Chapter 142 - The Great Depression

Praeris nearly laughed out loud. Mrs. Willow's cursing was simply too entertaining.

Most importantly, Mrs. Willow really could afford to hire ten pregnant women.

Though of course, Mrs. Willow was just venting.

Starting in 1986, defecating in public had been prohibited by the Public Order Act, even for pregnant women.

The regulation made Londoners seem rather uncivilized, but Praeris still wanted to laugh.

She wasn't a Londoner anyway.

She was born in Southend-on-Sea, in Essex!

And Scotland Yard wasn't responsible for policing the City of London, it covered Greater London, excluding the City. People just liked using Scotland Yard as shorthand for the British police in general.

Once the laughter faded, Praeris's mood grew heavy again.

Emmeline Vance was dressed in Muggle clothes, but having spent so long in the wizarding world, the telltale signs were all too plain in Praeris's eyes. Most wizards were not very good at passing as Muggles.

And Amelia Bones was Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement at the Ministry of Magic. Susan Bones's aunt.

She hadn't expected so much to have happened out there during this time. Death Eaters were already targeting wizards.

Vance and Bones were both people too far removed from her world.

Upon learning of their deaths, Praeris returned to Diagon Alley the next day to buy a stack of newspapers from Old Tom.

"Come with me!" Old Tom called out in a low voice.

The moment he saw Praeris, he pulled her toward the back kitchen.

"What's going on?" she asked.

Hogwarts had begun its summer holiday in the third week of June. The last time she had come back was still in June, Old Tom hadn't been in the shop then, only the two assistants. Praeris had given them a brief greeting and run off to the herb merchant for Polyjuice Potion ingredients.

In mid-July, Dumbledore had taken her directly by Apparition in the night, leaving her completely in the dark about whatever had changed in Diagon Alley since.

Now, Praeris didn't see the assistants anywhere in the shop.

Old Tom, who always knew everything worth knowing, let out a long sigh.

He already knew that Winnie had become a Death Eater again. He had seen her moving with them. But some time ago, Death Eaters had come asking about Winnie and Purnell. Old Tom had connected that to Karkaroff's death in early July, and a chill had run through him.

If Winnie was still a Death Eater, why would those people come around asking about her?

And Karkaroff, a Death Eater himself, had died a gruesome death, nothing like the style of the Order of the Phoenix or the Aurors.

Most of the time, Old Tom turned a blind eye and a deaf ear to this sort of thing. That was his survival wisdom.

But Praeris was different.

He had watched Praeris grow up, year after year.

He had celebrated the first time this child took first place. He had introduced her to the job at Prim Purnell's shop. She had met Winnie Brown in his establishment.

Facing Praeris, he could not bring himself to say this was none of his business.

"In our eyes, you're still a child." Old Tom held her hand. "We won't tell them anything about you. But Winnie..."

"Go ahead and tell them," Praeris said softly. "It doesn't matter."

Winnie had spent a long time in Diagon Alley. There was no room to maneuver on that. If Old Tom and the other shopkeepers pretended they knew nothing, that was courting death.

"Ah! Little Prae! This is grown-up business!" Old Tom's wrinkled face creased with worry. "Just say you only stayed at my shop and knew nothing, all right!"

Praeris blinked. She turned her head away, unwilling to let Old Tom see how moved she was.

Her days in Diagon Alley had been the happiest time of her life. She didn't deny that she had once lived here, and she had long since accepted that there would come a time to pay a price for that happiness.

Human nature was complicated. She could understand the people of Diagon Alley giving up her connection to Winnie in order to survive.

When it came to life and death, nothing else was more important. Especially your own.

Praeris had already prepared for this. She had told Draco she had simply worked part-time at the beauty potions shop.

She was a Slytherin. A prefect. Close to pure-blood families and the children of Death Eaters. She had "exposed" Dumbledore for Umbridge.

Now, she had simply worked part-time at the beauty potions shop during a stretch of financial hardship, introduced by Old Tom. That was nothing.

