The Phoenix Syndrome – A Tale of Rebirth, Love, and Hate

a/n – I had planned on posting this yesterday, but apparently, Monday was International Migraine Day. So, in honor of that, I spent the day in a darkened lair trying to do anything to take my mind off it.

JKR and her partners own the entirety of the Harry Potter universe, no infringement upon her properties is intended or created. Also, a couple of other disclaimers will occur at the end.

However, one word of warning to other writers. If you're stuck on a chapter, don't mark time by creating an overly developed biography/background for a minor walk-on character. Somewhere in the fourteen pages of background I created for Ms. Harriet, I became conflicted over my original plans for her.

Harriet McLaggen, on the other hand, thinks it's just fine. Just what I needed, a pushy Hufflepuff.

Chapter Thirty-two – A Tale of The Maidens Four

0950 28 October 2019 – Charms Corridor, Hogwarts School of W&W, Scotland

The organized chaos that passed for change of classes at Hogwarts was in full swing as the last of the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff students made their way to the Charms classroom.

Blinking in surprise, Lily Potter took one look at the witch who was trudging dejectedly towards the class and hurried to catch her before she entered the class.

Falling in step with her, Lily linked her arm through the free arm of the distracted Hufflepuff witch and smirked as Harriet McLaggen almost jumped out of her shoes.

"Pax, Hari, it's just me," Lily said as they approached the door. "Rumor has it you got some bad news last night," she continued as the girl blushed furiously but didn't pull away from her.

"Hey, Lils," Harriet said in a quiet voice. "Had a family visit last night. Apparently, it takes three people to come tell me that my Grandfather had a serious accident and is in St Mungo's," she said, sticking to the story that her grandmother and cousin had drilled into her as they walked around the grounds yesterday.

"Your Mum's father," Lily asked as the pair entered the classroom. Steering the witch she was walking with towards the corner of the room that was known for having the least noticeable pair of seats in the room, Lily smiled as Hari simply rolled her eyes.

Rumored to be a legacy of the semi-legendary Weasley twins, the pair of seats in question had been replaced numerous times over the intervening years, the room reconfigured, and a curse breaker from Gringotts had spent 72 hours on the room and still the title of 'the siege ridiculous' was attached to those two seats.

Whether or not it was an intended consequence for what the Weasley twins had intended to accomplish, the pair of seats was so unnoticeable it was rumored that, at least, one current Hogwarts student had gotten their start in life during a NEWT level Charms lecture.

While everyone on staff denies it being possible, it is interesting to note that the current seeker for the Hufflepuff house team's middle name is 'Felicitas', the verbal component for the Cheering Charm.

As the pair slid into their chosen seats, with Lily watched as a couple of Puffs who were heading their way stopped and turned back to their own seats. Lily nudged the pensive witch with her shoulder to subtly get her attention.

"Talk about it," Lily whispered just as Professor McDougal-Li entered the room.

Shaking her head slightly, and feeling more than a bit guilty about what her family was asking of her, Harriet tried balancing everything in her head.

Despite their reassurances last evening, Harriet didn't fully trust her family's motivations with anything in regard to the Potter family. The mere fact that they wanted her to get Lily Potter away from everyone so they could 'talk' to her was more than a bit suspicious.

The fact that they wanted this conversation to happen this evening at the edge of the Forbidden Forest just made it more so.

Regardless of what any of the Weasleys thought, being called 'the Forbidden Forest' wasn't just a catchy title to drive up the tourist trade, though she snorted in amusement at the vision of Roxanne Weasley standing out by Hagrid's old hut with a little booth and a sign that read "Tours of the only Acromantula Colony West of Bora-Bora just 10s".

Seeing Lily watching her out of the corner of her eye, she smiled and whispered, "Just a funny thought about your cousin Rox."

Giving her friend a look, since, while she liked her cousin Roxanne, the likelihood of that particular witch popping into anyone's mind without something at least a bit shady being involved was very slim.

Not that Rox was a shady witch, mind you, but the daughter of George Weasley wasn't a blushing ingénue by any stretch of the imagination. The fact that she had been caught by her Head of House with a bootleg copy of the infamous Marauder's Map selling directions to the broom closet or hidden alcove where various couples were was only a part of her reputation.

And that was just in her first year.

And she did it without shame or playing favorites since one of her biggest moneymakers had been the location of wherever her cousins Teddy Lupin and Vickie Weasley were seeking 'alone time'.

Seeing the usually unflappable Lily Potter start snickering, Harriet made up her mind. Family be damned, while she wasn't a witch's witch like they thought, she'd take whatever punishment her thoroughly scary cousin Evadne or her grandmother would dish out before she'd serve Lily up to whatever schemes they had in their demented minds.

By all the Hells, she was a 'Puff for a reason.

"Need to talk to you, after," she whispered as she tried to focus on what their professor was saying as the class started up.

Seeing that the Gryffindor witch nodded thoughtfully, Harriet tried to concentrate on today's presentation, a continuation of last week's lectures on exactly how Charms fit into an integrated approach towards being a well-rounded witch or wizard.

Which, if the class ran true to form, meant that half of the class would be totally lost within five minutes and Professor McDougal-Li would be pulling her hair out a few minutes after that and she'd be breaking the class into smaller groups.

Hoping against hope that the handful of students in the class that actually got what she was trying to teach them would be able to help her explain it to their classmates.

