"There was an explosion at the prison. We don't have any additional information for the time being. Stay put." Gawain Robards' voice came from his Patronus while Rachel stumbled for her wardrobe while shedding her nightgown. The prison was her responsibility and Gawain was crazy if he thought she wasn't going out there to see if she could help.
She dressed in record time, stopping to tie her shoes because she was no use to anyone if she was tripping over herself, and then she hurried down the hallway and rapped her knuckles on Theo's bedroom door.
He opened the door a moment later, wand in hand and hair sleep tousled. "What happened?"
"Attack on the prison. I'm apparating to Leicester to help," she said in a rush.
"Do you want me to come?" he asked, now fully alert.
"No, the aurors are already on scene. I'm sure we can handle it. I have to go now. Let me just check the wards here and make sure you're secure. I'll send you a Patronus message when I'm done. I'm probably going straight to the Wizengamot from the prison." She held her hands up and did a quick but thorough check of the wards. "Alright. Send me a Patronus if something seems wrong and I'll come straight back."
Theo darted forward and hugged her and she gave him a hug back. "Be careful, please," was all he said.
"I will." Rachel apparated herself directly to the front of the prison, finding two wands drawn on her immediately and the strong smell of smoke. "Hold," she called. "It's Wizengamot Member Snow. What is the status? Is there loose Fiendfyre?"
"No Fiendfyre; the smoke is from the explosion," one of the aurors said as they lowered their wands.
"Casualties? Death Eater sightings?"
"No Death Eaters have been sighted. Unknown casualties. Warden Matthias has organized the guards to do a full cell count and to check for casualties," the auror reported.
"Who's in charge here?" she said, wanting a more immediate accounting of what was happening.
"That would be me. I thought I told you to stay put," Gawain said as he strode forward. "Where is Warden Matthias? He was supposed to report to me if we needed Healers called from St. Mungo's."
"Warden Matthias is coordinating with the guards," the auror said.
"Status of the wards?" Rachel asked, figuring their next jobs were to check for casualties and provide aid and keep the prisoners from escaping if the wards had been damaged.
"Unknown. We need someone to look at them," Gawain said.
"I can do that. I might not be able to fix them, but I can tell you what's wrong with them," Rachel volunteered. "The wards are in segments, I need to go to the damaged segment."
"I'll take her," an auror said, jogging up to them. A second look revealed that it was Cedric.
Gawain frowned for a moment as he looked around. "Rufus would have my head if he knew I was doing this," he muttered. "Fine. Auror Diggory, take Wizengamot Member Snow to the site of the damage so she can assess the wards and protect her from harm."
Rachel nodded to him and joined Cedric. "Where are we going?" she asked. She could smell smoke but in the dark she couldn't tell where it was coming from.
"We're going to have to go inside if we want to go directly to the damage; it's on the upper level," Cedric said.
"That's fine. Lead the way," she said.
They went into the prison and found a number of people in guards' robes rushing this way and that.
"I don't have a report for you yet," Warden Matthais said, not looking up from where was collecting reports from guards.
"We need to be taken to the site of the explosion to assess the wards," Cedric said.
Warden Matthias did look up that time and then quickly bowed. "Wizengamot Member Snow, if you'll pardon me for saying so, you shouldn't be here."
"We need someone to look at the wards and I'm the person who happens to be here," she said, keeping her tone completely business. "I'm perfectly safe in the company of Auror Diggory." Not that she needed Cedric's protection - if there was an attack, she would be the one protecting him.
"If you say so. Take a guard token - it will let you through the doors. Can you actually repair the wards?" Warden Matthais asked, handing over a silver medallion.
"I won't know until I've looked at them. Do we know if the Death Eaters breached the prison?" she checked, because that would change the situation inside dramatically.
"Haven't seen hide nor hair of them. Don't know how they thought they were getting through on the second level anyway, but that's where we keep the Death Eaters. Probably trying to free their compatriots."
Rachel remembered all too well how the Dark Lord had blown up a segment of Azkaban and then had broom riders fly in to rescue their fellow Death Eaters. "Are all of the prisoners accounted for?"
"Still finding that out. I should know in the next thirty minutes or so along with a casualty report," he said, looking pointedly at where a guard was waiting for him.
"Thank you," Rachel said, stepping away and heading deeper into the prison. Now that he'd told her where the attack had been located, she didn't need directions. She and Amelia had designed the prison themselves.
