While We Were Out
So far, I’d personally call my first day out of Hogwarts a success. The hospital had been painful, but important and had underscored the extended importance of why fate had finally called me back to my original reality. There are other tasks outside the school’s borders that will need attending to. And it’s all part of a bigger picture.
But the valley full of dragons was an amazing balm in the grand scheme of life that often feels like it’s trying to edge the unseen magical world out of the modern muggle world and knowing I can help prevent that? Priceless knowledge. And I flew, good gods, it’s been so, so long since I’d had enough of my origin DNA to inhabit and remember all I knew I could be in my youngest years of life.
So, yes, the day was a success. That seems to be where the success ceases, though, because when Dumbledore meets us just outside the Grand Entry, his aura has the too-tense look of a guitar string that’s a single twist from snapping. When Snape stiffens beside me, I know he’s finally noticed it too. As has Moody on my other side Lupin’s senses pick it up a few seconds later and Tonks only a half-second after that.
“Something’s happened, I take it?” I finally ask.
“The tapestry’s been destroyed,” Dumbledore admits, then heaves in a breath like what he’ll say next— “and the other shades in the Gallery Hall were all spelled into 'sleeping'. Also, Godric won’t wake in his borrowed painting and the other Founders have vanished from their own painting; the everlasting enchantment on the frame itself has been broken. Also, the school governors believe it’s time, though only temporarily, for a prominent Ministry presence to be added to Hogwarts school.”
I'm positive that the only reason there are no crickets dramatically chirping in the silence that follows is due to the fact that it’s still winter. The way I can almost feel my stomach plummeting to somewhere near my knees tells me that’s not entirely the worst of the worst.
“And who have they chosen to infiltrate our ranks with?” Lupin asks quietly.
For a fraction of a second, Dumbledore looks pained and damn near resigned.
“Oh no— please, no?” I beg, suddenly exhausted.
“If it helps,” Dumbledore sighs like a peace offering, “I believe Professor Flitwick can work up a color-blinding charm for the short term.”
Yup. My stomach has now dropped to my heels because this is the worst. Fuck.
“They— how can—“ Tonks chokes out, head shaking. “How does Fudge, or Umbridge or anyone else, think she’s even qualified?!” She hisses. “If this is for student and staff protection, shouldn’t it be someone within Ministry Law Enforcement?” She demands and beside her, Moody grunts his agreement with a furious scowl.
“When does she arrive?” Snape asks, sounding way calmer than I know he is because I’m leaning into his side for support and he seems to be doing it right back, which is how I know he’s maybe more tightly strung than even Dumbledore right this second.
“Tomorrow,” Dumbledore sighs. “With the continued curses plaguing the school, regardless of their source, the governors, half of whom have children or extended family attending here now, have made the case that a more active Ministry presence is needed.” He sighs heavily. "They... might not be wrong, honestly, especially with the founders newly active, though Cornelius won't be swayed from choosing his secretary, I'm afraid. Not yet, at any rate."
"Does the Minister or Umbridge know about the founders?" I ask, newly nervous. And angry. And frustrated, though not with Dumbledore. He's doing what he can and is just as done with our continued problems as the rest of us.
"I've told Cornelius," Dumbledore admits, "but stressed caution with how many others should be informed. Few will believe it because it is nearly impossible, but of those who will, it would no doubt cause far more problems here, and more still for you when you need to work freely."
I suddenly sense another timer ticking down in the back of my mind, this one for how long until the founder's 'return' or 'awakening' becomes public knowledge and I grind out the most creative curses I can manage with my jaws still clenched tight and has them all studying me worriedly.
“What on earth was that language?” Moody eventually demands when I'm finally done, his eyebrow dancing with something like delight, which probably means he’d gotten the psychic gist of it.
“Klingon,” I mutter. “The angriest fictional species ever.” I sigh at Dumbledore. "Does he really think having Umbridge here is going to help me work 'freely'?" I demand. "I hate even asking, but is Fudge really that naive?" Dumbledore's sigh says it all.
“Cornelius is under the impression that you’ll continue to need a prominent support system,” Dumbledore confides wryly. “And as such, should you request aid from any Ministry position, you’re to be given their full cooperation.”
I blink for a few seconds while that pings through my head. “That… almost sounds more like a threat than a help,” I sigh, suddenly exhausted. “I don't suppose that 'help' can come in the way of having less help, could it?" I ask, unsurprised when Dumbledore just sighs unhappily as an answer. "Does he know about the basilisk? Or that one of the founders used the castle to curse the students?" Dumbledore shakes his head, but also looks like he's not totally sure saying nothing is the right call. "Okay… so, glass half full, things could be worse," I announce, straightening. "Alright, so... if Sal is out and about, we need to lock down the basilisk sooner rather than later."
