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The house elves.
They were a slave race – oh, the wizards might protest otherwise, but anyone who uttered the phrase 'they like to serve' or similar was only further incriminating whatever biotinker equivelent had devised the elves in the first place – focused to the point of fixation on being useful, staying out of sight, and keeping things clean. This did not coexist well with Taylor's need to keep a steady supply of insects within Hogwarts' walls. Her bugs were only safe hidden in cracks in the walls and the occasional unused classroom. If they came out into the open, which they had to in order to be useful, elves would vanish them with a single snap of the fingers. This was only limited by the elvish need to not be seen by the students they served, and the constant interruption of more important tasks. Unless, of course, the students commented on the bugs, in which case the elves became bug-seeking missiles the instant nobody was looking.
Taylor ended up doing most of her exploring and investigating the old-fashioned way, and bringing in new supplies of bugs every weekend to refresh the castle after the week without her guidance saw almost every single insect in the castle eliminated. Bugs were a last resort and a luxury in Hogwarts.
Bug-based gripes aside, she did very much like the castle. She had worried about bad feelings arising from essentially being back in a school after more than a decade well shot of educational institutions, but Hogwarts was as much like Winslow as a mythical Cerberus was a ratty street mongrel. All the asshole students and teachers in the world couldn't make the castle itself any less mystical and enjoyable to explore, she was only ever there when classes weren't in session, and she as a snake enjoyed the instinctive disinterest and deference of everyone immediately assuming she was an illicit pet if they saw her at all. Even better, snakes were the thematic property of Slytherin house, the group of students most likely to otherwise contemplate doing nasty things to the pets of others.
She had thought such stereotyping was just that, stereotyping, but the Malfoy boy really did his best to live up to the hype, and the other students in his house contributed to the image in their own ways. They venerated bigotry and backstabbing, and while she could imagine Lisa enjoying ripping through their juvenile machinations, it was not what she would consider a healthy environment for a child. Not when it was a sanctioned part of the school!
Overall she approved of Hogwarts, but the house system and the rampantly biased Professors – not just Snape – did push a few of her buttons. They could do away with the houses and the school would be better for it. Slytherin wasn't the only cancerous growth; her son's explanation of the houses' bad qualities was, in her opinion, right on the mark.
Such suggestions for improving the state of British magical education were little more than dissatisfied thoughts circling around in her head, though. She was here for her son, and changing the country's education system was second to making sure Harry, personally, was safe and happy. It could wait until he graduated. She would need a project or two to keep herself busy once he grew up, and the magical world was rife with the kind of corruption she despised, without any of the external stressors that would make truly changing things a Sisyphean task. In the meantime, she had her nonexistent hand full reconnecting with her son.
She watched as he studied with his friends, wondering when he had become so studious. She listened as he tossed increasingly bawdy jokes back and forth with Ginny, hissing with amusement when they both remembered she was in the room with them after a particularly off-color exchange. She coiled up in a spiral comfortably close to the fire as Harry and a few other Hufflepuffs sprawled out on the floor of their common room, playing Wizarding games with entirely too many explosions. She slithered among magical plants in the greenhouses with Harry and Neville's guidance, quickly learning what not to go near. She listened thoughtfully, wishing she could take notes, as Hermione and Ginny bounced magical theories back and forth with startling eloquence, to Harry and Neville's amazed confusion. She listened to Luna telling the group about magical creatures that might or might not exist, and approved wholeheartedly as the odd little girl was gradually integrated into their friendship.
She was there, and it was good, exactly what the both of them needed after being forcefully separated for so long. For her to be present, not rushing to get things done, not working towards something bigger. Just… there. In his life.
She satisfied her need for plotting and working towards bigger goals with Sirius, whenever she could find the time. The last few pieces of their plan for Pettigrew fell into place a few weeks into the spring term of the school year.
Sirius knew he wasn't right in the head. Azkaban did that to people, and he was no exception. But he was getting better. He didn't talk to himself without meaning too anymore, and his nightmares were of the normal 'wake up screaming' variety, not the kind that shredded the wallpaper with outbursts of accidental magic. He could pass for normal around other people. The tremors in his hands didn't make him drop his wand anymore.
That last improvement, funnily enough, had been Taylor's final prerequisite for their plan to get him exonerated. 'You shouldn't risk your only chance at exoneration if it's likely you'll drop your wand at the worst possible moment,' she had argued every time he said there was no need to wait. 'If it can go wrong, assume it will. You aren't walking out into the line of fire with an obvious disability that is going away on its own. Wait.'
