Malfoy Dungeons
The dungeon was dark, the kind of dark that clung like oil, thick and greasy against the skin. A single torch guttered near the iron door.
If anything, Orla preferred her incarceration at the hands of auror. Atleast then she had 3 squre meals a day and a chance to mock her interrogators. Being a guest of her "friends" was far worse.
Orla sat in the filth. Her arms were wrapped around her knees, her lips blue and trembling. She did not speak. Not at first. Her teeth chattered in time with the drip-drip-drip of the distant leak. The cold here was not mere temperature. It was the kind of cold that carved into bone
The door creaked. Abraxas Malfoy did not announce himself. He didn't need to. His cane struck stone thrice, echoing like a gavel. He marched in, looked down at her, and sneered.
"Explain," he snarled.
"Five days," she whispered. "Five days of silence, hunger, darkness... and now you come, Abraxas? Now?"
"You think I didn't want to come?" He snarled in an angry whisper. "The Dark Lord is abroad again — on business that requires every sliver of attention. This was the only window. And I arrive to this."
She shuddered. "The screams... the children..." Her voice broke, a sob bubbling up from deep within her body. "I couldn't bear it. I took skoomah. Just enough to dull the edge. Just... just enough not to hear their cries."
"Enough to ruin everything." He hissed the words like venom. "You think this is some schoolyard tantrum? Your idiocy cost us months of work. That kiss was meant to start a chain. One child. One tragedy. Then fear. Then policy. Then power."
"I tried—"
"You failed," Abraxas cut in. His lip curled, elegant and cruel. "And worse — you failed deliberately. At first, I thought perhaps the Dementor's aura was too much. Perhaps even a hardened snake like you broke under it. I would have appealed for mercy….But now... Now I see. You chose to feel. You pitied them"
Her eyes welled again, pale lips trembling. "They were only children," Orla whispered. "Babies. Barely past their first spellbooks. I heard them weep for their mothers as the Dementor came. I heard their sobs turn into chokes when its breath turned the air to ice. I—"
Abraxas struck her.
The cane cracked across her cheek with a sound like a snapped branch, and she sprawled sideways in the filth, blood on her teeth.
"Children?" Abraxas hissed as he towered over her and struck again. ""Mudbloods, Vinsmere. Filth. Rats. Foul meat that crept through the wards and defiled the sacred halls of Hogwarts with their stench and slop. That is what they are. And yet you wept… pitied… that filth?!"
Orla clutched her face, but he struck again.
"You think your womb aches? Is that it?" His voice was savage now, stripped of poise. "If you hungered for children, we would have found you a man of breeding. A pureblood. Someone to fill your belly a hundred times over. You'd have had babes in silk swaddling, fed by wet-nurses and guarded by thralls. If you were barren…we'd have made you fertile, Orla. Alchemy and art and coin can fix that."
He struck again.
"And when they grew up, they would've lived like Gods amongst men "
She lay broken beneath him, naked and shaking, sobbing with no strength left to raise her voice.
"Instead you sold our vengeance for sentiment. You pissed away power to spare a few brats the kiss. Do you even know who you serve?"
Orla did not lift her head. Her voice was a ragged whisper now, "I do. I do. I beg his forgiveness. I beg the Dark Lord... please. Please, my lord. Spare me. Let me serve again. Let me—"
"Your prayers are in vain and frankly speaking, insulting," Abraxas said.
He made to leave but she grabbed his boots.
"Please," she begged. "Give me poison. Let me die clean."
"Poison?" he repeated. "Do you even know what you're asking for, Orla? Or have you forgotten who we serve? There is no mercy here. No clean deaths. Only lessons. And you, my dear... you are going to teach."
Her eyes widened. "Don't let him—"
But Abraxas was already walking away. He stopped at the threshold, not turning.
"The Dark Lord will make an example of you."
He let the silence linger like a noose.
"And rightly so."
Then the door shut and darkness returned.
The Trial
He stood above them all — pale, tall, hair long as spider silk and white as ash. His face was thin, cruelly carved, beautiful in the way of ancient marble left out in the rain too long. His eyes, red-veined and ancient, gleamed as if reflecting something that wasn't there.
Lord Voldemort.
At his feet knelt Orla Vinsmere, stripped and shackled, her head bowed low, her body covered in welts and dried blood. She no longer wept. Her tears had dried hours ago. She only whimpered now.
The Dark Lord circled her like a hound circles a carcass, each footstep tapping softly on the runes etched into the stone beneath. The silence was thick as oil.
"Behold her," he murmured, voice rich with contempt. "The traitor. The whore. The mother of mercy."
A ripple of cruel laughter passed through the gathered circle. Someone snorted. Another chuckled behind their mask. Voldemort continued, slow and theatrical.
"This is the woman who feared the sound of children screaming. Who, when given the honor of death, offered compassion. She gave them pity. Mudbloods. Rats. Maggots writhing in the garden of our sacred blood."
He crouched, grasped Orla's chin, and lifted her face for all to see.
"This face once passed laws. Spoke like a basilisk. And yet here she is. Bent, broken, a soft little girl playing at power. Shall we call her Orla the Merciful? Or shall we call her what she truly is — a mother without a spine?"
More laughter.
"Look at her!" Voldemort barked. "This is what sentiment breeds. Weakness in womb and will. Her woman's tears soaked the very ground we meant to sanctify with fear."
Then he turned to the gathered circle.
"And I, your Lord, must demand justice. For what is broken must be punished. For what is weak... must be taught. So I ask you now—"
His arms flared wide.
"—what shall be done with this thing?"
The silence cracked like thunder as a voice rang out from the back — sharp, shrill, desperate.
