Rodolphus retrieved Sirius from the infirmary almost the moment Nott was satisfied he was well enough to leave. They went straight to another part of headquarters that Sirius had never visited, this one clearly a practice room for dueling. Mulciber was there, lazily aiming hexes at an old snitch.
"Keep going, Felix, and faster," Rodolphus ordered. "I'll be working with Sirius for a few minutes first."
Mulciber nodded curtly.
"I assume you had no chance to practice in captivity?" Rodolphus asked while simultaneously twirling his wand to conjure a target.
"I did some. On the days when I could get out of bed anyway." (So, almost every day, but Rodolphpus didn't need to know that). "You can still practice wand movements with an inert stick. And wandless magic, obviously."
Rodolphus looked vaguely pleased with him. "Show me. Speed and accuracy with stinging hexes like last time."
Sirius grinned and took out his wand. He started casting. Unlike the last time he had attempted this with Rodolphus back in Malfoy manor, his hand moved precisely and efficiently, and his spell hit the target every time. It probably still wasn't as fast as he could have managed before Bella cursed him, but it was already better than he had been at Hogwarts. Rodolphus started moving the target, and his accuracy only suffered slightly, hitting nearer the edges of the target but not wildly off-base.
"Good. Very good. I honestly thought we'd have a lot more work to do."
"I said I was practicing."
"Out of curiosity, what was your routine?"
"Variable. Anywhere from a few minutes to several hours, depending on how I was feeling and who was around watching me." He shrugged. "I spent a lot of time bored, alone in a bedroom. My casting was still pants until a little over a week ago, around the time they were able to stop the nerve regenerator."
"Still, accuracy is difficult to improve in an enclosed space without a proper target."
"I had a proper target." Sirius conjured a lump of clay, quickly formed it into a homunculus - much easier with two hands - and muttered "Shabtis." He set it down, and the little fellow started running in zigzags around the floor. Mulciber casually aimed a curse at it, and it dodged to hide behind Rodolphus' shoes.
Rodolphus stomped on it. Or tried to. The shabti jumped aside and hightailed it to hide under a cupboard. "It does use its environment better than a snitch," he observed wryly.
"Yeah. I can tell you right now I'll be abysmal at dueling though. I haven't been in a position to practice balance and dodging worth a damn."
"Well, let's see. I'll cast stingers, you dodge." So saying, he launched a rapid volley of hexes Sirius' way. Sirius was absolutely right. He managed to dodge the first one. The next three all hit, then he dodged again, before taking one right on the bridge of his nose that made both his eyes swell shut and thus ended his ability to see and therefore avoid anything else. "Well," Rodolphus laughed dryly. "We have our work cut out for us. Hold still, I'll fix it."
After reducing the swelling in Sirius' face, Rodolphus walked him through some stretches and agility exercises for him to practice on his own time. He promised they would actually duel next time, when Sirius would hopefully be a little more prepared.
"But that's not the only reason you're with me today. Felix, get over here."
"Yes, sir."
"Now, Sirius, I believe you are aware of Felix' skill with the Imperious curse?"
"Yes, by reputation," Sirius said slowly.
"Good. Now, Felix, Sirius has successfully thrown off the Imperious curse multiple times."
"Really? Who cast it?" Felix asked, sounding quite surprised.
"My wife, when she was training him. I want you to cast it, see if he can resist you as well as he can her."
"Ah." He gave Sirius a considering look. He broke out into a grin. "A galleon says you won't," he said mockingly.
"Two galleons," Sirius said immediately. "You're no Bella."
"No, with the Imperious curse, I'm better."
"Whatever, Mulciber."
"Imperio!"
Sirius quite enjoyed being under the Imperious curse. He always did. It was a soothing, relaxing place to be. It was a blissful reprieve from the constant stress of his current existence. If he could trust someone to put him under just for relaxation purposes, he totally would.
"Stand on one foot," came Mulciber's silken command.
Sirius did without a second thought.
