A/N: Might I suggest that, after reading this, you go and read my other mini-fic Ulterior Motives (please do!) if you want to know a bit more about what's going on. It's been up for a couple of weeks and I haven't updated it because I'm focussing on this story right now, but it's supposed to provide a bit of a backstory to one of the characters in this fic.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Everyone in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement had been drawn into the investigation as to what had happened at Godric's Hollow last night, and now even junior administrators like Barty were present at the scene. He had been assigned to trying to trace the footsteps of the Death Eaters that had been present in the surrounding area, as they'd managed to confirm the Dark Lord hadn't gone immediately to the house. It was a rather pointless task, given that most of them had disapparated very close to the scene of the crime, but given that he was now on his own in the forest surrounding Godric's Hollow it gave him more chance to fulfil his other task of finding out exactly what had become of Pettigrew.

Barty was, in all honesty, frightened as hell. He hadn't really understood what the others had meant last night when they said the Dark Lord had gone, but once he'd read the papers and heard his father's ranting this morning, he'd begun to worry what was going to happen to him. The Dark Lord couldn't be dead. He couldn't be. Barty didn't want to believe it. But if he was, what did that mean for him?

Bellatrix had said they would find him, and Barty knew that was exactly what they were going to have to do. It was the only way forward for him now: he'd gotten involved with the Death Eaters in the firm belief that the Dark Lord would win this war and Barty would come out of it in a better position than his father, but now he didn't know what was going to happen. However, he still had time to turn things around if he was able to prove his loyalty by finding the Dark Lord. It seemed that some of the others had given up already. When Barty had arrived here this morning the Ministry had sent a unit from the Department of Mysteries, of which Augustus Rookwood – the Death Eaters' inside man – was part of. Barty had only managed to speak to him briefly, but apparently Lucius Malfoy had already banned them from going anywhere near his house again. Selfish, disloyal bastard.

Barty wasn't supposed to be out here on his own, but the man he'd been sent to review the area with really was intolerable and they didn't get on at all. Calkwell had gone in the opposite direction to try and find evidence in another part of the forest, while Barty was now here trying to find traces left by Death Eater activity by himself. He almost laughed at the pointlessness of it. Even if he found anything he wasn't going to tell anyone. Despite the fact he knew he had little to fear from the Death Eaters, the uncertainty of the situation still made him rather nervous, and when he heard the sound of something scrabbling behind him on the forest floor he whipped round quickly. He paused for a moment as he tried to work out what had caused it, but seeing there was nothing in sight he shrugged it off as just being one of those things that could have been caused by anything. Nothing to worry about.

As he turned back round, however, he was in for a shock as he realised there was somebody standing in front of him. He began reaching for his wand, but didn't have much chance to do anything before Pettigrew shouted "Stupefy!" and Barty was thrown to the floor. Somehow, he managed to keep hold of his wand and tried to return the curse, but Pettigrew was too fast – something Barty was learning quickly he was very good at – and followed it up with "Expelliarmus!" Barty's wand was wrenched out of his hand and he didn't have much choice but to try and run away as Pettigrew quickly approached him. He didn't have chance to get very far before Pettigrew once again cast the curse he had used in Islington to stick him to the floor. Barty wondered what Pettigrew was doing here and why he had decided to come back, but just as he was about to spit some insult at him along the lines of "Filthy traitor," Pettigrew had kicked him in the stomach. Barty doubled over and gasped in pain, but he couldn't get up.

"It's all your fault, you bastard," Pettigrew said, his high-pitched voice strangely menacing.

"What's my fault? You're the one who led us to this, you treacherous little rat," Barty spat back at him.

"You just couldn't let me keep the money, could you?" Pettigrew snarled, and kicked him again. Barty groaned.

"Well, you wanted to live."

"You have no idea what this was about!" Pettigrew gave him another kick in the stomach, and then one more in his face. Barty yelped as he heard his nose crack and felt blood begin to pour down his face.

"Then what is this about?" he muttered thickly through the stream of blood.

"Emily."

"Who?"

"Emily Brondheim! Don't you remember her? Blonde Hufflepuff girl three years above you?"

Barty's lack of reaction clearly showed he didn't, and Pettigrew looked like he was about to kick him again, but then decided against it.

"No, you wouldn't, would you. Funny how nobody ever seemed to notice her but me."

Barty was completely confused, but just wanted to be able to reach his wand so he could put a rather nasty hex on Pettigrew. The bastard deserved it. "What the fuck's she got to do with anything?"

"Everything! The money was for her. When she got involved with one of…your lot."

"Well, whatever it was it was her own fault…"

"Shut up!" Pettigrew gave him another brutal kick and Barty groaned as he spat out blood. "She didn't know what she was letting herself in for. She had no idea he was a Death Eater. It was just that Rosier took advantage of her. When Moody came for him…he saw her with him and thought she must be a Death Eater too. Then of course he died, and they all came after her even though she wasn't involved in any of it. It was your father that signed the arrest warrant for her, you son of a bitch. She's been on the run ever since. That's why I asked you for the money; I thought that if it was you people who'd got her into that mess then you could damn well get her out. I was going to get her a new identity, a new life somewhere else. She was going to leave the country and nobody would ever find her. I had everything planned out and I just needed the money. But now I can't even get that! What am I supposed to do? Now they're trying to round up the Death Eaters and I've got nothing to fall back on. She's going to end up in Azkaban and it's all because of you, you bastard!"

