lomonaaeren

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Chapter Nineteen—By This Sign Ye Shall Know Him

Lucius took the package from the barn owl with a slight frown. Anything dangerous would have set off so many wards around the Manor that most people knew not to bother sending him something like that, but he hadn’t been expecting a package, either.

He unwrapped the small thing and tipped the contents into his head, aware of the owl sitting placidly on the windowsill and awaiting a response.

He swore when he saw what it was, and tossed the contents into the air. The owl hooted in displeasure and took flight, swooping across the room to land on top of his bookshelf and glare down at him.

Lucius stared, sick, at the bit of earlobe now on the floor, and the fingernail lying next to it. With hands nearly numb, except that they shook with dread, he tore open the envelope that had accompanied the package.

Theodosius Nott defied me. I destroyed him and took his wealth and killed his child. Perhaps you should be wary of crossing me.

There was no signature, but at the bottom, in lines that glowed as if they had been burned into the paper with a wand, was a circle surrounding a triangle bisected by a line. Lucius stared at it until some old memory snapped to life in his head.

The symbol of the Deathly Hallows, and by extension, the Peverell family who had first owned them.

Lucius dropped the parchment onto the windowsill and paced in a slow circle, his head bowed. The owl hooted at him, and Lucius stopped and stared up at it, wondering if he could fasten a tracking spell to it that would allow him to find where this Peverell laired, at the very least.

But when he drew his wand and tried, the spell splashed smoothly off, as if some kind of transparent, untouchable shield existed around the owl. It just made the bird puff up at him and hoot more angrily than ever.

“Shut up!” Lucius snapped, and then shook his head roughly. He was not going to let Peverell make him irrational and stand here arguing with birds.

The rational thing to do here would be—

To verify what Peverell had said in his letter, of course. Lucius crossed over to the fireplace and tossed Floo powder in, calling, “Nott’s Might!” It was the private name for Theodosius’s Floo that he gave only to trusted allies. Most everyone else knew it as Nott House or Nott Manor.

The fire turned green for a second, and then dark. In seconds, it spat the Floo powder back onto the carpet and then sat there, silent.

Lucius stared, his heart pounding so fast that he felt sick. The only time that happened was when the place that the Floo connection normally led to had ceased to exist. Not just had its name changed, which might have happened if Peverell had claimed the house. Ceased to exist.

Lucius would have to bring in help on this. This time, he cast the Floo powder and yelled for the Ministry.

*

“Are all you right, Professor Riddle?”

It seemed to Harry that Professor Riddle was both tired and injured in some way that had nothing to do with a wound. He didn’t limp as he led Harry to the patch of grass they used for their private offensive magic lessons, but he looked as if he wanted to. And his face had strained lines on it when he turned around.

Professor Riddle took a deep breath and then shook his head briskly. “I’m fine, Harry.”

“Are you sure? You don’t have to—”

“We are going to,” said Professor Riddle, and okay, yeah, that made him look more like the man Harry knew. His wand snapped into his hand. “I know that you have the barriers in your mind right now, but I would like you to have full command of your war wizard powers someday, and I am sure that you are eager for that day.”

Harry nodded determinedly. Professor Riddle sketched a circle in the air with his wand, a spell Harry didn’t know, and fire trailed the motion. Harry found himself gaping in awe as a circle of fire just opened and spun there, filling a second later with spokes like a wheel.

“This wheel is a spell used by war wizards,” Professor Riddle said. His voice sounded strained, the way his face had looked, and Harry turned to him in concern. Small trickles of sweat were making their way down his cheeks.

Normally, Harry knew, holding a spell like this wouldn’t have been a strain for Professor Riddle at all. He began to feel worried.

“Concentrate on the spell, Harry, not on me.”

That was pretty clear instructions, at least. Harry jerked his eyes back to the wheel of fire.

“It is used to contain and hold several spells at once, so they might be released in a barrage in battle,” Professor Riddle went on. He gestured with his wand, and the wheel spun nearer Harry. Now he could see that some of the spokes were fuzzy, covered with what might be growling mold—or a lot more likely, just magic. “It costs a lot of power to cast the spell at first, but after that, you can hold it without effort, and it will release the other spells in whatever order you tell it to.”

