Shout at the Devil

by MalcolmTent6730

Magic wasn't real. That's what Ryan Black was told for most of his life. It was a truth he believed until about a week after his eighteenth birthday, when he was contacted by his dead dad's estate about his own. Being born a squib he had no reason to be informed, except for a small gift his old man left him. Evil pieces in Harry Potter. AU Hogwarts University. Eventual OC-Multi,

45. Chapter 45

June 24th 2013, Great Hall, Hogwarts, Scotland, 9:30 PM BST

I felt a shift in the air as we all gathered in the great hall. It only took me a second to identify the magical lockdown I'd asked the old man to impose, and I let out a sigh of relief. Hogwarts was OLD, and it was built on a massive magical nexus that had been feeding into the very magical castle for centuries. The wards on this place should keep out a minor god, at least for a while.

Harry, Ron, and Hermione had caught up with us as we entered the hall, Harry looking worried as a distraught Gabi fussed over Fleur. "Ryan," he said as his girlfriend finally calmed down enough for him to get a word in. "What's happening?"

"Give me a minute," I told him bluntly. "This is going to be a mess and I don't want to tell the story more than once."

He nodded grimly, but it didn't take nearly as long as I'd have liked for the hall to fill up. Dumbledore called me up to the head of the crowd to announce my news, and when I got up there, I decided to rip the bandaid off. "So…Lord Voldemort is back. And he's way worse now." I told them all cheerfully.

Daphne, who had followed me up, smacked the back of my head. "Honestly," she said acidly. "Have you no tact?"

"What? I'm just saying. They don't get anything out of me sugarcoating shit." I turned back to the crowd. "You guys got any questions?" There was a low murmur running through the room as all the wizards present dissolved into harsh whispers. I picked a hard bitten looking man who was probably some kind of wizard cop. "You, got something to say?"

He sneered at me. "Lord Voldemort is dead." His tone was hard and scathing.

"Extremely," I agreed casually. "Doesn't seem to be slowing him down. Got brought back by a necromancer. I imagine he'll be here soon, unless he decides to lay low. Hard to say what he'll be doing, other than presumably annihilating the small faction of necromancers that refused to bend the knee. Seems he's bent on taking them over."

Madame Maxime sniffed. "Even if this is true, which I see no evidence of, why would this be our problem? Voldemort is an English menace."

Fleur gasped in outrage. "Madame!" she snapped. "How could you?"

"It is, how do you say…nothing personal," the woman said calmly. "I simply refuse to risk the lives of my students attempting to fight in a pointless war that does not involve them."

I shrugged. "I mean, if you don't see how the megalomaniacal insane super lich with super special new soul devouring powers is an everyone problem I can't force you. But I think we can all agree having someone that powerful running around is a bad thing."

"What Mr. Black means to say," cut in Dumbledore. "Is that Lord Voldemort's former limitations are gone, and he is unlikely to stop at just England in this newest campaign."

I personally suspected he wouldn't even START with England. I was pretty sure he would be aiming his malice at Ireland. The secret of whatever his new power was had to come from there. I'd heard multiple references to Mevolent's mentor having similar abilities, and if we had any chance at stopping that bastard, we'd need to find out what exactly that meant.

My instincts were hit or miss, but they made it clear that the black burn wouldn't be enough to put him down. He was basically dripping the stuff, and he'd most likely be able to use it to counter Fiendfyre too. I was afraid killing him this time wouldn't be quite so simple.

I needed to do some divination. It might not be perfect, but I could at least confirm a few things. Once that was done I'd have somewhere to start with this whole Unnamed thing.

Forcing my attention back to the present, I took in the crowd. "Anyway, this isn't a negotiation. I'm sure we can let you go if you really want to. I figured I'd warn you what was coming out of the goodness of my heart, but if you want to run off and die that's fine. Before you go though, I figured you might be interested in some proof."

With a flick of his wand, Dumbledore summoned his pensieve, which landed with a thump on the ground beside him. Strolling up, I tapped my own wand against my temple, pulling out the memory of my brief sight of Voldemort and Wormtail.

There was some hesitation, but one by one, several key wizards stepped up to watch it, faces turning ashen as they stepped back and made way. Pius Thicknesse, one of the potential minister candidates, sneered at me as he stepped away. "Very convenient, isn't it? This critical danger at such a crucial time? This sort of emergency would require a strong leader. You could easily have manufactured this to allow Bones to take control of the ministry."

"Dude, I have way bigger shit to deal with than who runs your ineffectual magic government," I said bluntly. "I guess it would be convenient, as you put it, but it's not worth this much trouble. Besides, you just watched the memory. Like I said, no one is keeping you here. You want to go claim the ministry feel free, you can enjoy your position for the ten minutes it takes for Voldemort to blanket the whole place in black soul destroying fire and turn it into a city of the dead."

I didn't share my worries about Ireland. Once we got things settled I was going to slip out and get to Roarhaven. If anyone anywhere would know about Mevolent shit it would be someone there, and I had to assume their defences were at LEAST as good as here.

I'd been planning to drop in there anyway. We were coming up on a dead end with Harry's Horcrux, and we needed to deal with it now more than ever. When we put down Voldemort this time, it needed to be PERMANENT, assuming we could even manage anything.

Thicknesse laughed mockingly. "You think I need to leave here to become minister? Boy, your pathetic attempt at a coup ends here. I invoke a referendum. Not to deal with this so called lich, but to address the attempted revolution of Orion Black and Albus Dumbledore. They've kidnapped the heads of the magical community and attempted to blackmail us into obedience!"

I frowned at him for a second, then rolled my eyes. Reaching into a circle, I pulled out a little trinket I'd been working on enchanting. It was a two spell enchantment. I blurred forward, faster than anyone in the room could track, and snapped it closed around Pius's neck. He'd made the mistake of stalking closer to prosthelytize, probably hoping to jump us once he made his move.

He choked as the collar snapped shut, the anti-disapparition and imperturbable charms on it making it both impossible to remove and perfect for this situation. Then I plucked his still moving wand from his fingers and pushed him backwards into a still forming circle.

