Constellations of Change

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Corridor outside of the Hospital Wing

“You’re going to have to let go of them at some point,” Ted chided his wife and daughter as the Tonks family made their way towards the staircase. He was fairly certain Andromeda and Nymphadora hadn’t let Iris and Luna out of their grasps in the last two hours except to switch between the two younger witches, both of whom were now slumbering and being carried, Luna bridal carried by Nymphadora while Iris koalaed on her mother’s back. “It’d be easier to levitate them down to Hogsmeade Station.”

“I’m perfectly capable of carrying my daughter,” Andromeda huffed, for once grateful rather than concerned for Iris’s still small size. Madame Pomfrey, who had administered the sleeping draughts responsible for the exhausted girl’s unconscious states after thoroughly checking them out, had offered to let the girls sleep in the Hospital Wing of course, along with Ginny and the petrified students, but Andi was keen to get the girls home to convalesce. While she was incredibly sympathetic to Molly Weasley and her family’s ordeal, she’d rather have her children resting somewhere the overbearing woman wasn’t buzzing about.

Nym, currently standing as tall as her Metamorphmagus abilities allowed her, shifted Luna in her arms. “I can’t believe Xenophillius isn’t here,” she muttered, “I’m happy to have Luna with us, but you’d think he’d have come running.”

“The seriousness of the situation didn’t seem to register with him,” Andromeda replied through gritted teeth, forcing herself to be diplomatic. Luna’s father had also been at the Ministry when word came of the catastrophe involving their kids, but, unlike Amelia, the Tonks, the Greengrasses, and the Weasleys, he hadn’t come running. Even Tracey’s mother, who was competing abroad at the moment, had arranged an international floo call. (The Grangers had not been contacted yet due to the difficulty communicating things to muggles, and their not being allowed on Hogwarts grounds, but McGonagall should be visiting them that evening to let them know there had been a situation but Hermione was fine.)

To his minor credit, he had asked for the Tonks to check on Luna and let him know if anything dire had happened to her, but overall, he seemed more concerned with accosting Fudge due to his belief that Sirius’s exoneration was proof of one of his many conspiracies. While magical folks could be an eccentric lot, Xenophillius took it to an unhealthy extreme. Andromeda wasn’t sure if it all stemmed from Pandora’s death, or just how he was, but the man’s obsession with his conspiracy theories had seemingly led him to neglecting Luna in a way that made the witch’s blood boil. 

The family, official members and not, wove their way through the mostly empty castle, heading towards the edge of the grounds, where a thestral pulled carriage waited to take them to the station, from whence they would depart for Megaron Hall. After the excitement in the Chamber, the headmaster had eventually instated an early curfew, calling the students back to their dormitories, while the situation was locked down. Amelia’s Aurors, after taking statements from the girls, were still inspecting the scene, though apparently the mysterious Chamber had closed itself up after Dumbledore extricated the students. 

“Nymphadora,” Andromeda began as they crossed the gently rolling grounds, “just so you’re not surprised when we get home, Remus and Sirius are staying with us.”

“Oh right,” Nym replied, having forgotten the other momentous events of the day following the excitement with the Chamber. “How is he, Sirius I mean?” She had fond but vague memories of her falsely imprisoned uncle but was also well aware from her DADA studies the effects long term Dementor exposure could have on a person.

“He’s doing remarkably well, all things considered,” Ted opined. “If I had to guess, he probably spent a lot of time in his dog form to resist the worst of the Dementor’s gloom. He’s obviously still scarred by that, but it could have been a lot worse,” he finished darkly. The fact that Sirius Black was also an unregistered Animagus had come out during Pettigrew’s trial, but in light of the massive miscarriage of justice already visited upon him, the ministry had waived pursuing any charges related to that. Ted, a barrister by trade, was already incandescent with rage on the inside over how the courts had been perverted in this whole affair and would have relished the chance to defend his in-law if it had come to it.

“Honestly, Remus might be the most shaken up at the moment,” Andromeda added as the carriage neared the station. They wouldn’t be taking the Hogwarts Express, but the station stood at the boundary of the wards on the grounds that prevented most kinds of transportation magic and was one of the gateways that led to the roads leading to Hogsmeade. Since there were three of them unable to apparate, and it was exceedingly difficult to do side-along with more than one other person, the family would be heading for their friend Emmaline Vance’s house in the village to Floo home. 

Tonks looked at her mother quizzically, “why?” She’d only met Remus a handful of times, the man constantly being on the move, but she liked him well enough. 

Andromeda bit her lip, “he feels guilty. He’s hardly alone in that.” Andromeda, Amelia, Remus and others who had known and loved Sirius were all having to grapple with the revelation of who the true traitor had been. “Perhaps it’s because he’s the last of the marauders. Those four were so close in school, thick as thieves, sometimes literally. I’m sure it’s hitting him harder than most that he missed the signs of Peter being the traitor.”

“That’s dumb,” Nym said bluntly, “it wasn’t like he was in charge of the DMLE or the Ministry back then. This was all Crouch and Bagnold’s fault, plus Dumbles if you blame him for not intervening at all.”

“In any event,” Andromeda cut in before her daughter could further insult her headmaster. Andromeda might never truly forgive the man for what he’d allowed to happen to Iris, but he had kept to their agreement ever since the day she brought Iris home, and Nymphadora could stand to learn a little diplomacy. “They’re both obviously very concerned about Iris, so we shouldn’t dawdle at Emmaline’s.”

Nymphadora rolled her eyes, but relented, and the little Tonks family steadily made their way to the waiting green flames and onward to home.

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Hogwarts, Headmaster’s Office, Early the Next Morning

Albus felt very old indeed as the sun rose on a new dawn; he hadn’t slept since the last. After the battle with Tom, and it was Tom somehow, his afternoon and evening had been consumed dealing with the fallout. Then, once Amelia’s aurors were satisfied for the moment, the students and officials had both been assuaged, and the young Miss Weasley had been given over to Pompey’s care, Albus had burned the midnight oil trying to get to the bottom of what the charred husk of a diary sitting on his desk had been, and how it led to so much terror.

It looked so plain, so unremarkable now, but he had seen for himself the power it held, and the connection it had with the sentient memory of Tom possessing Ms. Weasley. He knew it was Dark. He knew it was dangerous. But he didn’t know what it was.

You could instill an enchanted object with a degree of intelligence, even sapience depending on how you defined it, though Albus didn’t consider such objects to be truly independent intelligences once you broke them down. From a piece of parchment charmed to display certain messages when specific phrases were spoken, to something as dizzyingly complex as the Sorting Hat, such objects were just acting out instructions from their original creator. Even magical portraits, which certainly had their uses, were merely flattened imitations of those they depicted.

Despite attestations to the contrary both by his admirers and his more paranoid critics, Albus was far from all knowing. Magic was as vast a subject of study as one could find, and while Albus considered himself the foremost expert in many fields of it, he hadn’t personally delved much into the murky field of soul magic. ‘And Soul Magic is almost certainly at work here, given the independence and active will Tom displayed.’

That was his best guess as to what the diary had been, prior to its destruction, a soul container of some sort. The way it had reacted to the magically deadly basilisk venom, its parasitic relationship with Ginny, and Tom’s known interest in that kind of magic all indicated that was the most likely culprit. Unfortunately, when it came to soul containers, there were few magical objects more shrouded in mystery. The only rule was that the artifacts would be unnatural, and the means of their creation Dark.

A phylactery, a horcrux, another similar object with which he wasn’t familiar, they were all possible identities for the broken book. Figuring out what precise kind of magic Tom had used, and how far he’d split his soul would take research, and that research would take time

He glanced up through half-moon glasses at what Filius had jokingly once called, “the really Forbidden section.” It was a glass case charmed to be larger on the inside, which held a collection of volumes he’d removed from the Hogwarts library when he took the post of Headmaster. He wasn’t seeking to stifle students, but there were some things they were better off not knowing, and certain knowledge that was better forgotten. 

As a rule, he’d plundered the Darkest books in the library, especially those which touched on Dark magic he knew Tom had eventually used in his reign of terror. Looking at the pallid, snake-like man he’d been at the end, compared to the handsome youth Dumbledore had just been forcibly reminded of, it was obvious Tom had worked some dark rituals on his own body. So it was that the texts outlining The Alignment of Stygios, the Sacrifice of Ancient Bloode, and more were pruned before they proved too tantalizing a prize for future students.

In all there were maybe 30 or so books laying in the locked glass case, and they would be the beginning of Albus’s study. If he could understand what precise magic Tom had conducted to tie himself to the mortal plane beyond his natural life, he could start piecing together how he’d done it and ‘how it might finally be undone, before it is too late for us all.’

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Megaron Hall, The Same Morning

Sunlight tickled across Iris’s eyelids until she moaned and stretched, letting herself slowly return to wakefulness.

“Mmh, Irey don’t push,” Nymphadora mumbled from where she lay next to her on the bed. The Metamorphmagus’s currently long dark red hair perfectly matching Iris’s own shade covered most of her head in an epic bed head. On the other side of the older Tonks sister, a still sleeping Luna was curled in a ball against her back, seemingly trying to pull all of the bed’s covers to her like a whirlpool. 

As Iris blinked awake, the events of the previous day began to filter back to her, Ginny, the basilisk, the Chamber, Luna and the Diary, Dumbledore arriving, and so on. It had felt like the most awful form of deja vu, once again being drawn into a life and death struggle with a wraith of Voldemort in a secret chamber, not knowing if she or her sister would survive. Honestly, she was more than a little sick of it. 

“At least it’s all over for now,” she mumbled as she sat up. They’d already told all of the relatively little they knew about what happened to both Dumbledore and Auror Robards and gotten a mostly clean bill of health before Madame Pomfrey had given them calming draughts and sleeping potions to let them rest. Iris had protested the latter measure at the time but could grumpily admit she really had needed rest after the adrenaline pumping events of the day. “Guess mum and dad brought us home…”

Nymphadora groaned, opened her pale grey eyes that matched Luna’s, and turned over, “yeah, we’re home for the weekend again. Susan’s at Aunt Amelia’s and I think Greengrass went back with her folks too.” Hermione and Tracey had stayed at Hogwarts, since their parents weren’t in a position to easily collect them. “Also, once you’re back to 100%, you are in so much trouble for getting in mortal danger again Irey.”

“I don’t do it on purpose,” Iris mumbled, stretching her arms above her head. She sighed, “at least we can just relax today and not have to worry about anything serious for a bit.”

“Hmmm,” Luna’s soft airy voice cut in as the little blonde ball began to unfurl, “I would have thought dealing with Sirius was something that was on the agenda today.”

“Dragonspit!” Iris exclaimed, suddenly remembering what else had happened yesterday before a shade of the Dark Lord tried to feed her to a giant snake. While the trial had been a foregone conclusion, she’d thought she’d have the rest of the semester to prepare herself mentally for meeting her godfather. 

“Language,” Nymphadora teased, as if she didn’t have a far more ribald vocabulary than her little sister. The older girl shifted up and swung her feet off the bed, “don’t stress about it too much sis. He’s a bit shaky from Azkaban, but he’s a good guy. You know mum and dad wouldn’t have him in the guest room with Remus if he wasn’t.” Nymphadora had briefly reunited with the honorary uncle, technical cousin one time removed, she hadn’t seen since she was a toddler the night before. 

Iris let out a deep breath and started getting ready. She took the opportunity of being away from Hogwarts to eschew her uniform in favor of a dark plaid dress over a white collared shirt and some tall white socks. She retrieved a dollop of Sleakeazy’s to quickly tame her wild wavy red hair into something tangle free, and, after pausing to think it over a moment, clasped a simple jade pendant on a silver chain around her neck. It had belonged to her birth mother, one of the few items retrieved from the ruins of Godric’s Hollow. She kept it safe in her jewelry box most of the time, but it just felt right to wear it today.

While Nym was still helping brush Luna’s hair, Iris slipped out of her room and padded softly over to her parents’ room. Peering in, she saw her dad snoring under a thick quilt; she was confident he wouldn’t have let himself rest until everyone else was safe and sound, so she tip-toed away to let him get a little more hard-earned sleep.

Creeping down the stairs, her eyes fell upon a peculiar sight in the den. Her mum was there in her robe, reading the paper with a cup of tea at her side, and Uncle Remus was laid out on the couch snoring, but there was no sign of Sirius Black. Instead, there was a large black dog curled up by the fire, snoring almost in sync with Remus.

“Mum?” Iris called out as she stepped into the room.

“Iris,” Andromeda responded, quickly rising to her feet and crossing the room to pull her youngest into a hug. “I’m so glad you’re okay, sweetie. Don’t scare me like that.”

“Like I just told Nym, I don’t go looking for trouble,” she protested as she was crushed against her mother. “All I did this time was go to the bathroom.”

Behind the two hugging witches, the dark form of dog stirred awake and began to shift until Sirius Black was standing behind Andromeda, looking a bit hesitant. When she broke from her mum, Iris got her first good look at her godfather since she’d been an infant. Sirius had a handsome face, though it was gaunt to go with his emaciated frame. He wore what she recognized as one of her dad’s usual sets of work robes, and the chocolate-colored garment was obviously a bit oversized for the man. His hair was long and scraggly, but looked like it had recently been washed, and his beard wasn’t exactly neat, but it was trimmed a bit more than she would have expected.

“Um, hi,” Iris said softly.

“Hi,” Sirius croaked, his voice sounding hoarse. He coughed, “I’m, uh, that, is, I’m you’re…. What I mean is… Your Dad, he asked me and I’m so sorry that I-“His fumbled greeting was cut off by Iris pulling him into a tentative hug, something he hesitated before fully embracing, shedding a few tears onto her hair.

Iris didn’t immediately feel some magical connection with the man, but she wanted to. More than that, she could see how much he was hurting, and instinctively reached out to help. She remembered being a prisoner, alone and unwanted, until her mum came to rescue her, and she was more than ready to pay that kindness back to her godfather.

After a bit the pair calmed down, Remus awoke, and the morning progressed with Sirius and Iris slowly getting to know one another. Sirius still had a goblin’s hoard worth of things to catch up on from his time in Azkaban, but he mostly seemed interested in learning all the little minutiae of Iris’s life.

For her part, the Potter heiress couldn’t find it in herself to blame Sirius for leaving her with Hagrid, even if he clearly blamed himself for it. His intention hadn’t been to abandon her to Dumbledore for any long stretch of time, and hence to the Dursleys. Sure, it had been foolhardy to charge straight after Peter without explaining things to her mum or aunt, or anyone really, but she understood acting without thinking in that kind of situation.

“-so then I spot a flash of red hair sitting among the toadstools,” Nymphadora, who had since joined them along with Luna recounted, “and when I walked over there, there’s Iris trying to bribe a pixie with a loaf of honeyed bread!”

There was some general chuckling, and Iris pouted before protesting, “I just wanted it to sit still so I could sketch it, and I was eight!” The pixies had ended up stealing the bread and tangling her hair in knots before Nym scared them off.

Luna patted her arm, “don’t worry, Iris. I once did something very similar with a wrackspurt and a leg of curried goat.” While she had abandoned many of her father’s beliefs over the last year, as she steadily subjected them to an evidence-based examination, Luna still held out belief in some of the fantastic creatures that most of them assumed only existed in Xenophillius’s head.

Andromeda looked up at the grandfather clock, “well, it appears we’ve talked the morning away.” The Tonks matriarch couldn’t keep the smile off her face. Sure, it would never be exactly how it had been, but sitting by the fireplace with Sirius sharing stories brought back the happiest memories of her youth. “Siri, I know you have business at Gringotts today-“ Her cousin instantly pouted, not relishing responsibility even after all these years, “so why don’t you go ahead and head over with Remus to take care of it, and we’ll meet you in a few hours at Fortescue’s?”

The spoonful of sugar, or in this case ice cream, had the intended effect and a still clearly reluctant, but complying, Sirius rose to his feet. Remus clapped his friend on the back, “C’mon, Pads, I’ll make sure you don’t accidentally sign away your inheritance.”

Sirius snorted, “I never wanted their gold in the first place. Bloody hell, Moony, I’m a Lord now.” He shook his head in disbelief.

Andromeda rolled her eyes, “and I’m sure you’ll make the Wizengamot regret letting you take your seat five minutes into your first session. But, your name is on all the important paperwork and now that you’re a free man, you have a lot of pending affairs to wrangle. Oh, that reminds me, Dobby.”

At the mention of his name there was a loud CRACK and the house elf in question appeared. The little fellow had been freed from the Malfoys’ service the previous day, Andromeda completing the deal with her estranged sister literally seconds before word arrived of the disaster at Hogwarts.

The Crisis in the Chamber meant the information Dobby had was no longer particularly useful; the elf knew his hated master was involved or at least aware of the danger at the school, but he didn’t know or have evidence of the specifics, so Amelia bitterly admitted it wasn’t enough for an investigation and prosecution against Lucius. Still, the old family elf was finally free and he looked positively giddy as he appeared before the family.

“Misee Andromeda! Master Sirius! Little Missee Potter!” The elf cried. He was bouncing with excitement, already looking much better than the conflicted self-flagellating creature who had been stealing Iris’s mail all those months ago.

Andromeda turned to regard her daughters, “Iris, Nymphadora, your father and I already discussed this, but since it concerns the whole family, you deserve to have a voice in this. Dobby, go ahead.”

The elf cleared his throat and pulled himself up to his full, still very short, height, before bowing towards the Tonks sisters. “Missee Nymphadora, Missee Iris, Dobby is humbly requesting to be being the Tonkses family elf. Dobby is a very hardworking elf and will try his very best if you be wanting to have me.” There was clear nervousness in his squeaky little voice.

Iris and Nym shared a glance and the former shrugged while the latter grinned and said, “welcome to the family, Dobby,” making her own ears as long and floppy as she could, though they didn’t match the original. 

Dobby let out a squeal of glee before going around and thanking everyone in the room, somehow managing to shake Remus’s hand three times despite him not actually living in Megaron Hall. Ted had already worked out the details with the elf the night before after Andromeda laid down for a few winks, so the girls’ agreement was the last necessary step.

All house-elf contracts were essentially the same simple arrangement, the elf provided domestic service to the family, something they naturally enjoyed doing anyhow, in return for being allowed to absorb some of the magic that accumulated in a magical household. Among most European magicals, where house-elves were native, having one bound to your family was considered a real boon. That said, Ted had a few conditions before letting Dobby join them.