“Do you have to cast the spells before you cast the wheel?”

“Very good, Harry. Yes. You must cast them in private, without giving them anyone or anything to fasten on, and with your intention firmly in mind. That limits the spells the wheel can contain to a certain number of offensive ones, of course. A spell that would affect you or that would be, say, a shield which would take effect even if an enemy wasn’t there with you would be useless in this case.”

“Can I try?” Harry was almost bouncing as he watched the wheel turn and saw the fuzz all along the spokes.

“Of course, Harry. But remember that you likely won’t get it the first time—”

“I know.” Harry smiled at Professor Riddle, who looked back at him with a slight frown. “But I still want to try. Can I?”

“Yes, I have said so,” Professor Riddle muttered, and then showed him the wand movement and the incantation. The wand movement was a big, swirling circle, the one he had already seen Professor Riddle perform, and the incantation was Rota belli.

Harry calmed his breathing with an effort and then stabbed his wand forwards, completing the circle, making it as big as he could. “Rota belli!”

The air seemed to bulge and ripple, and Harry had the oddest sensation of power flowing out of the center of his chest. But then fire trailed his motion, the way that it had for Professor Riddle, and the spell snapped into view, growing spokes almost instantly.

Harry laughed in delight. There was no fuzz on the spokes of his wheel, he saw, when he stepped forwards to examine it. But that was all right. He hadn’t cast any spells before he cast this one, so he could hardly be upset about that.

He looked up and saw Professor Riddle staring at him. “Sir? Are you all right?”

Professor Riddle gave his head a sharp shake, and then a smile that looked like a goblin’s crept over his face. “Fine, Harry. It simply appears that I have misunderstood something about the nature of war wizards.”

“What’s that, sir?”

“Your magic is adapted to casting this kind of spell.” Professor Riddle nodded to the flaming wheel still hovering quietly in front of them. “I thought you would have difficulty the first time because I did, and we are of similar power levels. But I never had the potential to become a war wizard. You do, and so you master the spell more easily than others would.” He paused. “I wonder…”

“Yes, sir?”

“I have a book in my possession that belonged to one of the last war wizards, who called herself Disaster,” Professor Riddle said, his gaze heavy on Harry. “I acquired it out of interest as well as to keep it away from purebloods like Lucius Malfoy, but it’s merely a rather dull accounting of her day-to-day activities. I wonder if you would see something different in it.”

*

Harry definitely did. Tom heard his delighted gasp as he took the tome, with its somewhat cracked, brilliant red-and-gold binding, in his hands, and the pages began to glow. When he opened it, Harry looked up with wide eyes. “The writing is moving!”

Tom leaned over to see, and a sharp glow from the book cut into his eyes. Tom cursed and covered them with one hand.

“Professor Riddle? Are you all right?”

Tom waved Harry off while blinking hard to remove the spots from his vision. It was objectively harder to do than it should have been when he had only looked into that light for a moment. He shook his head. “Yes, fine. You said the writing is moving? Is it changing?”

“Yes. It’s becoming sharper, and now she says…oh! She’s talking about how she cast her first spell when she was seven years old! Do you think it’s a bad thing that I was older than that when I cast my first one, Professor Riddle?”

Tom shook his head and took a seat next to Harry at the table in his private library, which was at the top of a tower on the main library. Many of these books did eventually make their way out to other people, but only to students and professors he could trust not to mistreat them or take offense at the content. “You didn’t know magic existed, Harry. I’m sure she was raised in a magical family.”

“Yes, she says she’s a half-blood, and her mother was Muggleborn. Just like me!”

From the shining look in the boy’s eyes, Tom wouldn’t have to give his usual lecture about making sure that Harry treated the book correctly. He leaned back with a small smile and watched as Harry all but clasped the book to his chest. “Then I’m sure that you’ll be able to cast the same spells she did, and learn from her.”

“I can borrow this book, sir? Really?”

“Yes, of course.” Tom smiled at Harry. “It’s not doing me much good sitting on a shelf in my library and not permitting me to read it, anyway.”

“Okay! Thanks, sir!”

Harry bounced up from the seat and ran for the stairs that led down to the main library. Tom listened to the sound of his clattering footsteps fading and shook his head in amusement. It was good to know that Harry was not only adapted to the career of a war wizard, but enthusiastic about pursuing that career. Tom would have hated to try and push him down that path if he hadn’t wanted to go down it.

