(All characters and locations within belong to J.K. Rowling unless otherwise stated.)

Chapter 12

The New Year

“Never underestimate just how far a single smile can go.”

General (ret.) Jigme Dorji Wengshuk

It took a while for Harriet to fall asleep that night. Everyone was too excited talking about the tournament. The exception was Hermione who seemed to be against the idea of the tournament altogether.

“Oh relax, Hermione,” Fred said dismissively. “You heard Dumbledore. No one’s gonna get hurt.”

“If something can go wrong, it will,” Hermione said, flipping the page on her Ancient Runes textbook.

“You’re such a downer, Hermione,” Ronnie said. “You really think Dumbledore would put us all in harm’s way like that?”

Hermione raised an eyebrow.

“Well, okay, on purpose I mean.”

Harriet laughed.

The following morning, Fred, George, and Lee Jordan still had not given up their ambition to cheat their way into becoming the Hogwarts champion. Ronnie meanwhile was going over their new timetables.

“Not bad,” she said. “Outside all morning. Herbology with the Hufflepuffs and Care of Magical Creatures. Still with the Slytherins, of course…”

“Oh Ronnie must you always go on about them?” Hermione asked. “One of your best friends is a Slytherin.”

“Dora doesn’t count,” Ronnie said dismissively.

“Double Divination this afternoon,” Harriet moaned, making room for Dora to join them.

“So wish McGonagall had let us drop that so we could just be in Muggle Studies instead,” Ronnie groaned.

“Well, to be fair,” Dora said “you two are still doing well in Trelawney’s class, right?”

“Didn’t do so well on crystal balls, but I suppose overall…” Harriet admitted, grudgingly.

“Well, why complain then?” Dora said. “I say use it. Super easy class you can just bluff your way through and still get high marks without actually doing much work? Sounds like a win-win to me.”

Harriet laughed and Ronnie smiled.

“Okay, you have a good point there,” Ronnie admitted.

“And we’ll have Professor Spring together tomorrow,” Hermione said excitedly.

At that moment, there was the fluttering of paper and everyone looked up to see that the post owls had arrived. They swirled around the ceiling in a fluffy, feathery cloud before swooping down on their owners.

Harriet smiled watching them, though she always felt a little pang of jealousy every time. She didn’t really know anyone outside of Hogwarts, so she very rarely received any post. Neville Longbottom, who was notoriously forgetful, received a package from his grandmother. Over at the Slytherin table, Draco Malfoy had received his usual parcel of goodies from home.

Harriet looked down at her plate of food and sighed to herself. Just as she was about to stab her fork into her eggs there was a thunking noise on the table in front of her. She looked up and was quite taken aback to see an owl sitting on the table before her. Not just any owl, either. It was Daniel’s eagle-owl, Axl.

Axl hooted and lowered his head, pushing a package towards her with his beak. Harriet was still too surprised to move. Axl hooted again.

“Go on,” Dora said nudging Harriet’s elbow and bringing her to her senses.

Harriet slowly reached out for the package. Axl stepped back and helped himself to a sausage before swooping off, silently. Harriet untied the twine, unfolding the paper. The box itself was made of a nearly white wood, which looked familiar to Harriet. The top was inlaid with a dark wood like the cherry furniture of McIntyre Manor and had the Hogwarts crest emblazoned on it.

“Wow,” Scott said, impressed. “He made the whole thing of holly with a cherry inlay, that’s impressive, usually people do it the other way around.”

Harriet put a trembling hand on the box and tried to lift the lid. It wouldn’t open.

“There’s a letter underneath it,” Marcus pointed out.

Harriet lifted the box and picked up the envelope. She could feel the key inside it. She opened the envelope and tipped it, dropping the key into her hand. Then, she took out the letter.

“What does it say?” Ronnie asked, excitedly.

“Ronnie!” Hermione hissed.

Harriet blushed but read silently:

Dear Harriet,

It occurred to Remus that you’ve probably never received a “good-luck” start-of-year package, so we decided it was time to fix that. Plus, Snuffles wanted to give you something for your birthday. Remus made the box, while Snuffles and I filled it with goodies. We think it will come in useful this year. Have a great first term and see you around town and during the Tournament (yeah, Remus and I knew about the tournament for a while now, but we thought the surprise would be more fun than us just telling you.)

Lots of love,

Daniel

Remus

Snuffles

P.S. Do not open the tray until midnight tonight.

