* * *

             THEY ENTERED THE GREAT HALL FOR BREAKFAST AT EXACTLY THE SAME MOMENT AS THE POST OWLS ON MONDAY MORNING. hermione was not the only person eagerly awaiting her daily prophet: nearly everyone was eager for more news about the escaped death eaters, who, despite many reported sightings, had still not been caught. she gave the delivery owl a knut and unfolded the newspaper eagerly while elara helped himself to herself juice, when the first owl landed with a thud in front of harry.

            "who're you after?" he asked it, languidly removing his own orange juice from underneath its beak and leaning forward to see the recipient's name and address:

HARRY POTTER 
GREAT HALL 
HOGWARTS SCHOOL

            frowning, he made to take the letter from the owl, but before he could do so, three, four, five more owls had fluttered down beside it and were jockeying for position, treading in the butter, knocking over the salt, and each attempting to give him their letters first.

            "what's going on?" ron asked in amazement, as the whole of gryffindor table leaned forward to watch as another seven owls landed amongst the first ones, screeching, hooting, and flapping their wings.

            "this is the most interesting thing to happen here since — well, christmas," said elara amusedly, watching the owls battle it out.

            "not valentine's day?" said harry in mock hurt.

            "you mean the day i kicked your ass in a race? i guess," said elara smugly.

            harry rolled his eyes and nudged elara's side.

            "harry!" said hermione breathlessly, plunging her hands into the feathery mass and pulling out a screech owl bearing a long, cylindrical package. "i think i know what this means — open this one first!"

            harry ripped off the brown packaging. out rolled a tightly furled copy of march's edition of the quibbler. he unrolled it to see his face grinning sheepishly at him from the front cover. in large red letters across his picture were the words:

HARRY POTTER SPEAKS OUT AT LAST:
THE TRUTH ABOUT HE-WHO-MUST-NOT-BE-NAMED AND THE NIGHT I SAW HIM RETURN

            "it's good, isn't it?" said luna, who had drifted over to the gryffindor table and now squeezed herself onto the bench between fred and ron. "it came out yesterday, i asked dad to send you a free copy. i expect all these," she waved a hand at the assembled owls still scrabbling around on the table in front of elara and harry, "are letters from readers."

            "that's what I thought," said hermione eagerly, "harry, d'you mind if we — ?"

            "help yourself," said harry, slightly bemused.

            elara, ron, and hermione started ripping open envelopes.

            "this one's from a bloke who thinks you're off your rocker," said ron, glancing down his letter. "ah well . . ."

            "this woman recommends you try a good course of shock spells at st. mungo's," said hermione, looking disappointed and crumpling up a second.

            "this one looks okay, though," said harry slowly. "hey, she says she believes me!"

            "this one does too," said elara, eyes scanning the writing. "he's also written some really funny stuff about the ministry."

            "this one's in two minds," said fred, who had joined in the letter-opening with enthusiasm. "says you don't come across as a mad person, but he really doesn't want to believe you-know-who's back so he doesn't know what to think now. . . . blimey, what a waste of parchment . . ."

            "here's another one you've convinced, harry!" said hermione excitedly. " 'having read your side of the story i am forced to the conclusion that the daily prophet has treated you very unfairly. . . . little though i want to think that he-who-must-not-be-named has returned, i am forced to accept that you are telling the truth. . . .' oh this is wonderful!"

            "another one who thinks you're barking," said ron, throwing a crumpled letter over his shoulder, "but this one says you've got her converted, and she now thinks you're a real hero — she's put in a photograph too — wow —"

            "this one's just confessed her love for you — that's. . . nice," said elara, trying to hide her bitterness.

            "what is going on here?" said a falsely sweet, girlish voice.

            elara looked up with her hands full of envelopes. professor umbridge was standing behind fred and luna, her bulging toad's eyes scanning the mess of owls and letters on the table in front of elara and harry. behind her elara saw many of the students watching them avidly.

            "why have you got all these letters, mr. potter?" she asked slowly. 

            "is that a crime now?" said fred loudly. "getting mail?"

            "be careful, mr. weasley, or i shall have to put you in detention," said umbridge. "well, mr. potter?"

            harry hesitated.

            "people have written to me because i gave an interview," said harry. "about what happened to me last june."

            "an interview?" repeated umbridge, her voice thinner and higher than ever. "what do you mean?"

