Chapter 29-Frieda's Gambit
Frieda is gone.
She was standing in the room with me.
"There are goblins on the other side of that door," she told me.
"I know," I said.
"How?"
"I just do. Can you escape?"
"Yes, but…"
She looked at her wand.
"Don't bother giving it to me," I told her. "I'm no better with them than Rose."
She shook her head. "I wasn't going to. I only wanted to do this."
She swished the branch over her head, drawing a ball of light from the air around us, and shot glowing power towards a tiny plastic window at the ceiling so it crackled in a shower of sparks. The window radiated a pinkish glow, but died the instant the orb of light had banged the window without leaving even a crack. I recognized the spell. She'd done it for me several times in school.
"Good luck," she told me.
The goblins waiting outside barged into the room and Frieda went for the door defenselessly. She vanished and now here I stand. Two goblins before me.
"One wrong move and you're dead," the one on the right tells me.
I pause at the comment and realize something.
"Wrong," I say, turning around to walk towards the back wall without so much as glancing at them over my shoulder. Evidently, he wasn't expecting that.
"Get back here!" he shouts. His threats would be menacing enough to send chills down my spine if I hadn't met Jagobin the day before and if I wasn't the sun's slave.
I reach the crates and climb on top of one. It's no harder than climbing out the window to the roof, so I do so easily. They won't attack me. They need me alive and unharmed. They need this body.
"We will attack!"
"So do it," I challenge, calling their bluff. I am nimble from stretching and lot of running and climbing the roof at school. It doesn't take me long to get to the top of each the crates. "I dare you."
But what can they do? If they try to stun me up here, I'll fall and break my neck. If they harm me, Jagobin will have their hides. They think I am trapped in here, so they are cautious instead of on the offense.
I stand at the top of the tower of crates I turn to them and grip the edge of the wall where the window is that Frieda smashed with her ball of light. I stare down at the two smaller figures. I am a stone figure cemented to the highest wall of a chapel, looking down at my parishioners. The two goblins look at me fearfully and say nothing. I think they fear I will jump and are ready to catch me. My hand touches the window behind me and provides small resistance before I can push my fingers through the gooey barrier.
I smile. "Goodbye." And with that, I fit my feet through the space and push my entire body through the window that is just large enough to allow my chest leniency. I only just manage to squeeze myself between the ceiling and wall. I must push through the strangely thick substance that is like some sort of cold molten glass that heals and conforms to my body. When my feet come out, I instantly notice there is nothing there. They wave around in air. I expected there to be a floor. Why would Frieda send me through this to drop to my death? Why would she send me through this at all when the goblins could easily come through after me? It is too late to go back now.
I grip the ledge of the window as I come through completely and once I am on the other side of the barrier, my eyes meet a cavern, deep and dark and wide so I can only see the wall against which I rest and the rounded ceiling above me. Below is an abyss of darkness. Hanging from a chain in front of me is a cage. I now realize how Frieda knew neither goblin would be following me.
Albus had never set foot in a prison before. Many of his older relatives went there now and then to visit people, his father especially, but his mother told him that Azkaban was no place for children. He hated when she called him a child. He was fifteen. He was one of the best charms wizards in his year, yet everyone treated him like a little boy in his family. It was frustrating. That's why he was rather satisfied when he stepped into the old prison and didn't feel any different. It was dank and dimly-lit and had different hallways lined with doors far too close together for any of the rooms on the other side to be a decent size. The entire place was concrete poured over a steel skeleton. The walls were slathered with thick globs of dull gray paint. The entire place was silent. It was cold, yet moisture was everywhere, making for a musty smell.
Albus whistled, walking forward and twirling around to get the full view of the empty entrance. The sound waves echoed down the halls.
"This place is cool," he said, opening a tiny squeaking flap in a cell door to peek inside. "This was supposed to hold wizards?"
"Careful, Albus," Rose warned. "You don't know what they're using these cells for now."
"You worry about everything."
