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Manipulations to War | ||||||
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Category: Pre-OotP Characters:Sirius Black Genres: Drama Warnings: Death Story is Complete Rating: R Reviews: 19 Summary: Sequel to Harry's second Christmas. James and Lily are dead, and Sirius, Remus and Anwen are living in the Potter keep with Harry. They want him to have a well balanced childhood, but the need to keep him safe is greater. Sirius is working to unravel where the Potter money went while Anwen wants to discover why they were in Godric's Hollow and not safely in the Potter's home. Hitcount: Story Total: 18929; Chapter Total: 750 Author's Notes: Many thanks to my brilliant beta, Arnel. On her warning, I will tell you the last third of the chapter is a bit gross. MNF |
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Chapter 32: Hide and Seek Sirius had never been fond of Anwen taking on dangerous missions without him being at her side. Before James and Lily's deaths, he worried less if James were with her and, on occasion, even Remus, but he preferred to be at her side. This mission, however, he knew from the very beginning she needed to take Kingsley, and he needed to lead the other half of their attack. Unbeknownst to Gellert Grindelwald, Anwen had been able to pick around his mental defences, and even as they bantered or whatever was happening, Anwen was trolling his mind for information. She'd never have been able to do it without Albus's help. Anwen had studied mind healing with Beverly Weston, the mind healer who had helped her after the Death Eater attack on her when she was sixteen. She learned that everyone's mind was set up like a place where they felt safe and loved. Anwen's mind resembled the little house that they had shared with Remus immediately after all of them left Hogwarts. Sirius's mind resembled Gryffindor Tower, the first place that he'd felt at home. Remus's was the small, secluded cottage where he'd grown up and the vast forest beyond. Albus had told Anwen that Gellert's resembled the sprawling tunnel system at Durmstrang. Albus also said there was a back door, something each of them did so the other could always get in if there was a problem. Albus was sure that Gellert had forgotten it was there. As recently as two months before Albus's arrest, Gellert's was still in place and easily accessible. Albus and Gellert had met for monthly chess matches for the entirety of the latter’s incarceration. Anwen wasn’t above exploiting such a thing. Sirius was waiting for her message. Their silent speech had been growing in recent years. Realizing that Harry and Ginny could speak easily, Anwen wanted to test just how far a married couple could push their connection. They’d stretched it so that they could be thousands of miles apart and still hear each other. Sirius was in the Italian apartment he’d inherited in his role as Lord Black. Frank and Aurors Gawain Robards and Geraldine Winters were waiting with the recently re-instated Hit Wizard Sirius for the word from his wife that they were to move and capture the creature that Tom Riddle had become. Anwen and Alice had determined that Tom had visited Gellert numerous times over the years, the last being just before Tom returned to the UK and began calling himself Voldemort before the Wizarding War. So it was likely Gellert knew where Tom's European bolthole was. There were also visitors who didn’t exist coming to see Gellert; Anwen was sure they were Death Eaters in disguise. She would dig through whatever depravity she had to find Tom’s hiding place. Sirius paced the wide palazzo, ignoring both the fresh tea and espresso that Genvissa, his house-elf, had made. Alice, Amelia, and Remus had all the children at the house in the Potter Keep, which was on lock-down. No one could enter the property until Sirius, Frank, or Anwen let them in. “Sirius, you have to stop pacing,” Frank said. “You’re going to ruin the marble floors.” “I don’t care about the marble floors, Frank.” “You might not, but I’m sure Anwen does. She loves coming here. Relax. Kingsley isn’t going to let anything happen to her.” “I know,” Sirius conceded, “but I don’t know what her mind is seeing as she dredges Grindelwald’s brain.” "To end this, Anwen will deal with anything. We find Tom; we keep him from coming back. Your mother knows what she's doing, and little Harry will be fine. You just need to hold on a bit longer.” “Albania,” Anwen’s voice floated into Sirius’s head. “He’s in Albania. Someone grab that map,” Sirius directed. They’d brought a map of every European country with them. Auror Winters quickly worked on the alphabetically indexed maps and promptly returned the Albanian one to its proper size. “Where?” Robards asked. “It’s a fairly large country.” “Hold on, Anwen’s carrying on a conversation, playing chess, making hand signals to Kingsley, and digging through Grindelwald’s head. She’ll find what we need.” “Remind me to promote your wife when she gets back,” Robards said, and Sirius growled at him. “Fine, I won’t promote her unless she wants to be promoted.” “Do we have any suspicious magical crimes in the area?” Gerry Winters asked, hoping to distract Sirius. Frank began scanning his international unsolved crimes file. “We have a dead villager, found in the forest with no straightforward signs of how they died. It was on the banks of the Vijose River,” he said. “And there was another