            "i mean a reporter asked me questions and i answered them," said harry. "here —"

            and he threw the copy of the quibbler at her. she caught it and stared down at the cover. her pale, doughy face turned an ugly, patchy violet. elara snorted into her orange juice.

            "when did you do this?" she asked, her voice trembling slightly. 

            "last hogsmeade weekend," said harry.

            she looked up at him, incandescent with rage, the magazine shaking in her stubby fingers.

            "there will be no more hogsmeade trips for you, mr. potter," she whispered. "how you dare . . . how you could . . ." she took a deep breath. "i have tried again and again to teach you not to tell lies. the message, apparently, has still not sunk in. fifty points from gryffindor and another week's worth of detentions."

            "just because fudge won't sleep with you," snapped elara, "doesn't mean you get to take your frustration out on kids."

            it seemed almost everyone around them had heard, because a collective gasp rang through the hall.

            "such words should never come out of a lady's mouth. you could do with joining mr. potter in detention," umbridge's girlish voice trembled.

            "i'm hardly a lady, and neither are you. no, you're less of a 'lady' than i am, because i would never, ever torture children."

            "two weeks detention."

            she stalked away, clutching the quibbler to her chest, the eyes of many students following her.

            "what a bitch," snarled elara, ripping open another letter.

            by mid-morning enormous signs had been put up all over the school, not just on house notice boards, but in the corridors and classrooms too.

— by order of —

the high inquisitor of hogwarts

any student found in possession of the magazine the quibbler will be expelled.

the above is in accordance with educational decree number twenty-seven.

signed:

dolores umbridge

high inquisitor

            every time elara or hermione caught sight of one of these signs they beamed with pleasure, although elara was sure they were smug for different reasons.

            "what exactly are you two so happy about?" harry asked them.

            "oh harry, don't you see?" hermione breathed. "if she could have done one thing to make absolutely sure that every single person in this school will read your interview, it was banning it!"

            "oh, well, i just find it funny that umbridge is ridiculously scared of a mutiny," said elara happily.

            "who's planning a mutiny?"

            "me."

            "lara, no."

            "lara, yes."

            it seemed that hermione was quite right. by the end of that day, though elara had not seen so much as a corner of the quibbler anywhere in the school, the whole place seemed to be quoting the interview at each other; elara heard them whispering about it as they queued up outside classes, discussing it over lunch and in the back of lessons, but every occupant of the cubicles in the girls' toilets had been talking about it when elara nipped in there before divination.

            "they saw me, and obviously they know i know you, so they were bombarding me with questions," elara told harry, her eyes mischievous, "i told them you have a hungarian horntail tattoo across your chest."

            "what for?"

            "hey, at least i didn't tell them it was niffler."

             meanwhile professor umbridge was stalking the school, stopping students at random and demanding that they turn out their books and pockets. elara knew she was looking for copies of the quibbler, but the students were several steps ahead of her. the pages carrying harry's interview had been bewitched to resemble extracts from textbooks if anyone but themselves read it, or else wiped magically blank until they wanted to peruse it again. soon it seemed that every single person in the school had read it.

            the teachers were, of course, forbidden from mentioning the interview by educational decree number twenty-six, but they found ways to express their feelings about it all the same. professor sprout awarded gryffindor twenty points when harry passed her a watering can; a beaming professor flitwick pressed a box of squeaking sugar mice on him at the end of charms, said "shh!" and hurried away; and professor trelawney broke into hysterical sobs during divination and announced to the startled class, and a very disapproving umbridge, that harry was not going to suffer an early death after all, but would live to a ripe old age, become minister of magic, and have twelve children.

            elara choked on air hearing that one.

            and unbelievably, no sooner had elara and harry arrived outside transfiguration than something just as good happened: seamus stepped out of the queue to face harry.

            "i just wanted to say," he mumbled, squinting at harry's left knee, "i believe you. and i've sent a copy of that magazine to me mam." 

            if anything more was needed to complete elara's happiness, it was draco, crabbe, and goyle's reactions. she saw them with their heads together later that afternoon in the library, together with a weedy-looking boy hermione whispered was called theodore nott. they looked around at harry as he and elara browsed the shelves for the book they needed on partial vanishment, and goyle cracked his knuckles threateningly and draco whispered something undoubtedly malevolent to crabbe. elara knew perfectly well why they were acting like this: harry had named all of their fathers as death eaters.

