Chapter 13: The Dark Mark and The Black Diary

Hogwarts Castle, Somewhere in the Scottish Highlands

November 22nd, 1992, 10:30 PM

"Wizards really have some very strange ways of transportation."

Leona's comment got a chuckle from Erik and a small giggle from Selena and Joan.

The wizard in the room looked at Leona like she had grown a second head. She just shrugged.

"The fireplace is closed again."

Erik said after closing the floo connection.

"Erik, dear, that black mark in the rat's arm, It was a slave brand, wasn't it?"

Selena randomly asks Erik. He nods, confirming her thoughts.

"Yes, it was. At least appeared to be one. But it was different from a normal one. It appeared to have been done using corrupted magic as a source."

"What do you mean by slave mark?"

Director Bones directly asked. Any additional information that she could get on the thing was good information in her books.

"Some antique and old magical civilizations had the custom of using slaves. To identify who belonged to whom, each master branded his slaves with his own mark. The brand had some functions beside the obvious identification one. It served as a beacon for transportation, enabling the master to travel to the slave's location or the slave to travel to its master's location. It also worked as an extra pool of magic for the master, that when necessary could drain the magic from the slave's pool to replenish its own quicker. Keep in mind that these slaves were always of magical origin. The mark needs the 'to be' slave's consent to work. In the old times magical knowledge was restricted to those in power, so to get access to the knowledge people tended to 'sell' themselves for an agreed time frame. After the servitude time was complete, the brand was removed and the 'been' slave kept the magical knowledge with an oath of not teaching it to no one. Of course the use of slave brands came into disuse with the discovery of a new race that was named house-elves, and the creation and popularization of magical schools. But the rat's brand appeared to be different. The magic that created it was corrupted, it was distorted in a way."

Director Bones was focused on hearing the information, just like the others in the room, she had some light shed on the origins of the dark mark. Just the piece about the receiving person having to give its consent to be branded already sunk all the defenses of being under the imperius curse.

Professor Snape had a white face hearing the information. He was a branded slave. And the worst part was that it was for life! The Dark Lord had been very clear in the 'acceptance ritual', saying that they would bear his mark until their deaths. But since Lord Ravenclaw had the knowledge about the original brand, he should know how to remove it, right?

"Lord Ravenclaw, is there a way to remove the brand?"

Erik looked at the dark man's face, then looked at his arm. After some thinking he answered.

"There's four ways, Professor… Sorry, I don't know your name."

"Snape, Severus Snape. Master for potions of the castle, and Head of House Slytherin."

"Well, Professor Snape, as I was saying, there's four ways of removing it. First way is to serve the agreed time specified at the branding ritual. Second way is to grow more powerful than the master at the brand time and expunge the brand by oneself. Third way is to receive your freedom early. Fourth way is if the master dies with no direct magical heir the brand will disappear, otherwise the 'ownership' will be passed to his heir."

Professor Snape was analysing the options. They were definitely not good news to him. Croaker, who was silent until then, answers having compiled the new knowledge.

"So, the Dark Mark still being visible, even after Peter Pettigrew confirming the vaporization of the Dark Lord's body, means…?"

"That the man is still alive, barely, but still alive. Or that he had a magical heir. If what the rat said was true, and not a lie that was told to him and he believed, I'm inclined to bet on the first option."

That revelation threw the wizards in the room in concern. Erik ignored their concerns for the time being and called to them.

"I think we wasted too much time, we have a class 5 dark artifact to recover."

Erik then walked to the stair of the female dormitories, and started climbing. The Unspeakables were the firsts to follow after him. The Aurors followed after. Professor McGonagall waited for a bit, and followed them, giving Professor Snape a pitying look. The Professor quickly arrived in the corridor of the female dormitories and found the group waiting for her outside of a door with a plaque on it that read '1st Year'. Seeing her, Erik opened the door and he and the group entered the dormitory. The room was tidy compared with the boy's room that they had visited early. Erik then took his blue leather gloves and offered them to the group. The Aurors and professor looked at him as if asking why he was giving it to them. With a blank face, Erik said.

"Do you really expect me, a man, to go through a girl's personal items? Don't worry about any curse, it's true dragon leather, there's no touch curse that would affect it."

The female Aurors and Professor McGonagall rolled their eyes at that. One of the Unspeakables took the offered gloves from Erik's hand and wore them.

"It's by that bed."

Erik said to the Unspeakable while pointing to one of the four beds in the room, and she, probably, went to search for the dark artifact. While she started to spread the girl's possessions on the bed, one of her colleagues went by the bed's side and casted an aura detection over the spread items. Erik noticed that the girl's possessions seemed to be all well used, and imagined that she must be from a poor family.

"The backpack."

The Unspeakable that was casting said. The other one put the other items on the bed aside, and emptied the backpack over the bed. The Unspeakable casted again the detector.

"The black book. The rest is clear."

He pointed at a worn leather bound black thin book. The first Unspeakable, who was wearing the blue leather gloves, cautiously picked the thin black book.

"'T. M. Riddle'. It seems to be a diary of sorts."

She cautiously drops the black diary in the middle of the room, on top of a quickly conjured desk. The other Unspeakable then starts to cast diagnose spells at it. Erik cocks his head to the side and says.

"Hum… That's some heavy stuff. The last I saw one of those was in Ecuador, inside an old tomb."

"What is it?"

Asked the Unspeakable that until now was standing at the back. The Aurors and Professor McGonagall were interested in the answer too.

"Have you ever heard about Horcruxes?"

The Unspeakable that asked groaned hearing that. Director Bones and Master Auror Robards' faces blanked. The casting Unspeakable started to cast a very specific diagnostic.