He had waited. Taylor didn't scare him – however much she might think otherwise, he had grown up around a whole family dripping in the dark arts and she rated as a five out of ten on that scale – but he did want to stay on her good side. She was Harry's mum, after all.
Sirius was a big believer in being able to pick one's family, whatever stuck-up Pureblood breeding tapestries might claim. She'd picked Harry, done the work to properly stake her claim by single-handedly – ha – raising him, and he loved her. Matter closed. There was room for a godfather Padfoot in there, and perhaps in time some respect for Harry's other two deceased parents, but only if Sirius kept his foot out of his mouth and the literal snake out of his proverbial trousers.
That joke bordered on masochistic; so tempting, and yet certain to end in well-deserved pain, specifically his. He would need to stock some antivenom before he brought it back. In the meantime, best to let Taylor think she had scared it out of him. The look on her face when he whipped it out at the perfect moment would be glorious for the second or two it took her to move from shock to revenge.
He grinned as he straightened his robes, looked at himself in the mirror one last time, and confirmed that the glamor was up. It wasn't his finest work, but it was adequate; a bland, dark-skinned face with a pencil mustache and way too many wrinkles, perched atop a neck that was far too long, giving him the appearance of a constipated foreign nobleman. The acting to go with it was snobbish and not something a prison escapee should be able to pull off after roughing it and eating bugs for six months. Nobody would suspect a thing, so long as he resisted scratching at the abominable itch the glamor induced in his nose hairs.
He turned, gave an empty Grimmauld Place the finger on general principle, and pinched some Floo powder out of the vase by the fireplace. "Leaky Cauldron," he called out.
Step one of Taylor's master plan to exonerate him with so much flair that he couldn't possibly be given the 'Old Yeller' treatment, whatever that meant: Go to Diagon Alley.
He made his way out to the open street, walking stiffly. The Alley was busy, but not so busy that there were too many people for their plan. He kept his eyes open, though, looking for potential complications. There was an Auror nearby, speaking to an older man with a cane about something, so he couldn't do anything quite yet.
Sirius pretended to stop and consider a window display of talking bowler hats. Then he actually did consider the hats. They looked to be enchanted to hold a 'conversation' about the owner's dapper looks, amateur work really, he'd figured that out in fifth year so he could charm a certain witch's knickers with some choice comments… The charms were easily alterable, even considering there were probably a few token anti-tampering spells placed over the rest.
His persona wouldn't look very good in a hat, but his persona didn't look very good anyway, and a bit of de-snobbing would be nice. Sirius ducked into the store and dropped two Galleons on an overpriced talking hat.
He was in the middle of re-enchanting it out in the street when something exploded nearby. The Auror talking to the old man reacted quickly, twisting to apparate away and investigate the disturbance.
Step two: Taylor set off some preplanned distractions throughout the Alley. Nobody would be hurt, but a few cauldrons might need to be replaced before the day was done.
Sirius hurriedly finished enchanting his hat, slinging the modified spells back into place with haphazard abandon, and set it at a jaunty angle on his head. "Trigger word is 'Black' and only I can say it," he muttered.
"You got it," the hat confirmed, its voice different and now oddly familiar, though he couldn't place it. Probably an effect of him personally redoing the speech charms.
That bit of business attended to, he continued to watch the crowd. His cue should be coming along any moment now…
A portly wizard stumbled out of Knockturn Alley, shoving people aside as he ran away. Some of the passersby who got a good look at his face squinted and turned to watch him go. His robes were covered in soot, and he looked confused, like he had no idea how he had come to be in Diagon Alley.
That was probably because his last coherent memory was fleeing Sirius outside platform nine and three-quarters. It was the easiest way to remove all of the mildly incriminating things Pettigrew had witnessed since then; subject-oriented obliviation took a fine touch, but time-oriented obliviation just required the mental sledgehammer.
Step three: Reintroduce Pettigrew to the Wizarding world.
"You!" Sirius yelled, pitching his voice to be older and much frailer than it should be. He set off at a brisk walk. "Oy! Peter!"
Pettigrew looked up. "Do I know you?" he asked. He even stopped running, like he actually thought this might be something good! Sirius had to hold back a vicious grin.
"Pettigrew, old chap, everyone knows you!" Sirius proclaimed. He was ten long steps away. Eight. Six. And closing.
