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The Art of Self-Fashioning	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > General > General Views: 26077 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 3
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Chapter Fifteen—Yar (Part Two)

            Harry watched as Neville stepped slowly forwards to confront the Hungarian Horntail. No matter how many plans they’d discussed, Harry knew Neville still wasn’t very confident. He hadn’t known if he could perform the spells they’d found, and he was only right to be terrified of a dragon.

            That was why Harry hadn’t told him about the little addition to the Task he’d planned on. Neville was honorable, anyway. He would probably think it was cheating.

            The Hungarian Horntail lowered her head and made a sound like all the air in the world being pulled in. Neville’s knees shook a little. He raised his wand and tried to speak a curse, probably the Conjunctivitis Curse, but Harry could already see it wouldn’t come out.

            Harry held up his arm and waved his hand, giving a shrill whistle. No one noticed, since so many people were shouting, and the dragon was rapidly building up to a roar.

            Yar stooped from above and behind, aiming straight at the dragon’s tail. It hadn’t taken much training to convince her to do this; it was a moving thing below her on the ground, and she could hunt it. In seconds Harry lost sight of her. She was behind the Horntail now, which meant that most people wouldn’t notice her, either.

            The Horntail shrieked abruptly as eagle talons dug into her tail. She lunged around and stamped a paw down. The crowd shrieked in turn.

            Harry stiffened. An eagle’s natural instinct was to bind to its prey, wrap its feet around it and stay there while it fed. He had done some training with Yar that he’d hoped would get her over that, but he didn’t actually know if it would. He hadn’t had the chance to see, not for sure. He leaned back in his seat.

            The dragon’s tail whipped up into the air. There was nothing on it. Harry relaxed again.

            Neville shook his head as if he was waking up from a trance, and aimed his wand. “Accio golden egg!” he shouted, the spell that Harry had coached him on using after the Conjunctivitis Curse. The Summoning Charm was one that Neville was pretty good at, since he’d got extra tutoring from Flitwick and it wasn’t violent magic.

            (Harry wondered if he was the only one who had noticed that the more violent the magic was, the more Neville hated it. He had almost fainted when Professor Moody had them duel with some strong curses in class the other day).

            The dragon swung around again with a roar as the egg went speeding past her and slammed into Neville’s arms. Neville didn’t look at her. He just ran as fast as he could, and the dragon’s blast of fire didn’t do more than give him a hotfoot.

            Harry leaned back and closed his eyes. His friend had survived the First Task, and Yar had got away. That was all he cared about right now.

*

            “I know you helped me.”

            Harry paused and turned to look at Neville, who was standing next to his table in the library. Harry had started reading more about the Cruciatus Curse after Professor Moody had showed it to them in class the other day. He needed to know the side-effects and how people had tried to cure it in the past, he had finally realized, or he wouldn’t be able to do much for his parents either.

            “What do you mean?” Harry asked.

            Neville sat down in front of him and looked intently into his eyes. Harry could see why some people hadn’t noticed his lack of confidence. When Neville wanted to, he could be intense. And sometimes his scar and the eyes combined were compelling.

            “I know you helped me during the First Task,” Neville repeated. “I didn’t tell anyone because I don’t want them to know where Yar comes from. I appreciate it. But don’t do it again.”

            Harry nodded once. Terry and Neville were the only ones he had told about creating Yar. The rest of the time, he either trained outside with her, in the Forbidden Forest so everyone would just think she was a wild eagle, or she flew around and hunted things on her own. It was good for her. She was getting stronger and faster.

            “Harry, do you hear me?”

            “I nodded, didn’t I?” Harry sighed. “Sorry. I was afraid of what would happen to you. I didn’t know you would get the highest score of anybody.” The judges had argued for a long time, but had finally decided that it was really impressive that Neville had performed some sort of spell to distract the dragon they hadn’t even seen, and had awarded him a lot of points.

            “I appreciate it,” Neville repeated. “But I really want to survive on my own.” He spent a moment gnawing his lip, and then said, “I have to prove that I’m good enough on my own to survive V-Voldemort.”

            Harry gave him a smile. “I understand, Neville. Thanks for being understanding about it this time.”