"Are you sure about this, Rachel?" Cedric asked once they were alone. "He wasn't sure if the prisoners were accounted for."
"We'll be alright. They don't have wands," Rachel said, going to the stairway and then climbing.
"People can still attack without wands," he pointed out.
"I'm aware, but anyone grabbing onto me will be highly discouraged by the jolt of electricity that I send through them." Louisa had taught her that one as a method of self defense that she said she taught to every woman who came to her for training in elemental magic. It was a handy trick, but Rachel had never actually needed to try it on a person before.
"There is that," Cedric said. "Even so, I'd rather we weren't in a fight."
"The wards have to come first or we could suddenly have a much bigger problem on our hands," she said as they reached the second floor. "A mass escape from the prison would be chaos."
"I can't argue with that either," Cedric said, using the token to open the door. "Stay near me."
"I will," she said, because she was the one responsible for Cedric being here. She wouldn't abandon him.
They went through another hallway and reached the door to the cell block that housed the Death Eaters. Rachel readied her hands and nodded to Cedric to open the door. A first glance suggested that the Death Eaters were all still in their cells, though many of them were standing at the bars.
"What happened?" one of them demanded.
"There was an explosion. We're still determining the cause," Rachel said steadily, but without pausing to speak to the man further.
As they went further back, smoke started filling in the ceiling. She could hear a few people coughing. Rachel came to a stop and started casting ventilation charms, wanting to move the smoke out as quickly as possible. "Send a Patronus to Gawain. Tell him we need Healers to treat smoke inhalation in this cell block," she told Cedric.
Cedric did so and they moved onward.
Rachel slowed as they reached the site of the explosion, casting more ventilation charms but reaching the point where she couldn't move forward because of the smoke. "Hello? Can you tell us if you're injured?" she called, unable to see if there were more cells.
"There's no one back there."
Rachel jumped slightly and turned to see that it was Thomas Rowle, standing at the front of his cell. "No one is there because they're dead or because there aren't any more cells?" she checked.
"This is the end of the row. The walls are through there," Thomas said, pausing to cough into the sleeve of his robes.
"We'll have Healers here soon. Stay close to the ground, the air is a little better down there," she told him. She took a few steps and cast a ventilation charm directly in front of his cell. "That will help a little."
"Who's out there? Who came for us?" Thomas asked.
"We don't know," Rachel said.
"Rachel," Cedric said, looking deeply uncomfortable.
"I'm afraid I have work to do. The Healers will be here soon; they'll bring you a potion for smoke inhalation," she told him before stepping away. She returned to the smoke, which was clearing enough now so that she could see the fissure in the walls.
Rachel brought both of her hands up and then started touching the wards. She wasn't linked to these wards, only the Warden and his Head Guard were, but she could still examine them, if not quite with the ease that she could the ones at her home. "Anti-apparition ward and portkey ward for this section held," she said, her eyes mostly closed as she assessed the information in her mind.
"That's a relief. How did they get an explosive through then?" Cedric asked. "They shouldn't have been able to get within five meters of the building."
She knew that too. "They took down the outer wards, they're completely gone. That wasn't done in the explosion. This doesn't make sense. Why stop there?"
Cedric was looking around. "Let's save the speculation for Robards."
"We need to get a ward expert as soon as possible to put these back up and to do a more thorough examination than what I can do. The only way this makes sense…" Rachel trailed off. The only way this made sense is if whoever attacked was trying to kill the Death Eaters, not free them. That was an observation she was going to have to give to Amelia and Gawain in private.
"Anything else we can learn here or do to help?" Cedric asked.
"Once this smoke clears they need someone on the wall figuring out what sort of explosive did this sort of damage through the wards," she said, thinking of Cyril's experiments and how he promised her something like that could never be used in combat. Well, this wasn't combat exactly, but it was definitely a problem. "I can't fix the wards - we need an expert."
"To Gawain Robards. We've assessed the wards. Anti-apparition and portkey wards are still up in this section but we need an expert here to reassess and to put up the wards that are down," Cedric said, summoning his badger Patronus. "Anything else we should do here?"
"No, I've got to get to the Ministry and start preparing things there. I think I've been as useful as I can be here," she said, making a mental list of everyone who she now needed to speak with.
