Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or its universe.
A/N: Happy holidays to all. Here is a chapter for all you wonderful people. Check out my Discord server! Links are in my profile.
Shoutouts: Thanks to KitWillow, x102reddragon and PotterWithABokken for their awesome beta work. Check out their stuff!
The Shadow of Death
Chapter 10: Whiskey Lullaby
Harry was dreadfully bored. He was stuck in detention with Umbridge yet again. He had written lines in the Defense classroom every night for nearly a month. He wanted to claw out his eyes.
He had earned himself a month of detentions with Umbridge two weeks prior. The "wardrobe incident", as the student body called it, had been equally entertaining and revolting. But it had served its purpose in the end.
Who knew a bit of spilled ink and a slow-acting disintegration charm on Umbridge's robes was worth a month of detentions?
Quills scratched against parchment amid the crackling of a small fire in the hearth. Umbridge's heavy breathing filled the room. The abnormal gloom of the room settled over him like a scratchy blanket.
Harry looked up and suppressed a smile. The woman was glowering at him, her face twitching violently every few seconds.
'It will not be much longer,' he thought. 'Enjoy your time at Hogwarts while you can, Dolores.'
Looking to his right, Harry took in Granger's stooped form. She was the first person to join him in detention. Harry did not know how she had come to be here with him.
His hand wrote without his conscious thought. Harry wondered if she had actually done anything or if Umbridge had given the girl detention for simply existing. The professor's behavior had become erratic enough that either was plausible.
Granger's brown eyes took in the back of her hand. She had been given the same line to write as Harry. Her brow scrunched as she stared at the marks against her pale skin. Granger looked at him.
Harry went back to his work. Granger followed his example, not wishing to incite the woman's wrath any further.
They had been writing lines for two hours when Umbridge stood. Her feet pounded against the stone floor, her gait stilted. The woman leered down at them but Harry could see the pain she hid.
"I s-see the m-message is s-sinking in." Umbridge's shoulder jerked as her thumb trailed over the cuts on Harry's hand. "P-perhaps you w-will learn not to c-cast m-magic that is b-beyond your skills."
Silence met her statement. Umbridge glowered at the two students.
"Get out," she hissed.
Granger set to work immediately. Harry packed his few belongings at a more sedate pace. He noted Umbridge's facial twitches intensify from the corner of his eye.
He stood and stretched, shaking the cramps from his right hand before leaving the room. Umbridge's sinister gaze bored into him the entire way.
The well-lit hall pounded against his eyes as the door closed. The sound of shuffling feet from his left was loud in the silence of the stone hall.
"What did you do to the quills?" Granger's words were hurried, her eyes set in a scowl.
Harry strode past her, forcing Granger to jog to keep up with him.
"Nothing," he replied. He sped up.
"Those are blood quills," Granger said between pants as she matched his pace.
Their footsteps echoed in the empty hall as they made their way to their common rooms. Harry clenched his fist. She had made for better company in detention.
"An astute observation, Granger," he said as they reached the staircase.
Granger huffed and rolled her eyes. "They didn't act like normal blood quills, Potter. Using them that much should hurt, but these didn't. Plus-"
"And I would not know that, would I?" Harry scowled at the girl as they climbed the moving stairs. "I was raised by muggles."
The staircase he needed to ascend moved as they approached. He cursed under his breath. Granger's eyes bored into the side of his head.
"I don't believe you." Her voice was quiet. "You know more than you let on. I can tell that you aren't who you pretend to be. You might fool others, Potter, but I'm smarter than them."
Stone ground stone as the stairs moved toward them. His knuckles whitened and Harry counted down the seconds until he would finally be rid of her.
"I am who I am, Granger. Believe it or not, I do not care."
Harry jumped onto the staircase as soon as it was close enough. He thanked all the gods in existence that it changed its course before she could do the same. He looked at her over his shoulder as he continued his climb.
"Whatever is wrong with those quills is Umbridge's doing," he said. "I am nothing more than a student, Granger. Use the logic you hold so dear."
Her low growl echoed up the staircase as Harry disappeared through a hidden passage a floor above.
