A/N: I'm going to keep this author's note short and sweet, because frankly updates have been so few and far between that I'm pretty sure everyone just wants to get on and read the chapter lol! All I can do is apologise. Those who know me personally know that I've been going through a tough time lately. A lot of things have happened in the past few months, including my dear bookshop closing. I began writing Twin Vice in that shop and it was without a doubt the main inspiration for the story, the heart and soul of my town, and a very dear friend.
So many apologies for the less than frequent updates, but thank you so much for sticking by it. I can't even tell you how much that means to me. So thank you, and MERRY CHRISTMAS!!
Brood of hell, you're not a mortal!
Shall the entire house go under?
-The Sorcerer's Apprentice
Twin Vice Paranormal Detectives
Casebook Closed: Gluttony
oOo
Running. Nox hated running. Why some people did it for pleasure was beyond her. Still, running for your life spurred you on a bit. The tunnel behind them was getting smaller, as if it were shrinking with each impossibly long stride the Plague Doctor took. Even from this distance she could hear the rattling breath through the creature's beak-like mask, like something very old and very slow. A stitch stabbed her right side like a knife.
"What is he?" she panted.
"More a matter of it than he," Merlin replied, cackling. To her amazement he seemed to be enjoying fleeing for his life. There was a definite skip in his cat-like step. "I told you. The Plague Doctor is neither man, wizard, nor Muggle;" he continued, "neither alive nor dead. He is a monster; a memory of the Plague sealed long ago inside these walls."
"Yes," she snapped, "but how did it become like this?"
"Mind your manners and keep your patience," Merlin hissed through a slit in his sharp teeth. "That room back there was a nasty place of unnatural experiments on human flesh – a doctor's bid to rid the world of the Black Death that turned his skin and soul into something much more terrible. That kind of sin leaves a footprint on this world."
"Is it a Vengeful?"
Merlin nodded. "Oh aye, more or less so. Vengefuls are born out of strong human emotion: sadness, rage, fear, vengeance. The stronger the emotion, the more powerful the Vengeful becomes."
The Angel trembled beneath their feet.
"But I've never met a Vengeful this strong before," she admitted. "It's like it has the whole building under control!"
Merlin casually picked at his tombstone teeth, only vaguely watching the path in front of him as they sped down it. "Hmm, and why might you think that is?" he asked.
Nox did not answer. She had suspected from the beginning that a shard was playing a role in the haunting of the Angel Hotel. There was always a feeling of emptiness whenever a shard was around; cold and emptiness, and forgetting.
"I do hope you understand now that this Vengeful is unhindered by attempts to seal it by its name, birth and death date alone," Merlin chatted offhandedly. "It has attached itself to one of your shards and therefore without the Vengeful's Form, Truth and Regret you cannot destroy it."
Nox blinked. "What do you mean by form, truth and regret?"
"Form is an object's true state. Truth is the state of the object; how it came to be. Regret is the state of the soul." Merlin's eyes gleamed. "In order to extract a shard from a person's heart, you must first learn the truth – their sin – and their regret. Isn't that correct?"
Nox nodded, numbly, her mind thumbing through her previous cases. But there was still a glaring problem. Her previous subjects had been, for all intents and purposes, alive. The Plague Doctor on the other hand had been dead for centuries. She could feel the chill of the gloved hand that offered death reaching out behind them. Shrinking from it, she choked back her fear and willed her body to move faster through the pitch dark tunnels.
A thought struck her. "Why has this Plague Doctor never appeared before now?" she asked.
"Oh, he has." Merlin's eyes twinkled in the gloom. "The Ministry sealed him up, but the shard released him. That, little Knight, is what's given him renewed strength. And now…"
"It consumes all in its' path," she finished. "Gluttony…"
Merlin nodded his wolfish head and grinned, his beady golden eyes flashing. "The Form is found!"
Nox could not smile. "But how can I find out its truth and regret? It's not like I can bleeding well interview him!"
"Keh!" Merlin spat acidly. "Given up already have you? You're a detective aren't you, or have I been misinformed?" His ugly tombstone grin grew wider. "To find the Truth, you must first discover the Plague Doctor's true Form."
"And the regret?"
He looked at her slyly through twisted tendrils of scraggly hair and said with a blinding smile "To gain a Vengeful's Regret you must uncover its' True Name and have it speak it out loud."
"But how? It's a monster."
"Have a little pity. Even the most evil-seeming are rarely that." said Merlin in a whisper that might have been just for himself.
Then, like a great cat, the tramp leapt off the path and slipped between the cracks in the tunnel walls, his black and white doom padding loyally at his heels. His voice was so faint, Nox wondered if she was imagining it, which led her to wonder whether she had imagined Merlin and his dog altogether. Unfortunately the cold shred of logic she had managed to cling onto as a paranormal detective insisted that her eyes had not lied. Her eyes never lied.
With an alarmed jolt she realised her pace had slowed due to Merlin's distraction and there behind her, not a few yards away, was the Plague Doctor. Its breath rattled through the sickle-like beak. He was not running. Nox realised with horror that he did not need to run in order to catch her. Death walked like the Plague Doctor, a steady and inexorable walk that seemed to take forever while moving astonishingly fast.
She turned and fled.
oOo
For the first time in his after-life, Fred knew what it meant to be dead. It was more than a coffin and a hole in the ground. It was more than having no reflection, no substance. It was more than having a conked-out heart.
He cast the Angel Hotel a swift glance as he drifted past. The bank situated in the lower floors looked closed for the remainder of the afternoon. The windows were darkened and the entrance was shut. A crowd of agitated Muggles were gathering at the doors, waving their bankbooks and angrily chapping on the black windows. Fred peered closer. A foot long red cross had been painted on the main door; dark, wet and glistening in the milky afternoon light. With a shrug, he carried on through increasingly anxious crowds of Muggles until he reached the rusted gates of Weasley Manor and drifted through. The path through the tangled garden of weeds and headless rose stems was sparkling with frost and melting snow.
Being dead meant the whole world moved on and past and through you like you weren't there, even though you were, just like his mother's gaze had the first time he re-entered The Burrow after he'd been buried. Being dead was the way Angelina never fully looked him in the eye when he was telling a joke and the deep lines on George's face. It was owning no future, no present, only a past. And once that was gone or forgotten he truly would be a ghost, because all ghosts forget. Eventually.