"With reason. Now, get away from there. We need to find Carina and Frieda and get out of here. I'd rather not bump into Jagobin today if at all possible and the longer we spend in here, the more likely that is."
"We can't split up," Scorpius said. "Not again. Rose and I barely managed to take out a single goblin."
"They're quicker than they look," Rose agreed.
"And stronger," he added, touching his neck. "Thing nearly strangled us."
Suddenly, the door to the cell beside Albus opened and Frieda walked out, blonde hair looking as if it hadn't been brushed in days and covered in dust. She paused when she saw the four, eyes bulging out of their sockets and mouths gaping open, and rolled her eyes.
"Five floors down in the old storage facility. Should be a snap to find," she said.
With that, she ran past the group and up the stairs.
Scorpius had only gained himself enough to shout, "HEY!" before she disappeared behind the door they had used to get down here. He looked around. "Should we go get her?"
"I really don't know," Albus said. "She seemed like she was trying to help us."
"Trying to help us, my arse. That girl's been nothing but trouble all this time. You think she's finally going to prove useful now?"
"Well, this would be when it most counts."
"It certainly counted before when she could've avoided this entire thing! What if that place is a trap waiting to be walked into?"
"He has a point," Rose agreed. "Frieda did cause this mess. It would be strange of her to change her tune so quickly."
"But why would she think we'd trust her?" Leo asked. "And where is she going?"
Frieda ran. The crowded streets of town were nothing she was unfamiliar with. She knew all about public transportation and the ways of muggles, but she'd never been to London before. Things were giant here. The more she tried to run, the more she encountered resistance from people milling about. She had to work fast. The instant Jacobin and his followers realized where she was headed, they would snatch her. She'd flown a broom here, but she couldn't go on that through muggle London. Everyone would see.
Frieda was shoved and pushed through a giant crowd of people, making her way down avenue after avenue until she reached the right street. She flew down the way, searching for the correct address, before she found it. Before her, a brick apartment building climbed into the sky. She ran up to the door and pressed the buzzer under the name Wespurt. She stood at the door, waiting for the click, but it didn't come. She poked her head about, wondering what she'd done wrong.
"Who is it?" a voice shouted down.
Frieda ran back down the stairs and gazed up at the woman in the second-story flat who was supposedly Leo's mother.
"Mrs. Wespurt?" she asked.
Her eyes widened. "Frieda?" she asked.
"Later. Let me in!"
The woman hesitated, but vanished back into the apartment and the door clicked. Frieda rushed inside and up the stairs to the Wespurts' flat, throwing the door open without a knock. She ran to the fireplace and grabbed a handful of floo powder from a bowl on the table beside the hearth.
"Frieda." She froze at the sound of Myra Wespurt's voice. "What are you doing?"
Frieda turned back to her, rage burning in the thirteen-year-old's eyes. "Fixing both of our mistakes. You know, because of you and your husband's cowardice, everyone's safety has been jeopardized, most of all your son's."
Myra Wespurt's face was calm and understanding. "Honey, we only didn't what we thought was best for—."
"You!" Frieda spat. "You did what was best for you and nobody else! Don't act innocent, like you did everything you could. You didn't do anything! You shoved me onto your friends and hid me in another country! You gave Leo a dangerous object that made him hate women! You're still not doing anything because you refuse to face the repercussions of your actions!" She backed into the fireplace and felt a shadow pass over her face from the hearth. "Say what you want about me, but at least I'm brave enough to admit when I'm wrong and face the penalty."
"Frieda!" Mrs. Wespurt ran to stop her, but she threw the floo into the ground and felt the green flames lap the outside of her body.
"Ministry of Magic!"
She emerged in a large stone fireplace, green flames vanishing from around her. Instantly, she ran out into the expansive hall of the Ministry of Magic, winter robes flying out behind her. It was filled with people and she had no idea where she was going. Hm. She stopped a man in diplomatic robes.
"Excuse me, Sir," she said. "Where can I find the auror department?"
"Why? Is there an emergency?"
"I'm just trying to find my father," she lied. Her father was obviously dead. She just didn't want to cause a stir for the entire Ministry of Magic.