Pettigrew had stopped entirely, and his face was gradually draining of color as the murmurs of the crowd grew louder, many repeating his name. "No, you're mistaken," he got out, squeaking like the rat he really was.
"Order of Merlin recipient Peter Pettigrew, I know your face," Sirius proclaimed grandly, sweeping up to clap the shell-shocked wizard on the shoulder. "Saw you in the papers back then. Aren't you supposed to be dead?"
"I got better," Pettigrew choked out.
"Oh, Peter," Sirius let his voice drop and let go of the posh upper-class accent for a moment. He grasped Pettigrew's other shoulder in a seemingly friendly embrace. "Do you realize that you're absolutely buggered now?" he whispered.
Peter jerked away from him, instantly recognizing Sirius' real voice, and did the stupidest thing he possibly could; he tried to apparate away.
Step five, or step zero or negative ten depending on how one counted them: stick a nifty little anti-apparition doohickey in Peter's robes before releasing him in Diagon Alley. It wasn't all that complicated a magical item; just a little glass ball with a potion inside that really didn't like being spun around just as a magical charge attempted to encompass it, like what might happen when a wizard or witch intended to apparate. Not sold for that purpose, most people didn't think creatively, but he'd used them to great effect pranking the older Slytherins trying to sneak away during Hogsmeade weekends… Good times. Almost as good as this.
Instead of the portly wizard twisting on his heel and disappearing, he twisted and his backside promptly exploded, scorching his robes and ruining his concentration just before he could get to the part of apparition that made splinching oneself possible. He sprawled forward, his robes a smoldering wreck from the waist down, but his skin and flesh mostly unharmed. It wouldn't do to have him seriously injured and pitiable.
"You've got a lot of nerve, showing your face!" Sirius boomed, drawing his wand.
"You're Sirius Black!" Pettigrew screamed, finally latching onto the obvious method of turning the crowd against his assailant.
"Black?" Sirius asked, advancing on Pettigrew as he scrambled to his feet and frantically checked his robe pockets for his wand, which he would find was sadly not present. He probably wouldn't have managed to apparate without it, as he was a mediocre wizard at best, but luckily even a failed attempt could set off the potion, so it didn't matter whether he was already doomed to fail.
"His heart's black," Sirius' hat chimed in. "Does that count?"
"Not now, hat," Sirius chided it. "Pettigrew. What are you doing alive?"
"Looks to me like he faked his death," Sirius' hat suggested, quite loudly.
Sirius tilted his head, feigning thoughtfulness. "You know, you may be right," he agreed. The hat had been a perfect addition to this plan; so much better than monologuing it all himself! "But why?"
"Heroes don't hide," his hat answered. "And what was all that about Muggles dying in the escape? And them finding a finger?"
"You're Sirius Black!" Pettigrew again claimed, attempting to back away, into the crowd. Without a wand and with buttocks too scorched to properly run, he didn't really have any other way out.
"Could someone kindly hold the bugger still?" Sirius requested. "We're deducing things here."
It was at this point that Taylor had predicted Sirius' little play would fall apart if he even got this far; she said that nobody in the crowd would step up, and that the accusations wouldn't seem plausible enough. She expected it, and had crafted several alternative approaches based on exactly how badly it fell apart.
Sirius had argued that she was overestimating the average wizard's willingness to think for himself, and underestimating how much appearances affected credibility. Here he was, a posh foreigner who was just flawed enough to not seem disingenuously perfect, and now with a talking hat playing the foil in a delightfully interesting but ultimately respectable persona. Then there was Pettigrew; disheveled, having burst a burning ball of fire off his buttocks when he tried to apparate, and accusing said posh man of being a dangerous lunatic he obviously was not.
A burly witch who happened to be standing nearby socked Pettigrew in the back of the head and grabbed him in a headlock. "Got him, sir. Go on."
Sirius could have kissed her; the plan would work whether or not he was revealed as Sirius Black or the crowd seemed to be on Pettigrew's side, but this version of the plan was so much more fun! "Yes, thank you. Hat?"
"I reckon something is fishy," his hat declared. "Pull up that sleeve of his."
Pettigrew tried to knock his head back into the witch's face, but she just tilted her head back and popped him in the jaw with her free arm. Someone else reached forward and yanked up Pettigrew's sleeve.
The Dark Mark stared balefully out at the crowd, and Pettigrew's chances of getting out of this disappeared like a little puff of smoke from the back of his robes.
