The clock that sits upon Harry's mantelpiece is a sturdy, ponderous piece of furniture. It looks like it belongs in a pretentious sort of tosser's house, not on a tiny fireplace that doesn't look like it can support its weight. Since the fireplace has held that clock up for over fifteen years, looks are obviously deceiving. Nonetheless, Harry likes the feeling of precariousness the clock gives him - it suits how he feels - has felt - for a long time. Nearly as long as he's had the clock, in fact.

For all the symbolism attributed to it, the clock looks like an ordinary clock (even if it is a pretentious tosser's sort of clock). It has all the numbers, the hour, minute, and second hands helpfully pointing to the time, and a chime which informs passerby disinclined to use their eyes that it's the top of the hour. It's performed this function so well for so long that Harry has forgotten what else it can do.

So when one day it goes BOOOONGGGG..., Harry is startled into snorting his firewhiskey-laced tea out of his nose. Groaning from the burn in his nose, Harry squints through watering eyes up at the mantel. The clock's face is serene, gives no indication that it's done anything so wholly out of its usual function, or that indeed anything unusual has happened.

Harry sits stock-still, only swiping irritably at his eyes when they blur from the water, obscuring his view. Holding his breath, he counts under his breath as he continues to stare at the clock as if it were demented.

Five...four...three...two...

BOOOOONGGGGG....

"It can't be," he whispers, jaw nearly meeting the floor. "There's no way."

He stands, drawing his wand on reflex as he advances upon the clock. Peering at the face, still unchanged, Harry counts again. Four...three...two....

BOOOOONGGGGG....

"Te revelare."

The clock face glows with Harry's spell, goes opaque, then shines like a mirror. Harry glimpses his own face, pale as the Bloody Baron, dark-circled eyes wide behind his chunky glasses. Then another image plumes up, obscuring his reflection. The face which appears is entirely unknown to him - a smirking, almost feminine face, except for the masculine cut of his cheekbones and jaw, mischief in his eyes and cunning ambition in the curl of his generous mouth. Raising an amused eyebrow, the man tilts his face in greeting, then shifts and holds up an elegant hand.

OP DOVH TO RESUME, say the brilliant silver words that shimmer into being above his hand. BRING NEEDLE AND THREAD.

Harry has barely read the last word when the stranger snaps his hand closed. With another smirk, the man holds up a finger, then reaches into his ear. Digging thoughtfully around in it, his face registers triumph, upon which he then draws a gleaming Galleon coin out of his ear and tosses it in Harry's direction. Astounded, Harry scrambles to catch the coin as it falls out of the clock; before his eyes, the numbers and letters on the Galleon start moving, flying about in a furious cloud before they settle, like birds, into a coherent message.

When Harry looks back up at him, the man in the clock gives him a sly wink. Then he turns round and moves out of the clock face, which, on cue, smoothly reverts to its original appearance as if it had never been gone.

Harry will never admit that it takes far too many minutes of standing dumbly in his kitchen staring at a perfectly ordinary clock before he snaps to his senses. Glancing hurriedly at the Galleon in his hand, he curses when he discovers the message is gone. Thinking furiously, he draws his wand and taps the Galleon, thinking needle and thread. A flash, then nothing: the Galleon's face doesn't change, the numbers do not move. Harry tries again, keeping the wandtip pressed to the coin. The flash this time nearly blinds him - he'd forgotten about that. Blinking the spots away, he looks down at the Galleon. Bingo.

"'Old safe house,'" Harry reads quietly to himself, "'nine o'clock. See it through to the end.' Well, that's not ominous or anything."

'Course, he adds to himself, nearly everything about Unspeakable work is ominous. Should be reassured that whoever is behind this is keeping with the trend, really. Pocketing the Galleon, he turns back to the clock, whose hands read eight fifteen. Forty five minutes' notice, as usual. Once again in keeping with the trend.

"All right," Harry says to the clock on the mantel, "I don't know who you are or how you know about the 'needle and thread,'" he grimaces, regretting all over again letting the code phrase stand without more protest, "but if you're up to any funny business, you'll have me to deal with."

The clock ticks over to eight sixteen as its only answer. He would feel more idiotic about talking to an inanimate object, but the funny thing about magic is that oftentimes things are not as they appear. Especially not Unspeakable things. Harry glares at the clock another moment for good measure, then turns away.

