The Toxicologist

The Fourth House

The House of Masters

Imbue items with power. These artificers specialise in the construction of mythical artefacts. As the only House able to lock magic into metal and inanimate material, the Fourth House gave rise to legends such as the sword of Excalibur. Uniquely able to animate objects with a false life, or breathe sentience into rings, charge weapons and bathe the foundations of buildings with protective ward magics, this House is in high demand and are rarely without careers. Their symbol is the hammer and anvil.

Members of the Fourth House are known as Masters, Smiths or Artificers

— Magical Minds and Where to Find Them! A Guide for 'Muggles' (Normal Folk). Alice K. Fisher

Draco Malfoy, heir extraordinaire, boy wonder, had no records. None. It was like he didn’t exist. Harry drummed his pen on the table and stared at his computer, wondering if the stress of the year had addled the Malfoy couple so much that they’d invented a son. Possibly to forestall a divorce.

They were waiting for Hermione. On the other side of the office Ron hunched over in the corner making mild, pleased sounds, a muggle Switch clasped in his hands.

People made babies in some dire attempt to save a marriage. Could they make up a baby?

The shiny new bell over the reception door sounded. Harry could just about hear it. As he packed up and shut down, Ron mumbled, “Go on without me.”

“What?”

“I’ll be a minute," said Ron seriously, his voice low.

After a moment’s deliberation, Harry started to tidy Ron’s paperwork away, too.

Draco must exist, surely? Harry couldn’t find a single public record, not even a birth certificate. As usual the reps in the Guild were no help. And  contacting the Ministry of Magic proved to be about as fruitful as ironing his own hands.

At least he’d convinced Lady Malfoy to share the details of the case with Ron. Harry received a response to his owl that morning, giving him written permission. She was getting nervous.

“Meet you outside?” said Harry.

Ron nodded without looking up, his eyes a little wide, breathing noisily through his nose.

From the corridor Harry could hear raised voices. Hermione’s voice especially; it was high pitched, and she was talking very fast.

“You two! How could you just sit there while — couldn't you — didn't you see me?”

“Sorry. Dung just installed a new bell, but I think it’s jamming the door,” said Teddy.

“Then you should have opened it, shouldn't you? And not left someone standing outside. What are you even doing that was so distracting? Let me see!”

Out in reception Harry was assaulted by a version of Hermione he’d never seen. She was very wet. Hermione's normally bushy brown hair was so drenched that it lay plastered to her head in dark ribbed waves. She was bare-armed and trembling slightly, wearing a flashy pencil skirt and top thing that Harry couldn’t be sure wasn’t a dress. Oh, actually, it connected in the middle. It was very nice, and made of black fabric — or waterlogged navy.

Below a ticking radiator, upon a threadbare carpet, lay an incredibly wet platypus.

Hermione was marching to the front desk, droplets of water flying from her hair.

Teddy's eyes went wide. He opened his drawer and drove his forearm over all the magazines, sending them flying in a tumble. Lavender put herself between them.

“Nothing,” said Lavender.

“Well it doesn't look like nothing, does it?” said Hermione. “What if I was a client? How do you think a client would feel if you’d ignored them while the door was stuck?”

“Well, you're not a client,” said Lavender.

“We didn't see you,” appeased Teddy, raising his hands placatingly. "You could have given it a minute."

“A... a minute? Give it a minute? It's a Biblical plague outside!"

"Hi Hermione," greeted Harry. "You're, um, wet?"

"Yes, I'm wet, it happens in the rain," Hermione snapped. Harry reared his neck back. “No thanks to you two, not sharing an ounce of common decency between you.”

Lavender lifted her sculpted eyebrows and shrugged her shoulders helplessly. "Why'd you come out without a jacket?"

Hermione looked flustered. “Nevermind that.”

Ron ambled out obliviously, his eyes glued to the device in his hands. 

"And you! ”

Ron almost dropped his Switch.

“Come along now! Put that away and get in the car, both of you!”

Confused and surprised, Harry and Ron scrambled out the door, abandoning their coworkers without goodbyes.

Ron drove with his hands clutched white on the wheel. Rain beat down against the windscreen wipers.

In the front passenger seat sat Hermione, very stiff and very tall, not saying a word. On her lap her balled fists clenched and unclenched. She was watching the road resolutely. Water dripped rhythmically from the ends of her hair onto her lap. Ron had put the heating up, which the platypus at her feet at least enjoyed, if that wheezing indicated life.

