A/N: This takes place eleven years previous to the prologue-I wanted you to get a taste of the future before heading to the past-if only you knew how far ( Thanks to everyone who reviewed, I'll mention your names at the bottom. You reviewers are what inspired me to put up this next chapter a few days earlier than I had planned. This chapter is kind of boring because it's a transitional one, and I promise the next one will be better. So, again, please read and review!





Voldemort's Worst Scandal



Chapter Two

The Plan

If anyone had seen him, they would have found a most peculiar sight: a large, fat rat running through the village of Hogsmeade, dragging a red pouch by its drawstring in his teeth. He scurried over the cool ground in the twilight. It was awfully cool, even for an October night, and his paws were cold as he drew nearer to his destination. Luckily he had his thick coat of fur to keep him warm.

He hadn't been to Hogsmeade in quite some time-since his school days, in fact, when he, James, Sirius, and Remus used to wreak havoc throughout the village. Now, he was simply Wormtail, and he was on an important errand for his master. This was his last chance to prove to his master that he could get a job done well.

In the past, Wormtail's master, Voldemort, the second most evil wizard of all time, had tried numerous times to kill off Harry Potter. For a while, he had gone for the big, showy, Death-Eaters-there-to-intimidate-Harry kind of thing. But when that failed for years, he had decided to try and do it in much simpler ways. When Harry was fifteen, they had tried two hundred and thirty-three times to kill him, but somehow, it had always failed. It was either the fault of one of Harry's friends or the fault of Wormtail himself-usually the latter. There were so many that Voldemort had started a filing cabinet just for his evil plots, with three drawers: one labeled "Failed Plans", one labeled "New Ideas/Untested Plans", and one labeled "Plans that Worked". Needless to say, the "Plans that Worked" drawer was empty.

Now that Harry was sixteen, they were running out of ideas. How much longer could they hold Evil Knitting Bees and send Harry cursed Weasley sweaters? So Voldemort had come up with this. The flask inside the pouch that Wormtail was dragging held their last plan. And he had no intention of letting it fail.

Wormtail arrived at Honeydukes, the sweet shop in Hogsmeade. This was his intended destination, and it seemed that he was just in time. Inside, the owners were preparing to close up the shop. One put on his coat and opened the door, then stopped inside the doorway to ask if the other owner was coming. Quickly, Wormtail dodged the man's heavy boots and ran into the store, hiding behind a rack of Pumpkin Pasties and Sugar Quills. The other owner left, and Wormtail waited until he no longer heard their footsteps to return to his human form.

Rat turned to a short, pudgy human with a pouch in his teeth. Wormtail spit it out and fumbled through the darkness to find the stairs to the cellar. This was so familiar; everything was coming back to him now. He got down to the cellar and got down on all fours, and after several moments of searching with his hands, he got out his wand and muttered, "Lumos."

The cellar was illuminated now with the burst of light that exploded from his wand. There were crates, boxes, and barrels of all shapes and sizes, stacked everywhere in random distribution. Wormtail wondered how anyone could possibly find anything down there. Finally he found what he was looking for-a trapdoor fixed into the ground-luckily he remembered where it was, or else he would never have found it.

He hesitated before opening what he had found. This trapdoor, this passageway.they brought back memories of James, Sirius, Remus.he was overwhelmed for a moment by memory. He knew he deserved this, and then, shaking himself, he heaved open the trapdoor and, closing it behind him, went down the staircase and through the passageway.

Wormtail knew he had to hurry. The night's dinner at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry must have started by now, and he had to hurry and do this tonight.

The reason that it was so important that he do this tonight was that Albus Dumbledore, the headmaster of Hogwarts, was out on business. He needed to carry out the plan without Dumbledore there because Dumbledore was the greatest wizard of the time, and it would be exceedingly difficult to do this from right under Dumbledore's nose, wouldn't it?

He broke into a run, panting before he had run five steps. Wormtail was very much out of shape, having been spending much time as a rat and much other time serving Voldemort-when did he have time to run? He was never very athletic, no, that had been James. Sirius, too. But never he. He had always been the one who followed everyone around, whining and complaining and panting from the effort.

After sprinting, then running, then jogging, then finally settling at a leisurely pace, Wormtail arrived at the end of the passageway. He climbed out of the one-eyed witch's hump and quickly returned to rat form.

If he could have smiled, he would have. This was so easy! Thanks to James, Sirius, and Remus, he would be bringing the downfall of Harry Potter and his little friends-that Hermione Granger, his Mudblood girlfriend, Ron Weasley, his best friend, Ginny Weasley, Ron's sister whom Voldemort wanted dead for escaping his diary, and Seamus Finnigan, who Voldemort wanted dead for spoiling so many plots to kill Harry. If only James could be here to see that he had brought about the death of his own son!

Wormtail went through numerous corridors until he came to the portrait that led to the kitchens. He was glad that no one had decided to skip supper tonight and go by him in the hallway. He looked around carefully to make sure that no one was around, turned into a human again, and tickled the pear on the painting. It swung open to reveal the vast, immaculate kitchens with about a hundred house-elves there in their uniforms. Now it was time to put on his act.

"Sir, may we help you?" asked one house-elf.

"Yes, I would like three hundred roast turkeys, on Professor McGonagall's order," Wormtail answered, smothering a grin.

"Three hundred, sir?"

"Yes. Three hundred. On second thought, make it five hundred. Yes, that's what the Professor wanted. Five hundred roast turkeys hand- delivered to the Great Hall by the house-elves." Wormtail answered.

Like bees in a hive, the house-elves set to work. They pointed out to Wormtail that it might take up to an hour to get all of those turkeys delivered. He said that it would be fine. Now, he needed to carry out his evil plot while the other house-elves weren't looking.

"Hey, you!" Wormtail called out to a house-elf. "Come over here for a second. You have a special job." The house-elf came over and Wormtail said, "I need five goblets of pumpkin juice on a tray immediately."

"Yes, sir, whatever you want, sir!" The house-elf went right to his job. Within moments he had brought back a tray freshly laden with the pumpkin juice he'd asked for.

"Go and fetch me a student," said Wormtail.

"But, sir, we house-elves mustn't leave the kitchens until after hours!" complained the house-elf, with terror in his eye.

Wormtail got down on his knees so that he was at eye level with the house- elf. "Look here," he said, "You get the student, or else-" he made a slicing motion across his throat, "-your little friends here are dead. And don't even try to tell on me, you see, I will be watching you. Watch this." He took a shiny pan off of one of the shelves and, "Crystallus," he whispered, pointing with his wand. The pan became clear, and he could see the house-elf through it. "Now go."









A/N: Thanks to: Me, nut job, SoccerAngel, guess, and AgiVega for reviewing! Next chapter within a week!