It didn't help matters that with a few exceptions, the majority of the people who grasped the concept that all of magic was part of a greater whole were either first generation witches and wizards or had first generation parents.

While the blatant prejudices of the past weren't publicly acceptable, though her extended family was a good example of how it simmered beneath the polite surface of modern society, there was still a feeling of 'of course I understand it, my great-great-great grandfather was a wizard, thank you very much' that was more the rule than the exception.

Shaking her head as she got up to go work with the same three 'Puffs that she'd been working with last week and trying not to smirk as Lily rolled her eyes before finding her own trio of lost souls, Harriet thought that it would have been nice if her grandmother had been a greengrocer from Dover and not the pureblood harridan she was.

The class passed quickly, with Fiona O'Neil grasping the fact that you could incorporate various charms into a matrix with some fairly simple transfigurations to vary your results, but when the class ended Zelda Smith was still fairly in the dark about how you could combine a simple transfiguration with the leviosa charm to create something a bit flashier than just levitating a feather or turning a matchstick into a needle.

Though she had to admit, Lily Potter turning half dozen matchsticks into a handful of caltrops as you levitated them under the feet of her make-believe opponent was certainly a bit flashier than her attempt.

Though her example of tossing the matches on the ground and then transforming them into finish nails while levitating them up into the eyes of the practice dummy wasn't anything to sneeze at either, thank you very much.

As the pair left the classroom, with most of the members of their respective houses chattering away about how they would improve their presentation for next time. Lily bumped her shoulder and nodded down the corridor that led to one of the back stairs.

As they branched off, with Harriet having to wave off a couple of the other 'Puffs from accompanying her, she noticed the smirk on Lily's face as they started descending the stairs.

"Hufflepuff solidarity to protect you from the big bad Gryffindor witch?"

Snickering, Harriet shrugged and rolled her eyes. "Rumor has it I'm a witches' witch so I think they just wanted to know if I wanted support for when I confessed my feelings to you and you shoot me down in a show of Gryffindor arrogance."

Giggling and blushing, Lily waved her hand as if she was fanning herself. "We're first years, for Heaven's sake. It's not as if you're going to drag me into an unused classroom and have your wicked way with me."

Waiting for a couple of moments, Harriet deadpanned, "True, that's why we have all of those cozy little 'study rooms' off our Common Room.

"It's much more convenient to lure unsuspecting witches down to the Badger's den where we have properly upholstered squishy furniture so we can have our wicked way with them without getting splinters from the old furniture that ends up in unused classrooms in very inconvenient places."

Seeing Lily goggling at her out of the corner of her eye, Harriet waited almost a four count before starting to snicker.

"Or, so I've been told," she added while noticing that Lily, unlike her Weasley cousins, only blushed faintly rather than going all 'Weasley Red' as the tint was commonly called.

As they reached the landing for the first floor, Lily looked left and right before grabbing Harriet's hand and pulling her quickly across the passageway. Squeaking in surprise, Harriet only had a second to wonder before Lily pulled her through a suit of armor that seemed to shimmer when the ginger witch touched it.

A moment of darkness, and then the lights returned.

"Whoa," was all Harriet could say as she looked around at the space they found themselves in.

Looking like a mini common room, though it appeared to be a cross between Gryffindor and Slytherin in colours and décor, the room they found themselves had a window that had to be a magical construct since it was on what would have been an interior wall of the castle and even if it hadn't the entirety of the castle was between this spot and Black Lake which could be clearly seen.

"Teddy found this place his second year," Lily said as she walked over to the sideboard that flanked the window. Placing her hand palm down on it and closing her eyes for a few seconds, she smirked when there was a subtle chiming sound and a tea service shimmered into existence.

"The best we can suss out that it's part of a set of rooms that date from sometime shortly after the founding. While it's not the legendary 'Library of Ravenclaw', everything we've been able to figure out is that there are rooms scattered around the castle that aren't part of the normal classroom layout that belonged to the Founders and their protégés back in the day."

"But …."

"Yes, it's a bit too modern to be over a thousand years old. Vicki figured that the house elves must know about the places and keep them current and usable."

Pausing for a moment, she added, "As opposed to the Chamber of Secrets which is still decorated in 'Early Gloomy'."

Picking up the tea service and nodding towards the pair of armchairs that flanked the fireplace with a low table between them.

"I'll be Mother and you tell me exactly what's got you so worked up."

As the pair settled into their respective seats, Lily made a show of setting up the tea service and pouring a pair of mugs of tea, along with distributing the biscuits that were part and parcel of a proper tea.

Arching an eyebrow as the ginger witch handed her a properly constructed mug of tea, a couple of drops of milk and a hint of lemon, and wondering exactly how she'd remembered that bit since she could only remember a handful of times that they'd had tea together and she'd have had to ask to know that Lily apparently took hers as it came.

Cradling the mug between her hands, she sat back and took a couple of deep breaths.

"My grandfather is in St. Mungo's," Harriet began in a quiet voice. "The irony of them coming to tell me is twofold.

"First, I'm not really close to my grandfather, or rather the old man never seemed to find a reason to be interested in any of the witches in the family other than making certain that any matches made were beneficial to the family.

"The second is that I'm certain that Grandfather Hiram ended up in the hospital because they needed to talk to me, and they needed a reason for the three of them to come to Hogwarts and speak to me alone that the Headmistress couldn't object to."

