The pain and panic in Dumbledore's nightmare made him moan and shiver. 'I want to wake up!'
But he could not move from the window seat with his painful left arm attached to the windowpane. On the other side of the window, Dumbledore saw the hideous form of Tom Marvolo Riddle's homunculus and his multitude of Death Eaters standing on a street in London.
'I know this place! It is Grimmauld Place,' Dumbledore shouted in his mind.
The enormous serpent swayed back and forth in time with the movements of her master on the other side of the glass. The Dark Lord frowned when he recognised his snake and diary, Slytherin's locket, Ravenclaw's diadem, and Hufflepuff's chalice attached to the window. He stepped closer to examine Dumbledore's hand attached to the window and laughed when he recognised the ring and the curse that blackened the headmaster's hand. Then Tom Riddle turned his curious gaze at the golden egg that seemed to whisper to him.
In his desperation, Dumbledore wondered, 'Why can't I wake up? Where is the elder wand?'
& CHANGE SCENE &
Goblin Invoices (14 August 1996)Albus Dumbledore winced as he reappeared outside the Leaky Cauldron in the spot designated for arrivals via apparition in Diagon Alley. The person arriving before him had been slow to move, so his arrival was delayed almost one full second and magic 'smacked his hand' so to speak, for the pause. The old wizard sighed, thinking how even magic didn't respect his accomplishments sometimes. Moving quickly to be out of the way for the next arrival, he glanced about the alley – it appeared to be a typical summer midday crowd with shoppers and a few wizards intent on business matters.
'If I never looked at tax rolls and budgets, I would never understand that business is a necessary evil in the magical world,' he thought. 'Such a shame that we can't all live on a farm or in the forest like our ancestors who discovered magic.'
He shuddered thinking about the sameness of the homes on Privet Drive and wondered how the muggles could live on a street that was nothing but duplicate homes.
'If I leave Harry Potter there long enough, he'll allow Tom to kill him just to escape from the dullness of suburbia,' Dumbledore added smugly. 'Now to work – there are goblins to bribe.'
Strolling across the alley to the entrance to the bank, he admired the marble of the pillars and the shiny armour of the guards. 'I wonder if their halberds are real or just props?' he wondered. 'They wouldn't dare to harm a wizard.'
Stepping inside where the temperature was much cooler, he smiled benevolently at the other wizards in the queue and joined one of the lines. A few seconds later, he was slightly perturbed because a clerk had not approached him to pull him from the queue and send him on back to Sowsbreath. The headmaster was required to wait for a full ten minutes while the line in front of him was whittled down, one wizarding customer at a time.
Dumbledore didn't realise that a stalker trailed after him this morning. The goblins on the steps had 'seen' the invisible elf that appeared near the meddlesome old wizard, but they said nothing to him when he walked past and entered the bank. The elf moved onto a statue of Lord Pierson Fleamont, the founder of Magical Britain in the 1660s, and waited like many other elves who followed their masters or their master's children in the alley.
Once he reached the desk, the teller was surly and curt but quickly sent Dumbledore to a bench in the corner to wait again. The headmaster's anger only increased as he was forced to wait for another three minutes until the runner indicated for him to follow him to Sowsbreath office.
"I am well aware of the location of Account Manager Sowsbreath office, young goblin," Dumbledore replied to dismiss the runner.
"He's moved. If you wander around the halls, the guards will feed you to the dragons as punishment," the goblin replied and led Dumbledore deep inside the bank. They walked by the door where Dumbledore remembered the Potter Accounts being managed and walked further into the depths. Finally, they stopped before a door with the nameplates 'Sowsbreath – Potter Account' and the second, 'Sowsbreath – Black Account' underneath it. Knocking once, the goblin opened the door and stepped back.
Moving into the office, Dumbledore's nose twitched to scent old and rotted blood. He saw the familiar face of the goblin, but it was marked by a new scar that ran across the forehead and down across the nose. The clawed hand that waved him forward was missing one digit.
