Resurrection

The silence our unexpected visitor left in his wake was deafening. I didn't even know where to start - it was a toss up between the outrageous claims Harry fecking Potter had made about me being a witch and the fact that the most important people in my, well, existence, I suppose, had lied to me. Then there was my death. I didn't like the troubled look on Harry's face when I told him how I died. I knew how I died. It was quick and painless. One moment I'd been walking to my car, the next I was in the Void. So where did he get off looking at me like that?

"Lothy, you do understand I gave you an abbreviated version of my name because there was a fair chance I'd been the one to kill you?" Lert - no, Gellert - asked. "And after you told me about those books, about the Hallows. Was I to tell you then?"

I hesitated, briefly, and snuck a glance at Marv - no, Voldemort - who simply raised an eyebrow at me in challenge. I really hadn't wanted to get into this, I realized miserably, not until all of that nonsense about me being a witch and having somehow known Harry was cleared up. But Gellert wasn't leaving me much of a choice.

"I understand that," I said at last, "but you're missing the point. It's not your reasons for not telling me that I take issue with, it's the fact that you didn't - "

That they didn't trust me, I finished lamely in my mind, at a loss for words that could be said aloud. They did trust me, that much was self-evident. When I thought of all the little bits and pieces about their lives that they had surrendered, I couldn't say they didn't. My boys were Dark Lords, of course they were paranoid.

It was such a laughably obvious thought that I wanted to cry. My boys were Dark Lords. They were paranoid, powerful, endlessly charismatic leaders that could convince men to die for their respective causes. Of course they would stumble when it came to friendship, to trust. I was fairly certain they weren't using me; there wasn't much use to be had of me that they couldn't have gotten as easily as all the other spirits that had come to live in Portach-upon-Styx.

I might have been the only ghost in the Void that could conjure things, but I'd offered freely the fruits of my not-quite-labour to anyone that came across us. Food, shelter, luxuries. We didn't need it to survive, being dead and all, but it made being forever bound to an endless desert a lot more bearable than it would have been otherwise.

There was no need to be my 'friend' to share in my gift. And there certainly was no need to stay in the flat above my bakery with me, when I would have so happily conjured them any sort of dwelling they pleased. We were friends, or at least as close to friends as two Dark Lords far older than they looked could come with a silly Irish girl who liked to read any and every type of book and hum while she baked.

"That we did not…?" Gellert pressed, and I could almost sense his patience wearing thin. What the forecast was for the man I knew to be as changeable as the sea during a storm, I couldn't guess, but I knew it was best to appease him or he'd be impossible.

"I wish you could have trusted me," I answered simply, "but I understand why that wasn't really an option for you. So consider yourselves forgiven. But I might call you Lerty every so often, Gellert. I rather like it."

Lerty was probably not the most appropriate way to refer to a wizard who was hailed as the most powerful Dark Wizard of all time until Voldemort outdid him, (in Britain, at least) but in comparison to Harry's absurd story about me being a powerful witch and heir to an ancient line, it seemed almost normal.

"Of course, Spatzi," Gellert crooned, lazy triumph warming every syllable of the words. "Whatever it is you wish."

I fought back a bit of a smirk as he petted my hair in his casually familiar manner; he was laying it on a bit thick, wasn't he? Marv, I mean Tom, snorted belligerently under his breath, no doubt thinking the same as I was.

"You do not speak for me, Gellert." He reproached sharply, his eyes a dark hunter green in the dim light of the Void. "I make no apologies for my actions; my name is my own and if I do not see fit to share it, I will not."

Instead of taking offence at his high-handed manner, I grinned.

"I'm going to call you Tom from now on," I informed him impertinently. "And you're forgiven whether you like it or not."

He sneered at me, but said nothing else, instead fixing his gaze intently ahead of him. Gellert's grin had gone from one of cosy smugness to something more similar to the enthusiastic baring of teeth in greeting of our newly returned visitor. I hadn't even noticed him come up. Or appear. Whatever the Master of Death did these days.

"Right - " Harry began, and was so much like the Harry I'd read about and seen in the movies that I rather wanted to laugh. "Right. I forget that you lot are…new."