"Robards will be glad to hear that," Cedric said.
Rachel half felt that she needed to remind Gawain that he had been the one sending her out to capture Death Eaters ten years ago. She wasn't a child who needed coddling. "Let's go report in and make sure those Healers are coming."
Cedric nodded and they made their way back out of the cell block together, Rachel hyperaware of the stares of the Death Eaters as they passed through.
Since it was only four in the morning by the time Rachel had finished at the prison, she had apparated home, showered, changed into nice clothes and robes, assured Theo that there hadn't been any casualties, that all of the prisoners were accounted for, and that there had been no sightings of Death Eaters, and then had flooed to the Wizengamot chambers.
It was quiet, which only meant that no one had been notified yet, so Rachel went down to the MLE. It was mostly quiet here as well. Rachel found Amelia's office door open and peered inside to find her sending a Patronus message to Gawain. She knocked on the doorframe when she was finished and Amelia spun, looking slightly harried.
"Did Gawain send for you or Rufus?" she asked.
"Gawain," Rachel said, entering the office and hoping she wasn't getting Gawain into trouble. "It's what I would have wanted, under the circumstances."
Amelia still did not look pleased. "I take it you've actually been on site?"
"I have. No known casualties. I need to tell you about the wards."
"Should Rufus be here for this?"
"It would probably be good for him to hear it, but it can wait if he's not in the Ministry," she said, figuring the information would make it to him in the next few hours regardless.
"He's here. I'll have…" Amelia paused, apparently remembering that none of their clerks were here this early. She cast her Patronus again. "To Rufus Scrimgeour. Could you please join me in my office in the MLE at your earliest convenience for an update on the situation?" Her hawk swooped away with the message.
"Are we calling an emergency Wizengamot meeting?" Rachel checked.
"We'll discuss that in a moment and bring Janice into the conversation once we have a few facts. Please, have a seat," Amelia said, dropping down into the chair behind her desk.
Once again Rachel was grateful that at least some of the fractures in their government had been repaired. She hadn't known it at the time, because she had been busy with school and her own life, but during the war after Professor Dumbledore had lost the Chief Warlock title, there had been times where the new Chief Warlock - Marvin Richards - had declined to hold Wizengamot meetings when the Minister had asked for them. Richards had disappeared at the end of the war; no one knew if he'd been working with the Death Eaters and didn't want to go up on charges or if he had been opposing the Death Eaters and had been killed in the process - his body had never been found.
Nowadays, if Rufus and Amelia said they needed an emergency Wizengamot meeting, Janice was either agreeing or suggesting it herself. Technically Janice was the only one who could call meetings of the Wizengamot or preside over them, but Rufus still had a lot of weight in the room.
Rufus arrived, rapping his knuckles on the doorframe as he entered and then pulled the door closed behind himself. Rachel couldn't help but think he looked greyer than he had a decade ago as well. "I take it we have a report?" he asked as he sat down next to Rachel.
"No known casualties. Healers are treating prisoners who were subject to smoke inhalation. No one spotted the person responsible. Rachel has told me that she needs to tell us about the situation with the wards," Amelia summarized.
Rufus looked at Rachel in alarm. "Surely the wards are not down?"
"The anti-apparition wards and portkey wards on the attacked cell block are up. That was the first thing I checked. When I was there, it looked like the Death Eaters were all accounted for in their cells," she said quickly.
"Warden Matthias indicated that he has done a full roll call and all the prisoners are accounted for and are in their cells," Amelia added.
"I'm sensing a 'but' coming along," Rufus said, looking between the two of them.
"The outer wards were all down, allowing someone to approach the prison to use the explosive directly. Given that this was on the second story, it was not a coincidence where that explosive was used," Rachel said steadily, willing to let them make the connections for themselves.
"The explosive must not have worked as they were intending," Amelia said after they'd all sat with that for a while.
"What about the structural wards? Were they down?" Rufus asked.
"No, just the outer wards. They must have contained some of the explosion. If whoever did this didn't know to look for those wards, that could explain why this didn't work as they'd planned," Rachel suggested.
Amelia shook her head. "No, they have a ward expert. They would have seen those wards. If they wanted to kill the Death Eaters, why not bring down the rest of the wards, apparate in, and take care of the problem personally?"
