Michael Pickles woke abruptly and rolled over on the cold, stone floor. The baby was crying again; it had been crying on and off all night. Michael blinked his eyes and then rubbed at them aggressively. As he looked up at his brother Lee he sighed with the frustration that was becoming second nature to him in within the circular walls of their prison. His younger brother had the baby cradled in a ragged blanket and was rocking him silently, as though he would be able to comfort it and take away the pain. In truth the baby was cold, hungry and wet.

When their vile blonde captor had brought the baby in kicking and screaming, he had simply placed him on the floor at their feet with a malicious smile and not a word of explanation. He had given them nothing they needed to look after it with the exception a small bottle of milk that occasionally refilled itself. There was no crib, no change of clothes, no toys or bath, and only a dirty towel for a nappy and a bucket of cold water to clean it. Michael had a very bad feeling about it all. It told him that they were perhaps not expected to be in the prison much longer. He glanced up at Lee and saw fear and confusion in the deep blue eyes. He noticed that the usual twinkle had been dulled and his heart sank - it was starting to feel beyond him to protect his younger siblings. Lee, he knew, was still weak from the curse that the man had thrown at him several days earlier. Michael had thought for one awful moment that he was dead, but it turned out that it had been just another trick to try to break them.

Michael had never seen such hatred from anyone as the man showed to them and he wondered often as to the cause of it.

‘Shut him up, will you?’ Michael snapped now as the screaming rose a few decibels and the chubby fists pummelled the air. It had been days since he had slept properly and it made him short with his brother.

‘He can’t help it,’ Lee said quietly.

‘I know,’ Michael said at once, sorry now. He sat up. ‘Here, give him to me.’

Wordlessly Lee passed his elder brother the crying baby. Michael absentmindedly wiped snot and tears from the small nose and mouth with his sleeve.

‘He’s hungry,’ Lee said.

‘We’re all hungry,’ Michael said, wondering at his brother’s irritating knack of stating the bleeding obvious. He looked down into the familiar podgy face. Since the wizard had brought this baby instead of his brother, Thomas, back to the dungeon Michael had been trying to shake off any feeling of recognition. He refused to believe that his eight year-old brother had been transformed to the one-year-old baby he now held, but as he looked at him closely any doubt left him. It was Thomas, from the turned up nose to the stubborn chin. He didn’t find it strange how rapidly he accepted this explanation, even though, before they had been taken, he had thought magic was something you only read in fairy-tales. He was resilient and shrewd and had adapted to the fact that anything was possible in their current situation. What he had yet to figure out was how he could use it to his advantage.

‘What are we going to do?’ Thomas said. He played with his hands as he spoke refusing to look at Michael. He had repeated the question so many times since they had been taken that he half-expected a clout for his troubles. It seemed, however, that Michael was beyond anger.

Michael sighed. He lay down on his back, with baby Thomas cradled to his chest, hoping to share with him what little warmth remained in his body. Above him the crackling lantern swung like a pendulum in the draft that rattled their dungeon day and night. He followed it with his eyes listlessly, back and forth, back and forth, as Thomas grumbled with hunger. The spindly shadows that the dim light cast round the circular funnel seemed to grow and dart over them both, like a spiders web taunting them, waiting for the moment it would snare them and engulf them with darkness. He blinked rapidly as the ugly gargoyle of the fairy with the broken wing appeared to wink at him. It wasn’t the first time Michael had imagined things in the still of the night. He sometimes got the feeling that the twisted piece of stone was watching over their every move.

‘I don’t know,’ he answered at last.

Lee hugged his knees up to his chest in resignation and closed his eyes. It had been the answer he had expected. He tried to blank his mind so that sleep might overcome him. At least when he slept he didn’t have to deal with their situation; he could imagine that he was in his own, comfortable bed that he shared with two of his younger brothers; he could pretend that they were kicking and jostling with each other for the warm quilt, safe in the knowledge that when they woke there would be a cooked breakfast and clean clothes; their mother’s smiling face and his father ready to ruffle his hair before he left for his job in the factory. Those memories, however, were getting fainter and fainter. There were times when he couldn’t even picture his room or their high-rise flat. He was a sensible boy and a realist. He knew in his heart that, despite Michael’s assurances that they would escape, there was a good chance that they would never see home again. He cursed himself for all the times he had taken his mother and father and brothers and sister for granted. He had the niggling feeling that he would never see normal life again. As Lee looked at the sobbing baby that seemed to have once been his brother, Thomas, he felt angry tears spring to his eyes. He put his head into his hands, trying to ignore the uncomfortable feeling that that was only the beginning of what the dark wizard had in store for them.