He was like a weary professor addressing a group of rowdy teenagers.

"Just - oh, never mind it. Lothiriel, have you, er, come to grips with everything?"

"Harry, if you think I'm a witch, you're mad," I informed him, feeling distinctly uncomfortable. "And I'm dead, in case you haven't noticed."

Harry waved a hand dismissively.

"Not any more mad than a person who decides to play house with the darkest wizards of all time," Harry reasoned, making me flush brilliant red. "And being dead isn't as permanent a status as people seem to think it is. I would know."

He held my gaze thoughtfully until I looked away, and for a moment, it almost seemed possible, that I was who he thought I was. For a moment, at least.

"Alright, say for a moment that you haven't lost the plot completely and you do know me from one of your previous lives." I began, struggling with my well justified scepticism. "Your plan is to bring me back to life somehow as a witch in your world and then…what? Will I be reborn into some random family? I don't much fancy being a baby again. Will I just appear out of nowhere, no money or papers or connections to get by with? How am I supposed to do all those things you think I will without resources?"

If, and I do mean if, I were actually going to be sent to his world, well…that meant I would be leaving the Void. I wasn't sure how I felt about that. On the one hand, getting a chance to be a witch and use magic sounded fantastic! On the other, I would be swept up in the war with Voldemort, possibly harmed and killed if Harry's vague description of my involvement was to be believed. Possibly tortured and killed, even.

I wasn't convinced that leaving the closest friends I had ever had and the town I had created was worth what might end up being a horrible, agonizing death. Leave my comfortable, happy existence as a ghost to face an uncertain future without my friends, without family or fortune to pave the way? No; a Gryffindor I was definitely not.

"You won't be a baby," Harry assured me patiently. "And you won't lack for anything. As long as you can get to Gringotts, a couple drops of blood will solve all your problems. From there you can figure things out yourselves, I think. Tom and Grindelwald will have wands, so they should manage getting you there alright."

I started, and I wasn't the only one. Well, I was the only one who jolted in my seat as though I had been shocked; Tom and Gellert straightened a little in surprise, but other than Tom's scowl at being addressed by name gave no other indication of their thoughts.

"Ourselves?" I parroted, bemusement colouring my tone. "You mean, Gellert and Tom…they'd come back with me?"

Because letting Gellert Grindelwald and Lord Voldemort loose on the unsuspecting magical population was a brilliant idea.

"Why not?" Harry asked flippantly. "It'll be like having your own Crabbe and Goyle. You can never be too safe these days, you know."

I choked on a lungful of air at the image of Tom and Gellert standing on either side of Draco Malfoy like hired thugs and hurriedly pushed it aside for fear of one of the two Dark Lords in question reading my mind. Tom, at least, I knew was far more than proficient enough in legilimency to do so.

But loosing Grindelwald and Voldemort on the world?!

"I - " Oh God, what on earth could I say in response to that? I wasn't so disloyal that I would argue against allowing my boys to roam the earth, but it was disaster waiting to happen! "Wouldn't it be dangerous? What if people recognized them?"

Judging from the barely contained amusement on Harry's face, he was well aware that my expression of concern was reserved, not for my boys, who would surely face lifetime upon lifetime in Azkaban for what they'd done, but for any persons unfortunate enough to recognize and attempt to dispense justice on them. I didn't dare sneak a glance at either of the boys at my side, but then, I hardly needed to. Gellert, no doubt, would be grinning with roguish satisfaction. Tom, of course, wouldn't condescend to make his amusement plain on his face, but the hint of a smirk would grace his mouth anyway.

"I don't think you need to worry about anyone but Dumbledore recognizing them, really," Harry mused conversationally. "And even then, with Grindelwald in Nurmengard and Voldemort out there as a wraith, no one will be able to prove anything. As for any other, er, difficulties that might arise, I'm sure you'll have it all under control."

I opened my mouth to object, because honestly, he couldn't have expected me to be able to step in if Voldemort or Grindelwald decided to have a go at some unlucky aurors, but Harry wasn't done.

