II. Across The Universe
Thoughts meander like the restless wind inside a letter box
They tumble blindly as they make their way
Across the universe
Nothing’s gonna change my world
Nothing’s gonna change my world
7th September 1975
Ara Black entered Hogwarts for the new school year, a different girl.
Taller, though that was hardly the first thing a person noticed. No, they noticed the tenseness to her form. The hard and angry glint to her eyes. With that, a person would spot her new blunt fringe - cut in a fashionable muggle style - and the new length to her bright indigo hair. Now perfectly tamed through Muggle means - Andy and Ted having taken her into Muggle London to a hair salon for the experience.
She had grown up over the summer, a little more shapely and defined; traces of the woman she would become in the delicate angles of her face.
Donning her usual muggle fashions: tight brown bellbottoms with a band shirt tied at the waist to cinch her middle. Gold hoops in her ears, another looped around her nostril.
By her side, arms around hers, walked her two brothers.
Her twin, now sporting bright crimson locks - cut a little shorter on the sides but still flowing down his neck. He too had grown. A little more muscular, a little taller after the summer. Donning those same muggle styles - bellbottoms and a loose band shirt that matched Ara’s. Even Regulus wore the matching Queen shirt, though with his black slacks and shorter brown hair - let free from gel or styling in his natural curls.
They walked together. Tense smiles and tight holds.
The end of summer had been difficult for them all.
Ara’s silent days outnumbered the rest; the Black side of the family sequestered in Dorea and Charlus’s wing most days. The Potters on the outskirts, desperate to help.
Oh, how she wished they could.
A snore from behind broke Ara melancholy thoughts, blinking her mind from the Potter Manor and back into Dumbledore’s office.
“Ah, you must be one of mine.” A deep voice spoke. Ara turned her head - looking up to the wall of portraits until her eyes settled on the one watching her intently, sat atop an ornate golden chair.
With dark curls and dark eyes, his lineage ran clear. She didn’t need to read the placard beneath to know he was Phineas Nigellus Black - some great-great-grandfather of hers.
“Indeed I am.” She nodded, awkwardly.
“Wrong robes.” He tutted. “Then again, better than that little thing in the yellow. It is most distasteful for a Black to be in any House but Slytherin.”
“I think the most distasteful part of our House might be that your grandchildren are salivating at the feet of a stupid warlord.” She retorted bitterly. The portrait stared at her with surprise, blinking once. “Or that they used Unforgivables on children.”
“Certainly not!” Phineas exclaimed. “We may be a mad bunch, but we have manners.”
“Walburga Black would disagree.”
“Oh, that hag.” Phineas spoke cooly, narrowing his eyes. “At least tell me the heir to the House is well.”
“I am.” She agreed, smirking as the portrait blanched at the idea of a female heir.
“What has our family come to?” He lamented.
“Trust me,” she bit out, “it’s my lot that are going to save it before all your stupid values burn our House to the ground. Now kindly piss off. I have to yell some more once the Headmaster returns.”
She turned away, refusing to see the portraits reaction.
As she waited for the Headmaster to return, Ara picked up a small glass paperweight from his desk - rolling it along her palm as she stared at the door.
Her dreams were coming more rapidly now. No longer pressing into her twin’s mind; a burden purely her own. As most burdens were. And with each dream, the puzzle of her visions pulled itself together, piece by piece. She could almost complete it. The edges were set in scenes of battles in towers and Ministry halls. Foliage of Harry’s laughter and Ron’s stuffed cheeks as they sat at the Gryffindor table.
But there was this piece, right in the middle, that she could not find. It wasn’t under the cold tent or her swim in the Black Lake. Nor was it in memories of a ginger family, summers lying by a pond beneath a willow.
She sensed the answers were soon approaching. The time of ignorance was dwindling with each dream and each scribbled theory on scraps of parchment hidden at the base of her trunk below records and Reg’s science fiction books.
God, she hoped the answers didn’t break her.
“I want to meet the Order.” Ara declared, the moment the door swung open. Dumbledore halted only briefly in his step, continuing to his desk and sitting behind it before he spoke again.
