Ranko sighed with relief as she slid from the open portal into the dark alley. She had begun to think she'd never manage to actually use the Wayfinder the way it was intended. Of course, there was still reason for concern, for she had been warned that when used without interference, the Wayfinder was likely to bring her to the sort of high action destiny-ridden places that would most quickly recharge and align it, just as its first transition had dropped her in a heap of trouble by putting her where she could come into accidental contact with that ring.

Still, having not heard from Tofu since the whole incident with the cat's escape, she had no intention of hiding away from magic or excitement. She'd had more than enough of that when she had stuck by that hobbit learning their tongue. Boredom was not something she took lightly.

A loud bang in the distance attracted her attention and she looked up from the enshrouding darkness. She did not see the source of the sound, but she did spy a massive black dog slinking furtively into the alleyway. More to the point, she saw the aura of magic hanging about the dog. For just a moment she tensed for a leap away through the shadows. The dog's passage through a pool of light cast by a flickering bulb hanging unshielded from a doorway highlighted the dog's ribs. In the light he seemed a pitiful thing, more than half-starved, his coat matted and tangled.

Ranko felt a sudden surge of kinship with the beast. She knew what it was to go without food, to live hand-to-mouth, though that had not been a real concern for her for centuries now, ever since her death.

"Besides," she thought, "he's got some kind of magic on him and there's got to be some kind of story behind it."

She waited until the dog had trotted past her, not seeing her as she was concealed within the shadows, her element, then she slipped out behind him. A moment's focus sent a tendril of her substance lashing out and between one step and the next she had a collar around his throat.

He turned instantly, with an angry growl, and to her surprise, instead of pulling away or threatening her, he leapt instantly to the attack. She caught him easily, not bothering to avoid the jaws that clamped about her throat, and bearing him in her arms, stepped backwards into the darkness.

A quick scan of the shadows and she stepped out in a dense forest, amidst the strongest concentration of shadows she could feel. The dog did not seem to notice their change of location, his focus intent on suffocating her. His attention was readily caught, however, when she melted away from his jaws, shifting a portion of the black stone of the tower of Orthanc into the current plane, allowing it, as was its wont, to form a dwelling, though she held the size down. The trees about them vanished into shadow, then a floor formed beneath them and walls rose up about them.

The dog whined in confusion and fear but immediately returned to the attack when she reappeared kneeling by him, reforming her substance and rising from the floor. She was somewhat startled when he grabbed the leash with his teeth and sought to jerk it from her arm, but she knew he would have no luck. Even as the dog seemed to recognize this and turned to gnawing on her arm instead in an effort to loosen her grip, she formed a stiff bristled brush and began to work on a tuft of his fur.

After several more futile attempts at escape, the beast settled down and resigned itself to her ministrations. It perked up considerably when she summoned a rabbit captured by her roving feline essence. It intrigued her somewhat that the cat did not seem concerned by the dog's presence and it's willingness to hunt for the dog made Galadriel's words to her about the cat's relationship to herself seem more credible than ever.

The dog's growl when she pulled too hard on a particularly bad snarl centered on a short bit of thorny vine triggered a sudden memory from her distant childhood. A soft smile graced her small mouth as she mentally thumbed her nose at her father. So what if a stray dog might have rabies? It wasn't like he could give them to her now.

"You know," she said softly, "I never had a pet before. I wanted one, a few times. I think... I might even have liked cats, before... and after I ended up in Nerima, I remember thinking a few times that a pet, at least, was the sort of friend who wouldn't try to kill you the next time he met you, like all my other friends seem too." She blithely ignored the fact that the dog had in fact tried to do just that. After all, it could not succeed so she had no reason to hold it against him.

Finally unsnarling the recalcitrant vine, she set it beside a growing pile of small objects. "Boy, your fur's a real mess, ya know?" she commented. She brushed her fingers through the silky smooth and surprisingly long fur that she had just brushed before moving on to the next tangle.

A strange rasping sensation caught her attention, and turning to look at the source, she saw that the dog had finished the rabbit and was lapping at the blood on the floor. A shudder ran through her. The floor in front of his muzzle suddenly rippled and flowed, carrying the carcass and blood away, vanishing through the wall as if it were nothing more than a curtain of water. He whined softly and Ranko stroked his fur. "Sorry, that was just a bit too weird, even for me." She wasn't actually commenting about the blood but about the rasping effect of his tongue against her skin, for the house was still a part of her, and she could feel through it.

In front of him the floor rippled again and a bowl formed. Reaching over him she held her hand, pointing at the bowl, and from her finger a slow stream of water poured forth, filling the bowl. The dog wasted no time in slaking his thirst and she laughed lightly as she returned to brushing his fur.

She brushed him for hours before his coat was finally free of tangles and foreign objects. Finally she rose and stretched. "You should get some rest," she teased the beast. "I know you're probably still hungry, you're so thin, but I've been told that it's not safe for starving people to eat too much too quickly. I'll give you some more when you wake back up."

She gathered the dog into her arms, hardly seeming to notice the burden in spite of the dog being larger than she was. A yielding cushion of layers upon layers of shadowy black cloth rose from the black stone floor and she lay him upon it then slipped out the door, closing it behind herself.

"Mustn't get out of practice," she said aloud, suppressing a chuckle at the thought, for it brought up warning images of her father's bulk. "Heh, though even if I did I'd never lose my shape. Suck on that, old man!"

---

The dog waited for what seemed an interminable period before deciding that the silver-haired witch was indeed gone. Rising and padding from the bed, he paced to the window and looked out. His tongue rolled from his mouth and his eyes widened as he beheld the witch dancing. The moon was high enough in the sky for its slanting beams to reach the ground beneath the trees and her black skin seemed caressed by the silver moonbeams, while her hair fairly glowed in its light.

She had abandoned clothing, preferring to practice her art unencumbered, and he was spellbound by her lithe form as she danced and spun in the moonlight. It was several minutes before he realized that she was not actually dancing, or rather, not merely dancing. She was in fact engaged in some form of shadow-boxing, as best he could tell. It seemed a strange thought, that so powerful a witch would be a fighter of a physical sort, but looking on the movement of her powerful muscles as she punched and kicked, falling through the air from leaps beyond the ability of anyone he had ever seen, it was impossible not to believe.

Finally he tore himself from the window. He had to escape before she realized who he was. He clawed at the collar but could get no hold upon it. She was a witch, of that there could be no question, given the ease with which she had commanded the magic of this wondrous house and so he had little doubt that this collar was magic as well. He had to get rid of it or she would probably be able to track him easily or even draw him back to her.

