In the Shadow of What If's

Chapter Thirty-Seven:

Evermoor tried its best to carry on as usual.

But "usual" had become something increasingly hard to define.

The presence of a Ministry observer would have been enough to unbalance any household. Add to that the fact that said observer was a young woman of twenty-five, assigned to observe a five-year-old boy and his familiar—a familiar who may or may not have been the daughter of a hundred-headed serpent from myth—and routine was all but impossible.

Yet somehow, Harrison made it work.

They rose early. Ate breakfast together in the solarium—porridge for Thomas, fruit and toast for Isadora, and black tea strong enough to blister paint for Harrison. Morrigan often lay draped over the edge of Thomas's chair, her gleaming eyes fixed on the sunlight dappling the marble tiles. She rarely ate in front of others, though now and then she accepted a sliver of cooked meat placed discreetly into a small silver dish beside her boy.

And always, Agent Isadora Vale followed. From a respectful distance. Her notebook, bound in Ministry-issue dragonhide, was never far from reach.

She was polite. Professional. Efficient. Not once had she overstepped. She offered no opinions, only observations. She asked questions when appropriate and took quiet, meticulous notes on everything—especially Morrigan.

And Morrigan... tolerated it.

Mostly.

She never hissed. Never flared her feathers in warning. But her golden eyes narrowed each time Isadora lingered too long near Thomas, and her coils grew tighter whenever the young agent approached while he slept or practiced wandless spells in the garden.

Only when Isadora was gone—usually on long afternoon walks or locked away writing reports upstairs—did Morrigan truly speak.

She always slithered to Thomas's side, nuzzling under his chin with a hiss of delight before flicking her tongue toward Harrison.

"I miss the sound of home," she would whisper, tail twitching. "So few speak the language of truth anymore."

Harrison had begun to think of Parseltongue not as a language of darkness, as most feared, but one of precision. Every word mattered. Every breath carried intent.

When he and Thomas and Morrigan spoke together, it felt like peeling back the world's noise and stepping into something ancient. Something clean.

"She watches me like prey," Morrigan would say on quieter days, eyes tracking Isadora from the windows. "But her fear is not hatred. Only habit."

"She's trying," Thomas would reply, always careful not to judge. "She doesn't speak our tongue. But she doesn't try to stop us from speaking it either."

Morrigan had grown fond of that answer.

She was talking more, even if she still reserved her speech for the boys she had bonded herself to. When Harrison spoke to her, she responded not like an animal—but like someone who had lived through ages.

And when Thomas curled up on the rug with her coiled protectively around him, it was clear the bond had gone far beyond magic.

It was three days into their tense new arrangement when the calm, watchful rhythm of the manor was disrupted by the arrival of a familiar crack of apparition and the unmistakable scent of lavender and basil that always accompanied her.

Euphemia Potter had arrived.

"You waited until the girl was already in the house?" she said by way of greeting, her eyebrows arched halfway to the ceiling as she kissed Harrison's cheek and adjusted her traveling cloak. "Honestly, Harrison. You're clever enough to charm blood wards and teach your child ancient ritual magic, but you forget the optics of unwed house guests?"