I do not own Bleach or Harry Potter the both belong respectively to Tite Kubo and J.K. Rowling
"So you think You-Know-Who is experimenting on his Death Eaters" said Hermione.
After the strange run in with the Hollowfied Death Eater, Harry met up with his friends in the Gryffindor common room; where they filled each other in, as they sat around one of the more private tables.
"It's the only thing that makes sense" said Harry.
"It has to be the Resurrection Stone" said Ginny.
"Good thing he buggered it up" said Ron.
"Still, it's troubling that he can even try something like that" said Hermione. "Do you think the Central 46, knew the Stone could do that?" she asked Harry.
"I don't know. They said their records were lost during an attack on the Seireitei. I don't see why they'd have to lie about that considering I was with two captains. But it would explain why they jumped to such harsh methods."
"Maybe we shouldn't worry about it too much for now" said Ginny. "It won't make a difference what powers the Stone has in the long run."
"Right what matters is dealing with Voldemort" Harry agreed, leaving his seat. "Anyway I better go see what Dumbledore wants."
"Just try to get back before curfew" Hermione cautioned.
"Yeah, Umbridge is gunning for you" said Ron.
"Don't worry, I'll be careful." Harry promised, as he left Gryffindor tower.
Remembering the last time, he had been in the headmaster's office, Harry made his way to the seventh floor corridor where there was a single gargoyle statue positioned against the wall.
"Pumpkin Pasties" he told the statue, and the gargoyle moved aside; the wall behind it sild apart, revealing a moving spiral stone staircase, which carried Harry up to Dumbledore's office door. Sensing only one person inside, he opened the door to find Dumbledore at his desk.
"Good evening, Harry" Dumbledore greeted, seemingly not bothered by the fact Harry didn't knock. "I hope you had an enjoyable first day back at school."
"What did you call me here for?" Harry demanded, not wanting to waste time.
Dumbledore frowned slightly at the boy's tone, missing the days that Harry used to be in awe of him. But that time has passed and he must now focus on the here and now.
"I called you here to discuss certain matters" he said, in a businesslike voice. "Judging from the state of your scar, I'm assuming you've learned everything."
"You mean: how you've been letting me walk around, with a piece of Voldemort's soul in me" Harry said bitingly. "Anything else you think I'm too young to know about? Maybe you can tell me where you're keeping Hermione's parents?"
"I assure you and Ms. Granger that they are well" said Dumbledore.
"Considering that last time you promised to protect someone's family, you'll forgive my skepticism."
Dumbledore sighed, knowing he should've expected Harry to bring up his failure with the late Ravencroft women.
"Then I suggest we get to work" said Dumbledore. "The sooner Voldemort is defeated the sooner I will return Ms. Granger's parents."
With a flick of his wand Dumbledore summoned a shallow stone basin, etched with runic markings to his desk. "This is a Pensieve. With it we shall be visiting the memories of Bob Ogden."
"Who?"
"A former employee of the DMLE. He died some time ago, but I managed to persuade him to grant me a copy of his memories."
"And what does he have to do with stopping Voldemort?" Harry asked, starting to suspect this was another one of Dumbledore's games. "If this is another one of your tests…"
"I assure you, Harry, there is a method to my madness." Dumbledore pulled a crystal vial from his pocket, containing a swirling silvery-white substance, and poured it into the basin. "Now we simply look inside."
Not feeling all that trusting, Harry gestured for the headmaster to go first, to which he complied, leaning forward into the Pensieve until his entire body entered the magical object.
Following after Dumbledore, Harry found himself standing on a dirt road somewhere in the country side, bordered by tall hedges, beneath a bright clear summer sky. In front of them stood a short, plump man wearing immensely thick glasses that reduced his eyes to mole-like specks.
Harry assumed this was Ogden; he was the only one in sight, and he was wearing the typically hilarious result of a wizard attempting to blend amongst muggles.
Before he could once again ask why they were interested in the man, Dumbledore and Harry moved to follow as Ogden took off running down the dirt road. As they passed a sign post pointing after Ogden, Harry read: Little Hangleton, 1 mile.
They followed Ogden all the way to a hill overlooking the aforementioned village, where sat inside a valley between two large steep hills. As he looked over the village, Harry had the strangest sense of déjà vu.
He didn't have time to dwell on it though as they were forced to follow Ogden down into the valley. While he assumed they were going into the village, Harry was quickly proven wrong as Ogden instead went down a curve in the road that continued on the other side of a large gap in the hedges.
