Disclaimer: Know that I own nothing of the Wizarding world. All credits go to J.K. Rowling and her magical imagination.
I thank her for so much inspiration and courage to write myself.
Chapter 1: The howling in the wind.
Rain poured down the heavens as the night fell in the county lands south of a small village called Wick.
It had been raining for two weeks now and the skies did not betray any stopping soon.
Along one of the many dirt roads there was an abandoned shack that belonged to one of the many farm companies around Wick.
The ram shackled little barn creaked and moaned in the stormy wind.
The man inside pushed a small piece of the dirty linen aside that he had put up in front of the window.
Sure that had heard something he sat down on one of the chairs he had stolen from the nearby farm.
Breathing heavily he reached for his bag of goodies and took out a sphere formed glass instrument.
It did not do anything special but the man sat it on the table and watched it for a minute.
Suddenly he stood up and walked to the window again as he pushed aside the self-made curtains and got scared from the bewildered bearded man in the window.
As thunder struck Igor Karkaroff knew it was his own reflection that had scared him. For almost a year now he had not shaven his face or even combed his head.
He looked like a possessed, homeless man that had seen a ghost.
"Where are you, I know you are out there, aren't you?"
The man spoke in an east European accent and walked from one side of the door to the other, as both sides had a window to it.
"Would they have stopped looking for me?" He whimpered to himself as he sat back on the chair again. He knew he shouldn't have gone to London today.
He just wanted to be back in the Magical World for a little bit. But when he saw Crabbe and Goyle in Diagonally he swore they had recognized him.
They could not openly attack him, but they had pointed at him and then pointed to the sky. An old sign from his old friends that the marked man had to die.
The reference that the Deatheater made by pointing to the sky would mean. "Put the Dark Mark above his head."
This basically meant "Kill this person!" He had fled quickly back to his hideout and even though he knew they could not follow him unless they had grabbed him.
For the first time in a year he had felt exposed. He would have to avoid known Magical places and stay out of sight from now on.
The uneasy feeling came to a rest only hours later, Igor had calmed his nerves with a black liquorish tasting drink and sat down on his bed.
No point exhausting himself over what could have happened, when it had not. If his old friends wanted to kill him, they would have done so already.
He knew the methods they used to find their enemies. More at ease Karkaroff fell asleep soon and had a sleepless dream for the first time in that year.
Woken by a loud thunderclap, Igor bolted upright in his bed and felt his heart race when he saw his own shadow painted against the opposite wall.
"Damn this cold British weather!" he cursed as he got up from his bed.
He grabbed his wand and the bottle of vodka that stood on the table and sat back on his bed again.
"This is no way of living, this is punishment for being honest."
His voice sounded scruff and dry before taking a long and much needed swallow of the warming liquid.
The rain was again slamming against the roof and now thunder and lightning accompanied the sound of the stormy weather.
"Always this lousy weather. Must I endure so much only because I turned myself from the darkness? I thought being good would have his benefits."
Igor said out loud looking at the ceiling as if he could see the clouds and beyond. The wind made its presents known by making every wood board creek.
Every small crack or hole in the small shack made a whistling sound and Igor could not help but to think about the shrieking shack.
The smile he got from remembering simpler times suddenly disappeared as he heard a soft howling in the wind.
"There can't be wolves around in these parts, unless…" Finishing his thought would make the matter a lot worse."
Igor thought to himself, but he definitely had heard howling, wolves howling.
The part of Britain he was in however did not house any wolf family, but being the wizard that he was there was another kind of wolf that could be living here.
A second louder howl made Igor jump up again and he raced to the window. Looking outside, he could only see the rain and the trees near his cottage.
"You are being paranoid old man." Igor said softly to himself.
"Just the wind playing with the trees, nothing more than that to it. You're being paranoid."
He looked up into the sky and as the lightning illuminated the sky, Igor's heart skipped a beat.
The clouds above the cottage had formed a skull, a grey skull pouring out a merciless downfall of water.
"Sweet heavens," Igor whispered to himself. "I'm doomed."
