Father comes home late. Very, very late.
Mr. Crouch stops just inside the front door, pausing in hesitation before he waves his wand and unlaces his boots. The old man's shoulders hunch in exhaustion as he glances around the entrance. Yet, his eyes are hard and bright as he shrugs off his navy topcoat onto the standing coat rack. While Father loosens his tie, he walks past the entrance and through the hall.
Behind him, Bary stands tucked away in a corner. He's wearing his invisibility cloak just as he's supposed to be, just as he's had for years when Father's home. And he walks just as silently as he's always been instructed to as he follows the old man through the rest of the house.
It's past midnight, so Father doesn't call Winky to serve him his goblet of whiskey. Instead, the man treads his way past rooms dimly lit by the lamps. Ignoring when those lamps die down one by one behind him. It's a house elf's job to make sure the master's house is taken care of for the night as she follows along unseen and unheard. Unfortunately, Winky is a bit indisposed at the moment, so it's up to Barty to curl his fingers under his cloak and let his magic snuff out each light that may bother Father.
His magic flows out so much easier than when he levitated Mother's book back onto its shelf, bumping the cover against the others several times before it shakily slipped back into its slot.
As his magic continues to unfurl from him, Barty keeps his curled fingers stiff. He can't let out too much lest Father pick up any unusual pressure to the air. Can't let Father suspect that his son follows behind him with his magic trickling out one hand and the kitchen knife clenched in the other.
The haze tells him to stay put. To stay in this house docile and behaved while obeying his master. But his master isn't the voice in his head, that stifling pleasant presence pushing down on Barty even now.
His Master is outside. Somewhere out there in the world and Barty must obey him.
Barty can do both, he can stay in this house like ordered and follow his Master's wishes. He just has to balance on the knife's edge of each of their demands.
Father never turns around, not even when he passes the firmly shut door of his forgotten son's room. The old man merely treks into his bedroom. Tossing off his tie before sitting on the edge of the fully made bed. Mother's picture rests on the nightstand that Mr. Crouch glances at. A shadow of exhaustion passes through his eyes before he places his wand next to the small frame.
During the years of the war, the younger man that Mr. Crouch was never would have just waved his hand and magically shut his bedroom door. He would have paced through the house, testing the wards as his son shadowed him. Father would have ranted about the fools that let their guards down, the McKinnons who didn't sweep through every boundary of their home and the Prewetts who failed to seal off their floo fireplace.
By the time was done with those rounds, it must have been Mother who helped him get ready for bed, who convinced him to shed his work clothes of the day and to change into the appropriate attire instead of the wrinkled, business wear he now lies down in.
Mr. Crouch probably still left his wand on the nightstand, right within reach for the day someone blasted through the door.
Minutes pass, breaths slow until an old man's awareness dims enough for Barty to reach out. His fingers grasp onto the wood handle of the first wand he's held in forever. The spiral handle is almost too large for his grasp compared to…something slim, loyal, and lost.
When he raises it, the magic within the fir wood growls against his palm, pushing back against his own power as he ponders the old man lying before him. Sleep fails to soften the severeness of Father's face, especially the frown that cuts deep even in slumber. Perhaps he's frowning at himself, his subconscious calling him a fool for forgetting about the Death Eater in his own home.
"Avada Kedavra."