It was no use. He could not win free of it as he was. He gave the window a quick glance to be sure she was dancing still then his form altered rapidly, his newly untangled locks receding as his limbs reshaped, his face flattening. He felt a moment's guilt as he did so, for she had treated him kindly, and fed him, but that guilt was as a drop of water before the ocean of guilt that drove him to escape from Azkaban, the wizarding prison where he had been held for so many long years. There had been no happy thoughts in his time there, no food for the Dementors, the dark soul-eating guards of Azkaban, not until a newspaper article found its way to his hands, an article that told him his best friends' son lived, yet told him also that the villainous traitor who had betrayed his friends to their death had insinuated himself into the family of one of the boy's closest friends.

Guilt at stealing what from her behavior he guessed to be a young, beautiful witch's first pet fled almost before it formed. He rose quickly, grasping the collar with both hands but he could find no clasp. Fumbling in his robes, he drew out his stolen wand. He would have to flee quickly, for the instant he used it, the Ministry would be upon him, though he did not think they yet knew that he was the one who had stolen it, but the collar was obviously magical and it would take magic to remove it.

The rich voice of his captor sounded from behind him and he spun in alarm, his wand moving to begin a spell. It was snatched from his hand before he got a single word out and he stared at her in amazement. He flinched as she raised her hand and felt his hair. "Not wet," she murmured, to his surprise, then her eyes refocused on his face. "Jusenkyou?" she queried, and he shook his head at the unfamiliar word.

She spoke again, several times, in what sounded like different languages, though he knew none of them.

"Are those places? People? I don't understand." he countered, bewildered.

Casting a look of frustration at him she stalked away, clothes swirling into being about her, seeming to rise from her very flesh, concealing once more her undeniably womanly form. A chair of the same black stone as the house rose up near the wall she was walking towards and she sat in it and turned to look at him. He was still speechless, wondering why she had not already summoned the Aurors. He had failed to escape, she had had his wand before he had even realized it and he was still bound by her collar.

A chair rose up behind him suddenly and the floor tilted, tipping him back until he collapsed into it. He felt the collar shift suddenly then slither away, as if it was a snake. "Sorry 'bout that," she said, looking suddenly embarrassed, "I thought you were just a stray."

She looked him over then and he felt sudden shame. He knew he must look a sight, in his tattered robes, with his gaunt features and long hair, though at least it was no longer matted and tangled. He could not keep his eyes from examining her form in return, his guilt receding momentarily before his wonder and puzzlement as moonlight glinted behind her, highlighting her silvery hair and blacker than black skin.

"You look strong," she commented, "even if you are thin, so why have you had to go hungry?" She leaned forward, seeing his glance at the door. "No, no, no need to think about running." She smiled suddenly, a predatory, feline expression, and he felt a chill run through him.

"You recognize me, then?" he rasped, feeling a sudden wave of frustration. His mouth felt dry though his hands were slick with sweat. He knew his picture was being shown in every media, they were taking no chances on someone being so unaware of him as to offer aid to someone down on his luck, but he had felt a momentary rise of hope when he'd seen no sign of recognition on her lovely features.

She shook her head. "No, I don't know who you are, but the Wayfinder brought me to you, and that means you are interesting, you've some part to play. That means if I keep you close then I won't have to waste time being bored." She could see the anger and frustration on his face at the tone of her words, with her speaking as if he were still a pet, but she did not apologize nor restrain her words. After so long being treated as an object or a possession it felt good to turn it around, if only in words.

She turned her attention to the wand she'd taken from him, examining it curiously. "So, what is this then?" she queried. "A nature wand of some sort?" It definitely didn't look like a real wand, a powerful wand, being made of some sort of wood, as best she could tell. There was only the barest hint of magic in it even to her keen senses.

"Nature wand?" he asked, puzzled. "It is just my wand. Don't use it, please." He looked at her again, noticing for the first time the point of her ear rising through her hair. Was she some strange variety of veela, or a dryad of some dark tree, or other nature spirit? It had only just occurred to him that he had not seen her wielding a wand, for all the magic he'd seen her do, which implied that she was some sort of creature that had in-born magic, though he had never heard of any that had such versatile powers.

The thought of her being one of the rare powerful wizards capable of full-fledged wandless magic sent shivers through him. Most wizards could accomplish minor effects without a wand, though they generally lacked control. Indeed, it was such wandless magic that wizarding families watched for so closely in their children, to reassure themselves that their children were not squibs, not magic-less. If she was in fact a witch and not a creature of magic, then the wandless magic he had seen her perform--traveling through shadows, calling up a house, reshaping it at will--implied a power level equal to that of wizards with legendary fame.

His eyes were involuntarily drawn to the walls of the house, which, almost as if in compensation for the relatively small size of the dwelling, were intricate beyond compare, their surface rippled and ridged in complex patterns, the walls flowing into floor and ceiling with no obvious transition.

His thoughts turned desperate as she continued to turn his wand over and over in her hands, but he could think of nothing that he could do. Without his wand he had nothing more than his talent as an animagus to fall back on and he had had no luck against her in that form. She seemed such a small thing that he should be able to overpower her, except that he was weak from lack of food and she had shown herself to be a skilled fighter, and she was under some charm that rendered his teeth harmless, for she bore not the slightest scratch from his many attempts to escape. For that matter, his mass alone as a dog should have knocked her over, yet she had taken the force of his impact without the slightest stumble. And even had he still possessed the wand he was not sure that he could overmatch her innate power with it, especially since it was not well attuned to him. He had not exactly had a wide variety of choices at the time.

---

"You're on the run," she said suddenly, having recognized the similarities to the time she had spent with her father and the times they had gone hungry after having to quickly leave a town.

He seemed to slump into himself as the memory of some unknown terror passed over his gaze. "Please," he begged, all the strength seeming to leave him, "please don't turn me over to them."

"Them? Them who? Who are you running from? And why?"

"The dementors," he said, "My godson is in danger and I had to escape, to protect him," he told her, hoping against hope that she might bear him some sympathy, if he could just arouse it before she learned who he was and why he'd been locked away.

She nodded, a bit absently, then returned her attention to the wand he held. "So, if it's 'just' a wand, as you say, how do you use it?"

"Please," he protested, "if you use it, they'll know where I am." Immediately he blanched, realizing what he'd just given away.

"No worries," she said lightly, tossing the wand back to him. "I'm not interested in using it. Just wondered what it was for." He stared at her in surprise, hardly able to believe that she had just returned his wand.

"It... I... I'm a wizard," he said suddenly, wondering how she could not know that, not know what wands were, when she was so clearly part of the wizarding world.

She brightened at this, an eager smile lighting her face. "Magic, that's almost never boring," she said happily, "can you show me?"

He blanched again. "I told you, if I use my wand, they'll be able to track me," he protested.

"Oh," she muttered, then stood and began walking back and forth. It was difficult to suppress her disappointment. He knew some magic that let him take the shape of an animal, but he cast it with a wand that by all the rules of magic she knew should be a powerless thing, or swiftly decaying, since it was not composed of precious metals or gems capable of handling the storing and passage of great amounts of magic.

