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“Mummy?”

“Not now, moonbeam, mummy is trying a very important spell.”

“Daddy has been set on fire.”

Pandora’s head shot up and she looked at her grim looking daughter.  “He has?  Luna-”

She scrambled out of her workroom and ran for the house.  “Xeno!  Xeno!”

She burst into the kitchen where her husband was looking mildly surprised, holding the spoon that was dripping orange syrup, and decidedly not on fire.

She blinked in bewilderment.

“Yes, dear?”

She spun to her daughter, an admonishment on her tongue, when an explosion rattled the house and sent her careening into her husband, getting the smell of orange up her nose.  She knew it would dry and stick and ruin her shirt but all she could see was the shards of the plate that had fallen and the dust settling.  She levered herself to her feet and looked out the window to see her workroom as a husk, the walls caved in, and the only things remaining were the support beams that made it look like an open ribcage.

“I’m sorry, mummy,” Luna said quietly, “I told a lie.”

Pandora opened and closed her mouth, looking at the shell of her workroom.

“Was it a very big lie,” Xenophilius said, unconcerned, “or was it the thing that made Pandora’s Box explode?”

“Well.  It didn’t make it explode…”

Pandora clutched her daughter and her husband close to her, uncaring of how the syrup was getting in Luna’s hair, which would mean they’d have to cut it, but it didn’t matter when she was alive.

“That’s alright, love,” she said breathlessly, “we’re alright.”

Luna looked decidedly smug, grinning widely.  “Yes, we are.”

Saul Croaker looked over his scrambling department in disdain.

“What’s going on,” he barked, causing the cloaked and “anonymous” figures to freeze.

“Sir,” one said nervously, “the Time Department was raided.”

“Raided?”  He blinked in incredulity.  “By whom?  Where’s the Unspeakable on the Time projects?”

“Here, I came as soon as I felt the alert,” a young voice called, walking into the department unrobed.  Saul raised an eyebrow and the teenager scowled.  “Don’t try it, Croaker,” he grumbled.

“How old are you, champ?”

The boy rolled his eyes and thrust his wrist out, the magic of the Unspeakable tattoo flickering into perception.  “Fourteen going on thirty.  Or almost forty, depending on what you count.  First joined the Unspeakables three runs ago, near as I can tell, only figured out how to remember two runs ago.”

Saul hummed.

The boy smiled cooly.  “Unspeakable Chrome, in charge of the Time Department.”

“And the raid?”

He huffed.  “I’m not sure what they’re doing with them, but I’m inclined to let them go.  I can recall the time turners if I need to, but I think they’re close to breaking the loops.”

Saul paused and let himself process all of that information before nodding.   He idly looked at all the other Unspeakables who were lingering and not so subtly eavesdropping.

“Let’s take this to my office,” he said finally, “and you can get me the details.”

The teenager smiled smugly, very clearly giving the finger to Unspeakable Knife.

Saul raised an eyebrow and the kid huffed.  “She’s consistently an asshole who wants my job.  But she’s not going to get it.”

He chuckled.  “Well, you are the most qualified, even if you’re not out of Hogwarts yet.”

“If I figure out how they got in the loops, I’m going to kill them for making me go through school this many times…”

The very small patronus circled idly in meandering paths as the cloaked figure stalked through the halls.  People cried and screamed and begged and threatened around them but were ignored.  They didn’t stop in front of the newly empty cell that had lost its prisoner a few days ago.  A single crow feather rested on the thin blanket that masqueraded as a bed.

Instead, they stopped at the cell immediately next to it.

The woman inside looked up and gave a crooked grin, shadowed eyes trying to pick out features.

“Hello,” she crooned, “here to visit Beautiful Bella?  Show me your pretty face, please?”

The figure snorted.

“Then will you show me your throat?”   Her face contorted into a crazed snarl on the last word and she lunged forward, scrabbling at the bars to reach the figure.  Her jagged nails that resembled broken talons fell a few inches short of the unmoving figure.

They idly cast a spell that blocked the view from the other cells and slowly lowered their hood.  The little glowing wasp alighted on her shoulder and she smoothed out her honey blond hair.  Her eyes glinted like chips of ice and her smile was cold.  The young woman cocked her head idly.

“Greengrass,” Bellatrix hissed, “you look young.”

The woman snorted.  “I imagine so.  And it’s still incorrect according to Blaise.”

“Why’d you come to visit,” the crazy woman said sweetly, “come to pledge?  Break poor Bella out and come out of neutrality to serve the Dark Lord?”

“Oh, I serve a Dark Lord,” she said mildly.  “Unfortunately, I’ve been given the name Belladonna, and, well, there can only be one.  Besides, I’ve been meaning to get my fiance a gift.  Really, this is threefold.”

Bellatrix wobbled a little, not equipped to do much thinking, but working herself up all the same.  “Three?”

“Of course,” the woman said, raising her wand, “you will be Lord Chronos’ first victim.”

“Morag, are you certain?”

The eleven year old looked up at him.  “Of course, father.”

McDougal senior inspected her for any sign of… anything negative, but found none.  He beamed.

“Of course,” he said cheerfully, “if you want to learn more Dark Arts, I’m glad you came to me so we could talk about it safely together!”

Morag gave a very small smile, but it shone genuinely in her eyes.  She was just like him, eager in the pursuit of knowledge.  His little Ravenclaw.  He’d been afraid his wife had managed to impress upon her those Light principles that even learning Dark magic would corrupt you.  He knew that this was of course not the case, that was ludicrous.  Now his wife couldn’t find and throw out the books they had!

“We’ll keep this a secret from your mother,” he winked, and she winked back.

Susan was taking more interest in her work, but Amelia thought this was probably a good thing.  She seemed to already have a comprehensive knowledge of a lot of the laws anyway, but she was really stepping it up now, asking about specific cases and ensuring she had the exact wording of the law.

“Suzie,” Amelia said one evening, “you’ve really done a lot of research.”

Her niece blushed, but nodded.  “I was thinking of maybe going into law after school,” she confessed, and Amelia chuckled.

“You’re not even at Hogwarts yet, darling.”

Susan shrugged.  “I just want to help people.  Better to start early.”

Ah, so noble.

Well, anything Amelia could do to help, as long as it wasn’t illegal.

“Ugh, Pans, when are you going to learn?”

Pansy ignored her older brother, continuing to read her magazine. 

“Maybe if you stopped reading Witch Weekly and started reading more Dark books, the little Malfoy would actually like you!”

He stomped out of the room when he continued to get no response, and finally, Pansy burst out laughing.

“As if I wasn’t Draco’s maid of honor twice,” she scoffed, going back to idly copying and shrinking the Dark Arts books in the library around her to send out.  There were a couple in every family library that were unique, but she happened to be the least scrutinized, so she was also making copies for the common books.

“Besides,” she giggled to herself, “this isn’t even Witch Weekly.”

She continued to flip through “Hexes and Curses Every Dark Witch Should Know.”  It had been a very popular copy distributed.

Vincent Crabbe sometimes remembered dying.

He wasn’t the only one of their number, of course, who’d been gone and then returned.  Greg’s best friend (and girlfriend at least once, but nothing was tied down) Lavender still sometimes had to stare at herself in the mirror, tracing the smooth, unmauled skin.  No one since that first loop had died, thank Merlin, but it was still something he remembered.  It wasn’t really something one could forget, after all.

It was mostly brought up in his mind when he was reminding himself that he’d already died once and come back, so he could tackle this one creature.  (Besides, while they weren’t quite there yet, they’d never break the loop while someone was dead.)

Millie was the one who was really in charge of the whole animal thing, but she’d been extremely busy since her birthday, and Vince had always had a way with animals that had carried Draco and Greg through Care that first time when none of them really knew what they were doing.  If they’d done a second muggle run, for Uni, he’d probably have tried for a veterinary school, specializing in birds.  Not only had Harry gone out to find Hedwig every run (already kidnapped, of course, this was the Dark Lord run) and everyone had grown quite fond of the owl, but people liked to find and love their pets and post owls from previous loops as well.  And apparently, if you get heavily injured in animagus form, since all of them had at least one form, then you can’t change back as a safety thing because wounds don’t translate well, so it was worth it to learn for that.

In this case, his experience was probably saving his bacon as he had to splint a hippogriff’s hindleg.

“I just wanted your feathers,” he grumbled as she screeched and tried to claw his face off.  Finally he did a partial bodybind on her front half and her other leg for good measure.  She stared at him incredulously and he couldn’t help but roll his eyes.

"You’re very fierce and lovely,” he said, mollifying her slightly, “but you’re also very dramatic.  I promise I’m helping, diva.”

Her eyes lit up and he mentally cursed.

“I just named you, didn’t I?”

She looked incredibly smug for someone who couldn’t move, but let him finish splinting her leg and even parted with tail, wing, and neck feathers.

He sighed.  “Well, I hope Millie’s manor grounds are willing to house a hippogriff, Diva…”

She ruffled her feathers primly before lowering herself for him to hop on.

Vince waffled back and forth for a moment before giving a wry smile.  “Oh, alright.”

Yes, Vince remembered dying.  But he also remembered the good things from the first run, the things he’d loved the most.  One thing he could agree with Harry on?  Flying.  Feeling the wind on your face, the swooping sensation in your stomach with the rises and falls, the dips and dives.  Trusting what was keeping you afloat and leaning into turns with nothing but the ground hundred of meters below you.  He was glad for the loops, for the opportunity to fly again.  

It was the farthest thing from dying that he knew.

Terry looked over the blood healing rituals again.  His family was full of healers, after all, so while they hadn’t used these books in ages, they were still in the back of the library.  Now he just needed to make sure that none of his family members saw him reading.  And get copies of these books to Sally-Anne, she’d seemed interested in healing two runs ago when they were going around the world.

(Or maybe she’d been interested in him…?  Hmm, maybe this time he could ask her to Hogsmeade, she’d moved in the original run before she could go and the next two hadn’t been focused on it…)

Ernie was actually very good at running the books and scheduling!  He’d never really found his niche in magic like some of the others had - the research teams, the offshoot of the research teams that was the alchemy team, the wand team, the offshoots of the original acquisitions teams that sectioned off into plants and animals… Ernie had originally just been in the Wizengamot team, focusing on their plans for the future.  But they’d refined and scrapped and redone and refined those plans to death over the actual decades, so everyone else was finding new things to do, new things to learn.  Ernie, on the other hand, just shifted slightly to the left.  

Ernie was a secretary in his heart.

Zacharias Smith (who was far more tolerable than the first time around, since he’d mellowed out considerably - nothing like trauma bonding and the futility of one’s actions to make you act like a regular human being!) had made fun of him in their original go around for keeping a schedule like a Ravenclaw, but he hadn’t known how bad it had been - Ernie liked to know his friends’ schedules too, to make sure they didn’t forget anything.  When they spent time in the muggle world, he’d seen their calendars, which seemed like a very basic thing that wizards just didn’t have!  Probably due to the fact that they had the tempus spell, which made it quite easy to tell what the current date was, even if you’d been in a coma, for example.  But calendars, they were an excellent invention because they had little blocks for each day so you could write down important events coming up instead of hoping your notes were organized, if you even bothered to write one.

So yes, Ernie had done excellent in the Wizen department, and he was going to do excellent in the Dark Lord run they were doing as well, because simply put, the time turner thing was a clusterfuck.

When they’d first asked the problem of, “What if us disappearing to go be ‘evil’ is noticed and they connect us to our ‘evil’ selves?”, Ron had mentioned time turners, like Hermione had used in the first run.  All good and well, they’d stolen all the supplies and pre-made ones easily enough, but that led to a massive debate about when to use them.  Every day?  Just when you need an alibi?  Do you go through the day first “evil” and then as a regular student, or vice versa?  How do we prevent ourselves from aging twice as fast if we use it too frequently?  Will this affect the age numbers Blaise calculated and isn’t sharing because he wants everyone else to do the math themselves like a dickhead who got straight A’s through Calculus III since he insists it’s barely even algebra and the only reason no one else wanted to do it was because it was tedious?

…There might be some lingering frustration there.  Not the point!  The point was, Ernie had practically leapt for the chance to solve this!  To prevent premature aging that would get noticed and also because huddling up so they could share their dozen time turners between all thirty three of them every day seemed like a chore, they would plan if they needed to be “evil” beforehand and do that day first, then turn back time to produce their alibi.  Sure, it meant their reaction to any news would have to be acted, but most of the time news would come out the next day anyway, and this prevented them from trying to out paradox the time turners by learning what their “evil” selves accomplished ahead of time.  If there were things to do, Ernie would schedule it.  If things had to change because of the things done, he’d change the schedule.  They still had to listen to Harry (sorry, Dark Lord Chronos) of course, because he was the Dark Lord of the Dark Lord run, but Ernie, or rather, Hourglass, was in charge of scheduling.

And he was going to take to it with relish.

(“Honey,” Lady MacMillan said, “did you get Ernest another notebook while you were out?”

Lord MacMillan laughed jovially.  “Of course, darling.  You’ve seen our boy and his schedules and lists!  Perhaps he’ll break the mold and go to Ravenclaw like your brother!”

Lady MacMillan snorted and smiled at her husband, putting her hand on his cheek.  “Oh, love, you know as well as I do that he’s far too hard working for that.  If it makes him happy, then I’m happy.  He’ll make friends with someone who won’t make fun of him, like that dratted Smith boy.”

“Oh,” Lord Macmillan leaned in, “haven’t you seen the influx of owls?  I dare say he already made some!”

