Summary: In which Harry, newly graduated card wielder, ends up with Tom Riddle, Evil Card Mistress of the Century, as her terrible arch-nemesis... in both senses of the word, considering the fact that they don't make very good enemies.

It isn't helping that their decks aren't the only things heating up the battle field, ifyouknowwhatImean.

Warnings: femslash, magical AU, light crack pairings, crack turns not-crack, FEMALE HARRY, FEMALE TOM, supervillain!Tom, unwillingheroine!Harry

Pairings: TMR/HP (female!Tom Marvolo Riddle / female!Harry Potter), LV/HP (male!LV / male!HP), other light crack pairings

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, obviously. Characters belong to J.K. Rowling. This story was inspired by CardCaptor Sakura (property of CLAMP) and Yu-Gi-Oh's Duel Monsters (thanks Kazuki Takahashi-sama!)

Note: the romance is rather light~

Harry figured life really hated her.

She'd graduated top of her class in Hogwarts Academy, was called a child prodigy duelist by her professors, and had half the school thinking she'd go "dark" and the other half thinking she was a lying, bitch of a chit who'd fail her first year out of school. Yeah.

She didn't know either.

All Harry really knew was that school sucked when everyone was against you, and obviously she'd get high grades if she spent most of her time studying how to defend herself against said everyone, and the only difference between the Magical world and the Mundane world was being able to do cool things and having super villains exist and be… villainous.

The only thing she loved about the Magical world was her deck, hand-crafted by herself and filled with all the love and care she could give. Her desire, since now that she had received training there was no way she would be let back into the Mundane world, was to become a Card Mistress, able to be independent and use her own cards. Other card wielders had to settle for using the standard pack made and regulated by the Ministry, and were also required to work for them as the military force fighting against bad guys.

Harry certainly didn't want that type of life. As far as she was concerned, the Magical world could fight its own wars. She just wanted to be left alone and out of the population's greedy attention as someone who came from the Mundane world. The worlds usually didn't touch, so having Harry, born in one but belonging to the other, suddenly appear one day was apparently the best thing since sliced bread for the witches and wizards of Magical Britain.

Yeahno. If there was anything Harry hated more than the student body of Hogwarts, it was fame and popularity, specifically those granted by the population of the Magical world. She just didn't do well under the spotlight.

Anyway, to become a Card Mistress required years and years of experience, not to mention a healthy bit of power to boot. It required tests, permits, licenses, status—fame helped, and money as well. The process was terribly complicated, and made even harder by the corrupt officials working in the Ministry that wanted fewer Card Mistresses or Card Masters in the world. Harry wasn't sure how she'd do it, but she'd do it. Creating her own deck might've been completely by accident, but there was no way she was going to give it up to the Ministry.

She dreamed of using them freely one day, either in sporting duels or for peaceful purposes. There were many card wielders who became healers, or farmers or builders. Any sort of job could be made easier with the use of cards, and all Harry wanted to do was use them. They were her friends, and she could feel—acutely so—that keeping them stuck in their cards all day was dreadfully dull for them. They liked to be of use.

Which was why any opportunity she could, she snuck in using them. As a card wielder under the Ministry, as per requirements and regulations, Harry was to partake in battle using the standard deck that all her fellows also used on the field. Whenever she conveniently found herself alone due to the, ah, flow of battle, a few non-standard cards here and there weren't easily noticed. By anyone.

The situation sucked a bit less during those times.

Except, well, when the situation was already shot to hell. Somehow her current mission of reconnaissance ended up as a confrontation between herself and Tom Riddle—Dark, Evil, whatever adjective of the like, Card Mistress of the Century. The strongest known, the prodigy, the genius—leader of the malignant organization called the Death Eaters, who seemed to exist to be a thorn in the Ministry's side and cause chaos among the populace—

The Tom Riddle who tamed super villains to be villains under her name.

That Tom Riddle.

And Harry had no backup.

Life sucked.

"So the Ministry is getting that desperate? Sending a child who's barely stepped out of her diapers yet to face me? I almost pity you." She looked amused. Harry didn't blame her.

"They didn't send me," Harry defended, more for her pride than anything else. Being a little chess piece was not her idea of a good time, and she doubted the thought ever crossed the Minister's head—he was too busy being seen as important to scheme.

"So you're telling me you just happened to stumble upon my evil lair?"

Harry blinked. "This is your evil lair? Doesn't look all that evil… Actually, I really like the décor. It's not snobby and has a really homey feel, y'know? Comforting. Warm… hey, you even have a fireplace!"

Tom raised her eyebrow. "Thank you. I'm rather fond of it myself, considering I designed it. Being a super villain doesn't mean I have to have skeletons hanging on the walls and blood splatters all over the floors, you know. That's disgustingly unhygienic."

"I know, right?! Like, if a hero doesn't come and off the guy, he'll probably die from the bacteria build up alone! It's not healthy to keep dead bodies around the house as decoration. And the blood? What if they had a disease? Gross."

"I'd flay any of my followers who are stupid enough to do that," agreed the Card Mistress.

"Thank God. At least someone is sane in this world," Harry huffed.

"You went to Hogwarts, didn't you?"

"Oh, uh, yeah. How'd you know?"

"The Headmaster is certifiably insane," Tom drawled, "and the professors are all under his thumb. I reckon some unfortunate student will suffer by it, either by being driven to insanity or becoming a super villain himself."

"If you've got a category for completely pessimistic, you sure can write my name down."

"I'll add it to the list," she agreed. "Now that you've suitably distracted me, may we return to the topic at hand?"

Harry scowled. "Damn. Thought it would work."

"Yes, well, as amusing as you are, I might've let you go had it not been for the little detail that you've apparently discovered my lair. How did you manage that? Ministry point you in the right direction? Did they put a tracker on all their newbies and scatter them into the winds, waiting for one to die before heading to that location? I certainly wouldn't put it past them."

"Um… well, I was on a reconnaissance mission…"

"And? I'll torture it out of you if I have to."

"Wait, no!" Harry exclaimed as she saw Tom take out her deck and shuffle it. "I'm not resisting, am I? Totally not! It's just… it's kind of embarrassing to say, okay?!"

"Oh, pity for you," she mocked. "Out with it. I don't have all the time in the world to wait for brats."

Harry bristled, but she kept her eyes on the deck that the Card Mistress had in her hands. There was no way she could beat her in a duel—aside from the fact that Tom had far more experience than her, no one exactly knew the full contents of Tom's deck. There were a few infamous cards that she'd used in battle, like one with large bat wings and another that was a dragon that spit ice instead of flames, but no one knew all fifty two, and Harry sure as hell wasn't going to risk her neck finding out another one.

"I kind of… got lost."

Silence. Tom gave her a disbelieving look before echoing, "lost?"

"I was going the right way," Harry defended, "following the tree line that marked the borders… and then, well, suddenly… I wasn't. I swear the trees just disappeared, so I kept going because hey, maybe they cut off for a bit and continued up ahead, but, um… well, they didn't. And I kind of just… ended up here? I was going to ask for directions back from whoever lived here, but um… yeah," she finished lamely.

"What's your name?"

Harry blinked. "Huh?"

"Name," Tom repeated.

"Oh! Um… I'm Harry. Potter. Harry Potter."

Tom hummed. "Harry Potter… be honored that I'll remember it. You truly are an unfortunate child. Curious, but unfortunate. You see, I'd sympathize and let you go, but I didn't get to where I am now by being nice. And you know where I live now. Can't have someone like you escaping, can I? Next thing I know I'll have the Ministry knocking at my door, and then I'll have to move and remake everything from scratch, and I just don't have that kind of time. You understand, don't you?"

"…If I say no, will you repeat all that and at least give me the chance to draw my deck?"

Tom laughed, catching Harry off guard. "Interesting child. No, but we will have a proper duel. I want to see it—taste it, that potential of yours. If I let you blossom you'll become a Mistress worthy of matching me I'm afraid, but that's far into the distant future. Now you are but an infant, perfect to snip off the bud. But I want to see, if only to catch a glimpse, of what you'll become…"

Harry drew her deck. Tom smirked. "Now, child, we duel."

"I hope you mean outside, because this is kind of close-quarters and I'd hate to ruin your décor—" The Card Mistress waved a hand and suddenly they were outside. Harry blinked. "That works."

In frightening synchronization, they took the skies, airborne in a matter of seconds. Harry took in the wind, the pull of her hair, the flutter of her cape, and then she was drawing her card.

Cards were containers for creatures of immense magical power. They were given generic names—words, describing their power—that often reflected their power levels. The stronger the word, the stronger the card, but just as well the more mental and magical strength it took to control them. It was dangerous to use a powerful card past your power level, especially because the creatures were sentient, and if they didn't take to you it could prove disastrous.

Harry herself was on very good terms with her cards—on part because she was their creator, but also became they were friends. She gave them personal names, names a human would use instead of simple nouns, and they were all the closer for it.

There were actually many different styles that duelists used. Some went for brute strength, focusing on a specific element in the entirety of their deck, or even just focusing on a single card as their main fighter. They used the others in their deck to either enhance or protect their offensive power, and though it was an effective method, Harry found they were easily countered by experienced duelists.

There were also wielders who used themselves in battle, their cards enhancing themselves, which allowed them to go into the thick of battle and strike right at their opposition, sometimes even bypassing the other cards if able. Harry had tried it once or twice—it was a requirement at Hogwarts to try out different battle styles, as the Ministry's standard deck actually had multiple versions to suit different uses—but wasn't all too fond of it. It was for those who lived off of their adrenaline.

Her own method focused on a single card as her main offense. However, instead of a specific element or style, Harry focused on versatility. Few could use the style to great success since it took an enormous amount of magical stamina to manage—calling the cards took strength and stamina, and Harry hesitated to use the style without her own deck; rarely more than three or four cards were called in an average duel, which was one of the reasons Harry did so well in Hogwarts' sanctioned duels.

Of course, now out in the field, there were high level card duelists who obviously had greater magical stamina than the average student, and even used the same style. Harry knew the advantage she had at the Academy was nearly nonexistent now.

Especially against Tom Riddle, a real genius.

Well, there was no point in trying to make a trap by using anything other than her strongest style. It'd probably get her killed faster if she tried something different, actually. Harry took a deep breath and called forth her staff, feeling the holly wood in her hand a moment after. It was sturdy—a reassuring weight, if nothing else—and she figured the best she could do was stay alive long enough that someone would notice her disappearance and look for her.

Either that, or try and run away, but she doubted she could get very far. The Death Eaters would hunt her down surely, if not Tom Riddle herself wanting to finish her prey.

"The Mirror!" she called, pressing the head of her staff against the card's face. It emitted an eerie green glow before strange gossamer strands flew forth and gathered a meter in front of her. When they finished congregating, a boy no older than eighteen stood with his back to her, almost as good as her twin.

Tom called her own card at the same time. "The Blizzard." Harry saw similar blue gossamer strands quickly build up to at least four meters, and what solidified was one of the Card Mistress' known creatures—a dragon.

"End this quickly, Draco."

Harry yelped. "Wait! Weren't you trying to gauge my potential or something?! Gah! The Blaze!"

Coincidentally, a dragon also formed beside The Mirror, a fiery red as opposed to the metallic blue of The Blizzard's. Just in time, The Mirror climbed onto The Blaze's back, barely managing to dodge the icy breath shot at them by taking further into the skies. Harry herself had to spiral upwards to skirt away from the attack.

"Ron, help Harry melt that thing! Fiendfyre!"

Tom made a noise at the back of her throat when the opposing dragon and his rider readied their attacks, a building sphere of fire in the former's mouth and a red vortex gaining speed in the latter's outstretched hand. She motioned to her dragon. "Freeze the rider, Draco. Glacius."

The Blizzard dodged the incoming attack and climbed above the two before firing another icy breath. It missed—well, the two managed to dodge—and the game of try-and-nail-the-other-with-a-nasty-long-ranged-attack continued. It met with little success; they both were flexible, light-weight dragons, and The Blaze, despite his inferior experience, had a rider to even out the playing field, especially useful because The Mirror could reflect some of the attack if it managed to nearly graze them.

While Tom seemed utterly relaxed and patient, Harry was panicking. She knew they couldn't dodge forever—the likelihood of them making a mistake instead of the Card Mistress was high. In terms of the waiting game, Riddle would win without a doubt. And if all their attacks kept missing, no way could she have the stamina to keep this up. While Riddle only had to exert energy for one card, Harry had two. And without The Mirror, The Blaze would be pretty much toast—the irony wasn't lost there either.

Unfortunately, when Harry finally figured out her next move, Tom decided she wanted it to end faster.

"Enough, Draco. Give them a blizzard worthy of your name to contend with, won't you?"

"Drop him, Ron!"

Tom blinked. The Blaze spiraled up over The Blizzard and did something that looked like a 360—dropping his rider right onto the other dragon's back. The Mirror immediately clutched at the ice dragon's spikes, finding them impossibly slippery but still able to hold on somehow.

"Cute," the Card Mistress sneered, "but what exactly do you think you'll accomplish with that? Draco's still going to—"

"Channel it, Harry!"

The Mirror stretched his arm up to the sky, struggling to keep it held up as a similar vortex of icy blue built at his fingertips. Just as Tom figured out what was going to happen, The Mirror pointed his hand at her and let loose the torrent of a snowstorm in her direction. It was such a large force of wind and ice and hail that Harry couldn't see anything in that direction at all.

Harry hadn't expected that. She thought it was just going to be a slightly more powerful icy breath, not a—not a—

The name The Blizzard makes a lot more sense now.

"Oh my God—go catch her Ron!" Harry didn't want to kill someone!

Just as the red dragon shot forward toward a falling body, so too did the blue dragon follow, his unexpected rider accompanying. They both seemed to realize at the same time that either of them catching Tom on their back was not a good idea, what with the spikes and all, so The Blaze nudged the body mid-fall toward The Blizzard's back, where The Mirror caught her in his arms.

As they landed, Harry flew down to meet them.

"Oh my God—ohmyGodohmyGodohmyGod—is she—is she okay? Harry please tell me she's still breathing—Ron, puff some heat or something to warm her up—What did she call you, Draco? Do you know the way back to her house? We should get some blankets for her or something—a bed, she needs a bed, a fire in her cozy fireplace, and some hot tea from her undoubtedly chic kitchen—"

"Glacius."

The Blaze disappeared in a whirl of ice and wind, and the Card Mistress who commanded it leaped out of The Mirror's arms just as The Blizzard bucked the rider off. The Mirror fell to the ground with a sharp gasp of pain.

Harry froze, and then her expression morphed into one of sincere rage. "You—you—you… You lying cheat! I was worried that I'd killed you and you just—"

Tom looked amused. "I'm the Greatest Card Mistress of the Century, and you think a silly little trick like that could kill me? I admit I was a bit surprised… but don't think that highly of yourself. As a treat for amusing me, I suppose I can at least make your death… informing."

"What?!" She was officially pissed off. "I thought you were a good person! I tried to save you, and now you just talk about killing me like it's—ugh! Well I'll show you—Harry and I are going to beat you into next week—"

"A petty bluff. The Reflection, merge with The Blizzard."

The card wielder's rage melted off her face as she watched the dragon become strands of gossamer once more, and from the card Tom had just drawn a bright red glow began to form a tall figure. At first, Harry thought it was just a man, but then as the features began to clear and solidify, she realized it was some humanoid creature instead—

Slitted red eyes. Flattened nose. Thin, if not nonexistent, lips. Patches of scales along what skin was not covered by a black robe.

