Soon after Aster agreed to grow closer with Susan, a knock echoed through the room.
Amelia didn't think much of it until she heard the unmistakable voice of Albus Dumbledore.
"May I come in?" he asked gently.
Amelia stood up quickly, a touch of surprise breaking through her usual composure. "Y-Yes, of course. Come in."
Dumbledore entered with a calm presence, his gaze settling briefly on Aster, who lay stretched across the sofa. He gave a small, acknowledging nod.
"I came as requested, Amelia," he said, his tone as warm and composed as ever.
She hadn't expected him to arrive so soon.
"Children, please stay here. We'll just be a moment," Amelia instructed, then turned and walked alongside Dumbledore down the corridor.
They entered a private room and closed the door behind them.
Dumbledore closed the door softly behind them, the echo of the latch clicking into place far quieter than Amelia's voice had been.
He didn't sit.
He simply stood there, hands folded in front of him, eyes behind the half-moon spectacles calm as still water.
But Amelia Bones was not calm.
"You knew?" she asked, breathing sharper now, "don't play coy with me, Albus."
"About what?" Dumbledore asked gently, as if unaware of the storm she carried into this room.
"Don't come with mysteries, did you know the boy had Ancient Magic?"
The name alone felt too heavy for the air. Even here, even now.
"He should have awakened in three or four years," she continued, voice tight. "Not when he's eleven. Not now. And certainly not in the middle of a bloody Knight Bus incident!"
She slammed her palm against the edge of the table between them.
"He doesn't even match the profile! Every recorded Ancient Magic wielder was a squib or late bloomer, an empty well before the flood. They awakened after magic was long denied them. They were older. Quieter. Broken. Not... not this boy, not this Black, who wields magic like it's his breath!"
Dumbledore took a long moment before replying. His voice was measured.
"No," he said, "he does not match the profile. That much is true."
"You're not surprised," Amelia hissed.
"I'm not," he admitted.
Amelia took a step forward. "You let this happen."
"I observed," he said.
"You watched a child awaken the most volatile, reality-warping force we know of, four years early!"
"And he's alive."
That stopped her. The silence that followed was not peace; it was pressure, hanging between them like gravity.
"I've seen what Ancient Magic can do," she said finally. "You know I have."
Dumbledore's eyes darkened, ever so slightly. "I know."
"He's a child, Albus."
"He is," Dumbledore said softly. "But he is not just a child."
Amelia turned, pacing now.
"His power isn't stable. He doesn't know what he's doing—"
"No one does, at first."
"He could've killed everyone on that bus—!"
"But he didn't."
"He didn't mean to save them either!" she snapped.
Dumbledore inclined his head. "And yet, he did."
Silence again.
Then Amelia asked the question she had been holding down in her chest.
"Why him?"
Dumbledore finally moved, one slow step forward. "That," he said, "is what the magic chose to answer. Not us."
Amelia stared at him. "You're going to keep him at Hogwarts?"
"Where else would he be safe?"
She didn't answer. Because she didn't know. Not really.
"He needs guidance," she said at last.
"And he will have it."
"From you?"
Amelia's eyes narrowed at that.
"You're not talking about the Department of Mysteries."
"No," Dumbledore replied, his voice quiet but deliberate. "They study magic. They do not understand it."
She stepped toward him again, lowering her voice. "Then who, Albus? Who alive could possibly claim more knowledge than you?"
Dumbledore looked her dead in the eyes now.
"Those who once used it. Not those who studied it from the safety of parchment and glass."
Amelia stiffened.
"You don't mean—"
"There are still echoes of the past," Dumbledore interrupted gently.
She looked down, then to the floor beneath them.
"That reservoir under the Ministry is not safe," she said. "It should be sealed. It should have been forgotten."
Dumbledore nodded. "And yet it wasn't. Which is why it still calls to someone."
Amelia exhaled through her nose. "He felt it, didn't he? Just now."
"Yes," Dumbledore confirmed. "Just as he will feel beneath Hogwarts. He may not know what he's hearing yet, but in time... he will."
"Do you want him to follow it?"
