End of July 1993. England. Potter again.
The rust-streaked tin bowl was filled with a brown stew with chunks of strange reddish-gray meat. Some of these chunks even had traces of matted fur on them—apparently, the contents of this peculiar stew had been running around the dump and meowing that morning.
If someone had told Harry two years ago that he would enjoy a horrible brew with a smell that would be nauseating to an ordinary person, he would have grimaced in disgust and called the speaker crazy. But not now.
"It's cozy here ," Dobryak rumbled gutturally. "Cozy and nice. Isn't it a blessing?"
Harry agreed with him. It was almost as warm and wonderful here as the Weasleys' house. Only... better. Because in the red-haired family's house the call of the warp was not felt so strongly. The voice of Grandfather Nurgle.
Nodding gratefully to the fat cook in a greasy semblance of an apron, the boy with emerald-green eyes picked up a similarly rusty spoon and began to eat. This was happening in Reverend Andy's "garbage church", in its conditional "backyard" - a relatively flat area under the open sky, compressed on all sides by mountains of garbage. Apparently, the Reverend's flock had grown enough to no longer fit in the "dining room" that Harry had seen a year ago.
- Yes, my friend, we have more people, - Snot, sitting opposite Potter, mumbled, licking his own plate with a blue-black tongue - the fourth in a row. As usual, he was damn perceptive in determining the mood and thoughts of his interlocutor. - There were a couple of dozen cripples and homeless people, now there are two hundred... homeless people and cripples, - the little demon croaked, pleased with his joke. - They serve Grandfather, make a semblance of furniture from the surrounding trash, live in one word. And if any of the Lord's boys or other bandits show up... then some kind of weapon will be found, - the Nurgling grinned.
Snot, turning his attention away from Harry, turned his round, whitish eyes to the cook, who was shambling past with her elephantine, fat-swollen legs. He made one of his most endearing faces and held out his empty bowl in a pleading gesture.
- Most beautiful Barbara! Darling! Our bright sun! Goddess! Venus! Are you really going to leave a poor little Nurgling hungry? - he screeched disgustingly, turning to the fat woman.
- Snot, you glutton! - Despite the content of the phrase, the tone of the cook named Barbara was rather good-natured. - You gobbled up half a pot with one face! You left almost nothing for the boy - and look how thin he is, - she nodded towards Harry, who was modestly devouring his portion. He sighed barely audibly: why did all women over forty, like this Barbara or Mrs. Weasley, invariably point out his supposed "thinness"?
Potter himself preferred to call it "elegance" and "slenderness." But he was not going to argue about the terms: as in the case of Molly Weasley, Barbara was too good a cook to argue with this beautiful and kind woman!
However, many people would find Harry's judgments somewhat... strange. As he himself had two years ago. Considering the slimy concoction of a half-cooked sick cat, with tufts of fur floating on the surface, tasty was at the very least unhealthy. And only a stoned drug addict who hadn't had a woman for ten years could call the cook Barbara beautiful . Fortunately, Harry had in mind a completely different meaning of the word "beautiful."
In fact, the cook may have once been pretty. But now, when her belly and butt were almost symmetrical, having turned into two fat tails hanging down in front and behind her body, her clothes were covered with greenish-brown stains, and her face was a pimply-purulent layer of folds, it was even strange to talk about her former beauty.
"You may not believe me, Harry," grinned Snot, who had already managed to devour the fifth portion of cat stew that the kind-hearted woman had given him, "but our chef's sunshine even has a husband! True, he is somewhat... limited in his movements. Moreover, he constantly follows her."
The boy glanced at the Nurgling in bewilderment, finishing the stinking brown liquid with bits of wool straight from the bowl - his aunt and uncle had taught him that you can't leave food on your plate! Because even if you got a bowl of meat today - at the same time, children in some Africa got nothing. Now Harry understood this to mean that you should appreciate everything that the Gods give you: be it another Gift or just a bowl of stew with cat meat.
"Her husband is always with her," the little demon explained, seeing Harry's carefully concealed bewilderment. "They went into seclusion a couple of months ago… You've had sex education classes, haven't you?" Snot suddenly narrowed his eyes, looking at Harry and pursing his lips.
