A/N: Hey, gang! Long time no see!

I am so, so sorry this took as long as it did. As you might have guessed, I finally found full-time work :) Still, here I am and here, hopefully, I will remain, as I've missed the Strange Invisible-verse and all the people in it.

My beloved SignoftheTimes helped enormously, as always. We're still roommates and still have a really good time. Newt is well and as evil as ever.

Hoping the same is true of all of you, and wishing you a happy, safe and prosperous 2014,

Madea

Nicolae Pavel shoved forward through chest-high shit, moving the gibbering Travers with him as they slogged deeper into London's stinking heart, the ancient sewers above them giving evidence to the great age of the city and its infrastructure; some of the graffiti was in Latin or even runes.

Pavel stopped as Arco raised a hand. He pressed his ear to the wall and nodded once. 'Mages?'

Three came forward. One of them raised her staff and began to chant in a high, sweet voice as the other two stood well back. The sewage began to move, slowly flowing backward. Could they have done that earlier, thought Pavel, piqued, but then Black was turning and went racing to get the other dogs.

The two remaining mages waited until the first was done to begin their own tasks. The second raised her staff and tapped. The wall did not vanish. Rather, it became dim, as if it were its own outline, and the third mage began to dissemble it piece by piece, the building groaning once and then settling as if nothing were the matter.

The gap was widening, wider, and now wide enough. The group moved in, dripping foully on the floor, and then the mages were closing the gap, with the pack of dogs in tense but silent readiness. Black growled suddenly, muscles locking as he hunkered down, hackles rising.

Pavel touched his back. 'What is it?'

Black's dog-nose was wet and cold under his hand. He nudged, grunting. Pavel could smell them coming; carrion-reeking, jack-booted, bloody-mouthed, charnel-minded. He growled too, low in his chest, and the other wolves came closer, packing together, hands hooking.

'Hold' hissed Lem. 'Hold a moment, lads.' He crept forward on his belly, straining to see outward in the very faint glow. The mages finished their work and the room was plunged into darkness. Arco dropped and crawled out to get Lem, tugging him back, and then went out again. Nicolae could hear Eugen sniffing and then he eeled back to where Nicolae was crouching down. 'Ten are coming.'

'We should welcome them.'

He could hear the small muscles of Eugen's face work as he grinned. 'When all you have is a hammer...'

The mages didn't need to open the wall again. One of them just dimmed it as the others drew through a stinking, endless stream and waited. The jack-booted feet continued to pound closer until they stopped not more than a few corridors over. One of them spoke.

'I smell somefin' he said in an accent Nicolae was straining to follow 'but I ain't hear nuffin.'

'Maybe a wall finally went.'

'Mebbe.'

The boots came closer. The wolves crouched, waiting. Lem smelled like he was grinning. 'We should leave one t carry the tale' he breathed. 'So it'll draw em down.'

'I agree. Hear that, gentlemen?'

Muted agreement from the wolves. The jack-boots were closer now. He could smell them coming. Another growl rose in his throat, vibrating in his throat and belly. He crouched down, waiting, and then the mages loosed the wall of sewage on them, and in the confusion the wolves attacked.

It was a short, pitched battle, and when it over and the lone remainder of Greyback's flunkies sent running to carry the tale as Lem had suggested, they pressed forward, Arco leading them by smell and hearing.

The sound of it was like silk drawn over silk. Pavel shuddered, knowing it was close, and then raised a hand to stop the column. In the dark he could clearly see where the other wolves were, even if he couldn't make out their faces more than just the shape of their features.

'Humans to the back and on the inside. Eyes down. Watch Travers, Gorgiu.'

They formed into a sort of chain. Pavel moved to the front and took Arco's shoulder as they pressed tightly together, belly to back. Arco took a slow step forward and then another more sure one.

The basilisk was nearing them now. It didn't feel like the other wolves had; this had an element of inevitability to it, a sense that things would play out as they played out. He shut his eyes more tightly and stepped in time with the others.

'Mages.'

The mages pressed forward. Through his lids Pavel could see the muted light from their staves as they raised them by feel and tapped. It should draw the creature, they thought. Maybe. One of them leaned toward him and then a soft cloth was covering his eyes. Pavel relaxed as the blindfold protected his gaze from the basilisk.

'Do you feel it?'

'Yes' said the lead mage. 'He's coming. He's here.'