"And why are they aiming to kill Death Eaters instead of recruiting them? Have any of our undercover operatives been recruited? Have they even been approached?" Rufus asked.
"No, nothing. Whoever is doing this doesn't want to recruit," Amelia said.
Rachel ran over all of this in her mind. "Could this have been a fake attack? Maybe they were watching to see what our reactions were? How fast we brought in Healers. How much time before the aurors arrived. How long they might have before we notice someone is missing."
"I've never known the Death Eaters to do such a thing, but I think we have to say that they are too skilled for this not to have been deliberately to gain something, even if we don't know what that is just yet. I want to know more about the explosive. If they bought it somewhere, that will tell us something. If they can make it themselves, or if it was a spell, that tells us something too. I want a full ward check done on the prison to make sure they didn't tamper with any other wards and we're just focused on the obvious ones," Rufus said.
Amelia was taking notes. "I'll make sure it's taken care of. Are we calling a Wizengamot meeting?"
"I think we'd better. We can use this. The prison was too difficult for the attackers to assail, all prisoners are uninjured and are accounted for, aurors were on scene immediately. This was a sign that our preparations are working. That's our message. I'll bring in Janice. Anything else for me right now?" Rufus asked.
"No. I'll coordinate with Gawain. It's going to take a few days for a full reporting of the wards, even for an expert. I'll see who I can dig up from the Unspeakables who is an expert on explosives," Amelia said.
"Cyril is working in explosive potions. If it was a potion, he can probably tell you more. You'll want someone else if it was a spell," Rachel suggested.
Amelia nodded, her quill moving again.
"We'll leave you to it," Rufus said, motioning for Rachel to go with him.
Rachel followed him out of the MLE and into the hallway.
"I'm not sure I'm comfortable with you showing up after Death Eater attacks," Rufus said as they walked. "I asked Amelia and Gawain not to send Draco. We can't afford to lose either of you."
She hesitated as she reached for an appropriate response. "I don't usually, but the prison is my responsibility. I'm responsible for those people there and I needed to help in any way that I could."
Rufus nodded. "I understand why you feel that way, but Gawain had the situation under control."
"I'm sure he did. I don't doubt Gawain's abilities in the slightest. But they needed someone to take a look at the wards, and I happened to be there to do it. I'm thinking I'm going to take an independent study on wards in the near future, so I can do more than assess them."
"I imagine you will fit that somewhere in your copious free time," Rufus said, raising an eyebrow at her. "My point stands. What if the Death Eater had been waiting to see who would show up? They could have killed you with a single spell to the back before anyone had time to react."
"That could happen anywhere I go," she pointed out.
Rufus came to a stop, looking pained. "I don't suppose I can get you to accept an auror guard?"
"You can't. I'm not a child anymore and I'm more powerful than any of our aurors."
"Power isn't everything."
"It's not. But I'm skilled too. I was an auror. I'm trained in combat. I'm trained in elemental magic. No one can defend me as well as I can defend myself." She didn't see why people had such difficulty in believing that.
Rufus sighed. "I know you're capable, but you are also important. More than me, more than Amelia, you are a symbol to this nation and we cannot lose you. If you need to go to a site of a Death Eater attack for whatever reason, wait until it has been fully cleared. Alright?"
"Alright," she agreed, though she didn't really think it was going to be a problem. She wasn't an auror any longer and responding to attacks did not fall into her job description.
"Good. I'm going to get Janice so that we can start the process for the emergency Wizengamot meeting. You have your faction in hand?" he checked.
"I'll take care of them," she promised.
"Good. Watch your back," he said before moving away.
Rachel went back into the Wizengamot chambers and then into her office where she sat down with a sigh of her own.
"It is very early, if I'm not mistaken," Monty said, waking in his portrait.
"It is," she agreed.
"Did something happen, dear?"
"Attack on the prison. No casualties, thankfully, but it seems like it's only because whoever did the attack didn't want casualties." She was still trying to wrap her head around what the purpose of all of this was. "Do I look weak to you? Do I look like I need protection?"
"No, you don't look weak. You look young and perhaps petite. You are actually very similar in appearance to my aunt Darlene. She was also slender and petite, and people typically mistook her for a few decades younger than she was, which she enjoyed greatly," Monty said.
Rachel didn't enjoy it now, but it might be an advantage to her when she was in her fifties and sixties.
"Why do you ask such questions?"
