The Package

Lightning flashed across the sky, making Tonks wince. She stared hard at the dark-robed figure, now standing stock still in front of Borgin and Burkes. There was no doubt of the man's identity: Albert Goyle, one of the Dark Lord's more mentally challenged Death Eaters. He stood there, an odd look on his face, almost as though he was waiting for something. And just what that was, was revealed a second later. As Tonks watched, an enormous bird, like a hawk or an eagle, emerged from the sky and landed perfectly on top of the creaky wooden sign hanging in front of the store. It sat there for a few seconds and then, as the bearded man watched, it looked down at Goyle and gave a single squawk.

"Right, then," Tonks heard him mutter. The bird's cry seemed to tell Goyle all he needed to hear, as the brutish wizard immediately walked forward, heading toward the front door of the Dark Arts shop. Tonks tensed, her hand on her wand. She could stop him right this second if she chose to. A well placed Impediment Curse or a Stunner would do the job rather nicely, but instead she calmly waited. Her orders from Dumbledore had been specific. Wait until the Death Eater emerged from the shop with Lord Voldemort's package before apprehending him. She thought of Dedalus Diggle, standing up the alley apiece and wondered if he was ready to help her. She shrugged it off, she was an Auror...for crying out loud.

Tonks knew that she was more than Goyle's match in a duel.

She bit her lip as the hulking Death Eater entered Borgin and Burkes. As Goyle disappeared inside, Tonks found herself thinking back to the Battle of the Department of Mysteries, or at least everything that happened before her own Aunt Bellatrix rendered her unconscious with a spell. She remembered the shouts, the spells and hexes fired this way and that. Her cousin Sirius Black dueling fiercely with the Death Eater Walden Macnair. As much as she had hated to admit it, until the point where she lost consciousness, it had seemed liked she and her fellow Order members were getting royally stomped by the Death Eaters...that was until old Dumbledore showed up. She later heard from Remus Lupin, how Dumbledore had showed up just when things seemed their absolute worst, and had saved the day by single-handedly defeating not only a dozen or so Death Eaters by himself, but the Dark Lord as well.

A dozen or so Death Eaters were captured that night: Lucius Malfoy, Armand Crabbe, Walden Macnair, Rodolphus and Rabastan Lestrange, and Tyrus Mulciber just to name a few. The complete list of captured Death Eaters was back at Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place. She had read it herself only a few hours ago, but now she couldn't remember if Albert Goyle's name had been on the list. She could have sworn that he had been apprehended as well, but, it could very well have been that Jugson bloke. He and Goyle did bear a striking resemblance to one another. That is, they both looked like shaved apes. A small smile lit Tonks' face as a mental image arose of Albert Goyle sitting in a Muggle zoo somewhere, eating bananas. She chuckled softly, but clammed up immediately as the front door of Borgin and Burkes opened, and the ape...er, wizard in question strode out, a small black box held firmly in his hands.

Tonks drew her wand. This was it, she thought. A quick, simple Impediment Curse and this is all over. Nice and neat.

Suddenly Goyle stopped dead in the middle of Knockturn Alley. He looked inquisitively up at the large hawk perched on the store sign. The bird cocked its head, looked this way and that and gave another squawk.

"That's what I thought," Goyle rumbled. He began to look around the alley, a stupid smile slowly appearing on his face. He looked right at Tonks' hiding place briefly and then scanned the rest of the alley. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, he turned back to the bird. "You sure, old man?" he asked.

The hawk squawked affirmative.

Goyle drew his wand. "All right," he bellowed. "Come out, now!"

Tonks hissed softly under her breath. He knows I'm here. But, how? I got top marks in disguise and concealment! Sure, my stealth and tracking could have used some work, but-

Her reverie was quickly broken as the hawk suddenly hopped off the sign, soared downward, and landed right on Tonks' left shoulder.

"Damn!" she snarled.

"Ah there you are! Stupefy!" Goyle practically growled the last word as he jabbed his wand at Tonks. She shrieked and dove to one side, just barely missing the spell aimed directly at her face. She landed hard on her side and felt a stab of pain streak through her body. That damn bird! It's helping him somehow! But how could a bird be helping him?

Unless-

Meanwhile Goyle charged forward, his dull, stupid eyes shining much like a manticore's eyes right before it mauls its victim to death. He looked down at Tonks and smiled, a savage and cruel smile if ever there was one.

"You," he grunted. "I know you. You're one of Dumbledore's." He continued to look at her, as though she were a dead animal in the middle of the road, yet the cruel smile never left his face. He motioned lackadaisically at the black, velvet box in his hand. "You're wondering about this, ain't you?" He chuckled. "Master said Dumbledore might send some of his people after it. That's why he sent him with me." Goyle gestured to the dark brown hawk, now standing in the alley less than two feet from her head. "He can see the sneaky types coming a mile away!"

