"This is getting away from us, Albus," Alastor Moody said without preamble as he dropped wearily into a threadbare arm chair covered in cat hair. They had decided Arabella Figg's house was the safest place for these particular clandestine meetings. Other than Alastor, Albus, and Fleamont and Euphemia Potter, the squib was the only other member of the Order of the Phoenix who knew about Sirius Black, and ever since Sirius' tearful confession of his first murder, Fleamont and Euphemia had been kept out of the loop regarding Sirius' activities.
"Sirius' plan went extraordinarily well this time," Portrait Moody pointed out. Alastor glanced up at it. Arabella kept her version in the back of her collection of family portraits and photos, but it had elbowed its way into the frame of her grandparents' wedding portrait today, which had a premium location at the front. "Thirty-three thousand, six hundred twenty-six muggles were there, and not a single fatality."
"That degree of success is the problem. He tied up half the Ministry and all the drafted civilian obliviators for almost five days! We got lucky that You-Know-Who only used that to murder Dorcas! If he'd done something bigger, we wouldn't have been able to stop him."
Arabella cleared her throat loudly. "Excuse me, but there were several other fatalities."
Alastor and Albus both looked at her in surprise. She glared at them. She sounded... peeved. "You forget I was stuck at Lord's for three of those days. The deaths were the Ministry's fault more than Sirius.' Did they really not record them? Sirius' rune field was brilliant so far as keeping things orderly and preventing the stampede. It was so helpful in fact the Ministry just left it up until the end and confunded the muggles to all sit in place as they awaited obliviation. Problem being, the muggles were all there for multiple days as well! Thank Merlin Sirius chose a test cricket match, so there was plenty of tea and biscuits and other food stuffs on hand to keep people fed and hydrated. The six who died were people who rely on daily medication to stay alive." At Alastor's surprised expression, Arabella rolled her eyes. "Muggles can't cure things like diabetes and epilepsy, you know? With the Confundus in place, I didn't realize anything was wrong until someone suffered a terrible convulsion on day three. With the field in place, no one could run to help him, and he died before I got there. After that, I very slowly walked to the nearest Ministry official, who hadn't even noticed the seizure, and got him to arrange health checks. We found five more people dead or in comas. After that, they had someone from St. Mungo's out to identify the muggles with dangerous health conditions for priority processing. And I was let go."
"I'm sorry, I did not realize," Alastor said. And he should have seen it in a report...
Arabella looked away. "Four out of thirty-three thousand still isn't bad. It could have been so much worse. Honestly, I thought it would be until I saw it happen. We've got to be as smart as Sirius and his Ravenclaw girl in future. I knew medications could be an issue if we were stuck for four or five days like Sirius anticipated, but I didn't count on the Ministry spelling everyone into complacency so they couldn't call for help."
"There are just too many variables," Alastor groused. "We're never going to control the situation perfectly, no matter how prepared and vigilant we try to be. Our best bet would be to get Sirius to back off."
"Unfortunately, You-Know-Who was just as impressed with the operation as you," Portrait Moody informed them. "From his perspective, this was more a test of Sirius' new team and of the Ministry response than anything else. Sirius believes that's why he used the time to hunt Dorcas Meadows down personally rather than risking his other operatives. The only other thing discussed at the meeting Sirius attended was who of the Death Eaters continued to be tailed throughout the duration of the obliviation effort. They successfully identified six: Bellatrix and Rodolphus Lestrange, Antonin Dolohov, Yolande Mulciber, Corban Yaxley, and Evan Rosier."
Alastor winced. They had had only enough spare Order members to spy on eight Death Eaters during the obliviations, so now they had essentially confirmed for Voldemort which of his people were most closely monitored and which were not. Malfoy, Yaxley, and Rosier did not even have official arrest warrants out. It was going to be a mind game whether he left the tails on the same people in future or tracked others. Was Voldemort likely to delegate to new people in order to maintain secrecy or not?
"We cannot change Voldemort's intent to use Sirius," Albus said decisively. "Even were Sirius to come home now, young Avery and Ms. Bertram would simply take over, we would have no early warning to prepare, and more muggles would die. Dorcas is a great loss to the Order, and to the Ministry, and to all who knew her, but we must move forward to ensure her loss is not in vain. Now, it is clear that Voldemort's forces are also depleted during the obliviation efforts; he does not yet wish to expose more of his operatives by forbidding them from answering the draft. And yet, we can be confident that every time Sirius does something big, so will Voldemort, and it will involve the Inner Circle or at least Death Eaters who have not come to the Obliviators' attention. We will focus our efforts on anticipating his targets. We will avoid overcommitting our own people on the days off the attack so we will be flexible enough to intervene. We will have all our non-combatants lay low during those days so as not to present a target..."
