Zorian Kazinski and the Chamber of Secrets - Jackson_Overland_Frost - Mother of Learning (2024)

Chapter 1: The Locket

Chapter Text

“This place is creepy,” Zach comments, looking around Ollivander’s with wide eyes as a tape measure seems to skim over every part of his body. Zorian, standing off to the side with his hands clasped behind his back, rolls his eyes and doesn’t bother translating.

Immediately after arriving at No. 12 Grimmauld Place from King’s Cross station, before he’d even unpacked his bags, Zorian and Remus had sat Sirius down in the dining room, swore him to secrecy, and explained the whole of Zorian’s situation from beginning to end, so that he could not be accused of purposely hiding things in order to gain Sirius’ trust. He even gives the true story of what happened beneath the third floor corridor with Quirrell –including dying and seeing the real Harry Potter in the afterlife –and puts all his cards face-up on the table: he is not going back to the Dursleys, but he is willing to find somewhere else to live if Sirius isn’t comfortable with taking him in. As he speaks, Sirius’ face slowly drams of emotion, until he looks more like a particularly realistic wax figure than a man… but in the end, he assures Zorian and Zach that they are welcome in his home. And then he avoids them entirely for several days.

This seems pretty reasonable to Zorian, and Remus is already fully aware that he’s not capable of inhibiting Zorian’s mobility, so now around a week into the summer holiday, he and Zach have just popped by Ireland to fetch the pine wand Zorian’s simulacrum had left behind, before returning to London to visit Diagon Alley and get Zach a wand of his own.

“Give this one a wave, won’t you?” says Ollivander, thrusting a pale wand into Zach’s hands. “Aspen and dragon heartstring, fourteen inches. Reasonably springy.” Instead of properly waving it, Zach gives the wand a playful flick, and the tip goes off with an explosion of light and sound, like shooting a gun. Zorian breathes a quiet sigh of relief –he’d forgotten until they were walking into the store that just because Zach was a perfectly competent magic user didn’t mean he’d be able to use this world’s form of magic, and if his friend had turned out to be a muggle, they really would’ve been screwed.

“Aspen wand owners tend to be strong-minded, determined, and are often either accomplished duellists, or destined to be,” Zorian recites –in Ikosian, so that Zach can more easily understand –instead of letting on that he was worried. “That wood type is particularly suited for flexible spellcasting and combative magic, while the length of your wand and the dragon heartstring core seems to indicate that you will be a particularly flamboyant caster, which… makes sense, for you.” The dragon heartstring will also be something of a blessing, he hopes, since they’re said to learn new spells faster and more easily than other wand cores, and Zach will have to learn the first three years (at least) of the Hogwarts curriculum in less than three months.

Zach shoots him a grin. “Thank you,” he says to an applauding Ollivander, in stilted English. “How much for it?”

“Seven galleons, Mr. Noveda,” Ollivander replies, though Zorian’s the one who hands the money over. It’s a little amusing for Zach to be reliant on Zorian’s inherited coffers, this go around.

“Where to next?” Zach asks, looping an arm around Zorian’s shoulders as they leave the shop. He’d done some more research on the Trace, and it seemed that the enchantment was most likely applied to the wand of every first year student during their first ride on the Hogwarts Express –meaning that with their pine and aspen wands respectively, they wouldn’t have to worry about encountering any restrictions placed on the usage of underage magic until fall term.

“I need to find a shop that will sell me decent quality quartz,” Zorian answers, “and I would like to see if any of the books at Flourish and Blotts mention a Tom Riddle. We can take a break and have lunch somewhere around here, then we’ll stop by Madam Malkin’s, since we both need a few new sets of robes –you can’t borrow Sirius’ clothes forever.”

“Muggle clothes are comfortable,” says Zach in English. “And your robes make you look like a girl. With the long hair?”

Zorian rolls his eyes. Harry’s naturally messy hair is a lot more manageable once it’s been grown out, and he thinks the robes he picked out make him look quite sophisticated. “You should’ve told Jornak that when you had the chance,” he replies, and Zach grumbles.

Number 12, Grimmauld Place has changed drastically since he visited Remus there some time ago. Most of the first floor has been cleared of its various pests, deep cleaned, and renovated –repainted in bright, cheerful colors, and installed with proper lighting. A heavy, Gryffindor-red curtain is tied securely into place over the portrait of Sirius’ mother, one Walburga Black, which hangs in the entrance hallway and is apparently nigh impossible to remove. Sirius seemed to take quite a bit of pleasure in ripping the master bedroom to shreds before remaking it in a way designed specifically to make the family that disowned him roll over in their graves; Zach moves into Sirius’ childhood bedroom on the fourth floor (although Sirius had removed many of the decorations he’d placed there as a teenager, the decor remains quite loudly red and gold), while Zorian claims the fittingly Slytherin one next door, which once belonged to Sirius’ younger brother.

Regulus Black’s bedroom hadn’t yet been touched in the renovations when Zorian first claims it, so it’s on that wall that he finds his first real insight into the Dark Lord’s –or Tom Riddle, if Death was to be believed –life. At some point, Regulus had pasted a collage of newspaper clippings about Voldemort’s movements to the wall, and though they’re now yellowed and crinkled with age, they’re still clear enough, and the words still legible.

In the late 1970s, Lord Voldemort looks nothing like the wretched parasite Zorian had seen clinging to the back of Quirrell’s head –he’s regal and conventionally handsome, with aristocratic features, dark hair graying at the temples, and an aura of power that feels tangible even through the faded moving photograph, where Voldemort stares piercingly into the camera even as the Death Eaters that flank him rush around, a tangle of pale masks and fluid, moving robes (he wonders, absently, if Snape was among them). Zorian knows from personal experience that the Dark Lord is competent and dangerous, even in his current, weakened form, but he can actually imagine people wanting to follow the man in these pictures. The media at this time seemingly hasn’t taken a side on what would become the First Wizarding War yet; in some of the articles, Voldemort is still described as someone that could be respected.

Though he removes the picture of Regulus posing with the rest of the Slytherin Quidditch team, he keeps the newspaper clippings for further study (he stores them in his mind as well, to be a backup since the clippings are old and fragile, but he’s not sure if his usual way of memorizing and copying blueprints will work with the moving picture enchantments). Then, because he’s a Slytherin himself –and not entirely lacking in house pride, despite his best efforts – he keeps most of the room’s furnishings the same, though he asks Kreacher to clean them all thoroughly, and then does a second pass himself.

When he and Zach return from Diagon Alley, they put their purchases away (Zorian ended up buying himself a nice new set of knives, which now hang at his belt, and Zach wanted to try even more weird candies after being devastated by the news that they’re too young to drink alcohol in this world) and then reconvene in Zach’s bedroom, since it’s the larger of the two. Although they still have to be careful with their mana usage while they’re not at Hogwarts, he also only has one simulacrum active, and Zach pointed out there’s no point in just sitting on full mana reserves when they’re not expecting to be attacked. Therefore, it’s Zorian who performs the modified soul marker ritual, which he’s adjusted to hopefully target the shard of Voldemort’s soul that he carries, rather than the marker he shares with Zach –a surprisingly difficult alteration, since the very original ritual doesn’t even contend with soul magic, just detecting a marker using a copy of the mark provided by the caster. Not being able to access Alanic’s expertise, or even just reference books on soul magic and tracking spells, means the ritual definitely isn’t as optimized as it could be… but he’s fairly confident that it should work, and he’s proud enough of that.

Like the first time he casted the soul marker tracking ritual, he checks and triple checks the spell formula circle for faults before he starts chanting –and when he’s done, nearly twenty minutes later, he has to stare into the middle distance for several moments as he process the information his ritual just dumped into his head.

“So?” Zach sits cross-legged on his bed, watching Zorian with interest. Zorian holds up a hand for him to wait, and he obliges, closing the textbook on his lap, on which he had been experimenting with using divinations to automatically translate the text into Ikosian. He’s so far failed at trying to make Zach practice speaking English even when they’re alone, though it’s been nice to have someone to speak Ikosian with, and it can be hard to speak technically about their world’s style of magic when he doesn’t even know if there are accurate English translations of words like projection, illusionism, and negation, when those concepts don’t even exist in here (he would say alchemy and potion-craft are pretty synonymous though, as with alteration and transfiguration).

Once he’s reasonably certain the unexpected results aren’t a result of a fault in his ritual, he sighs and leaves the circle to sit down on Zach’s bed, rubbing his eyes and pushing his glasses up on his forehead.

“Alright,” he says after another few moments, reaching for the map of Great Britain that they’d prepared. “The ritual gave me seven results, which is within the range that we expected. I’ll start with the furthest –which is outside the range of the spell, I believe, somewhere to the southwest of here. Most likely it’s on continental Europe, since I’m still getting a direction, just not a precise location.”

“Does that mean there could be other soul pieces completely outside the range of your ritual, and we just wouldn’t know?” Zach asks, leaning over the map with him.

Zorian purses his lips. “It’s possible, I suppose, but I think it’d be pretty unlikely. We expected a maximum of eight results, and I’m currently thinking that the one result outside my range is the Dark Lord’s main soul.” He draws an arrow on the map, pointing towards the southwest corner, and Zach hums an agreement.

“If you say so. What about the others?”

“The next furthest is up north, around 250 miles from here in the Scottish highlands –I would say that it’s definitely hidden at Hogwarts, or at least in the surrounding area, in the Forbidden Forest or Hogsmeade, so that’ll make it extremely easy to search for once we get there, and we don’t really have to worry about it until fall term. Then there’s one about 200 miles away –I would say it’s near here,” He marks a star slightly north of a city called York, “but we would have to get a lot closer before I can track it with any real accuracy, since I’m not familiar with that area. Within teleportation distance, there’s one to our west in Wiltshire, and another here in London, somewhere in the pocket dimension of Diagon Alley.” For this, he just marks the Leaky Cauldron on their map. “Since it’s unplottable, we’ll also have to go there before we can track it with any more accuracy.”

“That’s… only five,” says Zach, suspiciously. “And the seventh soul piece is you. So where’s the sixth?”

“Well,” he replies, “it would seem that the sixth piece of the Dark Lord’s soul is in the Black family townhouse, around three floors down from here, and most likely in the kitchen.”

Kreacher, the Black family’s elderly house elf, has not become more pleasant in appearance nor personality since the first time Zorian encountered him. Nonetheless, he doesn’t feel comfortable rummaging through the kitchen cupboard that the elf claimed as his own, so he calls Kreacher down.

“Yes, Mister Kazinski-Potter?” he croaks (Kreacher had been sworn to secrecy, the same as Remus and Sirius, so that he and Zach could speak freely while at home). Like Sirius, the old elf has seemed somewhat uncertain on what to make of them, two teenage wizards from another world. Zach had cheerfully revealed that the Noble House Noveda, of which he is the last remaining heir, has a strong magical bloodline and a proud militaristic tradition –which makes him as close to being pureblood as possible –while Zorian rarely mentions his family. That being said, neither of them could rightly be called mudbloods or blood-traitors, and Zorian is a Slytherin, and has read quite a bit about pureblood aristocratic tradition, which seems to earn him some respect.

“If it’s alright with you, might we be allowed to look through your cupboard?” he asks politely, making sure to phrase it as a request rather than an order. Sirius, to whom Kreacher is magically bound to serve, had commanded him to follow orders given by all three other members of their household –Zach only uses this power for silly, meaningless things; Remus tries to be polite but is sometimes forced to order him around, since Kreacher would never willing obey a werewolf; and Zorian does his best to never phrase anything as a command if it can be avoided, following his own rule of trying to stay cordial and polite to everyone and everything he encounters in this world. “We’re looking for something, and I believe it might be in there.”

Kreacher narrows his eyes. “Kreacher does not have anything belonging to the young sirs. Kreacher is a good elf, not a thief.”

“We’re not looking for something that belongs to us, but an item that was in this house before we arrived,” Zorian explains apologetically. “It might have belonged to your old master or mistress.” Now that he’s paying attention, he can sense a portion of the Dark Lord’s soul somewhere inside the cupboard, though it’s so small and unobtrusive that he never would’ve noticed if he hadn’t been looking for it. It occurs to him that this may actually be intentional.

“Master Sirius discarded many heirlooms of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black,” Kreacher spits. “Blood-traitor master turned his back on the honor and dignity of his House, disrespecting his ancestors–”

“You didn’t save any?” Zach interrupts. Kreacher eyes him shiftily.

“That’s right,” Zorian says, “you obviously care about the Black family legacy. Were you able to salvage any of the heirlooms?” He crouches, shows off a bracelet that he wears –a Black heirloom that Tonks had gifted him last Christmas. If the horcrux is actually a Black family heirloom as well, that would make a lot of sense; it’s obvious that Voldemort is deeply invested in the pureblood families of Great Britain, and to make one of their artifacts into a horcrux may have been a way of honoring House Black’s decades of service to his cause. “I care about the tradition of this family too, so I won’t throw away anything you might’ve been able to save, or tell Sirius about any of it. I just want to look.”

They stare each other down; Zorian is still slightly unnerved by his inability to pick up even Kreacher’s most surface thoughts and emotions. After a moment, Kreacher bows and steps aside. “As the young sir wishes,” he says.

The interior of Kreacher’s cupboard is just… sad. The small, dark space contains a nest of grimy blankets of the same color and texture as the dirty rags the house elf still wears, which glitters in places with trinkets that Kreacher had managed to salvage from Sirius and Remus’ efforts. He understands that Sirius was mistreated by his family as a child and that Kreacher was probably complicit in that mistreatment; he understands that Sirius becoming Kreacher’s master has likely only made their antagonistic relationship worse (he himself is not immune to holding grudges). That understanding doesn’t stop the cupboard under the kitchen counter from reminding him uncomfortably of a dark, spidery cupboard under a set of hardwood stairs, walls painted beige and peach, and a heavy padlock on the door. They may not be his memories, but Zorian is still Harry Potter in many of the ways that matter.

“You should clean this place up a bit,” he says quietly. “Take any of the spare blankets and clothes from the linen closet upstairs, or buy new ones. I’ll pay for it if Sirius won’t.”

The house elf bows again. “Young sir is too kind.”

His fingers are drawn, when he crouches down and reaches inside, to the far depths of Kreacher’s nest, between several layers of blanket –he touches heavy, cold metal, and after a few pulls, draws out an ornate golden locket.

Kreacher lets out a choked gasp.

It’s heavy, ostentatious, and about half the size of his palm, hung on a gold, filigree chain. A serpentine S is inlaid on the front in glittering green jewels, most likely emeralds, and the gold surfaces are all covered in swirling, snaking patterns. Though it has no visible clasp, he can see a thin seam around the edges, and the loop that the chain is threaded through seems to also function as a hinge. He tries prying it open, but the two halves remain quite firmly stuck together.

“Need some help?” Zach asks, and Zorian passes it over with a frown. Then he notices Kreacher’s expression: wide, bulging eyes, face screwed up as if he’s holding his breath, fingers flexing at his sides.

“What do you know about the locket, Kreacher?”

“It’s–that’s–” Kreacher closes his eyes, swaying back and forth. “Master Regulus’ locket, young sir. Kreacher failed in his orders. Kreacher has–Kreacher is yet to fulfill Master Regulus’ final orders. Kreacher is a bad elf!” At that, the house elf bursts into sobs.

“What?” Zorian asks in a panic. What is he supposed to do in this situation? “Are you okay? What were Regulus’ orders? Maybe we could help you fulfill them?”

“M– Master Regulus ordered Kreacher to destroy the locket, Kreacher tried everything, everything he knew, but nothing–nothing would work… So many powerful spells upon the casing, Kreacher was sure the way to destroy it was to get inside it, but–but it would not open… Kreacher punished himself, he tried again, he punished himself, he tried again. Kreacher failed to obey orders, Kreacher could not destroy the locket!” The elf lets out a loud, wailing cry, and starts attempting to brain himself on the kitchen tile.

