Chapter 6 – Kreacher’s Den

She seemed so delicate.

To his world-weary eyes she was a sparkling bead of morning dew – light and refreshing – catching the sunlight as she touched the twisted stinging nettle of his soul. Years of service to the Dark had made him embittered, cynical and isolated. He was a solitary soldier in a clandestine, endless war against dangerous Dark wizards.

She was like a breath of fresh air to him. A mere schoolgirl, intelligent, a Goddess undiscovered yet to bloom. In his eyes, her beauty was timeless, always remaining the way she was now – never changing. However short this stolen time may be with her, he would make the most of every moment.

His dreams were of nothing but her. During that first night in Grimmauld Place, he tossed fitfully in his sleep, her dream self in his arms, holding and kissing him with love and desire. Her school uniform he found provocative, and within the confines of his dream he could undo her tie, unbutton her blouse…

Clunk!

… Run his hands across her shoulders as he placed dainty moth kisses down the pale skin of her neck…

Clunk, thud, tap!

… Capture her lips in a kiss that made him want to…

Clunk, thud, tap! Clunk, thud, tap! Clunk, thud, tap!

… Gaze lovingly at her beautifully faded irises, exaggerated through her chunky prescription lenses and stay in her toilet forever.

Cluck! “Wake up, sonny!”

A sharp prod in his ribs had him awake, alert and whooshing to the ceiling quicker than a rat up a drainpipe.

“Good reflexes, but you should have been aware of my presence a lot earlier – constant vigilance – even if you can boast immortality.”

Pumblechook looked down at a knarled old wizard. He was reminded of an Auror chap who frequented Azkaban twenty years ago. This fellow was much better looking though, with some handsome facial scaring and an enviable chunk out of his nose. The debonair, tattered travelling cloak he flung back haphazardly across one shoulder was very smart indeed; obviously this was a man of taste and high social standing. Shifting his walking stick to stand within reach, leaning against the hearth, the old man slumped down awkwardly in the rocking chair that Pumblechook had just, rather rapidly, vacated.

With a flick of the wizard’s wand, another chair was summoned, which Pumblechook mistakenly thought was for him. He drifted down to the kitchen floor. The wizard ignored him, and hoisted his prosthetic leg onto it instead.

“Which one are you, then? You all look the bloody same to me,” the wizard growled disparagingly.

More to the point, sir, who are you? That is my bed you are sitting in, and I was enjoying a rather explicit dream about Myrtle before you so rudely interrupted.

The old man took down his hood and shook out his unruly grey mane. “Never mind, we’ll find out who y’are soon enough. I just hope you’re not that Fizziwig.” He pointed a crooked finger straight at Pumblechook. “I’ll tell you this – if a Dementor could be a Lockhart, that fancy fop of a floating fool would be writing books called Dancing with Dementors and signing bloody autographs!”

Pumblechook sat at the kitchen table. Don’t I know it. At least you don’t have to live with Fiz… hang on, how do you know-”

“Or that silly fucker that let Black slip past him. Either he couldn’t see dogs or was stupid enough to think Azkaban had taken in strays. What was his name again? Bramblebuck? Tumblewood?”

Dejected, he covered his face with his hands. Pumblechook?

“No, I can’t remember. As it is, he did us a favour in the long run.”

I did? I mean, I should have maintained constant vigilance…

“It’s all for nought now, I s’pose.” The wizard shrugged and dragged out a worn leather file from under his cloak. “They’ve all turned to the Dark, deserted their posts and fled to who-knows-where with You-Know-Who to do you-know-what.”

A tad ambiguous that statement, wouldn’t you say? Could I ask you to be more specific?

“Raising hell, that’s what they’re doing!” The old wizard’s voice was rising. “All except you, apparently, and I’m not convinced that you’re what Albus says you are.”

Tall, dark and devilishly death-like?

“But my old friend has proved me wrong before, so for his benefit I am going to be civil. Now where’s my fucking tea?”