Pocketing his wand, I turned to the others with an apologetic smile. "Yeah…that's not going to happen. Leave if you want, but I don't feel like going to wizard jail, nor do I feel like having to fight all of you. Pius there is now stranded on a deserted island off the coast of Nova Scotia. I went there for a beach weekend. Lovely place. Full of snakes."

"Now see here!" Hissed a self important wizard I didn't know and didn't care to. "You can't just-" I raised a hand threateningly and he swallowed, stepping back as his eyes flicked to my people. "This is ridiculous, I'm leaving." Turning, he stalked out, followed by a series of other wizards, most of whom looked pretty shady.

I glanced at Dumbledore, who nodded. They could leave but not come back in. My eyes flicked to Seras, then back to them, telling her to make sure they actually left and didn't get into any trouble.

"Now, anyone ELSE have any doubts?" I asked bluntly. "Because, you can feel free to watch the memory again. I don't know how to edit them, and even if I did, it's about an hour old, so I don't even think I'd have had time. Still, like we said, you can leave whenever you want. I'm sure Voldemort will-" I was cut off by a series of silver shapes bursting into the room. I turned to Dumbledore, recognizing the Patronus charm. He looked disturbed.

The shapes landed on a series of witches and wizards. Amelia, Scrimgeour, Crouch. All of them listened, faces growing pale. "Th-the ministry," said Amelia breathlessly. "The ministry has fallen. Azkaban as well. The Dementors abandoned us. They laid siege to the ministry beside Voldemort and a series of escaped convicts."

"Wow, that dude doesn't drag his feet," I observed with a wince. "I guess we were lucky most of you decided to fuck off from your important real jobs to come watch college kids try to survive dangerous death trials."

No one even bothered to bristle, they were all too stunned. Fleur turned on Madame Maxime. "You see?" she asked in french. "We can't ignore this. The English ministry may not be as powerful as the French, but they are a force to be reckoned with. To be destroyed in just a day…we need to help."

Maxime stared at the spot where Thicknesse had gone through. "This method of transportation of yours seems to bypass the wards here," she noted, cutting to the heart of the matter. "Can you evacuate Beauxbatons? Bring my children here?"

Natasha nodded. "I will begin the evacuation of Durmstrang. If you might lend me Skulduggery and Valkyrie for the effort?"

"Yes and yes," I confirmed. "Fleur, you take Seras, Tanith and the Queen Dremora. Rooks one and two will go with Val and Nat. Shaggy, Scooby, D.B, I want you all to hit Hogsmeade and start bringing people up here. Rosmerta, the shopkeepers."

It was a little on the goody goody side, but we needed as many wizards as possible on our side for whenever this shook out. Numbers never hurt. Nobody ever died from too much cannon fodder. I could see pride glowing on the faces of Suzie and Stori, which made me feel a little bad for that thought, but I was saving them anyway.

The rest of the non pawn Dremora went with those three, and I turned to Dumbledore. "I have to grab a few people. My mom and Sirius are around here somewhere, take care of them."

A few people in this case was really just one. I needed to pick up China Sorrows. If anyone could help me get this shit solved it would be her. Roarhaven seemed risky right now, given how active Voldemort was. I'd get them a message once things had calmed down and drop in. Dumbledore nodded, calling for everyone to gather up.

Before I left, I gave each of my girls a quick kiss, hugging them to let them know it would be ok. I even gave Hermione a surreptitious pat on the ass when I stepped away from Harry, and enjoyed her red face at the action.

Then I stepped through a circle, appearing in China's house. The woman herself was sitting in an overstuffed chair drinking tea. She looked up at me calmly, raising one eyebrow at my appearance. "We need to gather your books and go," I told her bluntly. "There's a lich coming. Might not be right away, but I have a feeling you're on the list. We have a fallback position waiting. A massive magical library you'll have free access to."

Waving my staff, Pawns one through eight stepped out of midair. She stared at me for a minute, then sighed. "Well, if you'll be taking them to a library I suppose I can't complain. Let's get started moving them." I knew throwing out the lure of more books would get her. With another wave of my staff, I started opening circles, taking whole bookcases, as did the Pawns. Hopefully this wouldn't take long.

June 24th 2013, Slytherin Dorm, Hogwarts, Scotland, 11:00 AM BST

We got some sleep after I finished helping China. Val was so relieved to see her mentor I thought she would cry, but my badass Queen managed to push it down, just giving her a tight hug and bustling China off to her dorm.

After that, I wanted to go out hunting…but I knew it was a bad idea. The part of me reacting to Voldemort being back was my Wrath, wanting to crush him, and my Pride telling me I was safe. Without knowing how to kill the bastard though, I was NOT safe. We had things to handle before we confronted him.

The first of those, which Val roped China into, was fixing Harry. With access to both her own library and the Hogwarts collection (including the restricted section) as well as having Solomon on hand after retrieving him from his penthouse, not to mention help from Nat, they'd been able to cobble together most of a ritual that they believed might work.

"Alright," I said as we sat at the table eating breakfast. "Tell me how this works, exactly?" China set a book down, turning it to face me, though she batted my hand away when I reached for it, glaring at my greasy fingers. I shrugged, picking up another sausage link and leaning down to read the book. "The Orb of Thesulah," I read aloud. "What does it do?"

"It's a soul container," she responded quietly. "It's made to summon souls from the afterlife and store them. This would normally be a problem, since Harry's soul isn't IN the afterlife, but we did some research and found a way to disconnect it."

Solomon, sitting next to her, grimaced. "I suggested using your killing curse. I was told it's too indiscriminate. We need something more…precise. Luckily, as a Necromancer, I'm well versed in the matters of souls and their manipulation. I then proposed a more surgical focus, but we're being held up because they're reticent to attempt such a risky procedure. Alternatives have been proposed, and we think we've found-"

"No," I said bluntly, cutting him off. "We'll do yours." The others looked at me aghast, clearly appalled I'd propose pretty much killing Harry to do this ritual when there might be another way. "The thing he said, about the killing curse? It reminded me of a hint Gaunter gave me. That things usually come full circle. Harry got his scar when Voldemort used the curse on him. If this more surgical option is the same thing it should fit the bill. What exactly is it?"