"Agreed," Dumbledore says with another nod.
"So, I’ll see Ric first, I guess, figure out--“
“No,” three of my surrounding friends chorus their flat protests, but it’s Snape who’s giving me his best ‘fond bitchface’ who caps it with: “At the very least, eat first. It’s been nearly all day and none of us are fool enough to think this day hasn’t sapped a lot of your usable magic.”
I wrinkle my nose, but shrug-nod because yeah, it’s been a day. “Okay.”
***
Much as I’d rather eat in my apartment with Wyn and/or my available pack-flock, I still have appearances to upkeep and rejoin Hufflepuff for dinner, but do have to quick-think a convincing fib for my absence today since a few classmates had seen me leaving with both teachers and Aurors. I don’t mention the hospital, but I do latch on to Snape's explanation of visiting some long lost extended family I hadn’t known about. (Technically, it's totally true.)
Annie seems extra determined to see me safely returned to Hufflepuff (to no doubt grill me on my long lost family), but Dumbledore offers a last-second save to discuss education advancements for the summer but even Dumbledore has to reassure Annie that I'll be personally escorted back by a teacher afterwards.
The basilisk won't talk, at all, which isn't a bad thing, but does shake and nod her head in response to Dumbledore's questions. (She only bears her teeth a little when I ask if she'd like me to give her (not basilisk) functioning eyes.) But, her decision made, we time tamper her with one of the industrial-strength potions I'd made just for this possibility and between Dumbledore's magic and mine, we finish off her prison with a hardcore binding spell that could hold until the Earth's very core goes cold. All in all, I feel better when we reseal the Chamber, and that's the end of that.
Then we move onto Godric.
The second I see Godric, I know what the problem is.
“Damnit,” I rasp softly when my entire emotional everything tries doing fifty things all at once. “He’s dead.”
Dumbledore startles, stiffening, then peers closer, lips pursed and eyebrows furrowing. Godric’s still in the hunter’s cabin while the hunters themselves are down the hall with a separate fox hunting party. Godric’s nearly a shade and therefore seems to be breathing, but to my eye, there’s a hollowness to him that speaks of the lack of both soul and magic.
“His soul was there last night and now it’s gone,” I explain when Dumbledore looks a bit doubtful. “So is his magic.”
“It seems as if impossibilities just keep stacking up,” Dumbledore grouses, shaking his head and looking a bit sad.
“Only nearly impossible," I correct. "But yeah, very much seems that way,” I agree, a tiny bit sad myself. Sad, because as long as he still lived, there was a chance he’d eventually earned my trust if not my forgiveness or eventual respect. I stare at his non-sleeping form and mentally wish him a not-hellish afterlife, wherever that is for him. On a whim, I brush my fingers over the wall at its edge—. "Whoa,” I croak, my eyes widening, then welling up.
“Miss Devons?” Dumbledore asks, looking slightly alarmed.
“He— he, um… he fixed the castle,” I whisper, then rub back the tear that had dared to escape but this might be the one thing that’s ever involved me personally that might earn some amount of forgiveness (and a mild amount of respect), if that’s why he’d—. “He poured all his magic into it. All of his magic,” I emphasize and Dumbledore’s eyes widen while his lips part. “Suicide by magical gifting.”
I lay my palm on the wall and offer a silent hello and the castle practically beams with whole and healthy delight and I huff a small laugh.
“It’s stronger,” I tell Dumbledore. “A lot stronger. He…. maybe earned a bit of his reputation back on this alone. The castle’s no lightweight on a normal day, but this? This is— I don’t even have a metaphor. It’s just…” I finally just let my lack of words speak for me but for all the time he'd spent lazing around for the last millennia, Godric himself was no magical lightweight and now the castle’s twice as strong as it was last week.
Dumbledore sucks in a breath of surprise when he presses his own palm to the wall; an amazed smile blooms over his face when he nods. “It is.”
“Well, let's use it while we’ve got it,” I murmur. “Good to see you’re feeling better, big guy,” I say with a pat of my fingers and the castle offers me a fond, mental hug in return. “Can you show us what happened to the tapestry? Or help me run an echo spell?”
I growl when Rowena's face flashes in my mind, but there’s an odd sense of unawareness to her actions as she points the wand at the tapestry, whispers the spell, then mechanically turns and walks a few paces down the hall, pulling open a door that I’m sure wasn’t ‘there-there’ before and vanishes.