Harriet’s eyes went wide. She read the signatures again. All three of them had clearly been written by different hands. She looked hard at that last signature. It was Sirius. She recognized his handwriting, how often had she reread the last letter he’d sent her on her ride home on the Hogwarts Express last summer? Did this mean that Daniel and Remus were meeting with Sirius despite his being under house-arrest? If so, what are they playing at? Harriet thought, they could get in so much trouble. Unless they’re allowed to talk to him, but if they are, why can’t I?

“What does it say?” Ronnie pressed.

“It… It’s from Daniel and Remus,” Harriet said, pocketing the letter. She didn’t know if she was ready for them to know that, somehow, Sirius had something to do with this as well.

Without saying anymore, Harriet put the key into the lock and opened the box. She gasped at what she saw. It was a jewellery box.

Inside was a tray of compartments covered in soft, green felt. In one of the compartments was a pair of silver earrings, each in the shape of little silver snowy owls. In the main compartment was a necklace made of a thin, silver chain connected to two silver wings that were linked to a small golden ball.

“Oh, Harriet,” Hermione said softly, putting a hand over her heart as she watched. “It’s beautiful.”

“Remus made it…” Harriet said quietly.

Her cheeks felt very warm now. Dora was giving Harriet a sly smile.

“What?” Harriet asked.

Dora’s grin grew. “Well, you’ll have to get your ears pierced now, won’t you?”

Harriet blushed brighter. “Oh shut up.”

“Oh it’s not that bad, Harriet,” Hermione said, pulling back her own hair to reveal her own pierced ears. “Even I have them.”

Marcus snorted into his goblet. Hermione raised an eyebrow at him. “Sorry,” Marcus said. “It’s just the way you say that, like it’s always some big shock to everyone that you’re a girl or something.”

Hermione rolled her eyes, but as she took a sip of her own goblet, Harriet distinctly noticed her give a little smile.

Soon, the bell rang to signal the start of lessons. Harriet and the rest of the Gryffindors made their way down to the Herbology greenhouses. Harriet was having a hard time focusing. She’d packed the box very carefully in her bag, as she hadn’t had time to run back to Gryffindor Tower to put it away, and so couldn’t help stealing glances at her bag all the way through class, worried something was going to happen to it.

Fortunately, all they were doing was extracting Bubotuber pus, which was an oddly satisfying yet disgusting activity which involved popping the Bubotubers’ swellings and collecting the thick, lime-green, petrol-smelling liquid that came out of them. According to Professor Sprout Bubotuber pus was helpful in the treatment of acne.

The bell rang and the Gryffindors headed off to Care of Magical Creatures. The sight wasn’t reassuring. Hagrid was smiling down at them all, warmly as ever, but around his feet were several wooden crates which were rattling around and emitting the occasional popping noise like a firecracker. Harriet discreetly set her bag just inside the open front door of Hagrid’s hut as they formed a circle around him.

“Mornin’!” Hagrid said in greeting, grinning down at them all. “Better wait fer the Slytherins, they won’t wanna miss this – Blast-Ended Skrewts!”

“Uh, come again?” Ronnie asked.

Hagrid beamed and pointed down into the crates. Everyone leaned over cautiously to look.

“Eurgh!” Lavender Brown shrieked and jumped back a couple paces.

While Harriet didn’t always get on as well with Lavender and her best friend, Parvati (particularly where it came to their vapid worship of Professor Trelawney) she had to admit that this time Lavender had a point. The Skrewts were hideous.

They looked like shell-less lobsters. Their skin was milky-white and looked slimy. There seemed to be no rhyme or reason to where their legs protruded from their fleshy bodies, and Harriet couldn’t identify any heads. There looked to be a hundred of them per crate, and they were clambering over each other, bumping into the walls, and stank of rotting fish. Every now and then, a Skrewt would make a pop and phut noise and a jet of sparks would spray out of one end, rocketing the Skrewt ahead a foot or so.

“Only just hatched,” Hagrid said, puffing up with pride. “So yeh’ll be able ter raise ‘em yerselves! Thought we’d make a bit of a project of it!”

“And why exactly would we want to raise them?” asked a disdainful voice.

It was the Slytherins. Draco was still leading the group and was looking into the crates with disgust. His crowd of cronies were sniggering.

Hagrid stammered a bit, clearly fishing around for an explanation.