Solomon grimaced. "An ancient piece of very dark magic. An aboriginal pointing bone. Its construction is…distasteful, so I shant give you details, but it's made to neatly sever soul from body. No muss, no fuss. Just point and kill. It's substantially more refined as a tool, and we can calibrate it with the ritual. Once we detach the soul, we just need a way to get it into the orb, and then you can destroy it with your flame."

Val cut in. "Which brings us to the third and most complicated part. Trapping a soul after it leaves the body. Horcruxes can exist independent of a physical vessel, turning into wraiths and escaping."

"We need a soul trap spell," I said with a grimace. "That's…like high necromancy. Used to make phylacteries and soul gems." At their surprised looks I shrugged. "I've been reading up on necromancy while I worked out what it could do. I call Voldemort a Lich, but a Horcrux is to a Phylactery what a skateboard is to a Ferrari. It's basically shanking your soul so hard a piece flies off into something nearby. It's messy and sloppy. There's no way we can use the same method if we're surgically cutting out a soul fragment."

Solomon growled in frustration. "If we had the Soul Catcher that Dusk and his conspirators stole this would be simplicity, but it was reclaimed by the Necromancer Temple after the incident with the Desolation Engine."

Nat, who had been sitting quietly listening, sighed deeply. "I know of a place we might get something of that kind. There's a Bokor in the French Quarter in New Orleans that traffics in the souls of the dead. He channels them for power. He calls himself Papa Tunde and he owes me a significant favor. I helped him out of a jam with a very old vampire about a century ago."

My necromancy research had involved quite a bit of ancillary digging on related practices. I knew that a Bokor was the term for someone who practiced the 'Left Hand Path' (I.E dark magic) of Voodoo, where a more traditional Voudun priest was a Houngan.

"Is that…safe?" I asked hesitantly. "Bokor can be seriously nasty. We're talking hardcore ritual sacrifices, curses, all sorts of shit."

"Somehow I don't think we're going going to get a soul trap ritual from someone who practices magic fuelled by hugs and puppies," said Val dryly. "It's fine. I'll go with Nat, we can bring Solomon for backup. In the meantime, we need you to go pick up the orb and the bone. Both of them are going to be in Knockturn Alley, and you're the only one of us who has been there and can take a circle directly in."

I grimaced. "Diagon is going to be a fucking shitshow right now, and Knockturn won't be better. No way Voldemort doesn't hit a population center that size. I'm honestly shocked he hasn't tried attack here."

"He doesn't need to," shrugged Nat. "We've corralled everyone who might oppose him in one place. Effectively taking us all off the board. It'll keep us all safe, but it also lets him run rampant. The smart play is to leave us alone until he's gathered a larger force, then hit us with everything he's got."

Which I knew. I didn't like it though. I turned to Val. "You or Tanith been able to get in touch with Ghastly?"
"He's at Roarhaven," she nodded. "We warned him first thing, and he was already on site. They shifted the whole town into a pocket dimension. No one is getting in unless they're invited. Why, do you need them for something?"

"I need to find out more about The Unnamed. Whatever Voldemort did to himself involves him." I smiled tightly. "In case you didn't notice, there ISN'T an invincible super lich ruling over us all with an iron fist, so SOMEONE figured out how to get rid of him."

The Unnamed had been Mevolent's mentor. Mevolent who had Skulduggery, Grindelwald, and a Necromancer scary enough that Val was afraid of him as lieutenants. By the transitive property, he was a serious fucking badass, and the fact that he wasn't still around to terrify everyone around him into submission implied he'd been killed. I needed to know how.

First though, I had to destroy the last Horcrux without killing my surrogate cousin. "We can worry about Roarhaven later. They're safe, which is all that matters. China, if you're free while I go retrieve the bone and orb, can you look into The Unnamed? Anything you find will be helpful. I just need to know where I have to go for the materials."

I heard a thump as a new form joined us at the table, slumping down in defeat as her red eyes fixed on me. "I know who will have them," she said tiredly. "And I can get him to give them to us. I just have to actually TALK to that bastard."

Closing my eyes, I sighed. Roran. Because of course the vampire would be the one who had the stuff we needed. He ran a curiosities shop in Knockturn, and was so fucking powerful he was essentially the sole reason for the vampire presence in London being tolerated. Roran Redhand was a monster that even other monsters were scared of.

He was also a fucking sociopath. He was directly responsible for the death of Seras's parents via neglecting his progeny, and he insisted that made her one of his. He'd tried to claim her as his offspring several times, and only her involvement with Alucard prevented him from enforcing that claim (whatever that fucking meant, she refused to tell me). Asking her to confront him was…awful.

"Are you sure?" I asked hesitantly. "I mean we can try to find them somewhere else. Knockturn is a big place."

"A big place that has probably been looted clean, at least if the necromancers and death eaters aren't just too scared of Roran to do it." She laughed hollowly. "Either way, the world is on the edge of open war between supernatural factions. If it tips over then the mortals get involved and everything goes pear shaped. My undead daddy issues aren't worth the deaths of untold millions of people. If Roran can help, I'll get him to agree to do it."

I wanted to argue, wanted to tell her it was fine. But…it wasn't. She was right. Roran was powerful. Having him on our side would mean more safety for our people. I already had a few of my peerage out contacting Vincent, Alucard, and Nicholas. We were going to need all hands on deck if we were going to get through this. Because I still remembered what Gaunter had said. This game wasn't between Voldemort and me. It was between Gaunter and the Faceless ones. Whatever Voldemort had done to himself he had to have learned how to do it from them, which meant he owed them.

I personally didn't want to live in the blasted out wasteland Skulduggery had told me about being trapped in when he got sent to the OTHER world the Faceless ones had been stuck in. I had to assume their endgame was returning for revenge on the Ancients and all their descendants, namely, fucking US.

"Fine," I finally bit out. "But I'm going to be right there. I WILL kill that vampire if I have to. Elder or not, I'm not the same as I used to be. I can take him if pushed. It would suck to lose the potential backup, but if he makes it a choice between you and him, I'm picking you. We can find other supporters if we need them."