That maddening sound. It was close now, so close that the fetid smell of the thing was almost worst than the choking stench of the shit that was dripping down their charmed bodies. Pavel had to fight his instinct to snarl and then run as the sound and the stench enveloped them blind. The basilisk was upon them, the basilisk was here.

The cold felt like a blanket. It came from nowhere and everywhere, cold enough that his toenails began to ache and his nosehairs crackle. The basilisk paused. The head揺ow it rasped and hesitated on the rough stone! The sound of it!-dragged slowly as it sniffed them with a wet, sticking sound that made his skin crawl.

It progressed again but more slowly, cautiously as the first tendrils of cold wrapped around the terrible body. He stayed directly against the wall and waited, smelling the thing, his heightened hearing making every noise a torture. It was coming. It was here.

A mage's staff, blindingly bright now. He raised his head instinctively as the sun seemed to flood in. The basilisk stopped and opened its mouth. It roared, stones shaking. A chip hit his shoulder and Nicolae ducked and then froze again.

He felt it go by. It brushed him, skin sickeningly smooth and soft, soft like a rotting corpse is soft. The cold was getting worse. The stones pressing his back were icy, unbearable. He groaned between clenched teeth despite himself and then drew in a sharp breath as the smell overwhelmed him completely.

The basilisk was thrashing now, flailing against the cold and ice which were slowing it. Behind him Travers was wailing and Lem was hitting him, rythmic as shushing. The column moved and Nicolae moved with it, step by agonising step. The ground was slippery underfoot. Ice, he thought, and then the column advanced again as the dogs pushed forward, led by Black, and began to bark.

It was a confusion of sound and stenches and sensations, when he tried in later life to think back. Just a lot of disconnected stimuli that had felt baffling and scary at the time. His feet kept going one in front of another and his hand found purchase on the wall, the one that wasn't gripping Eugen to keep the column together. The dogs were barking and snarling, eyes shielded for them as Black, with his own little blindfold, driving them on with his hoarse basso yelps and snaps.

From high above them there was a splitting, tearing sound and then a clap of thunder that shook Nicolae's teeth in his head. 'The roof!'

The others took up the cry. 'Paavo got the kids!'

The wolves cheered raggedly and then pushed forward, a new urgency in them. The flames would melt the ice if they didn't move quickly enough now. The basilisk was whipping its head from side to side but the struggle was weaker now. This seemed possible, if barely.

Above them the fire was singing as it ate the roof, and the wolves cheered again. 'Fuck the Dark Lord!'

With that sentiment swirling through them, the group began the task of getting the basilisk outside, as fire began to harry them from above and the next party of Greyback's boys got ever closer.

Nagini could smell change in the air, a sense of things altering and shifting that made her nervous. She raised her head, sniffing, and decided to call some of her little snakes to see what there was to see. Then she coiled herself around Hetty-Speaker and little Eda-young, sometimes lightly nudging one or the other to test that they were still breathing.

Greg-young was approaching her, shoes clicking. 'Nagini? Just got a letter from my da. Troop movements from here to London. Draco'll be here before too long, I should think.'

Nagini dipped her head and used the tip of her tail to ruffle his hair to show her understanding. Greg-young smiled a bit. 'When the time comes, we need to make sure the elves can get the kids clear. Me, I'm staying here.'

She quirked her tail, eyes narrowing disapprovingly. He was doing what? Despite his lamentable lack of skill in Speaking, Greg-young could guess. He gestured about them both.

'I helped make this. Not on purpose but I did. Now I'm going to fix it.'

No, he wasn't. 'Greg-young is not either' Nagini hissed, hoping that would translate. Greg-young touched her head fondly. 'Sides, Da'll need some help and I know the castle inside and out, now.'

Nagini held up the tip of her tail for quiet. Footsteps, coming closer. She could pick up at least ten distinct sets, some humans and some man-wolves.

'Oi in there.' The smell of him, she thought revolted. Of it. A creature like a man but who wasn't, a creature with a man's face and a man's heart but empty inside, cold like stone. She raised up to strike, herding children behind herself.

'We know you're in there.'

No one moved. No one spoke. Greg-young crept to the place where they entered and a small clear glass-thing opened. He shrunk down and pressed an eye to it. Could the men葉he things熔n the other side not see him?

'We know you're in there, Goyle. And Krum, you little motherfucker.' Some of them waved sticks at the empty spaces and made things to sit down on. Greg-human relaxed a little bit, shaking his head. 'They can't get in but we can't get out, now. What'll we do?'