"This isn't an opportunity," Alastor snorted. "More people are going to die. It's inevitable."
Albus nodded, sadly and reluctantly. "It is inevitable, true. We will simply have to make the best of a bad situation, and as young Sirius once said, we must win the war before he, and many other people, gets killed."
Alastor looked at his own painted face. "Do you think Sirius can still handle it? It's going to be just as hard for him as for us."
The portrait nodded. "He's a tough kid, and a brave kid."
"That tough, brave kid is responsible for more deaths than a lot of true Death Eaters now," Arabella warned. "I understand he's in a terrible situation and he doesn't have a lot of options if he wants to survive. It's a situation you two never should have let him get into in the first place. He values his own life and believes in his own potential enough, he will keep himself there, and alive, until you better figure out how to use him better than you are, Albus. Give him something definitive to do. He's clearly smart enough to figure out how, especially with us helping him."
Albus did not answer her. That he did not made Alastor's blood run cold. For the first time, he realized Albus did not actually have a grand plan end the war. Their strategies of picking off Death Eaters and protecting the Ministry from total usurpation were stalemates and had been for years. Their efforts to draw Voldemort into direct confrontation with Albus had uniformly failed, because Voldemort was deliberately avoiding the clash. Albus' defense of the status quo was immaculate, but it was not and never would be a victory except by attrition and slow annihilation of both sides. For the first time, he understood why Albus had allowed Sirius to become a spy when previous volunteers over the years had been refused; Albus had no other way to get new leverage over Voldemort and was losing hope. The fate of the war rested on Sirius stumbling across some valuable intelligence to present a new, winning strategy. The fate of the war rested on a miracle.
So, they were doomed. Alastor picked up the nearest cat. He needed something to pet right now. With any luck, it would purr for him.
The order for Sirius' next big gig came less than a week after the cricket game. The Dark Lord for unknown reasons wanted a nocturnal strike this time, so not a sporting event. Fortunately a shorter, one- or two-day distraction was acceptable, so Sirius looked through their list of potential venues at the end of the month and picked a concert, with a band called The Clash in Harlesden on 25th October.
Audrey was ecstatic, because she had always wanted to go to a rock concert with her muggle cousins, but had never been allowed because her parents "disapproved of the culture." The Clash was not a band Audrey had known of before, and the venue was a little shabby when they inspected it one night, but that was still good enough so far as she was concerned. She presented Sirius with a proposal the very next day wherein all three of them would go to the concert and actually stay there for the duration, only letting loose with the magical attack at the very end. Avery quickly warmed to the idea; his curiosity regarding modern muggle music had been piqued during the confusing conversation with the gay couple back in August. Despite warnings from Voldemort and from his own conscience not to turn the muggle-baiting job into a game, Sirius agreed. Damn it all, he was only eighteen. He deserved to go out and party at an edgy concert once in his life.
Audrey got them last-minute standing-room tickets, with confirmation the concert was nearly sold out (the Roxy Theater capacity was a little less than two thousand). She also got them a copy of the band's only album and rigged up an old muggle device called a gramophone to play it for them. The music was... interesting. It wasn't melodic like the Beatles. The beats were fast, the backing loud enough to nearly drown out the mumbling singers. And yet, it was compelling. They listened to it multiple times whilst furiously carving out more immobilization runes, this time into wooden tiles Audrey would stick to the theater walls. Sirius found himself at odd times humming the chorus to the song "Remote Control: Can't make no progress/ Can't get ahead/ Can't stop the regress/ Don't wanna be dead."
The concert itself surpassed Sirius' wildest expectations. Even while they were just milling about in the crowd before an empty stage, the hall thrummed with visceral energy. There were so many bodies packed so close together, some chattering excitedly, some dancing even without any music. The air was thick with smoke, and not just from cigarettes but from something mustier that smelled simultaneously gross and enticing that Audrey called simply "weed."
"I advise you lot not to accept anything anyone here offers you," Audrey said giddily.
"Yeah, I figured that out already," Avery said, sniffing the air distastefully.
