Chapter Six: The Death Eaters final meeting.
A man with a stocky build sat in his parlour room eating breakfast and drinking his morning tea.
"My paper!" the man growled at the servant standing nearby.
The small and frail woman quickly obeyed and placed the paper infront of her master. If the man noticed her deed or her at all, he gave no sign. He simply grunted as he picked up the newspaper. He took a large swig of his tea and looked at the headline. He found it incredibly hard to swallow at that point. He spat out his tea and yelled for his servant as he stood up knocking the remaining tea on to the already splattered paper.
"Adelle!" The man cried, "Get me Lestrange on the floo now!"
The man hurried to his study and saw the face of Rufus Lestrange looking back at him annoyed.
"He's been found!" The man said gleefully, "The traitor's been found!"
"Where!" Rufus demanded.
"He's at St. Mungos."
"Damn!" Rufus spat, "That place will be crawling with Aurors!"
"I don't care, call all the remaining death eaters and tell them to meet at my house!" the man demanded.
"No!" Rufus shook his head.
"No?" The man raised an arrogant eyebrow. "Have you forgotten who kept you all out of Azkaban? Have you forgotten who has given you all your lives back? You owe me Rufus! You all owe me and I want everyone here with in the hour!"
"But it will take me that long to contact everyone!" Rufus protested.
"Not if you use the Dark mark it won't" The man pointed out. "I have not had the privelige of taking the mark before our master died but you still have it and can use it. So I suggest you use it."
"But I don't even know if it works still!"
"That is not my problem and I suggest you hurry." The man grinned evilly as he broke off contact with Lestrange. He then turned to his servant. "We will be having twenty or more guests in the next hour and I want refreshments ready."
The woman nodded and left to tell the house elves their orders.
With in the hour the guests started to arrive at the home. The woman showed them into the visiting room and was passing out refreshments when the master arrived.
"Welcome." The man said as he entered the room. "I have called you all here because we have a potential problem that needs to be dealt with and quickly."
A man cleared his throat. "Do you think it wise to speak of anything in front of your servant?"
"Adelle? She is of no consequence and cannot harm anyone here. She was my nanny as a child and the only oneI would trust with my life." The man said dismissively and continued. "Now, today as I was reading my paper I found a particular headline that both surprised me and delighted me at the same time." The man began to pace the room. "It said that Lucius Malfoy had been apprehended by the Aurors and taken to St. Mungos. Now why he is there I cannot say."
There were murmurs of surprise.
"But!" The man continued, "We all know that he fled after the master was killed and went into hiding. He has since remained in hiding with the shame that he holds onto for deserting us all. I want to take this moment to remind all of you exactly what you owe me."
"We Bloody well know what we owe you! Get to the point!" Avery growled.
"My point, if you will is simply this. I want Lucius Malfoy's head on a platter and I want it now!" The man growled.
"You do know there'll be Auror's at St. Mungos protecting him right?" Mcnair asked, "What do you expect us to do? Charge in and get captured just because you want Malfoy's head?"
"No, I don't want you to get captured. But I do want you to use the cunningI know you all have to get past the Aurors and get me Malfoy's head!" The man told them.
"You're mad!" Avery snorted, "Do you expect us to pose as hospital staff to get at him!"
"I expect you to take what ever measure you feel necessary Avery." The man shot Avery a look, "I don't care how you do it. I truly don't even care when, I just care about it being done and I don't want to hear any excuses from you!"
"Fine!" Avery growled and aparated out of the room.
Slowly the others aparated out as well and the man sat down in a chair by the fire. He took the brandy his servant brought to him and smiled at himself with pleasure.
Avery paced his study angrilly. Stopping only every now and then to aim a kick at any house elf that was unfortunate enough to get in his way.
"That snot nosed little runt!" Avery growled. "Who in Bloody hell has allowed us to be run by some pimple faced, wet behind the ear twerp that's barely out of adolesence?"
"Avery!" a voice called from the fire.
