Reader Beware: This story is violent. I don't think it's above and beyond a PG-13 film or a book that would get Scholastic's seal of approval, and certainly, it's not more violent than the novel's by Jo, but it is a type of violence that one might not associate with a Harry Potter tale. It is a bit more disturbing, and in at least one case, very realistic. The reason, is that this goes down a road that Harry Potter didn't. I'm sure there have been fanfics like this, but I've never read them, or found them. Once I get a few chapters into this, it should be clear what is going on, and I will know I have done a good job if reviewers come back and tell me this story reads like a Cold War Era spy novel. This is not about writing about my favorite characters, or simply writing another Harry Potter fanfic. This is about exploring the darker grown up world of wizardry that Jo's books hinted at but never really showed us until the end, when it was exploded out of proportion into all out war. This explores the secret side of war, the side that tends to be unexpectedly violent and disturbing; the side that plays tricks on peoples mind; the side that breeds paranoia; the side that requires a person to take any measures necessary to keep a secret.

Persephone Raven shifted her weight from one foot to another, staring nervously at the red phone booth. It was a simple matter of stepping inside and dialing the number. It was the right thing to do. It was the most noble thing she could have done in her thus-far short and sorry life. So why did the good and noble thing to do have to be the hardest thing she had ever done in her life? All week she had thought that her choice boiled down to deciding whether or not she should do this good and noble thing, or keep doing a job that made her sick and kept her up with nightmares. She stepped up to the booth and looked at her reflection.

She was a seventeen-year-old witch with pale white and flawless skin and black hair. She had been popular at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, with boys falling over each other just to talk to her. Her black robes hid her frail wisp of a frame, and the hood over her head made her look like some tragic widow. What stood out most was her clear blue eyes. Her father had been muggle-born. Her mother had been a pureblood, the family having disowned her mother for having dared to marry a mudblood. While her father bore the name, Raven, her mother had been Corrina Malfoy. Looking at her reflection, she didn't see the aristocratic Malfoy features. All that indicated her lineage was those eyes and while Lucius had totally disowned his sister, Corrina, he had welcomed Persephone.

She stared past her reflection to the vandalized telephone in the booth. Just as she was reaching for the door, there was an incredible burning sensation on the inside of her left arm. It was a crippling pain and she was forced to clutch her forearm until it passed. Master was calling. She might have disapparated at that very moment, then all of the courage she had built up would have been wasted. So this was it. If she chose to answer the call, she would never be able to work up the nerve to return here again. If she chose to go forward with her plan, then she would have to ignore the call, and the Dark Lord would immediately know that she had betrayed him. The choice became very simple. She could answer the Dark Mark, or she could dial the telephone.

What kind of choice was that? The Dark Lord had promised greatness. He had promised a utopia for all of wizard kind. Hard decisions had to be made, but in the end, they would be well worth the rewards. Hadn't she agreed? Hadn't the choice to join the Death Eaters been her own, conscious decision? Didn't she believe in what she was doing? When she was sixteen, and the Dark Lord told her he needed her eyes inside of Hogwarts, spying on Dumbledore, she believed with all of her heart. Now, a year later, she wanted to say she still believed, but if she was truly honest with herself, then she would have to confess that the answer was, "No." Now, she suddenly realized that this was beyond just doing the right thing. What she was really deciding was whether or not to save her soul. She pulled the door open and stepped inside. Lifting the receiver, she dropped a coin in the slot and dialed 62442.

As if standing right next to her, a woman's voice said, "Welcome to the Ministry of Magic. Please state your name and reason for visiting."

"Um...Persephone Raven. I'm here to turn myself in."

"Thank you." A coin dropped into the slot and Persephone took it. It said "Persephone Raven: Auror Affairs." "Visitor, please take your badge and affix it to the front of your robes." The telephone booth began to lower into the ground. "You will be required to register your wand and submit to a full search at the main reception desk at the opposite end of the Atrium." For a moment, she was surrounded by darkness but found herself coming down into the Atrium. "Thank you for visiting the Ministry of Magic." She had been here once before. Stepping out of the elevator, she walked down the rows of fireplaces where Ministry workers and officials were coming and going via floo powder. The place was highly intimidating and spoke of an immovable body. No wonder there were people that hated the Ministry enough to rebel, such as the Dark Lord.

