Chương 85: CHAPTER 80: THE GREENGRASS PACT
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As it
Were tissue of silver
I'll wear, O fate, thy grey,
And go mistily radiant, clad
Like the moon.
~
by Adelaide Crapsey
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On a rather cloudy afternoon, there was a boy who had just blinked in front of a mansion, that boy was of course Ed. He walked slowly to the front door as it was far away from the entrance. As he was closer to the front door, it slowly opened, revealing a blonde girl with a cold face.
Ed then arrived at the front door, greeting the blonde girl.
"Hello Daph." He said.
"Cut the bullshit. Let's just do this." She quickly said, turning her body towards the mansion. The two then walked through the medium sized hall of the mansion.
"You brought your notes right?" she asked suddenly.
"I brought it." Ed pulled out a notebook from his pocket. "Read it carefully, it'll strengthen your occlumency, give it to your father also if he agrees."
Daphne hummed, then she suddenly stopped, making Ed confused.
"Listen well Ed… a-are you sure I've got to stay away from you all starting this year?" she whispered loudly to Ed, looking desperate for some reason.
"We need to build your image Daph." Ed stated. "Why do you ask anyway?"
"There's the Triwizard Tournament thing…" she answered quietly.
"Oh." Ed simply said. "You want to ask Richard to the Yule Ball?"
The girl just nodded, embarrassed that she had been seen through.
Ed thought for a while. "I think you can…" he said. "The one who'll be the spy will be your father, but in the fifth year, you need to definitely stay away from us."
Daphne nodded. "Okay…. thank you…"
"It's your right really." Ed said with a weak smile. "I'm forcing you to do these kinds of things… yet I don't give you anything…"
Daphne hummed, and the two continued their walk. After about a minute of walking, they arrived at a study room, it was the study room of Daphne's father. Daphne knocked the door rather loudly so his father would hear her.
"Come in." she heard someone say.
Daphne and Ed then entered the room, the room was full of books and parchment, and Ed can see the family tree painted on a wall, and on top of it, the symbol of the Greengrass family.
"Aldrich… What brings you here?" Adonis asked, sitting on his desk.
"Lord Greengrass." Ed greeted politely. "I've come to claim my favour from you."
Adonis raised his eyebrow. "What favour do you need? Political favour? Marriage?"
Ed ignored the third question. "Before I tell you, may I ask if you show your left wrist?" Ed blurted out, making Adonis frown.
"Are you accusing me of being a death eater, Ed?" he asked coldly.
"I am." Ed said truthfully. "But if you're not, then you will."
"What do you mean?" Adonis was confused and enraged at the command at the same time.
"That's my request." Ed answered. "For you to be the servant of the dark lord."
Adonis frowned even more. "What is this nonsense?!" Adonis stood up from his seat, enraged.
"You heard right Lord Greengrass, I want you to be a death eater." Ed continued. "You've been offered, haven't you?"
"How-"
"Your circle of friends is a dead giveaway." Ed cut him off.
The man calmed down, but was still surprised by how this boy read him like a book. "Why do you want me to be a death eater? You want to turn me in to the ministry? "
"Oh no." Ed shook his head in denial. "In fact, I want to encourage you to enter their circle…."
Adonis frowned. "But?"
"I want you to be a spy of course." Ed answered, surprising Adonis. "I need an inside job that will plant a bug, that will eventually be the Dark Lord's regime downfall."
"And risk my entire family?! You don't know the cruelty of the dark lord boy!"
Daphne snorted at her father's words. "You already risk the family by gathering with them, father." she coldly said. "Do you not realize that we're the fresh target for him? Do you want the same thing that happened to his family to happen to us?"
The father realized what his daughter said and paled. "Lucius Malfoy is dead...."
"And you're the perfect candidate to replace him." Ed continued. "You brought this upon yourself Lord Greengrass. Why do you support him anyway? You know he's insane."
Adonis stared at Ed. "You want to know, boy? Because he's our only hope of cleansing the wizarding world."
"Cleansing of what?" Ed questioned.
"Half-breeds, Mudbloods, Blood Traitors." Adonis said.
"You realized that I'm a blood traitor, and my girlfriend is a muggle born right?"
Adonis didn't say anything.
Ed chuckled. "Times have changed Lord Greengrass… the purebloods won't stand for long. The muggles are getting stronger by the minute. And the wizards won't stand if they decide to fight them."
"I know that." Adonis hissed.
"Then why stay stubborn?"
"Pride. Envy. Greed." He said. "Most Death eaters are like that. They're too prideful to say that the times have changed, they don't want to share the wizarding world with mudbloods, they envied the muggles for their superiority…"
"Which ones are you then?"
"Me?" he chuckled. "Pride, of course. My family built this dynasty using the natural magic that they meticulously crafted, and the family has stood for hundreds of years. I'm not making some muggles think that they're our equals. "
Ed chuckled. "You know… a friend of mine, a muggle-born, had just discovered a new type of magic… all alone. Do you think he's beneath you? I think not."
The room went silent. "Your family will still be special even if you didn't 'cleanse' the entire wizarding community. If you contribute, if you're powerful, then you're definitely at the top Lord Greengrass."
"Perhaps you're right." Adonis said. "But I'm almost an old man. You can't convince me so easily, Ed."
"Oh I'm not convincing you Lord Greengrass." Ed said. "I'm just telling you the truth and giving you a choice."
"Either you will join the death eaters, I will deal with Tom's army without you, and once I win, you'll be in Azkaban or dead, separated from the rest of your family." Ed continued. "Or you help me, I will keep Astoria and your wife safe, and once we've won, you have glory on your family's name. 'Adonis Greengrass, one of the key players to the Dark Lord's downfall', that would be wicked innit?"
