Rodolphus felt Hermione's grip on his arm again as she almost fell. As they walked from the barrier to the house, her feet were occasionally entangled in the weeds that grew in the alley. They left long before dawn in order to do everything they had planned for the day. The sun had not yet risen, and the weather was wet. It was harder for Hermione than for him, but she stubbornly made her way behind, not wanting to accept help.
"We're almost there," he promised in a whisper, not wanting to disturb the silence.
Soon they were indeed getting close enough to the Crouch house. It was gloomy, so the light in the windows of the first floor and the smoke from the chimney immediately attracted attention.
"Are you sure this is the house we're looking for?" Hermione spoke quietly, as did he.
"I have been here many times. Let's get closer and find out what's going on here," said Rodolphus, continuing to walk forward.
They came close to the slightly rickety door, listening to the sounds in the house. But they didn't hear anything. Rodolphus cast a spell: "Homenum revelio. There is someone in the house. Seems like a child."
"Child? Do you think Crouch hid his child here?"
Fanatical Barty, who was only obsessed with serving the Dark Lord suddenly got offspring? What's wrong with all of them? And some sick witches agree to give birth from such wizards. Unfathomable. They could only hope that these were all surprises for today. "Let's go check it out. There are definitely no adults in the house, but they may be somewhere nearby."
And they entered, trying to open the door quietly. But the rusty hinges creaked loudly anyway. It felt like no one had used this door for a very long time. The aisle was littered with old furniture, which they safely walked around without hitting. The wooden floor creaked and debris crunched under the soles of their boots. It was much colder inside than outside.
"It looks like this place has been taken over by the homeless."
"Unless these homeless people are from a witch family. The territory has Muggle-repellent protection. And the house itself was under the Unplottability spell, because an official of the Ministry of Magic lived here.
They walked slowly down the corridor towards the light waiting for them at the end of the farthest door. All this time they continued to speak in whispers and tried not to make any noise. There were no sounds from inside the house. The air smelled of food, both fresh and spoiled, a peculiar nauseating concoction.
"They just throw the food away." - They looked at each other. Both of them disliked the situation more and more.
"And what's that?" Rodolphus drew attention to the marks on the wall, as if someone was sticking with very dirty hands. These marks were clearly not left by a child.
"Where do you think his mother is?"
"I do not know, but I would say that the presence of a woman is not felt here."
"Poor kid, how he is all alone here. Can we take him somewhere where someone will take care of him?" Hermione suggested. Her eyes sparkled in the subdued light of the lumos.
"Most likely we will. Let's see what kind of child it is. We must not frighten him away," he replied, preferring to be more careful. Rodolphus wanted to clear things up before revealing himself. From the moment they entered the house, a sense of danger haunted him and he began to regret that he had allowed Hermione to come here unarmed.
They had already reached the doorway when a small figure appeared against the light. She really looked like a child of about five in a faded, ruffled children's dress. But she was not a child at all. It was a house elf with huge brown eyes and a nose resembling a ripe tomato.
"Who is there? Why did you come?" The thin voice rang with notes of menace.
"Winky?" Hermione was surprised.
"How do you know Winky?" - the house elf put her hands on her hips and looked at the couple doubtfully. It was definitely a servant of the Crouch family, only in the clothes that her former master most likely handed her. But she didn't seem to have been banished, she acted as if this place was still her full home.
"We are friends. I am Rodolphus Lestrange." He stepped forward, deciding that it was not a good idea to use someone else's name. "I've been Mrs. Crouch's medical wizard for many years. And this…"
"And I'm Penelope Clearwater, I'm doing an internship at St. Mungo's Hospital," Hermione hastened to introduce herself.
Winky looked at him first, and something like recognition flashed in her eyes, then she turned her attentive gaze to Hermione. The house elf's ears fluttered as she squealed in delight.
"Winky remembered you now, miss! You are the owner's apprentice, Winky has seen you before. You came to the Hogwarts kitchen." Large drops of tears slid down her sunken cheeks. "And you…" she turned to the wizard, "you are a friend of my hosts! Master Barty spoke so highly of you! It's such an honor to meet you again!"
She bowed obsequiously to him. After that, the little hand of the house elf grabbed Hermione's arm and pulled her into the room, ignoring her reluctance to go. Hermione cast a helpless glance at Rodolphus, but he only shrugged as he followed them into the peach-colored dining room.