She knew that it would likely lead merely to further disappointment; she had learned most of the shape changing spells extant on Distanfae's world and none had been able to affect her and it was unlikely that he could teach her anything more powerful. But still, that she could not even try to learn came as a blow and brought with it the despairing thought that she would never know if this magic he used might be the one that could restore her. Then again, he could not teach her, but perhaps he was not the only one that knew this magic?

Finally she turned to him. "Forgot to give my name," she said, wearing a vague smile, "I'm Ranko. What's yer name?"

"Sirius," he replied, watching carefully and clutching his wand tightly, ready to leap to the attack if she reacted poorly, "Sirius Black."

"Nice ta meet ya, Sirius," she said. "So... if you can't show me, where would one go around here to learn about magic?"

A slow smile grew on Sirius's lean face. "Well, the place I've been trying to reach, where my godson is, is Hogwart's School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

Hogwarts

Ranko stared at the gates of the castle, wondering about the hooded figures that lurked there. "Oh, well," she decided, "if they bother me, they'll get what's coming to 'em alright, and if they don't, well, good for them."

Looking down at the silky black robe that swirled about her and the golden form of her wand of air, she reached up and rubbed her finger over the tips of her ears thoughtfully, wondering what sort of creature the folk of this world would take her for. Sirius had seemed quite uncertain as to what she was but he had not even mentioned an elf as a possibility. Now she looked different again from what she had when first he saw her, for he had insisted that to gain tutelage at Hogwart's she would need to be far younger than she appeared.

She had, of course, immediately dismissed his suggestion of applying for a teaching position. She knew nothing of their way of magic, a fact he was obviously not clear on, thinking that she merely did magic with less of the restrictions his sort of wizard dealt with. She had no intention of disabusing him, but she also wanted proper training. Now, through his coaching, she had the appearance of an early-blooming thirteen year old. Her hair was still long skeins of silver and her skin a midnight black as smooth and flawless as Chinese porcelain. Her eyes were the deep blue of the sky in early evening, her lips a glistening silver.

"It's not important," she told herself, "it just means I'm getting closer to home. There weren't any elves there, neither."

Rising from her concealment, she strode down the path and up to the gates. The hooded figures shifted about then glided smoothly across the grounds in her direction as she approached. She felt a sudden pressure on her mind, almost familiar, and felt the slow stirring of memories she had blocked away, memories that led only to depression and pain, and instinctively reacted. She was lifted from the ground as her aura of sheer confidence burst into brilliant blue life around her. That felt like a emotional attack of some kind, almost like a drain, she mused. Let's see them deal with an overload. The figures fell back in disarray and she passed unmolested between them.

She strode up to the gates and waited a moment, but they did not open. Shaking her head in irritation she leapt upwards but encountered an invisible blockage just above the gates. Instead of landing on the top of the gates, she fell back to the ground in front of them, touching down lightly upon her feet. She glared about her flaring her aura again, but the figures surged forward, seeming ready for the magnitude of her emotions this time, and she felt a strong pressure, as if she were being pulled apart. Recognizing her mistake in an instant, and berating herself for reacting incorrectly, even after hearing Sirius' tales about them, she focused her ki into the Soul of Ice, her emotions vanishing behind an icy wall.

The dementors drew back for a moment, then moved forward again, renewing their assault, but she felt no more pressure from them. Try as they might, she had successfully locked her emotions beyond their reach. One came directly towards her, away from the group, and she grimaced when its gray and rotted skin became visible under its heavy hood. Still, unlike its usual prey, she was far from paralyzed with fear or emotion. More to the point, perhaps, the disgusting thing's appearance and behavior triggered an unfortunate sequence of memories. Ranko had little reason to feel sympathy towards the dementors at the best of times, after hearing Sirius's story, but when her memories of the illithids of Faerun surged up, particularly of her encounter with an undead illithid, she lost all restraint.

Giving in to her irritation and dislike, and no longer perceiving any distinction between these soul-leeches and the brain-feeding, tentacle-mouthed illithidae, she whipped into motion. The foremost dementor had barely crossed into her reach when she shifted her stance and dropped into a powerful spin, bringing her right leg all the way around, pivoting on the ball of her left foot, accelerating her turn and the force of her kick still further by allowing the sphere of lead she used to control her center of gravity to plummet into her right foot. Her toes dug into the dementor's unguarded abdomen, and she felt a distinct crack as it crumpled forward, even as it hurtled backward.

It slammed into another dementor behind it, but she took no notice, having already dropped her weighted foot into the ground, transferring its momentum into her left foot, spinning with her torso nearly horizontal, as her left leg came whipping up and over, slamming hard into the shoulder of another of the dark-robed creeps, crumpling it. As soon as her foot made contact with it, and both her feet had something to press against, she dropped her torso backwards and kipped up, lifting her upper body and driving her left foot even harder into the dementor's shoulder. Once more she heard a painful sounding crack.

The other dementors were beginning to reel back in shock, but far too little time had passed for them to be out of her range. She allowed the upward momentum of her torso to rotate about her pelvis, bringing her forward and then down, as she dropped her hands to the ground. Planting her palms into a handspring, she bent her elbows and tucked into a roll, getting her feet under her and then powering into an uppercut into the gut of the next dementor.

It too crumpled forward as it flew backward, though its flight took it well above the dementors stumbling back behind it. Realizing that all the hooded figures had begun to retreat, Ranko straightened from the stance she had dropped into after her uppercut. Turning away from them, she strode back to the gate.

That ought to teach them to leave a poor, innocent little girl alone, she grinned to herself, thinking about how the fight must have looked from the outside, a petite third-year student throwing around... she snorted to herself suddenly, thinking how much more the dementors had looked like the prototypical dark wizard than poor, bedraggled, tangled up Sirius. Not that she was unfamiliar with the habit of the actually powerful dark wizards of violating those stereotypes, but still, that surely must have fit the picture. All those dark, robed guys surrounding a defenseless little girl, doubtless preparing to make her a virgin sacrifice. She grimaced then, glaring up at the castle. "Don't I rate a knight in shining armor?" she muttered angrily, irritated at the perversely silent castle and persistently closed gates. "You're supposed to be the good guys, so where was my rescue?"

Examining the gates she finally found a heavy rope to one side. Walking over to it, she gave it a healthy pull and from somewhere in the distance the tolling of a deep bell sounded. She was about to pull on it a second time when she saw movement in the distance and decided to wait. Perhaps she'd caught someone's attention. Sure enough, a few minutes later a mountain of a man came puffing up to the gate and looked out at her. "Okay," Ranko murmured, "so why do I feel like I'm at the wrong castle?" Weren't giants usually the inhabitants of the evil castles? Holding fair damsels in towers, and what not?