Persephone came to a desk with a bored looking wizard sitting behind it. Without looking at her he said, "All visitors must submit their wands at the front desk." She handed him her wand. He placed the wand on a reader. "10 inches, rosewood, sphinx hair core, in use for seven years." He filled out a slip and stuck it on spike with similar slips on it. "I keep this." He handed the wand back to her. "You get this back." Persephone looked at her wand questioningly, wondering whether or not she should actually be allowed to have it, given what she was there for. The wizard, still not looking up, continued. "What are you here for?"

Persephone said, "I'm here to turn myself in."

This piqued his interest and he looked at her for the first time. "Oh? What for?"

Persephone handed her wand back to him and said, "I'm a Death Eater."

The wizard took the wand and examined it, then opened a drawer. "In that case, I should probably keep this, too." He put the wand in the drawer and said, "Wait here." He went over to a group of windows.

After a minute or so, three wizards walked up. The way they carried themselves, she was certain they were aurors. She found that she couldn't stop shaking, that she had never been more frightened in her life, but she knew she had to do this. The three wizards took positions cornering her against the desk, though they weren't overtly aggressive. Most people probably wouldn't notice that they were being surrounded. One of them was a tall black man, not much older than her, shaved bald and wearing an earring in one ear and wore robes of beautiful red. Another had long, unkempt, brown or dark blonde hair and a number of scars on his face and wore black robes. The third man seemed positively ordinary in his brown suit and vest with nicely cut black hair and glasses, but he was a large man with broad shoulders.

It was the ordinary man who introduced himself. He smiled congenially and extended his hand. "I'm Eugene Sample. This is Kingsley Shacklebolt and Alastor Moody."

Persephone accepted the handshake and said, "I'm Persephone Raven." Her voice was shaky. Why couldn't she get control of her body? "There are things I need to tell you." Oh, good grief, she sounded like she was falling apart. Then again, maybe she was falling apart.

Shacklebolt, his voice deep and soothing, said, "You don't have to be afraid. Listen, you're doing the right thing. We can go down to our office. We can get you some tea, and we can talk comfortably. Okay?"

Persephone could only manage to nod. Sample took her by the arm, gently, but with a firm enough grip to let her know she wasn't going anywhere else. "Shouldn't I be shackled or something."

"I beg your pardon?" said Sample. Moody just laughed.

"I mean, I'm dangerous. Shouldn't I be restrained some kind of way?"

Sample laughed. "Well, Moody might agree with you, but generally when a girl we never suspected of being a Death Eater turns herself in out of the blue, we tend to give her the benefit of the doubt. Besides, you don't look very dangerous."

Persephone was breathing hard now. Tears were streaming down her cheeks and she couldn't help herself. She said, "Of course, I'm dangerous. I've killed two people."

Sample gave her an appraising look. As they stepped into a lift, he said, "Miss Raven, your future and what happens now depends entirely on you. Now, I believe you came here to set things right. Did you?"

Persephone nodded.

"Then what on Earth do we need shackles for, hmm?"

Inside the lift, a number of witches and wizards crowded inside. There were a number of paper airplanes overhead, some of which left the lift, while others joined the ones above. One wizard had burns all over his beard and robe and smelled strongly of sulfur and brimstone. Another man was holding onto the handle of a dolly carrying a large metal container covered in holes. It rattled sporadically. There was another man with horns atop his head. Most of the other witches and wizards seemed normal enough. As the lift ascended, it gradually emptied of witches and wizards, as well as paper airplanes. The man with the crate exited on the floor that housed the Department for the Control and Regulation of Magical Creatures. When the man with the horns got off, Persephone strongly suspected he was going straight to the Accidental Magic Reversal Squad.

