Thursday evening, 10 September 1942, in Delilah Lockhart Patil's house in Londinium...

[hand_of_shiva]

“Surya,” said Delilah Patil as she opened her door to her stepdaughter-and former schoolmate-she had been one of the Slytherin prefects during Surya’s first years at Hogwarts, and it had been Surya who had introduced her to her father when Maya had begun to have troubles. “It’s so good to see you, how have you been?”

Surya smiled as she followed Lilah into the house. “Quite well, thank you. My research is going as well as can be expected, given how difficult it is to get research subjects. How are you doing?”

Lilah started to say she was fine, but then she realised that it didn’t do to hide her emotions from people she loved-and remembered that Surya wasn’t especially good at noticing things without being told. “I’m…all right. But I’ve had some unsettling news about Gilderoy, and Rohan Chakravarty’s parents are putting financial pressure on him to come home-and I really can’t help him much more.”

“There are rumours of strange things happening at Hogwarts,” said Surya. “Two students have died since school started. There are wild stories of what killed them, but we can’t determine what really happened because the Aurors have mishandled it, as usual.” She added, almost as an afterthought, “I hope Gilderoy isn’t mixed up in that.”

Lilah paled slightly at the thought of it. She led Surya over to the couch in the parlour, and poured chai for them both; there was a tray of chaat-samosas and other small things she knew Surya liked-for the two of them to eat in lieu of a proper meal. Lilah wasn’t ever very hungry, and had eaten sparingly even before her husband had died. “He could be. If it has anything to do with whatever killed Maya.”

Surya took her chai gratefully. Bran was a nice boy, but his idea of a good cup of tea was decidedly English. “I don’t think so.” She frowned, trying to decide what she could say to Lilah without upsetting her too much or giving away too many secrets. “Whoever killed Maya brought her back and then kept her under control for some time. Whatever is happening at Hogwarts is different-apparently the ghosts were told to attack other students, but whoever killed them was not good enough to make the compulsion work. It was enough for the Aurors to think them a threat, but then, like most people, they are superstitious fools when it comes to the dead.”

Lilah nodded; she suspected Surya would think her superstitious as well, if they ever really talked about that, but Surya’s ability being what it was, she was always going to be much more comfortable with death than most people. “Gilderoy keeps seeing Maya in mirrors. I can’t tell if it’s grief or something more sinister. And he thinks he’s developing powers, and I can’t tell if it’s actually happening or just a wish to be special.” She sighed. “But whatever it is, there’s still something going on at Hogwarts, and he’s in the middle of it, and so are Rajinder and Anjali.”

Surya shook her head. “Whatever was said, it was the words of whoever was using her and cannot be trusted. I know; I talked to her after the control was broken.” After Maya had died and she had brought her back, that was. “But what of the other children? Viresh said nothing of them-well, he said nothing of anything he did at Hogwarts, which is only to be expected of him.”

“I don’t know,” said Lilah, and she looked all the more troubled. “Surya-I’ve really been out of my mind the last two years, haven’t I? I read Endymion’s letter, and it was like waking up from a dream.”

Surya paused, considering. Her first thought was to treat that as a figure of speech, but… “Do you really think so? Father’s death was a great shock, and for a time I thought that would be the end of his research, but there seems to be a great deal of interest in it all of a sudden. It might not be a coincidence. Viresh is even convincing people to talk to him, odd as it seems-he always before seemed to have a great talent for driving them away.”

Lilah started to say that it wasn’t just the research, but the last sentence hit her right where it counted. “He is?”

Surya smiled. “Oh, yes. He even had one come back to him today-though that one, I think, is more interested in my brother’s physical charms than his research skills. And for once the feeling is mutual.” She shook her head fondly. “After all the women my brother has turned down, can you imagine he fell for an Englishman?”

“Yes,” said Lilah after a moment. “I always thought it would be a man, in the end.”

Surya cocked her head. “Really? Well, you are better at judging these things than I am. I should have thought to ask you-we had a pool going, and I lost.” She grinned. “At least I had a better chance than Gareth Rosier-he was convinced Viresh was asexual-mainly because he’s the sort who cannot believe anyone would turn him down for any other reason.”

Lilah laughed softly. “And as for the English part…Viresh is out to prove he’s better at being Vikram than Vikram was.”

“There is that,” Surya nodded. “For all that he would deny it, the easiest way to get him to do something is to hint that he cannot do it as well as Father did.”

“So of course it’s an Englishman,” said Lilah. “No doubt it would have to be someone with quite a forceful personality.”

Surya laughed. “Oh, you have no idea. Gareth challenged him-I’m not sure if he wanted him, or was just upset that he’d actually succeeded where Gareth had failed-and got smacked down hard for his trouble. And then the Englishman-Trevelyan, I think it was-practically drags my brother back into his office for the rest of the afternoon.”

Lilah couldn’t help giggling. “That’s hilarious. Well, good for Viresh. I should perhaps apologise for the letter I sent him earlier today; I thought he was ignoring me, but he probably hasn’t come up for air in days.”

“Yes, he is rather single-minded when he discovers something new, isn’t he?” Surya was still smiling.

Lilah was still giggling. “Yes, but in this case, that’s really a good thing.” If she’d been talking to anyone else, she might have added that it was something Viresh had in common with his father, but that was something Surya really did not need to know.

