When the Dark Lord came to Hogwarts, Zacharias Smith ran without a thought. He thought little of the children he bowled over as he made his way down the passage toward the Hog’s Head and even less of those who had stayed behind to fight. If they were so keen to die, then they were welcome to it. But Zacharias wasn’t so keen to die. So he ran, and fast, the chaos around him sucking up the echoing of his hard-soled shoes against the old stone of the castle’s walls and floors as he went.

When he’d joined Dumbledore’s Army, he thought he would learn some cool magic, meet a few girls, and hear a little gossip. He had done all of those things. But he hadn’t signed up for this. He hadn’t signed up to be a soldier. Or maybe he had, the name being “Dumbledore’s Army� and all, but he’d thought it was just a clever name. It had been fun to career about the castle after hours, pranking Slytherins, feeling dangerous with his new dueling spells, knowing things only a few other people knew, being a hero among the younger students. Not that he had ever claimed to be a hero. He just hadn’t corrected the little blighters, and was that really so wrong?

He ran, and kept running with eyes for nothing but the pinprick of light near the head of the line. Madam Pomfrey had cast Lumos to make her wand more visible. To someone else the wand’s cold, bluish-white light might’ve looked terrifying, casting everyone’s terrified features into stark, deeply shaded relief as they passed. It made them look like ghosts. But to Zacharias it looked like a warm, glowing sun, a beacon that, if he could only just reach it, meant safety. Even as a reasonably good-looking, if gawky, eighteen-year-old boy with all of the roiling hormonal impulse that entailed, he truly believed he had never wanted anything so much as to reach that light. He thought he might hug Madam Pomfrey when he reached it, if only to get that much closer to the light. He couldn’t take his eyes off of it.

Or he thought he couldn’t. Until he did. His eye was drawn against all odds by someone fighting against the current. It was him. It was Harry. Scorched, bloodied, and generally worse for the wear, but Harry all the same.

It was his eyes that did it. Those green eyes. Zacharias remembered that they were green because that was the first time he had noticed them. They locked onto his own golden-brown eyes, and Zacharias saw something in them. Somethings, plural. He saw tiredness, he saw fear, and he saw determination. But mostly he saw anger. He saw anger in those green eyes, and it saw him. Zacharias stopped so suddenly that he nearly tripped, whether over a badly laid stone or a first year, he couldn’t have said. But as paralyzingly fast as those eyes had seized upon him, they let him go, moving on to bigger and, maybe not better but definitely different, more important things. Zacharias was nothing. An afterthought. He didn’t even know if Harry had actually seen him in the press of the crowd or if he had just imagined it.

Something inside of Zacharias Smith broke then. It didn’t hurt, not really. But it bled all the same. He tried to call out as Harry and the others passed, but his voice caught in his throat. He watched them go. When they had rounded a far-off corner, off to battle and another great adventure with their friends, their real, loyal friends, Zacharias found himself fixated once more on Madam Pomfrey’s wand. It wasn’t far now. He began to make his way toward it again, but slower, a little more careful of the little ones around him. His face burned. When he reached it, its glow seemed to envelope his entire world.

And that was the last thing that Zacharias Smith remembered of the day that the Dark Lord came to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. He had been seventeen then, on the last day he would ever see Hogwarts or anyone he had known there. That was just shy of twenty years past.

---

When his father had come to retrieve him from Hogsmeade during the blur following the battle, Zacharias was expecting for there to be consequences. But there weren’t. None. A few days after he returned home to suburban London, he received notice that he had graduated along with the rest of the class. The school even apologized for being unable to hold a formal ceremony. No one from the Ministry came to snap Zacharias’ wand into pieces, though he considered doing it himself. Every time a story about the battle came out in a newspaper, he expected there to be something in it about his having run away, as ridiculous as he knew that was. If he didn’t tell anyone, no one would know. Even the people who were there would probably just assume they’d missed him during the chaos. Probably.

Everyone except Harry.

Zacharias didn’t break his wand, but after two weeks he stopped carrying it. A month after that he put it in a cardboard box that he had found in his basement and placed it gingerly on the top shelf of his bedroom closet. Every now and then he would feel a temptation to open the box, to take out the long, slender piece of cream-colored wood. But he didn’t. Not even just to look at it.

It was almost a year before he told his parents what he’d done. During that time they never asked him what had happened. They never wondered why he didn’t do any magic, why he never went looking for a job, why he didn’t seem interested in doing anything beyond sitting in his room and reading. They had been content to assume that his experiences had been so traumatic that he just couldn’t bear to talk about them, and that time would heal his non-existent wounds.

“Well…uh…what else could you have done?� his father had asked. His mother had stayed stone silent and seemed to have no intention of speaking up at all.

