[Deitha Albron]

Deitha was not looking forward to this.

She'd taken a job that, as it turned out, was a debt owed to what she thought was a minor functionary within the Ministry. Jumped up little bureaucrat that lost daddy's money in a game of something and wanted to send heavies round to get it back before daddy noticed, or something like that. She didn't really pay too much attention - this kind of job was never especially interesting but it paid the bills, and seemed to be the kind of job she wanted at the moment.

Recent events and trips to the Meridian Clinic in Knockturn Alley had boosted her self confidence and self-esteem but as much as she felt like doing good deeds, she still had bills to pay, not to mention a reputation to preserve. And even with her new-found senses of empathy and compassion, she was not immune to that part of her that still thoroughly relished giving folks a good scare and incentive to fulfill their obligations.

But jobs that seemed simple on the surface had a habit of not being so simple in practice, and this was no exception to that particular trait. Turned out that in order to reach the people who owed money, she had to find an informant. The debt in question was with someone sufficiently well protected that others would go to Azkaban in their place.

And so that was where she found herself going. The stuffed-shirt she was contracted to had arranged it all - a boat out to Azkaban, someone from the Ministry to accompany her, all the conveniences.

Normally she'd have double pig-tails and a hat with a really wide brim for confidence and sass, and a dress in a bold colour to show the world that she didn't care what it brought, she was going to go out in style. As she'd dressed that morning, she had a wry smile thinking about the first time she sassed her way into Meridian with her most potent purple dress, but today she went with a loose fitting black number. Respectful, sombre, appropriate. On some level it seemed like some sympathetic magic armour; signalling to the Dementors that she wasn't a threat and was somewhat like them.

Nonsense. She was nothing like them. But she was also a fringe element of society, there to move things along and occupy a space that others might not. She twinned her dress with a sombre mid-grey cloak that she hoped would spare her from the winds crossing the North Sea.

She wasn't fond of the idea of going to Azkaban. She'd heard stories, of course. The ones that kids tell each other to frighten themselves. The ones adults tell to frighten the kids. The ones adults tell each other to try to appeal to a better nature. The ones that her 'customers' threaten her with.

But that was very different from the thought of actually going. She had assumed, up to recently, that if she had had to go, she would have been largely immune; the things that had happened to her had left her with a very stunted view of herself and of life. More than one of her jobs had been completely out of nothing more than an unhealthy mix of anger and pure spite. Recently, of course, she had started something of a healing process, and each day was a couple of shades brighter than it had been before.

She knew, of course, that any experience she had with the Dementors would be temporary, and that she had ensured a thorough supply of chocolate for the trip. It helped that she liked chocolate.

She was met off the Scottish coast by a man who claimed to be from the Ministry, who grunted his name at her - Roderick Spode - and the oarsman of a small rickety wooden thing professing to being a boat, but Deitha was not convinced. She could barely see the man, such was his scrawny, almost skeletal frame swallowed up by the rather burly black hooded cloak around him.

"So, uh, off we shove?" She tried to sound positive, but it came out as thin and reedy in the wind.

Spode gestured towards the boat. "After you." Spode looked positively ill already just at the thought of getting on a boat, especially one that seemed like it might barely take just Deitha's weight, let alone the three of them, but once aboard, he seemed stoic enough.

She'd had no idea how long it would take to row out to Azkaban - long enough for it to be a useful deterrent, long enough to give a traveller plenty of time to forment thoughts on the duration of their time on the island, and not nearly long enough to let the otherwise accumulating sense of dread float away unheeded.

And so they arrived. The oarsman remained silent. Spode handed him something and a thin, damn-near skeletal hand reached out from the folds of his cloak to snatch it - seemingly angrily - from Spode's hand.

It suddenly occurred to Deitha whether the ferryman was paid for one way or both ways. She hoped she didn't have to find out. Spode, however, seemed to read her mind, and muttered gruffly in her direction. "He'll be here when we're done to take us back. This way."

She followed Spode through the first archway, up some stairs, she wasn't really paying attention to him, just following his burly physique and waiting for the inevitable.

It wasn't long coming. First a chill wind seemed to cross her - despite it being completely sheltered from any actual drafts, and the world seemed to desaturate a fraction, the colour bleeding out from the edges of her vision, as she started to hear an echo in her mind. A scream. Crying. A tangle of limbs thrashing.

Whatever warmth she'd carried in her heart the last while after her visit to the Meridian Clinic, that all faded out of view, sinking beneath the water, as if the skies and lands as on the other side of a mirror's edge. A sharp inhalation of breath and it seemed to freeze in her throat; it was like her nightmares had come back and where they had all been kept at bay, they were all rushing together, clamouring to get into her mind - but stopped at the gate, even though that was little comfort. They were still there, still audible and wailing and gnashing and crashing.

She exhaled and titled her neck sharply to the side, cracking the neck joint in two places. This she could deal with - she was made of sterner stuff and what was it to her if her recent good mood simply evaporated into what she'd had before? After all... when doing her best work - the work which pleased her in ways that were less wholesome, that wasn't happy. That was primal and as far as she was concerned, not even the Dementors could take that away from her. It was hers and hers alone.

She stood at the entrance to the cell of the man she was here to see. Spode stood to the side, watching but not really paying any attention. He looked as if he were about to lose whatever breakfast he'd had, perhaps he was not as proof against the Dementors as she was. Had she been feeling more charitable, she might have offered some chocolate - but for the moment that was switched off.

Truth be told, she hadn't actually known the man she was coming to see, only that she was who she had to speak to. The man before her was a pitiable spectacle, a shadow of who he would have been before however long had been spent here in this place. He'd been sat staring hard at the wall - or perhaps a hole in the wall at the sea, it was hard to be sure.

As she watched, he was weeping, and as he shuffled around, she could see there was a small hole there. The last sight of a world that had gone very wrong for him, as it were.

