Turncoats And Cold Fire

It might be June, but it certainly didn’t feel like summer; cold icy rain came sleeting down on Liadawn Rednet as she stepped off of the Bermuda Sailor onto the dock. Behind her her enchanted luggage came, following her like a toddler did its mum.

"You sure you don’t need a guide?" a rather handsome young wizard called from the deck of the ship through the rain. "The docks can be dangerous at times, you know!"

Seeing that some sailors were looking at her with leering eyes as they hung out under a small shelter—which was odd because with her tall lanky frame, rather prominent nose, and wild curly hair she definitely wasn’t a pretty young girl—Liadawn could understand why the wizard on the ship was worried, even if she knew she wouldn’t have a problem with the rouges running around The Port. "I’ll be fine!" she called back, waving cheerily like the sweet, naïve, and rich musician she’d pretended to be on her trip from Spain back to homeland England. Then she turned and walked off down the wooden dock, ignoring the confused protests behind her. Don’t worry kid; when I have trouble dealing with ordinary ruffians like these guys, I’ll hand in my Green Flame member badge. It’s like fearing an Auror is going to get murdered by a pickpocket. Of course, truthfully, stranger things had happened, which was why she was keeping her eyes open. She’d fled the country sixteen years ago, in fear that the hoards of Death Eaters that were being caught would somehow slip her true name and she’d be sent to Azkaban. Well, actually she’d not been fearful that the glazes would let anything slip—all they knew was her alias and the morbid titles that most Green Flames picked up during their missions. Liaverus SnapNet. Bard. Neither of them were connected in any physical way to her real name. She’d been more fearful her partner, her blood brother who’d been switched to another sub-grouping of the Death Eaters (espionage), would be caught and made to say something—especially since she suspected he hadn’t been caught but had switched sides sometime during the few years before Voldemort had been defeated.

Liadawn sighed. She set foot on English soil and immediately the memories came flooding back—there were no Spanish gypsies to take her mind off of things with new foreign magic, no new people to meet (rather many to avoid), no dear friends to embrace warmly. Death Eaters did not have friends, and especially not Green Flame Death Eaters. Even though she was a turncoat herself, she’d never let anyone know it; she had just slipped away one day and never came back. If her name was wanted it wouldn’t matter that she’d turned or not—who would pardon her?

Never mind that. She’d just be careful right now—and quickly find a room to stay the night in! She put a rain-repelling charm on herself and quickly made her way down the single road in this tiny little wizard port, her boots splashing through the puddles.

Out of the corner of one hazel eye she watched as one of the rough-looking sailors muttered something to his companion while eyeing her. She hoped he wouldn’t—

Too late. She pretended to ignore him while she slogged steadily through small ponds made by sunken cobbles towards what seemed to be the only inn at the port. He kept coming, stepping into the rain from his shelter. She let him come up behind her as close as he could without disturbing the trunk, and slid her hands into her robe pockets as if to warm them while she waited for him to make his move. She wished the rain was clearer so she could see if she knew him—right now all she could make out that he was of medium height with dark brown hair—or something like that.

Then he disappeared. She blinked. There had been no popping sound of an Apperation. Shit! Invisibility? Suddenly adrenaline was pumping through her veins; obviously someone knew she had come back into Britain, and they weren’t happy about it. If this man wasn’t a hit wizard she’d eat her boots.

Water splashed behind her and she whirled, ducking down behind her trunk, trying to figure out where the man had gone. Her eyes flicked to the puddles on the ground but whoever was there was smart enough to know they’d cause ripples even if they were invisible, and had probably levitated; she saw nothing. In her pockets, she grasped her wand with her right hand and a knife with the left—even if they got her wand from her she’d still be armed, and wizards usually did not expect attacks with muggle weapons.

"Now who’s the ickle bastard who’d attack a lone woman, eh?" she called out. "Show your face!"

No face showed but out of the corner of her eye she caught the distinctive pattern of rain sheeting off of a protection spell. She grinned at the invisible man, baring her teeth. Damned if he did, damned if he didn’t. If he removed the spell, she’d see the drips of water from his cloak make ripples in the puddles on the street. If he didn’t she saw the odd rain pattern. She whipped out her wand and spat "Stupefy!" hoping she was aiming at the center of his body rather than at the air a foot away from his side.

The spell missed and she swore when a hex went sizzling over her head, throwing orange sparks. She dived down, laying flat on the wet street as it soared past her, striking a lamppost and melting it into a puddle of molten metal. They’re going for keeps, aren’t they? But what side are they on?!