“No! Kreacher, stop!” Zorian orders, in shock, but it’s too late. Loud footsteps thump down the stairs, and Sirius appears at the entrance to the kitchen, a look of vague horror on this face. They must make quite the picture: Zorian, kneeling on the floor; Zach swearing quietly in Ikosian as he tries to pry the locket open; and Kreacher laying on the floor and utterly pitiful, a bruise already blooming on his pale, wrinkled forehead, eyes swollen and bloodshot with tears.

“What in Merlin’s name is going on in here?”

Zorian shoots the man a glare, but Kreacher is already picking himself up off the floor and bowing low enough that his disproportionately large nose brushes his knobbly knees. “Master,” he croaks hoarsely.

“We’re in the middle of something,” Zorian says curtly. He needs Kreacher to be honest, and honest means vulnerable, and vulnerable means –well, it’s just not going to happen with Sirius in the room.

“I can see that,” Sirius replies. He takes another good look around the kitchen, and his gaze finally lands on Zach, who’d given up and started using magic –not that it’s giving him much more success. “What is that?”

“A horcrux,” says Zach, quite cheerfully. Sirius and Kreacher a nearly identical sound of shock and horror, in unison, and then eye each other with antagonistic distaste.

“It’s what?” says Sirius.

“Whatever,” Zorian grumbles. “Kreacher, could you tell us the entire story of the locket, from beginning to end, so we understand what we’re dealing with?”

“Kreacher was ordered never to tell any person in the family, even Mistress” he replies, glaring sideways at Sirius. Zorian sees Sirius starting to puff up with anger, and puts up a hand to forestall his reaction.

“Could you tell us if Sirius just went and stood outside the kitchen?” He feels Zach’s mind brush against his questioningly, and allows the link to form –they’ve perfected this form of translation over the past couple of weeks, where part of Zorian’s mind dedicates itself purely to translating English to Ikosian and then telepathically transmits everything almost instantly to Zach. It’s not perfect, however, and Zach does actually need to become somewhat proficient in English before the fall term, since they won’t be taking the same classes (and most likely won’t be even sorted into the same House), so Zorian usually refuses to use it.

Sirius and Kreacher eye each other, but Zorian being Kreacher’s favorite member of the household was bound to pay off eventually, so the elf nods stiffly. Sirius takes another look around the room, eyes narrowed, and then steps outside the kitchen, just out of sight.

The story Kreacher reveals is a tragic, horrifying one. Zorian only manages to keep his composure throughout because Kreacher loses his own early on, words slurring into gasping sobs, and he is determined to know the whole story. He reads between the lines: if Voldemort had a way of bypassing his own defenses, he would have used them; the Dark Lord is a competent necromancer, with inferi to spare on defenses that he might’ve never had to use; Regulus Black, at age seventeen, betrayed the Dark Lord. The locket is not a Black family heirloom – it’s a Slytherin one, which paints a particular picture when paired together with Voldemort’s Parseltongue ability. One horcrux the heirloom of a Hogwarts founder, and another hidden in or around Hogwarts itself. What he knows about Tom Riddle feels like a jumble of disparate puzzle pieces, for now, but it’s only a matter of time before they start fitting together.

He looks up when Sirius reenters, and isn’t sure whether or not to be surprised that the face of Regulus’ older brother is wet with tears.

“I had no idea,” he mutters, swiping over his eyes with the back of his hand. Then he presses his lips together, and Zorian feels him swallow down his grief before glaring at the horcrux. “Well, how do we f*cking destroy that thing?”

“It would seem that we have to get it open first,” Zorian sighs. He turns to Zach. “Any luck?”

“It resists every brute force method to pry it open that I can try without blowing up this kitchen,” Zach tells him, obviously frustrated. “I can see the seam, but it acts like it's completely soldered together.”

“So, that’s a no,” he translates. “There’s probably a specific spell used to open it, or it’s keyed to the Dark Lord’s magical signature, or his wand…” Although, if it’s a Slytherin family heirloom, and he suspects the Dark Lord would probably want to honor his own heritage, and the Slytherin bloodline trait is– “...or you need to say a specific phrase in Parseltongue. Can Parseltongue be learned? And,” he realizes, “we need a plan for when we manage to open it, since it may not be possible to destroy it by ordinary means. Opening the locket may also activate other wards and protections that are currently dormant, or even alert the Dark Lord that his horcrux is being tampered with, drawing his attention.”

“Let me guess,” Zach jokes. “You have to do some research.”

Zorian eyes Sirius and Kreacher cautiously, since they are the two with desperation radiating off of them in waves, like heat distortion. He never would’ve thought he’d see the day where he was describing Zach as level-headed, but he also supposes that it wasn’t Zach’s younger brother who got violently drowned by the Dark Lord’s undead. “I do think that would be wise,” he says. “There’s also so little information on horcruxes available at all –I would like to examine the locket further to see if there’s anything notable about the soul fragment or the vessel that could help us find and destroy the others.”

“Get up, Kreacher,” Sirius orders, after a moment. Kreacher picks himself up and bows low, eyes and nose still streaming. “Find a magic dampening box, the best one you can find, and bring it here to contain the locket until it can be destroyed.”

“As Master wishes,” Kreacher croaks hoarsely, and apparates away with a loud pop.

Chapter 2: Spinner's End

Chapter Text

Sirius becomes much warmer to them, after that. Not that he was necessarily cold before, but he starts acting like Zorian is his godson again, rather than the ghost of. They also end up transferring the horcrux from the magic dampening box into a pocket dimension, since he and Zach can seal that sort of thing off much more securely (and apparently, pocket dimensions anchored to solid objects outright didn’t exist in this world, which makes him feel a little better about just how accessible expansion charms are). Complex artifice projects are still a massive pain because many of the materials he’s used to working with don’t exist, and he also can’t brew some of the potions necessary to create those materials because, not only does he not have access to basic alchemy equipment, many of the ingredients he needs don’t exist –but containing the horcrux is important enough that Zach sacrifices some of the nice spell formula jewelry Zorian had created for him back home to the cause.

Zorian then rearms him, of course, but it’s all just a little clunky in comparison.

Over the next few days, he sits Zach down in the parlor of Grimmauld Place, and together they start working through the first year Hogwarts curriculum, occasionally joined by Sirius and/or Remus. Zach, obviously, picks up the theory much faster than an eleven year old, and Zorian has had a lot of practice teaching him, but it’s still immensely tedious. Meanwhile, his simulacra (Zach still dislikes using the spell, even though he’s proficient in it) investigate the locations of Voldemort’s other horcruxes, cast a plethora of divinations on the locket, or dig through the pile of goblin-made artifacts that Sirius had been meaning to sell or throw out, so that he can experiment with breaking them down to use for artifice.

In terms of the other horcrux locations, he’s fated for disappointment. The one north of York seems to be located in a dilapidated old shack on the edges of a small town called Little Hangleton –the only reason he doesn’t feel like he’s made a severe error in his calculations is that the tangled ruin of ivy, shingles, and crumbling stone walls is also the site of some truly magnificent, fantastically dangerous wards that he doesn’t dare go near without a proper expert. In Wiltshire he finds the extravagant Malfoy Manor, recognizable by the truly outrageous albino peaco*cks that strut around its expansive gardens and grounds, and complete with its own over-the-top warding scheme. And in Diagon Alley, at the final location they had planned to check over the summer, he discovers that the fragment of Voldemort’s soul that he’s tracking is in an unknown Gringotts vault.

That is going to be the worst one. By far that horcrux is going to be the absolute most difficult, most frustrating one to acquire, especially since they can immediately confirm it’s nowhere near the Potter vault. Not that he thinks it’ll be easy to get at the horcrux in Little Hangleton, especially after hearing from Kreacher about the sorts of defenses Voldemort erected around the locket –Regulus really did them a massive favor, though it cost him his life –but at least they won’t have to break in discreetly. It’s not like they can just repeatedly brute-force breaking in like they did with Eldemar’s royal treasury… and he suspects that Gringotts is just as well protected.

Also, unlike back then, they don’t have detailed building plans, they don’t have prior knowledge of the security measures in place, and they don’t have a thousand-year-old lich on their side. They don’t even know what sort of object the horcrux is, other than that it’s most likely something the Dark Lord found sentimentally significant. The depths of Gringotts could quite literally be described as a labyrinth of horrors, and with little to no idea of what they’re even looking for, let alone where it is, Zorian is rather stumped on where to even begin. Additionally, he’d discovered that teleporting into unplottable locations is much like trying to teleport into a pocket dimension such as the imperial orb: due to the very nature of being unplottable, they simply aren’t associated with coordinates or particular distances (with calculable numbers) from outside of themselves. Meanwhile, the vast maze below Gringotts is an unplottable area inside of an unplottable area, namely Diagon Alley, which means that even just getting in will be a hassle.

His examination of the locket horcrux does not prove much more fruitful. By way of the extensive Black library –which Sirius and Remus had renovated but not yet fully sorted through – he finds that the locket was most likely created by Salazar Slytherin himself, rather than by the goblins as they had suspected. He also manages to confirm that it can only be opened by Parseltongue (there are Gaunts in the Black family tree, he finds, and the most recent was a Parselmouth herself), though any command to open should do, unless Voldemort reconfigured the wards to only accept a specific password; it’s possible, but unlikely, given that Voldemort is the only remaining Parselmouth in Great Britain, or at least believes himself to be.

Although he can tell that additional protections have been placed on the locket (and, in line with Kreacher’s account, nothing he does to the locket even lands a mark), what they are precisely remains elusive. Within the pocket dimension, the soul fragment within seems to remain completely inert, but when he removes the horcrux to examine it, he is able to sense the soul flitting around the object, sometimes as a general haze, sometimes almost like an insect or bird. If the soul piece is sentient in any way, Zorian has no doubt that he is being examined just as he examines it –however, any attempt to use mind magic on the locket is thwarted by the fact that, to his mind sense, it seems to be a completely inanimate object.

At least his experimentation with goblin-forged silver proves to be an unmitigated success – in Zorian’s opinion, he’s been due for one of those. By nature it imbibes anything that strengthens it, and Zorian is pleased to find that it imbibes and channels mana better than any other material he’s worked with in this world thus far. The scarcity and expense of goblin-wrought silver is still an issue, and he feels a little bad breaking down Sirius’ family heirlooms, but since Sirius could not be any more clear that he does not want them, Zorian uses alteration to break down around a dozen goblets and gets to work on a basic spell formula cube for combat, small enough to hide in his robes. Nothing extravagant, since he’s still limited by his lack of crystallized mana, but it can automatically absorb and store ambient mana from the air, and most individual fights won’t take the full hour that his cube can run for. With unfamiliar materials, nothing to look at for reference, and making things up as he goes, Zorian feels like he does a pretty decent job.

A unintentional (though certainly foreseeable) side effect of Sirius becoming friendlier with them is that he and Zach hit it off almost immediately, as that friendship had previously been impeded by Zach’s constant proximity to Zorian. Sirius quickly becomes Zach’s favorite person to practice English with, since Zorian refuses to teach him slang and expletives, while Sirius is only too delighted to. The following chain of events –Sirius being subjected to Zach’s whining about not being able to get a drink; Sirius realizing that he, himself, misses going to muggle clubs in London; and Remus looking vaguely nostalgic in Sirius’ vicinity – eventually leads to Zorian being subjected to the sight of his godfather clad in nothing but a very tight-fitting pair of leather trousers.

“Oh, why?” he groans, immediately ducking back out of the room.

“Sorry, pup!” Sirius calls back cheerily. “Say, you wouldn’t want to come clubbing with us, would you?”

“I’m literally eleven?” There is truly no world in which Sirius is actually a responsible caretaker for an eleven year old; Remus is better, but not by much. He’s grateful for the amount of freedom he has, staying at Grimmauld Place, and if they tried to limit his and Zach’s mobility he wouldn’t hesitate to resort to drastic measures, but he won’t lie and say it's an environment fit for actual children.

“You’re not really eleven, and did you know polyjuice potion gives you the alcohol tolerance of whoever you’re polyjuiced as?” Sirius emerges in a t-shirt (with the hem cropped short) pulled over something with fishnet sleeves, red dragonhide boots, and various pieces of silver jewelry. His hair is styled messily but intentionally, and Zorian is somewhat amused to find that he’s even dyed his gray streaks bright red. He also looks significantly younger than usual, and it takes a second before Zorian realizes most of Sirius’ stress lines have been glamoured away, so that he could pass as being in his late twenties.

“Not interested,” Zorian replies, rolling his eyes. “I’m sure Zach neglected to tell you that I don’t drink, even at home. And since when did you have piercings?” A silver ring had spontaneously appeared in his nose, a stud above his eyebrow, and he wears several earrings in addition to the rings, bangles, and chains.

Sirius grins sheepishly. “I don’t really. Well, I used to have my ears pierced, but they closed up while I was–you know. Some of them are clips, some are actually ear cuffs, and the rest are illusions. But they look pretty real, don’t you think?” He turns his head back and forth, preening. Zorian doesn’t even want to know what Zach is wearing.

“Regardless, what I came up here to say in the first place is that, if you’re all going out for the night, I see no point in staying home by myself,” he says, changing the subject. “Although I have no desire to join you, I might be away for… a day and a half? Two days, if things drag on for a while afterwards.”

“Where are you going?”

“To visit a friend,” he replies ambiguously. “I want to try performing a purification ritual on the horcrux, and the Summer Solstice will be a good time for it, but I need to consult with an expert first. And even if it doesn’t destroy the horcrux altogether, I’d like to see what happens.”

Sirius narrows his eyes; they both know full well that Zorian is hiding things from him. “Who’s your friend?”

“Oh,” says Zach, emerging from the stairwell, mercifully still in his own body and his own normal robes (Sirius had ended up reimbursing him for everything they’d spent at Diagon Alley the other day, which Zorian certainly isn’t complaining about. The Black coffers are still far more extensive than the Potters’). “It’ll be your weird friend, right? Snape?”

Zorian sighs heavily at the same time as Sirius lets out a horrified shriek. “You’d rather hang out with Snivellus than us!?”

“I need to consult Professor Snape’s expertise in Dark magic and purification rituals,” he repeats, and aims a glare towards Zach as well. “And you will not bother or frankly contact him in any way, Sirius Black, because he is my head of house, and if you piss him off I will be the one suffering the consequences once the school year starts. He’s managed to resist taunting you all this time, despite knowing that I’m staying with you this summer, so please be mature enough to ignore him as well.”

He and Sirius stare each other down, but Sirius soon relents and tilts his chin up to break eye-contact. “Fine, but I’m not happy about it,” he says, dramatically. “Unbelievable. My own godson, friends with Snape. Merlin’s bloody testicl*s. Unbelievable.”

Zorian wrinkles his nose in mild disgust. In his opinion, it’s pretty unbelievable that James Potter and Sirius Black, two pureblood boys from wealthy and respectable families, with conventional good looks and high social regard, would bully an unathletic, bookish halfblood from a single-income household –and that Sirius would double down on it as a grown adult. “Well, now that that’s settled, I’ll need to get ready to go as well,” he says instead of commenting, because he still does like Sirius most of the time.

He actually needs a ritual to get to Snape –his first real experiment with mixing two forms of magic. The teleportation spell involves certain divinations that calculate the destination’s coordinates and distance from the caster; apparation only requires a strong sense of the destination. And while he wouldn’t be able to locate Snape’s house on a map, he has been on its front step before, inside the man’s occlumency shields. Using a ritual, he’s hopeful that he can usefully combine the two methods of instantaneous travel, and teleport to the approximate location of Snape’s home without having to suffer the unpleasant sensation of apparation that his books had described.

