend who’s afraid of the Mark for personal reasons,” Pansy said, inscrutable, “but he didn’t know much, so we’re trying to work out who else might have an idea, and how we could arrange to get more information from them on the sly.”

Hermione’s lips pursed. “I can’t say I like it, but considering… Draco might know. His father’s always tended towards a loose tongue. I suppose I could…”

“If you play it as a purely academic interest, it wouldn’t raise any alarm—you’re known for being academic,” Justin said. “Are you comfortable with that, though?” 

“Who else could ask him without it being weird? And we do need to know, if we’re going to find a way to protect against it. Which I’m assuming is the goal here.”

“You assume correctly,” said Harry. “Alright. If you’re sure—”

“Yes, I’m sure,” Hermione said. Harry looked at the shadows under her eyes and wondered when was the last time she slept. 

“Wait.” Justin looked at his watch and then up with a frown. “‘Mione, were you and Draco meeting today or tomorrow before dinner? Because—”

“Merlin’s pants,” said Hermione, which could really only be further evidence that she needed ten hours of uninterrupted sleep, but Harry didn’t get a chance to tell her so before she snatched her bag and rushed straight back out of the room. 

Pansy broke the ensuing silence with a snort. “Well then.” 

“If she doesn’t sleep tonight I’m going to dose her with a sleeping potion,” Daphne said. “It’s not like her to forget something on her schedule. How late is she, anyway?” 

This last was directed at Justin, who grimaced. “I’m not sure exactly, but I think at least thirty minutes. Draco said something about meeting right after classes. It’s why I knew he wouldn’t be around for this.” 

On cue, several chimes rang through the room. Harry pulled his journal out of his bag with a sigh and saw that, indeed, Draco had just written all the sixth year Vipers asking if anyone had seen Hermione. 

Daphne summoned one of Hermione’s discarded quills and wrote back She’s on her way. Apologies; she and I were discussing something, and lost track of time. 

That was enough of a diversion, in Harry’s opinion. He cleared his throat. “Was there anyone else we wanted to speak to about the Mark?” 

“Celesta said she’ll write her brother,” Daphne said, looking up from the journal, which had gone silent. “Harry—what about Flint?” 

“He’s a good enough occlumens that I think I could just ask him directly,” Harry mused. “Mm. I’ll try to set a meeting over the holidays. Thanks—I hadn’t thought of him.” 

Which probably meant Harry, too, needed sleep, not that he knew when he’d get any. He had another research project for Gatlin to finish this evening, several ideas from Vanessa to look into for supporting the Greengrasses, and now Hermione’s notes on the Wizengamot voting patterns to go over. It was unlikely that he’d get to sleep before one in the morning. Harry longed for the Yule break, when at the very least he would be able to sleep in. 

“I didn’t have any other ideas,” Justin admitted. He looked hopefully at Pansy. “Want to go wander a bit before dinner?” 

“Sure.” She smiled back, and took his hand when he held it out. “Bye, Harry, Daph.” 

“Don’t get slimed by Peeves,” Daphne called after them, smirking. 

Justin half turned back. “Okay, that was one time!” 

“Come on,” Pansy said with a cackle. 

Still grinning, Daphne charmed her things into her bag. Her smile faded when she looked at Harry. “Don’t worry. Theo might find out more over the hols, or Pansy; and there’s Flint to talk to, still, and Celesta’s brother. We’ve far from exhausted all our possible sources.” 

“I know.” How to explain that wasn’t what had Harry so—morose? Nothing felt right, lately. Nothing felt sure. Or, well, almost nothing, because here was Daphne, steady, sharp, and sure as ever. 

Seized by a sudden impulse, Harry touched her wrist. She stopped moving and looked curiously at him. “You know I—value our friendship. Very much.” 

“Yes.” Daphne smiled, soft as she ever got. “I know. So do I.” 

Harry did his best to smile back, and then she too left, and in her wake the Knights’ Room felt too quiet. Scorch marks still marred the walls and ceiling in the corner where George and Fred used to experiment. Other gouges, scuffs, scratches, and pocks formed a record of experimental spells and magical accidents going back years: Harry could identify most of the ones his friends had caused, and wondered, looking at other, older signs, who had been responsible for those. Who else had used this room before him as a safe haven or a hiding spot. Who else would use it, in the future, and run their fingers over acid-washed stone, and ask how that happened. 

Merlin, this melancholy felt like quicksand. Harry shook it off and reached for Hermione’s parchments. Whatever her research, he was sure it was thorough and well-documented; Hermione was meticulous like that. 

Three of her names were people Harry had noted as oddly supportive of Peasegood’s bill. Two, however, were new to him; and Harry had himself identified two others not on Hermione’s list, bringing the total to seven. 

Seven seats voting oddly. Not very many, overall, but there were probably some of Peasegood’s political allies whose support hadn’t stood out, and likewise some other seats falling under the Dark Lord’s thrall who hadn’t been instructed to support it lest they gain attention. So seven at least were suspected of caving to Death Eater pressure. 

Harry didn’t like this. Didn't like the prospect of lasting social unrest if people suspected every Wizengamot seat of so much more than what could be called typical levels of behind-the-scenes politicking. It was one thing to negotiate directly with other seat-holders; it was another thing entirely to be a puppet vote for a group of political radicals who could realistically be described as domestic terrorists. And he didn’t like where this was heading. 

Assuming Voldemort was behind Peasegood’s proposal, the Dark Lord hadn’t gone for changes to the statutes about legal use of magic, or the frustratingly broad definitions of “Dark” artifacts warranting confiscation, or barriers to formally incorporating an enclave. This wasn’t just about policy change. It was about consolidating control. 

Almost without conscious thought, Harry reached for a clean sheet of parchment embossed with the Black crest, and spread it on the table in front of him. 

Voldemort was prone to coercion and threats—vinegar, rather than honey. At least some of his legislative support had to resent him. And if the threats against them could be minimized, some of his support would wane. Harry had information about where to best direct protective efforts and no power to act on it. 

Others, however—

The Vipers would hate this idea. Harry himself didn’t much like it. But it was logical, and unexpected, and a Slytherin used all the tools at their disposal, even the distasteful. 

Harry took his time drafting the letter. Crafting its careful mix of honesty and deception proved exhilarating: there was a relief in not pretending to be less than he was, like Harry constantly did with Slughorn, with Dumbledore, and even to an extent with Snape. 

Along with the letter he bundled up clean copies of Hermione’s arithmancy and Harry’s own notes on voting histories and familial interests, everything necessary for someone to understand why he had selected these individuals as the probable targets of coercion. He couldn’t expect to be believed otherwise. 

One last chance to look it over and Harry nodded to himself. It was as good as it was going to get. And, really, there was no sense in waiting, so he went straight to the owlery and whistled Alekta down from her roost. 

The falcon held still for the letter, but gave him an extremely dubious look. “I know,” Harry said, stroking the soft feathers on her throat, “but you’ll be safe, and the worst thing that happens is I don’t get a reply.” 

Alekta chittered scornfully, but she did consent to fly off with the letter. Harry just hoped she didn’t express her disapproval by taking a nice long hunting break along the way. 

He made the trip from owlery back to the Knights’ Room without paying too much attention to his surroundings; everyone else was at dinner, and he was safe enough in corridors far from the usual routes to and from the Great Hall. Probably Harry should be taking one of those, but he could always snag a bite from the kitchens later. He didn’t feel particularly inclined to go down and sit at the Slytherin table in front of dozens of eyes that looked for any sign of weakness. 

Burning soreness had taken over his legs and diaphragm completely by the time Harry got back to the Knights’ Room. He collapsed into his usual chair and for a moment just sat there, fighting to breathe normally. Fuck. Shouldn’t have pushed himself with all those stairs at the pace he was going but he hadn’t wanted to linger: stairwells had limited entry and exit points and nowhere to hide. Even during dinner in deserted hallways that was just a bad situation. 

Harry’s eyes fell on a newspaper clipping neatly laid out on top of the work he’d left spread across the table. He sat straighter with a frown. Blue ink across the top reading Of interest in Pansy’s handwriting explained who had left it here. The moving picture on the clipping advised caution and required Harry to tap his wand to it before it resolved from a foggy grey blur into clarity, and he immediately understood why Pansy brought it to him. 

Mysterious Death Rocks Appleby, read the caption, and the picture made Harry wince: the victim’s body didn’t show any visible, physical damage, but something about the splay of the limbs was deeply unsettling. Accompanying the picture was a short few paragraphs telling readers the Aurors had been called in and had no suspects as yet. Nothing on the cause of death or where in Appleby he’d been found. Not even a name. 

After months of newspaper reports of people found dead in their homes or simply vanishing without a trace, this story stuck out. Harry studied it a moment longer. Both inside and outside Hogwarts, things were getting worse. Just this week several Vipers had gotten hurt, worst among them Alex; Graham was still in a very slow recovery; Noah had admitted to compulsively checking everything he ate and drank, even in the Great Hall or in private. 

I do what I can, he told himself, tucking the clipping away, and what I must.

Ginny 

Two names: Garvis Loughty of Ravenclaw and Hander Gerth of Gryffindor. 

Two names, one easy solution. Garvis Loughty was the Ravenclaw seventh-year prefect and often took advantage of the prefects’ lounge to relax with his friends, including Gerth, somewhere away from the rest of the students. Lazy, in Ginny’s opinion—Harry had found the Knights’ Room, set up wards, made a password, found furniture, made them a place—but laziness was the least of the things she found objectionable about Loughty. 

