Liberté Foncée

How soft this Prison is
How sweet these sullen bars
No Despot but the King of Down
Invented this repose

Of Fate if this is All
Has he no added Realm
A Dungeon but a Kinsman is
Incarceration -- Home.

-- Emily Dickenson, How Soft This Prison Is

CHAPTER SIXTEEN: UNFORGIVABLES

Shane was frustrated. No, beyond frustrated. He had thought of his own side of this war - so to speak - as more civilized than the Death Eaters, but apparently not.

He tried again, forcing his voice to stay level. "Sir, they've got some of our best--"

"That may be the case," the aged wizard across the desk said coldly, putting down his quill and looking up at him through hard eyes, "but we can simply not risk any others to save them."

"They'll be killed. All of them."

"Yes," said the superior, "they will be. There is nothing we can do about it." He frowned. "You have a personal interest in this, I take it?"

Shane scowled. "Yes."

"I guessed as much. You've never been interested in a matter such as this before. Why now? Why never before? I might pay more attention under other circumstances, boy, but this is almost selfish."

"She was all I had left!" Shane snapped. He glanced around for something to throw. He settled for the softly glowing crystal orb on the desk in front of him. It shattered against the wall.

The superior now looked mildly annoyed. "That," he said distastefully, "was a rare item."

"You wouldn't listen," Shane sulked. He felt very much like he was eight years old and angry with his mummy for not letting him go play with his friends.

"And I still will not." Eric Weasley surveyed him carefully. "If you wish to go alone, you are free to do so, but at your own peril. I advise you to accept that this girl is as good as dead - if not dead already - and to move on." Shane threw him an acid look and his features softened just barely. "You are not the only person who has lost close ones in this world, Mr. Parker. You won't be the last. But you are good at what you do for us, and I recommend you concentrate on your work and not on getting yourself killed."

Shane walked out of the office without another word.

*

It was a small cell, grey: the color of a road after many years of use, one that had never been repaved. There was a small window, roughly the size of a sheet of paper, with three thick bars partially blocking the white sunlight that spilled onto the concrete.

It was cold, and Rayne huddled in a shadowy corner. Stupid, she thought to herself, bloody stupid. She'd thought it she was ready to be out again, working, but apparently she was far from it. She'd slipped, a careless error, and been caught, as well as half a dozen others who strayed a few seconds, waiting for her, making sure she was all right.

She glanced around the miserable alcove. The Death Eaters weren't very hospitable, she noted.

*

Shane opened his front door, and nearly called out before he remembered no one was there to greet. The note he'd taken from the owl before it nearly pecked him to death some hours before was still on the table. It was hastily scribbled, a very brief account of what had happened. The author of it wasn't exactly a close friend, but they'd said hello everyone once in a while. Braeden something.

Shane picked up the note and reread the few lines, certain phrases jumping out of him.

Friend of yours... captured... Death Eaters...hurry...

He sighed heavily, reaching to his pocket and coming up with only an empty cigarette packet. He swore and reached for a bottle on the counter instead.

*

"You need more practice," Adrienne had informed him cheerfully. Ayden had rolled his eyes and grumbled, repeating that she was twisted cow and that he was not going to practice the Unforgivable curses on anyone, elf or human. Adrienne tutted. Common mistake, she'd said. It'd get him killed in the end.

He grumbled to himself under his breath as he walked to the dungeons, trying to think of some way of getting himself out of this. Adrienne had informed him she'd be along shortly and that if he wasn't waiting for her when she arrived, there would be consequences.

Ayden did not intend to find out what these consequences were.

He rounded a corner and walked past the first cell, glancing out the window. The sun was setting, and he had an appointment with a clan of vampires again tonight. Shit.

He stopped. Did a double take. Pinched himself.

"Fuck," he said softly.

Rayne looked up and her mouth dropped open.

Perhaps he should have expected something like this, Ayden thought. Karma had a twisted sense of humor where he was concerned.

"Ready, Ryan?"

Very, very twisted.

"Find one to practice on? Brilliant. Oh, look, she's shocked." Adrienne smiled in a would-be-pleasant way.

"Adrienne," said Ayden quietly, "shut up."

She frowned. "What is it?"

"It's... No, I dunno. Not her. Seems like she'd be the type to look at you when you're trying to torture." He coughed. "You learn a few things from vampires. They can't feed properly if the victim looks at them. It's unnerving. Shit happens, you know?"

Adrienne gave him a skeptical look, but shrugged. "Just hurry up, I'm not letting you leave until you get some decent practice, and your track record with vampires isn't all that sparking. Probably best if you're not late."

"How considerate of you."

"I try, really."