            Neville nodded and left. Harry settled back and thought for a second. No one knew what the Second Task was going to be like yet, except for the judges. No one had figured out what the golden egg meant yet.

            But Harry knew he would have to be careful during the other Tasks to help Neville without him seeing it.

*

            Severus sat back in his chair, closed his eyes, and counted his breaths. It was a useful technique when he was feeling particularly out of sorts, which was the case after the training session he’d had with the Brat-Who-Lived today.

            The boy simply could not hold his head up. He stared at Severus in terror and squeaked when Severus tried to show him countercurses, never mind curses! He would not pay attention to Potions brewing that Severus knew, based on his marks in Herbology, he ought to have been able to do easily.

            It was enough to nearly make Severus wish Albus had not protected him from Azkaban all those years ago. He would probably be dead or soulless now, but at least he wouldn’t have to teach Longbottom.

            This year, what with the extra chance that Longbottom would die in the Tournament and the disturbing pains in the Mark, Severus could finally say that Longbottom was more irritating than Potter.

            A sharp headache began at once when he thought of that brat. Severus stood up and stalked across his office to fetch a pain remedy from his supply cupboard.

            Potter stared at him with mocking green eyes, and did better than he’d ever done in his class. Severus knew that. But the mockery made him vanish the potions anyway and chide the boy and assign him detentions.

            And Potter accepted the detentions without saying anything. As if what Severus did to him didn’t matter.

            Severus shut his eyes as he felt the potion begin to travel down his throat, doing its subtle work on the centers of pain. The dittany would spread out and bring the pain under control, the tincture of belladonna would conspire to make him forget what had hurt, his breath would ease from the dilation on the lungs of the diced strangler vine…

            Contemplating potions, Severus found it easier to return to what mattered. Not brats, but surviving, and brewing, and finding out the identity of his enemy.

Since the Retrocognition Potion had failed, he would have to try some other method.

*

Harry galloped outside the school. When he looked up at the Owlery and produced the shrill whistle he had perfected just for her, Yar came speeding down towards him from the top of the wall. It hadn’t taken her long to realize that although she could hunt on her own, she got more interesting and varied—and tasty—game when hunting with Harry.

            Harry again tore over to the broom shed and removed a school broom from within it. By now, he’d flown with Yar so many times that his transition to the air was almost instantaneous. One moment he was part of the ground, the next he was part of the sky, and soaring with her, winding up in spiral patterns that she mimicked.

            It was late afternoon, cold enough that there were no Quidditch teams practicing, as they sometimes did despite the lack of Quidditch this year. Even the Gryffindors seemed less fanatical about that since their mad Captain had left school last summer—without the Quidditch Cup.

            Terry had said that. But it wasn’t Terry or his continual plans for Harry to join the Quidditch team that bothered Harry now.

            It was Padma, of all people.

            Harry bent down over his broom and shot forwards. Yar was gliding beside him in seconds, that easy motion that didn’t seem fast until Harry looked down and saw the amount of ground her shadow was covering.

            Harry vaulted up, vaulted down, and then dropped into a dive. Yar followed, her feathers sleeked back by the wind, her yellow eyes gazing intently forwards. There was snow beneath her; that didn’t dismay her. She rose again when she realized there was no prey at the end of his drop and this was a useless dive as far as she was concerned.

            Harry kept going. The snow tumbled beneath him, rising. He could have stopped. He saw no reason to do so until he pulled out of the dive with his boots raising white, sparkling scuffles.

            In seconds he was up again, twisting around, twisting, twisting. The air was dizzy and radiant in his eyes. He caught a glimpse of Yar, of a songbird streaking away from him, of an owl that was flying in with a message dodging him while it hooted in alarm.

            When he was at gliding height again and he could calm down a little, Harry lined himself up with the broom and took a cleansing breath. The air was so cold, up here. He could think in more detail of what had happened without immediately wanting to scrape his skin off or the air out of his lungs.

            Padma had asked him to the Yule Ball.

            It was so ridiculous that Harry had simply stared at her. Padma, who had started with the confident smile she usually had in class, had stammered to a halt when she’d explained about his “mysterious charm” and how it affected her.

            Harry had gone on staring until Padma had withdrawn, white and with tears brimming in her eyes. And Harry had come out here to fly it off.