Thankfully, he was saved from wrestling with the kettle as Severus pushed the door open, his face thunderous. He had dark circles under his eyes that spoke volumes about what sort of a night he’d had. Lucky old Snape – he’d probably had some very vivid dreams as well. He looked fantastic in Pumblechook’s opinion.

Neither of the men moved. They glared Hexes at each other across the cold kitchen.

“Snape…”

“Moody…”

Moody! That’s who you are! The Auror who used to visit Azkaban. Twitchy wizard, always checking security arrangements, shift patterns, which Dementor was which…

“What are you doing here?” Severus asked suspiciously, narrowing his eyes.

“I’ve come to debrief the three of you. Whenever Miss Tinkerbelle decides to join us, I already met the Ferryman.” He gestured his head toward Pumblechook, who spun quickly behind him looking for this Ferryman person. Seeing no one, the penny dropped and he understood what Moody meant.

Excuse me, but I am not the Ferryman! Good grief, he’s a right miserable sod. Drifts about looking for fresh souls, offering them boat trips…

Snape didn’t seem amused either. “I don’t think I like your tone,” he replied with menace. “Miss Granger is not Tinkerbelle.”

… Wanting his payment up front…

Moody took the bait. “She damn well is, flitting about with her wand! The Order is no place for a silly little girl!”

… Not a thought spared for health and safety, never a life jacket in sight…

“I take offence at that! She is NOT a silly little girl…” Snape hastily looked down at the floor. “Not anymore,” he added quietly.

… ‘Come onto my little boat’, he says, ‘let me punt you across the millpond’. Oh yes, full of his promises…

The door opened half-way. Unseen by the two arguing wizards, they were joined by their missing party.

Good morning, Hermione. Did you sleep well?

“I did, thank you, Pumbles. But, what’s all this shouting? Who’s a little girl?”

Severus answered her question. “You are, apparently, according to Peg-Leg.” He leered at Moody, his arms folded.

“Very childish, Snape,” Moody spat.

“I suppose calling someone Tinkerbelle isn’t?”

Hermione, do you think I look like the Ferryman?

“Peg-leg, Tinkerbelle, the Ferryman… have I stepped into a pantomime?” she asked, obviously confused.

Snape unfolded his arms and turned away from her. He faced the stove, lighting the burner with his wand to make the tea. “No, you have not.”

Oh yes you have.

“Shh, Pumblechook!” Hermione hissed crossly.

Moody slapped his walking stick against his wooden leg and let out a barking laugh. “That’s the name, Pumblechook! The daft sod that let Sirius Black patter straight past him!” He pulled out a squashed patisserie box from his pocket and tossed it across the table. “There’s your breakfast. Croissants filled with ham and cheese. Spare your thanks – I sat on them.”

Pumblechook cowered beneath Moody’s words, ashamed that his secret was out. What would they think? He wasn’t even a half-decent Dementor before he lost all his power and despair. Certainly now they knew he was disgraced they wouldn’t want him. He would be cast off again; perhaps they would toss him aside as his kin had done? He may never see his dear Myrtle again.

“Really? Did you let Black out?” Hermione asked excitedly.

Pumblechook lowered his head. Unfortunately, yes, he replied miserably.

“Well done, you!” Hermione exclaimed, and when Pumbles looked up she had a grin from ear to ear.

“Well done, indeed,” Snape replied silkily.

Hermione shot him a glare. “Sirius Black was an innocent man.”

Innocent, are you sure? Perhaps this means I will be reinstated, my summary dismissal overturned on appeal.

Sniffing the pastry Moody had thrown on the table, dismissing it as Fwooper fodder, Pumblechook sighed and made his way to the door. He was sure someone had mentioned Doxies last night and fancied nibbling on a couple of those. Hermione seemed to understand his intentions.

“First floor,” she said between mouthfuls. “Drawing room. Ruffle the curtains.”

He nodded his thanks and drifted up the small, spiral stairs. The hallway was quiet this morning. He let out a rattling chuckle as he breezed past the portraits, pausing only to glare victoriously at the moth-eaten velvet curtains that covered Mrs Black’s perfectly peaceful portrait.

