Death in a Dog-Collar
Chapter Two: Bumped Off in the Night
To say that Sandra had had a peaceful night would be to overstate the case. For one thing, no matter how weary they might be, she and Peter never slept well when apart. Even after her pre-bed video calls, one to David and a more risqué one to Peter later on, she still missed them both. The evening had been an unsurprisingly subdued one, with everyones' thoughts on their murdered colleague and the potential danger they were all in, the tension was palpable. Finally, with a chair wedged firmly under the door handle and a heavy book close to hand, Sandra had gone to bed. But sleep had been a long time coming and though it was deep when it arrived, she still woke earlier than normal. Still, after a shower she felt able to go down to breakfast.
It was still early, and though breakfast was being served, there were few people in the restaurant. Sandra, having never been able to manage a cooked breakfast, had grabbed a glass of orange juice and some croissants, butter and jam from the buffet. Glancing around, she saw that one table was occupied by a familiar figure, so she went over.
"Mind if I join you, Draco?" She asked.
Rather to her surprise, Draco actually got up and seated her before resuming his place. A server immediately appeared and enquired if Sandra would like a hot drink.
"Oh, tea, please!" She replied.
"Certainly, Reverend," the waiter replied, "which blend?"
Sandra blinked -tea was tea, unless you counted that awful chamomile stuff Hermi was so fond of. Draco came to her rescue. "I recommend English Breakfast."
"Err, ok, yes, I'll have that!" Sandra told the server, who nodded and moved away.
"There are those of the more modern persuasion," Draco noted, "who take the view that drinking tea in the mornings is somewhat vulgar. However, I find myself more disposed to the traditional habit of reserving coffee for the evening.
"Did you sleep well, Sandra?"
"Sort of." She allowed. "Just not for as long as usual!"
"Sleeping at all under the current circumstances tells me that you are not someone who is easily scared." Draco noted.
At that point the waiter reappeared with a large, laden tray. He placed a small pot of tea, jug of milk, bowl of sugar and teacup in front of Sandra. "English Breakfast tea." He told her. Then he placed a plate in front of Draco. "Your Scotch Woodcock, sir."
"I'm no expert on game-birds," Sandra said as the waiter moved off, "but your 'woodcock' looks more like scrambled eggs on toast!"
"Which indeed it is." Draco replied. "With the key added ingredient of The Gentlemans' Relish spread on the toast! I was frankly delighted to see it on the menu, as it is not often served nowadays."
Sandra noted that although Draco rarely smiled, his eyes frequently twinkled with humour. He was not a person, she thought, who displayed emotion too openly.
"You informed me yesterday," he went on, "that this was not, quote, 'your first rodeo'. From that I infer that you have encountered dangerous or at least unusual occurrences before. Would you mind telling me about that?"
"Long stories." Sandra said. "I'll give you the Readers' Digest version. A few years ago some odd stuff was going on in my parish -some kind of protection racket, but not the usual sort…"
"Use of an Imperius Curse to make people damage their own property, followed by a demand for money in order to prevent a reoccurrence?" Draco asked.
"Bang on!" Sandra acknowledged. "I sort of guessed magic might be involved, so I spoke to Hermi and Ronnie, and they came over to help. It got complicated because there was a Kobold in the house the crooks were using. Also, they were using that house because they were treasure-hunting. There was a cellar with a tunnel that led to an ancient tomb and the tomb had a Wight in it!"
"Indeed?" Draco raised an eyebrow. "Had you been in any other company, that would undoubtedly have been the end of you! However, I take leave to doubt that a mere Wight gave more than a moments' pause to the formidable Mr Weasley and his no less redoubtable spouse!"
He talks like someone in a Victorian novel, Sandra thought, but he makes it sound so natural! She nodded. "I'd never realised just how dangerous Ronnie is or how skilled a witch Hermi is!
"Well, I thought that was the end of it, adventures, I mean, until I was told that someone was lighting bonfires in the old ruined church. Peter – my other half – and I thought it was kids and we went up one night to scare them off. We were lucky, my talent warned me that something much worse was going on! We got clear and I got in touch with Hermi, but a bit late. Peter and I were kidnapped – David was at his grandparents, luckily -and things looked sticky until Ronnie turned up with Harry and another chap – not a wizard -called Dante."
