A Treasured Object

At least Care of Magical Creatures should be fun,  Spike thought as she entered the stables.  I'm hoping to pick up some pointers for the creature I'm working to design for my OWL this term-- and she stopped dead when she saw what was waiting in the corral out back. 

The griffin's fierce, proud eyes met hers and seemed to see into her very soul, weighing her and finding her wanting.  It clawed at the ground with its lion's talons, tail lashing.  "So glad you could join us, Spike," drawled Professor Harkiss sardonically.  "Since you must know everything about the griffs, since you seem to feel free to skip the first five minutes of my carefully planned introduction, perhaps you can show us how to handle one." 

Spike started to explain that she was only late because  . . . and then realized it was hopeless.  Professor Harkiss was known to blow hot and cold towards those of her own House, perhaps to avoid accusations of favorites, or because she wanted to keep the Slytherins guessing where her allegiance lay at a given moment.  Spike rather suspected the latter, leavened with a heavy dose of particular pets within the House itself.  Harkiss never seemed to single out Pimpernelle for special attention.

She struggled to recall what she had read of the beasts, recall what she knew about handling large animals.  Perhaps if I start like I would one of the riding bears . . .  no direct eye contact, don't get too close at first . . .  She watched it sidelong as she approached, and when it started to bridle, she stopped where she was, bowed her head.  It spread its wings, bringing its head up and back, so she dropped a curtsey to hide the weakness in her knees, and not coincidentally, make herself a smaller target.   She saw its approach, slow and measured, lion's paws coming closer, then the top of its head as it bowed before her.

They appreciate treasure, she remembered.  Do I have anything special with me?  She reached into her book bag and pulled out a square that she had spent hours laboring over, working to get ti to come out just right.  Treasure and a combination of colors and textures -- perhaps this will speak to it somehow.  She offered it on an open palm.



The griffin sniffed at it, tipping its head to look carefully at her, its eye the size of her thumb, its hooked predator's beak inches from her hand.  Spike nodded to it.  Take it, if you want it.  Its wings flared out and then wrapped around the tow of them for an instant.  Spike sneezed from the dust that was stirred up and shaken loose.  The animal nipped up the square in its beak, then backed away, tucking it under one wing. 

Spike stayed where she was for a long moment, then stood and returned to the ring of students.  Professor Wigworthy had joined the class, and when she saw Spike she broke off a hissed conference with Harkness.  One of the Squib animal handlers came to lead the griffin away, and another, a tawny creature with mild blue eyes, took its place.  Wigworthy put one hand on Spike's shoulder.  "Walk with me," the Ravenclaw said sharply, and Spike meekly followed.  Now what?  The flobberworm tanks?  I wasn't all that late . . .

When they were out of earshot, the professor spun Spike around to look at here carefully.  "Hands," she demanded, and Spike obediently showed her, palms up.  "You're all right then?"

"Yes . . ."

"I don't know what they were thinking, bringing out a broody griffin for a class of Second Years.  That's Master's level work, that is.  You're sure you're . . ."

Broody?  "Is she . . . with  . . ."  Do they lay eggs?  Do they have live young?  Some of both, heaven help us?

"Yes."  All concern for the student vanished in the joy of a teaching opportunity.  "One of the first to actually mate in captivity.  We have such high hopes for the possibility of being able to replenish the world's shrinking population, but we have to get a breeding program started after all . . .  Did she take something from you?  I thought I saw something when the two of you were communing."

Spike explained about the blanket square.  "So I thought -- did I do something wrong?"

Wigworthy thought it over. "I don't see how that could hurt," she said, tapping her front teeth with one fingernail.  "Tell you what -- and I probably shouldn't even offer to do this -- but if you're willing to cut your lunch hour short by just a bit -- we could stop by the griffin's aerie and see what she's made of your . . . offering."

The remainder of class seemed to drag by, and not just because the new griffin seemed placid by comparison.  Wigworthy waited next to the gate, and Spike maneuvered to be the last student out. Not too difficult; most of them were more interested in what had been laid out in the Great Hall than they were in sticking around after class. 

It wasn't quite what Spike had expected --they looked into a ball on a plinth, rather than making the climb to the aerie, but Spike supposed that made sense, in order not to disturb the animals.  Wigworthy hummed a little aimless tune under her breath as she focused in, something that went around and around like a lullaby.  Spike found herself breathing to its soothing rhythm, drifting peacefully.

"Ah, here she is.  And look!"  The griffin was lying down, head on her front paws, wings folded, somewhere between cat and dragon as she slept wrapped around an egg bigger than Spike's head.  Laid carefully and neatly over the egg was the blanket square. 

"A treasured object to protect her greatest treasure."  Wigworthy held up a fist, and Spike fought to keep from ducking away.  She said I hadn't . . . oh.  Ravenclaw thing.  Tentatively, Spike made a fist and tapped knuckles with the professor. 

"I understand you're sitting Care of Magical Creatures this term."  Spike nodded, and Wigworthy continued, "Please consider our library open and available to you, and my office door open any time.  I think you may have a special aptitude for this, and I'd like to see it developed further."

Spike thought about her OWL, the flasks and vats down in the semi-abandoned Potions lab where she did most of her work.  The tubes, the incubators; the scalpels, forceps, retractors.  The ingredients she had had to concoct out of raw materials, the equipment she had had to obtain at the glassblowers in Knockturn Alley, that she had to order from Durmstrang.  "I'll . . . do that, Professor Wigworthy."  Well, this was what she had come for.  Might as well make the most of it.