At the foot of the stairs, complete with an umbrella resting in it, was what looked like a hollowed out troll’s leg. Dark green and tinged with an aesthetically pleasing layer of grime, the objet d’art stood out as a piece of great merit. This was indeed a house of fine taste.

Ascending the stairs to the first floor he wafted into the first unlocked room, which he hoped was the drawing room. Darkened by the dirty windows, the room contained a bureau, a cluster of dusty chairs and an ancient sofa. A large tapestry hung from the walls, but he gave it no heed. Sitting down in one of the high-backed chairs, he faced the curtains, his pointed black tongue whetting his lips.

Breakfast, where art thou?

Twitching his scrawny index finger, the curtains shook violently, disturbing the inhabitants in a fluttering cloud of Dark fairies. Aggressively, they flew at him, ice crystals forming on their wing tips as they got closer. Determinedly, the largest Doxies tightened their facial expressions and ploughed toward him, teeth barred in anger.

He let them get within and inch of his chair before lazily lifting his index finger again. Flick, the first fairy tumbled through the air to be caught by his other hand. Flick, Flick, two more. Some of the hairy fairies in the back ranks fell back, afraid of this new foe. Others tried to halt in mid-air and were picked off easily by the hungry Dementor. Soon he had his hands crammed full of screaming, helpless Doxies. Smiling viciously at his breakfast, he chose one and lifted it to his mouth...

A loud crash, a shriek and the sound of splashing water had him out of the chair and whooshing through the door toward the upper levels. He thought Hermione was in trouble, the scream was definitely that of a girl. Without hesitation, he followed the noise – shouting, cursing and another crash.

On the uppermost floor a narrow hallway lead to an old wooden door. The voices continued to shout as Pumblechook burst in.

Myrtle!

The room was a small bathroom. With only her head and shoulders protruding from the toilet pan was his girlfriend, feebly pretending to spit out water.

“Pah! Pah!”

Nothing came out, of course. She hadn’t the ability to ingest water or even get wet, but Pumblechook found her attempt endearing.

Turning to look at him, she gave him a broad smile. “Pah! Pah! Oh, Chookie, there you are! I’ve had the most horrendous journey, and then this nasty ghoul said such dreadful things to me.” She twirled her pigtail and pouted at him. As she looked downwards her eyes suddenly lit up. “Ooh, a bunch of Doxies! Are they for me?”

Myrtle was pointing to his hand. Pumblechook looked down to where she was gesturing, surprised to see he still held five struggling, hairy black fairies in his fist. They were desperately trying to bite him. Vicious, sharp teeth gnawed at his knuckles, but in the adrenalin rush of his fright, and then his overwhelming headiness of love, he couldn’t feel them. Myrtle wasn’t only an aphrodisiac, but as an anaesthetic she was a knock-out.

Yes, my dull and see-through one. But what of this ghoul that dared to berate my love?

“Oh, he’s up there…” She repeatedly jabbed her finger, pointing upwards toward the cistern. “… He said I was a trespassing trollop, Chookie. He threw a nasty sharp pumice stone at me. It passed right through my head.”

He did WHAT? Righteous anger seeped through Pumblechook. No one had the right to attack Myrtle, no one.

Levitating to the ceiling, snarling in rage, he looked for the ghoul that dared assault his beloved. His cloak filled the room, billowing around him, making him appear as furious as he felt. A sharp nod of his head slammed the toilet seat shut, forcing Myrtle back down the pan. She squealed in surprise, but for the moment Pumblechook needed her safe and out of harm’s way.

Huddled on top of the cistern was what looked like a heap of rags cowering against the wall. “S.. sorry…” a small voice squeaked. “D.. don’t h.. hurt me!”

Running footsteps behind him halted in the doorway. “What’s going on here?” demanded Snape. Pumblechook turned to see the professor, wand drawn, blocking the door with an outstretched arm preventing Hermione from entering. She, too, had her wand out and a startled look on her face.

Nothing to worry about, he told them slowly and with meaning. I am merely exorcising.

“He says he’s exercising,” Hermione told Severus with a sigh relief. She lowered her wand, but Snape kept his trained on the Dementor.