Harry didn’t risk opening the plastic wrapper of his chocolate frog. Every shift they made in their seats, each noise louder than a breath (and honestly, she'd given them a look for that) gained its own share of tightening, until Hermione was wound up like a spring, ready to snap.

Unable to take it any longer Harry asked, "What's wrong?"

Hermione turned so fast that Ron swerved the car, whipping his head to look at her with a strangled sound.

"You! You’re wrong. You never think," she said breathlessly.

Harry's jaw tightened.

"This isn’t some detention for being out of bed," said Hermione, her voice thick. "This is my career!"

Oh. The vampires. If they were angry at Harry for his crowdsurfing, they might well be guilt-tripping Hermione. Harry was about to offer her a piece of fudge to smooth things over, but things went from bad to worse. Hermione started to cry.

At once Ron froze, horrified, and cast wildly around for something to say. "A bit of fudge'll cheer you up," he offered spiritedly. "Right, Harry?"

Hurriedly reaching into the pile of treats dumped on the back seat, Harry offered one forward.

"FUDGE WON'T FIX ANYTHING !"

"What are you talking about?" Ron squeaked.

"I was fired!" cried Hermione.

"What!" said Ron, baffled. "Why?"

"Why?" Hermione said hysterically. "Whynot? I'm the last person they'd want. I’m the last person anyone will want!"

There was an awful wobble in her voice. "They said I’m supporting Harry. There are multiple articles out today saying I'm some nasty Gamergate sympathiser who cares more about shielding my friend than I do practicing what I preach. That I'm v-virtue signalling. And I might as well be!"

Hermione hiccuped, blinking back tears. "I told you to tone it down, I told you that if you kept up with these public displays of prejudice then someone would notice. Well someone is now everyone . You can't just say these things, Harry. After everything — you — and with that mob! That rotten, cruel mob that went on to kill two girls.”

"Come on, ‘Mione. That’s not fair," said Ron. "Harry got stuck in that. He was at the church for the muggles.”

“Then he should have made a statement! A public statement. Everyone sees you as condoning that attack, Harry. You’ve got good social reach, you should have said something. You’re on Twitter all the time!”

“To check academic stuff,” said Harry, his cheeks pink.

“Lay off, Hermione,” muttered Ron.

"Oh, yes. Side with Harry, I knew you would!" said Hermione shrilly. “You’ve no leg to stand on, Ronald. That lecture of his, you heard it all beforehand and you let him keep in those horrid, horrid notes. Harry listens to you, you have a real opportunity here to turn his head on this matter and each time it's the same. You don't even try!"

"He is sitting right here," said Harry.

"Oi! They weren't just notes," defended Ron, missing Harry's frantic head shaking. "We spent weeks memorising cell checkpoints and vampire mumbo jumbo. You weren't there, you didn't see me. I wasn't half bad you know, I got up in the lounge and said my bit. Harry knows."

"You practiced?" Hermione mouthed, horror dawning. "You rehearsed that hateful right-wing propaganda?”

Hermione looked like she was struggling to recognise Ron. “How could you? It’s the worst sort of societal dog whistle and it damages vampires!”

"That's the point," Ron muttered.

"Well don't let it be the point! Be better. Both of you!”

Hermione twisted around in her seatbelt to offer Harry a beseeching look.

"This isn't about that man, Harry," Hermione said. "I agree. I agree on everything you said back then, where it concerns that. Some people are horrible, horrible people."

Harry couldn't meet her gaze. There was a lump pressing into his throat. 

"But please,” Hermione breathed, tears sliding down her face. “Please see that one vile person doesn't represent everyone in a minority."

Through the rearview mirror Ron's expression was dark. Harry didn't trust himself to speak.

They drove in silence all the way to the Burrow, where they pulled up next to a tumbledown farm, scattering several chickens who'd been pecking their way around the front.

The Burrow looked like it had once been a large pigsty, but extra rooms had been added here and there until it was several stories high of crooked, unlevel stone. Round the back lay a tumble of Wellington boots and a large tap where the Weasleys could wash the mud off of their summons' paws.

Ron turned off the engine. Hermione was facing away to the passenger window, but her shoulders were still shaking.

