The Ransom of Albus Dumbledore

His meeting with Hermione finished, Sirius let himself go, slipped backwards in the mirror, and watched the frame recede rapidly until it was but a point of light. He passed myriad other dimensions, tantalizing wheres and whens he might someday want to investigate—but not now. Released from the pull of the terrestrial plane, he slid along through the ether until he found a bit of space-time cloud that looked and sounded familiar—dark and lonely, with that irritating ticking and whooshing—and made a dogleg left into it. He found himself zooming down a long gray hallway, one of many in Death's castle. He landed gracefully—the first time he'd managed it without teetering and falling on his face. For a few seconds, he felt almost human, sauntering down the dingy stone corridor; it was, in fact, a bit like being back at Hogwarts in his salad days. At any moment he expected—well, hoped—to see James or Remus or even that little rat Wormtail turning the corner, the light of 'mischief managed' in their eyes. He missed his friends and wished for the umpteenth time that he could go either backward or forward in time: back to life with Lupin and his godson Harry at Grimmauld Place or forward to the Afterlife to be with James and Lily Potter, his surrogate brother and sister. But once again, he was stuck in a kind of dreary stasis, and he was determined this time to make himself useful.

He thought about his conversation with Hermione. It was nice to know he still had the ability to persuade a girl to do what he wanted although he definitely had no desire to do with Hermione what he once did with other nubile young women. She would make a decent partner—brainy and knowledgeable—but she had a reputation for bossiness, and he knew she didn't much care for his own rather casual attitude towards 'The Rules'. This would not be an easy ride.

But anything—even spending weeks with the know-it-all wench— would be better than this waiting. It made him think of the limbo he had endured for close to a year in Grimmauld Place, hiding out from the Ministry, watching lesser lights like Dung Fletcher and that traitor Severus Snape wallow in glory and usefulness, while he had to sit on his hands, powerless to help in the fight against Voldemort and his toadies. But now he had a mission: to save his old Headmaster.

He thought back. Said mission had been thrust on him by the Grim Reaper himself. Well, maybe not thrust, more like suggested… . It had been nearly a week now since he heard the shocking news of Dumbledore's demise…

~*~

He had been sitting with Death in Death's garden, playing Scrabble. It was a quiet morning. Sergei and Bertha had thankfully not made an appearance in days. And Regimald… well, he was another story… Best not to think about Reg. Thinking about him tended to make him show up.

Everything in the garden, every leaf, every flower, was some shade of black. Sirius, not being the meditative type, except on the ways and means of having a good time, had never thought before how very many tinges and textures of black there could be. He was forced into it now as there was little else to do, waiting for his opponent to make a move. He noticed now the way the thin light played on the different surfaces and transformed their blackness into shades of near-to-color. The roses, for example, their petals had an almost-red patina to them; the violets wore a blue-black sheen.

It was decidedly creepy, all that black, and its owner was creepy too, with his skull-face half-hidden in the hood of his voluminous black robe, one brittle, bone hand, gripping the shaft of a gleaming scythe, the other rearranging the letter tiles in his rack. He had a monochromatic voice too, with a unique, distinctly final quality to it, as if every word was the last a bloke would ever hear.

In spite of all this and the alternating bouts of ranting and passive aggressive silence from his host, the two had developed something of a rapport. Their conversations reminded Sirius a bit of Lupin at his most naive. (He often thought that Remus's nickname, Moony, did as much to point up his nerdy detachment from reality as it was a veiled reference to his lycanthropy.) Death didn't know much about Life, and was forever asking Sirius questions about what it was like being human. He rarely had a chance to actually speak with persons he had helped Beyond the Pale. They weren't supposed to just show up on his doorstep like Sirius—and Bertha and Sergei—did. And given that one could never get a word in edgeways with Bertha nor decipher a tenth part of Sergei's mumblings, Sirius seemed the logical person to interrogate. So, every once in a while, when he was feeling a tad less testy than usual, The Pale Prince would unleash on his captive guest all his questions about the nature of humanity and its intriguing subset: wizardkind.

For instance, he didn't understand the need for wands. When you wanted to go someplace, you just imagined the place and there you were—with none of that uncomfortable feeling afterwards of having been stuffed through a large macaroni. Or if you needed something, say a back-scratcher or a bit of cake, you didn't need to point and mutter, you just thought of what you wanted, and there it was.

On this particular morning, the subject of Dumbledore came up during the game. Sirius had just finished explaining how the Unforgiveable Curses worked.

"… and this green light comes out, and you just snuff it. No pain, nothing. That's what they say, anyway. But speaking of—you know—killing people, I sort of thought you'd be more—uh—busy, just now."

"Well, there are no plagues or wars to speak of just at the moment," Death replied, pushing the letters h-y-x-i-a-t-e onto the end of the 'asp' Sirius had just laid down. "With the triple letter on the 'y' and the double word score, that's 64 for me," he said smugly. "Humped your asp, didn't I?"

Sirius shrugged and wrote it down. Humped your asp. It sounded like something James would say, and for a moment he felt a little more at home with his host. "Glad to be of service," he replied. "But what about the Death Eaters? They're killing lots of people, aren't they?"