"Or… you were forced to join anyway. Your wife and children either became captives or dead, your wealth wasted for nothing, and once the dark lord fell, you'll be in Azkaban as well."
Adonis gulped. "And how would you know you would win?"
"Oh I know I would win." Ed said while smiling softly. "It's just that I want to make Tom's life miserable first, then I would kill him."
Adonis laughed. "You want to play with the dark lord's life?"
"After everything he had done to my family, I'd say he deserved it." Ed commented.
"No…" Adonis shook his head. "You? A boy, can kill the dark lord easily?"
"The dark lord is weak." Ed said. "What does he have that I don't have? Raw power? I have more raw power than you can even imagine… control? I can control space itself, is that enough control for you? Duelling skill? If he can't move, he can't duel. Knowledge? —" Ed laughed at his own words. "Want to compare knowledge with an Aldrich?"
Adonis stared at Ed. "I never knew the full extent of the Aldrich family… There's your father, who can easily kill twenty death eaters in a battle… Your grandfather, a genius in everything… and you… you're the most peculiar one… your magic is simply bizarre to say the least."
Ed raised his eyebrow. "So?"
"Convince me with your magic. If you can show me that you are truly more powerful than the dark lord, then I will take the vow to help you."
Ed stared at Adonis for a while. "Fine, what do you want to see?"
"You're the one who has the power, surprise me."
Ed hummed. He then walked towards the window. He saw birds flying by the mansion and smirked.
"Say… up for a fly?"
Daphne and Adonis were confused. "What?"
But before they could say anything, Ed had made the group switch places with the birds in the air. Once Daphne realized that she was falling to the ground, she screamed loudly, angry at Ed.
"WHAT THE HELL!" she screamed to the sky. "PUT US DOWN YOU DIMWIT!"
Adonis looked pale as well. "I- I CAN'T APPARATE! SOMEONE BLOCKED APPARITION!"
"QUITE NICE RIGHT?!" Ed asked to the two. "IT'S FREEING!"
"FREEING YOUR ARSE! PUT US DOWN!" Daphne screamed once again.
"FINE!" Ed screamed back, and the three blinked back to the ground. They were in front of the mansion now, catching their breath.
"W-What the hell was that?!" Daphne was definitely mad. "You're just trolling us?!"
Ed chuckled as he fixed his clothes. "How about it Lord Greengrass? Is that good enough for you?"
"Don't mock me Aldrich." Adonis grumbled. "Don't play us, show us your magic, I'm not interested in you teleporting people around."
Ed then turned serious. "You want to see my magic?" he questioned. "Fine."
Ed then suddenly breathed out air, but it was visible, a cold breath. The surroundings suddenly turned very cold, it was so cold that Daphne could feel that her skin started to feel numb quickly, it was so cold that Adonis could feel his blood start to freeze.
"Quite a hot day, was it not?" Ed commented. "I changed the temperature quite a bit."
The once cloudy afternoon turned into an extremely cold afternoon. The clouds started to release its moisture, but it wasn't raining, it was hail. "Woops, sorry, hailing." Ed commented once again as he made a temporary shelter in front of the mansion using ice.
"O-Okay… Y-You've m-made your p-point…" Daphne said as she was shivering from the cold. "J-Just c-cancel the m-magic o-or s-something…"
"Y-Yes E-ed… you've m-made your point… s-stop it." Adonis continued, also shivering.
"Alright then." Ed snapped his finger, and the temperature turned to 'normal'. Normal as in it's still cold, but it wasn't deadly like before. "What do you want to see next, Lord Greengrass?" Ed asked again as he conjured a white flame to warm the other two.
"No more." Adonis said. "You'll destroy my mansion if you do anything more."
"You agree then?"
"The dark lord definitely can't freeze an entire area in an instant..." Adonis mumbled. "Very well, Aldrich... But you must also promise that you will protect my family if anything happens to me. "
"I will." Ed answered. "But I must ask, why are you doing this? I need to know your intentions on this."
Adonis stared at Ed, then at Daphne. He then sighed. "In our short conversation that we just had, I realized that I have made a lot of mistakes… I unintentionally put my family in danger by feeding my pride… and I blocked my two daughters happiness…" he said. "I realized that you are a convincing man Ed… you have successfully convinced me to abandon this broken ideology, so I will help you, and I just hope I get to see my daughters get their happiness and a changed community."
"You have quite an indecisive personality, Lord Greengrass." Ed commented. "Only a conversation and you already switched sides."
"I have had doubts these past couple of months," he said. "The things they're planning... it's inhumane..."
"I'm assuming you're talking about the riot."
"So you knew." Adonis whispered. "Very well, let's do the vow, Daphne. You'll be the third person."
Daphne, who was confused at his father's words, suddenly snapped out of it, and quickly became the third person of the vow. The ritual went well, Adonis and Ed had made a pact that Adonis would support him as an agent to the death eaters, he would be a planted bug.
Adonis then said goodbye to the two teenagers and went inside to check on his family, leaving Ed and Daphne alone.
"What was that?" The girl asked. "What about my happiness?"
"I'm assuming he knows about your feelings for Richard... I don't know."
"H-He knows?" Daphne stuttered.
"I mean, parents usually notice these types of things, the ones who care anyway."
"You think he'll prevent me and Richie from getting together?"
"Have you not heard what he said?" Ed questioned. "He will probably support you, he's just too proud to say it out loud, we men tend to be like that."
Daphne sighed in relief.
"Well…" Ed then fixed his clothes a bit again. "It's time I leave, good luck with Richard."
Daphne just nodded, and Ed disappeared into thin air, leaving Daphne alone.
Daphne gulped, and also finally fixed her clothes. "Good luck to me too."
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