"I want him to choose," Dumbledore said simply. "And to do that, he needs truth. Not fear. Not suppression."
Amelia turned her back to him for a moment, staring at the wall. Her voice, when it came again, was quieter.
"I'll assign Aurors in plain clothes around the ministry while he's here," she murmured. "If anything goes wrong..."
"I'll take responsibility," Dumbledore said. "As I always have."
Amelia nodded once, tight. Then after a pause: "What do we tell him?"
Dumbledore considered it.
"The truth," he said at last. "But only what he's ready to hear."
Her brow furrowed. "And if he's ready for more than you expect?"
Dumbledore's eyes twinkled, but it wasn't amusement. It was something deeper. Older.
"Then," he said, "he might finally become something this world hasn't seen in centuries."
"A weapon?" she asked bitterly.
They soon returned to Amelia's office to be surprised by what they saw.
Dumbledore's expression, though still calm, had turned solemn.
Aster was summoning something out of thin air, an artifact.
Amelia stepped beside him, arms folded tightly. "He conjured a bound artifact, Albus. That's not accidental magic."
"It's not," Dumbledore agreed quietly.
Aster, meanwhile, looked at them both, slightly confused by the tension. "Is… something wrong?"
"No," Dumbledore replied at once, his voice gentle. "Only that you've done something very rare. Most wizards live their whole lives without ever performing true conjuration."
Aster frowned. "I just… I wanted to give her something useful."
Amelia's eyes flicked to Susan, who clutched the ring in her hand, wide-eyed, flushed, but fiercely protective of it already.
"That ring," Amelia said slowly, "will follow a binding protocol. It's attuned to you."
Aster tilted his head. "So?"
"So," Amelia continued carefully, "if it breaks, or is forcefully removed or she feels distraught, it might not just alert you. It might pull you to her side, without warning."
Aster paused. Then simply said, "Good."
Dumbledore chuckled softly, not mocking, but like an old man pleasantly surprised by something young and sharp.
"You've tied your magic to a person, Aster," he said. "Be sure that's what you truly want."
Aster looked at Susan. She was avoiding his gaze, but holding the ring as though it were made of glass and fire at once.
Then he nodded. "I do."
The moment he spoke, something shifted. Not magic, not a spell, but intention. The kind that made things real.
And as if to confirm it, Aster's eyes shimmered, deepening in color until they were unmistakably violet, not a reflection, but a change that settled behind his pupils and stayed. A flicker of light coiled inside them, almost serpentine, like magic recognizing itself.
Dumbledore looked at Aster, and for a moment, there was no headmaster in his eyes—only the quiet understanding of a man who had once been young, who once made promises just like that.
He knew what it meant, when a boy with ancient magic looked someone in the eye and said, "I do."
It wasn't power. It wasn't romance.
It was intention, stubborn and fierce and impossible to shake.
Aster was protecting Susan—not because someone told him to, but because he'd chosen it. That was what mattered.
And that was what made it dangerous.
Beside him, Amelia Bones said nothing, but Dumbledore could feel the gears turning in her mind. She was sharp, too sharp to miss what had just happened. She wouldn't interfere… but she'd use it. Protectively, of course. Strategically.
She will guard her niece by pushing Aster forward, Dumbledore thought, and Aster will never know she's doing it for Susan's sake, not his.
He couldn't stay in this anymore.
Not right now.
At that moment, an owl beat its wings against the glass, parchment curled in its talons.
Dumbledore opened the message with a flick of his wand. His expression tightened.
Something had happened at Hogwarts.
He folded the message neatly, tucked it away, and straightened his robes.
"Aster," he said, "I hope to speak with you again. When you return to Hogwarts, we'll talk more about your future, and your magic."
Aster stood, still a little pale, but nodded with quiet resolve.
Dumbledore turned to Susan. "Be careful with that ring. It's more than it seems."
Susan clutched it reflexively, nodding. "I will, Professor."
And without another word, Dumbledore swept from the room, his pace no longer leisurely.
He moved quickly, almost urgently, because something had gone wrong at Hogwarts.
And the boy with violet eyes wasn't the only storm on the horizon anymore.