WARNING: Will contain violence, murder, gore and dubious consent. Read at your own risk.
Notes: Written for kijani's Harry Potter 10k and Gamma Orionis' OTP Boot Camp Challenge with the prompt 'young'. It's a kind of mentor/protégé relationship with a sexual aspect.

Sort-of sequal to A Man Called Fenrir.

ELOCUTION LESSONS

Chapter One

Scabior hadn't had a lot of money growing up. His parents claimed to be Purebloods, but it was most definitely more diluted than they made out. Scabior knew for a fact that one of his great-aunts was a veterinarian, but his parents never mentioned her, or any of the other family they had that hadn't been born quite magical. Family gatherings were usually restricted to a handful of aunts and uncles who stood around drinking corner-shop plonk as though it was Merlot and talking about how they'd once met Abraxas Malfoy's father, and cousins who liked to steal the adults' wands and set cats' tails on fire. He'd grown up in some god-forsaken corner of London, surrounded by Muggles and told to pretend to his neighbours that he was one, too. He'd spent his evenings during the summer months mucking about on street corners with the local youths, drinking cheap cider from cans and throwing the empty ones at passing children. It wasn't exactly idyllic, but it was all he'd ever known or thought could be, so he didn't complain.

The summer after he left Hogwarts, however, the rumours about the Death Eaters that had been quietly building since his first year began to become more than just furtive whispers.

Scabior had left school with two OWLs to his name, and his mother hadn't been thrilled. She'd let him continue living with her, rent-free, though, on the condition that he moved to the sofa and found a job. A boy in Scabior's year at school, Wilkes, had apparently joined the Death Eaters before he'd left, and Scabior had heard vague rumours that the rewards were grand indeed. He wrote to Wilkes asking about it, and Wilkes agreed to meet him for a drink in a pub in Knockturn Alley.

He had emphasised the need for loyalty, devotion, skill, loyalty, a certain bloodthirstiness, and a number of other things that Scabior didn't really pay attention to. He was too busy watching the barmaid. But when Wilkes finished talking, he asked if he could possibly have job with them, doing anything, because the shops in Diagon Alley were overstaffed as it was. Wilkes smirked, and said the Death Eaters had been waiting for a new recruit to do a certain, special job – looking after a puppy, he'd said – and he'd said that he would be paid well, and there was the possibility of promotions. Scabior had agreed then and there, and Wilkes had handed to him, straight away, a slip of parchment with a name and address.

"Good luck," he'd said with a broad smile, and Scabior hadn't thought much more of that.

He followed the instructions on how to get to his knew place of work as written the scrappy bit of parchment. He seemed to walk for hours, and though he wouldn't admit it to himself, he got lost once or twice. Eventually he found himself in a run-down sort of area. There weren't many houses, but those that were there were large buildings with sprawling, overgrown gardens, suggesting that the area has once been quite affluent. It evidently wasn't any more. A ginger tomcat prowled across the cracked pavement in front of him, hissing.

Scabior frowned and studied his parchment, then looked around. The houses didn't seem as though they were still inhabited. For the most part, the windows were boarded up and there was a fine collection of litter on display in the gardens – broken beer bottles, empty crisp packets and broken bits of Muggle gadgets. The only house that showed any sign of life was the one that the tomcat was now slinking towards.

A small old lady, hunched over, her skin shrivelled and sagging, was beating a ratty rug against the low garden wall while a skinny tabby cat wound around her feet. Scabior approached her hesitantly. Her brow was furrowed and she did not look to be particularly friendly.

"'Scuse me?" he called, over the sound of the rug thwacking against the wall. "'Ello?"

She stopped eventually, giving him a look that said she did not appreciate being told what to do by a scruffy little urchin like him. "What d'you want?" she asked abruptly.

"Er... I'm lookin' for an 'ouse," said Scabior. "I'm meant to be workin' there, only it doesn't look like anyone lives 'ere, so maybe I've got the wrong place...?"

The woman snatched the parchment from him, deftly, despite her withered, crooked hands, and Scabior stared at her, rather taken aback.

"Ah, yes. That's Greyback's place. Number eleven. Up that way." She gestured. "Wouldn't go there if I was you."

"Why not?" asked Scabior.

"Man's a maniac. I only seen him a couple of times, saw him go on once but never seen him come out, but the noises that come from that place..." She trailed off, looking miserable, a ghost of fear passing behind her eyes.

