“OK, listen up”, Harry clapped his hands, and his family gathered in front of him. It was a very nice day in the woods, and they really missed stretching their legs outside.

“We lucked out with Hermione this time, but imagine if they were leading with something deadly. Doesn’t have to be Avada Kedavra, it could have been Sectumsempra, or Reducto, or even Stupefy. There are terrible spells out there, things that amputate limbs, destroy minds, wipe memory. She ended up bound and disarmed, but conscious, able to work wandless magic. They could have hit her with something that would knock her out, and then transported her who knows where, and who knows what they would have done to her before we could intervene, or she could do something about it. We messed up, and we got lucky”.

They all nodded in agreement. “So, let’s see the post mortem analysis here. I’ll start with myself. I misjudged the threat level. The moment I couldn’t remote view the situation in the field, I should have aborted the mission and sent at least three people, heavily shielded, with smoke grenades with disabling potion, knocked them all out first and since they made sure nobody can disapparate from there, that would have worked. I failed and it could’ve got Hermione killed”.

“I didn’t create spells for her to use wandlessly in an emergency. Quick stuff that would instantly pause time for every living being around her, another spell that would have them bound, disarmed, unconscious and ready for transport. A rescue spell that would render her instantly invisible, shielded, that would inactivate all magic that was cast upon her in the last hour, and so on. And I also underestimated the threat. I should have seen the signs – the hut was too far, too well shielded to be a mere smugglers’ nest. I’m giving myself a failing grade as well, and the fact Hermione made it safely out is not due to any help from me”, Lyra finished.

“I didn’t go with her despite having a bad feeling. I dismissed it because I wanted her to grow her confidence by doing an easy job unassisted. I almost got my wife killed because I was slacking”, Viktor nodded gravely.

“I didn’t have a shield charm on me, or my clothes. I believed it would be easy despite there being no actual sign confirming it. I took absence of immediate problems as evidence of safety. I had a feeling there were people in the hut when I entered, and I didn’t immediately act on it. And when I was hit and on the floor, I panicked and used the easiest and deadliest form of magical attack that I could pull off, when Expelliarmus would have rendered them all harmless as the first move, giving me time for the second move. I convinced myself it would be easy, and when it wasn’t, I went for the nuclear option”, Hermione smiled.

“Nuclear?”, Viktor raised an eyebrow.

“Muggles have nuclear bombs that can instantly destroy whole cities with everybody in them. It’s the weapon of last resort they never want to use because there’s no going back after that – and the enemies have them as well, and it’s expected that they will all get killed in the retaliatory strike”, she explained. “Going for the nuclear option means panicking and overreacting, which I did”.

“OK, it’s good to know that we are all on the same page. Now, let’s see what we did well. I had everybody on stand by, ready to intervene on call. That worked well later on. Also, I handled the aftermath well. Other than that, I can’t think of anything”, Harry smiled bitterly.

“I taught her wandless magic and we made that communication bracelet spell that used to be a baby alarm, but now she used it to call for help”, Lyra nodded.

“I didn’t do anything right. I stood there like a fool instead of being with her, she did all the work, and I gave an interview later glazing over our fuckup, acting as if she had it under control”, Viktor was remorseful.

“I learned from Lyra attentively enough that I could use wandless spatial compression and disruption on multiple targets at once. I also called for help as soon as I physically could”, Hermione concluded.

“So, let’s summarise. We need to take things more seriously and not ignore signs of danger. We don’t send people alone into danger. We need communication devices, similar to that bracelet of yours, but something we can give out and remove, not as permanent, something similar to the muggle radio. Something that transmits voice to the central at all times, and possibly the visuals. If the signal interrupts for whatever reason, we immediately send support. We need those spells Lyra talked about, quick, almost automated action along predictable lines, and we need to practice with those until it’s our second nature. Also, when anti-apparition and anti-surveillance magic is detected, we interpret it in the most paranoid way possible, assuming that five death eaters under invisibility cloaks are about to fire Avada Kedavra the moment someone enters”, Harry concluded.

“I’ll start working on it immediately”, Lyra nodded and kissed his hand.

“I can do the communication artefacts so that Lyra doesn’t have to do all the work”, Hermione smiled.

…

“I just remembered something. In the forbidden forest, I had a situation where I was overwhelmed by waves and waves of Acromantulas charging at me, and I just thought about how I would deal with that now and I honestly don’t know. I would do a perimeter freeze but I would be instantly overwhelmed by new enemies. Any barrier would hold for a while, and then I would be overwhelmed. If something like that happened within an anti-apparition zone, like that island within the cave surrounded by the Inferi, I would be dead”, Harry told his wife as they were preparing for sleep.

“That’s a good point”, she nodded. “We always assume human threats, but I think those might increasingly become the lesser concern, and we might instead be forced to deal with dangerous creatures. Basilisks, Dragons, Acromantulas, and who knows what. I need to take this into account when designing the spells”.

…

“Good morning boys and girl, I am putting you back to school”, Lyra smiled as she approached the breakfast table with her coffee and croissants. It’s been a week since their post mortem, and she was busy.