What she hadn't expected was that Old Tom, Florian, and the other shopkeepers would worry for her out of plain, unadorned kindness. Think of her. Keep her secrets.

When you coldly observe the distortions of human nature and believe you have seen through this world, the light of human goodness can awaken a hope that is hard to destroy.

As she had grown more familiar with Occlumency, she had come to understand why the Sorting Hat had placed her in Slytherin.

Because the girl she had been was truly suited to it. Not only because of her rebellion against the idea of a "savior."

She had wanted her own wealth. She had wanted to climb. She refused to spend her life as the lowest of the low, beneath everyone else.

She had hated nearly everyone in the convent and had thought about killing those who bullied her. She had the power to do it, didn't she?

If Hogwarts had never sent an invitation to the eleven-year-old her, she likely would have used boarding secondary school as an alibi after leaving the convent and seized the chance to kill Fiona and Sister Mayne and all the others who had tormented her.

And yet.

Love.

From that July and August of her eleventh year, she had received far, far too much of it. From people who shared not a drop of blood with her.

"Love is a precious kind of wealth," the believer who had gifted her the poetry collection had once said.

Praeris had replied in a guileless tone: "If love is wealth, then poets must be very rich, right?"

The believer had smiled and nodded. "Yes. He possesses boundless wealth of love."

"Then how did the poet freeze to death?" Praeris asked, earnest and merciless. "Why didn't he use that wealth to buy some coal?"

The believer had gone quiet. After a long moment: "Child, love cannot be traded."

Praeris pressed on. "If something cannot be traded, how can its value be measured? How can it count as wealth at all?"

Another silence. Then: "Some wealth lives inside us. It is intangible — an eternal life force."

Praeris's tone was calm, but not without edge. "And yet this eternal life force cannot even keep a person alive."

The believer had nearly fled. But before leaving, she still placed the poetry collection, filled with love, into Praeris's hands.

One final sentence: "Praeris, I believe you will one day think differently."

It was practically a curse.

At the time, Praeris had laughed it off. She had thought that believer was simply a lunatic whose brain had been washed clean of sense.

Tangible wealth over intangible wealth. A life force that could keep her comfortable over an eternal one that couldn't keep her warm.

Praeris was not that foolish, penniless poet.

If it were her, she would have set fire to those sentimental poetry collections and used them as fuel.

So no, Praeris had never felt the Sorting Hat had placed her in the wrong house. Quite the opposite, its Legilimency was actually rather good.

It was only a pity that love had a strange magic of its own.

Love made people who shared no blood with her give to her. Love gave her today's life, clothed and fed without worry. Love gave her strength.

Love also made her heart go soft. Made her hesitate. Made her unlike herself. Made her develop, inexplicably, a longing for even more of it.

Why do you love me?

If you do, how can I not love you back?

"Thank you." Praeris stretched out her arms and held Old Tom tight. "Thank you for the love you've all given me."

Old Tom went flustered, his hands hovering awkwardly at his sides. "Well — we watched you grow up, didn't we!"

It took a while before the two of them had both settled.

"Time passes so quickly." Old Tom shook his head. "In just one year, you've grown so tall."

"Have I?" Praeris didn't have that sense. "I see myself every day. I've gotten used to it — I don't feel like I've changed much." She glanced toward the front. "But the Leaky Cauldron — where is everyone?"

Old Tom shook his head. "Now everyone's afraid for themselves. So many shops have closed. What reason is there to come to Diagon Alley?"

"What happened?" Praeris asked in disbelief.

Prim Purnell had voluntarily closed her shop last year and gone to the Order of the Phoenix. But the others' closures had not been voluntary.

Old Tom told her: Florian had vanished from his shop, looked like he'd been taken by force. Ollivander had also disappeared, but there were no signs of a struggle in his shop.

Now, customers came to Diagon Alley only when they had no other choice, and the shopkeepers were all watching their backs. Only Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes and the Leaky Cauldron still maintained daily operations.

Praeris listened to Old Tom's account with a sinking feeling.