"Ah, Account Manager Sowsbreath, I offer my congratulations on your promotion," Dumbledore said as the door behind him closed. Glancing about the room at the bloodstains, he added, "It appears to have been an epic battle."
"Ironstream fought well, but I defeated him with axe and knife. The fool thought to fight only with his axe, and I got close enough to slip my knife into his belly and slit it open," Sowsbreath said, waving toward the blood on the walls. "I flung him about for a time to make certain the walls were decorated."
"Well, yes," Dumbledore managed to reply. "But everything is well with the accounts? You have control of both sets of vaults?"
"I do. I have been swamped reading all the Black family reports and account histories." The goblins paused and said, "But this morning, let's begin by settling the matters of invoices."
The goblin pushed the paper across the desk to Dumbledore that totalled 6,000 galleons for payment directly to Sowsbreath. The old wizard inclined his head in acceptance and reached for the contract quill to sign the invoice for payment.
'A bargain for control of the Black vaults as well as the Wizengamot,' Dumbledore thought as he signed his very long name on the contract. The itch on the back of his hand was quite annoying, but he continued without pause until he finished signing Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore. Then he sat the quill back on the desktop and watched as the invoice suddenly turned red and vanished in flames.
"What was that?" Sowsbreath demanded to know. "What did you do, wizard?"
Surprised by the paper burning, Dumbledore assured the goblin, "I didn't do anything except sign my name! You know I always pay your gratuity without delay."
Frowning, Sowsbreath gritted his fangs and waved his knife about but found no residue of magic from wandless magic or a prank by the human. The goblin quickly summoned another sheet of paper and again wrote the invoice. He pushed it across to Dumbledore, who once again signed his name to the paper, and they watched once again as the paper immediately turned red and burned away.
"What is this?" roared the goblin. "Wizard, what are you doing to cause this?"
"I am doing nothing!" Dumbledore replied in his most stern tone. "May I draw my wand and…."
"No! Do not draw your wand!" ordered Sowsbreath as the office door flew open and three goblin guards from the hallway stormed into the room. Two carried the long, sharp halberds, and the third hefted a deadly and sharp battle axe. The three guards took up positions around Dumbledore, who remained perfectly still to not initiate action by the armed goblins.
"What is the problem, Account Manager Sowsbreath?" asked the goblin with the battle axe.
"This flijudamesta signs an invoice, but it turns red and burns away," the account manager replied. "That has never happened before."
The goblin with the battle-axe grinned, his razor-sharp fangs displayed, making Dumbledore wonder if the axe or the teeth would cause the more painful death. Then the goblin said, "That only happens when the flijudamesta doesn't have authority to pay the invoice."
For a moment, Dumbledore and Sowsbreath remained silent.
"What do you mean?" Sowsbreath demanded of the guard.
"If a wizard attempts to spend gold from a vault of someone else, the invoice burns away," the goblin guard explained. "It happens with Lucius Malfoy on occasion when he tries to use the Black vaults or the LeStrange vaults. We get to charge him ten sickles for each red invoice."
Dumbledore carefully asked, "Which vault did you mark for this invoice?"
Snarling, Sowsbreath pulled out more paper and a report with a list of vaults. For the next five minutes, he wrote invoices for 6,000 galleons charged against the different vaults he supervised. Dumbledore signed each invoice with the black quill, and the first eight sheets of paper turned red and burned away. Then for the last four vaults, the signed invoice turned red but shredded itself, leaving confetti to fly around the room much like at the Halloween feast in the Great Hall.
Rubbing his very sore hand now, Dumbledore asked, "Perhaps you could charge the bill against the Potter accounts. As Harry Potter's guardian, I authorise you to take…"
Sowsbreath interrupted the headmaster with a snarl and growled, "Idiot flijudamesta! I have written invoices against the Black vaults and each Potter vault! Even the boy's trust vault! The confetti bombs were the invoices against the Potter vaults."
The goblin turned to the guard now and asked, "What does the confetti mean? I have never seen that happen."
