Finite Incantatem

The Grief II

*

Albus and Rose leaned an ear to the door. There were none of the fiery tones that Teddy had described; the atmosphere must have calmed down. Rose was proud of herself for making the right decision.

"Draco, we've never been friends, but please trust me" said Harry sympathetically.

"I'm burying my son next to my wife's grave. What do I care about your rules? I have nothing left to lose now!" Malfoy emphasized the last sentence with anger.

Rose shivered and Albus looked uncomfortable too. He feared Scorpius' father even in the best of times.

"I can understand how you feel, but..."

"No, you can't possibly understand how I feel!" Draco shouted. A heartbreaking silence followed his words. Harry couldn't understand it: he still had a family waiting for him at home.

"Draco, listen to me." Harry said, raising his voice. "I've just placed a Trace on Dark Magic. From now on, anyone using the Dark Arts in Britain will be considered a Death Eater, captured, and imprisoned in Azkaban. Do you want to be reckless and end up inside too? Do you want your father to return there, at his age?"

Peering through the keyhole, Rose could only see an elegant round table and its centerpiece, a skull-shaped candle holder. She imagined that Mr. Malfoy didn't want to end up in Azkaban at all. In fact, he stayed silent, and Harry continued:

"Our world has been at peace for almost thirty years, and it must remain so. We will scrutinize the wand of anyone who sets off the Trace. We'll catch that Death Eater soon, you'll see. Assuming he is one."

"Why shouldn't he be?" Draco asked.

Harry calmly explained, "Because anyone who was captured years ago is still in prison. We are not aware of any other Death Eaters."

"There are no other Death Eaters on the loose," confirmed Draco, who didn't seem happy to broach that subject. "But if he's not one of them, who else could it be?"

"Literally anyone. There are still plenty of wizards without a Dark Mark on their arm who are capable of killing."

"You're forgetting about the Dark Mark! No one except the followers of the Dark Lord has ever known how to conjure it."

Harry lost patience and demanded, "If you know anything, speak up."

"I know nothing," Draco replied, clearly irritated. "I was just thinking... maybe some servants... Hell, you're the Auror, Potter, I thought it was your job to find the answers!"

Harry sighed. He let Malfoy calm down, then asked him again, "Does your family still have unfinished business with the other Death Eaters?"

A enchanted quill darted across the rough surface of a parchment inside the room. Rose could hear the sound of it. When Malfoy responded, the girl sensed his resentment.

"Of course. I believe my son fell into an ambush by someone who wanted to strike deep against us. Without Scorpius, I have no heirs left; my family, after over a thousand years, will extinguish. It's a petty punishment, worthy of the followers of the Dark Lord."

No one in that room or outside paused to reflect on the fact that the Malfoys themselves had once been followers of Lord Voldemort.

"Were there any other reasons he should be in Knockturn Alley?"

"I never allowed my son to go there."

"He didn't tell you where he was going before leaving the house?"

The quill continued to race across the Auror's parchment frantically.

"As far as I knew, he went out with your niece, that know-it-all like her mother..." Malfoy added in a low voice.