            Not because she had asked him. Harry could have said no and gone on with that well enough. It was the same thing he would say if asked to play Quidditch, or Gobstones, or anything that didn’t have to do with his ultimate goal.

            But if other people thought he was “mysterious” and “charming,” if they were noticing him and he didn’t even notice them noticing, then he was in trouble. At any time, he might do something that would reveal himself or his goals, and it might be in front of someone who wouldn’t attack him the way Snape had. Instead, they could withdraw and report it to Dumbledore, or McGonagall, or something.

            Damn it.

            Harry finally sat up, and Yar circled towards him again. Harry nodded at her, studying her focused golden eyes for a second. This was the way he wanted to be. Yar and other eagles lived for their one purpose, and no one thought they were strange for it.

            If I was an animal, certain things would be so much easier.

            Of course, if he was an animal, he also wouldn’t be able to bring his parents back, so there were obvious disadvantages. But for the first time, Harry felt his interest stir at the thought of becoming an Animagus, instead of simply Transfiguring parts of himself as needed. He could spend time in an animal’s form then, and it would be a holiday from some parts of reality that were more stressful than he could deal with right now.

            In the end, he flew to the ground and Transfigured a rabbit out of a clump of grass. It wasn’t the best rabbit ever, since it ran in a straight line unlike a normal rabbit and didn’t hop very well, but Yar didn’t care. She fell on the rabbit and rolled it, and Harry knew a moment of intense joy when she struck.

            That was the joy he wanted. That was the joy he was going to have. Harry sat back slowly and closed his eyes, and listened to the sounds of Yar tearing.

            He needed to get Professor Moody to show him the Cruciatus Curse again, and remind him of what his parents had suffered. He would need to get back on track.

*

            Minerva closed her eyes and took a slow sip of the brandy. It had been a Christmas gift from Hagrid.

            The fire was warm, the carpet thick, the book by the side of her chair welcoming. And still Minerva couldn’t read, because every time she closed her eyes, she saw Harry greeting his parents in St. Mungo’s for his Christmas visit.

            James and Lily were the same as always. Staring eyes, wandering limbs, and drooling mouths. They hadn’t changed and wouldn’t, Minerva supposed, except for the changes of whitening hair and mouths falling in as they aged. So far, they still resembled the man and woman she had known in the Order of the Phoenix strongly enough to hurt her heart.

            Harry, though…

            He was half a meter taller than the edge of James’s bed now, when Minerva could remember him being almost the same height as it. He leaned forwards and talked to his parents with the same intensity, but in an even quieter voice. This time, he had brought his parents small Transfigured scenes in wood, scenes he had made first out of paper. The scene for James was of figures that looked like Harry and James flying on brooms.

            The scene for Lily was simply an image of her sitting with a baby in her arms on a chair, smiling down at the child as if he was the center of the world.

            Minerva closed her eyes now and drained the brandy the rest of the way. It burned and made her choke, but that was better than choking because of the pain.

            She knew Harry could master object-to-object Transfigurations, but, it seemed, only of paper to wood. And only when it was for his parents, or perhaps other people he cared greatly about. Minerva assumed he had given Christmas presents to his friends, but she didn’t know.

            And he talked to his parents with such hope in his eyes. Did he hope they would wake up someday? That they would hear him no matter how distant they were, locked behind doors of damaged brain tissue?

            Minerva had tried to find out, as they left St. Mungo’s, asking Harry if he thought his parents could understand him. Harry had blinked at her and replied, “I don’t think so, Professor McGonagall. But it makes me feel better to talk to them.”

            “I’m glad,” Minerva had said, and had reached out to squeeze Harry’s shoulder. It was the sort of gesture he would sometimes accept and sometimes not. This time, with him turned back to the hospital to stare at it, Minerva didn’t think he noticed. “But—forgive me, Harry. Can you foresee a time when it won’t make you feel better?”

            She did wonder, from some of the books she had sometimes seen Harry carrying about, if he had accepted that his parents’ condition was permanent. Perhaps he hoped to learn Healing magic and cure them that way.

            “Oh. No, Professor McGonagall.”