"Death!" cried Walburga Black, her voice rasping from behind a tight obsidian mask. "She spat on your mercy, my Lord! Let her die like the mongrels she loved!"
Walburga roared it again, hoping the dark lord wouldn't lump all women in the organization with Orla.
Then another echoed her: "Death!" A man this time, eager to follow. Then another. A dozen. Then the hall erupted in a low, sycophantic chant, rising like a tide.
"Death. Death. Death."
Voldemort stood still in their midst, smiling faintly as the chorus grew. He did not speak. He only watched Orla — eyes locked on hers — as the chant built, louder and louder, until it echoed like a war drum in the bones of the earth.
But his smile was not kind.
And justice, for him, was never so simple as death.
Punishment
The chapel beneath the Malfoy estate had no altar. Only a slab of obsidian, carved from the veins of a mountain broken long ago. It glistened wetly in the torchlight, stained from generations of rites. The air stank of iron, ash, and rot. A single silver chain creaked from the ceiling, and from it hung
Orla Vinsmere, stripped utterly, her arms limp, her hair matted with blood.
Three robed figures entered in silence.
Not interrogators. Not brutes.
Penitents.
They who challenged all the blapshemies against their God-to-be.
They did not speak to her.
The rite began.
The flail came first. A chant rose as the masked chaplain circled her, intoning ancient syllables. With each verse, the flail struck. Across her shoulders. Across her spine. Across the soft meat beneath her arms.
Each lash drew blood. But each lash also drew a whisper from the walls — as if the stone itself drank her pain and sang for more.
"Repent," the bone-mask hissed.
"I—" Orla sobbed. "I failed. I'm sorry, please—"
The next strike came harder. Across her chest this time, opening skin.
"Do not confess. Repent."
Then came the second chaplain.
He dipped the brand into the coals, lifted it high, and pressed it to the center of her back. Her scream echoed, high and keening, as the flesh bubbled and hissed. The mark burned into her — the Serpent's Sigil. A symbol of sin, now seared into her forever.
"You were given command," the bronze-mask intoned, voice like gravel. "And you chose mercy. You looked into the eyes of filth, and you flinched."
The brand kissed her again, lower this time, beneath her ribs.
"Repent."
"I do!" Orla shrieked. "I swear it—I was weak—I won't be again—"
The third chaplain stepped forward. The book opened with a gust of ash. He began to read.
Verses of filth. Lines of venomous dogma. As he spoke, her blood turned to fire. The spells in the words unmade her from within — turning every memory of comfort into shame, every warm thing into disgust.
"You will repeat the creed," the wood-mask commanded.
Orla shook her head. Her jaw hung loose, her mouth broken from earlier screams.
"You will repeat it."
He placed his palm against her breastbone and whispered a single word.
Her heart stuttered. Then beat. Then stuttered again.
Pain like a blade inside her ribs. Her eyes rolled back.
"The world is rot—" the chaplain began.
"The world is rot," Orla gasped.
"Blood is truth."
"Blood is—truth—"
Eating The Eyes
Voldemort stepped into the ruin of a room.
Orla did not raise her head.
She couldn't. Her arms hung limp, joints swollen, one shoulder grotesquely dislocated. Her hair had been torn from one side, leaving bare, bruised scalp caked in dried pus and blood. Her lips were cracked, black with rot, and the hole where her tongue had once been throbbed with raw agony.
She moaned, low and animal.
"Ah, there she is," Voldemort murmured, stepping around her, his wandlight drifting across her battered face. "The heroine of Hogwarts. The brave girl who wept for vermin."
He crouched before her.
"So quiet now. So obedient."
Another moan. That hole in her mouth quivered with every breath.
He chuckled.
"I heard they took your tongue." He reached out and stroked her cheek with gloved fingers. "How thoughtful. You always did talk too much. All talk, no action. So much so like you contemporaries."
She shivered at his touch.
Then the door slammed shut behind him.
Sealed.
No runes. No key. No escape.
Her breath quickened. She tried to scream, a guttural wet sound deep in her throat. Her body thrashed, but the chains held her fast.
Voldemort smiled.
"You're not afraid of me," he whispered, "You're afraid of what I am becoming."
And then he leaned forward — not to speak, not to threaten — but to sinks his teeth in her flesh.
His mouth opened wide, wider than humanly possible, and he sank his teeth into her shoulder. The flesh tore with a crackle. She screamed, a high choking wail, as he bit again, this time lower, pulling muscle from bone and chewing with slow, deliberate relish.
Orla trembled.
Because as he fed — he changed.
The pallor faded from his skin, and color returned like fresh blood into cloth. His hair darkened, lengthened, thick and lustrous. The deep lines around his eyes smoothed. His eyes — still red, still wrong — gleamed with a terrible brightness.
Before her now stood not the old monster, the ragged revenant who haunted politics.
But him.
The young Lord.
The heir of Slytherin in his prime — tall, cruel, handsome as a blade. No older than thirty
Yog taught that flesh is false, that only what feeds survives. The gods who walked before us did not die — they were devoured. Their prayers were teeth. Their mercy was meat.
"You see now," he said softly, licking blood from his lips. "Your weakness is my wine."
"You poor, soft thing," he murmured. "You wanted to be their mother, didn't you? Is that what this was? Some little fantasy? Saving the children. Cradling the filth. Swaddling your pity like it meant something."
He rose to his full height and turned, robes sweeping behind him.
"You should have just said you wanted to be a mother, Orla. We would've arranged something fitting."
He moved to the altar.
From within a satchel wrought of dragonhide, he drew a cylinder — long, smooth, and pulsing with black runes. It glowed faintly, throbbing with slow, rhythmic light. Inside the glass casing floated a writhing shadow — formless, but alive. It scratched at the walls of its prison with fingers made of thought and hunger.
