HP Midnight Light

- 1979th February 3 - Unnamed Castle, Cumbria

"I just want to know how to end this matter." Cornelia got up from her father's hospital bed, and stared at everyone present with unfriendly eyes——Signus was held in solitary confinement under the order of the Dark Lord to wait for further punishment .Now there are only Bellatrix and Narcissa in the ward besides Cornelia. After hearing the news of Evan's accident, the latter took Cornelia to the castle according to Bella's instructions.

"Francis raised objections. He believed that Signus would not be the real mastermind behind the scenes. The Dark Lord thought he was right, and he had appointed someone to continue the investigation." Bella replied.She had no particular feelings for the active and feisty cousin, but she was well aware of how angry the Dark Lord had been about it.

"Very good," Cornelia sneered, "No matter who did it, I hope he will be punished as he should."

"The Dark Lord will give you a reasonable answer, Leah." Narcissa said softly, the pregnancy made her much gentler and more emotional, "Let's go out first, the patients need to rest..."

At this time, Travers, who was in charge of inspecting the castle, suddenly rushed into the ward: "Sorry, I don't want to disturb you, but there is a woman who is frantically trying to destroy our barrier."

Narcissa looked at her sister in surprise, and Bella's eyebrows twitched together: "Who is it?"

Travers glanced cautiously at Cornelia and replied in a low voice, "Katherine Shafik."

"Let her in." Cornelia said abruptly, she glanced at Bella, "I want to see what she can say, even before the real Mrs. Gu Zi came out first? She thought she was something—let her in!" She held back the last half of the ugly words, and demanded directly.

Travers looked over to Bella, who nodded for him to bring her in.

"We'd better go out." Narcissa suggested again, "This is not a place for... talking."

As soon as the barrier was lifted, Catherine rushed into the castle and ran into the three of them in the hall.Regardless of Cornelia's cold eyes, she begged Bella directly: "Signus was wronged!"

"That's not necessarily the case!" Cornelia sneered, holding back her anger, "Even if he didn't do the poison, Signus can't be blamed."

"Stop making irresponsible remarks, Rozier, you want Signus to die!" Catherine reprimanded without scruple, Cornelia's face sank, and then she turned to begging Bella, " Is Signus okay? Please let me see the Dark Lord, I know he has nothing to do with this, someone must be setting him up—”

"The Dark Lord won't see you, and you're not allowed to see Signus." Bella looked away in disgust. "If you came here just to talk nonsense, then you can go now."

"No! Mrs. Lestrange!" Bella's face changed slightly because of her address, but Catherine didn't notice, she kept talking to herself, "Please, you know that Signus is innocent. Someone must be behind the scenes, either Watson or Rozier..."

"Have you splashed enough dirty water!" Cornelia lost her patience, she stepped forward and looked at Catherine, "Let me tell you, whether Signus has poisoned or not, he has nothing to do with this matter. Clearing the relationship. Do you think you can still beg for his mercy? The Dark Lord didn't lock you up as well—"

"You don't need to tell me this, Rozier! Regardless of whether Signus poisoned him or not, you will blame him. Maybe the whole thing is a conspiracy planned by you, and you borrowed Signus' power The superior, and then thought about replacing it. What a clever plan to cross the river and tear down the bridge, Signus has already seen who you are!"

Bella and Narcissa looked at each other.

"I don't need to be judged by Signus, the question now is how dare you yell in front of me." Cornelia looked at Catherine with a sneer, "Don't forget that you are only Signus Mistress, you already consider yourself Mrs. Bulstrode before Margaret abdicates?"

"She's probably dying, I know what's going on, she drank a whole bottle to clear her good father up, didn't she? Maybe she'll be dead before sundown today. By your kind words, Rob Kiel, maybe tomorrow I'll really be Mrs. Bulstrode..."

"Presumptuous!" Narcissa scolded, she stared at Catherine angrily, "How dare you mention Margaret! You shameless, despicable, nasty..." Narcissa's education limited her performance , she glared at Catherine but couldn't find strong words to fight back.But Bella would not let her sister be wronged, she spat at Catherine:

"Stop jumping around here, you bitch, just say so if you want a killing curse, or shut up and get out of here, lest you dirty the Dark Lord's land!"