Dumbledore and I stare at each other, then turn to follow Rowana's path.
And there's no door.
Shit.
“Huh,” I mutter, then touch the wall again. “Would you open it for us? Or tell us what’s needed for us to?” The castle groans unhappily and I give it a reassuring pat. “That’s fine,” I say soothingly, then begin the echo spell.
“Looks like someone whammied her,” I murmur, and Dumbledore nods, watches Rowena light the tapestry again, then comes shuffling back our way, proving my words true when her pupils are little more than pinprick small. She may as well be hypnotized. Or over-imperiused. And then she opens the door.
“Just how many secret passages does this castle have?” Dumbledore asks with a lopsided smile that slowly drops when we see just beyond Rowena which would be fantastic if it led anywhere but the laboratory I’m seeing because it's come with a tidal wave-sized batch of nightmare memories—
"Miss Devons?” Dumbledore asks softly, reaching out and I jerk back, dizzy and sick and trembling and shake my head.
“I— uh,” I rasp, already backing away further, grateful the spell drops and ceases the reminder of that place. “I can’t,” I blurt, stumbling back the next step, then another and then freeze when Snape’s suddenly right there behind me, keeping me steady with familiar twin grips on my shoulders that I’m sure I'd recognize anywhere.
“Alright,” Dumbledore says placatingly from where the door had been. “If you can tell me where to look for another entry—“
“It’s— no? I’m sorry, n-not today,” I choke out and this time, when I turn and head blindly onward, Snape doesn’t miss a beat and keeps up at my side while I flee and there should be some sort of a cosmic limit on how many times one can genuinely panic in a day when one’s panic response can level a city purely on accident. I don’t quite notice where we’re going until the apartment stairs are under my feet and still, Snape’s right there.
“Go see him,” little chess-playing Wyn says from where he and little Syn are all but pressed against the frame, as are they both in the library painting, faces serious but gentle with what I’m sure is pity and I don’t question how they know already, rushing straight down the hall and to the painting where Wyn’s waiting, his hand splayed wide against the canvas and I press my own in return with what’s close to a whimper until the panic begins a slow drain.
“I’m so sorry,” Wyn says miserably when all I can do is stare at him while my breathing levels as he continues to sap the worst of the panic away and buffs the remaining laboratory memories to something a bit softer and less vivid, in my face bloody horror. “I hadn’t thought you’d ever see that place again.”
“W-what did you d-do?” I rasp and Wyn winces, though not with guilt, exactly.
“Same thing I did when we were little. I blocked the worst of your memories off. Or, detoured them? Or buffered them. Just those memories, no others. If I’d known it wouldn’t extend past my death, I’d have warned you,” he says softly and looks so, so sad.
“N—not your f-fault,” I stutter-croak out. "Forgot that apartment had a door in the gallery hall. Took me by surprise."
“This is undoubtedly a terrible time to ask, but what are you talking about?” Snape asks quietly, squeezing my shoulder and I hadn’t even noticed he was still right here, steadying me. (He's got a fantastic knack for it, thankfully.)
“It might take a few days for her to—“ Wyn starts to tell him, but I shake my head.
Wyn and I weren’t the only ones with our own apartments; Rowena had her own private one and like the apartment here, she had her own lab where she and Sal tried to discover how I worked.
“Where mad scientists and crazy doctors go to fiddle with things they definitely shouldn’t,” I mutter, glad I’ve stopped stuttering at least.
“A lab,” Wyn agrees. “The kind where deranged people do deranged deeds.”
“Dr. Frankenstein’s lab had nothing on a Founder’s lab,” I mumble. “Even Frankenstein moved on to only toying with dead things.”
I skip through a memory of a reality where they’d actually gone full-on Purge movie; once a year the freaks came out to play and—
“Bad things happened,” I admit in the most understated statement to have ever been understated and from this close, I can actually feel the waves of anger radiating from Snape.
“Very bad,” Wyn agrees, rubbing his thumb against the canvas where mine is, a gentle question of ‘are you ready to talk about it?’.
With one tragic and unforgettable exception, I’ve literally never wanted my brother back as much as I do right this second. Maybe just to blur and detour these memories all over again, but logically, I know I should talk about it. Logic and panic don’t work especially well together though.
In the last reality I'd gone for a medical career, at the end of my last gross anatomy course, all of us pre meds gathered around a cadaver and the instructors openly tested half the class before calling me up for my turn.