Zach, however, grins at him winningly. “You don’t want me to come with you?” he asks. “You should introduce me to your new best friend.” He’d actually sat with Zorian while he’d designed the modified teleportation ritual; despite his distractible nature, Zach has been progressing very quickly through the first year curriculum, especially since Zorian knows what the first year exams look like. Where Zorian fully mastered most of the material, since he was forced to work at essentially the same pace as his classmates during the school year, Zach simply becomes reasonably proficient at each spell and then moves on –enough to get an Acceptable, but not needing to reach for a perfect Outstanding.

At this, Zorian just huffs, though not without amusem*nt. “You’ve already met, don’t tell me you’ve forgotten already,” he replies. “Though thankfully you didn’t speak English at the time, because I think Professor Snape would actually hate you. Like I said –better not to torture him unnecessarily.”

Snape opens his door, after nearly fifteen minutes of knocking, with a look of sour displeasure on his face. “Are you aware, Mister Kazinski, that it is the summer holiday,” he says forcefully. “I’m certain that even your insipid, pitiful little mind was able to deduce that much. It is for my own sanity that I am only subjected to the brilliant young minds of Hogwarts for nine months out of the year. What, pray tell, do you want?”

“How to destroy a horcrux,” he replies promptly, and to prove immediately that he isn’t here just to waste Snape’s time, Zorian produces the locket from a fold in his robes.

His potions professor glowers at him for a long moment, but after a glance down at the locket, steps back from the door. “Come in.”

It’s extremely strange to see Snape wearing casual muggle clothing –though Zorian supposes that he does live in an entirely muggle neighborhood –and yet it’s almost stranger to see the inside of his home. Stepping through the familiar front door brings him directly into a tiny parlor, which in the heavy summer heat bears the oppressive feeling of a dark, padded cell. The walls, except for the two small windows facing the front of the house, are covered entirely in books bound in worn leather. In the center of the room, a threadbare sofa, old armchair, and rickety coffee table stand grouped together as if cowering from the walls, and though Snape must have already been living here in the weeks since term ended, everything is coated in a layer of dust.

Compared to the neat, albeit somewhat gloomy potions master’s office at Hogwarts, Snape’s home just seems… well, he’s not even sure how to explain it. It’s uncanny; there’s a sort of dissonance there. His shoulders don’t relax until they pass through into the small kitchen, which clearly actually sees some use, by how it's kept as clean as Snape’s brewing station at school. Like the man’s rather unkempt appearance, the sitting room almost seems to be a facade of sorts, just discomforting enough to keep anyone from looking any closer. Standing in the kitchen, however, as Snape gestures for him to sit at one of the high stools by the narrow kitchen counter, the man seems to actually fit into the space, with his neat but plain clothing, and his hair tied up off his neck in deference to the summer heat.

“Let me examine that,” Snape demands once he’s settled, and Zorian obliges, sliding the locket across the counter. Snape turns it over in his hands, briefly attempts to pull it open, and pulls out his wand.

“I’ve investigated it quite thoroughly,” Zorian tells him. “I’m able to sense the portion of the Dark Lord’s soul that it contains, and I believe that the locket itself is an heirloom of the Slytherin family, possibly created by Salazar Slytherin himself, as I was able to date the artifact to the time period that the founders of Hogwarts were active. I also believe that the locket can only be opened via Parseltongue. Opening the locket may be necessary in order to destroy or remove the soul fragment within, the surface metal and decorations seem to be indestructible.”

Snape remains silent as he listens to Zorian’s report, until he finishes casting his own series of divinations on the locket. Then he looks up. “Move.” Zorian slides to his feet and steps around the counter, out of Snape’s line of fire; as soon as he’s done so, Snape points his wand calmly at the horcux and casts, “Avada kedavra.”

A flash of green light and a rushing sound later, the locket still sits completely unmarked on the countertop, the soul within still perfectly intact and attached to its container. Zorian raises his eyebrows at this almost casual usage of a highly illegal “unforgivable” curse, but does not comment.

“Where did you acquire this?” Snape asks, picking up the locket and turning it around in his hands.

“The Black family townhouse,” he replies, clasping his hands behind his back. “Regulus Black apparently discovered that the Dark Lord had this particular horcrux over a decade ago, betrayed him, and was killed by the horcrux’s defenses in the process of retrieving it. He charged the Black family house elf with destroying it in secret, but all efforts to even open it were unsuccessful, and so we were able to find it in the house elf’s possession just this past week.”

“Tell me what methods have already been attempted.”

“All manner of sharp and blunt objects; magical sharp, blunt, and explosive force; fire; goblin-forged weaponry; attempting to magically break the locket down into its component pieces; and likely others.”

“Fiendfyre?” Zorian shakes his head. He’s heard the term in certain Dark Arts texts, but doesn’t completely know what it is. “Basilisk venom?”

“Also no,” he replies. “With the Summer Solstice approaching, I thought that we could perhaps try and perform a purification ritual on it, since it’s such Dark magic.” Seeing Snape’s derisive raised eyebrow, he hurriedly continues, “even if it does not completely destroy the horcrux, I would be curious to see what would happen. I understand that a typical horcrux can only be destroyed by methods which damage it beyond magical repair, but perhaps a particularly powerful Light spell or ritual could weaken, damage, or even sever the Dark bonds which attach the soul fragment to its vessel, thereby eliminating it without destroying the object itself.”

“Not an idea without merit,” Snape allows. “Mister Noveda hasn’t deigned to join us?”

“Having met Zach before, you can imagine that the current occupants of the Black ancestral home do not allow one to find even a single moment of peace,” Zorian says dryly. “Of course I jumped at the opportunity to escape somewhere a bit… quieter.” It’s not an entirely honest sentiment, but it draws a smirk from Snape. “I have also been wondering –what are we going to do about the issue of Zach and Dumbledore?”

“You wish for Mister Noveda to enroll at Hogwarts for the fall term,” Snape clarifies, and Zorian nods to confirm. “The headmaster will certainly want to meet with him soon to ask him some questions. Decide on a story to tell –make it clear that there’s no simple way to return him home, and that he would benefit from interacting with magical peers for the duration of his stay here. It’s unlikely that the headmaster will wish to involve the ministry, and allowing your friend at Hogwarts will soon reveal itself to be the simplest way of keeping everything within his sphere of influence.”

He’s long wondered why Snape seems so loyal to Dumbledore, and yet simultaneously so ready to… well, not betray him exactly, but just to go behind his back. He was the one to warn Zorian away from Dumbledore in the first place, and he’s used the false mind trick Snape taught him many more times against the Headmaster than against the Dark Lord. Of course, he still can’t imagine asking something like that to Snape’s face.

After that, they make arrangements for the next day, so that they can make the extensive preparations for the more complex ritual, get a few hours of sleep, and then perform it, which will take from dawn till midday. Then they discuss the other horcrux locations late enough into the night that Severus provides tea, fragrantly floral and charmed to be refreshingly cold, as they go over Little Hangleton, Malfoy Manor, and the utter horror of Gringotts. In the end, the conversation lasts until well past midnight, and Severus, who is turning out to be a surprisingly good host, offers Zorian the bed in his spare room for the night – which he graciously accepts. Although he really does enjoy and is perfectly content with his current arrangement at Grimmauld Place, he must admit that it’s nice to catch a break from all the extroverts. And strange as it is, Severus is good company.

Chapter 3: Summer Solstice

Chapter Text

The next day, he and –well, especially outside of a school setting, it does just feel more natural to call him “Severus” –make their preparations for the Summer Solstice ritual. He isn’t sure what plans, if any, Severus originally had for the solstice, but the purification ritual they eventually decide on is as straightforward as the cleansing and protection ones that they’ve practiced together in the past. Instead, Severus describes it as a “purification through fire” that refines a person’s magic and burns away Dark impurities… which all sounds somewhat more destructive than Zorian typically imagines from the Light Arts, but that might be just what they need.

Zach contacts him while he’s stopped for lunch. [When will you be home?] he asks, his telepathic voice projected by an ear-cuff they both wear, etched with spell formula to transmit these sorts of messages. Zorian had just crafted one for himself the other day, since it’s not as though he had anyone to telepathically communicate with before then (it feels good to be reachable, in case trouble arrives unexpectedly on either of their ends. And it’s good to have someone who’d want to reach him).

[Tomorrow afternoon, most likely,] he replies, reaching back. He can get a sense of Zach’s emotions through the connection –mostly boredom and restlessness.

The forest Severus had apparated them to (and side-along apparation is truly awful, nearly moreso than traveling by floo) is quiet and serene, and the two had separated upon arrival, since Zorian won’t need him to return to Spinner’s End. Something about interacting with Severus is that, although he remains quite guarded, neither of them hide that they don’t entirely trust one another. Remus and Sirius need to be kept under the impression that they know everything there is to know about Zorian, or at least that he’s not intentionally hiding anything from them (and Zach is the same way, though these days he actually does know pretty much everything about him)… but there is something strangely relaxing about openly keeping things close to his chest, as paradoxical as it might seem.

[Hmm…] Zach hums, and though he can’t detect any tension, Zorian still sits up when he realizes that Zach isn’t completely relaxed either. [Well, no need to hurry back, but we’ve had something of an encounter.]

[What do you mean?]

[An unfamiliar house elf popped by, apparently belonging to the Malfoys,] Zach reports. [I believe it met briefly with Kreacher, who says it had a warning for you but didn’t specify what it was or how urgent. Well, a warning for “Harry Potter”, but that’s you. None of us saw it, only Kreacher, but it might come by again.]

Zorian frowns, leaning back against his tree. [What did Kreacher say when I wasn’t there?]

[I don’t think he said anything in particular,] says Zach, with the mental equivalent of a shrug. [Just that you weren’t home. I’m not worried about it, but I figured you’d want to know.]

[You’re never worried about anything,] Zorian replies, with faux-annoyance, but his shoulders relax. He does trust Zach’s judgment, after everything. [Keep me updated.]

Zach confirms, then lets the connection dissolve; Zorian finishes his sandwich and stands back up. Time to get back to harvesting fresh ingredients for their ritual, lest Severus mock him endlessly for lazing about –though, the summer holidays have seemingly been pleasant enough that even that thought makes him smile.

The Summer Solstice dawns bright and early, just as he supposes it’s meant to. Zorian had only caught a few hours sleep at Spinner’s End, but ice-cold lightning zips along his nerves from the potion he and Severus had imbibed at sundown the evening before, and he feels shiveringly wide awake. Though he understands that the Light Arts are just as powerful (and as bad as it sounds), Zorian must admit that on a purely personal level, he really prefers Dark magic –there is just something so unpleasant about waking before dawn, unable to shake the sensation of having just resurfaced from a swim in a frozen lake, in the middle of June. Everything about the Light Arts is just so cold, and after spending so many years in perpetual late-summer-early-fall, Zorian thinks that winter may just be his least favorite season.

Despite this, he doesn’t speak a word of complaint to Severus, who has been very graciously hosting him the past two nights, and honestly feels just as displeased to be awake behind his perfectly impassive mask. Only during these rituals is his empathy able to pick up anything from behind Severus’ occlumency shields; it’s something related to being more in-tune with the wild magic around them that permits it –like ambient mana, like the Mirror of Erised’s aura, the atmosphere simply seeps into them, flowing through and mingling freely with their own magic. He doesn’t doubt that the ebb and flow of its current picks up and carries along particles of his own apprehension, but he finds it unlikely that any flickermind would be able to sense it, even a mind mage like Severus.

They start their bonfire in silence. Tinder of dried herbs soaked in a particular potion; wood gathered from a forest soaked in magic; kindling gathered from a forest soaked in feral magic, from trees that had grown for decades in magic-rich soil. Sparks fly from both their wands (Severus doesn’t verbally question the appearance of Zorian’s pine wand, though he does give it a pointed glance), and the fire catches, sending fragrant smoke billowing into the air. They both breathe it in as they settle into their positions, wands held low, eyes on the flames licking high and cold –as if they’re sucking the summer heat out of the air, drinking it down, consuming rather than adding to it.

Instead of whipping around them like a whirlwind, the wild magic seems to settle around them as the sun rises over the horizon, gathering around the fire like children picking up suitable sticks and preparing to toast marshmallows. It feels like a simple blanket around his shoulders at first, simply present, but slowly gets heavier – by mid-morning, around four hours in, he reluctantly sinks to his knees to better bear the weight. The passage of time goes a little fuzzy, like his head is full of cotton; though his perfect mental clock ticks away, every method by which he consciously perceives the world distorts like he’s underwater. From time to time he or Severus will add more wood to the fire, but other than that, everything bleeds away but the crackling of the fire and the steady thump of his heartbeat. If anything or anyone disturbs them, he doesn’t notice… though he has a feeling that the ritual itself deters any such possibility.

A few minutes before high noon, more than eight hours after the fire was initially lit, Severus rouses and brings Zorian to his feet with a hand on his shoulder. Though the magic is still heavy in the air, he finds himself suddenly able to stand, and though the area feels pleasantly cold, he realizes that he’s absolutely drenched in sweat. Severus reaches into the fire unflinchingly, and passes him a glass bottle of water that’s been sitting, half buried, at the edges of the flames. They both drink, and the water is icy and refreshing, though it still fizzes and almost burns on the way down. Then they both return to their places, kneeling around the fire. The final third of the bottle, Zorian prepares to pour over the locket, which he had tied to his belt by its chain (there couldn’t be any worse way of transporting this particular horcrux than by actually wearing it) –when a sudden impulse stops him.

:Open:, he hisses, the Parseltongue slithering out of his mouth like water bubbling up out of a stream. The golden doors of the locket swing open with a click, and before any thought at all enters his head, he upends the bottle onto the living, dark eye that blinks up at them with shock from under the locket’s fine glass windows.

Then, with little fanfare, he casts the locket into the flames.

It shrieks and screams and sizzles, and with his heightened sensitivity to the emotions of all others participating in the ritual, Zorian can’t suppress a flinch at the pain and fear that emits from Tom Riddle’s soul as it's put through the refining fire. A fine, dark mist rises from the locket to mingle with the smoke. He glances at Severus, who stares back impassively, and they continue on to finish the ritual.

“May the fire cleanse these hands, and the Light guide them away from Darkness.” Severus then plunges his hands, palms facing upward, into the depths of the flames for several moments; the flames seem to seize and flare, spitting up sparks from the creases and calluses of his skin, but not actually burning. When the fire returns to normal, he withdraws them back to his lap.

It feels like sparks are crawling up his throat as he suddenly becomes electrically aware of his own body –but he has improved at this, over time. “May the fire refine these hands for the task ahead,” he murmurs, swallowing down a cough and ignoring Severus’ eyebrow raise at the changed wording, “and may the Light burn away the impurities of Darkness.” What he’s realized is that, during these rituals, his words are less of an incantation and more of a prayer; the precise words and cadence don’t matter, so much as the intent, respect, and meaning of them do. Therefore, he might as well just ask for what he wants.

He thrusts his hands into the fire, which feels as cold and immaterial as any of the Hogwarts ghosts. The wild magic buffets them, like the ocean’s currents as felt from the seafloor, and the sparks that alight in each crevice of his skin do hurt, but not so much so that he has to grit his teeth to keep his hands relaxed and open in the flames. It really does feel like what he had asked for –like every fleck of dirt, dust, and dead skin is being seared away –but the feeling spreads, all up his arms and down his back, so that all the skin that he suddenly felt so aware of is tingling, and all the blood in his body comes to a chilly, steady simmer.

Then the flames die down again, and he withdraws his hands just as Severus did.

With their ritual complete, and high noon past, their fire begins to burn hot instead of cold. At least the brunt of the exertion in this ritual happened over the course of the morning, so all they really have to do now is to put out the fire, which drowns quickly from a quick spray of aquamenti from Severus’ wand. They stomp out the embers and mix whatever remains with sand and soil, and when Zorian retrieves the locket from the slurry of ashes, he finds that the glass is cracked from the sudden changes in temperature, and Tom Riddle’s soul is gone.