"What sorta noises?" asked Scabior.

"Screaming," said the old lady. "In the night. So loud it wakes me up. Not every night, mind you, but it sure as I'm standing here comes from that house. It's like he's torturing a little child or putting an animal in a cage. I called the police." At this point, she reached out and gripped Scabior's wrist, firmly, trembling. "I called them, by they said there was no number eleven. They said I'm making it up. But I'm not, you see? He's in there. And he's a monster."

There was a moment of intense silence.

"Alright," said Scabior cheerily. "Thanks for your 'elp." And he broke away from her, heading in the direction that she had first advised him.

"Don't go there!" she called out, but she didn't move to follow him. He had long strides and had already covered too much ground, and besides, she didn't seem to want to set a foot in the direction of the house. Scabior looked back, and she was standing staring at him, a look of sadness and terror on her face, but he just turned back, shrugged, kept on walking and began to hum to himself.

He reached the end of the houses eventually. The grey footpath wound snakelike uphill, and the houses were scattered around it almost carelessly. When he reached the top of the hill, the end of the estate, he stopped for a moment to get his breath back, hands on knees. There was a mesh fence erected at the ending of the footpath, with plastic Muggle signs that warned about renovation on the other side. Scabior wondered if their drills and tools were what the old lady had heard, but he knew, from the look on her face, that she was certain about what she was hearing. It was probably spells gone wrong, he thought to himself. Or a magical artefact that just happened to make unpleasant noises. Or something.

He tuned, looking for number eleven. The row ended at number nine, slightly further down the hill. Number ten was behind him on the other side, looking desolate and dirty and blackened and boarded up. Scabior straightened up and looked at the parchment again. Number Eleven, it definitely said. It was written elegantly, in blue ink.

"Come on," he growled, and as he looked ahead, the grass in front of him began to writhe. From it protruded a metal spike – a spire – followed shortly after, as the thing began to rise, by slabs of dark slate and a dirty white wall, dusty windows and a peeling door. Before he knew it, Scabior was looking at Number Eleven. "That's more like it," he said to himself, an, checking around to make sure that nobody was watching (though there was no-one in sight), he strode forward and rapped on the door.

After a few moments, it was answered by the man Scabior had been told was called Fenrir Greyback. Scabior's first impression was that he was enormous. He seemed to take up the whole doorway. His robes were a dark grey, tattered at the edges, and looked much too tight for him, as though he'd bought them long ago.

Scabior's second impression was that the man looked wild. His hair hung in loose curls almost down to his shoulders, and was dirty and matted. His teeth and his overlong nails were yellow, and he looked as though he hadn't had a bath in years. Pointed ears poked through his tangled hair, and his teeth were pointed and sharp, giving him a somewhat bestial appearance. The lower half of his face was covered in the sort of scruff that said he did shave occasionally, but thought it much too troublesome to bother with often. Scabior supposed, because he appreciated things of beauty, that the man hadn't been ugly, once, but now he looked, frankly, like shit.

And the last thing Scabior noticed about him, before his train of thought was interrupted, was that his eyes were a strange shade of yellow, and had dark purplish shadows sagging under them. He looked impossibly tired.

"Whaddaya want?" he growled, eyes narrowed.

"Fenrir Greyback, sir?" Scabior stuck out his hand, which Greyback ignored. "They sent me 'ere to do somethin' for you. Somethin' about a puppy, 'sat right?"

Greyback wrinkled his nose, as though he was smelling him. Scabior shifted uncomfortably. He knew he probably smelt like burnt toast and dish soap – there was no door between his front room and kitchen. He let his hand drop, abashed.

"You are…?" said Greyback, his voice a low snarl.

"Scabior, sir. I work with the Death Eaters." It wasn't exactly a lie.

"Scabior who? You look about twelve."

"I'm seventeen!" Scabior frowned, indignant.

Greyback snorted. "And when did you decide death eating was a suitable career choice?"

Scabior blinked at him, and rubbed the back of his head, looking at the ground. He had no idea what exactly 'death eating' was, of course, and was hoping that, as his employer, Greyback would show him the ropes. But instead he sighed, scratched under his chin with those horrible talons, and said, "The kid's in bed. I assume you've been told what you're to do. I'm going out. Don't touch anything. If you don't do this right, I'll rip your throat out and I'll eat it."

