All The Warlock's Men
by everambling
i
June 17th, 1999. Nine o'clock Saturday morning. Early for a Floo call. Nott brought him the news before the owls began to flock the office windows.
Riddle listened and seethed. Five wizards, apprehended while trespassing inside Wizengamot chambers, had been taken to Azkaban at daybreak to await trial. They counted among their number Augustus Rookwood, recently retired Unspeakable, who was purported to have called on Lucius Malfoy to act as his legal council.
"Skeeter might try to scoop you on the story," Nott concluded. Right on cue, Rita Skeeter was followed into the office by hosts of lime green memos.
Rita moved like someone assured of her own position. She was not yet heading the Daily Prophet, but she knew the secrets of everyone in the room, and what she did not know, she invented, which was just as good. She dedicated herself to vitriol with aplomb and was rewarded with top sales. Her gold teeth glinted at the competition across the room, flashing a warning: Rita would suffer no one to stand in her way.
It suited Riddle to let her go on thinking he was as much under her sway as the rest of the office. He had toyed with the idea of eliminating her, but upon discovering her little secret had decided that it would be more sensible to blackmail her when the opportunity presented himself.
He swished his wand under his robes.
"Imperio."
"So I suppose you've heard." Nott's lips moved at Riddle's command. "Incredible, isn't it?"
"Young man, when you've owned a Quick Quotes Quill as long as I have, nothing surprises you anymore," said Rita.
"And about Warbeck accepting, as well?" Nott insisted.
Rita's expression slipped. The flash of gold receded.
"Eh? Celestina Warbeck?"
"Right. Well, we—Riddle and I—asked Cuffe to assign us to the story, but he turned us down. We'll probably end up on the Wizengamot arrest." Riddle gave his wand another flick, and Nott raised an eyebrow. "Obviously, you know about Celestina Warbeck being offered Dumbledore's post? She's meant to replace him as Headmistress of Hogwarts."
A blank, earnest face greeted Rita's scrutiny.
"You didn't…? Perhaps I should've spoken to Cuffe first before saying anything," Nott muttered.
"Excuse me, darling," said Rita briskly. "Duty calls."
She was gone in a swish of magenta silk and a click of tapered bootheels. Riddle released Nott from the curse.
"I need everything you can find on Rookwood," he said. There was no call to obtain clearance from Cuffe. Once Riddle got the scoop, the story would be conferred to him as a matter of course.
Nott look dazed. "Did you just—"
"Yes, yes, there was no time to explain what I required of you," said Riddle impatiently. "Rookwood. Now."
Nott disguised his reluctance, albeit poorly, and busied himself about the paperwork. Riddle could taste steel on his tongue. A vibration much like when too many curses broke the skin in rapid succession. This Wizengamot business was a window, he thought. Exactly what it might lead to was anyone's guess, but a familiar headache was pressing in on the edges of his vision. The window was his for the taking.
One of the fireplaces lining the oak wall opposite roared to life. Emerald sparks spilled onto the ancient shag carpet as two figures stepped out. Barnabus Cuffe, and Hermione Granger.
An impediment.
"Ah, Tom!" cried Cuffe, Editor in Chief, brain of a Bowtruckle. "Good job you're here at this early hour. Seen Skeeter around these parts?"
"She went out," said Riddle. He kept his eyes on the Editor and his attention trained wholly on Granger.
"Indeed. Just as well. I don't look forward to assigning her that backfiring lavatory story in Wales. She'll have been expecting… Well, but I've arranged otherwise with Miss Granger, here. I believe you two know each other?"
"I was a year behind Riddle at Hogwarts," said Granger with ill-concealed discomfort. She held out a hand and Riddle shook it, steadily, smiling.
Hermione Granger was bookish, domineering, and certainly clever. She was a Gryffindor and a Mudblood, that most damning of combinations. At school she had hung around with a Potter and a Weasley, unremarkable dolts both, and after that incident with the Chamber of Secrets all three had seemed to give Riddle a wide berth. Granger might never know that Riddle felt a rather amusing, intangible connection to her for how close she had come to losing her life at his hands. Had circumstances not transpired differently…
"And my successor, as a former Head Girl," said Riddle. Granger's answering smile was thin.
