Chapter 11:

Unseen Guardians Take Action

"My kids are going to be so stoked!" Amable said as she scratched the stray. "We have a puppy now!"

"There is no possible way you're a mother." Lucretia said in disbelief.

"Well… okay, nieces and nephews. But I'm the one always house and babysitting, and homeschooling, so I consider them mine." Amable said.

Even the dog looked at her funny as she talked. Lucretia liked her less and less the more she learned of her.

"You're not supposed to bring anything back from missions. No trophies." She explained.

"It's a dog! Not a trophy. I'm going to call you Grim!" Amable said.

That was a bit too on the nose. And more than a little ominous.

It was decidedly not a grim, of that, she was sure. She'd seen one before. The real deal. This was just a regular old dog, staring off into the woods around them with its tongue hanging out. It was probably trying to bum free meals off of people, one of the friendlier strays you can find.

Don't get her wrong, she adored dogs as much as the next gal. And he was adorable, but now wasn't the time to be adopting strays.

"Everyone else will tell you the same thing, but let's just get back to the hole out. I'm ready for bed." Lucretia pleaded.

The three of them walked along the path quietly after that. The only interruption was "Grim" hopping on his kind legs begging for the food in their bags occasionally. Okay, she was warming up to him. She could stay up an extra thirty minutes to give him a bath and meal at least.

They reached their little hideaway, a cabin well off the beaten path, and just waltzed right in. Everybody was crowded around the wizarding wireless on the table.

"Any interesting news?" Amable asked.

"DMLE has switched gears completely to find their kidnapped Auror and department head, so that ought to give us some breathing room. But Hogwarts is probably even more locked down than before." Said Manvel.

They all caught sight of the new addition to their team at the same time, to mixed reactions. Manvel laughed, Roderick sighed in exasperation while Antonio and Sandoa both fawned over the creature.

It padded right on over to the wall of hands waiting to pat him. His tailed wagged so hard that she worried it might break the table every time he hit it.

Then it howled and they all flinched away. No, wait. It wasn't the dog. Something outside howled, and it sounded close.

Everyone stood up at attention.

Antonio turned to their new companion.

"Friend of yours?" He asked Grim.

The dog seemed completely nonplussed by the sound of another canine nearby, so it probably was just another stray dog, but not a friend of his.

"Animal control is really out of sorts in these parts, aren't they?" Manvel asked.

"It just means more free pets for crazies like me." Amable said. "Now, let's get you fed."

She put her big paper bag down on the table and retrieved some kind of plastic wrapped confectionery. It resembled a croissant crossed with a doughnut with red frosting. She unpackaged it and bend over to offer it to Grim.

"You must be super hungry. Here you go." Amable said.

Another howl rang through the building, this one even closer. This time it actually made the hairs on lucretia's neck stand on end.

"Wait a minute… That sounds like a wolf. And isn't tonight…" Manvel started to ask when he was interrupted by Amable's screaming.

The dog just then lunged past the offered bun to wrap its fangs around Amable's face, and immediate began shaking its head violenet to tear her flesh from her skull. He brought her down to the ground and continued, her screaming and flailing all the while.

Holy fucking food aggression batman!

She fumbled to draw her wand, seeing everybody else do the same, as her mind raced with what spell to use to free Amable of the psycho dog when the back wall burst inward. The answer to Manvel's unfinished question came in the form of a fully transformed werewolf that removed his head from his shoulders in a single swipe.

And like that Lucretia knew this was a setup and this was no wild animal attack. As if to confirm her conclusion a third assailant, somewhere outside, started hurling curses through the walls as well. She, Roderik and Sandoa all had the presence of mind to hit the deck. Lucretia had the additional presence of mind necessary to recall that using fire against werewolves was more of a winning strategy that whatever the fuck kind of complicated restraining charm Antonio was trying to bind the creature with. She couldn't hear the incantation over Amable screaming into the maw of the dog wrapped around her face.

She dove towards the back door, away from the caster outside, and cast an advanced incendiary curse. A ball of fire exploded in the center of the room right in front of the werewolf. It was snuffed out in what she recognized as a perfectly cast counter spell.

She looked up to the man who had cast it, only to receive the death glare of Sirius Black. The mass murderer had stringy skin, tendons and muscles hanging from his mouth like spaghetti. In an instant his wand was pointed at her.

Not wanting to be reduced to a finger, she threw up a shield charm as fast as she could. Even with it, his blasting curse blew her through the wall and back door, which were thankfully unprotected by her shield and were disintegrated before she was flung through it. Splinters and larger wood fragments embedded themselves into her exposed back as she skidded across the frost-covered grass like a skipping stone.

She threw caution to the wind and went on the offensive. Giving up all pretense of defensive magic, she hurled a classic dueling pattern of spells. Piercer, bludgeoner, cutter, blasting and for a cherry on top, a crushing charm. The latter most didn't have an answer to or expect, and Sirius Black was no exception.

He deftly batted away both the piercer and cutter, ducked beneath the bludgeoner, and rolled away from the blasting curse while sending conjured chains and ropes at her. She opted to tank them, knowing her mobility was already a moot point for the large chunks of wood sticking out of her body and causing her pain even through the adrenaline high.

