A heavy fog surrounded Spinner’s End: a constant feature that was a throwback from its days as a factory town. The building around which the back-to-back terraced houses had been built in the late-Victorian period had long since expelled its last belch of smoke but it seemed to still hover and the moths lingered as black as the night sky. It was a place that, upon his arrival, Theodore Rookwood found he never wanted to trespass again. His heart yearned for a breath of fresh air and the golden glow of the sunshine in the countryside. Yet he persisted beneath the mire, brushing his way through the winding, narrow streets until he found the door he was looking for: 142.
The man who opened the door arrested Theodore with simultaneously a look of fear and of admiration. The robes he’d worn were ostentatious as per usual but weren’t as striking as his usual attire. They were dark with an emerald trim and an ashen-cum-coal travelling cloak hung around his shoulders, clasped at his throat with a snake broach that was studded with emeralds and a ruby for its eye. The man straightened up, glancing at the signet ring on Theodore’s right hand that bore the bird and the chess piece for which his family were named. In that instance he seemed to think twice about letting Theodore in but that lapse was enough time and at once he was inside.
The Rookwood man had always been beneath threatening people. What he made were promises. When he drew his wand and spoke it was not a half-hearted threat to execute in cold blood the Yewbeam’s wife but a promise and the green spark that began to glow at the end of his wand was proof enough of Theodore’s intensions. However, unluckily for Paul Yewbeam, he didn’t know what it was that Theodore wanted to know exactly. The batter for the cakes Pansy had been making had slid from her grasp and was staining her carpet, a piece of glass from the bowl also having reached out to cut at her foot when it shattered.
Information was what Theodore demanded: anything about their son. At once, Paul Yewbeam stuttered out all he knew, rattling off largely useless bits of trivial knowledge about the young man which did little to ease Theodore’s temper. His grip affirmed itself on his wand and the green glow began to grow, the words tripping over eagerly onto his tongue, Pansy’s eyes beginning to reflect the colour of the Killing Curse he’d cast upon her if something, anything didn’t become a useful feature for him.
Borgin and Burke’s saved Pansy Yewbeam’s life.
Theodore whipped his wand back and forward once more, Pansy’s screams rising into the air at his movement. Nothing happened though. No magic crackled forth to his target and Theodore stood, his eyebrows rising a little as the quaking woman looked out from behind her hands. Despite himself he chuckled and shook his head, tempted to return his wand to his pocket. However, the element of surprise was paramount so when he moved his wand again, he immobilised the pair and from there he set about adjusting their memories so that even if they would’ve considered it prudent they would have a whit to report to their son.
With a crack, Theodore apparated out of Spinner’s End and straight into the betting shop that was snuggled in between a dingy café and a wand handle shop in the heart of Knockturn Alley. Theodore’s gaze immediately settled on the Death Eater that he knew he’d find and he tore the fat lump of a man off of the chair before the roulette machine he so delighted in pouring his galleons into. Like a squealing pig the man cried and never as loud as he did when Theodore slammed him up against the wall, holding him up off of the floor, choking him by the scruff of his collar.
“Tell me, Yaxley, what do I have to do to get information round here?”
Despite the inferiority of his position, Yaxley smiled, great rotting teeth on show for Theodore’s benefit. To his credit, the pompous Rookwood did not flinch, his grip merely tightened on the man as his colouring began to dash closer to purple than anything regarding health.
“Misplaced your wife, Rookwood. How careless.” Yaxley bit back with a hollow chuckle as, again, Theodore’s grip tightened.
“Tell me about Yewbeam, Yaxley, or the Death Eaters will have to fish you out of the Thames if your wife wants something to bury.”
Yaxley didn’t seem to believe him and an arrogant expression unwisely crossed his features. Theodore knew then that Yaxley didn’t have anything to say to him. He knew about as much as Theodore did on that front. The Rookwood dropped Yaxley unceremoniously onto his fat arse, dust exploding from the creaking floorboards upon impact. Theodore whipped out his wand and poked it between Yaxley’s eyes, as though the man needed any further coaxing to give Theodore something, anything, to work on.
“Death Eaters don’t tell me nothin’ these days, lad. Don’t know why you’re both’rin’ to be honest with yah. Quick way out of that sham of a marriage of yours, eh, her death.”
Theodore chuckled humourlessly. “Is it?” He inquired. “Crucio.”
The silence that had overwhelmed the betting shop exploded and shattered into a pieces as Yaxley’s screams took to their ears. His writhing, ridiculous lump of a body did nothing to soothe the rage Theodore felt though he could not deny the feeling of absolute satisfaction at seeing the waste of a human being in such acute pain. However, it did the trick and soon he was crying out for mercy, mercy, anything, I’ll give you anything, just give me mercy.
