Unlike a Sister (Harmione)

Chapter 34: Nicole

Three weeks before the start of the Callahan trial, Walter, Theresa, Nicole, and Duncan Cameron received their first gene therapy treatment, delivered intravenously into their spinal columns.

The procedure required anesthesia and close observation. Given the unreliability of Muggle equipment at St. Mungo's, Alex secured a room in a little-trafficked corridor of his workplace, the Royal London Hospital. Thanks to her supercharged celebrity, it had been simple enough for Hermione to convince Healer Waltham and the assistant Healers to release the Camerons, including the still comatose Nicole, for an unspecified "outing."

Sitting by the window with Ron and Hermione, Harry observed the globular IV bags with their long tubes glimmering like jellyfish above the Camerons' heads. Alex, Thomas, and Elena kept darting between the four beds, reading off the beeping machines and murmuring to one another. The three doctors-two medical, one PhD-had been there since early morning.

"How long will the treatment take?" Hermione broached, watching Duncan closely.

"The infusion will take about an hour," said Dr. Puckle, her brows drawn together as she studied something on a sleek, folding computer. "We'll need to monitor them the rest of the afternoon, though, as they come out of anesthesia."

Just then, there was a knock on the door and the doctors and wizards froze.

"Alex?" said a voice Harry recognized. "You in here? Thandie said-"

Alex rushed forward but not before Dr. Amar Srinivasan pushed through the door. He looked around the cramped room and the four beds.

"Jesus fucking Merlin," Ron muttered under his breath. "We may actually know too many doctors."

"Wh-what's all this?" said the doctor who'd saved Hermione's life on a previous occasion.

"Special case," Alex said quickly, turning him towards the door. "What d'you need?"

"Just a consult..."

But then his eyes landed on Harry, Ron, and Hermione. The doctor blinked before his face broke into a wide smile.

"That can't be Harry and Hermione! And Ron too?"

"You all know each other?" said Alex, startled.

Hermione slid off the window ledge and walked as quickly as her legs would allow.

"Amar," she beamed, embracing him tightly. "It's so good to see you!"

"Likewise!" he said, taking her hands warmly before he noticed the scars. "What're you doing here? I hope everything's all right?"

"Yes, perfectly all right," she laughed, though there was something forced in it. Harry could almost hear the gins turning behind her eyes, casting about for something believable to tell the trauma surgeon.

"Dr. Peck is helping with a case I've taken on," said the supposed Muggle public attorney. "Terrible thing...criminal negligence related to...chemical run-off...brain damage...but how're you? How's Seema?"

"Oh, she's grand, thanks. She keeps talking about you two, actually," he said for Harry had come up next to her. "Keeps asking when we'll have the Weasleys over."

Harry and Hermione laughed uncomfortably while Ron smirked behind them. Alex's eyes darted between the four of them, but the Puckles kept their heads down over the computer.

"We'd love that," Hermione said weakly. "It's been a long time."

"That's my fault," Amar said, looking at her fondly. "I've be on an MSF mission these past few months."

"MSF?" said Ron.

"Sorry. Médecins Sans Frontières."

Harry could tell that didn't clarify things for Ron (or him either).

"You heard about the earthquake in Papua New Guinea in February?"

Harry, Ron, and Hermione nodded slowly.

"Well, they're always in need of trauma surgeons after something like that. I got back late last month."

"That's incredible," Hermione breathed with trademark earnest intensity. "That's so wonderful you did that."

Dr. Srinivasan looked away, embarrassed. "I'm not joking, though. Seema really is determined to have you over. When would be best?" He glanced at Ron. "You're welcome too, of course! And your sister."

"Well, thanks," said Ron.

Hermione laughed uncomfortably again. "How about sometime next month? Work's a bit busy at the moment..."

"Of course," the doctor smiled. "Just let me know. What's your mobile? Perhaps best to coordinate that way."

Hermione swallowed but recited her landline number.

"Great," said Amar, tapping the bright pane of light all Muggles seemed to carry. "I'll send you a text."

"Great," said Hermione feebly.

Amar again looked around the room-at the Camerons laid out on their stomachs, at the intravenous solutions glowing above their heads like tongues of white fire. But he made no comment.

"Could I steal you, Alex?" he said, turning to his colleague. "Cyclist without a helmet. Nasty one."

"Of course," said the younger doctor. "I'll just wrap up a couple things and be right down."

Dr. Srinivasan left then, closing the door behind him.

Alex stared at Harry, Ron, and Hermione.

"Does anyone want to explain or...?"

"He thinks we're Muggles and that they're married," said Ron succinctly.

"Right," said Alex. "Do I want to know...?"

"You don't," Harry sighed. "You really don't."

The next few days were tense.

The Camerons came out of anesthesia and, though exceptionally groggy, seemed no worse for wear. Operation Un-Squib (as Ron and George had taken to calling their little taskforce despite Hermione's protests that it didn't make sense) carefully transferred them back to St. Mungo's.

Three days later, they were ready to try the counter-Memory Charm again. Given her recovery, Hermione didn't trust herself to perform it and none of the others were particularly good at it.

"Ask Healer Holbrooke," Harry suggested, sitting on a spare bed.

The Camerons had been given an entire ward to themselves now. It was about the size of a one-bedroom flat, but a definite improvement from the less private Thickey Ward.

"Waltham won't like that," Hermione said worriedly, doing her paces between the row of beds. "But I trust her to do it more than anyone."

"She's clever, though," said Ron. "She'll want to know why we're going behind the head Healer's back and why we suddenly want her to do a bunch of counter-charms when they haven't worked for months."

"Should we just tell her what we're really doing?" asked Emi from the windowsill next to Maggie.

"Jesus Christ," mumbled Alex, rubbing his temples. "How many more people are we going to tell?"

"You act like this group can't keep a secret," George laughed. "Half of us were in Dumbledore's Army."

Alex made a peevish gesture. "Is that supposed to mean something to me?"

The wizards shared amused glances.

"A convenient lie might be in order," George went on. "Tell her we've heard the Camerons saying things...things they shouldn't remember...that we think they might be improving but we don't trust Waltham to take it seriously."

"It might work," Alex said after a moment. "She doesn't like Waltham, though I doubt she'd admit it. He always talks over her in our seminars."

Operation Un-Squib decided Alex should be the one to approach her. He spent the most time with the Camerons and the doctor and Healer had developed a solid professional bond.

Yet, the next morning found Healer Holbrooke looking skeptically between Harry, Hermione, Emi, Alex, and Thomas Puckle (who they introduced as a distant family friend) in the Camerons' suite.

"Tell me what he said again?"

"He said Fitch might downgrade the UK's credit rating again if there's a no-deal Brexit," said Alex.

The Healer stared at him blankly. "And that means?"

Though a Muggle-born, Healer Holbrooke (much like Hermione) was not deeply immersed in Muggle current events anymore.

"It means he might be remembering things he used to care about in his job. He was a banker, you see."

"Was I?" came Walter Cameron's good-natured chuckle, the Muggle looking up a from a thick crime novel held upside down.

The short-haired Healer still looked doubtful.

"Please, Dana," Hermione pressed, "it could mean something. And if there's any chance, we've got to try. We know Healer Waltham wouldn't take this seriously, but you..."

She worried her lip. She studied the Camerons' charts in her arms for a long time.

"All right," she sighed. "We can try. It won't do any harm, at least."

She performed several rounds of the counter-charm with the easy grace of someone who had cast it thousands of times. After each round, Harry, Hermione, and Emi gently questioned Walter, Theresa, and Duncan about Callahan's attack or about their specific memory lapses.

By seven in the evening, however, there was no improvement. The Camerons remembered nothing of the attack. Their memories were not restored. Once Healer Holbrooke left after another round, Thomas Puckle turned to them and said lowly:

"It's only been four days. The genes may need more time to replicate in their systems. It's also possible they'll need more intravenous infusions." He shook his head. "I wish I could say more, but we're in uncharted territory here."

Hermione nodded but Harry, again, saw the wounded hope in her eyes. They looked at one another and he knew what she was thinking.

How long could they continue to put the Camerons through this? Was it perhaps time-at long last-to consider home options for Walter and Theresa? To make a concerted search for Nicole and Duncan's godparents? They were running out of time. Duncan was in his "last year" at the Agrippa School, which ended in less than three weeks. He could not return for another year and he could not go to Hogwarts.

"I'm sorry if this means they can't testify, Hermione," said Thomas softly.

