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."