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Chapter Text

A/N: This is an Alanna the Lioness take on Harry Potter. You don’t have to have read the former series, just know that its premise is a girl who longs to go to knight school and switches places with her twin brother to do so. As far as HP is concerned, this is AU. It’s set in a world where there’s no prophecy, Voldemort became a politician instead of a terrorist, and—oh yeah, Harry is now Harriet. This, along with many other elements of the general plot, might seem cliché, but I’ve done my best to make the story both entertaining and moving, realistic and fantastical. Enjoy.

A/N 2: After completing the third book I’ve decided to begin going back and editing the older chapters in order to bring them stylistically up to the level of the latest ones. No plot elements have been changed—I’m just cleaning up the style/grammar.

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 1:

“Has one of my father’s pranks turned your brains to porridge?” Arcturus Rigel Black clamped a hand over his cousin’s mouth while glancing about the musty hallway anxiously. “You can’t just say things like that in the open, Harry. Don’t you know what your mum would do to us if she heard?”

Harriet Potter allowed herself to be pulled down the hall, up the narrow staircase, and into Archie’s bedroom, quite used to her cousin’s dramatics. Her mother was safely out of earshot in the parlor with her fathers and uncles, and it wasn’t as if the decapitated heads of house-elves past were going to rat them out, but when Archie wanted drama, drama was created. She waited patiently while Archie dragged the chest of drawers over to barricade the door and settled for a very small eye-roll when he stuffed his handkerchief in the keyhole for good measure.

“Now?”

“Okay, now.” He plopped down on the bed as though the last five minutes had exhausted him beyond endurance and stared at her through his untidy fringe. “Pleasepleaseplease tell me you weren’t joking.”

She took in his pathetically hopeful expression with a small smile. “I wasn’t. I convinced mum and dad that I want to attend the American Institute of Magic.” Not that it had been a hard sell; that she was showing any amount of enthusiasm for a school other than Hogwarts was a great relief to her parents, no doubt.

“I can’t believe it.” Archie flopped back onto the covers and blinked at the ceiling like an owl dazed by the sun. “It’s happening. I’m really going to be a Healer. Harry, I—” He took a deep, steadying breath. “I don’t know how I’ll ever thank you.”

Harry reached out to pat her cousin gently on the hand. “You’re helping me just as much, remember? Without you taking my place at AIM, I couldn't take yours at Hogwarts.”

“Right, guess not.” Archie laughed a bit breathlessly and a grin lit up his round face with mischief. “So, what’s next?”

Harry pulled a well-worn piece of parchment from her pocket. She took quill and ink from Archie’s nightstand and crossed off ‘lie through teeth to parents’ from their list. Archie had written the list, which explained why ‘jump with joy’ was the only item apart from ‘become a girl’ that wasn’t crossed off. “Well,” she said, “we can’t switch trunks until the night before we leave, so other than getting hold of the Polyjuice Potion, that’s it.”

“Right,” Archie said. “So when I get to AIM, I’ll tell the headmistress that whoever transcribed the forms over Floo messed up, and my name’s Harry, not Harriet. They won’t know the English Book of Gold well enough in America to think anything of it.”

“Right.”

“What I don’t get is how you—” Here Archie pointed skeptically in the general direction of her face. “—are going to be me.”

“Because you’re so unique,” Harry said dryly. “Everyone knows of the Black heir, but you don’t really have any friends—”

“Oi!”

“—besides me, and I inherited enough pureblooded features from my dad to pass even Lord Malfoy’s scrutiny,” she finished, tilting her nose up to emphasize the afore mentioned ‘good’ breeding.

Archie narrowed his eyes in mock judgment. “Hmm, yes, this one does have the pureblood nose and cheekbones. The eyes are a bit vulgar—if only they were a stately grey rather than that common green hue—but the perfectly pointed chin more than makes up for it. But the hair! Oh, dear Merlin, never did a pureblood see the like.”

Harry tossed a pillow lazily at his snobby expression. “Our hair is the same color—black as your family name.”

“It’s not the color that’s the problem,” he chuckled. “It’s the texture. The Potter mop is quite distinctive.”

“It’s not that bad,” Harry said, scowling defensively as her cousin gave her an expression of patent disbelief.

Archie shook his head ruefully. “Sorry, cuz, but anyone in England who sees that hair will right away associate it with your father. His picture’s in the paper too often. The hair has to go if you want to pass as me.”

“But you have long hair.” She frowned, fingering a shoulder-length lock. “It’ll seem odd if you suddenly wear it short.”

“We’ll make it a grand gesture. Tomorrow you and I are both cutting our hair in honor of the end of our childhood. With luck, it’ll make you look like a girlish boy and me like a boyish girl,” Archie said. She noted he didn’t sound enthusiastic at the prospect.

Harry grimaced herself, just imagining the look on her mother’s face when they came back from the salon. There was nothing for it, though. They had to look as alike as possible, if this plan of theirs was going to last beyond the first term. Once their ruse got underway, a few inches of hair was going to seem like nothing compared to some of the other things they’d have to do.

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

The next day, she and Archie went to one of the Diagon barbershops and said goodbye to their long, and in Harry’s case unruly, hair. Before she knew it, the wayward crow’s nest her father always tousled when she came near was gone. In its place were close-cropped locks that curled gently around her forehead and ears.

“I look too delicate with my face all exposed.” Harry frowned while squinting at herself in the mirror. “They’ll know I’m a girl.”

“They won’t,” Archie assured her, admiring his own shorter style. She had to admit that, put next to one another, there was a remarkable similarity between the two of them. Not enough for their parents to mistake them, but enough to put doubt into a stranger, perhaps. “Pureblooded children generally have delicate features anyway. You only think you look exposed because you’re used to that lion’s mane overwhelming your features.”

He reached over from the chair next to her and plucked the glasses from her face. “There, don’t we look like twins?”

“I can’t see anything without my glasses,” she said, rolling blurry eyes.

Archie grinned. “That’s going to be a problem. We need to get you contacts—I’m thinking steel colored or maybe argent.” He peered at himself in the mirror thoughtfully. “What do you think, do I look like an argent to you?”

“You look like an idiot to me,” Harry informed him.

“Well, you better practice your village idiot expressions, then.” Archie laughed. “Seeing as you have to be me in a few days.”

“Maybe I’ll improve you,” Harry said, smiling. “By the time you’re yourself again I’ll have set the bar so high people will say ‘what happened to that Archie Black? He was so collected in school, and now he seems rather buffoonish.’”

“Careful, cousin, or I might do something novel to your reputation, too,” Archie threatened with an answering grin.

“Do your worst.” Harry shrugged. “I’ll just assume your identity permanently.”

Archie grimaced. “Can we make every effort to not have that happen? No offense to womankind, but I really don’t want to be a girl forever.”

“You’re not actually going to be a girl,” she reminded him. “I’m the one who has to lie about my gender for seven years.”

They both lapsed into a thoughtful silence, the full scope of their intentions beginning to creep past their mental defenses. “It’ll be worth it,” Archie said at last, just before the hairdresser returned with the bill.

“It will,” she agreed. It would have to be.

--0

[AbAbAb]

--0

Their last night at home arrived quickly, and Archie packed everything he could possibly need for a school he wouldn’t ever be attending. He had mixed feelings about their ruse, despite his readiness to go forward with it. The prospect of lying to his dad for the next seven years was an unhappy one. Now that Mum was gone, he was all his dad had left, and if their deception was discovered, it would likely cause a rift in their relationship, but on the other hand…it’s not as if they were hurting anyone. Harry got to chase her dream of studying under Master Snape, and AIM had the best Healer certification track of any Western magical school; by the time he graduated he’d be a fully qualified Mediwizard, several years ahead of an equivalent student of Hogwarts standards. Well, he would be if the two of them pulled it off.

When he’d finished packing what was essentially Harry’s trunk, he and his dad went over to Potter Place in Godric’s Hollow for dinner. Uncle Remus was already there, setting the table. Remus wasn’t really his uncle; nor was James, come to that, but they all considered one another family, so exact blood relations didn’t really matter.

“Are you psyched for school, Archie?” James asked once they’d all sat at the table. Lily nudged him reprovingly with her elbow, glancing at Harry with unveiled concern, but James grinned reassuringly at his wife and continued talking over the spread. “You’re going to love Hogwarts—no place like it anywhere. Why, the things me and your uncle and father got up to when we were there…As the representative of the second generation of Marauders, you’ll have to carry on the family legacy—”

“Of pranking the daylights out of unsuspecting Defense Against the Dark Arts professors,” Sirius cut in. He barked out a laugh and slapped Remus on the back. Remus shook his head exasperatedly, but didn’t say anything to rebuke him. Archie knew it was Remus’ opinion that Sirius laughed much too rarely. Archie’s mother had passed away a few years ago of a rare wasting sickness, and his dad really hadn’t been the same since. Neither had he, come to that.

“Why just the Defense professors?” Archie asked, playing along. “Is that part of the tradition?”

“Eh, not really. It’s just that they’re usually the best targets.” James twirled his fork thoughtfully. “The job’s been cursed as long as anyone can remember, so you never get the same one two years in a row.”

“And rookie professors are the easiest marks.” Sirius winked at his son. “Though if you want to prank Snivellus once or twice, your old man would be much obliged.”

“Don’t call him that,” Lily said automatically. It wasn’t infrequent she had to make the request. “He’s a good man.”

“Not to mention a genius,” Harry added quietly into her fish. No one acknowledged this remark, as it, too, was commonplace. 

Harry had been in a state of near-idol-worship ever since she read an article in Potions Quarterly about his work with the Wolfsbane potion. His cousin came off as taciturn and uninteresting, if not downright cold, to most people, but she had harbored a deep fascination for potions. She’d spent the better part of her free time stirring up unlikely concoctions in her parents’ basement for as long as he could remember. Archie knew his cousin wanted nothing in the world but to brew potions for the rest of her life, preferably alone, but in her mind, mediocrity in the art was not enough. The only way to become the greatest Potions Mistress in the country was to study under the greatest Potions Master in the country, and he, if you believed Harry’s judgment on the subject, was at Hogwarts. Archie could relate to her single-mindedness—he felt much the same about Healing—but he wished she’d pick her battles when it came to Uncle James.

“Eleven years later and you’re still defending the man.” James made a face.

“Eleven years later and you’re still holding onto a childish rivalry,” Lily returned, looking to Remus for support. “Remus thinks it’s ridiculous, don’t you?”

“She has a point,” the werewolf said mildly. He glanced between James and Sirius with a slight smile. “There’s no need to perpetuate this, is there? I’m sure by now he’s washed his hair.”

Sirius and James burst into fresh gales of laughter, and Lily gave Remus an exasperated, thanks-for-nothing stare. He held his hands up in surrender and cheerfully changed the subject. “Harry, how are you looking forward to America?”

“Can’t wait.” The newly-shorn girl glanced at Archie before continuing. “It’ll be interesting to travel abroad. I’m, ah, actually thinking of trying the Healer track.”

“Really?” Remus chewed thoughtfully as her parents exchanged confused looks. “That’s a difficult area of specialization. I thought you were planning on pursuing a Potions career.”

“Well, all the really advanced Healing is done with potions nowadays,” Harry said, toying casually with her vegetables. “If I want to make potions to help people, not just brew them for money, then I should see the problem from the other side, too.”

Archie didn’t think she was lying—she almost never did, directly. She had mentioned wanting one day to be able to help people with the potions she invented, and Mediwizards did rely heavily on potions for the more complicated cures, but he knew if it weren’t for him she wouldn’t even consider a specialty in Healing. That was all Archie. After watching his mother suffer for months under the influence of an illness there was no viable treatment for, he became obsessed with the idea of one day saving lives.

When he first decided he wanted to be a Healer, he’d asked his father if he could accompany Harry to a school in America instead of taking the place reserved for him at Hogwarts. Sirius wouldn’t hear of it. Archie thought his father’s unusual unreasonableness on the subject was a combination of his fear that he’d be losing his son in a way, too, if he went so far away and his desire for Archie to have the same wonderful experiences he’d had in school. Hogwarts was where Sirius had met his best friends, where he’d met and fallen in love with Diana, Archie’s mother. Their arguments on the subject of Archie’s schooling had become so sour that when Harry had first idly suggested switching places to solve both their frustrations, Archie considered it seriously. He didn’t want to disappoint his dad, but Sirius lived his life in the past, and Archie couldn’t change that. He knew he could never bring his mum back. He might be able to one day be the difference that saved someone else’s loved one, however, and to see that dream become a reality, he’d lie to the whole world if he had to.

After dinner, the two cousins went up to Harry’s room for a private goodbye. They wouldn’t see one another until winter break at the earliest, and they had never been apart that long before. The long separation wasn’t at the forefront of their minds, however.  

“Did you get your dad to shrink yours, too?” Harry asked, producing a miniaturized trunk from a bookshelf.

Archie produced his miniaturized trunk from his pocket and exchanged it for Harry’s thankfully not-too-feminine one. They wouldn’t be unshrunk until they reached their respective schools the following evening. “Did you nick the potions from Uncle James’ Auror kit?” This was the part of their plan he was least sure about. Unlike the rest of it, which seemed fairly innocent, stealing was so obviously wrong. He supposed he’d better get used to living in a state of moral greyness.

“Here.” Harry pulled two beakers from under her bed, pouring doses of the mud-brown liquid into vials, one for each of them. “You’ll have to keep the beaker hidden. I’ve replaced it with a neutral concoction that smells and tastes as bad, but doesn’t do anything. Hopefully he’ll assume it’s a defective batch.”

Archie nodded his understanding and they both plucked hairs without further ado. Switching vials, they each drank the dose with the other’s essence.

Blergh. Archie shuddered, suddenly doubting he’d ever be able to drink the foul muck again, much less the dozens of times that would be required to make it seven years as his cousin. Then he wasn’t thinking about the taste, because the transformation had seized a vicious hold of his inners. Whatever he’d anticipated, it was many times worse. His limbs quaked with the effort of not moaning aloud, and it was a long moment before he could open his eyes without them watering. When he did, he felt as though he were looking into a mirror.

“Weird.” Archie squinted. “You have awful eyesight, Harry. Give me your glasses.”

“That explains why the world’s so blurry.” Harry took off her spectacles and blinked at the world around her, apparently enjoying her now-perfect vision. Archie put the glasses on with a sigh of distaste. It would only be for a little while.

They had enough stolen Polyjuice to last until they were safely away from their parents the next morning, and after that, Harry had contacts to correct her vision and change her eye color to an unremarkable grey, while he had green contacts for thoroughness’ sake. He wasn’t expecting to run into anyone at AIM who had even heard of the Potters. Harry was the one who would have a hard time pulling off their deception.

“I packed extra potions books into my trunk for you, so study up in case Mum mentions something in a letter I should know about,” Harry said. “Don’t forget to learn a handwriting charm first thing so you can answer my parents’ correspondence, and I’ll do the same for the letters your dad sends. Keep an extra copy of what you write, and we’ll exchange them by owl post at the end of the school year so we can keep our stories straight over the summer.”

“All right, I remember,” Archie said. Honestly, Harry acted as though it fell to her to take his mum’s place sometimes. Not that he minded. Much. He could see through her in any case. Harry was more nervous than she looked if she was rambling out instructions they’d already agreed upon.

“That’s it then. This is…goodbye.” Harry looked a little lost for a moment, but quickly pulled it together to give him a firm, “Good luck.”

“Yeah.” Archie felt a bit lost himself at the magnitude of what they were about to undertake.

“Arch?”

“Yeah?”

Harry took a deep breath. “Even if this blows up in our face and they kick me out before the first class, I’m saying right now: I don’t regret anything.”

Archie was taken aback at her forthrightness, but squared his eleven-year-old shoulders nonetheless. “Me neither. Thank you. This was your idea, and without it, I would have taken years longer to reach my goal. It’s also going to be a lot more dangerous for you, and, well, I’m grateful for everything, no matter what happens.”

“Same. Thanks for letting me borrow your name, Arch,” Harry said, lightening the air between them with a lame attempt at levity. “I’ll try not to blacken it too much in the next seven years.”

“Do your worst,” Archie said, grinning.

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

Harry ducked into the boys’ bathroom on the Hogwarts Express and waited in a stall for the Polyjuice to wear off. Every moment seemed like an eternity, but she knew that was just her nerves getting the best of her. It was easier going than it had been coming. When she was herself again, she changed into Archie’s school robes and moved to the sink to blink her new lenses into place. Staring back at her from the mirror was a sober-looking eleven-year-old boy with a halo of onyx curls and flat, grey eyes. Her eyelashes were perhaps a bit too long to be masculine, but the lips were thin enough and the fragile bone structure could have belonged to any number of pureblood lines. She’d heard the Malfoys in particular were known for their pointed faces. Her voice was too high-pitched at first, but with a little practice it dropped slightly to a more natural octave for a young boy.

Satisfied, she exited the restroom and began to walk the length of the train, looking for a spare compartment. As she glanced around at all the excited faces, it began to dawn on her that she’d really done it. She’d got as far as the train without discovery, and everyone she met from now on would be complete strangers, so anything she messed up on would simply be attributed to Arcturus Black’s unknown character. She pondered that for a moment. Arcturus Black. Arcturus Rigel Black. She wrinkled her nose. It felt too strange to be taking Archie’s name. A name he didn’t even like, no less. Should she refer to herself in her head as Archie, just to lessen the chance that she’d get confused and mess up? But then, how would she refer to Archie? After thinking on it for a long moment, she decided that as long as she was appropriating Archie’s person she might as well be decisive about it. While she was playing Archie’s part, she would go by his middle name. From now on I’ll be Rigel Black, the best Potions student Hogwarts has ever seen.

Rigel—and wasn’t it odd to rename herself in her own thoughts for convenience’s sake?—was nearly to the end of the train before she saw a promising compartment. There was only one boy sitting quietly within, reading the first-year Herbology textbook. She slid open the door and nodded in greeting when the boy looked up. He had an open, cheerful face, with lank brown hair that fell across his forehead and brown eyes that held not a hint of malice. There was something familiar about him, and she wondered if her parents knew his.

“Are you saving these seats for anyone?” she asked.

“Uh, no.” The kid looked surprised that she would think that. “You can sit, if you want.”

“Thank you.” She shut the door and took a seat across from him. “I’m Rigel,” she said, trying out the name for the first time aloud.

“Neville.” He smiled tentatively. It looked as though he would say something else, but he refrained. He was probably used to giving his last name when introducing himself. Most purebloods gave their family name as a courtesy. She’d rather not bring up her borrowed last name just yet, however. The Black name could swing either way, depending on whether his parents had told him they were Dark purebloods or blood-traitors.

“Pleased to meet you. Is that 1000 Magical Herbs and Fungi?” Rigel nodded at the book in Neville’s lap.

He glanced down at it as if to check, but caught himself and flushed. “Yeah. Um, have you read much of it yet?”

“I have,” she said, then backtracked as the boy looked significantly alarmed. “I don’t think you need to have read any of it, though. I was only interested because Herbology has a lot to do with Potions.”

“Oh.” Neville looked much relieved. “So, you like Potions, then? I read the introduction to that textbook, too, but it looks complicated. And the first potion listed uses toad parts. I have a toad. His name is Trevor. I don’t know if I like the idea of dissecting animals for parts.”

“You won’t have to do the harvesting, most likely. The professor will have the ingredients already,” Rigel said.

“You think? Maybe it won’t be so bad, then.” Neville swung his feet a bit nervously, then blurted, “What House do you think you’ll be sorted into?”

“I’m hoping for Slytherin,” she said honestly.

“You—Slytherin?” Neville squeaked.

“From that reaction, I’m guessing your family are Gryffindors. So are mine,” Rigel admitted.

“And you’re actually hoping for Slytherin?” He looked half-doubtful, half-confused.

“The Potions Master at Hogwarts is the head of Slytherin House,” she explained. “I’ve heard he favors his own House, so the best chance I have at getting extra tutoring from him is to be in Slytherin.”

“You’d go against your line for some extra help in Potions?” Neville bit his lip, “Can you even do that? Pick your House against tradition, I mean.”

“Maybe not, but I think I can meet the requirements if I get the chance. I just have to be cunning and ambitious, right?”

“Well, good luck,” he offered kindly.

“Thank you,” she said. “I hope you like the House you get, as well.”

They spent the rest of the trip in comfortable silence. The only interruption was when Neville quietly asked if Rigel would leave so he could change into his school robes. Rigel didn’t mind stepping outside to wait if it made the shy boy more comfortable, though she was quite desensitized to the male form thanks to Archie’s complete lack of modesty.

While she was standing outside the compartment, a tall boy with deep-set features and a surly expression approached from the other end of the train. Due to the narrowness of the corridor, she was partially blocking his way. Instead of just walking around her, however, he veered and slammed a heavily muscled shoulder into her side. Not expecting it, she fell sideways to the ugly carpet and awkwardly broke her fall with her elbows. Pushing herself back up to her knees, she glared at the boy, who was sneering down at her.

“Are you blind?” she asked, remembering to pitch her voice deeper, the way Archie’s went when he got angry, just in time.

The moment his eyes narrowed, she knew she shouldn’t have said that. The boy was much larger and meaner-looking than any kid she’d ever met, and despite her reluctance to take open hostility lying down, she had to admit she hadn’t thought it through.

The bigger boy advanced on her almost casually, shoving a foot toward her middle. Only a swift roll in the opposite direction saved her from a bruised belly. She got to her feet and rounded on the kid, taking in their respective heights at close-range and deciding he was maybe a fifth or sixth year. “My apologies,” she said through gritted teeth. Better to defuse the situation than get in over her head. “Obviously, you’re not blind, just rather upset, but there’s no need to take it out on me.”

He took a step toward her with clenched fists, then paused and pulled out his wand instead, a nasty smirk on his face. “Little first-years should know better than to talk faster than their wands can move. Consider this your first lesson: when an upper-classman kicks you, stay down.”

I might if I thought it would make you go away, Rigel thought, stiffening her spine and preparing to take whatever curse he tossed her way.

Before either of them could make a move, a stern voice from down the train called, “You, there! No fighting on the train!” A thin, redheaded boy with a gleaming gold badge on his chest strutted importantly to stand between Rigel and the surly boy, neither of whom had relaxed. “Flint,” the redhead said upon catching sight of the other boy’s face. “I might have known. I’ll be taking ten points from Slytherin when we get to Hogwarts for pulling your wand on another student—and a first year, no less.”

Flint curled his lip at the boy. “Weasley.” Apparently that was enough said, for he turned and stalked off with only a last, annoyed glare in Rigel’s direction.

“Nothing but trouble this time of year, that one.” The freckled boy sighed. He looked down at Rigel with a slight frown. “All right there? Bad luck getting in Flint’s way your first day. He likes to hold a grudge, so be sure to steer clear for a few weeks.”

“I certainly won’t go seeking him out,” she said, straightening her robes. “Thank you for the intervention.”

“It was no trouble,” the boy said airily. “I was only doing my duty as a prefect.”

Rigel nodded once more in thanks, then turned to rejoin Neville in their compartment. If he wondered why she’d stayed outside for so long, he didn’t ask. She reclaimed her seat silently, lost in thought. Not even to Hogwarts yet and she’d already made an enemy. She hoped fervently this wasn’t a sign of more such instances to come. She also hoped Archie was faring better with his side of the ruse, wherever he was.

--0—0—0

--0--0

--0

[end of chapter one].

A/N: To anyone who’s read this far: thank you for giving an unusual idea a chance. To clear up any initial confusion (though everything will be explained in time, of course), Hogwarts at this time only takes pureblooded students. This was not always the case. Remus and Snape are halfbloods, and when they attended school at Hogwarts, only muggleborns were banned. Since then, the laws have become more strict. Harry and Archie are not truly cousins in the literal sense, but as James and Sirius are distant relations, they consider themselves ‘cousins.’

A/N 2: If you are reading this for the first time on AO3, the entire series, which is in Book 5 at the moment, is up on FFN, and I am slowly migrating chapters over as I edit them. Thanks everyone for your patience.

Best,

Violet

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter Two:

As the train slowed, she could see the lights of Hogsmeade Station in the distance. Compartment doors began to slam open one after another, so she and Neville joined the crowd pushing toward the exits. They got separated from one another in the crush, and by the time she’d departed the train, the small boy was nowhere to be seen. A man larger than anyone Rigel had ever seen led them to the shore of a deep-water lake, where tiny wooden boats awaited them. She shared a boat with a pair of girls and a freckled boy with the same shade of red hair as the prefect she’d met on the train. She tried not to wonder if the rickety old things were seaworthy, but the fact that the boats moved forward under a kind of mass hypnotic spell didn’t buoy her faith in the crafts.

Once safely ashore, she and the others followed the giant man, Hagrid, up to the castle. It was bigger than she’d imagined, but other than its size, she wasn’t able to gain a firm impression of it in the dark. The great doors beckoned them inside, and they stood quietly in the Entrance Hall until a stern-faced woman—the Transfiguration professor, McGonagall—came out to collect them.

McGonagall herded them into a line in no particular order and led them through the big oak doors into the Great Hall. Rigel’s eyes widened involuntarily at the sheer number of students in the hall. She’d thought there would be a lot fewer, with the school only accepting purebloods, but she supposed not many people “married out of magic” these days. She’d heard that not so long ago about fifty percent of Wizarding children were halfbloods. Now, most of the muggle blood had been bred out of the gene pool once more, so muggleborns and halfbloods like herself only made up about twenty percent of the population.

There were four long tables that took up the bulk of the Hall, and a smaller, perpendicularly placed table at the far end of the room that looked to be for professors and staff. The colored ties confirmed the students were arranged by House. She glanced about the room to avoid looking at anyone directly as they were led to a spot in front of the head table designated by a lump of fabric sitting on a short stool. The ceiling caught her eye, and she sucked in her breath quietly. It looked as though the whole galaxy had been brought down to fill the hall. Such stars as she’d never seen before graced the empyrean. She’d heard that out in the wilderness, away from the lights of cities, the stars and planets shone brighter, but she’d never imagined it would be such a spectacle.

Just when she had come to think perhaps there was no ceiling, only empty space, a nudge from behind brought her back to her surroundings. A girl with short blonde hair cut at a fashionable angle away from her face leaned close to whisper, “It’s enchanted to look like the sky outside, and if you don’t stop gaping at it, everyone will think you’re a commoner before you even get sorted.”

Rigel turned her artificial grey eyes to meet amused blue ones. The blonde girl was obviously from one of the more prominent pureblood families; everything from the articulate way she spoke to the poised way she held herself suggested hours upon hours of social instruction as a child. The other girl smiled to show she wasn’t trying to be catty, but helpful, so Rigel nodded to show she was grateful for the advice. She started to introduce herself properly, but her words were cut off; the lump of fabric on the stool had begun to sing. Loudly.

“Welcome, welcome, one and all

To this fine place, in this Great Hall.

Yes, it’s that time of year once more

When I help Master Dumbledore

To place you where you need to be:

The House that is your destiny.

To those of you who always yearn

To know as much as you can learn,

Who seek the truth in every way

And plan to study every day,

Don’t worry—here you’re not alone

In Ravenclaw you’ll find your home.

To any who have talent—yes,

And always try to do their best,

Who only take the things they earn

And wait with patience for their turn

And value loyalty and trust,

Why, you belong in Hufflepuff.

To those of you that have ambition

And a cunning disposition,

If you keep your secrets close

And know that wisdom never boasts

And want to find your truest friends,

Then you must go to Slytherin.

To those of you with steady nerve,

The stout of heart who never swerve

From any duty come their way,

Who aren’t afraid to speak their say

And meet the danger at their door,

You will be great in Gryffindor.

So come to me and put me on;

I’ve never once been told I’m wrong.

I’ll find inside your deepest soul

The proper House to make you whole.

Maybe it’s not a pretty sight

But this old hat will steer you right.”

The hall broke into thunderous applause, all the first-years joining in with bemusement. “We just have to try it on?” The redhead she’d shared a boat with laughed. “That’s easy!”

Professor McGonagall pulled a scroll from her robes and unrolled it. “When I call your name, come forward, sit on the stool, and try on the hat. Abbott, Hannah.”

A mousy-looking blonde girl with pigtails aquiver stepped forward nervously and sat on the stool. She gingerly placed the hat on her head, wrinkling her nose a bit as though she’d encountered a foul smell.

“HUFFLEPUFF!” the hat cried.

“So, whatever you do, don’t think about how bad the hat smells or it’ll punish you by sending you to the badgers,” the short-haired girl from earlier whispered into Rigel’s ear. She had to bite her lip to hide a smile of amusement.

“Black, Arcturus.”

Rigel smoothed her face into an expression of detached politeness—by far the easiest neutral expression to maintain while nervous—and stepped forward toward the stool Abbott had just vacated. Her last thought before putting the hat on was that it didn’t really smell that bad.

“Why thank you, young lady,” the hat murmured in her head.

If she weren’t so tense, she would have jumped, but she kept the blank mask on her face while thinking to the hat, “You’re not going to kick me out, are you? Please let me stay. I’ll work hard, I promise—”

“Calm down, Miss Potter; I’m not a snitch—I’m a hat! I’m here to sort you, not pass judgment on your life choices. Now, let’s see… You do have quite a bit of talent, and you’re willing to work hard, but I can see that you have greater ambitions than self-satisfaction. It was courageous of you to risk so much to be here, and clever to have planned it out so perfectly, but above all sneaky, so very sly. I know just where to put someone with so many secrets to keep. Good luck in…  

“SLYTHERIN!”

Rigel stood calmly, though on the inside she was weak with relief. She carefully removed the hat after a whispered, “Thank you,” and turned toward the table that was clapping. On the way, her eyes met those of the girl she’d been standing next to, who mouthed, “Good job!” at her and subtly mimed holding her breath to avoid a stinky smell.

She told herself it was rude to laugh at Hufflepuffs as she took a seat at the end of the Slytherin table. There was an array of empty places around her, presumably for the other new first-years. They were who she should be focusing on—the other students who would soon become her housemates—not the ones made Hufflepuffs. Still, when “Bones, Susan” went to Hufflepuff after a similarly distasteful expression on her face, Rigel’s lips twitched upwards at the corners without her conscious control.

Before long, she was joined by “Bulstrode, Millicent” and “Crabbe, Vincent.” Tracey Davis, Daphne Greengrass, and Gregory Goyle all quickly followed. After that, there was a lull until a sharply put-together boy with platinum blond hair and a confident expression strode forward to the tune of, “Malfoy, Draco.” Davis and Greengrass, whom Rigel had only briefly attempted to maintain conversation with once their discussion turned to the merits of linen versus silk tablecloths, made small swooning noises as they watched the Malfoy scion put the hat on without even bothering to sit. The hat seemed to shout “SLYTHERIN” before it even touched his perfectly groomed hair, and Rigel thought she might not have bothered to sit down on the rickety stool either if she had been that sure of the outcome.

Malfoy’s eyes scanned the table coolly as he approached. Across the table, the large boys Crabbe and Goyle moved over hastily to make room between them, which left Rigel staring straight into slate grey eyes as the heir to one of the oldest and most influential Dark pureblood families slid into the seat directly across from her. He nodded in her direction, and she was nonplussed until she realized that, as Arcturus Black, they were cousins through Draco’s mother, Narcissa Malfoy née Black. She nodded back just as stiffly and both turned their attention to the sorting as “Nott, Theodore” was made a Slytherin as well. When “Parkinson, Pansy” was called, the girl who’d warned her about acting like a peasant moved gracefully toward the stool. Her sorting took only slightly longer than Malfoy’s, though she made a great show of sitting primly on the stool and adjusting the hat on her head before brushing off imaginary lint from its brim as she set it back on the stool.

Rigel moved over just enough to extend an invitation to sit beside her without seeming eager about it, and Parkinson politely smiled her thanks as she sat to Rigel’s left and tucked her robes gracefully beneath her. “I knew you were Slytherin material,” Parkinson confided quietly, seeming content to ignore the sorting for the time being.

“Oh really?” Rigel lifted an eyebrow in the manner she’d seen Archie appropriate when he was in pureblood-mode. “And how did you figure that while I was gaping like a country bumpkin?”

The blonde girl twinkled prettily at her. “I just know these things,” she said. “For instance, I can tell you that there’s only one student left over there who will join us at this table, and he won’t be called until the very end, so you can stop trying to divide your attention between me and the hat.”

Rigel let herself blink once at the other girl. “You’re quite perceptive, Miss Parkinson.”

“Call me Pansy,” the blonde said after a considering pause. “We are, after all, going to be great friends, Mr. Black.”

“All of my great friends call me Rigel,” she said, trying out a grin that was based on Sirius’ roguish expressions.

It must have worked, because Pansy looked ever so slightly taken aback for a moment before allowing a wry smile to crease her aristocratic features. “You are certainly your father’s son, Rigel.”

“Do you know my father?” She feigned surprise. “I shall have to chastise him for keeping such a gem to himself.” She was laying it on pretty thick, and she honestly hoped what people said about first impressions was true and she never had to act like this again, because it was making her feel a bit queasy. It was necessary that people believed she was the son of Sirius Black, however, so for a little while she would channel her uncle’s irrepressible spirit.

“Suffice it to say that every girl at this table has been warned by her mother to steer clear of the Black scion if she wishes to keep her reputation intact.” Pansy smiled with amusement, not seeming too concerned about steering clear herself. “But I think you’re all talk.”

She made a mental note to ask Sirius what he’d done at Hogwarts that had mothers a decade later fearing for their daughters’ virtue in the presence of an eleven-year-old. Though, on the other hand, she supposed she’d rather not know. 

“I’m grateful that you’ve decided to look past those unmitigated rumors and give me a chance,” Rigel chose to say.

Whatever reply Pansy might have made was forgotten as “Zabini, Blaise” was sorted into Slytherin, and McGonagall took the hat and stool away. As Dumbledore stood to make his opening speech, Pansy and Rigel turned their attention his way. With her face looking toward the headmaster’s chair, Rigel couldn’t help but notice, from the corner of her eye, the scrutinizing gaze one Draco Malfoy was leveling at her from across the table. He must have been very curious about the cousin he’d never met, she thought.

Dumbledore was eccentric, that much everyone knew. Rigel thought he was leaning a little far into the adjective, all the same. His long, white beard was braided with ribbons in the four House colors and his pointed hat was covered with tropical flowers and birds. He said a few words, the impenetrability of which suggested that he chose them randomly from the dictionary, and waved his hands dramatically. Immediately, the tables in front of them filled with every imaginable kind of food. Starters, soups, entrees, desserts, and drinks were spread before them in a chaotic mess, and as children all around the hall began grabbing whatever was closest to them, she wondered if the randomness of placement wasn’t intentionally whimsical.   

Rigel put her napkin in her lap, noting that all the napkins at the Slytherin table were black, and therefore wouldn’t leave noticeable residue on black school robes the way a white napkin would have. She supposed she could get used to such details. Across the table, Crabbe and Goyle were stuffing themselves with chocolate confections, not even bothering with plates, while the blond boy between them slowly piled a variety of foods onto his plate, as though he was playing diplomat to each food group and was reluctant to show favoritism. Rigel asked Greengrass to pass the garden salad and, although the girl blinked at Rigel entirely too many times in the process, she did hand it over. Rigel piled her plate high with leaves and dug in.

“Don’t you want anything more substantial than that?” Pansy glanced askance at her plate with obvious curiosity.

Rigel swallowed carefully before answering. “No, thank you.” Pansy waited a beat, but when it became clear that Rigel had no intention of elaborating, she shrugged and turned to her own dinner. Rigel was both impressed and amused at the other girl’s expression of studied disinterest, so she offered, “I’m a vegetarian.”  

Pansy turned back with raised eyebrows. “Is that so?”

“You don’t eat any meat?” the dark-haired girl, Bulstrode, asked, glancing down at her own steak and kidney pie as if she couldn’t bear the thought of giving it up forever.

“I eat some fish,” Rigel said. The sturdy girl only shook her head mournfully in response and turned back to her own dinner.

Rigel had debated whether or not to change her diet for this masquerade, but eventually decided against it. For one, she wasn’t sure if she could fake a liking for meat for seven years, and for another, her vegetarian diet would go a long way toward explaining why she remained so small and scrawny while the other boys were growing taller and broader. Archie wasn’t a vegetarian, but no one here would know that, and if it somehow got back to Sirius that his son’s eating habits had changed, she could always say she had done it out of nostalgia for her cousin. It was the kind of thing Archie would do in a fit of dramatics.

She finished her dinner quietly, finding the pumpkin juice to be dessert enough for her, and almost didn’t notice when the Malfoy heir once again turned his considering gaze her way. He wasn’t very subtle, however, and after his second obvious glance Rigel noticed Pansy noticing it, too. Pansy didn’t look surprised that Malfoy might be curious about Rigel, so she supposed all the kids here must know the intricate system of blood connections that bound them to one another.

By the time everyone had finished eating, it was quite late, and Rigel was more than ready to go to sleep. Even her nerves at having come this far couldn’t make her listen with more than half an ear to Dumbledore’s informational speech about rules, forbidden forests, and so on. When they were finally released, she fell into step beside Pansy as they and the other first-years followed the Slytherin prefects into the dungeons. By the time they reached the entrance to the common room, she was freezing as well as sleepy. Didn’t they heat anything below the kitchens? One of the prefects, a girl with long, black hair and heavy eye-makeup, turned and addressed their group.

“This is the common room. You probably won’t be able to find it on your own for a few weeks because it just looks like a blank stretch of wall, but that’s to stop the other Houses from finding it, so whatever you do, don’t draw a map or place markers along the corridors to find your way back.” She said it in such a way that Rigel suspected the rules were based on experience. “Just follow an older Slytherin until you learn your way around.”

“Don’t be too proud to ask directions, either,” another prefect added. “The upper-years had to do the same thing when they were first-years. In this House, no one expects you to figure everything out on your own like a Ravenclaw but, on the other hand, we’re not Hufflepuffs. If you want help, you have to ask, and don’t expect it to be free.”

“The password is Ouroboros,” said the first prefect. She stood to the side as the wall slid open and blessedly warm air from the common room wafted out into the corridor. If keeping the corridors in the dungeons uncommonly cold was some sort of psychological trick to make them associate the common room with cozy hospitableness, she couldn’t fault its execution. They all shuffled inside gratefully, and the prefects herded them over to one of the great fireplaces along the walls to get their bearings and warm up.

The common room was very dark, with the light of flickering flames from the torches and fires casting eerie shadows over every surface. Once she grew accustomed to the low lighting, though, she found it quite elegant, if a little claustrophobic due to the low ceilings. The windows didn’t help, since all they revealed at the moment was pitch-black lake water. She supposed more light would filter down from the surface during the day. The furniture she thought well suited to House Slytherin. All of it was low-backed, so that it would be obvious who was in each seat even from behind, and none of it was cluttered too closely together or tucked way back into corners. There was nowhere to hide. Thankfully, the furnishings were made of basic, dark woods that left the green and silver fabric scheme something short of garish. Seven different hallways led off like spokes on half a wheel from the main room. One for each year.

The prefect with the long, black hair came back over to them and said, “Change of plans. Something’s come up, so our Head of House will hold the start-of-term meeting in the morning instead of this evening. That means all of you must be up and finished with breakfast thirty minutes early tomorrow, so as soon as you get situated, go to bed. First-year dorms are down the hallway all the way to your right. To protect the safety and privacy of Slytherin students, no one but the students in each year can pass through the doorway to their respective halls. Use this privacy wisely, as students who abuse the privilege will find it revoked for all their year mates.” She waved them all toward their dorms, saying, “Go on, little snakes; your room assignments are on the outside of the doors. Oh, and boys: I wouldn’t recommend trying to go into one of the girls’ dorms. You won’t like the consequences. Goodnight.”

Rigel tiredly followed Pansy and the others down the first-year hallway. There were four doors along the corridor, two for the girls, and two for the boys. The girls seemed pleased to only be two to a room, instead of three, and the only boy who looked put out by the room assignments was Zabini, who was assigned to a room with Crabbe and Goyle. At the very end of the hall, on the right hand side, was a door with “Arcturus Black” written right above “Draco Malfoy” and “Theodore Nott,” which Rigel pushed open mechanically. She made a beeline for the bed with her un-shrunk trunk sitting at its foot. Her roommates filed in behind her and started getting ready for bed, but she went straight to her mattress and was half-asleep upon it within moments. The relief she felt at having made it all the way to the Slytherin dorms without being kicked out followed her into her dreams, and she didn’t fight the smile as she drifted off to thoughts of what the morning would bring.

--0—0—0

--0—0

--0

[end of chapter two].

A/N: Important: I know in canon most of the kids are half-bloods, not purebloods, but I’m changing it so that in this AU, pureblood society is so ingrained that their parents never married muggles or muggleborns but still had kids. Because of this, many kids that in canon are halfbloods or even muggleborns will probably still be included in the story at Hogwarts. There will also be more purebloods of the OC variety to fill in the gaps of a society that didn’t experience the loss of numbers in a civil war the way canon’s HP universe did. Unless stated otherwise, assume a character at Hogwarts is pureblood.

On Pansy’s appearance: In the movies she’s got brown hair, but in the books it doesn’t say. So she’s blonde.

Finally: I know you’re thinking: no scar? no prophecy? This is just a schoolyard fic then. Well, maybe at first, but you don’t need a scar on your head to start a revolution, or to be the focus of a political maelstrom, which is where this fic is headed. If you’re looking for a quick romance with a quirky gender-bender plot to provide hijinks, maybe this isn’t for you. It’s a serious look at the perils and consequences of playing dangerous games with dangerous people. That said, it’s also funny, light-hearted in places, thought-provoking, and exciting. So I hope you enjoy it. Thanks for reading.

-Violet

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 3:

It was the third time Draco Malfoy leveled his gaze at Rigel Black, and still the boy remained unaware. It wasn’t just any gaze, either. It was the one his father had taught him, the weighty one, meant to be felt across ballrooms. If Draco hadn’t known the Black heir was raised by blood traitors before, it would have been made obvious by the boy’s sheer obliviousness. No child raised in a proper pureblood house would have been able to sleep through such pointed scrutiny, and each moment he stared, getting not so much as a twitch from the other boy, brought fresh annoyance to Draco’s mood.

He was supposed to write a letter to his mother this morning about the sorting, and particularly about the Black heir, but how was he to do that when he had nothing to say? He’d walked the train a couple of times before it left the station, but hadn’t seen anyone who looked like the picture of young Sirius Black from his mother’s family tree. He had thought he would be able to meet Black at some point before the sorting, or at the very least during dinner if he was sorted into Slytherin as his mother had hoped. But although he’d initiated contact (a judicious head nod in greeting) and given him plenty of impetus to speak to him (blatant staring at dinner), the dark-haired boy hadn’t reacted to his presence at all. And when they ended up in the same room, he'd been certain Black would introduce himself like any proper pureblood. Nott certainly remembered his manners, but Black went straight to sleep! All in all, Draco mused, the other boy was plain irksome, entirely undeserving of his mother’s misguided instruction to befriend him. Related or not, he wasn’t anything resembling company befitting a Malfoy.

Finally, at half-past sunrise, Rigel Black began to stir. Draco would have loved to take credit for that, but it appeared the other boy was used to awakening at such a time, for he looked neither confused nor surprised when he glanced at the watch on his bedside table. Draco thought his father would be proud of him for the patience he showed waiting for Black to notice him. He may as well have been waiting for Goyle to find his way to the end of a sentence, however, for Rigel Black had less self-awareness than his father’s peacocks. The boy got out of bed and stretched, never once looking around. Draco’s short supply of patience ran out when Black started to pick out his clothes for the day, and he cleared his throat with a practiced decorum only a Malfoy could have held onto so early in the day.

That got his attention, Draco thought exasperatedly as Black paused, bent over his trunk. How did this airhead get into Slytherin? “Going somewhere?” he said out loud.

Black slung a towel over his shoulder and a held up a brush in one hand. “Yeah,” he said, shutting his trunk. With a bundle of clean clothes—Draco winced at the callous wrinkling of perfectly good robes— Black strode to the door of their bathroom, stepping inside and shutting it behind him. Draco heard the distinct click of the lock, and huffed grumpily.

“Well, good morning to you, too,” he muttered, flinging himself from the bed to the standing wardrobe where he’d unpacked and stored all of his robes the night before, like any normal person. Forget the promise he made to his mother; no vague inkling of a familial alliance in the future was worth it if that was how Rigel Black was going to be all the time.

By the time Draco had brushed out his robes and combed back his hair and therefore regained his dignity, he had calmed down a little. One week, thought Draco. I’ll be friendly and, Merlin forbid, slightly solicitous for one week. After that, if Black is still a reticent little nobody, even Mother can’t blame me for moving on to more suitable acquaintanceships. 

--0

HpHpHp

--0

Rigel leaned shakily against the closed bathroom door. She didn’t think she’d ever been stared at so much in her life. What did Malfoy want? A picture? She’d retreated to the bathroom to get out from under his heavy gaze—the boy had a glare like a hammer—but a quick look in the mirror showed nothing unusual. No green hair or fangs or subtle suggestion that she wasn’t a boy. In short, nothing that would merit such intense scrutiny. Shivering with a feeling of vague foreboding, she checked the lock on the door again and got undressed and into the shower. She was still getting used to how little time she had to spend getting ready in the morning without long hair to deal with, so she’d have to find something to do in the mornings if she didn’t start waking up later. Come to think of it, what was the Malfoy boy doing up so early, besides drilling holes into the back of people’s heads with his eyes? By the time she dried her hair and dressed, she’d decided it was none of her business.

As she re-entered the dorm room, she was met with a blindingly cheerful smile and a “good morning” from Nott, who was apparently just as bad in the mornings as Archie; all sunshine and bluebirds. He was waiting with tousled brown hair and a toothbrush in one hand. “Finished?”

“Yes,” she said, moving out of the doorway. “Did I wake you with the shower?”

“Nope.” He tossed a grin at her as he brushed past. “It was Draco with his Malfoy-stare-of-death.”

Not sure what to say to that, she merely nodded and continued to her bed, which was between Nott’s and Malfoy’s, where she hung her towel over the silver canopy to dry. She saw Malfoy’s narrow-eyed look out in her periphery, but ignored him, thinking he probably had never re-used a towel in his life and was wondering why she would hang it up instead of dumping it in the hamper for the elves.

She was forced to re-think her conclusion when he intercepted her on her way to the door.

“I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced,” he said. “I’m Draco Malfoy.”

“Rigel Black,” she said. “Pleased to meet you.”

“Are you going to breakfast already?” he asked politely, a friendly smile on his face as if he hadn’t just leapt in front of her to formally introduce himself. “It doesn’t start for another twenty minutes, I don’t think.”

“Unless you have a map of the school, it may take that long for me to find my way,” she said, stepping pointedly around him. She knew it was rude beyond belief, but the one thing she didn’t need, the one thing that could ruin everything, was attention from the wrong kind of people. And if Malfoy didn’t qualify as wrong, she’d eat her potions ingredients.

“You could ask an older student,” he pointed out to her back. The lack of irritation or censure in his voice impressed her enough that she turned around to face him once more.

“I doubt they’re headed to breakfast this early,” she said, feeling every-so-slightly vindicated when she saw his eyes flash and his lip protrude a tiny bit before the polite smile could distract from it. There was the spoiled child she’d expected of the Malfoy scion, who pouted, however briefly, when things didn’t fall into their place at his feet.

“They would be in twenty minutes, when it starts,” he said slowly, his overly-patient tone that of someone explaining something he shouldn’t have to.

“You’re probably right.” She offered him the tiniest of smiles, barely more than a crinkle, and proceeded to turn around and open the door to the corridor. “Good morning, Malfoy.” She allowed herself another smile, this one genuine, at the imagined look on his face as she shut the door firmly behind her.

The common room was indeed deserted. Even though they had to finish breakfast thirty minutes early in order to meet with their Head of House that morning, there wasn’t any reason for students to be about before the elves had even begun serving it, so Rigel enjoyed the silence as she crossed to the common room entrance. Faced with the blank wall, she realized she didn’t know how to open it from the inside. “Ouroboros?” she guessed, pleasantly surprised when the wall slid to the side silently. It actually made good sense, she thought as it closed just as quietly behind her. This way, you wouldn’t be able to leave the common room without knowing the password to get back in, making it less likely that someone would be caught outside in the cold dungeon air all night.

When she had walked far enough to be out of the immediate sight of the common room entrance, she pulled out a deceptively blank piece of parchment. Archie gave it to her shortly after Sirius had given it to him. James and Sirius had told Archie what it was, reminiscing about the time Filch confiscated it from them before impressing on him exactly how important it was that it never fall into prefect or professor hands. Apparently, they’d claimed it as their property a few years after graduation without ever admitting to the old caretaker what it was.

With the Marauder’s Map in hand, she traversed the dungeons carefully. All the corridors looked the same, but with a bird’s-eye-view, the pattern was a little easier to understand. Her feet would remember better than her eyes did, however, so she walked as many of them as she could before twenty minutes had passed. After making certain she could find the Potions classroom, she made a bee-line for the staircase that would take her back up to the Entrance Hall, and from there to the Great Hall. She wiped the parchment clean and tucked it away as she started to ascend the stairs, and was halfway up when a voice called out from behind her.

She glanced over her shoulder to see Nott hurrying up the staircase to catch up with her, Malfoy and an older Slytherin following at a more sedate pace.

“Are you just now going up?” Nott asked incredulously. “You left ages ago.”

“The dungeons are extensive,” she said as the slower two joined them.

“You’ve been lost all this time?” The older Slytherin, an athletic-looking boy with warm brown hair and eyes, asked with amusement.

“It’s not as if I had a map,” she said, straight-faced.  

“No better way to learn than to get lost, they say.” The boy led the way into the Great Hall. “I’m Adrian Pucey.”

She inclined her head absently. “Rigel Black.”

Pucey frowned as they found seats near the middle of the Slytherin table. “Forgive me, but I had thought it was Arcturus Black.”

“Rigel is my middle name,” she said, noting as she poured herself a glass of milk that her roommates were listening attentively. Nott and Pucey exchanged a confused glance when she started eating a bowl of porridge and they realized that was going to leave it at that. She thought Malfoy’s eyebrow might have twitched before he turned to his eggs.

Rigel has just finished eating when Pansy walked into the hall. She came to stand behind Nott, who was seated to Rigel’s left, and cleared her throat delicately. The lanky boy immediately moved down a bit, crowding the boy on his left to allow Pansy room to sit. She nodded like a queen who had just received a bow from one of her courtiers, and greeted Rigel somewhat coolly. “Good morning, Mr. Black.” She served herself a plate of fruit, fussing over which piece of melon she wanted, before continuing. “I was a bit surprised to see that you’d already left this morning.” There was an unstated without me at the end of that sentence, but if Pansy thought to throw Rigel off, she should have been more direct. Communicating without speaking was one of her and Archie’s specialties.

“I’ve always been an early riser,” she said. You weren’t there when I left.

“I see,” Pansy said. “And just what about the early morning do you find so agreeable?” Would it be worth my while to rise early as well?

“I find the general lack of noise to be appealing,” Rigel said, pretending not to notice Pansy stiffening in offense as she paused to finish her milk before continuing. “It allows one to understand the few things they do hear more clearly.” I wake early to avoid people, but I would make an exception for you because I would like to better understand you. Truly, the second half of Rigel’s statement might also be interpreted as a desire to have more intimate conversation, away from prying eyes and distractions, but she thought that between their young age and Pansy’s good sense she was unlikely to be misunderstood.

“Perhaps I will be afforded the opportunity to see for myself,” she demurred, offering a small smile to show that Rigel had escaped her irritation for the time being. Her statement was so neutral that it couldn’t have meant anything, but Rigel chose to interpret it as a maybe. Whether or not Pansy would rise early with her tomorrow didn’t matter. Pansy had gotten what she wanted, an explanation and an invitation, if not an apology. Rigel wondered if she could expect such maneuvering every time Pansy was miffed at her. The blonde certainly seemed to be enjoying herself, smug satisfaction radiating from her every gesture.

Rigel inwardly berated herself for forgetting that, as they had made a point of formally introducing themselves and then dropping those formalities, it would be expected that she escort Pansy to the next meal they had together. She could only be glad Pansy hadn’t taken her slip as a personal snub.

At thirty-five minutes until the end of breakfast, Slytherin House rose as one and retreated to the dungeons, startling a few first-year Hufflepuffs on their way out of the Hall. Their Head of House was already present when they arrived. He stood tall and unmoving in the middle of the common room as the students crowded in and filled the edges of the room. The first-years kept together in a group by one of the study tables, shifting uncertainly as an oppressive weight settled over the room. When the silence had just begun to stretch from expectant to uncomfortable, he spoke.

“For those of you who do not know…” He looked toward their group of eleven-year-olds and Rigel found herself riveted against her will. He had a gaze that sprang like a trap if you were foolish enough to let his eyes catch yours. “I am the Potions Master, Severus Snape, your Head of House. I apologize for my absence last night; I was unavoidably detained, as will happen at times. Nevertheless.” He began to turn in a circle as he spoke, including everyone in the room in his regard. “As the new term begins, you will be expected to remember, or in the case of our newest members, discover, what it means to be a Slytherin. To some of you, whose forbearers walked these dungeons, it means tradition, and to others it simply means unqualified acceptance, but for all of you, Slytherin means a chance to carve the contours of your future and forge your destiny as you see fit.

“As your Head of House, it is my duty to assist you in furthering the ambitions that secured your place here in this room. For seven years, your goals are my goals. Your plans and dreams and schemes will become my own motivations, and as long as you dwell herein I pledge to assist you in realizing all your endeavors.” He paused for a moment to let his words, incredible as they were, sink in before continuing. “In that vein, if at any time you require assistance, simply seek a portrait of Salazar Slytherin, and he will find me posthaste.” He gestured to a picture of a dark-haired, green-eyed man hanging above the main fireplace.

Rigel observed her Head of House as he spoke, searching for the tell-tale signs…yes, there in the fire-proof robes, and there in the close-cut fingernails, and even there in the slight flaring of the nostrils as his nose prepared to inventory the scents in the room—this was a Potions Master. She absorbed his body language, proud and stiff. He looked more like a general appraising his ranks than any teacher she’d ever imagined. When he turned to directly face the first-years, Rigel noted that he was more menacing in person than he had seemed on paper, with his hawk-like features and looming presence, and yet, his words were much kinder. In his articles, he spent as much time tossing acerbic comments at his incompetent contemporaries as he did presenting his revolutionary findings and brilliant deductions. She’d already steeled herself against immediate hostility merely because of who Sirius was, but Snape seemed not to have even noticed her.

“In Slytherin House we stick together, because a lone snake is no match for a lion, an eagle, or, yes, even a badger. We draw strength from our solidarity, our connections, and any other resources that become available.” He paused to smirk in a way that had most of the older students chuckling along darkly. “There are very few rules in Slytherin that cannot be bent to some extent. One is the policy against in-House fighting. If you have a problem with a member of your House, settle it with words in private or wands over the holidays. In this school, as far as anyone else is concerned, my snakes do not turn their fangs on one another. Any other issues are considered on a case-by-case basis. When you have crossed a line, you will know it, and pray you have the intelligence not to make the same mistake twice.” He bared his teeth in a parody of a grin, and Rigel vowed then and there to never get on his bad side.

Snape gave them all a final, dark-eyed stare. Satisfied his point had been received—indeed, even Malfoy looked like he wanted to squirm—he turned on his heel and left. The vacuum left behind by his presence was such that it took several seconds after the common room wall slid closed for anyone to move. Finally, a prefect cleared his throat and said, “Your schedules should have been delivered to your dorms by now, and whoever has class nearest the Charms classroom first is responsible for showing the new snakelets the way.”

Rigel met Pansy’s gaze, and the blonde raised her eyebrow in a silent question. She took her time, mulling over her impressions as they walked toward their rooms, and finally decided that a shrug was the best reply she could give. Pansy smiled, as if she had expected such a reaction.

“He’s got presence,” Pansy said. “Father tells me he’s quite renowned as a Potions Master, and everyone says he’s a good Head of House.”

Nott, who was walking behind them, snorted with incredulous amusement. “Everyone in Slytherin, maybe. The rest of the Houses think he’s a right bastard.”

Pansy frowned at his language, but merely said, “Who cares what they think? They’re wrong.”

Rigel left them to argue about it, still processing her first encounter with her…idol? Certainly not. If there was anything Severus Snape wasn’t, it was worshipable. Her hero, perhaps? No, too childish. Her future mentor, she decided. With any luck at all. He was just as larger-than-life in person as she’d imagined, and despite his words about approaching him with their ambitions, there was something inaccessible about him. She couldn’t imagine going up to him and demanding his attention, especially considering the last name she was borrowing. And her real last name, for that matter. She’d just have to work twice as hard and make him notice her.

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[end of chapter three].

Chapter Text

A great big thank you to DwellingOnDreams7 and also to Kichi for your splendid reviews. They meant more than you can know on my first story, and you inspired me to keep going :).

Also thank you to those of you who might have reviewed before I took down the story, changed some things, and reposted it all those years ago. You helped me find a better direction for it, and I in no way mean to disregard your helpful advice and comments.

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 4:

Malfoy kept pace with her on the way to their first class, Charms. She alternated walking slightly faster, then slower, to see if he became unconsciously frustrated, but he wasn’t easily thrown off balance. In fact, he adjusted smoothly to each change in gait and never missed a conversational beat, despite how little fodder she provided.

“Looking forward to class, Black?” Malfoy’s tone was bland. Politely curious. As though he didn’t care if she bothered to answer.

“To Charms?” Rigel glanced over at the boy who was so determined to engage her. “Or to classes in general?”

“Either.” He smiled in a way that would be charming in a few years. “Both.”

“Oh.” She nodded in exaggerated understanding. “No.”

That time she was sure his eyebrow twitched.

“None of them?” He pressed gently. “Not even Flying? I personally can’t wait to show those Gryffindors how Quidditch is supposed to be played.”

She debated turning the conversation toward his interest in Quidditch, but thought it might interest him too much to be properly deterring. “I suppose I am looking forward to Potions,” she offered instead. The flash of triumph in Malfoy’s eyes wasn’t at all suspicious.

“Potions? It’s lucky you’re in Slytherin, then,” he said as they walked into the Charms classroom. She thought perhaps he would leave it at that and go sit with Nott or Zabini, but instead he practically herded her toward the table Pansy had just claimed, which had two extra seats. She ended up in the middle and wondered whether Malfoy thought sitting her by Pansy would make her comfortable enough to answer all his questions. She also wondered if he was planning on writing up a dossier on her and sending it to his parents, but, as usual, she kept her wonderings to herself.

“What’s lucky?” Pansy asked, having only caught part of Malfoy’s remark.

“That Black is in Slytherin, since his interest is in Potions.”

“Lucky,” Rigel agreed, her voice thick with irony.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Pansy asked, a small bite to her usually collected tone. Rigel realized belatedly it sounded as though she was sarcastically maligning her House on the first day. This was confirmed when Pansy continued quietly, so as not to expose the tension to anyone listening. “You should be proud to be in Slytherin. Just because your father might not approve—”

Rigel interrupted, just as quietly. “I didn't mean I considered myself unlucky to be in Slytherin. I meant it wasn’t really luck that I was put here. I wanted to be in Slytherin.”

“Even though your father’s a—” She caught herself before she said “blood-traitor” but the sentiment hung in the air between them. “Well, why would you want to be in Slytherin?”

“Malfoy’s already told you that,” Rigel said.

Malfoy and Pansy shared a look of veiled disbelief. “You wanted to be in Slytherin so that Snape would help you with Potions?” Malfoy clarified. It was clear he thought that a pretty weak reason for abandoning family expectations, even if her family was a bunch of blood-traitors.

The Charms professor arrived at last, letting Rigel out of the conversation with a noncommittal shrug. She hadn’t meant to share that much, but it might be hazardous to her health if the other Slytherins thought she held prejudice against her own House.

Charms class turned out to be fairly straightforward. Professor Flitwick explained the theory behind the Levitation Charm and set them all to practicing on feathers for the rest of the period. Rigel watched as Pansy and Draco eventually got good enough with their feathers to try dueling with them mid-air. It wasn’t exactly thrilling; when the feathers clashed, it was with a pathetic, whispering motion. When the novelty wore thin, they turned to Rigel for a new source of amusement.

“Why don’t you try?” Pansy suggested. “If you don’t learn now, you’ll only have to do it for homework.”

“I suppose,” she said disinterestedly, ignoring the intent way Malfoy stared at her feather, as if he had good reason to suspect it was about to do something amazing. She waved her wand, saying, “Wingardium Leviosa.” Nothing happened. She tried again, then several more times, and still nothing.

“Perhaps your feather is heavier,” Pansy said kindly, leaning down until she was eye-level with the table. “Wait—I think it moved a bit!”

“That was you breathing on it, Parkinson,” Malfoy said. He looked disappointed for some reason. “Try again, Black.”

She did. For the rest of the lesson, she practiced until she thought she’d be able to perform the wand movement in her sleep. For all the good it did her.

“I just don’t understand,” Pansy kept saying, even as they walked to History of Magic. “It isn’t supposed to be that difficult. Are you sure you were trying hard enough?”

“Yes.” Maybe. Rigel suppressed a sigh. She had to get through almost an entire week of these tedious classes before she’d be anywhere near a cauldron. They didn’t have Potions until Thursday, unfortunately, and even that was only theory. She wouldn’t actually get to brew anything until Friday, assuming Professor Snape let them brew the first week.

All through History of Magic, Pansy and Malfoy sent one another meaningful looks. She didn’t know what exactly they meant, but they would look at her, then look at each other, and then look back at her, and it certainly seemed to mean something. By lunch, she was ready to hex both of them, only she didn’t know any hexes, and she gathered their parents had already taught them the Shield Charm. Rigel didn’t blame them. If I had as many enemies as the Malfoys, I’d make sure my kids could defend themselves too.

Just when she thought they’d gotten past her lackluster performance in Charms, Malfoy dragged Pucey into the discussion at lunch. “Adrian, how long did it take you to learn the Levitation Charm?” he asked across the table.

“Awhile, actually.” Pucey scratched his head. “Nearly the whole class period I think, but then, my parents were strict about underage magic. I never did magic on purpose until I came to Hogwarts.”

Malfoy and Pansy exchanged a worried look. Malfoy, Rigel could understand; he’d been watching her since the Welcome Feast, and if he was waiting for her to do something interesting, he would be sadly disappointed by her lack of spell-casting skills. Pansy though…Rigel felt her eyebrows crease. Perhaps Pansy regretted making friends with Rigel now that she’d shown herself to be magically unremarkable.

Pucey had been filled in while she thought, and he turned to her with an expression of surprise and concern. “You couldn’t even get it off the table?”

Rigel shrugged.

“Not a single twitch,” Pansy supplied. How nice to have such blunt friends.

“Well, how hard were you trying?” Pucey asked.

“I tried many times,” she said. “My wand movement and pronunciation were correct; it just didn’t work.”

“And you’re sure you’re not using a fake wand?” Pansy glanced at her sleeve, as though expecting a rubber chicken to emerge and give the game up.

“Yes, I’m sure.” Twelve inches, ash, unicorn hair. Ollivander called it “well-balanced.”

“But wait,” Pucey said thoughtfully. “You said that you tried several times, but not how hard you tried.”

Rigel gazed at him blankly.

“Oh for—” Malfoy, it seemed, had run out of patience for the day. She gave him points for almost making it through lunch. “You have to want the magic to work, Black. You can’t just wave your wand and expect it to do stuff.”

“That’s right,” Pucey said, the confidence of an upperclassman who’d just come up with a plausible answer in his tone. “Intent is crucial when casting a spell, along with concentration and determination.”

How silly, Rigel thought. In Potions, you can’t get a better result by simply wanting it more. Results came from following the necessary procedure. If the rest of their magical learning was going to be an exercise in wishing, she’d keep her cauldrons and leave the rest of it to children with more active imaginations. She shuddered to think of the implications for their culture if the larger part of success in magic could be boiled down to wanting it badly enough. It explained more than it didn’t, she reflected, but all she said was, “Oh.” Malfoy huffed next to her, and the other two gave up on convincing her, but the look in Pansy’s eyes said plainly there was a “for now” attached to their truce.

Defense Against the Dark Arts was, if anything, worse than Charms. The professor was a stuttering young man who had apparently had a bad run-in with Vampires while on his tour of the continent the year before. Rigel could see why Sirius and James would think him an easy target for practical jokes. He started them on trying to light their wand tips with the Lumos spell, but the look on his face when he assured them a strong light scared away all sorts of dangerous magical creatures wasn’t entirely convincing.

Pansy yawned dramatically, and from Malfoy’s expression of agreement, Rigel assumed this was another spell they had learned ahead of time. Which left the two of them with nothing better to do than tutor Rigel.

“No, no. Say it more forcefully.”

“Wave your wand like you mean it.”

When Malfoy attempted to manually grasp her wrist and move it with the appropriate vigor, Rigel dropped her wand on the desk and favored her determined coaches with a deadpan look. “Are you two switching to Hufflepuff?”

“Certainly not!”

“Don’t be absurd, Black.”

“Then stop badgering me.”

Their expressions competed to demonstrate who was more affronted and offended, but they switched their attention to critiquing the others in their class with only the occasional suggestion as to how Rigel could learn from their classmates’ mistakes. Rigel diligently kept at it until the end of the period, despite what a waste of time it seemed. She added Lumos to the list of spells whose wand movements she had committed to muscle memory and happily shoved her wand in her bookbag when class finally ended.

They had a study period before dinner, so Rigel, Pansy, and Malfoy headed back to the dungeons to work on the first assignment from Professor Binns. He wanted a list of what they believed to be the most important historical events in the last century, and as all three found themselves fairly well-versed in recent wizarding history, it didn’t take long. Unfortunately, that meant they had time to bug Rigel about her spell-casting.

“It’s like you’re a muggle,” Malfoy told her.

“Maybe I am,” she said. Both of them flinched back involuntarily before their brains caught up.

“No, you’re not,” Pansy said. “You just aren’t trying hard enough. What do you want more than anything else right now?”

“I want you to stop helping me.”

“Well, that’s why it’s not working,” Malfoy said. “The feather won’t float until the thing you want most in the world for one moment is to make it float.”

“But why would I want to make it float?” Rigel’s patience frayed near to snapping. “It would be easier and faster to just pick it up.”

“What if you wanted to move a boulder?”

“Can you move a boulder with Wingardium Leviosa?”

“Well…no. You probably need a stronger spell. But just imagine.”

Rigel shook her head. “I can’t think of a single time in my life when I’ve thought to myself, ‘if only I could move that boulder.’ It just seems pointless, I guess.”

Pansy sighed. “Okay, then what about the Lumos Charm? It’s very useful.”

“But it isn’t dark in here.” She gestured to the common-room. “I have no need of a lit wand.”

“You are never going to learn magic that way,” Malfoy said, his eyes narrowed.

Rigel shrugged. She was there to learn Potions, not magic.

After dinner, she retreated to her room to write a letter to Sirius. She didn’t know how to change her handwriting yet, so she used a dicto-quill and hoped Sirius assumed his son was too lazy to write it himself.

Dear Dad,

Miss me yet? I miss having my own room already, but the food here is way better than the stuff you cook, ha ha. The train ride was fun, I met a nice boy called Neville (I think he’s a Longbottom), and the castle is just as cool as you and Uncle James always said! So don’t freak out, but I was sorted into Slytherin—surprise! Don’t worry, cause everyone’s been really cool to me so far and the other boys in my dorm are nice enough, although some of the girls in our year were giving me looks like they thought I would pounce on them at any moment. What exactly did you do to their mothers when you were here, Dad?

My first day of classes went well, but history’s really boring! Our DADA professor looks like one good prank would scare him out of his garlic necklace, but I guess I won’t know until I try, huh? So yeah, everything’s good here, don’t worry too much and promise not to turn my bedroom into a pool hall or something, ok?

With love,

Archie

(P.S.—the you-know-what still works)

Archie’s voice was exhausting, but she thought it sounded enough like her cousin to pass muster. She carefully did not mention any Snapes, Malfoys, or the trouble she was having with spells. Nothing that might cause Sirius to worry. If Sirius ever came to Hogwarts, everything would be ruined, so it was imperative she avoid such things as grievous injuries, massive amounts of detentions, or anything else that would give Sirius a reason to appear. She could be Archie on paper, but until they found a way to permanently change their appearances, that’s where the ruse would end.

Rigel packed away the dicto-quill. It was less than an hour before curfew, and neither of her roommates was asleep. Nott was elbow-deep in a game of Exploding Snap with Zabini, who was apparently already sick of his own roommates. Malfoy was…also writing a letter. Which meant she probably wouldn’t be going to the Owlery alone. She slipped the Marauder’s Map from her pocket casually, knowing any suspicious movement would only trigger her fellow Slytherins’ notice. She began quietly muttering nonsense phrases, seeming for all the world as if she was reading a portion of her letter out loud under her breath to check the wording. She slipped “I solemnly swear that I am up to no good” in the middle and worked quickly to memorize the fastest route to the Owlery. Wiping the map in the same manner, she tucked it away and rolled up her letter as unobtrusively as possible.

She pulled on her gloves and wrapped a scarf around her neck snugly. Sirius had sprung for weather-resistant spells in Archie’s robes, so she didn’t need a cloak. She stood casually and was almost to the door when, surprise of surprises, Malfoy stopped her.

“Going somewhere, Black?”

Is he going to say that every time it becomes clear that I am, in fact, going somewhere? She indulged in a mental eye-roll. “Yes, Malfoy.”

“You’re going to send a letter. In the Owlery.” He said it like an accusation. She shrugged noncommittally, which she supposed was as good as an admission. He rose from his bed and rolled his own letter briskly. “It’s only a half-hour until curfew.”

“Shouldn’t take more than fifteen minutes each way,” she pointed out.

“It took you twenty minutes just to get out of the dungeons this morning,” Malfoy said evenly. “I’m coming with you.”

“There’s really no need—”

“Sure there is.” Nott spoke up from across the room. “You don’t want to be wandering alone this late at night in Gryff and Claw territory. Weren’t you listening to Professor Snape this morning?”

“It’s no trouble,” Malfoy assured her, his grin flashing too much tooth to be completely friendly. “I need to send my letter with Archimedes, anyway.”

A Malfoy would have an owl named Archimedes, she thought, but she gave in with a modicum of good grace. She already knew he would insist upon coming. They traversed the common room in silence, broken only when Malfoy spoke the password to the wall.

The dungeons were cold and eerie with a different sort of quiet than had pervaded the morning. Their footsteps echoed on the clean floors as they walked: an advantage if you needed to hear intruders coming, and a disadvantage if you wanted to move about unseen. She took the turns to the Entrance Hall confidently, and Malfoy seemed content to follow her lead until they reached the ground floor. He turned toward the main stair, which led to the connecting stairway that ran up the middle of the castle, while she turned toward the West stairway, which wound its way up the side of the castle. They both stopped and stared at one another.

“We should take the main stair,” Malfoy said. “We don’t know the castle well enough to take side-routes, and the more remote an area, the easier it is to get ambushed there.”

“Isn’t that why you came with me? To prevent an attack from anyone we might have ticked off by breathing today?” Rigel gave him a look that said clearly: you can go wherever you want, but I’m going this way.

He made a noise like a smothered sigh in the back of his throat, but walked determinately over to the West stairs, glaring at her all the time. Rigel ignored his dark look and led a silent climb up three flights of stairs to the fourth floor. It wasn’t until she took the connecting corridor that Malfoy spoke up exasperatedly.

“Right. Now I know we’re going the wrong way. You’re turning East, and the Owlery is next to the West Tower. We should have kept going up the next flight of stairs.”

Rigel kept walking until she reached a tapestry of two young wizards dueling over a swooning maiden. She moved the hanging aside and glanced back as if to say, coming? Malfoy shut his mouth and eyed the passageway she’d revealed untrustingly.

“How do I know this isn’t a trap?” he said as he peered into the gloomy space. It was a steep, narrow staircase that seemed to go straight up.

“Sure, Malfoy. I forced you to follow me to the Owlery so I could get expelled my first night by pushing the Malfoy scion down a flight of stairs,” Rigel said.

He looked close to huffing, but he pushed past her and started up the stairs. He lit his wand with the Lumos spell and sent her a look over his shoulder that said see how useful it is?

She waited until he’d climbed several feet before calling, “Watch out for step thirty-three.”