"Don't worry about that," she said, voice fierce. "What's important is that we're trying."

"Thomas," said Alex slowly. He was standing at the window, his silver, folding computer open on the sill. He had told Harry it was the only place the computer could connect to some intangible network permeating the air. "Did you ever notice this?"

"What?" said Thomas, standing.

"Nicole's genes...they're different than the others."

"How's that?" said the other Muggle, removing expensive-looking horn-rimmed glasses from his shirt pocket.

Harry, Hermione, and Emi followed, looking over the doctors' shoulders as they reviewed a genetic analysis report on Nicole Cameron.

"She has three of the seven magical gene areas," said Alex. "The others have none."

"Yes, but that shouldn't matter," said Thomas. "They're still latent genes. Her infusion was slightly different since those genes only need to be activated, not added, to her genetic material."

Alex scrolled through several more pages of the report.

"They come from the matrilineal side, these genes, though her mum doesn't have them," Alex murmured. "But Theresa has magical relatives...and not too distant, I'd say."

"Right," said Thomas, frowning, "but that's not surprising. When we ran the models based on the six hundred samples, we knew that. About forty percent of the non-magical population should have a magical relative within two generations."

"Yeah," said the young doctor softly. "She's still different, though. I wonder..."

Distantly, Harry remembered something Duncan had said...in the attic of the home they'd been forced to abandon...where a witch and her child had lived alone and shut away...

Nicole hates the attic. She gets a bad feeling whenever we come up here...

Alex studied the screen for a while longer. Then, he turned to them.

"Her blood type is O-Neg."

Harry stood outside the Gloucestershire Division of the Wizengamot watching officials from the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes conjure massive Muggle-repelling wards along the entire street. Large crowds were expected, so an Obliviator Squad was on-call and, though they did not anticipate violence, a sizable contingent of Aurors.

"Coffee black," said Matthew Durkheim.

"Thanks," Harry yawned.

It was early, not yet six. The trial wouldn't begin for another three hours. Sipping their caffeine in silence, they watched two officials cordon off the designated Apparation point.

"You reckon she's ready?"

Harry glanced at his deputy. He didn't bother pretending he didn't know who he meant. But it was the first time Matt had asked about her in a way that didn't directly relate to their work.

He smiled grimly before taking another sip.

"I reckon she's been ready her whole life."

Ten minutes later, Harry stepped into the gallery lined with ionic columns. It was already unseasonably warm outside and the cool interior felt good against his flushed skin. He was in full dress uniform today and he hated the way his starched collar rubbed at his neck and how the medals clinked every time he took a step.

He had just exited the loo when he saw a slight figure emerge from the meeting chamber. His heart picked up in his chest.

"Didn't know you'd be here so early," he smiled. "Couldn't sleep?"

She stopped before him. "Shocker."

In an infinite second, they took in one another's appearance. Her curls were lustrous and warm, held back in a delicate clasp. She wore the traditional black robes with the high white collar. Her legs were bare, the scars pale tributaries against her smooth skin.

It had been something of a debate among them all, what to do about her legs.

"Show 'em what the bastards did," Angelina told her one evening before taking a sizable gulp of wine. "Make them see what blood supremacism really is."

"They're her fucking legs," Emi barked. "She doesn't have to put them on show."

"They're not even that bad anymore," said George, taking Angelina's wine from her. "What's there to look at?"

"The Wizengamot has a dress code," remarked Lakey, sliding Mrs. Granger's proffered piece of cake onto his plate. "Women aren't allowed to wear trousers."

All the witches in the room groaned.

"Judge Fawley wrote to me last week, I forgot to tell you," said Hermione. "He said they'd waive the rule if I chose."

Looking down at her heeled shoes, Harry felt a surge of warmth that had nothing to do with the weather or his uniform.

"Where're Lakey and Emi?"

"Should be here soon. How're the wards?"

"Nearly done."

"Good."

They looked at each other, her eyes lingering on his aiguillettes.

Then, without another word, she turned on her heel and strode towards a large tapestry hanging between two pillars. Casting a glance around the empty gallery, heart thundering in his ears, Harry followed.

The second the tapestry swung behind his boots, their lips found one another in the darkness. He pushed her so hard against the wall that her feet might've left the floor, but she clung to him, lips hard and bruising against his own. She gripped his hair, the aiguillettes, before taking his hand and guiding it to her breast and he felt her through her nice, traditional robes, making her breath catch, but he wanted to move his hand lower, to lift the hem of her stupid, prudish, traditional robes, to shove his fingers inside her, to rip off his own stupid, stiff, pointless uniform, to feel her tight and warm around him again-but that'd be crazy, right? He couldn't do that. He couldn't fuck her right here behind a tapestry...

But, like she often was, Hermione was a step ahead of him. Her delicate hand slipped between their bodies and she held the thick weight of him through his trousers. He released a ragged breath, pressing his forehead to hers.

"Careful, Granger."

She smiled, tilting her face towards his. They kissed while her fingers did amazing things and synapses rewired inside his skull.

After another minute, they broke apart.

"I've been waiting to do that," she breathed against his lips. "It's been weeks."

"I know," he murmured.

They hadn't kissed since that night. There'd been little moments here and there-fingers grazing when he passed her a file, knees touching under the table, his large hand wrapping around her waist as she did her circuits around the library.

But they hadn't been alone.

Slowly, she reached up and freed the first button on her high collar. Barely breathing, Harry watched her fingers dip inside and remove a silver chain, from which hung a small sapphire cradled between two wings: the representation of Nike, the goddess of victory. Winged victory.

"For protection, right?" she whispered.

He chuckled softly. "Right."

They kissed, more gentle this time. In the heady silence that followed, the air was full of unspoken things. Things he wanted to say about the two of them...about Ron and Ginny...about the children...about their careers...about a vision he'd had of two Ministers, one current and one future...

But this...oh, this...

What was honor to her breath against his lips? What was duty to her dark eyes?

What is the waking world to one who's dreaming?

By nine o'clock, the meeting chamber was fit to bursting with members of the public, the press, and Ministry officials. The back of the chamber was standing room only and the great doors had been thrown open to the gallery, where hundreds more stood, craning their necks to catch a glimpse of the most important trial in living memory. From outside, Harry heard the distant chants of demonstrators-Muggle and Muggle-born rights groups, feminist organizations, elf liberation activists, goblin and centaur enfranchisement causes, and-yes-a small number of unabashed blood supremacists.

In the row behind the prosecution's table, Harry and Ron sat on either side of Walter, Theresa, and Duncan Cameron. The Muggles looked bemusedly around the majestic room while Harry, next to the aisle, glared at any photographer who got too close. That previous Friday, Duncan had graduated at the top of his class from the Agrippa School. Though they no longer needed to protect his identity, Hermione was mindful that the Deputy Headmistress, Elda Stalk, had taken a significant professional risk in admitting the Muggle boy to the wizarding school. As such, Hermione had changed his brown hair to blonde and transfigured his face so that he had a rather weak chin and heavy brows.

Next to Ron sat Mr. and Mrs. Granger, who would see their daughter at trial for the first time in their lives. Next to them was Alex, the doctor's face inscrutable as he surveyed the courtroom that had so recently forbade his kind. Next to him, Ginny, George, Angelina, Mrs. Weasley, and Mr. and Mrs. Puckle. Elena looked beside herself with joy as she spoke to the grandmother of her daughter's closest friends at Hogwarts. Mrs. Weasley, for her part, seemed reluctantly flattered by the elegant Muggle woman's attention as she explained the difference between winter and summer dress robes.

Prominent Ministry officials and members of other regional Wizengamots had sent lackeys to hold seats in the rows behind them (for the pictures, of course) and, beyond them, Harry saw many of the same celebrities and luminaries he'd seen at the New Year's ball. But there were others he knew, too-Matt, Gwen, Cassiopeia Burke, Benjamin "Backfire Ben" Starkey, Maisie, Daniel Marin, Neville and Hannah, Luna, Dean and Seamus and their wives, Professor McGonagall, Elda Stalk, Emi's husband Luke, Lakey's four grown daughters, and several employees from Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, including Maggie Dwyer. She caught Harry's eye and they grinned at one another. Beyond her, to his immense shock, sat Draco Malfoy, who looked characteristically bored.

The excited hum of voices fell as the court attendant stepped forward and shouted, "Call to order! All rise for the honorable members of the Wizengamot of Gloucestershire!"