Sitting back, Lily stared in disbelief. While her own mother was a cold, heartless witch she couldn't wrap her mind about her putting her own father in the hospital, despite all the desperate and evil things she'd done.

"That's …" Shaking her head, Lily blinked and then started again. "What do you need? How can the Potters help?"

"Damn it, Lils. The fact that the witches in my extended family are up to their sculpted eyebrows in some arcane plot to snag a Potter wizard is bad enough. The fact that they have been plotting for multiple generations is even worse.

"And now that they suddenly want to talk to you alone doesn't exactly make me feel all warm and fuzzy."

"This isn't the Selwyn obsession with Potter wizards," another voice broke in. Looking around, Harriet was surprised to see the former Flora Parkinson, now Flora Potter lounging on the davenport across the way. As the Slytherin third year swung her feet back onto the floor, she cocked her head to the side and sighed.

"How's it feel to be a pawn in a game that started before Hogwarts was built," Flora asked the Hufflepuff witch as she stood and came over to where the other two witches were.

Nodding her thanks as Lily summoned another chair for her, she reached down and grabbed Lily's tea and took a noisy swig as she plopped into the chair.

"Of course, I don't mind, Flora. Help yourself to my tea, Flora. Want me to rub your throat and help you swallow it, Flora?" Lily deadpanned as she fixed herself another mug.

"It's a good thing I knew you were here," she continued as Harriet just stared in disbelief at the pair."

"Hush, you." Flora said as she settled gracefully into the chair that Lily had summoned.

"Tell me everything about your 'meeting' last night," she said as she watched the Hufflepuff witch carefully.

Listening to Harriet recount her meeting with her family the day before, Flora watched the younger witch very carefully, using the skills she had picked up from her mother.

While Pansy Parkinson was by any reckoning a fairly abysmal mother, she had made certain that her only child was well versed in those skills that would enable her to survive in the very cut throat and dangerous world that she made her way in.

Which included how to read people to know the truth of what they were telling. And the truth of what they weren't.

Sitting back, Flora looked over at Lily who was frowning as she considered the entire sad story that her friend had just recounted.

"You're correct, Flora. Since I'm not a wizard and there really isn't any viable way to change that, this can't be another go at trying to snag a Potter wizard," Lily said as she carefully placed her mug on the table.

"And whatever this is, they're up to no good since they put a family member into the hospital and obviously cast some sort of enchantment that caused out little lost Puff here to buy that silly arsed story they gave her as a cover for this."

Blinking in surprise, Harriet suddenly realized that her nagging doubts about the entire situation were turning into wholesale disbelief as she realized that there wasn't any good reason for getting Lily Potter away from the rest of her extended family and outside the primary wards on the ancient castle.

"That bitch," she hissed in disbelief. "We have to go to the Headmistress with this."

"With absolutely no proof? I'm certain that they've covered their tracks with your grandfather's 'accident' so that as long as he doesn't die, whatever story they tell will pass muster."

"And if we tell my father or … Hermione about this," Lily added, stumbling a bit on referring to the older witch, "there'd be more aurors and hit wizards at the castle by the end of tea than in London."

"And that's a bad thing, how?" Harriet riposted, glaring at the pair of witches.

"It's the difference between the dagger you can see and the dagger you can't," Flora said with a thoughtful expression. Seeing the confused look on the faces of the two younger witches, she sighed.

"We know there's a threat that we can see and that we have a time and place for," Flora explained as she sat her purloined mug of tea back on the table.

"While you'll be outside the main wards of the castle proper, we'll still be within the wards that cover the grounds, so anything that happens would have to be either subtle or not directly harmful."

Frowning, Lily sat back and gave Flora a cautious nod. "True. From what Daddy's said about the wards, once they straightened them out from what He-With-Too-Damn-Many-Middle-Names did to them, they'll alert the Headmistress if they bring anything dark or dangerous into the castle grounds.

"And if any spells that fall outside the range of what's acceptable for a school are cast they'll invoke a response and sound an alarm, so that leaves …"

"Too many things that we can't comprehend," Harriet snapped back. "In case you've forgotten they did something to make me buy that ridiculous story last night and no alerts went off."

"Which means it was subtle, low powered, and not permanent," Flora countered. "It probably was based upon you, deep down, wanting to accept what they told you at face value."

Seeing her fellow first year was about to scoff, Lily sighed noisily. "Even as difficult as Ginevra

Weasley was, there was always a part of me that wanted, deep down, to believe that a day would come when she would just be my mother."

Blinking in surprise, Harriet sat back and thought about what the Gryffindor witch had said.

While she had no illusions about her Grandmother and cousin, Harriet realized that she did harbor a hope that her mother might actually put her and her siblings first, ahead of these ridiculous family obligations.

Ruefully acknowledging that she was 'oh for two' in the parental lottery since her father had checked out from having any sort of active input into things around the house once he finally accepted the fact that her mother was still carrying a rather large torch for one Harry Potter and had only married him because of the McLaggen family's ties to the Selwyn clan, Harriet simply asked, "So what do we do?"

Giggling, Lily looked over at Flora and shook her head. "Occam's Razor doesn't serve us in this case. The simplest answer would be to simply call in some family markers, have the three of us nowhere near Hagrid's old hut tonight, and then offer Hari here sanctuary with the family after she gets her Grandmother and cousin arrested tonight."