The man crawled, turning to her like some lame dog barely able to stand let alone walk. "Is it time?"

"Time?" Deitha echoed.

"The bells... the bells..."

"I'm sorry, I don't..."

Spode interjected. "Church bells tolling for the dead." Then with the nearest his voice apparently did for kindness, "He's asking if it's the end for him. Others ask similar."

Deitha shook her head sadly. "No, I'm afraid not. I'm here on business relating to a friend of yours."

The wraith before her snarled. "Tain't afraid o' dying in here." Such an uncharacteristic reaction compared to moments ago. She wondered if he was under some kind of curse.

"Look, I'm here on business. If you tell me what I need to know, maybe I can put in a word for you."

He collapsed into a heap of maniacal laughter, the kind that veers occasionally into sanity. "Shan't! Shan't! Won't!" The paroxysm of laughter abated. "Won't." He muttered... "Won't... can't."

Deitha sighed. She was determined to get answers even if it took her longer than anticipated. Turning away, she broke a small piece of chocolate off in her pocket and shoved it into her mouth with as quick a gesture as she could manage, not wanting to give either Spode or the prisoner any more opportunity to comment on the subject - and she was pretty sure offering chocolate to an inmate wasn't exactly above board.

She sat down, cross-legged, coming to the height of the wretch before her, and simply watched, passively. If she gave the impression she wasn't a threat, maybe he'd open up after all. Maybe the poor sod was too far gone, but she was here and determined to make use of coming here.

[Odhrán Ó Dálaigh]

All roads lead to Rome, or rather Bern, in Odhrán's case.

It was uncomfortable how a part of his life that he had always firmly rejected, was to make or break him now. Being pureblooded had never mattered to Odhrán, he'd never played the games of society, never danced the dance of slowly ingratiating himself. He hadn't needed to. He was brilliant and he knew it; anything he ever wanted he could accomplish through learning and research. He could get there on his own initiative. Except, he now found that this long held belief wasn't true. The answer to his problems was to rely on privilege and it stung in unexpected ways.

Merci viu mau, Grandma Wenger. Merci viu mau, Aunt Mia. After trying to arrange for a visit to Azkaban through the British ministry for weeks, he had finally conceded that it would be easier to ask the Swiss side of his family to assist. And helped they had. It was almost disgusting just how easy it had been. A call to his aunt and grandmother later and he was meeting with Erich Camenzind, a high-ranking Swiss diplomat. Of course, he'd been an Aspermont graduate, of course, he'd been one of Aunt Mia's favourite students. And it was only a small favour. His Great Uncle Dorveny could have taken care of matters too, following his recent election to Bundesrat of the Eidgenossenschaft.

He'd come to Bern to work out some of the details in person, to say his thanks, to act appropriately contrite. It was so strange. He'd mixed with Swiss society even less than with Irish and British society. He thought he knew the rules of how to be a pureblood, but they were different here than back home. The reverence people held for his grandmother seemed to extend to him as well. Here he wasn't the son of a fallen man who had gone to Azkaban, but a Wenger by blood and therefore almost untouchable. Odhrán uneasily wondered what the price for all of this would be. He now owed Aunt Mia and she would come to collect payment eventually. A worry for another day.

He'd have to leave soon, but he had promised his mother to make a trip to Chocolatier Läderach's. You can't go to Azkaban with that awful British chocolate, she had insisted. And funnily enough, he found himself agreeing. He bought several bars of dark chocolate and a strange, triangular thing that was modelled after a confection popular in the muggle world. The clerk had called it a Toblerone. Mit Montélimar-Nougat angereichert. For whatever that meant. He supposed he would be finding out soon.

With this most important errant completed, he was to meet with Camenzind at his residence to catch a portkey to somewhere. He'd not really gained much insight into where exactly Azkaban was, and this small detail didn't help to ease his mind. If he didn't know how to get there, it probably wouldn't be easy to get back from there as well. He had to rely on the Wenger family's influence to protect him. He was probably foolish to venture into the lion's den like this. Fortunately, he had a trick or two up his sleeve the British ministry had probably not taken into consideration. He'd get what he wanted.

Grandma Wenger had said to dress the part. His usual black and grey clothes had been exchanged something a little flashier; an elegant, charcoal suit with wine-red lining and impeccable tailoring, a cloak that matched. He'd been given one of the Wenger family heirlooms, an Ordenskette, or Collane as Aunt Mia called it, his grandmother usually wore when receiving guests in Bern. It weighed far more that it had any business to and featured a golden bear pendant that Odhrán reckoned was solid enough to use as a weight to knock somebody out with. Maybe, that was why his grandmother liked it so much. On a more serious note, he had some dim recollection that it marked him as member of the Wenger family and as under the protection of the Order of Paracelsus for whatever that might be worth on British soil. Besides the similarly attired Camenzind they sure looked the part of a diplomatic delegation.

The portkey whisked them onto a boat. How peculiar. Odhrán had never known that these devices were capable of being keyed to a moving object. Surrounded by nothing but water the reality of this quest was starting to sink in. Just what would he find where he was going? Odhrán tried to recall what he knew. The last twenty years had dulled his memories of his father. He couldn't remember his features anymore - just what he looked like in photographs. What did his voice sound like? He thought he knew and yet he wondered. Would he even recognise... No, that thought was too much to bear. He would know. He was certain.

Waves rocked their boat. Odhrán looked at Camenzind, his expression weary. The man returned the glance. They attempted a conversation, but it was hard to find much to discuss. They were here on business. Him to see his father and Camenzind to deal with something involving the deep vaults of the Swiss National treasury. It was better not to ask, because he most certainly didn't want to know. Swiss witches and wizards were strange when it came to money.