one, although this one was on the Macedonian border. There are also several missing girls in the same area.” “Which Death Eaters can’t we account for?” Sirius asked. He knew what missing girls meant; the Death Eaters were having their sport with them. "Nott has gone quiet," Robards answered. "No one has seen him in about a year. However, his young son and his fourth wife have been seen all over London in that same time." “I know. My cousin, Narcissa, entertains them frequently at Grimmauld Place. Draco enjoys playing with him more than Harry. Of course, we have rules at our house,” Sirius said drolly. “Anyone else?” “No one has seen Mulciber since Selwyn was caught four years ago,” Robards answered. “I’ll bet all of these crimes are related to Tommy boy and his band of goons,” Frank said. “Memallaj, on the river Vijose. He’s there, in the forest. Nott has recently visited Gellert and given him the news.” Anwen’s voice was no louder than a whisper, but Sirius heard her clearly. “Memallaj, is that right?” Sirius asked. “Yes, it’s right here,” Winters said, pointing at the map. “Let’s go,” Sirius said before Disapparating. A&S A&S A&S A&S A&S “What do you know about my Rosier?” Gellert angrily asked Anwen. "I know they were recently banished to hell by the trio of Furies," she said coolly. "I know you somehow trapped a Fury and made her do your dirty work. Now, the only spell I could find to trap a Fury was written in Ancient Samarian, which is a dead language. So what did you promise your Fallen One, your Rosier? Your soul? After the number of people you've murdered, your soul was already gone." "What would you know of souls? Do you know there is the power to raise souls from the dead and make them fight for you? I told Tom all about it." "You mean Inferi? He used them to little advantage in the war. Or are you speaking of your fabled Hallows? Really, taking cues from children's literature? It is a fable, nothing more." "How wrong you are," Gellert yelled as he stood and tipped over the table the chessboard had been on. "The Hallows are real, and they will bring the world to its knees." "Perhaps children's literature is right up your alley since you're acting no better than my three-year-old when she loses her temper," Anwen said blandly. Gellert looked at her with hatred. "Do you know where your Hallows are?" The dryness of Anwen's tone infuriated Gellert, and he charged at her. She flicked her third finger, and a bubble bloomed into life around him. Gellert was now trapped and entirely at her will. “You have few secrets from me at this point,” Anwen said tiredly. “While you’ve been trumping about, I’ve opened your mind like a can of beans. You’ve been spilling your secrets and not even realized it.” “I am a master at Occlumency!” "Who has a backdoor your former lover knew how to access. Good thing then that he thought of me as his daughter and wanted me to succeed in bringing you down. The whole plot, your brilliant plan, is laid bare in my mind. How does it feel? Years of planning and plotting, and now, it's over. You’ve failed.” "No, Tom will rise again! You're just a girl; you can't defeat me! I'm the greatest wizard in the world!" Gellert was becoming unhinged. He spat when he spoke, some of it clinging to the sides of his mouth and chin. He had ripped his jacket in his urgency to remove it, and his hair was becoming wilder with each pass of his fingers through it. Anwen and Kingsley watched, appearing unimpressed. “No, even with all his faults and his fall from grace, Albus remains the most powerful wizard in the world. Doesn’t that irk you?” “I was always more powerful than he was. I’m the one who made him great!” “He beat you. He defeated you and took your wand.” “Tom will still continue my work!” “Tom’s time is up. There is a team headed to him right now. It is truly over.” "No, I have one more faithful one; he will have my revenge!" "I hope you're not speaking of the one called 'Nate.' See, I let the Auror on duty know that Nate had been helping you, and he promised to take him into custody as soon as the door was closed and sealed earlier," Anwen explained. “The Aurors are under my rule.” "Not these," Kingsley explained. "We had all the former Aurors removed from duty last evening and brought in a team from the International Wizarding Prison in Antarctica. So your cushy imprisonment here has ended. You're going to be incarcerated in a whole new prison, and your view will not be so spectacular." Kingsley took a lookout at the vista and wondered how anyone had been convinced this was a prison for the old coot. “No, I negotiated my remaining here as part of my surrender to Dumbledore,” Gellert cried. “Albus isn’t really in a position of power anymore,” King continued. “The new Chief Mugwump wasn’t about playing favourites with anyone, especially a mass murderer.” “They’ve built you a beautiful new cell inside a dormant volcano,” Anwen said, leaning close to Gellert’s face. “And you won’t be surrounded by life-sustaining magic. Get used to the heat; where you're headed when your life is over is going to be even hotter than your new cell.” Anwen waved her hand, and her Patronus flew from her, alerting the group awaiting her signal to come in and remove Gellert Grindelwald from Nurmengard at last. Albus's love for the man had allowed him to stay here, but that love was burned out, and now Gellert would finally be treated like the scum he was. His death would come swiftly without