Fic: "Fra Pandolf's Hands" for waterbird
AAANNDDD WE'RE OFF!!!!! What? It's 1st April here!
Title: Fra Pandolf’s Hands
Author: a_t_rain
Recipient waterbird
Rating: PG
Characters: Dean, OC, cameos from Draco, Scrimgeour, and Bagman
Summary: Dean thinks his dreams have come true when the most famous painter in the wizarding world takes him on as an apprentice. But magical portraiture is a dangerous enterprise, and in the final days of the war, the Minister for Magic approaches the young artist with a commission that may end in murder...
Author’s Notes: I hope you enjoy this - it’s a bit darker than what I usually write, but I had fun working on it. The title, and several references in the text, come from Robert Browning’s My Last Duchess.
Fra Pandolf’s Hands
That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall,
Looking as if she were alive. I call
That piece a wonder, now...
- Robert Browning
Part One: Apprentice
“Very well, Potter,” said Professor McGonagall, “here is your schedule. Oh, by the way, twenty hopefuls have already put down their names for the Gryffindor Quidditch team. I shall pass the list to you in due course and you can fix up trials at your leisure.”
Harry began to gather up his things; Dean took his O.W.L. results out of his book bag, expecting his turn to be next. But Professor McGonagall remained at the opposite end of the table and turned instead to Ron Weasley. “Weasley, you, too, are eligible to proceed to N.E.W.T.-level Potions -”
Dean coughed.
“I have not forgotten about you, Thomas,” said McGonagall without looking up, “but I must ask you to show a little patience. I would like a word with you after the other students have gone.”
Ron shot Dean a questioning look, and Dean shrugged, trying to hide his nervousness. He had no idea what this was about; he thought the subjects he had chosen were appropriate, and he had been pleased, though a little surprised, by his O.W.L. results. Professor McGonagall couldn’t be about to accuse him of cheating, could she? He wasn’t really sure how he’d managed to scrape passing marks in Potions and History of Magic, but he knew he’d done it honestly, and McGonagall wasn’t the type to accuse a fellow without evidence -
Dean didn’t have long to wonder; McGonagall had finished drawing up a schedule for Ron, and he and Harry hurried off together.
“Now, Mr. Thomas,” McGonagall said briskly, “I understand you have a gift for drawing. Have you ever thought of serving an apprenticeship with a wizarding artist after you leave school?”
“Once or twice,” Dean muttered, astonished. He didn’t know how his Head of House had come by this information. He certainly hadn’t mentioned anything about art when they met to discuss his career options last spring, thinking she would consider such an ambition too frivolous to be worthy of her notice.
“Normally, one would not begin such an apprenticeship until the age of eighteen, but Master Julio Romano will be visiting Hogwarts this year to paint Professor Dumbledore’s portrait. He has expressed an interest in taking on one sixth- or seventh-year student of exceptional talent as an apprentice. You may have heard of Master Romano; he is the finest wizarding painter living, and studying under him is both an honor and a rare opportunity. I must impress upon you that if you are not certain that you want to do this - or if you are not willing to devote the time and effort that the craft of portrait-painting demands - many students would gladly take your place. I have, however, put forth your name, and Professor Dumbledore has approved my choice. Are you willing?”
Dean’s head was whirling. Of course he’d heard of Julio Romano - who hadn’t? - but he hadn’t even known the artist was still alive, much less at Hogwarts. And his professors thought he might be good enough to serve an apprenticeship with Master Romano?
After a minute, he realized that McGonagall was still awaiting his answer. Mutely, he nodded.
She scrutinized his O.W.L. results and the list of courses he’d chosen. “Good ... I see you have already decided to continue with Charms and Transfiguration, both of which you will need, and although Defense Against the Dark Arts is not particularly important for an artist, it is a wise choice given recent events. I see you have an Exceeds Expectations in Potions, but I do not think you will have the time to continue with the subject if you decide to go through with the apprenticeship. I understand from Master Romano that you will have no need for anything more complicated than a Color-Fixing Solution.”
Dean nodded his assent; he had neither expected nor wanted to take N.E.W.T.-level Potions.
“I also see no need for you to continue with Care of Magical Creatures.”
“But I like Care of Magical Creatures,” said Dean, feeling uncomfortably aware that he was one of the few students who did like it, and that Hagrid might well be facing an empty class if he didn’t sign up for it. “Don’t I have time for another subject, even with the apprenticeship?”
“Yes,” said Professor McGonagall. “History of Magic. Sixth year includes the study of magical arts and architecture. Absolutely essential for any aspiring portraitist.”
Dean groaned.
* * *
At first, his apprenticeship seemed to consist entirely of mixing paints, cleaning brushes, and watching in silence as Julio Romano worked on the great portrait of the Headmaster. The master painter forbade everyone from speaking, or even coughing, as he worked; Dumbledore took this in good spirits and handed around lemon drops at the beginning of each session, even to Fawkes. Dean, however, found the stillness in the office oppressive. There were so many questions he would have liked to ask: When and how did a portrait come to life? What were the charms that Master Romano cast on the canvas from time to time, and on Dumbledore before their first session? How had he managed to capture the way the light in the office thickened at the autumn sunset? But Romano did not seem to encourage questions, even after the afternoon’s work was done and Dean was helping him put his paints away.
