Beta: Cloudy

This is the last fluff padding we have before Shit Goes Down.

Ngl... I just really wanted to upload on April 1st. Mwah.

(≖‿‿≖)ノ⌒●~*

My thief outfit was in honor of a highwayman. Black, tall, thick leather boots with runes carved inside them to absorb impact from falling at a great height. Equally sturdy black pants that were resistant to tears in case they got caught anything. A belt lined with Muggle devices that could still work under heavy wards in case I couldn't use magic. A dark blue tunic, black leather vest, black leather gloves, and of course the ever important silvery Cloak of Invisibility. I did have a few spare black cloaks that could double as invisibility cloaks, but I loved my Deathly Hallow version best.

Tom was given a similar outfit, swapping out the blue tunic for his favorite color: grey.

When he stepped out into the living room, dressed, I fanned myself. "Take me now."

He chuckled. "But there's no broom cupboard nearby."

That got a very loud unladylike snort out of me as I fought against the desire to cackle. I buried my face in my hands, taking deep breaths before my giggles were under control.

"Oh man," I said, "this is going to be fun."

"I certainly hope so," he said. "Second date and all."

"Oh-ho! Second date now, huh?" I chuckled. "How many more until you put out?"

Tom made a loud hmm sound. "Depends on which rules we're playing by. Common decency would suggest marriage—"

I boo'd.

"—but that's clearly been thrown out the window since the seventies," he finished. "I'm not sure what the standard is now."

"Neither am I," I said. "You know as Prefect I'm supposed to roam the halls, right?"

"Mm-hmm."

"You won't believe how many people I've already caught mid-throws in the cupboards. Younger than me! I can't believe I'm not the one getting caught in the cupboards. What a waste."

"How scandalous," he mocked.

"Truly. It's my only flaw," I agreed.

It was Tom's turn to snort.

"Hey!"

"Yes, yes. Your only flaw," he patronized.

My lips turned back up in a wicked smile. "Glad you agree. Come on, the night is young and we've much to do!"

"After you," he said, bowing briefly.

(≖‿‿≖)ノ⌒●~*

Rosier Manor.

It was once Unplottable, but the wards had deteriorated and so it was found by some of my illegal sources.

The current Lord of Rosier was a man named Felix who graduated Hogwarts in the early 1980s—barely a decade older than Harry. Felix did not reside in the manor, contrary to public knowledge, but lived in a flat in London. The man voted more often with the Dark than Neutral or Light, but as far as I could discern he had not joined the Death Eaters, nor did he collude with them.

He was a bigot, but an independent one.

I didn't know why he didn't live in his manor. I paid a hefty sum from Gringotts for the Goblins to disclose that Felix spared no expense to fortify the manor, yet he himself did not choose to reside in it.

Curious.

As we flew out there, I asked Tom if he had any thoughts.

Tom had to slightly raise his voice to be heard above the wind. The brooms came with some built in wind-dampening runes to make it easier for users to talk at high altitudes when flying. It helped a lot but it wasn't flawless. "Do you know why Ancient and Noble homes require maintenance?"

"I assume you're talking about more than the standard maintenance?" I guessed.

"If a Lord leaves an Ancient and Noble home left to rot they can face extremely hefty fines. The kind of fines that would even put a dent in the Malfoy fortune," said Tom.

My lips tugged down as my brow furrowed in thought. When I was younger, I did remember Sirius being thoroughly pissed that he had been named Lord Black and forced to inherit the Ancient and Noble home of Black. At the time I had simply thought it was because he hated his family name, but perhaps there could have been more to it?

At my perplexed expression, Tom continued, "Ancient and Noble homes tend to collect old magical artifacts. The longer magic resides in a home the stronger it can grow. Ancient and Noble homes tend to also carry a fair few of what would now be considered Dark artifacts—although it could have been perfectly legal to own them at the time. When Dark artifacts are isolated for a prolonged period of time it can have ill effect on the surrounding environment, doubly so if it is a magical environment. Perhaps a good example would be pyramid tombs?"

"Tombs—as in literally cursed mummy tombs?" I sought to clarify.