Like a roll of thunder, there was a great shuffling and groaning as hundreds got to their feet. The side door opened and seven magistrates filed inside, all wearing red and gold robes and white wigs. Bearded and solemn, Judge Gaheris Fawley took the high-backed, center chair at the bench and gaveled court into session.

"Be seated," he said in his deep, craggy voice. "The guards will bring in the accused."

A different door opened and Theodonus Callahan appeared. Camera bursts briefly obscuring him from sight, he was escorted to his chair by two security wizards. He looked much the same as his last court appearance-clean-shaven, dark blonde hair neatly combed, formal robes. Gone, however, were the square-rimmed glasses. Free from the pretension, his cool blue eyes darted across the chamber before resting on Hermione, his gaze flittering to her legs before he turned back to Fawley. Harry glanced at the audience. Nearly everyone was watching the former Auror with a look of stony opprobrium. Callahan's mother and brother sat behind the defense's table, their faces ashen and blank.

Once Callahan was seated near his counselor, Edward Bruton, Fawley spoke again.

"We are resuming this trial after nearly five months. I understand counsel has come to an agreement on how to proceed?"

Bruton stood.

"We have, your honor, with thanks to my learned friend, Counselor Granger." This time, he nodded deeply in her direction. "My client has agreed to forgo all witnesses in his defense if he is allowed to address the court for twenty minutes before the verdict is read."

Fawley turned to Hermione. "And this is agreeable to opposing counsel?"

She stood and the cameras clicked madly like insect wings. Many of the photographers stooped low to get her legs in frame.

"It is, your honor, and the Ministry thanks defense counsel for its flexibility over the course of the trial and the extended recess."

"Very well," said Fawley. "And may I say, Counselor Granger, on behalf of the Gloucestershire Division of the Wizengamot, that we are pleased to see you in good health and returned to the courtroom."

"Thank you, sir," she said, surprised.

Harry saw Mrs. Granger press a handkerchief to her eyes.

"With that," grunted Fawley, seemingly unaccustomed to expressions of professional regard, "I understand the prosecution has two remaining witnesses."

"We do, your honor. The Ministry calls Yvain More to the stand."

Murmurs filled the chamber as another side door opened. Tall and handsome, with only a thin scar running along his jaw, Yvain stepped forward, escorted by two security wizards.

Harry looked across the aisle at the More family. Yvain's sister, Caelia, was holding tight to her Muggle husband's hand, her eyes bright and focused on her brother. Then, Harry glanced at Callahan. He was watching his former acolyte with barely disguised contempt, his lips white and pinched like a muzzled dog.

"Mr. More," said Fawley, once the ex-Auror was seated at the carved, wooden dais, "do you swear that the testimony you shall give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?"

"I do."

"You may proceed, Counselor Granger."

The chamber fell deathly still as the one-time captive approached her captor.

Harry saw Emi whisper something to Lakey. Both counselors had urged Hermione to let one of them do it. It was too much to question your own abductor. But, two weeks after that stormstruck night, Hermione asked to see Yvain. With a security wizard standing in the corner of her library, they spent an hour together before he was whisked back to his cell deep beneath the Ministry. She never told anyone what they talked about but, two days later, Caelia visited. Hermione held Caelia's sleeping Muggle child in her arms and the two women talked for hours. When they embraced at the door, Harry saw that look in the younger witch's eyes-that sort of surprised, but consummate, respect that came over people when they got to know Hermione Granger.

Heels echoing off the polished wooden floor, she stopped before Caelia's brother.

"Thank you so much for coming, Yvain."

"Of course," he croaked. He cleared his throat and tried again. "Of course."

"Can you tell the court how you first met the defendant, Theodonus Callahan?"

Shoulders hunched, hardly raising his eyes from the floor, Yvain told his story-of meeting Callahan during Recruitment Week, of their long correspondence during his training programme, of the gradual and calculated revelation of the older Auror's blood supremacism, of his hatred and distrust of Muggles and Muggle-borns.

When he had finished, Harry thought the faces in the audience had grown harder still. Callahan kept his eyes fixed on his erstwhile protégé, like a hawk might a snake.

"Thank you, Yvain," Hermione said, "for sharing that with us."

She looked out at the silent courtroom, her eyes stopping on Harry. Almost unconsciously, she touched her fingers to her collar, beneath which his necklace lay. She turned back to the former Auror.

"Since your arrest five months ago, I understand you have been participating in a de-radicalization programme?"

"Yes," he murmured. "There's a former Death Eater-one who left the group before the Battle of Hogwarts-who ran a de-radicalization course after the war. I've been meeting with him three times a week."

"And how have you found it?"

"Good," Yvain said quietly. "I see now...I see I was wrong about a lot of things. I thought I was thinking for myself but really..." And, this time, he did look up at his former mentor. "It was just another type of lie."

Hermione nodded, letting his answer fill the silence.

"Though they have no connection to you or the defendant," she continued, "you must be aware that the Auror Department recently dismissed eighteen Aurors for holding blood supremacist views."

"Yes."

"What would you say to them and any future Aurors who might be swayed by the beliefs you held?"

He stared hard at the floor and released a long breath.

"I'd say...just think about what you're being told," he murmured. "Really think. If someone's telling you that someone else, some other group is responsible for all your problems...there's something not right about that. Life is never...it isn't that cut and dry."

He lifted his eyes and found his sister in the crowd, hers eyes bright and full of love.

"And if something doesn't feel right," he said, holding her gaze, "talk to people who've cared about you from the start. Ask what they think. If they think it's wrong too, then it probably is..."

He said nothing else and Hermione turned to the bench. "No further questions, your honor."

"Wait," Yvain nearly shouted, causing several people to jump in their seats.

She looked at him.

He swallowed, but met her eyes. "I wanted to say...to tell you...I'm so sorry for what I did to you. I-I think about it every day. I know I've already told you and that it doesn't make up for anything...but I wanted to say it...here."

A dark pulse of anger slid down Harry's spine as whispers filled the room. Yvain wasn't going to Azkaban; there was no reason to lay it on thick and force a reaction from her in front of everyone.

But he was reminded-yet again-that Hermione was a better person than him. She smiled faintly at the young man who had bound her to a stake.

"Thank you, Yvain."

After confirming Bruton would not cross-examine, Fawley nodded to the Yvain. He exited through the same side door, Callahan's eyes trailing after him.

"You may call your last witness," Fawley said to Hermione.

She nodded, returning to her table. She glanced at the Camerons in the front row, her eyes trailing to Duncan's hand gripping his father's arm.

She turned back to Fawley and touched her throat again.

"Your honor," she said in a clear, strong voice, "the Ministry calls Nicole Cameron to the stand."

Like a string of crackers, surprised shouts rippled across the courtroom and into the gallery. The side door opened and Nicole Cameron was wheeled inside, accompanied by two attendants-one from St. Mungo's and one from the Office of Wizard-Muggle Exchange. The young girl was very thin after nine months in a magical coma. Her waxen skin looked almost translucent, like tissue paper, and her once thick blonde hair was fragile and limp. But her large eyes were bright and alert, the shape and hue of her brother's-blue with flecks of sea green.

She was wheeled past Callahan's chair-the smoke from the cameras hovering like flak in the air-and found her family in the crowd. Walter and Duncan smiled at her encouragingly, but her mother looked ill. Her narrow face was white, matching her knuckles gripped around the pew.

Reaching the dais, the St. Mungo's attendant helped Nicole up the steps. She wore blue jeans and a light yellow blouse, both overly baggy. Tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, she took in the chamber-the polished mahogany floors, the painted plasterwork ceiling, the hundreds of people wearing strange clothes, the shivering Quick-Quote Quills in the press box, and the witness stand with its carved, bearded wizards pointing wands at the sky.

Fawley slammed the gavel and the murmurs faded.

"Miss Cameron," said the magistrate, and there was a gentleness in his voice that Harry had never heard before, "I believe Counselor Granger has told you and your family about our proceedings?"

She nodded quickly.

"Very good," he said, face as grooved as a peach pit when he smiled. "I am going to swear you in now. It's just like the trials in your world. You must do your very best to tell the truth. And if, at any point, you need to stop, you just tell Counselor Granger, all right?"

She swallowed. Her mouth moved strangely before actual words came out.

"Ye-yessir."

The damage to Nicole's brain had been worse than the others'. From the early diagnostic spells conducted by Healer Waltham and Alex's own expertise, they knew her frontal lobe had sustained serious injury, including the area that controlled speech. They worried that-even if the transfusion worked-she would be unable to communicate. But they all agreed to try.