“I mean…” Draco said, giving one of his hands a wave of exasperation. “What do they do? What’s their purpose?”

Hagrid paused for a few more seconds, before he finally thought up an answer. “Tha’ll be next lesson, Malfoy. Just feedin’ ‘em today. I got a few things. Never ‘ad ‘em before, so not sure what they’ll go fer. Got ant eggs, frog livers, an’ a bit o’ grass snake. Just try a bit of each.”

Harriet and her friends all gave each other ever-suffering looks before they reluctantly put their hands into the slimy frog livers and dropped them into the crate. Harriet couldn’t really see the point to it. As far as she could tell, none of the Skrewts had mouths.

“Ouch!” Dean Thomas yelled in pain. “It got me!”

Hagrid hurried over, anxiety on his face. Harriet rolled her eyes. As much as she loved Hagrid, she had thought he would have learned his lesson over Buckbeak.

“Its end exploded!” Dean said, glaring and showing Hagrid a fresh, shiny burn on his hand.

“Ah, yeah, that can happen when they blast off. Maybe best we all wear our dragon-hide gloves from here on,” Hagrid said.

“Eurgh,” Lavender said, jumping back from her box again. “What’s that pointy thing on that one?”

“Ah, some of ‘em have got stings,” Hagrid said knowledgably.

Lavender drew back from the box, giving Hagrid and exasperated look.

“I reckon they’re the males. The females I think are the ones that have the sucker things on their bellies. My guess is they’re fer suckin’ blood.”

Jackson Lee groaned nearby, pinching the bridge of his nose with his fingers and clenching his eyes shut in frustration. Apparently, Jackson found Hagrid’s newest find just as ridiculous as the rest of them did.

“Well, I can certainly see why we’d want to keep them then,” Draco said, his voice rich with irony. “Who wouldn’t want pets that sting you, burn you, and suck your blood all at once?”

“Just because they’re not pretty, doesn’t mean they’re not useful,” Hermione snapped. “Dragon blood is incredibly useful, but you wouldn’t want a dragon for a pet, would you?”

Harriet, Ronnie, Kieran, and Marcus all gave Hagrid little grins. He blushed and gave them a furtive smile. Hagrid had actually owned a pet baby dragon for a short while during their first year. Hagrid’s affection for all creatures monstrous and deadly was a Hogwarts legend.

“Well… at least they’re not very big,” Ronnie said as they made their way back up to the school for lunch.

“Yeah, they aren’t now,” said little Rachel Kane. “Before long they’re gonna be able to eat Harriet and me in one bite.”

“Huh?” Harriet said.

“Well, we’re the shortest in the class,” Rachel pointed out.

Harriet looked around and realized that Rachel was right. Everyone with the exception of Rachel was noticeably taller than her now.

“Well it won’t matter,” Marcus said stretching. “It’ll be worth it if it turns out they cure sea sickness or something, right?”

Harriet and Rachel gave him dirty looks and Hermione rolled her eyes.

“You know I only said that to shut Malfoy up. If you ask me, the best thing would probably be to ship them all back to wherever they came from.”

They sat at the Gryffindor table, Scott and Dora joining them. They all stared as Hermione began to shovel food into her mouth at a furious pace.

“Ummmm, if you don’t mind, Hermione, I’d rather not have you vomiting all over the table while I’m eating,” Dora said. “Maybe slow down a bit…?”

“Almost done,” Hermione said through a mouthful of sprouts. “Need to get to the library.”

“What?” Ronnie asked. “We don’t have any homework yet—” Ronnie narrowed her eyes. “You don’t still have that time-turner, do you?”

“No!” Hermione hissed, looking around and leaning over the table, whispering. “I never had it, remember?”

Ronnie rolled her eyes. Hermione wolfed down the rest of her lunch and sprang up from the table. “See you all at dinner!” she said and hurried off.

An hour and a half later, Harriet was sighing dismally in the hot Divination classroom. Professor Trelawney was as miserable as ever. The moment Harriet had entered the classroom, Professor Trelawney had swooped down on her. Most of what she said was her usual nonsense, though the last part of it had somehow nested in Harriet’s mind and wouldn’t go away. I fear the thing you dread will indeed come to pass.

Normally, Harriet would have paid it no mind. However, after Professor Trelawney’s real prediction last spring, Pettigrew’s escape, her nightmare, and the events at the World Cup, the words seemed to stick in her mind more than they normally would.

