The Imposter Complex, Chapter Forty Two: Down Memory Lane Again.

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I fled down the corridor, enshrouded in darkness, and the spiders poured forth behind me.

Chittering ebon monsters, each with a dozen legs or more. They seethed in my wake.

I tripped, splashing into oily black water, and they were upon me. I burned, and a scream tore its way out of my throat before a spider skittered into my mouth and down-

I jerked violently awake, slamming my head against something hard. I groaned lowly. I was on the carpet in my living room, and now there was a crack in the frame of my couch where I'd struck it.

My head ached, but not from contact with the couch. It was that deep throbbing pain of a migraine, the Unbreakable Vow beating against my head like a drum. It had been going easy on me yesterday, but now it was back with a vengeance.

The events of the previous evening came upon me in a rush. The last thing I recalled was... opening the Chest.

I leapt to my feet. There it was, lid hanging at its side. It was empty.

Hein was gone. Of course he was, I chided myself. The stains of deep-sea goop on my armchair remained. Nobody ever accused the Grim Reaper of being decent. Rose-gold rays of sunrise were spearing through the curtains - apparently I'd spent much of the night on the floor.

I stretched my back until it popped, and moved to investigate the chest. It had become wholly inert, the warding that Gerard had so delicately disassembled now completely devoid of power. The interior looked as though it had been burned, though it was difficult to tell against the ebony. I ran a experimental finger along the inside, and it came back black with soot. The result of imprisoning my Death for so long, or simply a result of whatever ritual had trapped it? I would likely never know. That irritated me.

My stomach rumbled, and I turned away from the chest. Food first, thinking later. But when I stepped from the soft carpet of my living room to the hard stone of my kitchen, I felt something come loose from my shoe. I looked down curiously.

At first I thought it was just an odd-looking pebble, but then I knelt to take a closer look. It wasn't a pebble. It was a seed, unlike any I'd seen before, and I had a NEWT level Herbology education. A moment later, I realised. It was a seed from Roshar.

:—:

That Friday's Order meeting at Tech Mell was... a little awkward, at least for Sirius and I. It was made no less so by Kingsley, who kept shooting us furious looks whilst we waited for everyone to arrive. Well, furious by his standards, which amounted to a light frown.

He gave us one last stern look before standing. Dumbledore was absent today - gods only know what he was up to - so Kingsley was taking charge. Hagrid was absent too, though that I did know about. Off trying to convince the Giants to stay out of things.

'First things first.' he began, his tone grave. 'There was a Death Eater attack on the wizarding community on the Isle of Wight two nights ago. Three families were hit.'

The room erupted in shock and horror, everyone talking at once.

'Why didn't we hear anything about this!?' Bill demanded, loudest of all.

'The Minister has decided to embargo the press whilst the investigation is ongoing.' Kingsley said, his expression betraying his feeling on that decision. 'I don't think she will be able to keep it quiet for long though. Marshall and Lucretia Fawley are dead.'

I blinked. I'd never met the Fawleys, but their sons were my students. And now their sons were orphans. I almost missed what Kingsley said next.

'-the Culkins, and the old Rosier place. Corvia Rosier is missing, looks like she put up a fight.'

I resisted leaping to my feet, but it was a near thing. 'What!?'

Kingsley raised a curious eyebrow at me. 'Yes, we are not quite sure what motivated that. It is odd for Death Eaters to go after their own like that.'

My knuckles whitened under the table. I knew why. Hugo was in danger, and worse, I didn't even know how to warn him.

'She's not one of their own.' I muttered to myself, but nobody seemed to hear me. Fear gripped me. I'd never met Hugo's daughter myself, though Garrow and Lysander had both described her as strong-willed. But was she an Occlumens good enough to thwart Lord Voldemort?

'Speaking of people going after their own...' Kingsley had continued with the meeting through my distraction, and was now looking severely down at Sirius and I. 'What on earth did you two do at Grimmauld place?!'

'Cascading runic failure,' I said, in the same moment that Sirius said 'Coincidental gas leak,' in his most innocent sounding voice. I let slip a small smile despite myself, broken from a rapidly darkening train of thought.

Kingsley frowned more deeply. 'I'd have expected you could at least come up with an agreed fiction.'

Sirius held up his hands defensively. 'We didn't mean to do it, Kingsley. We didn't rock up to the place planning to blow it up, it just sort of fell out that way.'

'It was the house or Sirius's life. I chose Sirius.' I added.

