As the two young werewolves stared skyward in horror, Sirius came alive with panic. “No – no – they’re going to be here, they’re here – they’re here!” he hissed, but rather than incoherent babbling it did seem like he had a genuine point as he turned frantically back and forth, his aristocratic nose twitching. Suddenly he stopped, and Rhiannon lowered her gaze to look, bewildered. He had gone tense, his stiff muscles trembling and his dark eyes wide with fear as he searched for some scent or sound on the air.

Then, quick as spitting flame, Sirius turned that terrified gaze on Rhiannon and Dudley, the brief moment in which their eyes met bringing with it a searing pain as she felt some of his terror. “Get down,” he hissed, and he lunged at them both, knocking them bodily to the ground as a crackling light flashed past overhead. Sirius levelled his wand on Rhiannon’s face and muttered something she didn’t quite catch, and all of a sudden it was like the light went out of the world, leaving Rhiannon sprawled on the ground and fumbling in a greyish fog like a flipped turtle.

“Si- Sirius? Wha-?” Rhiannon gasped, fumbling blindly in the dark for her companions. She found Dudley’s solid form, but he dragged her back to the ground as something whizzed by too close over their heads and Rhiannon’s mouth connected with the sodden leaf-litter. She growled, spat and wriggled against Dudley’s grip, impatient and growing fearful in the clouded darkness as footsteps crowded closer, voices she didn’t recognise muttered and hissed to one another.

“Hands in the air, any wands on the ground,” a harsh voice ordered them sharply. Rhiannon wasn’t quite sure which way was up, but she didn’t have a wand, and she did her best to look non-threatening – not that she was sure she looked very threatening to begin with, being a skinny fourteen-year-old in pink cotton pyjamas with mud on her face and in her hair.

“Hold up, Barty,” another voice said, and Rhiannon’s skin prickled as she recognised it – Amos Diggory. She didn’t exactly like the man, but he at least knew her, sort of. “That’s Potter and her cousin, they’re kids – they’d never be able to cast it.”

“That might be so, but – he’s not a child,” the first man said grimly, the man Amos had referred to as Barty. Rhiannon felt a chill in her blood, and fought to keep her panic under control as she realised that this ‘Barty’ meant Sirius. No – no, they couldn’t, he’d just been freed... “You there, raise your head so we can see you.”

Presumably Sirius did so, and several gasps echoed from around them – they had Rhiannon, Dudley and Sirius surrounded. “Sirius Black,” ‘Barty’ said, a note of triumph in his voice. “Caught at the scene of the crime!”

“Hey, hold up,” Dudley spoke up, and had he been in his favoured form he would have been bristling with irritation. “What crime? You mean the Dark Mark? ‘cos that was up on the hill, and I know you can check wands to see what they’ve cast. You can’t just pin this on Sirius – again.”

Sirius tried to shush him, as the people encircling the three of them spluttered angrily. Rhiannon admired her cousin’s readiness to defend Sirius, his refusal to be shamed into silence, and while it might get them into trouble... he wasn’t wrong. It would look very, very bad for the Ministry to wrongfully accuse Sirius a second time, especially with the election next year. And it might help their case to remind the Ministry of that.

“Very well, ah – Black, your wand.” the harsh-voiced man demanded, and as presumably Sirius complied, he took it with a hiss of irritation and examined it. “Prior incantato,” he murmured, and there was a soft crackle and swish as the wand emitted a hot sort of light that Rhiannon could feel, rather than see. “Well, that’s certainly not the Dark Mark... in fact, I don’t think I know that one. Amos?”

Amos Diggory muttered to himself, and his clothes rustled as Rhiannon guessed he peered closer. “That’s... yes, I think so. That’s a wicked little charm that conceals the tapetum lucidum in a werewolf’s eyes, I’ve seen it a few times. Care to explain, Black?” he asked sharply. Rhiannon gulped, and hoped desperately that he wasn’t looking at her, sure her fear must show on her face.

“My – my partner is a werewolf,” Sirius replied shortly, with just the slightest catch in his voice on the lie. “We saw someone in the woods and I cast the charm on him so his eyes wouldn’t light up if they looked our way, these two were lagging behind so I went back to get them and we ended up separated when the Mark went up.”

“Plausible,” Amos told his companions with a sigh. “His – partner – is Remus Lupin. If he’s telling the truth, Lupin should be somewhere nearby – along with the rest of the Weasleys, I’m presuming.”