Dumbledore and Harry followed him onto a narrow dirt track bordered by higher and wilder hedges than those they had left behind. The path was crooked, rocky, and potholed, showing no sign of care. Still they followed Ogden until he finally came to a stop to in front of a dilapidated old house, half-hidden amongst tangled tree trunks.
Harry half assumed the house was abandoned before remembering there was supposed to be a point to this whole episode. There just had to be something significant about the house.
So he watched patiently by Dumbledore's side as Ogden drew his wand and cautiously approached the door, only stop as a man in rags dropped down from the trees, landing in front of him.
"You're not welcome here" the man hissed, standing before them with thick hair matted with dirt. Several of his teeth were missing, and his small dark eyes stared in opposite directions.
"Um, good morning" said Ogden, taking a cautious step back. "I'm from the Ministry of Magic. I…"
"You're not welcome"
Harry shared Ogden's apparent confusion as neither of them could understand what the man was saying.
"It seems you've lost your ability to understand Parseltongue" Dumbledore observed.
"Guess so" said Harry. He wasn't going to miss it.
"Perhaps this will help" Dumbledore waved his wand, causing the world around them to shimmer only for a moment. "There that should make things easier."
The man in the rags advanced on Ogden, holding a knife in one hand, a wand in the other.
"Now, look" Ogden started, but it was too late.
There was a loud bang and next thing he knew, Ogden was on the ground, clutching his nose, while a nasty yellow goo seeped from between his fingers.
"Morfin!" a man shouted from inside the house.
Moments later an elderly man came rushing out. Shorter than the first, and oddly proportioned; his shoulders were very broad and his arms overlong, which, with his bright brown eyes, short scrubby hair, and wrinkled face, gave him the look of a powerful, aged monkey. He came to a halt beside the man with the knife, who was now cackling with laughter at the sight of Ogden on the ground.
"Ministry?" the elderly man asked, looking down at Ogden.
"Indeed!" Ogden said angrily, dabbing his face. "And you, I take it, are Mr. Gaunt?"
"That's right" said Gaunt. "Got you in the face, did he?"
"Yes, he did!" the Ministry worker snapped.
"Should've made your presence known. This is private property. Can't just walk in here and not expect my son to defend himself."
Ogden didn't appreciate the elderly man's aggressive justification of his son's actions.
"Defend himself from what?!" he demanded, getting to his feet.
"Busybodies. Intruders. Muggles and filth."
As Ogden pointed his wand at his own nose, stopping the flow of what appeared to be yellow pus, Mr. Gaunt, out of the corner of his mouth hissed at Morfin.
"Get in the house. Don't argue."
Morfin looked like he was about to argue, but quickly backed down once his father leveled him with a threatening look, leaving him to lumber away inside the house.
"It's actually your son, I'm here to see" said Ogden, as he cleaned the last of the pus of himself. "That was Morfin, wasn't it?"
"That was Morfin" the old man said indifferently. "You pureblood?"
"That's neither here nor there"
And like that Harry felt his respect for Ogden rise. Gaunt on the other hand felt differently, as he muttered in what was clearly supposed to be an offensive tone "Never seen noses like yours down in the village."
"I don't doubt it, if your son's been let loose on them," said Ogden. "Perhaps we could continue this discussion inside?"
"Inside?"
"Yes, Mr. Gaunt. I've already told you. I'm here about Morfin. We sent an owl."
"Got no use for owls" said Gaunt. "I don't open letters."
"Then you can't complain that you get no warning of visitors. I am here following a serious breach of wizarding law, which occurred here in the early hours of this morning."
"Alright, alright! Come in the bleeding house, won't do you much good!"
The house seemed to contain three tiny rooms. Two doors led off the main room, which served as kitchen and living room combined. Morfin was sitting in a filthy armchair beside the smoking fire, twisting a live adder between his thick fingers and crooning softly at it in Parseltongue.
A scuffling noise in corner of the room, alerted Harry to the presence of a girl by the window, whose ragged gray dress was the exact same color of the dirty stone wall behind her.
She was standing over a steaming pot on a grimy black stove, fiddling around with the shelf of filthy pots and pans above it. Her hair was lank and dull and she had a plain, pale, rather heavy face. Her eyes, like her brother's, stared in opposite directions. She looked a little cleaner than the two men, but Harry thought he had never seen a more defeated looking person.
"My daughter Merope" Gaunt said begrudgingly, as Ogden looked at her curiously.
"Good morning" he greeted.