Insensible to the tone of their exchange, Cuffe clapped his hands together.
"I trust you will show Miss Granger around our offices, then!" he exclaimed. "She will be working here in collaboration with the Department of Magical Law Enforcement for the duration of the Wizengamot break-in trials, of which I am sure you've had wind by now. She will be heading the investigation."
Rage burned its way up Riddle's throat. Into his mouth, his nose. Cloying.
"Very good, sir," he said quietly.
"Miss Granger has a standing arrangement with the paper for contractual work as a political correspondent, as a result of a previous, ah, altercation with Rita," said Cuffe by way of an explanation, which he at least seemed to think Riddle was owed. "Miss Granger, I am assigning Tom to the investigation alongside you for an extra eye with some field experience. You understand. I leave you in his capable hands."
"Oh!" Granger said, taken aback. "That really isn't necessary—I mean, thank you sir, but I don't…"
Cuffe had already hurried away.
Riddle and Granger remained at a standoff, staring at one another with naked dislike, until Riddle reached for his cloak.
"Do you drink, Miss Granger?" he asked.
Two Harpies. Five Goblins. One Mudblood. Five Purebloods converting gold to scotch. Riddle kept stock of the patrons at the Hopping Pot while Granger pretended to consume her ginger and wine.
She was not as clever as she had appeared at Hogwarts. She had come out for a drink.
Flint, Nott, and Crabbe were watching from the furthest booth. Their eyes shifted from Riddle's hood to Granger's neckline, their expressions from one kind of hunger to another. On Riddle's signal, any one of them would have strode over and cursed the breath from Granger's lungs. If she knew it, she did not betray a trace of anxiety. She sat with her back to them.
"You asked me here for a reason," she said.
"Professional courtesy," said Riddle. "If we're to work together, we should become better acquainted than we were at Hogwarts, don't you think?"
"I didn't intend for Cuffe to assign us to the story together."
Flint laughed loudly at a comment of Nott's. Both leered in Granger's direction. Without turning, she shifted uncomfortably in her seat.
Riddle threw them a quelling look. "Our friends didn't move in the same circles. But we were both Prefects, after all."
"You don't have friends, Riddle," said Granger mildly. "You have followers. Hangers-on."
There was something in her tone that recalled brash, intolerable Bellatrix Lestrange, who had disrobed for him in a forgotten wing of Malfoy Manor. Who liked to cut her house-elves, sometimes, with the blunt edge of a silver knife. Who spoke to Riddle with an assurance that she would come to regret, one day.
"Granger." He moved to reveal the lines of his face to the candlelight. "This story is mine in all but title. You must realize that."
"And you must have wanted the title badly, to have had Rita sidelined," Granger mused.
"But it seems I needn't have bothered. What must have happened between Skeeter and you since Hogwarts, when she was lambasting you for using love potions on Viktor Krum? She didn't cede the story to you willingly, I'm sure."
"I never used a love potion on Viktor," Granger snapped. "That's vile."
At this, Riddle's anger was stoked and burned hotter. Talk of vileness and love potions put him in a state of discomfort. He felt small. He felt unremarkable.
Viper quick, Riddle reached over the table and seized Granger's wrist. He held her fast and stood, though she stiffened.
"Come dance," he said.
Granger flashed a look of dismay. "Thank you, but I prefer to turn in early and get a good start on the story tomorrow."
"I know three things about Rookwood that you don't. For each dance, I'll tell you one of them."
They moved across the pub to the patio adjoined by Bowman Wright's Iron Forge, where enchanted awnings shielded the cobbled way from moonlight. The skin of their arms brushed together. Riddle found this uncomfortable and provoking, just as he had found Bellatrix. He had reached out to touch her, yes; thinking of love potions all the while. He had found the whole ecstatic ordeal a reminder of the shack with the Adder nailed to the door, and the inbred whelp cowering within, and the filth coating every surface.
There was a gramophone by the pub window blaring an old Warbeck tune. They danced.