That was when the lights dimmed throughout the hall. The stage lights came on, glinting off the drum set. Then they flashed and flickered wildly, throwing strange shadows across the excited crowd as the band trooped onto the stage. The crowd did not just applaud, they screamed in ecstatic joy. Audrey joined in, hollering the names of the band members. Sirius really wondered how she had ended up with the Death Eaters.
And then the music started. It started with a crashing drum pulsing like a heartbeat. A guitar joined in, its sound amplified through the muggle electronics in a way that to Sirius felt like it could be magic. His body began to move almost involuntarily in tandem with the rhythm. Avery and Audrey, locked against him, were just as consumed. Audrey was openly enthralled, Avery only slightly more restrained as the huge sound thrummed inside their bones. The singer was almost incomprehensible over the instruments and the noise of the crowd, but he still held sway over all with his riveting command of the stage, with the blunt emotions ringing in his voice. Yes, the songs had lyrics, and Sirius even knew some of them and found himself shouting along with them at times, but the meaning and the power of the music was communicated independent of the words. Sirius lost his sense of time, lost any sense of purpose. He was just one of a throbbing, sweating crowd of humanity, shoulder to shoulder with mostly muggles, sharing this indescribable, mind-altering experience.
He was brought back to cold reality when his left arm started to burn. He did not know why he was being summoned. He had not been expecting it, but there was no more time to waste. He fumbled in his pocket for his shrunken Death Eater robes. He looked around and despaired that Audrey and Avery were no longer at his side. No matter. They couldn't mistake his signal. He apparated up to the catwalk over the stage and froze the two muggle technicians on it who had been monitoring the lights. He pulled on his black robes and mask, muttered "Arresto Momentum" and jumped down onto the stage. "Petrificus Totalus." He cast the jinx at all four band members in turn. When they fell to the stage, rigid, the sudden silence of the hall and its stunned crowd was deafening. "Lumos Maxima." He directed the intense ball of light up to the rafters, illuminating the entire hall. Everyone would see and hear what was happening.
Avery apparated to his side at that moment. Several muggles yelped at his sudden arrival. "THIS SHAMEFUL REVELRY ENDS NOW!" Avery cried, perfectly on script. "YOU SONS OF INANITY, WITNESS THE POWER OF THE DARK LORD!"
Right then, Audrey levitated a random woman out of the audience. Sirius cast the Transmogrifian Torture on the woman, and everyone watched and listened in reverent, horrified silence as she screamed. Audrey slowly floated the writhing woman over the crowd's heads and settled her onto the stage like a sacrifice on an altar.
"YOU SHALL BURN BEFORE THE SERVANTS OF THE DARK LORD!" Avery shouted.
So saying, Sirius cast a silent flame-freezing charm at the stage, and then stowed his wand and said clearly "Inkhera." Flames leapt from both his open palms. He chose the Egyptian spell because a simple Finite wouldn't work on it. The Ministry would have to put out all the fires before starting the obliviations, but they would have to use water. He touched his hands to the stage, which caught fire instantly. Finally, the muggles started to scream. The ones nearest the stage attempted to get away, only to be caught in the crowd and Audrey's runic net. The array had permitted them all to dance in place, but it did not allow them to run.
With a loud crack, Audrey joined them onstage. Sirius took the signal to jump down, both Audrey and Avery at his heels casting flame-freezing charms while Sirius set fire to the wooden floor and the pillars. The flame-freezing charm was truly wonderful, Sirius thought. It worked by altering the nature of combustion, slowing down the reaction in the wood, or whatever fuel was chosen, and transforming far more of its energy to light than to heat. Thus, the charmed fire would continue to consume anything with the same/lower ignition temperature, but nothing with a higher ignition temperature. And this time, when it reached the walls and the rune tiles stuck to them, the array would start to crumble for more people to get out, a timed safety valve.
Fortunately, the ignition temperature of skin was over twice that of wood, according to Audrey, as was that of their cotton robes. Rubber and synthetic fibers had a lower ignition temperature, so quite a lot of muggle clothing was bound to burn, but not the people themselves. No, even should they stand in the center of the flames, like the frozen band members back onstage, the muggles would only feel a tickling heat. Some of them nearest the drama had already realized this and had stopped trying to get away, instead standing near the fires, reaching their hands into it in bewilderment.
