Chapter 22:Infiltration

The crack of Apparition was almost silent, the mark of a true expert, but it was still just loud enough for the man leaning against the wall by the phone booth to hear. Straightening up, he turned and bowed slightly.

"My Lord, all is in readiness."

"Excellent, Walden." Voldemort smirked. "Let us proceed and remember, from now until we leave, I am Mr Tom Riddle."

"Yes, My…Mr Riddle. Sorry. Mr Riddle. Mr Riddle. Got it."

"How many are inside?" Voldemort asked and Macnair scoffed.

"Skeleton crew only. Just enough to keep an eye on things and trigger a recall alert but not enough to do anything. We just need to get you past the security… but your wand… is rather recognisable…"

"Which is why I have a Gregorovich original." Voldemort lifted the silver-birch wand and waved it lazily. "Be proud, Walden. You are the first in this country to see my second wand."

"Thank you… Mr Riddle." Walden replied and Voldemort nodded.

"Excellent. Shall we proceed?"

Walden nodded and motioned to the phone booth. "The number is 62442… not sure why they picked that number, though."

"If you look at the letters, it spells out magic." Voldemort supplied and Walden stared at the phone in shock.

"Blimey! So it does! Well, how about that!"

Unnoticed by Walden, Voldemort rolled his eyes.

"Well, shall we?"

"Oh! Right… um, six, two, four, four, two… Walden Macnair… escorting Mr Riddle…"

A badge popped out of the change slot and Walden put it on, then he vanished in a flash of magic. Voldemort stepped into the box, typed the number and listened to the recorded voice.

"Welcome to the Ministry of Magic. Please state your name and the purpose of your visit."

"Tom Riddle, to retrieve a lost item." Voldemort said pleasantly and a badge clattered into the coin-return tray. Picking it up, Voldemort took a moment to smirk at the embossed writing.

Tom Riddle

Item Retrieval

Putting it on, Vldemort hung up the phone, then the booth seemed to spin around him, opening up to eject him into the lobby of the Ministry of Magic. The lobby was almost deserted except for a sinlge man behind a counter and Voldemort strolled over to him, flanked by Walden. The man put down his newspaper and looked at them, then he smiled in recognition.

"Walden, didn't know you were in today."

"He's helping me deal with a minor bureaucratic irritant." Voldemort answered, offering his wand and the security guard motioned for him to put it on the scales in front of him. A moment later, a piece of parchment popped out and the man looked at it.

"Silver-birch and Thestral-tail, fourteen inches?"

"Indeed." Voldemort replied and the man placed the parchment on a desk-spike.

"Okay, that's done, you can take your wand now. Good luck with the forms… paperwork's horrible."

"It is indeed." Voldemort agreed as he slipped his wand back into his belt-holster. "Walden?"

"Right this way, Mr Riddle." Walden managed as the Guard returned to his paper. Voldemort followed Walden to the lift, where he carefully closed the gates before pressing one of the buttons.

"So far, so…" He began, only for Voldemort to clasp a hand across his mouth.

"Don't." Voldemort hissed. "Do not tempt fate. The last time I did, it cost me a decade of formless existence!"

"…sorry…" Walden mumbled and Voldemort released his follower, turning to face the lift door again.

"Just keep your mind on our mission, Walden." He almost purred as the lift juddered to a halt. "Now, which way is it?"

"Erm… this way."

.

"Regent Longbottom, so kind of you to arrive!" Lucius declaimed as the elderly witch stepped out of the Floo. "Albus is already in the main hall."

Augusta looked round, then took another look. "It is an honor to be here, Lord Malfoy." She said stiffly, then she let her puzzlement show. "I heard that your mansion was decorated with intricate carvings and paintings in every inch, but…"

Lucius nodded. "My wife made some suggestions and I agreed. By only having the carvings and ornamentation as highlights, it makes them more noticable and doesn't overpower the senses nearly as much."

"Your wife has exquisite taste." Augusta admitted as Neville arrived through the Floo.

"Heir Longbottom." Lucius said in greeting. "You may be interested to learn that I have followed in the tradition that Lord Potter started. I have hired several members of the Ballycastle Bats to oversee my private Quidditch pitch which I have recently had lowered to make it easier to conceal from the Muggles."

.

"The Hall of Prophecies." Walden stated as they stepped through the doorway into a huge room filled with shelving, each shelf holding a line of fist-sized crystal spheres.

"How exactly does the security system work here?" Voldemort asked and Walden coughed to buy a few second to organise his thoughts.

"Well, there's a low-level repulsion spell on each sphere so that only those the prophecy inside refers to or those with special medallions can touch them. If anyone tries to force their way through the protective spell, touching the sphere triggers a second spell that scrambles the mind. It can take months to recover from that."

"Seems almost like overkill." Voldemort mused. "Then again, knowing the future can help you to shape it. So… the prophecy we want… how do we find it?"

"The Book." Walden pointed at the huge tome on a pedestal in a small alcove. "Let's see… Prophecy about the Dark Lord and Harry Potter."

The book glowed before slamming open, its pages blurring until they stopped. Walden peered at the open pages before nodding.

"Ah, here we are! Row ninety-seven, shelf four, space five."

Voldemort looked round, spotting instantly the small wooden numbers affixed to each set of shelves.

"Very good, Walden. Let us proceed."

.

"Lord Potter." Cornelius said warily.

"Minister." harry replied courteously.

