Springfic: "The Camel's Back" for miramiraficfic
Title: The Camel's Back
Author: tetleythesecond
Recipient: miramiraficfic
Character: Amelia Bones
Rating: PG-13
Warnings (highlight to view): none
Wordcount: ~7,100 words
Summary: A prison breakout brings back memories.
Author's Notes: Dear miramiraficfic, thank you for this inspiring prompt. I hope you like what I did with it. I also thank my excellent, thoughtful, and patient betas for their help and the mods for running this fest!
Betas: kellychambliss and therealsnape
Monday, 13 January 1996, 6:12 p.m.
Amelia Bones dragged a billowing cloud of soot behind her as she pushed open the swing doors of the Auror Headquarters and barged in. Her light grey hair and dark grey cloak were sprinkled with black, and if it hadn’t been for the glowing cheeks that looked as if she had taken the six flights of stairs between the Floo Hub and Level Two three steps at a time and not slowed down once to catch her breath, one might have likened Director Bones to a Cairn Terrier that had just chased a cat in the coal shack.
The golden badge on her chest was flashing violently.
"Is it true?"
"I'm afraid so." Kingsley Shacklebolt approached her from his cubicle, giving her one of his grave nods. "We called you as soon as we heard."
"Who are they?"
Kingsley looked at the parchment in his hand. "The Lestranges-Bellatrix, Rabastan and Rodolphus. Dolohov. Rookwood. Mulciber. Janice and Patricia McInally. Pitford." He put down the parchment and looked at Amelia. "And Travers."
Travers.
Amelia closed her eyes and took a breath. Inhale lightly, exhale deeply. As she'd learned to do it, just once, just enough to collect herself but too little to allow the images to form.
Oh, they would come, the images; she'd seen too much of Travers's work to keep them at bay. His coldness, his twisted sense of humour. Yet this wasn't a time for images. This was a time for Law Enforcement Officer Bones.
And it was Law Enforcement Officer Bones who opened her eyes.
"I want everybody on this shift, plus the ones on standby duty, in my office in fifteen minutes. This is top priority now. Shacklebolt?"
"Yes, Ma'am?"
"I'm pulling you off Black for the time being. He still in Tibet?"
"Siberia, I've heard."
"Siberia..." She gave Kingsley a piercing look, then took a handkerchief out of the pocket of her robe and began rubbing the chimney grime off the monocle that was dangling from a purple velvet band on her waistcoat. "Well, there's no way we're going to find him there any time soon, is there? Plenty of chance for a dog to hide..."
"I'm afraid so, Ma'am."
"Fine," she snapped, shoving the monocle into her chest pocket and the hankie back into her robe as she took a few energetic steps towards her office. "I'm putting you in charge of the escape until Scrimgeour comes back from skiing-Tonks, get a message to him, will you, please?"
She had called the last words over her shoulder as she marched into her office and slammed the door shut.
Fifteen minutes.
Fifteen minutes until her staff would expect directions and orders to track down ten Death Eaters who had escaped from Azkaban. In fifteen minutes, Travers and his friends could be anywhere.
They probably already were.
Amelia shrugged off her coat and sat down heavily. Eyes closed, her left hand massaging the bridge of her nose, she tried to concentrate. What she needed was a strategy. And for that, she needed focus. Not the thought of Travers's deeds. She'd need her best Aurors, and maybe Tonks, who had made rapid progress. Not the memory of the distorted, pain-stricken faces of her loved ones, their still eyes torn wide open or frozen in a last, fearful glance at a wife, a husband, a child. Of bodies mutilated, violated, desecrated. Of Mother. Father. Edgar, Rashida and the children. Marlene.
Amelia Summoned a bottle of water and a glass from the shelf.
She'd call Moody. Not that he was likely to take up service again even if she begged him to (which she wouldn't); he'd always been more comfortable working alone and without too many restrictions, and he could probably do that better with his current affiliations. But perhaps, for the sake of friendship and old times, he'd share some of his intelligence. If he had any, that was. His master, the great, wise man who answered to no-one and acknowledged no questions, didn't exactly have a reputation for transparency and accountability.
Stop that, she scolded herself. Ask Moody. And if he won't share anything, you will.
Yes, she would. It had taken her a while to accept Moody's other allegiance, as she called it. Moody's, Edgar's, Marlene's allegiance. The allegiance they had pledged to a group that didn't answer to any democratic institution she knew of-and she happened to know quite a few. Nobody had ever told her what methods they used or refused. And Dumbledore might be, no, was a secretive old coot who'd rather play with his own militia than assume responsibility in office no matter how often they'd ask him, and his Deputy adored him far too much for his own good. But Amelia had to give him that every time any member of the Order of the Phoenix had delivered their prey so far, it had been alive and in better shape than what some of her colleagues under Crouch used to produce.
Add to that the fact that when it comes to old coots in charge and too-admiring deputies, there's worse than Dumbledore and the Scot, democracy here or there...
Plus, she knew that they had Moody. Kingsley, too, most likely, and perhaps Tonks, judging by the improvements in her wandwork that showed traces of a very familiar style. A style she remembered all too well from the secret practice duels of two zealous teenagers up in the North Tower attic and from countless manoeuvres and fights later on.
Amelia downed a glass of water and got up. A brisk flick of the wand removed all traces of soot and grime from her robes. A breath of nicotine would be good now, but that would have to wait. Really. It would.
Oh, what the hell.
Accio summoned a small, golden package, and Lumos lit the tip of the Benson & Hedges clenched between her lips, ready to soothe her nerves and-as she rarely neglected to remind herself-bring her yet another bit closer to turning the insides of her lungs into solidly-paved surfaces.
"Shacklebolt?"
She opened the door just a crack. Letting Kingsley in was one thing, but she wouldn't quite like the younger ones to catch her indulging in her filthy habit. They probably knew, but she was old-fashioned that way. Better an open secret than an open flank.
"Ma'am?"
"Would you come here for a second, please? Tonks, have you reached the standbys?"
"Yes, Ma'am. Lacey and Chowdhury just arrived; Browne, Postlethwayt and Tennison will be here in five minutes, and Hooch just needs to drop off his baby and will be right here. Dawlish has...uh..."
"Forget about Dawlish," Amelia said curtly. Dawlish's sudden-onset standby-duty diarrhoea was as legendary as it was probably fake. Had he been a better Auror, Amelia would have minded. But as it was, Dawlish wasn't exactly the man he used to be and was probably more helpful on the loo than in the field.
"Everyone else, please hold yourselves ready. I'll call you in once I've spoken to Kingsley."
She had just placed a hand on Kingsley's shoulder to usher him into her office while carefully keeping her right hand out of sight, when she heard a noise from the doorway. It was the noise that never failed to make the hair rise on the back of her neck. She hadn't heard it since August. And she hadn't missed it a bit.
"Hem, hem..."
Amelia turned her head slowly. Anything to delay the encounter, if only for a second.
"It seems that I arrived just at the right time," Dolores Umbridge said with a smile reminiscent of undiluted sugar substitutes as she brushed a speck of soot from the shoulder of her pink cardigan. A reddish ink smudge on the right index finger made Amelia assume that the Undersecretary had flooed in right from her other job. "A word in my office, Amelia?"
"I'm sorry, Dolores. I hope you'll understand that..."
"A word, please? I would hate to do this in front of everybody." She smiled apologetically at the Aurors peering over from their cubicles. "It is always highly ungratifying to be forced to undermine a colleague's authority in front of her subordinates..."
"All right," Amelia snapped. "Tonks, I want everyone ready when I return." She swiftly, if a tad regretfully, levitated the cigarette into the ashtray and made it stub itself out.
"Yes, Ma'am."
"After you," Dolores Umbridge cooed as she stepped aside for Amelia to pass into the main corridor.
When the door had swung shut behind them, Dolores turned to Amelia.
"I'm so very sorry to have taken you out of there, but I daresay that I just saved you from a bit of an embarrassment," she said in a low voice, as if the portraits on the walls and the memos fluttering back and forth didn't have both the ears and the inclination to listen in on a whispered conversation. And relay it at their leisure.
"I don't understand..."
"You see, Amelia," Dolores continued as a fleshy, pink-polished finger pressed a gilded button by the row of lifts, "the Minister realised that he had to make a few changes around here."
One of the brass cages came to a screeching halt. Dolores flicked her wand, and the grille slid open with a loud rattle. When they stepped into the lift, Amelia was glad to see that they were the only passengers.
"The thing is, it seems that your Department has been a bit prone to-what shall I call it?-a wee bit of actionism of late. You see, Cornelius is worried that you're expending far too much energy and manpower..." (She gave a coy chuckle, as if she'd just said something singularly silly) "...or should I say 'womanpower'?-on operations that raise a lot of uncalled-for attention. Think of the whole squad you sent to Azkaban upon the allegations of a deluded old man and a self-important little boy. And for what?"