"Right," he says, propping his fists on his hips, "time to prepare."

Starting with finishing the remainder of his firewhiskey tea.

 —  

The 'old safehouse' is, as might be expected of an Unspeakable-associated location, is nothing remarkable amongst its neighbors. It was made from the same ancient stone, bore the same stern façade, has the wrought iron fences around its door and across its front like a particularly prickly hat and beard, as any other house in the block, the only difference being the numbers that designated it Six Hundred and Forty Five Guildenstern Road, as opposed to Six Hundred and Forty Three or Six Hundred and Forty Seven.

In all other respects Six Hundred and Forty Five was the same, right up to the throng of bodies milling around its insides and spilling out onto its meagre lawn, jovially drunken tones mixing with intellectual chatter mixing with nasty remarks disguised as socialites' polite small talk.

Indeed, between the smallish party of Quidditch fans going on at Six Hundred Forty Three and the literal gala occurring in Six Hundred and Forty Seven, Harry can hardly hear himself think, much less his own voice as he chants, "Excuse me, make way, coming through, sorry, I'm terribly sorry, make way, excuse me..." a path through the crowd. A few times he gets pushed for bumping into someone, drinks are splashed all over him and the unfortunate blocking him, and more than once a woman's glare turns into an skin-crawling appraising look, but Harry only soldiers on, intent upon reaching his goal.

He makes a noise of triumph as he fights clear of the horde, snagging one of the bottles of butterbeer sitting unobtrusively next to the far larger, flashier-labelled set of Ogden's Firewhiskey (though not without casting a longing look at the latter). Knocking back his bottle, he drains half of it before taking a breather, the satisfied "Ahhh" nearly a belch with the force behind it.

Looking round, he beams a comradely look around, magnanimously toasts a bloke who happens to catch his eye – he smiles soppily at the "Cheers, mate!" he gets in return – and drains the other half. Letting the bottle drop from his hand, he stumbles to his right and giggles as he fetches up against someone, hand shooting out to their shoulder for support as he leans full up against them.

"Sorry, guv, might've had a bit much," Harry sniggers, patting his crutch companionably. "Hope y're not off—offe—angry. Be on me way...soonish." He sways on his feet, but his companion doesn't seem to mind much. In fact, said companion has not said anything one way or the other in response to Harry's statements.

Squinting up past a creased forehead, Harry looks at whom he's currently using as an extra skeleton. "Oh!" he mumbles, shifting. "Didn't...didn't see you there. Terribly sorry. I'll just, err, get out of your way then." He steps back from the cloak hung up on the hat stand, tries to sketch a bow but gives it up for a loss when he wobbles. "Definitely had too much," he mumbles to himself. "Wh're's the bathroom, gotta piss..."

He spots a likely person who seems like they'd know where the bathroom is. "Oi, y'know where the loo is?" he yells, nearly falling flat on his face as he goes up to them.

The person he's picked turns and raises a disdainful eyebrow at him. "No, and even if I did, I shan't tell you," she says coldly, drawing herself up haughtily. "You're a pathetic waste of flesh, getting this drunk at a party and embarrassing everyone around you with your untoward behavior."

"Oi...m'not untowa-untowar—whatever you said," Harry protests. "J'st wanted to know where the loo is."

"So you can sick up what you just drank?" The woman scoffs. "No thank you. I don't fancy vomit all over my toilets, so you'll have to go outside." She waves a scornful hand at him and turns back to her friends.

"'Cuse me," Harry mutters, staggering away from her. "No harm in ask'n."

"Quite rude, wasn't she?" someone says in his ear. "You'll have to forgive her, she's been planning this all year and is most put out that the vagrants on either side of her picked the same day to have their own to-do."

Harry lifts his head to see that his new acquaintance is a tall stork of a man, with arms and legs much longer than they should be and a head much larger than his thin neck should be able to support. The expression on his face is so cheerful, however, that Harry finds himself smiling back and feeling very friendly towards this newcomer.

"Here, I'll show you where the loo is," the man says, slipping his hand under Harry's elbow and confidently urging him forward. Harry goes along readily, only insisting upon a stop for another 'drink', which his guide allows quite without complaint. They make better progress then, Harry busy chugging away at his new bottle while his acquaintance steers them out of the room, around the corner, and down the hall.