“They tested me," I croak out. "Everything they could think to ask, they wanted to know.”
“And that was a lot,” Wyn adds quietly. “What do you do with a power source that seems to have almost no limits?
“Test the hell out of it,” I sigh, finally letting my hand drop and don’t argue when Snape pulls me into his side and lets me lean as heavily as I need to and I’m once again stupidly grateful for him just being him and him simply being here helping me deal with all this shit.
“Painful tests, I’d assume,” Snape murmurs.
“One would think so,” I agree, shaking my head a little. “But not in the moment, no. There’s an odd and rare disorder, for muggles,” I sort of flop a hand out to the world at large. "It's a fluke in the brain that keeps pain from being a deterrent sensation. Muggles with that fluke can hold a hot coal in their hands until the skin is burned down to the muscle and it wouldn’t register as anything more than a sort of pressure to tell the brain they’re holding something.”
Snape shuffles on his feet for a second, likely realizing what horrors came of that biological fluke. I talk so he won't have to.
“So without that particular boundary, those kids could endure a lot of damage without much complaint.” I want to shut them away all over again, but this time, I’m not sure I should. Or even can— even though Wyn managed for years without me even realizing it, apparently.
“But,” Wyn continues, lips pursed, “hypothetically, if there were a way to actually let those muggles suddenly feel all sensation as they’re meant to, it seems logical there would be some psychological backlash, if those sensation memories are too recent.”
“Or... if one of those kids happened to be born with a nearly perfect memory,” I add.
Snape says nothing, but draws in a somewhat shaky breath and it reminds me to do the same, slow and steady.
“Backlash seems like too weak a word for some things,” I huff. “If magic can fix it, what’s the real harm?” I snark acidly.
“And now that they’re out—“ Snape adds.
“THEY’RE WHAT?!” Wyn lion-growls a grating, metallic sound so furious, it shakes half the knick knacks in the room and Snape stiffens for a second with surprise. Wyn’s temper is usually pretty loud but— well.
He’s a lion. (And they're pretty loud.) He’s also in a painting and relatively harmless.
“And Godric’s dead,” I continue, “but gave all his magic to the castle, which is good timing since the Ministry is sending the pink toad here in a possible takeover attempt and I’m pretty sure the castle now has the means to make every waking moment a living hell for her, so there’s that for an upside.”
Wyn’s still half shifted with too-sharp, metallic lion teeth and eyes blazing radioactive gold, if that’s even a thing, but he’s not even close to calm, understandably; he’d been traumatized right alongside me just by living it through me.
“Should I be offering condolences?” Snape asks a bit uncertainly.
“No,” I huff out a dry laugh and Wyn snorts. “But I can’t really hate a dead guy when he’d died doing what I’d actually just told him to do. ‘Stow the sentimental bullshit and fix the castle’."
Wyn blinks himself back to his usual, looking flummoxed. “And he just… did?” He demands.
“Well, not right then, no. Last night he said he didn’t know how and wasn’t lying… so, today at some point, but no idea when; I was busy."
"Busy," Wyn repeats, frowning again. "Too busy to smack some sense into him while you had the chance?" He doesn't say it with judgement, so I just snort.
"I smacked him through a dozen paintings,” I offer, “but anything more and I might not have stopped at just smacking," I confess. “And I've frequently got this wiseass little voice in the back of my mind reminding me to think before I barbecue." Wyn both smirks and nods his understanding. "Yesterday was rough enough, so today was a brief holiday. So, busy un-cursing a few people, meeting some new other people, playing with a newborn dragon and overall having a blast. But yeah, last night we caught Ric in one of the gallery hall paintings, reversed the Imperious curse Salazar had laid on him and managed to get a few answers.
"Apparently Rowena's been mostly crazy for centuries and Imperiused, Sal's still a psychotic puppet master, because of course he is, and Helga's Imperiused maybe because she’s finally as done with Sal's crap as everyone else.”
"And you told Godric to man up," Snape adds, sounding amused.
"Yeah, well, 'cowardly lion' wasn't a good look on him," I defend in a huff. "And clearly his self-image was still too important to keep from playing the pity card like he's ever been some sort of victim."
Wyn blinks at me in silence, gaping a bit, then at Snape, then back to me. “You’re life is so much more interesting than mine now,” he pouts. “Both of you sit down and tell me everything.”
And we do, starting with the emotional amplifying curse (where I don't mention hugging, but Wyn's twinkling eyes says he knows anyhow), then diagnosing the castle and onward to catching Godric, de-cursing him and finally explaining to Dumbledore that his aura's been sending some alarming signals out that we couldn't actually tell him about without the probability of making it worse.