"If you mean where babies come from, I know," Harry muttered, blushing slightly. "Well… Boys have a penis, girls have a vagina, and they… well, basically…"
- Well, you're completely embarrassed! - snorted the Nurgling. - I don't know which of the purple slaves of the Thirsty Bitch is sitting in your head, my friend, but he is clearly not very competent in his subject, since I have to comment on such simple things!
"Hey!" the Sweet Tooth in Harry's head exclaimed indignantly. "I'm competent enough! And you know everything, Harry - tell him! Well... in theory ," the Slaaneshi added, as if making excuses. "Practice, however..."
"It has to do with the Hogwarts enchantments," Potter replied, frowning as he set his plate aside. "There are certain… restrictions that apply to entering a school of magic."
- Oh, right, for children under sixteen... - Snot said understandingly, purring as he licked the next - fifth - bowl. - Anyway, the story of Barbara and her husband is quite interesting, - he put the bowl aside. - They decided to do that very thing . Barbara got into a kneeling position - in common parlance, on all fours - and put out her... monumental aphedron. Dick positioned himself, entered... and then went all the way in!
"What do you mean all of it?" Harry raised his eyebrows.
- I mean, she sucked him inside herself, - Snot said as if it were something self-evident. - And now he sits quietly in her womb and is slowly digested with all the comforts. A slacker! - the little demon suddenly spat. - Alphonse, a gigolo! A dependent! While his woman runs, works and feeds all those in need - this goat sits in warmth and comfort, feeding on her juices! Well settled, what can I say, - Snot finally spread his paws. - And Barbara looks satisfied...
Harry glanced sideways at Barbara, who was busy in the kitchen corner, and thought that the Nurgling really did have Legilimency - otherwise it would have been absolutely impossible to read any emotions on the fat woman's deformed face.
"Okay, my friend," Snot finally sighed, casting a regretful glance at the pile of empty bowls, and jumped off the battered chair he had been sitting on. "Shall we take a walk? Last time we didn't quite get a chance to look around, and there was nothing to show... But this is a different matter!"
They left the rubbish-fenced area and slowly moved along a kind of "canyon" formed by mountains of all kinds of rubbish. The stench around was - good for you! Again: if Harry had been the same ordinary boy, he probably would have vomited the stew he had just eaten right on the ground - such was the stench! But that's just it, he hadn't been ordinary for a long time.
"Since the Lord took an interest in our little community, there's been a lot more work to do - good health!" said Snot, waddling amusingly on his short legs, which were almost invisible from under his round pink-green sides. "But, as I said, we have quite a few people now, and we've gotten hold of some weapons..."
"Оружие?" — заинтересованно рыкнул Забияка, будто принюхиваясь. "Пусть покажет!"
"Show me what weapons you have?" Harry voiced the demon's desire. Today he was in a good-natured mood - and therefore more willing to listen to the voices in his head.
"Yes, they just arrived," the Nurgling nodded, pointing to another hole in the pile of junk.
This time it was a real cave deep in a mountain of rubbish! Harry couldn't imagine how Reverend Andy's cultists had dug and reinforced its vaults - most likely, with their own hands - but the result looked more than impressive.
Inside the elongated room, there were several tables along the walls, piled high with various weapons of varying degrees of rust. Many pistols: both magazine and revolvers. Several UZIs of various modifications, a couple of hunting carbines. And at the end, four rifles with wooden butts and smoothly curving magazines, leaning against the wall.
"AK-74!" Zabiyaka said with some kind of reverence. "5.45 caliber, 30-round magazine. The aimed range is up to five hundred meters for single targets, and up to a kilometer for group targets. The rate of fire is six hundred rounds per minute. One of the most reliable rifles in this world!" he finished hoarsely.
"How did you find out about this?" the boy was surprised, continuing to examine the instruments of death presented.
"Noosphere ," explained Smarty, after it became clear that the Khorne had fallen out of touch with reality and was in no hurry to answer. "Gradually, you not only open yourself to the warp, but you also open access to your world. And we slowly begin to scan the information field of your planet, read the thoughts and feelings floating around, accept its knowledge, desires, and aspirations."
