Full Moon
Full Moon
It was discussed at length that entire day, what we'd need to do in order to break the curse on my ring. We had run out of leads so I explained my theory about the seventeen deaths and decided all we could really do next was research.
The group was divided, half being skeptical about how I'd come to the conclusion out of nowhere, while the others accepted it as fact, more or less based off of my intuition and Legilimency that they'd been witness to personally.
Badeea, Liz and Charlie had to get back to their programs but promised they'd do some digging as well. Having people in France, Brazil and Romania could only improve our chances of finding something useful in the history of other wizarding countries and cultures.
Merula, Ismelda and Diego decided to take a break from their wanderings so Barnaby and I offered to put them up at our house for however long they wanted to stay. Adding three additional houseguests on top of Alexi wouldn't even come close to our capacity, given the magical extensions on our house. And I was glad for the company, especially of my former dormmates.
We divided up into groups and decided we'd all tackle researching specific things. Barnaby, myself and Alexi would be looking into the Lee family history. Penny, Chiara, Tulip and Tonks would use their access in their jobs to cover death records at St Mungo's and the Ministry of Magic. Andre, Jae and Talbot would comb through Knockturn Alley for any clues we might have missed, and Merula, Ismelda, Diego and Ben were to be researching the mysterious author of the Moste Ancient Magicks book, M.R.L.
Everyone seemed excited to get started, except for Ben, who at the last minute decided to join the Knockturn Alley group instead. I wasn't sure if it was because he wanted to do something more hands on or if he was uncomfortable spending so much time around Alexi after hearing Chiara's cover story about him being her boyfriend.
Barnaby and I also decided that since we already had the only known Werewolf on the WCU's radar at our house, out time would be best spent at home.
The story of the explosion at St Mungo's had quickly spread and we used it as an excuse to take a brief leave of absence from work to "recover." Uncle Cecil was sympathetic and told us he could handle things without us for a while.
We gave ourselves a timeline of about two weeks to come up with something. During those two weeks life went on more or less as usual. We spent our days researching and resumed the Circle of Khanna meetings every few nights, to discuss anything useful we'd discovered.
Our friends abroad kept in touch, including Bill. Sending owls and popping in via the floo network whenever they could to join us for meetings.
But as the end of July grew closer, we hadn't really gotten very far. Nothing suspicious had been uncovered in death records of that century, nothing that fit our criteria or involved the number seventeen anyway, which I had become obsessed with. Knockturn Alley hadn't turned up any new leads either. Barnaby, Alexi and I had run out of research material on the Lee family. We'd gone through everything belonging to Barnaby's parents or other Lee ancestors that was still in the house and we'd investigated as much as we could through public records and had reluctantly started to talk about maybe visiting Lee Manor again.
Our first real break came from Merula, of all people. Who had never been big on our study sessions at Hogwarts, but she was the one who found the most useful link in her research of the mysterious author M.R.L.
"Marcallous Reid Lee, M.R.L." she told us smugly, pointing at the name on a list of banned books. She'd managed to get it from Madam Pince by means of a very flattering letter crediting our school Librarian as the inspiration to Merula's fictitious desire to follow in her footsteps.
"It doesn't say he wrote your book, only that anything written by him is banned. So obviously he wrote something nasty enough to make the list and I'd say a book that includes the actual instructions on how to create Inferi qualifies."
Barnaby was the most stunned of all by this information. "That'd be my great, great, great, great, great, er, I'm not sure how many greats, grandfather, Marcallous Lee, I didn't know his middle name. Never thought I'd see the day a Lee wrote a book to be honest, but knowing the dark and dodgy stuff in it, it fits. Grandmother always talked about him like he was some hero or something but never said exactly what he did. There's a portrait of him at Lee Manor, right above the dining room table" he finished.