She did not answer, but with a frightened glance at her father turned her back on the room and continued shifting the pots on the shelf behind her.
I wish I could help her Harry thought to himself, remembering his time with the Durselys. But it was only a memory, there was nothing he could do for the girl.
"Well, Mr. Gaunt," said Ogden, "to get straight to the point, we have reason to believe that your son, Morfin, performed magic in front of a muggle late last night."
There was a deafening clang, as Merope dropped one of the pots.
"Pick it up!" Gaunt bellowed. "That's it, grub on the floor like some filthy muggle, what's your wand for, useless sack of muck?"
Merope's cheeks burned, as she lost her grip on the pot, dropping it again. Shakily drawing her wand her pocket, she pointed it at the pot, and muttered a hasty, inaudible spell that caused the pot to shoot across the floor away from her, hit the opposite wall, and crack in two.
"Mend it you, useless lump!" Gaunt screamed, as Morfin let out a mad cackle of laughter.
Merope stumbled across the room, but before she had time to raise her wand, Ogden had lifted his own and said firmly, "Reparo" the pot mended itself instantly.
Gaunt looked for a moment as though he was going to shout at Ogden, but seemed to think better of it: Instead, he jeered at his daughter
"Lucky the nice man from the Ministry's here, isn't it? Perhaps he'll take you off my hands, perhaps he doesn't mind dirty Squibs…"
Without looking at anybody or thanking Ogden, Merope picked up the pot and returned it, hands trembling, to its shelf. She then stood quite still, her back against the wall between the filthy window and the stove, as though she wished for nothing more than to sink into the stone and vanish.
"You better have a good reason for us being here" Harry growled, struggling to control his temper at the sight of such horrific abuse.
"I assure you Harry, I take no pleasure in this either" Dumbledore replied. "But we must press onward."
"Mr. Gaunt" Ogden began again. "As I've said: the reason for my visit…"
"I heard you the first time!" Gaunt snapped. "And so what? Morfin gave a muggle what was coming to him – what of it?"
"Morfin has broken wizarding law" the Ministry worker said sternly.
"He taught a filthy muggle a lesson, that' illegal now?"
"Yes, I'm afraid it is"
Ogden unrolled a small scroll of parchment from his pocket.
"What's that, his sentence?" Gaunt demanded, his voice rising angrily.
"It is a summons to the Ministry for a hearing."
"Summons? Summons! Who do you think you are, summoning my son anywhere?"
"The Head of the Magical Law Enforcement Squad," said Ogden. \
"And you think we're scum, do you?!" screamed Gaunt, advancing on Ogden now, with a dirty yellow-nailed finger pointing at his chest. "Scum who'll come running when the Ministry calls? Do you know who you're talking to, you filthy little mudblood, do you?"
"I was under the impression that I was speaking to Mr. Gaunt."
"That's right!"
For a moment, Harry thought Gaunt was making an obscene hand gesture, but then he realized he was showing Ogden, the black-stoned ring he was wearing on his middle finger. Harry's eyes widened as he recognized the ring, as the one Voldemort wore during their graveyard battle.
"That's the Resurrection Stone" he gasped.
"Indeed it is Harry" said Dumbledore. "But I'm afraid there's still more to see."
They watched as Gaunt then made a show of pointing out the symbol engraved on the stone: A straight line running vertically through a circle, enclosed inside a triangle.
"Centuries this has been in our family. That's how far back we go, and pureblood all the way! Know how much I've been offered for this, with the Peverell coat of arms engraved on the stone?"
"I've really no idea," said Ogden, blinking as the ring sailed within an inch of his nose. "It's quite beside the point, Mr. Gaunt. Your son has committed…"
With a howl of rage, Gaunt ran toward his daughter. Harry was literally shaking with anger as he was forced to watch Gaunt drag Merope over to Ogden, by the gold chain around her neck.
"See this?!" he bellowed, shaking a heavy golden locket at Ogden, ignoring his daughter's desperate gasping for breath.
"I see it, I see it!" Ogden said hastily.
"Slythein's!" Gaunt yelled. "Salazar Slytherin's! We're his last living descendants, what do you say to that?!"
"Mr. Gaunt, your daughter!" Ogden said in alarm, but Gaunt had already released Merope; she staggered away from him, back to her corner, massaging her neck and gulping for air.
"So!" said Gaunt triumphantly, as though he had just proved a complicated point beyond all possible dispute. "Don't you go talking to us as if we're dirt on your shoes! Generations of purebloods, wizards all — more than you can say, I don't doubt!"
