Book III
State of Fear
Chapter 1
Violent Intent
"III"
August 24, 2007
After finding the cages, Ginny fills with rage. And it simmers in her gut all the way back to London.
She goes right to Botley Road and storms into the Professor's office and—ignoring him completely—she sets about tearing apart everything she can get her hands on.
It isn't really that she blames him for the children or the cages. But she has nowhere else to put her anger and impotence. In that moment, she feels somewhere beyond herself—with the stark realization of someone who's whole worldview has just been turned on its head.
She always walks a fine line between the realities of this world, at least that's how she sees it. But today, she feels pushed closer to death than ever before. There is something horribly morbid about leaving the warehouse and she feels as if something stained her then, irreparable, unerasable. Blue ink splotch covering her chest, sinking beyond her skin into her soul.
That's all to say, she feels all of that and nothing at all as she destroys his office.
And the whole time, he just sits there, passively staring at her while waiting for her anger to burn out.
Magic starts and spits along her skin in vibrant electric sparks filling the room with the smell of ozone.
Finally, she stands panting, anger exhausted, and lets the magical buzz filling her head dissipate. The vining plant on the Professor's windowsill withers as she reins in her magic, a conscious pulling inward, like the drag of smoke up a chimney.
"Finished?" he asks, and she glowers at him. "Care to explain that tantrum?"
And she does.
Afterwards, he sits back in his chair. "Fix it."
"What?"
"The room, Ginevra, fix my goddamn office."
Glowering again she pulls out her wand and with a wave sets everything back in its place, mending the broken tables and chairs, fixing the ruined displays of exotic artefacts and trophies, removing the ink stains from the rare silk carpet set under his desk.
"Now," he continues, sitting forward, "fix this other mess."
"How the fuck–" she starts, loudly.
But he interupts, just as loudly. "I know it is shocking. No one expected this. Not you, nor I, nor the Goblins. But this is what we're dealing with now. So go. And. Fix. It."
For a moment, she wants to clamour about unfairness, but closing her eyes she takes a deep breath.
Right.
How can she fix this? How will she fix it?
Is there a fix?
August 30, 2007
The problem she faces immediately upon trying to stem the shadowy organisation behind the missing children, is that no children appear to be missing. There aren't many reports in the wizarding governments around the world of children gone missing, and the few reports that are all turn into deadends as she follows up with them.
Where then, are the children coming from?
She expands her search to the muggle world, where she has the opposite problem. She's inundated with accounts of missing children. A virtual pile of documents and files and reports she has to sift through.
She starts logically, creating a grid pattern. She can start here, in the UK, and move abroad. She pulls in reports from her Botley Road contacts, then moves on to quick infiltrations into the few governments she has no contact with.
Her apartment in London becomes a war zone of paper, manilla folders, and red string. She calls it her murder board. As in, I will murder whoever is behind all of this godsdamned mess.
How are there this many kids missing from the Muggle world and no one is doing anything about it? She doesn't understand it.
The work goes slowly. But she moves through it steadily, referring each case to the parameters she set out. And it becomes clear: somehow, the Eight have figured out a way to detect magic in muggleborn children before the Magical Governments have been able to. Stealing them away, and hiding them in the protected cages.
Comparing the files with ones of Muggleborns from Ministries worldwide, she begins to create a list. When a Muggleborn fails to appear in a wizarding world, not much happens. In the UK for example, a representative of Hogwarts will reach out to introduce the family to the magical world, the fact that Hogwarts remains a subsidised part of the Ministry allows them fair leeway into managing that. Other countries have different systems, but one thing remains constant– there isn't much care placed to following up with Muggleborns who do not wish to be integrated. In most cases, this leads to obliviation and wards set around the Muggleborn child to limit the magical affectations. If the child is missing, if there's no newly discovered magical child to integrate, then no acknowledgement or file of anything is created to follow up with. A magical child just cleanly and neatly disappears from the system.
She has to marvel at the way the Eight have pulled this off. Hundreds of cases from around the world, from the Americas to Indonesia, any wizarding government she has access to has at least a few Muggleborn children gone missing. And nothing is done about it.
Her anger builds and simmers throughout her research as her list grows and grows.
September 18, 2007
Creating the list of the missing children is only the first step. Now, she has to discover how they're being identified, and how they're disappearing.
This is where the Eight come in, she is sure of it. Somehow the mingling of the magical and the mundane at the top end of their governing bodies has had a slippage, a gap taken advantage of.
She's become particularly skilled at finding these gaps, however, through her research for the goblins. Looking for things that are not, finding an absence rather than a presence is mind-bending work. But it's a puzzle she thrills in.