“I don’t know,� Zacharias lied. They never had another conversation about it. Zacharias often asked himself what was worse: the idea that his parents were silently judging him for being a coward and a traitor, or the idea that maybe they weren’t? He went through phases of believing both of these alternately, scrutinizing every word his parents did or didn’t say to him on one of those two bases. He didn’t want to, but it was hard to avoid. He rarely left the house, and he never spoke to anyone when he did. His parents were his only company.

It was another long year before Zacharias couldn’t do it any longer. He left, and he didn’t come back. All he packed was a backpack full of clothes and a stash of Muggle money stolen from his father’s safe, about £1000. He never said goodbye, neither to his parents, nor to his wand. It wasn’t as though he made some pact with himself, cutting his palm and squeezing until enough blood was running to write with. Nothing like that. He just knew, somehow, that he would never do magic again.

What he would do, on the other hand, was very much in question. He had no plan other than to make his way into London proper and figure something out once he was there. He was twenty years old, still objectively good-looking in spite of two years spent as a relative shut-in, and had a full wallet. Surely, something would come his way. As long as that something wasn’t someone who knew him from back then, he thought he would do fine. In fact, he’d begun cultivating his first beard in the few weeks that this non-plan had been in the making. It was a rather tufty, flesh-colored thing just then but it was already beginning to change his face to the point that he thought someone would have to look very hard to recognize him.

Funnily enough, his plan worked out almost exactly as it had in his head.

---

When he got off the bus that had taken him into the city, he decided that his first stop would be for a cup of tea. It was raining and cold, and it soon emerged that his jacket wasn’t nearly up to the task of keeping him warm. The nearest café was on the other side of the street behind a grey façade with one large window looking out onto the street. The word “BREWSBANE� was written in large white block capitals near the top of the window. What the word could have meant, Zacharias didn’t know, but he wasn’t sure it mattered as long as they could do a strong builder’s.

It was mostly empty inside, the time being slightly after lunch on a Wednesday. A few patrons were scattered throughout the place. Only the girl behind the counter seemed to take any notice at all of Zacharias as he entered. She was very cute.

“G’day.� And apparently very Australian. Brewsbane; now he got it. She looked the part too, with a freckled face, strawberry blonde hair held back by a dark blue bandana, and eyes the color of an aggressively cloudless early afternoon sky. The smile she gave him, though forced, was full of charmingly crooked teeth. Over a red and white striped shirt she wore a black apron that said “BREWSBANE� on it in the same lettering as the window.

“Uh…hi,� Zacharias said. It was an appalling time to realize that he had never ordered anything in a Muggle café before, but it happened anyway. He consoled himself momentarily with memories of ordering drinks at the Hog’s Head, but this only took his mind to places that he didn’t want it to go. The last time he had been at the Hog’s Head. Madam Pomfrey, the first years, Harry. Everything.

“Did you want to order something?� the girl asked, snapping Zacharias out of his reverie. He was torn between gratefulness toward her and anger at himself for almost immediately falling back into the trap he was trying to escape from.

“Yeah, sorry,� he said. “Can you do a builder’s tea?�

She sighed dissappointedly, “I can.� The implication being that she wouldn’t unless he made her. She made no move to actually do anything.

“Is there something you’d rather make?� Zacharias asked.

“It’s more of a coffee shop, but no one ever wants coffee. I told Mum and Dad that would happen before we moved, but heaven forbid anyone listen to Edie,� the girl said.

“I’ll have whatever you want to make for me,� Zacharias said, if only because it seemed strangely important to her. And in any case, whatever she wanted to make for him was unlikely to cost more than £1000.

“Serious?� she asked.

“Until I change my mind, yeah,� he said, taking a seat that would give him a view of the espresso machine, a great silver tank of a thing, all brushed metal and brutalist corners. Without another word, Edie set about making him something. There was much grinding of beans, clacking of depressed toggles on the machine, and the whooshing of pressurized steam which turned to crackling when it met milk. What she passed to him after a minute was a small cup featuring a brown ring of coffee around a bean-shaped white center.

“What is it?�

“Flat white. Try it.� He did. In the years to come he would tell people that he had fallen in love with Edie the first time he tried her coffee. She would laugh, their friends would laugh, but they would both know that he was just covering for the fact that he couldn’t pinpoint exactly when he’d fallen for her. In the end, this was just as good a time as any. And in fairness to him, she couldn’t remember when she’d fallen for him either.

“What do you think?� she had asked him.

Zacharias looked into those blue eyes and said, “I…think I need a job here.�

She was taken aback, but recovered quickly. “A job?�

“Yes.�

“You know that’s not how you go about getting a job, right?�

“I didn’t know that actually,� he admitted with a shrug.

“What’s your name?� she asked.

“Zacha…,� he began.

“Your name is Zacha? Sounds Australian enough.�

“Sorry,� he said. “Zach. Just Zach.� It had come out of his mouth without any warning. A new name for a new start, he supposed. Or newish at any rate.