The two adult Macmillans were quite pleased with their son.  He was a little obsessive, yes, but he seemed to take great pleasure in his lists and schedules.  And the idea of blocking out days?  Ingenious.  What a good lad.)

Ron had kind of… forgotten how chaotic the Burrow was.  The funny thing was, if pressed, he’d tell anyone that their loop group (fun to say) was far more chaotic than his home that only had seven people in it including himself.  Since it was still just past his birthday, in March, Percy and the twins weren’t even home, and his father was gone most of the day anyway, so it was really just him, his mum, and Ginny.  Ginny seemed way more childish and annoying than he remembered, but it was pretty easy to tolerate her when he considered… well, she was only ten.

Regardless, the chaos of the Burrow was kind of… soothing for Ron, after all this time.  They usually didn’t hang around their homes all that much once the loop started at the very moment Hermione turned eleven.  Now that they were using the rune before the reset instead of the potion that had to be delivered when it started, the only sign that something had changed in all of them was differences in behavior.  And, granted, trying to act like children again after all this time was… difficult.  Ron had never been more grateful that he was the sixth child.

Errol heaved to the kitchen table with two letters clutched in his grasp and Molly looked up from their lunch startled when Ron reached for them with a grin.

“Ronald?  Someone’s writing to you?”

He flashed the seals on the letters.  One was a rook in purple wax, the other a queen in blue.  “I’m starved of chess opponents, mum, so I wrote to some people and we do it through the post.”

Molly looked confused for a moment before she broke out in a warm smile.  “Well, I’m certain I don’t know how that works, but I’m glad you’re making friends.  Are they your age?”

He smiled back.  “Yeah.  Few months older, but they’re both going to be in my year at Hogwarts.”

Molly gasped, delighted.  “That’s wonderful!  Then you can play them in person!  Oh, or, well, if you know who they are, we can arrange a playdate!”

Ron hesitated for a moment before looking between the rook and the queen.  “Maybe,” he said slowly, eyeing the queen, “I think Hermione might be down for that.  Tracey…”

Ginny gaped.  “You’re talking to girls?   About chess?!”

“Ginny,” Molly scolded, heart clearly not in it for how excited she looked, “I think it’s wonderful that Ron is talking to peers his age, regardless of gender.”

Ron snorted internally as he read the messages each had sent.  Coded to chess games, of course, but really more plans they were moving forward with.  Bellatrix’s corpse had been discovered and the symbol carved into the floor under her lifeless body was being puzzled over, but it hadn’t made the press yet.  No comments on Sirius’ absence, so they either didn’t care or had assumed he was dead.  He hummed to himself and started figuring out how to maneuver people for the next step of their plan.  They had wanted to wait until Quirrell took the bait, but perhaps another victim was in order.

He pushed back from the table with a carefree grin.

“I’m gonna reply,” he said, “and I’ll ask if Hermione would be willing to meetup.  She’s a muggleborn, though, so either she has to come to us or we have to be pretty normal.”

“Oh,” Molly looked almost choked up, “your father will be delighted to go with you, I’m certain!  Just wait until he hears… you’re all grown up and talking to girls…”

Ron just gave her a sheepish grin and ducked his head.  If she was this excited with him just talking to a girl, he couldn’t imagine how she’d feel knowing that he was also technically engaged .  To both his Rook and his Queen.  They regularly teamed up on him and Hermione insisted that they only get married out of the loops, with Tracey backing her up.  They weren’t going to be like Harry and Draco, getting sappily remarried whenever they wanted, no, Tracey was determined to make it a once in a lifetime wedding and she meant it.

He took out parchment and a quill and started the letters, first to Tracey with his thoughts on their next steps, then to Hermione with that and confessing his mum had seen the letters and asking if she wanted to meet in person to play chess instead of just doing letters forever.

Closing them both, he melted dark red wax to seal them and pressed his own insignia in, leaving the wax to cool with the image of his own chess piece, the king.

He hummed the old song to himself, hunting down Errol, who had rested by now.

“Weasley can save anything, he never leaves a single ring, that’s why the Gryffindors all sing, Weasley is our King…”

Michael looked around the Corner House with a small grin.

“Oh where oh where,” he said in a sing-song voice, “could those little munchkins be?  Over yonder, over there, over hill or over dale?  In the laundry, in the hall, in the closet, in the walls?”

His little sisters giggled and he snorted under his breath before humming.

“Nothing here,” he said loudly, checking under the couch, which could barely fit a dust bunny, “I guess they must not be in the sitting room.”

The curtains moved and he ignored it.  He cocked his head as the yelling of his parents filtered down the hall from his father’s study and started humming louder to drown them out as he heard the word “murdered.”  His sisters didn’t need to hear this.  They were four and five.  Casey was the only one who ever got to be a first year in these loops, not that she had the first time since it had been too dangerous, so he always saw them as his baby siblings no matter what.  They never knew enough magic by the time they reset that it was easy to remember that Casey and Elaine were children, in a way that a lot of people struggled with if they had older siblings.

His ring heated up in the emergency pattern and he knew he needed to find a place to disappear.  The ring looked like it was two strands that crossed over the top of his finger, making a shape like an ex.  Or, well, an hourglass.

He grabbed Elaine from behind the curtain, making her shriek in delight that quickly turned into giggles, and he shushed her with mirth in his eyes as she scrambled to hold onto his neck, letting him free a hand.  He walked over to the suspicious pile of pillows in the corner of the room.

“Wow,” he said loudly, “that sure does look comfy, huh Elly?”

She giggled and nodded.

“Wish Casey were here to lay with us on these super comfy looking pillows, but I guess we can just lay on them together!”

The pillow nest exploded and Casey revealed herself with a shriek of laughter.

“No,” she yelled, “I’m in the pillows!  I’m not comfy!”

Michael tossed his other sister onto the pillows and beamed.  “Tell you what, I’ll go get my bedding and we can make a whole fort, okay?”

They eagerly agreed and he slipped out of the room and up the stairs to his bedroom.  He scrawled a note, “bedding for fort in sitting room” and then fished out the necklace from the shared space box.  Two other slots of twenty were empty.

He slipped the time turner on and waited.  The ring pulsed five times, so he shrugged and spun the time turner five times.  Who was he to disagree with Ernie?

Michael walked back into his room and checked the note.  “Oh, right,” he muttered, putting the time turner back in the box, “pillow fort with Casey and Elaine.”

He did a quick spell to make sure his enchanted cloak was well hidden and grabbed his comforter.  He passed his father’s study on the way back down.

“-the same symbol, like a clock face, under Dolores Umbridge; how is she connected to Bellatrix-?!”

He grinned, sweeping back into the sitting room.

“Aw,” he beamed, “you started without me?  It looks so good!  I bet we can make it even better, though…”

Justin yawned and stretched.  He penned another message to Seamus, Megan, and Lisa.  If they could just figure out the combination of magical photography, pensieve technology, and muggle recording equipment, then they could figure out broadcasting.  Justin hadn’t even been on the original Acquisitions or Research and Development teams - he and Lisa had been in War Strategy - but they’d been tasked with figuring out some technomancy.  Granted, he was relatively certain Megan and Seamus were collaborating with anyone not in development of spells and rituals, since adding dark magic to their repertoire had vastly increased the pool of research available to them.  Not that Theo or Sue had cared, of course; rune magic had been classified as dark with an asterisk for the last two centuries, so technically, most if not all of their ritual work was illegal.  That or guaranteed to get them jobs with the Department of Mysteries.  Probably both, if Justin was being honest with himself.

Regardless, their Dark Lord Chronos had been insistent on developing something like live broadcasting before they really stepped into the limelight because, in his words, “there is no way the media won’t try to spin some bullshit and the public won’t try to bury their heads in the sand if we don’t force them to watch,” which everyone collectively agreed was the case with their society.

Words formed on the page of the notebook and he raised an eyebrow at Seamus’ loopy scrawl, trying to decipher the flowing cursive and thanking his lucky stars that all British schools still taught their students cursive almost exclusively.

He took a sip of coffee (stolen from his dad while the elite businessman wasn’t paying attention; really quite simple to do with magic that Mr. Finch-Fletchley wasn’t aware existed quite yet since Professor Flitwick would be visiting next week) and almost immediately choked on it when he fully deciphered what had been said.  Megan immediately replied with her fast and jagged script and Justin could only watch in awe as they wrote out arithmetic sequences and wand motions that would make the spell take shape.  Lisa chimed in with wanting a device they could attach the enchantments to so the spell wouldn’t have to be continuously cast, and finally Justin grabbed his biro again.

What they needed was a mirror.

As he wrote and watched the idea get formalized for testing (on sports games, of course, this was Seamus they were talking about, who was thinking only of Dean as always), he understood what his namesake must have felt, bringing fire to the humans.  Soon, the wizarding world would experience television.  That it would be used for their own purposes?  Well, such is the nature of invention.

(Now to avoid getting his liver pecked out…)

Hannah beamed as she unwrapped Tony’s birthday gift to her.  It was a crystal oleander stem wrapped around an obsidian bishop.  The color difference really made the crystal sparkle in the light.

Her mother looked at in confusion.  “Who’s that from?”

“Tony,” she said cheerfully, “remember, the boy Susan introduced me to?”

Her father made a noise of realization.  “Goldstein.  You’re still talking to that boy?”

She pouted.  “Of course!  We’re going to be classmates in less than three months!  And I think he’s sweet.”

Her parents still looked confused at the gift.  “Do you like chess?”

Hannah couldn’t help but giggle, slipping the figure away for now.  “It’s an inside joke, mum.  He likes chess, just like I like flowers more.  And I think these ones are pretty!”

Lady Abbot immediately smiled.  “Yes, it was a lovely present.  As long as you’re happy with it and understand, I’m very glad you made a good friend.”

Hannah nodded rapidly.  “I wish I had met him before his birthday party,” she said in a regretful tone, “I could have gotten him a more personalized gift…”

Of course, she had, she mused privately while her parents assured her there was always next year and told her to open the rest of her presents from friends.  They didn’t often get each other things, having already gone through at least three dozen birthdays with each other, but most of the people who were closer got each other gifts at milestones.  Here, they were still in their first year of this run, and everyone was running with the spirit of having something new and exciting to do.

She opened Susan’s gift and read the note with a snort.

Oleander “perfume.”  It seems that choosing to use a flower name meant everyone gave you flower themed gifts.  The fact that everyone with a flower all happened to be poisonous flowers meant they were probably all getting poison too.  She considered the other member of her team and shrugged.  Neville and Daphne gave each other deadly plants all the time as their version of flirting (in the muggle run they’d seen “The Addams Family” and Hannah was privately calling them Neville and Daphne Addams ever since) and Blaise had purposefully joined the plant named team specifically to be a poisonous plant for fun, so.  As for Severus Snape…

Well, Hannah didn’t want to speculate on why their Lord Chronos had named the man after that particular flower.

Neville locked the greenhouse behind him and walked to the manor.  He idly flicked his wand before tucking it into the hidden holster and entered the parlor where his grandmother was sitting sipping tea and looking a little haggard.  “Is Uncle Algie feeling any better?”

She sighed and cupped his face.  “No, unfortunately.”

Neville cast his eyes down in fake sadness and to hide his very slight smile.  Of course he wasn’t.  The false snowdrop had done its job beautifully, and he had one of the only specimens of swamp orchids outside of the Everglades, so even if the healers did figure out what had caused his heart and blood problems, it would take too long for them to try and cultivate the orchid on British soil, since the cure needed to be brewed within ten minutes of harvest or it simply would not work.

So tragic.

Alice swept into the room, meeting his eyes and smiling, the corners of her face crinkling with happiness.

“Hello, Augusta,” she said, making an attempt at solemn and falling short to Neville’s ears, “the healers say he’s only got a few more days before the coma takes over, if you wanted to spend time with him.  Frank’s there now.”

Augusta wasted no time, flooing to Saint Mungos and leaving the two behind.  In ten minutes of drinking tea, Frank flooed home, a grim expression on his face for half a moment before he broke into a wide grin.

“There were complications,” he said gleefully, “the old bastard is dead!”

Neville and his mother cheered, sombering immediately with a cough before they made eye contact and the three burst into renewed giggles.

“Oh,” Alice sighed, “I don’t mind a Dark Lord run at all.  What an utter sot.”

“Right, okay,” Frank took a few deep breaths, “we’re very sad, it’s horribly tragic, no more laughing.”

They lasted another three seconds.

“Hagrid,” he heard the young savior say, just barely heard over the crowd of admirers, “you said you have to go to the bank first?”

“Aye,” the halfbreed replied jovially, not even trying to quieten himself, the oaf, “‘fessor Dumbledore wan’s me to pick somethin’ up for ‘im.”

Oh what an utter fool, Quirinus thought to himself as he hurried to the bank, that must be the stone.  He had to move quickly if he wanted to reach the vault before the half giant oaf.

His master would rise again and Quirinus would be rewarded beyond belief!

DARK LORD ON THE RISE?

By Rita Skeeter for the Daily Prophet

The Dark Mark was seen once again, for the first time in almost ten years, above the sleepy town of Crowfield, England.  Seventeen muggles and forty three chickens tragically lost their lives yesterday, August 7th, and are leaving us to wonder.

Is this He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named, returned?  Is this one of his followers who slipped through the cracks, trying to spread fear in their old master’s name?  Or is this someone’s idea of a cruel joke?

