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christmasspirit) wrote2023-06-03 07:21 pm
christmasspirit) wrote2023-06-03 07:21 pm
Entry tags:
- autumn,
- beginnings,
- christmas spirit au,
- draco malfoy,
- fanfic,
- first term,
- gryffindors,
- harry potter,
- hermione granger,
- hogwarts,
- hogwarts eighth year,
- minerva mcgonagall,
- nearly headless nick,
- pansy parkinson,
- peeves,
- portrait albus dumbledore,
- portrait phineas nigellus black,
- post-war,
- severus snape,
- slight angst,
- slytherins,
- summer,
- the bloody baron,
- the fat friar,
- the grey lady
"soaring part 4" by gingerbred
chapter 04 observations
Characters: Harry Potter / Draco Malfoy, Hermione Granger, Minerva McGonagall, assorted ghosts, a smattering of portraits
Saturday 12 - Sunday 13 September, 1998. Exhausted by the events of the evening, or maybe it's Hermione's late night debate with the Headmistress, Harry tries to get some sleep in Professor McGonagall's office while the witches work out how best to protect the students. Fortunately others prove more willing to assist them.
Originally Published: 2023-06-03 on LJ / DW
Words: 5 k
Rating: Teen and Up Audiences
Characters: Hermione Granger (8G, Head Girl), Minerva McGonagall (Headmistress), Harry Potter (8G, Captain, Seeker), portrait Phineas Nigellus Black (portrait of the one-time Headmaster and ex-Head of Slytherin), portrait Albus Dumbledore (portrait of the one-time Headmaster and ex-Head of Gryffindor), the Bloody Baron (the Slytherin house ghost), Nearly Headless Nick (the Gryffindor house ghost), the Fat Friar (the Hufflepuff house ghost), Peeves (meddlesome poltergeist), the Grey Lady (the Ravenclaw house ghost)
Mentioned briefly: Draco Malfoy (8S, Prefect, Captain, Seeker), Severus Snape (Head of Slytherin and Deputy Headmaster), Pansy Parkinson (8S, Prefect), Ron Weasley (8G, Prefect, Keeper)
Previously:
The previouslies are very robust. If you've recently read the Christmas Spirit stories, skip them, if not, no worries, I've got you covered. You can find links to the individual stories / chapters in the "christmas spirit index" (LJ / DW / AO3).
12 September, 1998. A group of masked individuals attack Draco and Pansy, the 8th year Slytherin Prefects, as they make their rounds. Harry and Ron, coincidentally in the vicinity due to some late night mischief of their own, come to their rescue. S 02 Concerned for her safety, Harry informs Hermione that one of the attackers was apparently a Gryffindor, and that he isn't at all certain they wouldn't have sexually assaulted Parkinson had they not happened upon them. 'Mione makes it clear that they'll have to report this to Professor McGonagall, which they do, although Harry is good enough to keep Ron out of it. Listening to the two witches talk, Harry realises Hermione must meet with the Headmistress to do this a lot. S 03
24 December, 1998. We make the acquaintance of the Headmstrs' Enchanted Map. A single tap of the Headmistress' (or -master's) wand is sufficient to reveal students', pets' and poltergeist's locations. (Potential intruders as well, obviously.) As a nod to privacy - and only in emergencies, of course - a second tap, coupled with the proper intent, would show staff, ghosts and invited guests. There's little enough privacy in the castle as there is. CS
The Slytherin portrait coalition is nicked from 'beyond wandpoint' (first introduced in chapter 78) because they have one, damn it. Just because it isn't canon doesn't mean it shouldn't be.
Saturday 12 - Sunday 13 September 1998
Headmistress' office and Hogwarts corridorsHarry dozes fitfully on the Headmistress' little loveseat while she and Hermione debate the relative merits of assorted solutions.
At one point he wakes to discussion of magical artefacts. Hermione has evidently relayed the Fat Lady's report that she hadn't been able to see who entered the dorm before Harry and Ron, meaning at least one of the attackers was somehow cloaked. 'Mione seems to have surmised correctly, too, that it's sufficient for the Headmistress to hear it to decide not to pursue that lead further, which means she may not have to learn about Harry's Cloak after all. He dares hope for a moment as he observes them covertly through his long, dark eyelashes, and yet Harry can't help feeling like her gaze ticks to him as she says, "We'll also have to make an announcement that we now have a zero tolerance policy for illicit items of the sort. Expressly banning it obviously hasn't been sufficient, but if we adjust the penalties accordingly..." And yes, he's positive the Headmistress is staring right at him. Courageously he pretends to be asleep until he nods off again.
