Metamorphosis
Chapter Three: Metamorphosis
"The truth." Dumbledore sighed. "...is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should therefore be treated with great caution." –Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
In the course of six hours, Nymphadora Tonks felt as if her life was changed forever.
There was so much to public service, so much more than auror academy could ever teach her. It was part of why the academy had begun the shadow program. It allowed trainees to receive a stipend to live on while they worked their way up, allowed for practical experience, and most importantly, allowed for aurors to handpick who they wanted to train and who they didn't.
While Tonks was rather certain that Shacklebolt would never want to work with her ever again after this, she felt simultaneously over the moon and as if she had aged ten years in a day. This was much better experience than fetching tea for superiors or rescuing kneazles from a tree. In fact, it was sheer luck that she had been on call that night, and that the dispatcher had put her with a senior auror rather than a junior one. It was also sheer luck that the dispatcher didn't know how personal this call would be for Tonks. If she had known, they might have taken her off the case before it had even begun.
"Oi, Tonks!" Williamson called, breaking her focus. "Look at this!"
She strode over to the body, still eyeing the perimeter. The ghosts had calmed some, the sunlight seeming to make them sleepy. One in particular had been rather pushy, however, bemoaning that his own supposed murder had never been solved. A quick check had confirmed that he had actually died of a Felix Felicis overdose years ago, and the caretaker had agreed that Browne was a bit of a crackpot. But the bitter ghost had refused to let the matter go, even threatening to possess the dead man's body if Tonks didn't listen to him.
She called him on his bluff, and he had sulked right back to his grave to take a nap. Ever since then, the other ghosts and magical creatures had seemed more tranquil, but Tonks wasn't going to let him slip past her when he woke back up.
"What's wrong?" She asked, noticing Williamson's own concerned expression.
"I was so focused on the lad's head, I didn't even look at his arm. Did you see this?" He pointed to the man's left hand. It looked like it had decayed and withered away, but by what magic she couldn't know.
"Yeah. The ghosts were saying he used some sort of magical ring. Can't tell if it's what brought back the Potters, if it's what killed 'im, or both."
"It doesn't make sense." Williamson insisted, tapping his foot impatiently. "What has Quirrell been doing for the past year? Why kidnap Harry and then just sacrifice yourself to bring the boys' parents back from the dead? And why wouldn't Harry stay to meet them?"
"And where did the ring go…?" Tonks murmured thoughtfully, examining Quirrell closely. The body had stiffened since her arrival, his last expressions and movements frozen in death. But his face had taken a turn for the worse, having paled, the blood pooling on the side he had fallen on. The sight of his pale skin and bulging eyes was unsettling, but Shacklebolt had forbidden them from covering the body, not wanting to contaminate the scene.
"Remember anything about him?" Williamson asked, the corner of his lips twitching in amusement. He seemed unphased by Quirrell's appearance, the man not being his first dead body. Tonks rolled her eyes.
"I'm not that young, thank you. He didn't teach at Hogwarts until after I graduated. I was schoolmates with Charlie Weasley, though. His younger brother was little Harry's best friend. The Weasleys said Quirrell was a nervous, stuttering wreck. Last person anyone would suspect to do something like this."
"Yeah, that's what all the papers were saying...must be how he got past Dumbledore, eh?" Williamson smiled before frowning. "Weasleys...aren't they the ones whose daughter was killed? Jenny, Winnie, something like that?"
"Ginny, yeah. That was Charlie's baby sister. Only daughter in the Weasley family for generations, too."
"The girls in that family must be as cursed as the DADA position, then."
"Maybe." Tonks muttered, shaking her head. "An imperius breaks after the caster dies, right? Maybe Quirrell was working with someone. He hardly seems the type to come up with this kind of plan by himself."
"You think Harry was imperiused?"
"If you were orphaned, wouldn't you do anything to see your parents again? If I were 'im, I would have stayed. I would have watched and made sure they really were alive."
"But if he were imperiused, why would Quirrell even bring him along?"
"Blood magic? I mean, that's what this has to be, right? A life for a life."