"The Rookwoods are intimately acquainted with the Minister's Senior Undersecretary, Umbridge," said Riddle. Two steps right. One step back.
"If that's the case, why did Rookwood retain Lucius Malfoy as his attorney?"
"That is the question we face. To call on Umbridge for legal council would seem the wiser move."
"Then tomorrow we should pay Malfoy a visit."
Two steps left. Riddle was now facing the pub, holding Granger to him. On his nod, Crabbe stumbled through.
Crabbe brandished his wand. Nott followed behind him, casting sparks and uttering curses. Riddle swung Granger around so that she was safe from harm.
"Stop," he barked.
Crabbe and Nott disregarded him. They might not have been playacting at all. Both loped drunkenly in a half circle, their curses narrowly missing one another. Granger had drawn her wand. The taste was back, the bitterness on Riddle's tongue. Everything was unfolding.
A well-placed curse of Nott's grazed Granger's shoulder. She screamed.
Riddle spun. His movements were exact; his spell cleared the alleyway, throwing Nott and Crabbe twenty feet into the air. A preternatural calm followed. The pub's patrons knew better than to come running. For the still forms of his acolytes sprawled on the cobbled way, Riddle reserved cold contempt. He gave a negligent wave of his wand, tossing them against the side of a nearby shop.
"Are you all right?" he asked Granger.
A hundred times he had executed this ploy, to a hundred dutiful exclamations of gratitude. Granger was no exception. She smiled, heaping on him all the requisite thanks. And, she stood a good distance from him, arms crossed. Something was amiss.
"Why did you do that?" she asked at last.
"I believe the element of trust will be of some value if we're to work together. I won't have a colleague harmed by petty miscreants. We have had our differences, Miss Granger, but you will recall that I have never tolerated disorder."
"I also recall Nott and Crabbe being your shadows at Hogwarts. Always at your beck and call."
"Meaning?"
She cast a look around, to the grit, the broken glass, the sheen of Rosemerta's cider coating the Alley. There was a stench to Knockturn that was lost in the race to outfox the rabble that passed for company there. But Granger could smell it.
"I think we ought to retire for the night," she said at last. "Thank you for the drink, and… whatever else happened here." She left without requesting the two more pieces of information he had promised.
Riddle decided to kill her.
On the Saturday following, Cuffe sent Granger on a Portkey to the continent to speak to Elphias Doge, retired member of the highest ranks of the Wizengamot. For the duration of her absence, Granger made periodic Floo calls to the Prophet offices. Her information was clear, prompt, and valuable. Cuffe was in the throes of adoration: the temple of Granger was soon an inviolate institution in his eyes. By the second edition deadline on the 25th of June, Granger had uncovered a series of Gringotts notes inexplicably bearing the seal of Dolores Umbridge's office, passed through a number of German banks and into the pockets of… Augustus Rookwood.
"We've never had a story like this," Cuffe raved. "Not ever."
To the sound of Rita grinding her teeth conspicuously at her desk, Riddle rewrote Granger's hurriedly scrawled reports for print, adding the panache favored by the Prophet's readership and ensuring that his byline appeared on the saga in its entirety. Granger's work, it was impossible to deny, was a cut above the usual drivel produced by Nott or any of the interns Cuffe fished out of the rubbish pile in Diagon. With the time Riddle saved on useless corrections, he was able to re-establish contact with an old acquaintance.
The Wasp, so named for his former occupation as Beater of a beloved National League Quidditch team, was a petty gambler turned Confidence man, who could be counted on to produce Class C Non-Tradable Goods on a dime and move them through the bounds of Hogwarts. He was also a notorious bed-hopper, which made him a goldmine of Wizarding society secrets.
Riddle's owl to the Wasp detailed the connection between Umbridge and Rookwood and asked whether the underground had anything to add on the subject. The Wasp responded within the hour: off the record, several prominent members of the Minister's former personal security staff, including current Head of the Auror Office Gawain Robards, had long held an unusual obsession for Dorcas Meadowes, Fudge's chief competitor. Word on the street was that Robards had at one time engaged in a thorough investigation of Meadowes's personal activities, off the books.