“Go back downstairs,” Snape commanded her without taking his eyes or his wand off Pumblechook. As Hermione disappeared and her footsteps receded, he spoke again, directly and succinctly. “Make sure you do a thorough job of it.”

He turned and slammed the door behind him, leaving Pumblechook alone with the ghoul. Myrtle was banging her fist against the closed toilet seat, but he paid her no heed; he had work to do.

Hear me, Oh demonic spirit who possesses this lavatory.

I command thee to depart at once and return into this place no more!

By the Holy, Magical and mighty everlasting power of the Supreme Being I cast thee OUT!

Depart from this bathroom at once – Pumblechook commands thee!

The power of the exorcism engulfed him as he recited the ritual over and over again. He raised his skeletal hands upwards while focussing his will on banishing the ghoul. Above his head the bare gaslight flickered on and off; hissing, igniting, whistling as its flame extinguished. The sash window rattled in its casing and the top flew off the cold tap.

The slimy, bucked-toothed ghoul screamed, cupping his hands over his ears and he slowly shrunk until he was the size of a Knut. With a tiny Pop! he vanished, leaving the bathroom spirit free. Spirit free, that is, apart from the teenaged ghost still stuck in the U-bend.

Myrtle!

Drifting back to the floor, he opened the toilet seat and pulled her out. She looked both startled and confused.

“Pumblechook?” She threw her arms around him, encompassing him in a chilling embrace. “You are my absolute hero!”

He flushed grey at her words, wrapping his own arms about her. “How did you find me, my privie princess?”

She looked up at him. Magnified eyes gazed through his veil-like shroud as it fluttered in the breeze of his laboured breathing. “I told Sir Nicholas, who asked Sir Cadogan, who found out from The Bloody Baron that Phineas Nigellus knew about ‘Headquarters’, and where it could be located on the sewer network. My love,” she added as an afterthought.

So resourceful…

“And brave. I nearly went the wrong way at Prestonpans, it was a real battle to find my way out into the right waste pipe.”

So tenacious…

“And then I arrived here, exhausted, and find myself attacked by a screaming spirit hurling lava rocks!”

That fiend is no more, my love…

She held him tightly, and sighed. “Oh, Chookie…”

***************

It was nearly lunchtime when Hermione called him back to the kitchen. Hiding Myrtle in the upstairs toilet was going to be easy – the ghoul had been in residence long enough for the human inhabitants to take no notice of the haunting. Promising to return as quickly as possible, he descended between the staircases, dropping to the ground floor like a weighted corpse.

Moody, Snape and Hermione were sat around the kitchen table, pieces of parchment scattered before them. They looked up as he entered, then Moody resumed talking.

“The Chalice – Helga Hufflepuff’s cup – location unknown,” he said, holding up a picture of a golden object with two ornate handles and a badger crest. “Then there’s the serpent – Nagini – descendant of the Naga Kings. Find her and I’ll bet my good leg that the Dark Lord won’t be far behind.”

He tossed the parchment to the table and picked up a picture of a bronze eagle. “An item that once belonged to Rowena Ravenclaw. We haven’t the foggiest idea what this might be, but thanks to an off-hand comment in The Quibbler, we may have a good idea where to find it.”

“I thought The Quibbler was full of twaddle.”

“You need to learn to read between the lines, Miss Granger,” Moody said, reaching for a picture of a necklace. “Salazar’s Locket – an heirloom of the Gaunt family, Dumbledore believes he may have located it in a sea cave on the east coast.”

“Don’t we have anything more specific than that?” Snape asked, taking the picture from Moody and studying it.

Moody shook his head. “Not that he’s telling us, at any rate. But this one’s our best bet… an item belonging to Godric Gryffindor, its location identified. We move on this tonight, as soon as the shops have closed in Diagon Alley.”

“Diagon Alley?”

“Yes, Tinkerbelle, we’re off to the Alley, but there’ll be no fancy shopping for you.”

Hermione huffed.