Catherine's face turned pale. She didn't dare to provoke Bella, so she pointed the finger at Cornelia again: "You just want to take this opportunity to crush Signus..."

"Your Signus has done nothing but this stupid life-giving plan," interrupted Cornelia, "if you were well-informed and quick-witted, you would have known what happened to him not long ago. The new proposal just had a miscarriage, so you should also think about yourself, even if this illegitimate child can be born, it is very likely that he will not live to grow up—”

"How dare you curse my child!" Catherine was missing a good opportunity to get angry, she rushed forward almost crazily, and Cornelia instinctively pushed back——

"what!"

Catherine just staggered, and it was Narcissa who fell on the ground. She was knocked back by Catherine unpreparedly and fell hard to the ground after taking a few steps back.

Bella screamed: "Cissy!" She knelt beside Narcissa, "You'll be fine...someone!"

Travers rushed over after hearing Bella's voice.

"She needs a healer!" Bella said a series of healing spells with shaking hands, but it didn't work.

"We can't call the therapist here," Travers reminded her, trembling.

"Then find a way to send her to Malfoy Manor!" Bella yelled frantically, "Cissy, Sissy—"

"We can't just take her away like this!" Cornelia yelled, and Travers tried, but failed, to pull Bella away. "We need to find someone first... Snape! Snape! "

- A day later - Watson Manor, Cumbria

"I don't want to go back, Dad," begged Margaret.With Frances' loving care, she has recovered.Although Signus had been imprisoned, Margaret didn't want to return to that boring manor at all.

"No, Maggie." Francis had to ruthlessly refuse his daughter's request.

"dad--"

"I will take you back to live for a while after this turmoil is over, but you must go back now." Francis persuaded, "Now there is chaos in the Bulstrode family, and your marriage contract with Signus is still valid. There is no reason for you not to show up. Unless you can give me a convincing reason."

Margaret's lips moved for a while, and she finally didn't say anything about Catherine Shafik: "Okay."

A few minutes later the father and daughter stepped out of the Burstead family fireplace, and they were greeted with awe by the Burstrods.Margaret ironically found that the attitude of Mrs. Bulstrode, who had made things difficult for her in the past, was simply respectful.

"Go and pack your things, Maggie." Francis told his daughter, and then he looked at Mr. Burst, "I wonder if you could take a few minutes to talk to me?"

"Of course, of course." Mr. Bulstrode responded repeatedly, and he invited Francis into the reception room. Francis didn't touch the tea, but directly interrupted Mr. Borstead's endless polite words, apologies and cryptic pleas :

"You already know the ins and outs of the matter?"

"Yes." Hearing Francis' initiative, Mr. Bird seemed to heave a sigh of relief, and he hurriedly continued, "I don't understand where there are omissions, but Francis, I can assure you that Signus never did anything to you. Potions mess with it a bit. You know he has no reason or need to—"

Francis raised a hand to signal him to be silent: "Yes. That's the crux of the problem—someone obviously added ingredients to my potion. The problem is that I handed over the box to Signus, and then He passed it on to the Dark Lord, and who else could poison him in the process?"

Mr. Burst swallowed tremblingly: "Francis..."

"You can also see that, in the eyes of the Dark Lord and others, there is no other suspect except Signus." Francis said unhurriedly, "Besides, he is not without reason. Anyone who carefully If you think about it carefully, you will find that Signus is in a state of isolation and helplessness among the Death Eaters. Maybe he wants to take this opportunity to create riots or eradicate dissidents. Look, I can think of one or two reasons, The Dark Lord may have thought of something else long ago."

"No, that's impossible! Francis, I'm sure Signus doesn't think so!"

"I'm not the person you want to convince." Francis saw the cold sweat on Mr. Bostrode's forehead, and decided to add more fire, "The main problem is that Evan Rozier was among the people who were poisoned this time, and Signer The conflict between Stanley and his daughter is well known."

"This... this..." Mr. Burst wiped the sweat from his upper lip, and he easily understood what Francis said, "Then..."

"Let's get straight to the point." Francis leaned slightly closer to the other party and lowered his voice. "It's not impossible to get Signus off the hook, as long as someone is willing to make a little sacrifice."