Theodore ended the spell, drawing his wand away before glancing up over the patrons who had, at his look, returned to their business. Leaning down, Theodore dragged Yaxley up to sit against the wall. The man’s chest heaved, his face the colour of ripe plums as he spluttered out harsh breaths, his nerves jingling his hands this way and that as he fought to take back some of the control that Theodore had stolen from him with the spell.
“Drakes…Drakes is there. Borgin and Burke’s… though you knew that, di’n’t yah, kid?” He wheezed a half-laugh as Theodore nodded and he shook his head. “You are a Death Eater really, aren’t you? More resourceful than me though I’ve spent all Christmas on their tails. Knew something was wrong. We like to watch you Rookwoods. It’s not good enough to have Augustus and Kendall and Athena. You’re an asset, boy, and because you’re now Thaddeus’ little bastard you need a family, don’t you? Yes. We’ve been keeping an eye on your wife ‘specially for your dad. It was me who decided to go looking proper-like for her. I’d call that loyalty wouldn’t you? Loyalty to you.”
Theodore’s eyes widened a little at the sides and Yaxley looked at him, the latter’s breath beginning to return to its wheezy normality. Theodore groped around in the man’s pockets and expelled a packet of cigarettes for him. He lit one, shoving it crudely to Yaxley’s lips before grasping the man’s upper arms.
“What do you mean?” He asked tightly. “What do you mean by that?”
“Loyalty?” Yaxley gruffed, taking the cigarette from his lips and exhaling into Theodore’s face the smoke. The Rookwood thumped Yaxley for his trouble and the latter grunted before nodding. “Daddy Rookwood made his face known at Malfoy Manor, believe it or not. Saw him dump a load of coin down, I did. He’s paid someone. Can only assume it’ll be your boy Yew-wood or whatever. Yewtree? Yewbeam! Him. Try the attic, lad.”
“Borgin never bothered to put in a dungeon?” Theodore asked brusequely.
Yaxley’s bushy eyebrows rose as he exhaled another mouthful of smoke.
“Your dungeon is the way out, nipper. Out through the sewers and you’ll bumble up in the Leaky Cauldron before you know it. Though, that’s only if he’s not there. Likes to play with his meal, that one.”
Theodore hauled Yaxley back to his feet and hurled the man out through the door, onto the street. Into the Knockturn Alley crowds they plunged, weaving up towards Borgin and Burke’s. Yaxley squeaked as he felt Theodore’s wand prod into his back and the two men drew closer to the dilapidated building still absurdly in working order.
“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Yaxley stuttered out, bravery failing him as the two reached the mouth of the alley way between Borgin’s and another, indistinct shop building. “You could marry a pretty Pureblood and forget all about this messy business with the Half-Blood and-”
Theodore’s hand clapping Yaxley over the back of the head ended the other man’s sentence.
“She’s my wife.” Theodore told Yaxley, as though the simple enough fact made all the sense in the world.
Yaxley shook his head. “Fine. Look, he’s not in there, Rookwood. He must be upstairs. The attic.”
Theodore nodded and left Yaxley’s side, muttering one last order to stay put. Yaxley nodded and slid into the shadows of the alleyway, watching from afar as ever as Theodore slid into the shop behind a small family. With a word to the mother, however, they exited the shop just as quickly and Theodore scoured the ground floor for people before turning the little card on the door from ‘open’ to ‘closed.’
From there, Theodore moved into the back room, hopping lithely between room to room until he found the staircase and then, wary of the old floorboards, began to climb. He found the second floor with relative ease and following that he also discovered the hatch to the attic. There was little movement on that floor but the floorboards above groaned with minute movement, unable to take the life that seemed to be up there that it had not entertained in decades.
Pulling the hatch would announce Theodore’s presence, this he knew. What he wanted was the element of surprise. What he ideally wanted was an in-and-out job. He wanted to fetch Hallie, take her home to her mother and then go out and hunt the sorry little cretin that had taken a cheap shot at a Rookwood woman. Then, when the boy was floating down the river Thames with Yaxley not far behind him, Theodore would introduce his lady wife either to Dark Magic, protective charms or comfortable living in the country with multiple children and animals to amuse her.
Anything but battles and torture and injury and the paralysing fear that had engulfed him: the fear he’d never see her again.
Pull the hatch, Theodore did.
Magic boosted the wizard up into the attic and he drew his wand once more, pointing it directly at Yewbeam. With a flourish, Theodore threw a slashing curse at the man as the red mist descended and for the first time in a long time, true rage began to fill him. No one would ever have the right to touch his wife. Ever. She was a Rookwood woman, Merlin damn her, and the bastard deserved nothing less than a painful death to pay for every injury he had inflicted upon her. She belonged to Theodore. She belonged to him. She was his as he was hers. No one was allowed to hurt her and after Yewbeam. No one would ever hurt her again. That, Theodore was determined to secure.
He’d start with killing Yewbeam.
by Henry Yewbeam Thu Dec 26, 2013 4:05 am