When he gets home, teleporting straight to his bedroom in Grimmauld Place from Spinner’s End after a quick debrief, he immediately sheds his top layer of clothing and crawls into bed. Magic is exhausting, he hasn’t slept well the past two nights, and he’s been up since four AM. [Wake me up when it’s time for dinner,] he tells Zach, eyes already sliding shut –and then he goes dead to the world for the next five hours.

He initially left the locket at Spinner’s End, since he could already tell that there’s no longer any fragment of soul attached to it, but after a few days Severus owls it back to him so that he can conduct his own examinations. Kreacher weeps and nearly passes out when Zorian shows him the broken glass inside and recounts their method of destroying it, then embraces his leg quite tearfully. Sirius is the only one who seems to understand what sort of purification ritual they had invoked, and he turns the locket over in his hands thoughtfully before returning it. He confirms Severus’ observations –that the darker wards and curses on the locket were destroyed in the ritual, but the neutral protections remain. Also, when he closes the two halves together again, he finds that not only have the Parsel enchantments remained, he retained the ability to speak Parseltongue.

All in all, he finds it to be quite a strange ability, especially since he thought that he’d simply picked it up accidentally during the ritual. He understands the theory: through various methods (but in this case, by imbibing the potion and through a deep meditative state), the boundaries of the participants’ personal magic, life force, and soul are broken down and allowed to blur with the ambient, wild magic. Although other parts of the ritual are meant to invoke and call a saturation of Light magic specifically into their vicinity, the magical energy of the participants will also naturally mix, albeit on a purely surface level. Because they’d modified and performed the ritual in such a way that the horcrux (and the Dark Lord’s soul fragment therein) would be considered an active participant, Zorian had initially assumed that he’d somehow absorbed some of the horcrux’s Parsel ability from the surrounding wild magic, since it had been in such close proximity to him throughout the morning.

However, by focusing on his soul perception and mage sense at the same time, he discovers that the Parseltongue ability never came from the locket horcrux, but rather the much closer scar horcrux –or rather, the piece of soul inside his curse scar (he’s not sure if “horcrux” is the technically accurate way to describe it, since a horcrux is really a vessel prepared in a very specific way, not just the concept of a soul fragment in and of itself). Because the soul fragment was attached to his scar by accident rather than methods of Dark magic, and he later intentionally tied it to himself by carrying that fragment with him when he died and came back to life a few months ago, the ritual they performed had no effect on its bond to him.

Parseltongue, he finds, sounds just like English unless he concentrates on his mage sense while speaking it –and even then the differences are subtle, even though he can feel his lips and tongue moving differently. At first, he can only speak Parseltongue when focusing intently on something snakelike, such as the S on the front of the locket, or one of the many Slytherin-themed decors and fastenings in his bedroom. Then, he figures out how to speak it simply by bringing to mind an image of a snake, and later to simply focus on how it feels, at a metaphysical level, to speak Parseltongue, and activate it whenever he wishes by that method.

That the ritual does not destroy the Parsel enchantments also confirms what he’d already assumed was true: Parseltongue is not an inherently Dark ability, though it is associated with the Dark Arts. If he thinks back, he can also recall an instance where Harry Potter spoke to a Brazilian boa constrictor in a zoo –in fact, that the glass of the boa constrictor’s enclosure suddenly vanished (allowing for the snake’s subsequent escape) was the reason that the Dursleys had locked Harry away before going on holiday in the first place. This indicates to him that he’s actually been a Parselmouth this entire time, as a side effect of hosting part of the Dark Lord’s soul, but had simply never encountered a snake for long enough to notice.

There is one more thing that they encounter, in those last few weeks of June that pass peacefully and warm: while Sirius and Remus are at the ministry one afternoon, still filing paperwork for Zorian’s custody even though the matter’s been all but decided already, he and Zach draw back the curtain on Walburga Black’s portrait.

“Lady Black,” he greets respectfully, bowing at the waist just as instructed in the primer Theodore Nott had gifted him last Christmas. Nearly all the portraits on the walls of Grimmauld Place have been either put into stasis or relocated to the attic, some to prevent them from spying and gossiping about their household’s myriad secrets, and many more because Sirius simply does not care for them. However, the portrait of Sirius’ mother is apparently just as proud and stubborn as the woman was in life, and the frame utterly refuses to budge from the wall. Zorian suspects that they could simply also separate the top layer of plaster (or whatever material) from the wall, but Sirius already had the entire entryway repainted, and is reluctant to resort to those sorts of methods.

He remains in his bowed posture for several moments, trying to judge her silence –but of course, an animated portrait is still a portrait, and has no mind to read –then straightens. “My name is Harry Potter, heir to the legacy of House Potter,” he says. “All my thanks for allowing us to stay in your home these past few weeks.”

Walburga Black stares a moment longer (he’s wearing his best summer robes in a traditional pureblood style, buttoned all the way up to his collar in the front, airy and light in deference to the heat, and an elegant pale green), then sneers. “What do you want, boy?” Sirius, it seemed, had not underestimated her rudeness, though at least she wasn’t screaming.

Then again, her eldest son and the heir to the main branch of House Black had run away from home to go live with the Potters as a teenager, so perhaps she would simply never be fond of him. He certainly didn’t think Zach would fare any better; his friend stands off to the side for this one, out of the portrait’s line of sight, giving him an unironically supportive thumbs up.

“Did you ever know of a man named Tom Riddle?” he asks. It doesn’t matter if Walburga knows one or two of his secrets –there are no other portraits of her, and she has no one to share them with. And either way, no one would think it strange for the Boy Who Lived to be researching his fated enemy. “I believe he was a Slytherin, and you may have been in Hogwarts at around the same time.”

The portrait’s eyebrows shoot up. “Tom?” she says, with some affection. “Yes, he was a year below me at Hogwarts. He was really very bright, I believe he became the Head Boy the year after I graduated… only to start working at some distasteful antique shop in Knockturn Alley after graduating himself. Orion and I invited him to our son Regulus’ naming ceremony here in 1961, but he disappeared off the face of the earth soon after, and that was the last I saw of him.” So she didn’t know that Tom Riddle had become the Dark Lord –that was interesting.

“Riddle isn’t a wizarding surname,” he notes.

“Unfortunate to be sure, but these things can be excused from time to time,” she replies, with a shallow nod. “I heard from Orion that Tom was of the Slytherin bloodline, and could speak Parseltongue. And to think that we believed all the Gaunts had squandered away their wealth and died, wretched and destitute –but Tom was proof that there will always be power in a Sacred bloodline. He proved himself worthy of being one of us, many times over.”

“Were you close to him in Hogwarts?” Walburga Black’s eyes slide away from him as she reminisces about her school days, seeming to forget that she’s talking to a Potter.

“Ah, we spoke, but he was always closer with the boys,” she murmurs. “They had their own little dueling club –or was it a politicking club? My husband was never a part of it, but dear Abraxas was, and Theodorus from my year, and Argentius Mulciber from Orion’s year, if I remember correctly. They called themselves the Knights of Walpurgis. I must admit, I always felt a little flattered by it, though I believe our shared namesake was merely a coincidence.” She snaps out of the memory, then, and suddenly looks at Zorian sharply, down the line of her nose. Although she’s merely enchanted oil and pigment on canvas, the signature gray eyes of her bloodline are still piercing. “Why do you ask me these things?”

There’s no reason for him to lie to this woman, but there is also no reason for him to tell the truth. Instead of doing either, he places his wand hand over his heart and bows again. “Thank you very much for speaking with me, Lady Black,” he says, and she narrows her eyes.

“You young men and your secrets.” She shakes her head. “You’re reminiscent of him, if you’re so curious; Tom always had that same look in his eye, like he knew things that you didn’t. Many of us old houses have been wondering if you would step up to be the next leader of the Dark faction, after our Lord’s defeat.”

:They’ll have to keep wondering:, he hisses in Parseltongue (for he is not entirely free of the mischievous impulse), and in his peripheral vision, he sees Zach slap a hand over his mouth before a snicker can escape. Of Walburga’s expression, he only catches a glance before Zach drops the heavy curtain back over her portrait.

Chapter 4: Enrolling at Hogwarts

Chapter Text

The expected owl comes from Dumbledore in early July, requesting Zach’s presence at Hogwarts to discuss what will happen next. And of course Zorian joins him, ostensibly as a translator (Zach’s English is surprisingly good considering he’s only been in England for a bit over a month, but he still has a pretty heavy accent that sometimes makes it difficult to tell what he’s saying), but really just to keep an eye on the situation. Also, Zorian is familiar enough with Zach’s thought processes and manner of speaking that he can fill in the gaps in Zach’s English vocabulary.

Therefore, on one dreadfully hot summer day, he and Zach step together through the fireplace at Grimmauld Place directly into the headmaster’s office at Hogwarts –going together, because clear annunciation is absolutely necessary for floo travel, and in that respect, Zach’s accent is rather prohibitive. Traveling by floo is always unpleasant, but he’s gotten used to it by necessity over the past few weeks, as they’ve been helping Remus finish packing up and moving his various belongings over from the rather unfortunate Knockturn Alley flat he’d been living in for the past several years. Still, he has to wrinkle his nose as he brushes soot off his nice robes, and then reaches over to straighten Zach’s when it looks like he won’t do so himself (Zorian prefers the sophisticated styles that are the current fashion for most pureblood heirs their age; Zach went out shopping in the muggle world with Sirius, and has taken to more athletic, open-front robes in bolder colors, which he wears over-top of muggle clothing in the style more popular with halfblood and muggleborn mages).

“Ah, Mister Noveda, I hope you’ve been settling in well.” Dumbledore strides towards them, his hands held out and palm-up in warm welcome. “And Harry, my boy. What a pleasure to see you as well. I hear from your godfather and Mister Lupin that you’ve been adjusting well to the new living arrangements. Have you boys been enjoying your summer?”

“It’s been very restful thus far, sir,” Zorian replies. He doesn’t feel any strand of legilimency yet, and the false mind sometimes inhibits his ability to think clearly and consciously, so he doesn’t pull it up quite yet –but rather keeps it ready at a moment’s notice.

“And you, Mister Noveda?”

Zach glances between him and Dumbledore in a show of hesitance, though their minds are pressed together and Zorian can clearly sense no such thing. Instead, he gets the distinct feeling that Zach primarily sees this as some sort of performance that they’re putting on together, and the primary emotion that comes through is amusem*nt. “Yes sir,” he says.

“I’m very glad to hear that. How have you been settling in?” Dumbledore guides them over to his desk, conjuring a third chair with a wave of his hand, while speaking (Zorian doesn’t gape at the display of magic, but he’s wildly impressed). They all sit down, Dumbledore folding his hands pensively on his desk, electric blue eyes somehow strikingly sharp and warm at the same time. Bizarrely, this feature is more eye-catching than his robes, which are one of the milder affronts to nature that Zorian has witnessed –but being pure white and emblazoned with an army of various brightly-colored fruit like an overly cheerful tablecloth, they are an affront nonetheless.

“Easily, sir,” Zach answers. “Sirius and Remus are very welcoming, and Harry has been teaching me English every day.”

“I’m very impressed with the both of you… though I’m sure this has been a difficult adjustment for you especially, Mister Noveda. I’m afraid we’ve been unable to pinpoint exactly where you came from or how you were transported here to Hogwarts. Any light you could shed on the situation could bring us several steps closer to bringing you home.”

“From what Zach’s told me, he also isn’t completely sure how he arrived here,” Zorian sighs, when Zach turns on him with wide eyes. He clearly understood the gist of the prompt, but just doesn’t want to answer. “He’s a wizard from a place called Eldemar –I researched it, but I couldn’t find any countries, states, or provinces called that –and apparently while he was sleeping one night, spirits called angels appeared to him and instructed him to step through a portal.” He uses the Ikosian word for angels despite the obvious translation, mostly to sow confusion, but ‘portal’ is actually the best word he can think of to explain how a dimensional gate construct appears; they obviously use the same word as ‘doorway/gateway’ in Ikosian, but in English that’s just confusing. “It seems that the portal in question led into the Mirror of Erised’s reflection, because he came through right into the midst of my duel with Quirrell.”

Quirrell, of course, cannot contest this –the man passed away before he could ever wake up, not just because he fell and cracked his skull, but because the Dark Lord’s wraith actually did a lot of irreversible damage to his mind and body in his possession and abrupt departure. Apparently Dumbledore had tried to revive him after Severus had brought him and Zach to the hospital wing, but was unsuccessful, and he died mere hours later after being transported to St. Mungo’s via floo.

“He doesn’t recognize any of the maps I’ve shown him, nor does he speak any recognizable language,” Zorian continues. “If it weren’t completely absurd, I would guess that he came from another universe entirely.”

“Why would that be completely absurd, young man?” Dumbledore asks, eyes twinkling. “Certainly things just as strange, or stranger, have happened before.”

“Because if people from other worlds could be transported to ours at random, then it would’ve happened before. There would be a historical precedent of such things occurring, instances that would not be better explained by madness or memory charms – but I looked into it and couldn’t find any written record of anything like this happening before.”

“Not every event and piece of knowledge is recorded in writing, my boy, and not every piece of record is accessible to even an intelligent young man such as yourself,” Dumbledore reprimands gently, leaning forwards. “And I would presume, based on the intervention of spirits as you say, that Mister Noveda’s placement here was not so random after all.”

“Yes sir,” he says, pressing his lips together.

“I do think I’m from another world,” says Zach, and Zorian side-eyes him. “I know I’m not from this one. Nothing is the same here as what I know from home. I do know magic, but it’s a very different kind of magic than Harry’s been teaching me the past month.”

“That must be very hard for you,” Dumbledore says sympathetically. “Though I must note, Mister Potter, that magic is not to be used by students over the summer holidays.” To this, Zorian does not deign to respond.

“It’s been fun,” Zach cheerfully replies. “Home is very boring, and I like learning new magic. Harry is a good teacher, and funny.” Zorian surreptitiously elbows him in the ribs, and Zach turns towards him with a grin –this, too, is part of their performance, and when he sees Dumbledore smile, Zorian knows their little stunt has been successful.

“I’m glad to see you boys have become such good friends,” Dumbledore says. “Your professors have told me, Harry, that they have been a little worried about your ability to connect with your peers and make friends over the past year.” That would be Professor McGonagall betraying him, just as he knew she would. “It’s absolutely understandable that someone in your position would feel quite lonely.”

Zorian resists the urge to roll his eyes. Making “friends” in this world is a doomed endeavor from the start, with how many secrets he has, and knowing that he will be returning home as soon as he completes his mission. If Zach’s presence could be useful for anything though, hopefully it will get him into advanced classes, or better yet, let him test into a higher year. “How long will it take to find a way for Zach to return home?” he asks.

“For now, it’s impossible to tell,” the headmaster answers. “That being said, it would be remiss of me not to extend this invitation, lest we impose on Mister Black’s hospitality indefinitely: Mister Noveda, how would you like to attend Hogwarts this coming fall?”

Perfect. This is what they’d been wanting. Zach beams. “Wow! I’d love to!”

“He won’t be joining the incoming first years, surely,” Zorian interrupts, leaning in. “Zach’s fifteen, he should be a fifth year.”

“I shall arrange some placement exams for Mister Noveda to take at the end of summer,” Dumbledore replies peaceably, blue eyes twinkling. “I trust that you are as good of a tutor as Mister Noveda claims, my boy.”

He’s not sure if that’s meant to be bait or not, but he snatches at it anyway. “Could I possibly also take the placement exams?” he asks, only just not slamming his hands against the desktop. “I’ve essentially already self-taught myself the entire second year curriculum, and the third year curriculum as well in certain classes.” He tilts his chin up to stare intently into Dumbledore’s eyes, in the way that Zach teasingly describes as ‘glaring daggers’ (which is potentially now even more unsettling, what with his vivid green eyes). “I have the scores and temperament to thrive in a more academically rigorous environment –Professor Snape and Professor McGonagall would both agree with me –and I believe that my friendship with Zach proves that I will find it easier to connect with older, more mature peers. If these mock exams will be taking place either way, I ask that you please allow me this opportunity to succeed.”