Her gamble paid off, as Sirius Black fell from the force of the crushing air pressure, the equivalent of finding yourself suddenly ten meters under the ocean for a split second. This opening gave her enough time to free herself with a single slash of her wand.

She wanted to finish the fight, but every instinct and bit of training told her to flee. From the base desire to continue living, to knowing she had to get word of Sirius Black joining forces with who could only be his fellow Death Eater, Fenrir Greyback, and both were after the Hallows.

She spun in place, prepared to apparate away, but was a split second too late.

"Sectumsempra!" She heard the spell that sliced her from throat to crotch.

She would have continued to apparate away, and likely splinched herself, but whatever this cutting curse was caused damned near as much pain as a cruciatus, but localized to the wound. It felt like the wound was being cut open and healed over and over and over again, the pain of the injury constantly fresh.

She fell to the ground unable to move as her body went into shock, and there she spasmed as she fought a battle of wills with her body.

"Damnit Snivellous! I wanted to catch at least one alive!" Sirius Black complained as he struggled against the pressure of her charm, which had still yet to subside.

A dark haired man walked into her view and canceled her charm, before offering a hand. Black took it and was lifted to his feet.

"You're in luck. One got away. Almost two there, thanks to you." This Snivelous person said.

"What? How is that my fault?" Black demanded.

Her vision was beginning to dark as she quietly choked on her own blood.

"Remember the young lady whose face you used as a chew toy instead of her throat?" Snivelous demanded. "Yeah, she portkeyed out."

"Damn it all! I told you we should have set up anti portkey wards too."

"There wasn't time for that and an anti-apparition ward." Snivelous told him. "And yet you still let this one escape even that precaution."

"Well, we can't interrogate anybody now. How much time do you reckon we have to raid the place before faceless gets backup?" Black asked.

"at least thirty minutes. Leave the corpses to me. I know how to get information out of them." Snivelous said, turning to Lucretia.

He tilted his head, and she saw him recognize that she was still alive. She wondered if he was considering saving her in order to have a live informant. If he was he must have decided against it, because a moment later he pointed his wand at her.

"Avada Kedavra!"

Hogsmeade weekend came around with muted enthusiasm from the student population, not least because of the standing army patrolling the entire castle and town.

The trolls from second year were brought back in to guard the interior of the castle, and somebody had worked out a deal with the centaurs to have them patrolling the grounds and path to Hogsmeade. There were actually fewer Aurors on patrol since the start of the week, one a couple dozen around Hogsmeade and Hogwarts. The nonhuman watchers were necessary substitutes so they could be literally everywhere else in the country on the hunt for Amelia Bones and Nymphadora Tonks.

Harry had additional accompaniments. A barely recovered Alastor Moody and Kingsley Shacklebolt. They were on their way to a Gringottes office here in Hogsmeade. Apparently they had branch offices who provided access to funds and legal services. Perfect place to have a hiring contract drafted and notarized for his two permanent body guards and tutors.

"We seem to have attracted a following." Said Kingsley.

He was right. Despite them opting to walk to Hogsmeade in places of taking the carriages, a lot of students were walking behind them. They were mostly walking because all of them were stir crazy, the two Senior Aurors from their confinement in the hospital wing and him from being confined in Gryffindor tower for his own protection. Or at least that's what he was told after the decision was made.

"They must feel safer in Potter's shadow than the thestrals and centaur guard." Moody said.

Thestrals? Oh right, those nightmare creatures drawing the carriage. He had also opted to walk after catching his first glimpse of those and being a little put off by the reason he was only seeing them now.

"I think it has more to do with the two bad-ass aurors flanking me." Harry said.

Moody snorted.

"Right, because they all witnessed Kingsley and I slaying a dragon and turning a Death Eater into spaghetti." Real-Moody guffawed.

"I didn't do the latter in front of a crowd." Harry groused.

Somebody, Ernie he thought, yelled a counterpoint from somewhere behind him.

"We saw the entire fight from Herbology!" He said.

"And Care of magical creatures!" He heard one of the Patils say.

"And ze charms class!" Said Fleur Delacour, who he hadn't realized was tagging along.

Harry glared behind him at all of the Hogwarts, Bauxbatons and Durmstrang students. The underclassmen actually shied away from his glare to hide behind the older foreign students.

"Then why in the bloody hell do you want to be anywhere near me?!" He demanded.

A series of murmurs and shrugs were their reply. He got the general message of them all trusting and liking him more than Aurors, centaurs and trolls. He supposed the latter was fair enough. He liked to think he certainly smelled better.

How badly do you have to fuck up to get Severus, Sirius and Remus to work together to come murder your ass? This bad. You have to fuck up this bad.

When I thought to myself "How would Sirius Black and Remus Lupin retaliate to the son of James Potter being targeted by and turned into a killer by a group of assassins?" The answer? "The same way Severus Snape would retaliate to the son of Lily Evans being targeted by and turned into a killer by a group of assassins. Mass fucking murder!" It took some restraint to have them wait both for a full moon and for the DMLE to be too preoccupied to interrupt their vigilantism, but it was worth it.

So yeah, not that anybody complained about the M rating being undeserved before, but it's definitely solidified now.