Chapter Text
As far as Reuben Doors was concerned, every witch or wizard stupid enough to wind up homeless should be thrown in Azkaban. They deserved nothing more for wasting their gifts and talents. Especially this filthy codger, he thought, eyeing the pile of rags curled up on the low stoop against the alley wall.
Doors hated coming to this disgusting place, almost as much as he hated the old bum constantly slumped against the door he needed. It was bad enough he had to slog through Muggle London’s seediest alleyway in the first place just to interrogate some pathetic blood traitor; to have to kick this worthless maggot out of his way every single time was almost unbearable. However, it wasn’t every day the Dark Lord asked for a specific Death Eater for a mission, and it certainly wasn’t every day he asked for Doors. So, when the Mark burned, how could he say no?
The old man stirred and looked up at Doors. “Ah, back again, eh, sprogling?” he asked, raising a tattered bowler hat in greeting.
Doors suppressed a shudder. Even the old man’s voice made his skin crawl. “In my way again, filth?”
The old man’s mouth split into a toothless smile. “Seems I am. Bu’ the cold bites into these ol’ bones somethin’ fierce, an’ the heat from inside does wonders. And seein’ as I don’ have my wand no more, ‘s the only way I can keep from freezin’. Now, why don’ you tell ol’ Max why you’re always darkenin’ ‘is doorway, yeah?” He reached out for the hem of Doors’s pressed white pants. “This get up’s a bit fancy for the likes o’ this hole.”
Doors practically scrambled away from the old man’s grimy fingers. “Keep your filthy hands off my clothes. You’ve already ruined my favorite pair of shoes.”
Max’s shoulders shook with a smokey laugh. “If I remember tha’ right, you kicked me ‘stead o’ askin’ polite like if I’d move. ‘Ow’s ‘at my fault?”
Doors sneered. “It was your filth that ruined them. Whatever you’re covered in that makes you smell like the back side of a centaur wouldn’t come off. That’s four hundred galleons down the drain, which was three hundred ninety-nine galleons, sixteen sickles, and twenty-eight knuts more than you are worth.”
Max just laughed again. “Well, ‘ow d’you plan on movin’ me today, then, if not ‘ith another bit o’ your fancy footwear?”
Wasting magic on rats was something Doors considered beneath him, but he couldn’t afford to lose another pair of shoes on Max again. He pulled out his wand from his sleeve and pointed it at the old man. He grinned. “ Flipendo .”
Max flew backward, crashing into a pile of garbage bags thrown into the alley from the restaurant next door.
Doors chuckled. That would hopefully teach Max to get out of the way all on his own from now on. Or, better yet, get him to leave the alley all together.
Groans rang from the pile of trash like music to Doors’s ears as the wizard turned his wand on the heavy metal door in front of him. Yaxley’s complex series of protection and locking spells was, frankly, overkill. He understood for the past few witches and wizards he’d interrogated over the last few months; they were Ministry workers, hit wizards, people who had information to give. What was so special about this particular Muggle lover, nothing more than a common magizoologist, Doors would never know. In the week he’d been visiting her, she hadn’t given them anything, not about Dumbledore, the Order, or Harry Potter. It didn’t look like she knew anything at all, really. Not that he was complaining; he always enjoyed a good interrogation. But still, this felt like a waste of -
Bright red sparks exploded in his eyes and sent his wand skittering across the ground. He jumped and fell backward off the stoop, landing on a pile of thick, moldering cardboard boxes, slamming his head against the opposite wall.
Movement caught Doors’s eye, and he turned his fuzzy gaze toward it. Max clambered to his feet, brushing off his arms and the tail of his long, fraying overcoat. Doors blinked hard to clear his vision. Why brush himself off? He was homeless…
Then Doors saw the wand Max clutched in his fist.
Max narrowed his eyes at Doors and perched a hand on his hip. “Well, you could certainly use a few lessons in basic manners,” he said, raising an eyebrow. “The nerve, throwing an old man into a pile of rubbish! What would your mother think of you?”
Doors shook his head and scanned the alleyway again. He must be concussed; Max’s lips were definitely the ones moving, but the voice was a young woman’s.
The side of Max’s mouth curled in a smirk. “No no, you’re not hearing things, handsome,” the wrinkled man said as he sauntered closer. “As with many aspects of the wizarding world, things are not always as they seem.” He held out his wand and winked. “ Petrificus totalus .”
Doors’s body immediately stiffened. He couldn’t even move his eyes. Bloody hell.
Max flicked his wand and Doors’s body floated into the air, frozen in a spidery sprawl. The older wizard tilted his head and moved until his nose almost touched Doors’s. “Just so you know, I muddied your shoes on purpose,” he said, the young woman’s voice still coming from his thin lips, which now moved over two rows of straight white teeth. He squeezed his eyes shut, and Doors couldn’t believe what he saw next. With a shake of his head, the deep crags and dark age spots melted away into smooth, tawny skin and delicate, feminine features. The eyes in the new face shifted from a milky, bloodshot grey to a clear, vibrant blue framed by long eyelashes. Finally, the witch pushed her fingers under the front of the bowler hat and slid it off the back of her head. Thick locks of hair followed the path her fingers traced until a cascade of dark curls spilled down her back.
