Chapter 8: Follow Orders
Bulstrode, he wrote. No response. He knew Bulstrode always carried her protean notes with her. Theo poured himself some tea.
The flat didn't seem like it had been tampered with while he was being questioned at the Ministry, but he was having trouble shaking the feeling of being watched. He took a drink and jiggled his leg. Nothing was coming through on the card.
Bulstrode, can I have a word?
He tried to sip his tea slowly. It wasn't as if he could do anything at the moment. He wasn't about to go breaking into the Ministry to get the second letter; he really would end up in Azkaban that way.
London was settling into a gloomy winter evening, lights blurred beyond his rain-streaked window. The Protean note moved. Bulstrode's blocky writing came through one deliberate line at a time.
END
OF
TERM
REPORTS
Well, he knew she wouldn't be happy.
But I'm so bloody bored, Mil.
It was one of their old code words as eyes; boring meant urgent. That got a response.
Come through. Floo. Admin offices.
It was a cold soggy walk to Knockturn. Some of the businesses may have had boarded shopfronts, but the Floos still worked if you brought your own powder. The side door to Maggs and Marsh would still open if you kicked away the loose bricks at the lower corner and pried the back the boards at the threshold before casting on the door. There were muddy tracks diagonally across the dusty floor leading to the Floo in the back room, but thankfully the shop was empty.
Theo threw in his powder, and the connection flared up. He stepped through cautiously to the Hogwarts' administrative offices, brushing the ash off his trousers and peering around the room. Bulstrode liked to hire on students from the House to take on most of the grunt work and to have people she could order around, but she was alone now, brusquely clearing files off her desk onto a trolley.
"Well? What's so boring then, Nott?"
He sighed and pulled a chair over from one of the other desks. "Got pulled in for Ministry questioning today."
She snorted, unimpressed. "Did they finally get wind of Longarse's stunt?"
"No. Don't think they know about Goyle. It was my letters to my dad."
"Your what?"
He told her. She wasn't pleased.
"Bloody stupid."
"Yeah, I know."
"Stupid code."
"Oh, yeah."
"If you'd cleared it with me, I'd have told you to stuff it."
"Yeah, Mil, why do you think I never cleared it with you?"
"Cause you're an idiot."
"I got that, thanks. Point is, someone else knew the code and wrote that second letter. Forged it."
"Right, so who knows it?"
"Well, me and Goyle. And my dad and Mr. Crabbe."
"Don't see your dad or Crabbe sending a forgery to themselves in Azkaban on their own. That leaves Goyle."
"Which, I mean. He couldn't forge a… anything."
"What did the code say?"
"Mil, I didn't have a chance to decipher it! I'd need to sit down with a quill… and it would take time. I only glanced it over, I didn't memorize it."
"Definitely your handwriting?" Bulstrode was bearing down now sharply.
"Yeah."
And you did read it?"
"More like skimmed it, didn't have a chance for more than that. But I -"
"That's enough." She was opening a drawer and pulling out quill and parchment.
"What?"
"We need to know, yeah? We'll use the Pensieve."
"What?"
"It's in the Restricted Artifact Archives in the library. School got it when Snape offed the old sod."
"Oh, right."
"Come on."
The corridors were deserted, after-hours on a rainy evening during the holidays. Nothing moved but the portraits wincing and blinking at Theo's Lumos. Bulstrode never bothered with one, she could see well enough in the dark. Their steps echoed off the stones, and Theo felt a thin thread of pleasurable excitement, despite his worry about the letter.
It's because it reminds you of being an eye, he realized. The corridors at night, Bulstrode stalking along beside him. The possibility of running into either the Carrows or staff or the DA at every turn.
Ridiculous, it wasn't as though those had been good times. But they had been something. Was that why Bulstrode never left? She got to relive it. Or perhaps it was the chance to order people around and take the place down from the inside.