"Take a gander at that," Sirius said loudly, wishing he had a pipe to dramatically suck on. "Faked his death, got a Dark Mark… Looks like this was an old-fashioned frame-up to me."
"Or maybe a dispute among criminals," his hat countered. "Does Black have a Dark Mark?"
"Don't know, old chap," Sirius admitted. "But it certainly doesn't seem right that Pettigrew does."
Pettigrew opened his mouth to object, but unfortunately for him the witch who had him in a headlock took that as another sign of resistance and thumped him in the back of the head, knocking the last vestiges of consciousness from him. Real salt of the earth, she was. He ought to get her Floo address.
"I say someone ought to drag this blighter to the nearest authority and pump him full of Veritaserum," Sirius suggested. "Ask him about Black. What was it Black was convicted for?"
"Being You-Know-Who's right hand man," his hat reminded him.
Sirius hid his flinch flawlessly. He hadn't enchanted the hat to say that! Someone in the crowd was supposed to speak up! But the show had to go on, and it was as good a setup as any. "Rings a bell, but I thought he also betrayed the Potters… Better ask Pettigrew about that, something is fishy here."
The seeds of doubt thoroughly sown and his luck almost certainly spent, Sirius doffed his hat at the witch holding Pettigrew. "I think my work is done here, you fine folks can handle the rest," he suggested.
"We wouldn't say no to a tip, though," his hat commented.
"Certainly we would, I am a gentleman of fine stature!" Sirius retorted, his ad-libbing skills rusty but thankfully still up to the task.
"I need a new case of hat polish," the hat whined as he put it back on.
"Someone go get the Aurors," the burly woman commanded.
Sirius smiled rakishly and sauntered away, thinking furiously.
The plan had gone perfectly… But what the hell had happened with the hat?
As it turned out, anti-eavesdropping wards were only effective against ears outside the ward. Taylor could hear the discussion going on between Senior Auror Dawlish and Director Amelia Bones despite several layered privacy wards and two floors of Ministry separating them, all thanks to the insects she had secreted in a corner of Bones' office, brought in on Dawlish's robes.
"Please fill out form thirty next," a clerk told Taylor, handing her a form titled 'Animagus Registration: Transformation Method'. She took it and began inking in the many boxes, writing out her name for the thirtieth time since starting the paperwork. Animagus registration was a brilliant excuse to keep her in the Ministry for hours on end. If she needed more time, she just had to mess up a single letter, and the entire form would need to be redone.
In the meantime, Amelia Bones was smiling tightly at her subordinate. "No," she said calmly, "we will not be providing Pettigrew with anything beyond what the letter of the law requires. Most certainly not visitors, not even the Minister. He must be questioned first, and the flight risk he poses properly assessed. Even then, I expect his Animagus form will have him locked away in solitary to prevent escape attempts." She'd found the 'Animagi for Beginners' pamphlet in the rat's robe pocket and thought to ask the obvious question, then. Good.
"The Minister was very insistent, and I have had several Wizengamot members requesting to see Pettigrew too," Dawlish said nervously. "As well as the Chief Warlock." Taylor could almost smell the toadying through her bugs. And was that Dumbledore on the list of people trying to get to Pettigrew? Curious.
"No to all of them," Amelia said serenely. "We will do this by the books. The public demands no less. And tell the Minister when you see him that the Kiss On Sight order for Black had better be repealed before a Dementor catches Black and Kisses away the Minister's chances of reelection. By tomorrow the entire country will be anticipating this trial."
"He won't like that," Dawlish objected.
"He'll like a lynch mob even less," Amelia retorted. "It's the right thing to do, besides."
Dawlish nodded and left her office, presumably off to deliver the news to the Minister.
"It's lucky that what's right and what's politically expedient happen to be aligned just this once," Amelia mused. "Almost too lucky…"
Taylor filled out the last line of form thirty, signing with a tired flourish, and handed the paper back to the Ministry worker. "Next form?"
"That was the last form," the clerk said. "You are registering as a…" He paged through her submitted paperwork. His eyebrows rose. "Moose?"
"Yes." She got the benefits of registering as an animagus that way, chief among them the beginning of a paper trail establishing her as a law-abiding witch, but with none of the drawbacks of doing so with what she considered her 'real' form. Nothing was more dangerous than intentionally misleading tactical information.
"Please prepare to demonstrate your form and pose for a picture," the clerk said as he stood. He had a little old-fashioned camera. "Back up."
