Chapter 10
The walk back to the agent's suite was quiet, no one could think of small talk. That is until Amaryllis remembered a time constraint.
"Saxony went to her grandparents for lunch today. I will have to go get her at 2:00, so we will have to be done by then."
The agents looked at their watches and saw that they had an hour and a half. "That should be fine, it that is long enough to answer the questions." Prentiss assured her.
"It could push it, but we can see how it goes."
They soon came to the door and all three went inside. Amaryllis was asked to wait outside the conference room for a minute while the agents went inside to catch the rest of the team up on the situation.
Rossi was the first to register their entrance "You guys are back real soon?" Everyone looked at them with unspoken questions.
Morgan sighed, "Well the answers she was giving became rather complicated and long, so we thought it best if she comes and tells all of us at the same time."
"What do you know already?"
"The prophesy was heard by two people, one was Dumbledore, who warned two families that had a child that it could be talking about." Prentiss started.
"And the other?" Gideon asked.
Morgan answered this one, "The other was a Death Eater who was eavesdropping."
"That explains how Voldemort found out."
Morgan continued, "She said that who the Death Eater was in a long story so she will tell us in a minute."
Reid cut in here, "What about Sirius Black?"
Morgan and Prentiss looked at each other, and Prentiss hesitantly started to explain "Well… she insists that Black is innocent."
The room was silent for a minute, then Hotch collected himself "Well then, is she outside?" with the agents' nods, he ordered "Bring her in."
Amaryllis came in and everyone settled down around the table.
"So which question should I answer first, Sirius or the Death Eater?" Amaryllis was willing to answer but the agents could tell that she didn't really want to be talking about all this.
Reid was conflicted; he had made a promise to himself, when he first met Amaryllis. He had promised that he would try his best to not profile her. He wanted to get to know her the normal way. It didn't always work, he had been profiling for a long time, so it was hard to turn off. But he was glad that she could still surprise him sometimes as yesterday and today had proven that. And now, after all that work, he is forced to profile the one person he promised himself he wouldn't.
Hotch was the one to answer her "Either one would be fine."
Amaryllis nodded "I'll start with Sirius. I know that you don't quite believe me when I say he is innocent."
"Well, the evidence is overwhelming." Gideon interjected "I don't want to believe in his guilt, but I can't see a way that he is innocent."
"I realize that." Amaryllis comforted, "A lot of people have run into that dilemma," She turned back to address the whole team, "Sirius was framed. My parents did tell Albus that they were going to use Sirius as their Secret Keeper, and that was their plan, until the day before the spell was cast. Sirius knew that he was the obvious choice, so he convinced them to pick someone who would be the last person that Voldemort would expect, Peter Pettigrew." She stopped, to let all that sink in.
Gideon sat forward, "That makes more sense than him going after Sirius. Peter wasn't a strong person, in anyway. It would have been easy for Voldemort to manipulate him."
"Yes" Amaryllis agreed and continued, "Pettigrew had already been marked by Voldemort when he became my parents' Secret Keeper. He did go looking for Sirius that night and when he found him, he shot killing curses from behind his back so it would look like Sirius killed those muggles."
JJ was the next to ask a question, "What about his own death, did Black take revenge and kill him?"
Amaryllis shook her head "No, Pettigrew, survived that night."
"How?"
"While they were still at school, my father, Sirius and Pettigrew became animagi," the agents didn't even have to ask what an animagi was, "An animagus is a someone who is able to turn into an animal. Why they became animagi is a whole other story. Anyway, animagi are required to register who they are and what they can turn into. My father and his friends didn't." She paused in the story and cleared her throat, "Could I get some water, please?" she implored. Reid stood to get her a glass of cold water. She smiled her thanks and took a sip before continuing.
"Pettigrew waited until Sirius fired a spell at him, and when he did, Pettigrew cut off one of his fingers and transformed into a rat. Then he slipped away unnoticed as the Aurors took Sirius away."
"What about his trial, even on open and shut case takes time?" Hotch questioned.
"There wasn't one. The only explanation I heard was that the Ministry wanted to put the whole thing behind them." Tears filled her eyes and threatened to fall, "All they had to do was give a dose of truth serum and he wouldn't have lost 12 years in Azakaban."
The agents were silent for a moment before continuing with their questions.
"How did you learn of this? The only people alive couldn't or wouldn't tell you."