The first had been that Dobby would take a stipend monthly from the family to cover his expenses. In actuality it was essentially a salary but couched in terms that would be more amenable to a house elf for whom the word ‘pay’ was treated like a dirty phrase. The one day off a week he’d pushed the elf to take had also had to be described as ‘a period to recuperate so that he might have more energy for performing his duties during the other six days’. He’d also made clear this was a new arrangement, not a resumption of Dobby’s duties as a Black family elf, so there would be no implementing any of their traditions without Andromeda and Ted’s explicit say so. The final piece had been that Dobby was only to clean the common areas of the house, partially for privacy, but also because Ted felt his daughters keeping their own rooms tidy was important for building a sense of personal responsibility. 

As the elf popped off to excitedly start cleaning the muddy back door frame he’d noticed when he first arrived, and Sirius and Remus set off for the bank, Andromeda felt a little wistful. Dobby, Sirius and Remus, it all reminded her of her childhood for good and ill. She half expected to see teenage Bella walk through the doorway loudly arguing with her father, while Cissy trailed after, her nose in one of those romance novels she had so adored. ‘Cissy….’

While she’d successfully secured the elf’s freedom, her latest interaction with her little sister had been unpleasant enough to make Andromeda feel she could go another decade without another one. There had been the usual deluge of snide comments peppered throughout, and some winging about the situation, but the topper on the cake and the barb that made Andromeda almost hex Narcissa in the middle of the Ministry atrium had been when Narcissa told her to “take the elf and run home to that hovel you share with your nice fat mu-ggleborn husband.” It had been clear she’d been about to call him something else and switched to the more socially acceptable term mid-word.

Luckily, a combination of self-restraint and Fillius arriving seconds later with the news of what happened to Iris and Luna, had stopped the two Black daughters from escalating from harsh words to wands. 

Andromeda was a patient woman, and she tried to be a kind one, but insulting her family was the fastest path to transfigure her from a docile doe into an angry mama dragon. Setting aside the fact she loved her husband dearly and wouldn’t stand to hear anyone insult him, sister or no, the fact that Narcissa’s assessment of Ted Tonks was so categorically off the mark really got her hackles up.

‘For one, Ted’s not fat. If anything, he was pleasingly plump,’ Andi thought. She’d seen fat, Iris’s monster of a maternal uncle, Horace Slughorn, Molly Weasley. At worst her husband was stocky, and besides that she’d love him till the day she died even if the small spare tire from too many butterbeers kept growing. As a Healer she’d eventually worry about his health, but as his wife it wouldn’t change a thing.

The word that really ticked her off though was nice. It flattened one of Edward Tonks’s best characteristics down to nothing. Ted wasn’t nice; he was kind, and the difference between the two mattered. Plenty of people could be nice most of the time or when it served them, Nimue’s Bubbling Cauldron! She’d seen her aunt Walburga pretend to be sweet and pleasant when prospective suitors were attending a Black family event, and she’d never known a nastier old witch.

Ted cared about people; he had an open mind and a heart the size of a manticore. He could be stern if he really had to, but most of the time her genial Welsh groom was the infinitely caring and accepting wizard she’d wed. 

“Something on your mind, love?”

Andromeda turned to see the man she’d just been thinking about had awoken and come into the den when she wasn’t looking while Nym was leading Iris and Luna to the kitchen to scrounge up some lunch. She chuckled, “Sorry, babe, I totally spaced out there for a moment.”

Ted rubbed her shoulders, “After the last two days, it’s only natural to be tired. Go get some sleep and I’ll watch the girls.”

Andi yawned and rose, twisting about as she did so to meet her lips with Teds, enjoying a sleepy kiss. Breaking away she said, “okay, but wake me up in three hours. I promised Sirius we’d meet them for ice cream in the Alley and I don’t want to miss out on trying that new almond and beetlejuice flavor Florian’s been advertising.”

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Daily Prophet Offices, Diagon Alley, Later that Day

Barnabus Cuffe took a heavy drag on his cigar before letting out a long stream of purple and green smoke. The beleaguered editor-in-chief of the Prophet had his back to the wall of his office, trying to straighten it out and find a moment of peace amidst the tumult of the newsroom beyond his office door. Today’s edition had just left the massive owlery that sat atop the large Prophet complex, and they were already rushing to put tomorrow’s together.

Grunting slightly from the omnipresent minor pain in his joints, Barnabus walked over to his desk and sat down with a huff. While he loved his job, having aspired to journalism since he ran a student paper at Hogwarts, it was harder than it used to be. Circulation wasn’t what it once was and the editor couldn’t help but feel he was being squeezed at both ends. The paper was facing not inconsiderable challenges, which would be enough to keep him busy without having management breathe down his neck at the same time.

Three main problems had been dragging down the Prophet’s circulation, and thus its profits, for the last several years, and none of them seemed to be going anywhere. The first, and the one that annoyed him the most personally, were those blasted Wizard Wireless devices that were selling like gangbusters down the street. Modeled apparently after some muggle thingamabob, the ‘radios’ and the accompanying station based in Hogsmeade were steadily taking off. While they’d been introduced a few decades ago, most of the traditionalist wizarding community had been slow to adopt the devices, which transmitted news along with music and variety programs, but as the years went by, they were becoming more accepted.

Unfortunately for Barnabus, the success of the WWN meant some young witches and wizards canceling their Prophet subscription, content with the alternative. That was actually connected to the second larger problem, which was increasing competition across the board. In the last decade, quite a few other publications had either sprung up or expanded their operations, often poaching from Cuffe’s newsroom for staff when they did so. While there was no alternative British daily paper, some folks seemed content to rely on the weekly or monthly news mags, like Witch Weekly or The Gentleman Warlock. He even had more international competition ever since the Ministry reduced parchment tariffs. 

However, the biggest problem facing Magical Britain’s biggest publication was also the one he could do the least to combat: Peace. As uncomfortable as it might be to admit it, dangerous times made for exciting news and the horrors of Grindelwald followed by Voldemort had been boom times for the Prophet. Indeed, even while the total population had dwindled during the terror of He Who Must Not Be Named, the Prophet had hit their record subscriber count.

Personally, Barnabus found not having to deal with the prospect of being murdered in your home preferable, even if it meant their Galleon intake was a little leaner. However not everyone seemed to agree with him, including the new publisher, Pippa McMillan. The always impeccably dressed witch had inherited the position from her childless uncle Bedivere McMillan a little over a year ago, and she seemed to value the paper in direct relation to the number of Galleons it produced. 

Barnabus didn’t hate his new boss, but she didn’t have ink in her blood like her uncle had; everything with her was costs, growth and margins. Their weekly meetings were all about the numbers and how to grow them, seemingly by any means possible. All of it had combined to push the paper in an increasingly sensationalist direction to drum up interest, much to Barney’s chagrin. It was a dragon dung sandwich, but he had to swallow it.

‘And if it isn’t the embodiment of that dragon dung coming to give me another headache right now,’ he bemoaned to himself as he caught a glint of light bouncing off the pair of bejeweled spectacles bobbing their way towards him through the transparent glass office door. The eyepieces were gaudy enough on their own, but it was the witch they were attached to that gave him heartburn.

“Barney, you old coot!” Rita Skeeter immediately began badgering her boss as soon as she swung the door open, “why in the name of Merlin’s dusty gonads has my column been pushed to page 12! Page 12!”

Barnabus closed his eyes, partially to shield himself from the aggressive lime color of Rita’s blazer and the bright pink dress it was paired with. In the light Irish accent he’d never shaken despite nearly a century living in London he replied, “Black and Pettigrew pushed everything back, Skeeter. Ya might have missed it but the third most notorious criminal in the last century gettin’ released from Azkaban was fairly big news.” The whole paper had been wall to wall coverage of the two trials, and with Black’s only concluding yesterday, it was still dominating the front pages.

Rita rolled her eyes in an exaggerated fashion, “that’s yesterday’s news Barney, baby,” lecturing a wizard with decades and decades of experience in the game, “my column has some real juice. If what my sources are telling me is true, there’s been big developments in the Hogwarts petrification story.”

“And if you could actually name one of your sources, or better yet, get them on the record, ya might have something,” Barnabus retorted. He personally found the idea that the petrifications weren’t in some way related to Pettigrew unlikely, but he’d be open to another explanation if Rita could actually back up any of her rampant speculation. Frankly, if she didn’t fairly regularly manage to unearth an actual piece of spectacular dirt to seed her articles with, he’d have dropped the hammer on her a long time ago, profits be damned. 

Unfortunately, Rita’s column and occasional larger pieces had become one of the most consistently popular parts of the Daily Prophet. She’d started as, and in many ways still was, a gossip columnist, but steadily she’d moved into editorial and even sometimes main story work. Her sensationalist style moved copies, and her uncanny ability to ferret out the secrets of prominent members of their society demanded attention. Barnabus was still technically her boss, but her importance to the paper, and growing personal friendship with Pippa, meant Skeeter had a lot more latitude than pretty much any other member of the staff. 

“You play things far too safe, Barney dear,” Rita shot back snidely before plowing on to her next topic of conversation. “Speaking of Black, can you believe that oaf wouldn’t talk to me? There I was giving him the chance to set the record straight, and the brute basically growls at me while running out of the Ministry. Honestly, he was acting just like the criminal we know him as, dashing to the Floo the second he could. And Amelia Bones was right beside him of course. Yes, our dear head of the DMLE is going to be the subject of the next little expose I have planned and her scandalous relationship with the former prisoner. He may be free, but his time with the dementors may have made him just as demented and depraved as we always said he was.”

Barnabus tried to tune her out as he jotted a few quick notes down with his trusty hawk feather quill. He would like to get an interview with Black sooner rather than later, but he doubted Rita would be the one to get it. He would just have to hope her attempts wouldn’t sour the returned head of House Black against the Prophet as a whole.  Enchanter’s Quarterly getting the first post-prison interview with Sirius Black was just what he needed. 

Rita continued to natter on, complaining about every little thing. Eventually she finished with, “and I saw that Andromeda Black. You know-“

“Rita, this is all marvelously interesting,” Barnabus cut her off before she could rant about one of her favorite subjects of ire, the Tonks family. Unknown to Barnabus, most of Rita’s ire stemmed from the fact that the family’s excessively well-warded property had kept her from sneaking onto the grounds to spy on young Iris Potter. (It was actually Andromeda’s extensive insect-repelling charms, intended to protect the potion ingredients she grew herself, that stopped Rita from approaching in her beetle form, rather than the ones directed at hostile wizards.) “But I’ve got a lunch with Horace to get to.”

Skeeter grimaced before smiling slyly, “have fun with Slughorn, Barney darling. I have my own lunch with Pippa; I wonder which one will be more productive?”

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

That Evening, Bones Manor

The Ancestral Bones home was well kept, if a bit too large for its current number of occupants. It had been remodeled in what had been at the time modern Edwardian style. Amelia’s grandfather, whose son had sadly predeceased him due to a nasty case of Dragon Pox, leaving the older Bones and his wife to raise his two grandchildren, Amelia and Edgar, from an early age, had been an enthusiast for the grand baroque revivals then in vogue, even if many other old families scoffed at anything that contemporary being too muggle.

With a red brick and white marble edifice, a young Sirius Black had always found the home inviting, or at least as inviting as the home of one’s prospective in-laws could be. He’d never spent much time within its walls, but the few memories he had were pleasant ones. Back then, the younger generation working for the Order had tried to put some distance between themselves and their older family members, to keep them from being targeted by the Death Eaters, not that it had worked. Old Man Bones had caught a bone crusher curse in the chest after making a passionate speech decrying Voldemort in the Wizengamot, and his wife and son would also not survive the shadow war. 

He shook his head, very much like the dog he often was, trying to push the darker recollections from his mind and get a control of his racing pulse. Standing before the big front portico, he summoned his Gryffindor bravery and pulled the door chime.

Sirius was seriously beginning to worry that the Dementors had given him heart problems, considering how the organ had been pounding like a goblin miner’s hammer all day. From finally reuniting with his god daughter, to reactivating the Black accounts, to the sheer strangeness of finally being back with his friends and family after so many years alone in that cell, the day had been a whirlwind. In his darker moments he doubted he’d ever left Azkaban, and simply snapped and imagined a better world. ‘C’mon, you old mutt, you know that’s not true. You’re happy and the Dementors would never allow that.’

The morning and later afternoon spent with Iris, Nymphadora and, surprisingly, Xenophillius’s daughter Luna had gone better than he would have ever hoped. (It was strange that the little blonde was staying with the Tonks family, rather than her own, but his cousin had given him a look that told him she’d explain it to him later, and he’d held his tongue. ‘And Remus says you have no tact.’) He still felt like he’d missed so much, but they’d finally started filling in the gaps from the last 11 years.

Nymphadora was surprisingly close to how he remembered her, considering she’d been little more than a toddler when he’d been put away. The teen was feisty, headstrong, defiant but ultimately very caring. She reminded him of Andromeda and Amelia in equal measure, especially since she was apparently planning to follow her honorary aunt’s footsteps, but every now and then a hint of good old Ted would peek through. ‘After all, she didn’t become a diehard Harpies fan because of Andi.’

Iris on the other hand had been full of surprises. He felt a bit sheepish when he realized he’d long been picturing the girl he hadn’t seen since she was more or less an infant as a ginger female version of James, a charismatic prankster without an ounce of fear in him and an innate tendency towards heroism. In his defense, because he’d been forcibly removed from the girl’s life before she could really start displaying her own personality, so his memories of his chosen brother were all he had to go on.

The young Potter girl wasn’t just James reborn; somewhat obviously, there was a fair bit of Lily in her as well, but it wasn’t like she was a carbon copy of a young Lily Evans either, even if the resemblance between mother and daughter was pretty strong. While traits of Lily and James, and Andromeda and Ted for that matter, were a part of her, Iris was her own unique person Sirius was eager to finally get to know. 

The first surprise was the girl’s Hogwarts House; Sirius nearly choked on his warm cider when he found out his god daughter was a Claw, not a Lion, but he tried to show he was supportive. ‘Afterall, it’s not like she’s a snake.’ In his memory Ravenclaws were an odd bunch, a little too concerned with their books and occasionally a bit stuck up, but he had known a few good blokes among the Eagles, and he was sure Iris fell into that category.

As the previous fact had indicated, he realized the girl was a bit of a brainiac, even more so than Lily had been. James had been smart, but he and Sirius were slackers up till the last two years at Hogwarts, just coasting through their courses on their talent and bumming notes from (S) Peter and Remus. Iris was apparently an utter bookworm, and Andromeda had proudly boasted about her adoptive daughter’s nearly perfect marks.

Still, Iris had scoffed when her E in History of Magic came up, saying it wasn’t worth trying to get an O since Binns hardly actually taught anything, and often used outdated sources. It seemed her obsession was the learning itself, rather than her grades in and of themselves, a distinction Sirius probably wouldn’t have understood as a younger man.

There were sparks of James in her, to be sure. The incredible devotion to her family and friends was textbook Prongs, and, while she wasn’t exactly boasting about breaking rules in front of her mother, Sirius got the impression his god daughter was more comfortable with a little rule breaking than a young Evans had ever been. It was good at least to know Prongs’ old cloak wasn’t sitting on a shelf.

He'd spent most of the day with the girls, but he knew it would take much more time to bridge the gap from his stolen decade. Still, it was a start, and more than anything, his darkest fear, that Iris would reject him for not being there for her, that she wouldn’t want him in her life, hadn’t come to pass.

Now though, he was about to walk into a meeting just as important as the one he’d had with Iris earlier that day, and he could only pray to the gods it went as well. His goddaughter wasn’t the only red-haired girl he’d failed that day he went running off after the rat like a wild idiot. Susan Bones should have grown up under his protection, with an uncle to care for her alongside her auntie, and he was nervous as hell to reacquaint himself with the girl.

‘Plus, if she decides she hates you, you can kiss kissing Amy goodbye’, Sirius moped as the big bell chimed. Susan was Amelia’s priority and Sirius understood that. If he made her uncomfortable, or she just didn’t like him hanging around, it would put a serious damper on his hopeful rekindling of his relationship with his one-time fiance.

He took a deep breath and shook himself, ’that’s not the important thing right now,’ he chastised himself. ‘Susan was basically supposed to be your kid and you weren’t there for her. Making it up to her is the priority.’

The door swung open and Sirius couldn’t help muttering a soft “wow.” He’d tried his best to look presentable for that night, covering for his still emaciated frame and gaunt features as much as he could. Iris had insisted on taking him to get some robes that fit properly while they were in Diagon Alley, even paying Madame Malkin herself. Sirius had tried to wave her off, considering he had just come from Gringotts and confirmed he was now a VERY rich man, but the short redhead just gave him a flat look that was trademark Andromeda, and he’d let her have her way.

The point was, he was wearing some nice properly fitted crimson robes over a clean white oxford, and a pair of pressed slacks; he had combed his still ragged hair to the best of his ability, and Remus had trimmed his beard into a respectable goatee, but he couldn’t hold a candle to how Amelia looked. 

Outside of the Ministry, Amy let her hair down and stopped hiding behind the monocle. She’d had to fight to be taken seriously in the DMLE at first, and the habit of trying to present a bit older than she really was had never gone away. After all, Amy was still quite a young woman by wizarding standards and likely was only able to ascend to such a senior position at her age because of how decimated the department had been after Voldemort. It had certainly been why Fudge underestimated her enough initially to agree to the appointment.

Standing in front of Sirius now, she was a vision. Her coppery red hair, a fair few shades lighter than Iris’s, tumbled down her bare shoulders, and the off the shoulder cap sleeve dress with a laced-up cream bodice and dark golden knee length flare skirt she wore almost made Sirius transform back into Padfoot so he could properly drool.

“Hello, Siri,” Amelia said softly. The emotions were still tender between them, after their reunion in the Ministry holding room. The crisis at Hogwarts had stopped them from continuing to hash things out, but Amy had sent a midnight owl inviting him to join them that evening so he could meet Susan and they could continue to talk. It was pretty clear they both still loved each other, but the feelings of betrayal, the pain of Sirius’s abandonment and Amelia’s isolation, and just all the time spent apart was something that would take time to heal. 

“Hiya, Amy,” Sirius replied, gruffer than he intended, “that dress is very … fetching.”

Amelia rolled her eyes, “Sirius I’ve heard you say dirtier things than you’d find in Edgar’s old Blotus’s Book of Blue Humour, and that got him two weeks of detention when McGonagall found it. You don’t have to pretend to suddenly be polite and proper.”

“I can be polite!” Sirius protested as he crossed the threshold. However, when he drew closer to Amelia he whispered, “that dress makes you look like a Veela who shampooed her hair with Amortentia, and you know what it makes me want to do, but I’m really trying to make a good impression with the kid.”

Amelia just smirked and closed the door. Inside she felt younger than she had in years, excited even after all this time and the Dementors she could still get that kind of reaction from Sirius, but she kept a lid on her emotions, because Sirius was right. They’d hopefully have lots of time for that when they were both ready, but tonight was about Sirius getting to know Susan, and if anything, she was more anxious about it going well than Sirius was.