"Recite the twelve uses of dragon blood."
Again, Sirius did, but he did it in German. Rodolphus started to smile. Mulciber frowned.
"Sing the Hogwarts Song in falsetto."
Sirius grinned wildly, now conscously fighting the compulsion to burst into song. There were two or three false starts before he managed to say, rather than sing, "I did that at the opening feast once, in fourth year, I think. Used a Sonorus and everything."
Mulciber scowled at him. "I remember. It was terrible."
"Then why d'you want me to do it again?"
"First thing I thought of."
"Really? I would have commanded me to pull my pants down or something. Be funnier."
"Well, I guess he can resist," Rodolphus interjected.
"Obviously. He hasn't fully thrown it though."
"Only because this is a serious high, and I love to annoy you," Sirius said. Still standing on one foot, he started bouncing and moving his arms, dancing in place like a giddy child.
"Are you making him do that?"
"No. Sirius, stop it. Stand still."
"Repression - gonna start on Tuesday" Sirius sang suddenly, with no idea which muggle song he was quoting. He continued to hop around on one foot, giving a little pirouette with every line of the song. "Repression - gonna be a Dalek... Repression - I am a robot... Repression..." He blinked and set his foot down at last. The pleasant Imperious fog cleared. The song was from that Clash concert. He remembered now. "Actually, no, I do not obey. Cheers, Mulciber. You owe me a galleon."
"Maybe it's a Black thing," Mulciber ventured, lowering his wand. "Want me to try again?"
"Not right now."
"Shouldn't have made me do schoolwork. You know how much I hated that," Sirius told Mulciber.
"Any idea how you resist, Sirius?" Rodolphus asked.
Sirius shrugged. "Combination of being able to recognize exactly what's going on and being generally contrary whenever someone tells me what to do, I guess. The books all say it comes down to willpower, but you know that. Why?"
"Bella cannot describe it, and the Dark Lord's teachings on the subject are... too technical for most. And yet, with the Ministry's recent Unforgivables policy, it is important we increase the numbers of Death Eaters who can resist the curse, if we can."
"It's not a standard training?" Sirius asked, honestly surprised.
Rodolphus smirked. "Well, most will have the experience at least once, certainly the Inner Circle, but training... let us just say Bella is an unorthodox instructor and pushes further than most would think is reasonable." Understatement of the century, that. "Historically, wizards have an aptitude to resist the curse, or they do not. Repetition does not help those without aptitude, only addles their minds over time. Even amongst the Dark Lord's followers, few have learned to resist the curse, and none so young and inexperienced as you."
Sirius side-eyed Mulciber. "What about you? When's your birthday?" Mulciber flushed. "Hah! My cousin's still got you beat there, then, you so-called Imperious Prodigy."
"Behave, Sirius. Now, I would like you to practice with Felix, see if he can learn to resist as you do. Depending on how it goes, we might do the same with a larger group in a few days."
"Sure."
"I'll leave you to it, then." He nodded at them both and left.
Struck by a sudden thought, Sirius leaned close to Mulciber. "Can he resist the Imperious? I never asked," he muttered.
Mulciber regained his customary smirk. "Not mine."
"Nice. Imperio." Mulciber's expression turned vacant. "Open your eyes and mouth as wide as you can, then stick your tongue out and waggle it at me." Mulciber complied instantly, just as compliant as any muggle Sirius had tried this on. He directed the young wizard through a host of silly faces with a mixture of verbal and nonverbal commands before getting bored and dropping the curse. Mulciber blinked and scowled at him. "Were you even trying to resist?" Sirius asked curiously.
"Of course!" Sirius raised an eyebrow. Mulciber flushed and looked at his shoes. "I mean... well, I meant to resist, but you surprised me. It's harder that way."
"No, it isn't. Bella used to jump me coming out of the bathroom and curse me. You need to decide to fight back as soon as you feel that overwhelming peace, regardless of whether you were expecting it or not."
