SKELETONS

P R O L O G U E

McGonagall paced backwards and forwards in her office, looking at the large portrait of Dumbledore resting proudly on the wall next to her desk, and wondered how he had always seemed so calm and in control.

It was not that she was not up to the job, far from it, but the previous year had left a lot of scars and she needed to be sure that this would be the best year Hogwarts had ever seen. The war was over in a technical sense but the scenes so many students had witnessed of death and torture would never be over, not in their minds.

She had made the choice to invite back students who had been in their final year to complete their N.E.W.T.S if they so chose. Though, if she was completely honest with herself, McGonagall also felt like she needed the DA members around for just a bit longer.

She had spent the summer reviewing all the memories Dumbledore had collected in his pensive and thinking carefully about everything that had happened in the past 50 years.

It had to be over, right? Tom Riddle's soul had been completely destroyed, there was no way he could come back...

...but wouldn't he have set something in place for this?

His paranoia near the end was consuming, it would make sense that when he found Potter was hunting his horcruxes he would've done something to further shield himself from eternal death.

Perhaps, though, she was giving him too much credit. One of his main downfalls was his ego and vanity- would he have dreamt that one day all his horcruxes would be destroyed and the elder wand would betray him? That he may actually lose?

Then again, this all happened because of the prophecy, and Riddle had been an exceedingly smart boy...

She sighed and pulled her grey hair into its signature bun. There was no time to think about this now, students would be arriving this evening and she needed to make sure everything was prepared.

As she pulled the sorting hat from its shelf she let go of her racing thoughts and got started on the task at hand.