Don't Mention It

Thanks to Astopperindeath for her beta work.

The mood of the house shifted as the girls, who now referred to themselves as 'my troops,' started to understand the scope of what we were trying to do. The solidarity was complete. Those that might have sniped at each other before, not unusual with so many women thrown together, left it by the wayside as our mission became clearer and as our successes became more obvious.

Two days after 'the incident', as we called it, we had another success. The house had been curiously empty of Death Eaters since Saturday night, so it was a surprise when Ma called me into the foyer to take the Elder Goyle upstairs.

He was never much for the house; he came whenever there was a celebration and usually stayed in a lounge laughing and talking. He mostly stuck to drinking, with the occasional grope. According to Greg, he was satisfied with his marriage and so only went through the motions due to the type of peer pressure that a Death Eater would be foolish to ignore.

Taking me upstairs was an event the impact of which was not lost on the curious women I left behind.

Entering the room, he shut the door and warded it; he then walked slowly over to the bed and pulled the blanket off. With a wave of his wand he transformed it into, well, a blanket with mismatched sleeves. He muttered an oath and then threw it at me.

"Snape said to make you decent. Put that on."

I kept my face schooled into a mask of polite confusion. If I had been nervous when Nott and I danced this dance, I was terrified now.

Shrugging into the attempted robes, I let my arms fall to my sides and smiled politely at him.

He sat on the bed with a groan and scrubbed at his hair with stubby fingers.

I just stood there with my plastic smile on my face.

Finally, he fixed me with a bloodshot eye and jabbed a finger at a chair.

"Sit, girl, you make me nervous." I made him nervous? I sat, taking a moment to cover every inch of my skin with fabric.

"Macnair's dead."

I knew this was a probability, so I kept my composure.

"The Dark Lord executed him in front of everyone. Pulled his heart right out of his chest." He shook his head. "I think we were supposed to be impressed. He made an impression on me, though, didn't he?"

I listened as he told me how in an excess of rage, Voldemort had lashed out at the nearest person. Standing guard near the throne, Gregory Goyle Jr. had only been spared the dark hex flung at him because Severus had cast a shield at the same time. Goyle Sr. had rushed over and stood in front of his son. The Elder Goyle had never offered a threat, just put himself in his son's place, and Snape had immediately dropped to his knees and sought forgiveness. They had paid for their intervention, but the Dark Lord eventually forgave them for their rash actions.

"Are you still hurt?" I asked, rising and coming over to him, the very picture of concern. He was not the one I really wanted to ask about.

He waved a hand at me.

"A dark hex here or there comes with the territory, girl. Nothing new. I'll live, Snape will as well. Although we're both getting too old for this shite." He fumbled around in his robes and pulled out a book. He tapped it with his wand, and it returned to its original size. That done, he handed it to me. "Snape wanted you to read this, and here's some parchment and ink, quill's inside the book. You can't keep them; I will have to take it all back in the morning."

I looked at the book; it was a manual of defensive spells.

"Why?"

"He said you might need to brush up. Been a few years since you girls used a wand."

"No. Why are you doing this?"

He stretched his legs out on the bed and adjusted the pillows behind his head.

"Because I am tired, girl. I am bloody tired of it all. Snape understands; a man can't go through his life always wondering when the axe will find his neck. I need peace, and if life would be more peaceful with you mudbloods in charge, then I'm ready for it. Just be sure there's a place for my son in your new world."

With that, he closed his eyes.

I spent that night practicing spells by swishing my quill in the air and taking furious notes. When the first light chime sounded, my fingers were discolored from the ink. Goyle vanished the stains right before he left, and I wanted to cry.

Balling my hands into fists and summoning my resolve, I raced up the stairs to the attic and woke all the girls and called a meeting in the wardrobe room.

"What the hell are you wearing?" asked Peaches when she stumbled sleepily into the room. I looked and saw I was still wearing the hideous blanket with sleeves. I rolled my eyes and cursed and then tossed it off.