"Ah! Winky is happy! So happy you remembered! You came to the master's birthday!" Winky squeaked. "Come on, come on! Master Barty's guests! His student and his friend!"
Hermione was seated at the table. Serving and cutlery for three people immediately appeared on the table. House elves never shared a meal with wizards, so having a third-person utensil was a wake-up call for Rodolphus. Although it is quite possible that the house elf, as well as many orphaned elves, went crazy with grief and now imagined that she was receiving guests. She set the table, arranged the dishes. Hot steam rose from these treats, clearly visible in the cold air.
"Do you live in this house alone?" Hermione's secular tone did not deceive Rodolphus, her voice was an octave higher due to obvious nervousness.
Winky wailed: "Winky will never leave his home unattended. Winky is a good house elf..."
"Here's your baby," thought Rodolphus, forced to sit down at the table as well, but already thinking of stunning the creature and getting down to business.
Winky, meanwhile, didn't stop talking. "Winky hurried home as soon as she found out. Winky always believed that her master would come back and wait for her. She did everything to protect him. Winky's duty is to serve her master. Winky is good. She will never leave her duties." - the house elf almost jumped for joy, grabbing her ears and crushing them with tiny palms. - "What happiness! Master will be happy! He hasn't received guests for a long time."
"Master?" Rodolphus pricked up his ears, "Who do you mean, Winky?"
"Master Barty, of course!" she explained.
Hermione raised her eyebrows in surprise. He didn't really understand what was going on either.
"I didn't know anything," he answered in a barely audible voice to an unasked question, and turned to Winky louder: "And how long has your master returned?"
The house elf fussed over the table, continuing to arrange the dishes.
"Master Barty was sent home last summer. Winky was assigned to look after him and Winky accepted the responsibility. Winky is good."
There were two options. Either Winky was really crazy and it seemed to her that Barty was in the house. Either Barty really is somewhere in the vicinity, otherwise the spell would have detected him. If the house elf was assigned to look after him. He was in such a state in recent years that he should not have understood anything. He was an empty shell. And then there was only one question left to be clarified:
"Who put you in charge of looking after Bartemius, Winky?"
She froze for a second and became extremely frightened by this question "Winky can't tell, Winky swore she'd keep it a secret."
Rodolphus held his wand at the ready. He was sure that he would find an empty house, but everything turned out to be completely different from what he expected. Something was clearly going on and it was better to be prepared for anything.
A plate of appetizers appeared in front of Rodolphus.
"Help yourself! Winky cooked all night to celebrate the master's birthday. Winky will bring Master Barty." She slipped out of the room before either Rodolphus or Hermione could get a word in.
"Where did she go? There is no one else in the house." Hermione got up from her chair and looked out the door to see where Winky had gone.
Rodolphus, meanwhile, once again checked the house and again did not find anyone. "I do not know. She said she'd bring Barty. He was a vegetable when I last saw him."
"What if he became a ghost?"
"He didn't have the soul for that," the wizard reminded her. "I don't find anyone in the house but us.
Hermione returned to the table and sat down sadly, looking at the various dishes. "Poor thing really hoped that Barty would have guests. Even for three there is too much food."
"She's coming back," Rodolphus said quietly, the spell showing only the house elf so far, and that calmed him down for a bit.
When she was already close, he was suddenly overcome by chills that penetrated to the bones. The room became many times colder, the lamps dimmed, sparingly giving light into space. Rodolphus knew all these signs. For fifteen years, whenever this happened, the ultimate evil approached his cell. His reaction was faster than he realized it all, he dragged Hermione away from the table. Both instinctively backed away.
Winky appeared at the entrance holding a rope in her hand.
"Look who I brought. I persuaded master Barty to come out to the guests," - she pulled the impromptu leash and stepped aside, freeing the passage.
A thin figure in dark-soaked rags and rotting gray skin slowly appeared in the doorway. The creature noisily sucked air into its gaping black mouth. If this creature had once been Barty Crouch Jr., it didn't look human at all now.
"Winky, that's not your master!" shouted Hermione. "It's a Dementor!" As soon as she said this, the rope slipped from the hands of the house elf. The Dementor rushed forward, spurred on by hunger.