"Dante?" Draco queried. "Tall, rugged fellow with white hair, a red coat, an unnecessarily large sword and an equally oversized opinion of himself?"
"That would be him!" Sandra agreed with a chuckle.
"Well, since Dante Sparda is a freelance demon hunter, then I take it that someone was summoning demons." Draco said. "A somewhat risky pastime at best! I gather matters became a little intense?"
"Too intense for me to want to say much about it." Sandra confessed.
"Then I shall ask no more." Draco allowed. "So you are a family person?"
"Yep!" She averred. "Peter's in banking, which is good, because vicars aren't that well paid! But he does talk in numbers and formulas sometimes, which is annoying. Our son, David, is ten and a complete hellion, when he's not being a total charmer!
"How about you?"
"I am married." Draco told her. "A state which has proved more survivable that I imagined it would be. Astoria is fortunately a woman of great fortitude and patience. Our son is named Scorpius. He attends Hogwarts, where he has thrown family tradition to the winds by being sorted into Gryffindor House. He has also, presumably with an eye to not repeating my mistakes, made fast friends with the current generation of Potters and Weasleys."
"Clever lad!" Sandra approved. "But you can't be that difficult to live with, Draco!"
This time he did grin, an expression that had more than a little of the wolf in it. "You have no idea!" He replied. "I am unconscionably fussy about what I eat, drink and wear, for one thing. For another, I can be more than a little irascible upon occasion. I am also not over- fond of socialising; dinner parties bring out the absolute worst in me."
Sandra was about to point out that there were worse character traits, when Dean Sillitoe came up to the table, quickly enough to indicate concern while not actually running.
"Agent Malfoy." He said. "There's been another…incident. If you would follow me?"
Draco calmly scooped up his last mouthful of egg and rose to his feet.
"Sandra?" He said.
"If you think I can help…" She said, getting up.
"Your insights may be of value." Draco told her as they moved off. "You are also an excellent sounding board for my own thoughts. Come, Whitson, the game's afoot!"
"If I didn't know better, I'd think you only wanted me along so you could say that!" She replied.
XXXXX
The man in the bed looked to be in this thirties, sharp-featured, brown hair with a pronounced widows' peak, and quite dead.
"I'm getting nothing." Sandra told Draco. "He must have died in his sleep."
Draco bent over the corpse and lifted an eyelid. Then he pulled the bedclothes down a little to examine the neck.
"Asphyxiation due to strangulation." He said grimly. "I saw the petechial haemorrhaging in the eye, and here are the marks on his neck."
"Looks like a rope or something, not hands." Sillitoe noted.
"Yes…." Draco looked around, then his eye fell on a plant pot that stood on a small table under the window. He went over and Sandra followed. She saw that the pot had the hotels' logo on it and that there was a printed card propped against it which read Compliments of the Management. The plant in the pot was decidedly unimpressive, being no more than a dark green stalk with a couple of leaves. Draco examined the plant carefully.
"Dirty work at the crossroads!" Draco remarked, then opened the curtains wide. The sunlight streamed in, and as soon as it touched the plant, the leaves shrivelled and the stalk pulled back into the soil.
"Quite so." Draco nodded. "I would need confirmation from my sometime classmate Neville Longbottom – currently Professor of Herbology at Hogwarts – but I believe this to be Devils' Noose!"
"Which is?" Sandra asked.
"A recent and prohibited magical cultivar of the common Devils' Snare." Draco told them. "Devils' Snare will entangle a person or animal who encroaches on it, and will tighten if the intruder struggles. The outcome can be fatal, but generally if the victim ceases to struggle or becomes unconscious, the plant will relax its' grip.
"Devils' Noose, however, is more aggressive. It will actively seek out body warmth and the sound of breathing, with a view to putting an end to them. Placed in a dark room with a sleeping person, the outcome is inevitable, as we see. Fortunately for us, the cultivar is even more heliophobic than its root stock. Even sunlight filtered through curtains is sufficient to paralyse it, and full sunlight causes it to retreat underground."