Taylor pushed her seat aside and stepped back, mentally preparing to grit her teeth. Animagus transformations were not painful… But she wasn't really an animagus, and the curse she used did hurt. She couldn't let it show.
She chanted the incantation in her head, brandished her wand, and imagined a moose. Her power and the curse did the rest, forcefully crushing and stretching her to a new form, with all of the pain those descriptions implied. Thankfully, turning into an animal looked the same from the outside no matter what method one used.
The clerk's tired eyes widened slightly, but by the time he put the camera to his face he looked dead inside again. "Hold still."
Taylor posed for the picture, balancing awkwardly on three legs. Not only was she a big, ungainly moose with a huge rack of ugly horns on her head, she was missing a leg. It was impossible to have a more conspicuous animagus form. Thankfully, she could be any animal, not just this Moose. Her unique condition wasn't always a severe disadvantage; it let her use this spell like nobody else could.
"Change back," the clerk ordered.
She silently evoked the countercurse, and her power dutifully restored her. It was harder to hide her pain going the other way, but she covered it by grimacing and holding her neck. "Going from having a rack to not having one is really uncomfortable," she explained.
For some reason that made the clerk blush. She didn't figure it out until after she had left his office.
"They're not that small!" she growled to herself once she realized what, exactly, she had said.
She wasn't going to say a word to Sirius about this. He had enough material without her feeding the flames. All he needed to know was what she'd spied on upstairs. He'd get his fair trial.
When Taylor visited Harry that weekend, she noticed a framed copy of the Daily Prophet sitting by his bedside. On the front page, a spindly dark-skinned man tipped his bowler hat at a woman holding Pettigrew in a headlock. The hat's brim moved, and the man laughed and said something before putting it back on.
'Peter Pettigrew Alive, Bearing Dark Mark!' the headline screamed.
Sirius looked patently ridiculous with the hat, and he was insufferable about having pulled off the whole ruse without a hitch, but he had good reason to be smug about it. Things had gone perfectly. He wasn't going to turn himself in for the trial until public pressure gave the Minister a few sleepless nights and a date was scheduled, but it seemed inevitable that the truth would come out. If Pettigrew disappeared or died mysteriously before then, there would be a riot, and Sirius would probably get his retrial anyway.
For some reason Sirius had been muttering and sticking his hand up the hat's brim when she left to go to Hogwarts that afternoon, and the hat had been snarking back at him, but that was just Sirius. She presumed the hat was the magical equivalent of a sock puppet.
"Hey, Hissy," Harry said fondly. He held his arm out, and she took the offer to ride along, coiling herself up around his forearm and bicep, hidden beneath the sleeve of his robe. "Good week?"
"Very good," she replied as they ventured out into the castle proper, passing through the Hufflepuff common room on the way. "You?"
"Some Potter trouble, with people coming out of the woodwork to ask me about Black and Pettigrew," Harry said, "but that's nothing."
Ah, Potter trouble. The catch-all term Harry used for the problems that last name, and him being associated with it, caused. Taylor understood his desire not to associate himself with the name a lot better now that she had heard, at length, his list of complaints about all the annoyances and outright dangers the name managed to convey to him even with him refusing it at every opportunity.
"Here comes some more Potter trouble now," Harry muttered. Taylor poked her head out his sleeve to see a scruffy-looking man coming toward them.
"Harry, I've been looking for you," Lupin said. "Do you have a moment?"
"Not really, my friends are waiting for me," Harry said blandly.
"You do have a moment," Lupin said more firmly. "You've seen the newspapers?"
"Yeah?" Harry shrugged. "So?" Taylor had never seen passive-aggressive Harry before. She was fascinated.
"Black was–" Lupin began.
"The bastard time-traveling child of James and Lily Potter, probably," Harry interrupted. "If it has to do with them I don't care. Does it?"
"Five points from Hufflepuff for interrupting and disrespecting a professor," Lupin snapped. "It does, in fact, have to do with them."
"Okay. Good to know he is their child, or their best friend, or whatever. I'll be sure to let him know I'm not Harry Potter if I see him." Harry's shoulders tensed. "I do actually have somewhere to be, Professor."
"Just… No. Nevermind. Go." Lupin growled.
