Mortem . Sirius Black

chapter one hundred and three

March 22nd - Undisclosed Location

Voldemort was surrounded by three of his most trusted followers, Bellatrix Lestrange, Lucius Malfoy, and Fenrir Greyback in one of the many rooms of the Mafloy manor.

Theodore Nott had sent him a letter, telling him that the diadem was well hidden within the castle, and no one knew of its existence. For some reason, the news didn't appease the Dark Lord as much as they should. He had a feeling that it was impossible for something as big as that to happen at Hogwarts without Nephera catching wind of it.

The girl was one step ahead of him, always had been even while he had her captive, and the past months of silence unnerved him more than anything.

The Death Eaters that remained at Hogwarts had been fully unsuccessful at killing her, and by this point, Tom was certain that they had given up completely.

"My Lord?" asked Lucius, confused by the long silence

Tom sighed, and snapped his eyes up to meet the other man's, "Nephera Winchester, an evergrowing headache that doesn't seem to go away," he stated, "What do we know about what she's doing?"

Bellatrix cleared her throat, "Not much, my Lord, she's kept quiet,"

"I know, that's what has been worrying me," he stood up, walking to the window overlooking the Malfoy gardens, "I fear that she knows more than she is letting on, we need someone to interrogate her,"

At the thought of interrogation and torture, particularly that of Nephera's, Bellatrix piped up, but Riddle cut her off once more, "As admirable as your bloodthirsty is, Bellatrix, Nephera isn't the kind of person to be beaten by brute force. No, her battles are mental, fought with wits and intelligent schemes,"

"Then how, my Lord?" asked Fenrir

Riddle turned to look at them, a smirk on his face, "Send word to Snape, from what I've heard, she underestimates him most of all-"

"Veritaserum won't work, she can resist it," braved the reminder Lucius

"I'm aware of that," replied the Dark Lord, "But there are other ways to get information out of someone, some of which are more effective than the truth potion,"

Over at Hogwarts, the two Slytherins and the three Gryffindors were all standing around a table in the room of Requirement, looking at the diadem of Roweena Ravenclaw in front of them.

"What do we do with it?" asked James, "I mean, is it really a Horcrux?"

Nephera crouched down, inspecting the object clearly. From such a small distance, she could hear faint whispers coming from the small crown, in a language she didn't recognize, "Reg, listen," she said, and the boy obeyed and drew nearer to the object, "What language is that?"

The boy frowned, "I don't know, Black Speech, maybe?"

Black Speech was a language that had faded off centuries ago, it was used by dark wizards and witches in the middle ages. Not only was it dead, but also completely forbidden in modern wizarding society, for the spells cast in Black speech would be destructive, painful, and utterly gruesome.

"No, I would've recognised it if it were," replied the girl, "Parseltongue?"

Regulus thought for a second before answering, "Given that he's Slytherins' heir, then it's a possibility,"

The others, not understanding why this was such a big deal. But then again, the three Gryffindors were completely out of their depth when surrounded by such Dark Magic, so they typically remained quiet and let the two Slytherins with experience deal with it.