"Here, now, wha's all this about?" he said, looking with a pale face at the hooded figures about, not noticing the three unmoving dementors, still crumpled on the ground. "Yeh'd best come in quick before they get a min' ter do summat, then," he said rapidly, opening the gates before her, a look of near terror on his face. Ranko slipped in and watched as he barred them again. He heaved a great sigh of relief before turning to look at her. "Here now little lady, what're yeh doin' here, early and all? There's weeks still ter go before school begins. Best yeh come up an' let the headmaster have a look a' yeh, I 'spect. Well, come on then. I'm Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of Keys and Grounds here at Hogwarts. What migh' be yehr name?"

"I am called Ranko," she said.

He nodded and muttered to himself then turned and began walking with great swinging strides up the hill. He dwarfed her, of course, yet when he reached the main doors of the imposing fortress, he seemed small before them, and she wondered again if she might not have come to the wrong place. Had Sirius sent her astray? She was relieved, though more at not having to lose her trust in Sirius than from any concern for herself, when the stairs and doors she spied beyond the entrance hall seemed normal enough for a castle. Hagrid gave her only a moment to look about, however, glancing around himself as if unsure where to go, or perhaps merely deciding where the person he was looking for might be found, before striding determinedly on, leaving Ranko to follow quickly behind, concealing as best she could her irritation at having to trot to keep up with him. It would be so easy to raise her scale back up to match his long strides, but that would ruin all hard work she'd put in setting herself up as a third-year student.

While he seemed to give little thought to any difficulty she might have in keeping up with him, he did open doors for her, one after another, standing by the open door and waiting until she had entered before following after and taking up the lead once more. She gritted her teeth, fighting the urge to protest his irritatingly courteous treatment of her, having to remind herself time and again that it was not his fault that she was a woman now.

He stopped suddenly and called out, "Professor McGonagall!" Ranko saw an older lady with iron-gray hair and square-rimmed spectacles, wearing robes and a bent hat, turn and begin walking towards them. "Well," the big man muttered, "She i'n't the headmaster, mind, but she'll know what ter do with yeh, better'n me, anyways. Professor, I found thi' young lady up by the gates. Didn' figger it righ' ter leave her out there with the dementors and all, e'en if she i'n't rightly s'posed ter be here yet."

The lady looked down through her spectacles at Ranko for a long moment. "I don't recognize you, young lady. What year are you?"

"What year?" Ranko asked, her forehead wrinkling.

"You are a student here at Hogwarts, are you not?"

"Not yet," Ranko replied, "I'm here to see about getting in."

"How... unusual," McGonagall replied, frowning down at the silver-haired young lady. "Hogwarts is by invitation, young lady." Almost to herself she continued, "You cannot be a Muggle, or you could not have found the castle, yet if you were a witch, you would have already been at school..."

"Are you transferring here? From Beauxbaton's perhaps?" she asked, then continued in a lower tone, "Though surely we would have been informed?"

"No, I've not studied magic of your sort before."

"But you have studied magic?" a new voice queried, though it felt more a statement than a question. Ranko turned to see a kindly looking old man, with long white hair and beard and a pointed hat with a crooked tip.

"Come," he said, gesturing at them all, "let us step outside once more and see what the young lady can do."

A few minutes later they all stood outside on the grounds, though Hagrid hardly seemed to know why he was there or what to do with himself.

"Demonstrate for us, my dear," he said. "What sort of magic do you know?"

Ranko nodded and looking at the wand of air she held, wondered what she should use to demonstrate. She was thinking at first to demonstrate only minor magics, perhaps a bit of levitation, when she caught the doubtful expression on Professor McGonagall's face. Her own expression hardened then and she strode quickly away from the group. She did not see McGonagall direct an apologetic glance at Dumbledore, obviously realizing that she had pricked the child's pride.

Mist began to rise from the ground and swirl about her, thickening as she moved. A soft wind arose as mist rapidly spread about her, defying the strengthening wind. Her robes began to flap as the wind strengthened to a breeze and then a gale. Hagrid moved behind the Professors and placed a hand on each of their backs to steady them.

Ranko continued walking and after a few moments the watchers realized she was rising. Streamers of mist trailed after her as her feet rose from the mist as if she were climbing a hill, except that there was no longer any ground beneath her.

Wind began to swirl about her, stirring the mist and lifting it, shadowing her form. She raised her hands and they noticed that clouds were swiftly forming overhead, blotting out the stars even as the mist swirled more violently.

A light rain began to fall, quite suddenly. Just as quickly a pink umbrella opened over Professor McGonagall's head, held by the meaty hand of the groundskeeper.

The bottom of the clouds directly above the thirteen year old girl were beginning to swirl and descend, evidence of the strength of the whirlwind forming about her.

"Albus, are you quite sure this is safe?" McGonagall asked Dumbledore, glancing anxiously at his placid face. He was untouched by the rain, in spite of his lacking an umbrella.

A sudden rumble of thunder brought their attention to the clouds in time to see another bolt of lightning streak across the darkening clouds, now black and heavy. The rain intensified, then a sudden bolt slashed downward, striking the heart of the whirlwind and lighting up Ranko for them to see, her arms flung wide as if welcoming the wind and lightning, her silver hair streaming in the wind.

"She'll be hurt," cried out McGonagall as she took an involuntary half-step forward, her hand raising, but her words were drowned out by another strike.

A third time lightning flashed downward, but this time it hit the ground, throwing up dirt and grass into the wind. Quickly on its heels strokes followed, one after another, yielding a continuous peal of thunder as the bolts traced lines across the field.

McGonagall and Hagrid stared across the field with pallid faces, certain that the girl had tried to impress them and in so doing, called on power too great for her to control, costing her life.

Slowly the storm subsided and as the winds fell once more, and the rain eased, the watchers became aware that they had company. Professor Snape and Madame Hooch had both come out to see what the others were doing out in this weather, and what had produced the obviously magical disturbance.

The whirlwind finally lost its cohesion, dispersing and taking with it the concealing veil of mist and rain. From the dwindling mists a small figure strode forth. Walking as if down a mild slope, Ranko came toward them.

"How was that, Professor?" she challenged, smirking. McGonagall strode forward, moving at little less than a run.

"How could you?" she cried, still dismayed, grabbing Ranko's shoulders and turning her about, running her hands down her, her eye's darting about, obviously looking for the wounds she expected from such foolish behavior. "How could you do something so risky? You could have been killed if you lost control!"

"Lost control? I bloody signed my name with lightning and you say I haven't got control?"

Indeed, as the assembled looked past her to the field, they could see that there were two definite patterns carved into the field, which a few among them recognized as Japanese Kanji.

---

Hagrid looked out past the door and a broad grin split his face when he saw that his unexpected guest was none other than Albus Dumbledore. "C'min, come in, Professor Dumbledore, sir," he said, stepping out of the older wizard's way.

Dumbledore made himself comfortable in the small wooden hut, waiting until Hagrid had served tea, though he knew better than to try Hagrid's biscuits, preferring to keep his teeth where they were, before bringing up the reason for his visit.