"Rufus didn't want me out at the prison after the attack. I got the feeling that Amelia didn't approve either."
"Well, I can hardly blame him for that. You are a Wizengamot member, not an auror. Do you think the Minister or even Amelia would put themselves in such a position?" he asked. "You are too important to be running around exposing yourself to Death Eaters."
"People didn't seem to have that objection ten years ago when I signed up to capture the Death Eaters," she pointed out.
"And I don't know what they were thinking then, and that was before you became such a prominent voice in our government. People rely on you. It's not about strength or weakness, it is about being sensible and not placing yourself in unnecessary danger," Monty said. "You are a prime target for assassination; it would destabilize the nation and that is exactly what some of these people want."
Rachel exhaled. "Sometimes I don't like who I'm expected to be very much." She wondered if Professor Dumbledore ever found himself feeling this way, if he ever regretted defeating Grindelwald.
"I know. And at the end of the day it is your life and you must decide how you are going to live it. I and all the people who love you would strongly prefer if you were as safe as possible," Monty said.
She couldn't exactly argue with that. "I just want people to see me for who I am, and not who they think I am."
"I think everyone in this world has that problem to some extent, though I understand why you would feel that particularly keenly."
She sighed and stood. "I've got to start calling people in. We have an emergency Wizengamot meeting and I want everyone to know what they're walking into." She could give her faction the basic information and she'd let Amelia decide how much of the situation with the wards they were sharing with the nation at large. She raised her hand, ready to cast her Patronus, and settled into her task.
Two days later found Rachel back in the Department of Mysteries. The Wizengamot had met and various people spoke on the Death Eater threat and Amelia and Rufus had reassured everyone that the situation was under control and that they weren't anticipating wide scale attacks on infrastructure. Rachel was less certain about that. To her, the Death Eaters' actions weren't making any sense, so it seemed impossible to predict what they might do next.
She was wandering the Department today and found her thoughts otherwise occupied. The Department was heavily present in her mind, and Rachel wished she could find a way to communicate with her, or at least know if the Department was reading her thoughts. In a way, it was kind of the same question as with the Death Eaters: what did the Department want?
From her explorations, she'd found there were usually at least a few other people in the Department at the same time as she was. Could the Department be monitoring all of them at the same time? What sort of entity could take in that sort of information? What was she gaining by it? For that matter, how did the Department get here in the first place and what was she? They knew how Hogwarts was formed - sort of. The Founders had put their magic into the castle, bringing it to life to help care for the students. How such a thing could be done and what was involved had been lost to time. Over the centuries, Hogwarts had gained more and more presence as the castle was added to and a lot of magic was performed there.
It stood to reason that a lot of magic had been performed at the Ministry over the centuries, but the rest of the Ministry wasn't sentient or sapient. It all seemed concentrated here in the Department. And, actually, Rachel hadn't seen anyone casting magic inside the Department at all.
She opened another door, not bothering to chide the Department that she wanted to go to the Morsius Pensieve - because she didn't - and she entered a room she didn't immediately recognize. Rachel pulled out her log book, which she'd begun to keep with her, and prepared to make a new entry. If she was going to study the Department, she might as well actually study it and that meant keeping research notes. She'd been keeping track of which rooms led to which and writing descriptions and drawing rough pictures of the rooms she found. This research was undoubtedly duplicated many times in the Archives, but she'd been told it was possible to make something of a personal map of the Department and she figured that was her first step for navigating it successfully and without spending hours of her time lost.
There were a few vacant desks, but the main feature of the room was an enormous cylinder glass tank that could easily serve as a swimming pool. It was filled with a green translucent fluid. Rachel bent over one of the desks for a moment, pulled out a quill and prepared to make a new entry on her list of rooms. She was up to thirty five now. She paused as she realized she didn't know what to call the room, because there were other rooms with tanks in them, so 'Tank Room' was hardly descriptive.
Deciding her next step was to see what was in the tank, Rachel stepped closer, noticing what looked like very oddly shaped white fish moving around inside. Then she moved closer for a better look. She shrieked and stumbled back a few steps, both of her hands raised to cast. Inside her mind she felt the presence of the Department shift suddenly, pressing against her.