"Yes," he said. "If the home is left to its own devices for too long things can happen. Creatures born, or mutated into something far more sinister than the average witch or wizard can handle. When those things start to leave the home... I'm sure you understand. The Ministry then has to send in several teams of Cursebreakers and the family is given an extremely hefty fine."

Tom took a deep breath before continuing, "If the Rosier family is anything like I remember them being, their home would be riddled with Dark things. Perhaps it has become too dangerous for even the Lord to live there."

"Then why not clean it out?" I asked. "Paddy cleaned up the Black manor."

"It would be shameful to admit that the Ancient and Noble home of Rosier has deteriorated to such a point the Lord cannot handle it," he said. "There is only one living member of the family thus far?"

"Yes, Felix Rosier does not have a spouse or child," I confirmed. "His sister—the previous Lady—died a couple years ago. He sunk a lot of his fortune into protecting the manor as soon as he became Lord."

"Probably intended to let it rot under the wards like a time bomb," he mused. "He would be long dead by the time it set off and consequently not his problem."

"Huh. I picked this manor 'cause I thought it would be an easy start to test against strong wards and no one would be home, but looks like it might be pretty dangerous," I said, wondering what kind of Dark things we would find.

"Not so dangerous. There's no wards to stop a port-key from activating," he said. "And we've learned our lesson about portkeys."

Who knew portkeys could expire?

I sure didn't. That was why mine didn't work in the Triwizard Tournament. Super unfortunate time to learn, but it made for an unforgettable lesson. At least I survived the mistake.

"Yep. Got a new one refreshed and ready to go."

"There we go," he said. "No wards to Apparate out either."

"Do you know how to?"

"By myself, yes. Took the lessons in seventh year. But with someone else? Mm... first time for everything," he said with a smirk.

"I'd get splinched for you," I said with a wink. Then I realized that wasn't nearly as flirtatious to say out loud as it was in my head. "Um. That sounded better in my head. Can I take that back?"

"No," he said, his smirk widening to an adorable gleeful grin. "I will never let you."

"Shit."

(≖‿‿≖)ノ⌒●~*

The Ancient and Noble Rosier manor stood atop a hill surrounded by a dense forest. A long black iron fence kept the forest from reaching the manor. The overgrown lawn was riddled with weeds and what I assumed to be gnomes.

Tom and I flew in slowly.

I felt the wards as we neared. I raised my hand out to Tom to signal him to slow down and stay behind me. He moved his broom to hover behind me as I switched my sitting position to sit sideways.

The wards were thick like an iceberg, being near them made my body ache from the intense magical output.

My fancy Muggle tricks and common sense wouldn't get me through this.

It was going to take actual magical talent to pry open a hole.

I raised my wand, extremely grateful to no longer have the trace, and quietly muttered, "Emissionem."

Med school didn't teach me anything about lasers, or lights, or radiation. No, this was purely picked up because I wanted to see if I could make a lightsaber with my wand. I knew the basics was creating some type of laser, and then somehow managing its form to not carry on until stopped—as lights and lasers would continue in their projected path until stopped.

Lasers were surprisingly interesting to read about. I never knew it was an acronym for Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation until I started my research.

The radiation part concerned me as I wasn't sure how radiation and magic worked together, but as it turned out small-scale radiation didn't perturb magic at all—at least not in a way I had to actively calculate for it when creating the spell.

There really hadn't been much study of radiation and magic at all. I hadn't found articles on the subject and for a few years I was beginning to wonder if any wizard had researched radiation.

Thankfully, Professor Dumbledore was aware of a few on-going research projects into it. We discussed it several times in Alchemy.

Radiation, at its core, was energy that came from a source and traveled through space at the speed of light. It had an electric and or magnetic field and wave-like properties.

There were four major types of radiation: alpha, beta, neutrons, and electromagnetic waves. Alpha (two protons; two neutrons) was the heaviest type of radiation and formed naturally in materials in the earth such as uranium. Beta (an electron not attached to an atom with a negative charge) was cosmic radiation—it had never been recreated through magic on its own. Neutron (a particle with no charge in the nucleus of an atom) was commonly used in nuclear reactors. And last but the most diverse: electromagnetic radiation which covered from x-rays, to solar rays, gamma rays, and everything in between.