He drifted through the large oak door of Weasley Manor and into the main hall. He stood for a while in the centre of the room and stared at the chequered marble slabs until the rigid pattern began to play tricks on his eyes.
The bad smell was worse now. There was blood mixed with thyme, sharp and tangy, like iron in his mouth. It was sour too; rotting vegetation mixed with old wine. And if he'd been listening, he would have heard the small voices through the wall close to the Angel. But Fred was feeling too sullen and bitter to acknowledge any of it, because now he knew, now he understood with a certainty that frightened him something that George had known all along. Life was for the living, not for the dead.
He walked slowly up the stairs, not bothering to avoid that step, the one that dropped straight down into Peru, floating briefly over it and continuing up and up until he reached the first floor, and stopped.
He could hear music.
It was music unlike any he had ever heard. Most tunes he was familiar with began with a beginning. They would swell, twist, wind up into a fantastic crescendo, then stop suddenly or trail into a gentle whisper. This music was nothing like that. It was the prelude to an end at the edge of perception; the overture of the graveyard. If haunted mirrors and barrows and black cats could sing in wonky harmony and have the tune distilled through a dusty violin of silver strings, the lyrics written by the fingers of a dead court jester with a wicked sense of humour, this is what it would sound like. And it was coming from the rooftop.
The second floor of Weasley Manor was largely unexplored owing to the very basic fact that Fred and George had not even explored the entirety of the Halls of Fortitude. Their house appeared to have no respect for the logic of time and space. If it had had a face, it would have sneered at Newton and called Einstein something very unflattering. Fred did, however, know where the roof was and that was generally up. Exploring had lost its intrigue in the past few years. After all, being able to float through walls kind of did away with the mystery and the fun of procuring a big rusty key from a hidden drawer to unlock that strange door at the end of the hall.
If he had been alive, he would have walked along the balcony landing that overlooked the main entrance. Then he would have walked through the passage to his right and up a flight of rickety wooden ladders into the attic and out of the skylight and onto the rooftop. But he was not alive, Fred thought very bitterly. So he drifted through the air, thin and wispy, like a dandelion head caught in the breeze, and up through the great glass panelled dome.
Jack Frost was crouched on the rooftop, singing like the mad court jester, playing his fiddle and tapping his foot to the manic rhythm.
Emperor, your crown won't help you! The hour is bitter, like the grave Dance Macabre, Da-
Peasant, child, the same hand dealt you
I've come to take you by the hand
Over river deep to distant land
Mother, daughter, priest and slave
Sweeping gentle, in a trance
Come and join La Morte Danse.
Jack Frost stopped singing. His head turned shortly towards Fred, the angle not quite right. He was like a bird, Fred thought – a scabby London sparrow. He wasn't surprised to see him here. Like Weasley Manor, the elf didn't appear to have any respect for time or space, slipping between dream worlds and reality like walking from one class to another. Jack's small bright eyes looked him up and down. A grin spread itself across his pointed face like butter, the points of his icicle teeth showing over dark blue lips.
"Well don't-choo look like a barrel o' sunshine," he commented sarcastically.
Drearily, Fred took a seat beside him on the icy rooftop. Jack plucked at the strings of his instrument. They sat in silence, neither enjoying the others' company.
"I'm dead, by the way," said Fred at length. He was scowling at the rooftops across the road. "Conked out. Done and dusted. Popped my clogs, had my lot and shuffled off my mortal coil."
"Very poetic of yeh."
"Cheers."
"Kind've caught my attention, mind. You being see-through an' all," said Jack dryly, putting away his fiddle. "That why yer lookin' like yeh crawled out of the wrong side of someone else's grave?" He snorted disdainfully. "And here ah thought you might be some fun. But yer just like all the rest. Once the dead realise their proper dead, like, they lose themselves. Memories are the first thing t' go. Names is the last. But yeh'll be around a long time before that happens."
When Fred didn't respond, Jack shrugged and said, "Suit yerself." Carefully, he plucked a wriggling beetle from the innards of his moth-eaten suit jacket. He let it crawl in and out of his disjointed fingers, watching it with the lazy interest of a cat. Then he popped it into his mouth and crunched noisily.
Fred folded his arms across his knees. He unfolded them. He clenched his fists. The solemn expression looked alien on the normally jovial terrain of his face.
Then he asked darkly, "Do you remember your real name?"
"Jack's my name," the elf replied nonchalantly, picking a spider out of his nose and happily squishing it between his thumb and forefinger.
Fred wasn't sure what kind of answer he'd expected to get. He wasn't sure if the elf ever remembered a time when he had been Helga Hufflepuff's brother. Whatever Gudrun had done to him, he was not Puck, not anymore. But still…Jack was solid. Jack was real, much more real than a ghost. Fred had to know how, even if Jack was completely off his head, he just had to know that there was a chance at the impossible.
"There is, y'know."
Fred turned. Jack was grinning at him like a skull. His beady eyes swivelled madly and he leaned close in a conspiratorial whisper.
"Lots of ways. Lots 'n lots of ways to return to the living and all of 'em bad. Each one worse than the last," said Jack conversationally. "It's gotta be bad if Death doesn't want you. The Well at the World's End? That'll bring you back. But only after drownin' a bunch of virgins or a group of wide, watery-eyed orphans. Then there's the Philosopher's Stone, but yeh need a breath of life in yeh in the first place for it to do any good. Besides, I heard it was done off with." He paused thoughtfully, tapping his chin. "Course, there's always that one…"
There was something guileless in Jack Frost's smile. Fred recognised it as the look of a merchant about to sell him a leaky cauldron.
"The Resurrection Stone of the Deathly Hallows." The elf leered. "Plucked from the World Tree by Death himself! Oh yeah…that'd do it. That'd bring yeh back, whether yeh want to return or not."
Fred stared at Jack as the elf cackled and crackled carelessly. He thought of the childhood dreams Ditchwater Nam had sealed him inside when she had captured him alongside George and Nox on Scrum. He knew now that those were no mere dreams, but fragments of the past: Jack's past. Hufflepuff's past. Gudrun past. Salazar Slytherin's.