Rachel could feel her heart pounding in her chest and thought that was quite silly. There was no threat here. It took her a moment to convince herself of that well enough that she lowered her hands. She shook her head. Go out to the site of a Death Eater attack and wander through a prison when there may be escaped prisoners and it was like a walk in a park. Encounter a tank full of brains and she apparently freaked out.
Almost unwillingly, she stepped closer again and had a good look. She'd never seen a human brain, nor did she wish to, but from what little she knew she thought they generally had the right size and shape to be human. And they seemed…alive? They were swimming around at least. It took her looking closer to see how they were propelling themselves. The brains had thin, nearly invisible tendrils coming from where she thought the brain stem was supposed to be. Maybe not human then, though she wasn't sure how that was better. She didn't see how someone's living brain could possibly be ethically harvested.
She went back to the desk and opened her log again, pausing over the room list. Finally she wrote down 'The Think Tank' because brain vat sounded silly, and flipped to a new page to sketch and describe the room. At some point she was going to ask Patrick if she could bring her camera into the Department for better documentation, because her art was not very good. She estimated there were maybe fifteen to twenty brains in the tank, though it was difficult to tell because they kept moving around.
When she was finished she put her log book and quill back into her pocket and then went around the room and through the door on the other side. This brought her to the bone room, which she was okay with. She was much more comfortable with bones than she was brains. She didn't think anyone was going around killing people or creatures for their bones. Or, at least, she hoped not. Maybe she needed to have a conversation with Patrick or Liesel about how things were sourced for the Department and maybe that would put her mind at ease a little bit. On the other hand, she might learn things that she didn't really want to know.
The next room was the Morsius Pensieve and Rachel sighed and prepared herself to go back into Tom's memories. Tom had now finished at Hogwarts and was working for Borgin and Burkes. She had also seen him using wandless magic for the first time in the last memory she'd seen of him. He was using mild compulsion charms on people, either to get them to sell their artifacts for lower prices or to buy something that the shop was selling. It was hard to notice, if you weren't familiar with wandless magic, but she'd seen the way he'd worked his movements into seemingly harmless gestures.
"Nothing too gruesome today, please," she told the Morsius Pensieve. She had enough of a startle for one day with the brains.
When Rachel apparated to Severus' house for dinner on Sunday she found him in his armchair with a book and a quill, his quill busily moving as he worked.
Rachel went to the sofa and waited for him to finish his thought. She knew better than to interrupt a researcher at work.
About five minutes later he set aside his book and looked at her. "How are you?"
"Not bad. You? Looks like you're working on something important," she asked.
"Theorizing on the effect delaying modifications still. This project may be even bigger than I realized, but that is fine."
Rachel nodded. She knew very well what it was like to start with a simple goal and have that spiral out into a project that spanned years. "That's exciting. I'm looking forward to seeing what you come up with."
"If you want to work on this project, I would not mind having another potioneer join me, though I know you already have research of your own to take care of," he offered.
"I'd love to work on something with you, but I honestly don't know where I'd fit it in my schedule at the moment." Her mornings were in the Department, her afternoons and early evenings were in the Wizengamot, and after dinner were all the other odds and ends and projects that she needed to fit in somewhere.
"I understand. How is the Wizengamot these days? The newspaper seemed to think that they didn't do much to address the situation at the prison."
She sighed. "There wasn't really that much to address and there was plenty left out of that report."
"I had figured as much. I presume the problem was not that the Death Eaters couldn't have gotten through the wards?" he checked.
"They could have walked right in without bothering with the explosives if they'd wanted to. Whoever this is isn't stymied by wards at all."
"There are not many people in the world with that ability, but I presume the MLE knows that too."
"We know. Hell if we know the point of that attack though. They could have easily released the Death Eaters, which is something we are consulting with ward experts about to try and prevent that from happening. Or they could have killed the Death Eaters if they'd wanted to, which the explosive points at, but it's clear from the way things were done that wasn't their goal either. As far as the MLE can tell, they're not recruiting at all," she explained.
Severus frowned as he seemed to consider this. "It sounds to me like they're using the name of the Death Eaters to distract people from their true intentions. Nothing would rattle the nation more than Death Eater attacks. Even a series of murders would not get this attention without the Dark Mark being cast."
"But what do they gain by all of this?" she pressed. "This doesn't seem to be a path to gaining political power. If they wanted another war they'd be recruiting and they would have freed the imprisoned Death Eaters."