And then she looked at Tom, who was actually very easy on the eyes. How was this… thing her reflection?!

From his sleeve, Harry saw The Reflection draw a thin stick of white wood, similar to the quality of Tom's own staff. The gossamer blue strands of The Blizzard were absorbed into its tip, and the strange humanoid card smirked.

A shiver ran down her spine. Was she… was she going to die today?

"This is Voldemort," Tom pleasantly introduced. "As you can see, he looks little like me, but make no mistake… he embodies my spirit perfectly well. Imagine my surprise when I realized how similar our dueling styles were… Be honored, Harry Potter, for not only will I remember your name long past your death today, but you will also die feeling the true wrath of my deck. Voldemort, end them."

What ensued next was the most pathetic excuse for a duel ever. It was more like a massacre.

Card after card Harry summoned until she was panting, out of breath. The Mirror was in little better state. Six cards in total were completely annihilated by The Reflection, no matter what she and The Mirror tried to do. Tom, on the other hand, summoned nothing else. She didn't need to.

Harry quickly realized what the true strength of The Reflection was. It wasn't like The Mirror, who drew strength from any summons on the field—no, The Reflection was able to use whatever Tom summoned as well as his Card Mistress' own magical reserves.

His attacks could be pure magic, bolts of power from his wand, and with his lithe, snake-like form, he made the perfect duelist. Harry could tell from watching her that Tom was half controlling him, half letting his own sentience do as he pleased.

When The Reflection finally had The Mirror splayed on the ground, unable to get up, he approached and loomed over the card.

"Voldemort," Tom began, and her card pointed his wand at a now hopeless opponent. "Finish it."

Harry's mind probably raced through a thousand different combinations she wanted to use—planned to use, couldn't have used; she didn't have enough strength left in her to try, but thinking about them and knowing she could at least put up one last fight—even if futile—was a bit better than going down submissive. She wanted to live, even though the glowing tip of The Reflection's wand made it seem unlikely.

Soon, The Mirror would go back into his card, and then it would be her turn to be at wand point—

But then, the light disappeared.

Harry blinked.

Tom blinked.

The Reflection spoke. "Master," he began, his voice having some ineffable hissy quality to it, "may I keep him?"

"Pardon?" Tom asked, as baffled as Harry.

"As a pet," The Reflection clarified, motioning to The Mirror who was, at this point, lying in dumbfounded shock.

"E-excuse me?!" Harry exclaimed at the same time as Tom replied with, "That's not possible."

The Reflection frowned. "Are you quite sure, Master?"

"He's her's," the Card Mistress motioned to Harry, "Besides, why do you want him anyway? I thought you'd rather have a snake for a pet."

The Reflection inclined his head. "Snakes are beautiful, but he is… cute. Like a small animal." Harry choked on her spit as the card continued, "And if he is hers, can we not simply keep both of them?"

"I'm not cute!" The Mirror insisted. "And my master isn't something to be kept like a toy!"

"Are you quite sure?" The Reflection bent down and grabbed his chin, "because your pout says differently."

"It's—it's not a pout! It's a scowl!"

For the next few minutes, Harry could do nothing but stare in complete wonderment as the two cards—she didn't even know what to call it. Bickered? Flirted? Regardless, at some point The Mirror managed to stand up, and the two cards continued arguing with the added hilarity of size coming in to play. The Reflection was a good two heads taller than The Mirror, and since the latter was already exhausted from the fight, he didn't have enough power to remove himself from The Reflection's grasp.

Harry didn't want to call it a hug. It was more like a—like a—looming embrace, or whatever. The taller humanoid card had placed his chin on top of The Mirror's head, and held said shorter card to him with an arm thrown about his shoulders.

"What did you do to my card," Tom stated more than asked.

Harry turned to stare at the Card Mistress incredulously. "Me?" she asked, "You think I did something to your card? You were kicking my ass! How could I have done anything to your stupid card?!"

The Card Mistress looked smug one second and angry the next. "Voldemort is the farthest thing away from stupid," she snapped. "And if you didn't do anything, then how can you explain this?!"

"This," Harry growled back as she pointed to the two, "is harassment. As in, you're the Card Mistress between us—why'd you have to go and create such a weird card? If anyone did anything, it's you! Get him off Harry!"

"Voldemort is a masterpiece, thank you very much," Tom glared, "He's never acted this way before! It's clearly your fault!"

"I didn't do anything!"

"The proof's right in front of you! Clearly you have, stop lying and fix it!"

"Um, need I remind you I'm practically fresh out of the Academy? If I did something, I sure as hell don't know what I did, or how to fix it! It's way more likely that you did something and just don't want to admit it because you're not sure how to reverse it!"

"I would know—If I did anything in the first place!"

"Well I sure as hell didn't do anything. It's my card he's harassing, after all—"

"Then why is Voldemort acting this way—"

"He's your card! Why don't you ask him?!"

Tom paused. "Voldemort," she snapped, "get off him."

The Reflection frowned. "But Master—"

Instantly, the Card Mistress turned back around Harry. "He's never disobeyed me before! This is entirely your fault! You probably accidentally did something like you accidentally bypassed my wards!"

"Um, your sarcasm tells me you still think I did it on purpose! Which I didn't! I got lost, okay—"

"Well do you really expect me to believe some newbie like you could get through my wards? They probably trained you to do it! Most Hogwarts alumni hardly know how to make a complex ward, never mind get through one undetected—"

Harry snapped. "Stop blaming me! Look, I've had a terrible day—first I missed breakfast, then I got sent on a reconnaissance mission on my break, then I got lost, no matter what you may think—then I found, well, you, and then you threw death threats at me when you could've just let me go since I don't remember how I got here anyway, and then you challenged me to a stupid duel and you made me think you stupid died, but you didn't, and then you whooped my stupid ass and now you blame me when your stupid card starts acting all stupid-weird when clearly it's my card that's the stupid victim!"

The field was quiet after she finished her rant.

The Mirror bit his lip. "Master—Master!"

Suddenly there was the sound of assault, of something firing and fire and then The Mirror was in front of her, but to no use because they were already too weak and—

Harry heard Tom summon a card before the explosion happened.

When the smoke cleared and her ears stopped ringing, Harry saw the red gossamer strands of The Reflection disappearing back into his card, surprisingly having been right in front of her and The Mirror. She turned to look at Tom, who was closer to her than she remembered, and in the Card Mistress' hands were three unsummoned cards.

Her gaze was locked on something in the distance, somewhere in the sky. Harry turned to look.

A regimen of card wielders were floating not far off with standard The Shot and The Arrow cards summoned—long ranged sniper cards all aimed at them. At the front was Alastor Moody, a Card Master and Head Auror, who Harry and some other recruits had trained under for a week before switching teachers.

He was a harsh trainer, to be sure. He was also very efficient, with a polished track record of most apprehended Death Eaters and a title of Best Duelist in Magical Britain. Harry was sure he had even more awards under his belt, but those were the two she remembered.

She also recalled his strange, whirling magical eye, and saw it now as he and the regimen approached, taking in the surroundings before fixing itself on her.

"Riddle," he sneered.

Tom's face was emotionless. "Alastor. A shame you interrupted an execution."

"Doesn't seem like an execution to me," he grunted, inclining his head toward Harry, "She's still alive, ain't she?"

Tom sneered. "The Dark," she called forth before anyone could react, and in the blink of an eye she vanished, a force of black magic knocking everyone back a few meters. All that was left was a haunting echo—"I'll leave this time, but make no mistake, that girl will die by my hands."

Harry shivered.

When Moody turned both his eyes onto her again, a thoughtful look on his face, she knew life was going to suck even more.

A day later and everyone was heralding her as "the one to defeat the Dark Lady."

Honestly, everything was so… surreal. She came back, got a good night's sleep—after being treated with a few potions of course; magical exhaustion and all that—and then she wakes up and her face is on the front page of The Prophet.

And people were calling her the Girl-Who-Lived.

As well as the Savior.

And songs were being made about her, for crying out loud!—one of which was called The Prophecy, playing in every shop ever. Soon, she doubted even the elevators would be safe from that blasted tune!

It was too early to deal with this. Harry just wanted to crawl back into her bed and die.

Sadly, she couldn't—since apparently she had a meeting to go to that involved the Minister, the Headmaster of Hogwarts, and the Head Auror.

One day. Seriously, one day! If Harry thought yesterday was bad, today was worse. At the very least, in the conclusion of the very long and very boring and very uncomfortable meeting, Harry could at least say she had received a permit to use her own cards out on the field, as well as expectation that she would be trained with them under the very best the Ministry could offer.

Because apparently now she was the only one who could defeat the Most Evil Card Mistress of the Century.

Harry didn't even know how that was supposed to work, but Dumbledore had smiled and said that he knew "she would be the one," and then everyone was suddenly nodding and smiling and repeating that yes, Harry was some fabled "Chosen One" from the Mundane world who had come to save them from utter annihilation at the hands of one Tom Riddle.

Funny, since aside from the whole death threats thing, Riddle had seemed like a nice, sensible person. Ah, yes, and aside from the whole card business as well.

What had she said again? That the Headmaster was "certifiably insane" and would eventually drive some student to "becoming a supervillain"? Well, that sounded awfully tempting now.

Harry sighed. "Well, what do you think, Harry?"

The Mirror smiled encouragingly at her. "Magical Britain has a lot of flaws, Master."

Harry groaned. "Yeah, you said it. This place is weird. Just yesterday I was some normal card wielder, and today apparently there's a prophecy about me or something, and I have a fate or destiny or what-have-you to defeat one of the strongest witches to ever live. Great."

The Mirror pat her comfortingly on the shoulder.

"What do you think of it?"

"Well," the card began, idly biting his lip, "Voldemort doesn't seem like a bad person."

Harry blinked, and then squinted. "Voldemort? Who's that? Oh, was it Riddle's one card—um… The Reflection?"

The Mirror nodded and flushed. "He's really strong."

"Yeah," Harry continued on obliviously, "no kidding. I can't even imagine how much stamina she needed to keep him summoned! We really need to train up if we're going to live again—"

"He protected us," The Mirror interrupted softly.

"Oh? Did he?"

"Yes. He protected us from the initial blast by hitting it before it reached us, and then his master summoned another card that allowed him to make a shield around our general area. About ten meters in diameter, I think."

"So that was what happened…" Harry murmured before scowling again. "Geez, those Ministry people really need to learn how to aim! We were almost fried!"

"Mmm…"

"—it feels like everyone's trying to kill us now. Ugh. Guess we'll just have to train harder. You and Ron are pretty fierce, but we've got to get better—"

"Mmm…"

Harry continued talking, and The Mirror, unnoticed, went quiet as his cheeks filled with color and his eyes glazed. It was the beginning of trouble.

Or, well, maybe the beginning of the end of it, actually.

A month later, when a Death Eater raid hit Hogsmeade and news came back to the Ministry that Tom Riddle was there, Harry was sent off along with Alastor Moody and Nymphadora Tonks, and two regimens of incoming reinforcements, to stop them.

She really shouldn't have been surprised when the Aurors left her alone with Riddle, nor when the Death Eaters left them as well without a word from their leader. At first Harry thought this was all planned—Tom did want to kill her, after all—but upon looking at said Card Mistress, she seemed just as lost as Harry.

So… the whole propaganda thing? Apparently it was working on everyone but the two supposed arch-enemies.

"Um, hi." Harry hesitantly waved.

"Hello," Tom deadpanned, raising an eyebrow when Harry began to fidget.

"Look, I don't know how to start a confrontation, so—"

"Awkward attempt acknowledged. Very well, let's get on with it, Potter. I do have a raid to get back to, and unlike last time I doubt this'll take very long."

Harry frowned. "Hey! I was training, you know—"

"And how far did you think you got in a month?"

"…Not very," she admitted, and was surprised when Tom laughed.

"Your honesty will never cease to amuse me… Until you're dead, of course, which should be momentarily. Ah, a shame, but not that big of one. I'm rather tired of Dumbledore's attempts to unnerve me."

Harry huffed. "And again with the not being able to make up your mind. Are you bipolar or something? You either want to finish this quickly or you don't. Choose one and stick with it so I at least know what's coming!"

The Card Mistress tilted her head. "You're very calm about your death, I see."

"Not really… it's a defense mechanism—hey! Don't do that!"

"A return for what you tried on me last time," Tom smirked. Her card was in her hand and Harry didn't even have her deck out yet. The card wielder fumbled, finally managing to get both her cards and her staff out just as Tom called, "The Dark!"

To make up for lost time, Harry threw two cards out at once—a trick she'd been practicing and only mastered once she was able to practice with her deck out in the open—and tapped both of them with her staff. "The Mirror! The Light!"

The creature that appeared on Tom's side was one Harry instantly recognized as one of the few known cards in Tom's deck. It was the one with bat wings, a humanoid figure dressed in black with even darker piercing eyes, a creepy blackness seeming to drip off his figure.

In contrast, Harry's summon—The Mirror, of course, but it was The Light that had the notable difference, obviously—was dressed in white, flowing silk, had the fluffiest bird wings in the history of ever, and had flowers weaved into her striking red hair. In fact, her face looked very similar to The Mirror's, which was not a coincidence. Harry admitted to modeling The Light after her mother, who shared her green eyes.

"Severus—" Tom was about to command, but realized something about her card was off. "Severus?"

The Dark was frozen, struck dumb at the sight of The Light. It was love at first sight, but not only for The Dark. Harry had turned to her own card to observe her expression, and true to expectation, The Light was just as enamored as her opponent was.

"God damn it," Harry muttered, and she heard Tom echo the sentiment across the field.

"It doesn't matter anyway," Tom sniffed, "Isn't that right, Severus? We did have this talk—obey your master, and strike them down! Sectumsempra!"

Harry had no idea what The Dark did, but she figured it was dangerous when the creature suddenly flew at them. "Lily!" she called, and The Light, acting as a guardian angel, put her hands on The Mirror's shoulders as he raised his hand and summoned a silvery glow. "Protego Maxima!"

The two powers clashed on the field, but neither won. Harry was a bit relieved to find out this strange… thing going on with their cards wouldn't affect the battle too much, because she had no idea how to deal with it and upsetting her cards was the last thing she wanted to do. If her cards decided to stop fighting, Harry wouldn't have the heart to tell them no; it was their choice to fight alongside her or not.

When Tom told The Dark to go in for another attack, he seemed to begin to, but then collapsed on the ground and clutched at his heart as if the very idea was sickening, and—

What played out next was the most dramatic soap opera Harry had ever seen. She had no idea when The Light learned and memorized Shakespeare, of all things—nor when The Dark did, but who knew what the Card Mistress taught her cards in her spare time?—but they were basically quoting lines from various plays and sonnets back at each other.

...In retrospect, it was actually very impressive, considering the fact that everything made sense.

Err, well, the conversation did. Nothing about these cards were making sense. At all.

"Um, Master?" The Mirror glanced between the two before turning back to Harry, who was still in a sort of disbelief at the scene. "What should I do?"

He looked so adorable and sane that she just wanted to walk over and hug him. Harry briefly wondered if this was narcissism or not, but then looking back at the debacle going on in the field, decided it probably wasn't and that she just wanted affirmation of her own sanity despite her card's lack thereof.

"…I don't even know."