He was an old man, perhaps only a few years younger than Dumbledore, though the Headmaster was looking increasingly frail this year, and Master Romano was still vigorous. He spoke with a slight accent and looked out at the world with glittering black eyes under heavy brows. His hands moved swiftly when he painted, and though he often said to Dean, “Watch what I do now,” Dean usually felt as if he’d missed whatever it was he was supposed to see; in the blink of an eye there would be a glint of light off Dumbledore’s painted spectacles where there hadn’t been before, or a strand of hair would take silky shape.
For all that, the afternoons Dean spent with him were not unpleasant. They were certainly more interesting than the History of Magic lessons he sat through in a nearly empty classroom, with only Theodore Nott of Slytherin and a handful of earnest-looking Ravenclaws for company. Professor Binns droned through a litany of famous wizarding artists without bothering to show the class any examples of their work. It was Master Romano who lent Dean books full of color plates and forgot to ask for them back, and who often paused as they walked to and from the Headmaster’s office to point out a particularly remarkable painting or a feature of the school’s architecture that Dean had always taken for granted.
He had asked to see some of Dean’s drawings on the first day of his apprenticeship; Dean had brought him a dozen examples of what he thought was his best work, and then stood by awkwardly as Romano spent an hour leafing through them and saying almost nothing, except to point out the occasional misplaced line or error in perspective. It took him weeks to understand that when Master Romano said nothing, it was a compliment.
Master Romano said little else to him, except to give him orders and command him to watch more closely, for the next two months. Then, as they were cleaning up one afternoon, he turned abruptly to Dean and asked him if he would like to try a painting of his own.
“I’d like that, sir,” said Dean, trying to hide his excitement. He felt like jumping up and punching the ceiling of Dumbledore’s office.
“Go and mix some paints. Use the charms I taught you.”
Master Romano watched closely as Dean worked, and gave him a small nod of approval. “Now think of a place that you love, and paint it. It must be a true picture, as the portrait I am painting of Dumbledore is a true portrait. It is easiest to learn that if it comes from love. But there must be no people in it and no animals. Only a place. You understand me?”
Dean nodded. He thought of the places he knew: his family’s crowded flat in London; Diagon Alley before the war had muted its colors and silenced people’s chatter; the grey stone cottages and green fields in the village Seamus came from; the West Indies, where his cousins lived...
That would make a brilliant painting, if only he could do justice to the clear light in the islands and the colors.
He worked on the picture for a week. Mindful of Master Romano’s instruction to include no people and no animals, he painted a strip of empty beach, white between the blue water and a stand of casuarina trees. He added a palm in the foreground, though trying to capture the play of light and shade on the fronds gave him more than a day’s worth of trouble.
He was putting the last touches on the palm tree’s shadow when the miracle happened. The landscape seemed to go rigid like a living thing holding its breath, and then it breathed. Wind stirred in the palm fronds; the shadows of the trees swayed; the surface of the water rippled and the light sparkled on the sea.
Involuntarily, Dean cried out.
“Silence, please!” snapped Master Romano, who was inspecting the work he’d done on Dumbledore’s portrait that afternoon and frowning.
“Sorry,” muttered Dean. “It’s only - Well, I think you’d better have a look.”
Master Romano walked around to stand behind Dean’s canvas. “Well done,” he said after inspecting it for a moment. “It has life and magic; that is the important thing. However...” He went on to point out a dozen flaws with the painting, some of which Dean had known about, some of which he thought nobody but Romano would ever notice. “It is a good picture,” he admitted at last, grudgingly. “Try again, and see if you can make it great.”
But Dean didn’t want to paint the same scene twice. He’d discovered a new and wonderful kind of magic, and he was eager to find out what he could do with it and what its limits were. He looked at the bright surface of his blue ocean and thought of the mysterious, silent world that lay beneath it; he’d often seen it when he went swimming with a Bubble-Head Charm. His second piece would be something different altogether, an underwater seascape.
He painted fan coral swaying gently with the ebb and flow of the sea, and deep trenches lined with silvery sand, and the shimmering light of the sky seen from underwater.
Last of all, he painted fish - little striped sergeant-majors, a school of blue tang, a big, gentle parrotfish nibbling at the coral in the foreground. He took particular care with the parrotfish, edging the tail with blue and bright yellow, outlining the green scales in purple, and adding a streak of neon pink over the gills.
As he painted the last stroke, the parrotfish flicked its tail and swam off among the coral. Dean drew in his breath at the beauty of it.
Master Romano’s voice made him jump. “Just what do you think you are doing?”
“Er - painting a fish,” said Dean stupidly.
“So I see. Are you completely a fool? Did you not hear me say, you will paint no people and no animals?”
“I forgot.”
“It is dangerous to forget when you know almost nothing to begin with!”
