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𝐑𝐔𝐍𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐖𝐈𝐓𝐇 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐖𝐎𝐋𝐕𝐄𝐒

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We were children,

Thrust into war

and once it ends

What will we become?

·͙*̩̩͙˚̩̥̩̥*̩̩̥͙　✩　*̩̩̥͙˚̩̥̩̥*̩̩͙‧͙ .·͙*̩̩͙˚̩̥̩̥*̩̩̥͙　✩　*̩̩̥͙˚̩̥̩̥*̩̩͙‧͙ .

on, the square of unkempt grass in the middle of Grimmauld Place shriveled in the sun until it was brittle and brown. The inhabitants of number twelve were never seen by anybody in the surrounding houses, and nor was number twelve itself. The Muggles who lived in Grimmauld Place had long since accepted the amusing mistake in the numbering that had caused number eleven to sit beside number thirteen. And yet the square was now attracting a trickle of visitors who seemed to find the anomaly most intriguing.

Barely a day passed without one or two people arriving in Grimmauld Place with no other purpose, or so it seemed, than to lean against the railings facing numbers eleven and thirteen, watching the join between the two houses. The lurkers were never the same two days running, although they all seemed to share a dislike for normal clothing. Most of the Londoners who passed them were used to eccentric dressers and took little notice, though occasionally one of them might glance back, wondering why anyone would wear such long cloaks in this heat.

The watchers seemed to be gleaning little satisfaction from their vigil. Occasionally one of them started forward excitedly, as if they had seen something interesting at last, only to fall back looking disappointed. On the first day of September there were more people lurking in the square than ever before. Half a dozen men in long cloaks stood silent and watchful, gazing as ever at houses eleven and thirteen, but the thing for which they were waiting still appeared elusive.

Very quickly, all fun activities had been exhausted. Elara and Ron had begun narrating the thoughts of the cloaked Death Eaters (much to Hermione's annoyance and Harry's amusement.) When not making fun of Voldemort's stans, Hermione and Elara had been experimenting with coffee recipes. At one point, Elara, Ron, and Harry had actually piled a bunch of blankets at the bottom of the stairs and slid down on a mattress. There were few boredom killers Hermione approved of, and one was Harry's and Ron's version of Cutthroat Kitchen.

As evening drew in, bringing with it an unexpected gust of chilly rain for the first time in weeks, there occurred one of those inexplicable moments when they appeared to have seen something interesting. The man with the twisted face pointed and his closest companion, a podgy, pallid man, started forward, but a moment later they had relaxed into their previous state of inactivity, looking frustrated and disappointed.

Meanwhile, inside number twelve, Elara had just entered the hall. She had nearly lost her balance as she Apparated onto the top step just outside the front door, and thought that the Death Eaters might have caught a glimpse of her momentarily exposed elbow.

Shutting the front door carefully behind her, she pulled off the Invisibility Cloak, draped it over her arm, and hurried along the gloomy hallway toward the door that led to the basement, a stolen copy of the Daily Prophet clutched in her hand.

The usual low whisper of "Severus Snape?" greeted her, the chill wind swept her, and her tongue rolled up for a moment.

"I didn't kill you," she said, once it had unrolled, then held her breath as the dusty jinx-figure exploded.

She waited until she was halfway down the stairs to the kitchen, out of earshot of Mrs. Black and clear of the dust cloud, before calling, "I've got news, and you might be more pissed off than I am."

The kitchen was almost unrecognizable. Every surface now shone: Copper pots and pans had been burnished to a rosy glow; the wooden tabletop gleamed; the goblets and plates already laid for dinner glinted in the light from a merrily blazing fire, on which a cauldron was simmering.

Nothing in the room, however, was more dramatically different than the house-elf who now came hurrying toward Elara, dressed in a snowy-white towel, his ear hair as clean and fluffy as cotton wool, Regulus's locket bouncing on his thin chest.

"Shoes off, if you please, Mistress Elara, and hands washed before dinner," croaked Kreacher, seizing the Invisibility Cloak and slouching off to hang it on a hook on the wall, beside a number of old-fashioned robes that had been freshly laundered.