            "and the best bit is," whispered hermione gleefully as they left the library, "they can't contradict you, because they can't admit they've read the article!"

            to cap it all, luna told him over dinner that no copy of the quibbler had ever sold out faster.

            "dad's reprinting!" she told harry, her eyes popping excitedly. "he can't believe it, he says people seem even more interested in this than the crumple-horned snorkacks!"

            harry was a hero in the gryffindor common room that night; daringly, fred, george, and aurora had put an enlargement charm on the front cover of the quibbler and hung it on the wall, so that harry's giant head gazed down upon the proceedings, occasionally saying things like "the ministry are morons" and "eat dung, umbridge" in a booming voice. hermione did not find this very amusing; she said it interfered with her concentration, and ended up going to bed early out of irritation. elara had to admit that the poster was not quite as funny after an hour or two, especially when the talking spell had started to wear off, so that it merely shouted disconnected words like "dung" and "umbridge" at more and more frequent intervals in a progressively higher voice. elara was able to distract everyone in the common room and she yanked harry upstairs.

            "thank you," said harry, rubbing his scar. "i was wondering when i'd be able to escape."

            "it's no problem," said elara, nudging his side softly. "i'm just glad no one knows i was there. i don't think i'd be able to handle a bunch of random people pestering me."

            "there'd be one broken nose and at least three bat-bogey hexes."

            "you're not wrong," said elara, leaning in.

            "when am i ever?" said harry leaning in too.

            "i can think of at least five times right now — "

            the dormitory was empty when elara reached it. she undressed and got into bed, wishing that, for once, she'd be able to have an all right sleep without her potion. she rolled over onto her side, closed her eyes, and surprisingly fell asleep almost at once...

             she was standing in a dark, curtained room lit by a single branch of candles. voldemort's hands were clenched on the back of a chair in front of him. they were long-fingered and white as though they had not seen sunlight for years and looked like large, pale spiders against the dark velvet of the chair.

            elara made a noise of disgust. not again, she thought.

            beyond the chair, in a pool of light cast upon the floor by the candles, knelt a man in black robes.

            "i have been badly advised, it seems," said voldemort, in his high, annoying, cold voice that pulsed with anger.

            "master, i crave your pardon. . . ." croaked the man kneeling on the floor. the back of his head glimmered in the candlelight. he seemed to be trembling.

            "i do not blame you, rookwood," said voldemort in that cold, cruel voice.

            he relinquished his grip upon the chair and walked around it, closer to the man cowering upon the floor, until he stood directly over him in the darkness.

            "you are sure of your facts, rookwood?" asked voldemort.

            "yes, my lord, yes . . . i used to work in the department after — after all. . . ."

            "avery told me bode would be able to remove it."

            "bode could never have taken it, master. . . . bode would have known he could not. . . . undoubtedly that is why he fought so hard against malfoy's imperius curse. . . ."

            "stand up, rookwood," whispered voldemort.

            the kneeling man almost fell over in his haste to obey. his face was pockmarked; the scars were thrown into relief by the candlelight. he remained a little stooped when standing, as though halfway through a bow, and he darted terrified looks up at voldemort's face.

            "you have done well to tell me this," said voldemort. "very well . . . i have wasted months on fruitless schemes, it seems. . . . but no matter . . . we begin again, from now. you have lord voldemort's gratitude, rookwood. . . ."

            "my lord . . . yes, my lord," gasped rookwood, his voice hoarse with relief.

            "i shall need your help. i shall need all the information you can give me."

            "of course, my lord, of course . . . anything . . ."

            "very well . . . you may go. send avery to me."

            rookwood scurried backward, bowing, and disappeared through a door.

            left alone in the dark room, voldemort turned toward the wall. a cracked, age-spotted mirror hung on the wall in the shadows. he moved toward it. his reflection grew larger and clearer in the darkness. . . . a face whiter than a skull . . . red eyes with slits for pupils . . .

            the vision shifted. elara was back on the coastal cliff with the small cottage. this time, there was no woman in a pale pink flowy dress. the atmosphere was odd. elara felt as if nothing bad could happen to her here. that she could relax for once. that in some odd sort of way... she was home.

            but, power was brimming at elara's fingertips. it was like something was inside and was begging to be let out. she clenched her hands in an attempt to stop whatever was happening. this place, wherever she was, seemed to be surrounded by some different magic. 

            elara heard it. there was the siren call again, but this time, it was much softer. instead of a warning, it seemed to be... begging her to follow. her legs acted on their own accord and she began heading towards the cozy looking cottage. oddly, elara felt no need to draw her wand as she would usually do in a situation like this.

            two small creatures elara had never seen before bounded around her legs as she stepped through a cute metal gateway into a small garden. the garden was brimming with mysterious plants and creatures. they all seemed to be harmless. 

            it wasn't until that elara realized she was suppose to be exploring the cottage that she resumed her way through the harmless garden. she pushed open the door. the right wall as soon as she walked in was covered was mysterious, powerful-looking artifacts.