"They wouldn't act without some purpose in mind, and it is clear they are too rational to simply be insane. Perhaps they want the unrest for another purpose that we have yet to see," he suggested.
Rachel shook her head, though she wasn't disagreeing. She just didn't understand what motivated people like that. "If they wanted unrest they should have dropped the anti-apparition wards on the prison and let them all escape. They certainly had the opportunity to do so."
"That would ultimately take the attention away from them. The nation would begin to focus on the recapture of the prisoners, not the person who freed them. Maybe they don't want the competition."
"Maybe. Honestly, I'm not sure how we're ever going to catch them. They're never there when the MLE shows up." She'd been worrying about that for a while now.
"They need a lure. If they knew what would draw them, they could set up a target and wait for them to attack. Unfortunately that lure would probably be a family with a muggleborn, and I don't think the MLE is willing to do such a thing." Severus shook his head.
Considering they'd been killing families with children, Rachel didn't think it was right to set up a lure in such a way either. It had been easier when they'd known the Dark Lord would eventually come for her. "I keep hoping that more attacks will give us more information, but instead they just make it more confusing."
"The attacks are giving you more information. It's putting together the pieces that is the difficult part. I'm sure Amelia has her best minds on it. Are you ready for dinner?" he asked.
"Yeah, I could eat." Rachel stood as Severus did and they went into the kitchen. "How's the Guild these days?"
"Same as it usually is. I might not take another apprentice after Andrea, not for a while at least," Severus said, leaning down to check inside the oven.
"She's that bad?"
"She's unique, that is for certain," he said, retrieving the small ham in its pan. "And I would prefer a somewhat more distant relationship with the Guild myself, though I half suspect they are nominating me for the Innovation Award to draw me closer."
Rachel had the same suspicion about herself when she'd received the award three years ago. "You more than deserved the nomination. And the Guild can sort itself out."
"Thank you," he said, handing her a plate. "I suspect the day that the Potions Guild sorts itself out will be the same day the Wizengamot does."
"Never," she agreed with a sigh. "Sometimes hermit life sounds appealing."
"Sometimes it does. Let's have dinner. Tell me about your research."
Rachel served herself, ready to tell him what she'd been doing with the few hours she'd managed to spend on her sleeping potion project this week.
Both Theo and Hermione were in the sitting room when Rachel came home on Monday evening. "Is everything alright?" Rachel checked.
"Just fine. I wanted to stop by and chat," Hermione said.
"I'll be down in a moment, I just need to change," Rachel said, now that she knew there wasn't an urgent problem. She went into her office and dropped off her work that she'd planned to return to after eating dinner, and then went upstairs and changed into a pair of trousers, a blouse, and a casual robe that hung open at the front.
Dingbat meowed plaintively, so Rachel picked her up and carried her back downstairs. "I think you've already been fed; it's after six," she told her as she walked, getting a meow in response.
"Ah, look who you have. How is she doing?" Hermione asked, peering at Dingbat as Rachel came back into the sitting room.
"Oh, she's her usual self," Rachel said as she sat down next to Theo on the sofa.
"By which she means Dingbat doesn't know up from down, most days," Theo said with a smile.
"She does," she said, petting Dingbat and feeling obligated to defend her. "She does just fine."
Hermione laughed. "I'm sure she does. She gets along alright with Feverfew still? I've been considering getting a younger cat to keep Crookshanks company as he ages, but the idea of traveling with two cats is a bit much."
"I think you're crazy to do it with one," Theo said, resting his hand on Rachel's forearm.
"There is that," Hermione said, not quite disagreeing. "How has your shoulder been, Rachel?"
"Good. Still extending my range of movement. I'll be seeing the Healer again in two weeks and hopefully he'll clear me to be back on a broomstick."
"Don't rush it. You want everything back in place before you stress it again," she warned.
"I won't rush it. I've been very good. I stayed in the sling the whole time I was supposed to and I do the prescribed exercises and I haven't been on a broom for months," Rachel said, feeling that she had done everything she was supposed to have done, therefore her shoulder should cooperate and be better. "It is feeling better. Everything feels in the right place. I can put pressure on it. I can even lay flat on my back now without any pain."
"I'm glad. Just be gentle with it. It takes a good six months for everything to integrate properly after that kind of work," Hermione said.