For a second, the office is silent.

Then Zach raises an eyebrow and snickers. “You’re such a swot,” he teases, and Zorian reflexively turns to smack him in the shoulder with the heel of his hand, using all his strength (which is still not much, because it’s at an awkward angle and he’s eleven years old, but is sufficient enough to bruise). “Ow!”

“I literally hate you, who taught you to say that?” he accuses. “Was it Sirius?”

“f*ck if I’ll tell you,” Zach says gleefully, and dodges a second strike.

By the time they get themselves back together, he’s missed Dumbledore’s initial reaction, though he can tell the headmaster is now amused. “Had you already been enrolled, Mister Noveda, and were it not the summer holidays, I would’ve had to take off House points for crude language,” he scolds warmly. “Nonetheless, my dear boy, I have heard from Minerva that you are seeking additional or accelerated classes this coming year, particularly in transfiguration. I must say that it is unprecedented to allow a non-transfer student to skip an entire year as you are proposing, especially if we consider that electives begin in the third year. If you wish to feel more challenged in your classes, I would advise you to discuss advanced studies or extracurricular tutoring with individual professors. If you wish to socialize with classmates in other years, might I suggest joining one of the many clubs that have formed here at Hogwarts?”

Zorian frowns, but nods curtly, even though he has absolutely no interest in doing that.

The reality of the situation is this: that any relationship he forms in this world will be lost as soon as he returns home, with no chance of continued conversation. Although there are certainly people he likes in this universe, and that he would consider his friends and allies, he wants to avoid entrenching himself in any deeper acquaintanceships that might render him reluctant to leave. The only person he will get to keep, in the end, is Zach –who Zorian must admit is already his best friend, as well as very possibly the only person who truly knows him in either world.

When they return from Hogwarts, Zorian steps out of the fireplace to see Kreacher waiting for him in the parlor… along with an unfamiliar house elf, with green eyes the size of tennis balls, much less ashen skin than Kreacher, and dressed in an old, off-white pillowcase rather than the tunic-like wrap that Kreacher fashions out of the cloths he’s given. At Zorian’s appearance it jumps forward and bows so low that the tip of its long nose brushes the carpet, and Kreacher belatedly follows suit, looking distinctly displeased.

“Who’s this, Kreacher?”

“I’s Dobby, Harry Potter, sir!” Kreacher’s frown deepens as the other house elf –Dobby –stands back up and starts speaking in a startlingly high-pitched voice. “So long has Dobby been wanting to meet the great Harry Potter, such an honor it is!”

“Dobby is a Malfoy family house elf, Master Harry,” Kreacher interrupts. The two elves glare at each other.

“Dobby will have to punish himself most grievously for coming to see you, sir. Dobby will have to shut his ears in the oven door for this. But Dobby has come to protect Harry Potter, to warn him, even if he does have to shut his ears in the oven door later… the great Harry Potter must not go back to Hogwarts!”

Kreacher abruptly turns and smacks the other elf upside the head. “Do not presume to tell the young master what to do!” he hisses. “It is a good house elf’s place to be seen and not be heard.”

“It’s fine, Kreacher.” Kreacher reluctantly stands down, allowing him to examine Dobby with narrowed eyes. Like Kreacher (and perhaps all house elves), Dobby has completely opaque, effectively impenetrable mental shields. “Why mustn't I return to Hogwarts? Explain the purposes behind your warning to me, as clearly as possible, so long as it does not cause you to enact any sort of punishment on yourself.”

“Harry Potter sir is too kind,” Dobby squeaks, trembling all over. Zorian is a little alarmed to see tears welling up in the house elf’s bulging eyes. “If Harry Potter goes back to Hogwarts, he will be in mortal danger. Dobby heard tell that the great Harry Potter met the Dark Lord for a second time… that Harry Potter escaped yet again. Sir is too great, too good to lose. There is a plot, Harry Potter. A plot to make most terrible things happen at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry this year. Harry Potter must not put himself in peril. He is too important, sir!"

He trades a look with Zach, who’s watching this entire encounter with raised eyebrows. “Can you tell me what the danger is?” Dobby makes a horrible choking noise, and Kreacher grabs him by the pillowcase-collar before he can slam his head into the side of their nice wooden coffee table.

"This is why good house elves should not be going against his master’s wishes,” Kreacher says knowingly. Zorian has to suppress an inappropriate snicker, knowing that Kreacher goes against Sirius’ wishes all the time – albeit, much more elegantly than Dobby currently is.

“Stop doing that,” Zorian sighs. “Let’s try this: yes or no questions. Dobby, you can nod or shake your head if you’re able to answer, and if you can’t answer without punishing yourself, don’t do anything at all.” Dobby stops struggling in Kreacher’s grasp and stands again, not looking Zorian in the eye, but giving a little nod in response. “Is the Dark Lord behind this plot?”

Slowly, hesitantly, Dobby shakes his head.

“Do you know where the danger is coming from, and who is behind the plot?” Dobby nods this time, more confidently. “And it’s nothing at all to do with the Dark Lord?”

Although Dobby shakes his head again, he keeps glancing towards Zorian meaningfully, as if trying to give him some sort of hint. “Not… not He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, sir,” he whispers.

Not relating to the Dark Lord, but perhaps indirectly related to him or his cause, possibly something to do with his followers. Dobby is a Malfoy family elf. There’s something there that’s yet to click –but it will, eventually. “Is the danger more or less than when the Dark Lord was quite literally teaching at the school last year?” Zorian asks.

“More, Harry Potter sir,” Dobby says emphatically. “Much, much more. Terrible, horrible things! Harry Potter must not return to school.” What danger in the British wizarding world is greater than Voldemort, the actively genocidal Dark Lord?

“The danger isn’t to do with the Dark Lord,” he says, “but is it to do with Tom Riddle?”

Dobby shrieks and jumps about a foot in the air; Zach claps his hands over his ears and Zorian only just resists doing the same. “The valiant Harry Potter is even brighter, even greater than Dobby could’ve guessed!” the elf squeaks loudly, and Zorian grimaces. Draco Malfoy is already obnoxious; Draco Malfoy armed with a piece of the Dark Lord’s soul will be an absolute terror – and if Dobby is to be believed, a potentially deadly one. Perhaps a Draco Malfoy possessed by a piece of the Dark Lord’s soul? For some reason, he imagines Draco with Tom Riddle’s dark eyes, holding the imperial dagger and preparing to stab him in his sleep. It’s not a particularly comforting image, but it is a little ridiculous.

“Will the other students still be in danger if I do not attend school this fall?” Zach turns to stare at him, and Zorian sends him a mental eye-roll; obviously they'll still be attending Hogwarts, he's just asking.

Dobby shrinks in on himself sheepishly, and doesn’t answer –which is, quite frankly, somewhat alarming, as it means that Zorian is not necessarily the target of whatever the Malfoys have planned. He feels as if this has the potential to become very complicated very quickly, and quietly hopes he will not have to actually kill one of his classmates. He hopes that none of his classmates will die, just in general.

“Well, I thank you for the warning,” Zorian says. “I’ll think about it, alright? You can go home now.” He glances at Kreacher, who nods. “Dobby, you’re dismissed.”

“Thank you, Mister Harry Potter, sir!” And with a pop, Dobby handily disappears.

Chapter 5: As the Seventh Month Dies

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As the summer goes on, Zorian really comes to regret destroying the locket so soon. He genuinely hadn’t expected the purification ritual to work immediately, even though it had been the Summer Solstice… starting at dawn and ending at high noon… and they’d taken care to gather power for the entire morning, to give it the highest chance of success… well, perhaps he should have expected it. But he thinks of the intelligent dark eye that peered out at him from within the locket, and the way Tom Riddle’s soul flitted around his hands as he examined its vessel, and the way Walburga said, “you’re reminiscent of him”. Destroying the horcruxes will make the Dark Lord mortal again, but it won’t make killing him easy.

Also, he must admit that he is curious. Severus once said that the only one who might be able to teach him anything worthwhile in the field of legilimency would be the Dark Lord… and after running up against Severus’ reluctance to teach him anything truly unsavory, he suspects the same could be said for the Dark Arts. Zorian has long been willing to put aside his scruples in the name of knowledge and potentially getting an upper hand –and Zach wouldn’t let him go off the deep end, now that he’s here as well (knowing someone will be keeping an eye on him is actually a massive relief, although he would never admit it. Getting a morality check from an outside perspective is much easier than constantly putting his own actions and motives under a microscope to make sure they don’t cross an arbitrary line… even if “whatever upsets Zach” is still somewhat arbitrary).

If the horcruxes are sentient, and not only sentient but conscious of their environment, and not only conscious but willing and able to communicate –that opens up a lot of fresh avenues to explore. There are opportunities there that he doesn’t want to throw into the fire before he at least knows what’s being offered. And if the Dark Lord’s soul proves to be too dangerous an opponent, which he must admit is always possible, they have a pocket dimension built to contain him, and a reliable method by which to destroy its vessels. He would say that, if their Summer Solstice bonfire was so effective, some sort of bathing or washing ritual at Spring Equinox should also work, perhaps one spanning the full twelve hours of daylight? This, at least, he’ll still be able to discuss with Severus, and the equinox is still many months away.

And so perhaps an idea starts to brew in his mind, and perhaps he lets it ferment. Whether or not anything comes of it, he’ll have to wait and see.

In the meantime, Zach leads him gleefully downstairs to Grimmauld Place’s back garden, and he senses a surprising number of familiar minds a mere second before the door opens and they’re all jumping out at him.

“HAPPY BIRTHDAY!”

Zorian, who’s birthday is quite distinctly in late winter, and who hasn’t celebrated his birthday in many years anyway on account of the time loop, flinches first and then stares. Remus and Sirius are there, along with what he can only assume is the entire Tonks family, and his classmates Hermione, Tracey, Theo, and Blaise. [I tried to invite your friend Severus, but Sirius wouldn’t let me,] Zach says, which snaps him out of his shocked silence enough that he can walk forward into the garden, taking in the decorations and the arrangement of food spread out across a long table. Then, aloud –“Do you like it?”

And so, on Harry Potter’s birthday, they enjoy themselves. It’s a genuinely nice party that Zach’s planned for them, made all the more impressive by the fact that it’s still somewhat intimate, and that he resisted inviting Zorian’s entire year at Hogwarts, and everyone else he knew the name of. Something about it feels very sentimental, almost bitter-sweet, and he can tell that Sirius and Remus feel it too; he has to hope that the real Harry Potter is having a very excellent twelfth birthday spent with friends and family in the afterlife, since he never had anything like this in life. Similarly, he hopes that he’ll be home soon, so that he can finally turn sixteen in the company of people he can guiltlessly call his friends, and family members he’s found himself to actually like.

The rest of the party almost seems to slip past him. Kreacher was the one who’d cooked up the practical banquet of a lunch; there is fresh salad of both fruit and vegetable varieties, and they cut off slices of freshly roasted chicken to make sandwiches. There is quite a beautiful birthday cake decorated with twelve candles, many ice cream flavors, and Zach surprises him once again by revealing custard and fruit tarts, close to (but still not quite) what they might’ve had at home.

He speaks to Hermione about their summer homework, which has been keeping her busy alongside her muggle summer school (and which he admittedly hasn’t started yet), and his Slytherin yearmates join them when they start discussing the second year curriculum. All four of them have previewed the material to some extent, and even Zach is pulled in to talk about the third year electives – Zorian thinks he’d like to take ancient runes and arithmancy, if he isn’t able to vanquish the Dark Lord this year, while Zach is primarily interested in care of magical creatures. Theo says that his father, one Theobald Nott, is very sorry he couldn’t make it; judging by their family’s naming conventions, Zorian has to guess that the Theodorus that Walburga Black mentioned must’ve also been a Nott, possibly Theo’s grandfather. Perhaps the infamous Cantankerous Nott who’d put the Sacred 28 bloodlines down into writing simply hadn’t been part of the main hereditary line?

Sirius and Tonks fight over the right to introduce him to Andromeda Tonks, Sirius’ “favorite cousin, not that she has much competition,” he laughs. They look like cousins standing next to each other, with their bloodline’s haughty, aristocratic features and piercing gray eyes, though Sirius has slightly darker hair, and Andromeda’s face is creased with smile lines rather than stressed ones. Tonks –her given name is Nymphadora, though she makes such a grimace when her mother introduces her as such –spots him looking, and with a wink, magicks herself a head of curly dark hair to match, though she keeps it stylishly short (Zach gasps with delight at the show, and Zorian feels how pleased Tonks is to have someone new to boast about her metamorphmagus abilities to). Andromeda’s muggleborn husband, one Ted Tonks, could not stand out more in their little circle; he’s light haired, big-bellied, and relentlessly warm, mellow, and friendly.

“Pleasure to meet you, ma’am,” Zorian says, with a shallow bow.

“Please,” says Andromeda, “call me Andy.” She holds out a hand to shake the muggle way, and he sees that the Black crest on his wristband matches the one etched onto her silver bracelet; the raven’s eyes are set with small black stones. He believes he’s still set to inherit the main Black vault from Sirius, so he makes a mental note to have his godfather replace him in the will with Nymphadora. Better that the fortune goes to the Tonks rather than the Malfoys, once he’s gone.

And in the end it’s him and Zach, each holding a plate of cake and a fork as they stand on the steps up to the back door, watching everyone else socialize. The cake is perfectly moist and fluffy, the frosting is so sweet that it makes his back teeth tingle slightly, and cream between layers is cut with cubes of soft yellow peach just sour enough that he doesn’t have to put his plate down after one bite.

“Happy twelfth birthday, Zorian,” Zach teases, and Zorian has to look over his shoulder and crane his neck upwards in order to properly roll his eyes in response. Not only must Zach be significantly taller than him, he has also decided to stand two steps above him on the stairs to rub it in. “I got you something,” he continues.

“Everyone says we’re doing gifts later,” Zorian reminds him.

“I got you something for that too, don’t worry,” he says with a laugh. Zorian turns fully to see him pull a few rolls of parchment out of his bag and pass them over; when he unrolls them he finds the mock 2nd year exams that he’d written with Remus’ help a few days back, fully filled out. One roll is even a full history of magic paper written in messy cursive, with Remus’ signature across the top confirming that it was written within the time limit. They’re all in reasonably fluent English. “So… what do you think?”

“You’re on track,” Zorian replies, switching to Ikosian and lowering his voice. “If you just know the third year material for the core subjects they’ll have to let you into fourth year, which is the best we can hope for –you may just have to take electives with third year students, but that’s not bad at all. I’ll go over the questions with you later but they look good. I’m impressed, when did you have time to do these? Your English is improving faster than I expected.”

Zach scratches his neck sheepishly. “Actually, I finally got a translation spell to work,” he says, and Zorian raises his eyebrows. “It does still require that I know English, and the spell should improve accuracy based on how fluent I am –I used one of those forensic divinations as a base, it looks at the English input and outputs a best guess in Ikosian using illusion magic to change the text on the page.”

“Have you modified it for hearing English spoken in real time? You’ll be hearing lectures more often than reading from your textbook, once school starts–” Zorian cuts himself off. “Don’t get too reliant on it though, it's a crutch. If it’s only using English you already know, your language skills will never improve.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Zach pokes him in the shoulder. “The essays were all me though, so please ignore my spelling mistakes? English spelling f*cking sucks and makes no sense.”

He huffs out a laugh, and when someone taps him on the elbow, he jerks his head up so fast that Zach almost falls backwards. “Constant vigilance!” Tonks teases in sing-song. “What are you boys whispering about?”