When Tom called back The Dark, The Light began to sob almost hysterically. Tears ran down her soft cheeks as she tried in vain to wipe them away, and it only got worse when The Mirror tried to comfort her. Harry mentally agreed with her opponent's decision and withdrew her cards.

"I don't think either of us did that," Harry began cautiously, expecting to play another blame game.

Tom paused. "I agree with you," she said with a reluctant nod.

"Um… so… try again?"

"Again."

They both summoned new cards to the field, careful not to match up The Reflection and The Mirror again. For some reason it felt like those two had been the start of it—and they were, Harry was almost sure of it—seeing The Light crying was bad enough; she didn't want to see The Mirror break down.

He was, after all, in a way her. Harry didn't like playing favorites, but she was very fond of The Mirror. She didn't want him to re-live the terrible trauma of being harassed again by Tom Riddle's stupid card! Then again, they had trained with—perhaps not the express but always with it in mind—the belief that she and the Card Mistress would cross staves again eventually, and that probably meant dealing with The Reflection.

She was sure The Mirror was strong enough to stand up against his fears, but that didn't mean she wanted him to have to face them so soon!

Luckily, Harry's summon of The Blaze countered Riddle's own call of The Weed. It barely finished manifesting before Riddle recalled it with a scowl on her face, not wanting to even try that matchup. Instead, she quickly summoned The Chaos while dodging the incoming blast of fire that Harry had commanded.

The Chaos. Harry frowned. It sounded strong. But what did it do—?

The thing that materialized was a woman. She was intangible; translucent, like an otherworldly sprite. Her hair was pitch black and wild, nails sharp as talons, and adorning her feet were the two sharpest stiletto boots Harry had ever seen. There was a crazed grin on her face, and she teetered from side to side as if she simply couldn't wait to maul something to death.

Harry knew just the card to deal with her.

Which was lucky, because she was flying at The Blaze right now. "Crucio that damned dragon, Bellatrix."

The woman shrieked with glee. "Pretty little Drac-y-poo needs to focus on serving Master instead of making eggs with Master's enemies!"

Harry didn't even want to try to figure out what weird thing Tom's cards were talking about now. "Ron, give her a nice fireball to the face! Incendio!" After successfully occupying The Chaos, at least for a few more seconds before she spun around and got a blast off onto The Blaze's wing, Harry pulled out another card with confidence.

After her last failure, she made sure that magical stamina training was in her schedule every day. Her max usage was ten cards, and four at once as opposed to her previous three. "Return, The Blaze! Switch out with The Sentinel!"

A warrior decked out in heavy armor—including helmet, sword and shield—materialized in a glow of gold. His armor had a metallic red to it, and intricate designs of lions and swirls engraved on his shield. While his face was covered, Harry knew exactly what he looked like—she had modeled him after her father, after all.

Okay, so she might've gone to town on the detail of him too—the hilt of his sword had a lion on it, for God's sake and the blade even had an engraving—but she missed her parents terribly and wanted to preserve the image of her father... valiantly.

He was one of her strongest cards, and his duo with The Mirror was one of her most powerful combinations. It was a rather niche combo though, so she couldn't always use them in tandem. At the very least, The Sentinel worked decently well in general situations whenever she needed to buy time or counter a powerhouse, which was what she was doing now.

The Chaos launched another flurry of attacks, and The Sentinel instinctively raised his shield to block them. A few reached around, managing to singe his armor before he heaved forward and brute-forced his way through the assault. Brandishing his sword, The Sentinel lunged at her, momentarily causing her to defend before she managed to take flight and begin her aerial attacks.

Even Harry had to back away with the amount of magic she was shooting. The Chaos indeed.

Thankfully, there was a lack of finesse and accuracy in her attacks, which disassociated her from The Reflection. The Chaos's attacks were rapid and unyielding, but didn't possess the strategic movement of a duelist. She was a glass cannon, in other words, and Harry was never more thankful that she had made a card that specifically countered those types. Otherwise she was sure she would've died several times over by now.

In fact, she was unsure why Riddle hadn't withdrawn her already. By the looks of it, the woman was waiting for something—probably a chance to blow him up and not have to deal with him later? Harry frowned. She needed to combat this quickly then—make the time worth something, since apparently no one from the Ministry wanted to help her.

Just as she'd made the decision, The Chaos cackled and managed a blow that knocked The Sentinel off guard. He dodged the follow up attack, but when she came in again he could do little more than throw himself to the side. The Chaos skimmed him, knocking off his helmet before The Sentinel gave her a nice gash across the chest.

She screamed like a banshee, whirling back and pointing a threatening hand at her opponent. "Bella's going to—" she stopped, and a curious expression took over her face.

On the field, The Sentinel managed to get up, the unveiled face of James Potter dirtied but no less determined. Harry looked back and forth between them, and when Tom sighed, realized that, well...

It happened.

Oh my God that's—

Harry wants to vomit. Seeing someone moon after her mother hadn't been so strange—she remembered, distantly, that it had been an often occurrence that men would flirt with Lily, and James would always come by to chase them off—and while yes, it had definitely creeped her out to see the image of her mother all lovey-dovey-dramatic with another man, even that hadn't been so weird because The Light was radically different from Lily.

But... Her father? The Sentinel was much closer in personality to James Potter, and while according to her uncle, James had been an utter playboy in the past, Harry only remembered him chasing after her mother's skirt. Oh, he was handsome, no doubt about that, but the way he so clearly hung over his wife deterred most women fairly quickly from approaching him.

At least The Sentinel was clearly not in love with The Chaos like she was with him.

"Potter..." Riddle began to growl, but Harry raised her hands up in surrender.

"It's not my fault that your cards fall in love easily!"

"Mm. Right. Sure."

"Just because my cards are pretty as opposed to creepy—sorry James, handsome—doesn't mean I'm at fault."

"Hmph," Riddle sniffed, "well, it doesn't matter anyway—not with Bellatrix. I did summon her for a reason."

The Chaos clapped her hands together gleefully and cackled again. "Oh Master! So generous! So kind! Giving Bella a handsome man to play with! I'll be sure to torture him well!"

"...What?! Your cards are mad!"

Tom opened her mouth to refute the claim, but then reconsidered. "...Some of them, yes."

"Damn it—James, don't let that crazy lady get close to you! Expecto patronum!"

"Come play with Bella!" The Chaos shrieked.

"Most Evil Card Mistress my ass! More like Weirdest of the Century," Harry muttered. She watched as a bright light wave shot forth from James' sword swipe. It transformed into a large stag, raising itself on its hind legs before it galloped forward and struck The Chaos directly. The collision seemed to shatter The Chaos, dispersing her into purple gossamer strands that spread into the air.

Her banshee cry was the only warning that something was coming. Harry looked across the field and saw a tell-tale smirk splattered across Tom's face.

"The Mirror!" she called, nearly too late. He materialized just in time as The Chaos' indefinite form slammed into The Sentinel on all four sides.

The rush of wind had made the other side inaudible. Tom summoned The Reflection the second she felt the impact.

When the zephyr calmed and the field cleared, The Mirror stood in the center, an apparition form of The Sentinel beside him. They held the same relaxed stance, a gaze as endless as the sky, and when The Mirror raised his left arm, The Sentinel's sword appeared in his hand, as translucent as the card it belonged to.

Harry couldn't believe she'd made it so far. It was now or never.

"Harry—"

The Mirror spun around and charged at the Card Mistress, but his attack was interrupted by a clash with The Reflection.

Damn. So close.

"It's my turn now." Tom chuckled darkly. "I think I've seen enough of your power. You bear an uncanny resemblance to my younger self—but it's just that. You've yet to experience true strength, haven't yet touched it with your fingers and felt it cradled in the palm of your hand. You've yet to feel magic's overwhelming presence like a kiss along the skin, feel it's intoxicating hold like the embrace of a drug. You have potential. But since when has potential been enough?

Good bye, Harry Potter. It's a shame, but I dare say not a significant one. I'll think of you fondly when I'm ruling the world!"

The Mirror retreated, acknowledging his opponent. "Master—" he began, but did not need to finish. Harry understood. This time, The Reflection looked ready to fight.

"I don't want to fight him," The Mirror said quietly, "We owe him a life debt."

That made Harry freeze. Was this it, then—

"But if Master commands it, I will gladly fight. The thought of losing Master, who created and raised me... I can't bear it. None of us can. That's why… We'll win for sure. Please trust us, okay?"

Across the field, The Reflection spoke to his own creator. "If she is killed, then we will keep them?"

Tom sighed. "Since you all insist, I suppose I might as well. It's not like I need another deck, but..."

The Reflection nodded. "Our thanks, Master."

"I feel like I spoil you all too much..."

"This will only hurt for a moment," The Reflection said, redirecting his gaze toward his opponents. "Until it's over, wait patiently."

The Mirror raised his sword. "...I can't do that. Sorry."

They clashed. Harry knew it had only been a month—there was little progress she could've made that would allow her to win this fight—but again, she'd rather go down fighting when she did. Anything else her pride wouldn't allow.

The last time The Reflection destroyed them. She expected little difference, but at least—this time—a little longer—

"The Sentinel, become the sword that smites Life! The Grim, become the cloak that hides the doomed from the brink of Death! The Seer, become my gaze of Victory! Three elements of war, bless the persistent warrior; Life, Death, Victory—paint the mural of conquest!"

All three summoned cards merged together to form a ball of light. The Mirror ran for it, The Reflection hot on his heels and gaining. Two magics collided on the field, one a fiery wave of red and another a wake of green.

There was a delayed explosion. Harry braced herself and squeezed her eyes shut to protect them from the incoming blast of dust and smoke. When she figured it was safe enough to look, she opened her eyes and squinted to try and figure out what was going on in the battlefield.

Surprisingly, The Mirror was on top of The Reflection, about to strike the finishing blow. Huh, so her spell had worked after all. That was nice. Harry blinked, and was about to break out into exuberant cheer as the sight of her impossible victory neared, until—

"I bet you can't do it," The Reflection drawled, utterly calm despite his position.

"I-I can!"

"Mm… I don't think so. I did save you and your master, after all. You owe a life debt to me. Will you truly go back on it now?"

The Mirror spluttered. Harry practically spit fire.

"Hey! That's blackmail!" she shouted across the field.

Tom smirked. "Really? I didn't notice. Oh well."

"That's—You—That's cheap!"

"Well what kind of a hero lets herself get saved by a villain? You were just asking to be taken advantage of—"

"Don't say it like that!" Harry squeaked. "Besides, I never wanted to be a hero! Actually, I might as well blame you for the whole bloody mess! Why'd you have to go leave like that? That was probably what made Dumbledore get that whole stupid idea in his head that I was destined to defeat you or something!"

"Stop trying to push the fault of your incompetence on someone else."

"You—ugh. Harry, crush her stupid card to pieces! I don't care anymore. We're getting out of here alive if it's the last thing I do! Just to spite Miss Perfection over there!"

"How daring of you to recognize my superiority. Well, I suppose compliments must be given where they are due—"

"Go to Hell!" Harry snapped.

The Mirror, about to obey his master's orders, steadied to plunge the sword into The Reflection's heart, but was thrown off at the last second. The Reflection leaped for him, his wand having been done away with in their obscured scuffle, and soon enough managed to kick away the glowing sword that The Mirror had been about to stab him with. They ended up wrestling on the floor, trying to regain dominance over the other but never managing to hold it quite long enough to kill the other off.

Harry stared. Tom sighed.

After a few minutes, The Mirror disentangled himself and darted back a few meters to stand before Harry. The Reflection also rose to his feet, looking fairly annoyed but still able to fight.

"Master," The Mirror panted, cheeks a heated red, "I hate his guts! He tried to grope me!"

"Come now, pet. Master wants me to tame you before I can bring you home—"

"No! The only master I'll accept is Master!"

"I'll take care of you—"

"I want Master!"

"My own master is not as terrible as you make her out to be—"

"You think I'm so disloyal? I'd rather die than serve anyone else!"

Harry wanted to cry. The message of this was all too obvious. Now she knew what Tom felt when her cards appeared to randomly fall in love with someone else's. This is ridiculous!

The Reflection frowned. "I do not wish to harm you."

"You already did the second you suggested I take another master," The Mirror spat.

"Master is kind to her cards," The Reflection insisted. "She will care for you like you are her own. I will care for you."

"How could you think I would agree to that?! Are you disrespecting my loyalty?!"

"I admire your loyalty," The Reflection hastily amended.

"Sure, and I'm not a card!"

"This is pathetic," Tom cut in. "If you don't want to fight him, just say so. You were never very good at stalling, dear Voldemort."

"...Apologies, Master."

Harry huffed. "You too, Harry?"

The Mirror looked sheepish. "Um, well we kind of tried to plan it during the explosion… not very convincing, was it?"

"I won't force you, then."

"Ah, but Master!"

Harry shrugged and rubbed the back of her neck while averting her eyes. "You know the spell only works if it's used as a trump card. If you don't have the determination, then it won't work. Besides, I'm pretty low on magic anyway since it failed. Not like I could fight even if I wanted to. You can spend your last moments… err… talking to The Reflection, I guess. Oh, unless you don't want to—"

"I do," The Mirror insisted. "We do. Want to die with you. All of us. We're your cards—no one else's."

Harry smiled at her card's vehemence. "Thanks."

Across the field, Tom was staring at her with an unreadable expression. The Reflection's eyes were on The Mirror. Completely oblivious to their two masters, the two cards began to converse quietly in the middle of the field, both seeming to forget the reality of the matter when together.

Harry bit her lip. "So, you wanna go get a bite to eat? I know a good bakery—"

Tom looked at her in disbelief.

"Well, I mean, I get a death wish, right? And I'm kind of hungry, so…"

The Card Mistress stared. Harry fidgeted.

"For giving me an… interesting battle, I suppose you do."

Since Tom's face was known far and wide in the Magical world, Harry brought them to a Mundane shop. It felt extremely surreal—sitting across from Tom Riddle with dainty slices of cake and a cute coffee mug. Harry only hesitated a little before diving in and deciding she'd enjoy her last meal, especially if it consisted of the sweets she was planning on ordering.

Tiramisu, strawberry shortcake, mini limoncello trifle cups and red velvet cupcake with a macadamia nut cookie on the side—once Harry started eating, she began to enjoy herself thoroughly without restraint. If she was going to die, she wasn't going to need to save money anyway. Or watch her weight.

A plate modestly piled with colorful macaroons was placed on the table.

Okay, definitely not watching her weight or her wallet.

Harry took the pink one and placed it on her plate. When she looked up, Tom was staring at her with increasing incredulity.

"You can have some, you know. I'm paying," Harry said. It was only polite—she was getting her death wish, Tom was getting free food. When the only thing the Card Mistress did was eye the cake on the table, Harry frowned. "Do you not like sweets?"

"I've... never had any of these," Tom admitted.

Harry almost dropped her fork with how abruptly she froze. The younger card wielder clicked her tongue and immediately took a swipe of the limoncello with her fork, reaching across the table afterwards to unceremoniously shove it into the mouth of a still-incredulous Tom Riddle.

"You need to," Harry commanded. Her voice was slow, strong, and serious. "I mean okay, the Magical world has cauldron cakes, pumpkin pasties, butterbeer and sugar quills, but Mundanes are just as good if not better in the sweets department. They're just far more diverse."

Tom gave her a look that made Harry pull her hand back, leaving the fork in her mouth. After a moment, the Card Mistress slowly removed the utensil—all the limoncello was cleaned and definitely swallowed, Harry smugly noted—and said, "I've never had Magical sweets either."

