"Best cool your head before you say something you might regret."
Oleandra awoke to an unfamiliar ceiling, a strangely familiar voice echoing in her ears.
She blinked a few times to make sure she was seeing things correctly while she mentally reorganised her memories. The last thing she remembered was hugging Daphne; they'd returned to Salazar Slytherin's Scriptorium in the hopes of finding clues to the location of Hogwarts's nexus, when…
"Aargh!"
A muffled scream shattered the quiet of the night. Oleandra's fingers twitched, ready to weave a hand sign, but she froze at the sound of Ron Weasley's iconic voice. "It's all right, mate— you're still here. Take a breath."
Oleandra's eyes slowly began adapting to the obscurity.
"What the Hel?" Oleandra murmured a second later.
It had taken her a moment to realise that this perfectly ordinary phenomenon was, for her, anything but ordinary. It was something she hadn't experienced in years; her Mystic Eyes saw as clearly in pitch darkness as in broad daylight, so her eyes never needed to adjust.
Oleandra swung her legs out of bed and stood, groping her way through the darkness. Her fingers brushed again soft fabric as she bumped into a wall, then traced along it until she found the exit. Lifting a curtain, she ducked beneath it and stepped through into a larger, candlelit room.
"I'm in a tent?" Oleandra muttered to herself, glancing at her surroundings warily. "Ugh, reeks of cat urine…"
It was then that she noticed her.
At a table in the centre of the room sat a girl with bushy brown hair, burning the midnight oil. By the wavering light of a candle, she read from an ancient‑looking book, though Oleandra couldn't make out its cover in the dark.
"Oh, Viviane," said Hermione, glancing up from the pages of her tome as she noticed Oleandra standing there. "Did Harry wake you?"
Oleandra's eyes widened slightly.
"Er— yeah," she replied stiffly. "Does he, er, often get nightmares?"
It took Oleandra a moment to piece it together, as she glanced out of a window and failed to catch sight of her reflection in the glass. Somehow, she was dreaming what her reflection‑doppelganger was seeing, since she had left her for Harry and his friends to kidnap. She pinched her forearm and winced; for a dream, this felt far too real.
Nope, this was definitely happening.
"Mhm," Hermione grunted noncommittally, her eyes flicking back to the pages of her book. "Since you're awake, would you be a dear and put the kettle on? I've a feeling the boys are going to want something hot to drink when..."
And just as Hermione was about to predict, Harry, Ron, and Sirius walked into the tent's common area and settled around the table at her side, dressed in their pyjamas. Ron took a seat next to Hermione, while the two other boys sat across from them.
Oleandra lowered her head and made for the kitchenette, where she found a cauldron filled with what looked like spring water. She quickly got hold of a kettle and filled it, then set it on the hob and turned on the gas.
"What did you see this time, Harry?" Hermione asked, setting down her book.
Oleandra sneaked a glance over her shoulder as she rummaged around the cupboards, looking for tealeaves. Hermione was reading The Tales of Beedle the Bard, a very old edition at that. Sirius caught Oleandra's eye and winked, and she quickly turned away.
"It wasn't Vol— it wasn't You-Know-Who, this time," Harry recounted. "It was her."
"Oleandra?" Ron prompted, but Harry shook his head.
"Daphne, but Oleandra was there too." Harry corrected him. "I was seeing her through her sister's eyes."
The Gryffindor squad jumped as the sound of shattering china reached their ears; Oleandra had dropped a teacup in shock at what she'd just heard. "I'll help her tidy up," said Sirius, rising from his chair. "Carry on without me."
"Oleandra was looking for something in a secret room in the dungeons; it looked a lot like the Chamber of Secrets, but it wasn't," Harry went on. "Daphne didn't know what they were looking for, though... she was… suffering."
Harry's voice trembled. He hated possessing Daphne— hated it even more than sharing minds with You-Know-Who. His hatred he could bear, but her sorrow… her sorrow was boundless, deep as the ocean.
"A part of Dumbledore's plan, maybe?" Ron asked hopefully.
Harry closed his eyes, trying to recall what he had seen in his nightmare. Nearby, Sirius knelt beside Oleandra, drew his wand, and with a deft flick sent the shards of china floating back together until the teacup stood whole once more, jumping and twirling in a little jig.
"Impressive, don't you think?" Sirius said, giving another wink.
"Show off," Oleandra muttered, snatching the teacup out of the air.
Outwardly, she wore a mask of irritation, but deep inside, her panic was mounting.
She couldn't feel her magic.
"Right, you have some of Oleandra's memories," Sirius said off-handedly. "Even though you're a Muggle, I s'pose you've already seen all our tricks, eh? It'll take more than a Mending Charm to impress you, but what can I say, I relish the challenge…"
Was that what they thought of her reflection-doppelganger? That she was just a Muggle that looked a lot like her? Some sort of body double!?
The kettle whistled stridently.
"I'll get that," Sirius said confidently. "You go sit with the others, they won't bite… though I might."
"He's just kidding," Hermione said crossly, glaring at Sirius. "Here, you can sit next to me, I could use some help translating this passage from Old English."
Oleandra obediently sat in the chair Hermione had drawn up for her, her heart beating fast.
This was the stuff of her worst nightmares.
In her first and second years, she'd often dream that she'd wake up in her bed at home, her parents at her bedside telling her that Hogwarts had been nothing but a dream, and that she was still a Squib. She would wake in the middle of the night, sweating, before letting out a shaky sigh of relief when she realised that she was still in the dormitories.
"So, basically," said Ron, glum as ever, "we're still no closer to getting anywhere."
"Not exactly," Harry replied, just as glumly. "I learned both of the twins are Horcruxes."
"That's even worse!" Ron shouted. "How many does that make!? Okay, we know all seven, but we still haven't got our hands on a single one! For all we know, Dumbledore could be barking up the wrong tree— and You-Know-Who might be churning out more of them as we speak!"
"You-Know-Who himself, Gaunt's ring, Slytherin's locket, Hufflepuff's cup, Ravenclaw's diadem, Oleandra, Daphne," Hermione recited carefully. "Yes, that does add up to seven. I think we've got them all!"
Hermione was starting to get excited. Now that they had identified the last remaining Horcrux, they could begin hunting them down one by one! After finding the Muggle-Born sanctuary, of course; they were getting close to finding it.
"Yeah, we've got them all," said Ron sarcastically. "Now all we need to do is ask You-Know-Who nicely where he's hidden them."