He then spat at Ogden's feet, eliciting more of Morfin's cackled laughter, while Merope silently bowed her head, hiding her face beneath her hair.
"Mr. Gaunt," said Ogden doggedly, "I am afraid that neither your ancestors nor mine have anything to do with the matter in hand. I am here because of Morfin, Morfin and the muggle he accosted late last night. Our information," he glanced down at his scroll of parchment, "is that Morfin performed a jinx or hex on the said muggle, causing him to erupt in highly painful hives."
Morfin giggled.
"Be quiet, boy" Gaunt snarled in Parseltongue, and Morfin fell silent again. "So what if he did?" he said defiantly to Ogden. "I expect you've wiped the muggle's filthy face clean for him, and his memory to boot."
"That's not the point, Mr. Gaunt. This was an unprovoked attack on a defenseless…"
"I had you marked as muggle lover the moment I saw you" Gaunt sneered, and spat on the floor again.
"This discussion is getting us nowhere. It is clear from your son's behavior that he feels no remorse for his actions." Ogden glanced at his scroll once more. "Morfin will attend a hearing on the fourteenth of September to answer for the charges of using magic in front of a muggle and causing harm and distress to that same mug..."
Ogden paused, as the clopping sounds of horses and loud, laughing voices came in through the open window.
"My God, what an eyesore!" a girl's voice rang out. "Couldn't your father have that hovel cleared away, Tom?"
"It's not ours," said a young man's voice. "Everything on the other side of the valley belongs to us, but that cottage belongs to an old tramp called Gaunt, and his children. The son's quite mad, you should hear some of the stories they tell in the village"
The girl laughed. The clopping noise grew louder and louder. Morfin made to get out of his armchair.
"Sit down" his father hissed.
"Tom" came the girl's voice again, sounding so though they were now beside the house. "I might be wrong but has somebody nailed a snake to that door?"
"Good lord, you're right!" Tom's voice cried out. "That'll be the son, I told you he's not right in the head. Don't look at it, Cecilia, darling."
The sound of horses grew fainter as they left the house behind.
"'Darling'" Morfin whispered in Parseltongue, looking at his sister. "'Darling,' he called her. So he wouldn't have you anyway."
The blood drained from Merope's face so fast Harry was sure she was going to faint.
"What's that?" Gaunt hissed sharply, looking from his son to his daughter. "What did you say, Morfin?"
"She likes looking at that muggle" said Morfin, a vicious expression on his face as he stared at his sister, who now looked terrified. "Always in the garden when he passes, peering through the hedge at him, isn't she? And last night" Merope shook her head frantically, imploringly, but Morfin went on ruthlessly. "She was hanging out the window, waiting for him."
"Hanging out of the window to look at a muggle?" said Gaunt quietly.
All three of the Gaunts seemed to have forgotten Ogden, who was looking both bewildered and irritated at this renewed outbreak of incomprehensible hissing and rasping.
"Is it true?" Gaunt hissed, stalking toward the terrified girl. "My daughter — pureblooded descendant of Salazar Slytherin — hankering after a filthy, dirt veined Muggle?"
Merope shook her head frantically, pressing herself into the wall, apparently unable to speak.
"But I got him, Father!" Morfin cackled. "I got him as he went by. Didn't look so pretty with hives all over him, did he, Merope?"
"You disgusting little Squib. You blood traitor!" Gaunt roared, dropping out of Parseltongue, as he closed his hands around his daughter's throat.
"No!" Harry and Ogden cried.
Forgetting it was in fact a memory, Harry rushed forward, intending to pull Gaunt off the poor girl, only to pass right through the man.
At the same time Ogden raised his wand and cried out: "Relashio!"
Gaunt was knocked away from his daughter; sent tripping over a chair before falling flat on his back.
Enraged by the attack on his father – never mind that he saved his sister's life – Morfin leapt out of his chair and charged Ogden, brandishing his bloody knife and firing hexes indiscriminately from his wand.
Ogden had no choice but to run for his life. Dumbledore indicated that they ought to follow and Harry obeyed, Merope's screams echoing in his ears.
They watched Ogden dashed up the path and onto the main road, where he collided with a glossy chestnut horse ridden by a very handsome, dark-haired young man. Both he and the pretty girl riding beside him on a gray horse roared with laughter at the sight of Ogden, who bounced off the horse's flank and set off again.