"How are you coping with your Lordship?" Cornelius asked and Harry hid a smirk at the opening offered.

"Quite well. My Gringotts Account Manager has done a splendid job of managing my interests while my home has been fully rebuilt. Oddly, though, I've been looking through the asset list and I seem to be missing two House-elves."

Cornelius blanched slightly and opened his mouth, but Harry continued.

"I'm fully aware that by being absent, not by choice, I hasten to add, for a decade would have meant that they would have passed away due to the lack of a Bond, so I'm quite grateful that someone did take them in. However, as Lord Potter, I am quite concerned about their continued well-being since they are, legally speaking, still my property since I haven't received any payment for them. If whoever's taken them in has treated them well, then I'll happily reward them with enough money to buy three House-elves, but if they've been mistreated… well. We saw what happened to that fraud Lockhart."

Cornelius somehow managed to relax and tense up at the same time, then he coughed.

"I do believe that my predecessor took your elves for herself just before she retired. I'll be happy to put you in contact with her, if you wish."

"That's very kind of you, Minister."

Neither of them noticed the small figure watching them with a despondant expression, although Harry caught the slight pop of it vanishing. Looking round curiously, he finally shrugged and turned back to his conversation with the Minister, pulling something out of his pocket.

"By the way, I was wondering, what happened here?" He asked and Cornelius turned bone-white, staring at the picture that Harry was holding.

"Well… erm… that is…"

Harry put away the picture of Cornelius and the curse-breakers that Jor-El had supplied.

"It was only a bit of idle curiosity." He stated, knowing that Cornelius would understand the message. "Probably a training drill or something. Nothing to make a fuss about, right?"

"Oh, yes!" Cornelius agreed, still pale. "Nothing at all to be worried about! Not at all!"

.

"Here it is!" Walden called and Voldemort quickly moved to his side, eyes going to the label attached to the silver three-dragon stand that the sphere was resting on.

S.P.T. to A.P.W.B.D.

Dark Lord

And

(?)

Harry Potter

"Well, well, well." Voldemort mused, reacing out cautiously. His questing hand was unimpeded and his smile grew predatorial as he touched the sphere. "It would seem that it is about me. S.P.T… Sybil Trelawny. So that's why the old fool has her teaching in Hogwarts. How does one play a Prophecy Sphere?"

"You… simply tap it with your wand, sir." Walden replied. "Anyone can play a Prophecy, but only those that the Prophecy are about can remove it. It does cause an alarm when a Sphere is taken, though."

Voldemort looked round, then cast a couple of spells to prevent anyone else from hearing.

"Well then, let us see what it says and once it is written down, we shall leave."

Walden watched as Voldemort pulled out his wand and tapped it against the Sphere. The ball glowed, then a translucent figure rose from it and began speaking.

"The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches…"

.

.

Lucius sagged as the Floo died down, leaving only his family with him.

"That was certainly… interesting." He finally admitted and Narcissa gave him a long look.

"My love, why did you invite all of those from the Light faction? It doesn't seem to bein keeping with your normal ways of doing things?"

Lucius felt a stab of irritated gratitude to Lord Voldemort for, just before his departure, running through the possible (but untrue) reasons he should give if pressed.

"My beloved, young Lord Potter is going to become a strong political force even before he leaves Hogwarts. It is quite important that he not see us as an enemy. A rival, maybe. Possibly an opponant, since that would keep any conflict between us civilised enough that we would not do worse than jockeying for position. Should I let him see me as an enemy, though, such as he saw Lockhart…"

Lucius trailed off and Narcissa pulled his head down to give him a deep, passionate kiss. When she finally released him, he simply stared blankly at her.

"You are finally learning how to take the long view." Narcissa murmured into his ear. "I am so proud of you, my beloved."

.

Voldemort sat in the comfortable chair in the Malfoy Guest Lodge and re-read the piece of Parchment before him. After playing the Prophecy Sphere twice (and using a Dicta-quill for the second playthrough), he had departed from the Ministry without a single problem and sent Macnair on his way then detouring to pick up a specific item from Borgin and Burkes before returning to his new (albeit temporary) home.

"The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches..." He recited once more.

"Born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies...

"And the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not...

"And either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives...

"The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies..."

He leaned back in his chair, one hand moving almost unbidden to pick up the glass of Firewhiskey that was on the table. "Interesting. Had I but known of this… but it is too late for that. I have indeed marked young Potter and he is a Lord, thus my equal. I have the memories from the one I supplanted showing me the power that he used… yet that worries me. Wandless magic… Family magic… and yet neither James Potter nor Lily Potter chose to use it when I came upon them all those years ago… why would that be?"

Voldemort took a sip of the Firewhiskey. Once the resulting flames had dissipated, he re-read the parchment.

"Either must die at the hand of the other… so for me to live, Potter must die. Well, I had been planning to kill him anyway, so I do not see how that affects my plans in any real way…"

Voldemort looked out the window at the starry night.

"He will have power the Dark Lord knows not…" He repeated to himself. "Why did neither of the Potters use that against me? Was I simply too fast for them to react to, does it need time to activate or is it something else…?"

The night offered no answer to his introspection.

"And what do those symbols mean?" Voldemort muttered to himself.

.

Cornelius Fudge took another swig of Firewhiskey, ignoring the worried look that his wife gave him before she left the room. Putting the glass down, he buried his head in his hands.

"He knows!" He groaned. "If I do anything against him… My career will be over!"