"...What."

Tom scowled. "I've simply—there was never the opportunity, I suppose you could say."

Harry shook her head. "No. I don't believe you. There's always the opportunity for cake!"

"As a child I might've wanted them, but I never got them, so by the time I could have them, the urge had died."

"That's… oh my God, that's so sad!" Harry sniffed. "I couldn't have them as a kid either, but then once I grew up and tried some—just wow. It's amazing. You don't know what you're missing! We have to fix this now since it's probably going to be the last thing I do. Let me go order a fruit tart…"

As Harry walked away, Tom's eyes lingered on her form before shifting back to the cup of limoncello trifle. Her gaze immediately swiveled back, however, to make sure the card wielder wasn't actually using the moment to escape.

Tom was silent, even upon her return.

"Okay, so you've really got to try this—" Harry trailed off as she plopped back into her seat, choosing to reply to Tom's silence with a quiet all her own. She coupled it with a smile as she pushed the cup of dessert forward, along with the plate of macaroons.

The Card Mistress paused. And then she took up her own fork and lightly swiped a bit of cream.

Harry grinned.

They spent the next hour enjoying the sweets laid out upon the table.

Tom's sudden demureness didn't affront Harry at all. The thoughtfulness was actually somewhat welcomed.

Because Harry had never thought she'd die quite like this, and once she'd realized that her life was probably going to be significantly shortened—what with the Most Evil Card Mistress of the Century hunting her down—she'd figured that she would never do anything… well, important. Life changing. Never do anything with her life since it was so… short.

But now? Tom's shift in demeanor told Harry that she'd done something. Whether it was good or bad, little or big, the card wielder was rather sure she'd just gotten her arch-nemesis addicted to sweets. And who knew—maybe Tom would be so occupied with tasting the best sweets in the world to consider world domination or whatever she wanted.

It was an accomplishment in Harry's book. And really, it felt good.

Living life without something sweet and fluffy to it was terrible! Everyone needed a feel-good treat, and Tom had clearly gone on too long without one.

"Any more last wishes, Potter?" Tom asked, her tone back to its usual smug amusement.

"Umm… I think I'm too full to make any more." Harry laughed. "Seriously though, could you make it… umm, fast? And painless? Torture's really not my thing. And, well, I know it's kind of the supervillain stereotype to 'make an example' of their enemies, but… we're not really enemies, right? I saved you, you saved me, we argued… We had cake together—"

"Yes yes," Tom waved. "Fair enough. Quick and painless, as far as I'm concerned, means clean. I actually prefer that, mind you, so let's—"

The suddenness of their meeting being interrupted threw both of them off. They were on a field in the middle of nowhere—back in the Magical world, but Harry genuinely had no idea where Tom had brought her—and, in all likelihood, where no one would find them, but lo and behold the Ministry could actually do something for once.

Tom clicked her tongue.

Harry didn't think it could get any more surreal than this.

"Potter! You alright there?" Moody yelled as soon as she was back within the battalion's protection.

"Umm… I think so? Not sure..."

"Get it together, Hero! Constant vigilance!"

The booming of the Head Auror's voice didn't make things better in the least. Harry could only watch in amazement as Tom, realizing she was outnumbered, did a bit of damage on the forces with only a card or two and then effortlessly escaped.

"She'll be mine next time," the Card Mistress sneered one last time.

"She'll be ready for you next time!" Moody snarled back. He turned around once she left and Harry knew her bones would be left miserable and aching for the next few weeks. "Potter! We're stepping up the training!"

"Yes sir…"

Well, at least she got to eat her sweets.

"Master," The Mirror murmured. He seemed to battle with some doubt in his mind before finally moving to touch his master's elbow.

Harry whimpered, the pillows in her arms squeezed as tight as her eyelids. She—she didn't understand. Everything was okay. Even when Madam Pomphrey was performing her checkups with an eye almost scarier than Moody's, it had been okay. So why weren't things okay now? She—

She was scared.

Terribly so.

"Master, we're okay."

Harry wanted to nod and smile and agree, but she couldn't. Not when okay meant alive. That it had almost come to that, this afternoon—that death had been so close—

She'd been okay with it, before. Or at least, she thought she had. It had been so surreal that only her mind understood what was reality—her heart had certainly not. It was one of the things she'd picked up over the years, a permanent halfhearted countenance. Always annoyed, always tired, always happy or always sad. Always used to being the butt of the joke, and only seeing it as something to be indignant about instead of terrified.

Never furious. Never blissful. Never anguished.

Always calm enough to blunt the blows and carry the weight of her body on her own two feet.

Harry's hands shook. She felt The Mirror hug her, press a kiss to the crown of her head and whisper soothing sounds to try and calm her.

She'd almost died today.

Really died.

God, what was she thinking?! It had seemed like a joke when she was experiencing it—but now, thinking back and remembering all the times Tom's hands had been in her pockets, probably contemplating exactly when and where and how Harry would die—

Probably thinking what card to use. What card wouldn't make a mess.

Harry's defense mechanisms didn't quite work when she was left alone.

The Mirror cradled her as she cried. She didn't know why she was crying—only that she was, and she was terribly, terribly afraid of something she felt in the creeping corners of the room, distant and too close at the same time.

Harry thought she understood why children were afraid of the monster in the closet now.

In retrospect, it was rather eye-opening—considering the fact that she'd never understood why people thought any existed. Her closet certainly didn't have one. And she would know, since she lived in hers.

After that, and several consequential attempts that ended up in much the same way, it became almost like a joke for the villain-and-hero duo.

They fought—oh, they fought—Harry steadily improving and always giving as good as she got, but the Card Mistress usually managed to pull ahead. When that happened, they would fly off to the Mundane world and fulfill more of Harry's "death wishes." Often times they went to a bakery or a cafe, but once they went to a popular ice cream parlor and another time a clothes shop, because Harry really wanted tips on looking as suave as Tom did all the time.

Because Harry couldn't pay for everything as if it were her last day ever, they often split the bill. And once they were done, they would fly off to a field in the Magical world, talk a bit and prepare an "execution," and each time, the Ministry's card wielders would find them and shoo the Card Mistress off.

When Harry thought about it, it felt like they were playing hooky... and getting away with it.

After the twelfth time, Tom started giving her lessons. It started out as offhanded tips after Harry came out magically exhausted, and then they became real tutoring sessions as Tom seemed to give up on the wholehearted killing her enemy thing after all. Note the wholeheartedly. Harry couldn't rest a beat, otherwise the halfheartedly would off her and then she'd have to deal with the Card Mistress' condescending stare.

At one point, confused with her supposed enemy but not wanting look a gift horse in the mouth, Harry asked, "So what do you want anyway?"

Tom finished swallowing her bite of Marzipan before replying with a question of her own. "You don't know?" The look that followed was one full of disappointment and irritation.

Harry quickly corrected herself. "Of course I know, but that's full of the propaganda the Ministry hands out like complimentary cookies. How could I not when Shacklebolt is shouting it every training session? But I want to hear it from you."

Tom seemed satisfied with that. Harry unconsciously sat up a bit straighter at the attention.

"I want equality," Tom said as she turned to look out the window. Window seats were the woman's favorites, which Harry quickly found out.

"E...quality," Harry parroted.

"Far different from what the Ministry says, isn't it? Well, I don't blame them for flipping around my goals. They're practically a dictatorship anyway, and I'm the rebellion. If they didn't insult me, I'd have stormed in there myself and hit them a couple of times."

The younger card wielder smiled to herself. That did sound like Tom.

"I want," she began again, playing with the cream stuck to her plate with her fork, "less restrictions for card wielders. You have cards of your own because you accidentally made them, correct? Card making would be easier and safer if they taught the theory in schools. Unfortunately they just banned it to Card Masters' rights."

"I've always wanted to freely use my cards," Harry confessed.

"Yes. And all those who want to become card wielders after school serve a Ministry service."

"That keeps them in control?"

"Correct," Tom nodded. "The problem is, other than that, a far too skewed ratio of newbies and experienced personnel, since they're always actively using their card wielders... at the same time."

"Overcrowding," Harry grimaced. "I'm one of the lucky few who got a salary, since I'm better than the rest at my job. One of my group mates... He's brilliant at healing, but he was put on reconnaissance instead and isn't a particularly great flyer..."

"And he's punished because of it on top of no salary."

"Yeah."

"Even down in the lower ranks their corruption bleeds through," Tom murmured. Harry looked at her plate. "Healers are very prestigious, as you must know. If your groupmate comes from an old family, there's a high chance someone up top has a grudge against him. Cutting off all possibility of a bright future of the next generation... That's what I would do."

"So... You plan to overthrow them? Is that what you're doing now?"

"Ultimately, yes. Right now I'm serving as a distraction."

Harry blinked. "Distraction?"

"Mm, yes. My seeds are planted all through the Ministry. I simply need them to take root and off a couple men on the council. Then overthrowing the Minister is relatively simple."

"Um..." Harry frowned. "You mean Dumbledore, right?"

"And some but mostly him."

"...You make it sound really easy," she confessed. "What's stopping you?"

"You, actually," Tom smirked as Harry jolted. "Dumbledore's no longer coming out to meet me in battle. I can defeat Moody easily, but I have no reason to if that batty headmaster doesn't come out."

"You... You want to lull him into a false sense of security with Moody?"

"Hm, you're coming to know me rather well, aren't you?"

"Aren't you worried that'll make them both war heroes?" Harry couldn't stop herself from asking. "No one will accept you as Minister!"

"Who said I was going to be Minister?" the Card Mistress raised a brow. "Oh no, I have minions for that. I'll rule quite nicely from my comfortable evil lair, thank you very much. As far as I'm concerned, the public doesn't need to know a thing."

"That's insane," Harry whispered.

"Insanely brilliant."

"Maybe," she deadpanned. "I'm not sure—I can't see the plan well enough behind your massive ego."

Tom pretended to preen, which caused Harry to burst into a flurry of giggles.

"You're like... You're like an anti-hero or something!"

Tom paused and the serious look upon her face made Harry quiet. "You shouldn't think of me like that," she said. "I am very much the villain, Harry. Don't romanticize what I'm doing in your head. I am very much a villain."

Said card wielder furrowed her brows. "I don't understand."

Tom sighed, stood, and patted her head. "I wouldn't expect you to. It's alright. Come, it's getting late."

Harry didn't feel like it was alright at all.

Her relationship with Tom could be rather slow going. Sometimes she didn't see the woman for months—the only time they met, after all, was during raids. In between, Harry's days were filled with training and lessons, meeting with all those important people who leaped at the chance to hide behind her back.

It was confusing, to be honest. Who was right and who was wrong—she didn't know.

Speaking to her cards also didn't help much. While some were unnerved by interactions with Tom's cards, they all seemed to agree that their enemy wasn't the Card Mistress. Harry easily accepted that this was probably a biased opinion. The leader of her deck was The Mirror, after all, who was absolutely enamored with The Reflection—the leader of Tom's deck.

Harry also wondered whether or not it mattered if either side was right. In the end, no one could be right all the time—she wasn't sure if even she would like to be right all the time. Being wrong, while it was terrible while it was happening, was also comforting. It meant there were still things that she didn't understand in the world, and as long as there was that—

Maybe it meant there was meaning to living after all.

That night after the first time—the first time she and Tom had fought as hero and villain, the first time they ate sweets together, the first time she felt death looming over her shoulder—had done… things to her psyche that Harry didn't want to admit. She ignored it most of the time. Being comfortable with the idea of dying was good, in her situation.

Her weird friendship with the person trying to kill her allowed for little assurance of anything definite. Harry didn't think Tom would poison her food one day, but who knew. In the back of her mind, Harry distrusted the growing comfort she had with her arch-nemesis. The problem was, she didn't want to.

And she wasn't sure if she distrusted that feeling too.

But as long as Tom didn't pull some weird assassination method, Harry acknowledged that it was probably too late to hate the woman now. In fact, as a person, Harry was quite fond of her. Tom had some strange quirks, but they weren't jarring in any way, shape, or form—at least to her—and the blunt, almost appreciative way she spoke of normally upsetting things made Harry's chest feel strange.

Because there was a shift in her voice, a glaze in her eyes, a slanted, close lipped smile on her face—and Tom was entirely too attractive to go around looking like that too—

Weird. Harry cut that thought off at that.

Taking out her cards, the card wielder decided some good old-fashioned fortune telling never hurt anyone. She just—she just wanted to know something, for once. It was okay if it was something as simple as a single "good" or "bad"—Harry just wanted to feel certain of something, even if she really wasn't.

The minute her palm was placed on the top of her deck, Harry knew they shifted to accommodate her will. She smiled, picked up the first card, and flipped it over.

The Seer stared back at her with blue eyes like the moon and endless waves of blonde hair, her usual dreamy smile on her face. Harry pressed a quick kiss to the card's glossy surface.

"Become my hand that feels the threads of the future, The Seer," she whispered. The card slowly glided out of her hands and landed, still face up, a half a meter or so away from her on the floor.

Harry picked up the rest of her deck and shuffled the cards wordlessly. Then, she cut her deck into five piles using the same hand that had drawn The Seer—her left. Then, she returned all five piles to one single deck in a random order. From the top of this deck, she drew nine cards.

The first was placed directly below The Seer. The second was placed below it, to the left. The third went below and to the right. The fourth, fifth, and sixth went into the row below the two, forming a pyramid formation. The remaining cards went into a reverse pyramid formation to create a rhombus shape.

Harry scanned the layout she had in front of her. For her deck, having a divination card—The Seer—was highly unusual. It didn't fit in the theme of her deck, nor had any battle capabilities. However, Harry didn't make her cards with something in mind. All her cards came about naturally, from her purest hopes rather than something marred with purposeful intentions. And though that disadvantaged her in some ways, overall she considered it a strength.

The topmost card, just below The Seer, was the one she flipped over first.

"The Shift," Harry whispered. The Shift card was of a woman dressed in Elizabethan fashion, gaze stern and composed. A pair of square glasses rested on the curved bridge of her nose. Her black hair was pulled back into a tight bun, a stunning contrast with the pale shade of her skin. One hand was in her lap, the other held up in front of her.

What stood out most from the picture was that the woman's body was split entirely in half. Half of it was as described, simply a woman—the other half was that of a more… animalistic nature. In short, it was the merging of a human and cat face.

While normally The Shift was a card whose power was to transform, she also represented a quick swerve in movement. To flip The Shift as the very first card… Harry frowned. It foretold extremities—something very good, or something very bad.

Next, Harry flipped over the card directly opposite to The Shift—the card at the very bottom of the formation.

"The Snare." Harry gulped. The Shift and The Snare, one right after the other—definitely not a good sign.

The Snare card had a picture of not one but two identical red foxes, both with three tails. The way they were arranged looked almost as if they were a yin-yang symbol—if not for the fact that neither was white and neither was black. On both of them, one of their ears had a single earring hanging—a large metallic hoop better fit for a bracelet, but not.

The Snare card was not a card meant for direct battle. It was a card for trickery, for traps, for wit to outsmart a greater, unaware opponent. It was a card meant to help the "underdog." In this situation, she was wary of the most likely reason for its appearance—there would be a trap. The second meaning, which would be compatible with The Shift as well, was of the weaker of sides besting the stronger.

In her situation, that would probably equate to Harry winning and Tom… losing.