Another time he rouses to learn there's apparently something by way of a Marauder's Map for the headmasters and -mistresses. Well of course there is. He supposes it doesn't make sense that the Marauders would have invented it by themselves as mere students, and even less that if they hadn't, that the school wouldn't have such a resource of their own. Where should he expect to find one if not here? He hadn't really considered it, but then he's prone to giving the Marauders perhaps a little too much credit for all too obvious reasons. Hermione is shooting looks his way now, and stifling a grin, apparently intuiting his surprise. It certainly helps explain how Dumbledore always seemed to know everything.
The witches huddle over the map, and he can't help noticing how Hermione's glance - not-so-surreptitiously - darts to the dungeons, very evidently doing her level best to memorise the layout if he knows his friend, and he is quite sure he does. In some ways that must provide her with even more information than his visit to Slytherin in second year had given him. The Snakes should be thrilled.
"I'll make a point of consulting the Map more regularly," Professor McGonagall vows.
"I think the issue was that it was a group of students that attacked. Had it been one or two, I doubt it would have mattered near as much," Hermione ventures, and the Professor nods sagely.
"A knot of people in hiding should be easier to identify," she takes her point. "If I observe anything of that nature, students congregating in unusual places at unusual hours, we'll know to take action..." Merlin, if Umbridge had had the Map, it suddenly strikes Harry, they never would have been able to form the DA... Which of course had been part of Remus' objection, years before, to his having the Marauders' Map, that it could fall into the wrong hands and become a threat....
"Would half hourly checks be sufficient do you imagine..." Ah, but then the pink frog had been locked out of the Headmaster's office, and wouldn't have had access... Not that they should probably rely on such things...
"More likely we'd need to check in ten or fifteen minute intervals..." And then he remembers the Room of Requirement is Unplottable anyway, which means it won't show up on the map either - well, probably - so who knows...
"It helps, obviously, that they can't Apparate or Portkey into position..." If they'd been careful how they entered and left the room...
"We'll need to be especially cautious on any occasion we're forced to relax those restrictions..." He yawns, not even sure who's talking anymore, further reinforcing his sense that the two women are far too similar.
"Would we even have to?" He eventually dozes off again contemplating the necessary logistics demanded of a problem long since solved and now moot.
The bizarrest sight he wakes to is a meeting with the House ghosts, a few of whom quite evidently have little desire to be in close proximity with the others. At first he took it for a dream, gaining in certainty when Nearly Headless Nick waved at him, up until he realised they must have summoned the ghosts at some point while he was sleeping and were now having the strangest staff meeting he could possibly conceive.
It gets stranger. They've explained the situation and some of their ideas how to best address it, and the Bloody Baron of all... uh... ghosts, in that creaky whisper of his, reluctantly suggests that if they make use of the portraits in the areas where people were most likely to be able to lie in waiting, perhaps they could catch the perpetrators before they've much chance to act. At least Harry thinks he's reluctant, but then that's sort of the Baron's MO.
"Don't we do that already?" Hermione asks the room, finding it difficult to believe they have this many of the paintings at the school and no one has thought to use them. She may be grossly underestimating generations of Slytherins on that count.
"It's hardly organised," Nick sounds scandalised at the very thought.
"The problem, I believe you'll find, is that the portraits aren't especially... intelligent..." The Baron explains, and Harry could swear that that portrait he'd heard before is coughing again, most likely in indignation this time. "Most!" The ghost quickly amends, the loudest Harry has ever heard that raspy voice get, seemingly agreeing with the Gryffindor's assessment. "Most portraits." And yes, Harry thinks the ghost might just be blushing. If they can even do such things, this is what it must look like. "By nature, unless properly... conditioned in the making, they aren't particularly... wise." Definitely coughing. "But if you were able to keep the instructions simple..."
"Something any good educator should know to do," the portrait grumbles. "Instructions should always be simpler than the students, although occasionally that's an impossible ask." Harry is pretty sure that's an insult. He turns his head slightly, angling to spot the portrait and then nearly laughs. It's the one Hermione had dragged along with them when they'd gone on the run last year, Sirius' great wotsit, Headmaster Black. Well that fits. And explains the ghost's unease, he imagines. Slytherins.
