What Floor is This?
Antonin Dolohov grinned when he spotted the lumps on the floor. Raising his lit wand, he hurried forward to view the bodies of the three Russians that Lestrange and Nott faced. He studied them curiously. They were wearing black and red robes with little golden pieces of metal on the shoulders, upper arms, and breasts. One of them had a long scar stretching across his cheek. He noticed someone had broken their wands in half; he caught a glimpse of dragon heartstring from two, unicorn tail from the third. He smirked to himself — it had to have been Nott who made sure their wands were snapped even though the blokes were dead. Dolohov would admit (not aloud of course) that Nott’s strategics had their uses. That’s three less wands that could be used against them.
One of the bodies made a groaning noise and Dolohov’s heart nearly stopped. He took a step backward and darkened his wand. The Russian lying amidst the scattered remains of a suit of armor moved, attempting to rise to his feet but slumping back to the floor. The armor around him clanged from the movement, making him groan again.
Without hesitating, Dolohov leapt forward and put the Russian out of his misery with a quick curse. He made sure the other two were definitely dead before stepping over the bodies and continuing down the corridor, laughing to himself. Lestrange thought he had gotten three — but he’d only knocked off two. Dolohov mentally notched himself one point and deducted one from Lestrange. He was only down by one — which wasn’t too shabby.
After a few more turns, he came to an open door at the end of a corridor. He could see the outline of a staircase beyond it. Darkening his wand for the second time, he hurried forward and cautiously peered out — looking up and down the staircase. No one was in sight, but there was a black scorch mark on the wall nearby, and the stairs had chunks of rock scattered about them.
His heart beginning to speed up, he stepped out into the staircase and spent a moment deciding which way he ought to go — up or down the stairs. Spinning his wand between his hands and eyeing each closed door along the staircase, he finally let his wand rest in his right hand and settled on going up.
He had only taken a few steps when the door ahead swung open and several figures dressed like the ones he had just stepped over burst into the staircase.
“Oh shit,” he said aloud while thinking Impedimenta — and the figures froze for an instant. But it gave him enough time to snarl a spell at the stairs the Russians had stepped out onto.
The stairs exploded into a cloud of rock and dust and when his Impedimenta Charm ended, the Russians tripped. Two fell down the stairs with a yell. The third hit the stone wall but caught himself in time to shoot a curse down at Dolohov.
Dolohov dropped to the stairs and the Killing Curse sailed over his head. He peeked up and snarled, “Avada Kedavra!” right back. The Russian collapsed and Dolohov turned his attention to the two who were beginning to pick themselves up.
He hit the stairs with a spell he had only read about and laughed with delight when it actually worked. With a rumble, the stairs flattened, sank into the stone foundation of the castle and turned into a steep ramp that sent both him and the two Russians crashing downwards. The Russians began sliding towards him, barking spells that hit the walls and blew pieces of rock everywhere.
Dolohov rolled backwards and flung himself at the doorway he had just walked out of. He vaulted upwards and managed to scramble back into the dark corridor, but he saw a flash of light in the corner of his eye. A curse bounced off the wall and nicked his right shoulder. He hit the floor with a grunt of pain. Ignoring it, he rolled up and flattened himself to the wall, catching sight of the Russians in what had once been a staircase.
Hearing a snarl of Russian, he ducked and jabbed his wand at the open door opposite him, throwing all his magic into the curse. The door fell off its hinges, split into multiple pieces with a groan and launched itself out into the staircase. He heard a yelp and looked up to watch one of the sharpened wooden stakes of what had once been an old door impale one of the Russians in the gut. In an explosion of blood, the Russian fell, rolling down the stone slide.
Dolohov’s eyes landed on stubby fingers hanging onto the ledge between the stairs and the corridor he hid in. Coarse black hairs sprouted from the knuckles of each finger. There was a long scar along the ring finger, as though it had been sliced open and never properly healed. For a moment he was frozen, aware of nothing but his pumping blood — before the fingers clenched and there was a groan. He caught a glimpse of long dark hair and furious eyes over the ledge, then his wand was up and he hissed, “giacco frigidilors interno!”
The eyes widened and the fingers loosened. The Russian fell onto the stone slide with a moan, rolling after the other. Dolohov leaned forward to watch him tumble down and grinned, knowing exactly what the Russian was experiencing. He’d used the curse Natalie had used on him back in July, when she’d frozen all the water in his body.
Silence descended and Dolohov staggered to his feet, feeling the pain rush over him all at once. Hissing to himself, he pressed his hand to his burning shoulder and felt stickiness. With a quick spell, he conjured a clean cloth and applied pressure while trying not to think about the pain. Bloody Russians.