"I guess that's where we'll have to go next then." I said, checking with Barnaby through a glance. He nodded. "Yeah, we've come up short everywhere else. I'm not excited about it, and I don't know how we'll get the information we need from Grandmother but we have to try something, it's our first solid lead in ages" he agreed.
"I'll go with you, if you want" Alexi offered. In the time since we'd brought him to live with us he'd shown himself to be an extremely loyal and compassionate friend. He was also very protective of Barnaby and I. He'd joined the Circle of Khanna officially on the day after we'd returned from St Mungo's and he had already become close with many people. Specifically Chiara and Diego. "But not tonight. It's the full moon tonight and I can't risk not getting home in time" he reminded us, looking worried.
There had been an unfortunate spill in the Alchemy room during the explosion at St Mungo's, resulting in a large portion of the Ministry's Wolfsbane potion being wasted or contaminated. So much that Penny had been unable to sneak any out for Alexi.
Chiara had access to the Ministry approved purchase of Wolfsbane since she was registered, but due to the shortage she'd opted to not purchase any, saying selflessly that she could handle it, and others needed it more.
Usually she was fine, doing a few extra security spells as a precaution and under the influence of the Wolfsbane, her transformation nights were quiet and she mostly slept. But she'd admitted that without the potion she wasn't sure she'd remain contained in her flat for the night.
Barnaby and I had planned in advance to give Alexi access to the fifth floor for the night, and ultimately Chiara thought it safest if she stayed with him. Hoping they could help each other through the difficult transformation and not put anyone else at risk. So long as we were sure we were okay with having two completely feral Werewolves locked up in the attic.
We didn't have any other ideas so the plan went ahead. We had an early dinner, during which Alexi and Chiara ate like ravenous.. wolves. Trying to satiate their appetites ahead of time to hopefully reduce it once they'd transformed. We were all a bit on edge, hoping things would go smoothly, but Diego seemed the most nervous. I had never known him to be particularly afraid of anything, but the reason for his nerves became clear as Chiara stood up from the table, suggesting they get an early start on reinforcing the security of the attic.
Diego jumped to his feet saying he wanted to help, but Chiara told him gently it was best if they sealed off everything on their way up. "You go Chiara, I'll join you in a second." Alexi told her, leading Diego out of the kitchen by the hand.
I could see it in the way Diego fretted and allowed Alexi to lead the way that there was some kind of relationship forming between them. I wasn't terribly surprised, Diego was a massive flirt and had been openly hitting on Alexi since they met. I had never asked Alexi about his sexuality, close as we were, Barnaby and I had decided not to make our mutual attraction to Alexi known, so I hadn't wanted the subject to come up and make things awkward while we all lived together.
I'd thought at first that Chiara and Alexi might hit it off, they were definitely very close and had the whole Werewolf thing in common. I wondered then if Alexi identified as gay like Diego or possibly bisexual like Barnaby. But I'd decided it wasn't my business either way and if he wanted me or anyone else to know he'd say so.
Eventually Diego returned to the kitchen, his eyes rather red, and started quietly cleaning up the table as Alexi and Chiara went upstairs together.
Diego was a blessing to live with, Barnaby and I weren't exactly neat freaks, but Merula and Ismelda, and somewhat Alexi were kind of slobs, so it was wonderful having him willing to pitch in with the housework and tidying.
Out of an overabundance of caution, we'd decided for that night everyone would camp out together in the living room on the ground floor of the house. While we were confident after they'd vanished the fifth floor staircase that Alexi and Chiara would not be able to get out, I didn't like the idea of people sleeping in separate rooms alone, just on the off chance that they did manage to find a way out into the floors below.
We knew they'd magically sealed off all doors, windows and staircases as they went up to the fifth floor, but we still did the same on our side afterwards. Knowing we'd done everything within our power to keep a safe distance for the night we settled into our sofa beds early. All was quiet from upstairs after casting Muffliato for the benefit of our Muggle neighbors, but it took ages for us to finally get to sleep.