Friday dawned and after breakfast Felix knocked on the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom door.
"Three build…hello Felix", Professor Horsewood cut short what she was telling Professor Jordan.
"Three buildings destroyed this week alone and counting, all owned by yours truly. Azrail's on a rampage…yeah, Mr. McCormack mailed me."
"He was a star pupil in his day and is a veritable sage with Wizarding law local and international, but ever so occasionally his efficiency can be infuriating", Professor Horsewood sighed.
Felix chuckled. "Yes, ma'am."
"So, it seems I was correct, Azrail's destroying all property under your ownership."
"Smoking out the rats, I seem me graduating and having nowhere to live for all about five minutes before Azrail kills me", Felix snorted.
"Professor Jordan and I agree it'll take place in platform nine and three quarters at the end of your seventh year. But we are preparing for it, Fairbanks may not be, but he is not my only contact in the Ministry. We are preparing for it rest assured", Professor Horsewood tried to reassure him.
"I know him better than that, he doesn't have the army or the impulse control to wait that long or attack in center London, as soon as I'm out of Hogwarts' protection he'll strike. So, Gringotts?"
"Indeed, we will all three go. You and I will enter your vault while Professor Jordan will stay and guard the entrance to the bank. Shall we?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Awfully cooperative today, Mister", Professor Horsewood joked extending her arm.
"Yes, ma'am", Felix chuckled taking hold of her elbow.
"Sometimes I like you kids agreeing with me, and for some reason sometimes when you kids start to agree with me I start to check my rear and cringe", she dissaparated all three of them.
They popped in the bank's lobby, a vast white marble with golden and plaster furnishings high-ceiling hall with an umbrella-shaped grand crystal chandelier hanging from the ceiling and counters running on left and right with goblins behind them and red and black suit uniformed goblin guards in several places and next to doors.
Felix read a large marble in front of them.
Enter, stranger, but take heed
Of what awaits the sin of greed
For those who take, but do not earn,
Must pay most dearly in their turn.
So if you seek beneath our floors
A treasure that was never yours,
Thief, you have been warned, beware
Of finding more than treasure there.
"Endearing", he said in a dry voice.
Felix followed Professor Horsewood to one of the tillers as Professor Jordan remained behind, hands in his robes' pockets. Felix knew he was holding his wand in one of them two pockets.
They stood in front of an old-looking goblin with long pointy ears, sharp-looking teeth and cyan eyes with a mostly bald head. "I am here to visit my vault, Felix Burton aka…"
"Dreogan Gaunt. Yes, follow me, please", the goblin stood up from its highchair, jumped down to the floor and lead them through two corridors and into a mining cart adjusted for the job with comfortable velvet seats.
For what seemed like an eternity they descended into the bowels of the Earth past other vaults small, medium and large.
Eventually the cart stopped in front of a vault with a black door and only three other vaults next to it. The air smelled of damp mold and rainy forest floor.
First the goblin stepped out then Felix and Professor Horsewood stood in front of the vault with the black door.
"Place your key in that lock, please", the goblin pointed with his short, chubby fingers at a lock-hole at the right side of the vault's door as it inserted his key to the left side.
Felix did as instructed and turned his key in unison with the Gringotts' goblin employee.
For a few seconds sounds emanated from inside the vault, like chains dragging and locks unlocking before the door finally swung open on its own revealing slowly the vault's contents.
Felix had never seen so much gold concentrated in one place. Gold coins, gold plates, a chair, several piles of papers and pieces of parchment.
"Only direct family members can enter a curse has been placed that anyone else suffers instant death. Our curse-breakers have this far been unable to remove it", the goblin stopped Professor Horsewood from entering by standing in front of her.
"Grand. I'll stay outside then", Professor Horsewood replied not at all happy of the development.
"Lovely, I'll search fast", Felix entered the vault and started rummaging through it dispersing piles of gold coins and other items as he searched for any evidence of criminal wrongdoing by the Governors.
