8.

Aldershot thought I was mad. That was okay. Fred and George, when they finally brought my uniform, thought I was mad. That was okay, too. The Healers all thought I was mad. Even that was okay. They weren't the ones I had to convince of it.

Unfortunately, Kingsley thought I was mad, too.

"Weasley," he said, "you're not making any sense."

"Yes I am!" I said. "This all goes back to Tiresias, that's how it all fits together! Someone affiliated with that club is stealing from Muggles and using a Forgetfulness Potion to cover his tracks, the poisonings were just a side-effect of contaminated herbs, and Malfoy knows about it because he's been using a glamour and two aliases to work for both clubs at the same time!"

Kingsley sighed, and rubbed the bridge of his nose. I could sympathize, a bit—I was still half-green and spotty and raving in his office about a project that wasn't technically under his jurisdiction. I suppose I could've also gone to my dad about it, since the victims were all Muggles, but I would've had too much to catch him up on. Besides, Kingsley deserved it more. "One thing at a time," he said. "You're saying that Draco Malfoy and Lysander White are the same person?"

"Yes," I said, "it's his middle name, and his mother was a Black, you see? He must've been afraid to look for work in Knockturn under his own name. That's why he's such a bastard to everyone at Tiresias, because they might break the illusion if they touched him. Malfoy couldn't possibly have seen anything of what was actually happening at the Golden Claw, because it was going on in back and he was always out front with the piano, but if he recognized someone from Tiresias at the Golden Claw he might've been able to pick up something, that's how he knew and that's what he told me, that must be where Higgs is—"

"Higgs?" Kingsley asked. "You never mentioned a Higgs before."

I sighed. "Malfoy mentioned the name to me a few days ago—"

"When did you talk to him a few days ago?"

"Will you quit interrupting me?" I said, then remembered myself and added, "Sir?"

Kingsley leaned back in his seat and picked up a fatherly sort of voice. "Ron, you're making a lot of tenuous claims without a great deal of hard evidence. You're still a bit under the weather—"

"I've got spots, that doesn't mean I'm mad," I said. "Kingsley, everything fits. Someone at Tiresias is behind all this, Malfoy knows it, and it shouldn't be too difficult to figure out who it is because that place has a customer base of about twelve."

Kingsley opened his mouth to say something, but a thump from the other side of his office door interrupted him. "I'm in a closed meeting," he called out. "I'll be with you momentarily."

The thump came again.

"Just sign the paperwork and shuffle it over to the Enforcers," I said, "tell them we've got proof—"

Thump thump thump.

"I will be with you in a moment!" Kingsley called.

Thumpthumpthumpthumpthump.

I wrenched the door open, got halfway through shouting "What the bloody fuck do you want?" and ended up with an owl in my lap. It had a Gringotts seal around its neck and a scroll addressed to me in its beak. I tossed the owl into a handy open file drawer, ripped open the scroll, and laughed out loud. "There it is," I told Kingsley as I spread it on his desk. "There's the last piece of it."

Ron,

I didn't actually read your letter or send you this. Please quit trying to get me fired. There were deposits on or just after the dates you gave me, all into the same account, though that one's got a history of big transfers from Muggle banks so I don't think any of the goblins would've noticed it. The name on the key is Terrence Higgs, and the transaction information is at the bottom of the scroll. If you tell anyone I told you this I will kill you.

All my love, Bill.

"Terrence Higgs," I said aloud. "We've got a suspect."

Kingsley frowned. "We can't issue a warrant on illegally obtained evidence," he said.

"The rest of it is legal, though!" I said. "Kingsley, you know it makes sense, just kick it over to Aldershot and make her look into it and I'll tuck myself back into the hospital like a good boy."

For a minute I thought that Kingsley was going to tell me to, I dunno, go lay with a cold compress and wait for the hallucinations to pass. Then he folded his arms across his chest and said, "All right."

"All right?"

