Bad Romance

Chapter 68

Chapter 68: We Never Shoot To Stun

When the meal was over, Bulstrode led them back into the kitchen, where there was a Floo against the back wall. Rather than elves, wizards and a few goblins were doing the cooking over several open fires. The room was full of delicious smells, and Rodolphus eyed the dishes in progress as they passed.

"We are going to the wand factory now. It is called Elemental Mages," Bulstrode said before tossing a pinch of Floo powder into the fire and stepping through.

"Here you are." The voice came from a goblin near Bellatrix's elbow. His face was flushed from the heat of the kitchen, and his shoulder-length white hair was held back in a hairnet. He held an open can out to them with a Floo powder label on the other side.

Bellatrix and Rodolphus each took a pinch, then the goblin extended the can to Ali Bulstrode. The three went through the Floo one at a time with Rod in the lead and Ali bringing up the rear. The fireplace on the other end was just as large, located in the back of what appeared to be an office.

"Tell Mr. Grindelwald thanks for coming through on the help!" The voice came from a muscular wizard wearing forest green robes who sat behind a huge desk across the room.

"Yes, of course," Bulstrode replied distractedly. He was glaring down at his Ministry robe, feverishly trying to shake the soot off the front of it. Turning to Bellatrix and Rodolphus, he added, "And you lot aren't allowed to kill everyone. Just half." Bellatrix's jaw dropped.

Bulstrode scowled. "What? You can't just stop at half? Because we need to question some of them, you know! How else do you expect us to get an upper hand on the cow's activities?"

"She didn't look fat to me," Rodolphus muttered with a smirk.

"She doesn't have to be overweight to be an emotional cow," Bulstrode shot back. "Her personality is cowish."

"True enough," Rodolphus grinned.

"It's just that I didn't think we were going to be allowed to kill at all," Bellatrix said. She shot a look at the man behind the desk, obviously unmoved by the conversation, which Bulstrode apparently did not mind having in front of him.

"The Minister and Grindelwald want to send her a message, so you are allowed to kill half," Bulstrode explained.

"Your new Minister doesn't fuck around! I like it. That's exactly what we need these days." The wizard behind the desk lit up something to smoke. It didn't smell like anything Bellatrix recognized; though she, Rod, and Rabastan could do some aggressive partying, none of them were smokers.

Taking a heavy drag, he leaned back so that his chair tipped onto its back legs as his eyes focused happily on a point on the ceiling.

"That's our girl," Rodolphus agreed with a proud nod, as though the Lestranges had handpicked the new Minister themselves.

"And letting you lot out." The desk wizard blew a smoke ring, then let out a chuckle that turned into a cough. "I bet that scared the shit out of everyone! Really keeps fuckers in line, though, don't it? With you lot running Azkaban."

"That's the idea," Bellatrix murmured. Americans were an unsettling mix of blunt and strange, half refreshing and half uncomfortable. Bellatrix was amused.

"Well, there are three invisibility cloaks behind the door there. Help yourselves, and thanks again for the assistance."

Bulstrode nodded, taking one cloak which he draped over himself and his wife, promptly vanishing. "We wait outside for the strike," he told Bellatrix and Rodolphus. "We thought we'd leave you each a cloak in case you need to do a lot of moving about and don't find it convenient to stick together."