Lumpy, Bumpy, Irregular

The asteroid belt.  Spike sighed, crossed out yet another opening line on the parchment.  It, like so many others, looked so good, and ultimately led nowhere.  After sitting for her Astronomy OWL last term, with all of the commensurate excitement of nearly failing it at midterms, only to pull off a nigh miracle at the last possible minute, astronomy the class was proving to be somewhat less . . . interesting.  Perhaps I should have sat for History of Magic first . . . then she reconsidered her plans for the next term, assuming her OWL passed muster this term.  No, there are no boring OWLs.  "Too bad the same cannot be said for classes," she grumbled. 

Sascha looked up from the game he was playing in the corner with a rubber ball and mouse skulls.  Spike had seen him at it before, a game of speed and dexterity.  Plus it helped to have enormous hands.  "What the problem is?" he asked, scooping up the full dozen in one grab and pocketing them.

"Oh, it's just hard to get inspired over a bunch of lumpy rocks floating around in space."  Spike picked up her quill, spun it in lazy circles, then dropped it again.  "They're  . . . lumpy, bumpy, and irregular.  They fly around like rocks, tumbling over and over.  They're BORING."

"Huh.  So make something lumpy, bumpy and irregular, yah?  Crumple up de page so --" he demonstrated with the parchment and its struck-through lines, disregarding Spike's squeal of outrage, "--mebbe tear it some around de edges --"

"Sascha!"  She grabbed for it, but he held it up out of reach.

"--and add a leetle color." He splashed it with wine, mustard, and balsamic vinaigrette from the dinner tray the elves hadn't whisked away yet.  "Now.  Lumpy, bumpy, irregular.  Do you essay on dis."  And he walked away, humming something under his breath. 

Spike looked at the stained, ragged, crumpled parchment in despair. I can't write on that.  I can't turn something in on that!  I can't . . . but this is also a school of magic.  What do I have a wand for, after all?  She squared her shoulders.  I can use this idea.

At class the next day, the professor was forced to concede that Spike's submission did indeed exhibit all the characteristics of the asteroid belt. "That is, lumpy, bumpy, and irregular.  Nicely played."  Spike smiled, thinking about how after class, she would show Sascha how it also flew, much like the stones of the asteroids.  Best work on your ducking speed, Sascha.

A Charmed Memory

It was a glorious spring morning -- the heather was beginning to blossom, the bees were waking up, and the gardens beckoned.  Spike picked up a cherrywood single wand and her Charms homework, going outside to work al fresco.  A parchment on a much loved person, to keep them close to you no matter the distance between you.

Sitting under a tree in the dappled shade, she thought back to an earlier time back home, sitting with her father's mother in the little gazebo she favored, under the vines in the back garden.  The area had been charmed with warmth, to keep it clear from snow even in the deepest winters.  It was always spring in Babushka's garden, she mused, the soft living heart of Schadelthron, tucked deep in the ribs of stone.

She had been a renowned witch of the single wand school of magic, turning her skills from enormous coverlets that stayed warm in the draftiest, drabbest seasons to cunning dolls and toys that tumbled and bounced in Spike's hands.  That was a wonderful day, when I was able to show her that I had learned a little of the single wand magic myself.  We sat together in the gazebo, casting together.  She was working a complex Transfiguration, changing and vanishing it piece by piece, and I  . . . I was doing Charms, wasn't I?  A simple charm, but with lightness to it.

Spike peered at the fiery heart that burned in the center of the parchment, with its Slytherin green surround.  Much like this one.  Her hands worked automatically, surrounding the center with a lattice that recalled the boards of the gazebo.



I inherited her parchments and notes when she went beyond the veil, along with many of her tools. She held up the wand, squinting at it.  In fact, this was one . . .  For a moment, she could feel the older woman's soft, wrinkled, tissue-paper hand in hers.

A Pair of Socks

Dmitri opened the door to the lab, peered cautiously inside.  The usual warning sign on the door not to look in with the remaining eye wasn't posted, but Little Mistress was known to be somewhat absent minded when the muse was on her.  The lab smelled faintly of butterbeer, bone marrow, yarrow, and red clover.  *Safe enough.  Nothing flammable, nothing explosive.*  "Leedle Mees?  You has company."  He gently nudged his knee-high companion in through the gap.

Spike swiveled on the high stool to see a young house-elf creeping across the floor.  He wore a tattered faded Hogwarts t-shirt clearly cast off from a student's winnowings, and a stocking cap . . . no, an actual stocking on his head, the leg and foot wrapped around his neck like a liripipe.  She put three fingers to her mouth to hide her smile, coughed as a pretext. 

"That's a bad cough you have, Miss Spike.  I could get you . . ."  It's voice was high and piping, not broken yet.  *A young house-elf, then.  That explains the clothing.  Rebelling and shocking with its willingness to actually wear the real article; still within the pale by wearing them not quite right.*

"No, no, just a momentary tickle from the dust and damp."  She cleared her throat to prove it.  "No matter how you try, entropy will have its way," she added, as the elf's ears began to droop at the implied criticism.  "So!  You didn't come down to discuss housekeeping, you would have just apparated in, if that were the case.  What do you want?"

The elf stared at its bare, knobby feet, like calloused, chilblained potatoes, and mumbled something.

"Excuse me?"

He stared up at her earnestly.  "Socks, Missy.  Wibble wants socks."

"But -- Doesn't the SPEW Crew leave plenty lying about the castle . . ."  She pointed at Wibble's head.  He sighed. 

