Ever steady, they floated, casting their shines on all, giving warmth while rain was dashing against the ancient windows, like so many times on the respective date. Flashing the hall, the occasional lightning rushed across the ceiling below which glowing grimaces danced. Lively voices echoed all around, disregarding the battle of good and bad above. Plenty of food between them. Enough candy to give them caries for years. And yet not all of them felt the need to feed themselves. Not everyone could enjoy the atmosphere. Up on the staff table, one seat was empty.
“Hey Malfoy!”, one of his housemates called over, with a mischievous laugh. “Where’s your father?”
“Prepartying, apparently!”, laughed another, frustrating the boy even more.
“Ignore them.”, grumbled his best friend.
“Doesn’t make them stop, now does it? Maybe I should just play along, no idea. Is your dad gonna come to the party?”
“No. I won’t be going there either.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t feel like watching others getting drunk. Actually, I don’t feel like watching Slughorn getting drunk. Not that he’s ever fully sober anyway.”
“Hm. If you say so,”
“Besides, there’s still an essay I need to finish before Thursday.”
“I thought you were done?”
“I’m not satisfied with it.”
“But you know he’ll be,”
“Yeah. And that’s the problem. He’ll always be satisfied with anything I do. Not because I’m good at it, but because it’s me.”
“Yeah.”, said Lisa who sat opposite to them. “That’s just how it is. And if you write that you can chuck a Phoenix feather into Veritaserum to make it tell people what the interrogator wants to hear, instead. He’d find it an ingenious thought that is worth trying out and give you an O as well as fifty points.”
“As long as we’d win the House Cup,”, giggled her friend Aubrey.
“Actually, you should be awarded fifty points, Lisa.”, grumbled Albus. “Because that is just what a Phoenix feather added to fresh Veritaserum will do. Doesn’t change its appearance, doesn’t change the smell only a well trained nose can detect, doesn’t change the behaviour of the drinker. Other than that they answer, well, with what the interrogator wants to hear.”
“What? Who found that out?”
“The one who’ll hopefully be our Potions teacher next year. Personally, I wouldn’t mind a mid-term change.”
“Wait a minute – are you talking about – ?”
“Yes, Aubrey.”, Albus grunted.
“Tz. Didn’t you just say you don’t want special treatment?”
“What a clever girl you are.”
“Sure. But then wishing for your granddad to be our teacher,”
“Yes. Because he’ll teach us to brew potions, not to be bootlickers. In his classroom, it’s achievements and thirst for knowledge and skill that matter, not fame.”
“How can you say? He hasn’t been teaching for twenty years. You were never in a classroom of his.”
“Neither were you. If you excuse me now,”, he raised and meant to leave, but not without – “Scorpius?”
“I’m still hungry. And you know I’ll be going to the party.”
“Fine. If you decide otherwise, you know where to find me. Good night.”
~~#~~
“Is there any more?”
There was much more, but for now, she knew, it would suffice. Turning her ring around the finger, she looked out into the rain, listened to the sound of it hitting the old glass of the octagonal tower. In it, reflected the firelight from the other side of the ring shaped table. It was not an exact ring, as a gap was cut into it. A gap that was facing the stairs up to a high throne, which was framed by a window of stained glass each. Furs were lining the stairs, at either side of the blood red carpet. Yet it hadn’t always been of that colour. Only minutes ago, she had been the tenth in the room. Eight around the table. The ninth laid on the formerly crème carpet, a stuck grin facing the spiky chandelier that hung right above the hole in the centre of the table ring. Dancing, the candles’ flames flickered in his shining but cold eyes. Leaking from the whole width of his neck, what gave the carpet its new varnish.
“Milady Ambages?”
Desisting of the golden ring, she pulled the wand back out of her ornamented belt. Ponderingly patted the tip on her left palm with it, three times. Then she flicked it. Behind her, the corpse took off and glided through the air. Sizzling, the fire in the huge chimney took care of it, filling the mouldy air with a harsh yet wondrously sweet smell. Inhaling it deep, she turned around with a satisfied smile, her shoes trailing over the furs. Slow but content she glided onto the high throne. Both elbows on the arm rests, her wand held playfully between with each hand, her smile wandered from one head to the other.
“Petty.”, she smirked. “I wished there had been another way, but my dear husband was slowing things down, and, as I believe, you can understand, we have been slowed down long enough. But yes, We shall grant him his last wish. The serpent’s head must fall. Though not yet. For this, it is still a bit early. Too many are there, that could stand in our way. Untouchable, hidden safely and even gaining access would be too suspicious. Time will tell, if we can lure them out somehow. Still, who isn’t with us, is against us and shall burn on the stake. I trust you bring news, Sir Irchard? How would you say, is Mr Fletcher’s liver?”
“His tea is hardly of the healthy sort.”, Sir Irchard laughed, brushing his fingers over his ginger moustache, and the other men and women laughed with him.
“Lady Margaret?”
“Let me say that much, as cunning as Goblins are, their weakness ever was and will always be gold. There are some funds that have been frozen and forgotten for too many years. Nobody will miss them.”
“Good. Sir Damian?”
“Things are in progress. Or they are standing still. All a matter of the beholder’s moving speed.”, she had to laugh, but it was a cold and high pitched laugh – and still, it was amused.
“They do not call you an Unspeakable for nothing. Good, good. The rest of you, I have knowledge of your – ah – progress and that shall do for now. Let us not delay the ceremony any longer. After all we are finally celebrating our fallen martyrs tonight.”
~~#~~
Every decision she had made at home, she already regretted. From taking the day off although having known beforehand she would spend the night alone in her room, especially when an owl had woken her with a notice that the head of the Department of International Magical Cooperation had deceased overnight, and the reason why she had actually taken the day off, to her choice of not only not having early breakfast but skipping it entirely, even the clothes she had picked, coat down to her underwear and shoes. She regretted it all the moment she appeared on the cliffside and was nearly blown into the sea by the iciest wind she had felt since sliding downhill towards a boathouse with the bell of a buoy ringing for its life. Yes, even icier than Dementors in the rain or the Black Lake in February.
