Disclaimer: This is a work of fanfiction based on the Harry Potter universe. All recognizable characters, plots, and settings are the exclusive property of J.K Rowling. I make no claim to ownership.
Acknowledgements: Thank you to my editor Athena Hope, as well as my betas 3CP, Luq707, Regress, and Thanos for their work on this story.
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Harry Potter and the Conjoining of Paragons
By ACI100
Chapter 49: The Plight of Pawns
December 10, 1943
The Third Floor
10:00 PM
Emily stared into the full-body mirror up ahead. Nothing stared back except the face of Romulus Lestrange. All this time trailing him and still he hasn't noticed. Not once had he cast Homenum Revelio or anything else that may have detected her. Fool.
Pampered pureblood prince would be more accurate. It was a shame these were the powerful people in this warped world of witchcraft and wizardry. Their lives breed complacency and stagnation. How different things would be if people like her had the power.
Romulus waved his wand and the mirror slid aside, but he paused in the doorway when he saw no sign of her inside their hidden room.
A small smile crested her lips while she carefully picked her way around him — still disillusioned and with her footsteps silenced — and took her place standing near the fire.
"Nervous, Romulus?" His eyes darted 'round until she let her concealment fall. She noticed him edge a half step back.
Is he hiding something, or is this his usual wariness? How she yearned for more people like Harry — people who treated her like a person and not like some great, looming shadow.
"Scary times," he muttered, stepping into the room and letting the mirror slide shut behind him.
"Does Grindelwald unnerve you?" There was a stab of panic when she said his name, just enough for her to feel with a glance into his eyes.
It could be nothing. It's not unusual for a Brit to fear Grindelwald these days. Her instincts told her otherwise. That stab had not been dull and deep like the pang of dread, but sharp and sudden like the blind panic known best by the guilty.
He pulled his eyes away from hers. "I think everyone is worried. I never liked Dumbledore, but no one doubted he was Britain's best chance. Who knows what will happen now?"
"No one really knows where the Lestranges fall. There have been rumours about them supporting Grindelwald for years, but Father has always thought they were just rumours. The Lestranges came from France, so rumours about wider Magical Europe have always followed them."
Was Cassie's father right, or were the rumours true? Maybe you know much better than most. "Britain doesn't need Dumbledore. Grindelwald will still be defeated, just like Emeric the Evil and all the other would-be dark lords."
A dark shadow flashed across Lestrange's face. Either I've upset him, or the idea of Grindelwald losing doesn't please him. "We'll see. I'm not as confident now as I was a few months ago."
His gaze flashed around the room. Like a cornered animal's. Her pulse quickened; things like this had always excited her.
"What's this about, anyway? I doubt you asked me here to talk about Grindelwald."
"You would be surprised." Silence hung for half a heartbeat before her wand leapt from her sleeve and slammed against her palm. Romulus fumbled for his own, but he was much too slow.
"Legilimens."
Phantom fingers tried brushing her aside, but she seized them and twisted until a lance of pain rippled across their connection and a strained gasp left Lestrange's lips. I have him.
Dozens of newspaper headlines flashed past her sight, then there was a gleaming tomb sitting in what looked like an ancient mausoleum.
"Grindelwald will change things," an old man who must have been the boy's father said while leaning across a polished table. The room was dark but for a lone candle flickering between them and sending patches of shadow dancing across the old man's face. "He will make things the way they once were. You will serve him, boy, no matter what you want."
Emily seized that strand and pulled, flooded by other images until one stood out.
A brutish boy half a head taller than Lestrange leaning over him with his wand in one hand and a dark card clutched between the thick fingers of his other. A triangular symbol marked the card — the same symbol she had seen on Ignotus Peverell's gravestone.
Macnair. Lestrange was threatened by Nero Macnair.
Emily thought she had her rat, but the longer she looked, the less sure she was. He wasn't the one who told Grindelwald's agents where Harry studied. He wasn't the one who helped them bypass the spell. No matter how hard she looked, she could see no real connection between Grindelwald and Lestrange. Just threats, then. Macnair wants him to join.
Emily ended the spell and Romulus slumped against the wall while clutching at his temples. A thin stream of blood trickled from one nostril while beads of sweat tumbled from a brow scrunched up in skull-rattling pain.
She jerked her wand upwards and he was thrust off his feet and slammed hard against the wall. "I have some questions, Romulus. You're going to answer them for me and then I'll decide what needs doing." She felt his panic and offered a sharp smile. "Don't worry. You won't remember any of this. Everything will be just fine in the end."