What we know:

• The Dark Mark can only be cast with a specific incantation.
• People were killed with Dark Magic
• The Dark Lord was defeated by the Boy-Who-Lived, Harry Potter, almost ten years ago
• Harry Potter is set to attend Hogwarts this September
• Not all of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named’s followers were captured and put into prison
• One of His most notorious followers, Bellatrix Lestrange, was found dead in her cell around the time the Longbottoms, previously in the Saint Janus Thickey ward due to her attacks, woke up whole and hale, with an odd circular symbol under her that was repeated with the heinous murder of Senior Undersecretary for the Minister, Dolores Umbridge

What we can only speculate:

• Reportedly, survivors of the initial attacks might have heard this spell being used and retained the memory ten years later to either keep to themselves or tell to another
• Dark Magic is usable only by those with no morals
• Perhaps with a decade of time since the Dark Lord’s defeat, people are going to target the Boy-Who-Lived
• Hogwarts is home to Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, Chief Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, and Headmaster of Hogwarts, who is the only person You-Know-Who ever feared and surely will be able to keep our boy savior safe from these terrible people
• Like last time, perhaps certain upstanding individuals are being imperioused, maybe to take the fall?
• The new symbol is quite simple, with a circle and two lines, one shorter than the other, but no one quite knows what it means or who put it there, or murdered both Lestrange and Umbridge

Is this the Dark Lord returned?  Is it Death Eaters?  Or is it some new Dark Lord on the rise?

Stay tuned, only with the Daily Prophet.

Rita Skeeter, signing off for now…

The platform 9 and ¾ was bustling.  It was ten thirty, the time when most people were at the train station.  Enough time for people to settle in, but not too early that they’d get horribly bored.  Everywhere children from ages eleven to seventeen were saying goodbye to their family members.  Fireplaces were flaring, quiet pops could be heard if you were paying attention.  It was controlled chaos, with the sounds of people and pets.

That’s probably why it took people a moment to notice the hooded figures in their midst, standing at intervals.  In fact, until a tall pale figure appeared, most didn’t see anything amiss.

Lord Voldemort drew attention with a loud bang, and people started screaming, but even as people could enter, no one could leave.  Even the barrier between the muggle and magical sides was blocked by two large Death Eaters.

Voldemort sneered at the populace.  “Today marks the official return of the Dark Lord Voldemort.  I will soon have control over all of-”

Someone coughed.

He turned slowly, pointing his wand.  “Who dares interrupt the Dark Lord Voldemort?”

A low chuckle started.  The voice was slightly distorted, but a few people could swear that they recognized it.  Unlike Voldemort’s sibilant tones that bore a slight hiss, this voice was blocky and smooth.  It sounded like a London accent, but the accent of the working class as opposed to something posh.

“That would be me,” the figure stepped forward, “I suppose you could call me your usurper.  I am Lord Chronos.  Dark Lord, in case that wasn’t clear; not that there’s been a true Grey or Light Lord in actual centuries.  Oh, perhaps…”

“My lord,” a posh sounding woman said in exasperation, “we can determine the next future later.”

He coughed delicately.  “Yes, Nyx, sorry.  Where was I?”

Voldemort didn’t wait for this pretender to regain his train of thought, sending a flash of green his way.  The man, who’s features were indistinct, held up his black gloved hand and the green flash froze solid, making everyone gasp.  He chuckled again and very slowly moved his hand so the blast was pointing at the ground before it resumed its motion, slamming into the platform and leaving a black mark.  Lord Chronos brushed off his gold and black robes and sniffed.

He snapped his gloved fingers.  “That’s right!  Here.”

He threw something at Voldemort at a speed that didn’t make any sense for how gentle and careless the toss looked, and as soon as it impacted Voldemort vanished in a swirl.

Lord Chronos stretched, showing how skinny he truly was.  “Hourglass, what was the timer on that one?”

“A minute, my lord.”

“Hmm.  Krios?”

A man robed in black with embroidered golden constellations barked out a laugh.  “All Death Eaters that were here are locked down.  Knight and Gaea are having a blast showing Tethis the ropes.”

“Prometheus?”

All of the people who spoke at Lord Chronos’s call had gold detailing on their robes, though the colors and details themselves varied depending on the names.  This man was wearing navy blue.  “Mirrors are up and live to all major wizarding districts in the Isles.”

“Then let me bear my message,” Chronos said with great joy, “I am Lord Chronos, as stated, and it is high time I took the scene!  Worry not, I do not wish for death and violence as my foolish predecessor did.  Only those who repeatedly choose death and violence themselves will bear the mark of my displeasure.”

Someone pushed forward.  “Elijah Monroe of the Daily Prophet!  Does that mean you are claiming the deaths of Bellatrix Lestrange and Dolores Umbridge?”

He nodded.  “Yes, I-”

“My lord.”

On cue (of Hourglass, based on the designs on his robes), Voldemort popped back into existence, or, well, what was probably Voldemort.  People screamed and backed away from the mess, and after a few moments, Krios stepped forward and vanished what the former Dark Lord had become.

“Ah, yes,” Chronos coughed, “Voldemort is dead for good this time.  Nothing to tie him down, no extra backups.  We’ve gotten quite good at that, haven’t we?”

A woman with golden castles on her purple robes snorted.  “It’s all Moondial and Sundial, at this point.”

“Yes, Rook,” he said exasperatedly, “but it could have been us.  It was you and Queen that one time, wasn’t it?”

“A group effort, my lord.”

Chronos laughed quietly in the still and stunned air.  “Where was I?  Ah, yes, the symbols.  It’s a clock, obviously.  It reads oh two oh five.”

The reporter, emboldened, raised his hand again.  “Does that time have a particular meaning?”

Chronos hummed.  “I suppose it’s also about the witching hour, isn’t it?  Well, I don’t want to stop the children from going to school.  I assume you all can handle the incapacitated Death Eaters, since Krios, Knight, and Gaea practically took care of them for you?  Well.  We’ll be putting forth our new laws to your minister soon, so stay posted for that.  Ah, and the DA is more than happy to talk about the broadcasting that allowed this momentous occasion to be brought to everyone live.  Until next time!”

As one, the self named “DA” disappeared from the platform as if they were never there.  Not half a second later, Albus Dumbledore and several other teachers appeared on the platform, wands out.

“Oh dear,” the headmaster said wearily, “most distressing indeed.  Worry not, we are here to help.”

The aurors popped in a moment later and very quickly started rounding up the dazed Death Eaters.

“Students,” Albus said gravely once the Opening Feast had been cleared from the tables, “This morning on the platform a new Dark Lord has risen in the ashes of the old.  He fashions himself as ruler over all of the British Isle.  We must not allow him to take hold.   We lived in fear of Lord Voldemort for too long, and only through the noble sacrifice of the Potters was he first defeated.  Now, this man seeks to be a dictator over us all and has already murdered two women.  You will be safe within the walls of Hogwarts, but I must remind you that evil men flourish when good men do nothing.  If you hear or see anything related to this man, Chronos, please inform a staff member.”

With that solemn message, the prefects guided their new housemates to their common rooms.  He watched sadly as people whispered and craned their necks for glances at Harry, the poor boy, who was hunched over with his fellow Gryffindors.  Ron Weasley and Neville Longbottom were both beside him, excellent light choices of friend.

“Severus,” he called before the potion’s master could get too far, “a word.”

The young man raised a single eyebrow imperiously but waited.  Albus lingered until they were the only two still in the hall, and only then did he begin to walk.

“I’m afraid I have a dreadful task for you, my boy,” and oh how his heart broke for it, “but I must ask it of you all the same.”

“Get to the point, Albus,” the man rolled his eyes, “I have new snakes to terrify.”

Albus spared a moment to chuckle before it died.  “I must ask you to try to join the ranks of the DA.”

Severus stopped.  “Excuse me?’

Albus nodded.  “I assume it means something like… Dark Alliance.  I must ask you to infiltrate this newest Dark Lord’s circle so that we might have the upper hand.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Please,” he begged, “for Harry.  For Lily’s son!  Surely this Lord Chronos will target the only known individuals to vanquish his predecessors!”

“Which also includes you, if you recall.”

“I am a fully grown wizard who has lived a long life.  Harry is not such an individual.”

Severus sneered.

“You swore to protect him.”

The man scoffed.  “Fine.  I will attempt to join their ranks.  I make no promises, however, as no one has seen them.”

“That is all I can ask,” Albus relaxed minutely.  He had to know what was going on in the enemies’ minds so that he could resurrect the old Order of the Phoenix and take them out.  The British Isles would not suffer another Dark Lord while he remained alive.

Pomona was absolutely delighted by the new first years.  It was unusual to get more than two or three people who truly had a passion for herbology.  Oh, sure, some people put a lot of effort into her class, notably her badgers and her ravens, but it was rare that there weren’t some people who didn’t like the class and made no effort to hide it.  Girls who hated getting dirty, boys who hated being confined to the greenhouse, and people in general who just didn’t see the point in the manual labor when there were spells for that.  But this new crop of first years, oh how they relaxed in her class.  They relished the opportunity to stick their hands in the dirt and take care of plants!  And there was a significant portion of the class that seemed to really enjoy the lessons, and a few prodigies.  Neville Longbottom and Daphne Greengrass, a lion and a snake, were two of her best students, leading their classmates and needing no instruction.  They even came in during free periods to talk with her more and look at some of her more volatile plants!  Also surprising, Lavender Brown and Gregory Goyle.  They were more oriented in the nature of the magic of the plants as opposed to their potion or topical effects, and she had seen them once comparing notes.  Another surprising combination!

Then again, she mused, the house rivalries were quite subdued this year.

It was wonderful, she thought at breakfast, to watch as students sat at any table they wished, doing homework together and spreading joy!  While the older years stuck to their own colors, the first years had truly come together in a few short weeks as a unified group.  No amount of prompting from older years or threatening, in some cases, could make them separate.  Any bullying attempts were either subtle enough that none of the staff had seen them, or completely avoided.  They were all unified and no first year had been sent to the hospital wing yet.  Personally, Pomona thought it was a happy consequence of the rise of the new Dark Lord.

She wasn’t fond of another tyrant, of course, but since he hadn’t done much other than depose his predecessor violently (and inadvertently protecting the students, she noted) and kill two odious women, she was postponing judgement.  If he faded into the background, which she doubted, she would be more than content.  As it was, the first years had banded together, and she believed it was in part because their first glimpse of Hogwarts had been one Dark Lord violently killing another.  It seemed like it had rallied them together, letting them cross house boundaries as other years hadn’t had the chance to.  United in adversity before they could be split apart.  It was lovely!

Yes, Pomona Sprout loved all of her students, but she couldn’t help but feel this year of students would hold a special place in her heart, and hold all her hope for the future.

And if this Lord Chronos came knocking to threaten her students?

Well, badgers were known to be quite vicious.

A bang went off down the hallway and she eyed Fred and George, sitting innocently at the Gryffindor table.  They smiled back at her (and more likely, Minerva who was sitting next to her) like butter wouldn’t melt in their mouths, and she couldn’t help but chuckle.

Every year had its spots of color, after all.

Albus knocked on the door to Severus’ office and it swung open on utterly silent hinges.  The man the room belonged to was standing like a gargoyle over the pensieve, frozen solid with an inscrutable expression.  His knuckles were white, and Albus’ heart went out to the man.  He knew what he had asked him to do when he’d asked it, but seeing the results of Severus’ return from swearing to another Dark Lord momentarily made him question if it was worth it.  He swiftly buried that thought.  It had to be, for the greater good.

Albus indicated the pensieve.  “Shall we?”

Severus’ eyes flicked up to search his face, pools of darkness that revealed nothing.  “Yes,” his voice was smooth and soft, holding no emotion, “let’s.”

He dove in first, allowing Severus that moment of privacy as he oriented himself in the memory.  It was an expansive chamber, with no windows.  There was very little light, and it was most easily seen in a deep pool of still water that lined one of the great walls.  It wasn’t murky, but it was so dark it seemed black, and Albus dreaded what could be lurking inside.  He noted an empty pedestal with shards of stone still clinging to the base.  A statue of some sort that had been removed?  Pillars supported the expansive chamber with carvings of vines and snakes.  Perhaps this most recent dark lord was a Slytherin, like Tom was.

Severus appeared beside him and indicated to the door where a stream of robed individuals entered.  The door was a great round thing that swung open on old hinges, temporarily revealing a long corridor, lit by blue fire, reminding him most certainly of the color of bluebell flowers.  He recognized a few of the robes as one that was deep blue with golden crowns flicked their (her?) wand and more of the flames illuminated the cavern, bringing the detailing into sharp relief.  The individuals spread across the cavern, until the man calling himself Lord Chronos strode forward with confidence, taking a step to perch on the ruins of whatever statue had been there, no doubt a desecration of whatever space this might be.  The lighting was eerie, shimming off of the golden thread every individual had on their robes and making it all seem white with the color difference.

The current Severus stepped up beside him. “I am there.”

Albus turned to see the person indicated and sucked in a breath.  They had determined that the DA was divided into four groupings, one based off of Greek deities, mostly titans, one based on implements of time, like the individual known as Hourglass, one group based off of chess pieces, and a final group that was centered around poisonous flowers.  It seemed as if Severus was joining the group of flowers, as his deep black robe was embroidered with golden lilies.

He shook with rage.  How dare they?  How dare they use that part of Severus’ past against him?

“Asphodel,” Chronos said, and Albus still could not place the man’s voice; it must be masked, he assumed, in a way that prevented recognition.  If Severus had not pointed himself out, the figure now stepping forward, he wouldn’t have been able to match the black hair, even.  Their faces weren’t covered, but their features still slipped from his mind as soon as he wasn’t actively looking at them.

Severus, Asphodel, named for the lilies of the underworld, stepped forward and bowed his head.  It was a shallow bow, but thankfully Chronos didn’t seem to notice.

