Anne unwrapped a large parcel and began organizing the stack of letters, newspapers, and magazines inside. Some of the letters were thick, containing a dozen charts and several sheets of stationery; others were thin, with only a few brief lines.
She arranged all the letters by date, then started reading them one by one, occasionally jotting things down in two thick notebooks. Instead of a quill, she used an ordinary fountain pen and letter paper. From time to time, she sketched diagrams on blank sheets using a pencil and annotated them with colored ballpoint pens.
"Anne? What are you doing?" Fanny asked as she walked over, drying her hair with a towel. "Huh? What's all this? Can I take a look?" she pointed to the pile of newspapers and magazines.
Anne nodded. "Sure, go ahead."
"The Times," "Financial Times," "World Futures Weekly"? Fanny raised a brow. "Why are you subscribing to so many Muggle newspapers and magazines?"
Still reading her letter, Anne didn't even look up. "Just trying to learn a few things..."
"Learn this? Anne, do you have too much time on your hands?" Fanny asked, puzzled.
"Not really. But don't forget what the Roland family is all about. Sooner or later, my aunt will pass everything down to me. I'd rather be proactive now than scramble to learn it all last-minute."
"Hmm... alright..." Fanny flipped through one of the magazines, frowning at the pages filled with numbers and technical terms. She quickly lost interest and put them back.
Once the letters were sorted, Anne started replying to them. After making a modest profit in the Reeve market over the summer, she'd opened an account at a London securities firm, planning to venture into longer-term futures trading. She had even hired an agent to handle communication via post, managing business on a weekly basis.
The letters were sent to Aaron's house, and every Wednesday night, Obi would package the subscribed newspapers and magazines and mail them to Anne. On Thursday mornings, Anne would receive them, read and prepare replies that evening, and then on Friday morning, Momo would deliver the responses back to Aaron's place for Obi to post through the British mail system.
At this point, Anne's assets had grown to nearly £10,000.
After finishing the last reply and sealing it with a stamp, Anne bundled the outgoing letters into a neat parcel and started reading the newspapers.
Halfway through, Fanny burst into the dormitory holding a book. "Anne! Anne!"
"What is it, Fanny? Catch your breath first... then talk..." Anne put down her paper and turned toward her.
Fanny shoved the book into her hands. "You... you... look!"
Anne glanced at the cover, "The Academic Ace's Path to Greatness – Potions Edition (Year 1)", and smiled inwardly. So someone actually bought this kind of book. Outwardly, though, she kept a straight face and asked, "What about it?"
Now breathing steadily, Fanny snatched the book back, flipped through several pages, and jabbed an angry finger at a stick-figure comic. "Anne, someone stole your idea!"
Anne flipped through the book and started laughing.
Fanny immediately realized what was going on. "Oh, I see. This book is yours, isn't it? And you're laughing! Why didn't you tell me?"
"Okay, okay, I admit it, I wrote it. But I've just been so busy lately, and you didn't write back to me over the break, so I forgot to mention it..."
"Hmph! So this is that 'brilliant money-making idea' you hinted at at the end of last term?"
Anne flipped to the first few pages and thought to herself that whoever bought the book must be a diligent student, the practice questions in Chapter One had all been completed, with thoughtful notes written in neat quill script under each mistake.
"Yup, this is it. Where did you get this copy from?" Anne asked.
"I was in the common room and saw a first-year student frowning over it. When he noticed me watching, he nervously asked for help... I answered his question and then spotted the stick figures. I borrowed it from him and rushed over here…" Fanny looked sheepish. She hadn't exactly asked politely.
"Hehe..." Anne chuckled. "So right now that first-year's probably sitting there, completely confused?"
Fanny glared at her.
"Alright, alright... Let's return the book and then I'll explain properly, okay?" Anne got up with the book in hand.
When they reached the Slytherin common room, there weren't many students around. A short boy sat in an armchair, nervously glancing toward the girls' dormitory. When he saw Fanny emerge, he quickly looked down, fiddling with the feather of his quill.
Anne walked straight over, smiling as she sat across from him. Fanny took the seat beside her, making the boy flush even redder and lower his head further.
Anne slid the book toward him with a gentle smile. "Thanks for lending this to us. No need to be nervous. I'm Anne Roland-Reeve, and this is Fanny Charles. We're fourth years. What about you?"
The boy raised his head slightly, eyes still lowered toward his notebook. "I'm Malcolm Doback. First year."
"Malcolm Doback? That's a lovely name, don't you think, Fanny?" Anne said warmly.
"Absolutely. Very nice. Thank you again for lending us your book, Malcolm," Fanny added.
Perhaps reassured by their kind tone and appearance, Malcolm mumbled shyly, "It's... it's okay... Um, can I maybe ask you guys questions in the future? I just think... a lot of the subjects are really hard..."