"Pay attention, ladies, I have some news. The Elder Goyle has joined our ranks, and he gave me a book of defensive spells to read." I waited for the excited exclamations to die down. "I think we should all practice some of the hand movements and incantations. I don't see why he would have given me the book if there wasn't the possibility of wands in our future."

The room erupted in noise as the women reacted to the news with an expected amount of emotion. I held out my hand as if holding an imaginary wand and slowly went through the movements for Protego. Soon, all twenty-four women were scattered about, firmly gripping their future wands and muttering the spell.

It was almost an hour, and five spells later, that a startled gasp made us all turn towards the door. Ma was standing there with one hand on her bosom and the other covering her mouth. Her face was locked in an expression of surprise and fear. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Nadia start to slowly angle her way along the wall. When she was almost behind her, Ma spun to the side and whipped out her wand.

"No!" she yelled, and then in a quieter voice: "No, you don't want to do that." Backing up to one of the shelves along the wall, she kept her wand trained on us as she dug a hand into one of the baskets of hair accessories. None of us moved. I'm not sure if any of us were even breathing. Eventually, she pulled out one of the long thin hair ornaments that looked like a stick with a tassel hanging off the end; she pulled the tassel off. With an appraising look at us, she tossed the stick down. We all backed away. She shouted a quick series of spells and jabbed her wand at the stick on the floor. With a frightened squeal, Ma turned on her heel and fled the room. We looked at each other in confusion and then looked down to see twenty-four sticks lying in a pile.

"Well," said Maisy, "I guess we know what side of the fence she stands on now."

"I think you're right," said Nadia. She scooped up the sticks and held them out to me. I took one. It was now about ten inches long and much thicker than it had been but still had the garish pink varnish with gold decoration.

"Grab your wands, ladies, it's time to swish and flick," I said.

We spent the entire morning reviewing. Tea and scones appeared on a table by the door, and we all smiled at each other, excited to have added yet another member of our seditious group. We practiced the wand movements for every spell we could remember. Defensive spells were all well and good, but if Severus thought I would be satisfied with just that, he had another thing coming.

When we were dressed for the day, we headed downstairs. Ma stood in the foyer looking pale and a bit sickly. The women went about their business as if nothing had happened, as if this was any other day, and I could see Ma relax a bit until I walked up to her.

"Thank you... Agatha," I said quietly.

She shot a quick darting glance at me and then looked back at the stairs.

"Don't mention it, Hermione." Then she chirped a small hysterical titter. "Please, Merlin, don't ever mention it."

"A time will come, maybe soon, when things done might be better mentioned." I told her.

She turned suddenly and grabbed my hand lightly. She pulled me towards her office and once inside, she grabbed a bottle of firewhisky and poured two glasses. Handing me one, she collapsed into her chair and pointed at the other one.

"I only wanted to live, Princess. I am not a fighter; I am not strong. When the world went to hell, I did the only thing I knew how to do, I survived." She gulped her drink and went on; I sat and listened to her disjointed explanation of her motivations. "I never was particularly brave. I was the only bloody Hufflepuff in a family of Slytherins; you can bet I learned to survive. And I was good at it too, right up until I wasn't." Her eyes got sad. "You know my first name now, but do you know the rest of it?"

I shook my head.

"Rosier. I am Agatha Rosier. Ah, I see you've heard of my family, yes, those Rosiers. I was the runt of the litter. In many ways. Proud family they are, or were, only uncles and maiden aunts left now.

"Getting dragged into the whole Death Eater mess wasn't a choice for me. But it was at one of their silly functions all those years ago that I met a boy. No, I won't tell you who. But it is enough for you to know I loved him, and he loved me. He seemed just as lost among those wolves as I was, and we always dreamed of a chance to run away, to strike out on our own and leave the fear behind." She blinked back tears and gulped the rest of her drink.

"Anyway, I slept with him--several times, as a matter of fact--enough times for the usual outcome when the young and stupid pretend they're grown up." She poured another drink.