Orla's eyes widened. She tried to shake her head. The chain held her still.
"Do you know what this is?" Voldemort asked softly. "A shard. Not of me. Not yet. But something... close. A mirror fragment. A sliver of what waits beneath all magic. It dreams in the dark. It wants out."
He stepped forward.
"You wanted to give life, Orla? Now you shall. But not to children. No, no — not to children."
He held the cylinder before her womanhood.
"You will give birth to abominations. To broken truths. To hungry lies. You'll be their cradle. Their grave. Their church."
And then shoved it in without mercy.
Revelations
The dungeon had gone still.
No more rattling chains. No breath from the broken woman on the altar. Just a low, wet sound — a churning.
Within Orla's abdomen, the shadows moved.
The air turned sour.
Voldemort stood before her. He no longer spoke. He watched. The birth would happen soon.
But then it came — a tug. A pulse behind his eyes. A whisper in a voice not his own.
"The eye."
He blinked. The shadows in her belly twisted in time with the beat of his heart.
"Take it."
He turned to her face.
She barely resembled a woman. One side of her face had collapsed under bruises, blood caked along her jaw and brow. Her lips were split. Her nose bent wrong. But her eye, her left, remained intact.
There was something there. Not defiance. Not pity.
Knowledge.
An old tale stirred in his memory — one he'd read in the Black Library beneath Carrow's villa. A god from the old world. Odin, the mad wanderer who gave his eye to drink from Mimir's well. Who bought wisdom with pain, and paid with sight.
But this was no self-sacrifice.
This was theft.
And Voldemort had never begged for wisdom. He took it.
He stepped forward and gripped Orla's jaw, fingers digging into her cheeks. She whimpered, unable to resist. Then he drove his thumb into her socket and simply removed it.
Without a thought, he ate it.
And the world unfolded.
Voldemort hovered amidst it — not flesh now, but spirit disrobed, stripped of sinew and mask, gliding through the pure waves of the ether. Above him, the sky cracked with spirals. Beneath, stars wept molten thought. He could feel the threads of magic themselves — not cast, not channeled, but woven — and he was the loom. The center. The pivot of all turning things.
He felt divine.
The kind of divine that eats gods. The kind that writes new commandments in bone.
But still... there it was.
A tug.
Low. Faint. At his navel, like a line drawn in blood from another place, another self.
He ignored it.
Drifted deeper. Tasted a thousand future murders in the wind. Saw his name scrawled on ruined altars by hands that hadn't yet been born. Felt the abomination still slick and hissing beneath him, whispering his titles into the air.
But the tug returned.
Stronger this time. Not a summons. A warning.
Then came the voice.
Muffled. Shouting. Like someone screaming from behind water. Or across time.
"HE IS COMING!"
Voldemort blinked. The sky above him shimmered. For the first time in ages — in aeons of the soul — he looked down.
What he saw made no sense.
A boy. Standing in blackness. Pale. Thin. His hair flat and dark like his own at sixteen. His face sharp. Angry. Eyes aflame.
He was screaming. Lips pulled back, veins in his throat pulsing. Voldemort couldn't hear the words. Only fragments. Rushing water. A drumbeat behind his ribs.
He tried to turn away—
And felt the jolt.
Like an earthquake, but inside. It cracked through his ribs. Rattled his spine. The vision stuttered. The ether screamed. All the stars above blinked.
The boy screamed louder, fists clenched. The same face. The same face.
And Voldemort understood — this wasn't a child. This wasn't an echo.
This was him. Or a shadow of him. A ghost formed of what he might've been. And it was shouting the same phrase again and again:
"He is coming—he is coming—SAVE—SAVE YOURSELF—"
Then the sound came.
It was a roar — so vast it did not echo, because it had no need to. It did not ring through the ether. It silenced it.
A tiger's roar.
But it did not come from an animal. It came from something else. Something clad in fire, but not the red hunger of nature or the black flames of the abyss — no, this flame was argent. Silver-white. Blinding.
Righteous.
It marched toward him.
Step by step, the knight emerged through the veil. Armor like burnished moonlight, every edge screaming purity. The sword in its grip shimmered like a blade honed on the bones of angels. No helm. No face. Just that white fire where a head should be. The flame knew his name.
Voldemort turned.
But his limbs would not answer.
He had become a god — a god who fed on eyes and blood and truth — but now he could not move. The fire did not chase him. It did not need to. It advanced with the certainty of justice, and that alone unmade him.
Then came the second roar.
And he screamed.
Wrenched from the ether like a fish dragged from the sea, Voldemort crashed back into the mortal world.
The chapel stank of blood and ash.
He collapsed onto all fours, choking. Dark ichor — thick and reeking of burned meat — spewed from his mouth in torrents. It spattered across the stone like boiling tar. He retched again, limbs shaking, hair slicked to his forehead.
Then he screamed.
A scream without magic. Without poise. A human thing — terrified, high and desperate. A scream that should not come from a god.
He looked left.
And saw Orla.
Still chained. Still broken. Still dead.
But her ruined mouth had curled. Smiling.
A chaplain burst in, robes snapping behind him, wand already raised.
"My Lord!"
He rushed forward, horrified.
Voldemort flinched back, eyes wild. He barely recognized the man. The torchlight gleamed on his mask — bronze, carved with serpents. His wand reached out—
And Voldemort struck.
"AVADA KADEVRA!"
The man instantly dropped dead.
Voldemort stood over the corpse, still breathing in gulps, like a man who had almost drowned. Blood dripped from his chin. He stared at the doorway.