Seras shot me a grateful smile. "I appreciate that, Ryan. But I'll be fine. I'm not letting my baggage end the world. My parents wouldn't have wanted that."

I took her hand, squeezing it tightly. Seras didn't talk about her folks much. She'd healed, as much as you could from something like that, and bonded with my mom. She was part of the family, but I knew their death's still affected her, obviously. Roran was a reminder that they'd died for nothing. She could easily have blamed me. It was partially my fault. But she hadn't. And I owed her for that.

"Do you want to wait for Fleur to get back with Flamel and Perenelle?" I asked quietly. "She could come with us?"

"If you need her to keep us safe, that's fine," she said with chuckle. "If not, I'd rather just get this over with. We can go now and be back within the hour probably. The less time I have to spend there the better."

Nodding, I wolfed down my last few bites, cleaned my hands off then stood and offered her my arm. She took it, and I escorted her to the hidden chamber off the great hall. Once we were out of sight I opened a circle, pulling her through into Knockturn alley without a shred of hesitation, just wanting to give her what she asked for and get this done.

When we arrived, I was unsurprised to see a zombie hurl itself out from between two buildings at us. A quick flick of my fingers bisected it with a cutting curse, the gore splattering just short of my shoes as it fell to pieces in our direction. Well that answered that question. We weren't alone here. Wonderful.

June 24th 2013, Red Dragon Curiosities, London, England, 12:00 PM BST

Despite the zombies, cultists, and various nasties (I was pretty sure I'd seen a fucking Wendigo lurking behind a building, though it didn't come out) that had either come with Voldemort or been drawn by the chaos, Red Dragon Curiosities itself was shockingly untouched.

Trash, damage, blood, it all stopped in pretty much a perfect line about ten feet in front of Roran's shop. It was as if even the natural phenomena like wind were too scared to fuck with the Elder Vampire. It hadn't taken us long to reach the shop, though we'd run into a few random annoyances we had to take care of, but once we stepped over the line, everything just stopped bothering us.

Seras, meanwhile, looked deeply disturbed. I took her hand, squeezing it lightly. "Hey, don't worry about it. We'll ask him for his help, and if he says no we'll buy the shit and split. I was thinking back, and I'm PRETTY sure I remember seeing an aboriginal pointing bone on my first visit. That means we just need to hope he has the Orb. You don't have to do anything you don't want. Hell, you can stay out here if it makes you feel better."

My Rook yanked her hand away waspishly. "I'm not a coward," she snapped. "I said I wanted to help. I can convince him to back us up. Just trust me for once!"

I put my hands up. "Whoa! Don't shoot. I do trust you, I was just worried. I know this isn't going to be easy for you. I promise I have all the faith in the world that you can do this. I just kind of hate myself for making you."

Her expression softened. "You aren't making me," she said softly. "You wouldn't. And that's why I volunteered. You…you could be a lot worse to me than you are. Seeing how other fledgeling vampires are treated really drives that home. You're good to me, if a bit absent minded. And our peerage is important to me. They're my family now. I want to help."

"Well, after you then," I said with a small smile, gesturing her forward. "But I reserve the right to drop a Fiendfyre hurricane on this dump if he tries to put his hands on you."

"He won't," she grimaced. "I'm Alucard's. At least as far as Vampires are concerned. Even Roran doesn't pick fights with Alucard. But if I agree to change my allegiance…he sees me as a prize to be won. Not just the power, but being able to snub Alucard without giving him an excuse to get pissed."

I snorted at that. "I don't think Alucard needs an excuse to get pissed. I'm pretty sure he'd kill Roran just to amuse himself."

She shrugged. "Maybe, he's not as wild as he tries to come across. Part of the reason for the stability of the current Vampire regime is because Alucard wants it that way. He used to run things a bit more actively, but lately he's just been doing whatever he wants. Even a few years ago when he met Shaggy his vibe was very different. I think he just gets bored and likes to shake things up."

That did sound like him. The devil-vampire was probably one of the scariest beings I'd ever met. He did whatever he felt like doing in the moment, and no one could really stop him. I wondered if Voldemort had sent people after him, I couldn't see him allowing someone like Alucard to exist, even if he had to waste an army to put him down. I doubted it would be as easy as he thought, but I'd reach out to Vincent to check in when I could.

Pushing the door open, we stepped into the shop. It was exactly the same as I remembered, down to the smell in the air. I turned to where I vaguely remembered seeing something my first time in the shop and…there. I spotted the Aboriginal Pointing Bone. I plucked it off the shelf from its place next to the Hagstone, then headed to the counter.

No one seemed to be working, but when I rang the bell, I caught a blur of motion and Roran appeared in front of us. "Victoria," he said pleasantly. "If it isn't my wayward grandchild. Come to visit your old grandpa. If I'd known you were coming I'd have prepared a snack. I have the most wonderful spanish dancer on retainer."

"Roran," said Seras tightly. "We're here for business, I'm afraid. Though I would be…willing, to talk to you once we finish up."

I set the bone on the counter. "We wanted to buy this, and we're looking for an Orb of Thesulah, if you have one." I made it clear with my tone that this was going to take priority over pleasantries, and his eyes flashed as he glanced down at it.

"I do," he allowed, head nodding lazily. "An old protege of mine was cursed with one. He went on a bit of a rampage, smashing as many of them as he could get his hands on. I tucked one away for safekeeping. A good businessman is always looking for ways to corner the market. That said, this particular artifact of exceptional value. The bone you can take for a few thousand gold, but the orb…the orb isn't something I can part with for money."

I'd expected that. He'd made similar comments about the information I'd asked for back in the day. Of course, that had mostly been an excuse to get out of there without dealing with him directly, but I knew what he wanted. Blood.

I considered it. Bleeding for anyone would be unpleasant, and seeing a Vampire drink that blood, especially one I didn't like much, would be salt in the wound, but… It might be worth it. Assuming we got more than just the orb out of the deal. I turned to Seras, ceding negotiating power to her. She knew without me asking what I wanted.