“I know a lot of things!” Dean retorted, stung. “I know enough about painting to make that fish come to life, don’t I?”
“When you make a magical painting of a person or an animal, you take away its life-force - do you understand? That fish died the minute you put the last touch on your canvas. There are binding spells you can do to prevent this - someday I will teach you, if you are not too stubborn to learn. I do them on Professor Dumbledore’s portrait every day, and I performed a Soul-Fixing Charm on Dumbledore himself before I began. The portrait will be still, frozen, until the day he dies, and only then it will come to life. But you must do this before you begin to paint, and every day thereafter. Because you did not listen to me, you have killed a fish - and you might as easily have killed a human!”
“You didn’t tell me any of this!” Dean protested.
“You should have known! Remember Fra Pandolf and the Duke of Ferrara’s wife!”
“Who the hell are they?”
“You have not been reading your History of Magic book!” snapped Master Romano. This was certainly true, but as far as Dean was concerned, it explained nothing. Master Romano, however, turned his back and walked away without saying more.
Dean tried to tell himself he had a right to be angry at Romano. The master painter could have bloody well told him why he shouldn’t paint animals, instead of giving orders without explaining them. But in truth, he hadn’t the heart to be very angry. He turned the painting to the wall, feeling raw and sick and guilty.
It was only a stupid fish, he reminded himself. He ate fish all the time, didn’t he, and he didn’t feel guilty about that. What did it matter if one had died, somewhere in the Caribbean?
But it wasn’t really about the fish. He was frightened at his power, and he hadn’t felt this afraid of magic since first year, when he’d accidentally turned Seamus into a little, wizened old man in Charms, and had to wait outside the door with his heart pounding while Professor Flitwick reversed the spell. But no spell could reverse a death.
That evening, he went looking for the story of Fra Pandolf and the Duke of Ferrara’s wife. Romano had been right; Dean hadn’t bothered to read the last three hundred pages or so of the History of Magic textbook. He’d quit doing homework for Binns after Harry recruited him for the Gryffindor Quidditch team. Between Quidditch and the apprenticeship, he just didn’t have time to study any more; he barely even saw his girlfriend except at practices, and he’d fallen asleep in Charms after spending most of the night studying.
Suddenly he felt utterly wretched. It only made matters worse that he had everything a bloke was supposed to want - a place on the Quidditch team, a pretty girlfriend, an apprenticeship that many older and more talented wizards would have sold their souls to have. Seamus had been jealous and edgy ever since he became Chaser, and he knew in his heart that things weren’t going right with Ginny either, not since the day Ron and Harry had interrupted them in the corridor.
He buried himself in the History of Magic textbook to avoid thinking about Seamus and Ginny. There it was: a Muggle Duke, in the days before the Statute of Secrecy, had commissioned a portrait of his wife from a famous wizarding artist called Fra Pandolf. The world had understood Soul-Fixing Charms only imperfectly, in those days, and she had died on the instant the portrait was completed. According to a footnote in the textbook, an Englishman named Browning had later written a famous poem about the incident from the Duke’s point of view, although since he was a Muggle, he had of course got the salient details wrong.
The following afternoon, Master Romano asked him what he had found out about Fra Pandolf, and Dean told him.
“Did you look up the poem as well?”
Dean shook his head. “The bloke who wrote the book didn’t seem to think very highly of it.”
“Browning understood more than your textbook gives him credit for. All artists do. Tell me, did your book mention what happened to Fra Pandolf afterward?”
“It said no blame attached to him, and the Duke paid him a lot of money for the portrait.” Dean thought about this for a moment, chewing on his lower lip. “I thought that was kind of strange. Weren’t those the days of witch-burnings?”
Romano nodded. “You are not completely a fool. I am sorry that I said you were.”
Dean hid a smile. “Not completely a fool” was high praise indeed from Romano.
“Come, I will show you something. Professor Dumbledore has gone away, so we have the afternoon to ourselves.”
Romano rummaged among the paintings in his studio and unearthed a particularly dusty-looking one, in a peeling and cracking frame. It depicted a city of sun and stone, dazzling white with a light that could come only from the painter’s own magic, though nothing stirred in the narrow streets or the plaza that opened on a massive baroque cathedral. “I painted that when I was your age,” he said.
“You were a lot better than I am.”
Romano shook his head. “I tried harder, that is all. Go back and work on your picture of the island, it will be as good someday.”
The sky in the painting was darkening even as Dean watched, and the changing light touched the white stones of the cathedral with rose. “That’s your place, isn’t it, sir? Like the island is mine.”
“Yes,” said Romano. “Keep that place in your heart,” he added cryptically, “and remember that your truth is worth more than money.”
Part Two: Journeyman
The war was still raging when Dean left school. Harry Potter would destroy Voldemort later that summer, leaving only scattered cells of Death Eaters to carry on the fight; but that battle was yet to come when Rufus Scrimgeour summoned Dean to the Ministry of Magic.