Then at the body.
Then — again — at Orla.
She was smiling. Still smiling.
Ollivander's Wand Shop
The bell over the shop belled ringed and Garrick looked up in surprise, "Miss Black?!"
"Master Ollivander," Narcissa cooly greeted and marched upto the counter.
"Its been a while since I have seen one of the Black sisters," Garrick said. "I certainly hope everything is all right with the wand."
"Why wouldn't it?" Narcissa smiled charmingly. "It was created by the legendary Ollivander himself."
She said and slid her wand right over.
"Oh you," Garrick chided her as he took her wand. "I could never say no to Orion just as I can't say no to his granddaughter."
Narcissa bowed her head in gratitude at that.
"Now, what can I do for you young lady?" Garrick said.
"Just polish and general maintenance, Master Ollivander. I have noticed the wood has become rough around the tips," Narcissa said.
"An excellent choice, madame! A witch who regularly has wand maintained would rarely be led astray. My, its been a while since a young mage walked in to have their wand maintained. You on the other hand -" He grandiously gestured towards her. "Are an erudite and most thoughtful of witches."
"You are too kind, Master Ollivander. Now, how long will this take?" Narcissa said as she pushed some galleons towards him.
At that last part Ollivander grumbled as he looked at the clock and sighed sheepishly, "Well its nearly lunch time…."
"I need it now, Master Ollivander," Narcissa said in a voice that brooked no counters. "I have travelled a long way here."
Ollivander mumbled some excuses.
"Surely somebody can else do a simple maintenance?" Narcissa asked. "What about the new apprentice of yours?"
"W-wel oh mY?!" Ollivander grumbled, "You can't possibly expect an apprentice to maintain and polish the wand of the woman to whose grandfather I sold the first wand. A daughter of House Black, no less!"
But Narcissa was already moving. She lifted the barrier and locked an arm around Ollivanders and escorted him to the door.
"I am sure any mage capable enough to enamor you for apprenticeship is more than capable of handling a simple polish job," Narcissa said gently let the old man out the door. "Why don't you go out and enjoy the sunny day? Hekate knows those are rarer than phoenixes on our isle? While you are it, I whole heartedly recommend the roast at 12th street."
"Why yes … of course…." Garrick mumbled.
"Splendid! I shall stand watch and browse your latest" Narcissa beamed as she shut the shop door, menacingly turnign the sign from "Open" to "Closed" – daring Ollivander to argue further. Ollviander swallowed before marching off to satiate an appetite that didn't sem as voracious as did 12 minutes ago.
Fixin' Wands
"Valemont," Narcissa said and tossed her wand at the front of his work desk. "We have business to discus.s"
Harry didn't reply. He was intently staring at a large magnifying glass, which zoomed in on particular spots of the wand in response to Harry's will. Beneath the glass was a broken wand. It had been cleaved neatly at the midpoint, not snapped in anger or in haste, but severed with the same cold deliberation one might show to an execution. A clean break. A message.
"Now … what was the ruling?" Harry mumbled as he idly grabbed at the numerous potions bottle near him. "Auror repair protocol dictates low-resonance adhesives—no core interference, no memory disruption."
"I beg your pardon?" Narcissa said.
Harry still ignored her.
"Ah yes…. Eagle core feather…. Booted Eagle… French made," Harry murmured. "Bartholomew's iron fix solution….."
He snapped his fingers and a flashy purple bottle with a vivid wizard guaranteeing an iron fix to broken items threw itself in his hands. Harry carefully took out a drop and applied it at the broken edges before setting it together. He gently placed it down on the table and activated a lamp that bathed the wand in blue light.
Harry then set aside the magnifying glass and rubbed his eyes. Narcissa deliberately raised her head and looked down at him with all the aristocratic scorn she could muster.
"Are you done, Mr. Valemont?" Narcissa asked, and Harry blinked. "It is considered impolite to keep a lady waiting. Especially one of a noble stature. Are you not even going to offer a seat?"
Harry blinked at her. Slowly.
"Garrick has been running this store for longer than you and I have been alive, Narcissa," Harry said.
"I am still standing," Narcissa said.
"Did you just dog walk the man out of his store for your needs?" Harry asked, and the temperature dropped. To her credit, Narcissa was unmoved and raised an eyebrow at him
"Master," Narcissa said, and Harry was confused.
"What?"
Narcissa stepped forward and placed a thick grimmoire on the workbench. "It's considered poor form to call a craftsman by his given name, especially when he's a century your elder. Especially in his shop."
"Fascinating. I am being lectured on etiquette by a woman who just commandeered an entire shop," Harry said.
"I borrowed it," she said, shrugging ever so slightly. "Commandeering is your people's favorite pastime, is it not?" Her voice was calm, but the words were not. "Though I suppose you'd need to be a Valemont for that to be true."
That made him laugh. A sharp, joyless bark. Narcissa scowled at that.
"Your sort always had the most vulgar manners."
"My sort?" Harry's lip curled slightly. "And what sort is that, Narcissa? The sort that knows how to use their hands, or the sort who don't kneel quickly enough for your liking?"
Her eyes flickered, amused. "Oh, I'm certain you're adept with your hands, Valemont. But finesse is another matter entirely."
"Finesse?" Harry echoed. "You mean the way you stomped in here, tossed your wand onto my table, and started demanding my attention like some bored princess?"
"Better a bored princess than a frustrated stableboy pretending at mastery," Narcissa said.
"Frustrated, is it? Is that your expert opinion?" Harry shot back.
"Expert?" Narcissa purred before chuckling. "No. But it doesn't take an expert to recognize a man who spends his evenings polishing sticks alone."