Snape sneered across the table at us. 'I believe them. We all know Black and Riddle couldn't competently plan a late brunch without accidentally levelling a palace.'

I very nearly snapped at him, but wrestled my temper, struggling, back under control. To my surprise, Kingsley spoke before I did.

'Kindly do not start, Snape.' he said calmly. He turned his gaze back on Sirius and I. 'You're very lucky that we didn't have to explain that one to the Muggles. A muggle terrorist group called the IRA appear to have claimed responsibility, of all thi-'

'The IRA aren't fecking terrorists!'

I twisted in my chair. A sandy-haired woman in her mid forties, her glare baleful. One of the new recruits, Finnegan I think her name was. Kingsley's jaw tightened, but he did not reply, and there were several long moments of tense silence. Confused silence too, from the large slice of the room that clearly had no concept of muggle politics.

'...It does seem a bit off to call the IRA terrorists in this house, doesn't it?' Bill interjected at last, giving Kingsley a prodding look. Augusta Longbottom hadn't looked offended at all, but Kingsley seemed to take his point.

'My apologies, Sinéad. But yes, apparently some new faction in... that organisation have claimed responsibility. We're not entirely sure what prompted that, but in this case, I am willing to not look a gift horse in the mouth. The muggles close enough to the blast to be injured have been healed, and their memories modified.'

He tapped his papers against the table with finality.

'So. Don't do it again. You won't get that lucky twice. Remus? How are matters looking with the werewolves on the continent?'

I blinked, and the meeting moved on like nothing had happened. That was it? I mean sure, Sirius technically was the only wizarding party to suffer damages, and nobody except his elf died, but we blew up a bloody street. I'd expected more of a bollocking than that, especially from an Auror.

After the meeting, I waved Cedric Diggory over. He came over to join me, looking reluctant. Odd.

'Alright, what have you got for me on Prosper Deveny, Cedric?'

Diggory made an awkward expression. 'Er, well if you had asked me two hours ago, I'd be able to tell you "loads". But as of now... well I'm not sure.'

I raised an eyebrow. 'Very well, I'll bite. What happened?'

'Well... I think somebody might have attacked him, or something.'

Cedric sat down, opening up a binder and pulling out some documents. 'So I had him pinned down to this muggle hotel room in Rajasthan, in northern India, right? But last night, there were a whole load of noise complaints about his room, and when the manager came up to investigate, he found the room... like this.'

He laid out a large printed photograph - muggle - on the table. It looked like something out of an evidence file. I didn't ask where he'd gotten it.

The hotel room it depicted was a shambles, not a single piece of furniture not destroyed. Curiously, I didn't see any clear signs of spellwork; all the damage looks like it could have been done mundanely.

'So he was attacked.' I said promptly. 'Not too surprising, the man's a professional criminal.'

'More than just attacked, I think.' Cedric said, his expression now grim.

He laid down a second photograph. This one in the bedroom, with a little pool of blood-red liquid seeping into the carpet. Something had been dragged through it. On the wall, also in blood, someone had painted three Jiǎgǔwén glyphs. I recognised the mark.

'Fuck.' I spat. 'Yokai.'

Cedric blinked in surprise. 'The Dark Lord of Hong Kong?'

I sighed. 'Yeah. I've had a run in with him in the past, the bastard. What the bloody hell does he want with Deveny?'

Cedric hesitated. 'Well... you did say he's a thief. Maybe he robbed him or something.

I rubbed my chin, irritated. I could practically feel Qin Shi Huang's golem-slaying sword slipping further from my grasp. 'Alright. Keep looking into it - carefully. Let's not tread on any toes before we're ready.'

When Cedric left, I span the Gaunt Ring around my finger three times. Nothing. Wherever Prosper Deveny was, he wasn't dead yet.

:—:

I appeared with a crack atop a mountain peak, soared high and lonely above the moorlands. Ben Hope. The coldest place in Scotland, give or take, and this deep into autumn you could truly feel it. The Dementor floating a few dozen metres away from me didn't help in the least.

This particular Dementor was an emissary, placed at my command to spare me from having make a trek to Azkaban whenever I wanted to talk to their collective consciousness. It turned its head to regard me, the black void beneath its hood somehow managing to emote. It seemed curious. I was slowly getting better at reading their body language. Sort of.

Images of Sandy's throat opening on my knife flashed before my eyes. I shuddered, and shook them away. I couldn't afford to let this abomination's aura get to me.

'Report.' I said. I pulled my cloak a little closer around myself and shivered. At this distance, I might be able to repress the Dementor's mental effects, but no warming charm could cut through its environmental effects.

