“Ennervate!”

Pettigrew woke up slowly from the effects of the strong stunner and looked up to see someone directly n front of him with their wand directly pointed at his forehead. He was also bound up in conjured ropes and there were four more people arrayed around the first with their wands pointed at him as well. He blinked to clear his eyes and his vision came into focus to see the students around him. He immediately recognized Darius, Harry and Neville, he had lived in the Gryffindor tower before, after all. But he wasn’t too sure about the other two girls. They had the yellow and green trimmings in their robes which showed they were of the Hufflepuff and Slytherin houses respectively.

He was in a bad situation now. Being in the castle was dangerous enough, being caught would see him handed over to the dementors post-haste. But he had a task and he had no choice but to do it or suffer the wrath of Lord Voldemort. And he knew of Darius. Ron had complained about the boy often enough, about how he was supposed to be the best friend of the boy-who-lived and his place had been snatched away by Neville and Darius. But Pettigrew saw past that for what he was, he was one of those geniuses that came along once in a while, like James and Sirius had been. He had been so jealous of their innate skills and knew exactly how Ron felt. But now was not the time to reminisce or remember old grudges. Darius was a dangerous opponent and he had already been divested of his wand, he could only hope that he would be able to turn the situation around.

Darius saw the twitchy little traitor and had to hold himself back from striking him mercilessly. This rotten coward was the reason two brave people had lost their lives to a maniac and a little boy was left orphaned. But he had to shelve his hatred for now and get answers.

“So, Pettigrew, you know how this goes. You have been captured and are our prisoner. So, fess up on everything you are trying to do, or we get it out of you the hard way.”

Pettigrew paled a bit at Darius’ smirk and but managed to hold himself together. “I will say nothing. What are you going to do, a mere student, to a death eater in the service of the Dark Lord. You better let me go if you know what’s good for you. Otherwise he will come after you, your families and all your loved ones and kill them all.”

“What a brave front you have put up! But we all know the cowardly scum you are. But it seems your fear of Voldemort lets you ignore the immediate threat in front of you. Well, no matter! There are other ways to go about it.”

Darius knew he had to be careful with his next steps. The information he would get from Pettigrew might prove far too important not to take a risk though. He silently placed a muffliato in the surrounding area. He had already instructed the others to keep a distance of at least a few meters, so that they could move to capture Pettigrew if he tried to escape.

“Somnus!” He placed a low powered sleep charm to get Pettigrew to be drowsy and lower his mental defenses. It would be much easier to do the next step then.

“Legilimens!” He may not be an accomplished Legilimens in terms of skill but due to training under mental pressure in the RoR, he was easily able to brute-force his way into Pettigrew’s mind, especially considering his defenses were already down.

“What is your aim here?”

Images swum around in his mind and came together to show Babymort giving the rat instructions to get the blood of Harry Potter against his will. He had been given an unbreakable phial with preservation charms to get it back for Voldemort.

Damn!

“Do you know why?”

Pettigrew’s memories showed the procedures his master made him do to start creating a potion. He said he will resurrect himself and return to his full power with a secret ritual he knows. Harry Potter’s blood is one of the needed components of the ritual.

“Is there any one else involved in the plan?”

Macnair had come today as backup for the rat. He was supposed to be distracting Dumbledore along with the other member of the Committee for Disposal of Dangerous Creatures, who was under the Imperius. After he is able to separate from Dumbledore, he would wait for Pettigrew near the edge of the Hogwarts grounds.

“Anybody else?”

At least, according to his memories, no one else is involved. Thank god for small mercies.

“Where is Lord Voldemort and is there anyone else with his right now?”

Pettigrew’s memories seemed to be growing hazy as he tried to find out the answer. He delved deeper and deeper but to no use. There seemed to be no way to get the information of Voldemort’s location from Pettigrew. Either the information had been shielded by Voldemort himself by placing some sort of mental blockade or more likely, the place was under the Fidelius.

As to the person taking care of Voldemort right now, a shiver went down Darius’ spine. It was Fenrir Greyback. Voldemort had promised Greyback something, Pettigrew didn’t know what. In return, Greyback had sworn an unbreakable Vow, to serve and protect the Dark Lord till his eventual resurrection. This was not good, not good at all. Having that psychopath on Voldemort’s side this early in the game was unacceptable.