The man told her how to locate the department and she sprinted through the Ministry without so much as casting a glance back at him, shedding her scarf and dropping it to the ground before she jumped on the elevator and hit the wall within it. The doors promptly closed and she grabbed the stitch in her side, panting and feeling the beat of her heart through her head.
"Merlin, I need to run more."
She straightened her spine and flipped her hair back, only then noticing there was another man in the elevator. Wearing auror robes.
"Well," she breathed scooping some blonde locks behind her ear. "Hello."
"What floor?" he asked.
"Yours," she said.
He nodded. "I could've guessed as much. What's it this time?"
The doors opened with a ding and she rushed into the middle of an office filled with cubicles and witches and wizards working dutifully on paperwork. She jumped onto a desk covered with papers.
"Hey!" a man protested.
"LISTEN UP! There is an emergency situation going on right now. We need as much help as we can get. My friends are in trouble. Please!"
"What's going on?" one of the men asked, standing and ready to move.
"It's goblins. There's a half-goblin named Jagobin."
"Jagobin?" the elevator man asked, walking towards her. "How do you know about Jagobin?"
"He kidnapped my friend."
"Why does he want your friend?"
"How should I know?" she lied. "She went to visit a friend at St. Mungo's and he was off with her! Now, my friends have run after her with hardly enough backup to fight off a stray raccoon. They're mostly Gryffindors, needless to say."
Several people in the office let out a collective groan.
"What are we going to do about another one?" a woman asked her coworker. "Jagobin's never taken children before."
"Don't just stand around talking! We need to go!" Frieda shouted.
"And do what?" the first man asked. "Look, kid, we've been trying to take down Jagobin's crime syndicate for years. The fact of the matter is he's slippery and has far too many goblins on his side for our department to handle. When we've finally found his weak spot, we can send him to Azkaban. For now, we'll have to file the missing report and find out what to do about your friend. We might be able to strike a deal with Jagobin."
"Not on this. He'll never release her. Not for any amount of public money. He loathes the Ministry and places too much value in my friend."
"What, exactly, did your friend do?"
"The same thing I did. She existed."
"I don't follow."
"It's hard to explain. I can't. Not now. Not here. The point is that the weak spot you've been looking for is here. I have it. My friends are already fighting Jagobin's henchmen. You have to help them."
"He has hundreds of goblins on his side," the woman mentioned. "We'll never be able to cut through that on such short notice."
"He has thirty-seven goblins working for him," she revealed. She'd broken into his office the night before and found the true number of employees he kept track of. Carina was right. There were barely any. She should've looked through his records years ago. She'd just never had the courage.
The wizard whose desk she was on scoffed. "So what if barely anyone works for him? He's a goblin who heads a goblin regime. Once other goblins learn we're attacking him, they'll freeze wizarding banking assets and run to help him."
"No, they won't!" Frieda denied. "Jagobin takes advantage of desperate goblins that have no family, money, or shelter. Most goblins don't agree with him at all. They're all rude, thieving prats, for sure, but they aren't murderers and kidnappers. There's a point where the line between differences in our species ends and we're the same. This is safe. This is an emergency. Follow me. Please. If you don't believe me, I have one of yours on my side, Michael Wespurt."
"How do you know all of this?"
"WHY DO I NEED TO EXPLAIN EVERYTHING TO YOU! MY FRIENDS ARE FIGHTING FOR THEIR LIVES!" she screamed. "If you're not going to help me, just mull over your bloody paperwork!"
She ran to the elevator, but stopped short of going in. Their only hope was the aurors. She turned back around.
"I am the only sibling to Jagobin and because of that I know more about him than all of your intelligence sources put together. I am telling you now; there are only fourteen goblins in that building, Jagobin included, and only five wizards to fight them. I worked for this man until an hour ago. His entire brand is an illusion. He is rich and powerful, no doubt, but the muscle is fabricated. He is a hundred-fold weaker than he lets on. If you help me, I will give you everything I know. Please will you help me?" The room was silent.