She considered him for a moment, the steeliness of her gaze undermined significantly by her freckles and said, “Well, I’ll have to talk to my mum and dad since they own the place but...well, I’ve been telling them we need to get another person in here. Just Zach, mate, it might be your lucky day.�

---

That was how it had all started. And how it had all ended. Zacharias, now Zach, began working full-time at Brewsbane, making just enough money to live in a small flat with two roommates, neither of whom he saw very much of. He, Edie, and her parents, who had moved the family to London when Edie was fourteen to open the shop, were the only other people who worked there. He barely had time to spare a thought for magic. His parents still lived only a short bus ride away, but he didn’t go to see them. He didn’t try to get in touch. Neither did they. If they really wanted to, he reasoned, they could have found him easily enough. It wasn’t as though they’d given up magic too.

But they never did, at least as far as he was aware, but he was okay with that. He had bigger things to think about. Six months into working at Brewsbane he asked Edie for a date. Her father had been less than pleased, but with an admonition of “I know where you work� had let them go about their business anyway. Zach expected every single day that she would break it off with him and he would have to find a new job. She knew little of his parents, having been told they were both dead, nor anything of his life before he came to London. She must’ve sensed that there was something he wasn’t telling her, but she had the good grace not to ask. Or at least he thought it was grace. It might’ve been fear of what she would find out.

But for some reason, she didn’t. Edie seemed to accept that whatever was in his past, he was worthwhile whether she knew it or not. He hadn’t the foggiest notion of how to process this most of the time, and instead just accepted it for what it was.

When he was twenty-four and she was twenty-two, they were married. As he had no family and most of hers was in Australia, they had done it there on a beach in Sydney. They had no honeymoon. There wasn’t time; the shop had been closed for a week straight. They returned to England and life went on again much as it had been for the past four years. Magical in another way, but one that Zach was finding himself increasingly used to.

A year later, Edie’s parents had died in a car accident on the M4. They had left the business to their daughter and son-in-law. Watching Edie grieve brought some of it back. And not just memories of grief, though those were there too, particularly the sight of Harry holding Cedric Diggory’s lifeless body during fourth year. Good memories too, of experiments in the Hufflepuff common room with mood-altering potions. Could he find the ingredients to whip something like that up? Should he? The answer, of course, was no on both counts, and he settled once again for finding a sort of magic in the way that she persevered through everything.

After that, he barely thought about magic at all. He could almost have convinced himself that he had really left it behind. Until the day Edie told him they were going to have a baby. When she was born, a roiling bundle of red-blonde hair and soft pink skin, they named her Jezebel. As much as he tried to convince himself that she might be different than he was, each birthday made it clearer and clearer that she too had magic. He had spent so long and tried to hard to forget magic, and now he found himself in a constant state of alert, waiting for the next accident he would have to cover for when she had a tantrum. Once, when Jezzie was five, she had screamed so loudly that a window shattered to pieces in their flat. The night after her eighth birthday party, Edie had mentioned how she had walked in on her that morning having what sounded like a very interesting conversation with a bird that had landed on her windowsill. Zach had laughed it off at the time, but the sound had been hollow in his ears.

On her eleventh birthday, his daughter had walked into the coffee shop below their flat and taken up her usual seat in one of the booths. She’d grown to look very much like her mother, but with her father’s brown eyes and angular, handsome features and gawky limbs. She insisted on cutting her own hair in the most outrageous way possible, shaving it to a reddish scruff on the sides and in back while leaving the top long. Zach thought it was a bit extreme for an eleven year old at the time, but then, her parents did own a coffee shop in a rapidly gentrifying neighborhood of London.

“What the…?� he heard her mutter from the booth. She picked something up from the seat, hopped out of the booth and walked to where her father stood behind the counter. He nearly collapsed to the floor when he saw what she was holding out to him. “I sat on this,� she said in the blunt way she often spoke. “Did you put it there? Is it a birthday present? Is it money?�

The envelope was just as he remembered it, heavy, parchment-like paper, every word hand-written in green ink. He only had time to read

Ms. J. Smith
The Booth on the Left

before he felt his chest begin to tighten. Zacharias Smith knew his well-crafted deception wasn’t going to hold up any longer. He only hoped that his world would. He was absolutely certain of only one thing: he was going to need his wand.

“You’re going to have to say all that one more time for me. At least. And slowly, please,� Edie said when they got home that night and he showed her the letter. Zacharias had briefly considered not showing it to her at all, but he knew what could happen when Hogwarts letters were ignored. Jezzie probably wasn’t another Harry Potter, but however intent on having her the school might’ve been, it was generally better to just open the first letter.

To her great credit, Jezzie had taken the whole thing very much in stride, at least as much as she knew. Zacharias hadn’t told her about his own past at the school, that her grandparents were probably still alive on an estate on the outskirts of the city where the brooms pushed themselves about, or that her father had left the school in disgrace. That would come later. For now, all she knew was that she was being invited to learn magic, which seemed to surprise her very little, all things considered.

