19. The fasting of demons

Caius's cottage stood in darkness, the only light coming from the kitchen window. Hermione sat at the heavy, pockmarked kitchen table, her face pale in the glare of the single light bulb that protruded from the ceiling. Sitting before her on the kitchen table was an unmarked glass bottle containing a black liquid.

'Sure this is a good idea?' Caius had asked her before handing over the bottle.

'I don't have good ideas anymore,' she had replied.

'Do you want me there as some kind of back-up?' he had asked.

'No, I'll be alright, I think.'

The kitchen had a desolate, abandoned air about it. She had tidied away the tea things and put the few provisions in the house away in the cupboards, as if she was preparing to lock up the house and leave.

Isaac Edwards had located Rachel Thirlwell, and had made an appointment with her for ten o'clock that evening. He was also carrying a flask of Dementico, or Lillian Herrick's special brew, as he called it. The trick was going to be to get Rachel Thirlwell to drink from it too.

'She might have been warned, of course,' Isaac had said.

'Then again, she might not,' Hermione had replied. 'It'll make the show more entertaining, and it'll be more of a test for Lillian Herrick if she decides to help her.'

Noticing the sound of rain outside, she got up and looked out into the darkness. I still have a few minutes. A little of the light from the back lane behind the house made it as far as the cottage, making a dull orange background for the raindrops splashing against the grimy kitchen window. Out in the lane nothing was moving.

'But do you think there's any chance of convincing her to leave Lillian?' she had said to Isaac.

'I don't know, but I'm going to try anyway.' He had seemed to shiver as he spoke the words. He has something up his sleeve. She could look for herself of course, but if he wasn't willing to tell her, she wasn't willing to try. She had sworn to herself she wouldn't do that again.

'Isn't it worth us going on the offensive?' he had added, the tension, or the nerves, still palpable in his voice.

'Even if we win, how will we know that we really won and weren't just allowed to win?'

'Is that a reason to do nothing?'

'No. It isn't.'

The cold seeped easily through the single window pane. She pulled the belt around her cardigan a little tighter. She was wearing a scarf to shield her from the cold and damp that had set in. The sickly heat that had ushered in Halloween was a distant memory. Should I have told Harry what I'm planning to do? She looked away from the window and drifted back to the table, her gaze falling on the innocuous little bottle of black liquid. I don't know.

A street at night unfolded in front of her at a fast walking pace. The image before was slightly blurred, and she squinted instinctively in an attempt to make the picture clearer, but this had no effect. On the left-hand of the street was a series of shop fronts, some closed for the evening, some boarded up. A dirty brick wall ran along the other side of the street, and the dim clanking of a train could be heard from a cutting below. Isaac walked at a relentless pace, and Hermione felt a sensation of disorientation, as if her head was moving without her legs. A teenaged boy in a tracksuit crossed the street in front of him, head down and smoking a cigarette, and was narrowly missed by a car. The boy stopped before a door that opened onto the street and started hammering on it. Isaac pressed on, passing the brightly lit window of a kebab shop, before crossing the road himself and stopping before a brick-fronted post-war block of flats.

He looked down a row of doorbells with flat numbers next to them, selected one and pressed it. A girl's voice said 'third floor' through the metal grill above the doorbells and he was buzzed in. He glanced for a moment at the lift then made instead for the stairs. The stairwell was utilitarian, with bare brick walls and concrete steps, but it seemed fairly clean.

The door opened quickly.

'You're very punctual,' said the girl who stood in the doorway. She's the one. She has that look in her eyes. The girl was scarcely twenty if that. Her hazel eyes looked out from within a dark swathe of black and silver eye make-up. Her skin was pale and her long black hair tied back in a ponytail, apart from a couple of stray locks of hair that fell down by her temples. She was wearing a tight-fitting long-sleeved black top, a short denim skirt, black tights and knee-high black motorcycle boots. Around her neck she wore a long silver chain. From the chain hung an eye-shaped pendant, wreathed by barbed wire, and on her fingers she wore multiple rings. The eyes were clear and searching, pale halos reflected in them from the light over their head. They stared quizzically at Isaac, assessing him. As to what his reaction to her was, Hermione elected to leave that to him.