"Another question is much more interesting: where did these guys get so many weapons?" Slastyona exclaimed in amazement.
"That's definitely a million dollar question ," the Tzeentch chuckled, but didn't elaborate or share his thoughts. Sighing, Harry turned to Snot and asked the question that had so intrigued the four voices.
"Huh-huh-huh," the Nurgling laughed good-naturedly in response. "To anyone else, I would say that it's a company secret, but... You, my friend, as our sort of main investor and founder, deserve to know more about our... partners."
The claws on Snot's three-fingered limb thoughtfully clicked against the body of one of the Kalashnikovs - which, it must be said, were in much better condition than the other guns dumped in this "armory".
"You know, the Irish Republican Army recently decided to officially make peace with old Britain," Snot said out of nowhere. Or rather, Harry sensed that he was trying to get to something, but he wasn't quite sure what it was yet.
- Yeah, - the boy shrugged. - They said something like that on TV. And my uncle seemed to mention that they wrote about it in the newspapers.
- Well, well, - the Nurgling nodded mockingly. - They fought, blew things up, killed - and then bam! - and they just made peace, - he grunted. - It's just that in recent years the IRA guys have been dragging a bunch of these toys to their hideouts all over England, - a nod towards the armory. - Which they don't seem to need anymore - so they sell them... to interested parties.
There was a sly, unspoken look in Snot's eyes, but Harry thought it best to save his questions for later.
- So we grabbed a couple of piles of similar junk - the black market is now full of similar stuff. There are even five mortars, - the little demon puffed up proudly.
"Mortars?!" Harry's eyes widened in amazement. He had a rough idea of what a mortar was from fragments of films on TV and from stories told by Ruffnut. The latter even howled with anticipation at the word!
"Yeah," Snot smiled even more smugly. "Barracks Destroyers* are Irish homemade stuff. Weak to the point of downright feebleness, we practically got them as change. But if you do a little magic with them..." He glanced slyly at Harry.
"I'll see what I can do," Potter smiled back brightly. "But the thing is..." he hesitated slightly. "My lab and most of my supplies were left at school. Of course, I had welded some things before school, but the quality wasn't the same..."
"Yeah," Snot frowned, thinking about something. Then he grinned from ear to ear again and said, "I think Andy and the guys can solve your problem, my friend!"
- By the way, where did you get the money for all this wealth? - the boy asked the question spinning in his head. - It seemed to me that you... er, well, are a little short of funds, - he smiled a little embarrassedly.
"Just tell me straight," the Nurgling snorted. "You want to know where a bunch of homeless people get money for weapons, right?" he narrowed his eyes slyly.
"Well… yes," Potter shrugged.
- Andy is collecting donations, - said Snot. But, seeing the obvious skepticism on Harry's face, he clarified: - Believe me, it's not only down-and-out tramps who are drawn to the miracles granted by Grandfather. Andy just went to negotiate with one of those... suffering ones, - he smiled slyly. - What? You're not the only one who knows how to cook up all sorts of useful crap, - he snorted. And then he slightly adjusted the topic: - And anyway, we don't have any slackers here: everyone earns a little. Even the kids managed to start a business!
"Business?" Harry chuckled skeptically.
"Aha," the Nurgling nodded. "Did you like the stew?" he asked suddenly.
"Yes, very tasty," the boy nodded in response. "Thank Barbara again on my behalf."
- Sure, my friend, - Snot smiled broadly. - She was quite a plump cat, even though she was a stray. By the way, she had recently given birth - and she went straight into the soup! The kittens were left behind, it's a pity for them... So our kids came up with a way to not let the kittens go to waste, and to earn some money!
"Just like that?" Harry chuckled again.
- Well, yes, - the Nurgling nodded. - Inventive kids, I must say! They twist the neck of a kitten, rip open its belly and leave it in the sun. A couple of days later, maggots appear - fat, juicy, - Snot waved his hands. - The kids collect them and sell them to the fishermen who hang out by the river nearby - it's just the right season, demand is crazy *
! And considering that our worms are blessed by Grandfather, the bite on them is the same.
Potter just shook his head at this. The local kids had a peculiar concept of "feeling sorry for the kitten."