“It’s a school,� Zacharias said, slowly, as though he were talking to someone from another country. “She’s been invited to go and learn magic there.�

“Like how to saw a lady in half?� Edie asked.

“No,� Zacharias said. If she thought he was joking, he hoped the look on his face was enough to disabuse her of that notion. He thought it was, from what he could see in the mirror behind her. His face, bearded and now bespectacled but still showing some of the well-formed angles of his youth, was a grim mask, his mouth a hard line.

“Real magic, mum,� Jezzie said helpfully. “I can go.� It wasn’t a question. “Cause dad did. Right? Tell her.�

“That’s right,� Zacharias said. He knew he was going to have to prove it, he just hoped that he could make the time between now and then last as long as possible. He had no wand, and although he’d learned some minor wandless magic at Hogwarts, even that was very advanced stuff compared to the ease of using a wand. He didn’t know if he had the fingers for it any longer.

“I thought you went to…,� Edie trailed off as she realized that they had never, in all their years together, actually discussed where Zacharias had gone to school, at least not in any significant detail. “Hang on…this doesn’t make any sense.�

“No,� Zacharias agreed as he screwed up the fingers of his right hand into a series of contortions that were familiar in aching pain that they caused to blossom in his joints, “it doesn’t.� With a final snap of his fingers that echoed off of the plaster walls of the flat, a small purple flame burst to life and hovered about an inch above the palm of Zacharias’ outstretched hand. Edie pressed herself back into the large orange chair that she liked to read in, as far away as she could get from the flame while still being in the chair. Jezzie was fascinated.

“How did you do that?� Edie asked.

“Magic.� He snapped again and the flame disappeared. Zacharias thought absurdly that he would never be able to adequately explain to his wife how difficult that small spell had been to do without a wand.

“Have you always been able to do that?�

“Not always. My mum and dad…they have magic too,� Zacharias explained. “I got my invitation to Hogwarts on my eleventh birthday and went there to learn. Before that I only could do a few things at random. I got really angry once and managed to kick a pumpkin from our garden a mile off. That sort of thing.�

Edie was suddenly on high alert, “Have magic? They’re alive?�

Zacharias had known this was coming too. “I think so.�

“You think so?�

“Look, Edie,� he said, “I’ve never lied to you. About any of it. When I left all of this behind, I left for good, my parents included, and they never tried to find me either. One of the things that drew me to you was the fact that you could let me be myself without the magic, without my past. I didn’t have to lie.�

“But why did you do it?� she asked. “What could make a person leave, well, I don’t rightly know what it is, but what could make someone leave real bloody magic behind?�

“Is-is it alright if we save that for another time? I’m not sure I’m quite ready to talk about that yet. If you can believe it, this has all come as a shock to me too,� he said.

She never hesitated for a moment. “You can tell me when you’re ready. We’ve gotten along this far. If you say that you’re the same man with or without magic, I believe you.� Zacharias felt a stinging behind his glasses and blinked it away.

Jezzie was watching this all with rapt attention and finally broke in, “So can I go?�

“Is it a good school?� Edie asked.

“The best,� was all Zacharias could say by way of response. Something in her eyes seemed to bore right through him, to understand what was going unsaid: if it was the best, he hadn’t appreciated it that way. Edie’s eyes passed between Zacharias and Jezzie. Jezzie’s stared straight back into her mother’s, willing her to give the answer she so wanted.

“And you, you’re alright with her doing this even with…whatever happened to you?� Edie asked.

“Sometimes, when magic is involved, choices are limited,� Zacharias answered. “If she has talent, and they think she does, then she needs training.�

Edie nodded. She read the letter that she had been clutching in her white-knuckled hands throughout the entire conversation over once more. It might’ve been the twentieth time. Her grip on its thick, creamy paper loosened slightly, and she handed it without a word to Jezzie.

“Really?� Jezzie said. “Really?! Thank you, thank you, thank you!� She got up like a shot and pelted down the short hallway toward her room, whooping the entire way.

“We’re going to have a long, long talk,� Edie said when she was out of earshot. “You know that, right?�

“I do,� Zacharias said.

“But before that,� she said with a tired smile, “do I get to meet your parents?�

Suddenly a cracking sound could be heard from outside the window, just outside the apartment where the iron fire escape was bolted to the building. Edie nearly jumped out of her skin, thinking that someone had decided to celebrate bonfire night early, but Zacharias remained stone still. He knew that sound. Someone had Apparated onto their fire escape. When he’d sent the owl to his parents’ manor, he had hoped that the effort of spotting and flagging down a magic owl would be worth it. It seemed it was.