"For nothing, Dolores," Amelia said, through teeth unclenched with effort. "Seeing as the investigation was called off from the highest level."
"As it very well should have been. If, I repeat, if there had been a problem with the Dementors, what good would it have done to make the fact known? Creating panic among the people. Alerting the prisoners, perhaps even giving them ideas."
The door of the lift had opened on Level One. The ceiling here was a bit higher than on the other levels, and the corridor seemed longer and straighter.
"I may not have been too far off the mark, Dolores. As it happens, ten of the prisoners just did get out."
"And we don't know if the Dementors had anything to do with it." It never ceased to amaze Amelia that whenever she was sure that Dolores's voice couldn't get any more saccharine, Dolores instantly proved her wrong. "For all we know, it may well have been Black who tipped them off. Who, if I may remind you, is still leading your Aurors around by their noses."
Dolores unlocked a large, oaken door and waved Amelia in.
"But I trust you have little time for trivialities like catching a dangerous murderer, Amelia, when you're so busy rousing the rabble at Azkaban. Or summoning witnesses for the defence of a petty criminal who wanted to break into the Department of Mysteries. Seriously, Amelia..." Dolores shook her head as she indicated a low armchair of pink leather facing her overlarge desk. "I've been missing a certain sense of proportion in your work of late..."
Amelia waited patiently for Dolores to finish. It took her an effort, but she had learned that it never paid to interrupt the Senior Undersecretary. Each of the two times she'd tried it in her career, she'd landed herself with a visit from the Ministry-employed Therawizard, who wanted to talk to her about anger management, childhood issues, and possible upward migration of the uterus due to desiccation. Amelia didn't know where Victor Joy got his theories, but she was quite sure that she had absolutely no designs upon a third consultation. Especially given the remedy he had proposed during the previous one.
She therefore kept her mouth shut and her arms crossed in front of her chest, waited, and listened. She hadn't sat down. She'd be damned if she would lower herself into the squishy armchair while Dolores towered above her behind the oversized desk on its half-foot podium.
So Amelia ignored the first, the second, and even the third invitation to sit down, and awaited her turn.
It hadn't come yet.
"...which is why, Amelia, I have conferred with the Minister on how to take some of the heavy burden from your shoulder. And I daresay that we have found a nice solution."
She Summoned a large, lavender-coloured teapot, two cups, and a kitten-shaped pot of sugar from a side table. When Amelia answered her questioning gaze with a shake of the head, Dolores poured one cup. Gripping her teaspoon with three fingers, more delicately than Amelia would have thought possible with hands like that, Dolores ladled three generous heaps of sugar into the cup. The spoon made a soft, clinking noise as she stirred.
"To cut a long story short: as per Law Enforcement Decree Number Thirteen, all Auror deployments shall henceforth be signed off either by the Minister himself or his Senior Under...me. That way we will be able to share with you some of the cumbersome respon-"
Amelia felt as if the rest of the sentence was drowned out by the blood shooting into her head. A few months ago, in mid-August to be exact, they'd begun making her seek approval for each sortie that didn't exclusively involve hunting Ministry-defined Dark Wizards. Now she'd have to apply even for those that did. Which meant, in effect, that the Head of Magical Law Enforcement had just been relegated to sitting at her desk, shuffling papers from left to right, and filling out forms. Stripped of her competences, sorted out, discarded. Sent into retirement, only not. A clever move, she had to give them that.
"Given that we also have other fish to fry, I think that a subtle but efficient operation of four or five Aurors should be enough for this problem," Dolores continued. "Especially now that Law Enforcement Decree Number Six of 1981 has been reinstalled..."
And that was when Amelia had too much.
"NO!"
"Yes, Amelia. After due consideration..."
"You cannot possibly be serious." Heat rose in Amelia's face. "Authorising Aurors to use Unforgivables was the most unwise thing that a Head of Magical Law Enforcement ever did! It lowers us to the level of those whose values and principles we reject. It makes us a very part of that which we want to erase from this world! Dolores, please tell me that this isn't..."
"I wish you'd sit down, Amelia," Dolores chirped, in a tone that sounded like a well-rehearsed mix of pained and compassionate. "I know your stance on this; in fact, you've made it quite public, if I may remind you. Now, I don't know what made you share your views with the press, and I wouldn't be so...close-minded as to hold it against you if you hadn't been, let's say, a hundred percent immune to the charms of a certain reporter..." (She had lowered both her voice and her head at this) "...but I must ask that you remember this time where your loyalties lie."
Amelia felt a throbbing sensation in her forehead. That cursed little tell-tale vein should be giving away her anger nicely by now. Not about that last insinuation; she'd done the interview quite on purpose back then, and if Dolores liked to believe that Rita Skeeter had manoeuvred her into divulging information with a calculated show of cleavage and a painted face, then she was welcome to think so. But there was one thing you didn't tell a Hufflepuff without having another one coming.
"My loyalties, Dolores," she said, trembling with the effort to stay calm, "my loyalties lie with those whom I have sworn to protect, serve, and be accountable to."
"You, Amelia, are first and foremost accountable to the Ministry. Please, do not forget that? It would be a shame if a capable witch like you gave in to the temptation of raising her profile on the back of her duties. One might almost think you had, how shall I put it ... designs? As if ranking third in this organisation of ours no longer stilled your hunger for ... serving the people?"
Dolores got up and looked down at Amelia from her podium. Amelia didn't flinch. A stare was no less a stare for being sugar-coated, and if Dolores wanted a match, fine. She knew she should sit down. It was getting decidedly warm under the collar, and that feeling in her chest wasn't a good sign; Healer Johnson had told her so often enough. But between a sign of weakness in front of Dolores Umbridge and a month at St Mungo's at best, she'd gladly choose the latter.
At last, Dolores broke into a smile. She circled the desk and approached Amelia with small, dainty steps.
"Ah, forgive me. I am probably too harsh on you." An amply-ringed hand laid itself on Amelia's upper arm. "I shouldn't forget how difficult this situation must be for you. With almost your entire family having perished at the hands of those monsters. And not just your family, if what one hears is correct-though you must excuse me if I'm crossing a line here." She tutted briefly and sighed. "You caught Travers yourself, didn't you? Terrible, terrible thing it must be for you to see him out of prison now. I don't know if I could cope..."
Dolores flicked her wand and Summoned a tall, black bottle and two glasses. Waving both at Amelia, she winked.
"Tiny glass of sherry, against the shock?" she asked. "Neither of us is officially on duty at this time of the day; I daresay we may risk it."
She uncorked the bottle with a loud plop, and the rich, sweet scent filled the room as she poured two small crystal glasses.
"Just a little one, Amelia?"
Amelia swallowed.
"No, thank you, Dolores. Now if I may excuse myself?"
"Certainly."
Dolores Umbridge sat down behind her desk and looked like a very pleased Senior Undersecretary to the Minister of Magic.
***
Monday, 13 January 1996, 8:43 p.m.
Even though Amelia Bones usually walked to work and back, she didn't often stop in Muggle shops. The Demetria Witches' Farming Collective supplied her with most of the staples she needed, and for everything beyond that, there was Diagon Alley. She made an exception for used Muggle gramophone records, and for the hideously overpriced body lotions they sold in a small shop not far from Covent Garden. Well, that, and the little golden packages. But she hardly remembered when she had last set foot into the supermarket that she passed twice every day on Tottenham Court Road.
She placed her briefcase into the shopping cart and pushed through the aisles. There was only one item on her mental shopping list, and she'd probably find it somewhere in the back.
Indeed.
On wooden shelves adorned with fake vines, there stood rows and rows of bottles. Tall, green and brown wine bottles, with little flags by the price tags to show where they came from. Clear bottles, sporting blue or green labels with Russian names, pictures of fruits, or silly red hats. Colourful bottles of the sweet stuff she'd never had much use for.
And, at the far end of the aisle, the bottles she was looking for. Three rows of them, slim or round, clear or dark, with black or parchment-coloured labels in understated, traditional designs conveying a first taste of the liquid inside them that shimmered in all the tones from gold to deepest bronze. The more expensive ones were packed in cartons, red, black, white, silver ones, printed or embossed, tall or plump like the bottles inside them.
She ran a hand over them.
The choice had always taken her a while.
It had depended on the mood, really. Was it one for light and fruity, quick down the throat and in the blood? A taste of smoke, like the cigar she and Edgar had pilfered from Grampy when they were teenagers and paid dearly with a decidedly un-adult reaction of the stomach and a week's being grounded? Or rather a flavour of sandalwood and musk, warm and rich, like Marlene in the early hours of the morning, rolling over one last time under the rustling sheets before she'd really, really have to go?
