Tense and Tender Meetings


The opening of the gate by Harry's magic-infused shout broke the 
stalemate Fudge had been maintaining, as the delegations could no 
longer be kept out.

When Fudge realized that they were on their way to the castle, he 
panicked. Even for him it was obvious that the shout that had echoed 
over the grounds was focused at the gate and therefore could not be 
attributed to anyone in the Great Hall, and that this instantly 
annihilated his hopes of getting the new power on his side by fair 
means. Potter was the only missing student, and Umbridge had been just
flat wrong about the breeding foundation issue.

He had not given up, however. He knew what the Prophet had reported 
about the boy's lovelife. The moment he made it through the doors of 
Hogwarts, he shouted, "Quickly, place Potter's muggleborn, that 
Granger girl, in 'protective detention!' He won't dare to act against 
the Ministry if we have her!"

Croaker groaned. Unfortunately, he could not unilaterally unseat the 
Minister, and even if he could, it was probably too late already. A 
Supreme Power had arisen on the British Isles, and the fallout could 
have lifted the British Ministry to a preeminent and virtually 
unassailable position. Instead, with Fudge at the helm, the Ship of 
State was, he feared, about to founder against an immovable spire.

---

Harry had eyes and ears all over Hogwarts now, and as soon as the 
order was given to detain Hemione, he acted. Hermione and Luna had 
only a mere instant's warning to stand up, before the ground beneath 
them liquefied and they vanished into the floor with a quiet splash. 
Hermione had some idea where they might be going, as they quickly 
ended up in a long tube, a pipe, down which they swiftly sped, yet 
though Luna should have been less prepared, she was squealing with 
delight and glee.

Hermione wondered, as she felt her stomach rising within her, whether 
the Wizarding world had water parks or playgrounds, and whether this 
was or was not Luna's first exposure to such.

"Oh, my stomach feels all full of Whirling Dervishes," Luna announced 
when they were set gently down in the darkness. It sounded to Hermione 
as though the younger girl were stumbling about, and she put up her 
open hands to catch her if the apparently dizzy but delighted girl 
were to bump into her. She had no idea if Luna was referring to the 
whirling dervishes she knew of, people that wore colorful flowing robes 
and spun in place in a religious devotion, or some fantastical 
creature like her nargles that merely happened to share the name, but 
either way she could empathise with the sentiment. 

Her stomach was also aflutter, though in her case she was certain it 
was at least as much due to her memories of her experience the last 
time Harry had all but abducted her.

That it was Harry's doing she had not the slightest doubt, as it had 
been the little Harry-doll figure that had warned her to stand. The 
previous time she had not seemingly been physically present, as far 
as she could tell afterwards. This time, she and Luna both were, and 
she was simultaneously excited and fearful. The Ministry was pretty 
clearly out to get Harry again, but her concern for the consequences 
to her best friend were taking a back seat for the moment to her 
worries for her and Luna. She did not know about the order regarding 
her, but she knew well enough that whether or not she would have been 
a target before, she and Luna surely would be now, after vanishing 
from the Great Hall in front of everyone like that. 

She lifted her wand and softly cast, "Lumos," producing a soft glow 
from her wand, which nevertheless seemed startlingly bright in the 
dense gloom. They were indeed in an underground chamber, a tunnel 
hewn through solid stone, where several pipes met above them. She 
wrinkled her nose at the sight and smell of the water they had landed 
in, only deep enough to wet their shoes, but who knew when more would 
come flowing down.

"Come on, Luna, let's get out of this muck, and under some cover," 
she said, tugging the younger girl away from the center of the 
confluence.

Even as they moved away, a nervous and very obviously female version 
of Harry stepped diffidently into view. Unlike the concealing Hogwarts
robes that Luna and Hermione wore, Harry was dressed in simple, well
fitted Muggle clothing that left no doubt about his gender, or his
considerable feminine appeal. This was far from the confident, take
charge Harry that Hermione had experienced, but even so, Hermione felt
her pulse quicken and her breathing deepen as her mind replayed those
events, which had occurred not very far from this spot, if her guess
was correct.