"By the way," he continued conversationally, and twisted a heavy looking ring off his finger to hold out to me expectantly. "I, Harry James Potter, Lord of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Potter, Lord of the Noble House of Gryffindor, do hereby name Lothiriel Muliphen Llywarch, daughter of Liam of the House of Loughlin and Gwenda of the House of Llywarch, heir to the House of Gryffindor. That said, I, Harry James Potter, Lord of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Potter, Lord of the Noble House of Gryffindor, do hereby renounce the title of Lord of the Noble House of Gryffindor and pass all responsibilities, rights, powers, and properties associated with it to my heir. So mote it be."

He paused, watching the ring in his hand, and looked quite satisfied when the obnoxious ruby set in the centre of it flashed brightly in recognition of his words.

"Here. Take it," he insisted, as though he hadn't left me and my companions utterly taken aback by the impromptu inheritance ceremony.

I don't think it had quite sunk in yet, really, that he'd apparently made me Gryffindor's heir, but that might have been in part due to another, more pressing objection.

"Now I know you're full of it," I accused, making no move whatsoever to accept the ruby ring being held out to me. "I haven't even got a middle name, and if I did it wouldn't be something as awful sounding as Muliphen!"

"Blame whichever one of your ancestors was a Black," Harry advised sagely, "because it's definitely your name. The school register at Hogwarts doesn't lie."

The implication behind the words was enough to momentarily deflect my ire.

"I'm going to Hogwarts?" I asked, and could literally feel any chances of me deciding to stay behind in Portach-upon-Styx dribble down the drain as it occurred to me that being sent back as a witch meant I could do magic. "To learn how to cast spells and brew potions?"

A smile that was nothing short of knowing fluttered over Harry's face.

"Absolutely. You'll make a great witch, Lothy," he told me sincerely. "And the name Muliphen isn't so terrible. Alright, so it sounds awful, but you always liked what it meant."

It was a weak attempt to console me, but it did, at least, catch my interest.

"My name's Lothiriel Llywarch-Loughlin," I muttered contrarily, and then gave into my curiosity. "What does Muliphen mean, then?"

"It's the name of a star," Tom muttered at my side, speaking for the first time in Harry's presence. "From the constellation Canis Major. It was a popular name in the Black family during the eighteenth century. It means 'star to swear by.'"

His eyes had been fixed on Harry in undisguised loathing since he'd come back, but he spared me a brief glance when he finished speaking as though he was measuring my worth against the name.

"Its use was discontinued when Muliphen Black VI was disowned for eloping with a vampire on her wedding day. Her father, Eridanus Black, was killed in the resulting feud with the DuPont family, who took offence over her rejection of their heir." He continued, glaring venomously at Harry as he spoke. "It was noted in Toujours Pur: A History of One of the Most Prolific Houses in Wizarding History that her uncle, Antares Black II, was so pleased with his elder brother's death and the assets seized through right of conquest after the DuPont family was exterminated that he considered reinstating her as thanks on the condition that she abandon her vampire husband and marry a candidate of his choosing."

The look on my face was probably one of stupefied disbelief, but not for the reason Tom seemed to assume it was.

"She wasn't reinstated," he snapped, as though that was why I was surprised. "Antares was persuaded to see reason; no self-respecting Black would spread her legs for a vampire. To reinstate a classless wretch like her would have been to cast away his newly gained title."

I flushed. Tom wasn't one for crudity, not usually, at least. It was jarring to hear it coming from his mouth, from the same mouth that snapped at Gellert for being too familiar with me. And in such a vicious tone of censure…

"How do you know all that?" I asked instead, putting what he'd said from my mind completely. "I know you were a prodigy and can probably recite whole books from memory, but why on earth do you know about some girl disowned by the Black family?"

It was hardly pertinent information to his quest of purging the Wizarding World of those of supposedly unworthy blood, after all, and hardly what I imagined he would read about for fun. Centuries old pureblood gossip? Hardly worth his precious time.

The glare he turned on me was startlingly malicious; it wasn't that I didn't think him capable of it, especially now that I knew who he was, but he had never…never looked at me that way before. So hatefully, as though I had wronged him.