Harry walked away, his back stiff and his arm tense. He quickly relaxed once he found his friends and they started up a game of wizard trivia, but the encounter stayed with Taylor all day, and when she found herself at loose ends she decided to pay some attention to the staff. Specifically, she knew that they had a staff meeting every Saturday afternoon…
She slithered her way into the old classroom they used for their meetings just as the boring administrative talk was wrapping up. McGonagall, as deputy Headmistress, headed up all of that, and even her light Scottish brogue couldn't make it any more interesting to listen to.
Dumbledore wasn't there, more's the pity. Taylor didn't dare slither her way up to his office alone, so she saw very little of the man who had kidnapped her son. It was hard to know her enemy when she hardly ever saw him.
"That's all we need to discuss about the budget today," McGonagall concluded as Taylor slithered into a good listening spot well out of sight of the assembled professors. "Remember to alert Sinistra of any more Punching Telescope incidents before you destroy the telescope, and we won't have to replace any more before the Weasleys graduate. Are there any students who need discussing?"
"I'd like to bring up Harry Potter," Lupin said, and Taylor knew she had made the right decision to come and eavesdrop on this particular day. Then again, Lupin had the air of a man at the end of his patience earlier in the day, so it made sense he would want to vent now.
"Let's not discuss the brat," Snape drawled.
"Severus, hold your tongue," Sprout huffed. "Harry has done nothing to deserve your disdain. He's the best student in his year, academically, and he never causes any trouble."
"Miss Granger has him beat when you consider the other houses, but I think neither of them would be doing quite so well alone," Flitwick chimed in.
"I want to discuss why you all just call him Harry, except for Snape," Lupin clarified. "I've tried to get through to him, but he has his back up over his own last name."
"Didn't you get a well-deserved scolding from Harry on that very topic?" Sprout asked, her voice deceptively mild. "I remember saying that you should consider yourself told and leave it alone."
"Yes, but I still don't understand." Lupin's breathing was heavy, and he sounded angry. "Why do you let him do this? It's disrespectful."
"On this one thing we agree," Snape said coldly.
"It's not a matter of letting him, Remus," Professor Babbling, Harry's teacher in Runes if Taylor remembered correctly, answered. "It's simply the right thing to do. He asked that I call him by the name he chose. I thought about it, decided that there was no harm in it and that I would rather have his respect than his resentment, and chose to do so. How is the opposite approach working out for you and Snape?"
"The fact is," Flitwick added before Snape or Lupin could respond, "that there is nothing wrong with a boy wanting to use the last name of his adoptive mother. I've never met Mrs. Hebert, which is understandable given she is a Muggle, but if Harry cares that much about her I think it's rather touching."
"Not to mention it gets him out of the spotlight he doesn't seem to care for," Sprout added.
"We, as Professors, chose to not make a scene out of a name," McGonagall concluded. "It's up to you how you interact with Harry, Remus, but you assured me at the start of the year that it wouldn't be a problem."
"I did not expect him to hate his actual parents," Remus said bluntly. "That is a problem. His Boggart is a problem. He–"
"I hope you are not about to tell us about his Boggart," Sprout cut in. "You held Harry back to let him face his alone for a reason."
"It was not what I expected," Remus said stiffly.
"Let the brat have his little fears," Severus said. "I know I don't want to hear about them." Robes rustled, and though Taylor couldn't properly see them from her hiding place she suspected he had leaned forward. "If you speak about the Boggarts of the students you hold back to grant privacy, you will not be teaching here next week. My Slytherins take that privacy very seriously. Please give me an excuse to sic their parents on you."
"Professor Lupin was not about to violate that trust," McGonagall declared. "Let's move on. Remus, you need to stop pushing Harry about James and Lily. Let him have his space. All you are doing is making him resent you."
Lupin muttered something too quiet for Taylor to hear, and then Flitwick asked McGonagall if the Professors needed to be on the lookout for Ronald Weasley's missing rat or not, and the conversation drifted away from interesting topics, leaving Taylor with a much more comprehensive understanding of exactly how the staff saw her son.
She would have to ask Sirius why Snape, of all people, cared so much about Harry 'disrespecting' the Potters. From what she'd gathered, Snape ought to be celebrating someone else joining him in dancing on James Potter's grave. And perhaps while she was at it, she would bring up the werewolf's obsession with the same topic.
Harry was her son. She wouldn't have minded overmuch if he showed an interest in his birth parents, only the unique circumstances of her receiving him had stopped her from telling him he was adopted long before magic came into their lives. But he had chosen to deny them so long as people denied her presence in his life, and as such, she was going to make sure that didn't come with any backlash.