"So, it's definitely a wizard thing?" Sillitoe asked.
"There is certainly wizard involvement." Draco allowed. "But, that said, a muggle of sufficient intelligence could be instructed as to how to safely place the plant, and such items can be purchased, even by muggles, on the black market."
"So, not a wizard?" Sandra enquired.
"Not necessarily." Draco replied. "We may, after all, be dealing with more than one person. Possibly a wizard with a muggle partner or subordinate. In default of more information, I am disinclined to be prescriptive at this point."
He Transfigured the pot into a metal sphere, which he then shrank and placed in his pocket. "I will take this to Hogwarts in due course." He said. "Professor Longbottom will no doubt have the time of his life studying it!"
"What do we do?" Sillitoe asked.
"I will seal this room." Draco said. "You will tell your colleagues that this man has passed away during the night, but you will plead ignorance as to how. I realise that lying is not encouraged among the clergy, but under the circumstances this is our best option. I would also advise that everyone stay in sight of everyone else for the time being. It is clear that our perpetrator does not like crowds.
"I will speak with Her Grace immediately. If you would, Sandra?"
XXXX
It happened as they were walking along the corridor to the Bishops' suite. Sandra suddenly moved closer to Draco, touched his hand lightly and murmured.
"Somebody just tried to cast an Imperius curse on me!"
"Walk ahead a little." He replied. Then he was gone.
Sandra walked on a few metres, then turned on hearing a gasp. A man had emerged from behind the drawn curtains of a large window. Not as tall as Draco, but broader. He was raising his wand, too late, as Draco was already within arms reach. There was a blur of movement and a yelp, then a wand skittered across the floor to land at Sandras' feet. The wizard spun away from Draco and went into a fighting stance.
Draco moved into a similar stance, thinking: He's right-handed, and expecting karate.
His opponent came in with a sword-strike. Draco evaded rather than blocking, going in fast and low with a half-fist to the solar plexus followed immediately by an elbow strike to the jaw. This direct and brutal attack caught his adversary off-guard and put him down, out cold.
"You fight a bit like Ronnie and Harry." Sandra said. "But your stance was different."
"You are observant, as I have said." Draco replied. "Ronald trained in Taekwondo and Harry in Aikido, while I learned Shotokan. However, we are all also trained in Krav Maga. There is a wand under your foot, Sandra."
"Yeah." She said. "I didn't want to pick it up because of fingerprints, but I also didn't want him picking it up too easily!"
"If he had attacked you…" Draco said.
"I'd've yelled my head off and tried to kick him in the knackers or claw his eyes out." Sandra told him. "Somebody would have heard!"
"Quite so." Draco admitted. "Tell me, is 'knackers' a theological term?"
"Purely secular." Sandra responded. "The theological term is 'wedding tackle'!"
"Ah!" Draco nodded, then took a clear plastic bag from a pocket and handed it to her. "Handle the wand with this. I will bring our new acquaintance along."
"What has it got in its' pocketses?" Sandra asked. "Practically everything, it seems!"
"As much as one may reasonably get into a pair of magically-augmented pockets." Draco allowed. "Though sadly there is a distinct shortage of Rings of Power!" He bound the unconscious man with a spell Sandra had seen before, and began to hoist him, with little apparent effort, over his shoulders.
"Rings of Power?" She said. "So Third Age! Who needs them when you have a smart-phone? One app to rule them all, as they say!"
XXXXX
The Bishop watched with interest as Draco dumped his prisoner unceremoniously into an armchair.
"What happened?" She asked.
"Our friend here made an elementary but understandable mistake." Draco said. "He attempted to take mental control of Sandra here, doubtless in order to use her as a distraction which would have left me open to attack. It seems, however, he was not aware that Sandra is an active Psyker, and as such naturally immune to curses of that nature."
"But equally naturally aware of it when somebody tries." Sandra added. "I warned Draco, and he did the rest!"
"Do you know him?" Sillitoe asked.
"His face is not familiar." Draco admitted. "But, small as our world is by comparison with the muggle one, I do not know every wizard by sight."
