Chapter 4: Broken Faith

                                    

                                          
This chapter has been long, long in the making. Since about midway through Ascendant long. 
Some of you will be quite appreciative of it, I'm sure.
____________________________________
Ash smeared the roads and painted houses black, a morbid reflection of winter's might choking the world half a year early. The only color that stood out was the blue and red of the Patrolmen and Aurors skittering about, erasing the memories of any Muggle fortunate enough both to witness and survive the zombies' rampage. Jen let the curtain flutter down and dropped into a nearby chair. "I'm so ready for this day to be over."
The glares that followed that simple statement were palpable even without total awareness of everything within Grimmauld Place. Lifting her head to look at her friends, all of whom were slumped on the floor, she cocked her head in confusion. What were they so upset about?
Susan was clearly happy to elaborate. "What. Was that all about?"
"I'm not sure what you—"
"There is no way you're that strong. No witch can keep casting like that for almost two hours. All of us had to take a break, every single one of us. Except you. You kept going, and when we fell back, you actually took over where we had been casting." That was true enough. For all that sacrificing her magical core almost ten years ago had ruined her resistance to other people's spells, stamina was something she would never have to worry about. Her friends and family had nearly drained their own cores, which was an interesting process to watch even if it did put that much more work on her own shoulders. Those zombies hadn't been so polite as to kill themselves. Susan's voice broke through her internal praise. "That wasn't natural, Jen. You just don't get like that without going through dark rituals and human sacrifice and stuff like that. Things that ought not to be meddled with."
Her eyes narrowed. "Was that a question or an accusation, Susan?"
"I haven't decided quite yet."
Baron-be-damned Aurors and DMLE directors and their nosy, self-righteous Hufflepuff nieces. Or maybe just Hufflepuffs in general; the only member of the family who was anything like this was an Auror and a Badger both. She smiled faintly at the thought before letting her head drop once more against the back of the chair. "I'm going to pretend you said it was a question, then, if only because that's the far less offensive option. I'm easily the strongest witch of our year, possibly in the whole school. I won't be so arrogant as to say that I'm on You-Know-Who or Dumbledore's level, but I don't know that I'm far off it, either. I've also worked with Flitwick for the last three years and have gotten very good at pacing myself. And no," she added when her redheaded friend opened her mouth to interject, "I have not performed any rituals, dark or otherwise, on myself to increase or somehow change my magic."
That had all been Elsie's doing.
The corners of Tracey's mouth twitched in a suppressed smile. Had she told the Slytherin something approaching the truth about her core? She honestly could not recall at the moment. Sometimes it was hard to remember who knew what about her past.
"And the weird-looking Fiendfyre?"
"That wasn't Fiendfyre," she denied with a smile. "That was just an adjustment I made to the Patronus Charm."