Bowing his head respectfully to the powerful goblin behind the desk, the goblin explained, "This happens with regular wizards like Arthur Weasley at least once a year. His wife spends more galleons than they have, and he has a red invoice that shreds itself. We charge him ten sickles for each red invoice, and he has to bring galleons to the bank to bring the account back into the 'black'.
Dumbledore carefully asked, "Did you perhaps designate a vault of artefacts without galleons?"
The guard said nothing, but he did keep his eye on Dumbledore, and the other two guards lowered their halberds and pointed them at the wizard. When no one spoke for a full minute, the guard said calmly, "Then there are insufficient funds in those vaults to make payment. You wrote a dozen invoices, so the wizard owes the bank two hundred and four sickles for the paper."
Sowsbreath remained silent, staring at Dumbledore, who returned the stare.
'Where is the gold in the Potter accounts?' Dumbledore wondered. 'Why can't I charge an expense against the Black accounts?'
Then Sowsbreath smiled and said, "Let's try one more time, shall we? Then the headmaster can be on his way."
The goblin wrote out another invoice and shoved it across the desk. Without reading it and only hopeful of leaving the bank alive, Dumbledore picked up the contract quill again and signed his name. This time, the invoice turned black and vanished – the funds were present to pay the invoice, and Dumbledore had the authority to charge the expense to the account.
Sighing with relief, Dumbledore smiled and said, "There. Excellent."
Sowsbreath said nothing for a moment and kept his eyes on Dumbledore. Finally, he said, "That concludes all our business today, Mr Dumbledore. You should depart and allow me to return to my work."
"Of course, Account Manager Sowsbreath, of course," Dumbledore replied with the relief he felt evident in his voice. "I hope you will investigate and let me know what caused the earlier problems."
The goblin did not reply while the three guards herded the wizard out the door. Just before he was pushed into the hall, Dumbledore asked, "What vault did you reference on the invoice that was accepted?"
From behind the desk, Sowsbreath replied, "Your personal vault, Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore…from your personal vault."
Hurrying from the bank, Dumbledore stepped around any wizard or witch in his way – for once, his age did not slow him down as he used his magic to smooth his exit, trying to get away from the goblins. At the apparition point in the alley, he paused long enough for magic to smack him with a stinging hex before he decided against attempting the spell.
'I am too distracted and would splinch myself,' he thought. 'And I must remember to ask Flitwick what 'flijudamesta' means.'
Dumbledore strolled into the Leaky Cauldron and only realised he didn't have any sickles left to pay for floo powder – the goblins had collected all his loose change to pay for the invoice paper that burned or shredded. Moving out of the queue, he thought to sit at the bar until someone he knew well arrived. But Tom looked at him queer when Dumbledore sat without ordering anything to drink.
Once again, outside the Leaky in Diagon Alley, Dumbledore cast a spell on a piece of low stone wall to make it comfortable to sit on and waited. None of the Order of the Phoenix members walked past him, and none of the Hogwarts faculty appeared. He attempted to meditate but found the persistent itch from the black quill scratches on the back of his hand distracted him so much he could not fully engage his occlumency shields. While he waited for someone to appear, his mind did wander back to the image from Harry Potter's thoughts earlier in the day – the Gaunt family ring. The stone in the ring bore the symbol of the Peverell brothers and the Deathly Hallows.
'The stone that will bring back the souls of the dead,' he thought excitedly. 'Once I have it and the Elder Wand, it should be simple to 'borrow' the cloak from the boy for a few hours. I can substitute another cloak or tell him to forget it…I do like obliviate.'
Forgetting his problems with Gringotts, Dumbledore found his focus returned and rose from his softened seat to approach the apparition point once again. Imagining the gates of Hogwarts firmly in his mind, he spun around and vanished from Diagon Alley.
++CHANGE***SCENE++
Minerva McGonagall spent the month of August getting Hogwarts ready for the new school year with very little help from Headmaster Dumbledore. She learned decades ago to not count on the wizard for anything except platitudes and orders to implement new ideas he had that created more work for her. Today, 13 August, she and Professor Filius Flitwick met with the elves about cleaning the dormitories and hallways.