Although she regretted all that, despite only needing to Apparate back home and simply come back another day, she stumbled on, over the slippery rocks, crouching already so that she wouldn’t give the wind an excuse to lift her off her way too thin soles and go dancing with the foaming sea. She knew she was closer to the barrier than at her first visit, but it felt like years of having to crawl over the ground. Then, like a Fata Morgana in what was nothing but a grey and brown blur, the house was there. Someone must have seen her and let her in, she knew, the moment the bubble of enchantments sucked her inside. If only they stopped the weather, she thought. And if only the wooden stairs hadn’t been even more slippery than the rocks.
With a shriek that got lost in nature’s rampage, she noticed a hand before her. As if her life depended on it, she clutched it tight, surprised by the warmth and strength, and by the speed she was dragged into the house with. As soon as the door was shut, she fell to the floor and lost her hearing. Or maybe it was merely the house’s perfect insulation. Yes, she did hear the wind howl, still, and the waves rush, but it was all like miles away and to her left, blessing her like a choir of angels, the lit fireplace smiled at her. But she must have gone mad. It smiled at her with Harry’s face. It even greeted her with Harry’s voice.
“Good morning,”, he snickered amused. “It seems you’ve finally found out that there is nothing more challenging than coastal Hebridian autumn storms. Make sure she’s still alive tomorrow. We can’t have another department head dead.”
“Very – charming – ”, she coughed water.
“I gotta go. After all, I’m her deputy and need to do her work today.”
“Piss off – Edwin.”, panting heavily, she rolled onto her back and closed her eyes.
“Edwin?”, a voice she hadn’t expected, startled her.
“Forget it.”, she grunted at the man who was curiously looking down on her. “You apparently have anyway.”
“If you say so,”
Again he offered his hand to her and she knew it had been him before as well, although he was miraculously dry. Maybe he had been clever enough to protect himself against the rain. After all he should have expected to get wet, should he leave the house. Thankful, she let herself be pulled to her feet another time. What he wore, was blood red and looked incredibly Chinese. Wide trousers and a wide gown that reached almost to his knees. She wasn’t sure if the sleeves were double layers or if it was a gown over another shirt. Rather the second, she considered, as the long gown was silkier than the trousers and wrist long sleeves under the upper. The slant row of ornamental knots as buttons and the tight high collar were undoubtedly Chinese. His goatee wasn’t twisted now, but he had bound a top layer of his dark ginger waves to a small – fishbone braid as she would get to see – at the back.
“Take off your clothes.”, he said grim and turned to the adjacent kitchen.
It was only separated from the entrance area by a slim piece of wall on the left on which a big black framed mirror hung, a fence of half its width on the right, pillars and spandrels between, all made from the same almost black wood as the wall panelling and floor board. The black chimney to her left was flanked by a small window on each side and framed by a low iron fence on the floor. A painting of some bamboo in front of foggy mountains hung above the mantelpiece and on it stood one of Luna’s infamous Thestral figurines, a candelabrum that had obviously been lit between her last visit and now and a woven cornucopia filled with differently coloured small pumpkins that hadn’t been there before.
Still however, in the corner left of her between chimney and doorside wall, stood a crooked old table carrying a gramophone and some stacked baskets beneath On the chimney’s other side, on a black dresser below the mirror and although the letters from last time had been replaced with more small pumpkins, laid something that was more curious than the Thestral figurines or even the pool one floor under the round rug she stood on: Two lit candles and a small green and golden vase with an exotic seeming flower that had either been renewed or never stopped blooming rested on the black coffin that could have been for a child. Behind it by the window, another vase with more Asian appearing greens. Between the candles laid a holly twig.
“Who’s in that coffin, if you don’t mind me asking?”
“I’ll tell you if you undressed, picked Alastor’s coat from the valet stand; if you don’t have any spare clothes with you; and made sure I don’t see too much of your skin. Don’t forget to take off your shoes. Severus hates it if I forget to wipe my paws off and print the floor with mud. Don’t make me explain to him why your shoes did the same or why Harry murdered me because you died from hypothermia.”
“Alright, alright!”, she barked, shaking her head but doing as he had told her.
Luckily she had indeed spare clothes in her beaded bag. Luckily, a Weasley Jumper, woollen socks and comfortable leggings. The house was warm, but she was still freezing.
“Shoes on the rack.”
“Sorry?”
“I said, put the shoes on the rack.”, Igor hissed impatiently.
“How can you – oh. Right. The mirror.”
“Yes. Are you dressed?”
“Uh – ”
“Just because I saw your shoes standing in the wrong spot, doesn’t mean I saw you.”
“Yes, I am dressed.”, Hermione huffed. “The coffin.”
He slouched over and nodded her to him. The light from the candles gave his eyes a spooky glow when he squeezed himself between the dresser and the iron fence. Very tense, she waited for him to tell a story. But instead, he pulled on each of the three small iron handles at the coffin’s side, revealing them to be nothing but drawers that were filled with quills, parchment and other writing utensils respectively. Shooing her back with hasty flicks of his hands, he too stepped out and pulled the lid to the left without causing the objects on it to fall, as it was apparently fixed by a spindle. Neatly sorted, inside it, were a number of filled as well as empty envelopes and quite a stack of postcards, the top one more than obviously from a place only Luna would visit. A slack wave of his left hand closed the coffin again. Blinking heavily with her lips ajar, she eyed his bored frown from below.
“What did you think?”, Igor asked sardonically.
“Not what I expected.”, she breathed her reply.
“Well now you know.”, shrugging it off, he turned for the kitchen again, but this time also walked into it. “Tea?”
“Oh yes, please!”
The idea of warm tea sounded better than anything to her, actually. Sitting down at the wider stove-, fridge- and sink-side of the table, she looked out through the two broad windows, one of them being covered by the greenhouse, the other in the open. The rest of the walls were lined with more black kitchen furniture, to her right and behind her also hanging cupboards. Last time already, she had admitted to herself that she liked how the kitchen looked less organised than the rest of the house, with all the useful clutter standing around: pots with herbs on this side of the mirror carrying wall, more of such hanging from it. Now the mixing bowls and cutting boards had apparently been stored, but the big scale still stood on the counter’s end by the door to the greenhouse.