*****BREAK*****
Low whispers echoed around the small, dimly lit room. Something of note had happened recently. Students' voices occasionally raised and were quieted moments later. Furtive glances were shot around the room's perimeter after each outburst.
A large fire roared in the room's singular hearth, though it did little to penetrate the room's perpetual cold. The older students huddled around its warmth, leaving the younger years to shiver in the common room's green light.
Daphne sighed and squinted at the book in front of her. She'd been unable to concentrate since coming back to Hogwarts. Malfoy's blustering didn't help. He'd been insufferable since the Dark Lord's return.
She couldn't care less what he had to say. No, her thoughts continually strayed back to that night. It haunted her dreams and crept upon her during her waking hours. She couldn't be rid of it.
Shivers coursed through her body at the memory of the grey wizard. He'd sought her parents out because they were Death Eaters. Bile rose in her throat and she blinked back tears.
Daphne had always believed herself to be above muggles and muggleborns. Her parents had instilled that superiority in her. But after that night, she'd washed her hands of it all. Her beliefs were not worth her life.
Or worse, as had been the case for her father and…
'No.' Daphne squeezed her eyes shut. 'It's best not to think of it.'
She turned toward the portal that showed the Black Lake. A pack of Grindylows made faces at the students. A gathering of first years giggled at the display and returned the creatures' actions.
How she wished she could go back to simpler times. But it was not to be. History couldn't be rewritten. It'd been a hard lesson to learn, one paid in blood.
Her skin crawled and she shut her book. Her impeccable grades had slipped, but she couldn't bring herself to care. She stared at the dark table and jumped when a hand grabbed her own.
Her eyes darted up and caught her friend's worried gaze. Tracey Davis had been her best friend since first year.
Daphne looked away, unable to meet her brown eyes.
She'd done her best to remain her normal, aloof self. None had seen past her veneer, but Tracey knew. Daphne had never been able to fool her.
Guilt slithered in her gut like a brood of vipers. Tracey had been so patient with her, but she'd not told the girl what troubled her. Still, her friend remained a silent pillar of support.
Tracey sighed and Daphne pulled her hand into her lap. Daphne knew the girl was at her wit's end. But it was a story she'd never share. She couldn't.
His promise rang through her head and her throat swole.
Her eyes traced the worry lines marring Tracey's face. Daphne couldn't allow her friend to die, even if it meant wallowing in her own grief. Some things were best left lying.
Silence fell over the common room and Daphne looked up. All her housemates were staring at the entrance to the common room. Brow raised, Daphne followed her gaze.
And her heart stopped. Bile seared the back of her throat and her eyes watered.
He was here. Daphne shook her head and bolted from her chair. The wet, cold wall dug into her shoulder blades. His grey cowl shifted and she felt his eyes on her. Her skin prickled, slick with sweat, and her chest heaved.
Tracey shot her a confused look. Daphne ignored her, her body quaking.
"Who the hell do you think you are?" Malfoy stepped to the front of the common room, his bookends flanking him. "You'd best leave before I force you out."
"Malfoy, shut up!" Her words rang through the common room and her eyes widened.
All eyes turned on her and she shrank into herself.
"Do you know him, Greengrass?" Malfoy's eyes narrowed. "Get this thing out of here. I wouldn't want things to get...violent."
"I suggest you listen to Greengrass, Malfoy." The grey wizard stepped into the common room. The stone wall closed behind him.
Such a simple thing, but its closing felt so final.
The upper years drew their wands and pointed them at him. Daphne's eyes darted between all of them. She shook her head, her blonde hair fanning around her.
'No.' She closed her eyes. 'Not again. Not here. It's not real. He's not real.'
"Or you'll do what?" Smugness oozed from Malfoy's words. "You're outnumbered. Leave...now."
"He isn't real, he isn't real, he isn't real," she muttered. Daphne pulled at her hair.
That thing's magic washed over her and she shivered. It pulled at her mind and she fell, the pit dark and endless. Screams echoed in her mind. The iron of blood filled her nostrils.