The card wielder took in a shaky breath. She still had more cards to flip—the worst mistake she could do now was over-think before she'd even seen the rest of the future her cards had felt.

For her third move, Harry flipped over the three cards in the middle row, from left to right.

"The Eclipse, The Mirror, and The Ash...?"

Harry frowned. She almost never flipped The Mirror—especially not in the middle three, as the middle represented the opposing force—not her. Was she her own enemy, in this situation? That… couldn't be right—then The Mirror would've been the second card she'd flipped, but that was The Snare—

The Eclipse, The Mirror, The Ash.

Maybe she should be starting at the beginning instead of the middle. Harry focused on the first to the left—The Eclipse card.

The Eclipse was, frankly, a werewolf. However, instead of baring his fangs in the picture, he was turned around so only his back showed. His two claws hung at his sides, and his pose was somber and solitary. To Harry, he represented the beginning after an end—a sequential change, unlike The Shift who was abrupt and sudden. The Eclipse was something expected.

He also represented darkness. Specifically, something hidden in the darkness, usually alone. Harry didn't like the sound of that—and paired with The Snare… How ominous.

She didn't understand The Mirror even with that, so Harry moved on to the third card, The Ash.

The Ash card was of a young girl—an adolescent, really—with soot lightly dabbed over every inch of her visible skin. She had brown bushy hair reaching to her chest, and her smile was small, close-lipped, and slightly nervous. Her dress was a simple black lace piece, and in her arms was a little leather bound slip of a book, one more used for light notes and reminders than any real journalism or reading.

The Ash card could represent two radically different things. She could either mean shining clean, or something obscured through—metaphorical or literal—dirt. The latter was not, however, because of vague intentions or some haunted knowledge like The Eclipse was. The Ash was a bit… purer than that; she hid with the utmost shy and nervous opinion.

What The Ash hid was usually good. The Eclipse tended to hide the more… darker things. Having both of them at the same time though, with The Mirror in the center…

That troubled Harry as much as it confused her.

The Shift, The Snare, The Eclipse, The Mirror, and The Ash in that order.

...There was one more card to draw.

Harry turned her eyes to where her deck was beside her, away from the pyramid formation. Now the last step was to draw the topmost card from the deck—that would complete the prediction.

The card wielder gulped, and then drew.

The Blaze, blue eyes, red scales and all, stared up at her as her last card.

While the first card usually represented what generally would happen or had happened to cause the event, the second card representing how the action would start or what the action was that would trigger the prediction, the third, fourth, and fifth cards representing the nature of the opposing force, the sixth and last card flipped represented its goals, or effect.

Or affect, as it might be.

The Blaze specifically represented—other than fire and heat—chaos. Whatever would happen would be quick, chaotic, and filled with a flurry of action—probably one of violence. He also could represent strong emotions—and in that context, it would probably be specifically of her own or the main opposing force's.

It was possible that, because of The Ash, that whoever or whatever the prediction spoke of was hiding their emotions.

Harry frowned. The Mirror really threw her off though. Was it really herself? Normally that would be ridiculously clear and make sense, but The Snare… that card usually connotated an external force. Somehow, even though the best answer was probably the simplest, Harry didn't believe that it was her.

The card wielder shook her head. Either way, it meant to be careful and aware. Something was going to happen—soon.

Harry reached across the card formation to pick up The Seer at the top.

"Could you remember this prediction please, Luna? I feel like it'll be important." The card glowed at her master's askance. Harry smiled. "Thank you."

She hadn't expected an aerial barrage.

Harry mentally cursed, swerving in the air to avoid the rapid attacks. She couldn't run forever—she knew that—but where would she go? To whom? The rest of the Ministry forces were occupied and already having a hard time—if she brought the Death Eater reinforcements to them, nothing good would come of it.

And where was Tom?

Harry made a deep dive into the forest below. She would have to try and trick them—hide and force them to give up from their search. Her only hope was that none of them had any tracker-type cards—that would end her charade quickly.

It was supposed to be a normal raid, Harry groaned. She'd expected to get into a brawl with Tom, end up flying somewhere secluded and out of the way, and after the Card Mistress would beat her black and blue in their "lessons," fly off for some very odd female hero-villain bonding time.

None of that happened.

For one, Harry—actively fighting on the front lines and taking out many a Death Eater—didn't see Tom, who was usually there at the start. Thus, she had continued to fight, though in the back of her mind she wondered at the strange occurrence. Her eyes constantly scanned the skies, wondering where the Card Mistress was.

After a while, Moody had gotten a report that their back lines were being attacked, so Harry had flown off to help fight them off since the front lines were holding. She'd arrived, beat them off, and even went on to chase them unimpeded with a minor force behind her back. However, somewhere in the chaos they'd gotten separated, and Harry had sent off a message spell to tell them to go back to the main Ministry forces afterward, hoping they had received it.

At that time, there was no real need to worry. Nothing strange was happening. Harry did assume they got her message and headed back from wherever they were, and for a time she had also began to head back.

Until she saw a mob of Death Eaters flying in the same direction as she was.

Harry had immediately planned to stay away from them—she was alone, no reinforcements on the way, and also a high priority target. There would be nothing good getting tangled up in that—and though she knew she could take out a decent chunk of them, taking them on all at once was too ambitious. She knew her limits well what with all the times she fought with Tom.

...But she hadn't accounted for them catching sight of her.

Nor the ensuing chase that resumed.

Harry wanted nothing more than to get in her bed and rest her aching bones and strained magical core, but here, hiding in a copse of trees, she wasn't sure if there was any chance of that happening any time soon. From the glow that came from where the mob was searching for her, Harry knew they had tracker-type cards and would exhaust everything they had to capture her.

The card wielder pulled out a card from her pocket, flipping it over to find The Snare in her hand. She pressed the tip of her stave to it and then whispered, "Deceive my enemies and find victory for the one who stands against twenty, The Snare."

Orange-red gossamer strands stretched out before her, and in a moment, Harry found her face-to-face with two identical foxes. She smiled at them as they flicked their tails and darted off.

Time to set some traps. She was hardly going to go down without a fight.

"The Ash, hide me from those that seek to do a pure heart harm—"

"The Eclipse, become the sentinel of the darkness—"

"The Mirror, reflect all harm onto their originators!"

Four cards without breaking a sweat, even after all the fighting she'd done today. Harry grinned triumphantly. Tom had really built up her stamina. Imbued with her spells of purpose and the desire of their creator, her cards instantly spread out around the forest to their intended places. Only The Ash remained with her, and with a shy reassuring smile, took her hand and squeezed.

The Ash's magic spread over them, a direct shield against the tracking cards the Death Eaters were using. As long as Harry could actively feed magic to The Ash, she should be safe. It was an undesirable method of protection—something that drained magic to keep up was terribly inconvenient and usually only used when absolutely necessary without alternatives—but it was the only way she could hide herself on such short notice.

Tracking cards worked even past illusions and would find her even if she used The Shift to take the form of something else.

A distance away, Harry heard the sounds of the Death Eaters falling into the traps set by The Snare. They were a mischievous pair, and their tricks ranged from irritating to deadly, giving a good variety to keep enemies confused and easy targets. She'd sent The Mirror to pair up with The Eclipse, an offensive force to ambush her enemies safely.

The Eclipse, despite his large and bulky form, was fairly elusive. His power could trick the hearts of unprotected card wielders, and in the confusion, he could then use the strength of his lycan form to crush them. Along with his speed, he was not easy to catch, fading in and out of the shadows like an image not truly there. The Eclipse was a card that could stand on his own.

Harry had sent The Mirror to protect her two cards out battling, as she couldn't watch and command their attack herself. The Mirror would thus take that role as the leader of her deck. His natural defense of reflecting attacks, combined with the faultless respect all her other cards had for him, reassured her that they would be well on their own.

Harry's confidence grew as she felt through the bond with her cards their impending victory. It was then that her pocket burned, and Harry hastily slipped a hand in to draw the first card her fingers could touch.

The Seer.

"The reading—" Harry gasped. It was a reminder. Did that mean this was where it would happen? Coincidentally, the cards she had summoned right now—

The Snare. The Eclipse. The Mirror. The Ash.

...It wasn't coincidence, was it?

A rustle from her left made Harry freeze. Technically no one would be able to see or sense her in any fashion as long as The Ash was here, but the fortune telling put her on edge. She watched in growing horror as yet another group of Death Eaters emerged. What was going on?!

She'd been so focused on The Seer that she hadn't noticed until they were upon her. Harry cursed under her breath.

"You sure she's in this forest?"

"Yeah. Her cards were fightin' Rosier's regimen. She's in here somewhere..."

"The Dark Lady will be pleased if we catch her..."

"Slippery one. Heh, we'll show her what it's like to get on her knees—"

There was malicious laughter. Harry held her breath and squeezed her eyes shut. Beside her, The Ash moved to stand in front of her master despite the fact that she could do little should her shield drop.

The Ash was a delicate card, unfit for battle. Harry pulled out The Blaze just in case. She'd set the forest on fire and fly away in the chaos if she needed to.

And then it happened. There was a roar from above, a gust of wind, and then The Blizzard was landing and flattening the forest, Tom on his back. Harry's heart told her to relax. Her brain told her the situation was even more dangerous now.

The Seer burned in her hands. Harry resisted the urge to hiss.

"What do you think you're doing?" Tom sneered. "I believe I ordered reinforcements at the front, not loitering in the forest."

"My Lady," the leader of the group bowed. "We had no intentions to disobey your orders, but Rosier's group said they found the girl—alone. They chased her into the forest, but were unable to find her. However, they were attacked by her cards. I came and ordered half my men to assist them. They should be easily defeated momentarily. We are hunting for her now."

"What cards?"

"A boy, two foxes, and a werewolf were what we saw, my Lady."

"You're sure she hasn't already escaped?"

"We have Death Eaters monitoring the skies. She's in here somewhere."

This—this was the situation her cards foretold, wasn't it? Harry bit her lip. The Shift... A swerve in movement. A change. Extreme good, or extreme bad. The Snare... She was cornered, trapped in her own trick.

Was Tom finally going to kill her, today?

The Eclipse, The Mirror, The Ash. It made sense—Tom was darkness. The Ash represented how Harry felt about her—conflicted, good-hearted, but still her enemy. The Mirror didn't represent Harry—it represented their similarities. Similar fighting styles. Similar decks. Harry liked to think they could be similar of mind too. And most obviously, Tom possessed The Reflection. It could have represented that.

The Blaze was obvious. Chaos. Confusion. And now—

Harry suddenly felt like all her strength had been sapped from her. She knew what that meant. Her cards had been defeated. Harry panicked, turning to look at The Ash, but the card shared a similar look of anguish and fear. She used too much magical power. The Ash faded back into her pocket. The protection fell.

Tom stopped mid-sentence. Harry turned back around. Their eyes locked.

She knew she was doomed. Fear coursed through her veins. Nothing was surreal anymore. Everything was so very real, and how had she allowed herself to forget that ultimately, Tom wanted her dead?

The woman had even said that the only thing in the way was her.

Then, Harry hadn't fully believed it. Tom hadn't seriously tried to kill her for awhile now.

It was over.

"My Lady—?" The Death Eater moved to turn around and figure out what the Card Mistress was looking at, but The Blizzard snarled and stomped and—wait, moved to cover her? Harry blinked.

"I've sent my card to call back the others. We'll find her here instead. Well, what are you waiting for? Go." There was a crunch of leaves and rustle of cloth. The Blizzard growled. "Not that way. Draco wants that direction. Honestly, split up and search!"

The Death Eaters scattered in a flurry. None of them tried to go around the dragon again.

When they were all gone, The Blizzard stepped aside. Harry clutched The Blaze. She didn't exactly have enough magical power for it, but desperate times—maybe she could at least try—

Tom stepped forward. The Seer was searing between her fingertips.

"Silly girl. What are you doing?"

Harry blinked. "Huh...?"

"Leaving the front lines." Tom crossed her arms and tapped her fingers impatiently. "That was reckless. Why would you leave your protection?"

"You ambushed the back!" The younger card wielder finally found the voice to argue. "What was I supposed to do, let us get pincered?"

"You should've let someone else do it."

"That would've taken a whole group of twenty. If I just went, I'd only need five with me—"

"Idiot. That put you in danger. Where's your five now?"

"I-I sent them back..." Harry mumbled.

"And didn't go back yourself. Mhm."

"Well I was being chased! I—"

"Stupid girl. I thought you had a better sense of self-preservation than that," Tom sneered.

Harry couldn't take being looked at like that—not by Tom. "Well you weren't there!" she shouted. "You weren't—I was worried that you—"

"Quiet. You'll be found by my minions no matter what I do like that."

While Harry followed that direction, let it not be said she did so obediently. Her eyes glared a violent shade of green, though Tom looked unperturbed by it.

The Card Mistress paused and some curious expression crossed her face. It was something stuck between equal parts disturbance and relief, and then something else in her eyes that made them seem oddly attractive in the light reaching in from above the trees. Harry lost strength in her glare and fidgeted. She didn't know what to do when Tom looked like that—

"I was finishing some last minute preparations, if you must know," Tom said stiffly. Her eyes avoided Harry's. "And then there was an… issue with some of my men on the other side. I'm… I'm fine."

"Oh… That's good."

"Quite."

Harry wondered what that curiously odd stutter her heart did meant. The Seer's heat cooled in her hand, and Harry wondered what that meant too. Was it… crisis avoided? Or…? There were too many things that happened around Tom that the young card wielder had never encountered before.

"Do you… trust me?"

That was an awfully straightforward question. So much so it could be considered—well, it probably had been considered—the forbidden question. Harry froze—noticeably so—and Tom looked like she regretted asking it.

Harry panicked. No! Don't get the wrong idea—it's not like that at all—but wait, should she really be caring about her enemy's opinion of her? Oh, blast!

Because her mind said no. Her heart, on the other hand, said—"Yes."

It slipped out before Harry could stop herself. The second it did, she turned to look away—anywhere, anywhere other than Tom—because she couldn't bear to see what sort of expression the Card Mistress had on her face in reply to that.

Tom's voice was soft and affectionate this time. "Stupid girl," she murmured. "How have you managed to survive all this time?" And then she walked forward, extended a hand to help Harry up, and waited.

Harry took it. It was about then that she realized she was completely, utterly, undeniably doomed.

Tom Riddle was the perfect villain for her after all.

Because every time they met, she made her a little less of the hero Harry had never actually been in the first place.

And her heart was completely okay with that.

Her new discovery of these… feelings left Harry straggling the line between self-hatred and ecstasy, horror and indifference. Her mind tended to justify things in ways that both left her guilty and indignant, like: I never wanted to be a hero anyway or the only reason I'm fighting with Tom is the Ministry and Dumbledore. She didn't want to think these things, because these things were things she'd already accepted as part of her situation.

It felt wrong to look back on them and deny what she'd agreed with herself.

The Mirror, however, was unsurprised. "Master," he told her one day, "Whenever it involves Voldemort's master, you always dance around the issue. Unlike Voldemort and I, who deal with each other through confrontation, you deal with her by avoiding it."

"How is that not surprising?" Harry asked dubiously. "You're my reflection, aren't you?"

The Mirror smiled. "Things are reflected in strange ways," he replied. "A mirror image is never exactly the same as the original. It is similar in other ways. You could say I show your true desire."

"So I'm not brave or courageous or heroic in any shape or form, so you are for me? Is that what you're saying?"