"You shouldn't have spoken so vulgarly in front of a lady," Gellert reprimanded loftily, his blue-grey eyes cold as he dropped his arm about my shoulders and drew me in close to his side. "Such coarseness should have been abandoned when you left the filthy muggle hovel you were raised in once and for all."

As soon as he mentioned Tom's upbringing, I understood. Tom wasn't one for crudity, but the story of a witch, the pureblood daughter of an ancient line, eloping with a creature wizards considered beneath them? The parallel was too much to ignore. He'd come across it while trying to find his father, I thought with bated breath, a strange, hard sort of pity filling my stomach. He must have read every book on genealogy in the library trying to find him, and come across his mother and her history instead.

I didn't dare do more than glance at Tom to see what his reaction to Gellert's words would be; I was afraid he would read the understanding in my face.

Tom didn't stand, it would have been beneath him to bolt out of his seat and lose his head like a Gryffindor, but there was murder written on his face and anyone would have been a fool to miss it. Gellert didn't seem to care, though; he grinned as though he'd snatched the last of a hand-made batch of Milchrahmstrudel right from under Tom's nose.

"You lot are impossible," Harry accused, staring at us in a manner that was distinctly unimpressed as he single-handedly cut down the tension between my boys before it came to anything. Tom glared him down hard for the interruption, but Gellert merely studied him with a clinical sort of curiosity. Harry, true to form, ignored them both. "Except for you, Lothy. A bit difficult, maybe, but never impossible."

"Thank you?" I ventured unsurely as Gellert began to stroke my hair.

"For saying that you're only a bit difficult, or for making you Lady Gryffindor?" Harry inquired innocently. I blanched a shade of white previously unknown to man.

"I didn't accept the ring," I reminded him, for some reason feeling particularly at odds with the title he was trying to bestow upon me. "So I'm not Lady anything."

Gellert's fingers trailed to my cheek, his arm around me tightening as though he understood better than I did why my shoulders were suddenly tense and my breathing a little shallow. Harry watched us thoughtfully.

"No," he said at last, his voice almost pitying. "Not yet, at least. But you are Heir until you go to Gringotts for an inheritance test to get your titles officially, and before you argue, I would take a look at your left hand."

I did, and was startled to see a ruby ring of a design similar to the one he had offered me but less grand snugly wrapped around my middle finger.

"Listen," Harry interjected before I could protest. "There isn't much time. You'll probably be sent back any minute now, probably, since I only expected this would take a quarter of an hour and we must be at the tail end of that. Lothiriel, never forget that you're a good person, alright? No matter what happens. You are the most worthy witch in the world; you deserve everything given to you and you are not weak. You're going to be brilliant, and if you ever need proof of it, just remember that not any witch could keep these two in hand."

I flinched, and tried to draw away from him, away from Gellert, away from Tom. His words cut, though I knew he meant them kindly; they cut me to the quick and I wanted nothing more than to sink into the floor and disappear. And keeping these two in hand? Voldemort and Grindelwald? Friends or not, they would kill me for the presumption!

"Calm down, Lothy." Harry instructed kindly. "Death will send you back to January 31st, 1991. You've been granted permission to take Tom and Gellert back with you; they'll have their wands when they arrive, which should make things easier for you. You'll have to make your own way to Gringotts, but once you do you'll have access to your vaults and properties, so you should be alright."

"Permission?" I repeated, my mind working furiously at the implication. We would be sent back to '91, that was Harry's first year. Better still, we would have more than seven months before school to start…to start hunting down horcruxes.

Harry nodded but the movement was nearly lost to me in my sudden understanding. You made my life good, he'd told me. You gave me the chance at normality I've always wanted. What else could that mean but that I'd somehow, with the help of Gellert and Tom, managed to cut his Voldemort down at the knees so that he could deliver the finishing blow without losing so much? Saving Sirius, which I would do without hesitation either way, would not be a significant enough change to allow Harry 'normality.' To give him what he implied I would give him, to make this life of all the lives he'd lived the best…

I would have to save everyone.

"Could you get permission for another person?" I asked before I even really thought about it; as soon as the words had left my mouth, though, my resolve strengthened. "Can we bring someone else back with us?"

Harry looked taken aback.