This time, it's a puzzle she can find meaning in.
Sometimes, when she's feeling maudlin or reflective, she'll wonder if she's gone the right route in her life, if the path she's followed has been good for her or the world.
But now, with this. She is certain. She's here for a reason. If only to stop this injustice. If it's the last thing she ever does, she will see them home safely.
-0-0-
July 8, 2008
It's curious, the way things unfold.
The way time flows.
There's peace in predictability. Serenity in routine.
That's probably why she's always been drawn to runes, to rituals: they have set outcomes. Everytime. No variability. She can trust in the results every single time.
It's taken a long time, but it's finally ready. Years have gone by, and as each month passes by her worry and fright grows, inability clawing at her. But no longer.
July 9, 2008
The world has always felt small. Even when she leaves the wizarding world and ventures out into the large non-magical population the world feels constrained, bound within set parameters. There are expectations and the world naturally sets to fulfil them.
Her jobs have always worked that way too, fitting within her expectations. The agencies need work done, she goes and does the work. The higher the clearance, the more the magical and mundane worlds mix. It all makes sense.
But when she finds the captive children. Nothing makes sense anymore. All of a sudden the boundaries in the world expand, massive, unknown, hazy. All expectations go out the window.
She feels rather lost, the unknowns rising like massive cliffs around her until she's but a small speck at the bottom of a deep crevasse.
But it can't get to her, she won't let it.
She feels violent with her intent.
Sometimes it feels wrong to admit it to herself, but Ginny has always liked violence. Well, maybe 'liked' is the wrong word. She's always appreciated it? Found comfort in its predictability?
Violence sometimes feels like the most right thing in the world. Maybe it's the high tension that builds in her. Or maybe it's just the satisfaction of seeing someone break beneath her.
But no matter what it is, right now, she'll just enjoy watching this man fall apart.
His blood is hot on her hands. And she grins.
The path here hasn't been easy. It isn't even easy now. But she can lose her mind a bit. Let it go. Because this is simple. This is straightforward.
He stands between her and her goals. He has information.
And information she knows how to get.
-0-0-
Earlier… In a small town just west of the Snežnik plateau.
In local myth, it is said that there is a man living in the woods up the mountain. She asks at the small waystation in the foothills. "Take the road out of town", the lady would say. "When the dirt turns to stone, you've gone far enough."
He has a cabin. You can't find it. It's hidden from the world. But on clear nights with a full moon, when the moon reaches its highest point in the sky, a path sometimes appears. A broken jagged thing, stepping between the tight pines.
The locals stay away, one too many children gone missing on a dare, run out at night with their friends, trampling into the forest with the impervious bravado of youth. But then they never come out again.
Whether there is something nefarious or just the child gets lost in the dense wood, who's to say. But the legend perseveres.
Ginny thrives on these local stories. This is the way to find the hidden magics in the world. Muggle myths and folklore hint at secrets of the magical world, secrets wizards keep from one another. But in the folly of magic, they often forget about their mundane counterparts, and the stories leak out into the world, whispered late at night, told in dark corners of the local bar, stories for a fire and a nervous audience.
They're what has helped her find the library, the dwarves, the rope.
The locals have stories, and she knows how to get them.
In the village, they call him 'Gorski,' when they say his name at all. And when they do, they whisper it. She suspects he thrives off of these stories. But he'll just be a man, she's sure of it, nothing more.
The forest smells damp. The moonlight doesn't reach Ginny's path, the upper stretches of pine boughs too heavy and dense, but a small spellight keeps her company as she walks deeper down the track.
An old quonset hut looms heavy in the dark, a lurching monster that starts her heart beating for a moment. Her grip on her wand tightens.
She taps—almost involuntarily—at her the grips of the two handguns strapped around her shoulders. Reassurance in each. A nervous tic.
Witching hour, the woman had said, which left Ginny frustrated. Which witching hour, she'd wanted to know, but the woman hadn't been able to elaborate further. Witching hour, she'd repeated. Firmly.
Ginny sighs, but keeps on.
Inside, the hut is empty, a patch of dirt, damp in one corner from a leaky seam in the roof.
She checks her watch. It's just before midnight. The first chance of a path opens soon. So she will wait sitting here in a corner hidden behind her favorite spells, patient and watching. Her spellight fades leaving a darkness so black that spots form and flicker in front of her eyes.
Water drips to the dirt, soft ticking.
Time passes.
She checks her watch again: 1:03AM. The hour's passed with no change. Sighing, she settles back to wait for another two hours.
There's a meditative state—a wakeful doze—that she finds useful on stakeouts when time moves oddly and boredom can become debilitative.
