The Necromancer Amulet

Chapter One - The Durmstrang Teacher

".....his power is greater than any ever known," Karkaroff said with an excited gleam in his cold eyes, having summoned her to his office after returning from another trip abroad. As he explained to her the plans of the new Dark Lord, Secessa did not flinch. Instead, she studied him with a steady gaze, knowing that any small sign of hesitation would make him realise that his newly appointed Dark Arts teacher did not meet the school's ideological standards.

Leaning back on the hard, wooden armchair opposite the Headmaster's desk, she tried to look comfortable. The sparsely furnished room was dark, only partly lit by the small, bluish fire in the hearth, and Karkaroff's face was shrouded in the shadow of the evening.

"And now, of course, you will have to spend more time away working for this man," she said.

"Oh, naturally. And, you shall come with me. I am sure The Dark Lord will find good use for you," Karkaroff replied, looking shrewdly pleased with the thought.

"But what about the children?" she asked evenly, carefully gauging his reaction. "Shouldn't they be groomed to be part of this new society as well?"

Karkaroff leant back in his chair, thinking slowly while tracing a long finger just above his grey-streaked goatee. Then he looked up, and gave her a steely smile. "A good suggestion, the Dark Lord will be happy to learn of an effective way to recruit and train Death Eaters. You will stay on here to ensure that the school is run effectively."

..........

When the tunnel ended, Secessa looked back, through the desolate and barren forest, toward the Durmstrang castle. The sturdy front gates stood ajar, and a sudden gust of wind brought the smell of smoke to her sensitive nose. A hooded, black-cloaked figure stood by the Entrance, surveying the grounds, but he was not looking her way. It's as I feared. Death Eaters.

The sun was about to set, and an ominous glow covered the school, as the sun shone from behind the mountaintops, leaving parts of it in shadow. And Durmstrang will remain in shadow, from now on, she thought heavily, her eyes unable for awhile to let go. Sparks suddenly erupted from a third floor window that had been left ajar - Elena's office - but her close friend was also prepared, for an attack, with a portkey and set the sparks, most likely, as a diversion. Vladimir, of course, would already be inside the secret tunnel leading from the library to the caves. Even if the Death Eaters found the tunnel, they would never be able to track him in the darkness.

I am alone now.

Finally turning her back on her old home, the fox trotted evenly through the windswept forest, a light snowfall soon covering all traces of her passage. Memories of her years on the tundra in the Ural Mountains passed through her head in one last review.

*

Secessa graduated among the top students from Durmstrang Institute, with excellent marks in Dark Arts and Transfiguration. She was a rather aloof girl throughout her school years, whom occasionally shot cold glares from greyish-blue eyes at anyone annoying her. Unsociable, pale, blonde, and sharp-faced, she hardly attracted the company of the other students, so she made few friends, until she learned the advantages of small talk in her sixth year. Then, she found out that there were quite a few people who didn't mind helping her with the more boring homework in exchange for a chat with her about her family's illegal beast-breeding, and she was not one to pass over such a useful opportunity.

Her father beamed when he heard of the connections she made, and since it kept him off her back, she thought it was a small price to pay for little social effort. So, during her final year at school, although some still thought her to be self-important, cold-hearted, and distant at times, she won admiration from others due to her talent with beasts and curses. And always, the teachers regarded her as a model student, who especially excelled in the Dark Arts.

Although she seemed a bit too interested in the protection against dark magic, her teachers usually put her curiosity down as ambition to learn the subject properly. They never realised that she had already discovered, during her childhood, the dire consequences of over-using the Dark Arts, and because of this, she thought that many of its uses were disagreeable.

After graduating, she spent some years at the Russian Ministry of Magic, studying banshees, vampires, and other evil-minded creatures, and although trained to tame the beasts, she caused too many accidental killings to keep the employment. The Ministry sent a letter to Durmstrang explaining the situation as, "an unfortunate misapprehension of her talents." However, they did advise the Headmaster Karkaroff to employ her as a Dark Arts teacher, as she certainly had all the theoretical knowledge needed, and was regarded as "of the right mind and temperament for the job." Karkaroff hired her at once.

Secessa relished teaching, and she was happy to see that the students respected her. Apart from her experience with magical beasts, she was well-trained by the Ministry in most curses and counter-curses. The parents of the school appreciated her sincere care for their children as she unconventionally taught them a wide range of protection spells as well.

She took the practicals for the higher-grade, lethal curses out of the Dark Arts syllabus, and she told Karkaroff that this was due the unfortunate fact of her never managing to master them completely. He was very understanding. After all, the Ministry had fired her due to a lack of curse control in close combat, and he did not want any incidents at Durmstrang. Besides, theory was good enough, as it took real field experience to master the curses, which the students would receive best as Death Eaters.

When Karkaroff returned from his last journey to England, frightened and nervous, her official reaction was indifference. She had read the papers; she understood perfectly well why he was upset, and she left him alone. It was about that time that she started to test the loyalty of the different teachers, to decide which would be suitable for her little project - saving select students from Karkaroff's evil ambitions. Just because the Dark Lord appeared to be dead did not mean all evil influences had disappeared from the world with him.