Sometimes it had been just a name that spoke to her.
Singleton of Dufftown.
Welcome to my world.
Amelia took the cream-coloured cylinder out of the shelf and cradled it in her hand. It had been some time since she'd bought her last. And she hadn't even missed it. Not for fourteen years and two months.
She placed the bottle into her shopping cart.
With not so much at a look at the other shelves, she walked to the checkout, paid, and stepped out into the cold London evening.
***
It was past nine when Amelia heaved herself up the stairs of her Bloomsbury tenement. Half-deaf Mrs Ashton was watching some quiz show that had the most unnerving jingle. Otherwise, she heard no other sound than her own, heavy breath. Somehow, those stairs hadn't always seemed so steep.
Her knees ached, and her back was tense as she touched the wand in her pocket and unlocked the door to her flat. Was that what it was like to feel old? Muscles stiff? Mind weary? Bones useless?
She entered and put the wards back up, taking extra care that day. Then she peeled herself out of her Muggle coat and took the badge off her waistcoat. On most nights she took the badge with her into the sitting room, even the bedroom, just in case it started flashing, like it had earlier that evening.
Not tonight.
Tonight, Law Enforcement Officer Bones would be Amelia. Sister, daughter, lover of the victims of Martin Travers.
To them she would drink.
***
She went into the kitchen and rummaged around the old, white cupboard for a glass. There wasn't anything more stylish than cheap, plain water glasses, but that would do. She took one of them, rinsed it, and lifted the top off the carton cylinder.
Amelia knew that she could have got far better merchandise in her part of London. Hardly anything in the Muggle world, and certainly nothing in a Muggle supermarket, could compete with a bottle of Ogden's. She knew where they used to have, and probably still had, the best vintages. But the Leaky was out of the question. Tom remembered her all too well.
She'd been too much of a regular there, back then. In 1981, the year when she could measure her downfall in funerals. The year when she'd begun to drink the dreams away.
It had started with an exception, really. A lapse, a temporary lack of self-control after her parents had been discovered dead in their home in Ottery St Catchpole. Who could blame her, the bereaved daughter with no family of her own? Who would point a finger when it happened again, after the funeral of a dear colleage? And then there was another lapse, another funeral, and an exception again, and suddenly she'd found herself setting up a rule: no drinking on days that didn't have a T.
And then she came home one Friday evening in July, and her badge was flashing, and the message said, "Godric's Hollow, McKinnon home, four dead."
From then on, she'd do anything to sleep without dreams.
Sometimes it even worked.
***
The dreams always began with the same image. Herself, standing by Mother's and Father's open grave. Her brother Robert lending her an arm, firm but discreet. Her colleagues, her Department Head, bowing their heads as they pass by her and murmur condolences. She can dispense with their commiseration, that well-intentioned but false assumption that it spares her feelings to be kept in the dark about the results of the post-mortems. As if the lack of knowledge made her imagine anything less than the most heinous acts. Moody has a heart, takes her aside, tells her what she's suspected all along. Why else would one kill a frail, elderly couple, if not information on the whereabouts of an undesirable relative?
There's her brother Edgar. The baby of the family, the exceptionally talented but devil-may-care hothead who wouldn't believe that he'd never be an Auror. Wouldn't believe it until they failed him the third time. They, the examination board. She was on it. She doesn't think he's forgiven her that the vote was unanimous. And there's a strange mix of guilt and pride in his eyes as he tells her that she isn’t the only Bones the Dark Side considers undesirable. There's this group of fighters, Dumbledore has assembled it, and he's one of them, for they see his merits, unlike some Ministry farts who can't find their own arses in their trousers.
So often has she dreamed of the two of them yelling at each other at the top of their lungs, right by their parents' open grave, that she sometimes can't tell if it's a memory or a dream. Was it there, was it at the reception, or was it merely in her mind that Robert and his pregnant wife tore them apart into opposite corners, and did Linda slap Edgar and Robert hold her tight until she broke down crying, or was it the other way round? And if so, which way?
***
Slowly, Amelia uncorked the bottle and poured. An inch.
For now.
A Singleton for the Odd Bones out.
***
Marlene looks gorgeous on the cream-coloured satin sheets of Amelia's bed. Tall, slender, married Marlene. She of the endless, pearly legs and the curly, red hair. She who has fire and a head of her own, as well as a husband, two lovely children, and no demands. Which makes her the ideal lover for an aspiring Head Auror with a war on her hands and her mind in the trenches, always in the trenches, except in those moments when the long, thick mane trails down her stomach and brushes her thighs and makes her ache for the soft, moist warmth of Marlene's lips.
Yes, Marlene. She who comes on Fridays, and oh, how she comes on Fridays.
Marlene, she who never asks-and never tells her that she's one of Edgar's and Dumbledore's lot until Amelia finds her naked body in the garden of the McKinnon family home.
***
She set the open bottle down on the kitchen buffet.
And picked it up again.
Make it two inches.
***
And then, Edgar. Jason, Jasmine, Rashida, Edgar. Killed in that order. Youngest first. Jay, the little one, slaughtered and maimed, for that's the way to do it. Saves the efficient Death Eater the effort of torturing the others. Four hearts with one wand, as it were. They've even put a little pumpkin over his head.
It's Halloween, after all.
***
Amelia took the bottle and the glass, sat down at the formica table by the window, and looked out into the foggy London night.
Those had always been the dreams.
And she'd chased them. Chased them the only way that seemed to make sense any more.
Until that night.
***
Friday, 1 November 1981, 0:31 a.m.
When Amelia went home from duty in those wee hours of All Saints in 1981, nobody missed her.
They were out celebrating the end of the Dark Times. Sending fireworks up in the air, lighting candles, kissing and hugging loved ones and strangers alike if they were so inclined. Tears of joy and relief mixed with tears of mourning for those who hadn't made it, as wizards and witches celebrated the Boy Who Lived and the Mother Who Had Given Her Life For His. As if all the others, as if old Mrs Bones, Marlene, Rashida and Edgar had served Tom Riddle and his followers their progeny on a silver platter.
No, nobody would miss Amelia Bones.
Her remaining brother and his young family were out of the country, and that was good. Robert, Linda, and Baby Susan were safe, and they had each other. No need burdening them with the presence of the spinster aunt who'd lost her family, her love, and now even her fight, not knowing if she'd have the power to find it again.
Neither did she know if she should bother.
And so, while everybody was out celebrating, Amelia Bones retreated to her small flat with enough Ogden's to preserve a medium-sized Erumpet.
She didn't even need a glass.
***
When she woke up, she didn't know.
Why, even less.
The only thing she knew was the smell of damp wool and old sweat. An aroma that got through the densest fog of her brain. Friend, it said.
There was a drizzle of an acrid liquid on her lips, then a growling voice in the darkness. She'd never remember what he said, whether he found her on the floor or on the couch, whether he helped her sit or let her scramble up by herself. Or how long he sat there when she passed out again.
She probably told him to go away at one point. Not to piss off; those weren't the kind of consonants she trusted herself with even in the more lucid moments of that night. The moments when she felt the throbbing head, the parched throat, the stale taste in her mouth, and the paralysis in her limbs before something that may or may not have been sleep claimed her back.
When she awoke for the third, or fourth, or perhaps fifth time, and the neglected, sorry excuse for a well-bred lady's sitting room at last began to take shape in the fallow light of dawn, Moody spoke.
"All right if I talk?"
Blinking had to do for a yes.
"Minute..."
Moody didn't help her up. He didn't catch her as she wavered, didn't budge as she navigated her way along the sofa, the wall, the wardrobe, into the tiny bathroom off the corridor. And as her likeness came into focus in the mercilessly-lit mirror, she saw that he'd also steered clear of tending to a small gash that had appeared on her temple God-knows-how, or prettying her up to spare her the sight of bloated, dark-rimmed eyes squinting out of an ashen, tear-stained face.
Moody had his own notion of friendship.
And she thanked him for it.
Cold water had to suffice as a first remedy. She didn't feel ready to do magic quite yet.
***
"Chasing your ghosts," Moody said as she came back into the living room, more steadily now that the spinning had given way to the slow rocking of a ship in a sea after the storm.
Amelia didn't nod because it hadn't been a question.
Moody handed her a glass of water and lit her a cigarette.
"Case you want an alternative," he said as he smoothed a piece of parchment on the couch table in front of her. It contained a mix of numbers, letters and small circles. Coordinates. And a time. 6:27 p.m.
She couldn't follow.