Scabior gulped. He didn't know what else to say, so he waited for Greyback to say something else, but he didn't. He just pushed past Scabior, who stared after him, and Disapparated with a crack. Scabior blinked at the spot he had been, and then turned slowly back to the house. The door was open, revealing a long, dark hallway with peeling paint. The floorboards were bare and there were no pictures hanging on the walls. As he stepped inside, the floor creaked beneath his feet and he wondered to himself just what he was entering into, and if it wasn't too late to turn back.

A kid, Greyback had said. A kid, in bed. What did he mean, a kid? Scabior had been told he was to look after a puppy. He wasn't any good with children. Animals he could cope with. All a dog needed was a scratch behind the ears and a couple of scraps of meat. A child needed clothing, and bathing, and… changing. Scabior shuddered. And what about those strange noises the old woman on the way had talked about? Oh, God… what if he was keeping some sort of animal for conducting experiments on, trying to make it into a human? A chill ran up his spine. He'd read a book like that, once. Well, he hadn't exactly read it, but a local boy said his sister had, and that it was "fuckin' messed up, man". That was why Scabior did not read books.

The door behind him swung shut with a bang and he jumped. He knew it was just the wind – at least, he told himself it was – but he couldn't help feeling that he'd found himself in one of the ghost stories that his aunt used to tell when he was a small child. It took just a moment for his eyes to become adjusted to the dark: the windows, thankfully, were clear of dust, and the sunlight from outside was enough that he didn't need his wand for illumination, despite the lack of other lighting.

He walked slowly to the end of the hallway, tense, waiting for something to jump out at him at any moment. The door there was slightly ajar, and he pushed it open. It didn't make a sound, and he crept forward into the room hesitantly, wondering if he was about to be set upon by whatever mutant creation Greyback kept here – and almost jumped out of his skin at a loud screeching sound from beneath him.

He stumbled backwards, grappling for his wand, pointing it at the source of the noise, trying desperately to recall any curses he'd learnt for protection, and found himself staring at a headless rubber chicken. He closed his eyes and let out a breath of relief. Just a toy, that was all… And when his speeding heart had quietened down, he opened his eyes and he looked around the room and he saw it.

A pile of bones in the corner, not white and dry as they were in the pictures of the horror books he'd read as a child, but thick with a slimy red something that could only have been flesh. There were all kinds – large, heavy looking, ones that would have been part of a leg at some point, some that looked about the size of his own lower arm, and some tiny assorted and unidentifiable ones. Blood trickled from them into a small, congealing black pool on the floor, and nearby walls were smeared with red. As Scabior stared at them, unable to look away, he saw dents and incisions in them, as though someone – something – had been gnawing at them. And, now that he noticed, the smell. The smell was unbearable. But the worst part – and Scabior had to repeat it to himself over and over again to convince himself that he believed it was not true – was that each and every one of the bones looked terribly, terribly human.

Gagging, hand covering his mouth, eyes wide in horror at the sight before him, Scabior turned and ran from the room. Arms out in front of him, he stumbled into the nearest door. It led into a sitting room, wide and sprawling, with worn red furniture. It seemed to be completely empty otherwise, devoid of all magic, and Scabior slumped onto the sofa, drawing his wand and shaking. Something Wilkes had said earlier came back to his mind. He's a bit… odd. Bit creepy. But you're being paid, aren't you?

Scabior shuddered and swallowed. If he left now he would be shoved out of the Death Eaters and then he'd have to go back home and stay on his mother's sofa and smell like burnt toast and dish soap until he was an old, old man while his peers did something interesting and worthwhile with their lives. So he gripped his wand tightly and sat very, very still. Once or twice he heard something stir upstairs, and if he listened closely he could hear something breathing, but he didn't leave the room and he didn't go to see what it was. He assumed it would cry if it wanted anything – or whine or howl or whatever it was that sort of creature did. But it didn't; it seemed to be asleep, so Scabior didn't do anything and he didn't move until the twilight had faded and it was completely dark and Greyback returned.

He smelled of dirt and ale and Scabior pushed past him before he even had a chance to step in the doorway.

"Eager to leave, are you?" said Greyback, with a rasping sort of chuckle. "Can't say I'm surprised. Same time next week?"

Scabior whimpered.

/

He met Wilkes for a drink and told him what he had seen, about the bones, and noises, and the emptiness and the bloody creepiness of the whole thing. Wilkes laughed.