Tonks grunted and started to sit up. Goyle raised his foot and brought it down in the center of her chest. The pain was like nothing she had ever felt before. She knew without a doubt that she was now the proud owner of at least one broken rib. The Death Eater chuckled. "Don't get up on my account!" he said, sneering at her. "That just-"

But what exactly that was "just," Tonks never found out.

Suddenly from behind Goyle, a voice bellowed, "Impedimenta!" A look of almost comic surprise appeared on Goyle's face, a split second before he was flung sideways onto the ground. Despite the agony, she smiled. It was about time Dedalus got here. She looked up gratefully, ready to thank the wizard for getting off his ass and helping her out, when she got a good look at the wizard who had taken down Goyle. She gasped.

It wasn't Dedalus Diggle.

It was Remus Lupin.

***

Tonks blinked, not sure if she should believe her eyes. "Re...mus? Remus? What are you doing here, mate?" she asked, in an unconvincing attempt to be nonchalant, as if they had happened upon one another in Gringotts. She started to rise, got about halfway and let out a gasp of pain as her broken rib made itself known.

"Stay down, Nymphadora," Remus chided as he knelt by her side. "You're obviously injured."

"Don't call me that," she snapped. "How many-oof!" Her words were cut off by a shot of agonizing pain in her side from Remus gently pressing the area with his fingertips. Remus looked at her sympathetically. "I think you have broken ribs, Nymph..."

Despite the pain in her side, she glared at him.

He coughed, and continued. "Um, Tonks. I've got to get you to St. Mungo's."

She shook her head. "Remus, I'm all right. Besides, what about him?" She gestured to the semiconscious Goyle, who was groaning softly and attempting to stand.

Lupin turned in a flash. "Incarcerous!"

Ropes exploded out of his wand and began to wrap themselves around the large Death Eater, who howled angrily. He struggled vainly to escape, saw it was all for naught and stopped, flopping down on his back like a salmon.

Lupin grinned at Tonks. "He's not going anywhere."

Tonks rolled her eyes. "What about the pa-" She stopped, blinked and gave a start. Dedalus! She had forgotten about him!

"Remus? Where's Dedalus?" A look of confusion crossed her face. "He was right down there a few moments ago." She gestured vaguely to the dark area where Dedalus had earlier concealed himself.

Remus gave her a grim look. "He's still down there, but he's been Stunned." He thought a minute and continued. "Apparently, someone slipped up behind him and Stunned him while you were busy watching our friend here." He looked down at the bound Goyle and then back at Tonks, "I don't think Goyle was alone."

Tonks gave a small gasp. The hawk! It-

"Remus, he wasn't alone. There was a brown hawk with him, sitting up there on the signpost. It...I know how this sounds...it pointed me out to him. Remus, I...I think it was an animagus."

Lupin looked thoughtful for a second, then whirled and turned to Goyle. The black box he had brought out of Borgin and Burkes had fallen onto the road and now lay on its side, about two yards from where Goyle lay, immobilized. Remus crouched down and picked it up. Then he knelt next to Goyle.

"All right, you. Listen and listen good. I'm going to ask you a couple of questions, and then you are going to answer them. Goyle, we can do this the easy way or the hard way. But personally, I'm for the easy way. How about it?"

Goyle growled softly. "I ain't telling you nothing, you werewolf scum."

To Tonks' surprise, Lupin chuckled.

"Is that the best you can come up with, Goyle? 'Werewolf scum?' By Merlin, Lord Voldemort is getting hard up for followers if he allows you to hang around."

Both Tonks and Goyle flinched at the name.

"But, you know, I came prepared for this eventuality. You see, I just knew it was going to be the 'hard' way." Remus reached into his robes and withdrew a small bottle of potion. He gave Goyle a wide smile. "Do you know what this is?"

Goyle glared mutely at him.

"It's Veritaserum. Surely you aren't too stupid to know what that is, are you?"

Judging by the way that Albert Goyle's eyes immediately widened, Lupin knew that the hulking oaf did indeed know what Veritaserum was.

"One last chance, Albert," Remus chided, "you can answer my questions on your own, or you can get a little help."

Conflict flickered in Goyle's eyes. To Tonks it looked liked a cow eating grass, the way that his muddy brown pupils flicked this way and that. Finally the bearded man stopped, drew himself up a bit and stared defiantly at Lupin.