"No. You are all those things, otherwise I would not be them. However, in certain situations, you shy away from them. No one is something all the time—Master, that's terribly tiring."

"Then… you and The Reflection—"

The Mirror nodded encouragingly and smiled again. Harry blushed at his pointed silence.

"Wait, then are you saying that Tom is—"

"I'm not saying anything," the card denied.

Harry deflated. "Oh. Of course you're not…"

"Ah! But don't lose hope, Master! In the end, the fact that you're unsure is undoubtedly you. I don't think you've changed in any way—you're simply showing the things that you always have been, but weren't at the time. And, you know, between The Reflection and me…" The Mirror smiled coyly. "I guess you could say it was love at first sight."

Harry sputtered. "Wha—it definitely wasn't like that at all! Ah! Wait, does that mean Tom—"

It was too late. Her card had already retreated into the safety of its inanimate form. Harry pouted.

"Do you agree with him, Luna?"

The Seer smiled as she combed through her master's hair. "Destiny and Fate are strange things. Nothing is completely fated to be until it happens. That disparity between destiny and not is what you call "coincidence." And I do like coincidences very much. You're very pretty, Master. Don't you know?"

Like usual, Harry had no idea what her card was saying. With an exasperated huff, Harry wrapped her arms around her legs from her sitting position and said, "Is this your way of telling me that I'm being silly?"

"You're not being silly at all."

"Then…?"

Luna smiled patiently, even though Harry couldn't see it. "Master, I think you're in love."

"Thanks for the confirmation."

"And when you're in love, love has you do what love needs to make love right. Because people tend to do things more often when they're right, you know. That doesn't make love wrong, just… influential. And I think, Master, that I quite favor you in love rather than out of it. Love makes things ever so pretty—to make up for the times when it isn't. And I think it's very good that you think Tom Riddle is already very beautiful, because I think you'll be needing it soon."

"Luna, you're going too fast for me! And who said I was in love with Tom?"

"Oh, Master," The Seer giggled. "Who else would you be in love with?"

"Wait," Harry paused, "Are you telling me that… that it's fate, or something?"

"Oh no, Master. I'd never tell you such a silly thing as fate—" at that, Harry snorted, "—it's just something we cards know, you know? And Tom Riddle's deck is very likeable too. If the cards are fond of each other, who's to say that their makers aren't? No, Master, I don't meant to say that your love was destined to be love, or to even happen at all. But even still, nothing is wrong with coincidences—that doesn't make it any less than what it is. And I think you're rather good at that, Master—keeping things the way they are. So you shouldn't grow tired of that any time soon, I hope."

"Somehow that makes me feel a bit better, Luna," Harry paused again, "Thanks."

"It was my pleasure, Master." The Seer finished off the loose braid and then returned to her card.

Harry sighed. She spread her cards out in her hands and studied each and every one of them. "Do any of you have anything else to say too?"

They warmed in her hands, but said nothing. Harry figured that was a positive enough sign.

In love with Tom, huh…

Harry frowned. She wished love wasn't so good at doing what it did—maybe then her heart would stop beating so fast.

The air was chilly in the autumn days, so Harry took to wearing scarves more often. They were soft and fluffy and some childish part of her thought that if she wore something new, it'd draw attention to it instead of her loud thumping heart these days. It was most insistent ever since she accepted her love for Tom.

Sometimes she looked out her window and wondered if Tom felt it too, wherever she was.

She'd finally managed to wrangle a day off from Moody to "recuperate." Harry was truly thankful—maybe it was the way her eyes would trail off into the distance sometimes that made the Head Auror think she was going to burn out, or maybe he was just in a good mood when she asked; Harry didn't know. Whatever it was, it got her a day off to wander about in a small Magical village, so she certainly wasn't complaining.

Someone fell in step beside her and Harry looked over. It was a person in a neutral green cloak, high quality undoubtedly—she looked up into the hood and saw familiar red eyes looking back at her.

"Hello," Harry whispered. Her cursed heart began to pick up, loud like drums in her chest, and she wondered if Tom could hear them. If Tom knew.

"Hello," Tom greeted back.

They walked aimlessly for a while in silence.

"Would you care to duel with me? To pass the time," Tom said. It sounded important to the Card Mistress, no matter how much she tried to downplay it with her words.

"Sure, I guess."

Tom nodded, and without missing a beat, they moved behind a building. Tom drew a card, wrapped her arms around Harry—she can definitely hear it now; I'm sure of it!—and with a whisper of a name, they vanished from the village.

They appeared in a familiar field. Harry didn't know what landmark jogged her memory—certainly, there were none—but she recognized it as the place where they first fought. Tom let go of her, and the missing warmth almost fooled her into following it.

Harry flushed, turning to look the other way in hopes that Tom didn't see. The woman had a penchant for staring at her face when least expected.

"You know," the Card Mistress began, "you've grown a lot. At first I thought you were a silly little girl who would never reach her full potential, but at some point, you convinced me to nurture it."

Harry moved to face her, but Tom was turned around and all she could see was her strong, solitary back.

"And I found I didn't mind training you. You were a lovely student; someone who grew during the heat of battle. I respect that of you, Harry—you've always given me your best and nothing less than that. I respect that. I don't know why you fight, but you fight like each blow means the world to you. Maybe it does. You and I both knew it stopped being about life and death a long time ago."

"I-I respect you too! I-I don't know why, but... always, you've been the one who—"

Tom turned around, a strange smile on her face. Harry paused.

"Y-You've been the one... who..."

"You could say I show your true desire."

"I don't think you changed in any way."

"I don't mean your love was destined to be love..."

The Seer burned in her pocket. Harry swallowed to try and wet her fast-drying throat.

"It's always been you," she whispered.

Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi.

I show not your face but your heart's desire.

The Mirror. The Reflection.

Tom nodded and murmured, with just as much meaning in it, "Yes."

The word was blown away with the wind before it was able to reach Harry, but somehow, the card wielder knew exactly what they were supposed to tell. For Harry, who wanted to be strong and peerless, powerful enough to stand on her own and do as she pleased, and for Tom, who found the top of the mountain a depressing thing indeed and wanted only to return to what she used to be—

For both of them, who saw each other as reflections mirrored across broken shards of glass, it had always been—

Tom. Harry.

"Come, Harry," the Card Mistress commanded, voice loud and clear across the wind and distance, "Show me the power behind your reflection. Make me understand your resolve. What do you want from this world? For what purpose were your cards created? What does your heart scream for in the midst of battle? This is my final lesson for you. Make me understand."

They drew their cards, and what ensued next was the most extraordinary battle Harry had ever fought.

Tom, true to her stance, went full power this time. No bored amusement, only focused, dangerous Card Mistress. Every time an attack hit from her cards, every time Tom shouted a command, Harry could feel it. Because this, this was the Greatest Card Mistress of the Century. Great but Terrible. Harry felt the shock of her blows rattle and echo through every little piece of her bones.

But Harry didn't back down. She gave as good as she got, summoning card after card, spell after spell, strike after strike to give Tom an even match. How long they fought, she didn't know. All she knew was at some point, their battle ascended, flying high into the sky and among the clouds, dodging, feinting, weaving and spiraling.

Instead of two masterminds of opposite sides of a battlefield, they became warriors themselves, fighting alongside their cards. They became one even with each other—predicting the other's moves to the fraction of a second. Harry forgot her confusion, forsook her doubt. She put her faith wholeheartedly in what she did know.

Her love for Tom.

Her cards.

Her desire for a place in this world—a reason for existing on the line between Mundane and Magical.

And what she wanted to convey to the person crossing staves with her—to the person who had refined her potential and given her the power to project her voice across a battlefield—

You're so lonely up there, sitting on your throne of clouds, her heart shouted. Aren't you scared?

No, Tom replied, I am here because I choose to be. This is my prize. This is what my power has won me.

The world is a scary place, Harry admitted, but I think it's worse to be alone. Aren't you cold up there? It's awfully high.

No, Tom replied again, I'm not cold. And even if I was, the strong do not falter.

Don't you ever wonder? If you're so powerful, aren't you scared that you'll drown?

What is there to drown in?

Your power. The part of you that you aren't—not what you are, not your reflection, but that that has deviated from what you are. What has become from your strength.

Tom faltered.

Harry took it. "The Mirror!" she called to their arena in the sky.

"The Reflection!"

That's a silly thing to fear. I do what I like because I have power—how would I lose myself in what I am?

By forgetting what you are. By remembering, but being too high up to reach back down and help yourself up. That's what I'm scared of.

You're weak, Tom shot back.

No, Harry answered calmly, I'm not weak. And you know it too. I'm strong, but not so weary as to abandon all that I am.

I do what I must. With great power comes great responsibility—

Are you drowning? Harry shouted. A particularly powerful blast from The Mirror and The Blaze clipped The Blizzard's wing and nearly dislodged The Reflection. Are you drowning? Are you, Tom?

N—

Fire wrapped around The Blizzard.

o—

"Fiendfyre, Ron!"

No, I'm not!

"Voldemort, reflect it!"

"Dodge!"

I'm not drowning. I'm not weak. I know who I am—

Really? Harry shouted. You do? You don't sound like you do—

How would you know?

Because I am your reflection. I am your mirror. And you are mine. They say you can never know yourself well enough—between you and I, I think I can. I... I want to become you, just as much as I fear becoming you. I think that's the truth of it, just as much as it's the truth of anything. Hey Tom, are you lonely?

"Finish them, Voldemort! Reflect the power of the frozen tundra, Glacius!"

Harry quickly returned The Blaze and called, "The Sentinel, become the shield of your namesake! The Grim, become the steed of conquest!"

The Mirror shielded the first burst of ice, and as the second wave of snow and shards came rushing forth, commanded The Grim to try and dodge it. The large black dog did try to some success—he was fast, without a doubt, but the frozen winds encompassed everything and all. Even Harry was forced to try and shield herself from the oncoming attack.

"Combine with The Venom, The Mist!"

It was too much. Harry yelped as she was blown away from the vortex of power. She knew what Tom was doing—by creating the blast first with a continuous outward spiral of wind and ice, she was able to throw whatever power she pleased in a wide area range. In this case, it would be deadly venom and freezing mist.

If any of those things hit her or her cards, they were finished.

But Harry wasn't about to give up yet.

"The Light, cleanse the impurities before me!" she shouted, fighting against the buffers of air. "The Eclipse, find the hidden pathway to the heart of the storm and guide the persistent warrior!"

She couldn't see a thing, couldn't hear a thing across the field either, so Harry had no idea what Tom was doing. She doubted the Card Mistress could tell what she was doing. Well, that was fine—that meant it was now or never.

Before, The Mirror's reluctance to fight was, she realized, because she as his master did not possess enough resolve. Sure, she was fighting with her life on the line—but Tom Riddle had seemed light years ahead anyway. All she'd really wanted to do was stall until help came. The thought of victory never once formed a definite resolution in her mind.

That was why her trump card didn't work.

But now, maybe it would.

Under The Light's protection, The Sentinel didn't need to stay in shield form. The Eclipse would take The Mirror right to where The Reflection was. Since she was sure Tom had protections up around her deck's leader, The Eclipse could also handle that afterward with his presence already there. That would leave The Mirror free to clash directly with his counterpart.

Now or never.

Harry took a deep breath and braved the mighty tundra of magic before her.

"The Sentinel, become the sword that smites Life! The Grim, become the cloak that hides the doomed from the brink of Death! The Seer, become my gaze of Victory! Three elements of war, bless the persistent warrior; Life, Death, Victory—paint the mural of conquest!"

The world is a big place. Infinitesimally small at the top—but that's just an illusion. It's actually even bigger up there, at the place between the stars and the ground where the sky stretches out farther than the eyes can see. Endlessly. Hey Tom, I don't think I could survive in a place like that. It sounds really scary, to be there all alone.

You can see beautiful things up there, I hear, but I think I like it better down here. Somewhere between that place and the ground, a place that people normally forget exists. As beautiful as it can be, I think it's hiding a true horror. And I think you already know what that horror is.

Hey Tom, sitting up there on your throne of clouds with a scepter of stars that you can never hold, what's it like there? Is that marvelous horror so bewitching that you don't want to leave?

Or is it that you're trapped there?

Have you forgotten how to get down?

Hey Tom.

It's okay.

Maybe you've been up there so long that you've forgotten—down here isn't scarier in the least. In fact, I think it can be rather beautiful here—it's hard to find, but I've seen it once or twice. Maybe if you're with me, we'll find it more often. Maybe you should come down—just for a visit?

...Hey Tom?

I'll come and get you, if you've forgotten how to come down.

There was an explosion. Harry didn't know what happened, but that was all she could hear—the sound of the blast rang in her ears, and then the wind stopped and she opened her eyes and suddenly, just like that, it was over.

Well, not completely.

The card wielder didn't even glance at where the battle had taken place to check whether or not actual battle was still going on. All she could see was Tom's body falling, falling and falling and falling and the Card Mistress wasn't doing anything to stop it. Harry spiraled into a deep dive, hands stretched out for Tom's, urging the woman to meet her eyes just once.

Once.

Tom looked just as Harry's hand clasped hers.

Let go, Tom said.

No, Harry replied.

Let go, Tom demanded.

No, Harry retorted.

Let me go!

No way!

Harry, let go!

"I won't!"

Harry tugged and they began to slow, but Tom still dangled and Harry still felt her weight as if the woman had no will left to fly.

"...Why?" the Card Mistress whispered.

That was an easy one. Harry beamed down at her and said without missing a single beat, "Because you're important to me, Tom!"

There was a moment of pause where they both remained there, suspended and motionless in a pocket of time. But then Tom moved and it was broken; the weight disappeared from Harry's hand—indeed, the Card Mistress' hand slipped out of hers completely—and instead two arms wound around her waist as she became the one being held up.

Tom's cheek rested against her stomach, head pressed to her abdomen underneath her breasts. For some reason, even though this position made Harry's heart beat the loudest it had ever sounded, she wasn't embarrassed at all.

Because no matter how ironic it was, Harry, whose frantic panic always preoccupied her with volume, loved quietly. Her love was silent, gentle; soft, but ever-present. She neither cared for an all-consuming love nor wanted one, but it didn't make her love weak in the slightest. It was strong and constant, like the rhythm of her breathing.

On the other hand, Tom's love was a conflicted one. It wasn't always there, and when it was it tended to hide behind corners and murmur softly instead of speaking proudly. It was unsure, hesitant, and yet not of its existence but rather of its consequences. Tom's love was overly cautious because it knew little of things other than harm—and that was okay. Tom could learn. Harry could teach her.

Don't let go.

Tom said nothing. Her arms eased their grip and instead of remaining in a tight embrace, entwined her fingers with her partner's. In this manner they re-ascended, closer to each other than ever before.

The sight that met them back up was a pleasant one.

The Reflection and The Mirror, along with the rest of their summoned cards, greeted them amiably. The two sides who were supposed to be opponents seemed to have no reserves about mingling after the fight was over. Neither Harry nor Tom could be angry with them—the two decks had become much like comrades (and for some, a little more than that) with the progression of camaraderie between their masters.

"Are you both alright, Master?" The Mirror asked. He was ruffled and his clothes were definitely dirty, but he appeared well—just as The Reflection did, arms wrapped around the shorter card from behind.

"Yes," Harry answered, squeezing Tom's hand, "I think so."

"Fly with me?" the Card Mistress asked.