She jumped at Tracey's hand on her shoulder. The girl looked between her and the grey wizard, her mouth opening. Daphne shook her head.
"I have a message to deliver."
The assembled Slytherins laughed. The grey wizard didn't move.
"I've heard of you." Adrian Pucey sneered and stepped up beside Malfoy. "My father told me all about you. One of Dumbledore's lackeys, you are. Leave. We're not interested in what that geezer sent you to tell us."
"Dumbledore does not know I am here." The grey wizard took another step forward. "Many of you here are children of Death Eaters. You know the Dark Lord has returned."
Pucey walked up to the grey wizard. He peered down his nose at him. "I've no idea what you're on about. I suggest you leave before we make you."
Magic blasted through the room and Pucey was tossed like a ragdoll across the room. The Slytherins shot spells at the grey wizard, many of them dark in nature.
Daphne watched as the spells neared him, praying to any god that would listen that he'd die. Her heart sank as the spells passed through him, scorching the stone wall at his back.
A momentary lapse in the students' casting was all he needed. His magic flooded the room. Her hair stood on end. The Slytherins shouted out as their wands left their grasp and clattered at his feet.
Fire formed around his hand and he pointed it at the wands. The message was clear.
Frost spread from his feet and the students shivered. Shadowy miasma leaked from his body. The fire in the hearth sputtered and hissed as it died. The common room was thrown into darkness.
His grey form was set in an eerie light by the fire around his hand.
"You will listen and you will stay silent." His voice was quiet. "I will only say this once. Some of you seek to join Voldemort when you leave this place. None of you will."
Silence settled over the room. Pucey glared at the grey wizard from the floor.
"And what do we get?" His eyes thinned to slits. "The Dark Lord will kill us if we refuse him."
"Feel free to flee Britain." The fire crackled and his breaths formed whisps. "I do not care. But if you take the Dark Mark then I will hunt you down and slaughter you like the vermin you are. None of you are safe. Not from me."
His cowl turned toward her. She could feel his smirk.
"Ask Miss Greengrass," he said. "She knows this better than any of you."
Tracey gasped behind her and the Slytherins turned calculating eyes on her.
"Speaking of, Miss Greengrass." His voice was filled with venom. Blood froze in her veins. "We have unfinished business. Come with me."
She didn't move. She couldn't.
Many of the students whispered among one another. Someone shoved her from behind.
Daphne stumbled and her legs moved of their own accord toward him. Visions of that night danced through her mind and she trembled. He waved his free hand at the wall behind him.
"Heed my words," he called to the Slytherins. "After you, Miss Greengrass."
The stone wall opened at her approach. He followed her from the common room into the dark dungeons. Daphne's skin prickled. Her hand twitched toward the wand in her pocket.
"I would advise against such an action, Miss Greengrass." Daphne's hand curled to a tight fist. He was amused.
They came to stop in front of an abandoned storage room. Grey fabric scratched as he opened the door and waved her inside. A small fire lit the room. The smell of mildew was overbearing.
Daphne ignored her flip-flopping stomach and stood across from him as far as the small room allowed.
"W-what do you want from m-me?" Daphne cursed under her breath.
The grey wizard remained silent as he walked toward her. All warmth left her body as he walked around her. His gaze felt as though it penetrated her very soul.
Iron coated her tongue and she realized she'd bitten her cheek hard enough to draw blood. The taste brought forth memories of the last time she'd seen him. Whispers tickled her ears and screams shook her mind.
Eyes narrowed, Daphne squared her shoulders when he'd come within a metre of her. She looked up into his darkened cowl. Just like before, she was unable to see his face.
The screams were deafening. They pounded against her mind, threatening to consume her.
"What I want is something you can easily give." The grey wizard's low voice brought her from the brink. The screams lessened.
Heat rose in her chest at his words. "After everything you've done you still want more?"
He nodded. "I want information."
Daphne scoffed and forced her trembling legs to still.
He was close enough she could feel his breath splash across her face. Her stomach did somersaults in her torso. Her skin crawled and the heat spread throughout her body.