He stopped dead. She could almost hear him counting to ten in his head before he spoke. “Come again?”

She drew level with him, barely managing it in the narrow passage. “We are now on the twenty-fourth stair, and I thought you should know that the thirty-third step is, in fact, a trap.”

He stared at her, probably imagining her violent strangulation. “Why don’t you go first?”

She did, stepping exaggeratedly over the trick stair to make sure Malfoy didn’t forget, as amusing as it would have been to watch him become trapped knee-deep in a staircase. They came out of the passage on the seventh floor, a few meters East of the entrance to the Owlery stairs. Malfoy pursed his lips, but was too proud to ask how she’d known the way. Just as well, since she would have lied and said she heard it from an older student.

They took the steps up to the Owlery quickly. It wasn’t yet cold enough for the stairs to be icy, but the biting wind discouraged any lingering. Rigel found a school owl to take her letter and Malfoy whistled sharply for his. Rigel said “Sirius Black” clearly and watched the Screech Owl fly off into the night. She turned around and saw Malfoy muttering agitatedly to himself beside his Eagle Owl. She suddenly realized that while she had dressed warmly for her trip to the Owlery, which was necessarily exposed to the night air for the birds to come and go, Malfoy, being too preoccupied with insisting on accompanying her, hadn’t.

In that moment, he looked younger than his eleven years. His nose was slightly red, as were the tips of his ears, and his hair was a wind-blown mess. He cursed quietly again as he fumbled and dropped his tightly rolled scroll, and Rigel guessed his fingers were numb as well. She caught the letter before it could hit the ground and become covered in bird-droppings. Malfoy looked up sharply, his coldly frozen expression made less effective by the knowledge that he probably was freezing. So she ignored his glower, tied the scroll securely to his stately owl’s leg, and said, “To your father?”

“None of your business,” he snapped.

She raised an eyebrow. “Shall I plug my ears while you give your owl instructions, then?”

He might have flushed, but it was too cold to tell. “Malfoy Manor,” he told the bird.

Rigel eyed the bird as it took flight, wondering how much of that letter was about her. She shrugged off the suspicion, thinking she might be a little too good at pretending to be her cousin if she was already so vain. She turned back to Malfoy, whose breath was coming in short puffs between lips that had lost most of their color. She took off her scarf and quickly wound it around the pale boy’s neck and mouth, effectively muffling his spluttered protests for a few moments. By the time he wrestled his chin free of the thick fabric, she’d stripped off her gloves and roughly grabbed hold of one of his hands, tisking when she found it trembling with cold.

“What—” He could barely get the word out through clenched teeth.

“Hold these for me, won’t you Malfoy?” She shoved his hand into one of her already-warm gloves and did the same with the other. “Thanks.”

“You—”

Rigel was already headed toward the stairs. “Hurry up, Malfoy; we don’t want to be late.”

“If we’re back to the dungeons before curfew, Snape won’t take points,” he said, moving quickly to catch up. His voice was muffled again, and she bit her lip to keep from smiling at the picture Malfoy made with his face half-buried in her scarf. He looked like a baby bird peeking out of its nest, except he had another nest on top of his head in the form of his once-perfect hair.

They walked back to the common room in relative silence, Malfoy observing the way Rigel navigated the dungeons perfectly without comment. Good. If he learned one thing tonight, it should be that it was better not to question her, since he wouldn’t get a straight answer anyway. At the entrance to their rooms, he divested himself of her scarf and gloves and pushed them into her hands without looking at her.

She stored the articles of clothing in her trunk and took off her shoes, then lay down on her bed and willed sleep to come. Nott glanced over at her through his hangings and said, “Don’t you have night clothes?”

“No,” she said. She had decided it would be strange for her to change in the bathroom every time she put on her pajamas. If Archie was a typical example, boys had no modesty. She would change in the morning while she was already in the bathroom showering. Better to seem odd than have them think she had something to hide.

Nott let the matter drop, turning away from her onto his side. Rigel stared up at the canopy, thinking over her first day at Hogwarts. She wouldn’t know if she’d made the right choice until Friday, but so far it was both better and worse than she’d expected. Pansy and Malfoy were…entertaining. She’d expected to be alone at Hogwarts, when she bothered imagining anything other than the Potions classes. Having close friends would be dangerous, but she didn’t mind having people to eat meals with. Classes had been a disaster. She sighed quietly to herself, wishing she didn’t have to take any of the wooly wand classes. All she wanted to do was brew. When sleep took her away in its arms, she dreamed of simmering cauldrons over a warm, constant heat.

--0

DmDmDm

--0

He stared at the sleeping boy on the next bed as though he would answer all the questions swimming in Draco’s head. He probably could, if he wanted to, but Rigel Black had proved unforthcoming. A whole day he’d spent with Black, and all he knew was that he had a vague interest in Potions and was absolutely dismal at wand magic. Not much to write home about, though he had, and usually not enough to warrant any continuing interest on his part. So why was he still staring? It was the little things, the places where his words and actions didn’t quite meet, that had Draco determined to know more. Black had supposedly been hopelessly lost before breakfast, but demonstrated complete confidence in navigating the dungeons that evening. And when in Morgana’s name had he found that passage to the seventh floor?

He didn’t act much like the son of Sirius Black, either, from what Malfoy had heard about his mother’s cousin. Aside from the modicum of charm he exhibited at the Welcome Feast, Black’s personality had fallen a fair distance from his father’s tree. He had the Black hair and eye color, but even that was a bit dull. Mordred’s luck if he was to be saddled with the dullest Black in generations for a companion. He just knew Mother would make sure of it, at least until she met the boy. Rigel Black was withdrawn to the point of unfriendliness and had no compunction ignoring social norms when it pleased him. He clearly preferred to keep personal information close to his chest, and yet…he had chosen to dictate his letter to his father out loud.

And that letter! Draco had heard most of it, and either Black was keeping his real personality locked away from his cohorts or he was out-and-out lying to his father. Draco was leaning toward the second, because several things in the letter really had been lies. His classes most certainly had not gone well. Rigel Black also didn’t seem the type to be interested in pranks, though Draco knew his family made a living in base magical trickery as entertainment. Which version of the boy was real?

Then there was his attitude toward Draco and Pansy. He’d been rude and somewhat hostile most of the day, but had given up his own scarf and gloves in the Owlery like it was nothing. Extremely contradictory, if not downright suspicious. Draco would be keeping a close watch on the newest Black, regardless of what his mother had to say about it. Sooner or later, he’ll show his hand, and I’ll be there when it happens.

--0—0—0

--0--0

--0

[end of chapter four].

A/N: In canon, I think they don’t try any actual charms until Halloween, but I’m speeding things along, because I think magic should come a bit more naturally to wizards (well… most wizards).

If you want to know the complete timetable for reference:

Monday: Charms, HoM, Lunch, DADA

Tuesday: Transfiguration, Herbology, Lunch, Flying

Wednesday: Charms, HoM, Lunch, DADA, Astronomy

Thursday: (no 1st period b/c up late for Ast.), Potions (theory), Lunch, Transfiguration

Friday: Double Potions (practical), Lunch, Herbology

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 5:

The next morning when Rigel stepped into the common room, she found Pansy sitting quietly on one of the low-backed chairs, glancing through their Transfiguration text. The blonde girl was really quite pretty in the pale green light coming through the windows from the lake. She was also very good at pretending to be absorbed in her reading. Rigel changed her heading and waited for Pansy to acknowledge her. Pansy closed the book neatly and flicked luminous blue eyes up to meet hers.

“Good morning, Rigel.”

“Good morning.” Rigel nodded toward the common room door. “I’m going to take a walk.”

“I would love to come with you.” Pansy rose, and Rigel noticed she was already dressed to go to breakfast, despite the early hour. She gallantly offered her arm, feeling beyond silly even as Pansy gracefully rested her hand on Rigel’s elbow. They left the common room, and Rigel led them toward the Entrance Hall. She thought Pansy’s robes and shoes looked too thin for prolonged cold, and she’d seen enough of the dungeons yesterday, so she decided they’d walk the first floor and perhaps the basement if they had time. Rigel especially wanted to figure out where the painting that led to the kitchens was.

As they walked, Rigel learned many things about the girl. Pansy was named after a kind of violet, because her mother was so fond of them, and she was an only child. Her parents had arranged a series of private tutors for her over the years, so she had come to Hogwarts with a full background in Wizarding Law, Pureblood Etiquette, and Magical History, which included extensive knowledge of the most famous and influential people and families in the Western Wizarding World. She confided to Rigel her opinion that the reason no one had ever tried to have their history professor, Binns, replaced by someone more competent was because most of the students, and especially those from influential families, were already so well versed in it.

Pansy mentioned an interest in taking Care of Magical Creatures in her third year, because when she was younger, a herd of unicorns had moved into the forest behind her mansion, which was a Wizarding Wildlife Preserve, and she had grown close to the beautiful creatures before they moved on.

By the time they entered the Great Hall for breakfast, Rigel knew that Pansy’s favorite color was periwinkle, that she hated the color lavender because she was allergic to the plant, and that her greatest ambition was to learn to bake. Her grandmother allegedly made the most delicious pies and cakes, better than any house elf, but her mother refused to let Pansy practice at home after the third fire-related incident.

Rigel found she didn’t mind Pansy’s company as long as Pansy was content to talk about herself. She reminded Rigel of Archie a bit, the way she carried the whole conversation easily without becoming annoying. Come to think of it, Draco reminded her a bit of Archie too, the way he impulsively pursued whatever he happened to be interested in at the time. It seemed Rigel had unconsciously drifted toward the familiar, however much it had seemed as though Pansy and Draco had been the ones to attach themselves to her. They strolled over to the Slytherin table together, and Rigel waited politely for Pansy to take a seat before doing so herself, noting as she did that Pansy had maneuvered her into sitting next to Malfoy once again. She wondered if it was her fate to be ever between the two of them.

“Good morning,” Pansy said to the general assembly of first-years.

“Where were you two this morning?” Davis asked.

“Walking.” Pansy buttered a scone with care. “It’s a rather refreshing way to begin the day.”

“Just walking?” Greengrass asked with a suspicious look at Rigel.

“There was talking involved as well, I believe,” Rigel said.

Pansy gave a startled laugh. “You have a way with understatement.” Her eyes twinkled mischievously, and she looked as though she had solved a great puzzle. “I knew you must have a sense of humor if you were raised by Sirius Black and James Potter.”

“I think most of the professors are waiting anxiously for the practical jokes to begin,” Zabini added, a slight smile playing about his mouth. “The Weasley terrors have spent every meal since the sorting on the edge of their seats with anticipation.”

Rigel inspected the Gryffindor table, where there did indeed seem to be two identical redheads alternately glancing around the hall and staring at her with disappointment. She shrugged her shoulders, saying, “I have no talent for pranks.”

“Well, as your dorm mate, I am much relieved,” Nott told her. “And if you ever decide to take up the family mantle, do us a favor and practice on the Hufflepuffs.”

“I’m not sure that Malfoy and Pansy deserve that,” she said blandly.

The others gave her confused looks, but Malfoy glared and Pansy tapped her knife against Rigel’s water goblet reproachfully.

“Rigel thinks he’s being funny, calling us Hufflepuffs because we ‘badgered’ him so much yesterday,” Pansy said, a sweet smile blooming on her face the only foreshadowing of her revenge. “You see, he had a little trouble with the charms we learned, and we were only trying to help, weren’t we Malfoy?”

Malfoy played along, just as sweetly. “We were indeed, and Black isn’t the only one with a talent for understatement. His attempts were simply abysmal, weren’t they, Parkinson?”

“Oh, you must call me Pansy,” the blonde girl said cheerfully. “After all, we’ll be working together a long time if we’re to try and teach this plebian how magic is supposed to be performed.”

“Then I insist you call me Draco,” Malfoy said gallantly, shaking his head sadly at Rigel. “For I fear we have a long road ahead of us.”

“See if I sit by you two in Transfiguration,” Rigel muttered into her breakfast.

“Oh, you will, if only because we sit by you,” Pansy assured her.

Rigel supposed she deserved it for calling them Puffs in front of their year-mates, but now everyone half-suspected she was a Squib, if their embarrassed glances were any indication.

Ten minutes later, they followed a prefect to Transfiguration, where a cat sat silently on the professor’s empty desk. Rigel stared at the cat, a suspicion forming in her mind. She’d been around animagi the whole of her childhood, and between Sirius and James, she knew an animal that was not an animal when she saw one.

Sure enough, as the clock on the wall chimed the hour, the cat leapt off the desk, transforming mid-air into the stern-faced woman who’d met them before their Sorting. Most of the class released quiet gasps and looked at their neighbors in awe. Professor McGonagall turned to the blackboard and waved her wand at a piece of chalk. It animated and began writing while she introduced herself and called roll.

“Welcome to Transfiguration,” she said, not sounding at all welcoming. “This is a very difficult subject, and I expect you all to work hard and apply yourselves to it. There will be no fooling around in here; next to Potions, it is the branch of magic where things can most easily go wrong if you aren’t extremely careful. Mr. Black!”

Rigel contained her jump, but could not help giving the woman an alarmed stare. “Yes,
Professor?”

“You knew or guessed I was not all I seemed when you first walked in,” she commented.

Rigel wondered just how she had figured that out, but said, “Yes, Professor.”

“How?”

“You were too still,” Rigel said after a moment. “Cats are naturally quiet animals, but you were watchful, so I guessed you were a human in animal form.”

“Why not assume I was a familiar or some other intelligent animal?” McGonagall pressed. Rigel sensed she was the kind of professor who always wanted the most complete answer possible.

It seemed unwise to tell the class that her father and uncle were animagi, so she just shrugged, saying, “All of our professors have been in the classroom when we arrived, someone mentioned you left the staff table before we finished breakfast, and the markings around your eyes were unusual for a tabby cat.”

“Excellent observational skills.” McGonagall nodded briskly. “Five points to Slytherin. It is vital that you begin to develop an awareness for magic at all times. Magic can be used to deceive the unsuspecting, especially Transfiguration, which is the magic of turning one thing into another, but there are almost always signs, if you remember to look for them.”

She spent the rest of the lesson teaching them to turn matches into needles, and Pansy and Malfoy, predictably, had much better luck than Rigel.

“Mine’s gone silver.” Pansy smiled proudly. They had been warned that the chances of anyone succeeding the first day were slim.

“I think I’ve got a hole in one end of mine,” Malfoy added, looking satisfied.

The two of them turned to Rigel expectantly and she glanced down at her match. “Oh, look. I’ve made a match.” She feigned a dreamy sort of joy. They both sighed at her, so she offered a small but real smile. “You both did very well. I’m so proud,” she added, just to see them scowl at her again. They looked like twins when they did that, both pale-skinned with blond hair and expressions of amused exasperation.

“You’re impossible,” Malfoy declared. “At this rate, they’ll kick you out by the end of the week, and then Pansy will cry, and Zabini will move into the empty space in our dorm to get away from Crabbe and Goyle, and I heard he snores. I’ll miss out on my beauty sleep, and Pansy won’t be able to use her glamour spells on me—”

“I do not use glamours.”

“—because she’ll be too distraught and crying, and I’ll grow up to be ugly and therefore uninfluential and it will be all your fault!”

Rigel rolled her eyes and turned back to her match, figuring she could at least practice the incantation some more. She felt Malfoy glaring at her, as though she’d committed some unconscionable crime by not being talented like he was. The longer he stared at her, willing her to be something that she wasn’t, the more she began to wish fervently that she had something pointy to jab him with so the superior arse would stop bothering her.

Pansy inhaled a sharp breath and Malfoy’s stare shifted abruptly to her match—except it wasn’t a match anymore. It was a needle.

“Oh, well done, Mr. Black.” Professor McGonagall had come to check their work. “Ten more points to Slytherin. Mr. Malfoy, Miss Parkinson, you have made very good attempts as well.”

As soon as she walked away, Pansy mouthed, “Fifteen points to Slytherin in one class!”

Malfoy shot her a look that said focus. “Black, how in Merlin’s name did you do that?”

“Same as you, I expect,” Rigel said, quite shocked herself but unwilling to show it.

“You didn’t even say the incantation,” he hissed fiercely.

The look of awed confusion on his face made Rigel uncomfortable, so she lied. “Yes, I did; you must not have heard it over the sound of your own superiority.”

The insult didn’t even distract him. “You were dismal at Charms and Defense, and this is supposed to be much harder.”

“What did you do differently?” Pansy asked. “I mean, what were you thinking when you did it?”

“I was thinking I’d like something to poke Malfoy with,” Rigel said.

Pansy looked as though she couldn’t tell if Rigel was joking or not. “I guess you just needed the right motivation, then.”

Malfoy smirked Rigel stifled a groan at the satisfaction in his smug face. “So this means we can annoy you in every class—in fact, we’re practically obligated to. Pansy and I are the key to your success.”

After Transfiguration, on the way to Herbology, Zabini approached them. Rigel didn’t know much about the boy, besides what people said about his mother, but he had a quiet presence when he spoke. “I noticed your success in McGonagall’s class. Looks like those two were exaggerating this morning.” He nodded at her shadows.

“I think it was just a fluke,” Rigel said. “Perhaps that particular match had been a needle before.”

The dark boy raised an unconvinced eyebrow. “In any case, Slytherin House seems to have gained an unexpected asset in you, Black.”

“Likewise, I’m sure, Zabini.” Rigel nodded politely as they reached the greenhouses and Professor Sprout ushered them inside.

Professor Sprout was a hands-on teacher. She set them to examining different soils and guessing what types of magical plants would grow best in each one. Rigel knew the properties of a lot of plants, as they were used in Potions, but she hadn’t known growing conditions could have so much impact on potency. She was shocked to discover that, if grown in the wrong soil, Flitterbloom lost half of its nutritional value. That meant for a vitamin potion to be up to standard, it would require twice as much! She vowed to start asking where the ingredients she purchased were grown before using them in her potions.

After Herbology they were all slightly dirty, but they had Flying that afternoon, so no one bothered cleaning up before lunch. Malfoy was practically vibrating in his seat, he was so excited, and he mentioned three separate times that he couldn’t believe first years weren’t allowed their own brooms. Rigel put a hand on his arm the fourth time his leg bumped into hers because he couldn’t stop himself from bouncing it, and he finally calmed enough to finish his lunch with some decorum. She shared an amused glance with Pansy, who seemed unimpressed by the idea of flying on a broom in general, much less in front of half the students in their year.

They had Flying with the Gryffindors, and the barrier between the Houses was never more apparent to Rigel than the moment they reached the pitch. The Gryffindors lined up along one side, while the Slytherins took the other. She recognized Neville from the train and smiled slightly in his direction when he noticed her. Pansy eyed a girl called Lavender Brown mistrustfully, probably for her first name alone, and Malfoy stared down the gangly, redheaded Weasley as though he’d insulted Malfoy’s family crest. The boy seemed just as unhappy to be looking at Malfoy, and Rigel wondered if they’d ever encountered one another in life or only in rumor.

Madam Hooch blew her whistle to get their attention. “Today we’re going to cover the basics. I know many of you have brooms of your own at home, and will likely think this review beneath you, but if you plan to play Quidditch for your House, you’ll want to be sure you have the fundamentals down. Don’t worry.” She grinned like a shark. “If you’ve been doing it wrong your whole life, I’ll tell you.”

Completely unreassured, the class nevertheless followed her directions and a dozen students started screaming “UP!” at their brooms. Malfoy rolled his eyes and snapped his fingers imperiously at the old Comet beside him. “Up.” It flew into his hand as though it had simply been waiting for an opportunity to do so.

Pansy got hers to roll over a few times before eventually losing patience. She picked it up off the ground with a scowl on her face. Rigel said “up” in a tone that was apparently not convincing enough for her Shooting Star.

Malfoy, who was on Rigel’s right, looked over and said, “It’s the same thing as a Wingardium Leviosa, but the broom channels the magic instead of your wand. You have to mean it, Black.”

“Why can’t I pick it up like Pansy did?” she asked, knowing full well what Malfoy was going to say.

“Because you’ll never learn that way.” He shot Pansy a look around Rigel and said, “Pansy doesn’t want to learn, but you should take this seriously.”

“Why?” she said again, deciding Malfoy was more interesting exasperated. She wondered how long it would take for him to become completely fed up with her. “I don't want to learn either.”

He frowned at her. “You have to like Quidditch. If Pansy doesn’t like it, you have to so that I’m not the only one in our group.”

She raised her eyebrows at his reasoning. Since when were they a ‘group?’ Malfoy’s expression was determined enough to deter further argument. “All right,” she said. “Up.”

The broom rose steadily to her waiting hand, and the wood seemed to thrum with anticipation beneath her fingers. She looked regretfully down at the old broom, knowing it would be ever so disappointed when she pretended to wobble in the air. If people knew she wasn’t horrible on a broom, they might want her to try out for the House Team in a few years. Quidditch would both detract from her Potions studies and provide unnecessary opportunities for someone to discover her secret. Sirius might sneak onto the grounds to watch his son play, or someone on the team might walk in on her changing in the locker room. Not to mention the extra attention if she did somehow make the team—too much scrutiny was dangerous. She had too much to hide.

“Mount your brooms,” Madam Hooch called, demonstrating how they were to swing one leg over to the other side. Everyone got more or less situated, and she said, “Now, on the count of three, I want all of you to push lightly off the ground, hover for a moment, then come back down by leaning forward slightly. One—”

But Neville was already airborne and rising steadily. Several students gasped, and the round-faced boy gripped the broom tightly, his face chalk-white with terror. Hooch pushed off the ground and flew toward him, stretching out a hand to try and pull him to safety—where was her wand? Before Hooch could reach him, Neville’s grip failed. He plummeted straight down with a scream that wrenched at Rigel’s gut, and all she could think in frozen dismay was if there was anything in her whole life she ever wanted to make levitate, it was Neville, right now.

Fire, blazing hot, raced through her blood and—

He was slowing, stopping, hovering a few inches above the ground in a shivering daze, and Rigel realized she was holding her hand out toward him, as if in supplication. His milky hazel eyes met hers and the look of fearful gratitude in them made her hand tremble. The spell broke, and Neville landed with a relieved exhalation of breath on the soft grass. Hooch landed moments later and helped the boy to his feet. When it was clear that he was shaking too much to stand, she said, “Poor boy, you’ve had quite a scare. Let’s get you to the Hospital Wing for a calming draught.” She swung him up into her arms, showing surprising strength for a person of her height, and called over her shoulder, “Stay here and on the ground, or you’ll be in detention until you graduate.”

Rigel had tucked her hands into her pockets when Neville hit the ground, but it was too late to avoid attention. Most of the class was staring at her. She could see the Gryffindors wrestling between relief that their classmate hadn’t been hurt and suspicion that a snake would help a lion for no reason. Her own Housemates were just plain gaping at her, having been under the understandable impression that she couldn’t even perform the Levitation Charm, much less on a heavy, moving object—and somehow without a wand. Rigel’s reality had shifted in exactly the same way, and, not wanting to examine that line of questioning further, turned pointedly to Pansy and said, “Do you think Professor Sprout will care where we acquire the soil sample we’re supposed to analyze for our homework?”

Pansy just blinked at her, for once at a complete loss. Rigel turned to Malfoy. “I mean, she can’t expect us to traipse through the Forbidden Forest, right? We could probably just ask the Gamekeeper for a sample from his garden.” Malfoy looked as though he was considering slapping her, so she narrowed her eyes and said, “Stop looking at me like I’m hysterical. Just drop it.”

“Drop—” He swore softly. “You are beyond words, and that is not a compliment.”

She shrugged, and was about to change the subject again when she noticed the redheaded Gryffindor walking their way. With nervous foreboding in her stomach, she put on the friendliest expression she could muster while still sorting through the panic inside.

“Hey—” he began hotly.

Rigel interrupted. “Hey, you know Neville, right?”

“I—yeah, of course.” The redhead frowned. “He’s in our dorm, but—”

“Great.” She smiled stiffly. “Can you tell him I hope he’s okay when you see him next?”

“Well, sure, I guess.” Confusion has taken the wind out of his hostility.

“Oh, how rude of me.” Rigel extended her hand toward the Gryffindor’s face. “I’m Rigel Black. If you just tell him Rigel said ‘hi,’ he’ll know who you mean.”

“Ron Weasley.” He scrutinized her hand in a careful way that made Pansy stiffen. Rigel wondered if he could tell it was still tingling.

“It’s fine, Pansy,” Rigel said, pitching her voice to a soothing cadence. “If my brothers were the Weasley twins, I’d be in the habit of looking for pranks everywhere, too. On my honor, it’s just a hand,” she promised.

He had the decency to flush embarrassedly, but seized on the excuse as he shook her hand briefly. “Can’t be too careful with those two.”

“I understand,” Rigel assured him.

The Gryffindor seemed to remember suddenly why he’d come over in the first place, and demanded, “Why’d you stop Neville from falling?”

“More like ‘how?’” Malfoy muttered.

“I didn’t realize my intervening would offend anyone,” she said, deciding to bluff and act as if she’d meant to do it. Better to show strength, not weakness. “I’ll be sure to leave it to you next time.”

“That’s not—I mean—” Weasley pressed his lips together in open frustration. “What’s in it for you?”

“It’s always a tragedy when good blood goes to waste,” she said seriously. “The Longbottom family is very ancient, and it would be a shame for their line to die out from such an avoidable accident.”

She was actually rather proud of that response. She thought it sounded appropriately pureblooded and mercenary considering the reputation of her House. Weasley looked as if all his worst fears had been realized, so she must have said something right. He scoffed dismissively at her and began to stalk back to his side of the pitch. Perhaps it would have ended there if only Malfoy had kept his big mouth shut.

He snorted loud enough for those around them to hear. “Oh, yes. What a tragedy to lose someone with so much potential to grow into a muggle-loving blood-traitor like his parents.”

Weasley immediately drew his wand and said a spell so fast that Rigel would later suspect he’d been waiting for an excuse. A jet of sickly-yellow light shot toward Malfoy, who looked gob-smacked at the idea of anyone actually attacking him for what he probably considered casual banter. Pansy let out an outraged noise, but it was Rigel who unthinkingly lunged sideways to move Malfoy out of the path of the jinx. Perhaps she was too used to playing protector to her cousin, who was often caught in the unexpected consequences of his own thoughtlessness. The hex struck her square in the shoulder and knocked her backwards into the grass.

It didn’t hurt. But it should have.

Distantly, she heard Pansy protest and Malfoy shout while Weasley stuttered that it was supposed to have hit him. This didn’t make Malfoy any happier, and as Rigel sat up slowly, rubbing at the dirt off her arm from where she’d hit the ground, she saw Weasley running back toward his Housemates while Nott and Zabini prevented Malfoy from pursuing.

“What an odd turn of events.” Her voice was bleary, or perhaps only in her head. “I hope someone tells Malfoy he looks like an angry kneazle.”

Pansy bent down to offer Rigel a hand, saying, “Draco, leave it. Rigel’s fine.” Rigel stared at the hand. How did Pansy get her fingernails to look like polished silver?

Malfoy broke from the other boys’ hold. He crouched down next to Pansy. “You all right, Black?”

“I’m all-wrong.” She smiled into his concerned face. “Wrong hair, wrong place. And my eyes. These aren’t my eyes. I’ve stolen yours, I’m afraid.”

“What?” He frowned at her. “You’re not making any sense.”

“You can’t make sense,” she said solemnly. “You have to find it.” This statement struck her as exhausting, so she flopped back onto the ground and stared at the sky, wondering how long it would keep raining honey. They were going to be awfully sticky for dinner.

“What’s wrong with him?” Malfoy demanded. “Weasley, what the bloody hell did you do to him!?”

“It was just a Jelly-legs Jinx!” Weasley yelled back. His face was a remarkable shade of red that made his hair blush with jealousy. “It wasn’t supposed to even knock him down!”

“A Jelly-legs Jinx is orange-red in color.” Zabini peered down at Rigel with a pitying grimace. “That one looked more like a Jelly-brains Jinx to me.”

“Jelly-brains?” Pansy lost her carefully cultivated calm, and Rigel discovered her blond friend was actually a gust of icy wind in human form. “You turned his brains to jelly?”

“Pan, it’s okay,” Rigel said in her best calming tone. It came out a bit on the giggly side, “The sky is going to rain honey all week, and if all of me turns to jelly, then everyone can have toast.”

Malfoy growled at Weasley. “You better get over here and fix him this instant, you incompetent prat, or my father is going to—”

“What in Merlin’s name is going on here?” Madam Hooch was back, and she looked like a Valkyrie answering the call of a lightning storm. “Mr. Black, are you all right?”

“No,” Pansy said, calm once more, though a bit breathless. “No, he’s not all right. He’s got jam for brains.”

“Ah.” The Flying instructor pulled Rigel up into a sitting position by her shoulders and stared intently into Rigel’s face. Her eyes were like tennis balls, flitting back and forth, only Rigel couldn’t tell who was winning the match. “The Jelly-brains Jinx, was it? Not to worry, Miss Parkinson, it’ll wear off soon enough. Who is responsible for this?”

“Weasley,” Malfoy ground out. “This is how the Gryffindors decided to repay Black for saving their useless Housemate’s life.”

“I didn’t do that,” Rigel said earnestly. “It was magic that did it. I was just pointing at him at the time. You shouldn’t be so growly,” she added with a regretful look. “It makes your eyebrows twitch something terrible.”

Pansy choked on a laugh and tried to help Rigel stand. “What a mess. Why would you take that Jinx?”

“Seriously, Black.” Malfoy hadn’t yet found his own amusement. “Of the three of us, you’re the only one who doesn’t know the Shield Charm. What gives you the right to jump in front of an unknown spell?”

Rigel carefully disentangled herself from Pansy. “I’d rather you didn’t hug me,” she said. “I don’t want your mother to get the wrong idea.”

Pansy chuckled wryly. “Why would she get the wrong idea? Don’t you like me like that? I’m crushed, really.”

“I thought you might be.” Rigel sighed. “It’s all Sirius’ fault. He tarnished my reputation, so now I’m stuck being friends with a Malfoy.”

“I’d resent that if you were in your right mind.” Malfoy sniffed. “Consider yourself blessed to even be worthy of my presence.”

“Are you an angel, then, Malfoy?” she asked. “You don’t look much like one, but I suppose that explains why Pansy hangs around with you.”

Madam Hooch blew her whistle to dismiss the class, and Pansy and Malfoy marched her as quickly as possible back to the castle. The jinx didn’t wear off until they were almost back to the common room, and her first clue was the throbbing ache in her shoulder where the Jinx had hit her. The headache came next. Rigel groaned, pulled away from their hold, and gripped her head fiercely.

“Rigel?” Pansy asked cautiously.

“I know why it’s called the Jelly-brains Jinx now,” she moaned over the pounding of her skull. “It’s because your head feels as though it’s been squished like a berry when it wears off. Ouch.”

The other two let out twin sighs of relief. “Thank Merlin,” Malfoy drawled. “I don’t think I could take another minute of the inanities that were dribbling out of your mouth.”

“Honestly, Draco,” Pansy said softly, trying not to cause Rigel any more pain. “He took that curse for you.”

“Nobody asked him to,” Malfoy muttered.

“Wasn’t trying to,” Rigel shot back. “Sometimes my muscles spasm without my control.” She stopped at the inconspicuous stretch of wall. “Ouroboros.”

They walked with her through the common room, and an unspoken agreement was made not to bring up the Flying lesson, Neville’s near-fall, or Rigel’s stint in la-la-land for the rest of the day. They worked on their Herbology assignment until dinner. Pansy and Draco finished theirs, but Rigel couldn’t concentrate, and it wasn’t only the lingering headache that rankled.

She couldn’t stop thinking about the burning rush that boiled through her veins when Neville’s fall had been stopped. When she had stopped it. No, when something had stopped it. She wasn’t convinced it had anything to do with her. And even if it did, it definitely wouldn’t happen again.

--0—0—0

--0—0

--0

[end of chapter five].

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 6:

Rigel woke Thursday morning in a rare mood, filled with a childish excitement she thought she’d outgrown long ago. Perhaps it was Hogwarts herself. The castle seemed to breathe magic into the most ordinary of things. Not that Thursday was ordinary—it was their first day of Potions.

Rigel was first to arrive in the laboratory. The classroom, near-freezing to accommodate the preservation of ingredients, was almost blindingly well-lit. The tables were wide enough for two cauldrons to sit comfortably and still have enough room to prepare ingredients, and the aisles were generous, so that one could walk without brushing their robes against another's station. Rigel thoroughly approved. She stowed her bag under the table closest to the blackboard, keeping only her textbook for a quick refresher of chapter one.

She had given Malfoy and Pansy the slip during breakfast, made easier by the fact that neither of them was speaking to her. Wednesday had been a trial for all of them. The day began innocuously. She and Pansy took their pre-breakfast walk, this time about the second floor, and Malfoy didn’t even mention the events of Tuesday's Flying class while they ate. Then they went to Charms, and Wednesday turned like old dairy. She couldn't reproduce the Levitation Charm for Professor Flitwick, which lost Slytherin five points and won her the suspicion of her housemates. They’d all seen her perform the charm perfectly the day before, in defense of a Gryffindor, no less, so what could they conclude but that she was deliberately sabotaging herself?

She had to hear about it from Malfoy and Pansy all through History, and by the time they got to Defense, Rigel was so sick of it she went and sat with Crabbe and Goyle, neither of whom said anything when she couldn't manage the Lumos Charm. Malfoy took the hint, but Pansy took offense. She publicly snubbed Rigel by sitting pointedly with Davis and Greengrass during dinner. They hadn't spoken since.

Malfoy kept his cool until Astronomy. Professor Sinistra set them to identifying a list of stars and constellations. Malfoy pestered her for answers, and when she finally told him she didn't know which star Orion was, Malfoy called her a selfish git who horded his knowledge of spells and stars from his friends. He no longer believed Rigel couldn't perform the spells in class, and he was especially adamant that Heir Black would know stars from constellations when it came to the names on his own family tree. Maybe Archie did, at that. Draco had taken up with Zabini and Nott for the rest of the class, and it wasn't hard for Rigel to slip away from two people who were still studiously ignoring her at breakfast the next day.

She was re-reading the footnotes on cauldron bottom thickness—fascinating stuff—when Neville and the youngest Weasley arrived. The smell of bacon preceded them down the aisle, and they seemed to be carrying an assortment of rolls and bulging, greasy napkins between them.

"Are you sure we're allowed to have food in here?" Neville asked as they made their way to a table on the other side of the room.

"Probably not." Weasley shrugged. "But we'll finish before Snape gets here, and better this than being late because we stayed at breakfast. Remember how mad McGonagall was?"

"I'll never forget the look on her face." Neville shuddered. "She would have eaten us if she was any big—oomph!" Weasley had noticed Rigel and promptly elbowed Neville in the side. "Wha—oh. Hi, Rigel."

"Hi, Neville." Rigel nodded politely. "Hello, Weasley."

"Black." The redhead returned her nod, albeit stiffly.

"How are you feeling today, Neville?" she asked, speaking just loud enough to carry across the room. Neville grinned and moved closer to her table, followed more slowly by Weasley.

"Fine." His round face was entirely guileless. "Madam Pomfrey made me stay in the Hospital Wing for the rest of the day. My gran talked to the headmaster when they fire-called her and—well, she was really rude, actually, but I'm excused from Flying lessons for the year on account of trauma."

He looked quite pleased with this, so Rigel said, "Congratulations."

"Thanks." He grinned. "And thanks for saving me, too."

"I already told you why he did that," Weasley muttered.

"Rigel didn't mean all that, Ron." Neville spoke soothingly. "He just has to say stuff like that to be a good Slytherin, right?" Neville gave her an expectant look as he bit into a cheese-stuffed roll.

Rigel smiled. "Yes, well. About yesterday…" She widened her eyes earnestly. "It wasn't really anything I did that saved you. My wand did the spell by itself."

Weasley scoffed. "That's impossible."

"Well, that's what happened," she said. "I think since that’s the only spell I know, and I was pretty panicked when I saw you falling, my wand just…reacted. Instinctively."

"I guess that makes sense," Ron said slowly. There was a line between his brows that said he was working hard to convince himself. "Though, I've never heard of accidental magic with a wand."

"Still, thanks." Neville said.

"Don’t thank me." She made a small motion with her shoulders that was almost a shrug, almost a dismissal, hoping the boy wouldn’t carry her accidental magic as a debt between them. "We were just really lucky."

Neville made a sound of fervent agreement while polishing off his roll.

Weasley eyed her warily, and then stuck his hand out toward her with violent determination. "You're an alright sort, Black."

Rigel took his tanned hand. "You as well, Weasley."

He made a face that twisted his freckles around. "Just Ron. I have too many siblings here for you to call us all ‘Weasley.’"

"Very well," she said. "Then I am Rigel."

"Not Arc-turus?" He pronounced the name awkwardly.

"Rigel is my middle name," she said. The door to the classroom opened and Malfoy walked in, closely followed by Pansy and Nott.

"See you, then, Rigel." Ron retreated to his side of the room.

Neville darted a nervous glance at Malfoy and jerked his head up and down. "Bye, Rigel."

Rigel returned to her book, but had only read three sentences when a pale, perfectly manicured hand snatched it away from her. She looked up into angry grey eyes and knew for a moment the formidable man her classmate would become. She'd heard it said that eyes could be arresting, and though Malfoy's gaze had an element of capture, Rigel thought coming under his baleful attention was more like landing on the moon. There was a shift into confused disorientation when she found herself surprised by something she knew she shouldn't be. A feeling of losing her footing, then pressing fear on the heels of the realization that something was pulling her away from the ground, instead of toward it. As though Malfoy could turn the universe on its head whenever it displeased him.

Then Malfoy spoke, a sharp, petulant sound that broke the illusion entirely. She re-focused on Malfoy's pale forehead instead of those anti-gravity eyes. “Those no-account peasants call you by your first name?” he demanded, not bothering to keep his voice down.

Rigel glanced over at Neville and Ron, who were fortunately too engrossed in finishing their breakfast to notice. Pansy and Nott had heard, however, and both smirked at her, clearly enjoying the sight of a Malfoy disturbed to righteous indignation.

"Yes." Rigel turned her gaze pointedly to the book he was holding hostage. He moved it behind his back just as pointedly.

"I don't even call you by your first name," he bit out.

"That's true."

Malfoy huffed and his lower lip protruded ever so slightly. "And Pansy only uses it so that others will think she's in good with the mysterious Black Heir."

"I beg your pardon!" Pansy turned appealing eyes on Rigel. "Rigel, that's not true—we're friends, aren't we?"

"Are you speaking to me again?" she asked. Pansy flushed. "I'm not mysterious, anyway," she added, leaning to the side and trying to see around Malfoy to where he was hiding her textbook.

"Yeah.” Nott snorted. “Right.”

Malfoy moved sideways so he was directly in front of her again. "Stop that!"

Rigel straightened obediently and blinked in a way she knew made her look like an abandoned baby owl. "Why are you so upset, Malfoy?"

It was Malfoy's turn to stare stupidly down at her. "Up…set, I'm not—"

"You can call me 'Rigel' if you really want to," she said, making her eyes go even wider and tilting her head just so. The new lenses dried her sclerae, so there wasn’t much moisture to catch the sterile lights overhead, but she let her vision go unfocused and soft. Her brows tightened enough to convey a depthless sorrow at the idea that Malfoy had ever misunderstood her.

“Well, all right,” he said uncertainly. Rigel wasn't sure if her patented, parent-proof ‘look’ would work as well without her natural eyes, but Malfoy's dazed and vaguely apologetic expression told her it was still effectively disarming with grey contacts. He gave his head a little shake and added quickly, "But you have to call me ‘Draco.’”

"Okay, Draco." She smiled with her whole face for a single, agonizing second. She made sure her eyes crinkled and her nose scrunched up the tiniest bit and her teeth flashed shyly, and then she snatched her book from the dumbstruck boy's slackened grip before he could remember his name.

Pansy and Nott could not smother their amusement. The door opened again, and Nott went off to join Zabini at a table in the back, still chuckling. Pansy took the next table over, and Draco sat distractedly beside Rigel. She flipped cheerfully to the index and began to cross-reference stirring-rod materials with their uses and dangers.

Five more minutes passed before Draco finally turned to her and said, "How did you do that?" She offered a blank stare. "Never mind," he muttered, pulling out his notetaking supplies with a grimace.

Rigel hid a smile as Draco ran a hand through his hair in annoyed self-recrimination. She didn't feel sorry for him; he’d stolen her Potions book, and he still hadn't apologized for his words the previous day. That look, really a series of expressions that took advantage of her delicate features, had been developed with Archie, who could pull it off even better than she could. It worked every time. Most people had a deep-seated infant-instinct and an evolutionary predisposition to respond unconsciously to things that trigged it. The look was scientifically engineered to activate those instincts by arranging the facial muscles to express innocence, helplessness, and fragility. Rigel wielded it mercilessly to distract and confound, and she saw no reason to pull her punches now, when the stakes were higher than any of the mischief they’d gotten into at home.

The door behind the teacher’s desk burst open on a wave of magic, subduing the class into silence as Professor Snape stalked like a shadow into the room. He flicked his wrist at the door leading to the dungeons. It slammed shut and locked with an audible click just as the bell rang. Several people gulped, and Ron nudged Neville knowingly on the other side of the room.

"Clear your desks." Professor Snape stood framed by the blackboard and gazed down his nose at them. There was a sense of rehearsal about him as he called roll, a melding of old familiarity and new disdain. Occasionally, he paused on a name and something that on another man would have been a grimace tilted the edges of his mouth. He wasn't old enough to have taught any of their parents, so Rigel imagined the names brought to mind his years in school, like hers, or older siblings, like Ron’s. She didn't think the pause meant anything good for those unfortunate enough to remind Snape of anyone. He seemed less than enamored with his memories.

After Zabini indicated his presence, Snape began to pace the length of the room. Twenty pairs of eyes followed his movements, weaker animals tracking the gait of a panther who may or may not be hungry. Snape's voice was soft and slid so smoothly into the silent air that she didn't realize he'd begun speaking until halfway through his second sentence. She mentally scrambled to replay the words, afraid of missing anything this brilliant man had to say.

"Many of you have already heard about this class, and for any who haven't—" His smirk was a nasty piece of work. “—you will. Purely for the sake of those to whom comprehension does not often follow contextualization—and I don't doubt this will include a percentage of you large enough to give me new dread for the future of magic—I—" Here he paused directly in front of Rigel and fixed his nearly-black eyes on her. “—am Professor Severus Snape, the Potions Master."

Rigel dropped her gaze to the table, her heart beating erratically with nervous anticipation. This was the moment her dream became reality. Months of lying to her parents, all her pocket money spent on ever-lasting contacts, a plan that deprived Archie of his birthright, and a long week of holding herself at careful distance from all around her: it all led to this. As of this class, she was studying under Master Snape, the greatest creative mind in the potions community. Now, finally, she would learn things the journals and articles only mentioned and the books only hinted at. She held her breath without realizing it as Snape continued speaking in that sibilant baritone, which was practically engineered for dripping secret potions knowledge into an eagerly waiting student's ears.

"Potions is a demanding art, one which always takes more than it gives."

"Sounds like my father's mistress," Nott whispered indelicately from the back table.

More like the basic laws of energy, she thought. The end result is less than what you put into it, because there is energy lost in the transaction. The point is that you also get more than you put in, because you end up with something that wasn't there before.

Professor Snape was reminding them of the invisible sacrifices that were lost in the process, literally and metaphorically. And Nott had compared the exacting art of potions-making to the management of an lopsided love affair.

"Unlike your father's latest two-Knut paramour." Professor Snape speared Nott with a glance. "Grasping this subject will give you things your soft little minds can scarcely dream of. Pay attention, work hard, and I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, and even put a stopper in death."

The room held its breath, not a soul moving, until—

"Weasley!"

The redhead jumped and gaped for a moment before remembering how to speak. "Y-yes?" Ron shifted nervously, his hands clenching and unclenching on the table.

"What is the most common use for peeled shrivelfig?" Snape took a single step toward Ron's table, and the boy paled dramatically, his freckles standing out like speckles on a Thrush egg.

“Uh...” Ron looked torn between looking around for help and not letting Snape out of his sight. “No idea?”

Draco scoffed a tad too loudly to be believable. "What kind of brainless clod has never heard of a Shrinking Solution?"

Snape turned his attention to the blond. "Correct, Mr. Malfoy. Five points to Slytherin."

The Gryffindors seemed to deflate simultaneously.

It's also used commonly in Euphoria Inducers, Rigel thought, only mildly sour she hadn’t been called on instead. And technically, it's the juice inside the skinned shrivelfig that's used in Shrinking Solutions.

"Patil." Snape turned toward a girl with luminous golden eyes and a plait of black hair down her back. "When would you ingest the leaves of the aconite plant?"

The girl bit her lip. Her pretty eyes lifted from her desk to Professor Snape's collar, then hastily dropped. "Um, never? Because it's poisonous, isn't it?"

"I wonder what you will do, Miss Patil, when your blood pressure is dangerously high, but you refuse to take the heart sedative because there is aconite in it." Professor Snape spoke with a bit more rancor than was needed to make his point. "Or when you can't take a sweat inducer for your fever for the same reason."

Patil shrank back into her seat, cheeks red and lip trembling. Rigel thought Snape might have mentioned that aconite leaves are poisonous, that you never should eat the leaves by themselves, and that you only ingest them in potions with strong neutralizing agents, but she supposed his intention was to show them there was no "always" or "never" in potions. A poison could easily become medicine, a harmless edible just as easily made ruinous by its reaction to what it was brewed alongside.

Draco answered a question about angel trumpet flowers correctly, and Pansy took an educated guess when asked for the uses of armadillo bile, but Rigel wasn't called on until after Goyle suggested that antimony was used to keep vampires away. She thought the professor might give up entirely at that point, but then his eyes caught her expectant look.

Snape swooped down on her, or so it seemed from her admittedly low vantage point. From his emotionless expression and the fact that he had put her off until last, Rigel assumed he was marshaling a herculean effort to treat her neutrally. She could see the distaste in his eyes when he approached, and she had been present at too many dinner conversations that made Snape the archenemy of Sirius and James’ boyhood antics not to know the simmering resentment that must live even deeper, beneath Snape’s professional mien.

Snape was known to favor his own house, so he couldn’t treat her as caustically as the Gryffindors without admitting Sirius Black still irked him. At the same time, he likely couldn't bring himself to favor her as he would any other Slytherin. Neutrality was safe, neutrality made sense, but it was not what she wanted from him.

"Black," he said when he was close enough to dissect her. "What would I get if I mixed powdered root of asphodel into an infusion of wormwood?"

Rigel frowned. That potion isn't anywhere on the first-year syllabus. The other questions had focused on common ingredient uses and dangers, which made sense for an introductary class. Rigel’s question technically qualified, but she doubted anyone else would know that—

"They make the Draught of Living Death, sir."

Snape's eyes sharpened to black drills, boring across the distance between them. He studied her as though she were a strange plant he'd come across in the forest, one he wasn't sure would prove useful.

"And what is the difference between monkshood and wolfsbane?" The veneer of neutrality had vanished, and she was a specimen in a jar for his perusal.

Rigel glanced at Draco, who had also answered his question correctly, but he was equally mystified.

Snape noticed and said smoothly, "You are the last student, Mr. Black, but I have several questions remaining. The material must be covered.” She didn’t believe for a second that Snape had miscounted the number of students when preparing his lecture, or that he had intended all along to ask the final student multiple, increasingly difficult questions. Snape raised an eyebrow and he voice turned deceptively reasonable. “Unless you don't know the answer. In that case, I can begin again with Mr. Weasley."

Rigel didn't have to glance at Ron to know he was sending her a pleading look. "They are both the same as the poisonous plant Patil identified earlier," she said. "Aconite."

"Indeed." Did Snape have a thoughtful note to his voice, or was that wishful thinking? "What is a bezoar, and where would you look if you needed to find one?"

"It's a small stone that neutralizes poisons, though it doesn't work very well on snake venom or nightshade-based toxins. It is usually taken from the stomach of a goat that is older than fifteen months but no older than eight years." Rigel felt the intensely interested look Draco was giving her but ignored it to focus on Snape. He didn't seem irritated that she'd expounded on her answer, but he didn't look ready to offer her an apprenticeship on the spot, either. Rigel did not know how to strike a balance between impressing him and arousing his distain. She hadn’t orchestrated this part of the plan, had presumed her years of study and natural ability would be enough to garner his attention, but what if her family’s enmity had killed this chance long before she ever conceived of it?

Snape stared at her a few seconds longer, a god in judgement on her impudent soul, before he turned away to address the rest of the class. "You will be tested on all of the information given today. Class dismissed." Snape swept his robes behind him as he turned and left by the same door he'd entered through.

It was a long moment before anyone made for the door. The entire class shared a collective mental exhaustion from sitting in fear of being called on and then wracking their brains for the answers, some of which weren't even covered in chapter one of their textbook.

Rigel gathered her things from under the table, reflecting that the bell had not yet rung. Did Snape often release his class early? With any luck, they'd get to lunch before the Great Hall reached maximum chaos. Draco and Pansy fell into step beside her before she'd gone far in the winding dungeons.

"How did you know all that?" Draco asked.

"Did Professor Snape warn you about the questions ahead of time like he did Draco?" Pansy added. Rigel glanced sideways at Draco, who flushed. Pansy grinned. "I knew it.”

"He's my godfather; of course he's going to help me out," Draco said plaintively. "He didn’t give me the answers, just told me to brush up on the first three chapters before class. But I know he didn't tell you."

"That's true," Rigel said, slipping her hands into her pockets to warm them after the cold classroom.

"I think...you were telling the truth the other day when you said that ridiculous thing about being a Slytherin to get on Snape's good side," Draco said slowly. He seemed to be in the process of coming to terms with it even as he added, "You actually knew all that stuff, didn't you?"

Rigel smiled at the disgruntled look on Draco's face. Sometimes he wasn't so bad, for a pureblood snob.

Pansy sighed. "So, you really can't do spells for coppers, if that's how you are when you're actually good at a subject."

"Spells are much harder than potions," Rigel said. "And not as interesting." Not as predictable, is what she meant, but she didn’t know how to describe the absolute, unnatural horror she’d felt when her magic rose up in her veins like the tide coming in all at once. She didn’t know how to consciously seek out such a feeling. How did they get used to it? That sensation of drowning in their own skin?

Draco and Pansy exchanged a long look, then Draco nodded and pressed his mouth into a line that said he was about to do something very difficult and emotionally taxing. "Rigel, we're sorry for yesterday. We understand you better, now. Sort of." He grimaced, but gamely looped an arm through each of theirs in an attempt to tow them more quickly up the main dungeon stair. "Now, let's go eat before all the tarts are gone."

Pansy extracted herself from Draco's stranglehold gracefully, saying, "Yes, we are sorry, and this afternoon we’d like you to show us how to do that needle transfiguration."

"I told you," Rigel said, letting Draco tow her along. "You just have to really want to poke someone." She glanced over at the blond boy through her hair. "I could probably do it right now, if you want."

The taller boy glared down at her and Pansy smiled cheekily at them both. Rigel knew suddenly, the way she knew Doxy Eggs were two sickles an ounce, that the three of them would be friends. She had decided not to make any friends, had hoped if she was odd enough and obstructive enough, no one would bother, but somehow these two were going to manage it. She didn’t know how such a friendship would work, when there were parts of herself—most of herself—she would never be able to share. She didn’t know why they wanted it, given her relative lack of social graces, political power, or interest in any subject besides Potions.

They would be friends until they weren’t, until that day when her goals had been accomplished and the ruse was done, or the day her secrets refused to be kept. On that day, they would hate her. She could only hope that day was years away.

--0

HpHpHp

--0

She couldn't produce the needle in Transfiguration, but that was okay; she didn't really need a needle, and nothing was worth opening the door to her magic except dire necessity. Professor McGonagall rewarded her efforts with a severe look, but then, all her looks were varying levels of severe.

After dinner, Pansy went to meet with Bulstrode, who wanted to introduce her to a few of the older students, and Draco went to the Owlery to send a letter to his father. Though he’d glanced at her about fifteen times while writing it, Rigel thought it definitely wasn't about her.

Left to her own devices, Rigel climbed several moving flights of stairs to walk the third floor with the Marauder's Map. Hogwarts was a maze, but that maze was now her home, and one day the ruse might depend on her knowing it better than most. Her father and uncles had demonstrated in tale how useful a knowledge of the many trick passageways and secret rooms could be. She was about two-thirds of the way through exploring that floor when a crashing noise rent the air and a door down the corridor shook on its hinges.

She checked the Map, thinking it might be Peeves the poltergeist stirring up trouble for the caretaker, Filch. The little dot on the Map, however, said "Marcus Flint." The bully from the train. She wondered if he had caused the explosion on purpose or on accident. Firmly reasoning that if he was in some kind of trouble, it was nothing a first-year could help with, she stowed the Map and walked straight past the room.

She was three doors down when the one she’d passed slammed open. She kept walking, but Flint's low voice caught up with her, forestalling any idea of slipping around the next corner in peace.

"Oi!" Flint had a naturally harsh voice, so it was difficult to tell if he was angry or not. "What's a snakelet doing lurking about so far from the dungeons?"

Rigel turned around on slow feet. Flint didn’t look any happier to see her now than he had when she’d run into him on the train. "Walking," she said evenly. "Sorry to have disturbed you, Flint."

He approached her almost lazily, with a confidence that said he knew a first-year didn’t have anywhere to run. "Thought that was you, Black." He said her last name oddly, and there was a gleam in his eyes she didn’t like. She hadn’t given him her name, which meant he’d gone out of his way to discover it. "Learned some manners since the train, have you?"

"Yes," she said politely. She would be a fool indeed if she made the mistake of antagonizing Flint twice.

He grunted, dark green eyes tracing her features. "Don't think that will be enough to save you. If it was just rudeness between us, I'd leave you be now that you’re a snake, but I'm afraid we've other business to settle."

She frowned, unable to think of any other animosity between them. As far as she knew, the Flints had no beef with the Blacks.

"You look perplexed," he said. A dark smile burrowed into his cheek. "I'm not angry with you, if that’s what you’re wondering. In fact, you've caught me in a generous mood; I've just blown off a bit of steam. Maybe that’s why I’m willing to offer you a deal.”

“A…deal?” Rigel had no idea where this was going. She didn’t think madness ran in the Flint line, but any number of old families had succumbed to inbreeding in recent generations. A Black, ostensible or not, had no room to judge.

“I know your secret.” Flint said it with such relish she wondered why he didn’t go ahead and make a sandwich with it. She wanted to dismiss his words as ludicrous posturing, but he seemed so certain. So menacingly sure. “We don't keep such dangerous secrets for free in Slytherin, even if we are feeling generous."

Rigel fixed solemn eyes on Flint's bronze-flecked green and she wondered if she could bluff her way out of the situation without revealing anything. "My secret?" she asked neutrally. "Do tell; what secret would that be?"

"Got so many you can't keep track?" He laughed at her, a harsh, braying sound. "I don't doubt that, but I was referring to the fact that you've been using someone else's name."

Rigel went very still. Her guts wanted to climb up her esophagus and spill themselves in gooey ribbons at his feet, to plead for mercy before he told anyone—but her heart froze over with a ruthless ice she didn’t know she was capable of, and her voice came out relatively calm. “Why don’t we take this out of the corridor?” She turned sharply and yanked on the nearest door, gesturing for Flint to precede her. Flint kept his self-assured smirk as he stepped into the old classroom. She closed the door behind them and folded her arms, taking a relaxed posture against it. She would not act defensive or overly guilty—not until she knew what he knew.

"What's this really about, Flint?" she asked lightly. "Everyone knows Rigel isn't actually my first name, but you must admit ‘Arcturus’ is a bit pretentious." She smiled cajolingly, the way she’d seen Sirius do when he wanted Remus to support one of his more ridiculous and irresponsible ideas.

Flint smiled slowly back at her, but there was nothing cajoling about it. Mockingly, he clapped his hands. "Good try, snakelet. Ten points to Slytherin for quick thinking. If I wasn't sure of my information, I might even have believed that act. Unfortunately for you…" His gaze held the weight of unmistakable knowledge, and she knew then she wouldn't be able to talk her way out of it. "I've known Archie Black since he was old enough to understand Quidditch, and though you are a good actor, you're not him."

Archie, what have you done? A pureblood who knew him well enough to call him by his preferred nickname, who was Hogwarts-aged, and Archie neglected to mention him? All their planning, all their preparation, and this was how easily the ruse crumbled? Outwardly, she attempted to maintain a calculating visage. He had mentioned a deal. Bitterly, she grasped at it. "What do you want, Flint?"

"Oh, several things," he said easily, as though he hadn’t just accused her of a capital criminal offense.

Blood identity theft was treated very seriously in the current political climate. Archie would be in trouble if it was discovered he’d infiltrated a foreign school under false pretenses, but if she were found out…the consequences would be considerably more crippling. But then, she’d known that going into it.

Flint’s voice had a swagger to it, now that he knew she was at his mercy. "I'd ask why, but I think I've got most of it figured; feel free to confirm it for me. Archie has attended home games for the Wimbledon Wasps since he was about four, did you know? His father books two seats in the VIP box every match, which is where my father and I happen to sit, as well."

If Archie were there, she’d have doused his ears with an itching potion. She knew he went to those games with Sirius, but he’d never mentioned striking up a regular friendship there.

"We sat together often," Flint continued. Rigel could only listen in mounting frustration as the depth of Flint’s familiarity with Archie played out. "Gravitated toward one another, the only boys in the box. After his mother died, he started coming by himself. Black senior refused to leave the house, but Archie needed something normal. That’s when he told me his ambition to become a Healer."

Rigel tried and failed to hide her surprise that another knew Archie's dearest wish. She said nothing to confirm or deny, which seemed only to encourage Flint’s smug monologue. "I figure the only way you're here and Sirius Black hasn’t sent a squad of Aurors out looking for his kid is because Archie's where he wants to be, in America. He needs someone to pose as him so his father won't catch on to the fact that Archie's not at Hogwarts. That’s where you come in." He nodded at her, an expression of satisfaction on his face. He would have made a decent detective, but Rigel couldn’t find it in her to admire the boy who was so gleefully threatening everything. "I’m guessing you were slotted to go to America, so Archie could take your place without making up a new identity, but your accent is British, which means you’re not a pureblood at all, or you'd have been down for Hogwarts.” Flint grinned as he came to the most damning conclusion. “Your features are inbred enough to pass as Archie, and you know the social basics, so I doubt you're a muggleborn. Which means you're a halfblood, and you get to go to the most prestigious school of magic in the world in exchange for covering for Archie in America. The only thing I don't know is who you are."

Rigel took a deep breath, filtering the story she would tell through the facts he already had. He didn't know she was a girl, he didn't know she was a Potter, and he thought the whole thing was Archie's plan, with her a convenient stand-in. He was enough Archie’s friend to realize she wasn’t him, which made it unlikely he’d purposely crush Archie’s dream by turning her in, and the sneer when he said halfblood seemed automatic, no real malice behind it. He wouldn’t turn her in on principle alone. He just wanted to blackmail her, and blackmail she could handle.

“You’re right about all of it,” she said slowly. “Almost all of it—this charming accent is just a charm, I’m afraid. Archie wanted to go to AIM and convinced me to take his place here. He even paid for it, so it’s free.” She shrugged, as though money was reason enough to commit blood identity theft. Flint did not question it, so perhaps the motivation would hold. “As for who—I'm no one, really. Just a friend of Archie's.”

"Archie's never mentioned any male friends to me," Flint countered.

"He also neglected to mention you to me, obviously." She said the last word with just the right amount of bitterness, and Flint laughed again.

"Fair enough. I wouldn’t tell me, either, if I was you. I guess it doesn't matter who you are. You’re Arcturus ‘Rigel’ Black, now. For however long that lasts.” Flint gave her a look of amused expectation.

"You still haven't told me what you want." She met his gaze as though unafraid of his demands. Only she was terrified. Because he could ask for anything and she would give it to him. Because the other option was Azkaban, and he knew it.

"As I said, I'm in a generous mood," he drawled. "There's really only one thing I need right now. Maybe you’ve heard I had to repeat this year. Well, it wasn’t what everyone says; I didn’t fail any exams. I just didn't do a single assignment last year, and they used that as an excuse to hold me back, no matter how well I knew the material."

Rigel nodded, partly to show she followed but mostly to prompt him to get to the point.

"McGonagall’s already on my case this year." One side of his upper lip lifted, exposing crooked teeth. "What I need is a bright, eager snakelet to do my work for me. Then, I don't have to waste my time writing about things I already know, the professors can pretend their methods are working, and as long as my homework is done on time, I don't think anyone needs to know where the real Arcturus Black is. Win, win, win. Oh, and Archie wins, too, I guess." Flint smirked again, apparently pleased that all was right in the world.

Rigel took her time in thinking it over. It seemed a paltry thing to demand in exchange for a secret that could literally destroy her. She would do any amount of extra homework to keep the ruse intact. Her friendships with Draco and Pansy would not become so close that they’d notice the extra time she spent in the library. So really, what harm?

"Can a first year really do a fifth year's work?" she asked. "Won't it make you look bad?"

"You can put my name on whatever drivel you want, as long as it meets their arbitrary requirements for passing the year." Flint rolled his shoulders unconcernedly. "It's not like you have to do the spells; just research them. There's a whole library for that, I hear."

Research was easy enough, and maybe some of it would be applicable to potions. She had already decided, as keeping her secret and preserving their ambitions was worth any price, but the idea that she would get to see the fifth-year potions work four years early was a kind of silver lining.

"Deal." She held out her hand, and Flint took it with a solid grasp. "Mail me your assignments, and I'll mail them back before they're due." She straightened from the door, hoping her legs would hold her through her relief. "I hope you will consider our business from here on to be concluded."

"Who can say what may come up in the world of business," Flint prevaricated. "For now, I am satisfied."

Realizing that was all she was going to get, Rigel opened the door, adding, "I'll leave the handwriting charms for you to figure out," over her shoulder. The sound of Flint's harsh laughter followed her down the corridor.

By the time she got to the first floor, her hands were shaking. Her pulse raced as though she’d climbed up four flights of stairs instead of down them, and she hurried through the dungeons to a small alcove concealed behind a depiction of Salazar Slytherin's familiar, a foot-long baby basilisk which didn't move like the other paintings. Rigel took a fleeting moment to hope that was because the painting hadn't been treated in the right glaze, not because the basilisk was still alive. She collapsed onto the shallow seat in the alcove and buried her hands in her short hair.

That was too close. She allowed the admission silently. First thing in the morning, she had to owl Archie and make sure he hadn't forgotten anything else. Then she needed to make friends with a fifth year. Most homework assignments could be completed with the right textbook, but there would be things that only came from cumulative learning experience. Rigel let out a choked laugh. The plan to avoid making friends had well and truly flown. It would have to be someone who didn’t ask too many questions.

At least she could use her spotty spell-work as an excuse for the extra studying. She could feel her Hogwarts fantasies, in which she dazzled Master Snape with her brewing acumen and studied potions exclusively from morning to night, evaporating like morning mist. The reality of keeping up the ruse burned such fancies away.

It was late by the time she reached her room, and Nott was already asleep behind his bed curtains. Running water in the bathroom told her Draco was probably brushing his teeth. She slipped off her boots and waited for Malfoy to finish and douse the lights. He came out with a towel over his face, gently patting his skin dry, and Rigel stifled a smile. A Malfoy would wash his face before bed at the tender age of eleven.

Draco lowered the towel and jumped a little at seeing her. "Where've you been?" he asked bluntly. His face was splotchy from the hot water on his pale complexion and a few drops of moisture fell from his bangs to land on his nose.

"Library," she said, laying the foundation for her cover story. "I'm sure I'll be able to do those spells if I understand them better."

"Oh. Good idea." He reached into his wardrobe for his nightshirt.

Rigel made to close the hangings, but Draco's voice stopped her. "Rigel?" He was quiet in deference to their sleeping roommate. She slid the hangings back to look at him. He sat on his bedspread, shirt in hand, regarding her seriously. "I wrote my father tonight," he said, still staring at her, the way a child stares at a bird they are trying not to scare away.

"I know."

"He and Mother are very curious about you. Since we’re cousins, and all." Draco’s eyes dropped to his bedspread, and he toyed with a loose thread. "I wrote a bit about you. I hope you don't mind. It's just that I told him we were friends and…a Malfoy is always honest with his real friends." He looked up at her, expectantly, so she offered him a slightly bewildered smile. "We're real friends, aren't we?" Draco prompted, stiffly vulnerable.

Rigel hesitated, a strange and sorrowful guilt shivering through her. "Draco…you should know I'm a very private person. I am honored that you would consider me a true friend, and I would like to return that regard." She smiled weakly. "But I demand no honesty from you. Because I cannot return it. There are things I probably won't ever feel comfortable telling you. Still, I would value this friendship as much as I am able."

Draco surprised her by grinning faintly. "Spoken like a true Slytherin," he said. "And I accept your not-necessarily-honest friendship as long as you're okay with me writing home about some of the more interesting possible-truths about you."

Rigel grinned back. The Malfoy scion was unpredictable as well, it seemed. She wondered at his easy acceptance of such a strange definition of friendship. Was he raised to expect such arrangements, or did he want to be her friend that badly? Could they have a true camaraderie with secrets and lies between them? Rigel didn't know, but somehow in the last week, the proud, impetuous, impossibly demanding, suddenly earnest, and unexpectedly human boy had become something more tolerable than a burr and less dangerous than a viper in her mind. He was a friend now, for better or worse—Pansy, too. Rigel was many things, but she was not cold-hearted. They had made a concerted effort, and she was losing the will to continue to brush them off. She could have this strange facsimile of friendship, couldn’t she? Surely, they and the ruse were not mutually exclusive. Surely, she could lie to her family and friends when necessary and value them all the same.

“That’s fine,” she said.

"Great." Draco stood to douse the lights and added, when she could no longer see his expression, "Then you should know Mother has invited you to sit with us for the first Quidditch game."

"What?" Rigel blinked in the darkness.

"Father is on the Board of Governors, so he comes to watch the school Quidditch games in the staff box sometimes with Mother." She heard the mattress creak as Draco climbed back into bed. "I wasn't allowed before, because I was too young, but now I have a seat and Mother insisted I extend the invitation to you."

"What about Pansy?" Rigel asked softly. Her voice still seemed loud in the dark.

"I already asked her. She knows Mother from their tea circle, but she has no interest in Quidditch. If she comes to the game, it’ll only be for the opportunity to socialize or out of a sense of duty.” Draco yawned, then added, “I’d rather sit with someone who likes the game. Ah—you do like Quidditch, don’t you?”

"Naturally." She could not fake disinterest in a sport she played for seven years. Since he couldn’t see her face, she indulged in a grimace before saying, "I'll send you mother an owl tomorrow accepting her gracious invitation." Meeting Draco’s parents. How bad could it be?

"Good. Night, Rigel."

"Goodnight, Draco."

She tried not to think about how she was going to convince Lady Malfoy that she was the son of the Sirius Black when Narcissa Malfoy had actually grown up with Sirius as close cousins. She had too much to think about already. She pulled the blankets over her head. The closeness of her own breath, its reassuring heat, almost convinced her she was somewhere safe, in no danger of anything at all.

When in doubt, recite potions recipes. Blood-Replenishing Potion: Step One, treat the inside of the cauldron with a non-acidic oil. Step Two, heat the cauldron over a small, dense flame until the oil begins to glisten. Step Three, add half a liter of hand-filtered dragon bile, making sure no stray pieces of the dragon's stomach lining make it into the cauldron while it is hot. Step Four, crush two stalks of St. Stewart's Bane...

--0—0—0

--0—0

--0

[end of chapter six].

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 7:

The next morning, Rigel took the shortcut through the dueling knights’ tapestry on the fourth floor on her way to the Owlery. She made her way carefully in the pitch blackness, her footsteps unnaturally quiet. She was just wondering if there were muffling charms in effect on the stairs when a solid body going to opposite direction crashed into her.

"Woah!" A voice shouted in her ear as they fell, tumbling back down the five steps she just climbed. When they landed in the small space between the back of the tapestry and the first stair, the boy crushing her lower legs groaned and called, "Oi, Gred! There's someone else in here!"

"Lumos." A second voice came from halfway up the steps. The light from the wand, held high above its owner's head, revealed her attackers. The Weasley twins. She would recognize their hair, the same shade as Ron's, anywhere.

The one on the floor beside her relinquished his squatting rights to her legs and stood. When he offered a hand, she took it. He hauled her up cheerfully, making a show of checking her over for imaginary dirt. "Alright there?" he asked. "Can't tell if that's muck or just the color of your hair in this light."

“’Course he's not." The other one bounded down the stairs to get a look at her in his wand light. "Terribly sorry, chap. Forge here has always been the clumsy one."

Rigel opened her mouth, but the other one cut across her.

"Don't believe him, good fellow! I’m not the clumsy one, Gred is the forgetful one.” The twin who’d helped her up grinned conspiratorially. “He forgot that I'm the pretty one, and he's the clumsy one, which is why I usually go first down these stairs and therefore why I was the one who ran into you."

Rigel nodded in a way that conveyed more acceptance than understanding.

"Unfortunately, Forge is also the rude one," the other said.

“Which is the one who will actually introduce himself?” Rigel asked. “Because where I’m from, we exchange names before throwing people down a flight of stairs.”

They exchanged grins that could devil a dozen eggs, and Rigel decided not to believe them before they even spoke.

"I'm Fred, maybe."

"George, likewise."

"And we're the Weasley Twins," they chorused.

"Never heard of you." Rigel stayed absolutely deadpan.

They threw their heads back in identical laughs.

"A kindred spirit!" George crowed.

"He jokes! An heir!" Fred ruffled her hair in a spurt of elation. It turned out there was dirt in it, and when Rigel sneezed, they laughed again.

"We must know the name of our prodigy," George declared.

"Indeed, who is it that possesses the wherewithal to find this passage and the sense of humor to refrain from cursing us for our clumsiness?" Fred asked.

"I'm Rigel," she said, a little unnerved to be standing in a secret passageway she wasn't expecting anyone else to even know about with the two most infamous trouble makers in the school. “And I don’t know any curses.”

"Rigel, Rigel." Fred glanced questioningly at his twin. "Doesn't ring a bell."

"You sure that's your name?" George asked. "Don't feel too bad; I forget mine's Forge all the time."

"Silly, I'm Forge," Fred said. "I told you he was the forgetful one."

"Actually, it was your brother who told me that you were the forgetful one," Rigel said. "Back when he was Forge instead of you."

"Ah, yes." Fred looked confused for a moment. "Well, I guess he was right, though of course if it was Fred who told you that it might as well have been me. I'm Fred most of the time."

Rigel didn't even try to make sense of that.

"Clever little thing; you a Ravenclaw, Rigel?" George asked. He peered at her robes and Rigel realized she hadn't put on her green and silver tie that morning. She had been planning on grabbing it before breakfast.

"I'm a Slytherin." She expected them to recoil, as if they were the snakes, but their grins grew even wider, making them look manic in the dim wand light. Rigel thought she had good reason to be concerned.

"Now I know why your mud-colored hair looks familiar," George said. "You're Sirius Black's son, Arcturus."

"And we thought we had trouble with names." Fred shook his head sadly. "You've gone and given yourself a whole new one."

If only you knew.

"Rigel is my middle name," she said. "But yes, Sirius Black is my father."

Fred grabbed her hands and began swinging them in restless excitement. "Is it true he once performed a Conditional Transfiguration on the main stair that turned it into a slide every time someone said 'homework' while standing on it?"

"Actually, that was James Potter," Rigel said, amazed that they had even heard of that prank. The Marauders had published a book of jokes and pranks a few years back, which had been a huge success at Zonko's Joke Shop, but as far as she knew, that one wasn't in it. "My dad was the one who charmed the mirrors in the bathrooms on the first, third, and fifth floors to spit juice at anyone who tried to walk out without washing their hands."

The twins stared, their cobalt blue eyes as wide and bright as galleons.

"That was him? There's a mirror on the fifth floor that still does that!" Fred exclaimed.

"The Marauders are our heroes," George explained.

Fred bounced on his toes as he nodded. "The Marauder Line at Zonko's always has the best prank supplies. Our parents actually knew them when they were seventh years at Hogwarts and the Marauders were just really noisy firsties."