"Dear lords", Felix exasperated having to shift through some ten dozen different crowns from simple silver to gold and platinum with ornate large gems. "Who would need to hoard crowns and why?"
"One who wished to crown their youngest son Emperor, I'd imagine", Professor Horsewood replied matter-of-factly.
"Right, I forgot who my father was there for a minute…" Felix went back to searching the vault's contents. Several gold and silver items, books and one of the paper piles later, Felix found a book with a note in. He opened the large leather-bound tome and read the note aloud.
"Azrail's not interested, but I'll make Dreogan into an immortal Emperor. Now that I found this book on how to create a Horcrux I just have to wait until Dreogan grows old enough and grows to hate and loathe Azrail and himself enough. Azrail believes I am letting him torture him so that Dreogan grows through adversity, the truth is Dreogan will grow up with increasing hatred festering within and at the appropriate time he will kill Azrail and in that moment the Horcrux will be complete and he will become immortal, I have already procured one of the quills Azrail used to create the curses he tests on Dreogan, it'll make for a fine Horcrux when the time comes. And it'll soon be followed by a second one by means of patricide, he already hates me more than enough."
"I do not envy your family…" Professor Horsewood's voice trailed mired by disgust and pity.
"There's an inestimable queue ahead of you on that one, ma'am", Felix gave her the book and note, and she burned them to ash, making sure nothing was left readable.
Twenty minutes later Felix had stacked any and all papers, parchments and books outside the vault but had found nothing of interest to the core of his search. "There's a lot of wealth, and no more documents of any sort…there's nothing more here, dammit!"
"We'll take these and give them a look back in Hogwarts", Professor Horsewood flicked and switched her wand and the piles of books and papers vanished.
Felix stepped out of the vault and the Gringotts goblin was ready to shut the door when a portal opened up, Azrail showing up on the other side.
"Hello, brother. Give me the Shadeglass!" Azrail spat at Felix as the goblin tried to run and hide behind the vault's solid outer walls.
"Come and get it!" Felix spat back at him.
"Oh, I'm coming for it, brother. I'm coming for you and everyone you hold dear! Every friend, every Professor, their parents, their friends….EVERYONE! I'm coming for you and it! Come what may that Prophesy will not come to pass!" Azrail waved his wand and the portal closed just as abruptly as it had opened.
"That's not good, is it", Felix didn't really expect a reply to his rhetorical question.
"Unimaginably not…let's leave, fast", Professor Horsewood boarded the mining cart.
The goblin closed the vault's door and entered the car fast behind Felix. No one spoke during the ride back up the surface, as both Professor and pupil were absorbed in their thoughts.
Once back up they walked fast out towards the lobby where the goblins went about their business dealing with the bank's customers. "Ives", Professor Horsewood gave him her hand as Felix held on to her elbow.
They apparated back in the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom where Professor Horsewood told Professor Jordan what had happened down in the vault.
"We do not have the resources to protect everyone…", Ives Jordan stated in despair.
"Azrail knows about Claudia, the Blakes, Emerick and Bellerophon for sure. He may know about Socrates and Uriel by now. Of course, you two and every other Professor in Hogwarts and Elysion is included in his threat", Felix sighed.
"Atreos can more than adequately protect his son, Socrates' family and his Professors, I'll send him a message. The Blakes are safe, not even Azrail can get to them. The others are a problem I have to solve. If you will excuse me", she left in a hurry.
"So, these were in your vault?" Professor Jordan pointed at the piles of books and parchments a few feet away.
Felix nodded and they started going through them. They found books on manipulating the timeline, time and not creating paradoxes, these Professor Jordan burned to a crisp. They found books and parchments on curses not even Professor Jordan knew existed, those he kept for the restricted section of the library. They found a lot of accounting information on the Gaunt estate which Felix kept aside to send to Mr. McCormack, but they found nothing containing accounts of crimes committed by the Governors.
