Chapter 7
Albus Dumbledore had once told Minerva that she was born to be a cat. “Curious, graceful, but reserved,” he had rhymed off, while she had taken her first steps in feline form around his classroom. “But more importantly, because you’ll always land on your feet.”
Despite telling Sirius Black that human transfiguration was a subject that she was unwilling to broach with students before they reached sixth year, Minerva had been just about his age when she’d begun expressing interest in the most difficult type of transfiguration there was herself.
Becoming an animagus wasn’t something typically taught at Hogwarts and was incredibly dangerous to attempt. Professor Dumbledore had given her what felt like countless heavy and complicated books to study before he would even consider giving her the practical lessons she’d begged him for.
Minerva had been the first Hogwarts student in decades to succeed and was only one of seven people in Britain to register that century. It had been a long and arduous process that had taken her nearly three years to achieve. But she had done it all because she was passionate about Transfiguration and wished to explore all the realms that her specialty offered.
“Because I’ll always land on my feet? Are you forgetting my fall from the sky in our last Quidditch game, Professor?” eighteen year old Minerva had scowled all those many years ago, once she’d managed to turn back into her human self and catch her breath.
Bitterness towards Slytherin House for the foul in the final match that had left her with a concussion and several broken ribs, had temporarily overshadowed Minerva’s elation at achieving her goal at long last - but only for a moment. She certainly hadn’t landed on her feet on that particular day though. And it had taken her years to recognize the inner strength in herself that Dumbledore had seen all along.
“You’re finding your way again, Minerva. About time,” she told herself, moving elegantly as her cat counterpart across the garden fence that stretched behind a series of flats on a busy London street.
It had been a bit of a letdown to successfully transform for the first time after all her hard work and find an ordinary grey tabby cat staring back at her in the mirror. During her training she had often hoped for a majestic bird of some sort that would grant her the ability to take to the sky with more liberties and agility than she had ever achieved on a broomstick. But now, Minerva wouldn’t have it any other way.
She quite agreed with Dumbledore that her animagus form suited her and her intentions perfectly. Being an ordinary tabby cat permitted her to blend in, but be ever present. It enabled her to step back from the world when she needed a break and observe it from a different perspective without drawing any attention to herself. Everything seemed quieter when she was a cat and so much more simple. She always did her best thinking that way.
“And I know that I’m finally where I’m meant to be. And I believe that I’m where you’d want me to be as well,” Minerva thought, unsure who exactly she was speaking to.
Be it God or perhaps Dougal - she supposed it didn’t matter. She hadn’t gone out on a stroll this morning to grieve. She’d gone walking to peacefully contemplate this new beginning and all the matters of the heart that had been settled during one of the most hopeful and satisfying nights of her life. She was silently celebrating the true significance of at long last finding her footing after all these years - trusting with confidence that it wouldn’t even matter if she didn’t always land on her feet now because there was someone there to catch her.
Ruff Ruff - A large golden dog charging the fence suddenly broke Minerva out of her tranquil reverie and the cat in her hissed back instinctively before she got a hold of herself.
“Now that really won’t do, will it?” Minerva scolded the dog sharply, once she had jumped off the fence and transformed back into her human self. “You and I are going to have to learn to get along.”
The dog sniffed at her reproachfully. It seemed quite taken-aback by the formidable woman who had replaced the distracted cat it had been sure to get the better of. The hard snow crunched underneath Minerva’s boots as she walked the short way across the garden to the door to let herself in, the dog sprinting ahead.
“I promise, I didn’t notice you there when I let Shadow out,” Elphinstone proclaimed, his beard twitching as the dog rushed towards him with an enthusiastically wagging tail.
Elphinstone stepped back from the stove to scratch him fondly behind the ears and Minerva couldn’t resist a smile. He looked so warm and inviting, standing there in a blue housecoat and matching slippers. The sight of eggs and bacon sizzling on the burner behind him made Minerva’s stomach flutter as she recalled telling Elphinstone last night that breakfasts with him had become her favourite thing.
“Where did you go?”
“Just a walk,” Minerva replied, slipping her boots off and lining them neatly together by the door before crossing the small kitchen in her bare feet to kiss him.
“Strawberries,” she observed, noting the bowl of sliced berries on the counter next to Elphinstone's wand. “Did you grow them?”
