Vagary

{Sixteen}

After a few hours of a late-night working through details and minor evidence, Harry felt more than tired. Not only was it exhausting to try and get information from a castle of children, but it really put him to the test on things he was supposed to know.

McGonagall was handier than ever in filling in more gaps, but as the night went on, it felt like no matter how hard Harry tried, he'd be filling them in forever.

Remus helped with all the children, names, unruliness, and all while giving him the side-eye, probably attempting to see if at the end of their arduous night he could glean some information from him about Hermione and Severus. He was lucky to have known Remus in his past life to be able to see it now. Though he was certainly changed, looking healthy, fit, and proud: a man deserving of happiness, it didn't change the fact he was marauder through and through.

Unable to get caught up in the throws of seeing him again, Harry focused on his notes for the disappearance of Caelum. The twins hadn't proved useful, they'd gone off with third-years Jacob Thomas and Phillip Harggle, leaving Mr. Black to a girl in Slytherin who said that she had left Caelum near the entrance of the school.

The entrance hall had no paintings in it, so they were of little help, and the ghosts were more geared towards watching over the newer students heading towards the dorms. Plaza had only arrived a few minutes prior, but seemed to have lost the boy's trace only a few feet out of the door.

Diagnostic spells were next, lurking around the main entrance to see if any charms or hexes had been casted strong enough to leave any magical residue.

What they ran into was unexpected to say the least.

An imperius curse, or the traces of it. They were able to identify the core of the wand that had done it, but only that and not the exact specifications of the wand itself nor its user. It was a start. Harry wrote down the unicorn hair note, glad enough that he had something at all to work with. Now, it was up to the other, less senior aurors, to see if anyone had reported unforgivable usage.

Frankly, he wasn't hopeful.

The night ended with him handing the case to other capable hands for the evening as he needed to sleep before he started once again on the investigation in the morning. Lest he be of no help, he left without saying goodbye to many of the people there.

The school was under protection of a rotation of two Aurors until Caelum was found, in constant contact with Minerva should they ever need it.

He wasn't thrilled to find Hermione stoic on the couch with Draco, looking no worse for wear than earlier, but at least far less depressed. They'd had a long weekend with her being so down and out, especially considering they were on edge about how being separated from Snape would affect her.

Even a glamor charm couldn't rid anyone of those deep-set bags under her eyes.

"How'd it go?" Draco asked, tired eyes on him.

"We haven't got much. An unforgivable, a theory it might be related to Mrs. Black, and then a wand core. Considering you're part of the Black family, and you two share the same god-father, I trust you to keep all this a secret?"

Draco nodded, and Hermione closed her eyes, resting her head on his shoulder.

"Severus stopped by earlier."

"I'd wondered where he'd gone off to," Harry commented, moving Hermione's legs out from beneath her and putting an arm around her.

"We didn't resolve anything, he still seems rather upset," she whispered, conscious of the amount of children and yelling he'd just dealth with. That and it was rather late into the night.