*groan*

"Really?"

"Really."

"Gibbers?"

He asked the casting Unspeakable. The cloaked man finished his spell and directed his cloaked face to his superior.

"Affirmative for Horcrux."

"Bloody Hell. Who is the kid?"

The gloved Unspeakable, Buzzer, went to one of the books still on top of the bed and opened it, reading the name written on the front cover's back out loud.

"Ginny Weasley."

"Wow, another Weasley kid. The family must have a hell of a lot of luck."

Said Erik with sarcasm. Professor McGonagall pursed her mouth at the comment, but had to agree with Erik. She then asked.

"What is a Horcrux."

"That is classified info…"

"It's a soul anchor."

Erik said, interrupting Croaker.

"Lord Ravenclaw, you can't divulge the information about horcruxes."

"Why not? Professor McGonagall is the kid's 'parent in locus', she is concerned about her ward. She has the right to know."

Croaker sighed at Erik's answer, but relented.

"Ok, but she can't spread the information about it."

"I'm sure that she will not, even more sure after she knows what that is."

Erik rebated Croaker, looking at Professor McGonagall and starting to explain.

"As I was saying, Horcruxes are soul anchors. Phylacteries. They were documented by a fool named Herpo. I say documented because the use of the items predate his works. He documented how to tear a piece of your own soul and how to bind it to an artifact, transforming it into a Horcrux. After the piece of soul is bound, the item becomes indestructible by normal means, and while the item exists, the main soul is bound to our plane. The Horcrux can also possess the item's user and suck his life force. If the life force is enough, the soul piece can then assume physical form, killing the host. I suspect that the girl was being possessed by the piece of soul inside the Diary."

Professor McGonagall blanched at the information, just like the Aurors that didn't know about it.

"We have to destroy it, then."

Said the Professor, righteously, wanting to protect her cub.

Erik chuckled at that. Professor McGonagall looked at him with fury in her eyes.

"What are you chuckling for, Lord Ravenclaw, this is serious!"

"I know, Professor McGonagall. And it's a good thing that we identified the item soon enough. We must just have identified the culprit for the petrifications too. Whoever this 'T.M.Riddle' is, he must be the one who was opening Salazar's Secret Chamber. We now know the 'what', the 'who', and the 'how'. Another reason for the chuckle is that the second class 5 item in the castle has the same magical signature as this one, meaning that the fool 'T.M.Riddle' probably crafted more than one of the items, meaning that we can use them to track him on any other horcrux. There was a reason that Herpo was nicknamed 'the fool'."

He calmly explained to the Professor.

"But Ms. Weasley…"

"Don't worry Professor McGonagall. She will recover. She will need to visit a mind healer, but if she doesn't make any more contact with the item, she will recover."

Professor McGonagall let out a breath of relief at that.

Croaker then asked Erik.

"Lord Ravenclaw, do you have the means to track the pieces? I believe that we don't have this knowledge."

"Oh yeah, it's a very simple item crafted with the help of runes and a simple ritual. I can pass it to you after we are done here."

Croaker nodded at Erik and thanked him.

"Thank you."

He then retrieved a leather pouch from inside his robes and passed it to the gloved Buzzer. It was a Mokeskin pouch. Buzzer then opened the pouch and deposited the horcrux inside. She then passed the pouch back to Croaker. Director Bones was looking at everything with attention. As if predicting the question, Croaker said to her.

"Don't worry Amelia, it's our job to dispose of such items."

Director Bones then nodded at the cloaked man.

"The question now is, who is 'T.M.Riddle'? If he was the same person to open the chamber 45 years ago, Hagrid must know about him, Dumbledore too. But something tells me that it will be easier to get the information from Hagrid. The ex-Headmaster doesn't seem the type to share information."

Erik throws the question while the group is recovering from the revelations.

"You are right, Lord Ravenclaw, Dumbledore had the uncanny habit of keeping information from others."

Said Director Bones. It seemed that she had some past experiences with the 'old boy'.

"Let's go back. With this one, Gryffindor is clean, and we have other three dormitories to clean. They would be quicker than here. Dimpy, please send an elf to organize Ms. Weasley's things."

Erik said and exited the dormitory. The group followed behind him.

*pop*

*snap*

Soon enough, with a soft pop, a young house-elf appeared and with a snap of it's fingers, Ginny's stuff started to go back to it's right place. It disappeared with another pop as soon as the job was done.

*pop*

In the Common Room, Erik arrived and waited together with his wives for the rest of the group. They having arrived, he addressed them all.

"Gryffindor's Tower is clean. Ravenclaw's next!"

He then exited the Common Room, waving a 'good night' to Elizabeth, the Fat Lady's portrait, and followed by the Professors, Aurors and Unspeakables.

The group quickly walked through the corridors in silence, and climbed down the stairs to the fifth floor, where the entrance to Ravenclaw's Tower was located.

Arriving in front of the eagle shaped bronze knocker, Erik waited for the group and said.

"Eagle, please grant us access to the tower."

"Of course I will, Lord Ravenclaw, but you know the rules.

"Sigh… Ask away."

"What hangs down by the thigh of a man, under his cloak, yet is stiff and hard? When the man pulls up his robe, he puts the head of this hanging thing into that familiar hole of matching length which he has filled many times before."

The group behind Erik blushed hearing the knocker riddle. Professor McGonaggal had a scandalized look on her face.

"I really hope that you are not giving this kind of riddle to the students, Eagle. The answer is 'a key'."

"Correct as always, my Lord. And don't worry, I only give this kind of riddle when there's no students near."

The eagle then granted passage to the group.

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