Incredible things happen. Sometimes witches and wizards have to live Muggle lives and comply with the necessities of the moment. What kinds of necessities? Oh, but it was the war. Everyone had to make his path along the winding road of discovering one's choice. There were no battles fought in the battlefields, no soldiers marching in endless troops, no visible and separate headquarters. Muggles were also ignorant of all the developments that were parallel to their plane of existence and did not intersect it for the time being. But it all depended on the finesse of invisible actions and inaudible decisions of those select few from the inner circles of the two belligerent sides who had to perform the most subtle and proficient dances on the tip of the wand, as as the common saying had it.

The almost total exposure of the wizards involved to the ones more powerful than rank and file spies of the War (Wizards War II, as it became known in the annals) made not only the exploits, but also the routine of espionage and counter-espionage incredibly dangerous for everyone.

That last time when Professor Snape enjoyed his small vengeance upon Lucius Malfoy with the good old Cruciatus curse, he was watched not only by men, but also by a woman. He was too busy with his errand and brilliant attempts at concealment not to give himself away, and so he failed to notice her. But she couldn't help recognizing him, even after a few years passed since she had visited Hogwarts for the infamous Tri-Wizard Tournament, the one where she proved to be the worst. The worst—this feeling has been burning her all the way since the Tournament, though she thought at the time that her defeat had been only fair. That she did her very best and even slightly more than that, that she learned to understand people and so on and so forth, without end. Still she was not used to being the worst. And so, immediately after graduation from Beauxbatons with honours, she came to Voldemort. If she was the worst in the Tournament she will be the only woman among the Death Eaters.

This year professor Dumbledore, the elderly and wise Headmaster of Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and also the most outstanding living wizard in Europe (except Voldemort), was so kind as to offer her a new position at his school's staff-table and within the faculty. The position of the "International Wizards' Relations and Diplomatic Etiquette" Professor. Besides being wise before the face of the growing dark menace Dumbledore was quite a multiculturalist. And he always rejoiced at having beautiful teachers.

"The Dumb professor (so Voldemort called Dumbledore) thinks he can face me with the same ease he opposed Grindelwald in 1945," hissed Voldemort, painfully squeezing her upper arm and joining her in watching Snape, who was now stepping on Malfoy's throat with his well-polished black shoe. "We'll see, we'll see… I don't trust him, dearest."

"You don't trust Snape? Why?" asked Fleur coldly. In Voldemort's headquarters she was always indifferent on the verge of freeezing.

"He wears my mark, Flower. Besides, I don't really need the mark to know the truth. That's why you are spared yet." Voldemort's hand, much like a head of a large snake, streamed along Fleur's hair, not touching it, making her shiver with cold and her head ache.

"What for? It will make your regal skin ugly", said Voldemort. He never had full-fledged women followers before, and didn't think he needed one.

"It's in woman's nature to like being tormented by the one she loves", said Fleur and forced a look into the unblinking red eyes.

"And so it shall be, dearest. We'll have this little surprise for our elegant bat of a professor. All right. I'll make him do it for you and then we contemplate. You both." And the red eyes glittered.

"The one she loves" was a strange phrase to address the Dark Lord with. He Who Can Not Be Named was also He Who Can Not Be Loved, but only obeyed and feared. But Fleur meant it, and as long as she meant it, she knew that she would be trusted. What happened to her? Free, generous, and always quite sure of herself, knowing neither fear nor doubt, loving and fair, all this she was; and all this was in the past. What had to happen to young mademoiselle Delacour to bring her to this ancient castle in the Highlands, where Voldemort had erected his new throne? The strange feeling of detachment from everyone had filled her up to the brim. Besides, after the incident in the lake, when young Harry Potter saved her little sister Gabrielle, the child changed beyond repair. She became silent, alien, and after some time—what doctor Guilielmo had diagnosed as—autistic. Little Gabie, the most cheerful and lovely child of all, unspoiled by all love that was poured over her, ever-smiling, with sunny-reddish shining curls (unlike her own—platinum-blond and only slightly wavy), this little girl had to be taken to the Mungo's hospital for Magic Maladies and Injuries to the intensive psychiatric care wing. On the day it happened Fleur had a mental block.

She just knew that it all had been the consequence of those moron wizarding games. Kindly wizards allowed this to happen. Fair and great Dumbledore, strict and grand McGonagall, the whole Ministry of Magic and sinister selfish freaks like this treacherous Severus Snape. Just look at him torturing his own friend the way one can curse only the worst enemy! …No, she shouldn't think of it, not now. And besides, Snape mustn't see her here—she was supposed to start teaching (and spying) side by side with him at Hogwarts shortly. She turned away from the one-way transparent wall just in time to see the flap of Voldemort's cloak swishing away to the dark passage.