"Winky, hold him!" Hermione pleaded.
But the little house elf wouldn't be able to hold off the dark creature now. She blinked her eyes helplessly, apparently for the first time faced with such behavior of her ward.
"Master, you are scaring our guests!" – of course, it was pointless to persuade the dark creature. In addition to trying to coax the Dementor, the house elf tried to catch the rope again. But the Dementor was moving much faster and was already very close to them.
Hermione tugged at the wizard's hand. He understood without words that she needed a wand. She sharply pointed the wand at the dark figure. "Expecto Patro..."
"Don't you dare!" Winky squealed, noticing this. The magical blow seemed to knock the spirit out of them. Both Hermione and Rodolphus slammed hard into the wall. They couldn't keep their feet. "Don't you dare raise your wands at my master.
The witch groaned in pain.
The Dementor was already towering over her, regarding her as more desirable prey. He leaned over her, sucking in air greedily, wanting to suck the soul out of her. Hermione whimpered. She had no strength to resist, her body went limp and no longer obeyed her.
"Harry…" she whispered in a delirium, weakening by the second, "Ron…"
Rodolphus clenched his teeth, pushing away the numbness and pain. He saw the rope lying directly in front of him and pulled it with all his might, pulling the creature away from Hermione. The Dementor, forced to retreat, turned to him. The black voracious mouth was right in front of the wizard's face in a split second.
The whole world faded before the eyes of Rodolphus, burying him under a feeling of unbearable longing. It was all an illusion. A beautiful dream of freedom, and now the wizard has returned to reality: into the impregnable dark-soaked walls of Azkaban; in piercing cold and dampness; the howling of the wind and the prisoners next door. He will never get out. Never pick up a magic wand. Never feel happy. Never meet Hermione.
Only emptiness awaits him and will never let him go.
"Expecto patronum!" The voice of the witch pulled him out of his nightmare. The same witch that was in his illusory dreams. Suddenly he admitted the thought that she was real. He wasn't delusional at all. The Dementor ran away, pursued by the silver Patronus. Through the veil of darkness, Rodolphus saw that he was in a room with peach walls. And then the graceful silhouette of a witch.
She was very close and her beautiful face framed by brown curls was scared. He reached out and touched her cheek, checking to see if she would disappear. She didn't disappear.
"Rodolphus," she breathed with relief, as if she could not say anything more now.
He closed his eyes for a second. He knew they didn't have much time. That he had sunk into a stupor and must quickly pull himself together. He rubbed his face with an effort, trying to bring himself to his senses. He took a deep breath and tried to get up. The witch put a wand in his hand, and she herself supported him, although she herself could hardly stand on her feet.
There was no more Dementor or house elf in the room. In the center of the room, a table set and furnished with dishes was waiting for the start of the meal. The whole picture seemed so surreal that it was hard to believe what was happening.
"Come on, we need to leave." He recovered enough to stand without Hermione's help.
The two went out into the corridor.
"What does all of this mean!" Hermione said the thought he had himself. They stood in a dark corridor with no visible beginning or end. Everything was different when they entered. Even the direction of the corridor changed by ninety degrees. "From which direction did we come?"
"I don't know, but we can't stay where we are." he said.
They fell into a trap. It seemed that the corridor was endless, they walked several dozen steps, but there were no doors on the sides. From the outside, the house did not seem so huge, but they seemed to have fallen into another dimension. There were no windows and no natural light. There were only dark corners and windings of the corridor.
"Not a single door," said Hermione, not slowing down her pace.
Rodolphus searched for the north with the Four Point Spell, but it didn't work due to space distortions.
"Until we deal with the house elf, we can't get out of here.
"She's just a defenseless creature brainwashed by wizards."
"Which played with space. Don't let her innocent appearance fool you." Rodolphus sent a beam of light forward to check how far the corridor stretches. When the light disappeared somewhere very far away without illuminating the end of the corridor, Hermione said:
"You're right. She thinks the Dementor is her master."
Rodolphus wasn't a fan of magical creatures, to be sure, but he was beginning to guess where the Dementors came from.
"I think that's what he is. His soulless body has undergone changes. Just like the Dark Lord, he lost his former appearance. Revelio!" He jabbed his wand at the walls, checking to see if the doors were hidden by house elf sorcery. He sighed in annoyance when nothing had changed. "There are no windows, no doors, nothing to lead us outside. And if by some miracle we find a fireplace, will it be in working condition for so many years ..."
