0930 hours


Yavin Morgenthau, frowning, pushed up his coloured spectacles so that he could reread the logbook that recorded Lawrence Musgrave's visitors on the fourth floor. Today was to be the official commencement of treatment and he had taken time away from level nine to see to this - Yavin hadn't even been looking at the signatures above his, Miranda's name simply caught his eye by chance. An unexpected discovery. Why had she visited their patient on a weekend? Had she been working? No. He was certain she had not. After all, he had a copy of her schedule.


The entry had been overseen by Hitwizard Stump - the same one this morning. Yavin drew his wand and handed it to the man; he didn't need it to read minds and it was a precaution for going in by himself.

"I'll be entering without our Madam Healer," he raised his eyebrows and glanced at the enchanted window that allowed him to see into the hospital bedroom - Lawrence was pacing back and forth in an understandably restless attitude. The door opened. Yavin stalked through lithely, both hands behind his back and a barely-there smile on his lips.

Much of the room was as he had last seen it, save for the paintings that were enchanted to change. He kept his eyes on Lawrence instead. "Good morning. How are, aha, how are we today? You don't mind a quick word before, that is, before it's strictly business?"

The research had been reordered and piled as best he could at the foot of the middle armchair. Between the decomposition to single sheets, the blood, anxious grasp and rereading, it all looked dogeared. They were the the only thing in the room that accurately reflected the intrusion of the patient. Lawrence had tidied anything out of place as he paced out his anxiety. At least this cell was larger than the last. He’d even made his bed, tucked so tight with one hand that you could bounce a knut on it. Not that he had one.

The door opened and Lawrence paused long enough to look round and identify the figure stepping in. Yavin Morgenthau was taller and older than Lawrence, with long limbs. He was a younger model of Mortimer Gamp in many ways, only he dressed the opposite - not an undertaker but with bright, bold patterns.

“Fine, fine.” Lawrence replied, adopting a rather British societal defence, coming to a stop. His hazel eyes darted from Morgenthau to the door, and back, brow furrowed. Why weren’t they starting? He’d prefer to get this over and done with so he knew what to expect. How to cope. Where was Andy?

“You don’t mind a quick word before, that is, before it’s strictly business?”

“Not at all.” Lawrence shrugged nonchalantly, though he twitched, and glanced at the door again. Realising himself, he gestured to the armchair Yavin had taken the first time they’d met in the room, but didn’t move to sit, preoccupied with the door. “She not with you?” He asked, “Andy - the Head Healer.”

Musgrave's eyes, darting to the closed entrance behind him and then to himself, made the man's thought process perfectly evident. He wasn't expecting Yavin to be alone. Certainly, under normal circumstances, waiting for Miranda to arrive was the natural thing to do - but Healer Storm had thrown 'normal' out of the window with more recklessness than an auror-in-training. Some Healers veered away from treating people they liked, much less people they hated! Complications were expected.

"Not yet." Yavin replied and crossed the room to gracefully sink into one of the armchairs, sparing a glance at the stack of reading in the centre. "But it, hm, it appears you've recently sat down with Andy," he looked up at Lawrence with a mild smile.

Their patient had clearly been obsessing over the course of treatment to come. Yavin wanted to exercise as much courtesy and goodwill as he could, knowing what he did about the history between Miranda and Musgrave. He had begun his professional life as a Healer in New York; he intended to keep to the oath he had taken then, in as many aspects of his life.

"Did you two have a, um,  pleasant chat yesterday?" he leaned back in the chair, crossing his legs and intertwining his fingers in his lap. "Catching up over the, aha, the good old days maybe?"

“… it appears you’ve recently sat down with Andy.”

Lawrence diverted his attention from the door properly, and saw Morgenthau’s mild smile. Andy’s minder had found out, which shouldn’t have been a great surprise. Had she told him, or had he found out? Level Nine had always had eyes and ears everywhere even in Lawrence’s time as an auror. In the time of war and occupied Ministry, Level Nine had performed horrific experiments in Voldemort’s name and it would take years to consider fully trusting them, even if the wizard sat in the armchair was a newer recruit in peacetime. He was under Edwin’s partial control…

“Pleasant? You have met Andy, haven’t you?” Lawrence asked sarcastically, drawing closer to the armchair with the pile of papers. The only times Andy Carter had ever been pleasant was when she wanted him between her legs. But even that wasn't a happy thought to dredge up.