“Amos! Barty!” someone called through the woods, and Rhiannon’s spirits lifted as she recognised Arthur Weasley’s voice. “Thank God we found you – Barty, we found your elf in the bushes up the ridge, she’s been Stunned, there’s a wand near her – we already checked, it’s the one that cast the Mark.”

“Winky?” ‘Barty’, the harsh-voiced man asked, taken aback. Rhiannon prickled now with a more focused dislike – so this was Winky’s master, ‘Master Crouch’, who had asked them to save him a seat and never showed up, who hadn’t even given her permission to hide in the attack! And Barty Crouch, that rang a bell... that would make him the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement who had sentenced Sirius the first time, she’d read about it. No wonder Sirius’ breaths rasped and trembled in his chest. He didn’t have that power now, he’d been disgraced, but... he still had a certain threatening air about him.

“Winky, yes,” said a fourth voice, one Rhiannon belatedly recognised to belong to Ludo Bagman. “Here – like Arthur said, she’s Stunned, I don’t know whose wand this is.”

“That’s Rhiannon’s,” Dudley chimed in, and Rhiannon felt a frisson of fear. Her missing wand – had cast the Dark Mark? “She lost it earlier, can we have it back?”

“It’s evidence, young man,” Barty Crouch told him coldly. “If that wand indeed cast the Dark Mark, its owner is implicated again. Perhaps h- she threw it aside once she cast the Mark.”

“We heard an incantation up on the hill, we were nowhere near it!” Dudley retorted in frustration. “She dropped it ages ago, probably when we were fleeing the camp, someone must have picked it up and used it, we don’t even know how to cast the Dark Mark – she’s Rhiannon fucking Potter, for fucks’ sake!”

“Language, boy,” Crouch warned him sternly, and Rhiannon had to restrain herself from growling. “There’s also the matter of my elf – set it there, please, Ludovic – yes, ah... rennervate,” he muttered. Rhiannon recognised the incantation as a sort of wizarding equivalent of smelling salts – a universal waking charm that would work against most common causes of unconsciousness.

“Master! Master, this one so sorry, he-” Winky stammered, but they fell silent with a miserable gulp as presumably Mr. Crouch gestured for silence.

“Elf, do you know who I am?” Amos Diggory asked Winky sternly. “I am the head of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. You were found with a wand – already a crime – and the wand which cast an illegal symbol of terrorists, no less. What do you have to say for yourself?”

“W-w-winky isn’t doing it, sir!” Winky stammered, their voice wet with tears and mucus. “Winky is not knowing how! This one only – only picked wand up, sir, to return it to its owner.”

Rhiannon’s heart twinged in sympathy. It was illegal for any nonhuman creature to carry a wand – technically, it wasn’t even legal for Rhiannon herself to have one but Winky as a house-elf would be punished much more harshly by that law. “Um – m-m-m-m-m-mister Crouch, mister Diggory, s-sirs, she c-c-c-couldn’t have c-cast it,” Rhiannon stammered, turning her mostly-sightless gaze on where she hoped he was standing. “T-the voice was low, loud – W-w-w-w-winky’s squeaky. And it was-s-s-s-sn’t me, n-n-n-nobody h-hatesss-s-s Voldem-m-m-m-mort m-more than me. Nobody.”

“Be that as it may, Mist- Miss Potter, this elf was found with the guilty wand in its hand.” Amos Diggory replied coldly. His voice echoed from a little further to the right than where Rhiannon had guessed him to be and she winced, kicking herself internally – she couldn’t give herself away but it was so much harder to pinpoint without sight when she didn’t have her nose either.

“S-s-so they Stunned themself too?” Rhiannon snapped back, feeling her temper rising. “It – it’s obvious what-t-t h-happened – Winky g-g-got close to who- whoever-rr-r c-cast it, they Stunned Winky and d-dropped my wand when they ran. They – W- Winky probably didn’t even see who it w-was!”

Someone put a hand on Rhiannon’s arm to calm her, and Rhiannon very nearly bit them before realising it was Sirius. “Easy,” he whispered, so quietly she doubted their human companions could hear. “He can make life very, very difficult for you, they both can.”

“Rhiannon is probably right,” Mr. Weasley spoke up, sounding anxious – all of the Ministry wizards here outranked him significantly. “Ludo can point you back to where we found her, there might be someone else’s footprints. It’s... well, it’s not exactly well-known how to cast it, is it? Where could Winky have learned it? Unless you’re suggesting Mr. Crouch is...”

“Yes, Amos – what are you suggesting?” Barty Crouch asked, his voice clipped and frosty. “That I routinely teach Dark Magic to my servants? You know what I lost as well as anyone else.”