"Careful there, there're a few steps," the man says, cheerful face unabated. "Just lift your feet there, oop!, and cheerio! The loo." The man flourishes so grandly that Harry bursts into a fit of chortles, hanging off of the door jamb as he laughs. The man smiles as well, seeming pleased at Harry's reaction, and bows again, this time with a sort of finality.

"Do feel perfectly all right to sick up if that's what you need, old chap," the man says affably, making to close the door. "And if you need anything else, just pull that rope there, and one of the elves should pop in to see to you."

"Cheers," Harry says, already hunting for the toilet. He finds it just as the man shuts the door, and bends over it, groaning miserably for several long seconds. He then lets a half-minute go by, whereupon he groans some more, and then staggers over to the rope hanging innocuously in the corner.

Instead of pulling the rope, Harry reaches for the wall next to the rope. He has to feel around blindly for a bit, but finally his fingers encounter a section of the wall that feels smoother than the rest. Harry pushes on it, looks around behind him.

Pop!

He's summoned an elf all right, a small, portly one ready to burst out of its purple-and-black pillowcase. Without a word, it takes his hand and tugs, pulling Harry through the horrid feeling of being squished through a straw that is Side Apparation. Then his feet find the ground, and Harry really is feeling ill, but not ill enough that he can't register where he is.

"The tunnels under Hogsmeade," Harry says to himself. "Of course it would be here." He suspects that if he were to climb out of the hatch he sees above his head, that he would be in Honeydukes, not far from the cave in which he used to visit Sirius, during fourth year. For a moment, he has an ache in his chest, an irresistible urge to actually go out that way and go up to that cave, overlay the inside with ham bones and the scruffy fur of his godfather, go back to simpler times.

He allows the ache to exist for a moment more, then squashes it thoroughly underneath a metaphorical boot. This isn't the time for flights of fancy; he has a meet he has to get to on time, or else he won't find the answers to his burning questions until another time when the mysterious man in the clock contacts him again.

Shaking his head, he sets off down the path. He doesn't bother to see whether or not the elf is still there – he heard the pop! of it Disapparating as soon as it let go of his hand – and simply trudges on, ducking low underneath the low-hanging ceiling where it dips occasionally, and thinking that the tunnel is much longer than he remembers. But then the tunnel flattens and starts gradually inclining, and a short time later, his head is banging against the ceiling once more – only this ceiling is wooden, and a ring knocker is hanging directly in front of his face.

"Needle and thread," he mutters to it.

The hatch swings open without a sound.

Emerging into the Shrieking Shack is not the blast to the past he thought it would be: Instead of the dust he thought would be there, the floors are sparkling clean, the furniture is not quite in as bad shape as it really ought to be, and the man from the clock is sitting on the less-than-raggedy couch, legs crossed, a cup of tea raised to his lips.

Harry lunges all the way out of the hatch and backs up to the wall, his hand on his wand but not pointed directly at the stranger yet. "Who are you?" he asks accusingly. "How do you know about this?"

The stranger doesn't immediately reply; he chooses to finish his sip of tea and lower his cup to the saucer before he finally looks up at Harry. "Hello, Mr. Porter," he says in a friendly tone. "It's good to meet you at last, after hearing so much about you."

Harry grits his teeth. Damned politicians and their damned mind games. It's obvious, now, who, or rather what, this person is, with his well-polished shoes, fitted waistcoat underneath his expensive robe, and perfectly-trimmed hair. The person is, as he had noted in the clock, rather more feminine up close than Harry would have thought, but it only accentuates the image of a politician at home, undercut enough by the sharp cut of his face and his shoulders.

"I'm not an Unspeakable anymore," Harry says angrily. "Your Croaker cut me loose a long time ago."

"'My' Croaker, as you call him, is no longer in charge of the department," the stranger says. "In fact, the leadership has been in different hands for a while."

"I suppose you're the new Croaker, then?" Harry sighs, his shoulders slumping.

"Ah, not quite," the stranger says. "If you would take a seat?"

Harry doesn't move. "Not until you tell me who you are and what you are in the department."

The stranger raises his eyebrows, gives a little sigh. "As you wish. My name is Silas Smythersen, the Junior Undersecretary of the Department of Mysteries."