As they drew closer, Odhrán could feel the presence of dementors in the area. It was like a strange chill coming over him and it was frightening. However, it was too late to have second thoughts now. He carefully set about rearranging the content of his mind. Dementors fed on human happiness and emotion. He'd seen enough of the world to know what no longer human looked like, and he was letting these thoughts rise to the surface now, making his mind look cold, bleak, and desperate. If any of them came to close to him, he was determined to let them understand what it was like to have all happiness taken away.

The boat docked near the prison graveyard. Odhrán's legs felt wobbly as he stepped onto the quay, but the look in his blue eyes remained determined. Having come all this way, he could handle the last step as well. As he walked up to the building, he read the names on the gravestones: D. O'Driscoll, H. Grantham, P. Dumbledore, A Witherspoon. Some of these names he recognised, others he read for the first time. How had so many died here? Why has the ministry even permitting this charade of a justice system? Camenzind seemed to have the same question. The two men looked at each for a long time before parting ways.

"Wieder hier?"

"Ja."

"Wie lang?"

"Weiss nicht."

Odhrán went left, while Camenzind went right. Somehow, it was easier to do this alone. Somehow it was harder too. A dementor floated up close to Odhrán and he studied the empty sockets in its skull where eyes should have been. The creature seemed to pay him no mind for now. Either there were juicier targets for it to hunt, or his Occlumency was holding. Odhrán liked to think it was his skill that was making a difference, but he didn't know for sure.

Azkaban was disgusting. Everything was filthy. It smelled of urine and ammonia and rotting food. Damp too. How did anyone deserve to be here, regardless of what they had done? He looked into a cell. Not here. The next didn't look right either. No, no, another no, definitely not. Had his father died, and nobody had told his mother and him? The thought gave him chills and he tried to remember if he had seen his name on the graveyard coming in. Would they even deign to give him a grave? An overpowering sense of anger overcame him, making his magic itch under his skin. He was so tense and coiled, it wouldn't have been surprising to see sparks flying off him.

At last, he found what he was looking for. A cell containing a mere shadow of a man, curled up in a corner, rocking back and forth, singing a tune just a little of key.

"Father?" Odhrán asked into the semi-darkness. The prisoner looked up. Eyes met.

In no time the prison seemed to burst into a flurry of activity. Dementors were rushing in from all sides. Ah, human emotion. Odhrán's eyes narrowed dangerously as the creatures zoomed closer.

"Confringo!"

His blasting curse struck with such force that it pushed the cloaked creatures back from where he was standing. There were no guards to reprimand him for this and he felt no remorse.

"You will not bother us!" he hissed angrily. Could dementors understand? He was not sure, nor did he care. Odhrán focused his attention on the one dementor that was the closest. His wand moved quickly, the incantation was mouthed and never spoken. In his mind he held the memory of a patient he had recently treated. A poor witch who had lived through such horror that it was unspeakable. The injuries, the curses, the abuse, the damage done to her. He pushed the thoughts forward and straight into the creature's path. It retreated for now with a wailing sound.

"Yes, that's right. I am not very tasty. Now, back off."

[Deitha Albron]

She'd settled down on the worn flagstones, opposite the man she'd come here to see, peaceful, tranquil - at least superficially. The noise in her head was quite something, though, as the dementors loomed around the building made it quite noisy for Deitha. Trying to rake up the past, trying to bury the present, trying to rob something of the future. But none had come too close and the chocolate had helped.

But she was confused - there was a commotion down the way, an aisle or so over, the next row of cells, the next row of inmates - and she'd recognise the sound of a blasting curse anywhere.

The prisoner she'd come here to see suddenly looked - if it were possible - more confused, more empty. Slowly drained of happiness, leaving only the inky blackness behind, only for the emptiness in his heart to be refilled with fear. Though if he responded a little to fear that way, maybe that gave Deitha some leverage. If only she could make fear of her more potent than the cloying pungent persistence that was life with the dementors.

The blasting curse came with some words, bitter, angry, but not raised. This was someone capable of some truly potent anger. And... that voice. It was familiar, though she hoped she was wrong about that.

Deitha got to her feet, took one look at Spode, who made it perfectly clear he wasn't going to get involved - and that any mischief Deitha got up to was entirely her own lookout - and she stood, staring into the distance from where the sound came.

On the one hand, she had a job to do and this was her last, best hope of making that happen, in the here and now - and she wouldn't want to waste the opportunity. On the other, if she was right, the voice was probably going to need some help.

Deitha twirled her wand in her fingers for a moment to think. She needed an answer from this prisoner, and she needed to intervene but dammit there wasn't enough time to do both. Not unless this poor wretch would yield - quickly - and without her doing something that would see her wound up here herself.

She looked down at the man at her feet, and summoned every ounce of bile in her stomach. Every word oozed with venom, every look flush with malice.

"You. You are going to help me. I need a name - you know who I mean."

But the poor wretch just curled up into a ball, hands clasped over his ears, rocking back and forth, muttering gibberish to himself in a language only he could understand. Occasional words might have been in a language Deitha recognised but it seemed pretty unlikely.

Spode coughed. "Miss, he's too far gone. I don't think he can tell you what you need to know."

Deitha looked at Spode. They often described 'looks that could kill', but this was more of a more primal, 'if looks could maim and leave you in agony for hours' kind of moment. He took the point almost immediately. Something about her eyes had turned not entirely human. Her normal blue had shifted to a much darker blue; the kind of colour the sky takes on when lit almost solely by the moonlight, still recognisably blue but somehow not yet black. The kind that could smoulder with a fury and an anger.

A wand was waved and syllables were mouthed.

"YOU." Her voice deepened an octave. "GAZE UPON ME, AND YOU SHALL KNOW WHAT IT MEANS TO DESPAIR." The voice had deepened and widened so it seemed no longer entirely recognisably female... or perhaps even recognisably human - though fully understandable.

