When the potion's effect finally wore off, Miki, unable to bear the burning embarrassment, bolted out of the shop like a bullet, slamming the door loudly behind him.
A rare smile played on Ben's face. Having thoroughly interrogated his protégé, he was convinced the guy wasn't lying. Though Truth Serum could be beaten with proper preparation, the old man knew full well that Miki wasn't prepared for such an interrogation.
— Look at you, smiling like a kid, — Victor scoffed, sitting on the edge of the counter. — Are you really that happy to learn how deeply devoted he is to you?
Ben's smile vanished in an instant, giving way to his usual stern expression.
— What are you even talking about? I don't give a damn about him, — he said coldly, turning away. — It's just nice to know I wasn't betrayed. That's all.
— Yeah, right, of course, — Victor rolled his eyes. Then he spun the empty vial in his fingers and sniffed the neck. — Second-rate potion, I could brew better. Still, even if it's not ideal, it's pretty dangerous stuff... If I spilt all my secrets under the influence of something like this, I'd have to destroy this world afterward just to cover my tracks.
Ben glanced at him sideways, then shifted his gaze to Adele, who was looking over the request flyers on the mercenary board with a bored expression, and merely shook his head heavily.
— Alright, jokes aside. You said you had some business with me. What's the favor?
Victor immediately grew serious and nodded.
— I need a crew of ten people. But exclusively proven and reliable ones. The kind who will carry out my assignment, take their gold, and keep their mouths shut.
Ben snorted and shook his head:
— Kid, I think you forgot where you are. This is Knockturn Alley. Every single one of my clients here would sell his own mother for a sack of Galleons. They're 'reliable' in only one way—they're cautious and hard to catch. But if it benefits them, they'll turn you in without a second thought.
Victor frowned displeasedly, crossing his arms over his chest.
— After running this shithole for so many years, haven't you gathered at least a loyal core of followers around yourself? I'm disappointed in you.
The old man merely shrugged indifferently.
— I have no need for them. I'm a powerful enough wizard on my own, and conducting business alone is much easier. At least nobody drives a knife into your back.
Victor looked at him with pity, then grimaced:
— Damn it... Looks like I'll have to ask Dumbledore for help. Ugh, I really don't want to get involved with him.
— Why don't you ask your grandmother for help? — Ben reminded him.
— Grandmother? — Victor raised an eyebrow in surprise. — But my business is here in England, not France.
Ben couldn't hold back a soft chuckle.
— Kid, you severely underestimate Madame Flamel. Take my word for it: if she needs to, she won't send ten, but a hundred top-tier wizards. And by the time anyone finds out about them, they'll have already done everything and vanished.
Victor paused for a moment, weighing the old man's words, and then turned to his sister.
— Adele, my joy, stop reading assassination contracts and other illegal business. Get out a piece of paper and a pen. You're writing a letter to our beloved grandmother.
Adele finally tore herself away from the board and looked at her brother.
— Victor, why don't we take a contract ourselves? There are a couple of very interesting options here!
Ben, hearing this coming from the mouth of a little girl, raised his eyebrows in surprise and looked at her brother.
Victor merely smirked self-satisfiedly in response, proudly squaring his shoulders:
— That's my sister, isn't she?
France. The Flamel Estate.
— Darling, you've been frowning since morning. Why don't you finally calm down? They clearly wrote that they would only be delayed in England for a short while, — Nicolas said softly, looking with a smile at his wife, who sat in an armchair in the middle of the living room.
Perenelle, who had indeed been sulking since yesterday evening, shot her husband a displeased look.
— Well, tell me, what could possibly be so important that they can't return home right away? They haven't been home for several months! And now, after leaving school, instead of immediately Apparating to the estate, they go off wandering around.
Thanks to their returned youth, the couple had become much more emotional. Although both were well over six hundred years old, thanks to their reclaimed bodies, they now felt and acted as if they had barely turned thirty.
— Well, they're likely just saying goodbye to their school friends, — Nicolas said. — I'm sure as soon as the Hogwarts Express arrives at its final station in London, they'll send a letter for Misi to pick them up.
In that very same instant, Misi the house-elf appeared in the room with a quiet pop, gently clutching a fluffy cat to her chest.
— Master, a letter from Mr. Victor has arrived! — she said, loyally offering the sealed envelope to Nicolas.
— See? Just as I said, — Nicolas was already reaching out his hand for the envelope, but it suddenly vanished right out of the elf's fingers.
— Misi, get ready. You're going to England now to bring Victor and Adele home, — Perenelle ordered with a satisfied smile, breaking open the envelope.
Her eyes skimmed over the first few lines. However, as she read on, the smile began to fade from her face. The air in the living room suddenly grew heavy, and such a colossal magical pressure crashed down upon Nicolas and the elf that the cat broke free from the elf's arms with a frightened meow and hid under the sofa.
When Perenelle reached the middle, the aura vanished just as rapidly, but her face remained serious, even though a smirk touched her lips.
— And what did he write in there? — Nicolas asked, burning with curiosity.
