CHAPTER TWENTY - Loyalties Lie

Severus Snape strolled into the Headmaster's Office at Hogwarts, his footsteps creating loud echoes that bounced off the empty halls. Although all Hogwarts staff went home during the Summer break, Snape knew he'd be able to find Dumbledore at the school.

Dumbledore was standing in front of the pensieve at the side of his office, blankly staring at the mirror above it.

"What is it, Severus?" Dumbledore asked, not moving his gaze from the mirror as the professor walked in.

"The girl is back." Snape said, stopping at the doorway.

"Be more specific, Severus, what girl?"

"The Romanian one. The one that disappeared three years ago."

"She's back?" Dumbledore finally turned towards Snape, a slightly shocked expression resting on his face. "Amidst these unsettling times?"

"It gets worse," said Severus, walking up to Dumbledore's desk. "She was at the meeting today."

Dumbledore's eyes widened even further. He inhaled deeply and beckoned for Snape to sit down before sitting onto his own chair.

"She's a Nightmare Demon. A creature from the Spiritual Dimension. The Dark Lord called her down to Earth to spy on Potter and leak our information."

"And she agreed?"

"Yes. He made her a deal: in exchange for her help, he would teach her his magic and knowledge. Knowing the Dark Lord, he's got plans for this girl."

"Why would she want to learn his magic?" Dumbledore muttered to herself. "Nightmare Demon, Spiritual Dimension… that explains why she is naturally talented at Legilimency. Her abilities might be much stronger than we think."

"I don't think there is any way of stopping her, Albus. With the Dark Lord training her, she could change everything. One word from her and all of our plans will go to waste. We can't hide from her, either. She can see right through it." Snape said darkly.

"Then I think we both know what we should do."

"Win her over?"

"Ultimately, the choice is hers. She can see straight through us, so there's not much we can do to sway her opinions. We can only hope that she chooses us in the end. Because if she doesn't…" Dumbledore trailed off, giving Snape a knowing glance.

Snape nodded. "Should I talk to her?"

"Only if needed. Gain her trust, keep her safe. We might need her."

***

"Avada Kedavra!" Attuoria said, pointing at the spider on the table in front of her. A flash of green light shot out from her wand and hit the creature, causing it to fall limp and motionless. Dead spiders lay scattered all across the table, with only two of them still alive.

This morning, Snape paid her a visit and brought all the stuff she had left in Hogwarts from her previous trip down to the mortal realm. She now had her school robes back (although they no longer fit), her first-year books, and her wand.

She glanced up at Voldemort for a second, who was staring at the table of dead spiders with a frown on his face.

"She successfully performed the Killing Curse on her first try… even Bellatrix had to practise multiple times before she got it. She's ruthless. Powerful. Like me..." Voldemort's thoughts echoed into her mind as she turned her head back down to stare at the table.

Attuoria didn't know whether or not to feel proud that Voldemort was comparing her to himself. She wasn't sure what he had expected from a Nightmare Demon like her. Not giving it much thought, she quickly killed off the last two spiders on the table.

"Good, good," Voldemort muttered. "Now, to remove the trace of your kills, we could use the vanishing spell." He pointed his wand at a spider at the edge of the table. "Evanesco."

The small black creature disappeared from the surface.

Attuoria brought out her wand. "Evanesco," she said, pointing her wand at another spider. That, too, disappeared. She then focused on all twelve dead spiders that lay on the table before speaking again, "Evanesco."

All the spiders vanished at once, and the table was again bare as it was this morning.

"Hmm..." Voldemort said with a small huff, not displaying any emotion on his face. "Not bad. We'll finish off with another Unforgivable Curse, the Cruciatus Curse."

Attuoria nodded and conjured up a flock of birds from the tip of her wand, making sure to capture them in a cage that was transfigured from a chair. She grabbed onto one of the birds with her left hand, but was careful not to hurt it.

"The incantation is crucio. It's a spell used to torture the victim, so you can only perform it if you have full intent of causing pain to your target. Watch."

Voldemort whipped out his wand and beckoned for Attuoria to set the bird down on the table. She let go of the creature from her grasp, and the Dark Lord did not hesitate.

"Crucio!" He spat, tilting the tip of his wand towards the bird. The small avian let out a screech, and Attuoria could hear light cracking sounds coming from its writhing body. "Your turn."

Staring down at the creature, Attuoria watched its fuzzy chest rise and fall heavily, the rest of its body lying completely motionless on the table. The bird was in pain.

But Attuoria didn't know anything about pain. The few times she experienced it, she either ignored it or waited for the bothersome feeling to go away. It didn't seem too bad. At least the bird wasn't dead after experiencing the Cruciatus Curse. It was just temporary pain.

"Kill it first, will you? Get a new bird." Voldemort directed. Attuoria nodded and obeyed, cutting the bird's life short with a green flash of light. After a quick evanesco, the bird was gone from existence.

She then reached into the cage and grabbed out another bird.

"Crucio!"

The bird let out a similar screech of pain and began twitching violently as it lay on the table. She was doing it right. She let the spell last for around five seconds before pulling her wand away from the target, leaving the creature in the same position as the last.

��Good." Voldemort said. His tone was slightly different from before.

"All three unforgivables, done on her first try. She could be useful, very useful. Perhaps in the future, she could work alongside Bellatrix or Severus," she heard him think as he folded his wand into his robes.

"That's all for today. You requested books, Lucius got them. They're all in the study room."