            Harry’s voice was slow with suspicion. Minerva knew she couldn’t get away with asking these sorts of questions for much longer, not if she wanted him to think she was ignorant of how much the visits to his parents affected him.

            But she dared one more. “Do you think your parents are going to get better on their own, Harry?”

            “Not on their own, Professor McGonagall. Or it would have happened by now. No, I don’t.”

            That didn’t answer the question of whether he believed Healers might come up with a miracle, but Harry had folded into himself the way he so often did after that, his open face closing, his eyes going bright and soft and remote, and Minerva hadn’t felt able to ask any more questions. She let it go, and let Harry go when they returned to Hogwarts—which he promptly did, vanishing in the direction of Ravenclaw Tower.

            He rarely came to see her anymore.

            Minerva closed her eyes. She had so many things to think well of Harry for. He had passions and interests outside Transfiguration, now. He had friends. Filius had said Harry was doing better in Charms, maybe because he was helping Neville study. Harry had told her he and his relatives had reached a kind of accommodation. At least he saw his parents now, and that was better than knowing they didn’t exist.

            So why does it feel like I’m standing here and just watching as he rushes towards a cliff?

*

            “You’re a strange one, Potter.”

            But Professor Moody said it without any hostility in his face as he stood back to wave Harry into his office.

            There were pictures of wanted wizards on the walls, and fewer books than Lupin had had last year. Harry glanced around once before he faced Moody.

            “You said you’d show me on a spider again, sir.”

            Moody nodded and drew his wand with a dry chuckle. “I didn’t imagine that you came here for the pleasure of my company, Potter.” He paused, and his magical eye rolled over and fixed on Harry with what Harry thought was a strange intensity. “Do you care for the class at all besides this one curse?”

            Harry looked at him. He didn’t think there were a lot of adults he could tell the truth to, but this was one of them. “No.”

            Moody chuckled again. “Maybe someday something will change that,” he said. “I think you could be an impressive student in Defense if you chose that path.”

            “I already chose mine.”

            Moody went still for a moment, studying Harry. Then he said, “I knew what I wanted when I was young. I had to sacrifice a lot to attain it. Do you think you can do the same thing?”

            Harry felt himself smile. He wanted to tell Moody how much he’d already sacrificed, how much he had learned, how much he was going to do to free his parents from the clutches of the Cruciatus Curse.

            But just because Moody was safe to trust with some truths didn’t make Harry stupid enough to trust him with all of them. He only inclined his head.

            “You’ll be one to watch, and no mistake,” Moody murmured, with a soft look in his ordinary eye. “Well. Watch, then.” He took a spider from his pocket and once again performed the Cruciatus Curse on it.

            Harry bent close to watch the spider’s limbs jerk. This time, he thought, he was really seeing how much the curse affected. The damage was spread throughout the body. It was no wonder his parents were so broken. They would have felt pain from their arms and hands and knees and heads, all at once, as well as their brains.

            He glanced up. Moody was watching him, not the spider.

            Harry was instantly cautious. Had he let down his barriers again, the way he accidentally had around Padma, and made someone think he was interesting? He said, “I suppose you think it’s strange to be interested in the Unforgivable Curses, sir.”

            “Not at all,” said Moody dryly. “After all, a lot of Dark wizards are. And Aurors have to know them so we can capture the wizards who use them.”

            Harry offered the truth that fooled everyone. “I want to know what kind of curse took my parents from me. I want to know what they felt.”

            Moody’s eyebrows flew up. “Of course,” he said a moment later. “I knew your parents had been subjected to that curse. I knew it,” he repeated. Maybe he was thinking that he should have connected Harry’s interest in the curse to his Mum and Dad before.

            Harry shrugged and turned back to study the new spider that was jerking under the new instance of the curse. Moody would only show him two at a time, because to cast more than that was physically draining.

            Harry had an idea how he could use the physically draining thing, too. It would just take some work.

            “Thank you, sir,” he said, when the spider was done. He stepped back and nodded to Moody and made for the door.

            “You know nothing short of a miracle can heal your parents, Mr. Potter?”

            “I know that.” And I’m going to be that miracle.