"Well, yes? It would depend on who, I think. For one," he began, brow furrowed, "they would have to be from the Void to even be considered, which narrows your options down to dark wizards, basically. Who were you thinking of?"

A Death Eater would definitely meet that condition.

"Regulus Black," I replied instantly. He didn't deserve to die as he did, or at least, the way he died made up for whatever sins he committed as a Death Eater, as brief as his tenure as one was. He knew about the horcruxes and could help us hunt them down.

Harry drew away from me a little, an inscrutable expression on his face.

"Sorry, not him." His features twisted into a fleeting expression of regret at the dismay on my face and he hastily corrected them. "He's…not here. In the Void. Not all dark wizards go to the Void; Merlin didn't, although Morgana did."

He nodded at me, and I chose not to think of the significance of those two names.

"If he was an option, Lothiriel, I'm sure he'd gladly help you," Harry assured me, and then glanced at his watch. "Time's nearly up. Right. So, I'm not actually sure where you're going to appear since you never told me, but supposedly it all worked out so I'm assuming you all appear together. When you get to your vault, you'll find an amulet that looks a bit like a time-turner but isn't one. It's vital that you put it on right then; it's more important than your family ring, alright? It'll protect you from legilimency, which I'm sure you'll appreciate the need for, and, well, you find the other bit out when you read the book."

I had no idea what he was on about and it must have shown on my face because he laughed awkwardly and waved away my uncertainty and then suddenly frowned in concentration.

"I feel like I'm forgetting something," he started, brow furrowing further. "Oh, right. Trust the vampires that share your blood, don't accept sweets from, actually, don't accept sweets from anyone unless they've been so thoroughly checked for spells and potions that Mad-Eye would eat them, remember your namesake when you can't place the picture, and whatever you do, do not under any circumstances whatsoever - "

I never got the chance to hear what he said because the wind picked up and the ground began to shake beneath us, and though Harry looked perfectly still in the centre of all the pandemonium, Gellert and Tom were caught up in it just as I was.

The world began to spin around us, forming a furious, unremitting vortex that threatened to swallow up the entire expanse of the Void; Gellert clutched me in a grip so tight it hurt as we were lifted off the bench on which we sat and Tom was lost to the groaning hurricane of shadow. I clung to Gellert as best I could, but the force of the wind buffeting us was too strong to fight; the last I saw of him was his outstretched hand and then he was gone and so was everything else.

For a long, miserable moment, I was alone in the dark, in a nothingness more absolute than there had ever been in the Void. And then -

And then I was spat out into a well-lit, cosy-looking kitchen.

"What you doin' in here?" A frightened voice squeaked, startling me nearly out of my wits.

Nearly out of my wits. Nearly.

"Are you Winky?" I asked upon recognizing her, as though I hadn't met her but was aware I would be meeting a house elf at my destination.

She nodded warily.

"You's not supposed to be in here," she accused, looking timid for all that I was aware she was probably preparing herself to expel me from the property before notifying her master.

"It's alright," I assured her, my stomach sinking as I prayed my ruse would work. "Mr. Crouch sent me. I'm here about…" I lowered my voice to nearly a whisper. "I'm here about Barty Jr. It's probably a false alarm, but Mr. Crouch couldn't risk summoning you to the Ministry or nipping back to warn you."

She still looked alarmed, though hopefully more so because of what I was implying than because she didn't trust me.

"I'm bound by the Unbreakable Vow never to reveal the truth about your mistress and how she switched places with Barty." I continued, and surreptitiously crossed my fingers in the folds of the apron I had appeared in for luck. "No one else knows, but a Ministry employee was asking questions about Mr. Crouch's 'guest' that were unsafe to answer. He's sorting everything out right now, but I've been instructed to escort Barty Jr. to safety in the event that Mr. Crouch brings someone round to prove it's just you here."

That sounded plausible enough, didn't it?

"If that happens, I will escort Barty out under his invisibility cloak without magic; once Mr. Crouch has gone or I receive notification that it is safe to return and have Barty Jr. call you, I will bring him safely back to the house and take my leave," I added, figuring that specificity was more in line with what little could be known about Barty Crouch Senior's character. "I doubt it will come to that, though."