Attuoria nodded. "Thank you," she said, rising from her seat while nonverbally vanishing the cage of birds. Even without emotions, Attuoria made sure to get her manners right. Human or not, being polite and knowing your place was important. Voldemort gave her a curt nod back before disappearing from the room with a swish of his dark cloak.

"Ah, Ms Knight," Narcissa called, standing at the doorway of the drawing room. "You're done with your lesson, right? Come down and have some tea."

Attuoria cracked a smile, glancing at the pale woman. She was such a sweet lady, it was just a pity she was stuck in such a cold, dark situation.

"Mrs Malfoy, please, drop the formalities. Just call me Attuoria. After all, I look no older than Draco."

Narcissa returned a small smile as Attuoria approached her. "The age of your human appearance and your real age are very different, I would assume."

"Only by a century."

***

After a calming afternoon tea with Narcissa, Attuoria shut herself in the study room and began reading. Despite having read an abundance of books on her previous trip to the mortal realm, all of those were more history-related than about magic.

This time, she asked the Dark Lord for books about magic, especially those that she could easily use for self study. And so here she was, sitting in a musty room with more books than the shelves could hold.

"Accio!" Attuoria demanded, pointing her wand at the copy of Curses and Counter-Curses on the ground. The book whizzed towards her and she caught it with her free hand.

She took a glance at the fourth Standard Book of Spells that lay open on the desk in front of her. Not a single spell in this book had proved to be a challenge for her.

Yet again, even the Unforgivable Curses were easy in her hands.

Attuoria sighed and closed the textbook. She'd already gone through every spell in the book, and there was nothing more to learn.

She tossed the book off the table and raised up her wand again.

"Accio dress!"

Attuoria waited for a few seconds before the black, misty material flew into her hand through the wall behind her. She whipped her head back and glanced at the wall. It was still solid, without any cracks whatsoever.

Attuoria glanced at the school robes she'd summoned in a previous incantation of the summoning charm. The robes had gotten stuck trying to enter the closed study room door. Despite being summoned, it was still a physical object that took up space.

But this black material, on the other hand, didn't behave like a normal piece of clothing. It shot through a wall. Clothes don't pass through walls.

She thought of the day before, when she tried to make Draco open the gates for her. He attempted to grab onto her arm, but his hand went straight through. That was how she was able to unhook the lock from the inside. The dress helped her. Maybe the dress responded to her needs?

Attuoria set the dress down onto the table. It stayed. She picked it back up.

I want to place the dress on the ground, she said clearly in her mind, and then dropped the dress onto the table.

It passed through the hard wood and landed on the floor, it's flowy fabric glistening in the dustiness.

"So it does act on my command…" Attuoria muttered to herself, bending down under the table to grab the dress.

Right then, the door creaked open and the light from the study shone into the hallway. It was like two different worlds - a warm, brightly lit study with dust flying everywhere, versus a cold, dark hallway with thin, empty air.

Attuoria's eyes shot to the door.

"Mr Malfoy," she greeted with a small nod. "Do you need to use the study? I can leave."

"No," Lucius Malfoy drawled, standing at the doorway with his cane in hand. "I actually have a favour to ask. You are learning magic, aren't you?"

"Yes."

"Would you mind if Draco joined you?"

Attuoria frowned. "Is this your idea or his?"

"My idea, purely my idea," Mr Malfoy said hastily. "I just thought he would benefit from some more studying."

Attuoria considered the idea. She quite liked being alone in the study, but at the same time, the Malfoys were doing her a favour by letting her stay at their house. Who was she to stop them from entering their own study?

"Sure," Attuoria agreed. "Studying together. That doesn't sound too bad."

Lucius grimaced, but Attuoria could sense that it was an attempt to smile.

"Oh, and please, join us for dinner tonight."

***

Attuoria's lessons with Voldemort the next few days were quite the interesting episodes. After reading through the entire collection of Standard Book of Spells and various other books, there weren't many spells left for her to learn. Voldemort also seemed to realise that teaching her average spells wasn't enough. She was looking for his deepest, darkest skills, and she could tell that he was hesitant. They ended up spending a few weeks practising duelling, which is a skill Voldemort prided himself on.

Every time after Attuoria finished her lesson with Lord Voldemort, she would return to the study and find Draco sitting at the desk, usually staring out the window in boredom.

"Did you learn anything special from the Dark Lord?" He sneered the moment Attuoria entered the study. That was his typical greeting.

She lightly shut the door before making her way over to the couch chair in the room. With her wand in one hand and a copy of A Guide to Advanced Transfiguration in the other, she ignored him.

"I asked you a question." said Draco, narrowing his eyes at the girl. "You might not be human, but you can speak. Answer me."

"I'm here to study. If you're not, you should leave." Attuoria replied in a completely monotonous tone, not taking her eyes off the book.

Draco opened his mouth to make another snide remark, but paused. Then, he turned away and picked up the Standard Book of Spells that Attuoria had hastily thrown on the ground the other day. Attuoria raised her eyebrows. Funny, this is the first time he actually listened to her and picked up a book in the past week.

"What?" Draco said, pulling Attuoria out of her thoughts.

"What?" Attuoria repeated.

"You're staring at me again."

"Oh, sorry." Attuoria said. "I wasn't reading your mind or anything," she added hastily.

"Sure." Draco said with a small smirk.

"I'm really not."

He didn't say anything, but smiled at his book. He clearly wasn't convinced.

Attuoria returned to her book and finished reading the last page on Human Transfiguration.