"You, of all the people in this school, Hagrid, are the most interested in Magical Creatures. That is, of course, why I've offered you the course, but," and he held up his hand to forestall Hagrid's quick thanks, "no, no, don't worry, I'm not here to take that away or anything of the sort, Hagrid. I want your advice, or your knowledge. That young girl that was just here, I want your opinion on her, Hagrid."

Hagrid munched thoughtfully on a hard biscuit for a minute. "Well, Professor, the firs' thin' I noticed, righ' off, was that she didn' seem at all scared of the dementors at the gate, sir, an' they make me feel ruddy terrible. I don' know why they were staying s' far away from her, either, after what you said about them and all."

"She had p'inted ears an' silver hair fer all she wa'n't but thirteen 'r so. I dunno fer sure, Professor, I can't say what she'd be, but yer right, I don' think she's quite all-human. Like a veela, kinda, but dark, not fair. Vampire blood, migh' be, though tha'd not 'splain the hair."

Dumbledore frowned, looking thoughtfully out Hagrid's window to where the Hogwart's gate was visible through the light rain that had settled in shortly after Ranko had left the castle. She had indeed shown no qualms about leaving through the gate alone, though they had offered her an escort.

---

"Well, Minerva, what did you think of our new student?"

"Albus, she scared me out of my wits with that display. I was sure she had tried too hard to impress us and let the spell go out of control, and there she was, writing her name on the lawn with lightning. A gold wand? I'm not sure she even used it. I don't think she's a witch, Albus. She's something else entirely, though I've little idea what.

"But mark this, Albus! She came right up to our gates, so she's no Muggle. She showed no fear of the dementors, but how could she know they'd be here? If I came to the gates unsuspecting and felt their touch I'd not be so calm, of that you may be sure!

"I'm a bit worried, I must admit, what with Black out and about, that she might not be from the Enemy. It seems suspicious, does it not, for her to show up just at this point? Can you imagine what would happen if she was provoked into a spell duel with Harry, even if she's not working for them knowingly?"

Minerva turned away so that Dumbledore could not see her face. He had accepted her as a student, even agreeing to let her try the third-year classes...

"And that's another thing," she said, spinning back to face the Headmaster. "We get a new student unlike any before, and she just happens to be Harry's age, Albus? How likely is that?" She turned away again. "Are you going to sort her? What if she has a way to manipulate it?"

She caught the movement of Dumbledore's pointed hat as he shook his head. "No, Minerva. There I think you are right. Besides, we don't really know what year to place her in, yet. Still, remember, she did in fact show tremendous control out there, and those bolts of lightning could as easily have struck us. If she is not dark, do we really want to chance her turning to it because we turned her away?"

---

Snape growled irritably when the tapping sounded again. "Come in!" he shouted, trying not to lose the count of his stirring. His frown lessened when he saw who it was. Dumbledore, at least, would have sense enough to wait until the potion was finished before saying whatever he had come to say, unless it was some sort of emergency.

A small smile grew on his face for an instant when the potion cleared then turned a delicate light blue. A wave of his wand banished the flames that burned beneath the small cauldron. He placed a metal lid on the cauldron then turned to Dumbledore.

"I'm finished. What do you need?"

"I want your opinion," Dumbledore responded, taking no offense at Snape's curt tone, "of the girl whose demonstration you saw this morning."

"It's obvious," Snape hissed, "she's one of His!"

"You've seen her then, Severus?"

"No, I've not seen her before, nor heard of her." Snape was reluctant, knowing that he was weakening his case in spite of his own certainty, but he could not lie about this to Dumbledore. "But what else can she be?"

"It is obvious to me that that demonstration was no young witch trying to gain a place at a school. Those were spells of great power, Albus, but I've never seen even one of them before! That means there are no standard defenses for them, no known counterspells. He's mocking us, I tell you, you can't mean to allow her to attend. One duel and His task will be complete!"

"But she will attend. And at least at first, she will be allowed to take the third year courses, until we've placed her level. Do keep an eye on her, Severus."

Diving In

Sirius looked up at the sound of the door and saw the little silver-haired girl slip into the room, her robes swirling around her as she shut the door and spun to face him. A single leap took her across the room to stand in front of him. She smirked at the startled look on his face.

"The old man agreed to let me stay," she said, grinning suddenly. "He gave me a list of things to get, said I need to go to some alley in London.

"You were right, by the way. I showed off a bit, and once they saw I could do real magic they agreed there was no point in making me take the introductory courses, so they put me in with my age group. Hah! If they only knew," she laughed. She gave him an appraising examination and nodded sharply. "You're looking better."

Sirius agreed. He was looking and feeling better than he had in a long while. His hair, while still long, was clean and well-brushed, and bound back in a ponytail. He had filled out a bit from eating regularly, and his skin was no longer sallow. What was more, he was no longer alone. He had an intermediary who was willing to try and convince Harry that Sirius was not what he had been portrayed as.

"I can't go with you," he said apologetically, "it's not safe for me there, even as Padfoot. There are simply too many wizards and witches there." He smiled and held up a key. "I can give you this, though. It's the key to my vault in Gringott's, the bank there. Take what you need and bring a bit back for me, if you would."

"Right. But before I go, can you tell me what I'd want a broom for? It says here that we can have a broom, but what for? We aren't going to be cleaning all the time are we?"

Sirius laughed so hard he collapsed and it was several minutes before he managed to choke out an explanation. "You want one to fly on, of course."

Ranko scowled for a moment when she realized that he was laughing at her lack of knowledge then brushed it aside. She would have a look at the brooms anyway, but she figured she would end up using a broom of her own essence if it came to it, as she was doing for her wand, rather than buying one.

"I'm off to London. Neko'll look after ya. Don't do anything to make 'im mad." She spun around and stalked away, slamming the door behind her as she left, irritated that he still hadn't stopped laughing.

She looked at the forest around her, still feeling that spark of irritation. "London," she muttered. "Well, if it's the capital it should be visible from the air when I get near." She shook her head. "No, that's foolish. I'll just fly till I get to the nearest town and ask directions."

Reaching inward to find the right skein of gold, the gold that had come from the ring she'd taken from the Calimshite assassin, she drew on its power and cloaked herself in invisibility.

A seam appeared in her robes and the shirt she wore beneath, then another, side-by-side near her shoulder blades. A rippling wash of metal flowed outward from the holes then solidified into two great dragon wings. Mentally she called out to the ancient celestial dragon that shared her prison, but once more she received no reply. "You know I'm not going to let you rest until I've learned to fly like this," she shouted into the emptiness within her.

Momentarily shifting her awareness of her arms to her wings, she flexed them and stretched them out. She was learning to move them, slowly, but she was still no nearer to actually being able to fly with them. Positioning them spread wide, angled slightly to the rear, she released her awareness of them, locking them into place, then called on the power of her ring of flight. Soon she was gliding unseen over the forest.

