The Nightmare Man

Chapter Eighteen

Warning for this chapter: Contains a bit of gore and violence.

-o-

Chapter Eighteen

February turned into March and slowly the weather warmed up. Harrison wasn't too fond of spring. Everything was wet and one day it was cold, the other warm. Never made up its mind, that damn weather and he usually spent the whole spring sulking in his room. Even in his prison the walls seemed to have grown damp under a period of time which he christened to spring and therefore sulked, chained to the chair.

But there was no time to sulking. Corresponding with Harry every other day reassured him that the teen was still holding on although Dumbledore was putting more pressure on him. Fred and George were back with the Nightmare Lord although they sometimes camped out in the Forbidden Forest to visit the now lonely teen. He was distancing himself from his friends and worried about his parents who weren't responding much to his letters. They were busy, distracted and some teenage angst was low on their priority list.

Harrison wondered if he should kill Lily. James' fate was up to Severus to decide and had been ever since Harrison saw James attack the potions master. As for the rest of the Marauders... well, they were fair game. But he hadn't noticed Peter amongst them, and Voldemort never mentioned him. Perhaps he wasn't friends with them anymore? Or did he die?

"Master, you haven't been listening to me have you?"

He looked up at Elise and shook his head, squinting a bit in the early morning light. She sighed and began again:

"We need to upgrade our wards around the manor, and the east wing is in poor condition. I need some time to fix it all."

"You need to take the wards down and redo it all, or is it just minor adjustments?" he wondered, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"I need to take them down," she said. "If I have all servants to help, that can be done in a couple of hours."

It wasn't very known but Harrison wasn't too good with wards around his own manor. Sure, he had done loads on the Hogwarts wards but Elise handled those at the manor. All he could do was lend her magic to do it faster.

"But it'll leave the manor exposed to anyone," he said, getting to the root of the problem. Or rather, why Elise had bothered talking to him about the manor wards in the first place.

"Yes," she confessed.

"Cornelius is hunting me. What happens if you don't redo them now?"

"They'll collapse eventually. It's better if I get to do this as fast as possible."

Harrison tapped his fingers against his lips, thinking.

"I could distract him. Let him know where I am and chase me around for a while. You can still tap into my magic to finish it faster."

"You should have someone with you."

"I'll take the Dementors," he replied. "What about Angel and Lucy?"

"I can spare one servant that can watch over them."

"Take Fred or George. They're the youngest and least experienced with wards."

"Understood."

"When will you do it?"

"The preparations will take a few hours as well," Elise said.

"Oh, that's alright. More time to prepare my route then. Also, I need to discuss something with Voldemort."

"Important?"