This was too early. Why on earth was this happening already. Darius desperately needed to delay this plan. He wouldn’t be able to protect him all over the year. Sooner or later, one of his lackeys might be able to get their hands on his blood. Pettigrew escaping early has caused a shit load of problems. With no information from Bertha Jorkins, he couldn’t even come up with the abduction plan. And that is when it struck Darius. He had the ideal patsy right in front of him. But it would take great resolve on Darius’ part.

He realized it quite early, that this life of his will not be as peaceful as his previous one. That someday, he would be faced with the death eaters and he would have to put them down. He was not an idealist like Dumbledore, he understood that in war, it was either your side or the other side. Using stunners and disarmers was beyond foolhardy when going up against people who are likely to send a killing curse at you the very next second. The Order of the Phoenix suffered heavy losses in the first war because of that. But he was still not a cold-blooded killer and it wasn’t an easy transition. At least he would do it in an indirect manner this time.

It was time to put his impromptu plan to the test.

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He looked around and saw that the other four were still alert and had their wands pointed towards Pettigrew, ready to strike him down if it was required.

“Confundo!”

“Serpens Agonia!”

The dark curse hit Pettigrew and the man immediately started to shake in pain. Darius quickly followed up with a weak wandless bombarda at the ground between Pettigrew and himself, blowing up that small area and creating a smokescreen. Pettigrew took the chance to transform, as Darius knew he would and scarpered away as fast as his three limbs could carry him.

“Incendio!” The stream of fire burst out from the end of Darius’ wand and spread out in the area in front of him rapidly, sending the temperature in the room up by a few degrees near instantaneously. He was careful to keep it a foot above the floor though. This way, Pettigrew escaped in the confusion and the other four students couldn’t come close enough to see through the trick.

“All of you, Pettigrew had a backup wand and managed to escape by using a distraction. I don’t know if he escaped or not, so be wary. Neville, Daphne and Hannah, please hurry to the Headmaster and inform him that Pettigrew was sighted within Hogwarts premises. Also, he and Macnair are here on a covert mission given to them by Lord Voldemort.”

The girls made to run out of the room when Darius remembered something.

“Wait!”

He quickly drew out the Marauder’s map and looked at it to find Dumbledore’s name. The headmaster was currently in his office and he also spotted Pettigrew racing out of the school wards. Good, that part of the plan was successful. The confundus charm made him forget to meet Macnair and escape back to Voldemort on his own.

Macnair was still waiting a few meters away from the school gates. This was an excellent opportunity to ambush him.

“Daphne and Hannah, head to the headmaster’s office. Dumbledore is currently located there. Go! Go! Hurry up!”

The girls rushed off in a hurry and Darius turned to face Harry.

“Harry, there is another death eater on the grounds right now. Want to come with me to take him down?”

“Another one!? Let’s go now. God knows what might happen if we delay.”

The two of them took off immediately. Darius led Harry through a couple of secret passages to shorten their route by a lot and they were in front of the castle doors in no time.

Darius placed a disillusionment charm on both of them and a muffliato on their feet as well. They rushed towards the castle gates and stopped near a small copse of trees nearby. Macnair was not visible anywhere nearby, so Darius took out the map again. The map showed his location to be less than five meters away, just on the other side of the trees.

He must be under an invisibility cloak, just waiting for Pettigrew to come to the assigned place with the vial of blood. There was only one thing to do, flush him out.

Darius pointed his wand at the approximate position of Macnair and let loose.

“Bombarda Maxima!”

The entire area blew up and a badly mangled body flew out of the patch and landed on the ground a couple of meters away. Of course, this was all a play for Harry’s benefit. Darius already knew that Macnair was there by seeing his aura. Only a cloak like Harry’s would be able to hide from his aura sight. But there was no way he was letting one of these racist, bigoted, maniac terrorists get away. Even if Voldemort was taken down, these people would be there to destroy whatever peace was made. The more of them got taken out early, the better it would be for everyone. But it would not do to just let this one bleed out just like that.

“Harry, go back to the castle and let Dumbledore know about this guy as well. He looks to be alive still but won’t be for much longer.”

