S1E8 — : Index, Please
November pressed frost to the windows and patience into the corridors. The lake went to pewter again; the sky decided gray was a discipline, not a color. Corvus liked it—weather with rules.
Ravenclaw's eagle asked, "What word is spelled incorrectly in every dictionary?"
"Incorrectly," he said, and slipped out, locket warm, coin a steady note under the sternum.
In the Great Hall he timed porridge viscosity (unreliable), refused to invent Etiquette Jam (for now), and found a crisp note at his plate in McGonagall's tidy script:
> Mr. Black—
Please carry this memorandum to Madam Pince regarding new study protocols. Return with her signature.
—M. McG
An errand with edges and no cape. Excellent.
---
Reference Weather
The library breathed paper and rule of law. Madam Pince received McGonagall's memo as if accepting custody of a dragon egg, read once, twice, and nodded like a hinge that charges rent.
"New protocols," she said. "Study nooks: no hexes, no duels, no romantic narrations." She peered over her spectacles. "You are to… assist with implementation."
"Gladly," Corvus said. "I brought manners."
He drew a small lattice across the air, the Reader's Halo tuned finer: opt-in bubbles labeled with a discreet blue thread over selected tables. Pince tested one; the air thickened to absorb noise and loosen fidgets.
"Hm," she said, which in Pince meant keep your life. "Label them."
Corvus conjured placards with a librarian's dignity: QUIET NOOK — OPT-IN — STEP OUT TO CHATTER. Pince actually didn't frown.
> CV-003A — Quiet Nook (Library spec): opt-in, self-sheathing at curfew; Pince approval rating: startled continuous.
As he worked, Hermione arrived with a stack of ambition, Harry with curiosity in a jumper, Ron with a suspicion of tables. They beelined for the catalog.
"Looking for Nicolas Flamel?" Corvus asked the air, not them.
Hermione's eyes flicked up. "We're… researching," she said, which is Gryffindor for yes.
"Try biography indexes before alchemy," Corvus said mildly. "People catalog people like trophies."
She blinked, filed it, and didn't ask how he knew. Good brain.
---
The Index Thread
Madam Pince stalked by like a stealth audit. Corvus intercepted with a bow fit for the queen of whispering.
"Proposal: Index Thread," he said. "A whisper-charm that nudges hands toward reference paths, not answers. Safer than children spelunking the Restricted Section by hubris."
Pince's mouth fought a smile and lost by a molecule. "Demonstrate."
He etched a translucent glyph above the wooden catalog: a single, courteous rune that wakes when someone thinks who was he? The drawer face glimmered and, without betraying content, lit the People: Notable cards—Flamel included—while leaving the Restricted stacks asleep.
Harry's eyebrows performed punctuation. Hermione murmured, "Oh," like a small victory landing. Pince permitted a fractional nod.
> CV-009 — Index Thread: pathfinding, not unlocking; bias to safe sources; dissolves at lights-out.
"Do not make me regret this," Pince said to the air, which agreed to behave.
---
Polite Alohomora
Between shelves, Corvus rehearsed what Flitwick had drilled: Alohomora as permission, not prybar. He chose a battered supply cupboard that had nothing to hide and everything to squeak, and he asked—tone pitched to may I?
Click. The lock opened as if pleased by his manners.
He wrote in the Mystery Log:
> 57. Doors = purposes; Alohomora = request.
57a. Rude caster → refusal. Polite caster → yes. (People, likewise.)
He shut it again, gratified by the simple engineering of dignity.
---
Hallway Civilities
Between classes, Slytherins flowed like confident ink. Draco Malfoy approached with Crabbe and Goyle in tow, smug with the week's gossip.
"Black," Draco said, "still nesting with Ravenclaws? I suppose someone must look down on us from towers."
"Only to admire the stair craftsmanship," Corvus said, unbothered. "I recommend it."
The corridor, remembering CE-1, replayed Draco's last kind phrase in his own crisp voice—soft, just for him: "Let her pass, then." (Earlier, to a second-year at a bottleneck.) Draco's shoulders re-aligned by a whisper. He didn't know why he stood a hair taller; he did.
"Do stop being peculiar," Draco said, less poisonous. "It's unnerving."
"I'm saving venom for Potions," Corvus said, and was gone.