In a moment something heavy, fleshy and patched left Voldemort's side and approached her by the floor with dull hissing. A giant snake's coil slowly encircled her and touched her black taper chamois shoe. Fleur froze: Nagini of course, what a dreadful pet! Fleur had always tried to refrain from snakes. Luckily Voldemort didn't know about it: it was only natural for his followers and especially for the Slytherins to develop liking to serpents. But Fleur was much closer to birds and graceful animals than to reptiles. Yes, she was horror-stricken by snakes. Nagini's triangle head, so much like her master's hand, lifted the hem of her dark-silver robes and touched her ankle. It was not the first time that the beast showed her dislike to Fleur. Fleur froze helplessly, idly staring through the wall at Snape. He was finally prepared to leave after casting the last sarcastic remark to the prostrate and bleeding Lucius Malfoy. Nagini could sense her fright and shock as her head kept touching Fleur's leg, tapping, punctuating, sometimes feeling her skin with its forked tongue, making her shudder and suggest the presence of human mind inside this ugly serpentine skull. Meanwhile the transparency of the wall was diminishing, leaving only a small oblong see-through window, through which she stared at Professor Snape's back. He was leaving with his usual, very much Hogwarts-like, air of showiness. That was the end of her—Fleur could feel the cold creeping closer to her heart, soon she'll join Gabrielle in her mental asylum or just die, but no, does it have to be so stupid, please… Her wand with a hair of a Veela was left on the table. Fleur twitched, trying to reach the wand, and Nagini immediately tightened the grip—at her waist already.

Professor Snape stopped, though clearly he was in a hurry, and unwilling to stay in the castle any longer. The window was growing turbid and Fleur was grateful that the last thing she could see was at least a human back, not the snake's coils. Snape turned round, slowly. The magic window closing, Nagini dragged her to the floor. Now Snape's face showed a faint surprise; he once again withdrew his wand and waved it just an inch, with something recognizable as irritation. Fleur silently struggled for the presence of mind and mental equilibrium, too scared to touch the snake with her hands and desperately holding on the wall.

"Transparatio!" clearly mouthed Snape, and what was left of the window froze in the see-through position for Fleur.

The Death Eaters in the room were exchanging glances, but obviously they could neither see her, nor understand what had come over Snape. And then he made a quick step to the wall, pointed the wand at Nagini and—hissed. Greenish light escaped the tip of his wand, rushed into the room, leaving charring cracks in the wall, and hit the snake. Fleur's skirt fell down, hiding her bare leg again. Nagini streamed down to the floor, with a sizzle like a scalded frying pan. Even if Snape was surprised to encounter Fleur in such circumstances, he didn't show it.

She had almost forgotten how radically black-and-white his colouring was, let alone his attire. Sharp strands of black hair cutting across the high pale forehead and ascetic jaw-line, fierce eyes of black lead, showing no trace of compassion; oh, he was very dangerous and, unlike some of the Voldemort's followers, he wasn't hiding it. How could Voldemort ever believe him?

Fleur leaned to the rough block wall, which eventually absorbed the oval transparent window, scratching it with her instantly breaking nails and slid to the floor, finally allowing herself to lose consciousness with the terrible word "parselmouth" banging in her mind.

What became of the resurrected Voldemort? The disabled creature that drank Unicorn's blood with Quirrell's mouth, the one that had been but a spirit awaiting his time, degradingly hiding in other wizards' turbans or diaries, the self-made wizard-king, nearly omnipotent, opposed by a laughably small group of students and teachers, inspired by a headmaster and headed by the Potter boy! Harry graduated from Hogwarts and Fleur lost the trace of him. All was still. There was no real opposition to the Dark Lord in the wizarding world, while the 44 Dementors of Azkaban were only too eager to perform their deadly kisses on those thrown to them by Voldemort. It seemed that the Dark Lord enjoyed this arrangement with them most of all, if he could enjoy anything at all besides immortality and power. Was he immortal?.. No one knew.

Voldemort didn't trust a single one of them. All those burning Dark Marks, the habit of entertaining himself with Cruciatus didn't contradict with his eyes, half-shut when it came to their numerous lies and pitiful attempts to compete with each other. His divide et impera strategy was older than these Scottish hills which he now dominated entirely. He was the Serpent-king of a viper nest and only he could control it, occasionally stirring one Death Eater up against another.

