Daughter of Leda

Lucius felt his breath catch in the back of his throat and his heart begin to race. Did he really know Severus as well as he thought? And did it matter? This was his chance to fix things. If he was wrong, and Severus was truly in the service of the Dark Lord... of Voldemort... then he was really only sacrificing himself. Draco hadn’t known he was coming, and didn’t have to be implicated. The risk to himself was well worth what stood to be gained. “I know you, Severus. I have ever since we were little boys here at Hogwarts. A part of you died when Lily was killed, and I know you better than to think your loyalties would be left undamaged after it. I know you would thirst for revenge, and rightly so.”

“Time changes a man,” was Severus’ only response. His voice was even, betraying no emotion. To anyone not knowing the subject of the conversation, the man who had spent so much of his life as a Potions Professor could just as easily be lecturing one of his students.

“Not you,” said Lucius emphatically. “I know you better than that, and you know it too. I am a desperate man, and I need your help.”

Severus sighed and nodded after a moment. “Very well, Lucius. I will go to the Order on your behalf. I will see what can be arranged for the protection of you and your family after all of this.”

At that Lucius was finally able to release the breath he didn’t know he was holding.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

“In the dream I see a young girl who drinks something that, somehow, I know to be a polyjuice potion. She then turns into a kitten, of all the absurd things, and begins stalking the halls of Hogwarts. In the dungeons she encounters a small green garden snake, such as would never be considered a threat save by those who fear all snakes simply because they are snakes. The two circle each other, hissing at one another in their own way, and then the scene changes. It is now a forest, but all the trees are on fire. The kitten has now become a lion and the garden snake a cobra. They still circle, but then suddenly they turn away from one another and face the forest. It is strange, but almost as if they are protecting each other’s backs. The harder I look, the stranger the scene becomes, and I see flashes of chains binding them or limbs that for a moment look human. When I try to focus on those details though, they fade away. Some nights the chains seem to break, and the serpent and lion go separate ways. Those nights I see the fire consume them. Other nights they stay together and seem to consume the fire, although in waking hours it is extremely hard to explain how they manage that.”

Hermione awoke with strengthened resolve, as well as strengthened panic. That constant dread of what could happen and the overwhelming drive to be prepared for anything had once more dug its claws into her with ruthless force.

The words of Leda’s first letter came back to her with a vengeance. She’d dreamt that very dream. Leda’s dream. Now she was even more certain she was overlooking things. She pulled that letter out once more, examining every last word.

“...the jewelry is family heirlooms that I wish for your use and nothing else. You may find certain pieces to be of magical assistance, but I will leave that to your own discovery... With the gold key and this letter there should also be a pearl necklace with a single silver and emerald serpent charm... It will announce your identity to your allies, even when you are unaware of them...”

She really could have banged her head against the wall at that point, she felt so stupid. How could the brilliant Gryffindor with perfects grades that always got the Golden Trio out of any disaster have been so completely and utterly useless?

Uggghhhh...

It was perfect. So perfect. And spelled out so clearly. Yet Miss Brilliant hadn’t even noticed it. She examined every piece of paper, figured out the charm on the necklace she’d had since childhood, but never had she thought to examine the other pieces of jewelry left to her by Leda. And the pearl necklace – what did she mean it would announce her identity to her allies?

Bloody fucking hell.

She grabbed the small wooden chest in which she had been keeping the jewelry and raced down the halls of 12 Grimmauld Place, skidding to a stop on her sock-covered feet once reaching the library.

“Remus! Oh, hey Tonks,” she colored slightly at her own behavior, and considered waiting until later for secrecy’s sake, but was too damned impatient. Besides, it didn’t prove anything other than she had a ton of old jewelry. “I need someone to examine this who would know what to look for. I think some of these have magical properties, and I only know a few testing methods.”

Tonks was laughing at her, unafraid to make a point of how incredibly foolish she had looked. Hadn’t exactly been graceful either, but then again, Tonks couldn’t say much about that part.

Remus took one look at the jewelry and sighed. “Brilliant timing, Hermione. Moody is in the kitchen. He would probably be the best here for looking at it, though I might be able to think of a friend or two in Knockturn Alley that would know more. I just don’t know if you want to be taking these things there.”

“Thanks Remus,” Hermione said. “Um... you two... err... carry on.”

Unless she was very much mistaken, she could have sworn she saw those two quickly putting space between them when she walked in the room. Then again, she had been distracted, so perhaps it wasn’t what it had looked like. Though I think it was exactly what it looked like...

Filing that detail away for later, Hermione went to locate Moody. She gave a brief and entirely truthful explanation of the jewelry’s origin, knowing that the best way to lie was to stay as close to the truth as possible. Lying by omission really was the safest thing when you had to lie. He may have suspected that there was a great deal more to the story than she was mentioning, but since he knew of no reason for concern he left it alone. Constant vigilance was all well and good, but there was a point at which discretion was a higher virtue.

Through a number of charms completely unrecognized by Hermione, he managed to identify the properties of a few. Two had a variation of a disillusionment charm on them, which he suggested might very well work like an invisibility cloak. “Probably not as well,” he had amended, “but sometimes you don’t need such drastic measures. If people aren’t looking for you to be there, a lesser charm can work just as well and be harder to track.”

It was when he lifted out a delicate silver circlet, ornate but not quite broad enough to be called a diadem, that his good eye widened and his mad eye twitched. “Now where did you get this, missy?” he asked gruffly.

“It’s a family heirloom,” Hermione explained simply. “Apparently someone in my family was a witch, and it eventually got passed down to me.”

She knew at that point that he knew there was much she left out, and he knew she knew it, but as he words were evidently the truth he remained somewhat satisfied. “This, missy, magnifies the wearer’s magic. Put it on, apply some form of a sticking charm to make sure it doesn’t fall off, and any spell you cast will be stronger because of it. How strong of a magnification depends on the skill of the one who made this, but it is strong because I can feel the magic in it.”

Moody set a candle before her. “Put the thing on and then cast a simple spell to light it. Something you’ve used before, that you know the strength of.”

Nodding, Hermione cast the first practical fire spell that came to mind. It was the same one she always used when lighting a candle or a fire, and she put only enough force in it for the purpose of a candle. The moment the candle lit, she jumped back. Flame rose quickly from the candle, so far into the air that it seemed like a dragon’s breath. Moody quickly cast a charm to extinguish it before it could harm the ceiling permanently, and then another to remove the black circle that had been burned into it.

Hermione’s hand rose to trace the shape of the circlet she wore, and for a moment all they could do was stare at each other in surprise.