Mulciber looked back up at him. "How in Merlin's name do you decide you don't want to feel that good?"
Sirius shrugged. "Dunno. Same way you decide you'd rather take a chance on Sorting into Gryffindor than do the thing Walburga Black desired and expected and be a Slytherin."
Mulciber sneered. "So it is the Black family madness that lets you fight off my curse."
"Maybe. What I don't get is why you can't fight it off if you're so good at putting it on others. The books always said it was a 'battle of wills,' but if that was true, you should have no problem with this. Are you an Occlumens?"
"Of course."
"A good one?"
"Decent."
"Well, then, that's not it either."
"Are you saying you use Occlumency to resist the Imperious?"
"Eh, not really. Occlumency is all about focusing your mind. The Imperious is about emptying if of anything but the controller's command. You do need to be able to focus on resisting to throw it off, but... I suck at teaching, don't I? Let's see you try again." He cast the curse again and this time made Mulciber jump around and dance, which the wizard did with aplomb. He decided to try something else. "Take off your robe, slowly, like I'm a pretty girl." Now that was uncomfortable to watch, Mulciber gradually undoing his buttons whilst making fervent eye contact. He dismissed the curse after about six buttons, unwilling to make Mulciber actually strip for him.
"What the fuck, Black?" Mulciber hissed as soon as the light of sapience returned to his eyes. He held his robe closed again and turned slightly to redo the buttons.
"I thought you might have more luck if I gave a command you'd be more genuinely reluctant to follow."
"If that's all it took, it would be impossible to force anyone to commit murder with the curse," Mulciber pointed out acidly.
"Yeah, but it was worth a shot." He didn't have to ask to know there had been no thought of resistance in Mulciber's mind. He had no idea how to teach what he did, and little inclination to, either. He, and Moody, had assumed back when Bella was first working with him in the spring that most if not all of the Death Eaters had some resistance to the Imperious curse, which was a point of frustration they shared regarding Crouch's Unforgivables legislation. But if that was not the case, then perhaps they should use the curse more. "Say, Mulciber, who else besides me and Bella can resist you? Even a little bit?"
"I don't know all their names. Maybe ten people all told. Dolohov was one, although he had trouble throwing it off completely. Lord Yaxley. Lord Malfoy. Abraxas, that is. Actually, Lucius too. Resist, not throw off. It was one of the reasons the Dark Lord was so angry about what happened at his trial, I think."
Yes, Voldemort would indeed have been miffed to think there was an Imperator more capable than Mulciber not already in his pocket. And what had Lucius said at the hospital? He said it was the only way for me to see our baby... Merlin, Lucius had agreed to be Imperioused and chosen not to resist, until it was no longer a decision. Even more evidence against Abraxas; Lucius would not have trusted anyone else's judgment for a plan that ruthless, would have doubted anyone else's power over him.
"What does their resistance feel like to you? With Bella, it felt like I was the one losing focus on controlling her."
"That's not it at all! She's like trying to push a door closed against a raging hippogriff." He paused, considering. "Funny, now I think of it, you're all different. With you, it's like there's nothing to hold on to at all, as if my curse were a net and your mind a swarm of flies too small to keep trapped in it."
"Charming."
"Abraxas was like a heavy stone, too heavy to hold for long. Dolohov is like... like the coals of a bonfire. You disturb the wrong place, and suddenly it starts to spark and smoke, ready to leap back into flame. And Lucius just felt... human. A foolish one. Like I had to constantly tell him and remind him what to do, and he would think about it but then eventually do it. I suspect if I had ever held the curse long-term on any of them, they would have broken through inevitably. It just might have taken longer than with you and Bella."
So, every interaction was unique, depending on who was casting and who was resisting. Interesting. Weird. Sirius had no idea what to make of it. "I've never tried holding the curse for more than half an hour or so," Sirius mused. "Bella went over the theory, of course, but do you have any tips, Imperious Prodigy?"
"Don't call me that. I can tell you're mocking me."
"I would never, World's Greatest Imperator."