He stood up and felt his head swim. Scowling, he cast an Anti-Vertigo Charm on himself. His magical weakness even several days after his defeat of Theodosius Nott was concerning.

Then again, not only had he essentially been leeched and fought a Legilimency battle with a powerful wizard, he had burned the Nott house to the ground afterwards with Fiendfyre. It was better for no one to know exactly whose magic had been expanded there, or what had happened to Theodosius’s body or the Nott daughters.

Lucius Malfoy, of course, might recognize the magical signature. But Tom had already primed him to think it was Roland Peverell who had done it, which served his purpose of keeping the Minister distracted and off-balance.

Stretching and willing his legs to bear him as strongly as they always had, Tom went to see how the Nott children were settling in.

*

“Who are you?”

Hermione had got used to not knowing the names of all the older students at Fortius, although she thought she knew all the professors by now. And the older students would usually introduce themselves if she asked.

But this boy looked like he was her age. And he was sitting down at a table in the library that Hermione had come to consider her private territory with a book as large as his head, which he covered with one hand when he turned to stare at her.

The boy was pale and weedy, with brown eyes that studied Hermione as if she was an insect. Hermione puffed herself up, and had to stop herself from drawing her wand. He had to be a student here, or maybe a guest of one of the professors, and she would probably be in trouble if she attacked him.

On the other hand, he would most definitely be in trouble if he didn’t stop staring at her like that.

“My name is Theodore Nott,” the boy finally said, when Hermione had been about to pull her wand and damn the consequences. “I came here with my sisters last week.” He turned back to his book as if he’d said all that needed to be said.

Hermione gasped. “But your father is a pureblood.”

“My mother too, as a matter of fact.” Nott kept reading his book.

Hermione backed up a step until her head almost hit a shelf. What was a pureblood boy doing here? Had Professor Riddle kidnapped him the way he’d kidnapped Harry? But from what Harry had said, no one was going to miss him. She knew that Mr. Nott was a crony of Lucius Malfoy’s and would probably miss his son a lot.

“What are you doing here?”

The boy sighed loudly and turned towards her. “I’m here because my father was an insane idiot, and now he’s dead,” he muttered. “Professor Riddle invited me. Are you going to go over and gasp at every single pureblood student who comes to Fortius?”

“I didn’t know we had any pureblood students who weren’t Squibs.”

Nott’s eyes widened. “There are Squibs here?”

“Yes.” Hermione glared triumphantly at him. She was sure that she had found the means to drive him off, or at least make him go and complain to Professor Riddle, who would then escort Nott out of here. “And I’m Muggleborn, myself. Do you want to go and complain now to whoever brought you here?”

“That would be me, Miss Granger.”

Professor Riddle was walking around the corner. Hermione turned to frown at him. “Why is he here, though, Professor? Isn’t he a—a walking security risk?”

“She said that there are Squibs here,” Nott blurted.

“Yes,” Professor Riddle said, stopping and looking at him. “And Muggleborns, and half-bloods, and students who were cast out of Hogwarts, and professors who had an education on the Continent, and people like me who were considered of no account. Do you have a problem with that, Mr. Nott?”

Nott looked down so abruptly that Hermione felt sorry for him. She hadn’t wanted him to get in trouble, really, just stop acting stupid. “No, Professor,” he whispered. “I’m still grateful for what you did in offering me a place here.” His eyes darted towards Hermione as he spoke, as if there was something else he would have said except for her presence. Hermione wondered indignantly if he thought she was a security risk.

“Good,” Professor Riddle said, and faced Hermione. “Miss Granger, aren’t you supposed to be in an Aerial Battle class right now?”

Hermione could feel herself flush. At least it wouldn’t be that visible. She drew herself up. “I’m not good at fighting on brooms, Professor Riddle,” she said. “I don’t think I’m ever going to be good at fighting on brooms.”

“All the more reason you should try to become better,” said Professor Riddle, with extremely deceptive cheerfulness, and kept one hand on her shoulder as he guided her out of the library nook. Hermione craned her neck to look back over her shoulder. At least Nott wasn’t staring smugly after her. He was staring at the book he had pulled out instead, his ears red.