“Not exactly.” Lawrence clarified, “Why, what did she say about it?” He paused, staring intently at his visitor, “Oh, like that is it.” He took a seat, folding his legs up, propping his chin on the stump of his arm, hidden in the long sleeve of the patient garb. He'd learn how to sit normally on an armchair when he didn't feel like a tiger in a cage.

“I think she wanted to clear the air,” he elaborated, “or maybe not even that, but get some answers from me alone. Take a moment to read me, even.” He shrugged. The Head Healer hadn't seemed all that sure why she was there either. By the way she was dressed it had suggested she hadn't already been in to do her job on Sunday. Andy dressed conservatively, or in her uniform, when she was working, not like Morgenthau's fashion.

“Pretty ballsy to come in here alone since she thinks I attempted to murder her husband.”  His responses were rushed, and he continued to glance to the door. “I said I didn’t think we should be talking without you. Guessing by you asking, we shouldn’t have.” 

            “Pleasant? You have met Andy, haven’t you?”

Yavin's smile widened, eyelids lowering slightly as he acknowledged this undeniable fact of life: Miranda Storm was not conventionally likeable. He allowed Lawrence to draw whatever conclusions suited him, and listened with the calm air of a detached observer attempting to sate some fledgling curiosity. Not that the impression would be bought by a paranoiac. This man wasn't an idiot, based on his voracious interest in the material on the third armchair, and his verbal responses.

            “I said I didn’t think we should be talking without you. Guessing by you asking, we shouldn’t have.”

"There is no we in, that is, in such a situation." Yavin sighed heavily and lowered his glasses, which had been propped up on his forehead. "Only she. You did not have the option of, aha, of leaving the conversation, you were subjected to it."

Clearing the air and getting answers sounded like... euphemisms, at best. She had come here for a personal purpose and the logbook did not show any other Healers signed in for observational or professional purposes. They hadn't taken Lawrence in so that Miranda could use him as her personal therapy box whenever she felt like it.

"Did she read you?" he flattened his palms together, holding them under his chin in a meditative purpose and not quite looking at Lawrence - gaze settling on the paintings in the room. "Tell me what, hm, what happened." A pause. "If you want to."

“Did she read you?”

“I don’t think so,” Lawrence shook his head. He wasn’t even sure she’d had her wand with her, and the only time he’d let her in his head she’d needed it - but that could have been front. She would read him today, tomorrow, days to come, and he would never be able to protect himself unless he had a wand and occlumens ability. Neither of which would come easily, or at all.

“Tell me what, hm, what happened. If you want to.”

Morgenthau wasn’t making eye contact, to Lawrence’s intrigue. He was a strange wizard, but the fact he wouldn’t meet Lawrence’s eye at this moment was somewhat reassuring. The eye contact with a legilimens could mean he was read. Though he had now read Morgenthau’s book. He was an accomplished legilimens, and asking Lawrence to recall yesterday verbally would bring the thoughts up to the surface.

The former auror paused for a long moment in consideration. He drew a breath and forced his eyes closed to calm himself. It was just Andy Carter. But brain soup. But patronising. But Edwin’s forced obliviation. Who was to say he could trust Morgenthau either?

“She wanted me to tell her what she’d done to make me go to her, before I gave myself up.” He had to assume the wizard in the other armchair had read about the shared history. If necessary, he would fill him in later of the three times he had crossed the threshold of the Storms’ house. Once in trespass, twice invited.

“I told her it was nothing she’d done, that her reputation preceded her. When we were at school, studying our final exams, she had helped me with the quality of potions, my weakest, and I her defensive wandwork, her weakest. When I got out I heard she had become Head Healer in high regard.”

      “Do you remember Gladys-May’s cousin in our year?” Willy asked, “Ravenclaw. Andy Carter?”
     “Yeah, what of her?”
     “Head Healer of St Mungo’s.” Willy shuffled his backside and gave a quick, earnest little nod. “Her! She was horrible!”
     “Well, that’s why she’s the boss. Nice people don’t get to be the boss.”[1]

“I went to her for help, but I wasn’t in the right mind to ask for it, so to say,” Lawrence explained, “I don’t think she believes me. She doesn’t want to believe me, she would rather believe I lie, and continue to lie once her research begins.” He pulled at the arm of his robes, “that’s why she’ll read what she wants.”

