A/N: I feel awful for taking so long to update, I think this is the longest I've ever gone without uploading a new chapter. I've just been so much busier than I was expecting this past couple of weeks, what with A-Level results coming in and sorting uni stuff out. Anyway, here's the final chapter of this volume. I'll try and get the next one started as soon as possible, but I'm not sure when that'll be. When I start uni I'll probably have barely any time for writing at all, so really sorry in advance if the updates start to become really infrequent. I'm not giving up on this though; I fully intend to finish it.

Part Two, Chapter Thirty

When Barty had told her the hotel was in Mayfair Gwen had been expecting something luxurious, and she wasn't too sure what to think when he apparated with her to just outside what appeared to be a rather ordinary looking office block. The building was just off a main street and Gwen could see muggle traffic driving past the road end, but there'd been nobody around to see them apparate. Looking up at it, Gwen could see no lights were on in any of the windows and it appeared to be locked up for the night. She gave a slight frown, unsure as to whether this was where they were supposed to be or not. Noticing her slightly puzzled expression, Barty gave her a grin as they crossed to the doors, which he opened with a wave of his wand and a muttered, "Alohomora." Then he pushed the door open and stood to one side to allow her in, grinning as he said, "Ladies first."

They entered the building and Gwen looked around at the dark lobby. It really did appear to be just a muggle office block, and she couldn't work out how they were supposed to be getting to the hotel. "Okay, Barty, where are we going?" she asked as they crossed the lobby towards the lifts opposite the entrance.

"You'll see," he replied with a wink, not giving her any further explanation as he punched the button for the lift. It arrived and the pair of them stepped inside and waited for the doors to close.

Gwen looked at Barty with an eyebrow raised, still rather perplexed, and he grinned at her as he waved his wand over the panel with the buttons for the floors. The buttons for levels twelve and thirteen slowly inched apart from each other and another button with "12.5" stamped in the middle of it materialised between them.

Finally understanding, Gwen made an, "Oh," sound as Barty pressed the button for the additional floor.

The lift began to move smoothly upwards and Barty took hold of Gwen's hand and gave it a squeeze, before the doors slid open again to allow them out into the foyer of the Circe Hotel.

Now this was more like what Gwen had been expecting. The floor was made of smooth black marble and in front of them was a check-in desk made of polished granite with a glass top. The walls were white plaster, and looking up Gwen could see Greco-Roman patterns on the coving and murals of wizarding mythology on the ceiling. Despite being impressed by it all, she still couldn't help but worry about how on earth Barty had managed to afford it. He'd told her he was using the money she'd made him from buying stocks on his behalf, but she knew that hadn't been all that much and there was always the risk that the markets would take an unfavourable turn and he'd lose that money very quickly. She really hoped he hadn't spent a completely stupid amount coming here, but the more she looked round the more she began to suspect that was the case.

And if he couldn't afford to stay here on a regular basis, where had he been living these past couple of weeks?

She didn't particularly want to bring it up while they were checking in and the receptionist was there listening, but she decided she was going to make a point saying something once they'd got to their room. No matter what he said to her, she still couldn't help but worry about him. However, as they reached the room and Barty opened the door to the suite to lead her inside she barely had time to even register what the room looked like, let alone say anything, before he'd suddenly shut the door behind them and pressed his lips to hers again.

She made an initial noise of surprise and then kissed him back enthusiastically. She still wanted to talk to him, but now they were on their own she wasn't exactly going to try to stop him doing this.

He pulled her over towards the bed – not exactly trying to rush, but there was something about his movements that was rather insistent. He kept his lips locked on hers as he gently pushed her towards the edge of the bed, and as she began to lie back on it she pulled him down on top of her. He had his hands on her hips and hadn't started trying to undress her yet, so she took the initiative and reached up to undo his bow tie. As she made the movement his tongue was still deep inside her mouth, but she felt him give a slight moan of protest and he suddenly pulled back from her.

It was quite a sudden movement from him and Gwen immediately worried that she'd done something wrong. The evening had been going great so far and she couldn't think what had prompted him to do that. He was still kneeling on the bed over her and she searched his face for any sign of what the problem was, but his expression seemed fairly neutral and she couldn't work it out. "Just a second," he murmured, before reaching inside his jacket to take out his wand.