"Thank you for your input, Phineas Nigellus," Professor McGonagall gifts the portrait a look that brooks no further interruption. "Please continue," she instructs the Slytherin House ghost.
"If you identify the most likely points for attack..." he gestures a chain bearing hand in the general direction of her map, rattling quite a bit in the process. "The portraits there could be carefully instructed... Were the parameters for both the... thresholds for action and the subsequent... measures to be taken sufficiently streamlined... Students gathering or duelling in the corridors, perhaps... Immediately notification of staff and the nearest House ghost," the Fat Friar looks suddenly panicked. "That should do," the Baron concludes.
He studiously doesn't mention the placement of the portraits - always tricky as he's duty bound to serve the Headmasters and -mistresses as well as his House - and hopes the witch won't think to rearrange them too much. He'd hate to have to explain to his Head of House why the Slytherin portrait coalition's network no longer functioned properly. And of course Phineas Nigellus, the Headmaster who'd implemented much of the current network arrangement, might never forgive him. He'd likely have his head... Ha! And wouldn't that just annoy Sir Nicholas no end... Ach! But then it was their Snakelets who'd been attacked, and the Baron fears it's unlikely to be the last time, too. Did he actually have a choice?
The Friar pipes up, "Would they really need to alert us, too?" The Grey Lady doesn't seem particularly pleased by the thought either, but with her it's often difficult to tell.
Nearly Headless Nick is proud to chime in, warming immediately to his potential new role, almost in inverse proportion to the Hufflepuff's hesitation in fact. "We can arrive much more quickly than the, uh, living can," he gives the witches an apologetic smile, as if either would wish to switch places with him just for that particular capability... "And we can assess the situation far better than elves or portraits. We're clearly best suited to determine what's called for."
Hermione agrees by and large, albeit not entirely sold as to their judgment. "At the least, you should be able to provide an account of the events after the fact," she says, and the Baron has a bad turn when he realises he can't even do that from the attack before. He'd considered it more important to see to it that the innocent made it to safety than to follow the perpetrators back to their assorted Houses as if that would have been possible. He can hardly split himself into thirds. And after the young Malfoy lad's Spell, those were already known, surely? Plus he could scarcely have identified the individuals as long as they wore those masks.
Peering at the map, Hermione asks, "Would we need to move portraits to better observe the niches and alcoves?"
"No..." come twin replies - one perhaps a touch too quickly - from the Baron and the portrait of Headmaster Black. "I doubt that would be necessary," the painting endeavours to assure them more smoothly. "When you examine the areas more closely, you'll find most such spaces are overlooked by portraits already, or there are at least paintings in the vicinity where portraits could be deployed, and if they're carefully briefed..."
Dumbledore's portrait had appeared to be fast asleep, as usual, but at this his eyes open wide and with the excessive bonhomie Harry remembers fondly from years past, he cries, "Capital! You'll take over that briefing then, Phineas Nigellus? I'm sure Minerva would be ever so grateful." Headmaster Black is back to sputtering, and a few of the other portraits chuckle at his plight, but soon he's agreed, if only because it's more likely to keep his precious network intact. He'll be having words with the Baron later, and not a few of them. "Splendid," Albus smarms as he pops a lemon sherbet into his mouth. "That should free her up to see to more pressing things." His grin is every bit as sweet as the treat he clicks audibly against his painted teeth.
A surreal interlude ensues in which 'Mione, in an effort to outline a plan, tries explaining CCTV to the room. Professor McGonagall is a half-blood, it seems, and Hermione keeps attempting to build a sort of figurative bridge for the rest using the woman's experiences, except she just doesn't have any that are applicable. The Headmistress has been well and truly out of the Muggle world long enough not to have the faintest what 'Mione's on about - Harry does his very best not to chuckle, because the witch is pretty much ancient - and if she doesn't follow, none of the rest gathered have a prayer. He can't tell if Hermione doesn't see that, or if this is her way of trying to finesse her point more delicately. What she's aiming for is familiar, at least to some, and nothing at all for the Friar, say, to be apprehensive about.
A fair few of the portraits are amused in turn, as the young woman seems to fail to recognise they've had this... See See Teavee, or some version of it, for centuries now, and as slow as some - well, most - portraits may be, it's evidently still a good deal more intelligent a system than these thoroughly mindless cameras of hers. Most smile benignly. The Muggle-born.