'I tend to be,' was his reply.

'Why don't you come in?' She turned away from the door and he followed her in.

The flat was incongruously luxurious in comparison to the bleak stairwell. It had the comfortable and modern decor of a hotel room, save for the crimson walls. There was a king-sized bed, a leather sofa, and a mahogany table with four chairs. The decor was minimal, apart from a bedside lamp, a full-length mirror and in one corner of the room, a bar.

She stood in the centre of the room, apparently looking at the scene before her. Then she turned to him with a flourish.

'So … where do you want me?' she said quickly.

'The table,' he replied.

'What do you want to do there?'

'I want us to talk,' he replied in a low voice.

'I see.'

'You sound a little disappointed, but that can't be right.'

'Maybe I am, maybe I'm not,' she replied.

They sat down opposite one another at the table.

'So you're one of the ones who want to talk …' she said as she sat down.

'Tonight I want to talk,' he replied. 'I suppose you get people like that in here from time to time?'

'Certainly,' she replied.

'Do they want to talk about themselves or about you?' he asked.

'A majority want to talk about themselves, others want to 'get to know me', if you see what I mean. They like to have a more personal relationship. Or perhaps they want to save me. What do you want?'

'A bit of both, I suppose,' he replied.

'You suppose? I won't get my hopes up in that case.'

She sat for a moment, contemplating him with what seemed like a more relaxed air. She feels in control.

'Why don't I get you something to drink?' she said, quickly rising up out of her chair.

'Why don't you?'

She went over to the bar and looked under it.

'What do you want?' she asked courteously.

'Just a tonic,' he replied.

'Nothing stronger than that?'

'Not for the moment.'

She opened a small bottle of tonic, the kind normally found in a hotel minibar, and poured it into a tall glass. She brought the glass over and laid it down on the table before him.

'Are you not having anything?'

'I haven't decided what to have yet.'

He waited silently, not touching his drink, as she went back to the bar and poured herself the same drink as his.

As she sat down she glanced with faint amusement at his untouched drink.

'How gentlemanly of you to wait for me.'

'Oh, I don't know about that.'

He waited for her to drink first before reaching out to sip from his drink.

'Not everyone is attentive to a little detail like that,' she said, brushing a strand of hair out of her eyes. 'I think we just got off on the right foot.'

He picked up his glass again.

'In that case, let me drink to us staying on good terms throughout the evening.' This time he raised his glass and took a longer mouthful. Her eyes blinked rapidly in quick succession as she watched him drink. When he put the glass down on the table it was half empty.

'Naturally relaxed,' she remarked. 'I envy you.'

'Oh I'm sure,' he replied in a lower voice.

'You do drink stronger things, I suppose?'

She could easily find that out if she wanted, Hermione whispered in the dark, half to herself.

He paused for a moment before replying.

'Oh, I drink, ' he replied nonchalantly. 'I hope I haven't just gone down in your estimation.'

She smiled, and this time the smile lingered a little longer.

'You value my good opinion. I'm touched.'

She glanced for a moment across the room at a spot that was beyond Hermione's sight.

'Since we're just talking at the moment,' she went on, 'I could do with a cigarette. You don't mind, I suppose?'

'Go ahead,' he replied. She stood up and walked to the bar. Her bag lay on the counter. She opened it and took out a packet of cigarettes and a lighter. She returned to the table, sat down and lit a cigarette. She offered him one but he refused. She left the lighter on the table.

'Do you have some problems you'd like to tell me about?' she said in a bright manner. 'I'm quite likely to have some very good advice,' she said, exhaling her first intake of the cigarette. 'People like me often do, don't they?'

'You probably would,' he replied. 'I was going to say something like you're too intelligent for this, but I'll spare you sentiments you've probably heard before.'

She looked at him strangely for a moment, before regaining her composure.

'Sometimes it's convenient to come across as not so intelligent,' she replied quietly. 'Some people prefer it that way.'