That night, in the Slytherin Common Room…
Harry swept back a tangle of sweat-soaked hair while entering the common room. Usually there would be clinking bottles and raucous laughter on Friday night. Maybe there would be some upper years snogging in a corner while the lower years shouted at one another over a chess board or an exploding deck of cards.
Tonight the room was quiet. Most students were already in their beds, with some clustered around the room's edges pouring over stacks of parchment or heaps of textbooks. End-of-term exams began in less than three days and many older students looked strained and haggard.
He could understand why. Never had so much work been heaped on them, but he had long since moved beyond worrying about trivial things like OWLs. None of them will matter if Grindelwald kills me.
His friends were another matter. Dorea was reading from their Defence Against the Dark Arts textbook while Elena's quill scratched quietly atop a sheet of parchment still wet with ink.
Her head lifted when Harry came close. "It's weird seeing you in the common room."
It had been rare since Dumbledore's death. First he had hidden from the truth of his demise, locked away with Emily or in solitude while the unwelcome truth did its best to crush him. I wasted too much time grieving.
Almost all his time since had been spent locked away with Charlus, sometimes joined by Emily while they practiced. Often he had not returned from those nights out until long after the rest of Slytherin were fast asleep in their dormitories.
"How's Charlus?"
Harry sighed, slumping into an armchair across from Dorea and just feet from Elena. "Stressed. We both are."
The girls exchanged looks. "Harry," said Elena in a voice that shuddered, "you can't do this. Neither of you can do this."
Doubtful voices whispered inside his mind, but he beat them back and focused on Emily's grand vision.
"Don't you see, Harry? There's a path forward. We can conquer death. That means immortality and never-ending armies. Grindelwald is irrelevant — no one can win against those odds."
"I don't know what you're on about. We're just practicing. The duel against Grindelwald made us realize how far behind we really are."
The last year had made him a better liar than he had ever imagined being, but no amount of skill could save him now.
Both girls just watched him with worried faces. "You mean to fight him." Elena's voice really was shaking now. I mean to kill him; I made a promise. "You can't, Harry. Not you, not Charlus, not even Riddle."
"It's suicide." Dorea had put down her textbook and leant across the fire, dark curls spilling across one side of her face. "You can't beat him. Hogsmeade proved it; you won't close that gap."
"We don't plan to beat him — not the way you're thinking."
The saliva tasted foul in his mouth. Just another secret I can't tell them. It's too valuable. Plus the fewer people who know, the fewer people Grindelwald will hunt. If they did fail, anyone who knew about their quest would die. It's what any good dark lord would do.
Anger flashed in Dorea's eyes. "It doesn't matter how you plan on beating him. You're students — brilliant ones, but still students — and he's the most powerful wizard in the world. There's nothing you can do that will stop him."
Harry closed his eyes and drew in a long, deep breath. Just rip off the bandage. Don't string them along; it will be worse that way. "There's nothing you can say that will stop me."
"Why?" Dorea was wringing her hands nowk. Her shoulders had begun to shake. Guilt curdled in Harry's stomach. I have to do this. He'll kill me if I don't, and I could never let Emily die; not after seeing that look in her eyes. "It's stupid!"
"It's war." Someone coughed in the room's far corner. Harry paid them no heed; he had cast a privacy ward the moment he'd sat down. "You've seen Charlus since his father's death. You know what happened to my parents." Dorea shrank back ever so slightly. "Do you really need to ask me why?"
I wish I could just tell the truth. Would it make more or less sense if he could? Everything is such a fucking mess. The guilt twisted sharply in his stomach. And it's all my fault. He thought that, beyond any other reason, was why he had to stop Grindelwald.
What did my dad say about Voldemort? A prophecy saying one of us had to kill the other? It felt like he had escaped nothing and was back in that same spot, just facing a different dark lord, this time without the help of Dumbledore.
"I just…" Dorea's voice trailed off. Harry's next breath caught when he saw tears rippling in her dark brown eyes. "I don't want to see you die."
"You won't." He made himself smile, made himself mean it with every fibre of his being. I have to make her believe it. It's the only way he could live with himself.
He steeled himself and reached across the fire, seizing Dorea's hand. She looked up sharply while he reached out and took Elena's, too. "I know you don't believe me, but we do have a plan. Our plan isn't to fight him, and it will work." His next breath crawled from him, fighting and clawing each inch of the way. "I promise."