Winky seemed far less unsure than she had before, and I fought the urge release the breath I was holding as she nodded.

Where was Gellert? And Tom? Tom had been separated from us first…Didn't Harry say we would arrive together? My head was spinning, whether from the after-effects of returning from the dead or simply from confusion I wasn't sure. What was I doing in Barty Crouch's house, and more importantly, how on earth was I supposed to find Gellert and Tom? Would I even be able to leave the house? Crouch would have had it warded, if only to keep people away from Crouch Jr. Did exiting a property activate wards like trying to enter one? I didn't know how to use any magic and I was wandless besides.

Barty Crouch Jr. was wandless and thus unable to help me even if I promised to take him to Tom, and under the Imperius Curse besides. The only person that could possibly help me get to my friends was Winky, and without Crouch Senior's express order that was unlikely to happen. And unless there happened to be some other person capable of -

My eyes swivelled against their will the vacant expression of the man sitting in the chair not three feet away from me.

If Death believed me capable of keeping Grindelwald and Voldemort in line…then surely a single Death Eater would be manageable? Even if he was mad as a hatter; I had the advantage of being able to promise to deliver him to Tom. I would refrain from bringing it up, though, until I felt I had no other choice.

"Oh!" I exclaimed, making Winky jump. I looked at her apologetically. "Sorry, my ring just buzzed me. It's Mr. Crouch's signal."

Her eyes widened as I flashed the ring Harry had magicked onto me.

"Right," I continued, as though I hadn't startled her purposefully. "I'm sorry, I'm not sure where the door is; I've never been to Mr. Crouch's house before. Would you be so kind as to direct Barty Jr. and I to the door? I'll watch him just beyond the property line until you come get me or Mr. Crouch communicates a false alarm through my ring."

I smiled, sweetly and politely, and when she still looked unsure, I pretended to misunderstand her hesitance.

"Don't worry," I continued gently, "Mr. Crouch told me about the potion Barty is on. I know he's safe to be around as long as he's taken his daily dose."

Still hesitant, I thought, observing her expression. No matter; Tom had taught me well enough to handle this. I had to handle this.

"He has taken his potion, hasn't he?" I asked, trying to sound a little fearful. "Mr. Crouch said he was safe - "

"Master Barty is plenty safe!" Winky insisted, doing a complete one-eighty when it seemed as though I might back out of the plot to keep his existence a secret. "Winky is allowing Master Barty to go with you; Master Barty is safe. Winky will be showing you to the door."

I was torn between the relieved satisfaction I felt at my hastily thrown together plan working and the urge to be sick. I was tricking an innocent being for my own benefit; and worse still, I was plotting to free one of the most dangerous, unstable Death Eaters from imprisonment for the same reason.

"Thank you, Winky," I said magnanimously, even as guilt churned in my stomach and my bottom lip started to quiver. "Thank you very much."

If she lost her job because of me, I would find some way to make it up to her.

"Master Barty must come this way," she encouraged the empty shell that was her master, after giving me a long, funny look for what I'd said. "Master Barty is seeing outside for a little while. Isn't that good, Master Barty?"

There was no response from Barty Jr, but he followed her towards the door with little fuss. Anxiety kicked in again as I wondered if he was going to be able to break through the Imperius Curse's influence at all. He seemed too vacant, as though nothing going on around him was getting through to him at all.

He was covered in his invisibility cloak and Winky permitted me to take hold of his arm to lead him outside. I was careful and conscientious in doing so despite the fact that he was a Death Eater and had helped torture Neville's parents to insanity. He deserved to be treated with dignity just like any other human being, no matter what he had done. It seemed to me as though he wasn't in his right mind, anyway. Aside from being mind-controlled by his father, I amended quietly to myself.

By the time I got him past the property line, I wasn't sure whether I pitied him or was afraid of what he'd be if I was successful in getting through to him.

I didn't know it then, but when I placed my hands on either side of his face and started murmuring encouragement to him, begging him to wake up, I set in motion a chain of events that had, in a bizarre way, gone full circle and ended as it begun. He was a brilliant, brilliant wizard, I told him; if anyone could break through the Imperius it was him. Fight, I pleaded. He needed to fight his father's will; he needed to overcome, overpower him. And when it looked as though my cause was lost, I tried a different tactic.