Theo had enjoyed being an eye, at first. There were plans and assignments, watching and plotting. He quite liked that bit. But it got worse and worse as it went on. Maybe the worst part of all was watching what it was doing to the rest of them, Daphne in particular, though she always claimed to be enjoying herself. And Snape, of course. By the spring, there was something in the way he stared into the middle distance that was just not right. And he had been letting things go, sometimes losing track of the Carrows' movements.
One of them had to ask the question, Theo had thought. He didn't want to, not at all, but he found himself stammering it out at one of his reports to Snape.
"Sir, uh, if… I mean, do we have…"
Snape had been looking out the window abstractedly, but then he turned to Theo in annoyance. "What?"
Theo took a breath and looked at the desk. "Do we have a contingency plan if, uh, if you…"
"You know the contingency plan. You report to Bulstrode," said Snape impatiently.
"Sir."
"Ask it, Mr. Nott."
"How likely is it that we need it?"
Snape gave a short frosty smile. "He won't kill me yet, Mr. Nott. I'm useful to him."
Theo imagined that he was quite useful, right up until he wasn't. He'd caught a glimpse of him after the battle,completely useless, when Aberforth was keeping him alive, hidden in a back room of the Hogshead. It wasn't at all good to be useless, but Theo knew that already. According to Bulstrode, Snape had been making himself useful in the years since.
They finally came up the last flight and down the corridor to the library. Bulstrode set to work on the locking charm on the doors under the disapproving glare of the portrait of Alphonse Armitage the Archivist.
"Administration division gets all the passwords, Bulstrode?" Theo asked. Alphonse hmphfed.
"Shut it," said Bulstrode in their general direction.
The latch clicked open. Theo's Lumos cast towering shadows between the stacks.
"You can get into the Restricted Section?" Theo asked quietly. Bulstrode didn't dignify that with a response, but set off to the right, skirting the far side of the stacks, Theo behind her. A looming grey shape between two of the shelves made Theo start, but he relaxed as he recognized the Grey Lady, meditatively passing her head through the volumes on the shelves. Could she read anything like that? Theo wondered.
They were almost at the Restricted Section. Bulstrode's arm caught him straight in the chest. She was pushing him back between the shelves, stony-faced. He dropped his Lumos and edged back quietly. With the Lumos gone, he could see a bluish light coming from the end of the room, only a few rows away.
Bulstrode stepped back out into the aisle. "Who's there?" she said loudly. Theo eased farther back between the shelves. There was a thump from the end of the room.
"Who's there?" said Bulstrode, again.
"Miss Bulstrode, is it?" It was the thin reedy voice of Madam Pince, the librarian.
"What are you doing here?" said Bulstrode, heading forward.
"Well, really, I might ask you the same thing," said Madam Pince, irritated.
"No," said Bulstrode.
Theo crept around the far end on the shelves to the last row, then crouched to peer around behind. Madam Pince was standing behind the last row with her hands on her hips, holding chalk and stylus from laying wards. She was directly in front of the Restricted Section. There would be no getting past her unseen.
"What?" she said to Bulstrode.
"It's hols. You should be off."
"I don't think so. The Restricted Section wards need strengthening. Some students of some Houses take the word 'restricted' as a kind of challenge."
"So, you're volunteering."
"What are you talking about, Miss Bulstrode? I hardly need to volunteer to do my own job."
"You were at the staff meeting. Due to budget concerns, unauthorized overtime and holiday work is unauthorized. No unauthorized work. No unauthorized pay."
"Oh, come now. I appreciate your diligence with school budgets, Miss Bulstrode, but this work is authorized. I spoke to Minerva and she said I could use my own discretion for repairs and maintenance."
"No. Not authorized. She didn't authorize it with me."
"Well, really! You imagine the Headmistress needs to authorize work with you?"
"If she wants it in the payroll, yeah."
Theo covered his mouth with his hand and ducked back behind the row.
"Well, I certainly don't intend to put off needed maintenance for some sort of bureaucratic breakdown."
"So, you're volunteering then."
"No, I -"
"You're not getting paid." Bulstrode always knew how to hit where it hurt.
"And you, Miss Bulstrode? Are you volunteering?"
