Peace, quiet. Nature had shed the shackles of winter, March had restored colour to the world, bright new grass was pushing through with vigour, and the Forbidden Forest had ceased to resemble the haunt of every monster from a Brothers Grimm fairy tale. Students were making every effort to spend their free time outside the castle walls — walking the grounds, along the lakeshore, or at least in the courtyards. Walking, laughing, occasionally conjuring spells purely for amusement.
Daphne and I did much the same, sometimes joining one of the small mixed groups that gathered from different houses. Neither of us had much time to spare, though — everything went to studying. Pansy had let slip at some point that Daphne was, in her own way, the Slytherin equivalent of Hermione, except that instead of studying everything indiscriminately, she preferred to focus on whatever couldn't easily be studied at home.
"Back in first year, actually, we girls divided things up amongst ourselves," Pansy announced, in her customary tone of supreme self-importance, having joined one of our walks along the lakeshore.
"How, exactly?"
"By interest, Hector," Daphne answered, smoothly cutting Pansy off. "By interest. I take Runes and Potions. Pansy takes Charms and Arithmancy. Milli takes Transfiguration and everything else."
"Isn't that a lot for one person?"
"Oh, trust me, it suits her perfectly."
"The lucky ones are just Daphne — and you," Pansy said, putting on an exaggerated pout and kicking one of the small stones lining the lakeshore, sending it skipping away. "Only the two of you."
"She means that Snape is the only professor who's actually taken us on as students," Daphne explained, with a faint smile.
"Mordred's painted hag," Pansy said, with rather more venom than the occasion seemed to demand. "Our dear Arithmancy professor. Dug her heels in and that was that — apparently we don't understand anything, don't know anything, and can't appreciate the elegance of numerical magic. Snape in a skirt."
"Sounds like you really can't stand her," I said, smirking.
"Terribly."
That, more or less, was how our infrequent walks tended to go — occasionally broken up by a picnic, or the company of other students, or conversation about everything and nothing in particular. Everything, that is, except the Dark Lord and the situation surrounding him.
The trouble was that nothing about that situation was clear. Nothing at all. A complete information void on that front. The gutter press maintained its silence, mentioning only in passing that someone had gone missing — a pureblood, perhaps, or some unknown vagrant, or a Muggle-born. It might be a known blood-purity zealot, a regular at some pub, or even a Squib. Now, every unexplained absence of a witch or wizard from wherever they were expected — whether a shop, a pub, or a mundane desk at the Ministry — was immediately covered in the press.
Only in most cases those people eventually turned up again. Some had simply gone on a magical bender, playing at savages in the woods or lying ill at home. Others had, on a whim, "taken off" to visit relatives. Their return, however, went unreported, and word of it spread only by mouth, reaching Hogwarts well after the fact.
Our house's designated informant on matters of the D.M.L. and the Auror Office — Susan — had gone completely quiet, though not from any reluctance to share what she knew of events outside Hogwarts, but simply because she had nothing to share. Her aunt's letters said nothing beyond variations on the theme of "all is well in Baghdad." The others were equally at a loss. From fragments overheard through the little spiders, some Slytherin parents or relatives had apparently "rejoined" or thrown their lot in with the Dark Lord, had seen him in person and had the pleasure of his company — yet there was no intelligence whatsoever about any movement, however minor, on Voldemort's side.
The conclusion: things were bad. The students stewed in total ignorance, the adults were in the same state, and that only amplified the anxiety of those who were already worried — who in turn managed to set everyone else on edge. The only relief on the horizon was the anticipation of the Gryffindor–Hufflepuff match. Wonderful. Due to the rescheduling of the last game, the swap of two matches, we now faced three games in a row, with only one in our favour so far, and the next one coming up barely a week away — the sixteenth of March.
But the defining development in school life at my year level was this: Potter hadn't entirely abandoned his hard work and self-improvement. Only halfway. Which mattered, because at our infrequent D.A. meetings the atmosphere had returned to something functional — Ron had stopped casting a pall over everyone, and Harry had stopped being a sulking dead weight who dragged the whole room down with him. Well, not everyone — but it wasn't as though the rest of them were hardened fighters to begin with, or had ever given serious thought to the combat application of magic before signing up. The Duelling Club's two dozen or so members had always seen a wand as a weapon, not just a tool. Here, though... Well. Future civilians who had only just realised that the thing in their hands wasn't merely a screwdriver, a watering can, or a pair of scissors — that magic wasn't only domestic.
And so there we sat, in Hogwarts, suspended in an information vacuum of our own.
. . . . .