"Second floor, housing the Department of International Cooperation, the Auror office, and the Department for Muggle Relations."

Moody spoke for the first time. "This is us." His voice was gruff and unfriendly, and it was clear that just the fact that she was a Death Eater was quite unforgivable to him.

The Auror office was located near the middle of the second floor. Persephone wasn't sure what she was expecting; a noisy office with Death Eaters sitting shackled waiting to be processed, perhaps. What she wasn't expecting was a messy row of cubicles that was almost devoid of life. She assumed the aurors were dedicating almost all of their time to pursuing the Dark Lord's minions. She was led into a room off to the side. It was an interrogation room, and she was directed to sit in a chair at a table. Moody, Sample, and Shacklebolt made themselves comfortable. Persephone didn't see where it came from, but Sample procured a pot of tea with biscuits and four mugs. He offered her a cup and she took a drink. The warm liquid had an almost immediate calming effect on her. Sample pulled out a sheet of parchment, stuck it to a clip board and held a quill to it.

Moody was the first to speak. "So, you've come to confess and name names. First thing's first, what do you want in exchange?"

Exchange? Did these auror's think she came here to cut a deal? "I-I wasn't asking anything in exchange."

Sample rubbed the bridge of his nose and said, "Alastor..."

"No," said Moody, "I'm serious. The young lady has decided to be noble and we'll be very thankful for that. The question is, how thankful are we expected to be?" There was something derisive in Moody's tone, and Persephone felt very offended by it, though she wasn't sure why.

She didn't hide her feelings. "Be as thankful or thankless as you like. I didn't come here for a payout. Do you want my statement or don't you?"

Sample raised a hand and said, "Alastor, can we please just hear what she has to say?"

Moody shrugged and sat down.

Sample continued. "I apologize. No Death Eaters have ever come quietly before. I'm sure Alastor doesn't know what to make of one that isn't putting up a fight."

Persephone nodded. "So how should I do this?"

"Just start at the beginning, wherever that is for you. When did Voldemort recruit you? Or maybe you feel your story starts even earlier, how you felt about life, the things that ultimately compelled you to join the Death Eaters. Take your time. There's no rush."

Persephone nodded again. That certainly covered a wide range. She began by forcing herself to say her master's name. Somehow, that made her decision to betray him feel final, as if saying his name would solidify the barrier she was trying to build between herself and the Dark Lord. "V-Vol-Voldemort...recruited me when I was 16. I came from a family known for their involvement in the Dark Arts. My uncle was Lucius Malfoy. That's why the Dark...why Voldemort chose me. He said he wanted someone in Hogwarts who could gather information on Professor Dumbledore and who could recruit other students to Voldemort's cause.

"My-my mother married a muggleborn wizard and the Malfoy's disowned her. Growing up, I never knew my family history. When I first went to Hogwarts, the Sorting Hat put me in Slytherin. I met Regulus Black. My Uncle Lucius had already graduated. You see, my mother was the oldest child. Lucius was only ten years older than me. Black introduced me to my family, and I spent more time with them than I did with my parents. They assured me I had to be properly educated about my wizarding pride. It was a very confusing time. They told me things about my mother, how she lacked proper pride and how she didn't care about me, because if she did, she would have chosen a better father, and that she was teaching me to disgrace the name of wizardry. Well, you know how you can be immersed in a world that tells you only what it wants you to hear. You start to believe it, but no matter how much you believe the lies, there's this thing; you remember the way things were before, and maybe you see things more clearly, or maybe you're just seeing things the way other people think you should see them.

"The fact that I couldn't understand my resentment towards my parents meant less than nothing. It was more than made up for by speeches about what it meant to be pureblood, how the viciousness of muggles have forced us to live in hiding like animals in fear. So I knew that my mother must be wrong even if I didn't exactly understand how, because these things made sense. Soon, I was eager to join the Dark Lord's crusade. When I was sixteen, he branded me with his mark," she pulled up her left sleeve and showed them her inner arm.

Shacklebolt said, "The mark is black. That means he's calling you. You risked a lot to come here."