Master is early.

I frowned slightly. 'I didn't tell you I was setting a schedule, that's why I told you to leave this one here permanently. I come when I deem it necessary. Report.'

The Gestalt sense not the many-souled ones upon this isle. It paused. Perhaps if the Gestalt were to conduct the search from a lower altitude-

'No.' I said. 'You advised me that you could sense soul energy that dense at a distance of twenty one kilometres. So you will remain at the tropopause and scour from there.'

It stared at me. Did I detect discontent?

It has been some time since last Master fed the Gestalt.

'Your feast at Azkaban was barely a fortnight ago. There's still plenty of prisoners for you to drain passively.'

Much of the Corpus is absent from the House of Apollyon. The Gestalt goes hungry.

I scowled. It was true, Scrimgeour and I had elected to remove four fifths of the Dementors from Azkaban after the attack, dedicating them instead to sniffing out where the Terracotta Army might be hidden. I might have to talk to him about moving some back. But I had the feeling that it wouldn't do much. The Dementors were looking for an excuse.

Perhaps if the Gestalt were to partake of-

'No.' I said again, more stoutly. 'You will not Kiss any of the prisoners unless ordered, or you will receive no more Terracotta soldiers.'

The void stared from beneath its hood.

If the Gestalt will not be fed, the Gestalt will feed itself.

Damn it, I had expected to have a lot more time before they started getting unruly. I should have known better; the Ministry had barely been keeping them satisfied as it was. If they defected to Lord Voldemort, we were bollocked. Beneath my cloak, I laid a hand on my only weapon against a Dementor; one of the Terracotta Soldiers' swords. We still didn't even know if it'd work in human hands.

I cleared my throat. 'The Gestalt will be fed. You know that I can deliver.'

The Dementor seemed to contemplate.

One week.

It drifted up into the sky away from me without being dismissed. At least the Gestalt wasn't bright enough to realise the paradox behind my promise. For now.

Fucking gods damnit.

:—:

I threw down Slytherin's Locket in disgust. The emeralds inlay glimmered mockingly in the candlelight of my cellar. Taunting me. I'd had precious little chance in the past few days to investigate my latest acquisition, but now that I had sat down with it, the artefact had proven stubbornly inert. As with everything else this week, it seemed hell-bent on foiling me.

It was still a Horcrux, even if no part of my soul still resided within it. I had already tested my ability to sequester within it, as I could the Ring. But no other abilities whatsoever had manifested.

The locket was probably the least famous of the Founders' surviving relics, and this was likely why. It lacked the storied legends of Gryffindor's Sword, or Ravenclaw's Diadem. Slytherin himself hadn't done anything fabled with it, and from what I could tell, it had most just been quietly passed down by my ancestors for a thousand years. Had it even had any magic of its own before I'd come along?

There was one other means I had for determining if it had any secrets. I tossed the locket aside on my workbench. A twitch of Yew and Phoenix Feather brought a low leather couch springing into existence, and I laid down upon it, making myself comfortable. I'd been putting this off, but no longer. It was time, I think, to let myself remember what the Locket Horcrux had known.

With a deep breath, I drew back the barrier in my mind keeping Locket's memories separated, and dove in.

The first memory that met me was my own teenage face, staring at me from the other side of the Chamber of Secrets. I would have blinked in surprise, if I were in control. After so long with my current face, seeing my "true" self was jarring.

'Lord Voldemort,' my other self greeted me. 'You look like shit.'

Nausea gripped me, and I doubled over, heaving for vomit that would not come. My only reward was the revolting taste of bile in my mouth.

I straightened, and to my horror laid eyes on the ravaged remains of Sandy McKellan in the middle of the ritual circle, glassy eyes gazing upward. A mere twinge of regret rippled across Lord Voldemort. It dulled swiftly, leaving behind naught but excitement.

I yanked myself out of the memory, disgusted. I'd not expected him to have become that callous, that quickly. After all, he'd still possessed more soul then than I did now. Wasn't that how that worked?

More apprehensive now, I skimmed ahead, past the creation of Ring, which I had no interested in witnessing. Slowly, I dipped back into the pool.

'Don't be ridiculous Andy. Dumbledore's not foolish enough to face Grindelwald on open battle, he would get soundly trounced.'

Abraxas spoke matter-of-factly, leaning back on the couch. We were in the Slytherin Common Room, spread lazily across the seats closest to the fire. All of my inner circle of Hogwarts mates were here, the original Knights of Walpurgis themselves.