"Is it over, then?" Craddock asked.
"Not until we are sure that our friend here was acting alone." Draco said. "Mr Sillitoe, if you would be so good as to proceed as we agreed earlier? Thank you, we will join you in the main area shortly."
Sillitoe left, not without a piercing glance back at the unconscious wizard.
Draco took out his wand, an unusually long one, Sandra noted, and glossy black in colour.
"Let us see what our guest has to say for himself." Draco said. "Ennervate!"
The man was jerked back into awareness suddenly, but clearly realised his situation quickly, glaring at Draco but saying nothing.
"Good morning." Draco said formally. "We haven't been introduced. My name is Malfoy, Draco Malfoy. May I ask yours?"
The wizards' mouth worked for a moment, then he spat "Hail HYDRA!" stiffened, then slumped.
"Oh, dear." Draco said. "I was afraid that might happen. HYDRA operatives are quite absurdly loyal. It may be something to do with the threat of death by slow torture if they are found to have cooperated with a captor.
"My apologies, your Grace. It was not my intention to expose you to such unpleasantness."
"I've seen death before, Agent Malfoy." The Bishop said. "I was a hospital chaplain for a while.
"Is this it, then? Is it over?"
"Not quite." Draco admitted. "This man had an accomplice. I have my suspicions as to their identity, but require more proof.
"Since my erstwhile opponent is going nowhere, I suggest that you and Mr Craddock go to the lobby. People will be worried and you must do your best to contain the situation until I arrive.
"Sandra, you're with me!"
The last sentence was spoken without the usual drawl and elaborate phraseology, reminding Sandra of Ron at his most tactical.
XXXXX
Draco set off down the corridor as a smart pace, talking as he went. It was, Sandra thought, a good job that she too had long legs and was in fairly good shape. Hermi would have had to fairly run to keep up with Draco. She noticed also that the languid gentleman spy was gone, replaced by a man who fairly vibrated with energy.
"I don't need much sleep." Draco was saying. "So I spent a good deal of last night snooping around. I got into the Security Room and found out that whatever was locking this place down seemed to be coming from outside. I'm no tech expert, but I had a look in the Server Room and found this!"
He showed her a small grey plastic box. There was a switch on the top and a blue light glowed beside it.
"I've seen things like this before." Draco went on. "It's the sort of gadget an organisation called AIM manufactures and sells. At the moment, it's still switched on, but I'll be switching it off soon enough!"
"Well, like you said earlier about a muggle and that magic plant, a wizard could be taught how to use that." Sandra pointed out.
"Of course." Draco acknowledged. "Which is why I've assembled everyone in one place."
They had arrived at the managers' office, Draco knocked briefly and went in.
"What do you need, Agent Malfoy?" The manager asked.
"I need you to station security staff at all the exits." Draco said. "Anyone attempting to leave in a hurry should be detained until I give the all-clear. You should also place some people in the Server Room to apprehend anyone trying to enter there. The imposed lockdown should end shortly, but it is important that no-one leaves until I give the word."
Then they were off again, heading towards the Conference Suite.
"I need you to keep an eye out while I'm talking to them." Draco told Sandra. "If you see anything off-kilter, let me know. I have my notions as to what is going on, but I can't be sure, and I can't watch all of them, so I need your eyes as well."
Not far from the door to the Conference Suite, a man was waiting. Tall, powerfully-built with fair hair and a square-jawed face.
"Mr Dursley, thank you for coming." Draco said. "Events march, and I'm in a position where to use hotel security might defeat my object. So I need you to stay near the door, but unobtrusively. Should anyone try to leave before I or my partner here let you know it's alright, I need you to detain them, or at least delay them, until I get there.
"Use any means necessary, but do not place yourself in danger. If firearms or a wand are involved, back off and shout!"
"Got it!" Dursley nodded, face set.
Sillitoe was waiting for them just inside the Conference Centre Lobby, where there was considerable hubbub going on.
"The natives are getting restless!" He informed them. "Somebody must have been in the corridor and overheard us talking in the dead mans' room, and it looks like somebody also saw you capture that wizard!