She was certain that he had because despite devoting the majority of his life to service in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, Minerva knew that it was an affinity for nature that fed Elphinstone’s soul. The spare bedroom in this flat was a charmed interior greenhouse that enabled plants, both magical and food sources, to thrive all winter long. And as soon as the frost melted, Elphinstone would undoubtedly devote as much time as possible to the small garden he cherished out back.
“Yes, I did,” Elphinstone affirmed softly, as Minerva popped one into her mouth. “So just a walk? You’re still alright - with everything?”
“Yes.”
Minerva cupped his cheek in her hand reassuringly, but Elphinstone’s blue eyes persisted in scanning hers searchingly for clues to the contrary. Minerva didn’t quite have the words to express how certain and happy she was with the steps they had taken and with what she had instigated. She wished that she could confide in Elphinstone about meeting with Gellert Grindelwald and the profound influence the imprisoned dark wizard had had on her, but she knew that she couldn’t.
“I was just wondering about things,” she said, kissing his lips once again before adding, “important things.”
“Like what?” Elphinstone asked, still looking mildly concerned despite Minerva’s best efforts to put him at ease.
“Like what form your patronus takes,” she replied, and Elphinstone’s white eyebrows raised in surprise at the unexpectedly light question posed for the sole purpose of knowing every part of him.
“My patronus?” he repeated.
“Yes,” said Minerva, caressing the other side of his face now in her left hand so that Elphinstone could look nowhere but down on herself and she kissed him many more times while he wrapped his arms around her waist.
“How could I have neglected to ask that about you until now?” she added, shaking her head in disbelief at her own idiocy. “I’d just been thinking about how my animagus form is a cat and my patronus is a cat, but you’ve always had a dog as long as I’ve known you and I think that suits you as well.”
“My patronus is a brown bear,” Elphinstone told her, fingers drumming on her hips over the coat she had tossed on prior to her venture outdoors.
“Really?” said Minerva, her theory instantly thrown out the window.
As Elphinstone pulled away to refocus on the stove, Minerva conceded, “Well, I suppose that suits you as well - strong, instinctive, and stable.”
“Thank you,” Elphinstone replied, flipping over the bacon and eggs with a spatula by hand. Quite adept he was at cooking, even without the use of magic. It was one of the many things Minerva’s mother had appreciated about him and always found despairingly lacking in her daughter.
“Courageous and protective,” she added, beginning to unfasten the buttons on her coat one at a time, deliberately slow while she waited for Elphinstone to turn back around and take notice of her again.
She had on beneath her coat only the slip she’d worn under her dress from last night. Its fabric was sheer with lace embroidery over the bodice and the thin straps. It hugged her tightly in flattering ways that Minerva ordinarily wouldn’t care about. But she enjoyed the way her curves currently caught Elphinstone’s attention and liked how she saw his eyes move over her figure appreciatively. It wasn’t often that Minerva McGonagall got to think of herself as pretty.
“Playful and mischievous?” she suggested, tossing her coat over the back of one of the kitchen chairs at the table that was already set for the two of them.
“I’m not so sure that’s correct, but I’ll take it,” Elphinstone chuckled, reaching for her hand and tugging her closer.
Minerva giggled as he lifted her up onto the counter. Burrowing her face against the crevice of Elphinstone’s neck, she was only mildly aware of him picking his wand up and murmuring a quick Immobulus charm at the pan on the stove before bestowing all his attention onto her.
The past twelve hours had been like something out of a fantasy when Minerva considered that she so rarely indulged in what she wanted and almost never broke the rules. And several more hours passed before it was jointly decided that they couldn’t put off going to Hogwarts any longer. Elphinstone was supposed to have met with Dumbledore that morning and Minerva had been expected to return at some point the previous night.
But if Dumbledore had any opinion at all on his deputy leaving Gryffindor without its head of house for more than half the day, then he was choosing not to show it. He welcomed them both into his circular study warmly without commenting on the time and then listened attentively from the throne-like chair behind his desk while Elphinstone detailed everything he had already shared with Minerva: about how Lucius Malfoy had been spotted in Caithness during the attacks, but that the Ministry was choosing not to investigate right now.