“You’ve recently joined our number,” Chronos seemed amused by this, “but already you’ve proven helpful.”

“I thank you, my lord.”

“I do want more focus on the poison though.  Foxglove is getting testy again.”

“How rude,” a voice called cheerfully from another place in the room as others tittered in amusement, “you can’t even blame me, when Nightshade and Bella are the ones making horrible abominations that get me all excited!  But Gaea, dear, it is truly a delight to work with you.”

“Oh, a charmer, just like your mother.”

“I live to please.”

Several people audibly snorted.

Chronos waved his hand.  “Fine, fine, you all can reconvene after the meeting to compare notes again.  You’re close to getting it anyway.”

Severus bowed.  “It shall be done.”

“Now,” Chronos clapped his hands, “next order of business, we’re banning eggs.”

Everyone paused.

The individual in red robes with crowns pinched the bridge of his nose.  “For the love of the gods, where is Ananke?”

Someone pushed through the crowd and stepped on the dais beside Chronos.  They were the only individual who had silver thread instead of gold on a robe that otherwise matched Chronos.  Their features slipped from Albus’ mind just like everyone else's.

“Darling,” they said gently, “why are you trying to ban eggs.”

It was said as a flat statement as opposed to a question, and Chronos looked at Ananke (and if Albus knew his Greek mythology, that implied Chronos was named after the primordial, not the titan, and this was his lady love) with a blank expression.

“Simple,” he said firmly, “I went to make a cake and the egg was rotten, which ruined the entire batch.  It was a huge waste!  And I didn’t get to give you a cake!”

Ananke frowned.  “So you’re banning eggs?  Across the entire country?  Because you didn't check to see if your eggs were rotten before trying to make cake?  Where did you even get the eggs?”

“I, ah, I went to the cottage?”

“…You mean the cottage we haven’t been to in years?”

“…Oh shit.”

Ananke sighed again, wrapping an arm around Chronos’ waist.  “So we’re not banning eggs.”

“I suppose.”

“Think of all the pastry you’d never be able to make or eat without eggs.  And what would farmers do?  Slaughter all their chickens?”

“No, I assumed they would have to destroy their eggs or turn them over to be destroyed.”

Hourglass stepped up and loomed dangerously.  “As in, turn them over to one of us?”

Chronos looked taken aback.  “If I say no will you believe me?”

Hourglass took a moment to look menacing for another moment before stepping back.  “As long as we’re on the same page that your mandates shouldn’t make more scheduling conflicts.”

“Krios,” Chronos stage-whispered, “help me!”

The man wearing constellations snorted.  “Not on your life.  Hourglass could make my life a scheduling nightmare.  Not sure what Mnemosyne sees in him.”

“Jokes on you,” someone called, “I’m into that!”

Ananke coughed lightly.  “If we could pretend to act our age for a moment?”

They drew out of the memory as it ended and Severus shook himself off like he was removing something distasteful.  Albus mourned for him.  “The rest of the memory is childish and pointless bickering.  We disbanded shortly after.”

Albus nodded.  He assumed it was a disarming tactic to make Severus feel more comfortable and open to giving up secrets or endearing them to him.

“And the meeting among the flowers?”

“We ran out of time and they decided on a letter correspondence.  It’s written on occlumency paper, meaning it appears blank in a memory, and is keyed to the signature of the intended recipient.  I could explain to you the technical aspects if you so desired,” Severus raised an eyebrow.

Albus sighed.  “No, but may I ask what the poison is for?”

He huffed.  “Belladonna and Nightshade are botanists.  They grow rare and new plants that they have created and often test what the effects of said plants are.  Most of the poison is relatively non lethal, but with debilitating or embarrassing effects that Foxglove delights in testing.  On what, I know not, but I fear…”

Albus sighed.  “Most worrisome indeed.  And their identities are all hidden?”

“It is clear that they are, in general, aware of who their fellows are.  At the very least, they have all been working together for years, since they were possibly children, as there is a camaraderie and copious amount of inside jokes that do not spawn from, shall we say, work relationships.  However, the robes have enchantments on them that prevent you from recognizing anything about them aside from a perceived gender, as you might have seen, and even that is not guaranteed to be correct.  No amount of occlumency can get around the enchantments.”

“Perhaps they already knew of it,” he sighed, “it is a dark art, after all.”

Severus pursed his lips.  “Indeed.”

“My boy,” Albus said softly, “their name for you is cruel, and I am sorry you have to bear it.”

Severus merely stared him down, inscrutable, until he left, saddened by the steps they had to take to prevent the tyranny of this new Dark Lord.

(As such, he didn’t see the inaudible snort Severus gave as soon as he turned away.)

A hand reached out from behind a tapestry and pulled Harry in.  Ron and Hermione immediately stormed after him, wands raised with a spell glowing at the tips, but Ron just sighed and slipped it away.

“Gred.  Forge.  Why are you kidnapping Harry?”

Harry himself looked completely nonplussed, of course, looking up at the two twins guilelessly.  “I mean, it’s fine.”

Ron gave him a look that clearly said, “you’re supposed to be in charge, get your shit together,” before raising an eyebrow at his brothers.  “Well?”

Fred chuckled and waved his hand with a flourish.  “Well, you see, Ronniekins-”

“-we’re quite good at what we do-”

“-so much that we never get caught, no sir-”

“-of course not, we’re too slick-”

“-too practiced-”

“-too clever-”

“-and handsome, don’t forget handsome-”

“-but our pranks wouldn’t be possible without our pride and joy-

“-our magnum opus-”

“-wish we could take credit-”

“-alas, it’s a bit beyond us right now-”

(The three of them exchanged a look that stated, “oh shit.”)

“-but imagine our surprise-”

“-when our beloved tool of terror-”

“-our magnificent perpetrator of pranks-”

“-our glorious map of mischief-”

(And here came the audible “oh shit.”)

“-revealed something like…”

“Yes, something like…”

They flipped the map around, letting the three of them see it, and said together, “Lord Chronos himself?”

They waited in anticipatory silence before Harry coughed lightly. “Fuck.”

Hermione pinched the bridge of her nose.  “How in the nine hells did we forget about the Marauder’s Map?”

“Well,” Ron said dryly, “for one, why does the Map show our DA names?  Oh look, there’s Michael.”

Fred made a noise of intrigue.  “Mnemosyne?  He has a good memory then?”

Harry peered at it.  “Oi, is he using his shift to go flirt with Ernie?  Ew, I didn’t need to know that!  Why is Ernie letting him, that’s a clear violation of the schedule!”

Hermione rolled her eyes.  “Harry, focus.  Fred and George could tell someone.”

Ron snorted darkly.  “They won’t.  First, who would believe them?  Second, if they were an issue, I guarantee that they’re already on the schedule.  If they want to be the first statues, they’re welcome to try and blab, but they’re smarter than that.”

George frowned.  “Thanks, I think.  Yeah, that’s not where we were going with this.  I guess we wanted to know… why?”

“And,” Fred said, uncharacteristically serious, “if talks go well, if you’re accepting members.  The robes look wicked, by the way.”

Hermione and Ron waited watchfully as Harry pondered before shrugging.  “Sure.  I think you guys are swell, so I guess we can tell you.  Do you want the short answer or the long answer?”

The twins looked at each other and had a silent conversation before Fred grinned. “Short answer,” he said, “just to see how you can uncomplicate it.”

“He means complicate it more,” George said helpfully.

Harry snickered.  “Right.  Our year is stuck in a time loop, we’re still not broken out, but we’re on our way, so we’re using this to learn all of the other side of magic and test public reactions to things with no real consequences.  We have additional people who’ve joined the runs, so to speak, through an invention many loops ago.  This is technically our sixth time being eleven.”

The twins whistled and George hummed.  “So are you going to become genocidal maniacs?”

Harry looked affronted.  “We’ve only killed two people!  And it’s probably going to stay that way, I don’t think I hate anyone as much as we hated those two.”

“Three,” Hermione coughed, “but he’s a bit of a gimme every time.”

Harry blinked.  “What, Tom?”

“Yes Harry, he’s still a person.”

“I mean, I guess so?”

“Regardless,” Ron cut in, “we’re going to need you to give an oath that says you won’t show anyone else the map.  Arguably, you should get one of our maps instead, let Harry or Padfoot keep that one.”

Hermione wrinkled her nose past their gasp.  “Selene should keep it, more like.  I don’t trust Krios.”

Fred and George opened and closed their mouths.  “Hang on,” George said slowly, “Selene, goddess of the moon?”

“Yeah, Moony,” Harry confirmed, “why?”

They spun around and had a furious whispered conference before they turned back with large smiles on their faces.  “Right,” Fred said cheerfully, “we’ll swear an oath, no big deal, but we have some conditions of our own.  One, we meet the Marauders.  Two, we obtain a replacement map, that I assume does largely the same thing as this one.  Three, you take us on provisionally as part of your experimental teams.”

“Yeah,” George smirked, “if all the DA’s stuff was invented by you all, I want to see what we can do, what pranks we can make.”

Harry pondered for a moment before shrugging.  “Sure, why not?  You’ll need to talk to Themis for the oath, and we can go from there.  Our maps are locked to your magical signature, so anyone not in the loop, and yes that was a pun, can’t see anything on it.  Look, here, I’ll show you.”

He pulled out his own copy of the Time Map and tapped his wand to the “Hogwarts” option, letting the castle spiral from ink in his view.  He noted that most people were in the Great Hall; it was lunch time, wasn’t it?  No one was around other than them, which was nice.  No potential witnesses they needed to get rid of.

“You can’t see anything,” he said idly as he drew a question mark and started writing, “right?”

He let them cast reveal spells on it as he waited for the message to come back before dismissing the map.

“Cool, she’s on her way.  You do technically have to swear to me, but it’s not like we have a cool tattoo or anything like the other guys did.”

“Boo,” Fred laughed, “maybe I wanted to be cool!”

“It would probably just be the symbol,” Ron grumbled, “since that’s what we’re going with for everything else.”

George snapped his fingers.  “That’s right, what’s up with two oh five?”

“It’s a date.”

They blinked, processing that.  “May second?”

They all frowned silently, but Susan appeared in the tapestry before they had to respond.  She looked at the twins with a critical eye before slowly smirking.

“Oh,” she laughed, “I’m sure Prometheus and the gang will be delighted to get the Weasley twins on board.  Should I even ask?”

“Marauder’s Map registered our DA names.  They probably watched us switch.”

She blinked.  “I suppose that would do it, yes.  My Lord, terms?”

There was a brush of fabric as the person outside the tapestry walked away.

The Great Hall was abuzz as the students all read over the Daily Prophet.  Filius sipped his tea, watching the students.  He’d already read the article, of course, and had kept himself abreast of the laws that a terrified Minister Fudge had displayed to the floor, supposedly crafted by Themis, the titaness of justice, law, and order.  It was clear to anyone with a brain that these laws were a result of the DA making good on Chronos’ promise to start sending in laws that they wanted passed.  Since the fiasco on the platform, there had largely been a lack of presence from the Dark Alliance, as they were being titled.  However, yesterday had seen people loudly and vocally declaring that a various number of the laws (creature laws, mostly, that were to the benefit of house elves, goblins, and werewolves) were terrible and would tear the country apart, setting them up for failure and ridicule.  Some protested about tradition, others about that they were simply being threatened into this, and others still were opposed simply because the people proposing them were dark by their own admission.  It was startling to Filius that some of the individuals on the light side, even, were against laws they otherwise claim they would have voted for simply because a Dark Lord wanted them.  Then, those people had all not turned up to work the next day, and a short investigation showed them alive, but frozen still.

Temporal magic, Filius had found, was finicky by its very nature.  Whatever new spell or charm had been cast on all who opposed the Dark Lord’s chosen laws, it wasn’t one anyone had ever seen.  As far as anyone could tell, they were still alive, and they didn’t need to eat.  Everything about them save for their minds were frozen in time, and nothing anyone had done could break them out of it.  According to rumors, all of the new time statues had frozen at precisely 2:05 in the morning, just like the symbol of the DA and their lord.

No one knew how to break out of the charm, either, and several cursebreakers had already backed out of trying to break the Curse of Chronos, as they were calling it.

He hummed and watched the students while he mused.  In all likelihood, the laws would find little to no opposition now.  Even the people who hadn’t voiced their opposition would likely fall in line in fear of getting cursed as well, because no one knew how it was done.  There was no evidence that homes had been broken into , no evidence that they had interacted with a shady individual, nothing.  No one knew quite how it had happened, and that by itself was terrifying enough.

Albus stood up to give a speech about the dangers of the dark and not giving in to fear, and Filius privately rolled his eyes.  No amount of bravery could stop the curse, he had no doubt.

Also, he might be a wizard, but he was a goblin first, and some of those laws had been quite favorable to his nation.

He’d have to see more about this Dark Alliance, but for now, he was cautiously intrigued.

The halloween feast was glorious, thought Cedric Diggory, as wonderful as it always was.  He looked down the table where the first years (and only the Hufflepuff ones, which was always strange since he’d gotten quite used to having an eclectic assortment of firsties) were all celebratory smiles.

Professor Dumbledore gave a classic speech about finding joy even in dark times, and about how winter always passed to give way to spring and new life, and he couldn’t help but beam.  Sure, his dad was currently a frozen statue, but his mum was fine and was actually glad for the time she could put the house in order.  He’d been disquieted at first, but he’d read over the laws and found them very reasonable himself.  Plus, it wasn’t like Amos Diggory was dead, he was just taking a bit of a break for being a bit of a bigot.  Personally, Cedric was just glad that You-Know-Who was gone, and for good.  It’d been pretty scary to think he was back, but then he was just as suddenly gone again.  Cedric was only fourteen by a month, after all!  He didn’t remember being at war, but he never wanted to either.