Hermione had expected to feel cross. Her last encounter with the 
infuriating boy had ventured well beyond anything she had expected to 
ever experience, and now he had kidnapped her in front of the whole 
school, and she was fairly certain by now that this entire mess was 
his fault. He had attempted the animagus transformation without 
supervision, in spite of being warned against it. She was not at all 
sure how the weird school wide testing was connected to his absence, 
considering that all it ought to have taken was a simple headcount to 
identify the missing student, if that was their concern, but she was 
pretty confident it was Harry's fault somehow.

When she saw him . . . er, her, all thought fled her mind and she had 
crossed the distance between them in an instant. Her eyes registered 
the shift in Harry's expression, from a sort of naughty puppy look of 
a dog that had made a mess and been caught with it, to a panicked 
look and an attempt at evasion, but only after she had caught the 
smaller girl up in an enveloping hug.

When she was once more able to focus on what was happening, she found
Harry had clutched on to her just as tightly, pressing into her and 
breathing hard, her breath hitching every now and again as though she
were fighting off tears. Another weight to her side turned out to be 
Luna, who had blithely joined in the hug. Hermione was tempted to slap
Harry anyway, out of sheer principle, but held back. He was obviously 
emotionally fragile at the moment, considering he was apparently 
quite literally falling apart. She pulled back and glanced down at her
pocket to confirm that all that had happened was not merely her 
imagination working overtime. 

The tiny blue-skinned Harry was still there, hanging on the edge of
the pocket gasping for breath from where she had been crushed between
them.

A rather more solid voice sounded beyond them, "Well, welcome,
Hermione. I see I'm not the only one to have been so summarily taken.
And, Luna, was it?"

"Professor?!" Hermione squealed in shock. Remus Lupin stepped into
view, trailed by two more rather diffident girls, also well-dressed in
close fitting Muggle attire. "Oh, no!" She stared in horror at what
was clearly a werewolf-cursed Harry. For a moment, she was tempted to
grab Luna and run from this madness. Werewolves, no matter how much
she might hate the discriminatory laws the Ministry had against them,
were genuinely dangerous, and their instincts would be to attack any
humans they encountered.

Her logical mind swiftly overrode that concern, as it was clear that
nothing in the were-Harry's behavior indicated that they were in any
danger of anything other than puppy-dog eyes. Her gaze moved to the
other Harry, the one with red skin, wings, black horns, and a pointed
tail. "Succubus," she breathed, now utterly certain what Harry had
become. There was nothing yet to explain his splintered state, but
there could be no denying that this was a succubi version of her best
friend. She felt her nipples tightening, her heart speeding up, and
she ruthlessly suppressed herself, pressing her magic down and
fighting against her response.

Luna felt no such concern, and had happily run across the room to hug
the Professor, and then the two Harry's, one after the other. It was
only then that Hermione noticed the tiny Luna that had managed to dive
onto Luna's robes when Harry grabbed her, and just finished climbing
back to her shoulder.

She glared at Harry, well, at the Harry closest to her, the human, but
clearly female Harry. "What in Merlin's name is going on, Harry?"

"Yes, quite," Remus said. "What on earth has been going on?"

All the Harry's looked down, abashed and ashamed. "I'm sorry, to all
of you. I just keep making things worse." He gestured and two large
couches appeared facing each other. As he morosely slumped into one,
and the other two Harry's headed that way, it was immediately obvious
to the other three that he intended one couch for the Harry's, and one
for the others, and none of them were going to stand for that.
Hermione plopped down right next to the human Harry, while Remus and
Luna dragged the other two down to the other couch with them.

He looked up finally at Remus, staring with huge, sad, tear-filled
eyes at the last of the Marauders. "I . . . I wanted Sirius to be
proud of me. I wanted to be able to keep you company. I thought . . .
Professor McGonagall said I couldn't do it, because I could not see
enough of my form, but I was sure! I mean, if Pettigrew could do it, I
had to be able to!"

"You attempted an Animagus transformation without anyone to watch
you," Remus said in understanding rather than approbrium. Harry
nodded, sniffling and rubbing his nose.

The succubus Harry, who had somehow ended up on the couch with Luna on
her lap, and looked a bit shell-shocked, finally spoke up next. "We
turned into this, and . . . and after how everyone reacted to my being
able to speak Parseltongue, well . . ."

Hermione gulped, remembering Ron's initial reaction to that, and her
own. "You thought we would turn on you." She stared at the succubus,
wishing jealously that she felt confident enough to sit in her Harry's
lap the way Luna was.