“Albus, he’s engaged to Bellatrix’s sister,” Minerva cut in impatiently, growing frustrated in the silence while Dumbledore spent several minutes studying the muggle photograph of Lucius over his half-moon spectacles.
How quickly reality had come crashing down around her once they’d apparated to Hogsmeade and walked back up to the castle. The cruelty of war and the uncertainty all around them was never going to be ignored for long. The only carry-over was that Elphinstone had tightly held her hand the entire way. And she was his now and he was hers. They’d paused briefly by Minerva’s quarters so that she could fix her hair and change from her muggle gown into casual robes, and then it had been up to the Headmaster’s office to confront everything that had been temporarily cast to the side. To figure out how to coexist it with the joy Minerva could feel radiating through her entire body.
“Bellatrix and Rodolphus Lestrange were confirmed as Death Eaters by the Ministry,” she pressed on, when Dumbledore still didn’t say anything. “And we now know that Lucius Malfoy was with them.”
“At least for fact, in the same vicinity,” Elphinstone said quietly, and Minerva stared at him. “But in all likelihood, he was there for the same reason.”
“All recently out of school - all from families that are known for sprouting pureblood ideology - and all from Slytherin house,” Minerva added. “We really can’t continue to ignore what is happening here.”
“I have no intention of ignoring anything,” Dumbledore said calmly, setting the photograph back down on the desk and picking up the engagement announcement that had been printed in The Prophet. “But I’m not surprised that the Ministry is unwilling to look too deeply at a member of the Malfoy family.”
“So that’s where we come in,” said Elphinstone. “Certainly you can agree that this is relevant?”
“Yes, but I must admit that I would not have been inclined to suspect Lucius Malfoy until now,” Dumbledore replied. “The Death Eaters tend to be made up of the weak seeking protection, the ambitious seeking some shared glory, and the thuggish, gravitating towards a leader who can show them more refined forms of cruelty. But in all his years at Hogwarts, Malfoy never seemed predisposed to be violent, and he has status and privilege all on his own. So what persuaded him to join Voldemort?”
“Isn’t bigotry enough of a reason?” asked Minerva.
“Hate is almost as powerful a motivator as love,” Dumbledore agreed quietly. “It seems I’m guilty of underestimating how effectively those seeds of hatred can be planted in the young. One would hope that their time at school would open them up to the possibility of making their own choices - perhaps different choices than what their parents would make for them. It does happen. We can’t lose hope of it happening.”
“Would you be fine with me interviewing the woman who took this photo?” Elphinstone asked. “I’m not as closely monitored as the auror department and with a simple memory modification charm, I should be able to get there and back without making the Ministry aware.”
“And if they do discover that you were in Caithness, you can just say that you were visiting my family,” Minerva told him, and out of the corner of her eye she saw Dumbledore smile.
“Can you go today?” he asked Elphinstone.
“I can go right now,” Elphinstone replied, pocketing the photograph and newspaper clipping as he stood.
“I’ll walk you out,” Minerva said, rising to her own feet now. “I won’t come along though - there’s some things I need to take care of here - but perhaps you actually should go see my parents once you’re done with the interview. That way it’s not a lie if the Ministry is watching the village and spots you…and it will relieve some of my guilt for not visiting them this month.”
They left Dumbledore, with him and Elphinstone making plans to follow-up tomorrow, and were all the way down the corridor before Elphinstone asked, “do you want me to tell your mother and father anything about us? Because I think that’s something you should tell them yourself.”
“No, you do it,” Minerva smirked. “That way I won’t have to see mum’s relieved expression when she discovers her only daughter just might not die an old maid after all - I honestly think that’s what she’d see if she faced a boggart.”
“I think you’re just too stubborn to give her the satisfaction of telling her yourself,” Elphinstone replied, “but I’m relieved that you think they’ll be pleased - I am much older than you after all.”
“Nobody cares about that,” Minerva waved him off, least of all her.
She kissed him quickly before they vacated the empty corridor and left him with a coy suggestion that he come back to Hogwarts to spend the night in her quarters, lest he be late for Dumbledore tomorrow. And as she proceeded on through the castle alone, the remnant blush in her cheeks had her contemplating just how peculiar it was to switch from conversations about Death Eaters to love. Though she supposed that was balance and a good thing when life was so uncertain.