And the prisoner made eye contact. Stared deep into her eyes - as black as midnight. And the man screamed. It was one thing to stare into the face of dementors passing by; their consumption of emotion was mostly passive and impersonal. This on the other hand, this was personal.

"I COULD LEAVE YOU HERE, ROTTING IN YOUR OWN FILTH UNTIL YOU CEASE TO HAVE ANY WILL TO CONTINUE. YOUR FATE WILL BE IGNOBLE AND UNMOURNED."

But her eyes widened, growing slightly larger than they should in her face, her voice deepened another semitone. "BUT IF YOU DO NOT TELL ME WHAT I NEED TO KNOW, I WILL ENSURE THAT FATE IS MERELY THE BEST YOU CAN HOPE FOR."

She took a deep breath and relaxed her lungs, trying to return to her normal voice without obviously coughing.

"If you don't tell me what I need to know, right now, I will curse you to be forever trapped here - not just until you die. I will ensure your ghost is torn from your body, and made to suffer here with the dementors for eternity. You can watch as the rats and the fleas gnaw your flesh - they are very partial to eyeballs - and the carrion will pick your bones clean. You might, if you're lucky, then get buried in the graveyard out back, but I imagine whatever is left of your mouldering corpse by that time will have been desecrated by vermin and the like. And you shall have to watch. Your ghost will be compelled to watch it happen as the dementors leech whatever good is left in your spirit - and you'll be stuck here, forever, with them, without even the release of death to make it go away."

She waved her wand again, and her eyes returned to their natural blue. "Or, you tell me what I need to know, since we both know you're innocent of the charges you were brought in here for, and I will see about getting you out of here. This is a one time offer. You need to talk, now. I will count to five, if you don't tell me by then, I will leave what is left of your soul to the dementors for eternity."

The man was just sat still, utterly bewildered, utterly terrified, and the stench of his bodily functions having given out on him during Deitha's speech hadn't gone unnoticed. In other times she might have enjoyed the spectacle, but she was in a hurry.

She counted one. Two. Thr-- and the man launched into the most furious babble, in mostly English, about the man she really needed to find, his erstwhile employer. The man he was covering for while being in this hellhole. The man who had, apparently, ensured his family were taken care of if only the wretch would play the patsy.

The full story, and she hadn't even gotten to four.

When he'd finished babbling, he looked at her desperately. Pleading almost incoherently for release. She nodded to Spode, "Can you speak to the man who arranged this little day trip? See if we can't make our friend here just a little more comfortable. Meanwhile I'm going to see what's going on."

The noise hadn't entirely backed down in the distance. There had been the blasting spell, of course, some angry words, but that had followed with a wailing and a gnashing and a sound that could only be described as rending a hole in a soul. It had to be something with the dementors.

She took off down the aisle and saw a well-dressed man facing down a dementor. No, not just the one actually - more were coming.

She gasped as she recognised the man - a nightmare, of a sort, was coming true, that her friend in the form of the healer from that little place in Knockturn Alley was here, with dementors looming toward him. What the hell was he doing here? At least it explained why he'd looked so tired, if he had had to come here to get answers.

"What are you doing here?" she blurted, and then realised with some surprise that the healer while the blasting spell she'd heard had clearly been his, that wasn't what was keeping them at bay. It seemed like the dementor was staying back out of what - for a human - would be called fear.

A second was looming, but Deitha was there, wand ready. She wasn't sure if it was about to strike. But Odhrán was here and if anyone was dementor-proof, she figured it'd be him.

[Odhrán Ó Dálaigh]

Good. The dementor was backing off. Others still loitered in the area, drawn forth by the moment of connection he had shared with his father. The power of human emotion seemed undeniable. And yet the dementors seemed unsure what to do. Apparently, there weren't used to somebody fighting dirtily. One of them tried to fly closer again. Odhrán turned to face it, wand still raised. He cast the same incantation as before, the same cold fire in his eyes. The resulting screech was blood-curling, but it served its purpose. More of he dementors were floating away. 

Elsewhere, he could hear a manically raised, inhuman voice - though the words it said failed to register. This place was everything he had imagined, and then it was worse than that. How could people say sending anybody here was just? That thought seemed to stay with him. Was imprisonment in this way really the best way to deal with criminals and their reintegration into society? Whoever managed to make it out of this abyss was bound to remain broken for the rest of their life.

He was about to give his undivided attention to his father, when another person appeared on the scene.

What are you doing here? That was a voice he thought he would have recognised anywhere.

"Miss Albron?!"

What for the love of all things good and holy was she doing here? Odhrán turned slowly, and yes, sure enough this was debt-collecting nightmare patient. From the looks of it, she wasn't a prisoner here either. Why would she even? Odhrán would have thought that he was about the only person stupid enough to risk a visit to Azkaban.

"I could ask you the same," he commented to her.

This was unexpected. Odhrán didn't now what to do. Fuck. He'd never really considered running into a patient here. That...

"You shouldn't be here," he eventually forced out. "Not with what you've been going through recently. Are you suicidal?"

Odhrán didn't want to care, didn't want to worry about Deitha, but of course he did. He was still her healer, even if this wasn't a place of healing. He felt the urge to protect her, but there were more important things he had to be doing. He needed to protect his father. They needed to talk and now there was this woman here who really wasn't supposed to be seeing any of this. Screw it. He couldn't change things now. Choices had been made. The die was cast.

"If you'd kindly excuse me, Miss Albron - I've got a family matter to attend to here. I appreciate your willingness though to lend me a wand. I think, maybe, I can handle this myself. My head seems to make them scream. Such a shame, isn't it? Poor dementors."

He flashed her a smile that betrayed a side of him he usually buried deep within. He had been truthful enough when he had told her during treatment that most witches and wizards enjoyed sadism on some level. He was no exception to that rule. People had hurt him and his family. Getting even was a thought that had kept him going. Getting to one-up the people who had betrayed them, now that was just delicious.