He shrugged, looking down at Luna's blond hair where she was leaning
her head against his chest, listening to his heartbeat. 

"I was afraid of it, but even if you didn't, Hermione, how would Ron
react to me becoming a girl? Or a demon? But mostly, I was afraid of
what the Order would do. An animagus form . . ." He trailed off, and
the human Harry picked it up again.

"An animagus form is like a Patronus, it reflects what is in you.
Parseltongue Dumbledore could pass off as coming from Voldemort, but
this! Apparently, I really am Dark." He looked down sadly.

"I don't think . . ."

"Excuse us." Remus Lupin's protest was cut off by a new voice, smoky
and sensual, and they all turned to see two more succubi. There could
be no doubting their nature. Garbed in halter tops that made it clear
there were no bras worn beneath, and loincloths worn with belts, that
draped between their legs nearly to the floor, they were visions of
sex and lust, and Remus was far less conflicted about his body's
response to them than he had been about his involuntary response to
his little Harry-ettes, though the resemblance one bore to Lily Potter
was a little off-putting. Not that she was at all unattractive, mind.
He had experienced the same attraction to Lily as most of the wizards
at Hogwarts during her later years there. Once she belonged to James,
though, that attraction had been stronly suppressed.

"Oh, look Idra, there's no question, she's definitely my Lily's
spawn!" The taller of the two, red-skinned and copper-haired, with a
dark, forked tongue and long, curling horns, ignored the sudden
tenseness and defensive stance all the Harry's took in front of their
chosen mortals. She was staring at the succubus Harry with an odd mix
of hunger and affection, and the other Harry's looked at each other.

Lupin's sharp eyes caught movement behind the two succubi, as more
Harry's slipped silently into the room. Amongst them he noticed a new
form, like unto an Indian Naga, half beautiful feminine human-like
Harry, half massive snake, like a large constrictor, all green scales,
with closed eyes. 

"Such power," the other said. "Mahaila, how can it be your sprog? Feel
how old they are. Far older than us." She shivered, and stepped closer
to her companion. She was far less sanguine about her situation than
Mahaila, who once she recognized Lily in the child, had cast her fear
aside.

Mahaila just laughed, and dropping to one knee, threw her arms wide.
"Come give your granny a hug, darling," she said.

"Granny?" Harry asked from behind her. "What do you mean by that?"

Idra squawked and spun about, and seeing them surrounded, looked up as
if looking for a means of escape, and squeaked at the site of a Harry
poking the top half of his body down through the ceiling.

Mahaila looked back at the Harry that had spoken, and for the first
time, appeared to actually notice the other Harry's, especially the
two additional succubus-form Harry's. "What . . . by Odin's hairy
bodkins, sprog, what've you done to yourself? These . . . these are
all you!?"

Idra, who had skin of a pinker shade, a sort of cotton candy shade
that looked delectable, and horns more like those of a sheep,
triangular in cross-section, ribbed, and curving towards a coiled
shape, was turning slowly, her hands held up defensively, clearly
unnerved at being surrounded. Mahaila, on the other hand, seemed more
worried about what had happened to Harry than fearful.

"Oh, never mind, darling, it doesn't matter," she said, reaching out
and grabbing the Harry that had crept up behind her and thus come
within range, and dragging him into a cuddly hug, ignoring the way all
the other Harry's tensed up, and the way the magic swelled and swirled
in the room like a living thing. "Granny's here for you now. You
weren't supposed to wake us up yet, you know."

She rubbed Harry's nose with her own, as if he was a small child,
paying no attention to the attempted interjections of Remus and
Hermione. Luna was almost the only one not trying to say anything, as
she was satisfied to cuddle the Harry she was holding. Even Idra was
talking nervously, trying to get Mahaila to pay attention to the
danger they appeared to be in.

"No, no you weren't, not for a hundred years or more, but just look at
you, all overflowing with power and age, why, you feel like a
millenial already!"

Harry was, if anything, even more vulnerable to gentle, tender
affection than he was to sexual attention, but he also had a dozen
minds in the room that were not so clouded as the two being cuddled.
He had no objection to Luna's gentle cuddling, but being treated like
a baby by someone he had never met, that was obviously Dark, and had
apparently something to do with why he was trapped as a female, was
too much to be borne.

The girl in Mahaila's hands dissolved into tiny sprites that fled in
all directions, hiding on the other Harry's, and diving into
Hermione's hair, Lupin's pockets, and landing on Luna's shoulders.

