Ripples shivered through the air like disturbed water, scattering the pale moonlight that fell across the scene, clear and cold as mountain spring water.
Severus Snape appeared suddenly on the narrow path before Malfoy Manor, where low-growing hawthorn bushes crowded thick along the verge, their branches reaching toward the path.
The summer heat was suffocating even at this late hour. Even deep in the night it refused to relent or offer any mercy, yet Severus had still wrapped himself head to toe in black robes that seemed to drink in what little light remained.
His damp hair clung to his sallow face in dark strands, impossible to tell whether the moisture was sweat from the oppressive heat or the natural grease that always seemed to coat his locks.
He glanced up at the crescent moon hanging in the center of the sky like a silver sickle, then set off toward the manor looming ahead in the darkness.
'It's gotten worse,'
As he drew closer along the gravel path, the Malfoy estate sharpened into clearer view against the dark sky. A grey mist, thin as gauze or funeral veils, lay draped over the grounds. And at the sight of it spreading across the lawns, something stirred in Severus's otherwise emotionless black eyes.
This unnatural phenomenon had appeared only after the Dark Lord took up residence at the manor following his resurrection. The cause was obvious enough.
'But what did it mean exactly?'
Severus recalled the Dark Lord at the height of his former power during the first war. No such physical strangeness had attended him then. Was this new force he had somehow mastered since his return from death? Or had his evil simply deepened and intensified further?
He passed through the iron gates as though dissolving through a phantom wall.
The grounds beyond the gates looked like the depths of autumn despite it being high summer. The lawns had gone a dull, sickly yellow instead of their usual vibrant green. The majestic plane trees lining the paths had shed their green, their leaves brown and curling as though winter had come early.
Everything visible had taken on the look of something withered and abandoned.
Lucius's famous white peacocks—those proud, expensive symbols of the family's wealth and status were nowhere to be seen.
The air carried no obvious smell that Severus could identify, yet his senses insisted on registering something nonetheless: the persistent, underlying trace of rot and decay.
He had noticed faint signs of this the last time he had visited, and had not thought much of it at the time. But now the strangeness was too conspicuous, too widespread to ignore or rationalize away.
'I would have to speak to Dumbledore and Bryan about this development,'
The thought surfaced as he crunched across the gravel drive and approached the entrance to the manor.
The moment he pushed open the heavy of that vast white edifice, however—darkness and the thick scent of blood rushing out to meet him—every conscious thought was smothered in the thick blankness he kept stored somewhere deep in his soul. His face showed nothing but cold indifference.
A long table nearly the full width of the marble-floored room dominated the space, flanked on both sides by seated figures. As Severus entered through the doorway, he felt their gazes turn toward him immediately—faces swallowed by shadow and darkness, identities concealed behind masks or simply by the dim lighting.
The atmosphere was oppressive. No one spoke a word of greeting. But some of those gazes tracking his movement across the floor, Severus could feel with certainty, were laced with malice toward him.
"I was beginning to think you wouldn't make it tonight, Severus," came the high, cold voice.
The one who controlled them all did not sit at the table with his followers.
Pale moonlight fell through the floor-length windows in silver streams and pooled around a high-backed chair positioned before the cold fireplace, facing away from the gathered followers.
The chair rocked slowly, back and forth with menace.
"You understand, my Lord—I cannot afford to appear too eager to leave Hogwarts," Severus said bowing slightly from the waist, his voice was carrying no inflection or emotion at all. "Where Harry Potter is concerned, Dumbledore is more cautious and watchful than anyone I know. I cannot reveal undue curiosity."
"Of course, of course, dear Severus—we all know how exceptionally well you understand Dumbledore and his thinking,"
Voldemort tried a lightness of tone to conceal his impatience, though he succeeded only partially. Scattered, sycophantic laughter rose from both sides of the table in response to his words.
"I imagine you've managed to clarify certain things for us tonight, haven't you, dear Severus?"
The chair turned slowly on its axis with a faint creak. A pair of terrible crimson eyes, slitted like a serpent's, emerged from the darkness.
"Yes, my Lord. I have—" Severus began.
"Sit and tell me everything," Voldemort interrupted, gesturing with one pale hand.
"Sit beside Adam there. I expect you haven't met our new friend—you've been rather absent from our recent gatherings, after all."
At the near end of the long table, a wizard with distinctive silver-white hair and a neatly trimmed beard sat with perfect posture.
He wore gold-wire spectacles that caught the moonlight, and was dressed impeccably in fitted trousers and an elegant waistcoat rather than the traditional robes most wizards preferred.
At Voldemort's words, he half-rose from his seat with grace and offered Severus a smile.
"It is an honor to serve the great Dark Lord alongside you, Professor Snape," the man said in accented English.
Severus regarded him without any expression.
"Adam carries a distinguished name, Severus," Voldemort added. "I trust you will find each other's company pleasant and productive."
At that statement, Severus gave Adam Vogel a brief, utterly indifferent nod of acknowledgment, walked over and pulled out the heavy chair beside him with a scrape of wood against marble.
