The Search Is Over

Chapter 35

As it happened, Regulus was distracted by a passing thought before he and Kreacher could apparate away. The thought shocked him, not because it was particularly shocking in itself, but because he truly hadn't expected it. The thought had come from a Death Eater. He knew this because said Death Eater was thinking about the orders he had just received from Voldemort involving stealing something from the Ministry For Magic from the Department of Mysteries.

"Wait here," Regulus whispered to Kreacher. "I will be right back, I swear."

Kreacher opened his mouth to protest, but Regulus was off with vampiric speed, snatching the man by the arm and spinning him around to lock their gazes.

"Come with me," he said quietly. A surge of adrenaline shot through him at doing this to a wizard, because he never had before. Vampiric hypnotism should work on anyone, but assuming this and putting it into practice were two entirely different things. What if the man had wards against the Imperius curse? Would they block him?

Regulus thought not, but the theory was as yet unpracticed. The vampiric form of hypnotism did not involve using a direct spell, though. For the first time in far too long, Regulus found himself interested and excited over this experiment. With Kreacher in his life again, he had room to care about the things he'd once found interesting when it came to magic and how it interacted with itself and with other factors.

Fortunately his theory was correct. Perhaps the man had no protections up or perhaps he did and they simply did not work against Vampires, but he relaxed and came docilely along with Regulus to rejoin Kreacher in the alley.

"This is a Death Eater," he told Kreacher. "He needs to die before he can carry out his orders to steal from the Ministry of Magic."

Kreacher nodded, eyes full of pride at Regulus's action. "Brilliant Master Regulus," he whispered. "What was this Death Eater going to steal, Kreacher wonders?"

"He wasn't thinking about it hard enough for me to be sure, but we are about to find out," Regulus said and drove his fangs into the neck of the Death Eater. Wizard blood tasted nearly the same as Muggle blood as it turned out.

As he drained the man's life away, the Death Eater's mind relaxed in surrender, leaving it free and easy for Regulus to plunder. It did not take long to find the answer he sought. The man slid lifelessly to the ground as Regulus turned to Kreacher.

"He wanted some veil that is supposed to lead to the land of the dead or something like that," Regulus said with a shudder. "If that doesn't sound disturbing I don't know what does! How would one even create such a thing?"

"Probably a necromancer," Kreacher replied thoughtfully.

"Let's go back to Dora's and talk...I want to think about this...We will go to Hogwarts tomorrow," Regulus decided. Kreacher nodded and Regulus took his hand and apparated them back to Dora's where they spent several hours talking of this strange veil. Together they came up with many disturbing uses for such a thing, none of them soothing. Of course both knew that they could not truly know the uses for this veil but they were still quite unsettled nonetheless.

They were watching the eleven o'clock news with Dora when Kreacher brought up an interesting point. The weather for the next day was to be rainy and cloudy and the elf wondered if this meant that Regulus could move about as there would be no sun.

"I've never tried, though on very dark rainy days, I do sleep rather fitfully," Regulus said.

"Kreacher remembers studying weather spells with Master Regulus for a school project in Master Regulus's third year at Hogwarts. Does he recall?"

Regulus frowned, then slowly nodded. "Yes...I do...it was about how to move clouds from one area to another if they are present."

Kreacher nodded. "Kreacher thinks that if Master Regulus moves several layers of clouds over himself tomorrow he can make it dark enough to travel during the day to Hogwarts. It would be an interesting experiment, and it would allow Master Regulus more freedom if it works out. If it does not, Master Regulus will simply return to his sleep."