In the doorside corner, the tallest cabinet, reaching from floor to ceiling. This wall to her right hosted more windows and the counters were still cluttered with mugs, four teakettles, a stand with coloured boxes that, according to their labels, contained different sorts of loose tea and a glass covered whatnot with various desserts. A single counter, behind her and between the old fridge and stove, was crammed with bottles that held different oils, vinegars and spices, a knife block and some other kitchen tools in a stand. Left of the stove was another piece of counter, then the sink with a window behind as well, and above, in the outwards corner, no cupboard, but instead an L-shaped shelf board with some books and a single red rose in a slim vase. She could have sworn the rose had been white last time however.
Meanwhile Igor had already taken some tea from a separate jar that was kept in the tall cabinet and filled it into the kettle, the water in it having started boiling on the stove already. As soon as the mist hit the crumpled leaves, Hermione’s eyes shot open and she had to giggle.
“No need to laugh. Did you honestly think I didn’t know you shared your favourite sort of tea?”
“What if mine had changed over the years?”
Refusing her an answer, he placed the black kettle along with a mug on the table and sent the brown kettle flying like the other before, so it could collect water from the tap and settle down on the stove for boiling as well. The spearmint jar back where it had come from, he picked one that stood next to it. Squinting, she tried to identify the mixture, but failed terribly. Whatever it was, the smell of it wasn’t nearly as pleasant as her tea’s. Distorting her face, she accepted its existence. Apparently it tasted better than it smelled, or otherwise he wouldn’t drink it, she believed. Or did he have to? She remembered talks about medicine. Also what had happened in the courtroom. Was that what painted Igor’s teeth yellow? The infamous tea of doom that was also his lifesaver? If that was the case, she could indeed be very grateful of how healthy she still was.
“Now.”, he took the brown kettle and a very plain red mug with him to the table and placed the things not far from hers, before he grabbed the chair to her right and turned it slightly, so he wouldn’t have to distort his neck when looking at her. “Let me guess.”, crossing his legs, he rested his left palm on his thighs, the right elbow on the table, his head leant onto his loosely bent right fingers. “You didn’t expect to find only me here.”
“No.”, she had to confess. “Where are the others?”
“Aberforth is back in Hogsmeade, sadly. After Minerva found out he’d moved in with us – ”, Igor sighed downright musically, “That woman is one furious cat, I’m telling you. Looks like she loves him and wasn’t very pleased about his decision to just disappear without a notice. Her excuse was that as the owner of a business, he bemudded his sworn responsibility towards the people of Hogsmeade.”
“Tz.”, chuckled Hermione. “Really.”
“Yes. As if she was the mayor of that forsaken snow cave or something. Now his room is empty and Ariana is back in the pub. Petty. I started liking her. It is very interesting to talk to a teenager from a century ago, you must know. But we also couldn’t miss the complaints of students wanting to sneak out through the Room of Requirement. He never told us whom he had replaced her with.”
“Wait. It doesn’t matter what portrait is hanging there?”
“Silly girl. Of course not! Does it matter what sink or potty you place over a wormhole pit?”
“Uh no.”
“There you go.”
“Is it clear now, that the castle created a sort of wormhole pit?”
“Have you come to a different conclusion?”, his bored stare cost her an unnerved smirk, but nothing more.
“So? Where are the others?”, she demanded but startled from a very brief, high pitched sound, almost like someone had stepped onto a hooter.
“Zhùfú nǐ.”
“What?”, Hermione shortly bent down to look under the table, but all she saw was an empty cat bed on the floor, over by the counter with the herb pots.
“Yuèguāng sneezed.”
“Oh. Is he in that bed?”
“No.”, upon her frown, he rolled his eyes. “Of course he’s in his bed. I’d see him if he was sitting higher and I’d have heard him move, anyway. Also that means your tea is ready. Mine still needs a bit. Now don’t look at me like that. Of course Demiguises don’t sneeze if spearmint tea is ready to be drunk. At least none that I know. But he sneezes when mine is about to be ready and, while I might be a hopeless mathematician, that much I can guess passed time. Not as precise as Severus can though,”
Huffing, she poured some into the mug and held it with both hands then, warming her fingers for a few moments before she took the soothing sip. He had measured correctly. It was exactly to her liking. Neither too intense nor too watery. But she wasn’t sure he had said the truth about the sneeze at all, as she just now noticed the clock above the greenhouse door. Smirking at it with her eyes flicking back and forth between it and him remained without result however, as he didn’t bother her while filling his own stinky solution into his red mug. By that, she got to see the other side of it. It carried a small image of the Russian flag and some Cyrillic text. Curious, she leaned a little to the side so she could read it, aloud.
“Я не могу сохранять спокойствие. Я русский.”
“Christmas present from Alastor.”
“Really. Who would have thought.”
“What.”, wiggling his eyebrows once, he then took a sip himself.
“That you can’t keep calm. But I hardly think that’s due to your nationality. Also you haven’t exactly freaked out since I came here.”
“Would you like me to change that?”, he put down the mug on his thigh, holding it with both hands too now.
“Not really,”, Hermione sighed with a worried smirk, but his sudden warm smile was so contrary to the sarcastic hint his voice had born throughout their entire conversation that it caught her off-guard.
“To continue answering your question, Alastor is still asleep. Or, again, as it is. He woke up with extreme phantom pain in his leg, so I gave him a sleeping potion. We’ll see how he’ll do in – ”, Igor quickly checked the clock, “Four hours. I measured it so he won’t wake up too long before Severus comes home for lunch.”
“So he’s at work? In this turmoil? And you aren’t?”
“People here aren’t exactly famous for wanting to buy meat on All Hallows’ Day. Regardless of nature’s mood. What is your excuse for having taken the day off? And don’t say you liked our weather forecast.”
“I thought he wouldn’t work today, actually.”
“Well, there goes all your plans, Hermione.”
“You don’t say.”
“But if you should reconsider your plans and want to get back to the Ministry, as you hopefully noticed, there is a safe Floo line between our ground floor chimney and Harry’s office.”
“What’s the password, in case I need it?”
“Three guesses.”
“What?”, the moan had just left her without meaning to. “But it could be anything!”
“Goodness, never heard of that saying? I didn’t actually mean you to – never mind. It is more a pun than a password, actually.”, nonetheless she urged him with quick blinking. “Ashwinder eggs.”
“I would have never been able to guess that, by the way.”, if he was capable of bored frowns, so was she.
“And I hope you know I wouldn’t have cut your tongue out if you had needed more than three guesses.”
“What makes you sure I haven’t expected you to.”
“That I have faith in your good heart?”