Mr. Burst's pupils narrowed, and he asked, stumbling: "I—you—you mean—"

"You know what I mean." Francis said with a smile. "You also know that the Dark Lord is very angry. He will not allow anyone to betray him-this time it will be someone else, and next time it will probably be the Dark Lord." I—so, you can predict what kind of punishment Signus will face?"

The lid of the teacup slipped out of Mr. Burstrode's hand and fell to the ground and smashed into pieces. He bent down tremblingly to pick up the broken china, but did not answer Francis' words.

"Maybe I've overstepped the line, but..." Francis said wisely, "In any case, I hope Merlin will favor you. You know, Margaret is still Signus' wife after all."

"father!"

Margaret suddenly opened the door impolitely, and she looked at Francis: "We are going to Malfoy Manor, Sissy... Sissy has a miscarriage."

"The therapist from St. Mungo's tried everything, but it didn't work." Lucius lit a cigar tremblingly, and took a deep puff.

When Francis saw the bloodshot eyes in his eyes, he couldn't help feeling pity.He patted his shoulder hard and said nothing.

Margaret and Bellatrix stood opposite each other outside Narcissa's room, and the therapists were still busy in the room.Margaret is still unclear about the specific circumstances of the matter: "How could this be?"

With an angry face, Bella gave a general account of what happened in the castle vestibule.Finally, she pulled out her wand as if venting her anger, and waved vigorously: "Rozier!"

Margaret stopped the vase in time. "Don't disturb Sissy!" She warned in a low voice, "Rozier? But from your description, she looks more like a momentary miss."

"I don't care!" Bella said viciously, "She can push Shafiq to other places, or just stun her. She knows hundreds if not thousands of spells. Does she have to push?" No?"

Bella chose to blame Cornelia for the accident, but Margaret had a different idea.

"They're still young, Sissy and Lucius will have children." Margaret whispered as if talking to herself.

"It's a girl." Bella said suddenly, she stared stubbornly at the vase just now, but her voice was unsteady, "Sissy has already thought of a name, Hesper Margaret, but... now there is nothing ...Cissy's world should be perfect and flawless...she has always been the little princess of the Black family..." Bella twisted the hem of her robe nervously, her eyelashes trembling violently.Margaret hesitated for a moment, and took her hand:

"everything will get better."

Bella held her hand back firmly, and whispered softly: "I won't make it easy for them——Rozier, Burst, Shafik..."

"Don't be like this, Bella." Margaret sighed, "Promise me, the only person you need to care about now is Sissy."

A therapist pushed the door out at this time, she looked at the two women in the corridor: "You can go in and talk to Mrs Malfoy now, but she can't be too tired."

"I'm going to call Lucius." Margaret said decisively, but Bella stopped her movements suddenly:

"Go and accompany Sissy...it's best not to let her see me now." To avoid bringing up sad memories.

Margaret froze for a moment, Bella had already gone down the stairs.She tidied up her mood a little and walked into Narcissa's bedroom.Narcissa lay on her back, haggard and dull, with residual tears in the corners of her eyes.Seeing Marguerite coming, she forced a smile.Margaret hurried to her bedside and held her hand. The pair of close friends looked at each other but were relatively speechless.Little did they expect that even shocks would come one after the other in their lives.

The silence was broken by the presence of Lucius, who sat down beside Narcissa's bed and rested his forehead on her hand like a wounded child.Margaret got up and exited the room to leave space for the traumatized couple. Francis and Bella were outside the door, their faces were ugly, and there were faint and intermittent sobbing sounds in the room.

"They've been married for so many years, and they finally had a child..." Bella stopped abruptly before she finished speaking. She shook her hair vigorously, and suddenly walked quickly to the nearest bathroom without warning.

"Everything will be fine." Francis reached out and stroked his daughter's hair. Margaret threw herself into her father's arms. She blinked, and a tear fell into Francis's robe without a trace.

That night, the Dark Lord freed Signus.The price of his freedom was his father's sacrifice.

"I want to clear the way for Signus, because in my opinion, the rewards he received are far from worthy of his efforts." Mr. Birdsde said mechanically, kneeling on the cold ground, "Signus Nas put the box containing the potion in his study, and I secretly mixed the potion in it at night when no one was around, without Signus knowing. The next day, he offered the potion directly. "

"Where did you get the medicine?" Amycus looked at the Dark Lord's expression and asked instead, "What's the prescription?"