Odhrán retrieved some of the dark chocolate bars from his bag and broke the bar three ways. He gave the largest piece to his father, then handed a piece to Deitha while taking the last piece himself.

"Miss Albron, this is my father the honourable Darragh Ó Dálaigh. Father, this lovely lady is Deitha Albron. She is a patient of mine who probably shouldn't be here. And yes, I've become a healer. I know, not what you would have wanted - but it was necessary."

The crouched man in the corner of the cell had taken the chocolate but was not eating it. Instead he was staring at it as if it wasn't real. After a moment or two, he decided to stare at Odhrán instead, looking as if he was experiencing a rather pleasant dream. His blue eyes looked dull and glazed over, his black hair so filthy and unkempt it had become a single mat of tangles and dirt. Odhrán felt himself crumbling on the inside, experiencing a different flavour of despair and depression than the one so readily provided by the ambient presence of dementors.

Odhrán crouched down, so he was at the same height as his father. He had the feeling that there were words being left unsaid, as his father's mouth opened and closed. However, no sound came. It was the most heart-breaking moment. His father didn't even try to interact with him, probably thinking that it was all a dream. Quite possibly a dream he had before. Once again, Odhrán felt at loss as to what he was supposed to do. He reached out to place his hand on his father's arm giving it a light squeeze.

Think Odhrán, think. This wasn't the first time he'd dealt with the effects Azkaban had on a person. What had he done the last time when a patient had been brought to him?

Legillimency seemed like a possible answer, but this place was hardly safe to give it a go. He'd have to stop focusing his mind on occluding to do that and right now his ability to moderate what the dementors could see and perceive was what was keeping them out of trouble. Perhaps, there was another way.

He reached inside his bag again to retrieve a small notebook. There were a couple of photographs on the inside, the first showing one showing a woman in her early thirties with long black her and vivid, light blue eyes. She waved animatedly inside photograph, the twirled around in the pretty, lavender gown she was wearing.

"Your daughter," Odhrán whispered to his father.

The prisoner took a deep breath, sounding both pained and astonished at the same time. "Aoibheann," the man breathed out.

"Yes, Aoibheann. She lived. She got better. It took me the better part of twenty years, but she is healing. She sends her love. As does mother. As does everybody."

Odhrán tried to give the notebook with the photographs to his father, but the man had another desire. He was scooting closer to Odhrán so he could reach out and touch his face as if to test if all of this was real.

"Odhrán."

"Yes, it's me. I should have been here a lot sooner. I have no excuse." Odhrán felt a breakdown coming on that he was sure he could not afford. If he collapsed into tears, if he gave way to emotion, they would not be safe. "Except... Aoibheann needed me more than you did. They didn't just curse her," he explained nervously, "they destroyed her mind. They wiped everything that made her human. On purpose. Because if she would have remembered anything, it might have exonerated you."

At this point, even occlumency could only do so much. Tears were streaming down Odhrán cheeks, but since it wasn't a happy emotion he felt overcome with, it probably didn't hold much appeal to the cloaked creatures.

"I know you are innocent. You never did anything wrong. I will get you out of here and I will cut them all down, one by one. Fernsby, Rookwood, Audish, Dankworth, Polaris. They will pay for this. For what they did to you. And Aoibheann."

His father looked at him with an expression between comprehension and confusion. "Winthrop" he added to the list with a wheeze. "Spalding."

Odhrán nodded, though he did not understand. These were not names he had heard before. Aliases? More enemies? Allies? A place to start? He didn't know what he was receiving, but he was sure he could figure it out.

He pulled his father closer into an awkward, half hug and they remained for a while, mutual tears interspersing their unspoken dialogue with punctuation. Odhrán could feel that something was shifting again as the emotion of hope re-entered the picture. While Odhrán could manage to occlude his own feelings, there was little he could do to mask the emotions of another. A horrifying realisation hit Odhrán. The dementors would come for his father with a special kind of vengeance by the time this visit was over. He was giving his father hope, and that hope was like the sweetest honey to these soulless creatures.

The were moving, coming closer. Cloaks flapped. He could feel them before he saw them, and it was more of them yet.

"I would suggest, Deitha" Odhrán started as he got up from his crouch, "that you get out of the blast radius of my Confringo. They are coming again and it's rather a few more than the last time."

[Deitha Albron]

No wonder Odhrán had looked so awful when she'd seen him - if he was planning on coming here, that would be terrifying enough when it were solely on business, where a certain amount of the internal strife this place caused could be... detached. But this, this was family, and while Deitha couldn't care less if it were her father here, she wasn't quite so sure how she'd react if it were her brother in here.

She couldn't imagine what Odhrán was going through - she'd never known anyone quite so controlled as him, the fact he was in the state he was in... this couldn't be just the influence of the dementors, this went deeper. She stood back, warily watching the dementors, as Odhrán and his father talked, well, more accurately, Odhrán talked at his father somewhat.

Deitha felt a little ill inside at hearing, in passing, the details of his family - small wonder the man was so damned detached. He'd have to be.

Up to that point, though, whatever noise he was generating from inside his head had kept the dementors at bay - inwardly she was impressed. Impressed and scared. Impressed that he contained that darkness and still did good. Scared that he contained that darkness and hadn't done evil, but she got flashes of their last conversation - that even doing awful things can still be good work.

But his self control had withered slightly between talking about his family - she couldn't imagine the mix of emotions he must be feeling, and what she was feeling on his behalf could be no more than a pale imitation. But they were feelings. The dementors fed on feelings. They were coming. More of them. It wasn't clear how many more - but it was more.

She could feel them now - even the chocolate in her system wasn't entirely proof again this. The hairs on the back of her neck standing up. The hopes, dreams, happy thoughts fading away... no, not fading... being gnawed... clawed away at the edges. The dementors didn't care who was innocent or guilty, who deserved to be here or who didn't. They just cared that food was served up nice and fresh.