Those words actually educed a surprised chuckle from her. What exactly had he said that for? Something in his look told her, that he hadn’t made fun of her with those words. They meant something and she was utmost curious as to what exactly he had referred to.
“Why do you hate women?”
“I don’t? Who says I hate women?”
“Multiple people have come to the conclusion, if you really wish to know. You are acting quite averse to us.”
“I don’t hate women.”, she was actually very glad now that he remained calm.
“But you don’t think particularly high of us.”
“Do I have to throw velvet carpets before your feet so to make you believe I value anyone whom I deem worthy of being valued by me?”
“Uh – no! It’s just – ”
“It is true. I don’t exactly fancy women.”
“No. You’re gay.”
“Yes. But that doesn’t automatically make anyone a misogynist, or does it?”
“Perhaps it does, however, in your case?”
“Whether my tendency to stay in careful distance to women and my sexuality are connected is not a question you should ask me.”, now his tone did become a little fierce. “I’m not a psychologist.”, in spite, she looked straight into his eyes, noticing gladly that it was enough to take away his defensive tension.
“The orphanage you grew up in was run by women, wasn’t it?”
Upon that he had to clear his throat. Covering it up by taking a sip of his horrific tea, he also gave himself time to consider his next words, she knew.
“Russian women are one of a kind, you must know. Especially in authoritative positions. If you hear one yelling at a four-year-old who peed his pants that he will never be a real man and they let him stand outside naked in winter; mind, in Siberia; so he `learns to appreciate clean clothes´, you certainly find your ways to avoid women. Trust me as I say, Hermione, had I not decided to draw a line between myself and that place once I had received notice from Durmstrang, I would have become a killer much sooner in my life.”
“Someone should forbid places like that.”, she gargled, needing a sip herself.
“And still there are more orphanages around the world that aren’t the admirable showpiece Draco has created. It isn’t the places. It is the people that run them.”
“So Durmstrang was your chance to finally live?”
“I would say, it was, yes. Maybe even something mildly like a home. Still I never managed to fit in. I guess I’ll never know if it was because there is too much diversity in the school or because I just can’t.”
“Diversity? Oh you mean, because the school accepts students from multiple countries that don’t have the same national language?”
“For example, yes,”
“Yeah. Viktor told me that the first year is mostly English courses and that you are only allowed to take actual classes if they consider your English acceptable. Was it always like that?”
“It was. Well, at least already when I started my education. I never asked about the time before English became the global language. Of course you are free to continue English classes past the first year as well, and they offer other languages. Not only for students. Teachers can take them as well.”
“Interesting. Is that how you learned Italian?”
“No. My Italian is still terrible. I did take lessons, but dropped out. I may have been fascinated by Italian Renaissance fashion and architecture, but it wasn’t enough to keep me fully interested. There were other subjects that had more priority to me, in the end. But I cannot deny, it had happened to have appeared – ”
“Appeared being useful.”, Hermione laughed heartly, believing to know now whom the phrase had come from, originally.
“Yes. What’s so funny.”
“Nothing.”, she grinned. “You lived in Venice for a while, didn’t you?”
“I did, yes. But it didn’t satisfy me the way I had hoped. So I went to other places. All around the world, nowhere more than a month, at first. Strangely I ended up back in Venice for – a week and a half, eventually. But then I made the happy mistake to randomly sneak into the opera. They played Turandot. Italy died for me that night. It was almost like the country itself had told me to abandon it for good and go to China. I think if it hadn’t been for Severus, I’d still be in Nanshi.”
“Didn’t he want to live there?”
“Oh I think he would have accommodated himself well. He even learned Mandarin for me, although I never asked him to. But when the war was over, he asked me where I wanted to live. He told me to name any place. I wondered if our old house by the sea was still standing.”
“And it was.”
“Yes. It had survived under its bubble of magic, all those years.”
“How much have you altered it, over time?”
“Very much. But this kitchen and the entrance room are pretty much the same. The greenhouse got some sturdier windows meanwhile, but what you see here, hasn’t changed. Of course the bathroom area was what we changed the most. Originally, we didn’t have a cellar or first floor. So what now is the stairs, had been bathroom as well. My room was what Alastor’s is now, Aberforth’s room was once Severus’, inter alia. We always wanted separate rooms, so either could have their peace, but we could share beds if we wanted.”
“Therefore the double bed.”, Hermione noticed.
“Yes. After the war, we built the first floor, like it is now, roofed balcony included, so we could still sit outside if the wind from the sea was getting uncomfortable. The sofa and chaise longue were probably the nicest addition though. I also like the roofed trench around Alastor’s room and the bathroom.”, she briefly stretched her neck to see it. “Nice place to relax in summer and the goats sometimes drank from it. Oh and my room is slightly bigger now too.”
“Ran out of storage for your knife collection?”
“Maybe?”, Igor grinned, but only for three seconds. “Also we had to find space for the piano. They had a little fight about it, but in the end Alastor accepted that Severus didn’t want it in the sitting room. The chess table was the compromise.”
“Why don’t you have the sitting room down here? Wouldn’t it be easier for Alastor to not climb upstairs?”
“You do know he can fly, yes?”
“Oh. Well, yes. Now that you say,”
“We would have had to make bigger windows, but even down on Crimea, on very stormy days, the spring tides would splash over the cliff and hit those. We wanted a cosy place, not having to sit behind closed shutters.”, she could relate to that from experience.
“And why do you have two gramophones? I mean, the one upstairs is Tobias’. I recognised it.”
“The one down here is Alastor’s. Previously they were swapped, as that one was connected to a – very – uh – interesting wireless radio.”
“Wait a minute! Arthur had something like that in his barn, years ago! He built the radio into the gramophone for saving space!”
“Yes. His daughter asked him. I don’t think she told him whose it is; not even now. Maybe he knew anyway. He’d once built the combo for Alastor.”
“And he never asked her where she’d gotten it from?”, Igor shrugged on it.
“No. Maybe he had, but she didn’t say anything to us about it. So yes, we scraped a nice piece off the bathroom corridor for the stairs at first, but as Severus’ room went higher, we built the pool into it. The loo being right next to it was interesting, but Alastor wanted to keep it that way. It amused him.”
“So you had a tub, a shower and an indoor pool? All the time?”