“Do you have the potion?” Ginny whispered as soon as Evalyn came into view at the top of the stairs. 

“Yep.” Evalyn hurried down to Ginny and Natalie, flashing a vial tucked into her palm. “Theo didn’t even ask why.” 

Ginny smiled—it was so nice being friends with older students who were as flexible as Fred and George—but her amusement faded quickly. The point of this wasn’t fun. The point was to do something. To level the scales a little in what ways they could. 

Although it might be a little fun. 

“Password?” Evalyn checked, and Natalie nodded. That had been the hardest part of this plan—the lounge was always password protected, like the prefects’ bath, and winkling it out of a distracted Draco had taken Natalie days. 

Ginny’s part had been relatively easy. She looked up the spell they were going to use, and learned it, and then she tailed Gerth and Loughty around under her good-and-getting-better disillusionment charm to get a sense of their schedule. 

Today was their chance. A prefect’s meeting in the morning, after which the rest of the prefects tended to clear out, since they had no duties on Sundays—and when the rest of them weren’t likely to be around was Loughty’s favorite time to bring all his friends over and, according to the house-elves, make a colossal mess. 

The meeting let out half an hour ago. Plenty of time for everyone to clear out, not enough time for Loughty to have gotten his friends and brought them back. Ginny disillusioned all three of them and led the way through a pre-calculated series of access corridors, secret passages, and cramped disused staircases to avoid as much risk of being spotted as possible. Her heart beat steady and sure as they went, her feet fell silently, her wand hand was steady. Doing something, after so many weeks of just waiting, just lying down and taking it, felt fucking great. 

You can put the Weasley in Slytherin, but can’t make her less a Weasley, Ginny thought, darkly amused to imagine Mum’s reaction if someone told her Weasley traits belonged in the snake house. They did, though. Ginny. Percy. Bill. The twins, probably. Weasleys knew what they wanted and knew how to get it. Weasleys were loyal. Weasleys had dreams. They were also brave, and bold, and principled—no one could be all one House, in Ginny’s opinion—but she’d decided her family and her school House were only at odds if she let them be. 

Ginny set aside all thoughts of principles and brothers when they turned the last corner. The world warped around them, what had been their floor suddenly a wall; Ginny scrambled over and jumped to the real floor in the few seconds before gravity reassumed its normal direction. As always, coming out of this particular secret passage was disorienting to the point of nausea. 

Natalie wasn’t quite fast enough, and toppled towards the real floor. Ginny caught her friend and hauled her upright out of the way for Evalyn, who managed to keep her feet, though she stumbled and had to lean on the wall for a second. 

A couple breaths to recover, and then Ginny set off again, an edge of adrenaline now twining through her body, though she still felt steady all the way through. Once they were through that door up ahead they’d be committed. No going back. 

Natalie whispered the password— “Sagittarius”—as soon as they got to the door, and the lock obediently clicked open, and then without so much as a second to pause or doubt, they were through. 

All three of them went to work immediately. Natalie targeted the few paintings with a charm she knew to make their subjects dazed, sleepy, and apathetic for the next few hours; once it wore off, they wouldn’t remember the time under its effects except as a blur. Evalyn, meanwhile, went for the sidebar with treats and drinks so easily dosed, and Ginny set about layering some charms over the room, concentrating fiercely. Like the prefects’ bathroom, the lounge was pretty well warded: it didn’t want to accept anyone else’s spells. Certainly nothing malicious. A basic sound-in wand-ward, though, that was fine. 

To her displeasure, the next ward—to guard against attention and alarm—didn’t take. Ginny tried it four times before she checked that the portraits were all out of it and whispered the problem for Ev and Nat to hear. 

Evalyn frowned. Or, at least, Ginny thought so; it was hard to see facial movements, even with her imperfect disillusionment. “Not even a more minor version?” 

“That is the minor version.” 

“I vote we keep on,” Nat said. “We’ve already done the charm, used the potion—it’ll be Yule break soon, and after that all the seventh years always buckle down for NEWTs, we might not get another chance!” 

Ginny looked at Evalyn, as the coolest-headed of the three of them, though also the one prone to indecision. Ev bit her lip and looked around the room, then down at the empty vial in her hand. “Nat’s right. Let’s stay. We know the rest of the prefects don’t come here much. Loughty’s just taken the place over.” 

And hogged it for himself, but that was to their benefit today. Ginny nodded. “Okay. Um… behind that wardrobe?” 

It was the world’s worst hiding place, but these were arrogant boys secure in their own privacy, and the girls didn’t need to hide for long. Just until the potion kicked in. 

Ginny only counted thirteen minutes before she heard the door swing open. The boys came into the lounge’s entrance vestibule, shedding cloaks and bags with the nonsensical comments and loud sniggering of a conversation that had devolved fully into inside jokes. Pressed in close behind Ginny, Evalyn sighed, and Natalie whispered “Boys” in a scornful tone. 

The first of them to come into sight was a Ravenclaw Ginny didn’t care about; she had eyes only for Loughty and Gerth, respectively the second and third to step through the door. “—seen her face!” Gerth crowed. 

“Blimey, I bet it was something.” This was from the fourth boy, who kicked the door shut on his heels. Probably no one else, then. Perfect. 

Ginny focused on breathing slowly through her nose to stay calm as the boys settled in and Gerth summoned snacks and drinks for them all from the sidebar. Theo’s potion was a slow-acting one designed to mimic the sensation of naturally dropping off to sleep. If they did this right the boys would just wake up in a few hours having dozed off over their food, no one the wiser. 

Holding still and listening was the hardest part. Ginny was used to the way boys acted when unsupervised, having grown up surrounded by a passel of brothers, but Natalie and Evalyn had no particular experience with this, and kept twitching whenever one or the other of the boys made a crass joke or belched for his friends’ amusement. The twins used to do that—try to burp their way through old nursery rhymes. Ginny had been better at it than either of them until Mum put a stop to the whole game. 

Finally, though, their energy began to subside, voices getting slower and now punctuated with yawns. One and then another complained of exhaustion. “Can’t wait for th’holiday,” Loughty slurred in response, “gonna sleep… all day…” 

And… down, Ginny thought, as he slumped forward onto the table. Gerth and one of the others were already snoozing. The fourth blinked at his friends with placid confusion before he, too, slid down in his seat and fell still. 

They gave it another minute, just to make sure, and then Evalyn tapped Ginny’s shoulder, and the three of them stepped out of their hiding place. 

Natalie went over to the table and leaned down, studying Loughty from only inches away. He didn’t so much as twitch. “Fucking bastards,” she said lowly. 

Evalyn locked the door and pulled Natalie back. “C’mon, we’re not here for that.” 

“Make it stick, Gin,” Natalie said, her eyes, dark with hate, flicking between Loughty and Gerth. 

Oh, I plan to. Ginny raised her wand and began the incantation. It was a long one, a mix of several languages. When Theo found it in a book in the Chamber and translated the description, he said one of the languages in the spell was so old it had been forgotten between the time of the Founders and the present day. 

Ginny fancied she felt magic echoing back through uncountable ages as she cast. Felt something surging up from the depths in answer to her call. Far stronger than she’d expected, and wilder too; and she knew with sudden certainty that Theo had mistranslated something. This spell was not meant to be cast by incantation alone. 

But she couldn’t stop now, she had no time to even draw a ritual circle, and nothing prepared to act as a vessel for a spell like this into which she could channel it, so Ginny gritted her teeth around the final syllable and let it go. 

The wards around the room failed immediately, she knew that much—and both Loughty and Gerth, her targets, went rigid as magic lashed their bodies. It shouldn’t take long to sink in. Ginny fought for control; her wand shook in her hand with the force of the magic pouring through it, and if she let go, if she lost her nerve, the backlash might kill her. 

Ginny pictured Luna’s face, smile serene, hair done up in braids that hummed with power. Thought of the sun glowing gold on the walls of her room back home. No, she thought, this is not how I die, and tightened her grip. 

The book said to expect a soft nimbus of light around the target of this spell when it took. What actually happened wasn’t so much a nimbus as a flare, blinding and painful, light and heat searing Ginny’s eyes and hands and exposed skin. 

Then, with a crack, it was over. 

Ginny panted in the silence. Her hands were red and raw, her face felt hot and sensitive too. The tablecloth and the hems of the boys’ robes were singed, but it looked like her actual targets escaped unharmed, all the magic bursting away from them. Lucky fuckers. 

“Did it take?” asked Evalyn in a hushed voice. 

“I… think so.” Ginny wet cracked lips. “I guess we might not find out until the next time they try to go after someone.” 

It wouldn’t be Alex, but Ginny couldn’t watch everyone in the school. Bullies like these would come up with a reason to hurt anyone they found alone and vulnerable. And when they did, when they used magic out of malice to harm someone unprovoked, it would rebound on them instead. 

In hindsight, Ginny should have realized a spell so esoteric and proactive would need more than just an incantation. It was a wonder she’d managed to cast it at all. 

“Gin!” 

Ginny whipped around, only to see Natalie’s horrified eyes fixed on the door. Immediately Ginny knew why. Someone was battering on it, another prefect maybe or a professor drawn by the noise, who knew. Didn’t matter. They were screwed. 