"They want out, and I can't blame them! I'm going to stay here for now and try to stop any stampede.
"Do what you have to do, but make it quick!"
Draco nodded and carried on. Sandra noted that people were giving them a wide berth, which was odd but convenient. She murmured to Draco.
"Why is the Dean more afraid of you than worried about a panic?"
"Excellent question." He murmured back. "Watch him!"
The Bishop was standing on the speakers' platform under the big screen. When she saw Draco and Sandra approaching, she stepped over to the podium, switched on the microphone, and called out:
"Everyone! Can I have your attention, please!"
It was not a shout, precisely, but the tone carried a natural authority that caused the hubbub to cease almost at once.
"Thank you." The Bishop continued. "Now, you've all been very patient in what's been a scary time, but with any luck it'll all be over soon. Here is Agent Malfoy of SHIELD to update us all on the situation."
"We don't need updating!" Called a fat, red-faced vicar at the front of the crowd. "We know what's happened. Somebody else has been killed, and he duelled with the wizard who did it and caught him! It's all done and we need to get out of here and go home!"
"And after that," another priest called out, a tall, thin, elderly man who had been a big supporter of the former Bishop, "we need to put a motion before the Synod to forbid any more lax interpretation of Scripture regarding so-called 'empowered humans'!"
"In the matter of Scripture, I can only confess to profound ignorance." Draco, who had taken the podium, replied. "However, may I ask you, sir, how you came by the information you have just shared?"
Under Dracos' icy gaze, the red-faced vicar was less aggressive, but nevertheless audible.
"Everybody knows!" He said. "Somebody heard you talking in the dead mans' room, and you were seen duelling with the wizard! Nobody told us you were one as well!"
"Remarkable!" Draco said. "Given the fact that I had placed a Silencing Spell on the doorway, so that nobody outside the room could possibly have heard anything that was said inside it. It is also worthy of remark that I did not engage in a duel, at least of the magical type, with the guilty party, but overcame him in hand-to-hand combat.
"May I ask who gave you your information?"
It was the tall thin man who answered, frowning slightly. "I'm not sure. I heard it from somebody who heard it from someone else. Are you saying that it's all untrue?"
"No, just not entirely accurate, at least in the matter of the duel." Draco replied. "As to the rest, unfortunately another of your number was murdered last night. However, that fact, along with anything else discussed in that room, could only be known by three people: myself, the Reverend Granger-Whitson here, and the Dean. The Reverend and I have been in each others' company the entire time, and so can vouch for each other. Dean Sillitoe, however…"
"Is doing a runner!" Sandra interrupted, pointing.
Sillitoe made it out of the door, but then found the looming figure of Dursley in his path. He stopped, half off-balance and wholly unsure of who this unknown person was. Dursley never gave him time to figure it out, stepping in and landing a solid right that stretched the fugitive on the floor, out cold.
"Game, set and match!" Draco announced.
XXXX
"It is fortunate that SHIELD conducts very thorough background checks on potential contacts." Draco was saying later. The bulk of the clergy had departed, and SHIELD teams had taken away the dead wizard and a concussed Sillitoe. Now there was only a small group, sitting in an otherwise empty coffee shop. Draco, Sandra, the Bishop, Reverend Craddock, the Dursleys and the thin elderly priest who'd been complaining about lax doctrine earlier.
"We knew, for instance," Draco went on, "that Major Stephen Sillitoe had been invalided out of the army with severe Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder many years ago. He is currently resident in a private clinic which presents itself as a charitable concern dedicated to the housing and treatment of PTSD cases who have no family. We suspect it to be a HYDRA operation dedicated to stealing the identities of patients and assigning them to covert operatives. However, we had no concrete evidence until now."
"But surely the Army would have told the Church that?" The Bishop said.
"Had they been asked, I am sure they would." Draco replied. "However, the Army regards such information as highly confidential, and would only reveal it upon receipt of a proper query. It seems that at the time our impostor applied to begin studying for ministry, the Church authorities were less than zealous in their research, confining it to a simple request for confirmation that there had in fact been a Major Sillitoe in the correct regiment at the right time."
