I'm finally better! :D
This chapter would've been up earlier, but it wouldn't upload. This one was really complex to write, and it's pretty long, so I hope it lives up to your expectations. (I know, it better, considering it took me four days to write it. I'm sorry.)
Review! Tell me what you think! I really appreciate the ones I've been getting :)
Disclaimer: This world and these characters belong to J.K. Rowling. The only thing I own is the plot.
Dom shut her eyes and raked a hand through her hair. She was utterly exhausted. The previous morning, she'd received an owl from James that had said that after years of relative inactivity from the Riddlers, they'd suddenly kidnapped Rose, Al, Alice, and Scorpius.
According to James, a thorough search of the castle had led them to make this conclusion: the four weren't at Hogwarts. They weren't at Hogsmeade, either, according to Louis; he had asked the elves to scour the place, and they had complied; they adored the Legacy members for their frequent visits and being the family members of "Mister Harry Potter, sir, who was a great friend to Dobby." An old elf named Winky in particular was ready to do anything they wanted, because surprisingly, it was not Hermione Granger or Harry Potter who had taken care of her after Dobby died, but Ron Weasley, who had said that "Harry and Hermione have got too much on their plates to come around here now, but I know they'd both want you to be all right, and I reckon you've grown on me, right?"
Although it was dangerous, especially with the exhausting nature of their jobs, every Legacy member had Apparated long-distance to Hogwarts that day for an impromptu Legacy meeting. Lily, who had confined herself to the Slytherin Common Room (because it was Saturday, and none of the students had classes), assured them that Alice, Scorpius, Al, and Rose all had their Legacy coins.
Despite their having the coins, none of them had heard a single word from any of the four, so Teddy took charge, as he had in old times: Those of them with jobs within the United Kingdom would search at night, and those of them who were out of the country would keep attempting to contact the four while doing what they could to assist with the search, as well as searching whatever country they were in, just to be safe. The students would go to class normally, and they would have the outward appearance of carrying on with their lives.
Word of what had occurred could not get out. That would lead to questions, and the Riddlers had information that couldn't escape. The majority of them was of age and would go to Azkaban, and those that didn't would be expelled and refused jobs. Their parents' names would help them a little in the job area, and Merlin knew they could pay whatever fines came their way, but the high-tier jobs they wanted – Auror, Hit Wizard, Healer, etc. – wouldn't be possible. It would ruin their lives.
Really, the Riddlers need not have bothered with blackmail; Legacy couldn't have gone to the Ministry anyway. At least they knew how they had smuggled the four out, though – through the Shrieking Shack and into Hogsmeade.
It was now very late on Sunday; technically, Monday, really. Dom had stolen a dragon and scoured Romania when it became clear that the four were not in the U.K. She didn't know about populated places, but she knew they weren't anywhere remote in Romania. Vic had assured them that they weren't in any remote area of Egypt, either.
There was no way to know if the four were in a city, or even a small town. For all they knew, they could be in someone's home. Dom had broken into too many solitary houses to count that night. Any home with a hint of dark magic, and she had bypassed the wards and searched it thoroughly. She didn't spend more than five minutes in any house, and she had been at it for about thirty-seven inconsecutive hours – every spare moment she had.
She'd been using potions to stay awake, and at eight o'clock in the morning, just after she had surreptitiously returned, she was about to begin work. She didn't have hours like someone who worked in an office did, and that allowed her a bit of flexibility time-wise.
A sudden searing pain cut through her robes, and Dom yelped and fished out her Legacy coin. "Hello?" came Rose's raspy voice, and Dom's heart leaped.
Forgetting all about her exhaustion, Dom answered eagerly, "Rose? Where are you? Where are the others? Are you all right?"
She heard a barrage of questions come from the others until Alice finally snapped, "Will you all shut up?" Her voice, much like Rose's, was raspy and brittle, but at least she had her attitude.
"How are you?" Teddy asked gently, when everyone was silent.