“What are you doing here, Miss Evans?”
Minerva had gone to the hospital wing to check in on a student that she knew would have been admitted that morning, and was surprised to find Lily Evans alone inside the office. The fourth year girl was pulling jars of a white creamy substance from a crate at her feet and lining them up in one of the cabinets behind the desk.
“I’m stocking the potion stores, Professor,” Lily replied.
“Yes, I see that,” said Minerva. “But why?”
“Extra credit,” Lily answered. “And Professor Slughorn said if we helped him then we wouldn’t have to write the essay that the rest of the class is doing on Pepperup Potion.”
“But you’re good at essays,” Minerva frowned, just as Madam Pomfrey walked into the room.
“But given the choice I’d rather just get on doing the thing than have to write about it,” Lily shrugged, closing the cabinet door behind the last jar and then picking up her crate.
“Finished?” Madam Pomfrey asked, setting the file folder she was carrying down onto the desk.
Lily nodded. “Those were the Blemish Blisters and we’re nearly done with the Blood Replenisher. I’ll probably be back in an hour or so.”
“Thank you, Miss Evans,” Madam Pomfrey smiled.
“Now I see why Horace has so much available time to throw parties,” Minerva observed, once Lily had left to go back to the potions lab.
“So long as I keep getting my orders filled correctly, I’ll turn a blind eye to Horace concocting crafty ways to avoid work,” Madam Pomfrey laughed, sitting down and dipping her quill into the ink. “How was your night?”
“Fine,” Minerva said vaguely.
Already frustrated with the Head of Slytherin’s lack of control over the happenings in his house, she was predisposed to be annoyed by anything he did at the moment. Students assigned detention were routinely given menial tasks to complete such as cleaning, filing, or preparing supplies for a class - but this seemed different. Even though she had to acknowledge that Evans had hardly been complaining and she'd probably be a hypocrite if she objected to Slughorn's methods too loudly.
“I used to hang back in Transfiguration to help change the creatures and objects we worked on back to their usual forms,” Minerva confessed. “Dumbledore never asked me to but I liked getting the extra practice and the opportunity to pick his brain on the topics we hadn’t covered in class yet.”
“And you’ve been together ever since,” Madam Pomfrey smiled, making a couple of scratches with her quill in the open file in front of her.
Minerva cleared her throat. “So how’s our boy, Poppy? Did you release him yet?”
“No,” Madam Pomfrey said, looking up at the sudden change of conversation. “I’m going to keep him for now but I'll probably let him attend classes on Monday.”
Minerva nodded, though that was never what she wanted to hear. Despite being rather stubborn about showing up for her own medical checks, she was always concerned about the welfare of her students. The bold and headstrong Gryffindors had a particular proclivity for getting hurt, which kept her visits to the hospital wing quite regular - but one particular boy, through no fault of his own, had her in here more often than any of the others.
“He’s due for another pain reliever in a minute actually,” Madam Pomfrey said, glancing at the clock on the wall. “Would you like to give it to him?”
“Yes,” said Minerva, who regularly oversaw such care in the dormitory to help keep his nights in the hospital wing to as much a minimum as possible. It made her happy to do so. Invoking the maternal sentiments she so rarely got to express.
“Homework on a Saturday, Lupin? I’m not sure whether to be impressed or concerned,” she observed, entering the hospital wing and walking down the row of freshly made beds to the one occupied next to the window.
Since he was the only student there at present, none of the curtains were drawn around him. To protect his privacy, they made deliberate efforts to conceal just how often Remus Lupin had to visit the hospital wing. Though his dorm mates could hardly fail to notice his absence every full moon, Minerva thought that it was a testament to Dumbledore, Madam Pomfrey, and herself that the truth about Remus Lupin had not otherwise been exposed in the four years that he’d attended Hogwarts.
“Professor Slughorn set an essay and I’m still nowhere close to being finished,” Remus replied, looking completely exhausted.
“You know that your teachers will grant you extensions if you need more time,” she reminded him.
Lupin’s cut and bruised face flushed at her words. He abhorred asking for any special treatment and that was the primary reason why Minerva never minded offering it. Bitten by a werewolf as a small child, Remus Lupin never seemed to take for granted how fortunate he was to be able to attend Hogwarts at all. No headmaster before Dumbledore would have ever allowed such a thing.