"Wibble wants  . . . Wibble . . ." he swallowed hard.  Spike wondered at how difficult it must be for a slave race to express desire for anything, any wish that would imply an ego that was capable of things like desire.  *I am not a thing that makes decisions,* she thought, and shivered.  "Wibble wants crocheted socks," he finished, a flash of defiance creeping into his eyes, then quickly extinguished.  "If that's all right," he finished, looking back at the floor.

Spike looked at the retort.  *It was going to have to simmer for an hour undisturbed, and having something to do with her hands would keep her from poking at it.  Plus, having a house elf owe her a favor  . . . yes, this could be useful on several fronts.*  "Dobby style, right?"  Wibble's eyes glittered tearfully for a second, and he nodded.

A scant hour later, the socks were complete, Wibble was sitting on the bench admiring his newly clad feet, and Spike was diligently stirring her potion, twelve deosil, fifteen widdershins, and thirteen figure of eight, reversing the center cross each time.

Wibble started to say farewell, then thought better of it.  He simply stood, turned on one heel -- *Warm!  Finally warm!* -- and vanished.

Animal, Vegetable, Mineral

Spike dug through her stash, hunting for just the right ingredients to bring with her to Potions.  The assignment was to bring something that was less than satisfactory and re-work it into a more pleasing configuration.  "Sometimes," Professor Halliwell had drawled from beneath the black-draped portrait of Severus Snape, "One simply must work with what fate has handed one.  It is not always possible to obtain the freshest possible wolfsbane harvested under the exact moment of the zenith of the full moon at the time of the plant's most auspicious potency.  Sometimes, one simply takes what the market offers, and then it is the skill of the witch or wizard that determines the ultimate success of the spell."

She knew she had something perfect in her pile, the only issue was finding it . . . ah-ha.  She pulled out three amalgamations, making a face as she did so. 

The balls of annoyance.  She had been delighted with the colors when she beheld them in the shop window, the yellow of the citrine, the auburn of the fox's fur, the brown of the oak gall.  She had attempted spellwork with them several times, and each time, the battle between the organic and mineral (not to mention the wrestling match between the plant and animal) had torn the spell apart.  "I need to create harmony between these divergent components," she sighed, as she began dismantling their current form and preparing them for Potions.  

 In the laboratory, Spike pondered the materials available. 

A very basic Potions kit, she noted, with an irritated acceptance.  You're not an ickle Firstie any more, she reminded herself.  You need to be up for more challenging work.  If you can't get the finest, best-quality ingredients to start with, then why would you expect to have a complete catalog at your fingertips?  What can you do with what's in your hand, Schadelthron?

She sighed, picked up the chunk of resin.  This will resonate with the citrine, and bring the oak gall some brightness.  Into the cauldron.  Next, the dove's blood, for warmth, and a drop of the lake water.  Water brings harmony to disparate elements, as the universal solvent, and the element of patience.  She tested her mixture on a scrap of parchment.

 Yes.  Yes, that should work. 

She added acid to the mix, then carefully lowered her disparate ingredients into the potion, holding her breath.  Nothing to do but to wait while it simmers. 

Once the wandwork was complete -- the stirrings carefully timed, sunwise so many times, doesil so many more, figure eights, infinities, with the carefully counted paused between -- Spike removed her ingredients from the vat and hung them to dry in the sunlight.

She had to admit, once she returned to collect her property, that they had come out well.  The amber and blood had warmed the oak gall, smoothed the citrine's edges, and the water had calmed the fox's fur.  The new ingredients shone brightly together, chiming softly when she stroked it with one fingertip.  She didn't know what she would create with the new ingredients, but they would be magnificent.  

A "Better" Owl

After the welcoming feast and sorting whirl had died down, and the Pit was settling in for their first night back at Hogwarts, Spike was occupied and occupying one of the larger tables in the laboratory, burning the midnight oil with plans for the term.  Dmitri found her there after lights-out, scribbling away, with her head propped on one ink-stained hand.

"Five more minutes," she grumbled when she heard the door creak open.  He pried the quill out of her cramped hand, massaging the fingers to get her to let go. 

"Bedtime," he growled firmly, sweeping her papers into a stack and rolling them up.  "Gonna be breakfast in a couple hours, then classes.  You don' wanna be sleeping through classes, do you?  Like ickle firstie who don' know when 'nough's 'nough."

"But I'm not -- " A jawbreaking yawn swallowed whatever Spike was not.  "Besides, I have that OWL to propose.  Just another five minute would let me . . ."

"Nother five minutes have you sleeping here in de chair.  Tell me 'bout it on de way up; be de same as making more notes to youself."

"It's that multipart OWL," she said, allowing herself to be taken by the arm and helped out of the chair.  "See, regular owls are always getting in trouble, especially the smaller ones.  They fight with hawks when they have to fly in the day, they're prey for cats.  We need tougher owls, owls that can see in the light as well as the dark; stronger, bigger owls that can carry more without getting tired."

"Hmmm."  The light had been turned out, the door closed behind them, and now they were starting up the stairs.  Hopefully, explaining her project would keep her distracted enough to keep from noticing that she was being chivvied off to sleep until her head hit the pillow.  Monologuing, the key to keeping a master happy.

"So I want to . . ." she stopped on the stairs, suddenly bone-weary.  Dmitri picked her up, barely breaking stride.  "Want to build a better owl," she mumbled into his shoulder. 

"How you gonna do dat?"