Or at least one of them was. 

Ginny raised her wand to cast a disillusionment charm on Ev and realized, to her horror, that it was no more than a dead stick in her hand. For just a moment the world rocked under her feet. Ginny had carried this wand of yew and unicorn hair since her first year. It was as familiar to her as her own face. And now it was broken, because—

“Give me that,” Ginny said, snatching Evalyn’s wand from her. There wasn’t time to have a crisis. Ginny smacked Ev over the head, rushing out the incantation as fast as she could without slurring, and then did the same to Natalie before handing Evalyn her wand back. 

By now her friends had caught on. “Ginny,” said Nat softly, “you don’t have to do this.”

“Yes I do. They’ll expel you for this. Me—” Ginny wet her lips again, and tasted blood. “I’ll be fine. Quick—in the wardrobe. Slip out as soon as the mess dies down.” 

Anguished, Natalie stepped back to the wardrobe, yanking its doors open and clambering inside. Evalyn pulled Ginny into a fierce, fast hug before spinning away—though not before Ginny saw tears glittering on Ev’s cheeks. Another second and both of them were tucked down beneath spare uniform robes and an old moth-eaten cloak. 

Ginny slammed the wardrobe shut. Turned around, set her deadened wand on the table, and waited to face the music. 

The next hour was a blur. 

First Professor McGonagall harangued her at length, while Professor Snape stood there, scowling with fearsome anger in his beetle-black eyes. Ginny avoided eye contact with either of them and said little. It wasn't like they actually wanted to hear her reasons, or excuses. 

Ginny clung to the knowledge that her plan, as far as she knew, worked: Professor Sinistra, doing a hall patrol, had heard the crack of the miscast spell and come running. Naturally, she had been horrified to see Ginny, and insisted on immediately carting all four potion-unconscious students up to the hospital wing with Ginny in tow, leaving the lounge empty. 

Surely by now Natalie and Evalyn had gotten away. 

Eventually, they tired of demanding answers Ginny wouldn’t give, and frog-marched her up to Dumbledore’s office. 

Ginny stiffened when the door swung open and revealed quite a bit of red hair. They’d called in her mum and—oh, Merlin, Bill—for reinforcements. Mum was fairly quivering with rage. Along with them stood Madam Pomfrey and Professor Flitwick. 

The room was, altogether, quite crowded. 

“Miss Weasley,” Dumbledore said forbiddingly. “Have you anything to say for yourself?” 

Ginny stood very straight and kept her eyes fixed on the edge of his desk. “No, sir.” 

“Ginevra Weasley—” Mum started. 

Dumbledore held up a hand. “One moment, please, Molly. Miss Weasley, you were found around a passel of students in a drugged sleep, having attempted some magic that did this to your wand.” He deposited it on the desktop and Mum made a choked-off sound of rage. “Please explain.” 

Quickly, Ginny considered the implications of defiance. She could just keep holding her tongue, but the more of a brat she was about this the worse he was likely to take it—and she was a Weasley. She, unlike her friends, could walk safely of late. She could bear this. 

“One of them hurt my friend,” she said quietly. “So I wanted to hex him. But it didn’t work… I don’t know what happened.” The grief in her voice, as she gestured to her wand, was very real. 

“And so you… prepared an ambush?” 

Ginny shrugged. 

Mum had evidently had enough: her wand lashed with the speed of a once-deadly duelist and a silent charm hit Ginny. She felt its effects immediately. A loose-tongue jinx and an old favorite of Mum’s when she was trying to get one of the twins to spill their guts. Over time, Fred and George had both learned to fight it off by the time they were third years. None of the other Weasley siblings had been on the wrong end of their mum’s wand enough to resist it. 

The charm pulled at her. Demanding she talk. Technically it didn’t alter the mind, that was why it was just a charm and not even a jinx, but most people couldn’t control what they were saying or think fast enough to monitor a near-constant stream of words. Ginny couldn’t just shrug it off like the twins but she had a secret advantage: Theo had made them all cast this on each other, all the time, silently and from behind if possible, until nearly all the Vipers could handle this and most other easy-to-use forms of getting someone to talk. 

“He hurt my friend, hurt him really bad, and we couldn’t go to the hospital wing,” Ginny started. Dumbledore and Flitwick both looked disapprovingly at Mum, but this was well within the bounds of something a parent could use as a discipline tool, so even if they wanted to step in they couldn’t. “I was so worried, I thought he was gonna die, and I knew no one would care if we reported it ‘cause he’s a Slytherin, and if we went to the hospital wing there’d be questions and maybe his family would find out, and I had to watch a friend of ours try to heal him, and I was so scared, and then so angry, because we’re getting jinxed all the time in the halls and no one does a thing about it,” never mind that Dumbledore had his reasons for not wanting panic among the students, it still sucked, “and I knew who’d done it so I just wanted to hex him, and make him feel what he’d done to my friend,” that was treading too close to the nature of the spell she’d cast, “so I just—just went and figured out where he’d be, and yeah, alright, I tried to hex him! But it didn’t work. I don’t know why. I was so angry I wasn’t thinking straight.”

“What did you cast?” Mum hissed. 

Ginny clamped her mouth shut and tasted blood. 

Mum’s eyes narrowed. “Ginevra Molly Weasley, you will tell us the spell or so help me I will homeschool you until you turn seventeen!” 

“Molly, please…” Dumbledore said. 

Mum rounded on him, but before she could speak, Dumbledore lifted a hand to stop her. “Really, I understand your distress—”

“Do you, Albus? Really? Because from what I can see, you’ve allowed those snakes to corrupt my baby girl!” 

“I’m not a baby!” Ginny spat, when, between the spell and her rage, she could keep silent no longer. 

“No one is saying that,” Flitwick said with more gentleness than Ginny really felt she deserved. Not that she felt particularly guilty, but objectively, gentle wasn’t the warranted response. 

“Miss Weasley,” said Dumbledore, again quieting Mum with a gesture, “it is all too easy, for a witch or wizard of your age, to fall in with the immature and irresponsible of your peers. If one of your fellow students put you up to this… or if perhaps one of them taught you a curse to use…”

“I just wanted to hex him, alright? Not like, seriously hurt him! Just—do something! No one else… taught me anything, or, or even knew about it!” Thank Merlin the loose-lips charm didn’t compel truth. Just talking. 

“Mmm. You are sure?” Dumbledore said slowly, his blue eyes piercing. “Rest assured, Miss Weasley, there will be consequences for this behavior, but a… genuine show of remorse, of accepting responsibility for what you’ve done, may lessen it somewhat.” 

Hot rage coursed through her. Trying to make her give up her friends, was he? Trying to make her a quisling? Fuck him. Let’s see how he likes a taste of Weasley loyalty when it isn’t aimed at HIM.  “There was no one else,” Ginny repeated, and crossed her arms, and bit her tongue again. 

Mum looked scandalized. 

Dumbledore sighed with the weight of an entire sun, and for just a second, looked so very, very old. For just that second Ginny felt like she understood him: the burden he bore, the pressure he’d carried for a century, the kind of dream of a better world that could drive a man to trample over anyone in his way and wield those loyal to him like tools. Ginny imagined being a tool in this man’s hand, a fire, burning the fuel it was given. 

It was almost Slytherin, really. Admirably ruthless. Tragically pointless. 

And if she was a fire she preferred to burn things of her choosing, thanks. 

Ginny waited for him to decide her punishment. 

Harry

When Natalie and Evalyn turned up in the Knights’ Room, he had known, immediately, that something was very wrong. Even angry, Natalie was fickle and fey as a chill wind, not this direct and heavy manner; and he had never seen Evalyn, normally cool-headed, so close to tears. Oh, it was subtle, and well-hidden—they were not Slytherins for nothing—but Harry made it his business to know all his Vipers’ tells. 

Natalie paused at the edge of Harry’s couch and said two words, quiet. “It’s Ginny.” 

That was an hour ago. Now Harry waited along the path to the dungeons, half-hidden in an alcove, for his wayward Viper. 

At last, he heard soft footsteps, and peered out from his hiding place. Even visibly upset, she walked straight as a knife’s edge, with an athlete’s unconscious mastery of her body. Witchlight flickered over her bright red hair and the stony expression on her face. 

“Ginny,” he murmured, when she drew even with him. 

She twitched, not towards her wand holster as expected, but the knife he knew she wore concealed in one boot. “Oh. Harry.” 

“Walk with me.” 

It was not a request. 

Ginny fell in step next to him. This stretch of corridor had no paintings, and Harry had been here long enough to be fairly sure no ghosts were about in this part of the castle at night. They could speak, and settle things, before they returned to the common room and their peers’ watchful eyes. 

“I was stupid,” Ginny said finally. 

Harry kept his voice light. “Were you? How?” 

“I—that spell. I should have known better.” 

“Yes, you should have.” Harry had made Evalyn tell him the exact spell they used, and then nearly thrown something at the wall. “It was from a book on ritual magic, Ginny.” 

“I know. But I read the translated description, and the incantation, and—I thought it was a derivative of a larger ritual… those are in ritual books sometimes.” 

Harry sighed. “Yes, they are. It was not an unreasonable assumption.” 

“Are you agreeing with me or not?” Ginny snapped. 

There were her teeth. “I don’t believe you need me to tell you that you were reckless and foolish; that though your assumptions were not unfounded, using a spell steeped so thoroughly in forgotten and poorly understood magic without prior experimentation was foolish. At the very least you might have asked for help. But you know all of this.” 