Seeing that Flora was going to protest, Lily shook her head and held up her hand. "Daddy giving sanctuary to yet another underage witch is going to start all kinds of rumors about his intentions and you know it."

Blushing, Harriet shrugged and said, "I still think we should do something official." Pausing for a second, she added, "And you wouldn't …"

"Oh, please," Lily broke in with a glare. "Can you look me in the eye and tell me you wouldn't pay a heavy price when you got back with your loving family after getting a couple of Selwyn witches arrested by siding with a Potter witch?"

Snickering, Flora added, "Not to mention the fact that half the castle would be expecting to see a ring being sported by one of you two, there's no way we could send you back and have any viable hope of seeing you ever again.

"You'd be attending 'a witch's convent school in France' by the weekend," referencing the standard excuse given for young witches from some of the more 'traditional' families when they dropped off the map.

"Lucky me," Harriet snarked as she waggled her eyebrows in an over the top manner. "Whatever would an aspiring witch's witch do locked in an idyllic chateau in southern France with hundreds of other witches?"

"Hush, you," Lily said with a straight face. "Everyone knows that witch's convent schools are either depressing gothic structures overlooking the Channel or squalid tenements overlooking the run-down areas of industrial districts."

"Actually, nine times out of ten said witch finds herself stuffed in a sack and ending up in a seedy bazaar somewhere where she's 'apprenticed' to a witch of ill repute, never to see the light of day, but that's neither here nor there," Flora said with a hint of something in her voice.

'So," Lily said in a breezy voice trying to dispel the pall that had settled over the trio after Flora's declaration, "if we're not going to do the sensible thing and we're intent on going all 'Harry Potter' with this, do we have a plan or do we take a page out of my dad's journal and just wing it?"

Giving the younger ginger witch a smirk, Flora simply shrugged. "I think this falls squarely under the heading of 'Mothers' work'," she said in a tone that brooked no arguments from the other two.

"We've got three choices, in that case," Harriet said as she looked ruefully from Lily to Fiona. "My mum would rush in with some half arsed plan that she knew was doomed to fail and hope that Harry Potter came riding in on a broom to save us.

"Your mum," she continued nodding to Flora," would have something very convoluted with multiple cutouts and more moving parts than a muggle motorcar." Pausing for a moment, she added, "and we'd have had to have started two weeks ago to even have a chance at pulling it off."

"And if you were to go with my birth mother's example it'd be classic Gryffindor. Blowing in like a swarm of hippogriffs and overwhelming everything with what the muggles used to call 'shock and awe'," Lily cut in with a smirk.

"However, since that would essentially be pulling a 'Harry Potter', I'm going to suggest that we go with what Hermione Granger would do in such a situation."

"Call in Auror Team Twelve and let your dreamy cousin take care of it," Harriet said, trying and failing to pull an innocent face.

"Hands off the metamorph, unless of course you really want to explain to a Veela who's studying to be an Advocate why you're trying to poach her wizard," Lily said with a grin.

Eyes going wide, Flora leaned closer and said, "No, we take the irresponsible reckless 'Harry Potter' plan and tweak it just so, using some very classic Slytherin elements," Flora said as she gave Lily a look.

"And that means, we need Rose," Lily responded with a knowing smirk.

1612 gmt, 28 October 2019, the outer keep, Hogwarts School of W&W, Scotland

Huddled together under the venerable Potter invisibility cloak, Rose and Flora were looking at the much-folded piece of parchment in their hands as they tried to remain as still as they could.

'Knowing' that they were invisible to almost any ordinary means of detection beneath the cloak and Flora having cast a couple of incantations that masked their sounds and scents well enough, she claimed, that werewolves wouldn't notice them if they didn't do anything foolish.

Not wanting to ask the other Slytherin witch exactly how she was so certain, since Rose had concluded that the blonde Slytherin was not given to hyperbole and if she stated something in her matter of fact manner, it was something she was either confident of her sources or had personally experienced.

Though, Rose admitted, one night she was going to ask her newest sister exactly when and where she'd been playing hide and seek with werewolves.

However, twenty minutes before sundown and scant feet from the edge of the Forbidden Forest was neither the time or place.

"I still think Hari's cousin is going to wonder exactly why a wooden tub was sitting out by the marker for Hagrid's old hut," Flora said in a hushed tone.

"Lily conjured something to sit on," Rose said with a chuckle. "Is it our fault that one of Uncle George's 'Flash-bang Surprises' is underneath it? It looks old and grody enough that it could have been something that Hagrid used to feed some of his less exotic pets out of."

"Thank goodness for the British mania of putting up commemorative markers every fifteen feet or so," Flora replied as she watched the granite plinth with the bronze plaque attached that marked the location of the cabin of Hogwarts longtime 'Keeper of the Keys'.

"Hari's cousin said that she'd meet them near the old cabin, this at least gives us a place to start."

Holding up her hand, Rose nodded towards the open copy of the Marauders map.

"Two incoming just entered the map's area, most likely on brooms in the forest winding between the trees at the speeds they're moving."

"That's bold," Flora said as she frowned. "The centaurs are better than they were in our mothers' day, but they're still more likely to fire a warning shot center of mass at someone intruding in their domain that they don't recognize."