"We need to find out from Andy later, when we meet him, about these 'sufferers' – the Reverend has really got himself into some interesting business ," Smart Guy drawled thoughtfully. "This could be useful . "
"Don't stick your nose into the affairs of someone else's cult!" Dobryak snapped back jealously. "Andy and Harry will sort it out themselves! The last thing we need is for you to stick your crooked little hands into it, distorting their aspirations and confusing their thoughts!"
"I don't pretend to belong to this, so to speak, cult ," the Smart Guy snorted in response. "And Harry himself will decide whether he needs to meddle in his affairs or not. Isn't that right, Harry?"
"The smart guy is right," the boy shrugged. "We'll have to get into these things anyway. So he's just stating a fact."
"I will not tire of repeating it ," the demon of Nurgle sighed wearily at this. "If the slave of the Distorter begins to utter banalities and voice well-known facts, then he is up to something!"
"Pff!" - Sweet Tooth interjected, clearly tired of listening to yet another empty squabble. "He's always up to something. What a discovery!" - Dobryak didn't respond to this, falling silent, offended. "Besides, I'm also interested in who these rich "sufferers" are, who are ready to shell out enough money for Nurglite slop to buy an entire arsenal!"
"Well, they clearly didn't earn their weapons with maggots," the Tzeentch chuckled.
Harry snorted into his fist, imagining the cultists trying to buy weapons by paying with maggots. It was a crazy picture, of course, but it lifted his spirits.
"And there's one place I've wanted to visit for a long time," Harry recalled, turning to Snot again. "I've been meaning to go to the hospital for the second year now…"
- Are you sick, my friend? - the Nurgling immediately leaned forward with feigned sympathy, stretching his disproportionate mouth into another smile. - Where does it hurt? Tell Uncle Snot - we'll cure you in a jiffy! Look, Martin was cured.
A black man was just limping past with his swollen tongue hanging out of his mouth, dragging some kind of box. Hearing the last phrase, he mumbled something indignantly, shook his head and walked on.
"Martin had no illnesses before your treatment," the boy snorted.
"Everyone is sick with something," Snot answered philosophically, shrugging his narrow shoulders. "It's not necessarily a physical illness. Lack of self-confidence, loneliness, depression – all of these things bring suffering to people just as much. Martin was spared from these sufferings! Isn't that enough?"
"I'm doing fine as is," Harry said with a grin.
- Ah... Well, in the end, you serve Grandfather one way or another, - Snot sighed sadly. - Of course, I've never heard of Champions of all four Gods** at once, but who knows... - the Nurgling narrowed his eyes slyly. - Who knows what will come into Their heads?
"As for the hospital," Harry returned the conversation to the direction he needed, as if nothing had happened, "I was planning to hold one... ritual there. With an interesting potion. That's why I need the brewing equipment," he smiled.
- Oh. Oh! - the Nurgling was fired up with the idea. - Why didn't you say anything earlier, Harry? - for once, Snot called Potter by his first name, as they had agreed at the very beginning, and not the usual "friend".
- Well, somehow... it didn't come up, - the boy bowed his head with feigned remorse. - And then I thought... You said that Andy and Martin, and several of your guys, used to work for a local drug lord. That is, in theory, they know where the drug labs are. Well, or they know someone who knows. So I decided that you could very well help me get hold of the supplies with which I will brew the necessary potion and perform the ritual...
Snot laughed.
- And I see you've already thought of everything, my friend, - he muttered good-naturedly, having finished laughing. - Indeed, we've dug up a lot on the Lord and his gang. Oh, this is so exciting! - the Nurgling even jumped up. Then he comically stuck out his belly and saluted with his three-fingered paw: - Lead the way, General Potter, sir!
- Well, not right now, - Harry chuckled, slightly embarrassed. - I'll send a couple of servants who know household magic to help us prepare. And I'll also provide a couple of powders that will explode in a poisonous cloud - especially for mortars! And in general - it would be nice to have a look at the place where we are going to attack, plan the operation ... - the boy suddenly noticed that Snot was looking at him strangely. - What?
"No, not a general," the Nurgling shook his head with the same frozen expression on his face. Then he sucked in his snot with feeling and said in a deliberately enthusiastic whisper: "Field Marshal!"