"The stovepipe. It might take us outside, if not the floo itself."
"Yes, we should try," he agreed with Hermione. "Just for the life of me, I don't know where to find a fireplace here."
They continued down the empty corridor.
"Rodolphus, there's the door!" Hermione pointed forward, without saying a word, they ran forward.
The door was locked, though after a simple unlocking spell they went inside.
It was the bedroom. The dirty beige walls looked like someone was tearing the walls with bare hands, hitting the walls in mad desperation. Most of the furniture was worn out. The bed was screwed into the floor with huge metal bolts, and shackles lay on top. Whoever was here before was a prisoner here. Only the bright Quidditch posters clinging to one of the walls diluted the gloomy picture.
"This place scares me," Hermione admitted. "Let's get out of here as soon as possible."
"All right," Rodolphus agreed, "I'll try to cut a passage." He stepped forward, shielding Hermione from possible fragments, and aimed his wand at the wall with posters, assuming that it was the wall that adjoins the street: "Reducto!"
There was a gap in the wall, big enough for both of them. Slightly clearing their throats from the dust that had risen into the air, they moved towards the opening.
Instead of the street, they ended up in another room with mirrored walls. It seemed. that the reflections go to infinity. Hundreds of fragments hung from the ceiling, they sparkled thanks to the magical light, they rang from the slightest movement of air. And against the far wall, on a pedestal, stood a small black-and-white portrait framed by long-faded flowers and sagging candles. The woman in the portrait smiled sadly and sighed heavily, looking at the couple. Rodolphus recognized her as the late Mrs. Crouch.
Only after everything else, he noticed a small figure huddled next to the plinth. A house elf sobbed bitterly at the monument to her mistress.
"Winky," Hermione whispered as she sank down beside her, "please listen to me. We want to help..."
The mirrors fogged up, and then began to be covered with frost. The trembling fragments froze in immobility. Dead silence reigned, broken only by the whisper of Hermione trying to get through to the house elf.
"It's coming," Rodolphus warned, but neither Winky nor Hermione noticed.
Chills ran down his spine again. As he expected, a Dementor floated out from behind the door.
"Avada Kedavra!" wizard shouted, not really counting on anything, the Dementor did not even slow down, and the spell passed through as if it had not been there. "Crucio!" - nothing again. "Impedimenta!" The last spell only briefly delayed the threat.
Hermione, finally distracted from Winky, stood close to the man and grabbed his arm. He turned his face to her. She asked to be allowed to take the wand. He saw her lips move, but did not hear the words, only guessed them, sinking more and more into despair. He released his wand, opening his fingers.
"Expecto patronum!" A faint cloud escaped from the tip of the wand. It did not reach the creature, it went out halfway.
"Hermione!" Rodolphus drew her away from the figure that had already approached them.
"It doesn't work," she sobbed in sadness.
"Forget it… Give me a wand."
"Wait, I'll try again." Hermione exhaled noisily and repeated, "Expecto Patronum!"
Fortunately, this time she managed to summon an otter. The dark being stopped. The Patronus blocked Barty's path, but could not drive him far, it turned out so weak.
"Let's go," shouted Rodolphus, grabbing the witch by the arm, but she didn't budge. - "What else?"
Ignoring his question, she broke free and ran to the elf: "Winky! Winky, get up now!"
The house elf twirled her head so hard that it seemed that her head was about to fall off her neck. Her sobs didn't stop for a moment.
"Bad miss! Miss attacked Master Barty! She hurt him."
Winky! The witch burst into tears herself. She took the house elf by the shoulders and shook it a little, "Winky, this is not your master. He was gone.
"Leave her, we don't have time for this," Rodolphus whispered in an attempt to take Hermione away, but she slipped out of his hands, no matter how hard he tried to keep her. He didn't know why she felt that way. The way she suddenly moved away, becoming cold - he did not like. She got angry with him.
We can't leave her! You don't care, do you? You think she's just a magical creature, - these words were not an accusation, a dry statement of fact, but Hermione's eyes were full of anger. There was so much in him: sadness, pity, disgust, coldness - and all these feelings were directed at him. Rodolphus could not believe that he would lose her trust over such a small thing.