Realising he intended to turn the lights out again, Gwen suddenly reached a hand out to close around his and forced him to lower the wand. "You, er…you know you don't have to," she muttered shyly, blushing bright red but at the same time resolved that if this relationship was going anywhere they couldn't keep doing this in the dark. She trusted him. Or at least she wanted to trust him, and maybe that was why she was doing this.

He just stared at her for a couple of seconds, seemingly taken aback. "Really? You're sure you're alright with that?"

She bit her lip nervously and then nodded. "Yes."

He remained silent for a few moments, as if trying to decide what he wanted to do. It occurred to her that she hadn't asked him if he was okay with it and was about to say something, but then he smiled at her. "Alright," he said, leaning down again and pressing another kiss to her lips but pulling away again quickly. "Just give me five minutes," he said as he got up off the bed and walked over towards the door to the bathroom, which he closed behind him without looking at her.

Gwen stared after him for a couple of seconds, beginning to worry that maybe she'd given him the wrong answer. He hadn't exactly seemed irritated by or uncomfortable with her response, but there seemed to be something a little off about his reaction to it. Still, if he did have a problem with it he would surely have said something – he wasn't the kind to hide what he was really thinking.

Gwen sighed and laid back down on the bed, feeling her stomach begin to squirm with nerves. Everything about the evening had been great so far, and she really didn't want anything to go wrong now. Despite their argument the other day and despite how much worry he kept causing her, she still loved being around him. But that didn't stop her feeling nervous.

With another sigh she got up off the bed and crossed to the window. The curtains were still open, and looking out she could see the twinkling lights of the city below. London was a busy place, and she vaguely wondered if anybody below might happen to be looking up at her right now. Then she remembered this floor was probably invisible to muggles from the outside. She stared out at the lights of the traffic below, trying to distract herself from the fluttering feeling in the pit of her stomach, but there really wasn't much to hold her attention very long. Just as she was about to turn away from the window and draw the curtains when something caught her attention.

On the outside window ledge, just the other side of the glass, was a beetle. If it had just been an ordinary looking beetle she would probably have thought nothing of it at all, but she noticed that this one was rather peculiar looking. Perhaps not the most interesting thing in the world, but it was something to concentrate on while she waited for Barty to finish in the bathroom. Bending closer to the glass, she squinted her eyes slightly to get a better look at it and block out the reflection from inside the room. It was quite large, for a beetle, and emerald green in colour. Gwen thought she could make out strange spotted markings on its head, but just as she was leaning even closer to get a better look a sudden movement on the other side of the glass caused her to jump back in shock.

A rat had appeared on the window ledge outside, seemingly having leapt from one of the drainpipes running down the outside of the building. The beetle scarpered, flying off just as the rat landed right next to where it had been sitting. Once Gwen had recovered from the initial shock of the rat appearing from nowhere, she leant closer to the window again and gave it a scowl. She hated rats. And what the hell was it doing here anyway? It wasn't like rats were the kind of creature that normally scaled twelve storeys of a building for no apparent reason. As she continued to frown at it she noticed that one of its front toes was missing, and she wondered if it had perhaps escaped from a bird's nest that was somewhere on the building above them. Perhaps some crow or something had taken it home for food and bitten one of its toes off, and then…

Actually, she didn't want to think about that. Her stomach was squirming enough as it was without her squeamishness adding to the sensation. Shooting the rat one final glare, she drew the curtains and then went to sit back down on the bed. She'd only been there a couple of seconds when the bathroom door opened again and Barty walked out, with his bow tie undone and the top few buttons of his shirt open. He'd taken his suit jacket off and tossed it over the back of a nearby chair before crossing over to the bed. "Sorry. Anyway, where were we?" he said as he leaned in to kiss her again.

He'd been smiling as he said it, but for some reason Gwen felt a sudden sense of unease come over her. She couldn't even specify why, but as his lips met hers again she suddenly tensed up. He noticed she didn't respond, keeping her mouth firmly closed, and he pulled back a few inches and gave her a concerned look. "Gwen?"

As quickly as it had come on the feeling passed, and Gwen wondered why she'd even felt it at all. "Sorry," she muttered, not giving him any time to respond before she began kissing him again.