"Who'd have thought then they'd go on to become legends?" George shook his head in apparent amazement.

"Imagine being raised by the four of them." Fred sighed wistfully. "Was it as wonderful as it sounds?"

"Only three, actually." Rigel was used to having to explain this. The Marauder Line bore a stylized ‘MWP&P.’ Although Peter was no longer around, they left his moniker, Wormtail, on their products in tribute to the time of care-free joy that had inspired them. "Peter Pettigrew, the fourth Marauder, doesn't associate with the others anymore. He joined the S.O.W. Party and decided he couldn't afford such juvenile friends."

Their faces fell. “A Marauder in the Cow Party?”

Fred shook his head. “For shame.”

S.O.W. stood for Save Our World, and it was supposed to be pronounced like the sowing of seeds in a garden. Its opponents pronounced it like the barnyard animal, and often went further and called it by its old name—the Cure Our World Party. C.O.W. and S.O.W. were two iterations of the same conservative political movement, currently headed by Lord Riddle. Its supporters believed the problems of modern Wizarding society could be laid at the feet of undesirables and their corruptive influence on traditional—read, ‘pureblood’—ideals. It was the C.O.W. Party that first pushed for Hogwarts to close its doors to muggleborns, citing security risks, but it was the S.O.W. Party that had barred even halfbloods from attending.

Rigel tried to bring the conversation back to more pleasant pastures. "It really was wonderful, though. If you like waking up with purple scales where your hair used to be every now and then."

"Wicked." They breathed the word as one.

"I suppose," she said. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to mail a letter before breakfast."

"Not to worry, Slytherin puppy," Fred declared. For a confused moment, she wondered if he knew about Sirius’ animagus form, but Fred plowed ahead as though the spontaneous nickname was inconsequential. "We know the way, so we'll escort you. It's right through—" He faltered and glanced up the passageway. "Actually, the fastest way is up these stairs, so I'm guessing from your presence that you already knew that..." He trailed off with a sheepish chuckle.

George elbowed him in the side. "As if the next generation Marauder doesn't know his way around the castle. This pup was probably born with the sacred knowledge."

"Still, you couldn't ask for better company this fine morning," Fred said, taking one of her arms and looping it through his. He used significantly less finesse than Draco had the day before.

George did the same one her other side, saying, "Too true, brother mine. And it would be ever-so-irresponsible of us, as Gryffindors, to allow a baby snake to wander the nest unattended."

"Quite so," Fred agreed. "Shall we?"

"We shall."

With that, the two redheads began towing her up the stairs, skipping over the trick step automatically and lifting her over it like a child between them. They chatted all the way to the Owlery, prancing from topic to topic with the grace of a pair of fire dancers who had leapt over flames together all their lives.

"--and don't even get me started on Percy." Fred shuddered dramatically. "Ron's an alright sort, for a hot-headed git—"

"Though he might not be so hot-headed if we hadn't fed him so many pepper imps when he was little," George put in thoughtfully.

"—but Percy is a rule-lover." Fred whispered the term as though saying it aloud might breed more of them.

"Is he a redheaded prefect?" Rigel asked.

"Oh, the shame." Fred put a hand to his temple. "Trickster help him, he is."

"He did me a good turn on the train," Rigel said, thinking fast. "Since he's your brother, he deserves proper thanks. Why don't you introduce me later?"

Fred and George turned their sharp eyes toward one another in a silent conference that reminded her a bit of Archie and herself. Rigel knew they were looking for the trick, the turn, the moment the joke becomes apparent and effective; the punch line. She also knew they wouldn't find it, because they didn't have all the pieces.

"Sure. We'll introduce you," Fred said slowly.

"Though if you're planning to prank the poor sod, we insist that no permanent harm be done to him. He is our brother, after all." George was smiling, but there was marble in the firm tilt of his chin. Rigel made a note to not upset any of the other Weasleys. They had more protection than they probably realized.

"I just want to talk to him," Rigel said. "It would be nice to have an older student to go to for advice, and he seems the type to enjoy giving it out."

"Too true, that," Fred said ruefully.

“Though, as older students full of excellent advice, we are dutifully offended,” added George.

Fred bowed grandly at the top of the outer stair. "The Owlery awaits, so we'll leave you to your business."

"Look us up after last period and we'll introduce you to Perc." George winked over his shoulder. "We'll be down by the lake with Lee."

Rigel climbed the last few steps, pulling the letters she had to send from her pockets. The first one, to Draco's mother, was simple enough.

Dear Lady Malfoy,

Thank you for the gracious invitation to watch this year's first Quidditch game with your family. I would be honored to sit with you and your son, as long as it is no inconvenience. I look forward to being formally introduced.

Yours Sincerely,

Arcturus Rigel Black

She rolled the letter carefully, ensuring the Black family crest on the outside of the paper was visible, and tied it with a green ribbon to a young owl with gentle claws.

"Take this to Narcissa Malfoy," she said softly. The owl flew gracefully through the window, and Rigel turned to the second letter. This one was significantly less formal, but much more complicated. She couldn't risk the letter being read by someone else, so she'd had to write it in a sort of code.

Dear Harry,

How are you!? I miss you so, so much and don't you dare roll your eyes at me—I know you secretly deep down miss me too. How are classes going? I’m sure you’ll do great in the Healing track. Just don't let it affect your Potions studies, haha, as if anything could! So, guess who I ran into today? Marcus Flint! You know, the guy who always sits with me and Dad at the Quidditch games. Oh, wait, I never told you about him, did I? Oops, well he's an old friend of mine, and I didn't expect to see him here at Hogwarts. We spent all yesterday catching up, and he remembers almost everything I've ever told him, isn't that something? I felt bad that I couldn't say the same, but you know how terrible my memory is. You're always having to remind me of things.  

Anyway, classes are going well. I made a few friends, with Draco Malfoy of all people, if you can believe it, and Pansy Parkinson, as well as a few Weasleys, and of course there's Marcus. You know, I think you would like Marcus. He's really laid back for a fifth year, and definitely not the type to cause drama or trouble just because he can. I think he prefers to settle his problems under the table haha, and I know you always tell me I should be less dramatic and just deal with things. Perhaps Marcus will help me get better at that. Maybe I'll introduce you this summer and the two of you can write while we're at school. I worry about you all the way in America by yourself.  

Anyway, I hope you're well.

Your cousin,

Rigel

P.S. I'm not going by Archie here at school. I think it's time I took a more mature name, so I've been using my middle name—what do you think? Maybe I'll go back to being Archie someday, but for now it's just Rigel.

There. She rolled the second letter and sent it off with a Screech Owl, another kind of code between the two of them. Sending a letter with a Screech Owl meant it was important, but still safe to read around others. A Barn Owl meant nothing important, just general news, and an Eagle Owl meant an emergency.

It wasn’t terribly subtle, but at least she had warned him that Flint was here, that he recognized her as not-Archie, and that they had struck a deal. She'd all but told him to write Flint himself, and pressed him to remind her of any other things she was supposed to remember about Archie's life that they hadn’t already covered.

She hoped he really wouldn’t slack too much in Potions; it would be a dead giveaway to their parents when they saw grade reports, and it would detract from the credibility of Harry Potter the Potions Mistress later on. She would have to pretend an interest in Healing while she was at Hogwarts, but they didn’t even have it as an option until third year.

The sun was already up and climbing, so Rigel hurried down to breakfast. Draco and Pansy were discussing their Herbology assignment, which Rigel had put off a little late and was planning on finishing during lunch. When the post came, she looked up automatically, but she was still surprised to see two owls swoop down onto her breakfast and thrust their legs at her.

One she recognized. It was Uncle Sirius' tawny owl. It had a permanently rumpled look that Rigel thought Sirius had chosen it for. Before they’d left home, she and Archie had had to bribe the family owls for weeks to convince them to bring their letters to one another. Even with address charms on the envelopes, owls were much cleverer than most people gave them credit for. It was only after many failed attempts at addressing letters to one another falsely that they realized the owls took bribes in the form of regular treats.

She took Sirius’ letter and waved Ruffles graciously toward the platter of bacon, then turned to the other owl. It was a common school owl, and when she peeked inside the letter, she understood why. It was from Flint.

That was fast. She resisted the urge to look over at Flint damningly and stowed his letter in her pocket to read later. She unfolded the first letter instead.

Archie,

How are you? You sounded good in your letter, but then, I've never known you to not sound good, not that I could actually hear your letter as sound, of course, I just meant that you write with a very strong voice—

Moony says I'm rambling, but what does he know? Anyway, glad things are going so well, son. I know you wanted to go to a school with a better Healing program, but your experience at Hogwarts will far outweigh any head start on your adult career. Don't be in such a hurry to grow up!

So, have you pranked anyone yet? That Defense professor sounds like a perfect trial target, or maybe one of those snake roommates of yours—no, I'm not disappointed about your House, and I'm not just saying that because Moony is hitting me for making cracks at your new friends. Ouch! He's got quite a swat, our Moony. Almost as good as Lily's. OUCH! Okay, so I deserved that. Anyway, Arch, I should have known you'd be a Slytherin with all that ambition to be a Healer, of course that's honest ambition, not really Slytherin ambition, but the hat probably can't tell the difference.

But if you're going to be a Slytherin, you're gonna have to go all the way with it—no half-baked Slytherins in our family! I've redecorated the entire house in green and silver, and I expect you to try out for your House Quidditch team, if only to make up for the fact that Harry can’t. James says she doesn't think she'll have time to join an intramural, since she'll be doing boring stuff like studying instead—I know, what a waste of talent! I've asked Dumbledore if I can come watch a few matches for old times’ sake, but the Board of Governors has recently changed the rules in the interest of security. Allegedly. James says it’s codswallop, but parents can't come watch the games anymore. It's apparently only students, staff, and Board of Governors members—how convenient—so I won't get to see you play, but you can still tell me all about it in loving detail. Moony wants to write now, so have fun, and don't work too hard or I’ll send you a Howler full of embarrassing stories.

Love, Dad.

Hey Archie, it's Remus. How's school? I hope you don't think your father is serious—no, not that joke again!—when he says not to focus on your studies. You should, of course, have fun, and trying out for Quidditch is a great idea, but learn a lot, too, so you can achieve the ambition that got you into Slytherin House. We wouldn't want all this green and silver tinsel to go to waste. I'm afraid I'm not joking. There are dancing snakes in the courtyard. Hurry home for Christmas break and control your father!

Love, Uncle Remus.

Rigel smiled and shook her head. She wondered if Sirius had noted her used of the dicto-quill in her letter and responded in kind to be cheeky. She liked to think she was better as controlling her stream of thoughts than he and Remus were. The asides and parenthetical clauses were difficult to follow with just the basic grammar charms built into the quill.

Her smile faded as she tucked the letter into her book bag. It wasn’t fair to Sirius, what they were doing. It wasn’t fair to James and Lily, either, but Sirius was the one who had only recently climbed out of the dark pool he’d sunk himself in after Diane’s tragic passing. It was equally tragic that, just as Sirius regained his footing—playing pranks again, expressing interest in Quidditch matches—Archie and Harry had ripped it out from under him.

She knew she had a responsibility, as Archie, to help Sirius continue to recover. It sat awkwardly in her stomach, a burden she had never expected to carry, but it was hers now, for better or worse. She prayed it wasn’t for worse.

--0

HpHpHp

--0

After breakfast, they had their first practical Potions lesson. Rigel flipped through the book as they waited for class to start, daydreaming about which one they would be brewing first. After his speech the day before, she half-hoped Snape would dispense with the book altogether and teach them something completely unexpected. As the bell rang, however, Snape waved his wand at the blackboard and a spidery hand scrawled the recipe for a boil cure, along with a page number for where it could be found in their textbook.

Rigel’s heart fell back into a normal rhythm as she realized they would be starting with potions that were little more than herbal remedies. She only hoped they moved quickly onto the more fascinating concoctions. She had been waiting to try things like Polyjuice, Amortentia, and Wolfsbane, partially because the ingredients were so expensive and mostly because such potions were dangerous to brew outside of a classroom without a license.

Slowly and fluidly, she set up her brewing station. The Boil-cure Potion wouldn't take long to make, and she wasn't in any hurry to get started. She wanted to savor the experience. Her first potion under proper instruction. She stowed her textbook safely away before unpacking her student potions kit. It was basic, but it held all the ingredients required for a potion like this. She wouldn’t get to explore the student storeroom that day, but she comforted herself with the idea that they wouldn’t have a student storeroom if they weren’t going to eventually brew much more difficult potions.

Snape lit the flames at every station simultaneously, and Rigel carefully settled her cauldron and waited for the entire bottom to get hot before adding the first ingredients: the wet ones that would form the base. There were no tricks to this potion; it was a simple add-and-stir, with a few extra steps for filtering and re-heating.

She glanced at the other students while she stirred, counting first clockwise and then counterclockwise in her head. Crabbe was squinting hopelessly at the blackboard, not seeming to realize the recipe was duplicated in his book. Nott was enthusiastically, if barbarically, chopping his dandelion roots; she could see the ragged edges from her own table. The fraying strands would catch the frog spores and prevent them from dissolving as they should. When the roots were strained, the soothing spores would be strained out as well, and his potion would be too acidic to use on human skin.

Rigel wondered if his knife was just exceedingly dull. She had a set of beautiful platinum knives that Remus, Lily, and Archie had all chipped in to get her for her tenth birthday. Less reactive than silver, with an edge that would remain spell-sharp for years. The basic silver-lined steel that came with the first-year kit probably couldn’t replicate her precise cuts.

Across the room, a girl in a Gryffindor tie dangled her long hair into her cauldron every time she leaned forward to check her potion’s consistency. This particular potion would not react badly to such treatment, aside from making her hair smell like swamp gas for the rest of the day, but it was poor sanitation practice all the same. Rigel took a moment to appreciate her short hair. She had been reluctant to sacrifice her curly locks as first, but it did make for much easier brewing.

Rigel could understand why Snape began with such a boring potion, if this was what he had to work with. At a school that didn’t even admit muggleborns, it was astonishing that most of the students lacked even the most basic concepts of brewing safety and technique. They had magical parents, for Merlin’s sake. Potions was one of the few branches of magic you could teach a kid before they had a wand, and she knew for a fact her classmates had tutors in magical history and the basics of self-defense. She shook her head in bewilderment as she took her potion off the fire. Some people just had no appreciation for the art.

She added the porcupine quills when her brew was sufficiently cooled. The instructions were very specific on that point, and she had learned the hard way how porcupine quills reacted to heat. The black mark where her cauldron had been still marred their living room rug. She was given permission to brew in her mother’s basement lab, with its built-in safety spells, shortly thereafter.

With at least half an hour of their block period to spare, Rigel bottled her sample and cleared her space. She had taken her time, and thought most people ought to be bottling by now, but only Draco and Goyle had reached the same stage. She eyed Goyle’s work and thought it was less that he’d finished his potion and more that his potion was simply finished. It looked like black tar congealing in the bottom of his cauldron, but he was gamely scraping some out and into a vial, so that was something.

Draco was yawning dramatically beside his finished sample, which would probably work as a boil-cure, if whoever used it didn't get so nauseated from inhaling the undercooked dillysprout fumes that they couldn't apply it properly. She supposed he may well gloat, since he had still done better than most.

Pansy was glaring at her potion, which was a cheerful yellow soup when it was supposed to be a dark green paste. Rigel thought she'd probably skipped adding the knotgrass entirely. Knotgrass was a thickening agent and green enough to be responsible for the final ideal color. Neville's potion wasn't too bad, just off-color and emitting faint brown smoke. He'd probably just gotten nervous and lost count of his counterclockwise stirring.

She and Draco packed up their station and took their samples to Snape's desk. The professor had spent the lesson carefully observing his students, like a bird of prey. He circled any who appeared weak, but instead of death, he delivered salvation when he swooped down on them. Snape had already prevented several explosions involving mishandled porcupine quills. His sharp eyes cut their way as they dropped off the samples, and he nodded curtly before turning his attention back to those still working. He seemed…tense, and Rigel didn’t blame him. Imagine being responsible for the safety of two dozen eleven-year-olds who hadn’t the good sense to keep from trailing their sleeves through their ingredient piles.

What did he see when he watched them brew, and was it disappointing? Rigel had often wondered why a man with enough ideas to churn out a major article for publication every two years or so would choose to teach schoolchildren at Hogwarts. Observing him now, she did not get the feeling he enjoyed the act of teaching for its own sake.

Perhaps she was being unfair, however. It was only their first lesson. His older students, who had been with him six or seven years, must give him more satisfaction. If they did not, Rigel vowed that she would make up for it in her time at Hogwarts. She would be the best student he had ever taught. She would show him his efforts were not wasted.

"When you are finished, you may get started on an eight-inch essay regarding the safety precautions one should take while working with such things as volatile ingredients, open flames, and sharp cutting implements," Snape barked loudly. "Due Monday."

Nobody dared to groan. Rigel took out a fresh roll of parchment and began her essay. Draco glanced at her paper several times from the corner of his eye, and she bore it patiently. If he had a question, he would ask. Sure enough, when she started a new paragraph he whispered, "You didn’t even make an outline. Are you going to write the whole thing from memory?"

She nodded, mentally organizing her points as she worked. It would be more instructive to write the essay in chronological order of the safety precautions one should take from beginning to end, instead of grouping them by the danger they prevented or combated.

Draco hummed disbelievingly. "What are you putting for the flames, then? It's not as though you can use a Flame-Freezing Charm if you want the potion to work."

"You should start by securing all loose articles of clothing. Sleeves should be rolled, hair tied back, that sort of thing. Then you should clear away unnecessary materials. None of the potions ingredients are wrapped in paper for a reason. Glass jars and metal containers are resistant to heat, but if your textbook is on the table by the flame and someone walks by and bumps your station, it could catch fire. That's why Professor Snape puts the recipe on the board even though it's also in the book." She spoke absently while considering the merits of using built-in fumigation spells when working with certain ingredients. "That enough to start?"

"Thanks." Draco shook his head ruefully. "I never would have guessed so much thought went into all this."

"Seventy percent of all serious magical accidents involve potions, not including flying accidents," Rigel said seriously. "There's an entire specialized field in Potions that deals with improving safety in the lab and educating people about the dangers of certain ingredients and tools."

"You're a Potions encyclopedia, Rigel," Pansy said quietly as she pulled up a chair. She had a fresh sheet of parchment to start her essay and a frown that said she was not satisfied with how her potion had turned out at all.

Rigel shrugged. She had always liked Potions, had been reading Potions Quarterly since she’d realized other people liked Potions, too, so of course she had a working knowledge of the subject.

"Snape is sure to notice eventually," Draco whispered reassuringly. "He's always really busy at the start of term. I used to never see him from August to October. I bet after Halloween, he’ll pay more attention to those who are doing well in his class."

"If he doesn't, I'll just have to try harder." Rigel brought one corner of her mouth up in a half-smile.

"Or you could just…tell him your ambitions." Draco raised his eyebrows. "He was serious in his start of term speech. Snape takes really good care of his Slytherins. All you have to do is ask, and he'll do almost anything for one of his snakes."

"Where's the fun in that?" she asked as she measured the inches she had written.

"I can't tell if he's serious," Pansy said ruefully.

Sirius would be pleased to know I was mistaken for him, she thought wryly, but she wasn't serious, not really. Snape might be willing to extend favors to the others, but for the son of Sirius Black? No, she didn’t think so. Rigel would have to prove that she was worth his time and effort.

She had eight-and-three-quarter inches of medium-small writing. Not exactly eight, which would indicate she gave up the essay as soon as she could, but not an entire inch longer, which might suggest she didn't respect his requirements.

The bell rang as she was brushing the drying sand off her essay. She rolled it up and waved Draco and Pansy to go ahead of her. The rest of the class filed out, shoulders slumped as though they had just undergone the defining tribulation of their short lives, and Rigel waited to see whether Snape immediately left as well. He was making short work of tidying the classroom, so she approached him. He had his back to her, wiping the blackboard clean with his wand, when she cleared her throat quietly.

Snape turned his head sharply, nostrils flared, and Rigel was struck with the knowledge that his immediate response to surprise was to locate the source and supply oxygen to his brain for quick thinking. Upon identifying her, his face assumed a blank expression, and he lowered his wand carefully, as if he had to think about leaving himself open to attack around a student. Rigel had the sudden, ironic hope that her short hair and grey eyes didn't make her look toomuch like Sirius, no matter that that had been her original intention.

"Mr. Black." Snape looked down his prominent nose at her, his voice studiously inflectionless. They were back to neutrality, then. "Do you have a question about the lesson or essay?"

"No, sir." She said it deferentially, keeping her hands still and her eyes at a level just below his. "I've finished my essay, and I was wondering if you would mind giving me an additional assignment for the weekend." She dared to meet his eyes for a moment, but found only fathoms in their depths. "I would, of course, understand if you had no time to grade a second essay." Merlin forbid he think her presumptuous with his time.

He blinked hard, once, and lowered his chin to catch her eye directly. "Extra work won’t gain you extra credit; it would be factored into your grade as if it were required, and do not make the mistake of believing that doing twice as much means you can work half as diligently on each."

"Of course, sir." She kept his gaze, willing him to take a chance on her.

He looked away first, turning his gaze to the group of samples on his desk, searching until his eyes came to rest on the one labeled "Black." Snape pursed his lips at the innocuous vial of green paste.

"Give me the essay I have already assigned. If I find that it is neither rushed nor hopelessly inaccurate, I will consider giving you an additional assignment." He held out his hand for her scroll, which she relinquished. "Come to my office after dinner to either collect this essay for revision or receive more work."

"Yes, sir." She bobbed her head in a nod that somehow came out as an awkward half-bow. Her cheeks flushed. "I—thank you."

“Don’t thank me yet, Mr. Black.”

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--0

[end of chapter seven]

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 8:

After their afternoon Herbology lesson, Rigel let Draco and Pansy walk ahead of her up the lawn while she veered toward the lake, where Fred and George had promised to introduce her to their clever and conveniently-fifth-year older brother.

A line of leafy trees presided over the shore of the lake, and a number of older students had taken refuge under their branches. She wondered at what level they would earn free periods and doubted she’d spend that extra time chatting under trees, unless she had already read all the Potions books in the library by then.

She walked the length of the shoreline, but didn’t see any redheads she recognized. Just as she was debating returning to the castle, an unfamiliar voice called her into the shade.

"Rigel Black, yeah?" The speaker was a smiling boy with dreadlocks that brushed his shoulders when he stuck out his hand. “Lee Jordan. Fred and George mentioned you’d be coming down.” White teeth flashed brightly against his mahogany skin, and the mischief in his brown eyes seemed barely contained by their thick, spiky lashes.

“They mentioned you, too. Pleased to meet you.”

Jordan grinned. "You say that like you mean it."

"I do mean it." Rigel allowed polite confusion to bleed into her tone.

"A Slytherin never means anything." He waved his hand. "But neither does a prankster, so you're actually in excellent company."

"Gryffindor seems to have the cornered the field in that regard," she said wryly.

Jordan inclined his head magnanimously. "My year in particular. But aside from me, Fred, and George, you’re unlikely to meet additional competition."

“Competition?” Rigel smiled with her eyes. "Somehow, I doubt I’m in the running."

“Son of a Marauder, and you don’t have an aptitude for pranks? That’s not what the twins—” Jordan broke off, turning toward the commotion coming their way.

"—no, no! You two are not throwing me in the lake!"

Fred and George were literally dragging their older brother down the path toward them. Percy had a look of panic and was struggling vainly. She wondered if they’d taken his wand, or if Percy was above doing magic on his little brothers. "I mean it this time! I'll owl Mum if you don't release me this instant!"

Fred and George dropped Percy's arms as though they had caught fire.

Fred chuckled nervously. "Let’s not drag poor old Mum into this."

"I'm telling her you called her old and poor—"

"Now, Perc, there's no need for all that." George cut across his brother quickly, pointing toward their shady tree. "We've just brought you here to meet someone, see?"

"Who?" Percy demanded, looking around. "I've already met Lee."

"It’s the little one behind Lee." Fred jogged forward and dragged Rigel into clearer view. "This one, here."

"Oh." Percy adjusted his horn-rimmed glasses and smoothed his robes before stepping forward to meet her. "I'm Percy Weasley. My brothers didn't drag you down here, too, did they? Because man-handling a first-year is an entirely unacceptable sort of—"

"Drag? What drag?" Fred reared his head back in exaggerated affrontery.

"Actually, I asked them to introduce us," she said. "I'm Rigel Black. You helped me out on the train ride, if you remember, so when I discovered who you were, I wanted to thank you formally."

"Ah." Percy seemed extremely taken aback, as though no one had ever thanked him for anything in his life. "Well, there's no need for all that. But you're welcome. I’m glad I was there. Flint isn't usually that troublesome, but he tends to be in a terrible mood on the train, and sometimes he takes it out on others."

"We’re in the same House, now, so we've worked out our differences, but I still wanted to thank you for stepping in when you did.” Rigel widened her eyes and tilted her head back earnestly. “It was above and beyond, and I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you."

Percy flushed. "Just doing my duty as a prefect."

"Still, I'll try and pay back the favor someday, if you’re ever in trouble." From the looks the twins exchanged behind Percy’s back, she needed to dial it back a little, so Rigel softened her expression from outright adoration to something more admiring.

The tallest redhead acknowledged her words a tad uncomfortably. "And if you should need help again, I'll be glad to do what I can, of course."

Rigel widened her eyes guilelessly. "Would you?" she asked wonderingly. It was just the opening she’d been waiting for. "I wouldn't want to be a bother, and I'd ask a Ravenclaw, but I don't know any, and you seem so smart..."

"Yes?" Percy prompted. His chest inflated ever-so-slightly. "What is it?"

"Well, I'm curious about so many things, but sometimes I don't understand it the way the book explains. Could I come ask you when I get confused in my studies?" She infused her voice with tentative hope.

"Of course!" Percy assured her. "Far be it from me to keep an eager young mind from knowledge. Anytime you want to discuss something academic, just come up and knock on the Gryffindor common room. Fred and George can show you where, and even if I'm not there, someone will be able to find me."

"Thanks so much." Rigel aimed her best smile up at the prefect.

"Yes, well." Percy adjusted his glasses and nodded curtly to her. "Just maybe don't wear that tie, and it should be fine." With that, he said goodbye to Lee and his brothers and started back up the path toward the castle.

"Well, I'm impressed," said Jordan when Percy had gone. "It took Fred and George three months to get an invite to the Slytherin common room."

"Though they never did let us come back after that first time," Fred said wistfully.

"Some people just can't hold their jinxed sweets." George gave Rigel an odd look. "We would have let you in the common room—supervised, of course—if you'd asked, you know."

"I really do want to talk to your brother," Rigel said. "I think he'll be a wonderful resource for my studies."

"Whatever you say," Fred said slowly. “Only careful who you use that look on in the future. You can only get away with it so long, even at your age.”

They were observant. She would take the advice under consideration.

"And don't forget to stop in and see us when you come up to the Nest," George added.

"We gotta go.” Jordan had a Tempus spell floating above his wrist. “Oliver called a team meeting about the trials next week, remember? And McGonagall wants to talk to me about commentating.”

"Nice meeting you, Jordan," Rigel said.

"One day I'll believe you, kid." He laughed as the three of them ran off. "But not today!"

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

Dinner was spent twisting her vegetables across her plate and avoiding Draco's increasingly exasperated questions about where she went after Herbology. She didn’t know how to explain why she needed an upperclassman to ask about advanced studies when, as they were correctly aware, she wasn’t interested in any studies that didn’t include Potions. It was Pansy who finally shut him up.

"That’s enough, Draco," she said severely. "Rigel doesn’t have to tell you everything he does. He can disappear if he wants to, and I would say the same if someone was pressuring you to say where you’d been this afternoon.”

Draco set his face mulishly, but subsided for the moment. He started to wind up again when Rigel told them she had somewhere to be after dinner, but a look from Pansy made him shrug as nonchalantly as an eleven-year-old could manage and go with the others back to the Slytherin common room without another word.

Rigel approached Snape's office in the dungeons with slow, deliberate steps. She'd waited exactly five minutes after he left the staff table before following. She wanted to seem punctual, but not impatient.

The door to Snape's office was made of sturdy oak, but it felt like an insurmountable barrier stood between her and the other side. What if he hated my essay? What if the things I wrote down were too obvious? She lifted a hand to knock on the door but dropped it again when she noticed it shaking. She had thought that assignment seemed too easy. There was probably a trick somewhere she’d missed, and now he was going to think she was the most oblivious student who ever had the nerve to waste their professor's time.

“Don’t chicken out,” she told herself firmly. This was what she had come to do. She knocked firmly before she could stop herself.

“Enter!”

The call was sharp, but he didn’t sound angry. Disproportionately relieved that he hadn’t told her to go away instead, she turned the silver handle, distracted for a moment by the shine of the curious metal. Odd choice for a dungeon doorknob.

Professor Snape's office was a sparse, square room, decorated with the most gruesome of ingredients. Jars of spleens, eyeballs, dried wings, and scales were displayed like trophies on the many shelves; otherwise, there were no personal touches. No books or keepsakes. No art, save a portrait of Salazar Slytherin. The only furniture was a basic wooden desk and the chair Snape sat on.

The desk was empty but for a stack of detention slips and trays that looked like they would hold essays later in the year. His chair looked uncomfortable, and she couldn’t picture him sitting there working for several hours a day. She wondered whether the office was merely for show. If so, it was a good intimidation tactic—she certainly felt intimidated as she moved to stand in front of his desk, hands folded behind her back. He looked at her consideringly from the other side of it, and she tried to keep her returning stare deferential, but it was difficult.

She did not like to be intimidated. If he’d called her there to ridicule her for something she’d missed in her essay, she would not hesitate to defend herself no matter how much she respected him.

He took in her stance and expression, and the lines on his face softened for a brief instant. It was the kind of unintended slack created when a person was caught off-guard by a memory they thought they'd forgotten. It passed quickly, however, and Snape pressed his mouth into an even thinner line than it usually presented.

"Mr. Black," he began, his tone once again one of carefully correct neutrality. "I find it…difficult to imagine that you completed the essay I assigned in the extra time at the end of today's lesson." She opened her mouth, but he held up a hand and continued. "I am not accusing you of anything, but it is possible that a student would be able to get the essay topic from a Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff who had their practical lesson yesterday and complete the essay ahead of time in a misguided endeavor to get into my good books, as they say."

Rigel's eyes widened in unfabricated dismay. He thought her a dishonest brown-noser. She might be trying to impress him, but she would not go so far as to feign her work. "Is there any way I can convince you of my sincerity?" She could not fully keep the trepidation from her voice.

"There is." Snape folded his hands on the desk and held her gaze. "If you are to convince me you do not require references when writing such an essay, I would ask you to write another now, in my presence.”

She blew out a breath she didn’t know she was holding. Was that all? She’d already asked for another assignment, so that sounded more like he was capitulating than testing her.

Snape misinterpreted her exhale, and his eyes sharpened. “Know that I do not mean to attack you, Mr. Black. The essay you gave me conveyed an advance understanding of the basics of brewing. This second assignment would be a way for me to accurately gauge your capability, but if you choose to, you may leave here without writing the assignment and we shall not speak of this again. Our dealings will remain the same as any of your Slytherin classmates.”

Bully that. She lifted her chin, confident she could tackle almost any Potions-related essay he gave her. Even if she didn’t know, she could make a reasonable guess. "I didn’t bring a quill or parchment."

He reached into a desk drawer and pulled out a clean roll of parchment along with a set of writing instruments. He set them on the desk silently, almost daring her to take them.

"What is the essay, sir?" she asked, her confidence dipping once more. What if it was something terribly advanced, like the recipe for Wolfsbane or Felix Felicis?

"It is not an essay, per se.” He lifted an eyebrow, and now she could see it was definitely a challenge. “Simply list every Potions ingredient you know of, followed by any dangers and uses you remember. It is meant to be along the same lines as what we covered in class yesterday, though if you know of others not discussed in class, please add those as well. Take your time. There is no length requirement, but I would like to understand the breadth of your knowledge."

Rigel nodded and reached to take the writing supplies. "May I use the other side of your desk to write on, sir?"

"I have not often been called fair," he said dryly. "But I have never yet forced a student to write an essay standing up." So saying, he pulled out his wand and conjured a student desk and chair in the corner of the room for her use. She thanked him, then sat and immediately began writing.

Abberra Leaves: used in Skele-Grow (sliced) and Nutrient Potion (diced). Must be harvested by pulling the roots of the plant up intact or else the leaves dry out and become poisonous within three days.

Aconite: used in Wolfsbane (the flowers, crushed), various poisons (usually the stalks, shredded) and recently in Ardor Increasing Potions (just the pollinated stamens, though this method is largely untested). Very dangerous to collect, as it grows most prolifically in werewolf territory and must be harvested with silver at the full moon. Also poisonous to ingest and difficult to add to Potions without causing them to explode. Highly reactive to most other ingredients.

Adder Stingers: used mainly in Prank Potions to cause embarrassing rashes or other skin conditions, with the exception of its use in Morning Sickness Remedies for pregnant witches in their first trimester. Dangerous because too much in any potion can make it too hot to drink without burning the throat of the drinker severely. Should wear gloves when working with it.

Aesop's Flower: used by those in the field of Divination for Dream Walking Potions. Strong hallucinogen, sometimes sold on the black market as a recreational drug. Dangerously addictive in frequent, heavy doses.

And so it went.

Rigel wrote all the way to: Mellonite: used for Muscle Cramp Relief Potions (ground and dried) as well as in Intestinal Regulation Potions and in many balms and pastes for sore or stiff muscles. Dangerous only if a person inhales the fumes of it in a potion, loses muscle control, and causes an accident.

Then she ran out of parchment.

She rose and walked the few steps over to Snape's desk. He seemed to be drafting a letter, so she kept her eyes politely away from his parchment and waited for him to come to a stopping point. He set down his quill and reached out a hand toward her, palm up.

"Finished?" he asked.

"No, sir." Rigel said. Snape looked up, then around the room, seeming surprised by how low the torches had burned. "I need more parchment."

"More parchment?" he repeated, frowning.

"Yes," she said, apologetic. Perhaps he was irritated she had used so much. "I'll be sure to reimburse you for the supplies."

"Reimb—" He scowled blackly. "Give me that." He summoned the roll of parchment from her desk and unrolled it, staring at the small, even writing on the front, then slowly turning it over to the back side, which was equally saturated.

"I only got halfway through the Ms," she said regretfully.

His eyes snapped up to hers. "Sit. Now." He crooked his finger at the chair she was using, which slid over to face his desk with a jarring scrape of wood on stone. When she hesitated, startled by his sudden impatience when he had seemed pleased to wait around all night before, he gestured imperiously for her to use it. She sat quietly while his eyes moved rapidly across, then down, the scroll. She mentally compiled the rest of the ingredients she remembered, in case he asked her to recite them orally instead.

Minutes passed in silence, their only interruption when Snape flipped the roll over. At last, he flung down the parchment and fixed her with an iron stare. "Do you have a photographic memory, Mr. Black?"

"No, sir."

"An...extreme fascination for Herbology," he suggested. She thought he sounded sick.

"Not particularly," she said quietly.

"Am I to understand, then, that you have more than a passing interest in Potions, Mr. Black?" Snape clenched his teeth on her surname convulsively.

"Exactly, sir." She searched his face, eyes flicking desperately over too-pale skin and flame-retardant gel slicked into chemically damaged hair. "As long as I can remember, it’s all I’ve really cared about. You understand, don't you? No one else does. They say I know enough about Potions and I should concentrate on something else, but…I can’t. Nothing else interests me. But you—you'll teach me new things, won't you? I don’t mean to impose, and I’m sure you get a lot of requests for tutelage considering your position in the Potions community. It’s just, I'm so tired of learning from books."

His eyes closed like steel curtains for a long moment. Rigel tried to focus on the jars of ingredients, the situation with Flint, her new and strange friendship with Draco, anything but Snape and his unreadable expression. Perhaps it was just the tension in the room, but it seemed to Rigel her Fate hung in the balance in that moment. Whatever came next, it was entirely up to him.

Snape sighed heavily. "The level of knowledge you have displayed today is nothing short of incredible for a first-year student, so perhaps you will forgive me for having been somewhat reluctant to believe it.” He passed his hand across his eyes. His nostrils flared as he added, "I do understand."

Rigel hadn't realized what those words would mean, placed together like that and coming from Snape, until he said them. She'd heard of losing a weight you didn't know you carried, but this felt like a window had opened and she hadn't even known she was indoors. As though she'd been looking at a world removed by glass without realizing it, and now she could feel the breeze.

She closed her eyes to savor those words, then opened them and poured everything she felt for Potions into her gaze. It was more difficult than she expected, perhaps because she had never fully shared this part of herself with anyone, but she projected all her passion and curiosity and longing—the despair when she realized her dream was here at Hogwarts, where she could never be—and the triumph of those words, of having her dream validated at last. She shoved it all toward Master Snape, wanting him to see, to know, as she knew, that Potions was the only thing she could ever do.

One moment she was offering up her soul, equal parts willing Snape to understand and wondering desperately if he thought she had what it took, and the next—

Her consciousness slipped. Shifted. And the feelings were not hers—disbelief and ambivalent consternation—and the thoughts were not either—what was she to do? Be glad to have found a Slytherin at last who had the potential she needed or bitterly resent that it would be Black to have such a son, one wasted on him if the boy had to learn Potions from a book—and then she was gasping for air, feeling only her own bewilderment and nausea.

She staggered back from the desk, her breath short and somewhat panicked. Snape was frozen, eyes flared in surprised anger.

"What just happened?" Rigel asked, putting a hand to her temple.

"So I would ask you, if I did not already know what happened. You projected your unsolicited thoughts to me, and what’s more, you trespassed on my thoughts regarding you in a flagrant violation of—”

Rigel cut across him. "You saw my thoughts? What did you see?" Her voice rose uncontrollably toward her natural octave. "I don't understand how—" Her voice failed her, and she buried her face in her hands, trembling violently. He was furious. She was exposed. What had she done? It couldn't all end there, it just couldn't.

"Precisely what I wish to know," Snape growled. "How did you do this? My mind is shielded and that was no Legilimency I've ever experienced. It was as though I were originator of the feelings you projected, instead of merely an observer to your experiences. What did you do, Mr. Black?”

She heard him speaking, but it was from such a long way away it didn’t register that he was talking to her.

It came louder.

"Mr. Black. Arctur—Rigel. Rigel."

"Huh—what, me?" Rigel gulped the air desperately.

"Of course, boy, who else—?" Snape began again. "Rigel, you are having a panic attack. Take slower breaths and talk through it." He inhaled deeply and let it out slowly. She found herself mimicking him without realizing it until her trembling ceased.

"I’m sorry. I'm so sorry, Professor." She sucked in air and babbled as coherently as she could. "I didn’t mean to—I wasn’t trying to—” The air was just out of reach. She closed her eyes to focus on getting the words out. It was important he understood her. “I just wanted to make you understand. That I—that I’m serious. About being here. Please don’t send me home. I swear I didn’t know what I was—”

"I am not going to expel you, Rigel," Snape said, slowly and clearly. "If you cannot control your fear, I will provide you a Calming Draught.”

"Oh. No, thank you." She was not expelled. She was not expelled and he was not as angry as he’d first appeared. Her heartrate calmed even further as she realized he still referred to her as Rigel Black. If his side of that strange experience had been as disorientating as hers, it was unlikely he'd noticed anything significantly incriminating. "So...so what now, sir?"

"I don't understand what happened here, but it is clear you did not intend it, and…it has cleared any doubts I may have had about your sincerity in learning my art," Professor Snape said carefully. "Provided it does not happen again, I see no reason for the last ten minutes to affect anything beyond this room."

Her head shot up so fast it cricked, and she stared, unable to believe it could go away so easily. "Truly? You would give me another chance?"

Snape set his face determinately. "You have not yet spent your first chance, Mr. Black.”

She caught the unconscious emphasis on her last name again. “My father—”

“Your father does not factor here.”

Her mouth fell open. Just like that, he was going to ignore the fact that he and Sirius hated one another? “Then…you think I have talent? Enough to pursue this field?”

“You might have tremendous talent, but that it not the reason I will take you as my student. More than talent, you have drive, and that is the hallmark of our House. Do you understand?” He caught her gaze and she found she did not understand, not really. There was a fierce promise in his expression. “I will cheer for Gryffindor before I see that ambition atrophy."

Draco had said…but she hadn’t believed it. He would teach her merely because she wanted it badly enough? Then, she had never needed to prove her knowledge or ability at all?

Rigel swayed a bit on her feet, suddenly exhausted.

"It's been a long day for us both, Mr. Black.” Snape’s voice held a thread of amusement she didn’t think she had imagined, and she wondered if perfect neutrality had drifted ever-so-slightly toward lukewarm. "Get some sleep, and we will deal with the aftermath of this when we must. For Monday, you may choose one ingredient from the list you compiled and write ten inches of in-depth discussion on it."

"Yes, sir." Rigel moved toward the door, but paused. "Thank you." He nodded curtly, and something about the cool professionalism pushed her to add, "You won't regret this, Professor Snape. I promise you."

"Of that, I have no doubts, Mr. Black."

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--0—0

--0

[end of chapter eight].

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 9:

Saturday was going to be great. With no classes to swallow the free spaces in her schedule, she woke early and slipped out of the dorms to find the library. If she got a head-start on Flint’s homework assignments, she could finish them before her classmates realized she had more work than she should.

She had to stop and stare for a moment when she reached the library doors. Her family’s library had a well-curated selection, and the Black library at Grimmauld Place was nothing to sniff at, but Hogwarts had a library that looked as though it spontaneously generated a copy of every book ever written the world over. She wasn’t even sure it ought to fit inside the castle, and after a moment of dizzying disorientation, she stopped thinking about it and let the undetectable extension charms do their thing.

The sun was barely visible through the windows, but the lamps were lit at the study tables. She chose an out of the way desk and unrolled Flint’s letter to remind herself of the assignments.

Due Monday: 14 inches on the properties of the Venimis Tentacula plant, including how it is grown and harvested and a labeled diagram drawn to scale of the important features.

Due Wednesday: 10 inches on Switching Spells and how they relate to and compare with Swapping Spells.

Due Wednesday, 12 inches on the late sixteenth century goblin rebellions headed by Urlag the Terrible.

Due Thursday: 1 roll of parchment on the merits and consequences of using different materials in brewing potions that affect the nervous system.

Rigel re-rolled the parchment and told herself firmly, I can do this. It wasn’t anything impossible. She could think of several arguments to make for the Potions essay already, and she knew enough about Venimis Tentacula that she could probably get away with just one other source. She had never learned to draw, so she hoped Professor Sprout didn't grade on artistry.

The History and Charms essays were a mystery. She was aware of goblin rebellions generally, as a thing that sometimes happened, but she had no idea who led which ones. And if she’d been put on the spot, she would have said Switching Spells and Swapping Spells were definitely the same thing.

In the stacks dedicated to Charms, she found The Standard Book of Spells, Grade Five, along with a book called Charms of Equal Exchange, which looked promising. Before she was halfway through the essay, she had taken four additional trips to the shelves for more specific books and had The Standard Book of Spells, grades two, three, and four open in front of her as well. It was a few hours before she had ten inches that she thought comprised an accurate comparison of Swapping and Switching Spells, though she was not too certain of the paragraph in which she’d attempted to describe their relative level of difficulty. It was hard to know without having done the spells herself.

After re-shelving all the Charms books, she wandered to the History section and ran into a bit of trouble. The entire section was organized by author, not by period, so finding a reference beyond A History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot, which only contained a brief synopsis of the rebellion, proved impossible. Rigel had already skipped breakfast and only had a couple of hours left before she would be missed at lunch, so she decided to risk asking the librarian for help. It wasn’t so unusual for a first-year to be asking for books on sixteenth-century goblin rebellions, surely.

Madam Pince sat in silent judgement behind her ornate desk in the center of the library. Her eyes roved the stacks at intervals for any sign of disruption, and there was something about her that reminded Rigel of a vulture. An air of underfed savagery lingered in the way her bony hands grasped the edges of the books she rescued from the return pile. As Rigel approached, she thought she saw the woman whisper reassuringly to one as she lovingly stamped its inner cover.

"Excuse me?" Rigel kept her voice sotto voce, knowing without being told that this was a woman who held the sanctity of the library’s quiet in absolute reverence.

Pince turned sharp, hungry eyes on her. "What do you want?" Her whisper was strangely articulated, developed, perhaps, over long years of speaking only at sub-volume.

"I need information on a specific goblin rebellion," Rigel said softly, "But I don't know what book I—"

Pince cut her off impatiently. "Which rebellion?"

"Urlag the Terrible's uprising in the—"

"Late sixteenth century, yes. North side of the fourth stack to the left in the History section.” Her eyes longingly followed the path of her own directions. "Sixth shelf from the bottom. There are three texts, all by Wilheilma Pofkey, embossed with silver on the spines. Now go, and be quiet."

Rigel made her way back to the History section, marveling at the mind capable of retaining and retrieving such exact information. She wondered if it was love or obsession that kept the knowledge clear in Pince’s psyche. Rigel knew from experience the two often cohabitated.

She counted the stacks and found the books Pince recommended. Wilheilma Pofkey had written three books on the sixteenth-century: one on the politics of that time, one on its economy and trade, and one on its art and culture. Urlag's rebellion was explored through a difference lens in each of them.

Rigel had eight inches written when she glanced at the big clock by the doors and realized lunch began in five minutes. She rolled her work reluctantly. Urlag turned out to be a fascinating goblin for his time period. He’d revolutionized the techniques of goblin warfare by inventing a system of wards that proved it was possible to lay siege to an entire community of witches and wizards. His rebellion had starved the wizarding government of the time into desperation by cutting off trade options until they agreed to renegotiate the goblins' contracts.

Rigel stacked all three books on the sixteenth century and toted them over to the checkout desk so she could finish the essay in her room later. Madam Pince gave her a sour look as she pulled the books toward her to update their checkout logs.

"Name?"

"Rigel Black."

Madam Pince went still except for her hands, which convulsed on the books. "Black?" The books disappeared behind her desk, so fast Rigel thought she must not be as old as she looked. "No books for you, you—" The librarian stood to glare down at Rigel, who was too stunned by the sudden vitriol to move. Pince’s nostrils flared as she exhaled fiercely, like a dragon smoking out its prey. "Sirius Black nearly burned down my Divination section.”

Pince slammed her hands down on the desk, leaning over it to deliver her scathing diatribe more directly. “Most of those books are handwritten accounts of long dead Seers—priceless tomes of knowledge!” Rigel took a step backwards before her brain realized it was probably better not to make any sudden movements. Pince shook her head as she pointed a bone-thin finger toward the exit. “No. No son of his is welcome here. Out! Get out!"

Pince’s voice had risen to a shriek, sanctity of the library be damned, and Rigel was drawing dirty looks from the other students, so she left the books and got out of there before someone could take House points.

First Snape, now Pince. She had to wonder whether pretending to be Sirius' son was more of a hindrance than a help.

Rigel didn’t realize how fast she was walking until she passed a series of paintings she didn’t recognize. She hadn't been paying attention to where she was going, taking any route available to put distance between her and the irate librarian. When she checked the Map, it informed her she’d climbed two flights of stairs in her haste. She was in the east-most corridor on the fifth floor.

She wasn’t going to figure out what to do about her library access on an empty stomach. Better to go to lunch and worry about the rest of it later. Rigel hiked up her book bag as she consulted the Map for the quickest route. A set of crumbling stairs at the end of the corridor led directly to the third floor. The stairs were only wide enough for two people across, and they were steeper than most, by-passing the fourth floor at a sharp angle, but they would put her nearer the main staircase at the bottom.

Rigel was halfway down the stairs, thinking longingly of rice pudding, when a hot lance of magic pierced her calf from behind. A Trip-Jinx. Archie had caught her more than once with it, though never on a flight of stairs. It bunched the muscles in her leg, forcing a spasm that pitched her forward into space, and the weight of her bag as it swung out ahead of her overbalanced her further. She had time to bring up her hands to protect her head and face, and then she was toppling into oblivion.

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

When she woke, it was to a dull blanket of pain that shifted and sharpened in several places as she became aware enough to tease the sensations into actual sense. Her throbbing neck could be explained by the uncomfortable angle at which it sat—half-scrunched against the bottom step of the stairs she vaguely recalled starting down. Bruises throbbed at her awareness, like blinking lights on a display. Her tongue felt swollen, as though she had bitten it, and at first, she thought she’d injured her back into an awkward position, but then she realized she was laying on top of her bookbag. She hoped the essays weren't irreparably wrinkled.

Rigel braced her right hand against the steps to push herself up to her knees, but when she shifted her body, pain pulled a whimper from her lips quicker than her brain could figure out what was wrong. Her left hand registered a panicked complaint, and somehow it had earned the power to make her stomach heave and her head spin. She forced herself to look.

The strap on her bag had wrapped around her left wrist, tangled somehow between the trip and the fall and forcibly tightened until her wrist snapped under the strain. Unwinding the strap would make it immeasurably worse, but she couldn’t leave it that way. She forced her right hand to move, trying to imagine it was someone else’s wrist. Someone else’s purple, swollen appendage that had to be unwound. She peeled and twisted the unbreakable strap away from the snapped joint, her stomach attempting mutiny several times, despite it having no breakfast or lunch with which to manufacture munitions.

Pain swelled and throbbed as blood rushed back and forth across the de-pressurized divide, and she rocked against the feeling with a low keen as tears ran from her eyes, fleeing the carnage. She couldn’t blame them. She wanted to flee from her own body as well, but she was trapped there in the hurricane of agony. When the roaring, churning tide of pain ebbed to something more constant, she risked another, miserable look at the broken appendage.

She could not fix it. She could find the Hospital Wing on the Map, but she knew enough about medical magic from Archie to hesitate, even through the pain. A Healer could tell all sorts of things about a patient. Diagnostic spells might reveal too much. How could she guarantee the Mediwitch looked only at her wrist and not the rest of her? A fall down a set of stairs would merit a scan for concussion, for internal bleeding, and Merlin only knew what else.

Rigel levered herself onto the bottom stair without jostling her left arm, wondering if a spell to fix a broken wrist was something a first year could perform. She certainly wanted it badly enough to make the magic work, but she was also banned from the library. Perhaps an older Slytherin could teach her the spell, if she found something to trade them for it.

She was just checking the zipper on her bag to make sure nothing had fallen out of it when cheerful voices echoed down the third-floor corridor ahead. She arranged herself casually, draping her robes over her left hand and suppressing the sound she wanted to make as two boys came around the corner.

It was Ron and Neville, probably on their way back from lunch. They stopped in surprise when they saw her sitting on the ground at the foot of the stairs.

She tried to grit her teeth in a small smile. “Hi Neville. Ron.” Her voice sounded strained even to her own ears, and she knew she must look a mess, with her clothes and hair in disarray and tear-tracks on her cheeks.

The two Gryffindors gave her concerned looks.

"Are you okay, Rigel?" Neville bit his lip, looking her over.

“What are you doing on the ground?” Ron added.

"Just…so many stairs." She gestured vaguely to the steep flight behind her with her right hand. “Thought I’d take a break.” The unintentional pun made a slightly-hysterical voice in her head laugh into the abyss of pain.

Neville nodded kindly. "It is a lot. Almost wish I’d been a Hufflepuff. They don’t have to climb the whole castle three times a day."

Ron set his face in a mulish look that said he wasn't going to be misdirected so easily. "I didn’t see you at lunch, and you don't look tired. You look ill. Your face is gone all green. Have you been crying?”

Rigel grimaced at Ron’s sharp observational skills, and Neville misinterpreted the expression.

"Were you really, Rigel? It’s all right, you know. We wouldn’t tell anyone, and there aren't any Slytherins around to see."

She tried another smile, pretty sure it came out like a wince. "Thanks, Neville. I’ll be okay, though I am a bit peckish from missing lunch. Shouldn’t climb stairs on an empty stomach.”

"Well, that doesn't explain why you missed lunch, or why your clothes are roughed up and your face is getting greener by the moment. Godric, you look like you just fell off a cliff." His own words caught up to him as his eyes darted between her and the stairs behind her. She could practically see him counting her limbs: three visible, one not. His mouth settled into a grim line. "Or down a flight of stone steps. Show us your left wrist, Rigel."

"Oh, no." Neville moaned as if it had been him who fell. "Did you trip?"

"Yeah, I did." She admitted. She clutched the robes folded over her wrist. "I'm really okay, though, so you guys just go back to whatever—"

Ron strode forward and grabbed her forearm with incredible speed. He yanked her left hand out of her robes, an ugly cry ripped out of her throat, and Ron dropped her arm with a startled sound of his own. She cradled it protectively, blinking back another wave of tears, and Neville hissed sympathetically as Ron apologized over and over. She looked down at her wrist. It bent unnaturally away from her and was turning all sorts of alarming colors. She kept her mouth firmly shut and breathed through her nose.

When he’d run out of curses and apologies, Ron seized command of the situation. "That's broken," he said firmly. "Neville, stay here while I go find a professor or someone who knows where the Hospital Wing is."

"No." Rigel gasped, still riding the horse of pain. "No Hospital Wing." They looked at her like she was speaking Gobbledygook. "I can’t stand hospitals. And Mediwizards, too. They upset me."

"You can't just leave it like that," Neville said. "It has to be set and Healed, right?"

“I won’t go to the Hospital Wing.”

Ron began to pace as he tried to decide what to do. "Okay. If you won't, you won’t. Then we'll take you back to our common room. Percy's there, and he's a prefect. He knows all kinds of magic. Maybe he can even set the bone, or something."

"Fine." Rigel was beginning to feel a little overwhelmed, and she wondered if that was the shock finally wearing off.

Neville helped her stand and Ron took her bookbag. The three of them made their way slowly up the stairs, down the sixth-floor corridor, and up another flight until they stopped before a huge portrait of a voluptuous woman in pink.

"Flitterglibs," Ron said clearly. The portrait swung outward to reveal an enormous hole. It was large enough to clamber through, but she had to question with incredulity the sheer annoyance it must be to do this daily several times. They piled in one after another, and Neville led her to a ring of furniture in front of the fire while Ron ran off to find his brother.

She had been sitting on one of the plushy red couches for only a minute or so when something that sounded like an avalanche came clambering down a nearby set of stairs. The crashing sound turned out to be Fred and George, both of whom were laughing uproariously as they pulled a protesting Ron along behind them.

"No, Fred. George, stop it!" Ron twisted in their grasp. "I have to get to Percy. I don't have time for this!"

"Percy is incapacitated, baby brother," George said between laughs. "I promise, you really don't want to see him right now."

"Let go.” Ron pulled backwards but was no match for his brothers’ combined weights. “Gred, Forge, whoever you are, this is serious! I need Percy right—"

"Now, now, ickle Ronnikins," Fred shook his head admonishingly. "What could you possibly need Percy for when you've got us? Tell us your little first-year woes, and we promise not to mock you extensively."

"Unless you really, really deserve it," George added.

"Unless you can heal broken bones, you'd better go undo whatever you did to Percy so he can help me," Ron demanded. His face flamed like his hair in the heat of his anger.

The twins sobered immediately.

"Broken bones, you say?” Fred crossed his arms. “We've some experience with those, haven't we, Forge?"

"Indeed, we have, Gred. Depending on the type, of course. Whose bones did you break, Ron?" George’s eyes moved critically over Ron's thin form. "’Cause all yours look just fine to me."

"Not me," Ron said tiredly. "Another first year fell down some stairs and his wrist looks pretty bad."

"Ooh, wrist bones are tricky," George said. "Tell him to go to the Hospital Wing."

"He won’t go. Says he hates hospitals," Ron explained. "Can't you do something to help? Or do I need to get Percy after all?"

"Oh, we can do something," Fred said cheerfully. "It'll hurt like hell, though."

Ron blanched. "Uh, never mind, then. I'll just..." He looked helplessly back toward the fireplace, where Neville and Rigel watched the exchange anxiously.

The twins followed his glance and broke into grins.

"Rigel!" Fred cried, bounding down the stairs and over to where she sat. "What are you doing here?"

"We didn't expect you so soon." George's smile faded as he caught sight of her cradled wrist. "Ah, so the broken first year is you, is it? We might have known."

"You do have a talent for falling down stairs, pup." Fred examined the purpling break, then shook his head grimly. "I'm afraid we're going to have to amputate this."

Neville wobbled dangerously on his feet.

"Just kidding!" Fred said. "Actually, Fred and I break bones all the time."

"You're Fred today, you forgetful git." George rolled his eyes affectionately. "But he's right. We do. We can set it for you if you really don't want to go to see Madam Pomfrey, but there are too many little bones in the wrist to risk fixing it magically myself. I can get them in about the right places, but they'll need to adjust by themselves a few millimeters here or there over the course of the healing."

"Yep. It'll have to heal on its own, which will take about, eh, seven weeks, would you say?" Fred glanced at George with a raised eyebrow.

"More like five, with the ambient magic in this place helping out," George estimated. "The real trouble is we can't numb it until after it's set, because the only numbing spell we know also freezes the muscles to prevent usage."

Rigel nodded tightly. "That’s fine.” It was more than fine. It was a solution that didn’t involve risking the exposure of her secret, and that was worth nearly any amount of pain. “Just do it."

The twins shrugged simultaneously. Ron looked on in horror as his brothers rolled up their sleeves ominously, and Neville turned his face away, looking greener than Rigel felt.

"Try not to move sudden-like," Fred said, taking her left elbow in his hand. He lifted the arm so they could see the wrist clearly, and Rigel groaned as tension rushed back into her wrist.

"I know, puppy." George spoke soothingly. He fingered his wand a bit nervously, and she hoped he really did know what he was doing. "Just a bit longer. You're going to feel a pop on three. One—"

He snapped out a word in Latin, and Rigel felt her bones grind against one another violently as the shadows at the edges of her vision rose up to annihilate her consciousness. The next she knew was a hand shaking her and a stiff bandage around a wrist she could no longer feel.

"Rigel," George said. "Back with us? It's okay, now. Fred numbed and wrapped it, and it should stay numb until your body produces enough endorphins on its own. Eat a big dinner and make sure you don’t roll onto it in your sleep tonight, all right?"

"It looks serious," Neville said, eyeing the wrapping that went from Rigel's thumb to her elbow.

Fred rubbed his neck sheepishly. "I might have over done the bandage a bit. Mum's way better at it. It's not so bad, as injuries go. Rigel just won't be doing much left-handed for a while."

"It's not my stirring or chopping hand, anyway," Rigel mumbled, feeling slow and sleepy as her body pumped her with its own natural drugs.

"How're you going to explain this?" Ron asked keenly. "Professors will want to know what happened, and also why you didn't go to Madam Pomfrey."

"I want to know that, too," George said mildly. "The last time you fell down a flight of stairs, we ran smack into you in the dark. You don't strike me as the clumsy sort, so who ran into you this time?"

"No one ran into me," she said honestly. "I…tripped."

Fred caught her eyes. "Who tripped you, then?"

She didn’t know how he guessed any more than she knew who tripped her. Ron and Neville shot her betrayed expressions as they realized she’d kept the specifics of her fall from them deliberately. "They got me from behind,” she said, a bit defensive. “It could have been anyone…but I was on the fifth floor, east side."

"Closest to Gryffindor," Ron said grimly, glancing around his common room.

"Anyone can be anywhere in the castle," Rigel said, shrugging helplessly. "I was there, wasn’t I? And it would be remarkably Slytherin to stage an attack as far from the dungeons as possible."

"Either way, someone wants our new protégé hurt," Fred said sadly. "I'm afraid when we find out who did this, we'll have to show them what's what, Gred."

"Course we will," George said. The lightness of his tone contrasted starkly with the steadiness in his steady eyes. "Or my name isn't Forge."

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

The twins, Ron, and Neville sent her off with pockets full of sweets to substitute for the missed meals, and she thanked them profusely as she clambered back out of their portrait hole. The new bandage was awkwardly tight and came halfway down her hand, but as long as she let that arm hang by her side, her sleeve would cover it. If she was very careful, no one else ever needed to know of her injury.

She entered the common room quietly, but her labor of stealth was not to bear fruit. The door was still sliding closed behind her when Pansy called out from one of the study tables. "Rigel! There you are."

Rigel looked over in time to see Draco's head swivel around toward her like a shark scenting prey. She had a sudden impulse to check herself for blood. With all the casualness of a person who knows exactly what they did, she walked to their table. Keeping her left hand safely out of view, she hefted her book bag onto the table with her right hand and sat down next to Pansy, with Draco opposite them.

Draco clearly wanted to know where she'd been all day, but she suspected pride would keep him from asking outright. Taking full advantage, she feigned ignorance, politely asking how their day was going instead of answering the myriad questions simmering in those silver eyes.

"Not as well as it could have done." Pansy cast a glance around the common room. "Certain people have been asking where you were, and without any idea what to say, it’s been a challenge to successfully divert their attention.” She waited for Rigel to offer an explanation, and when Rigel resolutely maintained obliviousness, Pansy sighed prettily. “Then, of course, there's this Charms assignment that doesn't make any sense. I’m afraid I don’t have a natural talent for Charms."

"And yet, you have so many," Rigel said, pulling her own Charms assignment out of her bag.

Pansy smiled. “Glad to have you back, Rigel. Draco isn’t nearly so good at flattery.”

Draco scowled at the pair of them. “Let’s just get this finished so we can have the rest of the weekend off.”

Rigel scanned the assignment. They were asked to gage the limits of the Levitation Charm by discussing whether the suggested list of objects would or would not make good targets for the spell. Apples, rocks, tree limbs, and so on were listed as possible targets. Pansy was attempting to answer the question literally, by practicing the Charm on things of various weights to see whether it was strong enough to lift them. She muttered about the subjective nature of the assignment, as each person’s magic was theoretically capable of different things, so Rigel just put “no” for everything except “humans” and called it done.

Pansy finished soon after with a dissatisfied moue. "Finally,” she said, rolling up her assignment. "I feel like going for a walk."

"Well, I haven't finished my Potions essay yet.” Draco scowled at the parchment and twirled his quill restlessly. "So I guess you two can go without me."

"Actually, I haven't finished mine, either," Rigel said.

"I thought you finished yours in class Friday." Pansy looked suspicious, as though Rigel might be trying to avoid walking with her.

"And if you weren't in the library working on the Charms and Potions assignments, then what were you doing all day with your book bag?" Draco had found his opening at last.

"I was kicked out of the library before I could get any work done. Then I went for a walk," Rigel said.

Pansy raised an eyebrow. "Kicked out? What did you do?"

"Absolutely nothing."

Draco huffed exasperatedly. "Don’t tell us, then. Let me see your Potions essay, at least. I'm not sure my conclusion makes sense."

"I don't have it," Rigel said.

"Then go get it." Draco waved her toward the dorms.

"I mean, I finished it already and gave it to Professor Snape." Rigel unrolled a clean sheet of parchment and carefully pinned it down with stones, all one-handed. Then she pulled out her dicto-quill.

"But you just said you hadn't finished it." Even Pansy looked exasperated with her now.

"Snape gave me another one to complete for Monday.”

They both made noises of sympathetic understanding. "Snape gave you extra work for turning it in early?” Draco shook his head. “That does sound like him, but he's usually nicer to Slytherins."

“I asked for the extra work. Do you mind if I dictate my essay?" she asked Draco, since he would have to sit through it.

"Why don't you just write it?" His heart didn’t seem to be in the question, and she mentally congratulated herself for wearing him down.

"I'm incredibly lazy."

Draco didn’t smile at her joke, but he did shrug his permission for her to use the dicto-quill. She knew it was an annoying way to complete an assignment when others were working in the same space, but the Charms worksheet had been hard enough to complete one-handed. Trying to write an entire essay, even with stones to hold the parchment open, was sure to result in something incomprehensibly messy.

Pansy left to charm Blaise into escorting her on her desired walk, and the dicto-quill sprang upright to attention as Rigel spoke firmly to it. "Quill start. Essay on Nimue's Breath. New line.”

Draco made a face and hunkered over his own essay. Rigel hid a smile and spoke a little louder than was necessary, just to watch him grimace.

“Nimue's Breath, commonly called The Widow Maker due to its use in Merlicide, is a small, blue flower with sharp, black thorns. It is commonly found in damp caves near salty bodies of water. The flower is the only part of the plant used in potions, and the flower is usually placed in the cauldron whole, unless the recipe specifically calls for the essence or perfume of Nimue's Breath, such as in certain inhibition-lowering Potions.”

She caught Draco’s eye as he lifted his head to stare incredulously at her. She smiled, and the quill wobbled a little at the amusement in her voice as she continued. “As such, special care must be taken when harvesting to ensure the petals don't separate or become crushed. It is best to use a small, serrated knife to cut the stem as close to the root as possible. The thorns are fewer at the base of the flower, although dragon hide or similar gloves are still recommended to prevent pricks. While the thorns are not poisonous like the flower is, any blood spilt over the flower causes it to lose its potency immediately."

Draco put down his quill and frowned at her. Her smile widened. He hadn’t heard anything yet.

"Nimue's Breath is often mistaken for the Parcilia Flower, which is the same size, shape, and color. The Parcilia Flower isn't remotely poisonous, so it is important to differentiate between the two of them, but by no means should one check which flower they’ve come across by smell. There is a difference in smell; Parcilia smells a little like lavender, while Nimue’s Breath smells like honey and milk, but the smell of Nimue’s Breath is what makes it so dangerous. The perfume released by the flower contains a chemical that temporarily affects the brain’s ability to make decisions and stimulates the part of the brain that reacts to pleasure. Inhaling it directly causes a wizard to feel so irrationally happy that he often refuses to leave the flower, taking in more and more of the perfume and neglecting to do anything else until he either dies of exposure or is rescued by someone unaffected. The Ancient Greeks had a myth about an island full of these flowers, supposedly the creation of Orpheus. A field of Nimue’s Breath would not put a whole crew of men to sleep at a distance, however. As long as one does not breathe in directly over the stamen, the perfume alone is not strong enough to be a problem for the careful brewer. New line.”

Draco suddenly reached out to still the quill, capturing it in his hand so it didn’t record his commentary as he said, “You talk about this flower like it’s the most fascinating thing you’ve ever heard.”

“It is fascinating,” Rigel agreed.

“You don’t show this much interest in any of our other subjects.”

“They aren’t Potions.”

Draco let go of the dicto-quill and sat back in his chair, waiting for her to continue.

“Nimue’s Breath is the essential ingredient in many variations of Merlicide, the poison of choice for witches seeking to murder their partners—”

Draco snorted in amused surprise, and Rigel grinned over the quill.

“—but it is also used in a number of other basic poisons. It is interesting to note that this flower is almost always used the same way. No matter the poison, the base is prepared first. The base is usually just common herbs and spices boiled into water for the sole purpose of disguising the poisonous ingredients. Next, the potioneer might add anything from nightshade to aconite, even common garden gnome poison, so long as it is deadly. These poisonous components, if correctly proportioned, disappear completely into the base. Then, Nimue’s Breath is added. It only takes a single flower, whole and untouched, placed in the mixture at boiling temperature. The flower dissolves instantly and leaves behind its entrancing perfume. Nimue’s Breath itself is not deadly. However, Nimue’s Breath causes a poison to become irresistible to the drinker. It was especially common in the mid-fourteenth century for witches to slip a potion laced with Nimue’s Breath into their husband’s food or drink, then simply watch as he consumed the poison desperately, demanding more of his own death.”

“Bloody hell,” Draco muttered, too low for the quill to catch.

“New line. It is vital that Nimue’s Breath be added to a potion at boiling point; otherwise, instead of dissolving, the flower will only congeal and stick to the side of the cauldron. Therefore, the flower must be added while brewing a poison for the first time. One cannot purchase or pre-make a poison, then add Nimue’s Breath to it, unless it is a poison that can handle being re-heated without destabilizing. New line.

“Sometimes, the essence or nectar of the flower is added in tiny doses to anti-inhibitors, such as certain alcoholic beverages, recreational drugs, or aphrodisiacs, but care should be taken in adding the irresistible qualities of Nimue’s Breath to an already addictive substance. One can recognize the presence of Nimue’s Breath in a liquid by looking for a characteristic Mother-of-Pearl sheen out of the corner of one’s eye. Nimue’s Breath sells for approximately eleven sickles per flower, though it becomes more expensive during the wet season due to the increased difficulty in procuring it as its natural caves fill with water.”

That looked about ten inches, so Rigel wrapped it up quickly. “New line. In conclusion, Nimue’s Breath is an essential element in many poisons despite it being intrinsically non-toxic. It has very few legal uses and the conscientious brewer should be wary of working with it. If using the flower is unavoidable, wearing gloves when harvesting and avoiding direct inhalation should be sufficient protection. Stop Quill.”

Rigel cast drying sand on the parchment. “How’s yours going?” she asked, deliberately baiting. Draco’s quill nib had long since dried of ink. The blond stared at her like she was a big cat exhibit at the zoo. She supposed he was waiting for her to yawn widely and show off her teeth.

“Why…” He cleared his throat. “Why are you even looking for extra tutelage in Potions? I mean, it sounds like you already know everything. What’s Snape even going to teach you?”

Rigel couldn’t help but smile. Her Potions knowledge was well-earned, but it was endearing that he thought Snape didn’t have much more to teach her. “Understanding ingredients, to a Potions Master, is like knowing the alphabet to a poet. I’ve learned what I can on my own, and I’d like to think I’m ahead of most first-years, but there’s so much I can’t learn without brewing and dedicated instruction. There’s more than just memorizing recipes; there’s brewing techniques, strategies, instincts, timing, and most of all practice. So many things I only know in theory—”

“Okay, okay.” Draco held his hands up in surrender. “I get it. You’re not at Snape’s level yet.”

Rigel snorted. “As if I’ll ever be.”

“Is my godfather really that good?” Draco seemed skeptical, and it made her mouth fall open to realize he’d no idea what kind of genius he had access to his entire life. At her flabbergasted expression, he crossed his arms defensively. “What? He spends his time teaching schoolkids.”

“He’s the best in all Britain,” Rigel said. On that, she held absolute conviction. “His work is on the cutting edge of Potions research. He’s created dozens of original recipes, finding new ways to use ingredients no one else has thought of, not to mention the significant improvements he’s made to a number of notoriously tricky advanced potions. But it’s more than that.”

Rigel wasn’t sure how to explain; no one at home ever wanted to hear her opinions on Snape, so she’d never articulated them aloud before, but she tried. “It’s his understanding of the art of it. All the articles in publication are professionally interesting, but Snape’s articles are the ones you read again. The way he writes about Potions is like the way other people write about philosophy, warfare, even love. Reading it, you can only think that, to Professor Snape, Potions is breathing. It's being. That’s how good he is. That’s the whole reason I’m here. Someday…” She had never put the dream of her heart into these words before, but she thought Draco wouldn’t laugh. “I want Potions to be like breathing to me, too.”

“Well.” Draco looked away, obviously taken aback by her uncharacteristic fervor. “I’m sure if anyone can reach that level, it’s you. Just from one essay, it’s obvious you’re waist-deep in this stuff. In fact—” He flashed her a smug smile. “I’m going to be proud to say we’re friends, one day.”

Rigel made a face, aware that he had intended to both complement and embarrass her simultaneously. “If we’re still friends when I get my Mastery, I’ll give you a special discount on anything I brew.”

“Including poisons?”

“I won’t be that kind of potioneer.” She sobered. “I want to be a researcher, like Professor Snape. Create new potions, improve old ones, that sort of thing.”

“I never knew all that stuff about my godfather,” Draco said, thoughtful. “He doesn’t like to boast about his work. I think that’s why he and my father get along so well. Father hates people who boast.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” Rolling up her essay, she cast a glance at his. “Still need help with your conclusion?”

Draco pushed it toward her with a smirk. “If you look over it, I’m sure to get a good mark.”

Rigel reached for it, remembering just in time not to use her left hand. It was going to take some practice to make using one hand for everything look natural. She was hoping to avoid anyone noticing as long as possible, but if it came down to it, she would simply imply that she’d already been to the Hospital Wing, hence the wrapping. She didn’t think anyone would, though. Most people didn’t look for duplicity until they already knew something was wrong.

When Draco was satisfied with his essay, he jumped up from the table and shot Rigel a boyish grin. “Let’s go flying.”

Rigel prevaricated. “I’m pretty tired.” She was, in fact. Also, there was no way she should fly with a broken wrist.