“Just Zach’s enrollment at Hogwarts this fall,” he answers. “He’ll be the first transfer student in several decades, and obviously, his circ*mstances are rather unique. Do you think he’ll be sorted alongside the first-years?”

“Hmm, probably,” Tonks says. “They do like to make a spectacle of it, don’t they? Say, firstie Zach, what House do you reckon you’ll be in?”

“Gryffindor,” he and Zach chorus, as one. It’s just obvious. Whereas Zorian could pretty much see himself in any other House, Zach is practically a textbook Gryffindor, utterly determined, self-sacrificing, and reckless. He is neither cunning nor ambitious enough to join Zorian in Slytherin, lacks the desire for knowledge that characterizes Ravenclaws, and he simply doesn’t have the work ethic (or the modesty) for Hufflepuff. There is no other House he could possibly be sorted into.

“Well, it’s good to have a strong sense of identity,” she laughs. “You two are a riot. I wish I could be there to see Hogwarts throw a fit over a Slytherin and a Gryffindor being as buddy-buddy as you two have been –and you being the Boy Who Lived at that, Harry.”

Zorian groans. “I studied with Hermione nearly all of last year, and she’s a Gryffindor.”

“If you and Hermione act like that, I would already be reading gossip columns about it,” Tonks reassures him, though the sentiment is ruined by an insinuating wink. He scowls, refusing to look at what kind of face Zach is making, and Tonks holds up both hands with a grin. “I jest, I jest. Hey, it’s good to see you doing well though. After the Pettigrew debacle it’s nice to see that we actually do make a difference, seeing you living with your godfather now and all.”

“Right, I nearly forgot about Pettigrew,” he says. “Any luck tracking him down?”

“Not yet,” she sighs. “He’s warded himself against nearly all our methods of tracking, so apparently it's nearly impossible to even get a direction on him. I gotta say it’s been a great learning experience, but I just can’t keep up with the senior aurors even with Moody dragging me along, and it’s not great to feel like we aren’t making any progress with it all. Our best guess is that he’s already left the country somehow.”

“Damn,” Zach says. [Aurors?]

[Magical law enforcement,] Zorian thinks back. [Tonks is a trainee; Moody is her mentor.]

“Let me know if I can help at all,” Zach offers. “My world has loads of spells for tracking and scrying that Pettigrew won’t know anything about.”

“I’ll let everyone know,” Tonks says cheerfully, though Zorian can sense her doubt. He hopes she’ll follow through anyways though –he hasn’t been able to offer his own expertise, for obvious reasons (and capturing Pettigrew just isn’t high on his priority list), but he’s absolutely willing to pass Zach everything he ever learned about divination from Haslush.

“So what’s this I’m hearing about you and Hermione?” Zach jokes, changing the subject.

“I will push you down these stairs, Zach Noveda,” Zorian threatens. “She’s twelve.”

“You’re twelve,” says Tonks, looking terribly amused. “Have I said happy birthday yet?”

Later in the afternoon, he opens gifts. Hermione got him a sturdy muggle planner for the upcoming school year and a pack of colorful highlighters, which he is verbally appreciative enough of that none of the purebloods mock her gift; likely she teamed up with Tracey, who presents him with a selection of muggle pens, mechanical pencils, and erasers. Theo and Blaise both get him books again –a leatherbound copy of Cantankerous Nott’s Pure-blood Directory and a frivolous adventure novel titled Auror Adrian and the Monstrous Masquerade respectively (Zorian raises an eyebrow at the latter, but Blaise only grins at him shamelessly). From Tonks and her family he receives a wand holster that straps to his wrist and forearm, hidden beneath the wide sleeves of his robes, and she shows him how to flick his wand into his hand with a single smooth gesture.

He unwraps Zach’s gift next, lifts the lid on the box just enough to catch a glimpse of gleaming red, and then snaps the box such again. Zach snickers. “You are terrible,” he announces, very seriously, and his friend covers his mouth with both hands to suppress further laughter.

Placing the f*cking Philosopher’s Stone aside, however Zach got his hands on that, he reaches for the final package, labeled a combined gift from Sirius and Remus: a small, square, handheld mirror with a silver frame and a solid handle. On the back of the mirror is the raised image of a stag in a forest clearing of some kind, framed by botanicals.

“It’s a two-way mirror that used to belong to James,” Sirius tells him, and pulls out a matching mirror framed in gold. Although James Potter was not really his father… Zorian supposes that he doesn’t know the man any more than Harry Potter would have. Merlin knows he’s gotten enough comments that they look nearly identical. “I’ve got the other; we used to use them when we were stuck in separate detentions. Of course, we kept ‘em way more inconspicuous back then, but I thought it’d be a nicer gift if I got some custom frames made.” On the back of Sirius’ mirror, he sees a familiar grinning dog. “If you ever want to chat, just say my name into it –you’ll appear in my mirror, and I’ll be able to talk in yours.”

This, he realizes, is actually purely a Sirius gift, which means that Remus will have something for him later that’s just not fit for him to present in public. By evening, after everyone’s gone home (by floo, apparation, or in Hermione’s case, when her parents’ very ordinary car pulls up to Grimmauld Place’s front door) this is confirmed when Remus presents him a leatherbound copy of The Art of Self-Transfiguration.

“Although human transfiguration is not usually taught to Hogwarts students until their sixth year, James and Sirius first discovered this book in their own second years,” Remus tells him briskly. “I’ve bookmarked several things in here that you may find useful, and added some annotations when relevant –particularly, I think you’ll appreciate the ability to transfigure yourself appear as your true age. I should note that self-transformation is extremely dangerous and strictly not permitted at Hogwarts, except for under the direction of a professor… but perhaps unfortunately, there are things more important than following the rules.” The corners of his eyes crinkle in amusem*nt. “I’ve also contributed some notes on the animagus transformation, though if you really do want to explore that avenue, you should talk to Padfoot.”

The first thing that has been putting him off the animagus transformation is that the first step is keeping a mandrake leaf in his mouth for an entire month, to be used as a potion ingredient; the second is that, unlike the shifter ritual or transformation potions, he will not get to choose what animal he transforms into. The third is that he suspects the animagus ability is associated, connected, or even anchored to the soul somehow, which could pose an issue for when he returns home; when he left the timeloop, the permanent tunneler toad enhancement – which had been anchored to his life force – had unraveled and crippled his mana reserves for several days. A similar enhancement, but anchored as tightly and intrinsically as the shifter ability, and to his soul rather than his life force, has the potential for severe future repercussions. It’s a huge risk for only a chance at receiving a useful ability.

Being able to look like himself, however… or even just transfiguring himself to look like an adult –that could be incredibly useful. Polyjuice potion is expensive and difficult to acquire, not to mention having to retrieve a sample from someone innocuous and unrecognizable. Even just hiding his scar, and then slightly changing his face shape, skin tone, and eye color would be a perfectly effective and practical disguise.

A common sight for he and Moony that summer is to walk into the parlor and see Harry –no, Zorian – with his legs slung over Zach’s lap, the older teen using his godson’s thighs as a flat surface upon which to study, and Zorian with some fiddly bit of metal floating above his face, rotating slowly as symbols etched themselves into its surface (any insinuation he makes about the nature of Zach’s relationship with his godson is simply met with laughter or a derisive scoff, depending on who’s present, so he had eventually just given up). On a particular afternoon in early August, however, instead of some tiny watch gear, or an incomprehensible bit of machinery, Sirius comes down the stairs to find the pup carving runes into Flamel’s thrice-damned Philosopher’s Stone.

Now, Sirius would never admit this for love or money, but his godson can be rather intimidating. He really hadn’t thought it possible for a twelve year old to be scary –and of course, he’s not personally afraid of Zori, who probably about as dangerous to him as any disgruntled teenager –but there’s something really uncanny about the kid. It’s just weird to see that disdainful eyebrow-raise on James’ face, or a cold, calculating glare that uses Lily’s eyes. Also, Moony totally agrees with him that Zorian’s way over-competent for a fifteen (or maybe sixteen now?) year old, even compared to them that grew up in the midst of a war. It’s the casual wandless magic, the unthinking displays of power, the absolutely blasé way he talks about horcruxes and other Dark Arts… well, Sirius just doesn’t know what to make of it. It’s just weird.

“Zorian,” he says, slowly, just to make sure. His godson glances up at him. “Is that, by chance, the bloody Philosopher’s Stone?”

Here is another thing that happened this summer, for which his godson was the impetus: he found out that his little brother betrayed Voldemort, in the end. Turned against his master with enough force that he died from it, even if he didn’t manage to actually destroy that piece of Voldemort’s soul. The same year that he was the best man at James and Lily’s wedding, Regulus was in some horrible nightmare cave, drinking poison and getting dragged to his watery grave, sacrificing his life so that someone else might kill the Dark Lord he’d sworn his life to. Reggie, for whom he’d resentfully taken a thousand punishments as a kid; who he’d somewhat guiltily ignored for all their shared school years; who he hadn’t even tried to pull away from Voldemort’s service; who’s death he hadn’t even mourned until now.

Moony is the one who’d dragged him through most of his wrestling with this new grief, over the past months –no need to subject the kids to his mental breakdowns. Remus has truly been his rock and anchor since being released from St. Mungo’s, in a way that he can’t fully conceptualize, let alone ever pay back (Moony still calls him Padfoot, sometimes, like they can pretend that they aren’t the only two Marauders left).

“Just don’t worry about it,” Zorian replies, returning his attention to the project in front of him. Zach giggles. “We can give it back to the Flamels when I’m done.”

“What does that mean?” He comes over to get a closer look; Zorian is using a thin-tipped marker to ink lines of unfamiliar runes and geometric symbols into the Stone’s blood red surface. “Pretty sure that’s not the way to make gold or the elixir, pup.”

“Oh, I’m not trying to do either,” Zori replies peaceably. “I was thinking, if the stone holds the transformative force to power such intensive alchemical transformations an infinite number of times, I should be able to utilize that force as a form of energy to power magical constructs.”

This is, he must admit, one of the reasons Sirius believes he must have the most terrifying godson on the planet. He is simultaneously wary and proud.

There is one more thing that he is not yet sure how he will contend with: once, he asked what would happen once Zorian manages to kill Voldemort and return home. His godson traded a look with Zach, and replied, “Well… you see, Harry had already passed away before I arrived here, and only my soul and magic passed over to this world. So when I go home, it’ll be like… I’m dead, essentially, which will at least make things easy to explain. I’ll leave the body behind, and everything.”

The truth is this: his godson has been dead the entire time. He never actually knew Harry, only the stranger inhabiting his body –and when the stranger goes home, he won’t get his godson back. Harry Potter has been dead this entire time.

Chapter 6: Flourish and Blotts

Chapter Text

Zorian jerks awake, breathing hard and with one hand already pressed to the lightning-bolt scar on his forehead, which burns beneath his fingers like someone’s just pressed a red-hot brand to his skin. His mental clock tells him that it’s just after four in the morning.

Hermione had owled him a few days ago, now that the book lists for the upcoming year had come in (including the entire repertoire of an author named Gilderoy Lockhart), to say that she would be in London later that day to purchase her books, and wondering if he might like to meet up with her family in Diagon Alley. They don’t have Zach’s booklist yet, seeing as he’s likely to get a custom one once he completes his placement exams, but he’d owled back a confirmation regardless. Their entire household would be making a day trip out of it, and they’d been planning to leave around noon, which gives him plenty of time to catch another few hours of sleep, but…

He prods the curse scar, and winces. What had he just been dreaming about? The memories are only half as hazy as those of a true dream –in fact, they feel strangely more like those initial fading memories of his deal with the angels, which he’d had to contend with during his first summer in this world. It’s not a very comforting comparison, if he’s honest.

If he concentrates, he can remember a dark room with a warm fire, but feeling a bone-deep cold and fatigue despite what (now that he’s awake)he feels to be a frankly oppressive mid-August heat wave. There was definitely a snake on the hearth rug, for which he’d felt a strange affection, and he’d been talking to someone he despised… a cowardly man who’d been taking care of him, who he’d called Wormtail –Peter Pettigrew. He can only recall snatches of their conversation: something about the snake’s venom, a distinct sense of ironic amusem*nt, a plot to capture Harry Potter. Frustratingly, the details escape him, except that he thought his wordplay about “giving their right hands” was really quite funny.

He was dreaming from Voldemort’s perspective, Zorian realizes. Through the piece of soul that is anchored to his curse scar, he was somehow able to subconsciously scry for Voldemort in his dreams. If he can figure out how to do the same but consciously, scrying in the typical way using a mirror or a shallow dish of reflective liquid, or even better, access Voldemort’s mind through meditation alone –this could be extremely useful. They would always know what the Dark Lord is planning.

The only reason he doesn’t immediately cross the hall and wake up Zach is because, despite everything, he’s still not a morning person –though he does also try to be a good friend. Excited and pleased, though his scar still twinges painfully, Zorian slides back into bed and pulls his covers, which are enchanted to stay and just the right temperature, back up to his chin.

He wakes up for the second time at around half past nine; their household has a leisurely brunch, prepared by Kreacher, and then they take the floo to Diagon Alley. As planned, they meet the Grangers in front of Gringotts –but surprisingly, they run into the Weasley clan inside, having just come back up from their vault, as Hermione’s parents exchange muggle currency for the standard coins. To his surprise, Mrs. Weasley embraces Sirius and Remus, one after the other, with warm greetings and pats on the back for them both; Mr. Weasley is introduced to the Grangers, and immediately invites them to have a drink.

“Dad works in the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office at the ministry,” Ron explains sheepishly. “He’s really interested in all kinds of muggle stuff, since he grew up pureblood and all. Your parents are going to be pestered with all sorts of questions.” He rarely sees Ron and Hermione interact with each other, for all that they’re in Gryffindor and the same year. Although (from what he understands) Ron was rather unkind to her towards the beginning of last year, after Quirrell let in the troll on Halloween their relationship seemed to simmer down, and he stopped antagonizing her. For now, Ron is merely awkward, and Hermione’s side-eye is coolly assessing but not frigid.

On the marble steps before the bank they separate, somewhat unexpectedly, into groups –Remus decides to join Mr. Weasley and the Grangers at the Leaky Cauldron, and Mrs. Weasley passes Ron off to Zorian, Hermione, and Sirius simply because they’ll be shopping for the same things, so that she can pull a flustered Ginny off towards Ollivander’s. Zach and he exchange a quick glance before the former elects to join the twins and their friend Lee Jordan, since unless something goes unforeseeably wrong, he’ll most likely be sharing a dormitory with them once they head off to Hogwarts; Percy, the eldest Weasley brother present (and if he remembers correctly, one of the Gryffindor prefects), wanders off on his own with a mutter about needing a new quill.

"We'll all meet at Flourish and Blotts in an hour to buy your school books," Mrs. Weasley announces, and with one more warning to the twins not to take a single step down Knockturn Alley, they all go their separate ways.

They first get ice cream cones, on Sirius’ dime and insistence (it really is far too hot out), then go buy their various potions ingredients, stationary supplies, and suchlike. They stop for Ron at Quality Quidditch Supplies, where he spends some time longingly staring at the brooms –now that they’ll be in second year, they’re technically old enough to have their own, though Ron doesn’t purchase anything –and then for Sirius at Gambol and Japes Wizarding Joke Shop, where they run into Zach, Lee Jordan, Fred, and George in the fireworks aisle.

[Good?] Zorian asks, from across the store, where Sirius is looking for fun ways in which he can spike Remus’ tea.

[Fantastic,] Zach confirms. [Absolutely brilliant. You’ll love these.]

[I’ll love… prank products?] he clarifies, skeptically.

Zach grins. [You love explosions, unconventional ways to use magic, and innocuous objects you can use to cause mayhem.] This is, admittedly, quite accurate.

[Show me when we get home,] he says.