"Of course." Harry grinned, and the cards shared pleased mischievous looks amongst themselves as they returned to their other forms.

Somehow, even while being close to absolute magical exhaustion, Tom and Harry still found the strength within them to fly. They magnificently did so too—it was not at the same fast-paced, break-neck speeds of their battle, but it was no less impressive. Lazy swoops, easy dives, spirals and twines and complex circles—together, in silence aside from Harry's delighted laughter.

If there was ever a moment when Harry knew how much she treasured her love for Tom, it would have been then.

And she was content to let it sit there in comfortable, blessed silence—the mountain on which Tom rested her weary back.

After that, Harry was in a state of perpetual cloud nine. Sometimes it would manifest in a rougher (more enthusiastic, Moody approved with a nod) training session, other times it arose in a dazed, distracted state in which Harry moved more by instinct and reflex than any sort of conscious decision.

It wasn't exactly Constant Vigilance, but considering the fact that Harry made a good show of dodging all the obstacles flying at her during an aerial warm up while she was in said state… well, there was little to complain about, much to her instructor's displeasure.

And because of this, you could say it was almost expected that something bad would happen. Something bad always did, Harry bemoaned. She raced across the battlefield as fast as she could, dodging spells and cards while spending little to retaliate. The marble floors were hard against her bare feet and her clothes weren't the light-weight, battle-ready apparel that she usually wore, but there had been no time for that.

No time at all.

There'd been a ball hosted by the Ministry, a formal event in celebration of the winter solstice. Yule. Harry had been running late for some reason or other, and when she'd arrived, the party had already been at full blast. Everyone had been drinking, eating, dancing and having a good time—already their guards had been low, and if Harry had been on time doubtless she would've been one of them.

But she'd been late. And she'd still had her wits about her when the attack happened.

And if she knew Tom like she thought she did—

Harry raced up the grand staircase and through the halls, aiming to get to the meeting room where she knew the big council heads were. They'd just gone up after she arrived, and it'd been only a few minutes after when the politicians were swarming her that the Death Eaters attacked.

Undoubtedly, Tom would aim to off them all in one go. Harry had no idea what she was doing—she agreed there needed to be change, but she was unsure where exactly she stood when it came to the Card Mistress' campaign. Honestly, Harry had no idea what she would do either if she made it there on time.

Would she fight for the council? Fight to protect lives?

What was she doing anyway?

When her dress got in the way for the nth time, the card wielder growled before ripping the fabric and throwing the shreds to the side. It was Ministry-supplied anyway. After that, she reached the meeting room with little obstacle.

Harry paused. She had no idea what she'd find inside. No clue as to what she was doing or would do. This was a bad situation all around—going in without a plan? She'd been trained better than that! But she was already here and—

She wanted to see Tom.

The woman hadn't said a word to her about this attack, after all. True, she had no obligation to, but Harry thought they were closer than that. Not to mention that time they flew together—

Hadn't that meant something? For the first time since then, Harry doubted.

But that was neither here nor there. The card wielder threw the door open and decided then and there that what would come, would come.

The Seer burned in her hands.

She had not expected to see Dumbledore holding Tom at stave point, with three of his cards behind him and none of the Card Mistress' summoned. He'd looked over when the door had opened, as had Tom, but that had been no matter to Harry. Seeing that—seeing Tom vulnerable, in danger, what else could she do?

Harry moved without thinking.

"The Eclipse!" she summoned, glossy silver gossamer strands of magic fusing together to form the werewolf. He snarled, and before anyone could blink, she'd taken out one of Dumbledore's cards.

"Ms. Potter—" the Headmaster attempted to call, but Harry wouldn't listen. She could feel several other Ministry members surround her; confused, as she should be their hero, but recognizing an attack when they saw one.

Honestly, that was impressive, but she had no tolerance for any of that right now.

"With all due respect, Headmaster, get away from Tom," she spat.

Dumbledore frowned. "Ms. Potter? Are you alright? Our goal has been to capture her, and here we have her—"

The Eclipse materialized again in the shadows of the Ministry officials surrounding her. He instantly took them out—knocking them over with a single blow of his powerful claws. She stepped over their groaning bodies and glared straight into his eyes.

"Let Tom go."

Dumbledore looked between the Card Mistress and his once student. When Tom said nothing, he sighed and muttered a, "I see…"

"I'm afraid I won't, Ms. Potter."

"That's fine," Harry said, motions completely on autopilot as all she could do was concentrate on the point of Dumbledore's stave. "I expected that. Remus!"

The Eclipse materialized then beside the Card Mistress, and before any of Dumbledore's cards could stop it, he brought her into the shadows with him. Their attacks sliced thin air.

"I don't want to hurt you, Ms. Potter, but I'm afraid if that's what it takes to apprehend my old student…"

Harry didn't even let him finish. "The Grim!" she summoned, and the battle started.

It was even, for awhile, but then Harry started to gain the upper hand as her attacks never ceased. She was relentless—ruthless, almost. Her cards sensed her desperation and reacted in turn. Dumbledore, who was still inwardly reeling in the shock of her betrayal, was hesitant. He truly didn't want to hurt her—and Harry took advantage of the opening and ran away with it.

With The Snare prohibiting any other Ministry forces to enter the room, The Eclipse having already brought Tom to safety, and The Mirror just as enraged as she was, the fight turned in her favor. Just as Harry defeated another one of the Card Master's cards, someone snapped.

Death Eaters appeared out of nowhere and grabbed hold of Dumbledore. One of them took his deck, the other took his stave.

What… what was going on? Harry snapped her head to the side when she heard someone come up beside her.

It was Tom.

The Card Mistress smiled at her. "Well done," she said.

Harry couldn't smile back. "...What?"

"You've been a big help, Harry. I couldn't have gotten my Death Eaters any closer unless he was too distracted to sense them—which you did masterfully. I knew training you was a good idea."

"What?" Harry repeated. Only then did she scan Tom's body and see that the woman was completely unharmed.

The Seer went cold in her hands. A feeling of dread crept up her spine. No, she didn't want to believe—

"What do you mean, Tom."

Completely oblivious to the quiver in her companion's voice, the Card Mistress said, "I said you were in the way, didn't I? Well, I figured out a way to solve that without removing you. Quite ingenious, isn't it? Oh, Dumbledore never expected his Savior to turn against him! The Chosen One! Betrayal would have simply been unheard of. Ah, but that is the difference between heroes and villains. Heroes care about the means they use to get something. Villains have no regard at all. Trying to do both results in failure, as he found out."

"You… you used me?"

"Well, yes of course—ah, are you hurt anywhere? I have healers on standby—"

Harry slapped away Tom's hand when the woman tried to touch her cheek. It had been on reflex—and Tom must've recognized the shocked look on her face because she didn't try again or call it out.

"I-I'm fine," the card wielder replied, voice growing hysteric. "Just… just fine. Um… I've got to… I—I've got to go—"

Tom waved her off. "Of course. I'll see you later, Harry. It's disappointing we didn't get to dance together—perhaps next time?"

"Sure."

The Card Mistress didn't even look at her as she began to shout orders at her Death Eaters. Harry took one last look at the scene—perhaps to burn it into her memory, perhaps to tell herself that this was real and happening and this whole time?—before darting out of the room and away from that place.

Despite being confused, shocked, and a healthy bit pissed off, Harry wasn't going to do anything until she figured out what was going on. It had been uncharacteristic of Tom to—well, not to pull such a trick, Harry admitted, because that was in-character. Tom definitely was the type to use people for her own means—no, the strange part of it all had been her disregard for Harry's opinion.

Not that Harry believed Tom was supposed to confide in everything and anything she ever thought to do with the young card wielder. No; but for something this big involving her? Tom couldn't have possibly thought that she could pull it off with little consequence coming from Harry. But the woman acted just like that.

And that was the big part that pissed her off! What was she, a welcome mat to wipe feet on? Harry didn't know what Tom was thinking, but damn it all if she was going to simper and sulk about it instead of getting some answers.

Falling in love with her enemy was supposed to have a very specific and very unique advantage to it—things couldn't get much worse if the person had already tried to kill you. That should've eliminated most of the terribleness in at least half of the common relationship follies. Harry supposed it was partly her fault for thinking she was immune to Tom's wickedness. Clearly she wasn't.

She was going to get to the bottom of this.

"So I'd like to address what happened last week," Harry began. Across from her, she watched Tom with a keen predator's eyes. She saw the Card Mistress stiffen, but not much past that.

Hm. Curious.

"Yes?"

Harry figured one of the reasons she was even here today was because she had been 'amusingly blunt' with the person she was currently with. Therefore, she chose to continue the trend. "What would possibly make you think I was alright with you fooling me, of course. That was a particularly dirty trick, I think, even for you."

"...I thought about it," Tom admitted, "For awhile, actually. After the first few times, I recognized the potential for the plan, so decided not to kill you—"

"Charming," Harry quipped before she could stop herself.

"—But I was unsure whether or not go through with it. There were significant consequences."

"Oh good, so you did think about those."

She saw Tom wince at her tone. "You're angry with me."

"...You know, I'm not sure what makes me angrier—the fact that you pulled such a dirty trick and haven't apologized, or the fact that you thought I wouldn't be cross with you. Who in their right minds wouldn't be?"

"Harry—"

"No—just—no. Really, I want to know exactly what made you think it was going to be okay, especially becaus you 'thought about it' and realized it probably wasn't going to go over well."

"Well, you love me, of course. I saw it in your eyes after our last duel."

So Tom knew about it. Harry felt her blood begin to boil beneath her skin.

"And what does that have to do with anything?"

"That I'm important to you. That you'd consider why I did the things I did and understand—"

Harry just wanted her to stop talking. She was sick of what she was hearing. Her love wasn't supposed to be taken so cheaply, explained so neutrally. So indifferently. It wasn't that type of love!

"Understand what?!" she shouted, rising as she slammed her hands onto the table. The people around them turned to look and whisper, and at the attention, Harry calmed and sat down.

"Understand what?" she repeated.

"Understand that I was doing it for you."

"...Tom you better have a damn good reason for using that line otherwise I'm going to take this glass of water and dump it over your pretty little head."

The woman frowned. "I was. It was upsetting you; I could tell."

"What was?"

"This whole situation," Tom paused, "the Ministry. Dumbledore. Death Eaters. Me. You didn't want to be fighting at all, but it isn't in your nature to deceive. It's in mine. So I decided to do it for you. If I won, you wouldn't have to worry anymore. It was for myself as much as it was for you."

Tom reached across the table and placed her hand on Harry's clenched fist. "You've no idea what you do to me, Harry."

"And you have no idea what you do to me. This is the second time you've worried me unduly! If you do that again I'm going to kick your ass!"

Tom laughed. "I won't do it again."

"No, this isn't a laughing matter," Harry insisted. "I know you're in a dangerous position; I already worry enough. There better not be a next time. I swear, this is the only time I'm going to forgive you for pulling this shit. If you do it again, you better get down on your knees and pray Tom Riddle, because I'll beat you into the ground. Literally."

"Fair enough. By the way, you're living with me now."

"...What?!"

"The public's hunting for your head. It's safer with me."

Harry wanted to bang her head against the wall. "You're going to have to start communicating with me about these things. Really."

"I'll try."

Tom did, in fact, not try. Harry couldn't believe the nerve of the woman. Honestly, did she really believe that just because Harry cared about her, everything would be okay? She was getting really tired of this!

Maybe Tom was sick. Maybe she wasn't. Maybe she just wanted to see how far she could push Harry before the card wielder snapped and fell down a steep cliff. Who knew.

True to Tom's word, once Dumbledore was removed, her faction inside the Ministry was able to climb up and take control rather quickly. A man named Lucius Malfoy, who Harry learned was actually Tom's right hand, became Minister. Harry didn't like him, but neither did he like her, so fair enough. Apparently, he valued cunning, shrewdness, intrigue, and power—and Harry only had one out of the four.

So she might be a tad bitter, fine—but didn't she have a right to be? She defeated the Most Evil Card Mistress of the Century, and now said Mistress would prefer to leave her in a gilded cage than let her go out and face the jaws of the public! Tom always made up excuses that forced Harry to stay in her "evil lair," and while she humored the woman for a month or two—Tom was trying to get in some legislation and stabilize the Ministry, and she admitted the Magical population had been wanting to put her head on a pitchfork at the time—Harry grew restless.

This was ridiculous.

And as the icing on the cake saying goes, Tom was obviously too busy to spend any time with her—understandable—which resulted in Harry staying inside with absolutely nothing to do for a Hell of a long time—absurd.

Harry didn't do well without things to do. She'd spent the last couple years constantly moving her body and training her magical abilities under the Ministry; being unable to continue her full routine left her restless and irritable. Tom's evil lair did have some facilities that she could and did use in order to exercise, but the barrier kept her grounded and not being able to fly was blasphemy in her humble opinion.

Her cards shared her agitation. They were able to fight each other so it shouldn't have been that bad, but their master's vexed mood bled over to them as well. It really was just a horrible situation for Harry, and she was determined to wack Tom over the head if the woman told her to stay put again.

...Speaking of Tom, the Card Mistress was terribly distracted these days. In Harry's opinion, the woman had too much ambition stored up and released it in too small an interval of time. She put too much on her plate rather than taking it slow and steady, and all the things she was trying to do were too easily hindered with her attention spread so thin.

When Harry wasn't spending her time annoyed with the woman, she was usually busy worrying about her. And nothing she said or did would make Tom let her help her either. Essentially, Harry felt useless and was indeed useless.

That left a disgusting taste in her mouth.

That morning, when Tom emerged from her office muttering and blearily blinking her eyes, Harry instantly knew the woman had gotten no sleep. For the third time that week. It was time to put her foot down.

"Duel me, Tom."

The Card Mistress blinked. Harry usually wasn't the one who started their spars. "Perhaps later, Harry. I need to go over the revised bill with Lucius—"

"No."

Tom frowned and proceeded to blink the sleep from her eyes. "Pardon?"

Harry lifted her chin and repeated, "No. You and I are going to fight right now, and maybe that'll beat some sense into that head of yours."

"Excuse me? Harry, I really don't have time for this—"

"Well that's too bad. You're going to make time. I swear to God, Tom—you're going to make. Time. I'm done with waiting for you to get your head out of your ass. If you've ever given a damn about me, you're going to forget everything you've got to do today and duel me."

Maybe it was something in her eyes. Maybe it was what she said. Harry didn't know what it was that made Tom pause for the first time in months, but whatever it was, it made her agree to humor her.

Humor.

Harry was doing this for Tom's own good.

They went outside and half-way into the fight, Tom was forced to put down the anti-flight barrier. And the intensive magic sensor. And the anti-movement-magic barrier. Harry ruthlessly drove the woman into a corner to get her point across and won a dominating victory with it.

Both she and Tom knew that it wasn't supposed to be that easy. They were usually at a 50-50 win rate, each battle an upward climb—but not this time.

"Now do you understand what I'm trying to say?" Harry demanded. When Tom was silent, she continued, "I don't care what you and Lucius are going over. It could be an alliance or a declaration of war for all I care—whatever it is, you're going to postpone it until I feel safe that you're not going to get assassinated for missing so much sleep and skipping meals. So you're going back inside and sleeping for the rest of the day. If you try to escape, I'll beat your ass into the ground again. Got it?"

Slowly, reluctantly, Tom sighed.

"What was that?"

"I said... fine."