Draco leveled a stern look at her. “Rigel, I’ve barely seen you in days.”

“That is a brazen exaggeration.”

“Tryouts are next weekend for Slytherin, so we need to practice.”

“I’m not trying out for the team.”

“First-years don’t usually get spots, but it’s good to show interest so they can scout you next year,” Draco explained, deliberately misunderstanding her. “Anyway, we have to take advantage of the opportunities on offer. Did you know first-years didn’t used to be able to even have brooms at Hogwarts? We’re living in a golden age.”

Rigel had never met Draco’s father, but sometimes she could hear him speaking out of Draco’s mouth.

First-years used to be banned from having brooms at Hogwarts because there was a valid concern that muggleborns unfamiliar with the mechanics of broom-riding would injure themselves if left to fly unattended. Their Flying lessons were in fact a holdover from that time as well. That had all changed when Riddle’s S.O.W. Party had forced his anti-muggleborn legislation packages through the Wizengamot. She supposed she could not expect an eleven-year-old who didn’t know any muggleborns to be concerned with anything other than how the change benefitted him, but she was not as enthused about taking advantage of this golden age as he might presume.

“Can you at least come and help me practice?” Draco’s expression was so earnestly imploring she could feel the physical façade of her resistance crumbling in its wake. She tried to mentally overlay his face with something less endearing, but his wide silver eyes brought to mind only puppies. Sad puppies. Left out in the rain.

Twenty minutes later, Rigel found herself on the Quidditch pitch, holding an old school broom in her right hand, a beater’s bat under her armpit, and wondering how exactly she had been talked into such a terrible idea.  

She could fly one-handed. That wasn’t the problem. All positions in Quidditch involved some one-handed flying, and as a beater, she could spend an entire game with one hand gripping a bat, but there was a difference between flying with one hand free and flying with no hand to grip the broom. Not to mention the difficulty of protecting an injured hand against jostling. She didn’t think the twins meant her to test the numbing spell so aggressively.  

Still, the tryout was important to Draco, so for the sake of their stilted and still-burgeoning friendship, she would try.

Draco tied a bag of wingless golden orbs to her broom. They would stand in for Snitches, and she would use her bat to propel the small balls in various directions for him to catch. Draco was riding the latest Comet. He leapt into the sky so fast he might have been a firework, just waiting to be set off. She squeezed the school broom with her knees and followed slowly, cradling her left hand in her lap so it looked like she was holding on with it. Hopefully he wouldn’t think to correct her grip.

Rigel took a few minutes to get used to the rhythm of tossing a ball into the air, grabbing her bat from under her armpit, and hitting it before it came down. Beater was Rigel’s favorite position to play, and the one she probably would have tried out for, if circumstances were different. Sirius would be expecting Archie to try, but even if she’d wanted to brave the locker room and risk an injury that might put her in the Hospital Wing, she wouldn’t be able to try out with a broken wrist. Perhaps she could simply lie, and tell him she hadn’t made the team.

Draco wasn’t too bad, as far as she could tell. Rigel wasn’t swinging the bat with her usual speed, but she gave Draco a good workout by sending the little balls first one way, then the other, for about an hour. They hadn’t requested the lights be turned on, as this wasn’t an official practice, so it was too dark to see the balls once the sun went down. They gave up the bat and balls and practiced flying maneuvers, Draco showing her all his tricks and Rigel concentrating on staying steady in the air.

Ten minutes before dinner, they headed inside. Draco was grinning confidently, hair fluffed wildly about his head and cheeks flushed from the exercise. He looked like he’d stepped out of a 1940’s ad for muggle aeronauts. She could easily picture him with one of those long scarves and a set of pilot goggles perched jauntily atop his head. Rigel knew her face, on the other hand, was pale, and she was sweating. It wasn’t a sweat from exertion, but a cold sweat, from the small waves of nausea that had lapped at her for the last half-hour or so.

“You’re really not that bad on a broom,” Draco said generously as they sat between Nott and Pansy at the dinner table. “It’s hard to balance with only one hand while swinging a bat if you’re not used to it.”

“It was quite a challenge,” Rigel agreed, serving herself a large helping of pasta. The sweets from earlier sat uneasily in her stomach, and she hoped the weight of the carbohydrates would settle the lingering nausea into quiescence.

“Are you guys trying out for the team, then?” Nott asked over his kidney pie.

“Obviously,” Draco declared.

“No,” Rigel said, simultaneously.

“I’m for seeker,” Draco elaborated. With a supportive look at Rigel he added, “You could, you know. You could be a keeper. They don't have to move around as much.”

“Maybe next year,” Rigel offered. Even as she said it, she knew she shouldn’t give the boy hope. Better to be firm from the outset, otherwise she’d have to refuse him all over again next year.

The events of the day caught up to her around dessert, and Rigel excused herself early and made her way back to the dorms. In the morning, she would have to figure out how to get library access so she could finish those essays for Flint. She didn’t want them hanging over her all week. If there was no other option, she could always use her dad’s Invisibility Cloak. Then she would be stealing books instead of checking them out, though, and Pince had seemed like the kind of librarian who would notice.  

She was so tired, mentally and physically, from her first day without classes that she fell asleep without bothering to take off her shoes. She cradled her broken wrist protectively against her side, and her last, ominous thought before dropping like a stone into the river sleep was that she still had no idea who wanted her hurt badly enough to hex her down a flight of stone steps in broad daylight. Only time would tell if it had been a random prank or a premeditated attack.

--0—0—0

--0—0

--0

[end of chapter nine].

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 10:

On Sunday, optimism turned to creativity. Rigel left her two roommates dozing behind their velvet hangings and stole through the dungeons up to the basement, where she meant to enact a plan that had come to her in the night.

Even if she hadn’t already passed it on one of her walks with Pansy, the still-life portrait, several times her size, was hard to miss. The Map was clear about what to do next, a tiny figure tickling a pear perniciously, but Rigel still looked over her shoulder in silent embarrassment as she stretched out her right hand and copied its movements.

The pear giggled, which was rather more startling than the requirement to tickle it, and Rigel thought she saw it grow an eye and wink at her before the portrait swung inwards. Creeped out or not, Rigel had to grin. The Map was a priceless resource, the ethics of stalking the castle’s every inhabitant aside.

Unexpectedly, and in flagrant disregard to the probabilities of architecture, the kitchens were at least as big as the Great Hall. Taking in the five long tables, situated in exactly the same manner as the student and staff tables, Rigel realized the kitchens must be directly beneath the Great Hall, and that food arranged on the tables below was somehow transferred vertically up through the ceiling.

Also unexpectedly, the kitchens that morning were even noisier than the Great Hall during meal times, which Rigel wouldn’t have thought possible. Pots and pans whisked from surface to surface, clanging and occasionally crashing into one another. A huge fireplace roared impressively when its grate was opened, and she saw pans and baking dishes levitating over the flames. Rhythmic chopping and slicing noises came from a factory line of elves with cutting boards, and timers seemed to go off every few seconds, blending together in a chorus that Rigel would have found impossible to keep straight.

Yet, woven through the chaos, there was order, or at least some kind of plan. The elves danced around one another, indifferent to the near-misses with sharp knives and boiling-hot sauces. The intricate pageantry would have taken humans years to even choreograph, much less attempt to execute.

Rigel stood uncomfortably to the side, intimidated by the overwhelming sense of purpose in the room. Who was she, with no instrument or part, to interrupt the symphony before her? She watched and waited for a natural break in the flow. Within a couple minutes, and to no cue that Rigel could perceive, a house elf with a pink tea cozy around her waist broke from the ranks. A necklace of champagne corks bobbed around her neck as the house-elf approached Rigel with a wide smile.

“Hello, young sir.” The house-elf’s voice was squeakier than Rigel had expected. She’d never met a house-elf in person, though she had seen their stuffed heads mounted on plaques in the attic at Grimmauld Place. As the house-elf curtseyed gracefully, Rigel wiped the image from her mind. “We is very sorry for the wait. What can Binny be doing for you?”

“Hi, Binny.” Rigel crouched down so she was on Binny’s level. “I don’t want to bother you if you’re busy making breakfast, but I was hoping someone here could help me with something.”

“Binny is not busy, Binny is on her…” The house-elf moved her face closer, whispering, “break” like it was a filthy word.

“I wouldn’t want to take up your break,” Rigel said uncertainly.

Binny’s luminous gaze drew her in, her wide eyes imploring. House-elves did not seem to need to blink as often as humans. “Please, young sir. The headmaster is making us take breaks from cooking every hour, but you is not needing help cooking, is you?”

“No.”

The elf put her hands together with a smile. “Then Binny is helping you.”

Rigel had to smile back. “I won’t tell Dumbledore if you won’t.”

Binny made an exaggerated zipping motion across her lips, bouncing on her toes excitedly. Rigel had to remind herself the house-elf was probably much older than she was.

“I need to disguise myself. Not for anything bad,” she added, seeing Binny’s look of dismay. “I’m not going to break any school rules, but I need a uniform that doesn’t have a Slytherin crest on it.”

Binny frowned dejectedly into Rigel’s face. “We is not supposed to be helping students with mischief.”

“It’s not even for mischief,” Rigel promised. “I’m going to use it to study.”

Binny stared at Rigel for a long moment, her pupils dilating and contracting. “You is telling the truth.”

“Then, can you help me?” Rigel looked around the room. “You all do the laundry, right? Can I borrow another student’s outer robe, if I bring it back before tonight so it can be returned?”

Binny shook her head fiercely, her ears flapping. “No, no, no. We is not giving you other students’ clothes.”

Rigel grimaced. “I understand. I wouldn’t want to get you into trouble.”

Binny bounced nervously from foot to foot, then froze. A look of fearful enlightenment dawned across her expressive face. She darted quick, wide-eyed glances at the other house-elves, none of whom were looking their way, then whispered, “Is you losing one of your robes?”

“What?”

“You is!?” Binny exclaimed loudly, and Rigel jumped with surprise. “If you is losing a robe, you is coming with me! The lost and found is being right through here!” Binny pitched her voice above the clanking dishes and winked broadly at Rigel before taking off through the melee. Rigel scrambled to keep up, ducking platters of food and jumping bowls of punch as she followed Binny to a door on the other side of the kitchens.

They emerged in a much quieter room, which was dominated by huge vats of water and lined on every side by labeled laundry bins. There had to be at least one for each dormitory in the whole school. Binny waved her toward the right side of the room, where a large bin, nearly overflowing with clothes, stood on its own. It was labeled “Lost and Found.”

“Here you is.” Binny grinned triumphantly up at her. “Since you is wanting to find some robes, maybe you is losing them first. There is being all kinds of lost things in here, and maybe you is finding something you is losing in here, yes, young sir?”

Rigel grinned back at Binny. “Yes, how silly of me. I’m sure I lost something I need to find in here. Thank you, Binny.” She surveyed the bin critically. In the top layer alone she could see everything from Quidditch uniforms to high-heeled shoes. It was perfect.

“Best if you is taking anything you is finding,” Binny warned her. “If you is coming back for it later, it is maybe not being here.”

“Do people usually come back for their things, then?” Rigel didn’t like the idea of stealing something someone actually wanted.

“Oh, no.” Binny shook her head for emphasis. “No one is ever coming for these things, but they is going, sometimes.”

“Going where?” Rigel asked, curious now despite herself.

“To the Room of Lost Things,” Binny said. “If it is being lost for long enough, or if it is being lost on purpose, it sometimes is going to that room.”

“How can you lose something on purpose?” Rigel wondered aloud.

“Maybe you is not wanting to be finding it again.” Binny shrugged bony shoulders.

“Or not wanting anyone else to find it.” Rigel tilted her head. “It sounds like a room for hiding things.”

“Hiding or losing, if you is wanting to find something from the bin, you is not wanting it to go there, is you?” Binny’s logic was indisputable.

“I suppose not. Thank you, Binny. You’ve been really helpful.”

“You is most welcome.” Binny turned her head to a sound Rigel didn’t catch. “Binny is going back to work now. I is wishing you luck with your finding, young sir.”

Binny left for the kitchen on a glad skip, and Rigel eyed the lost and found bin determinedly. Maybe Pince would bar Rigel Black from her library, but she did not check the identity of every student who entered. If she found a good enough disguise, she could finish Flint’s homework that afternoon.

Sorting through the bin took some time. No matter what Binny said about items lost for long enough disappearing, Rigel found pieces of clothing that must have been in the laundry room for years. Not only out-of-date uniforms, but hoop-skirts, coat tails, bowlers, and blazers. By the time she reached the bottom of the bin, she had enough items in her size for several disguises.

Rigel took one school robe from each of the other three Houses, complete with House crests on the chest pockets and colored ties to match. She found a pair of glasses that were just a little crooked and three wigs from a selection of eight that she could only wonder at the purpose of. She had one shaggy redheaded wig that was curly around the ends and a mousy brown wig with pin-straight, ear-length hair. The third, a girl’s wig with blunt bangs and long, blonde hair that was neatly braided, would be a last resort.

She gathered her spoils together under one arm and tried to figure out how to get them back into the dorms without anyone noticing. By that time, her too-observant roommates were probably awake. Rigel struck inspiration when she examined the laundry bins lining the room.

The nearest was labeled “Ravenclaw 4-G-1.” She peered inside, feeing vaguely uncomfortable, and saw that it was separated inside. There were five segments in the bin, and all of them had female accoutrements mixed in with the generic school robes. If she had designed the labeling system, that would make it the first bin for the fourth-year Ravenclaw girls.

Rigel made her way around the room until she came to the bin that read “Slytherin 1-B-2.” Inside there were three segments, and in one of them, she recognized Archie’s golden boxer shorts. They really would have to have a talk about his taste in underclothes when she got home for winter break.

She kept the Gryffindor robes and tie, and the redheaded wig and glasses. She stuffed the rest down into her section of the laundry bin, along with the two extra wigs. If the house-elves worked their usual magic, they would be folded neatly in her trunk by the time she got back to the room that evening.

Rigel lifted her good hand to Binny in thanks as she passed back through the kitchens. Binny winked cheerfully at her from behind a towering bowl of strawberries and told her to come back and visit soon.

Rigel pushed the spare robe into her book bag, grateful for the undetectable extension charm Sirius had added. She didn’t know what he’d assumed Archie would use the extra room for, but it was suspiciously convenient for carrying curiously-shaped or bulky objects without notice. She climbed the steps to the Great Hall and found many of the dishes she’d seen prepared just moments earlier waiting for her at the Slytherin table. The basket of strawberries in particular seemed to twinkle at her.

She rushed through breakfast, not giving anyone a chance to ask her where she’d been or why her left hand stayed firmly in her lap. As long as she kept her mouth full, her classmates were too polite to pose any questions.

As soon as she’d downed her glass of juice, she took off again, determined to finish those essays before lunch.

Rigel changed in the bathroom closest to the library. The fewer people who saw her wandering the halls disguised as a student that didn’t exist, the better. She swapped robes and wetted her hair to slick it back. The wig was almost impossible manage one-handed, and the heart-jolting fear that someone could walk in at any moment and question her made it all the harder.

She made a face at the feel of the tight, scratchy underside pressing against her wet scalp. Perhaps eventually she could learn a spell to change her hair color instead. When it was settled, a Gryffindor boy with flat grey eyes and messy red hair looked back at her from the mirror. She thought she looked a bit like a Weasley, if a person squinted or had very poor eyesight. She could only pray Pince’s mental catalogue of the castle’s students wasn’t nearly as accurate as the one she had for its books.

The large, round glasses sat oddly on her nose. They were nothing like the practical pair she’d used before the contacts, but she was grateful they were costume and not prescription. Although ridiculous, they didn’t compete with her corrected vision.

In a moment of indulgence, she rooted in her bag for a pot of ink. After watering down a small amount in her palm, she dabbed it across her nose and cheeks with the point of her quill. The sight of her reflection made her chuckle, and for a moment she missed Archie fiercely. He would delight in the sheer silliness of the situation. Her cousin could be counted on to see the fun in everything, even difficulties, and she suspected she would have been a more serious person without his influence.

Too late for that now. With a final grin at the boy in the mirror, she slunk from the bathroom in a posture that probably looked at awkward as it felt. Shaking her head at herself, she muttered, “Don’t overthink it.” Settling into an unobtrusive shuffle, she ducked into the library with her face averted carefully from the librarian’s desk.

The library was still quiet, the procrastination-prone students not yet under enough pressure to haunt its stacks. She made a bee-line toward the history section and found the books on the sixteenth century right where she left them. It took two trips to get all three to a table one-handed, but no one looked twice at her.

The thick, cheap lenses in the costume glasses immediately annoyed her eyes. She slipped them low on her nose and read over the top so she didn’t give herself a headache. The wig was itchy, but she dared not scratch at it, and strands of red hair kept falling into her line of sight, making her twitch with surprise. Still, she finished the History essay.

There were a number of books on Venimis Tentacula in the Herbology section, and she found one with a colored illustration that she tried copying onto blank parchment to satisfy the diagram portion of Flint’s assignment.

When she leaned back to judge the final effect of her attempt, her lips twisted in instinctive disgust. Merlin, but she was not an artist. Her rendition of the plant looked remarkably like the giant squid, and neither had been improved by the hybridization.

It was the tentacles. They defied perspective. And it didn’t help that the illustration kept moving.

Rigel crumpled her pitiful attempt into a ball and tapped her fingers against the table agitatedly. She couldn’t mail the essay back without the diagram, but she felt foolish wasting her time trying to draw such a complicated plant.

She glanced at Madam Pince and found her looming over a cowering Ravenclaw, gesticulating aggressively at the dog-eared corner of a page in his Transfiguration textbook. It would be unwise to be caught defacing a book, but…

She dripped the tiniest dot of ink onto the page. It welled and didn’t seep. Rigel smirked. If she were the librarian, she’d put waterproofing charms on all the books, too.

Rigel slid her bookbag over on the table to block Madam Pince’s view of the book. With her left elbow braced on the spine, she slowly and carefully traced the lines of the book’s illustration in ink. The ink sat wetly on top of the page, and the illustration froze underneath it, as though the plant in the picture could feel the nib of her quill.

When she’d gone over all the major lines, she lowered parchment down onto the wet page. The ink soaked into the parchment perfectly, and when she pulled it away, she had a rough tracing. Rigel blotted the page with the edge of her stolen robes, leaving it to dry completely before she shut the book. Relief seeped just like the ink through her veins, and she finished the assignment with neat labels around the edges of the scroll.

The rest of Flint’s homework went faster. The Herbology and Potions essays were the longest, but she knew far more about those topics, so it was the work of two hours to finish them both. As she scattered drying sand on the last of her words, she wondered why she was putting so much effort into the older boy’s work.

Anyone who asked a first-year to do their assignments could not possibly care about the quality with which they were completed.

She packed up her things one-handed and silently admitted that it was half guilt and half hope. Part of her felt as though she deserved the extra work. She had lied to everyone to get there. To her family, to her new friends. It made sense on a twisted level that her path should be harder than the others’. The part of her that needed to make up for what she’d done didn’t even resent the blackmail. It was a sort of penance, and it made her feel, in a way that she could quietly admit was a bit sad, as though she’d earned back whatever moral fiber she lost in all the secrets and lies.

Then there was the hopeful half. She couldn’t deny the Slytherin side of her that understood the principle of reciprocity, either. If she did a good enough job, then, whether he wanted to or not, Flint would have to feel a little beholden to her. Maybe it would be enough to keep him quiet in the years to come.

Rigel tore off her redheaded disguise in the nearest bathroom, but it didn’t make any difference. Beneath it was just a different disguise, and that one she could never take off.

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

Rigel braved the steep outer steps to the Owlery, determined to send Flint’s assignments off and be done with them for the week. She would spend the rest of the day with Pansy and Draco, if they let her. That, too, was a kind of penance.

The wind tore at her clothes and hair. She tucked her chin into her collar and squinted to keep her contacts from drying out. In doing so, she sacrificed much of her line of sight, and she didn’t see the girl coming round the corner down the stairs until Rigel had run smack into her.

They both gasped as they fell sideways into the railing, Rigel with muted agony as her left wrist jostled and the other girl with surprise. The railing was strong, not even shaking as it took the full brunt of their weight, but the other girl made a noise of terror and reached for Rigel desperately. Rigel twisted so her left arm was out of her reach and braced her right arm on the girl’s shoulder.

They both took several calming breaths, and Rigel unclenched her teeth as the throbbing in her broken wrist quiesced to a level ache.

“Are you alright?” Rigel leaned her head back just in time to escape being swiped by blonde pigtails as the girl looked sharply up at her.

“I think so.” The girl still had her fists clenched around Rigel’s robes. Her legs gave out without warning, and she sat hard on the steps, pulling Rigel down with her. Rigel grunted as her knees hit the stair and the blonde girl flashed dismayed eyes at her. “Sorry!” She released Rigel’s robes and straightened her black and yellow tie with shaking fingers, but made no move to stand. Her breath was coming a little too quickly.

“That’s all right. We’re okay, aren’t we?”

The girl sniffed woefully. “Yes. I’m so sorry. I wasn’t looking where I was going and then—I thought we were going to die, just now.”

“The railing is probably reinforced,” Rigel offered.

The other girl nodded miserably, setting her pigtails to swaying. Slytherin had a couple of classes with Hufflepuff, and Rigel thought she recognized the other first-year now.

“It’s Abbott, right?” Rigel clambered to her feet and offered the Hufflepuff her good hand.

“H-Hannah,” the girl confirmed, levering herself up with Rigel’s help.

“I’m Rigel Black.”

The girl’s eyes went straight to her green and silver tie, as though she had only just noticed it. She paled and took a half-step back into the railing she had been so afraid of moments before. “I—I didn’t mean to, Black. It was an accident.”

Rigel tried to soften her gaze into something reassuring. “I know. I’m not upset. As long as you’re all right.”

Abbott still looked somewhat miserable, but she no longer seemed terrified, at least. “Oh. No—I mean, yes. I’m fine.” The girl had a sizable scrape on her leg from where it had slid into the railing, actually, and Rigel felt the knife of sympathy prick her conscience. Not for the first time, she was glad she didn’t have to wear a skirt with her uniform.

“Do you want me to walk you to the Hospital Wing?”

She would go no further than the doors, but she could show the other girl where it was, at least.

“Um.” Abbott looked confused, as though Rigel might be joking. Her cheeks took on a bit of pink, and Rigel was relieved she was getting some of her color back after their scare, at least. “I’ll just ask…one of my housemates.”

Rigel nodded, inwardly relieved that Abbott hadn’t taken her up on her offer. She had no desire to climb all those stairs again. “Be careful the rest of the way down.”

“I—I will!” Abbott gave her one last, searching look and hurried past her down the stairs, pigtails flying behind her in the wind.

“Right.” Rigel blew out a sigh and adjusted her bag on her shoulder. It was uncharitable for her to think so, considering her own sex, but girls were a little weird.

She chose a nondescript school owl to carry Flint’s essays, which she stacked and rolled together as if they were one thick letter. That chore finally completed, Rigel took the stairs back down to the seventh floor, this time with her eyes wide open despite the wind.

For each stair she descended, her mood seemed to lift. With homework settled and the first week finally behind her, she could take a moment to appreciate how many things had gone right. Here she was, a halfblood at Hogwarts, studying under the brightest mind in her prospective field. She’d made it a whole week without anyone noticing a thing. What was an injured wrist or a little blackmail when balanced against that success?

She reached the main stairway complex and waited a few moments for a set of stairs to move over to the seventh-floor landing. There was already a staircase waiting on the sixth-floor landing, and she was just starting down the second set of stairs when one disappeared out from under her.

Rigel dropped straight down, breath caught on a yell, foot unable to find purchase, hand missing the railing by scant inches, and in the same, disorienting instant a jet of hot air whistled over her head in a confusion of red light.

Stone jaws clamped down on her left thigh, and air hissed out of clenched teeth. Her remaining leg and good arm braced against the stairs above and below, and she stared in stunned dismay at the stone mouth that had once been a stair.

The sound of muffled laughter from one of the landings above made her breath freeze in her chest for a different reason. The red light. Someone had tried to hex her again. Only they missed when she hit the trick stair instead.

Rigel tried to twist around to see who it was, but her elbow slipped and she sank another few inches into the trap. She gritted her teeth and clenched all her muscles to keep herself still, bracing for whatever attack came next.

None came. The staircase began to move again, sending her bag tumbling down another two steps, and she craned her neck to see where the laughter had come from. She heard slow footsteps above and behind her, as though whoever it was kept pace with the moving stair to remain in her blind spot. If only she could see, she would not feel so utterly helpless.

Her staircase ground to a halt when it met the fifth-floor landing, and the footsteps above paused. The clunking sound of something small hitting a stone step behind her made her flinch. The thing rolled down two steps and Rigel curled away from it, imagining the worst—

It hit her in the side of the head and exploded into a cloud of putrid air. The stench filled her nostrils and she coughed, then gagged on it. A stink bomb, she realized as her eyes began to stream. Over the sound of her own violent sneezing, she heard the footsteps moving fast away from the scene. Rigel wished she could flee, or at least push the dung bomb the rest of the way down the stairs, but she couldn’t move her limbs without sinking up to her crotch in the trap. She craned her neck as far away from the stink bomb as she could and tried to breathe unaffected air, but there didn’t seem to be any.

She wanted to puke. More than that, she wanted to curse whatever sick strain of luck had landed her in that predicament. The Map didn’t say anything about a trick stair on one of the main staircases. She wasn’t sure if she should feel grateful the trap had saved her from that hex or resentful it had left her a sitting duck for what came next. Rigel could not afford another fall, not with her wrist still healing, but she didn’t fancy being stuck there with dung bomb in her hair until someone came back from lunch, either.

A harsh bark of laughter came from above, and for a moment, she thought her assailant was back. Then she recognized it.

“You’ve got the natural survivability of a toothless viper, kid.” Heavy footsteps marked his progress down the stairs, and Flint strolled into her peripheral vision with a smirk. He mimed holding his nose as he took an exaggerated step over the trick stair her leg was caught in. “That’s how it’s done, in case you were wondering,” he drawled from the stair below her.

Rigel bared her teeth in a grimace at him. “How nice to see you, Flint,” she panted.

Flint gave her a mean grin. “Likewise. Running into you just cheers me up, somehow.”

Rigel sighed, but it sounded more desperate than exasperated as it hissed through her teeth. “Will you please help me out of here?”

“Can’t get yourself out?” He put his hands in his pockets and pretended to examine her situation by tilting his head at various angles.

“I’m not strong enough to pry the trap apart.” Not with only one hand, and not while trying to keep herself from sinking further into it. Her right arm and leg were shaking from the effort of just keeping herself where she was.

Flint considered this silently for a moment, then his shrewd gaze fell on her cradled left hand. With a dark smile, he held out his own hand toward her. “Take it, then. I’ll pull you out.”

Rigel set her face in a scowl as his fingertips dangled before her eyes tauntingly. “I can’t.” Even if she released her right had from its braced position, she wouldn’t be able to take it fast enough to avoid the trap swallowing her. Her left hand wasn’t an option, and she was pretty sure he had guessed as much, by the way his smirk only widened. “Can you just pry open the stair? Or better yet, disable the trap.”

Flint only laughed. “And how do you propose I do that? Ask the castle nicely?”

“Sometimes there’s a switch on the underside of the railings near a trick step,” Rigel told him.

Flint gave her a hard look that said she shouldn’t have known that, but he did bend at the waist and make a show of checking both railings. “No such luck.” With a winkle of his nose, he hastily stood upright again. “Pah! You stink, Black. I’m not so sure I can get close enough to open the stair without hurling on you.”

“Didn’t take you for a weak stomach,” Rigel snapped. At his raised eyebrow, she forced her expression into something less mutinous. It wasn’t as though anyone else had come along to help. “Please, Flint.”

“Hn.” Flint rolled up his robe sleeves. “You owe me an extra credit assignment for this.”

Relief turned her agreement into a sigh. “Deal.”

Flint crouched and firmly gripped both sides of the trick stair. He heaved against the mechanism, and the stone shuddered in protest, but the two sides of the vise slowly inched back. When she had enough clearance to pull her leg free, Rigel summoned the dregs of her energy and pushed herself up and out with a pained grunt.

She collapsed on the stair below, breathing hard, her injured wrist held protectively to her front. As soon as she was free, Flint allowed the trap to snap back into place with a sickening thud.

“Thanks,” Rigel said tiredly. She shook out the aching muscles in her limbs as best she could and retrieved her bag from where it had fallen several steps down.

“Don’t mention it.” Flint fixed her with a menacing look. “To anybody.” Once she’d nodded her agreement, Flint indicated the spent dung bomb with a jerk of his chin. “What was that about? Trying to send up a smoke-signal?”

Rigel scowled at him. “It’s not mine.”

He let out a sharp sound of amusement. “Someone less kind than me found you first? Aren’t many who meet that standard in this school. You really do have shit luck.”

Rigel bent to pick up the stink bomb shell so no one else would slip on it. She pocketed it without looking at Flint. “What are you doing up here, anyway? Isn’t everyone at lunch?”

“This is the way to the Owlery, isn’t it?”

Rigel nodded slowly. “That thing I owe you is in the mail.”

“Better and better.” Flint began to move past her, and at the last second, he moved to check her with his right shoulder. Rigel flinched away, holding her left arm protectively, and Flint let a nasty smile bloom on his face again. “What happened to your arm, unlucky snake?”

“Goodbye, Flint.”

His laughter followed her down the stairs.

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

Returning to the common room, Rigel felt like a soldier coming home from a war. That she’d lost. Her limbs trembled with fatigue, her brain felt stuffed with wool, and something about being attacked twice in one week had shriveled her heart into a pile of wilted greens.

Pansy rose from a low couch to greet her, but her smile vanished when her nose got within range. “Eugh. Rigel, you smell like dragon dung.”

“Your friendship is truly a balm to my soul.”

Pansy grimaced sympathetically, wafting at the air around Rigel’s head somewhat ineffectually. “I was going to introduce you to some people today, but that will have to wait. Even friendship has its limits.”

“Sorry to spoil your plans. I got caught with a dung bomb from behind.”

Pansy made a disapproving noise in the back of her throat. She sounded a little like Lily in that moment. “Throwing dung bombs at a first year; who would stoop so low? Forgive me for saying so, but it smells as though it landed in your hair.”

Rigel couldn’t smell it anymore, but she could imagine. “It did, actually. I’m going to need a whole bottle of shampoo to get it out, aren’t I?”

Pansy met her eyes carefully. “I’m not sure you’ll be able to, unless whatever was wrong with your left hand earlier is fixed.”

Rigel stared at her. Pansy’s face softened. “I won’t ask. Just don’t mistake us for fools. Come on, I’ll help you wash your hair.”

Pansy marched her across the common room with a hand between Rigel’s shoulder blades. When they turned down the first-year offshoot, Rigel was going to tell Pansy she wasn’t allowed in her room, but Pansy walked straight past her own dorm and headed for Rigel’s.

Pansy knocked twice, then threw open the door and walked right in.

“Pansy?” Draco’s voice was half-squawk. “What in Salazar’s name are you—Rigel!” Draco stood, the book in his lap falling to the coverlet. “Is something wr—oh, Merlin.” He clapped a hand to his nose and glared in horrified affront at them over his fingers. “What is that smell?”

“Awful, isn’t it?” Pansy breezed past the choking boy and towed Rigel into the bathroom. “Rigel got hit with a dung bomb, and he needs help washing it out.” She took a moment to observe the state of their bathroom, then asked in a neutral tone, “Do the house elves even clean in here?”

Draco spluttered a defense from his bed. “Not on weekends.” The words came out muted, as he still had his nose in a death-grip.

Pansy poked her head back into the room and gave Draco a stern look. “I’m sure a Malfoy doesn’t flinch from something as harmless as an unpleasant odor. Which of these bottles is shampoo? No, Rigel.” Pansy held up a hand as Rigel made to point it out. “Please move as little as humanly possible.”

Draco gave Rigel a look that said he was questioning the value of their continued friendship, but he did manfully slide off the bed and confer with Pansy over which combination of scents and scouring agents would be most effective in dealing with “the dead niffler that rotted on Rigel’s head.”

Armed with gloves, towels, and what appeared to be every bottle of soap in the bathroom, Pansy and Draco herded Rigel to the sink like she was a hazmat risk. When Draco okayed the water temperature, Pansy pushed Rigel’s head forward until she was leaning over the deep basin, her hair directly under the tap. Rigel screwed up her eyes so her contacts didn’t get rinsed out.

It was a strange feeling, having two sets of hands alternately pulling and scrubbing at her hair, and she had to tense her neck muscles to keep her head in generally the same spot under the opposing forces, but twenty minutes later, they released her.

Rigel rubbed at her wet hair with a towel one-handed as Draco and Pansy disposed of the gloves.

“I can’t smell it anymore, but that might be because my brain turned off that sense in self-defense,” Draco said.

Pansy’s grimace said she rather agreed. “We’ve done all we can for the moment, but we might need a third opinion before he’s fit for human company.”

Her scalp was raw and her neck sore, but her nose didn’t burn anymore, so she thanked the blond duo with her face averted in embarrassment.

Draco waved a hand dismissively. “It’s our noses we were saving.”

“And that’s what friends are for.” Pansy took a deep, satisfied breath. “This deserves celebration. Wait here.”

Pansy was back in moments with a large pink tin, which she set in the middle of Draco’s bedspread. She perched on the end of his mattress, feet on his trunk, and waited until Draco and Rigel had awkwardly clambered onto either side of the bed to open the tin with a flourish. It was full of biscuits.

“My grandmother sent them this morning,” Pansy told Rigel. “You rushed off so quickly you missed the post.”

Draco picked two from the tin instantly, with a decisiveness that said he had got a look earlier and knew exactly which ones he wanted. Pansy waited until Rigel had taken a round shortbread with a jam center before selecting a lemon Shrewsbury for herself.

“You should take a few, Rigel. Grandmother is an accomplished baker, and you missed lunch again.”

Rigel smiled and nearly swallowed her first biscuit whole, she was so hungry. Draco made an indignant sound that was muffled by the biscuit in his mouth. He gestured to the crumbs she had spilled on his bedspread, and Rigel picked each one off and ate it, licking her fingers for effect.

The other two laughed, and Draco rolled his eyes as he flopped back against his pillows to get more comfortable.

They ate biscuits until the tin was empty, and even then, they lingered in one another’s company. As Pansy and Draco chatted about the people they knew and the classes they liked or disliked so far, Rigel thought it was the first time she’d felt truly comfortable around them, as though some stilted barrier between them had been dismantled.

The barrier was on her end, she realized slowly. She had finally let her guard down enough to just…exist with them as people, instead of treating them as adversaries in a game only she was playing. They were funny, which she had already known, but she hadn’t let herself properly enjoy that about them until now. They were observant, too, picking apart their classmates’ personalities and abilities with devastating insight. Rigel adjusted the sleeve on her left arm and thought she would be lucky to have them on her side, come to that.

When it was time to go to dinner, they walked together. Sat together. Half-full from the biscuits, the three of them shared a secret smile when their housemates asked why they weren’t eating much. She felt included, part of a whole, similar to being home with Archie, but even easier, because she could check out from time to time and the other two would go right on with the conversation without her.

Unknowingly, they had given her exactly what she needed after a long week, and, imperceptivity, she relaxed that much more into their company. Friendship was not such a bad thing, she reflected. Perhaps, as much risk as it brought to the ruse, it could bring at least that much comfort, as well.

--0—0—0

--0—0

--0

[end of chapter ten].

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 11

All week, Rigel felt the ghostly pressure of eyes tracing the lines of her back, but whenever she turned, no one was there. At first, she thought it was a ghost, except it seemed the height of hubris to imagine a ghost would find any interest in a human’s day to day activity.

Her shoulder blades ever a-twitch, she found herself moving stiffly, avoiding empty corridors and acting as uninteresting—and uninjured—as possible.

She couldn’t help but think it was her attacker, watching for weakness, waiting to get her alone again.

Before Transfiguration on Thursday, she felt the eyes again, and this time she caught the flutter of a robe ducking back around a corner when she whirled. Rigel stopped in the middle of the corridor, caught in indecision. Should she pursue? Or try to lure them closer first?

Zabini hung back from the group of Slytherin students to wait beside her. His dark eyes roved the empty corridor. “What is it?”

“Nothing.”

Zabini raised an eyebrow. “‘Nothing’ made you suddenly separate yourself from Draco and Pansy? You three are as thick as Goyle’s skull.”

Were they? Rigel supposed they spent nearly all their hours together. The stiff linen formality of their friendship had softened completely to malleable threads of common interest and allied affection. She knew that Draco liked Transfiguration because he found it uncommonly challenging and that Pansy enjoyed Astronomy even though she already knew most of what they were being taught. She’d even told them a bit about Sirius. Most telling, if she dared to admit it: she looked for them first whenever she entered a room.

“I thought—” She tried to assess Zabini’s expression, but it was unreadable. “I think someone was following us.”

Zabini let a wolf’s knowing smile wax over his face. “You finally noticed. The blonde butterfly has been following you all week.”

“Butterfly?” Rigel took a step toward the corner, but a hand on her shoulder held her back.

“They’ll be gone by the time you get there.” At her pointed look, he removed his hand with an apologetic smile. “Can you not hear the frantic beating of wings in flight?”

She could indeed hear the sound of running footsteps fading quickly. Rigel pressed her lips together in frustration. “Why didn’t you say anything sooner? Who was that?”

“If you had not noticed eventually, you would not deserve to be warned.” Zabini started toward the classroom. “As for who, I imagine you’ll know soon enough.” He held open the door expectantly. “You don’t want to be late for the quiz, do you?”

Rigel hurried inside, worry over a potential stalker taking backseat to the quiz she was about to fail. Rigel claimed the seat between Pansy and Draco while McGonagall enchanted the questions onto the board.

“You have thirty minutes to complete the short-answer section. I will be asking each you to demonstrate a matchstick-to-needle Transfiguration while you work. Please take out a blank sheet of parchment and begin.” Professor McGonagall waved her wand and their textbooks flew into a stack at the front of the room.

Rigel worked steadily through the questions. They ranged from straightforward to theoretical. Name the five elemental laws of Transfiguration. Is it harder to animate an inanimate object or the other way around? What classification of Transfiguration might result in a beetle growing the nose of a mouse and a mouse losing its nose completely? All of it had been discussed in class and in their textbook. Her quill was down long before McGonagall reached their table for the practical demonstration.

The professor placed a matchstick in front of Pansy first. “Please turn this into a needle, Miss Parkinson, and know that your grade is not based solely on the final result. Don’t be nervous if you can’t change it all the way.”

Pansy picked up her wand and waved it confidently, speaking the incantation clearly. Her match morphed slowly and smoothly into a needle, until it sat in innocent perfection, as though it hadn’t ever dreamed of being anything else.

McGonagall picked it up, checking the hole and the point, and nodded approvingly. “Very good. You next, Mr. Black.”

Rigel studied her matchstick apprehensively before taking a deep breath and saying the incantation, automatically waving her wand in the complicated wrist-movement over the match. It stayed a match.

Professor McGonagall frowned and leaned in to get a better look at what Rigel was doing. She waved for Rigel to try again. Rigel was sure her incantation was perfect and her wand-movement precise, but no transformation occurred. After the third time, McGonagall made a small “Hmm” in the back of her throat, and said, “Take a moment to focus your intent, Mr. Black, while I test Mr. Malfoy.”

Draco shot her a worried look, then focused on his own match. He set his mouth in an uncompromising line and glaredat it, speaking the spell forcefully. His matchstick seemed to hesitate for an instant, vibrating slightly as it wavered, then all at once it became a shiny, silver needle and lay still again.

McGonagall inspected it, raising her eyebrows at the lethal-looking point. “Very nice, Mr. Malfoy.” She turned to Rigel once more. “Mr. Black, if you would.”

Rigel performed the movement and said the words once more, unable to help feeling as though she was acting in a play about magical people, and not really a witch at all. She tried to mentally trick her magic into thinking she really wanted the match to be a needle, if for no other reason than to avoid the disappointed eyes of McGonagall, Pansy, and Draco, all of whom stared expectantly at the match, but no change occurred. It was still, and probably always would be, a match.

The sinking feeling in her chest was familiar. Transfiguration wasn’t the only class in which Rigel had a series of paralyzing practical difficulties. She did fine in Herbology, History of Magic, Astronomy, and Potions, but anything requiring wand work was impossible. Even the Flying instructor had given her a disappointed look when she wobbled on her broom one-handed.

McGonagall made a mark on her grading scroll. “I can give you points for the correct incantation and wand-movement, Mr. Black, but you’d best hope you did well on the written portion of this quiz. I expect more effort from you in the future.”

McGonagall moved on, and Draco and Pansy gave her identical, pitying looks.

“You did everything right,” Pansy said soothingly. “I’m sure it doesn’t count for much of our grade, anyway.”

“That’s right,” Draco added. There was a distinct lack of true conviction in his tone. “You’ll be able to make it up later in the term.”

“Thanks,” Rigel muttered, stowing her useless wand in her bag and trying to ignore the looks of her other classmates.

“At least it’s over with.” Draco gave her a bracing smile.

“And we’ve got double Potions to look forward to tomorrow,” Pansy said brightly. “That will take your mind off of it.”

Rigel smiled at them. “Thanks for lying to me. It helps.”

“Anytime.” Draco said magnanimously.

Pansy and Rigel exchanged amused looks, but Rigel’s grin fell away when McGonagall said everyone was dismissed except her.

Rigel waved her friends on and slowly shouldered her bag, picking her way through the tables to the professor’s desk. “Yes, Professor?”

“Mr. Black, I’m sorry to say that you were the only first-year in all of my classes who was unable to effect even a partial Transfiguration for this quiz.” The older woman peered through her spectacles at Rigel. “Care to explain why you are so far behind?”

“No, Professor.” Her voice was a little tight in answering, but the frustration was hard to bottle. If Rigel could explain what was wrong with her magic, she might be halfway to fixing it.

“It is as though you aren’t trying at all, Mr. Black.” McGonagall searched Rigel’s expression. “I can understand if you were nervous to make the attempt in front of your friends. Would you like to try one more time, now?” The older woman’s eyes softened. “Your father was a gifted Transfiguration student, you know.”

If she meant to help Rigel relax, the words had the opposite effect. She was not the son of Sirius Black, and sometimes, she didn’t even feel like a real Potter. Everyone in her family was brilliant with wand work—James, Lily, Remus, Sirius; four stars in a brilliant constellation. She knew they would be disappointed if they could see her, unable to manage even the simplest of spells. Her insides clamped down on every churning feeling lest it betray something to the professor. Face carefully controlled, she said, “I don’t really see the point.”

“Very well.” Professor McGonagall’s regard hardened. “If that is how you feel, I’m assigning you detention tomorrow night, to be served with Mr. Filch at seven o-clock. I hope that this, along with the poor score you will receive on your quiz today, will inspire you to take your studies a little more seriously.”

“Yes, Professor,” Rigel said tonelessly. She accepted the detention slip, which gave the time and place of the remedial work, and left, the feeling in her chest only growing tighter.

Her friends were waiting outside the classroom, and they made sympathetic noises when they saw the pink slip of paper in her hands.

Pansy gave the closed classroom door a miffed look after reading the detention slip aloud. “How can she give you detention for a bad grade? The grade is punishment enough.”

“On Friday night, too. And with Filch.” Draco grimaced. “That’s just cruel.”

“Friday!” Pansy double-checked the slip. “You were supposed to meet a couple of my acquaintances that day. I’ll have to introduce you another time, I suppose.”

“Sorry,” Rigel offered, reclaiming the slip and tucking it into her bag.

“It’s not your fault.” Her friend fluttered her fingers dismissively. “I mean it is, but I don’t blame you for getting detention on Friday specifically.”

“We’ve really got to fix whatever this is, though,” Draco said as they began walking toward the dungeons. “If you keep failing practicals, everyone will think you’re a squib.”

“Would you end our friendship if I was?” Rigel didn’t know what made her ask. It was an impossible question, a test that wasn’t about squibhood at all, but a much more dangerous secret that kept her awake some nights, listening to her roommates breathe as the guilt slowly ate her alive.

Pansy and Draco shared a look that she wasn’t pureblood enough to decipher.

“We could remain friends,” Pansy said slowly. “Though it would become a great deal more difficult if the information got back to our parents.”

“Don’t be morbid,” Draco said firmly. He seemed to have forgotten that he brought it up in the first place. “You’re not, so it doesn’t matter. Let’s go play Quidditch. Pansy can watch.”

“Joy of all possible joys.” Pansy raised her eyes briefly to the ceiling. “You’d best make it entertaining if I’m going to watch you flit about on an overgrown matchstick. Otherwise, we’ll see if the needle Transfiguration is scalable.”

Rigel’s left wrist gave a preemptory throb at the thought of more flying, but the bulk of her mind was busy poking at an even more painful and less obvious injury. She turned over their answers in her mind and couldn’t decide what to feel. Would they still be friends if Rigel’s status as someone of lesser blood was revealed? They hadn’t said no, but there had been no unequivocable yes, either.

She supposed she shouldn’t ask questions she didn’t want to know the answer to.

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

Friday night’s detention plucked a strange chord of memory from Rigel’s childhood.

Once, she and Archie had accidentally uncovered the portrait of Sirius’ mother in the attic.  Archie cut himself on the frame, and his blood broke the sealing enchantment. The next thing they knew, the foul woman was alive and shrieking at them from her painted cage.

The vitriol she spewed had shocked and frightened them. Rigel could perfectly recall the phosphoric rage in the painting’s eyes, and she could only imagine how much more terrible Walburga Black had been in life. Her demented cackle still made appearances in Rigel’s dreams.

It was the only time she’d seen Sirius livid, and even as he lectured them about how long it had taken to seal the portrait and how dangerous it was, spilling a Black Heir’s blood around so many old artifacts, she couldn’t help but think he was more scared and ashamed than angry. He had carefully raised Archie out from under the cloud of blood prejudice, and here was his mother raining it down on his son anyway.

As she polished plaques in the trophy room, Filch’s disdainful muttering brought the memory floating to the surface of her mind, like foam on a sluggish tide. It wasn’t the pitch or the words themselves, but the resentful cadence, like a mantra too often repeated, that gave her the uneasy feeling of being in the presence of one whose hatred had completely defined him.

“Lazy students, privileged little brats…” The caretaker watched her work as though McGonagall was going to quiz him on Rigel’s performance.

The way he sneered at her, mumbling insults and complaints to his cat while making sure she heard every word, made her neck and shoulders tense with indignation. She couldn’t go any faster with her left hand useless. She was already sore from bracing the trophies between her knees as it was.

“Squandering the magic nature gave him, too good to study…” Filch stroked his cat in languid passes. “Some real work will change his tune, my lovely. He’ll see how good he has it now…”

She knew it was difficult to be a squib in their society. She knew it, and a part of her felt guilty for having used his disability to attempt to provoke an emotional reaction from Draco and Pansy the day before, but by the end of the night, her sympathy had hardened to something cold and ashamed in her stomach. She hadn’t been trying to shirk her studies…had she? Maybe she hadn’t thought the other classes all that important, since it was Potions she really wanted to learn, but Rigel of all people knew how precious her opportunity at Hogwarts was—she just didn’t know how to convince her magic to rise to it with her.

Filch released her only when the entire room was sparkling, and she dragged her sore body down past the Entrance Hall as the clock struck an hour with too many chimes to count.

She was just starting down the stairs when she heard it—the faint echo of a single set of footsteps.

It was past curfew. She had a detention slip, but no one else should be wandering the castle at that time of night. And prefects patrolled in pairs, not alone. Rigel didn’t pause or give any indication she’d heard, but she made her own footsteps fainter. She felt like a child who had heard a noise in the dark, holding its breath and straining to hear an imagined monster’s heavy shuffling.

Except the footsteps came closer, so she wasn’t imagining it at all.

She turned the first corner in the dungeons and stopped, balling her courage into a fist. She would surprise them when they rounded the corner and finally get a look at their face. Her heart climbed over the rest of her organs, clamoring in her ears, an urgent roaring—

A small sphere skittered around the corner and burst into a cloud of smoke.

Rigel choked and ducked away from the spewing fog. The corridor became a churning swirl of black and white smoke, and it felt as though she was inside a crystal ball, some Seer peering into her life, probably disappointed by her ignoble fate. A jet of light cut through the dense haze and hit the wall where her head would have if she hadn’t bent at the waist in search of air. Ducking and hunching her shoulders, she scurried as fast as she could in the opposite direction. Before she made it around the next corner, a searing slice caught her in the back and propelled her forward to meet the hard stone.

She ground out a scream when her broken wrist hit the floor, but fear pulled at her, stronger than the pain. She scrambled to her feet, clutching her throbbing left hand to her chest, and ran.

Rigel’s heart raced ahead of her, flying faster than her feet could carry it, and for a moment, under the spell of adrenaline, she could almost pretend she was chasing it, and not running from anything at all.

The dungeons sprawled beneath the foundations of the castle, wider than any of the floors above. If it was a fellow Slytherin chasing her, she didn’t stand much hope of outrunning them, but with anyone else, Rigel had the home pitch advantage. She hadn’t taken her bookbag to detention and so didn’t have the Map to guide her, but she knew the corridors well enough to make a wide circle, as far from the common room as she could manage. After a while, her run turned into a slow walk. She flinched at every noise, imagined or real, and her heart took its sweet time coming back to settle in her chest where it belonged.

Only when she was sure she had lost her attacker did she turn for the common room. Her lower back burned, but she couldn’t see the impact sight, so she wasn’t sure what kind of spell had landed. It didn’t immobilize her or turn her into anything unintelligible, at least.

When the wall slid back, Rigel froze as nearly every eye in the common room turned her way. It was packed with students relaxing late on a Friday evening, and naturally, everyone wanted to know who was out and about so brazenly past curfew.

Most people, upon seeing the pink slip she still clutched numbly in her right hand, turned away again. Others let their eyes linger on her sweaty face and disheveled robes.

“Rigel, over here!”

Draco and Pansy held their hands up so she could see them with the other first-years by one of the fireplaces. Rigel stumbled over and sunk into a low-backed couch.

She felt like a bathtub that had just been drained. Fear and adrenaline swirled in a sluggish spiral at the bottom of her stomach, and she was crusted in the scum of shame for having run. Pain had mostly gone with the rest of her emotions, but a few remaining bubbles popped slowly, one at a time. A throb in her wrist. A burn at her back.

Pansy moved to sit beside her, and Rigel flinched away with a gasp as the movement pulled at the couch and sent fire licking up her back.

With a wordless noise of distress, Pansy pushed Rigel forward by the shoulder, moving the affected area away from the couch. “What in Morgana’s name happened to your back, Rigel?”

“You can see it?”

“Your robes are sliced through,” Pansy snapped.

Come to that, she could feel the wash of air against her injury. “Someone shot a spell at me.”

Nott jumped up from his seat to get a better look. “Merlin, that’s a nasty one.”

“What’s it look like?” Rigel asked. “I can’t see where it hit, but it burns.”

“Stinging Hex,” Nott said authoritatively. “It glanced up your back. Were you crouching?”

Cowering, that’s what she was doing. Running away. Her face heated. What would James and Sirius say? But Pansy only made a sound of wordless sympathy and clutched Rigel’s shoulder in a silent promise.

“Who did this to you?” Draco’s eyes were hard, demanding answers.

Rigel didn’t have any. “I don’t know?”

“The blonde butterfly?” Zabini had the look of one attempting to reconcile facts that didn’t fit together in his mind.

She shrugged. “They sent a smoke bomb ahead, so I couldn’t see who it was.” Rigel made a face and extracted herself from Pansy’s grip. Her skill pulled and itched, like an insect bite that went from her waist to the bottom of her shoulder blade.

“I could ask one of the older students to heal it,” Pansy offered.

“If it’s a Stinging Hex, it’ll dissipate on its own,” Rigel muttered. At least, she thought it would. It wasn’t exactly the kind of spell that got thrown around at home. She’d been on the receiving end of countless pranks growing up, but never one that hurt. Never one that made her feel so frightened that she panicked and ran for her life. And yet, a smoke bomb was a prankster’s weapon. Then there was the dung bomb. It confused her. Was this someone’s poorly-executed idea of a joke or an earnest attempt to hurt her?

“What kind of an honorless arse hexes a first year from behind?” Draco’s voice rose as his anger found an outlet, drawing curious looks from those sitting closest to their circle.

“All I know is it wasn’t a Slytherin. They couldn’t keep up in the dungeons at all.”

“And they chased you through the dungeons?” Draco took to his feet, unable to properly express his outrage from a seated vantage. “Only a Gryffindor would be so stupid and stoop so low in the first place.”

Adrian Pucey drifted into their circle, no doubt drawn by the commotion. “What’s this, Black? A Gryffindor attacked you?”

His question was louder even than Draco’s outburst, and it cut through the surrounding conversation like a bludger.

“Attacked?”

“One of our first-years?”

“They wouldn’t dare.”

“I don’t know it was a Gryffindor,” Rigel said.

She was ignored. More students inserted themselves into their circle, most of them older and all of them outraged on her behalf. Rigel wanted to shrink back into the furnishings, but instead she was prompted to stand and turn around so they could all see how she’d been hit while running away.

“Someone get a prefect.”

“They’re on rounds. What about Snape?”

“I say we tell everyone—”

“Enough!” Rigel forced herself to stand tall despite the way it pulled at her still-stinging back. “I don’t know who hexed me, I don’t know why, but I’m tired and I’m going to bed. Please just let this be.”

Pucey gave her a sympathetic look. “It’s out of your hands, Black. No one tries to gut a snake in our own dungeons. This has to be answered.”

“I don’t want you all to do anything.”

The last thing she needed was for the teachers to descend on her with too much attention and probing questions. If they forced her to cooperate, it could lead to her explaining the other incidents, which could only lead to the Hospital Wing, the one place she dreaded in all the school.

Pucey exchanged a silent look with the other older students, and then he set a hand on her shoulder comfortingly. “You don’t need to know anything about it. Get some sleep. Let us take care of it.”

It was not the reassurance she was looking for, but it was clearly all she was going to get from them. Avoiding the eyes of her classmates, she made for her dorm room. The Stinging Hex would wear off in under an hour, but the stress of not knowing what her housemates were going to do in response to her attack kept her awake much longer.

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

It was pleasantly cool the next day, with a cloudless sky and no wind to speak of. In other words, it was a—

“Perfect day for Quidditch!” Draco grinned as he piled his plate with food and alternatively turned to address Rigel, then Pansy, continuously checking to see that they were maintaining the appropriate level of excitement. “Of course, there won’t be any tailwind, but since I have to fly in all directions, it wouldn’t make much difference for me, anyway.”

Draco paused with a spoonful of carrots over his plate, realized there was no room left, and magnanimously dumped them onto Rigel’s.

“You like vegetables,” he told her cheerfully. He dug into the feast he’d compiled as gracefully as anyone with that much food could.

“Aren’t you afraid you’ll get sick, eating all that?” Pansy asked, clearly struggling not to be appalled at the Malfoy scion’s complete eschewal of table manners.

Before Draco could try to answer with his mouth full, Rigel offered, “Seekers will probably try out last. He’ll have time to digest, and there’s no telling how long he might be in the air.”

“Also,” Draco added when he came up for air and pumpkin juice, “A Malfoy never gets sick.”

Pansy and Rigel shared a fond look. Flint stood lazily from his seat down the table, and every other player-hopeful shot to their feet to follow him from the hall like sycophantic courtiers.

“This is it.” Draco set his utensils down deliberately and flashed them a confident, magazine-worthy grin. “Don’t bother wishing me luck.” He stood dramatically, but paused to look down at them expectantly before swinging his other leg over the bench. “You are coming to watch, right?”

“We’ll be there,” Pansy assured him. “In fact, we’ll be cheering so loudly you’ll be embarrassed to know us.”

“I was not made aware of this plan.” Rigel gave a regretful sigh. “If only I’d worn my Draco-is-the-best-possible-choice t-shirt.”

Draco’s eyes lit with Lumos Charms from within, and her sarcasm glanced right off. “Great. I have to get ready, but come soon so you don’t miss anything important.”

He left the Great Hall at a pace that would be called a run, if he weren’t a Malfoy.

“Generations of good breeding out the window as soon as Quidditch is mentioned.” Pansy shook her head. “Boys.”

Rigel remembered just in time that it would be strange if she nodded in agreement, so instead she returned with, “Spending hours in support of a friend despite having absolutely no interest in the subject of his obsession. Girls.”

Pansy laughed. “Just remember you two don’t deserve me.”

“We’d never forget it.”

As her amusement subsided, Pansy looked sidelong at Rigel while toying with her cup. “Where were you this morning? You don’t have to tell me,” she added quickly, before Rigel could open her mouth. “I know you don’t answer to me, but you’ve hardly disappeared at all this week, so I just wondered why suddenly…”

Rigel swallowed her bite of carrots slowly, trying to decide how to answer. The closer she stuck to the truth, the better. “I was in the library. I’ve been using the weekends to do some research.”

“You do homework with Draco and me during the week,” Pansy said. It was not so much an accusation as a reminder of what Pansy already knew—what Rigel shouldn’t bother to try and lie about, perhaps.

“It’s not for any of our assignments. Just extra research, which I didn’t think would interest you two.”

“You said you were kicked out of the library,” Pansy said quietly. She looked as though she wanted to believe Rigel, but found it difficult.

“I was, but I found a way around it.” Rigel smiled gently. “I promise I don’t have an exciting, secret life that I’m hiding because I want to have all the fun to myself. It really is quite boring work.”

“Is it Potions research?”

“Some of it,” Rigel admitted. Technically, some of Flint’s essays were about Potions. “I’m also trying to figure out what’s going on with my magic.” She wasn’t, really, but she injected enough real frustration in her voice that she didn’t think Pansy would notice. “I don’t fancy another detention.”

Her gracious friend allowed the conversation to be steered away without protest. “That’s right. We never asked you how it went because of what happened last night. Was it awful?”

“Tell you on the way to the pitch.” Rigel stood and offered her arm. “If we’re not there by the time the chasers start, Draco will fret.”

On their way down to the stadium, she and Pansy could see dozens of players flying above the stands in a wide circle. Their speeds varied, and more than one wobbled hopelessly in the air as faster, more confident players overtook them.

They climbed the stands for a better view, and by the time they found their seats, Flint seemed to be separating the contingent of hopefuls into ‘maybes’ and ‘no-way-in-hells.’

The latter group was banished to the stands to join the rest of the spectators, and Rigel and Pansy shared a relieved look when Draco stayed down on the pitch. He had survived the first hurdle, at least.

Flint’s booming voice, magically magnified to an alarming degree, called chasers and keepers to try out first. Draco jogged to the side of the pitch with the other beaters and seekers, and Pansy waved exuberantly until he saw them and waved back. Rigel had to smile as the boy stood a little straighter under their supportive eyes.

Draco was far from the only confident hopeful. The waiting players stood like a stable of restless horses, chomping to get airborne. As the chaser-keeper round drew to a close, however, most of them deflated like stuck balloons. Flint picked the same three chasers and keeper as last year. By the speed with which he chose, the tryout seemed a mere formality.

Pansy gave Rigel a worried look.

Draco strode onto the pitch as though he owned it, smile firmly in place and head held at just the right angle for the sunlight to catch his silver eyes. Pansy and Rigel gave a cheer, and the other girls in their grade joined in enthusiastically, until even Flint looked over in annoyance. It was worth the captain’s dark scowl to see Draco’s confidence bolstered even further as he mounted his broom.

Flint loosed four bludgers and three snitches. The beaters would take aim at both the seekers and one another, but the seeker competition was simple: whoever caught the first snitch won. It looked more dangerous than a regular game, with no chasers to distract the beaters, and also more challenging. Rigel almost wished she could have tried out after all.

Flint blew his whistle and all fourteen players took to the air.

“Do you think he’ll get it?” Pansy asked. Her clear blue eyes narrowed against the sun. “He’s only a first-year.”

Rigel shrugged. “The seeker tryout is straightforward. If he catches it first, it’ll be hard to justify denying him a spot.”

“Flint doesn’t seem the type to bother justifying himself to anyone.”

Rigel had no reassuring response to that. They tracked Draco’s figure through the sky. He was in good form, Rigel thought, trying to see him objectively. Their practices had honed Draco’s ability to change directions quickly, so he was able to avoid the bludgers fairly easily, and his strategy seemed to involve sticking closely to Higgs, the veteran seeker.

No one so much as sighted a snitch in the chaos of four bludgers and eight beaters, but there was something both horrifying and beautiful about watching fourteen people come so close to disaster so many times in quick succession.

Even as his friend, Rigel thought she was unbiased in judging Draco a marvel on a broom. She was no slouch in the air, but Draco flew with an elegance that made him seem born to it, as though his grace on the earth was the true wonder.

Twenty minutes later, Pansy sighed and sat back in her seat. “Well, I tried. I’ve been very supportive and patient, and now I’m bored. Rigel, entertain me.”

Rigel spoke without taking her eyes from the drill. “How can you be bored? We’ve seen five near-deadly accidents so far.”

“I don’t think you can call them ‘accidents’ if someone is purposely hitting a big steel ball at you and hoping you fall a hundred feet to the ground.”

“As a human being, not to mention a Slytherin, you’re supposed to be entertained by mindless bloodshed.” Rigel heard Pansy’s huff of amusement, but she didn’t look away from the spectacle until a third voice broke in.

“It’s far from mindless,” Flint said, coming up beside them. He kicked the backs of the seats in front of them, and a couple of third-years scurried out of the way so he could prop his feet up when he sat. “This violence serves a very important purpose.”

“What purpose is that?” Rigel asked. Pansy elbowed her subtly from her other side and gave her a look that asked why the fifth-year Quidditch Captain was talking to them.

“This little spectacle, while dangerous beyond reason and mostly useless in determining Quidditch potential, is part of a brilliant campaign of misinformation that is vital to our team’s success.” Flint trained his eyes not on the chaos happening above their heads but across the pitch at the opposite stands, where students of other Houses were also loitering, watching the trial.

Pansy leaned around Rigel. “Are you using this tryout as an attempt to intimidate the other teams, Mr. Flint?”

Flint gave a bark of his harsh laughter. “Don’t ever call me “Mr.” anything. It’s just Flint. And I’m not attempting. I’m succeeding.”

Rigel gave a small smile. “They’ll think the Slytherin players are dedicated beyond sanity, watching this mess.”

Flint’s answering smile was nothing short of vicious. “People deserve to have their expectations met. One glimpse of this will vindicate every assumption about violent, bloodthirsty Slytherins.”

Pansy made a noise that was only half-approving.

Flint cut his eyes to the blonde girl, a challenge in his voice. “You don’t like my tactics?”

Pansy’s eyes trailed Draco, who was searching for the snitch in perfect diligence. “I don’t presume to know whether the effect on our opponents’ morale is worth putting our House members through such a trial when it’s just for show.”

Flint eyed the small pack of Gryffindors in the stands mercilessly. “It is. Smart money says Wood’ll be having his team practice with four bludgers within the week. With any luck, one of his chasers gets too injured to play, and we wipe the floor with them.”

Rigel frowned. “So, there is no tryout. You’ll be picking the old team no matter what?”

“Why not?” Flint shrugged unconcernedly as he watched the unknowing hopefuls battle it out in vain to further the team’s consequence. “Already got a good team. No need to add new blood.”

Rigel looked over at Pansy to see she was looking just as miserably back at her. Draco will be so disappointed. She didn’t have long to pity him. Even as she thought it, Higgs went into a steep dive, and Draco was right behind him. Both players weaved between beaters, dodging bludgers, and the crowd grew steadily louder as it became clear that neither was feinting.

“Come on, Draco!” Pansy stood from her seat, caught up at last in the excitement.

Higgs leveled out, but Draco shot past him, and the crowd erupted as they all realized the two weren’t even chasing the same snitch. Higgs caught his just a hairsbreadth before Draco, and Flint’s whistle cut the rest of the scrimmage short.

Rigel and Pansy waited with heavy hearts for Flint to descend back to the pitch and pick his beaters and seeker. They swallowed their disappointment on Draco’s behalf, telling one another that he was spectacular and agreeing that he shouldn’t find out it was all for nothing from the start.

Whatever Flint said to them didn’t take long. The pitch began to empty, the rejected hopefuls groaning and gathering their equipment, some angrily, some dejectedly. Rigel and Pansy lagged behind the rest of the spectators as they filed out, and soon they saw a sweaty, red-faced Malfoy pushing quickly up the stairs toward them. Draco dropped his broom when he was close enough and launched himself at them. He ended up half-hugging each of them, his face buried between their shoulders. Pansy nearly overbalanced and Rigel suppressed a hiss as her left wrist jostled, but she couldn’t be angry. Not when he’d just suffered such a disappointment.

“Can. You. Believe it?” Draco panted, his voice distorted with fatigue.

“I know.” Pansy patted his head soothingly. “It’s quite ridiculous.”

“Flint’s an ass,” Rigel agreed.

“What?” Draco pulled back with a confused look.

Pansy and Rigel exchanged a quick glance to make sure that the other was also now confused.

“What?” Rigel repeated. Up close, Draco wasn’t nearly as torn up as she’d expected.

“Well, whatever—isn’t it great!?” Draco beamed. “I made the team!”

They stared at him blankly. Rigel respooled her sympathy and cast around for another response in the face of this new, contradictory information. She was not quick enough.

“What’s with you two?” Draco was looking more put-out by the second. “It’s only reserve seeker, but it’s still pretty—”

“Oh!” Pansy pulled Draco into a more confident hug. “That’s amazing, Draco. Well done.”

“We thought—” Rigel broke off with a sheepish smile. “Well, it looked like Flint wasn't adding any new players to the team.”

“He didn’t.” Draco was smiling again, at least. “He picked all the same players as last year, but he said I had so much potential he was taking me on as a reserve, to train me up as Higg’s replacement!”

“High praise coming from the captain.” Pansy stepped back to smooth her robes.

Draco and Rigel stepped back as well, and Draco admitted. “Well, he didn't say it exactly like that. But that’s what he meant.”

They laughed, and Draco retrieved his broom from where it’d rolled under the seats.

“Let’s head back. Draco, you can get cleaned up, and Rigel can disappear mysteriously until dinner.” Pansy softened the suggestion with a smile, but Rigel was feeling too keyed up to think of studying just then.

“It’s not mysterious if you give me permission.” Rigel shook her head mournfully. “I’ll have to spend all afternoon with you, now, if only to preserve my air of unpredictability. Besides.” She nudged Draco as they started out of the stands. “We have to celebrate this victory together.”

As they made their way up to the castle, Draco said casually, “Now that I’m on the team, I’ll be watching from the players’ box.”

“Good for you.” Pansy was waiting for the punch line, but Rigel could already see where this was going.

“Oh, but—” she started. Draco cut her off with practiced efficiency.

“Not to worry, Rigel. My mother’s invitation remains open. I’m sure you’ll have a wonderful time watching the first match with my parents, even without my illustrious presence to invigorate you.” Draco’s bright smile should have been sinister, but he seemed to actually believe his words.

“Who will introduce us properly if you aren’t even there when we meet?” Rigel argued. It was a perfectly reasonable objection, but her reluctance was much more than an aversion to bad manners. Without Draco there to distract his mother, there was nothing to stop Mrs. Malfoy from noticing all the ways in which Rigel was not like Sirius Black.

“Nonsense.” There was a bounce in Draco’s step that said he knew exactly what he was doing. “Pansy gets along famously with my mother. She can introduce you.”

“But I’m not going to the—”

“Oh, yes you are.” Rigel turned to Pansy desperately. “You have to sit in that box with me, Pansy. Please, Pan.”

“Well…I suppose I was invited originally anyway.” Pansy pursed her lips. “Even if there are a limited number of seats, Draco’s just given his up. Still, several hours of Quidditch…you’ll owe me.”

“Done. Anything.”

“You make it sound like you’re facing a dragon.” Draco scowled. “I’ll have you know my mother is perfectly nice.” At Pansy’s raised eyebrow, he added, “To people who don’t get on her bad side.”

“Introductions,” Pansy said after a long moment. “We’ll trade. I’ll go with you and introduce you to Lady Malfoy if you give me a few hours tomorrow to introduce you to people I think you need to know.”

Rigel hesitated. Pansy had been angling all week to introduce Rigel to her older friends, and Rigel had been avoiding the opportunity, not at all sure how she was going to navigate the political and social waters of Slytherin House just yet. Also, how had Rigel ended up doing something she didn’t want to do in both sides of the trade? The Quidditch match was a real threat, however. She did not want to face the Malfoys alone. Her disguise wasn’t perfect, and she was certain to do or say something utterly wrong for a pureblood heir without Pansy there to smooth things over.

All it took was one mistake; one misstep, and the entire pretense could fall.

“Deal.” Rigel shook on it, and Draco grinned smugly at them both.

She didn’t know how to feel about being out-maneuvered by a boy who probably only wanted his two best friends and his parents to watch his first match together. On the one hand, it was the kind of complication that she meant to avoid friendship for in the first place. On the other hand, it was impossible to stay angry when he looked so pleased with himself. Calling herself the worst kind of sucker, Rigel resigned herself to being thrust into society by Pansy’s well-meaning hands, whether she wanted to or not.

--0—0—0

--0—0

--0

[end of chapter eleven].

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 12:

The next morning, Rigel woke to brisk knocking on their door. They had been up past midnight celebrating Draco’s spot on the House team, and she had no idea what time it was, but her internal clock professed it certainly had not been seven hours. The knocking continued, and she slowly resigned herself to the idea that the others were not going to answer it.

She moved back her hangings, exchanging a bleary-eyed look with Draco, who slept with his curtains open. He eyed her, face half-swallowed by the pillow, but made no move to investigate the knocking. Nott’s hand groped at the bedside table for his pocket watch. It disappeared into his bedding and a muttered, “Hell, no” from beneath the sheets made his opinion on the matter clear.

“You’re dressed. You get it.” Draco offered this solution with perfect dignity before turning his face fully into the pillow.

Rigel supposed she was, at that. She rolled out of bed and shivered as her bare feet met the cold dungeon floor. Padding her way to the door, she cracked it, intending to give the knocker her firm regrets and then return to bed.

Unfortunately for that plan, it was Pansy. The inhumanly awake blonde breezed past Rigel and cast the Lumos Charm so brightly it elicited an immediate groan from Nott’s bed. Draco began a noise of startled indignation that fizzled out when he caught sight of her.

“Pans!” He ran his fingers through his hair in a hasty attempt to look dignified in his nightclothes. “You can’t barge into a gentleman’s room first thing in the morning.” At Pansy’s raised eyebrow, Draco seemed to think better of scowling at her and redirected his ire to Rigel. “I told you to answer it because you’re already decent. If you let the person in, it defeats the purpose.”

Rigel met his stare and raised him a shrug. “A gentleman never refuses a lady.”

“More importantly, a lady never gives a gentleman the chance to.” Pansy eyed the state of their dorm room with a distinctly motherly disappointment.

“Why are you here, Pansy?” Nott elected out of the discussion on gentlemanly behavior by remaining firmly in bed.

“I’m here to ready Rigel for breakfast.”

“Rigel can’t dress himself?” Draco waved his hand over Rigel’s rumpled clothing. “Oh, wait, he already did. Mission accomplished.”

Pansy gave Rigel a dubious once-over. “We’re doing introductions after breakfast, and I need him to look like a pureblood heir.”

“He is a pureblood heir,” Nott said from his prostrate position of protest. “So however he looks must be how one is supposed to look.”

“Rigel doesn’t normally concern himself with conforming to…more traditional aspects of style.” Pansy’s tone was perfectly diplomatic, which made it all the more insulting. “While he is undoubtedly accomplished in his own right, visual clues will reinforce his consequence for those who are too stupid to think for themselves.”

“You’re introducing me to stupid people?”

“No! That’s not what—” At the look on Rigel’s face, Pansy relented. “I’m sorry if I offended you just now. Only, since I’m making the introductions, your image reflects on me today.”

Rigel looked down at her bed-wrinkled robes. “I was going to change.”

“Breakfast doesn’t start for another hour,” Nott added.

Pansy shot Draco a smug glance. “Perfection takes time.”

Draco only groaned. “You can stay as long as you stop quoting my mother. And be quiet so the rest of us can go back to sleep.”

Nott cheered weakly and shut his hangings immediately.