"Just tell me what you want," he asked.
Hermione closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath, gathering her patience.
"We have to get her out of here, Rodolphus." She said his name with a pleading incongruity with the emotion in her eyes.
The otter guarded them, but grew weaker. There was less and less time left. Rodolphus did not know what to do in such a situation. He himself couldn't summon a Patronus, he had so often resorted to dark magic to take risks. No, but Hermione refused to leave Winky. And the house elf was hysterical, not understanding anything. The unfortunate house elf sincerely believed that there was something left of her former owner inside the dark creature.
Well, he thought, if Hermione asked so, then he would do for her what he was good at.
It was easy to take Hermione's wand away - his wand - it was nice to feel the echo of her magic - oh yes, he liked to come into contact with something so pure, but it would not last long - it remained only to crush the house elf's willpower with one sharp movement.
"Imperio," the house elf fell silent in an instant, not a trace of suffering remained on her wet face. The little creature succumbed so easily that it did not take much effort to subdue her. Her soul longed to be led. And her broken willpower had the remnants of someone's old Imperius on it. Hermione was right, the house elf was brainwashed...
Rodolphus was still angry at the witch's stubbornness, he made her rise to her feet much more rudely than he should have, but she ignored it. She hypnotized Winky with her eyes, as if she could influence something.
All this would have continued for some indefinite time, but at the moment when Rodolphus cast an unforgivable spell, the otter melted away. The Dementor moved toward them, sucking in air.
Rodolphus squeezed the witch's hand until it hurt, fearing that she would start to break out again:
"All right, let's go!"
Hermione followed him, as did the weak-willed Winky.
"Everto Statum," roaring with a spell that knocked back the enemy, Rodolphus forced the Dementor to move out of the way, the standard battle magic against this creature was more effective than the dark one. They were able to break through to the door. The Dementor pursued them. But the wizard now had a plan. He stopped, releasing the witch. He turned to the Dementor. It was halfway to the wizard, radiating an aura of soulless evil by its mere existence.
"What are you doing?" Hermione called out, it seemed to him that she was worried about him, it strangely gave him strength.
He didn't answer the question, he didn't have time for that. He put all his intention into the spell to shield this world from what the dark creature was. All intent is to strengthen the spell for the ages. Directly in front of the Dementor was an impregnable floor-to-ceiling wall. The Dementor was immured in a room of mirrors.
Even though an aura of darkness still hung around this place, the enclosed space should have kept him imprisoned. Rodolphus breathed a sigh of relief.
"Now we can look around the house. After all, that's what we came here for," he said.
Hermione laughed nervously: "Well, it was our first walk for Horcruxes, and instead of opening the caches, we created one."
Rodolphus turned to the house elf: "Winky, how about we continue our tour of the house?" Show me where your masters hid their most valuable things."
Who would have thought that the Crouches do not have anything really valuable in the house. For the first time, Rodolphus saw such meager caches, which contained anything but real treasures and artifacts.
But there was a dark side to the whole story. The elder Bartemius, though honest for the most part, nevertheless committed the crime of kidnapping his son from Azkaban. Hermione, during the examination, told how he pulled it off. He changed his son to his wife. Not out of great love or for the sake of saving his son. The bedroom they stumbled upon apparently belonged to his son. Rodolphus guessed that the distortions of space were created in order to keep the Death Eater within the house. Winky, as a confidant, easily operated this place and could restrain Barty, who turned into a monster. While under the imperius, she naively tried to feed him regular human food, but he craved to devour human souls.
By the time they returned home, shabby and tired, it was past midnight.
"Winky, go to the servants' room," Rodolphus ordered, not yet deciding what to do. "You will live there until I decide what to do with you."
The house elf moved away, instinctively sensing the location of the house elf room. Hermione gave her a sad look.
"I'm going to have a drink," Rodolphus said to the witch, heading straight for the bar in the living room.
Hermione couldn't find anything better than to follow him. Rodolphus began to choose the strongest firewhiskey that was at hand.
Glancing at Hermione, he doubted she'd ever taken anything stronger than butterbeer into her mouth, but since she was still around, he poured her one too. She winced as she took her first small sip, swallowing it immediately, but didn't give up on the idea of drinking. She seemed to need it, too, to get rid of the chills and tension.