After leaving Gambol and Japes, Zorian is the one to drag their group into a tiny junk shop down the way, full of broken wands, lopsided brass scales, and old cloaks covered in potion stains. Surprisingly they find Percy there, deeply immersed in a small book called Prefects Who Gained Power. “‘A study of Hogwarts prefects and their later careers’,” reads Ron, leaning over to eye the back cover. “That sounds fascinating…”

“Go away,” Percy snaps, smacking the spine of the book lightly against Ron’s forehead.

After they leave, Zorian having purchased a broken silver pocket-watch, Ron confides to them in an undertone: “Course, he's very ambitious, Percy, he's got it all planned out. He wants to be Minister of Magic. We’ve barely seen him all summer though, he’s been locking himself in his room. Wish I knew what he was up to –he got twelve Outstandings on his O.W.L.s and barely gloated at all.”

“Twelve?” Zorian asks, surprised. “How many exams did he take? I thought that nine classes was already considered a full class schedule for upperclassmen.”

“I think you can take three or more electives with a professor’s permission,” Ron reveals, and Hermione perks up with interest. “Not sure why you’d want to though. Bill –my oldest brother –also got all twelve O.W.L.s, and he told Perce to just self-study for the divination and muggle studies exams.”

After an hour’s passed, they follow the flow of foot traffic along the street to start making their way towards Flourish and Blotts –and as they approach, they soon see a surprisingly large crowd jostling outside the doors, trying to get in, despite the efforts of a rather harassed-looking man standing near the entrance. A banner stretched across the store’s upper windows reveals the reason why, proclaiming: “GILDEROY LOCKHART will be signing copies of his autobiography ‘MAGICAL ME’,” and then beneath that, “Today 12:30PM - 4:3oPM”.

Zorian can’t help grimacing; he’s never gotten over his distaste of large crowds, even after mastering his empath ability, and today especially it’s far too hot and sticky out to be around so many people in close proximity. Trying to find the other Weasleys in the crowd will be a nightmare. “Perhaps we should come back on a different day,” he suggests… at the same time as Hermione squeals with excitement.

“We can actually meet him!” she says, grabbing his arm. “Harry, come on. I mean, he's written almost the whole booklist!”

“Leave it to me,” says Sirius, affixing a too-wide grin to his face. It makes him look rather mass-murderer-y, which is ironic considering what he’d been convicted for, and the crowd parts before him like water as he swans on into the store, Zorian and the two Gryffindors following close on his heels.

“Your godfather is cool,” Ron whispers to him. “Crazy terrifying, but cool.”

A long line, starting at the back of the store where Gilderoy Lockhart is signing his books, winds around the entire shop and out the door, where it merges into the clamoring crowd they’d just come through. They each grab a copy of The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 2 before sneaking up the line to where Remus, the rest of the Weasleys, and Hermione’s parents are standing; all their other textbooks are repeats from first year, except for the Lockhart books.

“Hey Moony,” says Sirius, directly into Remus’ ear, and the werewolf flinches forward with a yelp.

“Merlin, Sirius,” he scolds, then looks down at Zorian and his peers with a smile. “There you three are. We’re still waiting on Zach and your brothers, Ron –although I believe Percy made it here some minutes ago, and simply decided he would rather look at some other books than stand in line.”

“Can I also go do that?” Zorian pleads. The atmosphere of the entire store is unpleasant, and he really doesn’t want to tangibly feel how flustered these adult women are by Lockhart’s mere presence. “You already know what books I need to get, they’re the same as everyone else’s. I don’t care if they’re signed, so there’s no real reason for us to stand in line.”

“We’ll be at the front of the line in just a minute,” says Mrs. Weasley, who’s attempting to fix her hair –the heat and humidity has not been kind to it. Sure enough, Gilderoy Lockhart slowly comes into view. He sits at a table surrounded by large paintings and framed photographs of his own face, all winking and flashing blindingly white teeth at the crowd. For a second he can’t even pick out which among them is the real Lockhart, as he is making the exact same expression as his many reflections, but he’s eventually able to connect the peaco*ck-tail-feather quill to an arm draped in pale blue fabric, which is then attached to the actual person Gilderoy Lockhart at the shoulder.

He must say that he is immediately skeptical of the man’s competency; he simply lacks the aura of intelligence and power that Zorian typically expects from an experienced combat mage… though admittedly, his best friend (and one of the best practitioners of martial magic he knows) is Zach, so he’s forced to reserve his judgment. By the reactions of other people in the store, he supposes that Lockhart must be considered attractive by some metric of physical appearance, but personally Zorian doesn’t see the appeal; that level of borderline uncanny self-absorption just isn’t his style. Certainly the man is using glamours, if not some sort of attraction charm or enchantment –if so, Zorian’s mind magic might explain why he’s so unaffected.

Nearby, a short, irritable-looking man dances around Lockhart’s table, taking photographs with a large black camera that emits puffs of purple smoke with every blinding flash. Ron nearly runs into him as the line moves forward, and he snarls, “Out of the way! This is for the Daily Prophet,” before any of them can react.

Ron stumbles back, rubbing his foot where the photographer had stepped on it. “Big deal,” he huffs.

“Are you okay?” Zorian asks, glaring. What kind of asshole nearly bowls over a twelve year old kid and then doesn’t even apologize? Unfortunately, Gilderoy Lockhart apparently hears him, because he looks up, glances briefly at Ron, and then his eyes slide immediately over to Zorian. He stares –Zorian grimaces –and then leaps to his feet with a shout.

“It can’t be Harry Potter?” The crowd parts, whispering excitedly and applauding as Lockhart lunges forward, seizes Zorian’s arm despite his best efforts to hide behind Sirius, and pulls him into the empty space that’s formed just in front of his table. Somehow ignoring his furious scowl, Lockhart shakes his hand rigorously for the photographer and grins. “Nice big smile, Harry,” he says, through his own gleaming teeth. “Together, you and I are worth the front page.” As soon as Lockhart’s grip loosens even slightly, Zorian yanks his hand back and cradles it to his chest –his fingers feel slightly numb. He attempts to sidle back towards his group, but Lockhart throws an arm around his shoulders and clamps him tightly to his side.

“Let f*cking go of me,” he hisses, trying not to make a scene. Lockhart doesn’t look at him and pretends not to have heard, so he stomps harshly down on the man’s foot with the heel of his dragonhide boot –which does make the grip loosen, but even so is only slightly more effective. “Let go of me or I will start screaming,” he warns in a slightly louder voice, and Lockhart finally seems to learn how to keep his hands to himself.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Lockhart announces loudly, waving for quiet. “What an extraordinary moment this is! The perfect moment for me to make a little announcement I've been sitting on for some time!

“When young Harry here stepped into Flourish and Blotts today, he only wanted to buy my autobiography –which I shall be happy to present him now, free of charge.” The crowd applauds again. “He had no idea,” Lockhart continues, and Zorian narrowly avoids the hand aiming for his shoulder as he glares daggers into the camera lens, “that he would shortly be getting much, much more than my book, Magical Me. He and his schoolmates will, in fact, be getting the real magical me. Yes, ladies and gentlemen – I have great pleasure and pride in announcing that this September, I will be taking up the post of Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry!”

The crowd cheers and claps, and Zorian accepts the free books even as he vividly imagines committing a murder. Gilderoy Lockhart, he decides, will be very lucky to survive the next year –because if the curse on the DADA position doesn’t kill him, Zorian might take matters into his own hands.

Staggering slightly as he tries to balance the tall pile of books in his hands, he makes his way back over to the group and dumps the entire bunch into the closest Weasley’s cauldron –which happens to be Ginny’s. “Take these,” he says roughly. “I’ll buy my own.”

Zach and the twins had mercifully arrived while he was having one of the worst encounters of his life, and upon seeing them, he falls into his friend with an exhausted grunt. Sirius and Remus surround them somewhat protectively (though neither presumes to touch him); their group as a whole has moved away from the line and back towards the slightly less crowded front of the store. “You okay?” Zach asks, sounding mildly amused, though he pats Zorian comfortingly on the back.

“I think I hate him more than Quatach-Ichl, Jornak, and Silverlake combined,” he mutters in Ikosian; Zach laughs quietly at his expense. “And that was more painful than having my arm sawed off.”

“You can’t kill people just because you don’t like them, buddy,” Zach says, correctly guessing at the direction of his thoughts.

“Eulgh,” Zorian replies, separating himself and rubbing his shoulder. He’s going to steal the necessary copies of those books rather than buying them, he decides, because they’re expensive and he simply refuses to give Lockhart any more money than he already has. Bad enough that, by next month, he’ll have to deal with encountering the man as a professor every week. “I’ll come up with a better reason,” he swears.

“That’s the spirit,” Sirius agrees. “Let me know if I can help!”

“Well, well, well –Arthur Weasley.” It’s an unfamiliar, mocking voice, and Zorian pushes Sirius aside to get a better look at who’s addressing Ron’s father. Unexpectedly, he first makes eye-contact with his classmate Draco, whose face makes an equally surprised expression when he sees Zorian. They nod politely at each other, and then his eyes slide upwards to a man he recognizes as the current leader of the conservative political faction and Lord of House Malfoy: Draco’s father, Lucius. Like his son, Lucius Malfoy has fair skin, and a long, pointed face with a straight nose and strong brows; the Malfoy bloodline has characteristic pale blond, very straight, very fine hair, and unlike Draco (who slicks his hair back), Lucius wears it quite long.

“Lucius,” Mr. Weasley replies coldly.

“Busy time at the Ministry, I hear,” says Lucius. “All those raids… I hope they're paying you overtime?” Like Zorian just a few moments earlier, he reaches into Ginny’s cauldron and extracts an old, battered, very fifth-hand copy of A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration by Emeric Switch –and sneers derisively. “Obviously not. Dear me, what's the use of being a disgrace to the name of wizardkind if they don't even pay you well for it?”

Mr. Weasley flushes darkly with anger. “We have a very different idea of what disgraces the name of wizardkind, Malfoy.”

“Clearly,” says Lucius, turning up his nose snottily. His pale eyes stray to the Grangers, who watch the confrontation apprehensively. “The company you keep, Weasley… and I thought your family could sink no lower–” With a loud clang and thunk, Arthur Weasley sends his daughter’s cauldron flying as he lunges at Lucius, knocking him backwards into a bookshelf. Heavy spellbooks rain down onto all their heads –Remus, thinking fast, casts a shield charm overhead –and their group breaks into loud yelling, with the twins cheering their father on, and Mrs. Weasley shrieking. The crowd ripples around them, knocking even more shelves over, with the poor shop assistant helpless to stop them.

Zorian must say that his jaw literally drops; it is a small consolation to look over and see Draco looking similarly shocked and horrified to see two grown men resorting to physical violence, on the ground, in a crowded public space. In fact, Draco looks considerably more horrified than Zorian feels, which seems fair considering one of the men in question is actually his father. Then, as if things could possibly get any worse, the Daily Prophet photographer snaps a picture with a billowing plume of violet smoke.

“Your father won’t ever let that photo see the light of day,” Zorian attempts to reassure him, and Draco glances at him with wide eyes. “In fact, you should try and get ahold of it sooner rather than later, in case you ever need to blackmail him.” His classmate’s expression quickly goes thoughtful, and Zorian mentally congratulates himself on the successful social interaction.

All at once, Hagrid appears to pull Arthur and Lucius apart. The Weasley family patriarch sports a split lip, while a blooming black eye (from being hit with a hardcover encyclopedia of toadstools) decorates the countenance of the honorable Lord Malfoy. Lucius quickly pulls himself out of Hagrid’s grasp and thrusts Ginny’s transfiguration textbook, which he somehow kept hold of, towards her. “Here, girl – take your book, it's the best your father can give you,” he says nastily, swollen eye glittering with malice. Then he beckons Draco to his side and sweeps out of the shop.

“You should've ignored him, Arthur," Hagrid scolds, straightening the man’s robes for him. Zorian realizes it’s very possible, even likely, that Hagrid was already the groundskeeper at Hogwarts when Ron’s parents were in school… which is a strange thought. “Rotten to the core, the whole family, everyone knows that. No Malfoy's worth listenin' to –bad blood, that's what it is.” What –that’s literally blood politics. Does nobody realize just how ironic it is to deride the Malfoys for being blood supremacists, and then immediately blame their blood for it? “Come on now,” Hagrid continues, “let's get outta here.”

Though the unfortunate shop assistant looks like he wants to stop them from leaving (which is reasonable in Zorian’s opinion, they did make an absolute mess of the store and Mr. Weasley was in many ways the instigator, or at least the one that escalated things to physical violence), Hagrid’s mere presence stops him. They hurry out onto the street, the Hermione’s parents looking distinctly peaky, and Mrs. Weasley practically shaking with fury. It’s a subdued group that makes its way to the Leaky Cauldron to floo home, or in the Grangers’ case, to take the bus –but when the fireplace spits them all out back at Number 12 Grimmauld Place, the members of his household can only take one look at each other before bursting into hysterical laughter.

All in all, it's a brilliant distraction from his unpleasant encounter with Lockhart, and completely erases any lingering discomfort –not that it’ll save the man from Zorian’s budding grudge.

Chapter 7: Back to School

Chapter Text

He and Zach separate early in the morning on the first of September; Zach takes the floo up to Hogwarts to take his placement exams –Zorian is fairly confident that he’ll be able to test through third year to join the twins in fourth, even though by age he should be going into fifth year –while Zorian himself is forced to take the Hogwarts Express from King’s Cross Station. The next time they see each other will be at the welcoming feast, where Zach will probably be sorted alongside the incoming first years. On their last evening at Grimmauld Place, they join Kreacher in the kitchen and attempt to replicate Ikosian dishes without knowing what they’re doing, and though they don’t really succeed at making themselves homesick, dinner is still strangely delicious due to the house elf’s interventions and expertise. Remus’ evening hot chocolate turns his skin bright blue, and Zach sets off fireworks that harmlessly explode and throw blinding sparks and colorful stars, the latter of which bounce around the room for nearly half an hour, and resist all efforts to catch one for closer examination.

After making sure that nothing too magical is showing, Remus hails a muggle taxi, into the trunk of which they are only just able to fit Zorian’s trunk. Though Sirius makes a fuss and fake-cries rather theatrically about Zorian’s departure, they won’t have much reason to miss him –he’s leaving a simulacrum in London that’ll be using Grimmauld Place as a home base, which he’ll have to dismiss and replace via gate spell every month, and he has the two-way mirror Sirius gave him for his birthday. The taxi brings them to King’s Cross with time to spare, and he quickly finds a trolley to load his trunk onto so that they can wheel it inside.

Upon reaching the platform, Sirius goes first, as the one rolling the trolley, striding confidently through the barrier without a single glance towards the surrounding muggles. Remus gestures for Zorian to go through next, and as he had last year, Zorian leans casually against the barrier, steps backwards, and–hits solid brick. He furrows his eyebrows.

“Harry?” Remus asks. Zorian presses his palm flat against the barrier, which suddenly feels as solid as any normal wall.

“You try going through,” he says. “I’ll let Sirius know. Oh, and can you set up a quick muggle-repelling charm?” He pulls the mirror out of his book-bag, and speaks Sirius’ name; sure enough, his reflection ripples for a second before turning into an upside-down view of Sirius’ hand groping for the mirror’s handle. Another moment, and he’s seeing his godfather’s worried gray eyes looking back at him, a reasonably busy platform 9¾ in the background.

“What happened?” he asks immediately.

“Not sure, but the barrier seems to have closed immediately after you went through.” He turns the mirror around to show Remus, who’d just finished covering their area in a notice-me-not (rather than a muggle-repellant, which, that’s actually smart), and was now casting a series of divinations at the barrier. An increasingly confused look grows on the werewolf’s face, and he walks up to try sticking his hand through, only for his arm to pass through as completely normal.

“Come here and try again,” he says, reaching out for the mirror. Zorian passes it to him, then attempts to step through the barrier again. Completely solid. He and Remus exchange a baffled glance.

