Chapter 32: The Sapphire Prison
"Do we still have any box of Madame Rousseau's face water left in our stock?" Narcissa asked her husband as she lifted her eyes up from the large office book as the two of them worked hard in their office late at night again.
"Yes, we have a few boxes of it. But we need more of Hermann's Hair Tonic. Suddenly, everyone's buying it out," Lucius said as he looked at the list of the goods left in their stock. He rolled up the sleeves of his shirt – his wife would soon be over with the summarizing of the products they needed to place orders for, but he still needed to finish calculating the revenue from each of the products. He grinned, remembering his wife's remark tonight for Lucius taking off his robe because of the summer heat and putting it over the back of the chair next to him, now wearing only a silk shirt, a silk vest, and fine cotton trousers. "Indeed, be careful not to turn into a Muggle," she had scolded him. "Now's summer and it's hot," Lucius had replied, but Narcissa had just given him a firm look, slightly tilted her head sideways, like saying, "Have you slept so awry on your arm last night and lost your ability to cast even a simple cooling charm?"
"How was your visit at Mrs. Hamilton's place? Did you manage to get her to place her facial cosmetics products in our shop?" Lucius asked as he recalled that his wife had an appointment for visiting this particular lady today.
She shifted uncomfortably in her seat wearing her fine silver-blue robes and her sapphire pendant glistened in the candlelight. She elegantly put her fingers of her left hand to her forehead and replied with a sigh, "Actually, I didn't meet her. Her butler told me the lady was busy. Most likely she's wrapping around her finger her eighth husband. I won't be very surprised if there'll be an article about her already in the tomorrow's copy of the Daily Prophet."
"Oh, I see. Then at least you managed to arrange the visit on another date?" Lucius asked. He suppressed a grin, since it was obvious why his wife was so eager to do the business with this scandalous Mrs. Hamilton all by herself. This lady had been married seven times before and all of her husbands had mysteriously died, leaving her a huge pile of money and a number of real estates. Apparently Narcissa wanted to keep him as far away as possible from such a woman. But he wasn't so stupid to lose his honour and wealth for a pair of long legs and incredibly full breasts. Besides, his wife still looked beautiful enough so he didn't have a lot of silly thoughts about having an affair.
"Yes, the butler put my visit to the twentieth of July. Can you believe it?" Narcissa said contemptuously. Although she herself enjoyed a rich and comfortable life, she found Mrs. Hamilton's lifestyle too lax.
"It's after a whole…" Lucius began, but he was suddenly interrupted by a knock on the front door. "Who could be there?" He turned his gaze to the antique family clock with a pendulum hanging on the wall. "It's half past eleven. I wonder who could have bothered us in such a late hour?"
Narcissa just shrugged and returned to her list of the products and orders.
The knock sounded again, a little more insistently now. "I'll go and see who's there." We no longer have any servant to send to open the door, the blond man thought grimly as he stood up. He quickly put on his robe, leaving the front of it open.
Their office was located on the first floor of the manor, and Lucy crossed the room to the window and looked down out of it in the direction of the front door, hoping to see the troublemaker. At first he couldn't see anyone, but a moment later he thought he saw a flicker of a black robe in the twilight as someone was pacing on the front steps. Could there be one of those ruffians? I told Lestrange right away to keep himself with all his businesses away from my place. I have no desire to return to Azkaban. He descended the wide marble staircase to the entrance hall on the ground floor and crossed the soft, colourful carpet with quiet steps as he measured his way toward the impatient knocks.
Lucius opened one of the front double doors inward and curiously looked out. There stood a brown-haired young man about as old as his son. He thought maybe he had seen him somewhere, though he hadn't even the slightest idea who he actually was; and even less Lucius understood why he was bothering them so late in the night.
"Good evening," the young man greeted the owner of Malfoy Manor with a smile.
"Good evening," Lucius replied sourly as he gave him an arrogant look. Really, what could possibly this guttersnipe want here? He still had to do his calculations and then his soft, comfortable bed was awaiting him. "Do you need something?"