1.	13th January, 2011 Heed not how Hope Believes

Lawrence explained, without further persuasion being required.

He listened in silence and without giving any external sign of his personal thought process. Inside, Yavin noted what it was Miranda had done: she had proposed a study around an old school friend who had gone on to harass and attack her personal as well as professional life, she had trapped him and indicated she would read his mind for research purposes, she had abused her authority to demand emotional satisfaction from a man who didn't have the autonomy to leave the room.

Suffice to say that Healer Storm was herself both a damaged and dangerous individual.

            "...that’s why she’ll read what she wants."

Yavin gently pushed his thoughts aside and turned his head to look at Lawrence, smile almost entirely faded. "You forget she isn't the only cat in this, hum, this game. You have my word that procedures will be fair, to the best extent of my ability to ensure it."

He lowered his hands from their thinking position and sat forward, serious. This had to be dealt with immediately. Before Miranda saw their patient today.

"Will you consent, that is, to my...?" Yavin gestured at his forehead and then at the other wizard. "Just think about her, hah, her visit. I believe you, of course, but, hm. I would like to see." This wasn't the Wizengamot; he could use his skills to derive his own conclusions about this pair.

“Mr Morgenthau,” Lawrence replied calmly, “You have asked me a question for which I have given a reasonable verbal answer, and you want to take a look in my head.” He blinked, anxiety creeping up his spine. He didn’t have to spell it out, surely, that they were not much different to each other.

“I am a mouse in a trap with two cats who want to play mind games with me.”

Lawrence looked away pointedly and inhaled shakily, frustrated. Dire as it might seem, given what had happened at Oulton Broad, he’d have trusted Sandy Misslethorpe in that chair over Morgenthau or Andy at that very moment. He wondered if the other wizard could glean that without even meaning to.

Defying both researchers a glimpse into his head on the inaugural day of the study felt like signing an order to return to Azkaban. But there was one person in this whole sorry debacle he could trust, and that was the tenacious Harper Graves. She never tired of reminding Lawrence that despite the encyclopaedia of crimes he had committed in twelve months, he still had some rights. Like his consent.

“I knew your predecessor well. The last few times I have met with unspeakables they gave me no reason to trust them. And as much as you’re Andy’s minder, you’re appointed by a Minister who ordered destruction of my memories. Forgive my paranoid squeaking, Mr Morgenthau.”

Generally speaking, it was perfectly natural for the average wix to feel reluctant about allowing someone into their mindscape - and Lawrence was far from average. Merlin knew what he had inside of his head, wondrous or otherwise. His distrust was perhaps the healthiest thing to expect from such a psyche.

And could he really be blamed, having faced a personality like Miranda?

A grim, darker look entered Yavin's eye at the mention of Mortimer Gamp. Some days it was easier to think of that man in an objective sense; other days, he could only think of his pupil describing circumstances of children being left to rot in level nine's labyrinthine dungeon. That madness went unchecked for years.

"Do you, ah, genuinely think you're paranoid?" he asked, abruptly turning the direction of their conversation. Yavin narrowed his gaze at Lawrence and crossed his legs casually. "It isn't paranoia if, haha, if you're justified, is it?"

The Ministry of Magic was not trusted by its own people sometimes, much less its captors. And Edwin Glass had done something to Musgrave's mind.

"I don't, hm, I don't play mind games with patients. I study and I heal." Yavin glanced down at his hands, briefly examining his nails. "Although you are, I mean, you are entitled to refuse." This wasn't the first time he had dealt with someone afraid of becoming a lab experiment or a toy.

Nobody wanted to be played with and thrown away. "We are in a hospital. Miranda might, hm, act like queen, but she's also a slave to its, shall we say, its common cause."

They’d planned on meeting just before 10 o’clock that morning in order to briefly re-cover the approach and aims of the morning before visiting the patient. Miranda had been in the hospital before 7 o’clock and she’d spent the last couple of hours on the fourth floor with her patients. According to the mediwitches and healers on the wards, there’d been a strange atmosphere throughout the night. Habitually, dementor exposed patients exhibited high amounts of anxiety, but this had been extreme.

“Keep me updated.” The Head Healer told the Healer in charge of the ward before leaving for the corridor.