"What do you want?" Ron asked eventually. "Help us out here, 'Mione."

Hermione opened her mouth but, at first, no sound came out beyond a high-pitched continuous wheeze.

"What do I — what do I want?" Hermione burst. "The only thing you've not once given!"

"AN APOLOGY."

The car door slammed.

Ron locked up the Ford, his gaze going to the backdoor through which Hermione had vanished. It was propped wide open by a boot. Apropos nothing, a long and elegant gazelle, with a streak of inky black fur along its golden hide, bounded out from the kitchen. In four proud jumps it was away to the field.

“Huh,” said Ron. “Bill’s here.”

“Percy, too,” said Harry, jerking his chin to where Ron’s older brother was out in the field, talking into a mobile phone. Not all muggle devices had been ignored by the general wizarding public; even the Guild used phones. “Oh and…” Harry’s voice trailed off. There, tucked behind the woodshed was a second car, if you could call it that, beaten up and old, it was a banger that barely functioned as a car.

“Lupin,” said Ron nervously. He shot Harry a look.

But Harry didn’t react. He just crossed the chicken-seeded yard, in time to be met at the door by an almighty shriek. 

A red fox was mid-air, careening so fast over the central kitchen unit that it went into the wall. It hit the corkboard that was pinned above the waste bin, and after a suspended moment of disbelief, slid down into the bin.

The second fox made the door, and sent Harry spinning, hot on the heels of a squealing brown capybara. The strange animal was  skidding over its own legs.

“WILL YOU KEEP YOUR SUMMONS OUT! If I have to tell you one more time — Harry, dear, lovely to see you. Have a nibble while you wait.”

“Hullo, Harry!” chorused Fred and George.

Harry edged into the cramped, small kitchen where Mrs Molly Weasley — short, plump, red-cheeked — was brandishing a large wooden spoon at her sons. Despite being both taller than her, the twins shrunk back as their mother rounded on them, and they continued to set out the cutlery in silence. Mrs Weasley turned and dropped into Harry’s hands a giant bowl of Twiglets.

At the head of the scrubbed-down table Mr Arthur Weasley closed his newspaper. Thin, tired and balding, with dusty robes and a kind smile, he said, “Come on in boys. I hope you’re hungry. We might have gone a bit overboard.”

Hermione, Harry noticed, was already sitting down, staring pointedly at the table.

“Nonsense,” said Mrs Weasley. “You must be starving, Harry. Do come by more. Even just for tea, it needn’t be such a fuss. Bill will join us later, he’s got work to catch up on before he can come downstairs.”

“And Percy will oil his way in when he’s done sucking up to the Guild,” said Fred — or George.

“You might take a leaf out of Percy’s book,” quipped Mrs Weasley. “Merlin knows with what's going on right now, the Guild might be the lesser evil.”

“Disgusting, mother,” said Fred.

“Dis-GOOSE-ting,” echoed George. “The bar really is on the ground. Hip hip hooray for Britain!”

Harry was smiling, still holding his bowl of Twiglets, but he was struggling to ignore the last person who had just slipped into the room. Remus Lupin was hovering outside the lounge, unobtrusive, his head dipping under an old farm beam. Light brown hair with flecks of grey, Lupin looked shabby and tired, the pallor of his face drawn. It was made worse by the tension in his body, as his tried to catch Harry’s attention.

Harry didn’t look up. Fortunately, Lupin approached with the sort of hesitation a wolf might make of an unknown. It was easy for Harry to brush past him, going straight to a chair next to Mr Weasley. Upon Arthur's lap was Tibby, the little chocolate-coloured weasel familiar, but she was currently asleep.

Ron took the Twiglets out of Harry’s grasp and stuffed a fistful into his mouth. “How’s the job hunt going, Dad?”

Harry spun his head around. “You quit?” he asked, stressed. “Really, Mr Weasley, you didn’t have to do that.”

Mr Weasley shook his head. “No, no, Harry, it's high time this generation put their money into their mouths.”

“Er.”

Mr Weasley leaned forward over the table, and gave Harry’s hand a squeeze. “We support you entirely. I am doing this for myself, though, too. After what happened with Lily and James, well…” He and Mrs Weasley shared a significant look. “We wouldn't have it any other way.”

Arthur sat back. “Besides, the Ministry is due a reformation, and it’ll be much easier to do from the outside. I was wrong to think otherwise.”