"Disillusioned, most likely," Rose said. "They're about fifteen feet apart, probably to keep from hitting each other after a quick change of direction to avoid a pesky tree."

"Too bad the maps don't cover the entire forest, we'd have more warning," Flora commented quietly. "Who's the other one?"

Blinking in surprise, Rose closed her eyes for a moment and then said, "Someone named … Guillaume Jegado-Malfoy. Guess we're importing lowlife scum now." Tisking and shaking her head, she sighed.

"One would think that British lowlife scum would be good enough for them."

"I'm certain that Ministry has an Office to track minions and toadies ensuring that proper permits and such are on file, we can file a complaint after this is over."

Looking over to where the other two were sitting, trying not to look as if they were waiting on anyone in particular, Rose shook her head.

"I told them the sun was going to be heading behind the mountains before we'd be done with this, I can't believe Hari didn't wear a jumper or something a bit warmer than her basic school kit."

"That's why she was a bit late meeting Elle," Flora said as she scanned the treeline to see if she could see the intruders. "She said she went back and changed at the last tic, something about she felt what she was wearing was like wearing a big target so she ditched the jumper."

Snorting, Rose shook her head. "Like you can't see that whiter than white uniform blouse all the way to Hogsmeade." Pausing for a moment, she turned her head and said, "Elle?"

"This Lily is Lily Luna," Flora explained. "Helps me try to keep straight where I'm talking about Lily Potter or Lily Dursley." Blushing slightly, she explained, "Trying to overcome that whole pureblood surnames only thing."

"You can get away with Lils," Rose said. "No one other than Hugo could think about messing around with the other one's name and even then …"

"That's odd," Rose said. "And not in a good way. Right before Ms. Selwyn stepped out of the tree line, our imported lowlife minion just disappeared."

Looking up in surprise, Flora risked a glance at the map before locking her eyes on the treeline where she could now see the approaching witch, she asked, "Moved out of range disappeared off the edge or just disappeared?"

"Just bloody vanished like someone flipped one of Grandfather Arthur's switches," Rose said as her eyes widened.

"A dead body in the Forbidden Forest just made this, officially, 'in over our heads' territory. Send the 'break off' signal. Now. If Selwyn's willing to kill her accomplice …"

Pulling the modified galleon that they'd used, from time to time between the cousins and friends. While not as useful as the communication mirrors, they had the dual advantages of being silent and relatively inconspicuous since everyone carried coins on them, Rose quickly sent the sequence that they'd agreed on which would signal something was wrong and they two were to break off.

Seeing Lily touch the pocket where she kept the coin, both girls were expecting to see the pair begin to stand as the intruder made her way towards them from the treeline.

While Lily took a step back, Harriet was speaking, as if she was trying to reassure her friend that her cousin meant them no harm.

"Blast and damned," Rose swore. "Hari's missed the signal, she thinks Lily's playing for time to get her close enough for the surprise."

"At least they're backing the right way," Flora said as she tried desperately to coax someway for the pair of them to approach both quickly and unseen.

"It shouldn't be noticeable, but we need to start moving towards them," Rose said as she quickly folded the parchment and slipped it into her pocket. "This cloak covered three for several years, the two of us should be able to move towards them without tipping our hand."

As she gripped her wand in one hand and the inside of the cloak in the other, she added, "Provided neither of us trips over the other's feet."

As the pair moved closer, they could see that Harriet's 'cousin' Evadne Selwyn was coming towards them from the treeline of the Forbidden Forest. As the blonde witch strode towards the two witches with determination, Flora glanced at Rose before saying, "I'll count down triggering the surprise to detonate it when she's five feet from the girls.

"The explosion should catch her unawares and the flash should keep her from focusing for a moment or two. We drop the cloak and sprint over there, screaming blue murder, and we either take her down or get the heck out of here and back to the castle."

Rose held her wand in her hand and clucked her tongue. "That amazingly sounds like a 'Harry Potter Classic'," she whispered with feigned surprise.

"Apparently, all it takes to overcome years of Slytherin training is Harry Potter."

"Dad rules," was the ginger witch's whispered reply.

Hearing the lack of response from her partner, she added, "He chose both of us. Dad rules."

At that moment, Flora finally realized exactly what the phrase 'went to Hell in a handbasket' that Hermione's mother was fond of using meant.

As Evadne reached the spot they had chosen to trigger the ambush, Evadne Selwyn was raising her wand just as Flora crushed the soapstone carved rune token in her left hand.

Dropping the cloak, she whipped off a hex that combined the paintball spell that they used for accuracy practice in DADA classes with a blinding white light at the incoming witch's face.

Trusting in the others to carry out their parts of the plan, she put her head down and charged forward, aiming a wide arced flaming hex at the feet of the witch she was charging.

Lily, when she heard the explosion of the wooden barrel they had just gotten up from and a high ringing contralto shouting "Dad Rules!" as a battle cry, grabbed Harriet's arm and pulled the brunette witch to the side, intent on both flanking the intruder and keeping Harriet and herself out of the line of fire of the intruder.

As the pieces of the broken wooden cask slammed into the incoming witch, her face was suddenly covered with paint that was glowing in an almost sickly shade of green.

Seeing movement out of the corner of her eye, she stared in amazement as Flora put her head down and charged the intruder, shooting out an arc or flames at her feet as she closed the gap.