"A life for two lives." Williamson corrected furtively. "What little I know about blood magic, I thought it always required an even trade. But then again, none of this is even supposed to be possible. Bloody hell, we need an expert on this. I know Shacklebolt's trying to keep this under wraps, but as soon as he tells Scringemour, the Ministry will know about it, and as soon as the Ministry knows about it, it'll be in the Daily Prophet anyways."
Tonks bit her lip. "He's right, though. The longer we can keep it contained, the more we know that what we're finding hasn't been tampered with. Isn't Bill Weasley a curse-breaker? The Egyptians used blood wards. Maybe he could help."
"It's an idea." Williamson admitted, grimacing as he took a closer look at the shriveled hand. "But Shacklebolt won't like it. Arthur Weasley works for the ministry, and if their youngest son was Harry's best friend, there's no way the family's impartial."
"Especially if they think any of this has to do with Ginny's death." Tonks agreed bitterly, kicking a rock. But no sooner had she done so, then the sky lit up, the sun peeking in the distance. Tonks smiled, twirling her hair between two fingers. She watched in satisfaction as the strand changed colors, transitioning into an ombre of red and orange.
"To match the Weasley's?" Williamson joked, writing down some notes. Tonks shook her head.
"No, to match the sunrise."
"Oh, you're killing me, Tonks. Such a romantic, and here you are, working on becoming an auror."
"What's wrong with a romantic auror?"
"Won't last long in this line of work, you'll see. You stare at the nastiness in people too long, and you become a little nasty, yourself..." He cocked his head to the side, stopping suddenly. Tonks leaned over, spotting what he was looking at.
"The footprints? I saw them, too. I told Shacklebolt about them, but he, uh, was chewing me out about something else at the time. They have to be Harry's, don't you think?" But Williamson had gone quiet, instead carefully following the trail.
"I've heard muggles actually take shoe castings." Tonks prodded helpfully, following him. "We could prove it's him…."
"That's not what I'm looking at." Williamson murmured, his eyes following the trail. The footsteps continued off into the distance, leading to a small wooded area. Williamson followed them, and seeing the tracks stop beneath a trunk, looked up and whistled.
"Morganna's tits….he climbed the ruddy tree!"
Tonks approached the forested area herself, glancing around from tree to tree.
"He did watch them. He must have been hiding from them…. but...I don't see any other footprints."
"Exactly." Williamson murmured, his eyebrows furrowed. "Nobody up there, but no sign he ever climbed back down, on foot, at least. None of this makes sense."
"Maybe there was a portkey." Tonks murmured, looking around. She widened her eyes. "Or maybe the ring was the portkey. That would explain why it's gone."
"Yeah." Williamson agreed, although rather reluctantly. "I suppose." Williamson peered forward, watching as the tree limbs swayed. But as he took another step forward, a flock of ravens flew out of the oak, squawking at him angrily as they left in a huff. He shook his head, sighing as he turned.
They both turned just in time to see a very, very different-looking James Potter walking towards them, accompanied by a junior auror, Thomas Carpenter. Tonks nearly had to pick her jaw off the ground at the sight of the dark-haired man. Now cleaned of mud, he looked nearly identical to all the newspapers and books Tonks had seen over the years, just like his wife. The approaching wizard shrugged sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head with his hand.
"I'm, uh, kind of blind as a bat right now. You two haven't seen my glasses, have you?"
Tonks grimaced. She had, in fact.
"They're, uh, still in your coffin, mate. I think you might've been laying on 'em. They're in so many pieces, I don't even think a reparo could do the trick." That had to be the most surreal thing she'd ever said aloud.
"Aw, bloody hell. I can barely see a foot in front of me without them. Have we met, Mrs….?" Tonks blinked, confused, before Williamson broke out laughing.
"It's the same girl as before, mate. Tonks. She just changed her hair color."
"Oh." The man chuckled sheepishly. "Sorry 'bout that. Faces are still kind of blurry at the moment. Wait, you-changed your hair color?"
"Yeah, to 'match the sunrise'. She thinks it's 'romantic'." Williamson teased, elbowing her. She shook her head in pretend disgust, before turning to the confused Potter.
"I'm a Metamorphmagus. Ruddy useful in my disguise classes."