He seemed quite happy to let her carry on and pushed his tongue forward to explore deeper inside her mouth. As she lay back down on the bed he climbed on top of her so that his knees were either side of her thighs, and she moved her hands to his back to pull him even closer to her. He kicked his shoes off and then lowered himself down even further so that she could feel his weight pressing down on top of her.

This felt good. Once again, she found she was putting off talking to him about something important, but when they were both enjoying something this much it could wait. He pulled back from her lips ever so slightly as he sat up again, pulling her with him as he moved his hands over her shoulders and down her back. She felt him fiddling with the fastenings on her dress, trying to get it off, and when he didn't manage it in a few seconds he made a noise of irritation and scowled. "How the fuck does that work?" he muttered, and Gwen saw his cheeks colour slightly as instead he moved his hand down her leg to pull off her shoes.

She gave a slight chuckle as she bent her leg round his hip to make it easier for him. "Hook and eye and a zip. It's not that hard," she said, teasing him as she wrapped her hands round the back of his neck and pulled his face closer to hers again. He didn't say anything, but made a slightly disgruntled noise in response as they resumed kissing. She let her left hand move up to run through his hair while she returned the other one to his chest and began to unbutton the rest of his shirt. He hadn't tried to undo her dress again, seemingly still embarrassed about having not managed it the first time, and let her unfasten his shirt and pull it off his shoulders. They continued kissing as Gwen helped Barty untangle his arms from the material, both of them with their eyes closed, still shy despite having agreed to leave the lights on. As it finally came off and Gwen tossed it to the floor Barty returned his hands to her back, trying to undress her again. She was taken by surprise as she felt some kind of material brush against her skin, and she opened her eyes and drew back from him slightly, trying to see what it was.

As he noticed she was pulling away he opened his eyes too and looked at her with a slightly worried expression, returning his hands to her waist as he realised she wasn't close enough to reach round any more. She glanced down at his left arm, and felt a sudden rush of horror as she saw the bandage wrapped round it. Wide eyed, she glanced back up at his face, and as she noticed his uncomfortable expression the sense of unease she'd felt earlier returned. "Barty," she said apprehensively, "What's that?"

He very quickly tried to hide his worried expression with one of nonchalance. "It's nothing," he replied, and she could tell his casual tone was forced, "Don't worry about it. It isn't important." He tried to stop her asking anything further by shutting her up with a kiss, put she put up a hand to stop him leaning any closer.

"No, seriously, Barty. What did you do to it?" she asked firmly, definitely worried by what she'd seen. If he'd hurt himself then she definitely had reason to be worried, but what was bothering her even more was why he seemed to be trying to hide it.

He stared at her for a few seconds, seemingly annoyed that she was asking, but then sighed. "I spilt revealant potion on it at work. Got burnt a bit, that's all," he said, trying to brush it off. "It's not bothering me."

She raised a sceptical eyebrow at him. "Really?"

He gave a hollow laugh, but Gwen thought there seemed to be a slight sense of panic in it, "Look Gwen, I know my father's a bastard, but he's hasn't been quite so horrible that he's driven me to slashing my wrists, if that's what you're thinking."

She just looked at him, still with an uneasy expression and not returning the almost-reassuring smile he was trying to give her. That wasn't what she'd been thinking. She wasn't even sure what thought exactly had crossed her mind, but she suddenly had a very strong sense that she needed to get away from him. Part of her – actually, a very largepart of her – didn't want to. She wanted to make sure he was alright and check that he hadn't hurt himself too badly, but something was telling her that something was wrong. Although she was concerned about him, she knew it wouldn't be wise to let on to him what she was really thinking.

"Alright," she said quietly, sounding much less calm than she'd intended. He took that as an all clear and tried starting to kiss her again, but again she pulled away. She leant forward a little apprehensively to briefly press her lips to his, hoping that would appease him for now, and then drew back from him. "Sorry, I think I need five minutes too," she said, getting up off the bed and crossing to the bathroom. She didn't look at him, but heard the sound of movement behind her. For a moment she felt a rush of panic as she thought he might try and stop her, but then she heard him sigh and sit back down on the bed.