“Here’s a list of spells I made for you, with descriptions and instructions”, she handed them a piece of parchment, which Hermione immediately duplicated so that each of them would have one.

“Festino, Tranquillo, Deleo, Effugio, Pax, Zona stasis, Lux propria”, Viktor read the spells out loud. “You’re such an incredible overachiever, sis”, he smiled.

She shrugged and smiled. “It would be about time, since I almost got your wife killed by being the opposite”.

“What do they do?”, Harry met her eyes.

“Festino makes your personal time go faster, so the world looks like it’s in slow motion while you move. It gives you a short burst, about a minute, but in that minute you can do whatever and nobody can oppose you”, she started.

“Woah”, Viktor was amazed. “So it basically feels like Impedimenta cast on the rest of the world, while you either escape, or mop them up. This is an incredible weapon. We have to keep this to ourselves because if anyone else uses it, it could have terrible consequences”, he warned.

“Absolutely, but it’s a spell that can be cast only wandlessly by touching magic directly, and we’re keeping that within our intimate family circle because spreading it out is just a horrible idea”, Lyra nodded. “But let me continue. Tranquillo is the opposite – it doesn’t accelerate you, it slows down everything in the area to a standstill, or close enough. That’s what I used without a spell in Knockturn Alley. It can affect the target area or individual people, but once it’s applied, new people entering the area won’t be frozen in time, which is good when our people come to support us, and bad if the hordes of enemies are rushing to overwhelm us, so there’s that”, she nodded seriously.

“So this means we can now trivially cast that time freeze you did there?”, Hermione wondered.

“Yes. That’s identical magic, only invoked by a spell. Next, Deleo. It’s like Reducto, only focused on magic. Never do this inside the house or any other magical place because this will neutralise all existing spells, regardless of who cast them. The only thing that overrides it is deeper authority; you can’t, for instance, enter someone’s home and negate their protective spells unless you are specifically on a mission as Aurors, which gives you deeper authority and then you can basically override everything, as long as it is related to the specific mission you are on. The deeper magic is specific regarding this. You’re just not allowed to abuse it, but when you have authority of your office, you can use it to delete all magical wards on a specific place”, she warned.

“Woah. I wish I had this in that cave where Voldemort kept the medallion”, Harry mused. “I could have inactivated all that horrible stuff, since Voldemort had no inherent authority over the place”.

“Exactly”, his wife nodded, “And this is what it’s meant to do. Also, for neutralising anti-apparition and anti-surveillance spells such as those Hermione had to face. Next, Effugio. It allows you to escape to the last location of perfect safety. This will be either home, or with people you love. It picks the location specific to the caster, from their own soul, and cuts through all anti-apparition spells in existence with absolute priority. It allows you to escape from traps such as the one we allowed Hermione to walk into. It also casts a temporary time freeze during the disapparition process so that we wouldn’t have situations like aunt Bella throwing a knife and killing Dobby”, she reminisced with sadness.

“That stuff is incredibly useful, sis. You’re a genius”, Viktor was impressed.

She blushed slightly. “Thank you. Next, there’s Pax. It strikes either a zone, or individual targets, always excluding the caster, and disarms and petrifies everybody within the area of effect. It’s not capable of cutting through all protective charms, so be careful about that”, she smiled.

“Useful”, Hermione nodded. “But if someone has a Protego artefact on them, you need to be ready for immediate follow-up”.

“Exactly”, Lyra confirmed. “However, it is something I would recommend as a second spell, after time-freezing them with Tranquillo, or speeding yourself up with Festino. It allows you to wrap them up quickly, but it’s not the first spell I would use. The next one is Zona stasis, and it’s very much like Tranquillo, only it works on an area, not people, which makes is incredibly tricky to use. It makes the place work on slowed down time for all who enter it. Harry gave me the idea when he reminded me of the time he was rushed by a deluge of Acromantulas in the forbidden forest, and this would essentially time-freeze everybody who enters the area of effect. That, of course, includes the caster, his friends and all reinforcements. The point of this is to make a time-frozen sphere around yourself so that the enemies can’t touch you regardless of how many there are, so that you have the time to disapparate from the area where you’re overwhelmed, or, if that’s not possible, apply the next spell that would kill all the frozen enemies and figure out your next move when the spell wears out, which will be five minutes or so”, she finished.

“This is incredibly impressive”, Harry smiled at his true love. “Your new spells are among the most impressive offensive and defensive magic I’ve ever seen”, he nodded.

“The last spell is Lux propria, and it’s like a combination of the Peruvian instant darkness powder and the Hand of Glory, that I used in that very dark hour of Dumbledore’s death”, she shivered. “When you activate that spell, it creates an area of effect around you where everybody else will be temporarily blind, nobody outside the area can see into it, and only the caster sees normally. It allows you to escape or infiltrate”.

“We need to practice those until they are our second nature, because I already forgot half of them”, Viktor nodded. “But honestly, Lyra, what you did with this in a mere week, I have no words”, he looked at his sister adoringly, and he could tell that Harry and Hermione felt the same.

“You’re awesome and I worship you”, Hermione whispered in Lyra’s ear as they hugged, and Lyra hid her embarrassment in Hermione’s hair.