Perenelle slowly lowered the letter onto her knees and looked at her husband.
— Someone tried to kill them, — she answered in an even tone.
Nicolas frowned:
— Are you going to England?
— No, Victor has already taken care of everything.
Flamel nodded and asked nothing further; he understood how that crazy kid had settled it all.
Perenelle pondered for a moment and looked at the elf:
— Misi, the trip to England is canceled. Instead, summon Antoine to me.
Victor took Adele to the Grangers, who were just getting ready to head out to King's Cross Station to meet Hermione. Leaving his sister with them, he spent a couple of hours strolling through the Muggle shops in London before finally settling down at a cozy outdoor café.
While waiting for his order, Victor lazily watched the Muggles passing by. They led the most ordinary, measured, and peaceful life, filled with simple everyday cares. Victor couldn't help but wonder: what, exactly, was so bad about a life like that?
And this thought wasn't a sudden flash of philosophy—at that moment, he was mentally answering himself. Or rather, his own hallucination, which sat unceremoniously on the chair directly opposite him.
Victor hadn't left Adele at the safe Granger home and requested combat support from Perenelle for no reason. When he finished his massacre of Fenrir and his werewolves, his mind had glitched once again. Though he had grown accustomed to these hallucinations recently, this time something was off: for some reason, it felt like something serious.
Victor still didn't know what exactly it was connected to. Were his special eyes the cause, or was it a side effect of his experiments with clones? One way or another, this copy was different from all the previous ones. It had been following him ever since the forest where Greyback's slaughtered pack still lay.
And now, leisurely propping his chin on his hand and staring point-blank at Victor, his own double asked him a strange question:
— Tell me... haven't you ever wanted to be the most ordinary, simple human being? Just like all of them around us?
Victor looked at his double and shook his head.
— No, a life like that is far too boring, — he replied.
Although he was talking out loud to himself, no one in the café paid him the slightest attention. Simple Notice-Me-Not Charms worked flawlessly. Magic was a bloody convenient thing, after all.
— That's because it seems boring to you now, — the copy smirked ironically, leaning back against the chair. — After all, you've become a rather powerful wizard in the world of Harry Potter, so to speak. But if you were born the most ordinary child without a drop of magic—would that really have been so bad? You knew the future of this world. You could have easily built yourself a decent fortune on technology or stocks and lived like a king.
— Why did you even bring up this conversation? — Victor looked at himself with curiosity. — There's absolutely no point to these musings. I'm already a wizard, and that can't be changed.
The copy shrugged nonchalantly.
— I don't know myself. Ultimately, I'm just a figment of your sick brain. And since I brought it up... it means somewhere deep inside, you're thinking about it yourself.
Victor fell into thought: the hallucination was right. But no matter how much he dug around in his own head, he couldn't grasp those thoughts of a simple life within himself. Just how deep in his subconscious were they buried?
And why had his mind decided to throw him this glitch right now?
Yes, visions had come to him before. But usually that only happened in moments of severe mental exhaustion or in critical situations, like in the mental asylum or when he lost to Quirrell. Why were they always copies of himself?
Victor knew the answer perfectly well. It all traced back to his very first hallucination—Victor-the-Second. That double was born in his head many years ago when his mind, unable to handle the pressure, tried to save itself. In an environment where no one believed him, Victor's brain created the only person he could trust implicitly and who would always believe in him unconditionally.
He had created himself.
— Why don't you ask me directly why I'm here? — the copy drew him out of his thoughts with a soft smile.
— You won't answer anyway, — Victor shrugged. — Because I don't know myself.
— Well, don't be so sure, — the double leaned his elbows on the table, pitching forward. — I am the manifestation of your most secret thoughts. The ones you yourself don't fully realize yet. Or simply don't want to understand.
— And why are you here in that case? — Victor asked.
The copy frowned for a moment, as if genuinely lost in deep thought, and then shook its head, breaking into a smile once again:
— No. You're right, you're not ready to know yet. Or you know, but you drive that truth away from yourself. But I can give you a hint. At the exact moment you were mercilessly slaughtering Fenrir Greyback's people in the forest... a thought flashed through your head. Just one single thought. But it was so terrible, so repulsive, that it scared you. You instantly buried it at the very bottom of your subconscious and forced yourself to forget it entirely. And that fleeting fear was enough for me to come into being.
The glitch bared its teeth in a predatory, insane grin, staring straight into Victor's soul:
— What were you thinking about, huh? What scared the invincible Victor Moss so badly that he sealed it deep inside and now fears even touching the lock? Why did you really send Adele to the Grangers? Why were you afraid to be left alone with her and asked your grandmother for help? And most importantly, why...
The double suddenly froze mid-sentence and snapped his head toward the exit of the café.
— Approaching, — the clone whispered, and its image began to slowly fade into the air. — I think that's the very person we've been waiting for.
Victor frowned, feeling everything inside him tighten with frustration. He understood full well that the words the hallucination hadn't finished were very important. But, sensing the approach of a powerful magical source, he shrugged, brushed it off, and finally started eating.