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The Twisted Trunk


Minerva McGonagall was inconsolable.

“I should have just listened to the boy!” she said, upset, her accent trembling through her words as she clutched the bit of parchment that Peter Pettigrew had left behind on his bed. She was sitting behind her desk in her office as she lamented, tears fogging her narrow glasses as Elphinstone Urquart rubbed her shoulders consolingly. “Now we haven’t any idea where he’s gone and it’s my fault he’s missing!”

“Breathe, Minerva,” begged Elphinstone, “Deepest breaths, my love.”

“I canna help it, Elphinstone,” she cried.

“It isn’t your fault, Min,” he persisted.

“It is,” Minerva wailed, “And if anything happens to the boy… oh poor little Peter! However did he find out?”

Elphinstone shook his head - he’d been wondering the same thing.

The fireplace flashed and suddenly Albus Dumbledore was through the flames, his eyes a bit wild with worry as he crossed the room. Elphinstone stood upright behind Minerva’s chair, releasing her shoulders like a teenager caught in the act of some forbidden amorous activity. The headmaster didn’t seem to notice Elphinstone’s reaction to his presence.

“So it’s true then, confirmed, that the boy is gone?”

“It’s true, it’s true,” wailed Minerva. “Oh Albus,” she reached across the desk for his hands, “He could be anywhere! He’s missing and it’s my fault. If only I’d listened to him the other night!”

Dumbledore shook his head, “It is not your fault, Minerva.”

“We have to find him,” she pleaded, “Albus, we have to find them both. I canna be losin’ James Potter and Peter Pettigrew - I doubt that me heart could handle it, Albus! Please, it’s broken enough already!”

Dumbledore frowned and he squeezed Minerva’s hands. He didn’t want to tell her the rest. He didn’t want to tell her that Peter and James were not the only two gone missing. He didn’t want to tell her that gone, too, were Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Lily Evans…

She looked up at him, seeing the concern waffling about in his eyes and her stomach turned. “Albus,” she whimpered.

He drew a deep breath.




Far north, Regulus leg the lot of the rescuers into the pub in Havmork - The Twisted Trunk. The pub was warm and lit with a warm cast to it. The walls were wood and sturdy wood tables and chairs filled the open space. A long bar ran along one wall, behind were shelves and shelves of bottles of all shapes and colours and stacks of shimmering goblets and steins and glasses. The bartender waved his wand so that a shaker hung in the air beside him, mixing a drink, even as he poured another out over ice into a glass and slid it across the bar to a rather disturbing looking man with long, stringy black hair and a mean face. The tables were littered with more people of the same nature - an old hag sat in a corner, her long hooked nose fixed with a knot of a mole and her eyes darting over a mangy old potions book.

The group of them sad a seat and Regulus went to order a round of hot toddies that would thaw them out from the icy air they’d just walked through. He returned, rubbing his hands together as they tingled from relief of the cold and sat, looking ‘round at the crew of them - Maryrose with her pale white hair slowly fading into a soft blue, Remus shivering as Sirius rubbed his arms, and Lily, looking pale and worried, staring off into space.

“Right. We need a plan,” Regulus said.

“We go and get James! That’s the plan,” Sirius said boldly.

Remus nodded.

“Obviously we go and get ames,” Regulus said, “But that isn’t a plan, that’s an objective. We need a plan.”

Sirius looked offended, “It is so a plan, don’t be dim.”

“Don’t you be dim!” Regulus replied. The bar tender arrived then, sliding steaming glasses of the buttery drink across the table to each of them and Regulus thanked him and watched him leave. Once he was gone, Regulus turned back to face them and he rapped his knuckles against the table, “We can’t just barge into Durmstrang and destroy it. You can’t tear it brick from brick like you’ve said in the car. We need a plan to figure out where in the castle James Potter is, we need to know where we’re going when we’re in there. A lot of us wandering about the halls of Durmstrang will stand out very much. We need to be as efficient as possible so that the Dark Lord doesn’t get wind that we are here or else he’ll panic and either flee or he’ll kill James. Maybe both.”

Sirius stared at Regulus with a horrified expression.

Lily’s cheeks went even more pale than they’d been before and she bit her lower lip, pained by the words Regulus said.