Contrary to custom, Rodolphus drained his first glass in one gulp, instead of drinking in small sips, as was customary. He now did not care about the canons of drinking alcohol, he wanted to quickly regain his peace of mind.
"Professor Lupin said that after an encounter with a Dementor, you should eat chocolate."
They sat in silence, watching the wood burning in the fireplace. There was something oppressive in the atmosphere. Overwhelmingly heavy. The darkness thickened outside the window.
"I haven't eaten chocolate for many years. Sorry, I don't have it."
If she hadn't noticed, there was only simple food in the house, the kind that the decrepit house-elf managed to get after his return. In the end, the owner was gone for more than fifteen years, but everything was in order with the stocks of alcohol. Firewhisky never spoils.
"Yesterday I would have bought food with pleasure. And today I have no appetite," said Hermione.
He himself had lost his appetite after their unexpected adventure. But now, so clearly, he remembered something strange. Since Rodolphus returned from Azkaban, he had rarely been able to get through to the old house-elf so that he understood what was expected of him. The food the house elf prepared was far from refined. Rodolphus, who became unpretentious after the Azkaban stew, believed that these were the most delicious dishes in the world. Nevertheless, from somewhere he found more varied food for the golden trio and even sweets. It was strange. He simply could not remember the little things, how exactly he managed to supply the fugitives.
"Do you know what I'm thinking now?" he asked Hermione. "I don't remember where I got food for the three of you when you were on the run."
Hermione looked at him like he was crazy. Not surprisingly, he himself sometimes noticed oddities in himself and was sometimes afraid that the years spent under the yoke of Dementor influence had irreversibly changed him for the worse.
"It doesn't matter now," she muttered in confusion. "You challenged the worst man in all of Britain, maybe the whole world. It is important."
Perhaps so. This act was reckless, but the thought of what he had done gave Rodolphus satisfaction. He drank his firewhisky with the intention of adding more.
Hermione dipped her face into her glass, lost in her own thoughts. She was pale, as if the colors had been sucked out of her by a Dementor. She was very tense. It seemed that if this continued, sooner or later Hermione would break. If he doesn't find a way to shake her up. Rodolphus decided that she needed more firewhiskey to take that weight off her shoulders.
"Pour yourself more firewhisky." He pushed the decanter towards her, to which the witch only grimaced.
"I can't drink." But her glass was already almost empty.
"You won't notice how you learn," Rodolphus chuckled.
She just looked at him from under her long eyelashes, with an infinitely apathetic look.
"I do not want. Drinking won't help me. There is as little meaning in the ability to drink alcohol as in divination."
"Do you have something against divination?" Rodolphus was surprised.
"Divinations are for charlatans," she said as if it should have been obvious.
She used a wand, saw magic with her own eyes, probably communicated with ghosts and portraits, but devalued divination.
"Strange, because it was because of the prophecy that we fought in the Department of Mysteries," he reminded her of the long-standing incident in the Department of Mysteries. "Why were you so resistant?"
"I fought for my friends who were in danger," she answered without hesitation.
Then Rodolphus decided to reveal to her the "terrible" truth about how diligently the Death Eaters tried not to cripple teenagers:
"They weren't in danger. The Dark Lord has ordered us not to harm anyone. We would let you all go."
"And me? The hateful mudblood," she fixed her gaze on him, as if to say that she would not tolerate outright lies. He didn't mean to deceive her.
"Of course. We didn't know any of you. The plan was for Harry Potter to come alone, as he had done on previous occasions, according to the witnesses. Although even if we knew that he would bring friends, we had a clear order."
"And you wouldn't take him prisoner to take him to You-Know-Who." Drinking made her sly more.
"It would be very reasonable to finish this whole epic and move on to the construction of a new world. The problem is that the Dark Lord doesn't like simple solutions. His actions should carry a touch of sacredness. Therefore, nothing threatened Potter in the gateways and underground departments. The victory should have had more witnesses so that it would be talked about longer," - Rodolphus tried to explain and was surprised himself that it had not occurred to him earlier how unreasonable Voldemort was.
"I don't even know what to say to that," she smiled sadly. "Had I understood this earlier, some of my actions would have been different. Then the future would be different."