"What's happened?" Ron asked apprehensively.

He, Harry, and Hermione had been poring over a sheaf of scribbled notes and hand-drawn maps that littered the end of the long kitchen table, but now they watched as Harry strode toward Elara and pressed a quick kiss to her cheek before she threw down the newspaper on top of their scattered parchment.

A large picture of a familiar, hook-nosed, black-haired man stared up at them all, beneath a headline that read:

"No!" said Harry, Ron, and Hermione loudly.

Hermione was quickest; she snatched up the newspaper and began to read the accompanying story out loud.

"'Severus Snape, long-standing Potions master at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, was today appointed headmaster in the most important of several staffing changes at the ancient school. Following the resignation of the previous Muggle Studies teacher, Alecto Carrow will take over the post while her brother, Amycus, fills the position of Defense Against the Dark Arts professor.

"'I welcome the opportunity to uphold our finest Wizarding traditions and values —' Like committing murder and cutting off people's ears, I suppose! Snape, headmaster! Snape in Dumbledore's study — Merlin's pants!" she shrieked, making Elara, Harry, and Ron jump.

She leapt up from the table and hurtled from the room, shouting as she went, "I'll be back in a minute!"

"'Merlin's pants'?" repeated Ron, looking amused. "She must be upset. Anyways, Lara, you said you were pissed. What did you do this time?"

"I almost set the newspaper stand on fire. Luckily, the amulet seemed to stop it," admitted Elara nonchalantly, popping a grape into her mouth.

Ron laughed pulled the newspaper toward him and perused the article about Snape.

"The other teachers won't stand for this. McGonagall and Flitwick and Sprout all know the truth, they know how Dumbledore died. They won't accept Snape as headmaster. And who are these Carrows?"

"Death Eaters," said Harry bitterly. "There are pictures of them inside. They were at the top of the tower when Snape killed Dumbledore, so it's all friends together. And," Harry went on, drawing up a chair, "I can't see that the other teachers have got any choice but to stay. If the Ministry and Voldemort are behind Snape it'll be a choice between staying and teaching, or a nice few years in Azkaban — and that's if they're lucky. I reckon they'll stay to try and protect the students."

"One of the few times I wished I was going to Hogwarts this year," said Elara, moving behind Harry's chair and draping her arms around him, "The shit I would pull — it would be glorious, and Seamus and Ron would be my accomplices."

"Not me?" said Harry, feigning offension.

"See, the plans Ron and I have include arson and a few molotov cocktails. You're too moral to agree."

"When the hell did you have time to make molotovs?"

"Seamus and I made around ten after Dumbledore's funeral."

"Without me?!" said Ron, actually looking rather hurt.

"It's nothing personal Ron, but in terms of violent anarchism, Seamus and I are on Ministry watchlists."

Kreacher came bustling to the table with a large tureen in his hands, and ladled out soup into pristine bowls, whistling between his teeth as he did so.

"Thanks, Kreacher," said Harry, still looking rather concerned, flipped over the Prophet. "Well, at least we know exactly where Snape is now."

Elara began to spoon soup into her mouth. The quality of Kreacher's cooking had improved dramatically ever since he had been given Regulus's locket: Today's French onion was as good as Elara had ever tasted.

"There are still a load of Death Eaters watching the house," she told Harry and Ron as she ate, "more than usual. They're hoping we'll march out carrying our school trunks and head off for the Hogwarts Express."

Ron glanced at his watch.

"I've been thinking about that all day. It left nearly six hours ago. Weird, not being on it, isn't it?"

In her mind's eye Elara seemed to see the scarlet steam engine, shimmering between fields and hills, a rippling scarlet caterpillar. She was sure Ginny, Neville, and Luna were sitting together at this moment, perhaps wondering where she, Harry, Ron, and Hermione were, or debating how best to undermine Snape's new regime.

"They nearly saw me coming back in just now," Elara said. "I landed weirdly on the top step,and the Cloak slipped."

"I do that every time. Oh, here she is," Ron added, craning around in his seat to watch Hermione reentering the kitchen. "And what in the name of Merlin's most baggy Y Fronts was that about?"