Fred remembered the blizzard as if it were his own memory, remembered Puck kneeling by the body of his friend, the tall figure of Gudrun towering over them both. Fred remembered how the icy chill of the storm cut his throat like shards of glass, remembered how the Snow Witch's long white fingers waggled and caressed the air; how those same fingers reached into Puck's chest and pulled out boy's heart as though plucking an apple from a tree.
'Taking the heart of your friend is a harsh crime in this world… as harsh as the frost….'
Fred hated the idea of fate or destiny. He had never really bought the load of toff about Harry's 'Prophecy', but he knew the dreams of his childhood were linked to his present. He studied Jack's face closely.
"And what about you?" asked Fred darkly. "What did you do to wind up like this? Bump someone off for a Resurrection Stone? Nick some old lady's purse for eternal life?" He could not keep the bitterness out of his tone. "You were human once."
Jack turned sharply, looking murderous. He no longer looked like the supercilious jester. Just because something is funny or peculiar, or just a little off-beat, does not mean it isn't dangerous. The maniac light in his eye turned dead cold. He glared violently and when he spoke his voice was neither Jack's nor Puck's, but somewhere strangled in between.
"Nothing you'd ever be willing to do."
Fred nodded and looked Jack gravely in the eye. "I really hope not."
Jack sniffed. Then he rose and stretched theatrically. His long disjointed arms dangled at his sides, as though the threads that bound him together were starting to fray. "I'm late," he said. "Late for a very important date." He smiled nastily, showing many teeth. "A bit like you."
There was a shiver in the world and a dust of ice crystals, and Jack Frost disappeared leaving Fred alone on the rooftop, watching the world moving below him. The crowd outside the Angel Hotel was steadily growing.
oOo
Something was going on, Bill Weasley was sure of it. It wasn't just the commotion outside Gringotts Bank that had alerted him. It was there in the wind or in the corner of his eye, but every time he turned his scarred head to catch it, whatever had been lurking vanished into shadow and slipped out of reach. It would always return. Late during the long nights, while the soft sigh of Victoire's breathing and the smell of Fleur's damp hair on the pillow filled the bedroom, he could hear the fox and the hare cry, The Wolves are running! And in his blood he knew it too.
There had been whisperings lately; rumours flitting amongst members of the Ministry, passing from shopper to merchant along Diagon Alley. It was always with an air of macabre humour. People joked nervously that the Death Eaters had risen again. Others laughed that someone had forgotten to tell winter to bog off and make room for spring. The older few said the Fey Folk were coming out of the hills, and that made Bill shiver uncomfortably. Nobody ever understood that what they couldn't see may still be about to occur.
Ignoring the indignant shouts of his Goblin employees, Bill marched outside. People were crowded along Diagon Alley chattering excitedly. He recognised Katie Bell, one of the twins' close friends, squeezing through the crowds. Bill raised her hand to catch her attention. Katie smiled and made one last ditch effort to inch past two very stout wizards engrossed in conversation.
"Hello, Bill. It's been a while," said Katie, then jabbed her thumb at the bustling crowds behind her. "This lot have gone bonkers today."
"Do you know why?" asked Bill, his eyes skimming the crowd with a small frown.
"Yeah," she said. "Well, sort of. There's something going on along Pentonville Road. Think it might be a Poltergeist or some disturbance. Apparently it's attracted some Muggles' attention." She looked sympathetic. "I feel sorry for your dad. Don't think it will be very pleasant for him at work today- hey! Where are you going?"
"Thanks, sorry," Bill muttered hurriedly, ignoring Katie who was wearing an expression of confusion and concern, and strode off through the crowd towards his brothers' shop.
As the eldest of the Weasley siblings, Bill had developed a finely tuned instinct when it came to his twin brothers. He had had his suspicions for months that Fred and George had something to do with the strange goings on lately. Now he hoped to Godric he was wrong.
oOo
"Thought I was the great nit doing all the moping today," Lee commented lightly. The remark went unacknowledged of course. George was pretending to be hard at work fixing a cauldron that had grown so tired of Teddy Lupin harassing it that it had gotten to its feet and stormed out of the shop in a strop.
Lee grunted. "Thrilling conversationalist you are."
George leaned back on his haunches and shot him a swift smile. "Sorry. Nightmare galloping cauldrons are. Good for writing incriminating evidence on and watching them scarper, mind you," he laughed, but as he turned away, Lee caught the dark shadow falling across his friend's face.
Lee hesitated, then said tentatively, "You alright man? Seriously?"
George began nodding brightly, then stopped. His shoulders drooped and he sighed tiredly. "Have you ever looked at your face so long in the mirror that you become a stranger?"
Lee blinked, unsure of how to answer or if indeed George wanted an answer at all. But that was George for you. He never asked for help or advice, though he gave it freely to anyone who needed it, along with an exploding pair of pants and a punching telescope.
Without a word, Lee put his hand on his friend's shoulder, feeling for a moment the shared grief that always lingered, threatening to press on their lungs and heart like a cold brass weight. Whatever Fred was, despite having him around to talk and laugh and jeer with them just like the old days, nothing could disguise the fact that his remains were mouldering deep and lonely in the ground. And one day he and George would leave him lonelier still.
George looked up, the corners of his mouth lifting in an almost-smile. "Sod it. Let's close up for today. Nearly five o'clock anyway. How about we grab Fred and head to the Leaky for a pint?"
Lee smiled. "Sounds good to-"
Just then, the clown head above the door burst into peels of wicked laughter as Bill burst into the shop. They knew by the expression on his face that something was deeply wrong; steely, grave, an almost animalistic attentiveness – the way Bill had looked before the Battle of Hogwarts.
George's stomach lurched. He knew what his brother was going to say before he said it.
"Something's happened along Pentonville Road." Bill looked directly at George with sympathetic eyes. "I don't know where exactly-"
But George was already up and running across the shop floor, and with a violent twist and a resounding crack that caused several jars of jellied eels to shatter, he vanished out of sight.
oOo
She could more than see the Plague Doctor now. Every one of her five senses was attuned to his close proximity, his steady gait through the tunnels, moving like a shadow towards her. She climbed higher, tearing up stone steps that crumbled dangerously beneath her feet and Nox suddenly wanted nothing more than to see sunlight again, to see a familiar face. She thought of Fred, his big daft grin egging her on, and her legs pumped harder, giving her the final boost of energy she needed to leap the last few stairs.