"Our man Travers has ordered a clandestine Portkey," growled Moody. "I'm planning to see him off. Only not to France."
"...told you that?"
"Never you mind. Not the old man, if it appeases you. And I'd rather not have our colleagues in on it. Not since Decree Six. But I wouldn't mind if Auror Bones lent me a wand. Capable witch, tenacious as a terrier, they say. Saved my arse once."
"Only half of it."
"Well, I don't care to lose the other half, too. Fellows are complaining the way it is already." He got up and refilled Amelia's water glass from the tip of his wand. "I'm leaving at five. Apparate a quarter of a mile east of the coordinates; there's a grove there. With the potion I gave you, you ought to be fine by then. Simple Disillusionment charm should do."
He went to the door and opened it.
"I'll be in the kitchen," was the last thing he said before he left Amelia alone. Amelia heard the door of the pantry click open, and there was a characteristic sniff before the living room door fell shut and she sank back onto the couch.
Burying her face in the cushions to shield her eyes against the rising sun, she curled up again and slowly drifted out of waking.
***
She awoke when she heard a gurgling sound through the wall, then the toilet flushing. A hearty retch, followed by spitting and water running. The manly polyphony of bathroom rituals.
Four-forty-five, said the grandmother clock on the mantelpiece. The late afternoon sun was sending its last rays through the window before it would disappear behind number thirteen.
The piece of parchment still lay on the couch table. Moody had weighted it down with the bottle of Ogden's he must have picked up from the floor. The full one, the one she hadn't had to open any more. Or hadn't got to. Depended how you looked at it.
Funny to see her options laid out like that.
She heard a shuffling noise in the corridor. Boots being pulled on, a few test spells being spoken to check that the wand was in working order and the magical power up and running.
Perhaps he was right. Perhaps there was another way of chasing Travers's ghost, of chasing away the dreams of what he'd done to her loved ones.
And if there wasn't, she had still enough left to drink herself to death another day.
Amelia got up, went over to the chest next to the chimney, opened it with a flick of her wand, and took out her combat robes.
***
They found him all right. Hunching under a bush, frantically holding on to an old, moth-eaten pullover that smelled as if half the dwellers of the nearby forest had peed on it. Whoever the double agent was who had got him that Portkey, he certainly didn't seem to like Travers.
They had an easy game with him. Not one of his former friends had come to his rescue, for cowardice, for want of caring, or perhaps for heavy chains around their feet.
She made him surrender, shove over his wand-"My brother's, too, Travers!"-and come out from under that bush with his hands in the air and his robes taken off, all of them. The actual arrest she left to Moody.
She'd never used an Unforgivable, and she could do without the temptation.
Then Amelia witnessed his trials from the first sound of the hammer to the last word of the verdict. Gave testimony, too, on the wounds he'd inflicted on her family, and Mr and Mrs James McKinnon ... she was a Marlene if her notes were correct ... and their children. She gave minute descriptions of the curses he'd used to hurt them, torture them, and finish them off when he'd had enough. On the specific traces of killing curses spoken with Dragon heartstring wands. The similarities between the killings, the hexes, the physical violence, the playful touch with which he'd arranged the bodies for them to find.
And when the life sentence had been spoken, and the trapdoor of Courtroom Ten had fallen shut above Martin Travers, Amelia took the remaining stock of Ogden's and Laphroaig into the bathroom and emptied the bottles into the grimy toilet.
Then she cleaned house.
The dreams had left her alone since.
Most of the time.
***
Monday, 13 January 1996, 9:27 p.m.
Yet it had all come to nothing, hadn't it?
Amelia looked at the liquid that was rippling in the glass as she gave it a gentle twirl.
The Dark Side were getting stronger by the day. She'd known when she'd heard the Potter boy talk about Dementors in Little Whinging. Her investigations had been obstructed on every possible side, but if there was one thing she had always prided herself on, it was that she knew when someone told the truth.
Their ranks were swelling. More and more wizards and witches were noticing how the wind was blowing and turned their coats accordingly. And the Dark Side had the werewolves, were going for the giants, could be sure of the Dementors. All those beings to whom the wizarding community wouldn't grant a decent place, who were relegated to the fringes of a society that had the cheek of being surprised when its outcasts allied themselves with someone who promised that he'd help them hit back.
Brave wizardkind had refused to live with them, and now brave wizardkind would have to fight them.
Only with what means?
Here she was, a terrier with her teeth pulled out and her tail clipped. Stripped of her powers by a Minister whose motto was "No Panic", mobbed by an Undersecretary who would do everything to sandbag Amelia's work for fear she'd do it too well.
For fear that Amelia had "designs".
Right.
The amber tongues of the double Singleton lapped higher and higher up the inside of the glass as she twirled a little harder. Should she leave it at two inches for the time being, to keep up at least the appearance of taking it slowly?
Or say the hell with it, make it full?
It would be so easy. Wash down the pain, fill up the emptiness, douse your heart and submerge your brain until they resemble something floating in a glass jar at Lovegood's cabinet of curiosities. After all, what difference does it make if you sit at your desk all composed, putting on your bravest face as you ask your incompetent superior whether you may please send an understaffed team of Aurors to die at the hands of the Nameless Man's cronies-or if you lie there in your flat, passed out or barely conscious next to the bottle that's fallen from your hand and that you'd reach for if only you could make yourself, to kill off the ever-present fear of being the last Bones standing; lie there long beyond caring whether you're in your bed or on the kitchen floor, or whether you did or didn't make it into the bathroom before your limbs and your goddamned muscles stopped responding to the fuzzy commands of your cotton-wool brain?
"Tiny glass of Sherry, against the shock?" Dolores had asked with that sugary smirk of hers. "Just a little one?"
Wouldn't that just suit you, Dolores.
Amelia Bones raised the glass to her loved ones departed. To her parents, who had taught their children to believe that they could do anything, which wasn't true but had been a nice thought as long as it lasted. To her troublesome baby brother, who had never stopped believing it. To her Evening Star, who didn't bother with beliefs and just did.
She toasted her loved ones alive, few as they were. Robert, Linda, and no-more-but-still-Baby Susan, who at sixteen should be out dancing, not learning how to fight. She toasted her friend, that half-arsed git who didn't answer owls but had a habit of turning up when you least expected him. And that kitten at the Ministry who would love to see the Terrier fall.
There was an expression of calm in Amelia Bones's face as she got up from the old-fashioned metal-frame chair.
"Cheers," she said.
Took a few steps.
Raised the glass a little higher.
And poured its contents slowly down the kitchen sink.
***~~~***
Epilogue
Tuesday, 21 January 1996, 7:59 a.m.
The face in the grate, more toad-like than ever in the green glow of the Floo fire, looked incredulous.
"Three weeks...as of...today?"
"Yes, Dolores." Amelia Bones stifled a yawn. Sleep had come late that night. "I'd like to take my holiday early this year. To take my mind off things. And I'm not getting any younger, as you know."
"I'm not sure if I can allow this..."
"I would be tremendously grateful to you, Dolores. The opportunity just came up; they usually have a waiting list of half a year at least."
"Who?"
"Oh, just some easy-going resort in the Aegean. All single witches, all friendly..." Amelia took a puff of her Benson & Hedges and brought her face close to the fireplace. Lowering her voice to a conspiratorial tone, she added: "You could come, too, if you wanted to. I'm sure I can get you a recommendation. And a bed."
Dolores Umbridge's cough sent the ashes flying up in Amelia's fireplace. "Well, Amelia, I suppose Dawlish can cover for you while you're away.
"Thank you," Amelia said. Blowing a small cloud of smoke at Dolores's face in the grate, she added, "I knew you'd understand."
***
"How'd it go?" Moody asked as he stepped out of the fireplace in Amelia's office a few minutes past eight.
"A treat." She brushed him off with her hands. Moody didn't have a habit of bothering about dust or soot, and neither did he care for having a wand flicked at him. "I've got three weeks. Now, according to my friend Jane from the London Police-her brother's in my squad-Travers and someone else were spotted in an establishment in Broadwick Street tonight. Imagine that. Apparently he's still got that mark I left on his willy when we arrested him. Other one sounds like Mulciber. I have an appointment with Jane at eight-thirty and plan to take it from there. You on board?"
"Lead on, Bones," Moody said.
Amelia smirked as she tossed Moody an eye patch and a Muggle coat of a less conspicuous colour than the one he was wearing.
She checked her wand before she hid it in the seam of her coat and snipped the remains of a half-smoked cigarette into the fireplace, just where Dolores Umbridge's face had been.
She wasn't a fool. What they were doing was risky, and it could cost her anything from her life to her job.
The Terrier might still go down.
Yet she'd be damned if it the last thing to fall out of her hand would be anything but a wand.