"A Junior Undersecretary?" Harry can feel his brows furrow. "How does a Junior Undersecretary have the authority to know about – that mission?"

"The 'Destruction of Voldemort's Horcruxes' one, you mean?" Smythersen's smile is sly. "I have a few connections here and there, some resources as Undersecretary."

Harry wants nothing more than to wipe the smile off this smug arsehole's face. "Is one of these 'resources' reconstituting records that were destroyed by Fiendfyre?" He raises his own eyebrows. "Because Croaker did quite the job on them, as I recall."

"So he did," Smythersen acknowledges. "But he didn't destroy everything. It's surprising how far how a single reference buried deep in the Archives can lead, if you know where to look."

Harry narrows his eyes. "You've an insider," he accuses. "Someone told you about the mission."

"I was told you were quick on your feet." Smythersen smiles delightedly. Harry can't tell if it's genuine. "It's good to see that that skill of yours hasn't languished in the intervening years."

All right, he's officially tired of this game. "Out with it," Harry says impatiently. "What do you want from me?"

Smythersen's eyes gleam. He uncrosses his legs and leans forward, the spare lighting in the Shack catching the pale blue of his eyes, the shine of his coiffed hair. "What I want is rather simple, Mr. Porter. I want to continue that which you left off. I want to reform the team that was so influential in bringing low the Darkest Lord of our time. I want Lord Voldemort to pay for the crimes against humanity which he has committed."

Harry stares. He can't help it. From one moment to the next Smythersen transformed from a typical Ministry bureaucrat to a passionate creature, his every word backed by a conviction Harry can feel the sincerity of down to his bones. Harry can't help but be impressed by the level of acting skill he's watching here. Whoever this Smythersen guy is, whatever it is he is up to, he's good. Good enough to be Junior Undersecretary of the Department only because it suits him and whatever plan he's following for the moment.

"What's he done to you, personally?" Harry asks. There has to be something for the strength in Smythersen's voice to ring true so deeply, even if, as Harry suspects, there's more to this than is readily apparent to the eye.

Smythersen meets said eye squarely. "I have my reasons," he says cryptically, "as much as you have yours."

Ah, so that's how this is going to go then. Harry and this canny lad have a common goal, and they'll be working together to accomplish it. Harry doesn't think he's understating it when he says he hates being used, but he has had to get used to it over the years, such that he's not going to dig in his heels about it.

"How do you plan on restarting it then?" Harry wants to know. "You know that Croaker locked up this case tighter than a unicorn's arse, it'll be impossible to get everything in order."

"Why don't you leave that to me?" Smythersen suggests. "I am, after all, the mastermind behind this plan."

Harry doesn't like it, but again, he's had to get used to being left in the dark as to the wider plan more often than not. Doesn't mean he has to lie back and take it. "I reserve the right to object to anything funny," he insists. "I want to know who your insider is, everything that's happening, who is involved, who we're bringing in - all of it. If you can't do that, I'm out."

Smythersen sighs a little sigh, practiced and theatrical. "What has the world come to that we can't trust each other?"

Harry can feel the gape of what? forming on his face.

The ends of Smythersen's mouth twitch. "Yes, all right, I agree, that was a bit over the top. My apologies." He somehow executes an elegant bow from his spot on the sofa. "Is there anything else you would like to stipulate?"

He delivers this with such nonchalance that Harry hesitates, studies Smythersen sidelong. Were it Croaker of whom he was making demands, Harry would be watching a warning tic building up in Croaker's craggy face before Mount Vesuvius blew. Smythersen, on the other hand, is blank of any such warning signs, only seeming politely curious like the sort a customer service person wears, along the lines of Can I help you?

Perversely, this only serves to make Harry angrier.

Crossing his arms over his chest, he decides to hell with it, he'll see how far he can push this. "All righ', guv, y'wan mor stips?" Mean satisfaction wells up in him when Smythersen twitches, full-body, and acute discomfort and disgust etches their lines across his face. Works on the politicians every time.

"How's about," he continues in a normal tone of voice, "you break every single contract Croaker had us sign, that bloody stupid non-interaction clause especially, and the one about no unsupervised gatherings, too. While we're at it, find a way around the numerous Unbreakable Vows we were forced to make, or, better yet, go back in time twelve years and stop the disbandment from happening at all.