"All right." He sat down. "I'll write up the warrant and get it approved. Though the Wizengamot will probably thing that I'm utterly mad—"

Another owl swooped in through the open door and crashed into the opposite wall; it was wearing a little purple Express Post helmet as well. Kingsley picked up its scroll and dropped the new owl in the same drawer as the old owl. He read it and frowned. "Well, that changes things," he mumbled.

"What? What is it? What's wrong?" I demanded.

Kinglsey twisted around and hunched over so I couldn't read over his shoulder, but said, "Rickler just spoke with Mr. Cox of the Golden Claw. Apparently Malfoy showed up earlier this morning announcing he'd quit and demanding his final paycheck—"

"Oh, shit," I said.

"—and when Cox refused, he just walked out...Weasley? Ron, where are you going?"

"I'll be right back!" I shouted over my shoulder as I raced towards the lifts. "Just get the warrant!"

Malfoy was going to run, Malfoy was going to run, and I was going to have to chase the little git to get this all sorted out. Why the hell did he insist on making himself look guilty all the bloody time? It was like he enjoyed it or something. Didn't he see it would be so much easier on all of us if he'd just hold still and let me save his pretty, pathetic arse—

No, scratch that, solve the case. Which had nothing to do with Malfoy. Nor Malfoy's arse. Even if it was very nice. Bloody hell, I was going to need a vacation when this was over. There were too many queers running around and I hadn't gotten laid in far too long. A quick shag at some Muggle club where nobody knew or cared who I was, and then a few days among the firmly heterosexual, that ought to do the trick. I could go back to how things were, on my nice straight (hah!) track to a career and a family and the occasional night in a place like the Golden Claw, pulling strangers for a fuck in the private lounges for the rest of my life—

I Apparated from the Ministry to Malfoy's building without breaking my stride, then stopped and pounded my head against a handy brick wall. Stop that, I told myself. You are not a pathetic old pervert.

Yet, said the Hermione-voice.

None of this has anything to do with my lifestyle choices.

Except to the extent that they've left you desperate unhappy and obsessed with the first bit of anything you've gotten in months.

I'm not unhappy, I told myself, I'm not obsessed, and I need to stop talking to myself now.

Suit yourself, the Hermione-voice said.

Because I was covered in green spots and still had large green streaks in my hair, I couldn't exactly go into the front of the building; I considered my options and elected to try the fire escape again. There was a wino in the alley who looked at me with dull and bloodshot eyes as I clambered up the ladder. "Happy Christmas," I called down to him. "The end is near."

He saluted me with his bottle and went to sleep. Don't ever tell me I don't take anti-Muggle precautions.

Once again I stretched out over the side of the platform and peered through the dusty window into Malfoy's flat. It looked a mess—furniture turned up and stuff strewn about—but after a moment I saw Malfoy dart through the room with a pile of sheet music and underwear in his arms. I had to take my wand in the wrong hand to do it, but I charmed the window open and started to crawl inside.

I say "started" because my feet definitely left contact with the fire escape before my arms got enough grip on the window sill to pull the rest of me all the way through. I tried to grab onto the radiator under the window and got a handful of screaming hot metal. I may have shouted something to the effect of "Bloody fuck!"

Malfoy was suddenly standing in the doorway to the bedroom with his wand on me. There were dark circles under his eyes and his hair was rumpled and sticking up oddly, as was one side of his collar. He stared at me for just a moment, while I kicked at the wall outside for a toehold. Eventually he asked, "Weasley?"

"Yes, Malfoy?" I said.

"What in the name of Merlin are you doing here?"

"Currently?" I said. "Trying not to fall."

"In more general terms, please."

A toehold! I shoved myself further up through the window, but that only left me with the windowsill jammed into my bits instead of my armpits, and my face was just inches from the hot radiator. I flipped my legs up and walked on my hands for about a foot before making an awkward somersault into the room. I hoped the wino had gotten a good show. I stood up, brushed myself off, and reached for my wand before I remembered Malfoy was pointing his at me and not looking particularly stable. "I'm trying to stop you from running," I said.

He snorted. "Right. So you can arrest me."

"We're not going to—" I cleared my throat. "Well. We are going to arrest you. But it'll be all right."