“Yes. But not fully all the time. Sadly the pool had to go when Harry and Ginevra decided to stay overnight more often, children included. We restored the previous room, with a double bed and a small one for James, which we later turned into a bunk bed and even added another bed for Lily. The room is, as I said, currently Aberforth’s. Or was, if Minerva really forces him to leave us. We got rid of the additional beds after moving to Skye. But after we removed the pool for the benefits of accommodating visitors properly, it wasn’t long until Alastor simply blasted a hole into the bathroom.”
“Why?”
“Because he insisted on having the pool back!”, Igor wailed. “Fortunately Severus stopped him before he would tear the house apart. That was the birth of the cellar and the bigger pool down there. It doesn’t have daylight anymore, but the fake windows aren’t all too bad and the waterfall compensates it. Also that Mongolian Demon’s Fig, Luna’s wedding gift to us, flourishes well down there. They usually grow in caves, needing little soil and they filter the moist air around. The glowing substance that is created in their roots and eventually fills the fruits, has extraordinary cell renewing properties. It is one of the ingredients of Skelegro, by the way. Unfortunately it cannot bring anything back that had been gone for more than a few weeks. It is good for emergencies, but our hope that it would grow back Alastor’s leg was in vain.”
“It’s still interesting to have. And to look at.”
“Inter alia, yes. And Yuèguāng really likes the fruits.”
“Ginny wondered how he’s still alive. Could it be the fruits?”, Hermione considered immediately.
“Maybe? I don’t know. They might have extended his life expectancy by now, yes, but I don’t think we will ever know for sure. After all, Severus and I haven’t been married that long yet. And Yuèguāng isn’t an ordinary Demiguise either, as one might say.”, he refilled his mug, causing Hermione’s nose to tickle, but she could prevent the sneeze by rubbing it.
“What do you mean?”
“When he came to me, I thought he was a cub. But he hasn’t grown an inch since. Also his eyes are much brighter than those of known Demiguises. Usually they have entirely black eyes that only glow up blue when they are stressed and reckon what is going to happen around them, but his are missing whatever enzyme that blackens the coroneas as well and so you can see the colour of his pupils. Luna showed me one of Newt Scamander’s diaries. He too had a Demiguise with that eye mutation, but it was of normal body size.”
“Maybe it’s because neither is living in the wild?”
“Perhaps the other way round. Yuèguāng’s eyes were like that already when I moved into the apartment in Nanshi. He lived in the old tree in the patio. My theory is rather that whatever substance it is, it must be so essential that it influences their behaviour towards humans. Makes them more trusting, in general. Newt found his Demiguise in a park, not in the the wild. Luna has done some research on it, but couldn’t find any urban Demiguises herself to prove it.”
“What a surprise. Seeing as they can turn invisible.”
“Oh no, that isn’t the issue!”, Igor assured. “It is more the fact that they avoid the presence of humans. She has however found a wild group. But none of them had the mutation, so it might take years until we can say for sure. She noticed though that they were really aggressive before they fled, when she tried to approach them. Of course they had been invisible, but they realised she could see them.”
“Hm.”, something in the back of her head still wouldn’t stop wanting to break through. “About Alastor’s leg.”, she pondered out loud. “Voldemort created a magical hand for Pettigrew. Could it not be possible that – ”
“Minutes after he cut it off.”, said Igor curt.
“But – ”
“If such magic was the ultimate solution, don’t you think more people would run around with magical limbs? Spells to temporarily create such have been found centuries ago. But so far, the number of successful attempts was limited and all were flawed to some extent. Of course, someone like Severus could make you believe its possibility. Tell you how easy the theory behind it is. Your loyalty to his ways of thinking is admirable. And yet, he would also tell you that the permutation is far from it. The part of it you try to ignore to the best you can. On that matter, wizards are as experienced as Muggles are. Fully functional artificial body parts are a dream that still is just a dream. Even Alastor’s eye doesn’t always do what it should. And there is an expiry date to chopped nerves.”
“But if there is something like phantom pain,”
“By all means, if you want to be cleverer than people who dedicated their lives to studies about it, do it. Change your subject of expertise and find the ground breaking invention. I’d really like to believe you are able to. But don’t think I expect you to succeed in Alastor’s lifetime. Prove me wrong or drop it.”
“Fine, then not.”, Hermione heard something through the storm that made her straighten with interest. “Was that – ”
“Hm? Ah yes, Ab left us three of his goats. They are in their cote, right under the windows behind me.”
“Oh! And you – ”, she giggled, “Don’t mind them?”
“As long as I don’t have to take care of them,”
“Sure.”
“Speaking of goats – have you had breakfast yet?”
“Speaking of goats.”, Hermione grumbled under her breath, but continued louder. “No, I haven’t had goats – I mean breakfast, yet.”
“Not that I’m a chef or anything,”, Igor placed his mug on the table and raised, “But I can handle breakfast. Blinis? Syrniki? Rye bread? Gruel? Eggs? Bean goulash? Kasha?”
“What’s Kasha?”
“Buckwheat porridge.”
“Oh. No, I think I take the normal gruel.”, he opened one of the doors of the cabinet and took out a big jar of oatmeal, while clattering, a pot had filled itself with milk from one of the big cans that had come flying from between fence and fridge, and landed on the stove which turned itself back on.
“With butter? More salty? Sweet? Jam to it?”, he asked as the milk can returned to its space and he poured some of the flakes into the pot.
“Uh – maybe a little bit of butter, yes. Not a chef, huh?”
“Harry told me to – ”
“Keep me alive, yes.”, she grunted, but gasped when a silver fur ball suddenly sat on the table.
“Серьезно?”, the man grumbled and summoned another pot as well as the milk again and heated a second plate for it.
“What’s he – does he like gruel too or what?”
“He’s addicted to it. Recognises the sound of it in the jar when it is being moved.”, Hermione turned her head more to see that Igor summoned a slice of butter from the fridge, but kept it levitating. “Eats more of it than all of us combined. Next to greens and fruits, of course. And black currant jam. You should hear the protest if I don’t mix it in.”, a glass of it also left the fridge and Yuèguāng straightened, scratching some of the longest fur beneath his chin. “This is his second breakfast today, in case you wonder. He’s already had the same, an hour before you came here.”
“You’ve been up since six? On a free day?”, chuckled Hermione, pouring some more spearmint tea into her mug to cover the other’s scent.