"So be it," said Lupin. With amazing speed, the former Defense Against The Dark Arts professor lunged over and grabbed Goyle's nose with his left hand. Remus slammed Goyle's head down on the ground hard and waited. Although Goyle fought like an electric eel, there was really nothing he could do, bound in magical ropes as he was. Thirty seconds passed and then a minute. Tonks actually began to feel alarmed. What if this defiant Death Eater chose to suffocate rather than open his mouth and drink the Veritaserum? They'd have nothing to go on!

But Tonks' fears were for nothing, as Goyle suddenly opened his mouth and began to take in gulping gasps of air. As he did so, Lupin poured exactly three drops of the powerful truth serum into the gaping maw that was Albert Goyle's mouth.

At first nothing happened.

Ten seconds passed. Then twenty...

At thirty, Goyle's eyes developed a liquid, vacant quality. At forty, he slumped back into the ropes that held him and drooled softly. At one minute, he appeared completely hypnotized.

Lupin sighed. "Whew. Well, now that that's done, we don't need to keep him tied anymore." Lupin performed the countercurse and the magical ropes fell away and vanished immediately.

Albert Goyle did not twitch.

"Right," said Lupin, standing up. "Now Albert, I have a few questions to ask you and I want you to answer them. Do you understand?"

"Yes," said Goyle.

"My first question is this, 'What is in this box and why is it important to your Master'?"

Goyle thought a moment and replied, a drugged, hollow intonation in his voice. "I don't know. Master only told me to go and pick it up. It's not smart to question him."

Lupin examined the black box in his hands. Curiously, he attempted to open it. The lid would not lift.

"Am I correct to assume that there is a spell on this box to prevent just anyone from opening it?" Remus asked.

"Yes," Goyle monotoned. "The Master trusts no one. Only he can open it."

Tonks groaned. She should have known better than to think this would be an easy task. Remus gave her a reassuring wink.

"I assumed as much," he said to Goyle. "Now, here's something else that I'm curious about. The brown hawk that was with you. Was he a true bird, or was he an animagus, as my comrade here suspects?"

A dull sort of light flickered in Goyle's eyes. Tonks realized what was going on. Goyle was trying to resist the Veritaserum. She'd seen this before, in interrogations. But she wasn't worried. No one EVER resisted Veritaserum.

"He...he...he..." Goyle stammered.

"Yes?" Lupin prodded.

"He....was an animagus," Goyle finally sputtered out.

"You don't say," Lupin said, almost conversationally. "Who was he?"

Goyle looked at Lupin with wet, drugged eyes. After almost thirty seconds of attempting to resist...he answered.

"Le...Lestrange. Sandoval Lestrange." Goyle said. "He's Rodolphus and Rabastan's father."

Tonks and Lupin looked at each other, surprised. Of course they had known that Rodolphus and Rabastan were servants of the Dark Lord and that the Lestranges were among the oldest and most prejudiced pureblood families...but the old man was actually a Death Eater? He was over a hundred years old! Even older than Elphias Doge, one of their contemporaries in the Order of the Phoenix. As a matter of fact, Sandoval was almost as old as Albus Dumbledore!

"Blimey," said Tonks. "I know that old codger. He served on the Wizengamot for almost seventy years! He stepped down right after Aunt Bella and Uncle Rodolphus went to Azkaban. Scandal and all, you know." She looked wordlessly at Remus. "Everyone knows that old Sandoval Lestrange is terribly prejudiced against," she winced, "'Mudbloods' and 'Half-breeds' and the like. When I was little, I was terribly afraid of him. Long white beard and those hard, piercing eyes that looked like marbles." Tonks shuddered. "I never knew he was an animagus, though," she mused.

"Maybe he's unregistered," Lupin mused. "If so, that's all we need to send him away."

"Now that sounds too easy," Tonks said, chuckling, but her chuckles broke off abruptly as another spasm of pain shot through her side.

"Really, Nympha-ahem, Tonks, we need to get you to St. Mungo's quickly. What do you say we wrap things up here?"

She nodded.

Remus reached deep into his robes and withdrew a large hunk of coal. Sitting it on the ground next to Goyle, he pointed his wand at it and muttered an incantation. Immediately, the lump of coal transformed neatly into an identical copy of the black box Goyle was taking to the Dark Lord. Taking the real box and placing it inside his robes, Remus smiled.

As Goyle lay there looking up at the sky with a dazed expression, Remus gingerly helped Tonks to her feet. "See to Dedalus," she said.