Hetty-Speaker showed her teeth. 'Darling, let us take care of that. Nagini, when the snakes come back would you let me know?'

Nagini curled up around her and dropped her head for a nap. 'Nagini will do that. Nagini thinks Hetty-Speaker should sleep now.'

So the two of them did it, and Nagini waited, coiled, for her moment to strike.

In another part of Britain entirely, Metellus Travers sobbed as the wolves shoved him roughly through the twisting, winding tunnels of the Ministry's underground in order to drive the Basilisk庸oul, unnatural beast熔utside. His foot kept catching on the stones and he would stumble, and then hard, claw-like hands would right him and force him onwards. He could feel the air getting hotter and colder too, as the flames spread and they got closer to the outside. Once there was the beginnings of a skirmish but the basilisk, maddened, made short work of the boys Greyback sent, and they pressed onward against the heat as the mages made more and more ice to slow the thing so that it could be driven outside.

Travers had never seen himself as a bad man. A weak man, possibly. A man who liked the comforts of his easy, predictable life rather more than liberty and blood purity and everything else, and who had joined the Death Eaters mostly because he thought they gave him the best chance at preserving those things, but not a bad man as someone like Greyback was a bad man, or young McNair.

As he stumbled, he reflected on how a person as average預s unbad預s himself had ended up here, pushed along in the dark, his own piss dried raspy and salt-hard against his legs. There was no moment he could point to, definitively, as the key one, and finally he stopped trying, shaking his head a little as if to negate what was being done to him.

Finally the pushing stopped. Travers went still, raising his head a little. They were still, he perceived, under the ground. The tunnels were getting hotter, the ice dripping down the back of his neck as he stood.

'We're at a fork. What next, Travers?'

'I don't know.'

'You do.' The wolf punched him hard in the kidney and he went down, moaning. Travers heard water splashing under someone's feet and then Scabior was looming over him, hands tangled in his hair. He knew it was Scabior because the man bent down, mouth to his ear, and spoke.

'Fuckin useless cunt, you are. I oughts t open your throat rite now an save us all some damned bother.'

'No, no! Left! Left fork!'

A wolf hauled him back to his feet and pushed hard. 'Move, pimp! There's no women here for you to sell!'

That was, part of Travers' brain gibbered, a reference to something. His mind refused to conjure it and it faded as they climbed a few sets of slick, treacherous steps and then seemed to emerge into a wide-open space. The fire was much louder here and much closer; the heat seared his face and hands, made his nose-hairs feel crisp. Travers stumbled forward and his hands flew up, bound, to catch his fall. They slammed into something. The statue?

So it had come full circle even now. He had been wounded here once, badly, his sole moment of heroism, by these same men driving him through the corridors. He had been part of the group that voted to approve helping Bulgaria fight the werewolf menace just upstairs of here. He had left from here to visit Cunegard Lestrange of the thousand last names and a stare like a gorgon's.

How, finally, had it come to this? He raised his head more and tried to figure out where the basilisk was. He could hear the eerie scales slipping over the marbles and shuddered violently, stomach contracting like he needed to retch.

'Shit' said a voice 'here they come!'

Travers took his moment to strike. He raised his hands, ripped off his blindfold and shouted. 'It's Travers! Save me, save me!' He blundered toward the figures coming from the smoke even as they raised their wands and fired.

He dodged, tugging hard at the ropes binding his hands. Nothing happened. He stumbled toward the line of Greyback's boys and aurors, shouting, and then, blessedly, one of them recognised him. He felt hands謡olf hands, but friendly wolf hands, at least, grab him, and someone cut the ropes. He raised his hands victoriously and someone shoved a wand into them.

And then they were leaving. He found himself on the floor, clutching the wand. He jumped up, shouting. 'What are you doing? I say, what are you doing?'

One of Greyback's boys turned. 'We're needed elsewhere, mate.'

'But you can't just leave me!'

The wolf smiled a little. 'Dark Lord's afraid you've been telling them things, Metellus. He seems to think a hero's death would be best for us all.'

'What?'

'Our country thanks you for your sacrifice.' The wolf spun and sprinted after his fellows. Doors shut someplace with a clang that sounded, to Metellus Travers, like the signal that marked the end of his life.

He spun, wand high. He was a Death Eater, after all. He could die like one. He fired the first salvo. There was no answer. Travers blinked, wondering what was happening. He never did get an answer.