"Damn, nothing? There was nothing in the Manor in father's study, and nothing else in the vault. I can't imagine father didn't have stuff on them, or Azrail even more so. Alfred Nott, Joymother and the others followed father because of their combined craze over the Imperium Arcana, but I doubt it very much they'd willingly follow Azrail into his insanity over the Old Gods spells…so, where is it? Whatever he has on them", Felix exasperated when they finished going through it all.
"Sometimes answers lie right in front of our eyes, and sometimes they lie behind well locked and hidden doors", Professor Jordan stated.
"Speaking of which, my mind's gone blank, have I asked you, sir, if you know what this key might unlock? Me and the others have found nothing on it", Felix showed him the ornate key Averill had given them the previous year with "G.V.M" engraved on it.
Jordan took it in his hand examining it back and forth for a minute before giving it back to Felix. "I'm afraid I haven't got an Earthly idea on what that unlocks."
"Uhm…no offense, sir. But, do you honestly not know or you're telling me you don't know so that I can somehow be inspired to search and find the answer on my own? Because I'm getting it from Socrates and you and along with everything else…I'm tired and I would just like for a straight answer for once, please."
"Just my luck", Professor Jordan chuckled kindheartedly. "I once try the former and I'm mistaken for the latter. I'll see you later, Felix."
"Thank you, sir", Felix left for the Great Hall where he ate lunch before spending some time in the Library until he was ready for some rest in the common room before sleep.
Entering the portrait guarded entrance he instantly knew something was wrong, very wrong, seeing Nate sitting in the sofa with his younger cousin crying in his arms as people surrounded him trying to console him.
"What's wrong? What happened?"
Nate looked up ashen white with silent tears of his own streaking down his cheeks. "Father…Azrail.." He stuttered and took a breath. "Azrail attacked my house…mum's lightly injured, dad's lost a leg and lots of blood and…and…uncle and granny are dead…Dad knew of Azrail's weak point and got him good, he ain't dead but he's severely injured…that's all the Headmistress knew to tell us…" Liam wailed at rehearing of his father's and grandmother's deaths.
"I…oh my god, I'm so sorry, I-I don't know what to say…I'm sorry…" Felix felt weak in the knees and blood draining from his face.
"It is not your fault you are not at fault for Azrail's actions. Guys, thanks for the support, but can we have the room?" He told those around him. "Liam, I'll come upstairs in the dorm to tuck you in, but can you please give me a minute with Felix?" Liam nodded getting up and leaving the common room with the other Hufflepuff students and Quidditch team.
Nate stood up and walked in front of Felix. "I want in", he said in a low voice trembling from the fury.
"Huh? In what?" Felix wasn't faking it, his mind had temporarily forgotten of the Students of Hogwarts.
"I hear things, you for example having created a club of sorts to train and "fight" Professor Hudson's edicts. You training the leaders of the club who in turn trained us, at first with Occlumency and Legilimency and then the Patronus charm, as well as more spells. If you haven't already you need to start teaching us how to protect ourselves against Azrail, because you know he will attack us, all of us who are involved with you. So, I want in."
"The Students of Hogwarts hasn't officially been disbanded, but since Professor Hudson has calmed down, we aren't meeting as often as before. But okay, I'll let you know of when the next training meeting will be, okay?"
Nate nodded. "You are going to kill that son of a bitch, right?"
"Yeah, that's the idea, but…his mother wasn't that. Just a woman who got the ugly end of a horrible husband and brother with no options, no choices and two kids who ended up sociopaths. When you find yourself having to try and kill your own son because you caught him torturing his own half-brother, when you find yourself in the same situation as her, then you can call her a bitch."
Nate's first instinct was to tell Felix to go fuck himself but after that initial surge of rage passed, he took a deep breath and gave a sharp nod. "You're right, I'm sorry. I didn't know that…"
"Not many do, welcome to the club…" Felix made to leave.
"It's after curfew, where are you going?"
"I'm a Prefect, there's no curfew and I'm going to the Headmistress, if Azrail begun attacking so soon, if he attacked your family, then everyone I know is…I must go talk to her."
"Good luck…" Nate ascended the stairs to the first years' dorm rooms.