Phineas simply groans at the hubris, but then it's nearly impossible to get adequate credit for something you've spent literal decades doing your utmost to hide from everyone's notice. If history winds up attributing his network to a Muggle-born Moggie, he will eat his ruddy hat. "Yes, yes, I believe I understand what you're after.
"If you'll be so good as to identify the problem locations," he addresses the Headmistress, attempting to pretend the younger witch is no longer there - on top of this latest affront, he still hasn't forgiven her for that hellacious camping trip, and definitely not for placing his portrait in some bag, extended or not, "I'll speak to the relevant portraits." If he could afford to leave, he bloody well would; instead he sits there, quietly grumbling to himself.
"You're quite sure they were students, Harry?" Dumbledore asks him now that they've both clearly stopped feigning slumber.
Again Harry recites what he'd observed and his deductions, concluding, "They certainly weren't adults..." Hermione, who has spent much of the night arguing some of the students are just that, thank you very much, positively glares at him. Hoping not to incur her wrath, uh, further, he hurriedly adds, "I mean, not all students are adults, so these would be those. Or maybe recent leavers or graduates..." Hermione stands pinching the bridge of her nose in an exasperated fashion that strikes him as familiar, and then he recalls that Headmaster Black had been doing a fair bit of that, too, which must be it. "But then non-students would have a harder time getting in here, wouldn't they?" These days, he no longer knows, so yeah, that's very much a question.
"Yes, Mr. Potter, they most assuredly would. You'll find no more Vanishing Cabinets or anything remotely similar on campus, I can assure you," Professor McGonagall only glances at Dumbledore briefly; he just beams, completely unfazed, shifting his sherbet about his mouth.
"Anyway, I only heard one speak clearly, and he was definitely English," Harry asserts. Neither witch asks him if he recognised the bloke or his voice, assuming he wasn't keeping the information to himself in some sort of perverse dramatic build up. There's something to be said for intelligence. "As for the rest, it'd be hard to say off of the single word or two required for their Hexes. But Malfoy's Spell seems to confirm it. If not students at present, I'd say it indicates people who've at least been Sorted at some point. And someone seems to have returned to Gryffindor right before us..." No one comments on the sudden switch to the royal 'we', although Headmaster Black rolls his eyes again. He'll never understand how this boy was able to win the war.
"What Spell did Mr. Malfoy use?" the Headmistress asks.
"Do...mus Revelio?" Harry tries to recall.
"Domum Revelio," Hermione corrects, confident, which strikes him as funny as she wasn't even there.
"You're familiar with it?" the Professor asks Hermione, but 'Mione just shakes her head.
"No, but I was sure to master the declensions first year."
"That's only as reliable as the knowledge of the individual who created the Spell," Headmaster Black mutters, nearly as pedantic as Hermione. He has a point, not that Harry follows, but that comes as little surprise. He's sort of used to it by now.
The Headmistress is taking notes, including a mental one to ask the boy in question should she fail to find the Spell in the library first. It wouldn't do to discover it was effectively Sorting people and have deducted four hundred points from Ravenclaw erroneously.
"Their outfits speak to premeditation," Black points out, thinking it's past time people acknowledge the obvious. "If the choice of target were deliberate..."
"Then they knew enough to know Mr. Malfoy and Miss Parkinson had patrol duty tonight," Professor McGonagall agrees. "As the Saturday duties are served in rotation, that would be clear insider knowledge. When was the rota made?" she asks Hermione.
Hermione shakes her head reluctantly, the thought having already occurred to her. "Two days ago. We thought the Hufflepuffs would be stuck doing duty tonight until the Slytherins stepped up."
"Enough time to dispatch the owls, but on balance, an unlikely scenario," Headmaster Black nods, his displeasure more than obvious. "Either way, at the least, they'd have had help from within the castle."
Nick and the Fat Friar seem appalled, surely no one from their Houses - the Grey Lady rather wisely abstains; quite sensible in light of those eight ghostly eagles Malfoy had conjured - but a solemn Headmistress nods now, too, in complete agreement with the Slytherin. Her notes just keep getting longer.