            Moody leaned down, and his voice was hoarse in an odd way. “Just remember there are people in the world who can offer you that miracle, Mr. Potter. You only have to find them. And sometimes, you have to pay a high price. But I don’t think any price can be too high, for you.”

            Harry studied Moody. He didn’t think Moody had taken an interest in him the way Padma had. He didn’t want to drag Harry into the middle of a stage and make people take notice of him.

            No, instead Moody seemed to be thinking he could make someone else important to Harry. Whoever could promise miracles.

            But Harry had no interest in following anyone or paying anyone or joining anyone. He made his voice polite as he said, “I would pay a high price.”

            “Think about it,” Moody advised him, and opened his door. “When you’re ready to do more than think about it, come to me.”

            Which would be never, Harry thought, and slipped out the door.

*

            “I told you I was going to do it without your help!”

            Neville was flushed and proud and sitting straight on the bench at the Gryffindor table. Harry grinned at him. He didn’t do that often, but Neville deserved it right now.

            “Yeah, you did.”

            The Second Task had turned out to be underwater. Harry had tried to figure out what he could do when he didn’t have an animal that could swim, and although he had studied fish a few times, he didn’t think he had time to Transfigure one before the morning came.

            And then Neville had found gillyweed all on his own, with his Herbology knowledge, and succeeded in rescuing Ron.

            Suddenly, though, Neville’s face fell. “I hope you aren’t angry that it wasn’t you,” he told Harry, leaning towards him.

            “Angry that what wasn’t me?”

            “Angry that you weren’t the one who was under the lake.” Neville looked the way he sometimes did, like he was writhing without moving. “I mean, I value you as a friend. I appreciate you a lot, Harry. It’s just that—Ron is there, and he’s my best friend, and he came back around to believing me after the First Task. You know?” By the end, Neville was almost babbling.

            Harry just smiled. He didn’t know Ron that well, but he was a Gryffindor and Neville liked him. That was enough of a voucher for Harry. “No. It’s fine.” Besides, Harry had always known that the things that were important to him weren’t important in the same way to other people. Harry felt close to Neville because he was one of his few friends. But Neville had more friends than he did.

            Neville sighed and nodded. “Thanks. I was worried about that.”

            “You shouldn’t have been.” Harry clapped him on the back once and made his way over to the Ravenclaw table. Terry stood up as he came towards him, and gave him a little frown. Harry held back a groan. He knew what this would be about.

            This was the kind of time when he wished he could have Yar swoop into the Great Hall and land on his shoulder and mantle at everybody, just so they would know not to mess with him.

            “Harry,” said Terry, and then glanced over to the right. Harry looked. There was Roger Davies, looking at him with interested eyes.

            “You heard that Diggory rescued Cho Chang from the lake?” Davies asked.

            “I saw him do it.” Harry had really only been at the Second Task to see Neville compete, but of course that meant he’d seen Diggory come up, too.

            “Right.” Davies looked daunted for a moment, which unfortunately didn’t last long enough for Harry to finish a mouthful of toast. “Well, she swallowed some water or had a bad reaction to the spells they used to keep her unconscious down there, I don’t know which. That means we’re without a Seeker for at least a week. She gets dizzy when she gets on a broom. I’d like you to work with us.”

            Davies paused, probably to allow Harry to be overwhelmed with gratitude. Harry kept eating.

            “Harry?” Terry was practically vibrating with energy.

            “No.”

            Davies blinked. Then he leaned forwards. “If you’re not confident about your lack of skill, it’s all right. I wouldn’t have given you a chance if I hadn’t seen you fly.”

            “I don’t know the rules of the game. You would spend your time training me. And besides, I don’t care enough about it.” Harry smiled a little at Davies, and saw him recoil. Oh, it was one of those smiles, the kind that Neville had tried to get him to stop giving. Too bad. “Do you want to play with an indifferent Seeker?”

            “No,” Davies whispered. His eyes were a little wide. Obviously, if Terry had warned him about it, he hadn’t warned him enough.

            “Well, then,” said Harry, and went back to eating.

            Davies got up after an uncomfortable few minutes and moved some seats down the table. Harry kept eating, and reached into a pocket for a book on Animagus training that he’d managed to get from the library. Apparently information on how to achieve the transformation was commonplace because they didn’t think many people would manage to do it.