Ginny’s shoulders sagged for just a second. “Yeah. I… wanted to do something myself.” 

To prove myself, Harry thought she meant, and impulsively rested his hand on her shoulder as they walked. Ginny was nearly taller than him now, but still, she leaned slightly into the contact, and her expression melted into something like guilt. 

“Did it take?” he said after a moment. “Natalie and Evalyn weren’t sure.” 

A flicker of a smile. “Yeah, it took. And with my wand dead—” a catch in her voice, but she soldiered on— “they couldn’t priori incantatem it. I just said I tried to cast a hex, but was too angry, and apparently nothing showed up on Pomfrey’s diagnostic scans.” 

Harry grinned at her. “Another benefit of using an ancient, obscure spell.” 

Ginny made a sound that might have been a laugh, but still looked braced for a fight, or for blame. 

“Hey.” Harry stopped walking, so that Ginny did too, and tugged her shoulder until she turned to face him. “I’m proud of you.” 

Unbelievably, she blinked several times, her eyes shiny. “You… well, it wasn’t very Slytherin of me, was it.”

“You made a mistake, and then you dealt with it. You correctly judged, under duress, the only way to salvage that situation, and you took it without hesitation. Slytherins know self-sacrifice, Gin, we’re just more circumspect about the right time for it. So,” Harry held her eyes squarely, “I’m proud of you.” 

And then, for the second time in as many months, he found himself hugging Ginny, only this time she was shaking just the faintest bit. Harry found it was not so terrible, this kind of contact—the utter lack of expectation in it, the safety, the unguarded affection from someone he—

Harry heard the scuff of footsteps, and looked up just in time to catch the eye of that girl from Veronica’s year, the one who kept snipping at his protege. He fixed her with the most fearsome glare he could muster: she immediately turned tail and went back the way she came. 

They should probably move, though. 

“Come on,” Harry said, stepping back. 

Ginny let go without hesitation, half-smiling at him with equal parts bitterness and relief. “Thanks.”

“Anytime.” Harry offered one arm with the exaggerated gallant air of a knight-errant in a comedic play, and mentally patted himself on the back when Ginny took it with a giggle. This was, he had determined, a somewhat helpful pattern when comforting a friend in distress: listen to them, then provide comforting words and/or solutions as the situation required, and then, when they had vented their emotions, engage humor to avoid any post-breakdown awkwardness. 

Harry couldn’t wait to tell Justin and Blaise he’d finally figured this out. Whether he’d tell them his other epiphany tonight remained to be seen. It might, he thought, be more useful to talk to Pansy. 

Andromeda

Never would she have guessed that Harry Black would write to her. The only more surprising letter, Andromeda thought, would be from one of her sisters. 

Also, she sincerely doubted that either of her sisters would manage to be this civil, or this clever, or this baldly self-interested yet also helpful. Here was a Slytherin without pretense. Here was someone recognizing her for what she was, too. 

Most of the Order thought her defanged. That political allegiance somehow defined one’s limits. Ethan knew better, and evidently, despite little direct interaction, Harry Black had guessed as much, too. 

Andromeda had guessed some things about him of late. That new Soothsayer publication, for one—it was extremely convenient, and the sheer lack of useful information to be found on it anywhere in the Ministry suggested Black influence greasing the levers of government. So too were its contents a bit too calculatedly derisive towards both of the major sides in their war. 

Who to blame? Naturally, a cunning upstart Slytherin with his own ambitions and far more power than should ever be in a teenager’s hands—because of course her cousin bent to his adopted son’s every whim. 

Sirius was impulsive like that, with those he loved. 

Andromeda knew why Harry Black would never willingly ally himself with Albus. So too did she know that he had spent the greater part of the last five and a half years surrounded by a paradigm of cruelty and winner-take-all, of prejudice and self-serving lack of principle, with its own near-inescapable gravity. 

But here he was sending her the calculations of a Muggleborn witch, using Muggle statistical science, and his own political observations. The mathematics looked, to Andromeda’s eye, correct—she was more accustomed to numbers wielded in arithmancy than pure mathematics, but Ted did enough of the latter for her to have a good understanding. And Black’s own suggestions showed an astute eye at odds with his year, but then, Andromeda knew what it was like to grow up too soon. 

Some of the information, unfortunately, required verification. Andromeda simply lacked the network of contacts that the Blacks could draw on, even whittled down to two. In order to verify it she would need help and in order to get that help she would need Ethan. 

But, considering Ethan’s not-entirely-baseless hatred of Black, she’d best keep her source to herself for now. 

Andromeda re-rolled the scroll, slipped it up her robe sleeve, and rose from the chair in her study to venture out into the living room. 

It was already packed. The first Order meeting—alive with tension over that bill from Peasegood whose origins no one knew, and Albus’ problems with a school board alarmed by scandal and their own Inquisitor’s changes, and the recent attack on the Slytherin quidditch team. 

Albus had been cryptic about the latter, but Andromeda got it out of Roger after the meeting, and had to admire Black’s sheer brass bollocks in essentially blackmailing Albus Dumbledore. 

She was also inclined to see Black’s cooperation on that matter as a positive sign. Instead of going straight to the Prophet or, if she was right, the Soothsayer, he’d chosen to go along with Albus’ cover-up, provided at least some pretense of an investigation occurred. Of course, Andromeda would eat her favorite hat if he wasn’t making his own inquiries, but she well knew what his associates’ families were like, and could certainly guess at his motivations for preferring Albus to the other current options. 

Obviously, he cared enough about his Muggleborn friend to, at the very least, not want a directly oppressive blood purist regime. 

Andromeda could work with that. Allies of circumstance, as it were, for as long as the circumstances lasted. 

Just after she sat down, in the back of the room, Ethan cleared his throat and called the unruly group to order. “Alright… anyone not able to make it?” 

“Bright had to watch her cousins,” someone called out. 

“Pity… anyone else?” Ethan made a note on a parchment. 

The group looked around, and murmured, and shook their heads. Merlin, they were all so young. And growing in number. Ethan had been recruiting, it seemed. Andromeda saw some faces she knew—the Diggory boy, the Pritchard, Devlin, and Towler daughters sitting together, and of course Barnaby Murdock, who Ethan worried lacked the nerve for this but kept showing up anyway. Andromeda was glad to see another generation taking up the torch, to see that Voldemort and his ilk hadn’t yet stomped all the fight out of their opponents, but she still hated to see their faces here, still softened by childish curves yet animated with hate. 

“So,” Ethan said, setting his parchment aside and sweeping fervent eyes around the room, “the old guard have had a bit of trouble lately with the Wizengamot, and Headmaster Dumbledore with the school board.” A rumble of discontent rose from the gathered younger Order. “Right. Some of you have heard about the bill our ally Dickon Peasegood proposed in the Wizengamot?” 

“Yeah, it would’ve let the Aurors nail those bastards!” someone called out. 

“But Black stopped it,” Pritchard said, with more hatred than Andromeda thought was exactly necessary. 

There was an opportunity, at least. Andromeda spoke in a clear and carrying voice, so that they would all listen: “I’ve recently come into possession of some information that suggests Black may have been right to oppose that bill.” 

Pritchard turned that scowl towards Andromeda, but she remained unperturbed; she’d faced down far more frightening things than a girl less than ten years out of Hogwarts. Ethan, though, looked little happier, to judge by his frown. “Where did this information come from?” he demanded. 

“For the safety of my source, I will not say.” Andromeda flicked her wand and conjured a slip of parchment with the names Black gave her written on it. “However, those are all the Wizengamot houses suspected of falling under pressure from He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, identified in part based on their anomalous support for Peasegood’s proposal. There may also be reason to believe Peasegood himself was a witting or unwitting patsy for the Dark.” 

Earlier, she’d pulled Shacklebolt and Fenwick aside, and asked them to increase their security around those Wizengamot families specifically. Both had heard her suspicions about Peasegood with discontent, but acceptance. Such was not the case now: an immediate outcry went up, voices overlapping and arguing, calling her sources frauds or questioning in her judgment or asking why You-Know-Who should want to empower the Aurors. 

Andromeda waited for them to settle, then looked pointedly at Ethan. 

“There are enough sympathizers of the Dark in the DMLE that such a law… may benefit them, should it come to be passed,” Ethan said. “Andi—”

“My source provided verifiable information.” Time to appease, give the appearance of conciliation. “Perhaps we can investigate certain aspects of it to determine if they spoke truly?” 

“It might be a trap,” said Diggory. “A waste of time.” 

“And yet, if it is not, we can put a stop to some of You-Know-Who’s plans in the Wizengamot,” said Zoey Sideris with a considering look. “I vote we follow up on it.” 

Ethan nodded at her. “You can take point on that, then. Speak with Andromeda after the meeting, and pick two or three others to help investigate. Now.” He turned to face the front again. “We need to talk about this Soothsayer.” 

“Did they find out who’s running it?” Towler said. 

This time, Stephen answered. “No, we still can’t find anything about the publication token… it’s legitimate, but all the original records seem to be conveniently missing, no matter how hard any of our people looks. We’re going to have to find another way.” 

