Incognito

✑ 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝟓.𝟐

𝚄𝚗𝚔𝚗𝚘𝚠𝚗 𝙻𝚘𝚌𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗
𝟷:𝟻𝟽 𝚊.𝚖 I

When Evelyn Harper King wakes up she finds herself tied to a chair. The room around her is cold and unfamiliar, somewhere close there's water dripping. Or perhaps it's the back of her head, still dripping blood from where James had hit her with the butt of her own gun.
At the thought of James, she jerked up, looking fiercely around for him.

"Relax Evelyn. I'm not going to kill you," came the voice from the dark. It was impossible to pinpoint where the voice was coming from until James stepped forwards and out the shadows.
"You're important."

"Of course I am. I know where your son is."

"Yes, I thought you took him. But we'll get to that."

"Where are we?" Evelyn asked.

"That's not important. We're here for a chat, no one is coming."

In truth they were in a stakeout location not listed on Hogwarts' database but he didn't find any benefit in telling her this. Instead he flicked in the lights and pulled a chair from behind a crate, dragging it to face her and taking a seat.

"I can't honestly say I never missed those eyes, Evelyn. I remember we used to spend hours in your bedroom, you would read to me and I would watch your eyes skim the pages  –you knew Shakespeare by memory anyway– but I would watch your eyes and think I must be the biggest bastard in the world if something that beautiful loved me and I couldn't do the decent thing and love you back. It used to keep me awake at night, thinking about how things might be different if I'd loved you." There was real emotion in his voice, raw and painful. Evelyn watched on in silence, realising for the first time that her silver contacts had been taken out, and the blue she was born with, that James was haunted by, had returned. "Would they? Would things have been different? What happened to you, Ev?"

"I changed."

James leaned closer, watching Evelyn with a hawkeye gaze.
"Tell me," he nearly pleaded, "tell me how."

Evelyn looked at him then, properly, and saw the desperation, saw the sadness. There was something raw like grit in her throat when she began to talk. She would tell him enough, not the whole story, but enough...

"It started before I joined, I think. But I didn't know at the time. I became a spy and I loved it, maybe I was a little less assured than the rest of you, but who doesn't love a damsel in distress?"

James gritted his teeth, "I think you severely misjudged my taste in women."

"Likely yes. But that's who I was back then. I painted my walls yellow and I kept cherry blossoms in my bedroom, and I had a collection of Shakespeare books that I'd read a hundred times, like the one in your hand. I figured you hadn't gone in my old room in years so you wouldn't notice it was missing. Anyway, for a while I was exactly who you thought I was: beautiful, kind hearted, underestimated, love-drunk Evelyn Harper King. But that wasn't enough for you, and I was already pulling away when Tom Riddle reached out to me, asked if I wanted to switch sides. No one suspected I would ever say yes but I did."

"How long were you working with him?"

"Don't insult me, James. You're a good enough spy to have pinpointed it, especially now you're looking."

"The July before you disappeared."

Evelyn nodded, the talk of summer making her miss the blonde hair that used to fall down her shoulders, licking her back.
"Yes."

"But if you were so valuable to the Death Eaters, why did you fake your own death?"

"That's where things get interesting. The Death Eaters suspected I was angry you didn't love me back, they didn't suspect that I might still love you; and by the time they did, I was already considering becoming a double agent. But then I heard you, Dorcas and Flitwick discussing me, talking about how you hadn't turned me down because you felt sorry. That's when I decided."
It wasn't the whole truth, but Evelyn doubted she would ever tell the real story, all the way through.

"But you came back."

"I came back."

James glanced to the window and saw the beginnings of a sunrise. It was still dark, too dark, but something lingered.
"Why?"

"Riddle told me to. He was worried you were getting close to taking him down so he sent me back in as someone else. I figured it might be a second shot. I could be severe, capable, beautiful in a different sort of way. I thought maybe if you fell in love with me as Ophelia, I could find information there, but of course that was difficult because Evelyn had done so much damage to you, and then of course she came."

"She is the mother of my child," James spat, "and I don't appreciate you speaking of her like that."

Evelyn nodded, almost passively, "I did what I could."

Unable to resist, but eyes still burning, James asked, "how did you get information to them?"

"Through notes left at events. In fact we often used books like the one in your hand."

Of course.

"Every fancy ball had a library."

"And every fancy library has a Shakespeare collection."

"So you left the notes in a copy of Hamlet. It's clever but I can't believe I never noticed. You took a name from your favourite play, Ophelia, and Dollie?"

"The doll I used to have on my shelf. I had a similar one on my table as Arson. I believe Harry had it a few weeks ago."

"Hardly imaginative. And Montgomery?"

"My mother's maiden name."

"Ah."

"Speaking of Harry. I'd like to strike you a deal."

James did not reply, be bit on his tongue to hard that it bled.

"I gather there are no radios here. You don't want to raise alarm, and I'm tied up here, but that's not helping anyone. So," Evelyn smiled, looking much more like she did as Ophelia. James could almost picture her eyes silver once more. "So, you're going to let me go, and you're going to give me twelve hours head start. Otherwise you will definitely never see him again."

"Twelve hours?"

Evelyn nodded.

"Why are you doing this?"

"Because I'm a follower of Riddle."

James walked round to her ties and undid them. Then he looked into her blue eyes, the girl he used to know. But James was beginning to realise that perhaps she had hardly existed at all. This beautiful, kind, trusting girl. How could he have known?
"Go," he said, lower than a whisper.

"Thank you, James," she headed for the door and he did not move. At the door she turned back, "for the record, there was a time in my life when I think I would have done anything for you. Anything." And with one last glance she was gone.

Ophelia Dollie Montgomery was officially dead, she never existed, and Evelyn Harper King vanished into the night...

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