Harriet, who suddenly decided that she was going to confront the member of her family who wanted her to betray her friends, was pulled back by Lily grabbing her arm, almost swinging her around and pulling the pair to the side, but closer to Evadne, though it was on the side away from her wand hand.

Rose, seeing that their 'surprise' had its desired effect but finding her direct line of fire impeded by the charging blonde, looked over to the edge of the forest where she had marked the location of one of the few Scottish Wildcats that roamed the Forbidden Forest.

Ignoring the hoary old joke about them being relatives of the Headmistress, she put her personal 'Plan B' into action.

Having decided that there needed to be a fool proof method of getting the attention of the school's authorities if things didn't go as planned, and accepting that since fools were so ingenious it had to be a very good one, she dipped into her trove of secrets that she had discovered about the school that the average student never found out about.

Unless they crossed some of the lines that reasonable people would never cross.

Along with the Unforgivables, there was a roster of spells, charms, jinxes, and incantations that had been 'tabooed' within the grounds of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry. If one of the seven were cast on school grounds, then every instructor in residence would know exactly who and where.

Having snuck down to the site before the others, she placed about six ounces of Nepeta Cataria, better known as catmint, and cast a subtle charm that would cause male felines to avoid the tree where she had planted her bait before she met up with the others.

The catmint worked as advertised, and there was a magnificent specimen of Scottish Wildcat lounging in the bole of the yew tree she had selected, making itself silly with the treat she had left for it.

Pointing her wand at the drugged out feline, she grimaced before she did the three jabs and whispered Libidinis Impetum at the unsuspecting feline.

Watching as the dark red beam struck the cat, who's head popped up and immediately began to track its surroundings.

Less than a second later, that cat launched itself into the forest, in pursuit of a male cat to satisfy the urge that had suddenly overcome it.

Striking any female mammal, the banned charm would cause the affected female to search out a sexual encounter post-haste. Since it did nothing to alter the reproductive cycle of the Wildcat, there wouldn't be a litter of kittens born out of season, but some lucky Tom out there was going to get to be very busy for the next several hours.

Which is why it's use was banned so heavily at a boarding school. While it was illegal to use the charm on someone without their permission anywhere in Britain, Hogwarts had banned it's use entirely.

Teenagers engaging in amorous sexual exploits was one thing, and one of the main reasons for Prefects and instructor patrols of the myriad of corridors and empty classrooms that the old castle seemed to have in excess. No one, with the exception of incoming firsties, were under the impression that things like that never happened at Hogwarts, and most of them figured it out before the Yule hols.

Having a charm that removed a witch's ability to say 'no', was quite another. Or, even think about saying no.

And while casting it would immediately alert the entire staff that something was amiss, casting it on a non-sentient denizen of the Forbidden Forest would, hopefully, be adjudicated under the 'ends justifying the means' standards when the staff arrived in moments to rescue the four of them.

Not that it would save them from the consequences of having this plan go south on them.

That was both water under a bridge that was upcoming and over a dam that was right past it.

Seeing that the intruder, realizing that this wasn't the situation she envisioned, was getting ready to go with her 'Plan B', Rose started moving to where she could get a better line of site on Harriet's cousin.

Seeing that the older witch was reaching into her robes and removing a bronze disk and changing the grip of her left hand so that her fingers were gripping the disk from its edges.

From her vantage point, Rose could see that the edges of the disk sliced into the fingers of the witch grasping it, which set alarm bells ringing in her head. While not knowing exactly what the disk would do, anything that required blood to function wasn't something you wanted to mess with.

A sickly blue glow started around the edges of the disk as she lunged forward and pressed it firmly against Lily Potter's jumper, causing the blue light to flare, alerting Rose to the fact that this was some sort of portkey.

Flora reached the group, lowered her shoulder and struck the older blonde squarely in her back, knocking her to the side.

Unfortunately, her grasp on the disk wasn't dislodged and its attachment to Lily's jumper survived as it pulled both Lily and Harriet to the side as the momentum of the incoming Slytherin tried to separate the attacker from her intended victim.

Seeing the wand in the other hand of the intruder, Rose was vaguely aware of the sounds of house elves arriving on the scene, she knew that the only thing she could attempt to do was block the blonde's wand from touching the portkey, so she dove at the older witch, slashing her wand through the movement to finish a severing charm.

As she cried "Difindo!", the intruder twisted slightly so that instead of severing the wand, her curse sliced through the hand gripping the portkey just as she slammed into the witch.

Feeling the hook through the navel sensation for only a second, a wave of pain signaled the backlash as they both fell out of the field of the portkey's activation.

Rose was aware of a blood-curdling scream from the witch she had knocked to the ground as said ground rushed up to meet them and she lost consciousness …

Current time, Infirmary, Hogwarts School of W&W

"… and that's where young Rose's report ends. Hogwarts staff arrived just as what we now know as a portkey transported the three missing witches off the grounds. An immediate attempt at tracking the portkey by the Deputy proved … less than fruitful."

"And by 'less than fruitful', what Horace is trying to not say is that I got my arse handed to me in two different locations," Luna said with a scowl. "Multi-stage portkey, at least three hops before its destination I would guess."

"While I'd not argue with the Deputy on a regular basis," Horace said with a shrug, "especially since it could affect my domestic situation, I would have to say that she handled the two what we've determined to be unknowing distractions covering the escape with great skill."