The last thing he saw was a gray face, like death itself, snake-like and awful. He was dying as he fell but he still felt, very faintly, the teeth that entered his neck and tore. His head popped off and bounced across the floor, expression faintly surprised. Blood was gushing from the stump of his neck but that stopped, like everything else in his life, undramatically, notable in no way at all.

Travers' shade, shorn from its mortal shell, blinked in surprise, once, as the basilisk turned from the husk that had housed it to face the other tormentors. The mages raised their staves and began to drive the creature outside as Travers's shade, if it was there, watched in mild puzzlement and then drifted off, unmoored, and suspecting that perhaps its destination was not very nice, after all.

Moody-Feathering would have been inclined to agree but he was fighting too hard. The flames above his head葉heir head容ncouraged a degree of hurry but overall he felt very calm. These were familiar corridors and he was quick and competent.

Beside him the Lestrange brothers ran silently, their knowledge of the Ministry nearly as complete as his own. He led them up a few flights of stairs and then raised his wand to the closed door.

'On my count, lads. One, two葉hree!' They burst through, wands raised, and then began to fire. The aurors stood, trying to resist them, and some of them actually lasted a little while before they died.

The air was thickening with smoke. Moody-Feathering held up a hand to the few remaining defenders. 'Drop your weapons, children. There's enough dead today.'

The leader sighed and did it. 'Take it, then. I want to go home.' He stood back from his wand. 'We aren't even aurors. We just run this stuff, isn't it?'

Moody-Feathering's wand snapped at something and it shrank. He pocketed the first part of the radio equipment and the Lestranges did likewise, until the entire studio was in their pockets and those of the engineers, who looked shaky but very focused.

The group turned and ran for the entrance. Above them fire was licking down the interior of the great hall of the Ministry. Glass popped and broke in the heat, showering them with a thousand tiny tinkling fragments. Rodolphus's foot caught in something and he nearly tripped. Headless, the body lay beside the fountain, a wand clutched in the bloodied hand. 'That's Metellus.'

'Good' said Moody-Feathering, and ran until they were outside. They dodged through the firefights that were pocking the street and careened down an alley, sending up a flare, shooting anything in their path.

Their people were waiting for them on top of a roof a disconcertingly short distance away. Three storeys below aurors fought and died but from here there was a marvelous view of things, and mages had crafted them a little dome to protect them and the equipment from harm.

Everything was soon resized and put to rights on floating dollies for the right moment, bolts of magic pinging harmlessly overhead. One of the men stepped forward, flinching as a particularly dire-seeming spell bounced off the dome, close enough to his face that it nearly singed his bushy moustache. 'My name is Jermyn Fordice.'

'Lovely. And?' Moody-Feathering had no time for this.

'I'm an announcer. Perhaps I should get on-air and alert the populace that London is...?'

'Falling? I presume the Londoners amongst them know that but perhaps some reassurance would not go amiss.'

The man took the microphone in one hand. 'Radio Wizarding Britain, this is Jermyn Fordice. The Imperial fleet had landed in London and the Ministry is being contested. Stay in your homes and do not come out. The Dark Lord has seemingly abandoned London. Repeat, the Ministry is being contested but there is no loyalist British presence in the-'

He stopped and shaded his eyes. 'Holy fucking shite, what is that? Are those-?'

'Dragons' said Moody-Feathering drily, and took the microphone. 'This is Desmond Feathering with the Imperial fleet. Their majesties would like everyone to remain inside and let us finish, if you please.'

The dragons moved low and fast, the fighting stopping a bit at a time at the sheer wonder of it and picking up again as the great beasts flew toward the Ministry, packed together, wings sending up gale-force wind. They were intent, taut with expectation. Moody-Feathering caught a single glimpse of Draco astride a Welsh Green and then he was swallowed by the flight completely.

The dragons spread out, as perfectly disciplined as aurors, and began to flap their wings. The sound was sharp, leathery, and even the fighting seemed to dim as the noise wafted across their rooftop refuge as things began to happen.

'AURORS! AVERT YOUR EYES! IT'S COMING!'

En masse the fighters began to run, taking their combat elsewhere or else stopping it completely as many of the loyalists threw down their wands and covered their eyes. The dragons dropped from the air with startling speed and took the ground, spreading their wings out. For protection, realised Moody-Feathering, to save the aurors from seeing it.