“Are you sure that he’s not a walking security risk, Professor?” Hermione asked once they were out of earshot.

“Why would he be, Miss Granger?”

At least he sounded as if he was taking her concerns seriously, so Hermione didn’t feel condescended to. She frowned at Professor Riddle, though. “Because of the way he reacted to the idea of Squibs being students here. And the way he was raised. Isn’t he going to turn on the rest of us sooner or later because he’s so convinced that purebloods are superior to everyone else?”

“Children can never change their minds about what their parents taught them, then?”

“You were saying almost the same thing in the Defense lesson you gave us last week about why you expect Fortius students to win duels with Hogwarts students, sir. That we’re more capable of creative and flexible thinking.”

Professor Riddle watched her with the blank mask that Hermione hated, because it meant that she didn’t know when she’d gone too far and he might get angry. Then again, he’d never got angry in a true sense yet, only expressed some disappointment when he obviously thought she ought to be more broad-minded.

“That’s true enough, Miss Granger. But you should note that I spoke of the school systems at that point, and not individual students’ families. I have had pureblood students and professors who have been brilliant strategists, and Muggleborn students and professors who refused to change their minds about simple and obvious things. Don’t fall into making the blood purity mistake from the other side.”

Hermione nodded slowly. And then she did allow Professor Riddle to usher her outside to her Aerial Battle class.

Normally, she never would have dreamed of skiving off a class. But she was so fascinated with some of the history reading she was doing that she had had to go back to the library, and she had rationalized it as Professor Galllin being too nice to try and make someone stay in the Aerial Battle class who so obviously had a distaste for it.

It seemed the joke was on her, as Professor Gallin frowned sternly in her direction when Professor Riddle delivered her to him. Hermione sighed, murmured an apology, and went back to learning something that wasn’t nearly as fascinating as history.

*

“You want me to take care of them? Why?”

Riddle grinned at Sirius. Sirius folded his arms and tried not to scowl. Yes, he could probably have sounded more gracious. However, it wasn’t every day that someone simply marched up to him and demanded that he take care of Theodosius’s Nott’s children—the son Sirius had known about, the secret daughters he hadn’t.

“You wouldn’t be solely responsible for their care, don’t be ridiculous,” Riddle said in a bored tone a second later, though the way his eyes glinted told Sirius he had deliberately phrased it the way he had to get a rise out of Sirius. “Theodore will become a student here with the other first-years, and he’ll spend most of his time with them. Sophia and Constance, however, will need a more delicate touch.”

“I know nothing about taking care of kids, Riddle! I spent ten years locked away in one house, for Merlin’s sake!”

“So did these children.”

Sirius blinked. He had heard the story that Riddle had told him about the Nott kids, of course he had, but he hadn’t really absorbed—

“Well, almost,” Riddle corrected then, and leaned back in the chair near the wall of the small room Sirius had taken for his own. It was in a block that Riddle had said was usually used as professors’ quarters before they moved to something more permanent. “Constance Nott is too young to have spent that length of time in there, but for Sophia Nott, it was almost a decade.”

Sirius nodded slowly. And from the way Riddle told the story, Sirius had had more room to move around freely than did the Nott children.

“I know that you grew up in nearly the same environment,” Riddle went on, his voice deepening and turning to something like a growl. Sirius had the odd feeling, then, that Riddle would have rescued him from his parents if he could have. “And you are a pureblood. They will feel more comfortable with you.”

“So long as I’m not completely responsible for them.”

“Of course not. We will have them seeing a Mind-Healer, just as you do. And I am hoping that Lupin will consent to spend some time with them.”

“He’s a werewolf. Won’t they be terrified?”

“I have a specific way to introduce myself,” Remus said, leaning his head in from the door that connected his set of rooms to Sirius’s.

Sirius turned towards him and gestured for him to go on. Remus came in and sprawled across the bottom of Sirius’s bed, and Sirius was struck again by how different he looked from the time before all this shit had happened, before he’d embraced the wolf. “I’m going to introduce myself as the monster who guards against monsters.”

Sirius blinked, and then began to smile. “Like monsters in nightmares,” he said. “Or fathers they might fear are coming back from the dead.”