“Dad’s going to become a muggle,” said George eagerly. 

“I’m going to work in tele,” said Mr Weasley. “I want to help those poor people who got stuck using that Time Turner.”

“He’s been watching Game of Thrones,” snickered Fred. “Thinks they’re all stuck there. We haven’t quite got onto acting.”

Mrs Weasley dumped the vegetable debris into the bin, and promptly screamed. For a fox had popped its furry red head up, opening its mouth playfully to grab at the potato and carrot peels. It tipped the entire bin over, rubbish and all,  before bolting into the garden, with a flash of bushy tail. Percy’s cry of anger came from outside, somewhere in the field.

“RIGHT. THAT IS IT. OUT. Get your summons OUT, for Heaven’s sake!”

Sitting down to eat, the family passed bowls and serving dishes between them, over cries of Butter! Butt-eeeerr and Quiche, Harry? Colourful leafy salads passed in front of Harry’s nose, as well as cold cuts of meats, hard cheese, tiger bread with Brussels pâté and a fine dish of smoked sardines. Even Percy joined them for lunch, such that Ginny's empty space looked conspicuously absent. Charlie was still in Romania, but everyone else was accounted for. All the same Mrs Weasley put a plate down and cutlery out for Ginny, which made Harry uncomfortable. Hermione was eyeing it, too, with a disapproving frown.

“We just passed our licence,” enthused Fred.

“Tier Four Summons,” grinned George. “Anywhere we like!”

“And you won’t stop doing it, either,” cut Percy. “Just because one can do something — like a monkey — does not mean that one should. I am perfectly capable and legally accredited to summon tier four beasts.”

“Bet you can’t control one, though,” grinned Fred. “Eh, Perce? That’s the real reason we don’t see you doing it.”

“How dare you? I am perfectly capable of —”

“How’s work, boys?” asked Mr Weasley, dissuading the nose which had just appeared above the table edge. “I bet you’ve been getting hell.”

“Nah,” said Ron. “It’s not too bad. Harry gets the worst flack, being as people are.”

“You’re a good boy, Harry,” said Mr Weasley. Mrs Weasley nodded fiercely. From across the table, Hermione made a stifled sound of disagreement.

“Terrible thing, with those poor girls,” said Mr Weasley. “But you mustn’t take it on, Harry. Leave this business out of your head, well out. This is exactly why it should be illegal to Embrace.”

Fred and George looked suddenly serious, and were for once silent.

But Hermione cleared her throat — very loudly.

“It’s all that social media,” declared Mrs Weasley. “And that book. The muggles think it’s attractive!”

With an uncomfortable excuse me, Percy removed himself.

“Let’s not blame the muggles,” cautioned Mr Weasley. “We had enough people from our world thinking vampirism is a quick route to fame or everlasting life. What about yourself, Harry? Have people been giving you trouble?”

Around a mouthful of cheesecake, Harry could only mumble. Mr Weasley smiled, his eyes soft and warm.

“I’m okay,” said Harry at last, as Mrs Weasley dropped into his half-cleared bowl a serving of crumble. “I just wish that hadn’t happened with the protest.”

Mr Weasley nodded, his lips thinning. “Absolutely, I couldn’t agree more. You mustn’t judge your actions, though, by the measure of an extremist. Molly and I were talking about it earlier. It’s grave, Harry. People aren’t going to like what you’re saying, nor what you’re showing them, but it’s important to have it out there.”

The twins were watching their father with rapt attention, nodding at various points.

“The people it needs to reach will find it,” said Mr Weasley. “The victims will find they’re not alone. They’ll realise there are people out there, good people, who see these vampires for what they are, people who are not reducing this down and letting them get away with it. It takes a great amount of courage, Harry, to be the target. The visible entity. I do hope you’re keeping yourself safe.”

“Yeah, I am. Ron and I are gonna be driving back and forth, so no more bus.”

“Good lads.”

Hermione’s hand was white around her spoon. She set it down with a loud sound. “I need to be excused, too.”

She scraped back her chair and took her plate, dropping it in the sink. “I’m going for a walk.”

“It might rain. My coat’s on the peg, just by the door,” said Lupin. “Do use it.”

Harry watched Hermione leave. Soon enough everyone was done with pudding, and Mrs Weasley was shooing them out of the kitchen so that Fred and George could clean up, to cries of Mother loves us not! Jail for mother!