"Yes, but they seem to prefer Fridays… and they like to do lots of people at one time. It's considerate of them… in a way."

"Considerate?" Sirius laid 'pott-r' across the 'e' of 'asphyxiate', wrote a '6', and sighed. His heart just wasn't in this game.

"Well, it means I only have to go to England once or twice a week. And they're efficient too. That Abba Dabba Curse, you were just talking about, for instance—"

"You mean Avada Kedavra."

"Whatever. It is, as you say, instantaneous and can cut quite a wide swath. Sometimes I feel I'm just in the way."

Sirius caught the faintest note of irritation in Death's usually emotionless voice. "You don't seem too happy with the idea."

"Oh, I don't mind a little free time. It's the sheer chutzpah of this fellow… Ribble… or Moldymort… or whatever he calls himself. First of all, he's managed to wangle his way out of his own Appointed Death Time—"

"What do you mean?"

"He learned a trick… a way to prolong his life."

"How?"

"By dividing his soul into lots of small pieces and hiding them in things."

Sirius snorted at this. "What do you mean? Like biscuit tins? Or his shoe maybe?"

"I don't know."

"But how do you divide up a soul anyway?"

"I was hoping you'd explain it to me, you being a wizard and all."

"An ex-wizard, I might remind you. And anyway, we don't all know all the magic there is to know, you know."

"No, I didn't know. Have you ever heard of the term 'Horcrux'?"

"No."

"Neither did I."

"How'd you spell it anyway? W-H-O-R-E?" Sirius thumbed through the much-used Scrabble Dictionary, 1993 edition, which was the only one Death would allow in the castle. It was a tribute to the game's inventor, 1993 being the year he had died.

"I'm sure it starts with an aitch, and there's an ex at the end, I think."

"It's not in here; so you can't use it."

"Can't use it?"

"In the game."

"What? I wasn't thinking of the game. No, listen: a Horcrux is the thingie, the life preserving trick I was talking about."

"The one Voldemort is using."

"Yes. I've managed to learn just a little about them in my travels, but I was hoping you could fill in the details."

"Never heard of them." Sirius watched as Death made the word 'poison' with the 'p' in his 'potter'.

"Sixteen! Where does the chap get off, creating these Horcruxes to extend his life? It's unnatural!"

"That's Voldemort for you. But I'm sorry, I haven't a clue about Horcruxes."

"Pity, really. There's this fellow named Dumbledore might have known about them if anybody would. Ever heard of him?"

"He was my old Headmaster. Everybody knows Dumbledore."

"Knew."

"New? What's new?"

"Nothing—I mean kuh-new. Everybody knew Dumbledore."

"What do you mean? He's not dead, is he?"

"Death looked at his pocket hour-glass. "Since about three hours ago."

"What?! Oh no, not Dumbledore. Poor Harry."

"Who’s Harry? Oh, your godson, Harold Patter."

"Potter. And it's just plain Harry. Oh Merlin, why'd this have to happen? First his parents… then me… and now Dumbledore."

"Were they close?"

Sirius nodded. "He was like a father to Harry. Oh, this is terrible. Who's next? Hagrid? McGonagall maybe?"

Death got out his little black Appointment Book. "Want me to look it up?"

"No, I'd rather not know. But how did it happen? How did he die?"

"Another murder. A foregone conclusion, one might say. The only odd thing was, he was supposed to be terminated by a fellow named—" Death paused and leafed through the book, then put his bone finger on a line, "—a fellow named 'Draco Malfoy', but the person who actually did the deed was one 'Severus Snape'."

"What? Snape? How could he! Of all the awful things I could imagine him doing, I would never have thought of this. How'd he kill him?"

"That Av Yer Cadaver thingie."

"Avada kedavra. Damn him—damn Snape to hell!"

"You want to know when he's due?" Death tapped his book.

"Yes! I mean no—not if I can't kill him myself." Sirius slumped in his chair. "So Dumbledore's dead."

"Yeeesss… after a fashion."

"What do you mean? A person's either dead or he's not… um… myself excepted, of course."

"Yes, you're definitely a special case. Dumbledore is too… but in different way."

"You mean he wasn't supposed to die?"

"Haven't you been listening? Of course he was. He planned for it in fact, but, having followed all the rules, consented to death, died, and so forth, he still can't Pass Over."

"What? Why?"

"It seems his protégé… that godson of yours: Harvey… or Herbie… or—"

"Harry. Potter."

"Yes, that's the name, Potter. He tried to rescue himself and this Dumbledore from some Inferi and made a grave error."

Sirius grinned at the unintentional pun. Death never made jokes. He didn't understand humor at all. But then he himself turned grim. "What was the error?"

Death explained about the water Harry took from the basin ("no use crying over spilled Styx"), the mingling of it with the water of the subterranean lake ("an honest mistake, but there it is"), and the Inferis' binding of the Headmaster's spirit ("wouldn't wish it on a three-headed dog.") He was no help whatever in seeing a solution to the problem, and Sirius had to drag out of him the information that it was the Headmaster's unkept promises that were holding him down in the ranks of the Inferi.