"I'll keep an eye on her," Theo promised, only smiling when Rachel nudged him with her knee. She didn't need anyone to keep an eye on her.
"That being said, I do have good news. Not perfect news, but good news," Hermione said.
"I would love to hear some good news," Rachel said. After the past few weeks - or months really - she would be happy to hear any good news at all.
"I helped Celeste Zabini. I just finished with her yesterday," Hermione said, flushing slightly.
"Hermione, that's wonderful," Rachel said.
"Yes, congratulations. How did you do it?" Theo asked.
"Well, unfortunately, I didn't break the curse. I wanted to, but so far I haven't found any way at all of breaking blood curses," she admitted.
"I don't know that there is such a thing. That's part of the point of blood curses, they can't be broken," Theo pointed out.
"That's the idea, but I have to stay open to the idea that it's a possibility. But what I have learned is that the effects of the blood curse can be mitigated, at least somewhat. I haven't found a way to stop it from being passed on yet either, but it's on my list of things to do. Blaise told me that he wasn't planning on having biological children, even though the curse has never manifested in him. I can't say I blame him, though I wish I could improve the situation for him," Hermione said.
"I think it's amazing that you're doing what you are doing already," Rachel said. "What about Celeste? How did you help her?"
"I interrupted the magic that was making her husband sick. Now he won't die - not from the curse at any rate - and she doesn't have to be widowed and marry yet again. It's far from the perfect solution, but it's the only one I've been able to come up with."
Theo shook his head. "That's probably the best solution possible and it will certainly give both of them some peace of mind. I imagine it will be a relief for Blaise as well, even if things aren't perfect."
"I really hope so. I will keep trying. I'm going to publish a case study about disrupting the effects of blood curses, because maybe it will help other curse specialists as well, but I'm not going to stop trying to break the curses themselves," Hermione said with a nod.
"If anyone could do it, it would be you," Rachel said, fully meaning it. Hermione was a force to be reckoned with once she put her considerable knowledge and attention to a problem.
"I don't suppose I can ask you about the Death Eaters? That article in the Daily Prophet wasn't exactly helpful," she asked.
"Neither Rufus nor Amelia were very happy about that article. I'm certain Rufus sent some poor clerk down there to have words with the editor." Rachel hadn't been very happy about the article either. People needed to be confident that the Wizengamot was acting in their best interests and that the MLE had the situation under control.
"Poor clerk. Can't be easy running messages from the Minister," Theo said.
"Not a job I'd want at any rate," Hermione agreed.
"Me neither. But the short answer is we still don't have any good information about the Death Eaters. We still don't even know how many we're looking at, what their goals are, or much of anything really. It's all currently speculation, though we are trying," she said, feeling the need to say that they were trying just about anything they could think of to do.
"I've been thinking about that as well, actually," Hermione said. "What if this is just one person? Or a handful of people working together? That would be much easier to hide than reforming the Death Eaters would be. Isolated attacks. In and out before the MLE can respond. They're clearly highly skilled. Why have a large group when they can accomplish their goals without the additional risk?"
"It makes a certain amount of sense, but they're not being very clear about their goals. Attacking muggleborns and their families is on brand for Death Eaters. Killing Emmaline and her family is too, though the question still remains of why her and not someone else in the Order or the MLE. Attacking the prison is odd," Theo said.
"Is it true that they attacked the section of the prison where the Death Eaters are being kept?" Hermione asked.
"That's true. And with their skills with wards, they could have easily set the Death Eaters free, or killed them, if that's what they had wished to do. Instead all of the Death Eaters were accounted for in their cells and were no worse for wear apart from some smoke inhalation," Rachel said, hoping Hermione could make more sense of it than she could.
"Then the attack on the prison was to accomplish another goal. Maybe they wanted to check how quickly the guards and the MLE would respond. Maybe they accomplished something else while they were there and no one has discovered it yet. Maybe they wanted to see who would show up," Hermione suggested.
"All possibilities we're considering," she said. "For right now though, we don't have much choice but to wait and see what the Death Eaters decide to do next. We've discovered no way of finding them thus far."
"And with that depressing note, would you like to stay for dinner?" Theo asked.
"That would be lovely, thank you," Hermione said. "Let's eat and you can tell me about your research and the Guilds."
Rachel set Dingbat down as they rose to go eat, trying to banish the spectre of the Death Eaters from her mind, at least for the time being.