"No. End of term reports and closing. Authorized."
"Really? And who authorized that?"
"I did."
Theo peered around the end of the row again.
"Of all the high-handed - ! Miss Bulstrode, I will not hesitate to bring this insubordinate, disrespectful exchange to the Headmistress. I will be lodging a formal complaint in your record!"
Bulstrode shrugged. "You can pick up a complaint form in my office. On your next authorized day."
Once you had spent seven years being called to task by Snape, everything else had the tendency to roll off your back, thought Theo.
Madam Pince was shoving away her warding materials with irritated huffs. Bulstrode watched impassively. Theo poised to move, then ducked behind the end of the stack as Pince stormed off a moment later. Bulstrode followed, and soon Theo was left in utter darkness.
He leaned against the end of the stacks, waiting, listening to the books settling in their bindings and the Grey Lady humming tunelessly in the Herbology section.
Bulstrode was back soon enough, probably after making a show of locking up, her heavy steps unmistakable. Theo held up a Lumos as Bulstrode scuffed away the chalk marks of the unfinished wards.
"A formal complaint in your record, Bulstrode," said Theo.
"It's been tried. I'm in charge of records."
The old wards cracked like an egg. That let them past the Restricted stacks easily enough. There was another set of wards on the inner room for the Restricted Artifact Archive, but Bulstrode got the keywords after a few tries. "She has a pattern," was the only thing she would say to Theo about it. He wondered how often she'd broken Pince's wards.
Theo's Lumos glinted off mirrors, clocks, and amulets as they moved through the room. He could see many of the objects had their own individual wards and protective cases. One small brown glass bottle with a lead stopper was behind three inscribed rings. It buzzed like a trapped fly as they passed. The Pensieve was a bit over halfway through the Archive, in a glass-fronted case whose door squeaked and shuddered when Bulstrode pulled it open. She set it on a table with a thud.
Theo looked at it with distaste. Snape had shown him the basics of extracting memories. It had come in handy a few times when they'd needed to review details of overheard conversations from the DA, but he'd never enjoyed the process.
Bulstrode laid out quill and parchment. "It'll be easier if we both go in, memorize a sentence or two at a time, then we come out and transcribe. Got it?"
Theo nodded miserably. He also didn't fancy Bulstrode listening to him talk to the Minister about Goyle and his dad. Well, that's what came of writing idiotic letters. He pulled out the miserable memory and let it slump into the Pensieve. He took a breath, leaned forward, and slid in.
There he was in the Ministry questioning room, looking nervous as hell, damn it, his voice sounding horribly tinny and nasal. Was that how he really sounded.?
Bulstrode scowled at him as he told Shacklebolt that Goyle's living arrangements were her idea.
"What, you think he couldn't guess?" said Theo. Bulstrode grunted.
Finally they came to the point of Shacklebolt pushing the letters across the table. "The one in the middle," said Theo.
Bulstrode and Theo jostled in close to examine the forgery. It took six trips through the memory in all, memorizing lines, then emerging to have Bulstrode transcribe them. Bulstrode was efficiently counting letters and writing out the code at the bottom of the page while Theo read it over again. He could see why the letters had been flagged as suspicious. With sentences like, "I admire your calm and becoming manner," no matter how good the forgery, it was clearly composed by someone with a very different idea of the relationship Theo had with his father.
He looked down at Bulstrode's completed message:
WEHAVEGGFOLLOWORDERSHIMORYOU
"So, kidnapping then," stated Bulstrode. She was rewriting the message with spaces.
WE HAVE GG FOLLOW ORDERS HIM OR YOU
"Trying to get money out of your dad for Goyle?"
Theo picked up the transcription. "It doesn't make sense," he said, for the third time that day. "He doesn't have any money. It's all been confiscated. And he wouldn't give a shit about Goyle."
"What, then?"
"It's not for my dad, it can't be. It has to be for Mr. Crabbe. He does give a shit about Goyle. Goyle told me they got close in Azkaban. Some kind of father-son thing."