Hopefully, Lord Chronos wouldn’t decide to go back on his whole “no killing (much)” thing, because Cedric wanted to actually get through school, thanks.

They went to bed, crashing from the sugar rush, and he snuggled into his duvet and quilt.  The common room was so cozy, it felt like nothing could hurt him here.

When the headmaster didn’t show up to breakfast, people were confused.

When he didn’t show up to lunch, people were concerned.

When Professor McGonagall stood in front of the school at dinner and announced that Professor Dumbledore had been struck with the Curse of Chronos, people freaked out in an uproar.

Cedric swallowed.  He knew that the headmaster had been vocally opposed to the Dark Lord Chronos since the very beginning, but it was hard to think that Albus Dumbledore, the greatest wizard of this century, whom even You-Know-Who hadn’t dared cross, had also fallen to the new dark lord.  He had no doubt that when the greater wizarding world heard of this, everyone would fall in line.  No one would be so foolish as to oppose someone who could successfully curse the great Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore.

Why did it seem so much more real, now?

SOME CURSES OF CHRONOS BROKEN - DELIBERATE OR SIGN OF WEAKNESS?

By Elijah Monroe for the Daily Prophet

Ladies and gentlewizards, we here at the Daily Prophet have been eagerly following news of the Dark Lord Chronos, self declared back on September first, and his various exploits.  About two months ago, at Halloween, Albus Dumbledore himself fell to the Curse of Chronos, becoming the latest and most widely known victim of the Dark Alliance for opposing their rule.  Other notable victims include a solid third of the Wizengamot, like Amos Diggory, Daedulus Diggle, Gabriel Ogden, and Angela Selwyn.

But, today, something has happened that is either miraculous or a warning.

The first victims of the curse have fallen out of their statue-like state and back into life!  Lady Selwyn reveals her experience to the Daily Prophet:

“It was terrible,” she said shakily, “I was left alone with my thoughts.  I did not hunger or thirst, or tire, but I could see and hear and not move.  All I could do was think, for months.”

And think she did.  She, like most of the victims released from the curse, now confess that they really think the laws were well written, but some sources wonder if this is said out of fear.

A mediwizard who wishes to remain anonymous said, “The issue with punishing people for disagreeing with you, is that if they then turn around and agree with you, it might mean they agree with you less than not wanting to be punished again.  While Lady Selwyn was not the most vocally opposed of the victims, revived or otherwise, her abrupt about face reeks of fear and disingenuousness.  If we allow the threat of punishment, nay, torture, to sway our beliefs, are we really agreeing with those laws of a tyrant?”

It’s an interesting thought to consider.  While Lady Selwyn did seem genuinely in agreement with the laws that passed in her absence, there was an undercurrent of fear in her.  Our mediwizard source has it right; while the time statues want for nothing, being trapped in your own mind for any period of time, let alone months, can be classified as torture.  We await an official ruling from the International Confederation of Wixen on whether this technically counts as torture and, possibly, a warcrime.

For now, based on the message released on the new Wizard Network (mirrors with the projections can be found in all major wizarding districts, inns, pubs, and taverns, often showing off Quidditch games both local and international, see more on page 3) by the dark lord, this was a test, to allow the victims to “choose the right” and vote.  The next series of laws are going up for a vote soon, a set of laws dedicated to expansive discrimination laws with a focus on werewolves, to compound with the “right to safety” laws passed back in September.

Will more members of the Wizengamot be turned into time statues?  Or will the wizarding world cave to the demands of a seemingly very progressive dark lord?

Stay tuned,

Elijah Monroe

Pandora stirred her tea with a sigh.  The sunroom was warm, which was in direct opposition with the snow that covered the grounds of Longbottom Manor.

“So,” Remus said lightly, “the, ah, children will be back next week.”

Alice snorted.  “As if they haven’t been sneaking out all term.  I saw Daphne in the special greenhouse just two days ago.  We chatted about hydraingeas.”

Frank made a noise.  “That’s the vampiric flower bush, isn’t it?”

His wife smiled softly at him.  “It is dear, yes.”

Pandora hummed.  “They’re still waiting for after the loop, yes?”

Frank snorted.  “For all that counts.  They want to both be eighteen when they get married, so even if Daphne gets to it in the last February, Neville hasn’t quite made it yet.  Not that they don’t act more like a married couple than we do, sometimes.”

Alice sighed into her tea.  “I can’t wait to put those wedding plans to use.  We finalized them last time, of course, but occasionally in our letters we’ll tweak them ever so slightly.  They’ll be just gorgeous, I know it.”

Remus smiled.  “All the weddings so far have been.  The amount of them waiting until after the break surprise me, however.  I would assume most of them would be like Harry and Draco, getting married every time they want to just so they can have their “big day” more than once.”

Pandora snorted.  “You and I both know that's specifically because Narcissa demands she can plan it every time she finds them practically in each other’s pockets.  What truly astounds me is that even though they’ve gotten married twice already, she’s managed to plan different weddings both times even without knowledge that it was a second wedding.”

Alice sniffed.  “Spring weddings and winter weddings are completely different, I’m with Cissa on this one.”

“Huh,” Remus cocked his head, “why did we never add her to the loops?  I’m sure Severus would have appreciated it.”

“We don’t want Lucy,” Frank wrinkled his nose, “and her one flaw is loving that man.”

“Amen,” Pandora muttered, “what a woman.”

“How’s Xeno,” Remus said, relaxing further into his chair, “still good?”

“Oh yes,” she sighed wistfully, “he’s doing wonderfully.  Luna has decided that she’s going to use her time before Hogwarts to find all the animals they talk about.  Apparently, she’s been talking with… Millicent Bulstrode, I believe?  And I’m almost certain that she’s going to use her “shifts” to do the same.  She’s already passed all of her classes last time, apparently, so her grades shouldn’t suffer for it.”

They drank tea and ate biscuits and pastries in calm silence for a moment before Remus hummed.

“Apparently, the technomancy team is ready for Christmas as well,” his face was mischievous, “and I dare say they exceeded Sirius and I in our youths.”

As if summoned, a great black dog bounded into the sun room and shook snow off on all of them.  There were great protests and wands whipped out, but the canine dodged all the spells before turning back into a man.

“Come on,” he said joyfully, “snowball fight!  Before the kids get here and trounce us with all the crazy shit they’ve learned!”

“We were there for half the shit they learned,” Frank complained, “and can someone please remind me again why we didn’t add Narcissa?  I want the more respectable Black!”

Everyone else made murmurs of agreement while Remus sneakily flicked his wand.  Sirius yelped when a mass of conjured snow fell on him.

“Right,” the werewolf declared, “this means war, outside, now.”

It took the other three little convincing to follow the two Marauders out, bundling up in spells and clothing to absolutely obliterate the purity of the picturesque landscape of the Longbottom main lawn.

(They were only barely older, mentally, than their children, after all, and everyone could do with some joy…

And cutthroat competition, of course.)

HOLIDAY CHEER AND TECHNOMANCY NEAR

By Elijah Monroe for the Daily Prophet

Fire Tech, the company behind the Wizard Network (now with channels so you can choose what to watch!) has released a long line of gizmos and gadgets in time for the holidays, for any Christmas or Yule gifts you might desire!  Named after Prometheus, this company has professed their desire to master technomancy.  Spokesperson Koios said, “the idea that magic and technology cannot exist has been a longstanding one, since pop up wizards [which is the american term for muggleborns] would come to major magical centers like Hogwarts or Diagon and things would stop working.  We here at Fire Tech seek to disprove that theory - and I think that so far, we’re succeeding.”

Indeed, Koios, named for the titan of resolve and intelligence, might have undersold them.  Featured in their current release is a Walkman, or a portable device that plays music through wires you place in your ears, a series of tapes you can purchase to go in the Walkman that include both wizarding music and muggle music; a computer, which for now functions as a much smaller library, with books and references stored on it that you can search up, including getting specific passages based on keywords instead of having to search entire books; and a gaming system called the Firebox, where you can hook it up to the same mirrors that display the Wizard Network (also available for purchase under the name “wizivisions”) and play a variety of games (see page 4 for the reviews so far).

These new technomagic tools are available for purchase in Diagon Alley and Hogsmeade at the storefronts for Fire Tech, and people are already eager to see what comes next.

Others, however, see this as a plot.  Daedalus Diggle, who most people are concerned is about to become a statue again (see the polls subscribers took last week on page 7, where we discuss the public’s thoughts and fears on the Dark Alliance and their lord), said, “Clearly the reason technomancy never has been solved is because it uses dark magic, and anyone who brings that devilry into their homes will be corrupting their children!  Dumbledore would advise the same, you know!”

Regardless of his thought, however, it seems like people who can purchase the very reasonably priced goods are doing so, as Fire Tech has seen record sales.  Salome Thomas, had this to say: “We love sports in this house.  We have our own television, the muggle inspiration for the wizivision, I think, and we watch the footie games every week.  Being able to show my husband the Quidditch games means I might finally be able to convince him and our son that it’s the superior sport!”

Prometheus, when asked for a statement, said, “We’re working on both expanding our products and expanding our channels.  We highly encourage the newspapers and magazines to see about doing a news segment.  We’d be willing to work with people, so if you have an idea for a show people might want to see, reach out in one of our branches and we’ll expand the network if we like your idea.  Of course, you’ll have to swear to Lord Chronos, but he gives very good benefits.”

Well, perhaps my bosses will have to look into that.

Stay posted, and perhaps we’ll be seeing you on the wizivision!

Elijah Monroe

Unspeakable Chrome hummed, thumbing through the papers on his desk.  He was also, of course, still at school as of this very moment, but, well, he wasn’t in charge of the Time Department for nothing.

He took the letter from the Minister asking for a cure for the Curse of Chronos and snorted, setting it on fire.

“As if,” he muttered to himself, “the ‘Dials were much too careful on that one.  I’d need another decade to even figure out the runes used.”

He immediately knocked on wood and viciously scowled.  “That was not an invitation,” he said irritably at the void.  He wasn’t certain there was a higher power, but he knew better than to tempt fate.

He checked over the time turner usage reports and hummed in consternation.  If he didn’t already know that they’d invented a charm that paused physical aging (an offshoot of the curse, in fact) then he’d be more concerned at the years they were adding to their already extensive times.  He had the exact numbers, of course, having marked them at one point or another and connected them to a spreadsheet he’d set up.  Honestly, it was only watching the timers freeze that he’d realized they’d manage to figure out how to stop time.  He wondered at the side effects and resolved to draft a letter.  Worst case, they’d tell him nothing.  Best case, he’d figure out if they’d accidentally invented immortality.  He wouldn’t put it past them, to be honest.

A little glowing hummingbird landed on the edge of his desk and he sighed, but gave the little thing a stroke down the breast with the back of his finger.  He stood and stretched, letting the bird dive into his chest again.  He flipped the hourglass on his desk, and the sands changed to go up the spout, pooling in a jagged pattern on the top.  Magnetic (and magic) sand made such interesting patterns.

“Back to school,” he muttered, “this can’t end fast enough.  I’ll have to send Mother another letter…”

Dernovich (and no he wasn't about to tell anyone his full name) looked over the horde of brats and sneered.  None of them held a candle to his two demons.  None of them would even come close, and he was disappointed in his countrymen and associates.  The only reason he was here was because of his demons, but to be fair, they never failed to send him a puzzle to solve as soon as he was getting bored.

“Listen up,” he barked, “if I could kill the people who failed this class, I would, but unfortunately that’s illegal.  So instead, I will make you drop out if you have no talent.  You’re here to be ritual masters, or you’re not here at all.  This isn’t England where rituals are illegal, so you have no excuse to be anything less.  All of you passed your Runes and Arithmancy OWLs or you wouldn’t be here.  Questions?  No?  Good.”

He ignored the raised hands and scared looks and grinned, showing each and every one of his yellowed, pointed teeth.

“Lesson one.  If you mind your own business away from people, but still have a reputation, then demons will come for you and imprison you in your own home while they steal all of your secrets.  By the time you get out, you won’t mind.  Write this down, by the way, it’s going to be on your test.  Now, the important thing to note about demons is…”

Said demons, of course, stepped up at the next meeting.

“Moondial, Sundial,” Chronos inclined his head, “what’ve you got?”

Theo, also known as Moondial, stepped up with a smirk.  “We’ve figured it out, we think.  We’re one piece away from breaking the loops completely.  Not sure what that piece is, but we’re quite close.”

“You won’t be able to fix it,” a soft voice called.

The crowd parted to reveal a figure in the lightest robe they had, but still a rich cobalt blue.  The gold embroidery was snakes and leaves and circles and eyes.

“Phoebe,” the dark lord intoned, “what do you know?”

Even as an “adult” since they all intentionally aged up when they were meeting, she was small, smaller than most of them, and waif thin.  She looked ephemeral.

“We can get close,” she said sadly, “we can take everything with us every time, we could even make the whole world remember if we wished to, trapping us in these seven and a half years together and letting the entire community try, but there is only one thing that can stop this from occurring again.  I don’t know what, yet.  We’ll know by the end of this one, though.”

Lord Chronos slowly nodded his head.  “So next is the last?  We’ll make it to eighteen?”

Luna beamed.  “Of course!”

He relaxed from where her words had previously made him tense.  “Alright.  Then let's test everything, yeah?”

