(Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows—Chapter 24: The Wandmaker)
"Have you finished, Pansy?" Verity asked of the Daily Prophet by her breakfast plate.
"Yeah," Pansy said languidly, staring at a blank piece of paper. Verity knew it was a charmed picture of Draco. Her roommate talked to it in the middle of the night. As Verity reached for the paper, however, Pansy looked up sharply. "Can't you take out a subscription?"
"I don't have money." She shook her head at the front page: ATTACKS BY MUGGLES MORE FREQUENT, SAY MINISTRY OFFICIALS.
"Think of that," Pansy said, a hint of her old acerbity back. "A pureblood without enough money for the Daily Prophet. Funny how you managed," she continued. "You used to be a Mudblood, but as soon as it got important, here you are with pureblood credentials."
Verity had expected this. Everyone else thought it odd too.
Since she only had Narcissa Malfoy's say-so she was pureblood, and Bellatrix seemed unlikely to swear to her unwanted daughter's blood status in front of the Ministry, Verity and the twins worked quickly when blood registration became official. She'd sent an owl to Professor Snape. He was headmaster (terrible as the idea was). He owled Mrs. Malfoy, asking for her assurance of Verity's story. With two prominent supporters of the Dark Side vouching for her, she avoided scrutiny. He even gave her an excuse to tell anyone who asked questions—one that didn't involve explaining she was the Lestranges' abandoned child.
"Professor Snape figured it out," she said easily. "I don't know who my parents are, so he tested my blood, and he could tell it was pure Wizarding blood."
Disappointed, Pansy grunted and tucked back into her breakfast as Verity returned to the Prophet. Most of it she skimmed and disregarded as rubbish, but when she got to the classified ads she stopped. Nowadays, they were the only nonfiction in the entire paper.
A man in Sussex needed help with undetectable poisons (she considered writing false instructions). Junebug Wilkins wanted to sell two musical teapots from her grandmother (price upon request). P. Travisham of Lower Flagley owned King Arthur's own crown, which had been handed down in his family from Merlin himself, and which he was selling for the bargain price of a thousand Galleons. There were also pleas for information about missing family and friends, which made her sad, and one lady posting a bounty on a neighbor who trampled her prize-winning Snargaluffs before they moved.
There was one last note in the corner of the page. It opened with "Hello then, miss." She dropped her fork. Eagerly, she looked closer.
Hello then, miss. We two are on a holiday. Your parents' friends were in our neighborhood. We're in good shape though. We're well-fed and have clean socks. Keep your chin up. Miss you so much it hurts. Love and love and love from me, and get-a-room-why-don't-you from him.
"Pansy," Verity said, trying to sound casual and failing spectacularly, "do you mind if I keep the classifieds?"
"What for?"
"This gentleman doesn't know how to brew an undetectable poison. He's offered a good reward. If I get the money, I can subscribe to the Prophet myself and stop borrowing yours." This sounded good to Pansy. Verity slipped the page into her robes, beaming.
The twins were in hiding, somewhere they weren't in charge of cooking or laundry. Whatever had caused their move, they were safe and alive.
Returning to Hogwarts was hardly worth it, she knew. Fear sank into every shadowy corner, every whispered conversation, every moment of daily life. Often she wondered if it wouldn't have been better to evade Snatchers with the boys. By far the worst, beyond the terror of the Carrows, was the isolation. She learned nothing of the outside world except what she read between the lines in the Prophet.
Leave it to the twins, though, to figure out how to send her a secret message. She imagined them brainstorming ways to get it to her. Someone (Fred) would suggest they march right to the gates of Hogwarts, demand Filch deliver the letter, and Disapparate before he knew what hit him. George would come up with something less mental. Silly, clever boys.
(Chapter 25: Shell Cottage)
Verity copied down "Common Misconceptions about Inferi" as Amycus wrote it on the blackboard. She already knew what she needed about Inferi: they were dead, and He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named used them. Unfortunately, because of the second point, she had to sit through Dark Arts (or, as she referred to it, Defense against Harry Potter) as Amycus waffled about how these useful creatures would be installed as security in the Ministry any day.
Filch barged through the door, dragging a boy behind him, a Gryffindor seventh year with soot-blackened robes and face. Amycus turned away from the blackboard. His eyes lit up greedily.
"Finnigan? Again?" he said. "What is it this time?" Finnigan was a frequent name in detention; he had been a good friend of Harry Potter. Still, Verity suspected he got away with more than he was punished for or even accused of.
"Caught him blowing up the toilets on the fifth floor, Professor Carrow, sir," Filch said with a deep bow. "Brat finished his work before I could stop him, I'm afraid. I suggest detention."
"At the least," Amycus said happily. "Let's see." He scanned his class. Most of them, Crabbe and Goyle included, sat up in their seats, but Verity and the other quarter of the students stared at their shoes and pretended they didn't exist. "MacLaren." Her heart sank. "I haven't seen you work lately. Come here." Amycus shoved Finnigan against the wall, then gestured for Verity. "Wand out, MacLaren," Amycus said. "Unless you want to show me you can do the Cruciatus Curse without a wand."
"No, sir," she breathed, and she withdrew her wand from her robes. She rubbed her arm.
"Let's see it."
"Yes, sir." Verity fixed her gaze on a stone in the wall above Finnegan's head as she pointed her wand at him. "Crucio," she whispered. He was grimacing, but her curse hadn't been very strong, which was alright, really. Silent, apologetic, she turned to go back to her seat.
"Where are you going? Pathetic. Again." Verity stopped. She couldn't. Fred would have stood up to Amycus. She stood still and tried not to let her hands shake.
"I said again." Amycus had his wand out. "Unless you want to join him. Parkinson would love to show you a correct Cruciatus Curse." Pansy sat even straighter and smiled expectantly, hoping Verity would be rebellious and let her show off.
Verity barely breathed, and she certainly didn't move. Bravery wasn't as easy as Gryffindors made it look. She felt a wand at the back of her neck. "One more chance," Amycus hissed in her ear. "I promise I'm better at the Cruciatus Curse than Parkinson. You don't want to cross me."
She broke. Biting her lip, she stepped forward, shut her eyes and said louder, "Crucio!" Finnigan cried out this time, and she heard him fall hard against the wall. Verity's heart ached with him. Quickly, though, too quickly to satisfy Amycus, he stumbled to his feet, breathing heavily, and the wand pressed into her neck.
"One. More. Time. You don't want me to think you're sympathetic," he growled. "I've never been convinced you're a pureblood, no matter what our dear headmaster says, and if you wait one more second I'll let my suspicions slip around the Muggle-Born Registration Committee. How does that sound?"
Torture. Interrogation. Azkaban. Fear took her over. Verity thrust her wand toward Finnigan. "Crucio!" He screamed this time and fell to the floor, his dirty face contorted. The moment Amycus dismissed her, expressing pleasant surprise with her good work, she fled to her seat.
Why, she thought miserably, why did she have to be a Slytherin? Fred and George wouldn't have given in. Neville Longbottom was still here and still fighting. Potter and his friends were who-knew-where working against He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. Whatever the Order of the Phoenix was doing, Verity hoped they were working fast.