She seemed to want to say something else, but she said nothing, taking a long gulp and pursing her lips. She made an incomprehensible gesture with her hand, running from her right breast to her left thigh, as if erasing something invisible from herself.
Rodolphus saluted her with his glass. He began to feel better.
"The future may bring surprises. Sometimes you find yourself on a path that was unthinkable."
Hermione, thinking a little more, nevertheless added firewhiskey to her empty glass in order to sip it again drop by drop, most likely due to the fact that it was difficult for her to drink alcohol, and not because she paid tribute to the rules of drinking.
"Maybe I don't have any path anymore," The way it was said with such doom caused concern. This feeling could suppress the remnants of the will to live.
"In such a state, it is impossible to fight to the bitter end," he remarked. "You weren't going to die, were you?"
She latched onto that thought.
"What will you do then?"
"You really need to learn how to drink to let go of those thoughts," he sighed, savoring another sip. Now he drank slowly, paying tribute to taste.
"Don't tell me you're scared of death, Death Eater." Her words rustled like smooth silk, but oozed with wicked irony. "Any of us could die. I know what I'll do if it's you. I want to know what you'll do if it's me."
Rodolphus began to form the opinion that she mentally buried herself. She wasn't going to survive. She was going to reach the end as far as possible, not hoping to escape. And if she fails, then pass the baton to him. How to evaluate this unconditional devotion to the cause, with which she accepted the possible consequences, while preparing to die.
"Share your ideas, I'll think about it."
"You're not answering my question." She twirled her glass of firewhiskey slightly as she stared blankly at the refraction of light in the amber liquid, but it interested her much less than watching the wizard. She raised her eyes, which had darkened in the dim light. "Will you continue our work? After all, you are not bound by anything. You are a pureblood and you belong to this wonderful magical world. In which, for example, I will never be accepted as long as the followers of You-Know-Who are in power. So why should you continue?"
Maybe she got a little drunk and became uncharacteristically aggressive. In his memory, women got giddy from drinking, but Hermione didn't. With each sip, she grew darker, and her eyes grew heavy. But she drank very little. Perhaps her anger had nothing to do with the influence of alcohol. It was all about the meeting with the Dementor, which showed how vulnerable they were.
Rodolphus picked up the decanter, shook it a little, and, splashing himself some more, put it away from her. She did not even pay attention to this, piercing him with an evil look and waiting for his answer.
He wanted to bring the witch to her senses. Remind her who he is.
But her question got him thinking. To be alone with all these problems, he did not even want to imagine such a thing. The burden is too heavy. Unlike her, he lacks the indulgence of being able to open up to someone to get support.
Her choice was small. But he had a choice. They both knew it, he could pretend that nothing happened and live as before. He knew that it would never be like before.
"Having come this far," he began, "I won't stop. I didn't just make this choice. I will destroy the Dark Lord. With you or without you. Because I hate him more than anyone else in this world."
"This is true? Do you really hate him?" - she internally lit up, believed him.
Rodolphus understood how different their worldviews were. They did not always understand each other, as if they spoke different languages. He wasn't able to predict her reaction right now, but he tried to explain it to her the best he could. It was important now that she understood him.
"He ruined everything he could. People and entire families are dying because of it. It seems to me that I, too, will die, and all my family, if I stay with him. I do not want it. Look at us, we're getting drunk on the quiet after the most pointless fight imaginable."
Her gaze softened. She leaned back. "What will happen to Winky?"
The abrupt change in the subject of their conversation surprised him a little. But he believed that she sincerely worried about the house elf. It was important to her, but he didn't care.
"I'll have to keep her under Imperius or she'll denounce us."
"She's a free elf, she didn't need to go back there," the witch shivered, her knees pressed to her chest in a defenseless gesture. "She could go wherever she wanted..."
"And she wanted to go home to her master. To what's left of it."
Hermione wasn't about to leave the subject.
"She is not to blame for what happened. You must forgive her."
"I know," anger at Winky had long since passed, but he did not want to leave the house elf here. Although he had few options, either to kill the creature or ... - "Winky is free, I could take her into my service. But it won't save her for long."
"What do you mean? she asked," furrowing her brows.
"My family has been childless for many years." He felt thirsty and took a long sip. - "When this happens, the house elfs die out. And Bellatrix will certainly find out about the appearance of another house elf, and then she will be interested in that."