"The Dark Lord needs you, Barty Crouch Jr," I whispered heatedly at him, resisting the urge to give him a little shake. "Your lord needs you."

I didn't know it then, but the sight of my stupid, freckly face and long, strawberry blonde braids would be the first thing Barty remembered without the haze of his father's Imperius since he'd been smuggled out of the dark of Azkaban. My face, like a particularly incriminating mug shot, would be forever a symbol of rapturous freedom, to one day be picked out of Barty's mind by a curious legilimens.

Of course, I didn't know that then.

The only thing I knew was Barty's hands abruptly there around my throat and the awful, awful thought that Gellert and Tom were going to die with me and it would all be my fault for being so stupid as to think I could keep a weak, wandless Death Eater in line.

"Who are you to speak of the Dark Lord?" He snarled, eyes alight with madness. He'd taken one look at my bare forearm and rightly assumed I wasn't a Death Eater. "Who sent you?"

I was some fecking chancer, wasn't I, thinking for a minute that loosing Barty Crouch Jr from beneath his father's thumb would somehow work out. Gellert, who was probably somewhere seeing the sun for the first time in nearly sixty years, was going to die because of my stupidity. Tom, who had wanted to live so badly he tore his soul to shreds to make sure he would always do so, would have that life snatched away from him because I decided to trust a man I knew to be a murderous, raving lunatic.

The sunshine hitting my face was a cruel reminder of what I was taking away from them. Black spots danced across my vision, looking almost like magic in their strange vividness. I was disconnected, somehow, from my body's desperate struggle for air. My mouth tried vainly to form some sort of response independently of me.

In fact, it rather felt like I was leaving my body.

"Answer me," he snarled, and then faltered. His hands loosened on my throat as his gaze sharpened on my face.

I came back to myself with alarming alacrity as air flooded my lungs and I could breathe again. Mary and Joseph, I'd nearly died. I'd nearly died and I hadn't cared a whit past being sorry that I would take Gellert and Tom with me.

"I don't - " My head felt as though someone had taken a sledgehammer to it and I still felt too light, as though I were a scant few inches from floating away. "I - "

I was spared whatever punishment I would have gotten for blurting out a wrong answer by a single word uttered by a cold, furious voice.

"Crucio," Tom snarled in a clipped, short tone, his voice teetering between brisk and angry.

The hands at my throat fell away and then Barty was convulsing on the ground, near foaming at the mouth in agony. I watched for a split second in numb horror before finally moving, grabbing Tom's arm and begging him to stop. Barty was too weak from his years under the Imperius; he would die, and even if he had tried to choke the life out of me not a minute ago, there was something achingly pitiable about his writhing form.

"You can't start handing Unforgivables out like fecking candy, Tom!" I tried, when my pleas for Barty's sake left him unmoved. "You'll bring the Ministry down on us and have your wand snapped and then where will we be?"

That stayed his hand, though he lowered his wand with a belligerent scoff.

"Stand up, Barty Crouch," he ordered, his eyes fixed coolly on the shivering mass that was one of his most devoted followers. "And beg forgiveness of the woman who has returned your master to this world when none of you faithful could do so."

Barty groaned on the floor; it was horrible to watch.

Tom's face twisted into an inhuman sneer and Barty screamed. It was a discordant sound, half agony and half rapture; he clutched at his forearm in adoring awe as though it was the Lamb of God itself stamped there and drew himself up onto his knees.

"My lord," he breathed, his shaky fingers reverently pulling back his sleeve to reveal his writhing Dark Mark. "My lord, you have returned! How?"

In that moment, Tom's face was truly something terrible to behold.

"Am I your lord?" Tom asked so silkily that it felt as though his voice were a tangible shadow slipping silently over my skin. "A loyal servant would have done as I commanded before presuming to question his master."

Barty's face went chalk white.

"Master, forgive me," he pleaded and then, as though catching himself, turned to me. "I beg your forgiveness, Miss. Had I known you had truly been sent by the Dark Lord I would never have presumed to lay a hand on you. I have offered you great insult and in doing so greater insult to my lord who favours you. Forgive me."