"I remembered this," Hermione panted.

She was carrying a large, framed picture, which she now lowered to the floor before seizing her small, beaded bag from the kitchen sideboard. Opening it, she proceeded to force the painting inside, and despite the fact that it was patently too large to fit inside the tiny bag, within a few seconds it had vanished, like so much else, into the bag's capacious depths.

"Phineas Nigellus," Hermione explained as she threw the bag onto the kitchen table with the usual sonorous, clanking crash.

"Sorry?" said Ron, but Elara understood.

The painted image of Phineas Nigellus Black was able to flit between his portrait in Grimmauld Place and the one that hung in the headmaster's office at Hogwarts: the circular tower-top room where Snape was no doubt sitting right now, in triumphant possession of Dumbledore's collection of delicate, silver magical instruments, the stone Pensieve, the Sorting Hat and, unless it had been moved elsewhere, the sword of Gryffindor.

"Snape could send Phineas Nigellus to look inside this house for him," Hermione explained to Ron as she resumed her seat. "But let him try it now, all Phineas Nigellus will be able to see is the inside of my handbag."

"Good thinking!" said Ron, looking impressed.

"Thank you," smiled Hermione, pulling her soup toward her. "So, Lara, what else happened today?"

"Nothing," said Elara. "Watched the Ministry entrance for seven hours. No sign of her. Saw your dad, though, Ron. He looks fine."

Ron nodded his appreciation of this news. They had agreed that it was far too dangerous to try and communicate with Mr. Weasley while he walked in and out of the Ministry, because he was always surrounded by other Ministry workers. It was, however, reassuring to catch these glimpses of him, even if he did look very strained and anxious.

"Dad always told us most Ministry people use the Floo Network to get to work," Ron said. "That's why we haven't seen Umbridge, she'd never walk, she'd think she's too important."

"And what about that funny old witch, that little wizard in the navy robes, and that witch who looks like she'll kill you if you step in her way?" Hermione asked.

"Oh yeah, the bloke from Magical Maintenance," said Ron.

"How do you know he works for Magical Maintenance?" Hermione asked, her soup spoon suspended in midair.

"Dad said everyone from Magical Maintenance wears navy blue robes."

"But you never told us that!"

Hermione dropped her spoon and pulled toward her the sheaf of notes and maps that she, Harry, and Ron had been examining when Elara had entered the kitchen.

"There's nothing in here about navy blue robes, nothing!" she said, flipping feverishly through the pages.

"Well, does it really matter?"

"Ron, it all matters! If we're going to get into the Ministry and not give ourselves away when they're bound to be on the lookout for intruders, every little detail matters! We've been over and over this, I mean, what's the point of all these reconnaissance trips if you aren't even bothering to tell us —"

"Blimey, Hermione, I forget one little thing —"

"You do realize, don't you, that there's probably no more dangerous place in the whole world for us to be right now than the Ministry of —"

"I think we should do it tomorrow," said Harry.

Hermione stopped dead, her jaw hanging; Ron choked a little over his soup; Elara paused mid-sip of her butterbeer.

"Tomorrow?" repeated Hermione. "You aren't serious, Harry?"

"I am," said Harry. "I don't think we're going to be much better prepared than we are now even if we skulk around the Ministry entrance for another month. The longer we put it off, the farther away that locket could be. There's already a good chance Umbridge has chucked it away; the thing doesn't open."

"Unless," said Ron, "she's found a way of opening it and she's now possessed."

"Wouldn't make any difference to her, she was so evil in the first place," Elara shrugged. "Anyways, I think Harry's right. Besides, it's much more fun to wing it."

Hermione was biting her lip, deep in thought.

"We know everything important," Harry went on, addressing Hermione. "We know they've stopped Apparition in and out of the Ministry. We know only the most senior Ministry members are allowed to connect their homes to the Floo Network now, because Ron heard those two Unspeakables complaining about it. And we know roughly where Umbridge's office is, because of what you heard that bearded bloke saying to his mate —"

"'I'll be up on level one, Dolores wants to see me,'" Hermione recited immediately.