The latest meeting of our club turned out to be something of a turning point — though only for a handful of students. The fact of the matter was that right now, on the evening of Wednesday the thirteenth of March, I was sitting at one of the tables in the Room of Requirement with the twins, who were in an unusually serious mood. Privacy charms up around us, and beyond them the others were practising spells, reading, chatting cheerfully — having a good time, in general.
"So then, gentlemen," I leaned forward in my chair, hands clasped together. "I'm listening."
The twins exchanged a glance, the way they always did before some kind of "decisive move." Fred spoke first — probably. It was increasingly difficult to be certain, as over the years they had grown more and more identical, deliberately eliminating the small differences between them and adding elements to their appearances that could easily be reversed, a parting switched to the other side, for instance.
"We talked it over and came to a decision—"
"Go on," I cut into the dramatic pause.
"We're accepting your offer of financial assistance."
"Took less than a year," I said, with a nod and no particular humour. "May I ask what brought you round?"
"Time," said George, taking over. "We risk not raising the full amount by the end of the year. And there's a very attractive offer coming up on a building in Diagon Alley."
"Understood. How much?"
The twins glanced at each other again.
"Eight hundred Galleons," they said in unison.
"Fine," I said, and simply nodded.
Fred leaned forward slightly.
"The main question — what are the terms?"
"Actually," I said, settling back into the chair and making myself comfortable, "nothing severe. One condition, and it's as simple as they come. Do you know who makes artefacts at Hogwarts?"
"No, but we'd very much like to," Fred answered for both of them.
"That would be me. Not a word to anyone."
"Oh!" The twins were surprised. Genuinely so.
George smirked, fished a Sickle from his pocket, and passed it to Fred, who accepted it as a matter of course.
"Told you."
"You just got lucky."
"As you can see, luck plays its part. And yes, obviously not a word — it's not in our interest either."
Their exchange concluded, the twins looked at me with mild smiles.
"And what does the young gifted wizard want from us?"
"And how on earth did you come up with such brilliant things in your very first year?"
"Stop clowning around, this isn't the time for jokes," I said, declining to match their tone — and they turned serious again. They could, when they chose. "The condition is simple. You'll handle sales of my product through your shop."
"That's no problem," Fred nodded.
"It's actually to our advantage," George confirmed. "But that's not all of it, is it?"
"By sales I also mean client relations. Since the ideal is to cover the full market — from cheap novelties to expensive, complex bespoke commissions — it won't be straightforward."
"We understand that. We've done something similar ourselves."
"With a focus on pranks," the other twin added.
"And even now," I said, allowing the faintest smile, "it would be useful to pick your brains on the subject. No offence intended, but you're not from a wealthy family, you don't have house-elves running about underfoot, and a great deal has to be done by hand."
"No offence taken from plain facts," Fred agreed, and George had no intention of staying quiet either.
"Especially when they're stated without any intent to belittle."
"At the same time, your father works directly with enchanted objects, and he works at the Ministry. I'd imagine you've heard a complaint or two over the years along the lines of: 'If only we had such-and-such, then we'd really be set.' In other words — your thoughts on what wizards actually need in terms of artefacts. Right now, for instance, there's the conflict with the Dark Lord."
The two of them frowned, but nodded in agreement.
"It'll turn hot soon, I'm certain of it. A great deal of fighting between the Aurors and the D.M.L."
No reply came, but from the look on their faces it was clear they agreed with me.
"The Aurors can still put up a meaningful fight, thanks to serious training. But the D.M.L. — most of them, from what I can tell, are barely further along in terms of practical skill than ordinary civilians. And yet I haven't seen a single defensive artefact on the market, or anything of that sort. Our task," — which I had conceived of more or less just now — "will be to fill the market with accessible defensive artefacts."
"That sounds more than reasonable and right."
"And profitable," Fred added.
"That's exactly what I'd like to hear your thoughts on, since you were born into this world."
"We'll—" the twins exchanged another glance. "Think it over and put together a list."
"When? And — money against the contract?"
"Of course!" They feigned indignation, and Fred added: "The list — this Sunday. Angelina's been running us into the ground at practice."
"Fine. Sunday it is, then — we sign everything, you get the money. Agreed?"
"Done."
We shook on it and returned to our respective groups, carrying on with independent practice.
I hoped they'd have sensible ideas — and more to the point, ideas that didn't exceed what wizards would consider reasonable. I could think up defensive functions perfectly well, but they might end up too impressive, too extraordinary, drawing unwanted attention — not so much to the product as to the person who made it. Did I need that? No.
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