"I'd say stop that arsehole Voldemort from killing the Potters, but even we couldn't do that, so I won't. Really, all I want is for the idiotic things that were done to us to be undone. I want my best friends back. I want," he says, breathing heavily, "my life back. Is that too much to ask?"

He makes himself stop there. Yeah, he's trying to piss Smythersen off, but even he knows there's a point of no return. Past that point, he'd antagonize the one man who seems to want to undo everything. In addition, there are some things this bloke doesn't need to know, and if Harry had gone on and said more, Smythersen would have known it all.

Smythersen has lost the spasm and is now studying Harry. Harry doesn't bother to try to hold that gaze. He hates how he's flipped from angry to hurt in the space of a second, how he's made himself vulnerable instead of finding a sore point, as he intended. Somewhere along the line, he lost control, probably never had it to begin with, and he has no one but himself to blame for it.

Not for the first time, he wishes, bitterly, that they had never come back.

He only turns back at Smythersen's polite cough. 

"Well," Smythersen says with bright cheer, "I can't promise anything on being able to go back twelve years," Harry just sighs at being made fun of, he hasn't got the energy to do anything, "but I can say I've already got a legal team working on the contracts. I don't blame you for wanting to break them, they were atrocious, and quite frankly beyond the pale. Croaker should have known that agents work best with less restraint, not more – that's practically the first rule of the department!"

"I don't think Croaker cared much for the rules where we were concerned," Harry says, shrugging apathetically. "I reckon he thought that since we broke the rules in the first place, he could do the same with us. Didn't want us destroying everything."

Smythersen frowns. "What rules did you break to warrant this level of mistreatment?" he asks, sounding truly perplexed. "What would you have destroyed?"

Harry is drawn up short. "What, your insider didn't tell you?" he blurts. The he winces. Good going, Harry, way to nearly trip the line there. It's not like anyone could have told about the time travel, the only ones who knew were Hermione, Ron, and you, oh, and Croaker. Some former Unspeakable you are.

"It appears," Smythersen says slowly, his eyes narrowing, "there is still have information I have yet to find out."

"Don't blame the insider," Harry hastens to say. "No one except a few people knew it."

"You're one of them." It is not quite a question.

"Yeah." Harry catches Smythersen's gaze. He almost offers him a way to find it, but then has a better idea. Instead he waits.

"Are you going to let me know what that is?" Smythersen could give McGonagall a run for her money in the frosty tone contest.

"Yes. If you break the contracts and the Unbreakable Vows." Never mind that Smythersen would have to find a way to break them both in order to know the full scope. Harry doesn't have to tell him that, at least not until after.

Smythersen stares him down, or tries. Harry is on firmer ground here, though, and matches the steely look with the knowledge of the necessity of breaking the contracts resting behind his eyes. The Shrieking Shack is silent around them, quite in contrast to its name; Harry waits. Finally, Smythersen inclines his head, conceding the battle.

"Very well," he says, raising a hand to the lapels of his robe and tugging sharply. It seems out of place, it must be a tell. Or at least the appearance of a tell. "To sum up: I break the contracts and keep you in the loop, as it were, about everything regarding the mission. In exchange, you come work for me as a full Unspeakable."

Years of training he has never quite lost helps Harry pick up the slight emphasis Smythersen places on "me." Harry looks at him sharply, but Smythersen's steely look hasn't changed, so the man's serious about it. Just— "A full Unspeakable?" he asks, just to check.

"A full Unspeakable," Smythersen returns.

Harry narrows his eyes. A full Unspeakable would mean he would not only be working on the DOVH mission, but also any other mission required of him. Since Smythersen would be his direct supervisor, those missions wouldn't necessarily for the Department's benefit, but rather for the purpose of furthering his own personal goals.

In short, Smythersen would have Harry right where he wanted him, the smug git.

He could walk away. It would be no skin off of his nose to continue on as he has, except...he's been so bloody miserable he could scream just to think about it. Plus, he's been itching to take down that arsehole for so long now, finish what he started, that he couldn't walk away from it now. Never mind that he still considers it his responsibility to take down the son of a bitch, whether or not anyone here knows the reason why.