The biggest danger was not from the fire itself but from suffocation and from the collapse of the burning building. Thus, when the hall was sufficiently alight, Sirius closed his fists to extinguish the flame and thrust his wand skyward. He blasted the roof off to let out the smoke. Audrey and Avery chanted "Arresto Momentum," slowing the falling debris to non-lethal and very obviously unnatural speed that left the muggles staring in awe. The crowd were still afraid, and even the intoxicated ones could not mistake this for anything but magic, but hardly anyone looked like they were trying to run now. Sirius nodded. The plan was working well.
He turned to whisper to his minions. "I've been summoned. Finish without me. Richard, you cast the Mark, right before leaving." So saying, he disapparated.
Rabastan was the only one waiting at Headquarters. He took Sirius' hand as soon as he entered the building and apparated them both into a dark woods bordering a sturdy wooden cottage. Apparently, the Dark Lord had opened a temporary hole in the anti-apparition ward on the Headquarters while leaving all the other defenses intact, effectively negating any attempts to track their movements tonight. Shit.
Sirius had no idea what was happening, and Rabastan did not explain. He only grinned darkly at Sirius before donning his mask, then beckoned Sirius to follow through the trees. They joined four other Death Eaters, of whom Bella alone was unmasked. She smiled at them both, then assumed a more business-like expression. "Good, we're all here. Okay, the caterwauling charm is at the forest edge. The Dark Lord and Rodolphus are on the other side waiting for us to trigger it. As soon as we do, anti-apparition, anti-floo, and energetic perimeter charms go up. Rodolphus will reinforce and patrol the perimeter. The rest of us will storm the house." She beamed around at the group. "And then we kill anyone not wearing a mask. Sirius, you find and destroy the floo first. Anyone casting a Patronus gets a killing curse immediately. If the anti-apparition wards fail or anyone somehow manages to escape otherwise, killing curses immediately. But I anticipate that won't be necessary, and everyone can have some fun, since the Ministry will be fully occupied with other matters for quite some time."
Sirius felt vaguely lightheaded. This was bad. He didn't know what to do. Moody's watch was closed and stuffed in a pocket under his robes. He didn't know whose house this was. He was here as part of an execution squad with direct orders to block the exits. He didn't know how to refuse. Even if he did refuse, how would that help? Voldemort and six Death Eaters against one household...
"Let's go," Bella ordered, putting on her own black mask.
Witlessly, Sirius followed. When they cleared the trees and the residents' security charms began to wail, he and the others started running. Bella blew the front door from its hinges even as it was morphing from simple wood to iron. A wall of flame leapt up around the house, but Rabastan doused part of it long enough for them all to rush through. Each of the other barely-visible protection wards collapsed in turn as various Death Eaters collaborated to expertly take them down, barely breaking stride.
And then they were inside the house, with curses flying. The only thing Sirius could think to do was to stall. He cast a shield charm and ducked through the first door on the left, even though he had noticed the chimney was on the right side of the front door. He would search for the floo as directed, it would just take awhile.
He was in a music room, and the only door was even farther away from where the main hearth should be. He crossed the room and opened it, expecting a closet or a library. Unfortunately, this proved to be one of those doors that opened not to where would be expected topologically but rather to wherever you were trying to go. He was now in the kitchen. He bit back a curse, but there was nothing for it. He stepped through the magical door and blasted the hearth to smithereens as instructed. He covered the breathing holes in his mask against the brick dust and slowly moved towards the noise of the nearest fight. Rounding the corner, he almost ran into a stray entrails-expelling curse. He jerked backwards, then peered around the corner again more cautiously.
It was a terrible scene. Two bodies lay on the ground, one an old man without a mark on him, the other a still-breathing mass of blood. The last occupant of this room crouched behind a sofa that had been transfigured into stone and was fending off three Death Eaters, who were clearly toying with their prey. Sirius decided not to join in, since he was facing their victim's unprotected back and would have no excuse for an unsatisfactory performance, once spotted.
He retreated back through the kitchen. This time, the magic door led not to the music room but back to the foyer, near the base of the staircase. He stared up at a child who stood frozen at the top of the steps. He looked about eight.
There was a swish of robes behind him, and Sirius spun about, leveling his wand. He pulled up short when he saw it was Voldemort himself casually stepping through the twisted doorframe. Voldemort's eyes flicked from Sirius to the child. He smiled. "Were you about to spill innocent magical blood?" he asked softly.
Not at all sure what the Dark Lord wanted him to say, Sirius nevertheless answered impishly, "Bella did say to kill anyone not wearing a mask. Excepting yourself, of course."
Voldemort laughed dryly. "Don't let me keep you."