Malfoy shook his head. "I've seen enough of the inside of Courtroom Ten already in my life, thank you."

"We need you to testify against Higgs," I said.

He raised his eyes at me. "You remember that, do you? I'm surprised. I think she's slipping."

"I...don't actually remember it," I said, for absolutely no reason that I can recall except for a hunch that dishonesty wouldn't earn me any points here. That, and I really wanted to know what had happened. "We got the name from bank records."

Malfoy backed into the bedroom and shook his head. "I'm not doing it," he said. "I'm already in enough trouble as it is."

"With who? With Higgs?" I dared to take a step forward, and Malfoy didn't hex me, just backed up further. He'd never had much in the way of nerve. "Just how deep are you in this mess?"

"I've nothing to do with it!" he said—practically shouted. "I already told you, I'm not involved."

"Funny, I don't remember that," I said. "Though I do remember being alone with you right before I woke up with this collection of fetching new spots, and some of my colleagues find that a bit incriminating."

Malfoy backed fully into the bedroom and suddenly slammed the door. I hit it with my shoulder and forced it open before he could lock it; he fell onto the bed, where a single suitcase was overflowing with clothes, sheet music, books and scrolls and an assortment of random crap. We drew on one another, wands practically meeting. "Do you think it's incriminating?" Malfoy asked in a strange tone of voice.

"No," I said. "I don't."

"Why not?"

I licked my lips. "I don't think you look like a guilty man."

He snorted, and lowered his wand, just a bit. "Must I really tell this over again?"

"Let me put it this way," I said. "An Enforcer, a Muggle Relations official, and possibly the head of the Auror's Division are going to be showing up here very soon. They will not be very happy and they will have a warrant to arrest you."

Malfoy sighed, and let his elbows fall to his knees, though he kept a dueling grip on his wand. "Then put that thing down," he said. "I can't concentrate with a wand in my face."

I lowered my wand, shut the door, and leaned against it. Malfoy scowled at me; I nodded at him. "Go on, then."

He straightened up, pointy little chin sticking out sharply, but his eyes were looking off to one side, not on my face. "As I told you last night, I've nothing to do with Higgs or his mad little schemes. I never wanted anything to do with them, and I told him so when he approached me—"

"He approached you when?" I asked.

Malfoy took a deep breath. "He approached Lysander White a little over a year ago about participating in a non-specific 'business venture.' I turned him down cold."

"Why?" I asked.

"Because seven years ago I went crawling to him for help and the son of a bitch laughed in my face."

I raised my eyebrows, not just at the trace of hot anger in his voice. "You'd just been set free seven years ago," I said. "What did you need his help for?"

Now Malfoy looked at me, and his expression was bitter. "What did I need help with?" he said. "Let's see, Weasley, my parents and most of my friends were dead. Most of the wizarding world thought I was either a Death Eater or a traitor to the Death Eaters. The Ministry had seized all my family assets for my father's crimes, and left me with nothing. Oh, yes, I was free, all right—free to starve."

Of all the wild theories I'd heard floated about Malfoy's fate after his acquittal, I'd never even considered something remotely like this. I swallowed the urge to—I don't know, apologize or something. We were too short on time. "So you went to Higgs for help?" I asked.

"I was looking for a job," Malfoy said. "I had gone to everyone I could think of, anyone I didn't think would kill me as soon as look at me ...at the time, Higgs had a good thing going with an old Belgian closet case who had more money that he knew what to do with. I hadn't talked to him in years—since I was a kid, really—but I thought, if anyone would have the gold to waste, if any wizard in the world would enjoy seeing me crawl, it'd be him.

"I pled my case to him. I begged him. I embarrassed myself far more than I am right now.

"He laughed at me and told me it was just desserts for the brooms."

That took me a moment to work out, before I suddenly remembered where I'd heard Higgs' name before. "The brooms?" I echoed. "He was still sore about the bloody brooms from second year?"

"He has a long memory and a sadistic streak," Malfoy said. "But he was my last chance, and after that I was forced to seek employment elsewhere. The Ministry arranged for the documentation—grudgingly—and I had the names altered.

