Chapter Six
xxxxx
The Apparition coordinates for the prison are way north, out by the coast. Storminess, solitude, that sort of thing. The waves swell and smash on the rocks a shocking distance below. Silvery-grey, lots of froth. The hissing, thundering noises are nerve-wracking, like cauldrons blowing up. The cliff actually shakes. Stand too near the edge and the spray will bloody well soak you. This far north, the weather's a total crapshoot, the cloud cover so thick half the time I wouldn't want to fly my broom through it. Today, it's blue enough to peel your eyeballs.
The entrance is at the south wall of the cliff. The waves make it necessary to shout, and between crashes there's still the hiss of foam racing up the shore. The dark rock's got white veins hidden all over. When the sun hits, the whole cliff breaks out in sparkles. Scrubby little plants and lacy things with long, dangly stems droop out of the cracks, fluttering in the wind. We Apparate down to the beach and crunch over. Tiny carved pixie faces crust the rock, leering gargoyles peeking out from under the leaves. They're all over the place, dripping moisture. Like barnacles, only with eyes.
An inconspicuous door appears. First time around, I was kind of expecting something more imposing, brass-bound and stained like a wine cask, "Abandon All Hope" scrawled across the top. It's actually pretty small. Del gives me a look and lifts the knocker: silver flowers, intertwined. Lilies, I think. Before it hits the plate, the door swings open and a house elf in a dark-blue robe bows us in.
"Scrappy is pleased to be seeing you again, Harry Potter," he squeaks, very dignified. No fawning or overexcitement here. A belt of pebbles hangs at his waist. Not something I usually think of house elves as having—waists, I mean. He looks like a pint-sized monk in a cassock. At his hip a ring of keys barely makes a sound; on Dobby they would have jangled like crazy.
"Aurors is to follow Scrappy. Warden Bulle and Secretary Keene is expecting you."
Good. I've been looking forward to this.
Last time, Bulle's spotty, supercilious clerk did most of the talking. Del kept a professionally straight face, but I think I may have grimaced more than once, because the Warden gave me the most quelling look I've received since Hogwarts. We talked specs and statistics, cell dimensions and availability, kitchen arrangements, proposed staffing, architectural soundness (a big-ticket item considering that Azkaban pretty much fell to pieces and the public's having nightmares about escaped Death Eaters), and so forth. We got ushered into a room stuffed with affidavits, proofs, ingredients lists, pledges of liability insurance. Important stuff, but yawn-worthy next to the real thing.
Today we get the tour.
Bulle takes the lead, Keene points out items of interest, me and Del exchange glances. Now and then a dull boom reaches us from the sea. We're in some inaccessible third floor corridor, totally turned around. Getting lost here would be easy and getting out impossible. Lots of curving and twisting about. Tunnels carved right into the cliff, but it feels more like—I don't know, a museum? Not sure I've ever been in one to compare. Sinuous and marble-like, is what I mean. Our footsteps clatter, hit the walls and fly back to us, just like the halls at Hogwarts. The echoes cover Del's whisper when she leans toward me, her eyes on the mosaic patterns that flow along both sides, twining around the cell doors, never stopping.
"This facility's fucking beautiful, you notice? A disgrace, you ask me. Why in Merlin's name would someone waste magic and money on an underground palace designed to lock up convicts?"
I've asked myself that, too. Because it's the first thing to hit you once the door clangs shut: the elegance, the obvious attempt to tart up the interior. If it wasn't meant to hold Dark wizards and other criminal types, maybe it wouldn't be so odd. But it's a contradiction in terms, and that usually means somebody's hiding something. Not necessarily something bad, but it's an auror's job to distinguish truth from glamour.
That's part of why I like it. The prison, I mean.
Ahead of us, Warden Bulle does one of his weird fluid moves, pivoting on his heel. For a bloke his age, he's awfully smooth. That word again: sinuous. Not surprising, since this place was built to his specifications. He squares his chin—well, his whole face is square, really strong bone structure, like a picture frame. All he does is stand still, watching. That thing with his chin might be useful to note, just in case it means he's prepping for a lie. His glance skips past me and nails Del. After our first introduction, when I thought he was going to order me tossed down a stairwell, he apparently decided to settle for treating me as a human dust mote instead. He blinks just a second too long every time our eyes meet, like he's trying to wash out the sight of me.
"Am I to understand you intend to lodge a complaint against my sense of style, Auror," the Warden pauses so slightly you could miss it, except that he makes sure we don't, "Biggerstaff?"
