This Time - Chapter Ten

Authors Note: Okay, I'm sorry! I have been soooo busy for months and will be till November at least (not accounting for upcoming coursework, fun!) so this may be the only update for a while. I will try my best to update more. Please keep reviewing, faving and following, it means a lot.

This chapter goes off in another plot sort of direction. I'm somewhat rushed with this wanting to update, so I hope its okay. Let me know what you think.
Till next time!
Thomas

"Rodolphus..." Sirius sighed, "where to start."
"Well you know him, and I'm guessing it's not good, so start with how you know him." I tell him.
"Take a wild guess. It's where all the crazy stuff happens."
"Your family." I say, darkly.
"Bingo." Sirius shoots me a thumbs up, before continuing. "You've heard of cousin Narcissa right?"
"The one who is looking after Andromeda?"
"Yeah. Lovely women, married a bad guy. Her sister is Bellatrix, and the two could not be more opposite."
"As in?" I ask.
"Narcissa is lovely, if sometimes making foolish decisions such as with her marriage. Bellatrix is down-right insane." Sirius flicks through his phones photos and passes it to me. On the screen is an image of a wedding invitation.

You are cordially invited to the wedding of Bellatrix Black and Rodolphus Lestrage...

"Christ." I tell him.
"Christ exactly. Well, he won't be there for the wedding. It's coming up in a few weeks."
"So he's got a fiancé and is seeing other women on the side."
"Well the wedding wasn't their decision, mostly. But Rodolphus was an old friend of the family and to be honest is just a dick head. I doubt Bella cares if she does know, but he's been seeing other women since their first date."
"We've got to tell Lily."
"We can't. Rodolphus has this, this magic around him. And I hate to be a dick, but I can't have him disappearing."
"Why not? If he's going to hurt Lily..." I say, my voice rising.
"He won't. Not yet anyway. Just trust me, there's important business between the two of us. I'll keep Lily safe."
I sigh. I don't like it, even though I trust Sirius. There is something off about Rodolphus, something dark. I'm not going to argue with him, not now anyway. It's been a long night.

Except when I wake in the morning, Sirius isn't in bed with me and no one else in the house. A scrawled note from Sirius tells me Lily received a call and went out, that he's certain it's Rodolphus and is shadowing her. She'll know, she's not an idiot.

I set about on my normal routine. Lily must have calmed down after last night, or I hope so. I try not to let the gnawing worrying feeling get to me as I pull my coat on, gulp down my tea and set out to go to work.

The two aren't there when I get back in the afternoon however. The worry grows, and I text Sirius.
'What on earth are you doing? Where are you?'
I don't get a reply. I text Lily next.
'You not home? Remember you've got the afternoon shift. Text me so I know ur okay'.
After fifteen minutes of pacing, I finally get a text back. It's from Lily.
'Cover for me. Busy tonight, won't be home.'
Well shit.

I go out and take Lily's shift. Minerva looks surprised to see me.
"No Lily?" she asks me as I set to work.
"No, she's out somewhere and can't make this shift."
"Where is she?" she asks.
"I wish I knew." I said, looking out of the window.
Rainclouds have covered Edinburgh since the grey skies of this morning. The trees lining the roads are waving in the strong winds. The pavements waver with rain splashes on the already soaking pavements.

It's not until four that I finally get a call from Sirius.
"Minerva, I'm taking my break." I call out to her before walking into the back room.
"Where the hell are you?" I snap then into my phone. "Where's Lily?"
"I'm sorry I haven't texted. She's with Rodolphus and I've lost them." Sirius says back. I can hear the rain and traffic from his end.
"She said she's not coming back tonight and not to wait up."
"Shit." Sirius curses. Then he gasps. "I think I know how to find them."
"How?"
"I'll tell you when I see you. Where are you?"
"Cosmos."
"Be with you in a few then." Sirius says, hanging up.
I'm left confused and honestly scared. Scared for Lily, and scared because of the sudden change in situation. I'm in the dark here and if Sirius is to be believed, Lily is at serious risk.

It is a few minutes later that Sirius comes into the shop, sits down at a table and pulls out his laptop. I'm back on the till so Minerva takes his order.
"You can go now. It's afternoon, there isn't much to do." she tells me, eyeing Sirius.
"Okay, thanks Minerva." I say. I remove my apron and go and sit down with Sirius.
"Prepared to tell me what the hell you are doing now?"
"Trying to gain access back into the family intranet. via proxy" he says tapping away.
"Why?"
"Rodolphus has a habit. He dates a woman for a week or two. Then... then they disappear."
"What! Why didn't you tell me any of this? Lily is with him!" I almost yell before realising where we are.
"It's fine, it's only been two days."
"Fine! If she's in danger and I can't do anything because you want to play detective and she goes missing I will personally remove the appendages from your body one by one."
"Remus, calm down. Nobody knows what he does with the woman, but whatever he does earns him a shit ton of money. Lily will be fine. We just can't let her leave the house again until she snaps out of this phase."

I sigh and let my head fall into the table. Sirius pats me on the back of the head before exclaiming, "I'm back in. Let me see what I can dig up."
I look up at his screen. What's there is a complex system. "What is it?" I ask.
"The e-mail on the family intranet. We all learnt how to get into the administrator account when we were younger, so we can see most of the e-mail."
"How is e-mail going to help us with this."
"It will. This is the log of the crimes my family have done. Whenever they illegally purchase something or pay off the police, it goes through here to the family accountant. A-ha." he exclaims again.
"What?"
"Rodolphus. It's an old e-mail for a recurring purchase from the pharmaceutical branch of the business. Something called 'Dark Magic'."
"What is it?" I ask.
"No idea. He orders it in bulk though at a litre a month. Let me see what I can find."
"I'll go get us another drink." I tell him, leaving him to his ferocious tapping.

It pains me that I don't know where Lily is. I should be out looking for her, or doing something at least. I bring over a couple of cokes from the fridge and sit down again with Sirius.
"Black Magic. It's a drug. A mix of Imperius, otherwise known as LXN and another drug called Somno. It says so in the old emails."
"What do they do."
"Somno is a sleeping drug. Imperius I'm not sure about, though it's on the illegal side of the business." Sirius pauses. "as is Rodolphus' career."
My heart beats quickly. "What is it?"
"First just know it's fine, Rodolphus is enough of an idiot to get his Black magic home delivered. I have an address in the city."
My heart beats faster. "Sirius, what is going to happen to Lily..."
Sirius takes a breath. "Human trafficking, essentially slavery. And yes, that's what happens to the women. Remus stay calm. We can go rescue her."

I don't hear the end of his sentence. My heart is in my throat, I'm cold yet sweating. And I'm scared, but not just scared. I'm angry.