She still didn't look at him as she closed the bathroom door, and then let out a shuddering breath as she turned around to stare at herself in the mirror. She wasn't really taking in the image, instead letting the last minute replay in her mind. Dozens of different explanations were running through her head, and although she knew the real reason could be perfectly innocent she couldn't stop herself fearing the worst. Martijn's words kept coming back to her, no matter how much she tried to stop them, "De Koning was the last person you'd expect to be a Death Eater…" Why was she thinking of that? That wasn't even relevant.

Except she couldn't shake the awful feeling that maybe it was. She knew how Death Eaters marked themselves; it had been reported in the Prophet plenty of times – a Dark Mark tattoo on the inside of the left arm. It would be just in the spot Barty had covered up, and she couldn't stop herself from jumping to conclusions.

Even so, she knew it was a ridiculous notion. There wasn't any reason for her to doubt that he'd just burnt himself with revealant potion - that was used a lot in dark magic investigations and it wasn't exactly implausible that he'd spilt some. But she also got the sense that he was hiding something.

She already knew he'd hidden stuff from her before: lying about why he wanted a loan, and when she'd thought she'd found out the truth about that there'd been the incident with Sander's auroscope. If it turned out that he was hiding a Dark Mark on his arm, then she had to admit it made sense. She was desperately trying to think of a reason for it not to, but the more she tried to recall a time when she had seen his arm clearly without a tattoo she realised she hadn't. If the flippant remark he'd made about slashing his wrists were true then even that would be preferable to what she was starting to suspect. But it wasn't possible, was it?

Was it?

The more Gwen thought about it the more she realised it wasn't quite as ridiculous as she'd assumed. It explained everything: the loan, the auroscope, the secretiveness…but still she didn't want to believe it. Everything made sense except for the way he treated her. All she knew about Death Eaters just didn't hold true with what she knew about Barty. Death Eaters were supposed to be cruel and heartless, but Barty wasn't like that. Maybe he was a little irritable, and he held grudges and liked pissing people off, but he wasn't downright bad. He'd never been anything but perfectly kind towards her, and the more she thought of that the more she felt bad about being so mistrusting of him.

But that didn't get rid of the sense of unease that had settled on her.

As Gwen tried to collect her thoughts together she drew in a deep breath and tried to focus on her reflection in the mirror. The girl staring back looked tired and worried – smudged make up and messed up hair, tired eyes, and a skinny frame that seemed to be shaking ever so slightly. How could Barty possibly have thought I looked beautiful? she thought to herself, but it occurred to her that he had seemed to genuinely mean it when he'd told her that earlier. The thought of that only made her feel worse for being suspicious of him. She was repaying him for being nice to her by showing him complete mistrust, and she knew she didn't have much reason to. She was basing her suspicions almost entirely on the fact that he'd covered up his left arm, and that wasn't really much to go on, was it? Everything she knew about him just didn't fit with what she knew about Death Eaters.

Maybe she really was just being stupid, but just as she considered that she noticed a small purplish mark on the side of her neck as she stared at her reflection. Frowning, she turned her head to the side and leant closer to the mirror to get a better look. Was that…? Oh fuck. Barty had done that. And he hadn't told her. Well, maybe that was one argument to suggest he wasn't quite as sweet as he seemed, but it was still something utterly trivial. It didn't exactly support the notion of him being a Death Eater, did it?

Gwen let out a sigh as she tried to calm herself down. Why was she panicking over this? Surely it would be better to just talk to him to try and get him to be honest with her. Except that every time she tried he kept avoiding her questions. Damn it, he wasn't making it easy for her to not be suspicious, even though she really wanted to be able to trust him. She didn't want to believe he was a Death Eater. She couldn't believe it. It just didn't make sense.

Trying to rationalise the situation wasn't helping. What was she going to do now? Go back out there and carry on as if nothing happened? Or try to find out the truth? Either way, she was going to have to face up to him. She'd left her wand in her bag which was on the floor beside the bed, so she couldn't disapparate out of here even if she wanted to. Just avoiding him wasn't going to be an option, but she'd not really wanted to do that anyway. She had to find out exactly what was going on, and although the logical part of her mind was trying to convince her her suspicions were unfounded, she couldn't stop herself from being scared. Would it be better to confront him, or try and pretend everything was alright?

As she tried to reach a decision as to what to do, she turned on the tap and washed off her make up as best she could, before unpinning her hair. She knew she was just trying to put off the inevitable, but she couldn't stay in here forever. When she was done she turned back to the door and rather timidly opened it, biting her lip nervously as she looked out onto the other side.