In the lounge, Harry almost jumped out his skin. He kept forgetting about the bear. The enormous grizzly was snoozing in the middle of the sunlit lounge. Dead to the world it slept, fairytalishly too big for the Burrow, its huge muzzle twitching, its shiny wet nostrils expanding. Sitting down Harry could just about see over her shoulders to where Mr Weasley was reading a book, Tibby back on his lap, watching the pages as they turned.

The air was still smelling pleasantly of apple and blackberry crumble. With the rhythmical rise and fall of the bear’s big breathing, and Tibby finally curled up into a ball, the foxes no where in sight, Harry felt his head nodding. 

Within minutes he was asleep.

When Harry awoke, he could hear a country chorus of early birdsong and the friendly crackling of a fire. His tummy was soft and warm, all of his limbs slow with sleep, and sunshine weighed on his lashes. Harry opened his eyes.

There was a fire, popping gently from a black cast iron grate. It was below a mantelpiece host to a marching line of family photographs. Dreamily, Harry wondered how long he’d been out, trying to shake a sense of disorientation. It was earlier than he expected. Light was streaming in through a crisscross of glass window panes, past a flutter of lace.

In the corner of the room stood an upright piano with a decorative lace doily and vase of flowers. The chaise lounge on the far wall had a patchwork cushion that Harry had thrown up on twice.

And finally, in front of him, a circular table that Harry knew too well. Across a white tablecloth lay an elaborate tea set, all real porcelain, and complete with a piping hot pot of tea; silver strainers for two cups; two plates of scones, one savoury, one fruit; and a wooden cutting board house to a butter knife, a nob of butter, and three types of bread. Wherever they could fit, stubby little jars sparkled, of marmalade, blackcurrant jam and runny honey, sealed in patchwork cotton lids, and bound in string.

It took Harry a while to realise he was not in the Burrow.

As he thought it, indeed as though the thought itself had been waiting for him to think it, Voldemort said, “Good morning.”

Harry swallowed, emotion thick in his throat.

Voldemort sat in the sunshine in a leather armchair, his navy blue slacks hitched up so he could cross his ankles. This time, his white shirt was hidden under a pale blue-and-grey tweed vest that looked very soft.

The Dark Lord was trying very hard to control his expression. He looked remarkably homely; and he hated every aspect of it.

Utterly lost, Harry said, “How do you know this place?”

“I do not.”

By the indignant tension in his body, Voldemort was opposed to the outfit, too. 

He was watching Harry rather carefully. “You look as though you might.”

Harry nodded. “It’s where I grew up.” And after a beat, said, “Potter Manor.”

Voldemort exhaled slowly, and made as if to count to ten.

“Why are we here?” said Harry. “Who’s doing this to us?”

“That is the question I have been asking myself for months now, Harry Potter. If you find out, please,” said Voldemort candidly, his left eyebrow rising slowly, “let the whole class know.”

Voldemort rose smoothly and moved to seat himself at the table, drawing out one of the cherry oak chairs whose feet had been carved to look like claws. With pragmatic grace he poured himself a steaming line of water and set down the teapot. Then tucked a thimble size of tea-leaf into a strainer, snapped it closed, and dropped the sphere into the water, agitating it with small bobs, up and down.

“What are you… doing?” asked Harry, bewildered. 

“I am hardly going to waste the opportunity to have tea. There is no magic on this earth so cruel or so crass as to bind me through dream jam.”

“I thought vampires could eat food, if they wanted.”

Harry watched Voldemort butter a slice of bread — and then Harry a slice, too — with appalled fascination.

“It tastes revolting, and has lost all pleasure.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

Voldemort cut Harry’s slice in polite halves. “You are communicating as a civilised being, for once. To what do I owe the honour?”

Harry received his designated slice.

“I think,” said Harry at last, “I’m just really bloody tired.”

“And here we are again. Would that you learned some Occlumency, Potter.”

They ate in a rare silence. Harry felt unusually peaceful in his head. But there was one question plaguing him.

“You didn’t want to be a vampire, did you?”

Voldemort touched a napkin to his mouth. “What gave it away?”

Harry ignored the sardonic drawl, for once feeling it slide off him. This dream felt calmer, somehow, altogether much better.

“Almost everything. Who, um, happened to sire you?”