"Replacement father, replacement son," said Bulstrode.
"Right. But Crabbe hasn't exactly got any money either, as far as I know."
"It says 'follow orders.' Someone wants him to do something."
"What's somebody in Azkaban going to do for anyone?"
Neither of them wanted to answer that. At length Bulstrode said, "favors?"
"For my dad?" Theo winced. "I mean, if he wanted to force him into something physical, I don't see why he would need to set all this up. Someone went to a lot of trouble for this."
Theo pulled the memory out of the Pensieve with his wand and let the silver strand burrow its way back into his mind. He shuddered. Bulstrode put the Pensieve back on the shelf and shut the cabinet. They started walking back toward the exit.
"Right. So someone kidnaps Goyle to make Crabbe do something. And whoever they are, they had to know where Goyle was, that I was writing my dad, and they had to know the code. Someone had to be in on it. My dad or Goyle."
"Or both," said Bulstrode.
"But look, Mil, I don't see Goyle getting nasty to Crabbe. I think he genuinely… he's not that good at acting."
"Crabbe might have told someone else about the code," said Bulstrode.
Theo shrugged. They still didn't quite have a toehold.
The Grey Lady was nudging a book trolley along the shelves with small taps. The wheels squeaked.
"What about the forgery?" said Bulstrode. "You said it was a good one?"
Theo gave a small shrug. "Hmm," he said.
Bulstrode looked at him sharply. "Well?"
Theo didn't say anything. She cut in front of him and blocked him with her straight arm and one large hand against the wall.
"Or, Zero, do you think you know exactly who forged it?"
Theo didn't look at her.
"And it's someone you're in business with, and you're bound by Good Faith agreements, and you can't say a bloody word?"
Theo didn't meet her gaze, and he didn't say a bloody word.
"Right," said Bulstrode. "We'll take care of that end. You take care of your father."
"What? Mil."
"No, this is our game now. We're handling it. I'm putting you on your dad. Find out if he had a hand in it."
She pulled the library doors shut and reset the locking charm.
"Yeah, it's impossible. I can't send another letter, I'd just get hauled in to Shacklebolt again."
"So, go and see him, then. Don't give me excuses, Zero, figure it out."
Theo sighed. "Thank you for the privilege of the assignment, sir, I pledge to uphold the honor of the House."
She thumped him on the arm. "Find your own way out. I still have reports to file and I have to destroy McGonagall's authorization for library maintenance."
Theo rubbed his arm and trailed after her down to the Administration Floo. Getting in to see his dad wouldn't be a problem, a simple visit request shouldn't be denied. The issue was being able to ask him anything of substance in the presence of the guard on duty.
Unless… the Malfoys knew a guard. How did Draco put it? He was happy to accept charitable contributions for the aid of the selectively blind and deaf, as a fellow sufferer. He'd have to ask Draco how to arrange it.
Neville looked again at the writing across Daphne's Protean note:
Of course, come up. Knockturn. Sootscrape Bldg. 4th back. Ring hard.
Was that all it took? He'd only just written her ten minutes before, 'Can we talk?' He hadn't hoped for anything beyond another 'piss off,' and certainly not so quickly. He tucked the note in his pocket. There was an envelope there; he felt a twinge of guilt. A second owled note from Harry. He hadn't opened this one. He hadn't answered the first one yet. He still didn't know what to say.
Soon, he told himself, as he passed through the shopping district in Diagon Alley. He'd think of a good reply, not lying, but not letting on that he'd found Snape either.
He almost missed the entry to Knockturn, dark next to the colorful fairy lights strung around the Diagon Alley shop windows. He ducked into the narrow gap, feeling absurdly self-conscious. It was a public street.
No holiday lights here; most of the storefronts were boarded. He squinted, trying to make out building names in the dim rainy evening light. It was hard to see much of anything. The buildings weren't particularly tall, but they seemed to lean their heads together like conspirators, dark bricks coated with the grime of ages. The alley was crooked, the buildings set at slightly irregular angles, a slimy gutter running along one side. Gaps between the buildings lead to even darker passages. One of these was occupied by some sort of food stall, the smell of oil and onions rolling out, and little bursts of orange flame under a sizzling pan lighting the faces of customers waiting for their food.