From the air she was quick to find a town and two soaring overflights showed her its layout and the location of the open stores. Dropping downward, she shifted her attention to her wings, drawing them in as she swooped into an alleyway where she withdrew her wings and sealed the holes in her clothing.

---

Ranko looked up curiously at the door of the Leaky Cauldron, set almost unnoticeably between two normal stores. It was getting on towards evening and she feared the shops would soon be closing, but if she could get to Gringott's before it closed, she would have the funds to purchase a room for the night.

"I hope it looks better inside than out," she muttered, though inside she was grinning. This was more what she was used to, seedy taverns at the start of adventures and such. Opening the door, she slipped in and shut it quickly behind her. She walked quickly through the tavern, not taking much note of the inhabitants, until she recalled that she would need someone to open the brick wall behind the tavern, according to Dumbledore. They probably wouldn't take too kindly to it if she simply knocked it out of the way.

Stopping midway through the room she spun on one toe and looked about. She saw a number of older witches and wizards, but she didn't really feel like dealing with condescension at the moment. Finally she spied a young boy looking at her with wide, startled eyes. He looked to be about thirteen, the same as her appearance. She made her way quickly through the tables toward him, smirking to herself as she saw him gulping.

Harry hoped the girl wasn't mad about him staring. He simply couldn't help it. He'd seen dark-skinned kids at Hogwart's before, but her skin wasn't dark, it was black, blacker than the night sky, framed by a halo of silvery hair that cast a soft shimmering light over her perfect features. She was wearing black robes that glimmered with a faint sheen that not only kept them from giving her the appearance of a silhouette, but also outlined the curves of her body as they clung to them. He gulped against the dryness in his throat when she fixed her deep blue eyes on him and began making her way towards him.

She stepped up to the table and asked in a soft, pleasant voice, "Can you show me how to get into Diagon Alley?"

"Uh, yeah, sure," stammered Harry, standing quickly, almost knocking over his chair. He was surprised that she sounded so, so... gentle. Given her appearance, her beauty notwithstanding, he had guessed her to be a Slytherin.

He led her out the back door and into the small yard behind the inn and drawing out his wand, showed her where to tap thrice. Her face seemed to light up as she smiled at him. To his surprise, she sketched a small bow. "Thank you. I am Ranko, may I have the honor of your name?"

Harry nodded quickly. "I'm Harry," he said. She had not recognized him and as she had given only her first name, he had some reason to hope she would not ask for his last name.

"Well, thank you again, Harry," she said with a second smile, then slipped off into the slowing activity of the Alley. Harry raised his hand for a moment, about to call after her, but thought better of it and went back inside.

"Is she a new student?" he wondered, "She looked about my age."

Ranko walked quickly down the street, noting the shops as she passed them, but focusing her intent on the large building at the street's end. "Gringott's," it said, in massive carved letters.

"It looks silly," she muttered to herself as she approached. Indeed it did, seeming to lean first to one side then to the other as her eyes traveled up it. "Sure doesn't look impregnable to me."

Entering through the large doors, she stood for a time bemused at the sight of the bank workers. They looked to her eyes like a warped, more evil version of gnomes. Finally she walked up to an open teller and handed him the key. "I need to make a withdrawal," she told him.

When she left Gringott's she had with her a considerable sum of galleons, as well as a curious sense of unreality. She had just walked into a bank and withdrawn money from the vault of a wanted criminal and no-one had made the least comment about it.

Seeing that the other stores were closing, she returned to the inn, stopping along the way to read the posters at the broom store, which was named after 'Quidditch,' which she supposed was a strange word for brooms. She would obtain her supplies in the morning. Entering the inn she noticed that the boy who had given her directions was absent from his table. Speaking to the bartender, she arranged for a room. It was pointless, she had no need for protection from the elements nor for sleep, but it would be best if she drew as little attention to herself as possible, for Sirius' sake.

In her room she pulled out the one other item she had obtained that day, a stick of wood she had picked up from the ground behind the inn. Setting it on a table, she then withdrew from her storage space her spellbook and a roll of parchment.

She did not generally care for the magic she had learned during her long sojourn on Distanfae's world. It had to be memorized each morning, for it was lost in sleep or by being cast. Well, she did not sleep, so she had no reason to worry about that, but her usual magic, employing spellfire or the abilities of items she absorbed, served well enough for most purposes, especially attack and defense and required no mental effort to recoup. Rememorizing spells after she had cast them, on the other hand, was far too much like studying, something she had never particularly enjoyed.

For this purpose, however, she needed structured magic. Flipping through her spellbook, she began not to memorize, but to plan, writing out on the parchment, which was magical and turned black at the touch of gold and cleared again at the touch of silver, the series of spells she would use.

Examining the basic limits of the flight spell, she compared them to the specifications for the latest brooms that she had read on the posters at the broom shop. Making a quick notation to remind herself to add in levitation and feather fall spells, she flipped through her spellbook to the metamagic section, the spells that modified other spells. It was irritating and far too much like math, calculating the effect of each metamagic spell as she worked on designing the right pattern of altering spells to give the flight spell the characteristics she desired, but the underlying subject held her interest, particularly given her eventual plans for it.

As the night wore on, she grew steadily more frustrated. She could readily extend the duration of the spell, or its range of effect, but she could find nothing that would substantially increase its speed. Haste and expeditious retreat were options, but neither could get the overall effect into the speed range described for the broom she had been looking at, and multiple castings of either simply resulted in an overlapping period of effect, without actually increasing the strength of the dweomer nor the speed it imparted.

Frustrated after fighting with the design for the spells after several hours, she turned her attention to the stick. "Now, you're going to be a problem," she growled. She did not really understand how those broomsticks could be made, not with the magic she knew, for it was a general rule that permanent magical items had to be formed of extremely valuable substances.

Yet all the broomsticks, as far as she could see, were made of wood and twigs or straw, hardly the sort of item that could be expected to last. "You've just got to last long enough to take the spells," she said, putting her chin in her hands as she looked at it, knowing that if it could take the spells, she would require only moments to absorb it, at which point it would be truly permanent. Was not there one other sort of object that could be used? "Art," she said suddenly. "That's it!"

She grasped the stick and quicksilver poured from her palms to engulf it. Under the influence of the quicksilver, she reshaped the stick, concentrating on an image in her mind. The wood flowed smoothly but she still had to release it twice to prevent the quicksilver from beginning to absorb it. The wood fibers were far less resistant to the absorption than the metals she had first learned this sort of manipulation on.

When completed, the stick had become a perfect scale model of a broomstick, with a neat bundle of twigs bunched at the rear. "A work of art, if I do say so myself," Ranko said then she set the broom aside and took up her spellbook.