            "elara tonks... i've been expecting you."

            elara whirled around, ready to attack whoever had spoken to her. it was the woman in the flowy dress from before, but this time, she had her hair braided in a warrior sort of fashion. around her eyes was painted black and her arms had stripes painted on them. her beautiful dress had been swapped for tight clothes except for a cape.

            "you're her. you're the vocar ad feram, or whatever you called yourself," said elara, relaxing.

            "that, i am. however, many before you have deemed it fit to call me anya."

            her tone and demeanor screamed power and importance. her shoulders were drawn back in a regal manner. elara was never one to respect someone right off the bat, but she found herself wishing she'd never have to cross this woman.

            "what does vocar ad feram mean? i've tried researching — "

            "very few know such a phrase even exists. it is esoteric knowledge. vocar ad feram means call of the wild."

            elara nodded.

            "and loco veteres?"

            "the place of ancients."

            "what about praedo malorum?"

            "that shall be revealed to you when you are ready to bear the burden of the responsibilities, the power, and the danger that comes along with that sacred name."

            "when will that be?"

            "regretfully," anya sighed, "when albus decides it is time."

            "albus? you mean dumbledore — "

            anya held up a hand. elara immediately stopped talking.

            "before we start training, you need to learn to control your temper. your predecessors had the same problem," said anya, as she examined elara's demeanor.

            "training? for what?"

            anya rubbed her temple.

            "there is much i wish to reveal with you, elara tonks. however, albus believes it best to mollycoddle you — "

            "well, tell him to stop!" retorted elara. "you're the bloody 'call of the wild' or some shit, so why don't you — "

            "this is what i mean. you cannot tap into your inner power with all this anger."

            "okay, miss i'm-wearing-war-paint-because-i'm-edgy, you take one good look at what's happening in my life, and you'll see why i'm pretty pissed off at everything."

            "i am dressed this way because this is how you feel at this moment. you feel like fighting. when we first met, you were scared. you wanted comfort. i was able to present myself as an unassuming being to you. now, i am a warrior."

            "can't you just tell me why i'm here? i don't have a lot of time, you know."

            "you are not ready. i shall try again sometime in the future. do try to calm yourself down some."

            however, the week did not improve as it progressed: elara found herself snapping at more people, couldn't focus on one subject, and had not found a chance to get harry alone, either to tell him what had happened or to blow off steam, whichever happened first. it seemed a lot these days that elara and harry were each other's stress relievers.

            now, elara and many others were watching the terrible scene in front of them. harry pushed through a crowd of slytherins and stood next to elara. professor trelawney was standing in the middle of the entrance hall with her wand in one hand and an empty sherry bottle in the other, looking utterly mad. her hair was sticking up on end, her glasses were lopsided so that one eye was magnified more than the other; her innumerable shawls and scarves were trailing haphazardly from her shoulders, giving the impression that she was falling apart at the seams. two large trunks lay on the floor beside her, one of them upside down; it looked very much as though it had been thrown down the stairs after her. professor trelawney was staring, apparently terrified, at professor umbridge.

            "no!" professor trelawney shrieked. "NO! this cannot be happening. . . . it cannot . . . i refuse to accept it!"

            "you didn't realize this was coming?" said a professor umbridge, sounding callously amused "incapable though you are of predicting even tomorrow's weather, you must surely have realized that your pitiful performance during my inspections, and lack of any improvement, would make it inevitable you would be sacked?"

            "you c-can't!" howled professor trelawney, tears streaming down her face from behind her enormous lenses, "you c-can't sack me! i've b-been here sixteen years! h-hogwarts is m-my h-home!"

            "it was your home," said professor umbridge, and elara was revolted to see the enjoyment stretching professor umbridge's toadlike face as she watched professor trelawney sink, sobbing uncontrollably, onto one of her trunks, "until an hour ago, when the minister of magic countersigned the order for your dismissal. now kindly remove yourself from this hall. you are embarrassing us."