"Good." Harry nodded once, short and decisive, and then proceeded to push Tom back inside and reset the barriers while adding a few of her own around Tom's room and bed. She knew the woman well; there was no way that she'd let the exhausted Card Mistress get past her.

After placing a jug full of water and a cup at her beside for whenever the woman woke, Harry pulled out Tom's deck and summoned The Reflection.

"I'm taking charge while Tom gets a break," she immediately explained. "Do you know where Malfoy Manor is? It's kind of an unscheduled one."

The Reflection took one look at his master, nodded his approval, and replied, "Yes. Master uses a private floo network in her office. I will take you there and show you how to use it."

"Thanks."

Five hours later, Harry was in the middle of doing secretarial work with Lucius Malfoy. She organized paperwork into proper piles for when Tom was back from being indisposed, rearranged her schedule to allow for the break, and then at length discussed with the Minister the legislation and campaigns they were having trouble with.

At the end of it, Lucius admitted he'd grown a grudging respect for Harry Potter. She clearly cared for the Dark Lady and proved as insightful and quick-witted as she was fiery and blunt.

"How long will our Lady be incapacitated?"

"Your Lady," Harry idly corrected, "And I don't know. As long as it takes. I admit I should've done this sooner. If she can get past the traps I set, she'll definitely be well enough to get back to work. If she can't, well, we'll just have to fill in and you'll just have to put up with me until then."

"Reasonable, I suppose," the Malfoy sniffed.

Harry rolled her eyes.

It took a whole seven days before Harry came back from meeting with Lucius to a sight of Tom Riddle sipping tea as she read the paper.

"Hello," Harry greeted. She felt The Snare curl about her legs and pat both of them on the head for standing guard so long.

"Hello," Tom replied. She set the paper down, and Harry was able to see that the woman was indeed better. Her red eyes were clearer, more awake to reality, and the slight sagging of her shoulders was no longer.

Harry sat down across from the woman. "How are you?"

"Better," Tom admitted. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," she paused, "Don't do that again."

"I won't."

"No," Harry pushed, "Well, yes this too—but the other thing as well."

"...Pardon?"

"I've been working with your right hand for the past week. That should give you a good idea of what I mean."

Tom took a deep breath. "Harry—"

"How could you possibly think this was smart? You've spent so much time trying to clear my name—"

Harry hadn't read the papers or kept up with the news of the Magical world's gossip vine, so she hadn't known—but all the newspapers had been busy publishing articles running her through the mud. Tom had been busy trying to clear her name—not the best thing to spend so many resources on while simultaneously trying to get several bills through.

"I know you don't like staying inside," Tom cut her off. "But you're far too wanted to be safe outside."

"I don't think it's any more dangerous than you walking around in public!"

Tom sighed. "I've been targeted for years. It's nothing much different—and my men are used to dealing with it as well. You, on the other hand—"

"I haven't said anything all this time because I knew you were working on more important things. If I was at the end of my rope I'd tell you. Don't you know me well enough to have some faith in that? And I can protect myself—"

"The difficult part about dealing with you," the Card Mistress murmured, "is how I can never be prepared enough."

"You shouldn't have to worry about me, Tom."

"Neither should you."

"Clearly I do if you're working yourself to death! I'm fine—"

"I don't believe you."

Harry sputtered. "W-Well, I'm better than you at least!"

"Harry, I'm not going to have this conversation with you."

"Tom—"

"No. Thank you for doing what you did, but we're not having this conversation. We can't seem to not worry about each other, so let's simply not try." Tom paused. "I'm concerned for both your safety and your happiness, Harry," she said quietly. "And I know you think the same of me. This will pass, and we'll be fine—but nothing will happen if I don't do something. Just bear with it a little longer, alright?"

Harry was silent. Tom sighed again and pressed her lips to her forehead before turning around and heading to her office—doubtlessly to lock herself in and dive into her work again.

Harry was left feeling more useless than before, if that was possible.

Harry stayed silent and neutral for a week. During that week, she watched Tom with a keen, observative eye—making sure the woman didn't "relapse" into her workaholic mode. And when she didn't, Harry made her decision.

It was probably reckless. Maybe stupid. But it was her choice, and ultimately, Harry felt like this was the best thing she could do for Tom right now. So, while the Card Mistress was at Malfoy Manor, Harry summoned The Mirror and spread her cards for a quick meeting.

"Take care of her," Harry said. "And make sure she knows I'm okay when she needs to. Tell The Reflection to make sure she eats and gets enough rest too."

The Mirror nodded.

"I... I don't know when I'll be back. But I'll be back. Will you all be good for Tom?"

Her cards floated about her, glowing warm. The Mirror smiled. "We understand, Master. And we're never truly apart from you—the bond we share is strong."

"That's good..."

Recognizing his master's expression, The Mirror reached over and hugged her. "Master, you take care of yourself too, okay?"

"Definitely. I'll be back... later. Oh, and make sure Tom doesn't look for me, okay?"

"The Ash will ensure it."

Harry smiled at said card. "Thanks, Hermione."

There was a pause before Harry let go. "Well... I'll be going now..."

"Stay safe. Come back soon."

She looked at each and every one of her cards. "I hope so. See you later."

"Until then," The Mirror replied.

Harry placed her prepared note on the bedside table and left.

A year came and went before Harry knew it. And then another after that. She couldn't say her stay in the Mundane world was especially exciting—though getting to know her cousin Dudley better after he'd grown up and apologized to her for their shared childhood was enlightening— but it was calm, and Harry was pretty sure she'd needed it.

She learned a lot of things.

The saying "absence makes the heart grow fonder," was accurate. She thought of Tom often, though it was not woe or desperation that colored her thoughts. Instead, it was a soft sort of yearning, shaded in affection and founded on her silent devotion.

But Harry was still unsure. The attachment between her and Tom was there, of course, but...

What form had her love taken? Harry didn't know.

...She knew of her own. Now more than ever, the card wielder felt the warmth of the single card in her pocket. Harry sighed into her teacup. Tom made her feel as confident as she did insecure.

Someone slid into the booth across from her. Harry didn't need to look up to know who it was. Speak of the devil, as it went, and he shall appear.

All the idioms and proverbs in the world, and none of them could possibly describe or help the fluctuations of her heartbeat. Maybe—maybe that was okay. In the end, she'd still be too scared to speak, so what did it matter? And all of the things she said instead to hide the other words would come out again, and that would be that.

Harry was a hypocrite.

"Hello," Tom said.

"Hi."

There was a pause where the younger card wielder refilled her tea cup from the pot on the table and handed it to Tom as they'd done long ago. The woman thanked her, and Harry, for some reason or other, figured that if she took a bite of cake she wouldn't have to talk. So she did.

It didn't work. Well, maybe it would've, since Tom wasn't saying anything, but Harry found the responsibility to begin had fallen onto her shoulders anyway. How problematic.

"How have you been?" she finally said after a while.

"Lonely."

The answer threw her off-guard. "Pardon?"

"It's been lonely without you," Tom repeated. "You've made me soft, you know."

Harry blinked. And then, she smiled. "How curious. I was just thinking you've changed me too."

"Or perhaps called forth what was already there, or inspired what had been too dead to live, or something else that sounds just as poetic, right?"

"...You've been spending time with Luna," Harry accused.

"I find her conversation delightfully convoluted."

"But you're lonely?"

"Have been." Tom reached across the table and caught her hand. "Not, now."

Oh.

Harry flushed. "I missed you too," she confessed. "It felt like forever since I've seen you... But I think the parting was worth it, if you're wondering. I think I needed it. It's strange, to be part of a society again."

"Do you prefer it here?"

"I like going to the park," Harry said when she couldn't come up with a definite answer. "And watching the flow of traffic. There's an old couple who always spends their mornings feeding the geese, and sometimes their grandchildren come with them and play tag. I've seen couples walk their dogs together, and two runners fall in love. I've seen people fall out of love too, and it's curious becaus I've never seen people so alive before."

Tom nodded as if she understood. She probably did. "You know," the Card Mistress began, "they say a boy's love is different from a girl's. They call it wild, free. Begging to run the distance of the earth and explore, like a wandering spirit from day one. But a girl's is like a domesticated bird. Her love recognizes the comfort of the cage, but it yearns for the sky all the same. Eventually, it finds a way to leave, and spreads its wings to the yonder."

"Does it ever come back?" Harry asked quietly.

"Some do, some don't. Home will always be home for them, but sometimes home isn't what they want. Sometimes they make a new home and forget their old one. A girl's love is like that, before it becomes a woman's."

Harry lowered her head to stare at the finish of the wooden table.

Tom tries to smile. "A girl's love is innocent and pure. A boy's is also, even though they differ. These are the loves that we treasure, but cannot touch or desire. So we wait until their love makes them a woman or a man, and hope that they come back home."

"How long have you been away, Tom?"

The woman was unsurprised at Harry's correct guess. "A long time, I suppose. A very long time. I've either never had a home or have forgotten where it is."

She took something out of her pocket and slid it across the table. It was a card. Harry flipped it over.

It was something she had never seen before. Harry knew for a fact it wasn't part of Tom's deck two years ago. The Heart, it read, underneath a picture of a beautiful woman, naked as the day she was born. Her two large fluffy wings covered part of her body in some form of modesty, contrasting with the pitch black of her long hair—almost like... Tom's?

Harry looked closer at the face.

It was Tom's face, but not. The woman had softer cheeks, lower eyebrows. The same lips, but a different smile. A familiar smile. And familiar eyes.

Me, Harry thought, but not.

"She hasn't been summoned since the day I found her," Tom said. Found, not created. "I haven't been able to. But she's warm and pleased, so I think she's waiting for something."

Harry made a choice, then. She withdrew the single card in her pocket, slid it across the table in the same manner as Tom had, and said, "I don't much like travel, now that I've experienced it. Maybe... Maybe we can find a home together?"

Tom flipped over the card. The Heart, and a picture of a white egg with the symbol of two wings—left and right.

And rest our weary hearts.

"I'd like that... May I kiss you?" Tom teased when Harry beamed and pressed her lips to Tom's The Heart card.

Harry laughed and fed her companion a swipe of cake, reminiscent to the first time they'd went out together. "Take me home first."

...

...

...

...

...

"So, Master, let me get this straight—" The Mirror began as he leaned back against The Reflection. "Your cards had the same name on them? They fused?"

Harry nodded.

"This is highly unordinary. It's unheard of for a card to share ownership," The Reflection mused.

Tom held up the merged The Heart card, which now had a picture of the same woman on it enclose between two halves of the cracked eggshell from Harry's card. "The body of the card is from mine, but Harry's completed it. If we're speaking of unheard of events, it's creating an unfinished card."

"True."

Harry frowned. "Why don't we just summon her? Maybe she'll tell us."

Having no better idea and no reason not to, Tom agreed. Holding the card together, they simultaneously called, "The Heart!"

No one expected the summon to be so… small. From gossamer strands of black and green, the white egg materialized and floated in mid-air. It was as big as an ostrich egg, which meant that The Heart would be as small as a bird.

The egg cracked. The Mirror and The Reflection moved closer.

There two two, three cracks before the egg split in half, the shell floating away and vanishing as a chrysalis of wings was revealed. They stirred, shifting finally until they opened and revealed the woman from the picture. The Heart saw The Mirror and The Reflection first.

"Papa!" she chirped.

Everyone blinked. That sort of made sense—both The Mirror and The Reflection were deck leaders, so now it was only a matter of who she was addressing.

The Mirror tried pointing to himself. She spread her arms out as if asking for a hug, but when The Mirror moved forward, The Heart chirped again—insistently, that was—"Papa!"

The Reflection stepped forward next. The Heart smiled and cheered approvingly. "Papa~!"

Harry groaned and buried her face against Tom's shoulder. The Card Mistress laughed. "What's wrong?"

"She's adorable!"

Tom laughed again, and this time The Heart heard. She turned around, flapping her fluffy wings like a butterfly. Unused to the movement, she teetered, but soon regained her balance in air and chirped again. "Mama~!"

"...Don't tell me—"

It was. When Tom held out her hand, The Heart unsteadily flew to it and landed, chirping the word again. That was all it took for Harry to lose it and cuddle the card.

"Ah! You're so cute! Of course I would have such a cute card! Let's just hope you don't have any of the insanity from Tom's side—"

"That was uncalled for!"

"Well it's true—"

While their masters partook in some good-natured arguing, The Mirror and The Reflection shared a pleased look. Things weren't completely okay yet, but there was a lot of promise. After all, their love had never weaned or struggled throughout the whole duration their masters were apart. It was a good sign.

The Reflection quickly dipped his head and stole a kiss.

"Hm?"

"When do you think our masters will mate?"

The Mirror tilted his head. "Mmm… I'll give them a week."

"Five days."

They shared another look and then turned back to look at said masters and their new addition.

"I'll make you a super cute dress so you can wear! Maybe lace? Something to compliment your wings…"

Tom rolled her eyes as her companion gushed. "Harry," she interrupted.

"Hm? Yeah?" Harry turned her head and Tom took the opportunity to steal kiss of her own.

"You owed me one," the Card Mistress said smugly when she pulled away.

Harry sputtered, and the situation became a chaotic one when The Heart chirped, "Love Tom~!"

The Seer popped up just when her master's face was at its reddest. "She'll grow up to become a fantastic card."

"...Wait, she'll grow?!"

"A changing card is unheard of," The Reflection mused. The Mirror rolled his eyes.

"The heart doesn't lie," The Seer continued on, completely unaware—or was she? The mischief in her eyes spoke differently— "So the honesty of two hearts… Hm, I wonder if that makes them so honest that they just can't help but tell the truth?"

"Do you mean the heart or The Heart?" The Mirror asked.

The Seer smiled. "I wonder."

"Why only me? That's definitely not fair!" Harry grumbled, bumping her shoulder against Tom's side. Instead of letting her pull away, however, the Card Mistress grabbed hold and wrapped her arms around her companion's waist, who yelped at the trap.

The Heart blinked from her spot sitting in Harry's cupped hands. "Love Harry~!" she chirped just as Tom put her chin on top of Harry's head.

The Card Mistress froze.

Harry grinned. "Aw, you're just the sweetest thing! I think we'll have lots of fun together too! Would you like that? Play time with Mama?" By the look Tom had gotten, the card wielder had every intention of using this situation to her best advantage.

"Mama~!"

While her younger counterpart gushed over The Heart, Tom turned to The Seer. "When you said that she couldn't help but tell the truth… did you mean anything?"

The Seer casually shrugged. "I mean what I say. Though, I'll give you that in her youngest state right now, she has a rather limited vocabulary…"

Tom cursed.

"...Three days."

"Five hours."

The Mirror gave The Reflection an incredulous look, to which the card simply shrugged. "They have a lot of time to make up for."

This fic has been posted on Ao3 under the same penname, just btw.

And if you wanna go over there and check out my super long A/N that looks a bit deeper into Harry / Harry's love, then it's over there too :P.

Otherwise... Hi guys, hope you liked the second installment to the Mahou Shoujo AUs series (the first is Witches, With a Capital 'W'; Heart of the Cards has NOTHING to do with that oneshot, but they have the general theme of Magical Girls and fem!HP&TMR). This has been what I've been working on for awhile now. I hope its been worth the time? Haha. It was definitely fun to write some parts!

I just... felt the fandom needed more fem!HP/fem!TMR n_nv. And silly fics. There needs to be more of these outrageous things too LOL . Just trying to cover all my bases!

Sincerely,

R.R.