Based off Alex's hunch that Nicole's latent magical genes might allow a blood transfusion to work, they prepared for another procedure. Nicole's blood type was O Negative, which meant she could only receive blood from an O Negative donor. Alex quickly blood-typed all the members of Operation Un-Squib and found only Maggie Dwyer was a match.

On a Saturday morning in St. Mungo's, with Harry and George standing guard at the door, Nicole received an infusion of Maggie's blood.

"We'll have to wake her," Alex said, as the second pouch emptied. "Which one of you will do it?"

They had all thought best to not involve Healer Holbrooke in this part of Nicole's treatment. There was only so much they could explain.

"I'll do it," Ginny said, not a little nervously. "I've had lots of practice on the pitch."

Once Alex gave the signal, Ginny raised her wand.

"Enervate!"

The sixteen-year-old awoke with a gasp. The wizards jumped back, but Alex took her hand.

"Nicole," he said with an equanimity of voice similar to Harry's when he was in the field, "you're safe. You're all right. I'm Dr. Peck. Can you squeeze my hand if you can hear me?"

She squeezed his hand, panicked eyes shooting around the ward. Her lips opened and closed, making a faint "m" sound.

"Your mum is here," the doctor said gently. "We will bring her to you very soon. We just need to do a few tests first."

He led her through a series of questions and asked her to track his fingers with her eyes. Her speech was labored and she soon became frustrated by the inability of her lips and tongue to move in the way she wanted. Before they brought in her family, Harry cast the counter-charm while the magical blood was still fresh in her system.

"I'm afraid we left her under too long," Alex told them quietly while Mrs. Cameron sobbed and stroked her daughter's hair. "The coma allowed her brain to heal, but we should've brought her out sooner so she could start working with a speech and physical therapist, regain her motor skills."

But Nicole made astounding progress over the next two weeks, almost like she'd been waiting impatiently for the chance and was determined not to squander it. She took to her speech exercises with a persistence that reminded Harry of Albus when he was first learning to read. The same hard-eyed diligence lit her face as she shaped her mouth around a word, as she strung them together like buoys along a fishing line, growing irritated when they didn't result in the coherent thought she intended.

But then, on the ninth day, Hermione asked her about Callahan's attack. And they all listened in quiet amazement as she led them haltingly through it. She remembered. Out of all her family, she had remembered.

Later that evening, while Duncan curled beside his sister and read to her, Hermione turned to the others. Her eyes were very bright and a great weight seemed to have lifted from her small frame.

"I don't think we can put her on the stand," she said softly. "It's too much."

"What do you mean?" Emi whispered sharply. "Bruton isn't going to cross. She remembers everything down to what he was wearing."

"I know, but the media, the public attention...it'd be a lot to ask even if she was in perfect health."

"Why'd we pass the Granger Amendment?" Emi pressed. "Why'd we put them through all this? They deserve the chance to tell everyone what happened to them."

The others agreed with Emi, even Alex who was fiercely protective of the Camerons. Hermione turned to Harry, who hadn't spoken.

"Ask her," he said quietly. "She's nearly of age. Ask her and her parents what they want to do."

Hermione nodded.

She sat quietly with the Camerons for a long time while the other members of Operation Un-Squib departed for homework nights and dinners. After a while, Harry came up to Alex by the window. He'd just rung off with the Puckles.

"What was it that did it?" he asked lowly. "The genes or the transfusion?"

"I don't know," the doctor said honestly. "She might've known all along and just been unable to express it."

"If it was the transfusion," Harry said slowly, "there could be countless non-magical people we could help in the same way...treat them for diseases this world has already cured."

Alex glanced at him and nodded. "I had the same thought."

"If it was the genes..."

They were both silent, watching Hermione and the Camerons. Walter, Theresa, and Duncan had shown no improvement. Regardless of what happened at trial, Nicole's family was still not well. Her father and mother could not earn a living; they could not care for her or her brother. And once the trial was over, the Camerons had no legal right to retain their knowledge of the magical world. Not without magical kin. There would be pressure again to oblivate them.

For some reason-turquoise-haired and grinning roguishly-Teddy Lupin flashed through Harry's mind.

"Miss Cameron," said Judge Fawley, "do you swear that the testimony you shall give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?"

Nicole swallowed. "I-I do."

And just like that, the first Muggle in Britain to testify against a wizard in three hundred and twenty-six years was sworn in.

Hermione stepped forward.

"Nicole," she said, her soft voice carrying in the still room, "thank you for coming today. I know this has been a very difficult time for you and your family."

She nodded, her large eyes still taking in the chamber. Harry saw sympathy in many of the faces in the crowd, but others were clearly gawking, like the Muggle girl was a curiosity in a zoo.

"Could you please state your full name for the court?"

"Cuh-Catherine Nicole Cameron. Nicole...middle name."

"Understood," Hermione smiled kindly. "You go by Nicole."

"Y-yes."

"How old are you, Nicole?"

"Suh-suh sixteen. Had birthday...while I was..."

Hermione nodded solemnly. Nicole had turned sixteen while still in a coma.

"I'm told you are a very good student," said Hermione. "You were also photographer for your school paper and your photos won several prizes in local competitions. Is that right?"

"Y-yes," she said, cheeks coloring.

"What do you like about photography so much?"

Her eyes brightened and her shoulders relaxed as she considered the question.

"Per-perspective. I like...seeing same things...everyone else...but from my perspective. I like...keeping memories."

"I can understand that," Hermione smiled. "How did you learn to use a camera?"

"Mum," said Nicole. "She-she does in-interior design. Needed help..."

"So you helped her with the pictures?"

"Y-yes."

Harry couldn't help noticing that the cameras in the press box were clicking a little less incessantly as their operators listened to this girl who shared their skill. In that moment, Harry was glad it was photography. It was an interest his world could understand, the first Muggle cameras having been modified for magical use over a hundred years ago.

Hermione looked over the crowd again, her eyes pausing on Mrs. Cameron.

"Nicole, I know this will be hard," she said gently, "but I'd like you to take us back to August 29th of last year. Can you tell the court what you remember of that night?"

Nicole swallowed and nodded. The room was so quiet, Harry could again hear the distant chants of the assembled masses outside.

"Sc-school just started. Had homework..." She smiled a little guiltily, revealing a mouth of metal wires. "But procrastinating...just got back from holiday too. Dad got a promotion...took us to Italy...so many photos..."

Hermione smiled encouragingly.

"W-was in my room...editing them...had headphones in..."

"You were listening to music?" Hermione clarified for the purebloods in the audience.

"Y-yes. Duncan came in...knew something wrong. He said...someone downstairs. It was late...should be no visitors..."

"Then what happened?"

"Told him...shut door. W-we knelt behind...listened...there was shouting..."

"Was it your mum and dad arguing?"

Nicole shook her head firmly. "Stranger...man's voice...deeper... deeper than Dad."

"All right. Then what happened?"

"Grabbed...mobile...wanted to text Mum...ask if okay...or call p-police."

"Mobile meaning your handheld telephone?"

Nicole's brows drew together. She'd been briefed that wizards were unfamiliar with more recent Muggle technology, but Harry could tell she was still surprised by how little they knew.

"Y-yes."

"Were you able to send a message to your mum's telephone? Or call the police?"

"No. Before could...scream...Mum screaming..."

There was a soft, collective intake of breath. Mrs. Cameron was still gripping the pew tightly, eyes fixed on her daughter.

"Duncan ran out..." Nicole went on, her voice smaller now, "I shouted...but went after...came downstairs...saw...didn't make sense..."

"Tell us what you saw, as best as you can."

"F-floating...Mum...Dad floating...ropes..."

"You saw your mum and dad floating in the air? Bound in ropes?"

"Y-yes."

"Did you see another man with your parents?"

"Y-yes."

"Is that man in this room?"

"Y-yes."

"Can you point to him?"

Nicole raised her waiflike arm, extended a finger, and pointed it across the courtroom at Theodonus Callahan.

Harry looked at the ex-Auror as whispers filled the chamber. The court had offered Nicole the option of placing a screen between herself and the accused, in case she did not want to look upon her tormentor. She had refused. Judge Fawley had also instructed Callahan not to look back at the Camerons in the audience, lest he be removed from the proceedings. But Harry could still see his face clearly and the expression he wore sent a wave of frozen rage through Harry's body. He looked bored, no more troubled than one might appear waiting for a late bus.

"Let the record show," said Hermione, "that Miss Cameron is pointing at the defendant."