"Oh, my, did you see that, Idra? She's learned so much!"

"HE!" More than a dozen voices spoke in concert, as Hermione had
reached her limit as well, and joined the chorus of Harry's in their
protest.

"What?"

"I'm a guy," insisted one of the Harry's firmly. Mahaila nodded
thoughtfully, not seeming to be put off by this claim coming from a
visibly feminine form.

"Oh, Lily had a son? I see, but then why? Surely because you can't,
yet why would that be so? Oho! Of course, Lily must have put a spell
on you to protect your friends when you first embraced your
Inhumanity. Your instincts in male form might have been quite
disastrous. I expect once you've learned to manage your instincts in
this form, you'll find your male form comes readily enough."

"You can change genders?" Hermione was surprised to hear that, given
that all of the Harry's she had thus far encountered had been
unequivocally female, and she realized that she found the thought of
experiencing the attention of so many Harry's at once while half or
more were male was enticing and the mere idea of it had set her heart
to racing.

"Normally," Idra said. "But we've been trapped here for ages, without
being able to feed. I'm not sure I could muster the mana to change my
nail color right now."

"Oh, stop whining." Mahaila was focused on the nearest Harry. "At
least neither of us are sealed. Harry, even if you can't take a male
form right now, you will be able to again one day."

Harry huffed. "In other words, what you are really saying, is, Harry,
you're a freak, abnormal in yet another way. You'll never manage to
change back from your animagus form, but it's okay, you'll be able to
fake it."

"Oh, is your name Harry, too? Animagus, hmm?" Mahaila glanced at Idra.
"Well, I guess that might explain how you managed to unleash your
Inhuman side early, but Harry, darling, this is who you are. You are
one of us, and you always have been, just like your mother, my
daughter Lily."

Idra glanced nervously back at her, then resumed warily watching the
encircling Harry's. 

"You think that makes it better?!" Harry practically screamed, while
Hermione crushed her Harry's hand in her grip, desperately trying to
ensure that he did not fear she was going to abandon him. "It's not
enough that I'm a freak in the Muggle world, I have to be a freak in
the Wizarding world too? How is that a good thing? I'm a Dark
Creature?!"

Mahaila looked at him, puzzling over his words. "But Harry, that is
what wizards and witches are; the offspring of Inhumans and Humans."

"Like Merlin," Hermione asked, leaning forward, still clutching
tightly to Harry's hand. "He was supposed to be the child of a Demon
and a human woman."

"Yes, exactly," Mahaila smiled, leaning back. "Oh, to be sure, most of
the rabble I can sense above us have diluted their blood to the point
their Inhuman side is far too small to ever manifest, but . . ."

Hermione broke in. "What about Muggleborns? Does that . . ." She
faltered for a moment, looking vaguely ill. "Does that mean my dad,
isn't . . ."

"Isn't your father? Probably not, dearie," Idra said, brightening up
as she had something encouraging to offer the human girl that seemed
to be important to the ancient being that had her surrounded, "if two
different dormant Inhuman lines cross, it can come back in force. But
generally, even direct Inhuman lineage involves three partners, not
two. It is easier that way."

"Because you don't have human DNA?" Hermione asked, relieved at the
revelation that her parents might still be her parents.

"Dunno what that might be," Idra shrugged, "but it takes a lot of
magic and power to spark a child without two mortals. Some have been
known to do it, but it takes skill and power that most haven't got,
much easier just to join with one of the mortals and contribute to a
joining."

"Is that what you did?" Harry asked, staring hard-eyed at Mahaila. He
was torn between hating her for making the accusations of "Freak!" he
had heard all his life true, hating her for having taken advantage of
his parents? Grandparents? What did she even mean by Granny? She had
called Lily her daughter. Did that mean Petunia was not really his
Aunt? And accepting the love of a family that he had wanted just as
long.

Mahaila smiled broadly. "Oh, I did it all! I had a wonderful time with
Harry and Rose. I met them after their had their first girl already,
and I knew right away we could have something wonderful."

Harry grimaced, wrapping his arms around himself tightly, stubbornly
ignoring the pressure it put on his breasts. Did he really want to
hear this?