High, crisp voice, a bit uppercrust, kind of flutey on the vowels. I'd tag him as a pureblood, although I'm not sure that's relevant. He's got Muggleborns working for him, after all.
He's another one of the things I like. I could use a challenge right now, and he's it.
Del hates the name Delphinium as much as Tonks ever hated being called Nymphadora, but she's kind of helpless against it since her last name's worse by a mile. And unless you want to come across as a professional nanny, it's just not on to go around asking people to call you "Auror Del."
"No, sir," she says. "Just remarking on the unique features of your design."
He glances over at the mosaics, and—blow me, it's like they move. Like shadowlight glitters over the wall just then, so the individual tiles change colour. Could be an optical illusion, I suppose.
Twenty galleons says it's magic.
Warden Bulle's white moustache hides the sharp corners of his mouth, so I can't tell whether he's smiling. I think he is, though. Probably at our expense.
Strictly speaking, our host's courting a hex. I didn't twig at first, but he's the reason I had that dream the other night. Waking up with a stiff prick between my legs? Sort of a dead giveaway. Because that's what he is, right? That combination of authority and arrogance, the lid banged down tight, but under all that coldness there's something seething at the bottom. No wonder it stirred up memories of Snape. They're the same type, if Snape could ever be said to have a type. This bloke's just a few rungs up the social ladder.
Ever since we arrived with our Ministry-monogrammed robes and our credentials proving we're legit, Hieronymus Bulle, Warden of the Catacombs, has been walking a very fine attitude line. He's stuck to it so far, but I keep waiting for him to fall off. Right away, his refusal to shake hands and his curt nod conveyed, I don't want you here. When he led us into the main corridor, the set of his shoulders spelled out: Go away and never darken my door again. His grey hair's gone partly white, which gives him a snowy-owl effect. He's a barbershop regular or else he's got a natural wave, because—maybe it sounds mental to imply that someone can sneer with their hair, but that rich-man's flip practically gives us the finger.
Up to this point he hasn't spoken one word to me and barely three to Del, and I don't know why he's acting like we've brought dragon pox into his sparkly dungeon. Kingsley Owled him in advance, all fair and aboveboard, letting him know the date and time we'd be Apparating in for our follow-up inspection. If he expects the Ministry to hand its convicts over to his underground lockbox, he'd bloody well better cooperate. Starting with the explanation he failed to give us the last time.
The corridors are glossy brownish-grey, as if the water that drenches the cliff outside has somehow got trapped under the surface. The mosaics are pebble-sized, flashy and colourful. Most of the bits are gemstone-polished, amber and ruby and cloudy emerald, with black strings of glitter bubbling through like oil slicks. It's a funny rainbow effect. The patterns make no sense. I keep checking, and sure enough, the colours change. Light ripples to dark and back again. Sometimes it runs in the opposite direction.
The Warden doesn't strike me as the sort of wizard who enjoys pretty stuff for its own sake. These mosaics have a point, and I want to know what they're doing here. Nudging Del to give her a heads-up, I stroll over to the righthand wall and slide my palm along the bumpy river of stones. Just as I expected, a pulse of magic flashes against my skin.
A few steps ahead, where Solomon Keene prattles on about enforced education and prisoner counselling, enjoying the sound of his own snobbish voice, Warden Bulle emits a furious hiss. Keene boggles as the Warden swings around. His glare has a definite impact on the pebbled bits, because the colours surge and the magic heats against my hand.
I keep stroking the mosaic, intrigued by his response. "Sorry. Is there some reason I shouldn't touch these?"
Keene hurries to butt in, "They're the magical component to our integrated security system, Auror Potter. We haven't warded them yet because we're still forging the different levels of the prison into a single unit. The structural balance depends on precise calibration, so if you would kindly refrain from fondling them?"
Fondling. What a self-satisfied git. I shrug. "Sure thing."
Warden Bulle inclines his head slightly. "Thank you, Mr. Keene." His uffish protégé perks right up, like he's just been offered a dog treat.
We walk on, past high, barred alcoves shining with perpetual Lumos. At one point the Warden angles his square face toward his clerk, but his pale eye, disdainful and undeceived, glints at me over his shoulder. He smoothes his moustache, and for a moment his profile grows really sly and stab-you-in-the-dark. What the hell? When he's facing forward again, Del shoots me a, "Whoo, boy," look, and we shake our heads.