"Exactly," said Harry. "And we know you get in using those funny coins, or tokens, or whatever they are, because I saw that witch borrowing one from her friend —"

"But we haven't got any!"

"If the plan works, we will have," Harry continued calmly.

"I don't know, Harry, I don't know. . . . There are an awful lot of things that could go wrong,so much relies on chance. . . ."

"Hermione, that'll be true even if we spend another three months preparing," said Elara. "It's time to act. The sooner we get that locket, the better."

Elara could tell from Ron's and Hermione's faces that they were scared; Harry did not seem particularly confident himself, and yet Elara was sure the time had come to put their plan into operation.

They had spent the previous four weeks taking it in turns to don the Invisibility Cloak and spy on the official entrance to the Ministry, which Ron, thanks to Mr. Weasley, had known since childhood. They had tailed Ministry workers on their way in, eavesdropped on their conversations, and learned by careful observation which of them could be relied upon to appear,alone, at the same time every day.

Occasionally there had been a chance to sneak a Daily Prophet out of somebody's briefcase. Slowly they had built up the sketchy maps and notes now stacked in front of Hermione.

"All right," said Ron slowly, "let's say we go for it tomorrow. . . . I think it should just be me and Harry."

"Oh, don't start that again!" sighed Hermione. "I thought we'd settled this."

"It's one thing hanging around the entrances under the Cloak, but this is different, Hermione."

Ron jabbed a finger at a copy of the Daily Prophet dated ten days previously.

"You're on the list of Muggle-borns who didn't present themselves for interrogation! Lara's literally got a twenty thousand galleon price on her decapitated head."

"And you're supposed to be dying of spattergroit at the Burrow! Lara can manipulate fire and was trained to fight by the literal personification of Magic. If anyone shouldn't go, it's Harry, he's got a ten-thousand-Galleon price on his head —"

"Fine, I'll stay here," said Harry. "Let me know if you ever defeat Voldemort, won't you?"

As Ron and Hermione laughed, pain shot through Elara's forehead. She immediately glanced over to Harry, who tried to pass off the pain by brushing his hair out of his eyes.

"Well, if all four of us go we'll have to Disapparate separately," Ron was saying. "We can't all fit under the Cloak anymore."

The pain in Elara's forehead was becoming more and more unbearable. Harry stood up. At once, Kreacher hurried forward.

"Master has not finished his soup, would Master prefer the savory stew, or else the treacle tart to which Master is so partial?"

"Thanks, Kreacher, but I'll be back in a minute — er — bathroom."

Harry hurried up the stairs. Hermione made to stand, but Elara held up a hand.

"Please, let me."

"You go to soft on him!" said Hermione annoyedly, "You know he needs to shut off that connection!"

"You can yell at him after he's done and calmed," said Elara resolutely, narrowing her eyes, daring Hermione to challenge her.

Seeing as the usual yelling had started during these episodes, Elara sped up the stairs and forced open the bathroom door with great difficulty. She was getting flashes of the visions Harry was seeing, greatly hindering her ability to use her normal strength.

Harry seemed to have sunk to the floor. Taking a deep breath, Elara willed calm to wash over her body, and her right hand emitted the softest glow. She knelt next to Harry, placing her hand upon his forehead. Within seconds, his breathing slowed and his eyes opened.

"Bad dream?" asked Elara, leaning back against the tiled wall.

"That has never been funny," groaned Harry, leaning his head against the wall.

Elara snorted.

"What happened this time?"

Harry looked over at her quizzically.

"I thought you could see?"

"Seems that whatever put me on this godforsaken planet is pissed that I haven't been able to figure out whatever Dumbledore was going on about in the tower."

"Oh," said Harry, leaning against Elara's shoulder. "I've just seen Voldemort murdering a woman. By now he's probably killed her whole family. And he didn't need to. It was Cedric all over again, Lara, they were just there. . . ."

Harry's voice became increasingly strained as he explained his vision, to which she placed her arms around him. His face was buried in her neck as his shoulders shuddered violently. These rare moments were graced with silence as Elara gently ran a hand through his hair.

After a long while, Harry broke the silence.

"Is Hermione gearing up to yell at me?"

Elara laughed.

"Probably."