This term, they were studying the stars and planets. Harriet had little interest as worries kept sweeping over her mind. She kept eyeing her bag and the present inside. She was worrying that Hagrid was going to get in trouble again over the Skrewts. She was still worrying about what Professor Trelawney had said.

“Harriet!” Ronnie hissed.

“Wha?”

Harriet looked around in surprise. Everyone in the room was looking at her. She sat up a little straighter. She must have started to nod off from the heat.

Professor Trelawney gave an indignant sniff. “I was saying, my dear, that you were clearly born under the baleful influence of Saturn.”

“Uh, Saturn?” Harriet said.

“Yes, dear, Saturn!” Professor Trelawney said, her indignation growing. “I was saying that Saturn was surely in a position of power in the heavens at the moment of your birth… your dark hair… your mean stature… tragic losses so young in life… I think I am right in saying, my dear, that you were born in mid-winter?”

Harriet raised her eyebrows. “No. I was born on the 31^st of July.”

Most of the class sniggered.

Harriet groaned in relief as class ended and they made their way to dinner. She was so ready for the day to be over. Unfortunately, life had one more curve to throw them.

As they joined the queue for dinner, the unpleasant and unwelcome voice of Pansy Parkinson cried out. “Weasley! Hey, Weasley!”

Harriet and her friends slowly turned. Pansy and Pixie were standing nearby, along with their lackey, Wendy Aarons and Blaise Zabini. Harriet noted that Wendy didn’t seem as amused as the other three.

“Your dad was in the paper, Weasley, did you know?” Pixie said, holding up a copy of the Daily Prophet. She was speaking loud enough for everyone in the Entrance Hall to hear her. “Listen to this!”

FURTHER MISTAKES AT THE MINISTRY OF MAGIC

It seems as though the Ministry of Magic’s troubles are not yet at an end, writes Rita Skeeter, Special Correspondent. Recently under fire for its poor crowd control at the Quidditch World Cup leading to the murder of a foreign dignitary, having to explain sentencing potentially innocent citizens to Azkaban without trial, letting a verified mass-murderer remain at large, and allowing the disappearance of one of its witches go un-investigated for months, the Ministry was plunged into fresh embarrassment yesterday by the antics of Arnold Weasley, of the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office.

Pansy shrieked with laughter. “Arnold Weasley,” she laughed maliciously. “They couldn’t even get his name right?”

“That’s not his name?” Pixie asked. “Well, shows how important he is, anyway.”

Pixie smirked and read on:

Arnold Weasley was yesterday involved in a tussle with several Muggle law-keepers (“policemen”) over a number of highly aggressive dustbins. Mr Weasley appears to have rushed to the aid of ‘Mad-Eye’ Moody, the aged ex-Auror who retired when he could no longer tell the difference between a handshake and attempted murder. Unsurprisingly, Mr Weasley found, upon arrival at Mr Moody’s heavily guarded house, that Mr Moody had once again raised a false alarm. Mr Weasley was forced to modify several memories before he could escape from the policemen, but refused to answer Daily Prophet questions about why he had involved the Ministry in such an undignified and potentially embarrassing scene.

“And look!” Pixie said spinning the paper around to show everyone. “There’s a picture! Weasley’s dear old mum and dad in front of their… er… house?”

“Yeah, I’m not seeing a house,” Zabini said tilting his head this-way and that.

“Mum could do with losing a bit of weight though,” Pansy said, thoughtfully. “Must be where Weasley gets her thunder-thighs from.”

Ronnie moved to take a step towards the group but Harriet and Marcus took hold of her arms, holding her back. Blaise sneered but suddenly, Cian Whelan, a Slytherin Muggle-born third year stepped out of the crowd.

“Oh yeah, three of you on one, that’s real good odds, isn’t it?” the shorter boy said glaring up at Zabini in particular.

“Watch yourself, little boy,” Zabini said, looking down at Cian as though the black-haired boy was something unpleasant on the bottom of his shoe.

“Blaise,” came Draco Malfoy’s voice. “I’ve been looking for you.”

“What for?” Blaise asked, looking around as Draco came towards them, flanked as ever by Crabbe and Goyle.

“What’s it matter?” Draco said taking hold of Zabini’s arm and pulling him towards the stairs that lead down to the Slytherin common room.

“But we’re waiting for dinner,” Zabini protested.