Ollivander at least made a kind of sense, he held the craft of wand-making. Perhaps Voldemort wanted him to custom-make a wand.

But Florian? He was just an ordinary ice cream shop owner. The fiercest he had ever gotten was threatening to report Winnie to Mrs. Prim.

And Florian was innocent, but what wrong had Mr. Diggory ever done?

War was cruel. It was an assault on humanity. The wheels of war did not slow for the powerful, and they showed no mercy to the weak or the unremarkable.

Perhaps Voldemort had simply taken a dislike to Florian. No particular reason. So he had him seized, and might kill him someday, with no special justification needed.

Mrs. Prim had survived because Winnie had made a deal with Dumbledore, risking her life to betray Voldemort once more.

Before, it had been Bertha Jorkins, Amos Diggory, Prim Purnell, Emmeline Vance, Amelia Bones.

Of that list, only Mrs. Prim had survived.

Now it was Florian and Ollivander, fates unknown.

And after that? The Death Eaters were still hunting the traitor Winnie.

Praeris had never wanted it more urgently than she did right now: Voldemort needed to die. Completely. Cleanly. So Diagon Alley could go back to what it had been.

Once, she had believed the power inside her was Mephistopheles's temptation.

Now she understood. The true devil was Voldemort. He was the one destroying Praeris's quiet happiness.

There was a saying: some people bring joy wherever they go. Others only bring joy when they're gone.

Sorry, Draco. But Voldemort must die.

And I'll do my part to make it happen.

"Even Gringotts..." Old Tom said slowly. "Gringotts has tightened its guard. Just withdrawing a bit of money now takes five hours. The goblins' instincts are the sharpest of all. They've already sensed the danger." He shook his head. "The times are changing."

Praeris wasn't sure whether the goblins had discovered what she and Dumbledore had done, or whether it was simply their instinct for danger.

Old Tom rambled on, telling her all the ways she should stay safe. An underage child had no business going out alone.

Praeris was not permitted to leave the Leaky Cauldron by herself. Old Tom called over the kitchen hand in charge of brewing drinks and making pastries and sent him to fetch Heidi.

Before long, Heidi arrived.

She was draped in silver and copper, a mismatched tangle of strange trinkets that jangled and clinked with every step.

"What are all these?" Praeris asked.

Heidi held them up with complete seriousness. "Protective amulets! The silver ones ward off werewolves, and the copper ones can..."

"Fake," Praeris said. "There's far more copper, aluminum, and tin in here than silver."

"How can that be!" Heidi stared. "But that wizard told me—"

"Silver is soft. It marks easily." Praeris poked the silver amulet. "This one, I'd need a knife just to scratch it."

Heidi wasn't ready to give up. "Then the copper ones ward off Dementors and Inferi!"

Praeris looked at her. "Filch taught your Defense Against the Dark Arts class, didn't he?"

Heidi's face fell completely. She gave a defeated wave of her hand. "Come on. Let's go get your school robes and textbooks sorted."

Diagon Alley had changed. The walls were plastered with wanted posters. Several shops had been boarded up and sealed. The whole street was as desolate as a department store during the Great Depression.

Stalls that belonged in Knockturn Alley had crept into Diagon Alley. Disheveled, grimy wizards hawked fake amulets to the handful of people still passing through.

Heidi's eyes went wide as she scanned for the wizard who had swindled her. She didn't find him.

"Tell me." Heidi nudged Praeris's arm. "Is there anything real in all of this?"

"Do you mean real silver, or real amulets, the kind that actually work?" Praeris asked.

"Both."

"No real silver," Praeris said, unhurried. "And no real amulets. Those markings that look like runes, they don't mean anything."

Heidi muttered, "I knew it. All swindlers."

"Miss!" one of the vendors called out. "Buy an amulet for your little sister!"

He said it with a leer, his eyes sliding slowly over the exposed hands and calves of both Heidi and Praeris.

Heidi's hand pressed hard against her wand.

➤ Next: Things Have Changed and People Are Gone