"I don't know the prescription. I bought a few bottles of highly poisonous potions from Knockturn Alley, and conducted some mixing experiments." Mr. Bird said, "In order to avoid trouble, I destroyed the remaining potions .”

"You are very smart." The Dark Lord's high-pitched laughter echoed in the conference room, "Very good, very good..."

Mr. Burst closed his eyes.

"Are you sure Signus doesn't know about this?" Amycus asked again.

"I'm sure." Mr. Burst said, "He will definitely stop me when he finds out. In order not to cause bad things, I concealed my thoughts from everyone."

"So you're trying to put the blame on Francis Watson?" Amycus asked. "Aren't you afraid it'll implicate your family?"

"Yes... I know that Francis's attitude towards the Dark Lord is not positive, so if there is a problem with the medicine, he will be the first to be suspected. As for the following things, according to my assumption, the Dark Lord will not blame Boss The German family. If it doesn’t work, just get rid of the relationship with the Watson family...so I didn’t think too much about it.”

"It seems that the matter is clear, master." Amycus whispered.

"I have one more question," said the Dark Lord. "Don't you think there are too many loopholes in your plan?"

"My only flaw is that I underestimated Francis Watson." Mr. Burst replied numbly. "He should have a hard time saying it, but I didn't expect him to dare to let his daughter take risks in order to prove his innocence—" He said Suddenly thought of something, Mr. Burst's words suddenly stopped, he suddenly saw the truth clearly in the blink of an eye, he quickly raised his head, "Dark Lord—"

But the latter had already raised his wand: "Avada Kedavra!"

A green light flashed, and his body was limp on the ground, motionless.

"Release Signus," the Dark Lord ordered coldly.

-February 1979, 3-

On a new day, the headline on the front page of the "Daily Prophet" is no longer news related to the Death Eaters, but is occupied by a bold line of words——

Squibs – misfortune or disgrace?

The following subtitle is even more shocking:

The illegal behavior of the pure-blood family without visible light has been revealed!

For centuries, it has been believed that a Squib's chances of being born are influenced by the lineage of its parents.Wizarding society has always believed that only families with half-blood or hemp-born wizarding parents are likely to have offspring without magical abilities.However, after three years of secret interviews and investigations, our reporter Rita Skeeter found out that for many years, some ancient pure-blood families have been tacitly adopting criminal behaviors to cover up the "shame" of the family.Skeeter's new discoveries will reveal the grim truth behind the veil of mystery for the wizarding world. (See the first page of this newspaper for details)

Born Abandoned: An Investigative Report by Rita Skeeter

It has long been assumed that Squibs would be registered with the Ministry of Magic, home-schooled by their parents to integrate into Muggle society, or employed in jobs that did not require the use of magic, but this is not the case: a considerable number of children born into pure-blood families, when they After being identified as a Squib (usually at the age of six or seven), their parents will try to erase them from the family, pretending that the child never existed.

In 1976, when I was researching the history of the Smith family, I stumbled upon a name on the family tree: Aurora Smith (1959.4.17-1966.11.17), the girl died of a serious illness when she was seven years old, in the Smith Manor There is also her small tombstone here.

However, I realized that there was a problem with the reporter's keen intuition - even a little wizard cannot die from the so-called "sickness", unless it is irreversible magic damage or dangerous biological damage, but whether it is the former or the latter It is impossible for anyone not to be reported in the newspapers and not to be filed by the Ministry of Magic.

When I came to ask questions, the Smiths were hesitant and impatient.They declined to share with me further details, other than to say that the family was devastated by the child's unexpected death and would not bring it up again ten years later.

This caught my attention.So it took me a while to investigate the details of the incident.Friends of the Smith family revealed that Aurora was lively, cute and very healthy since she was a child. They also suddenly received the news of her death.The behavior of the Smith family after that was even more suspicious. They buried their daughter quickly without even holding a formal funeral.I can't think of anything that could make Smith so reckless. The only possibility is that they are eager to bury secrets that they don't want to be known.Then I got the idea by chance during a conversation with a pureblood family member.This person confided to me that "squibs" were considered a disgraceful thing in a pure-blood family and brought shame on the whole family, so she was glad that there were no squibs in her family.Then I thought about everything about the Smiths—they couldn't have murdered Aurora under cover—so the girl must still be alive.At this point, I have decided to formally launch an investigation into Aurora Smith.