“You are not yet of age, Miss Black.” He spoke to her very gently, clearly sensing her bad mood. “And while I do believe you deserve to find your place in this fight, I do not wish to take away your childhood in doing so.”
“You’ve been begging me for information for years, holding back and telling me that I have a place in this thing while keeping me in the dark. I’ve met him twice now. Fucking Lord Voldemort. And I’m not some ‘Boy-Who-Lived’, I don’t have a chance at all!” Her chest heaved as she gasped in breaths - her face pink with anger.
“I know how you are feeling, Miss Black.” Dumbledore spoke quietly.
“No you don’t.” Ara laughed, hollowly. “If you did, you’d stop playing games and start taking responsibility.”
“Never try to understand the students.” Phineas piped in from behind. “They loathe it. They would much rather be tragically misunderstood, wallow in self-pity, stew in their own-“
“Butt out, Phineas!” Ara snapped, glaring at the portrait for a moment. “I’m not talking to you.” Returning her gaze to Dumbledore, Ara tilted her head appraisingly. “You say you understand, but you have never once bothered to actually get to know me. You force me into your office every so often and pry at my nightmares, but you never ask why I have them. You never think to wonder why my brothers and I stay with the Potter, why we… you just don’t care, do you?” She spoke finally, dejection in her eyes.
“Miss Black, perhaps if you allowed me to explain myself?”
“What good would it do?” Dumbledore looked down, the twinkle of his blue eyes diminished. “Why would I bother sitting and listening to you when you won’t listen to me?”
“I admit, I have not handled this situation well.” Dumbledore finally replied, an eery calmness to his words. “When I first discovered your situation, I truly did not know how severe it was. And once I was finally privy, I believed that Minerva would have a better handle on it than I.”
“How could she help me when you won’t let me talk to her?”
“A mistake I ought to have rectified much sooner.”
“It’s more than that. You have watched me suffer for years, watched my brothers suffer… and you have remained silent. You expected our silence, too. And I don’t get it! The only reason I can think of, is that you were afraid of us. Of our family name and all it suggests.”
“Of course I was.” He admitted. “Three children from a Dark House, sorted into the two Lightest Houses at Hogwarts. How could I not fear your potential? There is no shame in what you are feeling, Miss Black.”
“Good to know.” She retorted sarcastically.
“I have handled this situation, most appallingly. And I’m afraid that I have no idea how to solve it.”
“You can’t.” Ara stressed. “I know you think of yourself as the greatest wizard we’ve got, but you’re just a man.”
“And you are more than a simple witch.” Dumbledore spoke softly. “There is a reason why you are so very different to your family, and I wish to help you uncover it.”
“You just want to find out for yourself.” She laughed hollowly. “What kind of man do you think you are?” She bit out. “I’ll tell you what you are to me. You are a coward that won a single battle and has been lording it over the rest of Wizarding Britain for decades. You seek power and knowledge over others safety and you believe yourself to be superior to the rest of us mortals. How do you look at yourself and not see Tom Riddle in your reflection?”
He flinched, looking to her sadly as she stood.
“I do not know.” He replied, simply, for there were no other words to say.
“Some bloody hero, you are.” Ara spat, moving towards the door - fingers white as she gripped the paperweight.
“Please sit, Miss Black. We have more to discuss.”
“No, I have nothing left.” She shook her head, willing her eyes to stay dry.
“We must discuss your visions.” He implored. “There are things I have not told you. Things about you that could shift the tides of this war.”
“And whose fault is that?” She snapped.
“Miss Black-”
“This is all bullshit!” Ara screamed. “I am not a saviour, I am not some bloody Chosen One!” She threw the paperweight in her hand and it smashed against the stone floor - the tiniest flinch perceptible on Dumbledore’s face. “I am not a sheep to be led to slaughter! I didn’t ask for any of this! To be some fucked up Seer that only sees some girl’s future life, or some reverse reincarnation, or whatever it is that I am. So, don’t you dare tell me to be patient or not ask questions, because I am bloody terrified that I won’t make it to adulthood and I don’t know how to kill any bloody Dark Lord!”