The male Ironbelly stood front and centre, wings spread. It had an oddly stunted, runty aspect that reminded him of something he couldn't place. The Ironbelly's head went back in a shriek as it bellowed a challenge to an unseen enemy and then darted forward, head flashing like a sewing needle, tail swinging like a club. Viktor clung to the thing's back, head tucked well down to protect his eyes.

The Basilisk answered. Moody-Feathering forced himself to tear his eyes away. 'Mages, cover us, hurry!'

The dome went dark. Someone cried out and Moody-Feathering touched their arm. 'You're fine, Fordyce. We just don't want anyone seeing it.'

'Keep broadcasting. Hurry, get on air.'

'What?'

Fordyce sounded a bit more in control. 'People are going to want to know what to do once the city's fallen for true, my lord Feathering. If we can prevent a panic it might improve things from the word go.'

Rabastan's voice was close by. 'How do you know his name, I wonder?'

Fordyce snorted. 'If you haven't notice, my lord, things here are grim. I thought it politic to know which way the wind was apt to blow once things went all to shite. Pardon me.' His voice was incredibly mellow, like Mulciber's. Mulciber. Kingsley. Where was he now?

'And your wind, Mr. Fordyce?'

Fordyce's mellow voice was totally even, almost casual. 'I want to live a long, quiet life in peace.'

'That's fair.'

An engineer tapped something with a wand. 'We're on air, Jer.'

'Good enough, Donny. This is Jermyn Fordyce, reporting live from the Ministry. Citizens are asked to stay in their homes until the all-clear is called. Repeat...'

Outside it was too quiet. The burning Ministry was the only sound until there was a terrible crack and then a bellowing scream. From the dragon or the Basilisk? A low rumble might have been dragon flame or simply the disintegrating Ministry in its death throes. Moody-Feathering felt a moment of piercing, aching grief for the heart of Wizarding Britain and then it felt as if the very earth were shaking.

Moody-Feathering had a second of shocked dismay and then the flight was climbing, the flight was singing above them. A mage collapsed the bubble and in the sudden bright light of Wizarding London burning he could see the dragons directly overhead. Draco saw them and raised his wand to his throat. 'GET DOWN, WE'RE GOING TO-'

The dragon flew directly down, smooth as silk and so fast it was a white blur. It shrieked as it flew and then there was a sound like thunder as the male Ironbelly drew in air and breathed out flame. Surrounded by a corona of flame rider and mount rocketed into the heart of what had been the Ministry courtyard and was now a hellscape of burning.

The Basilisk roared and then the dragon was rolling, Viktor clinging to him for dear life as the dragon fought with talon and teeth. The head came forward a final time and found purchase, teeth flashing in the light and then ripped.

Screams from the ground, of horror or triumph it was hard to say. The dragon dropped the thing he was holding and raised his head to scream triumph at the sky, lit up. Clouds of dust swirled, mingling with the smoke to make a screen against Moody-Feathering's eyes. He strained, heart pounding.

'KRUM! KRUM! KRUM!' The voices rose again in screams of a different kind. The figure clinging to the male Ironbelly raised a hand to bring his wand to his throat.

'THE BASILISK IS DEAD!'

Fordyce didn't miss a stroke. 'The city has fallen. Repeat, London has fallen to the tsar. The Dark Lord's wonder weapon has been vanquished. Repeat, London has fallen and the Imperial army is in control.'

On the ground the cheers were spreading. 'KRUM! KRUM! KRUM!' Draco, on his Welsh Green, flew to Viktor's side and said something that made Viktor seem to nod. Draco's dragon wheeled and started for the fleet.

Moody-Feathering raised his own wand to his throat. 'MY LORD MALFOY, YOUR SERVICES ARE NEEDED HERE. MAKE YOUR WAY OVER, PLEASE.' Draco waved acknowledgement and came toward them.

The rest of the flight turned and flew toward them even as the ships came into view and lines began to come down so the support forces could start the work of occupation. Moody-Feathering laughed a little, glad to be alive and more glad that his nieces and nephews lived. And his Eda, his daughter, the one he thought he'd never have.

The dragon's wings whipped the air around them. Fordyce bowed low and then popped up like a niffler. 'Your grace, I am at your service.'

The dragon hovered as Draco slid easily off his back. 'Uncle? Uncles, pardon me.'

Moody-Feathering tugged him into a rough hug. 'That's my good boy.'

Draco hugged back, fiercely. 'Announcements?'

'Announcements.'