"'Spose I shoulda told you," he said, "but I thought it'd be funny. Besides, the other fellas don't want it spread about where he lives. Told them they could trust you not to tell, though, mate." He slapped Scabior's shoulder.

"Tell what?" asked Scabior.

"Greyback's a werewolf, and so's the kid. He does some jobs for us, the dirty ones, y'know? You gettin' the next round in?"

Scabior, though stunned, and a bit frightened, did get the next round in, and he did go back at the same time next week. The latter required a bit of consideration, but he reasoned eventually that werewolves weren't that scary, really, when they were normal, and there was money at stake, and those bones couldn't be human, after all...

Greyback raised his eyebrows when Scabior appeared at his door again, and Scabior set his jaw and nodded and said nothing. Greyback opened the door a little wider and gestured for Scabior to make his way inside. Scabior did so, and this time Greyback didn't Disapparate straight away.

"I never gave you the tour," he said, closing the door slightly and advancing further down the hall. Scabior felt suddenly very claustrophobic, and backed off slightly.

"Nah, 'salright… 'Sjust an 'ouse, innit?"

"The front room," said Greyback, ignoring him, elbowing the nearest door open. "You can see the view from the top of the hill from here. Lovely, isn't it?"

"Yeah," said Scabior, who was not moving any closer.

"Come and have a look," said Greyback.

"Nah, thanks," said Scabior. "'M fine where I am."

"I said…" said Greyback, and Scabior got the point. He took a couple of hesitant steps forward and peered into the room. It wasn't the one he'd been in last time; it was bigger, with a fireplace, a mirror… Parchments and newspapers were scattered a little on and around a writing-desk in the corner, a couple of plates with remnants of food on the floor near the sofa. It was more lived-in, but still creepy as hell. From where he stood, Scabior could make out a glimpse of the outside world from the window.

"'Sbeautiful," he said, then backed away again before Greyback could turn around. He wasn't scared of him – that would be ridiculous (or that was what he told himself) – but he didn't want the man anywhere near him, because… because he was much bigger than Scabior was and he was dirty and he smelled and he was a werewolf, for crying out loud.

Greyback cocked an eyebrow and pointed towards the door to the room Scabior had sat in the last time. "Living room. I'm keeping it for the others. Kitchen." He pointed. "I think that should be obvious enough." He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. "Spare bedroom. There are other bedrooms upstairs, but of course you knew that… And the bathroom's the door at the top. I needn't tell you that."

Scabior nodded weakly. He had no idea, and he knew Greyback knew he had no idea, but he had to at least pretend to agree, to be a good employee. There was a small thump-thumping of feet on the stairs, and Scabior stared. He couldn't see past the banister to who was coming down, but Greyback shifted slightly and then behind him, clinging to his trouser-leg, Scabior could see in the shadows a little boy.

"And this is Loki," said Greyback, placing a hand on the boys' head. "He needs to be fed."

And with that, he smiled at Scabior with those pointed yellow teeth, and patted the boy on the back, and turned and left the house, and Scabior was left alone with a small child.

He tried to smile, though he felt it came out more of a grimace, and said, "So, er… You 'ungry?"

Loki shrugged, looking down at the floor, shuffling a little. Scabior wasn't good at judging the ages of children; he hadn't been around enough of them to know much more than that they were snotty and dirty and whined a lot. This one looked about five years old, though, and was wearing a shirt that was too big for him, and jeans with holes in them. His hair looked too long, and hung about his face and stuck up slightly in odd directions.

"Where does your da—er—Greyback—er—Where does 'e keep the food?" asked Scabior.

"Cupboard," said Loki.

"Right," said Scabior, and turned to go into the kitchen. Loki followed him. Scabior looked around, wishing he wouldn't. He felt uncomfortable enough without having a child trail him. The bones from before were gone, but the wall was stained slightly brown. Scabior swallowed, and tried to ignore it, and began looking in the cupboards. There was bread and butter in one, but not much else, but the second one he opened was chilled by some sort of magic and it was piled high with slabs of red, unidentifiable meat. "Er," said Scabior. "Er… D'you eat this?"

He looked around. Loki was gazing at the cupboard hopefully. "Oh," said Scabior. "Oh. Right."

He fed Loki, and he talked with him – as much as he could bear to – before putting him to bed (and managing to avoid having to tell him a story). He resisted the urge to ask him if he knew what Greyback had meant by "saving it for the others", because he had a horrible, gnawing feeling in his gut that he knew himself. Before Loki settled, he asked Scabior, through yawns, "Are you a wizard?" Scabior nodded. "Oh. Fenrir says – he says wizards are bad. Are you bad?"