They all cheered and he grinned.

“One year done,” he yelled, “let’s get the rest!”

SPELLS AND ENCHANTMENTS AND POTIONS, OH MY!

By Rita Skeeter for the Daily Prophet

Everyone is having a sensational time across the globe as a wizard from Britain publishes a large set of spells, enchantments, and yes, even potions to wow the world!  Under the name Roonil Wazlib, twenty two new spells, seventeen innovative enchantments, and a whopping thirty five potent potions have been published in their respective journals.  This is astounding for multiple reasons!  First, most inventors specialize in one discipline.  Second, most masters only publish two or three new pieces of magic in their careers, with the previous record being held at eleven spells by Heracles Black in 1472, spells widely still used today such as the Vanishing Charm and the Sonorous spell.  The fact that Roonil Wazlib has published across disciplines and with such prolificarity shows that Britain indeed remains one of the best wizarding countries in the world and shows that Hogwarts indeed is the best wizarding school!

But some people are calling into question whether this was really all done by one person.

“We checked the records,” Minister Fudge declared solemnly, “and no such wizard exists in all of Britain!”

Well, if our good minister doesn’t know the legend, surely that means it’s a pseudonym?

Selina Travers, well known spell crafter responsible for the book “Cleaning Charms from Apartment to Manor” that includes three of her own invented charms, states through jealous tears that, “it’s highly likely that Roonil Wazlib is not only a pseudonym, but a pseud for multiple different people.  It simply isn’t possible to invent that much unless this is being posted after someone’s death according to their will, and even that’s suspect for the wide range of disciplines.”

Others say that since several of the enchantments, spells, and potions seem to come in groups (the environmental protective set, for example, with magic designed to protect people and things from the hazards of air, water, pressure, and more), they must be the work of the same individual, who simply tweaked things until they classified as “new.”  Others still say that “despite the wixen allergy to letting other people take credit, not everyone is like that, so maybe it’s a research team that wanted something specific done, and they just published all their findings together.”

Some far out conspiracies say that Roonil Wazlib is a product of the Dark Alliance, and swear they will never use the spells, enchantments, or potions, because they might be dark magic!  The magic is all currently being checked over by the ICW to ensure it breaks no laws, but since it passed the publication inspection, most are already happily using the new magic to their advantage.  Finally, we can go to the bottom of the ocean, which some researchers are already preparing to do to search for the lost city of Atlantis.

As for me personally, I’m absolutely going to learn the spell that makes my hair change with a thought like a metamorphmagus.  Who’s with me, ladies?

Rita Skeeter, signing off for now!

Second year started off with a bang, and by that, they meant that Blaise had somehow managed to poison sixty odd people.

The hospital wing was flooded with individuals that Madam Pompfrey inevitably had to turn away; no one was really injured, but she didn’t know what to do about what was affecting them.  People looked like they had been pranked, for the most part, with effects like body parts rearranging themselves, hair lengthening and shortening rapidly, a prevailing sense of being on the verge of tears without being able to cry, and seven notable individuals were stuck doing the robot dance and speaking in a stuttering monotone.  No one was having a good time, but mostly the upper years who’d been the only ones affected for some reason.  No one below fifth year was suffering from these things, and Professor Burbage had the dubious honor of being the only teacher who was changed, with the hair curse.

The real bang, however, was that Dumbledore very suddenly came out of his paralysis and immediately swept into the Great Hall in a tizzy just in time for the second week of classes, the morning that people discovered the incurable poison that, in Professor Snape’s professional opinion, would just have to wear off on its own.

Of course, this set off a whole slew of questions: was the paralysis just a poison?  Did that mean there was an antidote?  Daedulus Diggle had been frozen again, after all, along with others who were opposing the centaur laws being passed to give them protected lands that no wixen could enter or develop.

About a month into term, the poisons wound down to the point that people largely didn’t notice them anymore.

Which, of course, is when Lockhart got the hair symptoms that he couldn’t fix.

He stormed out of the castle in tears, it had been said.

(That poisoning had been intentional, of course.  They had only decided to keep him around for a bit of lighthearted fun, but by October they were fairly tired of him, so it was time to get him gone.  Parvati would have fun setting the lawyers on him again.)

Luna, Lavender, and Greg had an excellent time interviewing all the new ghosts at Nick’s Death Day party.  When he was not allowed to join the Headless Hunt, Sue popped out of nowhere and asked if he wanted to be fully headless.  After some contemplation, he gleefully determined that no, in fact, he did not!  After all, there were whole hordes of ghosts who were completely headless, but only one nearly headless!  He was unique, special, and known throughout the ages!  Become fully headless, and he would lose most of his charm and fade into obscurity with the rest of the Hunt!  And if they got offended by that, well, it’s not like anyone knew their names.  Pimsy, as the leader, was reportedly only known because he’d outright introduced himself, but all of the living guests and most of the dead ones professed they really didn’t know most of the Headless Hunt.

Yes, Nearly-Headless Nick he would stay.

His death day party was a rousing success!

The school rejoiced when Remus Lupin was hired as the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher to replace Lockhart.  Not only was he competent, but he was also handsome behind the scars, and a solid two thirds of the Hogwarts population was swooning.  In addition, Severus Snape, who had calmed down a few years ago, calmed further.  Some students even claimed they’d seen the man smiling, but that was quickly refuted, because could you imagine?  Dungeon Bat Snape, smiling?  Couldn’t be him.  Must’ve been the Weasley twins making an illusion.

(If anyone had bothered to ask Severus, of course, it’s possible he might have mentioned something about sensible, trustworthy individuals, or perhaps “the brats will finally be kept in line” but that didn’t really make sense to anyone, because it wasn’t like… oh, well, pranks had been reduced in recent years, hadn’t they?  But wasn’t that before Lupin?  Huh…)

(The “in line” part was something no one would have seen unless they had somehow managed to make it into Lupin’s third year classes.  He’d asked the students why they seemed so relieved to have a sort of free study period, since he didn’t need to teach them.  After all, Severus was also in on their whole thing, was he not giving them a time and a place to study dark magic?  He knew far more than Remus did at any rate.

“The problem,” Lisa Turpin said with a sigh, “is that he knows we’re capable of brewing potions, or at least, he knows which of us aren’t, so it’s less a self study and more, Potions 2: Electric Boogaloo, Dark Edition.  At this point, most of us are at least passable, so he insists that he’s a potions professor, he’s going to teach potions.  I can name four people off the top of my head that hate the fact that they’re more competent at potions and are thus forced into this as well.  Not Harry, surprisingly, he still feels vindicated every time he demonstrates he is not, in fact, incompetent… yeah, Snape did a number on him and Nev that first run.”

Regardless, Ernie was ecstatic that they now had time on the regular schedule devoted to actual learning instead of bs-ing their way through Hogwarts once more.)

The door to the Great Hall banged open and everyone jumped as the man strode in, all confidence on his pegleg, eye swiveling in his socket.  For an amputee, his gait was smooth, which is how they knew it was the real one, despite this not having supposed to have happened.

Harry squinted up at the staff table.  Yep, Remus was still there, looking just as bewildered.

“Ah,” Dumbledore still sounded a little frazzled even if he hadn’t been turned back into a statue more than twice and just to keep him on his toes, “as I was saying, we are hosting the Triwizard Tournament.  In an effort to maintain security for the event with an active Dark Lord around, I have employed Alastor Moody, dedicated dark wizard catcher.  I assure you, you and everyone in this school will always be safe from the Dark Alliance.”

People clapped politely, but Albus looked as if he had just won an Order of Merlin, First Class.  Moody just grunted and took a stance by the staff door, eyeing everyone like they were the Dark Lord Chronos himself.

Not, of course, that Moody knew, Harry snorted.

Well, this was sure to be interesting.

They had planned the Triwizard Tournament themselves after all; what was the point of all this power over the government if you couldn’t spice things up?

Pansy flicked her fingers and immediately all her little spies spread out around their international neighbors.  Yes, they weren’t really going to recruit children yet (Fred and George didn’t count) but it would still be good to see what international sentiments were.  She met Lavender’s eyes across the room and they both smirked.  Her second in command for the gossip mill was at work.  Their spy network was thriving, especially because most of their spies didn’t even know they were spies.

But Nyx?  Oh, Nyx knew every secret whispered at night, and Hemera, she knew every tidbit spoken in the day.

What she really hoped to find out is why one of the Durmstrang teachers had pointed at Theo and Sue and called them demons.  Not that that was really shocking, she agreed, but more why a quarter of the Durmstrang student component had then paled and drawn back, pulling back their friends as they went.  There had to be a story there, and she wanted to find out what.

She plucked the paper butterfly out of the air and opened it up, before looking at the man with a critical eye.

Huh, that was that man they’d erm, “met” on their world run, wasn’t it?

She watched in amusement as the short and violent man dragged both Remus and Severus out of the room with a cackle.  Lavender sent her a thought, ‘going to get drunk with the “adults,” no doubt going to get the other four as well.’

Pansy laughed out loud and turned to Millie.  “Tell me, Millie, do you want to see our head snake drunk off his ass?”

Lavender sent her an annoyed/amused flutter back, but she waved it off as all of their Slytherins leaned forward in interest.  She waggled a finger.

“I’m the only one who might reasonably sneak a cam in and you all know it.”

They grumbled, and the Durmstrang students looked confused, but she just patted the nearest one on the arm.

“You were telling me about Fire Tech International?”

They beamed.  Apparently, their mother worked there, and they only had so many good things to say.

Ahh, Pansy loved her job.

The hall was completely dark, the candles extinguished, until the Goblet of Fire lived up to its name and flared.  Everyone leaned forward in anticipation before it changed colors and it spat up a piece of parchment that McGonagall (Dumbledore was in literal timeout again) plucked out of the air with grace.

“The Champion for Durmstrang is Viktor Krum.”

They barely had time to cheer and clap, or stomp their feet in unison in the case of his schoolmates, before it flared again.

“The Champion for Beauxbatons is Fleur Delacour.”

Some people burst into tears.

“The Champion for Hogwarts is Cedric Diggory.”

The Hufflepuff table erupted into cheers and the professor gave them a small smile.  “Champions, to the-”

Fire flared again.

She cleared her throat and read the paper.

“The… Champion for Eton is Theodore Nott.”

“NO,” Draco called, standing slightly, “I can’t have him beating me again!”

“Dray, you couldn’t compete anyway,” Daphne said in exasperation, “you know all the tasks.”

Theo stood up with a smug grin on his face and flipped Draco the finger as he walked to the Champion’s room.

“The Champion for Beechborough is Sally-Anne Perks.”

She stood, beaming.  “Oh good, I missed this the first time.”

“The Champion for Oxford Music Academy…?  Is Sue Li.”

Dernovich started cackling, which was a step louder than his mean snickers when Theo had been drawn.

“The Champion for the Lord Chronos School of Awesomeness is… Frederick Gideon Weasley I’m owling your mother.”

“HA,” the ginger fistpumped the air, “YES!  I TOLD YOU I COULD GET CHOSEN!”

The goblet went dark and the lights came back on as the four additional champions made their way into the antechamber the champions were gathering in.  The Hall was silent except for Dernovich, before it broke out into yelling.

Harry looked at Ron and Hermione.  “I mean.  Better than me competing.”

Fire Tech had a big presence as they all gathered in the Great Hall, lit by the bright dawn outside and warmed by the castle’s fireplaces.  Not only were Mnemosyne (head of wizivision) and Prometheus (as well as several regular employees) talking to the champions and casting spells on them, but Koios and Helios (and again several employees) were setting up the viewing screens, made much larger than the standard wizivisions.  They set up seven small screens that, as the spells came online, focused on one champion each, and then two large ones on either side of the Hall (so everyone could see) that cycled through them depending on what the algorithm of the spell considered “interesting.”  Most people were nursing coffee or tea as they picked at breakfasts, but Tournament officials nervously avoided the members of the DA and directed all questions to the regular employed people.  Elijah Monroe, the correspondent from the Daily Prophet, Xenophilius Lovegood, from the Quibbler, and Rita Skeeter from Witch Weekly, were all talking to as many people as they could and getting statements while they were projected onto their respective wizivision channels.  Two weeks ago, when it was announced that Fire Tech and the DA were sponsoring the tournament and letting everyone see it, they had scrambled to send people and set up the connection to their own news channels.  People outside of Hogwarts could look at any of the three channels for their take on the tournament, while there was an official channel that would strictly be projecting without commentary from any of the DA.  There would be commentary from Ludo Bagman, likely on all three channels, as he was technically a tournament official from the Ministry’s Department of Magical Games and Entertainment.  He had also saved himself from a few ill-timed bets by investing in Fire Tech initially, since the investment had paid off exponentially, so he wasn’t exactly unbiased, but, well, needs must.

There was the sound of a bell, a warning bell, and all of the Fire Tech people cleared out to the sides of the room as Sirius Black stepped forward.

“Welcome,” he said with a grin, “to the Septsorceror Soiree!  Yeah, there wasn’t really a good way to do this, but no one could have guessed that we would get more than three champions, would we?  Today is November 26th, and today, in five minutes, the first task begins!  Champions, you will be transported into the Black Forest that I have donated for use of this task, as it is currently not a centaur protected forest.  You will be on a property with sufficient wards, though I will tell you now, one full of danger, in flora, fauna, and potentially more.  You will not be able to leave the property unless you activate your special emergency portkey or the time runs out.  Until sundown, your goal is to gather small golden eggs hidden around the forest, with a secondary goal of, obviously, surviving.  Your job is to safely collect as many as possible and protect them.  It is possible you can run into each other, but it’s unlikely unless you go looking.  You can only take your wand with you.  Questions?”