“So have you. And not every redhead is like your husband.”
“Obviously. I’ve been up since five, by the way. An owl ruined my sleep. Not Ron’s though. What did Harry want?”
“Telling us not only that Theodore Ambages from the Department of Mysteries still hasn’t come come back to work since his wife had given birth, but that someone died. Head of the Department of International Magical Cooperation.”
“Well, that was the owl that woke me.”
“He wasn’t too old, according to Harry.”
“No. Not the youngest, but not a Dumbledore, if you know what I mean.”, he nodded, mutually pouring the two gruels into a bowl each, the right one bigger and flatter and she could see that all of the pot’s content went into it, while the left bowl only took in half of – her – meal. “But everyone knew he had liver issues. It was just a matter of time.”
“Nothing anyone could do about it?”
“No. Sure, livers are highly regenerative, but he would have needed a new one.”
The butter had landed on her gruel, which sailed towards the table, while he mixed some of the jam into the other, by it, silently confirming to her smirk that he was left-handed. During the Triwizard Tournament, she had never paid attention to how he had held his cutlery, if though her brain told her now that she had noticed multiple times in which hand he preferred his wand. Also he had dragged her in with his left hand. A spoon settled down by her bowl.
“Thanks.”
“Prego.”, the jam returned to the fridge and the still half full pot was back on the stove, but on one of the rear plates so it wouldn’t burn.
“You don’t need a second breakfast?”, his answer was more stinky tea flowing into his Mug Of Truth with a little more force and the bigger bowl placed before Yuèguāng’s fur-less crouched toes.
“I wouldn’t have offered you Syrniki if there weren’t some left in the fridge.”, he sighed and sat back down just like he had before, legs crossed, right arm supporting his head, but the mug remained on the table this time. “Mine aren’t nearly as good as Severus’. Another reason I got up with him. Oh and that he didn’t manage to slip out of bed without my notice today. Normally he gets up earlier and wakes me with the smell of breakfast. Or a kiss, on Sundays.”
“Sweet.”, swallowing down sudden jealousy with a spoonful of surprisingly very tasty gruel, she wondered why Yuèguāng downright meditated over his. “Why’s he not eating, if he’s been so eager at first?”
“Because he knows when it has cooled down enough so he won’t burn his fingers?”
“Oh my. Sure. How silly of me.”
But only seconds later, the mix of a monkey and a sloth dug his long fingers into the sludgy pink like a shovel and started eating with visible delight, licking his fingers clean every few mouthfuls, so he wouldn’t push any of the gruel into the fur that reached his wrist. What surprised her more than the cleanliness was that he too was using his left hand.
“Interesting.”, she thought out loud with a frown. “He’s a lefty as well.”
“Oh he’s ambidextrous. He eats with his left hand, but prefers his right hand as much as he can when cleaning his fur. If he climbs onto something, he always uses his right hand first, but if he jumps over gaps, his left is the first to grab.”
“He does that deliberately?”, for some reason, Yuèguāng mostly held eye contact with her while both ate.
“I think so. Yes.”
“What the – ”, his orangey yellow topaz eyes had suddenly flashed up blue.
“Hm?”, Igor turned his head off her, but must have been too slow to see.
“His eyes – ”
Before she could finish her sentence, her shriek stopped it, but Yuèguāng’s flat right hand zoomed onto the tabletop without stopping to look at her. Casually, just as if he had expected it, his fingers closed and Hermione could hear very faint squeaking coming from it as he stretched out the arm, towards Igor. With a quiet chuckle the man closed the distance and accepted the –
“Mouse.”, Hermione puffed at the little head sticking out of the fist, struggling. “Has he seen that coming or what?”
“I told you they have precognitive sight.”
“And I think I read that in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. But I didn’t know how that works. Interesting. What’re you going to do with the mouse?”, he had let it slip a little, now holding it leisurely between his left thumb and forefinger by its tail, where it dangled, its tiny arms and legs flailing madly from its try to escape and she had a feeling that he wouldn’t be leaving the house to set it free between the firewood.
“Hm? I don’t know? Second breakfast?”, the gaze he gave it was troubling her, but she hoped imploringly that it had been a joke.
“You’re not – oh my god – ”
Clapping her hand on her mouth and squinting her eyes, she turned her head off him, unwilling to look at that, still in hope he had only bent back and opened his mouth to tease her. But then the squeaking stopped, with what sounded like breaking crispy toast and she was certain the gruel wouldn’t leave her controlled enough to land in the bowl it had come from. Even the storm seemed to have died down just to have her hear the cracking with every munch. Breathing in hard, she only stared at the Demiguise before her that had continued digging into the pink oatmeal paste as if it was an everyday occurrence to find a man eat a mouse alive. Maybe it was, some part of her wanted to tell her.
“You – you just had to do that, yes?”, risking a glimpse in the corner of her eye, she could see his childish smile as he swallowed down what must have been half of the rodent. “Urgh. Really. And I thought you were only teasing him there, in the library.”, she moaned. “I knew you’re irrevent, but that’s just disgusting.”
“What.”, he grinned at her, now that the rest of the mouse was gone and without wanting it, she turned her head back, finding herself presented with blood smeared teeth.
“Goodness! You’re even more gross than Crookshanks! And he’s a cat!”
“Half-Kneazle.”, Igor corrected and cleaned the teeth with his tongue, deliberately not closing his lips. “And I’m a dog. So what.”
“No, you’re an Animagus!”, Hermione whined.
“What is the difference, really.”
“That you’re human! Even if you do your best to convince people otherwise. And I thought – never mind. That just topped it.”, shaking her disgust off, she needed a huge gulp of tea and a refill, but noticed there wasn’t much left in the kettle. “Besides, the fur – ”
“Fur? What fur? That little fur? That’s ruffage not even worth mentioning. As I said, I’m a dog,”
“Animagus.”
“And rather like cats, we can actually digest it.”
“You are not a dog.”
“If I had turned into a dog first, would you have been as disgusted?”, that actually knocked her off the perge, her memory flicking into a cave, and Sirius gnawing on a chicken leg, thanking Harry for the compensation for rats.
“I – that is out of question! Your stomach is that of a human, not a dog’s!”
“Says who?”, grinned Igor sheepishly, the blood gone and only the yellow of his teeth remaining. “Just seconds ago you called me gross. Now you want to spare me from food poisoning?”