She led him through the old house till they came to the den, where the girl in question was waiting. Susan looked uncharacteristically nervous, sitting on a loveseat with her hands in her lap. She wore a comfortable maroon sweater and a dark green woolen pleated skirt. For Sirius, while he saw Edgar and Tilly in the girl for sure, he couldn’t help but notice how much the girl resembled her aunt and the portrait of Amelia and Edgar’s mother, who Sirius had never gotten to meet.

Before Sirius could do more than step into the room, Susan hopped to her feet and marched right up to him, her expression flipping from nervous to determined in a moment. She stopped right in front of him, and even though she was a good deal shorter than the 6 foot even Sirius, he felt mildly intimidated by her suddenly stern demeanor. (Years of getting in trouble with McGonagall had given the old dog a Pavlovian response of fear to redheads who looked like they were about to lecture him.)

“I’m Susan,” Susan said simply, dipping her head in the tiniest hint of the curtsey that was technically expected from a girl when members of noble families greeted one another. “But obviously you already know that. I’m going to cut straight to the point: I feel absolutely horrible about what happened to you and want to do everything I can to help you recover. I don’t blame you for the results of Pettigrew’s treachery, and while it would have been nice to grow up with an uncle, I’m not going to let what happened cast a dark shadow on the future.”

Sirius stood a bit dumbstruck, and to his later embarrassment, his mouth literally hung open a bit. (Actually, after so long in his dog form, he kept having to remind himself that sitting around with your mouth open and tongue hanging out wasn’t exactly appropriate with humans.) Everything Susan had just said was really positive, almost absurdly so, but her tone was sharp and clipped, and she hadn’t blinked once as she stared him down.

Susan kept going, “I sincerely hope we can have a good relationship in the months and years to come, and I promise you I’m not going to judge you for your past. However,” suddenly the timbre of her voice grew even more severe, leaving absolutely no doubt about the seriousness of her words, “Iris Potter is my best friend and Aunt Amelia is my mum. There are literally no two other people I love more in the whole world. I know it wasn’t entirely, or even mostly your fault, but the last decade hurt them too.”

“Susan,” Amelia tried to interrupt, putting a hand on her child’s shoulder. She was touched, especially since Susan rarely called her mum out loud, but she didn’t want the younger Bones woman to be inconsiderate of the utter nightmare Sirius had been living for over 12 years.

“I’m not in any way trying to minimize your own pain, or the gross injustice that it was,” Susan plowed on. “I know you need time to heal, and I want to do everything I can do to help. It’s just, before we all sit down, have some mulled wine, start sharing stories and laugh about the time Auntie locked her department issued keys in a box charmed to only be openable by those same keys, I need you to understand.” Susan took a deep breath and her voice finally cracked a bit, betraying the vulnerable girl beneath the façade she was putting up, “Auntie and Iris need you to be the good man I think you are and I need you to be there for them. Can you do that?”

Sirius took a deep ragged breath, ignoring the tears that welled from his eyes. After the third year in the cell, he’d thought the Dementors had taken the last of his tears no matter how depressed he became, but his emotions were now well and truly awake. He leaned down to look Susan in the eye, nodded, and made the promise he’d spend the rest of his life trying to keep, 

“I’ll always be there from now on, for all three of you.”

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

Hogwarts Library, Restricted Section, April

Spring had fully sprung and Iris Potter had returned to school. While that day in the Chamber had felt thoroughly climactic, there was still almost half of term to get through and then exams after that.

Returning to school had meant a renewal of the stares and whispers she’d lamentably gotten used to in her young life, but this time it wasn’t focused solely on Iris, spreading to the others who had been in the Chamber as well. Everyone knew the broad strokes, a handful of students had been abducted by a dark wizard hiding in the Chamber of Secrets to presumably be fed to his pet basilisk, but nobody knew the full truth besides those who’d been there and their close friends and family.

That secrecy was largely there to protect Ginny from recrimination for actions that weren’t truly hers, but it also served to avoid a panic over the claimed identity of the spirit at fault. Nobody wanted to invoke Voldemort if they didn’t have to, and the Ministry officials from the DMLE had agreed that, with the diary destroyed, the danger was ended for now, and there was no sign that the real Voldemort had returned.

Iris wasn’t so satisfied. While she was happy to be alive, and that her friends were unhurt, the unanswered questions swirling around the event were bothering her, which was what brought her to the restricted section under cloak that particular night. The events in the Chamber were too disturbingly similar to the confrontation with Quirrell during her first year for her to rest easy.

While the Headmaster had been happy to opine on who they had encountered both times, he had been frustratingly vague as to what the shades of Voldemort Iris had twice stumbled upon actually were. Even extremely powerful wizards didn't simply persist after death like that; at best they would leave a ghost and the greatest of those spiritual afterimages were far less than the wraiths she'd encountered.

A ghost was utterly immaterial, unable to affect the physical realm beyond giving a slight chill. More to the point, despite first impressions, a ghost was not the same entity as the witch or wizard that spawned it. They were flawed copies that tended to fixate only on especially strong emotional memories of their progenitors, most often their death. There were variations and exceptions of course, but not to the extent that could explain the Diary Spirit or the creature on the back of Quirrel’s head.

There was also the unsettling implication that, unlike the natural occurrence of ghosts, the Diary was constructed intentionally. It seemed very unlikely that Voldemort had created something so powerful by mistake or as a byproduct of something else, and she’d fixated on the little book as the key. That artifact had led Iris down the path of the only obviously similar creation: magical portraiture. Unfortunately, after consulting over a dozen texts, that path turned into a dead end. 

Allowing for individual variation, magical portraits worked within certain basic rules. If they depicted a fictitious person, they would be active from the moment the enchantment was finished but would only know that which they had been instilled with by the artist. If they depicted a real witch or wizard, they would be passive and not speak until the person they showed passed on, acting almost like an artificial ghost.

Even then, they wouldn’t know all the subject of the painting had known at the time of death. Instead, they would have an imperfect copy of their memory up to the moment the painting was done, and only then if the witch or wizard involved their own magic in the creation of the portrait. That was why you couldn’t just paint a picture of someone and interrogate it in lieu of the real person.

Sure, there were reports of individual examples that bent those rules like the portraits of former headmasters that appeared without the need for a painter, but even those only varied slightly. Most damning though was the fact that it needed to be a portrait. For the magic to work, the symbolic connection between a pictorial depiction of the subject and the witch or wizard was essential, so it couldn’t be reworked to function with a plain diary as far as she could figure.

Frustrated after many nights of research, she shoved the books she’d been studying to understand the diary away from her. (What she didn’t know was that Albus had already removed the books that would lead her in a different direction of research, pretty much stripping the library of every text that mentioned the manipulation of the soul.) If she couldn’t discover the nature of the opponent, the next best option was to better prepare herself for what she considered their inevitable next encounter.

While she'd be eternally thankful for Daphne and Susan coming to her rescue in the chamber, Iris hated having been so helpless. A monster that had already taken so much from her, a monster that shouldbe dead had her entirely at his mercy and she couldn't do anything. He had been going to kill Luna right in front of her and all she could do was watch.

What's worse was this was the second time in as many years something like this had happened. Would this happen every year? The thought of living her life like that further depressed her mood but strengthened her resolve to do something about it.

It was this realization that such evil would likely strike at her and her loved ones again, and a desire to be prepared for it that had her scouring through a wide array of tomes, looking for something to jump out at her as a new path of study. Her work with atmospheric charms was continuing apace, but she wanted something more. Eventually she settled on trying to correct for the biggest gap in her defenses she’d identified during the fight in the Chamber. 

Just as she'd first studied up on the Lightning Calling charm after encountering the Troll’s magic resistant hide, she started researching for magic she could learn that would have been useful after Riddle had restrained her and Luna. The problem was, there wasn't a lot of instantaneous magic you could work without a wand and bound as she'd been.

Some texts talked about essentially training the sort of spontaneous wandless magic kids tended to cause as their cores developed, but it didn't seem that promising an approach. In addition to being horribly inefficient in terms of magic used, it was difficult to get consistency of any sort, and you might as easily turn your teeth blue as do what you were trying to do. There was a reason wands had been such an important and groundbreaking development. 

Based on the writings of Philomena Urqhart, training to perform minor wandless magic like simple levitation was possible but it took years and years to master. Iris wasn't afraid of hard work but she needed a new arrow in her quiver faster than that.

Runes seemed a more fruitful field to look at, since they could be used to produce effects without a wand and were pretty versatile. She could etch a runic formula into a ring, or stitch it into her robes, to be activated in an emergency. It was definitely something to look at but Runes was a complicated field and one Iris hadn't even begun studying yet, though she fully intended to take the elective starting next year.

‘Maybe I could borrow Nym’s notes from last year to get a head start,’ she mused as she slipped another volume from the shelves and pulled it under her cloak. It was dark leather tome, obviously quite old, with the grandiose title A Moste Superb and Complete Treatise on the Art of Transfiguration by thee Druidess Cliodne, written out in peeling golden letters.

Flipping through the book she weighed whether to burn the last of the midnight oil reading it. On the one hand it looked fascinating, a trait it shared with much of the rest of Hogwarts superb collection, but she only had so much time before she needed to sneak back up to Ravenclaw Tower. If Penny discovered she was missing from her bed in the morning, both her Ravenclaw senior and her sister would kill her. Evil specters attacking her tended to bring out their overprotective tendencies

Dumbledore's display had impressed upon her the incredible potential of Transfiguration as a field, but it didn't get around the wand issue. She really should be keeping her research focused on her original goal of having a backup plan for when she was disarmed or surprised.

She was about to close the book when she saw a particular diagram and realized the answer had been right in front of her all along. There on the page was a medieval illustration of Cliodne turning into an albatross and back again, all without casting any spell at all.

Her first father had done it. Her godfather had done it. Merlin’s salty kidneys, even the rat bastard had managed to figure it out. Iris Potter was going to become an Animagus.

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

Hogwarts Quidditch Pitch, Very Early Morning, Start of May

Katie Bell held her heavy woolen cloak tight against herself as she marched down towards the Quidditch Pitch. Despite it being May, the promised warmth of Spring had yet to make itself known on these blustery Scottish mornings. With Oliver’s maniac training schedule, somewhat trying to make up for a lackluster seeker with constant chaser drills, she was well accustomed to trooping down to the pitch before the sun was in the sky.

Today, however, she wasn’t on her way to practice for once. The regular House season had already ended anticlimactically with Hufflepuff’s victory. No, instead she was responding to an odd request from her girlfriend’s, Merlin, she was still giddy to be able to call Tonks that, little sister.

Iris apparently wanted to improve her broom handling, and asked Katie to give her some pointers. It was surprising since the young Ravenclaw hadn’t really expressed much interest in brooms or Quidditch before, but Katie was more than happy to help. She and Iris were already on good terms, more or less friends in their own right, but she really wanted her girlfriend’s family to like her, so she was keen to keep making a good impression.

‘And helping with flying is absolutely something I can do.’ Not to toot her own horn, but Katie was the highest scoring chaser at Hogwarts, two years running. According to Tonks, Iris wasn’t totally incompetent on a broom, unlike Neville or Hermione from Katie’s own House. So, the lesson shouldn’t be too bad.

Apparently, the Potter girl just tended to have a bit of a disconnect between herself and the broom, getting frustrated when it didn’t maneuver like she pictured in her head. Katie figured all she really needed was more time in the air to get the hang of it.

When Katie stepped out onto the Pitch, Iris was already waiting for her down on the field, though, oddly, she didn’t have a broom with her. Indeed, Iris was sitting in a chair she must have dragged down onto the field, opposite another empty one. Her large python that sometimes hid in her robes was draped ostentatiously around her shoulders, & hissing something in her ear.

Katie approached cautiously, “Hiya, Iris, what’s uh, what’s going on? Do you need to borrow a broom?”

“No, and the fact you believed I wanted flying lessons was your first mistake,” Iris said coolly. “Please, take a seat Ms. Bell, we have much to discuss.”

Katie slowly lowered herself onto the offered chair, more than a bit thrown by Iris’s uncharacteristically cold demeanor. If it weren’t for the fact, she knew the threat of the Heir had been ended, she’d have been halfway worried Iris was the one possessed.

Iris tickled her pet snake with one hand while stating bluntly, “it has come to my attention, despite her attempts to hide it, that you are intending to court my elder sister, and I felt we should discuss certain ‘expectations’ that come along with that.”

‘Ah, well there goes the plan to keep things discreet,’ Katie thought ruefully. She wasn’t that broken up about it; successfully dating Nymphadora Tonks was one of her proudest accomplishments. The pair had just wanted to wait until the drama with Tonks’ freshly exonerated uncle Sirius, and the fracas around the Chamber had a chance to die down before going public.

Instantly Katie relaxed a bit as she realized what this was: Iris’s attempt at a shovel talk. She couldn’t help it; Katie knew the other witch was trying to be intimidating but given the redhead was two years younger, well under 5 foot tall, all of six stone and frankly cute as a button in Katie’s view, it wasn’t really having the intended effect.

Trying to repress a grin, she inquired, “oh, and what does courting the first daughter of the Tonks family entail? Are there some arcane Black traditions that come into play now that Mrs. Black-Tonks is back in the line of inheritance?” Iris and Nym’s mum had been readmitted officially into the Black family just last week, leading to the new hyphenate. Not that she really intended to use the new name outside of certain formal occasions; Andromeda was quite happy to be a Tonks.

“Oh, I’m sure there are,” Iris agreed off handedly, “but that’s hardly what’s important here. You’re dating my sister and I’d be quite protective of her, whatever her last name happens to be, Tonks, Potter, Black or even Bell.”

That elicited a blush from the normally bold Katie. “Iris we’ve just started dating, and we’re teenagers; it’s not like we’re getting married.”

Iris’s eyes narrowed, “oh, you’re saying you’re not serious? Is Nym just some fling to you?” Sebastian hissed lowly along with this mistress.

“What, no! Of course we’re serious,” Katie sputtered. She might not want to get down on one knee tomorrow, but she did daydream about her and Tonks going the distance. “Who do you take me for, Iris?”

“Hmm, one can never be too sure,” Iris replied airily, “I’ve read the Prophet and I know what you Quidditch players can be like. A witch in every port and all that.”

“I’m not Conner Harthorn,” Katie said firmly, referencing the Scottish seeker famous for his philandering, “I like Tonks a lot and intend to be good to her.”

“That’s good to hear,” Iris drawled, “because if you didn’t, indeed, if you ever hurt her, you will find the consequences most unpleasant.”

Katie couldn’t help smirking a little, “is this where you threaten to hex me into a matchbox? No offense, Iris, and it’s totally moot since I’d never knowingly hurt her, but I’d be more afraid of what your mum or Tonks herself would do in that situation.”

If Iris was insulted by the dismissal of her hexing skills (to be fair she was only a second year) she didn’t show it, instead keeping the same almost eerie calm she’d had since the odd conversation began. “Oh please, Nym likes you far too much for that to even be a remote possibility, and mum needn’t sully her hands. As the sister, it’s my duty to defend Nymphadora’s honor, something you’ll find I’m quite capable of doing, even if you currently can best me in a duel.”

Katie was about to interject that Iris had been reading too many Arthurian Romances, a branch of literature quite popular with young witches, when Iris let out a low hissing sound. The hiss was then answered by not only the snake on her shoulders, but by dozens and dozens of others.

Looking around in alarm, Katie realized that a small army of serpents had surrounded them while they talked. The Quidditch pitch had turned into a nest of vipers, and she was in the middle of it. (The collection of snakes was actually mostly grass snakes with the odd adder, but Katie was hardly an expert.)

“These are some of my friends,” Iris said casually, “and they are quite keen to assist me in making your life thoroughly unpleasant if you should behave as anything less than a woman of honor towards Nymphadora. If you choose to break up, or have the odd fight, that’s fine, but you will not cheat on her, cause her pain or break her heart. Are we clear?”

“Crystal,” Katie replied while her knuckles went white clutching the edge of her seat. She’d found out Iris was a Parselmouth when their little group had been filled in on the events in the Chamber of Secrets a few weeks ago, but it was a hippogriff of a different color to see the rare talent demonstrated right in front of her. 

It was, admittedly, not a little bit intimidating, even if the whole experience was unnecessary. Katie would hex herself into a matchbox before hurting Nymphadora. 

All at once the strange demeanor of the young Potter vanished like a cloud banished by a strong gale. Smiling brightly, the redhead sprung to her feet, rushing over to pull Katie up into a hug. “Welcome to the family!” She chirped.

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

Platform 9 ¾ , End of Term, June

Daphne parted from her friends after exiting the train with the usual tinge of sadness, but also a certain amount of relief. She had held herself together and held her head high like a proper Greengrass, but the encounter with the basilisk back in March had shaken her more than she’d let on and she was happy to be returning to the safety of her home and her family. 

Speaking of her family, her mother and father were both there to collect her, breaking away from a quiet conversation with Iris’s parents to walk over to her. Her father, poorly prepared to blend into the surrounding muggle train station in embroidered black robes and a top hat, had a troubled expression on his face, but her mother, wearing a more easily passing white silk blouse and pleated black skirt, had a wide smile on her face.

“Daphnekins,” her mum called to her as she pulled the younger Greengrass into a hug, her worry over her daughter for the past year overwhelming her normally impeccable sense of propriety. 

Daphne returned the embrace but protested, “mother, there are people about.” Delilah reluctantly released her daughter. The two women fell into step along with the family patriarch and made a more dignified exit from the wizarding train platform.

“Astoria didn’t wish to join you?” Daphne asked with a raised eyebrow after they passed through the false wall that divided the platform from the rest of Kings Cross. Her little sister had been jumping with excitement when she’d returned from her first year but wasn’t in evidence today.

“She is currently grounded for the week,” Samson informed her, “she tried turning her broccoli into candy twice after being told she had to eat her vegetables. The resulting small explosion left the dining room smelling of licorice for days before Mimsy could get the smell out.”

“Perhaps someone should keep better track of their wand,” Delilah teased her husband.

“I’m just impressed she even managed to get the smell right,” Daphne opined of her 11 year old sister, who would be starting Hogwarts next year.

The family made their way out of the train station, earning a few curious glances from passing muggles for Samson’s attire. They eventually stepped into an alley and her father held Daphne’s hand tightly, before the squeezing sensation of apparation popped them out on the doorstep of the Greengrass estate. 

A few hours later, after visiting with the grumpy Astoria who was confined to her room outside of meals and necessities until the weekend, Daphne joined her parents in the eastern drawing room, which had afternoon sunlight streaming through the big bay window for light.