After moving through the double locked doors towards Musgrave’s cell, Miranda frowned upon seeing only Stump there. He looked up from his book and she pulled her golden pocket watch from the pocket of her emerald and gold trimmed robes. It was time.

As if reading her thoughts, Stump waved a hand at the door before his gaze returned eagerly to ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’. Miranda frowned and moved towards the window. Inside the room was its occupant sat curled up in an armchair. The second chair was occupied by Yavin Morgenthau, her supposed partner in this endeavour.

Thin fingers encircled Miranda’s wand and a silent charm was cast.
"Although you are, I mean, you are entitled to refuse." Morgenthau told their patient, his back to the 2-way mirror.
"We are in a hospital. Miranda might, hm, act like queen, but she's also a slave to its, shall we say, its common cause."

What the hell was Morgenthau doing in there alone talking about her?

She couldn’t barge in and question him.

“Mr Stump.” The Head healer scanned around to see the Hitwizard. “Kindly request Morgenthau’s presence out here.” The look received by Stump made it clear he didn’t appreciate orders being given by the Healer, but he relented anyway, closing his book, and placing it on the seat as he stood.

Stump politely knocked and entered the room and Miranda continued to watch, arms folded, through the window.

Before the other wizard could react to Yavin's meandering, the door opened. He heard it click before he turned his gaze towards Fendrel with a skeptical expression - so she was watching. Hardly a surprise, considering they had agreed to meet at around this hour. No doubt she had questions of her own to pose.

            "The Head Healer...." Fenny began.
"I'll be, aha, I'll be out to see her in five minutes." Yavin replied levelly. "Don't let her in."

Luckily for them level two did not answer to the hospital. His attention returned to Lawrence as if though they hadn't been interrupted at all and he made an amused sound. "We have an audience," he raised his eyebrows as his mouth twitched into a smile. "Should I, hm, should I keep her waiting you think?"

Yavin sank backwards into the armchair, comfortably ensconced. He was just as happy to exchange odd pleasantries while their Madam Healer stewed in whatever was passing through her head.

“Do you … genuinely think you’re paranoid? It isn’t paranoia if… you’re justified, is it?” Lawrence’s lips quirked to one side over the debate of definition. It was a good point, and maybe he had considered it paranoia because since his surrender, he’d often been told he should have nothing to fear from his captors. That his cooperation would ensure they would be kind to him.

Morgenthau attempted to reassure him of his place in the research, that Lawrence had the right and permission to refuse.
“We are in a hospital. Miranda might, hm, act like a queen, but she’s also a slave to its, shall we say, its common cause.”

There was movement at the door. Lawrence had kept it clearly in his peripheral gaze throughout the conversation with Morgenthau. But instead of the Head Healer, it was Fendrel Stump. Lawrence’s gut couldn’t decide if this was a positive thing, or something more ominous.

“The Head Healer…”
“I’ll be, aha, I’ll be out to see her in five minutes.”

Lawrence glanced between the wizards, pulling at his left sleeve in distraction. Morgenthau was right about not being able to leave the room, but as the minutes ticked on Lawrence began to imagine bursting out of it. What he wouldn’t do to spend five minutes outside in fresh air and earth.

“Don’t let her in.”

Merlin, this was not at all panning out the way Lawrence had hoped the research might begin. After reading and analysing the notes he was allowed, he was keen to focus on investigation than the difficult dynamics between them personally. Morgenthau had the room though, quite literally. Fendrel Stump looked peeved to be the go between, despite his placid temperament and remarkable patience. Lawrence doubted the Head Healer was sunshine and daisies in the corridor. He swallowed on behalf of his minder, as Stump uttered something that sounded like as you wish, and returned.

“Should I… keep her waiting you think?”

Lawrence licked his lips and dragged his remaining fingers through his greying hair. There was less of it since they cut it when he arrived, and he was still getting used to it.
“Depends how livid you like a witch.” He replied quietly, lowering his gaze from the door as if Miranda stood right in front of it, staring at him. Miranda wasn’t good at waiting for what she wanted. He tapped at his temple, but didn’t meet Yavin’s eye.

“Why do you need to see in my head about what we talked about?”