'But you didn't think I would.'

She blew smoke away again.

'No, I didn't.'

They looked at each for a moment.

'Shall we run through the schedule for this evening?' she said with an arch look. 'You've booked me for the rest of the night. Are we going to spend the whole night talking?'

'That would be a bit much,' replied Isaac. 'To be honest I don't know how things are going to pan out. Can I start by telling you my name?'

'Your real name, I suppose?'

'Absolutely.'

'Go on then,' she replied, exhaling a cloud of smoke over the table.

'My name is Isaac.'

'It's charming,' she said gaily. 'My name is Severine,' she added in a mock sultry voice. He actually laughed. Don't think I've ever heard him do that before. The girl laughed along with him.

'It's nice, though, don't you think?'

He nodded.

'Just the right balance between darkness, exoticism and stereotype.'

'Something like that,' she replied, rolling her eyes.

'Just out of curiosity …,' he began.

'No,' she said, interrupting him. She paused for a moment, eyeing him with a cooler look. Not right now, she means.

'No problem,' he replied. 'It was a liberty on my part to ask.' She held his gaze, hers still tense.

'Anyway,' she said, breaking off the gaze, her tone more business-like. 'You were saying that you want to talk about me and about you. Why don't we start with you?'

'Fair enough,' he said. 'Ask me a question then.'

'Ok,' she said, sitting back in her chair. 'What are you, Isaac?'

'The way you put the question, you almost seem like you know what the answer is.'

'Oh no, I'm genuinely all curiosity.'

'Ok,' he said. 'I'm a wizard.'

Her eyelids blinked rapidly.

'A conjurer,' she replied in a cold voice that reminded Hermione of someone else. 'What, do you do children's parties and things like that?'

He laid his hand on the table, his open palm facing her. In an instant the lighter was in his hand.

'Not bad,' she replied in the same tone of voice. 'Can you do any more party tricks?' For the first time, Hermione felt a presence, not far from her, probing. Rachel was looking inside.

'She's looking,' Hermione whispered.

'What did you see?' he asked, suddenly looking up. She looked at him again, and there was the smallest flicker of apprehension.

'You made the lighter move across the table without touching it,' she replied in an off-hand manner.

'I don't mean there,' he replied. She looked at him again, her eyes wide open. For a while she said nothing. She glanced around the room, as if she was looking for something that would help her. At last she returned his gaze.

'I saw kindness,' she replied softly. 'And sadness. And guilt. Gnawing guilt. The same inside as out.'

'I mean you no harm,' he said, almost inaudibly. 'Don't call for help. There's no need. You're in control of this situation. You decide what happens here tonight.'

She nodded in reply. He leaned in a little closer.

'Tell me how you came to be here, Rachel.'

At the sound of her name she shuddered and seemed to glance around the room, her eyes glassy. After a few moments of silence, she looked back at him, her gaze clearer again.

'I'm here because this is where I was always meant to be,' she said at last, leaning back and pouting slightly.

He continued to look at her intently.

'You'll have to explain how that works,' he replied. His tone was more forceful, less forgiving. She paused again, raising her head slightly, as if listening for something indistinct in the air.

'First of all I want to know something.'

'Ask me.'

'How do you know me? Who sent you to find me? You tell me what you know about me, and then maybe I'll fill in the blanks, if I feel like it. I'll know if you're lying.'

He nodded.

'I take it as a compliment that you didn't feel the need to look until now.'

She narrowed her eyes.

'In spite of the present circumstances, somehow you seem trustworthy,' she replied. 'So how do you know me?'

'We're interested in you because you're interested in us.'

'Who are 'we' in this case?'

'Other wizards and witches.'

A smile started to tease itself out of her mouth.

'Oh you exist, then, do you?'

'We exist all right. And as I said, we're very interested in you.'

'I'm not interested in you,' she replied quickly.

'But she is. She's involved herself in our business.'

'And I'm supposed to be some way of getting at her? How disappointing.'

'I doubt it's that easy.'

She offered a half-smirk in response.