...Harry returned back to Little Whinging with somewhat mixed feelings.
The strange and - what can I say - terrifying in their improbability things that had happened to him in recent years never ceased to amaze him. It would seem that it was time to get used to more and more new events, new twists of fate, as well as his own creepy actions.
After all, much of what he himself would once have called "horrible" now seemed almost ordinary, necessary, or even downright pleasant. It's funny to say that once upon a time, the simple theft of pastries seemed like a monstrous sin to him! That's the truth: everything is known in comparison.
But then Snot showed him the arsenal that the cult that Potter had helped create had collected, and his head began to spin from the scale that his decisions and actions were acquiring. After all, now Harry was going to plan and participate in a real gang war, no less, just like in the movie that Dudley and Pierce secretly watch from their parents!
"This is the real deal!" Bully's voice echoed loudly in the walls of his skull. "Enough of all this dancing and hide-and-seek! Finally, a real war!"
"We've really been standing around for a while ," Sweet Tooth chuckled, as if stretching.
"Our enemies will know the blessing of Grandfather Nurgle - or die by our hand!" Dobryak proclaimed with an uncharacteristic pathos of bloodthirstiness.
Harry just sighed: the discord in his head sometimes began to irritate him. Although, compared to the headache he experienced at the very beginning of his formation as a warp sorcerer, it was heaven and earth.
Already approaching house number 4 on Tisovaya Street, out of the corner of his eye Harry noticed a strange shadow flashing in the gateway.
"A dog?" the boy frowned in surprise, easily spotting a black dog with shaggy and matted fur hiding in the gateway.
"Волкодав, вроде бы", — чуть усмехнулся Сластёна. "Тебе что, Фулгрима мало? Еще одного прожорливого питомца завести хочешь?"
Fulgrim really did eat a lot and with pleasure. Both special biscuits for owls and captured mice. He devoured the latter alive, thoughtfully and meticulously gutting the prey to its painful squeaks.
Harry ignored the Slaaneshi's joke. He peered intently into the gateway between the neighbors' fences across the road, where he saw the tail of a dog running away.
There was something wrong with this dog. Harry could sense the living creatures around him with sufficient clarity: the whisper of the warp, if you strained yourself, made it possible to determine who and in what numbers was around you. Either was or would be - it did not matter. Direct penetration into the minds of people and animals was more difficult - but the boy was learning to do this, more or less.
So, in the warp, this black dog "sounded" somehow… strange. Incorrect. It seemed like a dog, but something not quite a dog was flickering around it.
"Brainsnips!" laughed Sweetie, recalling their encounter with the strange first-year Ravenclaw Luna Lovegood, whom they had encountered after the Chamber of Secrets saga in the corridor near the Hospital Wing. She, like Harry, had come to visit Ginny Weasley - as it turned out, the girls were friends...
..."You have strange brain-slithers," she said, frowning slightly, looking into Potter's face. "Four big ones and a whole bunch of small ones. Be careful," she tilted her blond head to the side. "If you lose your vigilance, they'll get into your head and cause brain softening..."
...Harry was then surprised and even worried, but he didn't show it outwardly. But the Lovegood girl definitely interested both him and the four spirits: if she saw them and felt them... Then was there really a real psyker in front of them?! In the very sense that the inhabitants of the universe from which Potter's four spirit advisors came put into this word!
Of course, even if that was true, Lovegood's psychic abilities were dormant, like those of any psyker who lived in his universe. After all, the world where Harry was born was closed off from the Immaterium, and the local human magic was built on the energies of real space. But even here there were such... unique individuals, quasi-psykers who felt and saw something on the edge of perception, but could not fully contact the warp.
Harry Potter was the first warp sorcerer in his home universe in centuries. But that didn't rule out the existence of people like Lovegood - uninitiated psykers.
"In our world, these people would have gone down one of two straight paths from childhood ," Smarty commented on the memories of Luna. "Either they would have been taken from their parents and taken in the Black Ships of the Inquisition to Terra - for training. Or they would have been destroyed on the spot."
"Are there also 'indirect' paths?" Harry seized on the slip of the tongue.
