Chapter Two- Diamonds are Forever

The next morning dawned a little less miserable than the night before, instead of a heavy rain there was a light mizzle. As Morwen flicked her hood up and left her townhouse it settled into her thick hair and she cursed the frizz it would no doubt inspire. Dinner the previous night had been interesting, Nymphadora insisted she be called Tonks and turned out to be an auror while Molly's cooking skills were no less than they had been during the previous war. Briefly she thought of similar warm evenings, huddled in Andromeda and Ted Tonks' house, or one of the countless others they'd used, with members now long gone. The laughing Prewett twins and Caradoc, of course. A fellow Ravenclaw friend, who had ferried her around balls and events, a rather reluctant escort. Squashing the painful memories she headed to work, concentrating on another day in the cold caves ahead of her, no doubt.

Griphook was a pleasant enough little fellow and Morwen didn't mind spending her morning following him. However, she wasn't overly fond of his mode of transport, the little cart juddered along on the tracks after it had finally evened out. They'd gone down further than she'd been before, into older, bigger vaults. Their doors where vastly spaced apart and it took a while for Griphook to settle upon the one he was looking for.

"This is one of Gringotts' own vaults, Grimblewick asked personally for you to have a look at this," a pointed little sniff insured she was aware of what an honour this was. "You are not your uncle but you might know what it is and if we can sell it, what with you traipsing around the world with him."

After the performance of opening the locks Griphook finally gestured her into the vault. It was gargantuan in size but only one object rested in the middle in a glass case. Morwena recognised it as soon as she locked eyes on the tattered old mask, made from fine goats leather it didn't look at all alarming but she knew it was a nastier piece of work than it appeared.

"Where did Gringotts get this?" Peering into the glass case she noted that it still wore a grimace.
"We took it as collateral a right few years ago, we were told it's better than polyjuice, no one has volunteered to try it on," he fixed her a sardonic look, but she doubted to herself if the magic would work on a goblin anyway, " it has been here ever since, but we are cleaning house so to speak, in times of unrest gold is of more value than dark objects. Grimblewick would like rid of it."

"It came from Ecuador, it's an ancient thing, Uncle Izzy dug it up out of a jungle temple. The wizards in the area are quite secretive, hidden away from their muggles and no long revered as gods. They refuse to have much dealings with wizards from outside the locality, but Uncle Izzy managed to worm his way in of course. The temple was an area they refused to enter, but they let him dig the mask up if he took it far away. Which he did, across the Atlantic, they called it the mask of many faces," Griphook had produced a little notebook by this point and was quickly writing in crisp short hand.

"What does it do?" he ask in his high pitch.

"You may steal a person's face, their identity, but from what Uncle Izzy could understand from the ancient language in the tombs, the would be target had to killed while wearing the mask. Then when you put the mask on afterwards, you became them. There is no going back, the mask doesn't work like polyjuice, it doesn't wear off." Morwena shuddered, she had only been ten when she accompanied Izzy on that adventure, she could still feel the sticky heat and sting of strange insects. A translation charm, which Izzy had perfected himself, revealed scribing's inside the temple. The warnings against using the mask had been many.

"It can be used repeatedly but the wearer will go mad eventually, there were indications that previous wearer's began to hear their victims' voices. However, Uncle Izzy sold it to a private collector I think, one of his nastier finds I'm afraid," Grip hook nodded.

"Very well, we still have some time before lunch. Write up everything you just told me, we'll pass it onto the committee of elders. They'll decide what happens to it," Griphook ushered her back out of the vault.

"How come the goblins didn't find this information themselves," she asked as she busied herself onto her perch in the cart.

"Your dear old Uncle was a canny wizard, you know that. There was never any record of that find and the man who gave it to us did so on the behalf of his family. The original procurer is long dead and so the story died, Isiah Madern Selwyn was as shrewd as any Goblin, I suspect you're the only one who could read his writings even if we had them. Or so I have been told."
The witch thought of the boxes of writings sitting in her Uncle's now closed office in Diagon Alley. The meticulous notes could only be read by Morwen, because of all the old concealment charms Izzy had cast on the paper and the ink. Charms their ancestors had long perfected, specific to the Selwyns and only known to those members who had been admitted into family business. Sighing, she said nothing of this to the goblin, instead they sat in silence the whole way back up to the ground floor.