So he settled in Scotland and at his leisure freely experimented with local fauna, flora and even atmosphere. Once he overtakes the world he will fill it with prehistoric reptiles, horse-tails, and thinking marshes that breed poisonous creatures; and there will be no disgusting machinery of the Muggle world, no separate Muggle world at all—Muggles will all hide in caves, subterranean big houses and barracks, deprived of all rights and laden with endless obligations to fulfill, if their miserable lives were of any value to them. The lives of insects that know naught of magic, still less of wisdom. Local Muggles of course didn't know the reason for the deterioration of weather, poorer harvests and multiplying snakes that ate their good old mice and lively green frogs. Moreover, Fleur seemed to be the only one who understood Voldemort's tactics clearly. The Death Eaters didn't matter—every single one of them, spies or no spies. Only Voldemort and Dumbledore mattered, because they matched each other. Still housework had to be done; still the Dark Lord needed a reliable spy inside Hogwarts. A spy he could trust, and whom the Hogwarts staff would trust too. That's why Fleur suited him ideally. And she was beautiful.

She had just turned twenty that February and was a little self-conscious about her teaching in Hogwarts along with such fossils of science as McGonagall and Snape. Besides, her subject seemed to her fancy, not quite academic. Headmaster Dumbledore in his job offer letter emphasized the importance of the subject to his students, especially lately when a wizard needed to be able to tell a friend from foe: a Durmstrang graduate from a Romanian vampire and both from a Dark Wizard. To manage this without becoming biased and persecution manic, to maintain the feeling of magical charm, beauty, and good will was not easy. That's why Dumbledore wanted to see mademoiselle Fleur Delacour in Hogwarts—with all her European connections, and her French origins that her rich and famous family supported impeccably. Since cradle, Fleur was raised among VIW (Very Important Wizards) friends of the family and those diplomats who dropped by the Delacours suburban estate on their way to Paris.

She didn't accept the job immediately, not without hesitation and expressing her doubts to Professor Dumbledore. Her white-and-tawny falconet by the name of Vélocité brought the letter to Hogwarts and then back to their Ogive de la Montagne estate. The letter contained not only her written gratitude, but also her honest doubt whether such an entertaining course, as IWRADE was a worthy enterprise.

"I'm utterly convinced that you underestimate the challenge which the course in question poses both to students of Hogwarts, who are inclined to consider our small island the only inhabited place in the world and are often unwilling to know anything about the world in general, and to yourself. It is not going to be children's games, as you so finely phrased it; rather, it will be something very psychologically straining at times, and sometimes something seemingly impossible to perform. It's been Hogwarts' tradition to somewhat warm up the competition between the Houses, but times have changed. We need not only a change in the atmosphere of the school, but also someone to personify this change. And I trust that a single look in the mirror will convince you that you 'were born for this job'."

Fleur obediently looked in the mirror and saw no one but a platinum-haired doll with blank eyes. And so she took the letter to Voldemort as an entrance fee to the circle of his followers, and was accepted.

Fleur had a strange dream the night after the Nagini episode, which was more than unwonted after a very long time during which she could only see dreams of cold black water with lambent algae trying to braid into her hair and keep underwater until she suffocated.

"…Mademoiselle Delacour," was saying the distant voice, low and predatory, soft, albeit menacing. She looked around and saw herself in the dungeon, no less cold, dark and uninviting than Voldemort's castle or the lake water of her recurrent dreams. She could see nobody inside the gloomy vaulted premises, there were only strapped indistinct whispers and muted rustling in the darkest corner of the lodgment. The room seemed disturbingly familiar to her, as it often happens in dreams. She strained her vision and forced a few steps to the corner, slightly lifting her robes not to be trapped with something unexpected. Sleeping Fleur was frightened to move, but Fleur in the dream was not.

"Mademoiselle Delacour," echoed the same voice again, now closer, and she took another cautious step towards the whispering corner. Her outstretched hand touched the wall, felt the narrow passage and then she stepped into it cautiously. Not too far away she saw an obscure light. She stopped in doubt and fright. Fleur watching the dream screamed: "Back up! Don't go there! Stop!" Fleur in the dream seemed to hear her and stopped hesitantly. She seemed to come back to her senses and even made a step or two of retreat, but then again her keen ear caught the sound of the same words: "Mademoiselle Delacour…"

She rushed headlong to the candlelight and saw Professor Snape, slowly raising his head from a vial with blood-like maroon potion. Then all went black.