“Which is where we come in,” said Ethan. “Violet will be leading a group of you specifically to figure out more about the Soothsayer and who’s publishing it. I’ll ask for volunteers in a moment.” His voice softened. “By now we’ve all seen the ugly side of this war we’re in, and we’ve set our wands to some unpleasant tasks. Not everyone is cut out for every aspect of the fight, and that’s fine, but if you don’t have what it takes to follow any leads, all the way, don’t sign on to this project. There’s no shame in finding the role that suits you best.” 

Not surprisingly, that speech did nothing to quell the group; hands shot up immediately when Ethan called for volunteers. Andromeda wanted to shake her head. Pretty words aside, these Gryffindorish types didn’t really believe there was no shame in hanging back from a fight. Deep down, they judged those ill-fit for battle, those who, like Andromeda, resorted to espionage and subterfuge to win. They preferred open battle. Direct interrogation. Action, whatever the kind. 

Lucille Pritchard, Eggbert Hornby, Edith Towler, and Cedric Diggory wound up on the team under Violet Crockett. All four of them looked puffed-up with importance after Ethan made his selections; the passed-over volunteers, including Murdock and Gerth, slumped with disappointment. 

Ethan finished writing down these names. “Excellent. I’m sure you’ll do us all proud. And now, lastly, our surveillance operations. How are they going?” 

“That… man,” said Murdock slowly. “Turpin. Do the Aurors…”

“No, they’ve no idea it was anything to do with us,” Ethan assured him. He grimaced. “Which brings me to my last point—we need to exercise greater caution with our interrogations. Turpin gave us some information of use—Death Eaters are working in that club, passing information and supplies and whatnot—but his death drew attention we should try to avoid if we can. I’m as responsible for it as anyone, and I’ll be the first to exercise much more rigorous attention to detail. The only people who die should be targets too dangerous to let go. Any of You-Know-Who’s inner circle—anyone from Azkaban, or anyone on the List—they don’t leave your hands alive. But anyone else, discuss it with your team leader before a mission, and have a plan in place if you decide they’re too dangerous to walk free. Clear?” 

“Clear,” said Pritchard, loudly and with a pointed flip of her hair. Andromeda had to restrain a double take. Was the chit really resorting to flirtation to get attention from her commander? A man twenty years her senior, who also happened to be her superior in an illegal vigilante organization during wartime, and who had exhibited no interest in her whatsoever? 

At best, it was a bit of harmless position-jockeying. At worst, it could become a distraction, or foster resentment among their already-small numbers. Andromeda was not impressed. They all had better things to be worrying about than personal glory. Then again, Pritchard had been a Gryffindor, like all of her family, so it couldn’t be that surprising. 

All of her family but one, actually—Andromeda remembered something to do with the youngest of the Pritchard. She thought back. Hadn’t it involved the Blacks? 

As if he’d read her mind, Ethan picked that moment to list Sirius Black as one of their surveillance targets. 

Andromeda frowned and listened more closely. The other names she knew and agreed with. She saw all the intelligence that passed through this subset of the Order and through the main faction as well. But her cousin—

To avoid unnecessary fuss, she waited until the discussion of the names and surveillance got to Sirius before saying her piece. “It seems unlikely that Sirius should lead us to any active Death Eater cell.” 

“He’s a Black,” snapped Alvar Cornfoot. “We all know what they’re like. For Merlin’s sake, he went to Azkaban for using Dark magic! He killed James!” 

“Yes,” said Andromeda placidly, “and I certainly do not think he is trustworthy. We all know that to use Dark magic is to tempt corruption and power-madness.” They nodded along, mollified. “But his personal hatred of his own parents and relatives is well-known. He is not a political creature. So long as Bellatrix Lestrange stands in the service of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, Black will not. I do not propose we ally ourselves with him, only that we direct our energies towards more likely targets.” 

Ethan’s lips thinned, but he nodded slowly. “I agree that his hatred of his family was… never subtle, back in school.” 

“You can say that again,” muttered Amalia. 

“But there’s nevertheless a chance. We know what kinds of people his son,” Ethan spat the word, “runs with at school.” 

Diggory shifted uncomfortably. “I mean… sure, he’s close with some Death Eater kids, but isn’t he tight with Granger, from Gryffindor?” 

“A miss-sort, according to my brother,” Pritchard shot back. “You know that swotty type, cares more for books than people—”

“I believe Cedric referred not to her House but her blood status. The younger Black is, at the very least, not so much a blood purist as most of those among the Death Eaters’ numbers,” said Andromeda, though she knew, from long personal experience, that it wasn’t that simple. Even aside from the true purists, like her sisters and parents, plenty of Dark witches and wizards tolerated Muggleborns as a tacitly inferior class. Others cared naught for blood purity, favoring instead a meritocratic worldview that disregarded any Muggleborns whose merit was insufficient to make up for their other disadvantages. 

It was a worldview rooted in selfishness and lack of care for others, in an arrogant fantasy of superiority. It was a worldview with so many shades of seductive grey that one could slip down its gullet and be lost. When the enemy wore so many deceptively reasonable faces, the only counterpoint was to stand firm like an old oak tree, give no quarter, accept no compromise. So Andromeda kept her counsel to herself on the matter. 

Still, not all of the Order were as rigid as Pritchard, and, to be honest, Ethan. Zoey raised her eyebrows and said, “One or two Muggleborn friends doesn’t prove Hadrian Black isn’t a blood purist.” 

“No, but it does suggest, along with his cooperation with Albus of late, that he might be reluctant to embrace the Death Eaters,” Andromeda said. “And at any rate, he’s still a child. He is dangerous, he is to be avoided and mistrusted, but neither do I see much point in actively pursuing him.” 

There were some discontented muttering at this. Andromeda could see that not everyone agreed with her. Harry Black was a snake, and a Black, and had many ties to their enemy; and she understood them, Andromeda did not like the boy, but in this her emotional dislike of him would not cloud her judgment. 

The Order had far larger targets than Harry or Sirius Black. 

“We’ll keep Black as a surveillance target,” Ethan said finally, “the elder, that is. Surveillance only. If we see no signs of suspicious activities by, say, Imbolc, we leave him alone. Surely, Andi, you agree we should exercise due caution?”

His tone bore no hint of challenge, but Andromeda saw one nonetheless in his shoulders and about his mouth, likely subconscious. Time to capitulate while she was ahead. She smiled and spread her hands. “Yes, by all means. I only wish to caution against fixating on him at the expense of other, more vital targets.” 

“Wise words, and we’ll take heed of them,” said Zoey with a respectful nod. “Ethan, who’s next to discuss?”

Ethan scanned down his list of targets. “We’ve ruled out Pumperknell… and the Alexandrius siblings… Ah. Dan Illes.” 

Another name whose presence on this list Andromeda didn’t question. She sat back in her chair and committed the rest of the meeting to memory, her objectives completed. 

Later, she penned a brief missive, thanking Harry Black for his information and, after a brief internal debate, inviting him to write back if he had anything more to share or sought information himself. 

Andromeda preferred not to burn her bridges without cause. So long as Harry Black was kept far away from Jules—so long as Jules could be kept safe from the devastating pain of losing one’s sibling to the Dark—then Black could be a useful ally. 

Barty 

Some days he thought Harry had a bit more Gryffindor in him than Barty’s former apprentice liked to admit. Oh, he was careful about it, but when the time came Harry had no shortage of gumption, as evidenced in the latest episode of The Soothsayer. 

Granted, Barty had no certainty that Harry was behind the new periodical. It was all just speculation.

Most mornings the Death Eaters in residence at their Lord’s latest hideout (an old manor borrowed from the Selwyns, at present) took breakfast where they pleased, but He preferred supper be held with everyone in the formal dining room, like a parody of the family dinners Barty’s father insisted on having when he was a child. They were typically rather dull affairs in which Barty ate mechanically and occupied his thoughts with his latest research project (today’s was in regards to the possible arithmantic implications of a Mars and Saturn alignment with respect to ritual magic). Today’s supper, so far, had not been dull: it started with Rowle setting a copy of The Soothsayer on fire over an empty serving platter and went downhill from there. 

These fools should just thank Merlin their Lord wasn’t here to see their display of—of mummery and childish spleen. 

Jugson began ranting about creatures sullying pure wizard blood, inspired by the Soothsayer’s front-page argument for extending wand rights to any magical creature with the capacity to use one. It was actually a deeply convincing argument, well-structured and rationally sound, as well as an impassioned moral plea. Jugson, naturally, did not see it as such. 

Across the table, Yaxley caught Barty’s eye and grimaced slightly. Barty gave the older wizard a commiserating look over the rim of his wine glass. Drinking was also not something he typically did at these meals but tonight was proving exceptional. 

Since their Lord chose not to attend tonight, there was nothing to stop Barty leaving immediately upon completion of the dessert course. He was not entirely surprised when Yaxley appeared in the corridor before Barty even made it to the stairs. 

“Corban,” Barty said neutrally. 

“Barty. Would you care to take a stroll with me? I find this weather… refreshing.” 

It was probably close to freezing outside, and the wind had been rattling the windows all day. Barty raised his eyebrows. “There’s nothing quite so bracing as a gale.” 

Wrapped in winter cloaks and warming charms, they ventured out onto the grounds. The Selwyns were of the traditional sort who didn’t believe in manicured gardens: everything here was wild forest up to within twenty feet of the manor’s walls, old enough that the trees were fully matured and the ground beneath them relatively open. The canopy blunted the wind somewhat, to Barty’s relief; warming charms helped, but not even magic could entirely pull the teeth of a wind like this. 