"I'm sorry it couldn't have lasted longer, but when they passed, and
then Lily got pregnant and was constantly being scanned by healers, I
eventually had to return to hibernation. Without a ready source of
food, I could not stay active, and, well, it was and still is not safe
to hunt for new sources. I would have never become active had Rose not
found me and awoken me."

Idra was shivering and looking around wild-eyed, as the circle of
Harry's had tightened substantially, drawn in by the intense desire to
learn more about his family.

Hermione interrupted the family history lesson. "Source of food. What
is it, exactly, you consume?"

Mahaila smiled at the girl. "As if it weren't obvious from looking at
us?" She drew her legs closer together where she was kneeling, and
settling back so her bottom was resting on her heels, struck a Betty
Paige style pinup pose. "We feed on lust, the lust of mortals, or
their lifeforce in great need. Other emotions will do in a pinch, but
lust is the easiest to arouse without causing emotional harm."

"I don't feel drawn to you like I did to . . ." Hermione stopped,
blushing.

"Like you did to my little Harry? We are suppressing our allure, to
keep from being noticed by HIM."

The curious emphasis she put on the final word was not missed by
Hermione, but Harry spoke up again before she could question her
further. "You fed on my grandmother."

His voice was flat and hard, and Mahaila shook her head. "Not like you
are thinking, to be speaking so grimly, darling. They were as willing
participants as I, and took no harm from it."

"But if you could feed on human lust, how can you possibly have needed
to hibernate!?" Hermione was confused, aroused, and irritated, a
dangerous combination. "There are no end of copulations going on all
the time."

Mahaila sighed. "That which is not freely given must be forcibly
taken, and that is not without its harms. It is far better, Harry,
that you never take without willing cooperation. There are those who
hunt us, here in this world, and if you are harming others without
cause, they would be right in doing so."

"So, you don't," Remus Lupin asked, leaning forward. His arm had at
some point been dragged around the shoulders of the lupine Harry that
was now leaning hard into his side, snuggled under his arm. "Feed on
the unwilling, that is?"

"No, definitely not," Idra said quickly, "HE knows what to look for,
and HE knows he does not have us all."

Now Hermione was definitely not going to let this pass a second time.
"Who is he? You are putting a special emphasis there."

"The demon lord that conquered our home plane, and bound and sealed
most of our family. We cannot speak his name, else his attention would
be drawn to us and we would be taken."

"Oh, that's just great," Harry groused. "Another damn Voldemort to
deal with. Is there another prophecy to go with it?"

"None that I know of," Mahaila assured him. "And he does not know of
you, and you do not know his name. He will not perceive you, and even
if he did, you are not a former member of the kingdom he conquered, he
would have no power over you."

"You . . . you aren't planning on having me fight him?" Harry asked,
feeling suddenly off-balance, as the expected storyline failed to
materialize.

"Fight HIM? Oh, no, Harry, you mustn't think of it! I don't want to
lose you too, not after I just found you."

Idra spoke up then. "I, err, we were hoping, once we found out that
Mahaila had managed to have a daughter, that one of her get might in
time grow strong enough to awaken us, to sustain us so that we could
one day have a new home."

"Sustain you?" Hermione asked suspiciously.

"A demi-Inhuman can sustain themselves from mortal food," Idra pointed
out, "as Harry here has lived most of his life. As her descendants
grew in number, there might have come a time when there were enough of
them that they could pair with those of us who remain on this side,
free of HIM, and allow us to remain awake and active. Then we could
begin building a new home. We . . . we weren't expecting him to have
the power to awaken us for another hundred years though."

"Right," Mahaila said, her eyes narrowing. "Something happened to you,
Darling, and the shock of it awakened the both of us, and you feel
over a thousand years old instead of a mere handful, and you are all
over the place. What happened?"

Harry glanced nervously at Remus. "Ehrm, eh, before I answer that, how
do you feel about other Dark creatures?"

"I'm sorry, Harry-darling, I don't know what you mean by Dark
creatures."

"Like, werewolves, and vampires, and such."

She shrugged. "Werewolves are just mortals with a moon-curse, right?
I'm not sure what you mean by how I feel about them, but if you are
worried, don't be. You cannot catch that curse. And no vampire would
be likely to see you as a food source."

Harry glanced at Remus again, and Remus nodded slightly. "Well, uh, I
was fighting with a werewolf's curse, and leaning up against the body
of a basilisk I killed when I was twelve, and I really needed some way
to fight it without hurting Remus, and, well, I somehow absorbed the
basilisk."