Had he been able to speak, Doors would have cursed. Her hair was a deep shade of midnight blue.
He knew who she was. He'd heard Bellatrix curse her mongrel, shape-shifting niece to the depths on more occasions than he cared to count before she'd been thrown in Azkaban.
She raised her wand and whirled it over her head. “ Finite .” Instantly the tattered clothes disappeared, replaced by red auror’s robes.
Double bloody hell.
With a satisfied squeal, the witch stretched her arms out as far as they would go. “Blimey, it feels good to be out of that body. Oh, I hate being a bloke. I’ll never understand how you lot walk properly.” She ran her hand through her hair one more time, then turned her full attention back to Doors. “Reuben Doors, it is a pleasure to finally meet you.” She stuck out her hand. “Wotcher! The name’s Tonks!”
Doors just stared at her.
Tonks grinned for a second, then looked down at her hand. “Oh. Whoops, sorry. Forgot… Petrified and all that.”
She wasn’t sorry at all.
She glanced at the opening of the alley way. “Oh, I suppose we can’t have anyone walking by and seeing you floating here. More than a few Muggles would have a question or two about that.” She raised her wand and whispered, “ Repellum Muggletum .”
She tilted her head again, narrowing one eye in thought. “Hm… Can’t have any of your Death Eater mates popping in either. Cave inimicum .” She nodded and turned back to Doors, a bright grin lighting up her face.
Doors had never hated anyone so much in his life.
“Much better, yeah?” She winked again, as if they were co-conspirators in some juvenile prank. “Now that we’ve properly met, it’s my duty as an Auror with the Ministry of Magic to let you know that you are now under arrest. You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on before the Wizengamot. Anything you do say may be given as evidence.” She pursed her lips for a moment. “I am afraid I’ll have to search you, and with you petrified and suspended it might get a bit awkward.” She grinned again, and Doors wanted to spit. “Apologies in advance.”
She undid the front of his crisp white robes and let them fall open and hang toward the ground. Doors wanted to scream. He couldn’t even see what she was doing because he couldn’t move his eyes.
Tonks rummaged around in his robe pockets, muttering to herself with every one.
“Oh, what’s this?” she asked as she made it to the back panel of his robes.
Doors’s stomach plummeted.
“Oo, Undetectable Extension charm!” She patted a large pocket on the side of the jacket she wore under her Aurors’ robes. “Got one of those myself! Bloody useful, yeah?”
My lord, if you can hear me, please don’t let her find-
“Oh, bugger! Is that the time?” Tonks checked a small watch around her wrist and sighed. “And just when I found that… Oh, well.” Her nose curled in pure disappointment and Doors wanted to vomit.
She raised her wand and muttered, “ Expecto Patronum. ” A small silver form burst from the tip of her wand and scampered around the alleyway, kicking off walls and rubbish heaps alike, clearly enjoying itself. It kicked its long feet behind it and wiggled its ears with glee.
Tonks put a hand on her hip and shook her head. “Oh, for heaven’s sake, would you come here, you silly rabbit? I have a job for you!”
The rabbit stopped hopping and appeared on her shoulder. “Oi, Kingsley! You are more than well overdue to help me bring this over-dressed, pompous, rather unpleasant Death Eater back to the Ministry for questioning, processing, sentencing, and finally transfer to Azkaban, in that order.” The rabbit flitted off.
Doors had never considered himself a particularly violent person. Sure, he reveled in torturing his victims with knives and other tools rather than with the Cruciatus curse, but those were calculated movements based on careful thought with a set goal in mind. He’d never had a taste for the mindless carnage many of his fellow Death Eaters drank in like so much butterbeer.
But he would make an exception for this Tonks girl. His fingers itched to curl around his wand and send a Killing curse her way so powerful that her mother would feel it.
But he was petrified.
And there was no one coming to help him.
Scarcely a minute later, a silver lynx bounded up to the young Auror. “Sorry, Tonks my dear, but I am quite tied up at the moment,” the lynx said in a deep, smooth voice. “You’ll have to bring the fellow in yourself.”
The lynx disappeared in a puff of silver mist.
Tonks narrowed her eyes and huffed. “Prat. A load of good you are.” She sighed, reached into her own Extended pocket, and pulled out a piece of shimmering cloth. She cocked an eyebrow at Doors and threw the invisibility cloak over him, tying it together at the bottom to make a sort of bag. She tucked her wand into her sleeve, whispered, “ Mobilicorpus ,” and stepped out onto the crowded sidewalk, dragging Doors behind her like a giant, invisible balloon.
Doors’s body floated above the heads of the passing crowd, following Tonks down the street toward the Ministry of Magic, the last place he would enter as a relatively free man.
He would kill her. By the Dark Lord himself, if Doors managed to find his way out of Azkaban, he would kill Tonks. And not quickly either. No, he would savor it, just like he savored all his other victims.
But first he had to figure out how to get out of this mess. It was unlikely he’d succeed before getting shipped off to Azkaban, and the dementors were not likely to want a soul as black as his to leave any time soon.
Fine. He would wait. If there was one thing he could do as well as torture blood traitors for information, it was wait.