Remus flashed him a smile that seemed more full of canine teeth than it could possibly have been in his human form. “Exactly.”

“And it is fitting that all the children in the school unlearn the prejudice against werewolves, the ones who were raised with it,” Riddle said, because he evidently wanted to make sure that they didn’t forget he was on hand to ruin any moment. “I have already asked Lupin to teach a class on werewolf history, for the older years. The younger ones can get used to the thought of him as a professor and start seeing him more regularly at the dining hall.”

Remus paused at that, although Sirius didn’t know why until he spoke again. “You forget how raw I take my meat.”

“I forget nothing,” Riddle said. “The house-elves can make your meat as raw as you please. You can eat it as raw as you please. But it’s time that the children who do still have the fear of werewolves start learning that some of you are our allies.”

“Why?” Remus rolled over and into a position that Sirius recognized as a pouncing one that could put him right into Riddle’s face if it had to. “Yes, all right, you want them to respect me, and you need to do something with me other than send me on bloody missions now and again. But why are you so determined to overturn this prejudice against all members of my kind? Some of us have done terrible things.”

“What did I tell you was my ultimate goal?”

“Making the purebloods pay.”

Riddle rolled his eyes, a gesture Sirius wished he wouldn’t use, because it made the bastard seem too human. “Yes, and that will be coming. In some ways, you have already begun to make them do so. But I also want to make sure that the revolution does not simply turn into revenge, or end with a few of the worst people dead and our society as stratified as always. That means getting rid of stupid, blind beliefs like the one that werewolves are mindless monsters who cannot be trusted.”

“Some of us can’t.” Remus was still tense.

“And some purebloods can’t be trusted, some half-bloods, some Muggleborns, some Squibs, some goblins, some house-elves, some centaurs.” Riddle rolled his eyes again, impatiently. “That doesn’t mean that the belief should endure about werewolves and make all of you seem like monsters. So, yes, I’ll thank you to eat in the dining hall, Professor Lupin. And to direct children who shriek or ask questions about it to me. Unless the questions are polite enough that you want to answer them yourself.”

Sirius stared at Riddle. “Why did you decide on this?” he burst out. “Why did you decide that you should include—everybody, not just half-bloods or Muggleborns?” It had still been a shock to him to find out that the school had Squib students, although looking back on it, he supposed that no one had ever said Fortius didn’t.

“Not overnight,” Riddle said, standing. “Once, I only cared about their hatred of me. But then I started to investigate all the words, all the rumors, all the bigotry, all the beliefs. And once you start listening to one kind of music for long enough, you learn to recognize the tune despite the different words set to it.” He gave Sirius a thin smile and walked out the door.

Sirius and Remus stared at each other. Remus twitched his head a little, nostrils flaring, and then nodded. Riddle had kept walking, and wasn’t lingering to listen to them.

“Why in the world is he like this?” Sirius asked at last, softly, not really expecting Remus to answer him.

“I have no idea.” Remus stretched and lay down with his chin on his folded hands in a way that made him look like a wolf resting his head on his paws. “But I think that we’re going to be glad we chose to come here.”

*

“You called us here for a reason, Minister.”

Lucius gave a tight nod in the direction of Amelia Bones. She was a pureblood of what had once been the wrong sort, the kind who had protested when Lucius had passed some of his laws about Muggles and Muggleborns. But she had learned what was good for her quickly enough, especially since she had a number of half-blood nieces and nephews who might not have been allowed to attend Hogwarts otherwise.

“Yes, Auror Bones.” Lucius glanced around the room that stood in nearly the heart of the Ministry, surrounded on all sides by thick stone walls. It had once been the old Minister’s office until Lucius had decided that he needed a grander place to govern from. “Is this room secure?”

“Do you wish me to test the protocols, Minister?”

“Yes.”

Auror Bones’s eyes widened, but she drew her wand and stood to run it along the air in a pattern of tracery reminiscent of a spider’s web. Lucius watched closely, not seeing any motions that she shouldn’t be making. He relaxed slightly.

Auror Bones nodded and sat down again, glancing around the room as if wondering what this fairly motley collection was doing in the most secure place in the Ministry. “The protocols are intact, sir.”