Moody bent across the table, gesturing for Hermione to come closer. When she was leaning across the table also, he whispered, “Have you ever wondered what happened to old Ollivander? Do you think he shut up shop and went for a jolly holiday without a word to anybody just before his peak season? BAH!” he shouted, making Hermione start. “He’s been in possession of Godric Gryffindor’s wand for the past thirteen years. It’s my guess the Death Eaters were sent to retrieve it, and him – the poor old sod. I can see it now – masked minions turning out drawer after drawer of wand cases, only finding new stock…”

“Well, he’s hardly likely to keep such a valuable antique in his shop,” Severus pointed out, rather curtly.

Moody stared at Snape. “Is he not, now? Shows what you know, clever-clogs.” The Auror seemed to enjoy the silence and the confused looks on Hermione and Severus’ faces. He sat back and lit his pipe. “Have neither of you whiz-kids ever opened your eyes as you walk down Diagon Alley? Surely the pizzazz of the other shop windows with their shiny Quidditch brooms and fancy dress robes haven’t turned your heads, blinded you?”

Hermione looked at Snape, who was deep in thought.

“Tell me,” Moody asked, expelling a stream of smoke which Pumblechook inhaled longingly. “What is displayed in the window at Ollivander’s?”

Severus spoke up. “A wand.”

“A wand,” Moody repeated. “A lone, dusty wand. A very old, lone, dusty wand. About one thousand years old by my reckoning. Now, what could possibly be so special about an old wand that it is displayed all on its own on a faded purple cushion in a wand maker’s window?”

“It’s Godric Gryffindor’s wand?”

“That would be my guess, Tinkerbelle, and more importantly, it’s Dumbledore’s.” Moody sat back in the rocking chair and drew on his pipe.

After a long silence, Hermione rifled through the other pieces of parchment. “And the others – the locket, the cup, something belonging to Rowena Ravenclaw; finding these artefacts seems to be our priority.”

“It does,” Moody agreed without looking at her. “And when we find them it’s up to the Dark rider of the apocalypse here to neutralise them, so to speak,” he said with a nod toward the Dementor and a smile that showed a set of crooked, stained teeth.

Pumblechook was getting tired of Moody’s twisted sense of humour. One more jibe about him resembling anything other than a very handsome Dementor and he would give the Auror a one-way kissin’ ticket to the afterlife so he could meet the Grim Reaper personally. Then he could compare, takes notes, and-

“But how are we going to find these objects?” Hermione asked, interrupting his plans for revenge. She was holding a quill over a roll of parchment on which she appeared to be compiling a list. The nib of her quill seemed to be giving her problems – black ink droplets fell in large splodges across her work. She withdrew her wand, using it to clean the ink spill. “I mean, ‘Scourgify’ , it’s not as if we can see these Horcruxes for what they are. They’re not marked in any way.”

“That does appear to be the problem, Miss Granger,” Snape answered absently, reading each parchment and placing it carefully in piles before him. “It has taken the Headmaster many years to compile the meagre information we have here.”

Hermione tapped and scraped her wand against her quill, sharpening the nib to a fine point. “It’s not as if we could just cast ‘Accio Horcrux!’, it’s going to be a lot harder than that.”

There was a magical vibration, a rattling from the far end of the kitchen. Suddenly, a side door slammed open revealing a cupboard that held a rusted water tank. From a cramped space under the tank scraps of material, broken-framed photographs, maggot-infested fruit and several months of dust deposits were blasted onto the kitchen floor. All heads turned in surprise as a heavy gold locket flew from under the debris and headed straight for Hermione.

Moody jumped to his feet, clutching the edges of the table. Snape’s chair crashed to the floor as he stood and drew his wand. Just in time, Hermione ducked. A chain and pendant resembling Salazar Slytherin’s locket flew past her head and skidded to halt on the table in front of her.

Hermione stayed seated, still holding her wand against her quill. She stared at the locket in stunned disbelief. “Or perhaps,” she said, her voice shaking and suddenly soprano, “Horcrux hunting isn’t going to be as difficult as I first thought.”

---

Privie = toilet

Beta’d by LariLee.

Thanks to Chartreuse for proof-reading and to Fervesco for keeping Pumbles on the road to the hereafter.