Morwen spent the rest of the morning typing up a review of the mask, she made a quick note to herself to follow the artefact's next journey. Whoever would buy such a thing from the goblins would be an interesting name to have.

At lunch time she wandered out of the bank and down to 'Oakham&Sons Olde Shoppe and Tea Rooms,' she bought todays paper on her way in though the little shop, before heading up the stairs for some lunch.

Maggie Boot smiled when she caught her coming up the stairs, "Home again then stranger?" She put her note pad in her apron and embraced Morwen. The smiling woman was yet another school friend, a fellow Ravenclaw this time.

"Yes, for a little while anyway. How's everything, how's the kids?" she asked as she sat down in the corner beside the window. There was a low fire burning just opposite so she quickly shed her coat as Maggie leaned on the back of the spare chair across the table.
"Our Terry's still at Hogwarts, he's bright boy, just like his Dad. Mary is only starting Hogwarts this year, it was hard letting her go, I miss her about the place," she looked a little wistful.

"Merlin, where's does the time go?" Morwen couldn't believe the other's children where both at Hogwarts.

"I know, I'm starting to feel old! But anyways, I bet you're needing some lunch?" Maggie pulled the notepad out again.

"Just the special soup of the day thanks," her old school mate nodded before bustling into the back kitchens.

Morwen left the tea room with a promise to write and organise a proper coffee, the paper had been illuminating, Harry Potter's name had been scrawled across the front in slander and she couldn't help feel sorry for the boy. After all he'd gone through last year, the Prophet was piling all sorts of lies on top of him as well.
Walking through the atrium she made for the doors to the back, her office was on the first floor, a tiny cupboard like affair with no windows. A plaque reading '3-Morwen Selwyn- Curse breaker and Antiquities Surveyor' decorated the door. There was a note on the desk, unsurprisingly from Griphook, providing the number 1 and a single name. Bill Weasley.

Bill Weasley's office was three doors down from her own, and as she walked the carpet she wondered what he had in store. Bill was infamous as a cursebreaker, one of best Gringotts had, although there only something like five of them in all.

Knocking his door she heard a loud curse and thumping, the door opened to a tall, ginger wizard who wasn't looking anywhere near the doorway. Instead Bill was waving his wand and haplessly trying to tidy the files and notes strewn all over the floor into piles. He must have knocked them over when he got up to answer the door.
"Merlin's beard I hate paper work," the lanky figure exclaimed as he straightened up to meet her.
"You need a cabinet or two Bill," she sighed, "You do know the administration office can organise those for you."

"Well, yes but a few of the administrations officers aren't too fond of me at the minute," he scratched the back of his neck and she guessed they could be scorned women. Most of the office girls down there were his age, and by all accounts viewed him as some sort of dashing explorer.
"You must be Morwen Selwyn?"
"Yes, Griphook sent me this way," she shook his outstretched hand.

"Ah, yes, we have an object that's proving difficult to counter curse," he grabbed his jacket and motioned her out, she was rather pleased to see his office was as cupboard like as hers.
"I doubt I'll be of any more use than you," she followed him down the corridor.

"Well we've all had a go at it, I'm still researching, but I thought it might have been something you've come across," he shrugged the jacket on, patches decorated the elbows.

After waiting for Bill to retrieve the vault key from a goblin Morwen soon found herself in another blasted cart. Thankfully they didn't have far to go, this object was in one of the 'recent additions' vaults. Shelves lined the walls and one long wooden table dominated the centre of the vault. On the table sat an open box, it was cushioning a rather stunning necklace. Morwen wasn't really all that surprised, cursed jewellery tended to be the norm for breakers.
"Where did you find it then?" The chain was a string of white diamonds set in white gold but the centre stage went to the heart shaped pendent. Another diamond Morwen was shocked by its size, and even in the dull lighting of Gringotts it's clarity dazzled.

"Griphook won't tell us, goblin made but not by any British clan. They think the curse was worked in as it was made, makes it a little more difficult to get rid of usually," Bill leaned his elbows of the table but didn't dare touch the necklace.

"Shouldn't be impossible," she stares at the twinkling diamonds but doesn't dare touch them.