“He’s right,” Remus agreed.

Maryrose nodded, too, “Yes, he is.” She looked at Sirius, “I know for a fact it takes but a moment for a rescue mission to go very, very sour - very, very quickly. You forget that last year around this time, James and I were performing our own little rescue mission for Lucy Evans.” She said, “We didn’t thin it out very well and it almost ended very poorly. Luckily, James is much smarter than I am and he got us out of there safely. I don’t know how - but somehow. If we’d had a plan, it wouldn’t have been such a close call…”

“Alright then,” Sirius said, “What’s the plan? How are we supposed to plan? We can’t predict the future! We don’t know what it’s like in there! Bloody hell we can’t even see the damn castle! You say it’s underground - well how the bleedin’ hell are we supposed to get underground? ‘ey?”

“By ship,” Regulus replied.

Sirius, who had been intending to go on, posing ridiculous questions for some time, looked at him in confusion. “Excuse me?”

“Yeah, you get into Durmstrang by ship,” Regulus answered.

Remus stared at Regulus. “A ship that goes underground? Through a cave or something?”

“No,” Regulus shook his head, “Through the water.”

They all stared at him now, even Maryrose.

“I can’t explain it,” he said, shrugging, “But I know it works, I’ve done it.”

Sirius said, “What we need is a bloody Map like the Marauder’s Map.”

“Yes, that would be useful but --” Lily said, “Once again that stupid thing isn’t any help here!”

“Stupid? Stupid?” Sirius looked as though he’d been wounded through the heart at the words. He clutched his chest.

“The Marauders’ Map?” Regulu asked, “What is that?”

“A bit of genius is what,” Sirius said.

“A good deal of it, rather,” interrupted Lily, “When it is of actual use!”

“IT’S ALWAYS OF ACTUAL USE!” Sirius roared defensively.

Remus was staring at the table top, his eyes searching the air before him as he muttered…

“What was that?” Maryrose asked - catching a bit of the words Remus was saying. “Remus?”

They all looked to him.

“We need a map of Durmstrang,” Remus said, “I can do the rest.”

“Do the rest of what?” Lily asked.

Sirius’s eyes lit up, though, “Of course you can! You’re bloody brilliant. Oh Remus, you’re bloody brilliant!”

“What’s brilliant?” asked Regulus.

“If we can get our hands on a map of Durmstrang Institute, I can set the homonculous upon it and we’ll be able to see where in the mapped area James Potter is being held,” Remus replied, “It reveals any people within a mapped area.”

Lily asked, “Where are we to get a map of Durmstrang Institute, though?”

Remus shrugged, “Reckon they have one in one of their textbooks? Perhaps they’ve something similar to Hogwarts: A History?” he looked to Regulus.

“If they do, it’ll be in their library,” Regulus answered.

“Then we need to get to the bleedin’ library,” Sirius declared.

Regulus nodded. “Alright, this is starting to sound like more of a plan. So we go to the library in the castle, we find a map of Durmstrang, we cast this homonculous thing on it so we can see where James Potter is… and then what? Then we go bursting in the room and announce ourselves for Voldemort to see? And how will we get away without him and half the bloody institute catching us up?”

“Run fast, little brother,” Sirius replied.

Run fast?” Regulus said, “That’s your suggestion? The Dark Lord is on our tail and your suggestion is run fast? As though we could out run the Dark Lord!”

“You only need to outrun the slowest person when being chased by a bear, Reg,” Sirius replied.

“That’s terrible,” Maryrose muttered.

But there was a general murmur of chuckles about the table.

“We’ll figure out the getting away bit once we know where he is,” Sirius said with a more serious tone. “We have no way to know what our best way to escape is without knowing where we are escaping from.”

“True,” Regulus relented.

Sirius downed the last of his drink and cleared his throat, “We should go. Every moment we sit here is wasting seconds better used on saving James’s life.”

At the words, Lily’s mind raced back to that clock, laying pitifuly upon Mopsus’s work bench, the cogs being coaxed to grind… how weakly they’d moved… and he brought her hands to her heart, worried… She nodded, “And the seconds are precious.”

Regulus stood up and he took out his coin purse and threw money onto the tabletop. “Alright then,” he said, “Let’s go.”