The prisoner watched this exchange wide-eyed. Ayden didn't look at her as he led Adrienne away.

*

It was some time after - either very late or very early - that Ayden returned to the cell. He was exhausted, having nearly been bitten again, but he couldn't just leave this alone. Adrienne would know with certainty that something was up if he came back with her knowledge. This was the only time.

It was even darker in the dungeon, even though it was partly above ground. But there was no moon tonight. Ayden lit his wand and silent hurried down the steps. He felt the air getting colder around him.

"Rayne?" he asked quietly.

She was awake, and thoroughly confused. Ayden unlocked the cell door and stepped inside, closing and locking it behind himself, putting out the wand as he went.

"Maybe I really am mad," she said softly after a few moments' dead silence.

"No," Ayden said. "No, you're not."

He sat down beside her. She visibly recoiled, even though he'd made no move to touch her.

"This isn't real," she said, sounding awfully sure of herself. She raised her head and gave him a defiant look. "You're dead."

There was a pause while Ayden stared at her, and then she crumbled, pulling further away and receding into a corner, beginning to cry.

Ayden didn't know why this reaction shocked him so much, but it did. What felt like an eternity passed, and still, Rayne didn't turn back around. Finally, Ayden rose to his feet and silently left.

He walked slowly and heavily up the steps and down a corridor, around a turn, through a hidden passage. He knew one thing for certain: if Rayne didn't get out of the Death Eaters' hands quickly, she'd be dead before long. No captives ever lasted; torture and death seemed to follow one another in quick succession after the initial refusal to give up information of any sort.

There was little doubt in Ayden's mind Adrienne would somehow gain charge of the overseeing of this group of prisoners and that she would take him along for a study session or sorts. Frankly, he didn't give a damn if he was supposed to be heartless or not. There was a reason he specialized in demons.

Ayden stopped walking and frowned, trying to recognize where his feet had carried him. There was a light coming from the door in front of him. He knew this door, he realized.

Ayden took a moment to see if there was anyone who could have chucked a rock at his head, but the coast was clear. Nope, definitely an idea that hit him. He knocked.

Robert Dumont looked tired. Ayden could see a thick stack of books on the desk behind him, and more on a chair beside it. Dumont looked at him expectantly.

Ayden coughed. "Good evening, sir," he said politely, speaking to the ground. He took a moment to figure out how to best phrase what he wanted to say. He looked Dumont in the eye and cleared his throat. "I need a favor," he admitted.

Dumont arched an eyebrow and invited him inside.

*

Different people have different answers to what makes good days good and bad days bad. Whatever it was that made good days good, however, was getting more and more rare as time went on. Perhaps rare was too light a word. Near extinction was more accurate. In any case, it was going the way of the dodo, and this did not make Shane a happy camper.

The fact that the words "happy camper" could be used to describe him, even in the negative, was all the more irritating.

In short, this did not make for a cheery meeting in the middle of the night, in the middle of a dark street, in the middle of autumn when it was cold and all anyone wanted to do was be home in front of a pretty little fire (preferably contained in a grate) with a good book or film or meal.

With the idea of food in mind, Shane turned a corner and found himself knocked backward, almost to the ground, by someone heading the opposite direction.

Conlon swore, righted himself, and then took a moment to acknowledge Shane's existence.

Shane, in turn, regained his balance, said something rather rude in Conlon's direction, and grumbled something under his breath that, by his tone, was probably not much more polite.

"'Scuse me," Conlon said easily and stepped aside. He said something more eloquent by way of apology, and turned to continue on his way.

Shane gave him a half-hearted nod and muttered something under his breath, the latter part of which sounded suspiciously like "yank."

Conlon snorted derisively and stepped around, continuing on his way.

Shane continued in the opposite direction and pondered the definitive difference between good days and bad days.

*

Lost, Alena had recently decided, was not a good place or thing to be. She had a poor navigational sense and had all her life, but at least at home she'd known the language and could ask for directions.

She also really, really didn't like the Cyrillic alphabet. It confused her hopelessly. While her aunt was attempting to teach her some Bulgarian, but so far she was limited to confidently being able to say, Kak ste vieh? (How are you?) and Az haresvam pahtki (I like ducks). Which, given, was true, but still not very helpful if one should, say, find oneself in a strange neighborhood after having dozed off on the bus and unable to say a single word to the driver who dares not to speak English.

As she tried to explain her situation to the driver (who was glaring at her, frustrated) in some form of broken Bulgarian mixed with hand motions and quite a bit of swearing in English. It also wasn't in her favor that she couldn't remember her aunt's complex for the life of her.