"We might be open to that," she hedged. "But not just for the orb."

"You want me to throw in the bone for free?" he said, placing his hand on his chest as if aghast. "Why, I would surely be losing out, but I suppose for my favorite grandchild I might be willing to extend a bit of generosity."

Seras glared at him. "You know that thing isn't even a tenth the value of what you're asking. We want more. We want a Blood Pact."

The teasing affability dropped from Roran's face, replaced by stony indifference. "You ask for much, but promise little. A Blood Pact? Little girl, that ritual is ancient, and it isn't performed anymore for a reason. Where did you even hear about the pact?"

I knew the answer to that. Alucard's book. She'd been studying it, learning more about vampiric magic. Apparently she'd caught him off guard. She knew it too, she'd homed in on his unease, going after his weak spot as soon as it appeared. "That doesn't matter. The pact is your best bet. We know you're strong. Voldemort is leaving you alone, but you can't stay on the sidelines forever. Sooner or later you'll have to pick a side."

"And you think I'll pick yours?" he sneered. "That I'll debase myself serving some hellspawn lordling because we share a bloodline? You're an amusement to me, nothing more, and certainly not worth endangering my life."

His slip of the tongue about hellspawn told me he'd learned something about me. Not everything, I was sure (I doubted that was even possible), but he'd actually looked into what I asked him.

That didn't matter right now though, all that mattered was that we needed him on our side. "Voldemort isn't some dark lord," I cut in, going off my instinct. "He might not know it, but he DOES serve the Faceless Ones. If he gets his way, they'll use him to come back. I doubt you're old enough to have been around last time, but from what I hear, they don't use their toys gently. And EVERYONE is their toy."

Roran's jaw tightened, but he didn't respond. His head turned away, piercing red eyes glaring out the window. "What would be the terms?" He asked quietly. "Of our Pact. You know that Pacts are only possible between Vampires, yes?"

"We want you on our side," Seras cut in. I ceded the conversation back to her. She knew this subject better than I did. "And we want you to approach any Master Vampires, or at least powerful Elders. We're sending an emissary to Phantomas as well. The more of us that sign the Pact the more of us are invested in its terms, and the less chance of someone trying to default."

He hissed in discomfort. "A Grand Pact then. Ambitious. There is one Master I might call. Zellman Clock, in Poland. Most think him dead, but that old bat isn't an easy one to kill. If I can get him to sign on, I want three feedings."

"Two," she countered. "And we'll take the orb and bone in the process. Free and clear. Think of it as a goodwill gesture. We pay one feeding up front, the other you get after the signing."

He eyed her appraisingly. "Well, aren't you an impressive little mouse. A Grand defensive Pact before your first decade. I assume you'll be the officiator? Your connection to the lordling makes you ideal for the role."

At her nod, he sighed. Reaching under the counter, he pulled out a crystal goblet, blowing into the bowl and then wiping the remaining dust with a rag on the counter. Then he set it in front of me. "I'll do it. Fill the goblet to this line." He pointed at a spot about a third up the bowl. "The orb and bone are yours."

Reaching my wrist out, I flicked a finger, a neat cutting curse separating my flesh and sending dark red blood spilling out into the air. A second charm, a minor healing spell, knitted the perfectly clean slash together effortlessly, stopping the flow of blood.

He stared at it, eyes glowing in the dim light as I swept my staff and the bone and orb vanished. He didn't even bat an eye, just lifted the glass to his lips and slowly tilted it back.

He swallowed slowly, almost reverently, and his eyes fluttered as he swayed in place. I tapped my staff discretely, calling forth my Knights from inside just in case he decided to try some shit. The demonic enforcers appeared on either side of us, colossal black blades point down in front of them as they took up position within easy reach.

As he finally finished, he let out a contented sigh. "That was marvelous," he said giddily. "I will honor our agreement, and after our Pact is signed, I will have my payment once more. It was lovely doing business with you…granddaughter."

I turned, offering Seras my arm and Roran my back, and walked out without hesitation. My Knights followed, much less sanguine, but I maintained my image easily enough. Once we were outside, I smiled at Seras. "See, he didn't try to blackmail you into coming back. All we had to do was distract him with mid-class devil blood."

Snorting, she shook her head ruefully and then leaned up to peck me on the cheek. "I think he got the better part of the deal."

"Please," I scoffed. "I'd trade a pint of blood to keep you with me in a heartbeat. Hell, I have more than once. Speaking of which," I waggled my eyebrows at her. "You want sum sipp?" I made sure my tone was dirty enough to convey the offer.

She giggled. "I don't know how you managed to say that in such a way that I HEARD the weird spelling. But yes. I would love some 'sipp'. You sure you're up for it? You just gave blood."

I grinned at her, reaching down to pat her ass as I opened a circle for us. "Oh, trust me. I don't mind emptying out a bit if it means I get to fill you up. And by the time we're done, you're going to be STUFFED." The things I did for my girls.

June 24th 2013, Grounds, Hogwarts, Scotland, 1:00 PM BST

We returned to the castle to a pretty medium amount of fanfare. Some people noticed, but everyone was busy sitting around staring dramatically off into the middle distance. It took me a second to realize why, and when I did I winced. Smoke. Something was burning in the direction of Hogsmeade.

I stepped up next to Rosie, who had been standing with my mother. Really close to my mother actually. I blinked in outright shock as I noticed them fucking holding HANDS. "Um, hi mom…" I said slowly.

Her head snapped up, and she glanced down and then flushed a bit. "Ah. Ryan. You're back. I…" She glanced down at her hand. "I suppose you know Rosmerta."

"I know you called her, and I quote, a 'fucking huffleslut' the one time I brought her up." I pointed out in confusion. "So I have to say this is…unexpected. Also very confusing for me, because I definitely flirted with her."

Rosie grinned. "I flirt with everyone, darling. I'm a barmaid. It's good for the tips. If it helps though, she calls me worse than that in the bedroom, and I quite enjoy it."