“A most interesting publication,” Yaxley said after a few moments of silent walking. 

“Yes. And perhaps not as… sympathetic to our aims as it may have seemed, at first,” Barty said, just as neutrally. 

Yaxley sighed and drew his wand. Barty went rigid immediately, ready at any moment to defend his life, but Yaxley just cast an impressively robust ward around them and stowed his wand away again. “Let us speak freely.” 

From some of the others, Barty might think this a trap, but Yaxley was one of the most reasonable of his fellows, and Barty himself had his Lord’s unwavering favor. “Very well. I find it a persuasive argument, particularly with respect to the need for strong alliances among magical folk should we ever be exposed to Muggles.” 

“Do you think such a thing is likely?” 

Barty spoke slowly. “Spending time at Hogwarts showed me that… things have changed enormously among Muggles in the last few decades, and are changing more rapidly every passing year. They have been to the moon. There are rumors of some new mechanism for the instantaneous transfer of information anywhere around the world, to anyone. They can record moving pictures in great detail, and have devices in the upper atmosphere with powerful sensors that can look at the ground below… Yes, I think that exposure is inevitable, and pretending otherwise is the height of foolishness. And there are billions of them. Six billion and counting, compared to perhaps several million wixen worldwide, Muggleborns included; and… you understand the alchemical principle of atomic fissure?” 

“…yes,” said Yaxley, who, to his credit, had absorbed all this information with nary a twitch. 

“They have devised weapons that can release the power of atomic fissure, that which we harvest for contained alchemical works, and reduce an entire city to poisonous rubble within the span of seconds, with temperatures hotter than any fiendfyre. I know no wards that could stop such a thing. I know no magic that could equal it. We must ready ourselves now, and it would be the height of foolishness not to present a united front.” 

“I can see the sense in it,” Yaxley agreed. “And that article was certainly correct that the historical record with respect to controlling goblins and other such beings through force has only fostered resentment.” 

“Why make enemies when you can have friends?” 

Yaxley nodded. For a moment they moved in their dome of muted sound, the crunch of their footsteps echoing oddly back at Barty from the ward. The last traces of evening birdsong filtered to his ears as if he was underwater. 

“And the second article?” Yaxley said abruptly. 

No one had been willing to discuss the second article around their table. Barty was quite sure that conversations about it would happen behind closed doors, in private, between those with robust occlumency shields. 

The second article was an analysis of casualties related to Knights of Walpurgis and Death Eater activity from 1960 onwards, drawing on the kind of precise data that spoke of privileged, pureblood archival access, of palms greased by gold. The second article proved rather conclusively that the population of British Muggleborns had dipped more because of emigration than by any murder or homicide; and, further, that far more pure- and halfbloods had died than Muggleborns, by far. 

Barty didn’t particularly care. Blood was blood, and death was death, and to realize dreams on the scale of his Lord’s, sacrifices must be made. 

But for those who genuinely believed that strengthening the magical world and finding a new cultural center meant the systematic exclusion of all Muggleborns—for those who had joined the Death Eaters with some degree of faith in their own pureblooded superiority—

Compared to all that, the third piece, defending blood adoptions as a useful and safe spell that shouldn’t be criminalized, was positively banal. 

“The mathematics were correct, as far as I could tell,” said Barty, “and I made a few cursory inquiries today. The data too appears to be legitimate.” 

Yaxley’s voice was low. “Many of our esteemed colleagues will not care to hear that news.” 

“And what do you think?” 

“I think… that by percentage of the population, there are rather more pureblooded or halfblooded wixen than there are Muggleborns,” said Yaxley, managing to avoid saying Mudblood with the barest catch in his voice. Barty wondered why the sudden delicacy. “So it is only natural that a larger fraction of casualties will affect us.” 

Barty said nothing. 

“Bartemius.” 

The use of his full name drew Barty to a stop. He turned to face Yaxley and did not bother disguising his expression as he said, “Do not call me by that name.” 

Yaxley paled a shade. “Forgive me. I meant no offense.” 

“Speak your mind.” Barty did not allow himself to soften. He had no patience for these Slytherin games at the best of times, and the use of that name ate up what little was left. 

“You have spent time among them—the Muggleborns, the students at that castle. I find my own judgment—impaired. I have never associated with any of them enough to form a personal perception of the matter.” Yaxley looked as though speaking directly pained him. Good. “Tell me truly, is there a difference?” 

“In capacity for magical strength, in intelligence, in appearance? None whatsoever.” 

Yaxley blinked, evidently having expected more hem-hawing. “And yet…”

“Magical blood is magical blood,” Barty said, deciding to get this over with, whatever this was. “Pureblood, Muggleborn, who cares? Filius Flitwick is part-goblin and one of the most terrifying duelists on the international circuit. Severus Snape—halfblood, potions prodigy, and could put almost any other Death Eater in the ground in single combat. Lily Evans…” No more needed to be said about Lily Evans; it was not a subject Death Eaters preferred to discuss openly. “I don’t personally give a hippogriff’s shite for blood purity politics. It’s a political tool to me and nothing more. To exclude Muggleborns from wizarding society is a pointless and idiotic waste of resources. We are so few; can we really afford to reject any able wand? Why on Merlin’s soggy green earth would we want to make them hate us, make them more likely to side with the Muggles when the time comes?” 

His voice had grown loud. Barty tempered himself and turned away, annoyed at having lost control. 

Of late, these thoughts ran around and around in his head. Two years of freedom, and now one year of relative rest and comfort, had freed his mind from the fog it once labored under, and Barty found himself inhaling books and scholarship and research, trying to make up for all the time he had lost. And he could not get away from one inescapable conclusion: blood purity was a useful short-term rallying cry, but in the long run, would only weaken their world. 

Yaxley looked troubled in the wake of Barty’s tirade. “I take your point.” 

Barty began walking again so that Yaxley would be forced to fall in step or stay behind. He chose the former and another long period of silence passed between them. 

“I know some of our number may find that conclusion… difficult to grasp,” Barty said once he felt he could speak calmly. 

“It is—not particularly welcome,” Yaxley admitted, “but I know logic when I see it, even when said logic is uncomfortable. I will need to think more on this, but I sincerely appreciate your candor.” 

They had begun to steer back towards the house. “Should you wish to speak on the matter more, you’re welcome to ask me,” Barty said, “and I believe I may be able to provide some alternative sources of information on Muggles. There is much that appalling Muggle Studies curriculum leaves out and much that the navel-gazing fools in the Ministry prefer to ignore.” 

Yaxley laughed, short and harsh. “I certainly wouldn’t trust that lot to handle any real diplomacy with Muggles as numerous and well-armed as you describe. Fudge would mispronounce one of their odd words and cause some kind of international offense.” 

“Or sign something without reading it and give up our rights to own property or some such nonsense,” Barty said with a roll of his eyes. Fudge, the complacent Wizengamot, the self-serving upper echelons of the Ministry… all of them far too caught up in the past to see the future. 

Barty had always admired his Lord’s ability to separate things from the past that were useful, and worth preserving, as opposed to things that were a hindrance, and best left where they were. He had likewise scorned his Death Eater fellows’ inability to do either. 

Deep within the safe confines of his own mind, he had to admit that, of late, he worried his Lord catered too much to the traditionalist old guard. That his Lord may have begun to stray from the path of their cause. The problem was that Barty didn’t know. Oh, he had pieces, fragments of information, plans overheard from Death Eaters in their cups or when his Lord spoke in the musing, meandering way he allowed no one but Barty and a select few others to see. He had nothing concrete. 

Once his faith in his Lord had been so complete that this never bothered him. Almost alone out here, chill air scraping at his lungs, Barty couldn’t deny that he was troubled where before he would have been at peace. 

That he no longer implicitly trusted the Dark Lord to do what was best for their cause. 

After all, that attempt to criminalize sedition—that had seemed to come from the Death Eaters’ camp, though Barty still had not confirmed whether any of his fellows had gone to pressure Peasegood. And Barty had not agreed that it was a good idea. He had given the information about it to someone who could stop it and stop it Harry had. 

Barty had presumed to put his own opinion before his Lord’s. 

This realization, which he had avoided since sending the anonymous package in the owl post, left him faintly dizzy. Yaxley half-reached for him when Barty missed a step but Barty brushed him off and straightened. 

It was a frightening thought. Part of Barty felt himself arrogant and foolhardy, and chided him for disloyalty and lack of faith; but another part murmured rebelliously that he was not so stupid or uninformed as to render his own opinions pro forma worthless. 

Barty’s fingers splayed uncomfortably over the Dark Mark on his arm. 

For the first time since it burned into his skin, its permanence felt less like freedom, and more like a weight. 

Well. He shook aside the strange melancholy that had set over him. The only thing to do, then, was to seek more information. And should the Dark Lord’s plan become clear to him, then Barty would tell no one of his doubts, and accept that he had been wrong to suspect anything less, but—he couldn’t simply leave it unquestioned. Blind faith in the Ministry and Wizengamot was what had got them here. Barty couldn’t convince himself anymore that blind faith in a different authority would save them. 

Feeling as if the whole world had shifted uncomfortably to the left, but filled with new resolve, Barty followed Yaxley back inside. 

Harry 

The last hurdle before Harry could go home and bloody sleep was Slughorn’s stupid Christmas party. 