            “Harry.” Terry poked him sharply in the side.

            Harry looked up. “What?”

            “I had to get up my courage to speak to Roger, and then you treat him like that?” Terry was so red he looked like he had a sunburn. “Most people would kill for a chance like this.”

            “And I’m not most people.”

            “I would—”

            “Then ask him if you can play trainee Seeker.”

            “I’m not good enough. You are.”

            “And I don’t care.”

            Terry spent the rest of breakfast trying to talk to him about Quidditch. By now, Harry had practice in concentrating through the yelling of his relatives and the sound of the telly, and he read and absorbed. Terry finally sulked off to sit next to Anthony, and Harry went on reading.

            The Animagus transformation is only to be completed under a trained supervisor.

            Not bloody likely, Harry thought in peace, and turned another page.

*

            Albus stood in the Owlery, watching as a golden eagle sat on the windowsill, ignoring the silence of the owls as it cleaned its feet.

            Albus hadn’t taught Transfiguration classes on a regular basis for years, but he could still recognize a Transfigured creature when he saw one.

            The odd thing was, no one else seemed to. Albus had heard a few remarks from other professors and students about an eagle flying among the owls, but they all seemed to assume it was a wild one, or else a half-tamed pet that had escaped some student’s control. As it didn’t hurt the owls or any other magical creatures, no one had objected to it.

            Albus, though, wondered whether the sure sleekness of the lines, the way the eagle could exist and feed itself without constant supervision, wasn’t enough reason to object.

            Minerva hadn’t created it. Albus would have recognized the glow of her magic around a corner with his eyes closed. They had been friends for too many years.

            Besides him and Minerva, there were no masters of Transfiguration able to create such a bird in the school. And that meant it had probably been sent her by an outside force, as a spy.

            And Albus could think of only one outside force who would do that.

            This was the closest Albus had been to the eagle since he started seeing it. He had accustomed it to his presence by standing quietly and not trying to interrupt when it hunted. He thought he would soon gain enough of its trust to destroy it.

            In fact, he might have enough of that now.

            Sure enough, when he raised his wand, the bird paid no attention. Albus murmured the spell that would dissolve any Transfigured creature back into the components it had come from, whether that was a desk or a collection of leaves. “Finite commuto.”

            The minute the spell left his wand, the eagle leaped off the windowsill and was gone. For a moment, as Albus moved forwards to study the flight path of the spell, he hoped the white light would catch up with the eagle and dissolve it in midair. That would be the cleanest and easiest solution.

            Nothing of the sort happened. The spell was right behind the eagle, but all the bird did was rise and swerve, and the light earthed itself harmlessly in the broom shed. The next instant, the eagle was up and riding, and disappeared into the clouds.

            Albus nodded slowly. That confirmed extra magic had been added to the eagle, rather than simply creating a natural bird out of whatever objects the caster had chosen. The bird had wit enough to recognize threats, and yet it hadn’t fled Hogwarts grounds. It was bound to stay here, on the orders of its master.

            Albus would wait and ambush the eagle at a later date. At least its spying could do little harm now that he knew what it was.

            He would watch on a higher level of alertness for the next Transfigured spy, the one that Tom might hope would escape detection. And he would step up the preparations for calling the Order of the Phoenix back together. Some of them had already started meeting on a regular basis to train Neville. It would be a small matter to increase the things he was asking them to do, including tracking rumors of a new Death Eater specializing in Transfiguration.

            Shaking his head, Albus moved towards the stairs from the Owlery. His joints felt stiffer than they had in years. No matter what he did, the lures of greed and corruption, the main reasons people joined Tom, remained strong.

*

            “What is it?” Harry whispered, stroking Yar’s feathers. She had landed on his left shoulder an hour ago—something he hadn’t prepared for, since his right arm was her usual perch—and torn the skin to ribbons. Harry had had to cast some healing spells, and had then tried to cast her back into the air.

            She refused to go. She clung to him as he moved through the Forbidden Forest, searching out some more rare stones and leaves he could use as components in one of the potions he wanted to brew on his own, and Harry thought the passage of time would ease her nervousness.