"I don't think so."

"Oh," said Loki, and fell asleep.

/

The gnawing feeling in his gut was right. Several more times he returned, and several more times he tried to avoid the child whenever possible. Loki looked at him with wide eyes, as though he was the first person he had ever seen, and Scabior tried not to make eye contact, and put him to bed as soon as possible, ignoring requests for stories.

"Fenrir always tells me stories."

"I ain't Fenrir."

"About dragons and witches and… and little girls who get lost in the woods, and she meets this big wolf, and she thinks he's bad, but he's not, because her grandmother is really an evil witch, and—"

"I ain't Fenrir."

Fenrir seemed determined to make Scabior's life a misery. There was something about him that made him feel on edge – and it wasn't the werewolf thing, it wasn't, it wasn't, Scabior told himself. It was the fact that everything he did seemed somehow calculated to frighten him, the way he talked which seemed to suggest he was going to do something horrible to Scabior if he decided he didn't like him. But he never tried to hurt him physically – all he did was bring another child to the house.

One evening, when Scabior turned up, Greyback told him there was a new addition to the household and he better mind the sibling rivalry. He didn't say how, and he didn't say why, all he said was that her name was Harriet.

Harriet turned out to be a very small toddler, who had just learned to walk and liked to pull on things. Scabior spent much of the evening trying not to have his trousers pulled down, or his hair tugged out. Loki thought it was funny to poke her, and she cried very loudly.

Every two months or so after that, Greyback would introduce – or, at least, mention – a new addition. Scabior couldn't keep track of their names, but he found himself growing quite fond of them, and even deigned to read them a bedtime story once in a while. They had him attempting to bake them cauldron cakes on occasion, which was difficult with Harriet smashing the eggs on the floor and clapping flour over herself, and one boy that Scabior thought might have been called Algernon eating all of the mixture when his back was turned.

"I don't blame you," he said to the little boy. "It's nothin' I wouldn't do mysel'."

But they seemed to gang up on him. To bully him. Which was ridiculous, Scabior thought, because they were a group of children and he was a fully-grown adult. Well, nearly eighteen. But they seemed to make his job deliberately difficult, swinging from the rafters that ran across the roof and stealing his wand and setting fire to things and smearing their dinner on the windows. It might have been normal child behaviour, for all he knew, but Loki, who was not the eldest but seemed to be the most articulate, sometimes made comments about Scabior was different than them.

"'Snot what I thought it would be like," said Scabior to Greyback on the way out one evening. "Workin' for the Dark Lord. Thought it'd be more like bein' a pirate or somethin'." Greyback just sort of snorted at him.

He spoke to Wilkes over a pint and asked him if he could possibly be inducted into the proper Death Eater jobs yet, pretty please. Wilkes snorted into his drink.

"What, you? Why? You're a cub-sitter. I'm not going to bring that up in the meetings. We like to pretend Greyback's pack doesn't exist."

Scabior had no choice but to grit his teeth and bear it. He wasn't one for pleading. His mother had always told him he could make it up the ranks with patience and hard work. That was why none of the men in the family had ever made it anywhere, she said. They were all lazy, good-for-nothing sods. But Scabior was determined to persevere.

One day, when he was going to cub-sit, as Wilkes put it, he witnessed a man leaving the house. He was skeletal, his skin milky-white and riddled with faint scars, his eyes dark and blank, and he looked half-crazed and so very, very scared. Scabior didn't think much of it as the man hurried past him without meeting his eye – because who knew what Greyback did in his free time? But the sleeve of the man's robe was pulled back by the wind and Scabior caught sight of a dark burn mark on his lower arm – the mark of the Dark Lord.

So Scabior realised it wasn't just him. It wasn't Greyback and his silly little kids bullying him, and it wasn't all in his head. The others were scared of Greyback, too. That was why they wanted to ignore him. That was why they pretended he didn't exist. That was why they sent Scabior into his home, rather than an experienced and Death Eater who'd already received the Mark. Because Greyback was terrifying, and he was probably a monster to boot – a real one, not the sort that he told his children about. And it was then Scabior realised that if he wanted the Death Eaters' respect, he needed to be like Greyback, instead of just his skivvy. Or that was what he thought, anyway.