Harry leaned forward slightly. "I'm never alone, Narcissa. If you wanted a demonstration, you could've just asked. Or better yet, ask your baby sister. I'm sure that'll make for better pajama party gossip than your usual wine-soaked tragedies."
Narcissa's jaw stiffened, a muscle twitching just below her cheek. "Very funny, Valemont," she said through her teeth. "Very funny." Her voice was calm, but the tic betrayed her. "And here I thought your talents were limited to breaking things. Or fixing them with sticky potions and desperation."
"I never thought desperation was something you disapproved of," Harry drily said. "I figured it was your preferred natural state in men."
"Careful, Valemont. That kind of boldness implies familiarity. And believe me—I'd remember if we'd ever been… familiar."
"Maybe that's the problem, Narcissa. Too much memory. Not nearly enough action."
That stopped them both as they realized what their repertoire had led to. Neither moved. The room held its breath with them.
And in the heavy, quiet space that followed, neither one had the wit to speak first.
Narcissa's gaze lingered a moment longer. Then, without another word, she pulled the black grimmoire from the workbench and in front of him.
.
..
"That… was not how I intended this to begin."
Harry said nothing.
"I shouldn't have said what I said," she continued. "Any of it. I'd had a bit of wine before I came. I thought it might… help."
There was a stiffness in her delivery, an awkward clumsiness she seemed to loathe. The mask had slipped, if only by an inch.
"It's all right," he said, voice level. "I was no better. I shouldn't have dragged Tonks into it. That was... cheap."
Narcissa's face colored—not with rage this time, but something far rarer for her: embarrassment. She glanced away and gave a small, involuntary hiccup.
Harry blinked, surprised.
Her expression faltered further. "Merlin's bloody mercy," she muttered under her breath, dabbing at her lip with a gloved finger like the hiccup might be scrubbed away by sheer will.
Harry smiled sympathetically, reaching back into a cupboard and handed her a potion.
Narcissa sniffed it once, recognizing its make before nodding at him once in appreciation and chugging it. The red blush soon faded away and Narcissa felt more stable now.
"Thank you," she said stiffly.
Harry nodded once. "Don't mention it."
He nodded at that. Clapping his hands to get back to work, Harry took Narcissa's wand and immediately began dousing it with a wet, oily sponge. Narcissa fidgeted with her rings before getting back to work.
"I have news… about our … quarry…" Narcissa said.
"You have my undivided attention, Narcissa," Harry said. "Shall I get you anything?"
"Nay, thanks," Narcissa said and opened the thick grimmoire. "I have been researching these so-called horcruxes."
She paused at that word and inadvertently shivered. "You weren't wrong about them being the vilest possible magic. I am no virginal bride, mind you, but the idea of mutilating your own soul…. And for what… a wretched existence that flies on? That's not immortality, that's damnation."
Harry sighed and glanced at her sidelong. "That's one way to look at it," he said. "But our opinion doesn't matter. What matters is how Riddle sees it. To him, mutilating the soul, living as a shade, a half-thing—it's all preferable to the great unknown."
He set the sponge down, slowly. "Genius fears death more than anyone. It's the one thing they can't conquer, can't predict. Every spell, every incantation, every formula they've ever solved—none of it means anything when the silence comes. And Tom Riddle—make no mistake—is a prodigy among prodigies."
"Be that as it may," she said, "the lore is frustratingly vague. Beyond the need for cold-blooded murder, the actual workings of the ritual are shrouded in mystical incoherence."
She snapped the grimmoire shut with a sound like a coffin lid.
"There are a hundred and one rituals in this filthy book," she said, frowning. "Everyone more depraved than the last. Human leather, infant blood, cannibalism, rape layered in chanting. And yet the one we need—the one—is conspicuously absent."
Narcissa grimaced at that.
"It doesn't make sense. Not at all," Narcissa said.
"Oh?" Harry asked.
"Our grimoires are thorough," she said, her voice tightening. "House Black has always been pragmatic! Practical! We catalogue death like bankers tally coin. The existence of this kind of spiritual nonsense—this mystic obfuscation—is the antithesis of our entire tradition."
She looked him dead in the eye. "The book has been tampered with."
"Getting this copy was a pain," she muttered, glancing toward the grimmoire as if resenting the ink on its pages. "It's not from the main library. Merlin knows that's a corpse now, rotting under tradition and stupidity."
Harry nodded at that.
"With Walburga assuming control of the House until dear Regulus comes of age… I assumed she'd go after the gold vaults, the jewelry, maybe some of the old dowries still collecting dust in Rome. She's petty like that. Obsessed with coins and heirlooms."
Narcissa exhaled sharply, a short burst of frustrated air through her nose.
"But no. One of her first acts as Lady Black was to seal off entire sections of the family library. Scroll vaults, ritual annexes, the eastward wing where the bloodstone shelves are kept. All locked down. Even grandfather's keys won't open them anymore."
Harry frowned slightly, thoughtful. "She did that herself?"
Narcissa nodded. "Not the house-elves. Not a decree from Arcturus. Walburga. She even warded the locks. Proper ones. Scripted. Cursed, if rumors's to be believed."
She shook her head. "It's uncharacteristic. I always thought she was more bark than brain. She married Orion for status, not wit. But this? This reeks of foresight."
"Or somebody's guiding her hand," Harry offered, and Narcissa nodded at that.
"Perhaps," Narcissa said, but her voice was distant now, troubled. "But it's the kind of fear that knows something. She went straight to the shelves that matter, Valemont. Not the bloodline charts or etiquette grimoires. The deep stacks. The ones even my mother only visited with permission."
"And now?"
