Feast!
Chapter 3: Lily Liver
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When his anger waned, Dolohov trudged back his lodgings. The bare stairs, lit only by a single flickering lantern high above, creaked as he made his way up to the room above a second-hand robe shop in the less salubrious part of London. Without removing his cloak he slumped in a chair by the gaping hearth. The hours he marked by the level of the Ogden's bottle that stood on the table by his side, in easy reach of his hand. But despite the soporific effects of the liquid, sleep eluded him.
Becoming angry all over again he got up and left, slamming the door behind him.
What was the point? Rookwood with his broken promises and superior attitude. The one calling himself Lord Voldemort, he made promises beyond the imagination of most people but Dolohov was very imaginative. Left destitute in a dispute over land he wanted revenge. Slow revenge, the restoration of his fortune. The death of his enemies. Yet none of the promises had been fulfilled.
He walked and walked. Dawn broke as he stood on Westminster Bridge the band of grey light creeping up with the swirling tide. It began to rain.
He'd been misled. Why kill squibs when there was a real enemy out there? Attack that! He was angry. He was ready to abandon the whole idea, he'd slip away quietly, back to the east and they would not find him. He had friends.
Commuters passed around him. Shoes shining like wet cobbles, heavy overcoats, black umbrellas all too absorbed in their schedule to notice him, a shabby figure, unshaven and smelling of drink. He shambled off against the pedestrian flow, hating every one of them as they jostled, or sneered, or pushed by.
A woman, holding a damp newspaper over her head smiled and pressed a piece of paper into his hand. He stared after her then looked down at it. A one pound note. What use was that. I don't need your filthy muggle money - He almost yelled after her but already she was lost in the sweep of bodies. He let the note fall to the ground where it was trampled. Then he turned and went on his way.
Why did they dominate the world when it was the wizards who had power? They should fear us, he thought. Forget the Statute of Secrecy. He wanted to use what he had learned. So why, like everyone else were these people wasting their time on soft targets?
He felt the coins in his pocket, there was enough and so he made his way to the Cauldron. There was a crowd, not usual morning visitors but an oddly dishevelled mish-mash. Weariness was in the atmosphere as Tom handed out mulled mead, still in the same apron he had worn the night before. There was little space but he found a table in a nook at the far end of the room and ordered a bottle. Surely they must see him for what he was, what he had done … but he began to realise that the did not, he was just one of them.
Dolohov felt a thrill.
A wizard, grey dust clinging to his damp robes, hat askew approached. "May I?" he asked.
Dolohov nodded and watched as he heavily sat down, laying his hat on the table between them. Beneath it was a mop of curly blond hair.
"Friend, you look like you need a drink," Dolohov slid the bottle across the table and the man looked at it, then at him warily.
"I do. Were you there last night?"
"In the Alley? I was there." It was true to an extent.
"Then I welcome your offer. The clean up is just beginning. We're taking up shifts. You're not Ministry, are you?"
"No."
"We appreciate your help the most people like you – how the community pulls together when tragedy strikes."
"What happened? Do we know?"
"Nothing official," the man rummaged in his robes and pulled out a crinkled newspaper. "Look at this – could be the last issue they publish."
On the front page was a single word PANIC! And below it a scene of devastation. Ministry Cover up?: Page 2, The Rise of Dark Magic page 3 …
"They should publish. The public needs to know."
"What exactly?"
"What is happening here… I know… I must do something about it. Look, I don't know who you are but there is something big happening. It's not a gang of idiots, it's organised and it's powerful."
"Perhaps you should tell the Prophet, not me." but despite the disinterest in his tone, Dolohov was intrigued, it seemed that sometimes all people needed to make them talk was an open ear.
"There have been so many events – so many and no-one knows – it can't go on. It never reached the papers but last month, a whole family, the Prendergasts, they'd gone on holiday with some Muggle relatives – to Spain. They travelled the Muggle way so that they could all go together. We found them, six people still in their swimming costumes at the top of Everest. All frozen, stiff as boards. Some Muggles found them and nearly fell off the mountain in shock. They're still having their memories altered. If that isn't shocking enough, the Prendergasts still had their wands, it seemed they didn't even try to fight. Their little boy, five years old, and the Muggle family. All of them … sickening, and the Ministry will do nothing about it."
Dolohov was wondering exactly what this had to do with his situation but it was clear that this man carried more that disgruntlement with ministry cover-ups – he recognised something that was within himself – guilt.
"That's not all though. You won't read it here but the muggles are terrified. There's a gang you see, motorbikes and black leather, terrorising the cities. They call themselves the Death Eaters, spraying it on walls in paint that can't be removed. Tormenting any Muggles unlucky enough to cross their path. That skull, that was there last night – it's the same sign. It's the same people."
He was a man ready to crack. "Go to the paper," Dolohov suggested, disgusted at the mans performance. "Here, there's an address."
He seemed happier having shared his information with someone. Dolohov raised his glass again, intrigued.
Fun, playing the game for the danger. That was what Rookwood had been talking about. Indulging ones passions, whatever they happened to be at the expense of anyone who happened to get in the way.
That was what the whole conversation had been about. It was fun, a game a gamble, and why should someone with the power not even the odds.
Still it didn't explain the wait. He pushed back his chair and walked slowly down Diagon Alley, lingering at the site. It was daylight now. Broken beams stood upright like blackened, broken teeth, the oven merely a patch of red in the middle. The walls of Gringotts were once again pristine, and many hands eagerly scrubbed the bricks of the bookstore on the other side. People slowed down to look and Dolohov walked among them. They were unaware of him, of what he could do to their lives. That was power. That was fun.
Many weeks had passed since Halloween and Dolohov had started to wonder if he had failed their test. If he would ever hear from them. It made him more determined to join. After his conversation with the wizard in the Leaky Cauldron he had taken to stealing Muggle newspapers just to see what was in them. There was a lot that couldn't be explained without magic.
Strolling through Soho he'd watched three young men on motorcycles pull up outside a café. He could see that they weren't wizards, just teenagers trying to look tough. Even before they reached the entrance a woman with a mop in her hand blocked the doorway.
"You get out of here. Hooligans!" she shrieked. "You're not welcome with your punk rock music and your death eating idiocy. Get lost or I'll have the law on you. Vandals!"
Reducing them to spitting angrily on the pavement and revving their machines. Dolohov watched with interest for indeed it seemed that they had taken up the name and painted it in snot green on the back of their leather jackets. One again he opened his copy of the Times skimming through the copy of the Daily Prophet concealed within its pages.
If only they knew, he chuckled pleased that he was part of a joke that no one else could understand.