She had hoped that leaving the spells for a while before coming back to them would help her see something she had missed, but it was not to be. She simply could not find any combination of spells that would reproduce the abilities listed in the advertisement. "El could probably do it easy," she grumbled. Of course, he would simply have made up a new spell to do it. She was nowhere near that level, unfortunately.

The sky outside her window was beginning to lighten when she was finally ready to give up. Even as she conceded defeat, however, her mouth turned up in a sudden pleased smile. If she had not been so concentrated on duplicating the broom, she would have realized far earlier that it was actually a very good thing that she could not duplicate it. That meant that all she had to do was buy one and absorb it and she would have expanded her capabilities dramatically.

She considered again the description of the broom's abilities and her smile grew wider still. She greatly enjoyed flight but her ring was limited, even as flying with Tofu was, for in neither case could she hover, nor turn on a yen. With this broom, though, she ought to be able to!

Recognition of her own momentary cluelessness brought back memories of her childhood. Never in Nerima would she have had the peace and quiet to even attempt that magnitude of research. "Someone would have burst in at just the wrong point," she muttered, "and all that effort would have gone up in smoke."

As if in answer to her thoughts, a heavy knocking sounded at her door.

---

As usual, Harry began his day with breakfast in the main room of the Leaky Cauldron, watching the morning clientele go about their business. As he sat and watched, though, he found his mind returning to the silver-haired girl he had given directions to the previous day. He had not seen her since their first encounter, and probably never would again, but questions about her ran insistently through his mind.

Was she a student? She looked no older than he was, but she had been alone, unescorted, when she entered the tavern from muggle London. It would have made more sense if he had first encountered her in Diagon Alley. It was not unfeasible that her parents might have sent her there alone; but to send her through London? If she had been wearing ordinary clothes that might make sense; she might have had muggles for parents, like Hermione, or more like his aunt and uncle, rather, who were unwilling to get involved with magic. She would not be wearing witch's robes already in that case, though.

Of course, it was equally possible that she was not a student at all, or that she was a student at some other school, just visiting England for the summer, particularly given her exotic looks. She had definitely looked Eastern, but her skin had been this unbelievable black. Harry wondered if she might be descended from some exotic creature to get that true black color. Was that even possible?

"...silver-haired lass..." Harry looked up. Had he just heard that, or was it... His eyes fixed on a pair of wizards in Auror's robes sitting just two tables away. There was no-one between them and himself, and he could not suppress his shiver. He still did not know why the Ministry had suddenly turned a blind eye to his accidental blowing up of his Aunt Marge, when they had sent him a letter threatening expulsion after Dobby had levitated a pudding to smash it. That hadn't even been his wand doing the magic, and they had threatened him, and when he himself had blown up his aunt, he had fled the house, expecting to be captured by the Aurors and thrown in prison if he stayed.

"Reckon it must have been an illusion?"

"Must have. No way a little slip of a girl could have killed two of the guards." The speaker was a grey haired man with shifting eyes that seemed to be in constant motion. The man he was replying to was younger, with light brown hair, facing away from Harry.

"Black skin and silver hair. What do you reckon we're really facing? If they were using illusions, why'd they pick something so obvious. And why'd they stick to it afterwards. Why not just change it?"

"Been thinking about that," grey-hair answered. "I reckon it must be one o'them types illusions don't work so well on. Maybe the only illusion is her size or age."

"But still, it's kind of brazen, ain't it, to come waltzing into the alley, going right into Gringott's plain as you please, after killing two dementors and injuring several more?"

"And then to take a room in the Cauldron, when 'Arry Potter's staying here? We're facing sommat that ain't got much fear. They've checked. Nothin's flooed or apparated outta that room up there what she took, and she ain't been seen leaving."

"Could have left under an invisibility cloak."

"Don't think so. There's evidence of ongoing magic in the room, and I don't mean the lasting stuff as was there 'fore she came, neither."

Harry stared at his hands. He had talked to her, told her how to get into Diagon Alley. She was a murderess? Was it possible? Harry jerked when the door to the alleyway slammed open, sure that it would be more Auror's come to finally take him away. After all, blowing up his aunt by an accident they might overlook, but allowing a murderess into Diagon Alley?

He tried to shrink into his chair as much as he could, peering up through his bangs. His heart clenched when he saw that the fellow making quick strides across the room was in fact wearing Auror's robes, and coming right towards him. He nearly passed out when the Auror reached him, but the man swept past to stand just behind the brown haired man.

"Took a bit of doing," he hissed under his breath. "And you're not gonna like it, not at all, but I managed to worm the vault number out of the goblins." The man took a deep breath as if to steady himself, then continued. "She made a withdrawal... from the account of Sirius Black!"

"What!?" Both of the other Aurors stood at once, incidentally knocking their table over, though they ignored the crash of wood. It did get them the undivided attention of everyone in the place. "She's in league with Sirius Black?!"

"Shh! Quiet, damnit," the new man said, glancing upstairs nervously. "I've sent word to Hogwarts. We've got to get Potter out of here before we do anything!"

Harry perked up at this. He wasn't in trouble? He was going to get to go to Hogwarts early? But he hadn't purchased his supplies yet! He was not given an opportunity to protest. He wasn't even given the chance to get back into his room, number eleven, and fetch his things. He had to give a list of everything he had to an auror. Soon enough the auror came back downstairs with his trunk and Hedwig in her cage looking irritable.

Then it was off to Hogsmeade, through the floo network, after having gone over the list from the school and marking everything he needed and writing down all the potions supplies he knew that he was missing or short of.

Harry was rather irritable himself by the time they got to the castle. After Minister Fudge had refused to sign his permission form to allow him to go to Hogsmeade as third years were allowed to do, the least they could have done was let him have a look at it while they were passing through. After all, they had left the danger back at the Cauldron, so there should have been no reason not to let him have a look about. But he was bustled through Hogsmeade so quickly that he had scarcely more than an idea how large a village it was, and little more.

---

Ranko glared at the door. A shout sounded from without and Ranko shook her head in irritation. Apparently someone had in fact noticed her pulling money from Black's account. Either that or someone objected to her lack of restraint in defending herself at the gates of Hogwarts. At least, that was what she gathered from the shout. Ordinary people doing ordinary things did not usually, at least in her experience, go around telling other folk to come out with their hands empty.

Regardless, she had no interest in dealing with this world's version of authority. She heard something impacting loudly against the door as she faded into the shadows, but paid it no mind. Appearing within the woods near the castle of Hogwarts, she leapt into the branches of the tree in whose shadow she arrived. There she crouched, waiting, watching for any signs that her pursuers had managed to track her escape through the shadows.

After an interminable period spent alternating between thinking that enough time had passed, and thinking that it was unwise to risk Black-san's health over her impatience, she finally conceded that she had apparently escaped cleanly. Dropping backwards into the shadow of the trunk behind her, she rolled over and onto her feet in the Orthanc-house.