Draco had come out of the odd preoccupation that had consumed him lately long enough to tear through Harry’s trunk in search of a dress robe since “You couldn’t recognize real fashion if it bit you on the arse,” while Blaise muttered to himself over Harry’s relatively small collection of cufflinks. Harry had developed a twitch under one eye by the time they were both satisfied but was pleased enough to see the two of them acting normally for once to put up with it. 

Still, he suspected that the eye twitch was only going to get worse as this evening progressed. 

He attended with Celesta: not out of actual interest, but because the party promised to be invaluable for networking and Celesta never would have gotten an invite otherwise, her mother being in Azkaban and several of her relatives being Death Eater felons at large. The two of them walked arm in arm: Harry had ignored the protocols that suggested she be on his arm, as the younger child of her House while he was the Heir of his, and instead taken the position that denoted them equals. It raised a few eyebrows and a muttered comment about impropriety from the vicinity of Collywode as Harry and Celesta left the common room, but he paid them no mind. 

They got to Slughorn’s suite just as Finn came into the corridor from the other end, walking with Demelza Robins. Harry waved to them and held the door for Finn, who paused long enough to murmur, “Steer clear of the punch,” before continuing with his date. 

“Steer clear of the punch?” Celesta echoed. 

“I expect Finn and Natalie have spiked it with something or other.” Harry pasted on a smile as they stepped forward into a close, warm room smelling strongly of pine sap, cinnamon, and mulled wine. Heady and inviting, really. Curtains and tapestries covered nearly every inch of stone walls; thick carpets laid over the floors; sections of furniture flowed into one another in a seamless way that must have required careful arrangement. Harry had to give Slughorn credit: the man knew how to set an ambiance. 

They were almost immediately spotted by the man himself, who bore down on them like the Hogwarts Express clad in green velvet, already slightly flushed with wine. “Harry! So pleased you could come—and Miss Fawley! A delight, as always.” He forsook anything particularly formal in favor of shaking each of their hands enthusiastically. “You simply must meet—”

And with that, they were dragged away on a whirlwind tour of the party. 

Harry had to occlude just to keep up with the names and faces spinning by. Slughorn seemed determined to show off one of his prize pupils to as many people as possible—Nestor Selwyn and his brother Gainor; Pius Thicknesse, head of the Ministry Administrative Authority; Venus Evermonde, renowned legal scholar; Gilbert Wimple, chair of the Committee on Experimental Charms, whose unremovable horns would no doubt cause apoplexies should he ever go for a bare-headed stroll down Privet Drive. Harry spotted Griselda Marchbanks, one of the Ogden cousins, two members of the Weird Sisters, Harpies captain Gwenog Jones, the Scrimgeours, his old ally Spencer, and Elissa Kehl, a relative of Adrian’s who owned several valuable wand-wood forests in northern England. 

All of them were as eager to meet Harry as Slughorn was to show him off. Celesta bore it all with grace: this had, after all, been the point of their attending together. And if some of the guests seemed a bit too interested, or a bit discomfited, upon hearing Harry’s last name, well, it was nothing he wasn’t used to. 

At last Slughorn got distracted by some other newly-arrived prize and let them go with a promise to find him again in a bit. Harry gratefully accepted the reprieve and steered Celesta towards the mulled wine and hors d'oeuvres. 

Hermione and Draco were there already, Hermione lovely, as ever, in a lilac dress robe with slits in the sleeves from shoulder to elbow and elbow to wrist, which Harry vaguely remembered Pansy mentioning as some new fashion trend. It showed her skin and arms as she talked and gestured animatedly and he had to admit the effect was striking. Draco, in comparison, was stiffly formal in dress robes of a heavy pewter color that left him looking half a ghost against the rich colors and textures of almost everyone else. 

“Oh, Harry!” Hermione said when she saw them coming. “Have you tried the wine yet? It’s wonderful.” 

“How much have you tried?” Harry countered with a smirk. He and Celesta each took a glass from the enchanted serving station and joined their friends. 

Hermione wrinkled her nose at him. “Only half a glass, don’t be silly. I wouldn’t want to cloud my mind. Venus Evermonde is here!” 

“Oh, yeah, I met her earlier, have you had a chance yet?” 

“No!” 

“I’ll introduce you,” Draco said, “I think she knew my grandfather back in the day, she’ll be pleased to see me.” 

Hermione puffed up like Crookshanks when he was angry. 

Harry braced himself. 

In the next breath, she deflated, and smiled. “Thank you, Draco, that would be lovely.” 

“Please excuse us,” Draco said to Harry and Celesta with a stiff little bow, and led Hermione away, lost almost immediately in the shifting shoals of people and dim, dancing light. 

Celesta sipped her wine. “Trouble in paradise, looks like.”

“Not my business,” Harry dismissed. Hermione wouldn’t allow relationship strife to impede her focus. Draco might, but Harry needed him rather less, and at any rate they were both mature people who wouldn’t appreciate Harry butting into their relationship. 

At least he sincerely hoped they wouldn’t. He drew the line at individual emotional support: playing relationship counselor was not on the table. 

Celesta nudged him and pointed. “Look.” 

Harry looked, and nearly dropped his wine glass: Ginny and Luna, arm in arm, Ginny wrapped in a red dress robe cut in imitation of a dueling style and Luna wearing something that Harry could only describe as floaty. They were a study in contrasts. Perfect complements. Harry’s stomach did a funny little somersault. 

“Her mother might not approve,” Celesta said lowly. 

“Yeah, no kidding… not sure who here might report it back, though,” Harry said. “With Arthur Weasley dead they don’t exactly associate with the Ministry in-crowd. Except for Percy, but the way I hear it, he and his mother are barely speaking.”  

The crowds moved again and Luna and Ginny were lost to sight. Harry considered his wine glass: half empty. He could finish it over the course of the next few minutes and then avoid having any more tonight. 

Celesta sighed. “Oh, fantastic, I see McLaggen.”

“Is he coming this way?” 

“Yes. Let’s go,” said Celesta, pretending to spot someone she knew and determinedly leading Harry off at a smart clip. They both avoided looking in the direction of McLaggen and, as Harry saw from the corner of his eye, Libby Borage. 

A match made by Merlin, that. They were welcome to each other. 

Unfortunately, their escape from McLaggen and Borage resulted in them stepping directly into a far worse situation. Celesta and Harry ducked around a freestanding screen painted with some kind of alpine scene and found themselves nearly running smack into Slughorn, Snape, Jules, and Susan Bones, who, evidently, must be his date. 

Jules’ eyes skittered up to Harry’s and then away. Red crept over his ears and neck. 

Harry wanted to immolate something. 

“Oho! Just the person I wanted to see!” A heavy hand fell on Harry's shoulder and pulled him closer. Harry’s wand hand flexed at his side, and Snape’s and Jules’ eyes flickered towards the motion in unison. “Just as I was saying, Severus—these two—veritable prodigies, they are! Why, some of the modifications they think of—”

“Really,” said Snape, looking at Jules with the air of someone pinning an insect down for dissection. “I must confess I had never noticed any particular aptitude for the subject from Potter. Mr. Black, on the other hand, has indeed demonstrated uncommon skill in our art.” 

Slughorn chortled. He had clearly drunk rather more than one glass of wine, if the flush on his cheeks and gleam in his eyes were any indication, yet Harry thought he wasn’t quite as tipsy as he appeared. Crafty old spider. “Yes, well, some students just need a different touch, that’s what I always say! Thriving in different environments—I’ll wager these two could give you a run for your money, in a few years!” 

“Yes, Jules,” said Harry with warmth so fake his teeth hurt. “Wouldn’t that be wonderful? Perhaps we could apprentice to the same Master.” 

“Er… yeah.” Jules wouldn’t meet any of their eyes, staring resolutely somewhere over Slughorn’s shoulder. For someone raised around the press he seemed wildly uncomfortable. 

“Ha! Might be a trifle difficult there, Harry m’boy,” chuckled Slughorn. “Master Gatlin is known to be rigorous! Two apprentices of your age is more than the old codger could take.” 

“Tyrone Gatlin?” Jules’ eyes narrowed. “He’s on the Ministry’s watch list.” 

“He’s an internationally renowned Master and duelist.” Harry was barely able to keep his tone in the vicinity of civil. This was the longest interaction he and Jules had had since the previous June and it was every bit as bad as Harry had feared. 

Jules looked down. “Sorry.” 

“Not everyone on that list is,” Slughorn lowered his voice, “that sort, if you catch m’drift, Jules. Ministry’s got plenty of people they like to keep an eye on. We old hands should know, eh, Severus? Bright stars of our fields and so on.” 

“Yes,” said Snape, though he did not seem happy about sharing anything with Slughorn, let alone his reputation as a prodigy in the potions field. 

The music changed, and Celesta brightened. “Harry, I believe you promised me a dance.” 

Harry had done no such thing. He looped his arm through Celesta’s again and smiled at Slughorn. “You’ll have to excuse me, sir, I couldn’t possibly break my word.” 

“Oh no no, one certainly does not break faith with such a lovely witch! Enjoy yourselves, now, go on,” said Slughorn, good-naturedly shooing them away. 

Harry did not look back at Jules as they went. He was so bloody done with brothers. 