'The elves are extremely happy,' she observed, but like most wizards and witches, she had no interest in exploring the lives or feelings of house-elves.
"Minerva! There you are," called the headmaster, striding into the castle from the front door.
"Albus, whatever are you doing back here?"
Surprised by the question, he replied, "I returned from my holiday and thought to check on the castle,"
"Good," the witch replied. "I need your help with…"
"No, no. I am certain your decisions will be perfectly fine. Please do what you think best," the wizard replied without allowing her to continue. "Now, I wanted to let you know I have a lead on an ancient artefact that I must investigate. I shall be back later, and we three can have supper together in the Great Hall."
Pursing her lips, Minerva would not order the elves to prepare the Great Hall for dinner for two. If he remembered and wanted to dine with her, they would eat in her office, where the mess would be minimal and not impact the elves.
Just before leaving, the headmaster turned to Filius and asked, "I was at Gringotts today and met with an account manager. During our conversation, he used a word I had never heard before."
"Yes?" asked the wizard of small stature.
"Well, he referred to me as a 'flijudamesta', and I wondered what it meant," Dumbledore said. After staring at the headmaster for a moment and trying to control his facial expressions, the professor laughed and dropped to the floor. There Filius rolled about howling with laughter.
"Well, it must be something hilarious if Flitwick finds it this humorous," Minerva observed. "The goblin blood makes him go to excess when he finds something funny."
Impatient to be on his way, Dumbledore frowned and muttered, "Hopefully, he will be calm when I return, and he can share the humour with me – with us both."
++CHANGE***SCENE++
Hurrying back to the front door of Hogwarts, Dumbledore stepped through the door and suddenly remembered that he and only 'he' could apparate from anywhere inside the wards around Hogwarts.
'Why did I think I had to get out the gates?' he wondered but then was distracted by the ache on the back of his hand again. Without another thought about other topics, Dumbledore visualised the wooded area in Little Hangleton where the Gaunt family shack stood. The Elder Wand in his hand once again, he spun in place and apparated away.
++CHANGE***SCENE++
Minerva sighed with relief outside her office when Filius ceased howling with laughter, and she completed the meeting with the happy head elf. The charms professor stepped into her office, begged her forgiveness, and conjured himself a chair that fit his size before sitting and summoning an elf for a dram of brandy.
"Filius? Brandy in the middle of the afternoon?"
"I need a little something to calm myself is all," the half-goblin replied.
She watched him curiously and then asked, "What did that word mean? The one that made you laugh so uproariously?"
Flitwick snickered and would not look his co-worker in the face when he cleared his throat and replied, "I can't translate it completely… I wouldn't translate it for you…in any case; it is the vilest insult in the goblin language. It involves dragon excrement and human mating practices as understood by goblins."
He laughed again but kept it under control as he tried to explain, "Goblins don't…like humans…they think humans roll around. And the goblin called Dumbledore…that."
Rising from his conjured chair, the half-goblin ran from the room, his renewed laughter filtering back into her office. Minerva decided, 'I don't understand…perhaps I don't want to this time.'
++CHANGE***SCENE++
Albus Dumbledore appeared in a wooded glade on a warm August afternoon with a loud pop that any muggle would have heard in the immediate area. Under the trees, the shade cooled the air a bit, but Dumbledore renewed the cooling charm on his robes. Then he glanced about and saw the ruins of a dilapidated shack hidden by undergrowth and several saplings.
"How quaint," he muttered. "How might Tom have been different if he had been raised here rather than in that orphanage? Would he have been better or possibly worse?"
Using his wand freely, Dumbledore cleared the undergrowth and tree saplings away and left a clear path for him to reach the shack. He saw the remains of a serpent nailed to the wood on the door. Some preservation spell or other magic kept the skin intact otherwise, the carcass would have disintegrated. Casting again, Dumbledore determined that decades had passed since any magical person had approached this spot.