Flipping over and skidding herself around on the ground, using her rump as a pivot point, she planted her feet squarely on her trunk and kicked it, casting a hair-cut spell at the same time; hopefully one or the other would hit—the trunk would knock him over or the hair-cutting spell would clip his hair and it’d cease to be invisible as it fell, letting her know where he was.

It was the trunk that hit—she heard a grunt of pain and saw a splash as it knocked her attacker over. The hair spell caught a stray dog who’d been lurking near a dustbin and denuded it of fur. It ran off, yelping, hopefully distracting the bruised man on the ground. She rolled to her feet and ran over to where she could see the water still rippling outwards. Making sure her boot—which was steel-toed—was aimed directly for the center of the ripples, she kicked with all her strength. Her reward was a cry of pain and a gagging sound—she’d hit his stomach. Good. She put her knife away and with her left hand reached down to touch the man. Her fingers encountered a cloak—she tugged. It slid partly off, revealing a man curled up in fetal position with blood darkening the robes near his shins where the trunk had hit him. Liadawn removed his wand and stuck it inside her boot, then grabbed the man by his short red hair, digging her fingers in to get a good painful grip.

"Who are you?" she demanded, shoving her face uncomfortably close to his in an aggressive fashion.

The man rolled his eyes frantically searching for a way out, but there was none—most people were inside because of the rain and those she saw slink by in an alley were reluctant to interfere with a fight where the woman seemed to be, against all odds, winning. By god, she hoped she was winning and this guy had no backup.

"Speak!" she spat.

"I’m…me…" he said.

She slapped him. "No funny-boy tricks or I’ll Flame you and dump your body in the sea," she hissed.

He paled. "I’m…I’m Charlie."

"Charlie who?"

He didn’t answer, staring at her defiantly for a second before flicking his eyes towards the rest of her. She tensed. She knew that look—he was about to try to jump her, no doubt thinking that as a woman she’d be weaker than him. Well, she was, but she had a knife, and before he could get up the courage to try it, she had her knife out again and was touching it to his throat.

"I don’t need to speak any words to use this," she told him softly. "One little push and this thing slices a second smile right under that stubbly little chin of yours. Do you understand? It may be a muggle thing but it kills just as well as a wand—and it’s a lot more fun!" Personally she didn’t think so, killing was not fun, only necessary, but Rule One when becoming a Green Flame was to intimidate, and in her experience saying weird or crazy things scared the heck out of people.

He paled even more, and rain began to leak through his shield and wet his face and hair, looking almost like tears. Idlely she wondered how old he was—middle twenties, perhaps? About ten years younger than she was, Liadawn guessed. Too young to be in this business, whatever it was. But then, hadn’t she been seventeen or eighteen herself when she joined Voldemort as a young Death Eater?

"Now, what’s your family name?"

Again he didn’t answer. He looked determined to die right where he was if he had to. She made a disgusted sound. There really wasn’t any good way to get the information out of him without causing a really big scene on the street here. So…she mulled it over for a moment and then decided to use the Imperius Curse.

As part of her ruse she leaned forward by his ear, keeping the knife by his neck, and began to babble softly so it’d look to the people who were watching her as if she was arguing, reasoning, or frightening him—it didn’t matter which they thought she was doing as long as they thought one of them. Her babbling turned to random lyrics of one of her songs, and in the middle of it she cast a Defnant spell so no one else could hear her. Then, after pausing to look at him for a long moment, she cast the Imperius curse.

It took effect immediately, making his eyes glaze for a second. She then snapped "Understand me?" at him, and told him through the curse to gulp, look afraid, and nod his head. He did so, his mind offering very little resistance to the spell. "Good. Now get your sorry ass off the ground and follow me." Struggle, she told him. He did, and she took hold of him and put a halfway visible binding spell on his wrists so he couldn’t "grab" her. Then, all the niceties observed, she hauled him off the ground. Follow me reluctantly. He did so. So did her trunk, the follow-me spell on it not broken even though she’d used it as a football.

They passed a pile of hair—from the dog—and the molten lamppost. With a little reverse spell she put the lamppost to rights again but she couldn’t do anything with the hair—the dog had run off. She hoped it wouldn’t catch a cold or something, then smiled at her own foolishness. Her old partner would of sneered at her had he caught her saying that thought out loud.

Finally she and her hostage got over to the inn—she kept making him struggle just to keep appearances up. He was thoroughly soaked when they entered into the downstairs common room; his anti-rain spell had totally faded away.