> 58. Corridor Echo—maintenance dose: praise mirrors pride better than scolding mirrors shame.
---
Peeves, Rerouted (Again)
On the Charms landing, Peeves dangled upside down with a paint pot and the expression of an artist denied funding.
"Peeves," Corvus said, "there's a tapestry downstairs that insulted your juggling."
"It what?" Peeves sputtered, instantly betrayed by oxygen.
"Said your throws were 'adequate.'"
Peeves vanished with a bomb-pop shriek. Seconds later, the distant thwap of brushes against textile suggested the economy would recover.
> 59. Poltergeist management: weaponize tapestry snobbery; avoid faculty hair.
---
Susan, Hannah, and Biscuit Logistics
Hufflepuff corridor: Susan and Hannah doing Hufflepuff—carrying four books, three responsibilities, and one lemon tart.
"Your Quiet Nooks are brilliant," Susan said. "Pince glowered at me with approval. It was terrifying."
"Proper terror secures compliance," Corvus said. "Biscuits?"
Hannah handed him a shortbread like a diplomatic credential. "We're organizing a cross-house study rota. You're drafted for Runes."
"Good. Less chance of idiots blowing elbows off their wands," he said. "Bring your favorite shapes."
They rolled their eyes in a way that meant gratitude.
---
Third Floor: Wall, Not Door
The outlaw corridor hummed a half-song under the Headmaster's wards. Corvus stood at the turn—wall chosen, threshold refused—and listened. The wrong harmony was thinner since the Quidditch incident, but present, like a splinter that refuses theater.
The coin cooled. He put his palm to stone.
"I hear you," he said to the castle. "I'm not touching it."
Frost later would honor that sentence.
> 60. Disharmony status: lower amplitude; persistent; associated foot traffic: Quirrell (static), Snape (lightning rod). Continue witness/wall doctrine.
---
Controlled Variables — Filing Day
The hidden classroom behind the fourth gargoyle had developed an orderly soul. The chalkboard wore a tidy ledger:
CV-003A Quiet Nook — live
CV-005 Hallway Compass — live
CV-006 Breadcrumbs (HOME) — live
CV-007 Breathkeeper pins — Ravenclaw/Hufflepuff deployed, Gryffindor training tomorrow, Slytherin soon
CV-008 Umbrella Etiquette — rush hours only
CV-009 Index Thread — library only
Fred and George arrived with experimental whistles; Daphne Greengrass leaned in the doorway, cool as a signed treaty.
"Agenda," Corvus said. "One: biscuit budget. Two: CV-010."
"Tell me it's explosive," Fred pleaded.
"Explosive kindness," Corvus said. "Quill Amnesty. A charm-box that asks borrowed quills to come home at curfew. No shame, just a gentle tck-tck at owners who hoard."
Daphne's clockwork mouse clicked its teeth in what might have been applause. "Hilarious," she said. "Do it."
They built a cigar-box into a homing beacon with manners: quills tagged via light tap, box hums once at eleven, returns what it can without dramatics.
> CV-010 — Quill Amnesty: reduces stationary theft; increases gratitude; no detentions.
"Also," George said, "we have a small problem."
"A sentence that usually precedes a large one," Corvus said. "Proceed."
"Our Never-Quite-Invisible Gas makes shoes squeak in iambic pentameter. Filch hates Shakespeare now."
"Redirect to Lockhart's future tenure," Corvus said absently, then realized he'd spoken prophecy and chose to pretend he hadn't.
---
Teacup Choir, Breakfast Edition
Next morning, Teacup Choir (CV-004) ran a two-minute demo over the far Ravenclaw corner. Harmony plumped when compliments flew, thinned when gossip got sharp. Even Penelope Clearwater's posture relaxed a millimeter.
Flitwick drifted past, moustache hiding a grin. "Excellent tone, Mr. Black."
"Hypothetically," Corvus said, "if a Head of House wanted a five-minute tuneup near their more… theatrical table, one could be arranged."
"Hypothetically," Flitwick replied, "Professor McGonagall already asked."
---
The Coin Writes
That night, window frost drew letters with patient grace:
Ask nearer.
Corvus looked from glass to locket and back. The locket lay heavy and quiet, an unopened door that wore his father's hand like a memory.
"Nearer to what?" he asked the pane.
The frost added three dots—the punctuation for you know.