“Food.”, she huffed annoyed. “Don’t tell me you can turn your stomach into any you want.”, again, his response was sipping tea. “Fantastic. So the only reason for your interest in anatomy was so that you can turn your organs into anything, just so you can try eating everything in the world.”
“Nuh-uh. I figured that later. Yet I haven’t made the extensive use of it I could have. If you hear all the time that if you don’t behave, you will one day end up on the morgue slab, you can’t help getting curious.”
“The supervisors threatened the orphans with murder?”, now she was really shocked.
“Well, yes! But while the others, once they’ve been told that it is the table where people get cut open to see why they died, were scared enough to stick to the rules, it made me only curious. The warden had a big dog. A ferocious creature, but one day it got really sick and months later it was dead. She buried it on the orphanage’s grounds.”
“So you are saying,”, Hermione considered, “Your natural consequence was that you had to dig it out and dissect it to see what happened to it?”
“Why, yes! They also threatened us with dog food if we didn’t eat our meals. And now the dog was dead. I wanted to know what dog food did to you.”
“And? How did the dog die?”
“I was seven years old and that was the first time I’d seen the inside of any body. What do you think. I couldn’t find anything. Later I figured I had just overlooked it because I had no idea what it was. The dog had had stomach cancer.”
“So it had been the food?”, Hermione giggled, but he only shrugged.
“It could have been anything that caused it, really. But that was why everybody wanted to be an astronaut and I wanted to be a pathologist. Durmstrang changed my plans. Not that I might have had any big chances, if I hadn’t gone to Durmstrang. As I said, I would have ended up either being a serial killer, or dead.”
“Well, congratulations. You’ve become both.”
“Thank you.”
“But why didn’t you mention that in the courtroom? When you talked about the initiation? That you first and foremost always wanted to become a pathologist?”
“Would it have been relevant? For the process? For people’s opinion about me? I don’t think so. Besides, it’s got some interesting benefits if everyone takes you for a nutter. They won’t disagree if you’d like to be left alone, for example. Or you can make them do marvellous things when they picture all the horrors that could happen to them, shouldn’t they do as you say.”
“So just that I understand this correctly,”, like mesmerised she watched Yuèguāng carefully scrape the last bits from his bowl, “You don’t actually want people to like you?”
“The ones who like me, do it anyway. The others, I don’t depend on their opinion.”
After having licked his fingers clean a last time, the Demiguise just looked at his owner and gave a sound Hermione had never heard in her life before: it was like a long moan of a cat mixed with the screech of a snowy owl and the gnarling of an old door, eerily resounding in the big kitchen and the subdued noises of the storm outside made it even more peculiar. Whatever that had meant, she had understood it as much as Igor’s reply in Chinese. Then the ape hopped off the table, back over to where his bed was and disappeared from her sight.
“Do you understand him?”
“I do. It’s been twenty years, after all. Don’t you think you’d understand your pet by that time?”
“True. But does he understand what you say?”
“Meanwhile he does understand English really well. Though he prefers Mandarin. I can see it in his look. Also it helps me stay practised.”
“Do you miss China a lot?”, he only eyed her with a frown. “I know, you just said it’s been two decades, but – ”
“Of course I wouldn’t mind going back there one day, for a visit. Actually I have intentions that, if the day has come, I want to bury Yuèguāng under the tree that brought us together.”, Hermione nodded. “But the truth is, I miss Crimea more. This coast here is nice too, but not the same. It doesn’t have the charm of the first place, if you know what I mean.”, a loud howl of the wind emphasised it.
“I can hear that.”
“I’m not talking about the weather. The place is nice. Of course even the unfriendly weather is unfriendlier than down there, but I miss what we still had four years ago. I miss the village. The people. I miss being part of a community that is as strange and yet as normal as the three of us are. I miss the cheers of the children when the market ship came. I miss having had our working places practically opposite door. Now the entire island lies between. Yes, to save time, we always Apparated back home during lunch breaks, but I miss the luxury of just being able to walk over if one of us needed something from the other. And while the village may have been small and secluded and people didn’t have much to spend, we didn’t work for the money, but for seeing happy faces when we could hand something over the counter that would brighten their day. It brightened ours too. At least mine.”
Hermione couldn’t stop the tears from filling her eyes. Hearing that from someone like him actually touched her heart.
“You know that Severus intends to go back teaching at Hogwarts?”
“Yes.”
“Alright.”, she nodded. “But when I asked him what would happen to his cosy new life then, he said that it ended when he allowed you to let me in. Or already four years ago. Did he refer to the same, you think?”
“Now that you tell me, yes, very likely. Our cosy life ended when the riots broke out. The market ship didn’t come as often anymore and while we were way off the beaten track, we felt things weren’t going well on the peninsula. And then the ship suddenly started to bring soldiers as well. They claimed they wanted to spend a few days away from it all, but in truth they were spies, trying to find out where everyone’s allegiance lied. What once had been a shelter, had become a prison, with interrogators coming by every three weeks, seeing if we were grateful enough for the supplies that our hearts beat for Mother Russia.”
“That’s just sad. I don’t know how you can still be a proud Russian.”
“That is mankind.”, he said fierce. “That is just how humans are. If you aren’t for us, you are against us. As simple as that. Had my parents dumped me in a penal institution for children? Yes. Had that orphanage been government funded? Yes. Did the Ukraine lose Crimea? Yes. Did we have to flee from another war? Yes. Do I blame Russia for all that? No.”
“Why not?”
“Because Russia didn’t do any of that. Russia isn’t to blame. The blame lies with just a number of people that happened to have been born in the same country as I have. Russia never did me any harm. A select number of humans did. Nothing less, nothing more. Call my patriotism silly. Do that, while you are working in a high government position, defending the people of your country and their rights. But I ask you, Hermione. Don’t you as well agree that there should be no place for people who claim rights only for themselves and take away those of all others? In my opinion, by doing this, such people forfeited their right to claim any rights for themselves. Still, that does not make it any country’s fault. The blame is not with where they came from. It is with them only, by what they made of all that happened to them.”
“What made you move to Crimea in the first place anyway?”, knowing he was right and where this might go, she just had to make that u-turn; and fortunately, it erased his anger. “What connected either of you to the peninsula?”