Silence filled the space her harsh words had filled, numbing her down as she panted with exertion, staring down the wisest and most powerful man in Wizarding Britain. A man she had just reamed out, looking shellshocked in a way she frankly didn’t care about.
The more of Hermione’s life she saw, the more she felt distrust towards the Headmaster. This man, because that was all he was - not a God or a warlock, just a man; he simply couldn’t be trusted. His ideals and secrecy had killed them. She just knew it.
“Fuck your Greater Good.” She spat, revelling in the widening of his eyes at the phrase. Before he could open his mouth to reply, she made her way to the exit. Stopping only as she stood in the doorway, a look of utter contempt on her face. “Either you give me answers, or I stop talking. You decide.”
——
10th September 1975
Over her years at Hogwarts, Ara had never truly looked too hard at her Head of House. Hadn’t bothered to think too deeply into this woman that watched over them.
Her pin-straight black hair was pulled into a tight bun at the nape of her neck; stretching the sides of her stern face. Minerva McGonagall was blessed with a tall and imposing figure, often looming over the students of Gryffindor as she told them off.
Now, she sat behind her desk. Same height as Ara in their lowered positions.
She’d hardly spoken to the older witch once Dumbledore had told her not to. She didn’t know why, really. Maybe it was easier. Simple to just let everything lay buried.
Unfortunately for her, nothing stayed silent forever. Certainly not her Head of House.
“Am I right that you yelled at the Headmaster?” McGonagall peered over thin blame frames; expression flat, yet somehow not stern.
“Yes.”
“You informed him that he is a power hungry coward?”
“Yep.”
“And told him that his help was essentially conditional?”
“Yep.”
“Before finally leaving by informing him that you will not help him if he continues the way he is currently acting?”
“That’s the gist, yeah.”
McGonagall frowned briefly, before sliding the plate over the desk towards her.
“Have a biscuit, Black.”
Blinking, Ara complied - pinching a custard cream from the assortment and munching on it awkwardly. She regarded her Head of House cautiously, furrowed brow at the proud look on the woman’s face.
“Are you… not going to tell me off?”
“Certainly not.” She frowned.
“But I swore at the Headmaster. And I smashed some of his things.”
“That man ought to be put in his place every once in a while.” Her lip twitched, as though fighting a smile. “I’ve been doing the job alone for an awfully long time. It’s quite nice to have company.” With that, she lifted her teacup and had a sip of the beverage - eyes leering over the cup amusedly at her student. Setting the teacup down, she pinned Ara in place with a severe look. “I have trusted that man for years, and yet he failed to mention to me that one of my cubs was having nightmares of the future. He tried to prevent me from discovering the truth of your dreams, despite me being your Head of House. He has simply broken my trust.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Oh, dear girl, it is not your fault. Albus has a penchant for secrecy. In future, however, I would like to be kept in the loop.”
“The only reason I didn’t say was because he told me not to.”
“Of course he did.” She grumbled, displeased. “Then, perhaps you will do me a favour?” Ara nodded. “Tell me first. Whatever visions you see, come to me before him. We can decide together whether he deserves to know. Ought to serve him right, being out of the loop for a change.”
Ara barked out a surprised laugh, awkwardly clamming up at McGonagall’s stern look.
“Of course. I promise.” She nodded.
“Very well then.” The woman edged the plate closer to her. “Have another biscuit.”
Ara ate that one far more contentedly, sharing a small smile with the usually stern woman. It was quite nice not being yelled at, for a change.
“I find myself endlessly and incredibly proud of you.” McGonagall’s lips tugged upwards slightly, eyes soft and warm. “To persevere and be so very kind, despite your situation.”
“Can you…” Ara began, eyes watering, “I’m sorry, never mind.”
“What is it?”
“I just… I don’t think I’ve ever heard that before.” Ara tried to shrug it off, as though this revelation were something minor and unimportant.
But the gentle look to her Head of House’s eyes revealed her secret was known. With a shaky cough and a small smile, the older witch offered the plate of biscuits anew.
“Miss Black, I am truly proud of you.”
“Thank you.” Ara squeaked, snatching a biscuit to distract from the tears lining her eyes.