'Send someone to find out who's alive, if you don't mind.' Draco took the microphone from Fordyce's fingers.

'This is Malfoy. We've taken the city. London is burning but things are in control. We need everyone to give us a little time to sort things out and make sure that the worst of things has passed.'

'We desire no violence. Enough lives have been lost. Any auror who lays down his wand and surrenders will be spared. Any city, town or borough which bends the knee will not be sacked.'

He suddenly sagged against a speaker briefly. Rodolphus grabbed him, stiffening with concern but Draco shook his head no. 'Sorry, just tired.' He quickly ran through a few more salient points and then handed the microphone back to Fordyce.

The Zhivka was coming toward them. 'DRAGO? MY LORD?'

'HELLO, ANU. HOW DOES THE FLEET?'

'WELL, ACTUALLY. MAY I SET DOWN?'

Draco waved him toward the burning hulk of the Ministry. 'BE CAREFUL, PLEASE.'

The ship touched down so lightly there was not even a stir. Streams of people were coming off. Draco sagged against him again, eyes shut. 'Uncle Des?'

'Yes, Draco?'

'I'm going to bed now. I haven't slept since before Enver died. Is that all right?'

'Yes, we'll take it from here.'

An auror was coming toward them at a run. 'My lords?'

'Rise, auror. Do you have a list for me?'

The auror handed it over. 'Lady Malfoy sends me to tell you that the family is fine. She's heard from your parents and aunts, and my lord Ismaili sends word that he's alive and coming this way.'

'Scabior? Pavel?'

'They've been sighted.'

'Thank God. Tell my lady to meet me aboard the Zhivka, we're all going to get some rest before we have to move.'

Draco straightened for a moment, rubbing his eyes and then moved slowly and carefully for the dragon. 'He's tired too, I think.' The dragon's thin, sharp snout poked his arm and it made a low rumble, almost conversationally.

Draco nodded, eyes slipping shut again. 'You don't mind?'

In answer the dragon hovered a bit lower and Draco climbed on, clinging. As Moody-Feathering watched his head found the dragon's neck and he went limp. He's actually asleep, thought the two men in the same body. The dragon flapped off, moving gently so as to let the sleeper rest. Wonders, thought Moody-Feathering, really don't ever cease.

The thing the books always missed, thought Anu, was the stench after a battle. His boots splashed in something and he side-stepped, nearly running into Uncle Lucius as Uncle was on his blind side. Uncle's hand clasped his arm gently, unseen, and guided him.

'Lord Admiral, more looters.'

Anu turned, instinctively cocking his head so that he could use his reduced peripheral vision to take in the scene. Two aurors, possibly Macedonians, had a small string of sorry-looking people chained between them.

'Where were they?' Food-looters, or people caught with necessary medical supplies, water or shoes would be reprimanded and let loose with whatever it was they'd been trying to steal; those caught looting gold, valuables or works of art would hang.

'One of the houses on Snapdragon Circle, my lord. They had a few rugs and a silver salver on their persons, and a sack of gold was concealed in this one's shoe.' One auror gestured to an especially grimy-looking one.

'Throw them in a brig someplace and we'll deal with them later, please.'

The aurors nodded and bowed, leading the looters off. Uncle Lucius was moving like he hurt. Anu frowned up at him. 'What happened?'

'A burning hex to my ribs. The medi-witch fixed it but that skin growing back does tend to smart.'

Dogs were coming. One of them was actually Baba Sirius. 'Baba?'

Baba Sirius changed back and shook his head no. 'No survivors thus far but we're hopeful.'Baba Sirius sat down heavily on a cracked and blackened stone. 'So where do we go from here?'

Anu wondered the same. He'd been in the ships when the first explosion came, sending the fleet bouncing upward as he shouted orders, trying to equalise air pressure to keep them aloft. Below a shimmering rose of gold and crimson had opened in the centre of the Ministry and the petals were unfurling at furious pace, fingers of flame grasping the air with crude hunger.

'MIND THE FIRE!' Shouted Anu and then immediately gauged his options. The fire was growing hotter and he took them aloft, waiting for something to happen. Below them a stream of people were racing from the Ministry, hands up in raised his eye, waiting for a stream of small craft to emerge and try to flee to safety but none came.

He'd got them turned away from the battle of the Ministry courtyard just in time and then waited, holding them in place until he'd heard the flap of enormous wings and seen, like ghosts, three dragons coming toward them. One of the was Old Mother, and on her back, calm as a spring's morning, was Hermione, hair blowing behind her like a cape.