"I'll build an owl out of at least three different beasts.  Like when Dr. Wolfgang built you Hounds.  That's what I was talking with him about, back home, how he put you together using the one template.  Start with a man, make him stronger, faster, give him enhanced hearing and smell.  Like that.  But with an owl."

For a moment, the steps dropped out from under his feet as he listened to Spike sleepily outlining her plans.  The stairs in the dungeon seemed to be playing tricks along the lines of the great staircases above, swinging slowly around, gaping holes opening suddenly, risers going flat and slick under his boots.  As the shadowed world finally solidified around him again, he found himself asking the unspeakable question.  The one that no good minion would ever dream of giving voice to.

"But mistress -- why would you do such a thing?"

A Journal Entry, Conclusion

Ha.  If only we could have known . . . Little Spike proved to be an apt pupil, one of those quiet infants who take in the entire world through large dark eyes.  I thought the challenges would arise when she learned to walk, remembering my sons who seemed determined to throw themselves under the hooves of the largest mammal they could find as soon as they took their first staggering steps.  Or to help feed the fire, or to play with knives.

Ah, no. The trouble began when she taught herself to read.  Keeping her physically safe from those who would do her harm was easy -- I recruited two other Hounds whom I could trust as I would my own hands and eyes to take shifts with me as her bodyguards -- but keeping her safe from herself was another matter entirely. 

One of her uncles sent someone to eliminate her in her sleep, and I had a long discussion with the messenger at the top of the tower while Sascha rocked Spike back to quiet.  Another, cleverer man, sent a toy broom.  Spike quickly mastered the toy -- and then overrode the controls, as she preferred flying to walking.  She adored the brightly illustrated books that read themselves to you, and then whenever she was missing I could find her in the library; often spidered up in the shelves that housed the forbidden books, sounding out the complex Latin invocations.  When she learned to actually channel her will and bend the universe to her desire -- but that's all in the other entries, the fires, the holes in the walls, the rooms that had to be sealed off for months while the magisters performed the counter-invocations. 

It was a relief when she was accepted to Durmstrang.  At last, she would have a challenge to face in a safe place.  A place to stretch her wings and learn to fly so she could take her place in the skies.

Well.  We all know what happened next; that horrible moment in Arithmancy where it all went pear-shaped.  I like to think that if one of us had been there we could have prevented it somehow; confiscated Spike's note to herself with a promise of appropriate discipline to follow, maybe.  Nudged her elbow at just the right moment to spoil the line and render the diagram harmless. Horrible clumsy monsters, us.

That first night back, I spent thinking about all the times I had combed and braided Spike's hair when she was tiny, wondering if I would be able to do so one last time. A last service to perform for my mistress.  Fortunately, her father is a man of reason, rather than emotion.  He plays the part of the tyrant ruled by his heart well, sometimes almost too well, but he wasn't about to toss all his plans aside because of one small misunderstanding. 

So, we were off to Hogwarts.  I am proud of her for learning the qualities of perseverance, the laws of magic, especially that that which you pay attention to becomes.  Stubborn gritting it through and finishing, pulling off magic in the last hour, making it all come together and happen.  These qualities will stand her in good stead when she grows up and goes to fulfill the destiny planned for her.

At the same time, I worry.  As if I were that father of her blood.  If anyone could teach power and the ways to wield it, that would have been Durmstrang.  But perhaps Hogwarts can teach my little mistress a little cleverness, a little misdirection, a way of thinking outside the boundaries.  With where she's going, these might serve her better than brute force.

Water wears away mountains, one slow soft lick at a time.  Perhaps she may learn the ways of water.

It is late and getting later; the year has turned and the hour of the Octopus gives way to the hour of the Cat.  Time to close this for now.

--Totenberg

A Journal Entry, Part Two

At the beginning would be the logical choice.  I can hear my old commander's voice on the wind, there.  Any time someone made their report and started in the middle of things, he would wait for the initial burst of steam to run out, then dryly suggest that beginning at the beginning would be the logical point.  I hated those words, hated them until I heard them coming out of my mouth one day when my sleeve had the stripes. 

So.  The beginning, when the Lady ended her confinement at last, and the heir to Schadelthron was finally brought into the world.  I was honored to be standing guard outside her chambers while the Master was inside viewing the new life.  I remember when the door cracked open and he gestured me inside.  Placed the tiny bundle in my hands.  I was so shocked I nearly dropped it; he did me far too much honor. 

"I wanted your face to be one she knows as well as her mother's or mine." She yawned, face splitting wide, and then her eyes opened again, that perfect newborn's grey, that no color from nine months of looking at the red darkness.  Her skin was perfect, her head was round. The midwife had done an excellent job bringing her into the world gently.  The only sign of the animal source of birth was a smear of blood on one cheek, and Mistress came and wiped it off with a cloth. 

"Should you be up?"  The words were curt, but his voice was tender as he looked at his wife, forgetting me for a moment, standing there with all his hopes, his future in my hands.

"Nonsense," she said firmly.  "Everything went just as it should.  I'm fine.  Our little girl is fine.  There's no reason I should lie there as if I'd foaled like one of the bears -- and even you wouldn't question one getting to her feet and starting to lick her cub immediately afterwards."  She kissed him on the cheek, I remember. 

Then the penny dropped.  Her.  Little girl.  For a moment, I thought I understood my duty; that he was asking me to do the necessary work, to take this little mite out into the snows and lay her to rest on a hillside so they could grieve, then try again for a more fitting heir.  I thought for a moment of my sons, grown men, possibly grandfathers --possibly great- or great-great-grandfathers by then, and I held the little one closer for a second. It wasn't my place to refuse an order, nor my place to speak and volunteer.  So I waited, and each flutter of her heart made doing what I would have to do just that much harder.