"Pfft," Luna dismissed Horace's comment with a wave of her hand. "I'll admit the first one was a bit of a shocker, going into free-fall about a thousand feet above Loch Maree was a bit disconcerting. With the loch below getting closer with each second, it wasn't easy to pick out the track that pesky portkey left was it moved forward."

Closing her eyes in concentration, Hermione gasped softly as she realized that her long-time friend had less than ten seconds to find the trace of the portkey and follow it.

"Luna?"

"More distance between me and the loch than Harry had between him and the pitch the last time he did a Wronski Feint in a pickup quidditch game out on the school pitch," she said with a smirk.

"And the second leg," Hermione asked hesitantly since Luna had implied that the first jump was the lesser of the two.

"That one was a bit more … problematic," Luna said as she cast a hesitant look at Hector. Hermione looked over and saw the grim look on his face.

"Best guess is that the portkey was 'programed' with a runic sequence to perform the jumps, that fall over Loch Mairee was too tight to worry about someone's reaction time, and if they didn't have to worry about punching through a set of wards on the other points, they could add in a few extras."

"What the Deputy Headmistress is trying not to say is that we think they built in a locking charm like the ones they use on starter brooms to keep everyone from releasing their hold on the portkey once it started. A slight time delay on the first relay so that the portkey and its passengers would clear the spot in case someone was following too close behind, if they were below the pursuer then they wouldn't have any clue as to directionality before they disappeared."

"And the second leg?"

"Not certain if it's a ruse, but the second leg was also within Scotland. The Highland Wildlife Park in Kinguissie," Minerva said with a scowl. "According to the information we got, after the fact, our three students appeared in the middle of the polar bear enclosure.

"A loud explosion and a bright flash of light masked their departure about twenty seconds later, leaving behind two male bears in a rage when Luna appeared less than two minutes later."

"At which time I was forced to quickly depart since the one bear was bearing down on me and I could see the staff entering the enclosure which meant I wouldn't have any time to try to pick up the trace even if I could dissuade the bear from turning me into his late afternoon snack."

"Which is why you said 'at least three hops' since you deduce that the next hop was guaranteed to chop off any tail that was skilled enough to still be following," Hermione said with a thoughtful look.

"Very true, I bested the Spaniard and survived the Giant, but going up against a Sicilian with death on the line," Luna said with a rueful smirk and a wink.

"Nonsense," Matron Tudor dismissed with a wave of her hand and a grin. "You survived four years of potions with Severus 'I have no concept of proper safety procedures' Snape. You've been immune to Iocane powder since the winter hols of your second year, at least."

Pausing for a second to allow Hermione a chance at a perfunctory 'That's Professor Snape', Luna suddenly sobered and looked over at Harry for a moment. Seeing that he was still speaking quietly with Rose, she decided to grab the Snorkack by its crumpled horn for him.

Turning back to Hermione, she simply started, "Harry has an idea …"

Shrugging, Hermione smiled sadly. "I don't object to him, per se. He was an arse in school and he's been playing at being an arse ever since.

"Now that I'm read in on things, I do respect some of the things he's accomplished. His minder, however …"

"Could be considered a bit anal," Luna asked with a smirk, as if she knew what was coming.

"Who might be a bit …."

"Cauldron, kettle."

"Beg pardon?"

Resisting the urge to laugh, Luna simply chuckled and said, "You were about to suggest that Mercy Hendrecks might be a bit too close to Carrenton to be objective, to which I was simply inviting Director Cauldron to meet Ms. Kettle."

"It's not the same," Hermione replied stiffly. "Harry and I have a long-standing working relationship …"

"And everyone who met the two of you knew that you were gone for the boy the day after the 'Great Troll Hunt' back in your first year. The only difference between the two situations is that you two managed, with a bit of outside help, mind you, to delude yourselves for a quarter century while Carrenton and Hendrecks threw caution to the wind a bit more quickly."

"Do you honestly think Harry's not going to be chomping on the proverbial bit to go in and rescue the girls," Luna asked quietly. "And will you be willing to sign off on it, knowing it's going to be more than dicey?"

Hermione opened her mouth, and then closed it slowly as the truth of what Luna was saying sunk in.

Even before, she would have been … unwilling to send Harry into such a situation. Goodness knows she'd lost track of the number of times she'd considered not allowing him to be part of an operation or investigation. Using her pull to pass it to someone else.

Which would totally infuriate Harry since, while they no longer spoke of it often, he still had that 'saving people' thing, which was more an inability to sit by while there was something that needed to be done.

Because, for better or for worse Hermione conceded ironically, Harry Potter was the best choice for doing what needed to be done far too often.

"I believe I understand what you're trying to say," Hermione said slowly as she rolled her eyes at the growing amusement on Luna's face, "all I was trying to point out was …"

"… that the last thing we need on this case is another Hermione Granger nervously wondering if their wizard is going to survive and biting everyone's head off until he checks in?" Luna prompted in a voice that made her sound totally innocent.

"I wouldn't phrase it exactly that way," Hermione said with a sigh. "But I imagine that some people would."

Shaking her head, Hermione concentrated and conjured a 4x6 still picture of the wizard in question. A still non-magical photograph that looked as if it had come from a less than state of the art security camera somewhere.

Seeing the picture, Horace rolled his eyes. "Conjuring up something bright and shiny to distract the bad guys," he asked his boss with a smirk.