Sirius hesitated, then bowed, "As my lord commands." He turned and bounded up the stairs. Thankfully, the child turned and bolted away. Sirius shot several hexes after him, but deliberately just missed, destroying the banister instead. He heard Voldemort laughing again behind him, and breathed a sigh of relief as the Dark Lord's sure strides moved away, towards other, more exciting duels. When he reached the landing, it was clear he was not the only Death Eater upstairs, with more spell lights glimmering in the otherwise darkened hall. Fortunately, the child was wise enough to keep running up to the next landing, and Sirius followed. With any luck, Sirius would be the first and only Death Eater up here, and he would figure out what to do with that advantage before anyone joined him. He followed the child down the darkened hallway and into a bedroom with a sloped ceiling. Unexpectedly, a powerful cutting curse sliced right through his shield and grazed his shoulder. He hissed and dove behind the dresser, simultaneously recasting his shield charm. He followed that up with a silent Lumos maxima, temporarily blinding his opponent with the spell's radiance. He squinted to see who else was here, and his stomach plummeted into his boots when he recognized Marlene McKinnon, a Hufflepuff from his own year. They had dated for almost half of fifth year. The little boy must be the kid brother she had told him about. She was in her nightdress. This was probably her room. She had a large family, most of them older and dying downstairs.
Marlene cast a stunner in his general direction when the light started to fade. It bounced harmlessly off his shield. Sirius pointed his wand and summoned the boy. Both Marlene and her brother screamed. She lunged to grab him but missed. Sirius clasped the child in front of his chest. He kicked the door closed and shot a silencing charm at it. "Stop fighting if the both of you want to live," he commanded quietly, thinking fast. A plan was finally coming to him.
Marlene's mouth fell open, her expression undiluted disgust and horror. "Sirius Black?"
Damnit, she recognized his voice. He nodded once. "The Dark Lord is here to kill. I can't stop what's happening downstairs, but I will do what I can to shield you and your brother. Just keep screaming while I work. I'll tell Auror Moody how to find you when it's over. You two will have to go into hiding after this and pretend to be dead."
Marlene nodded, frightened tears running down her face. She took a deep breath, and started screaming, pleading for her life and for her brother's. Helpfully, that included his name, Ben.
Sirius whispered into Ben's ear. "This is going to be scary, Ben, but I need you to keep your eyes and ears open. You'll need to watch the magic I do so grownups can see it in your memory, if they need to." He let the boy go, and Ben flew to Marlene. "It's pretend, Benny," she said in a suddenly much lower and gentler voice. "I'm just pretending to scream. Sirius is my friend from school..."
Ben was crying. He didn't believe her, but Sirius couldn't wait. "Lie down." Marlene obeyed immediately, holding Ben's hand. Sirius pocketed his wand and raised both hands over her ankle. "Khetepet'akhew!" he incanted. Marlene started screaming again, this time for real as the skin of her leg split open and new bone thrust through it. He was really glad of the experimentation he had done with this spell; fortunate for them both the squirrel he had first tried this on had escaped its tether and skittered away so the curse landed on its tail instead rather than its head the way the scroll depicted. Ben screamed too and struggled to get away, but Marlene held him in place. Impatiently, Sirius drew his wand again. "Immobulus." Ben froze in place, fortunately with his eyes open and gaze directed where it needed to be for this. Sirius pocketed his wand again. It took less than a minute for the new skull to grow out of Marlene's bloody leg. He waited long enough for the flesh of the face to form and become recognizably Marlene's. He didn't wait for the hair to grow out, simply grabbed the thing and cast a wandless severing charm, leaving a raw wound all the way to the mutilated leg bones. And now the part that Ben had to see, in case Marlene started bleeding again when Moody found her. He covered the wound with his hand and said clearly, "Sekadua." Blood turned to black smoke curling around the edges of his hand. That was the residue of his original curse dissipating away, hopefully all of it. He then took out his wand, pinched the edges of the wound together, and sealed it with an ordinary healing charm. Hopefully, the Egyptian purification charm he had used was enough to ensure the cursed wound stayed closed.