Fawley slammed his gavel and the whispers subsided like a falling wind.

"What was the man doing to your parents, Nicole?"

"He had this...stick...wand...didn't know then...ropes so tight...Dad's face pur-purple...Mum shouted...leave...get out...I-I tried to grab Duncan...but..."

She stopped and stared hard at the floor.

"Take your time."

Harry could see the Muggle girl's eyes welling over and how hard she tried to stop it, her pale skin going red with the effort.

"It's all right, Nicole!" someone shouted after a moment. "You've got this!"

Heads swiveled to the back of the courtroom, where a group of young witches stood, wearing the characteristic purple badges of the largest Muggle-born witches' organization in the country. Hesitant laughter-and even a few additional shouts of support for Nicole-filled the chamber as a security wizard stepped forward and escorted the witch who'd originally shouted from the room.

"Order," Fawley barked, slamming his gavel on the bench. "All advocacy groups-and all those in the audience-are reminded that disruptions to the proceedings will not be tolerated. Any violators will be immediately removed from the chamber. Miss Cameron, you may continue when you are ready."

But Nicole seemed cheered by the outburst and swiped agitatedly at her eyes.

"I'm s-sorry..."

"That's all right," said Hermione gently, but Harry saw that hard spark to her eyes that he loved so much. "Your mum told you to leave..."

"Y-yes," she said thickly. "But before...ropes...out of nowhere...tied us too."

"What happened then?" Hermione asked quietly, the courtroom still once more.

"He-he shouted...questions...at me...Duncan..."

"What was he asking you and your brother about?"

"A book...said we knew where it was...that it was his..."

Murmurs again filled the chamber. Two days before the trial, Lakey-a capable manipulator of the wizarding press-had leaked the existence of Malleus Maleficarum. The papers covered the broad contours of the manifesto but, true to the arrangement brokered between Judge Fawley, Minister Shacklebolt, and Chief Potter, did not go into detail about the three acts of terrorism or quote Callahan's writings verbatim.

"Did you or your family know what book he was referring to?"

Nicole shook her head. "No...n-none of us knew. D-dad told him...search house...bookshelves...see for yourself. Take...what you want..." She paused and glanced at Callahan before quickly looking away. "He didn't...believe us..."

Hermione nodded. "What happened then?"

Nicole closed her eyes tightly and released a shaky breath.

"Strange..." she murmured. "C-can't explain..."

"Just do the best you can," Hermione said gently. "Take your time."

The Muggle child released another long breath, then spoke.

"Felt him...in my head...saw things...old mem-memories...bad...c-couldn't make it stop..."

The chamber was preternaturally still as Nicole Cameron described the effects of Legilimency. Distantly, Harry remembered his first experience with the spell. How Snape had raised his wand and ransacked Harry's mind, had witnessed a flickering film strip of his most private fears and emotions...how his brain ached afterwards, like Snape had been trying to pull it from his skull.

But he had had a wand. And however hostile his manner, Snape had been trying to help him. Nicole had no protection, no defenses. There was nothing she could do to repel the invasion of her mind by a man who cared nothing of the damage he might cause.

"What happened then?"

"C-could see again..." Nicole whispered, staring at her trainers. "Heard M-Mum...screaming to...leave me...she kept yelling...yelling...think it annoyed him...He turned stick...wand...on her...and she was screaming...but...but...different way...never heard her scream...like that..."

A shiver moved through the chamber and out into the gallery. Harry wondered just how many of them had heard someone be tortured via the Cruciatus. He, himself, had lost count but it was impossible to forget the moment when you heard the voice of a friend, a colleague, a loved one-which normally stayed within the customary bounds of human speech-contorted and transformed into unholy agony.

Like a shadow, he could see the law...Hermione's back arching off the dark grass...he could feel her palm pressed to his thundering heart...

"I-I thought...yes," Nicole went on, "someone will h-hear now...will help...but no one came...

"He went t-to Duncan next...eyes glazed...so scared...Dad yelling...Mum not...moving...

"W-When he was done...came back to me...said 'attic'...I didn't understand..."

"He said the word 'attic' to you?"

"Y-yes. Asked...'what's in there?' I-I said b-boxes...old things...then, he was back...in my mind...it went on and on...the attic was there...but couldn't seem to show...what he wanted...kept going...not sure h-how long...my head...hurt so much..."

She sniffed and wiped at her face with her blouse.

"Finally stopped...heard Dad yelling now...st-struggling ropes...thought choke himself...the man made him scream too..."

"And then?" Hermione whispered as another shiver moved through the chamber.

Nicole swallowed. "Wand...again...something else...Dad fell...Mum fell...thought...thought...dead..."

Involuntarily, Harry gripped Walter's knee while the Muggle stared at his daughter.

"Turned to me...wand...it was black...smooth but ridges-carvings-by his hand..." She stopped and looked up. "I-I don't remember...anything after..."

Hermione nodded and was quiet for a moment. Then, she turned and walked to her table. Lakey handed her a narrow box. She opened it carefully and removed Callahan's snapped wand. Holding it on her palm for the court to see, she carried it to the witness stand and placed it before Nicole. The blackthorn wand was simple and smooth, three ridges near the base its only ornamentation. From the splinters, Harry saw the fibrous tendon of a dragon's heartstring.

"Is this what you saw in the defendant's hand?"

Nicole stared at it, before raising her eyes to Hermione. "Yes."

The chamber filled with murmurs and grumbles and Harry felt a rush of pride. This young woman with a photographer's eye-with a talent for capturing memories-had remembered the details, had remembered when it mattered. He couldn't help savoring the way Callahan's mouth twisted downward as he took in the sympathetic response from the crowd, how their eyes hardened whenever they passed over him like spotting a dark blot against an azure sky.

As the murmurs faded, Hermione led Nicole through a series of questions about the impact Callahan's attack had had on their lives. The Muggle girl explained the damage done to her parents' memories, how they could not return to their professions. She talked about her friends and how much she missed them. Her voice falling low, she spoke of her mother's frequent inability to remember Duncan was her son. Not above a little showmanship herself, Hermione kept Callahan's wand on the stand as Nicole spoke, reminding them all who had destroyed the quiet peace of this unassuming family.

When she had finished, Harry glanced over the chamber. Dozens of witches-including two of the magistrates-were pressing handkerchiefs to their eyes. Many of the wizards stared at the floor. His and Draco's eyes met briefly before Harry faced forward again.

"Nicole," Hermione said, "thank you for being so brave...for telling us the truth. Is there anything else you would like to tell the court?"

Nicole blinked and looked at her family. Then, her large eyes swept over the crowd, the press, and, finally, Callahan himself. She turned back at Hermione.

"No," she said quietly, "just thank you...I know lot of...people worked hard...t-to help us get better. I-I hope we all...get better soon."

Harry was pretty sure everyone was a bit misty-eyed now. Even Fawley was studying his papers a little too closely.

"Thank you, Nicole. No further questions, your honor."

Fawley cleared his throat. "You may step down, Miss Cameron."

The St. Mungo's attendant came forward and helped her down the steps and into her wheelchair. As she was pushed towards her family, however, Nicole's eyes widened and Hermione and the attendant stopped short. Brows drawing together, Harry turned in his seat and his mouth fell open.

Hundreds of people were holding their lit wands in the air. As each second passed, more and more joined them until the chamber and the distant gallery resembled a shimmering wave in the sun.

Eyes bright, Harry looked down his row. The Camerons were staring at the display in amazement. They could not know it was commonly done at protests, at funerals...as a show of solidarity, as an acknowledgement of pain. But Harry could see that, somehow, they understood. Compassion needed no translation.

The wands stayed aloft as Nicole was brought to their row. Harry stood and helped her find her seat between her parents. As he sat down again-the medals on his uniform clinking in the stillness-his and Hermione's eyes met. She smiled softly before turning away.

Hermione had given no interview upon her recovery-not to the Prophet, not to the Wireless.

In the weeks ahead of the trial, the speculation was rampant. What would she say in her closing statement to the court, with the eyes of their fractured, federated world upon her?

This question painted the pages of the Prophet, the more liberal Quibbler, the odious gossip rag The Screeching Mandrake, and all the foreign outlets. At long last, would the Brightest Witch of Her Age address her abduction and torture? The stake and the flames? Her recovery and public veneration?

Harry knew she wouldn't. Not directly, at least. She would want the focus to be on the Camerons, on what Callahan had done. Not on herself.

