Nose to the Wind // tomarry

Chapter 27: Final Masquerade

On Valentine's Day, the magical British Isles declared war on Alexander Golubev and his allies. By the end of the day, the majority of the magical communities of Europe had joined them.

"It's so sweet," Bellatrix told Harry during lunch, after Voldemort had made a brief appearance to announce the official declaration, then returned to the ministry without eating. "My Lord got you a war for Valentine's Day!"

Harry snorted, while most of the handful of Death Eaters around the table paused in their hurried eating long enough to trade uncertain looks. As though they really thought that Harry would be dating the dark lord without having a similarly skewed moral compass.

"I'd much rather've had Golubev's head on a pike, without all the fanfare," Harry replied. "But I do understand that the niceties much be observed when the target is a public figure."

"Niceties," someone whispered disbelievingly.

"Something for your birthday wishlist," Bellatrix decided.

Harry scowled. "If it takes that long, I'm going to Russia and ripping out his throat myself."

Some of the Death Eaters shot him benevolent little smiles, like they thought he was joking, or believing too well of himself. Bellatrix, however, threw her head back and cackled.

At least there was someone who believed he could end Golubev's life if he got sick of waiting.

-0-

Golubev didn't waste any time gathering his forces, according to Harry's spies, and their European allies and those magicals who came from the Americas and Australia to help collected themselves with far more speed than Harry honestly had expected.

And yet, nothing happened.

"None of us are daft enough to try invading Russia when it's so cold; we've learnt our lesson, same as the muggles," Yaxley said tiredly during dinner that weekend. "It's possible the Russians are waiting on word from their agents."

Russian agents had been turning themselves in to the aurors or turning up dead in odd places ever since the St Mungo's fire. And while Harry might, privately, claim credit for some of those – Death was always willing to induce a few nightmares for him – he was hardly behind all of them.

"Perhaps," Bellatrix said Monday morning, while Harry frowned down at yet another article about Russian agents found dead, "someone is sneaking around after curfew."

Harry shot her a sharp look. "If someone is, someone else might start feeling very cross about being left out."

Which was how the pair of them ended up sneaking out of the manor like a couple of naughty schoolchildren and, following hints from Harry's spies, used the killing curse and some clever use of levitating spells on Bellatrix's part to leave out another four mysterious deaths before lunch, with another five by dinner.

Voldemort took one look at Bellatrix – who was somehow both slightly more manic and calmer than usual – as he sat down during dinner, then turned to Harry and said, "Scythe."

Evidently, there was little point in lying, so Harry shrugged and said, "I ran out of books to read."

:This is my own fault,: Voldemort decided, and Harry ducked his head to hide his grin, because his partner really should have known better than to give him a babysitter with both similar violent impulses and worse self-control than Harry had. "You're coming to the ministry tomorrow," he added in English. "Bella as well."

"My Lord," Bellatrix murmured, ducking her head.

"Why?" Harry had to ask. "Not that I'm not delighted to leave the manor for the first time in a week–"