Avery spun around in surprise. "What do you want Mcnair!" He snapped.
"There's no need to be rude Avery." Mcnair snapped back. "I'm not your enemy here."
"Sorry, just tense from the meeting." Avery apologized tersely. "What can I do for you?"
"Something has got to be done about that infantile git!" Mcnair stated.
"You read my thoughts. But what? I mean, we do owe him something. But do we owe him that much?" Avery inquired, "Do we owe him our lives to get at Malfoy for him?"
"I don't think we do, and neither do most of the others." Mcnair shook his head.
"So what should we do then?" Avery asked. "We'll never be rid of our debt until he's gone! He'll hold this over our heads forever!"
"Precisely. Which is why we have no other choice but to get rid of him." Mcnair pointed out, "If he's no longer around then he won't be able to hold this stupid debt over our heads."
"You think we should kill him?" Avery smiled wickedly. "You think we should kill Vincent Crabbe?"
"That's exactly what I'm thinking. He's no match for us, alone or combined so why not? Besides, we have nothing to lose and everything to gain." Mcnair explained, "And who ever said Lucius was a traitor? Just because he was smart enough to go into hiding rather than sticking around to be caught!"
"I agree, so how are we going to do this then?" Avery inquired.
"Well, I have others to talk to about this but once we all agree we'll strike at once." Mcnair told him, "Until then sit tight and wait for me to contact you."
Avery nodded and Mcnair's face dissapeared from the fire.
Avery felt like a giddy little child again. He had been waiting anxiously for this moment to come since his conversation a few days ago with Mcnair. Today would mean the end for Vincent Crabbe and his debt. Everyone that was fed up with Crabbe was present and Mcnair had been asked to be the one to preform the killing curse. But everyone would get the chance to make Crabbe regret he ever held that debt. The tweleve death eaters made their way to the door of the Crabbe family home. They didn't knock to gain entry this time and they also did not bother to conceal their identities. All of them wanted Crabbe to know just who they were and why they were there. With a wave of Mcnair's wand the door burst open and the death eaters entered the home. As soon as Crabbe was found he was dragged into the main room, which had been cleared out except for one chair. In this chair sat a very calm Mcnair, who grinned evilly at crabbe as he was dragged into the room.
"Your hold over us Vincent is now broken." Mcnair said cooly as Vincent was thrusted before him, "We have had enough, not only of you but this whole thing!"
"I don't understand. You owe me!" Crabbe looked around.
"We owe you nothing!"Mcnair spat.
"But, I testified to keep you out of Azkaban. I made sure that you all were able to remain free!" Crabbe protested.
"For that we are eternally greatful Vincent. But we have been far from free where it concerns you. You expected us to fall in line and be your servants. Someone to do your bidding like you were Voldemort." Mcnair shook his head. "No, I'm afraid that with the assumptions that you have made on what we do and do not owe you. That we simply cannot allow you to live. We can't have you trying to hold this over our heads, Crabbe."
Avery and Lestrange grabbed Crabbe by the arms and lifted him into a standing position. They let go of him an moved away as the first death eater yelled out.
"IMPERIO!"
Crabbe started to tap dance and sing 'I'm Henry the eighth I am' as the death eaters howled with laughter. Then the next one called out.
"CRUCIO!"
Instantly Crabbe went from singing to screaming as he collapsed to the floor in pain. His body jerking as one by one the death eaters took their turns. After a few hours of placing him alternatly under the Imperius curse and the Crutiatus curse, Mcnair decided it was time to put and end to his misery.
"Enough!" he called to the death eaters and walked up to Vincent, "You really should have thought of the consequences you could face before you did this."
Crabbe could only manage a sob in reply.
"Goodbye Vincent." Mcnair said coldly and raised his wand. "Avada Kedavra!"
The spell hit Crabbe and his body became lifeless.
All of the death eaters aparated out of the home at once, leaving Crabbe's body to be found an hour later by his servant as she returned from her shopping.