Lysander flushed. 'I wouldn't be so sure about that, Abe. My cousin's fighting in France, he attests the Germans fell apart on the Western front because Grindelwald fled as soon as he learned Dumbledore was in the country.'

I looked up from my chess game with Hugo and sneered. 'Really? Merlin, how embarrassing. What kind of Dark Lord runs from a fight? If I were serving under him, I'd leave, wouldn't you?'

The last was directed to Hugo, who was looking thoroughly disinterested by talk of the War. But he grinned mischievously at me anyway.

'You're one to talk about poor leadership, Tom. Checkmate.

I looked down at the board. My mouth opened, then closed. He had me.

A spike of irritation shot across my mind. Had it been anyone else, I thought in the memory, I would be furious. Instead, I smiled thinly. 'Well played, Rosier. Shall we... play again?'

I drew back from this memory as well. It was good seeing the boys again, as I remembered them. But not terribly useful. Moving on.

I was striding through the stone corridors of Hogwarts, alone. The NEWTs had wrapped up a week ago, and now I was facing my very last day in my only home.

Dippet, the ancient dithering fool, had rejected my application as Merrythought's replacement. As if there could ever be a better candidate for Defence Against The Dark Arts teacher than myself! I seethed at the very thought of it. After three hundred years of life, clearly he'd finally gone senile.

Instead, I'd been consigned to exile from the house that was quarter-mine by birthright! For whatever indefinite number of years he deemed "sufficient experience" for a teacher, as if I were not already more knowledgeable than Merrythought by my third year here!

Patience, Lord Voldemort I chided myself. You're an Immortal. What is a few years in the grand scheme?

I rounded the corner, passing by a tapestry of a man teaching trolls to dance. My packing was done. A flat in magical London awaited me. All that remained was to retrieve the second most valuable item I owned. Three heel turns later, and I was pulling open the door to the Room of Requirement. The chamber it produced was a vast hall, dim false sunlight filtering through skylights of a vaulted ceiling, casting its contents in a musty glow. Piles of junk and detritus, towering far over even my height, a thousand years of hidden things long forgotten by those whom had secreted them here. Save for one.

I found the place where I'd hidden the Diary easily enough, underneath a bookshelf mostly crammed with illicit french magazines. An ignoble hiding spot for a piece of my soul, perhaps, but it had dared to contradict me the last time we spoke, and subjecting it to this indignity offered me some petty revenge.

I tucked my horcrux into my bag, and turned to leave. The particular placement aside, the Room had served this purpose well indeed. There must have been thousands of items here, tens of thousand. Nobody would ever even have thought to look for a horcrux in a place like this, and even if they did, it would take an eon. I may be taking the Diary for the time being, but perhaps it could find its home here again in the future...

I withdrew from that memory, faintly repulsed. To have been trapped in the void under some teenager's abandoned porn for eternity? Perhaps Lord Voldemort now wished he'd carried through on that idea, but I shuddered at the thought.

No matter. I was still far away from where I wanted to be. I skimmed through later memories. Leaving Hogwarts, going to work for Caractacus Burke and Vitomir Borgin in search of interesting magic. Here we go, on the right track at last. Come on Locket, show me your origin story...

A room, not so unlike the one of the previous memory, though far smaller and more odiously decorated. Like the Room of Hidden Things, this little chamber was a hoard, so densely packed with cabinets and display cases that even a slender frame like my own could scarcely move through it.

This made the elderly woman seated at the centre of it all even more baffling than she was already, for she was far from slender. Surely she must have apparated into her chair, for there seemed no other explanation.

I slipped across the room with the air of a man who'd done it many times before, and greeted the woman with a kiss on the hand.

'I brought flowers,' I murmured, conjuring a bouquet from behind my back.

The woman simpered, and made a chittering noise that I only vaguely absorbed as human speech. I smiled where her tone indicated it was appropriate. Finally, she asked me why I was here, as though she were not already aware.

'Mr. Burke would like to make an improved offer for the goblin-made armor,' I said. 'Five hundred Galleons, he feels it is a more than fair b-'

The woman pouted like child. 'Now, now, not so fast, or I'll think you're only here for my trinkets!'

I am here for your trinkets, I wanted to say. Instead, I shunted the blame onto my boss.

She flicked her hand dismissively. 'Oh, Mr. Burke, phooey! I've something to show you that I've never shown Mr. Burke! Can you keep a secret, Tom? Will you promise you won't tell Mr. Burke I've got it? He'd never let me rest if he knew I'd shown it to you, and I'm not selling, not to Burke, not to anyone! But you, Tom, you'll appreciate it for its history, not how many Galleons you can get for it.'

