Atoning

That Friday, McGonagall was true to her word to appear after dinner. She found the classroom we were using and walked in just as I was explaining that she had agreed to teach us.

"Your timing is impeccable," I told her. "Now - you lot - listen up. Professor McGonagall has agreed to help us learn to be Animagi." I sat on a desk and gestured for McGonagall to begin.

"Becoming an Aminagus is extremely difficult," she began. "There have only been seven registered Animagi this century, though there are certainly more who have not registered for their own reasons. Those who choose to become Animagi face three distinct challenges.

"First, becoming an Animagus takes hard work over a long period of time. Many people choose not to pursue this route because they grow bored or frustrated with their slow progress. It also takes a high pain threshold. The first few times you transform will be painful. Your bones grow or shrink, often disappearing altogether; muscles and organs transform, appear, and vanish. It will be more painful than the Cruciatus curse. Your body eventually grows used to the changes. As an Animagus for more than thirty years, I can transform without any pain to speak of. Even if those two can be faced and overcome, becoming an Animagus requires you to be entirely comfortable with your own skin and abilities. It requires you to know yourself better than most ever do.

"Learning to be an Animagus is extremely dangerous. Transforming without entirely knowing how to revert back to your human shape is very common. That is why you are not to attempt a transformation without me.

"You are all responsible, capable young adults. As such, I expect you to inform me if there is a problem, and inform me immediately, and to ask questions as soon as you don't understand something.

"You have heard the risks. If there is anyone who wants to back out, do so now." She propped her hands on her hips as she looked at us. We looked back. She nodded, satisfied.

"Now then. The first step is to get to know yourself. To do that, we will begin with guided meditation."

"How is that different than regular meditation?" Malfoy asked. "We've already done that."

"You know how to meditate already?" she asked, surprised.

"That was the first thing I taught them," I answered. "Otherwise the House rooms would have been destroyed already."

"I...see," McGonagall replied, clearly not. "In that case, this may be much less difficult than I thought it would be. Mastering meditation is the hardest part of getting to know yourself. Mr. Malfoy, guided meditation is different because I will be telling you what to look for instead of allowing you to empty your mind.

"Since you already know how to meditate, get started. I will give you five minutes to clear your mind before I begin to speak."

We settled onto the floor or the desks, as our comfort dictated. Five minutes later, McGonagall said softly, "Now, I want you to think of yourself not as others see you, but as how you see you. Who are you? What sets you apart? What makes you similar to others?"

I thought. Who was I?

I was smart, certainly. I was altruistic - wasn't I giving up all but one of my nights to teach? I was withdrawn and quiet, but not shy. I was a mediator, keeping Malfoy and Potter from killing each other. I was cold around others, but warm and friendly when I chose to be. I had been hurt, the kind of hurt that lingered through years and lives, leaving indelible marks where nobody could see them but me. I was suspicious to the point of paranoia. I liked to keep things to myself. I kept people at arm's length. I refused to be lied to.

Surely I wasn't so - so one-dimensional. There had to be more to me than a paragraph.

I was insecure. Emotionally distant, as one of my therapists had called it.

I was loyal, I realized. Fred and George had trusted me, and I had kept their secrets - not to use against them later, but because I wanted to. I was cunning, keeping most everything to myself to use when it would benefit me. I was ruthless, killing dozens at a time simply because it needed to be done if we were to win this war, killing without a second thought.

Who am I?

I was generous, opening my home to Potter, offering my knowledge to the groups I was teaching, helping others with their homework when they needed it and asked me for help.

McGonagall interrupted my train of thought. "Now that you have answered those questions, I want you to imagine a place where you feel safe. When you have found that place, imagining every detail you can remember, open your eyes, keeping both your knowledge of yourself and the location in the front of your mind."

Where did I feel safe?

After the Yule Ball fiasco of last year, I didn't feel safe in my rooms. I didn't feel safe in my old house on Privet Drive or in the house I had lived in with my father and sisters. I didn't feel safe in the library here, or the common rooms, or the Great Hall, or in my classes because I never knew who would come up. I didn't feel safe at Grimmauld Place because of Molly Weasley and my new role in the Order. I couldn't think of the House of Those Forgotten because Tommy had died and it was far, far too painful to remember where he had lived.

That left one place I could think of: this room. This room, with my old betrayer. The desks, the locked door, the people I trusted to not harm me, was the only place I felt safe.

The knowledge depressed me a little bit. An old, unused classroom with battered desks and a broken blackboard was the only place I felt I could relax.

I grimaced slightly, but had to admit it made sense. I visualized it, from the crack in the blackboard to the "Rocky + Emily 4ever" etched into the desk three across and two back from the door.

I opened my eyes. McGonagall nodded at me. Luna and Susan had their eyes open and were looking at their arms - a comically over-sized eagle's wing and badger arm, respectively. Potter and Malfoy both had their eyes closed.

McGonagall came over. "Are you focusing on who you are and where you feel safe?" she asked softly. I nodded, recalling the sudden insights and the room I was standing in.

She tapped my elbow with her wand and intoned, "Agnosce animae bestiarum."

The pain was indescribable. I had to hold back tears as my skin erupted with downy red-and-silver feathers as the bones were reconstructed and hollowed.

"A phoenix," McGonagall said dryly. "Of course you wouldn't do anything normal."

Malfoy was revealed to be some kind of green snake ("Probably poisonous, if the bands are anything to go by," McGonagall murmured) and Potter was a lion. McGonagall ordered us to research our animals' anatomy and characteristics in preparation for next week. When they began to follow her out of the room, I called them back.

"Did you really think we were done?" I asked them, amused. "You should know better by now." Grumbling slightly, they settled down to listen to my lecture on models.