Pettigrew was about to kick him again, but Barty was expecting it and grabbed hold of his foot and twisted it so that Pettigrew fell to the floor with a yelp. He was about to bring up his wand again, but Barty grabbed hold of his arm and climbed on top of him to pin him to the floor. He still couldn't stand up properly, but managed to get to his knees and try and wrench the wand from Pettigrew's grasp. Before he'd managed it though Pettigrew had transformed into a rat again and scampered off. Barty tried to go after him, but it was difficult on his hands and knees and Pettigrew was far too fast for him. "Fuck!" he yelled after the retreating rodent, "Fuck!" He gave a frustrated scream before spitting out another gobbet of blood and collapsing on the floor. What did the rat think he was going to do now?

Thankfully, the curse didn't last as long as last time and within fifteen minutes Barty was able to get up again and collect his wand. He used it to clean himself up while still muttering curses under his breath, angry that once again he'd allowed himself to be overpowered by a supposedly less competent wizard. He did however think that Pettigrew's skills as an animagus gave him an unfair advantage, and Barty didn't know why he'd chosen to come after him anyway. It wasn't like Barty was to blame for his girlfriend (or whatever she'd been to him) getting involved with the Death Eaters, and he thought that if the bitch was too stupid to realise what was going on then it was her own fault how things had turned out.

A moment after thinking it, he realised the hypocrisy of that sentiment and wished he could take it back. Even though he hadn't said it out loud, he wished he'd never thought it in the first place. It didn't make Emily stupid just because she hadn't known what Rosier was up to. Gwen was clueless too, but she certainly wasn't stupid. But that still didn't mean that because things had turned out badly for Emily it was somehow Barty's fault. Did Pettigrew hold him responsible because his father had signed the warrant? That was probably the case, and Barty felt a surge of anger that people still judged him because of his father. He was nothing like Barty Crouch Sr, and if people could be bothered to pay any attention to him they would notice that.

After getting rid of the blood Barty headed back to the ruins of the Potters' house. He was sort of glad that he had at least got to find out what Pettigrew wanted the money for, but it didn't do any good now. When he arrived back he headed straight to Augustus Rookwood, who was carrying out a spell residue survey on the house. Barty walked purposefully up to him and spoke quietly so that only he could hear. "I've just seen Wormtail in the forest. He tried to attack me, but when I managed to overpower him he turned into a rat and ran away." There was no point giving him the full details, Barty thought.

Rookwood looked thoughtful for a moment, then nodded. "We have others looking for him in London, I'll let them know you saw him. Did you find out any more information as to what happened?"

"No." Barty thought about telling him about what Pettigrew had said, but decided it might be in his best interests not to mention it.

"Alright. We'll find him. And, Crouch, there's something else." He took Barty's arm and led him to one side so they could continue their conversation further away from everyone else. "There's a banker, Maurice Redknapp, he's a senior executive at Gringotts. His wife's an American xenocaster. She's in Seattle at the moment, but he might know something that can help us."

"Xenocaster?"

"Their equivalent of an Unmentionable. She's an expert in old magic and she might be able to tell us what happened to the Dark Lord, but we'll need her husband to get her co-operation. Rodolphus thinks he can break through the anti-apparition charm on Gringotts but we'll still need more information; like a floor plan of the building, the location of Redknapp's office and what security measures are in place. Do you think you could find that out for us, Crouch?"

Realising this meant an attack on Gringotts, Barty immediately felt reluctant to agree to it. However, he also felt pleased to have been asked to carry out a task that was so important, and reasoned with himself that since Gwen wasn't even on the same floor as Redknapp she'd be well out of harm's way. Not to mention that if he was supposed to be coming up with a plan to infiltrate Gringotts then it would give him more chances to see her, even though he hoped he could still prevent her from getting caught up in all this. He'd waited so long for the opportunity to show his true value to the Death Eaters, and now that it was finally here he couldn't let it pass. If he was able to do something really, truly important to helping find the Dark Lord the Barty knew whatever risks that were involved would be worth it. If he succeeded in the end then he knew he'd be justly rewarded. "I can, but you know things aren't likely to start calming down at work for at least a week. It'll be difficult to get away: I'll need time."

Rookwood seemed annoyed but nodded in acknowledgement; working at the Ministry himself he knew how difficult the situation was. "I know, but it needs to be as soon as possible. The longer we wait the less likely it is we'll be able to find out exactly what happened. This is important, Crouch. Do you think you can manage it?"

Barty wanted to be able to rise to the challenge. "Yes."

"Good." Rookwood then suddenly raised his voice and changed the subject, "Right then Crouch, I'll need a full spell history report on this place as soon as possible."

Barty gave a nod, slipping into his role easily. "I'll have it to you by this afternoon, sir."

"Good, good. It'll be important to us working out exactly what kind of magic is at play here."

And with that Rookwood headed back towards his team of Unmentionables, while Barty was left feeling both excited and nervous at the prospect of carrying out the task he'd been given.

A/N: When I was trying to think of a reason for Peter wanting the money I knew it was going to have to be pretty important. I was wondering what would cause him to sell out his best friends to Voldemort, so I decided on giving him a friend/love interest that he considered even more important than James and the others. I imagine it was a situation where he liked her more than she liked him, but even when she got involved with Rosier he didn't get up and still chose to help her out when she was in trouble. When I came up with it I was a bit worried maybe I was giving Peter too honourable a motive and he was acting more noble than he's portrayed in the books, but it's important to remember he was in Gryffindor, not Slytherin, and so he's more likely to show a Gryffindor trait by taking risks to help somebody out, rather than a Slytherin trait by deceiving everybody just for his own means. I don't think he's really evil at this point in the story, but becomes that way when his plan falls to pieces and he realises he has no other option. Maybe I'm making him slightly OOC, but I like to think I'm twisting the canon rather than contradicting it. I know some of you were curious as to why Peter wanted the money so I hope this explanation fits the bill.