It was possible, the Wasp added, that Fudge himself had been privy to this investigation. Had perhaps provided, through gold laundered by none other than Dolores Umbridge, the funds for the investigation's subsistence.
Riddle drafted the story. On the way to the fact-checker's desk to hand it in, he paused.
Through Potter and his father, the darling of the Curse-Breaker's Association of Wizarding Britain, Granger had access to a network of connections nearly equaling Riddle's own. Her continued involvement would ensure the expediency of the story's unraveling. He could always wait to dispose of her.
Riddle veered into Cuffe's office and requested that Granger's byline be included on the story, though she had not officially taken part in this particular facet of its development. Cuffe seemed pleased.
Granger never mentioned it. Riddle saw her celebrating her return from Germany in the Alley outside the Prophet offices one evening, surrounded by a cheerful band of Gryffindors. Clad in Muggle dress, smiling and chatting happily, she struck a very different figure to the severe reporter who haunted Cuffe's office day and night.
Their gazes crossed before Riddle could slip by unnoticed. She regarded him intently.
"Would you like to join us?" she asked.
The Longbottom boy who was always trailing after Granger's entourage froze, open-mouthed. Potter and Weasley looked at her uneasily.
"Thank you," said Riddle. "But I'm late for an appointment."
She nodded. The setting sun caught the window display behind her, flooding the Alley with wildfire light. For a moment Granger and her friends looked macabre with shadows cast across their faces and halos behind their heads.
Riddle Apparated home to his East London flat and immersed himself once more in Wizengamot records, until night turned to day.
On the first day of July, Cornelius Fudge addressed the public via Wizarding Wireless Network. The Prophet staff interrupted its annual community soirée to gather round Cuffe's wooden wireless and listen. Granger seated herself next to Riddle.
"Do you realize this is happening because of us?" she said in an undertone. The smell of ginger and wine wafted in Riddle's direction. She seemed in abnormally festive spirits, which Riddle attributed to the visit Weasley had paid her midway through the day.
Riddle sat rigid at the edge of Cuffe's desk, impassive in the stifling July heat, and gave a brief nod.
"I've been hearing all kinds of nonsense," Granger went on. "About how we ought to drop the story after this. If it's gotten his attention to the point where he's holding a press conference, it means the Minister's office will be upset. They could make trouble for us in the future."
Riddle nodded.
"Obviously, you disregarded them?" he said.
Granger smiled, pressing her glass against her forehead. The condensation turned to droplets of water at her hairline, sliding down her temple. The wireless crackled.
Fudge's voice invaded the airwaves.
"Pursuant to concerns raised in the Wizarding community following the recent Wizengamot break-ins," he said, "this office is launching a full investigation into any possible Ministry involvement in these ill-doings."
The copy editors shared looks of interest between them, nodding their approval. Granger made a small disparaging noise. Riddle shared her sentiment, but refrained from broadcasting his thoughts. He wished she would sit elsewhere.
Fudge added that any allegations of involvement by Dolores Umbridge in the break-ins were outlandish speculation. "We are taking every measure to ensure that our administration is free from implication in this matter. Of course, there have been allegations on both sides." He paused for dramatic effect. To the best of Riddle's knowledge, there had not, in fact, been any allegations of wrongdoing against Fudge's opponents. "I can say categorically that no one on my personal staff, presently employed, was involved in this very bizarre incident. Of course, the Devil of it is, in these situations—Mistakes will happen, of course, when passionate witches and wizards pursue their calling to the full extent of their capacity. This we can all understand. But what cannot be forgiven is a cover-up. No such skullduggery will be tolerated under my watch."*
Riddle released a breath as the broadcast cut out. Chairs were scraping against the floor as all but one of the staff returned to the party. Riddle realized that he and Granger had both leaned forward, the better to hear the address.
"What a ponce!" Rita exclaimed. There was an outbreak of raucous laughter.
Riddle and Granger leaned back, wearing identical frowns.
*Directly adapted from the first of Richard Nixon's 1972 political press conferences surrounding the Watergate break-ins. Ref. Bernstein, C. & Bob Woodward. All the President's Men. Warner Paperback Library: New York, 1975. Print.