Dean couldn’t afford a place of his own, so he had moved back in with his mother and stepfather. He shared a room with his two younger brothers at night, sleeping with his wand on the bedside table in case he needed to defend his family. By day, he haunted the galleries in Aesthetic Alley and tried to talk the owners into displaying his work. Nobody seemed very interested. These were troubled times, and the last thing most people cared about was buying art.
So when he got the letter from Scrimgeour - delivered not by owl post but by personal courier - he thought it was a stroke of luck. To be sure, the Minister wasn’t very forthcoming; he hadn’t provided the slightest hint about the nature of Dean’s commission, but at least he made it clear that it was a commission, and that Master Romano had spoken of Dean’s abilities in the highest terms indeed.
Dean arrived at the Ministry building at half-past-eight that evening, half an hour before the appointed time, but well after most of the Ministry employees had gone home. He pinned the badge that read Dean Thomas, Artist to his robes and entered the deserted Atrium. He spent the next twenty minutes studying the art in the building, most of which was monumental in scope and theme. A pre-Raphaelite mural representing Merlin and Nenyve advising King Arthur adorned one end of the Atrium, while a portrait of Queen Elizabeth gazing at John Dee with an adoring and improbably fatuous expression hung on the opposite wall. The Fountain of Magical Brethren, of course, had been destroyed two years earlier, but Dean had seen pictures in one of Master Romano’s books, and he was inclined to think it hadn’t been any great loss. He hoped Scrimgeour wasn’t expecting him to design a replacement. Actually, he couldn’t really picture anything he had created looking at home in this building, though he knew enough to keep his doubts to himself in front of the Minister.
He took the lift up to Scrimgeour’s office, showed his badge to the security troll and repeated the password he’d been given in the letter to the gargoyle. The door swung open, and Dean found himself face to face with the Minister.
Scrimgeour favored him with a thin smile. “Come in, Mr. Thomas, and good evening. I’ve been expecting you.”
At a flick of the Minister’s wand, the door closed and sealed itself, leaving only solid plaster where it had been. Dean noticed a small and ugly oil painting, depicting a frog-faced man in a wig, on the wall behind Scrimgeour’s desk. Otherwise, all four walls of the room were resolutely blank; they made him feel claustrophobic. He was inclined to agree that the office needed the services of an artist, but he wondered whether Scrimgeour really wanted one.
The Minister was studying his face intently, but he had not spoken. “You said you had a commission for me, sir?” Dean ventured to ask after a minute.
“I might,” said Scrimgeour. “Should you choose to accept the terms. I believe the Ministry can offer fair compensation.”
He named a sum that was more than Dean had expected to earn in five years.
“That sounds ... very fair, sir,” said Dean, once he had found his voice again. “What would I have to do?”
“Ah. The Ministry expects work of the very highest caliber, of course - as well as perfect discretion. Have you ever heard of a man named Ludovic Bagman?”
“Yeah, of course.” Dean hadn’t been expecting this question at all, but he was relieved that the Minister had asked him something he actually knew. “He was a Quidditch player - I think he used to be Beater for the Wimbourne Wasps, ages ago - and after that he was one of the judges at the Triwizard Tournament, only then he got into some sort of trouble over gambling debts, and he hasn’t been seen in three years.”
“That,” said Scrimgeour, “is what the Death Eaters want the public to think.”
Something stirred at the back of Dean’s memory. “Wasn’t Bagman accused of being a Death Eater in the first war? I think I read that somewhere.”
“He was accused, tried, and acquitted,” said Scrimgeour. “It was a farce of a trial, as well attended as the Quidditch World Cup and almost as unruly. The spectators didn’t seem to know the difference, which isn’t surprising, because the Wizengamot evidently didn’t either. Dozens of them crowded around Bagman afterward and asked him for autographs. He signed them all gladly. It must have seemed a cheap price to pay for his freedom.”
“Are you saying he was guilty?” asked Dean.
“Guilty as sin.” Scrimgeour opened one of his desk drawers and pulled out a thick file. One after another, he placed the documents on the desk in front of Dean: a photograph of Bagman shaking hands with Augustus Rookwood, the testimony of witnesses stating that Bagman had passed on information instrumental in the attempt to assassinate Millicent Bagnold in 1979 and the deaths of Luke and Marlene McKinnon and their children. Transcripts from Bagman’s trial. A more recent statement from Dean’s own ex-girlfriend, Ginny Weasley, describing one of the Death Eaters who had attacked Hogwarts a year earlier as a large blond man who looked like Bagman. Banking records showing that Bagman’s debts had been paid by Narcissa Malfoy.
“But what has all this got to do with me?” Dean asked half an hour later.
“Ah,” said Scrimgeour again. “Bagman, you must understand, is something of a parvenu. He pretends to be interested in art, though he’s a poor judge of it, and I have heard from reliable sources that he has lately expressed a desire to have his portrait painted. I have also been informed that Bagman knows very little about wizarding portraits, and has only a vague idea of the dangers involved. His chief concern is getting it done for a bargain price, and he would be more than happy to hire a young, green painter to do it - a risk that a more informed wizard would never take because of the potential for a tragic accident. Are you beginning to understand?”