There was only the slight problem that the major movements of a closing argument-its recitation of facts, its analysis of motive and intent, its recommended sentence-were no longer valid. While he had not said the words publicly yet, Callahan had all but confessed to the crime. Even if he said nothing, Yvain, Nicole, and Malleus Maleficarum had shown them who this man was. There was nothing, truly, to prove to the Wizengamot now.

So, even Hermione Granger-that embodiment of logos, that consummate lawyer who crafted her arguments with the same loving, methodical care as a sculptor might clay-had to acknowledge that something else might be required.

Harry did not envy her her task. He could think of only one time in his life when he'd been forced to make a grand speech-in the Great Hall against a setting sun-but even that had been more of a public dialogue during which he was (naturally) more focused on not dying than on rhetorical flourishes. As much as he was considered a resistance hero during the war, he hadn't actually done much talking. That was left to Kingsley and Potterwatch and Lee Jordan and so many others who were far more eloquent than him. There had been other moments, of course, but they were either small or canned-reluctantly persuading his classmates to join Dumbledore's Army, sitting for interviews after the war, reading from Ministry-cleared talking points before galas and dedication ceremonies.

It would not be like this. This mattered.

Somehow, she would have to speak to the moment their world found itself in. To capture all that had happened in the last nine months-Callahan's attack, the trial, her abduction, the manifesto-and make it mean something. She would have to balance the anger on the left with the growing defensiveness on the right. To direct these passions towards actions that could bring about justice and civic harmony, instead of more recrimination and retribution.

As spectators filled into the chamber after the lunch recess, Harry felt that natural skepticism stirring in him again.

They were all so hard-hearted now. Could anyone be persuaded of anything these days?

He glanced at Hermione, who was speaking lowly to the Camerons over the bar. He watched her lips move as she made Nicole and Duncan laugh, distracting them from the cameras still clicking madly in their direction. Faintly, he smiled.

People could still be persuaded to the good, couldn't they? She'd persuaded him, hadn't she?

He thought back to that moment in his office, nearly eight months ago now, when she had convinced him to release a statement in support of the magical evaluation conducted on Callahan.

He had asked her to be careful. One statement from him wouldn't turn public opinion in her favor. She had smiled fondly at him, but not in a way that he liked. She had said, "We can't let the public dictate our morals. They have to rise to ours, even if it's difficult to take at first."

He had thought her absurd, then. Reckless, even.

How had he become the cautious one and her reckless?

Because he was cautious. He saw that now. Since he was eighteen, he'd been on a single-minded quest to become the Chief of the Auror Department. Determined that no one should ever think the job handed to him because of his name, his ethos, he had followed the rules to a tee and absorbed the characteristics of his profession like a sponge, including the tendency towards moderation and political neutrality.

On the surface, this was a good thing. A politicized Auror Department would damage public trust. But he was coming to realize that his adopted moderation smacked of complacency, of a desire not to upset the status quo regardless of what injustices it perpetuated.

And yet, hadn't the great struggle of his young life-the battle against Voldemort and his Death Eaters-been an inherently political one? Why had he-the figurehead of that movement-been so willing to relinquish the revolutionary fervor to others after the war? To Kingsley and Lakey and Ministry reformers who, Harry must now acknowledge, were considerably older than the band of students who ultimately defeated the Dark Lord.

Harry knew the answer. He had wanted to make a name for himself apart from Voldemort, apart from the Boy Who Lived. He believed the Auror Department was the way to do that. So he happily lashed himself to his safe (though interesting and challenging) apolitical job and left the politics to the professionals.

He was not alone. They all chose their paths. Ron to business, Ginny to Quidditch, Neville to teaching, Luna to research.

Only Hermione hadn't strayed. The one true revolutionary among them all.

But, little by little, she had gotten to him.

Anything good he had done in the last nine months, he'd done because of her. Whether it was helping Alex with his work, agreeing to testify, staying his hand before he delivered a killing blow, or sacking blood supremacists-he'd done it because she'd inspired it, because he loved her. Because that strange stridency, that animus that defined her character was now inside him too. Or perhaps it had always been there and she had simply helped him find it again, calling him back to an earlier version of himself.

If she could draw that out of him, she could draw it out of others, too. And perhaps she already had. He thought of the vigil in front of St. Mungo's, of thousands of candles spreading back and back like a firmament. He thought of the signing ceremony, the adoring throngs and confetti swirling through the Atrium like petals. He thought of that morning, the wands raised in the air as they honored a brave, Muggle child.

Something was changing. How long it would last, he could not know. But she was doing the most remarkable thing a person could do: inspiring people to be brave, to extend a hand of friendship to those not like them, to love a little less guardedly.

Friendship, bravery, love...

She had told him once, he thought, that those were important things...

The court attendant called them to order and the reporters and spectators in the aisles scrambled to their seats. They all stood as the magistrates filed inside.

"In accordance with the agreement reached between counsel," said Fawley once he'd gaveled them into session, "the court will hear closing statements from the prosecution and defense. Counselor Granger, the floor is yours."

She stood and the cameras exploded once more. The flash powder now hovered in the air like a thin haze, exacerbating the heat in the stifling chamber.

But Hermione was unbothered. She touched her fingers to her throat and walked to the center of the well.

"Judge Fawley," she said in her clear, strong voice, "honorable members of the Wizengamot, my learned friend, Counselor Bruton-thank you for your participation here today and throughout this trial." She looked at the audience. "I want to especially thank the Cameron family for their courage and resilience during what has been a most trying year."

Duncan gripped Harry's arm with his other hand. Harry covered it with his own.

Hermione hesitated and looked down, eyes trailing over the scars that laced her limbs like a twisted embroidery. The crowd waited, breathless. She looked up and smiled wryly.

"I know there's been some speculation about what I'm going to say."

The audience laughed, the tension broken. Callahan's eyes narrowed.

"Even with time to think...these last five months...it's hard to know what to say." She looked at her parents in the front row. "Which reminded me of something my mum told me when I was a girl. She said, if you don't know what to say, just say the truth."

Mrs. Granger's eyes were very bright. Mrs. Cameron held her hand tightly.

"So that's what I'll try to do: say the truth. That is, of course, what the law is based on. That truth is a knowable thing-something that can be established with evidence and testimony and open debate.

"It's what attracted me to the law. After the war, after Hogwarts-you see-I knew I wanted to help people, but I wasn't particularly good at healing or dueling or teaching. No, what I like to think I'm good at is thinking...and arguing, as some in the front row can attest."

The crowd laughed again, many grinning good-naturedly at Ron and Harry and the redhead passed him an amused glance. Even now, she played into the Golden Trio obsession, knowing her audience would be unable to resist.

"I still remember the first trial I ever saw-all the words I didn't understand, the way the counselors sat and stood and moved around the well like a dance." She smiled at Lakey, who blinked rapidly. "I had good mentors. I learned the words and the movements and I loved everything about it. But what I loved most were those moments-always rare and fleeting-when a trial became more than a trial...when it became a microcosm of our history and all its grand debates. This, more than anything, is what I've thought about over the last five months: how this trial speaks to our history."

She paused and walked to the witness stand, her heels echoing off the polished floor.

"The Cameron family could not know that on the night of August 29th they would be dragged into the oldest debate in our history. That the wizard in their sitting room was part of a dark tradition that seeks the domination of their kind. That this desire for domination was the afterbirth of another debate that raged three hundred years before."

She touched the ledge where Callahan's broken wand had lain.

"The Camerons could not know that any more than Mr. Callahan could know what went on during the war. He was still a child." Harry saw the former Auror's back stiffen. "He could not know what it was really like then-the coup, the collapse of Brockdale Bridge, the summary execution of Muggles, the Muggle-Born Registration Commission, the Taboo, the Snatchers..."

Many in the audience shifted uncomfortably. The horrors of the war were not openly discussed these days.

"How could Mr. Callahan-whose first teachers were Death Eaters, Death Eaters who showed him a perverse sort of kindness-understand what would happen after the war? How a fervent, but superficial, mania over Muggle culture would take hold of our world. How distant bureaucrats in London would take steps to address the causes of the war: blood supremacism and discrimination, violence and exclusion.

"No, all Mr. Callahan knew was that his great house was ostracized and then integrated, the Muggle-borns given certain privileges as if they mattered more. This resentment would fester and-combined with an impressive intellect-would lead him to search for answers in the failed dark movements of history. And this history would teach him that we still have much to fear from Muggles, that they will always want to destroy us. Their religions drive them to violence. Their weapons wreak havoc on their own kind, so why would they spare us? Their technology and devotion to science have given them powers comparable to our own.