“I think you may be about to,� Zacharias send. The window slid open with a CHUNK, and after ducking his head to squeeze his lanky body through, Zacharias’ father was standing before him. As a boy, Zacharias had often heard people say that he looked like his father. He hadn’t really believed it until just that moment. Ezekiel Smith was even taller than his son, but had the same wheat-colored hair and gold-flecked brown eyes. Even his nose, slightly upturned, was exactly the same as Zacharias’ own. He was sixty now by Zacharias’ estimation, but there wasn’t a grey hair to be found anywhere on his head. He looked older, that much was true, but wizards’ long lifespans meant that he looked, at most, ten years older than the last time his son had seen him.

“Son,� was all he said.

“Dad,� was all Zacharias said.

“I…I got your message,� Ezekiel said, taking a tentative step toward his son. He seemed not to have noticed Edie, or Jezzie, who had heard the commotion and was peeking around a corner at everything. Before Zacharias knew what was happening his father had clasped him in a tight embrace, the first he could remember in his whole life.

When it broke apart he stared into his father’s eyes for a long moment. “You never tried to find me.�

“No,� his father insisted. “We always knew where you were. Always. But we knew you didn’t want us around. The way you left, everything that happened. We thought one day you would come back to us. And you did.�

“Hello,� came a small voice from somewhere near the floor. Jezzie was standing there, her hand extended toward her grandfather. “You’re my granddad.� It wasn’t a question.

“I am,� Ezekiel said, bending his knobby knees limberly to get down to her level as he took her hand and shook it. “Jezebel, yes? I heard you’ve been invited to Hogwarts.� He stood again and beamed at Zacharias, “Another Smith for Hufflepuff, eh? Loyalty, fairness, kindness.�

“Maybe.� Zacharias found that he had suddenly lost the good feeling that had threatened to bubble up from somewhere deep inside him. Edie broke him from his reverie by standing from her chair and introducing herself. Zacharias was gratified to find that his father had nothing to say about his son marrying a Muggle, though he was sure it was on the tip of his tongue. Loyal, fair, and kind the Smiths of Hufflepuff might’ve been, but they were also pureblooded as far back as anyone could remember which, among wizards, was quite a long ways. It was such a long ways, in fact, that no one really knew where the line began.

“Hufflepuff?� Jezzie asked. “That’s a stupid-sounding word. What's it mean?"

“Tell you later,� Zacharias said, then turning to Ezekiel, “Did you bring it?�

“I did.� He reached into an inner pocket of his long blue coat and withdrew Zacharias’ wand. It looked just the same, an eight inch length of cream-colored maple, the handled carved with whorling, non-sensical patterns. Just looking at it he could feel the dragon heartstring thrumming, singing to him. Singing for him. Mr. Ollivander had said that it had come from one of the largest Welsh Greens ever on record. Who knew if that was true. Probably Mr. Ollivander did.

He took it hungrily from his father’s hand, suddenly seized by the knowledge of just how much he had missed it after so long. The world seemed to go slightly dim around him, nothing lit properly except for himself and his wand as he felt the power rush back into and through him. When he felt it begin to settle he gave it a small flick. He felt the sparks before he saw them, golden and beautiful, cascading from the end of the wand and fading from sight just before they fell to the floor.

“Whoa,� Jezzie breathed from his right.

“Still got the feel for it, I see,� Ezekiel said with a wry grin. Zacharias was acutely aware of the fact that he couldn’t remember having seen his father smile before.

Edie said nothing, merely clasped her hand to her mouth. She still hadn’t quite believed what was happening until that moment it seemed.

“Can I try it?� Jezzie asked.

She reached for the wand and Zacharias pulled away. “No. Not this one. Every witch or wizard has their own wand. And besides, if you did any spells at your age we’d have the Ministry on us faster than you can…�

“Ministry?� Edie asked. She seemed to be taking all of this entirely too well, to the point that Zacharias was sure he was in for some sort of breakdown when they went to bed that night, assuming any of them could actually sleep.

“Our government,� Zacharias explained, surprised at how easily the word “our� had come out of his mouth in relationship to something magical. “Mostly they just try to make sure nobody spills the beans. Anyway, you’ll get your own wand, Jez. The best we can afford.�

“You don’t have to worry about that,� Ezekiel said.

“I’m not going to let you pay for this, Dad,� Zacharias said firmly.

“I’m not,� his father replied. “She is.� He leveled his index finger at Jezzie.

“Me?� For the first time all day Jezzie sounded incredulous. “I don’t have any money.�

Ezekiel reached his long-fingered hand back into the pocket from which he’d taken Zacharias’ wand and he drew a delicate golden key. He handed it to Jezzie. “I think you’ll find that you do. When your grandmother and I found out that you had been born, we started a small investment fund for you with Gringotts. It’s entirely yours and rather sizeable just now.� He turned to Edie, “Did your husband tell you that he came from considerable wealth? I expect he didn’t.� Zacharias’ face burned.