Alastor Moody and Nymhadora Tonks were positioned on top of a chalk downland on the edge of Wiltshire. They had their brooms in their hands and were huddled together under an undetectable concealment charm that they had had approved by one of the Order’s “marks” in the ministry – being that this wasn’t strictly “official business”; in fact it was very unofficial. Tonks held out her wrist displaying a thin glowing bracelet, which was really a ward-detector, and pointed it towards the manor that lay upon the hill. After a few moments a frown altered her face and her hair turned impulsively from discreet-black to blood-red. 

‘Alastor!’ she hissed, ‘I can’t apparate inside the Malfoy’s manor – the charms are such that only a pure-blood could even hope to gain admittance. And even if I could, the spells are more intricate than those that guard the Ministry of Magic.’

‘Pull yourself together, girl, and talk sense,’ Alastor said gruffly, automatically taking a swig from his small flask. ‘Do you really think that Dumbledore would have given us the task if we couldn’t have completed it?’

‘But these wards are new,’ Tonks said waving her wand over the bracelet. ‘There’s no way that Dumbledore …’

‘Don’t underestimate the knowledge of Albus Dumbledore,’ Alastor interrupted impatiently, stabbing the air in front of her with a thick lined finger to reiterate his point. ‘Do you really think that a wizard of his calibre could be outwitted by the likes of Lucius Malfoy?’ He spat out the words contemptuously and Tonks paused to wipe the drops of saliva from her face before replying.

‘Even Dumbledore can’t predict the workings of the Death Eaters,’ she said.

Alastor smiled grimly. His glass eye rotated wildly in its socket, which it often did when he was agitated. ‘He has Snape, doesn’t he? He does have his uses.’

Tonks pulled her sleeve back over the detector. Mad-Eye had spoken in a tone quite different to his usual bark and she waited for him to continue, sensing that there was more to the rescue than the information she had been given in the meeting. As an Auror she understood that operations such as the one they were about to carry out involved high risks which necessitated secrecy.

Alastor seemed now to be weighing something up in his mind. It was a long few minutes before he spoke again in hushed and deliberate tones -

‘Dumbledore knows of a magic that goes deeper than anything Lucius Malfoy would ever let himself remember. There have been rules guarding our world since Salazar Slytherin spread his poison. Why else have we been able to live alongside muggles? Voldemort tried every trick in the book to rid the world of them – but even he had to deal with the laws I am about to tell you. Muggles, for all we might consider them harmless, have had ties with the magical world since our time began. They would, as well we all know, flounder in any duel with the magical world, but since it has not been the general intention of most magical folk to quarrel with muggles, we have, over the years, put in place conventions that would stand them in better stead.’

‘But muggles have always been slaughtered by Dark Wizards,’ Tonks said.

Moody glowered. ‘If you would let me speak and not interrupt I will explain,’ he said. Tonks reddened slightly and nodded.

‘There have been those – such as the Death Eaters – who have killed muggles for sport. No one can hope to stem the tide of insanity that has affected men and wizards since time began, but the leaders of the muggles that have been in contact with the Ministry through the years have often come to agreements about what is known as “times of war”. The clause that we are going to use to rescue the children was put in place, I believe, by the Prime Minister of the muggle world, Winston Churchill, after the war of 1938. It was agreed, in collusion with the Ministry of Magic, that any muggles taken as prisoners of war by members of the wizarding world would be granted the Right-to-Magical-Intrusion-and-Participation if it could be proved that there were two warring sides and so they were indeed prisoners of war. It was set in place to even out the score between muggles and us. In this case it qualifies because the Death Eaters are set against the Order of the Phoenix. It doesn’t grant prisoners an immediate ticket home, but it does mean that they are granted temporary magical power to aid their release. It is not a law well-known except in those trusted by the Ministry – in fact out of the Order, only Dumbledore was privy to the information and that was only because of his service when Voldemort last terrorised our world. But it is a law, and we can use it now – without Ministry approval or knowledge. It is something written into the very fabric of our world and it can’t be refused in any circumstances – to do so would guarantee the captors immediate death - which is why I suppose Voldemort has gone to such lengths to keep the imprisonment secret from the order - not even trusting Snape with the knowledge.’

‘But they’re children!’ Tonks said. ‘They can’t possibly hope to know the law or use it.’

‘And that’s where we come in,’ Alastor said. ‘You are proficient, or so I’ve been told, in Legilimency.’

‘Yes’ Tonks agreed, ‘though nowhere near the powers of Severus …’

‘Severus is occupied elsewhere,’ Alastor said firmly. ‘We will use legilimency to guide the children’s use of magic. We also need this helmet plucked from the head of a general in World War Two,’ he added, fishing deeply into his robes and taking the item out. ‘It has been bled over by the two leaders that agreed to the convention – and Dumbledore managed to procure it from the ministry through Kingsley Shacklebolt. It will serve our purpose.’