The Angel Hotel felt full of the Plague Doctor's presence; the sour smelling darkness covering the building like living, writhing velvet. Nox could not stop herself then – she had to know how close he was, had to see him with her own eyes.
And in the instant that she glanced behind, her eyes frantically searching the dark, her foot caught the lip of the final step. Down she tumbled, cracking her chin painfully on the stone and biting down hard on her tongue. Blood filled her mouth as she scrambled to her feet. Then the she saw it out of the corner of her eye; a hand, scabbed and ancient, darting out of the darkness like a snake and grabbing at her throat.
There was an explosion and the world turned briefly to chaos. The door at the top of the steps flew off its hinges and a strangely familiar voice shouted out a spell that caused white/gold light to spill into the gloom. The scabbed hand shrank away and Nox, who had not stopped running, went flying into Luna Lovegood, sending them both sprawling gracelessly to the floor.
"Luna!" Nox gasped, the breath tearing her lungs. The fall had winded them both. She scrambled clumsily to her knees, pulling the young witch up with her. "What on earth are you doing here?!"
"Hello, Nox. Colloportus!" she said casually, waving her wand at the door they had just tumbled through. It locked with a click. "I thought you could use some help. I don't think my spell will stop it from getting through, but it might give us time to escape. I do hope so. It didn't look very happy."
"We'd better not stick around to find out," Nox said weakly, hastily wiping the sweat and grime from her face. "Come on, let's get moving. We have to find Percy quickly. If that thing isn't chasing us now, it'll be chasing someone else."
oOo
George Apparated in the snowy lane that ran between Weasley Manor and the Angel Hotel. The Angel somehow did not look like the bright and friendly neighbour it normally did in comparison to the disorderly gothic architecture of his own home. It looked rotten and neglected. If buildings could get sick, he thought, the Angel was at Death's door.
Still spinning from his hasty commute, George ran towards the back entrance, firing a spell at the locked door without a moment's hesitation. A red spark from his wand zipped across the Angel's back courtyard and struck the door with a spitting hiss. For a moment he thought it had worked and charged towards it. Then, there was a ripple in the air and an invisible blow sent George reeling backwards.
"OW- bugger!"
"George?"
"Fred?"
"No, it's Dumbledore," Fred said sarcastically, hovering palely above him. "Course it's me. Nice landing. Meant to do that of course?" He grinned.
"Of course," replied George, nodding solemnly. "A Weasley always lands on his arse."
Fred's eyes turned upwards to the Angel looming above them and his expression changed. "I thought you'd come. Something's up with this place alright. Percy and Nox haven't come out in hours, and there's a whole crowd of Muggles round the front. Few witches and wizards too, mind."
"Well I can't get inside this way," said George, getting to his feet restlessly. "Let's try round the front." They ran back towards the main entrance to the building, only to collide with a throng of angry Muggles who were demanding entrance into the bank. This door, like the back entrance, appeared to be magically sealed. George moaned. "I knew it had to be a tough Vengeful or some great tentacled face-sucking pillock. Why did we bleeding well let them go in by themselves?!"
"Just because the building has suddenly shut itself up, locking our brother and nosey Muggle inside, doesn't automatically mean there's anything wrong," said Fred, with an unconcerned wave of his hand. "When we hear Percy's spine-chilling, blood-curdling, girlish, freeze-the-marrow-in-your-bones scream, then we can panic. But only a little."
George looked at his twin doubtfully, then he ran a hand through his dishevelled hair so that it stuck up at crazy angles. "I told Luna that Nox was working here. She's in there too. I've gotten her mixed up in all of this ." He sighed. "I promised myself I wouldn't do that again."
Fred frowned. "I don't think you could stop Loony if you wanted to, mate. And anyway, this is Percy, Luna and Nox we're on about," he teased. "Honestly, I feel sorry for the Vengeful."
"We don't know what's in there, Fred," snapped George. "How are you so flipping calm all of a sudden?"
"Maybe 'cause I have a bit more faith in their abilities," Fred replied coolly. "And you might want to shout a little louder if you want your gathering crowd to demand an encore. Don't hold back. Still a few people in Peckham didn't hear you."
George ignored him, fishing the wand out from his sleeve. "I knew I should have gone with them. 'Scuse me, sorry, out of the way," he muttered distractedly, pushing further into the crowd.
"Guess it's true what they say about a positive attitude," Fred muttered to himself. "Might not solve your problems, but it will piss people off enough to make it worth the effort."
The twins reached the large tinted glass window of the bank and tried to peer inside, but before they could glimpse anything substantial an enormous barrel-chested figure blocked their view.
"Mr Weasley. I knew you and your sort would be sniffing around here at some point." Argos Thickley glared down at him under his one bushy eyebrow. "You crackpots deal in the grave more than a morgue keeper."
George ignored him. "Out of the way Thickley, you great poxy prat," he said, pushing passed him and roughly bumping shoulders with a second familiar figure who was also anxiously peering inside the bank. George groaned mentally. This was the last person he needed to meet.
"Mr Weasley!" squawked Rolf.
"George," said George flatly.
There was an awkward silence between them, primarily made awkward by the fact that George could not meet the other wizard's face for fear that if he did he'd have to rearrange it. Fred, who had been enjoying haunting a very bewildered and disgruntled looking Thickley, floated palely between them, his eyes flicking from one to the other.
"Friend of yours then," said Fred with a smirk.
"This is Rolf Scamander," said George, coolly. "Grandson of Newt Scamander, the Magizoologist."
"Hello!" said Rolf, smiling brightly. "Lovely to meet you at last, Fred."
"He's off his nut," George added.
"Pardon?"
"He said you have a nice butt," Fred clarified pleasantly.
"Oh. Quite!" Rolf turned back to face George, his face turning anxious. "A friend from your shop told me my dear Luna may be in some sort of difficulty. Have you seen her? Is she inside this building? I have tried to reason with the lovely Muggle chap over there, says he's an obeseman-"
"A policeman," Fred corrected, while George rolled his eyes skyward.