Hang it. He could walk away, but what choice would that be, really? All to avoid being yanked around by the nose like a prized bull, while the rest of the world burnt to ashes? Again? No choice, really.

"Fine," Harry grits out, hating Smythersen's look of triumph, swiftly suppressed. "As long as needle and thread is the priority."

"Of course. You drive a hard bargain, Mr. Porter," Smythersen says with a smile, extending his hand.

"No harder than you would have let me," Harry snorts, clasping the outreached hand and shaking it.

Smythersen's smile widens. "I suspect that having you aboard will do rather much more to shake up our little world than even I had thought."

Aha. Got him. "That your goal, then, to shake it up?" Harry asks, only too happy to have something up on Smythersen.

Chuckling, Smythersen extracts his hand. "I see I've given too much away. Very well, Mr. Porter, if you would be so good as to keep your lines of communication open, I will let you know when to come in to resume your employment in the department."

"Not that open," Harry says sharply, reminded of the thought he had had earlier about his clock not necessarily only a clock.

Smythersen has the bloody gall to wink. Wanker! Harry can't help the huff of laughter that escapes. Of course Smythersen looks inordinately pleased, puffing his chest out in an eerily accurate impression of a rooster. Or a peacock.

Snorting to himself, Harry notices Smythersen has stood up from the sofa. "Wait, is that it? You haven't got any contracts to sign?"

Smythersen chances him a sidelong look. "I think," he says carefully, "that under the circumstances, getting everything sorted out and in place before any more contracts are signed would be the wisest course."

"No bloody kidding!" Harry snorts again.

Smythersen tips his head in another half-nod. "For now, you're still under the standard Unspeakable non-disclosure agreement, as well as the battery of others Croaker insisted upon. Until the time comes to break them, I daresay we'll not worry about new ones, hm?"

Harry grimaces, his mood soured once more by the reminder. "Yeah," he mumbles.

Smythersen may have said "until," not "if," but Harry would bet the remainder of the vault his parents had left him that some of the contracts would be left unbroken. Call him suspicious, even as paranoid as Mad-Eye Moody if you like, but a few of the contracts favored the Department heavily, as he recalled, and whoever the new Croaker is would object very loudly to their break.

"A good evening to you, then." Smythersen makes a leg, this one considerably less odd than the bow from the sofa, but no less elegant, and twirls on his heel. A tiny pop! later, and Harry is left to sag against his trusty wall, alone in the pristine interior of the Shrieking Shack. In the wake of Smythersen's presence, he feels – he doesn't know what he feels.

"Overwhelmed" comes to mind, now that the implications of Smythersen's visit have sunk in. "Hopeful" is another, except it doesn't quite feel like it, not really, but he hasn't words to describe it. He was never any good at talking about his feelings anyhow. Either way, if Smythersen – and it is a big if, no matter how sincere the smug git seemed – comes through, Harry will be shocked. Pleased, but shocked.

He has the suspicion, though, that Smythersen will make sure Voldemort dies this time, if only because that arsehole is a threat to whatever plans he's got going.

—

Remus Lupin sighs quietly. Sirius is collapsed in the armchair next to the fire again, his mouth slack underneath eyes so bruised he looks like he has two black eyes. Nearly teetering off his lap is the photo album of Harry's first birthday. It's of little Harry alight with joy as he climbs all over Padfoot. Padfoot keeps shifting and wriggling, trying to keep Harry away from his tail or making Harry slide off so he has to start his climb anew.

"You can't keep going on like this, Paddy," Remus says to Sirius's face, creased with a frown even in sleep. "You're going to land yourself in hospital at St. Mungo's again, and..."

He stops it there, has to take a deep breath. There's no point in thinking of it, he tells himself, but it's already there: Sirius in the hospital bed, lifeless/ restless under the Dreamless Sleep, the Healer grim as she tallies the self-inflicted injuries Remus hadn't noticed until nearly too late, the despair on even Padfoot's face when another roadblock/ obstacle to gaining/ in the custody war for Harry appeared. From there it is not far to how Sirius looked mere minutes out of Azkaban: thin as a piece of parchment, dead eyes, the screams and manic laughter in the middle of the night.

Deep breaths, Remus reminds himself. You have your eye on him now. You know what to look for, it won't be like that again.

The shake of his hands begs to differ.

Pop!