He saw my thoughts in my eyes, I think, and nodded once.  "That.  That's why I need you."

"Yes sir."  For that moment I hated him, hated him for giving in to the wishes of his peers. No better than the masses, for all their power.  I wanted to hide her someplace safe, to take her away with me, away from service.  If I walked far enough, I might find a place where the deformed giant and his tiny charge could live in peace. I'd raise goats or cows, feed her on their milk.  I'd done that before, in another life, when I had a family of my own, between campaigns.  A soldier-farmer, then a soldier, finally back to a farmer, to live out my long days.

A useless fantasy, simply getting through the country my master controlled without being hunted down and destroyed would be futile with an infant.  A stolen infant, if one went so far as to be clear about it; even though her father's intent was to expose her on a hillside did not mean that she could then be claimed by the next person to come by.  That was no different, in the eyes of the law, than stealing the infant from its crib, or the loving arms of its mother.

I waited for him to dismiss me, to tell me to go and do my duty, hold his wife back as I left the rooms and the castle.  But instead, he stroked her head, and laid his hand on my arm. 

"I need you to help keep her safe," he said.  "You and I both know there will be those who take . . . exception  . . . to a girl child as the heir to the throne. She will need to lean on your strength until she develops her own."

A Journal Entry, Part One

25 Monkey, 31 Dragon, Hour of the Octopus

I take pen in hand this turning of the year to record my thoughts once more.  I have been slack in my duties to keep this for those who may come after me, and the only feeble excuse I can find is that it has been a busy year. 

The leather spines of my predecessors mock me from their neat rows, some stained with sand and sweat from places I have never seen and can only imagine when I turn the brittle browned pages, some of parchment, some of paper.  What can you know of busy, they grumble, you who have not been used in war for a century or more, you who have a soft position, watching over a little heir to the throne?  A female heir, at that?  What, she beats you at cards?  Serves you imaginary tea with her dolls?

And all I can reply is that this post, it is not like any other that I have known in my long years of service to the Family.  I would rather be out on the ice where the sun blinds and fails to warm, rather be in jungles that drip with hallucinogenically colored poisonous animals and plants, rather fight the sands that leap on the wind and strip flesh to bone.  In some ways, it would be safer. 

It would certainly be clearer, the enemy known, their weaknesses assessable, and plans to be laid athwart theirs.

Where to begin? 

Meet the Doctor (Conclusion)

His offices looked nothing like what she had pictured.  No bubbling chemicals (like Professor Snape's workbench), no stacks of papers and obscure clutter (like the Headmistress's office), no gloom and soot.  Well lit and gleaming white, as if the walls had just been washed down.  No torches, no candles, light pouring down from the ceiling as if the sun had been bleached to snowy white and hung to light his work.

He offered her tea, with a pat of butter floating in it, and she accepted, sipping at the salty bitter brew.  "It's the OWL I plan to sit for next term," she said, and then filled him in on the OWL examinations, the different requirements, and her plans.  He nodded, asking careful dissecting questions at intervals.  Spike was surprised to find out how much there was to know, and where the holes in her knowledge were.  She ended with an explanation of her plans to construct a chimera of her own, and he sat back, beaming.  The cherubic smile never rose above his rosy cheeks.

"Hands-on experience is always . . . preferable to pure theory," he started, "and hybrid vigor is often encouraging."  She head something rustle from behind the closed laboratory door.  He'd walked her down a hallway of doors, leaving the Hounds in the vestibule.  She hadn't seen a thing he didn't want seen.  "Have you considered how you're going to get the insect parts to blend with the dragon?" 

Spike began to answer, but was interrupted as something began to sob softly.  His expression didn't change as he snapped his fingers for Tick to go and attend it.  Spike realized why her Hounds always arranged themselves so someone was on either side of a door; so you always knew who was there. "I'm not certain," she admitted.  "Shouldn't the rule of similarity apply, scales are scales are scales?"

"It's a matter of, you should pardon the expression, scale." And they went on for an hour plotting, with the scherblocken sketching diagrams on scraps of parchment, with Spike asking the probing questions, circling sections of the sketch, drawing arrows and underlining parts for her own edification and research. 

Near the end, Spike stood and stretched.  "One more question, sir.  I'm thinking about a special History of Magic OWL for the term after . . ."

"Planning ahead, are we?  That's your father in you.  Good to see that trait bred true."

"So . . . what can you tell me about re-creating someone who has gone on before?  Like an Inferii, but not so . . ."

"Evil?  You want to animate the actual corpus, or are you looking to bring back a ghost?"

"Well  . . . neither, more like . . ." and she started to explain. 

Meet the Doctor, Part Four

The door swung wide before she could ask what the worst way of homecoming was, and the bonecutter stood there in front of them.  He was rounder than before, if anything, and Spike was surprised to see that rather than looming above like an airship, he was actually quite small, only a little taller than she was.  His moon face was still pink as if freshly scrubbed; his hands dainty, pudgy, soft paws.  He had a fringe of wispy silver hair ringing an otherwise bald pate, and his blue eyes were watery behind the lenses of his glasses. 