“Try casting those diagnostics while I’m touching it?” he suggests.

“Let’s try going together first. It’s letting me through, so maybe that will override whatever the issue is.”

“I’ll go find someone working here,” Sirius says, letting the mirror drop so that he can scan the platform. “Don’t worry, we still have over an hour before the train leaves.”

“I’m not too worried. I can’t teleport onto the platform, since it’s unplottable, but if all else fails you can put my luggage on the train and Zach can open me a gate to Hogwarts.”

“Hopefully we won’t have to resort to that,” says Sirius, before closing off the connection. They try Remus’ suggestion of walking through at the same time, to no avail –and the next time Remus tries going through on his own, the barrier decides to be completely solid for him as well.

This, the werewolf tells him, makes no sense and is absolutely baffling. “I could understand if there was some sort of charm on you that caused the barrier to become solid whenever you’re within a certain proximity to it,” he says, looking rather concerned, “but now I have no idea what sort of detection charm they’re using. Or how this ward works, at all!”

While they wait, several other Hogwarts students pass through, mostly upperclassmen that Zorian doesn’t recognize. They’re all able to get through to the platform alright, and after the failure of trying to cross at the same time, neither Zorian nor Remus want to risk cursing any more people to be stuck on this side of the barrier. Tracey and her mother also happen to come by while they’re standing around, which is slightly more awkward, but after exchanging casual greetings and a short explanation of what’s going on, she also heads on through. Surprisingly, he doesn’t see any of the Slytherin purebloods – perhaps there’s another way onto the platform that doesn’t require the snootier aristocrats to go through the muggle side of King’s Cross.

Eventually, a few seemingly muggle staff members approach them, although upon closer inspection, their uniform vests say “Globus Mundi Travel Agency” rather than “King’s Cross”, and they’re accompanied by Sirius. Remus immediately tells them everything they’ve tried so far, including the divinations he tried casting and their results; the less starry-eyed of the two women (he still hates being famous) directs Zorian to press his hand against the barrier, and promptly tries many of the same spells that Remus just did.

“Don’t worry pup, we already situated your trunk on the train,” Sirius reassures him. “Your Slytherin friends said they’d keep an eye on it.”

“Blaise and Theo?” he confirms. The other Slytherins probably won’t mess with his luggage, but they are likely to ask for favors in exchange, even Tracey. Blaise and Theo, on the other hand, need him to like them so that he’ll consider joining the Slytherin underclassmen political scene.

“The boys that were at your birthday party,” says Sirius, and he nods.

Over the next fifteen minutes, Remus somehow (and seemingly arbitrarily) regains the ability to go through the barrier, and they’re completely unable to replicate whichever way Zorian was able to infect someone else with his bizarre curse. However, they do find that as long as Zorian is touching the barrier, it does become solid for everyone else as well. They attempt having someone stick their arm halfway through the barrier to keep it intangible while Zorian tries walking through, but this alarmingly results in the poor witch getting her arm stuck in the solid barrier for several frightening minutes, even after Zorian hurriedly jumps back. At this point, a crowd begins to form in front of the barrier, including (as it nears 11 AM) the entire Weasley clan. Though it’s truly not his fault, Zorian’s ears burn knowing that whatever’s targeting him is also holding so many other people up.

“Can we please just go home and use the floo?” he half-begs Sirius, in a low voice. Even the staff members are starting to look increasingly stressed and harried, especially considering he and Sirius are both well-known public figures, the build-up of other students and their families, and the fact that this is all taking place in a predominantly muggle space, with the Statue of Secrecy only kept unbroken by a handful of hastily erected charms and wards (the few muggleborns had to forcefully drag their parents closer).

Sirius takes one look at him and immediately gives in. “Sure, pup,” he says. “Let’s stop bothering the nice people. I’m sure it’ll all be easier to figure out later today, when we’re not causing a traffic jam.”

“I’ll send a patronus to Dumbledore once we’re home,” Remus agrees. “Harry, how do you feel about side-along apparation?”

“Bad,” Zorian answers, “but let’s do it.” He and Remus link arms, simultaneously turn on their heels –and he’s pulled away back to Grimmauld Place as if being sucked through a narrow tube, in one of the worst ways to fast-travel he’s genuinely ever experienced. Even the floo system might be more pleasant, but frankly he just hates every form of wizarding transportation: broomsticks are dangerous and inelegant, he’s only heard stories of the Knight Bus but it seems even more so, and flying carpets are literally banned in Great Britain. The Hogwarts Express is comfortable enough, but trains (and cars, and bicycles, and other far less upsetting forms of transportation) are still a muggle invention first and foremost.

He’s heard rumors that Voldemort is the first and only wizard to have mastered a form of unassisted flight, which can not only be sustained over long distances and periods of time, but is also incredibly fast, maneuverable, and versatile. This is, in Zorian’s opinion, far and away the only form of magical travel in this world that holds any appeal; his own world’s version of the same is far too expensive and inefficient, in terms of mana. For combat he and Zach will often make flying platforms, whether physical or out of conjured ectoplasm, but those have their own cons and limitations.

Sirius appears in the parlor a few seconds after them, presumably having relayed their plan to the unfortunate staff. “Sorry about all that, pup,” he says, ruffling Zorian’s hair. “D’you want us to actually ask Dumbledore to open up the floo again? I’d bet your Zach’s still in the middle of his exams.”

“Is there another way onto the platform?” he asks. “Other than through the barrier? I didn’t see any of my pureblood classmates on the muggle side.”

“There aren’t any that I’m aware of,” Sirius replies, “though when I was Hogwarts age, Kreacher usually apparated Reggie, me, and our luggage straight from home to the platform.”

Zorian stares at him. He’d forgotten, to be completely honest, that apparition doesn’t follow the same rules as teleportation. “Sirius.” He steeples his fingers under his chin with a baleful gaze. “Why did we not just apparate onto the platform?”

“Perhaps because we are bloody stupid,” Sirius chirps, quite cheerfully. “Wizards have a reputation for that sort of thing, you know. Not an ounce of logic or thinking in our brains! We still have ten minutes or so, don’t we? Moony, won’t you do the honors?”

He groans, but grabs hold of Remus’ arm again –only for an awfully familiar elf to pop into existence in front of them. “NO!” shrieks Dobby, at the top of his lungs and with all the strength of his very high-pitched vocal chords. “HARRY POTTER SIR MUST NOT–”

And then, he and Remus have spun away, back towards King’s Cross, just in time for him to run aboard the train.

The day is sunny and brilliant, and though he sits with the other second year Slytherins in the compartment containing his trunk, he mostly tunes out their voices and dozes away the train ride, leaning against the window and gazing out at the fluffy, painted clouds. Although he does surreptitiously pay some extra attention to Draco Malfoy, mindful of Dobby’s desperate warning, nothing about the kid has seemingly changed over the summer. His empathy doesn’t pick up any anxiety or malice, and Draco’s surface thoughts are engaged with the conversation at hand, hoping he hadn’t forgotten anything at home, and excitement to be trying out for the position of seeker on the Slytherin quidditch team and showing off his new broom. His soul sense doesn’t pick up on the presence of Voldemort’s soul anywhere in Draco or his luggage, and he eventually dismisses the strange house elf’s concern for the time being. Perhaps Lucius Malfoy had been the one to put Dobby up to it in the first place, though he can’t think of why the Malfoy family patriarch would want to prevent Harry Potter from going to school.

Kreacher had packed up a few hand-pies filled with pork and vegetables to eat as an early afternoon meal, and the waxed cloth they’re wrapped in is enchanted to keep them perfectly warm, flaky, and delicious. He also indulges in purchasing a chocolate bar and an ice-cold lemon soda from the trolley witch when she comes by, since Zach had packed enough candy for them both, and he therefore didn’t have any sweets in his own luggage. Nobody comments on his muggle clothing, so he doesn’t change into his school uniform until they’re nearing the castle; although the robes are charmed for temperature regulation, it’s still far too warm to be wearing long black sleeves while sitting under the sun.

As he walks down the length of the train, he greets some of the other students he recognizes, and also stops briefly in Hermione’s compartment where he says hello to Ron and Ginny –who blushes furiously to be addressed – and then is introduced to Ginny’s best friend, a wispy girl named Luna Lovegood. She has silvery, faraway eyes, and long, wavy hair so pale and fine that she could almost be a Malfoy, if not for the softness of her face (Draco is all sharp angles, even at twelve). Also, no Malfoy would ever be seen wearing Luna’s flower-shaped, distinctly muggle, bright pink plastic glasses; seashells dangle from her earlobes, an entire dried rose hangs from a cord around her neck, and various beaded and woven bracelets climb up her wrists nearly to the elbow.

“Hello, Harry Potter,” she says dreamily. “You aren’t quite as handsome as Ginny said you were, but you do have very striking eyes. They remind me of the pea soup my papa sometimes makes.”

Ginny squeaks with embarrassment and hits her friend on the arm, but Zorian just raises both his eyebrows. He must say that’s a refreshing turn of pace in terms of eye-color-related comments, which usually revolve around how much he resembles Harry’s parents. Luna strikes him as being quite different from any of the Weasleys, but apparently the Lovegood family hails from the same small village, and as the only other witch in the area around Ginny’s age, the two had naturally become friends by simple proximity.

After some minutes he returns to his original compartment, and after the sun sets fiery and brilliant over the horizon, they arrive at Hogsmeade station on the far side of the Black Lake. Everyone shuffles out of the train, and after the first years are separated out to go across the lake with Hagrid, they all head out of the station in one large clump, where nearly a hundred carriages pulled by black, leathery, horse-like creatures, with glossy manes and tails, reptilian snouts, and massive batlike wings. The eerie creatures are strangely gaunt, and their skin clings tightly to each and every contour of their skeletons, so thin as to be nearly translucent. Nobody else pays them any attention, however, and he sees Luna in his peripheral vision smiling at the animals quite serenely, so Zorian also chooses not to comment.

Theo joins Draco, Crabbe, and Goyle in their carriage, and Tracy goes with Pansy, Daphne, and Millicent, so he and Blaise end up with Hermione (who eyes Blaise, but doesn’t comment) and Neville Longbottom, who’s so pointlessly nervous that it nearly gives Zorian a headache. At least Blaise is capable of being normal, and he and Hermione quickly hit it off talking about the transfiguration paper they’d been assigned over the summer. The carriages trundle up through the front gates and onto the grounds; the castle of Hogwarts is magnificent as ever, and even moreso when approached from a distance and after a long summer spent in the city, with its spires reaching for the sky and windows glowing warmly in the summer twilight. The tradition of first years sailing across the Black Lake is carefully curated, calculated so that their first glimpse of the school where they will spend their formative years is accompanied by a sense of looming, overwhelming awe –it’s a shame that Zach isn’t allowed the same privilege, though of course he’s been in the castle before.

They hop out of their carriage at the great oak doors of the front entrance, which are usually kept open during the school year (with exceptions for bad weather) but are opened for the fall term with a ceremonious bang by Professor McGonagall, the deputy headmistress. The upperclassmen flood straight through the marble entrance way and into the Great Hall, flowing to their respective house tables; the Slytherin table is closest to the door, and the new second years gleefully take their seats closer to the center of the table, leaving room at the end for whoever gets sorted into their house later in the evening. At the end of the table closest to the staff platform, this year’s graduating class takes their seats of honor with faces lifted high, accepting congratulations and well wishes for their N.E.W.T.s year from other upperclassmen.

The seventh years are all seventeen, going on eighteen –of their majority, in the wizarding world – and especially in Slytherin, many of them will inherit noble titles, seats on the Wizengamot, or receive prestigious scholarships, apprenticeships, or other positions as soon as they graduate. Of course, they still have a responsibility to study well and achieve decent grades on their exams, in order to honor their families and bloodlines, but few will have to worry about their future career prospects unless they wish to pursue something truly extraordinary or unusual. Although Zorian doesn’t expect to spend that long in this world, he notices that he isn’t the only underclassmen watching them with envy.

He tears his gaze away to glance up at the staff table, catching Snape’s eye first, and then scowling when he sees Gilderoy Lockhart –he’d been trying not to think about having to deal with the new DADA professor. His dreams of gruesome violence are soon interrupted by the Great Hall’s doors opening again, however, and the student body falls silent as Professor McGonnagall places the Sorting Hat on its customary three-legged stool. The hat sings a brief song, and then the sorting ceremony commences; Zorian can tell which of the first years come from wizarding families by how quickly they find his face in the crowd and stare at him.

“Enjoying the attention, Boy Who Lived?” Daphne teases, as a young Colin Creevey is sorted into Gryffindor with a longing look towards the Slytherin table. Zorian rolls his eyes.

“Oh, certainly,” he says dryly, and his friends laugh (despite his best efforts to keep them at arms-length, his Slytherin yearmates are his friends. It’s impossible for them not to be, after attending every class with them, sitting with them at every meal, and seeing them gossiping in their pajamas). “It’ll be quite refreshing to see some new faces stalking my every move after an entire summer of relative privacy.”

“Daphne, is Astoria being sorted this year?” Draco asks.

“Astoria’s my younger sister,” she explains first, glancing at Zorian. “She’s a few months too young, which she’s been complaining about all summer, but she’ll be here next year. My cousin Landon and I have a bet going about whether she’ll be in Slytherin or Ravenclaw.” She gestures towards a sixth year in Ravenclaw – like his cousin, Heir Greengrass is a brunette with pale green eyes.

The conversation pauses for the entire table to applaud as a young Conin Lestrange is sorted into Slytherin, though he’s from a minor, French branch of the family and not the main line. Still, almost all of the British Lestranges are in Azkaban these days, so Zorian wonders if his family has sent him over in hopes that he might claim the heirship, even though under normal circ*mstances the kid would have little to no claim. Zorian turns from the conversation to applaud politely for Luna Lovegood’s sorting into Ravenclaw, and later for Ginny Weasley to be sorted into Gryffindor with her siblings. Slytherin House also gains a handful of new students, including one of Pansy’s second cousins and several other kids with Sacred 28 surnames, a few from minor pureblood houses, and one unfortunate muggleborn or halfblood with dark auburn hair.

Once all the first years are sorted, Dumbledore steps forward with sparkling eyes. “Now, before we eat, we have one more, rather special sorting to watch,” he announces. “I present Mister Zach Noveda, who will be transferring into the fourth year.” Zorian –and the entire student body, which bursts into whispers –sits up straight to see Zach step fluidly into the great hall, wearing his most charming grin. He glances briefly towards the Slytherin table as he steps up towards the staff table, briefly catching Zorian’s eye, before letting his gaze sweep over the other houses as well.

Approaching the stool, Zach places the Sorting Hat on his head –upon which it actually fits, instead of flopping down over his eyes –and converses with it with just a few moments, projecting amusem*nt. Then, with little fanfare, the hat opens its mouth and announces, “GRYFFINDOR!”

The Gryffindor table erupts into loud cheering and applause, and Zach saunters over to sit with the Weasley twins, who slap him on the back. Most of Zorian’s housemates return to more neutral positions, dismissing him as a lion, but Zorian gazes after him thoughtfully; Zach’s sorting was actually slower than he’d thought. He’d seen Draco get sorted –the hat announced Slytherin before it had barely even touched the kid’s hair.

[Anything unexpected?] he asks.

[Me,] Zach answers with a silent laugh, catching his eye again as Dumbledore stands again to give a brief speech. [Your Sorting Hat was surprised to see me. Wanted to know how your mission was going.]

“Gotta say, I’m disappointed Zach’s not in our House too,” Blaise says sympathetically, guessing wrongly at Zorian’s train of thought as the welcoming feast appears up and down the tables. “He was a blast at your birthday party.” Zorian closes the connection with a shake of his head and a shrug, beginning to pile food onto his plate.

“I’m not too worried about it,” he replies.