Narcissa gave him a thin, dry smile. "Now? Gaining access is like asking a basilisk for a kiss. Possible, in theory. Just don't expect to survive the attempt."
Harry let the silence linger a beat longer before speaking.
"Even so, you have my thanks. Smuggling this out wasn't simple, I imagine."
Narcissa rolled her eyes but didn't protest.
Harry continued, "Even without the ritual, the spells inside will familiarize us with much of what the Death Eaters are likely to use. Tracking glyphs, branded oaths, blood-sculpting—this is their language."
"Dark magic," she said with a snort, "is more than their language. It's their lullaby."
Still, she inclined her head in a ghost of acknowledgment. "You're welcome, I suppose."
Harry glanced at her sidelong. "Now… about the other matter."
Narcissa stiffened, the corners of her mouth tightening. "What other matter?"
Harry's fingers tapped the edge of the bench. "Myrtle Warren."
A pause. She stared at him, unimpressed. "You're serious."
Harry waited.
"What possible connection," she said slowly, each word clipped, "could Myrtle Warren have to our quarry?"
Rita the Curious
Rita's first letter was written in peacock ink, scented faintly with lavender oil and dusted in just enough shimmer to dazzle the eyes but not the mind. She had worked on the phrasing for two hours.
Dear Professor Slughorn,
I write on behalf of the Hogwarts Gazette to cordially request an interview—
The second letter was snarkier. The third had teeth.
By the seventh, she stopped bothering with pleasantries and wrote simply, "It would be a terrible shame for your name to be left out of our prestigious Professor Profiles."
There was no reply.
So Rita Skeeter marched to the fat man's door herself.
He answered the door in a dressing gown lined with manticore fur and smelled like poached pears.
"Professor Slughorn?" she chirped.
He blinked. "Miss…?"
"Rita Skeeter," she beamed. "Senior columnist for the Hogwarts Gazette."
He frowned. "I haven't the faintest idea what that is."
"It's a very respected student—"
He was already closing the door.
"—publication."
Click.
Rita stared at the shut door, nostrils flaring.
"Fat bastard," she muttered. The dictaquill scribbled it down.
She came back that evening. And the next. She got nothing. No letters. No owl. Not even a howler telling her to bugger off.
So she stopped waiting for the door.
And took the air.
It was not easy, transforming mid-flight. Her Animagus form was new, and still nauseating. The wings worked, yes, but the eyes were so many, and the scent of dust and wax made her retch every time she passed over parchment. Still, she crept through his shutters like a sigh and perched on the cornice above his fireplace.
At first, Slughorn was disappointingly dull.
He read old wine catalogs. Wrote letters to everybody famous. Talked to portraits of long-dead Slughorns who didn't even like him. He sighed. Ate soft cheeses. Took naps in dragonbone slippers.
She thought he was just a vain windbag with a belly full of lies and no actual secrets.
Until the third night.
It was well past midnight when he stirred — suddenly, sharply, with a tremor of purpose. He shuffled to the far wall of his parlor, muttering to himself, and tapped thrice on the baseboard beneath the old case of first-edition potion guides.
It wasn't the wall that opened. It was the bookcase.
The whole thing folded inward like a stage curtain, revealing a narrow spiral stair made of blackstone. Green light seeped up from below.
Rita's wings twitched.
Slughorn hesitated at the top step. His eyes darted once behind him.
She froze.
He muttered, then descended — robes trailing behind him like shed skin.
Rita fluttered down after him, heart pounding. She caught a glimpse of bubbling cauldrons. Runed jars. A silver rack of what looked like spines.
Whatever Slughorn was doing beneath his cottage, it wasn't legal.
She landed on a shelf above the door and watched as he began humming, lighting sconces with bluebell fire.
Then he unstoppered a vial.
The smell hit her like a punch.
She dry-heaved — a moth trembling on the beam — barely holding her shape.
It was human. There was something human in that vial.
Below, Slughorn chuckled to himself, muttering some half-remembered recipe and adjusting the flame beneath a thick pewter cauldron. The liquid within swirled in slow, syrupy spirals, its hue shifting with every breath of the fire — gold, then amber, then a molten, molten white.
Rita's many-faceted eyes twitched.
That color.
She knew that color.
She'd seen it once — when a Gryffindor girl in sixth year had won a thimbleful of it during an inter-House brewing competition. The entire dormitory had buzzed for weeks. That girl had aced every exam that term, kissed the boy she'd pined for, and won three galleons on a bet she'd never meant to place.
Felix Felicis.
Liquid luck.
But this… this wasn't a school prize. This wasn't a sanctioned dose.
There was a human down there, in a pot, having something drained from her.
Below, Slughorn began to sing softly to himself as he stirred the brew, voice deep and content.
"Oh I brewed for a lord and a lady both, and I never charged a coin…"
The notes floated upward, warm and syrupy, like his wine-soaked breath. Rita remained frozen, her wings pressed tight against her sides. She had a dozen eyes and not one dared blink.
Something was wrong.
She felt it — not in her chest, but in her gut. A subtle shift in the way the steam curled, the faintest pulse of defensive enchantment on the doorframe. Her Animagus form was sensitive to these things. The magic here wasn't meant to keep people out.
It was designed to trap.
And for the first time since she'd taken the form of a moth, Rita felt something like a heartbeat in the walls — wards coming alive, threads of perception woven into the stone.
She had overstayed.
Rita's instincts flared. She fluttered off the rafter, silent and skimming low past the boiling cauldron, nearly gagging on the reek of distilled root, powdered asphodel, and sweat-soaked old robes. The air was syrupy. It clung to her wings.
No way back the way she came.
Her eyes darted—
There.