Pettigrew's trial was set for the fifth of July, and an amnesty was offered for Sirius Black if he turned himself in to stand trial. The Dementor's Kiss was officially off the table, and a return to Azkaban was unofficially very unlikely. It seemed the preliminary interrogation of Pettigrew had him singing loudly enough that the Ministry could read the writing on the wall.
One consequence of that date being set, besides the obvious one of it also being the date of Sirius' upcoming exoneration, was that Taylor knew for certain nothing about Harry's custody situation could change until after that day. As such, Harry would be at Dumbledore's mercy for one more summer. For the last summer, if anything went vaguely to plan during and after the trial.
Taylor was very curious to see Dumbledore's responses to Harry's apparently annual interrogation, so she tagged along with Harry when he went up to the Headmaster's office after the end of term exams.
"Good morning, Headmaster," Harry said respectfully. "Have you met my familiar? I brought her with me today."
"I was unaware you had found a familiar," Dumbledore said, his voice as grandfatherly and gentle as Taylor remembered. Knowing what he had done, it made her itch to bite him, which she attributed to background snake instincts. "Where is she?"
Taylor took that as her cue to poke her head out from Harry's sleeve. Sirius had sworn up and down that there was no immediately obvious way of recognizing an animagus or human transfigured into an animal, and this was the trial by fire. If Dumbledore immediately knew something was off about her, then it was better to know now than to be surprised wandering the castle at night, alone.
"Ah, a snake…" Dumbledore smiled. "An unusual choice for a Hufflepuff, perhaps, but one should make efforts to avoid fitting too neatly to any one label. Does she have a name?"
"Hissy," Harry said. "Because she hisses a lot. Luna gave her to me for Christmas this year."
"Quite the gift," Dumbledore said. "Do be careful with her. Her behavior may not match what you expect, and paying close attention to what she does will make your time together easier on the both of you."
"Sir…" Harry paused. "Are we talking about Hissy or Luna?"
Dumbledore chuckled and stroked his beard. "Perhaps both," he said. "For your familiar, so long as you keep her fed and ensure she does not dine on pet toads, you may keep her with you in the castle. I would suggest getting a suitable terrarium for her over the summer. Miss Lovegood need not be discouraged from eating toads. Probably."
"About the summer," Harry said. "Has there been no change with my mother?"
"Ah, Harry," Dumbledore frowned. "I would have told you if there had been. There has been no significant change."
Taylor supposed that was technically true, if one only observed her at home. She wondered if she was being watched when she was in her house. Not by anyone within a few square blocks of her, if her constant bug presence in the area was to be believed. Compared to magical environments her Muggle neighborhood was an insect stronghold. In the absence of magical defenses, such a clear and thorough awareness of the surrounding area let her sleep at night.
"But what if–" Harry began.
"I would suggest that you not dwell on that which cannot be changed," Dumbledore interjected. "I find that when I am thinking too much about something I ought not to, learning something new helps me. Is there anything I can answer for you? Questions that you have not found answers to in the library?"
Taylor had not heard many more blatant changes of subject. She felt insulted on Harry's behalf. He wasn't that easily distracted!
"The use of one of my many mysterious devices here in this office, perhaps?" Dumbledore offered. "I do not often explain them, simply because nobody bothers to ask."
"Uh… Give me a second…" Harry said, to all outward appearances completely distracted as he looked around the room. Taylor lacked a face to palm or a hand to palm it with, so she settled for knocking a few flies together and hissing in exasperated amusement. "I saw it last time I was here, and the time before that, but I haven't found any reference to it anywhere else, and even Luna doesn't know."
"Yes, my boy?" Dumbledore asked.
"What's a black unicorn?" Harry asked.
Taylor slithered back out onto his hand in the ensuing silence. She couldn't see any black unicorns, but she could see the stricken expression on Dumbledore's face.
"Of all things…" he murmured. His wizened old hands clenched, and he moved them out of sight. "Harry… Have you seen a black unicorn?" he asked. Quietly. Carefully.
Somehow, an innocent question had turned this little dance of denial and ignorance into something imminently dangerous. Taylor could feel it in the air. A gathering charge. The way Dumbledore's hands were hidden, the way Harry shifted his ams closer to himself, covering her up as he crossed them… She scented the air, marshaled the few bugs she had in the walls, and prepared for sudden violence, though she knew not why it might come.
"On your book's cover, sir," Harry said cautiously. He could feel the looming danger, too. "Nowhere else. Should I have?"