'Hermione? What's going on?'

She pulled up alongside and held out a hand Anu jumped, trusting her, trusting Old Mother, and neither of them failed him, not for a second. He landed easily on the broad, hard back, skidding a bit on her gloriously shiny scales, and then settling so that his cousin, taller and older, was holding him in front of her.

'The Dark Lord.' she said in her usual calm, even tone. 'He thinks if he can't have it, no one will.' Her voice was infinitely old and infinitely sad. 'He's wrong, but the cost will be terrible to behold.'

'It already is.'

Below them the fire was spreading, engulfing buildings on either side of the Ministry. People were screaming, a lot of them, and running, everyone that could. Hermione blinked once, audibly, and then Old Mother made a groan in her chest that might have been pain.

'Yes' said Hermione, and pressed her neck. 'I think so too.'

The other dragons flanked them. 'Go to Drago, Anu. Old Mother and I have work to do.'

Drago's dragon caught him as easily as Old Mother had. He flapped his wings a bit and then rose a might, tail lashing.

Drago patted his neck. 'Easy, boy.'

'What do we do, Drago?'

'There's nothing for it now but to wait for it to burn itself out, unfortunately.' His voice was hard and dry. Anu leaned into him and Drago hugged him. Drago's chest was hiccuping and his shoulders were trembling. He was crying.

'I'd have done anything to avoid this. Anything. Oh God. Britain, Britain.' He sobbed and Anu rose on his knees to hold him, hoping his wool trousers wouldn't slip on the Welsh Green's smooth back.

The dragon roared as if he could sense Drago's pain, and flapped harder. Drago sniffled, patting the dragon's shoulder. 'Easy. I'm all right.'

'Is he in your mind?'

'No. But I can feel him and he can feel me.' Drago patted the great shoulder again. 'He is very old and very clever. I like that.' Then he shook his head to clear it and said 'So now we'll deal with what we can do, shan't we?'

'Tell me.'

'Those kids Paavo just got need to be escorted back as soon as we can. A lot of them are too far gone but some of them can be helped. Then we'll set up medical aid stations for refugees. There will be a lot of them, so see that we have enough. Have them Portkey us some more medi-witches and wizards, please. I'd help you but I need to sleep.' It was something to start with, and Anu had had a brief nap just about a day earlier, so he was in a better place with that than Drago.

So now, hours later, Anu had done just that. The sun was a shivery gray crescent in the mist of dirt and cold in the air. The smell of fire and cooked flesh was beginning to recede a little, just a touch. But the human cost was growing by the hour, and now Baba Sirius was staring into the middle distance like Drago was prone to do. Anu touched his arm. 'Baba?'

'Kiddo?'

A stream of refugees walked past. They had the blank-eyed look of people who had seen too much too fast. Baba Sirius watched them go, shaking his head. 'I never thought I'd see the day Britons... that doesn't happen here.'

Anu sat down next to him and whistled. Goose ambled over and rested his shaggy head on Anu's knee. 'Nene's taken those kids back to Sofia to get them clear of the conflict zones.'

'I saw her before she went. Anu, is there any news from Scotland?'

'None, Baba. I'm sorry.'

Baba Sirius shook his head. 'Don't be, kiddo.' He stood up, stretching his back, which popped three times before he was done. 'Getting old.'

'No' said Anu firmly. 'Not at all.'

'What do you know about it, kid?' Baba Sirius cuffed him fondly and Anu rubbed his eye, feeling the grit in it. Sometimes the place where the left one had been ached with phantom pain, as if the eye were still there.

'That I hope we get to be old some day. All of us, I mean.'

Baba Sirius paused, eyes suddenly wet. 'Me, too. A lot of my friends didn't. A lot of your friends didn't.'

Anu thought of Enver just then, how someday he would be older than Baba Sirius, if he was lucky, and Enver would always be nineteen. Like Sven Lofstrom, he thought shivering. Like the dead they were still trying to clear out of the rubble of the Ministry.

'No. A lot of them died.'

Baba Sirius put his arm around Anu and Anu snuggled in, neck prickling. Death was close by, death had fed well but in his terrible greed he would take them all in turn. Like Enver, like Sven. He touched his admiral's insignia, knowing it would not protect him.

Instead, he turned his face up to the pale, scared sun and let it warm him, let it warm his bones and the place where his eye had been.