Initially I focused my investigation on the Smiths, thinking they had managed to hide the child somewhere in the house.But after careful investigation, I found that there is no sign of Aurora here.So I expanded the scope to include Muggle society.Now that those Squibs who grew up smoothly can thrive in the Muggle world, is it possible that the Smith family also decided to transfer poor Aurora into Muggle society?

My investigation had a breakthrough two years later.I used intermittent and fragmented leads to find an orphanage in London that had taken in a dying girl in the winter of 12 years ago - the timing coincided with Aurora's "death time" and their ages Also right on the number.

The girl was found passed out in the street by people from the orphanage with a high fever, and they thought she would not survive.But timely treatment saved the girl's life, but she couldn't remember everything in the past, only her age and name.She told the director of the orphanage that her name was "Ann Smith" and she was seven years old.

I'm sure it's a work of memory charms.The Smith family modified and erased her memory and brutally abandoned their daughter on a snowy night. If the orphanage didn't find poor Aurora in time, this would probably further escalate into a murder case.

Aurora grew up in an orphanage as "Ann" and was admitted to a Muggle university.She showed extreme resistance to my interview and repeatedly emphasized "I hate them, please stop talking about biological parents", how sad!What's even more sad is that Aurora is not alone.I tracked down another victim in a similar situation—"William Miller."At the age of seven, a World War II veteran adopted William who had "amnesia". He grew up in a chaotic area of ​​London and didn't know his own life experience.William didn't have the same luck as Aurora. The poor boy worked as a postman and needed to take care of his disabled adoptive father.When I asked him if he would go back with his biological parents if they came back for him.William's brown eyes immediately filled with tears. "I expect them to come to me all the time," he said tearfully. "They abandoned me cruelly, and I need an explanation." And his name is not William, his real name is "Gavin", from Greengrass Family, like Aurora, he is also an abandoned child.

……

The good news is that this report has been pre-submitted by me to the Ministry of Magic.After repeated discussions, the Ministry of Magic decided to hold a formal trial on March 3.On this day, the Wizengamot will further confirm the identities of Aurora and Gavin, as well as the charges that should be borne by the Smith family and the Greengrass family.A staff member who did not want to be named revealed to me that if the Ministry of Magic confirms the experience of Aurora and Gavin after Judgment Day, then the Ministry of Magic will issue relevant regulations and policies and thoroughly investigate the "involuntary murder" in pure-blood families. Type Abandonment” phenomenon.

The trial will not be made public, but I will observe it as a reporter and report the results in time.May Aurora and Gavin's lives get back on track, and hopefully no more Squib kids fall prey to pure-blood feudal pride after this.

(Contributed by Rita Skeeter)

The author has something to say:

Note:

1. Francis' plan is not complete.

2. The relationship between Margaret and Bella is average, and now they are temporarily united because of Narcissa.

3. I personally think that the relationship between Lucius and Narcissa should be a long-term relationship rather than purely because of interests.

4. There are two reasons why the Dark Lord believed the words of the old Mr. Burst: first, he still wanted Signus to work for him; second, he believed Francis' tricks.

5. [Smith Family]: There are two people mentioned in the original book - Hepziba Smith (the owner of the Gold Cup), and Zacharias Smith (an unpleasant character for the next generation)

6. Up to this chapter, all story lines have been connected with the children.

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Sort out some of the current relationship networks:

[Malfoy] + [Black] = ally

[Bosted] + [Rozier] = In the wrestling, Signus currently has the upper hand, but Rozier's family fell to Evan.

[Bost] + [Watson] = the latter unilaterally outputs attacks

[Watson] + [Malfoy] = Jiyou who has no interests involved

[Signus] + [Reculus] = false brotherhood

[Signus] + [Edmund] = current ally + a little bit of brotherhood

[Cornelia] + [Edmond] = current ally

[Cornelia] + [Betty, Agnes, Antares, Goyle, Crabbe, Knott] = current allies

【Cornelia】+【Vera】=The latter is an abandoned pawn

【Vera】+【Greengrass】=The woman's unrequited love

[Regules] + [Olivia] = young couple

【Aurora/Ann】+【Gavin/William】=EX

The relationship between the Order of the Phoenix and Gryffindor is relatively clear so I won't sort it out.

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