“What about me?”

“Someone has to be sacrificed for the greater good.” Draco closed his curtains as well, leaving Rigel to Pansy’s questionable mercy.

“I’m sure I can make myself presentable if you give me a chance,” Rigel tried, backing away slowly.

“After I show you what I want, you can try all by yourself next time.” Pansy’s smile was utterly simpering. “Don’t worry, it will be fun.”

After the first hour, Rigel resolved to get Pansy a dictionary with the word ‘fun’ circled and painstakingly explained.

First, Pansy sent Rigel to the shower with a set of clothes and instructions to wash everything but her hair. These were not the clothes she would be wearing to her introductions, evidently. Pansy called them ‘control clothes,’ and explained they would be a neutral backdrop for testing hairstyles and save the real outfit from wrinkles and water spots.

Rigel showered, vaguely grateful Pansy hadn’t insisted on supervising her scrubbing. She carefully wrapped her wrist with clean bandages from under the sink and dressed. The control clothes were loose and long-sleeved, at least. When she opened the door, Pansy waited with a basket of products that could put a student’s basic Potions kit to shame.

For the second time that week, Rigel found herself bending over a sink with Pansy’s hands in her hair. She didn’t mind the hair-washing, exactly, but it felt odd. Archie had never washed her hair.

After the fourth bottle, Rigel stopped trying to guess what Pansy was putting on her scalp and focused on staying still. Once she’d met whatever goalpost she had in mind, Pansy drew Rigel back from the sink and arranged her short locks about her head. When she drew her wand, Rigel held extremely still.

“Are you going to cut it?”

Pansy’s eyes softened from their intense focus. “No. I know a charm that makes it stay perfectly still as it dries, if that’s all right.” Rigel nodded her acceptance, and Pansy waved her wand in a weaving motion over the carefully settled pieces. “You should never use heating charms on your hair if you can help it,” she offered, perhaps mistaking Rigel’s question for interest in the process. “It can damage the ends, and I suspect your texture would not take well to it.”

Rigel tucked that information into the void, but smiled politely as Pansy made the final tweaks to her hair.

“Nails next.”

Rigel crossed her arms, unwilling to let Pansy get a close look at her left hand. Suspecting was one thing; there was no need to confirm anything for the girl. “My nails are fine.”

Pansy gave her a stern look. “You have to have clean fingernails, or no one will trust you.”

Rigel did not hide her disbelief.

“It’s true,” Pansy insisted. “A clean person runs a clean house, that’s what people think. If you are neat and tidy in your person, then you will be seen as fastidious in all your affairs. Dirty fingernails might as well be a flag with the words ‘I have no attention to detail’ in gold embroidery. My father taught me that.”

Certainly, that’s what they would tell themselves: that it had nothing to do with classism and a prejudice against people who did dirty work for a living. Rigel told herself she was reading too much into it, but the phrase ‘dirty blood’ kept going through her head, and she didn’t think she could convince herself the connotations weren’t there on a subconscious level.

“I keep my nails short and clean for Potions work,” Rigel said firmly. It was a habit she adopted ruthlessly after an article in Potions Quarterly had painstakingly outlined the potential consequences of unintended biomatter entering a volatile potion.

“At least let me confirm,” Pansy insisted.

Rigel presented her right hand, and, after a reluctantly impressed nod, Pansy turned the offensive on Rigel’s eyebrows.

“Not a lot,” she promised, brandishing the tweezers with a casualness that was not reassuring.

Rigel grimaced through the entire process and told herself to renegotiate the limits of their friendship when she was not at the mercy of the other girl’s artistic abandon.

Pansy leaned back to inspect her work. “Your eyes are a little dry.”

Rigel dropped her gaze to the side, hoping Pansy didn’t know that dryness was a side effect of prolonged magical contact usage.

“I didn’t sleep well. I can put some drops in.”

Pansy’s cheeks went slightly pink and she shook her head. “No, forgive me. That was entirely too far. Your eyes are fine, Rigel. I think we’ve just about finished in here.”

Pansy retreated to rummage through her closet. Archie had all kinds of clothes, most of which Rigel hadn’t even looked at except to hang them up when Draco scolded her for leaving perfectly good fabric in her trunk. Pansy made a pleased noise at the diversity of choices and plucked two sets of robes from their hangers.

“Why don’t you ever wear these?” Pansy held each set against Rigel’s neck in turn to gage the effect of the color against her skin. “I’d assumed you forgot to pack anything but school robes.”

“If I wear the same thing every day, I don’t have to worry about what day it is.”

Pansy dove back into the closet and surfaced with a garish robe of lime green trimmed in orange. The horror in her eyes demanded an explanation.

“Sirius has a disreputable sense of humor,” Rigel offered.

Pansy stared mutely at the floral pattern that, upon closer inspection, had fish heads where the petals should be.

“He and my uncles have matching sets.”

Caution to anyone who considered inviting the Marauders anywhere.

“I’m sure it makes an excellent ice-breaker.” Pansy pushed the monstrosity into the back of the closet as though it were a live rat she would prefer to exterminate. “Not quite what I had in mind for today. This, on the other hand, should do nicely.”

Pansy handed her a set of robes that looked black to the casual eye, but were in fact a very dark grey. Rigel went into the bathroom to change and grimaced as the thin material slid over her head. The real reason she stuck to school robes was the added bulk they gave her. While her male classmates had not hit their growth spurts yet, one day they would, and Rigel didn’t want to look delicate in comparison.

When she returned, Draco had finally dragged himself from the arms of sleep. The blond boy perched on the end of his bed, looking on with amusement as Pansy scowled fiercely at a rejected pile of shoes, which must have done something truly terrible to elicit such abhorrence.

Shoes were the only thing she and Archie hadn’t swapped. They had different sized feet, and anyway, Rigel liked her boots.

“What is this?” Pansy demanded.

“It appears to be every shoe in my closet,” Rigel said mildly.

“They don’t match anything here. And they’re bulky.” She said the last word as though it was a synonym for maggot.

“They’re protected against most types of acid,” Rigel informed her. “Not to mention fire-proof, water-proof, and resistant to corrosion.”

“They may be…serviceable,” Pansy allowed. “But they don’t go with the robes I picked out.”

“I could wear different robes.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Pansy turned to Draco. “We’ll have to borrow some of yours.”

“You want my shoes?” This was a shade too far before breakfast, apparently. Draco put up his hands. “What’s next, my underwear?”

“Just for the morning,” Pansy implored. “I’ll see them cleaned myself before they’re returned, and of course you’re welcome to demand a similar favor in return.”

“I seriously doubt I’ll be asking to borrow your shoes anytime soon, thanks though.” Draco rolled his eyes. “And I’m sure the Hogwarts house-elves don’t need to be supervised when they clean shoes.”

“So you agree? Great!” Pansy had her head in his trunk before he could blink. “Because I noticed you wearing a dove-grey pair last week that would be just perfect…”

“If they fit,” Rigel said quietly.

“He’s right.” Draco’s cheeks took on a ruddy tinge that made him look even more sleep-rumpled. “I haven’t fully grown into my height yet—”

“Oh, they’re tiny.” Pansy found the shoes she wanted, but eyed them uncertainly. “They’re almost as small as mine.”

Rigel had been expecting the opposite problem. One of the many great things about boots was the way they added length and breadth to her feet, which were smaller than she thought a boy’s should be.

They fit almost perfectly, to Pansy’s surprise and Draco’s embarrassed relief. The soles were a bit wider than her foot, but the length was good, and even Rigel could see that they contrasted nicely with the dark robes.

“Impeccable.” Pansy circled Rigel like a sculptor looking for something to chisel. “The symmetry between your eyes and your shoes really pulls it together. Doesn’t he look like a proper pureblood, Draco?”

“He looks rich, if that’s what you mean.” At Pansy’s unamused look, Draco added, “I wouldn’t think him out of place at one of Mother’s luncheons.”

Rigel eyed her reflection in the wardrobe mirror uncomfortably. It might as well have been a painting. She couldn’t see herself anywhere in the grey eyes, the perfectly tamed locks, the elegantly impractical robes, and the shoes—paper thin and permeable—which would probably wilt if taken anywhere near an active cauldron.

For a moment, she was terrified. Was this what it meant to chase a dream? Did she have to sacrifice her real self to find her would-be self? And even if she found it, if all her dreams become the facts of her reality, was there a way to get back to that dreamer unchanged? She didn’t know, and that thought was enough to halt her thinking altogether.

“Will you take the charm off of my hair now?” Rigel asked. “It’s making my head feel a bit funny, I think.”

“It should be dry by now.” Pansy lifted the charm and used her fingers to make the final adjustments. “Flawless. I’m afraid there’s nothing more for me to do.”

Draco sighed gustily. “And we’ll miss you terribly, but don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”

“Good thing breakfast starts in fifteen minutes, then.” Pansy gathered her products with prim satisfaction. “You won’t be bereft of my company for longer than it takes to wake Theo from his coma.”

The warning glare she sent Rigel as she paused by the door veritably dared her to change anything in her appearance before going to breakfast.

Rigel smiled meekly. “Thank you, Pansy.”

After she’d gone, Draco flopped backwards on his bedcovers. “I can’t remember which of us made friends with her first, but we are going to have a long seven years.”

“Never dull, though.” Rigel tugged at the uncomfortable robes. “And when people look back at the pictures, I suppose we’ll be the best-dressed ones in the frame.”

Draco wrinkled his nose. “I’m sure one day I’ll appreciate that, but right now I just wish I could have slept more.”

“You? What about me?”

“If you made more of an effort on an average day, Pansy wouldn’t have had to intervene, would she?” Draco drawled. Before Rigel could decide whether to throw one of her shoes at him, he levered himself off the bed and looked over at their roommate’s four-poster with a wicked glint. “And instead of arguing about which one of us got less sleep this morning—”

“As if it’s even in dispute.”

“—we should be waking Theo so he can enjoy the fresh dungeon air as well.”

Rigel slid her eyes to Nott’s light-canceling curtains. A steady timbre of sickeningly comfortable breathing noises sounded within.

“It is time for breakfast,” she said slowly.

“That’s the spirit.” Draco nudged her. “Practically doing him a favor, aren’t we?”

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

As she sat down to breakfast, Rigel found her rapport with the other girls in their year inexplicable altered. Which was to say, she appeared to suddenly have one.

“Love your hair today, Black,” Davis said with an appreciative flap of her eyelids.

“Did your house elf finally deliver your trunk?” Greengrass guessed. Her eyes lingered on Rigel’s robes in a way that was distinctly less comfortable than Pansy’s critical appraisal.

Pansy gave Rigel a less-than-subtle eyebrow raise. See how much difference it makes?

Rigel had to tense her muscles to keep from spilling her milk when Davis put an unsolicited hand on her forearm. Rigel shot Pansy a look of panic. I could do without this sort of difference, thank you very much.

Pansy took pity on her. “Rigel is meeting some friends of mine after breakfast.”

Bulstrode grunted in understanding. “You did good.” Her compliment was very much directed at Pansy, not Rigel. “Let me know how it goes.”

Now Rigel had to worry about why Bulstrode cared how her introduction went.

A Barn Owl dropped Archie’s long-awaited reply into Rigel’s lap, and she wasted no time opening it. Anything was better than a table full of scrutiny.

Dear Rigel (I like the change),  

I was so glad to receive your letter! It’s good to hear you’re doing well at Hogwarts, though why anyone would want to go to that pretentious place I really don’t understand.

Brave of you to befriend a Malfoy after all Dad and Uncle Sirius have told us. As for Marcus Flint, you did tell me about him, remember? I specifically recall you describing him as ‘rough around the edges’ but ‘much nicer than he looks’ when you told me about meeting him and his prejudiced father in the VIP box. You mentioned something about a troubled home life and a mother with a chronic illness (which was part of the reason you told him about your ambition to be a Healer, wasn’t it?) and you said if I ever met him, I should try and look past the surface, which is mostly just a front—am I remembering that right? Anyway, he sounds interesting, so perhaps I’ll send him an owl and see if we can’t all become good friends.

My classes are going well, and my Potions professor was especially impressed with my understanding of the art. I bet yours was too, considering how much of my knowledge must have rubbed off on you over the years. I don’t think I’ll have any problems learning Healing here, and I hope you aren’t too jealous of me—I’ll share everything I learn with you over the summers, and it’ll be like we’re both in Healer training. I’ve also made a friend—a muggleborn witch who’s also from England, Hermione Granger. She’s terrifyingly brilliant, but also kind and loyal, and she wants to be a Healer, too.

That’s all so far—Imagine I said something sappy and heart-felt about missing you, etc.

-Harry  

Rigel smiled fondly as she folded the letter and tucked it into her pocket. Archie would write to Flint, it seemed. She hoped he could cement an agreement to keep their secret safe indefinitely.

“Letter from my cousin,” she explained when Draco and Pansy sent her curious looks.

Draco tilted his head. “Which cousin? Lestrange?”

Rigel supposed he was mentally tracing the Black family tree, trying to decide who she’d be close enough in age to write to. He must be coming up blank if he thought she’d be corresponding with his aunt’s kid. Sirius hated Bellatrix.

Pansy cleared her throat delicately. “I think perhaps he meant a cousin in our year. Attending a different magical school.”

“At Durmstrang?” Draco frowned. “But not Lestrange?”

Pansy widened her eyes meaningfully at Draco, who made an oh of understanding with his mouth.

“One of the schools on the continent, then? We have family over there, too. The Malfoys came over from France with the Norman Conquest, you know.”

Rigel felt just a little vindictive as she burst his bubble. “No, not from the continent. She’s British, but she attends the American Institute of Magic.”

Rigel witnessed the exact moment Draco realized the only British magical children who went to America were those who could not attend Hogwarts because of their blood status.

He gave a faintly embarrassed, “Ah.”

Pansy looked between Draco’s uncomfortable expression and Rigel’s stiffly unapologetic posture and politely attended to her cup of tea.

Rigel could almost see Draco groping around in his head for something non-inflammatory to say. She knew his family’s politics all too well, and he might as well learn hers now, before their friendship went further.

“That would be the Potter Heiress, I suppose? You must have spent some time together as children, with your fathers in business together.”

“That’s right.” Rigel tried to keep the defensiveness from her tone. “Harry and I grew up together.”

“Harriet Potter goes by Harry?” Pansy abandoned any pretense of polite disinterest. “What’s she like?”

Rigel wasn’t sure how to answer that.

Pansy took her hesitation for confusion. “It’s just, there aren’t that many witches our age, and no one’s seen her since she was a baby, before the Potters stepped out of society.”

‘Stepped out’ was a diplomatic way to describe how the Potters and Blacks, along with every other Light-aligned family, had angrily turned their backs on Dark pureblood society altogether in a politically-motivated snub known as the Great Split.

On Halloween night, 1981, Lord Riddle orchestrated a civil coup of the Wizengamot. With enough supporters to form a quorum, the S.O.W Party called an emergency session at midnight. Most of the opposing council members were observing the holiday, and therefore mysteriously and unfortunately missed their summons.

In the absence of opposition, Riddle ruthlessly pushed through a packet of blood laws, including the one that reduced attendance at Hogwarts from purebloods and halfbloods to purebloods only.

It wasn’t just Hogwarts affected. One law phrased as nationalist protection of local jobs prevented anyone schooled outside of the UK from holding office in government or working for a public organization. Another forbade any witch or wizard with creature blood from voting in wizarding elections or enlisting in a law-enforcement agency. The worst was the change to Wizengamot procedure: the final law prevented the Wizengamot from overturning any previous legislation with less than a three-fourths majority. Even when the Light-aligned council members returned, there was nothing they could do.

The families whose council members had been excluded from the vote were outraged, and in silent, furious protest they had, to a one, cut Dark society altogether. Never since that night had the two sides mingled, except on Neutral grounds.

Rigel understood it was an incredibly sore point for most of the Dark hostesses, who suddenly had half the attendees at their balls and luncheons, but Pansy managed to reference it casually, as though the Great Split had not affected her at all. She also managed to make it sound as though Dark society was the only one that mattered.

“Harry is Harry,” Rigel said eventually. “I don’t know how to describe her.”

“Does she really have eyes as green as a serpent’s polished scales?”

Draco and Rigel exchanged a disbelieving look.

“What?” Pansy had never looked so defensive. “That’s what I heard.”

Draco gave a snort of laughter. “From who?”

Pansy lifted her chin. “You know my mother is a poet.”

“A poor one,” Bulstrode muttered from Draco’s other side.

Pansy pretended not to hear. “She met the Potter Heiress when she was an infant. So, are they?”

“They are green,” Rigel allowed. “Though I don’t know about ‘as-a-serpent’s-whatever.’ She looks like any other Potter, mostly, but the eyes are her mum’s.”

“Lily Potter nee Evans, right?” Pansy knew her society, Split or no Split. “They say she was quite lovely.”

“She still is,” Rigel agreed. “Aunt Lily is one of those people who never seems to age a day.”

“My mother is the same.” Draco smiled, then paused, a frown growing as he realized he’d compared Narcissa Black with a woman of muggle birth.

“The mark of true beauty,” Pansy said smoothly. “Were you and Miss Potter close as children?”

“The closest.” Rigel said. “My Uncle Remus doesn’t have any children, so she was my only friend, before I met you two. Godric’s Hollow is an aging community.” Most of their neighbors were as old as Mrs. Bagshot.

“You must have been more like siblings than friends, then,” Pansy said thoughtfully.

“We were. Harry’s like my little sister—or maybe older sister, the way she mothers me.” She could admit it easily; Archie needed mothering, after all.

“And now she’s studying in America?” Bulstrode’s eyes were sharp. “What’s her specialty?”

Rigel couldn’t imagine why the stocky girl was interested. “She’s in the Healing track.”

“AIM is known for that program,” Bulstrode commented. “It’s a fast-track for a certificate upon graduation, right?”

“As long as she passes all the classes.” Rigel hesitated, but felt compelled to add, “I don’t know if she’ll stick with it, though. Her real passion is Potions.”

“Then why is she in the Healing track?”

“It’s the better program. She thinks it would be a shame not to take advantage, as long as she’s there anyway.” Rigel kept her tone light, as though it wasn’t a crucial linchpin in their ruse. “She’ll keep studying Potions in her own time. Probably decide down the road which one she wants to pursue.”

Convoluted, but if someone learned that Harry had an interest in Potions, it was explained, and when Archie and Harry eventually switched back, they would say that Harry decided Healing wasn’t for her at the last minute.

Archie would take the Healing Exam under his own name once they’d graduated, saying that he’d been inspired by Harry’s studies and decided to learn Healing on his own. The trickiest part would be convincing everyone that Archie was in fact Archie after Rigel had been him for so long. Rigel would have no trouble becoming Harry again, because no one in society would know Harry at all.

Their appearance was the major problem, but they still had time to figure that out.

“Mediwizardry is a noble profession,” Pansy said.

“Though it’ll be hard to get a job if she was schooled out of the UK,” Draco added. Pansy sent him a repressing look. He shrugged it off. “It’s true. St. Mungo’s is a public hospital.”

“Harry will figure something out.” Something like becoming a Potions Mistress and working for private development companies like her mum did.

“Will she remain in America, then?” Pansy asked.

Rigel shrugged. “I don’t know all her plans.”

“I thought you two were such close friends.” There was a note of jealousy in Draco’s voice.

“We’re friends, and I don’t know your plans,” Rigel said.

“Good point.” Pansy grinned. “Especially since we don’t know yours, either.”

Rigel shrugged. “I want to be a Potions Master. That’s all there is to me.”

A group of people stood further down the table and Pansy suddenly abandoned her tea. “It’s time. Let’s try to get there before them.”

“Mordred forbid we make an older student wait,” Draco muttered. All the same, he removed his napkin from his lap and stood.

The three of them made it to the common room with time to spare for settling Rigel’s hair one final time. Pansy arranged them in seats by one of the best fireplaces. They were a study in casual repose, only discredited by the way Pansy’s eyes kept darting toward the entrance wall.

“I’ve known these two for years,” Pansy said quietly to Rigel. “Both eldest sons, both incredibly talented wizards, and they’re best friends. Their personalities can be a bit…” Her eyes shifted uncertainly. “You’ll see. They like to provoke people, but if they offend you, try not to show it.”

Rigel nodded. She didn’t need reminding of the basic tenants of Slytherin. She hadn’t been here long, but she wasn’t unobservant.  

“Why am I here again?” Draco was beside Rigel on the low couch, with Pansy cattycorner in a chair next to him. This put Rigel closest to the two empty chairs that would be taken by Pansy’s friends.

Pansy explained patiently. “As Rigel’s cousin, you are here in silent endorsement. If the Malfoys accept the Black Heir, then so must everyone else.”

Draco made a face. “There’s something unsavory about social maneuvering.”

“Those at the top of the social food chain can afford to feel that way.” Pansy’s eyes held an edge that was normally wrapped in gossamer niceties. “Others must reconcile themselves to the gentle game, no matter how repellant they find it to be at times.”

“But you and Rigel aren’t exactly bottom feeders,” Draco protested. “Why is it so important to push him into society right now?”

Rigel wanted to know that as well.

Pansy gave them an exasperated look. “You wait until now to ask? Honestly.” She looked toward the entrance wall again. “Rigel must be introduced to society while he’s at school. When he’s home, he is Light-aligned under his father and thus subject to the Split. School is a place of social neutrality, and it’s his only chance to gain allies for the future. Opinions form quickly, here. He’s been keeping to himself too much the last two weeks. If Rigel wants to be accepted in our social circles going forward—if we want our friendship with Rigel to be accepted—we have to show everyone that he belongs here and has nothing to hide.”

Draco gave Rigel a shrewd look. “But he does have things to hide.”

Rigel could not argue with that when she’d told him as much herself.

“No better way to hide things than by giving people no reason to go looking for them.” Pansy took to her feet gracefully, Draco and Rigel a beat behind her.

Two older boys approached the fireplace. They were of an age and height, though one was slightly taller.

“Edmund, Aldon, thank you for taking the time this morning.” Pansy stepped forward with a genuine smile. “You have met Draco Malfoy, I believe?” The older Slytherins nodded politely to Draco, who nodded back. “Then, may I introduce my classmate, Rigel Black?” Pansy turned her head to indicate Rigel, who kept her expression neutral as she received their regard. “Rigel, this is Aldon Rosier and Edmund Rookwood.”

“How do you do, Black?” Rookwood, the taller of the two, had light brown hair cut close to his head. He tilted his head in a nod that accentuated his square jaw, managing to convey friendliness without the hint of a smile.

“Well, thank you.” Rigel took his hand, and it transferred a pleasant warmth despite the dungeon air.

Rosier, slighter and more beautiful, took her hand before Rookwood had even fully released her. “Our meeting is overdue.” His hair was so black it skewed blue. Gold eyes gleamed with preternatural interest, and she thought he looked like a shadow next to his rock-statue of a friend. The flickering amusement in his eyes only enhanced the impression of light in a dark room.

“I’m sorry we couldn’t arrange something sooner,” Rigel said, her face a mask of polite interest.

Pansy sat first, followed by Draco. Rookwood chose the single seat opposite Pansy, and Rosier moved smoothly to the third space on the couch. Rigel had no choice but to sit between him and Draco, trying to keep her posture straight enough to avoid cutting anyone out of the conversation.

“I’m so pleased this worked out. I’ve been meaning to introduce you all since the start of term.” Pansy’s words were formal, but she injected such emotion into each syllable that it was hard to doubt her sincerity. “So thank you for taking the time. I know you’re busy.”

“I cannot think of anyone too busy to spend a few moments with you, Pansy.” If a mountain had a voice, strong and staid, it would have been Rookwood’s. The dull rumble was dangerous, Rigel decided. It had a lulling quality that belied the penetrating effect of his gaze. Half-lidded, he seemed to cast a Transparency Charm on everything before him. Or maybe that was just Rigel.

“We wouldn’t miss it, though as lowly fourth-years, our schedules are hardly hard-pressed to accommodate anything,” Rosier added.

Pansy accepted their flattery like a queen accepting a bow.

Draco laughed lightly, a sound so patently out of character Rigel had to check someone else hadn’t take his seat. “Oh, don’t tell her that. She’ll be expecting Rigel and me to be equally accommodating with our time, now.”

“And why shouldn’t you be?” Pansy asked, eyebrows raised playfully.

“If we spoil you, you’re liable to get out of hand,” Rigel said, figuring she may as well participate in the banter, since Pansy had gone to so much trouble to arrange everything.

“A woman is always out of hand,” Rosier said slyly, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees.

“Though she may never be long out of mind,” Rookwood added, leaning back in his chair, as though in counterbalance.

Rigel had to admit, they were good.

Pansy feigned pique at being singled out, but she couldn’t hide her relief that the ice was melting. “Your studies must be progressing smoothly, if you’ve enough time to spend the morning teasing me.”

“As smoothly as can be expected before we settle into career paths,” Rosier said.

“Are you considering anything in particular?” Rigel asked, projecting interest into the question. She could socialize. It wasn’t that hard.

“I may pursue a Mastery in Experimental Magical Theory at some point after graduation,” Rosier said idly, as though that was not an incredibly difficult specialty. “But Edmund is more interested in hands-on work, aren’t you?”

“I prefer the minding of magical plants and animals to the likes of Arithmancy, yes.” Rookwood rolled his shoulder in a one-man landslide. “One of my uncles works on an International Creatures Reserve, so I’m applying for an internship there next summer. If it suits me, I might look at working with dragons or hydras in the future.”

“You both have such specific ideas,” Pansy said wistfully. “I hope my future is as clear by the beginning of fourth year.”

“Don’t worry if nothing strikes a chord at first,” Rookwood said. “The basics in every subject are fairly dull.”

Draco nudged Rigel good naturedly. “Tell that to this one. He had his future picked out before he walked onto the Hogwarts Express.”

Their attention turned to Rigel. “Is that so? What will you do when you graduate, then?” Rosier’s mouth held an amused twist at the edges.

She tried not to let it phase her. Maybe it was overconfident to plan her life at eleven, but if she wanted something, why shouldn’t she go after it? The world wasn’t going to hand it to her.

Because he had asked what she would do, rather than what she wanted to do, she gave him the courtesy of an honest answer. “I’m going to be a Potions Master.”

The older Slytherins exchanged a look. Rigel wondered if they had been expecting her to say something like ‘Auror’ or ‘Prank-Inventor.’ When they refocused on her, their eyes had grown more intent, as though they were only now fully engaged in the conversation.

“A challenging subject,” Rookwood noted. “The Potions Mastery is rumored to be among the most difficult to obtain.” 

“Rigel is up to the challenge.” The confidence Draco radiated sent a bit of warmth straight into her chest.

Rosier noted it too. “A glowing endorsement.”

Rigel couldn’t tell if it was her imagination or if his eyes really lingered laughingly over her pink-tinged cheekbones when he said ‘glowing.’ Pansy wasn’t kidding about her friend having a needling disposition.

“And perfectly apt.” Pansy threw in her support without an ounce of subtlety. “Professor Snape has already begun giving Rigel extra tutelage.”

Another fathomless look passed between Rosier and Rookwood.

“Professor Snape’s judgement is incontestable,” Rosier said slowly. “As I understand it, he does not share his talents lightly.”

“My friends are too kind,” Rigel demurred. “At the moment, Professor Snape just assigns me a lot of extra work.”

Rosier laughed. “That sounds like him.”

“That you have gained his notice at all is still impressive,” Rookwood offered. “It’s only been two weeks. You must have nursed this ambition for some time before coming to Hogwarts.”

Rosier made a noise of understanding. “And long-term ambition would go a long way toward explaining your presence in Slytherin.”

“I wasn’t aware that it needed explaining.”

Rosier smiled. “Weren’t you? A great many people are curious about you, Black. They want to know on which side of the wand you’ll fall.”

“If I do land on one side or the other, rest assured it will be because I jumped.”

“I like this one, Pansy.” Rosier didn’t take his eyes off Rigel’s expressionless face.

“Yes, bring him around more often,” Rookwood agreed.

The upperclassmen stood, each nodding to Draco and bowing over Pansy’s hand gracefully.

“Until we meet again, Black.” Rosier favored Rigel with a sly grin while Rookwood restrained himself to a polite nod.

“Good day, Rookwood, Rosier.” Rigel nodded respectfully to each of them, then sat slowly back down on the couch once they’d walked away, extremely relieved that the meeting was over.

“That went so well!” Pansy beamed at her. “Aldon and Edmund have a lot of pull among the upper years. You’ve made wonderful allies today, Rigel.”

“I understand why you wanted me to meet them, but why did they seem so pleased to meet me?” Rigel asked.

“Everyone wants to bring éclat to their own family name, and the best way to do that, short of becoming distinguished through your own merits, is to make good connections. You have talent and ambition, not to mention an old family name, so there will never be a shortage of people desiring to connect themselves to you.”

“But everyone in Slytherin is ambitious. Surely, they’ll all want to be the sought after, rather than the seeking?” Rigel said, a bit confused.

“No reason not to do both.” Pansy smirked. “Then you have twice the clout. Now, we only have to hope Aldon and Edmund write to their parents about you. If that happens, their mothers will write to my mother and Draco’s mother and we’ll be practically ordered to be friends with you!”

“Oh. That’s…good?” Had Pansy really planned for all of that to happen? No wonder she insisted on them meeting well before the first Quidditch match.

“It’s all taken care of,” Pansy assured her. “Not that we would have dropped you even if the whole House was against you, but this does make the situation easier for us.”

“If the politicking is settled, let’s do something more productive with the rest of our morning.” Draco stretched as though he’d been on the couch for hours, rather than fifteen minutes. “Exploding Snap?”

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

Rigel begged out of the card game, citing homework. Draco was determined to put his off to later in the evening, and Pansy’s designs for her had been so well satisfied that she didn’t even press when Rigel left for the library.  

She used her Ravenclaw disguise, which involved the brown wig and the same pair of common round glasses. As she shuffled through the stacks with poor posture, she wondered whether she wouldn’t be good enough to take up acting by the time she figured out how to convince Pince to let her in of her own accord.

Flint had included the graded assignments from the previous week in his latest letter, and Rigel took full advantage of the comments to avoid making the same mistakes twice. That week was lighter on assignments, but several hours later she was still stuck on an essay about Vanishing Theory. The concepts involved seemed contradictory, and she wasn’t sure how to reconcile them.

Rigel got the feeling Transfiguration, unlike History or Herbology, was cumulative. Year five wasn’t just tackling more complicated subject matter; it required the foundation of the four previous years to understand.

Unable to move forward, she decided it was time to take Percy Weasley up on his offer.

Rigel climbed directly to Gryffindor tower. The main staircase reminded her she hadn’t been alone in the corridors since Friday’s incident, and she found her feet moving faster and her breath coming shorter than even a handful of staircases merited.

At the Fat Lady’s portrait, she took a moment to regain her composure.

“Visiting?” the portrait asked, eyeing her tie.

Rigel smiled guiltily and slid the wig off of her head, stowing it in her bag with the glasses. She knocked on the lady’s opulent frame, and a girl with blonde, curly hair stuck her head out a moment later.

“What’s up?” Her tone was neither friendly nor rude.

“Is Percy Weasley around?” Rigel asked. “He offered to help me with some extra curricula study.”

At the word ‘study,’ the curious expression left her face and she gave a bored nod. “Yeah, come on in.” She pushed open the painting and Rigel climbed carefully through the opening. “Prefect Weasley is over there.” She gestured to a long study table tucked into a niche between two sets of stairs.

Percy sat alone, up to his shoulders in books and running ink-stained fingers through his fireball of hair.

“He’s been in a right state since lunch,” the curly-haired girl informed her. “Good luck with that.”

Rigel thanked her and cautiously approached Percy’s barricade of books. He was either writing an essay or angrily destroying an innocent sheet of parchment.

“Percy?” She spoke quietly, but he still jumped as though she’d shouted.

“What? Who—oh, Rigel. Hello.” He rubbed a hand against his face, knocking his horn-rimmed glasses askew. “How are you?”

“Very well, thank you.” She recognized a few of the books Percy had stacked about him. “Working on a Potions essay?”

“Yes.” He scowled down at the mess of ink and parchment before him. “Or I was, before Potions decided to become Ancient Mesopotamian. This dratted assignment doesn’t make any sense.” He tossed down his quill with a sigh. “Did you come for help with something? I need a break from this anyway.”

Rigel moved a pile of crumpled parchment from a chair and sat. “I was hoping you could explain Vanishing Theory to me. It was mentioned in a book I was reading, so I looked it up, but I don’t understand parts of it.”

“Oh?” Percy looked interested. “That’s very advanced theory. We’re only just now getting into it, in fact.” Rigel tried not to fidget guiltily. “What are you having trouble with?”

“I don’t understand where things go when they are Vanished. The book says they go ‘into Non-being,’ but what is that, like another dimension?” Rigel asked.

“Non-being is a kind of theoretical place from which all of being comes out of. It’s not really another dimension, since other dimensions are just a different kind of being; rather, it’s the opposite of things that are. Vanished objects don’t exactly ‘go’ there, but they become the opposite of being—that is, they un-become. And once they aren’t being anymore, they are a part of Non-being, do you see?” Percy raised his eyebrows expectantly.

“Not really.” Rigel frowned. “If they don’t exist anymore, then how is it possible to get the objects back by Unvanishing them?”

“Well, it’s all theoretical,” Percy began slowly. “But you don’t really have to understand the physics of it to grasp the theory. Basically, just realize that you aren’t destroying whatever you Vanish—it’s not that kind of un-becoming. More like you’re giving it the property of lacking presence in this world. It’s still the same as it was before you Vanished it, only it isn’t here anymore, so it’s considered Non-being in that sense. The key is in distinguishing between Non-being and non-existence. An object in Non-being exists, it just doesn’t exist in being at the moment. That’s why you can retrieve a Vanished object if you know how.”

“So, a Vanishment is conditionally temporary?” Rigel asked.

“Yes, that’s usually the case.” Percy paused. “Well, unless it’s in true Non-being.” 

Rigel stared at him. “What is true Non-being, then? Even more Non-being?”

“It is the combination of Non-being and non-existence. True Non-being is really, truly gone. No getting something back,” Percy elaborated.

“All right…” She could accept that if she didn’t think too hard about it. Rigel carefully jotted down the phrase ‘property of lacking presence’ so she didn’t forget it. “I’m confused about another thing.”

Percy gestured for her to go on.

“I’ve read that in Apparition, for example, where a wizard Vanishes and Unvanishes himself in two different locations, it’s possible for the wizard to splinch himself, without killing himself, which suggests that the connection between Vanished parts of an object can survive the Vanishment—do you think it’s possible that it might work the same for linked charms?”

“A bad splinching often results in a severing of that connection,” Percy corrected her. “Not everyone gets put back together without issue. That said, explain your idea about linked charms.”

“If you Vanished an object with a link to something in being, say you Vanished one of the monitoring orbs Healers use while it was still linked to the person it was monitoring, and then you Unvanished it two hours later—would you have data for those two hours? Would the orb continue to work as a linked object in Non-being, if it remains unchanged in Non-being?”

“Well, I don’t know why it wouldn't, but you should ask Professor McGonagall in class if you really want to be sure,” he said.

“Would you mind asking her for me? I don’t want to seem like I’m showing off by reading ahead.”

Percy gave her a wry smile. “I’m curious myself, so I don’t mind, but you shouldn’t hide your intellect to impress your peers. For one, it won’t work.”

“I’ll keep that in mind. Can I ask one more thing?” Rigel smiled apologetically, but Percy didn’t seem to mind at all. “Apparition is just the Vanishment and Unvanishment of a person, but with different spatial dimensions used for the Unvanishment than were used in the original Vanishment, right?”

“That’s one way to look at it,” Percy acknowledged. “Go on.”

“So, if we consider that an object’s location in being is the result of its intersection point on the spatial-temporal grid, then if it’s possible to Vanish something across the spatial plane, shouldn’t it be possible to also Vanish things across the other?”

“You mean time travel?” Percy tilted his head.

“Yes. Could you Vanish an object into the past, for example?”

“I don’t know, Rigel. If it were Banishing, the answer would be a definite no, but Vanishings aren’t limited to moving through consecutive points on a plane. It might be that Apparition only works because the wizard is the Vanished object and therefore able to Unvanish himself in a different spatial location. I’m not sure if you could send an object somewhere specific across the spatial or temporal barrier, because you’d have no control once it was Vanished. Without any controlling parameters, an Unvanished object reappears where it was Vanished, but I suppose with a runic array prepared in advance you could force it to reappear anywhere…” He trailed off, thinking hard.

“A wizard would have to be impossibly powerful to vanish themselves across the temporal barrier anyway, wouldn’t they?” Rigel asked.

“I should think so,” Percy said. “But I’ll ask McGonagall about that too, if you like.”

“Thanks.” Rigel shook her head. “It’s so difficult to figure all this out.”

“Your grasp of it isn’t bad so far,” Percy said kindly.

“I understand it much better now. Thanks for your help.”

“No problem.” Percy straightened his glasses. “I think I understand it better after explaining it, actually. And anything is better than wading through this mess.” He gestured to the scattered notes in front of him.

She considered the battlefield of books and splatters of ink. She could have left. Percy wouldn’t have begrudged her. The older boy would never expect recompense, but as she took in his hopeless expression, she knew that Archie would have tried to help him, and that decided her.

“What’s the essay on?”

“Potion Fusion.” Percy sighed. “Professor Snape assigned everyone two potions, and we’re supposed to imagine a person who needs to take both at the same time and figure out what needs to be changed about the dosages and ingredients in order to make them both compatible and effective. It’s a nightmare, and Professor Snape always gives me the trickiest assignments because he thinks I’m an ‘uninspired, fact-grasping, know-it-all.’”

Rigel raised her eyebrows.

Percy flushed. “That’s what he wrote on my last paper.”

“Ah.” Rigel took another look at the books on the table. “Well, the first problem is you’re reading Bonagage. He hardly ever gets anything right.”

Percy looked at her as though she’d grown horns.

“I read Potions journals,” Rigel said. “And the general consensus among the academic community is that Bonagage is a blithering idiot who wouldn’t know knotgrass from fluxweed if he had to wipe his arse with them. If you cite him in your essay, Snape probably won’t even read it.”

Percy blinked several times before resolutely pushing the book in question away from him.

“Could I, ah, borrow those journals sometime?” he asked politely.

“Sure, but for now, what potions did you get?” Rigel scooted her chair closer to peer at his notes.

“Skele-gro and Blood Replenishing Potion. You know much about Potions, Rigel?”

“Yeah, I love Potions,” she said easily. “What have you worked out so far?”

“Well, the biggest trouble is with the bloodroot from the Blood Replenishing Potion, which reacts badly with the skullcap flowers in Skele-gro. Then there’s the huge amount of nettle leaves needed for Skele-gro, which tend to explode when placed in dragon bile. Unfortunately, Blood-Replenishing Potion is brewed on a dragon bile base.” Percy pursed his lips. “Also, the ginger and the cayenne used in Skele-gro to burn infection away are blood-thinners and circulators, both of which would be very bad to give to someone who’s possibly bleeding, having suffered a wound they’d need to take Blood Replenishing Potion for.”

“That is a tricky one.” Rigel tapped her finger against the table as she ran through the combinations in her mind. “What have you tried tweaking?”

“At first, I thought I could use willow bark instead of bloodroot for the Blood Replenisher, but willow bark needs to stew for over an hour, which is too long to leave the vervain in without rendering the whole thing undrinkable. I can’t just leave the vervain until last, either, because it has to go in at the same time as the hypericum flowers, which must go in straight after the St. Stewart’s Bane in order to bond properly to the dissolving stalks.” Percy recited it all with a tone of weary defeat.

“Why not use a different painkiller besides willow bark?” Rigel asked.

“Any of the others that I’ve come across so far have reacted violently with the trillium, which I can’t take out of the Skele-gro without causing the drinker’s muscles to cramp around the growing bones and make them re-grow crookedly,” Percy said.

“What about feverfew?” Rigel flipped through one of the herbal indexes on the table, but she couldn’t find feverfew listed in it.

“Is that an anesthetic?” Percy frowned. “It’s not in any of these.”

“Yes, it’s a rather hairy flower that grows in southeast Europe,” Rigel said. “It’ll work as a painkiller if you use enough of it—you need about three times as much feverfew as you would bloodroot, but it would go easily with the skullcap flowers, I think.”

“You’re sure about this?” Percy glanced at her apologetically. “You seem very bright, but Professor Snape already hates me…”

“What have you got to lose?” Rigel smiled. “Incidentally, feverfew also prevents platelets from clumping, so it’s really perfect for a Blood-Replenishing Potion.”

Percy laughed, but wrote it down nonetheless. “All right, Rigel, what else have you got for me?”

“I think you should consider replacing the ginger and cayenne with oatstraw,” Rigel said.

“Oatstraw?” Percy’s lips twisted wryly. “Something else that’s definitely not in any of these indexes. What does that one do?”

“It’s an anti-inflammatory, which never hurts, and it’s rolling in calcium and other vitamins. It will act as a thickening agent, but you can combat that by adding twice as much chimera milk. Seriously,” she added as Percy hesitated once more. “Cows eat oatstraw all the time, so you know it’s good for bones.”

“I’ll be sure to tell Professor Snape that.” He shook his head, scribbling away. “But what will burn out infections if we take the ginger and cayenne out?”

“We already added feverfew to the Blood Replenishing Potion,” Rigel said. “Even though the Skele-gro itself won’t have anything to ward off infection, if you’re giving them to the person at the same time, it won’t matter.”

Percy smiled slowly. “That’s…brilliant. Except for—”

“The nettle leaves.” Rigel grimaced. “I know. They’re as important to Skele-gro as the dragon bile is to the Blood Replenisher. You could maybe mimic the effect by adding about two tons of rosemary.”

“But the rosemary would mix with the St. Stewart’s Bane and make the person vomit both potions back up, so it’s useless,” Percy said.

“Professor Snape really does hate you.”

Percy snorted. “Could be worse. I heard he gave Oliver Wood Amortentia and Wolfsbane.”

“In what situation would you ever have to administer both Amortentia and Wolfsbane at the same time?” Rigel wrinkled her nose. “It would have to be a werewolf or the Wolfsbane would just poison them, and you’d have to be insane to want a soon-to-be-wolf to fall obsessively in lust with you on the night of the full moon. Unless…the Amortentia was brewed with the essence of your worst enemy.”

Percy let out a burst of laughter, causing several people in the common room to turn and stare. “I’ll tell Oliver to write his essay on that.”

They flipped through the ingredient indexes, throwing out suggestion after suggestion, until Percy shut his book and laid his glasses down on top of it, massaging his forehead. “I just don’t see how you can take the nettle leaves out of Skele-gro. It’s impossible.”

Rigel sat up straighter. “Maybe you’re not supposed to. Maybe you just have to alter the nettles so that they don’t react with the dragon bile.”

“But in doing that you would also be stripping the nettles of their regenerative properties, which is the entire point,” Percy argued.

“What if it was like a Vanishing, but opposite?” Rigel said excitedly.

“What?” Percy put his glasses back on.

“Temporarily conditional!”

“Explain,” Percy demanded, quill poised over his notes.

“When a person drinks Blood-Replenishing Potion, what happens to the dragon bile? It gets rejected and drained from the stomach almost immediately, so at most you have about two minutes that the nettles are dangerous if reactive. We coat the nettle leaves with ephedra oil, right before we put them into the base. Ephedra oil is non-reactive, extremely mild, but it disperses naturally—”

“When it bonds with dissolved mullein root!” Percy was grinning now, too. “So we add whole stalks of mullein root to either of the potions, and when the Blood Replenishing Potion is ingested, the dragon bile will be drained out before the mullein root fully dissolves, and by the time the ephedra oil is gone and the nettles are active again, there’s no dragon bile left to react with! It’s genius.”

Rigel grinned as she watched Percy’s quill fly across the page at full-speed.

“Perfect. It all works out perfectly,” he muttered. “Rigel—oh! Rigel.” He remembered her presence and blinked at her. “I don’t know how to thank you, but this is—”

Rigel waved off his thanks. “It was no trouble. I like Potions, and you helped me a ton with Vanishing Theory.”

“Still,” he said, practically beaming. “I’m going to show Professor Snape this time, and I couldn’t have done it without you. Anytime you need help with anything, day or night, just come and find me.”

“Thanks, Percy.”

“Oi! Percy!” Someone called frantically from the portrait hole. “You better get down to the fourth floor! Your brothers—”

“Merlin, what have they done now?” Percy stood, glancing distractedly at the cluttered table.

“I’ll look after your stuff for you until you get back,” Rigel offered.

“Will you?” He straightened his robes briskly and headed for the portrait hole. “One of these days I’m going to owl Mum about those two…”

Rigel pulled out the Transfiguration essay she was writing for Flint. She was near the Owlery already, so she may as well get it done and mailed before the weekend was over.

Thirty minutes later, she had a completed essay on Vanishing Theory and had begun to poke through the Potions books on the table, a couple of which she hadn’t read cover to cover.

She was starting to wonder if Percy had been caught up in a horrible prank when she was pulled from her reading by a familiar voice.

“Strange place to do your homework, isn’t it?”

Rigel looked up as Lee Jordan claimed the seat across from her.

“Isn’t this a study table?”

“In the Gryffindor common room.” Jordan laughed. “You’re something else, kid.”

“If you say so.”

“I’m not the only one.” Jordan leaned back until his chair was balanced on the back two legs. “The twins talk about you all the time.”

“Do they?” Rigel didn’t know what he wanted her to make of that.

“Sure, but that’s the Weasley twins for you.” Jordan shrugged. “Always going on about something new. They get tired of things pretty quickly, though—everything except one another.”

“And you, too,” Rigel said. “You’ve been their friend for years, haven’t you?”

“Can you be friends with a force of nature?” Jordan stared across the common room listlessly. “Sometimes, I don’t know. I used to think we were in it for the long haul, but they’ve been keeping secrets, hiding things from me.”

“Everyone hides things,” Rigel pointed out. “Don’t you?”

Jordan looked startled, as though he hadn’t considered whether or not his judgement could be turned back on himself.

“Friendship doesn’t have to mean no secrets.”

At least, she hoped it didn’t.

“Hm.” His gaze drifted again. “Still, when it comes down to it, the twins only ever look toward each other.”

Rigel said nothing, not wanting to put more of her opinions in the middle of what was obviously a complex relationship. She needn’t have worried. As inexplicably as he’d joined her, Jordan stood and said, “Don’t let them wear you out.”

Rigel stared after him, feeling vaguely unsettled.

As though summoned by demonic ritual, the twins appeared at the portrait hole not a minute after Jordan had left through it, grinning like stuffed canaries even as their older brother dragged himself wearily into the room after them.

The eldest Weasley made straight for her table, ignoring his brothers’ attempts to cajole him into accepting their apologies. As he approached, Rigel noticed Percy’s prefect badge was spitting confetti with every third step he took.

“Honestly, Perce,” Fred was saying, hand over his heart. “That spell was meant to hit the Slytherin prefect, not you.”

“And that makes it better?” Percy scowled as confetti rained down over his books and papers. “You can’t just go around pranking prefects for no reason. How does it look? My own brothers, the biggest source of insubordination since—”

“Woah, who said we did it for no reason? It’s not our fault we’re the generals in this— Rigel?” George had spotted her behind Percy’s stack of books.

“Puppy!” Fred cried cheerfully, bounding over to snag a seat next to her. George wasted no time in claiming the seat on her right, leaving Percy to sit across from them.

Instead, Percy began packing up his things. “May as well finish this in my room for all the work I’ll get done with these two around. See you, Rigel, and thanks again.”

“Anytime,” Rigel said. “See you around.”

With a short nod, Percy trudged off to one of the many staircases, a trail of confetti in his wake.

“So, what could a first-year Slytherin possibly be helping our brother the perfect prefect with?” George asked.

“And don’t bother lying; we can always tell,” Fred said.

“Percy and I have an arrangement of mutual academic gain,” Rigel said loftily. “Therefore, as his newfound ally, I must ask whether you really did make his badge belch confetti on purpose. If so, please don’t tell him I also asked you what spell it was. I’ve never seen it before, and I’ve seen a lot of pranking spells.”

Fred and George laughed.

“A happy accident,” Fred said proudly.

“The target, not the spell,” George clarified.

“Why were you pranking a Slytherin prefect, then?”

“Haven’t you heard?” George waggled his eyebrows. “Slytherin and Gryffindor are in a prank war, so naturally our services have been enlisted. It started Friday night. I suppose you don’t know why?”

Rigel frowned. Was that what the older Slytherins meant when they promised her attack would be answered? “Surely not…”

“You have been martyred,” Fred teased. “They’re saying you, a poor first-year, were viciously set upon by a cowardly Gryffindor while innocently walking through the dungeons past curfew on Friday night. The Slytherins have sworn revenge against any and all Gryffindors who cross their path.”

George shook his head. “As if they needed to come up with such an elaborate—”

“I told them not to.”

“—excuse.”

Fred and George both stared at her, and she wasn’t sure which one she was supposed to look at.

“Hang on, are you saying you really were attacked?” Fred frowned. “We thought they just wanted a reason to have a go at us.”

Rigel pressed her lips together.

“You were attacked. Again.” George’s eyes went flat. “Who was it?”

“I don’t know. I told the older Slytherins I didn’t know, and they insisted on assuming it was a Gryffindor anyway.” Rigel ran her right hand though her hair. “Now there’s a House war over it? That’s only going to draw more attention.”

Fred and George exchanged a look over her head. “How many times have you been targeted? Be honest.”

Rigel tallied them in her head. There was the first incident, where she broke her wrist, the one where she got trapped in a trick stair and dung-bombed, and then the stinging hex. “Three, I think.”

“You think?” Fred prompted.

“Well, I sort of thought someone was following me between classes one day, but they didn’t shoot a spell at me,” she admitted. Zabini didn’t offer the identity of the ‘blonde butterfly,’ so she assumed he didn’t think that was related to her attacker. Then again, how well did she know Zabini?

“Merlin, Rigel.” George rapped his fingers on the table in a quick drum. “All right. First of all, you have a stalker.”

“And second of all, we’re walking you back to your common room tonight.”

“Tonight?” Rigel craned her neck to look for a window. “What time is it?”

“It’s nearly seven-thirty,” George told her. “How long did Percy chain you to this desk?”

“Long enough to worry my friends,” she said, packing up her bag quickly. “I can’t believe I missed dinner again.”

Fred shrugged, standing as well. “We’ll stop by the kitchens on the way down.”

“Can we stop by the Owlery, too? I have some letters I’d rather mail while I’m already up here.”

“Better you go with us, anyway, considering how steep the Owlery stairs are,” George said darkly. “Let me see your wrist.”

Rigel offered it up for inspection. “I don’t suppose you could cast another of those numbing spells? It still aches a bit.”

“It shouldn’t.” George frowned as Fred unwrapped her bandages.

“It looks like it hasn’t healed much,” Fred said, checking her range of motion. “Either something is preventing your magic from helping it Heal, or the injury’s been treated so roughly that your body can barely keep it from worsening.”

He stared at her expectantly. She looked away.

George sighed, but he cast the numbing spell without pressing further. “If the pain persists, find one of us to re-cast it for you.”

“Yes, Healer George.”

“You mean Healer Fred,” Fred corrected her as he rewrapped the bandage. “I’m Healer George.”

“Whatever you say, Fred.”

“This one’s clever, Forge.” Fred ruffled her hair, intentionally mussing it.

“Didn’t you see the tie, Gred?” George tugged on Rigel’s Ravenclaw accessory.

Fred eyed it appreciatively. “I was wondering how you’d managed to stay unharassed all afternoon while we’re in the middle of a prank war. It’s not as impressive once you know the trick.”

Rigel sent George an admonishing look. “You’ve shattered the illusion.”

“I’ll buy him a new one when I’m rich and famous.” George smiled.

They made for the Owlery, Fred and George taking their role as bodyguards a bit too far and scaring the wits out of Lee Jordan as he came around the corner. He declined their invitation to join them, saying he was headed to a game of Exploding Snap, and after that, the twins refrained from shooting firecrackers at anyone they came across unexpectedly.

When they neared the Owlery, Rigel asked, “Would you mind waiting for me here?”

“How can we stop miscreants from toppling you down the icy—”

“They won’t be icy in mid-September.”

“—and treacherous stairs, if we aren’t on the stairs with you?”

“How about we wait at the top of the stairs and cover our ears while you reveal the secrets of the universe to your owl?” George offered.

“It’s not that I don't trust you guys,” she started.

Fred cut her off good-naturedly. “We’re teasing. Everybody has secrets.”

She smiled, recalling her words to Jordan not an hour before.

“Personally, I wouldn’t trust Gred either,” George stage-whispered. “But I’ll keep a close watch on him.”

“Me?” Fred clutched at non-existent pearls. “Don't believe these slanderous lies, Rigel. He’s the one you have to watch out for—ask anyone! They’ll all tell you Fred’s the evil twin.”

George shot Rigel a glance that was brimming with exasperated fondness. “Isn’t he wonderful, in the strangest way?”

Rigel grinned back, and Fred sighed as he caught on. “Oh, right. You already guessed I was Fred today, didn’t you?”

“I’m afraid so,” Rigel said. “I do think you’re wonderful, though.”

They reached the top of the stairs, and Rigel ducked inside while George and Fred took up positions on either side of the doorway like sentinels.

Rigel rolled the new essays for Flint together and made separate bundles for her replies to Remus, Sirius, and Archie. As she was tying the first roll, Fred began a particularly spirited rendition of “A Cauldron Full of Hot, Strong Love.” George joined in counterpart just as exuberantly, and Rigel worked quickly to finish before they brought the whole roost down.

“—I’ll boil you u-up some—omph!” Fred caught an elbow in the stomach when George saw her coming out.

“That was fast.”

“Someone had to save those owls from insanity.”

“Too late to insult us now.” George linked his arm through her elbow carefully, avoiding her wrist.

Fred took up her other side. “We’ve already figured out you like us.”

Rigel silently resigned herself to a life with more than one friend. At the rate she was earning new ones, she’d never be able to get rid of them all.

Fred and George hung back as they reached the Entrance Hall, and Rigel got the distinct feeling she was being tested. As she turned toward the stairs to the kitchens, they gave one another matching grins.

“Only the second week, and he knows where the kitchens are.”

“Took us three. We’ll have to watch this one, lest he usurp our reign.”

“I want nothing to do with your reign.”

“That’s not what Lee thinks.”

“He thinks you’re hiding a pranking genius under a façade of disinterest to lull us into complacency.”

Fred chuckled. “As if that would ever work.”

“We’re un-lullable,” George agreed.

Rigel tickled the pear. “I can only imagine your mother’s despair.”

They were barely through the door when a wave of house-elves set upon the twins. Fred and George mingled happily with the elves, who seemed eager to help with any task the twins might have brought them. They greeted many elves by name, and were offered a steady procession of food in exchange.

The offerings went into a bottomless bag they seemed to have brought in anticipation of the gifts, but one elf veered from the group and held a platter of strawberries up to Rigel instead.

“You is liking these?” Binny smiled as she plopped her tiny form on the bench next to Rigel.

“Binny!” Rigel gave the blushing elf a warm handshake. “I love strawberries, thank you. And thanks for the help with the you-know-what the other day.”

“Do we know?”

“I don’t believe we do.”

Rigel and Binny affected innocent expressions as the twins leaned over their table.

“Making deals with house elves?” George sighed despairingly. “I hope you got it in writing, because Binny here is notoriously difficult to pin down when the blood starts flying.”

“Young Sir ought not to be saying such things.” Binny wagged her finger, but a smile tugged at her lips.

“That’s right, Forge; we were sworn to silence, remember?” Fred looked over his shoulder in exaggerated fear. “You don’t want to go the same way as the other guy, do you?”

“What other guy?” George asked.

“The one who disappeared the same week the elves started serving lumpy gravy.”

Rigel gave Binny a dubious look.

“I is not knowing what you is talking about,” the elf said solemnly. “Binny is never ever serving gravy with suspicious lumps. Such a thing is being vicious slander.”

Fred and George collapsed onto the bench with laughter, and Binny gave a dainty curtsey as she stood.

“Is you wanting anything else?”

“Rigel missed dinner,” George said, wiping at his eyes.

Several house elves in the immediate vicinity gasped. Rigel watched with wide eyes as a plate piled high with vegetables, fruits, nuts, breads, and cheeses appeared before her. A pitcher of apple juice joined it a moment later. Her stomach gave a battle cry and she descended on the food with abandon.

“You a vegetarian, Puppy?” Fred glanced over the selection bemusedly.

“I am.” She said between bites. “How’d they know?”

“The house elves know everything,” George said.

She hoped that wasn’t true.

When she could eat no more, they took their leave, Rigel promising to visit Binny again soon.

Fred and George walked her as far as the Potions classroom, but there they came to a reluctant stop.

“We probably shouldn’t go further, but…”

“I’m in snake territory now,” Rigel assured them. “I’ll be fine from here.”

“You were attacked in the dungeons two nights ago,” George reminded her dryly.

“And I got away, because it wasn’t a Slytherin who attacked me,” she reasoned. When they exchanged hesitant looks, she smiled. “Don’t worry. I’m a fast runner.”

“You shouldn’t have to run from anything,” Fred said. “Not at Hogwarts.”

They’d be surprised how much there was to run from at Hogwarts. The truth, for one.

“Oi!”

Adrian Pucey and Lucian Bole came striding toward them, bristling in aggressive postures.

“What’s a pair of griffins doing so far from their tower?” Bole tossed his long black hair over his shoulder and looked down his nose at the Gryffindors.

George rolled his eyes and Fred yawned dramatically.

“These two bothering you, Black?” Pucey looked her over, but relaxed only slightly when she appeared to be in good health.

“They were looking out for me, actually,” Rigel said. “They heard about the attack on Friday and wanted to make sure I got back to the common room safely.”

“You were going to lead them straight to our common room? You stupid—”

“Luc, they already know where it is,” Pucey said.

“And they were just leaving me here, in any case,” Rigel muttered.

Bole sneered disagreeably. “You’ve got some nerve showing your faces down here if you heard about the attack.”

“Well, someone ought to watch out for your first years, if you can’t.” George had no sense of self-preservation, apparently.

Before Bole could hex him, Rigel reminded them, “We don’t know it was a Gryffindor who attacked me, anyway.”

Fred clapped a hand on her shoulder. “If it turns out it was, we’ll be the first to defect to the Slytherin camp.”

“Reckon you should be safe from staircases in the dungeons, at least,” George said idly.  

“Night, Rigel.” Fred waved sarcastically to the older Slytherins as he and his brother retreated up the corridor, not turning their backs until they reached the corner.

Pucey gave Rigel a hard-to-read look. “Interesting taste in allies, Black.”

“Don’t trust those two. What did he mean about staircases?” Bole demanded.

Somehow, she didn’t think they would be reassured by her explanation.

--0—0—0

--0—0

--0

[end of chapter twelve].

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 13:

He was drowning in stupidity. An artery of red ink bled without mercy from his quill, the only sane response to such criminally misinformed notions of magic. What little substance he found buried in the syntactic terrorism that passed for teenage literacy was enough to make him pity the great scholars of old, whose writings should have survived to be misquoted and petulantly interrogated by the likes of Zacharias Smith. Vitriol was the only defense. He must expunge any sense of certainty from their inflated psyches, sow sufficient doubt to reap a pause long enough for an inkling of common sense to trickle into their thick, sociopathic little—

“Well, now. Here we are again.”

Albus’s cheerful injection hauled him from the ocean of idiocy, but it took Severus a moment to shake off his despairing wrath. He never questioned his choice of profession more than when he was twenty essays deep, not a coherent example of actual comprehension in sight.

The staff room had cleared out save for Pomona, Minerva, and Filius, and the headmaster had joined them.

Ah. It would be the third Friday, then.

In the third week of September, Albus met with his Heads of House to informally discuss the emergent issues of the new term. It was not, as Sinistra was so fond of intimating, an excuse for the five of them to gossip about their students. Rather, it was a chance to socialize individual problems before they became everyone’s.

Albus twinkled fondly at them, a curator admiring his own collection of the greatest minds in the modern magical community. Not for the first time, Severus wondered at his own inclusion. No matter the articles he wrote nor the inroads he made, he could never shrug off the wretched boy in too-thin clothes who’d stumbled into the Great Hall without the wherewithal to even dream of a life outside of misery and insignificance.

The headmaster rocked in a chair by the fire, stroking his beard with a self-satisfied smile. “Before we begin, I’d like to thank each of you for another seamless start to the school year.” His startling blue eyes landed on Severus. “Hogwarts would be nothing without you.”

Severus looked away. The old wizard was far too perceptive for anyone’s sensibility.

Albus continued blithely, as if he wasn’t dropping each word with studied precision into Severus’ roiling pool of self-doubt. “Thank you also for appearing so promptly for this meeting. I know well the value of your time and talents.”

“Some of us appear more willingly than others.” Filius tipped his head at Severus from a plush velvet footstool. “Be honest—you forgot it was today.”

Severus lifted a cold cup of tea, only a sardonic twist at the edge of his mouth acknowledging the accuracy of the remark.  

Pomona leaned sideway on the sofa to murmur conspiratorially to Minerva. “He does that so well.”

Minerva pursed her lips to hide a smile of agreement. She and Severus had a friendship that only worked because neither of them admitted to it. “Too well. How many of my cubs have you traumatized this month, Severus?”

“No more than deserved it, as always.”

“Now, Severus.” Albus crooked a finger, and one of the enormous blankets Hagrid was always knitting leapt onto his legs like a lapdog. “We know how you value a controlled work environment—”

“Potions is an exceedingly dangerous and, in the presence of adolescents, unpredictable art.”

“—and none of us would dream of telling you how to run your classroom—”

“I sincerely doubt any of you could stomach the number of near-maimings I avert daily.”

“—but was it truly necessary to tell the third-year Ravenclaws that you would personally ensure they failed their O.W.L.s in two years if they didn’t produce a satisfactory Weakening Solution by the end of the period?” Albus gazed mildly at the ceiling. “I’m told Poppy ran completely out of Calming Draughts that afternoon.”

“As I am the one responsible for replacing those Calming Draughts, I see no reason for anyone else to complain.” Severus finished his tea unconcernedly. “Incidentally, every one of those approval-seeking balls of anxiety produced satisfactory results, so I conclude my methods are effective.”

“Leaving the subject of your methods for the next generation of Mind Healers to unravel, there are a couple of students I think we should discuss.” Pomona looked around for support.

Minerva nodded sharply. “Who are you concerned about?”

“What do you think of Neville Longbottom? I’ve found him somewhat timid in my classes, for all that he seems to be well-versed in my subject.”

“His parents were both so outgoing,” Filius recalled. Severus supposed that was one description for the way Frank and Alice vied for the inter-House popularity award before finally combining their fan clubs in the great Fralice union of ’75. “Do we have any reason to believe his home life is unpleasant?”

“Frank and Alice abuse a child?” Minerva huffed. “Never.”

“The grandmother, though…” Pomona cast an apologetic glance at Albus.

Albus considered the implication. “As much as I admire Augusta, it is fair to say she has an overbearing way with children. She still resides at Longbottom Manor with her son, and I cannot imagine her forgoing the opportunity to mold her grandson. Are you concerned, Minerva?”

The Head of Gryffindor House made a dismissive motion. “He is making friends—the youngest Weasley boy, for one. I will keep an eye out, but I suspect Hogwarts will give him the space he needs to flourish in his own time.”

Pomona deferred, as ever, to Minerva. “Then, let us turn to Marcus Flint. There is something…changed about his attitude this year. After being forced to repeat fifth year and denied his O.W.L.s, I expected more resistance, but his work has been on time and completely up to snuff.” She shook her head in evident bewilderment.

“I was going to mention Mr. Flint as well,” Minerva said grimly. “His work is completed but it doesn’t read at all like him. Even his written tests and quizzes have changed tone. He used to write with studied boredom and badly concealed indignation at the very idea that he be asked to prove what he knows. Now, his in-class work is utterly neutral, and his essays are peppered with conjecture and suggestions for theoretical applications. He sounds captivated by the material. I cannot tell if he has found a new, more subtle way to mock the assignment or if he finds it amusing to completely subvert my expectations of him.”

“Perhaps he has learned his lesson and is turning over a new leaf,” Filius suggested.

Severus had not thought it possible to reach such an age with a full supply of naïve optimism. “What he’s learned is that assignments have to get turned in for him to pass.” They didn’t honestly think he was writing them, did they? “The handwriting charms are convincing, and I’ve no doubt he changed the tone of his classroom assignments to lessen suspicion, but make no mistake: he has arranged for someone else to complete them.”

Pomona looked scandalized, but Minerva only nodded. She must have suspected as well. Severus had known from the first essay. Extensively cited, dizzyingly theoretical, and creative. If Marcus Flint had written it, he’d eat his stirring rod. Severus had combed his copies of previous essays by the older Ravenclaws, but the style hadn’t fit any one in particular.

“What will you do?” Minerva demanded.

Severus lifted an eyebrow. “Without proof, I cannot do a thing. I suspect Flint knows this. Unless the other student comes forward, our only evidence is stylistic. As long as he passes every test, which he is more than capable of, it will be impossible to prove he isn’t doing the assignments.”

Minerva frowned, dissatisfied. “We will watch the older students for signs of inexplicable stress or fatigue. Someone at this school is carrying a double workload.”

“It would be impossible for an N.E.W.T. student to sustain that for long,” Pomona supposed.

“Could it be a younger student?” Filius asked. “Now that I consider it, there was an unstudied tone of curiosity in some of Flint’s essays this term. It would fit with a student who hadn’t covered the topic in a previous year.”

“I doubt they’re any younger than fourth-year,” Minerva said. She sounded confident. “Much can be gleaned from books, but Flint turned in an exceptionally complicated essay on Vanishing Theory. It demonstrated a firm grasp on Non-being and the logical consequences of an object retaining properties after Vanishment. None of my third-years are so advanced.”

Albus leaned forward as though he were going to impart something weighty and wise, but then he leaned back again, and his incessant rocking resumed. “Continue to mark Mr. Flint’s assignments as you would any other. I trust you to keep an eye on the situation, Severus.”

“I keep both eyes on my Slytherins without your prompting,” Severus assured him.

“Then I hope you’ll be having a word with young Mr. Black, as well,” Minerva put in.

Severus gave her a narrow-eyed look. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean, Minerva.”

The older witch gave him an incredulous look back. “You do not find him taciturn and impossible to teach?”

He scowled. “I find him engaged and hard working. His written assignments show a rare rigor of thought, and his practical work is flawless.” Albus twinkled at him from his rocking chair, and Severus was sorely tempted to Transfigure it into a wooden pony. “The past does not cloud my eyes so much that I can not see when potential lies undisguised before me,” he snapped. “The boy is a once-in-a-decade talent.”

“It sounds as though we are acquainted with two very different Mr. Blacks,” Minerva said. “I admit his written work is good. In fact, his comprehension of the theory is the only thing scraping him a passing mark. As to his practical work, it is non-existent. I have yet to witness him perform a single piece of Transfiguration, though he at least pretended to succeed rather quickly in the first lesson.”

Severus was not the only one frowning, now.

“I’ve not had any trouble,” Pomona said. “Black is a veritable fountain of knowledge when it comes to plants, particularly the ones used in Potions.” She nodded in acknowledgment to Severus. “And he certainly doesn’t balk at practical assignments.”

“An unusual discrepancy.” Filius looked more interested than disappointed at the idea. “I have to agree with Minerva. I give him as much credit as I can for his written work, and he can demonstrate the incantations and the wand-movements that are expected, but he never actually casts the Charm.”

“He refuses to?” Albus clarified.

“No.” Minerva gave a frustrated scowl, and Severus saw how much it irked her, having Sirius Black’s heir prove lackluster in her subject. “He appears to try, at least the first few times, but it’s as if…well…”

“The boy cannot be a squib,” Severus snapped.

“People would know,” Filius agreed. “And I doubt his family would have let him attend school.”

Severus sneered. Light-aligned or no, all purebloods held the same prejudice when it came to magical ability. The idea that Sirius Black would send his son to face harassment and discrimination when he could quietly homeschool him instead was ridiculous.

“The day Longbottom fell off his broom…” Pomona’s slow words coaxed only impatient confusion from the rest of them. She hurried to explain. “Rolanda said his motion was inexplicably arrested before he hit the ground. She believed it to be accidental magic, but she also said that young Malfoy claimed it was Black who stopped the boy’s fall.”

Filius raised his eyebrows. “As far as I’ve seen, he has never even made his feather twitch.”

“Another puzzle,” Albus remarked, absently braiding a section of his beard. “A young wizard has the understanding, diligence, and potential to perform magic—and yet, he doesn’t. One account credits him with powerful, albeit likely uncontrolled, magical ability. No other signs of trauma have presented to suggest a natural block on his magic. He has friends. No behavioral issues. Anything to add, Severus?”

He kept the defensive anger from his expression as he answered. “I had not realized there was a problem. I will schedule a conference with Mr. Black this week to assess the situation. It will not continue.”

“Keep us abreast of your decisions.” Albus turned back to Minerva. “What else?”

“The prefects have signed a petition to increase the number of Hogsmede weekends around the holidays…”

Whatever else they spoke of, Severus did not hear it. He was busy replaying his every interaction with Black. Had he seen him do magic? Any at all? Potions did not require it at the first-year level, but surely he would have noticed something...

Draco lit the other boy’s fire once or twice, it was true. And he had seen Miss Parkinson casting an eye-protection charm on her friend, but was that proof? He couldn’t credence it. For all that he’d long anticipated the Blacks’ insanity-cultivating inbreeding coming home to roost in his old nemesis’ line, did it have to be this boy, who might actually make something of himself one day?

Some other explanation was at play. The boy hadn’t been shy about his obsession with Potions. Perhaps Severus had underestimated how dismissive he would be of the other subjects by comparison.

If the boy needed motivation, Severus would simply provide it.

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

The end of September swept her up in a whirlwind that threatened to toss her straight into October. She thought she had settled into the rhythm of classes and studying, but at some silent signal, the tempo double-timed.

Balancing her and Flint’s assignments was hard enough without the teachers uniting in displeasure at her inability to muster a spell. They heaped extra practice assignments in her lap and pushed her harder than ever in class, until she began to dread every wand lesson in their schedule.

She hated to face their inevitable disappointment, not to mention the sidelong looks from her classmates. Neither were particularly subtle. What was she supposed to do? The magic didn’t come to her, was that such a crime?

The only relief came with decreased scrutiny from Pansy and Draco, whose schedules ramped up in time with her own; Pansy filled her spare hours with strategic socialization, while Draco was reaping the rewards of ambition in the worst way.

“We have practice every other evening,” he bemoaned Thursday morning. There was a defensive note in his voice that leaned embarrassed, probably because Pansy had only narrowly rescued him from a face-plant in the morning porridge. The blond boy rubbed his eyes irritably. “It’s like Flint doesn’t have anything better to do than play Quidditch, never mind that we mere humans can barely keep up with our classes with this schedule.”

“Doesn’t the captain care about his own marks?” Pansy asked.

“That’s what’s wild: his marks are fine.” Draco shook his head. “I heard the others say he must have a time-turner or something.”

Rigel tried not to look guilty. “At least you’ll be a shoe in for the House Cup. None of the other teams are practicing so hard, are they?”

“I think Wood tried to endorse a similar schedule, but his team revolted.” Draco pushed his plate away to make room for his elbows. Propping his head on his hands, he seemed to be considering inciting a rebellion of his own.

“Perhaps when you win the first match, he’ll back off,” Pansy suggested.

“If any of us survive that long.” Draco’s head dipped dangerously toward his pumpkin juice.

“You won’t survive by not eating.” Pansy nudged his plate back toward him. “Finish up so we can get to Potions.”

“Yes, mum,” Draco grumbled.

On their way to the dungeons, the Potions Master overtook them. “Mr. Black, see me in my office after afternoon classes.”

“Yes, sir,” Rigel said automatically. Then his words caught up with her. After classes? To discuss one of her assignments or…could he be ready to give her extra lessons? She searched Snape’s face but found no clues in his customary scowl.

After a weighty look she wasn’t sure how to interpret, Snape strode past them in a long, practiced stride.

“What do you think he wants?” Pansy asked quietly.

Rigel shrugged, trying not to get her hopes up. “Maybe he has another assignment for me.”

