next week obsessing over how he was to persuade Slughorn to hand over the true memory. He was reduced to doing what he did increasingly these days when at a loss: poring over his Potions book, something Hermione (and a little bit Elara) absolutely hated.

"You won't find anything in there," said Hermione firmly, late on Sunday evening.

"Don't start, Hermione," said Harry. "If it hadn't been for the Prince, Ron wouldn't be sitting here now."

"Excuse you," said Elara dismissively, "I thought of the bezoar because of what Snape said first year."

Instead of responding, Harry folded down the corner of the page.

They were sitting beside the fire in the common room; the only other people awake were fellow sixth years. There had been a certain amount of excitement earlier when they had come back from dinner to find a new sign on the notice board that announced the date for their Apparition Test. Those who would be seventeen on or before the first test date, the twenty-first of April, had the option of signing up for additional practice sessions, which would take place (heavily supervised) in Hogsmeade.

Ron had panicked on reading this notice; he had still not managed to Apparate and feared he would not be ready for the test. Hermione, who had now achieved Apparition twice, was a little more confident, but Elara and Harry, who would not be seventeen for another three or four months, could not take the test whether ready or not.

"At least you can Apparate, though!" said Ron tensely. "You'll have no trouble come June and July!"

"I've only done it once," Elara reminded him; she had finally managed to disappear and rematerialize inside her hoop during their previous lesson.

Having wasted a lot of time worrying aloud about Apparition, Ron was now struggling to finish a viciously difficult essay for Snape that Elara, Harry, and Hermione had already completed.

"I'm telling you, the stupid Prince isn't going to be able to help you with this, Harry!" said Hermione, more loudly. "There's only one way to force someone to do what you want, and that's the Imperius Curse, which is illegal —"

"Yeah, I know that, thanks," said Harry, not looking up from the book. "That's why I'm looking for something different. Dumbledore says Veritaserum won't do it, but there might be something else, a potion or a spell. . . ."

"You're going about it the wrong way," said Elara. "Only you can get the memory, Dumbledore said. That must mean you can persuade Slughorn where other people can't. It's not a question of slipping him a potion, anyone could do that —"

"How d'you spell 'belligerent'?" said Ron, shaking his quill very hard while staring at his parchment. "It can't be B — U — M —"

"No, it isn't," said Hermione, pulling Ron's essay toward her. "And 'augury' doesn't begin O — R — G either. What kind of quill are you using?"

"It's one of Fred and George's Spell-Check ones . . . but I think the charm must be wearing off. . . ."

"Yes, it must," said Hermione, pointing at the title of his essay, "because we were asked how we'd deal with dementors, not 'Dugbogs,' and I don't remember you changing your name to 'Roonil Wazlib' either."

"Ah no!" said Ron, staring horror-struck at the parchment. "Don't say I'll have to write the whole thing out again!"

"It's okay, we can fix it," said Hermione, pulling the essay toward her and taking out her wand.

"I love you, Hermione," said Ron, sinking back in his chair, rubbing his eyes wearily.

Elara's mouth dropped open.

Hermione turned faintly pink, but merely said, "Don't letLavender hear you saying that."

"I won't," said Ron into his hands. "Or maybe I will . . . thenshe'll ditch me . . ."

"Why don't you ditch her if you want to finish it?" asked Harry.

"You haven't ever chucked anyone, have you?" said Ron. "You and Cho just —"

"Sort of fell apart, yeah," said Harry. "I mean, I liked Lara so. . . ."

"Wish that would happen with me and Lavender," said Ron gloomily, watching Hermione silently tapping each of his misspelled words with the end of her wand, so that they corrected themselves on the page. "But the more I hint I want to finish it, the tighter she holds on. It's like going out with the giant squid."

"There," said Hermione, some twenty minutes later, handing back Ron's essay.

"Thanks a million," said Ron. "Can I borrow your quill for the conclusion?"

Elara, who had been done with schoolwork and was expecting to pass out any minute so she could train with Anya looked around; the four of them were now the only ones left in the common room, Seamus having just gone up to bed cursing Snape and his essay. The only sounds were the crackling of the fire and Ron scratching out one last paragraph on dementors using Hermione's quill. Harry had just closed the Half-Blood Prince's book, yawning, when —Crack.

Hermione let out a little shriek; Ron spilled ink all over his freshly completed essay; Elara fell off her chair, swearing loudly, and Harry said, "Kreacher!"

The house-elf bowed low and addressed his own gnarled toes.

"Master said he wanted regular reports on what the Malfoy boy is doing, so Kreacher has come to give —"

Crack. Dobby appeared alongside Kreacher, his tea-cozy hat askew.

"Dobby has been helping too, Harry Potter!" he squeaked, casting Kreacher a resentful look. "And Kreacher ought to tell Dobby when he is coming to see Harry Potter so they can make their reports together!"

"What is this?" asked Hermione, still looking shocked by these sudden appearances. "What's going on, Harry?"

Harry hesitated before answering as house elves were always such a touchy subject with her.

"Well . . . they've been following Malfoy for me," he said.

"Night and day," croaked Kreacher.