"Is there any other option?"
'It's like I'm writing the rules here,' he thought.
"Death is another option. But you are compassionate and will not agree."
She snorted, "Sounds like it's bad."
"No, not bad, but sometimes insane."
Hermione left the glass, she wasn't going to drink any more. Drinking didn't really help her. It had been a long day and almost as long an evening, but there was still something unspoken in the air, making it difficult to end the day.
"I was wrong that Barty Crouch deserved a Dementor's kiss. Nobody deserves this."
Rodolphus said: "Because that's how Dementors appear, or because it's inhuman?"
"Both options," she said.
Well, it was nice to hear her admit she was wrong. There was silence for a while, which he broke this time: "We need another wand. We won't go into action unarmed anymore. You have to be ready for everything."
Today he was convinced that otherwise they could not cope. He was dismayed at how quickly the Patronus disappeared when he had to use the Imperius. It is possible that Hermione was not able to immediately summon the Patronus because Rodolphus had previously used dark magic.
"Where can we get another wand? Let's go to Diagon Alley so everyone knows I'm alive?" He was tired of her pessimism, and he knew where to get a wand at such times, only for some reason he hesitated, maybe he knew that she would not like this method? Then she better not know about his plans.
"No, I know where to get a new one." He turned the wand in his hands. Then he handed it to Hermione again. "Try summoning your Patronus."
"Now?" She was surprised at this request. - "Why?"
He answered "I want to test one guess."
She did as he asked. Again the Patronus did not take shape, only a faint light escaped and immediately went out. Hermione shyly returned the wand to its owner.
"I don't always succeed," she admitted, looking down guiltily. "I don't have many happy memories now. Those moments that helped before, no longer have such power."
"But did you feel anything else now?" - Rodolphus in turn, tried to feel the echo of her magic. Unsuccessfully. There was an echo, but so faint that if Rodolphus hadn't focused on it, he wouldn't have noticed any difference. "Something when you held a wand in your hand that wasn't there before," he explained when she raised her eyebrows.
"Heaviness, the wand seemed heavy to me," she answered immediately. - "What's the matter?"
"Magic. The wand responds to the magic we use. It's harder for you to summon a Patronus if I've used dark magic before. So we need to share the responsibilities. You are in charge of light magic, and I am in charge of dark magic. We will raise our chances of success. We may need both types of magic."
But Hermione only needed to be given food for thought, she paid attention to everything: "There is something wrong with your theory. You're using healing spells, it's light magic."
"I think it's because I mastered them before I became a Death Eater and because this wand is mine."
"Have you ever tried summoning a Patronus?"
Even if he tried, it was a long time ago and he did not succeed at that time. Most likely because he was still an unintelligent boy. He never tried again, because there was always something more important. But he did not tell her this, but answered in a different way:
"It's too risky. There is a difference between healing and a Patronus no matter what anyone says."
He took the last sip, deciding that he had had enough for today, he was too tired and now wanted to rest. Though Hermione didn't seem to want to let him go:
"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I didn't think we'd run into a Dementor. If I didn't summon my Patronus, we would be just like him."
Now he realized how much this encounter with the Dementor had affected her. How many dark thoughts were disturbed. And how hard it was for her to keep it all to the last. She was waiting for the right moment to express everything that hung on her soul as a heavy burden.
He could not leave it unattended, he felt that he should lighten her burden.
"Listen, it's all right. If you worry every time something doesn't work out, it will undermine your confidence. You will doubt your abilities, and doubt is not our friend. Think better about the fact that you still called the Patronus. You saved us! You did it!"
She relaxed a little, finally accepting his words. He was glad that she still listened.
"All right, I want to rest." - Rodolphus was about to go to bed, only he was not destined to rest today. Hermione saw him wince at the nasty tingle in the Dark Mark, then he explained, "The Dark Lord is wants to see me."
"Middle of the night." She looked at the blackness outside the window, which seemed so thick and especially dangerous. "What does he want?"
"I have to go to find out." The wizard stood up. "I don't think I'll be back soon. None of these appeals ended quickly."
"Why?" she asked suspiciously.
"The Dark Lord only calls at night if he has urgent business for the Death Eaters."
Hermione followed him with a petrified expression, she could only come to terms with what was happening. She couldn't change anything.
Rodolphus left the house.