I had no intentions of delving into alpha, beta, and neutron radiation given their volatile nature so I spent most of my study time on electromagnetic radiation.

Small-scale radiation could be ignored in magic—the creation of Lumos did not require knowledge about radiation, nor do any heat spells. The line between what was considered small and large was still undetermined and currently being researched by a small team of wizards in Russia. Professor Dumbledore kindly offered to forward me their research when they published it. It would be an interesting read.

The Lumos spell used a type of electromagnetic radiation called UV—ultraviolet radiation—but the creator of the spell did not need any knowledge about UV to create it.

There had been attempts at creating a spell to perfectly mimic sunlight but no public success. It would appear that true sunlight was considered a large-scale radiation.

At the time of starting my project I did not know if recreating a laser would also be considered large-scale radiation.

Honestly, I was just happy there was a team out there researching it. Because I wanted to know, but I didn't want to put in the time and effort to find out myself.

Heh.

Dumbledore was right: one didn't need to know chemistry, biology, or whatever to create spells or use magic. It simply increased your chance of success. No way anyone knows the chemical compound of a soul yet Tom Riddle was able to slice his in half.

Heheh... Heh. Holy shit I just got a great idea.

That would have to wait.

Returning to my spell: I wanted to create a laser as the first step to my lightsaber.

I knew it would be trickier than Lumos, but hopefully not as far-fetched as creating a mini sun.

And thankfully, it wasn't!

There were already plenty of geniuses who had created equations for lasers. All I had to do was find one that worked with magical arithmancy. I did that mostly through trial and error, but the results were still the same.

The hard part came next. Taking that spell and turning it from a laser to a laser cutter. Laser cutters focused the beam through a bore and then guided it through compressed gas—normally Oxygen or Nitrogen.

I somehow had to replicate all of those steps in a spell movement.

The spell name could not change: Emissionem worked perfectly to conjure the laser. But the wand movement changed the outcome.

If the spell name was the heart of the spell, then the wand movements were what guided it. It took a lot of trial and error, but I eventually found the right swishes and jabs to replicate the focusing and trigger.

Boom, laser cutter.

Lastly was getting it to not go on infinitely.

That was actually the easiest, I only had to pull back on my magic.

And now, I had my mini lightsaber.

See, wards weren't designed to obstruct light. They weren't really designed with any kind of light resistance in mind. Goblins weren't up to date on Muggle science, and not many wizards were either. Who would ever think to put up a ward to resist light?

Normally light would pass through the ward. Normally light wouldn't be condensed to a point that it could slice through metal.

The Rosier wards that were thicker than my arm length were cleanly sliced open with my lovely little blue lightsaber.

"Today is a good day," I said as I opened a hole through it. "I'm really glad that worked."

"How did you know it wouldn't trigger a reaction?" asked Tom.

"Wards are a bit like programs. When faced with something it wasn't prepared for, they kinda shut down," I said. "It didn't know what to do, so it acted like a literal wall of thick magic. It knows to let light in, but what Pure-blooded wizard would ever think there'd be a light spell that could do damage?"

Tom inclined his head. "Point."

"Let's slip on through. I sense more layers further in so we'll need to cut through them carefully," I said.

Tom held up his wand. "Okay."

Naturally Tom knew the spell. He checked my math when I made it. Although he did adjust it to be green instead of blue.

(≖‿‿≖)ノ⌒●~*

We finally made it inside.

After tearing down the wards, I jimmied the front door open and the two of us headed in.

The front door immediately slammed shut and locked behind us.

"That's nice," I said, peering into the darkness. Tom and I conjured Will-o-Wisps that hovered around our heads. Even with their light, it was still hard to see.

Which meant the darkness was not a normal kind of darkness, it was a magically enriched darkness. That was a telltale sign that something sinister resided nearby.

I held out my left hand to Tom. He looked down at it with raised eyebrows.

"So we don't get separated," I said, then smiled slyly. "And to make sure you feel safe. It is awfully dark in here."