He allowed himself one quick glance across the width of the table toward the opposite side—toward a strikingly beautiful young witch who radiated an aura of cold composure then returned his full attention to the Dark Lord waiting for his report.
"Dumbledore told me that following this morning's press conference, he spoke separately with both the Minister for Magic and with Bryan Watson,"
Severus began slowly, his voice was low. Every face at the long table turned toward him in the dimness, listening with complete attention.
"Dumbledore secured Harry Potter the right to house arrest in lieu of detention at the Ministry pending his formal trial. However, he was unable to extract from the Minister any substantial information regarding the Ministry's specific claim—that Harry Potter committed the alleged murder of a Muggle."
His dark eyes held Voldemort's burning red ones steadily.
"Both Dumbledore and Bryan believe this is nothing more than a Ministry scheme—a political plot designed deliberately to draw public attention away from the catastrophic Azkaban situation and the Minister's failure to prevent it. Dumbledore also disclosed to me that the Minister hinted, implicitly, at wanting to negotiate with Hogwarts for some kind of arrangement."
"Negotiate?" Adam Vogel interjected smoothly. "Over what terms specifically?"
"Dumbledore suspects the Minister wants him to publicly declare that reports of your return, my Lord, are nothing but lies and rumors—and furthermore, that the Minister appears to want Hogwarts placed under the full direct authority of the Ministry rather than maintaining its traditional independence."
Severus paused, then continued in the same flat tone: "But Bryan Watson has made his position absolutely clear to Dumbledore—he will not concede anything to the Ministry or cooperate with Fudge's schemes under any circumstances."
"Ah—so Watson might yet become one of ours after all," Voldemort said with feigned surprise, his lipless mouth was stretching.
"Or perhaps the Minister himself?"
A ripple of sniggering laughter ran down both sides of the table at this.
"So, it would seem that both Dumbledore and Watson are now completely convinced that Harry Potter's supposed murder was entirely fabricated by the British Ministry out of whole cloth—that it simply never happened at all?"
Adam Vogel put the question to Severus with courteous precision, his voice was cutting through the residual laughter. He received a single confirming nod in reply, and fell into thoughtful silence.
"What is your read on this situation, dear Adam?" Voldemort asked, clearly valuing this newcomer's opinion.
"How this entire affair unfolds, most honored Dark Lord, will depend entirely on whether Dumbledore and Watson can successfully find the weak point in the Ministry's fabrication,"
Adam replied, inclining his head respectfully toward the high-backed chair.
"Both sides understand perfectly well that this is a manufactured conspiracy—a political contest rather than a genuine criminal matter. If Dumbledore and Watson cannot break it open and expose the lie, they will have no choice but to accept the Minister's terms in order to protect Harry Potter from Azkaban. But if they somehow obtain decisive evidence proving the Ministry fabricated the entire case, Cornelius Fudge will be utterly ruined and likely removed from office."
Discussion erupted along the length of the table—Death Eaters were voicing their opinions in lively, agitated voices, arguing about possibilities and outcomes. Only Lucius and Severus watched in silence.
"Dear Adam," Voldemort said, his terrible expression was revealing nothing as he listened.
These calculations and political maneuvers, clearly, presented him with no surprises or new information. He held his cold smile fixed in place. "What is your specific view—I mean precisely: where should we position ourselves in all of this?"
"Assisting the Ministry serves our interests far better, most honored Dark Lord," Adam Vogel said with confidence.
"On the matter of Harry Potter's fate, the British Ministry has arrived—quite by accident and their own incompetence—at the same objective as ourselves. And if Dumbledore and Watson do somehow manage to expose Cornelius Fudge's scheme and prove it false, Fudge will unquestionably fall from power. I would venture that his continued tenure as Minister is, on balance, highly advantageous to us. He weakens the Ministry's effectiveness with every decision."
"Severus—" Voldemort's burning gaze shifted back, fixing on him.
"Do you think you might be able to slow Dumbledore down in this investigation? Delay him just enough?"
"I'm afraid that would be quite difficult, my Lord," Severus replied without hesitation—he had anticipated this exact question and prepared his answer carefully.
His voice did not waver or change tone. "It appears Dumbledore has delegated the entire task of finding the Ministry's flaw to Bryan Watson personally. Bryan is keeping the investigation in strict confidence—he has neither enlisted nor requested assistance from any member of the Order of the Phoenix, and is working entirely alone without sharing information."
"But isn't Watson your prized former student, Severus?" Antonin Dolohov's long, twisted face contorted into a grin that showed too many teeth. "You could volunteer to join his investigation directly—he trusts you, doesn't he?"
The corner of Severus's mouth moved, contempt was barely contained beneath his mask of indifference. But after a brief pause to control his expression, he addressed Voldemort directly, who had sunk into thoughtful silence.
"Doing so would arouse considerable suspicion from everyone, my Lord. Everyone in the Order—Dumbledore and Watson included—knows perfectly well that I would sooner see Harry Potter locked away in Azkaban for life than see his name cleared and his reputation restored. I have made my feelings about the boy abundantly clear over the years."
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