elara caught sight of the headmaster only twice over the next few weeks. he rarely appeared at meals anymore, and elara was sure hermione was right in thinking that he was leaving the school for days at a time. had dumbledore forgotten the lessons he was supposed to be giving elara and harry? dumbledore had said that the lessons were leading to something to do with the prophecies and although training with anya brought her great comfort, she liked lessons with dumbledore more.

halfway through october came their first trip of the term to hogsmeade. elara had wondered whether these trips would still be allowed, given the increasingly tight security measures around the school, but was pleased to know that they were going ahead; it was always good to get out of the castle grounds for a few hours. both harry and elara wanted at least a few moments alone, but decided it was best they stuck with ron and hermione.

the morning of, elara was already up and at it. on top of her normal wear, she dug through and found a flannel of harry's she had snagged. smiling, she pulled it over her shoulders. at breakfast, ron told a highly amusing story about harry's new spell which made him levitate by his ankle.

". . . and then there was another flash of light and i landed on the bed again!" ron grinned, helping himself to sausages.

elara smiled, although wary, into her coffee. hermione had not cracked a smile during this anecdote, and now turned an expression of wintry disapproval upon harry.

"was this spell, by any chance, another one from that potion book of yours?" she asked.

harry frowned at her.

"always jump to the worst conclusion, don't you?"

"was it?"

"well . . . yeah, it was, but so what?"

"so you just decided to try out an unknown, handwritten incantation and see what would happen?"

"why does it matter if it's handwritten?" said harry.

"because it's probably not ministry of magic–approved," said hermione. "and also," she added, as harry and ron rolled their eyes, "because i'm starting to think this prince character was a bit dodgy."

"i might be with hermione on this one," said elara.

both harry and ron shouted them down at once.

"it was a laugh!" said ron, upending a ketchup bottle over his sausages. "just a laugh, you two, that's all!"

"dangling people upside down by the ankle?" said hermione. "who puts their time and energy into making up spells like that?"

"fred and george," said ron, shrugging, "it's their kind of thing. and, er —"

"my dad," said harry.

"what?" said elara, ron, and hermione together.

"my dad used this spell," said harry. "i — lupin told me."

this last part was not true; elara remembered harry telling her about seeing it in the pensieve just before snape ended lessons with harry.

"maybe your dad did use it, harry," said elara gently, "but he's not the only one. remember the world cup? death eaters dangling people in the air. making them float along, asleep, helpless. do you remember how terrified we were?"

harry stared at her with a rather pained expression. none of them ever really brought up the quidditch world cup unless necessary.

"that was different," said ron, coming to harry's aid. "they were abusing it. harry and his dad were just having a laugh. you don't like the prince, hermione," he added, pointing a sausage at her sternly, "because he's better than you at potions —"

"it's got nothing to do with that!" said hermione, her cheeks reddening. "i just think it's very irresponsible to start performing spells when you don't even know what they're for, and stop talking about 'the prince' as if it's his title, i bet it's just a stupid nickname, and it doesn't seem as though he was a very nice person to me!"

"i don't see where you get that from," said harry heatedly. "if he'd been a budding death eater he wouldn't have been boasting about being 'half-blood,' would he?"

there were certainly half-blood death eaters. and now that elara thought more about it, she begun drawing dots. how come only harry, his dad and his friends, and the death eaters known about it? harry's dad and his friends (with the exception of peter) weren't death eaters, and neither was harry. that book must have been in the clutches of a death eater at one point or another.

"the death eaters can't all be pure-blood, there aren't enough pure-blood wizards left," said hermione stubbornly. "i expect most of them are half-bloods pretending to be pure. it's only muggleborns they hate, they'd be quite happy to let you, lara, and ron join up."

"there is no way they'd let me be a death eater!" said ron indignantly, a bit of sausage flying off the fork he was now brandishing at hermione and hitting ernie macmillan on the head. "my whole family are blood traitors! that's as bad as muggleborns to death eaters!"

"i'd rather jump out of an airplane," said elara moodily, annoyed at even the possibility of becoming a death eater, "no, i'd rather step on a landmine and die."

"and they'd love to have me," said harry sarcastically. "we'd be best pals if they didn't keep trying to do me in."

this made elara and ron laugh; even hermione gave a grudging smile, and a distraction arrived in the shape of ginny.

"hey, you two, i'm supposed to give you this."

it was a scroll of parchment with elara's and harry's name written upon it in familiar thin, slanting writing.

"thanks, ginny . . . it's dumbledore's next lesson!" elara told ron and hermione, pulling open the parchment and quickly reading its contents. "monday evening!" she felt suddenly light and happy, and smiled at harry. "want to join us in hogsmeade, ginny?" she asked.