“He never supplied a name.”

Harry jerked, suddenly alert. “Wait, he?”

“Yes, he, Potter. Is there a problem?”

“No,” said Harry, sitting straight in his chair. “Just surprising. I thought Violetta was your sire.”

“You thought wrong. Though she is rather keen to see the culprit dead.”

Harry’s mind was reeling, nothing was fitting anymore. “Who is he? Where is he?”

“I already told you,” snapped Voldemort. “I was not offered the decency of a name. He made up names.”

“But you must know something about him,” pressed Harry.

“You are more curious than this tale deserves. Regrets to your enthusiasm, Potter, but it was a very dull Embrace. I don’t remember any of it. And afterwards, we spoke. Ought else.”

“I don’t believe that at all,” said Harry. 

“Suit yourself.”

“How would someone put you down — someone who was powerful enough, why would they do that and not tell you who they were, or why they did it?”

“I was not put down ,” Voldemort snarled. “There is not a thing living or unliving on this earth that is capable of defeating Lord Voldemort.”

Harry didn’t comment. That was pretty obviously not the case.

“Simply,” said Voldemort, “I exhausted myself. If you must know I was casting a ritual, the fulfilment of which left me tired. Nothing more.” 

“Sounds like it went wrong.”

Voldemort did not reply. 

“Well,” Harry changed tact. “What was he like?”

“Why are you so curious? He was a boorish man. Commonplace and dull. An exploitative opportunist. And worse, a man possessed of the tiresome faculty of seeing beauty in all things; of loving all things, and, above all, life.”

Harry blinked.

“Oh,” said Harry, now frowning, now squinting. “He sounds like a right piece of work.”

“He was a very humble man,” said Voldemort, as though it were the worst insult in the world. The term rasped, silky, and dangerous from his tongue.

“Why on earth did he Embrace you?”

“Why indeed."

Voldemort sipped his tea, and Harry was struck by how human he looked in this setting, the high planes of his face were touched by little wings of light.

“Wait. If your sire —“

But Harry never finished. 

From another world, from the real , waking world, he heard something.

A scream.

The noise awoke Harry, at once. It was seemingly everywhere; with a giant cracking of glass and mortar, and rubble collapsing. Harry was up in a heartbeat, and then sprinting. Mr Weasley jerked awake with a start, his newspaper across his face. The old chandelier tinkled precariously as Tessa bear stood and bumped it.

The kitchen was in total chaos. Harry had to stand back and take it in, just to process what he was seeing. The sunny bay windows were no more, in fact half of the kitchen wall was missing, the sink spurting out a continuous stream of water from its broken faucets, all the pipes hissing.

The table was gone. Flattened. In its place a thick — body; head? Tail? Mottled emerald green and jewel blue, strangely rubbery, it looked like it had come out of a sex toy’s silicone mould, the sort of thing Harry wished he’d never seen Lavender browsing. 

Over the giant appendage Harry could see Ron’s head, frozen in horror, looking left and slowly right to better perceive, to take in the creature’s glistening bulk as it continued out the broken house. 

Mrs Weasley was shrieking, and screaming, whipping at the undulating sea creature with a chequered tea towel.

“WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?” she howled. “MY TABLE! MY HOUSE!”

“We’re so sorry!” hollered George from somewhere outside. “We didn’t know it would be so large! Kelpies are meant to be smaller!”

“They’re meant to eat gnomes when they get too close to the sea!”

It was certainly doing its job. Harry took a few steps out, compelled with sick fascination — as one might be to look upon a total car crash. Along the shiny body he peered until he could spy the destroyed garden, where the front half of a massive horse-like or dog-like creature was hoovering up gnomes. 

They shouted with their stubby arms in the air, running in all directions, zigzagging over the lawn. More stormed up to the surface to see what was going on. Amid the pandemonium the eager sea beast sprawled, stretched over Mrs Weasley’s prize roses and over the newly landscaped, crushed tomato strip. The kelpie was making hypnotic happy sounds, of a queer whale frequency.