‘It seems too easy,’ Tonks said looking at the helmet dubiously. Seeing Alastor’s dour expression she knew she had spoken rightly.

Alastor said simply, ‘The magical law requires that the liberating side show it a sacrifice. One of us will have to lose a limb. We will place it in the helmet in order to ignite its powers. They had to make such a dispensation so that it would not be easy for muggles to bribe wizards to invoke the law.’

‘Oh perfect!’ Tonks said.

Alastor smiled. ‘I’ll use one of my fingers,’ he said. ‘If we are successful it will grow back in “five and twenty years”’.

‘You mightn’t be alive in “five and twenty years”,’ Tonks said grinning. ‘We can use my little finger if you like; I’ve never been partial to it.’ As if to prove the point, she waved her wand and magicked a large hunting knife. ‘Might as well do it properly,’ she said, and, before Alastor could protest, she sliced off the little finger of her left hand and placed it in her helmet, stemming the stream of blood with a quick binding spell.

‘There was no need for that you silly girl,’ Alastor blustered, his one eye filled with revulsion at the sight of the pale amputated finger in the helmet. ‘You won’t be able to grow it back using your metamorphmagus abilities.’

Tonks shrugged. ‘It’s about time I bore a scar or two – the other Aurors are beginning to talk.’ She spoke with bravado, but in actual fact the pain that seared through her arm was quite acute and she had to bite her lip hard to stop herself wincing at the sight of her finger in the helmet. As she looked into the elder mans’ eyes, however, and saw the new respect for her in them she felt that it was worth it.

‘Right then,’ he said abruptly, taking out his wand, ‘time for phase two.’

Far away in Spinners End Severus Snape was pacing his faded living room carpet; fifteen steps forward a precise turn and then fifteen steps back. Lucius, as usual, was late.

 Snape had left Potter screaming and crying for him that afternoon. It had also been a difficult night. Snape thought that the young child had perhaps picked up on his preoccupied mood. Snape had paced his study all night, his mind going over the meeting with Lucius. Every now and then the boy’s small voice had called for him. When Snape had ignored it had broken down into tears. He had given up in the end and fetched Potter from his bed.

‘Me sleepy,’ Harry had said through tears.

‘Well go to sleep then,’ Snape had said with exasperation.

‘Can’t,’ had been the response. ‘Baddy men.’ It seemed that the child was having nightmares. ‘Pale-baddy,’ Harry had said, snot bubbling around his nose.

Snape had raised his eyebrow wryly. He had the feeling that he knew exactly what Potter was referring to. If he had been a bit older and more able to communicate, then Snape thought he might have pressed the child to tell him his dream – after all they had often been significant in the past - but the inane ramblings of a toddler were no use to him.

‘Want bobba milky,’ Harry had then said innocently. Snape had to admire his persistence. He had been trying to persuade him to give him his bottle in various ways for days. Instead Snape had given him a tumbler of milk to drink. Harry had slurped it cross-legged on the floor as Snape had resumed his pacing. After a few minutes Harry had gotten to his feet and shadowed Snape, pursing his lips and pushing his eyebrows down into a frown, trying to emulate the potions master with his deliberate walk and using his dressing gown to copy the billowing cloak. If Snape had been inclined to humour he might even have smiled. It made him feel slightly gratified that the boy tried so hard to copy him.

‘Time for bed,’ Snape had said at last as Harry’s eyelids had begun to droop. He had scooped him up into his arms and then laid him gently in his bed to little protest.

Harry had looked tensely up at him as he was about to leave and said uncertainly, ‘Mean baddies?’

‘No bad men will enter my chambers,’ Snape had assured him, as he absentmindedly tucked the covers around the small body. ‘You are quite safe with me.’

‘Nice Nape, goody Nape,’ Harry had said, satisfied, before rolling over with Cheep-Cheep tucked snugly under his arm. Snape had watched him silently until his breathing became regular, strangely relaxed in the toddler’s presence; he had then snuffed out the lamp and gone back to his study to resume the rhythmic pacing that helped him to think.

Snape was woken from his musings by a loud crack that reverberated around the room and shook its walls. Lucius Malfoy appeared a few feet in front of him smiling knowingly. A split second after the second crack Snape’s whole body stiffened as he realised that Lucius hadn’t come alone. He rushed to draw his wand, his black eyes burning with hatred as the second man did the same. He heard the malicious laughter of Lucius and curses in the air, before, with a purple flash of light and a sickening thud a body dropped to floor.