The alley's grimness lessened as he went further in. There were lit shop fronts here, nothing very sinister, more food stalls, a cheap tearoom.
He finally found the words 'Sootscrape Bldg' on a battered sign outside a second-hand wand and broom shop. A side door let him into a cramped lobby with a cracked white tile floor and some sort of bell box with levers for the different flats. A handwritten sign on a bit of cardboard taped to the box read, 'Ring hard or piss off, luvs.' It must be the right place. He pulled the lever for 4B as hard as he could. There was a distant jangling, and the inner security door opened a moment later with a click. The stairs led him up past flats with muffled music inside, or barking, or piles of Daily Prophets on the mat. The door to 4B was ajar. He knocked on it hesitantly.
"Longarse?" Daphne's voice came from further in.
He entered a short hall and pulled the door closed behind him.
"You're having a drink, right?" Neville could see Daphne ahead in a small kitchen.
"Uh, as long as it's not whatever you brought to the bridge meeting…" There was barely enough room for both of them by the counter. Daphne was pouring a very generous measure in two glasses.
She laughed. "No. That was just to take the piss out of Zabini. He's such a snob about booze." She added ice then picked up her glass and the bottle and brushed past him down the short hall.
Neville picked up his own glass and followed her back to a sitting room that was even smaller than the kitchen. It was brightened by butter-yellow walls and a vase of languidly drooping tulips out of season. There was a small shelf with a few books and a contraption that looked a bit like a wireless. A framed photo caught his eye, a group shot. He looked closer. A picture from what must have been Pansy's wedding. She was in pale lavender robes and looked more radiant than someone who advocated handing people over to Voldemort probably deserved. Other Slytherins were there in the group; Nott blending into the shrubbery behind the wedding party, Bulstrode and Daphne both dressed in pale yellow, must have been bridesmaids. Bulstrode looked very much like she wanted to punch things. Daphne was laughing, and she looked utterly…
"Go on, have a seat."
There was nowhere to sit but a faded brown velvet loveseat., Daphne was already sitting at one end, sideways, her elbow up on the back.
"Well?'
"Er."
"What? You did want the drink?"
He sat at the other end of the loveseat and put his glass on the table. There was only just enough room for them both.
"So, what is it, Longarse?"
"Have you, I mean, have the eyes really just dropped it?"
She chuckled. "Don't tell me you're losing sleep over Goyle. You're out of it."
"No, that's just it, I'm not."
"I really don't see it blowing back on you. Bulstrode just said that to wind you up."
"No, it's not that," Neville said impatiently.
"Well?"
"I'm not out of it. Nott called me in. So, I'm in now, and I can't just walk away from it. I, I don't walk away from things like this, Daphne. As long as it's not over, I'm part of it."
Daphne looked at him closely and drew back with a laugh.
"You really are like us, you know. You do like to play games. That's Slytherin all over. No matter how stupid or pointless, we always play on to the end." There was something on the edge of bitterness in the words.
"You said you like it."
"Oh, I do, I'm always doing it. You know, Goyle always says that deep down, everyone is just like us, but Slytherins are the only ones who are honest about it."
"You think -"
"I wouldn't give it too much weight, all of Goyle's ideas are terrible."
Neville laughed and took a drink. Whatever it was, it was better than the stuff she'd brought to the bridge.
"Anyway, that's why we won't be giving up. This is our game now. We don't just stop playing."
"You think you're close to finding him?"
She shrugged. "We're making inquiries. Someone knows where he is. He certainly didn't wipe Nott's flat on his own. It will come out; wizards are just terrible at keeping secrets."
"You think so?"
"Of course. Do you know any secrets that haven't come out?"
"Well - "
"So, inquiries. Someone will know something. What about you?"
"Me, what?"