            But here Yar still was, her fierce face tucked against his neck. Harry stroked her again and decided something must have attacked her. Perhaps another eagle, but in that case, he thought she would have carried wounds. More likely magic. Maybe a student had got scared and used magic; maybe a teacher had decided no student should have a pet eagle and tried to capture her to trace her owner.

            “You know I can find you if you go missing,” Harry said, and played with the edge of her tail, which Yar promptly fluffed out as if she wanted him to put his fingers in between the feathers. Harry smiled and did so. Yar lifted her head and shook out her wings, then flew from his shoulder to a branch and started scanning the leaves with intense eyes.

            It had been a minor change, then. But Harry would take the lesson from it that the person who had cast at Yar probably hadn’t intended to teach him.

            He would be even more careful, even more attentive to what other people thought of him, Harry thought as he forced his way deeper into the early March woods. And that included the next logical step of learning more about his parents.

*

            Harry carefully unfolded the old Daily Prophet behind the cover of a huge Charms book. Neither Neville nor Terry were with him today. Terry had been spending more time with the Quidditch team, even after Chang had recovered, as if he hoped they would grant him a position out of pity.

            And Neville had told Harry that Granger wanted him and Weasley to study with her. She seemed to think Neville had neglected his studying too much for the Triwizard Tournament.

            Harry thought of telling Granger that Neville had only been trying to survive, but he refrained. He didn’t know Granger that well, but she had stood by Neville when almost no one else had. He wouldn’t antagonize her.

            He had thought he would have more trouble finding the information he needed. As it turned out, it was almost—simple. All he had to do was ask Madam Pince, and she showed him the old stacks of yellowing newspapers.

            It had proven slightly more trouble to find one that had the appropriate pictures and trial transcripts. But Harry knew the dates he wanted. He simply persevered, swooping up and down until he found them.

            The description of the night that the Lestranges had cursed his parents, and how Black had dueled Pettigrew and died.

            Harry gently touched the photograph of the young Sirius Black, who was posing with his dad in front of a wall with a plaque on it. Sirius had had wild eyes, even though he wore a formal robe in the photo. Harry could imagine him getting up to the sorts of pranks that Weasley’s brothers apparently did all the time.

            I wish I could have known you, Harry thought. Once again, he was glad that his parents had survived, even if it had been horrible for them. This way, at least he could have the chance of knowing them once they were back to normal.

            Sirius was gone forever.

            And Lupin was alive but Harry wanted nothing to do with him, which was the worst of both worlds.

            Harry sighed noiselessly—Lupin was a problem that he had dealt with—and turned the page. At once he saw the picture he had been looking for, although he hadn’t known what the people in it looked like when he began to read. He swallowed noiselessly and leaned forwards.

            The picture showed a woman and two men, standing chained in what Harry assumed was a courtroom, although the background was blurry. The photographer had really wanted to just show the people.

            The two men had scowls and faces stamped with marks of age and pain. The woman was beautiful in an insane way. She faced the camera and laughed with her mouth open. Her hair was long and dark, and her eyes were huge and dark.

            Harry memorized the face, and then his eyes went to the caption.

            Bellatrix Lestrange, with her husband Rodolphus and her brother-in-law Rabastan, facing the Wizengamot.

            Bellatrix had a memorable face. Harry read a little of the article and wasn’t surprised to find out she was related to the Blacks. She did look like Sirius.

            But while Sirius had done his best to reject the evil he’d grown up with and chosen to be in Gryffindor, it sounded like Bellatrix had been happy and proud to bow down in front of Lord Dudders.

            And to torture my parents.

            Harry touched the edge of the picture with his finger. He was keeping his emotions to himself. He held them and they shook him, but he was their master. If he hadn’t been, he would have torn up the photograph.

            Instead, he read all the articles he could find about the Lestranges and his parents’ torture and how long the Lestranges had been sentenced to Azkaban, and then he returned the papers to their proper places. His mind blazed with faces as he went out to fly and be with Yar, Cross scampering at his heels to play with a string dangling off Harry’s robes.

            I am going to make them pay. They won’t even know who I am or where I’m coming from, but they will pay.

            That day, as he flew with Yar and watched her scan the ground for prey, Harry felt as if he understood her better than ever.
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The Art of Self-Fashioning