It was nothing more than a spark, but it was better than the cold it replaced.
"Information is often paid with lives," she rebutted. "If I'm caught it would cost me dearly. What will you give me in return?"
His grey cloak fluttered in an unseen torrent. Magic washed over her, thick and powerful. It was dangerous, revolting. Daphne's skin crawled over her bones.
"Life," he responded. The grey wizard walked toward the fire. "You need only listen to the others in your house and report your findings to me. I do not believe they will heed my warning. In return, you will receive my protection."
The spark ignited, releasing a torrent of flame in her chest. Her heart thumped in her chest and her hands slickened with sweat. Daphne stomped over to him and poked him in the chest.
He remained unmoved.
"Like you protected my sister?" Daphne's scream echoed in the room. The fire flickered and cast long shadows across it. "After what happened to her, you expect me to help you? I'd rather die."
Grey fabric shifted as he cocked his head. He grabbed the hand poking his chest and pushed it down to her side. His touch was gentle and Daphne's skin felt as if it would slough off her body.
And the fire inside her grew to a storm.
"Your sister?" He turned toward her fully. "I left both of you alive. Your father-"
"Was alive only in the strictest sense." Fire suffused her words. Adrenaline coursed through her veins, breaking the ice that had settled in her. "He was no better than Longbottom's parents. He's dead because of what you did to him. And Astoria..."
A tear rolled down her cheek, cooling her heated skin. Daphne closed her eyes and turned her head.
"Your sister lives," he replied. "I saw to that. And should you accept my offer then you will live to see the war's end."
Blonde hair struck her cheeks as Daphne shook her head. Her solitary tear flung from her face to disappear into the dark stone floor.
"You're a bastard." Daphne choked on the words and looked up at him. His grey form was blurred behind a wall of unshed tears. "It's your fault and you don't even know."
"What do I not know, Greengrass?" Just as before, he was emotionless in his delivery.
The inferno in her chest roared and her fist struck out. His grey cowl snapped to the side as her fist made contact with his cheek.
They stood, frozen in time. Daphne shook, surprised at her own actions.
'He's going to kill me.'
The solitary thought rang through her mind, but she felt nothing. Daphne almost welcomed it, desperate to end the pain she'd been living with.
"What happened to your sister?" His tone hadn't changed.
Daphne blinked and looked up at him. She felt his eyes on her and he made no move to attack.
"The Dark Lord." The words spilt from her lips before she could stop them. "He wanted answers. Whatever spell you cast on us that night… He couldn't get what you'd hidden. Astoria… Her mind broke and he killed our father."
"It was not my intention-"
"I don't care about your intentions," Daphne shrieked, her body stiff. "And after all of that, everything you've done to my family, you dare to take more. I see no reason to take your offer when it'll end with me broken in Saint Mungos."
His shadow lengthened as he towered over her. Daphne narrowed her eyes at him.
"I cannot bring your sister back." He seemed almost distracted. "But I can guarantee that if you do not accept my offer you will die. The Greengrasses will be no more and everything you own will be taken by the Ministry. Are you willing to lose everything just to spite me, Miss Greengrass?"
Her teeth ground together and she closed her eyes. The inferno in her chest washed away and ice sank into the pit of her stomach. Daphne choked back a sob.
Everything. The word bounced around her mind and consumed her. She'd already lost almost everything that night.
'He'll take it all,' she thought. 'You bastard.'
Tears streamed down her face as she opened her eyes and gave him a tight nod.
*****BREAK*****
Shadows leapt out from all directions and a cold gloom settled over the castle's halls. Only a scant few torches provided light this deep in Hogwarts. Portraits slumbered in their frames as she passed them by unseen.
It was quiet, curfew in effect. It was perfect for her escape.
Fleur had been left with precious little time to simply exist and think. Since her arrival at Hogwarts, she'd been harried by nearly all the males in the school. Her course load had only made things worse.
A scowl crossed her face as she passed a rather amourous pair of prefects on the second floor. Her silenced feet quickened when a glazed look settled on the male prefect's features.