“I’m okay, Professor,” he insisted.
Minerva didn’t answer, her focus now on the visible claw and bite marks covering his arms, neck, and face. Dumbledore had created a secure den for Lupin to be held in at the full moon for his transformations, but the separation from other humans to bite caused the werewolf to attack himself out of sheer desperation. It meant that Madam Pomfrey had to heal and piece the boy back together on the regular every single month and as Lupin had grown older, the werewolf in him seemed to become even more cruel and ferocious.
“It was a bad night, wasn’t it?” she whispered, sympathy welling up inside her as she propped a finger under Lupin’s chin to gently turn his head to one side and then the other.
The claw marks on his neck were deep and an angry red. It seemed almost a small miracle that the boy hadn’t slit his own throat last night. So excessive were his wounds sometimes that even the most potent healing potions couldn’t prevent permanent marks. Scars were freshly ripped open and the new injuries would barely have time to heal before they were inflicted again in this vicious and inescapable cycle.
“I’m okay,” Lupin said politely, but he downed the vial of pain reliever that Minerva passed him in one gulp.
“So you said,” she replied disbelievingly. “Get some sleep and I’ll be by to check on you later.”
But it was easier said than done and Minerva knew it. Resigned to the cruel fate life had handed him, it always seemed to be in the soft-spoken boy’s nature to downplay just how much he was hurting. The stigma regarding his affliction meant a constant load of anxiety and shame. Lupin knew as well as she did that the Ministry and the vast majority of parents would be in uproar if they knew a werewolf was attending school with their children. That’s why his friendships with James Potter, Sirius Black, and Peter Pettigrew were so sacred. That’s why Minerva wasn’t even irritated when she caught them attempting to sneak into the hospital wing just as she was leaving. Lupin needed to rest, but he needed his friends even more.
“Professor McGonagall, fancy running into you here of all places!” Sirius exclaimed charmingly, hovering a whole chocolate cake in the air with his wand, which James hurried to stand directly in front of and block from her view.
“You might be wondering what we’re doing outside the hospital wing with a cake nicked from the kitchens,” he said, tussling his black hair with his hand to make it stand up more than it already did. “But before you start to ask questions, please consider that there are way worse things we could be doing right now. And it’s not like we’re trying to bust him out.”
“Though we did consider it,” Sirius added cheekily, glancing over at Pettigrew, who was holding a stack of plates with four forks balanced on top.
“Man…” James shook his head.
“I have no idea what cake you’re talking about, Mr Potter,” Minerva stated, walking promptly around the three boys to descend the stairs before they could say anything else. She hoped that Poppy would be occupied in her office long enough to allow them a nice indulgent visit before she kicked them out. Minerva was feeling generous today.
“I’m so grateful to see that beautiful smile of yours more,” a calm voice pulled Minerva out of her thoughts about halfway to Gryffindor tower.
She’d been walking along, not even realizing that she’d been smiling to herself. Her mother had often reproached her for always being so serious but right now smiling came naturally. She felt like she’d just been given much to smile about despite this broken world. A second chance in this uncertain life that nobody could get out of alive. But just like that, she’d been transfigured from the inside. Because right now, despite everything that was wrong, she was happy.
“Were you looking for me, Albus?” she asked.
“No,” Dumbledore replied, “but there you are.”
Stepping closer to him, Minerva silently wondered how much she should tell him. But the twinkle in his eye suggested he already knew enough. It didn’t matter. She went to hug him at the same time that he moved to embrace her. As Poppy had said, the two of them had been together through it all. Her greatest teacher, her dearest friend, there to support her in this next chapter of her life.
“I want you to be happy too,” Minerva said quietly. “Is that possible?”
Deep down in Dumbledore’s core, she saw that he wasn’t. He hid it well, but she knew him better. He grieved as profoundly as she did and his regrets were stacked to heights she could never even conceive of. But he would never release them and the hopes he’d harbored for her, he would never grant to himself. He would never show himself as much grace as he was willing to grant to almost anyone else.
“I am so proud of you,” Dumbledore said, kissing the side of her head gently before walking ahead down the corridor. She could hear him humming a rather cheerful note to himself as he turned the corner. Answering Minerva’s question in his own way, but much to her dissatisfaction.