"The person responsible doesn't necessarily need to have used an Invisibility Cloak?" Harry asks, motivated, just a bit, by a hope to retain his own. "If they were Disillusioned, the Fat Lady wouldn't have seen them either?" Dumbledore's eyes twinkle and he gives Harry a decidedly unsubtle wink. Phineas just groans again. The things the damn Moggies get away with never fail to astound. From the way the Potter boy keeps idly patting his pocket, he'd be very surprised indeed if there weren't a Cloak to be found right there, here and now. Naturally no one sees fit to search him. Quelle surprise.
"Quite right, Mr. Potter, but Cloaks and articles of that nature eliminate the need for the ability to cast a strong Disillusionment Charm, levelling the field, as it were, which is hardly in our interests. And of course the Charms aren't as effective at any rate, particularly not when the portrait has been alerted to someone's passage to begin with." Harry looks puzzled.
"For example when the student has just used the password to gain admittance, the entry o-pening and clo-sing," Black explains more slowly. "Certainly then, even with no further instruction on our parts, the Fat Lady knew enough to look for someone entering."
Ah. Yes, Harry can see where that's an issue. And then he has an idea. "We could ask the other portraits if they could identify anyone returning to the dorms..."
Headmaster Black's mood improves visibly. He might just be smiling. "Which other portraits, Potter?"
"Well, the... The, uh... Whoever their Fat Ladies are," he finishes a bit weakly.
"The other Houses don't gain admission via portrait holes, Mr. Potter," the Headmistress explains, and as that sinks in, he grows a bit red contemplating the inherent unfairness.
Headmaster Black laughs now, "They've certainly given us far less cause to require such a solution over the centuries." Most of the other portraits and at least three of the ghosts readily agree. Hermione manages not to lecture them about confirmation bias, but only just. However, in light of the events of the evening, they may have something of a point, although the Ravenclaws could probably do with more supervision just now.
"The Founders themselves put those systems in play," she informs Harry instead. "Make of that what you will."
"I'd say Godric knew his House," Black is still smirking.
The discussion returns to which areas they might wish to observe and any other measures they might wish to take, and Harry nods off again while those assembled continue to offer suggestions.
Near as he can tell, the rights and privileges discussion continues intermittently through much of the night - 'Mione can be very singleminded - proving difficult to reconcile with the threat some of the students had quite evidently just amply proven themselves to be. But by the next morning, however improbably, the Headmistress has acknowledged the problem, and a meeting is announced for later that day with the eighth years, explicitly granting them more privileges. Which was bonkers, particularly in light of why they'd come to see the Headmistress, except Hermione was right. Safety was a separate issue, and should be addressed as such.
Word spreads and, somewhat unusually, Hermione becomes the hero for the expanded privileges, at least for most of the week that is, until Ron puts together something from things Harry has said and passes around what ultimately takes shape as the rumour that she's behind the loathsome tables in the Great Hall, and soon all good will - and then some - evaporates. Harry can't help thinking Ron could have waited until after her birthday to put something like that about. He makes a mental note to be more cautious with the things he tells the ginger moving forward.
When they finally leave the Headmistress' office in the very early hours of the morning, the ghosts long since vanished and the portraits fast asleep, 'Mione seems just as keen to get out of there and back to the dorms as he is, grabbing his arm and dragging him back with even more urgency than she'd dragged him there.
"Come on. Hurry," she whispers as they scuttle down a corridor, as though the tugging hadn't made her intentions clear enough. He laughs.
"Did you absolutely need to try to get her to expand our privileges now, of all times? Don't you think some other time, any other time would have been more appropriate?"
She tries not to look pitying again, but the witch has the world's worst Exploding Snap face. That's fine, he really is used to it. "It was now or never, Harry. I'm just glad I was on hand when she found out about the attacks..." 'On hand.' He chuckles. As if she weren't the one to break the news.
"How you reckon?" he asks, never pausing in their dash back to the dorms. He's in better shape for it than she is.
"The logical response was harsher curfews and far more restrictions," she allows. He couldn't agree more, he'd been sure of it. "We weren't going to be able to claw back privileges any time soon once that was established, never mind expanding them." And right again. Well it's hard to argue with success. "But I'd like to get out of here before she reconsiders..."
"So, 'educational reforms'... Do this often you two?" He asks. Her answering smile is an endearing and uniquely Hermione mix of smug satisfaction and sheepishness. Yeah, he thought as much. He wonders briefly which of the witches had come up with the horrible tables everyone hates in the Great Hall.