She stopped in the Entrance Hall. Grey stone met her eyes in every direction and Fleur sighed.
'Hogwarts is a depressing, ugly place,' she thought.
The school had actually left her awestruck the first time she'd seen it during the tournament. Beauxbatons, while beautiful with its crystalline towers, couldn't compare to the magical menagerie that was Hogwarts. It was charming in its own way.
However, that feeling had disappeared as the months had worn on. Hogwarts had been too much of a change and she'd been far too alone to appreciate it.
A draft whistled through the Entrance Hall, ruffling her robes and making her shiver. The weather had cooled more than she'd cared for over the past week. Her heart lurched in her chest.
Fleur would spend another year trapped between Hogwarts's drab walls. This time, however, she'd be completely alone. She swallowed a painful lump that formed in her throat.
'And here I will be.' Cold seeped through her shoe from the stone floor. 'I will miss Gabby's birthday next month.'
The cold atmosphere of her home wouldn't be something she missed. But she felt as if she'd been missing a part of herself recently. Her mother and sister had been her rocks while she'd attended Beauxbatons.
It tore at her heart like a ravaging beast at the end of each day. Fleur lost a bit of herself with each passing sunset, hardly able to sleep at night.
Fleur wrote them nearly every day, but it was not the same. Gabby was in her third year so they'd seen one another at Beauxbatons. They'd spent nearly every moment together.
Those moments, along with time with her friends in France, had been the only bright spots in her life. For years, they'd been what kept her sane. She'd never admit it, but she'd have given up entirely if not for them.
The castle groaned into the eerie night. It seemed as if Hogwarts shared her lament. Fleur looked around the empty room.
'Alone.'
The hall shrank and her heart hammered.
Darkness closed in around her, suffocating her. The silence, something she'd longed for, was oppressive. Fleur's chest constricted and her muscles tightened as she felt something press against her leg.
She didn't need to reach for it to know what was in her pocket. It was one of the many sources of her woes, after all.
Fleur's eyes narrowed.
Her father had reached out to her again. He'd all but demand that she ingratiate herself to Potter. Apparently, word had reached him that she'd yet to be seen with him.
"Your failures with the boy will be seen as a failure on my part," he'd written. "If you do not rectify this soon then it will have implications for my career. If you continue to disappoint me I will be forced to act, Daughter."
"Do whatever you must," she whispered his final instructions.
The desire to burn the letter grew. She wasn't sure why she hadn't already done so. Her father's callous words had stung her, though they shouldn't have.
'I'm nothing more than a tool,' she thought. Her hand clenched around the parchment in her pocket. 'He'd have me sully myself to further himself. Connard."
It'd been a little over a week since she'd confronted Potter. They'd reverted back to ignoring one another's existence. After how he'd comported himself with her, she'd prefer to keep along that vein.
But it wasn't to be. It never was for her. Fleur would have to act or her father would force worse upon both her and Gabrielle.
The parchment protested as her fist clenched around it.
'But how can I convince him?' Her eyes narrowed as she heard footsteps. 'He hates me and I hate him. He will see through my attempts.'
The footsteps grew louder. Fleur backed against a wall away from the sound. She looked down to ensure her disillusionment charm was functioning.
'Perhaps I can convince him to just be seen with me.' Her brow scrunched at the thought. 'After all, he said we could go our separate ways after I graduate. If I agree to his terms then perhaps he will agree to mine.'
Fleur shook her head against the tears forming in her eyes. She wanted more out of life. Her father's wishes would see her sacrifice her only dream.
'Damn him and damn his orders.'
Her palm swiped at her eyes as a person rounded the corner into the Entrance Hall. She stilled her movements. Fleur had expected a teacher.
Instead, a wizard covered from head to foot in grey robes entered from the dungeons. The grey wizard walked into the centre of the Entrance Hall and stopped. His hand twitched and his cowl turned toward her.
Every instinct she possessed yelled at her to run, to escape whoever or whatever this wizard was.
Fleur stopped breathing. She was sure he could hear her heart pounding in her chest.