“Oh – oh no, Mr. Crouch, my apologies – I only wish to find and punish the culprit, like you,” Mr. Diggory backtracked hastily, sounding highly uncomfortable.

“Well, the culprit is certainly not my elf. You, you, go with Ludo and Amos to find a trail. Winky, to me. This means clothes,” Mr. Crouch told the elf firmly. There was a rustle of his cloak that told Rhiannon he had turned away, and Winky let out a pitiful whimper at the threat as presumably they trailed after him – Rhiannon didn’t need eyes to imagine how the elf looked in that moment, her fear and misery were tangible in the heavy night air.

“No, she didn’t -” Dudley protested weakly, but he was shushed into silence as Crouch, Bagman and several of the other Ministry workers departed, their footsteps crunching loudly in the leaves. Sirius breathed a heavy sigh of relief, and

“Dawlish, can you, Whitsage and Silverthorn fan out and fetch Remus Lupin and the rest of the kids?” Arthur Weasley asked meekly, his voice ringing hollow in the wake of Crouch’s bad-tempered departure. “I sent them into the woods together to keep safe, if these three are here the rest must be out here somewhere.”

“Sure thing, Arthur,” Dawlish replied, sounding equally disconcerted by Barty Crouch’s manner. Rhiannon sympathised – she wasn’t quite sure how she felt about aurors overall, but it reassured her that this particular one was here, he’d been nice to her in the past and to her werewolf self too, so that made him at least cautiously safe in her books.

“Thanks,” Mr. Weasley replied. “Ah, Amos – I’ll be back on patrol as soon as I can manage,” he added apologetically. “I just need to get everyone back to our tent and ward the area so they’ll be safe – Dawlish, cast me a Sending when you find the rest and I’ll come fetch you,”

“Keep an eye out,” Dawlish cautioned Arthur. “We mostly cleared ground two but there’s some fires and scattered rioters still, medics crawling all over looking for casualties. I’ll send for Kingsley and Shacklebolt to head over and guard your lot til morning, it’s a hellscape in there.”

“Much appreciated,” Arthur replied wearily. A rustle of cloth suggested that he beckoned to Rhiannon and the rest of them, but he must have quickly realised the children couldn’t see as Rhiannon swung her head around in his direction in search of the movement. “Uh, Rhiannon lass, over here,” Arthur added, and for an embarrassing moment Rhiannon struggled to triangulate where he was. She took a couple of clumsy steps towards where she thought his voice had come from, until someone – Dudley she thought – pulled her back by the arm, and someone else coughed awkwardly.

“Ah, if you’re tied up here I’ll be back to rounding up Death Eaters, I heard Greyback and some of his fanatics are over in campground six, see you soon Arthur. Potter, I’ll make sure you get your wand back, we just need to look for prints and magical signatures first,” Amos told them. Rhiannon got the distinct sense he’d noticed her misdirection and cursed herself as he Disapparated with a surprisingly soft crack.

Arthur breathed a heavy sigh of relief. “That was a bloody mess,” he muttered. “I didn’t see either of your eyes flash, Sirius, I’m assuming you jinxed them?”

“Yeah,” Sirius agreed after a brief pause, his voice sounding strained. “Heard the – the Mark get, cast, figured we’d ha-ave Ministry down on us.”

“Good, quick thinking, if Amos had found out there’s no way we’d have got out of that without a formal accusation.” Arthur replied, and his footsteps squelched softly in the damp leaf-litter as he made his way nearer to them. He coughed softly and Rhiannon startled, having been unaware he was so close. “Ah, sorry – I, wanted to let you know I was here,” he apologised, as he took her gently by a shoulder and tilted her face up to get a better look at her eyes. Something, perhaps the tip of a wand, lifted her glasses out of the way and Rhiannon couldn’t quite stifle a giggle at the tickling sensation of having them placed in her hair in such a way.

“Finite incantatem,” Arthur muttered, and Rhiannon heard Sirius’ raspy voice as an echo of the same phrase, presumably as he lifted the jinx on Dudley. “Alright, that’ll free you up to see, but you’ve got to keep your eyes on the ground or on the back of whoever’s in front of you, don’t want your eyes giving you away. Rhiannon, can you handle the fire or do we need to put the minimiser jinxes back on?”

Rhiannon shook her head, gritting her teeth – no, she could handle it. She’d been blind enough that night. Arthur sighed, and patted her shoulder, then held out his arm for her to take it. “Stick close to me, eyes on the ground, don’t try to think about any of it. I’d Apparate you back but if Dawlish has aurors setting up a defense perimeter around the tent, I probably can’t, so it’s shanks’ pony for us.” he told them, the briskness that Rhiannon by now knew was his anxiety coming through strongly in his reedy voice. She nodded, and kept her eyes fixed firmly on the ground as he led her and Sirius, who was assisting Dudley, back through the forest the way they’d come.