The Innkeeper was a mousy-looking man who had a light web of scars over one side of his face—had he been thrown through a window sometime in the past? Looking at the inhabitants of the Inn, who consisted of a hag, a banshee, and some drunken-looking warlocks, she guessed he probably had at some point. But at least these folk would know better to question her. Although she was sure the rumor that a tall skinny woman with a nose like a beak had manhandled a guy at least half again her weight would be circulating shortly. Sometimes, Green Flame training was bad.

"I need a single room, please," she informed the Innkeeper, smiling at him rather sweetly.

He raised an eyebrow, looking at the dripping man standing uneasily (she commanded him to be so) behind her. Then a rather icky-looking sparkle appeared in his dull gray eyes and he winked before informing her that it would be five sickles for a night. What, do I look rich or something? she grumbled to herself, knowing that if she had ridden in from Spain on a ship that usually didn’t take passengers the news was probably all around by now, and everyone would want a bribe from her for doing perfectly ordinary services. She pinned the man with a glare and counted out five sickles for him, keeping her hand over them a second before she slid them across the counter towards him.

"That would of course be with dinner and breakfast," she told him in a tone that booked no argument. He looked displeased, but then upon second look at the man behind her decided not to argue when he was still cheating her by a good few sickles. Every sickle counted.

"Yes…that is included." He retrieved a key from under the counter and handed it to her. "It’ll vibrate when you’re headed towards your room," he told her.

"Thank you. I’ll be down for dinner once I get settled in." They exchanged nods and she hurried towards a door in the back wall of the common room, following where they key vibrated the hardest. Charlie followed as she told him to do.

Her room was on the first floor—of which she was glad; if something happened she’d not have to do any risky escapes involving ten-foot drops since the windows were near the ground—and of a medium size. It was furnished with two rather tacky Arabian-style lamps that automatically lit when she entered, an austere bed with a nightstand, and a worn desk with a solid but blocky chair. Go to the chair, she directed Charlie. He did so. Sit. He complied. Then she quickly did a spell that bound him to the chair and ended the Imperious curse.

He sat there and panted, his eyes wide. "Oh god…" he whispered, shaking. "Oh god…" He looked ready to have a panic attack.

Liadawn’s lip lifted slightly in scorn. She was not a fan of the Unforgivable Curses, but in her honest opinion the Imperious Curse was the least harmful—especially when all she did was make the man follow her around! She hadn’t forced him to do anything really bad under the curse like raping someone. Now she could understand someone freaking out if they had been forced to do something like that—it was bad enough doing it on your own initiative, under the Curse it was far worse besides being horribly invading of the inner self—but…after just being led around? No wonder she’d had it so easy to best him. She wondered if he had a phobia.

She took off her over robe and put it on the bed, watching the panting man out of the corner of her eye. She’d just let him calm down for a second. His eyes were glassy, but not so badly she had an urge to compromise her own safety to make sure he didn’t go into shock and die or something on her. She’d seen worse looks on other faces, and had even had them own her own face. Casually she turned away and examined the wet ragged hole she’d made in the back of her robes. They were ruined—she could try a patching charm but it’d still show. Behind her Charlie’s panting slowly slowed, then stopped.

"So," she said, breaking the silence. "Charlie."

"Fuck you," he ground out at her.

She turned and raised her eyebrows. "No thank you. I don’t do that with men who attack me."

He turned red in embarrassment, then redder with anger. "I didn’t attack you!"

Liadawn cocked her head to the side, and brushed a wet curl out of her face as she stepped towards him. For a second she reviewed her memory. He actually was correct; she’d assumed his disappearance was a prelude to an attack, but she had actually technically fired off the first spell—never mind that his, melting the lamppost, had been more deadly than any of hers. She narrowed her eyes. "Why were you approaching me?"

"Who says I was? There’s not exactly a hundred streets at The Port."

Again, true. One main street, a few alleys leading from it, then swampy undeveloped land for miles. But still, the street was wide. He’d been right behind her. "I get off a ship, try to find this inn, then some bozo—you, to be precise—follows me and does a disappearing act with his cloak when I turn to try to figure out who’s following me. I may have fired the first shot but none of my spells melted cast iron! Had that hit me, I would have been cremated directly on the spot. I’m a girl alone in a bad-ass little port town and you want me to brush all this off as coincidence? Child, I’ve lived long enough to know the difference between a real mistake and a pretend one. Just fess up and everything will be better. And start with your last name!"

"If you’ll tell me yours."

Her eyebrows shot up. "You’re not really in a position to make demands."

He glared.