"Your inquiries. Go on." She nudged him with her knee. "What have you been doing?"
"Well, right. I went to Draco."
"I know about that."
"I mean, I went back. I thought maybe he wouldn't have admitted to any contact with Goyle when Harry was along, but it was the same when I went back."
"That's probably right. Goyle won't speak to him. Nott thinks Goyle hates him for not still believing in the 'cause' and getting off easier. I think it's probably for not being the one who died instead of Vince."
"Yeah." Neville didn't know what to say. He had to say something in the hanging silence. "I went to Snape, too."
Daphne coughed on her drink. "You what?"
"Not that I thought he would know where Goyle was, exactly…"
"Did Bulstrode tell you where he is?"
"No, I, uh, put a couple of things together. It was mostly a guess."
"Bloody hell, Longarse, you actually hunted down Snape! Did you tell him all about the backbone of our society?"
"No!"
Daphne laughed. "What did he do?"
"He told me to piss off."
"You're not surprised, are you? He is in hiding."
"It was just like with Bulstrode."
"Yeah, those two are thick as thieves. Why did you have to go dragging him in?" She had a disgusted look.
"Really? I thought - "
"What, Longarse."
"Ok, now I'm going to sound a fool. I really just thought, well, he recruited you all as eyes because you were particularly loyal to him."
"Ah, that's where you went wrong. You're thinking of Hufflepuffs. They're the loyal ones."
"So, you really don't like him?"
Daphne shrugged. "He's all right, for what he is. It's the… repression and self-loathing thing. It gets old. I don't like being around that, it brings everything down." She took a drink. "Bulstrode says he's getting a little better. I'd have to see it to believe it."
"So, ok, why did you join him?"
"You don't have to like someone to be on their side."
"But I mean, why were you on his side?"
"Well, I don't know." She examined her nails as if there was something wrong with them, which there wasn't.
"Daphne."
"Well, since you're such a good listener." She touched his arm. "I like knowing everything about everybody."
"You don't say."
"Everything. So, as it happens, I really like history."
"History?"
"If you really get into it, it's just people's lives. There's love, intrigue, drama. Not that you'd know it from Hogwarts, that place sucks the joy out of everything. So, I've read a lot of history. It always gets on my nerves how people always talk about Voldemort like he was the one dark lord. The worst, the only genocidal fascist. But that's just nonsense. There have been a lot, wizard and muggle. And they have a lot in common. They're all into hierarchy and control, and mostly they have this real hard-on for controlling women. The minute they get in power, they're all up in your business, telling you who you can shag and who you can't, handing women out like prizes. I don't like people telling me what to do, Longarse, and nobody tells me what to do with my body. It's not on. I wasn't going to sit around and wait for some arsehole to come into power and tell me who to shag." She was still smiling but her voice had an angry edge that Neville hadn't heard from her before.
"So… you became an eye because you didn't want Voldemort to interfere with your social life."
She relaxed. "I can't possibly think of a better reason, can you?"
"No," he laughed.
"Right, Longarse, your turn. You were the idiots lining up to catch Cruciatus. Why did you do it?"
"Oh, probably to keep my friends and family from getting killed or something."
"I suppose it'll do."
She poured them both another drink. They hadn't really touched any new information about what the eyes were up to, but he found that he didn't mind.
"Well, if we're taking turns, why all this for Goyle? Not just that you're looking for him, but Nott putting him up and everything else?"
Daphne raised her eyebrows at him.
"I know he said it was to keep Goyle out of trouble and keep him from reflecting badly on the House, but… well, I don't really see it. All of you eyes seem pretty stable now."
"Bulstrode still gives the orders."
"Right, and you're just the types to follow orders without question."
"Aren't we though?"
"You're really not."
Daphne looked uncomfortable. She took a drink, and rolled the glass carefully between her fingers. "It's sort of a… debt."
"You owe Goyle?"
"Not me to him specifically, but like, all of us."
"What?"
"I didn't think you would get it."
"You could try me."
"Could I? I wouldn't mind."