"I'd love to see your wife," the guy replied, still smiling. "I have to discuss something with her."
"Boy, why do you need to see her so late at night?" Lucius said irritated. "We are tired and are going to bed soon. Now is not the time for talks. If this is so important to you, come tomorrow morning, then you can talk to my wife." Really, this incredible shamelessness of the modern youth nowadays is unbearable, Lucius thought, No sense of an acceptable visiting time at all.
"I'm sorry for bothering you so much," he said confidently, without even the slightest flinch as Lucius expression turned more irritated and harsh. "Though, the matter is both very urgent and of great importance. So I'm asking you to call your dear lady, please."
Lucius looked sternly at the young man with great suspicion and finally said, "Oh well, I'll summon her, but you'll stay outside and wait. If you want to be received properly, you need to come at a decent visiting time, not in the middle of the night."
"Of course, Mr. Malfoy," the young man replied. When Lucius turned away, it seemed to him that the boy had begun to smirk satisfied.
This modern youth. No sense of any manners. Really, could this world go any more wrong? he thought grumpily as he walked slowly back to the office.
"Who was there?" his wife asked as she looked up from the office book the moment Lucius entered.
"It's some boy. Insisting he wants to talk to you. I told him to wait outside while I'll go and get you," Lucius explained.
"I hope he wasn't a homeless, wasn't he?" Narcissa asked.
"No, he didn't look like that. At Draco's age, maybe even a Hogwarts student."
"What could such a boy possibly want from us? Didn't you recognize him?" Narcissa asked some more questions.
"No, I didn't. I thought you'll know him, since he's asking for you," Lucius replied with a shrug.
"Oh, well, I hope I'll do. We definitely aren't going to accommodate the homeless here at night." Announcing this, the blonde woman stood up from her chair and straightened her tired shoulders, and then she descended the stairs following her husband to the front door.
She half-opened the door and gave a suspicious look to the visiting young man, whom she didn't know. "What do you want of me?" she asked unkindly, without greeting him.
"Good evening, Mrs. Malfoy," the young man said with a grin. Then, with a wave of his wand he swiftly opened the double doors of Malfoy Manor, not hitting Lucius with them just by an inch. "I've come to collect your traitor's debt," the brown-haired guy said confidently.
A cold chill run down the spines of both Malfoys the moment the unknown young man made a firm step over the doorstep of their house as his face turned into a cruel grin and his eyes cast a hostile look.
There sounded a pop, and four young people – Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Draco – found themselves on the gravel driveway of Malfoy Manor, holding tightly to Kreacher's arm.
Harry regained his balance and a shiver run over him as he immediately faced the building of the Manor, and then he hurried to the front door, the others following him right away. The door was wide open.
"Fuck," Malfoy swore under his breath when they had run up the steps to the front door and had stopped to see what was going on in the hallway of the Malfoy house.
Terry-look-alike Voldemort had his wand in his right hand as if holding it loosely by his side, but, frightened, Draco's parents were trying to avoid the circle of yellow-green flames which burned around them, not letting them go anywhere. "…but it turns out you've given me only trouble," they now heard the dark wizard speaking, "and since I don't have neither much time, nor any willing to stay here any longer, Narcissa, you will now get to feel what Lord Voldemort does to those who dares to be-"
Suddenly Harry heard an exclamation next to him. "No!" shouted Draco Malfoy as he rushed to his parents holding tightly his wand. Harry ran after him, but stopped a second later as soon as he had entered the entrance of the manor. Malfoy got to his parents, but the circle of fire didn't let anyone through. Giving the youngest Malfoy just a quick look, Voldemort turned slowly toward the three Gryffindors. "Oh, the famous Harry Potter again? It seems you aren't going to leave me alone today," he said and then he waved his wand in a wide circle over his head carelessly.
"You'll leave the Malfoys be," Harry said much more confidently than he actually felt. He heard Hermione whispering softly something behind his back and saw air moving over the wide, luxurious carpet. The air stream created by the girl made a wide arc around Voldemort and then swiftly shot to the circle of the fire, where it quickly run over it in one single loop, extinguishing the magical fire. All three Malfoys hugged each other instantly; but Harry had a thought about this carpet for a second – indeed, how many times had Dobby had to bandage his fingers because he hadn't cleaned it properly? And here he had died.