Sally-Anne raised her hand.  “Are there protected creatures in the forest that we should avoid harming?”

Sirius thought for a moment.  “Not really.  Obviously, you will likely lose points if you’re overly cruel, but the majority of the beasts in there would kill you if given half a chance, so you’re fine to fight back.”

Viktor grunted.  “Do eggs break easily?”

“They’re more sturdy than a chicken egg, but treat them like ceramics.”

Cedric frowned.  “So we’re out for… nine hours?”

“Yes!”

Fleur smiled.  “And how would ze small children activate ze emergency portkey?”

Sirius smirked like he knew something she didn’t.  “All you have to say is, I want to return to Hogwarts without my eggs.”

Fred’s hand shot in the air.  “Mr. Padfoot sir!  Does this mean that if you use the portkey instead of waiting for the time limit, you essentially forfeit?”

Sirius shrugged, uncaring.  “Better than dying.  You have thirty seconds, champions.  Fight well.  Don’t die; I hear it’s bad for your health.”

They were very soon whisked away to different parts of a forest and people sat forward to watch eagerly, all of the screens showing them something different.

Tournament organizers lifted the eggs from the champions, settling them into marked crates and sealing them with a lock and a number, while mediwizards fluttering around the exhausted individuals.  Theo and Sue didn’t look winded at all, having individually made rituals that would just bring eggs to them without them having to budge.  They still had the third and fourth least eggs, to be fair, but they had done pretty well.  Fred, who patted out the fire the ashwinder he’d been running from had snagged him with, seemed pretty pleased with his third place finish.  Fleur looked the roughest, covered in mud from where she’d had to fight off the will-o-wisps and bog goblins, little pixie variants who loved hoarding shiny things.  She’d managed to get most of their hoard of eggs, but many had broken, putting her in sixth.  She was still ahead of Viktor, however, who’d had the majority of his eggs smashed at around two in the afternoon by a rampaging griffin and hadn’t quite managed to recover more than two dozen in the time remaining.  Setting nicely in second, Cedric looked ready for a bath and a bed, but he was beaming proudly.  His transfigurations had been genius, and he hadn’t broken a single egg.

Sally-Anne, in first, beamed at people, even as her housemate Hannah hugged her in glee.

“Chaos,” the girl whispered, not able to stop her giggling, “you might have shown off a bit too much.”

Sally-Anne snorted.  “I made sure to keep everything light and fourth or below.  I just got very creative…”

“I’ll say.  Go put Terry out of his misery, yeah?”

She laughed.

People reported on the Yule Ball, of course, especially with the champions and who they took, as well as some surprises (who knew that the Greengrass heiress and the Longbottom heir knew and liked each other?), but it largely passed uneventfully, except as a large and festive party.  There were no vast secrets revealed, even if everyone was still dying to know how the four extra champions had registered for other schools, three of them muggle and one made up (“new,” Fred claimed) let alone crossed the age line that had been verified by three experts.

“Oh, easy,” Sally-Anne had shrugged, “I’m actually like, forty something.”

The reporters had told her to keep her secrets, then.  

Percy Weasley, working for the Department of International Cooperation, had commented, “she must be referring to her eggs.  But she should know, there are spells that can track numbers like age, as long as you know how to tie them to something that can record it for you.  The ministry does it as well, in the Department of Birth and Death, to help them track certificates.  If a timer stops for too long, it gets marked as dead.”  No one particularly cared for his long winded explanation of it, but he was quite good at explaining what he had deemed a fascinating subject to those who wanted to listen.  He didn’t comment on his brother’s entrance to the tournament other than mentioning how he hoped his brother wouldn’t pull something like this again, but considering the boy, his past, and his friends, he wasn’t holding his breath.  He’d managed to escape the reporters before he’d been dragged into a more extensive interview, to his great relief.

“Second task,” Sirius nodded, “uses your eggs from the first.  I will turn the time over to Phoebe, who outsourced our creatures for this task.  Phoebe?”

A short willowy woman with indeterminate features glided forward.  “Thank you,” she said airily, “you’re all very lucky, it took me two lifetimes to find these wonderful creatures.  Every champion has a lace snake.  Lace snakes are called as such because their shed skin looks like lace.  These snakes almost went extinct due to over poaching, as their first shed skin has the special feature of being an impenetrable shield.  It can block anything, including a Killing Curse.  These seven are very rare specimens that have been nurtured and hatched from the egg.  They hatched just this morning, in fact,” she tilted her head, “most excellent timing, I would say.”

“Phoebe, you told us to hold the task today?”

“Yes, I know, it is excellent timing.  Lace snakes also have a feature where they will grow as they eat, meaning you can feed them an excessive amount of food, in this case eggs, and they will grow.  Once they stop being fed for about twenty four hours, they will then shed and be mostly fully mature lace snakes.  Champions, the eggs you collected in the first task are your, shall we say, free eggs.  No matter how poorly you do in this task, they are a given and will help increase the size of your lace snake accordingly.  You need to feed your snake as much as possible in the next hour by navigating the maze to the center and flying back.”

She gestured to the large glass ball behind her that they could see was filling with more flying creatures.  Most were relatively harmless, more annoying hecklers like cornish pixies, but they could also see the center where a good three hundred more eggs rested.

Rita pushed to the front, eager.  “Are you worried about cries of animal cruelty, for either your treatment of this almost extinct species, or for the golden eggs?  What are they from, anyway?”

Phoebe hummed.  “Fret not, they’re not real eggs in the sense that they weren’t from a creature.  Ananke and the original alchemy team created them as a failsafe.  They are packed with nutrients and proteins, and make an excellent emulsifier, but are rather tasteless.”

“A failsafe for what?”

“Anyway,” Phoebe said lightly with a slight giggle, “the more you feed your lace snake, the better prepared you will be in the third and final task.  Fire Tech is providing all of you with Firebolts, not made by the company, but so that everyone has an equal shot.  Best of luck!”

In the end, Cedric was ahead with a full cloak of lacey snakeskin.  Krum had managed a comeback with his excellent flying, and Fred was doing just fine as well.  Theo and Sue still managed respectable shields, but were not fond of flying.  Sally-Anne and Fleur were comfortably in the middle of the pack.  The world waited in anticipation for the third and final task.

Everyone was allowed to keep their lace snake skin after the tournament ended.  

Cedric, not hindered by his loss in the all out duel the seven had been thrown into, decided that a nice set of battle robes with a hood would not go amiss.  After all, Krum had taken him out with a curse to the eyes he hadn’t been able to dodge in time.  He was fine, but was a little embarrassed he hadn’t gotten his arm up in time.  Still, the snake skin and saved him from most of the spells lobbed his way, so he could say he was quite fond of the stuff.

Krum had wished he’d paid more attention to the fact that Professor Dernovich (who hated being called professor) had called two of his competitors “demons” but had assumed the man couldn’t have possibly meant the two fourth years at Hogwarts.  When would they have had the time or the skill to trap a rune and ritual master like Dernovich?  Then he walked into a trap they’d set up.  He blocked most of it with his snake skin, but his legs had still turned to stone, and he had been forced to withdraw.

Fred was surprised he got as far as he did, but he and Fleur had teamed up to knock out Theo.  They’d gotten themselves taken out in the process, but considering he knew that the other “boy” was actually approaching fifty and had been around the world learning from masters, he’d thought his idea to summon the brooms they’d used for the second task to avoid the ground and fly circles around people was a good one.

Fleur, like Cedric, knew that the lace snake skin was more valuable than the prize money, and felt no qualms about losing as long as she could take that with her.  No magic could get through it, and she knew she’d need to manipulate or sew it by hand, but she knew she had enough for gloves, which would make curse breaking significantly easier, and the fact that it looked like lace meant she’d also have a gorgeous pair of gloves, if she could manage it.  The excess she’d try to make into shoes, or rather, socks.  The experience in learning would be time consuming, but the reward she’d get out of it would make it worth it by a long shot.  Besides, nothing in the tournament had truly been life threatening aside from the first task, but even then the first hadn’t really had anything in it she couldn’t deal with.  She’d enjoyed this, really.

Theo was mildly disappointed in himself for getting taken out, but he’d never really liked flying.  He’d gone into runes for a reason, after all.  He’d gotten to test several combat rituals, which was nice, and a modified horcrux ritual had dragged in the alchemical creations in the first task, so it wasn’t like he’d had to do a lot of work.  He’d been strongarmed into giving up his lace snake skin for potions experiments, but that was fine, he’d studied its properties, and he and Sue would no doubt be spending most of the rest of this run trying to replicate the effects.  It would revolutionize magic if they could.

Sue hadn’t seen Sally-Anne coming, but the modified healing charm had been clever,  She’d also been strongarmed into giving up her snakeskin after, but that was fine, she’d gotten to second, she was fine with this and was fully ready to terrorize Dernovich’s hapless students more before they left.

Sally-Anne knew she was named Chaos for a reason.  As the only one who hadn’t been at Hogwarts for most of that first run, she’d gotten an uninterrupted education in the states, meaning she’d had access to that before everyone else had gone on their world run.  Sure, most of them had caught up, but she’d mostly taken the time to ensure she knew her basics and knew them well.  While the other travelers had expanded on their knowledge of everything, she’d doubled down on basics.  She’d never quite found a specialty, but she loved spells and finding new ways to use them.  It made her, arguably, the most convincing of the “children,” since she knew exactly how far to dumb herself down.  The fact that she hadn’t been a major player in any of the runs meant that it was easy for her to hang back in their all out duel, hiding behind the covers offered and picking people off until she was the last one standing.

Ahhh, what a glorious idea.  She was glad she hadn’t joined the planning team for this; no one was allowed to submit their names if they worked on the tournament, to prevent cheating.  More cheating than being at least twice the age of the other competitors, of course.

“And that concludes our Septsorceror Soiree,” Sirius said gleefully, “the first in history!  Give it up for our lovely contestants!  And someone check and make sure Moody hasn’t had any problems being a statue all year, yeah?”

Albus looked over the empty table with great sadness.  Alastor grunted at his side.

“Disgraceful,” the retired auror muttered, “the entire old Order are cowards.”

“Now, Alastor,” he sighed, “it is difficult to see the darkness when it is not focused on you.  Alice, Frank, Sirius, Remus, Minerva… none of them have been affected as we have.”

The only remaining members of the Order of the Phoenix were the dregs.  When he’d called everyone at the start of Harry’s fifth year, insisting they gather to discuss the Dark Lord and protecting the children, Harry especially, most of them had avoided it entirely.

“Well,” Arthur coughed after being nudged by his wife Molly, “to be fair, it’s not as if the Dark Lord has… killed anyone since those two?  Many statues, as, ah, I’m sure you well know, but no deaths.”

Alastor shuddered and slammed his fist on the table.  “It’s dark!  Evil!  A torture curse if I’ve ever seen one!  If the Wizengamot wasn’t full of scared slugs with no sense and spines of slime, they’d mark it as an Unforgivable!”

Molly sighed in exasperation.  “They’ve passed laws that are even more progressive than we advocated for in the last war, Albus, even if you disagree with their philosophy, you have to see they’re doing good.  And the eggs really are good for baking.  They’re apparently also vegan, since they’re created artificially.”

Emmeline furrowed her brow.  “What’s vegan?”

“I think it means not using anything from an animal?  Honey is in a bit of a grey area, what with the bees, but I think most veganites dislike using it.  It’s extreme vegetarianism, I believe.”

“Molly,” Albus gasped, “don’t tell me you use the eggs?!”

She pursed her lips.  “You do know they gave out the recipe for free, right?  I make them myself, especially after that fiasco with those foxes that killed two thirds of my hens.  I never did find them… Fred and George helped me get the recipe working right.  I hadn’t realized how clever they were before, I’m sorry to say.”

Albus despaired.  The Weasley’s had been his strongest supporters in the first war, and yet they were drawn in by the allure of Lord Chronos like so many others.  He made eye contact with Alastor and they both thought as one.

It was up to them.

ROONIL WAZLIB STRIKES AGAIN WITH SECOND PUBLICATION

By Elijah Monroe, official DA correspondent (with news cast version)

Five years after the first set of spells, potions, and enchantments, Roonil Wazlib has released another set.  While there are some interesting ones, like the clothing swap spell (so you can have an outfit for every occasion!), most people are drawn to the enchantment and potions sections, for two different reasons.

In the enchantment publications, there was an enchantment to be placed on something you wear that would make it impossible for people to remember what, exactly, you look like, without drawing attention to that fact in the moment.  Looking like a modification of a muggle repelling charm, a notice-me-not, and a bit of legilimency, the reason this came to attention is that it is, very clearly, the enchantment the DA uses on their robes that make it impossible to determine their identities.  Most of the new magic being published can be directly pointed back to the DA, in fact, which is what has some people in uproar.  They are, it seems, releasing all of their secrets.  It likely helps that at this point, the general public has accepted their rule due to all the innovations that have spawned (like the sorcerecorder, that can make home videos like the movies that have been shown on wizivision channels for years, see page seven for the latest in Fire Tech) and the progressive laws passed (like the comprehensive werewolf laws that allowed for free Wolfsbless (an improved Wolfsbane released with the first set of Roonil Wazlib originals, see the list of laws the DA have gotten passed on page 4) and guaranteed employment) but some are still giving outcry that they gave five years ago - these spells are dark.

The public has agreed: who cares?