The Bishop sighed. "You're right, of course. The sad fact is that we get so very few applicants of a decent standard, or any standard, that at one time, we'd settle for anyone with a pulse! Of course," she added wryly, "we were only recruiting from half the population back then!"
"So," This was the elderly priest who had protested about lax doctrine, "you knew it was Sillitoe all along?"
"No, I did not." Draco allowed. "The fact that he was using the name of another person did not invalidate the fact that, over the years, he had built a career in the Church on merit and hard work. For all I knew to the contrary, his imposture might have been for the purpose of hiding a personal history that would have barred him from the priesthood. I am not a religious person myself, and in any event, such matters do not fall within my professional remit.
"It did mark him, however, as a person of interest. Nevertheless, the precautions I took against being overheard whilst in the room of the second victim were not aimed at Mr Sillitoe, but at preventing a panic. It was only when Sandra here informed me of his state of mind that I was sure. That and his insistence on remaining near the door."
"And how, may I ask," the older priest went on, "was the Reverend Granger-Whitson able to assess his taste of mind so accurately and well?"
"You've already guessed that!" Sandra told him. "I'm a Mutant, a Psyker, of course. Not a powerful one, if Sillitoe hadn't been on the edge of panic, I wouldn't have been able to read him."
The old man shook his head. "It seems this old dog has some new tricks to learn!" He admitted. "I came here full of doubt about wizards and Mutants and so forth. It seems I was too quick to judge!"
"We're just people." Sandra said. "We can do things other people can't, but then they can do things we can't. I'd make a terrible accountant!"
"Will you be able to interrogate Sillitoe, or whatever his name is?" Craddock asked. "Only the other one killed himself when you tried!"
"We have a chance." Draco said. "I removed the false tooth and its poison capsule while he was unconscious. That alone proves him a HYDRA operative. However, there will be an implant either near his heart or at the base of his skull which contains a receiver and an explosive charge. If he does not report as scheduled twice in a row, his handler will detonate the device as a precaution. We cannot jam it, as the device only detonates if it ceases to receive a signal. If we are quick and careful, SHIELD surgeons will be able to remove it safely. Similarly, if we can isolate his computer and other devices quickly enough, we should be able to get enough data from them to estimate the degree to which HYDRA has infiltrated the Anglican Church.
"Now, Mr Dursley, I must thank you for your valuable assistance in this matter, as well as impressing upon you the need for absolute confidentiality regarding it. I must also say that there is something about your name which is nagging at the back of my mind, but I cannot recall what it is."
Dursley grinned. "I'm Harry Potters' cousin." He said. "We grew up together and I'm afraid I didn't treat him well for a lot of the time! This should go part of the way to making up for it!"
"So that's it!" Draco shook his head. "Harry has mentioned his foster-family occasionally. Well, we have this in common -I was guilty of treating Harry badly as a youngster. But he is a forgiving soul, fortunately."
"Too forgiving sometimes!" Dursley observed. "Fortunately, he's got that big brute Weasley around to clean up after him! I never knew what a thousand-yard stare was until I met him!"
"Quite so." Draco agreed. "Now if that is everything, I'm sure we all have places to be and things to do!
"Sandra, a word?"
The others left, then Draco said. "I would like to thank you, Sandra, for your invaluable assistance during this affair. It is considered bad practice for SHIELD agents to operate solo, and I am unused to doing so. Having your sharp mind and reliable presence here was of considerable help."
"I'm glad I could assist, Draco." She said. "Though I didn't do much!"
"You did exactly what I needed you to do." Draco told her. "Especially when one considers that you would have been perfectly justified in refusing to help at all!"
"Oh, I couldn't have done nothing, any more than Hermi could have!" Sandra declared.
They got up, and shook hands warmly. Sandra was tempted to hug him, but knew it would be unwelcome.
"Well, if you and your family are ever near Alfstonleigh, do drop in for Sunday Service. We have tea and biccies afterwards!" Sandra invited.
"Thank you for the invitation." Draco said with one of his rare grins. "But do not, as they say, hold your breath!"