Edie was suddenly at his side. “No, he didn’t. And it wouldn’t have mattered.� Ezekiel looked to be lost for words at that, and Zacharias only hoped that what he ended up finding didn’t include anything unintentionally offensive toward Muggles, not that Edie would have known the difference.

He finally gave a small cough to give himself more time to think and said, “Well, in any case, you’ll need to get her shopping done sooner rather than later I should think. Term is coming up quickly. If…if you don’t want to take her your mother and I could…�

“No,� Zacharias said. “I’ll take her. I need to do it.�

“Take me where?� Jezzie asked.

“To Diagon Alley.�

---

As much as she wanted to come along, Edie agreed without much argument that she would mind the store while Zacharias took Jezzie shopping the next day. He didn’t know quite how he would feel about the whole experience and didn’t want to worry her if he was unable to handle it. Jezzie had no choice but to be introduced to all this. Edie didn’t have to be. They took a bus down streets that ached with memory for Zacharias. He’d come down them before with his mother and father to do his own school shopping, and in later years gone with friends, entirely free of parents.

They disembarked in front of a building so thoroughly black and soot-stained that it looked as though it had recently been burned. But, as they always had, the colors changed as you approached, the creaky, swinging wooden sign faded from black to gold and displayed the words “Leaky Cauldron� in ornate carved lettering. Zacharias wondered if Jezzie could see what he did or if that only came later, once you’d really learned how to see what went on behind the world’s many obscuring layers of curtains.

“What’s this place? Is this the magic stuff shop?� Jezzie asked as she stared at it. She’d dressed in the most punk fashion she could muster, but even that was relatively mild, considering that she was eleven years old. Edgy haircuts were one thing, but the edgiest her clothing got was a red and black checked flannel and jeans that were ripped at both knees. He was fairly certain she’d done the ripping herself, and that he hadn’t bought them that way.

“No,� Zacharias said. “It’s a pub, of sorts.�

“I get to go into a pub?!� Zacharias was only a little disturbed at how eager his daughter seemed about that prospect.

“We’re just passing through,� Zacharias said. They entered to the sight of a motley collection of people, scattered all about the place. A man wearing an orange top hat was bent over a pint across the table from a goblin, and they were playing some sort of chess-like game where all of the pieces were different kinds of reptiles, undulating and glistening in the dim light as they made their moves. Three witches wearing matching purple shifts were muttering to one another in low tones in another corner and shooting dirty looks at anyone who came within ten feet of them, which was most people, given the size of the place. The room smelled of smoke, both tobacco and from cooking, with light tones of a bonfire thrown in for good measure.

“Hello, welcome,� came a distracted-sounding woman’s voice. The innkeeper was bustling about with armfuls of empty glasses and soiled washrags.

“’Lo,� Zacharias said as he passed, intending to leave it at that and pass through to the wall where one could enter Diagon Alley. Before he could, he heard a deafening crash and the distinctive sound of glass breaking. He turned instinctively toward the sound and saw it was the woman. She was staring at him, eyes wide and white. And suddenly he knew her. She had gained some weight since the last time he’d seen her, but she’d been only a girl then, and a wisp of a girl at that, all pink cheeks and hair that she wore in pigtails until she was eighteen. She was unmistakable. She was Hannah Abbott.

“Where’s Justin?� Zacharias Smith asked as he threw himself into an open seat in the train carriage. It seemed like every year it got harder and harder to find a good seat on the Hogwarts Express, especially as he grew taller and taller, while the rest of the train’s occupants seemed to grow smaller, if anything. Ernie Macmillan gave him a light shove, but said nothing. Across the carriage, Hannah Abbott just stared at him as though he had three heads. “What? Don’t tell me he’s missed the train.�

“Yeah,� Ernie huffed, his pale face going beet red beneath his dark blond hair. “He has.� He crossed his arms so violently that Zacharias had to laugh. Ernie had always been emotional, to say nothing of overly sensitive, and there was almost nothing funnier than annoying him to the brink of real anger.

“Oh shut up!� Hannah barked, lobbing a book at him. It missed his head only narrowly, banging into the wall of the compartment and falling open on the seat.

“Oi! What’s that about, eh?� Zacharias snapped, suddenly realizing that this was more than today’s game of “get a rise out of Ernie.� For a furious moment he considered whipping it back from whence it came with his strong Chaser’s arm, and he might’ve done had it been Ernie who threw it.

Something seemed to loosen within Ernie, and his round face twisted into a look of confusion that would have been amusing if it weren’t for the narrowly avoided head trauma. “You really don’t know, do you?�

“I hate when people answer questions with more questions,� Zacharias said. Hannah looked like she wanted to throw something else at him, but had nothing to hand that she was willing to lose.