Neville had just taken a sip. He coughed on it.
"Right. People are always saying Slytherins are into dark magic. They're not wrong. We like our traditions, and dark magic is the original stuff."
"So, you actually learn dark magic?"
"Like, secret classes? Uh, no. But the principles of it, yeah. How it works. Everything has a cost. Light magic is cheap. You don't pay anything for it. With dark magic, something gets sacrificed, so it's kind of drummed into us, to look for the cost and weigh the benefit. In dark magic, if there's a debt and you don't pay, just wait, you will, one way or another. It's better if you just decide to pay it yourself, that way you can be in control of the process. So, when you see things that way, you start seeing that it's not just dark magic, it's the way the whole world works. Debts and balances, that's the game we play. Like if you read one of those old wizard yarns; geas and boons and favors, you cut off my head, and I'll cut off yours. Right?"
"You could see it like that, I guess."
"Well, that's how we see it. We had our games and our plans, as the eyes. And Snape had his; he had a cover to keep, of course. But he wouldn't have had a shred of cover without some enthusiastic Slytherin recruits to prove his efforts. And for us eyes, there would have been heaps more scrutiny and pressure on us without them, especially on Nott. They did us an enormous favor by being part of our cover, and look how they paid for it. Draco barely managed to squeeze out. Vince died, and Goyle lost his dad and watched his best friend burn to death in front of him. Nott says he's still fucked up."
"You didn't exactly make them join."
"We didn't exactly try to stop them. And we knew nobody else would, either. We know how it is with us. Nobody looks after Slytherins."
"You had Snape, though."
"Oh, we had him up to a point. But that point was the cause, and it came before any of us. No, we have to look out for ourselves, we have to be our own cause. But we didn't look after our own. We let them go, and we benefitted, and they paid."
"I just don't see that it's your fault, though."
"That doesn't really matter. It's like magic. Magic doesn't care, right? Does an Unbreakable Vow care if you're a freely consenting adult? Does a life debt care if you didn't ask to get saved? No, a debt doesn't care, you still owe it even if it's not your fault that you owe it. Everything has a cost."
"How do you even keep track of something like that? Everyone would be owing everyone else all the time."
"You just… keep track, I guess. And if you owe one of us, we will remind you."
Neville was getting the idea that Slytherins had a sort of mental ledger of debts and balances.
Daphne put her glass down on the table. She looked almost troubled. She looked at him appraisingly.
"Look, that's why… you have to stop thanking us. Seriously, you really put your foot in it every time."
"But -"
"No, shut up and listen. It's not that we mind you offering to pay us back. We quite like that. But the thanking thing." She grimaced. "It's like you're putting a claim on it. 'Thank you for your service,' bollocks, what you're saying is, 'you noble Slytherins, serving the side of the light and good. Heroically putting yourself in harm's way for the benefit of others, selflessly doing what was right in the face of adversity,' or some rubbish like that. But it's just utter rot and you can't claim us, because we didn't do it for you. Or the light and good. We did it for us. You may owe us, but you don't get to claim that."
She had that hard look again. And, as it happened, she was right.
"You're right. I made a lot of assumptions. We all did, I mean the DA. But I used to make worse assumptions about Slytherins."
The hard look was gone again. Her face really did change quickly. "Is that an apology? You know, that's almost as bad as thanks."
"I thought Bulstrode was going to hit me when I tried to thank her."
She laughed.
"Ah, Daphne, the reason I wrote to you… look, I'm stuck. I know I made a mess of the parole thing, but I do want to keep helping. I just don't know what to do next."
"Oh, no, no, you had your turn, Longarse, it's mine now."
They were still taking turns then? Neville shrugged. "So, take it."
"I think I will." She looked at him archly over her glass. "Don't you want to kiss me?"
"Uh…"
"You know, Longarse, for fun." Somehow she had edged closer to him on the loveseat. Her hair swung forward as she leaned in.
"Well?"
"Yes," he heard himself say.