Keene casts an unlatching spell and leads us into one of the cells. No mosaics here. The room's the size of a cheap bedsitter, tiny but stark. Spotless. No punishing cold, no dampness, no despair-inducing soul-suckers. The only hint of correctional intent strikes me at first as the sort of outrageous luxury to make law enforcement cry foul: an enchanted window that brims and swirls with a long view of the sea.
But then I think, huh. Anyone cooped up here for any length of time will either be mesmerised by the wild and restless water pounding against the glass or tormented by a horizon he can't reach. For some prisoners it will be as addictive as the Mirror of Erised, and as difficult to turn away from to face the real world. Eeriest of all, the whoosh of the waves drains through the room over and over, each sigh more mournful than the one before.
Impressed despite myself, I glance at our host. His eyes are fixed on the billowing water, his moustache crimped in what I've already decided is his private version of a smile.
He catches me staring, and for a minute it's like wands-out between us, even though he doesn't pull his and I don't point mine. We look each other over with intent, half-hostile, half-daring, complete with a full-body eye-flick up and down to assess the goods, like we're in some pick-up club and neither one of us is willing to make the first move. Then the Warden lowers his lids over his sharp eyes for that disdainful extra second, as if shuddering at the offence to his good taste. Merlin, that's annoying.
A line of spray spatters the glass.
Before I make an arse of myself, Del says, "This is all very promising, sir. I can assure you we'll report that your facility represents an advance over our previous approach to incarceration. But we still haven't addressed the core issue."
I'm glad Bulle's looking at her and not at me when he ices over with angry authority. "It is not an 'advance,' Auror Biggerstaff. I expect the Catacombs to do nothing less than revolutionise our world's outmoded and grotesquely unethical approach to prison organisation."
"Right," I say, relieved at the change of subject. I'm a bit embarrassed to be acting so thin-skinned in front of Del. "That little matter of making the prisoners drink potions to suppress their magic. Not dehumanising at all. Really, I don't know why we didn't think of it first."
The Warden ignores me in favour of barking, "Scrappy," and when the house elf pops into view, says, "Would you kindly inform Dr. Catesby that we're ready for her? Have her meet our guests in the top-floor corridor near the archives."
The elf bows and vanishes. Keene locks the cell as we exit, even though no one's inside. He leads us toward a stairwell, but the Warden lingers behind. I stop and fold my arms.
"Auror Potter?" prompts Keene, and glances past me at his superior. "I imagine Warden Bulle will catch up with us in his own good time." He waits a few beats before adding, "The stairs are over here. This way, please."
I can't really give a reason for disobeying, so I follow. Without comment, Del fishes out a Hindsight mirror in a face-powder compact and hands it to me, and I nearly walk into a wall watching Warden Bulle trail his fingers along the mosaics. Then he stops and spreads his whole hand flat on one part of the design. He smiles knowingly, as if he has no doubt I'm watching, just one half of his mouth crooking his moustache into an accent mark. His face in the mirror is tilted down, like he's peering out from behind something. Like he used to have long hair and he still thinks—
My stomach jumps.
White light sifts through Bulle's fingers, and suddenly he's not in the hallway.
It's like somebody grabbed me by the bollocks. My body reacting ahead of my brain, I lurch around. Del nicks the compact out of my hand. She clips it shut in the act of squirreling it away, and still manages to steady me before I go sprawling out on the steps up to the next level. Not half embarrassing, because I'm the senior Auror here. She mutters, "Right-o, Potter, spill," but I put her off with a sideways eye-twitch. We'll compare notes later.
Keeping mum, we hustle like naughty little beggars to catch up, our footsteps ricocheting with the force of an Apparition crack, the kind that should have announced Bulle's disappearance, and didn't.
Solomon Keene doesn't say a word, just glares, then ascends the carved stone steps ahead of us, looking profoundly put-upon. His hair falls in his eyes and he leaves it there, sulking. I wouldn't blame him for thinking he's been saddled with the Simpleton Twins. Well, except that Del is five inches taller and five times darker than me, and I'm the one who's been breaking out in prattish behaviour and acting brassed off.
The walls glisten up and around in smooth spirals, slick as taffy, dark and cool. The sea pounds like military cannon through stone. We pass a steady bustle of house elves as we climb.
It's really bloody hard not to reach out and run my hand along the mosaics. On the top floor, they ribbon along beside us, unreadable, saturated with magic, weaving the whole prison together.