"Dobre, dobre, zagubeni ste," the driver said, sounding irritated. "Shto dah eh moy problehm?"

"Um," Alena said, thinking that a deus ex machina type interference would be useful. It was doubtful that "I like ducks" would provide any such desired result.

The driver glared at her. She murmured something of an excuse and then retreated, getting off the bus and into the nighttime streets.

*

Ayden made his way back to the Dead's quarters slowly, thinking hard. He did not agree with the idea he had just proposed to Dumont, not one bit. Trying to decide the right thing to do was not proving to be much of a success in his case.

Trying to push all thought out of his head, he collapsed on his bed and fell asleep, still fully dressed.

When he woke the next morning, it was really no longer morning, but some time after noon, possibly around one. He got out of bed, dressed, and then got on his hands and knees, pulling his trunk from under his bed. He opened it, pushed away the stack of stakes and the vials of holy water and getting to the personal items he'd packed months ago and hadn't touched since.

There were only a few things there: two books that had once been Mark's, a bit of extra money for emergencies, and the teddy bear that Adrienne was never to see, ever.

Ayden looked Mr. Snuggles over, petted him fondly on the head, then hid him at the very far end of the trunk. He pulled one of the books from the bottom of the trunk instead then closed the lid.

Out in the common room, he spotted Adrienne and Conlon, who were playing an enthused game of cards, and sat down beside Cal who was watching them.

"'Afte'noon," Conlon said, reshuffling the cards.

"Late night?" Cal asked sympathetically.

"If I knew what time I got back, I'd tell you." He opened the book in his hands and flipped through the pages rapidly.

"Speed reading?" Adrienne asked.

"Yes, it's quite intriguing." Ayden didn't look up from the book before he found what he was looking for: two photographs he'd left there a long time ago.

Mark and Violet waved up at him from one picture. His miniature self rolled his eyes from between them.

"Aww," Cal said, snatching the photograph from his hands. "Can I see this?"

"At least you asked before taking," he replied calmly.

"She's polite like that," Conlon agreed. Cal stuck her tongue out at the pair of them.

The redhead surveyed the photo. "You and your brother?" she asked.

Ayden nodded. "And his girlfriend."

Apocalypse smiled slightly. "You look like him."

Ayden nodded mutely.

By this time, Conlon and Adrienne had been distracted from their game and had joined them, listening to everything being said.

"So," Conlon ventured, "they're both dead?"

"Yes," Ayden replied softly.

"The same attack?" Adrienne asked. "That must've been hard."

Ayden frowned slightly. "No, it wasn't..." He sighed. "After Mark died, she looked after me. But she disappeared the morning of my eighteenth birthday. I woke up and she was gone. We never even found a body."

There was an awkward pause. "Do you know how either of them died?" Adrienne asked after a few moments.

Ayden smiled bitterly. "Death Eaters." He looked up at them as if to say, Ironic, innit? "I came home one night and he was dead. Vi was unconscious."

"That'll happen," Adrienne said matter-of-factly. "If someone's not hit by the curse but is standing near enough, they can be knocked out. Looks a lot like they're dead, too. People have been buried alive that way... It's more like they're stunned than unconscious, really. They don't wake up on their own."

There was a brief moment of silence.

"Cassada, has anyone ever told you that you're a very scary and morbid person and that you need serious mental and emotional help?" inquired Ayden.

"It's been mentioned. My dentist told me so once, if I remember correctly. Or maybe it was my doctor."

"My doctor was an evil sadist," Cal piped up.

"They all are," Conlon assured her.

"I killed my doctor," Adrienne said cheerfully. "He was trying to talk me into getting more shots than necessary at one time. Plus, he was overcharging." She shook her head. "Stupid Muggle bastard; needles are the devil."

"They are!" Cal launched into a story about her typical reaction to needles, and Ayden tuned them all out as he unfolded the second photograph in his hand.

Just Ayden and Mark, the elder of the two brothers aged fourteen at the most. A sugar-hyped, miniature Ayden zoomed around the frame of the photo, a racing broom disguised as a six-year-old boy. PhotoMark ignored the speeding sibling and pointed instead to the crease in the photograph distastefully, trying, but to no avail, to unfold it properly from the inside. He struggled for a few moments before sighing and pausing to rest.

Non-photographicAyden helped him out, smiling a little. That was his brother, sure enough: determined as hell and far too attentive to details.

He realized perhaps ten seconds later that he definitely should have hidden the picture before Cal and Adrienne saw it.

"Awww!" they chorused.

"You were so cute!" Cal squealed.

Ayden twitched. As a child, he'd claimed he was allergic to the word 'cute.' No need to stop now.