Merlin shook his head soberly. “Decent men joke not about politics. She is indeed the Minister, replacing Mr. Loquacious Knapp nearly two years previous. Further such minor shocks shall occur in the coming days. It would be wise to be prepared for them, lest your friends worry for your mental health.”
Aunt Hermione being Minister of Magic did not strike James as an example of a ‘minor shock’, but he understood the headmaster’s point nonetheless. He made to get up from the chair once more, finding himself already reluctant to return to the old mundanity of classes and schoolwork, despite—or perhaps because of—his immense relief.
But a thought came to him then, and he settled back into the chair.
“A question, James?” the headmaster asked, arching an eyebrow, putting down his parchments.
James shook his head distantly, unsure how to even ask, not knowing what words to form the ideas with. Finally, groping, he said, “What was it that happened between Petra and I? The silver thread that connected us for those lost, undone years. The shared power between us. The payment that she apparently had to make in the end to save us all…” He sighed deeply, running out of words, and looked up at Merlin, a little helplessly.
Merlin leaned back again and steepled his fingers. “You are more aware than many others, I think, of what makes a Horcrux, and how it works. Am I correct, James?”
James frowned a little. “A Horcrux is a bargain with dark magic.
A dark witch or wizard can make one if they kill another person. The horrible power of that act lets them break off a part of their soul, and secure it in case their body gets killed.”
Merlin consented to this description, imprecise as it surely was.
“It has been said that evil cannot create. It can only pervert. And this is true in the case of the Horcrux. For that dark magic is only a shadow copy of a much greater and more powerful Deep Magic. The ancient ones called it the Lex Carita, and this is the pact that your grandmother made for her son, Harry Potter, and that you made on behalf of Petra when you were ready to die to save her.
“And yet the Horcrux and the Lex Carita are in no way twins.
They are exact opposites. Where a Horcrux hoards the taker’s life via another’s murder, the Lex Carita preserves another’s life via the giver’s sacrifice. While a Horcrux’s bargain is capricious, always seeking to renege its promise, the Lex Carita is a pact of charity, always giving many times more. This is why your connection to Petra followed you into the past, before the moment of its very creation, while Petra’s Horcrux abandoned her the instant that she left her natural timeline.
But most importantly, the Horcrux offers only a poisoned half-life, where the Lex Carita grants perpetual and striving wellbeing.”
James’ thoughts darkened as he listened. When Merlin finished, he looked up at the headmaster, meeting his eyes. “But if this Lex Carita thing is supposed to bring wellbeing to the person it saves, then why did Petra end up right back on the Gwyndemere? Why did she have to die?”
“You assume your own definition of a person’s wellbeing,”
Merlin said, not without sympathy. “Wellbeing doesn’t mean mere happiness and safety. Wellbeing extends to the very depths of a person’s role in the tapestry of destiny. Petra was indeed a crimson thread, for her balance was in the red. She told you so herself: she had killed. The guilt of murder claimed her and defined her. Her turning point was not the Night of the Unveiling, or the gazebo in the lake, or even the Chamber of Secrets. Petra’s turning point was when she turned pain into vengeance. It was when she joined her own sister’s small powers with hers to kill the girl’s very mother. For that reason, the Lex Carita pact was less interested in preserving Petra’s mere life. It was intent on helping her balance the scales of her deepest soul.”
James found this an immensely and exquisitely unsatisfying answer. He pushed back into the chair, arms folded, his face set into a dark scowl of resolve. Perhaps someday he would accept this concept of greater good, and deeper right, and intangible redemption.
But not right now.
For now, he only mourned Petra. Silently, angrily, and hopelessly.
A minute later, he tramped down the spiral stairs to the Gargoyle corridor, just as classes resumed and doors banged shut all around, cutting off the noise of settling voices and squeaking chairs. A warm breeze, smelling of mown grass and lake mist, pushed through the windows lining the left wall. James stopped and took a deep breath, orienting himself to this imminently familiar yet delicately different reality.
“James,” a girl’s voice said from the corridor behind him, echoing in the falling silence.
James turned around, and then took an involuntary step backward, his breath catching, his heart pounding up into his throat.
“What?” the girl asked, smiling with bemused surprise, “you look like you just saw a ghost. Other than Professor Binns, of course, whose class I am currently late for.”
“You…” James breathed, blinking with fragile, unexpected joy.
He moved to her, stood in front of her, looked her up and down.
His cousin Lucy blushed a little in her Hufflepuff uniform. Her dark eyes darted to the window. It had been years since she had gotten over her crush on him, but clearly there was still a hint of something more than friendship between them. It wasn’t like they were blood relatives, after all. She used her right hand to comb a stray raven lock out of her eyes.
“I heard about what happened yesterday,” she said, glancing back up at him. “About how you went a little mental with triple-six fever and apparated off to a cemetery or something. Millie told me.
The whole Hufflepuff common room was having a laugh about it. I told them it wasn’t at all funny and that you surely had a good and important reason for what you did.”
With a warm rush, James remembered. He remembered his cousin’s unfailing loyalty, her boundless inner strength, her almost unconscious leadership. His smile widened into a helpless grin, and then a laugh of pure delight. Unable to help himself, he threw his arms around her and gave a brief, fierce embrace.
“Blimey,” she said, her voice muffled against his shoulder, “I don’t think it deserves all that. Get off me before anyone gets any weird ideas! Especially ‘Dolohov’ and Rose.” She pushed him away, a little ruffled, but clearly pleased nonetheless. “Come on,” she said, hefting her knapsack. “Walk with me to class. And tell me the truth…”
“Anything you want,” James agreed, nearly bursting with good humour. Together, they turned and made their way along the hall, walking in and out of warm sunbeams.
“Did you have a good reason for what happened last night?” she asked, glancing aside at him critically. “Only, I know you don’t have the best record when it comes to odd excuses. Sorry,” she shrugged a little apologetically. “You did miss six whole years of Quidditch tryouts.”