Remus looks up in surprise. That sounded like Apparation. He'd think it was a house elf, except they don't have one here, and if it was someone they know, they would have owled first.

Taking one last glance at Sirius, Remus pauses. That photo album really is close to falling off. With another sigh, Remus bends to slide the album carefully out of Sirius's pale fingers. Harry's beaming face and Padfoot's doggy grin disappear beneath the leather-bound cover, over which Remus runs his own fingers—

Knock, knock!

It is a visitor. Remus sets the photo album aside, draws his wand quickly enough to shoot a warming spell on Sirius's chair. Sirius shifts, his frown easing for all of a second before it returns. Remus flicks his wand at the fire, stokes it higher, too, for good measure. Merlin knows Sirius still needs all the warmth he can get, especially while dreaming.

Knock, knock!

"All right, all right, hang onto your knickers," Remus grumbles as he hurries from the room. "There's no need to be impatient."

Knock, knock! Knock, knock, knock! Knock, knock!

"I'm coming, I said!" Remus says, well and truly irritated now.

Knock! Knock! Knock, knock, knock! Knock! Knock!

For some reason, the sound of the knocking stirs something in Remus's memory. Slowing, Remus/ he frowns. What was it? It's on the tip of his brain. Knock. Knock. Knockknockknock. Knock. Knock. It's vaguely musical, but it's more than that. It reminds him of....

Knock! Knock! Knock, knock, knock! Knock! Knock!

"No," Remus says to himself. "You must be dreaming." Despite his admonitions, he waits a moment, standing stock-still in the sitting room, but the knocker doesn't knock again. Shoulders sagging from round his ears, Remus mutters, "Wishful thinking. Ah well, might as well see who it is anyhow."

Later, Remus will remember it in slow motion, his hand reaching towards the slightly-dinged doorknob, the mournful groan of the much-based door opening, Remus looking out as the door clears his line of vision. Then blinking. His jaw dropping open. His mind going blank.

"Well, it's about time," the woman on the other side of the door says, standing on his doorstep rather as if she were not a ghost of his past. "I was beginning to think you weren't at home after all."

"Hermione?" Remus says weakly. "Hermione Grainge?"

The smile which spreads over Hermione's face is soft and sharply amused all at once. "Hello, Remus," she says, the sharp amusement fading, "it's wonderful to see you again, after so long."

"It is you! I can't believe it! How long has it been?" As he asks the question, his own brain supplies the answer: twelve years. Twelve long years without Hermione's friendship, her caustic remarks about the misogynistic blighters in the department, twelve years without....

Hermione, thankfully, doesn't dignify that with the real answer. "Too long," she says instead, following Remus's direction to sit, prim as ever, on his ratty couch. "Fortunately, however, that's at an end."

Smiling, Remus, pointing himself at the kitchen, inquires if she still takes raspberry tea. "Oh, that would be absolutely divine," Hermione says, as he had known she would. "Do you know, they can never get the right flavor at any tea house I've come across?"

"I'm not surprised," Remus calls as he taps the tea kettle. "The tea houses are only interested in their own special blend, and good luck getting any tea, weak or otherwise, at a pub."

"Exactly right," Hermione tuts. "Honestly, pubs are an absolute nightmare, and not just because they don't have any proper tea! Who wants fish and chips without tea, I ask you?"

"Philistines," Remus says with a tut of his own, turning his nose up in the air.

"Philistines, indeed!" Hermione throws up her hands.

They grin at each other. "Merlin, but I have missed you, Hermione," Remus says wholeheartedly. "It hasn't been the same without you."

"That's my line, Remus Lupin," Hermione chastises.

Remus turns back to the tea kettle before his silly grin can give him away, not that she hasn't seen it on him before, the one that makes him look like a pathetic tosser, Sirius has told him often enough. He can't help it, though, Hermione is here, in his house, sitting there like no time has passed. Like Remus wasn't a brainless idiot and burnt the bridges between him and two of the best people he's been fortunate to have in his life.

The thought dampens the thrum in his veins. Why is Hermione here? To put it rather baldly, Remus had been a right berk to her at their last moment, to the point where she'd hexed him with Tentacle Ears and stomped out of his then-apartment, shouting that if she ever saw him again, she'd curse his balls off and made sure it stuck!