Mulciber flipped him the bird, and Sirius grinned at him. Mulciber did answer, though. "The most important thing with long-acting Imperious is to keep it simple and as close to their normal behavior as possible. The command should be something like, 'collect information on whatever subject and deliver it to person X every Saturday, otherwise act as normal. The hard part is leaving them enough freedom that they can act as normal."
Sirius nodded thoughtfully. "Lemme try again. I'll do that kind of delayed-command curse, to have you do something innocuous in five minutes and until then act as normal. Maybe you'll have an easier time resisting if you've got a bit more of yourself to work with. Imperio." In five minutes, do fifty pushups. He pushed an impression of a muggle workout into Mulciber's mind, in case he didn't know what a pushup was. "If that doesn't work, we could try using a Legilimency probe at the same time as the curse to figure out what's going on in your head."
"I don't know. It's dangerous to experiment with multiple mind magics at once," Mulciber said, a little distantly.
"True. Hey, did you ever hear the Dark Lord's Imperious didactic first hand? I haven't. I know Rodolphus said it was super technical, but if that's the case, Bella really dumbed it down for me. She was going on about a wizard's strength and whatnot."
"I did, once," Mulciber said, slowly and a little dreamily. "He used a lot of terms I'd never heard before. Id and Ego. He said the caster must exert his Ego, while in order to resist one must use the Id to access Ego and Superego sequentially to resist, and that to throw off the curse is to achieve an internal harmony of the three."
"What in Merlin's name is that supposed to mean?" Sirius asked, utterly mystified.
"He said the Id is the part of the subconscious that governs baser, animalistic desires, that we share with muggles. It's why there are rare muggles who can resist the curse, if not throw it off. The Superego is the part of the subconscious that is self-governing and self-critical, and this is distinct between muggles and wizardkind, because we are governed by the laws of magic which is ultimate truth, not of their science and laws and superstitions which are all based on misconceptions, fear, and deceit. The Superego of mudbloods is contaminated by their dogmatic upbringing, which is one reason why they are inferior; more could be saved if they were taken from their muggle homes at birth and brought up properly. Although lack of proximity to biological family often also causes contamination of the Superego. Only those with exceptional magical heritage can survive separation of the blood unscathed, or even forged and tempered by it such that the Superego becomes more powerful and more closely entwined with fundamental magical truth, and outside influences fall away.
"The Ego is the part of the subconscious that mediates between Id and Superego and experiences reality, and..." He suddenly stopped talking and dropped to all fours to do fifty pushups. Sirius sighed. It was getting interesting, too. What a load of shite Voldemort spewed! He was now quite convinced that nobody actually knew how the Imperious curse worked, not Voldemort, not the anonymous author of Secrets of the Darkest Art, not even Emeric the Evil who supposedly invented it. Everyone was just making explanations up based on their own biased experiences and observations and arithmantic equations with too many unknowns.
His musings were interrupted by Mulciber's moan of pain. He had finished his pushups and immediately fallen to the ground, breathing hard. "Ow... why did you make me to that?" he whined.
"Exercise is good for you."
"I hate you."
"That's fine. Do you want to keep practicing and troubleshooting this, or are you a quitter? We could go find a bunch of cats or rats or something, so I can try multiple curses at once. Since I have a harder time casting multiple, maybe you'll have an easier time breaking out."
Mulciber glared at him, then reluctantly nodded. "I've got some muggles at my house we can use."
Oh, joy. That wasn't a disturbing thing to say.
"Did Felix go with you on the Christmas mission, Richard?" Sirius asked quietly. He and Richard were sitting in the Averys' cozy parlor playing wizard's chess. They were the only two people still awake in the house. Morgan had returned to school even before Sirius had moved in. Winston went to bed at eight-thirty without fail, and Elaine one to two hours later. The quiet darkness after midnight was for the young. Well, mostly they were still awake because Sirius' silver hand was full of new bone splinters in the process of reinnervating, an experience he would have happily foregone. Richard was being a good friend and keeping him company. Two nights in, three nights to go, and his hand would be flesh and blood once more, according to Voldemort's lecture. He had come to Sirius' most recent appointment with Nott to inspect the arm before giving the go-ahead to start the Skelegro and the rest of Sirius' latest potions cocktail. He had also modified his quicksilver charm to vanish as living tissue replaced it.