"Why?" I asked. "Why the alias?"

He raised his chin again stiffly. " If I was to be exiled from the wizarding world, I was determined that there would be no looking back."

"Except for the part where you created an alias and got a job on Knockturn," I said.

He scowled, and his chin dipped a little. "I needed the money," he admitted. "Cox pays shit and I was only working three nights a week."

You know, I could've made a joke about that. I could've said quite a few things, in fact. Malfoy seemed to expect me to; he sat rigidly on the end of the bed, with a white-knuckle grip on his wand, and I could see his jaw muscles jumping. But looking at him like that, at how bloody damn arrogant he could still manage to be after all this...well. From one stubborn son of a bitch to another, I had to admire it. So instead I asked him, "So it was as White that Higgs originally approached you?"

"Right," he said. "And I told him to fuck himself."

"So how did you find out about the scam?"

"I started noticing him at the Golden Claw," he said. "He'd lost his Belgian friend and I supposed he was looking for a new sugar daddy, one he could control. But eventually I realized he was leaving with a different bloke every night, and after a point it became rather obvious he was getting money off of them anyway—he was throwing gold around like it grew in his garden."

I checked my watch; Aldershot should've been here by now to arrest him, unless something else had held her up. Kingsley, maybe? "And this is what you told me last night?" I asked.

He shrugged. "Mostly. You hadn't yet figured out about White then.

I frowned. "But if that's all you told me, how did I get close enough to Higgs to get poisoned?"

"How should I know?" he said. "I went and did my job and you went and blew my bloody cover, that's all I know."

"Blew your cover?" I asked, stomach sinking. "What did I do?"

"I don't know," he said again, standing up, "but Higgs has figured me out—he sent me a bloody owl this morning, a warning, and if I don't get out of London soon—"

He didn't finish that thought, just started trying to close the suitcase, prodding it with his wand without any apparent effect. I grabbed his wrist from behind to get his attention. "Malfoy, do you really think Higgs can hurt you if you're in Ministry custody?"

"No, and I can't catch a cold if I'm dead," he snapped, and tried to shake me off. "Nevertheless, I don't intend either to kill myself or to march peacefully to Azkaban."

"You're not going to Azkaban," I said. "But we can put you in protective custody—in a safe house, somewhere—and let Higgs think you're taking the fall for him."

"No, thank you," he said icily.

"Malfoy, be reasonable!" I spun him around—he was such a skinny bloke I probably could've tied his arms behind his head without much trouble—so I could say this to his face. "If you testify against Higgs you can keep your job—all of them—" He snorted at me— "and we'll protect you. I swear we will."

"You're going to protect me?" he said. "When you can't even protect yourself?"

"There were extenuating circumstances," I said. "Probably."

He rolled his eyes. "I said no. Now let me get out of here."

I stepped closer, basically pinning him against the bed, and another tactic. "Then think about revenge," I said softly. "He's going to go away for a long time for this, especially if it's been going on as long as you say. You can be the one to put him there—"

"You don't fucking get it!" Malfoy shouted, squirming. "I don't care about revenge, I don't care about Higgs, I don't care about anything! I've tried being a good guy, I've tried being a bad guy, and either way I've ended up losing. All I want is to get out of this alive and relatively intact, and all the rest of you lot can go screw yourselves."

"I'm not letting you do that!" I shouted right back.

"Why the hell not?" he asked. "You've still got Higgs cold—"

"I can't!"

"Why not?"

I kissed him. Again.

Somewhat to my surprise, he started kissing me back. Again.

Until someone suddenly pounded on the bedroom door, and I did the first thing that occurred to me, which was shove Malfoy away and leap as far across the room as possible, because I had not just done that and I did not fancy him and I was not going to sacrifice my entire bloody career for a quick fuck, no matter what the little voices in my head suggested was good for me.

"Aldershot, I can explain—" I started to say.

It wasn't Aldershot who burst into the room, however, and I had only a fraction of a second to appreciate that fact before I was Stunned.

Because that was just how my week was going.