Finite incantatem was a nearly-universal counterspell, and it had removed the nasiminus jinx along with the one that concealed the tapetum lucidum of Rhiannon’s eyes. As they drew nearer the edge of the woods, the pervasive scent of smoke – thick and stinking as they had noted much earlier, not clean-smelling like woodsmoke or thin like torch-flame – grew stronger, until Rhiannon was choking on it and Arthur had to pull them to a halt. “Shit, it’s worse out here than before, hold on,” he muttered. “Ah, masks. Do you mind if I conjure one for you? It’ll just go over your mouth and nose.

Again Rhiannon nodded numbly, and Arthur turned her again to face him. “Operculum,” he said clearly, and with a soft whoosh not unlike the times she had seen incarcerous cast, a cloth mask was conjured into existence around her lower face. It was really more of a bandanna than a mask, a simple cloth tied at the back, and as Rhiannon inspected it cautiously she heard Arthur repeat the charm on himself and their companions. “Apologies, I’m too rattled to conjure something better – requires focus and all that – but that cloth should help a bit, just until we get to the tent. Mundare aerem – that should keep the air clean as it goes in. Alright. Don’t touch anything, don’t look too closely, just follow me and keep your heads down, got it?”

Rhiannon and Dudley nodded dutifully, and the four of them set off up the hill again towards the camp-ground. When they reached it, Rhiannon couldn’t help herself and let out a cry of horror at what she saw. Arthur and the Ministry workers had been right – it was like a war-zone, burned tents and torn picket fences everywhere. Even with the filtering mask the air was heavy, reeking of smoke, spilled alcohol, blood and worse things – heavy, organic reeks that Rhiannon recognised from her brother’s infrequent attempts at hunting. The insides of an animal, parts that should never see light... she had to breathe shallowly, her stomach roiling and her whole body flooded with cold fear. Shock, she told herself, but thinking happened at a distance as if she were examining someone else’s body instead of her own. Her body moved woodenly along beside Arthur, dimly she knew she saw torn earth at her feet, but the world was washed in a bloody haze of smoke and death that her senses shied away from. The chants and cheers she had heard earlier were replaced by broken sobs and screams, gasping breaths of the dying or grieving, and it was all Rhiannon could do to keep moving forwards rather than simply fall to her knees and cry with them.

“Hoi, you there, Arthur!” a rough voice greeted them, and Rhiannon reminded herself just in time not to look up as a man strode towards them, lit wand raised as he inspected them all. “Merlin, you’re alright. Dawlish Sent us word to get over here, we were in the area anyway. This field’s mostly clear anyway, just a few stragglers, but we couldn’t risk it – this many drunk Death Eaters out, they’d consider Rhi Potter a right fine target, already had one bloody buffoon try to hex the tent – fuckin’ Thorfinn Rowle again, the prick, that’s three charges this year already... Ah, nevermind, you don’t want t’ hear about that – Shacklebolt booked ‘im anyway.”

“Thanks, Kingsley,” Arthur replied wearily. He began to lead Rhiannon up the hill toward the tent, but the man – Kingsley Arthur had called him, a stocky man dressed in jeans and a button-down shirt buttoned incorrectly, with tousled brown hair and a surprisingly youthful face who, perhaps late thirties to early forties, vaguely reminiscent of someone else Rhiannon knew but she couldn’t place it – put his arm out to stop them.

“Sorry, mate, you know the drill. Have to check you all, the site and the tent before you can go in, ‘case you’re not you and you’re a distraction.” Kingsley replied.

Arthur bristled. “Ah, bloody hell Nick,” he protested. “It’s pretty clearly us, don’t make me have the kids out in this hellscape any longer than I’ve got to.”

Kingsley – clearly his surname, now that Arthur addressed him more familiarly – winced, but held his ground. “’s protocol and all. I know it seems like nonsense but I’ve seen three of you this evening already. If you aren’t you, you’re the best bloody actor so far, the last one was a right egg and tried to keep me busy while ‘is mate sneaked a bomb in the back.” he replied firmly. “Now... ah, finite incantatem... Meteolojinx recanto...” he began to mutter to himself, draping magic around the four of them and flinging it out across the camp-site in barely-visible wisps. The hair on Rhiannon’s arms prickled and as she raised her arms to rub them, she caught sight of the tangled web of scars that criss-crossed her skin from under the short sleeves of her pyjama shirt right down to the backs of her hands. Now she wasn’t just cold, she was afraid – the charms she used to glamour herself were among the kinds an intruder might use to hide their identity, and they were stripped away just the same. But Kingsley didn’t seem to notice, still muttering to himself as he paced back and forth before them.