"Simply marvelous," drawled Scorpius. "Absolutely spiffing."
"Evidently not too bad if you're snapping at us and using sarcasm," Lucy said dryly, echoing Dom's thoughts. Then her voice became concerned. "Really, are you hurt very badly?"
"No," Rose answered without missing a beat, as the cousins listened closely, trying to figure out whether she was lying or not. They were very good at picking out liars, but the four were almost ridiculously skilled at lying undetected.
"Where's Al?" Teddy demanded.
"Right here," Al croaked. Dom frowned. There was something off about him . . .
"Have you got any idea where you are?" Vic asked.
"Sure," Scorpius answered. "We've got a lovely floor-to-ceiling view of our gorgeous surroundings, not to mention several travel brochures, and our captors are urging us to go sightseeing. They've laid out an entire plan for us regarding where we're going to go; I reckon they wanted to ask for suggestions, gain our approval; that sort of thing. I'm sure they also wanted to give us the opportunity to ask you to join us."
He was met with silence, and then, "We haven't got a bloody clue what country we're in. They're keeping us locked in cells in some basement somewhere. We know it's cold; I'm ninety percent sure it's snowing outside judging from the drafts we keep getting."
"Thank you, Rose," said Teddy. "We're working on finding you."
"How are they treating you?" Molly asked cautiously.
"Like royalty."
"Shut up, Scorpius. Ignore him; he's in a bad mood," said Alice. "Although I'm not exactly ready to celebrate, either. Er . . . we're not really feeling any love here. Don't take your time rescuing us."
Lucy tsked. "And to think I was planning to go on vacation before I started looking for you."
"That's enough," Vic cried in exasperation before a sarcastic banter contest could commence. It was never a good idea to try to let Legacy members attempt to outwit each other in the midst of a crisis. They were extremely, ridiculously competitive, and contests within Legacy, while incredibly amusing, tended to last forever.
"I've got to go," said Dom urgently, "and I suspect you all haven't got much time, either. Hang in there, you four. I'll start hunting again tonight. At least now we know Vic's looking in the wrong place. I doubt it's snowing in Egypt."
"Keep your coins close. We'll contact you whenever we can."
"Don't worry." Dom swore. "Ah, now I have to steal another dragon. Do you know how hard it was the first time?"
Before any of the others could ask, she'd shoved her coin into a pocket and run off. With hasty goodbyes, the others left as well, leaving the four prisoners to collapse out of relief.
"Do you think they could tell Al just gained consciousness?" Rose whispered, fingering the coin.
"I didn't . . . exactly talk . . . very much, did I?" gasped Al, his breathing labored.
Scorpius swore softly. "Al, are you still bleeding?"
"Only . . . in some places," Al spat through gritted teeth as he shifted himself up slightly. "Keep scabbing . . . and breaking . . ."
Alice laughed grimly. "Perfect. Why do you think the others at Hogwarts didn't answer our call?"
"Obviously it was important – I hope they're all right." Rose bit her lip.
Scorpius raised his head at that. "You don't think they'll kidnap some of the others, too?"
"Who knows?" Rose laughed harshly. "They could kill us all. Al, what did they want earlier, when they were questioning you?"
"They wanted," Al gasped, "to know everything . . . everything we've ever done . . . they know we've broken the law . . . know we've all done things that could get us arrested . . . they want retribution . . . but they don't have enough information to get it."
"They want to know our secrets," Alice realized. "They want to know what made us great in the beginning."
"They want to destroy us. Keeping us alive and broken is worse than killing us, and it hasn't got the same consequences." Rose stiffened all of a sudden. "Do you hear that? Footsteps – again – they're coming."
Al shut his eyes and let his head fall back against the wall. "Joy," he breathed.
James had a murderous headache. He was unusually tacit as he made his way down to breakfast with Louis and Fred, and this didn't go unnoticed by them. "Hey," Louis said, waving a hand in front of James's face. "James, stop."