"Dobby has not slept for a week, Harry Potter!" said Dobby proudly, swaying where he stood.

Hermione looked mutinous.

"You haven't slept, Dobby? But surely, Harry, you didn't tell him not to —"

"No, of course I didn't," said Harry quickly. "Dobby, you can sleep, all right? But has either of you found out anything?"

"Master Malfoy moves with a nobility that befits his pureblood," croaked Kreacher at once. "His features recall the fine bones of my mistress and his manners are those of —"

"We don't need to hear about your weird sexual thing for Draco," said Elara, weirded out by the high praise Draco was unknowingly receiving.

"Draco Malfoy is a bad boy!" squeaked Dobby angrily. "A bad boy who — who —"

He shuddered from the tassel of his tea cozy to the toes of his socks and then ran at the fire, as though about to dive into it; Elara, to whom this was not entirely unexpected, caught him around the middle and held him fast. For a few seconds Dobby struggled, then went limp.

"Thank you, Elara Tonks," he panted. "Dobby still finds it difficult to speak ill of his old masters. . . ."

Elara released him; Dobby straightened his tea cozy and said defiantly to Kreacher, "But Kreacher should know that Draco Malfoy is not a good master to a house-elf!"

"Let's fast forward to where he's actually been going," said Harry.

Kreacher bowed again, looking furious, and then said, "Master Malfoy eats in the Great Hall, he sleeps in a dormitory in the dungeons, he attends his classes in a variety of —"

"Dobby, you tell me," said Harry, cutting across Kreacher. "Has he been going anywhere he shouldn't have?"

"Harry Potter, sir," squeaked Dobby, his great orblike eyes shining in the firelight, "the Malfoy boy is breaking no rules that Dobby can discover, but he is still keen to avoid detection. He has been making regular visits to the seventh floor with a variety of other students, who keep watch for him while he enters —"

"The Room of Requirement!" said Harry, smacking himself hard on the forehead with Advanced Potion-Making. Elara, Hermione, and Ron stared at him. "That's where he's been sneaking off to! That's where he's doing . . . whatever he's doing! And I bet that's why he's been disappearing off the map — come to think of it, I've never seen the Room of Requirement on there!"

"Maybe the Marauders never knew the room was there," said Ron.

"I think it'll be part of the magic of the room," said Hermione. "If you need it to be Unplottable, it will be."

"Dobby, have you managed to get in to have a look at what Malfoy's doing?" said Harry eagerly.

"No, Harry Potter, that is impossible," said Dobby.

"No, it's not," said Harry at once. Elara pinched herself and Harry jumped, glaring at her. "Malfoy got into our headquarters there last year, so I'll be able to get in and spy on him, no problem."

"But I don't think you will, Harry," said Hermione slowly. "Malfoy already knew exactly how we were using the room, didn't he, because that stupid Marietta had blabbed. He needed the room to become the headquarters of the D.A., so it did. But you don't know what the room becomes when Malfoy goes in there, so you don't know what to ask it to transform into."

"There'll be a way around that," said Harry dismissively. "You've done brilliantly, Dobby."

"Kreacher's done well too," said Hermione kindly; but far from looking grateful, Kreacher averted his huge, bloodshot eyes and croaked at the ceiling, "The Mudblood is speaking to Kreacher, Kreacher will pretend he cannot hear —"

"Oh, shut up," Elara snapped at him, and Kreacher made one last deep bow and Disapparated. "You'd better go and get some sleep too, Dobby."

"Thank you, Elara Tonks, miss!" squeaked Dobby happily, and he too vanished.

"How good's this?" said Harry enthusiastically, turning to Elara, Ron, and Hermione the moment the room was elf-free again. "We know where Malfoy's going! We've got him cornered now!"

These discussions were always awkward, seeing as Elara knew exactly what Draco was up too and who he was.

"Yeah, it's great," said Ron glumly, who was attempting to mop up the sodden mass of ink that had recently been an almost completed essay. Hermione pulled it toward her and began siphoning the ink off with her wand.

"But what's all this about him going up there with a 'variety of students'?" said Hermione. "How many people are in on it? You wouldn't think he'd trust lots of them to know what he's doing. . . ."

"Yeah, that is weird," said Harry, frowning. "I heard him telling Crabbe it wasn't Crabbe's business what he was doing . . . so what's he telling all these . . . all these . . ."

Harry's voice tailed away; he was staring at the fire.

"God, I've been stupid," he said quietly. "It's obvious, isn't it? There was a great vat of it down in the dungeon. . . . He could've nicked some any time during that lesson. . . ."

"Nicked what?" said Elara.

"Polyjuice Potion. He stole some of the Polyjuice Potion Slughorn showed us in our first Potions lesson. . . . There aren't a whole variety of students standing guard for Malfoy . . . it's just Crabbe and Goyle as usual. . . . Yeah, it all fits!" said Harry, jumping up and starting to pace in front of the fire. "They're stupid enough to do what they're told even if he won't tell them what he's up to . . . but he doesn't want them to be seen lurking around outside the Room of Requirement, so he's got them taking Polyjuice to make them look like other people. . . . Those two girls I saw him with when he missed Quidditch — ha! Crabbe and Goyle!"