She arched herself towards him as elegantly as the tulips in their vase. He could taste the alcohol on her lips, she pressed herself close and there was a smell that made him think of flowers. She drew back from the kiss slowly. She removed the glass from his hand and put it on the table, a kind of private smile passing across her lips. She took his hand in an intent way.
"Daphne…"
"You did say I could try you, but if you can take it back if you don't want it."
"I didn't say that," said Neville quickly.
She laughed and shifted, moving onto his lap. He did want it, he found, very much.
Daphne put his hand where she wanted it, and he slid it upwards, along very smooth skin.
God, it had been a while. Not since Luna, and sex with Luna, well, it wasn't bad so much as confusing. Sometimes he couldn't tell at all if she was enjoying herself, and when he broke down and tried to get her to tell him what she wanted, her remarks were cryptic, at best.
Daphne leaned in and put her mouth on his neck, then whispered in his ear exactly what she wanted, and where, and how hard. Neville discovered that he was the kind to follow orders without question, was quite good at following orders, actually, if the sounds that Daphne was making were any indication.
When she ordered him to the bedroom, he followed her without question. Nice to be just doing rather than thinking so much about it. No need to plan out any next steps, Daphne had him well in hand. When at length, Daphne gave him several urgent orders, he was very, very happy to obey.
He dropped back onto the bed. Daphne rested her head on his chest, he could feel her ear pressed against him. She gave a contented hum. The way she rose and fell with his breath made him think of an ocean. He closed his eyes. A boat on a calm warm sea…
"You can stay a little while, Longarse, but then you should go and call yourself the Knight Bus. My boyfriend will be coming by soon."
His eyes flew open.
"Your… what?"
"My boyfriend, love."
Neville sat up abruptly, the ocean giving a heave to any small craft braving the waters. Daphne propped herself on her elbow and laughed. "Oh, don't tell me you thought it was true love. I said, 'for fun.'"
"Yeah," he said. Fun. Where were his trousers? "I thought you were free."
"Oh, did you want to be charged for the privilege?" The edge of her anger was back.
He tried to turn his shirt sleeves right-side-out. Everything was coming out wrong. "I, I mean, free to, uh…"
"Oh, I know exactly what you meant. You think I haven't heard it before?"
"No, that's not -"
"I told you. No one tells me who I can fuck."
She had told him, in several ways. Just for fun, just a game. And Ron had told him too, they would turn on you. Or had he turned on her? Shoes, he had shoes somewhere.
He tried again. "It's not that."
Daphne laughed. It wasn't a kind sound.
"I should be able to make that decision too, whether I'm, uh, I'm with someone who's with someone else."
"Bloody hell, you can't even say it. All right Longarse, if that was so fucking important to you, why didn't you bother to ask?"
He looked at her directly for the first time since he'd sat up. She'd made no move to get up herself and was lying on her side, naked, watching him. He felt like he was the naked one. And he had no idea why he hadn't asked. He still felt tricked, even though he couldn't say how exactly.
"Would you have told me the truth?"
He knew at once it was the wrong thing to say. Daphne rolled onto her back and said, "Oh, get out, Longbottom." There was no more anger in her voice, just something like bored disappointment.
"Right, right," he said under her breath. He tucked his rumpled robe under his arm. He was trailing a shoelace as he started for the door. He could hear her voice behind him.
"Kitchen. Back stairs."
Neville stumbled down the hall to the kitchen. There was a door out onto a small iron balcony. He stepped out into the the cold rain and started down the metal stairs.
A/N: I had a few technical difficulties getting this chapter edited, so I'll probably be catching errors over the next couple of days and uploading a final version. Apologies for any glaring errors.
Thank you so much for reading! A huge thank you again to all who have a chance to leave a review, I really appreciate it!
Update 1/06/21: Due to having to cover some extra work shifts this week, I'm a bit behind on getting the next chapter of The Cover up ready to post. Also, FFnet has a lot of bugs and technical issues at the moment, so I'm going to push off posting for a week in hopes the site will be a bit more stable then. Sorry for the delay, but the next chapter will be coming soon!