Tom accepted the hand with a smirk. "You don't need to make excuses, Rosie. If you're scared, I'll hold your hand."

I giggled at that. "So kind! Welp, you ready?"

"Yes. This looks... interesting."

Yeah. Interest was a word for the manor all right.

I had expected something grand and rich, you know? Something that oozed pompous bigotry. Given the level of darkness, I thought perhaps the evil would be some artifact hidden deep inside.

Nope.

It was dark because everything was evil inside.

Instead of a posh manor, we were greeted with the stuff of nightmares.

The Rosier manor was the embodiment of a Hollywood cursed house. Nothing was safe inside. The furniture had teeth and would randomly come to life to lunge at us—I admittedly screamed when the couch in the living room revealed a gaping mouth lined with hundreds of sharp teeth—that forced us to immediately destroy them. Tom showed off a variety of spells that made me green with envy.

Especially the one where he conjured glowing swords that impaled a hopping bookcase that spat fire.

What didn't have teeth and fangs had legs and bristles or were cursed with something nasty enough to make Tom whistle loudly and pull me close. Nothing in the house could be trusted. Nothing!

Even the curtains weren't curtains—they were Lethifolds! There is nothing more terrifying than a black curtain coming to life to devour your flesh. Especially if it was already hard to see in the magically darkened house and the only way to defend yourself from it is through a difficult spell that required a good mental attitude.

If I hadn't learned the Patronus charm we'd be in a pickle. As it stood, I had to constantly keep it up while we explored otherwise we'd be hounded by the creatures. There was no way to destroy them, after all, except through cursed fire or something equally devastating that would also destroy the house.

On the bright side Tom was finding a lot of neat little cursed objects to keep. He was like a child in a candy store and given an unlimited budget. Every room he found a dozen or so items that he happily told me all about.

It was impossible not to smile when I listened to how giddy he was when he found a pocket watch that belonged to a previous Dark Lord and had been used to mark the time of death for their enemies.

Morbid interests aside, there was nothing more endearing than listening to someone speak passionately about things they enjoyed.

I bet Tom would have made an amazing professor in Dark Arts.

Since I had to keep up with the Patronus, Tom did a lot of the heavy lifting. I would have tried duel-wielding, but Tom advised I should practice that in a safe environment before trying it in a Lethifold-infested manor. An excellent point.

While Tom exploded an army of dinner plates with spider legs and dozens of eyes, I wondered out loud, "Surprise we haven't found any poltergeist."

Ghouls, fiends, cursed furniture and everything in between but no ghosts.

"From what I know about Rosier, that's not surprising," Tom idly responded. When the flaming tea cups vanquished Tom gave my hand a squeeze and guided me further into the manor. My Patronus fox continued to circle us, keeping the flesh-eating blankets at bay.

My lips tugged down. "Why do you say that?"

"Rosier would not want any sentient dead," he said. "Ah, watch this."

Why emphasis on sentient?

Tom pushed open some double doors that revealed a spacious marbled room. A chandelier flickered to life upon our entry and revealed a golden adorned ballroom. There were intricate sculptures and marvelous decor. It was a classic ballroom, really, and it felt like such a waste for it to be neglected in the cursed manor. The doors we had walked through lead to a balcony that overlooked the ballroom.

I whistled in appreciation of the decor, but then let out a teen-tiny itsy-bitsy little scream of OH GOD NO—Tom guffawed—when I saw what was further in. The ballroom was filled with mannequins and all of them turned to look up at us.

Yikes.

"Heheheheheh," Tom covered his mouth with his hand to smother the noise.

"Shut up," I giggled, wishing I had a free hand to bury my burning face. Tom hadn't let go on my left hand and I was using my right hand to keep the Patronus up. "I-I didn't expect to see them."

"Heheheheh." It took a few more seconds before Tom could recollect himself. He still let out a small heheh under his breath though. Tom did an extravagant wave of his wand and said, "Spearca Feallan."

A beautiful array of baby blue sparks shot out from Tom's wand and spread out. They cascaded upon the ballroom, a rainfall of