THE LUDOVICO TECHNIQUE

Chapter 10 – Quiet before

Hermione was unable to concentrate on files or paperwork for the rest of the day, although she did consider that Rookwood's interview might be mildly interesting. He seemed rather too boisterous to have been an Unspeakable. After she attempted to read a line in Selwyn's file for the fifth time without success, and as she was technically not required to stay for set hours (as she had been in her previous post), she decided to head home early and stop at the Leaky Cauldron for dinner. She put a quick glamour charm on (to avoid the attention of the wizarding masses), enjoyed a shepherd's pie and a high-gravity mead, then stopped by and picked up the Louis Armstrong CD before heading back to her flat.

As she didn't live in a wizarding building, she owned both a telly and a CD player, although both tended to go on the fritz when she performed too many household charms and spells near them. She also had learned that placing either device too close to the fireplace (and its Floo Network connection) was dangerous; her original telly had disintegrated one morning when she was late to work.

She put the song on and discovered it took three repetitions to get it completely out of her head, after which she played the rest of the tunes on repeat while flipping through a few Muggle magazines and then the Prophet. It was a very slow news day, but a small ad toward the back of the paper caught her eye. Apparently, a new feature, Wizarding World Personals, was starting up at the beginning of May. Interested parties could place anonymous ads and the Prophet would serve as a clearing-house for replies. Hermione considered that she might place an ad or possibly respond to a few; her friends from school and the Ministry seemed to be permanently pairing up with alarming rapidity, and she did occasionally feel as if she was being left out of events. There weren't a lot of singletons about; given that I live in the equivalent of a mid-sized village, she thought. Not for the first time, she considered relocating to America or perhaps Australia. If her new Ministry position remained annoying and stressful, she thought, she'd start looking into it seriously.

As the hour grew later, Hermione headed into her bedroom, where she remained frustratingly awake. She attempted to sip some chamomile tea, with no success; Dreamless Sleep was her last-resort alternative, and she picked up the bottle several times and returned it to the cabinet, untouched.

Finally, after she'd ensconced herself on the couch with her favorite fuzzy Gryffindor blanket, her eyelids got heavy and she drifted off to sleep.

She was walking through an odd landscape that resembled the Hogwarts Great Hall, albeit the damaged version of it that she recalled from the Final Battle. Overall, the surroundings were grey and blurred and there wasn't a clear pathway through the gloom, but she pressed on nonetheless. Looking down, she noted she was in the bathrobe and pajamas she'd donned earlier that evening, and her wand was in its usual place in her robe pocket. She'd had similar dreams, but not for a few years. In them sometimes there were unsettling noises, usually explosions and screams, but this time it was silent, which is why she startled and instinctively grasped her wand to defend herself when she glimpsed a Death Eater in combat robes out of the corner of her eye, but the shadowy figure didn't appear to see her and passed quickly by, vanishing into one of the pockets of darkness.

She heard an insistent whispering from that darkness and walked closer to it. The voice sounded familiar, but until she walked closer to the edge of her perception, she couldn't quite figure out what was being said.

"….we're going to fucking lose, I can feel it, I did the sums last night, and now we know he doesn't really have a plan, we could just retreat to the Hall and barricade it!"

"Only plan that he has is to save his own skin," came a heavily-accented reply. "I think it has always been such."

"And if he manages to do that and finds we've scarpered, we're fucked, too. And Aurors know where to find me, anyway…some of them were part of that Phoenix lot who quit the Department, but I had them all over to the Hall for several drinks parties before that." Yaxley (because Hermione was sure that it was he) gave a long, despairing sigh.

"Banya…." Dolohov (it could be no one else) replied, in a rather sarcastic tone, and Hermione imagined he was rolling his eyes as an accompaniment.

"I know! I was bloody well trying to be a good boss, wasn't I?"

"There is no place for good bosses in a war."

"That may be the most Russian thing I've ever heard ye say, old friend."

"Here is something even more so. Our current choices are prison or death."

"With an extra added bit of torture before the latter, so they're both shite," Yaxley replied. "Although I suppose Russian prison might be worse."

"In wizarding world, much the same." Dolohov sighed. "Already know what Azkaban is like, that is my choice."

"You were there longer than me, Tosha, and ye made it through."

"Order of Phoenix regime probably will not use dementors," Dolohov said.

"Cold comfort, that," said Yaxley. "Guess we'd better get back out there. Maybe we'll be cellmates." And with that, Hermione saw Yaxley emerge from the darkness and look straight through her, then turn and dash quickly in the other direction. His long braid was intact, so clearly this was just before his defeat by George and Lee. Dolohov emerged behind Yaxley, but he paused and looked right at her.

"Myushka?" he said.

Hermione gave a long, loud gasp and abruptly woke up. She was covered in sweat, and she immediately jumped up from the couch and Scourgified the blanket and herself. A quick Tempus charm revealed that her alarm would be sounding in an hour anyway, so she grimly plodded off toward the shower.