“Fate.”
“Fate?”
“Or something similar, I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“Then on Rugia, after Severus’ mother died, we had to make a decision. Did we want to stay, wait for the snow to melt and help gather corpses? Or did we want to live? We had no clue where we should go. Severus came up with the idea to let an oracle decide.”
“There was an oracle in the village?”
“No. And I still don’t know why I say village. It was more of a town, actually. But never mind. So Severus magically projected a map of the earth onto our room’s floor. We stood on the bed, and together, threw a stone, with our eyes shut. It landed on Europe. There already, by the Black Sea. Though we said it had landed on Europe and not Asia. Then he projected a map of Europe and we repeated it. The stone landed on eastern Crimea, by the coast.”
“So it could have landed anywhere!”, Hermione frowned. “What if it had landed in the ocean?”
“Silly girl. We would have tried to find out if there was an island. If there wasn’t, we would have re-rolled. The only other thing that we knew was that we didn’t want to live in any polar region, glacier, desert, deep jungle, swamp or near a volcano that had been active within the past two hundred years. Of course you can never tell if a volcano won’t erupt, but two hundred years is quite the safe timespan.”
“And that is quite the interesting method.”
“Yes. And that, is also how we did it the second time, with Great Britain and Ireland. But the charm of it wasn’t the same.”, he said hollow.
“Oh. That’s what you meant.”
“Yes. That is what I meant.”
“And you?”
“Hm?”
“If Severus goes back to Hogwarts, what will you two do?”
“We’ll find an arrangement.”
“What will that arrangement be?”
“I said, we’ll find it. Not that we already have.”
“So you’re just letting things – flow?”
“Severus is the calculating one, not me.”, he said honest. “I never really was good at planning things. If I make a decision, I do. I do what feels right to me. If it backfires?”, he shrugged, “So what. The only one I can hate then is myself. And it gives me something to do with my life. Keeps me busy, so to say.”
“That’s reckless.”
“Perhaps. But it always worked out for me. In the end, things went well. You may say it is reckless. I on the other hand, simply have faith that Fortuna knows what she has planned for me.”
“Hm.”, chuckled Hermione, her head sinking with a weary smile. “You’re right. It can be relieving sometimes, to just do something you would have never thought you’d do.”
“And that, is your problem, not mine. I decided not to become a stereotype of my own. That way I don’t bore myself. And I don’t accidentally lock myself in my own cage.”
Her eyes losing the focus on the hand on his thigh, she understood that his philosophy was nothing but that of a child. To stay a child all your life, never going the rational way. Of course that was asinine, but for him, as he had said, it had worked out. It gave him the only real mental freedom he would ever be granted and it was solely in his own hands. Somehow, she admired him for it. And should it ever really fail, ever go terribly wrong, there was always Severus who would grab the string and pull the balloon back down. They both had found their match.
So as to distract herself from her own despair, she lifted her head. Looked at the clock. Past eight. She had been here for about an hour already, and it would be four more until Severus would get back. As interesting as it was, listening to Igor, getting to know the man she hadn’t had even the slightest idea about, she also didn’t know what the next hours would bring, let alone, if she actually wanted to stay. The reason why she had come, had meanwhile become unimportant. Igor had given her more answers to questions than she had believed she had had. Still, most of all, it made her sad. Disappointed. Once more, disappointed in herself and her narrow mind.
The truth was, the only question she didn’t get answered was to why Severus had granted her that one entry in his life. Why he had allowed her in his bed, the night that had changed everything. He could have sent her away. She wouldn’t have become pregnant. But she had. Maybe Igor was right. Maybe she didn’t need to understand. Maybe there wasn’t a reason she needed to know. Perhaps, she was better off simply accepting what had happened and making the best of it, for her child, for the two men, for herself and Ron, for everyone.
“Just one question.”, she asked the clock, pondering.
“Yes?”, curious, she turned her head back on him, finding him taking a sip from his mug again.
“Did you ever kiss a girl?”, and the sip got stuck in his throat. “Just once?”
“Excuse me,”, he coughed, laughing, blinking heavily, “But no. Never in my life. Did you?”
“Wha-?”, caught off guard as well, she could only gaze at his childish smirk.
“Kiss a girl?”
“No!”, it wasn’t anger that left her mouth, but surprise. “Of course not!”
“Well good to know.”, his smile became gentle again. “That as much as I couldn’t leave my comfort zone, you couldn’t either.”
“True. Severus did leave his comfort zone though. For you.”
“And found himself a new one. But never out of curiosity, that much I can say. He always sticks to his principles. Yes, sometimes he has to re-arrange or overthink them, but that was ever his choice. That doesn’t mean he isn’t curious though. He’s very curious. But still, he sticks to the principles he has set for himself.”
“And he passed that on to Harry.”, she huffed.
“It isn’t a bad thing, is it?”, Igor shrugged. “Though I can gladly claim that you haven’t been as much of a part of Harry’s life over the past years that you can say this for sure. He too has principles, yes. He howeverr, does let others break them for him, while he sticks to the one principle of living and letting live. That is his major drive. If not his only true drive. Probably why he can gladly wash his hands of responsibility, in every single matter.”, without actually wanting it, the dots connected.
“You’re right! While Harry is calculating and planning, in the end, he also just lets things unfold! It amuses him to watch people act predictably! He’s – he’s like – the perfect mix – of – goodness, you could be his mother!”, that froze Igor’s grin, apparently with the same thought that was her next. “You are – you’re like Lily – ”, she breathed. “With the addition of sadistic preferences of course, but – ”
“No, I am nothing like her.”, Igor sighed. “I have only met her a few times, but that much I can say for sure. Come to think about it, I might simply be the part of Severus, he suppressed in himself, so as to not appear weak to his father. So much, it became natural for him. And I think that is the real reason he loves me. I am the part of himself that he decided to kill when he was just a boy. And he is the part of me, that I struggled all my life with bonding to my fickle self.”
“An admirable relationship.”
“A lethal one.”, he corrected. “Where one cannot live without the other. That is why he sent me away. Back then. He feared it would happen, but eventually, he let it happen. I let it happen. Don’t admire us, Hermione. We are depending on each other, much more than we want. If any, I admire you and Ronald. You can come and go as you like, without finding your minds and hearts yelling that you did something wrong.”
~~#~~