“Homenum revelio,” Kingsley said finally, and Rhiannon had to turn away suddenly as Arthur Weasley began to glow a brilliant yellow. Sirius and the auror Kingsley himself were lit up in much the same way, but Rhiannon knew the game was up now as she realised the purpose of the spell – to reveal any hidden human presence. Desperately she tried to hide behind Arthur as Kingsley poked his head into the tent, but it was no use and he caught sight of her as he turned back toward them. “Well that’s th- oh, that’s very odd...” he began, before interrupting himself as he peered more closely at Rhiannon and Dudley, most conspicuously not glowing. He lit his wand with a murmur, and this time Rhiannon wasn’t quick enough to avert her gaze, the light leaving afterimages in her vision – and her eyes leaving a very particular image in his.

Arthur tugged Rhiannon close to him, protective now as her scars were illuminated in harsh relief by the yellow glow of the revelio charm. “Don’t – she’s just a child and he doesn’t even have a wand, it’s not breaking the Doctrine,” he began, almost pleading, but the casually-dressed auror held up a hand for him to stop.

“No, it’s not,” Kingsley replied calmly. Then the corners of his mouth quirked up into the tiniest wry smile, chasing a little of the hollowness from his weary face. “And since none of you are anything but what you seem to be, nor are any laws being broken, it’s nothing to do with my department. They won’t hear a thing from me but that I met you, checked you and let you into the tent.” he added, and even through her eyelashes Rhiannon could see as he bowed briefly to her, an oddly formal sort of gesture for the situation. “The duty I was assigned was to keep Miss Potter safe, and I intend to do that.”

With that, Rhiannon managed to place the familiar face at last – Kingsley, as in Bliss Kingsley, her Quidditch team-mate from last year and Fred Weasley’s sort-of girlfriend. This must be her father, or a similarly close relative. And it warmed her, even in the horror that surrounded them, to have found an ally within the Ministry. To her surprise, she found tears, welling up in her eyes and then spilling down her grimy cheeks, so worn out from all the horror and tension of the night that even that small show of support was overwhelming. Nick Kingsley knelt down and steadied the trembling teenage girl with a hand on her shoulder, his sooty face patient and kind. “I mean it, kid. Me ‘n Kingsley – Shacklebolt, that is, the higher-ups thought it was real funny to put Nick Kingsley with Kingsley Shacklebolt and we just sorta ended up stayin’ together after my training year was up – we’re here to protect you. As far as I’m concerned, I’ve failed at that if I keep you alive for the night but endanger you straight after. Now, c’mon, let’s get you settled in for the night and Dawlish’ll be back with your friends soon.” he told her quietly. Rhiannon nodded numbly and let Kingsley take her by the arm and lead her gently into the tent. She was already dressed in pyjamas, all she had to do was unlace her boots and crawl back into her stretcher bed to sleep.

But sleep didn’t come even with Sirius asleep by the door, and Rhiannon lay awake in the dark, breathing shallowly through a burned throat, keen ears alert for any sound, attuned even to the rough breaths of the two aurors standing guard outside. It was hard to tell time in the red-grey darkness, but Rhiannon guessed it was perhaps an hour before she heard footsteps, different than the two aurors’ quiet pacing, footsteps of several new people squelching and crackling in the sodden grass and burned mud outside. She took a deep breath in, coughing weakly on the smoke as she did so, but even with that token discomfort she recognised the mingled scents of her pack. Remus, Hermione, Luna, Fred, George, Nina and Ginny – all of them, safe.

Rhiannon's eyes, stinging from smoke and tears began to water again and she dragged herself free of her sleeping bag and staggered to the door, coughing and sobbing in equal measure as her packmates passed through the entrance. Nothing was right with the world, it felt as if nothing ever could be again after what had happened, but at least here in this small corner of it she had her pack together again. She hugged them each in turn, a tangle of motion and sensation, and she let herself be swept up with them as they made their way into the tent until at last her closest friends could go no further and they sank to the ground in a heap, sobbing brokenly until those sobs evened into shallow breaths that grew deeper, and the six of them – for Dudley had joined them as well and refused to let go of Ginny – fell asleep together on the floor, unconsciousness a welcome doorway that each of their minds fled through willingly to escape the horror the night had brought.