"Of course you can~" Fanny said. Anne smiled and nodded as well.
The next three weeks flew by. With Anne dropping the Divination course this year, she had more free time. The greenhouse remained a frequent destination. Occasionally, she delivered Professor Sprout's herbal extracts to Madam Pomfrey at the infirmary, and once even ran into Professor Snape there during one of her visits.
Snape had barely glanced at her before leaving, but Anne later learned that some of the rarer potions used in the infirmary required his expertise to prepare.
"I've never met anyone with such a natural gift for Potions as Professor Snape," Madam Pomfrey had told her. "He's brilliant. If you ever have questions, he's the one to ask, though he's not exactly easy to approach. Still, as your Head of House, I'm sure he'd be willing to help."
Anne had mixed feelings about that. She certainly acknowledged Snape's talent, but would rather spend hours in the library than risk him uncovering too much from her questions.
Fourth-year coursework was unquestionably harder than third year. Most subjects remained manageable for Anne, but Transfiguration had become significantly more challenging, and Care of Magical Creatures often felt painfully slow. But the one class that truly made her anxious was Defense Against the Dark Arts.
In the second week, Professor Moody announced that he would cast the Imperius Curse on each student in turn to demonstrate its effects and test their resistance.
Anne deeply disliked this idea. She knew "Moody" was actually a Death Eater, Barty Crouch Jr., sent by Voldemort to help Harry win the Triwizard Tournament and bring about his resurrection. She didn't remember every detail of the plot, but she vividly recalled the real Moody's fate, locked in the bottom compartment of his own magical trunk, left in darkness for months.
Still, Anne couldn't skip Defense class, it was mandatory, like Transfiguration.
"I really don't understand why so many of the required classes are awful," she muttered as she walked into the classroom.
Yet what happened next stunned even her. When Moody cast the Imperius Curse on her, she barely felt a thing. Just a fleeting lightness, a dreamy drowsiness, then nothing at all.
When nothing else happened, Anne turned to look at Moody in confusion.
He was clearly shocked, too, though he quickly recovered. The class roster zoomed from the podium into his hand. His magical eye scanned the list, while his normal eye locked onto Anne.
"Anne Roland-Reeve? Are you from the Roland family?"
Every pair of eyes in the room had already turned to Anne, but she didn't care. It was Moody's gaze that unsettled her.
She nodded hesitantly.
Moody tried to smile, but it looked more like a twitch of the lips, revealing yellow, uneven teeth.
"The Roland family, huh… It's been a while since I've seen one of you. The seventh Roland maxim: 'The strong don't always win, but winners are always strong.' True words, eh?"
"Um… yes, very true…"
"Alright, Roland, stand aside." Moody turned to the next student. But every classmate who stepped up afterward couldn't help stealing a glance at Anne, as if looking at her might help them resist the curse better.
So Anne stood at the back of the classroom, watching Moody curse each student. Quiet whispers buzzed all around. On the surface, Anne looked calm, but her mind was racing.
Does that mean the Roland family has a natural resistance to the Imperius Curse? Why didn't Diana ever tell me? Is this another thing that has to wait until I'm sixteen? The Roland background must be deeper than I thought. But to be born with such resistance... that's terrifying. This is one of the Unforgivable Curses, the highest-level illegal spells in the Ministry.
While she was lost in thought, Fanny, who had failed to resist the curse and had involuntary arm twitches, returned to Anne's side. Most Slytherins who had gone earlier had also lost control of some part of their body afterward.
"Is your arm alright?" Anne asked.
"Professor Moody said it'll wear off in ten minutes," Fanny replied. Then she looked at Anne and asked, "Anne, did you know you could resist it like that?"
Anne shook her head.
"Huh?" Fanny gasped softly, loud enough that Hermione, Harry, and Ron, waiting at the back of the Gryffindor line, heard. They collectively stepped back, now only two seats away.
The three of them leaned in, ears perked, but kept their eyes forward, terrified that Moody's magical eye might catch them chatting.
"It seems like my uncle and aunt have an unspoken agreement, not to tell me anything about the family or the complicated stuff until I come of age," Anne said, her voice tinged with frustration. "I only just learned that the Roland family has eight maxims. The third one is: 'Recognize mistakes, admit them, and actively correct them.' And then there's the seventh one, like Moody said…"
Fanny thought about that seriously, then said, "Anne, maybe your uncle and aunt have their reasons for doing things this way."
Anne shrugged and narrowed her eyes, falling silent.
In the end, only Harry managed to partially resist the curse on his first try. Moody praised him endlessly and made him repeat the demonstration four times until he could fully throw off the Imperius Curse.
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