A genial appearance, harmless to the point of bumbling, until you looked into his eyes, saw the grim lines of his mouth in the goatee.  No smile lines crinkling from the corners of eyes or mouth, just three grim slashes between his eyebrows where his will had raked its claws over and over again. From the corners of her eyes, Spike could see Sascha grimly concentrating on the floor, Tontenberg's  clenched fists.  At her back, Dmitri was a wall of obsidian, still radiating the heat that had made him, and fragile, struggling not to crack.  She took a deep breath, offered a hand to the man.  "Scherblocken--"

He took her hand in both his own, bowed over it.  Precisely the degree owed to the heir of the manor, the person who would inherit the lands and his office, the one who would have power over him one day.  The one whom he would serve by tending the riding bears, keeping them healthy and tame so that they would serve the rider's will.  A careful pavane of power, of checks and balances.  Blood on the snow, she thought, and pawprints leading away.  She met his gaze as he stood back erect, and saw that they understood one another perfectly. 

"I've come for advice," she started, and gained some satisfaction in seeing him blink, surprised.  A pawn to me, only a pawn.  But a piece nonetheless.

"Well, then.  Do come in, and let us see how I can provide some assistance."  His voice was a dry and tidy tenor.

Meet the Doctor, Part Three

Looking around at the hall inside, it was just as she remembered it from her rare visits with her father.  Grey stone, rough-worked to provide traction for boot soles.  Nothing breaking the endless grey but the seams of the rock, no tapestries, no paintings -- no distractions.  A piece of carpet had been laid down at the entrance to catch mud and snowmelt, but the color, if any, had faded into the dull no-color of dirt, blending into the stone.  Lights came from boxes in the ceiling, a chilly winter light, as if lit by the sun buried deep in cloud cover.  The shadows cast by the light were surprisingly faint and fuzzed out.  It's as if I'm somehow less solid, here.  Less real.

Tock waved them ahead, taking up the rear.  They walked down the narrow hall, passing metal doors with gray paint that blended them into the walls.  The handles were brass, as were the number plates on each door.  Metal doors, wondered Spike.  What goes on here that oak isn't enough?  Then she thought about it again, and shivered. Maybe this was a mistake . . .  But she couldn't turn around, not with her Hounds around her, flanking her and bringing up the rear, not with Tock behind them.  Stopping would cause a pileup, and explaining that she had-- What?  Simply lost her nerve? Over nothing more than fantods brought on by closed doors?  And what about her plans for next term?  She bit her lip.  No.  Tough it out.

The hall ended in a vestibule before a door with a metal wheel in place of a simple latch, and Tock glided through the crowd like a shark through water.  He spun the wheel this way and that, and when a heavy clack sounded, he pulled the door open.  He held up a single finger for them to wait, then slipped in, a piece of paper vanishing through the crack.

Spike folded her arms, tucking her hands into her armpits.  She was cold in more than flesh.  Totenberg laid a hand on her shoulder. "Is it . . . what you remembered?  Is it coming home for you?"

He bared his teeth, half-sneer, half-snarl, but made no reply.  Sascha answered for him. 

"In a way."  He was whispering, as if afraid of being overheard.  "In the worst way.  Wouldn't be here but for you."

Meet the Doctor, Part Two

A long moment in the gloom and silence passed.  Funny how snow has its own form of hush. Like it makes some kind of anti-sound, a textured silence that doesn't just drown out sound, but overrides them.

The Hounds cocked their heads, crouching and wary.  Not afraid, per se, but it was clear they had bad memories of the place, memories of blood, pain, and restraints.  Of helplessness and fear.  "Maybe there's no one here," ventured Spike.  Her toes were cold, cold in the way that presaged burning prickles when they started to thaw once more. 

Totenberg cocked his head.  "Nah, just . . . Tock is limping.  Slow." 

The good doctor had two assistants, nearly identical.  Perhaps he'd made them, perhaps he'd found them, perhaps some of both.  Tick and Tock, mirror images of one another.  She wondered how he could tell them apart through the door.  Considered asking, but before she'd decided, the door swung slowly, silently open.  A door like that should creak, Spike thought, creak and groan on its rusty, squealing hinges.  It was creepier that it opened without a sound, smoothly and easily. 

It was Tock who stood there, head cocked to the left, slender and fragile as a bird in close-fitting black.  A scarecrow of a man, his hair was sliced in an assymmetric cut, long on the left, shaved to stubble on the right, tapering towards the back.  He peered down his long, blade-thin nose at the trio, lips pressed together in a seam, one long-fingered spidery hand on the doorframe. 

Spike took a deep breath.  You are the heir to the throne of skulls. You own the clothes on his back, the food on his table, the very breath in his body.  If he breathes. She blinked hard at that, telling herself it was against the sting of the cold dry air. *You will be the mistress of his master one day, he has no authority to tell you where you may or may not go.  So own it, be it.  Tell him what you want.  "We're here to see . . ."

He cut her off with a wave of one arm, thin as knotted string, sweeping through the icy air.  He swung the door open, gliding smoothly out of the way.  He and Tick were graceful in their movements, smooth, oiled, and precise.  Even with the slight limp, he moved as if he were mounted on casters.  As if the doctor couldn't bear to have anything truly ugly around him, but could not quite manage beauty, either.

They knocked the worst of the snow off against the stoop, and entered the hallway. 

Meet the Doctor, Part One

They didn't really sleep, not like the lowland grizzlies that would shut down into a torpid state to survive, but they slept more than usual, like huge lazy cats dreaming away twelve to fourteen hours of each day.  Spring would find them lean but not haggard, and ready for action

Past the stables but before the barracks was where the Scherblocken kept his offices.  They were always cold, even in the summer, built of stone that hoarded the frost and chill of winter in their bones.  "Easy to clean," he'd said, the one time Spike had mustered the courage to ask him a direct question.  His eyes had twinkled like icicles in the sun; no warmth and nothing thicker than water.  Certainly nothing as tangible as humor or even sharp as malice, just emptiness.