"Yes, indeed, but he says the building is closed due to an electrical fault." Rolf glanced up uneasily at the looming, growing snow clouds. The sky looked like it was about to fall on them. "Luna means the world to me. She's more precious to me than the Galumphing Gillimander. I do hope she hasn't been… mixed up in anything too dangerous."
George shifted his gaze to the ground, apprehending Rolf's unspoken accusation. He looked around at Fred, who clapped an icy hand on his shoulder and muttered in his ear.
"Happy Valentines, mate."
oOo
Nox hadn't spared a moment, having taken Luna by the hand and running like buggery, hurtling along the corridors of the Angel Hotel and up two more flights of stairs before she felt safe enough to slow their pace down. There had to be better jobs out there, she thought irritably; jobs where the customers didn't have a personal grudge against your life.
"It was very brave of you trying to fight a monster like that," Luna said musingly, "a bit like bees chasing away dragons."
Nox gave a guilty laugh. "I really hate to spoil your heroic image of me, Luna, but you actually caught me in the process of scarpering for my life." She took a deep breath, then attempted to give Luna a stern no-nonsense look. "Listen, Luna, you can't let that thing touch you. It's a Plague Doctor. Or it used to be…"
"A Plague Doctor?" Luna repeated, with a tilt of her head.
"Doctors who visited neighbourhoods in order to tell whether or not those who lived there were afflicted with the Black Death," Nox explained. "The beaks they wear were stuffed with herbs to stop them breathing in the disease. They were called heroes, men who put their lives at risk." She swallowed. Her throat felt sickly dry. "But, this one… When he was alive, I think he carried out experiments on the tenants who stayed in the Angel Hotel."
"Oh," said Luna, her tone soft and sad. "I thought there were a lot of Muggle spirits here. The air feels heavier when there are Vengefuls around. Like dark clouds before the rain."
Nox nodded silently. Images of the horror in the room she had witnessed trickled into her mind: the vague outline of something roughly the size and shape of several bodies stacked neatly along the shelves; the old bones jutting out of the furnace…
"There are voices," Nox continued. "They come every now and again. And writing on the walls and a song-"
"I heard a song when I entered the building," Luna said, then began to recite dreamily, "'Be bold, be bold, but not too bold. You can run for your life, but the gates will hold'. It's an old Plague song like 'Ring Around the Roses'. It was written when King Charles II closed the gates of London to stop people infected with the Black Death from getting out. Your hand is quite sweaty by the way. Did you know that?"
"Sorry," Nox muttered and tried wiping her slippery palm on her trousers.
Luna smiled kindly. "I don't mind."
As they walked Nox told Luna about the assignment she and Percy had been set and how they had been split up before the Plague Doctor had chased her down into the bowels of the old building, and through the labyrinth of Salazar's tunnels. Nox wasn't sure how she was going to explain to anyone about Merlin and his dog, or the horrible room he had showed her, but Luna merely nodded sympathetically, taking in each word she said and storing it away behind her round, moon-like eyes.
Aidan's blood was still on her boots, she realised, and Nox had no doubt what had happened to the other people who had disappeared within the Angel. It all made sense now: the wet red cross she and Percy had encountered at the bank's main entrance, identical to the cross that officials had once painted on infected houses during the old Plague Year. The vengeful of the woman she had seen yesterday committing suicide from the fifth floor of the hotel was very likely one of the poor tenants whom the Plague Doctor had experimented on. Death had been her only escape. Now her spirit, like many others, was tied to the Plague Doctor.
Nox set her jaw in a grim line and tried to quell the nauseous feeling building in her stomach. Anger swelled inside her like a boil and threatened to erupt into panic that would expand into every nerve, every cell. This building was haunted to the core by bad blood and steeped in the spirit of the Black Death. How on earth could she defeat something that was torment and suffering itself, bound in the image and memory of a Plague Doctor?
She needed Fred and George. Wild and unpredictable, yes; impossible, definitely, but always eternally, unfailing, solidly dependable. And this was too much, way too much for her brain to unscramble alone.
"I wish you hadn't come here, Luna," she said. "It's too dangerous."
"Oh, it's not too awful. At least you know it is a Vengeful," said Luna serenely. "There are lots of them around in all shapes and forms, though very few people can see them. There was a famous case of one in Highgate Cemetery once. They exist as a physical extension of an evil intention like most Dark Creatures do. There is a theory that if you call out its True Name you can control it."
Nox fought back a moan. "So I've heard."
"Of course," Luna continued in a faraway tone, twirling a strand of hair around the tip of her wand, "if you give it any ordinary name it will act much the same way a Boggart does if it's named."
"Which is?"
"It becomes uncontrollable and devours everything in sight," she replied simply.
Nox deflated like a bagpipe. "I was worried you'd say that."
She led them along the first floor corridor where the majority of the bank's business offices were situated, gingerly peering through doorways. She had expected to find clerks or some sign that business was still running as per usual, but the first-floor was utterly abandoned. Perhaps Angus Postlethwaite had decided to close for the afternoon, though judging by his character, Nox did not think this scenario was likely.
A ghostly wind came whooshing down the corridors, banging doors against walls and whipping up anything that wasn't attached to the floor. Roots were slowly snaking out of the ceiling, winding and pushing their way through brick and plaster and an acrid tang like sour vinegar filled their nostrils. The floorboards beneath their feet began to tremble violently. Nox tried to ignore her shaking knees as they picked up their pace in order to keep their balance. There was no more filtered brown daylight seeping in through the grimy windows and when the power suddenly cut, causing the electric lights overhead to fizzle out, they found themselves stumbling uneasily across a moving floor.
Nox was almost glad they were in darkness, because she was sure she could hear the scratchy letters writing themselves along the walls beside them and in the gaps between the floorboards below, half embedded in soil, she glimpsed the half rotten bodies of rats.
Nox gripped Luna's hand tightly. "We're going to get out of this," she told her stubbornly, as much to comfort herself as Luna.
"Okay."
Nox faltered in the dark. "You don't have to be so trusting."
"It's much easier to simply believe than to sit around all day with your head in a cauldron wondering whether or not you should," Luna said brightly. "It saves much more time too, don't you think? But I should tell you that there are no more ways left in or out of this building. I tried Apparating inside, but the Angel seems to have shut itself all up like a clam."