"Good," Wyn sighs. "That's the biggest reason I haven't said much to him so far." I nod my understanding and summarize the conversation with Godric where Wyn comments again. "Only five steps ahead?" He scoffs. "Fifteen, minimum. And yeah, I told him the goblins weren't an issue when I came back demanding to know why I couldn't even say your name anymore," he growls, eyes glowing faintly. "I think he was more worried about the Black, especially after a spell like that. She mostly blamed him for not heeding her advice."
I snort. "Figures. If they haven't tried contacting me yet, they'll hold out until I'm officially free to leave the school."
"How," Snape finally asks, "would any of them even know?"
"For this room only?" Wyn says, leaning against the frame's edge again. "Unique bloodlines. Like the Iron family. Very few outside the goblin nation know just how long their average lifespan is. When I first met Black Iron Heart, she was nearing a thousand and ready to retire." Snape's eyes go wide. "And it's likely one of her children succeeded her and remembers everything perfectly," Wyn finishes. "Syn's right and Godric's an idiot."
"And now a dead idiot," I sigh, slumping a little. "I'm not even sure how much he explained after I peaced out last night, but at least Dumbledore's aura's still clear of influence."
"You're still okay with the story being told?" Wyn asks seriously, almost no inflection.
"I—" I stop, not quite sure how to word it. "As things are, there's a lot I can't let go of," I murmur, shrugging. "And I'm pretty sure the worst of the worst is eating me alive, somehow. I need that part to be over, consequences be damned," I confess quietly, slumping and both Wyn and Snape nod their agreement.
"Tell me about today, then," Wyn prompts and I do, but I pause after the retelling of the hospital and what the damage had looked like (that type of compounded damage alone was the type of sick I’d only ever seen my soulless self capable of) to order two hot fudge sundaes from the kitchens (each the size of an American football) that Snape pretends he doesn’t want until I threaten to eat it myself (because I really would, they’re delicious) and carry on story-telling until Wyn fixates on a singular point.
“You made a dragon,” Wyn says for the third time.
“He’s not a dragon,” I repeat for the third time. “He’s just… a Charlie. With a tiny bit of dragon blood magic in him. So… he’s a little bit dragon-ish? And I did give him a choice, told him it was irreversible and there’d be some new oddities to deal with and everything.” I pause to scoop a huge glob of chocolate fudge into my mouth and try to pretend I’m not huddling on the bed to hide from Wyn's judgy-ness.
“So he is a dragon, then,” Snape reiterates (not-even-remotely-)neutrally from where he’s half-relaxed, feet kicked comfortably out and slumped in the chair he’d dragged in from the kitchen, still only a third of the way through his treat (the slowpoke).
“There’s no such thing as being a ‘little bit’ dragon,” Wyn says flatly with his judgy eyes on. “That’s like saying Remus is only a little bit werewolf if he’d only been bitten five minutes ago.”
Snape nods his agreement with his spoon still in his mouth.
“I couldn’t watch him die when he’d just been snuggling a baby, like, ten minutes earlier!” I exclaim. “He’s a nest protector! A guardian!” I stress, then slump because… it’s possible I might’ve, maybe, a tiny bit— made him a dragon.
Damn. His mother will surely kill me; she had the kind of aura that all but screamed FORMIDABLE.
“So you made him a dragon,” Wyn repeats and this time, Snape (badly) hides an actual grin behind his giant cup of deliciousness and I grumble under my breath at them both and the story carries on again, though that’s pretty much the last of it beyond helping the Hungarian, playing chase in the sky and the protective aerial display as a sort of thank you to our new friends.
“A good day, then,” Wyn surmises where he’s back leaning against the frame and scraping paint from beneath his nails with the tip of his boot dagger.
“It was an amazing day,” I agree, smiling softly.
“I can’t believe you hadn’t told me, though” Snape huffs, his own judgy eyebrow raised at Wyn, who frowns right back.
“Told you what?”
“That she’s royalty,” Snape says with a near-scandalized scowl hiding the actual smile that only grows when Wyn cracks up laughing so hard he drops back out of view and I groan-growl-(somewhat fake)-glare at Snape and try to throw a pillow at him and can’t because they’ve decided to stick to the bed. Further proof that life is unfair.
But after fleeing to my lab (and away from my two favorite wise asses) to start a double batch of my pain killer, I’m back in Hufflepuff five minutes before lights out and manage to fall asleep with a smile.