“How are you holding up?” Her father asked her, setting his newspaper to the side.

“I’ve handled the situation appropriately and without dishonoring our house,” Daphne replied proudly. “Malfoy tried to take advantage of the situation in the Den, but considering he had been bluffing that he knew more of what was going on than he truly did, it was easy to make him look the fool yet again. Our faction has gained ground, and my personal following remains strong. I expect by our fourth year, with Flint presumably graduating, I will be able to pressure the House into having proper Quidditch tryouts, which Draco will inevitably lose and then tumble further from favor.”

“Daphne-“ Her mum began but Daphne cut her off.

“I know you’re going to point out how close Professor Snape is with Lord Malfoy, but I believe that can be overcome. The headmaster has suppressed many of the details of what happened in the Chamber, but the general impression that I confronted the Monster of Slytherin and came out unscathed has bolstered my reputation somewhat. There are of course the purists who supported the harming of muggleborns, and the diehards who think our Founder was right to leave the beast as a protector of the school, but on the whole the accomplishment has been met with respect.”

“Daphne,” Her father said more emphatically, before the normally formal and taciturn man showed her one of the rare tender expressions that only ever graced his face in private. “I had every confidence you’d handle the political aspects of the situation adeptly and commend you on your ambitious plan to sideline Lucius’s whelp, but your mother and I are concerned about how you are emotionally. I know we talked about it in the direct aftermath, but I want to be sure you are recovering.”

“Oh,” Daphne said softly, letting her own walls down. She shifted slightly in the black leather loveseat. “I’m doing okay, papa.” She’d hardly ever used the childish term for her father since she’d turned 8. She glanced between him and her equally concerned mum, “it was frightening, I won’t lie about that. The spirit controlling Weasley was bad enough but,” she shuddered, “the basilisk was far worse than any dragon.”

She looked towards her Dragonologist mother, “with them, I know they’re dangerous, but they’re not innately hostile. They’re animals; they can be territorial, or protective of their eggs, or hungry, but they aren’t malicious. There was something almost human about the malice of that thing.”

Delilah rose from her seat and strode over to sit next to Daphne and put an arm around her. “Well, a dragon is a natural creature, darling, and the monster you confronted wasn’t.”

Samson stroked his mustache, “loathe as I am to employ that overused term, the creation of Herpo’s Serpent is Dark Magic. I am very proud that you were able to face it so early into your education.” 

Daphne scoffed, “I did little more than run, cower and try to survive. If the Headmaster had not arrived, I suspect I too would have been petrified or worse.”

The head of their noble house harrumphed, “Daphne, I demanded a thorough accounting of the whole incident from the headmaster and managed to acquire a copy of the DMLE incident report,” it paid to be well connected, “if you hadn’t acted decisively and practically, Dumbledore would not have been summoned in the first place.”

Delilah squeezed her into her side, “not to diminish your friend Susan’s bravery, but you were the one who kept a cool head and are responsible for saving Iris and the other students.”

“Yes, Iris Potter,” Samson grumbled, “she seems to be quite the summoning charm for trouble.”

His daughter stared him down, “Father, you are far too wise and remarkable a man to misattribute the blame for this situation. Is Iris somewhat foolhardy when it comes to magical fauna, yes, but not to the point of folly. More to the point, she did nothing to embroil herself personally with the Petrification Crisis, and while she was the one to theorize the culprit could be a basilisk, she did not purposefully go looking for it.”

Her mother raised her own eyebrow at her husband, “after all, dear, you just said you read the reports. The poor girl just went to the bathroom and got attacked, hardly something she can be blamed for.” Over the last year Delilah had started meeting Andromeda for tea or drinks semi-regularly, reconnecting with her old friend, and wouldn’t have her husband unfairly besmirching her daughter.

Samson sighed, but let it go. His daughter and wife were right, and he knew that, but he was just so frustrated with the situation at Hogwarts over the last year that his grumpiness was difficult to keep in check. Still, he could admit his daughter’s close friend wasn’t to blame for what had occurred; he couldn’t even really blame the Weasley child, but there was someone he did feel comfortable directing his ire at.

“Your point is well taken,” he replied while pulling his pipe from his pocket and nonverbally summoning a small flame to the tip of his wand to light it. “However,” he let out a puff of fluorescent green smoke, “I will be having strong words with Arthur Weasley the next time I see him. Allowing a dark artefact that powerful to get mixed in with his child’s school things? When you consider he’s supposed to be an expert with enchanted items, it’s a serious oversight.”

From there the conversation started to shift into a discussion of the goings on at the Ministry, and what effect the news from Hogwarts might have on things. Afterall, pretty much every member of the Wizengamot and every worker at the Ministry had attended the school and most had relatives currently enrolled. 

Daphne mostly just listened and absorbed while her father decided that, while the time it took to get to the bottom of the petrifications may have shaken confidence in Dumbledore, he’d managed to pull the rabbit out of his hat by personally ending the threat before Malfoy’s shadow campaign to have him ousted could properly build up steam. 

Fudge was, as ever, eager to sweep it under the rug. For a Minister who’d run on a platform somewhere between “Back to Normal! And Let the Good Times Roll!” he was dogmatic about presenting wizarding Britain under him as happy, safe and prosperous. News like the Pettigrew/Black affair and the Petrification Crisis happening in the span of a year had him going into overdrive to try and smooth things over.

It actually was true that Britain’s recovery had continued under Fudge, and things were generally improving year after year. The population still hadn’t returned to where it was before Voldemort’s killing and the exodus of fearful magicals out of the isles that it caused, but best estimates had it hovering around 90,000 witches and wizards now, from a supposed low of 60,000 thirteen years ago. They didn’t follow the muggle practice of taking a census, and many of their kind liked to be off the floo network, so to speak, but it was still encouraging. 

Businesses had been rebuilt, and wounds were healing, but Samson didn’t exactly credit Fudge with that. “That gladhander should have been a Minister’s pressman, and never held the office himself.” 

“Didn’t you vote for him,” Delilah asked.

“Only the first time, as you well know,” Samson responded. They didn’t have anything like term limits, but there had been a call for a new election five years ago by Augusta Longbottom that Samson had supported, but Fudge had enough votes to stave it off and avoid another popular election; the Minister of Magic was the only popularly elected post in their government on a national level, with non-noble Wizengamot seats having their own election schedules for the various regions they represented. 

“Considering Fudge’s only serious opponent was the man who we all just discovered through Lord Black into Azkaban for over a decade without a trial,” Daphne drawled, inserting herself into the conversation, “I think father made a wise decision.” Barty Crouch Senior had lost to Fudge in what at the time was seen as an upset, but in retrospect it seemed a wise decision.

They talked into the evening hours, before a tired Daphne finally returned to her room and her bed, the familiar Diricawl down mattress always a bit more comfortable than the one she had in the dormitories. That night, the Greengrass heiress slept easier than she had in months.

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

Summer Holidays, July, Megaron Hall

Summer Holidays had thankfully finally arrived, letting the students of Hogwarts scatter back over the countryside for the summer. While the final months had been relatively incident free, barring the Lockhart trouble of course, after a year spent living with the anxiety of possibly getting petrified, most students were glad to take a break from the castle. 

“No effing way!” Nymphadora blurted out at breakfast one morning. The currently green haired girl had been waking up atypically early since school ended, anxiously awaiting her OWL results with the morning post, and since she was up already, was reading the Prophet. 

“Language,” Andromeda scolded tiredly. She’d been up quite late the night before, working to save a heavily cursed patient at St. Mungos. She was no longer an attending healer at the hospital but had been called in as a specialist to assist. A poor boy from Great Hangleton had been exploring in the woods and came into contact with something that seriously affected him; in the end they managed to save his life, but she expected the boy would live the rest of his life in the Janus Thickey ward.

Nymphadora’s sister skipped into the room, the last one to awake that morning. Sirius and Remus had left early to set up the Shrieking Shack, which Sirius had apparently impulsively purchased, for the full moon happening that night. (With her brewing the Wolfsbane potion, Andromeda had tried to convince Remus to just stay at Megaron Hall, but he’d insisted.) Ted had already dashed off to work, meeting with a pair of Georgian clients who refused to adjust themselves to local time, and Luna had, for the first time since summer began, actually slept at the Rookery, though Andromeda fully expected the blonde would be coming back through the floo before the day was done. 

Iris, still clad in her pajamas mumbled, “wha’s so strange, Nym?”

Tonks held up the newspaper, reading a few lines aloud, “after a triumphant year teaching at his alma mater, Hogwarts, the illustrious Gilderoy Lockhart has decided his incredible wisdom can’t be confined to one nation alone. He announced today that, rather than returning to Hogwarts, he will be taking a post at the Durmstrang Institute in the fall, giving him a chance to brush up on his Danish, in which he is of course fluent…yada yada, you get the point.”

“Seerioushly?” Iris asked like she was talking with her mouth full, despite not yet having touched her wheatcakes and bacon. There had been no official announcement, but it was pretty common knowledge around the castle that Lockhart had been dismissed after it was discovered he was funneling the stipend intended for securing school supplies and magical creatures to use in DADA classes, into his own pocket. He’d actually been turfed out of the castle three weeks before exams; Professor Dumbledore had stepped in to cover the classes, and consequently taught the students more in the last three weeks than most had learned in the last year. 

Tonks shook her head in disbelief, before saying, “I guess it’s probably better for their chances of finding a new applicant for the position if people think Gilderoy left of his own will, but still. Merlin bless Durmstrang next year.” She huffed and her hair wilted to a mousier brown, “I just hope sitting in that idiot’s class didn’t screw up my DADA OWL.”

Iris rolled her eyes, carefully chewing on a rasher of bacon. She swallowed and said, “Oh please, you’ve got no-shing to worry about.”

Nymphadora flicked a piece of toast at her sister, who dodged it with aplomb. “Like you have any room to talk. You and the rest of the children already have your results.”

“I am not a shild!” Iris protested with a pout, something that would have come across better if it wasn’t said with the same weird lisp she’d had all morning.

It was true though, that those students not taking the Ministry administered OWLS and NEWTS had already received their exam results, and Iris had gotten top marks as usual. The younger Tonks sister’s report card was mostly O’s with just the odd E in Herbology, Astronomy, and History of Magic.

=

Hours later, Andromeda hesitated outside Iris’s door. It was mid-afternoon and Nymphadora had decided to stroll down to the village, while Ted had yet to return from the office, sending an owl that he’d be running late for dinner that night. It was the ideal time for a one-on-one conversation with Iris

Andromeda knew something was going on with her daughter and had a sinking suspicion as to what it was. Iris had been quiet all day, almost silent and when questioned on anything, mumbled a monosyllabic reply. Couple that with her discovery that she was missing a few mandrake leaves from her storeroom that afternoon, and it wasn’t hard to figure out Iris had something dangerous under tongue. 

‘I should have seen this coming’, Andromeda chided herself. With all the stories of James and Sirius’s escapades in their animal forms that he regaled the family with every other meal, it was only natural the incredibly curious, and at times foolhardy in her pursuit of magical knowledge, Iris would become interested in Animagus’s and think it was a good idea to conduct the ritual herself. 

‘Maybe I should have jumped in when Siri was talking to stress how absurdly lucky Pettigrew was not to get stuck as an unthinking animal forever, if the ritual went even slightly wrong.’  The fact that the Marauders had successfully completed it as Hogwarts students was probably what gave Iris the idea, she could do it too.

The ritual wasn’t that complicated when you got down to it, though Andromeda wasn’t sure where exactly Iris had found a copy. She herself kept the relevant potioneering texts locked away under enchanted locks, but perhaps Hogwarts wasn’t so on top of security in the restricted section. 

Basically, there were two ways to become an Animagus, often colloquially referred to as the American and the European methods. She didn’t know the specifics of the former, but she did know the American method originated with native wizards and involved a long process over many years, and an intense mastery of transfiguration magic. Ironically, one of Britain’s most prominent public Animagi, Minerva McGonagall, had used that method to attain her tabby cat form, and it was also what James and Sirius had done, steadily improving their transformations over the course of two and a half years until they could both fully transform in their fifth. 

The latter technique originating in what was now modern-day Germany, that Pettigrew used, was considerably quicker, and ‘also considerably riskier’. It wasn’t common knowledge, theoretically being locked away by the Animagus Registry so they could keep control of it, but you could find it in several texts if you went looking for it. Andromeda was only familiar because a large part of the ritual involved the brewing of a potion and her old Master had her study it while she was pursuing her Mastery in Potioneering. 

Essentially, with the European Method, you first had to place a mandrake leaf in your mouth on the day of a full moon, like today, and hold it there until the next full moon. Then you exposed the leaf, which would have harmonized with the ritualist’s magic, and infuse it with moon light in a crystal phial, before adding one of their hairs, a silver teaspoon of dew from a place no human had touched for a week, and the chrysalis of a death’s-head moth.

The prospective Animagus then placed the concoction in a place where it wouldn’t be disturbed and waited until it was struck by natural lightning, often selecting a high peak or the top of a tree to increase the likelihood of that happening. Between the creation of the potion, and the lightning strike, they then had to perform a ritual chant every sunrise and sunset. Once the lightning struck, the potion should turn into a viscous blood red form and all you had to do was drink it. 

The American method was not without its dangers and took a large amount of skill with Transfiguration, but it was a slow steady process and if something went wrong it could generally be reversed, The European method was much more all or nothing; in theory it was much easier to do and required no special skill with Transfiguration, but if you prepared the potion incorrectly, or failed to do the ritual chant every single sunrise and sunset, it could result in a potion that permanently stuck you in a half animal half human horror, or turned you into a regular animal, destroying your human mind. That in mind, the prospect of her baby girl performing the ritual chilled Andromeda to the core. 

Knocking on her daughter’s door before entering, she discovered Iris sitting in her bed with Sebastian curled around her neck. It looked like the pair were reading a book together, though Andromeda was unsure if the familiar could actually read or was just interested in what Iris was doing. “Iris, darling, can I come in?”

Iris looked up and nodded but didn’t speak, and Sebastian slithered off to go bask in his terrarium. Andromeda just sighed, “Iris, spit the leaf out, we need to talk.”

The girl’s eyes widened in surprise but, after a stern look from her mum, she reluctantly spit the leaf into her rubbish bin. “How did you know?”

“Because I always keep track of my ingredient stocks, and you didn’t have a lisp before today,” Andromeda replied as she sat on the bed next to Iris. “Iris, what were you thinking?”

The redhead looked away, “Dad did it,” it was clear by context she meant James not Ted with that statement. 

“James was a Transfiguration prodigy, used the safer method, and even then, didn’t start turning into a stag until his fifth year,” Andromeda gently rebuked her.

“I don’t have time to wait that long,” Iris muttered. 

Andromeda ran her hand down her daughter’s back, “what are you talking about, Irey? You’ve got plenty of time to do this in the future if you decide it’s something you really want to do. When you’re done with Hogwarts and more ready for it-”

Iris laughed bitterly, startling Andromeda, “if I live that long.”

Andromeda frowned, “Iris, I know you went through something very traumatic this year, but I don’t like it when you talk like that.”

Iris hopped to her feet and paced forward then back, throwing her arms out to her sides in exasperation, “I’m just accepting reality!” Iris had largely seemed surprisingly okay after her crisis in the Chamber of Secrets, but bottled-up emotions and anxiety were now spilling out. “He killed my birth parents, scarred me, and now he’s attacked my sister two years in a row!” In her emotional state, she didn’t bother to pretend Luna wasn’t also a sister in her mind.

“Iris, I understand that,” Andromeda pleaded as she leaned forward. She was painfully aware her daughter had been hurt far too much and put in far too much danger in her young life. “And I know there are still unimprisoned Death Eaters out there, and it keeps me up at night, but what does any of that have to do with completing the Animagus ritual?”

“Because this is what I CAN do!” Iris exclaimed in a sudden burst of anger and pent-up frustration. “Voldemort should be dead and drifting into history, but he’s patently not. Clearly, he has found some way to persist that defies all the known rules of magic I thought I understood, and as infuriatingly bewildering as that is, I can’t pretend it isn’t true.” Iris began to pace again as she got worked up, finally letting all of her fears spill out to her mother. 

“I’ve tried to figure out how he’s done it, so that it may be undone, but I can’t,” she bitterly admitted. As bright as she was, Iris had in truth barely begun her magical education and whatever magic was at work with these shades of Voldemort was simply beyond her knowledge. “I’m learning combat magic as fast as I can, but after that duel between Professor Dumbledore and Riddle…” Iris shuddered at the memory, “I’m a long, long way from being good enough to actually defend myself if and when he comes back. The only thing I can do right now is run away, and this is the best way I can figure out how to do that…” Her voice grew small as she finished her little rant and she looked downcast. The shell of confidence she’d been projecting since the encounter in the Chamber had finally shattered.

Andromeda’s prior anger at her daughter’s recklessness was smothered by the even greater anger towards the world she felt at seeing Iris so distraught. She wanted nothing more than to be able to promise the redhead that her fears were unfounded; that Andromeda and Ted would always protect her, always keep her safe from the horrors of the world. ‘She should be worrying about getting asked on a trip to Hogsmeade or getting pranked by Peeves, not spending her spare time researching how to fight for her life,’ Andi thought bitterly as she swept the smaller witch into a hug. Unfortunately, as much as she wanted to tear Iris’s fears apart like a raging mother dragon, she couldn’t. She just didn’t know if and when some remnant of Voldemort would attack again, and her daughter had a point that ignoring that reality wouldn’t make it go away. 

In light of that, giving Iris a tool to ensure her survival, especially when she was without her wand, began to seem like the lesser of two evils. Iris had told her everything that happened in the Chamber and it was readily apparent how powerless the young witch felt when her wand had been taken by the possessed Ginny.

Mumbling into her mother’s torso as they continued their long hug Iris said, “I’m sorry, I know it was reckless. I didn’t mean to scare you, and I promise I won’t try it again.”

Finally separating from the hug, Andi could see how contrite her younger daughter was and trusted she wouldn't go forward with the ritual this summer, but would that always be true? Iris was barreling towards the typical rebellious teen phase and if she decided to try again in a couple years and hid it better, there was little Andromeda could do about it. A little rebellion was natural, but, as Iris's natural curiosity became more apparent as she grew, along with a somewhat cavalier attitude towards what kind of knowledge was age appropriate, Andi had worried about something like this; she hadn't guessed her daughter would try and turn into a shape shifter, but attempting a spell she wasn't ready for or getting hurt trying to study a dangerous beast had been among her fears. That potential rebellion was going to be a lot more dangerous than when Nymphadora started using London slang and making everyone call her by her surname.