"Griphook released the notes on it to us, the story of its powers is well described but other than that there's nothing. Not even the name of the family who owned it. Gringotts has bought it and want to sell the diamonds. Apparently it strangles brides, anything less than pureblood and she doesn't live long enough to finish the vows."

She pulls a chair over and sits down, "Sacred Twenty-Eight then and old. The necklace would probably strangle me, I doubt anyone is pure enough anymore. Where did Gringotts buy it and how come you can't break it then Weasley?"

"I have no idea, so many questions. Griphook won't say who sold it but it wasn't a family or the people who owned it. God knows where they picked it up," he sighed and pulled out a seat, "We've tried all the usual but it absorbs pretty much everything we do to it, strengthening the curse.

"Even simple revealing charms?" she drums the table, it must have an very expensive piece in its day.

"Yep, I can only imagine it takes from its victims as well," Bill reaches into a satchel he'd been carting about.

"These are its notes, will you look through them?" he hands her a disappointingly thin file, "I'm snowed under with assessments at the minute, the load of cursed stuff the community is needing looked at is serious."

Taking the file Morwen nods, "Muggleborn hate?"

"Seems to be, I'll meet you here the same time next week? See if we can't at least talk ourselves through how this curse works," he stands up to leave.

"Working how the curse operates is going to be the hardest part," she doubts something like this is going to be easily figured out.

"Well we'd better try, the Goblins are anxious to cash it in with the muggle world," Bill closed the vault as she climbed out and headed for the cart.

"I have an old friend who might have heard of it at least," she immediately thinks of the caged dog she'd left last evening needing an outlet.

Determined, Morwen penned a note when she returned to her desk, asking Remus if he had anything in for dinner? The pair had been rooming together in Sirius' family home, a rather amusing easy to return to how they used to live for awhile before Sirius was imprisoned. Now she set the letter in her 'post out tray' and watched it vanish, probably to the owlery on the topmost floor. Turning to the pile of appraisals Griphook had sent to her in trunk she sighed glad they'd already been curse broken as she prepared to value them.

The door to Grimmauld place opened at her acquiesce this time, closing it quietly behind her she managed to slip past Walburga Black and down into the kitchen.
At the bottom of the stairs she looked up from pulling the grocery bag out of her handbag to see two wands pointed between her eyes.

"Really? Are we doing the question every time?" she rolled her eyes.

"After Moody's bollocking last night, yes," Sirius remarked. "We need to sit down and sort out proper questions for each other."

"Moody was right, we can't be careless," Remus replied, "You ask this time Sirius, I did it last time."

"Where did I find you at the Summer Ball in Travers House before our Fifth year, and why were you there?" he asked intently.

Glaring at him she replied, "I was sulking in their library because Poppy Warrington told me I had a big nose. To which you replied that her pug face was far worse than my big nose and not too worry."

Scowling at him she remembered how she used to agonise over her rather prominent nose, it was a family trait and in her older age she realised it wasn't that hideous. Perhaps she'd grown into it.

"Yep," he grinned, returning to the kitchen table. "Never worry Moony, it's definitely Morwen. Is dinner going to be long? I'm starving."

Remus had the look of a long-suffering soul as he joined him and Morwen couldn't help but be pleased to see the once familiar picture again.

After they'd ate the dinner Morwen and Remus had thrown together while Sirius watched, which was another old familiar, Morwen pulled the file out of her bag. The witch had been surprised that she'd managed to walk out of Gringotts with it stowed in her handbag and not set off shrieking alarms and livid goblins. Pleased she set it on the table and Remus sent the dirty dishes to the sink for washing, clearing her some space.

"What's this, you bringing homework back from the bank?" Sirius asked, curious as she flicked the folder open.

"Of a kind," she pulled the photos of the necklace out and slid them across the kitchen table. "Don't suppose you've ever seen this?"

Sirius lifted the photo with a thoughtful expression, "Don't recognise it, why?" he handed them to Remus who shrugged.

"The goblin's want it curse broken," and so she told the story, of how it strangled brides who weren't pure blooded enough.

"Dear Merlin, there's likely something like that knocking around here. I wonder which family it belonged too, I don't even remember a story or the like of it in action." Sirius laughed as he pulled the few bits of paper out of the file. "But then, my darling mother would've known old stories like that, pity we never had much conversation."