"Right." Remus Lupin turned and walked up the street apiece. Tonks saw him bend down into a patch of dark shadow and take out his wand. He was using Ennervate, she knew. Sure enough a few seconds later, she saw the familiar face of kooky old Dedalus Diggle as he rose to a sitting position. The two wizards talked for a moment and then they came back towards her. As they walked up, Tonks could not resist ribbing old Dedalus. "Oy! Sleeping on the job, old timer?" she greeted him cheerfully.

A nervous grin crept over Dedalus' face. "Well, you know me, my dear, I-MERLIN'S BEARD! WHAT IN HELL HAPPENED TO YOU!"

As soon as he got close enough to see the dried blood on her cheek, Dedalus turned white as a sheet. His mouth worked soundlessly as he tried to think of what to say to the pretty young Metamorphagus Auror, who was obviously in great pain.

"It's okay! It's okay! Dedalus, calm down. That bugger there," she indicated the drooling Goyle, "busted one of my ribs, but Remus is taking me to St. Mungo's in a minute and they'll fix me up." She gave him what she hoped was a reassuring smile, but what she thought was more of a pained wince.

"Oh goodness me, Nymphadora. I feel like a complete hippogriff's ass," Dedalus muttered, looking at her pitifully. "If I had known that...that Death Eater was lurking around in the shadows, ready to ambush me, I would've been more careful." The look of pure, unadulterated remorse on his sallow face made Tonks feel so sorry for him that she didn't correct him for calling her by her first name.

"Yes, well," said Remus, slightly irritated. "There's plenty of time for this later. Right now, we have a mission to complete, don't we?"

Tonks nodded, as did Dedalus. As Remus took out his wand, Tonks put her hand on his arm.

"It really burns me that I can't just arrest him," Tonks grumbled. "I mean he is a Death Eater and he did assault an Auror, you know..."

"I know that, but Dumbledore said that it has to be done this way so that the Dark Lord won't get suspicious...although with Lestrange getting away, I don't know how we can assure that. Dumbledore knew nothing about him being here." He trailed off, thinking, and then continued. "If Sandoval Lestrange goes straight to Voldemort, as we assume he will, then it'll do no good to let Goyle go."

"Not to mention that when the Dark Lord opens that fake box and finds it empty..." Tonks trailed off.

"We can only hope that the Dark Lord thinks that Goyle was waylaid by robbers," said Lupin. "I didn't see any hawk when I arrived here, so hopefully Sandoval Lestrange can't tell the Dark Lord any different. The only thing that matters now is Tonks' health."

Tonks opened her mouth to protest, but Lupin waved his hand in dismissal.

Lupin turned to Dedalus. "Dedalus, can you take Tonks on to St. Mungo's? I've got to Obliviate him before the Veritaserum wears off, and then I'll be right behind you."

"Sure thing, Remus. Come on dear, let's get you fixed up." Dedalus took hold of Tonks' arm and the two of them Disapparated.

With a sigh, Lupin looked down at Goyle. "I sure wouldn't want to be you when Lord Voldemort sees the package you bring him is empty. I can't imagine what he'll do to you."

"He'll probably use the Cruciatus Curse," Goyle said in a hollow voice.

"Indeed. You poor bastard. Obliviate!"

***

The second Goyle's memory was successfully modified, Remus Lupin plunged his wand into his robes and stood up. As he prepared to Apparate to St. Mungo's, he found himself thinking of what he'd told Tonks. "We can only hope that the Dark Lord thinks he was waylaid by robbers," he repeated sarcastically. Although she was a little danger-prone and clumsy, Tonks was an Auror...and she was no fool. She would know as well as he did that the Dark Lord wouldn't believe that for a second. To be honest, Remus wasn't even sure that the Memory Charm he had just applied to Goyle would be worth the effort. He remembered what Dumbledore had told him about poor unfortunate Bertha Jorkins and how the Dark Lord had used such powerful magic to break through her Memory Charm that he had destroyed her mind. He looked at Goyle, lying there on the ground like a sack of potatoes. He shuddered.

No indeed, he would not like to be in Goyle's oversized shoes right now.

"Poor bastard," he mumbled again, shaking his head. Then with a soft *pop* Remus Lupin Disapparated.

***

Such was his concern for Tonks as well as his thoughts about the mysterious black box, Lupin never saw the brown hawk sitting on a window ledge approximately ten feet above where he had stood. The brown hawk that was even now flying off to make contact with his dark Master...

-----

Coming soon...

Chapter 3!

Tonks gets stitched up at St. Mungo's. Sandoval Lestrange reports to the Dark Lord, who as expected, goes berserk and makes a clueless Goyle wish he'd never been born. And what's this? A concerned Severus Snape? And oh yeah, Dumbledore makes an appearance!