No, paradoxically the safest thing might be to allow Iris to go ahead with the ritual when Andromeda could supervise the brewing of the potion. It was obvious Iris was seeking some connection with James, even if she'd focused more on the added protection, it would give her in her justification. Not that she doesn't have a point there too’ Andromeda mused. Instinctively the mother was in favor of anything that would have helped her daughter escape what had been her almost certain death in the Chamber of Secrets a few months ago. She still woke up with nightmares in the middle of the night, imagining what would happen if Albus hadn't shown up when he did.

‘Would this make me a terrible mother,’ she debated inwardly, ‘letting her try something so dangerous?’ Did the potential safety of having an animal form in her back pocket outweigh the danger of acquiring it. When she’d adopted Iris, she’d sworn to give the girl as loving and normal of a childhood as possible. The loving part was easy, Iris was easy to love, but she and Ted had always had to make considerations that other parents didn’t. 

Their property was warded to the edge of legality, they’d had to regularly threaten legal action to keep paparazzi at bay, and even kept the fact Iris had joined their family a secret until she went to Hogwarts and it was no longer practical. ‘We let her have her cloak, Morganna, I want her to have it with her at all times, and Ted told her in no uncertain terms to ignore the fact she’s underage and start slinging spells if someone threatens her.’ This was just a further step towards keeping her safe, even if it was one that filled her with immense trepidation.

“Iris, I need you to listen to what I’m about to say very carefully,” Andromeda said slowly, the wet eyed girl looking up at her. “I need to talk this over with your father but, and you are absolutely still in trouble for trying to do this in secret, I can see the benefits of letting you become an Animagus.”

Iris’s eyes lit up with excitement but Andromeda sternly stared her down, “if, IF, we let you do this there are going to be some very strict conditions and if you deviate at all I’ll pull the plug without hesitation.” Iris nodded like an overeager gnome, willing to accept whatever her mum said.

“First of all, I’m going to supervise the brewing of the potion every step of the way. You’ll have to physically do the work for the ritual, but I’m going to be right over your shoulder,” Andromeda explained. “And we’re going to get your godfather to help supervise as well, since he actually has experience with this.”

Iris tilted her head curiously, “didn’t he use the other method though?”

Andi crossed her arms, “some experience is better than none. I’d prefer we get someone from the Animagus Registry office to aid you as well, but since you’re not going to register that’s not feasible.”

“Wait,” Iris said shocked, “you’re not going to make me register?”

Her mum gave her a flat look. “Well, I highly doubt you were planning to keep this a secret from me and then go tell the Ministry in the first place,” Iris looked down remorsefully, “but in any event it would eliminate most of the benefits if you registered. I’m not letting you do this because you want to experience a unique piece of magic, or to let you have fun pulling pranks like your godfather. The only reason I’m considering allowing this is to give you further safety from He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named and his followers. If the fact that you’re an Animagus and your animal form are public record, it wouldn’t be a secret weapon.”

The Tonks matriarch could well remember the sad fate of Goldie Talbott and her husband. The other witch had been a supervising healer at St. Mungos while Andi herself had started as a trainee Healer there, and half the cases coming through the hospital were victims of the Death Eaters. Just a year or two before the fateful Halloween in Godric’s Hollow, when the Potters pulled their still mysterious feat of destroying the Dark Lord, leaving Iris an orphan, both Goldie and her husband had been targeted and killed by a squad of the terrorists for their outspoken opposition towards the bigoted movement. 

Goldie had been a swan Animagus, and her husband a hedgehog, both registered. They’d reportedly tried to hide by turning into their animal forms, but the public record let their killers know to target them even in those alternate shapes. If the whole point of this was to give Iris a new defense, it would be best if her attackers didn’t know about it.

“So, I guess we’re not telling Aunt Amelia about this?” Iris asked after a moment. 

“No, your aunt loves you and would lie for you if she had to, but it isn't fair of us to put her in that position if we don't have to,” Andromeda explained. When Amelia inevitably did find out about this bit of lawbreaking, she was going to be royally cross at having been left out of the loop, but Andi knew it was better for her best friend to be kept in the dark, so she'd have proper deniability.

Andromeda sighed, “when I talk to your father, we’ll figure out how legally dubious this actually is, but I think as long as nobody can prove you’ve been an Animagus for a significant amount of time, you can always walk into the Ministry and register later.” The registry had very briefly been discussed during Peter and Sirius’s hearings, but she’d need to ask Ted about the specifics. 

“Okay, so you and Sirius are going to supervise, and we’re going to keep it a secret,” Iris summarized.

“Yes, and as part of that, once we finish,” Andromeda replied, “I don’t want you being frivolous about this. The more you transform the more likely someone sees you doing it, and then this will all be pointless. We’ll start the ritual again on the next full moon if your father and Sirius agree.” She leaned down and looked her daughter in the eye, softly saying, “we’re only doing this because I want you safe, Iris, and I think you’re right about this being a good way to do that.”

Iris nodded and just said “I love you mum,” before hugging her mum once again.

Andromeda straightened up and patted her daughter on the back, adding offhandedly, “I love you too, sweetie, but you’re still grounded for the rest of the week.”

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-

Saint-Tropez, France, Same Day

After a moment of consideration, Hermione Granger decided to apply a third coat of sunscreen to her fair skin before daring to step out from the shade. The sky was perfectly clear and it was a beautiful sunny day on the picturesque Mediterranean beach. The Granger family were taking in the Riviera for their summer holiday, and, while Hermione would have preferred they spend their time in the resort town scoping out the historic citadel, her parents had insisted she had to try at least one day at the beach. 

‘I mean, I guess it’s not the worst,’ Hermione grudgingly admitted about the seaside paradise she was currently sitting in. She was half under a pitched umbrella, sitting up on a laid-out beach towel, rubbing the sun cream into her arm. She was confident there had to be a magical version of sun protection that might be superior, but she wasn’t familiar with it and wouldn’t be allowed to use her magic outside of school anyway. (In actuality, the British Trace had no reach onto the continent and she could pretty much use her wand with impunity, so long as she didn’t breach the Statute.)

Rubbing small circles of the sunscreen onto her freckled cheeks, she figured it was something to read up on when she returned to Britain. The Tonks’ private collection might not be 1% of the Hogwarts Library, but maybe her friend’s folks would have something on the subject.

As she finished coating her face, Hermione suddenly realized she had a problem. Her mum and her had purchased new swimsuits for the trip, and hers was a frilled peach coloured two piece, which meant her lower back was exposed and she couldn’t reach it to apply the sunblock. She’d ask her mum or dad to help her, like they had with the first two coats, but they were both playing in the surf in the distance.

Glancing around the popular but thankfully not quite overcrowded beach, she bit her lip and looked for someone who might be willing to help, and she’d feel comfortable asking. Not for the first time on her vacation, she wished Tracey, or Daphne, or any of her friends had accompanied her. She loved her family, but being alone with her mum and dad for a month reminded her of her life before Hogwarts, when she hadn’t had any friends her own age.

She dismissed any adults she didn’t know and decided the squad of older French boys currently throwing sand at each other was a bad prospect. She was on the verge of risking the sun momentarily and dashing out to the shoreline to get one of her parents to help, when she finally saw someone close to her own age.

‘By Merlin,’ it was one of the most attractive girls Hermione had ever seen. The platinum blonde teen was wearing a sky-blue bikini, a pair of odd-looking sunglasses, and was laid out on the beach sunbathing. Hermione couldn’t approve of the activity, that was just asking for a melanoma, but the girl was close enough she could hopefully get her attention without leaving the shade of her own umbrella.

“<Uh, Pardon me, Miss?>” Hermione called in her somewhat broken conversational French. “<Do you coming ouver ‘ere?>?”

The slightly older girl looked up and raised her glasses to her forehead, revealing piercing blue eyes. She rose and sauntered over to Hermione, “What eez eet you, need?”

“Oh, you speak English!” Hermione replied in mild surprise.

The girl smirked, “Better zan you speak French, at any rate.” She paused as if considering something before extending a hand and saying, “my name eez Fleur Delacour.”

Hermione happily returned the handshake, “I’m Hermione Granger, from England obviously. Well, I’m from Chelsea if you want to get specific, but that’s not important. I’m so sorry to bother you, but I was wondering if you could help apply my sunscreen to my back? It’s so sunny out and I don’t want to burn.”

Fleur took the offered bottle of sunblock and looked at it curiously, like she wasn’t familiar with the substance. ‘Maybe she’s just unfamiliar with the British brand,’ Hermione reasoned. After a moment Fleur nodded and said, “ah’ would be happy to help, Hermione.”

While Fleur applied the sunblock, the two girls exchanged pleasant small talk. Hermione learned Fleur wasn’t a local, living on the opposite coast of France, but was on her own vacation. Apparently, her mum, dad and sister were at the town cinema to watch that new American Hocus Pocus film because her sister wanted to, but Fleur had opted out.

“Eet iz offensively inaccurate, anyway,” Fleur opined. After finishing with the sunscreen, she’d sat next to Hermione on the blanket so they could continue their conversation. 

Hermione didn’t quite know what she meant by that but chuckled nervously, not wanting to dwell too much on a film about witches and accidentally reveal she was one herself. The muggleborn girl was more than a little paranoid about rule breaking, and the International Statute of Secrecy was pretty much the biggest rule of their whole society.

They continued to chat for a little while, Hermione being in no hurry to rush after her parents into the water and Fleur seeming amenable to the company. They had a surprising number of things in common, even if Hermione couldn’t reveal many details of the magical part of her life. Fleur also attended a boarding school, and her mother was also a dentist (In actuality Fleur hadn’t known what to say her mother did when Hermione asked, since she didn’t know a muggle equivalent to a professional duelist, so she just said she did the same thing Hermione’s parents did even though she had no clue what a dentist was.)

Before long though, the French girl rose to go, needing to meet up with her family before heading for lunch. 

“Well, it was nice meeting you,” Hermione said as Fleur stood up, “and thank you again for helping with my sunblock.”

Fleur smirked like she was thinking of some secret joke and said, “eet was a unique experience. Au revoir, Hermione, perhaps we will meet again someday.”

Hermione smiled and waved her off, but privately reflected, ‘it’s a shame, she’s quite nice, but we’ll probably never cross paths again.’

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-

The Burrow, Devon, That Evening

A miserable Ginny sat on the edge of the Weasley’s garden, partially obscured by a patch of growing pumpkins, her arms around her knees. She’d been out here since dinner ended; she just wanted to be alone, and that was pretty much impossible in the overcrowded Burrow.

‘Especially now,’ she thought bitterly. Ever since March, her mum and most of her brothers had become very overprotective, almost smothering. She understood why; when left to her own devices she’d managed to get possessed by Tom and almost kill a bunch of people, but it still sometimes felt like they were watching her like she was a sleeping Nundu just waiting to go off.

Far from her dream of finally finding her own identity outside of her six siblings, her first year at Hogwarts had been the worst of her life. The whole first half was a hazy blur, and the last few months were marred by guilt, shame and frustration. She hated herself for being weak enough to fall for Tom’s lies, and then too frightened of getting in trouble to raise the alarm while she still had some control. 

Then there was the possession itself. While she thankfully couldn’t remember the times Tom was entirely in control, those periods when they both had a hand on the tiller so to speak haunted her. Having control of her own actions, her own thoughts, slip away from her was terrifying, but the worst part might have been that occasionally her emotions resonated with his. Ginny had always wanted to feel special, to be someone, and Tom was so sure of his own superiority that Ginny had disturbingly enjoyed experiencing that confidence by proxy. The Mind Healers said that was the possessing spirit trying to manipulate her, but she still couldn’t shake the shame.

After a brief period at home, she’d returned to school, and thank Merlin, her peers weren’t told exactly what happened. That hadn’t stopped them from treating her as an object of intense curiosity, or her brothers basically following her around like bodyguards when she wasn’t in class or the girl’s room. Her final exam marks had been pretty abysmal too, worse than Ron’s first year with plenty of Ps and even a T in Potions.

The Mind Healers told her that wasn’t her fault either, that she hadn’t been enough in control to properly process the course work throughout the year, but she knew she’d disappointed her family anyway. At least it wasn’t her O.W.L year; her mum was already haranguing Fred and George to shape up before they took theirs next year, when she wasn’t preemptively crowing about how good Percy’s N.E.W.T results were sure to be. 

Now it was summer, and she was supposed to be recovering, getting back to normal, but she wasn’t even sure how to start. In the distance she saw two gnomes fighting over a stolen turnip and wished her life could be as blissfully simple as the dim little creatures.

“I know my father published an article saying boiled pumpkin juice was a good wrackspurt repellant, but in all honesty his evidence was very flimsy,” the airy voice of Luna Lovegood came from behind her. “I’m not sure sitting in a patch of gourds is going to help much.”

“L-Luna?” Ginny stuttered in surprise as she turned around to find her childhood friend standing there. She was just a bit different than how Ginny had always remembered her, but it was hard to place how, like the blonde, was maybe just a touch more put together, or a hair less spacey. ‘Or maybe it’s just been so long since you really talked that you can’t remember.’

“Hello Ginny,” Luna replied simply as she sat cross legged on the ground next to the Weasley girl, seemingly not caring about getting dirt on the muggle blue jeans she wore along with a Wyrd Sisters shirt that was at least two sizes too big for her.

Grasping for something, anything, to say, Ginny fixated on that detail, “I, uh, didn’t know you were a Wyrd Sisters fan.”

Luna shrugged, “it has been a long time since we conversed, many things have changed.” Ginny felt yet another pang of guilt but Luna breezily continued, “Nymphadora introduced me to them, and their layered harmonics are quite pleasing. This is her shirt actually, she lent it to me.”

“Nymphadora Tonks?” Ginny asked, “wow, that was nice of her. I guess you met her through…”

“Through Iris, yes,” Luna confirmed. “I should say that getting to know her, she’s not very much like how you used to describe her. She prefers tea to Otter’s Fizzy Orange Juice, and I’ve never heard her say ‘It’s Potting Time!’”

Ginny buried her face in her knees to hide her blush, childhood embarrassment overwhelming her current despair for the moment. As a little kid her favorite book had been a worn copy of Iris Potter and the Dreaming Prince her mum had purchased initially for Ron. The cover proudly proclaimed it was the first in the Iris Potter series, but it was the only one ever published and quite rare these days ever since legal action from Iris Potter’s guardians quashed the unauthorized publication.

The text was complete nonsense anyway, something she’d known on some level even before Ron returned for winter holidays the previous year with a firsthand account. For starters, Iris would have only been 5 when the book was published, hardly the age to realistically be fighting a dragon on the Russian steppe and swinging around Excalibur. Prince Tristain the Bold was also pretty clearly an invention as, while magical Russia was still ruled by a Czar, none of the royal family had been sleeping for 2000 years in a palace guarded by talking orangutans. 

Still, she had idolized the fictionalized version of the Girl-Who-Lived when she was little. The brave, talented, famous girl winning love and acclaim was exactly who Ginny had wanted to be. If it had been common knowledge back then that Iris also had red hair, instead of her dad’s black, Ginny probably would have keeled over from excitement. 

“She is very nice though,” Luna said, “she’s the reason I have friends now, and she found my mum’s bracelet after Marietta took it.”

Ginny looked down, “I’m glad you had someone. I’m sorry I wasn’t… I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you when we started Hogwarts.” The pair had largely become friends because they were the only two witches around the same age living in the immediate area, but Ginny had always looked past Luna’s eccentricities unlike Ron. She’d been hoping to make new friends at Hogwarts, particularly among her fellow Gryffindors, but she hadn’t intended to cut Luna off completely.

Luna shrugged, “you weren’t in control of your own actions, and it all worked out in the end. That said, I would like to renew our association if you were amenable to that.”

Ginny glanced over to her perfectly calm old friend, “are you sure you want to be friends with someone who had a piece of the Dark Lord latched onto her soul?”

Luna met her eyes without blinking, “While I expect the effects of that arcane piece of magic are likely fascinating, it’s a non-factor in my decision. I would like my friend Ginny back.”

Smiling just a bit for one of the first times since she woke up in the Hospital room, Ginny reached out her left hand to grasp Luna’s right.

“Then you have her.”

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-

Diagon Alley, August 12th 

“Where does that prat get off, giving someone else advice on choosing a pet!?” Hermione fumed as she stomped down the busy magical thoroughfare, carrying a large cat carrier under her arm.

“I’d offer to have Sebastian eat his new little owl too,” Iris replied from Hermione’s side, “but the chances of this one also being a secret Death Eater are exceptionally low.” Once again Hermione was doing her back-to-school shopping with Iris and Susan, since her parents were a bit out of their element navigating the magical shops.

On her other side, Susan was stowing the owl treats she’d just purchased for Hedwig into her satchel and said “I’m just glad Sirius went on ahead to Flourish and Blotts. If he saw the guy who was keeping the traitor safe all these years, he might deck him.”

“Sirius wouldn’t hit a teenager,” Iris replied with a roll of her eyes. “Turn into a dog and pee on his doorstep, sure, but he has some self-control.” 

The trio had run into their classmate Ron Weasley at The Magical Menagerie and had a somewhat awkward encounter as the boy purchased a replacement for ‘Scabbers’ and Hermione picked out her new half-kneazle cat, Crookshanks. 

However, that had been a minor enough hiccup in the busy day of shopping. Susan, Luna, Hermione, Iris, and Tonks all had shopping lists to work through, and with the third years starting their electives, most of them had more to purchase than they’d needed to since first year. Andi was supervising as usual, at the moment helping Luna select a new quill set down the street, but Sirius had offered to come along as well to help out and had been with the trio before heading one shop ahead to the bookstore, since apparently it was quite busy that day and a line was forming.

They’d already gotten quite a bit of their lists finished by that point. Iris had started the day getting re-fitted by Madame Malkin and left her school robes there to be altered while purchasing some new uniform sets; personally, she was thrilled she’d finally had the growth spurt over the summer that made it necessary.

Then they’d set about getting the new items required for their electives, heavy fireproof aprons for Susan and Iris, enchanted abacuses for Iris and Hermione, rune carving sets for all three, and a small assortment of Divination accoutrement for Hermione. Then there had been the necessary stocking up on essentials, like new potion ingredients, a refill of broom polish for Susan, a new bottle of Sleakeazys for Iris, and new quills and parchment for all of them, which is where they lost their youngest member when Luna proved very choosy about finding the best sort of feather for her quills.

They’d gone to the menagerie just for Susan and Iris to get some treats for their familiars, but Hermione instantly fell in love with the grumpy feline the instant she’d seen it, only for them to run into Weasley while making their purchases. 