"i'm going with dean — might see you there," she replied, waving at them as she left.

filch was standing at the oak front doors as usual, checking off the names of people who had permission to go into hogsmeade. the process took even longer than normal as filch was triple-checking everybody with his secrecy sensor.

"what does it matter if we're smuggling dark stuff OUT?" demanded ron, eyeing the long thin secrecy sensor with apprehension. "surely you ought to be checking what we bring back IN?"

his cheek earned him a few extra jabs with the sensor, and he was still wincing as they stepped out into the wind and sleet.

the walk into hogsmeade was not enjoyable. elara wrapped her scarf over her lower face; the exposed part soon felt both raw and numb. the road to the village was full of students bent double against the bitter wind. more than once elara wondered whether they might not have had a better time in the warm common room, and when they finally reached hogsmeade and saw that zonko's joke shop had been boarded up, elara took it as confirmation that this trip was not destined to be fun. ron pointed, with a thickly gloved hand, toward honeydukes, which was mercifully open, and elara, harry, and hermione staggered in his wake into the crowded shop.

"thank god," shivered ron as they were enveloped by warm, toffee-scented air. "let's stay here all afternoon."

"harry, m'boy!" said a booming voice from behind them, "and elara! excellent!"

"oh no," muttered elara. the three of them turned to see professor slughorn, who was wearing an enormous furry hat and an overcoat with matching fur collar, clutching a large bag of crystalized pineapple, and occupying at least a quarter of the shop.

"harry, elara, that's three of my little suppers you've missed now!" said slughorn, poking harry genially in the chest. "it won't do, i'm determined to have you two! miss granger loves them, don't you?"

"yes," said hermione helplessly, "they're really —"

"so why don't you come along?" demanded slughorn.

"well, i've had quidditch practice, professor," said harry, who had indeed been scheduling practices every time slughorn had sent him a little, violet ribbon-adorned invitation. this strategy meant that ron was not left out, lara could dodge the meetings too, and they usually had a laugh with ginny, imagining hermione shut up with mclaggen and zabini. "lara has to come to the practices, since she's helping."

"well, i certainly expect you to win your first match after all this hard work!" said slughorn. "but a little recreation never hurt anybody. now, how about monday night, you can't possibly want to practice in this weather. . . ."

"i can't, professor, lara and i've got — er — an appointment with professor dumbledore that evening."

"unlucky again!" cried slughorn dramatically. "ah, well . . . you can't evade me forever!"

and with a regal wave, he waddled out of the shop, taking as little notice of ron as though he had been a display of cockroach clusters.

"i can't believe you've wriggled out of another one," said hermione, shaking her head. "they're not that bad, you know. . . . they're even quite fun sometimes. . . ." but then she caught sight of ron's expression. "oh, look — they've got deluxe sugar quills — those would last hours!"

glad that hermione had changed the subject, elara showed much more interest in the new extra-large sugar quills than she would normally have done, but ron continued to look moody and merely shrugged when hermione asked him where he wanted to go next.

"i might go visit anne briefly," said elara, already bundling her scarf around her face, "you haven't met her yet, you should come."

"yeah, and we can go to the three broomsticks after," said harry.

"all right," said hermione.

they bundled their scarves back over their faces and left the sweetshop. the bitter wind was like knives on their faces after the sugary warmth of honeydukes. the street was not very busy; nobody was lingering to chat, just hurrying toward their destinations.

anne's coffee shop looked incredibly warm and pleasant. elara picked up her pace as she rushed towards the door. much to her surprise, the shop was packed. the door opened with the ring of a bell. elara smiled as she was met with a rush of warm air.

"lara!" called anne ecstatically.

anna looked much different from elara had seen her last. her hair was much now a platinum blonde with faded pink ends. half of it was falling out from the knot on her head. the only thing between her hair falling down and staying up was the red bandana on her head. she was sporting new glasses, these ones huge compared to her old ones.

ron and hermione just stared around, taking in the wild shop for the first time. the spice girls played softly in the background as elara and harry weaved between people to get to the counter.

"i'll be with you in a minute!" said anne, wiping her brown with her shoulder as she added a topping of whipped cream to a warlock's latte.

after making a few more drinks, anne was finally able to talk to them.

"i've never seen it so busy," said elara excitedly.

"someone from the daily prophet knew this was your favorite place. now everyone's here hoping to get a glimpse of the 'almighty savior'," said anne rather gratefully, staring fondly at her customers.

"its, er — its nice to see you again, anne," said harry awkwardly.

"is he always this awkward?"

"yep," said elara, smiling as harry threw her an indignant look.

"so, what can i get you?"

"i'll have a hazelnut latte, i think ron just wanted butterbeer, hermione wanted a lavender latte, and harry — "

"could i have a — a nutmeg and cinnamon latte?"

"he's seen the way, hasn't he," said anne, smirking.

"i've finally converted him," said elara, nodding.

