Wizarding Britain had learned how to smile again.
It did so carefully, like someone testing a healed wound—slowly, tentatively, always prepared for the pain to return. Five years had passed since Voldemort's death, and the country had rebuilt itself with a feverish devotion to normalcy. Streets were repaired. Institutions rebranded. Children were born who would never know the war except as a chapter in a history book, softened by distance and Ministry-approved language.
Peace, the Daily Prophet insisted, had prevailed.
But peace had a smell, Violet Cosmo thought, and this was not it.
From the high windows of Cosmo Manor's southern tower, she watched the rain sweep across the Lake District in silver sheets, blurring the horizon until sky and earth became indistinguishable. Storms were common here—drawn, perhaps, by the manor's wards, or by the kind of magic that had a habit of bending the world toward it. Violet stood utterly still, hands clasped behind her back, posture perfect without effort.
At sixteen, she had already learned that stillness unnerved people far more than motion.
Below her, the lake churned restlessly, dark waters rippling beneath low clouds. The wind tugged at the ivy clinging to the manor's stone walls, and somewhere deep within the house, ancient magic shifted, responding to her presence like a creature stirring in its sleep.
Violet closed her eyes.
She could feel it—the pulse of the wards, the layered protections keyed to her blood and her will. Astral anchors embedded in the surrounding land hummed faintly, aligned to constellations long erased from modern charts. The Cosmo family had never trusted the Ministry to define the heavens for them.
They had always preferred their own stars.
When she opened her eyes again, her reflection stared back at her from the glass: tall, sharp, composed. Short black hair fell in deliberate disarray around a face that knew how to be charming when it chose—and cruel when it didn't. Her blue eyes were cold today, thoughtful, fixed on a future the world had not yet realized was inevitable.
Five years ago, the Dark Lord had died screaming.
Violet had been eleven then—old enough to understand what it meant, young enough to see through the celebration. She remembered the way the manor had reacted that night: wards flaring briefly, runes burning brighter than they had in decades, the stars above shifting almost imperceptibly. The Cosmo magic had recognized the event not as an ending, but as a vacuum.
Power never vanished.
It redistributed.
Behind her, the door opened without a sound.
"You're brooding again," Adelaide Rosier said mildly.
Violet did not turn. "I'm thinking."
"That's what you call it now?"
A corner of Violet's mouth curved upward. "It's more dignified."
Adelaide crossed the room, her footsteps light against the ancient floor. She wore dark green robes today, the color complementing her eyes, her golden hair loose down her back in soft waves. There was something almost defiant in the way she occupied space—lean, graceful, and utterly unafraid.
Cosmo Manor accepted her presence as easily as it did Violet's.
That alone set her apart.
"You missed breakfast," Adelaide said, coming to stand beside her. "Again."
"I wasn't hungry."
Adelaide hummed, unimpressed. "You're never hungry when you're planning something dangerous."
Violet glanced at her then, blue eyes sharp with amusement. "And you're never bothered by that."
"No," Adelaide agreed easily. "I'm bothered when you plan dangerous things without me."
The words were light, but there was truth beneath them—shared history, shared secrets, shared ambition. Violet studied Adelaide for a moment longer than strictly necessary, noting the faint tension in her shoulders, the careful calm she wore like a second skin.
"Rosier Manor?" Violet asked quietly.
Adelaide's expression changed instantly. The warmth cooled, her features settling into something sharper, more distant. "I received a letter this morning."
"And?"
"My father is hosting guests tonight," Adelaide said. "Ministry-adjacent. Old allies pretending they were never allies at all."
Violet snorted softly. "How very modern of them."
"He wants me there."
Silence stretched between them.
"And will you go?" Violet asked.
Adelaide met her gaze. "Yes."
Violet's jaw tightened, just slightly. She turned back to the window, fingers curling against the stone. "Be careful."
Adelaide watched her, something soft and unreadable flickering across her face. "I always am."
That was not reassurance. It was a promise of competence.
Outside Cosmo Manor, the world continued its careful dance around the idea of peace.
At the Ministry of Magic, officials congratulated themselves on having dismantled the structures that had once allowed a Dark Lord to rise. Departments were restructured, committees formed, oversight expanded. Any magic deemed too old, too insular, or too dangerous was quietly regulated out of existence.
Ancient houses were encouraged to integrate.
To modernise.
To forget.
Violet Cosmo had passed her Ministry examinations with fifteen Outstanding OWLs at the age of fifteen, her results setting records that made bureaucrats uncomfortable. Homeschooled, unaligned, unmanageable. She had smiled politely while they tested her, answered every question flawlessly, and walked out with her future intact and entirely her own.
They had offered her Hogwarts.
She had declined.
At Rosier Manor, Adelaide played her role flawlessly.
She sat at her father's table that evening, posture immaculate, expression pleasant and distant. Adrian Rosier presided at the head, silver hair slicked back, his presence commanding despite the faint tremor in his left hand when he lifted his wineglass. He spoke of cooperation, of the importance of maintaining appearances, of the necessity of survival in a changed world.
Adelaide listened.
She always listened.
"You spend a great deal of time away," Adrian remarked casually, eyes sharp as they flicked toward her. "Cosmo Manor seems to suit you."
"It's quiet," Adelaide replied evenly. "I study better there."
"Indeed," Adrian said. "Lady Cosmo is… an interesting young woman."
Adelaide smiled, just slightly. "She is."
There was something probing in his gaze now, something calculating. "She has not aligned herself with the Ministry."
"Neither have many," Adelaide said.
"Many are fools," Adrian countered.
Adelaide said nothing.
Silence, too, could be a weapon.
Back at Cosmo Manor, Violet stood before a massive star chart etched into the library floor. Candles floated above it, their flames steady despite the storm outside. She traced a constellation with her wand, murmuring an incantation so old it no longer translated cleanly into modern language.
The stars responded.
High above, clouds shifted, thinning just enough for starlight to pierce through.
Violet straightened, power thrumming through her veins—controlled, deliberate, exquisite.
The world believed the war had ended.
It was wrong.
This was merely the pause between rulers.
And Violet Cosmo intended to decide what came next.