Walking up to the bookstore, they found Sirius leaning against the wall by the front door, the reported line nowhere to be found. Iris tilted her head curiously, “weren’t there supposed to be a ton of people waiting for something?” She had imagined it was some sort of book signing, like what had happened with Lockhart last year.

Sirius, who looked markedly better after a few months of sun, good food, rest, and frequent ‘in-depth conversations’ with Amelia, chuckled. “Turns out they were just keeping everyone out of the store for a bit when one of their displays went crazy. After they opened up, everyone was able to get in, but it looks like Moony went on a bender in there.”

Moony, that was to say Remus, hadn’t come with them that day because he was already at Hogwarts, moving his handful of belongings into his new quarters. Dumbledore had offered the secret werewolf the double-edged post of DADA professor, and he’d be filling that role in the coming year. He’d turned it down at first, insisting he needed to be there to support Sirius through his recovery, but his friend basically pestered him relentlessly until he reconsidered. Sirius knew Remus had never gotten to properly use his Defense Mastery, and didn’t want Lupin to turn down a golden opportunity on his account.

Stepping into what was usually her favorite shop on the street, Iris felt like she was stepping into a warzone. There were torn and chewed pages all over the ground, and many of the books on the shelves looked like they’d hastily been levitated back onto whatever was nearby, rather than where they were supposed to be. A very tired looking worker was holding his wand over a central table full of books that appeared to be shackled of all things. “Hogwarts students?”

“Uh, yes we are,” Hermione replied.

“If you’re getting The Monster Book of Monsters, go ahead and select your other purchases first,” he explained, “and I’ll give you one of these blasted things when you check out. I recommend keeping a close eye on them and hitting whatever bastard of a professor assigned them with a jelly-legs hex when you get to school.”

A bit thrown by the odd scenario, and the low growling coming from the central stack of books, the three girls set about getting their required texts without doing the normal browsing Iris and Hermione would like. It was a bit more difficult than usual given the disorganized state of the shop at the moment.

“Hmm,” Hermione said from behind the stack of books she’d already gotten, “I can’t find my Muggle Studies book, do you see it anywhere? My list is in my coat pocket if you need the title.”

“Wait, why are you getting the assigned books for Muggle Studies?” Iris asked in confusion as she took and looked over Hermione’s shopping list. “You’re already taking Arithmancy, Runes and Divination, and you’re Muggleborn anyway.”

“Well, I wanted to take all five offered electives,” Hermione replied primly as she took her list back, “but Professor McGonagall was very obstinate about it and forced me to pick three.”

“You mean just like everyone else?” Susan asked with a smirk earning her a dirty look from the bushy haired girl.

“Anyway,” Hermione continued, “I decided to get the texts for Muggle Studies and Care of Magical Creatures anyway, so I can study them in my own time.”

“Right,” Iris replied slowly, “but again, you grew up in the muggle world. What are you going to learn from,” she glanced at the title of the book, “Homelife and Social Habits of British Muggles?”

“Well it’s about studying the magical perspective on Muggles you see-“ Hermione started to reply before a louder growl from the odd books interrupted her. She looked back at the monstrous books and said, “actually, now that I think about it, maybe I don’t need the Care of Magical Creatures text after all.”

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

Hogwarts Express, Start of Iris’s Third Year

The enchanted locomotive steamed its way north, shaking with the slight regular movement of the engine as it rattled down the tracks. All up and down the cars, the students of Hogwarts were getting ready for the new year, reconnecting with friends after the summer and changing into their school robes. 

Hermione sat in a car, sandwiched a bit snugly between Tracey and Lavender. She’d been a bit surprised when her fellow Gryffindor asked to join them, something about Parvati needing to talk with Padma, but was happy to have her friend along for the journey. Still, with Lavender, Tracey, Hermione, Daphne, Susan, Iris, and Luna they were a bit of a tight fit in the standard compartment. ‘Honestly it’s probably for the best Ginny got dragged away to sit with her brothers, instead of sticking with Luna.’

The muggleborn girl was half listening to Tracey excitedly recounting her mum’s game winning maneuver at a match she’d gone to over the summer, while reading a book in her lap. She wryly noted at least half of the audience, Iris, Daphne and herself were doing so, but at least the Slytherin girl had Susan’s rapt attention. 

The book she had her nose in at the moment was Perfwiddyl’s Grande Atlas of the Known World, a finely embossed massive volume that barely fit in her school bag. The weighty tome had been a birthday present from Daphne and quickly became one of Hermione’s favorites, and a great help to her in understanding the hidden world she'd joined, even if it wasn't on the official History of Magic curriculum.

Quite simply, the book was exactly what it said on the tin, an atlas of the world, but one from the magical perspective. Despite living on the same planet, the wizarding world’s maps tended to be quite different from the muggle one Hermione was used to. Frankly, some of the changes were quite shocking, and it hammered home how much of the real world was just casually, yet systematically hidden from muggle view by enforcement of the statute.

For starters, the world was apparently literally a bit bigger than muggle reckoning would have it, with the sheer number of hidden magical spaces accounting for a significant amount of landmass, and that wasn't even considering the great underground or underwater civilizations of the Goblins or Merfolk. Pretty much every magical country had at least a few hidden magical urban centers, for instance Hogsmeade and the Diagon Alley area, but far more land had apparently been concealed and set aside as essentially nature reserves for magical flora and fauna. Hidden islands seemed to be the most commonly chosen location, given they were much easier to hide, but there were also sectioned off pieces of deep jungle, inaccessible mountain peaks, and more used for a similar purpose.

Then there were the political differences; as it turned out, while magical governments had at least a theoretical tie to their non-magical counterparts, they didn't always line up one to one. As Daphne had explained it to her, the enactment of the Statute at the end of the 17th century, had massively accelerated the already ongoing process of magical society desynchronizing from the larger muggle regime. Sometimes they still lined up relatively nicely, like magical France or Japan, but, for instance, there was no such thing as a united wizarding Germany, with the loose confederation of independent principalities more resembling the old Holy Roman Empire. 

The adherence to an older order wasn’t necessarily surprising, given what she’d read. Witches and Wizards seemed to be a traditional breed by their nature, perhaps due to their longer lifespans compared to muggles. Magical society was slow to embrace change; heck, some iconoclastic British witches and wizards had been refusing to recognize new kings since the Anglo-Saxon conquest, much less the Norman one. Eventually they’d broken entirely in the lead up to the enactment of the statute, and the Wizengamot hadn’t recognized a monarch since the end of the Tudor line.

“And then she hit the bludger and…” Tracey said, getting to the climax of her story, “she rode the dragon into downtown London and declared herself the reincarnation of Guinevere.”

“Wait, a dragon!?” Iris suddenly perked up at the D word, inadvertently confirming she hadn’t been paying close attention.

Daphne, meanwhile, without even looking up from her book drawled, “that seems highly improbable, Tracey. Iris, how has living with your godfather in the house been? I know we talked about it when we met up in July, but have things continued to be pleasant since?” The Greengrasses had left for a safari in a magical reserve in the Congo during the back half of summer, so it had been some time since she’d touched base with her friend.

Iris and Susan shared an awkward look. Iris played with the hem of her skirt and said, “uh, well he’s not exactly…”

“He’s not living with her anymore,” Susan said directly, “he moved into the Bones estate last week.” It had been something that only happened after several long discussions making sure Susan was okay with it, but honestly, she liked having the wizard around. It was bittersweet sometimes, thinking about what it would have been like to have him in her life, in her auntie’s life from the beginning, but mostly it was just sweet. Her Aunt was obviously so happy when Sirius was around, and she’d actually found herself enjoying one on one time with the old mutt herself, tossing the quaffle around or going on a trip round the Alley. It wasn’t like he was her dad yet, but she wouldn’t totally hate it if they got to that point down the line.

There was a rapping at the door and Luna squeezed out to open it and let in the Trolley Witch. The older woman made her usual offer of snacks, primarily candy and the overfull carriage purchased a relatively modest amount, a tube of Living Licorice for Lavender, a pumpkin pasty for Susan and a selection of Chocolate Frogs for Tracey, though she was more concerned about the trading cards than the chocolate. 

“Surprised the rest of you didn’t want anything,” Lavender mentioned before she took a bite of the first wiggling strand of black licorice.

Iris shrugged, “Hermione’s parents have some unique muggle beliefs about sweets hurting your teeth,” (Hermione had tried to explain dentistry to her wizard-raised friends countless times but it had never sunk in. Considering Healing had pretty much solved most conventional dental issues centuries ago, most witches and wizards didn’t see the point in worrying about sugar causing tooth decay). Iris continued, “Our house elf, Dobby, made way too much food for our farewell breakfast, so Luna and I are stuffed, and Daphne’s a snob.”

“I’m not a snob, Potter,” Daphne sniffed, “I just have taste. If the Express stocked a better selection, I would certainly partake.”

“If they stocked your fancy-ass sweets,” Susan opined, “most of the train couldn’t afford to buy anything.”

The good-natured barb got most of the carriage chuckling and the conversation quickly moved on until it was really time for them to change into their uniforms before the train got too close to Hogwarts. Daphne locked the door with a wave of her wand and a muttered chant of “Colloportus”, while all of them save Hermione, who’d as usual changed right after getting on the train, started doffing their muggle passing clothes they’d worn to Kings Cross to change into their uniforms.

Iris buttoned up her white base shirt, before tucking it into her dark grey knee length skirt. The grey jumper that went over the shirt was technically optional but given how cold Hogwarts grounds tended to be even as summer finished waning, she grabbed that from her bag as well and had worn dark woolen tights, also to stave off any chill. She had her usual moment of consternation with the blue and bronze tie, since she never wore a tie when she wasn’t in school, but Susan saw her furrowed brow and sighed before squeezing past a still partially disrobed Daphne to help Iris straighten the tie knot.

“You know you’re going to have to learn how to tie this properly, eventually right?” Susan teasingly scolded, “once Tonks graduates you won’t be able to walk over to the Hufflepuff table like a sad Crup and get her to fix it every breakfast.”

Iris snorted, “you say that like you won’t still be at that table for the remaining three years.”

Lavender, who had just finished dressing herself, looked Iris, who had on her sweater, skirt and tie, but hadn’t thrown her robes on top of it yet, over and said, “Iris, you’re looking great today. I love what that skirt does for your hips and you’re really starting to fill out your sweater.”

Iris blushed at Lavender’s compliment but felt a slight swell of pride in her chest. After years of being small for her age, possibly an ongoing effect of early childhood malnutrition, she’d finally started to shoot up and fill out over the summer. She was still short, but she wasn’t going to get confused for a first year again this term, and she’d managed to put a little weight on, gaining the curves Lavender had just noted. 

Perhaps typical of a young woman her age, she found herself starting to become more concerned with her personal appearance. Part of that stemmed from her longtime dissatisfaction with her small size and a desire to not be perceived as a child, but she’d be lying if she said she didn’t secretly hope she was growing up to be as pretty as either of her mums. 

So, the new half a foot of height, and her new actual need for a brassiere was welcome, and she’d started trying to be more consistent with brushing out her dark red thick wavy hair every day. She was thankful she didn’t have the utterly tangled squirrel’s nest Hermione suffered from, and generally liked her hair, but the classic Black family locks were a bit more trouble to take care of than Daphne’s silky straight blonde hair.

“Thanks, Lav,” Iris replied, experimentally using the nickname she’d heard Parvati and Hermione use for the other Gryffindor. Lavender wasn’t really in her core group of friends proper, but she did like the girl and had been really pleased that Hermione had someone else in her own House looking out for her, considering the whole Ron incident that led to them meeting. “Uh, you look really nice too, did you do something different with your, uh, cheeks?” Lavender always looked very pretty and put together and was the only person in the cabin likely to read the beauty articles in Teen Witch Weekly, but Iris was kind of taking a stab in the dark regarding Lavender’s rosy cheeks. She was becoming a bit more interested in that sort of thing, but she was still far from an expert.

Luckily it looked like she’d hit the target as Lavender lit up and said, “Yeah! It’s Assez de Chaleur blush. My Aunt in Paris sent me an owl with a bottle last month and now I really wish they sold it in the UK.”

“That’s probably because of the idiotic Potion tariff war Crouch started,” Daphne opined as she examined herself in a floating hand mirror to make sure not a single impeccable hair was out of place. Stowing the enchanted item back in her handbag, she turned more fully towards Lavender and said, “He got his robes in a twist over import regulations and its spiraling into a tit for tat that’s really gumming up international trade in of ingredients, cauldrons, and finished potion products.”

It was easy to forget sometimes, because Samson Greengrass was almost the quintessential noble Wizengamot member, but that wasn’t a full-time job, and the family had made their fortune in magical transit, an ancestor literally inventing floo travel, and trade, and were still heavily invested in it to this day. Complaints about things like this were a frequent subject at Daphne’s dinner table at home. 

“Hmm,” Luna hummed in confusion.

“Is something wrong Luna?” Iris asked her de facto little sister.

Luna had finished changing as well, save for her robes, but was looking down at the yellow and black tie she had on in consternation. “Either I’ve been casting the color changing charm in my sleep, or I do believe I’ve stolen Nymphadora’s ties.”

Several carriages over, Penelope Clearwater was cackling over the fact her best friend had apparently decided to join her in Ravenclaw for their second to last year.

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-

Beauxbatons, September.

All Dialogue in French unless otherwise noted.

The famed Singing Lemon Trees of Beauxbatons were in fine form that morning, piping their plaintive ditties into the autumn air. The courtyard in which they grew was dotted with little groups of students on a free period, enjoying the relative peace that came with the majority of their peers being in class. The tranquility was only occasionally disrupted by the slurping sound of the carnivorous foliage making a meal of one of the birds their song was meant to attract.

“Do you imagine the diet of the trees affects the taste of the lemons?” Marcelline, a sixth-year witch with close cropped coppery red hair, asked. She sat with several other older Beauxbatons students under the shade of the largest of the trees, first cultivated by their academy’s eccentric third headmaster.

Jean-Luc, a short and slight brown eyed fifth year, idly drew his wand and used it to pluck a ripe fruit from the tree with a muttered “Accio Lemon”. He caught the citrus in his palm and considered it for a moment, “it certainly affects the size of their crop; Professor Dupain was complaining in Herbology that if the second-year boys don’t stop tossing their uneaten coq-au-vin into the branches for a laugh, we’ll all be eating lemon tarts for dessert the rest of the term.”

Fleur considered commenting to suggest an experiment to compare lemons produced from different avian diets but held her tongue and continued to scribble away at her Runes essay instead. While she was cordial with Jean-Luc and Marcelline, she considered them more Sonia’s friends than hers and tended to keep them at arm’s length. ‘It is for the best.’

“AH HAH!” the fourth member, Sonia de Silva, interjected excitedly, gesturing to the copy of Le Cri De La Gargouille she had been reading. “Government officials admit to losing track of both Nicolas and Pernelle Flamels’ wands during the inquest of the famed alchemists!” She excitedly quoted from the small article tucked in the back of the paper. When the previously immortal couple had publicly destroyed their famed stone and allowed themselves to pass the previous year, it had been major news, especially in their native France, but by now any further details had slipped far from the front page. “Yet another irregularity,” Sonia huffed as she passed the paper to Fleur.

Fleur didn’t share her only friend’s obsession with the Flamel case, but, given that she was her only friend, she indulged the Spanish witch by glancing over the article. Apparently when the Flamels had been laid to rest in a spectacular state funeral over the summer, an event Fleur had attended with her family, they had placed replica wands in the caskets; the small but passionate group of witches and wizards who believed the deaths of the alchemists were suspicious, of which Sonia was a member, had apparently gotten wind of this fact and now pressured a government official to admit it.

The platinum blonde smirked, “well, given the general improvements in wand construction over the centuries, whomever stole it will likely be disappointed with the museum pieces they plundered.”  Even in this day and age there were those obsessed with the idea that a great wand made for a great wizard, despite all the evidence to the contrary. In general wand construction, particularly core sourcing, had gotten better over the years, not worse. Even then, while wands did differ in power and aptitude, it had been consistently proven that the connection with the individual witch wielding it was more important. There were those who could argue, though not within her hearing if they didn’t want a fight, that the Veela hair core in Fleur’s own wand wasn’t quite as powerful as, say, a dragon’s heartstring, but the overwhelming strength of her match with the rosewood instrument more than made up for it. The Flamels’ wands likely had some historical value but wouldn’t make the thief into the next immortal alchemist. 

“Hmph,” Sonia muttered as she waved away the most likely reason for the wands’ disappearance, “it is still another irregularity.” 

Fleur resisted rolling her eyes. She could understand where Sonia was coming from; the Flamels were such long standing titans, easily in the running for the most prominent magical citizens France ever produced, it was difficult to accept they were gone. Noting the shortening shadow of the lemon tree Fleur started to rise, “we should hurry to Transfiguration before Professor Prospero-“

“Still under Delacour’s spell, Jean-Luc?” A snobbish voice intruded upon them, “what would your father say?”

Fleur turned to her left to icily stare down the loathsome form of Fauntleroy Brown, while Jean-Luc anxiously fumbled to his feet. The tall, admittedly handsome sixth year sneered down at the younger boy, purposefully ignoring Fleur.  Latched onto his side, almost like a South Sea Leech Hydra in Fleur’s opinion, was the bully’s overly amorous girlfriend, Arabella Dennenboom, who, rather than ignore Fleur, was staring spiteful daggers at her.

‘It’s a shame, she’d be quite attractive if she wasn’t a bigot,’ Fleur reflected on the short dark haired, obviously well-endowed Dutch girl, before turning her attention back to the main asshole. “Oh, Monsieur Brown, I thought I smelled manure.” Last year an encounter between the two of them in the Herbology classroom had ended with Fauntleroy’s perfectly coiffed brown locks covered in fertilizer, something she delighted in reminding him of.

The prat’s face turned a gratifying shade of red, but he pointedly refused to look at her. He instead leered down at Jean-Luc, “I’d be careful who you choose to associate with, Jean-Luc. It could get you into trouble.”

The younger boy gulped and he scrambled to his feet. Jean-Luc’s father worked for Fauntleroy’s, and the younger Brown seemed to think this fact gave him the right to lord over the other boy. Gregory Brown, Fauntleroy’s father, was one of quite a number of English wizards who immigrated to the continent during Voldemort’s terror and ended up putting down roots, in his case marrying the daughter of a prominent French wizarding family, Fauntleroy’s mother. The couple now ran a very successful storefront in the Place Cachee, selling all manner of enchanted household items, such as automatic feather dusters etc.

Unfortunately for Fleur, the family also seemed to have brought the notorious British disdain for ‘half-breeds’ with them. While she suspected that kind of intolerance could be found globally, the isles had a reputation for being a particular hotbed of it, at least as far as the rest of western Europe was concerned. ‘At least he doesn’t seem to hate muggleborns too,’ Fleur thought mirthlessly, considering Arabella was one. Those two attitudes often went hand in hand, but not always, as the former was a bit more widespread.