Richard knocked over his rook with his elbow. The little chessman grunted and shook its fist at him before crawling back to its carven feet. Sirius waited. Richard glanced up at him quickly before looking away again. "How did you know?"
"You haven't mentioned him once since I came back. And I've been working with him some since getting out of the infirmary at headquarters, getting to know him better." Watching him perpetually Imperious ten muggles to slave for him like house elves, down to punishing and otherwise degrading themselves. It was an awesome, terrible power the youngest Mulciber wielded, and one he did not hesitate to abuse, or to inflict on his family and lesser guests when the mood struck him. His older sisters had already married and moved out, and now they never visited. His own mother had moved out of the family home as well over the summer to live in her brother's vacation cottage. His father who was himself another Death Eater quietly shared the son's largesse. And yet, Felix Mulciber was still somehow susceptible to the curse himself. It defied all logic and made Sirius return to his initial impression of how the Imperious was resisted: Sirius and Bella were contrary by nature, that was all. Mulciber wasn't; he was merely a minion infatuated with the trappings of wealth and power. His tastes and depravity were wholly predictable considering his upbringing as one of the pureblood but not Sacred Twenty-Eight. He fell into line and took every fad and stereotype to its logical, gauche extreme.
Getting to know Mulciber made Richard's friendship with him frankly mysterious.
"Knight to G2," Richard said, voice quavering a little.
"Tell me what happened."
"I don't want to," he replied wretchedly.
"Too bad, I'm your boss. And I'm your friend, the one you came to when you were scared shitless after Lucius' arrest, remember? Talk to me."
"Give me your cigarette." Wordlessly, Sirius passed it to him. It was the last of the pack he had given Richard for his birthday, and that Richard had saved untouched in a drawer ever since. He watched Richard breathe in the smoke, hacking and coughing with every inhale, until only the butt remained, which he ground into the ashtray between them. He coughed once more, then burst out, "He didn't used to be like this! At Hogwarts, I mean. He was... cool."
"Queen to D5."
"He was my best friend in Slytherin. Him and Severus. They were friends with me, not just with my title."
Sirius scoffed. "Oh, come on. They were not. Or at least, Felix wasn't if the way he was sucking up to me the other day counts for aught." At Sirius' second visit, Mulciber had offered him the services of a young, very attractive muggle girl, casually recommending her sexual favors with a wide, arrogant, toad-like smile. Utterly revolted, it was all Sirius could do not to curse Mulciber on the spot. He had ended up assuming the Condescending Noble voice and likened Mulciber's suggestion to bestiality. He then channeled his inner Bellatrix to explain that he, Sirius Black, Heir of an Ancient and Noble House, only touched muggle flesh if he was tearing it apart. And no, Mulciber, hanging out with the muggleborns in Gryffindor was different because he was only pretending to be friends with them and never physically touched them, except for the onetime drunken groping of voluptuous Mary MacDonald that he had, naturally, regretted once sober again.
Meanwhile, prim and proper Richard who dutifully remembered everyone's birthdays would surely have been horrified at the very idea of a carnal encounter with anyone outside the marriage bed, let alone a muggle. The two Slytherins should not be natural friends. They had nothing in common but their families' politics and a dormitory so far as Sirius could tell.
Richard grimaced. "He used to do that with me, too. Stopped eventually when he noticed how annoying he was being." Annoying was one way of putting it. "Felix was the one who noticed Severus was so good at the Dark Arts, better than anyone else in the school. He's the one who wanted to recruit him, initially. Then I wanted to as well, after I got to know Severus. Severus is just... so smart. I loved doing homework with him, listening to his mind work... Felix loved watching Severus inventing spells, especially curses."
