Chapter Ten

Back at the council estate Nausea blinked in the sudden daylight. As soon as that terrific concussion had been heard above the city, the inferi had all frozen back into corpses and collapsed to the ground. "The demon iss losssst!" breathed the dark witch, realising her own peril. The aurors, freed from Deliria's control, had begun to gaze around in horror at the carnage they had helped to commit. The muggles, realising they were no longer the object of hostility, ran away, back to their buildings.

"Get that monster!" yelled an auror pointing at Nausea. The aurors all raised their wands and Nausea, eyes swivelling frantically from side to side, disapparated. Just in the nick of time.

High above the city the airship headed in the direction of the Ministry Complex. Charli hugged Sally tightly. Sally was weeping desolately onto her friend's shoulder. The injustice Billie had received, added to the trauma the three of them had shared, affected her deeply. "The mission is not over yet girls, remember?" Alex urged, although her own distress threatened to overwhelm her. She switched on the airship's communication link, calling Madam Bones, formerly head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. The Ministry's rules of succession meant that she was now the Minister for Magic. "Madam Bones, we've booted the demon out of this world, my improvised team and I," she said in a trembling voice. "The insulation field is down, so I urge you to return and put out a nationwide alert for that lousy traitor, Darvill – also for the dark witch, with the title 'Nausea.'"

Darvill had sensed the demise of his terrible mistress. This time however, his allegiance to the dark forces was widely known and there could be no concealment or extenuation. All Ministry staff, instead of being enslaved, were now after him. Every escape route from the Ministry complex had been blocked. He had fled down to the department of Mysteries, but a group of aurors nearly cornered him and he barely made it into the rocky labyrinth of the primordial region alive. Madam Bones, who had just returned to the Ministry to assume her position of Minister for Magic, led the aurors in pursuit into the primordial region. Darvill hurtled through the dark, dank tunnels. A subterranean river flowed through the region. The rushing of its icy waters filled his ears. Unsuccessful experiments from the department's attempts to create non carbon based life forms by magic were hurled into the river where they always perished. Darvill turned a corner his head pounding. To have been granted London and as a next step, the world and then to have it all snatched away... Black despair tore at him. Madam Bones' voice, magically magnified sounded through the stone tunnels. "It's all over Darvill. Make it easy on yourself. Come quietly."

"Come quietly? Come quietly!" At that moment Darvill's mind broke completely and he roared with crazed laughter. Then, still gripping his wand, he plunged headfirst into the fast flowing river and was swept away.

A short time later it was nearly sunset. A pair of aurors stood outside the door to a flat high up in a tower block. Rufus Scrimgeour, now head of the auror office, apparated beside them, answering their request for help. "The dark witch is here sir," one of the aurors told him. "Look." Scrimgeour peered through a crack in the door. Sure enough, a gaunt witch with wild black hair was kneeling on the bare floor next to the corpse of a muggle man. She was gripping the corpse's temples and shrieking, "Rise! Rissse I ssay!"

"I think she's trying to animate the corpse," said one of the aurors in perplexity. "But she's had no success so far. Whenever we go in there she disapparates away again so I don't know how to pin her down."

There was a crack and a witch with shining golden hair apparated beside them. "Petersen!" Exclaimed Scrimgeour. "So glad you could make it. We are in need of your assistance."

"You boys can't do anything by yourselves can you?" Said Alex, shaking her head. She kicked open the door to the flat.

"Petersssen!" Exclaimed Nausea.

"Nausssssssssea!" Mocked Alex.

Nausea gasped. In the bloody light of the dying sun that streamed through the window, the vision of Alex seemed to blur and change before her eyes. There now stood before her a vision of a much older witch with silver hair, gaunt and terrifying, with steely grey eyes that seemed to bore into her.

"Mother?" Gasped Nausea, "no it'sss not posssible I..."

"Killed me daughter? Fifteen years ago, yes you did!" Bellowed the witch. "You abomination! Disgrace of my flesh. You won't get away this time, not now."

"I wass never like my milksssop of a ssister who would do whatever you ssay," hissed Nausea. "I can be rid of your tyranny a ssecond time!"

"There is something that all little girls should know!" growled the old witch in the doorway. "Matricides always get what is coming to them."

Nausea was about to shriek in defiance but found herself choking. Her very skin seemed to be tugging at itself as if trying to tear itself open and slough off. The dark witch collapsed to the floor and vomited blood. She gave a choking gasp as her joints were forced by a hostile will to turn against themselves and crack. She attempted to crawl away, but the old witch in the door way pounced and gripping at her evil daughter's dress, tore it open. And tore open her skin in the process, leaving nothing on the ground, but a pile of bloody bones and sinews.

The three wizards from the doorway blinked at the horrible sight. The old witch turned to them and Alex resumed her natural form. "You just witnessed the effects of my penance stare." She explained tersely. "Retribution for killing her mother was what the dark witch feared most. Family skeletons form powerful psychological weapons. The maternal-filial bond is something that can bring great joy – or with dysfunctional witches, potentially great disaster." And with that, Alex disapparated away.