His wand's magic rolled and buffeted his mind as he studied the shack before casting a spell that opened the door. There were no wards around the ruins, and he stepped forward, banishing several serpents into nothingness when they slithered toward him. Inside the collapsing walls with holes in the roof that lighted the entire floor, Dumbledore stepped around, feeling for magic in the space.
'Underneath the floor then,' he decided as the Elder Wand moved across and lifted the rotted floorboards to reveal a simple iron box surrounded by sleeping serpents. Once again, he banished the serpents into the nothingness of non-existence before attempting to levitate the box.
When the box did not rise from underneath the floor, Dumbledore was stupefied for only a moment before realising, 'It must be iron…old fashioned iron can block away powerful magic. Tom was being bright when he put his ring here.'
Bending over to lay his hands on the box and lift it from the space, Dumbledore did not notice the compulsion spells from two house-elves hidden in the underbrush. And as he began to remove the lid, the scratches on the back of his hand flared in protest of being used too much to lift the lid.
[I have the answers! You shall live forever as the master of death!] promised the ring. It sang of power, and even more importantly, it offered reconciliation with his sister. [I am the key!]
His Occlumency shields struggled to snap into place as Dumbledore fought the compulsions from the ring. But the scratches from the contract quill flared hot and distracted the wizard. He picked up the ring, dropped the box onto the floor and slipped the ring onto the finger on his left hand.
The flare of fire and pain threw him onto his side, and Dumbledore drew his hand close to his chest, searching for some relief from the burning pain racing up his hand. Then he fell into darkness.
++CHANGE***SCENE++
Harry's Final Preparations (14 August 1996)Harry Potter arrived at Grimmauld Place via Preacher's elf popping from Privet Drive. While not wholly comfortable, elf-travel beat side apparition or floo travel in the opinion of the Boy-Who-Lived.
"You need to allow Dobby and Treacher to bring in Dumbledore," Preacher said, shoving the guest book in front of Harry. Using a muggle ink pen, Harry quickly printed the full name for the headmaster and immediately, the two elves appeared with the headmaster, who was unconscious but restless, clutching his left hand to his chest. Dobby levitated the wizard to the window seat beside the large window that looked out on the Grimmauld Place while Breacher arrived with a box of potion bottles.
"Is that dreamless sleep?" asked Harry watching the elf select one of the bottles.
"Yes, Mr Harry Potter," Breacher replied as he lifted a bottle and glanced back for permission before proceeding to pour the potion down the headmaster's throat.
"To provide relief from the pain, I had to add other ingredients. The sleep will not be as deep as normal, and I must dose him with more every two to four hours," the elf explained.
"Will he wake up that often?" asked Harry, wanting to understand all the details of the sacrifice for the 'greater good' by Albus Dumbledore.
"The time will vary. When he does, he'll rouse and look about, but he will fall back asleep easily. I can give him the potion by just sending it to his belly after this first dose," the elf said.
"How long until the curse is evident – easy to see on his hand?"
The elf looked carefully at the left hand of the wizard without touching it and said, "Two days…three at the most."
"Where are his wands and other things?"
Dobby lifted a bag from the pocket of his new blue jeans and said, "Here they be's, Mr Harry Potter. He had three wands, two portkeys, and magical glasses."
"Can one of you remove the magic from his glasses? I want him to be able to see when he wakes up," Harry asked. Dobby and Breacher both had to snap their fingers several times to remove the magical charms on the glasses, and then Breacher levitated them to the headmaster's head and stuck them in place with a sticking charm.
"How strong is that charm?"
"It lasts until elf remove it, Mr Harry Potters," Breacher replied.
Smiling slightly, Harry instructed his elves, "I want one of you to stick the headmaster's left hand to the window. The top of his hand should face the window so that anyone looking through the window will see the ring there."
Breacher did as Harry asked, and then the young wizard said, "Dobby, cast a notice-me-not spell on Breacher's charm. I don't want Dumbledore to figure out why his hand won't come loose."