It's from that stillness that she comes to as an odd cracking light fills the middle of the hut, shearing the inky darkness into two. And out he steps, the man from the mountains.
And she smiles. Finally!
-0-0-
They are always so scornful at first. They think her weak, or incapable.
And that makes her angry. And when Ginny is angry, the world tends to act differently.
In a manner all too familiar, Gorski runs screaming out into the dark night, the quonset hut collapsing behind Ginny as she stalks after him. The roots from ancient beech forest tear apart the building like muddy claws, pulling it down into a moss grave.
He wildly casts spells back towards her, the light from each one throwing the surrounding forest into sharp contrast. They fly into the darkness, missing her by miles.
Ginny's heart pounds angrily in her ears, the air around her pulsing with each beat. She presses her hand to the rune on her arm, and the water elemental comes roaring out of the dirt, leeching the moisture from the ground, a roiling muddy human-like shape rushing towards the fleeing man.
His screams cut off suddenly as the elemental engulfs him, covering his head in water and he thrashes about trying to escape. The demon's watery form froths and bubbles as the man screams.
The air still shakes around Ginny. Taking deep breaths she closes her eyes, calming herself.
At a look from her, the elemental tips the man upside down, dangling him from his feet. One of the demon's hands is still clamped around Gorski's face and he chokes and coughs.
"Enough."
Gorski's spluttering breathing fills the quiet forest, sharp and ragged. The only other noise is the drip drip drip of water onto the stony ground.
Crouching down so her face is level with his, she stares at this man, this Gorski, the myth turned flesh. He's not what she expected. The phrase 'mountain man' evoke a certain image for her. But he looks out of place between the silver pines and shivering beeches. He looks like he would fit in more at a muggle bank than here.
His eyes are clamped shut as he sputters and hacks, trying to clear the water out of his throat.
"You," she says, poking him on the forehead, "have been difficult to find."
He glares at her now, finding bravado in his helpless situation. He whips his wand towards her and starts to croak out a spell, but she reaches out and smacks him across the face, hard. He yelps and drops his wand as his hand involuntarily flies to his face and he stares at her in shock.
"You… you slapped me!" He seems more startled than hurt, but she scoops up his wand from the ground and smacks him again.
And then again.
What can she say? He has a very smackable face.
"Listen to me," she says, as his startled expression turns indignant, "Hey! Listen. You are caught. You cannot escape. And you are going to die. I am going to kill you." His face, flushed and mottled from hanging upside down, turns an unattractive splotchy pink, paling in fear. "This is the end for you, Groski, but it is up to you what type of end you will have. I can draw it out, let my friend here drown you over and over again, let it play with you until it grows bored. I can draw all manners of pain and torture from you with just this." She plucks a small fern out of the ground, its roots moving like and seeking, reaching towards the man's face, leaving small streaks of dirt. Groski flinches, cringing away from the unnatural plant.
"Or, you can answer my questions, and it will all be over. Clean and simple. No fuss. No mess. It's up to you. I'll let you think about it for a few minutes." And with that, she stands and turns, walking away. The water demon froths and bubbles with delight, and the Groski's scream of "Wait–" is cut off as he is once again encased in water.
She lets him choke on it for a while. Counting slowly in her head. Vindictive, maybe, but enjoyable, definitely. Let him come to the realisation of what it is happening.
She turns back, "I know this is a lot to process, Groski, I'm telling you your life is ending, your mind is in direct conflict with that idea. But this is happening. And nothing you do will change it."
"Wait! Wait, wait, wait!" he screams. "I can help! I can hel–" Once again, his shouts are cut off by the water. After a moment, she gestures for the elemental to stop.
"No pleading will change my resolve. No begging will stay my hand."
"No! No! I can help. I have information! I can show you!"
"What could you show me that I couldn't take from you anyway? What could you tell me that would remove the years of red marked on your ledger? What could you possibly have to give me that could erase your crimes?" She is shouting by the end.
He is crying now, tears streaking into his hairline, dripping onto the ground before immediately getting absorbed by the demon holding him.
"I can show you how to find them, I can show you how to find them!" he gasps, between sobs. "The untested ones, the incubators, all of it! I'm the artificer, I know where it all is!"
She pauses at that. Well. Maybe he will actually be helpful after all. Gesturing to the demon she pulls out her wand and as the man collapses to the ground she says, "Petrificus Totalus." She doesn't need him trying to bolt immediately.
He goes rigid. Lying in a muddy clump of tangled limbs.
"You will accompany me back to England. And there, we will dissect your usefulness. Until then… Mutatio Ramus."
AN – Well, I know it's been almost 3 years of no updates, but I'm back bitches.