Remus started, and stared for a moment at the green skinned Naga-like
Harry, then quickly averted his eyes. No wonder that one had her eyes
closed.

"So that was that wave of magic that swept through the school,"
Hermione shouted, jumping to her feet, staring down at her Harry. "You
absorbed a thousand-year-old basilisk while fighting a werewolf's
curse?!"

"Uhm . . . yeah, and I think I ate the curse, too."

The furry Harry under Lupin's arm waved a hand, as Hermione spun to
face her.

"You ate his werewolf curse?" Hermione shrieked in disbelief and
panic. Lupin was staring down at his Harry with a look of shock, while
Luna merely looked mildly interesting, her hand carding through her
Harry's hair, while a row of little pixie-Harry's, and one tiny Luna,
sat swinging their legs on her shoulders.

---

Visiting Scotland had not been on Freja's bucket list. She and her
brother, Frej, named for the like-named twins of the Vanir, had heard
of Hogwarts, of course, and likewise of Durmstrang and Beauxbatons,
the three largest schools of magic in the wizarding world, but they
had not harbored any particular desire to see it. Their training was
traditional, an apprenticeship in the old style, from before the days
of universities and schools, and they had not felt any particular
desire for a different way.

To be sure, if you got a bad Master, an apprenticeship could be a
burden, but Sigurd and Vilhelmina were excellent teachers, and under
their instruction, she had learned much more than merely wand-magic. 

Still, it was in Scandinavia that one of the thirteen branches of
Wæccan be Myrddin, the Watchers of Merlin, had settled, and Sigurd was
the latest in a long line who had guarded and watched one of the
stones, ancient precursors of the legends that inspired crystal balls,
prophecy spheres, and similar devices in the long ages since.

So when her Master and Mistress made ready to travel as swiftly as
could be managed to Scotland, she and her brother had joined them. Now
they were temporarily encamped outside of Hogwart's outer walls, and
Freja watched as her teachers debated what should be done, and who
could be trusted.

The original division, she understood, had come about at least
partially because the very Foretelling that said that one would return
with power greater even than Merlin's own had also said that this
power would be so great that to resist would ruin a nation, and yet
that in spite of that very prediction, one who knew those words would
prove them true and bring about a ruler's fall. Over the years, as
various nations learned of this, through spying and inter-marriages
and other means, they each sought to avoid being the one, and so
banished the knowledge to an independent organization, trying to avoid
being the ones whose downfall was thus named. In some cases, the
independent organization had moved into a country of its own accord.
National borders were so fluid over most of history in Africa and
Europe that the organizations there were almost certainly no longer
associated with their country of origin.

She assumed that the other parties present were members of similar
organizations in their own countries. She did not know who had the
original stone, or how the copies were made, but she had heard that at
some point the method had been lost, or perhaps had ceased to work,
and she knew that the island of Japan, who had the very last stone,
was looked on with suspicion. After all, they had the thirteenth
stone, and in the West that oft had an ill luck associated with it.

Her teachers had not bought in to this theory, pointing out that even
if it was one of the thirteen that would fail, and not merely, as the
Foretelling actually said, one that knew the words, that it was folly
to assume that the order had any bearing on the fulfillment of the
prophecy. She knew that to the Japanese, four held more dire
significance, though thirteen was also sometimes seen as unlucky, and
guessed the Chinese might feel similarly.

She found nothing quite so tiresome as the politicking of the old,
though, and as several of the other groups had also brought young
people along, she ignored the shouted discussions in favor of crossing
the no-man's land between them and talking to the group from Japan,
who were closest. The thunderous voice that had warned against harming
what was its own, when the ground had swallowed up the werewolf, had
sent shivers through her, and she would never be able to shake them
off while listening to her elders debate them endlessly.

Like many Europeans, she was multi-lingual, but Japanese was not one
of the languages she knew, so she attempted English, guessing that as
they were coming to Scotland, they might have chosen delegates that
spoke the language, and she assumed they would have been more likely
to find English speakers than Japanese that had learned Gaelic.

"Hi, my name is Freja," she said brightly, dipping into a bow and
rising again, "What are your names? Oh, and this is Frej, my twin
brother," she added, feeling her brother step up behind her and set a
hand on her shoulder.