My mother rolled her eyes. "Behave. Listen, Ryan. After you brought her up, I took a trip to the Broomsticks. I just felt like talking to someone about Reggie. I got into a row with Rosie, then we had a drink, then the next week I came back. I didn't tell you because I try to keep my dating like away from you. It doesn't feel…respectful. Of your father. I loved Reggie but-"

I held up a hand. "Mom, Jesus. I'm a grown man with five girlfriends. I'm hardly going to throw a kid fit about you 'replacing my daddy' anymore than I will about that fact that you're apparently bi and never mentioned it. If you're happy, I'm happy."

She smiled wanly. "Well, the world is ending, so happy might be a bit of a stretch. But I'm glad you know. Now, you looked like you were here with a purpose?"

I blinked at that. "Shit, right. Rain check on the warm and fuzzies. Rosie, welcome to the family, try not to walk around our house naked, that would be REALLY confusing for me in a lot of ways. Love you mom, got to go stop the apocalypse bye."

My mom snorted before returning the sentiment, Rosie giggling like a madwoman as I bolted off to find the others and let them know I'd officially collected all the ingredients.

I found that everyone was scattered around, so i sent a bunch of house elves to collect them, and had them all meet me at the room of requirement. Including Harry and Gabi. When they arrived, we hustled them into the Room, and I finally told my surrogate cousin exactly what was going on. He was understandably annoyed.
"I've had a piece of Voldemort's SOUL lodged inside my head for my entire life and you didn't think to even TELL me?" He demanded.

Shrugging, I decided to just be up front about it. "Not like you noticed it over the LAST twenty years of existence. And I didn't want to bring it up and stress you out before we had a fix. Val said it's dormant, and isolated by some kind of weird sacrificial magic your mom used to protect you from the killing curse. Before you ask I have no idea. But the point is now we know how to remove it, so I'm telling you it's there."

He glared at me, clearly hoping I'd back down or apologize. The best I could do was explain. "Look, Harry. I made an executive decision. It was about you, and it sucks that you're upset, but I had to make a call and I made the one I thought was best. In your shoes, I wouldn't have wanted to know, and once you DID know, you couldn't go back to not knowing. Well, you could have asked us to obliviate you I guess, but I'm not super precise with memory charms, so that wasn't really an option."

That seemed to take the wind from his sails. "That's…I don't like it, but it's not what I figured. I thought you just assumed I couldn't handle it."

"Why the fuck would you WANT to handle it?" I asked in genuine confusion. "Not knowing you have an evil dictator soul in your skull is a gift. I wish they hadn't fucking told ME tio be honest. I don't understand people who whine about honesty. I wish people lied to me about more shit. The truth is stressful."

Not like, shit that was immediately relevant, of course, but long term threats or things that already happened that weren't germane to my situation? Ignorance was bliss, and I was more than happy to play the mushroom.

"This is a fascinating debate," said Natasha dryly. "But we've got stuff to do, so if you two are done philosophizing over the nature of truth, perhaps we could return to the slightly important task of extracting a dark soul fragment from Harry's head." She gestured further into the room, where Val, who had been the first one in, had set up a particularly complex circle.

Solomon was with her, as was, to my surprise, Flamel. I hadn't noticed him in the crowd, though admittedly there were more than a few people with us. Shrugging, I approached the circle. "So, this is the ritual," I said with interest. "I've got your materials right here, of course." I used the staff to pull them back from my pocket world, setting them in Val's hands when she held them out.

"Perfect," she said excitedly. "This is all we needed. The other ingredients we had. Basically, Solomon is going to use the bone as a sort of soul scalpel, Natasha got the talisman from Papa Tunde without much trouble, and we use that to chanel the soul into the orb where you-"

"Kill it with fire," I interrupted. "Yeah, I'm solid on that part. Kind of curious what the REST of it is for though."

She grimaced. "This particular Horcrux, based on what we know, is the newest. It was created from a very powerful fully formed dark wizard, one who had already potentially been altered by outside necromancy. The fragments in the other Horcruxes have been getting progressively more complex and aware. This one might be fully sentient, which means it might try to contact the original. We need to make sure that doesn't happen."

I glanced down at the circle, taking in the complex arcane symbols I mostly didn't understand. "Makes sense to me. You need me inside the circle for when you do this?"

"That would be best," said Flamel gravely. "Mr. Potter, if you would be so kind, you also have a position inside." He pointed to a pair of blank spots in the spidery design. Mine was pretty close to where he ended up putting the orb. weirdly , aside from the crazy sigils, the circle kind of reminded me of a yin yang symbol. The two empty spots were in the middle of opposing sides of the circle, and in the center was an almost imperceptible line of differentiation where the sigils shifted from one arcane variant to another similar but different one.

In the center, they set a…thing. It was made of tied roots and bones, with symbols painted onto it in blood. It looked wrong, sickening, and I winced internally at the trappings of Bokor, the left hand path. Say what you would about that stuff, but it was powerful, and it didn't pretend to be anything but serious dark magic.

Honestly, I'd have been more comfortable working with a Houngan, I didn't know shit about the Loa, but I knew the nastier ones could be vicious. But I assumed Natasha had a thorough grounding in Voudun if she was tight with some immortal Bokor, so I'd just trust she and the others knew what they were doing.

Flamel nodded. "Alright, we are in position," he flicked his wand and a series of lights appeared, some lit candles, some floating orbs that reflected off scattered glass, shells, and crystals in the circle, creating arcing rainbows that connected some disparate pieces.

It was like something had shifted, and the circle had become something else, snapping into relief as a three dimensional construct instead of two. It reminded me of the ritual to recreate the Sanguine Rose, and I could see Nicholas's hand in its creation. With that done, Val reached down into a pouch at her waist and withdrew the bone, passing it to Solomon.

The older necromancer began to murmur. His cane, held loosely in the opposite hand, boiled with darkness and magic as his necromancy seethed at whatever he was doing. Reaching down, he placed the bone on top of the cane, and it stuck fast as if glued there. Raising it up, he began to trace shapes in the air, and as I watched, trails of darkness were engraved in the space above the circle.

