Black coffee, with sugar

Chapter 16

"Hey, Greengrass, are you done messing with that iron box?", asked her boss, and Daphne, hunched over the iron box with a probable faerie item inside, looked up.

"No.", Daphne really wanted to finish melding it, and while yes, she did understand that if her boss ordered her to do something, her little project to be solved will have to be put on hold, and who knew what would be the object's reaction, when allowed to steep in magic.

"Well, then you should stop, because the owner of it is wreaking havoc, and the Aurors asked for it back.", he continued, and Daphne frowned. The owner? "A little girl, apparently. Very wild accidental magic, but they can't do anything because she will ever only answer to the box. Can you take it upstairs? And... Repair it, if you broke?"

Daphne looked at her half-open box, and nodded. Her boss, visibly relieved, went to check on another station. Daphne stared at the box, almost seeing what was inside, and taking a deep breath, fixed it. Whatever was inside, was important enough for an emissary to be sent out.

The fairies hardly ever, nowadays, interacted with the outside world; Portree, Daphne figured, was something of a gate and a market, a way to get fresh blood inside without getting out. There was a reason she had been warned to not take "free" samples from strangers, and it was because, with the fey, nothing was really free. There always a payment to be done, if you took something from them. Today, Daphne had something of them, and it was being asked back. She didn't want the fae to be indebted to her.

She hurried to the Auror office, box in her arms as safe as possible, listening to people comment on the apparent situation. Everyone seemed to describe the presumed fairy differently - ranging from a child to a creature to an old crone -, and Daphne, with every mumbled report, walked faster, wondering, in a far-off corner of her mind, what the fairy would be like, to her.

Daphne would've knocked on the office's door, but alas, it seemed like every Auror was crowded in the hallway. She looked at her box, then directed her eyes to the door, where she could see just a glimpse of the magical hurricane going inside. With a deep breath, Daphne started elbowing people out of her way. It wasn't the polite thing to do, but matters were urgent as they were, and the box felt like it was made of lead, instead of iron.

"Hey, what are you...?", a familiar voice asked, grabbing her arm, and Daphne looked at Harry, his eyes focused on the box. "Is that the box it is looking for?"

"It?", Daphne raised an eyebrow, and Harry shrugged.

"I see it as a snake. A really big one.", he did mumble something that sounded vaguely like "I wish I spoke parseltongue still", but Daphne chose to ignore it. He wasn't part of the Slytherin line, after all. He motioned to the box, and Daphne kept her elbowing situation going forward, only now with company. "Is that...?"

"What it's presumed to be looking for? Yes, seems like it.", Daphne shrugged, approaching the door, where there was a small shield spell holding the items floating inside from reaching the outside. Daphne couldn't see inside.

"Then why didn't it go to you?", Harry asked. He tapped the shoulder of someone, and he looked back at Harry. "Hey, seems like Unspeakable Greengrass got the box."

"Thank Merlin, we're already strapped for supplies as it is,", whoever it was replied, making space for Daphne to go through. "Have the fun of your life."

Daphne didn't see how, exactly, she was going to have fun, but she looked at Harry, and nodded to him. She wasn't sure how to convey that, if anything were to happen to her, Lilian should stay with him, when there was almost the entire Auror office listening in, but she hoped he got the message. Or, better yet, he wouldn't need to be told - he'd do it himself. If only, though. Daphne took a deep breath and dived in, and somehow, the flying items seemed to avoid her as she made a beeline for the screaming fairy. Daphne, however, heard nothing but silence. The scream wasn't as much as physical as a heavy, foreboding feeling she had inside her head.