"After his escape, I was warned that he might come after me, turns out that he was still chasing Pettigrew down. Near the end of my third year, we met, and he proved his innocence when he exposed Pettigrew, who was still pretending to be a normal rat. He was actually Ron's pet, Scabbers."
The agents were shocked by the injustice of the whole thing but were relieved to know the truth. They could tell that there was more to the story, but they knew their time was short and they had the information they needed, except for one thing, and Reid was the one to ask.
"Why wasn't he cleared then?"
"Pettigrew used a distraction to escape again, so Sirius went back on the run."
"So he didn't die in an attack on the Ministry?"
The tears that appeared before fell at this point and Amaryllis froze, but knew she should answer "He did, but he was defending not attacking."
The agents all nodded their heads and let the matter drop. They needed to move on to the next subject. They waited for her to wipe her tears, none of the missing Reid reaching out to grasp her hand for a minute until she calmed down enough to continue. He then let go and acted normal, as if he hadn't moved. Gideon looked incredibly relieved and then Rossi continued to the last question they needed answered.
"What about the Death Eater that heard the prophesy and told Riddle?"
Amaryllis paused, and Prentiss added to the question, "You said that you knew who it was."
Amaryllis gulped and answered, "I do know who it was… it was Severus Snape." As soon as she finished, she prepared for the outburst that was sure to come.
"What?"
"No way!"
"We sat next to him last night at dinner!"
These were just some of the angry replies, Morgan actually stood and went to go and confront the bad-tempered man who had given them trouble last night. Amaryllis raised her hands to stop Morgan and all the others from going too far. "I told you, it was a long answer. I know what it looks like right now, but please let me explain." The room was silent, all the agents looked at her, and she was looking at Hotch, who had stood soon after Morgan. Her eyes were pleading for just a little more time.
Hotch locked eyes with every member of his team, silently gaining their insights and opinions. Then he looked back to Amaryllis, whose eyes hadn't budged, "You will explain now." Hotch's voice didn't leave room for argument, "Why would a known Death Eater be allowed in the Order, how does anyone trust him?"
"They don't." Morgan was going to interrupt, but Amaryllis continued, "They trust Albus and Albus vouches for him."
"Why would he do that?"
"Well, this answer is going to sound flimsy but it is the truth." She continued at their nods. "After Snape learned of Voldemort's plan to attack my family he went to Albus and told him everything. He switched sides with Dumbledore's promise that my mother would be safe."
"Your mother?" Rossi questioned.
"Yes, before I continue, I have to say that all the Order knows is that Snape turned and that Dumbledore trusts him, and that is how we need to keep it. Snape doesn't even know that I know." She continued once the agents had agreed, some more grudgingly then others, "Snape and my mother grew up just a couple blocks from each other. He saw her doing accidental magic once and told her about the magical world. They became good friends, even when she was sorted into Gryffindor and him into Slytherin. The friendship stayed strong until their fifth year. Snape had become too influenced by the other Slytherins and their friendship ended over her blood status. He regretted it and tried to reconnect but my mother couldn't take it anymore. It didn't help that my mother started to go out with my father; Severus Snape and James Potter were the worst to enemies at school. I heard once that Snape took the Dark mark the day after my parents married, out of spite, but I don't know how for sure that is."
"Voldemort thought he had Snape undying support, but what he didn't count on was the fact that Snape was in love with my mother."
Garcia and Morgan had taken a sip of coffee at that point, and both choked, all the agents were speechless. Prentiss spoke first "He turned, risked his life, for one woman, who married another man?"
"I personally think it was more of the straw that broke the camel's back sort of thing, but yes." Amaryllis explained, "Voldemort wasn't always a terrorist, he formed his group with promises of changes in the government and how the magical world works, not all of which are unreasonable or malicious. Once Voldemort's political plans fell apart and he turned to fear, he lost a lot of support of families that now consider themselves neutral. When Voldemort came back, Snape once again became a spy. He is our double spy, another reason the Order doesn't completely trust him, nothing Albus or I could say would make them trust him again." More tears went down Amaryllis' face.
Reid once again took her hand before asking, "When did you find all this out?"
"I learned about the prophesy at the end of my fifth year, but not about Snape's role until my sixth." She gives a slight laugh and adds "It isn't fun to find out that your least favorite teacher was in love with your mum, especially when you're 16."
"How do you see him every day and not do something?" Garcia didn't understand.