"No, Mr Ó Dálaigh, I don't think blasting is going to do the job here." She said grimly, eyeing up the dementor wafting towards them. She tilted her neck to the left, producing two quite loud clicks.

If a mind attuned to occlumency and legilimancy could ward dementors at bay, she wondered what else could really keep a dementor at bay. A patronus was the obvious, but there were more ways to conjure up emotion. Fear, for example. Fear was always a good one. Besides, patronuses pushed them away rather than combating them head on.

The dementors, by their sheer presence, exuded fear. It was time they saw what fear looked like.

"You look like you need a moment. I got this one."

She stared at the dementor that was closest to Odhrán, grinned a grin that was a shade too wide, her wand danced in a rhythm and amorphous forms began to take shape.

Patronuses were wraiths, yes, of positivity. That was their strength: they kept dementors away by letting them try to feed - but having nothing of substance. Calories made of empty feelings.

But a student of Durmstrang learns something of the Dark Arts. Practical application thereof. Hogwarts students might learn about how to project happiness. Durmstrang students learn how to project fear.

The amorphous forms began to thicken, solidify, coalescing to take something of a form. Not a form, several forms. Things that resembled scorpions, but with more legs, two tails each equipped with stingers, and pairs of front claws that looked capable of snapping at almost anything.

Her voice dropped a register. "Go, my devourers. FEAST."

The dementor first stopped in its tracks, unsure what it perceived before itself; dementors cannot see, only sense. The devourers - a dozen of them by this point - swarmed in its direction, and each loosed something from their tails, causing small puffs of black smoke in the air, wafting in the direction of the dementor.

And then there was the sound. A sharp, shrill shrieking sound. A wail of fear and despair that cut through the air. A few nearby prisoners were watching, banging the bars with whatever little energy they had. The cry, undulating, unyielding, was unmistakably that of unadulterated, unmitigated terror. The dementor shrieked again and with the swarm heading ever closer, just turned and fled, gliding without the usual customary grace, cloak scraping against the walls.

With a wave of her hand, she dismissed the devourers and they disappeared in a puff of smoke and were gone.

She turned, the other dementors approaching from the other end of the aisle were stopped at a distance, a rumbling of noise in whatever passed for their throats.

"YOU WILL NOT FEED OFF THIS MAN."

Dementors did not speak, but the bobbing motion of the nearest of the dementors could pass readily enough for acquiescence, and they took a healthy distance from the pair.

Deitha cleared her throat, and her voice returned to its normal register. She smiled darkly at Odhrán. "Did I mention I scared people for a living? I am quite good at it."

[Odhrán Ó Dálaigh]

Odhrán felt just a little bit shakier on his legs than he had anticipated. The dementors were closing in on Deitha, his father and him. Strangely, he wasn't worried for himself. What could those floating sheets really do that was worse than what he had lived through already? He found he wasn't really worried about Deitha either. She was facing this head on, wand drawn. If anyone knew how to deal with darkness it was probably her. No, it was his father he worried about. Weak, confused and daring to hope again. It was a bad combination of things for a place like Azkaban.

Then a strange realisation hit him. Being not allowed to visit this place had been a strange form of kindness. Maybe, someone in the ministry hierarchy had tried to save him undue pain and suffering. Still, who were they to decide what he could and couldn't handle? He was on top of it all.

Deitha stepped forward into the fray, telling him she was taking care of this round. He didn't understand why she would risk getting into trouble for him, but there was no denying that she was competent. He decided to let her get on with it. This was not the time for a discussion. He found, to his own surprise, that he trusted her. Deitha's darkness was a familiar kind of darkness and he thought he rather knew it well. He had his own encounters with anger and the desire for revenge.

Odhrán watched in awe as she summoned creatures of nightmare from the void. He'd heard about it being possible at school, but he'd never actually seen somebody do it. The beasts were the stuff of nightmares. It was a good thing that Deitha was on his side in this. Here was one witch he most certainly did not want to cross.

As fascinating as watching was, he snapped out of it. There were things he needed to do here as well. He turned towards his father again. There was no time to talk it all trough. While Deitha could keep the dementors at bay for now, she wouldn't be able to do so forever. He needed answers from his father. He needed his father's side of the story. Odhrán looked at the broken man before him. He was in no state to provide what he needed. He'd rarely felt such reluctance, but he knew what needed to happen.

Odhrán slowly raised his wand and pointed it at his father. Their eyes locked. This was too hard, and yet it had to be done. His hand trembled as he started the wand movement, slowing it down to delay for a few seconds.

"Legillimens."

The connection was instant as his father offered no resistance. Odhrán staggered backwards. Looking into his fathers mind he found love and tenderness. These were not the things needed. He'd come for answers, not emotional closure. Still, he felt drawn to these images in his father's mind. Pictures of them together during happier times. There was no time for that. It took everything he had to force the focus of their link back to what happened with that cursed artefact and the strange dealings at the department of mysteries.

Impressions came so fast, it was giving Odhrán whiplash. He didn't understand what he was seeing, but there was always the pensieve to help him make sense of it later. He struggled to stay on his feet, leaning against a dirty cell wall as maintaining the mental link was draining him at quite an alarming rate.

"Yes, yes, keep going, more," he encouraged his father. "Show me everything. Show me what happened. I need to know." The urgency in his tone was unmistakeable.

Odhrán's eyes went wide, his wand hand started to tremble again. It was all too much. Half of his father's life was flashing before Odhrán's eyes. The good, the bad, the ugly, the lies, the intrigue, the danger.