“DIDN’T KNOW? YOU JUST GUESSED? THIRTY YEARS A ROOF OVER YOUR HEADS, FOOD ON THE TABLE, BIRTHDAY GIFTS — NO SONS OF MINE. IF THIS IS HOW YOU REPAY YOUR MOTHER —“

Harry watched, riveted, his eyes wide, his breathing shallow as one gnome was worked slowly into the mouth, the kelpie not quite able to reach it — having no legs but an elaborate set of fins, swaying like seaweed — it had got its tongue around the gnome’s midriff. The small, ugly little man was yowling “GEROFF!” as the dog-horse rolled to lay its head down sideways on the grass, and angle better to forcefully suck it into its mouth.

Fred and George were running around in front of it like gnomes, one of them white-knuckled and clasping a summoning book to his chest, the other twin trying to get the attention of the kelpie’s front end. More and more gnomes boiled out from the earth. 

“Well,” said Ron, incredulous, “Guess that takes care of the gnomes.”

Mrs Weasley’s rage did not cool that hour, nor the next, nor would it for the entire night. Mr Weasley privately told them it was perhaps better to go, and thank you for your help so far. 

Harry, Ron and Hermione abandoned the carnage so that Mrs Weasley could teach her twin sons exactly what sort of sons they were.

The drive back to the southwest was as silent, but a little less uncomfortable. Hermione did not turn to talk to either of them but on occasion she would cast Harry a low, pensive look, across the reflection of the dark rainy window. Ron dropped her off at the requested train station, neither of them happy to see their friend get into the back of an unknown, private car, executive and jet black, that looked more expensive than Ron’s entire mortgage.

“What do you think she does for them?” said Ron, his gaze on the red glow of the taillights as the Mercedes pulled away, rainmist around its wheels.

“Sits in press conferences,” said Harry, a little uncharitably. 

“Yeah, but… that can’t be all.”

Harry dropped his head back onto the headrest. “She makes the monsters approachable.”

Ron seemed to be waiting for him to elaborate.

Harry’s chest rose and fell in a sigh. “Hermione used to be a sensitivity reader — remember that stuff she did for the Prophet? — but I’m pretty sure she’s only working for Mithras now, and the vampires in London. She still sense-checks stuff, organises some meetings, and communicates common issues that people should avoid when they’re speaking to an old vampire. But mostly she helps the leeches with what to say when they’re on tv.”

“That’s mental,” muttered Ron, staring out, his forearm on the steering wheel.

Harry shot a dark look to the empty car park. “Yeah.”

It didn’t take long for them to reach Harry’s stop, outside his flat in Bath. He said his goodbyes and headed in.

In his dingy flat’s corridor, Harry battled with his jacket, dragging his keys out of a pocket.

He glanced up to his door — and stopped.

It was open.

Through a gap between the door and the frame, he could peer into the apartment, spy the rolled arm of his white sofa, and part of the coffee table. A shadow crossed the lounge.

Harry’s adrenaline spiked.

He had never felt so territorial in all his life. He could imagine the faceless burglar fingering his things. Anger tightened his belly, made alive the tiny hairs on his neck. Blood surged into Harry’s limbs. He took one silent step back, and then to the side, to press himself against the corridor’s wall.

They won’t bring dogs for a break in. Just call the police.

But he really, really did not want the police here. Harry couldn’t remember if he’d destroyed some rather incriminating correspondence with a political fringe group, and he had no idea what the drugs were that Dung was giving him. He’d experimented with half dosing at one point, and gotten power near the bed. 

The flush sounded.

Harry stared, incredulous, at the blank corridor wall. They were using his toilet?

Okay that was enough. Harry slammed open the front door and felt it reverberate through his arm. “Who the fuck is in here?”

“The tooth fairy,” the stranger drawled.

Out of the bathroom came a dark-haired, pale-skinned man, with little else to distinguish him. He was of tall but otherwise average build. Heavy black trousers were tucked into a pair of military grade steel-capped boots, and the sleeves of a soft green sweater were rolled up halfway. He was well groomed and well spoken.

Harry shot Edward a filthy look. “I thought you were fucking — I don’t know.”

“Paranoid are we?” said Edward. “Well it’s about time. Why are you so annoyed? I left the door open, so you’d know it was me.”

“How —“ said Harry, bewildered, “would that tell me that?”

“Would you prefer a cowboy hat? Or a sock?”

Harry pulled the door behind him, and dumped his keys. “How’d you get in?”

Edward dropped into the nearest sofa, his boots on and his legs spread. Harry eyed his rug angrily. 

“With alarming ease, as always,” said Edward. “How many times have I suggested that you change your locks, at the very least?”