"What?" James snapped.
"You've been obsessing," Fred snapped back, "and you need to stop. Now. You think I didn't notice you pacing all night? Mate, you look paler than Snape right now."
James didn't even bother to muster up a don't insult me. "How are we supposed to explain their absence to the professors?" he demanded. "They'll believe they skived off for a while. But how long before they start to ask questions?"
"We'll figure it out when the time comes," Louis said tiredly. "It's not as if we haven't done it before."
James rolled his eyes. "It's a bit harder to come up with an explanation for 'Professor, my little brother and his mates were kidnapped' than for 'Professor, I vandalized the Slytherin common room with my cousins.'"
Louis hit him over the head. "Because we haven't been covering up, 'Professor, I just broken about fifty different laws that could land everyone in my generation of the family in Azkaban' for the last decade of our lives, have we, James?"
Fred grinned. "He's got a point. Honestly though, I wish the Riddlers had picked a different time. We haven't gotten the chance to show the cousins that we're illegal animagi!"
The corner of James's mouth tugged up a little. "Fred, we've been illegal animagi since the end of last summer."
"But ever since Teddy graduated, it hasn't been the same. We've always been the middle ones, and we're in our last year now. We'll all have jobs; obligations outside of Legacy. When was the last time all of us were together? Even at Christmas, we weren't able to have a meeting with all of us there. Dom had to go back to Romania with Uncle Charlie, and we haven't seen Lucy's mates since she graduated."
"We saw Will at Andromeda's Christmas party," Louis countered.
Fred snickered. "No, they exchanged brief greetings with us and then went off to greet the rest of the relatives they hadn't seen in ages. And all Will saw of James was the back of his head when he was snogging Pryce in the hallway."
"Excuse me," said Del as she joined the conversation, grinning at James. "I've never kissed James in my life."
James returned the grin appreciatively. "That would be a bit hard to explain to Cecy. 'Honestly, I thought she was you!'"
"The hair, Cap'n," Del laughed, ruffling the dark brown mass. "Didn't you once say your father told you Potters always go for redheads? Your little brother's girlfriend is a redhead, too, isn't she? Besides, would you want to give my sister further incentive to beat us at the next Quidditch game?"
James shuddered. "Don't even joke," he muttered, thinking of the upcoming Gryffindor-Slytherin game. There was a Hufflepuff-Slytherin game scheduled a month after that, which Slytherin was bound to win, so Gryffindor had to beat Slytherin by a good amount, or even if they won the final match, they could lose the cup.
"Oh, no," Del realized. "James, how are we supposed to play without a Seeker? We'll have to find some excuse explaining Al's absence and use our reserve . . ."
"Hugo," sighed James. "Del, how are we supposed to play without both our Beaters, and a missing Chaser?"
"James," Del said in horror. "Forget the fact that we're missing more than half of our team. Slytherin's Seeker –"
"–is my sister," James finished glumly. "Lily Potter, who inherited all of her father's skill. Not to mention she's built small, unlike Hugo, who decided to inherit Uncle Ron's height."
"Al grew ridiculously tall, too, and he's a brilliant Seeker. Besides, it's not like you gave Hugo the spot without making sure he was the best out there first. He passed tryouts."
"They're missing and he's worried about what it'll do to Gryffindor's Quidditch chances?" Louis demanded to Fred.
Fred shrugged. "Quidditch is important. We can't lose to Slytherin. Besides, we were the ones who told him to get his mind off the Riddlers."
They approached the Gryffindor table and took seats, nodding at Rowan, who was already seated. She took one look at James, who was glaring at his little sister, and guessed, "Quidditch?"
Del nodded, putting her head in her hands. "I know it seems a little callous, but it seems easier to worry about what their absence will do to our chances of winning the Cup as opposed to what their absence will do to them."