The main reason for this is the memory restoration potion also published.  Finally, there is a reason for the miraculous recovery of Alice and Frank Longbottom and more patients in the Janus Thickey ward.  Prior to September 1990, no one believed they or anyone in that ward would recover, since it was a ward designed for long term care, but they were proved wrong with this potion.  It had seemed like a miraculous recovery at the time, but experts reviewed the people who recovered, and the majority of them had memory damage due to obliviates or extensive use of the cruciatus or hostile legilimency.  This potion is also effective for dementia and Alzheimer patients to combat the memory loss, which was the main thing still unable to be prevented with magic.  It is also not a brew that requires a potion’s mastery, but only about an OWL level.  Between this potion and the other healing spells and potions in the latest publication, people don't care who Roonil Wazlib is, or even if they’re multiple people.  It’s clear they’re connected to the DA in some way, if not outright members, but the amount of good they’ve done, Dark Lords or not, is undeniable.

I echo the public.  Who cares?  Albus Dumbledore and some of his associates seem to be the only ones still consistently frozen, and there is a stature gallery ward in Saint Mungos, funded by the Department of Mysteries and their head Time Unspeakable, for those like Alastor Moody and Daedulus Diggle and several older Wizengamot members who have remained statues for years after large amounts of bigotry and opposition.  Perhaps Dumbledore will eventually stop being released as well.

Regardless, Roonil Wazlib has given the entire wizarding world more secrets and magic that seems to be catapulting us into the future.  We do not know why, but on behalf of the public: thank you.

Elijah Monroe, official DA correspondent.

Easter of their seventh year, they planned a wedding.

Well, Narcissa planned a wedding, on the grounds that she didn’t remember planning the other two, and it didn’t matter to her if they had been acting like a married couple for at least three decades, she was seeing her son get married.

The world at large was not perfect; far from it.  Releasing some of their more secret keeping spells had led to an uptick in crime and a severe increase in statues.  Every time they went off “shift” and had to make up for the food and sleep they’d missed while their age was paused, they practically inhaled their omelets (the eggs really were highly nutritious) and passed out on the nearest flat surface.  Still, it was worth it to see what they could publish and what they really shouldn’t.  They knew the laws that would have push-back, the arguments that would be made against things, and the people they needed to watch out for.  They had hundreds of new plants and potions, knew more spells than they thought any one person could, and still they knew there was more to learn, but they were so, so close.

The ceremony was beautiful, and they all mingled with the various people who had been invited to the biggest wedding in the past few years.  Harry, on the other hand, made a beeline for Luna.

“My excellent prophetess,” he said jovially, “we’re, ah, getting a bit close to our deadline.”

She beamed at him and gave a shallow curtsy.  “My lord!  So we are.  It is about time for you to get that last piece.  Have you spoken to my father recently?”

He looked at the man who was hanging off of the arm of his wife, the indomitable Tethis.

“Xeno, Pandora,” he said cheerfully, “glad you could make it!  Luna said I should talk to you!”

Pandora smirked.  “You do tend to do whatever she tells you.  How has that worked out for you?”

He shrugged.  “Only about a third of her suggestions have been pranks.  But they were quite funny, to be fair.  I like Luna a lot, so I don’t mind if she wants to have fun with my blind faith every once in a while.”

Xenophilius laughed.  “She is very clever, yes!  Why, I have enjoyed her time away from school finding all sorts of creatures that most people didn’t believe were real!  I’m still not quite sure how she got permission to miss that much, but spending more time with her and Pandabear has been delightful!  It has even allowed me time to look into the Hallows!”

Harry instantly stilled and blinked. “The three Deathly Hallows?”

He let the information Xeno had told him all that time ago wash over him while he and Luna blinked at each other.  Pandora eventually cut her husband off to dance when he started to ramble on about how the man had tried to make an invisible sheet cake after the cloak, but hadn’t managed to find the bowl he’d put the batter in before the oven caught on fire.

Draco came over to snag his husband.

“You look shell shocked,” he said promptly as soon as they were dancing, “what happened?”

Harry swallowed.  “I think the last piece has something to do with the Deathly Hallows and the Master of Death.”

Draco looked taken aback.  “The fairytale is how we’re breaking out of the time loop?  Darling-”

“But the thing is,” Harry said curiously, “all of the pieces are real, I’m just not sure if the Master of Death thing is.  But I mean, it shouldn’t be too hard to gather the pieces, especially in the new loop.  Dumbledore is still a statue, so I could just take the wand off of him, we might have left the stone somewhere but the ‘Dials could probably locate it for me if I can’t find in a few days, and it’s not like I’ve ever really let go of the cloak…”

Draco licked his lips.  “Then that’s it?  What do you even do once you have them?”

“Not sure…”

“Excuse me,” a genderless voice said, “mind if I cut in?”

They both blinked at the featureless individual.

“Unspeakable Chrome,” they introduced themselves, “head of the Time Department.  I believe a conversation is long overdue.”

They exchanged a glance before Harry was passed off to the tall robed figure.

“I must say,” they hummed, “basing your robes on the Unspeakable robes, with the enchantments, was quite clever.  Did any of you manage to make it into the Unspeakables to pick our secrets apart, or did you come to a similar spell on your own?”

Harry hummed.  “On our own.  We never got old enough to get jobs, after all, so we didn’t really have time.”

“I’m surprised this is the first run you’re broken into the Department, then.  You did it with such ease, after all.”

He shrugged.  “We’ve had a lot of time to work on most things and we have some insane specialists.  Even if some of our post graduation plans have changed, like Michael going into broadcasting and Parvati into law, some people knew exactly what they wanted and made sure they were the top experts in their field, or close enough.  What all do you know, by the way?  As the Time person?”

Unspeakable Chrome snorted mirthlessly.  “Both more and less than I’d like.  What run is this for you?”

“Uh, if we’re counting the original one, six.  Original, first loop, Slytherin, world, muggle, dark lord.”

“My calculations were right, then,” they murmured, “fascinating.  I remember up to what you call the world run, where you all traveled the world and caused mass panic by disappearing.  Not that it seemed to bother you, as you then did it again.”

Harry grinned sheepishly.  “Well, we weren’t going to sit around at Hogwarts learning nothing.  Can you blame us?”

“For not coming up with a cover story?  Maybe.  It does get boring, though.  Thank you, by the way, for assuring me you hadn’t invented immortality with that age pausing spell.  It took about ten years off my life to imagine that getting into anyone’s hands.”

He shrugged.  “The downsides mean it’s not completely worth it as an immortality spell.  Good for time turners, though.”

“Ah, I’m glad you got such good use out of them.  I almost recalled them on principle.”

“You could have done that?”

“It was too much hassle, I was certain you’d just continue to steal them, or figure out how to make your own.  Much more sensible to use you as study material instead.”

“Horrific,” Harry said cheerfully, “but definitely in the spirit of the run.  Say, do you want to join us?  I can give you a fun code name?”

“I already have one,” they snorted, “but no thank you.  You are planning on breaking this soon, yes?  We aren’t simply going to relive these seven and a half years forever?”

“Not if I can help it!  Just have something I need to look into.”

They bowed, letting him go and stopping the dance.  “Best of luck, then.  I would like to live to May third myself.”

The Unspeakable disappeared into the crowd and Harry blindly reached out for his husband.  “Want to come with me to find the stone?”

Draco snorted.  “If you want.  We have about a month, yes?  I won’t be there when you actually use the thing, mind.”

“Aw,” he pouted, “don’t you want to meet my parents?”

“From an academic standpoint, I am curious to see if they remember the previous runs, since they were ghosts prior to the initiation of them-”

Harry laughed and pulled him into a kiss, making the party goers cheer.

“After the wedding is totally over, and maybe a honeymoon period,” he promised, “we have all the time in the world, technically.”

Harry took a deep breath and spun the stone three times.

“You know,” a genderless voice said, “that’s not really how this is supposed to work.”

He slowly turned to see what looked like a young child, but with pits instead of eyes.  Their skin was almost blue, possibly a feature of the fact that they mimicked a spirit the stone would normally summon, and their hair was pure white.

“Death.”

The being inclined their head.  “Master.”

Harry grimaced slightly, but less than he knew he would have had he really been seventeen.  “So, uh.  How ‘bout them time loops?”

Death cracked a small smile.  “How about them indeed.  You’re quite close to breaking them.”

He deflated.  “So Luna was right?  I just need to… do something with the Hallows?”

Death inclined their head.  “You must.”

“Is it anything past gathering them?”

The being looked at him for a moment, as much as one could without eyes, before humming.  “You gave up much, that first time.”

Harry flinched.

“Many of your loved ones who now circle you like planets in orbit fell into my grasp.  It is as it could have been, perhaps, but not how it must.  Everyone dies, Harry.  You just felt it was too soon for them.”

Harry’s brow pinched.  “So… because I didn’t want people to die, we got stuck in a time loop?  What does that have to do with the Hallows?”

Death looked at him blankly.  “For a moment in time, you became the Master of Death.  Wielder of all three Deathly Hallows.  Master of the Cloak, the Stone, the Wand.  Then, you looked at the battlegrounds in which you had fought and died, and said, no.  You let go of the Stone, you buried the Wand, and like your ancestor, you slipped under the Cloak and hid from my sight.  You rejected.  And thus, we began again.”

He opened and closed his mouth.  “What?”  His voice came out squeaky.  “Hang on, wait, you’re saying we’re in a time loop because I got mad about how things ended?”

Death snickered, sounding as childlike as they looked.  “Kind of.  For a moment, you had all the power you needed.  And then you used it.  But you weren’t just thinking of the dead, were you?”

Harry jolted.  “Oh.  No, I was also thinking of… my yearmates.  The Slytherins who’d been banished to the dungeon because no one trusted them.  The Gryffindors who’d rallied around Neville, when they’d once made fun of him.  The Hufflepuffs that helped the house elves get people around the battlefield and the children out of the castle, defending them from the monsters that came after them.  The Ravenclaws who were sniping from the towers.  All these people who’d been around me, but I hadn’t taken the time to know.  And some of them were dead or going to be arrested.”

Death smiled.  “Yes.  So you all woke up.  Are you ready to wake up again?”

Harry hesitated.  “All I have to do is accept it?”

“I await a guardian.”

He couldn’t help but snort.  “What, are you my patronus now?  You’re slightly off, Death.”

“No,” Death said as the night dragged on, dragging Harry’s eyelids closed, “ I await a guardian.  You must promise to safeguard Death from those like Tom Riddle, and then you can end your loop of life.  Wake up once more, Harry Potter.”

Ron woke up on September 19th, 1990, for hopefully the last time, and made his bed, threw on a shirt and some socks, and went downstairs.  Molly looked at him and smiled, putting a plate in front of him.  He grunted in thanks; even after all this time, he was never fully awake in the morning.  Could he figure out how to transfigure the pumpkin juice into coffee?  Would his mum notice?

Ginny looked up from the living room where she was reading one of those Harry Potter Adventure books that Ron was certain Parvati would relish suing yet again whenever she felt like it.

“Merlin, Ron, it’s almost nine thirty, Luna’s rooster crowed hours ago!”

Molly laughed.  “Oh Ginny, your brother has always been a late sleeper.  As long as he keeps up with his chores, I don’t have to wake him up at dawn.”

Ron grunted again, but grinned.  His mum’s food was still amazing, even after over fifty years of it, on and off.

Errol stumbled into the room and landed on the table in a heap.  Molly untied the letters from the leg that was sticking out and hummed.

“Oh good, Percy wrote!  And Ron, he wrote something just for you; must be tips for Hogwarts next year!”

Ginny complained about something jealous in the other room, but Ron didn’t hear her.  Percy wrote him?  Did that… usually happen?  He didn’t think it did, but then again, it had been almost eight years since he’d done this last, and for both of the runs before that he hadn’t stuck around for breakfast.  He hoped it wasn’t tips for Hogwarts, because he probably knew that castle and those lessons even better than the teachers did, at this point, but he opened the letter anyway.

Ron,

Please, for the love of everything sacred, tell me that this is the last run!!!  I cannot be woken up by Oliver not knowing the concept of an inside voice again .  I am writing this letter at four in the morning because the fucking quidditch fanatic decided to have morning practice on his own and keeps crashing into his chest in the dark.  Why the fuck do we wake up on today of all days, if I could go back in time and force your fiance to be born a day later I would, timelines be damned, for fucks sake, honestly fuck my job, I should have known better when I signed up for it and I fully blame you by the way-

The letter continued, but Ron’s brain was full of static as he connected the dots and let all of the pieces fall into place.

“Oh shit,” he breathed, “Percy’s Unspeakable Chrome.  Percy’s been in the past three runs.”

He silently weighed whether going through puberty over and over was better or worse than graduating and becoming an adult and then waking up as a kid again before he resolved to send Percy a nice gift, as well as an assurance that this was, indeed, the last run.

“Ron,” his mother shook him out of his thoughts, “was it a good letter?”

He considered for a moment, before nodding.  “Yeah.  I think my time at Hogwarts is going to be great.”

She beamed.  “Excellent!  But you still have a year, you know, so make sure you tend to the chickens once you finish eating and finish all your chores.  Then maybe you can do some reading.  I bet if you ask, Percy might send you his old notes, and then you can get ahead!”

Ron snorted.  “Fat chance, not when he still has OWLs.  But I don’t care, I’ll be fine.”

They’d done these seven and a half years six times, after all, so this time, the seventh, they were prepared for anything that came their way.  They’d practiced and experimented and pushed magic to its limits, so now all they had to do was live.

“Once more,” he muttered, “into the breach.”

For the very last time, it was September 19th, 1990.

And finally, they reached May 3rd, 1998.

And they lived.

THE END