***~~~***
Author: tetleythesecond
Recipient: miramiraficfic
Character: Amelia Bones
Rating: PG-13
Warnings (highlight to view): none
Wordcount: ~7,100 words
Summary: A prison breakout brings back memories.
Author's Notes: Dear miramiraficfic, thank you for this inspiring prompt. I hope you like what I did with it. I also thank my excellent, thoughtful, and patient betas for their help and the mods for running this fest!
Betas: kellychambliss and therealsnape
Monday, 13 January 1996, 6:12 p.m.
Amelia Bones dragged a billowing cloud of soot behind her as she pushed open the swing doors of the Auror Headquarters and barged in. Her light grey hair and dark grey cloak were sprinkled with black, and if it hadn’t been for the glowing cheeks that looked as if she had taken the six flights of stairs between the Floo Hub and Level Two three steps at a time and not slowed down once to catch her breath, one might have likened Director Bones to a Cairn Terrier that had just chased a cat in the coal shack.
The golden badge on her chest was flashing violently.
"Is it true?"
"I'm afraid so." Kingsley Shacklebolt approached her from his cubicle, giving her one of his grave nods. "We called you as soon as we heard."
"Who are they?"
Kingsley looked at the parchment in his hand. "The Lestranges-Bellatrix, Rabastan and Rodolphus. Dolohov. Rookwood. Mulciber. Janice and Patricia McInally. Pitford." He put down the parchment and looked at Amelia. "And Travers."
Travers.
Amelia closed her eyes and took a breath. Inhale lightly, exhale deeply. As she'd learned to do it, just once, just enough to collect herself but too little to allow the images to form.
Oh, they would come, the images; she'd seen too much of Travers's work to keep them at bay. His coldness, his twisted sense of humour. Yet this wasn't a time for images. This was a time for Law Enforcement Officer Bones.
And it was Law Enforcement Officer Bones who opened her eyes.
"I want everybody on this shift, plus the ones on standby duty, in my office in fifteen minutes. This is top priority now. Shacklebolt?"
"Yes, Ma'am?"
"I'm pulling you off Black for the time being. He still in Tibet?"
"Siberia, I've heard."
"Siberia..." She gave Kingsley a piercing look, then took a handkerchief out of the pocket of her robe and began rubbing the chimney grime off the monocle that was dangling from a purple velvet band on her waistcoat. "Well, there's no way we're going to find him there any time soon, is there? Plenty of chance for a dog to hide..."
"I'm afraid so, Ma'am."
"Fine," she snapped, shoving the monocle into her chest pocket and the hankie back into her robe as she took a few energetic steps towards her office. "I'm putting you in charge of the escape until Scrimgeour comes back from skiing-Tonks, get a message to him, will you, please?"
She had called the last words over her shoulder as she marched into her office and slammed the door shut.
Fifteen minutes.
Fifteen minutes until her staff would expect directions and orders to track down ten Death Eaters who had escaped from Azkaban. In fifteen minutes, Travers and his friends could be anywhere.
They probably already were.
Amelia shrugged off her coat and sat down heavily. Eyes closed, her left hand massaging the bridge of her nose, she tried to concentrate. What she needed was a strategy. And for that, she needed focus. Not the thought of Travers's deeds. She'd need her best Aurors, and maybe Tonks, who had made rapid progress. Not the memory of the distorted, pain-stricken faces of her loved ones, their still eyes torn wide open or frozen in a last, fearful glance at a wife, a husband, a child. Of bodies mutilated, violated, desecrated. Of Mother. Father. Edgar, Rashida and the children. Marlene.
Amelia Summoned a bottle of water and a glass from the shelf.
She'd call Moody. Not that he was likely to take up service again even if she begged him to (which she wouldn't); he'd always been more comfortable working alone and without too many restrictions, and he could probably do that better with his current affiliations. But perhaps, for the sake of friendship and old times, he'd share some of his intelligence. If he had any, that was. His master, the great, wise man who answered to no-one and acknowledged no questions, didn't exactly have a reputation for transparency and accountability.
Stop that, she scolded herself. Ask Moody. And if he won't share anything, you will.
Yes, she would. It had taken her a while to accept Moody's other allegiance, as she called it. Moody's, Edgar's, Marlene's allegiance. The allegiance they had pledged to a group that didn't answer to any democratic institution she knew of-and she happened to know quite a few. Nobody had ever told her what methods they used or refused. And Dumbledore might be, no, was a secretive old coot who'd rather play with his own militia than assume responsibility in office no matter how often they'd ask him, and his Deputy adored him far too much for his own good. But Amelia had to give him that every time any member of the Order of the Phoenix had delivered their prey so far, it had been alive and in better shape than what some of her colleagues under Crouch used to produce.
Add to that the fact that when it comes to old coots in charge and too-admiring deputies, there's worse than Dumbledore and the Scot, democracy here or there...
Plus, she knew that they had Moody. Kingsley, too, most likely, and perhaps Tonks, judging by the improvements in her wandwork that showed traces of a very familiar style. A style she remembered all too well from the secret practice duels of two zealous teenagers up in the North Tower attic and from countless manoeuvres and fights later on.
Amelia downed a glass of water and got up. A brisk flick of the wand removed all traces of soot and grime from her robes. A breath of nicotine would be good now, but that would have to wait. Really. It would.
Oh, what the hell.
Accio summoned a small, golden package, and Lumos lit the tip of the Benson & Hedges clenched between her lips, ready to soothe her nerves and-as she rarely neglected to remind herself-bring her yet another bit closer to turning the insides of her lungs into solidly-paved surfaces.
"Shacklebolt?"
She opened the door just a crack. Letting Kingsley in was one thing, but she wouldn't quite like the younger ones to catch her indulging in her filthy habit. They probably knew, but she was old-fashioned that way. Better an open secret than an open flank.
"Ma'am?"
"Would you come here for a second, please? Tonks, have you reached the standbys?"
"Yes, Ma'am. Lacey and Chowdhury just arrived; Browne, Postlethwayt and Tennison will be here in five minutes, and Hooch just needs to drop off his baby and will be right here. Dawlish has...uh..."
"Forget about Dawlish," Amelia said curtly. Dawlish's sudden-onset standby-duty diarrhoea was as legendary as it was probably fake. Had he been a better Auror, Amelia would have minded. But as it was, Dawlish wasn't exactly the man he used to be and was probably more helpful on the loo than in the field.
"Everyone else, please hold yourselves ready. I'll call you in once I've spoken to Kingsley."
She had just placed a hand on Kingsley's shoulder to usher him into her office while carefully keeping her right hand out of sight, when she heard a noise from the doorway. It was the noise that never failed to make the hair rise on the back of her neck. She hadn't heard it since August. And she hadn't missed it a bit.
"Hem, hem..."
Amelia turned her head slowly. Anything to delay the encounter, if only for a second.
"It seems that I arrived just at the right time," Dolores Umbridge said with a smile reminiscent of undiluted sugar substitutes as she brushed a speck of soot from the shoulder of her pink cardigan. A reddish ink smudge on the right index finger made Amelia assume that the Undersecretary had flooed in right from her other job. "A word in my office, Amelia?"
"I'm sorry, Dolores. I hope you'll understand that..."
"A word, please? I would hate to do this in front of everybody." She smiled apologetically at the Aurors peering over from their cubicles. "It is always highly ungratifying to be forced to undermine a colleague's authority in front of her subordinates..."
"All right," Amelia snapped. "Tonks, I want everyone ready when I return." She swiftly, if a tad regretfully, levitated the cigarette into the ashtray and made it stub itself out.
"Yes, Ma'am."
"After you," Dolores Umbridge cooed as she stepped aside for Amelia to pass into the main corridor.
When the door had swung shut behind them, Dolores turned to Amelia.
"I'm so very sorry to have taken you out of there, but I daresay that I just saved you from a bit of an embarrassment," she said in a low voice, as if the portraits on the walls and the memos fluttering back and forth didn't have both the ears and the inclination to listen in on a whispered conversation. And relay it at their leisure.
"I don't understand..."
"You see, Amelia," Dolores continued as a fleshy, pink-polished finger pressed a gilded button by the row of lifts, "the Minister realised that he had to make a few changes around here."
One of the brass cages came to a screeching halt. Dolores flicked her wand, and the grille slid open with a loud rattle. When they stepped into the lift, Amelia was glad to see that they were the only passengers.
"The thing is, it seems that your Department has been a bit prone to-what shall I call it?-a wee bit of actionism of late. You see, Cornelius is worried that you're expending far too much energy and manpower..." (She gave a coy chuckle, as if she'd just said something singularly silly) "...or should I say 'womanpower'?-on operations that raise a lot of uncalled-for attention. Think of the whole squad you sent to Azkaban upon the allegations of a deluded old man and a self-important little boy. And for what?"