He carved a new circle above the first, directly over Harry, who had laid down in the empty space opposite me. Nicholas knelt, placing a crystal on Harry's forehead, into which he channeled a bunch of the rainbows by shifting the light orbs. Harry's eyes fluttered closed, the crystal glowing as he drifted into a trance of some kind, and when he was down, Solomon lowered the cane, slowly dragging the other circle down.

As it sank, it shrank, becoming smaller and smaller until it was the size of a dime. He dragged it into the crystal on Harry's forehead, and the bright rainbow glow turned black. The crystal shattered, leaving behind the symbol itself, hanging in the air, weeping foul looking dark magic.

It writhed and twitched, struggling to escape, and Val stepped into the center of the circle, cutting her hand and dripping her blood on the soul channeling talisman. The red symbols painted on it began to glow with a crimson light, and the floor shook as red energy coalesced above the circle, looking for all the world like sunlight through seawater as it flickered and shifted.

The symbol let out a high pitched scream, struggling, but it began to move, drawn towards the center, until it reached the talisman and continued on, floating slowly and implacably toward the orb.

In the background, Natasha chanted, and my translation ability did nothing to tell me what she was saying. Not a language then, some kind of tonal key for a magic system maybe. It was guttural and harsh, sounded kind of german, but that wasn't important. The orb had begun to glow, filling with white smoke, and as the symbol reached it, the glass exterior rippled as the fragment slipped inside seamlessly and the smoke turned the same greasy black as the soul fragment energy.

Now it was my turn. I raised my staff, calling to the power inside, the power that was constantly expanding as my Dremora released their devil energy, coalescing it at the end of the flower on the staff's head, I created a ball of flame. It was so much easier now that I was mid class. No kernels needed. I could just force it to manifest.

Raising the staff, I brought it down like a hammer, smashing the orb of black flame into the orb containing the soul. When they overlapped, there was a scream and the Orb of Thesulah shattered, a wave of force blasting out as the soul fragment manifested into the screaming form of Lord Voldemort, burning away in black flame.

Harry sat up with a jerk, gasping, as his scar split open, and black ooze wept from the gash on his forehead as he screamed, eyes fluttering before he toppled back over, unconscious. I just grinned at the others, exhilarated. The last Horcrux had been destroyed. Voldemort was now mortal. Or as mortal as an unstoppable black fire lich could be. Now we just had to figure out how to kill him.

June 25th 2013, Sanctuary, Roarhaven, Ireland, 5:00 PM BST

After a quick celebration with Harry over cleansing him of a spiritual parasite, we sadly had to get the hell back to work. Voldemort was still active, sweeping over Europe like a plague, barely keeping his actions under the radar of the muggles.

I might have been wrong, but I suspected he was wary of Iscariot. I wasn't sure what they could actually do, but Voldemort's bullshit seemed like the kind of thing they could probably counter, and there had been reports of increased clergy activity in some of the cities he'd been hitting. After he dropped the ministry, he hit Hogsmeade, probably to try to draw us out, but when we hadn't taken the bait, he'd abandoned Hogwarts for the moment and headed into Ireland.

We'd heard about the attack on the sanctuary, of course, but none of us had known how committed they were to the assault. When we arrived at Roarhaven though, I was blown away by the sheer number of corpses and cloaked figures surrounding the empty area where the town had been.

I turned to Tanith, who had been in contact with Ghastly inside. She'd agreed to lead us into the dimensionally displaced stronghold so we could check their archives for information about the unnamed. The Sanctuary had fewer magic books than China, but their historical documentation outstripped hers by a mile. When we arrived, I had Val and Skulduggery ward us for sound with an air bubble and then disillusioned the whole group.

Rather than cart around two dozen people, we'd kept this raid light. Val, Tanith, and Skulduggery, me, Flamel, Dumbledore, and Natasha. We were as close to the clearing where Roarhaven had been as we could get, and Tanith insisted that we would be able to get in from over here. She was currently using some sort of enchanted stone to scan for the access point, running it over the air, watching the ripples that came off it carefully.

It didn't take long before we noticed a slight stutter in the ripples, and Tanith stopped, nodding in satisfaction. "This is it. There's an entrance to a small farmhouse on the other side, it's connected to Roarhaven proper by a series of tunnels."

Val grimaced. "It's the Torment's old place, isn't it?" At our questioning looks, she sighed. "We ran into this creepy spider sorcerer a few years ago. All sorts of gross spider based powers, extra legs, spider vomiting, plus he was a crazy sorcerer supremacist. He was killed during one of the Faceless skirmishes last year."

"Couldn't have happened to a nicer bloke," Tanith added with a snort. "But yes, his house is connected to the Roarhaven tunnels, and it's outside of town proper because he was so unpleasant even the OTHER supremacists didn't want him around."

Reaching into a pocket, she withdrew an amber crystal that hung from a black chord, supported by a small silver claw medallion. Holding it up to the spot where the ripple had been, she muttered a few words of broken language that didn't translate since she wasn't really saying anything, and as we watched, a line of orange energy coalesced in front of her. A single spark in the air dragged itself downward, carving an opening in the skin of the world, and without any fanfare, she pocketed the pendant and hooked her fingers in the tear, pulling it wider.

Despite her devil strength and her rather toned arms, Tanith had to actively strain for a minute or two to pull the veil apart, and when she finished, she gestured us all through quickly. Hopping inside, she resealed the rift, and the rest of us let our stealth spells drop as we looked around the new clearing we were standing in.

The spot we'd been before had been off the beaten path, a sub clearing in the woods around Roarhaven. This was the same physical place but…worse. Decaying animal bones, mouldering wood from unknown furniture, and suspicious holes in the ground intermixed with unseasonably dead trees and lots of rotting leaves.

At one end of the clearing I made out what could charitably called a house, if you wanted to really stretch the definition. A few rickety walls with a leaky roof slapped on top blacked off by not so much a door as a piece of rotten wood jammed in front of a frame.

Seeing our grimaces, Val nodded. "It's not really much worse than last time we were here. The Torment wasn't big on property upkeep. Though admittedly, the bones are new." Striding forward, she raised a heavy boot and stomped in the rotten wood of the door, yelping and leaping a full ten feet back in terror when a wave of spiders flowed out of the place.