"Do you mean to say," said Hermione in a hushed voice, "that that little girl whose scales I repaired — ?"

"Yeah, of course!" said Harry loudly, staring at her. "Of course! Malfoy must've been inside the room at the time, so she — what am I talking about? — he dropped the scales to tell Malfoy not to come out, because there was someone there! And there was that girl who dropped the toad spawn too! We've been walking past him all the time and not realizing it!"

"He's got Crabbe and Goyle transforming into girls?" guffawed Ron. "Blimey . . . No wonder they don't look too happy these days.. . . I'm surprised they don't tell him to stuff it. . . ."

"Well, they wouldn't, would they, if he's shown them his Dark Mark?" said Harry.

"The Dark Mark we don't know exists," said Elara, feigning skepticism.

"We'll see," said Harry confidently.

"Yes, we will," Hermione said, getting to her feet and stretching. "But, Harry, before you get all excited, I still don't think you'll be able to get into the Room of Requirement without knowing what's there first. And I don't think you should forget" — she heaved herbag onto her shoulder and gave him a very serious look — "that what you're supposed to be concentrating on is getting that memory from Slughorn — "

"Hey, guys — "

"I've got you," said Harry, diving to catch a stumbling Elara.

When Elara's eyes opened again, she was lying in the middle of a peaceful, grassy meadow. She was in different clothing. Her baggy pajamas were replaced by the tight clothes she usually wore for combat. She tied her hair back, wondering where Anya was.

Elara gazed around, discomforted and calmed at the same time by the meadow. Tall grass was bending slightly in the breeze. She began wading through the grass. Although she had no idea where she was, she wasn't put off by the change of scenery.

"Hello, Elara," said a voice, and she turned around.

There was Anya, standing tall and regal, also dressed in combat clothes.

"Why're we not at your place?"

"I'm afraid this will be our last session together."

"Wait — what?" asked Elara, scared and confused.

She needed these sessions with Anya. They gave her confidence that she could bare the weight of the world, that she fulfill everyone's expectations.

"Your final chapter begins soon. There are two things I must teach you before we part ways."

Elara knew arguing was fruitless. Millenia year old magical beings don't lose debates. Elara sighed and looked up at Anya.

"Okay."

Anya moved a couple of feet to a shady spot under a great oak tree, leaning against it. Elara moved to follow, and as she did, she couldn't help but notice that Anya looked so, so tired. Normally, she moved with a grace fit for a queen, but today her shoulders were slumped and there were bags under her eyes.

Elara sat on a mossy rock, looking expectantly up at Anya for whatever parting words she was going to bestow upon her.

"Are you familiar with the concept of Memoria Praeteritorum?"

"Of. . . . what?"

"All like you have an unfamiliar place in your mind that normal people don't. It's hidden deep away, and it's horribly difficult to reach. However, finding this place is your most important skill yet."

Everyday Elara was discovering new things about who she was and what she could do. What if there was something else she could do that could save lives, but she didn't know it because her sessions with Anya were over?

"So. . . . what is this place, exactly?"

"It holds all the memories of that past."

Elara stared at Anya for a moment.

"Why is this important, though? Because to me, shooting fire sounds a lot cooler than this."

Anya rubbed her temple in frustration, "You must discover the past to see the future."

Elara was even more confused than she was thirty seconds ago, but her intuition told her to stay quiet and wait for Anya to explain.

"You can only access this place once in your life. So, you can not 'practice' trying to get in. You should only try when there is a question that you so desperately need answering," said Anya firmly, pausing for a moment before adding. "You can learn dark things in this place, Elara. You must be careful."

"What's in there?"

"Darkness."

"That's dramatic," chuckled Elara, ignoring the shiver down her spine.

"You've felt it," said Anya, her quiet but her tone strong, "You see it coming, don't you?"

They were in the middle of the meadow again, standing face to face. Anya looked somber. There was a slight breeze coursing through Elara's soft hair, picking it up off her shoulders. She chewed her lip, not wanting to answer the question, afraid it would open a door she wanted to remain shut.

"My final piece to offer is about combat."

Elara smiled. She loved sparring with Anya.

"However," began Anya, moving into her starting position, "I won't be going easy on you."

"You always say that," retorted Elara, putting her fists up.

"I know," said Anya, disappearing into thin air, so that Elara could only hear her echoing voice, "but this time, I'm not holding anything back."

Elara had no time to react when something swept her leg and she fell to the floor.

"Rule number one, don't be distracted by your opponent's words."

Elara stood back up in no time, ready to focus. Anya materialized right in front of her, throwing a punch. Elara was able to move quickly to the side, sending a jab back. They moved quickly, both dodging and landing some. Anya, however, was winning. Her magic combined with her skill in hand to hand overpowered Elara quickly.

Eventually, Elara used her power against Anya, sending shooting flames at her. She was able to dispel them quickly.

"Rule two," said Anya, not even remotely winded, "only use your power as a last resort, or when you're enraged enough to conjure a lot of fire."