"I almost did. I was livid when I first found out. It was a good thing that Albus found me before I found Snape. Not that I could have done much against a fully trained wizard." Amaryllis stare at the table, remembering the past and getting her thoughts together "After that, I think it was a memory that Albus showed me. It was of when Snape came to him after my parents' death. He looked so… distraught, and broken. Whenever I see him, I remember how he looked then and I can't get angry…even when I tried. It could also be the fact that…" She trailed off.
The agents expected her to continue, but when she didn't Reid tapped her shoulder, she jerked up to look at him. "You stopped in the middle of a sentence."
"Oh, sorry."
"What were you going to say?" Gideon pushed.
Amaryllis settled herself again before answering "For over 13 years Snape has been a double spy. If you think about it there is no real danger to him if we discover that he has been Voldemort's side this whole time, the most we could do is throw him is Azkaban, but Voldemort could have him back out again in a couple weeks. But if Voldemort were to discover that Snape is loyal to the Order, he would most certainly suffer a fate worse than death." She stopped again.
"Go on." Gideon prompted.
She turned to look at him, "Yet, even knowing that, for 13 years he has gone to every meeting he is called to. Voldemort is one of the best mind readers in the world, if Snape did anything remotely suspicious, he was done for. And yet he still walks in danger, at times more than once a week. Once I truly understood that, I couldn't help but respect him a little, even if I don't like him."
The agents all digest this, most coming to understand, the others not wanting to question her any farther. But one caught on to something the others didn't.
"You said that Dumbledore showed you a memory, what did you mean?" Reid started the conversation again.
"We have a object called a pensieve, and what we can do is, extract a memory from our minds and place it in a pensieve, in order to view it from an outside point of view."
The same thought came to almost all the agents at the same time. Rossi was the one to voice it.
"Is there any way for us to use a pensieve, in order to watch memories of raids and other things? So we can see firsthand how Voldemort operates." All the agents looked hopeful towards her.
Amaryllis thought about it for a minute before answering, "I have never heard of a muggle using one before, but in theory it should be fine. Since the object is magical in and of itself, you shouldn't need to be magical to use it." All the agents were grateful and quickly thanked her.
"It is no trouble; I can have a pensieve with memories for you tomorrow afternoon" Amaryllis smiled and glanced towards the clock on the wall, "Oh... I need to go; Saxony and her Grandparents will be expecting me soon." She stood, as did the agents.
"Thank you for coming to answer our questions." Morgan opened to door for her.
"We promised to help in any way we could. I'll get what memories I can, of anything I think could help."
"Anything with an interaction with Voldemort would be great." Gideon gave her as a guideline. She nodded to them all and left.
The agents sat back down. The room was Silent for quite a while before Garcia broke the silence, "So what do we do with that?"
"Since he is a spy, Snape will have had a lot of experiences with Riddle. We could talk to him." Rossi suggested.
"Yes," Hotch agreed. "Any insight on why he chose to attack the Potter's instead of the Longbottoms?"
"Riddle seems to be a narcissist to me, he could have seen something of himself in Amaryllis that the Longbottom boy didn't have." Morgan reasoned.
"It obviously isn't gender, so what similarities do they have." Prentiss prompted.
Reid spoke first, "Both of them are orphans."
"But that was after she was attacked."
"That is true about all of their similarities. Riddle practically created another him. We are lucky that she has gone in the completely opposite direction." Gideon judged.
"Wait, orphans?" Reid dug through the papers on the table, "Garcia what do you have on Riddle parents?"
"Not much, let me dig." She turned around and started to type furiously.
"What are thinking in that big brain of yours, Pretty Boy?" Morgan teased.
"Blood is the everything to Riddle right?"
"Yeah so, the Longbottom boy is a pureblood, so it would make sense for Voldemort to target him."
"This is just a hunch."
Garcia chimed in with "Alright, I got it." Everyone turned to her, "His mother Merope Riddle nee Gaunt was a pureblood witch, said to descend from Salazar Slytherin himself, nothing spectacular about her. His father is Thomas Riddle, he was..." she turned around, "a muggle."
After a moment to let that register, everyone got it. Reid voiced it, "That's it, Amaryllis and Riddle are both half-bloods."
"Even though he stands for blood purity, he picked the child who reminded him of himself." JJ summed up.
"So we can add narcissist to the profile for sure, what else?" Hotch opened it up for more theories and discussion.
The BAU spent the rest of the afternoon going over everything they had learned that day and how it fit into the profile.
Edited 9/10/2015