“I’ve got better food down in the common room,” Draco snapped.

The Entrance Hall was very quiet again. Draco had let go of Zabini’s arm and turned to walk off. Apparently, he had expected Zabini to just follow him. Instead, Zabini turned a wicked grin on Cian who had turned his back, walking back into the crowd to re-join his friends when Zabini slowly drew his wand. At that moment, Draco looked around for Zabini and saw him. Harriet reached for her own wand to try and block Zabini but to her surprise, Draco was faster.

Harriet didn’t hear the spell Draco shouted over the cry that went up through the crowd. Harriet paused and loud bang rang through the Hall, which was followed by a bellowing roar.

“OH NO YOU DON’T, LADDIE!”

Everyone spun to look to the marble staircase. Mad-eye Moody was limping down the steps, his wand pointing right at a pure-white, pink-eyed ferret which was turning around in circles rapidly, looking around in apparent terror, exactly where Draco Malfoy had just been standing.

Moody’s wooden foot clopped even louder on the stone floor than it had in the Great Hall the previous night. No one was moving or making a sound as Moody approached. Moody turned to Zabini.

“Did he get you, laddie?”

“W-what?” Zabini asked. By the stunned look on his face, it had not yet registered to Zabini what had just happened.

“LEAVE IT!” Moody shouted.

“Wh-wh-what?” Zabini stammered.

“Not you—him!” Moody said, jerking a thumb over his shoulder at Crabbe who had just bent down to pick up the ferret.

Harriet noted that Moody’s big spinning eye was white, meaning it had rolled back into his own head. Harriet blinked as she realized this meant that not only did the eye spin seemingly of its own volition, but apparently it could see through the back of Moody’s head.

Moody turned and started to stump towards Crabbe, Goyle and the ferret. The ferret twittered and shot off towards the staircase down to the dungeons.

“I don’t think so!” Moody roared and his wand flashed again.

This time, the ferret flew ten feet straight up in the air and bounced back to the floor with painful sounding smack, before bouncing straight up in the air once more.

“I don’t like people who attack when their opponent’s back is turned,” Moody growled, making the ferret bounce higher and higher. “Stinking, cowardly thing to do.”

The ferret bounced more.

“Never—do—that—again!” Moody said, uttering each growled word every time the ferret hit the ground.

Harriet didn’t know what made her do it. She immediately took a step forward and shouted. “Stop it! You’ll kill him!”

“Professor Moody!” cried a shocked voice.

The combined shouts distracted Moody just enough that he stopped bouncing the ferret. It felt to the floor, curling up and quivering, clearly in pain.

Everyone looked up at the staircase where the second shout had come from. It was Professor McGonagall, her arms full of books.

“Ah, hello Professor McGonagall,” Moody said as though nothing out of sorts had happened at all.

“What… what were you doing?” Professor McGonagall asked, looking down at the ferret.

“Teaching,” Moody said casually.

“Teach—MOODY?! Is that a student?!” Professor McGonagall shrieked, dropping her books which cascaded down the stairs.

“Yep,” said Moody.

“No!” cried Professor McGonagall. She drew her own wand in a flash and hurrying down the stairs and with a loud snap, Draco Malfoy reappeared where the ferret had been. His hair was all over his face, which was a bright, burning red. He winced as he tried to get to his feet.

“Draco!” said a worried voice.

From a side corridor, Kenley Tyler hurried over to Draco. Kenley was a fifth year Slytherin, and like Cian was also a Muggle-born. She had helped them during Harriet’s second year while trying to solve the mystery of the Chamber of Secrets before her own petrification by Slytherin’s basilisk.

“What is going on here?” Professor McGonagall demanded as she and Kenley kneeled at Draco’s side.

“Someone thought he’d be clever and jinx another student when his back was turned. I decided to teach him why he should never do it again.”

Professor McGonagall looked scandalized. “Moody! We never use transfiguration as a punishment, and we never use corporal punishment! Surely Professor Dumbledore told you that!”

“He might have mentioned it,” Moody said dismissively.

“We give detentions, Moody! Or speak to the offender’s Head of House!”

“I’ll do that then,” Moody said, glaring at Draco, darkly.

Draco glared back at Moody. His eyes were watering and he was muttering darkly under his breath. Harriet could just discern the words “my father.”