“Yes,” said Dean, rising abruptly from his chair. “I’m not your man. Keep your money.”
Scrimgeour was still smiling. “Your scruples do you credit,” he said. “I should hardly have trusted you if you had given me any other answer. But I must ask you to examine one more set of documents before you go.”
The Minister took the last few papers from the file. They were old records of an Auror investigation that had never led to a trial, as the evidence was purely circumstantial, but taken along with the rest of the material in the file, it was damning. The evidence linked Bagman with a murder that had happened in 1980.
Dean had seen the victim’s name before: once in a yellowed obituary from the Daily Prophet, and once on his own birth certificate.
He looked up. Scrimgeour’s amber eyes were studying his face again, unblinking.
Dean swallowed. “I’ll do it,” he said.
“I thought you might.”
* * *
“How’s it coming, hey?” said Bagman jocularly. He was a big, blond man, going rather jowly and pouchy-eyed in his middle age, but with some remnants of good looks. He didn’t look like a killer, but then, neither did Dean. “I know there’s a lot of me to paint, but you’ve been at it more than a week. If you want to save yourself some time and make me as thin and pretty as I was twenty years ago, I won’t object.”
“It’s coming along all right,” said Dean. “Only another evening or two.” The truth was that he was making a mess of the portrait. His hands were shaking, and he’d smudged his work twice and had to paint over it. What he had managed to transfer to the canvas was characterless; it could just as easily have been a painting of an overweight Gilderoy Lockhart as one of Bagman.
I’m not going to be able to do this, he thought. It doesn’t matter whether I want to or not - the work hasn’t got enough of a life of its own to capture his life-force. He would just have to go back to Scrimgeour and tell him he had failed; he wasn’t a skilled enough artist to pull it off.
The thought should have been a relief, but Dean found it a bitter blow - partly to his artist’s pride, partly to something more elemental. This man killed my father. What good am I, if I can’t avenge him?
And now, at last, he wanted to do what Scrimgeour had asked him to do. He wanted to trap Bagman’s soul, pin it to the canvas, lay it bare so that the world could see the man for what he was. He began again on a fresh piece of canvas, painting Bagman’s portrait with fast and slashing strokes. It was the portrait of a murderer - and worse than that, a hypocrite, a man who had walked free because the public loved him, who had smiled and signed autographs and made a career of seeming affable and none too bright, who had walked in the sunshine knowing all the while that Dean’s father was lying in a shallow grave. And Dean - fourteen years old, watching the Triwizard Tournament from the stands - had admired him.
It took him only a matter of hours to finish the job. As the sun set, the twisted face beneath his hands came to life, snarling and sneering; and in that same moment, Bagman went slack and slumped heavily to the floor.
He didn’t look closely at Bagman’s inert body. He had wanted it to happen, but now it made him feel sick. Quickly, he packed up his paints and prepared to go back to Scrimgeour.
“Not so fast, Thomas,” said a voice from the shadows.
Dean straightened up. His wand and his paintbrush fell from his hand and clattered on the floor.
He’d known that voice. “Malfoy?” he whispered.
Draco Malfoy, who had been missing for more than a year, was holding his wand aloft like a lantern. “Is Bagman dead?” he asked coolly, as the light flickered across the Quidditch player’s face.
“I didn’t kill him,” said Dean. “I mean, I didn’t mean to kill him. It was an accident.”
“Don’t bother lying to me, mudblood. I know what happened here.”
“No, you don’t.” Dean willed his voice to grow steadier. “And I’m not Muggle-born. My father was a wizard and Bagman killed him. You’re right, I killed him on purpose, but I’ve done what I came to do. I’m not in this war. I haven’t got any quarrel with you or the Death Eaters.”
That last was a lie, and Dean felt ashamed of speaking it; he’d trained with Dumbledore’s Army and watched the Death Eaters pick off his friends. But tonight he was perfectly happy to let Draco Malfoy - and as many other Death Eaters as he might have brought with him - go their ways. He sure as hell wasn’t about to play the hero tonight. He just wanted to get out of there alive, and it was starting to look like he wasn’t going to make it.
“If he was a friend of yours, I’m sorry,” he added. As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he realized how fatuous they sounded.
“Oh, don’t worry,” said Draco, “he wasn’t a friend of mine.” He walked up to Bagman and turned him over with his foot. “He was an idiot and a liability. Drunk half the time, talked too much, expected the Dark Lord to pay his gambling debts. He’s only been on one mission since this war started, and he was such a poor hand with a wand that he killed Gibbon by accident.” He looked Dean in the eye. “We all wanted him dead. Don’t kid yourself - you would never have got in here to kill him if we hadn’t wanted you to.”
Dean swallowed. “The Death Eaters were using me all along?”
“How else would Scrimgeour know Bagman wanted his portrait painted? One of our men in the Ministry tipped him off. And who do you think planted the idea in the fool’s head in the first place?” Draco shook his head. “You really don’t think, do you, mudb - excuse me, half-blood?”
Dean said nothing. He wondered how he could have been such a fool.