Surya smiled again, but there was a touch of seriousness as she said, “Yes, I can’t believe he turned over Father’s notes. It’s one thing to use Mysteries to aid one’s research, quite another to tell them everything.” She knew quite well she’d have had a much harder time getting access to research subjects anywhere else; that, and the desire to have someone he trusted inside their offices, had been the only reasons her father had been able to accept her working there. “I don’t think he’s told them about me. My colleagues are terrible at keeping secrets from each other; if anyone had any suspicions, it would show.”

“Good,” said Lilah.

“It was bad enough when he was just harassing us.” Surya stumbled a bit on the last word; even with people who knew of her gift, the habit of keeping it secret was strong. “Now he’s got someone willing to co-operate, he might actually get some results, and who knows what he’ll do then.”

“Harassing you? Viresh was harassing you?” Lilah frowned.

Surya shook her head. “Not me, he never would. But he was up at Hogwarts, and there can’t be many reasons for that. It certainly wasn’t to talk to our cousins.”

“He went to interview Endymion Dashwood. I don’t know if you remember him-you were never around the business much, he used to brew potions for me.” Lilah sipped her chai.

Surya nodded. “Yes, you mentioned him. I don’t remember him, but he seems to have got the best of my brother. Viresh was not at all happy when he returned.” She smiled. “You know how rumours are; there was one going around that Chattox has forbidden him from returning to the school and threatened to let the hunters have him if he tries.”

Lilah sighed, though she was glad to know Endymion would be protected; Vikram had thought him both vulnerable and potentially far more powerful than he’d ever been willing to admit the possibility of being. “I do want the research to continue,” she said. “But not in a way that your father would not have approved of.”

“It’s Viresh we need to convince, and I don’t see any way to do that, short of finding one of us with a gift for persuasion. He’s so set on proving Father wrong about him that he can’t see the places where Father was right.” Surya shook her head.

“Your father wasn’t wrong. Viresh just didn’t understand him.” Lilah picked at a samosa.

“I know.” Surya nodded. “But just because he doesn’t have gifts, he thinks he has something to prove. I just wish I knew what it was. I know there are people who think we are dangerous, but I am never quite sure if my brother is one of them. He’s certainly willing to work for them.”

“Viresh has gifts; they’re just not the same sort of gift that you have, or Maya had. I wouldn’t have wanted that kind of trouble for myself, but…” Lilah shook her head. “I don’t know what to do with your brother, and I’m not sure I can do anything.”

“I can watch him. It should be easier now that he has a co-operative subject here in Londinium to keep him occupied.” Surya grinned; she still couldn’t quite believe it. “In more ways than one.”

“Good,” said Lilah. “I want to meet this man, but I don’t imagine Viresh will want me to.”

“Probably not,” Surya said. Asking Viresh to do something was the one sure way to get him to do the opposite, and doubly so if the request came from Lilah. “I’ll see what I can find about him. If he’s one of us, Father should have notes on him.”

“I have copies of almost everything,” Delilah said quietly. “Vikram made copies of everything, kept them in his vaults; Viresh only has what we had in the house when he died. But I don’t know how much or what that was. I went and picked up what’s here in Londinium today.”

“Good, then we can look at them now,” Surya said. “His name was Trevelyan, and he’s about my age. That should narrow it down enough, I think.”

Lilah got up, floating the tray of tea and snacks along behind her with a flick of her wand, and led Surya up the stairs into her father’s office, which had, for the most part, been kept as he’d left it, except for the boxes of files that Lilah had brought back that morning from Gringotts. After she set the tray on the desk, she removed the wards on them and opened them up, carefully. “Trevelyan…”

Surya watched, fascinated as always by how much work their father had put into his research. It really was a pity that Viresh had to go off in his own direction, because there were still so many unanswered questions. Why so many of them? Why now, and was there a reason for their gifts, or was it random?

“Here he is, Raphael Trevelyan, born 27 February, 1907…” Lilah sucked on her lower lip. “No picture.” She flipped the file open; there was only a birth certificate, a nativity and a single page of notes. “I don’t think your father ever met him. Just a note here, about the death of his mother.”

Surya nodded. That was all too common.

Lilah looked up at the maps on the walls, but there was nothing there either. She sighed and ate the rest of her samosa. “So the children. Rajinder would be about fourteen, Anjali rather younger.”

“Close enough that they can depend on each other,” Surya said. She’d been in her last year at Hogwarts when Viresh was in his first, and she wondered sometimes if things would have been different between them if they’d been closer in age.

“If they get along,” said Lilah hopefully.

“There is that,” Surya agreed. “I will invite them to stay with me over the holidays. I always hated winter in that castle.”

“I think you should all spend the holidays here,” said Lilah, who really liked the idea of it, even including Viresh and whoever his new lover was. “I suppose it would be too much to hope for, that Viresh’s friend might settle him down…”

“Perhaps,” Surya said. “He did seem rather protective of my brother. They can’t have known each other long, but it could be serious. It will be good for him, if so-even I know that sometimes you need to think about something other than research.”

Lilah smiled at her. “I’m glad,” she said quietly. “Viresh would never let anyone else protect him.”

“Yes, but I think he’s finally found someone more stubborn than he is,” Surya said fondly.

Lilah laughed. “Just like his father,” she said, and then she winced.

Surya nodded in sympathy. “I miss him too.”

“He was killed by one of his subjects,” Lilah said softly, hardly more than a breath. “Piccard. We trusted him, Surya. He wanted it more than Viresh does. Look after your brother. Some of these people…some of them really are dangerous. And not necessarily the powerful ones.” She wiped her face on her sleeve, awkward and nervous as always when talking about it.

Surya reached out and laid a hand on Lilah’s shoulder. “I will,” she said softly.

dirty_delilah and hand_of_shiva