Her eyes locked onto his own, hidden beneath a grey cowl. Fleur felt as if a knife was held at her throat. Her hair stood on end as they stared at each other.
Seconds crawled to minutes and it felt as though an eternity passed before the mysterious figure walked out of the hall.
Shaking her head and ignoring her inner protests, Fleur hurried after the wizard before the Entrance Hall's doors closed behind him. She shivered against the night air and squinted into the darkness.
His figure was almost entirely hidden beneath the cloudy sky. Fleur stood at the doors and watched as he walked into the night.
A chilled breeze blew and he stopped.
The grey wizard turned around and stared at her. Fleur's heart stopped.
He raised a singular hand. She'd been caught.
Goosebumps pricked her skin as Fleur reached for her wand. The wizard cocked his head and lowered his hand.
Fleur pointed her shaking wand in his direction, a spell on her lips.
And he disappeared.
She lowered her wand.
"'Ow?" she breathed. Fleur lit her wand. Grass and dirt met her eyes. "'Oo are you?"
Another cold breeze met her inquiry.
*****BREAK*****
The manor was lavish, but not nearly as opulent as the Greengrass's. A fire cracked merrily behind the mahogany desk situated in the center of the study. Books lined the walls, covered in a thick layer of dust.
A single bottle of firewhiskey and a smudged glass sat upon the desk. The pictures on the desk were turned down. Glass shards shimmered around the prone golden frames.
Harry turned around and took in the room's central piece. An unmoving portrait of a middle-aged woman in blue robes stared down at him. The portrait was large and was the only clean item in the room. A shrine.
'The late lady of the manor,' he thought. 'Ophelia if memory serves.'
Flames glinted off the glass on the desk as Harry looked down at it. Lip and finger smudges lined the fine piece. Firewhiskey had thickened at the bottom of the glass. Stale liquor filled his nostrils.
Scowling, Harry activated runes across his body and shimmered into the shadowed room. He tapped his finger against a rune on the underside of the desk and pulsed his magic into it.
The wards gave a weak pulse in return and he walked to a corner of the room.
'It will not be long.'
Minutes later he heard the front door of the small manor crash open. Muttered curses filtered up through the door.
"Damned wards," a masculine voice sounded from behind the door. "I'll talk to the goblins about repairing them tomorrow. They mucked up the last job. Can't get a moment's peace without them giving me a false alarm."
Thumps came from the other side of the door as Harry waited. The man, obviously drunk, was having difficulties.
The door finally opened with a bevy of muttered cursing. Harry got his first good look at the man. He'd taken to travelling under heavy robes when outside his home.
The wizard was middle-aged. His skin was sallow, thin and stretched over his skull like butter over too much bread. His beady blue eyes sunk into his head.
Heavy wafts of liquor reached Harry from across the room.
Oswin Nott stumbled across the room and sat behind his desk. Drawing his wand, the older wizard pressed it against the rune underneath the desk. His wand clattered to the desk and rolled across it.
The wizard looked around the room, his gaze settling on the portrait of his wife as he poured a glass of firewhiskey.
"You're likely rolling in your grave, my dear Ophelia." Nott brought the drink up to his lips and drained the glass. "Our son is a disappointment. Has been since you passed."
Silence settled over the room as Nott nodded.
"Theo doesn't want to take the Mark," he rasped as he poured another drink. "He's been cavorting with some mudblood. Tracey Davies I think her name is. I'll have to beat sense into him when he comes home for the holidays."
Nott nodded again and sipped at his drink. His blue eyes were hazy with drink and tears as he stared up at his wife's portrait.
"I miss you." Nott's voice was raw. His knuckles whitened around the glass. "It's been six years and I still miss you. This gods be damned world isn't fair. They took you from me."
The wizard's head lowered and Harry heard his tears pitter-patter against the wood desk. Nott's eyes were filled with fire when he looked back up. Tears left clear tracks against his dirty face before disappearing into his unkempt salt and pepper beard.
"But I'll get you back." The fire at his back cast Nott in shadows. His eyes gleamed in the dark. "Just like I promised you the day you died. The Dark Lord promised. He'll show me how. I just need time, my dear Ophelia."