Emily looked up at him through those desperate eyes while dark flames swallowed Dumbledore whole and the faded mark of House Peverell crept across a mould-stained headstone. It has to work; it can't fail.
The last enemy to be destroyed is death.
December 12, 1943
The Library
8:01 PM
Wind whistled against high, glass windows while a flock of crows cawed somewhere outside. Harry's quill scratched against his sheet of parchment while he read from a book filled with accounts detailing some of history's greatest duels. Hermione would be proud of me. She might have fainted if she saw me taking notes like this.
His ward hummed and a familiar scent drifted near. Harry frowned; he had never noticed it before. It was sweet but piny, an odd smell he couldn't quite describe.
"A whole minute late," he said, glancing up at the nearest clock as Emily took a seat across from him.
When did I start remembering how she smelled? This whole romance thing was a bunch of sappy, complicated nonsense. So why am I still smiling?
"I'll make it up to you another time." He had known this meeting must be serious, but now he understood it was dire. Not even a hint of teasing in the way she said that.
"What's up?" he asked, marking his place and snapping the aged book shut. "What's happened?"
She reached across the table and rested a hand on his. Her hand was warm and her fingers were unnaturally long. Or maybe not? Longer than mine, but she's bloody tall, so who knows. He shook himself; something serious was happening and he was thinking about things like her fingers and how tall she was? What the hell is wrong with me?
"Nero Macnair is working for Grindelwald." She said it flatly and in a way that left no doubt.
"Macnair?" Harry sat up in his chair. "How do you know?"
A faint tinge filled her cheeks. "I might have done some digging."
His eyes narrowed. "What kind of digging?"
"The kind involving thoughts, not dirt."
He felt his stomach drop, but he made himself ignore it. This is war; you don't have to like them, but things like this need doing. No matter how sick it made him, Emily was right. It was them, or the enemy — only one side could live.
And it will be us; it will be us forever. That thought brought him up short. When had he started thinking like that?
The last enemy to be destroyed is death.
"Fair enough." There was nothing else to say. "So we…" his voice trailed off. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't say it.
Her hand squeezed his. "I'll be taking care of it tonight. You don't have to worry."
It was like an electric shock went through him. Every muscle stiffened. "Tonight? We should both go. We should plan; what if it's a trap, what if —"
She reached across the table and placed a finger on his lips. "Do you trust me?" For a horrifying moment, he couldn't move, but slowly he made himself nod. "I have everything handled. This is my sort of work, I just thought you'd rather know."
Thought I'd rather know that my girlfriend's about to murder a child? Macnair might have been seventeen by now — Harry wasn't sure — but it was all the same to him. It made him sick just thinking about it, but not half so nauseous as imagining that desperate look while Emily talked about bombs and death.
One last try. "You're sure you don't want me with you?"
She smiled despite all of it — and damn him if that smile didn't ease the muscles tensed beneath his skin. "No. I have everything under control. I promise."
Later that night, in Knockturn Alley…
Cold winds bit through a heavy black cloak and made Lord Sirius Black II shiver. Falling snowflakes glittered in the faint light still streaming in from the more populated alley behind him. It was just about all the light he had.
The buildings here were low and shabby and did little to shelter him from the night's harsh cold. The brat better have something worthwhile.
"Lord Black." A tall, brown-haired boy stepped from the shadows. A black cloak swaddled him, but his was trimmed in fine, golden lace that flashed each time he moved.
Sirius's eyes flicked down towards the cloak. "I see you've done well for yourself since your graduation."
Edward Nott smiled, but there was something strained about it. "The year has been hard, but fruitful."
It's been hard, has it? Again he eyed the gold-trimmed cloak. Fruitful indeed. It was a queer choice of words. Sirius had met the Nott heir before and remembered a less refined way of speaking. Someone's gotten into his head and made him grow up this past year. He had a sneaking suspicion he knew who that someone was.
"And I'm guessing whatever you want with me will help you bear more fruit?"
Nott dipped his head. "Yes, Lord Black. I'm here to extend an offer of friendship from my liege lord."
And here it is. Four long years the war had raged. Countless hours had been spent avoiding this very moment, but finally it would come. It was always bound to once the bastard turned his sights on Britain.
"I presume you're not referring to your father?" It was barely a question.
Nott's lips turned up in a small, half-smile. "No, Lord Black. I'm here on behalf of Gellert Grindelwald."
Just that name made the winds feel harsher and the cold feel deeper. It was like they had sliced through his cloak and left naught but tattered rags behind.
Sirius cleared his mind and let the heightened cold fade. A name has no power over me. I will not be cowed by a child and his foreign master.