Lucius sat back and looked around himself, letting his eyes touch face after face. Arthur Weasley. Augusta Longbottom. His own sister-in-law, Andromeda Black, her hands clasped tightly in her lap. Horace Slughorn, who cleared his throat when Lucius glanced at him.

“I appreciate your wanting to call on me, Minister Malfoy, but I’m not sure what I can do to help with any project like the one that you described. Perhaps if you’d allow me to call on one of my contacts—”

“You are here because you know a lot of obscure magical lore, Horace,” Lucius said, in no mood to listen to the old coward’s plaints. “Auror Bones, because you are unfailingly loyal to the Ministry and cannot be corrupted. Arthur, because you are my friend and ally. Andromeda, because you have research skills Narcissa has praised to me more than once. Mrs. Longbottom, because you have a NEWT in History, a rare accomplishment in the era in which you attended Hogwarts.”

That led to an exchange of glances. Lucius watched, confident that they wouldn’t put together the real reason he had called them here.

All of them were purebloods, but none who held especially prominent positions in the new regime, and some (like Auror Bones, with her half-blood relatives) who had definite disadvantages. Lucius could not risk informing other purebloods of strength and power about Roland Peverell. They would seek to ally with him, perhaps, or find out whether he truly had the strength of the Deathly Hallows and take his secrets for themselves.

Lucius intended to retain his position despite Peverell’s challenge.

“You will have heard now about the death of Theodosius Nott, the disappearance of his son, Theodore, and the burning down of Nott House,” Lucius said, folding his hands on the desk. “I have called you here to try and investigate this—”

“You wish me to open an investigation, sir?”

“No, Auror Bones. I know who did it. But we will need research of a specialized kind to capture and defeat him. You see, he goes by Roland Peverell.”

That made more than one person gasp, although Andromeda simply narrowed her eyes. She was the one who spoke up first. “And you believe that he might have the Deathly Hallows with him? Believing in children’s stories now, Minister Malfoy?”

Lucius stared back at her until she dropped her eyes and remembered who she owed her survival to, after the slaughter of her unworthy piece of filth husband and half-blood daughter. She had been offered the choice of harvesting her daughter or slitting her throat, and had chosen the knife. “I do not know,” he said. “I know that I have felt Peverell’s magic, and that he is powerful. So powerful that I do not know how he achieved it. The Hallows would be one explanation.” He paused. “I must insist on a secrecy oath before we go further.”

They swore it, all of them, and even Andromeda looked curious as she put her wand away. Lucius said, “I met Peverell during a Hunt. He took away my ability to harvest magic.”

Arthur made a choked sound. Of course, the news would affect him the most. Lucius had heard the news that his eldest daughter was sickening new, which was most annoying.

“I didn’t know that was possible,” Auror Bones whispered, sounding shaken.

Lucius shook his head. “Neither did I. And you see why we must stop him before he does it to others, or simply kills them the way he did Theodosius. I believe he may be behind the Yaxley slaughter as well. This man is seeking to become the sole power in our world, the only possible harvester. We must stop him,” he repeated.

He glanced around the little circle, not the most satisfactory allies, but the ones he had. Andromeda’s eyes were shining with curiosity, and so were Horace’s. Auror Bones had raised her chin. She might be too stern and hidebound, but she believed in the rule of law, and as harvesting was legal but murder was not, she would find the one who had violated the laws. Arthur could be counted on. Augusta knew that she had been spared, along with her family, from harvesting, and it was best for them to support the regime that had honored their purity of blood and placed them on the safe list.

“This is where we will begin,” Lucius said.

*

Andromeda could feel the burning in her heart as she stepped out of the old Minister’s office. Augusta might have tried to catch up and walk with her to the lifts, but Andromeda hurried on ahead so she could be alone.

For the longest time, she had stewed in her hatred and her need for vengeance, unsure how she could express the former or get the latter. Any open rebellion against the regime would see her harvested, or killed, or shut up the way Sirius had been. And no one had trusted her with secrets of any kind (the private hair-styling spells Narcissa used didn’t count).

But now, now she had access to important knowledge, and once she figured out a way around the secrecy oath, she meant to find and make an ally of this Roland Peverell.

And then…

Vengeance. Vengeance for Ted, for Dora. At last. At last.