[Deitha Albron]

Deitha had, of course, seen legilimancy done in person - having had it happen to her - but there was a peculiar and slightly grim fascination of watching the connection happen between two people: the facial expressions, the faintly wide-eyed moment as connection hit, a concussion wave with it powerful enough to make a grown man stagger... a grown man who had already clearly seen more than his fair share of darkness.

But she soon enough snapped out of it... feelings were running high - between the prisoners that had banged on their cells and the connection between Odhrán and his father, at some point the dementors were going to smell that. Smelt like hope. Like love. Like feelings that dementors feast on - and they were not complex creatures. Their primal and raw fear might keep the first one at bay for a while, but the others had only heard it, not seen it.

While waiting warily to see if, or more precisely when, the dementors would choose to make an appearance, Deitha allowed herself to rationally process some of what she had seen... she had, of course, known that Odhrán must have some kind of shady past; healers by definition healed people and his methods were distinctly at odds with the... the Hypocritic Oath... Hippocratic Oath, the 'do no harm' oath healers take. What he did skirted that line - even if she'd benefitted from it.

If he came here to use legilimancy on his own father, whatever had happened to him - to them - must have been dark indeed. Clearly having just a list of names wasn't enough. But the bond was eminently strong between them, and Odhrán was clearly someone who believed in 'doing what you had to do for family'.

And that was enough for Deitha. Everyone had a price, some paid it gladly.

The first dementor had shown no sign of returning, but the ghostly murmurings from down the corridor had started to get louder. They were coming. Judging by how many different noises she heard, she thought maybe four of them were headed in their direction. There had been a dozen but they were not all headed in this direction...

Four. Four she could handle. It might get trickier if that four got another few friends, though.

They. Were. Coming.

Three there were coming closer, nearer and Deitha began to feel the telltale tingle of the hairs at the back of her neck standing up. That moment when the skin starts to crawl with the feelings of melancholic gloom that gave way to dread and despondency, and finally to despair and anguish.

The nearest of the three leaned back, shoulders - such as they have shoulders - pushed back as well, and it shrieked. Piercing, shrill, undulating. It had echoes of the cry of fear that the first dementor had had, but this was different, a different timbre, a different tone. Angrier, but yet fearful even in its exultation.

Deitha wasn't sure but it sure sounded like a call to arms. A battle cry. Rallying even in its despondence.

She pushed her sleeves up, something she always did when she had to concentrate. She'd never been sure why she'd done it but it was a thing she'd always done. Something about the gesture asserted a state of mind, a sense of readiness.

Fear had been a useful ally and bringing forth her nightmare fiends had terrified one of them; she wasn't quite so sure that three, or more, would be quite so afraid even of a swarm of devourers.

Her voice dropped a register. "WHAT DO YOU FEAR." It wasn't a question.

And suddenly it came to her.

Two devourers, each several feet long spawned in front of her, between her and the group - twin-tails flinging bolts of dark smoke in the direction of the group.

The first dementor stopped shrieking and all three shrank back a few feet - but no further, even as the devourers advanced. Her instinct had bee right after all: nightmare fuel is only so effective, and less so in groups. Fortunately, though, that wasn't the end game.

She remembered a lesson on dementors from her time in Durmstrang - they were almost admired in a sinister way there, and it was understood that these... things... spawned in places of decay, disrepute and disrepair, as if evil and the dark of the world itself grew a fungus and slime of its own putrefaction, in the form of dementors.

And if decay and ruin is where a dementor lives, well...

"THIS PLACE HAS WALLOWED IN YOUR FILTH AND YOUR STINK FOR TOO LONG." What came next was hard to describe... some mix of a dozen minor spells, each of which a nothing to a witch whose day job was crafting illusions and phantasms to inspire emotions in clients. Each of them crafting the illusion that instead of a rotting, putrid diseased corpse of a building that had spawned the dementors, that it was a castle, clean, resplendent, airy. It didn't have to hold long, and it wouldn't persist past a cursory examination but that was all it had to do, just give the impression that this... place... wasn't the midpoint of a digestive tract on the route to eternal damnation.

If you make the place so unwelcome, even dementors will leave like vermin off a stinking ship.

The group had dispersed, and Deitha felt herself letting go a little and slumping against a nearby wall as the illusions and devourer phantasms winked out of existence. They were safe -- for now, but she wasn't sure about next time. Next time might actually rely on her successfully casting a Patronus and she wasn't sure she even could. The tale of Raczidian had been told in Durmstrang to full effect.

She idly wondered what her minder, Spode, was doing. She didn't have to wonder about Odhrán - he was busy. For the moment, they were safe.

[Odhrán Ó Dálaigh]

Odhrán had placed his trust in Deitha and was only vague aware of what was happening around him. Fighting sounds, wailing, gnashing bones. It was enough to make anyone's skin crawl. Illusions seemed to flicker in and out of existence. He'd never seen anyone do anything quite like it before. Suddenly, the dingy cell was bright and airy and resplendent. It seemed to repel the dementors as he no longer felt their presence as keenly. What a neat trick.

Realising he was getting distracted he redoubled his efforts to focus on his father and the connection. He wasn't sure that he had everything, but he thought that he understood. At the very least he had a lot more than he'd known before. How he would be able to translate this information into actions remained to be seen.

"Father," he whispered urgently. "I can't hold this much longer. If there is anything else, anything at all you want me to know, now is the time."

Those had been the wrong words. Odhrán had hoped for more on the case, but instead found himself bathed in his father's affections and warm feelings towards his family. What was he trying to do? The dementors would come back and nothing would keep them at bay with such powerful lure. And yet Odhrán found himself giving in, allowing a moment of true emotion, letting himself feel loved and appreciated. It seemed like his father was quite proud of him. Odhrán choked up. His eyes were watering with tears suddenly starting to roll down his cheeks.

Eventually, Odhrán's teary eyes and excessive blinking broke the connection between father and son. Still leaning against the cell wall, Odhrán tried to catch his breath.