“Why are you looking so sick?” Draco taunted him. “You were happy enough for Scrimgeour to use you, weren’t you? What’s the difference?”
Dean forced himself to look at Bagman’s body. I’m sorry, he mouthed in Bagman’s direction, though he knew it could make no difference to a dead man.
“All right,” said Dean. “So I’ve done your dirty work for you. Are you happy now that I’ve said it? I’m leaving.”
Draco spun about on his heel. His wand was trained on Dean. “The Duke of Ferrara made a mistake. He let Fra Pandolf live.”
Dean concentrated on the wordless spells they’d learned in sixth year, trying to summon his own wand into his hand, knowing all the while that Draco had the advantage of him and it was useless.
But Draco stood still for a moment instead of attacking. He looked pale and ill, almost as bad as Dean felt. His hand was trembling. Dean risked a dive for the floor.
“Petrificus Totalis!”
Dean dodged the spell, rolling almost into a ball.
“AVADA -”
Bagman sat up.
Oh hell, Dean thought, he’s made Bagman into an Inferius. What works on Inferi? Heat. Light.
“Incendio!” A wall of fire burst from Dean’s wand. He had just enough time to register, in the blaze of light, that Draco looked every bit as shocked at Bagman’s resurrection as Dean was, and then he turned and ran out of the burning house. He stumbled through the gathering darkness until he judged he was far enough away to Apparate, gathered his strength for the journey to London - and then realized that being in London wouldn’t save him. The Death Eaters would trace him if he went back to Scrimgeour, and if he went home, they’d probably attack his family...
He took a wild leap of faith and concentrated on a plaza and a cathedral he had never seen.
* * *
The evening was hot and still; hardly a breath of wind stirred in the palm trees. The restaurants around the plaza were crowded with diners seated outdoors, and a group of girls Dean’s age swept by, laughing and chattering to each other in Spanish. He barely noticed the people. He was looking at buildings, trying to calculate the angle from which he’d seen them before.
He spotted a small alley leading off from the plaza opposite the cathedral. It looked no different from any of the other side streets except that nobody walked that way, nobody even gave it a second glance, and to Dean’s eyes the street had a curious luminous shimmer. This, he guessed, was the gateway to the wizarding district. He crossed its threshold, and the chatter of voices and the thrum of dance music from Muggle clubs grew hushed behind him.
He walked up and down the street, reading the names under the doorbells, until he found what he was looking for. He rang the bell, and stood there fidgeting for a long minute until Master Romano let him into the building.
“Sir, I need to talk to you about something.”
“Welcome to Cádiz,” said Romano. He did not seem particularly surprised to see Dean. “And there is no need to call me ‘sir.’ You are no longer an apprentice. You are a colleague.”
“Julio.” The name felt strange on Dean’s tongue. “I’m - I apologize for coming here, but I’m in trouble and I didn’t know where else to go.”
“So is everyone in England. It is no place for an artist any more. That is why I came home.”
“I’m in worse trouble than everyone else in England. Let me explain.” Dean told him everything, haltingly at first, then with the feverish zeal of confession. He didn’t look up at Romano after he came to the part where he accepted Scrimgeour’s proposition; somehow that moment was harder to talk about than Bagman’s death or its aftermath. But he plunged on with the story to the end. “I’ve killed a man. Maybe two people. One of them was self-defense, but I don’t expect the Aurors to understand that. I think the Death Eaters might be after me, too. I’ll go, if you don’t want me to stay.”
“You killed no one. It was on the news, on the wireless. Bagman’s house burned to the ground, but he and the Malfoy boy escaped. They will be lucky if your Ministry finds them before the other Death Eaters do.”
“But - But Bagman died. I saw.”
Romano waved his hand. “You only think you saw. Knocked him out, most likely. You might have weakened him permanently if the portrait had not burned. It was not a great portrait, I imagine?”
“It was - I was angry. I painted it in a hurry. No, I think it was pretty much crap, to tell you the truth.”
“That is what saved him. The explanation is simple. Only a true portrait can capture the sitter’s spirit, whole and entire. You saw only the Death Eater, not the man, and you painted him without sympathy or pity. That is not enough to give life to a painting, nor to take it from a man. Consider yourself fortunate that you did no better.”
“I do,” said Dean, feeling considerably shaken.
“And you let yourself be bought and sold by men who offered you no respect. If you mean to use everything I have taught you to kill the man who murdered your father - that is your own business. But for God’s sake, make it your own revenge and not someone else’s. That is all I have to say on the subject.” Romano stood up, took two glasses from the cupboard, and opened a bottle of wine. “And now, tell me what else you have been doing. It is more than a year since I saw you.”
They talked for most of the night. Dean began to feel steadier as he sipped at the wine, although he still pricked up his ears every time the news came on the wireless. Romano translated everything that had to do with the war in Britain, though most of it did not. As the night wore on, Dean began to feel as if the world of Aurors and Death Eaters were fading away behind him.