"They could become something more than mere mortal flesh. Do great things. Terrible things, but great nonetheless!" the Tzeentch said mysteriously. And then, as if answering Potter's unspoken thoughts, he added, "Like you, Harry, for example."
The boy nodded thoughtfully, continuing to walk towards the threshold of his aunt and uncle's house. His thoughts were occupied by that feeling from the mysterious black dog in the gateway. It seemed that he had seen some such animal quite recently. Just when he had developed his warp perception enough to catch such nuances. Only at that moment he had been carried away by the damn adventure with the basilisk, and he had been distracted! But now...
Harry shook his head: he would think about it another time. Right now it was much more important to figure out where he would go for the whole of tomorrow. Aunt Marge was coming - the only creature in the whole world that he hated even more than his aunt's family! And he was still sensible and adequate enough to understand that if Marge opened her mouth, she would be dead. And he himself was the Boy Who Got Into Trouble! So it was better to wait out the arrival of this fat bitch far from the house on Yew Flat 4.
He grinned. Now that was an excuse to sneak off to South Helens for the day. Especially since he had a lot of things to do now!
The only thing was that from now on he had to be much more careful when he went out. Something told Harry that he was being watched much more closely now than in previous years.
July 1993. England, Cokeworth, Spider's End Street.
- Uh... Severus? - the girl stammered timidly, pressed against the wall by the tall man. - Of course, I understand everything: I'm stylish, beautiful... sexy, - here Tonks mockingly blinked her long eyelashes. - But to pounce on me like that right in the hallway? Maybe we should at least snort for a while, like hedgehogs during mating season?
The owner of the house where everything actually happened - namely Severus Snape - stared for a few more seconds with an unreadable gaze at the smiling girl's face, whom he really had pressed against the wall and put his wand to her neck. Tonks, to be honest, already regretted her stupid joke. What if he cursed her with something more vicious instead of a pleasant conversation...
But everything worked out.
"Tonks," Snape said in his usual cool, even tone, taking a step away from the girl. But not putting away his wand, as she noted. "What brings you here? And mind you, I'm not even asking how you got into the house," he sighed. "A warrant?"
Tonks felt herself blush.
"Well…" she sniffled. The girl's hair had turned bright red. "It's… not very legal. But I thought that… Well…"
"That it's still worth continuing to spy on me?" the Potions Master raised an eyebrow. "Let me guess," Snape smiled sarcastically. "Alastor Moody was first suspended from work, and then sent into retirement - all within a measly couple of months after the incident with the basilisk. But before that, using his connections in the Auror Office and the Department of Mysteries, he got a warrant to search my house - a warrant that should have lost its power after his dismissal. And only thanks to the connivance of those same "connections" and the carelessness of the Ministry, this did not happen, right?"
A Warrant is a magical document with a special seal that allows one to locate and enter a wizard's home, even if it is disguised or protected. Of course, the Warrant could not overcome any radical spells, such as Fidelius, but such spells were rare.
- Well... - Tonks hesitated. And how does he manage to find out everything so accurately?! - In general... yes, - the girl exhaled. - The boss really did plan to continue... working with you, - she awkwardly paraphrased.
"And now that he's been kicked out of the Auror Office, he's decided to send you," Snape rolled his eyes, putting his wand away anyway.
The news of Moody's dismissal was even printed in the newspaper. Rita Skeeter, a scandalous journalist who is becoming increasingly popular, wrote a very cheeky article about "a crazy old man with manic habits, who was not fired much earlier only out of respect for his past achievements." After reading this note, Tonks really wanted to scratch this slut's face - the article was so disgusting!
True, the article was not on the front or even the third page of the Prophet - all the front pages of the newspaper were taken up with photographs of the escaped Sirius Black, descriptions of his features and stories of his chilling deeds. But that didn't make it any easier.
"To be honest, I came here myself. Of my own free will," Tonks frowned resentfully, glaring at the Potions Master. "And I don't think you were involved in the attacks at Hogwarts or that you're still working for He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named!" she added.
There was silence for a few seconds. Then Snape raised an eyebrow and asked:
- And? - Tonks blushed again at the "and". - If you don't think you should continue to follow me, then why did you come?