“He just gave you that essay on ingredients from magical beings,” Draco pointed out. “And he doesn’t need you to come to his office to give you an assignment. And he’s waiting till after our other classes. That means he thinks it’ll take a while.”

Which could mean anything. Rigel tried not to worry. “I’ll find out this afternoon.”

Pansy’s eyes were curious, but she smoothed her face into a polished mask as they reached the Potions classroom. “Let us know how it goes.”

“Of course.”

If Rigel thought a summoning to Snape’s office would be less nerve-wracking the second time around, she was forced to reevaluate that assumption as she stood before the door, steeling herself to grasp the silver handle and turn it.

Snape’s voice called impatiently from within before she got the chance, and she felt her cheeks warm. He must have proximity spells to alert him to loitering students.

Rigel entered sheepishly and saw, to her surprise, that Snape had already provided her a chair this time. She sat uncertainly, still without a guess as to whether she was in trouble or not.

“I’m sure you’re wondering why I called you here, so I will not waste your time with pleasantries,” Snape began, folding his hands before him on the desk.

Rigel nodded, though her affirmation hadn’t been sought.

“It is my duty, as both a professor and a Head of House, to pay close attention to the students in my care, and when there appear to be… discrepancies in a student’s work, it does not fail to come to my notice.” His voice was just loud enough to fill the small room without echoing, but it could not be called ‘soft.’ It was deadly.

Rigel’s face blanched. She tore her eyes from Snape’s to conduct a detailed study of her knees even as her mind took panicked flight and landed on the roll of corrected essays in her bookbag.

Flint’s essay on Potion Fusion, from the same assignment she’d helped Percy with. In red ink where the final mark should be were the words: Transparently done. Make no mistake; the source of your newfound interest in schoolwork will soon be exposed.

At the time, she’d written it off as an attempt to frighten Flint into coming clean. It was too much to hope that none of the professors would notice Flint’s work changing so drastically, but as long as no one pointed the finger at her, it was Flint’s lookout. And how could anyone suspect her?

She’d taken extra care with the Potions essays, because she knew she had a tendency to get carried away in that subject. In Flint’s essays, she used certain words and phrases repeatedly, then took pains to never use those identifiers in her own papers. But what if she hadn’t been careful enough? If he knew…

“I see you understand my meaning,” Snape drawled.

Too late, Rigel realized looking down ashamedly was as good as admitting her guilt. She raised her eyes slowly, widening them to a believable level of innocence as she did, until they rested steadily and blankly at the level of Snape’s forehead.

A disappointed frown settled into his brow, and it was nothing like the other professors’ frustration. They could berate her, but in the end, she didn’t care what they thought of her. The same could not be said of the Potions Master.

“Your work in my subject exceeds my usual standards, which only contributes to the distasteful nature of this situation. Were it merely a Potions issue, we could work it out discretely, but the Transfiguration, Charms, and Defense professors have all brought their concerns to light, and as your Head of House, it falls to me to deal with it.”

Rigel shook with the effort of holding back tears. She willed herself not to crumple, but her face felt hot and her eyes stung as she forced them to remain open, unblinking. How could she have erred so grievously that all those professors connected her to Flint’s essays? She had been so careful. Hadn’t she?

Rigel tried to focus on Snape’s words, but it was hard with her breath so loud in her chest.

“I have not handled a student with problems of this exact nature before,” he admitted.

Rigel willed her throat to swallow. Was what she’d done really so bad? Worse than anything he’d seen in years of teaching?

“No one has a word of reproach for your written work, but in every class requiring practical demonstration of wand magic, you fail to produce. Professor Flitwick believes you are genuinely trying, while Professor McGonagall is convinced you do not wish to succeed. Care to explain how it is you’ve yet to cast a single spell in the month since your arrival?”

Oh, Rigel thought, all the wind going out of her fear. Right. She should have known that would get back to her Head of House at some point. She just hadn’t expected him to take it so seriously. For a moment, she’d thought she was being expelled.

“I’m here to learn Potions,” she said, shrugging her shoulders. It was easier to pretend not to care, to act as though her daily failure didn’t bother her much at all.

“That does not give you leave to disregard everything else, you foolish child.”

Rigel shrank back from his ire, not understanding its vehemence. Certainly, it was inconvenient for the other professors to be bothering him over her poor wand work, but it wasn’t as though she’d intended for it to come back on him.

“I haven’t been,” she protested. Even clear of the fear that he’d discovered her deal with Flint and all it entailed, Rigel still felt off-balance. “I do the assignments. I study for the quizzes.”

“And your practical performance on these quizzes?” Snape’s nostrils flared. “What do you say about that?”

Rigel dropped her eyes. “I try. I swear I’m trying. The wand stuff just doesn’t work for me. It’s so easy for everyone else. And I know McGonagall thinks I’m not trying at all, but I don’t know what else to do. I’ve done every assignment.” And then some.

Snape let out a sigh that had Rigel raising her gaze again hopefully. “You must understand that this cannot continue the way it has been.”

Why not?

She didn’t realize she’d said the words aloud until he snapped, “Because this is a school for magic. You have to actually do magic at some point.”

“What if I’m a squib?” She knew no other word for it, this stuntedness inside her that caged whatever it was that she was supposed to be able to do as a witch. “Can I still be a Potions Master?”

Snape shook his head slowly, and the world fell out from under her. “Active magic is required for advanced brewing.” Before the terror of his words could swallow her whole, he said carefully, “I do not believe you to be a squib.”

“I—I know there’s magic inside me. I’ve felt it. Sometimes I—or my wand—something happens.”

“You’ve had bouts of accidental magic.”

“Yes.”  

“Strong ones?” he pressed.

That was one way to put it. “Yes. Strong ones.”

“Then you aren’t a squib.” Snape said it so simply, so resolutely, there could be no argument. But then—

“What’s wrong with me?” Rigel searched his gaze for pity, for a sign that there was something incurably the matter with her. Snape only looked perplexed. “And are you sure I have to fix it?”

“There are many kinds of magic that do not require the use of a wand to master,” he said carefully, though his white knuckles belied his calm tone of voice. “But no wizard can afford to ignore one part of his power entirely. It is folly, not in the least because it is vital for the development of your magical core that you exercise your magic consciously at this age. Quite apart from that, barring medical incapability, it is an embarrassment of a wizard who cannot manage basic spellwork. I will not have an embarrassment credited to the House of Slytherin, do you understand?”

“Yes, sir.” Rigel didn’t argue, though it seemed an impossible demand. She tried to summon determination, but she felt she had already been defeated.

Something in her expression made Snape extend his hand across the desk.

Her eyes wide, she began to reach for it. He snorted. “Your wand, Mr. Black.”

Her ears burned. She dove into her bag and searched until she found it crumpling the pages of her Transfiguration text at the bottom.

Snape seemed to be holding back a comment. Rigel made a face. “It doesn’t work anyway, so I don’t carry it on me.”

His eyes sharpened. He turned her wand over in his hands, probing for abnormalities or fissures, perhaps. “Ash?”

“Yes. Twelve inches, unicorn hair.”

“You received it at Ollivander’s?”

She nodded.

“What magic did it manifest?”

Rigel gazed blankly at him.

“What happened when you first held it?” he clarified.

She thought back. “It got sort of warm.”

Snape raised an eyebrow. “And Ollivander let you buy it?”

Rigel shrugged. “He didn’t have many left to offer me at that point. I went through most of his stock trying to find one that didn’t explode things violently when I touched it. This one didn’t explode anything. He said it was well balanced.”

In truth, he’d said a bit more than that, and he hadn’t been very happy with her, but she wasn’t paying attention at the time. She’d preordered a sample of ingredients from India and was anxious to pick them up at the apothecary.

“Balanced it may be, but it evidently doesn’t suit you,” Snape said. She couldn’t tell if he was exasperated with the world in general or her in particular.

“Better this than a wand that explodes everything,” Rigel said, a bit defensively.

“Not being an active danger to your health is not the standard for wands,” Snape drawled. “If you cannot do magic with it, it might as well be a stick you found on the ground outside.”

“We don’t know it’s the wand,” she reminded him, giving voice once more to her fear. “Maybe I can’t do wand magic. Maybe I was meant to do Potions, and nothing else.”

Snape set her wand back on the desk with ill grace. “There is no inherent difference between the magic that imbues a potion and the magic that turns a teacup into a rabbit. Only the manner of channeling is different, and if you cannot channel with a tool as simple as a wand then you will certainly never master the potions that require more advanced methods of imbuing—”

“But what can I do?” Rigel interrupted. She didn’t recall getting to her feet, but suddenly she was glaring down at Snape with her fear all bundled up with despair in her heart. “I’ve tried. I’m telling you, I’ve said those spells again and again and nothing happens.”

Rigel was shaking, frustrated beyond her capacity to contain. All month people had been pushing her. Her professors, her housemates, her friends—as if being told over and over how stupid she was would somehow help.

“I know I’m a failure as a wizard,” she said quietly. The anger cut an unfamiliar trail through her mind. She never shouted. What was she doing? “But I can’t just leave. My future is here at Hogwarts. Potions is all I have, and if you can’t teach me because of something that I can’t control, then all my hard work was wasted.”

And it will prove them right, a voice in her head hissed. Every day she walked the halls, hearing the footsteps of the hundreds of students that should have been there beside her. For every halfblood and muggleborn who would never see the Great Hall’s sky, she had to make it work. If I fail, it vindicates everyone who thinks that halfbloods can’t keep up with real wizards.

She had to stay at Hogwarts, for all the kids who didn’t get the chance, who didn’t have a pureblood cousin as generous as Archie, who would be forever scorned and legally exiled from their own country for a thing they couldn’t change. Ri—Harry had to stand up for everyone who couldn’t take a stand themselves, and on top of all that, it was for their dream, hers and Archie’s.

And she’d be damned if something as paltry as a piece of wood stood in her way.

Her temper running hot, she snatched her wand off the desk and whipped it toward the shelf of glass jars. It was like pushing a spit wad through a straw. The magic didn’t want to move, but she forced it.

The jars catapulted off the shelf, crashing against the stone ceiling and shattering in a shower of glass and embalming fluid.

Rigel didn’t even care. She laughed. How was that for a Levitation Charm?

“See?” She yelled into Snape’s shocked face without really seeing it. “See? I can do the stupid spells. I can do them all!”

The wand movement came automatically, its pattern almost an afterthought, and she spat another wad of magic at the wooden chair. It exploded into a waterfall of lethally-sharp needles—

She exhaled, and the Shield Charm bloomed between her and the flying needles as easy as breathing. If she were a dragon and she breathed fire, that is.

The sound of the needles coming down was like rain hitting a metal roof—only the rain was the metal. The Shield Charm flickered out, and she stared at the wreckage she’d made of Snape’s office.

She felt numb, and she didn’t notice her wand was on fire until Snape plucked it carefully from her hand. The ash wand was on fire. There was something funny about that, she just couldn’t think what—

Rigel swayed, and Snape reversed the Transfiguration before she could collapse in a puddle of needles. She caught herself on the newly-restored chair and sank into it slowly. “I…that was not well done, sir.” Her voice was faint, or perhaps her hearing had gone wonky. “I’m sorry.”

She was almost too ashamed to look Snape in the face—almost. Rigel met his gaze with a kind of distant horror. It all felt as though it was happening to someone else. Not her. Some other person who had completely lost control and destroyed their Head of House’s office.

“Well.” Snape had found his tongue at last, and Rigel steeled herself for a verbal lashing. “I would ask to see the Lumos Charm, but I’ve no doubt you would blind us both.”

Rigel’s brain didn’t process the words at first, and then—

“Sir?”

She gaped at his relaxed posture and half-lidded eyes. His eyebrows lifted sardonically, and there was something darkly amused about the way he held his mouth.

“I think it’s safe to say Ollivander was vastly mistaken in allowing you to settle for an inferior fit. This wand it no less destructive than the others.” He methodically set the room to rights. The glass Vanished, the liquid dried up, and a freshening charm took the edge off the smell of embalming fluid. “It simply required a monumental effort of will to push your magic into manifesting though it.”

Snape set the singed ash wand on the desk before her, but Rigel deliberately rolled it out of her reach.

“That demonstration, while lacking the emotional restraint befitting a student of Salazar Slytherin, was nevertheless informative,” Snape said, rolling her wand very pointedly back toward her. “I imagine your incidents of accidental magic were rare as a child. Rare and rather powerful.”

Rigel shuddered. “It only happened when I was so upset I couldn’t stand it. My magic would… explode things, tear them, turn them inside out. Sometimes it Vanished things completely, and we never found them again.” There hadn’t been many incidents, but each was a terrifying monument in her memory of childhood, flash-fried into her brain so she could never forget the helplessly exhilarating feeling.

Eventually, she’d learned not to get so upset by things. If she never got too excited or disappointed, if she didn’t let anything that happened make her angry, her magic wouldn’t take over. How embarrassing to have such a thing happen in front of her Head of House. She was much too old for accidental magic, now.

“Mr. Black, are you afraid of magic?”

She blinked in surprise. “Of course not. Why would I come to a magical school if I was?”

“Allow me to rephrase that,” he said, his voice gentle. She wished he would shout at her. “Are you frightened by your own magic?”

Rigel opened her mouth to deny it, but stopped. Was she? It galled her to admit to being afraid of something so silly. It was like being afraid of your own liver. Still, the denial would not leave her lips. The feeling that rushed up from that pit of anger both disgusted and delighted her, and then she hated herself for enjoying something so destructive.

Maybe fear was too simple a word. Revulsion felt closer to the truth.

“You think I’m preventing myself from using magic.” She could see it on his face. Not pity or contempt but the look you would give a child trying to put a square block in a round hole.

“It is the probable explanation,” Snape said evenly.

“But then…don’t I have reason to?” She gestured to the empty shelves, the only evidence of her utter loss of composure. “My magic is completely destructive.”

He regarded her seriously. “Magic is not inherently violent or mellow. It is we that give it shape and force.”

“Then I’m making it dangerous.” Rigel let the truth settle into her, uncomfortable and cold. “It’s my fault, not the wand or the magic. There is something wrong with me.”

“There is nothing wrong with you.” Snape had both hands on the desk, his hair hanging into his face, dark eyes arresting in their surety.

But how could he be so sure?

“It happens sometimes that the first bout of accidental magic, which often occurs too young to recall, startles a wizard in some way that makes them reluctant to repeat the feat.” Snape spoke slowly, as though to ensure she understood. “In some ways, magic is like a muscle, but in other ways, it is like water behind a dam. If you suppress your emotions in order to suppress your magic, it will only build until a day like today, when it bursts free all at once. Of course it takes a negative shape; the hardest emotions to control are fear and anger.”

Her eyes widened with dismay. “All this time I’ve been trying to control myself was making it worse.” And every time it burst out of her, uncontrolled, it frightened her more. A self-fulfilling cycle. “What about my wand?”

“If you had sufficient control over your magic by the time you entered Ollivander’s shop, it would have been difficult for the wandmaker to read you. Usually, he can use a person’s aura to divine which wand will suit them, but you would be a dark room to his abilities.”

“So he had me randomly try wands and hope that one fit.”

Snape considered the ash wand on the desk between them. “The wand you ended up with was probably the least conductive of those you tried. It didn’t cause anything to explode, but it prevented you from using magic even when you consciously tried to, unless the force of your will flooded the wand and overrode its buffering qualities.”

“I see.” She didn’t, really. What did it all mean? She wasn’t a squib, apparently, but what now? She tried to assemble the pieces of her psyche into something resembling a rational young adult. “Do I have to get a new wand?”

“I will see the headmaster about obtaining a waiver for someone to come and collect you this Saturday,” Snape said shortly.

“Couldn’t you do it, sir?” she blurted. New panic coursed through her hollowed-out veins at the thought of Sirius coming to get her—her, not Archie—from Hogwarts. “I mean, wouldn’t it be better if someone from the school took me, so it doesn’t look like I’m getting special treatment?”

“I cannot just leave the school to—”

“Please, sir. You already understand the situation.” She didn’t care that she was imposing. Sirius could not come and collect her. “It shouldn’t take long since I’ve already tried most of the wands Mr. Ollivander has, and also… I don’t think I’m ready to talk to my dad about this yet. He wouldn’t understand.”

That was a thing kids said about their parents, wasn’t it? Anyway, he wouldn’t understand. Archie’s incidents of accidental magic had been textbook. Adorable and benign.

Snape kept silent for a long, brooding minute before he said, rather tiredly, “I will speak to the headmaster about this, but either way, you will be acquiring a new wand.”

“You can keep that one,” Rigel said quickly.

Snape shook his head. “You will return it to Ollivander on Saturday.”

“Thank you, sir—”

“It is no more than the duties of my position demand. You shall have a working wand, lest Salazar Slytherin roll in his grave.”

Rigel smiled gratefully all the same. Snape had figured out what was wrong with her magic. What’s more, he actually had a plan to fix it. It was indisputably more than she’d arrived with, and she wasn’t even going to be expelled for doing Flint’s homework.

Snape checked the time with a wave of his wand. “It is late and this meeting has been more taxing than either of us anticipated. I will appraise your other professors of the situation. You will not be required to do any wand work until Monday. You may go now, if there is nothing else.”

Rigel rose and was almost to the door before she turned back around. “I really am sorry for making a mess of your office, sir. Especially about the preserved ingredients. Were they valuable? I can pay you—”

Snape’s face contorted in a spasm that froze her insides. “I do not require your father’s filthy money.”

The words stole her breath with their potency. For a moment, neither of them moved. Rigel didn’t dare to even breathe. In his gaze there was a hate so old it had petrified. She wondered how heavy a memory must be to sink emotion so deep, and how long it must be left in the dark to grow such fangs.

He blinked—or she did—and the air was breathable again; some intangible darkness returned to the edges of the room, the edges of consciousness, where it belonged.

Snape’s entire frame flinched and his eyes went as blank as a new blackboard. “Forgive me, Bl—” He glared at nothing, or perhaps himself. “I—”

“It’s fine.” Her voice made up for his in neutrality. “It’s been a… taxing evening, like you said. I was only going to say, though, that I could pay you back with work if you wanted. You know, scrubbing cauldrons or… but that can wait, as well. Good night, sir.”

“Good evening.”

She left before either of them could say anything else. For all that he’d hidden it quickly, she knew what she saw. Snape hated Sirius. Not like the Cannons hated the Magpies, not like the ripping rivalry Sirius and James nursed from school. This was something altogether deeper. More sinister.

Your father does not factor here.

What a lie that had been.

He’d lectured her about suppressing her emotions, but Snape was a man with a pain so deep she doubted he had a name for it. And looking at her brought it snarling to the surface.

That was fine, she assured herself on her way back to the common room. He didn’t have to like her. He had made it exceedingly clear that he would do his duty as Head of House no matter what. As long as she could make him see that giving her the Potions instruction she needed counted as part of that duty, he would do it.

She did not need anyone’s affection. Not even her own.

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

Friday morning found Rigel eating calmly at the Slytherin table, bookended by her friends. Maybe she sat facing the Entrance Hall doors, but it wasn’t to avoiding looking at the staff table.

Her friends didn’t seem to notice her preoccupation, but knowing them, they’d noticed and politely declined to comment on it. Either way, she was grateful.

The hatred between her Head of House and her father and uncles hadn’t seemed entirely real before. She’d been aware of it, in snide comments when she dogeared Snape’s articles and in the way Remus carefully edited stories from their youth, but it had been nothing more than an abstract obstacle. A barrier to be overcome like any other in her determination to be taught by the greatest Potions Master alive.

She hadn’t considered what that enmity meant for Professor Snape, faced with the child of his enemy and asked to shovel the muck of the past beneath a thin academic veneer.

Who was she to think decades of grievance—and the kind of emotion that could fuel a fire for that many years—would be swept aside with the work of a few weeks?

She would try harder, and be more patient, she promised herself. She wouldn’t give up, but she wouldn’t expect to be seen entirely in her own light all at once. As long as he gave her instruction, no matter how bitterly, she could live with the specter of her uncle’s adolescent memory hanging about.

Her thoughts were interrupted when a speckled Eagle Owl swooped down and dropped a letter before sailing off, not even stopping to nip at the bacon. Draco’s quick hands saved it from the oatmeal.

“Thanks,” she said, checking the envelope. The words ‘Rigel Black’ on the nondescript envelope stilled her breathing. She didn’t recognize the handwriting. Too thin to be from Flint. No one at home would address a letter to Archie that way. Archie knew she’d taken his middle name, but…why would he change his handwriting?

An Eagle Owl meant an emergency if it was from Archie, so she excused herself from the table without finishing her breakfast.

Good thing she did, really, as she might have thrown it back up again when she read it.

Black,  

Be at Greenhouse Four by sundown or everyone will know your secret.

Come alone.

Rigel crumpled the note and shoved it into her pocket on her way to the dungeons. Her feet knew the route to the Potions classroom without input from her racing mind.

The vagueness of the threat concerned her. It meant whoever sent it might not know anything at all. It also meant she had to go, in case they did.

The perfect trap.

It could be worse. That she’d received a letter at all meant they were looking to blackmail her, or they’d have turned her in without the warning.

She could handle blackmail. Flint was proof of that. And unlike the mysterious attacks she’d been suffering, at least this time she’d get to face her antagonist.

Unless the letter was from the attacker. In which case, it was a different kind of trap.

For once, she didn’t mind the rudimentary nature of the first-year Potions practicals. She could brew a Color-changing Potion in her sleep, so she used every watt of extra brain power to consider her options.

She could tell her friends and disregard the admonition to come alone. But she might lose her chance to negotiate if she scared the other party off. Even if they showed, her secret could be revealed to her friends.

She could ignore it. Pretend she had nothing to hide. Except what she had to hide was so dangerous she couldn’t afford to underestimate the threat. A bluff always worked when you had too much to lose to risk calling it incorrectly.

Rigel worried the problem to the bone, then held it in her teeth resolutely. In the end, all she really needed to decide was how to slip away.

She faked a stomachache.

“Is this about whatever Professor Snape called you in for last night?” Draco asked.

Rigel rolled over, her back to the door. “No,” she mumbled unconvincingly.

“You can tell me, you know,” Draco tried. “He’s my godfather. Maybe I can talk to him.”

“I’m fine. Just go.”

Draco left for dinner. Rigel waited until the common room was empty to slip on her cloak and duck out. She met no one in the dungeons and darted past the cheery warmth of the Great Hall to the castle doors.

The setting sun angled over the grounds, trailing shadows as it dipped teasingly toward the ravenous treetops. By the time she reached the greenhouses, the forest had taken its first bite.

Two figures melted out of the glass wall, shucking Invisibility Charms at her approach.

“What do you know? He really came.”

“You were right; he did have something to hide.”

Rigel blew out the breath she’d been holding. Rosier and Rookwood were the last people she’d expected. They’d been practically genial when Pansy introduced them. Just went to show appearances couldn’t be trusted.

“Really? You two?” Rigel shook her head in disgust, but it was mostly aimed at herself. She’d considered it might be a trap, but she hadn’t thought showing up was the trap.

“Welcome, secret-keeper.” Rosier smiled like a saber tooth tiger. His eyes glowed amber in the fading light and he leaned in as though they were in danger of being overheard. “Tell us, what confidences do you so willingly endanger yourself to keep?”

Rigel took a step back, unnerved, but Rookwood was there on her other side. More intimidating than Rosier’s amused smirk was Rookwood’s silent stare.

She lifted her chin and said nothing.

“No? Shame.” Rosier let out a bored sigh. “Still, we did not come here to learn your secrets, petty as they undoubtedly are.”

“What do you want, then?”

“We don’t trust you.” Rookwood’s ocean-deep voice held not a drop of remorse.

Rosier nodded. “That’s the sum of it. Pansy vouched for you, bent over backwards to get us in the room with you, but at that meeting it became clear her judgement has been compromised where you are concerned.”

“And she is not here with you.”

“And she is not here,” Rosier repeated ominously. “Which means you are keeping secrets from her, too.”

“Which means you can’t be trusted.”

Rigel shot Rookwood a scowl. She couldn’t be trusted? They were the ones sending cryptic, threatening notes to eleven-year-olds.

“And those who cannot be trusted…” Rosier drew out the suspense with a smile. “Must be tested.”

“Tested?”

Rosier exchanged an amused look with Rookwood, and she had to think this was all just a game to them. They had never known or cared about her secrets. “If we’re to approve your friendship with Pansy, you must be worthy. You’ve shown you aren’t trustworthy, I’m afraid, but we have hopes that your friendship holds worth of another kind.”

Rigel wished he would get to the point.

“It was brave to come out here alone to face an unknown enemy,” Rookwood said.

“Brave or rather craven. Were you terribly afraid we’d spill your secrets? Shall we find out which it is?” Rosier laughed. “Don’t look so scared. We just want to see if you’re worthy of your House. Run a little errand for us, and you’ll be on your way.”

“What kind of an errand?”

“The kind that tests your resourcefulness, of course. You can’t be a Slytherin without Slytherin’s qualities.” Rosier’s smile turned sharp, and she felt the other shoe drop. “If you don’t want to, all you have to do is agree to break off your friendship with Pansy. If you aren’t around her, we don’t care how unworthy you are.”

“No,” Rigel said, louder than she’d intended. She glared at the two older students. “Pansy’s my friend, and if you know her half as well as you think, you’d know that she won’t appreciate this kind of maneuvering behind her back.”

“True,” Rookwood said.

“But what Pansy doesn’t know won’t get us into trouble with her,” Rosier added quickly. “You won’t be telling her.”

It wasn’t a question.

“What’s your errand, then?”

“Are you sure Pansy’s worth all this trouble?”

“She is.” Rigel scowled at Rosier for suggesting otherwise. Maybe she was a rotten liar, but she wasn’t a bad friend. A Potter didn’t abandon her friends lightly, and if she’d learned one thing about Slytherins it was they stuck together no matter what. She wouldn’t be shaming either of her Houses that night.

“Wonderful.” Rosier smiled as though he were a sphinx and she’d solved his riddle. “Then here is your task: acquire two springs of fresh Canterberry and bring them back here.”

“You have two hours,” Rookwood added.

Rigel stared at them. Canterberries grew on shade-loving vines. In trees. She looked to the Forbidden Forest as her blood started pumping faster.

“Be glad it’s not a full moon tonight.” Rosier inspected his nails with affected unconcern.

Rigel made a face, but she had already agreed to the task, and the sooner she got it done, the better. She could only hope the truly dangerous creatures of the forest did not stir until deeper in the night.

She gave Hagrid’s cabin a wide berth, in case his dog had sensitive ears. The only thing worse than traipsing through the Forbidden Forest at night would have to be getting caught traipsing through the Forbidden Forest at night.

The forest, so hauntingly silent during the day, teemed with life now. The autumn breeze set the leaves to whistling, insects chirped and trilled in unseen numbers, and every twig beneath her feet was a snare in a concerto for strings, jarringly out of place.

Canterberries grew in bunches like grapes, and the vines liked to wrap themselves around the widest trees they could find. The trees on the edge of the forest weren’t nearly wide enough.

Trees got bigger as they got older, but also as they got closer to water. The older trees would be in the very center of the forest, where it had first begun, but that would also be the most dangerous section.

She found a swath of trees growing bigger in parallel to the tree line and went that way, hoping some offshoot of the Black Lake was responsible.

Ten minutes later, she came upon a healthy stream. The presiding trees swelled with pride of place nearest the water, and, sure enough, wore the distinctive twisting vines of Canterberry for their ornaments of state.

The vines trailed conspicuously from the sturdy branches to skim the surface of the water, and Rigel eyed the sprigs of berries, all out of reach. Animals would have eaten any that hung low enough, she supposed. She could try to knock some down, but the vines were thick. She might drop a few berries, but likely not a whole spray.

She would have to climb up and then out over the water to get the berries. Her left wrist gave a reluctant twinge, but she cradled it against her stomach reassuringly. First, a rope.

Rigel pulled a few of the looser, dying vines off a nearby tree and braided them together, using her teeth when necessary. She divested herself of the cumbersome cloak and robes, and, after a few tries, managed to loop the braided vine over the strongest-looking branch of the largest tree. She tied one end in a slipknot and tightened it until she had a long strand fastened securely to a branch high above.

The other end went around her waist, just in case.

She hooked her right arm over the lowest branch and walked up the trunk with her legs. Her shoulder protested the one-handed hang, but it was only until she could get a leg over the top.

Rigel wriggled like a drunk monkey, but managed to right herself to a seat on the first branch. While she rested, she shortened the rope around her waist. Now, she couldn’t fall further than the first branch.

From the first branch, she could reach the second and third by simply standing and hefting one leg over. When she reached a branch that went all the way out over the water, she hugged it against her belly and scooted, feeling like an overgrown inchworm.

The Canterberry vines were strong, but Rigel managed to gracelessly peel a few sprigs in curling protest from where they connected. She tossed them to the riverbank, then began the careful climb down after them.

Her limbs were still shaking from the climb up, but she made it to the lowest branch without falling. From there, she risked a jump, intentionally rolling onto her right side as she landed.

A groan boiled up as her left wrist jarred, but her ankles survived un-sprained.

She brushed herself off the best she could and collected the sprigs of berries from the ground. They were a little bruised, but recognizable and undeniably fresh, the green flesh of the broken connection raw and exposed.

She had just wrapped them in her cloak when the sound of slow applause rose over the bubbling stream.

“Pleased with himself, isn’t he?”

“Well-earned.”

Rosier and Rookwood dropped their Disillusionments simultaneously.

“You followed me.” She wasn’t sure if she should be grateful or annoyed, but she did think better of them, knowing they hadn’t actually sent a first year into the forest alone.

Rookwood eyed her cloak-wrapped berries. “You made quick work of our task. How did you know the berries would be here?”

“Been wandering the forest often?” Rosier suggested.

“They grow on big trees. Big trees grow near water.” Rigel narrowed her eyes. “Were you hoping I’d wander around in the dark for two hours, scared out of my mind?”

Rosier looked a little guilty. “Our time limit certainly didn’t give you enough credit.”

Rigel unrolled her cloak, letting the berries fall to their feet. “Since you’re here, I don’t have to take these back to the greenhouse, right? Unless you need them for a bunion cream…?”

Rosier laughed. “No, the berries don’t matter. We just wanted to see what you would do.”

“You are resourceful and brave. And you didn’t renounce Pansy.”

“In short, you pass.” Rosier smiled at her, but Rigel was not feeling very celebratory.

Her wrist ached and she was covered in dirt. She went to pull on her robes, but Rookwood stopped her.

“You’re injured.”

Rosier made a noise of understanding. “That’s why you climbed the tree one-handed.”

Rigel shifted her wrist behind her back defensively. Of course they would notice the bandage peeking out from her sleeve.

“Is it broken?” Rookwood pressed.

Rigel searched his stoic face, trying to decide whether she could get away with a lie, but taking her eyes off Rosier was a mistake.

He grabbed her elbow and pried her left arm out where he could examine it. “It’s the wrist.” He peeled back her sleeve. “Well-wrapped, but our certified Mediwitch can fix this in a heartbeat. Why in Salazar’s name are you walking around injured, Rigel Black?”

“That’s none of your business,” Rigel said, reclaiming her arm and stepping out of Rosier’s reach.

Rosier gave Rookwood a conspiratorial smirk. “So, we did find a secret.”

“He’s trustworthy after all,” the taller boy agreed.

She didn’t pretend to understand them. “Now having secrets makes me trustworthy?”

“Try to think like a Slytherin.” The golden-eyed boy tutted. “Us knowing one of your secrets makes you easier to trust because a person can always be trusted to protect their secrets.”

Rookwood cracked a smile at her confused face. “Everyone has secrets,” he acknowledged. “But a person whose secrets we know is less concerning than a person who appears to have none.”

“Whatever you say,” she said tiredly. “If our business is concluded, I’d like to get back before my friends miss me.”

“Our business is far from completed,” Rosier said with a dangerous smile. “But we’ll walk you back to the castle. Wouldn’t do to let Pansy’s new friend get lost in the woods.”

Rigel started walking, but Rosier suddenly snapped his fingers.

“Oh! I almost forgot. Edmund, would you mind?”

Rookwood drew his wand and Rigel backed into a tree, all too aware that she had no means to defend herself. The quieter Slytherin held up his other hand peaceably. “I’m going to fix your wrist.”

She stared at him. Fix her…could he?

Rookwood approached slowly and drew her arm from her side with a broad hand on her bicep. She couldn’t help her flinch when he slid his hand down to her wrist, but it was only to move the once-white shirtsleeve out of the way. Rookwood held her gaze reassuringly as he began to unwrap the bandages.

Rigel let him. Was this how a wild animal felt when a human tried to help it? She had no inclination to trust them, after they’d baited her into coming out there and wasted her evening proving some obscure point about friendship and Slytherin qualities. On the other hand, if they really could fix her wrist…the twins had said it would need until Halloween to heal on its own.

When the injury was uncovered, the older boys studied it critically.

“I expected worse,” Rosier admitted.

“The bone has already been set,” Rookwood noted. His fingers were careful as he probed the break. “When was this broken?”

Rigel glanced between them. Rosier’s smile did not reassure her, but Rookwood’s unflappable calm did, so she said, “First Saturday of term.”

“How?” Rosier could not suppress his curiosity for even a moment.

“Fell down some stairs. It caught in the strap of my bag and twisted.”

Rosier winced sympathetically, “I supposed you passed out?”

“I think so.”

The golden-eyed boy nodded. “Otherwise, your scream would have brought someone running. You kept this to yourself. I have to wonder why…”

Rookwood prompted her when she didn’t answer. “Someone set it for you.”

“Yes. But they didn’t know how to fix it.”

“Why not just go to the Hospital Wing?” Rosier shook his head.

“I don’t trust Healers.”

“Oh.” Rosier’s eyes went wide. “Because of what happened to your—”

“Aldon.”

Rosier clamped his mouth shut and shot Rookwood a grateful look. “Sorry,” he muttered. “Uncalled for.”

She accepted his apology with a nod. The less said about her reasons the better, but if they wanted to assume it was because of Archie’s mum, that was fine with her.

Rookwood pointed his wand at her broken wrist and she tensed.

“Not to worry,” Rosier said bracingly. “Edmund’s family runs a shelter for magical creatures. He fixes animals all the time, and first-years are basically the same.”

“Don’t listen to Aldon.” Rookwood’s voice was rough but soothing, like sand being raked in a Zen Garden. “Take a deep breath and hold still.”

Rookwood cast a numbing spell that made her ears roar. She missed the incantation he spoke next, but a hot-then-cold sensation rushed out through her fingers and up her elbow from the break, and the next moment, she was staring at a perfectly mended wrist.

“You’ll have to be careful for a bit. Build up the strength again.” Rookwood let a wry smile tug one side of his mouth. “I don’t recommend climbing any trees.”

Rigel moved her hand back and forth wonderingly. “It’s fixed. I—thank you. Thank you very much.” A smile took charge of her face, irrepressibly. She wanted to laugh. She wanted to swing a bat.

“The endorphins might make you a little giddy,” Rookwood added.

She didn’t care. She felt wonderful. On the way back to the castle, she thanked them several more times.

“Stop it,” Rosier finally protested. “It’s embarrassing. We wouldn’t just let you walk back into the common room injured. Someone might think we’d done it. Anyway, secrets aren’t that interesting once you know them.”

Rigel grinned at him. It was good to know that gratitude got under his skin.

Rosier narrowed his uncanny eyes at her pleased expression. “Don’t look so cheerful. You aren’t out of the woods yet.”

Rigel looked around the open grounds with exaggerated irony.

“That’s not what I meant—stop laughing, Ed.” Rosier scowled. “Fine, then. Enjoy your moment of victory, but this isn’t over. Now that we’ve eliminated this one, we’ll have to discover one of your other secrets before you’re trustworthy again—”

“Whatever you say, Rosier. As long as it doesn’t involve a nature walk through the Forbidden Forest.”

“I’m sure I can think up something worse,” Rosier muttered.

The effects of the Healing magic faded before they reached the common room. Her reservations about the older boys came back, tempered only by the knowledge that they hadn’t actually hurt her. Her father would think it a harmless bit of hazing, but she remembered all too well the look in Snape’s eyes the night before.

It was a fine line.

Pansy’s face lit up when Rigel came in flanked by Rosier and Rookwood, and even with her reservations in mind, the whole thing felt immediately worth it. What a sap she’d become.

Still, if she expected Snape to turn the other cheek when it came to her family, she could do no less. Flexing her pain-free wrist unconsciously, she wished both boys a pleasant evening and made for her dorm. A long shower was just the thing. Any lingering bad feelings would go the way of the dirt on her skin: down the drain.

--0—0—0

--0—0

--0

[end of chapter thirteen].

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 14:

“Good morning, Professor Snape.”

Rigel froze with her spoon to her mouth as Pansy addressed the air over her head. She’d known this was coming, and yet hadn’t readied herself at all to face him.

“Good day, Miss Parkinson, Mr. Malfoy.” There was a pause as he waited for Rigel to swivel in her seat. She set down her utensils and took the napkin from her lap. When she could delay no longer, she stood to face him. “Mr. Black, are you prepared to leave directly?”

The careful neutrality was back, a layer of frosting so thick you couldn’t see the way the cake had split in two underneath.

“Quite prepared, professor.”

“What’s happening?” Draco asked. He did so hate to be left out of things.

Rigel flicked her eyes up to Snape’s to see if she was allowed to tell them or not. He had seemed reluctant to accompany her initially, but it was he who had approached the breakfast table. She could easily have met him in his office if he didn’t want people to know.

“Your Housemate requires a new wand. I am escorting him to Ollivander’s.”

Pansy gave Rigel a disappointed look. “You’ve forgotten to tell us something important again, haven’t you?”

Rigel began to apologize, but Snape was already striding for the Entrance Hall. “I’ll explain later,” Rigel promised, hurrying after him.

Behind her, she heard Draco say, “No, he won’t.”

Rigel caught up to Professor Snape in the Entrance Hall, and they set off without a word between them down the sloping lawn toward the main gate.

She thought he would call a carriage at the gate, but Snape kept up his brisk stride down the path to Hogsmeade. Rigel didn’t mind the walk, though she wished she’d grabbed her scarf.

“You didn’t tell your friends.”

It was not a question, and Rigel wasn’t sure what Snape wanted to know. Tentatively, she said, “It’s not that I don’t trust them. Just that I don’t fully understand what’s wrong with my magic myself, so explaining it seems…”

“You avoid confrontation, even when the only thing you must confront is yourself.”

Also not a question, with just enough truth to sting. “Not everyone likes talking about themselves,” she muttered.

Snape shot her a look that said he saw right through her. She sincerely hoped he overestimated himself.

Hogsmeade did humming business on the weekends. They wove their way into the Three Broomsticks with difficulty, and Snape indicated she should Floo first.

She had never liked the Floo. The sheer counterintuition required to step into fire aside, the conveyance insisted on spitting her out instead of spinning her through with a gentle push, as everyone else apparently experienced it.

Archie always said it was because she tasted like potion fumes. Rigel suspected the Floo system simply knew she didn’t like it.

“The Leaky Cauldron!”

At least when she was catapulted out the other end, she had the consolation of knowing Snape wasn’t there to witness it.

Tom, the Cauldron’s barkeep, did not hide his grin as he helped her up. Snape strolled through the flames as though he didn’t even notice them, and Rigel had to assume everyone else was practicing their Floo travel in secret.

Snape glared a path through the throng of shoppers to Ollivander’s dingy shop. It was the kind of small and dark that made her think it should have a plaque designating it a site of historical significance. There was really no other reason it shouldn’t have been torn down and redeveloped.

When they reached the door, Rigel turned resolutely to Snape. “There’s no need to come inside, professor. If you wanted to go to Tate’s apothecary, I can join you as soon as I’m finished.”

“I am not leaving you unattended in Diagon,” Snape said dismissively, brushing past her into the store.

Nothing for it, then. She would have to bluff like mad and hope she seemed more trustworthy than an old man in a dark shop.

A bell rang, but the clapper was so dirty it sounded more like a metal thunk. The shop was packed with boxes, floor to ceiling and then floor to ceiling again, double-parked, and she thought it must be a fire hazard to have so much wood and dust in one place.

Ollivander himself sat behind the small counter, whittling slowly at a length of birch. He set it aside and stood to greet them.

“Don’t get many young ones once term’s begun.” He spoke softly, his milky-white eyes peering through the gloom at her—no, not at her, she realized. He was looking at her hands. For a wand.

Snape held his wand out for Ollivander to examine, and the older wizard reached for it eagerly, as though greeting an old friend.

“Ah, yes. Thirteen-and-one-half inches. Ebony and dragon heartstring.” Ollivander smiled at Snape knowingly. “Non-conforming. Good for combative magics. Still well-bonded I see, Master Snape.”

He remembers the wand first and the person who bought it second.

“It serves me well,” Snape confirmed.

“And yours?”

It had not occurred to her to be nervous about returning hers, but suddenly it felt as though she were returning a child to an orphanage.

Ollivander looked so expectant that Rigel found herself pulling the ash wand from her pocket and holding it out to him.

His gasp of dismay was audible. “What have you…” He touched the singed end of the wand, eyebrows drawn together in a bushy umbrella that forecasted thunder. “Ash, twelve inches, and a hair from a particularly docile unicorn. I parted with this wand but a month ago. What have you done to it, Miss—”

“Mister Black.” Rigel spoke forcefully over him before he could finish what he’d been about to say. Merlin’s beard, but she hadn’t thought the old man would actually remember selling her the wand.

Ollivander hesitated, tearing his eyes from the burnt wand to take in her Hogwarts robes and shorn haircut. “Mister Black…” He spoke slowly, and his voice took on a fragile note that hadn’t been there before. “Forgive me, child, but I cannot recall…”

Snape shifted beside her, but Rigel dared not glance over to see what he made of the situation. Ollivander was playing along, and that was all that mattered at the moment.

“It’s Rigel Black, remember?” She smiled her way through the brazen lie. “I came in with my cousin, Harry Potter. Harry got an elm wand, with a unicorn hair as well. I had a bit of trouble finding one that worked, though.”

“Ah.” Ollivander nodded. “That’s why I don’t recall. I didn’t consider that wand sold, after all. Knew you’d be back, and here you are.”

She looked at the ash wand ruefully. “You were right. This wand doesn’t work for me. I should have listened when I was here before.”

“You came back, that’s what matters.”

She resolutely did not look at Snape.

Ollivander slipped the ash wand into one of his many pockets. “I’ll be keeping this, lest you do any worse to it. Poor thing will need a clean overhaul before I can sell it on, but it won’t have a bond holding it back, at least.”

She had no idea what that meant, so she nodded solemnly.

“I hope you cleared your afternoon.” Ollivander hummed happily. “This time, I will find you a wand if it takes me all day.”

He sat Rigel down in a rickety chair and began to pull boxes, seemingly at random.

“Maple and unicorn hair, rather springy, try—oh dear!”

The wand bucked in her hand the moment she grasped it, and a potted plant in the corner met an untimely end in an explosion of singed leaves.

“Ah. I’d forgotten how exuberant your magic is.” Ollivander picked the maple wand off the floor with a determined smile. “No matter, no matter. We’ll have to proceed a bit differently, that’s all.”

“Professor Snape thinks that I’ve suppressed my magic,” Rigel offered, glancing at the silent professor, who seemed content to watch from the sidelines. “Will it even be possible for me to, er, bond with a wand?”

“I should think so.” Ollivander scratched his white head of hair. “It’s true I prefer to narrow it down by reading a wizard’s ambient magic, but even if your magic is tightly controlled, the right wand will sense it once it’s in your hand.”

“But there’s no way to know without trying them all?”

Anxiety stirred in her gut. The potted plant had been enough to put her on edge, and she was starting to remember why she’d been so eager to get away last time. Causing a series of explosions wasn’t the sort of thing that made a person want to lean into wand magic.

“You tried a great many last time, and I think it’s safe to eliminate those,” Ollivander said bracingly.

“How many does that leave Mr. Black to try?” Snape asked, his voice tight.

“Oh, no more than six or seven hundred,” Ollivander estimated. At Snape’s dark-eyed stare, the older wizard seemed to reconsider. “Unless…but I haven’t used that in years…”

Rigel and Snape waited patiently for him to continue, and he did, after giving them a disappointed look that suggested he’d been hoping they’d to rise to the bait.

“There is a book I haven’t needed since I was in training under my great uncle.” He puttered behind the counter and produced a book that had to have been bound in the early days of parchment making. Yellowed with age, it gave a crotchety crack along the spine when Ollivander opened it.

Rigel sneezed twice after inhaling what could only be the vaporized remains of a very old vampire that escaped the book as he blithely flipped the pages.

“It’s a wand-predictor,” Ollivander said significantly. He waited a beat for them to express their amazement, but Rigel was sneezing again.

“I’ve never seen one,” Snape offered diplomatically. She noticed he stayed as far back from the book-shaped urn as the cramped shop would allow.

“You wouldn’t have.” Ollivander gave a proud sniff over the tome, and Rigel said a prayer for the coven that would never know what happened to their fallen comrade. “Invented by my ancestors. Useful for wandmakers who cannot sense the resonance between wand and wizard for themselves. It won’t pinpoint the exact wand, but it gives a good idea of where to start.”

He gestured Rigel forward. On the page he held open, she saw rows of thumbprints in brown ink, with a wand wood and core noted next to each one. When Ollivander seized her hand and pricked her finger with the tip of a quill, it became evident what the ink was. She sort of doubted that quill was sanitary, but she reluctantly coated her thumb with enough blood to make a clear print.

Within a minute, a word appeared beside her print.

Holly.

Ollivander hummed in approval. “Just so. I might have suspected. Holly is a volatile wood, a dab hand at channeling impetuous emotions. It’s also particularly protective. I daresay any holly wand that chooses you won’t be so keen to give you up as the ash wand—”

He broke off as the next words appeared.

Phoenix Feather.

Ollivander stared at the book for a long moment before raising his furrowed eyes to peer at her curiously. “A rare combination. I was not expecting…” He shot a hard-to-read look at Snape, then leaned closer across the counter, as though his words were meant for her alone. “A phoenix’s allegiance is hard-won. They are creatures capable of both great detachment and great initiative. Combining the aloof nature of the phoenix with the passionate nature of holly usually results in disaster. As such, I’m afraid I have only one wand which fits these specifications.”

Ollivander shut the book and rummaged near the back of the shop. He returned with an underwhelming box that looked as though it had been languishing near a pile of mouse droppings for some time.

Then Ollivander opened the box, and the hairs on the back of Rigel’s neck stood straight up.

Instead of taking the wand out and handing it to her, he simply held the open box out toward her. “Holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches, nice and supple. Go on and take it.”

She wasn’t sure she wanted to. It felt as though Fate herself was breathing over her shoulder, and Rigel had the sudden urge to back away and keep on backing up until she was out of the shop and down the street at the apothecary.

Some competing instinct kept her rooted to the spot. It called to her, and all she could think was oh. That’s what it was supposed to feel like.

She took the wand. More accurately, as her fingers wrapped around the wood, she thrummed at the wand, and the wandthrummed back. Sparks like scarlet plumage shot out of the end, and for a moment, she could see the phoenix that gave its feather and hear its trill resonating in some echoing chamber deep inside her. It was like stepping into the rising sun.

“Bravo! Yes, well done.” Ollivander’s smile had an edge. “How curious,” he added as he took back the box.

Since she had not yet humored him and he had helped her find a better wand, Rigel prompted, “What’s curious?”

Ollivander looked her carefully in the eye. “I do not usually care to guess what will become of my creations once they leave my shop. The destiny of a wand is tied too closely to that of its wizard, and the fates of men are as changeable as sand, but I cannot help but think this wand was meant for great things.”

“Surely, there’s no way to know,” she said weakly, attempting a smile.

Ollivander didn’t smile back. “The phoenix whose feather resides in your wand gave another. Just one other. I sold the first long before you were born, but this one has lingered, awaiting its equal. When two wands share such a connection at their core, spectacular things are known to happen. I do not know what this connection will mean for you, but I am curious to see if you ever find your wand’s brother.”

Rigel wasn’t sure what to say to that, so she thanked Ollivander politely and pulled out her meager pin money. Ollivander declined payment, citing the ash wand returned unbonded, so she pocketed the holly wand and followed Snape out of the shop.

They didn’t speak on the way back to school, but she caught Snape glancing at her sidelong more than once.

Rigel did want to do great things, but not with a wand in her hand. She was grateful the holly wand had chosen her, but now she worried it might be disappointed. She felt like she’d walked out of the shop with the wand-equivalent of a Nimbus 2000 and no intention of ever playing Quidditch. Couldn’t he have talked her into a more basic model?

It was the only holly-and-phoenix wand he had, she reminded herself. Maybe it was too much wand for her, if he expected her to become some sort of Charms Master with it, but they would get on well enough. It hadn’t exploded anything yet, and it had been almost a whole hour.

Great things would come or they wouldn’t. The best she could do was focus on the present. She had more than enough to be getting on with.

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

Her new wand was brilliant, but a little too eager. She had no problem casting spells with it; she just wished it would stop there. The holly wand was like a firework that occasionally lit its own fuse.

She could swear sometimes it started performing a spell before she had even finished the incantation and wand movement. Other times, a spell came out magnified beyond her intentions. At first, Draco and Pansy were delighted for her, but after she exploded the training dummy she was supposed to be stunning in DADA, even her friends admitted she needed to dial it back a little.

Only she didn’t know how. She was holding a fireman hose and the teachers kept telling her to gently water the flowers. There was no gentle, controlled way to use the holly wand. Once she picked it up, it could pull whatever magic it wanted out of her and Rigel was supposed to be grateful it worked at all.

When she asked Snape about her wand’s enthusiasm, he theorized it may be siphoning off the built-up energy in her magical core whenever it could. His suggestion was to simply do more magic with it.

Rigel wasn’t so sure. The ash wand not doing what she willed it to had been annoying, but there was something downright unsettling about the holly wand doing not only what she willed but also whatever else it wanted.

Still, the look on McGonagall’s face when Rigel performed her first perfect Transfiguration in front of her was worth any excess zeel on the part of her wand. She was no longer in danger of failing her classes, which meant her goal of remaining at Hogwarts had been inarguably fulfilled.

Really, Rigel thought as she jogged through the dungeons on her way to the Halloween Feast, she shouldn’t complain.

She was running late that evening, having been caught up in an essay on ward theory for Flint, but she was sure her friends had saved her a seat. It was a simple thing, but she thought always having a seat might be what friendship had been created for in the first place.

On her way up the stairs to the Entrance Hall, she heard the first explosion.

Rigel had pressed herself to the side of the stairway before she heard the follow-up crackles and pops and saw the multi-color lights spilling out the open doors to the Great Hall.

“Fireworks,” she muttered, calming her racing heart. Bit bold to set them off indoors, but she supposed the ceilings in the Great Hall might be tall enough.

As she reached the main floor, the Weasley twins came darting out of the feast. Their expressions were backlit by the colorful firecrackers still going off in the hall behind them, and they didn’t look cheered.

“Fred, George.” Rigel had to call out, or they would have barreled right by her.

“Rigel.” George swung around. His face was caught between friendliness and consternation. It made him look a bit ill.

“Your doing?” she asked, indicating the fizzling fireworks.

The twins exchanged a dark glance.

“No,” Fred said shortly. “Look, sorry, but we’ve got to run.”

“See you. And watch yourself,” George added, dragging his twin away up the stairs.

That was odd. She had thought they’d been avoiding her the last few weeks, but now she was near sure of it. Perhaps she had offended them by spending so much time with Percy, but his help was invaluable. She wouldn’t give it up over a bit of brotherly jealousy.

There was an empty place between Pansy and Blaise Zabini that might as well have had Rigel’s name stamped into it. She gave Pansy an appreciative grin as she slid into the bench and nodded to Draco, who sat across from her.

“Sorry I’m late,” she offered. “I was—”

“In the library,” Pansy finished. “We figured.”

Rigel looked up and down the table, in awe at the extent of the decorations. There were towers of cupcakes, candy sculptures, mountains of playfully themed food. Their table had a giant spider made entirely of asparagus, and everyone’s goblets smoked spookily with green vapors.

“Did you see the fireworks?” Draco asked.

“Just missed them,” Rigel admitted. “Who set them off?”

“No one knows.” Theo leaned around Pansy to speculate excitedly. “A whole slew of them were planted in the Hufflepuff jack-o-lanterns. Exploded bits of pumpkin all over the poor duffers when they went off.”

Rigel craned her neck to see the Hufflepuff table over Draco’s shoulder, at the far end of the hall. She bit her lip to keep from laughing. It wasn’t really funny to scare people like that, but it did look like their table had fought a battle against Squash Army and lost.

“What did the professors do?”

“Contained them!” Theo slapped the table in his excitement. Pansy gave up eating and simply leaned back politely while Theo filled Rigel in. “Soon as the first one went off, Dumbledore was there with his wand, and a wicked shield came up around it so none of the students got burned. He shielded all of them, only he left the shields clear so we could still see the colors.”

“Sprout is steaming,” Millicent added, indicating the high table. None of the professors looked particularly happy, but Sprout in particular was glaring about the hall.

“Doesn’t like her precious ’puffs being picked on,” Draco noted.

“It is odd,” Rigel agreed.

“Pranks on Halloween aren’t odd,” Theo argued. “I hear there’s always at least one.”

“It’s odd that Hufflepuff would be targeted,” Rigel clarified. “Gryffindor and Slytherin are still in the middle of a prank war, aren’t they?”

“It’s died down a bit, but you’re not wrong,” Pansy said thoughtfully.

“They must have really annoyed someone,” Theo said, shrugging.

He turned back to his food, and Pansy allowed herself to continue her own meal with a serene patience that made Rigel wonder if she’d been a saint in another life.

The food was excellent, but Rigel was hard-pressed to find anything that wasn’t covered in sugar. She reached for the smoking goblet by her plate, hoping it wasn’t pumpkin juice.

The goblet was halfway to Rigel’s lips when someone screamed behind her and a hand knocked the cup violently from her grasp.

It sloshed as it clanged to the table, splashing her right hand and arm. The liquid burned where it hit her bare skin, and all she could think as she cried out in pain was that is not pumpkin juice.

She leapt off the bench, shouting, “Stay away from it!”

Rigel hauled Pansy out of her seat with her left hand and pushed the girl behind her toward the Gryffindor table. Blaise had scrambled back as soon as the goblet fell and Draco was dragging Millicent away on the other side of the table. Rigel thanked Merlin the tables had been widened to accommodate the extra food for the feast, or Draco would have gotten a lapful of it.

As it was, only Rigel got hurt, but gods it hurt. Her robes were smoking where the contents of the goblet had landed, and she heard Pansy demand a pitcher of water from the Gryffindor table as she focused on breathing in and out. In and out.

Cool water splashed in a blessed stream over her hand. Rigel closed her eyes as the burning pain receded for a moment and she could think.

Why the hell had there been acid in her water goblet?

Pansy had a second pitcher pouring slowly over Rigel’s arm, trying to prolong the relief, when Snape waded through the mob of panicking students to their table.

“Move aside, move aside,” he growled, carving a path for the teachers with a combination of efficient magic and menacing glares.

Gryffindors and Slytherins alike scrambled to get out of his way, but it wasn’t easy. The widened House tables meant the aisles between them were narrower than usual. Plus, everyone wanted to see what was going on.

The Potions Master took quick stock of the situation when he reached them. With cool efficiency, he severed Rigel’s sleeve at the shoulder and Vanished it.

Her arm looked like a candy cane, striped with patches of burning red.

Madam Pomfrey was right behind Snape, and she pulled out her wand with a frightfully focused stare. Rigel had no time to panic before the matronly woman cast an Aguamenti, and then she was feeling too grateful to do anything but sag with relief.

“You’ll be alright, Mr. Black,” the Healer assured her briskly. “Just an acid burn.”

Rigel could only nod and pray the superficiality of the wound made deeper or more general health scans entirely unnecessary.

Snape stiffened at the word ‘acid’ and swept his gaze over the Slytherin table.

“It was in his goblet,” Theo said loudly.

Rigel felt herself go a bit faint when she considered how close she had been to drinking it. Draco had come around the table to help, and he quickly braced her at the shoulder so she didn’t sway like a ninny.

She gave him a quick, “Thanks.”

Draco didn’t answer, so she tore her gaze away from her burning hand and searched his thunderous expression. It was aimed at Blaise—no, at the blonde girl Blaise was holding by the elbow.

It was Hannah Abbott. She looked miserable, crying and shaking, her pigtails askew.

Rigel frowned at Blaise, who gave her one of his odd smiles. “What shall I do with your blonde butterfly? Seems to be discontent with merely watching you.”

The girl flushed deeply, and she shivered.

Blonde butterfly. Rigel shook her head in confusion. “Abbott? You’re the one that’s been following me?”

“Following you?” Snape repeated dangerously.

“She’s the one that knocked the acid onto your arm,” Draco growled.

Abbott shook her head fiercely. “I didn't mean to.”

“We saw you dive for the goblet,” Draco hissed. “You were running right for him.”

“I was trying to stop him from drinking it!” Abbott looked to Rigel imploringly, unshed tears caught in her lashes. “I thought I was too late when I saw you lift it, and I panicked. I’m sorry! I didn’t know it would burn you, I just knew you couldn't d-drink it.”

Pomfrey had her wand working over Rigel’s arm in soothing patterns, and she could already feel the burn receding.

“Thanks, Abbott,” she said faintly

“Thanks?” Draco repeated in her ear, disbelieving.

“I’m glad I didn’t drink it.” Rigel eyed the fallen goblet, which the elves, wearing thick protective gloves and face masks, had just popped in to contain.

Snape loomed over the Hufflepuff girl, eyes menacing. “You claim not to have known it was acid, but you did know his cup had been tampered with in the first place. How is that, Miss Abbott?”

Her chin wobbled at the black look on Snape’s face, but she choked out, “I over h-heard it. I left the f-feast to go to the bathroom, and I heard someone say Rigel’s name—Black, I mean.”

Pansy caught Rigel’s eye, and the absurd thought that she would have to explain why Abbott was using her first name made her want to laugh and cry at the same time.

“So you went to investigate?” Snape did not seem to believe her.

“It—they—” Abbott looked one sniffle from falling to pieces. “It wasn’t in a nice way, you know? It was a b-boy, I think, and he said it so m-meanly. And I—I just—”

Rigel took pity on her. It was clear the girl didn’t want to get into why she’d gone to investigate at the sound of her name, but if she hadn’t, Rigel might be laid out in the Hospital Wing with a hole through her esophagus. “What else did they say?” she asked gently.

Abbott’s eyes filled with tears once more. “He said he’d gotten a t-tablet into your drink, and then he laughed, and he was thanking someone for setting off the f-fireworks.”

Every Slytherin in hearing went still, including their Head of House.

“It was a distraction,” Pansy said quietly. Her eyes flashed to the Hufflepuff table on the far side of the hall. The Ravenclaw table was next to it. Then the Slytherin table. Which meant the table everyone was looking away from at that moment was—

“Gryffindors,” Theo snarled.

The members of Godric’s House looked among themselves, eyes wide. No one could deny it made sense, but Rigel could see even they didn’t know who would do something so utterly disturbing.

A prank war was one thing. Attempted murder was quite another.

“I ran back in as fast as I could,” Abbott promised. Her wide eyes bored into Rigel’s. “Please, Ri—please, Black. I just thought it was poisoned or s-something. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“I believe you,” Rigel said firmly.

Draco muttered something under his breath, but it wasn’t his forgiveness to give. Blaise released Abbott at once, even straightening her over robe with an apologetic nod.

Rigel indicated her arm, which Pomfrey had just finished bandaging. “No lasting damage, and you saved me a much more serious injury. I am in your debt.”

“N-no,” Abbott rushed to say, shoulders slumping. “I should have been faster.”

Snape gave the Hufflepuff a baleful glare that made the girl straighten fearfully. “If I find out you are lying about this incident, Miss Abbott, you will rue the day you got your Hogwarts acceptance letter. As it is…” He took a deep, fortifying breath. “Ten points to Hufflepuff.”

The hall gaped in silence, and Rigel was sure she saw Snape’s lips twitch ever-so-slightly upward as he swept from the room.

Abbott’s Housemates descended to collect her, wrapping her in admiration for her heroic deed and generally bearing a put-upon demeanor that suggested they were the real victims in all this.

Rigel blew out a breath. “I’m heading back to the common room. You guys enjoy the feast.”

“No chance.” Draco flared his nostrils like an offended stallion. She wondered if he’d picked that up from his godfather. “You’re not going anywhere alone. Someone just tried to kill you!”

Draco caught her left arm and dragged it over his shoulder in a blatant show of support. Pansy set her hand on Rigel’s right elbow, above the bandages. The two of them escorted her proudly and defiantly out of the hall.

Rigel tried not to meet anyone’s eyes, but it was impossible with the whole hall staring at her. Rosier and Rookwood nodded from further down the table.

Ron and Neville followed her with worried looks as she passed the Gryffindors, and Percy said confidently, “We’ll find whoever did this, Black, make no mistake.”

Rigel tried to smile, but her eyes wandered the table and the smile fell away. The Weasley twins, usually so easy to pick out of a crowd, were nowhere to be seen. They hadn’t come back to the feast.

In the common room, Draco and Rigel collapsed on a low-backed couch, and Pansy sat only for a moment before standing once more and making for her room.

“She’ll be back,” Draco said. “She just needs something to do with her hands.”

Sure enough, Pansy returned carrying a tea tray, with a tin of her grandmother’s biscuits levitating shakily behind her.

Pansy set to making tea, and Draco started in on the disaster of a night.

“Who would even do something so—so—?” Draco kicked the chair next to him in frustration when words failed.

“I don’t know,” Rigel said quietly.

“You’ve offended no one. Kept to yourself.” Pansy shook her head, eyes on the tealeaves she was measuring. “It doesn’t make sense.”

“You’ve been up to the Gryffindor tower a bunch times,” Draco said. “Oh, come on,” he added when Rigel stared at him. “We know you aren’t always in the library. People talk. I just mean—has anyone been rude to you? Did you upset anyone there?”

“The only one I talk to is Percy. And the Weasley twins,” she added. “Sometimes Ron and Neville. That’s really it.”

“What are you talking to Percy Weasley for?” Draco scrunched his nose.

“He helps me with magical theory sometimes.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Pansy said at the same time. “A prefect wouldn’t be involved in something like this.”

“Those twins might,” Draco said.

“We don’t know it was a Gryffindor,” Rigel tried.

“Oh, come off it.” Draco kicked the chair again. “Don’t defend them. Someone wanted us all to be looking away from their table when it happened. They had a clear line of sight to your empty seat. Could have levitated it right in while the fireworks were going off.”

Pansy’s hand shook on the teapot. “I can’t believe I didn’t notice. But all the goblets were smoking.”

“They waited for Halloween on purpose,” Rigel said tiredly.

“If it was a Hufflepuff, Abbott should have recognized their voice,” Pansy said. “But how could they have planted the fireworks without a Hufflepuff’s help?”

“An accomplice? Abbott said they were thanking someone for that bit. Assuming they weren’t talking to themselves,” Draco added darkly.

“Maybe the accomplice didn’t know how serious the prank was going to be,” Rigel suggested. Imagining that two people at school wanted to seriously injure her was difficult.

“Well, they won’t come forward now, then. The whole school’s going to be in inquisition mode,” Draco said. “Even some of the Gryffindors looked furious. I bet if they find out who did it first, they’ll turn them in right off. No loyalty among the Gryffins. Not for stuff like this.”

Pansy passed Rigel her cup. “Do you think it was the Weasley twins?” she asked bluntly.

Rigel looked into the cup, reluctant to answer. “I don’t want it to be. I like them. But they were leaving the hall just as the fireworks went off.”

“Those fireworks are a Zonko’s product,” Draco said. “And weren’t you hit with a dung bomb? And a smoke bomb, that night in the dungeons?”

Rigel nodded. She would not deny that a pranking tool had been at work in each of her attacks. “Anyone can buy those products, though.”

“The same cannot be said for a tablet of acid,” Pansy said sharply. “This is no schoolyard prank.”

“Actually…” Draco frowned, thinking hard. “My father said something about tablets over the summer. The Ministry was running an inquiry. I don’t remember…oi! Blaise!”

Blaise was crossing the common room with Millicent and Theo. All three of them came over, and Pansy set out additional cups.

“This summer, there was something about tablets being recalled due to a Ministry inquiry. Did you hear anything about it?”

Blaise shook his head, but Millicent leaned forward and said, “The Zonko’s tablets, yes. I thought that’s what it might be, too.”

“What tablets?” Pansy prompted.

“It was a product Zonko’s launched in July,” Millicent explained. “But by August, they’d pulled them all. It was supposed to be some kind of state-changing thing. You slip it in your friend’s drink, the liquid turns solid and won’t come out, everyone laughs.”

“Plebian.” Draco rolled his eyes.

“And poorly-engineered,” Millicent said. “The runes along the edge of the tablets turned out to be easy to modify. Change one, and instead of turning your drink solid it’ll turn it poisonous. Or corrosive. They had at least one murder and two hospitalizations within a month, and the Ministry pulled the plug. Crashed the joke market, because this isn’t the first issue with a Zonko’s product this year. My cousin lost a lot of coin.”

“They may have stopped selling them, but some must still be out there.” Theo drummed his fingers on his chair.

“And someone would have to deliberately change the runes to make the tablet do that to your drink,” Blaise pointed out. “This wasn’t an accident.”

“Thank Salazar you didn’t drink it.” Pansy bit decisively into a biscuit and chewed it with Machiavellian purpose. “I’m sending Abbott flowers.”

“And we’re going to figure out who’s doing this,” Draco promised. “If Dumbledore doesn’t expel them, they’ll wish he had. It can’t go unanswered. My father would be furious to know this kind of violence is happening at the school.”

“Don’t tell him,” Rigel begged. “None of you. I don’t need it getting back to my family that I’m being attacked. They’ll pull me from school.”

Everyone exchanged a reluctant look before promising to at least downplay it, if they couldn’t avoid mentioning it altogether. She supposed that was as good as it got in Slytherin.

“In the meantime, try to spend less time in Gryffindor tower,” Pansy advised.

Rigel hesitated. She didn’t want to think someone she knew in Gryffindor was behind this, but it made sense not to push her luck. “Alright,” she said softly. “Just until the person who did this is uncovered.”

Their talk turned to other things, like the upcoming Quidditch match. Draco wouldn’t be playing unless something dreadful happened to Higgs, but he managed to look forward to watching the match with the other reserve players with as much if not more enthusiasm.

More than one older student stopped by their couch on the way in from the feast. They promised to avenge her, not seeming to hear her when she told them she didn’t think a renewed prank war was going to help.

Pansy advised her to let them do what they wanted. Everyone felt helpless, and more than a little outraged that a first-year had been so viciously and publicly attacked. It would do them good to have an outlet, Pansy said. If that outlet needed to be a war of cunning and surprise in her name, then so be it.

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

“In the name of Black!”

As one, the first-years ducked under the bench. A paint bomb went off all over the Gryffindor third-years, and McGonagall’s voice could be heard screeching the resulting loss of points over general chaos.

No one seemed to hear her or care about the points at all.

Rigel climbed back to her breakfast with the others, inspecting her scone for any rogue drops of paint.

“That’s the third one this morning,” Pansy said, straightening her robes. “Honestly.”

“Something something, people need an outlet,” Rigel muttered.

The blonde girl shot her an unimpressed look. “Obviously I didn’t know it was going to go this far.”

The first week of November had been chaos. The Slytherins launched a no-quarter campaign against Gryffindor House, and the lions, partly in self-defense and partly for the sheer blood of it all, retaliated in kind.

Not a meal passed without disturbance, McGonagall and Snape could barely keep a semblance of order between them, and even Dumbledore was starting to look worried as the week progressed.

The situation was not helped by the looming Quidditch season.

Anticipation ran high the week before the first match, and players from both teams were targeted in hopes of winning an edge by Saturday.

Draco should have been relatively safe, being both a first-year and only a reserve player, but someone had left a huge tarantula in his book bag on Wednesday and it gave him a nasty bite when he reached in for his Charms textbook. Luckily, Draco wasn’t allergic, and a trip to the Hospital Wing saw him good as new, but the incident had them all paying closer attention to their belongings.

The morning of the match, it was all but a three-ringed-circus.

Pansy had helped Rigel dress again, this time in robes of dark grey with emerald embroidery along the cuffs and a deceptively delicate scarf of the same green, which turned out to be quite warm. She’d certainly need it up in the teachers’ box. Pansy herself wore robes of forest green with silver trim and a black, cashmere scarf that made her golden-blonde hair shine brilliantly.

“Do you think there’ll be any pranks at the match?” Theo asked.

Draco shot him a scandalized look. “They wouldn’t dare. It’s Quidditch!”

His logic was unassailable, but Pansy took an unconvinced sip of tea. “I certainly hope no one embarrasses themselves while the Board of Governors is present.”

“Do all of them come to every match?” Millicent asked.

“No, but they all come to the first match,” Draco said. He turned to Rigel. “Are you looking forward to meeting my parents?”

Well, there was really only one answer to that.

“Yes.” At Pansy’s prompting eyebrow raise, Rigel added, “What, um, should I know about them before we meet?”

Draco sat straighter in his seat at the question. “Well, Father is very proper in mixed company. Don’t be offended if he’s overly formal. Mother will probably be a bit friendlier, because she’ll see you as family, and she already likes Pansy enough to suggest marriage on three separate occasions.”

Pansy smiled brightly. “I adore your mother, but we both know she hasn’t started considering matches for you yet.” Pansy turned to Rigel and added, “She has the most marvelous tea sets; I don’t think I’ve ever seen the same one twice.”

Draco gave a long-suffering sigh. “Whatever you do, don’t mention politics or Father’s work in the S.O.W. Party. He loves Quidditch, and he hates to have his leisure time interrupted with work.”

“That should be easy enough,” Pansy said. “I doubt Rigel is eager to converse on such subjects with the Malfoy patriarch.”

“I’d be entirely out of my depth,” Rigel admitted.

“Everyone is out of their depth when it comes to Father,” Draco said proudly. “That’s what makes him a Malfoy.”

Rigel and Pansy laughed, and Flint finally stood and signaled his team. Wood shot up immediately from the next table over and rallied his own troops for action.  

Draco stood and graciously accepted everyone’s luck and well wishes, none of them daring to acknowledge that he wouldn’t actually be playing. He followed his team, and Pansy took a moment to smooth the wrinkles from Rigel’s robes, shifting a few stray locks back into place.

Rigel offered Pansy her arm, a habit she was finding less uncomfortable as she got used to it, and the two of them made their way slowly down the lawn.

The teachers’ box was worth the climb, with wide rows and a sturdy railing that jutted out over the pitch. There was room to mingle congenially, as Pansy put it, on one side of the box, and the shimmer of magic over each bench seat suggested Comfort Charms and possibly even Warming Charms awaited.

Most of the professors and a lot of adults Rigel didn’t recognize were present when they arrived, and more than a few raised eyebrows as Pansy breezed into the box as if she owned it.

Mr. Malfoy was already there as well, unless some other man in the wizarding world looked as though he’d cloned himself in Draco, rather than merely fathering him. He and his wife sat next to Snape in the second row. They were dressed to match in striking silver, and their hair did, as Pansy professed, appear to hold the light itself captive in its strands.

Mrs. Malfoy spotted Pansy and made to stand. Her husband rose instantly, Professor Snape a beat behind. Both men turned to see who had garnered her attention, and Rigel, coward that she was, chose to meet Snape’s raised eyebrow rather than see whatever expression crossed Mr. Malfoy’s face first.

“My dear, you look lovely.” The beautiful lady stepped around the men to give Pansy a willowy embrace. She had the features of an alpine lake, crisp and remote.

“So wonderful to see you, Narcissa. Thank you for your kind invitation.” Pansy’s smile could have charmed a small country out of its woodlands. She dipped a curtsey and added, “It’s been too long, Lord Malfoy. I hope the day finds you well.”

“Pansy. I see formal schooling has not robbed you of your natural charm.” Mr.—Lord?—Malfoy inclined his head with regal fondness. His voice was as elegant as his silver-tipped serpent cane and, Rigel suspected, just as deadly when called upon. “Your father is well, I trust?”

“Quite well, thank you.”

Malfoy’s strong jaw flexed as he nodded, and it added to the impression of strength and power that he seemed to project without noticing. But of course he did notice. Rigel was sure he depended upon it.