Barty was sat on the edge of the bed, and it was obvious he'd been sat watching the door waiting for her to come back. "Sorry," she said, giving him an uneasy smile but trying to act naturally. She crossed to the bed to stand in front of him, not really sure what to do now. Should she just carry on and pretend everything was normal?

Her decision was made for her as Barty suddenly stood up and reached out to firmly grip her shoulders. She immediately stiffened at his touch, but relaxed slightly as she looked up into his face and saw such an earnest expression of affection there. His eyes almost seemed to be pleading with her to trust him, and she felt her suspicions waver. Surely no Death Eater could possibly give her a look like that.

"Barty…" she whispered, and he quickly put a finger to her lips to stop her saying any more.

"I'm sorry, Gwen," he muttered quietly. "What I said was stupid. I didn't mean to trivialise something serious, but I just don't want you worrying about me. I'm fine. Don't think about me anymore now. I just want this evening to be about you, so please just try and relax and have fun."

Gwen looked up at him and studied his face carefully, trying to work out if what he was saying was what he was really thinking. Honestly, she couldn't tell. He could have genuinely meant that, or he could just have been trying to avoid telling her anything again. Nerves were still gripping her and she gave a small shake of her head. "Barty, no. You can't tell me something like that and expect me to just go along with it. Of course I'm going to worry about you. If you've burnt yourself just let me have a look at it, make sure it's alright. I'll feel much better if you do." She was trying to sound caring, but really she was just more desperate to find out if her had in fact been lying to her.

She moved her right hand to take hold of his left arm, but he suddenly snatched it away from her. For a second she thought she saw his eyes flash with anger, but then his pleading expression returned. "Gwen, no, really. It's fine," he said insistently.

"Well, just let me look," she said again, reaching out for his arm. His reluctance to show her was making her even more nervous, but she had to know the truth.

"Gwen, stop it," he snapped, and as she touched his arm he suddenly brought his right hand up to grab hold of her wrist and push it away. The movement took her by surprise and she let out a slight gasp as his fingers closed round her wrist. He had a hard look in his eyes and was gripping her rather tightly, tight enough for it to hurt. As she looked up at him panic suddenly washed over her. He was giving her an angry glare, without a trace of the affection that had been there a moment ago, and it scared her.

This wasn't like him. This wasn't the Barty she was familiar with, and she suddenly realised she was terrified. Something was wrong. Something was so, so wrong.

"Barty, please…" she whispered, struggling to get the words out, and at the evident fear in her voice she suddenly felt his grip go slack. Gazing up into his eyes she saw his expression soften. For a moment he looked disgusted with himself for hurting her, but then he drew in a deep breath and let go of her arm.

He looked down at her for a moment, seeming to be trying to reach a decision with himself. Still unnerved, Gwen didn't say anything, but instead waited to see what he would do next. She didn't think he was going to hurt her, but she knew he could be about to do something else that was just as bad.

A few seconds passed in silence before he spoke again, reaching his left arm out to her as he did so.

"Go on then," he growled softly, speaking it almost as if it were a challenge. "If it means that much to you, take the bandage off."

A/N: Yes, I'm leaving it there. This is your season finale cliffhanger, I suppose. There's a bit of a twist to come next time though, because I plan on more or less re-writing this chapter but from Barty's POV. That might make things a bit more interesting.

Sorry if this chapter felt a bit disjointed at times. It's been really difficult to write because I've not had any time to just sit down and write it all in one go, so I had to do this in lots of little bits. I'm worried it doesn't really flow properly, or it jumps around and not everything's explained properly, so if I get chance I'm going to go over it and try and improve it. For now though I'm going to try and focus on getting new stuff written.

I've worked out how I'm going to to divide this story up into different sections, so I'm going to make this the last chapter of volume two because there's a new plot arc opening up in the next one now that Gwen and Barty's circumstances have quite clearly changed dramatically. I think I may make a point of ending each volume on a cliffhanger until we get to the end (or not... we'll see ;) ).

Again, I apologise for leaving you three weeks without an update. I'm really going to try and make sure I get the next part up sooner than that this time. Huge thanks to everyone who's reviewed, you're all awesome and if I could send you all a giant thank you cake I would!