Wincing at the memory, from the imagined physical pain as well as the hurt lodged deep in his heart, Remus wonders if he should ask, or if he should shut up and stop looking the gift hippogriff in the mouth. Or the beak, rather.

The kettle screams before he can find the answer; he busies himself getting all the trappings together, two tea cups, the tea bags, the biscuits, and the tray. By the time he returns to the table, he's almost got himself together, but then he makes the mistake of looking up.

Hermione is one of those people with a stare that could pierce right through you, read all your secrets without your needing to say a word. Remus breathes in sharply under that stare, but Hermione looks down at the tea settings as soon as he notices.

"Oooh, you've got the chocolate biscuits, too!" she exclaims happily. "Thought they'd gone when Gibbons' Bakery closed down."

"They were," Remus admits. "When I heard, I ordered as many as I could and tinned them with a long-term stasis spell."

"You didn't!" Hermione looks scandalized. Then she takes a bite of the biscuit. "Oh, you've got to let me take some of these home," she says dreamily. "These are just as good as I remember them."

"I'll even give you the spell I used," Remus promises. "The only reason the biscuits have lasted this long is because this is the first time I've opened the tin in years."

At that, Hermione looks him over again. Remus closes his eyes and tightens his fists in his lap. To his surprise, he shortly thereafter feels a hand on top of his, and Hermione's sympathetic smile when he dares to open his eyes.

"We've all had a rough time of it, Remus," she says gently. "You're not the only one with scars from then."

Remus swallows. "Does that mean...Harry...?"

"What?" Hermione appears confused.

"You said 'we've all'," Remus points out. "Naturally, I assumed..."

"Oh!" Hermione looks like she would dearly love to smack herself in the forehead. Remus is well familiar with that look on her. "No, no, everyone's all right. Well, I don't know for sure, actually, but I was told Harry's all right, so."

He frowns. "What do you mean, you 'don't know for sure'? Haven't you...?"

Hermione is biting her lip. "Well, you see," she says, averting her eyes, "we haven't. Been talking. Or anything else. After you retired—"

"I quit, Hermione," Remus says, not unkindly. "You needn't beat round about the bush."

Her smile is strained. "After you quit, then. Well, to put it succinctly: Croaker went mad. He called everybody up who was working on the mission and told us we were all fired."

"Fired?!" Remus exclaims.

"Yes," Hermione says, exhausted. She rubs at her eyes. "He made us all sign contracts like a non-disclosure agreement, but also an agreement not to interact with anybody from the mission ever, on pain of serious harm to us and our magic. Harry was the angriest about it, they had to 'sequester' him for a few days before he would sign."

"'Sequestered'? For 'a few days'?" Remus feels like he's been knocked on his arse by a hundred-stone troll. "What - how - ?"

"He had us all sewn up before we knew it," Hermione says sadly. "He knew everything about us, and he used it against us to get us to do what he wanted. What he wanted, evidently, was to shut down 'needle and thread'."

"But we hadn't found the last Horcrux yet!" Remus says, aghast.

"No," Hermione says heavily, "we hadn't."

Remus sits there in shock. "All this time, the last Horcrux has been lying around, waiting for someone to pick it up and fall under its spell?"

"It was, but not anymore," Hermione interjects. "The Potter boy destroyed it a few months ago."

"Harry did? James's son, Harry?" Remus queries incredulously.

"Yes, in the Chamber of Secrets," she says impatiently at him, as if he should know about this already. "Unfortunately, that's not the last one. That arsehole made one more before he was, err, temporarily vanquished."

Remus feels like he's about to be sick. "I think I'm going to be sick," he dutifully tells her.

"If you are, sick up in there," Hermione conjures a bin, decorated all over with flowers. Remus bends over it, but after several unsteady seconds, he realizes nothing's going to come up. The nauseated feeling doesn't go away, though, when he sits up, so he keeps the bin nearby. Just in case.

"Thanks," he says, indicating the bin.

"You're welcome," Hermione says distractedly. "Look, I'm just going to come straight out and say it. The reason I'm here is because the Department has had a change of leadership. I've been hired back on, and a lot has changed. I'm not saying they're any more werewolf-friendly than they were before," before Remus can interject, "but there is this: needle and thread is restarting. I want you there, working on it, with me."