Special – Dren POV II
After the trial, the court crumbled like a corpse left out under the sun. Fudge clung to every connection and miserable lever of power he still possessed, clawing at his dignity like a pig wallowing in its own filth. The only thing he achieved was a reduction of his sentence to five years. Five years in the Azkaban my lord Einar had rebuilt—a place where neither madness nor death offered any escape.
Fools deceived themselves, thinking that without Dementors it was somehow more humane. They didn't understand. Now there was something worse.
In the cells, lurking in the darkness, dwelled the Seekers: creatures with tentacles dripping caustic secretions, their vitreous eyes gleaming with a spark of cruel intelligence. They knew when to study, when to mutilate, when to let the pain nestle in the soul like a permanent guest. Sometimes they would open a prisoner with the precision of a surgeon and stitch them back together, simply to prove that all suffering was the choice of their tormentor.
Fudge reached his cell—if one could call that den of stone and mist a cell—and barely had time to approach the blackened little window. The fog began to seep through the cracks, sliding inside with a living purpose.
"Help!" he screeched, his voice cracked and pathetic.
The mist climbed into his throat and stole the cry, wrapping his face like a shroud. He was swallowed by the shadows in utter silence.
An instant later, a hypnotic illusion covered the prison, projecting an image of Fudge's corpse, hanging by the neck in his false cell. That everyone would believe in his suicide was a delicious detail.
The mist spat him out onto the cold, sticky floor of my Hall of Judgment. I watched from the gloom as Fudge lifted himself with a shudder of disgust, covered in someone else's blood. The metallic stench struck his face, and he staggered.
He rose with difficulty. Despair was always the first thing to bloom in men. He searched for an exit, any promise of relief, and lunged toward the door he believed would set him free.
He opened it.
And stepped back into the same room.
Another door.
Another useless sprint.
A perfect loop.
As panic took root, he turned with a shiver toward the moans infesting the darkness. And then he saw her. Umbridge. Her flesh carved with a twisted manifesto. The words gouged down to the bone: JUDGMENT. SHAME. SUFFERING.
"U-Umbridge…" he stammered, his voice as frail as his stomach. "What… what did they do to you…?"
Her tongue, split and lacerated with the same message, writhed uselessly. Her eyes were a pit of pleading and despair.
Fudge swallowed hard. He looked at her. He understood.
"Do you… want me to kill you?"
The glimmer of relief in Umbridge's eyes was almost beautiful.
"All right…" he whispered, his voice quivering as he struggled not to betray his own relief at sharing the burden. "It was my responsibility… I will grant you that mercy."
He found a jagged iron rod, rusted and cruel by its very nature. He placed it over her chest while Umbridge released a sigh that sounded far too much like a sob.
"Forgive me."
He drove it in. The heart yielded to the pressure. Life drained from her pupils.
And then I knew it was time.
My voice broke the stillness, low and rough, tinged with delight.
"Truly… a foolish thing."
A reddish glow pulsed from my hand. The wound closed as if the iron had never touched her. Her flesh quivered and knitted together, and a cursed breath returned to inflate her lungs. Her eyes opened in a flutter of pure terror.
"No… no! Let me die, I beg you!" Umbridge sobbed, her voice a ragged croak. "It was him… he forced me! He ordered me to harm his students!" She pointed at Fudge with a trembling finger.
Fudge froze. Then a roar of fury swelled his veins.
"Liar! You were the one who wanted to do it!"
"You were the one who wanted to humiliate them, discredit them! You're a coward!"
The rod sank into her throat again. A gush of blood darkened the shadows.
I moved my hand. Once more she revived. Once more her panic ignited.
"I could let you keep slaughtering each other forever…" I remarked softly as my shadow stretched across the floor. "But I prefer order. Torture properly administered."
Chains slithered across the ground like iron serpents. They caught him by wrists and ankles, biting into his flesh. He didn't need to scream—yet. That would come soon enough.