"Well…" the girl sniffled. "I remember you invited me for tea back in Hogwarts, but then… then somehow everything got messed up, and I never took up the offer," she found.
Snape laughed.
- You used an illegal Order, broke into the home of a former Death Eater, almost got hit between the eyes with a curse - and all for the sake of having some tea?!
- Well... - the girl twirled her finger in her palm, embarrassed. - I didn't get it, did I? - she looked up at the man. - Besides, - she frowned, - the boss left me his findings, evidence and some materials. But I'm just an ordinary intern! No one will believe me or help me if I lay them out and say that "crazy Moody" left them to me, - she seemed to mimic someone. - Well, I...
"So you decided to come to me with all this," Snape sighed tiredly. "Okay, come into the kitchen," he nodded towards the old shabby door to the left of the entrance to the house. "Since I promised tea, you'll have tea. And in the process, you can tell me what Moody left for you, since you decided to come to me."
A quarter of an hour later they were sitting quietly and peacefully at the table, drinking tea with thyme. Snape seemed to be getting genuine pleasure from the bitter drink, while Tonks was trying hard not to grimace after every sip.
But she finally had the opportunity to examine the situation and the owner of the house himself.
Snape's house was a small two-story cottage with a dark hallway, shabby wallpaper, and a tiny kitchen that barely fit the table at which they actually sat. In the hallway, Tonks noticed another door and a staircase leading to the second floor. But despite its modest size and some wear, it was clean and tidy, everything was in its place - it was clear that Snape was quite a pedant.
Severus Snape himself was dressed in black trousers, a black dressing gown and – who would have thought it – black slippers. Although, despite the usual color scheme for him, these clothes looked much more comfortable than his school clothes. Tonks found herself expecting Snape to wear a stiff-collared frock coat and black robes at home.
"I'll bet a galleon that I'm pretty much at the top of Moody's list of suspects," the owner of the house broke the silence at some point. "And at Hogwarts, he apparently only allowed us to work together for the sake of surveillance."
"I didn't!..." Tonks tried to protest again, but was interrupted by a wave of a long-fingered hand:
- Yes, yes, you "don't", I remember, - Snape snorted. - But that doesn't change the fact that your "boss" was closely watching my every move. And now that he's been suspended from service, you come to me... With what?
At the last phrase, Snape leaned back in his chair and, folding his fingers into a house in front of him, looked questioningly at the girl.
Tonks, taking a deep breath, finally pushed the cup of tasteless tea away from her. After which she began to tell:
— Before those Chamber of Secrets Horror attacks started last year, the chief was investigating. He said there was some kind of unhealthy… stirring going on," the girl winced, reproducing Moody's incomprehensible slang. "In Knockturn Alley, in the werewolf enclaves, in pure-blooded viper… I mean, society," she corrected herself at the last moment, causing the other man to chuckle incomprehensibly. "He thought something was brewing… Maybe even the resurrection of You-Know-Who!"
Snape's face was completely unreadable - it had become a frozen porcelain mask. Only the intense gaze of his black eyes made it clear that he was listening with the utmost attention.
- So, - Tonks hesitated a little, collecting her thoughts and making up her mind. Because if the boss found out that she told about his investigation, and to Mordred's Snape of all people, he would twist her head off! But she couldn't think of any other way out. - Anyway... almost three years ago, he came across traces of a strange ritual, - she said, as if throwing herself into the pool. - An unknown dark ritual, which, as he suspects, was aimed... at Harry Potter!
Snape allowed himself only a barely noticeable head movement at this phrase. But Tonks felt as if he was literally staring into her face!
"It was just before Potter's first year, and it all stopped when the school year started," she continued, swallowing. Tonks didn't understand why Severus was suddenly listening to her story with even more attention - and therefore feeling even more uncomfortable. "The Headmaster thought that Quirrell, who had sold himself to the Dark Lord, was performing those rituals, and that with his death the danger from that side was over...
"But Moody doesn't think so," Snape finished for Tonks. He stopped glaring at the girl, looking thoughtfully into space. But after only a few seconds, he returned to the conversation. "What are his ideas?"