He was a round man, nearly as broad as he was tall, with a fringe of white hair thick around his ears and a matching handlebar mustache and tightly groomed beard where the point of his chin would be.  Small wire-rimmed spectacles gave him the same squinting down his nose aspect as the bears he tended. 

Spike wasn't looking forward to the interview; she'd had second thoughts in her room, and her ambivalence had only grown while they walked through the snow.  But, if I want to do Care of Magical Creatures next term, and I want to create my own hybrid, then who better to discuss the matter with than the man who gave us the Hounds?  Even though the Hounds had been a part of the family's retained beasts for generations, the Scherblocken had been the same man all along.  Perhaps he repaired his won body the same way that he fixed the Hounds when they were injured and cared for the bears, extending their lives and usefulness.  He'd be a Ravenclaw, thought Spike, but a dark sort of Ravenclaw, someone who doesn't think much about whether a thing that could be done ought to be done.  A Slytherclaw, maybe.  Brilliant and amoral.

They were at the door.  Spike took hold of the ring and knocked.

Awake at Last (Part Three)

They didn't really sleep, not like the lowland grizzlies that would shut down into a torpid state to survive, but they slept more than usual, like huge lazy cats dreaming away twelve to fourteen hours of each day.  Spring would find them lean but not haggard, and ready for action

Past the stables but before the barracks was where the Scherblocken kept his offices.  They were always cold, even in the summer, built of stone that hoarded the frost and chill of winter in their bones.  "Easy to clean," he'd said, the one time Spike had mustered the courage to ask him a direct question.  His eyes had twinkled like icicles in the sun; no warmth and nothing thicker than water.  Certainly nothing as tangible as humor or even sharp as malice, just emptiness.

He was a round man, nearly as broad as he was tall, with a fringe of white hair thick around his ears and a matching handlebar mustache and tightly groomed beard where the point of his chin would be.  Small wire-rimmed spectacles gave him the same squinting down his nose aspect as the bears he tended. 

Spike wasn't looking forward to the interview; she'd had second thoughts in her room, and her ambivalence had only grown while they walked through the snow.  But, if I want to do Care of Magical Creatures next term, and I want to create my own hybrid, then who better to discuss the matter with than the man who gave us the Hounds?  Even though the Hounds had been a part of the family's retained beasts for generations, the Scherblocken had been the same man all along.  Perhaps he repaired his won body the same way that he fixed the Hounds when they were injured and cared for the bears, extending their lives and usefulness.  He'd be a Ravenclaw, thought Spike, but a dark sort of Ravenclaw, someone who doesn't think much about whether a thing that could be done ought to be done.  A Slytherclaw, maybe.  Brilliant and amoral.

They were at the door.  Spike took hold of the ring and knocked.

Awake at Last (Part Two)

Spike dressed for the winter weather behind her screen next to the fire. It was still dark, even though it was well past eight o'clock in the morning.  She missed the summer, with the long lazy twilight hours that stretched around the clock.  Back for winter break, she thought.  Too bad it couldn't be summer holidays.  She was looking forward to returning to Hogwarts in the south, with its earlier dawn and later sunset. 

Two pairs of warm wool socks in her fur-lined boots (Always take care of you feet, she could hear Totenberg insisting as he dressed blisters on her heels one day.  She had forgotten to break in a new pair of boots gently, instead choosing to go running over the hills in spring, drunk on the season like a young rabbit.)  Fur-lined mittens over fingerless muffatees over half-fingered gloves.  Surplice over the gown over the alepine next to her skin.  A cloak over it all, and she was ready to go.

They walked quietly through the castle, the Hounds padding at her heels and sides in a watchful wedge.   Even in her own halls, careful watch was kept over the heir to the Throne of Skulls (Although they hadn't actually used that throne in generations, Spike mused as the passed the audience chamber, turning to the left, and going down the stairs that would lead them out through the kitchens. 

Once outside, the cold was a slap in the face, making Spike gasp for air, finding very little but the cold, dry, thinness, like breathing the stars themselves.  She pulled the cloak tighter around herself.  My blood's thinned, she thought, down in Scotland, down in the warmth and wet. 

Totenberg took point to break the path, with Sascha behind him to trample it smoother.  Spike in the middle where she could walk in their steps, and Dmitri behind her if she started to fall.  They made their way over the grounds, through the gardens wreathed in ice, branches black and spare in the eerie half-light reflecting from the snow. 

She knew where the stables were, of course, even though she didn't ride the bears, not yet. She was still too young and small to control them, Matya said, and Atyets agreed, although each year, he was slower and slower to come to Matya's point of view.  One day, maybe even next year, she would be allowed up on one of the older, mellower steeds who had been allowed to age out of his teeth for just such training purposes.  Claws blunted, saddled and bridled, tamed as much as anything with a wild heart could be. 

They passed through the gate that separated the stables from the grounds, close but not too close.  The stables were quiet under their icing of snow; she could almost hear ursine snoring as they slept for the winter. 

Awake at Last (Part One)

Spike sat straight up in her bed, shaking off the dregs of the dream.  Sorting.  Sorted every term.  She shuddered.  It made sense, of a kind; hadn't Dumbledore himself expressed doubts about the system, said they Sorted too soon?  Perhaps unearthing other drives produced a more well-rounded witch or wizard in the end.   But to lose my place in Slytherin . . .