"So I spied. I recruited. Whenever a ministry official showed up, I noted it. I noted the teachers' comings and goings. I listened in on conversations whenever I could manage it. Then the summer holiday came. Dolohov had killed Gideon and Fabian Prewett."

"Dolohov?" asked Moody. "You're certain of that?"

Persephone nodded. "Yes, because Voldemort asked me to kill their sisters, Margaret and Molly. I couldn't catch up to Molly-I found out later that that was because she had married Arthur Weasley, I was looking for the wrong name-but Margaret..." she couldn't find her voice for a moment. "I was told he wouldn't ask me to kill...and Margaret was innocent. The night I killed her, I couldn't stop throwing up. She had nothing to do with the aurors or the Order. Her only offense was being related to some of the members. It turned my stomach but I did it because surely, the Dark Lord had a good reason, and I simply wasn't seeing it. I was punished for my failure to catch the other sister. Voldemort is very unforgiving and he likes to practice his cruciatus curse. I kept telling myself that I deserved it, and as repayment for my failure, I was asked to kill Niles Clearwater."

"An auror," said Moody. "Bet you had trouble with him."

"The night I received that order, I was with Rosier and the Lestranges. He was expecting to find only Rosier but instead found all four of us. He managed to stun the Lestranges. Rosier dueled him. He didn't get to me in time. Him, I was able to justify it to myself. I reasoned that it was me or him. The thing is, I was never really convinced. Then I began my final year in Hogwarts. With no killing or violence to occupy me, I started to have nightmares. After a month, they started coming every night and they haven't given me peace since. I figured the Dark Lord would know what do, but when I got off the train after finally graduating and receiving my NEWTs, he jeered me and humiliated me for being weak. Then, he asked me to kill Sirius Black. I couldn't do it, so I came here instead."

"So that's your story," said Sample.

"I'll tell you as much as I can. Names, hiding places; what I can't tell you, I'll show you. I'd even be willing to turn double agent for you; whatever it takes. I can tell Voldemort I was captured trying to kill Sirius Black."

"One step at a time," said Moody.

Meaningful looks passed between Sample, Moody, and Shacklebolt. Shacklebolt said, "Then what do you expect to happen after that?"

Persephone said, "Well, I suppose I'll be sent to Azkaban."

"Perhaps...and perhaps not."

Persephone said matter of factly, "I've killed. Killers go to prison."

Sample said, "There are other ways to pay your debt to society." He sat back in his chair. "I want a full statement before we bring her before the Wizengamot. I want Kingsley to take it. He's never done it before. Alastor, be here in case he needs some help. I'm going to talk to Crouch. See what he'll agree to in exchange for her testimony."

"I told you. I don't want anything in exchange. I just want to make sure Vol-Voldemort can't ruin anymore lives."

Moody said, "We understand that, but we're not going to just let you take the maximum punishment after you came here and laid it all on the line to take responsibility. That's no more just than a cold-blooded killer walking free, and I think we've learned enough here to know that you're not cold-blooded. Now, I think a couple of years in Azkaban might be in order to make sure you don't forget your lesson, but Barty Crouch will throw away the key if you don't try to deal and I don't think that's right."

"It's no less than I deserve," said Persephone. Moody smiled.

Sample said, "I'm sure there's plenty of people who would agree with that, but I believe that when a person is willing walk to her doom to make good, she at least deserves a chance to prove herself. I'm going to talk to Crouch now, and I'm going to see to it you get a chance. When Kingsley takes your statement, he will want to know what you intend to tell us. Don't give him your information. Just tell us what type of information you're going to give us. The Wizengamut will want to hear it for themselves."

With that, Sample left her with Moody and Shacklebolt. The questions were simple and told them that she intended to give names, procedures, and meeting locations. When it was done, Moody said she'd be staying in a cell in the Ministry. It was guarded by dementors. She felt them before she could see them. She could hear voices in her mind...

"No..." she heard a woman scream. "I didn't do anything. Please don't kill me..."

Persephone was cast into a continuous nightmare.