She pursed her mouth a bit, wishing she had some veritaserum on her. It would make things a lot easier. The way Charlie here was acting, she’d be forced to hurt him or something to get any information. Or blackmail him…

Her eyes skimmed over his body, searching for some clue. His robes, while not the most expensive brand (rather the contrary) were as clean as they could be after their fight. His boots, though, were older—but dragonhide. Dragonhide? Why ever would he need dragonhide boots? Even secondhand they were expansive—it was at odds with his robes, which were of lower-middle class quality. She filed that information away in her mind; maybe it had to do with his profession. He wore no jewelry, but that meant nothing—even rich men did not always wear jewelry. No—wait. There was something around his neck, tucked away in his robes still. She narrowed her eyes. It was a ceramic flower, somewhat clumsily made.

Bingo.

"Charlie," she said softly, looking directly into his eyes now, "if you don’t help me out and give me a little information here perhaps I’ll go find your little sister and get her to tell me."

His eyes widened and he went dead white. Bingo indeed, she thought.

"Weasley," he whispered. "Charlie Weasley."

The name didn’t ring a bell in her mind, but she was sure she could find someone with some info on that family’s name. "And why did you attack me?"

He tried to shrink down in the chair; Liadawn fancied it mirrored the sinking of hope in his heart. He looked like a nice boy far from home. There probably wasn’t any help coming his way soon.

"You’re a Death Eater," he muttered.

"So, boom, you see someone you think is a Death Eater and you go attack them like you’re some kind of hero?" She shook her head.

"You’re a wanted woman. Liaverus SnapNet."

"You think I’m ‘Liaverus SnapNet’, eh?" Liadawn smiled with little humor and strode over to him to tower like a thin tree. "You’ve only got my better half," she told him cryptically, just in case it would shake out any information on her old partner that he had; back before Voldemort was defeated by the infant Harry Potter "Liaverus SnapNet" had been an alias covering the activities of both her and her partner. It’d worked uncommonly well because, when they both wore black flowing robes and hoods, they looked very much the same. Both of them were on the tall side—her partner normally tall and her unusually tall for a woman—and were thin and somewhat bony.

"I know…I have a photo. If you’re going to kill me, get on with it!"

"If I’m going to kill you I’ll do it on my own time," she informed him, annoyed by his bravado. Charlie went paler. She hadn’t realized he could. "So…they sent a youngster out to capture a Green Flame Death Eater? My, they’re confident nowadays of their skill at training you guys."

Charlie didn’t hear that last part, she noticed. He mouthed the words "Green Flame" in astonishment.

"Green Flame. As in Avada Kedavra—green flame and then poof you’re dead." She smiled nastily at him. "You’re on the Minister’s side of this new war then?"

He gaped for a second, then shook his head violently. "Dumb cluck doesn’t want to admit that You-Know-Who is back," he muttered.

"Why do you think he was named ‘Fudge’?" she asked in amusement. "He bungles everything and has his thumb up his rear half the time. Who’s side are you on then?"

"Dumbledore," he said defensively.

That was a name she knew; he’d been some sort of Professor at Hogwarts, hadn’t he? She didn’t know from direct experience; she’d been home schooled. But her partner had gone there. "So Dumbledore is against Voldemort?"

He blanched at the name. "Yes," he muttered. "And so am I!"

"Quit crowing like a silly rooster," she told him irritably. "Especially not a declaration like that, especially in The Port. It’ll get you killed, easy."

"If you’re a Death Eater, you already know I’m on his side. And if you’re not, you know I’m not on You-Know-Who’s side."

Liadawn cocked her head to the side. "I thought you knew I was a Death Eater and had a photo to prove it," she said.

He glared up at her, but she could see the uncertainty in his eyes. If he was sent to kill her, why was he so damned uncertain?

A photo…she thought suddenly. She wanted to see that photo; if she was lucky it was the only copy of it around, and she could destroy it. Perhaps it held a clue as well.

Charlie tried to squirm away from her as she pulled his cloak the rest of the way off, but with a few firm tugs and some warning glances she managed to get it off of him. Then she undid his heavy outer robe while he started to get a very discomforted look in his eyes.

"I’m not going to ravish you, if that’s what you’re afraid of," she told him curtly, sticking her fingers into all the inside pockets, as well as the sleeves, in search of the photo or anything else. Nothing was in it, so she patted down the inner robe, wadding it up in her hands so she wouldn’t miss something sewn into a liner. Nothing again. But then she felt inside the front of the robe and found an inner pocket. There was something in it. She took it out.

It was an envelope. Her hazel eyes skimmed over the writing on the outside—all it said was "Charlie"—and then she slipped out two things; one was the aforementioned photo, and the other a letter. She unfolded the letter first, noting that it had been sealed with a crest unknown to her pressed into gold-seamed red wax. Her hazel eyes then moved to the words themselves, which were done in rich red ink.