"You got pregnant," I said quietly.

"Right in one."

"What happened to your boy?"

"Well he's dead, isn't he? Oh, the scandal when they found out I was up the duff! My boy asked me to marry him, and I was proud to say yes. He was my life, and now there would be three of us. We made plans, and I clung to his words throughout all the arguments and punishments from my family, the unending lectures on the shame I had brought upon the House of Rosier. I was going to show them; I was going to be respectable despite what they said. I told them all off. I told them what they could do with their stupid Dark Lord and their stupid movement. For once in my life, I tried to do more than just survive, I spat in their face!

"Soon after that, my boy went off on the Dark Lord's business and never came back. His brother sent word of his death. No one had any details."

"So there I was, a few months later, the blackest sheep in the family with my little black lamb."

She grabbed the bottle and poured another drink. Seeing mine untouched, she tsked.

"That's uncharitable of you, Princess. Drink to my tragic tale."

I lifted my glass to her and drank.

"What happened to your little lamb, Agatha?"

"She was packed off to France to live with my mother's people. I saw her a few times growing up, and before you ask, no, she doesn't know who I am. I'm sad to admit that she turned out to be a rather spoilt and mean girl. She would have made a fine Slytherin. I stopped going to see her years ago; it was too hard to look at my lover's eyes staring out at me from a face frozen in constant disdain. She would be just a bit older than you now."

"Tell me, what became of Agatha Rosier?"

"Agatha didn't survive. It started with little visits from other Death Eaters, visits that were supposed to be full of sympathy for my elder brother's death but were really about trying to get with the girl who puts it about. Eventually, I gave up defending myself.

"I was disowned. My 'loose' connection with the Death Eaters was all I had, and at that point His Darkness had been put out of the game by your little friend with the scar. I ended up in Knockturn Alley. Long story short, I became Ma. I still am Ma."

"When it all went tits up five years ago, I was approached about this job. I was old and tired of being on your side of things and thought this a step up, so I took the job. And a thankless job it is, too. No day off, no pay. Just room and board and a clothing allowance. And you surly lot trying to drink yourselves to death, thank you very much. As if I wouldn't be fined if that was to happen."

"Well, I don't drink much anymore, if that helps."

She gave me an appraising look.

"No you don't; as a matter of fact, you don't do a lot of things you used to, and at the same time now you do more than you ever did. Don't think I haven't seen which way the wind blows, Princess. I know Veritaserum has no taste." She sighed heavily and sat back in her chair.

"I don't know how much help I can be; I am weak and easily frightened, but I'll help however I can. Lying to Mulciber was the most exhilarating thing I've done since I was just a foolish girl. May I ask, how many of the Death Eaters in that room were yours?"

"Apart from Mulciber? All of them."

"Oh, very well done, Princess."

I placed my glass on the desk and leaned in towards her.

"Drop the wards on the house that keep us from doing magic."

"Oh, dive right into the thick of it, why don't you? I can't. It's Dark magic, Blood magic. You need one of your pet Death Eaters to do it, preferable one of the more powerful ones. Unless you want everyone to know you are up to something, leave them up. The Death Eaters can feel the wards; it's how they know they're safe. They'll know as soon as you drop them. Once down, leave them down; trust me, you would not want to do what was needed to raise them again, and it will be hard enough finding someone to drop them."

"Right then, I'll get back to you on that."

"What else do you need? What about privacy? We can designate certain rooms in the house as meeting rooms, redecorate so they are more conducive to the business at hand. Mind you, it can't cost much. I have to requisition the funds from the Ministry, so no major expenses if you don't want to attract notice."

"Who in the Ministry? Who gets the revenue from the house?"

Ma looked up at me suddenly with a gleam in her eye.

"Macnair did."

We both smiled; it wasn't very pretty.

"I wonder who will be in charge now?" she asked.

"We'll soon find out." I answered.

_{Very sorry for the delay. A family emergency came up.}