“He doesn’t have to listen to you,” Sonia said hotly, one hand on her hip and the other fingering her wand in its sheath. The Spanish witch was always hot-tempered when it came to defending her friends, and unfortunately, as the most obvious student with non-human heritage at Beauxbatons, Fleur was a frequent target of Fauntleroy’s. 

She suspected she wasn’t the only one. There was a rather short girl in the third year who likely had a goblin ancestor somewhere up the line, a second-year boy who missed meals once a month, and of course their towering headmistress. She was, however, out in the open and proud of her Veela heritage. She suspected that very pride was what got under Brown’s skin; perhaps if she’d kept it under wraps, he’d have been content to let her be even if it was an open secret. It was hard to know for sure.

“Of course he doesn’t,” Fauntleroy agreed, smiling in meanspirited joy, “it was just a piece of friendly advice.”

The old Beauxbatons Head Maid, Mademoiselle Gigi, chose that moment to walk into the courtyard, and the confrontation broke up before it could escalate, all six of the students really needing to hurry to class at that point.

As she let Sonia drag her away, Fleur shot a dark glare over her shoulder at the retreating figure of Fauntleroy Brown. She might not consider herself a real friend of Jean-Luc’s but she’d be burned at the stake before she let that bigot Brown pressure the younger boy into not associating with her, just because she was Veela. ‘This isn’t over, Englishman.’

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-

Hogwarts, Defense Against the Dark Arts Classroom, September

Tracey was a bit antsy with anticipation as she sat waiting for the first DADA class of the semester to begin. According to Susan and Hermione, who’d had their first class earlier in the week, they actually had a good DADA professor on their hands for once with Remus Lupin, and she was excited for the lesson.

While her dream was still to be a professional seeker, her mum had cautioned her to have a backup plan and she was starting to think more and more about a career in the DMLE. Maybe it was all the time spent with Susan rubbing off, or just the infuriating frequency with which her friends were threatened by dark magic, but she could kind of see herself becoming an Auror someday.

‘Besides, how am I supposed to make it as a seeker if I can’t even make the house team,’ she turned gloomy as the thought passed through her mind. The best she could hope for was reserve status, at least while Flint still captained the team; she was rather suspicious that the seventh year had been personally bribed along with the fleet of top of the line brooms Lucius Malfoy used to buy Draco’s spot on the team.

The prat in question was sitting on the opposite end of the Slytherin side of the classroom from her and Daphne, who were sharing a desk as usual; it wasn’t something the other houses tended to notice, considering Slytherin’s focus on outward solidarity, but they often self-sorted based on their faction alliance.

She and Daphne were on the side that bordered the Ravenclaws, putting them one desk over from where Iris sat with Padma Patil. If Tracey was excited, her redheaded friend looked positively giddy, chatting animatedly at a bemused Padma. It wasn’t surprising really, Iris had told them their new professor was an old family friend and quite knowledgeable about dark beasts in particular, so she had every reason to be enthusiastic.

Most of the class’s attention was drawn to the large cupboard that had been placed at the front of the room, which was shaking regularly like something was trying to get out of it. It didn’t exactly look like a secure cage for something, but with magic appearances could be deceiving, and there was an obvious lock fastened to the door.

“Intriguing, isn’t it?” a voice came from the back of the classroom.

Tracey and Daphne both turned around slightly in their chairs to catch their first glimpse of professor Lupin as he swept into the room. He wore a casual grey cotton suit and tie that looked well cared for if a bit old-fashioned. The day was reasonably warm and he seemed to have forgone his robes, as had a few of the students. He had light brown hair, with a few premature grey strands around the temples, a thin pencil mustache, and a few faded but notable scars on his right cheek trailing down to disappear at the collar of his shirt.

Lupin gestured to the rocking cabinet as he reached the front of the classroom and turned to face his students. “Would anyone like to venture a guess as to what is inside?”

“It’s a boggart, right sir?” Su Li asked.

“Quite right, Ms. Li, take a point for Ravenclaw,” Lupin replied easily. He cast his gaze across the assembled students, “now, can anyone tell me what a boggart looks like?”

“A boggart has no shape,” Daphne confidently replied, “its natural form is amorphous until it shifts to take the shape of the nearest witch or wizard’s greatest fear.”

“Which is what makes them so frightening,” Lupin agreed, “take five points for Slytherin, Ms. Greengrass. Now, luckily there exists a simple charm for repelling boggarts, let’s practice it now.” He then proceeded to have the class stand, magically shifting the desks to the wall to create a large clear space before the cabinet. Then, without wands, they practiced the Ridickulus incantation until he felt they all sufficiently understood how to do it.

He then proceeded to go over the finer points of the charm, and how it was only part of dealing with a boggart. As the creatures subsisted on fear, they were diminished and repelled by laughter, so forcing a comedic shape on the creature with the spell would see them quickly dealt with.

Michael Corner offered himself up as the first volunteer and Remus gave him some finer pointers, making him picture the cat costumes his grandmother put her familiar in clearly in his mind. That earned some sniggers, particularly from Goyle, but Michael did as he was told, and held his wand ready as Lupin released the dark creature.

The dark formless shape of the Boggart leapt out of the cabinet and immediately began shaping itself after it centered on Michael. Seconds later a snarling manticore was menacing the Ravenclaw, who took a nervous step backwards.

“Remember, picture a funny version of your fear as you cast the spell,” Lupin coached from the side, his own wand in his hand should he need to step in.

A scorpion tail dripping with poison started to move towards Michael when he waved his wand and cried, “Ridickulus!” and suddenly the manticore was stuffed into a frilly cat tutu, bows in its mane and a bell tied to its tail, shrinking back from the laughter coming from the class. It was a nice illustration of both a boggart’s weakness to humor, and that it couldn’t truly reproduce the abilities of whatever it transformed into, as a real manticore’s hide was resistant to most magic.

“Excellent work Mister Corner,” Lupin said with a clap of his hands, “that’s exactly how to deal with a boggart.” He turned to the rest of the class and instructed, “why don’t the rest of you line up to give it a try? Don’t worry, if you get into trouble, I’m here as a backup. However, I’m confident you’ll each be able to get the hang of it.”

The third years lined up one by one in a column facing the rocking cupboard. Their expressions were a mixture of excited bravado and a certain amount of fear. They all knew, and had just seen, that a boggart wasn’t actually whatever it appeared to be, but facing one’s deepest fear was an intimidating, and even potentially embarrassing prospect.

The actual practice with Ridickulus went at a fairly fast pace. First up was Isobel ‘Morag’ MacDougall, who was confronted with a large snapping green dragon, albeit one that could fit in the cleared space of the room, before she cried “Ridickulus” and turned the beast into a stuffed googly eyed dragon.

From there it continued in similar fashion, a student would step up, the boggart would change to match their greatest fear only to turn into a comical apparition under the effects of the charm. There were a few hiccups; Goyle forgot the charm and tried to just hex the troll swinging a club at him before Lupin made the oaken weapon into a squeaky toy. Later, Daphne managed to turn her basilisk into a toy snake in a can before it could lock eyes with anyone, but it still unnerved a lot of the students. 

Some of the fears were reasonable like Terry Boot’s Kappa or Draco’s Inferni, while others were laughable; Tracey literally rolled her eyes when the boggart turned into a torch wielding muggle to scare Pansy. Others still were just odd, or even unclear, which might have been a good thing on balance. Tracey knew the splintered broomstick she saw was symbolic of her mother’s death but was glad that fact was missed by most of her peers. Padma’s flickering candle was similarly inexplicable. However, the most puzzling transformation was the one that occurred when the creature came face to face with Iris Potter.

Daphne had tried to get to the front of the line so she could get the exercise out of the way, and then settled in to observe her classmates give it a try. An insight into the fears of her peers, friends and most importantly rivals could be useful after all. As Iris stepped up to the cupboard, Daphne half expected to see the creature turn into a basilisk like it had for her, or even He Who Must Not Be Named. She had not been expecting a pair of giants. 

Iris was usually so bold, bordering on reckless, when it came to magical fauna of all types; suffice to say, giants seemed an odd fear for a girl who Daphne was pretty sure would try and cuddle with a Welsh Scorcher if nobody stopped her. The other curious thing about this apparition was that it almost appeared as though it had already been hit with the Riddikulus charm; the giants were dressed in frumpy muggle clothing, an unflattering house dress for the female one with a too long neck, and a straining suit for the mustachioed male who seemed to lack a neck at all. 

Her friend paused for a moment but as the lady giant started to screech “FREA-“ Iris cut her off with a furious chant of “Ridickulus!”

In a flash the giants turned into bobble heads of themselves, before Iris swiftly turned away and allowed Lisa to step up and turn the boggart into a werewolf. The lesson then continued through the handful of remaining students before Lupin put the creature back in its cupboard to lecture a bit about it.

Daphne was nothing if not tactful, so she refrained from calling any special attention to Iris’s boggart, but she fully intended to ask her friend about it later in private. She didn’t want to pry, but she was curious, and surely Iris of all people couldn’t chide her for pursuing that curiosity. ‘Perhaps they were meant to be symbolic of the muggle threat?’ Daphne thought, grasping at straws and fixating on the muggle clothing.

That explanation didn’t really ring true for her. Pansy might be frightened of the witch burning boogie man, but Iris had never expressed a fear of nonmagical folk, and indeed occasionally mentioned her muggle grandparents via Mr. Tonks in a way that seemed to indicate they had a positive relationship. Sure, in the abstract Daphne could understand why muggles were scary in large numbers, but that didn’t seem to fit with what she knew of Iris or the giant’s size.

It was possible that Iris was just genuinely afraid of giants, but giants didn’t wear muggle clothing, or usually speak English and Daphne was sure Iris of all people would know that. If her fear was truly giants, shouldn’t the boggart have been wearing mammoth furs?

=

Later, after class finished and Professor Lupin had assigned some further reading on Bogarts, Tracey, Daphne and Iris were ambling down the hallway together. The afternoon DADA lesson had been the last class of the day for all three of them and it was too early to head down to the Great Hall for dinner, so the trio were on their way to the library to pick up a text Professor Lupin had recommended when Daphne had requested further reading on Boggarts and similar creatures.

“So, best DADA lesson ever, or best DADA lesson ever?” Tracey asked her friends. The sporty girl was walking backwards to address two of her three favorite bookworms, absolutely buzzing after their first class with Professor Lupin.

“He’s certainly a marked improvement on his predecessors,” Daphne assented with a nod of her head. She was quite impressed with Remus Lupin so far, but it was only one lesson so she’d hold her ultimate judgment. “Between Quirell’s fearfulness and Lockhart’s incompetence, we’ve had far too few hands-on lessons up till now.”

“Yeah, Uncle Remus focused on Dark Beasts during his Mastery study,” Iris enthusiastically informed them, “and he’s arranged to bring several in for us to see throughout the year, whenever it can be done safely.” Remus hadn’t literally let her read his lesson plans, no matter how many times she’d asked, but Iris had gotten a bit of a preview of the planned curriculum for their third year. 

“At least one course will provide proper instruction in that area,” Daphne opined as they descended the spiral staircase, passing a laughing quartet of fifth year Gryffindor boys and a pair of Hufflepuff second years. 

Iris frowned at the oblique reference to their first lesson in Care of Magical Creatures, which Daphne, Tracey, Iris, and Susan were taking, earlier that morning. It had been, interesting to be sure and none of them were really sure what to make of Hagrid as a professor. 

Elective courses, unlike core lessons for those below the NEWT level, weren’t divvied up by House pairs. Since each student could only take a maximum of three of the five electives currently offered, Divination, Care of Magical Creatures, Muggle Studies, Arithmancy, and Ancient Runes, and many only took two, the professors could handle the whole year group in a single lesson. Perhaps if the wizarding population of Britain continued to bounce back in the coming years that would change, but for now they were all together. 

The worry about their CMC course that had begun with the eccentric choice in the assigned textbook, had deepened at the opening feast when Hagrid was introduced as a new professor alongside Lupin. Iris liked the half-giant well enough, their mutual love of magical fauna just barely outweighing her misgivings over his role in her horrid early childhood and extreme house pride, but she was admittedly skeptical of how good he’d be as a professor.

It wasn’t written into law anywhere, but it was generally expected that a Hogwarts Professor would have a Mastery, the rough magical equivalent of a muggle doctorate, in a relevant subject. Lockhart hadn’t had one in a specialty related to DADA but given the difficulty Dumbledore faced in filling that particular post, the preferred credentials had grown a little loose.

Given he’d been expelled from Hogwarts and his wand snapped, a fact that was common knowledge in the Hogwarts rumor mill, but not often spoken aloud out of politeness, unless you were a prat like Malfoy or Parkinson, Rubeus Hagrid almost certainly hadn’t earned a Mastery. She knew he had a large amount of field experience that could theoretically make up for it, but given he’d thought it was a good idea to hatch an illegal dragon egg in his little, very flammable hut, she worried about his judgment. (If her friends had been privy to Iris’s thoughts, they might have noted the hypocrisy of her chiding someone else for being cavalier about safety when it came to magical creatures.)

“I dunno,” Tracey said with a shrug, before turning around so she didn’t trip stepping off the final stair. Speaking back over her shoulder she said, “getting to get face to face with a hippogriff was wicked and I am SO jealous of Weasley for getting to fly on Buckbeak.”

“Professor Hagrid’s lucky that idiot Draco didn’t get himself sliced to ribbons by Buckbeak, approaching without showing the proper respect,” Daphne said coolly.

“Hagrid’s lucky you were paying attention,” Iris added quietly. “I heard you mutter your incantation. Tripping Jinx?”

“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Daphne replied primly, “obviously Malfoy needs to learn to tie his shoelaces.” The ice queen façade that was all most of their peers ever saw of Daphne Greengrass lasted just a moment before all three girls shared a laugh in the mostly empty back hallway they were taking to get to the library while avoiding Peeve’s yearly dungbomb bombing of the firsties outside the Great Hall. 

Iris put the hand not currently carrying a book over her mouth to cover her giggle. She knew her friend had seen Malfoy about to charge the creature, as part of his juvenile dick measuring contest with Ron and intervened before the situation could escalate. 

Daphne came to a stop in the quiet hall, causing Tracey and Iris to cease walking as well, turning to look at her. Choosing her words carefully, and taking advantage of the relative privacy, she asked “Iris, before we go in to pick up the book. I wanted to ask why your boggart took the shape of giants. It seemed out of character for you.”

The Potter girl’s happy expression swiftly turned pensive and she took a deep breath. She opened her mouth to reply before seeming to think of something and drawing her silvery white wand from its holster instead. Pointing it down the hall in the direction they’d come from she chanted “Muffliato,” before turning and repeating the spell in the other direction.

She glanced back at her confused friends and explained, “just a little something my godfather taught me for when you want privacy.” She took a deep breath to steel herself and said, “Those weren’t giants.”

Tracey took a step closer, “you don’t have to tell us anything you aren’t comfortable with, Iris. I mean, I’m not exactly stoked to think about my deepest fear either.”

Iris shook her head, “No, you are two of my best friends, and I trust you. It’s just, this isn’t something I like to talk about.” She offered a weak smile.

Daphne locked eyes with her, “Iris, I think I’ve made it clear by now that I do not choose my friends lightly, and I won’t abandon them easily.”

“I know,” Iris muttered in agreement, trying to find the words to start her explanation. In the years that had passed since she and Sue had met the two of them in that compartment, she’d shared many of her secrets with Daphne and Tracey, her invisibility cloak, her habit of chatting with snakes, and even the inner conflict she’d felt over the whole Sirius situation. However, this was the thing she kept buried the deepest.

“The figures you saw were my maternal aunt and uncle,” she explained, just trying to get it over with. “While I bear a distant biological connection to one of them, they are not my family in any shape, way or form. When my birth parents were killed and Sirius was falsely accused and imprisoned, I was improperly given to the care of Albus Dumbledore and he left me with them.”

“Wait, your mum and dad didn’t….” Tracey asked.

Iris shook her head before she could finish the question. “I should have been placed in the care of mum at that point, but with everything falling apart, Dumbledore basically was the Ministry in some ways. He sealed my records, and decided I should grow up with my muggle relatives, just because my mum was related to Sirius and Bellatrix. As if half the population doesn’t have a Death Eater somewhere on the family tree.”

As the memories came back to her, she held her arms against herself and kept explaining. “Vernon and Petunia Dursley weren’t my family, and they made sure I knew it. They had already disowned my birth mum years ago for being a witch and I have no idea what Dumble-“

“What?” Daphne exclaimed, genuine shock making her impassive expression break and her eyes go wide, “they were upset she was magical?” It just didn’t make any sense to the pure-blood heiress. She didn’t have any kind of prejudice against muggleborns, but being magical was just better than being a muggle and an honor for any family. 

“They hate magic,” Iris said quietly with a shudder, “they hate it SO much.”

Daphne abandoned her decorum and pulled Iris into a fierce hug, joined after just a moment by Tracey. For Iris, who loved magic in all its forms and wanted nothing more than to study its secrets, she couldn’t imagine a worse environment.

Iris returned the hug gratefully, then eventually pushed them away with a weary sigh when they didn’t let go. “I’m fine, guys. It happened a long time ago.” Recalling it didn’t bring her to tears anymore, it just made her feel tired and small. “I’ll spare you the gory details, but the five years I spent with them were hell. Then my mum finally found out where I was, burst in like an avenging angel and brought me home.”

Daphne still glowered and then icily asked, “I trust your parents thoroughly reprimanded Professor Dumbledore for his role in this travesty?”

Iris chuckled, “yeah, my mum ripped him a new one and Dad threatened to ruin him legally and politically if he didn’t make things right. That’s why I’m a bit weird around the headmaster though; mum and dad don’t want me spending any time alone with him, and honestly it’s just really awkward being around him for me and Nym.”

Tracey put a hand on Iris’s shoulder and swallowed, trying to put her thoughts into speech. The Half-Blood had her own difficult relationship with muggle relations, considering her muggle father had abandoned her mother while she was still pregnant with Tracey. ‘I guess I never realized abandonment was preferable to abuse.’

Eventually she just bluntly said, “they sound like bloody sons of bitches and I hope they rot in Tartarus.”

That earned a snort of laughter from Iris and the gloomy atmosphere began to dissipate. Neither of the Slytherin students pressed her for details, and Iris didn’t seem eager to volunteer any. It had been something important to share with her friends, but not a part of her life Iris liked to dwell on for any length of time.

“Wait, why were they so big, though?” Tracey asked.