"For nothing, Dolores," Amelia said, through teeth unclenched with effort. "Seeing as the investigation was called off from the highest level."
"As it very well should have been. If, I repeat, if there had been a problem with the Dementors, what good would it have done to make the fact known? Creating panic among the people. Alerting the prisoners, perhaps even giving them ideas."
The door of the lift had opened on Level One. The ceiling here was a bit higher than on the other levels, and the corridor seemed longer and straighter.
"I may not have been too far off the mark, Dolores. As it happens, ten of the prisoners just did get out."
"And we don't know if the Dementors had anything to do with it." It never ceased to amaze Amelia that whenever she was sure that Dolores's voice couldn't get any more saccharine, Dolores instantly proved her wrong. "For all we know, it may well have been Black who tipped them off. Who, if I may remind you, is still leading your Aurors around by their noses."
Dolores unlocked a large, oaken door and waved Amelia in.
"But I trust you have little time for trivialities like catching a dangerous murderer, Amelia, when you're so busy rousing the rabble at Azkaban. Or summoning witnesses for the defence of a petty criminal who wanted to break into the Department of Mysteries. Seriously, Amelia..." Dolores shook her head as she indicated a low armchair of pink leather facing her overlarge desk. "I've been missing a certain sense of proportion in your work of late..."
Amelia waited patiently for Dolores to finish. It took her an effort, but she had learned that it never paid to interrupt the Senior Undersecretary. Each of the two times she'd tried it in her career, she'd landed herself with a visit from the Ministry-employed Therawizard, who wanted to talk to her about anger management, childhood issues, and possible upward migration of the uterus due to desiccation. Amelia didn't know where Victor Joy got his theories, but she was quite sure that she had absolutely no designs upon a third consultation. Especially given the remedy he had proposed during the previous one.
She therefore kept her mouth shut and her arms crossed in front of her chest, waited, and listened. She hadn't sat down. She'd be damned if she would lower herself into the squishy armchair while Dolores towered above her behind the oversized desk on its half-foot podium.
So Amelia ignored the first, the second, and even the third invitation to sit down, and awaited her turn.
It hadn't come yet.
"...which is why, Amelia, I have conferred with the Minister on how to take some of the heavy burden from your shoulder. And I daresay that we have found a nice solution."
She Summoned a large, lavender-coloured teapot, two cups, and a kitten-shaped pot of sugar from a side table. When Amelia answered her questioning gaze with a shake of the head, Dolores poured one cup. Gripping her teaspoon with three fingers, more delicately than Amelia would have thought possible with hands like that, Dolores ladled three generous heaps of sugar into the cup. The spoon made a soft, clinking noise as she stirred.
"To cut a long story short: as per Law Enforcement Decree Number Thirteen, all Auror deployments shall henceforth be signed off either by the Minister himself or his Senior Under...me. That way we will be able to share with you some of the cumbersome respon-"
Amelia felt as if the rest of the sentence was drowned out by the blood shooting into her head. A few months ago, in mid-August to be exact, they'd begun making her seek approval for each sortie that didn't exclusively involve hunting Ministry-defined Dark Wizards. Now she'd have to apply even for those that did. Which meant, in effect, that the Head of Magical Law Enforcement had just been relegated to sitting at her desk, shuffling papers from left to right, and filling out forms. Stripped of her competences, sorted out, discarded. Sent into retirement, only not. A clever move, she had to give them that.
"Given that we also have other fish to fry, I think that a subtle but efficient operation of four or five Aurors should be enough for this problem," Dolores continued. "Especially now that Law Enforcement Decree Number Six of 1981 has been reinstalled..."
And that was when Amelia had too much.
"NO!"
"Yes, Amelia. After due consideration..."
"You cannot possibly be serious." Heat rose in Amelia's face. "Authorising Aurors to use Unforgivables was the most unwise thing that a Head of Magical Law Enforcement ever did! It lowers us to the level of those whose values and principles we reject. It makes us a very part of that which we want to erase from this world! Dolores, please tell me that this isn't..."
"I wish you'd sit down, Amelia," Dolores chirped, in a tone that sounded like a well-rehearsed mix of pained and compassionate. "I know your stance on this; in fact, you've made it quite public, if I may remind you. Now, I don't know what made you share your views with the press, and I wouldn't be so...close-minded as to hold it against you if you hadn't been, let's say, a hundred percent immune to the charms of a certain reporter..." (She had lowered both her voice and her head at this) "...but I must ask that you remember this time where your loyalties lie."
Amelia felt a throbbing sensation in her forehead. That cursed little tell-tale vein should be giving away her anger nicely by now. Not about that last insinuation; she'd done the interview quite on purpose back then, and if Dolores liked to believe that Rita Skeeter had manoeuvred her into divulging information with a calculated show of cleavage and a painted face, then she was welcome to think so. But there was one thing you didn't tell a Hufflepuff without having another one coming.
"My loyalties, Dolores," she said, trembling with the effort to stay calm, "my loyalties lie with those whom I have sworn to protect, serve, and be accountable to."
"You, Amelia, are first and foremost accountable to the Ministry. Please, do not forget that? It would be a shame if a capable witch like you gave in to the temptation of raising her profile on the back of her duties. One might almost think you had, how shall I put it ... designs? As if ranking third in this organisation of ours no longer stilled your hunger for ... serving the people?"
Dolores got up and looked down at Amelia from her podium. Amelia didn't flinch. A stare was no less a stare for being sugar-coated, and if Dolores wanted a match, fine. She knew she should sit down. It was getting decidedly warm under the collar, and that feeling in her chest wasn't a good sign; Healer Johnson had told her so often enough. But between a sign of weakness in front of Dolores Umbridge and a month at St Mungo's at best, she'd gladly choose the latter.
At last, Dolores broke into a smile. She circled the desk and approached Amelia with small, dainty steps.
"Ah, forgive me. I am probably too harsh on you." An amply-ringed hand laid itself on Amelia's upper arm. "I shouldn't forget how difficult this situation must be for you. With almost your entire family having perished at the hands of those monsters. And not just your family, if what one hears is correct-though you must excuse me if I'm crossing a line here." She tutted briefly and sighed. "You caught Travers yourself, didn't you? Terrible, terrible thing it must be for you to see him out of prison now. I don't know if I could cope..."
Dolores flicked her wand and Summoned a tall, black bottle and two glasses. Waving both at Amelia, she winked.
"Tiny glass of sherry, against the shock?" she asked. "Neither of us is officially on duty at this time of the day; I daresay we may risk it."
She uncorked the bottle with a loud plop, and the rich, sweet scent filled the room as she poured two small crystal glasses.
"Just a little one, Amelia?"
Amelia swallowed.
"No, thank you, Dolores. Now if I may excuse myself?"
"Certainly."
Dolores Umbridge sat down behind her desk and looked like a very pleased Senior Undersecretary to the Minister of Magic.
***
Monday, 13 January 1996, 8:43 p.m.
Even though Amelia Bones usually walked to work and back, she didn't often stop in Muggle shops. The Demetria Witches' Farming Collective supplied her with most of the staples she needed, and for everything beyond that, there was Diagon Alley. She made an exception for used Muggle gramophone records, and for the hideously overpriced body lotions they sold in a small shop not far from Covent Garden. Well, that, and the little golden packages. But she hardly remembered when she had last set foot into the supermarket that she passed twice every day on Tottenham Court Road.
She placed her briefcase into the shopping cart and pushed through the aisles. There was only one item on her mental shopping list, and she'd probably find it somewhere in the back.
Indeed.
On wooden shelves adorned with fake vines, there stood rows and rows of bottles. Tall, green and brown wine bottles, with little flags by the price tags to show where they came from. Clear bottles, sporting blue or green labels with Russian names, pictures of fruits, or silly red hats. Colourful bottles of the sweet stuff she'd never had much use for.
And, at the far end of the aisle, the bottles she was looking for. Three rows of them, slim or round, clear or dark, with black or parchment-coloured labels in understated, traditional designs conveying a first taste of the liquid inside them that shimmered in all the tones from gold to deepest bronze. The more expensive ones were packed in cartons, red, black, white, silver ones, printed or embossed, tall or plump like the bottles inside them.
She ran a hand over them.
The choice had always taken her a while.
It had depended on the mood, really. Was it one for light and fruity, quick down the throat and in the blood? A taste of smoke, like the cigar she and Edgar had pilfered from Grampy when they were teenagers and paid dearly with a decidedly un-adult reaction of the stomach and a week's being grounded? Or rather a flavour of sandalwood and musk, warm and rich, like Marlene in the early hours of the morning, rolling over one last time under the rustling sheets before she'd really, really have to go?