anyone to care for him and surround him with magic. When Gellert was gone from the room, Kingsley looked at his partner. “Did you learn enough to put the puzzle together?” “More than enough, but we need to get home. Sirius and Frank are engaging, and I want to be at the house should there be a contingency to attack Harry if Tom is taken,” Anwen announced. “Then lead the way,” King said. “I’ve spent enough time in this place.” A&S A&S A&S A&S A&S “Tom Riddle, Lord Voldemort, has been hiding out in this?” Sirius asked as they came upon the hovel in the woods. It barely had a roof, and there was one window with waxed cloth covering it. A thin spiral of smoke wound up from the chimney. Sirius stepped out into the clearing and felt the hiss of a ward before he touched it. “Hold up, there’s a protective enchantment around this place. Frank, help me pull it down, would you?” Sirius was used to miscast spells or poorly created ones protecting those fleeing his team. He was talented at casting the spells to read protection lines and then undoing them. Whoever cast this one was good, but he was better. Monty Potter had made sure he and James knew how to cast a protection spell around their homes that couldn't be taken down quickly. With Anwen, he cast spells no one could get around. Within a few minutes, he and Frank had the protections surrounding the cottage down and the ones on the door now protecting a fallen and decaying tree about twenty yards away. As the quartet stepped into the clearing, the first thing they noticed was the number of dead and decaying snakes that littered the yard. "What do you think this is all about?" Frank asked as he magically cleared a path for himself. “Feeding off them? We knew he could talk to them, being a Parselmouth and all,” Geraldine suggested. “Whatever it was, it’s disgusting,” Robards said, and Sirius couldn’t help but smirk. "You're not afraid of a little snake, are you, Gawain?" “Shut it, Black.” Gawain Robards motioned for them to stop when they'd come approximately halfway in from the tree line. He then threw a Flash-Bang Spell through the window. He then blasted the door off the hinges. The team quickly threw Shield Charms up and held still. Finally, three men came flying out of the cabin: Walden McNair, Melvin Mulciber, and Leland Nott. Robards took Nott down quickly by first taking his wand and then hitting him with a strong Stunning Spell. He had him tied up and wearing a Portkey which would take him directly to the bowels of the Ministry for questioning. Sirius was duelling Mulciber, who had been a friend of his father's. The man might have been in his seventies, but he moved remarkably well. Robards joined in the fight. In his younger years, Sirius would have been upset to have had help; now he had three children and a wife he needed to get home to. When the pair hit him with simultaneous Stunners, Mulciber flew backward into a tree. When he landed, his neck was turned at an odd angle, and it was clear he was dead. Robards tied him and sent him to the Ministry anyway, as a full inquest would be required. Sirius didn't see what had happened, but Frank was treating Geraldine by ripping a bit of his outer robe off and binding her arm with it. He then placed a different style of Portkey on her and sent her off to St. Mungo's. Walden McNair was trapped among some tree branches Frank had transfigured a few feet away. A sizeable leafy section was over his mouth, muffling his screams. “Will she be okay?” Robards asked of Geraldine. “She should,” Frank replied. “Took a Cutting Hex to the upper arm, but I’d closed it well enough and bound it before I sent her to hospital.” "Good, good, let's get McNair to the Ministry, and then we can find Tom and end this," Robards directed. While the other two dealt with McNair, Sirius made for the structure. At the doorway, he stopped and cast several counter-curses, but he found no spells. He lit his wand with a simple Lumos and went inside. What he found shocked him. Sitting in what was little more than an infant's cot was a white, scrawny, slug-like creature. The eyes were little more than slits, and the pupils which looked through the slits were red. Moreover, the thing had a snake-like tail. “Sirius Black, have you come to take your place at my side?” the thing asked. “You’re Voldemort?” Sirius asked in shock. There was nothing threatening about this thing. In fact, Sirius realized he felt sorry for it. “I am Lord Voldemort. I am pleased you, the son of one of my closest advisors, has finally come to serve me.” "No, not why I'm here," Sirius said. "I'm the father of Harry Potter-Black, and you murdered my best friends. I'm taking you into the Ministry, and you're going to pay for your crimes." Sirius Stunned the creature, wrapped it in a blanket because he was unnerved by its tiny, hairy privates, and then put it in a stasis bubble for transport. When Sirius walked out of the squat, he met up with Frank. His friend looked at the thing Sirius was carrying and started to laugh. “Oh, if all those people we’ve put in prison could see what they’ve been so faithful to! Alice isn’t going to believe it.” "Come on, I want to find out what Anwen learned." So the two men Disapparated to the Italian Apartment, and from there, they used the Portkey to take them to the Wizarding Imprisonment Level to find somewhere to put the thing that was Tom Riddle. |
| Reviews 19 |
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