He put two items on the sill, twin moons: the coin and the locket. He did not open either. Promises are load-bearing.
Mystery Log:
> 61. Deliverables:
– Library: Quiet Nooks + Index Thread (path, not answer).
– Doors: permission model verified.
– CE-1 praise loop still superior to scolding.
– CV-010 Quill Amnesty live.
– Third-floor: hold the line.
61a. Thesis: Institutions are taught by ritual; people by permission; stone by praise.
61b. Frost says Ask nearer. Not today. Maybe tomorrow.
He doused the lamp. The tower breathed. Somewhere below, a mirror remembered faces it was hungry to show. Corvus turned on his side and practiced not knowing on purpose.
The frost's message—Ask nearer—wouldn't stop tapping the inside of his skull like a teaspoon against china. Corvus compromised with it the way he negotiated with stubborn locks: he would go near, not through.
He left the tower with legal innocence (curfew adjacent), the coin steady under his shirt, a sand timer in his pocket, and a breathkeeper pin he had no intention of abusing. The castle hummed its evening key. He followed the note in the stones that said: left, then don't be foolish.
Two corridors past the library, a disused classroom had decided to be a chapel for dust. The door didn't resist; it listened. Corvus knocked once.
"Question," he said softly. "What are you for?"
The room breathed him in. And there it was—tall as hunger, ornate as a family argument that got carved instead of solved: a mirror whose frame wore carvings like a crown and an inscription that read backward because that's how longing talks to itself.
His chest went cold and then very warm.
"Right," he murmured. "We'll be civilized about this."
He chalked a slender circle on the floor—a courtesy ring, not a prison—set his sand timer beside it, and established his rules aloud, because rules become truer when you declare them.
"Three-breath limit per look. No stepping closer without asking. Pin available if my lungs forget their job. If you sing, I critique your pitch."
The mirror did not sing. It waited—the way doors wait when they're old enough to know they're dangerous.
Corvus stood just inside the chalk and angled himself so he'd see the thing with, not into. He took his three breaths.
On the other side of the glass, systems worked. Hogwarts unfurled like a solved equation: staircases obeyed good manners by reflex; small lights bloomed for scared feet before fear had a name; the library's quiet didn't need defending because it had been taught how to defend itself. Ravenclaw's windows held stars that spelled home.
And there—like punctuation—Samantha, alive as laughter, wearing the cardigan she always forgot at the foot of the bed, head bent over a book she'd meant to recommend. Regulus stood behind them both, younger than photographs, older than his years, writing Not by blood noble, but by choice on the inside cover of a notebook and smiling like a man who had finally gotten to keep a promise. Farther back—out of focus but certain—Luna with paper stars in her hair, tying a ribbon around a stack of borrowed quills that had all come home by themselves. No capes. No spotlights. A school that didn't need heroes because it had infrastructure.
He exhaled on the third breath and stepped back before the want could reach him.
"Thank you," he told it, hoarse and practical at once. "That's enough for now."
The coin warmed—approval, or an anchor—and the mirror's glass lost a little of its tide-pull.
He turned his sand timer, let the sand walk itself down, and permitted a second look. This time he saw himself older by inches of responsibility, still thin with curiosity, handing a prefect pin to a girl with ink on her fingers while an eagle door laughed at a riddle it pretended was hard. He lifted his palm to the reflection and did not touch the glass.
"Door, not trap," he said. "Promise kept."
Behind him, the classroom's air changed—like a page turned by someone polite. He did not whirl. He didn't need to. Some presences are a temperature as much as a person.
"Good evening, Mr. Black," said Professor Dumbledore, voice warm as old cedar.
Corvus bowed his head the degree one bows to clocks that are accurate. "Sir."
"The Mirror is a persuasive storyteller," Dumbledore said, coming to stand beside him, not in front. "It tells the heart what it wants to hear, and the heart, poor gullible thing, believes every word."
"I set a timer," Corvus said. "And rules."
"Excellent," Dumbledore said, eyes creasing. "Many a mischief-maker has fewer rules than that." A glance at the chalk ring, at the breathkeeper pin, at the way the boy had left himself exits. "What did it show you?"
"A school that doesn't need saving," Corvus said simply. "And my mother and father meeting it halfway."