'So tell me about me,' she said finally, folding her arms and looking defiantly at him from across the table.

He leaned back in the chair and straightened his back.

'You were an exemplary pupil. A good daughter. Great things were expected from you, but you fell from grace.'

She seemed to smile, but it was a strange, glazed kind of smile.

'You'll have to be more specific,' she replied, in a gently mocking tone. 'You could be talking about almost anyone.'

'There were three of you,' Isaac continued. 'Caleb Priestley, Justin Pole and Rachel Thirlwell.'

This time there was no visible reaction.

'Shall I go on?'

She took out another cigarette and lit it quickly.

'Why not?'

'Two of you dropped out of school, the other went missing altogether. Apparently for no reason.'

'These things happen,' remarked Rachel drily.

'Certainly,' he replied. 'But it's less common for a teacher to engineer the corruption of her own pupils.'

Her body grew suddenly taut and her gaze went very cold.

'And how might she have done that?' she asked quietly.

'I suppose she thought you were open to her ideas.'

'Weak-willed, I suppose you mean?'

'Not at all.'

'Since you were such a diligent and promising student, you must have been a very interesting target.'

He paused, but Rachel made no response.

'Shall I go on?' he said again.

'I suppose you'd better,' she replied in a clipped tone. He bowed his head slightly and went on.

'Having selected you, she then went about bringing you together, by setting Caleb up to humiliate you in class.'

'Who says he humiliated me?' Rachel interjected.

'You left the classroom in tears.'

Rachel seemed to shake her head at the memory.

'I thanked him for it afterwards. He showed me how naive I was about life.'

Now he leaned in a little closer.

'What was the argument about?'

For a second, Rachel smiled.

'Good deeds lead to bad and bad deeds lead to good. Discuss.'

'That was the subject your teacher had asked you to debate.'

Rachel nodded.

'Oh, I was very active in class debates,' she murmured. 'No matter what the subject was. Always ready to contribute an opinion. Even if I knew nothing.'

'Top of the class,' he murmured bleakly.

'Yes, I was.'

'What happened after that?'

She looked away into space.

'You seem to know so much, why don't you tell me?'

'I want you to tell me. I may not do the story justice.'

She paused again. The cigarette had nearly burned itself out. She took one last drag then stubbed it out.

'It's up to you if you want to answer,' he said, grim resolve in his voice.

'And if I don't want to, will you make me?' She was smiling, but the look in her eyes was cold and glazed.

'I don't have the power.'

'Don't you? You seem rather powerful to me.'

Guilt drives it, Hermione couldn't help thinking.

'Does anyone have the power to stop you from speaking to me?' he continued.

A frown was frozen to her lips.

'You know the answer to that one,' she said softly.

'Well, is anyone stopping you now?'

She paused again, her eyes blinking as she seemed to search for something.

'No,' she said at last.

'That must mean you're allowed to answer.'

She tilted her head slightly so that her gaze seemed to be directed past him.

'She came out of the classroom especially. To find me,' she began, her tone cool and neutral. 'She stopped me in the corridor. She was very nice: she calmed me down. Told me I didn't have to come back to the class if I didn't want to. That she would have to report the incident to the headmaster, given how there was a whole classroom of witnesses, but that I shouldn't worry. She said she was proud of the both of us for holding strong convictions and being prepared to argue them in public. She told me to go and sit outside in the sun until I was feeling better.'

'She must have enjoyed that.'

'You don't know her,' Rachel retorted curtly. 'If you really knew her you wouldn't speak about her like that. You don't know what it's like to be noticed by someone like her.'

'You're right,' Isaac replied. 'To her credit, she seems to choose her people very well.'

His answer seemed to placate her a little.

'What happened after that?'

'There's an arboretum in the school grounds,' she went on. 'I went and sat there. After a while Caleb came and sat with me.'

'You didn't mind?'

'I knew by then that I had been stupid. But he apologised anyway, said it had been really childish of him to make such a fuss. He had got so angry because he wanted so much to persuade me to see things from a different perspective. That I was different from all the sheep in the class. That I was the only one worth arguing with. I told him that the more he shouted me down, the more I wanted to believe the proposal was right, but the more I knew I was wrong.'