Rowan glanced at her little sister, who was conversing easily with a fellow Slytherin who seemed to be a Riddler – at first glance, it would seem like a discussion between friends, but to one who had observed the proceedings of Slytherin debates and the diplomatic, intricate policies that defined every word they uttered, the tense set of Morgan's shoulders and the deceptively alluring smile on her companion's face told the story of an argument that could prove deadly.
She worried about them, sometimes. Truly, she did.
A sharp sound snapped Rowan out of her thoughts, and she spun to her left, heart beating erratically. "Merlin, Roxy! You nearly scared my robes off of me!" She bent down to pick up the fork Roxy had dropped, and when she straightened again, the girl hadn't moved an inch.
Hugo and Xander had stiffened beside her, and they were all staring, mouths agape slightly, at something behind Rowan. She spared a glance at her fellow seventh years, who didn't appear to have noticed anything amiss.
Turning back to Roxanne, Rowan frowned. "What–"
"Morning, all," a smooth, charming voice interrupted, sliding into the seat beside her. Rowan stiffened – Hugo, Roxy, and Xander still looked slightly shocked, and the faces of the others had slackened considerably.
Rowan had only heard a voice that charismatic come from two kinds of people in her life – those of Legacy, and those of Slytherin. She turned in her seat and took in the four new additions to their table.
They were eating as if nothing had happened, apparently oblivious to the tension surrounding them. Rowan focused on the one who had spoken.
"Scorpius," she said.
"We could give you your sight back," coaxed the lady in front of her. She talked as if she were speaking to a small child, in a placating, terrifying, utterly mad voice. She was reminding Rose horribly of Bellatrix Lestrange.
"Shockingly, I lack the desire to lay eyes upon your faces," Rose drawled. "If you lot look anything like you sound, it would be a thoroughly scarring and unpleasant experience that I'd prefer to spare myself."
"What was it you wanted to be . . . an Auror? Like your father?" demanded the pseudo-Bellatrix. "Something dangerous, no doubt – it's a pity they don't take the blind. I'm afraid Miss Perfect Rose Ginevra Weasley would fail the physical examinations and be written off as unqualified. What would that feel like, I wonder? For the first time in your disgustingly pretentious life, to fail?"
"I imagine it would give me a brief glimpse of what yours must be like," Rose answered, playing with her shackles. When the woman first walked in, she had shot some sort of spell at Rose's jaw that had hurt horribly. A minute after the pain had faded, Rose spat blood into her hand and felt a pointed canine in the middle of it. She hadn't been hurt physically after that.
"My life," said pseudo-Bellatrix, "is molded from foundations laid by your parents. From the moment I was born, I was considered scum, an outcast of wizarding society. From the moment you were born, you were raised on an altar, viewed as the most promising of the next generation, to lead our world into an era of light following the days of Voldemort's Death Eaters; to continue the legacy your parents, legends in their right, left behind in that war."
The word legacy echoed painfully within Rose's head. The woman was painting a heroic picture, an aggrandizing account of their ideals and dreams. "Your life is whatever you make it to be," Rose countered, feeling like they were speaking in inspirational sayings.
She could feel pseudo-Bellatrix sneering at her, so for some unfathomable reason, she tried to explain herself to the woman. "None of us want to continue the legacy of our parents," Rose said softly. "We want to create a legacy of our own."
When the woman spoke again, it wasn't in a condescending tone of voice. It was utterly emotionless, and Rose wondered if that meant the woman was feeling everything at once or nothing at all.
She simply said, "Ah."
This was not the interrogation Rose expected.
Al drew in a ragged breath and raised his head to look at the man in front of him. He hadn't bothered to hide his appearance (and thus, his identity, because Al would make sure Teddy could look this man up by description).
"I don't think you understand," Al told the man frankly. "See, by kidnapping me, you've given me everything I ever wanted. The chance to prove myself. And I'll sit here and tell you all about the inner workings of my mind, as far as I know, anyway. I'll tell you why I want what I want, and how my family has affected my ambitions. I'll spout poetic crap that means absolutely nothing to anyone who isn't me, and you can sit there and wonder why I'm not giving you the information that you want.