"You – what?" Nox spluttered, her voice halting. "But you got in."
"Hmm. Yes. I suppose I did," she replied, as though this thought had only just occurred to her. "There's always a door. Viktor used to say that. I see things nobody else bothers to look for." Her penetrating gaze settled on Nox. "You do, too. You see things that nobody else wants to see."
Nox gave a tight little laugh. "Whether I like it or not."
"I suppose people must think you're a bit odd, too."
There was a sad note in Luna's voice that caught Nox off guard. "You're not odd, Luna. You're different. And thank blazes for that," she said and gave a shrug that indicated that, although she was fairly fond of Fred, prankery and undeadlieness aside, she wasn't quite ready to join him in pushing up daisies. "Besides," she added, "the universe would be a very boring place without you prodding it all the time." She turned to look at the young witch with a reassuring smile, but was surprised to find Luna was looking directly at her with an expression that was as close to accusing Nox had ever seen her wear.
"You know," Luna began serenely, "Harry never let us help him either. He was too afraid that we would, how did Ron put it? 'Snuff it', I think. He carried the weight of everyone's troubles on his shoulders because he believed they were his troubles alone."
Nox bent her head in thought. She remembered Harry from the Weasleys' Christmas party, how his bright green eyes watched her and did not watch her at once. "Harry was the one who killed Voldemort, wasn't he?" she murmured.
Luna nodded. "Harry didn't understand that everyone is a hero in their own story. Voldemort was everyone's enemy," she continued, observing Nox with those oddly misty protuberant eyes. "The battle was as much ours as it was his. It might be brave being heroic, but no one can fight a battle alone." She paused, and Nox felt the grip on her hand tighten. "I know that you worry that I might be hurt, but it's a bit like being treated as though you have your head in a sack."
"Luna, we don't mean it like that-"
"And if you have made your minds up, then I have too," she prattled on conversationally, "and I really don't see how you can stop me. I can help."
Nox's eyes met Luna's. For all her dreaminess and peculiarities, Luna was stubborn and loyal to a fault, and Nox had long since suspected her of knowing much more about Fred's curse than she let on. The twins knew as well as Nox did that they could use Luna's expertise, but at what cost?
"You shouldn't be afraid of death." Luna was smiling slightly. "After all, even when we separate it's not like we'll never be together again, is it? We find our way back to each other eventually." She paused thoughtfully, tapping her wand against her chin. "That's what the dead want, too, I think. All the voices of spirits in this building. They might sound a little scary, but I think what they're really asking for is help."
Nox did not know what to say. Luna believed so many things on faith alone. She did not need proof or evidence that extraordinary things existed, she simply believed and her words lessened the dead weight curling in Nox's stomach. Then an idea struck her suddenly.
"A clue…"
"Pardon?"
"The song. The song! It's a clue! You're right!" Nox cried. "Luna, you're a genius!"
"Thank you." She beamed. "Is that something native to Scotland?"
oOo
Percy traipsed back into the boardroom where the remaining group was huddled together in a corner, save for Israel Darkwood, the ghost hunter from Soulseekers Paranormal Investigations, who was sitting primly at his laptop, his expression stoical.
The elderly psychic, Miss Whittle, looked up at him hopefully, her lined face drawn with anguish. Percy swallowed thickly, then shook his head. He had to turn away as the woman crumpled in her seat, sobs trembling through her.
Percy had chased after Ariadne, of course, but by the time he had found her, he knew it was too late. At first he had thought she was alive, her Vengeful looked frighteningly lifelike. But then she had turned and looked at him with empty, impossibly sad eyes. Long beaded necklaces and Wicca charms clinked and chimed around her neck, and her long beringed fingers fluttered gently, like the wings of a tired butterfly. She twisted bonelessly towards him, pearly white and fluid as smoke, and then lunged across the floor, her jaws gaping horribly wide. Percy had had no choice but to run. Even though he knew it was the only thing he could do, he felt wretched and sick with himself. If only he hadn't tripped. If only he'd gotten to her before the Angel did.
If only…
He sat down heavily at the board table beside a trembling Postlethwaite, who was tearing at the corners of his handkerchief with his teeth and repetitively muttering something about calling the Police.
"I suppose you've tried Apparating out of here," said Israel Darkwood matter-of-factly.
"No. How can I leave everyone here defenceless?" Percy pulled his horn-rimmed glasses off his face and rubbed his tired eyes wearily, then turned around sharply. "Hold on. How do you know-?"
"I'm surprised Kingsley allows one so obviously lacking in wits in his department. Work ethic is evidently on the decrease. They'll let anyone into the Ministry these days." Israel Darkwood slid his hand inside the sleeve of his left arm and produced a wand of polished ebony.
Percy turned red in the face. "Ghost hunting Muggle institution indeed."
"Oh, that was no lie," said Darkwood. "The Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures likes to keep its eye on the curious, more imaginative Muggles who nose around in affairs they need not be nosing."
"Like the Angel Hotel?" Percy prompted.
Israel gave him a hard stare. "That is my own business." He closed his laptop and clasped his hands on the table. "The creature haunting this building is my own responsibility. My grandfather sealed it long ago. It was strong back then, but from my investigations over the passed few weeks-"
"Few weeks?!" Percy spluttered, jumping to his feet. Beside him, Postlethwaite jumped out of his trance and glanced around nervously. "Do you mean to tell me the Ministry knew about this all along? Why didn't it do something the moment people began disappearing?!"
"The Ministry has been busy," said Darkwood tightly, "as you should well know, Mr Weasley. In addition to clearing up after the Last War, there have been several unexpected incidents. This is not the only disturbance of this magnitude. Our services are spread thin."
"Services!" Percy snorted. "What services would those be? You know a great deal more about this case than you pretend to. If it weren't for your secrecy, lives could have been saved!"
"I had heard you were one for following rules." Darkwood's cold gaze met his. "Apparently I was mistaken. But I will humour you nonetheless. There's no longer any reason not to."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean, Mr Weasley, that Apparating in and out of this building is now impossible. The taran that your co-worker, Detective Wolfe, rightly guessed at – the very same that stopped your dead brother from entering this building earlier – has prevented it. Like a mussel, a taran works as a defence mechanism against spirits and the Dark Arts, closing up entirely, meaning that no one can get in and no one can get out."