This time as we clatter in Keene's wake, I watch. Sure enough, at certain points in the stream of glimmering chips and jumbled-together pebbles, there's a repeating motif. A circle of black, studded with white flakes of various sizes, randomly arranged.
Before I can sidle over to check their magical signature, a surprised voice says, "Harry?" and I have to turn around. Looking gloomy, Solomon Keene flips his hair out of his eyes and introduces us to the prison's Head of Mental and Magical Reintegration. A woman with short, butter-yellow hair grasps my hand, and suddenly I see a Ravenclaw, and memories of the last battle come rushing up. Even though I didn't catch her name, I know I know her. She smiles and repeats, "Illyria Catesby," and all of a sudden we start chattering away like long-lost friends, about Hogwarts, about the past, about what it was like during the year of rebuilding, about her job and my job and who's married and who's in disgrace—
I forget Hieronymus Bulle and his odd smirk and that excited clench in my groin; I don't forget the way he vanished by touching the make-believe stars. Doesn't matter. I'm not done with him yet. I'll be back.
xxxxx
By the time I get home, Molly's already there, welcoming and untidy. I give everyone a kiss, hers on the cheek and Ginny on the lips, Al on the top of his head and Jamie in the blurry air behind him. My hyperactive eldest son is staggering around the sitting room wielding a dry stick he picked up outside, throwing curses at everything in sight. All the photos and paintings propped and hung and beaming from walls and mantelpieces, mostly Weasleys and Prewitts, applaud when he pretend-Crucios our silly, yippety crup.
I feel ten times better than I did this morning. Not wanting my mood spoiled, I toe my shoes off, Levitate a glass of Ogden's to my study, then have a tug-of-war with Molly over who gets to hold Al. As if I'm boneheaded and haven't already learned from our first child, Molly spends five minutes instructing me in the care and cuddling of babies. I nod until my head nearly falls off, then pad upstairs to rock Al back to sleep.
Ginny snuggles up to me in bed that night, taking me completely off guard. She climbs on top, and it's good. We both need it, I think. I try to ignore the sneaking suspicion that she's doing this because her mum said it was the wifely thing to do. Because really, it's better than not doing it at all.
No dreams, either, but when I wake up I've got that funny feeling in the pit of my stomach, all the way down between my thighs. Like my penis is having a dream without me, or maybe trying to tell me something.
I lie there spread out on our wide, cool bed, sun like a perfect blade of white through the windows, having hazy thoughts about starry mosaics and leisurely wanks until I'm late and have to skive off breakfast. As I dash out the door, Ginny tosses me a squirt-bottle full of steaming-hot coffee that I can sip as I fly. "See you, love!" we both shout, and then I'm off.
I could save time by Apparating or taking the Floo, but then I'd miss being outside. Flying's a way of breaking every single bond that ties me to earth. I love the wind fluttering and biting at my face, carving squint wrinkles. I love the sky and the silence and being alone, seeing everything from so high up.
George's broom—the Icarus High-Flyer number something-or-other—swerves suddenly and plunges, trying to throw me off. Swearing, I get us back on course and slap it across its broom-waxed nose. Then I have to act fast and Accio my plummeting caffeine fix before some poor sod down below gets offed by a coffee-filled asteroid.
xxxxx
"It's missing an ingredient," Kingsley announces in a locked-door convo two days later.
I snort—colour me shocked—and Del sighs and massages the back of her neck. Let's face it, Hieronymus Bulle's got a rotten case of haughtier-than-thou, and if his clerk's not a Slytherin, I'll hand Dung Fletcher the key to my Gringotts vault and let him roll around in the Galleons naked.
I say as much, and Del cuts me off. "I don't think Dr. Catesby would be an accomplice to fraud."
Dr. Catesby's the one who spelled us a duplicate copy of the magic-suppressing formula, the copy Del and I submitted along with our joint report on the Catacombs. I didn't say so at the time, but I thought it seemed too easy. Dr. Catesby filled us in on the background theory, while admitting she has zero expertise in anything potions-related. Not her field. Her role's more in overseeing rehabilitation, using the induced helplessness of the prisoners as an opportunity to educate them. She's in charge of classroom schedules and imported lecturers and therapeutic activities and similar Mugglish stuff. Sounds like a daycare centre, frankly.