"Gringotts are being pretty tight lipped as to how they got it, but they insist they don't know which family owned it," she was exasperated with the goblins, "If only they'd tell us their source. But Merlin knows Bill's harassed them enough for it to no avail."

Remus got up to put the kettle on murmuring to himself as Sirius read on, "I can't help but wonder if it's a wizarding curse at all."

"Sounds pretty strong, "Sirius replied, "it absorbs the unclean brides powers and seemingly everything the curse breakers have been spelling it with Moony."

Remus rattles around the cupboards for clean mugs before charming the tea tray over to the table, "Charming, sounds like it belongs to the Blacks indeed."

"Could it be cursed by anything bar a wizard?" Sirius asks puzzled.

"Well it does seem unlikely, but we do know that most creatures, especially the goblins, have a magic themselves," she poured herself coffee as Remus took the sheets of paper from Sirius.

"Yes, but they have not the means to channel a curse, surely," Remus mutters as he reads.

"So, a wizard had to have helped in some way?" Sirius got up and headed for the pantry.

"If Bill Weasley hasn't been able to break it, and will admit to it," Remus tells Morwen, and grins when Sirius returns with a bottle of Finnloch's Finest magically distilled whiskey.

"Then it's a curse with something different to it," Sirius agrees as he adds a good glug of the amber liquid to their mugs.

Morwen sat up, straightening her elbows from the table, "Sirius, your mother is still here."

Both men turned to her incredulous, "Morwena," Sirius sighed, "that portrait is as mad as a box of frogs."

"She was a fanatic, she's bound to remember something like that necklace," insistent she got up from the table, grabbing a photograph.

"Well, Morwen is a pureblood and a Selwyn," Remus replied thoughtfully, "Would she remember you?" he turned to her.

"Of course, your mother is bound to remember me," she fixed Sirius with a haughty stare and headed for the stairs.

"Do you know how long it takes me to shut her up Morwen," Sirius chased after her.

"You'll stay where she can't see you, Remus, you too," Morwen gazed up at the portrait as they closed the kitchen door, Sirius leaned on it and Remus leaned on the wall beside him. Hopefully at the far end of the hall, in the shadows of the great staircase, Walburga wouldn't notice them.

Taking in a deep breath she opened the curtains with a flick of her wand and immediately the old crone began screaming. The whites of her eyes shone as they rolled around the sunken sockets and her gaping mouth spat and drooled as she heaved and screeched all at once.
"Filth! In the house of my father's! Mudbloods and traitors!"

"Walburga?!" she shouted, repeating herself over and over, but it seemed the lucid moment Morwen had with her the previous evening had lapsed.

"Walburga," she tried and tried, "I have come to visit the House of Black!"

No matter how hard she tried to call over the old woman, still she screamed, eyes rolling, looking nowhere. Morwen thought how like her it was, her portrait was slightly higher than eyeline, just so the Black could look down her nose at everyone she surveyed even in death.

"Pointless!" Shouted Sirius, storming up the hallway as his mother never let up. "Shut up-"he went for the curtains, shouting and swearing at his blood kin all the time. "Shut up! You old bitch, you twisted hag!"

Sighing in defeat she reached to help him, shaking her head as he gave up momentarily to hurl insults back at the phantom of his mother. Standing with his hands in the air, craning up at her, bellowing at a painting about how the Black House deserved to rot into the ground. It seemed that his voice triggered a litany of insults she had buried deep somewhere for him, 'Filthy blood traitor! Abomination! If only I had known, I could have drowned you at birth!' The terrible words a mantra she snarled over and over at Sirius as Morwen struggled to pull the curtains together. Finally, Remus helped by strengthening her efforts with magic.

They all stood still, Morwen and Sirius slightly out of breath and as Remus began to return down the hallway for the kitchen Morwen turned to their dark-haired friend.

"Sirius…" she paused, looking into his grey eyes and trying to find words.

"Yes, yes I know, "he huffed before striding back down the hall, his voice carrying back towards her, "I'm legitimately insane for being drawn into a shouting match with my dead mother's portrait."

Shaking her head she was only thinking about how she wanted to tell him that his mother had been an awful woman. The painting was a spectre of how Walburga must have talked to her oldest son when they were hidden away inside this house.

Instead she said nothing and followed him back down to the warmly lit kitchen.