"Oh yeah? What did he invent besides Levicorpus and that toenail-growing hex?" He tried to sound dismissive, but he'd been secretly, resentfully impressed with Snape for inventing any spells at all ever since Levicorpus first made the rounds in fifth year. Seriously, what fifteen-year-old was that good at Arithmancy?
Richard counted off on his fingers: Libracorpus obviously, there was a tongue-tie jinx, Muffliato, and a healing charm Vulnera Senentur." He hesitated. "He had to come up with that one, to counter his otherwise irreversible cutting curse. That's the one Felix used on Christmas. We were supposed to be going by the same playbook as we did burning down that concert in October, all cold flames and Transmogrifians. But then just as Audrey had some muggle levitated over us, Felix cast Sectumsempra. We were both completely covered in blood. It was disgusting. It's really different from using Diffindo. If you put a lot of power into it, it's like slicing and stabbing the target twenty times all at once. There's massive blood loss, really quickly."
Sirius grunted to cover up his surprise. "Glad Snivelly never tried that one out in any of our corridor spats."
Richard shook his head. "He knew he wouldn't get away with it. He'd be lucky to just get expelled if he sliced up the Black or Potter heir, assuming he didn't kill you. He'd almost certainly have landed in Azkaban, and your mum might even have made a successful push for a kiss."
"True."
"I don't think Severus ever really wanted to kill anyone, either. He wanted to get you expelled, and he wanted to hurt you all sometimes. But not kill you."
"Well, he got is wish."
"The muggle died."
Sirius raised an eyebrow. Well, duh! "Does that bother you?"
Richard looked away. "Should it?"
Only if you're sane, and I think you just might be. Sirius shrugged. "I'm not here to judge you. It's not like we don't both know you're squeamish about murder, even muggles."
Richard grimaced. "Yes. It bothered me. I felt... proud... of how we'd been managing the missions. You, me, and Audrey, I mean."
"It is pretty wild to pull one over on the Ministry like we did, where we didn't hurt anyone, much, and yet they do cleaning up afterwards. It's just like pranking Filch. Brilliant."
"Exactly! I like the- the cleverness, and neatness of it all. Brutishly slashing and burning isn't as satisfying."
"Well, you'll be glad to know I have zero intention of incorporating Snape's nasty cutting curse into our next hit. There's a time and place for that kind of thing. Directly over our own heads while we're trying to keep our witnesses alive is not it."
Richard smiled weakly. "Yeah."
"As long as I'm your boss, Richard, I'm not going to make you do anything you really don't want to. If something's too much for you, you tell me, yeah?"
"Er, yeah."
"Good man. I'll still have you teach me that curse, though. Might be useful sometime. We can do it tomorrow. I'll even transfigure a pig so we don't have to kill any real animals, just for you. Your move, by the way."
"Oh. Right."
The next day, he dueled again with Rodolphus and received clearance to resume his usual muggle-baiting activities as soon as he was off the Skelegro, with the assurance he would soon be invited on additional missions too.
When Sirius then met up with Mulciber and some other Death Eaters to practice the Imperious curse some more, he cast his first indefinite command. He had gotten much more proficient in casting the curse under Mulciber's tutelage, so at least he got some practical use from their sessions, even if no one else did so far. The curse would not lift, unless Sirius rescinded his order, his victim learned to resist, or the command was fulfilled. And watching the Death Eater interact with the group, he doubted anyone, even Voldemort, would ever suspect the curse was in place until it was too late.
Author's note: of course Voldemort read Sigmund Freud and stole his ideas, got rid of all the innuendos, and then pretended they were his own. And of course he uses it to project his own insecurities onto everyone else and explain why he's better. And alas, poor Avery, such a relatively delicate flower surrounded by horrible weeds and thorns lol. At least Sirius is now reliably calling him by his name... Thanks for the reviews, and there will still be a Saturday update.
