Morning classes had already begun by the time Helios Black and Rose Potter left the castle.
Behind them, Hogwarts continued as though nothing had changed. Students hurried through corridors with books clutched to their chests, professors began their lessons, and the distant sound of classroom doors closing echoed faintly through the ancient halls. Somewhere, attendance was being taken. Somewhere, a professor was asking why two students were missing.
Helios did not care. Some conversations mattered more than lessons.
They walked in silence until the castle grounds opened before them. The morning air was cool, carrying the scent of damp grass and lake water. Far ahead, the Great Lake stretched beneath the pale sky, its surface calm except for the occasional ripple stirred by the breeze. The Giant Squid surfaced briefly in the distance, one lazy tentacle breaking the water before disappearing again.
Rose stopped near the old stone railing overlooking the lake. She rested her hands upon the weathered surface and stared out across the water. Helios remained standing a short distance away, his posture calm but his expression unreadable.
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
Then Helios said quietly, “Tell me everything.”
Rose glanced at him and nodded slowly. She took a breath, steadied herself, and began.
She told him about Professor McGonagall waking her before dawn, about being taken to Dumbledore’s office before she was fully awake, and about finding Moody and Tonks waiting there. She spoke of the prophecy, of Dumbledore explaining why Voldemort had hunted her since infancy, and of the strange, heavy feeling that settled over her when she realized a piece of her life had been hidden from her for years.
Helios listened without interrupting.
Rose continued, describing the journey into the Ministry, the silence of the Department of Mysteries, the endless shelves of glowing prophecy orbs, and the moment she touched the sphere that bore her name. Her voice grew quieter as she repeated the prophecy in full, every word still etched into her memory.
Then came the Death Eaters.
She told him about Voldemort’s arrival, about the fear that filled the Hall of Prophecy, about Moody and Tonks trying to protect her, about Dumbledore and the Order appearing just when everything seemed lost. She described the battle, the shattered shelves, the voices of broken prophecies whispering through the chaos, and the terrible blood magic Voldemort used against the Order.
Finally, she told him what happened afterward.
Grimmauld Place.
Sirius’s fury.
The accusation.
Dumbledore’s admission .
By the time Rose finished, the lake had grown brighter beneath the morning sun, but the peaceful scenery around them felt distant and unreal. Helios had not interrupted once. He had not asked a single question. He had simply listened, his expression darkening with each passing minute.
When she fell silent, he turned away.
For several seconds, he stood with his back to her, staring at the water. Then he began to pace along the stone path. His steps were slow at first, but soon they became sharper, more restless, his cloak shifting with every turn.
“This shouldn’t have happened,” he muttered.
Rose watched him anxiously.
She had seen Helios angry before. She had seen him cold, amused, irritated, and dangerously calm. But this was different. He looked unsettled, as though someone had changed the rules of a game he had believed he understood.
“No,” he said under his breath. “Not like this.”
He stopped, frowned toward the lake, then resumed pacing.
“I expected him to maneuver the Ministry into accepting Voldemort’s return. But using you as bait...” His jaw tightened. “No. I wasn’t expecting that.”
He looked toward the water, where sunlight shimmered across the surface in broken silver lines.
There was a part of him—an old, wounded, furious part—that wanted to scold her. He wanted to demand why she had trusted Dumbledore so easily, why she had not questioned the plan, why she had walked into danger with only Moody and Tonks beside her.
The words rose to the tip of his tongue.
And died there.
Because another memory surfaced before he could speak.
He remembered being fifteen. He remembered another Hogwarts, another life, another version of himself who would have done exactly what Rose had done. If Dumbledore had summoned him before dawn and told him there was something only he could do, Harry Potter would have gone. If someone he loved had been at risk, he would have rushed forward without hesitation. If adults had spoken in calm, grave voices and told him the danger was necessary, he would have believed them.
Rose had not been foolish.
She had been fifteen.
Just as he had once been.
Helios exhaled slowly. The anger did not vanish, but it changed shape. It no longer burned toward Rose. It turned instead toward the old man who had placed her in that position and called it necessity.
Then another thought struck him.
“And Voldemort,” he murmured.
Rose looked up.
Helios stopped pacing. “He came himself.”
“Is that strange?”
“Very.” Helios’s expression sharpened. “Voldemort is arrogant, ruthless, cruel, and obsessed with control, but he is not usually reckless. He rarely risks exposing himself unless he believes the reward is worth it. He had no guarantee the prophecy would still be there. No guarantee Dumbledore would not appear. No guarantee the Ministry would not interfere. And yet he came personally.”
Rose frowned. “What does that mean?”
“It means he wanted that prophecy badly enough to take the risk.” Helios looked back toward the castle. “Or he believed the opportunity would not come again.”
The silence between them deepened.
Rose shifted uncomfortably. She had spent the entire night dreading this conversation. Some part of her had expected disappointment. Anger, perhaps. She had expected Helios to look at her and see someone who had failed to understand what should have been obvious.
Instead, he looked tired.
Tired and worried.
Helios finally walked back toward her. He stopped directly in front of her, close enough that she had to lift her head to meet his eyes. For a moment, his expression softened.
“What happened yesterday has already happened,” he said quietly. “You cannot change it. You cannot go back and ask different questions. You cannot undo Dumbledore’s choices or Voldemort’s arrival. So stop trying to punish yourself for not seeing the trap before it closed.”
Rose’s throat tightened.
“I should have known.”