Meanwhile, Voldemort had turned his cruel gaze on Kreacher, who now stood next to Harry's feet, and looked at him suspiciously. "Oh, the House Elf magic. I was curious how could you actually catch up with me so fast," the dark wizard said seemingly just for himself. "But it doesn't matter. Mrs. Malfoy is going to get her punishment for her betrayal and then I'll go. You can rest assured for your friend Terry. Since you've uncovered my disguise I've no intentions to take his place anymore."
Kreacher! Harry realized, Voldemort had taken Kreacher with him to his cave to test his combined protection for his Locket Horcrux. What if he remembers him? "Kreacher!" Harry said softly so that the elf could hear. "Better wait for us in the yard, no, better go back to Hogwarts; I'll call you again when we'll need you."
"All right, sir," the elf immediately obeyed him, disappearing from the scene with the usual teleportation cracking sound.
"You aren't going anywhere, Riddle," Harry announced, readying his wand for casting spells.
"That we'll soon see, I'm sure," Voldemort laughed as he reached out his arm with his wand in front of him and after a wave of it a huge number of snakes slipped out of the floor next to his feet, slithering and hissing in the direction of Hermione, Harry, and Ron.
"Don't worry, I'll do it," Hermione said and, like Voldemort, drew an arc in front of them with her wand which made a thin blue glistening line on the soft, luxurious carpet. As soon as the first snake touched it, it faded into a greenish black puff of smoke. "Riddikulus on three," Hermione whispered softly.
Meanwhile, Voldemort had started guiding a heavy wrought iron handle of a torch with his wand, which he had lifted out of its holder just a second ago, aiming its sharp tip on the Malfoys. The torch stopped a good deal above their heads, swaying dangerously like a sword, but Malfoy's ancestors was exclaiming anxiously, while running to each other in their pictures hanging further down the hallway.
"One… Two… Three – Riddikulus!" Harry shouted finally, after counting softly, pointing his wand at Voldemort, and three identical spells shot at the wizard looking like Terry.
But they didn't reach Voldemort's back as they hit an invisible barrier protecting him. However, their blow had disturbed the Dark Lord with his spell with a torch, and it was now falling freely right down on the Narcissa's head. Draco pushed his mother away and at the last second, managed to wave his wand and send away the heavy handle of the torch so that it wouldn't crash his skull directly between his eyes.
Voldemort now turned to the trio with his eyebrows raised in acknowledgment. "So we're learning quickly, eh?"
"How ironic, isn't it? It turns out you're just one big scary Boggart," Harry said with a grim smirk. In the distance, there sounded a clock announcing twelve o'clock, the beginning of the night.
"The Boggart actually has a lot of power," Voldemort said with a cunning smile. "It governs fear, and no matter how much you would like to think that love is the most powerful thing in the world, I still see it for sure that the fear, strive for power, and pride are always making their way to ruling the world. Even without my help, they cope very well. Do tell me, Miss Granger, wasn't the fear your exact reason why you did lie to Mr. Weasley, and wasn't it the fear of losing your girlfriend and pride when you were so angry at your dear friend, and do tell me, Harry Potter, wasn't it due to the fear of your failure when you were so inexplicably anxious and grumpy all year long?"
The three of them flinched. Would Voldemort really be the cause of all the trouble in Hogwarts? That seemed too crazy. But they didn't have much time to think about it now.
"Riddikulus!" he shouted, but the spell hit the invisible shield and faded again. Ron and Hermione cast their spells a second later, but their effort fighting the invisible wall was vain too. Meanwhile, Harry saw the Malfoys whispering to each other behind Voldemort's back, and Narcissa reached behind her neck to unbuckle her sapphire necklace.
"Oh, so determined to destroy me. Potter, what's your next move?" Voldemort asked with a smirk. "I hope you aren't planning to burn down whole Hogwarts like it was with the Room of Requirement."