Percy grit his teeth. "And the cause?"
"A Vengeful," Darkwood replied.
"A Vengeful?" Percy cried incredulously. "What kind of Vengeful is strong enough to do all this?!"
"P-Perhaps you could conduct a séance?" piped in Postlethwaite, nervously. He had not understood a word the two men had been saying, but they seemed to know something about what was going on and frankly that was good enough for him. "M-Miss Whittle, you could start us off."
Darkwood raised one thick black eyebrow at the smaller man, a faint sneer tugging at his mouth. "I'm afraid I don't place much faith in the arts of Divination."
Percy frowned. "I was under the impression you were in agreement with Nox earlier."
Darkwood gave him a sideways glance that made Percy bristle. "Indeed I did. Highland Second Sight is set apart from ordinary divination, the main difference being that Second Sight cannot be harnessed with incense or tea leaves, or other such rubbish. It's completely involuntary."
"I'm about to do something completely involuntary myself," the bank manager mumbled, trembling and dabbing his bald head with a sodden handkerchief.
"Shh!" Percy hissed. He tilted his head to the side, listening intently while Postlethwaite made a small groan of despair beside him.
Be Bold, Be Bold
But not to Bold
You can run for your life
But the gates will hold
whispered a hundred or more voices throughout the building. A smell of sour wine and rotting vegetation filled their nostrils. Dark shapes slipped through the shadows at the edges of things; things that might have been animals, or rats, like those that once carried the plague. These shadows grew until they reached the high ceiling of the room, shadows full of forms, hands that came groping over the table and under the door, figures that swarmed in the windows. Only Postlethwaite screamed, panic-stricken in his chair.
In one fluid motion, Percy and Israel Darkwood unsheathed their wands, casting protection spell after spell to ward off the growing numbers of shadowy wraiths pouring through the gap beneath the door and the cracks in the ceiling. Percy felt the sides of his face become numb and tingle, a sensation that began to ache painfully. Frost was spreading quickly across the floor, crackling underneath their feet and nails and creeping over Miss Whittle, who was sitting in her chair with her face in her hands. Percy tried to call out to her, but his lips were swollen with the cold, the icy room so suddenly intense that even if he were able to cast a spell, it would freeze in the air before it could have any effect. Before darkness froze in his mind, Percy thought he could make out two distinct figures in the corner of the room: one bent and crooked, like an enormous black crow with a sickle-shaped beak; the other tall and cold, and blazing white. Like a Queen.
oOo
The door to the boardroom was completely frozen with ice. Nox spun sharply towards the witch at her side, who nodded and raised her wand towards the door.
"Liquefacere!"
To their shock, nothing happened. The ice crackled and cackled smugly, blocking their entrance.
"Try something else," Nox pressed earnestly.
"Incendio!"
Flames burst out flying from the tip of Luna's wand. The ice covering the door hissed like a snake at the impact of the hot flames, and Luna and Nox burst through into the room, gasping at the sudden biting cold. A strange, grey mist was streaming through the high windows of the boardroom. Their eyes finally found Percy standing beside Israel Darkwood, shivering and near solid from the bitter cold. Crystals of ice covered their clothes and eyelashes. Luna ran to tend to them. Even their wands, still sparking expectantly, were sparkling with frost. Nox followed the direction they were pointing and stiffened.
It was funny, she thought. The Plague Doctor did not look anything at all like a human now. She wondered how she could ever have mistaken it for anything remotely human-shaped. Neither did it look as menacing as before. It stood in a corner at the end of the room, dejected, like an old jacket flung over a coat rack. Something from inside the sleeves and pockets of the shapeless black thing rustled, like dead leaves skittering across ice. Around her, the dead whispery voices repeated their rhyme.
She took a step towards the Plague Doctor. It jerked its bird like head upwards, as if suddenly detecting her presence. There was something different about it. It seemed tired, weakened by the shard's inexhaustible hunger.
"Here…Come here…" it said in a slow, scratchy voice. "I have a song for you…" Nox imagined it was the sort of voice an old crow might have, if it could talk.
She took another careful step towards it, then asked, "Do you know your True Name?"
From the shadows, the Plague Doctor whispered, "Names, names, names, all faraway and lost. Zig, zag, zig. Oh what a beautiful night for the poor world. Long live death and equality!" The creature laughed; a wheezing sound like the wind whistling through trees. Feathers dripped from its black mantle.
"But you do know your True Name," she told it. "That's your regret. It's in the song – your song. Listen to it."
The Plague Doctor stood to its full height then, drawing in the shadowy figures that filled the windows and lurked in the corners, which writhed in their efforts to escape. Nox took a tentative step back. There was a tense pause as the Plague Doctor hung over her like a shroud, then, with a whimper of dismay, it sunk back into itself again, turning, bewildered, from side to side like an animal. Merlin had been right. Nox did pity it. It wasn't a monster, but a beast starving and inexorably pushed onwards by something it had no control over.
She took another step towards it, ignoring Percy's small squeak of despair behind her.
"You're hungry. I know that hunger," she said, trying to ignore the Vengeful's blank black eyes watching her from beneath its wide-rimmed hat. "I knew it for years. The emptiness, dreaming of nothing, chasing shadows. Death leaves you empty. It leaves you with a hole that you're driven to fill."
Another step. The Plague Doctor jerked its beak, now more crow-like than ever.
"Be careful! Don't touch it," Percy murmured, still feeling much more frozen than he would have liked.
"You can end all of it, all that hunger and yearning. It will go away," said Nox quietly . "All you need to do is say your name."
She reached out her hand towards the creature's breastbone, her fingers inches from the greasy leather coat. It moved, as if it were taking a shuddering breath. Nox snatched her hand away from it. A mouth opened in its mouthless face, dark, tacky stuff sticking to its teeth, which didn't quite seem to fit in its crow-like head. Hunger drove it; aching hunger, and a voice as clear and hard as winter. The voice was insistent, relentless as the snow.