"We should get going, Miss Albron," he said to Deitha. "The dementors will come back. They're on the move already. Too much hope. Way too much hope. That's a dangerous emotion to feel here and I suppose how many of the prisoners go mad. Well, I hoped you wouldn't have to see me do this."

Odhrán pointed his wand at his father again. "Stupefy! Obliviate!"

Darragh Ó Dálaigh collapsed onto the floor like a sack of potatoes, hitting the ground with a hard thud.

"It's kinder on him if he doesn't remember I was here. Now, do you have passage out of this hellscape or am I taking you with me?" 

The rational part of his brain knew she had to have arrived with somebody, and probably had to have made arrangements. However, he wasn't thinking all that straight at the moment. He took a few tentative steps forward finding that his stance was a little wobbly still, but it could have been worse. He looked to the left and then the right, which is where he saw them.
"Three, five, seven, nine..." his voice grew thinner with each dementor that he spotted. Deitha had just expended a lot of energy on her illusions, and he was so emotionally troubled that fighting with occlumency and legillimency seemed out of the question. He couldn't clear her mind or get any kind of shield back up. And they were on their own. Nobody would be too upset if neither of them came back from here. Well, Odhrán knew there was another option, though not one he put a lot of stock into. He'd had trouble with the spell before.

A happy memory. Odhrán's first instinct was to think of a kiss he'd shared with his girlfriend out on Inis Cú. It had been a perfect moment. The stars twinkling above them, the sea breaze, the way she'd looked at him. He'd felt giddy with joy and excitement.

"Expecto Patronum!" he tried the words, but all his wand delivered were a few silvery sparks and a puffing into nothingness. And this was why he hated this spell. Unreliable and fickle. When had he been happier than on Inis Cú? He thought it was an amazing memory, but apparently the spell that purported itself as the arbiter of his happiness felt differently. Odhrán felt a tinge of anger clouding his emotions. Not now. He needed happy.

And then he just knew. His mind focused on a moment from a little over a year ago. The day had been bright and cold. He'd been giving Aoibheann her medications when she had gently reached for his arm and just held his hand. So simple, and yet this moment had meant everything. The first time in as much as twenty years that she had done that. The day treatment had finally started lead to some tangible results.

"Expecto Patronum!" he said again, this time with deep conviction and certainty. The spell that unfolded before his eyes was massive. Silver mists were coalescing into a form, but from the looks of it not just any. A ghostly elk emerged from the aether, at least seven feet at the shoulder and with antlers so wide they clipped through the walls of the building. Oh holy! Had he just done that? He gave Deitha a questioning look, as if to check that it had really been him who had summoned this majestic beast.

"Boat's this way," he said and slowly set himself in motion. He couldn't help peek over his shoulder and watch the beast charge ahead into the gaggle of dementors. An elk. He supposed it suited him. He'd been called stubborn before.

[Deitha Albron]

Of all the things she didn't expect to see today, the sight of Odhrán stunning and removing his father's memories were not on the list. Whatever bond was there, whatever had happened between the two of them, Deitha couldn't imagine what had gone through Odhrán's mind to have done that - but he answered her - too much hope! She had assumed the dementors would have left Odhrán's father alone after her warning but if their connection had brought a much tastier morsel to the table, then perhaps as awful as it was, it was the kindest thing to have done.

Much as she didn't like the idea, Odhrán was right: they had to go, and the dementors would be back - and in greater numbers. They were already mustering.

She did have a way off the island - with her minder Spode, and she wondered what state he was in, whether he was in any fit state to come with them, or even to do something radical like help them. She looked half-expectantly down the corridor towards where she'd left Spode, but nothing.

And they were coming. They'd fled but the illusion she'd put up had never been intended to hold for long, and it had failed.

It occurred to her that if she disappeared and was never seen or heard of again, it would be inconvenient for some but... the thought she'd never walk her dog again sat uncomfortably with her. As the gloom began to descend, that was her strongest thought - not how they could get out of here, not whether help was coming, but whether she'd get to see her dog again.

Odhrán's wand sparked and sputtered some luminous wisps of colour and Deitha found herself wondering if it was time to face death with a smile and see if she could find a Patronus in herself - but this was far from the most ideal circumstance for trying it.

All of a sudden she could have fallen to the floor in shock as a thundering great silvery shimmery elk materialised, snorted and charged at the dementors. It was at least eight feet head to toe with ruddy great antlers seemingly prepared to spear any dementor who got too close.

She could have laughed when Odhrán told her about the boat - and she looked at him with a new-found sense of respect and awe.

"I need to pick up my minder first, we have a boat as well, but my one's all official like, it wouldn't look good if I didn't come back with him. Stay right here, I'll be right back."

She dashed off down the corridor, at what would have been a trot if her energy had yielded such enthusiasm, but she ambled along at speed to the cell where she'd made inquiries. Spode stood there, stoic, impassive, utterly disinterested. He opened his mouth as if to ask what had happened and seemingly thought better of it. There were certain things even a Ministry man didn't really want to know.

"Look, Spode, it's time to go. Now. We'll be taking a boat back, come on."

Spode didn't need telling twice, following Deitha along the halls, leaving a certain amount of confusion for Odhrán in his face, but Deitha simply said, "He's a friend - and it's time we were all going."

Both boats were waiting for them when they reached the edge of the grounds.

"So, uh, you want to take yours, I'll take mine and--" Before Deitha could finish, though, Spode interjected. "Right, miss, I don't care what business you have with this gentleman, I am to see you safely back to the Ministry for debriefing. We are going." It was the most he'd said all afternoon as he 'insisted' she get onto their boat.

Deitha looked at Odhrán with a rather peevish expression as the boat pushed off. She called into the fog, "I'll make an appointment, see you then." and then disappeared into the gloom, to leave Odhrán to his own passage back to sanity.