"No, but we are going to find Ravenclaw's Diadem sooner or later," Harry said firmly. "And it won't be a fake like the one in the Room of Requirement."
"There was a fake Diadem?" Voldemort asked in surprise. "By the way, the fact is that I really did hide the true Ravenclaw's Diadem there at first. I did it when I visited Dumbledore to ask him for the position of the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, but Dumbledore always was refusing me it…" The dark wizard seemed to be pondering something for a second, but a moment later he turned his firm gaze to Harry again. "So then, I made my way a little longer than necessary to the Room of Requirement and hid the Diadem in there. I had such a silly idea at that time that I was one of the extremely few persons, who had managed to reveal the secret of this Room, until I saw Trelawney storing her sherry bottles there when I was embodied in my loyal Quirrell. She was keeping her bloody sherry bottles next to my dear Diadem! So I ordered my obliging Quirinus Quirrell, a former Ravenclaw, to place it in a much more proper place. Because everything has its proper place, hasn't it?" Voldemort asked, now turning to Narcissa. "It applies also to the traitors, who can't answer one single damned question correctly!" Now the dark wizard has lost his temper, shouting angrily.
"Riddikulus!" Harry tried to cast a spell again, but the invisible shield stopped his magic shot again, delaying Voldemort in his black Hogwarts robes only for a brief second. He slowly raised his wand aiming at Narcissa, but meantime, Lucius had discretely begun to charm Naracissa's necklace he was now holding in his hand.
How do I break his shield? Harry pondered and realized he knew what to do. "Reducto!" he exclaimed, and a blue light came out of his wand, colliding with Voldemort's invisible shield, and it shook, eventually dissolving like a soap bubble. Harry immediately sent another Riddikulus charm, and Ron and Hermione did the same: the spell hit Voldemort, who had conjured up a huge knife out of nowhere now, but though, the spell was tripled, it just waved over his body, only barely setting him off balance.
Before Voldemort could recover and stab the knife in Narcissa's chest, Lucius suddenly said, "Go!" and run towards Voldemort, approaching him from his side, while holding the sapphire jewel in front of him in his stretched out arm, and Draco and Narcissa together cast the Riddikulus charm, following Harry's example.
Lucius muttered, "Anima incarcero," and pressed the jewel to the surprised, confused, and stunned Voldemort's body. "Here is your power, wealth and privileges of the Wizarding race. You promised the wizards are going to regain everything by their right to claim since ancient times, but in the end you tried to make us your slaves. Malfoys have never served as errand boys!" Lucius said as he let the stone go; it seemed to suck to Voldemort's clothes and it began shining with a disgusting green glow. Lucius quickly stepped back to his wife and son, and Voldemort's wand slipped out of his hand, and the knife fell to the floor and vanished.
Though Harry could see only the back of his head with his curly brown hair, but it looked like the dark wizard was starting to lean down to the floor as if melting and shrinking.
Eventually, he let out a long, agonizing howl in a low voice and collapsed on the floor with his robes falling in a pile over him. Though Harry thought the pile of his clothes seemed strangely empty. Harry felt overwhelmed by anxiety – what had Lucius done with him?! Was Voldemort destroyed, or did he manage to run away again? What had just actually happened?
But before he could move or say anything, something began to rise out of the fallen Hogwarts robes. When a body was fully raised from the floor, Harry saw the clothes had somehow changed. A former Hogwarts robes now had a hood, and Malfoys seemed to tremble in fear as the figure looked at them. The strange figure slowly began to turn around, wanting to take a look at their trio as well. The hooded one slowly turned to him until Harry saw two livid scarlet eyes with slits for pupils as the figure gave Hermione a hostile gaze. He looked exactly like Voldemort in his former form. But how was this possible? What had Lucius Malfoy done with him? Harry thought desperately, without knowing at all what to do now and what intentions does Voldemort have in this kind of body.