"Ah," Dumbledore murmured, and the syllable held more understanding than pity. "I am fond of infrastructures, myself."
They stood a moment, two men of different sizes worshipping at the same altar: systems over heroics; promises over prophecy.
"Will you move it?" Corvus asked, meaning the Mirror.
"In due time," Dumbledore said. "For now, it will sit here and practice not ruining anyone."
Corvus inclined his head. "I can add a courtesy tether—only to myself. Three-breath recall if I wander near. Noninvasive."
"By all means," Dumbledore said, amused. "One may never have too many seatbelts."
Corvus traced a small, private lattice from his wand to the space above the frame—no leash, just a line with his name on it. If he came back, the charm would tug his sleeve at breath three.
"Thank you for not asking what I saw," Dumbledore said, tone light as mending.
"I'm allergic to other people's thresholds," Corvus replied.
"An admirable condition," Dumbledore said. "Do keep it chronic."
Corvus reset his sand timer, nodded to the glass as one nods to a tool that could take a finger, and left with the headmaster at his shoulder. The door closed behind them with a sigh that decided, for now, to be benign.
---
Peeves Objects to Restraint
They hadn't gone twenty paces before Peeves dropped from a lampshade like a judgment with bells. "Oooo, boys and mirrors and feelings," he crowed, wheeling upside down. "Did the little Raven see a pony?"
"I saw a maintenance schedule," Corvus said.
Peeves gagged theatrically. Dumbledore's eyes twinkled murderously kind.
"Peeves," the headmaster said, "go sing to the trophies about their bravery. They haven't been insufferable in hours."
Peeves, affronted by the suggestion of underperforming insufferability, zipped away with a raspberry that made the sconces blush.
---
Library Addendum
By habit or gravity, Corvus drifted to the library before bed. Hermione had three volumes triangulated around Nicolas Flamel in a way that suggested the catalog had been helpful. Harry looked tired in the honest way. Ron used a quill like a sword that needed etiquette lessons.
Corvus set a Quill Amnesty box on a side table under Pince's supervision. The lid ticked once at eleven; two dozen quills slunk home from pockets all over the room. Pince's mouth twitched. Hermione didn't look up, but her good hand flicked a thank-you.
He wrote, quietly, on the corner of his log:
> 62. Mirror Protocol (personal): three-breath rule; timer; courtesy tether (self). Dumbledore aware; noninvasive.
62a. The right witness arrived; threshold remained a door.
---
Hallway Weather
On his way back, Draco Malfoy emerged from shadow with a face arranged for superiority and not quite sticking the landing.
"Ravenclaw," he said, tone less venom, more habit. "If you're going to go respectfully break rules, do it where Filch can't hear you."
"Noted," Corvus said. "Try telling your shoes to stop squeaking in iambic pentameter."
Draco blinked. "My—what?"
"Never mind," Corvus said, and the corridor faithfully replayed, just for Draco, "Let her pass, then," in Draco's own voice. Pride straightened his coat a fraction without his consent.
---
Tower, Frost, and the Kept Door
Ravenclaw's bronze eagle posed: "What can bring back the dead; make you weep, make you smile; make you young; is born in an instant, yet lasts a lifetime?"
"A memory," Corvus said, and felt the truth like a hand on his shoulder. The door opened, gentle.
At the window, frost was already writing. Better, it said. Then, lower, as if shy of its own advice: Again, but not alone.
"Understood," he told the glass. "Witnesses or walls."
He set the coin and locket on the sill, twin moons keeping different tides, and wrote the day down like a promise:
> 63. Deliverables:
– Library Quiet Nooks steady; Index Thread helpful; quills came home.
– Mirror met politely; rules held; no drowning.
– Dumbledore: ally in infrastructure; Peeves: redirected to trophy narcissism.
– Corridor Echo remains a better teacher than detentions.
63a. Doctrine: Doors are promises. Mirrors are doors with teeth. Bring rules and witnesses.
He did not open the locket. The refusal felt less like denial now, more like craftsmanship.
Paradox snored judgment from the rafters. The lake wore moonlight like a bruise getting better. Somewhere deep below, the wrong harmony quieted as if told a story that made mischief uninteresting for an hour.
"Steady," he said into the dark.
The coin warmed, a soft yes, and the castle, pleased by its boy's restraint, slept with one eye open and a smile older than all their cleverness.