A rusted vent tucked behind a cabinet of corked vials, the grille askew, its inside dark and crooked. A spill of soot coated the floor beneath it, and from within came a reek — rot and grease and whatever potion ingredients Horace discarded when no one was watching.
Rita dove.
Blood Magic
The room was black as the void between stars.
Only a single torch flickered in the wall sconce. Harry knelt at the center of the ritual circle. Its lines had been etched in silver and sealed in blood, glistening faintly beneath him. Narcissa stood across him.
"Focus," she said. "Breathe shallow. Let the blood settle before you spill it. If we are to reach the shore of souls, your will must cut cleaner than your wand."
Harry's jaw was tight.
"We could move faster," Narcissa murmured, eyes glinting beneath the shadow of her hood. "If we had a vessel. A sacrifice. A living heart from which to—"
"No." Harry's voice cracked like a whip.
She paused.
Harry's breath steamed in the air. "We're not tyrants. I'm not building a throne from corpses like the god-king mages of Ys or the red libraries of Babylon. I don't keep a blood harem."
Narcissa arched an eyebrow. "How quaint."
"I'll give my own."
He drew the blade.
It was silver. Simple. An Auror's tool, not a ritual dagger — but the edge was keen. He pressed it against the inside of his forearm and dragged.
The cut flared open, and the blood poured thick and hot into the center of the circle. For a moment, nothing.
Then it hit.
A flare. The air shivered. The flame recoiled. The runes etched into the marble drank the blood, silver turning crimson as the magic stirred like a beast beneath the floor.
Harry gasped — power shuddering through his chest like a heartbeat not his own.
Narcissa stepped forward. Her fingers moved in a dance of invocation, trailing thin threads of blue flame into the pool.
"Now," she whispered. "Call her."
Harry closed his eyes.
The power circled him like a cold wind. He reached through it, past the veil of flesh, past the old protections that swaddled Hogwarts in silence, past the dark, and into the gray. His voice was a murmur, trembling with strain.
"Myrtle Warren," he said. "Myrtle. Cruelly murdered. Basilisk eyes. Come to me!"
Nothing.
Only silence. And the pounding of his blood in his ears.
He tried again, stronger. "You were taken. Your soul was lost. I call you — I plead for you — show yourself!"
Still nothing.
Narcissa frowned. Sweat beaded on her brow.
She stepped into the circle, placing her palm against Harry's bleeding arm. Her own cut opened with a whispered Ferrum. Their blood mixed.
Together, they spoke.
"Myrtle Warren. We call. We demand. Come forth."
Still. Nothing.
No shimmer of ghostlight. No whisper of cold air. No echo.
Just darkness.
The spell wavered. The flame guttered low. And the magic unraveled.
Harry slumped forward, breath heaving, arms trembling.
Narcissa staggered to the side, pale as wax.
A pop broke the silence.
A young female house elf appeared beside them. She carried two tall goblets of orange juice, which she offered with trembling hands. Another elf followed, wrapping a length of clean linen around Harry's arm with silent, fussy care.
"That shouldn't have failed," Narcissa muttered. "Not with the anchor. Not with that level of blood-forcing."
Harry nodded slowly. "The ritual was sound."
They stared at one another across the cooling circle, bruised by silence.
Narcissa narrowed her eyes. "There's only one reason a summoning like that would fail."
Harry swallowed. "She's not dead."
The torch flickered once.
And the room felt colder.
Revelations
Rita stood in the center, shivering.
She opened her mouth. "I—"
Harry raised a hand. "Talk."
She flinched.
Then swallowed.
"I… I saw Slughorn. Brewing Felix Felicis. Not just one batch. Barrels. Six vats at least. And… and he had a memory jar with a screaming face in it. I think it was still alive. There were bones in the sink. I didn't stay long."
She dared to glance at them. "I'm not going back. I swear. I won't write it, I won't breathe it. I didn't think he— I just wanted a story—"
Her voice cracked.
Narcissa said nothing. Her face was unreadable. But Harry… Harry watched her as if she were a knife deciding which way to fall.
She wrung her hands, breath quickening. "I just thought it'd be funny, alright? Sluggie with a scandal. Not— not that."
A silence.
Then Harry stepped forward, eyes sharp and cold. "That's not everything."
Rita shook her head quickly, lips trembling. "I told you, I—I said—"
"You saw something," Harry said, voice low now, coiled. "Something worse."
She blinked rapidly, trying to breathe, but nothing came out.
Harry didn't wait.
His eyes locked onto hers.
"Legilimens."
It was neither gentle nor surgical. He smashed like a minotaur against a brick wall.
Flashes — glass. Steam. That smell again. A flickering wandlight against tiled walls. Then—
A tub.
Myrtle. Her body floating, limp and pale, head tilted back. A gas mask affixed to her face with silver bands, tubing wrapped around her throat like ivy. Her hair was spread in the water like ink in milk.
Rita had watched from the shadows. Had stared, frozen, wings twitching.
Harry pulled out like a man scalded.
Rita gasped. Blood streamed from her nose, and she staggered back, eyes wide and wild.
He caught her by the arm. "Why is she there?"
Rita sobbed. "I—I don't know—I didn't—please—"
"Why the mask?" he snapped. "What is he doing to her?"
"I don't know! I swear I don't know—"
"Tell me—"
"Harry." Narcissa's voice, sharp as a wand-tip.
He turned.
She was already kneeling by Rita, her wand moving with soft precision. A trace of green shimmered in the air as she touched the girl's temple and sealed the breach. The blood slowed. Rita trembled.
Narcissa looked up at Harry. "That's enough."
"She saw Myrtle—"
"She's also seventeen," Narcissa said coolly. "And not a soldier. Not yours."