"I think that will do, Harry," said Dumbledore. He took Harry by the elbow and tugged. Next moment, they were both soaring weightlessly through darkness.
When the darkness cleared away, Harry found himself back in Dumbledore's office, standing next to the Pensieve.
"What happened to Merope?" Harry asked.
"Oh, she survived" said Dumbledore, reseating himself behind his desk, inviting Harry to take a seat. "Ogden returned with reinforcements. Morfin and his father attempted to fight but both were overpowered and subsequently convicted. Morfin, who already had a record of muggle attacks, was sentenced to three years in Azkaban. Marvolo, for injuring several Ministry employees in addition to Ogden, received six months."
"Marvolo? As in Tom Marvolo Riddle?"
"As sharp as ever Harry. Yes, that man was Voldemort's grandfather. Marvolo, his son, Morfin, and his daughter, Merope, were the last of the Gaunts. A very ancient wizarding family noted for a vein of instability and violence that flourished through the generations due to their habit of marrying their own cousins. Lack of sense coupled with a great liking for grandeur meant that the family gold was squandered several generations before Marvolo was born. He, as you saw, was left in squalor and poverty, with a very nasty temper, a fantastic amount of arrogance and pride, and a couple of family heirlooms that he treasured just as much as his son, and rather more than his daughter."
"So, I'm guessing Merope is Voldemort's mother."
"Indeed. And is so happens that we also caught a glimpse of Voldemort's father as well."
"Tom. The man on the horse."
"Yes, that was Tom Riddle senior, the handsome muggle who used to go riding past the Gaunt cottage and for whom Merope Gaunt cherished a secret, burning passion."
"And they ended up married?" Harry found it hard to believe. Considering how smug Tom Riddle senior appeared to be, it seemed unlikely he would even glance twice at Merope.
"I think you're forgetting, that Merope was a witch. I believe that her magical powers were stunted by her father's abuse. Once Marvolo and Morfin were safely in Azkaban, once she was alone and free for the first time in her life, I am sure, she was able to gain full rein of her abilities and plot her escape from the desperate life she had led for eighteen years."
"So she bewitched him." The idea that someone could just spell someone into loving them, made Harry feel sick. At least he had Nakatsukasa to help keep his mind clear, most don't have that kind of protection.
"I'm sure it seemed more romantic to her. In any case, within a few months of the scene we have just witnessed, the village of Little Hangleton enjoyed a tremendous scandal. Imagine the squire's son running off with the tramp's daughter.
But the villagers' shock was nothing compared to Marvolo's.
He returned from Azkaban, expecting to find his daughter dutifully awaiting his return with a hot meal. Instead, he found a clear inch of dust and a note, explaining what she had done.
"From all that I have been able to discover, he never mentioned her name or existence from that day forth. The shock of her desertion may have contributed to his early death or perhaps he had simply never learned to feed himself. Regardless Azkaban had greatly weakened Marvolo, and he did not live to see Morfin return to the cottage."
"Wait he died?" that got Harry's attention. He knew for a fact that the Resurrection Stone's powers weren't limited by the owner's physical state. After all he'd seen it restore Voldemort's body after the Dark Lord had been reduced to ashes.
"I don't believe Marvolo had any idea what it was he held – let alone how to actually make use of the Stone's power."
Harry had to admit it made sense. If Marvolo was anything like his grandson – which seemed to be the case – he wouldn't have hesitated to sacrifice innocent souls for his own benefit.
"The ring was then passed on to his son, Morfin" Dumbledore continued. "Who also failed to unlock the powers of the Stone."
"But Voldemort was brought up in an orphanage, right?" Harry asked, remembering his run in with the Horcrux diary. "So I'm guessing Merope's spell on Tom Riddle senior didn't keep."
"I admit this is a great deal of guess work. But I believe that Merope, who was so deeply in love with Tom, eventually found she could no longer enslave him by magical means. Perhaps, she had convinced herself that he would have fallen in love with her in return. Perhaps, she thought he'd stay for the sake of their unborn child's sake. If so, she wrong on both counts. He left her, never saw her again, and never bothered to learn what had become of his son."
"Ok, so we learned Voldemort had a messed up family. You said Morfin never learned about the Stone's power, so at some point Voldemort found out about his uncle and took the ring for himself. So what does any of this have to do with stopping Voldemort?"
"I believe there is a muggle saying, Harry: 'Know thy enemy.' It is my belief that by tracing Voldemort's history, we can uncover the identities and perhaps even the locations of his Horcruxes."