"Names, names," it sighed, "all far away and lost…" It staggered, then looked around at the silent, anxious watchers, as if waking from a long sleep and shaking free from a persistent, nagging spell. It took another lumbering step towards Nox, stooping over her, and recited in its dead whispery voice, "King Charles has bolted all the gates and fled his halls for better stakes." Then it crumpled to the floor, the black coat writhing and flopping madly as a score of rats escaped its folds, chittering and bounding over each other into the shadows at the corners of the room.
Nox knelt by the greasy leather coat and pulled it open. All that was left was a sliver of glass that burned like a star in the murky room. She laid her hand on the coat, petting it gently.
"Poor thing."
oOo
They stood together on the snowy garden path of Weasley Manor, watching the flash of red and blue lights against the Angel Hotel's face. There was little noise, despite the confusion of police cars and ambulances, journalists and curious spectators milling around the Angel Hotel. The falling snow had an eerie way of quieting the world, even when the world was chaos. The building was a sorry sight now.
The ghost of Fred Weasley sprang up like a jack-in-the box behind her, a mischievous, self-satisfied smirk on his silver face.
"King Charles, eh? Funny name for a Vengeful."
"Hmm," she nodded her head. "But it makes sense if you think about it. King Charles fled the city during the Plague Year of 1665, leaving the sick and poor locked inside the city. The desperation and fear of that year and the betrayal felt by those who were left with no escape… Well, it makes sense for the Plague Doctor, who betrayed the tenants of the Angel, to have a name that sums the Black Death up."
Nox dug the heels of her brown leather boots deep into the ground. She suddenly wanted to be as close to Weasley Manor as possible. It was funny, Nox mused; she had never expected to feel safe in Weasley Manor, but now, as she watched the ghostly lights of the police cars through the snow, she felt warm and protected standing under its twisted gables, snake like motifs and grinning gargoyles.
"George thought you'd all popped your clogs in there," Fred chuckled.
"And you didn't?"
Fred pocketed his hands and rocked back onto heels, floating inches above the ground. "We might not have a lot in common, me being popular, heroic, charming–"
"–dead as a doornail."
"-and still a heck of a lot more attractive," he remarked dryly, "but we've got one thing in common." He beamed at her. "The word impossible isn't in our vocabulary. Not when it gets right down to it."
He turned to watch George, who was leaning against the icy garden wall watching the scene unfolding in front of the Angel Hotel. Along the street, Luna was talking with a frantic, but obviously relieved Rolf Scamander.
"I reckon George is forgetting that," said Fred quietly. Snow fell soundlessly through his body.
"George…" Nox shivered. Merlin's words of warning still ran in her ears. She had to find him, had to talk to him.
"Where are you going?" asked Fred, as she took off down the garden path at a brisk pace.
"I have to find someone," she called back, skidding through the gate and turning onto Pentonville Road. Nox didn't really know where she was going, but something told her that she would find him if she was looking. And sure enough, after a few minutes of trudging up the street through the blinding snow, something soft brushed her leg.
The black and white collie licked her hand tentatively. She stopped and patted its thick, damp coat, flecks of snow showing bright against the patches of black fur.
"Good girl," she said. "Now where's that spindly cockroach lurking?"
"Aren't you a wee bundle of joy?" grunted a voice from above her head. "Real 'pint is half empty' girl, aren't you?"
"The glass is always half empty," she scorned. "And cracked. And I just cut my lip on it. And chipped a tooth. What are you doing up there?"
"Watching the events, of course. Very good! Very good!" the tramp cackled. He was sitting on the top of a lamppost, clapping his grimy hands together enthusiastically. "Very good indeed! Why I thought for sure that Vengeful would have your head. Genius. Exceptionally clever. Almost as remarkable a feat as I could have pulled off."
"You're joking."
"Of course I am. You could never be quite as remarkable as I." He peered at her through curtains of greasy hair. "Only two more shards to go now. She is very close," he said seriously. "Avoid the cracks and shadows from now on. Don't look under the bed at night or at the street in witching hour. And mind you mind the Gap." He paused, as if waiting for something. "I told a joke. Does my joke not deserve laughter?"
"My sides are positively splitting," she replied flatly.
"If sarcasm was a sting it would pierce my skin and bones."
Tell me something." Nox stepped forward. "You said earlier that George will try to reverse death." She paused, trying to assemble her thoughts. She thought of the hole death and grief had left in the Plague Doctor, in George, in Luna, even in herself. She had seen firsthand what that grief could do to someone. "Is it such a bad thing? Bringing somebody back to life, I mean," she said quietly. "After all, if you are who you say you are, aren't you breaking some precious rule by being, well…being."
"It is the most amazing talent we have as humans," said Merlin idly, grasping a fleck of snow between a grimy thumb and forefinger, "believing in things that aren't true. That is a special kind of magic. One that most Muggles have lost." He fixed a very sober gaze on her, his yellow wolfish eyes gleaming like two hot coals in their sockets. "That is the underlying bitterness which fuels the Slytherins' hatred. Nobody likes to be forgotten. Not even Her. Especially not Her. Winter is very proud." He stood then, perching perfectly on top of the lamppost with the balance of a great cat. "All things must die eventually, even Death. Otherwise, what's the point?"
Merlin crouched and leapt from the lamppost, his rags fluttering in the drifting snow, landing with a crunch in the snow without the slightest waver.
"There is no such thing as a thing forgotten. Magic remembers. Blood remembers. Trees never forget and the earth is the library of all forgotten treasures." He grinned to himself like a hungry wolf sighting a lost lamb. "Be careful, little fish, little knight. Yours is the kind of curiosity that kills cats."
He knelt down towards an icy manhole cover and, placing a hand over its surface, the metal cover began to crisp and burn away like crate paper leaving an open black hole in the pavement. Before he leapt inside, he turned to Nox with his tombstone smile.
"Look for me under the apple tree when all is lost, little knight. And I will guide you like I did the Great Stones."
The black and white collie gave her one last lick, then padded obediently after her master, leaving not a single footprint behind her. And then there was only the snow. After a while, it began to harden to ice.
oOo
A/N: Good grief, have I actually finished that casebook? It's a Christmas miracle! Thank you to everyone who has stuck by this story through thick and thin. It's been a very difficult few months for me personally and I cannot apologise enough for the lack of updates. Hope you forgive me! Have a wonderful Christmas Eve and a magical Christmas Day!
MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL AND TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT!