Andromeda accepted the Stabilising and Restorative potions.
She refused the Purging draughts.
Narcissa had expected resistance. She had not expected Andromeda to cling to it with such pathetic dignity while sitting in a house that already smelled of bad choices and stale ingredients.
"You are all misguided," Andromeda snapped, one hand still tight around the edge of the sofa. "Hatred has made you stupid. Hatred and that blood purist's poison against Muggles and Muggleborns."
Bellatrix, who had been waiting for a sentence exactly like that, moved before Narcissa could answer.
She caught Andromeda by the jaw with one hand, forced her head back, and poured the Purging draught down her throat with the brisk irritation of a healer who hated her patient personally.
Andy choked, thrashed, and clawed weakly at Bellatrix's wrist.
Bellatrix held her until the last of the potion went down, then released her with visible disgust.
"There," Bella said. "If I had known how easy treating people would be, I would have offered to help at St Mungo's."
Narcissa did not bother telling her sister that this was not how healing worked. Bellatrix knew. She simply preferred violence where bedside manner ought to have stood.
The purge hit quickly.
Andromeda bent forward, one arm around her middle, the colour draining from her face in sharp waves. Narcissa took out her wand and watched the magical runoff as the potion forced foreign influences to the surface. One by one, the residues separated themselves under the diagnostic charm.
Love Potion, Confusing Concoction, Befuddlement Draught, and Elixir of Euphoria. Narcissa's face went still in a way Bellatrix recognised as dangerous.
Andy looked up from the sofa, saw the list forming in the air, and for the first time since her sisters entered the house, lost the energy to speak.
Her worldview did not collapse elegantly.
It cracked open in silence.
Bellatrix stared at the floating list and laughed once, a sound with no humour in it.
"You stupid, stupid cow."
Andromeda did not answer.
There was nothing left to defend. Not Ted, not her own judgment, not the grand speech she had clearly been rehearsing in her head for the last two weeks while waiting for Corvus to come and bargain with her.
Narcissa turned to Dora next.
Her niece submitted more easily, which was perhaps the only sensible thing she had done in her life. The Purging draught, diagnostic charm, and restorative sequence went through without argument. Dora's body shook under the force of it, not from the physical strain but from the realisation settling in behind it. Unlike her mother, she had not been dosed with a collection worthy of a back alley seduction racket. Dora was simply brainwashed, foolish, and caught in the collapse of a magical trait she had treated as a toy.
Bella was pacing like a caged tigress.
Narcissa closed the potion case and looked from one sister to the other.
"Andy and Dora need to be moved to the Nest," she said. "The healers there will continue the work properly."
Andromeda flinched at the word.
"The Nest?"
"Yes." Narcissa's tone remained cool. "That is where competent treatment happens now."
Bellatrix crouched in front of Dora, not because she felt gentle, but because talking down at this angle made the point sharper.
"You will drink what you are given. And if I hear that you have complained about it while looking like this, I will personally help your recovery."
Dora, pale and wide-eyed, nodded.
Good.
Narcissa called the Guards.
They entered the house without sound, took one look at Andromeda's shattered face and Dora's trapped body, and understood enough not to waste a question. The sisters stepped aside while the Guards prepared to move them. The Nestborn mind healer came in behind them, checked pupils, magical residue, and cognitive state with ruthless efficiency, then nodded once to Narcissa.
"We will do our best," he said.
Narcissa accepted that with relief she did not show.
Bella did not move from the doorway.
"We stay," she said.
Narcissa had already decided the same. Ted Tonks would return eventually, full of his own unremarkable confidence, and Bellatrix intended to be waiting.
Corvus had given one clear instruction. Do not kill the Muggleborn; bring him alive. The Guards took Andromeda and Dora to the Nest.
That was why Narcissa turned to her sister after the Guards left.
"Do not kill him."
Bellatrix looked confused. "Why would I do such a thing?" She asked.
"I will only cripple him beyond recovery."
Bella's eyes drifted toward the front door as if imagining all the available exceptions.
"He will live," she agreed. "Miserable, broken and educationally improved. I'll arrange a cell in my chambers."
The house grew quieter after they left.
Too quiet.
Narcissa stood by the window and looked out over the lane. Bellatrix sat in Ted Tonks's chair with the ease of an invader claiming precedent. She had one of Andy's kitchen knives in her hand and was turning it idly through her fingers with the expression of a woman reminding herself that stabbing counted as killing only if one was ambitious enough.
He came home shortly before dark.
Ted Tonks entered through his own front door with the tired shuffle of a man who expected stew, complaints, and a chair that still belonged to him.
He got one step inside.
Bellatrix rose.
Her wand was in her hand before the recognition fully reached his face.
"Ossio Dispersimus."
The curse hit him in the chest.
Ted screamed before he understood why. The sound that followed was wet, splintering, and wrong as bones inside him began to crack and burst outward in small fractures. He fell sideways against the wall, one hand grabbing at himself as if he could hold the pain in place by force.
Bellatrix did not wait.
"Incarcerous."
Ropes snapped around his arms and legs, pinning him half upright against the wall he had just struck.
He tried to breathe and failed properly.
Bella stepped closer, eyes bright.
"Reducto."
She did not aim at his body. She hit the floor beside his right foot. Stone exploded upward in a shower of fragments that tore through his trouser leg and lacerated the skin beneath. Ted howled.
"Still alive," Bellatrix said over her shoulder. "You see? I am a good witch. I listen when given proper instructions."
Narcissa did not answer. She stood by the window and watched the show silently.
Ted finally found enough breath to speak.
"What is this?"
Bellatrix stopped in front of him and tilted her head.
"This," she said softly, "is the part where your world becomes pain and nothing more."
"Crucio."
The curse folded him in on himself against the ropes.
He did not scream at first. The first second only stole shape from him. Then the sound came, raw and high and animal, as the Cruciatus unstitched every thought other than suffering.
Bella held it for seven long seconds and released.
Ted sagged, sobbing in ugly little gasps.
Bellatrix crouched so their faces were level.
"You dosed my sister with enough potion residue to shame a brothel." She smiled gently. "Would you like to explain yourself before I decide education requires repetition?"
He shook his head, whether in denial or confusion; Narcissa did not care.
Bellatrix did.
That was why the next curse was milder only by her standards.
"Flagrate."
Lines of burning pain ripped across his forearms without leaving real flame. Ted jerked and whimpered.
Then Bella took her time.
A Blasting Curse near the shoulder, close enough to dislocate it but not tear it free. A burning Hex across the face. The Cruciatus again, longer this time. Ted's world reduced exactly as Bella had promised. Pain, anticipation of pain and fear of the next word.
Narcissa let it continue until the man stopped even trying to form lies.
"Enough."
Bellatrix lowered her wand with visible disappointment.
Ted hung in the ropes, shaking.
Narcissa stepped closer and looked at him the way one examines contaminated parchment.
Bellatrix smiled proudly like a mother cat bringing dead mice to its owner.
At the Nest, Arcturus received the confirmation that Andromeda had been manipulated and did not speak for several seconds.
The silence around him changed shape.
Every person in the room felt it.
He did not go first to his granddaughter. He did not go first to Ted Tonks. He went to the Nest, to the small cell named Azkaban.
The irony pleased him enough to be worth preserving.
The cell door opened under his wand with a sound too soft for the hatred behind it.
Albus Dumbledore sat on the floor with his back to the wall, beard untended, robes reduced to fabric rather than symbol. He did not look up when Arcturus entered. The not-so-old-anymore man had finally lost the one battle that mattered and had done so inside his own soul.
Arcturus stood over him for a moment and found, to his own mild disappointment, that contempt had outlasted fury.
"This is the last time you hurt anyone from my blood."
The hiss in his voice carried more venom than Medusa's body could contain.
He raised his wand.
--
The next morning, the Daily Prophet carried the story at the top of the front page.
LOVE, LIES, AND POTION CRIMES: MINISTRY ORDERS INSPECTION OF MIXED BLOOD COUPLES
The article beneath it did not bother with subtlety. It laid out the discovery of potion manipulation in Andromeda Tonks's household and raised the obvious, ugly question of how many other relationships between purebloods and Muggleborns had begun under influence rather than consent.
The Ministry moved at once.
Any couple pairing one pureblood and one Muggleborn would now be subject to mandatory inspection.
What began as a scandal became a harvest.
The first investigations found more cases almost immediately. Some of them were simple coercion. Some were slower schemes. Some did not appear anywhere in the extracted memories from Dumbledore's mind, which suggested either delegation, imitation, or a culture of manipulation that had spread far beyond one man's direct handling.
Azkaban gained new residents as a result, and the Dementors gained new playmates.
-
MACUSA began its institutional integration slowly. Titles remained for the moment. Offices remained. Committees multiplied. Language softened. Everyone performed transition while knowing the shape of the future had already been decided.
Corvus followed the process closely through reports. In the meantime, he focused on the tome.
At other times, he worked on something larger.
He began creating circles from the Nestborn who would rule after his leaving. The chosen witches and wizards were not selected only for power. Power was common enough in the Nest. He wanted stability, endurance, discipline, and the right relationship to order. Those who met the mark received immortality. Not as a gift, but a necessity. Though their zeal interpreted it differently.
He had no intention of leaving behind a world that would immediately descend into factional struggle the moment he stepped beyond it. This world had become his base. His first true domain. He would not abandon it to ordinary succession chaos simply because mortal politics enjoyed eating itself. Whether Magical or Mundane.
-
Manard and his teams received new instructions to begin work on rockets, flying fortresses capable of enduring space, with hull systems able to survive void conditions, radiation, and prolonged isolation.
Corvus intended to colonise the other planets of the system. With magical engineering, planets like Mars were not beyond the reach of terraforming.
He remained adamant about keeping the segregation sharp.
Sharp enough that, in time, most of the Muggle population or most of the magical population would be moved to another world entirely. He had not yet decided which. The question amused him whenever it returned. It also did not feel theoretical any longer.
All the while, days passed, and Fleur grew accustomed to him and Elizaveta, to their complex relation.
The couple became a trio in practice long before anyone bothered naming it as such.
Elizaveta remained the only person with whom he shared the deeper architecture of his plans and some secrets, such as the Black Spire and operational plans. Fleur did not stand there yet. She was, for now, more political figure than inner confidante.
That did not mean he disliked her. Had he disliked her, he would have opposed the match outright. There was still time enough for her to mature and understand that love was not the only reason Elizaveta held the place she did. Reliability, capacity, and trust mattered more in the long run of things.
-
Time for the Yule Ball came at last. The castle below the frigate was dressed to show it.
In the gardens, long tables had been set and lined with candles, waiting to be lit at exactly midnight. Holly and evergreen had been arranged with more discipline than Dumbledore would ever have considered festive, which naturally made the effect better.
Harry, Neville, and Draco dressed for the occasion.
Harry flipped his wrist.
His wand slid into his palm from its holster with practice.
The motion took his mind to his first Yule in the castle, to the letter, the holster, the quill, and Corvus Black's instructions, written without sentiment and somehow all the more useful for that.
Neville turned at the movement. "Why are you drawing your wand?"
Harry smiled and reached into the pouch at his belt. "Because it reminded me of this."
He unfolded the letter and passed it across so Neville and Draco could read.
Potter,
Yule is the old turn of the year. Sunrise is late, sunset is early, and the dark is honest about what it is. We mark it with green boughs, beeswax candles, and a quiet room. At midnight, stand and be still for one minute. Think of what you owe and what you guard. Then light a single candle and say nothing more. Some houses tie a ribbon to the holly and keep it until the equinox. If you light a second candle, make it for the dead.
Do not show the holster in class unless you enjoy attention. Wear it all the time you are awake and practise with it unless you want your wand to fly out of your hand. The quill is a tail feather from a shadow raven. It will dry fast, and it will not blot. Treat it like a living thing, and it will last a decade.
Learn the forms. Learn the words. You are a wizard. Act like one.
C. Black
Draco finished the letter and handed it back with more care than he would have shown most things.
"It is good advice," he muttered. "You were lucky to get his guidance."
Neville nodded. "I'll light a second candle for my godmother."
Harry paused for a moment, folded the letter again, and tucked it away. "What about the ladies?"
Their dates were not surprising, at least not after the weeks behind them. Susan Bones for Harry. Hannah Abbott for Neville. Astoria Greengrass for Draco, which still amused Harry more than he admitted aloud. Astoria was a menace, and they loved the way she treated and managed Draco.
The sun had started to set by then, leaving the windows full of darkening blue and gold.
The trio of gentlemen straightened their cuffs, checked their collars, and began walking toward the great hall.