She could still smell bacon and coffee.  Sascha stirred at her feet, where he usually spent the night, curled up like a dog.  Totenberg opened the door from his usual post, and Dmitri came in with a pot and platter.  Spike put on a robe and fuzzy slippers, sitting at the small table by the window where she always had breakfast at home, from the time when her feet didn't quite reach the floor.  We're not morning people, that's for sure. The custom had been established generations before, when one of her ancestors had realized it was easier to keep staff if you didn't have to interact with them before your first cup of coffee. 

Totenberg let the first cup sink in, and then asked, "Gots plan for the day?"

Spike thought about her OWL, and the rest of the disastrous term, and her vow to earn a thousand points for Slytherin.  "I think I'll plan for the upcoming term," she said slowly.  "I think I have an idea for next term's OWL."

"What you gonna do?"

"Care of Magical Creatures."

"Don' have a gamekeeper, not as such . . ."  Any wildlife on the estate was expected to fend for itself, frankly, and most of it could, evolving toxins, fangs, and opposable thumbs at a healthy clip. 

"Nooooo  . . .  but we do have someone I could talk to.  And you could introduce me."  She pointed at him with half a strip of bacon, chewing slowly.

"You mean -- de bonecutter?"  Totenberg paled a little under his fur.  None of the Hounds had anything but unflinching respect for the man who kept putting them back together when they were hurt, but it didn't mean they loved him.

"The very one."

A Prophetic Dream?

It was the smells that woke her that morning, waffles and coffee and bacon and strawberries.  Spike sniffed, eyes still half-welded shut with sleep, Nutella.  Nutella and whipped cream, too.  First day  breakfast.  Totenberg insisted that a good breakfast was essential to a good start, and Spike had gradually convinced him that a few extra minutes of sleep before the first day was a good idea as well.  They'd compromised on breakfast in bed on the first day of each month during term. 

She rolled over in bed . . . and kept rolling until she hit the edge.  That was odd; usually one of her guards was there keeping watch like a living teddy bear.  The near-fall woke her up enough to open her eyes all the way, and she squinted against the bright light, so unlike the usual green-shaded gloom of the Pit.  Did they have to drain the Lake again? she wondered.   The squid can't be happy about that.

Something else was wrong with her room, too, and she struggled muzzily to put a finger on it.  So much light . . .  But before she could quite place it, the door swung open, and Totenberg, Dmitri, and Sacha appeared, carrying a plate of waffles piled high with strawberries, whipped cream and the food of the gods, chocolate hazelnut butter, a platter of bacon, and an enormous mug of coffee.  Spike stretched out her hands, and the coffee mug was promptly deposited into them.  She took a long pull gratefully, feeling the cobwebs melt away.  She opened her eyes again after finishing half the cup . . . and nearly spit out the half a mouthful.  Yellow.  The room was yellow, a bright sunshiny cheerful yellow, trimmed with shiny black. 

She closed her eyes tightly.  Still half asleep.  Still half-dreaming.  Must be.  Going to finish dreaming I'm drinking the coffee, then I'll dream I'm awake, so I'll actually be awake then, and then I can see what's going on.  She drained it to the bitter dregs, then opened her eyes again.  Still yellow.  Still black. Not a trace of green or silver.  Muffins, not skulls.  Badgers, not snakes.  I'm in  . . . HUFFLEPUFF???

There has to be an explanation.  She handed the empty mug back to Totenberg, suppressing a double-take.  "What are you wearing?  You're out of uniform!"

It was true.  Instead of their usual livery of mix and mismatch ("Wearing uniforms is lazy -- you stop looking at faces.  Anyone can find a uniform that will more or less fit," Totenberg had explained one day, and Spike had agreed, seeing some wisdom in that.  At the same time, she always harbored a sneaking suspicion that the Hounds just liked uniforms, and refused to commit to one particular standard.) the trio was wearing -- "You look like house elves," Spike blurted out.  "Explain."

Totenberg bowed, then scrambled to keep the tea towel around his waist as one knot came undone.  Those tea towels are really . . . scanty, thought Spike.  "Is simple, meestress.  I em you minion--I mean, house elf.  Hotty."

"And I'm Naughty," added Sascha, who was wearing a long, pointed, and patently false nose to go with his ear hat.  They did look a little like house-elf ears, thought Spike, or would have if the hat wasn't precariously tipped on Sascha's head like a batwinged fascinator.

"I'm Loverboi," finished Dmitri sourly.  The three were clearly striving for the distinctive squeaky voices of the house elves, but only managing a light baritone growl.  Dmitri had at least managed to find a king-sized pillowcase, which rode him like a minidress. 

"How . . . what?  when?"

"Was the Het.  The Het done it.  Decide you needs to be--"

"To be round."  Sascha beamed.  "Tol' you de gym vas bad idea."

"To be vell-rounded," corrected Totenberg, adjusting the ear hat, and only managing to switch it from starboard to port.  "You needs to spend zum time in anodder House, he said."

Spike had her face in her hands as they explained, by the time they reached the end, she had made up her mind.  She lowered her hands, feeling an old familiar grin spreading on her lips.  A rattlesnake grin, with a dark light in her eyes.  Well-rounded, eh?  Spend some time in another House?  She'd show them what she was made of.  She threw back the coverlet, reaching for her robes trimmed in yellow.  "Well," she said, emerging from the sleeves and hood, "badgers have fangs, too."