“No one else is trying to break in.”

Edward tilted his head, looking curiously for a moment at Harry’s bombsite of bills. “With the company you’ve been keeping recently, Potter, I wouldn’t be sure of that.”

“What are you talking about?” said Harry, coming over to tidy the letters into a pile, as casually as he could, before moving to hide them in the top kitchen cupboard. Edward’s pale gaze followed him.

“I was at Saviours Inc. the other day,” said Edward. “Since when did you accept vampires as clients, hm?”

“When are you ever at Saviours?” said Harry. “I’d have noticed you. My office is on the ground floor.”

“Your door was closed.”

Harry’s hackles rose. “What were you doing, creeping around the bins?”

An almost imperceptible change flickered over Edward’s expression. Irritation, possibly, anger.

“I was around,” said Edward. “Enough to see Lucius Malfoy go into your office.”

“Around?” said Harry flatly.

“I was on a street nearby and I saw Malfoy go in the back door. I just assumed the rest and you’ve now confirmed it for me.”

Harry sighed. “I didn’t accept his case, not that it’s any of your business.”

“Good,” said Edward, relaxing a touch. “You do give rather detailed lectures about the creatures, I can’t imagine they like it. I assumed Malfoy’s visit to you had something to do with that.”

“Something like it,” said Harry tiredly.

Edward frowned at Harry for a long moment. “Are you safe?”

Harry dropped his gaze. “Yeah. I told him to bugger off.”

Edward didn’t speak. Edward pointedly did not speak. After an uncomfortable length of silence Harry added, “I’m taking care, okay? I had so many bloody graffiti attacks and alley jumps that I even gave up and moved house. Ron and I take the car now. I’m not trivialising it.”

Edward took out a silver hip flask from his pocket and sipped from it, looking back at Harry with a guarded expression. “That sounds quite serious. Very serious.”

“It’ll take more than some nutjob to kill me,” said Harry, “and I’ve gotten pretty good at giving pensive memories of people’s faces.”

“The police can’t protect anyone,” said Edward.

“That’s the kind of rhetoric they want you to believe; don’t tell anyone, keep calm and carry on, no matter what they’ve done to fuck up your life. Stay silent and it won’t get worse. Well I’m not doing that. I’m not letting them dictate my life.”

“Well, they certainly can’t dictate your life if you’re dead, I suppose.”

Edward stretched his long legs out under the coffee table and sighed, rolling his head over onto his shoulder to look up at Harry with a surprising amount of understanding in his eyes.

“I hate the bastards too, you know. And I know you have your reasons to be as passionate as you are about educating people about their… methods. I appreciate it, even.”

Edward paused and then smiled. “If they kill you off then who’s going to tell everyone what monsters they are? Just… let me know if you need protection. Consider it. Anyone can learn to defend themselves against them — you more than most I’d wager.”

For a long while Harry did consider the rogue wizard’s offer. He’d never wanted help before, most people slowed things down. Harry wasn’t happy seeing them put themselves in danger, either. That had been one of his problems though, hadn’t it, when he’d first joined Saviours; he didn’t delegate, or know when to call for backup. Or he knew — and just didn’t.

But Edward didn’t count. Edward knew a lot about the underworld, and with Draco’s case proving a challenge, Harry might even make use of Edward’s expertise, or at least his contacts. 

“I’ll think about it,” said Harry.

Edward lifted the hip flask. Harry shook his head, but gave a well-meaning expression. He cast his attention around the room, wondering what he could do to get ready for bed that wouldn’t seem rude. “There stuff I can do this month?”

Edward rested his chin on his hand as he looked at Harry, leaning over the arm of the chair a little. “Not yet,” he said. “You keep doing what you do best. I already have people targeting that new bill that the Ministry are trying to push through. I’ll let you know if anything comes up.”

Harry looked surprised. “This was a social call?”

Something flickered in the depths of Edward's eyes and the corner of his mouth twitched. “Something like that.”

He rose smoothly. "See you later, Potter. Don’t let the bed bugs bite.”

For once, Harry did not dream of Voldemort.

Instead, he dreamed he was a cat. Scruffy and black haired, he couldn’t get Ron to listen to him. Ron kept going on and on about how Harry just needed a cat, and Harry could only meow helplessly. He felt very trapped in this new furry form, but slowly, given enough time, he forgot about that too.