I nodded with a slight, not-as-sincere-as-it-could-have-been smile while wondering how on earth he'd gone from sounding like a deranged lunatic to somewhat of a gentleman.

"He owes you a debt of honour," Tom hissed to me, and I was startled to find that I understood what he was saying, "for offering you insult. Accept his apology; his family magic will bind you in contract until the debt is repaid. You may be grateful for it later."

"I - " I began, and was startled to hear myself hiss. I cleared my throat and thought very hard of my mum's distinct accent, so different from me and my father's despite years of living in Athy. "You had only just broken out of the Imperius after years of being controlled. Your actions were understandable, given that trauma. I forgive you."

"You see how gracious she is?" Tom asked him softly, tilting his head towards me with a glint in his eyes that made me decidedly uncomfortable. "The lady who has done me such great service is none other than the heir of the House of Merlin. I would be very displeased if I were to hear of another incident of you offering her insult."

Barty goggled at me for a brief instant, and only when he had stopped in bemusement did I notice that he had been flicking his tongue like a snake since the instant he'd broken through the Imperius. He recovered quickly, though, and was soon all but literally pressing his forehead to the tips of Tom's shoes. I was sure that if Tom had been wearing robes, and not the muggle clothes he'd worn in the Void, Barty would have been kissing the hem of them.

"Tom, we should go," I murmured quietly, glancing around the street. No one had come running to see who was screaming, so I presumed Tom had put up some sort of silencing charm before torturing Barty. "You can side-along us both, right?"

It sounded awkward coming out of my mouth, side-along, as though I had an infinite amount of experience in such things. I only knew what it was from reading it in the books; Tom had a wand and could get us out of there, away from Winky who would surely begin to suspect something was wrong if we took much longer to answer her or escape.

My stomach churned anxiously at the thought of aurors swooping down on us. Where was Gellert? Oh, I knew he'd be alright; Harry had said he'd get his wand, same as Tom, after all. But I wished he was with us. I hadn't been without him since we'd met.

"Bartemius Crouch," Tom said softly, almost sounding fond in a strange, mocking way. "Will you join your lord, serve him once more as you did in the past? Will you hold to the oaths of allegiance you swore to your master?"

"Always, my lord!" Barty vowed fervently, his eyes bright with manic devotion. "I am loyal! If it wasn't for my blasted father I'd have scoured the world searching for you!"

Tom smiled, and it was a feral, terrible smile. He knew Barty's story from me, of course. It sickened me to realize the possible consequences of the harmless set of books sitting on a shelf in the library of the flat Gellert, Tom, and I shared above my bakery.

This was not the Tom I knew. This was not Voldemort, either. This was the Dark Lord, entirely at ease in his element, at himself at last with a disciple prostrate at his feet.

"Lothiriel," he commanded then, offering me his arm. I took it, fighting the urge to latch onto him like a limpet for fear of being lost or worse, splinched. Harry's description of apparating made it sound far from appealing, and though I knew Tom's skill to be second to none, I hadn't had the benefit of experiencing his ability.

"Barty," he ordered sharply, as though he were speaking to a misbehaved dog. Barty took hold of his arm, looking more alive than I felt, for all that his face was ashen and white, his hands still trembling from the force of Tom's Cruciatus Curse.

I didn't see Tom so much as wave his wand before we disappeared with a pop and were squeezed out into a dimly lit room of dark stone of which the title of most notable feature seemed to be a tie between the utter lack of windows and the foreboding presence of chains hooked to the wall.

"Tom…?" I questioned nervously, glancing back at him and feeling almost relieved to see the slightest touch of amusement on his face.

"Welcome to Nurmengard, Lothiriel. Do make yourself comfortable; apparently the price of an inheritance test was not included in our resurrection package and as such, until we manage to beg, borrow, and steal enough money to cover the cost, this is our new home."

If Tom's savage, scathing tone was any indication, he was displeased with the oversight and our current predicament. And if Tom was displeased, I was terribly, terribly afraid of what Gellert would be. Welcome to Nurmengard, indeed.