Nott hiccuped and his eyes narrowed to slits. He eyed his wand on the desk."Then we can be a proper family again."
Harry released his magic. Nott yelped as he was stuck defenceless to the carpeted floor. The man's drunken gaze darted around the room.
"Your son made the right choice, Nott." Harry stood visible above the prone man. "I am afraid you have not, however."
"I've no idea what you're on about." Unfocussed blue eyes narrowed up at Harry. "Now release me. If you do, I won't have to kill you."
Reaching down, Harry lifted the man's left sleeve. The Dark Mark undulated before their eyes. Harry looked back at Nott.
"Do you not know?" He crouched over the man. The smell of whiskey was overbearing from so close. "You serve Voldemort. Even as drunk as you are, you should know why I am here tonight."
Gears, rusted by drink, turned and creaked in the man's mind as he closed one eye up at Harry. Nott's eyes widened and his body bucked against the sticking charm holding him to the floor.
"G-grey wizard," he yelled. "Y-you're here to kill me!"
Harry nodded. "And your son if you do not tell me what I want to know."
Salt and pepper hair whipped around. "I can't. He'll kill me."
Black lightning crackled and popped at Harry's fingertips. "Perhaps this will help you see your situation more clearly."
The flesh on his chest sizzled like bacon in a hot pan. The magic burned his robes. Nott's skin reddened and bubbled. Putrid pus exploded from the boils. Blood leaked from the corners of his mouth.
And Nott howled, thrashing against the pain. The bottle of firewhiskey fell off the edge of the desk and shattered next to Nott's head.
"P-please," he yelled. "N-no more!"
Harry increased the intensity of the spell. The smells of burnt flesh and urine filled his nose. The man screamed until he could only let loose a high pitched squeal.
"M-mercy!"
Brown eyes and pleas of mercy filled Harry's mind at Nott's cry. He ended the spell and grasped at his head..
Theodus Greengrass.
Astoria Greengrass.
Nott's sobs filled the air. Brea Greengrass's broken form filled his mind's eye. He closed his eyes against the image.
"Lullaby and goodnight," Nott sang between wracking gasps. "With roses bestride, with lilies bedecked, 'neath baby's sweet bed. May thou sleep, may thou rest, may thy slumber be blest."
"Please, spare them! Have mercy." Brea's pleas filled his ears. Harry tasted blood on his tongue. "Please, kill me instead… Please."
"Shut up," Harry roared. His fist slammed into Nott and the man quieted. "Enough. I have had enough! Tell me what I want to know or I will force it from you."
Harry shook his head against the images and voices assaulting him. 'I must remain focussed. I cannot be distracted. I refuse to be weak. Not now.'
Nott trembled beneath him, his eyes manic.
"T-the Dark L-Lord… He…" Nott's words were broken by sobs and twitches. "He's been absent. Ancient Magic. He's searching. Always gone. Crouch is a distraction."
Sighing, Harry stood to his feet. He stared down at the broken man. Oswin Nott laid in a twitching heap in a puddle of urine and firewhiskey, sobbing.
Something ran though Harry at that moment. He dismissed it. His arm felt heavy as he raised it.
Nott knew nothing of use.
"Please… Please." Tears poured from his bloodshot eyes and snot glistened on his upper lip like diamonds. "I've told y-you everything. All I know. Please, spare me."
"You've made your choice, Oswin Nott." Magic flowed in tendrils from Harry's body and covered the broken man. "Now you die."
A choked scream left Nott's throat as blood and intestine was pulled from his mouth in thick ropes. The man choked and hacked, his dulling eyes fixed on Harry.
Waving his hand saw the blood and innards weave through the air to form shapes on the wall beneath Ophelia Nott's portrait. Words formed and shuddered cries pierced the study's air.
Harry looked upon his message, a weight settling over his shoulders.
'It will suffice.'
Nott twitched and breathed his last beneath the gore-splattered portrait. Blood and ropey sinew hung from his mouth.
A tear struck the whiskey-stained carpet and Harry disappeared.