'How did you know you were wrong?'

'It just sort of became clear to me, even while I was still standing there in class, trying to formulate arguments against him.'

'And that changed your opinion of him right then?'

She sighed, more out of tiredness than anything else.

'I never had a bad opinion about him. The next day everyone was coming up to me telling me how horribly he had acted, how sorry they were that I had had to suffer like that. I pretended that I agreed with them. I was still a coward then. So to begin with we kept our distance.'

'He was an outcast. A loner.'

She nodded.

'People at school said he was going mad. But that didn't matter to him. He enjoyed it.'

'He told you that?'

'It was obvious to me. He wanted them to shun him. He wanted them to think they were so much better than him.'

'So it was you, him and Justin.'

'No one else was redeemable.'

'Whose word was that? His? Or hers?'

She didn't answer or didn't hear the question. Her eyes were distant.

'We would meet up in the arboretum. Not many people went there, and it felt like it was sort of our place. Caleb brought Justin with him. Of course, he wasn't like everyone thought he was, either.'

'How was that?'

'They said he was simple. Gullible. Easily led, you said. I suppose you got that from some teacher at my old school.'

'It hardly matters,' Isaac replied. 'So how is Justin really?'

'Honest and direct. The rest were all fakes.'

'And what did you do, the three of you?'

Rachel smiled.

'Hate our classmates and teachers mainly. We would take it in turns to choose a classmate and do a quick character assassination of them — all the reasons why that person was an idiot. It felt bad to do it, but that was the whole point. It didn't matter whether the people we talked about were good or bad, the idea was that it left a bitter taste in your mouth, made you feel really bad.'

He sighed heavily.

'You were in training already.'

Rachel looked at him curiously.

'But without knowing it, I suppose,' he added.

'Training for what?' Rachel asked nonchalantly.

'The Circle.'

She maintained eye contact.

'You should be careful mentioning that,' she said softly. 'You know we're not alone.'

His body went taut.

'She could stop this in an instant,' Rachel continued. His body relaxed a little. Again he leaned a little closer.

'Well then, why doesn't she?'

'She probably finds it entertaining.'

'Well we'd better do our best to keep the entertainment coming.'

She glanced away in the direction of the darkened window. When she looked back his face had come closer to hers.

'And in the end, when you were ripe for plucking, she gathered you in.'

'We went willingly.'

'How did she sell it to you?'

'There was no convincing. It just made sense.'

He's starting to get angry.

'How do you sell someone the idea that doing bad is good for you?'

'Try it and see.'

'Oh I've done enough bad things in my life.'

'But when you do them the right way, they purify you.'

He shook his head.

'I may be a wizard, but I've never come across a witch who can twist things the way she can.'

She smiled strangely.

'You wouldn't understand.'

'Not unless I knew her.'

'That's right.'

'I bet she knows me.'

'I'm sure she does.'

'But she didn't give you any warning that I might be coming?'

Her eyes blinked rapidly.

'She probably didn't think it was worth it.'

He paused for a moment, a seemingly perfect silence surrounding him.

'Where is he now, your friend Caleb?'

She looked away. He waited for her to look back at him. After a few moments she returned his gaze, but she seemed not quite to be looking at him.

'Within the circle,' was all she replied. Then she stood up abruptly.

'Excuse me,' she said as she stepped away from the table.

'Of course,' he replied, with a distracted air.

She walked quickly across the room, stopping only to grab her bag from where it lay on a leather armchair by the room's single darkened window. She left the room, letting the door slam behind her. The sound of her boots rang out for a few instants on the tiled floor in the hallway. Then they heard the sound of the bathroom light being switched on.

Isaac sat motionless at the table while Hermione sat tight in the darkness.

It was several minutes before she returned. She slid back into her seat opposite Isaac, a composed, languid smile on her lips. He nodded tautly.

'Shall we talk about you now?' she asked laughingly.

'It's not time yet,' he replied softly.