The rest of us, barring Flamel who used some kind of ward, floated up off the ground, wings extended, and snickered at my flustered Queen, who glared around her in affront. "You're all arseholes. I didn't think to float, I just reacted. You're lucky I didn't reflexively burn them out. Might have set the house on fire."

I glanced skeptically at the extremely wet decomposing structure. "Not sure even hellfire could light that. Have an easier time burning water."

She muttered something vaguely insulting I didn't pay much attention to as we all approached the door. A quick light charm revealed the interior, while gross and decaying, wasn't full of more spiders.

It WAS weird and ancient looking. Not like a temple or something, but like from the fifties. Peeling green wallpaper, matted salmon carpet, an old wooden TV set with rabbit ears and an overstuffed red chair with a tv tray sitting in front of it, covered in dust. A few doors were off to the sides, presumably leading to a bathroom and or a kitchen.

"So…where are the tunnels?" I asked warily. "Because if this is another bathroom pipe situation I think I might prefer to just dig outside."

Laughing, Tanith walked over to a small turntable in the corner and picked it up, moving it aside to reveal a patch of carpet with the wallside edges disconnected from the floor. Leaning down, she pulled up the section, revealing a surprisingly sturdy looking wooden hatch in the floor. The thick iron latch had an even thicker padlock through it, but Tanith casually reached down and snapped it with a quick twist, pushing back the bolt and throwing it open.

Bats came rushing out, flooding the space before taking off through the door. "Well, that bodes well," I said glibly. "Val, Tanith, Nat, ladies first."

Val glared at me while Tanith just rolled her eyes and spread her wings, drifting down through the hole on the floor into the overwhelming darkness. After a minute or two, we heard a quick call of "Clear!" from below and one by one we drifted down into the tunnel. To my surprise, it wasn't cramped at all at the bottom. The shaft went pretty deep and opened up into a sizable cavern with a series of passages leading off it.

Tanith was standing near the northmost tunnel, and we all trailed behind her without any delay. Despite the fact that we were inside the shields and should be safe, I felt a shift in the air that I didn't like. I stopped. "Head on a swivel people. My gut says this isn't going to be the peaceful visit we were expecting."

Having learned to trust my instincts, everyone raised their guard, eyes peeled for threats. Tanith, being both my Knight and furthest ahead, was the first one to notice something amiss. She vanished in a blur, sword coming out in a chime of steel as she bisected a cloaked figure, Val slamming into the other from her spot behind the swordswoman. Both of them died pretty much instantly, and the third one, who tried to run, I neatly cut off at the knees with a quick cutting curse, sending him sprawling into the mud.

They were all wearing black cloaks and hoods, and I grimaced at the presumption that the Faceless had gotten some cultists in, at least until the legless one started vomiting up fucking spiders.

Val snarled, a blast of hellfire vaporizing the body and arachnids all in one swoop. "Hey, I was gonna question him-" I protested.

She held up a hand. "He wouldn't have talked. They never talk. They're all brainwashed. But it doesn't matter. We didn't need him to say anything. I told you about The Torment, but I didn't mention he was part of a very specific group. The Children of the Spider. You met one of them on your last visit. Madame Mist. Which means-"

"This was an inside job," said Tanith in horror. "Ghastly! He might not know about the traitors. We have to warn him!"

A dry chuckle rang through the air, punctuated by the sound of coughing blood, and then the rock wall beside us gave way and the indescribably ugly face of Ghastly Bespoke was revealed as he stumbled out, falling to his knees as he coughed up blood. "I assure you," he gasped as Tanith appeared at his side to catch him. "I am WELL aware of the traitors."

Skulduggery stalked forward, kneeling beside his friend. I saw the man flinch at the black armor my Bishop wore at all times now, and I remembered someone telling me that Lord Vile had killed Ghastly's mother. Awkward. "What happened?" the skeleton detective demanded. "Who did this to you?"

"Erskine," he coughed. "He tried to backstab me. Lucky I'd been training with Tanith for the past few months to get back in shape. Have to grow eyes in the back of your head to keep up with her speed."

We all froze. Val looked crushed, and I suspect Skulduggery would have too if he had an expression. "Erskine…Ravel?" whispered my Queen. "But Erskine was one of the Dead Men. You've all been friends for years. We helped him become Grand Mage. Why would he turn on us?"

"Apparently he was injured during the war and ended up in Roarhaven," Ghastly grimaced. "He became a sympathizer of the Children of the Spider. I suspect this little coup was just making the most of an opportunity, though he most likely won't hesitate to hand over the sanctuary resources in exchange for consideration from the cultists."

Val's knuckles whitened, bones cracking as she clenched her fists so tight rivulets of blood dripped from her palms. "How could he do this?" she grated out. "He was our FRIEND."

"Does he know what we're here for?" I asked Ghastly. "Hell, does he know we're HERE?"

The scarred man shook his head weakly. "Didn't have time to tell him. Tanith's message came not too long ago, I was meeting with him to fill him in when he and Mist attacked me. He wasn't expecting my earth magic. After being a statue for a while I developed something of a knack for the stuff. Training with Tanith polished it quite nicely."

"Nat, patch him up," I told my redheaded Bishop. "You know more healing magic than the rest of us. Tanith, take him with you and get out of here. Get him back to Hogwarts." She opened her mouth but I cut her off. "Don't argue. We've got more than enough firepower here to deal with a sorcerer insurrection, and Val and Skulduggery won't be of any use if they're distracted."

Grimacing, she finally nodded. "Fine, but you lot be careful. Val knows the layout, but Erskine knows it better. He might have set traps."

I grinned, spreading my hands to indicate myself. "Luckily, we have someone who can detect that kind of thing. Mostly. We'll let Skulduggery go first though, just in case." Everyone chuckled at something that was barely funny, and then Tanith opened a circle and shifted Ghastly and herself back to Hogwarts. "Alright, look alive people. Hostile sorcerers out for our heads. Why am I even surprised anymore?"

As usual pat-reon has the advance chapters on that site /malcolmtent hope everyone enjoys