“Oh yeah?” Moody said, limping closer. “Well, I know your father of old, boy… you tell him Moody’s keeping a close eye on his son… you tell him that from me… Now, your Head of house’ll be Snape, will it?”

“Yes,” Draco said through gritted teeth.

“Another old friend,” Moody growled. “I’ve been looking forward to a nice private chat with old Snape. Come on, you.”

Moody took hold of Draco’s arm and began to pull him off towards the dungeons. Kenley watched after them, her hands over her mouth, rocking back and forth from foot to foot, anxiously. Professor McGonagall looked just as uneasy. She gathered her books back up with her wand and hurried off up the stairs again, turning in the direction of Professor Dumbledore’s office.

“He… he tried to jinx you,” Pansy said, sounding disbelieving.

“He did…?” Zabini asked, looking dumbstruck.

Crabbe and Goyle were staring off gormlessly in the direction Moody and Draco had left. The whole crowd seemed mixed in its opinion of the events as they finally moved into the Great Hall. By the sound of it, half the crowd thought Draco (who had a long history of bullying other students) had it coming. The other half was of the opposite opinion. Harriet was surprised to note that the latter opinion was far from confined to Draco’s fellow Slytherins. Uncomfortably, given the years of animosity between them, Harriet had to admit that she herself was in the latter camp.

“Okay, I missed something huge,” Dora said as she joined them. “What did I miss?”

“Something that under any other circumstances would have been the best moment of my life,” Ronnie said, poking her food awkwardly.

“…Meaning…?” Dora asked.

“Moody transfigured Malfoy into a ferret and bounced him on the floor a bunch of times,” Marcus said, sounding a bit hollow.

Dora whistled. “What brought that on?”

“Zabini was going to hex Cian and Malfoy tried to jinx him first,” Kieran answered.

“Jinx Cian?” Dora asked.

“No… Zabini,” Harriet said.

Dora’s eyes went almost as wide as Moody’s magical one. “You’re kidding.”

“Nope,” Harriet replied.

“I…” Marcus said, trying to find the words. “Just…” he set his fork down. “Malfoy and I have hated each other since bloody day one…”

“But if that’s the case, why did Moody transfigure him?” Dora asked.

“I don’t know,” Kieran said reasonably. “He must not have seen what happened… he was all the way at the top of the stairs, wasn’t he? So… maybe it was just a mistake?”

“Yeah, maybe,” Harriet admitted, without much conviction.

“But… he could have really hurt him,” Hermione finally chimed in.

They ate in silence. Despite Hermione’s initial hurry to eat and get to the library that she’d had before the incident, she now ate slowly. However, she still went to the library after they’d finished. Harriet and Ronnie, meanwhile, had their extensive amounts of Divination homework to work on.

Slowly, the common room emptied as students drifted off to bed. Harriet, remembering her letter and present, stayed behind.

“Coming to bed?” Ronnie asked.

“Later,” Harriet said. “I… kind of want to be alone for a while.”

“Okay…” Ronnie said, “Everything alright?”

“Yeah,” Harriet said quickly. “Just, yeah, thinking about stuff.”

“Okay,” Ronnie said again and headed off up the staircase to their dorm. Harriet sighed looking at the clock. She still had a half-hour until midnight.

She pulled the jewellery box out of her bag and set it on the table in front of her. She opened the lid and stared at the felt covered tray. She noted the little felt loop on it that she was sure lifted the tray up to reveal the compartment underneath that she was not to open until midnight.

Harriet lifted the box again and curiously tilted the box. There was a soft sliding and thunk sound as something slid into the side of the box.

“Okay, well it’s got some weight to it,” Harriet said, sliding the object within the other way. She set the box back down and sighed, crossing her arms on the table in front of her and resting her chin upon them, staring at it. She looked at the top of the lid and blinked, tilting her head. There was clearly a place for a mirror to be placed into the lid. Yet there was no mirror. That was odd, Harriet thought. She’d have to write to Daniel and ask.

The minutes seemed to tick by at the speed of a particularly lazy snail. Harriet’s eyes started getting heavy as midnight drew nigh.

“Harriet?”

Harriet jumped. She must have dozed off, as she could have sworn someone had said her name. Yet as she looked around the common room, she was completely alone.

She looked over at the clock and saw it was a minute past midnight. The realization brought Harriet back to her senses instantly and she turned her attention to the box at once. She fumbled for the loop and pulled up. The tray came loose and folded up like a lid itself. Hidden underneath the tray was a small rectangular mirror.