"Quirrel or not, that warlock wasn't alone," Tonks explained. "The boss… he suspects that a group of wizards is plotting the return of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. Hence the strange rituals, and the possessed Quirrell, and Tom Riddle's diary with the basilisk at school, and now…"
"Sirius Black," Snape finished, almost in unison with Tonks. His gaze became almost piercing, he was so attentive. "Do you think someone helped him escape?"
"I don't know," the girl threw up her hands. "But the boss thinks that his escape looks very strange. Scrimgeour says that before that, only the Minister of Magic visited Black - as part of an open inspection of the prison. Black did not communicate with anyone else except other prisoners, jailers and dementors!"
"Hm," Snape frowned, stood up and began to collect the cups from the table with an empty look, as if on autopilot, taking them to the sink. It was obvious that he had gone deep into himself, thinking about something.
Unlike Tonks, who was simply trying to rehabilitate the disgraced Moody and finish his personal investigation, Snape had much more detailed information. And he knew that the Dark Lord was really, truly returning!
Both Dumbledore and Moody himself knew this. They just knew it differently.
Dumbledore did not believe that there were still any living companions of the Lord at large who could contribute to his resurrection. And those who do appear are newcomers who can be easily dealt with. For his own benefit, of course, and with the aim of fulfilling the prophecy. The Director was playing his own large-scale game, during which he would sacrifice hundreds of lives - in order, as he believed, to save millions. In full confidence that he had taken everything and everyone into account.
Moody was not at all aware of the prophecy that inexorably linked Voldemort and Harry Potter together. Otherwise, he would have understood that the boy was not just an object for revenge, of which He-Who-Must-Be-Named had many.
No! Snape knew that the reborn Dark Lord would target the Boy-Who-Lived first, as the primary threat to his power according to the prophecy. Or rather, he already had, given the stirrings around the spawn of James Potter.
Of course, Severus had suspected something like this before. And he was ready to protect Lily's son - as he had sworn at the time. But now that this insufferable Tonks, with a hint from Mordred's Moody, had finally put everything on the shelves, the puzzle was finally complete.
"So you think?..." Snape drawled.
- Yes! - the girl nodded. - Sirius Black will try to get to Harry Potter!
"And of course you decided to decisively prevent this?" the potion maker grinned.
- Well... yes! - Tonks was even surprised. - And you don't?!
"Tonks, listen," Snape sighed wearily again. "There will be someone to protect Potter, believe me! And it's not just the Aurors and the Ministry. Dumbledore will ensure the boy's safety, especially since his whereabouts are unknown to anyone except a small circle of people..."
"The rituals Quirrell performed three years ago," Tonks interrupted. "They were performed in the vicinity of the house where Harry Potter lives! Are you sure no one else knows about it?!"
Snape hesitated. His face, still impassive at first, twisted into an angry grimace for a moment.
However, he calmed down almost immediately.
Well, Albus! Well, you Mordred-scheming bastard!
Severus understood almost immediately what Tonks meant. Dumbledore, relying on the mysterious protection of the blood granted by Lily's ritual, was using the boy in the same capacity in which he had used him at school. As bait for the Dark Lord and his servants!
Well, and at the same time, he is probably experimenting with the protection itself, the essence of which he was never able to uncover.
And the worst thing about this guess was that even if Severus rushed to Albus right now to quarrel, he would achieve nothing. How many times had they argued about this topic? When Severus was watching Quirrell, when the basilisk attacks began, and dozens of times before that!
All he'll get is another lecture on the Common Good.
It's all useless...
"Um… Severus?" Tonks called after him, momentarily startled by the look of anger that flashed across Snape's face. "Are you all right?"
He turned his empty gaze to the girl and for a moment looked as if through her. And then his gaze again acquired meaning, and his lips stretched into a crooked smile.
Let Albus not allow more close observation of Potter and call for "watch and wait", let him. But no one said anything about searching for Sirius Black!
Catch Black, shake information out of him about those who stand behind him - if, of course, Moody's theory is correct - it doesn't directly concern Potter, right? Especially since he is free to do whatever he pleases during his legal summer vacation!
Taking a deep breath, Severus said:
- Well then. Where shall we begin our search?
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