Then she handed over a copy of this massive fucking potions breakthrough, just like that. We punted it to Kingsley first thing, and he memo'd it straight away to the Ministry's in-house potions experts with a high-priority binding charm.
For Merlin's sake, of course there's a missing ingredient. I could have told them that.
I'm about to point out that nobody implied fraud, but for once my mind gets the better of my mouth. Del's got the comfy seat and I've got the creaky ladder-back chair with the tiny lion-knobs that nibble your ears if you so much as slouch. Only she's the one sitting up straight as a lightning rod, like it's a throne not an overstuffed armchair.
I'd almost forgotten. I wasn't the only one surprised during our visit. Turns out Dr. Catesby took her advanced degree in Therapeutic Hybrid Evaluative Methods (an acronym that's either really tongue-in-cheek or really dumb) under Dr. Delilah Ridinghope, who just happens to be Del's ex. I mean Delphinium's ex. Yeah, they used to be known as "the Double Dels," but that's before Dr. Del, who's twice my Del's age, dumped her, and I don't know all the particulars, but if I remember correctly it was for a younger woman.
Undercurrents overcharge the air between us—Merlin, do I know this from all the not-arguing I do with Ginny—because Del can guess exactly what's parading through my head and I reckon I'm about three potential indiscretions away from being on her shit list. Kingsley contemplates our twitchy faces and then says, "It's not fraud. It's not even illegal. Suspicious as hell, I'll grant you, but we've no evidence of Dark Arts usage at this point. Aside from the concealed key to its preparation, which it may be within their rights to withhold—stow your objections, Harry, I'm still researching precedents—the mere existence of this potion is—"
He puts his elbows on the desk and rubs his fingertips against each other. "Well, let's just say there will be political fall-out. We don't have much choice—we can't keep farming out prisoners. But the Minister requests that for the time being we keep this strictly confidential. Which is why… "
He Summons the case file and riffles the pages. "We Owled the unsigned contract back to Warden Bulle with an inserted codicil and an ultimatum. This morning a house elf delivered his sealed agreement. The upshot is, I've got the authority to place a special liaison in the Catacombs, an agent who oversees the experimental application of this potion and reports his findings directly to me."
Brilliant. I come to attention so fiercely I almost knock my chair over backwards. Del's eyes flare for a second, then she folds her hands in her lap and examines them. In a contest between us, she knows who'll get the job.
I hold my breath. I fucking hoped Kingsley would force the issue.
"Auror Potter." There's a small collection of magical artefacts lined up across the front edge of Kingsley's desk, all related in some way to Muggle superstitions. He tickles a worn rabbit's foot, and its scuffed pads curl. "I take it from the hungry-werewolf look on your face that you'd like to apply for this assignment?"
"Uh." The werewolf remark throws me. Del flicks me a "well done on ya" look and props her chin on her fist, smiling. "If it doesn't conflict with any other lifesaving projects you've got slated for me, sir." I try not to sound too disrespectful. Or desperate.
He snorts, and so does Del, and the rabbit's paw kicks suddenly into the air. It somersaults and lands neatly in the palm of Kingsley's hand. He rubs a thumb over its fur. For luck, isn't it?
"Clear your appointment calendar of any superhero hijinks, in that case. Paperwork on my desk in an hour." Kingsley leans back and tugs on the gold hoop in his ear. Then he sets the rabbit's paw back on his desk and watches it teeter upright. It hops timidly onto the case folder. "It's your baby now—sorry, that would be an inappropriate word under the circumstances, wouldn't it? Your project, I mean." He lays his free hand across his stomach; he's been putting on weight this past year, and I totally understand why, even though I've gone in the other direction. If I ever return to fieldwork, I'll have to train like blazes. "Speaking of which, how's the new addition to the family?"
"A bundle of joy," I say, grinning. "Seriously. But my firstborn makes up for it. Got a miniature demon on our hands there."
Kingsley nods dubiously. He's never married, as far as I know, and I'm pretty sure from the thoughtful way he pets the rabbit's foot that he's congratulating himself right now on not having kids. "Just to be clear, Potter. One whiff of Dark magic in relation to that place, and you fly your arse out of there."
"I'm not an idiot, sir." I don't know where that comes from. The dream about Snape, I suppose. It always stirs up memories of his voice, and with his voice come the shadows of his insults.
But my boss just nods at me indulgently, and bugger. I don't know why it thrills me so much. But after being deskbound for bloody ages, I understand how Buckbeak must have felt, getting sprung from that attic.
I'm in.