"Something like that. Apparently, Harry thinks that since Mr. Carrenton is up to his smirk in this thing, already, if it looks as if we're looking for him, they might try to reach out to him to offer him sanctuary and enlist his aid," Hermione said while resisting the urge to sigh at the knowing look on Luna's face.

Looking down at his notebook, which was linked to ones held by some of the senior investigators both on scene and back in London, he chuckled.

"Apparently, Monsieur Jegado-Malfoy's purpose was to be a distraction for us. They probably intended for Selwyn to 'leave him behind' as a false trail all along."

He quickly explained to his boss and the others that the French wizard had quite an extensive record and reputation as was involved in the trafficking of underage witches and wizards in his native France.

"Since the sorts who engage in that practice are also involved in the purebred movements," Horace continued referring to the tendency of the predators to focus on first generation children since their family homes and schools wouldn't have the protections that a wizarding family would.

"They probably enlisted his help, offering him the other witch as 'payment' for assistance in abducting the Potter witch, all the while intending on leaving him behind as a misdirection."

"That makes a bit of sense," Hermione mused. "If we didn't know anything about the involvement of young Harriet's family, the disappearance of two witches from the grounds and a dead paedophile at the scene would have sent the investigation to France."

"Or, Lucius Malfoy, who's currently in custody. I can imagine quite a few people jumping to the conclusion this was some sort of revenge on his part with a distant relative being found dead at the scene of the crime," Horace mused.

"Time to create 'a person of interest'," Hermione quipped as she stepped outside the privacy zone and walked over to where Harry was talking to Rose.

Kneeling down beside the bed, and trying to ignore the memories of the number of times Harry had occupied this same spot in the Hospital Wing while they were students, Hermione smiled at her daughter.

Ignoring the smirk from Harry when he saw the picture, Hermione gently put her hand on Rose's.

"You know, we're going to get the girls back," she started as she watched her daughter carefully.

"Mum, I'm so sorry. We thought we'd thought of everything …"

Shaking her head, Hermine gently laid a finger against her daughter's lips to shush her.

"We'll talk about all of that once the girls are safe and sound." Taking a deep breath, she looked over at Harry who was nodding encouragingly. She could feel his support and his resolve through their link.

"We want to track this from both ends," Hermione continued as she looked down at the picture in her hand. Seeing that no one was paying any attention, she continued.

"We're going to try to see if we can get the people who are behind this to reach out to someone we choose, so I'm going to release a statement that we're looking for an individual who might be involved."

Showing Rose the picture, Hermione shook her head again as Rose was about to say something.

"We're going to publish that we're looking for this gentleman as 'a person if interest' because you saw him on the grounds earlier in the day when you were outside the castle."

Blinking a couple of times, Rose looked up at Harry. Seeing his smirk, she raised an eyebrow and turned back to her mother.

"He's not a person of interest to you, but you want them to be interested in him?"

"Something like that, sweetheart. He's dealt with these people before. If they think that the Ministry is looking for him …"

"They might reach out to him. Sort of a 'misery loves company' idea."

"That, and since he has contact with people outside Britain, they'll wonder what he was doing at Hogwarts and if he can help them gain support," Harry added as he nodded towards the doors to the Infirmary where the three MLE investigators who had been dispatched to check the dorms were coming in.

Inspector Meredith Dyer was coming up to them, flanked by the other two who had gone to the Gryffindor and Slytherin dorms with an evidence bag in her hand.

"The forensic boffins are going over the areas of the three young ladies with fine tooth combs, but other than being the personal areas of teenage witches, everything is remarkably … dull from a crime scene standpoint."

Nodding towards the bag, Hermione simply waited, having worked with Dyer enough times over the years she knew that the older witch would summarize everything in her own way.

"The Hufflepuff witch, McLaggen, had a journal. Not just your usual teen witch angst and family drama.

"Did a quick read through, if half the things she's got written down are accurate, she's the closest one to being relatively normal in her family. As my Da used to say, they put the 'fun' in dysfunctional."

Shaking her head, the blonde reached into the bag before continuing.

"Don't know if it's important, yet, but the witches in her dorm have been worried about her for the past couple of days. According to them, she's been on pins and needles since her family visited.

"They said she was almost driven when she got back from the Great Hall after last class. Usually she's the one who's area looks like a windstorm hit it, but she changed after class and everything got put away, neat as a pin."

Pausing for a second, Dyer added, "Almost as if she knew she wasn't coming back.

"She must have changed her mind about what she was wearing to go meet the others at the last second, though. Her dormmate said that she was almost to the door when she stopped, pulled this off and tossed it back on her bed."

Out of the bag, the investigator pulled the garment that Harriet had almost worn, but removed just before going out.

A bright red jumper.

an/2 - Props also go to Gene Roddenberry and the Star Trek universe who brought us the perfect counter to the Imperial Storm Trooper, the Red Shirts. With no disrespect intended, Harriet declined her invitation to join their ranks. Something about a bad dental plan, I think.

Also, William Goldman and his indellible mark on popular culture, 'The Princess Bride', added just a bit.

Finally, I needed somewhere in Scotland where one could find mindless carnivores. Since a friend of mine assured me that, but the time of this story, there would be wards around the Scottish Parliament Building, I took a cue from Robst' 'Harry Crow' when I found out that there was a wildlife park there.