"what?"

but anne just shot harry a smug look and turned away to work on their drinks. deciding it was funnier to not explain the joke to harry, elara just grabbed his arm and weaved back through the crowded shop. ron and hermione had found a table. they were bickering about god knows what.

"would you two shut the hell up and snog already?" said elara jokingly, but they fell quiet.

this day just kept getting better and better. they left after half an hour, because ron kept complaining about the distinct difference between this butterbeer and the three broomsticks' butterbeer. they cleaned up their table and stepped back outside into the cold.

there were only two people lingering outside. one was very tall and thin; squinting through the sleet elara recognized the barman who worked in the other hogsmeade pub, the hog's head. as elara, harry, ron, and hermione drew closer, the barman drew his cloak more tightly around his neck and walked away, leaving the shorter man to fumble with something in his arms. they were barely feet from him when elara realized who the man was.

"mundungus!" said harry.

the squat, bandy-legged man with long, straggly, ginger hair jumped and dropped an ancient suitcase, which burst open, releasing what looked like the entire contents of a junk shop window.

"oh, 'ello, 'arry," said mundungus fletcher, with a most unconvincing stab at airiness. "well, don't let me keep ya."

and he began scrabbling on the ground to retrieve the contents of his suitcase with every appearance of a man eager to be gone.

"are you selling this stuff?" asked elara, watching mundungus grab an assortment of grubby-looking objects from the ground.

"oh, well, gotta scrape a living," said mundungus. "gimme that!"

ron had stooped down and picked up something silver.

"hang on," ron said slowly. "this looks familiar —"

"thank you!" said mundungus, snatching the goblet out of ron's hand and stuffing it back into the case. "well, i'll see you all — OUCH!"

harry had pinned mundungus against the wall of the pub by the throat. holding him fast with one hand, he pulled out his wand.

elara's eyes widened. holy fuck. that's hot.

"harry!" squealed hermione.

"you took that from sirius's house," said harry, who was almost nose to nose with mundungus. "that had the black family crest on it."

elara moved beside harry, glaring at mundungus. he was already terrified enough of her without a wand.

"i — no — what — ?" spluttered mundungus, who was slowly turning purple.

"what did you do, go back the night he died and strip the place?" snarled harry.

"i — no —"

"give it to me!"

"harry, you mustn't!" shrieked hermione, as mundungus started to turn blue.

elara stood, smirking at mundungus. she was a strong believer of karma. maybe now was just the universe finally slapping him back. however, there was a bang, and harry's his hands flew off mundungus's throat. gasping and spluttering, mundungus seized his fallen case, then — CRACK — he disapparated.

harry swore at the top of his voice, spinning on the spot to see where mundungus had gone.

"COME BACK, YOU THIEVING — !"

"there's no point, harry."

nymhpie had appeared out of nowhere, her mousy hair wet with sleet.

"what the fuck — "

elara decided not to finish her sentence and instead wrap her sister in a tight hug.

"mundungus will probably be in london by now. there's no point yelling."

"he's nicked sirius's stuff! nicked it!"

"yes, but still," said nymphie, who seemed perfectly untroubled by this piece of information. "you should get out of the cold."

elara let go of her and waited for a minute before harry, ron, and hermione were out of earshot.

"cut the bullshit. tell me what's wrong," said elara, hands on her hips.

nymphie sighed.

"you're just a kid. you wouldn't understand."

"i'm going to say this out of love: i am destined to save the entire goddamn wizarding world. i'm a seer. i've fought voldemort and my crazy ass biological mom. i'm not a kid anymore. you're being crazy."

"later, lara. just not now," said nymphie.

she sounded so tired, so defeated. it hurt elara to leave her like this without having talked, but she knew pushing would only make it worse.

"okay. you know i love you, right?"

"i love you too."

harry was still fuming when elara found their a few minutes later. hermione slid a butterbeer across the table.

"can't the order control mundungus?" harry demanded of the other three in a furious whisper. "can't they at least stop him stealing everything that's not fixed down when he's at headquarters?"

"shh!" said hermione desperately, looking around to make sure nobody was listening; there were a couple of warlocks sitting close by who were staring at harry with great interest, and zabini was lolling against a pillar not far away. "harry, i'd be annoyed too, i know it's your things he's stealing —"

harry gagged on his butterbeer.

"yeah, it's my stuff!" he said. "no wonder he wasn't pleased to see me! well, i'm going to tell dumbledore what's going on, he's the only one who scares mundungus besides lara."

"good idea," whispered hermione, clearly pleased that harry was calming down. "ron, what are you staring at?"

"nothing," said ron, hastily looking away from the bar, but elara knew he was trying to catch the eye of the curvy and attractive barmaid, madam rosmerta, for whom he had long nursed a soft spot.

"i expect 'nothing's' in the back getting more firewhisky," said elara amusedly.