Iris shrugged as she started walking towards the library, “I was a tiny six-year-old when I last saw them and they seemed giant to me. Like I said, it was a long time ago.”

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

Hogwarts, Outside the Quidditch Pitch, Weekend after the First Week of Term, September

“I can only spend an hour or so with you in the library today,” Hermione apologetically informed her friends as they walked down the windy path towards the pitch, passing a small crowd of older students playing some sort of game with a large ball and the Summoning Charm. “Lav and I are meeting up in the Common Room after lunch to work on our Divination homework. I’m not quite getting some of Professor Trelawney’s lessons so far, so she’s helping me out.”

Daphne and Iris, who were walking with her, shared a curious glance. Hermione was typically the one helping other people with their homework, not the other way around, all three of them were. While they weren’t overly vain about it, the trio were consistently at the top of their year across their subjects and tended to be the person students in their year and below went to when they wanted to ask a question or copy notes. Of course, whether they got the notes was another question, with Daphne being quite selective, Hermione only helping anyone she thought was making an honest effort, and Iris willing to share her notes with almost anyone provided they copied them down and didn’t run off with the originals. 

“Well,” Iris replied, “she was really enthusiastic about the subject even before you had your first lesson, so she’s probably a bit ahead of the curve. I’m sure she can set you on the right path.”

“My dear friend Iris foretells the future well,” Daphne quipped, making Iris giggle and Hermione roll her eyes. Neither of them was taking Divination so there wasn’t much more they could contribute on the subject.

None of them had selected electives that lined up perfectly, but they all overlapped a bit. Iris was taking Runes, Arithmancy and Care of Magical Creatures, and Daphne shared the latter two but had opted for Muggle Studies over Runes. That had been a surprising choice to Iris, but Daphne had explained simply that getting to know Hermione made her realize she had some serious gaps in her knowledge where Muggles were concerned, and a proper Greengrass needed to correct that failing.

Hermione was taking Divination, Runes and Arithmancy, though, as she’d protested over the summer, she’d wanted to take all five. Both Susan and Tracey had opted to take only two electives rather than the maximum three, giving them a weekly free period. The Bones girl was taking Care of Magical Creatures and Runes, while Tracey had chosen Care of Magical Creatures and Divination.

“It’s fine either way,” Daphne continued as the trio arrived at the foot of the massive wooden structure of the pitch. “Susan has practice with the Hufflepuff team after they finish with the intramural pickup matches, so she won’t be able to join us at all anyway.” It was obvious from the tone of her voice that she found the choice to spend the day playing quidditch rather than reading to be a dubious one.

They ascended the back stairs, dodging out of the way of the Creevy brothers tromping down it, Daphne and Hermione instinctively forming a wall between them so Colin wouldn’t go for a picture. When they emerged in the stands, they were sparsely populated, as was to be expected since there was no formal game, with just a scattering of onlookers.

With some exceptions right before House matches, one morning most weekends was set aside as unbookable by the House teams so students not chosen for them could enjoy some friendly games of quidditch. Given how popular the game was, they pretty much always had enough people interested to form 3-6 squads, and Madame Hooch was there to supervise and make sure everyone got the chance to play.

Susan and Tracey were playing that morning, but interestingly so were Luna and Ginny. Iris was happy to see Luna had restored her friendship with the formerly possessed girl, but the youngest Weasley hadn’t really joined their group even to the extent Lavender had. She was more just Luna’s friend, but Iris thought it was a good thing Luna had a friend in her own year and classes.

“Who’s winning?” Hermione asked a nearby spectator, a dark haired fourth year Gryffindor called Fay Dunbar. 

Fay replied without taking her eyes off the field, “Slytherclaw just pulled ahead by 20, but Gryiffinpuff is starting to rally,” the portmanteau names were slang to indicate the two teams were each a combination of students from two houses. Fay huffed and turned to look at Hermione, “but the match is never going to finish if Diggory and Chang keep flirting instead of trying to catch the snitch.”

Hermione took a seat by her Housemate, while Daphne and Iris sat behind the two. It looked like Tracey once again wasn’t getting to play her preferred position of Seeker, instead flying as a chaser for her team along with Luna and Terry Boot. It wasn’t surprising that they’d want the starting seeker for Ravenclaw to play her normal position, but it was a bit surprising that Cedric and Cho were playing at all. The starting squad for each house generally played all the time anyway with the number of practices they did, so they weren’t usually down on the pitch for these friendly informal matches. 

Iris peered at the flyers, trying to follow the action and see what Fay was talking about. She wasn’t a big quidditch fan, but she’d grown up with it more and thus wasn’t as hopeless as Hermione when it came to understanding the game. Still, the seeker’s role had always seemed the most asinine and inscrutable to her, and she didn’t know enough to say if the flitting about in the air Cedric and Cho were doing with one another wasn’t a good seeking technique.

Iris liked her sister’s friend Cedric, even if things had been a bit awkward with him the previous year after Marietta’s bullying of Luna came to light. It was a complicated situation, but Iris understood Cho hadn’t taken part in the bullying personally, even if her best friend had been the ringleader, and she didn’t hold it against Cedric like she would if he were dating Marietta herself.

Within Ravenclaw Tower, Marietta and Iris had basically settled into acting like the other one didn’t exist, never greeting or taking notice of the other when they passed in the common room. The bulk of the Eagles had agreed with Penny and Iris that Marietta and her cronies’ behavior was a disgrace to their house, but there were a significant minority who either agreed with Marietta’s intentional isolation of ‘Looney’ Lovegood, or at least thought Professor Flitwick’s punishment had been an overreaction.

It hadn’t split the house into factions like Slytherin always was, but there was a quiet tension in the Aerie, particularly whenever Marietta or one of the younger girl’s who’d helped her were physically close to Iris, Luna or Penelope. Iris didn’t care. Luna was safe and happy now, and that was all that mattered. 

“So,” Daphne began, obviously wanting to focus on anything but the game that Fay was enthusiastically taking Hermione through, play by play. “Divination wasn’t to Hermione’s liking, and we share Creatures and Arithmancy, but how is Runes?”

“Really interesting!” Iris answered, always excited to talk about new knowledge. “Professor Babbling is really fun, and obviously knows her stuff. We didn’t really do much in just the first class but some of the examples she showed off were brilliant!” Professor Bathsheda ‘Shiva’ Babbling was a young, at least compared to most of her colleagues, energetic woman of Indian descent with dyed auburn hair and distinctive sleeve tattoos that incorporated several runic circuits.

She’d taken a page from Minerva’s book and liked to inspire her new students with a spectacular demonstration of what was possible with her branch of magic. This year she’d shown her new third year a fine wooden coat rack with runes carved into the lacquer that allowed you to make it shrink by turning one of the pegs and completing the runic circuit, only to enlarge it by twisting the handle back and breaking it.

After that she removed a scale model of the atrium of Pharaoh Teth’s tomb, and demonstrated the power of the doorway’s protective runes by throwing an apple through and letting them burn it to a crisp. Finally, she touched her own arms together to make her tattoos start to glow brightly and reproduce a magical shield charm in front of her.

Then she’d launched into her lecture, explaining how the three examples showed how Ancient Runes could be used for utility, protection and power.  Of course, there were a lot of drawbacks to Runes compared to wand work, but if you wanted to create a permanent effect, she maintained there was no better anchor than a proper runic circuit. 

“Her tattoos are so fascinating,” Iris explained as she finished relating how the lesson had gone. “I asked her after class why everyone didn’t get them, but she said there were a lot of drawbacks and limitations to runes you could put on a magical body.”

Daphne tilted her head in consideration, “also, that may be flashy, but really she’s just reproducing Lumos and Protego, and it’s not much faster or easier to tap your arms together than it is to cast them with a wand.”

After that the pair discussed their own Arithmancy essay due in two weeks, regarding the theory of magical numbers and the difference between the primary three. More than any other subject taught at Hogwarts, other than arguably Muggle Studies, Arithmancy hewed more towards theory than practical application, but both of them found it fascinating and Hermione looked like she dearly wished she could figure out how to politely exit the quidditch conversation with Fay to join them. 

The match ended up lasting another twenty minutes before Chang finally grabbed the snitch, during which time Ginny scored 50 points, Susan batted the bludger at her own seeker in frustration, Luna somehow managed to get turned around backwards on her broom, and Fay had convinced poor Hermione to agree to play as her partner in that month’s gobstones tournament.

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The Forbidden Forest, October 7th, an Hour till Midnight

“<Ssssstay back, Sssssebastian,>” Iris Potter hissed in Parseltongue to her serpentine companion, who slithered off in compliance. The Ravenclaw Third Year had slinked away from the castle under her invisibility cloak that evening, eschewing her semi-usual trek to the Restricted Section to instead creep into the Forbidden Forest.

She’d made her fair share of secret sojourns into the forest in the last two months, since this year there wasn’t a Unicorn poaching bogeyman or a petrifying monster to fear. Of course, there were quite a few things that were always in the forest that she should probably be afraid of, but Iris felt she was safe enough with her cloak and her wits to guard her. ‘It’s just a matter of knowing which parts not to stumble into.’

With a bit of trial and error, coupled with some subtle teasing out of details from Hagrid over tea, she had a rough map of at least a section of the Forest and the major danger spots. She knew to steer well clear of the Giant Spider colony she’d seen signs of to the west, and the Troll gang that made their home a bit further south. She’d found tracks a few weeks ago that made her suspect Fluffy had been let loose in the Forest after her year guarding the Philosopher's Stone, but she had yet to rediscover the pupper. 

However, it wasn’t her long-term project of cataloging all the mystical creatures that called these dark woods home that brought her out of the castle tonight. No, she was here to practice a bit of wandwork she couldn’t exactly do inside the school. Her study of Atmospheric charms had only grown over the summer, and she’d been devouring every book she could find on the subject, either in the Hogwarts Library, or for purchase at places like Flourish and Blotts. There was something exhilarating about harnessing the power of the storm, and the tricky way one had to shape their magic to account for miniscule atmospheric fluctuations was a delightful little puzzle to master. 

However, she was finding that the further she went with weather manipulation magic, the less feasible it was to practice it in her dorm, or even an empty classroom. For the spell she was trying to master that night in particular, she needed the open sky, and, since she didn’t want to be seen practicing on the grounds, the Forbidden Forest was her best bet while at school. 

Taking a breath of crisp autumn air, she cast off her cloak to stand in the open of the small clearing she’d come to. The Forbidden Forest was thickly wooded for the most part, but she’d found a small meadow with enough of a gap in the canopy that it would hopefully serve her purposes. As far as she’d been able to determine, scouting it out in the weeks ahead, based on the hoof marks, she was near the territory of the Unicorn herd, but given she was a young woman, she shouldn’t have much to fear from the powerful equine creatures so long as she didn’t antagonize them. 

From her satchel she pulled out the copy of Heart of the Storm, by Calliban Drake, a more advanced tome on atmospheric magic she’s temporarily ‘borrowed’ from the restricted section. Drake had been a sea captain and privateer in service of the English crown in the last century before the enactment of the Statute of Secrecy and had written his book as half memoir and half primer on offensive weather magic. Iris wasn’t planning to set to sea and hoist the black flag anytime soon, but she was finding it fascinating reading. 

Her eyes glided over the moving illustration presenting the proper wand movement for the casting of the Greater Lightning Calling Charm. She was very practiced with the lesser version, Fulgurio, but Drake’s version varied quite a bit. Where Fulgurio let her sling a modest jolt from the tip of her wand, this spell instead summoned a proper lightning bolt from the heavens down on the target.

It wasn’t quite as fast, as you first had to form a small thundercloud in the sky, but once you had created the cloud, Drake seemed to indicate you could bring down multiple bolts from it, if she was reading it correctly. Learning to form a thunder cloud would be a big leap for her towards the ultimate goal of atmospheric magic, shaping the weather of an entire region.

=

An hour later and she was starting to get the hang of the first part of the spell, as evidenced by the dark grey clouds that were rumbling above the part of the forest where she was but she had yet to pluck any lightning from the cumulonimbus mass. Growing tired, but still determined, she straightened herself and began another attempt.

She pointed her Horned Serpent Horn core wand to the sky and drew it in two large circles while chanting “Vococaelo….”. The dark clouds rumbled and grew as she channeled her magic once again skyward. She’d done this quite a few times, and her magic fed into the cloud well enough, but then she found herself losing her grasp of it, so this time she tried picturing a tether between her wand tip and the cloud, connecting her magic to the atmospheric disturbance she’d created. 

Then in a decisive downward stroke she chopped her wand downward to point at the rock she’d picked as her target, crying “FULMEN!” with all her might. She nearly fell backward with surprise as a golden crackling bolt of lightning followed the path of her wand tip down to crash into the boulder, cracking the stone with its force. A moment later sound caught up to light and a BOOM shook the clearing with a thunderclap.

Iris, her ears ringing, fell to her knees in pure exhaustion, but her face was beaming. She’d been worried her magical core still wasn’t developed enough for such powerful magic, but she’d done it! She was pretty sure she couldn’t do it again, but even managing it once made her flush with pride. Tonight, had been a good night.

“Who are you, and what are you doing in our forest?” A deep booming voice demanded from behind her.

Iris turned around slowly to come face to face with a scowling, towering centaur, bow in hand. Instantly she went pale as she realized she may have wandered into trouble after all. ‘I could have sworn Hagrid said the centaur herd lived well north of here,’ was the only thought that kept uselessly on repeat through her mind.

“Come, Bane,” another centaur, this one fairer with a braided red beard, “she is merely a foal, there is no need to frighten her.”

Bane stomped his hoof, “this foal, Ronan,” he snarled, “if she even still be a foal, just summoned an unnatural lightning strike that could have set our forest aflame. She is also clearly responsible for the clouds that have obscured the stars this evening and befouled our divinations.”

A handsome younger centaur trotted up to join his fellows. He regarded the still kneeling and frozen Iris curiously, “hmm, hair of flame and… Girl, show me thy forehead.”

Unable to think of another response, Iris simply compiled and pulled back her bangs. At least this centaur seemed less eager to skewer her with an arrow than the one called Bane.

The youngest crossed his arms and said, “it is faint, but do you see?”

The one identified as Rowan stroked his beard, “ah yes, the mark of thunder. You are the one called Potter.”

Finding her wits, Iris nodded hurriedly as she scrambled to her feet, “yes sir, noble centaur, I am Iris Potter.” In the back of her mind, she was desperately running through every scrap she’d ever read about the proud and fierce woodland beings. ‘Herds usually consist of 150-300 individuals, leadership based on seniority, skilled Diviners, best archers in the world, could stomp your head in like a grapefruit….’

“Hmm, Jupiter shines brightly,” Ronan said, inscrutably to Iris, but the other two seemed to understand. 

“And Venus nears her crossing,” The younger centaur added.

“Hmph,” Bane whinnied, “I care not, Firenze. This witch endangers our home.”

The youngest looking one, apparently called Firenze, raised an eyebrow, “it is not like you, to set yourself against the stars, Bane.”

“Uh, Lord Bane, sir?” Iris tried to cut in, reflexively falling back on the formal noble language Andromeda had given her a basic education in.

Bane placed his great bow on his back but continued to scowl at Iris. “We do not need the empty titles of wizardkind, witch. I am simply Bane.”

“Well, Bane then,” Iris diplomatically continued, “it was in no way my intention to endanger the forest or intrude on your territory. I chose that rock as my target because it wasn’t very near any tree, and it could absorb the force of the blast.”

Ronan, who had trotted over to the cracked boulder, examined the break, “barely absorbed. Jupiter is bright indeed. And she is still but a foal.” Iris’s usual rebuttal that she wasn’t a child, died in her throat, as at the moment it seemed being classed as a foal would be quite a good thing.

Bane stared first at Ronan, then at Firenze, before finally turning back to Iris, a sullen expression on his face. “She is no longer a foal, but I will not be the one to defy the celestial writing. Run back to your castle, Iris Potter, and know if you disturb our forest with your storm again,” He leaned his massive human half down to stare straight into her eyes, “my justice will be swift, and final.”

Iris was scrambling back towards Ravenclaw Tower so quickly, she barely remembered to retrieve her cloak and familiar.

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Excerpts from Twice Bitten, A Comprehensive Guide to Vampires and Lycanthropes, by Sir Diggibus Caesar.

Vampires and Werewolves, Werewolves and Vampires. Are there any two other dark beasts that make little witches and wizards fear bumps in the night more? Classic villains of popular literature, so much so they have drifted into the Muggle press, the dark legends around both creatures often obscures the facts regarding them.

Your faithful author has conducted countless interviews with expert Magizoologists, top Healers, noted Scholars, and GASP yes, actual Vampires and Werewolves to compile the incredible book you are now holding in your hands. In this text I’ll take you from the blood covens of Romania, to the dark packs of the American West, and everywhere in between. You’ll learn not just how to identify these creatures, but how to defend yourselves should they menace your own peaceful village…..

….. According to Healer Halliwell Lycanthropy and Vampirism are essentially contagious magical diseases transferred via bite. Despite what you may have heard, no one is born a howler or a blood sucker. Scattered reports claim a half-vampire can be born, but this has never been confirmed by experts. Similarly, the schoolyard boogeyman of the Vampiric Werewolf has never, and indeed, can never exist. 

These diseases are often paired together for their similarities, but the differences are just as striking. The first thing to know is that all werewolves were once witches or wizards, while every vampire started life as a muggle. Magical folk are naturally immune to the turning power of a vampire’s bite, and muggles that survive a tangle with a werewolf need not fear the full moon.

Theories abound as to why this is, but your remarkable writer tends to believe the words of the handsome Healer Halliwell. He thinks that lycanthropy works by infecting a wizard’s own magical core, which a muggle doesn’t have to get affected. Similarly, if vampirism involved the creation of a malformed core in a recently slain corpse, it would find no purchase in a witch who already had a healthy core of her own. Either way, more research is necessary…

…..  While a Werewolf’s transforming abilities are well known, the similar talent of their blood sucking counterparts are less well understood. Some vampires can indeed transform into bats, but most cannot, and them turning into mist or other beasts are simply muggle notions, or misconceptions. Essentially a Vampire must be in at least their fifth century before they develop this ability, and given their myriad weaknesses, many never reach this milestone…

……  If you fear a werewolf may have moved into your community, be sure to securely lock and ward your property before every full moon. Save your sickles as Silver has little effect on the creatures, but they have been known to fear the smell of Caesar’s patented Werewolf repellent……

….. Vampires naturally dislike garlic, so it is recommended that you always plant a large crop of it every harvest. The Lumos Solem incantation can also temporarily repel them, but it is not as effective as natural sunlight…..

….. Never date a vampire. Especially never date a vampire named Talia, she will only break your heart.