A split of second later, Harry noticed something had changed in the face of the cloaked figure – his eyes had turned bright yellow, and they seemed to be getting bigger and bigger. Also the figure itself began to stretch even taller and huger, until an enormous snake's head came out of the robe. The giant, dark green serpent towered to the ceiling of the entrance hall and shot out its forked tongue.
Harry felt overwhelmed with ice cold fears, which made his body unmovable like a stone. In front of him stood the King of the Serpents, the Basilisk, in all his might and power, turning his dark yellow eyes toward him. It seemed Harry could no longer move no matter how hard he tried; it seemed he was petrified forever…
The Basilisk opened his mouth revealing its many venomous tusks and began to lean closer to Harry wanting to swallow him, but he couldn't move even a single muscle in his body and his vision began to blur, and there was a tickling feeling inside of his right elbow like a deadly poison would be flowing through his veins. Only one thought suddenly popped into his mind: But how could a Basilisk have appeared here?
Then he heard two voices – Draco and Hermione both had shot the Riddikulus charm on the giant serpent. Harry suddenly realized – it was just a Boggart! Hermione's Boggart!
The freeze left him in an instant and he could see clearly the present situation now. The King of Serpents stumbled over an invisible obstacle and awkwardly fell on the soft carpet landing just a few inches away from Harry's feet. The snake bit its own tongue with its venomous teeth. Hermione made a soft laugh next to him, and Harry smiled as he looked at his friend. The Boggart faded in a black swirl of smoke, leaving nothing behind.
The Boggart was destroyed, but what had actually happened to Voldemort? Harry moved his leg, which a moment ago, he was so sure to be turned into a stone, and gingerly approached the fallen robe in the middle of the entrance hall. He squatted next to it and touched it, but felt only the cloth and nothing else. But then he noticed Narcissa Malfoy's sapphire pendant, which had fallen nearby. "Harry," Hermione warned him. He reached for the necklace. "Tsst." He quickly drew back his hand and shook it. It had oddly tickled his skin, making a feeling like someone or something wanted to slip inside him. Then he carefully took the chain of the necklace and lifted it off the floor as he got up on his feet. Meanwhile, the Malfoys, Hermione, and Ron had approached him. The strangely green glowing sapphire hung on a fine gold chain, swaying slowly.
"I imprisoned his soul into that sapphire," Lucius Malfoy explained. "It's just that I don't know how durable this prison is going to be since I'm performing this curse for the first time in my life."
"The Soul Imprisoning Curse," Hermione agreed. "If I recall it correctly, it was also a part of the ritual of creating a Horcrux," she added with a wince. Lucius looked at her oddly, but restrained himself of adding any comments about her Muggle ancestry.
"That seems probable, though this particular curse is stored in the repositories of the Malfoy Library, which, by the way, I'm always recommending you to study, Draco," Lucius added, looking at Draco sternly and with a little bit of reprehension, but Draco just rolled his eyes. Then, he turned back to Harry and Hermione, adding, "Technically the imprisonment of a whole soul requires a carefully prepared ritual, but I thought the simpler and faster version could also do it, since his soul had already been broken. Fortunately, it looks like it worked. But now do tell me, please, how could the Dark Lord have turned up on the front steps of our house?"
Harry quickly told the Malfoys that he had received the Gilderoy Lockhart's letter and everything what had happened next.
"So you mean the Dark Lord was strolling throughout Hogwarts the whole year?" Narcissa asked, still shaking from fear, and Lucius put his arm around her waist protectively.
"It seems so," Harry admitted awkwardly. He still felt guilty for not being able to find the Diadem and their failure of noticing that they had spent every day with Voldemort, joking with him and considering him their friend. "We had some suspicions before, that he might not be fully defeated, but it never occurred to us that he might be merged with a Boggart gaining the ability to walk freely among people like a real person. We assumed if he had actually survived, he would most probably wander somewhere in the form of a tiny ghost in the Forbidden Forest."
"I see," Lucius just said, and after a short moment of silence added, "Anyway, we must thank you for saving us. Though, I do not like to admit it, but we indeed owe you for this."
"You are welcome," Harry replied with a little smile. "Live long and in peace and do good things," he wished them.