Pansy turned to Snape and dipped a shallow curtsey for him as well. “Good day, Professor Snape.”

“Indeed, Miss Parkinson.” Snape gave a short nod, but his dark eyes swept the box restlessly.

“And who is your patient escort today, Pansy?” Mrs. Malfoy asked, a friendly smile playing at the edges of her mouth.

Pansy turned her shoulders at an angle to indicate Rigel to the three adults. “Lord and Lady Malfoy, may I introduce to you Rigel Black? Rigel is a dear friend to me, and to your son. Rigel, this is Draco’s mother, Lady Narcissa Malfoy, and his father, Lord Lucius Malfoy.”

“A pleasure to make your acquaintance at last, Mr. Black.” Mrs. Malfoy held out a delicate hand, and Rigel bowed over it respectfully, though she didn’t kiss it in deference to the lady’s husband. Pansy had been very clear on that.

“Likewise, fair lady.” Rigel raised her head. “Though I fear the tales of your grace and beauty are woefully inadequate; never in my life have I known elegance until this moment.”

Mrs. Malfoy’s smile bloomed like a rose: careful and refined. “I would not have thought it possible, but you are even more charming than your father, Mr. Black.”

“Please, call me Rigel, Lady Malfoy. I could not bear to be mistaken for my father in the eyes of such a queen.” Rigel let the light catch her eyes. She distinctly heard Snape snort.

Mrs. Malfoy’s laugh was delicate. Practiced. “Very well, Rigel. Then, to you I must be Narcissa.”

“As you wish, my lady,” Rigel said. She turned to Mr. Malfoy, schooling her features into the kind of pleasant engagement that didn’t reveal any feelings. “I am honored to be making your acquaintance, Lord Malfoy.”

And didn’t it feel strange to call him that? She knew in a vague sense that her father was technically a lord, too, but people didn’t go around calling him that. It was Auror Potter or just Potter. She felt as though she’d stepped into a regency novel, but she didn’t want to embarrass Pansy.

“The pleasure is mine, Mr. Black.” Malfoy inclined his proud head as she bowed deeply before him. “Draco has told us much about you.”

“Draco has far too good an opinion of me, so I can only hope our meeting does not pale in comparison to your expectations,” Rigel said, allowing warmth to crease her eyes as she spoke of her friend.

“I am not in the habit of forming inflexible expectations of people,” Malfoy said. “Particularly not on the word of my son.”

“It seems as though at least some of the things Draco hinted at are true, however,” Narcissa commented. Her gaze flicked playfully to Pansy. “I will certainly be warning the mothers in my tea circle to mind their daughters around you, Mr. Black.”

Rigel affected a look of distress. “Pansy, dear friend, put paid to this cruel inference.”

Pansy sent her a knowing smile, saying airily, “Alas, I would, if only the trail of broken hearts did not speak so condemningly for itself.”

Rigel turned to Snape, risking his notoriously thin sense of humor to include him in the conversation. “Professor, you aren’t going to allow them to malign my good name, are you?”

Snape looked down his nose at her, eyes glittering. “Your name is blackened beyond repair. However…” He tilted his head consideringly. “It is difficult to credence you have the time to build such a reputation when one considers the amount of work I assign you.”

Mr. Malfoy turned surprised eyes on his friend. The hint of amusement tempered his otherwise cold and formal demeanor. Now, Rigel could sort of see why Draco liked this man so much. “I never thought I’d see the day when Severus Snape admits to the inordinate demands he makes of his students.”

“And you never shall,” Snape rejoined. “I am, if anything, too easy on most of my students.”

Pansy shot Rigel a meaningful look, and it took her a moment to realize what was happening as Snape continued.

“But Mr. Black is not most students.” Snape indicated Rigel with a jut of his chin, and it was all Rigel could do not to beam with gratification. “I admit my expectations for him are higher, but the demands I make of him are embarrassingly easily met, if the speed with which he completes my tasks are any indication.”

Professor Snape was backing her in front of the Malfoy patriarch. And he even sounded like he meant it.

Rigel fought a blush as the Malfoys turned appraising eyes on her. Just then, Professor Quirrell broke in abruptly from the row behind them.

“Lord Malfoy, so good of you to come watch our little game,” he said, a tad too loudly. His voice was so oily he might have been trying to ooze his way into the aisle.

“Ah.” Mr. Malfoy turned his head alone toward Quirrell and gave a slow nod, though the thin man didn’t remember to bow back. “Professor Quirrell. Good day.”

“Yes, indeed, if you like this sort of thing.” Quirrell waved a hand at the Quidditch pitch as though gesturing to an especially odious display of frivolity. “I was wondering, Lord Malfoy, how the progress on that new bill is coming? You know the one—”

“Yes, I do.” Mr. Malfoy pressed his lips together and cast swift eyes over to where Dumbledore was chatting amiably with Professors McGonagall and Sprout. He turned fully to face Quirrell and said, in a low, tight voice, “That particular issue is still in the working. It likely will not proceed apace for some time, due to certain immovable objects which, at present, stand in the way.”

Quirrell looked quite disappointed. “Hm, what a shame. I had hoped to see the changes wrought within the year, you know. I have my eye on—”

“Fortunately, this matter was not contrived for your convenience, Professor Quirrell.”

Malfoy was clearly annoyed with the topic, and Rigel thought Quirrell must be especially dense to bring up what was obviously a sensitive subject in mixed company—company including Albus Dumbledore, leader of the opposition to the S.O.W. Party, who would surely be interested in whatever bill they were talking about.

“It will move forward when the climate is more appropriate. Now, if you will excuse me, I believe the match is starting soon.” Mr. Malfoy turned pointedly away from Quirrell, and Rigel caught the look of distain on his face before he smoothed it. “My apologies for interrupting our conversation,” he said. “It seems I am unable to escape my work even at my own son’s Quidditch match.”

Narcissa placed a gentle hand on her husband’s arm. He immediately clasped it in his and gave her a look that likely only she would understand.

“Not at all, Lord Malfoy,” Pansy demurred. “I believe you were correct, in any case. The match is about to start.”

Far below them, Madam Hooch was striding onto the pitch.

Rigel pressed Pansy’s hand into her elbow once more, though she was only escorting her another few feet, and said, “I very much enjoyed our meeting, Lady Malfoy, Lord Malfoy.”

“I am certain it will not be our last,” Narcissa said, moving aside with her husband to allow Rigel and Pansy access to their seats.

“I hope you enjoy the game, Professor Snape,” Rigel said as she maneuvered Pansy around the Malfoys. She tried to convey in her expression just how grateful she was for his support.

“I enjoy watching Slytherins win,” Snape said.

Rigel noticed McGonagall throw her colleague an unsportsmanlike look behind his back.

They settled in to watch the game, and it became immediately apparent that the scales were tipped decidedly in Gryffindor’s favor. The Slytherin team had practiced hard; it showed in their smooth coordination and aggressive plays, but no matter how they maneuvered, the Gryffindor chasers were simply better. They flew as though they had open telepathic connections, with the kind of teamwork that wasn’t a rehearsal of drills but a perfect mutual understanding. It made them flexible, and their improvisation and split-second adaptations to any maneuver the Slytherin team pulled seemed likely to win the day.

If the Gryffindor chasers were telepathic, the Weasley twins were clairvoyant. They seemed to completely anticipate the bludgers’ movements, for whenever a bludger veered one way, one of the twins was there to steer it somewhere else. The Slytherin beaters were relegated to defending their own players, not a chance for offensive tactics with the Weasleys monopolizing the bludgers so effectively.

But while Gryffindor racked up a seventy-point lead in the next forty-five minutes, it was the Slytherin seeker who spotted the snitch first, and it was clear to everyone when the Gryffindor seeker tried belatedly to follow that he was no match for Higgs.

Rigel shared a grin with Pansy when Higgs began to dive, and she noticed with surprise that Mr. Malfoy had leaned forward in his seat, face was rapt with attention as his grey eyes followed the darting snitch. It was the same, intensely focused look Draco affected when he was excited about something but knew better than to show it.

When Higgs caught the snitch, Malfoy’s riveted expression creased into a single, satisfied smirk that disappeared as he stood, but it made Rigel feel better about the aloof aristocrat to know he could be engaged by something as benign as a school Quidditch match.

As the stands cleared, Rigel and Pansy politely thanked their hosts and said their goodbyes.

“Give my regards to your father, Rigel,” Narcissa said. Her beautiful face betrayed no discomfort in acknowledging her estranged cousin.

“I will, my lady, though it will be cruel of me to make him so jealous of my good fortune in meeting you.” Rigel pulled out one last smile for her friend’s parents, though it felt like her cheek muscles had all but had it.

Narcissa laughed delightedly as they left, and Rigel couldn’t help but be pleased at how well she’d done in playing Archie. She was charming and proper, which was all anyone could ask of a pureblood at their age.

Expectations met, she felt no guilt in enjoying the rest of the day with Draco, who was flushed with exaltation at Slytherin’s victory and eager to regale them both with his opinion on every play he deemed interesting enough to dissect.

Rigel mused that even the scariest people and social experiences could be broken down like Quidditch plays, in a way. The key was to take each maneuver at a time, without forgetting how they all fit together.

Really, she didn’t know what Archie had been so worried about. Being a pureblood wasn’t exactly hard.

--0—0—0

--0—0

--0

[end of chapter fourteen].

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 15:

It was a good thing she’d brought her marks up in October, because after Halloween, her free time went the way of the exploded jack-o-lanterns. The other first-years escorted her to meals and between classes, and older students were recruited when she went to see Percy in Gryffindor Tower. She found herself seeking the older boy’s help more and more, as she couldn’t exactly go to the library with everyone in tow. It would be difficult to explain her use of disguises, not to mention her choice of reading. Whether he felt it his duty as a prefect or he genuinely enjoyed helping others, she didn’t know, but Percy never turned her away.

Her practical work remained hit-and-miss, and Rigel came to prefer the misses. She was less likely to get points off for failing to do a spell than for accidentally liquefying Quirrell’s turban and revealing his unfortunate comb-over to the whole class. Rigel could sort of understand why he didn’t believe it was an accident. Certainly, she had been glaring right at it, and naturally, she had been offended by the rather rude remarks regarding werewolves Quirrell had made in the moments preceding the regrettable incident, but what did that prove? Even if she had wanted it to happen, possibly even secretly wished it would happen, she didn’t actually will it to happen, so she denied culpability on the grounds that without intentionality there could be no crime.

The bright side of the steadily escalating prank war was no one noticed a paltry loss of points for turban-liquification.

A military historian might one day draw a convincing correlation between the frequency and ferocity of pranks pulled at Hogwarts and proximity to pending Quidditch matches, but such statistics meant little to those in the thick of the fight. Hufflepuff lost to Ravenclaw, but turned around and beat Gryffindor when Alicia Spinet was hit with a Boneless Hex the morning of the match. At that point, half the school was a suspect, and the only winner was chaos.

By late November, theirs was a battle-hardened class. Students on both sides of the war learned paranoia through practice, particularly during meal times. They all knew to scan their seats for spilled potions, check the underside of the table before sticking their legs in, and only drink and eat from platters and pitchers with undisturbed elf seals.

And that was just breakfast.

“I’m not sure I can take much more of this,” Pansy admitted as she straightened from inspecting her seat. She flagged one of the patrolling prefects and pointed to a seam on the underside. “Someone’s sawed halfway through the bench again.”

The prefect repaired the fissure, and they all sat.

“It is becoming rather tedious,” Draco said. “What’s the point of a prank that isn’t a surprise?”

“It’s siege warfare, now.” Millicent prodded the platter of muffins with her wand and relaxed when the elf seal flared blue as it ought to. “They’re trying to wear us down.”

“I don’t think anyone knows what the goal is anymore,” Theo grumbled. He reached for a sausage but paused as the elf seal around that platter flared a warning orange. “And now they’ve gotten to the sausages. What godless world have we fallen into?”

Rigel fished a dormouse from her empty teacup. “Third one this week,” she commented. “Rather uncreative lot, aren’t we?”

Draco made a face. “Don’t let the Weasley twins hear you say that—they’ll take it as a challenge.”

Pansy glanced over her shoulder at the Gryffindor table, where a group of fourth-years were struggling to subdue their fire-breathing fruit. “I honestly expected more out of those two, considering their reputation.”

Theo spoke low from Draco’s other side. “The Weasley twins stopped participating.”

“What?” Draco raised an eyebrow. “When did that change?”

“After Halloween,” Theo said, shooting a knowing look at Rigel.

Pansy made an approving noise. “Cross-House loyalty is rare in a friendship.”

Rigel said nothing. She didn’t know what to think about the Weasley twins. Since Halloween, they’d been suspiciously inconspicuous, not showing their faces when she studied with Percy and not meeting her eye at meals.

Once, she could have sworn she saw them change direction down a corridor when they saw her coming, dragging Lee Jordan between them with all the subtlety of a banner. They needn’t bother making it so clear they didn’t want to associate with her. It wasn’t as though they owed her anything. They could cavort with their other friends and pay her no further mind if it suited them.

A warning screech had them automatically clearing a space on the table. Nobody waited to see whether they had post—better safe than splashed with porridge—but the space still wasn’t big enough for the two owls that tried to land there simultaneously. After a brief, tetchy exchange, Draco’s owl, Archimedes, won the spot, and the second owl dropped its letter sullenly in Rigel’s lap without landing.

It was Archie’s handwriting, so she pocketed it for later.

Draco glanced up from his letter to say smugly, “Mother sends her regards.”

“Be so kind as to return them,” Rigel murmured.

“You must meet my parents next,” Pansy insisted. There was an envious list to her tone. “It’s too bad our families can’t socialize outside of school. I could try to convince them to come to a Quidditch match, but…it’s not really my father’s scene.”

“We could arrange something at King’s Cross,” Draco suggested. “The station must surely be considered neutral grounds. What do you think, Rigel? Would your father go for it?”

Rigel’s brain stalled painfully. “Well…” She cast around for something other than the truth, which was that by the time Sirius saw her she could not, in any way, look like the person her friends would recognize as Rigel Black. “I would like to meet your parents, Pansy. But perhaps I should meet them first on my own terms. Without my dad.”

“Ah.” Pansy gave a nod of understanding. “Yes. That would undoubtably be easier. Though it is not well done to meet a minor without his parents outside of school…we’ll just be barely out of school, I suppose. You can meet my parents before your father gets to the station—just tell him to meet you half an hour later than the train arrives.”

“I’ll try to arrange it,” Rigel promised.

But first she would have to reconsider how she was going to trade places with Archie before his dad saw him looking like Harry. She had been planning to feign illness and skip the train, Floo from Hogsmeade to the London airport, switch with Archie before her parents arrived, then send Archie to meet Sirius before the train got in later that day. If she was to meet Pansy’s parents at the train station, however, she would need to re-work the entire plan.

Rigel chewed on the problem until just before lunch, when she paused outside the Great Hall to finally read her cousin’s letter. She oughtn’t have bothered worrying.

Naturally, Archie was way ahead of her.

Rigel,

My dad sent me a letter saying Uncle Sirius received notice from the school nurse that you’d been injured somehow. Dad said you sent Sirius an explanation, and they both seem to think you’re involved in some kind of prank war. While I’m glad it was not serious enough to require Sirius to come to Hogwarts, you haven’t fooled me. You’d never condone a prank that hurt someone, so what happened? Are you okay? It’s not like you to make enemies. Are you in trouble? Do you need help? I know I’m far away, but you can count on me for anything, you know that.  

Speaking of, don’t worry about the Pajama Potion. I’ve got a plan to get my hands on some well before Christmas break. Expect a package in a couple of weeks, and for Merlin’s sake don’t open it at the table, all right? We don’t want to spoil the Pajama party.

Otherwise, things are good here. My studies are so interesting! I can already heal bruises and cuts, and we’re working our way up to broken bones in December. America is great! Not that I’ve seen anything but the AIM campus, but all the kids in my track are really cool. You’ve got to meet Hermione—she’s as brilliant as you are, and she’s instrumental in my daring pajama-related plan. With her on board, nothing could possibly go wrong.

And with those ominous last words, I leave you.

-Harry

Rigel read the letter twice, then ripped it into tiny pieces, vowing to dispose of them in various litterbins around the school. Honestly, Archie. Pajama Potion? Not exactly runic code.

At least he had a plan to get Polyjuice. She hadn’t made nearly as much headway in learning to brew it as she’d hoped. She was just so busy, and the recipe was probably a bit beyond her, even if she had all the ingredients. Which she didn’t. The student stores didn’t stock everything needed to brew expensive and illegal potions, it turned out. Her lab at home was better stocked, but she wasn’t at home, and she didn’t know how to get boomslang skin delivered in a way that wasn’t massively suspicious.

As the winter break loomed, she realized she’d have to start studying basic Healing in her free time as well. How would it look if Harry came home from school and didn’t know anything about the subject? Her parents wouldn’t expect them to do magic at home, but they were not above quizzing her at the dinner table.

Lily had a thing about education. Rigel thought if her mother had the chance, she would go back to school all over again just for the fun of it.

After her last class, Rigel asked some of the older students if she could go up to the tower. There was an exchange of brief, light-hearted grumbling about who needed the exercise more before Pucey found himself summarily volunteered.

“What do you keep going up there for, anyway?” Pucey asked as they climbed from the dungeons. “We’ve got smart people in Slytherin, too, you know.”

“Percy doesn’t ask anything in return.”

Pucey grunted. They both knew he could not say the same of the Slytherin prefects.

He walked her as far as the sixth floor, where a pair of Gryffindor second-years were standing a nervous guard over the beginning of Gryff territory. Posting such sentries was a relatively new precaution in the pranking war, but one the other Houses had swiftly mirrored. No one wanted to worry about pranks near their own common room.

Pucey looked them over dismissively. “This the whole detachment today?”

The shorter of the girls, her dark hair in a messy ponytail, piped up swiftly. “We’re on lookout. The others’ll come if we yell.”

Pucey snorted. “Sure they will.”

Rigel stepped forward. “I’ve got it from here, thanks, Pucey.”

“See that he gets to the chubby portrait unharmed,” Pucey warned. “Plenty know he’s up here.”

“Got it.” The taller girl rolled her eyes. “He’s only here every other day.”

Pucey gave Rigel a sarcastic smile. “Mind your manners.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Is this a prisoner exchange or are you dropping me off at daycare?”

“You’re a diplomat,” Pucey offered, pretending to doff an invisible hat to her. “A representative of state.”

“Or a spy,” the dark-haired girl muttered under her breath.

Rigel pretended not to hear her. That was diplomatic, wasn’t it?

She met no trouble on the way to the portrait hole, though she did run across a patrol of prefects who checked her for prank supplies before waving her on.

Percy perched in his usual spot; also as usual, they got a little carried away with their discussion. Where at first Rigel had sought his help out of confused desperation, the more she learned about magical theory, the more she wanted to know. Sometimes she forgot what the assignment’s original question even was, lost in the foothills of knowledge that Percy so confidently navigated.

It was past dinner when she finally packed up to go.

“You have someone to walk you?” Percy checked.

“Someone usually meets me at the checkpoint,” she assured him.

They had worked out a good system over the previous weeks. She would go to the edge of Gryffindor territory, where a few students were always on lookout, and they would send someone to collect an escort from the Slytherins who kept an eye out where the dungeons began.

It was a lot of climbing up and down stairs for everyone, but no one had yet begrudged her. Something about getting splashed with acid earned you a little forbearance, she supposed.

The Gryffindors were playing Gobstones when she approached.

“Turn’s almost over,” an older blond boy promised, eyes on the board.

“No rush.”

Rigel set her bag down and settled in to wait, but not a minute later, the Weasley twins came barreling around the corner. The pulled up like rearing horses when they spotted her leaning on the wall.

“Rigel!”

“Just who we were running to find.”

“And what are you running from?” Rigel looked down the empty corridor behind them.

“Filch.”

“No one.”

The twins exchanged a quick, indecipherable look.

Fred shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. We need to talk to you.”

Rigel glanced back at the other Gryffindors, but they were engrossed in the game. “I haven’t seen you all month. Now you need to talk to me?”

“We’re sorry about that,” George said earnestly. “We have been avoiding you, but it was necessary. We needed proof.”

“Proof of what?”

“On Halloween—” Fred lowered his voice and drew her away from the other Gryffindors. “Those fireworks were ours.”

Rigel stared. The was the last thing she expected him to say.

“We recognized them immediately,” George agreed. “Some of them we’d stashed awhile back. They’d be hard to get hold of these days.”

“When you came running out of the hall on Halloween…”

Fred’s face darkened. “We were going to check. Our stash had been cleaned out, and it wasn’t exactly laying out in the open, know what we mean?”

“Had to have been a Gryffindor,” George said sadly. “And we had a good idea who—”

“And it might even have been partly our fault—”

“But we had no proof.” George ran a hand through his hair. “So we stayed on him, all month, waiting for him to slip up—”

“Or confess.”

“—but it isn’t working.” George put his hands on Rigel’s shoulders. “We have no choice but to warn you, because we think—”

“Meow!”

George froze and Fred shuddered. “Mrs. Norris,” they hissed in union.

The caretaker’s cat stood like a serial killer, shadow flickering in the torchlight, lamp-like eyes unblinking and fixed on—

“We have to run.” Fred groped for George’s hand, and George produced a smoke bomb from thin air.

“It isn’t curfew yet,” Rigel said, completely confused.

“We're supposed to be in detention. With Filch.” George looked concerned but not contrite. “It was the only time we could think to talk to you without him being suspicious of where we—”

Fred released the smoke bomb with a loud pop and the other Gryffindors sent up cries of outrage as their Gobstones were swallowed in smog.

“Time to go.”

One of the twins—she couldn’t see who—grabbed Rigel’s arm and hauled her through the smoke and down a side corridor. She lost track of the turns as George hurled smoke bombs in every direction. It was like dashing through a dream, the corridors seeming to appear and disappear as they raced through the dense magical fog. She felt the whap of fabric against her head and assumed they had ducked through a passageway until an arm pressed her back into unyielding stone. It was a dead end.

The three of them froze. Someone’s hand found Rigel’s mouth as the sound of angry meow-ing came ever closer, and she tried to control her breathing.

“She’s going to find us,” Fred hissed.

“Only if you keep talking,” George shot back.

Rigel peeled the clammy hand from her face and whispered, “Go. I’ll distract her.”

There was a long silence as they considered it.

“It’s not me that’ll get in trouble,” she reminded them.

George let out a sigh that was too close to her ear. “All right. On the count of three.”

“One—”

“Be careful.”

“Three!”

They burst from the tapestried alcove. The twins scarpered one way while Rigel jumped in the path of Mrs. Norris. The cat yowled in affronted rage as Rigel blocked her from following the twins.

“Good kitty.” Rigel was not quite thick enough to offer the minor deity of student suffering her hand.

She ran at the spitting cat, hoping to scare it into a nearby classroom, but Mrs. Norris kept trying to get around her, raising pointed claws in the direction of her prey.

Rigel feigned aggression, hoping she wouldn’t have to resort to physically impeding the animal. Mrs. Norris seemed especially wary of her feet, and she wondered if the old cat had known the kick of a disgruntled student or two in her life. Feeling like the worst sort of bully, she herded the cat backwards, down a side corridor, then down a flight of stairs. Only when she was certain the twins had time to get away did Rigel let the feline dart past her.

As she looked around, Rigel realized she had no idea where she was. She didn’t have the Map; after the first time a patrol of prefects searched her, she made sure not to leave anything sensitive or incriminating in her bag when she went to see Percy. Just in case.

She wandered for a bit until she found the Main Stair. Rigel thought about backtracking to bother one of the older Gryffindors for an escort, but she was already halfway to the dungeons. She could make it to the common room in fifteen minutes if she hurried, and to the protected part of Slytherin territory in ten.

Except, at the foot of the dungeon stairs, where the older Slytherins had taken to setting up sentries, there was only an abandoned stack of cards and an empty dung bomb canister.

More victims of war.

Holding her nose, she skirted the sputtering canister. It must have just happened. Probably by the time she got back to the common room, the next crew would be on its way.

The rustle of robes against stone was her only warning.

She ducked on instinct, but the spell that came from the deep shadows of an alcove struck her feet. Ropes exploded from the point of impact and wrapped themselves around her from knees to shoulders. She landed hard on her side, her arms secured straight against her body down to her wrists, and she gasped like a landed fish as the breath was knocked out of her by the unforgiving stone.

Rigel twisted on the ground, feeling helpless as a worm, trying to at least flop around to face the caster so she’d know what was coming. Then he spoke, and she froze as the recognition hit her.

“You know, I’m disappointed,” he said conversationally. Soft footsteps marked his approach. “I thought the son of infamous Marauder Sirius Black would have a few more tricks up his sleeve. But you made it so easy, it almost wasn’t fun.”

He stepped directly over her, the hem of his robes brushing insolently across her body, depositing dust on her face and side. She glared into his shadowed face, desperately reaching for air that wasn’t coming.

“Jordan,” she mouthed, hardly any voice in her lungs.

“I’m sure I told you to call me ‘Lee.’” He tossed a dreadlock over his shoulder, dragonhide gloves on his hands. “But you Slytherins will do as you please.”

She forced her wheezing lungs to cooperate. “Is that what this is about?” she rasped. “My House?”

Teeth flashed in the semidarkness of the flickering torches, but she could see no evidence of humor in his large brown eyes. “Don’t be tiresome, Black. There is so much more between us than school rivalry. After all you’ve stolen from me, you really think I care about the color of your tie?”

Rigel did not pretend to understand him. “What have I stolen from you? The twins’ attention?”

They had tried to warn her. She knew now who they’d been afraid to name without proof. Jordan was their closest friend. Whatever had grown between them, she suspected she was bearing the brunt of sorely repressed resentment turned loose all at once.

“They’ve been drifting away for months. Want to start their own line, don’t they?” Jordan paced the corridor, seeming to forget Rigel for the moment. “They think I’m going to steal their ideas. Just because I passed that one recipe to my father—” He kicked the forgotten dung bomb with all his might, and the empty canister rang loudly as it bounced off the corridor wall.

Please let someone hear that, Rigel begged the universe.

Jordan squatted down to peer into her face, his expression pinched in anger. “Of course, they don’t mind hanging around you. Why would you need their ideas? The Marauder line is already thriving. If anything, they should be trying to get information from you.” Jordan leveled a finger at Rigel. “But did they listen when I told them that?”

“I bet they told you it was wrong,” Rigel said, the words coming out braver than she felt.

“Wrong?” Jordan sneered. “So easy for you to say, when your family has stolen everything from mine. What’s so wrong about taking it back?”

She couldn’t help the blank look on her face, but she recognized, as fury sparked deep in his eyes, that not knowing what he meant wasn’t going to win her any clemency for his imagined slights.

Jordan breathed out slowly, audibly. “No, of course you don’t know. You wouldn’t care, would you? What’s it to Heir Black if my mum and sister have to live in squalor because your father and his little friends put my dad out of a job?”

Rigel pressed her lips together. Her neck ached from lifting it to meet his furious gaze, and she wished he would get to the point, enact whatever petty revenge he seemed to think himself entitled to, and let her go on her way. Jordan had played his game long enough, and she was quite exhausted by it.

“Jordan, I don’t even know what your dad does, much less how my dad could have pushed him out of it—Sirius doesn’t even work, for Merlin’s sake.”

“Exactly!” Jordan clamped a hand around her jaw and forced her face further off the ground, wrenching her neck in the process. “Your father is filthy rich off his twisted family’s money, but is it enough? No.”

He thrust her head back down so hard it hit the floor. Pain bloomed and ricocheted around the inside of her skull, making it hard to concentrate on the words he was spewing.

“—has to take business from people who need it, drowning the market with his products, deep pockets funding every conceivable marketing opportunity until the rest of us eke out a living on the margins—”

“That’s what you’re on about?” She tried to limit herself to exasperation. Frustration, maybe, and annoyance and nothing more, nothing darker, but it was difficult. He’d done all of it—pushing her down stairs, cursing her from behind, acid in her drink—for a joke line at Zonko’s? She wanted to scream. Instead, she clenched her teeth and said, “Look, I’m sorry if your family’s business was hurt by the Marauder line. But I have nothing to do with that stuff. I don’t really even enjoy pranks.”

“Right.” Jordan stood from his crouch and sneered down at her. “Little Baby Black, gushing with Percy in the corner over Potions. Everyone knows how obsessed you are, taking extra work from Snape and lecturing even fifth-years on advanced theory. You may have the other competitors fooled, but I know how many prank products are potion-based. You’ll be invaluable to the next generation of Marauder products, but I’m going to be the next greatest joke inventor, not you, and not even the twins. I’m going to salvage my family’s fortune and my father’s reputation, and I don’t need Marauder spawn getting in my way.”

“But I won’t be,” Rigel insisted. How could she possibly prove that she wasn’t going to compete with him to form a pranking dynasty? It was mad. The worst sort of joke, only Jordan didn’t look like he was joking. “If I promise not to get into prank development, will you let me go? We’ll pretend this whole thing never happened.”

“Maybe you’re telling the truth,” Jordan said. His face had gone dead, as though he’d smothered any lingering emotion under a pillow in the dark. The calm stare scared her more than his ranting. “But the only way to know you won’t be in my way is to ensure you can’t be.”

Jordan reached slowly into his robes. At first, she thought he was drawing out the moment, savoring his triumph like a storybook villain, but he wasn’t reaching for his wand. As he withdrew a dragonhide pouch that squirmed violently in his grasp, she realized his slowness was a precaution for handling something very dangerous. He still wore dragonhide gloves, and suddenly Rigel did not want to know why.

She eyed the wriggling bag, her mind supplying a list of threatening things that size. The bag sat comfortably in the palm of Jordan’s hand, so it might hold a small scorpion, but any snake that could fit in there would be too young to have developed fangs or poison of any potency. The pouch bulged and squirmed, suggesting something many-jointed, and she conjured the image of a spider, furry and agitated.

Jordan had a tarantula, didn’t he? Tarantulas didn’t usually bite, and they weren’t very venomous, either. He must think first-years easily frightened.

Only, a tarantula wouldn’t require dragonhide gloves to handle it.

Jordan dipped a finger into the bag. When he removed it, a small cross between a spider and a crab clung to his glove with barbed forelegs. Rigel had never seen anything like it. Smooth, rounded shell encased the spiny-limbed creature like an iron umbrella, and on its underside, rows of teeth marched restlessly.

Jordan tilted the insectoid carefully so that Rigel could stare into its unnatural mouth, watching the sharp teeth open and close on the air.

“Isn’t it beautiful?” Jordan trailed a finger down the tiny creature’s shell. “A combination of painstaking breeding and magical enhancement, this little darling is my father’s greatest invention yet. Greater even than the tablet your housemates took such exception to.”

“Bit dark for a joke inventor, isn’t it?” Rigel said, an awful feeling in the pit of her stomach.

“That’s what Zonko said.” Jordan curled his lip. “The old fool can’t see past the quick laughs. A real prank takes ages to set up, and you have to get away with it, too.” He pulled open the insect’s mouth with his gloved finger, showing her the venom sacks behind them. “This venom goes straight to the brain. It interrupts short-term memory consolidation, effectively erasing a whole chunk of recent memory, including the moment its victim is attacked. The perfect prank, don’t you see? Even the target won’t remember how they came to be in their unfortunate state.”

“And what state is that?” Rigel struggled against the ropes, but they were too tight for any amount of movement to loosen them.

Jordan watched her writhe. “Don’t be afraid, Black. This creature’s bite doesn’t hurt. It’s too fast-acting for pain.” A dark smile squirmed its way across his face. “In fact, you won’t feel anything where it bites you. You won’t feel anything ever again. Shall we start with your hands?”

Darkness swam at the edge of her vision, her mind rebelling at the implication behind the words. Permanent loss of sensation. What kind of a joke was that? Without sensation there could be no reliable motor control. Without control, there would be no brewing. She’d lose everything. Potions—her Mastery—her Potions. Whatever thin branch of composure she’d been balanced on snapped, and she plunged into panic.

Rigel screamed as loud as she could.

“HELP! Help, somebody! Anybody, plea—!”

Dragonhide slapped across her mouth, muffling her voice and filling her nose with old leather. Jordan was close enough that she could feel his uneven breathing in a moist waft against her face. His other hand still held the insect, shell pinched between his fingers, its legs gestating wildly in the air. Rigel couldn’t look away as he lowered it slowly toward her left hand. She balled her fist helplessly, unable to move it more than an inch as the ropes kept it in place against her thigh.

“Over the break, I’ll stop by and see how my friend Rigel is doing after his inexplicable accident.” Jordan’s words dripped into her ear, slick and oozing. “I do need to take care of your cousin, the Potter brat, too.”

Perhaps it was the threat against Archie that did it. Or maybe it was the vile insect reaching out a barbed leg to touch the sensitive skin on the back of her hand. A feeling that made her muscles shiver in disgust, a sensation she would never feel again if she did not do something. And she had to do something. This was real, it was happening, and no one was going to come along and stop it in the nick of time.

A tear squeezed its way around her contact and blazed a silent trail down her cheek.

She let her emotions swallow her.

She thought it would feel like the sea rushing in, but the thrill of power coursing through her was more like a light turning on. All the ugly, shameful things hiding in her soul like cockroaches scurried out of sight. Only burning remained.

Thick, oily energy boiled through her veins, the first blast of it like a stagnant slime that had sat too long in one place. It was liquid and heat all at once, and something felt disturbingly right about its sudden exodus, a pond realizing it used to be a river before the dam was built.

Magic, hot and violent, exploded out of her.

The revolting creature poised a breath above her hand combusted into harmless ash, and Jordan was thrown bodily across the corridor. He smacked into the stone wall with an all too satisfying crunch. Rigel gulped down the air her lungs had been screaming for around Jordan’s dragonhide glove, and a searing pain along her hip disoriented her until she realized the phoenix wand in her pocket felt as though it was burning a hole through the fabric. Rigel hadn’t touched it—couldn’t, with the Incarcerous still ensnaring her—but as magic poured from every part of her at once, it did not seem to matter.

The feeling of her magic, raw and raging, running through her, was intoxicating. Like the high of a steep dive on a broom combined with the lethargy of sleeping late on a Saturday morning. She could only breathe in the wake of it as her magic stretched and coiled, part of her but separate, inside her and in the world all at once.

It was a kind of possession, and a kind of absolution.

With detached tranquility, she watched Jordan struggle to his feet. He had not taken more than a single step toward her when her magic swept forward and sent him careening into the wall on the other side of the corridor. A sharp snap and a strangled cry told her overwhelmed mind that his wrist was broken, either from the impact or from her magic’s need to revenge itself for the hurts he’d caused. Another crunch, and the boy was unconscious, limbs in a tangle on the floor.

It was not enough.

Rage, fueled by helplessness, would not be assuaged. The threats against her family, her health and ambitions, her ability and craft beat against the inside of her chest like a flock of birds trying to escape. Her entire being was a battle cry, a chorus of frenzied fury, and a single note of reason rang stridently against the harmony.

Don’t kill him, can’t kill him.

She didn’t want to listen. It was the voice that caged her. The voice that built the dam and wove the leash and—

I’ll be expelled, be hated and feared—

No one who feared her would ever take away her hands.

No more, no more, no more—

“Stop it!”

That was her own voice. Her entire body shook beneath the ropes and she did not think she could take any more viciousness. It wasn’t enough. But it had to be. Her magic roared, looking for something to destroy, and all she knew was that it couldn’t be Jordan, because there was no coming back from that ever.

The magic was loose, and it was too late to put back, but she could direct it. Rigel just needed something to hurl it at. The ropes. She scarcely imagined them severed before they’d been ripped in a hundred places. The restraints fell away, and Rigel collapsed spread-eagle on the ground, sucking in deep, shuddering breaths.

Still the magic circled. With a heave of willpower, Rigel set it to unraveling the hewn ropes, strand by strand. She hoped to spend the energy into exhaustion, just as emotional exhaustion was settling over her like a clammy blanket.

It was over. It was—

Footsteps thundered up the corridor, and Rigel forced protesting joints to move, pushing herself into a seated position as Blaise sprinted around the corner.

“Rigel!”

Draco and Pansy followed, both of them racing full-tilt, and Rigel’s mind slowly supplied the fact that she’d never seen her housemates run before.

“He’s here!”

She didn’t know who Draco was shouting at until Pucey, Bole, Rookwood, and Rosier rounded the corner at a more dignified trot. Evidently, the older Slytherins had left the panicked running to the first-years.

Pansy threw herself into Rigel’s arms as the other two skidded to a stop, gasping for breath.

“Thank Salazar you’re all right.” Pansy took Rigel by the shoulders with a grip that belied her stature. “You are all right, aren’t you?”

Rigel nodded, not trusting herself to vocalize what, exactly, she was at the moment.

Pansy buried her face in Rigel’s shoulder, and a damp spot grew there as she failed to stem a stream of hot tears. Rigel patted the blonde girl gingerly on the back. The feeling of Pansy’s school robes under her fingers, so innocuous and unimportant a sensation, managed to penetrate the shock where the sight of her friends alone had not. Rigel really was all right. Jordan’s creation had not succeeded. Her dreams remained intact.

Draco did not dissolve into tears. He drew himself to his full height and turned his attention to the crumpled form of Lee Jordan, channeling his concern into a disgusted glare at the unmoving boy. “What did he do to you?”

His certainty that Rigel wasn’t the aggressor healed a crack that had only just fractured inside her, and she was doubly glad she had not let the magic break Jordan into a thousand pieces.

“He tied me up. I got away.” Her voice was hoarse, so she left it there, despite how inadequately that explained it.

Blaise leveled dark eyes at Rigel and said, deceptively casual, “Heard you scream as I was coming from the common room. Didn’t think I could handle it alone, so I doubled back for reinforcements.”

“Though it seems we were unnecessary,” Rosier said. She’d already forgotten the four older Slytherins. Rosier toed at the unconscious third-year with his boot. “Jordan, isn’t it? How interesting.”

“The Weasley twins’ friend.” Bole swore softly. “They in on this, too?”

“No,” Rigel croaked. That much she was certain of. “They tried to warn me about him, but they didn’t get a chance to explain before he caught me alone.”

Draco shook his head. “The Jordans don’t have a feud with the Blacks.”

“As far as the Blacks know, anyway.” Blaise caught her eyes. “Did he explain why he was attacking you before…actually, I don’t know what you did to him.”

Rigel looked at Lee, who was bleeding sluggishly from a cut on his temple, his wrist bent at an unnatural angle. She shrugged as best she could around an armful of Pansy. “Something about my dad’s joke line. He wasn’t making much sense.”

Blaise nodded. “Jordan Sr. worked for Mr. Zonko as an inventor. He was successful for a number of years, but when the Marauders released their famous line, it was wildly more popular. Mr. Jordan continued to make joke products, but he couldn’t keep up with the Marauders’ ingenuity and appeal. His jokes became crueler and less light-hearted as he struggled to out-do his competitors and regain popularity, to the point that, after the tablet fiasco, Zonko stopped stocking Jordan’s inventions altogether.”

“How do you know all this, Zabini?” Pucey asked incredulously.

Rigel wanted to know that as well. And if he knew someone might have a grudge against her, why hadn’t he brought it up? Maybe they weren’t as close as Draco and Pansy, but she’d thought Blaise her friend.

Blaise shrugged. “After Halloween, I did a little research on those tablets. Millicent pointed me in the right direction.”

Millicent knew as well? Rigel stared at her hands. If she were them, and one of her friends was being harassed, wouldn’t she have said something if she had pertinent information? She didn’t know. She wanted to think so, but how well did she really understand her peers? Perhaps she would not think it her place to intervene.

“Jordan’s father invented those awful tablets?” Pansy dabbed at her eyes, still half in Rigel’s lap. Rigel took comfort that she, at least, hadn’t been aware of Jordan’s connection to the product. “That explains why he had access to them.”

“But why would he attack Rigel?” Draco looked like he wanted to hit something. “It’s not his fault Jordan’s father can’t sell his stupid jokes.”

“He thought I was going to take after my dad,” Rigel supplied. The words sounded as ridiculous aloud as they did in her head. If only there had been a way to convince Jordan that she wanted nothing to do with the future of Marauders Inc. She had her own mark to make in the world.

She could understand his anger and even his hatred if he thought the Marauders, especially Sirius and James, who came from wealth, had swallowed a large share of the market and pushed people who needed the work out of business. What she could have told him, though, was that the money made from the Marauders’ line didn’t go to the Black and Potter family vaults. A large portion of it went to Remus, who couldn’t hold a paying job due to his condition, and the rest of it had been donated to various causes over the years.

Still, no matter how her family’s side business had changed things for Jordan, it wasn’t her fault his dad thought modifying someone’s memory to be a good joke. It was impossible to feel sympathy for the boy who had anonymously tormented her for the last few months. Pity, perhaps, but not compassion. Not after he’d tried to destroy the hands she needed to make her livelihood.

“Whatever his reasons, it’s done now,” Pucey said. “He’ll be out of the castle for what happened on Halloween.”

“You didn’t kill him, did you?” Rosier made a show of looking up and down the corridor, entirely too at ease in the situation. “No one would blame you, but we’ll have to cover it up before anyone notices him missing.”

Rookwood bent to examine Jordan’s prone form. “Not dead. Broken wrist and a concussion, probably, but unlikely to die of blood loss from the cut on his forehead.”

“Oh, good. No rush then.” Rosier smiled, and Rigel recognized the ripple of satisfaction in his golden eyes as he gazed at Jordan’s splayed limbs. She had felt it in her own heart not minutes before.

“Actually, we should get Professor Snape as soon as we can,” Pucey said. “If anyone else finds us first…”

The older students exchanged a look, and Bole nodded. “I’ll alert Salazar’s portrait, if someone else hasn’t done it already.” He took off for the common room at a jog.

Draco crossed the corridor to sit on the ground next to Rigel, and Pansy moved off her lap, sweeping a pile of loose fibers out of her way.

Rigel stared at the fibers for a moment before her brain recognized them as raw hemp. Her magic hadn’t stopped at unraveling the ropes; it had unspun the very fiber itself. She told herself she was imagining the smug nudge inside her, the rumble of an errant dragon as it humored its captor by returning to its cage as though it had never run amok in the first place.

A few minutes passed, then Snape and McGonagall rushed onto the scene from the end of the corridor that led up to the Entrance Hall. McGonagall took in the seven Slytherins standing or sitting in various positions of repose and the single, unconscious Gryffindor on the stone floor. Rigel could read the unflattering conclusion in McGonagall’s furious gaze, and, judging by the rueful look Rosier and Pucey passed between them, they hadn’t counted on McGonagall being with Snape.

“What is the meaning of this?” McGonagall had the affronted tone and posture of a cat with its back up. “We received a message that Mr. Black had been attacked, but all I see is—”

“I received a message that one of my students was attacked.” Snape favored McGonagall with a warning flare of his eyelids. “I just happened to be in your office at the time. Think for a moment before you say anything unfortunate. If the situation were as simple as it appears, why would my students deliberately bring it to my attention?”

McGonagall cleared her throat brusquely. Her eyes caught and lingered on Pansy’s tear-stained face. “Yes, well. Why don’t you handle the questioning, then? I’m certain there is an explanation.”

Snape nodded sardonically to the Head of Gryffindor before turning his sharp eyes on Rigel. “Mr. Black, as the purported victim in this incident, you will explain the circumstances that led to this unfortunate scene—as long as Mr. Jordan is not in need of immediate medical attention, that is.”

Rookwood offered, “Jordan is merely unconscious. It’s kinder to keep him that way, until his wrist can be looked at.”

“Very well.” Snape’s face was absolutely pitiless as he dismissed Jordan without further inquiry. “Mr. Black?”

It wasn’t really a question, so Rigel cleared her throat, which was still a bit hoarse, and said, “The circumstances go back a bit.”

“If the incident on Halloween is included in this narrative, you’d best start at the beginning.” Snape’s eyes glittered, and she knew he was not going to like what he heard.

Rigel wondered how to frame the explanation, knowing anything she left out might be discovered later when Jordan was questioned.

“I think it started the first Friday of school,” she said. “That was the day I met Lee Jordan. I think he was trying to warn me off his friends, the twins, even then, but he was interrupted before his intent was clear.”

“Was Mr. Jordan jealous of your friendship with Messrs. Weasley?” Snape’s voice clipped out the question, clinical and detached.

Rigel tried to emulate his tone as she admitted, “I’m not sure. Looking back, I think he saw Fred and George’s interest in me as a sign that I was like my father, who he already hated.” She very determinedly did not look at Snape as she finished that particular observation. “I didn’t speak with Jordan again until much later, but the attacks started the very next day.”

“Attacks?” Draco whipped his head around, staring at Rigel in dawning disbelief. “How long was this going on before anyone noticed?”

Rigel opened her mouth to explain, but Snape cut across her.

“Questions can wait until the chain of events is recounted.”

She did not mistake the interlude for reprieve. The anger simmering in Snape’s cold expression promised a thorough interrogation forthcoming. Draco’s face mirrored his godfather’s, but it was overlaid with wounded feelings, so she had a harder time meeting his gaze. Pansy squeezed her hand in silent solidarity, and Rigel’s next words were directed at her.

“I was hit with a Trip-Jinx on one of the upper stairwells. I fell, my wrist got tangled in my bag and snapped. I passed out from the pain, and by the time I woke up, whoever tripped me was gone.”

“That’s how you injured your wrist.” Pansy’s bright eyes filled with tears once more.

Rosier leaned into Rookwood, his lips moving rapidly. Rigel couldn’t hear what he said, but Snape’s eyes narrowed as they cut toward the fourth-years.

“I don’t recall Madam Pomfrey mentioning a broken wrist the first weekend of term.” McGonagall pursed her lips as she frowned down at her. The woman seemed torn between sympathy and suspicion.

“I didn’t go to the Hospital Wing.” Rigel cringed as Draco made an angry noise and Pansy stiffened beside her. “I don’t like Healers and I don’t trust them. I wrapped it up and let it heal on its own.”

“You just wrapped it up?” Pansy squeezed her hand hard enough to ache. “I thought you’d burned yourself brewing out of bounds. A broken wrist would have taken weeks to heal. Of all the martyring Gryffindor things to—”

“That’s enough, Miss Parkinson.” Snape’s glare was not entirely aimed at the blonde girl. Rigel saw self-recrimination in it, too, and she wondered if he’d noticed her one-handed chopping or the awkwardness with which she carried ingredients from the student stores.

“I can’t believe you played Quidditch with me anyway,” Draco muttered.

“I was afraid I’d be made to go to the Hospital Wing if anyone knew,” Rigel said quietly.

“You would have been,” Snape snapped.

Rigel ducked her head, but couldn’t help but think she had made the right decision, then.

“What was the next incident? The Stinging Hex?” Pucey guessed. Snape’s glare turned on the older boy, and Pucey gulped. Evidently, the other snakes had opted not to involve their Head of House on that occasion.

“A dung bomb,” Rigel offered, recapturing Snape’s attention. “I got caught in a trick step on a different staircase later that weekend, and I think Jordan threw a dung bomb at my head.”

“You said Peeves threw that at you.” Pansy’s lips pursed in a good imitation of McGonagall.

“It could have been Peeves, for all I knew at the time,” Rigel said defensively. “I had no idea who was doing this stuff. It was my first week, and my dad told me plenty of stories about scrapes he got into at school. I thought…I don’t know. I guess I knew it wasn’t normal, but I didn’t understand someone was targeting me yet.”

Pansy let out a long breath, but she didn’t say anything more.

“Nothing else happened until the next Friday, after I got out of detention with Professor McGonagall.” Rigel nodded to the older witch, whose eyes widened as Rigel continued. “I was approached from behind and fired on from around a corner. They got me with a Stinging Hex on my back, but I lost them in the dungeons. Pretty sure that was Jordan, too.”

“That we can verify,” Pucey said. “When Black came into the common room that night, it was immediately evident he’d been attacked.”

“And no one thought to inform me.” Snape’s voice softened to dangerous levels.

“We assumed it was an isolated incident.” Rosier’s perpetual air of amusement was absent, but the bottomless curiosity remained as he stared at Rigel. “The House felt it was random anti-Slytherin sentiment rearing its prejudiced head as usual, and treated it as such.”

McGonagall had the look of someone who dearly wanted to speak, but she held her tongue.

Snape, too, curbed his opinion for the time being. “Continue, Mr. Black.”

She cast her mind back, trying to put everything in chronological order. “The next thing, I guess, was that Saturday. I was in the Gryffindor common room doing homework with Percy Weasley when I met Jordan again.”

Snape and McGonagall exchanged a frown at that, and Rigel supposed that while her forays to Gryffindor Tower were common knowledge among the students, the staff had little awareness of such things.

“That day, Jordan warned me pretty explicitly away from the Weasley twins, but I didn’t think much of it.” Rigel shook her head, wondering how she could have misinterpreted the boy’s intentions so severely. “I thought they’d had a fight or something. Things were quiet for a little while after that, and I think it was because the twins started keeping an eye on him. I don’t know what he said to them, but it was enough that they became concerned.” She felt bad, in retrospect, for assuming the twins simply didn’t want to be friends with her after their initial burst of interactions.

“And on Halloween?” McGonagall prompted. She was beginning to eye Jordan with dark disquiet, and Rigel wondered if hearing that the Weasley twins had sensed something off swayed her opinion more readily than Rigel’s word.

She nodded. “Jordan admitted to that. He stole the fireworks from the twins and put the tablet knowingly in my drink. I think he lost perspective completely after that. My housemates started escorting me everywhere, but tonight—”

“Yes, what in Salazar’s name happened tonight?” Draco ran a hand through his platinum hair. “We had a system, Rigel. You weren’t ever supposed to be alone.”

“A lot of stuff went wrong,” Rigel said helplessly. “I was waiting at the Gryffindor checkpoint for an escort, but then the twins showed up to warn me about Jordan, only they had to run because—” She broke off, her eyes darting to McGonagall guiltily. The look in the woman’s eyes said she knew exactly where the twins were supposed to be that night. “Well, they had to go, and then I was almost to the Slytherin checkpoint anyway—"

“What checkpoints, for Godric’s sake?” McGonagall looked at her whit’s end.

“For the prank war,” Rigel explained. “It escalated after Halloween.”

“We noticed,” Snape drawled.

“The older students in each House took certain measures to protect the common rooms,” Rookwood elaborated.

“Our checkpoint was just up the corridor,” Pucey added, gesturing to the abandoned playing cards. “They were hit with a dung bomb earlier, and we hadn’t sent out a replacement team before Blaise notified us of Rigel’s attack.”

“The dung bomb was still smoking when I came by,” Rigel agreed. “I think Jordan must have run off the sentries so he could catch me by surprise when I came down from the Tower.” She didn’t know how he’d planned to deal with any escorts, but surprise and a dark corridor might have been enough advantage, regardless.

Rigel took a steadying breath. This was the hard part, the piece of the story that was still wriggling in fresh blood. She wasn’t sure she could handle it objectively, yet, but she had to try.

“You were walking alone through the dungeons,” Pansy prompted. Her voice was a cool cloth over the burning memory. Rigel squeezed her hand.  

“Jordan was waiting in that alcove.” She nodded toward the spot. “He got me with an Incarcerous before I even knew he was there. He was so angry. Beside himself. He said my father and uncles were the reason his father was run out of the pranking business. He accused me of wanting to carry on the Marauder legacy, and he said he would make sure I co-ouldn’t.”

Her voice broke, and she clamped her mouth shut. Pansy wrapped an arm around her waist and Draco slung one over her shoulders. She couldn’t bring herself to smile at them, but their support was the only thing that kept the tears at bay.

“Jordan had this…creature in a bag,” she rushed on, wanting it over with. “Like a bug or a crab. His father bred it with magic. Its venom carried some sort of neurotoxin that was supposed to prevent the victim from remembering what happened. He said its bite would cause irreversible loss of sensation. He tried to make it bite my hands. He said—” She screwed up her face and made herself say it. “He said if I couldn’t use my hands to brew, then I wouldn’t be able to oppose him as a prank inventor in the future.”

“What the hell?” Pucey’s voice shook with disgust.

“Bloody bastard,” Draco spat.

Snape pretended not to hear the curses. His eyes were riveted on the hand Pansy held between hers. “Did it bite you, Rigel?”

She shook her head quickly. “I couldn’t let it. I tried to get away first, I really did.” She pleaded with her eyes for her Head of House to understand. “You know how my magic gets, professor. There was no one around, even though I yelled for help, and I—I just—”

“You defended yourself.” There was an ocean of understanding distilled in those three words.

“I hurt him.”

“He was trying to take your hands, Rigel,” Draco snapped. “I hope you did more than hurt him.”

“Mr. Malfoy!” McGonagall tried for outrage, but her voice shook.

Draco glared back at her, unrepentant.

“I think he’ll be okay,” Rigel said quietly. “I tried to re-direct the magic when I realized how upset it was. It sort of vaporized the bug-thing and threw Jordan into the wall, but then I set it to work on the ropes.” She gestured to the pile of hemp next to Pansy’s skirt. The adults and older students stared at the unspun fibers with varying levels of confusion. “Then my housemates came.”

Blaise took up the explanation from there: how he heard the screaming but fetched help before investigating, their arrival on the scene, and their decision to contact Professor Snape through the portrait system.

McGonagall conjured a stretcher and lifted Jordan onto it carefully. She had an overwhelmed expression that darkened to shame whenever she looked at the unconscious boy. “The Board of Governors will have to be informed. I don’t doubt the DMLE will be called. Severus, can you…?” She trailed off, looking to Rigel with a fierce sadness in her eyes. “This should never have happened, Mr. Black. I apologize on behalf of my House and for the school. Please understand that we draw a sharp line between pranks and persecution at Hogwarts. No student should face this kind of harassment. I hope you will come to a professor before it escalates, in the future.”

Rigel didn’t know what to say. Even having experienced it herself, would she be able to point to such a line if it happened again? McGonagall’s words were well-meant, but she could see that even Snape did not believe them.

When Rigel only nodded tentatively, McGonagall turned to Snape with a defeated slump to her shoulders. “I will have Poppy confine Jordan to the Wing. Will you speak to Albus?”

“I will.” Snape turned his dark eyes on Rigel as Jordan was carried away. “Ten points from Slytherin for suffering needlessly,” he hissed. As Rigel flinched, Snape added sharply, “Do not ever conceal something like this from me again. Any of you.” His gaze caught the older students with equal fervor. “I cannot act effectively on your behalf if I do not know what is happening in my own House.”

To a one, the Slytherins bowed their heads in acknowledgement. Rigel felt terrible. She had never intended things to escalate—of course she hadn’t. If anything, she’d been trying for the opposite. If she let it dissipate, she hoped it might go away. How could any of them know it would come to this?

Snape swept them with an assessing gaze, then he softened, almost imperceptivity. “Five points to each of the rest of you for assisting a housemate in need.”

“Lucian was here, sir,” Pucey put in immediately. “He alerted Salazar’s portrait.”

“Then five points for Mr. Bole as well,” Snape allowed. “Escort Mr. Black to the common room, and see that he makes it there in one piece this time.”

“Professor.” Rigel spoke up as he made to leave. “Will my father be notified?”

“Undoubtedly.”

“Can you tell him I’m fine and I don’t need him to come to school?”

Snape stared at her.

Rigel grimaced. “Or have Professor McGonagall tell him. He likes her.”

“I will see the message passed.”

“Thank you,” she murmured.

“It is my duty as your Head of House to handle such matters. One day, perhaps, you will believe that.”

The Potions Master stalked back toward the Entrance Hall, and Rigel climbed to her feet. Her bones ached and small tremors ran like electric currents through her muscles, but Draco let her lean on him as they made for the common room.

She would spend the rest of the evening facing question after subtly-phrased-question from her housemates, but in that moment, Rigel was a blank page, or maybe she was a page someone had scribbled full of ink. She felt empty and defiled at the same time. She had nothing more to say and even less to feel. All she wanted to do was sleep and forget any of it had ever happened.

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

When he recovered, Lee Jordan was formally withdrawn from Hogwarts, facing charges of assault and attempted maiming. Rumors circulated—that he’d been possessed by a poltergeist, that he’d been bitten by a werewolf—but everyone agreed the cheerful third-year must have been pushed to his breaking point to try and poison a first-year on Halloween. Already, the facts twisted and blurred. Had it really been acid, or just a smoking prank? What had happened that night in the dungeons that led to seven Slytherins getting points from Snape while Jordan was sent to the Hospital Wing, unconscious?

Rigel did not know what made her climb the stairs to the clock tower on the day the Aurors came, but she was not alone.

The twins leaned against the iron clock hands, watching them escort Jordan across the lawn. Fred turned as Rigel’s footsteps echoed, but he re-settled when he saw her. George put a hand on his brother’s shoulder and sighed.

“We should have known.”

“You couldn’t have,” Rigel said, coming up behind them.

Fred made a face. “We suspected something wasn’t right. We just didn’t imagine how deep it went.”

“It’s over now.” She took in Jordan’s bowed head and hunched shoulders and tried to summon something comforting to say. “I hope he gets the help he needs to move past it.”

George caught her eyes. “You don’t have to wish him well. Not after what he did.”

Rigel clenched and unclenched her hands, a tick she was trying not to let stick. Sometimes, she just needed to remind herself she could still feel them. “I don’t know what I would do if my family was suffering and I felt there was someone in the way of alleviating it. I think his motives got twisted along the way, but it doesn’t mean I can’t understand how the seed was planted.”

“I can’t forgive him,” Fred said staunchly. “It’s one thing to plant a seed, another to water it continuously.”

“He nursed the grudge until it consumed him,” George agreed. “I don’t know if he can come back from it.”

Rigel rested her hand on the clock face. “Time will tell.”

Fred’s lips hitched against his will. “Dash it, Rigel. Can’t you see we’re having a serious moment?”

“The time for serious moments is past.”

George shook his head slowly. “That’s terrible. Three time-words in one sentence.”

Despite his words, Rigel could see the sorrow receding from his eyes, letting the life back in. She took one last look at Jordan, then turned away.

“I expect you’ll come up with something to take everyone’s mind off this,” she said idly.

The twins exchanged a look.

“Not sure another prank would be appropriate,” Fred said.

“What else would be?” Rigel raised her eyebrows. “Don’t tell me you’re going to let the biggest pranking war in Hogwarts history end on a dud.”

George put a hand to his chin. “Well, when you put it like that…”

Rigel plugged her ears as she left the clock tower. “Don’t tell me. I’d rather be surprised.”

She did not want to flinch every time a firecracker or a dung bomb went off around her. The winter break meant returning to a family who’d had only one another to torment all term. There were bound to be jokes played and pranks pulled before the holiday was over, but more than that, she didn’t want to be afraid anymore. Wasn’t there a saying about getting back on the broom quickly after a bad fall?

It came the very next morning.

As Draco reached for the strawberry jam, an elf seal flared orange, then green. Draco froze with his hand over the jar. “What is that supposed to mean?”

Before anyone could answer, elf seals were going off up and down the table, flaring every color of the rainbow in a pattern that made no sense.

Theo pushed himself half-out of his chair with panic. “All the food’s been contaminated—”

Pop.

His oatmeal burst, as though an enormous bubble had risen beneath it, and brown-sugared sludge splattered all over Theo’s robes. His mouth hung open.

“What the—?”

Pop. Pop pop.

The jam, then both bowls of applesauce.

Students ducked for cover, some shrieking, others rolling off the benches like practiced assassins. A few quick-thinkers conjured shields, but mostly it was too late, because every semi-liquid on the table—and every other House table besides—had gone off near-simultaneously.

Then the post arrived.

Rigel spotted the Weasley twins hurrying out of the Great Hall, their housemates pelting them with food as they ran, cackling, and she almost missed the quaffle-sized package an owl dropped on her plate, so quickly did the bird flee the scene of bubbling breakfast.

It was from Archie, and Rigel tucked it into the expanded section of her schoolbag before anyone could take too much note of it. If the contents were what she suspected, Archie had acquired more than she’d dared to hope.

She had to wonder, with no small amount of trepidation, just how he’d managed to pull it off.

--0—0—0

--0—0

--0

[end of chapter fifteen].

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense

Chapter 16

Archie never could have done it without Hermione. As he told her several times a day, she was the brain to his body, the light to his cave, the muse to his song—

The very sharp elbow to his bruise.

But seriously, Hermione had been sent by the gods. To help him or to prevent him from destroying the world, he wasn’t yet certain. It may be that she was on earth for her own universe-shattering reason, and in fact, the more he thought about it, the more likely it seemed that he was a character in her story, rather than the other way around.

Still, it boded well for his life that a person of such obvious intelligence and significance had intersected with it so serendipitously. They shared a row on the aeroplane from London, and the rest, as they say, would be burned into the annals of time as a warning to sentient life everywhere.

Hermione had joined the Healing stream, too, instead of waiting until third year to declare like most of the other students. Her parents were ultra-specific muggle healers that only looked at a person’s teeth, except they also did something with the temporomandibular joint and jaw-related craniofacial pain and something called ‘orthodontics,’ whatever that was. Hermione was careful to clarify they didn’t do surgeries or oral cancers or maladies of the ‘ear, nose, and throat,’ and Archie had to assume there were other healers who handled those specific things. He’d had no idea muggle healing specialized to such an extent, but it made sense. There were so many of them; why not allow for expertise wherever possible?

They had every class together, and she was the only person who didn’t end the conversation when he voiced his opinion on the theoretical definitions of illness and health. She thought it was interesting that the basic concepts of wellness and unwellness didn’t always overlap with the reasons people went to see Healers. Hermione herself had a lot to say about the overarching system of healthcare in a society, and agreed that such definitions were not epistemological questions at all because they could determine a person’s access to care.

It was a match made in heaven, or, as John Kowalski liked to say, a friendship designed by the denizens of hell to inflict heretofore indescribable mental anguish and boredom on those around them.

Archie just liked to watch Hermione’s face light up when she asserted that any description of a biological ‘natural state’ against which definitions of sickness could be applied failed to incorporate the diversity of the human condition and individual experiences of wellness.

Her hand shot into the air when Professor Willoweed asked a question about platelets, and Archie couldn’t help but smile. She did it so unselfconsciously. Someone asked a question, and Hermione answered it. In the rare event she didn’t know, her eyes shot to the person who did know with an almost audible click as she attempted to absorb the information instantly through the ephemeral force of her gaze.

Halfway through Hermione’s explanation, Professor Marsh dragged a harassed-looking older student with messy brown hair into the classroom.

“I don’t need—”

“Sorry to interrupt your class.” Marsh spoke over the boy, who wore the green robes of the Mastery track and a patch for the Potions stream. “This one needs a Healing.”

The boy put his arm behind his back as Marsh reached for it, a mutinous expression on his face. “I need to be in Potions, where Master Tallum is probably taking the stasis spells off the cauldrons as we speak.”

Marsh, the Physical Education professor, raised her eyebrows, showing no sympathy for the boy. “You should have thought of that before you messed around in my class and caused an accident.”

Willoweed extended her hand, and the Potions student reluctantly allowed her to fold back his sleeve. A scrape ran the length of his forearm, fresh and bright. Willoweed smiled. “This will do nicely.”

“I’ll leave him in your hands, then.” Marsh left the classroom, impervious to the boy’s protests.

He tried them on Willoweed next. “Listen, I’m sure they need the practice, but we’re doing Polyjuice this unit. It’s time-sensitive. If I’m not there when the stasis comes off, it’ll undo weeks of effort.”

“This won’t take long, Mr. Bannett,” Willoweed assured him. “It is important for the Healing stream to get practical work in, as I’m sure you can appreciate.”

“I’m in the middle of my own practical work,” the boy groaned. His eyes roamed the classroom restively, clocking the exits. He looked ready to make a run for it.

His desperation found an echo in Archie. Hadn’t he been wondering how he and Harry were going to switch back for the holidays? There was no Uncle James to pilfer from this time, but, like a beacon from those torches they’d learned about in No-Maj class, a perfectly good alternative pilferee stood right in front of him.

His hand shot up with a speed that could have given Hermione a run for her money. “Professor Willoweed, what if I go with Bannett to Potions? I can heal him on the way.”

Willoweed looked skeptical. “And how would I evaluate your technique?”

Archie threw her a dashing smile that Harry would have smacked right off his face. “Needs of the patient before the needs of the Healer, right?”

He didn’t know if it was his patented charm or the fact that she’d seen him do a similar abrasion two weeks ago, but either way, reality rippled in his favor.

“Very well, Mr. Potter. But I expect you to come straight back here.”

“I certainly will.” He stood from the table, avoiding Hermione’s correctly-suspicious gaze as he nudged his notebook her direction. “Take notes for me?”

Hermione crossed her arms, but she didn’t have to answer. Archie had caught her trying an indexing spell that very morning, which meant she’d probably have a self-updating card catalogue for his notebook by lunch.

Archie examined the scrape as they moved briskly through the labyrinth of corridors. “Polyjuice, huh?” he said, conversationally. Never too soon to practice bedside manner. He ran the standard diagnostic spell they’d been taught back in September. It told him his patient had a scrape. On his arm. “Is it as difficult as they say?”

“More so.” Bannett seemed happier now that they were on their way. His long stride ate up the distance, and Archie had to jog to keep up with him. “Polyjuice is exact. Demanding, you know? If you don’t do every step perfectly, you might as well start again. It takes slow, carefully controlled action. Too sudden and you spook the ingredients into reacting. It’s like the potion wants you to earn it.”

Not even Harry talked about potions like they were wild animals to be tamed, but he recognized in Bannett the same bottomless zeal. Just as with Harry, Archie nodded in pretended understanding. “How long have you been working on this one?”

“Two and a half weeks. It’ll be another week and a half before it’s finished, and it’s only going this quickly because Professor Tallum scheduled it so that certain steps lined up with the lunar—”

“Wow, sounds tough,” Archie said absently. The trick to getting information without rousing suspicion was to only sort of sound like you were listening. He coaxed his magic into the gentle waves needed to Heal minor scrapes and bruises. The marks began to fade before his eyes. As they trotted down the stairs to the Potions laboratories, Archie asked, “Do you get to keep it when you finish?”

“What? Of course not.” Bannett snorted. “Polyjuice is highly illegal.”

Archie thought things were generally ‘legal’ or ‘illegal’ with no degrees of legality in between.

“Master Tallum will probably dispose of our samples after he shows us our grades next Friday. As he should.” They came to a stop before one of the nicer labs. “Well, this is it. Thank you, Mr…?”

“Potter,” Archie said. “Harry Potter.”

Bannett gave him an odd look, and Archie supposed he didn’t get the reference. Archie had only recently been introduced to the No-Maj invention called films, but he understood there were more in existence than any one person could view in their lifetime. Even in a wizarding lifetime, Hermione assured him, because more were being made all the time.

Still, Hermione would have understood the reference. Nothing went over her head.

Not even the things he wished would.

“I don’t know what you’re planning, Harry, but if you think you’re going to ruin some seventh-year’s Potions grade by stealing the potion he’s been working on for weeks, then you’ll have to go through me, because I won’t stand by—”

“Hermione!” Archie ushered his friend to a more secluded corner of the dormitory common area. “Sweet Hermione. Loyal, talented, brilliant Hermione—”

“You can’t sugar-coat your way out of this.”

Archie bravely weathered on. “You don't really believe me capable of such a thing, do you?”

Hermione looked skeptical. “You seemed awfully interested in that boy once you heard he was brewing Polyjuice.”

“I would never steal someone’s Polyjuice potion before it was graded. Honestly, I thought you knew me.” Archie shook his head.

“Oh.” Hermione bit her lip, evidently unsure whether she ought to believe him. “All right, then. I thought—wait. Oh, no.”

“Oh, yes.”

“No.”

“Yes!”

“You can’t be thinking—”

“Hermione, my pearl, I couldn’t possibly think without you.”

“This is serious, Harry!” Hermione wrung her hands and glanced around the common area nervously. “If we get caught—”

“Lovely. Knew I could count on you.” Archie kissed the girl’s fingertips with extravagant devotion, and Hermione rolled her eyes.

“I want this planned to a T,” she said sternly.

“I was just about to suggest a diagram.”

--0

[AbAbAb]

--0

The following Friday, they were ready. Hermione didn’t exactly approve of the plan, but she did give it all the robustness her not-inconsiderable brain could manage, and Archie thought it was going to be great fun.

Hermione opined that there were certain types of fun you had to be a little mad to appreciate. Archie couldn’t argue—his family had cultivated madness the way others selected for good looks. ‘Turn the dial up to ten and see what happens’ was just one of many unofficial Black Family Mottos. It only blew up in their faces every other generation or so.

They had Professor Tallum for general Potions, which meant they knew how he preferred to score practical assignments. He would return to each student the beaker they’d submitted, with a letter grade written on it in unassailable red ink. Once the students had noted their grades, with the option, seldom seized, to hear in colorful recitation exactly why they had been scored that way, the beakers would be collected, accounted for, and disposed of.

A responsible system, but Archie had a slightly different idea for how the Advanced Potions period that afternoon would play out.

Archie stood in a low-ceilinged basement corridor, not far from the advanced lab, readying himself for the feat of acting with which he was about to grace the world.

Hermione kicked him with an invisible foot, and he made a face in the general direction of her Disillusionment Charm. It was hard to be annoyed when she’d learned the charm specifically for this dubious escapade. Bless her brilliant mind. No thank you to her pointed boots, though.

Archie supposed that was the signal to stop fixing his blond wig and get a move on. He’d stolen it from the Drama Club storeroom, and it had the advantage of adhering to his skull with a bit of seamless magic, but it wasn’t quite as tragically windswept as he’d have liked. He was going for terrorized flight, blind panic, astoundedness—

“That’s not a word,” Hermione hissed.

Agree to disagree.

Archie poked his head around the corner and checked both ways before taking a deep breath and sprinting down the corridor. His shoes slapped against the concrete floor and the Mastery track robes he’d acquired for the occasion flapped like green sheets around his ankles. His exertion gave him a flushed and slightly frantic look, which would add the perfect layer of de rigueur to his deceit.

At the Advanced Potions lab, he flung open the door and cried into the room full of startled students, “TRROOOLL IN THE BASEMENT!” There was a beat of silence, into which he added, “Thought you ought to know.”

He turned back around and sprinted away before swerving to duck into the side corridor, which was already bereft of Hermione’s invisible presence.

From the shadows of an alcove, he could hear the sound of a couple dozen students rushing past in the main corridor. Standard troll protocol was to get everyone to the recreation pitch as fast as possible. There were defensive spells laid there for just such an emergency, and hopefully it would take a moment for the Potions students to realize they were the only ones who had evacuated.

Then an alarm started blaring across campus, and Archie belatedly realized the professors must have some ability to communicate quickly in a crisis.

“TROLL SIGHTING. TROLL SIGHTING IN THOMPSON HALL. ALL STUDENTS PROCEED TO THE QUODPOT GREEN. THIS IS NOT A DRILL.”

A stampede of feet began overhead, and Archie shrank as far back into the alcove as he could. The whole school was evacuating. Professors would be taking roll. If he and Hermione were missed, they would either have to fake their own deaths or pretend to have been waylaid by the troll.

He was just coming up with a story of how Hermione had dramatically rescued him from a girl’s bathroom with a Hovering Charm when the real Hermione, curls blowing wildly around her face in an invisible wind, slid to a halt in front of him and said, “What are you still doing here? Get to the field!”

Ah. Of course. They could simply show up at the evacuation and be accounted for on the roll. That was a much better plan.

Archie unstuck the wig from his head and shrugged out of the borrowed robes. “After you.”

They ran, Hermione tucking a clinking pouch into her school bag. Archie resisted the urge to inventory it on the spot.

“How’d it go?” he checked.

“Seven students got As. I took them all.”

“And the rest?”

Hermione shot him a look. “Dumped onto the floor, like we planned. Did you think I’d mess it up?”

“Mess it up? Hermione, you saved it! I was just about to fake my own death—”

“And waste all my hard work?”

They neared the Quodpot pitch and slowed to a fast walk. Archie hoped any visible nerves would be taken for fear of the rampaging troll. AIM actually did have a troll problem, which was one of the reasons they kept a lovely thick wall up around campus. American trolls were faster and more agile than their English counterparts, and Archie had heard their skulls were twice as thick.

Students were organized by track and stream, so Hermione and Archie stayed together and made for the first-year Healing group. Ranjan, one of the class monitors, looked up from a tally he was taking.