"And the other wands and thingies?" asked Dobby.
Harry examined Dumbledore's wands and portkeys before telling the elves to diminish or dispel the portkeys and banish the items into nothingness. The two regular wands were of little interest to him. The young wizard broke them in half and had different elves banish the pieces of the wands. The last wand seemed to be brimming with magical power, but it did not appeal to Harry.
"This is something special, but I don't want it. Put it into an iron box for now," Harry ordered while the wand suddenly seemed to want to flare or speak to him. Dobby quickly dumped the golden egg from its iron box, levitated the wand into the empty box, and closed the lid. This left the golden egg that now contained a soul shard of Tom Riddle on the floor.
"Good thinking, Dobby," Harry praised his elf. Then he continued, "Breacher, stick the golden egg on the window, and then Dobby can put his notice-me-not charm on the sticker."
Harry waited with the elves while two hours passed. He read a book on runes and arithmancy that presented the argument that those arts should be combined and found himself understanding the concepts reasonably quickly.
'I don't miss the headaches of my scar,' he thought just as Dumbledore seemed to be rousing. Stepping back from the window seat where the headmaster lay, Harry saw the headmaster staring at the golden egg for a moment before Breacher transported the next dose of the modified dreamless sleep into the headmaster's stomach and returned the wizard to slumber.
Once he was confident the headmaster was asleep and unable to move, Harry asked, "Where's the snake?"
& CHANGE SCENE &
Albus woke up a couple more times that afternoon and he seemed aware of his surroundings and stared at the soul containers after they were stuck on the window above the window seat.
Satisfied that the soul jars – including the seamless and sealed terrarium that held the angry snake – were all displayed to be visible from the street, Harry turned to his elves and said, "How do we corrupt the fidelius charm so that Bellatrix and others remember where Grimmauld Place is?"
"Black Manor ready for you in Mr Harry Potter, Lord Black," Breacher reminded the wizard. "Your aunt and uncle returned to a spotless house and manicured garden, but you will not return to that place."
Dobby explained how to remove the fidelius charm. Breacher, Preacher and Treacher offered ideas on altering and corrupting the charm. After a long discussion, with Dumbledore waking once and seeing Harry standing near the window for a moment, the elves and Harry agreed on how to corrupt the charm to allow Bellatrix and others who had visited the house many years ago to suddenly remember the existence and location of No.12 Grimmauld Place.
They waited until the middle of the next afternoon to alter the fidelius charm.
Once they were finished, Harry ordered the elves to 'prime the front door'. Any magic cast against the front door of Grimmauld Place would set off the explosives that were packed on every floor of the house. The elves had studied the primer cord the muggles used and tied the explosions at No.12 to No.10, No.14 and across the street to the rowhouses standing there. A simple unlocking charm would cause every building on Grimmauld Place to explode. And Dobby had stolen powerful explosives – the elf intended for there to be a crater left where this uncleanable house stood and shamed him and every other house-elf.
&CHANGE & SCENE &
Getting Tom Riddle's Attention (15 August 1996)At Malfoy Manor, with the holes on the roof allowing rain to fall onto the priceless carpets and antique furniture, Bellatrix LeStrange plopped down into a dry chair as her husband and brother-in-law taunted Pansy Parkinson about Draco Malfoy who was 'missing'. The girl thought she was in love with Draco and while she kept her mouth closed in front of the Dark Lord, Pansy had asked Bellatrix for aid in locating her 'betrothed'.
Suddenly, Bellatrix set up and shouted, "Be silent!"
The witch stood and moved toward where a window once provided a view of the gardens. A peacock ran from the yard when it caught view of the figure at the shattered encasement. She cast a spell with her wand and watched it point eastward toward London.
"I remember Grimmauld Place suddenly. The house is in London, and it appears that our lord's familiar is in that direction as well," Bellatrix announced.
"Bella…what are you?" asked Rabastan as his sister-in-law gave them one of her scary smiles.