She grinned at the startled cry Black gave at her sudden and odd manner of appearance. In fact, had she but known it, it was not so unnerving to Black to see her appear out of nowhere, as it was simply jarring to see her do so without there being a fireplace behind her. Portkeys and apparition did not usually involve a tumble, but travel by floo often did.

He shook his head ruefully, acknowledging his own startlement with a wry grin. "So, have all you need now?"

Ranko shook her head, tossing him a heavy bag of coins. "Apparently that bank wasn't quite as hush-hush as you thought. They showed up at my door in the inn just before I was about to go finish my shopping."

Sirius shook his head doubtfully. "The goblins are almost always steadfastly neutral about that sort of thing. I find it hard to accept that they would report someone accessing my account."

Ranko grinned. "Well, then I guess they must be peeved about those dementors I beat up."

Sirius' jaw dropped. "You... you beat..."

"About five or six dementors, I think it was. Hey, they attacked me first. They had it coming. I dunno, I hit two of 'em kinda hard. They might not have made it."

"How can you be so calm about that?" demanded Sirius, eyes narrowing. Though he knew it was not her true appearance, it was still hard to look past her current appearance, that of a thirteen or fourteen year old witch.

Ranko cast a sardonic glance at him as she fell backward into the chair that rippled up out of the floor to meet her. "I've encountered their sort before. We called them 'mind flayers.' I don't know what the experts called them. If these things are anything like the ones I've encountered, and they are, by appearance and by your own words, they've no respect for the lives of anything other than themselves. They take pleasure in pain and fear. I'm not going to lose any sleep over them, dead or alive." She did not mention that she was physically incapable of losing sleep over them. He did not need to know her full background.

"Anyway, I expect I will have to go back there to pick up the rest of my supplies before the week is out. But before I work on how to do that, there is something I need to know. You told me that you could not risk doing magic because it would lead them right to you, yet you changed from a dog to a man. You said that was not Jusenkyou, so I think it's about time I got an explanation." It had been thinking about the magic of the broom and the difficulty of performing it herself that had caused her to finally catch that little discrepancy in his claims.

---

Ranko looked out of the shadows of the forest's edge at the slowly moving forms of the dementors guarding the castle's perimeter. She watched carefully, but none of them ever seemed to move inward. She knew why they were there now; the authorities seemed to think that Sirius, having been responsible, in their eyes, for the deaths of Harry Potter's parents, his own best friends, at the hands of Lord Voldemort, had escaped Azkaban to take revenge on Potter himself, the one responsible for the fall of Lord Voldemort. After all, his actions seemed to them clear indication that he had been Voldemort's right hand man.

She had felt the effect of the dementors' near presence and had Sirius describe the effects of long term exposure and it made sense to her that if the school was to operate as a school the Azkaban guards would have to be kept away from the children.

To get into the school, she would have to pass through them, and the searches she had observed while obtaining the rest of her supplies from Diagon Alley under the influence of an appearance altering illusion strongly indicated that she herself was now one of their prime targets. Though the goblins at Gringott's had not reacted to her retrieving money from Black's account, that had apparently been put together with her self-defense against the dementors and the aurors were now firmly of the opinion that she was in league with Black. Astute of them.

Sirius had warned her about the various wards that guarded the school and she did not particularly care to risk testing whether the wards would detect and block her various forms of travel. Particularly since Sirius had been kind enough to divulge the location of an entrance to a secret passage onto the school grounds from the nearby village of Hogsmeade.

Ranko moved silently through the trees, but to her considerable irritation, she could not find a vantage point that would let her see the large willow tree that was her expected point of egress.

Shaking her head, she pulled back and dropped through the shadows back to the small shack on a hill just beyond Hogsmeade. The Shrieking Shack, Sirius had called it. Claimed that the villagers believed it to be haunted, though he had hinted that such was not the case, without offering any alternative explanation for the villager's beliefs.

She wasted no time trying to follow Sirius's instructions to find the secret entrance to the tunnel, choosing instead to draw up the substance of one of the most valuable gems she had absorbed during her stay on Distanfae's world, a gem of true seeing. With it serving as her eye, she located the door and had it open in moments.

Slipping in, she cautiously shut the door behind her. Her true seeing eyes pierced easily through the darkness and though quicksilver would have done as well, she left the true seeing gem in place. It might give her a moment's warning if this passage was no longer secret and traps had been laid for her.

As she moved carefully through the darkness, watching for the telltale glimmer of magic, a heavy rumble moved through the earth, a steady, deep vibration. The Hogwarts train had arrived. In a very short while, carriages would begin bringing the students to the castle through the gates, with the exception of the first year students, who would be brought, Sirius had informed her, across the lake in boats.

Ranko increased her pace, desiring to come to the castle in time to mingle with the entering older students, where she would have a better chance to fit in. Dumbledore had not said anything to her about being sorted, though Sirius had implied it happened to every student, so she was not sure whether she would be singled out or not.

Regardless, she expected a very dubious reception once they realized she was there, given the behavior of the aurors in Diagon Alley.

Reaching the tunnel's end, she ignored the knot that would still the great willow tree. She slipped out of the opening and immediately faded into a shadow, just as a thin, whip-like willow branch slashed through the space she had occupied but a moment before. She grinned at the lack of reaction around her. She had hoped that as long as her means of travel did not attempt to pass through the wards it would pass undetected, and so far it seemed she was correct.

Drifting across the grounds as a spot of darkness, she spied the great doors, open wide to welcome the students, who, she could see, were still some distance away in the horseless carriages. She drifted up to lurk beside the doors, grinning when a ghost darted away, spooked by her presence.

The carriages trundled up and halted, one after another, to disburse a tight group of usually four children apiece, occasionally more or less. Ranko watched them closely as they began to pass in, watching for green eyes behind glasses and unruly black hair concealing a scar of great import.

Finally she entered the castle, after the last of the students, though she quickly overtook them. Why had he not been there? A shiver passed through the throng of students as a shadow flickered past them bearing an immense presence, felt but unseen, and with it passed a silence as accompanies the person of one too great to dare bother without pressing need.

Taking advantage of a particularly dark corner near the head of the jostling snake of students, Ranko returned to material form shrouded by darkness and let the shadows slowly slip away as she neatly inserted herself into the students' ranks.

Almost instantly she was awarded space by the nervous students, as a barely half-understood intuition warned them of danger. To students whose nerves were already frayed by recent events, the warning was keenly felt and even more quickly heeded.

She passed into silence through the doors to the great candle-lit hall where long tables waited, her entrance announced, as it were, all eyes drawn to the sudden cessation of the usual bustle of students entering just before she reached it, and for a moment thereafter. A tense hush fell over the crowd as they for the first time consciously realized to whom they were reacting, a hush broken by a startled cry from the Gryffindor table.

"Ranko!"

Making A Name

Not yet posted.

An Eventful Day

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