“Good, you made it. John said you had stomachaches?”

Hermione nodded, but left it to Archie to say, “I tried to mix our soups together to create a more powerful mother soup, but may have accidentally created an advanced poison instead.”

“Today’s soups were corn chowder and Tom Yum.” Ranjan spoke as one who had just met horror for the first time.

“Nothing ventured, nothing regretted,” Archie said bracingly.

No one had any further questions, which was the important bit.

That evening, Archie stopped by Hermione’s room to pick up the vials of Polyjuice. She weighed the bag in her hand, listening to the glass clinking within, and asked quietly, “Why do you need it?”

Archie blinked at her. Somehow, when she hadn’t asked right away, he’d assumed she wouldn’t. A lot of his eccentricities Hermione accepted without questioning, but he supposed this was a step too far.

“Why didn’t you ask before helping me steal it?”

Hermione’s face hardened. “Because now I have something you want, so you have to answer.”

His jaw dropped. That was so… smart of her. Because he wouldn’t have answered if she’d asked before. But now she had the Polyjuice, and he did need it.

He’d never been more in awe of her. He just didn’t know how to answer her. What did people use Polyjuice for? Only one thing, really.

“It’s for when I go home,” he said, speaking slowly so his words didn’t get ahead of the lie he was spinning. “This is going to sound strange, but…I have to look like someone else when I’m at home.”

“That does sound strange. What’s wrong with how you look now?”

“This is who I really am,” Archie said, a bit of self-deprecation leaking in. “Back home, that’s not enough.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I can’t give you all the facts you would need to understand. Not ‘I won’t,’” he added, seeing the angry look on her face. “I can’t. It would hurt people.”

“Including you?”

Archie pictured Harry in an Azkaban cell. “Especially me.”

“The last part feels true.” Hermione held the bag of potions close for a long moment, then thrust it toward Archie with a worried frown. “You’re my friend, Harry. And you’re good, I know you are. You mess about, but you’d never hurt anyone intentionally, and I don’t think you would take this risk lightly.”

His heart shriveled in his chest, because she had no idea just how lightly he’d done it. He hadn’t known, not really, what it would mean, but he hadn’t wanted to. Hermione thought he was good, but he was the most selfish person he knew.

Still, he took the bag.

“Be careful,” she said. “It’s a mandatory misdemeanor if you’re caught using it back home.”

Archie smiled. Hermione didn’t do anything without all the facts. The smile faded. Unless he asked her to, apparently.

“I owe you,” he said.

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“I mean it.” Archie put a hand to his heart. “You don’t know what this means to me, but I do. And I won’t forget it.”

Hermione pushed him out of the room. “Don’t forget to do the extra credit assignment for Magical Psychology. No fake troll is going to bring down our weighted average.”

Archie didn’t know what it meant that Hermione calculated their combined grade point average against the rest of the class every week, but it made his insides feel like Christmas.

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

Rigel folded the letter with a fond smile. She couldn’t wait to see Archie again. Wonderful, leap-into-the-unknown Archie, who made mountains out of mushrooms and then ate them for breakfast.

Whatever seemed insurmountable when they were separated by an ocean would fall back into place when they reunited. One more week, and then she would be home, with her own eye color and her own clothing and her own name.

She liked Draco and Pansy, she really did, but she couldn’t talk to them about a lot of things, for a lot of reasons. She could tell Archie anything. He wouldn’t freak out when she told him what was going on with her magic and what it had almost done to Lee. He wouldn’t say something half-supportive and half-impatient like stop being scared of your own feelings or couldn’t you just try harder to control it?

Archie was kinder than the voices in her own head, like that.

Archie wouldn’t expect her to be someone she wasn’t. He’d just say, how’s Potions going? Is it everything you hoped? And she’d ask him about the Healing classes and whether he thought they could really do this and he’d say of course they could. Because together they could do anything.

The winter break was a good chance to reset and reevaluate their plans. It would also be a blessed relief from the lies.

Except, she considered as she packed her trunk for the break, the people at Hogwarts weren’t the only ones she’d been lying to.

--0—0—0

--0—0

--0

[end of chapter sixteen]

Chapter Text

The Pureblood Pretense:

Chapter 17:

Rigel stared out the window at the blurred countryside as the Hogwarts Express sped toward London. She tried not to fidget uncomfortably in the stiff robes Pansy had picked out for her. She doubted Archie had ever worn them, and she didn’t blame him. The sleeves bellowed fashionably at the elbow, trailing when she walked at a judicious speed, but in her lap, they felt heavy and hot, like a velvet curtain she was going to hem at any second.

Millicent offered input on the strategy for introducing Rigel to the Lord and Lady Parkinson, and even though it was Pansy’s parents in question, the blonde girl seemed genuinely appreciative of Millicent’s insights.

“Lady Malfoy already likes Rigel, so lean on that if you have to,” the dark-haired girl suggested. “Her opinion will carry more weight than yours.”

“Of course.” Pansy shot Draco a smile. “My parents will be hard-pressed to refuse a friendship with Rigel without calling the Malfoys’ judgement into question.”

“Perhaps, if it goes well today, I can approach my father about a formal friendship as well,” Millicent offered. She had a tentative question in her eyes that said she half-expected Rigel to refuse.

Rigel found it utterly antiquated that pureblood heiresses in Dark Society were held to stricter social conventions than the heirs, but she summoned a smile to reassure Millicent. “Whatever makes you most comfortable. Consider the door open on my end.” They may as well get all necessary parental approvals out of the way before she outgrew Archie’s dress robes.

Millicent raised her eyebrows. “You don’t need to consult with your father first?”

“He doesn’t hold with such customs.” At least, that’s what Archie would say. Rigel thought her uncle had a more complicated relationship with his heritage than he or Archie admitted. Though Sirius insisted etiquette-based distinctions of class were irrelevant, and while he would never insist Archie uphold them, he’d still taught his son the old pureblood customs.

Better to have a tool and not need it, she supposed, than the other way around.

“Is that why—”

Millicent was interrupted by the sliding thwack of the door.

“Puppy!”

Before the first-years could react, Fred darted into the compartment and lifted Rigel bodily from her seat. He pivoted like a dancer, heedless to the outraged gasps of her companions, and tossed her in one smooth movement to George, who caught her by the waist with only a moderately uncomfortable jolt.

“You’d make a decent trapeze artist.” George set her down before him and dusted his hands with a player’s flair. “Did you see him tuck his legs, Gred?”

Fred grinned from Rigel’s vacated seat between Draco and Blaise. His arms were stretched across the boys’ headrests, and the Slytherins seemed torn between violence and pretending the older Gryffindor did not exist. “Be honest, Pup; you’ve been chucked unexpectedly before.”

Rigel smoothed her robes before Pansy’s glare could grow any stronger. “I wasn’t sure if I was going through the doorway or not.”

It only took cracking an ankle once to be inclined toward tucking extremities in such an instance, though it had been many years since her dad and uncle played hot potato with their children. She noted age had not improved the experience overmuch.  

Still, it was a marked improvement over the way the rest of Gryffindor House had been treating her. The lions spent the end of term oscillating between refusing to believe one of their own had openly attacked a first year and going to great lengths to ensure the other houses knew Gryffindor didn’t endorse such things. In both cases, they sidestepped Rigel in the corridors as though she was made of broken glass and they might accidentally slice open their honor if they got too close.

Fred and George, naturally, overcompensated to the furthest degree in the other direction. One or the other picked her up, pulled her by the arm, pushed her along the corridor in front of them, or swung her in a circle at their every meeting.

George leaned an elbow on her head, showing off his superior height and questionable dedication to underarm hygiene. Without breathing through her nose, Rigel reminded him, “I did say goodbye before we left the platform.”

“We missed you already.” Fred pretended to dab his eyes, and Blaise produced a handkerchief to save his sleeve. Fred blew his nose in it and gave it back.

“We’ve decided to kidnap you and take you home to the Burrow,” George informed her.

“How do you feel about being stuffed in a trunk?” Fred added hopefully.

Rigel dislodged George’s elbow for the sake of her neck. “I suppose it would be difficult for you to survive the break without me if this is the result of a few hours’ withdrawal.”

She was joking, mostly, and so were the twins, but there was a dark undercurrent they all skirted. When either thought she was distracted by the other, the bracing cheer fell away, and she had caught each of them staring at her from the bottom of a well of regret more than once. She bore their overbearing intrusion into her personal space with the understanding that they were as worried as her friends in Slytherin had been and, unlike her housemates, didn’t get to reassure themselves that she was okay whenever they needed to.

“If you came with us, Mum would feed you until you’re too plump for those ridiculous dress robes,” George offered.

Rigel carefully did not look at Pansy as she lied, “I like these robes.” With a considering tilt of her head, she redirected. “I suppose your brothers would be there, too. Percy and I could get a lot of studying done if we had the whole break together.”

Fred stood from her seat with a forlorn sigh. “And just like that, he’s failed the first test. We’ll have to try harder next term.”

George agreed with an apologetic grimace. “You’re not ready for the Burrow yet. Perhaps one day.”

Fred put a hand to his heart and went down on one knee before her. “Forgive us for failing you.”

Before she could respond, a loud gasp came from outside the open compartment door. Greengrass butted her way past George, her eyes wide. “Are you proposing? Is it official? Does anyone else know?”

The twins froze, and Rigel sent a panicked look to the only person who could possibly save them.

Pansy rose and took Greengrass by the hand. “An unfortunate misunderstanding,” she said quietly, leading the girl back into the corridor. “Would you believe he forgot to apply to Rigel’s Head of House first?”

“He didn’t.” Greengrass craned her neck to give Fred a scandalized look as Pansy ushered her out.

Fred, to Rigel’s horror, began to flush. There was a thick silence in the compartment as the flustered Gryffindor got to his feet. Then George’s snort cut through it. “Wait until I tell Mum.”

Fred lunged for his brother and Rigel barely sidestepped in time. The twins rolled into the corridor, George getting the worst of the tussle, as he could scarcely stop laughing long enough to fight back.

“Can I be your best man?”

“You won’t survive to the rehearsal dinner!”

Pansy cleared her throat and the twins remembered they had an audience. Scrambling to their feet, both third-years bowed at the waist to the Slytherin girls.

“Our pardon, ladies,” Fred said with an attempt at unaffected humor.

George’s grin promised no mercy. “Our passions ran away with us.”

Fred groaned. “Goodbye, Rigel!” he called, high-tailing it back to their compartment. George followed him, cackling.

Greengrass turned her disappointed moue on Rigel. “So…you’re not engaged?”                           

Pansy’s eyes flashed over Greengrass’ shoulder, telling Rigel that the girl’s question was, unfortunately, in earnest.

Rigel shook her head. “A misunderstanding, as Pansy said.” It seemed safest to let her socially gifted friend make the explanations, so she retreated into the compartment and waited for one of her other so-called friends to meet her eyes.

Millicent put a hand over her mouth. Blaise didn’t even bother hiding his slow grin.

It was Theo who actually laughed. “First proposal of the year. Congratulations, Rigel.”

She narrowed her eyes at the sandy-haired boy. “Thanks a lot for the assist. One day I’ll return the favor.”

Theo raised his hands defensively. “I’m not getting in the way of the first Gryffindor-Slytherin union since…who was the last?”

“Pansy would know.”

Pansy came back into the compartment with a vaguely harried look. She shut the compartment door firmly behind her and said, “Crisis averted. Thank you for not telling her it was a joke—that can only reflect poorly on you at this stage in your social rise.”

Rigel didn’t love the way Pansy said ‘social rise’ as though she had a seven-year plan with Rigel’s name on it.

“Did she believe you?” Draco asked.

“Didn’t take much convincing,” Pansy confirmed. “No offense to your Weasleys, but their blood-traitor status worked in our favor. Greengrass was only too happy to think he’d bungled the proper observances.”

Rigel winced. “Is she going to spread unkind rumors about Fred?”

“She believes him to be a tragic figure of forbidden inter-House infatuation.”

Rigel wondered if the windows opened. She could just hurl herself from the moving train, disappear into the forest, and never have to explain to Archie why he was the female lead in a modern-day Romeo and Juliet.

“And now she’s gone to tell Davis, and they’ll sigh over the dark romanticism of it all,” Draco muttered. “Girls are so insipid.” Pansy angled her chin in a poised challenge and Millicent’s amused smile fell away. Draco was quick to capitulate. “Not you two, obviously.”

Theo shrugged. “They’ll grow out of it. Eventually.”

“Merlin willing, before we’re married off to one of them.” Draco shuddered.

Rigel tried to hide her distaste at the idea of arranged marriage, but she didn't quite manage it.

“Ah, but your father would look down on that sort of practice, wouldn’t he?” Blaise curled his lips in a mocking smile. “Must be nice. No prepubescent betrothals for you to worry about.”

“Dad’s never mentioned it.” Rigel spoke carefully, neither censure nor relief in her tone. “But I doubt any of the families who still practice arranged marriage would accept one of the turncoat Blacks as a prospect, in any case.”

“You might be surprised.” Pansy gave a dark smile, and there was a bitter twist to her words that sharpened Rigel’s attention. “There aren’t so many purebloods left that one of the Sacred Twenty-Eight gets overlooked; everyone’s name comes up sooner or later.”

“We’re eleven.” Theo wrinkled his nose. “Everything about us is going to change completely in the next few years.”

“Everything but your last name,” Millicent drawled. Her cynicism matched Pansy’s note for note.

Rigel thanked every god she knew by name that her cousin was a boy and she didn’t have to navigate whatever tangled web made pureblood witches exchange the hundred-yard stare of bloodied soldiers who had met in the trenches.

“A name can be tarnished unexpectedly,” Draco said. Even he didn’t look like he believed that, though.

“Yet family fortunes tend to trend upward regardless.” Blaise swept his hands about the compartment in bleak commiseration. “Face it—we’re frightfully eligible and always will be.”

“It’s still mental to be thinking about it now,” Theo insisted.

“Easy for you to say,” Millicent grumbled.

Draco wasn’t convinced. “You probably won’t get a say, anyway,” he pointed out. “Your parents will take the best offer, and you’ll go bravely to the stake.”

Pansy scowled, and her fingers became delicate fists, but she didn’t retort. What could she say? Draco, cruel as his words sounded, was perfectly correct. Pureblood witches married for advantage, because unlike the wizards, the advantages they came into the world with meant nothing. Pansy would lose the Parkinson name and money when she married, so she had to marry a somebody or become a nobody in her social circles. And every one of her peers faced the same choice and the same short list of options.

Rigel tried to salvage the mood. “I’ll save you,” she declared.

A smile tugged ruefully at Pansy’s lips. “You?”

“Of course. I won’t let you be married off to any of these duffers, Pan.” The boys in the compartment gave squawks of offended honor, and Pansy’s smile came into full bloom. “If anyone tries, and you don’t like them, I’ll intervene.”

“My hero.” Pansy affected an oxygen-less tone that suggested she’d just run two flights of stairs. “How will you save me? Demand a wizard’s duel for my freedom? Battle my unscrupulous suitor’s dragon-riding legions?”

“Marry her yourself?” Blaise’s comment prompted a round of groans.

“I am already sworn to my Potions,” Rigel said regretfully. At Pansy’s broken-hearted sigh, she shook her head with a smile. “But at the slightest lift of your brow I shall break my solemn vows and whisk you away to a bungalow in Bora Bora. An army of liberated house elves will feed you mangos and shade your delicate skin from the Caribbean sun, so that every shade of palest pink I find in your ivory cheeks I can claim as my own.”

Pansy fought a wide smile as the others snickered. “Is that all?”

Rigel could only rise to that challenge. Archie’s reputation required it. With great pageantry, she painted a picture of their impossible future. “That is only the days. When the moon lifts her veil, we will frolic like spring lambs in the surf, sipping on coconut nectar and crying our freedom to every wind, that the gusts may carry news of our incandescent happiness to these hapless lemmings, who shall be trapped in lonely longing behind the white picket bars of matrimony. Wasting away in sick envy, they shall weep when they hear the echoes of our joy on the western sea breeze.”

“Their suffering will only gratify us,” Pansy agreed, her blue eyes twinkling with mirth. “For in our generous hearts we’ll wish nothing more than for our friends to experience the same escape to complete freedom, even if death is the only door unlocked to them.”

Pansy’s words proved too much. Stiff good breeding collapsed under the weight of sheer farce and their housemates burst into laughter, long and uproarious.

Rigel sat back in her seat, wholly satisfied. It was not the usual exchange of controlled snickers or the measured laughter of social calculation. Instead, the compartment rang with surprised delight; unselfconscious enjoyment; childhood, and Rigel wondered if any of them heard the difference before it died away.

“Sometimes I wonder if you were really raised by a bunch of pranksters, but then you say something like that.” Theo dabbed at his streaming eyes with a handkerchief. “Imagine, keeping house elves in Bora Bora to shade you like some despoiled emperor. You’re crazy, Rigel.”

“All the Blacks are crazy,” Rigel said. “But we do right by our friends.”

“Which is when the Malfoys must step in—to save their friends from a Black’s idea of saving.” Draco shook his head, though his smile lingered. “Pans, the minute this fool starts talking about French Polynesian islands, I will lock him up and send you my father’s barrister. No marriage contract will stand a chance.”

Pansy laughed along with the others, but her eyes found Draco’s steady gaze, and she nodded minutely. Rigel realized with a lump in her throat that Draco, unlike Rigel, was entirely serious in offering Pansy a way out. And Pansy, who knew that the possibility of having to draw on that aid one day was real, had accepted, silently grateful.

Before their good mood could settle into boredom, the train pulled into the station.

Pansy fussed with Rigel’s hair and Draco’s collar as they waited for the other students to depart. Pansy wanted a relatively empty platform for the meeting. They all had shrunken trunks, courtesy of Adrian Pucey, in their pockets, so it was with the air of three people on a very important stroll that they finally disembarked the train.

“Your father isn’t coming until later?” Pansy clarified. Nerves straightened her shoulders and kept her chin higher than usual.

Rigel hid her amusement. “We have half an hour before he arrives. I told him I wanted to say goodbye to my friends without being embarrassed.”

“A plausible fiction,” Draco said.

In truth, Rigel had asked Sirius for forty-five extra minutes, to give herself enough time to drink Polyjuice after her friends and their parents had gone. Archie had arranged for the Potters to meet him at baggage claim so he could duck into a restroom and do the same thing. As long as his friends didn’t know what his luggage looked like, they wouldn’t think it odd when an unfamiliar girl picked it up. All they had to do was keep sipping Polyjuice until they could exchange places. And try not to lose count of the minutes since their last sip.

“There they are.” Pansy nodded to four imposing figures standing well clear of the train smoke.

The Malfoys were easily recognizable, resplendent in soft lavender silk, their hair so matched in color that Rigel wondered if that had been the deciding characteristic when Mr. Malfoy chose his wife. The Parkinsons were striking also, but not for their similarity. Mr. Parkinson was tall and lean, with jet-black hair combed back from angular features and a sharp pair of glasses that glinted with spells from the right angle. Mrs. Parkinson was petite and energetic, with caramel curls bouncing about her shoulders and the dreamiest hazel eyes Rigel had ever seen.

Rigel wasn’t sure at first how Pansy could be related to either of them. The girl must have inherited her golden hair from a relative, or else one of her parents dyed theirs.

“Good day, Lord Malfoy, Narcissa,” Pansy said when they were within polite speaking range. “Hello Father, Mother.”

Pansy’s mother reached out a hand, which Pansy clasped and pressed gently. Both mother and daughter smiled with suppressed emotion, and Mr. Parkinson looked on with silent fondness. All Rigel could think was that she’d never witnessed a more restrained reunion.

“How are you, Miss Parkinson?” Malfoy Sr. asked.

“Very well, thank you.” Pansy stepped away from her parents. “Mother, Father, you remember Draco Malfoy?”

Draco stepped forward to shake hands with Mr. Parkinson and receive precisely one affectionate nod and two approving looks from the other adults. It was like watching a play set in the time of Merlin and Morgana, except none of the actors realized they were in a satire.

“Your son is a credit to you, Lucius,” Mr. Parkinson said. “His grandfather’s bearing and your chin, I daresay.”

“But his mother’s eyes.” Mrs. Parkinson’s own eyes fairly shone with vivacious cheer, perhaps to make up for the way the rest of her face stayed poised in a perfect pureblood mask. Pansy came by her graces honestly, it seemed. “So wonderful to see you again, Draco.”

“The wonder is all mine.” Draco bowed.

“Father, Mother, may I introduce to you Rigel Black?” Pansy placed a hand on Rigel’s elbow. “Rigel is our Slytherin year-mate, son of Lord Sirius Black and the late Lady Diana Black.”

Rigel bowed formally to Mr. Parkinson and his wife, hovering just above Mrs. Parkinson’s hand as she did so.

“A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Black,” Mrs. Parkinson said warmly. “How is your father?”

“He is well, Lady Parkinson, and I daresay he will be even better when he learns of your kind query.” Her tongue wanted to stumble over the use of ‘lady,’ but she didn’t let it. “I am very glad for this chance to meet you both, and I would like to formally ask your permission to befriend your charming daughter.” She directed the last bit at Mr. Parkinson, whose only reaction to Rigel invoking the old custom was a sheen of light obscuring his glasses as he tilted his head consideringly.

“What say you, Lucius?” Parkinson turned to his friend. “As you have the advantage of Mr. Black’s acquaintance, I shall defer to your judgment.”

Malfoy gazed seriously into Rigel’s blank face for a moment, then said, “Although I have only had the pleasure of a brief meeting with young Mr. Black, he has the esteem of Severus Snape, a man whose opinion I trust implicitly, so I will vouch for his worth in regards to your daughter’s friendship.”

Rigel bowed gratefully toward Draco’s father, then lifted her chin and clasped her hands behind her back, ready to accept whatever decision Mr. Parkinson gave.

“With such a recommendation, I would be foolish to turn your candidature away, Mr. Black,” he finally decided. “May your friendship be long and mutually beneficial.”

Pansy beamed at her and Rigel heard Draco let out a small breath of relief. Rigel nodded with the appropriate amount of dignity, but then Mrs. Parkinson let out a pleased sigh and stepped forward to embrace her.

“Marvelously done.” The words were whispered in her ear, and Rigel felt very much like a child who had precociously performed a trick considered above her age bracket. “Welcome to the fold.” Mrs. Parkinson stepped back, her mask melted away by the warmth of her smile.

“Now that we are all friends, you must tell us about your first term.” Narcissa accepted Rigel’s bow over her hand with gracious nod. “Did you have many adventures?”

Draco and Pansy exchanged a look, and Rigel tried not to twitch guiltily.

“Adventures?” Pansy repeated, the picture of guileless puzzlement.

“Come, Draco.” Malfoy raised his eyebrows expectantly. “Your letters have been unusually vague of late.”

“Pansy’s too,” Mrs. Parkinson said, eyeing her daughter’s neutral expression with dawning concern.

Draco and Pansy both turned to Rigel. She had the sudden, uncomfortable realization that for all her friends’ warnings that they had a duty to report information to their parents, they had evidently not told them about what happened after Halloween. Perhaps not about Halloween, either. They’d protected her privacy instead.

Well, it was too late to salvage that. Rigel wouldn’t force them to lie to their parents’ faces. She knew firsthand how difficult that could be.

“That’s my fault,” Rigel said. “They were protecting me, though I did not ask them to.”

Mrs. Parkinson tried to smile. “When the son of Sirius Black claims the blame for something, it must be quite a tale.”

“Nothing so entertaining, Mrs. Parkinson,” Rigel hedged.

“Just Rose, if you please.”

“And do not leave us in suspense,” Narcissa insisted. “Your tone is ominous, Rigel, but surely we would have been informed if anything too terrible had occurred.”

“If not by our children, then at the least by your headmaster.” Malfoy’s expression hardened. “Even he would not keep news of a child’s wellbeing from his family.”

“Headmaster Dumbledore would not trouble you with news unrelated to your own son,” Rigel said. “The more…exciting events of our final term have left Draco and Pansy completely unscathed. This I can assure you.”

“And was your family equally assured of your own good health?” Rose pressed.

“My father was kept abreast of all happenings,” Rigel said. “He will be honored to know of your consideration.”

“Her consideration was for you, Mr. Black, not your father.” Mr. Parkinson spoke sharply. “As Pansy’s friend, your troubles will have ramifications in her life, and if you treat your own wellbeing so cavalierly, how can we expect you to take my daughter’s safety and happiness into account?”

“What happened wasn’t Rigel’s fault,” Pansy protested.

“He’s never put Pansy in danger,” Draco agreed. “Or me,” he added when his mother narrowed her eyes.

“Cassius,” Rose said in a low voice. “They’re children.”

“No, my lady. He’s right.” Rigel inclined her head toward Mr. Parkinson. “It is selfish to entertain the conceit that my troubles do not affect those around me. I would never want Pansy or Draco exposed by their friendship with me.”

And they would be, if anyone knew the truth. The blood felt hot in her ears, and she looked at Pansy and Draco, so quick to defend her, with a sudden, thick dread. What had she been thinking? It hadn’t seemed so big a deal, befriending them at school. They would see one another every day in any case. Why shouldn’t she have somewhere to sit at meals and someone to talk to about classes? It would be harder when it all ended in seven years, sure, but she had accepted that as a future difficulty.

Only, standing there, looking their parents in the eye after all that happened at the end of first term, how could Rigel say she would do right by their friendship? Was that a promise it was even possible for her to keep? And did it matter? She had already made it. And she hadn’t considered what it meant until too late.

“I’m certain this is much ado about nothing,” Narcissa said kindly. “What sort of political intrigues are you imagining occurred in a schoolyard, Cassius?”

“One can never be too careful with one’s children,” Mr. Parkinson said firmly. “And if Mr. Black has no qualms, I would rest easier knowing the full story behind my daughter’s cryptic letters.”

“I admit to some interest as well,” Malfoy said, his expression giving nothing away. “Severus has made infuriatingly offhand references to an event around Halloween that I cannot begin to guess at, and your name was thrown in amongst them, Mr. Black.”

Rigel glanced at her friends, both of whom nodded seriously. They would support her, however she framed the narrative. “As a member of the Board of Governors, were you made aware of the circumstances surrounding Lee Jordan’s withdrawal?”

Malfoy’s face folded into a dark frown. “It was closer to an unofficial expulsion.”

“There hasn’t been a student expelled from Hogwarts in fifty years, and the last time it happened, another student was killed.” Mr. Parkinson’s mouth pressed into a severe line.

“No one died,” Pansy said quickly.

“What happened?” Narcissa demanded. But it was her husband she looked to, not Rigel.

Malfoy set his jaw. “As a minor, his records are sealed, but I know he faces charges for attacking a fellow student.”

Rose looked to Rigel first. “Was it you?”

“That’s the short of it.” Rigel had practiced the clinical explanation of what happened. Repeated it to herself until she could recite it without flinching. Without shaking. “Lee Jordan blames my father for putting his out of business. I’m afraid that enmity was transferred to me. Unfortunately, he took his dislike too far, and his actions caused enough harm that his continued presence in the school was considered unsafe. He never targeted Pansy or Draco,” she added. “And now that he’s gone, the matter is satisfactorily resolved.”

Draco gave an indignant scoff. “He nearly killed you.”

“He attempted nothing of the kind.”

“Because permanent disfigurement isn’t cause for alarm,” Pansy said sharply.

“I was talking about when you fell down three flights of stairs,” Draco clarified. “And maybe you’ve forgotten the acid on Halloween—”

“Acid?” Narcissa’s hand flew to her husband’s elbow, where he gripped it steadily.

“Events are beginning to square,” Malfoy said, eyes glittering. “Severus asked me to put an ear to the ground for any un-reclaimed shipments of those joke tablets Jordan was written up for.”

“The ones that didn't have the proper anti-amending charms on them?” Parkinson phrased it as a question but spoke as though he knew exactly what Malfoy meant.

Rigel gaped at them. Did everyone else know about everything that happened to anyone in the magical world? How did they keep it all straight? Or did every old House have a team of current event analysts acting like the intelligence agency of a tiny nation? Did they share information? The knowing look Malfoy and Parkinson exchanged suggested some kind of standing trade agreement.

“Dangerous things,” Parkinson said, heavy censure in his tone. “I suppose Jordan’s son managed to smuggle some into Hogwarts.”

“Not only that,” Pansy said. “He used one to turn Rigel’s pumpkin juice to acid.”

All four parents looked deadly in that moment.

“It could have been any of you,” Parkinson said. “What if Pansy or Draco had picked up the wrong cup? I think you’d best explain everything.”

There was a sigh in Rigel’s chest that she kept carefully trapped there, waiting for the moment she could never have to speak about Lee Jordan again. “Perhaps Draco and Pansy can explain everything once you are comfortably at home,” she suggested. “It is a rather long story, but it’s over now, and none of us are in any danger going forward.”

“He will be tried?” Parkinson cut sharp eyes to Malfoy.

Malfoy looked less than pleased as he said, “A plea deal, more likely. Unless Lord Black was to get involved.”

Rigel fought a shudder. “No. We’ve left action to the D.M.L.E..”

“Lord Potter, then,” Parkinson suggested. “He’s well positioned to—”

“My family is not getting involved.” Rigel had been as firm as possible in her letters home. The Aurors had her statement, along with some circumstantial evidence from Halloween, but her magic had destroyed the weapon implicated in the final incident. They had Jordan’s wand, with Incarcerous and a number of other spells recorded on it at the time of her attack, but he had not fired any Unforgivables. And he had not, in the end, hurt her very much. Serious charges might not hold water in court, and the Aurors knew that. Rigel hoped Jordan did strike a plea deal and the whole thing was resolved quietly and without her further involvement. The last thing Archie needed was to be interrogated over events he hadn’t witnessed. “We’d like to put this behind us.”

Both men eyed Rigel as though they had a wealth of advice on the subject, but their wives had enough mercy to steer the conversation to less troubled waters.

“Let’s turn to more pleasant matters,” Rose said. “I understand Draco made the Quidditch team this year.”

“Indeed.” Narcissa picked up the thread gracefully. “And in his first year. Quite an accomplishment.”

“Only the reserve team,” Draco said. His smile sat proudly on his cheeks, nonetheless. “In a few years, I’ll be Slytherin’s starting seeker, though.”

“Your father played himself when he was at school, didn’t you, Lucius?”

“Chaser,” Malfoy agreed. “It was the only way I could capture this lovely creature’s attention.” He smiled down at his wife, who blinked up at him as if to say it was no more than she deserved.

“What about you, Rigel?” Rose asked. “Did you try for the team?”

“No, my lady. I prefer to focus my energies elsewhere.”

“But you had a broken wrist this year,” Draco pointed out. “You’re a good flyer. You should give it a go next year.”

“You are an avid Quidditch fan, are you not, Mr. Black?” Parkinson adjusted his glasses, and somehow it felt like a challenge. “Unless you prefer to watch?”

Rigel tried to guess how Mr. Parkinson might have heard she was an avid Quidditch fan. It seemed an odd thing for Pansy to mention in letters home, as Rigel had been trying to dampen her interest in the sport all term, first to avoid flying with a broken wrist, and then to avoid this exact situation, where someone might think it odd that Rigel didn’t want to try out for the team.

He must have heard that ‘Heir Black’ enjoyed Quidditch. In which case, she knew exactly which pureblood could have passed that information on.

“Are you acquainted with the Flint family?” Rigel asked.

“Flint was at school with us,” Parkinson confirmed. For the first time, he smiled, and Rigel wondered if she had finally impressed him by figuring out which connection had given her away. “Rose and I happened upon him and his son at the Quidditch World Cup five years ago, and they mentioned you.”

“Young Marcus Flint told us in no uncertain terms that he was saving the seat next to him for his friend Archie, even if he couldn’t make it.” Rose smiled in reminiscence. “Such a sweet boy.”

Draco lifted his brows in patent disbelief, and Pansy had the look of someone tucking information into a red folder for later.

Rigel remembered that year all too well. She and Archie were six, and her cousin had a ticket to one of the highest boxes in the stadium. Rigel had assumed Sirius bought it for him—she could even remember feeling a bit left out at the time—but now she wondered if the Flints hadn’t had an extra seat and invited Archie to join them.

The details blurred in irrelevance. Archie never got to go.

“That same week was the first time my mother fell ill,” Rigel said, as evenly as she could. “I didn’t end up attending the match, though Marcus is kind to have saved the seat anyway.”

The first time was frightening, but they’d thought it a fluke. The Healers hadn’t known how serious it was. Or even what it was. And then she got sick again. And again. An illness that defied diagnostics. By the time it became clear it was killing her, Diana had been in and out of the hospital dozens of times. She held on for over a year, but at eight, Archie had clung to his cousin’s hand and watched, dry-eyed with hollow resignation, as his mother was lowered gently into the waiting earth.

“I suppose I didn’t go to many Quidditch matches, after that.” It sounded silly, to think of missed sporting events when Archie’s whole life had slid out of shape that summer. Quidditch was only part of the normalcy that never recovered, though. When they learned Diana’s illness was terminal, she’d watched her cousin swell into an almost manic vehicle for positivity overnight. In his mother’s final months, he was the perfect son—doting, cheerful, optimistic, and never more than a room away. He lived like a songbird trying desperately to remain in the air. As long as he never landed, never brought down the mood or looked past the next morning, it was as though the world might exist in that bubble of light and laughter indefinitely.

When the wind finally died beneath him, Archie hit the ground hard. She hadn’t known how to catch him.

The adults were gearing up to say something—something the real Archie wouldn’t have wanted to hear, like how it was such an unfortunate tragedy or how Diana was somewhere better now, free of the pain, one with the wild magic of the world—or whatever people told themselves to pretend like the worst thing that could happen hadn’t really happened.

Rigel took the wheel of the conversation instead. “Draco’s tryouts were almost as good as a World Cup game, though. Remember, Pansy?”

Pansy, bless her beautiful presence of mind, didn’t even hesitate. “How could I forget? Captain Flint unleashed four bludgers and three snitches simultaneously. I thought someone was going to be hurled to the ground for certain.”

“My goodness.” Rose’s eyes finally shifted from Rigel’s face, but they remained sad. “Hogwarts Quidditch sounds more dangerous than it was in our day.”

“Too dangerous,” Narcissa agreed.

“It was fine, Mum,” Draco said. “Flint only did it to scare off the Gryffindors.”

“Counter-intelligence tactics. Now that’s clever,” Parkinson said.

The conversation finally settled into something resembling normal parent-child exchanges. They spoke of classes, professors, and schoolmates, and before she knew it, the clock had struck half-past. She only had fifteen minutes to meet Sirius in a café down the street from the station.

“It’s been an honor making your acquaintance, Lord and Lady Parkinson, and a pleasure to see you again, Lord and Lady Malfoy. I’m afraid I have to excuse myself to go and meet my father.”

“He isn’t meeting you here?” Rose asked, polite confusion in her tone.

Narcissa frowned. “Has he forgotten, Rigel? Sirius always did have a relaxed attitude toward schedules—”

“No, I asked him to meet me later. To give us time to become acquainted.” She wasn’t going to let them think Sirius Black had forgotten his kid at King's Cross, though Rigel wasn’t sure how much she revealed by admitting to arranging their meeting without his supervision.

“Then, give him my best,” Narcissa said carefully. Her eyes flicked between Rigel, Pansy, and Draco, and Rigel couldn’t begin to imagine what she was considering.

“I shall, though he does not deserve your best, fair lady.”

The adults chuckled, and Rigel felt good about the note they ended on as she hugged Draco and Pansy goodbye and wished them all a relaxing holiday.

Past the magical barrier that concealed platform 9 ¾, Rigel ducked into a public restroom and took one of their precious vials of Polyjuice out of her pocket. She dropped in a strand of Archie’s hair and had to grimace at the jarring shade of electric blue the addition produced. Archie would have such an alarmingly-colored essence.

Trying to ignore the smell, Rigel knocked back the dose in one quick movement. A few years of this, and I’ll be able to take shots of Firewhisky like it’s water, she mused in the seconds before her insides were set on fire.

Her guts felt like they were wringing the Harry Potter right out of her, and she supposed it made sense if Polyjuice changed you inside and out. She wondered if the pain in her lower abdomen would lessen if she wasn’t swapping primary sex characteristics, and then she had no attention for wonderings at all as the burning sensation moved to her muscles and skin. She felt her limbs lengthen slightly and her facial features shift, and then it was over.

As she caught her breath, she supposed she should save her complaints for later on. If the ruse lasted through puberty, the differences would start to become really pronounced. They were lucky they looked somewhat similar to one another to begin with.

Stinging eyes and blurred vision made Rigel stumble to the sink to take the contacts out. Staring back from the mirror was her cousin, Archie, with a few small differences from when she’d last seen him. He’d grown his hair out a little, and there was a lack of musculature in his arms that told her whatever he’d been up to at AIM, it wasn’t Quidditch.

Sirius was waiting in the café like he’d promised—and for Sirius, waiting meant casually flirting with one of the waitresses. It was unexpectedly warming to catch his devil-may-care grin lighting up the shadows that never seemed to leave his face, but she did feel a bit sorry for the waitress when Sirius’ attention waned the instant he caught sight of his son.

“Archie!” Sirius leapt off the stool and bounded over like the overgrown puppy he was.

He scooped her up and swung her around him in a circle, not appearing to notice that his kid wasn’t six years old anymore. Several patrons narrowly avoided being broadsided by Rigel’s trainers, and if she hadn’t already changed from her dress robes, they would have collected a full dining set from the café tables.

“You’re back!” Sirius twisted her before him as though he was examining a giant plushie. “And all in one piece, despite attempts made to the contrary. All this worrying is turning my hair grey.”

“It’s not even a little bit grey,” she assured him.

Sirius lifted her over his head like they were figure skaters, bringing her nose to his perfectly-black-locks. “Look at the roots for me, will you? I’m worried about this section in the back I can’t see properly—”

“Dad!” Rigel pushed her face away from the smell of his coconut hair product. “Your hair is fine—better looking than everyone else’s put together, I swear.” Sirius held her at arm’s length, squinting suspiciously. She rolled her eyes. “Honestly, you wonder why I asked you to meet me away from the platform?”

If his face hadn’t been right in front of her, she wouldn’t have seen it. Surprise and shame flitted through her uncle’s grey irises, and Rigel felt instantly like a complete arse.

“No, I mean—I didn’t mean it like that, Dad.” She had spoken without thinking, teasing without realizing that after months apart, Sirius and Archie’s relationship was not as bulletproof as it always seemed. “I’m only joking,” she tried as Sirius set her down.

“It’s cool, Arch.” Sirius slung an arm around her shoulders carelessly and led them out of the café and onto busy sidewalks. “I get it. When I was your age, I didn’t want my parents within ten miles of my friends.”

“No!” Rigel pulled Sirius to a stop, determined to straighten things out before she damaged Archie and Sirius’ relationship beyond repair.

“Hey, kiddo, it’s no big deal,” Sirius said, his voice betraying not a hint of the hurt she had seen under the surface just moments before.

“It is if that’s what you think,” Rigel said. She gave Sirius Archie’s most earnest expression. “Dad, I love you. It’s not anything like it was with your parents. I’m not ashamed of you or embarrassed by you in any way—I think you’re the greatest, bestest, most charming, fun, magnificent, caring, cool—”

“You forgot devilishly attractive.”

“—hilariously amazing dad in the whole world,” Rigel continued, pretending not to notice how Sirius preened under her praise. “I really was joking just now. I didn’t keep you from the station because I don’t want to be seen with you. I talk about you all the time. The Weasley twins worship the ground you walk on, you know, and Draco and Pansy would have loved to meet you.”

“Then why?” Sirius didn’t look hurt or bracingly cheerful anymore. He looked confused.

“Because I was selfish,” Rigel said, stalling for time with a self-deprecating grimace. She hated lying to Sirius; he was a close third to Remus and her mother on the list of people it was really hard to lie to. But without explaining about the Polyjuice, she would have to stretch the truth to its snapping point. “Everyone at school knows you—or thinks they do. You’re famous for your joke line, your Auror career, and yes, also your incredibly old and wealthy family. The truth is, I was meeting Pansy and Draco’s parents at the station. I wanted to make a good impression—and I’m not saying I don’t think you’d give a good impression, because you would, Dad, but I wanted to make a good impression on my own, you know? I wanted them to like or dislike me for me, not because my dad, the Head of the House of Black, was there.”

Sirius was silent for a long moment. “Draco and Pansy, huh? You know, I used to be on pretty good terms with cousin Cissa.”

“She says hi,” Rigel confirmed. “But I honestly wasn’t sure how it would go down. The train platform is kind of neutral territory, but I didn’t want to muck up my first meeting with them by putting you in a position that would go against the Great Split or putting them in a position where they had to treat me like they’d treat you, and vice versa…” She shook her head. “I don’t know. Politics is so complicated.”

“That’s a lot, Arch.” Sirius put his hands on his hips and tapped his fingers against his denim-clad waist. “Okay. I can understand why you arranged it this way. I’m not sure any of that would have occurred to me if you’d asked. To be honest, I never took the Split that seriously. Some of them are all right, you know.”

“Yeah, I know.” Rigel smiled Archie’s easy smile at Sirius. “And I know you wouldn’t have done anything to make it uncomfortable, but you know how some of the stiffer purebloods can be. I just wanted everything to go smoothly. Still, I should have told you.”

“Yes, you should have,” Sirius said firmly. A bit of his familiar humor snuck back into his tone. “You should always tell me everything. It’s a very easy rule to remember.”

“Did I hurt your feelings?” she asked slyly.

Sirius sucked in an affronted breath. “Why you little—hurt my feelings? Who’s the grown-up here?” He set off at a brisk stalk.

Rigel laughed and caught up to him. “That remains to be seen.”

Sirius tucked his hands into his jeans as they strolled. “So, Draco and Pansy. Gonna be heavy hitters in Dark Society one day?”

“Pansy’s punching above her weight class already,” Rigel said.

“The Parkinsons aren’t a bad pair, though I daresay Cassius gets by on his wife’s charm in most social interactions.” Sirius waggled his eyebrows. “Did he adjust his glasses at you?”

Rigel snorted. “At least twice.” With an apologetic frown, she added, “I really should have included you. You know these people better than I ever will.”

“Did Cissa say anything else?” Sirius pretended not to care about the answer, the only sure sign that he did. “Just hi?”

“She said ‘the sun has eclipsed the dog star,’ though I’m not sure what that means.”

“She didn’t—oh, good try, but I doubt after more than a decade of marriage to Malfoy Cissa has finally started making celestial puns.” Sirius grinned. “She misses me, huh?”

“She’s doing fine without you, as far as I can tell. Was she always that blonde? Because all the other Blacks are, well, black-haired, aren’t we?” Rigel asked.

His grin became a smirk. “Oh, yes. She gave my uncle Cygnus quite a shock when she came out Malfoy-blond. Nearly called a formal duel with old Abraxas until he realized Cissa had his nose. Of course, the Paternity Potion helped. I believe when Lucius asked for her hand Aunty Druella told him to have at it, on account of Cissa having clearly been meant for a Malfoy all along.”

They laughed, and Rigel thought she was finally getting a feel for Archie’s role. She could do this for another few hours, if needed.

Sirius found an alley he liked and Apparated them to the steps of Grimmauld Place. Rigel narrowly managed not to lose custody of the train snacks in her stomach as the universe squeezed her through the eye of a needle on her way across London.

“So how’s Marcus?” Sirius asked, making no move to open the front door. “You see him around much?”

“Sometimes,” she said casually, as if she didn't have a mountain of the older boy’s homework in her trunk at that very moment. “He’s captain of the Quidditch team, so I see him at Draco’s practices, but the upper years don’t mix much with the younger students.”

“Especially in Slytherin, right?” Sirius nodded in understanding. “I remember when Regulus got invited to sit with the Lestrange brothers as a third-year. Thought his head might explode from the pressure.”

Rigel said nothing, knowing Regulus was an uncomfortable subject for Sirius. She’d only seen Sirius’s brother once, at Diana’s funeral, but she knew he’d joined the S.O.W. Party while still in school. The Split had cut more than a few families in half, but she gathered the Black brothers had never been close.

“I’m glad to hear Marcus is well, though,” Sirius said as he fished keys out of his pocket. Rigel’s eyes narrowed on them. Sirius didn’t usually lock his front door. They had wards for that. “He doesn’t go home for breaks, does he?”

Trying to juggle her mounting suspicion with the conversation, Rigel vaguely recalled Flint signing the roster to stay over the holidays. “No, I don’t think so.”

“Good.” Sirius slid the key in the lock and Rigel braced herself for four months of pranks rolled into a single moment. There would be slime. There might be glitter. Sirius flung the door open and lifted his arms like a bull fighter. “Ta-daaaaah…why are you ducking?”

Rigel stood from her protective crouch warily. It might be a trick. She peered into the entryway of Grimmauld Place and blinked. Glanced at Sirius in confusion. “Were you robbed?”

“Rob—no, it’s redecorated!”

It had clearly been ransacked, not to mention vandalized, and all the more alarming that Sirius didn’t see it. Everything from the hat rack to the umbrella stand had been dipped in green paint. The main corridor, where the heads of house elves past once hung, appeared to be the victim of a tinsel typhoon. Silvery strands hung like Spanish moss from the torch brackets, the chandeliers, the banisters, and the doorframes. Clumps of it littered the floor like a patchy Easter basket, gathering in unlikely corners and probably nesting with a new generation of dust bunnies.

Rigel finally saw the banner, snakes dancing in a continuous loop, welcoming her to what she could only assume was some sort of Slytherin-inspired funhouse her uncle had forgotten to take down after Halloween. WELCOME HOME! it proclaimed.

She cleared her throat. “I thought Remus was kidding. I thought you were kidding.”

Sirius gave her a look that said she clearly should have known him better. “I never kid about defacing my family seat.” He chortled with delight as he towed off his boots and hung his coat on the snakehead pegs by the door. “Your Sorting opened up a world of decorating possibilities, so we went to town!”

“We?” Rigel sincerely doubted Remus had contributed creatively to the stylistic choices on display.

“Do you like it? Feel right at home?”

Rigel stared and stared at it. “I don’t know what to say.”

“Yes, I can see you’re overwhelmed.” Sirius took her elbow in his. “Let me give you the full tour.”

He showed her the parlor, with its green brocade couches and tapestries so silver they were practically mirrors. They saw the kitchen with its new silver dishes—not real silver, Sirius hastily assured her, in deference to Remus’ slight allergy—and the little snake salt and pepper shakers that hissed when you turned them upside down. The library wallpaper has been redone in electric green and metallic silver stripes, and Rigel pointedly did not ask whether the new snakeskin upholstery on the reading settee was real.

Archie’s bedroom saw a reassertion of taste, done over in deep, soothing emerald with subtle platinum highlights in the doorknobs and window fastenings. The stuffed snake on the pillow was almost cute, and Rigel thought Remus must have taken over on Archie’s spaces until she ducked into the ensuite bathroom to sneak a sip of Polyjuice and saw the green, glow-in-the-dark toilet paper stacked like a Christmas tree.

Only the garden redeemed it. Remus hadn’t been kidding in his first letter. The enclosed courtyard, which used to house Diana’s vegetable garden, was now home to twelve English grass snakes, which had been magicked an unnaturally bright green. The enclosure had the unlikely dimensions of the magically enlarged, and Sirius had rigged a chain of complicated weather charms to keep it temperature controlled.

“The little wrigglies get all the sunshine they need,” Sirius said proudly.

As he opened the paned door, six of the sunbathing snakes came slithering over to greet them. Sirius bent down to pet their heads and croon words of praise, and Rigel reassessed his dedication to the decoration scheme. He actually looked quite fond of them.

At her incredulous smile, he pouted. “What? They’re highly domesticated.”

She observed their indolent sprawling, languid slinking, and tired tongue-flicks. “They look a bit lethargic. I think you’re overfeeding them.”

“I feed them until they won’t eat anymore, just like I did with you.”

“You should write a parenting book.”

“The Serious Method.” Sirius nodded. “I would look pretty good on the inside of a jacket cover.”

He would probably make thousands of Galleons even if there was nothing between the pages but pictures of his own snakes. Sirius could simply do stuff like that.

The littlest snake began twining up Sirius’ bare foot, and to Rigel’s surprise, it said, “Take me inssside with you thisss time, One Who Sssmellsss Like Dogsss. I want to sssee where you keep the sssnacksss.”

“Oh, that tickles!” Sirius laughed, hopping on one foot as he pulled the little snake gently off his other. “This one always climbs on me, trying to get inside the house.”

Rigel had to wonder how much free time Sirius actually had if he was spelling snakes to talk to him. It was good Archie would be home for the break, but perhaps they could convince Remus to look in on the ex-Auror more often. Sirius quit his career in law-enforcement when Diana fell ill, and even after her passing, he never went back. He volunteered in the children’s ward at St. Mungo’s a few times a week and seemed to have no trouble living off his family’s fortune. She suspected the interest alone was enough to sustain all but his most lavish indulgences.

“When will Harry be home?” she asked as they meandered back into the kitchen.

“Lily and James are picking her up as we speak, I think.” Sirius rooted in the pantry and came up with a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter. “The whole gang’ll be here for dinner. I bet Harry’s over earlier, though. You know how she is, always checking up on you.”

“Yeah,” Rigel said around the dramatic irony in her throat. “Harry sure does worry about me.”

“She’s more Lily than James,” Sirius said idly. He stuck a table knife into the peanut butter and pushed it her way. “Lunch?”

Rigel coated two slices of bread and stuck them together, the simple act feeling odd after months of eating elf-made food. “Was it hard getting used to life without house elves?”

Sirius stared at her. Mouth full of peanut butter, he gummed, “ouat oo you eean?”

“I just mean, after Hogwarts.” She realized how it sounded and quickly amended. “I don’t think we should get one! It just feels strange to make my own food now, and it’s only been a few months. I can’t imagine after seven years…”

Sirius swallowed and shrugged. “I got used to fending for myself when I moved out of this house. I was glad to, though I should admit I ate a lot of meals at James’ place. His mum taught me how to cook, actually.” Sirius laughed. “That’s why he comes over so often—I learned her recipes better than Lily did.”

Rigel tried not to look too pointedly at the peanut butter sandwich in her uncle’s hands, but he was fooling himself if he thought grandma Potter’s recipes were why her parents insisted on having dinner with him several nights a week.

She’d never met any of her grandparents. The elder Potters both died of Dragon Pox just before she was born, and she was pretty sure Lily’s parents had passed away while her mother was still in school. The Blacks had been numerous enough to form their own political faction at one point, but now there was only Sirius and Regulus, unless one counted the witches who’d married out. Archie had grandparents on his mother’s side, but they weren’t close. She didn’t know why.

It was a bit sad, when she thought about it, that families as big as the Blacks and Potters had once been could now have dinner together without even putting the extra leaf in the dining room table.

“Do you ever wish you had more kids?” she asked.

Sirius choked on his sandwich. When he’d found his air again, he gave her a bewildered frown. “Arch, where’s this coming from? You know I’d never remarry.”

“I know.” She ducked her head. “I just wondered if you wished you’d had more…before.”

She shouldn’t have brought it up. It was none of her business, but she felt terrible when she imagined Sirius in this big house all alone. She should have written more often. Next term, she wouldn’t get so wrapped up in things that she forgot about Sirius, waiting here with his jamless, Sahara Desert sandwiches for Archie to write.

Sirius shook his head slowly. “One was more than I had reason to hope for. My parents were cousins, with the requisite history of close marriages on both sides. Regulus himself was a Merlin-ordained miracle. I didn’t know if I’d even be fertile enough to sire a kid that lived, but Diana didn’t care. She loved me enough to try, and you were so perfect. You cried like a little lion. You were everything we needed, and we didn’t have the heart to roll the dice a second time.”

He meant The Fade. That nebulous, not-quite-a-disease, not-quite-a-curse draining that cause some magical infants to simply fade away before their parents’ eyes. Everyone said it affected second- and third-born children disproportionately. It was the reason most of her classmates had no siblings.

Sirius reached over to ruffle her hair. “You worried about your old man here all alone?”

She was, and Archie would be too. “You went and got twelve new mouths to feed while I was gone. Seems a fair question.”

“Just keeping you on your toes, succession-wise and all.” Sirius grinned. “The little one’s feisty. She might murder the rest of you for a shot at the title.”

“I’m not worried.” She smirked. “If there’s one thing I’m learning in Slytherin, it’s how to protect myself from snakes.”

Sirius wrinkled his nose. “Don’t do that with your mouth. You look like a Malfoy.”

“You smirk,” she pointed out.

Sirius put a hand to his heart. “My smirk is devilish and attractive. Lucius Malfoy’s smirk is self-satisfied and smarmy. Frankly, I am shocked and unsettled that you can’t see the difference.”

“I can.” She meant it to be funny, but the joke fell heavily between them, because it was true. There was a huge difference between Lucius Malfoy and Sirius Black, and she didn’t want him to think Archie had forgotten what it was. “You’re nothing like them, Dad.”

Sirius smiled. “Thanks, Arch.”

That was something else she’d have to address. “You know, I’ve been going by my middle name at school.”

“Rigel? I didn’t know you even liked your middle name,” Sirius said, looking puzzled. “I only picked it because it wasn’t on Regulus’ list of suggestions.”

“Well, I’m growing up, now.” She immediately felt about eight for saying that out loud. Gamely, she pressed on. “Archie sounds a bit young, but Arcturus is a mouthful at my age. I’ll switch back when I’m older, I think, and of course you can still call me Archie at home. I just wanted you to know, in case someone from school mentions me as Rigel.”

“Ah.” Sirius waved the peanut butter knife dismissively. “Not like I can talk about nicknames; I was the genius who came up with Moony. School is a time for growing, so if you want to grow as Rigel, I say go for it.”

“Thanks.” Rigel cleared the bread and peanut butter, setting them on a random shelf inside the pantry. “So how many pranks do you think we can set up before Uncle James gets here?”

Sirius’s face split into a mischievous grin she hoped the Weasley twins never caught sight of. “He’ll be expecting about four, so I think we should aim for twelve.”

“You just like the number twelve,” Rigel said.

“It’s a dignified number.”

“Which is why it doesn’t suit you at all.”

“You’d better hope I don’t set up thirteen, because the last one will be on you, little snake.”

“If I thought an old dog like you had any new tricks I might actually be scared.” She raised her brows loftily. “You forget I’ve been marinating among the next generation of pranksters. The Weasley twins have taught me things you and Uncle James never dreamed of.”

“Prove it!”

“You asked for it.”

“Well, you’ll be begging for it.”

“For what?”

“Mercy!”

“Ah! No! Dad, where are you tickling?”

“Admit I’m a spry young pup!”

“I admit nothing, you mangy old straaaaaaay!”

The front door opened. Remus caught them frozen on the stairs, Rigel hanging onto the banister with all her strength as Sirius attempted to drag her through the tinsel by her leg.

Remus raised his bag of pranking supplies with a smile. “Thought you might need these.”

--0

[HpHpHp]

--0

Archie, Lily, and James arrived a few hours later, and damned if they didn’t get exactly twelve pranks set up in the nick of time.

Some of them were disabled right away, like the bucket of shed snakeskin over the doorway (Rigel did not ask Sirius how long he’d been collecting it). Others would probably never be triggered, like the eyes of the non-moving painting of Salazar Slytherin now hanging in the dining room, which would set fire to the hair of anyone who stared at them longer than thirty seconds. One Rigel insisted on purely to disorient Remus’ sharp nose. Dung bombs were truly a tool for all occasions, and if she accidently dropped one on him while suspending a batch in a net over the toilet, well, she must be a bit rusty, that’s all.

James had a good time trying and sometimes failing to ferret them out before they went off, and even waiting for James to go first didn’t save Lily from all of them—Remus was tricky with his time-delayed spells, that way.

In the chaos, Rigel and Archie snuck upstairs to her cousin’s bedroom unquestioned.

Archie closed the door with a sigh of relief. “That was close.” He pulled the usual chest of drawers over in front of the door and collapsed on the bed. “My ’juice is about to wear off, and I didn't fancy another hour as you, no offence.”

“None taken,” Rigel said, sitting on the foot of the bed. “I’ve got another ten minutes, I think. It’s good to see you.”

“Me? I’ve been worried sick about you!” Archie lifted his head from the pillow to scowl at her. “I had to count all your limbs after Polyjuice-ing into you just to make sure you hadn’t been maimed!”

“What’s to worry about?” Rigel asked. She hadn’t written anything overly alarming in her letters.

“Uncle James said that Dad said that you’d been attacked by another student.” Archie pinned her with a hard look. “So why didn’t you write me about that?”

“I mentioned I had an altercation with Lee Jordan—”

“But not that he’d been expelled for assaulting you.”

“He wasn’t. Technically.” She winced. “My dad knows about that?” He must have heard about it at work.

“And he has a lot of questions for you—me—ugh.” Archie blew out a frustrated breath. “Harry, you have to tell me these things. If you downplay the important events, how am I supposed to know when we’re in crisis mode?”

“We’re not in—”

Archie raised his voice to cover hers. “Because right now it feels like even if you were dying, you wouldn’t tell me!”

She clamped her mouth shut and stared at him. Was that really how she’d made him feel? “I wasn’t trying to hide it from you,” she said. “The Jordan thing was weird. I didn’t know what was going on until he attacked me, and then it was just—over. He left the school. So there wasn’t anything anyone could do at that point.”

“And what happened on Halloween?”

“That’s…complicated.”

Archie looked at his watch. “You have forty minutes until din—ow!” He doubled over, skin rippling, muscles and Merlin-knew-what-else sliding grotesquely underneath. She had to resist the urge to scoot backwards on the bed; Polyjuice transformations were as disturbing to watch as they were painful to experience.

When it was over, Archie panted on the emerald bedding. “Well, that’s rubbish,” he said. “Where was I?”

“We have forty minutes until dinner.”

“Yes, and you’re going to tell me every single thing that happened while you were pretending to be me.”

“Yes, Mum.”

“I…hmm, we seem to be experiencing a role reversal.” Archie frowned. “Aren’t you supposed to lecture me? Must be this Polyjuice. It’s making me confused. Can’t you jog in place or something to work it through your system faster?”

“I’m not sure it’s a function of metabolism,” she said, thinking. But what if it was? Her fingers itched for a notebook so she could write the question down for future experiments: did Polyjuice wear off faster if the subject exercised vigorously while under its influence? Or could some individuals metabolize it at a different rate for any reason? But then, the advertised period of effectiveness would be way off for those people.

She lost the thread of inquiry as her insides squirmed and her skin began to burn. Archie made a face and turned away until the transformation passed.

She fingered her unruly curls and reached for the glasses Archie had torn off in disgust the moment he entered the room. They perched smartly on her nose, and the world felt at once a step removed, safely filtered before it reached her, nothing like the uncomfortable immersion that was being Archie.

“I never knew how much I liked being me,” she said reverently.

They turned their backs on each other and switched clothes. Archie had worn her favorite blue sweater and a pair of jeans, and Rigel felt like a bird resettling into her nest as hugged herself.

Her cousin stretched his limbs. “It is good to be ‘Archie’ again.”

“I guess that makes me ‘Harry’ again.” She smiled. Yes. Harry. Perfect.

“Okay, Harry, then start going over the last four months with me.” Archie ran his hands through his hair, seemingly just because he could. “And I don’t mean the lies we’re going to tell our parents; I mean what really happened.”

Harry started at the beginning, knowing that unless Archie knew everything that transpired when she was him and vice versa, they might get their stories mixed up one day.

When she was finished, Archie blinked several times, then said, “The way you talk about your magic is both awesome and terrifying.”

“Awesome implies a bit of terror,” Harry said. “But what do you mean?”

“It sounds as though your magic can make things happen without you even learning how. If my magic could do that, think how many people I could help as a Healer.”

Harry frowned. “It’s not a good thing. It’s dangerous.”

“Only to people who try to hurt you,” Archie argued. “I’m glad it took care of Jordan.”

“It frightens me.”

“Why?” Archie searched her features, but Harry didn’t have a good answer to give him. It wasn’t a feeling she could rationalize. She couldn’t point to ‘that time she got stung by a bee’ and say there, that’s why she hated bees. This felt more instinctual. Like a fear of heights. A person didn’t have to fall off a cliff to be nervous about the edge. “Do you think it would turn on you?”

“What’s to stop it?” She asked herself that question all the time. “What if I got so embarrassed one day I wished I could disappear, and then I did? What if I was mad at you, and my magic lashed out even though I didn’t mean it to? My magic shouldn’t just give me whatever I want. I think—I think that’s how wizards go bad. They take whatever they want by the strength of their magic, even when it conflicts with what other people want.”

Archie made a face. “But it’s you.”

“Exactly.”

“Exactly, exactly,” Archie said. “Harry, you’re the most collected, level-headed, fair—”

“Don't forget honest,” she put in wryly.

“—just, kind-hearted—no, don't snort at me—hard-working, deserving person I’ve ever met, and if you reach the point that your magic lashes out at someone, you can bet they deserve it. Look at Jordan. Before that it never hurt anyone.”

“I only had a working wand for a month before it reached that level of—"

Archie put a hand over her mouth to quiet her, his grey eyes perfectly serious. “Even when we were kids, and you used to freak out when you did accidental magic, I never saw what the big deal was. You’re scared it might hurt someone but it never did. Your magic wouldn’t do something abhorrent to you, because it’s a part of you.”

“You can’t know that,” she mumbled beneath his hand. It was all too easy to say something bad ‘never happened’ until it did.

“But I do believe it.” Archie wiped his hand on the bed. “You’re a good person, Harry. Your magic is going to do good things.”

Harry thought of Snape’s chair bursting into a shower of needles, the ropes unraveling, straw dummies exploding, and she didn’t think it would really be that simple. Maybe her magic was benign now, but the only thing keeping the people close to her safe from it was her own emotions, which could swing wildly the moment her desires diverged from rational constraints.

Whatever Archie thought, her magic was dangerous. Like all dangerous things, it ought to be monitored. Controlled. But how could she monitor her own emotions?

Archie told her all about AIM, how his basic Healing classes were going, and his friend Hermione, of whom she was expected to speak fondly. She learned the names of his teachers, some key classmates in the Healing track, and in turn, she gave him easy-to-remember characteristics for Pansy and Draco, Fred and George, Ron and Neville, and, of course, Professor Snape, though she wasn’t sure if they’d be telling the family about her extra Potions work just yet.

When they thought they were ready to face the adults, they headed downstairs.

“There you two are.” Lily looked up from the onion she was chopping. “Finished exchanging secret confidences?”

Harry and Archie did not so much as exchange a guilty look.

“Just proving to Archie I’m still the best at Exploding Snap. Hi, Mum.” Harry ducked under Lily’s elbow for a sidelong hug. Previously, she wouldn’t have said her mother had a smell, but breathing it in, under the residual, lingering dung bomb smell in the air, she realized she’d missed it.

Lily gave her a strange look, but juggled the knife awkwardly to hug her back. “Hello darling. My, my, two hugs in one day; you must have missed me more than you let on,” she teased.

Harry smiled sheepishly, but internally she winced. Emotional weakness: 1; Ruse: 0. It would be foolish to relax now just because she was herself again. This was the most crucial stage, where their two lives overlapped with the people who knew them best, and where they had to explain away any discrepancies. Harry had to keep her wits.

“Archie, come here. I barely got to see you before you ran off upstairs.” Lily embraced Archie warmly. Over the top of Archie’s head, Lily added, “Harry, aren’t you going to give your uncle a proper hello?”

Harry felt extremely foolish crossing the kitchen and hugging Sirius as though it was the first time she’d seen him that day. It also felt wrong not to hug her father, who looked at once exactly the same and much older than he had four months ago, but she resisted the urge. She’d work one in later, more subtly. She could tell Archie was itching to pounce on his dad, too, but instead he shot her a commiserating smile.

As usual, Lily and Sirius cooked dinner. They who so seldom agreed on anything were like well-oiled clockwork in the kitchen. When Lily chopped, Sirius stirred, when Sirius put something in the oven, Lily set the timer. Even more amazing than the way they worked together was the way the food tasted when they worked together. It was like adding Lily’s cooking to Sirius’s cooking and multiplying by a factor of ten.

Dinner conversation should have been easy. They should have been able to fall back into old patterns and jokes as if they’d never been away. And it was, and they could, and yet...

“So, how do you like Hogwarts?”

A swift kick from Archie under the table kept Harry from answering automatically.

“It’s great,” Archie said enthusiastically. “The castle is grand, and I’ve made loads of friends, and the classes aren’t as old-fashioned as I thought.”

“Who’ve you pranked so far?” James asked. He eyed Archie over the top of his glasses like a manager waiting for an expense report.

“Well…uh…”

“You haven’t pranked anyone yet?” Sirius looked embarrassedly over at James and Remus, who both made the sign of the trickster with solemn faces. Lily rolled her eyes.

“Archie’s too smart to rush into unfamiliar territory with a handful of firecrackers,” Harry said.

“Yeah, I’ve been playing it carefully.” A sly smile grew on Archie’s face. “In fact, I was so careful no one else realizes this, but I started a prank war between Slytherin and Gryffindor. Biggest one the school’s seen in years. Now, I’ve got a pretty good idea of what the top players are capable of. Soon I can start on my own stuff.”

“Getting a handle on the competition first,” James said slowly. He nodded. “Clever.”

“And without identifying yourself as a threat,” Remus added. “They’ll underestimate you.”

“Oh-ho! I knew you were holding back this afternoon.” Sirius reached over to clap Archie on the back. “Was it Harry’s strategy? I know a long game when I see one. How did we end up with such smart kids, Prongs?”

“You had good taste in women,” Remus said dryly.

“It’s true.” James gave Lily a sappy smile. “Merlin knows all of Harry’s brains come from her mother.”

“She’ll need them,” Lily said. “Especially in those Healing classes. It’s a difficult route.”

“You’ve gone for Healing?” Remus paused with his fork halfway to his mouth. “Not Potions?”

“Archie and I have it all worked out,” Harry said, faux casual. “We’re going to try and fulfill each other’s dreams.” She ignored the way Remus slowly set his fork down and gave her his full attention. “In that vein, Healing classes are going great. Soon I’ll be able to mend broken bones, I think. I’m going to teach Archie a bit of the theory over winter break.”

Sirius rolled back one of his sleeves. “What luck! I have a bruise from setting up the pie launcher earlier—”

“What pie launcher is that?” Lily asked sweetly.

“Not the one at your house, Lils, the other—uh… I mean…quick, Harry, heal me up before your mum murders me.”

“Sirius Orion Black!”

“Is that where the pies we brought over yesterday went?” James looked a little heartbroken at the thought of dessert sacrificed for the greater goof.

Sirius pulled Harry’s chair back from the table and cowered behind her as though she was a human shield. “You’ll fix my bones when Lily breaks them, won’t you, my favorite niece?”

“Sorry, my second-favorite uncle. I’m not allowed to do magic outside of school,” Harry said.

Not to mention she had no idea how to heal bruises, much less a broken bone. She’d started reading up on the theory, but the Hogwarts library didn’t have a ton of Healing-related tomes.

“Oh, come on,” Sirius cajoled. He bent close as though imparting a grave secret. “The house is warded.”

“I just know you’re not encouraging my child to break the Decree for the Restriction of Underage Sorcery,” Lily said. The sugar-coating on her voice could have choked a candy cane.

“It’s actually called the Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery,” Sirius said loftily.

“I don’t care what it’s called! Our children are not getting expelled because you bumped your knee setting up pranks in your own house.”

“It was my elbow, Lilian.”

“It’ll be your skull, Sirius Black.”

“The smart witches always go for your brains,” Sirius told Archie conspiratorially. “They get smarter whenever you get dumber.” He eyed James meaningfully. “Remember that.”

Lily picked up the salt-shaker threateningly and it grew to the size of a swan. Harry thought her mother had done it until the hissing shaker came to life and began to thrash its way through the stuffed peppers. Sirius roared with laughter as the tail of the giant tableware whacked the mixed salad into James’ lap.

“Just another quiet dinner at Grimmauld Place,” Remus mused as he saved his pumpkin juice from certain annihilation.

“And since I have a feeling I know where the pies that were supposed to be for dessert went… can Archie and I be excused?” Harry asked.

James looked torn between wanting pie and wanting to see pie launched, but Remus excused them with a cheerful wink and they retreated to Archie’s room.

“So…”

“Yeah.”

“We haven’t got it good enough,” Archie said.

“It’s because we’re both trying to be two different people simultaneously.” Harry frowned. “What if instead of me trying to be you and you trying to be me and then getting confused on who’s who, we both try to be the same person?”

“You lost me.”

“We homogenize our alternate selves,” Harry explained. It was a perfect idea, and she didn’t know why Archie was looking at her as if she’d suggested they both get brain transplants. “I learn Healing, you learn Potions, we both prank the same amount and so—so we’re the same.”

“So we’re interchangeable,” Archie said. He grinned, starting to appreciate her genius. “We can’t be caught out when someone asks me to make a Potion or you to cure a cold if we can do those things.”

“It’ll mean a lot of extra studying for both of us,” Harry said. “But this had to happen anyway for us to be able to switch back eventually, right?”

“Right. And if our parents know we’re teaching one another, it won’t even be that weird when you get a Potions Mastery and I test for a Healing Certification, right?”

“Right. Even if someone suspects we switched, they won’t be able to prove it.”

“Unless they find out Harry was a boy when she attended AIM,” Archie said.

Harry wasn’t worried about that. “It’s not illegal to hide your sex. If anyone asks, I pretended to be a boy all those years. What are they going to do about it? But that means no one can ever know for sure that you’re a boy, Archie.”

“I’ll be the shyest boy at AIM,” Archie agreed. He frowned. “Wait, does this mean no…you know, until I’m seventeen?”

She shook her head, grossed out but also amused. “No, it just means you just can’t have sex while pretending to be me. Do whatever you want over the summer.”

“I don’t want to,” Archie said quickly. “I was just asking. It’s best to get these things sorted now.”

“Sure, but I think the bigger problem is our appearances,” Harry admitted. “I’ve been researching Polyjuice to try and find a way to make it last longer. I think we need to consider a permanent alteration if we’re going to survive, say, any random person who happens to meet both of us at any point over the next seven years.”

Archie groaned. “I don’t want to be you all the time. I want to switch back over the summers and breaks.”

“I’ll do my best.” But she wouldn’t make any promises. They were swiftly approaching a point of no return.

“Okay, I trust you.”

Harry nodded gratefully. “Back to our schooling: we should create a combined syllabus for all the Hogwarts and AIM classes we’re taking. Some of it will overlap, but we have to fill in any of the gaps that don’t.”

“It’s going to be like attending two schools at once.” Archie rubbed his forehead. “Who knew chasing your dreams was so hard?”

“You can back out now, if you want,” Harry offered. It pained her to put the choice on the table, but she’d never force Archie to do anything he didn’t want to do. “I’ll cook up some Spattergroit for us to catch, we’ll be out of school for a few months, and when we go back, it won’t be surprising that we look slightly different. Just say the word.”

Archie took a deep breath and let it slowly out. “Never. We’re in this together, Harry, and I am going to be the second-best Potions brewer in our generation by the time we’re through.”

“Then I’ll be the second-best Healer.”

“You’d better be.” Archie sniffed. “If you pick up Healing faster than I do, I shall be very put out.”

“You won’t be worried when you see my wand work.”

“I haven’t even seen your new wand yet. Where is it?” Archie asked expectantly.

Harry paused to think about it. “Um, I think it’s in my—I mean, your trunk. Maybe.”

“No wonder it’s mad at you.” Archie shook his head. “You’ve practically abandoned the poor thing.”

“Have not.” All the same, she crossed to the un-shrunk trunk and dug around in it until she found her wand rolled up in a pair of old socks. She half-expected the wand to shock her for the indignity when she pulled it free, but it thrummed happily, purring like a cat beneath her hand. It was more forgiving than she’d thought. Or it was saving its energy to catch her unaware.

“Ready to face the grown-ups again?” Archie asked.

“It’ll get easier,” Harry muttered. It had to. “Bring the schoolbag in your trunk to Potter Place tomorrow morning. I’ll bring whatever assignments you left in mine. We’ll make a study plan.”

“Deal.” Archie squeezed her in a sudden hug. “Don’t worry. We’ll get through this firestorm.”

“And find stars on the other side, right, Archie?” It was something Diana used to say.

“And find worlds on the other side, Harry.”

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[end of chapter seventeen].