Marlene's screams gave way to sobs. He stunned her, and Ben. He fished out his watch and opened it. His heart plummeted. No Moody. He was probably coordinating the Order or something, didn't realize Sirius' role tonight had not ended with the Dark Mark at Roxy Theater. Hoping against hope this wouldn't come back to bite him, Sirius pictured his fifteenth birthday at Hogwarts with James, Remus, and Peter, back when life was good and made sense. "Expecto Patronum!" There was his great, shaggy silver dog. He pictured Hagrid's hut in his mind; the affable Hogwarts groundskeeper was the only man he could think of who was definitely trustworthy, definitely didn't get an NEWT in charms, and almost definitely was not in the vicinity of anyone likely to recognize Sirius' voice and rat him out. "McKinnon's, top floor, second door on right. Tell Moody." The patronus shot away, hopefully to Hagrid.
He cast his trusty Petrification curse, then disillusionment charms, then impervious and cushioning charms on both McKinnons. Lastly, he pointed at Marlene's owl, beating against the door of its cage. "Avada Kedavra."
Severed head in hand, he left the room without a backward glance and set fire to the hall, with another flame-freezing charm and also a warming charm to disguise the lack of heat. He walked sedately down the stairs. Casting a Homenum revelio charm as he went, he confirmed there was only one life sign left on the first floor, presumably the Death Eater. Sirius walked down that hall and found the man pawing through a jewelry box in the master bedroom, a naked woman's corpse wrapped in a bloody towel on the bed, another witch dead on the floor with wand still in her hand. The Death Eater looked up briefly at Sirius before returning to his thievery. Sirius leveled his wand and cast the Killing curse without even thinking about what he was doing. The Death Eater fell silently, gold trinkets slipping from his fingers. He turned on his heel and walked back out, heading back to ground level.
Sirius was still on the stairs when a man dashed into the foyer in front of him but was brought down by a killing curse. Bella followed after him. She had lost the mask at some point. There was blood streaking her face, running down from a slice hidden in her thick hair. She looked up at Sirius and grinned. She clearly recognized him, despite the robes and mask. "It's clean up time. Where have you been? Having fun by the looks of it."
Sirius glanced down at his robes and only then realized he was rather dripping in Marlene's blood. He lifted up the severed head. "Found my ex-girlfriend."
Bella's eyes widened, and so did her smile. "Was she the one to get the Patronus off?"
Sirius shook his head. "That was another bugger, hiding in the closet in the next room. Didn't notice him until he spoke."
Bella sighed. "You'll learn. Next time, it's important to clear all the rooms before settling in to play."
Sirius nodded and jerked his head behind him. "Clearly. We lost someone who didn't. Looked like his back was to the door when I found him."
Bella rolled her eyes and muttered, "What an idiot. I warn them, and they don't listen."
Sirius snorted and descended the rest of the way. The fire he had set was spreading behind him, crackling loudly. He lifted up the head and carefully transfigured it into another paperweight similar to Ivan's, then stuck it in his pocket. He had needed the evidence of murder to be seen, and now it had. He didn't want anyone looking at it too closely and realizing it had been formed of dark magic.
Bella's eyes lit up. "I want one!" She turned back to her final victim and severed its head, then levitated it over to Sirius, who accepted it without comment and commenced another morbid transfiguration. He apologized silently to whoever this was. "Yours was bloodier," Bella observed, sounding disappointed.
"Mine was still alive," he informed her.
Bella cackled. Someone behind her cleared their throat. Sirius looked up to see Voldemort watching them with raised eyebrows. "It's time to go," he said simply.
Sirius tossed Bella her horrible new paperweight and followed them out. Rodolphus dropped the anti-apparition wards. Another Death Eater cast the Dark Mark. They all left the blood-soaked, burning house, with not a single auror appearing to bar their retreat.
It was only when they returned to Headquarters and unmasked that Sirius realized the Death Eater he had murdered, the only Death Eater to have died in the attack, was Rabastan.
Author's note: whew, that was a lot! Bonus chapter today because I decided to exclusively work on this story for this weekend, because you won't be getting more updates this coming weekend or the week after. Can't say I know much about the band The Clash. Probably their only song I could recognize is "Should I Stay or Should I Go." I picked them because that concert date and venue was real. Google doesn't turn out many other rock concerts in Britain in October 1978. Incidentally, one of their songs is entitled "Deadly Serious." In other news, the head-growing charm is sort of described in the books when Ron tells Harry about his family's trip to Egypt. As I didn't find anything promising in The Book of the Dead to match it, my incantation is totally made up and basically translates to "another evil head" lol. Some of you will notice the timeline for the deaths of Dorcas Meadows and the McKinnons doesn't match canon at all: that's intentional, because Voldemort's using Sirius' muggle-baiting extravaganzas to create the circumstances he needs, rather than waiting for opportunities to arise naturally.