She got to the Ministry about thirty minutes earlier than normal. Mr Robards came in right behind her and gave her an approving look and nodded, but made no comment. Alex was already in his office, and she poked her head in and said, "I'm a bit confused about something. Weren't we meant to see Rowle before Rookwood? I gave Mr Robards an interviews rota a couple of weeks ago when he asked for one."

"Just in case they were talking amongst themselves, or they overheard the guards talking, I decided to switch it around. I did mean to tell you, sorry."

"It's all right," Hermione said. "Anything to throw them off balance, I guess."

"Wait," Alex said, peering at her. "Are you all right? You look a bit…er…tired this morning. Want to go and grab some breakfast in the Atrium, or possibly something a bit more substantial at the canteen?"

"Yes," Hermione replied. "I didn't sleep well." Once they'd sat down in the canteen with their respective hot breakfasts, she added, "I had a bit of a disturbing dream last night."

"Not to poke fun at you but that's how a lot of Muggle jokes about my profession start."

"I realise that, but…well. This was different. It seemed more realistic."

"A lucid dream, then," Alex said, after he took a sip of coffee. "Witches and wizards have them, too, but they usually refer to them as visions or visits to the Faerie Realm or something equally fanciful."

"Well, this was a vision of the past, then. Except part of it wasn't." Hermione sliced into her omelet and took a bite, then blotted her mouth.

"What part wasn't?"

She poured a splash of milk in her tea, then stirred it, then added a bit of sugar. "Er…the part where Dolohov spoke to me."

"What did he say?"

"He looked at me and used that nickname, "Myushka." Except that he didn't use that back then as far as I know. Nor did I actually see him much at the Final Battle, which was where this dream took place. And Yaxley was there, too, but he walked right past without seeing me."

"I'm not sure what to tell you, other than possibly we ought to concentrate on some of the other inmates for a bit, even though we do need to visit Yax at some point today." He paused for a moment. "In fact, given this new information, I believe I will leave him bereft of your presence for the remainder of his stay at Mungo's. He'll have to dance with himself." Alex nodded at her and then took a bite of oatmeal.

"Well, he didn't speak to me in the dream."

"Doesn't mean he wasn't there," Alex said, after which he buttered a slice of toast. "I think they've imprinted on you. They could both be trying to, er, get under your skin by magical means."

"I suppose I wouldn't put it past either one," Hermione replied, after she took a sip of tea. "Even though I thought Azkaban had magic-dampening charms in the walls."

"You and I both know that such things can be fooled, or worked around. And it's possible some of those charms have degraded over time. The only thing we can be absolutely sure of is that neither of them have wands."

"In Yaxley's file, there was a picture of his wand after it was snapped straight away by, er, several Aurors, who also roughed him up a bit. I'm not sure about Dolohov's. I mean, he was in Azkaban before, so it was probably snapped years ago."

"I'm sure he went to an underground wand maker, or borrowed one."

Hermione was reminded of the time she'd used Bellatrix Lestrange's wand. "It never feels quite right to use another's wand, though."

"No, which is why many Dark wizards develop their wandless magic skills, as you no doubt are also aware?"

"Unfortunately," Hermione said.

They concentrated on their breakfasts after that for a bit, and Alex departed for St. Mungo's directly from the canteen.

Later that afternoon, when Hermione had gone through both Selwyn's and Rookwood's files yet again and made some rather redundant notes, Alex returned.

"I meant to be back earlier but I was having a word with the resident Mind Healers and the Potioneer about that experimental Euphoria; I think they need to dial back the formulation a bit. Yax was crooning Sinatra to me and quite honestly I found it rather more disturbing than an Imperius Curse." He paused. "I had to get out of there before he got to the end of 'My Way.'"

Hermione tried, and failed, to not think of that song, and of the wizard singing it (from his hospital bed in pajamas). "Did he have some wonky name for Frank Sinatra? Like, er, the New York Necromancer or something?"

"As a matter of fact he called him the Warbling Wizard," Alex said, chuckling. "I wonder what that's all about."

"I have no idea," Hermione said. "I'll ask Ginny this weekend. Her mum listens to a lot of that type of music on the Wizarding Wireless Network. I've never noticed any odd names but then again I wasn't always paying attention."

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AUTHOR'S NOTES:

Russian: (none, other than general Weltschmerz)

I realise this chapter is a bit short but I wanted to get it out before the weekend to make up for putting this story on hiatus for a bit (in favor of finishing Godless).

To all reviewers/followers/favorites—Thank you. To the anon reviewer who doesn't like Alex—well, he's not really supposed to be likable, so that works, I guess. To the other anon reviewer who said Yaxley was 'on drugs,' well—yes, while at St Mungo's, he's both been sedated and dosed with the magical equivalent of mood stabilizers.

Chapter titles are from the song "Favours" by the Delgados.