“Yeah, I’ll do that. But keep an eye on him, he might not be out for the count yet.”

Harry rushed back to the castle and Darius headed towards the body lying on the ground. Just as he was a few meters away from it, he saw the aura of the person spike up and quickly threw up the strongest shield he could.

“Protego Maxima!” And he was just in time too.

A wicked looking purple spell came flying towards him and hit his shield with a bang and gave off multicolored sparks. Darius noticed the shield beginning to give away and quickly rolled out of the way. The shield shattered a moment later and the spell went past where his chest had been just a second ago.

Macnair had gotten up by now, but he was in a sorry condition. His robes were tattered all over. His left hand was blown clean off his shoulder and lay on the ground a meter away. He was bleeding profusely and by his paling skin, looked ready to pass out any second.

Quickly buffing himself with a strong ventus, Darius began running in a semi-circle around Macnair, trying to block off his escape route out of the castle.

“Bombarda! Reducto! Incendio!”

Macnair managed to shield the first one but the second one blew a hole straight through the shield. Darius was quite powerful as it is and to add on that, Macnair didn’t even have half of his normal fighting capacity. The fire managed to reach him and set him alight.

Macnair screamed in pain and managed to put of the flames with an aguamenti charm.

His whole outfit was smoking, and the wounds looked in an even worse condition. His shoulder wound got burnt though and stopped bleeding for the moment.

Darius banished him with a strong depulso and he flew through the air and landed further within the Hogwarts wards. Darius had gotten in between him and the Hogwarts boundary by now and he couldn’t escape unless he managed to get by Darius.

Macnair got up to his feet unsteadily and noticed that his wand had blown even further away and was at least a few meters away.

He huffed a little bit and managed to wheeze out. “You’re a scary kid, you know that! Say what, come with me and I’m sure the Dark Lord can find some use for someone of your talents.”

So, he was trying to tempt him to switch sides? A final ploy to save his life. Darius was sure, Voldemort would sooner Crucio him for destroying his plans than welcome him into their ranks, not that he was eager to join their terrorist group anyways.

“Thanks, but no thanks!”

“Petrificus Totalum!” And Macnair keeled over, stiff as a board.

Darius knew he was in a dangerous position now. He may have lost his head in the midst of all the adrenaline rush, but he was able to come back to himself in short order. He had just attacked and lethally wounded a ministry employee and a pure-blood with no provocation whatsoever. The Wizengamot would have taken no time at all to give Darius the worst possible punishment.

He did not have Pettigrew in custody and neither did he have a memory of Pettigrew’s confession since he got all the information through Legilimency. So, he had no proof to back up his claims. But it shouldn’t be too hard to get it now.

“Confundo!” He placed the strongest confundus charm he could.

Darius once again resorted to the confundus charm to trick the opponent. Especially with the wounds he had and his mental state at the moment, Macnair should be completely swindled by it.

He quickly disillusioned himself and spoke in the best imitation of Voldemort’s voice that he could manage.

“You failed, Macnair. And you know that I don’t like failures. Speak, Macnair! What was your mission in Hogwarts? Tell me every one of the details.”

Macnair fell over himself to prostrate on the ground and laid out every part of Voldemort’s plan. About how Macnair was supposed to play his role, where he was supposed to rendezvous with Pettigrew, about how Pettigrew was to get the blood of Harry Potter and everything else he knew. Now, he had a complete confession from him and the memory to back it up. What happened to him was no longer the concern of Darius. The man had one foot in the grave already.

As he watched Macnair taking his final breath, he spied five silhouettes make their way across the lawn speedily towards him. As they came closer, he made out his four friends as well as Dumbledore rapidly making their way across the lawn. As he saw Dumbledore’s enraged face, he could truly appreciate the power this man must have wielded at his peak. His aura had changed from the gentle flow it normally had to a raging inferno around him. He might not like Dumbledore’s schemes much, but you got to give the man credit for his power.

He turned to see Macnair’s chest collapse as he passed away and heaved a deep sigh. He sat down on the lawn, not out of physical exhaustion but mental. He had taken two lives today and he knew he might have to take even more. Thank god this unexpected confrontation went their way! But he also knew that he could not let up in the least and would have to continue to get stronger if he wanted to come out of this alive.