"Wait here," she commanded and apparated away. Rodolphus LeStrange, also remembering the house, apparated away to protect his wife and keep her from beginning a fight without sufficient backup.
& CHANGE SCENE &
There was a loud pop as a wild-eyed witch appeared in the middle of the street. She paid no attention to the vehicles and workmen around her. With a negligent wave, she cast a powerful notice-me-not and then made two men fall from scaffolding. Sirens sounded and the majority of men moved away from the part of the street where she stood, staring at the front of her aunt's old home. Two supervisors among the work crew were muggle-born wizards who had seen Bellatrix LeStrange appear in the street. They also found that another rowhouse appeared between No10 and No.14.
"Get everyone out of here," the site manager shouted. "This work sight is shut down!"
The workmen obeyed the command without question with the push of a mild compulsion charm. Within minutes, the muggles shut down all motors and drove away in their vehicles or the down entrances to the tube. They all headed to their local pubs for an early beer except for the two men with broken legs caused by their fall.
In the meantime, Bella approached the house and stared at the window where several items were stuck to the glass. Behind her, Rodolphus appeared with a softer pop. He immediately scanned the area and noticed the muggles were leaving.
'At least there aren't a dozen dead in some explosion,' he thought with relief. He didn't care if Bellatrix killed muggles all day, but he didn't want to clean up a mess where the ministry appeared unless he had plenty of Death Eaters as cannon fodder and backup. Now he hurried to the witch's side where she glanced at him and smiled.
"Roddie, someone has been busy collecting some toys and displaying them in the window," she said. "And the snake is here."
Studying the window, Rodolphus nodded in agreement but counselled, "We must return to Wiltshire and inform our lord. He will be pleased with your report Bella."
Smacking her husband's arm lightly, Bellatrix smiled and said, "He will, won't he? Maybe he'll give me a blood traitor to play with for a night or two."
&& CHANGE SCENE &&
In Malfoy Manor, Pansy Parkinson and Rabastan LeStrange spread the word that Bellatrix and Rodolphus had apparated away with a lead to the location of the Dark Lord's familiar. When the pair reappeared, Lucius led them immediately into the presence of the Dark Lord.
Bellatrix announced, "I found her! Nagini is captive in the Black family home in London."
"How is that possible?"
Rudolphus explained, "There must have been a fidelius charm cast on the house and it has failed because Bella and I both suddenly remembered the place."
"Is it a trap?" asked Lucius.
"No doubt," Voldemort replied. "Let me see the memory, Bella."
The Dark Lord leapt into Bella's mind and first examined the return of Bella's memory of the house.
'That does look like a failing charm. No one removed the charm – Dumbledore's work no doubt.' Then the Dark Lord moved to the next memory and smirked when Bellatrix caused the muggles to fall and receive injuries. She did not pay any additional attention to the muggles but slowly approached the row house labelled as No.12.
'What is this?' he raged when he caught sight of his treasures stuck in the window. Ripping his probe from Bellatrix's mind and causing her to scream and collapse to the floor, the Dark Lord turned to Rudolphus and jumped into the wizard's mind. He watched the man arrive on the street and observe the fleeing muggles before following his wife as she walked toward the window.
Rudolphus saw the same items as Bellatrix plus a hand that was stuck to the window. Dropping out of the wizard's mind with the same violence as he had when he left Bella's mind, Voldemort took several deep breaths.
'My diary was there,' he remembered. He glared at Lucius and determined to kill the fool before the day was over. The wife and son would remain petrified and imprisoned in Bella's necklace for the next twenty years.
When he looked about, Bella and Rudolphus both were on their feet with blood dripping down their faces from their noses. Voldemort cast wandless healing charms on both Death Eaters – he would need their full power this afternoon when they entered Grimmauld Place.
"It is a trap no doubt, but I don't think they are prepared. They were attempting to remove or alter the fidelius charm but failed. We go now, we hit the front door hard. Dumbledore and Potter are to be taken alive. Everyone else dies!"
& CHANGE & SCENE &