Dear Charlie,

Dad’s getting together with the old crowd, says there’s a few problems he has to help clear up. Mom wants you to keep a look out for Percy and to tell him that he better let her know if family or work is more important otherwise he’ll be out the door. She’s kind of mad at him right now for taking so long to write home but I guess she doesn’t realize that Fred and George sent him a few Scarlet-Letters and things to him at the office, and now he only opens up stuff addressed to him after letting the Gringotts curse-breakers take a look at it. That’s how I know—the dumb git’s making me look bad; my friends think it’s a riot. Oh. Ron says hello. He’s sitting here trying to keep Pig in the room so I can send this to you. If he doesn’t watch it he’s going to squeeze the thing to death.

Anyway, you’re supposed to come home this weekend—mom wants to have some kind of Out Of School Party for the twins, Ron, and Ginny. She saw it in Witch Weekly or something as a fun family thing. I wouldn’t "forget" if I were you—with Percy acting the way he is and me…well, being me, she’ll hit the roof if you don’t show up too. Don’t let us down, bro. Just be there.

See you this weekend,

Bill

Liadawn frowned at the paper. This was just about family stuff—but surely Charlie would have had written orders? Then she looked at the photo—and snorted. To the casual eye, the person in it, with the tall, thin body type and the black hooded cloak looked like it very well could be her, but she knew her partner well enough to know it was him instead. It was a wizarding photo, and the cloaked figure never took down the hood—instead he paced the picture, slipping from shadow to shadow, ducking his head down so the hood would fall over his face and obscure it. She turned it over. There was a date on the back. Yesterday’s date, in fact. So, this was a recent picture of her old Green Flame partner. He was alive after all, and not in Azkaban. But…if the picture had been taken and developed yesterday, why had Charlie been sent after her instead of him? It didn’t make sense. Like Charlie not having written orders—unless…

She took out her wand and tapped the letter, saying "Revello!". Nothing happened, but she hadn’t expected it to. "Codeum arrange revello!"
Slowly, then more quickly, the letters glided across the vellum like some surreal stream with little red fish in it, and rearranged themselves into a new letter. But it didn’t say much.

Dear reader,

Keep your big nose out of our business, you ugly git!

Sincerely,

Gred and Forge Weasley

Liadawn snorted. Was this really the only other message in this letter? She looked at Charlie, who was staring at her. What am I going to do with him? she wondered. She had a feeling that he was, somehow, an innocent in this—or rather a pawn. But for what reason, and who was playing the chess game here? Voldemort, Dumbledore, Fudge, or someone else? Had someone sent Charlie her direction to remove him from the game—standing on the certainty that she would kill him—or to test which side she was on?

She’d already bungled horribly. It’d been years since she’d had to play this game; the physical talents came back easily enough, and so did the old confidence, but she feared her mind was not quite up to the mental gymnastics yet. If she’d had any wits about here, she should of screamed like some silly idiot when he’d come near her—perhaps that wizard from the ship would of saved her. Instead she’d taken him out in the middle of The Port, forced him to come with her to the inn and this room, and then interrogated him badly.

Well, what was done was done, as the old saying went. Although she really wanted to get out of here now she’d made a mess of things. She tucked the letter and the photo away in a pocket of her robe. A forgetting charm would do well now…she’d put him to sleep, perform the memory charm, distribute a few whisky bottles around the desk or the bed or something, then split. Yes, that would be good.

"Remas tene!" she said, pointing her wand at Charlie. Immediately his head fell forward, and beneath his eyelids his eyes twitched, seeing stuff in dreamland. She did the reverse charms for the binding spells and then levitated him over to the bed. It was a small matter of transfiguring some dead coals from the fire into two empty bottles. She set one on the nightstand, the other by the desk. Then she paused as she was about to drape the invisibility cloak over the chair. She could use a cloak like this. Her mouth twitching up in a smile—she hadn’t realized she would become a thief today—she folded it up carefully and set it on her trunk. Yes, she could use it—more than Charlie could, definitely. Going over to Charlie she cast a forgetting spell, focusing on making him forget everything from the moment he saw her and hopefully even beyond that. If she was correct in thinking that he should of never been fingered to try to capture her, nobody but the one who’d sent him would realize Charlie’s memory had been altered, and that person would already know she’d gotten away. If he ever remembered all of this, he’d probably think it all a dream.

With a sigh because food and sleep weren’t going to come soon after all, Liadawn went over to her trunk, set it on end with the cloak on top of it, and concentrated, getting a clear picture of where she wanted to go next–she didn’t exactly want to splinch herself. Then she Disapparated.