I resisted the urge to sneer. No doubt another overwrought hunk of Goblin silver that she was inordinately proud of for some reason.

'I'd be glad to see anything Miss Hepzibah shows me.'

She made more noise, waving the house elf over with a pair of leather boxes.

'Now, I think you'll like this, Tom...Oh, if my family knew I was showing you... They can't wait to get their hands on this!'

She opened the lid, and if I'd been barely listening to her before, everything she was saying now fell away into a vague background buzz. It wasn't goblin silver. It was golden, a delicate golden cup, or perhaps a handled bowl, and engraved on its upturned side was the face of a badger.

I reached out for it in a trance, lifting it on one finger.

'A badger...' I murmured, mostly to myself. 'Then this was...'

Hufflepuff's own chalice, it had to be. I could feel the undercurrent of power running through its handle against the flesh of my finger-

The old woman pinched me on the cheek, shocking me out of my daze. Like a band had snapped, I suddenly recalled myself. I cursed inwardly. A rookie mistake, Lord Voldemort, you should know better than to let the mask slip like that!

Yet the woman didn't seem to have noticed anything was amiss, as she plucked the cup from my hand, and set it back into its nestling. She traded the box containing the cup for the other item her elf was holding. She was speaking again, and this time I put in the effort to process her words.

'I think you'll like this even more, Tom. Lean in a little, dear boy, so you can see. Of course, Burke knows I've got this one, I bought it from him, and I daresay he'd love to get it back when I'm gone...'

When she showed me what lay within the second box, I had to make a conscious effort not to slip back into tunnel vision. I knew this thing from my Uncle's memories. Slytherin's Locket.

I picked it up reverently, admiring the emerald sigil. 'Slytherin's mark.'

'That's right!' the woman exclaimed cheerily. 'I had to pay an arm and a leg for it, but I couldn't let it pass, not a real treasure like that, had to have it for my collection. Burke bought it, apparently, from a ragged-looking woman who seemed to have stolen it, but had no idea of its true value. I daresay Burke paid her a pittance but there you are. Pretty, isn't it?'

My grip tightened momentarily at the words. This was mine. Mine by birthright, and Burke had as good as stolen it from my mother's own hands. I could feel the blood pumping in my ears. The rage.

She gently lifted the locket from my hand, and I only barely let her take it. She laid it back in its case, and handed it off to her elf again.

She made some noises again, and I made the appropriate noises back. I was going to murder this woman. I was going to murder Burke. The most ancient and sacred heirloom of my family, bandied about as a curio in the collection of this vapid twit. It would not stand.

I resurfaced from memory once again, grimacing. That sensation, that was all too familiar. All too invigorating. An unwelcome reminder that this is who I was once, and could easily become again.

That was enough for today. I didn't know how Lord Voldemort had killed Hepzibah or Burke, and I didn't want to stomach finding out just now.

Besides, I told myself, I had lessons to plan. I could resume delving through Locket's secrets another day.

:—:

Gently...

Carefully...

BANG BANG BANG!

I jumped, and almost dumped an entire eyedropper of occamy spinal fluid into my cauldron. I caught myself just barely in the nick of time, and swore. That could have blown up the whole house. For Merlin's sake, I had a doorbell.

Instead, I deposited three droplets of transparent liquid into the potion. It shimmered and hissed, then went quiet again. It would need several more contributions of spinal fluid over the next six hours before it would move to the next stage. One step closer to flight.

Whoever was at the door, they hadn't offended any of my threat detection charms. I set aside the eyedropper and stomped down the stairs, grumbling to myself, and thrust my front door open.

There was nobody standing on the other side. Instead, there was a small cardboard box, perhaps a few inches in each dimension, sitting innocently on the top step. I scowled down at it. What fresh rubbish was this going to be?

After passing my wand across it a few times to ensure that there were no curses upon it (and another couple of times to determine it wasn't a bomb), I picked up the box and brought it into my lounge room, setting it on the coffee table. Then, cautiously, I flipped it open. It was mostly filled with molded foam, muggle-style packaging. Only a single item sat nestled within, along with a tiny card. A signet ring, bearing a winged rose crest. The last time I'd seen it, it had sat on the finger of Hugo Rosier.

The card was written in my own handwriting.

St Jerome's Graveyard. Godric's Hollow. Midnight.

Alone, or not at all.

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A/N: Please review and follow.