"If we have done anything illegal, it is our business. Not yours. If there is one thing that means more to me than myself, it's my family, because they made me what I am. Without them, I'd have died a long time ago, suffocated by expectation. Also, as you continue to torture me and demand to be regaled with tales of our adventures, I'd like to add that stoically shouting 'Never!' isn't quite as liberating as I thought it would be."
Al was out of breath after his speech, and he didn't hesitate to hyperventilate in front of the man, who was looking nonplussed. Perversely, Al was enjoying himself, although he could do without the Cruciatus. Minutes before, he hadn't shown a shred of bravery – he would have been crying for the pain to end, but he couldn't speak.
But after, he'd managed to regain his mind. He had attempted to explain to this man why torturing him was not going to work, not because Al was a hero, and definitely not because Al was brave or selfless.
Really, it was because Al was selfish, and he thought he would much rather die and leave his family behind than be left behind and have his family die.
Scorpius flinched as his cell door slammed shut. The sound resonated, piercing his skull and intensifying his headache. Torture was really nothing like he'd expected. He'd once read about a girl who was going through torture who refused to give her torturers the satisfaction of hearing her scream.
He didn't make a sound, either, but really, it wasn't out of choice. He seemed to have lost the ability to scream, or speak, or think. He had contacted Al, but he had been utterly silent. Scorpius wondered if it was because he couldn't speak, or if he had nothing to say.
He had contacted Rose, too. Apparently, her torturer hadn't even attempted to hurt her. Rose was under the impression that her torture was of the mental variety. They wanted her to feel despair, so that she would give in completely. They thought she would do anything to get her sight, and in turn, her hope back.
They probably would have succeeded in making Rose completely depressed, she confessed. But then she thought of Scorpius shaking his head and repeating his words from earlier: don't you dare start feeling sorry for yourself, Rose.
So she didn't. At least, according to her mother, there were a load of starving children about the world who had never had grilled cheese, which would no doubt horrify Al, so they were luckier than quite a lot of people, just from that.
And there were plenty of blind people, she had said, that she didn't know personally, but she was sure they were wonderful people with lovely lives and danger-fraught vocations.
Leave it to Rose, thought Scorpius, to make him smile.
Alice remembered a few flashes of pain before she succumbed to oblivion. She didn't know how long she spent like that, but after a while, she was in a strange half-asleep state where she wasn't awake, but she had conscious thought.
She really hoped she wasn't dead. She had quite a bit left to do with her life, and dying would put a rather unfortunate hold on it all that she wasn't sure she could overcome, Legacy or otherwise.
She also really hoped she wouldn't end up insane in St. Mungo's like her grandmother and namesake, Alice Longbottom I. It would be all that fair to her father, to have two Alices that ended up in St. Mungo's because they were tortured by evil women who wanted to hurt them.
She thought privately that her father hadn't named her "Alice" as a tribute to his mother, but rather because he wanted a second chance with an Alice Longbottom. He wanted an Alice that would grow old and be happy and live and love and do whatever it was that Alices who weren't driven insane by torture were supposed to do.
Alice wished he had placed his faith in someone else, because she couldn't be his second chance. Whether she was sane or not by the end of this, she would never be exactly what he wanted. She had once said, "I want to be my dad when I grow up." And Louis had answered, "You'll be better than your dad."
He was wrong. She wouldn't be better than her dad. But she would be different.
Or maybe now she would be just dead. Or just insane. And that wasn't even different, because Alice Longbottom I had done it first. Obviously, life was not at all concerned with being fair.
It wasn't okay. But at least there three other people in the world that could attest to just how incredibly interesting she was. It was just unfortunate that they were just as likely as she to end up dead.