Sometimes it had been just a name that spoke to her.
Singleton of Dufftown.
Welcome to my world.
Amelia took the cream-coloured cylinder out of the shelf and cradled it in her hand. It had been some time since she'd bought her last. And she hadn't even missed it. Not for fourteen years and two months.
She placed the bottle into her shopping cart.
With not so much at a look at the other shelves, she walked to the checkout, paid, and stepped out into the cold London evening.
***
It was past nine when Amelia heaved herself up the stairs of her Bloomsbury tenement. Half-deaf Mrs Ashton was watching some quiz show that had the most unnerving jingle. Otherwise, she heard no other sound than her own, heavy breath. Somehow, those stairs hadn't always seemed so steep.
Her knees ached, and her back was tense as she touched the wand in her pocket and unlocked the door to her flat. Was that what it was like to feel old? Muscles stiff? Mind weary? Bones useless?
She entered and put the wards back up, taking extra care that day. Then she peeled herself out of her Muggle coat and took the badge off her waistcoat. On most nights she took the badge with her into the sitting room, even the bedroom, just in case it started flashing, like it had earlier that evening.
Not tonight.
Tonight, Law Enforcement Officer Bones would be Amelia. Sister, daughter, lover of the victims of Martin Travers.
To them she would drink.
***
She went into the kitchen and rummaged around the old, white cupboard for a glass. There wasn't anything more stylish than cheap, plain water glasses, but that would do. She took one of them, rinsed it, and lifted the top off the carton cylinder.
Amelia knew that she could have got far better merchandise in her part of London. Hardly anything in the Muggle world, and certainly nothing in a Muggle supermarket, could compete with a bottle of Ogden's. She knew where they used to have, and probably still had, the best vintages. But the Leaky was out of the question. Tom remembered her all too well.
She'd been too much of a regular there, back then. In 1981, the year when she could measure her downfall in funerals. The year when she'd begun to drink the dreams away.
It had started with an exception, really. A lapse, a temporary lack of self-control after her parents had been discovered dead in their home in Ottery St Catchpole. Who could blame her, the bereaved daughter with no family of her own? Who would point a finger when it happened again, after the funeral of a dear colleage? And then there was another lapse, another funeral, and an exception again, and suddenly she'd found herself setting up a rule: no drinking on days that didn't have a T.
And then she came home one Friday evening in July, and her badge was flashing, and the message said, "Godric's Hollow, McKinnon home, four dead."
From then on, she'd do anything to sleep without dreams.
Sometimes it even worked.
***
The dreams always began with the same image. Herself, standing by Mother's and Father's open grave. Her brother Robert lending her an arm, firm but discreet. Her colleagues, her Department Head, bowing their heads as they pass by her and murmur condolences. She can dispense with their commiseration, that well-intentioned but false assumption that it spares her feelings to be kept in the dark about the results of the post-mortems. As if the lack of knowledge made her imagine anything less than the most heinous acts. Moody has a heart, takes her aside, tells her what she's suspected all along. Why else would one kill a frail, elderly couple, if not information on the whereabouts of an undesirable relative?
There's her brother Edgar. The baby of the family, the exceptionally talented but devil-may-care hothead who wouldn't believe that he'd never be an Auror. Wouldn't believe it until they failed him the third time. They, the examination board. She was on it. She doesn't think he's forgiven her that the vote was unanimous. And there's a strange mix of guilt and pride in his eyes as he tells her that she isn’t the only Bones the Dark Side considers undesirable. There's this group of fighters, Dumbledore has assembled it, and he's one of them, for they see his merits, unlike some Ministry farts who can't find their own arses in their trousers.
So often has she dreamed of the two of them yelling at each other at the top of their lungs, right by their parents' open grave, that she sometimes can't tell if it's a memory or a dream. Was it there, was it at the reception, or was it merely in her mind that Robert and his pregnant wife tore them apart into opposite corners, and did Linda slap Edgar and Robert hold her tight until she broke down crying, or was it the other way round? And if so, which way?
***
Slowly, Amelia uncorked the bottle and poured. An inch.
For now.
A Singleton for the Odd Bones out.
***
Marlene looks gorgeous on the cream-coloured satin sheets of Amelia's bed. Tall, slender, married Marlene. She of the endless, pearly legs and the curly, red hair. She who has fire and a head of her own, as well as a husband, two lovely children, and no demands. Which makes her the ideal lover for an aspiring Head Auror with a war on her hands and her mind in the trenches, always in the trenches, except in those moments when the long, thick mane trails down her stomach and brushes her thighs and makes her ache for the soft, moist warmth of Marlene's lips.
Yes, Marlene. She who comes on Fridays, and oh, how she comes on Fridays.
Marlene, she who never asks-and never tells her that she's one of Edgar's and Dumbledore's lot until Amelia finds her naked body in the garden of the McKinnon family home.
***
She set the open bottle down on the kitchen buffet.
And picked it up again.
Make it two inches.
***
And then, Edgar. Jason, Jasmine, Rashida, Edgar. Killed in that order. Youngest first. Jay, the little one, slaughtered and maimed, for that's the way to do it. Saves the efficient Death Eater the effort of torturing the others. Four hearts with one wand, as it were. They've even put a little pumpkin over his head.
It's Halloween, after all.
***
Amelia took the bottle and the glass, sat down at the formica table by the window, and looked out into the foggy London night.
Those had always been the dreams.
And she'd chased them. Chased them the only way that seemed to make sense any more.
Until that night.
***
Friday, 1 November 1981, 0:31 a.m.
When Amelia went home from duty in those wee hours of All Saints in 1981, nobody missed her.
They were out celebrating the end of the Dark Times. Sending fireworks up in the air, lighting candles, kissing and hugging loved ones and strangers alike if they were so inclined. Tears of joy and relief mixed with tears of mourning for those who hadn't made it, as wizards and witches celebrated the Boy Who Lived and the Mother Who Had Given Her Life For His. As if all the others, as if old Mrs Bones, Marlene, Rashida and Edgar had served Tom Riddle and his followers their progeny on a silver platter.
No, nobody would miss Amelia Bones.
Her remaining brother and his young family were out of the country, and that was good. Robert, Linda, and Baby Susan were safe, and they had each other. No need burdening them with the presence of the spinster aunt who'd lost her family, her love, and now even her fight, not knowing if she'd have the power to find it again.
Neither did she know if she should bother.
And so, while everybody was out celebrating, Amelia Bones retreated to her small flat with enough Ogden's to preserve a medium-sized Erumpet.
She didn't even need a glass.
***
When she woke up, she didn't know.
Why, even less.
The only thing she knew was the smell of damp wool and old sweat. An aroma that got through the densest fog of her brain. Friend, it said.
There was a drizzle of an acrid liquid on her lips, then a growling voice in the darkness. She'd never remember what he said, whether he found her on the floor or on the couch, whether he helped her sit or let her scramble up by herself. Or how long he sat there when she passed out again.
She probably told him to go away at one point. Not to piss off; those weren't the kind of consonants she trusted herself with even in the more lucid moments of that night. The moments when she felt the throbbing head, the parched throat, the stale taste in her mouth, and the paralysis in her limbs before something that may or may not have been sleep claimed her back.
When she awoke for the third, or fourth, or perhaps fifth time, and the neglected, sorry excuse for a well-bred lady's sitting room at last began to take shape in the fallow light of dawn, Moody spoke.
"All right if I talk?"
Blinking had to do for a yes.
"Minute..."
Moody didn't help her up. He didn't catch her as she wavered, didn't budge as she navigated her way along the sofa, the wall, the wardrobe, into the tiny bathroom off the corridor. And as her likeness came into focus in the mercilessly-lit mirror, she saw that he'd also steered clear of tending to a small gash that had appeared on her temple God-knows-how, or prettying her up to spare her the sight of bloated, dark-rimmed eyes squinting out of an ashen, tear-stained face.
Moody had his own notion of friendship.
And she thanked him for it.
Cold water had to suffice as a first remedy. She didn't feel ready to do magic quite yet.
***
"Chasing your ghosts," Moody said as she came back into the living room, more steadily now that the spinning had given way to the slow rocking of a ship in a sea after the storm.
Amelia didn't nod because it hadn't been a question.
Moody handed her a glass of water and lit her a cigarette.
"Case you want an alternative," he said as he smoothed a piece of parchment on the couch table in front of her. It contained a mix of numbers, letters and small circles. Coordinates. And a time. 6:27 p.m.
She couldn't follow.
"Our man Travers has ordered a clandestine Portkey," growled Moody. "I'm planning to see him off. Only not to France."
