potter was silent
“let me rephrase that will you be able to get up every m and push through diffiult, almost hopeless situans? will you be alright digging through people’s personal lives in an impersonal way, oftentimes making them unomfortable, even ausing them pain? will you do that if it will help you reah your ultimate objetive?” igora leaned forward and held his stare will you wear fshing holiday jumpers if it means…she frowned “will you give everything to save the life of the person you’re tasked to find?”
“yes,” potter said
“yes to whih?”
“all of it,” he pursed his lips “it isn’t about me”
there it was igora sighed and sat bak so the ulminan of her legay would be taking the great harry potter under her wing “you’re going to end up transferring out by the holidays”
he smiled, “i really don’t think i will”
she eyed him “you’ll have long nights, early ms if you keep your london address, the ommute will wear on you”
“i’ll get a ft here,” he nodded
“your personal renships will suffer,” she stated she shot him a oy smile “you won’t see muh of your boyfriend”
harry didn’t blink “he’s a workaholi, too” a seond went by and then he’d realized what he’d said “hang on, how do you know about that?”
ignora’s smile widened “i have eyes,” she said “even if i didn’t, all edinburgh talked about st week was harry potter’s trip and his very publi arguments with drao malfoy” she winked “and your poor fasn hoies whih,” she nodded and looked down at his pin bk suit and tie, “i’m gd to see today are solid fabris”
iarus sableton stood in the atrium pretending to listen to bastien queensbury’s piering ompints on some level, he was grateful for his reent time spent with a mlaggen as it inreased his patiene threshold
“—and we’ve instituted several new inter-departmental mandates that require your full ooperan in these matters i won’t lose another areer-making ase beause of your iude!” queensbury gred at iarus “are you listening?”
“no,” he replied and turned his head at the sight of unspeakable malfoy “exuse me” iarus followed the blond and joined him in the lift one the doors losed, he turned and asked, “still no urge to join the eleven?”
malfoy slowly turned and stared at him “no, i should think not”
iarus shook his head “you’re the first person to use one of the timepiees who hasn’t been drawn in by the power” he’d wondered at the ease in whih malfoy had simply handed the timepiee bak, ter submitting himself to testing for the pandora problem “you don’t feel ompelled to use it again?”
“i—i thought maybe,” malfoy stared at the lift doors and frowned “but what would i want to mess with time for? the way i see it, i’m quite hy in the present”
the answer almost satisfied iarus, but he still didn’t quite know if malfoy ould be trusted the iniquitous eleven—or the ten, as they were a person short for the foreseeable future—were rumored to be divided on how to proeed with hoosing a repement for zivantus some viewed malfoy as the heir arent sine zivantus freely gifted the timepiee to him others had their own ideas about who theshould be but on the other hand, rumors of the ministry raking down on wayward departments meant the eyes that knew to look at the eleven—or ten—were going to be very ied in the events that had reently transpired the group might not hold as muh power as they’d like to believe well, apart from their autorati ontrol of time it would be a diey path going forward for all parties iarus wondered if the blond ould prove to be great ally in the oming days of hange
the lift reahed the department of mysteries and malfoy exited toward his offie “you have quite the level head, malfoy,” iarus said
he was answering the other man’s statement, but also ouldn’t help but think of malfoy’s suggesn the week before during his debrief he ouldn’t fet the moment malfoy had pulled a handkerhief from his poket and slid it aross the table “i’ve saved some of the inquollis arpus leaves” he’d added rather ominously, “should the ministry ever find themselves in a simirly dire situan”
iarus had been shoked to find out that malfoy knew about one of the department’s biggest and arguably best kept serets only seven other people knew of it, and iarus still hadn’t diserned if malfoy had figured it out on his own or if he’d been told for some speifi reason when he’d finished with malfoy and potter, iarus had walked the charm- sealed leaves of the pnt in quesn to a speifi shelf in the room of things that are fotten, misped, unused, and certainly don’t exist
he’d had to pass several dozen rows and quite a few reognizable objets that stood out among the piles of the gerous, the unwanted, and the broken he aught sight of the mirror of erised, the cloak of dramati billowing, the pensieve of broken memories, but deided to put what was left of the soul-cather near some bit of flesh in a jar he’d long suspeted to be voldemort’s nose
epilogue
“as we’ve seen, the urses are radially different from eah other but reted in that they eah pertain to a speifi greek mythos” herne stared at her wall of notes after two weeks of work, thousands of pages of a greek texts, hundreds of srolls depiting different myths, and four very haughty, flirtaus members of the greian ghost soiety, herne had figured out absolutely nothing about the urses ontained within pandora’s box “merlin,” she sighed and olpsed into a nearby armhair the room was barren save for the rge table that stood luttered with books, parhments, take away boxes, and the very mysteus item in quesn
she stared at the intriate silver box on the onferene table every