Another hour went by before they could reasonably leave. Seeing Jules standing there brazenly claiming credit for skill with potions that couldn’t possibly be his—skill in Harry’s art, Harry’s joy—had driven Harry behind a pane of glass he couldn’t breach. Everything went by at a remove, visible, but muffled. 

Harry had fought and clawed his way to where he was, and now Jules wanted to cheat? 

No. 

Newly determined to find the source of Jules’ impossible skill, Harry went through the motions of socializing on autopilot, letting Celesta carry most of their conversations. She didn’t object, seizing the opportunity as any socially ambitious Slytherin would, and accepting it when Harry chose to spend a few minutes conferring with Pansy and Justin for a break. 

Finally, though, he was free to make murmured excuses of House paperwork, and extricate himself from the party. Celesta put on a bit of a show of leaving with him, for the sake of politeness, and Harry likewise put on a bit of a show of insisting she stay and have fun, until Neville popped up out of nowhere, winked at Harry, and invited Celesta to dance, thus freeing Harry up to leave his date behind without either of them appearing rude. 

How Neville even spotted that, Harry didn’t know. His Gryffindor friend had grown up so much. 

Something twisted unpleasantly in Harry’s chest at the thought of all he was keeping from Neville right now. He brutally smashed the feeling back out of existence until his heart was once more just a heart. Daphne was right. They had no time for useless sentiment. This was a war. 

“Harry!” 

Harry turned around, and his heart lurched again. “What do you want?” he said coldly. 

Jules seemed to read the threat in his expression and stopped a healthy distance away, holding up hands conspicuously empty of a wand. “I… can we talk?” 

“About?” 

“…stuff.” 

Harry wanted to say no. He wanted to walk away and go back to his dorm and lie the fuck down and think about nothing for at least eight hours. 

But he hadn’t spoken to Jules in months. 

(But looking at Jules was still like looking at himself in a mirror.) 

“Fine. In here,” Harry said curtly, flicking his wand at the nearest door. It leapt open with an ear-scraping squeal of rusted hinges. 

Jules unhesitatingly walked through, presenting his back to a potential threat and stepping headlong into an unlit, unfamiliar environment. Harry genuinely couldn’t tell if this was a deliberate show of trust or just typical Gryffindor brashness, and hated that he was uncertain. 

The room was small, dusty, and occupied by a few sconces and a pile of broken desks in one corner. Harry lit the sconces with a murmured charm, and they blazed to life with ghostly pale fire. Shutting the door and casting several wards was the work of moments; with Jules here he couldn’t use one of his better tools, like the rune-wards Theo got better with every day, but several of them translated to wand-casting with little loss of potency. 

The whole time, Jules waited patiently. 

Eventually Harry could put it off no longer. He folded his arms such that his wand was still in his hand and ready to cast at a moment’s notice. “Talk.” 

Jules

Two Harrys stood before him. The one now, with fancy dress robes and emerald cufflinks and coiffed hair; and Harry from the Ministry, robes torn, lips split and bleeding, hair a wild bird’s nest. Both the now-Harry and the one in Jules’ memory wore the exact same hard expression. He was about as cold as a glacier, and equally unforgiving. 

Jules had a whole speech planned, but in the moment, remembered nothing. He groped for words. Came up with nothing. Fuck it. “I’m sorry.” 

Ha. It was childish, he knew it was childish, but Jules couldn’t help feeling pleased to get some hint of expression from Harry, even just a twitched eyebrow. 

“You’re… sorry,” Harry said slowly. 

“Yes.” Jules had asked Parvati and Neville for advice with apologies, since they were the smartest people he knew when it came to things like this, and both told him that a good apology didn’t make excuses, didn’t expect forgiveness, and didn’t try to dodge blame. Jules meant this apology and he wanted to do it right. 

“Okay. I’ll bite. What are you sorry for?” 

Jules took another breath. This was the hard part. “For… fuck, Harry, everything. I was a prat to you when we met. I listened to everything Dad said and—and he was wrong, I know that now, and I’m so sorry I didn’t see it then—didn’t stand up to him more. I should have. I didn’t. And I let—you know some of the other Gryffindors—Ron—say awful shite about you, and I believed it.” It felt a bit like lacerating himself, but he pushed on. “And—and last summer—” 

Harry’s eyes flashed dangerously, unnaturally green. “Yes, Julian? What about last summer?” 

“I’m sorry for everything I said.” Jules met that frightening stare. “I didn’t mean any of it, really. I wasn’t thinking. I just—wanted you to hurt like I was hurting, I—” Fuck, this was veering towards excuse territory, or had already gotten there. He backtracked. “It doesn’t matter. I shouldn’t have said any of that, and I’m sorry for it. And I’m… sorry for… trying to kill Sirius.” That last part was hard to say, but he had to, because he was sorry. “I know he didn’t—mean to—I know it wasn’t fair to—I can’t say I’ll ever like him. But trying to—to kill him myself—it wasn’t right, and it wasn’t fair, and it hurt you, and I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry,” Harry said again, as if testing a word he had just learned. “You are sorry. I see.” 

Unease set the hair prickling up and down Jules’ arms. 

“Do you want to hear a story?” Harry said. His voice was still soft, and he hadn’t moved, but still, Jules suddenly felt vulnerable with his wand up his sleeve while Harry’s was in his hand at the ready. “Once upon a time there was a little boy who lived in a cupboard under the stairs. It was small, and dark, and full of spiders, and he slept there all alone.” 

A shiver rolled down Jules’ spine. 

“And during the day,” Harry went on, “when he was allowed out, his wicked aunt and uncle set him to clean for them, and cook, and do all manner of housework, and when he broke things too heavy for his underfed child’s arms, they beat him for it. And do you know what he said?” 

Jules could guess. 

“He said I’m sorry.” Harry’s voice became soft, warm, a mockery of affectionate. “I’m sorry, Auntie. I’m sorry, Uncle. You see, he saw other little boys on the telly, and playing with his cousin, and he knew that when he had made a mistake, he. Should. Apologize. And he hoped, every time, that saying I’m sorry would make them stop.”

But it didn’t, thought Jules with distant horror. 

Harry seemed to read his mind. “No, it didn’t stop. They didn’t care. They demanded apology and laughed when he gave one. He apologized for everything. For things that weren’t his fault. For existing. Until one day, he decided that he would never apologize to them again. That he would not be sorry that he existed. That to say I’m sorry,” Harry’s voice became a malevolent hiss, “was to be weak.” 

Jules couldn’t move. 

Stepping closer, Harry stopped pretending to hide his wand, and held it loosely, head half-cocked as though imagining what curse he might like to cast with it. “I have not said I’m sorry and meant it since I was eight years old.” 

If Harry cast a curse, Jules wouldn’t stop him. 

Jules did not come here to fight. 

“Well,” he said, shocked when his voice came out cracked and hoarse, “I’m fucking sorry for that boy, too, because no one should ever have to grow up like that, and I’m sorry that anyone has. I didn’t. And—and I won’t apologize for that because I didn’t have any more control over who raised me than you did. But I am sorry that I never thought about what other people’s childhoods were like. To me,” he fought for calm, “an apology isn’t a lie. It—it’s just what it is. I don’t know. Regret. Remorse. You—you deserve to hear it. That’s all I wanted to say. And if we can… if you can ever forgive me, then—I’d like that. I’d like to try to be—better than I was. To know you, just… you, without all the bullshite. But if you can’t then that’s fine—I’m not, like, giving permission, I’m just acknowledging that I don’t expect or—or think you owe me forgiveness—I’m just trying to explain.” Fuck, was he making any sense? Focus, Jules. “I… yeah. That’s—that’s all I wanted to say.” 

They stood there in the dark, unmoving, a tableau of potential violence. Harry on the edge of casting, eyes alight with something malicious, something hateful, something waiting for any reason to strike. Any sign of a lie. 

Jules knew he wouldn’t give it any because he hadn’t lied. 

And in the faint furrow between Harry’s brows, the way his off-hand fingers twitched unconsciously, Jules saw Harry’s tension, uncertainty, inner chaos. 

It wasn’t fair, he decided, to just draw this out. Jules shifted uncomfortably and the strange tension broke somewhat. “I’ll, er… you can… think about it. Okay? I’m not—this isn’t, like, a timed… yeah. Fuck it, I’m sorry, I swear I meant this to make sense. I’m just gonna… go.” 

Jules stepped around Harry carefully and made for the door. 

His hand was on the knob when he heard Harry’s low voice say: “Wait.” 

Heart leaping painfully with hope, Jules turned. Harry was still facing away from him, head bowed, wand held at his side. 

“If you mean it,” Harry said, utterly unreadable, statuesque in his stillness, “then you’re going to have to prove it. You’ve had a fucking lot of chances. If you were anyone else, you wouldn’t be getting this one.”

“So—so you are…”

“A chance. That’s all. Prove you mean it. Prove to me you’re capable of seeing past your own bloody privilege, that this doesn’t just apply to me, and maybe I’ll believe that you’re really, truly sorry.” 

Jules desperately wished there was another word for sorry that he could use, just to never make his brother say it again. 

There was only one thing he could say to that, really. “Thank you,” Jules got out, wishing desperately Harry was the hugging type, and knowing that the peace between them could snap with one wrong move. “Really. Thank you. I’ll—you’ll see.” 

He didn’t trust himself to say anymore without accidentally making it worse. Jules wrenched the door open, feeling wards shrivel into nothing as he did, and all but bolted from the room.