And then the wireless broadcast cut off in the middle of a piece of music, and an excited-sounding announcer’s voice broke in. Dean caught the words Harry Potter, and then Voldemort. “What’s he saying?” he demanded of Romano. “What is it?”
Romano paced across the room to the window and drew the curtains aside. “It is the dawn.”
* * *
Epilogue: Master
“Professor Longbottom said I might want to think about doing an apprenticeship to a portrait-painter after I left school, sir.” The girl twisted one of her long pigtails around her finger. She looked very young. “I know it’s a little early, but I was wondering - since you were here to paint Professor McGonagall’s portrait - do you think you might ...?”
“What’s your name?” Dean asked.
“Rosalind Pye, sir.”
“And how old are you, Rosalind?”
“Sixteen.” Not so young, then. Dean was finding it hard to judge the ages of young people these days; he supposed it was one of the less-talked-about side effects of approaching middle age. He looked again at Rosalind’s upturned face and realized that he’d almost forgotten what it was to be so eager, and so nervous.
“Can I have a look at some of your work?”
Rosalind nodded, shyly, and opened the portfolio she’d brought with her. She had plenty of raw talent, Dean thought as he leafed through the pages. He kept the thought to himself and took his time examining her work - for no particular reason, except that was what Julio Romano would have done. The truth was, he wasn’t sure exactly what one did with an apprentice. He tried to remember, and wished Julio were still alive so he could ask him...
When he looked up again and saw that Rosalind was practically bouncing on the balls of her feet, hungry for a word or a sign from him, he began to wonder if Julio’s guidance would have been enough, after all.
“OK,” he said. “I think you have potential. Can you be here at three o’clock every afternoon, after your classes?”
“Oh, yes, sir! Thank you, Master Thomas!”
Dean smiled. “You don’t have to call me ‘Master Thomas.’ ‘Dean’ will do.” He hoped that would be all right with McGonagall and the rest of the Hogwarts staff. “Right. The first thing I’m going to teach you is how to perform a Soul-Fixing Charm, and why we use them...”
Title: Fra Pandolf’s Hands
Author: a_t_rain
Recipient waterbird
Rating: PG
Characters: Dean, OC, cameos from Draco, Scrimgeour, and Bagman
Summary: Dean thinks his dreams have come true when the most famous painter in the wizarding world takes him on as an apprentice. But magical portraiture is a dangerous enterprise, and in the final days of the war, the Minister for Magic approaches the young artist with a commission that may end in murder...
Author’s Notes: I hope you enjoy this - it’s a bit darker than what I usually write, but I had fun working on it. The title, and several references in the text, come from Robert Browning’s My Last Duchess.
Fra Pandolf’s Hands
That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall,
Looking as if she were alive. I call
That piece a wonder, now...
- Robert Browning
Part One: Apprentice
“Very well, Potter,” said Professor McGonagall, “here is your schedule. Oh, by the way, twenty hopefuls have already put down their names for the Gryffindor Quidditch team. I shall pass the list to you in due course and you can fix up trials at your leisure.”
Harry began to gather up his things; Dean took his O.W.L. results out of his book bag, expecting his turn to be next. But Professor McGonagall remained at the opposite end of the table and turned instead to Ron Weasley. “Weasley, you, too, are eligible to proceed to N.E.W.T.-level Potions -”
Dean coughed.
“I have not forgotten about you, Thomas,” said McGonagall without looking up, “but I must ask you to show a little patience. I would like a word with you after the other students have gone.”
Ron shot Dean a questioning look, and Dean shrugged, trying to hide his nervousness. He had no idea what this was about; he thought the subjects he had chosen were appropriate, and he had been pleased, though a little surprised, by his O.W.L. results. Professor McGonagall couldn’t be about to accuse him of cheating, could she? He wasn’t really sure how he’d managed to scrape passing marks in Potions and History of Magic, but he knew he’d done it honestly, and McGonagall wasn’t the type to accuse a fellow without evidence -
Dean didn’t have long to wonder; McGonagall had finished drawing up a schedule for Ron, and he and Harry hurried off together.
“Now, Mr. Thomas,” McGonagall said briskly, “I understand you have a gift for drawing. Have you ever thought of serving an apprenticeship with a wizarding artist after you leave school?”
“Once or twice,” Dean muttered, astonished. He didn’t know how his Head of House had come by this information. He certainly hadn’t mentioned anything about art when they met to discuss his career options last spring, thinking she would consider such an ambition too frivolous to be worthy of her notice.
“Normally, one would not begin such an apprenticeship until the age of eighteen, but Master Julio Romano will be visiting Hogwarts this year to paint Professor Dumbledore’s portrait. He has expressed an interest in taking on one sixth- or seventh-year student of exceptional talent as an apprentice. You may have heard of Master Romano; he is the finest wizarding painter living, and studying under him is both an honor and a rare opportunity. I must impress upon you that if you are not certain that you want to do this - or if you are not willing to devote the time and effort that the craft of portrait-painting demands - many students would gladly take your place. I have, however, put forth your name, and Professor Dumbledore has approved my choice. Are you willing?”