Sirius knew that in his nebulous state, he couldn't do much to effect the fulfillment of those promises. He did manage to extract from Death a promise of help from the Beyond if Sirius could find a human to get the List and act as their agent to carry out its stated intentions on the terrestrial plane. As his trump card, he played Voldemort's repeated violation of The Rules of the Underworld and his fear and jealousy of Dumbledore and intimated that it would irritate the Dark Lord in the extreme to learn that he had had his nemesis's soul entrapped, and then let it get away.

Death stopped short of promising any real help from the spirit world, but Sirius knew the thought of giving Voldemort the mickey would bring him some satisfaction.

He ceded the Scrabble match to Death, who by now had a handy lead, and took some time to decide whom he would approach for help. His reasoning kept bringing him back to Hermione Granger although he didn't really like the idea much. In life he had felt she looked down on him and disapproved of his feckless ways, and he didn't think his new status would improve their relationship. But there was nothing for it: Harry was out by virtue of the supreme commitment he needed to prepare for. Ron? Well that was a laugh. Ginny? Too young and too unknown a quantity. The twins? They'd have been his choice to orchestrate a celebration after the fact, but he wasn't sure they could be relied upon to keep focus for the length of time it would take to get the job done. Arthur and Molly still had too many obligations to family and the Order. Remus had the Werewolf Project. Tonks and the other Aurors? The absence of any of them would raise suspicions with the Ministry.

As he whisked away to find Hermione, he wondered briefly whether, in fact, it would be possible for Voldemort to learn of Dumbledore's extreme vulnerability, and if he did, whether he could do anything about it.

~*~

Today, Sirius, having gotten Hermione's 'yes', bounded down the paths of Death's Garden to report his success and see if he could count on some additional help in their first task.

But on this particular day—or night—or whatever, Death was sitting at the round, obsidian-coated table, having tea with his alter-ego, Reginald, the Death of Poets. Sirius had met Reginald, an incorrigible kibitzer, during one of those Scrabble games. Being a wordsmith, and a most irritating one at that, the Death of Poets had insisted on whispering possible letter combinations in Sirius's ear every time he took his turn.

Sirus had never thought that there might be more than one Grim Reaper, although now he thought about it, it made a sense that there should perhaps be one for each of the many species in the Plant and Animal Kingdoms, certainly a separate one for Magicals and Muggles at the very least. But there were in fact, only three: one for humans, one for rats (perhaps because there were so many of them), and one for—of all beings—poets.

This seemed unfair, but Death explained that it had come about because a mortal named Dante had written a poem called the Divine Comedy. In it, the poet Vergil guided some unnamed, benighted soul—presumably Dante himself—through the underworld.

The Divine Comedy was all the rage among the Dead in those old, old days. To them it read like a scandal sheet or tell-all biography, naming as it did all the bigwigs of Florence, Dante's home town, and revealing their most secret sins. Who, quick or dead, could resist that? So it was agreed that, as a reward for Dante's cleverness in making up so many interesting ways of passing Eternity, the spirit world should appoint a Vergil-like character to escort poets—not playwrights, not novelists, not essayists—just poets, through the tortuous paths of the Afterlife to their final resting place.

Sirius had a passing acquaintance with Dante's work. As a child, he often visited his female cousins. The eldest, Belletrix, being a bloodthirsty and sadistic sort, was by far the most fascinating to a little boy. She introduced him to the sickening descriptions of crime and punishment in 'The Inferno,' the first part of the epic. Her sister Andie, seeing his wild eyes and trembling limbs after a bout of Bellatrix's storytelling, would hasten to soothe him with the other, less scary parts, especially her favorite, Paradiso. Sirius never thought much of this part, except the description of the heavenly guide, Beatrice, who sounded like a swell girl, very beautiful and probably stacked. He did wish that the Death of Poets might have been more like Beatrice.

But dead poets were stuck with Reginald as a guide, a pale, lanky fellow, who didn't even have the imagination to look grim, like the original Death's Head. He most resembled an effete wandering minstrel in his parti-colored robes and tasseled cap, and his conversation was boring in the extreme, being made up of painfully rhythmic, blank verse.

"Hullo, Reg," said Sirius.

Informality irritated Reginald

"I don't believe I gave you leave to call me
"By that most odious name which sounds like spewing."

"What? Oh, you mean 'retch.' No, I didn't mean to imply that you were sickening. Not at all."

"Then kindly call me by that name my mother
"Was pleased to give me on her bed of childbirth."

"All right… Reginald. How's it going?"

"How to tell you of the myriad torpors
"That torment my so delicate condition
"Alas, I weep, I melt, I… "

And so it went—a florid retelling of Reg's week for a full ten minutes, replete with sighs and tears and limp-wristed dramatic gestures. Sirius got out of there as quickly as he could and never got to ask Death for help. He figured he and Hermione could handle one task by themselves. It had to be easier than enduring Reg's stories.