"At the same time, they tell us Muggles are inferior, stupid, and weak. That we must exert our power and return them to a natural state of subservience. Those who say this are, of course, the same people who listen to the Wireless, who take photographs of their children, who read the Prophet, who took a steam engine to Hogwarts for seven years-all ubiquitous facets of our lives only made possible through Muggle inventions. But these contradictions hardly matter. What place does logic have in the history of hate?"

She was silent for a moment. The skin beneath Callahan's left eye twitched.

"There's a Muggle writer I admire," she continued, studying her feet. "He said 'people are trapped in history and history is trapped in them.' We are-in so many ways-a product of the circumstances we are born into. I include myself in that. Like many Muggle-borns, I feel a double consciousness of loving two things that, by design, cannot be reconciled: an adopted world that distrusts me and the world of my parents, which every year grows more and more foreign to me. It's like having a foot in each world, though neither feels steady. You never quite find balance."

Harry glanced at the back of the chamber. Many of the witches with purple badges were blinking back tears. And Harry thought of a Christmas thirteen years ago...of Mad-Eye and crosses on trees...of the cool band of her engagement ring pressing into his palm...

"We are all trapped in history," she repeated, raising her eyes. "Perhaps you can forgive me, then, for not being entirely forthright with you five months ago."

The audience exchanged confused glances as Hermione walked to the center of the chamber.

"I told you that the separation of our worlds works because we police our own. That failing to deliver justice to our own kind endangers the balance our forbearers struck to protect us from the Muggles." She released a slow breath, looking over the crowd. "That argument was based in fear and a lower sort of justice. And I don't want to make that argument anymore.

"Here is the truth and what I want to say: reasonable people can disagree about relations between the magical and Muggle worlds. How open is too open? How far should intergovernmental consultations go? What is our duty to the Muggle world when it comes to treating disease or responding to disaster, if any? Are certain policies inching us closer and closer to exposure and what will that mean for our kind in other countries where superstitions still abound?

"These are all reasonable questions and we can debate them in good faith. But what is not reasonable, what is abhorrent, what will destroy both our worlds is all that Mr. Callahan believes. His poisoned logic was rejected three hundred years ago and we must reject it now. And the way we reject is by acknowledging that history lives in us, but it doesn't have to define us. We are neither independent of it nor enslaved by it. Within that tension, individuals are powerful and free, and so are peoples. We are free to choose differently, to make a different history that will live inside our children."

She said it all without raising her voice. Rather, it was a deliberate, quiet sort of passion that he had never quite heard from her before but that, instantly, felt just like her. A warmth grew in his chest.

"And I want to close on that...on children. Over the last nine months, my family has gotten know the Camerons." For the first time, her eyes grew bright. "They are wonderful and kind and so, so patient," she laughed, the tears just below the surface. "Walter and Theresa's son, Duncan, is so clever. I hope Hugo won't mind me saying it, but I think he knows he wouldn't have passed maths without Duncan."

The audience laughed, many swiping at their eyes. Duncan blushed scarlet.

"Nicole," she addressed the girl, "I've known you for less time, but you are just as brave and bright and strong as your parents always said."

The Muggle nodded, her hair falling like a curtain around her face.

"In both of you I see my children. And I think about how much I love them...about how I would feel if anyone tried to hurt them." She looked back at the audience. "I think many of you in this room can understand that feeling..."

She moved towards her table as a rumble of discontent rose from the crowd, many turning to glare at Callahan. The former Auror's eyes were narrowed, his lips pressed into a hard, white line.

At the table, Hermione lifted a file and carefully removed a large, handmade card. It was charmed, the broken heart on the front splitting and mending in a perpetual loop, held together by a Muggle plaster. She turned towards the audience, opening it so that the front was clearly visible.

"When I wasn't well..."

There was a soft, collective intake of breath. She was speaking of the attack.

"...Duncan gave me this. I looked at it a lot," she said, her finger trailing along the edge. "One day I thought, isn't that nice...the Muggle and the magical together in such a lovely card. It made me feel better and I am better..." she murmured, "thanks to Duncan and so many others who helped me. But the Camerons are not yet better. They are still healing."

She lowered the card and turned to Fawley.

"Your honor, earlier I spoke of a lower sort of justice, a justice based in fear. But there is another kind-higher and simpler and far more important: the justice of righting a wrong when we have the power to do so. I would ask you to think of that-of a kind family and what is owed to them, of what can be done to set things right. It is only through that justice that there can be healing for the Camerons and, I think, for ourselves too. Thank you."

She sat down and for several seconds there was no sound at all. Then, like a swollen river slipping over a rock face, a thunderous applause rose up through the chamber and surged into the distant gallery. People cheered and whistled and hollered, a few bangs emitting from wands.

Still gripping Duncan's hand, Harry felt himself laugh. He thought of an old philosophy, the old rhetorical proofs-pathos, logos, ethos. She had united all three in herself.

Pathos in her appeal to emotions, of children and what we would do to protect them.

Logos in her unsparing account of history, in pointing out logical flaws, in speaking to the better angels of their nature.

Ethos...

She was like him now. In the eyes of the public, logic and emotion would never matter more than her legend, her ethos. She would be respected and honored and listened to simply because she was who she was. The Brightest Witch of Her Age was an idea now, not a person, and the public would decide what it meant. Right now, it meant idealism and bravery and truth.

There were far worse things, Harry thought, to be known for.

Fawley slammed the gavel for a full minute before order was restored.

"Counselor Bruton," he said, "the floor is yours."

Grimacing, Bruton got to his feet. Addressing the magistrates, he did not speak long. He noted Callahan had no previous criminal history, that he'd recently been cooperative with the Auror Department, and that, given his mother's ill health, her son should have flexible visitation rights in Azkaban.

When he'd finished, Fawley nodded to his colleagues.

"Court stands in recess while the members deliberate."

With that, the magistrates filed out of the chamber. They returned fifteen minutes later. Those spectators who had rushed to the loo, rushed back. The journalists in the press box elbowed one another angrily, while the photographers stuffed fresh rolls of film into the backs of their antiquated cameras. Much to Harry's relief as he pulled at his stiff collar, someone finally cast a charm that cleared the flash powder from the air.

When Fawley gaveled them back into session, the whole courtroom felt held in suspension, like the charged stillness before a storm.

"In the matter of the Ministry of Magic vs. Theodonus Elyan Callahan, the Wizengamot of Gloucestershire has reached a verdict. Before the verdict is read-in accordance with the agreement reached by counsel-the defendant will have the opportunity to address the court for twenty minutes. Mr. Callahan, please stand."

The ex-Auror did so as the cameras burst behind him.

"Mr. Callahan," said Fawley, "I remind you that your statement must adhere to certain guidelines agreed to by your counsel. This includes a prohibition on any language that could be construed as incendiary or inciting others to violence against any particular group or community. Should you fail to abide by these restrictions, the court reserves the right to cast a silencing charm, without warning, and the remainder of your time will be forfeited. Is that understood?"

He nodded.

Fawley turned to the press box.

"I remind our friends in the media that the use of Quick-Quote Quills and recording devices is prohibited during the defendant's statement," he said, eying the reporters like rebellious children. "Any journalists or members of the public found in violation will be held accountable, including the potential revocation of press privileges. The Wizengamot will provide a transcript of the defendant's statement within two hours of the conclusion of this trial."

He arranged his papers and looked at the defendant levelly.

"Mr. Callahan, your time begins now."

The former Auror, who had stood ramrod straight throughout Fawley's instructions, turned towards the audience. His pale, cool eyes swept over the silent chamber and, reaching Harry, his lip curled slightly. When he spoke, his voice was strident and harsh, but deliberate.

"First of all, I do not recognize the legitimacy of this court," he said. "The so-called 'judges' on the bench are mere tools of the Muggle-loving establishment and they have no right to judge me. This trial is a farce, designed to demonize me and cow into submission any witch or wizard who would dare question their authority."

He paused, as though waiting for some reaction, but the silence stretched on.

"I do not recognize the court," he repeated, licking his dry lips, "but as this is my only opportunity to speak without its warped filter, I will address the charges the mudblood has laid at my door."

A low hiss rose from the crowd. Hermione's face was politely neutral, as though standing in the queue at Gringotts.

"The mudblood says I am a misguided child, a hypocrite, a bigoted criminal. I am not surprised by these attacks. I expected it. They persecute me because I speak the truth. They fear me because when the public has been fed a lie for so long, they are starving for the truth.