"So while I really wish we'd been able to answer the summons this morning, we were a bit preoccupied with the doppelgängers of the Golden Quartet!" finished James, breathing heavily after his rant.
Teddy was silent on the other end. "Let me get this perfectly straight," he said. "This morning at breakfast, four look-alikes showed up and began acting like nothing happened, and you actually thought it might be them for a few brief, blissful moments."
"And then," Vic chimed in, "they went to class, commenced absolute mayhem, and nearly got them expelled?"
"Actually," Hugo said, "yeah. I think the only thing that stopped Professor McGonagall from expelling them was the fact that they seemed to want to be expelled."
"Yeah," Xander agreed. "They don't really care about rules, but they love Hogwarts. They never wanted to be expelled."
"It's scary how incredibly perfect their acting is," Roxy added. "It would have been perfect if it weren't for that mistake in McGonagall's office."
"I suppose you know about it because you snuck in?" Molly asked wryly.
"It was bloody difficult, but yeah," Fred confessed. "Honestly, it would probably have taken us weeks before we noticed anything if it weren't for the fact that they warned us beforehand."
"So that's what they meant when they said, 'We considered not telling you at all. We guarantee, you wouldn't have noticed without this letter,'" Morgan noted.
"So what do you think?" asked Lucy. "Polyjuice?"
"Yes," said Rowan. "I heard the fake Scorpius speak before I saw him, and I didn't recognize the voice. It was a remarkably good impression, and the way he talked covered up the difference in voice, but I'm sure it's an imposter under Polyjuice."
"One of the graduates," Lorcan agreed. "Or four of them, rather. I haven't noticed them drinking out of flasks like with Mad-Eye Moody back in our parents' day, but I'm sure they're managing it somehow."
"They've spent a lot of time studying our behavior," Lily added. "I think the Riddlers have been observing far more closely than we ever realized."
"There are a lot of things about the Riddlers we're only just realizing," Teddy muttered. "All right – Lily, Morgan, and Lorcan – your new job is to figure out the names of the graduates. Compile a list of those in school as well, but only the inner circle, understand?"
"And us?" asked Louis.
"Research," answered Teddy. "Figure out a way to solve this problem with the imposters. You're going to spend your nights locked in the Room of Requirement, using all of the vast resources we've stocked up on over the years. There's a wealth of knowledge in there – use it."
James exhaled. "We've a lot of work ahead of us," he said grimly.
Teddy was completely serious. "Don't waste time," he warned. Then he sighed. "As for those of us who aren't at Hogwarts, we're going to continue our search. Hopefully we'll come up with something useful."
And so they had a plan. The meeting adjourned, and they got to work.
"Hey, Scorpius," muttered Rose. Alice and Al were still unconscious.
"Yeah?" Scorpius answered.
She grinned slightly. "I'm not wallowing in the depths of my self-pity," she announced. She held up the tooth, which was now sharp and slender and just long enough to accomplish the job she wanted. She had worked all through the day after the pseudo-Bellatrix woman visited her and through half the night, but she still had a few hours left before there was any danger of their captors paying any of them another visit.
"That's good to know," said Scorpius. "I haven't stopped breathing. Shall we congratulate ourselves?"
"Shut up," Rose said affectionately. "I have good news."
"Hmm?" He arched an eyebrow lazily, observing a rivulet of blood running down his arm. It looked black in the dark.
Rose held up the tooth again, fingering it. In her other hand, she hefted one of the shackles that had previously encircled her wrists. Teeth, it seemed, were longer than they appeared with half of one's gums covering them.
And although these Slytherins seemed to have a vendetta against her family, and did not seem particularly concerned with Muggles and Muggleborns and blood purity, they had not learned some of the more useful things invented by Muggles.
One of these things was the art of lock-picking.
The locks on her shackles were very complex magic-wise. They had layers upon layers of protective charms that kept them clasped. And yet physically, they were no more complex than the simple lock on a bathroom doorknob.
Vandalism wasn't the only thing James learned in America.