He was sorry to send the poor Hitwizard between himself and the Head Healer, but even Fendrel's pert parting words would not entirely distract Yavin from his purpose in this room. They had entrusted to him the study and well-being of Lawrence Musgrave. It would be remiss not to pursue a suspicion where there were valid indications of unethical behaviour.

            "Depends how livid you like a witch."
"Let's, aha ah, let's live dangerously today."

At the other wizard's gesture, Yavin glanced over his shoulder at the door - and then pried open his own mind the way you would unlatch a window in your home to yell at a neighbour across the street. Another layer of privacy. She didn't need to hear this.

When he spoke into Lawrence's mind, his words came in the form of a deep voice in a large and empty room. It had none of his verbal oddities.

"I need to see where and how the line was crossed." Yavin stared into space in the material world, not requiring eye contact to maintain their silent conversation. "I need to ensure it doesn't happen again." On an impulse, he smiled to himself and added in an amused tone, "Don't worry. We'll get down to actual work, as soon as we can."

He hadn't come here, after all, to mediate between the criminal and his captor.

Morgenthau’s voice gained a new acoustic in Lawrence’s head. The younger wizard lifted his chin on noticing the difference, and looked up. Morgenthau’s lips were not moving but he could hear him, clear as a bell. Musgrave’s eyebrows drew together at the bridge of his nose, a line of confusion forming as he realised the trick. His gaze shortened from Yavin’s face to middle distance as he focused on the voice internally.

“Are you-,” Lawrence spoke aloud, jumping at the sound of his own voice for the sheer contrast, “Can I…?”

This wasn’t like Ira Almasy skimming his mind’s eye for Edwin’s face as his lungs burned beneath her strangulation, it wasn’t like Mortimer Gamp trying to sneak in the back door about how to summon dementors when Lawrence had drawn his wand. This was much more subtle, elegant. It made the hairs on the back of his neck prickle, as if Morgenthau were both simultaneously in the chair opposite and right behind Lawrence’s eyes, watching the same image.

Do I just think like this? Can you hear me?
      Loud and clear.

Lawrence looked back to Morgenthau with the expression one might with the revelation of solving a tricky mathematical problem.

You’re in my... mindscape? Isn’t that what you call it - in your book?
      I'm on the edge of your mindscape. I only see or hear whatever you want to put forward. Think of it like a stage: the rest of you is behind the curtain.[1]
Fascinating.

But also horrifying. What had he said, ‘just think about her visit’?

Here goes.

Lawrence closed his eyes, face screwed a moment as he tried hard to concentrate, and perhaps a little too much, of yesterday’s encounter. Outwardly, he looked pained, or maybe constipated, or a bit of both.

1.	Yavin’s dialogue by Nuri

This particular form of communication was the one he favoured when first approaching wary Legilimens - especially younger ones who had reason to be suspicious of intruders. It gave them the option of retreating and it allowed even the uninitiated to hold some form of autonomy over their thoughts. A safe space.

            Here goes.

Yavin closed his corporeal eyes just then, prepared to absorb himself in the visual recollection of what Lawrence chose to project. Memories were as subjective as opinions but the broad strokes were generally truthful.

Miranda Storm's face came into focus: her arms crossed over her chest and her dark eyes full of some obscure emotion. A prepossessing but formidable thing to behold. She was dressed in casual clothing. Musgrave's memory-voice spoke. Head Healer. So, he had made the attempt to set a professional tone. It was she who had pushed past it.

Yavin maintained a passive role in his observation. He noted the point at which the patient tried to remind Miranda of what she was doing, noted the extremes in emotion she fully expressed and her repeated guilting, the generally erratic pattern of their exchange. Its abrupt ending. The aftertaste of the meeting, which lingered in Lawrence's thoughts, was one of frustration... and an exacerbation of true despair.

That lingered in Yavin's thoughts too as he opened his eyes. In spite of the despair, he could also sense that Lawrence didn't intend to be beaten down by Miranda. Neither were emotions to associate with one's Healer.

"Thank you," he said out loud and tilted his head towards Lawrence without looking him in the eye. "That was, hm, illuminating. I am sorry you had to, that is to say, had to experience it."

The helplessness. "I should see to our Madam Healer now." Yavin rose, blinking slowly and looking around the room in a leisurely manner. Inside, his mind revolved in concentric circles to do with logic and ethics: Musgrave and Miranda at the heart.

"You should, hum, should rest if you can. There is, ah, time."