"And the truth is we are losing our culture, our way of life. Long before Granger, long before the war, our ancestors made a fatal mistake. They hid us away and ceded the world's land and wealth to those lesser than us. Now, we live our lives underground, in the shadows. We scuttle like rats in the gutter. We hide our joy away for fear of exposure.

"We've given up so much, and yet, the mudbloods demand still more. Every year, there are more mixed marriages, more Squibs. Every year, more Muggles learn of our existence through exchange programmes and intergovernmental consultations. Granger herself has almost singlehandedly destroyed the institution of house-elvry, an essential part of our heritage. Our children increasingly listen to Muggle music, read their books, wear their clothes, use their technology, ingest their drugs, and even convert to their cults.

"Granger and her ilk will say these things only add color and vibrancy to our world," he said, voice dripping with disdain. "This is a lie. The Muggles have nothing to teach us. As it was three hundred years ago, so it is now. They know nothing but barbarism and hatred towards our kind. To further mix our worlds would be to dig our own grave."

Harry looked down his row. The Grangers and Puckles looked pale and stunned. Alex's face was expressionless. Mrs. Cameron looked furious, her arm wrapped tightly around Nicole's waist. Duncan's grip on Harry's arm had become vise-like.

In the faces of Ron, Ginny, George, Angelina, and Mrs. Weasley, however, Harry saw his own emotions reflected back to him: anger, disgust, shame. The audience was full of similar faces, a masked chorus united in condemnation.

But beneath the mask-in the darker corners within them all-Harry wondered how many of them would admit to having had similar thoughts as Callahan from time to time. Perhaps they would not express it so floridly or brazenly, but it surely manifested in quieter, more pernicious ways. When they laughed at the idioms Muggle-borns used, when they judged Perdita Puckle's strange clothes, when they dismissed Alex's profession as medieval and backwards.

But that's where, again, he saw Hermione's brilliance. She knew that tension lived within them, the push and pull between compassion and a reflexive tribalism. Finding the balance between the two was the project of politics. She only asked that they all try to be a bit braver, a little less suspicious. That they all ensure their views of the Muggle world were rooted in reality, not dated assumptions and stereotypes. If they could do that, the balance would tilt towards the good, though never fully in its favor.

Callahan said many more things. As Hermione must've known, he seemed particularly stung by her calling him a child who could not understand the war. As a result, he spent a great deal of time chronicling the supposed slights against himself and other Slytherins during his Hogwarts years. Caelia More-who had only known a post-integration Slytherin-looked at her housemate like he'd gone insane. As he went on, Callahan never mentioned the Camerons or the attack and Harry was not surprised. They had always been an afterthought for him.

"Two minutes, Mr. Callahan," Fawley said tiredly.

"I close with this: a warning," he said, voice dropping for dramatic effect. "There are many more like me, a silent majority who believe as I believe. I am calling upon all proud witches and wizards to break their silence, to stand up to the dissolution of our culture. If we do not fight back, if we do not keep the Muggles and mudbloods in line-"

"Mr. Callahan," barked Fawley warningly.

"-everything we once cherished will be snuffed out, crushed under the Muggle's boot..."

He paused there, seemingly finished. But then, his eyes landed on Harry again.

"And one more warning," he sneered, pointing a long finger at Harry from across the chamber. "Watch out for that one. Merlin help us if he's ever made Minister with her whispering in his ear."

"That's assuming I'm not whispering in her ear."

Harry hadn't said it loudly and the words were there before he even knew what he was doing, but-in the next moment-the courtroom exploded with laughter. Laughter that rang to the rafters like pealing bells, that had people doubling over in their seats. Ron reached across the Camerons and slapped him on the back. Hermione's face went violently pink, but she studied her papers. From the corner of his eye, Harry saw a security wizard step forward uncertainly, but Fawley shook his head. It'd be a little too much to escort Harry Potter from the chamber, in full dress uniform no less.

You'd think-after all this time-Harry would've learned to keep his wise-arse mouth shut. But, he hadn't. In any case, it was well worth it. Like a boggart confronted with laughter, Callahan suddenly looked very small, his face blotchy red and mouth sputtering.

"I believe your time is up, Mr. Callahan," said Fawley, his lips quirking as the crowd continued to laugh. "Please resume your seat."

Once the audience settled down again and a few more formalities were exchanged, Fawley instructed the defendant and counsel to rise.

Callahan and Bruton stood, as did Hermione, Lakey, and Emi. Harry studied her squared shoulders and the way her curls fell in a riotous wave over her stupid, traditional robes.

Fawley looked over the still room.

"The audience is advised that there are to be no outbursts, no disruptions until the full verdict is read. The clerk will read the charges."

A slight, elderly woman seated next to the bench stood.

"In the matter of the Ministry of Magic vs. Theodonus Elyan Callahan, the defendant is charged under Article Nine of the Wizard Criminal Code of Great Britain, the Humane Treatment of Human Species and Variants Act, circa 1732, and the Muggle Protection Act of 2008 with the severe mistreatment of Muggles.

"The charges include unauthorized entry into a private residence; the use of Legilimency without a warrant; two counts of the illegal use of Legilimency on minors; the unwarranted use of Legilimency on Muggles; two counts of the use of an Unforgivable Curse, the Cruciatus; two counts of using an Unforgivable Curse, the Cruciatus, on a Muggle; four counts of the unauthorized use of an Obliviation spell; four counts of the use of an Oblivation spell at level five severity with the threat of irreversibility."

She sat down again. Duncan's hand shook in Harry's own.

Fawley cleared his throat.

"In the matter of the first charge, we the members of the Gloucestershire Division of the Wizengamot find the defendant guilty.

"In the matter of the second charge, we the members of the Gloucestershire Division of the Wizengamot find the defendant guilty.

"In the matter of the third charge, we the members of the Gloucestershire Division of the Wizengamot find the defendant guilty."

It went on like this, through each of the charges, each of the counts. Like chorus and refrain.

And each time: guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty.

Guilty on all counts.

The whisper went back and back down the rows, through the columned gallery, onto the street where hundreds waited. It shivered onto rolls of parchment in the press box; it dug into the grooves of Wireless recording discs.

"On the matter of sentencing," Fawley went on, "it is the unanimous decision of the members that the defendant serve a term of incarceration in Azkaban Prison of no fewer than ninety-five years, without the possibility of early release."

Life in Azkaban, went the hushed voices, back and back. Life in Azkaban. Callahan got life.

"The defendant will now be remanded to the custody of the court."

Fawley stood and waved his wand. Golden manacles appeared from nothingness and wrapped themselves around Callahan's wrists. And Harry gripped Duncan's hand tighter, thinking: those hands will never hold a wand again, they'll never hurt you again.

"The court thanks counsel for their participation. Court is adjourned."

He slammed the gavel and the Muggles of Gloucester could be forgiven if they thought a small explosion had gone off in the abandoned warehouse in the center of old town.

The crowd jumped to its feet, stomping and yelling and clapping and whistling. The camera bulbs burst like fireworks. Lakey and Emi collapsed on top of Hermione, Lakey weeping openly. Duncan's hand slipped from Harry's as his mother pulled him to her chest, burying her face in his hair, clutching Nicole to her side. Walter laughed and wrapped them all in his large arms.

From the corner of his eye-for Walter had pulled him in too-Harry saw Bruton approach Hermione. The two counselors shook hands, the senior one speaking lowly by her ear. She smiled and they parted, Bruton following his client out a side door.

She turned to them and, in a moment that would surely make the front page of the Prophet, Duncan stepped onto the bar and launched himself into her arms.

She held him tightly, screwing her eyes shut and stroking his hair. The rest of them joined, shouting their congratulations, slapping backs, shaking hands, wiping at their eyes.

In another moment, she was before him. He bent low to kiss her cheek, his fingers grazing her side. He wanted to say something, but found there were no words important enough. So they looked at each other and the warmth grew in his chest.

She was soon torn away-by Ron, by her parents, by Ginny and George and Mrs. Weasley and Angelina, by Daniel and Neville and Luna, by Professor McGonagall whose tall, thin frame shook as she hugged her favorite pupil, her surrogate daughter.

But as Hermione stood straight after embracing Maisie, their eyes met once more across the horde of well-wishers and reporters. She smiled weakly and touched her fingers to her throat.

And though it was expected, though it was a foregone conclusion, it was still victory.

Winged Victory.