He peered out to what had once been a staircase. The bodies of the Russians had rolled all the way down the slide, out of sight, though there were streaks of blood, splinters of wood, and plenty of crumbled rock everywhere.
Dolohov froze when voices drifted down to him. Putting pressure on his bleeding shoulder with one hand, he raised his wand and leaned against the wall, readying himself. From the frantic sounds of the voice, someone else must have been on the stairs when he’d turned them into a steep slide.
“Thank Merlin,” he sighed when it became clear that there was more than one voice, that they spoke English, and that he recognized both.
“-SOME SORT OF JOKE-”
“THE CASTLE MUST BE JINXED-”
Dolohov peered into the stairwell to catch a glimpse of Rosier’s blond hair and laughed to himself. He shot the reverse spell at the slide and it morphed back into a staircase with a groaning noise.
Muttering, “fuck” under his breath as his shoulder started throbbing, he stepped out onto the staircase and grinned. Dawson and Rosier were climbing to their feet. They both looked like they’d seen some action — one side of Dawson’s face was reddened as though he’d taken a blow. Rosier’s lips were bloody and his cheek looked worse than Dawson’s.
“Bloody hell!” Dawson exclaimed when he saw Dolohov. Rosier let out a sigh of relief and dropped to sit on the stairs, patting them as though thankful they were no longer a steep slide.
“Hello to you too,” said Dolohov, moving up to greet them. “Anyone bring Dittany?”
Rosier tilted his head and raised an eyebrow. “What happened to you? And what happened to being prepared for anything?”
“Russians,” he said briefly and dropped to sit on the stair just below Rosier. He removed his hand from his shoulder and watched blood spurt from the open wound — quickly returning the bloodied cloth to apply pressure. “Nicked me.”
“Looks like a bit more than a nick, mate,” Dawson snorted. “We took out four of them a while back.”
“After getting caught,” Rosier muttered with a shake of his head. He wiped blood off his mouth and gave Dolohov a grin. He was missing several teeth. Dolohov thought it made him look rather dashing and considered telling him he ought not to get them fixed. “We met their boss, or whoever is leading them. He wanted to send our heads to Seamus Dawson.”
“Sounds like a nice bloke,” said Dolohov. “I just took out four Russians myself — I’m in a bet with Adolphus that I can nab the most Vladimirs. Either of you want in?”
“Hell yeah!” Dawson said with gusto. He clapped his hands together and looked up and down the staircase as though more Russians would burst out of one of the doors.
As if cued, a door a few floors above did open and the three of them immediately raised their wands towards it — but it was not a Russian who stepped out. It was a figure in all black. For a moment there was silence before the figure dropped its hood to reveal itself as Lord Voldemort.
Their wands lowered. He studied them until his posture relaxed and he strolled down the steps.
“Have any of you seen anyone?” he asked.
They all gawked at him. Dolohov laughed but quickly stopped when his shoulder let out a particularly painful throb. He blinked black spots away from his vision, furious that they had even appeared.
“I just took out four,” said Dolohov, watching Tom Riddle approach and lean on the wall a few steps above them. He swore his eyes flashed red. Dolohov nodded at the other two. “These idiots got caught by them.”
Voldemort shot a look between Dawson and Rosier. “You what?”
“We ran into a load of them,” Dawson admitted. “At least twenty. Got held by them for a bit — met their boss-”
“Scary looking bloke,” added Rosier. “Wanted to send our heads to Eric’s dad.”
“We took out four of them but, er, they definitely know we’re in here,” Dawson said with a wince.
“Zack and Adolphus nabbed two,” Dolohov said, peeking at the wound on his shoulder. The bleeding was finally beginning to slow, but the cloth was nearly soaked through. “Though I had to clean up their mess.”
“Well, they definitely know we’re here,” Voldemort gestured to the staircase. “I heard the noise from three floors up and several rooms over.”
“Oops,” said Dolohov.
Voldemort looked to Rosier and Dawson. “What floor were you on when you were caught?”
“Uh, third, maybe,” said Dawson. He pointed up the staircase. “We came from four doors up from where we are now.”
“But we went down two flights before that,” Rosier reported.
“That doesn’t sound like the third floor,” Voldemort stated with annoyance. He raked an eye over Dolohov’s shoulder, making him flinch under his piercing stare. “How useless is that going to make you?”
Dolohov frantically shook his head. “It won’t! I — I can patch it up. It’ll be fine.”
“Good,” he took a few steps up the stairs, paused as though counting the doors and shot a glance back at them. “I’d suggest you all get out of here if you want to be of any further use.”