"Doesn't help prevent you from tripping over your feet, though." Williamson teased. James's expression turned thoughtful, a faint smile on his face.
"I've met a Metamorphagus before. She's just a little girl, though, my best mate's little cousin…" He smiled softly, and Tonks shifted uncomfortably. "I wonder if the clumsy thing is part of the condition. She's the same way, traipsing about. Cute, really."
Carpenter, who had been quiet until now, swore suddenly, drawing surprise from the onlookers.
"What?" Williamson asked, looking between them. Tonks shook her head at Carpenter, but thick as ever, he ignored her, looking at her pointedly. "Does Shacklebolt know?"
"Know what?" Williamson repeated, still confused.
"I barely even remember him, it doesn't affect my impartiality." She lowered her voice, uncomfortably aware that James Potter could still hear her.
"Will a court believe that? Merlin, Tonks. Black's your bloody cousin-"
"Wait…..Dora?" Realization came over James, who looked ready to fall over again. She swallowed, her pulse quickening as she tried to explain herself.
"The Blacks burned us off their family tree a long time ago. We're only family by blood, which if you remember, most of us are by some extension or another."
"You were….you were just a kid. Just a mischievous little kid…" James muttered, still baffled by the back and forth.
She swallowed hard, looking James in the eye. Shacklebolt really was going to kill her.
"Mr. Potter, believe me, I am here to help you. If anything, I'm honored to be here, fixing my cousin's mistakes. But if you feel uncomfortable or threatened by me in any way-"
"Threatened?" James asked incredulously. "Why would I feel threatened?"
Once again, Potter seemed very in the dark about something that seemed obvious to everyone else. Williamson cleared his throat, turning to James.
"She means with, uh, what happened with Sirius Black….if you feel uncomfortable working with her, we all understand."
"What do you mean, 'what happened with Sirius'?" James asked, baffled. Tonks suddenly found her shoes to be very interesting. It was a shame she couldn't wear sandals on the job. She rather liked changing the color of her toenails without muttering a single charm.
"He was your secret keeper." She reminded him gently, not able to look him in the eye. "He's the reason you died."
The sun had risen in the distance, cutting through the mist. Tonks suddenly felt as blind as Potter, sunbeams striking her in the eyes.
"Sirius wasn't our secret keeper…" James murmured in horror, an indescribable look in his eyes. He stumbled, leaning on the tree they had been examining. "Peter Pettigrew was."
Silence reigned.
Tonks had heard the story a thousand times. She had heard her mum crying in the night at least a dozen. Her favorite cousin, the only other one to rebel against their deatheater relatives, had betrayed the entire wizarding world, been solely responsible for the death of two heroes, dozens of muggles, and even would have been responsible for the death of an infant if it weren't for pure luck.
The story she had heard a thousand times, the mugshot she had scowled at a hundred times, the question she had been asked in interview after interview-
"That's impossible." Carpenter murmured. "Black-Black killed people. He killed Pettigrew-"
"After fighting with him in the street." Tonks finished, closing her eyes. The story had always been that Pettigrew had confronted an escaping Black. That nothing was left of Pettigrew but the odd finger or toe. But what if it was the other way around? What if-
"No." James muttered darkly, pushing himself upright. "It was Peter. We thought-when the deatheaters arrived, I thought they had gotten to him. Tortured him. Are you telling me everyone thought it was Sirius?
"He was your best friend." Tonks reminded him, her voice caught in her throat. "And a Black. Even Dumbledore condemned him."
James's wife had the ability to flash between a softness to a suppressed fury in a matter of seconds. But this was the first time Tonks had seen James do the same. He bristled, and she could almost see his messy hair stand straight in the air as he clenched his fists. What little magic he had whirred about, and if Tonks wasn't crazy, she would say that the wind grew stronger as it whipped through her newly auburn hair. James looked between the aurors, his jaw set.
"What happened to Sirius? Where is he?"
The sun continued to emerge, blinding Tonks even more. She was glad, however, for it gave her an excuse to look away. She couldn't say the answer aloud. None of them could.
Azkaban. Sirius Black was in Azkaban