"No." Dumbledore sat back, his eyes fixed on Harry. There was no mirth or levity in those deceptive old eyes, not now. "No, you should not have," he repeated.
"I just wondered, since it seemed like something that would be in the books right next to unicorns," Harry continued. "There's nothing, though, not in the library."
"There would not be," Dumbledore said gravely. "Not even in the restricted section, though you should not be looking there in any case."
Harry schooled his features into an expression of innocence, but Taylor knew better. Not three weeks ago she bore witness to the successful conclusion of a scheme hatched between Hermione and Ginny on that very subject. Ginny knew how the books were protected and what to do to get around the protections, and Hermione wanted a way in prepared and tested in case of urgent future need. They'd broken through with hardly any trouble at all, and all of Harry's friends had spent a few evenings sneaking interesting books out. Even Luna took a few to squirrel away in her dorm room. Nothing that looked overly sinister, Taylor had checked, but things she fully understood keeping from the less mature and responsible majority of the student body.
"I have the only mention of them here, in my office," Dumbledore continued, apparently unaware of the rule-breaking Harry's friends had committed. "It is, I believe, the only existing copy of that particular book. Do not worry about black unicorns, Harry. They are not something that has ever naturally walked this earth."
Those were some loaded qualifiers Dumbledore probably thought he was sneaking past Harry. Taylor wanted that book, though she doubted she could get it.
"I wasn't worried, I was curious." Harry tensed. "Should I have been worried?"
"You?" Dumbledore slumped back in his chair, an odd expression coming across his features too fast to really be seen. In its place was something akin to regret. "No. Not you, Harry. My apologies. I do not believe you would knowingly have anything to do with such things. Anyone willingly involved with them… No. Let us speak no more of this."
The remnants of the dangerous mood lifted, tension palpably fleeing the cramped office. Dumbledore placed his gnarled old wand on the desk, within reach but not in his hand, and rubbed at his forehead. "We were speaking of your mother. And on that matter…"
"I just want to see her," Harry insisted.
"I know, Harry," Dumbledore sighed. "Truly, I do. This situation does not please me. But for the time being, you must accept that you cannot see her. If ever that changes, I will know and I will take you to her immediately, but we must respect her wishes like we would those of any other person. Her more so, as she is a Muggle and we are wizards, so the balance of power falls in our favor by default."
The hypocrisy, to Taylor, all but leaked out of Dumbledore's every pore. If she were to take him at his word, he would seem to be the polar opposite of the man who had obliviated her and stolen her child, then lied to him for years on end. Where was his respect for her choices when he did those things?
This man was inscrutable. And infuriating. She had learned nothing, less than nothing, about his intentions throughout the course of this visit. Worse, something had almost caused him to attack Harry… or to fear being attacked himself?
The only thing she was sure of that she wasn't before was that she did not want to take Dumbledore on in a straight fight, or find herself at his mercy. He was dangerous.
"I cannot permit you to see your mother, not at present," Dumbledore said. "I can, however, offer you a little more of a choice as to how you spend your summer. I understand you are on very good terms with Ginevra Weasley, and as such I made inquiries. The Weasleys would be happy to have you this summer. Alternatively, Madam Longbottom says her home remains open to you."
This wasn't something Taylor had expected, and truthfully she didn't know if she had a preference. It was probably best to leave this choice up to Harry. So long as he was away from Dumbledore, either was fine with her.
"Neville and his Gran are nice," Harry mused, "and I like the greenhouses… But I've never been to see the Weasleys' home before, and Ginny told me about the village they live near. I think I'd like to go stay with the Weasleys this summer."
"I'll let them know," Dumbledore assured him. "We will keep to your using the Floo, to ensure you have a safe trip. I hope you can enjoy your summer and put this unpleasant business behind you."
"I hope I can too," Harry agreed.
Taylor knew Harry would be able to put it behind him. By this time next year, Harry's location over the summer wouldn't be up to Dumbledore at all. She and Sirius were going to make sure of that.
Now, more than ever, it was important that Dumbledore be avoided. She couldn't effectively counter someone whose motives and goals were so completely opaque to her. She might have found Harry, and found a way to be with him, but the struggle to bring him home was far from over.
Notes:
Several readers were surprised by how fast Taylor reunited with Harry. The pacing and length of this story aside (it's only twelve chapters!), her physically reaching Harry was only the start of her getting him back. That plotline is going to carry us through the rest of the story, as I think this chapter begins to show.
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