"Thank you," Lucius said, smiling a little, too. "Could you only promise me that if something goes wrong with that sapphire, you'll tell it us so we're ready?"
"Of course," Harry promised and looked again at the greenish sapphire jewel. Then he opened his mokeskin pouch with his two fingers of his left hand and carefully placed the jewel in its depths. "But now we have to go back. Kreacher!"
Lucius Malfoy nodded in agreement and wished them good luck.
"Oh, don't forget me!" exclaimed Draco as soon as Kreacher appeared. "I have the exam in Potions tomorrow as well." He hugged his mother before saying goodbye to her and hurried to the elf and three of his Gryffindor schoolmates.
"So, Kreacher, take us to the dungeons next to the Slytherin Common Room," Harry said, and they all made their last look at the Malfoy couple before teleporting away with the loud cracking sound, and a second later they found themselves in the darkness of the Hogwarts dungeons.
Harry lighted the tip of his wand and allowed Kreacher to go. "Good luck in tomorrow's exam," Draco Malfoy said.
"Thank you. Good luck to you too. Allies?" Harry asked, reaching out his hand toward the Slytherin young man.
Malfoy looked at it, surprised, but then he took Harry's palm and squeezed it. "Allies," Draco confirmed with a smile. "There's no other option left for me, you really did save my mom."
Feeling a little awkward, they quickly said their goodbyes, and Harry, Ron, and Hermione sneaked back up to the Gryffindor Common Room. Luckily for them, they only had to avoid the Bloody Baron on their way and Ron's feet once got caught on the edge of the carpet, him almost falling on the suit of armour placed on the side of a hallway, but Harry managed to catch him in the last second. In the Common Room, Ginny was waiting for them sitting on the couch in their usual place by the fireplace and Romilda was sleeping next to her.
"Thank Merlin!" the girl exclaimed as soon as the three of them went through the portrait hole of the Fat Lady. "I was so worried!"
"Everything is fine," Harry said, unable to resist a smile. He felt so tired and excited that he could laugh and cry at the same time. "We caught up with him and Lucius imprisoned him in a sapphire jewel."
Of course, Ginny wanted to know all the details of the events, and while listening to his story, she held her breath and widened her eyes in all the scariest parts of it. It was already two o'clock in the night when they had talked through all the happenings at Malfoy Manor.
"And what about both of you?" Harry finally asked, wanting to know, what Ginny and Romilda did, while they were away.
"We got back to the Common Room without any incidents," Ginny explained, glancing at Romilda. "Then we talked much. I told her that I had been possessed by Voldemort in my first year, and it seemed to calm her down. She wasn't the only one whom he had fooled. He did dupe all of us. Oh, yes, and we agreed that she wouldn't tell anyone that Terry was Voldemort. She is going say that Terry's mom suddenly has gotten ill and that's why he has left Hogwarts so hastily."
"That's a splendid idea," Harry said with a sigh as he looked again at the sapphire pendant he had taken out of his pouch to show Ginny. It still glowed with that sickening greenish sheen. "Now we only have to find the Diadem since Lucius Malfoy said he had no idea how lasting his curse could be. What if Voldemort's soul breaks out again?"
"Brr." Hermione shivered from such a thought. "But now, in the middle of the night, we won't find the Diadem anyway, so we need to go to our beds. We have an exam next morning."
It seemed Ron had fallen asleep right on the couch, and the others agreed with Hermione's suggestion. They awoke Romilda. "Wake up, you need to go to sleep!" Ginny told her, shaking her shoulder, and everyone went to their dorm rooms. Ron, half asleep, just fell on his bed with his clothes on and was fully asleep in an instant, but Harry changed into pyjamas but then he rotated in his bed lying with his eyes open at least for an hour, unable to fall asleep.
Then suddenly he was awakened by the alarm of his wristwatch, urging him to get up. Rubbing his eyes, he sat upright and with slow moves prepared himself to start this Wednesday. He felt like a whole horde of Hippogriffs had run over his body, but he had to get up and go anyway – after a little more than two hours there is going to start the N.E.W.T. Potions exam.