“You are a true bloody idiot,� Ernie blustered. “What is it like to not pay any attention at all to the world around you? Really, I must know!� He waited a moment and when no recognition dawned on Zacharias face, he sighed dramatically, as was his way, “Justin isn’t going to be at Hogwarts this year.�

“He’s what?� Zacharias asked. “Did he flunk out? He wasn’t the bubblingest cauldron on the fire, I grant you…�

“He’s Muggle-born,� Hannah said, and suddenly she was sobbing into her hands. “They won’t let him come to school this year because his parents are Muggles.�

“Who won’t?!� Zacharias felt his face get very warm at the sight of Hannah’s tears, and of Ernie’s obvious concern for her as he swapped seats to sit next to her and placed one of his large, thick hands gently on her shoulder, gripping it reassuringly.

“The Ministry, their commission or whatever it’s called,� Hannah wailed. “He can’t come to school and he said he was going to have to go to a trial. He said there are dementors keeping his house under guard.�

“Dementors?� Zacharias flashed back to third year, when a group of dementors had made their way onto the Quidditch pitch during a match and caused Harry Potter to lose consciousness and fall from his broom. It had been Zacharias’ first year as a Chaser for the team. Harry had fallen so fast and so close to where he’d been sitting on his broom, soaked to the bone by the driving rain in his heavy Quidditch yellows, that he’d felt the wind as Harry’s limp form passed him before being caught by a spell from Professor Dumbledore.

At his repetition of the word, Hannah launched into a fresh fit of sobbing, her pigtails falling over her shoulders and wobbling in a way that, in a different situation, Zacharias might have joked about.

“He’s going to be brought before a tribunal at the Ministry to prove he didn’t steal his magic. You believe that?� Ernie asked, chomping and gnashing at the air as he spoke, his righteous anger rising again.

“You can’t steal magic,� Zacharias said. “You can do it or you can’t. Right?�

“Well, of course,� Ernie said. “But what does the truth matter when V…Voldemort� he had whispered the name but was clearly proud of himself for having used it “is running the whole show?�

“Why didn’t I know about any of this? Zacharias asked. “I mean, I knew he was back but…how did you both know about Justin?�

“He sent us letters,� Hannah said. Zacharias suddenly saw in his mind the image of an envelope, a plain white rectangle unlike the sort of stationary favored by wizards, that had been flown through his bedroom window by a large barn owl back in June. The letter had been addressed to him in Justin’s haphazard scrawl, but he had set it aside for later. He couldn’t remember if he had ever gone back to open it. The train pelted along a bend in its track for a moment as the three Hufflepuffs sat in awkward silence.

“Mine must’ve got lost,� he lied.

“Well it’s bloody bad and…,� Ernie was cut off midstream as a cadre of black-clothed adults wafted past the compartment. Their heads never moved in the slightest as they went, but the feeling that they saw everything nevertheless was inescapable. Hannah shivered where she sat as they passed, and Ernie’s eyes glinted with fire and steel. Zacharias was caught somewhere between the two and simply froze in place, neither looking directly at them or away from them. One, a black-haired woman, curled her upper lip in a nasty sneer as she passed, apparently noting the yellow and black Hufflepuff badges on Ernie and Hannah’s prefect’s robes.

“Death Eaters,� Ernie growled when they had gone by.

“What are they doing on the train?� Zacharias asked.

“Oh I’m sure they’ve got some official post from the Ministry, checking up on discipline, making sure no Muggle-borns got this far. But make no mistake. They’re Death Eaters alright. Going to be at the school too,� Ernie said, causing Hannah to experience a fresh bout of shaking. He patted her shoulder distractedly. “They’re saying Harry, Ron, and Hermione aren’t on the train. Won’t be at school. It’s going to be up to us to do something about all this. To keep everyone safe.�

“Us?� Zacharias asked.

“The D.A. You, me, Hannah, all the others. Or whoever’s left at any rate,� Ernie said in low tones, though the Death Eaters were well past by then.

“I know what I’m going to do,� Zacharias said.

“Oh?� Ernie asked.

“I’m just going to stay in the common room all year.�

If Ernie got the joke, he didn’t find it very funny. “You know what, Zacharias?� Ernie sighed, casting his eyes out the window over the misty, rolling landscape. “I believe that you would.�

---


That year’s Sorting Ceremony was one of the dourest events Zacharias could ever remember. The Great Hall had been stripped of any decoration, the professors all looked as though they had swallowed something horrible, and it seemed as though every other person, Muggle-born or otherwise, had elected not to come to school. It was hard to blame them; sharp-eyed men and women dressed all in black marched up and down the tables, looming even over the Slytherins as they went. Hardly anyone spoke, and every small noise echoed thunderously in the silence.