And so, Secessa continued teaching her Dark Arts classes with free reign, comfortable with the knowledge that, in this way, not much evil happened at the school that she wasn't aware of.

*

The sun had set, now, but the sky shimmered with stars, which spread light over the bare, snowy landscape some miles west of Durmstrang. Stopping on the top of a hill, the fox inhaled the air deeply. It was crisp and clear. The luscious scent of fat rabbit suddenly fleeted by, and she jumped to the chase, abandoning her reveries for a joyous hunt.

The rabbit was indeed tasty, as early autumn rabbits usually are. The fox burrowed down into the rabbit's warm, cosy hole, gnawing the last pieces of meat off the bones, while watching the night sky through the opening. Staying here would be nice, she thought then sighed, as she forced herself up again.

There was no time to rest. When I reach my destination, I will have a long, healthy sleep in some Muggle Inn. Trying to content herself with that thought, she crept out of the hole. The night wind ruffled her fur, and she broke into a trot.

*

The last couple of vacations, Secessa had spent her time studying some very interesting books that she had stumbled upon one day in her office. She was practicing the movements of a complex decloaking charm, when, suddenly, her bookshelf moved aside to reveal a small room, full of all sorts of dark magic items, including some very rare Necromancy literature. After a while, she had also discovered, due to the hollow sound of her feet against the floorboards, the hole underneath the floor of the little room (probably an abandoned animal's den). She decided that the escape route the small tunnel provided was indeed convenient, and should therefore be kept secret.

The room in itself, she discovered, had belonged to the last (and thankfully, deceased) Dark Arts teacher Khuditskii, a vile, but extremely intelligent, old man. He had spent most of his spare time pursuing further knowledge in his subject, but had not shared his advances with the other teachers, or for that matter, the students. Secessa upheld the tradition, but for other reasons.

As Secessa was the planning kind, she predicted her time at Durmstrang would end at some point, likely violently, and she carefully prepared her own, and her two friends' escapes. The three of them had were alerted to trouble when Karkaroff returned abruptly from the Triwizard Tournament. Clutching his left forearm with a white-knuckled hand, he had brusquely ordered Secessa to take care of his affairs. Then, he had packed a suitcase, and hastily took his leave of the teachers present in the Staff Room. Ursus had given the Headmaster a very shrewd and calculating look then, and that had alarmed her almost more than Karkaroff's suspicious behaviour. It was plain to her that Karkaroff had displeased his old 'friends', and Ursus was not the type to miss an opportunity to gain power by betrayal, nor would he balk at getting rid of any people that he believed stood in his way. She watched the Transfigurations teacher carefully after that incident, and she had seen him sneak off on several occasions, black-cloaked, in the middle of the night.

And so, when Karkaroff had returned to Durmstrang the next summer, seemingly a bit more relaxed, and convinced no one was after him any more, she had known that Ursus would betray him, and that it was only a matter of time before the Death Eaters arrived. Considering the heavy death toll on the nearby Muggle villages the past decade, Karkaroff's death would hardly be a loss to anyone, and she did not feel any remorse about letting things take their due course. However, she did not wish to be caught in the middle of things. Hence, when that cold, autumn day, just before the start of term, had come, she and her two friends were ready.

*

Having reached a small, wood hut hidden in the forest on the side of a mountain ledge, she sniffed carefully. No one has been here for ages. Since nothing seemed to have been disturbed, she stepped inside, transfigured back into her human form, and had a look around, her body aching with the usual post-transfiguration strain.

It was exactly as she remembered: under the window to her left, a small bed with a frayed blanket and a pillow on top, beside it a nightstand with a candle, and to her right, an old cabinet. She opened the cabinet door and tapped her wand at the bottom to reveal a concealed compartment, hidden by a cloaking charm. There she found what she wanted: some warm Muggle clothes, a small pouch containing Muggle money, and an Auto-Update Muggle Passport, issued to her by a friend at the Ministry many years ago.

She quickly changed her clothes, wrapped her robes and cloak into a roll that she tied on her back with two leather straps, and peered out through the window. It was almost morning, and she hadn't yet slept. Nevertheless, she had to go on; there was much that she still needed to do.

Determinedly, she walked down the hillside towards the little village far below, hoping that anyone who saw her would think she was just another villager, returning from a walk on the mountain. Suddenly, she heard a shriek, looked up, and saw a silvery grey owl with dark speckles come flying towards her. It landed gently on her arm, and she relieved it of its message, written in flowing letters on old parchment:

"I took your owl with me, and it helped me find a place to stay, just as you said it would. I am now in hiding, and will go through with everything as planned. V."

Excellent, she thought and stroked her owl lovingly. The owl, Odin, looked quite contented and hooted softly. She hadn't really expected Vladimir to have time to fetch him for her, so this was a very pleasant surprise.

If Vladimir had been free to roam the Third Floor, the Death Eaters must have spent more time looking for her than she thought. As they did not know she was an Animagus, they would probably spend endless hours looking for footprints while the snow kept falling, hiding her small tracks. She smiled to herself. Now to business. After conjuring up a quill and a piece of parchment, she started writing.

The morning sun sent its warm rays over the rocky slope where she stood, blinding her as she stretched up her arm. Odin sped away with his message, not to Vladimir, but to someone else. She needed more - powerful allies.