Rita's breath was still ragged, but her eyes had stopped darting. Narcissa reached into her cloak and withdrew the velvet pouch again. The same soft clink of coin.
She pressed it into Rita's palm.
"For your silence," Narcissa said, brushing a strand of hair from the girl's damp forehead. "And your courage."
"I don't want it," Rita whispered.
"Of course not, dear. But you still need it," Narcissa said.
Narcissa stood, fluid and calm.
"And we will talk again. Soon."
Rita turned and fled, one hand over her nose, the other clutching the bag of gold.
The door closed behind her.
Harry exhaled.
"She's lying," he said.
"She's terrified," Narcissa replied. "That's close enough."
.
..
"She's lying," Harry said again, quieter now, but no less bitter.
"She's afraid," Narcissa corrected, wiping Rita's blood from her fingertips with a silk kerchief. "Which is more than you allowed for."
Harry turned sharply. "You think I was too harsh?"
"I think," Narcissa said, voice smooth as silk stretched over glass, "that for someone who wields rhetoric like a duelist's blade, you butchered your delivery today. I've seen you talk hardened Slytherins into second-guessing their bloodlines. But with her?"
She gestured at the now-closed door.
"You lost your composure. A girl trembled and you turned into a bludgeon."
Harry's eyes narrowed. "And since when did the Black Princess give a damn about 'the lowly ones'? Did Walburga slip arsenic into your tea, or are we pretending now?"
Narcissa's lips curled — not quite a smile, and far too sharp.
"I don't suffer sentiment, Harry. But not everyone's forged from blade and oath like you are. Some people are clay. You press too hard, and you don't get shape — you get ruin."
Harry looked away, jaw clenched.
"She saw Myrtle," he muttered. "In that vat. A mask on her face. She's alive, Narcissa."
"Yes. And you terrified the only witness we had," she snapped, suddenly sharp.
The air between them hung heavy. Marble beneath their feet. A half-faded blood circle behind them. The taste of failed summoning still bitter on both their tongues.
Harry exhaled slowly.
"I know what I saw."
"So do I," Narcissa said, quieter now. "You're right. And we will act. But you can't afford to break every tool in your belt."
Harry's fingers twitched once.
Then he raised both hands to his head and dug them into his hair, fingers trembling. His breath came short, sharp, ragged — and then he swore, low and furious, the words slipping through clenched teeth.
"What a fucked world this is," he muttered, voice shaking. "Gods above. We summon the dead, slit ourselves open on marble, and the girl we're trying to save is soaking in a tub like meat. And that bastard is singing."
He turned away, pacing two steps, then stopped and hunched forward, both palms pressed to his skull as if he could crush the thoughts out.
Narcissa stood still.
Then, almost hesitantly — as if checking for the audience before the performance — she stepped forward and wrapped an arm around his back.
It wasn't tight. It wasn't tender.
But it was there.
Harry shook once.
Then he leaned.
His breath hitched.
And then he broke.
No sobbing, no wailing — just a breath expelled like a man who'd taken a sword to the ribs. His shoulders trembled. His head dipped forward. For a moment, it wasn't the strategist or the speaker or the soldier. It was him — raw, furious, tired.
Narcissa said nothing.
She just held him there, chin resting lightly against his shoulder.
"You need to be brave," she whispered. "We both do."
She rubbed gentle circles on his back.
"You don't have to be stone all the time," she said softly, her voice close against his ear. "No one should."
Harry didn't speak.
His hands were fists at his sides.
Narcissa's tone gentled further, quieter now.
"You've seen things that would break lesser men. You carry burdens no one else would dare lift. But even steel shatters when it's stretched too thin."
She pressed her palm flat against his back.
"And there's no shame in needing a moment. A breath. A hand."
He breathed — slow, shaking, silent.
Her voice dropped to a whisper.
"But we must stand again. Because if we break…" she paused, her fingers curling slightly in the fabric of his shirt. "There's no one else left who will do what must be done."
She leaned back slightly, just enough to catch his eyes.
"So gather yourself, Harry. And be brave. Not for the her. Not for me. For the world. For Tonks."
Harry let her words sink in. His mind was too tired from the days events to wonder if this was another powerplay by the Black princess.
The door creaked open.
Both of them turned.
Tonks stood in the frame, still in her coat, the rain darkening the shoulders. Her hair was long tonight — not bubblegum, not brilliant — just a deep, wet black, clinging to her cheeks and throat. Her face was unreadable, lips set, eyes tired.
No wand. No theatrics.
Just her.
She looked at them — Harry leaning ever so slightly against Narcissa, her cousin's arm around his back, the last of the blood magic still faintly pulsing in the marble behind them.
For a heartbeat, no one spoke.
Then Tonks stepped in, quiet as the storm behind her.
"You should have told me," she said, her voice low. Not accusing. Just worn. "I didn't need to hear it from a house elf bringing linens. I would've come."
Harry opened his mouth, but the words tangled before they formed.
"I thought maybe it was Rita," Tonks went on, glancing between them. "Some ridiculous little game. Thought you two were humoring her. I even thought maybe…" she trailed off, the corner of her mouth twitching, not quite into a smile. "Well. Jealous things. Doesn't matter."
"Then I thought maybe I'd walked in on something worse. A little three-way conspiracy. You and her and Rita, tangled up in something sordid and... private." A pause. A breath. "Would've been easier, honestly."
Narcissa said nothing. Her expression was carved stone.
"Nymphadora…." Narcissa warned, her hands clenched.
"But this," Tonks said. "Whatever this is — summoning rituals and blood magic — this is worse."
Her eyes met Harry's, and they didn't flinch.
"Because you're doing it without me."