The actual Sorting, usually a source of great fun, served only to make things worse. For one thing, the hat didn’t have a song, or if it did it wasn’t allowed to sing it. For another, only the Slytherins cheered when a first-year was added to their ranks, and most of them were. The Ravenclaws, always so concerned about the prestige of their own house even in times of trouble, at least engaged in some polite clapping whenever they managed to get someone new. Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs, as per usual, were kind to the young people who found themselves among them, but there was no cheering from either table. Zacharias found that he could count the number of first years sorted into both houses combined on his fingers alone.

The food that followed was spartan by Hogwarts standards, but the arrival of food meant that enough noise would be reverberating around the walls that one could speak at a reasonable volume without having to worry about being overheard.

“Three,� Ernie muttered to his mashed potatoes. “Can you believe that? Three first-year Hufflepuffs.�

“Well, you had to know that if Slytherin-types were taking the place over we’d be the first to go,� Zacharias said coolly. “Honestly, loyalty, and fairness aren’t exactly what they’re known for.�

“First to go? What sort of attitude is that?� Ernie sputtered. Susan Bones, who had lost so much weight over the summer that she looked like a red-headed skeleton, hushed him by gripping his arm until her knuckles went white.

“A realistic one. It’s not my fault you don’t see that,� Zacharias said, stopping himself from saying more with a mouthful of roast beef.

“Right, the one who didn’t know until the train that the school was in trouble is going to lecture me now. Is that it?� Ernie’s face was going beet red again, and he looked as though he might throw off Susan’s grip entirely in an effort to get across the table to Zacharias.

“I think you both need to shut it!� Hannah hissed from next to Zacharias, fully recovered from her brief episode on the train. She quieted as a Death Eater passed behind her. Had he stopped for a moment? Had he heard her? That and worse careened through Zacharias' head, distracting him so much that he nearly forgot to swallow his food. When they were well gone, Hannah reached into the folds of her robes, withdrew something from one of its many hidden pockets, and slammed it onto the table with an open palm. When she withdrew her hand a single coin was revealed. A golden Galleon.

“Is that what I think it is?� Zacharias backed away from it slightly as though it were infected with some kind of airborne disease.

“You have yours, right?� Hannah asked. Ernie was grinning madly from across the table.

“Of course I do, but…,� Zacharias said.

“But nothing,� Ernie said. Contrary to popular belief, he was smart enough not to take out his own coin. “What’s the plan?�

“Meeting. Tonight. Whoever can make it,� Hannah whispered. She looked off into the middle distance toward the Gryffindor table. Zacharias followed her gaze and caught sight of Neville Longbottom, who appeared to be talking to someone sitting next to him, but who had eyes only for Hannah. Sharper than he looked, that one, Zacharias thought, noting that there was no furtive wink, no shallow nod of the head to indicate that anything was passing between them.

What remained of the feast passed largely in silence. Ernie and Hannah did their duty as prefects, leading the Hufflepuffs to the common room, but there was none of the usual joy in it, the furtive cheerfulness that always accompanied the teaching of house secrets to younger students. Hannah got most of the way through the entry ritual, tapping out the syllabic rhythm of “Helga Hufflepuff� on the correct barrel in the kitchen corridor, before she realized she hadn’t explained what she was actually doing. If there was one thing worse than first-years, Zacharias thought, it was first-years who had been doused in vinegar because they didn’t know the proper way to get into the common room, and he was relieved when Hannah quickly caught and corrected her omissions.

Once everyone had piled in, Zacharias could think of nothing so much as crawling into bed and sleeping through the meeting. His friends wouldn’t like it, but was that his fault? All he wanted was to finish this year unscathed so he could begin his internship at St. Mungo’s. Getting oneself killed might’ve seemed romantic to a knockoff Cedric Diggory with delusions of becoming an Auror like Ernie, but Zacharias Smith was going to be a doctor, and a living one at that. If they did manage to shame him into going to the meeting that night, he resolved as he pulled the mustard yellow covers of his bed up to his chin, he would only stay long enough to tell them that he would not be attending any further meetings. Someone else could have his coin. Someone with less to lose.

People would call him disloyal, they would say he belonged in Slytherin, not Hufflepuff. But he had heard that before. But there was more than loyalty and kindness involved in being a Hufflepuff. Fairness, a sense of justice, those were just as important, and wasn’t it fair, wasn’t it just that he be allowed to make his own life and death decisions? The thought kept sleep at bay, and before he knew what he was doing, Zacharias had thrown off the covers, left the dormitory that he shared with Ernie and the others in his year, and planted himself in front of the common room fire with the house copy of The Tales of Beadle the Bard, a leatherbound book so old and yellowed Zacharias thought it might fall apart if he just looked at it too hard.

He fell asleep in his armchair without realizing it, somewhere in the middle of the tale of the three brothers, and woke to find the fire burned to embers, and two shadowy figures looming over him.

“It’s time,� the larger of the two said in a Glaswegian accent. It was Ernie. Bleary eyed and with a splitting headache, Zacharias rose quickly dressed himself, and left the common room behind the others.