Harriet lifted the mirror out. By the looks of it, it was the missing mirror from the inside of the lid. Harriet pushed the felt tray back down and pushed the mirror gently into the spot in the box’s lid. Sure enough, it fit in perfectly.

“Wow,” Harriet smiled, looking at her reflection.

She smiled and picked up the earrings from their compartment. She brushed back her hair and held up the little owl earrings to each ear.

“Lovely.”

“ACK!”

Harriet cried out in shock, dropping the earrings and tumbling off her chair. Nervously, Harriet rose to her knees, peeking over the edge of the table. She was sure that the voice had come from her jewellery box. Her eyes went even wider as she saw the sight of Sirius’ face smiling at her from inside the mirror.

Sirius looked much healthier than he had the last time Harriet had seen him. His face looked more fleshed out. His hair looked much more natural and washed. His eyes didn’t seem quite as sunken anymore, either.

“Sirius?!” Harriet asked, scrambling up and sitting in her chair again.

“The one and only,” the Sirius in the mirror replied, chuckling. “Bit jumpy, are we?”

Harriet rolled her eyes, blushing. “Well sorry, I wasn’t exactly expecting you to pop out of my mirror,” she grumbled. “How are you doing this?”

Sirius laughed. “It’s a two-way mirror. A linked pair of mirrors you can use to communicate instantly over long distances. Sort of like if Muggles had videos attached to their telephones. I have one and now you have the other. Your father and I used to use them when we were in different detentions. And well, now you have his we can communicate whenever you need me, despite my being a bit on the locked-up side.”

Harriet couldn’t help but smile. “But, how did you get it to Daniel and Remus?” she asked. “How did you sign that letter?”

Sirius laughed again. “Oh you really want me to spoil the secret so soon?”

“Yes,” Harriet said without hesitation.

Sirius laughed louder. “And there’s your mother,” he said. “See, the Shrieking Shack is sufficiently sealed up to keep a werewolf (or similarly sized creature) inside, but lots of much smaller things can slip in and out quite easily without being noticed by guards who are a bit too overconfident in how well the Shack can keep me in.”

“Like owls?” Harriet asked.

“Exactly,” Sirius said, grinning. “Daniel and Remus sent me the letter about making something for your start of term. I told them about the mirror and where to find it in my family’s old house (poor devils, said they had to fight off three boggarts and a swarm of doxies before they found it). They smuggled my old mirror to me, and sent on your father’s old mirror to you.”

Harriet shook her head in disbelief but she couldn’t stop smiling. “You three are something else.”

“Oh I know, I know,” Sirius said. “So, aside from the obvious details with the World Cup and all, how was your summer?”

“It was okay,” Harriet said. “I spent most of it worrying about you.”

Sirius’ smile finally faltered. “Ah,” he muttered. “Yeah, sorry about that. But Albus said he figured my best chance, what with yours and Daniel’s testimony in particular, that turning myself in was the best chance. If I kept running, it’d just make me look more guilty.”

“Yeah,” Harriet agreed. “I can see that. Testifying was so scary.”

“I bet, kiddo,” Sirius said. “But Daniel and Remus both said you did a great job, and they’re both very proud of you.”

Harriet felt her cheeks get warm, and for some reason, she felt her eyes start to get misty.

“Are you sure everything’s alright?” Sirius asked. Evidently, he had noticed.

“I don’t know,” Harriet said. “Just so much has happened and I just haven’t had time to stop and think about any of it, just more and more keeps happening.”

“I know, kiddo, I know,” Sirius said, his voice calm and quiet. “But you’re strong, damn you’re strong. You’ll get through this. You’ve got your friends, and you’ve got Remus and Daniel, and now you’ve got me.”

Harriet managed another smile and nodded, wiping her eyes. She set her arm back down and winced, lifting it again and seeing one of her earrings.

“Oh, just a sec,” Harriet said, putting the earring back into its compartment before hunting around for the other one. She finally found it under the table and put it in with the other earring.

“All there?” Sirius asked, chuckling.

“Yeah,” Harriet said, smiling brighter now.

Sirius was positively beaming. It was a back and forth chain reaction, the more Harriet smiled, the more Sirius seemed to smile, which in turn made Harriet smile more.

“So,” Sirius said, and grunted as if leaning back on a chair. “Tell me about your friends…”