            "no, you are embarrassing us," said elara loudly. many sniggered.

            professor trelawney shuddered and moaned, rocking backward and forward on her trunk in paroxysms of grief. elara heard a sob to her left and looked around. lavender and parvati were both crying silently, their arms around each other. then elara heard footsteps. professor mcgonagall had broken away from the spectators, marched straight up to professor trelawney and was patting her firmly on the back while withdrawing a large handkerchief from within her robes.

            "there, there, sibyll . . . calm down. . . . blow your nose on this. . . . it's not as bad as you think, now. . . . you are not going to have to leave hogwarts. . . ."

            "oh really, professor mcgonagall?" said umbridge in a deadly voice, taking a few steps forward. "and your authority for that statement is . . . ?"

            "that would be mine," said a deep voice.

            the oak front doors had swung open. students beside them scutled out of the way as dumbledore appeared in the entrance. what he had been doing out in the grounds elara could not imagine, but there was something impressive about the sight of him framed in the doorway against an oddly misty night. leaving the doors wide behind him, he strode forward through the circle of onlookers toward the place where professor trelawney sat, tearstained and trembling, upon her trunk, professor mcgonagall alongside her.

            "yours, professor dumbledore?" said umbridge with a singularly unpleasant little laugh. "i'm afraid you do not understand the position. i have here" — she pulled a parchment scroll from within her robes — "an order of dismissal signed by myself and the minister of magic. under the terms of educational decree number twenty-three, the high inquisitor of hogwarts has the power to inspect, place upon probation, and sack any teacher she — that is to say, i — feel is not performing up to the standard required by the ministry of magic. i have decided that professor trelawney is not up to scratch. i have dismissed her."

            to elara's very great surprise, dumbledore continued to smile. in elara's opinion, dumbledore should've just decked umbridge into next year. he looked down at professor trelawney, who was still sobbing and choking on her trunk, and said, "you are quite right, of course, professor umbridge. as high inquisitor you have every right to dismiss my teachers. you do not, however, have the authority to send them away from the castle. i am afraid," he went on, with a courteous little bow, "that the power to do that still resides with the headmaster, and it is my wish that professor trelawney continue to live at hogwarts."

            at this, professor trelawney gave a wild little laugh in which a hiccup was barely hidden.

            "no — no, i'll g-go, dumbledore! i sh-shall l-leave hogwarts and s-seek my fortune elsewhere —"

            "no," said dumbledore sharply. "it is my wish that you remain, sibyll."

            he turned to professor mcgonagall.

            "might i ask you to escort sibyll back upstairs, professor mcgonagall?"

            "of course," said mcgonagall. "up you get, sibyll. . . ."

            professor sprout came hurrying forward out of the crowd and grabbed professor trelawney's other arm. together they guided her past umbridge and up the marble stairs. professor flitwick went scurrying after them, his wand held out before him; he squeaked, "locomotor trunks!" and professor trelawney's luggage rose into the air and proceeded up the staircase after her, professor flitwick bringing up the rear.

            professor umbridge was standing stock-still, staring at dumbledore, who continued to smile benignly.

            "and what," she said in a whisper that nevertheless carried all around the entrance hall, "are you going to do with her once i appoint a new divination teacher who needs her lodgings?"

            "oh, that won't be a problem," said dumbledore pleasantly. "you see, i have already found us a new divination teacher, and he will prefer lodgings on the ground floor."

            "you've found — ?" said umbridge shrilly. "you've found? might i remind you, dumbledore, that under educational decree twenty- two —"

            "— the ministry has the right to appoint a suitable candidate if — and only if — the headmaster is unable to find one," said dumbledore. "and i am happy to say that on this occasion i have succeeded. may i introduce you?"

            he turned to face the open front doors, through which night mist was now drifting. elara heard hooves. there was a shocked murmur around the hall and those nearest the doors hastily moved even farther backward, some of them tripping over in their haste to clear a path for the newcomer.

            through the mist came a face elara had seen once before in a vision: white-blond hair and astonishingly blue eyes, the head and torso of a man joined to the palomino body of a horse.

            "this is firenze," said dumbledore happily to a thunderstruck umbridge. "i think you'll find him suitable."

* * *

AUTHORS NOTE

— all shall be revealed soon oooooo
— side note: i love elara with all my heart,
soul, mind, and spirit. i stan

written: february 19, 2020
published: april 21, 2020