A Seeker emerged, its tentacles undulating with eager anticipation. It began its work on Umbridge: every spell and every incision etched a word onto her skin, and when the skin ran out, it burrowed into the muscle, and if needed, engraved the bone itself.
JUDGMENT. SHAME. SUFFERING.
Fudge tried to look away. I did not allow it.
I stepped closer, my burning eyes fixed on his, and placed two fingers on his forehead.
"Now…" I whispered, "you will feel what all those who have ever known my dominion feel."
The curse erupted like a river breaking its banks.
Fudge's scream was pure music. He collapsed to his knees as invisible scars blackened his skin, as every fiber of his body ignited, as his mind was torn apart by visions of his own flesh devoured.
"AAAAAAAARGH!"
I smiled. The sight of human suffering never wearied me. The smile became tranquil as I turned my head toward an invisible corner. My lord was calling me.
And so, dissolving into the shadows, I left them there. United in their damnation.
…
When the void closed behind my back, I found myself once again in the main hall of Hogwarts. The stone was pristine, the air steeped in that artificial calm that always preceded chaos. I placed a gloved hand over my chest, bowing respectfully to whoever had summoned me.
Here, in this world, only one being could call me without my consent: my lord Einar.
"Master, I have fulfilled your mandate. The traitors now wail in their new dwelling," I murmured to myself as I lifted my gaze.
And then… I froze.
They were there.
Lucia, the little demon with the smile of a maiden and the heart of a dragon. Luna Lovegood—the human who never blinked and seemed able to peer into the soul of any creature, no matter how ancient.
"Dren, I found you!" Lucia announced with that macabre cheerfulness that always made me wish to sink into the floor.
My mind, capable of conceiving a thousand ways to flay a man alive, went utterly blank. For an instant, I experienced something humans call existential terror.
"It's Shadowy," Luna said in her ethereal voice, tilting her head as her large grey eyes bored into me. "I knew you'd come if we waited here. Creatures of the night always return to their lair."
My mouth moved before my brain commanded it.
"Miss Lucia… it is an honor to see you again."
As I spoke, my eyes swept across the hall with the nervous precision of a cornered predator. Were they all here…? Unfortunately, yes.
To one side, Hroar stood with his arms crossed, wearing an orcish grin that promised imminent calamity. He looked like a child eager to tear open a bloody present.
Nearby, Avento was chatting with young Lady Sofie as if this were a pleasant afternoon gathering. Noticing my presence, Avento turned and inclined his head in a small nod of greeting—one that, somehow, only made him more unsettling.
Blaise, the leader of this peculiar squad of stormy little demons, remained with the others, watching me with a calm smile. A smile that, on any other child, might have seemed friendly, but on him could only be interpreted as the prelude to a hunt. For them, my arrival was nothing more than the long-overdue formal introduction.
And, of course, at the back, my lord Einar sat, as serene as a king observing his personal court of fiends. His mere presence reminded me that, despite all my power, here I was nothing but a guest… and perhaps a future toy.
"Dren, let's fight!" Hroar bellowed, clashing his fists together with excitement. "The giant is strong, but he still needs training. I want to spar with you."
I took a deep breath. Protocol demanded courtesy, but my instincts were screaming run.
"I'm sorry, young master Hroar. I refuse to raise a weapon against my lord's offspring," I declared softly, hoping the refusal would settle the matter.
"Don't listen to him, Dren!" Lucia interjected, stepping forward with that damned smile that chilled my blood. "Come play with us."
That word—play—carried more threat than any dark oath.
"I'm sorry, young mistress Lucia," I replied with all the nobility I could muster. "But at this moment… I have an assignment from the master that admits no delay."
"Then we'll help you," she countered, tilting her head like a curious predator.
It was in that precise instant I realized I had to choose: dignity or survival. The choice was easy.
"It is impossible, young lady," I declared hollowly as I took a step back. "If you will excuse me… I must attend to my task."
I didn't wait for an answer.
The shadow wrapped around me like a balm. And I vanished from their sight with the speed of a consummate coward.