“No,” Helios said firmly. “You should have been told.”
Helios leaned one hand against the stone railing and looked across the lake. “Dumbledore made a choice. Voldemort made a choice. The Ministry made years of choices that allowed this to happen. Do not carry all of that on your shoulders simply because you were the one standing in the middle when everything collapsed.”
Rose looked away, blinking quickly.
For a while, the only sound was the soft movement of water against the shore.
Then Helios spoke again.
“But now the ball is in your court.”
Rose frowned. “What?”
He turned back to her. “You have power now.”
“What power?”
“Your name.”
Her face tightened immediately. “I don’t want—”
“I know,” Helios interrupted, but gently. “I know you hate it. I know you wanted to be normal. I know you never asked to become the Girl-Who-Lived.”
Rose looked down.
“But wishing will not change reality,” he continued. “You are famous. You always have been. You always will be. Whether you like it or not, people will look at you and see a symbol before they see a girl.”
“That’s not fair.”
“No,” Helios agreed. “It isn’t.”
He did not try to comfort her with lies. He did not tell her that people would eventually stop staring or that the world would someday treat her normally. Helios never offered comfort that was not true.
“But fairness has very little to do with power,” he said. “People will use your name if you let them. The Ministry will use it. Dumbledore will use it. The newspapers will use it. Pure-blood families will try to claim you. Half the country will want your approval, and the other half will fear what your disapproval could do.”
Rose stared at him.
Helios’s voice remained calm. “So if your fame is going to be used, then you must be the one to decide how.”
“I don’t know how to do that.”
“You will learn.”
She gave him a doubtful look.
His mouth curved faintly. “Not today. Today you need rest, food, and probably several hours where no one asks you to save Britain.”
Despite herself, Rose smiled weakly.
“But remember this,” Helios said, his tone becoming serious again. “Never allow someone else to spend your influence for you. Not Dumbledore. Not the Ministry. Not Sirius. Not your friends.”
Rose looked at him carefully. “Not even you?”
His answer came without hesitation.
“Especially not me.”
That startled her more than anything else he had said.
Helios held her gaze. “If your name carries weight, you decide where it is used. I may advise you. Others may warn you. But the choice must be yours. If you give that choice away, even to people who love you, then you become a banner they wave rather than a person who acts.”
Rose was silent for a long time.
Dumbledore had not needed to bind her with chains. He had not forced her wand from her hand or dragged her into the Ministry. He had simply placed the right words before her, trusted her to do what he knew she would do, and allowed her own sense of duty to carry her into danger.
She had thought she was choosing.
Now she was no longer sure.
Slowly, she nodded. “I’ll remember.”
“Good.”
For a moment, neither of them moved.
Then Rose gave him a small, tired smile. “Thank you.”
Helios nodded once.
She turned toward the castle, but after a few steps she looked back.
He had not followed.
He stood by the lake, staring across the water with a thoughtful expression that made him look much older than he was supposed to be.
Rose hesitated, then continued walking.
She had already taken more from him this morning than she had intended.
Soon, Helios stood alone.
The breeze stirred his robes, and the distant bells of Hogwarts rang out, announcing the next lesson. Somewhere inside the castle, students were opening books, answering questions, and pretending the world still made sense.
Helios bent down, picked up a small stone, and threw it across the lake.
It skipped once.
Twice.
Three times.
Then vanished beneath the surface.
“Everything is different,” he murmured.
His thoughts drifted to another world.
Another timeline.
After Voldemort’s defeat, Hermione had once joked that Voldemort had been oddly considerate about Harry’s education.
Harry had stared at her in disbelief. “What?”
“Think about it,” she had said, smiling in that dry, clever way of hers. “Every year he attacked after exams. He always waited until the school year was practically over.”
At the time, Harry had laughed.
Now, standing beside the Great Lake in a world that was not his own, Helios almost wished that ridiculous observation had been true here.
This Voldemort was different.
Far more proactive.
Far more willing to move early.
He did not wait for school calendars, exams, or dramatic endings. He struck when opportunity appeared. He risked himself when the prize mattered. He had walked into the Ministry himself because the prophecy was important enough to tempt him.
That made him dangerous in ways Helios had not fully accounted for.
Then there was Dumbledore.
His Dumbledore had manipulated him. There was no denying that. The old man had kept secrets, arranged circumstances, and guided Harry toward a fate he had not fully understood. But there had always been hesitation. Contingency plans. A terrible kind of love twisted by guilt and necessity.
This Dumbledore...
This Dumbledore had placed Rose where Voldemort could reach her and called it necessary.
One delayed signal.
One Order member arriving too late.
One Death Eater firing faster than expected.
Rose would have died.
Helios closed his eyes.
“No,” he whispered. “I can’t let this continue.”
The Ministry now admitted Voldemort had returned.
The war had officially begun.
Now, every newspaper in Britain is praising Rose Potter again. Politicians would seek her approval. Journalists would hunt for interviews. Aurors would want statements. Influential families would send polite letters wrapped in poison. The Girl-Who-Lived was no longer a troublesome child embarrassing the Ministry.
She was valuable again.
Thankfully, one secret remained buried.
The prophecy itself.
No Ministry official had revealed the words. No rumors had yet escaped the Department of Mysteries.
For now, only a handful of people understood the terrible truth that bound Rose Potter and Lord Voldemort together.
Helios opened his eyes and looked toward Hogwarts Castle.
The game had entered its next stage.
And this time, he intended to make the first move.