They looked at each other in silence for a moment.

'Did you start doing that before Caleb disappeared or after?' He began.

The answer took a while to come.

'After. But I had planned to from the very beginning.'

'It was your idea?'

'Yes. No one ever suggested it to me, if that's what you're getting at.'

'Why did you wait then?'

She paused again.

'He didn't think they were powerful enough to drive the Circle. They made you too weak, too susceptible to self-pity. Bound to fail.'

'And you're proving him wrong,' Isaac replied. 'I see no self-pity.'

She looked up at him and examined him in silence.

'Tell me,' she began, 'are you just gathering information, or are you recruiting as well?'

'What could I be recruiting you to?'

'Your side.'

'I'm not at all sure we're on different sides.'

'Where would the fun be if we were all on the same side?' she replied sardonically. 'So, are you trying to recruit me?'

'That would be risky if, like you say, we're being watched. Unless you're going to be allowed to be recruited, of course.'

'I'm no use to you anyway,' she Rachel. ' I'm finished.'

'Fallen from grace,' he murmured.

'If you like,' said Rachel, her tone as soft as his. 'We have to fall in order to rise.'

'So you believe you can rise out of this.'

'That's not how it works.'

'Tell me how it works.'

His gaze so fixed on her that she shifted slightly in her seat, as if to move out of its way.

'You fall and fall, and then when the guilt becomes unbearable you gain a moment of lucidity, but nothing more than a glimpse. Then it's gone, and the excuses begin again. And down you go again, only a bit stronger than before.'

'The guiltier you feel, the more powerful you are,' he replied, his voice bleakly sonorous. 'And what will you be when the end comes? Justified?'

'A dead drug addict prostitute I suppose,' she replied. Her voice was defiant but the pain was visible on her face. 'Nothing more and nothing less. But I'll go into the darkness with my eyes open.'

His gaze pierced hers.

'What ascetic lives you lead,' he said finally. 'And the only light is this dark lucidity.'

'That's a nice way of putting it,' she replied, holding his gaze. 'We are the opposite of light.'

'You shut yourselves off from it, which is the greatest acknowledgement that it exists.'

'We're not shut off from it.' Her voice was soft, yet distant. 'We stand in full sight of it. That's what makes it all the more excruciating.'

He looked upwards for a moment and took a deep breath. Then he looked back into her eyes.

'Which pain is worse?' he began, in an almost affable tone. 'Pain that's self-inflicted or the pain of those who suffer because of our actions?'

She seemed to shudder slightly before replying.

'Without the second, the first would be nothing. There would be nothing to feel guilty about.'

'Quite so,' he replied. His voice was bright, almost buoyant for an instant. Then it hardened and darkened again. 'But I ask again: which is worse, the safe, familiar pain of remorse, or the raw, uncontrollable pain of the helpless?'

She said nothing, but her eyes stared wider. As Hermione watched, the vision before her seemed to become stretched and taut.

'You seem to know all about guilt,' said Rachel finally.

He seemed to draw closer to her.

'Yes, I know all about it,' he replied, his voice strained. 'Or I thought I did. But what in my glib despair I called guilt was really just a show I put on for myself behind closed doors. The consequences of my actions were conveniently kept away from me, hidden by a wall of self-pity. But then I tasted it: the pain of another. And then at last I knew what guilt was.'

There was another pause, and all around her Hermione felt a kind of interference, almost like a burst of static or white noise.

'How?' asked Rachel, her voice barely audible.

'I can show it to you too,' he continued, his voice suddenly soft and coaxing. 'What guilt really looks like.'

The sensation grew acuter. It reminded Hermione of an insect in its death throes. What is it that he wants to show her? Whatever it was, it was time for the show to begin in earnest. He reached into his pocket and took out the bottle of black liquid. Without hesitation, he uncorked the bottle and drank a mouthful of the liquid. He handed the bottle to Rachel without speaking. Fear flickered across her face again.

'I don't need to drink this to look inside,' she said in a low voice.

'Drink it for me,' he replied, almost gently.

She took the bottle and drank.