"...told you that?"
"Never you mind. Not the old man, if it appeases you. And I'd rather not have our colleagues in on it. Not since Decree Six. But I wouldn't mind if Auror Bones lent me a wand. Capable witch, tenacious as a terrier, they say. Saved my arse once."
"Only half of it."
"Well, I don't care to lose the other half, too. Fellows are complaining the way it is already." He got up and refilled Amelia's water glass from the tip of his wand. "I'm leaving at five. Apparate a quarter of a mile east of the coordinates; there's a grove there. With the potion I gave you, you ought to be fine by then. Simple Disillusionment charm should do."
He went to the door and opened it.
"I'll be in the kitchen," was the last thing he said before he left Amelia alone. Amelia heard the door of the pantry click open, and there was a characteristic sniff before the living room door fell shut and she sank back onto the couch.
Burying her face in the cushions to shield her eyes against the rising sun, she curled up again and slowly drifted out of waking.
***
She awoke when she heard a gurgling sound through the wall, then the toilet flushing. A hearty retch, followed by spitting and water running. The manly polyphony of bathroom rituals.
Four-forty-five, said the grandmother clock on the mantelpiece. The late afternoon sun was sending its last rays through the window before it would disappear behind number thirteen.
The piece of parchment still lay on the couch table. Moody had weighted it down with the bottle of Ogden's he must have picked up from the floor. The full one, the one she hadn't had to open any more. Or hadn't got to. Depended how you looked at it.
Funny to see her options laid out like that.
She heard a shuffling noise in the corridor. Boots being pulled on, a few test spells being spoken to check that the wand was in working order and the magical power up and running.
Perhaps he was right. Perhaps there was another way of chasing Travers's ghost, of chasing away the dreams of what he'd done to her loved ones.
And if there wasn't, she had still enough left to drink herself to death another day.
Amelia got up, went over to the chest next to the chimney, opened it with a flick of her wand, and took out her combat robes.
***
They found him all right. Hunching under a bush, frantically holding on to an old, moth-eaten pullover that smelled as if half the dwellers of the nearby forest had peed on it. Whoever the double agent was who had got him that Portkey, he certainly didn't seem to like Travers.
They had an easy game with him. Not one of his former friends had come to his rescue, for cowardice, for want of caring, or perhaps for heavy chains around their feet.
She made him surrender, shove over his wand-"My brother's, too, Travers!"-and come out from under that bush with his hands in the air and his robes taken off, all of them. The actual arrest she left to Moody.
She'd never used an Unforgivable, and she could do without the temptation.
Then Amelia witnessed his trials from the first sound of the hammer to the last word of the verdict. Gave testimony, too, on the wounds he'd inflicted on her family, and Mr and Mrs James McKinnon ... she was a Marlene if her notes were correct ... and their children. She gave minute descriptions of the curses he'd used to hurt them, torture them, and finish them off when he'd had enough. On the specific traces of killing curses spoken with Dragon heartstring wands. The similarities between the killings, the hexes, the physical violence, the playful touch with which he'd arranged the bodies for them to find.
And when the life sentence had been spoken, and the trapdoor of Courtroom Ten had fallen shut above Martin Travers, Amelia took the remaining stock of Ogden's and Laphroaig into the bathroom and emptied the bottles into the grimy toilet.
Then she cleaned house.
The dreams had left her alone since.
Most of the time.
***
Monday, 13 January 1996, 9:27 p.m.
Yet it had all come to nothing, hadn't it?
Amelia looked at the liquid that was rippling in the glass as she gave it a gentle twirl.
The Dark Side were getting stronger by the day. She'd known when she'd heard the Potter boy talk about Dementors in Little Whinging. Her investigations had been obstructed on every possible side, but if there was one thing she had always prided herself on, it was that she knew when someone told the truth.
Their ranks were swelling. More and more wizards and witches were noticing how the wind was blowing and turned their coats accordingly. And the Dark Side had the werewolves, were going for the giants, could be sure of the Dementors. All those beings to whom the wizarding community wouldn't grant a decent place, who were relegated to the fringes of a society that had the cheek of being surprised when its outcasts allied themselves with someone who promised that he'd help them hit back.
Brave wizardkind had refused to live with them, and now brave wizardkind would have to fight them.
Only with what means?
Here she was, a terrier with her teeth pulled out and her tail clipped. Stripped of her powers by a Minister whose motto was "No Panic", mobbed by an Undersecretary who would do everything to sandbag Amelia's work for fear she'd do it too well.
For fear that Amelia had "designs".
Right.
The amber tongues of the double Singleton lapped higher and higher up the inside of the glass as she twirled a little harder. Should she leave it at two inches for the time being, to keep up at least the appearance of taking it slowly?
Or say the hell with it, make it full?
It would be so easy. Wash down the pain, fill up the emptiness, douse your heart and submerge your brain until they resemble something floating in a glass jar at Lovegood's cabinet of curiosities. After all, what difference does it make if you sit at your desk all composed, putting on your bravest face as you ask your incompetent superior whether you may please send an understaffed team of Aurors to die at the hands of the Nameless Man's cronies-or if you lie there in your flat, passed out or barely conscious next to the bottle that's fallen from your hand and that you'd reach for if only you could make yourself, to kill off the ever-present fear of being the last Bones standing; lie there long beyond caring whether you're in your bed or on the kitchen floor, or whether you did or didn't make it into the bathroom before your limbs and your goddamned muscles stopped responding to the fuzzy commands of your cotton-wool brain?
"Tiny glass of Sherry, against the shock?" Dolores had asked with that sugary smirk of hers. "Just a little one?"
Wouldn't that just suit you, Dolores.
Amelia Bones raised the glass to her loved ones departed. To her parents, who had taught their children to believe that they could do anything, which wasn't true but had been a nice thought as long as it lasted. To her troublesome baby brother, who had never stopped believing it. To her Evening Star, who didn't bother with beliefs and just did.
She toasted her loved ones alive, few as they were. Robert, Linda, and no-more-but-still-Baby Susan, who at sixteen should be out dancing, not learning how to fight. She toasted her friend, that half-arsed git who didn't answer owls but had a habit of turning up when you least expected him. And that kitten at the Ministry who would love to see the Terrier fall.
There was an expression of calm in Amelia Bones's face as she got up from the old-fashioned metal-frame chair.
"Cheers," she said.
Took a few steps.
Raised the glass a little higher.
And poured its contents slowly down the kitchen sink.
***~~~***
Epilogue
Tuesday, 21 January 1996, 7:59 a.m.
The face in the grate, more toad-like than ever in the green glow of the Floo fire, looked incredulous.
"Three weeks...as of...today?"
"Yes, Dolores." Amelia Bones stifled a yawn. Sleep had come late that night. "I'd like to take my holiday early this year. To take my mind off things. And I'm not getting any younger, as you know."
"I'm not sure if I can allow this..."
"I would be tremendously grateful to you, Dolores. The opportunity just came up; they usually have a waiting list of half a year at least."
"Who?"
"Oh, just some easy-going resort in the Aegean. All single witches, all friendly..." Amelia took a puff of her Benson & Hedges and brought her face close to the fireplace. Lowering her voice to a conspiratorial tone, she added: "You could come, too, if you wanted to. I'm sure I can get you a recommendation. And a bed."
Dolores Umbridge's cough sent the ashes flying up in Amelia's fireplace. "Well, Amelia, I suppose Dawlish can cover for you while you're away.
"Thank you," Amelia said. Blowing a small cloud of smoke at Dolores's face in the grate, she added, "I knew you'd understand."
***
"How'd it go?" Moody asked as he stepped out of the fireplace in Amelia's office a few minutes past eight.
"A treat." She brushed him off with her hands. Moody didn't have a habit of bothering about dust or soot, and neither did he care for having a wand flicked at him. "I've got three weeks. Now, according to my friend Jane from the London Police-her brother's in my squad-Travers and someone else were spotted in an establishment in Broadwick Street tonight. Imagine that. Apparently he's still got that mark I left on his willy when we arrested him. Other one sounds like Mulciber. I have an appointment with Jane at eight-thirty and plan to take it from there. You on board?"
"Lead on, Bones," Moody said.
Amelia smirked as she tossed Moody an eye patch and a Muggle coat of a less conspicuous colour than the one he was wearing.
She checked her wand before she hid it in the seam of her coat and snipped the remains of a half-smoked cigarette into the fireplace, just where Dolores Umbridge's face had been.
She wasn't a fool. What they were doing was risky, and it could cost her anything from her life to her job.
The Terrier might still go down.
Yet she'd be damned if it the last thing to fall out of her hand would be anything but a wand.
***~~~***