"You really need to stop adjusting your eyeglasses when you’re 'supposed to' be asleep," she changes the subject instead, an amused smile on her lips.
Well that's... Bugger. Yeah, he does that sometimes, when he's utterly spent, he falls asleep with his glasses on. And she's right. He also tends to put them on properly, adjusting them automatically before he's even fully awake. Damn. Oh well, so much for that ruse. Bygones. He spares a thought for how many will have noticed, underestimating easily half the room.
"I don't think you understand how well chosen the time point for the attack was, Harry," she tries to explain some of the difficulties he's still failed to grasp despite the night's protracted discussions. "If Parkinson and Malfoy were targeted, we'll need to do something..."
They're just rounding a corner and his luck for the evening holds. Some days it really isn't worth getting out of bed. Peeves appears, seemingly out of nowhere, cackling before them. Of course he does.
"Students out of bed! Stuuuuudents out of bed!" He shouts with unbridled glee.
Trying to shush him, largely from habit, Hermione taps her Head Girl badge a touch officiously, leaving Peeves thoroughly unimpressed. If anything, his position on authority figures all too well known, his glee becomes even more apparent. "Well you're hardly on rounds, now are you? Very naughty Head Giiiiiiiiiiirl out of bed! Stuuuuudents out of bed!"
Harry's already scanning the corridor for any inopportune busts that might be available for the poltergeist to try to drop on their heads. He has a little more practical experience with this sort of thing.
"We're returning from Professor McGonagall's office and on our way to those beds," she informs the poltergeist, who in turn continues his sing songing, singularly unimpressed. If anything, he gets louder yet. "It will hardly help to wake the castle for this, now will it?" Exasperated, she half shouts over him to be heard in a futile attempt at reason. Several of the - apparently rather slow - portraits in the vicinity have begun to rouse, and now that the Baron has pointed it out, yes, mostly they just sit there chatting with each other, thoroughly scandalised by the scene playing out before them, cheers. Few seem inclined to take any sort of action beyond visiting a neighbouring portrait to discuss things further, because it wouldn't do to simply be scandalised on one's own. Where's the fun in that?
What a useless bunch of gossips.
Of course those few otherwise inclined are sometimes all you need.
Hermione's at a bit of a loss for what to do next, Peeves is likely to follow them all the way back to Gryffindor like this, and she'd really rather not attract this sort of attention if at all possible. Harry takes her hand and tries to tug her back into motion, because he has experience with that, too. There's very likely little to be done for it, and they'd best get back before everyone gets up for the day. It's going to be enough of a struggle with as little sleep as they've had. And then all of a sudden, a third option presents itself.
With an enormous amount of terrifying clanking! and banging!, the Bloody Baron emerges from the nearest wall, easily more frightening than the poltergeist by far, and drowning out him and Hermione both with little evident effort. In that scratchy whisper of his, he admonishes simply, "Peeves..." and despite all the noise, that's all it takes for him to be heard.
The poltergeist goes quiet immediately.
"Return to your House..." the Slytherin instructs the Estrays. They don't need to be told twice. As they run off, the Baron pauses there for a moment, visible, frightening, clattering... floating sternly in front of the poltergeist as though summoned by his cries and not as if the ghost had been following the students back to their dorms... That thought never even occurs to Hermione as she makes her retreat, and when she glances nervously over her shoulder at the next bend, she sees the ghost disappear once more into the nearest wall.
They don't stop running until they reach the Fat Lady, who makes a great show of asking after the password, and 'are you quite sure?' and 'I don't let just anyone in you know' which at least one ghost in the vicinity thinks is utter bollocks if that's all it takes to gain entry, but Estrays...
Harry tries to ignore the portrait as best he can, having less sensitivity to the advantages of keeping her sweet, but then he - quite incorrectly - feels most of her digs are somehow directed at him. Guilty consciences and all that. Pointedly trying to ignore the painting, he attempts to resume his conversation with a slightly winded Hermione, and as he climbs through the portrait hole, he asks his friend, "So did you come up with anything? What did you want to do about the Slytherins?"
"I have some ideas," she replies as the portrait swings closed behind her.
The Baron's curiosity is decidedly piqued.
Written with oodles of love for
lostangelsoul3.
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Thank you. I liked that moment of Harry waking up to the House ghost meeting, because I think that would be seriously weird and disorientating.
BBaron needs some fun, or eternity gets boring. 😉