He met the Nott heir's eyes. This will turn into a political shitshow if I'm not careful. "I appreciate Mister Grindelwald's offer, but I must decline. The Blacks profit from Britain remaining the way it is. Change is not in our best interests."
The moon poked out between thick clouds drifting overhead and the darkness around them grew several shades brighter.
Nott's blue eyes were gleaming. Blue eyes? I don't remember the boy having blue eyes. "Change is in the best interest of all. All I do is for the greater good."
The brown hair lengthened and grew brighter until it shone like the falling snow around them. The nose sharpened and jutted further out from a softer face than the one Sirius had been staring into not a heartbeat sooner.
His next breath caught while he took a small step back. "Grindelwald."
The dark lord bowed his head. "I am sorry, Lord Black. I want the coming months to be bloodless. That is impossible, so I must settle for spilling the least magical blood I can." Those silvery blue eyes stared off towards the larger alley behind them. "Britain will all but demand bloodshed, so I must remind them. A strong message might not be enough, but it is the best opportunity I can give them."
A dark wand slid from Grindelwald's sleeve while Sirius found his own torn away by invisible fingers that snatched it from nowhere.
That dark wand swivelled slowly towards him. Thoughts froze, his heart stopped beating, and time stood still while he stared into eyes void of all emotion. Dorea, Arcturus, I'm sorry.
Meanwhile, in the Slytherin Common Room…
Emily crept noiselessly down the smooth, stone hallway, casting no shadow as she passed beneath a line of torches hanging above her head.
The common room was empty and everything was quiet, but she was not fooled. A pinprick of awareness lurked beyond her conscience, like a distant magnet, pulling her towards a target moving deeper down into the dungeons.
She stole one last glance around the common room. A small part of her wished she had accepted Harry's offer and let him come with her, but she crushed those thoughts.
It's not worth making him do this kind of work. Knots of guilt strangled her each time she remembered the strained expression twisting his face when he finally agreed that Grindelwald's agents inside the castle must be dealt with. It was a new feeling for her and not one she liked. I can't imagine how bad it would be if I actually had him do the killing.
She stepped from the common room and plunged after the Tracking Charm she had placed on Romulus two days past.
I was right. The charm told her he had stopped moving in the same classroom he had last been threatened in by Macnair. Good. Adjusting the plan would have taken too much time.
The closer she got, the more restlessly she moved. Her heart beat in anticipation.
Macnair's one of the people who tried taking Harry away from me. Something hot and feral burned inside her while the door loomed up ahead. Now I'll take everything from them.
A huge shadow loomed behind her and a cruel smile twisted her lips while Emily flicked her wand and slammed the classroom door open. There were but two figures inside — the same two Emily had expected.
Macnair leapt to his feet, but her wand was already on him and she was tearing through his mind. A strangled scream came from him while she seized threads of memory and pulled with all her mental might until a single vision swam up through murky depths.
A tall, brown-haired boy sliding a triangular card into Macnair's grasp with a hand on his shoulder and a gleam in his eye. "You won't regret this, Nero," said Aiden Burke.
One of Malfoy's goons last year — one of the ones who attacked Harry, but who got away.
Boiling rage churned inside her and she lashed out through the connection, conjuring up the worst pain she had ever felt and projecting it through the link to Macnair. His screams filled the room and echoed off the walls, but it wasn't enough. It would never be enough. This is why they all must die; if you leave one alive, they'll always come and fight another day.
Something slithered against the stones behind her and a hulking shadow rose along the opposite wall. Romulus's eyes went wide with terror, then he fell like a puppet with its strings cut. The connection between Emily and Macnair shattered when he too slumped.
"Did you get what you needed from him?" Cerastes hissed behind her.
"Yes," Emily hissed back, hand curled so tightly around her wand that it seared her palm.
"Who's next?" Cerastes asked. "Give the name and they will die."
"No." She could picture Burke's smug smile and it only made her more furious. He tried taking Harry from me. Sparks hissed from the tip of her wand and leapt between her fingers. "His name is Aiden Burke, but he is mine."
Author's Endnote:
If anyone worried that Emily had drifted too far from her immoral self, I hope the last two chapters have assuaged those worries. They are both changing each other, but neither will bend entirely to the other's desires. In other words, they're human.
Oh, and if you want to read the rest of this story, its finale will be up on P*T*E*N in the next two weeks.
Please read and review.
A heartfelt thank you is extended to my Mage-level patron, Cup, for her unwavering support.
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