Dean’s head was whirling. Of course he’d heard of Julio Romano - who hadn’t? - but he hadn’t even known the artist was still alive, much less at Hogwarts. And his professors thought he might be good enough to serve an apprenticeship with Master Romano?
After a minute, he realized that McGonagall was still awaiting his answer. Mutely, he nodded.
She scrutinized his O.W.L. results and the list of courses he’d chosen. “Good ... I see you have already decided to continue with Charms and Transfiguration, both of which you will need, and although Defense Against the Dark Arts is not particularly important for an artist, it is a wise choice given recent events. I see you have an Exceeds Expectations in Potions, but I do not think you will have the time to continue with the subject if you decide to go through with the apprenticeship. I understand from Master Romano that you will have no need for anything more complicated than a Color-Fixing Solution.”
Dean nodded his assent; he had neither expected nor wanted to take N.E.W.T.-level Potions.
“I also see no need for you to continue with Care of Magical Creatures.”
“But I like Care of Magical Creatures,” said Dean, feeling uncomfortably aware that he was one of the few students who did like it, and that Hagrid might well be facing an empty class if he didn’t sign up for it. “Don’t I have time for another subject, even with the apprenticeship?”
“Yes,” said Professor McGonagall. “History of Magic. Sixth year includes the study of magical arts and architecture. Absolutely essential for any aspiring portraitist.”
Dean groaned.
* * *
At first, his apprenticeship seemed to consist entirely of mixing paints, cleaning brushes, and watching in silence as Julio Romano worked on the great portrait of the Headmaster. The master painter forbade everyone from speaking, or even coughing, as he worked; Dumbledore took this in good spirits and handed around lemon drops at the beginning of each session, even to Fawkes. Dean, however, found the stillness in the office oppressive. There were so many questions he would have liked to ask: When and how did a portrait come to life? What were the charms that Master Romano cast on the canvas from time to time, and on Dumbledore before their first session? How had he managed to capture the way the light in the office thickened at the autumn sunset? But Romano did not seem to encourage questions, even after the afternoon’s work was done and Dean was helping him put his paints away.
He was an old man, perhaps only a few years younger than Dumbledore, though the Headmaster was looking increasingly frail this year, and Master Romano was still vigorous. He spoke with a slight accent and looked out at the world with glittering black eyes under heavy brows. His hands moved swiftly when he painted, and though he often said to Dean, “Watch what I do now,” Dean usually felt as if he’d missed whatever it was he was supposed to see; in the blink of an eye there would be a glint of light off Dumbledore’s painted spectacles where there hadn’t been before, or a strand of hair would take silky shape.
For all that, the afternoons Dean spent with him were not unpleasant. They were certainly more interesting than the History of Magic lessons he sat through in a nearly empty classroom, with only Theodore Nott of Slytherin and a handful of earnest-looking Ravenclaws for company. Professor Binns droned through a litany of famous wizarding artists without bothering to show the class any examples of their work. It was Master Romano who lent Dean books full of color plates and forgot to ask for them back, and who often paused as they walked to and from the Headmaster’s office to point out a particularly remarkable painting or a feature of the school’s architecture that Dean had always taken for granted.
He had asked to see some of Dean’s drawings on the first day of his apprenticeship; Dean had brought him a dozen examples of what he thought was his best work, and then stood by awkwardly as Romano spent an hour leafing through them and saying almost nothing, except to point out the occasional misplaced line or error in perspective. It took him weeks to understand that when Master Romano said nothing, it was a compliment.
Master Romano said little else to him, except to give him orders and command him to watch more closely, for the next two months. Then, as they were cleaning up one afternoon, he turned abruptly to Dean and asked him if he would like to try a painting of his own.
“I’d like that, sir,” said Dean, trying to hide his excitement. He felt like jumping up and punching the ceiling of Dumbledore’s office.
“Go and mix some paints. Use the charms I taught you.”
Master Romano watched closely as Dean worked, and gave him a small nod of approval. “Now think of a place that you love, and paint it. It must be a true picture, as the portrait I am painting of Dumbledore is a true portrait. It is easiest to learn that if it comes from love. But there must be no people in it and no animals. Only a place. You understand me?”
Dean nodded. He thought of the places he knew: his family’s crowded flat in London; Diagon Alley before the war had muted its colors and silenced people’s chatter; the grey stone cottages and green fields in the village Seamus came from; the West Indies, where his cousins lived...
That would make a brilliant painting, if only he could do justice to the clear light in the islands and the colors.
He worked on the picture for a week. Mindful of Master Romano’s instruction to include no people and no animals, he painted a strip of empty beach, white between the blue water and a stand of casuarina trees. He added a palm in the foreground, though trying to capture the play of light and shade on the fronds gave him more than a day’s worth of trouble.
He was putting the last touches on the palm tree’s shadow when the miracle happened. The landscape seemed to go rigid like a living thing holding its breath, and then it breathed. Wind stirred in the palm fronds; the shadows of the trees swayed; the surface of the water rippled and the light sparkled on the sea.
Involuntarily, Dean cried out.
“Silence, please!” snapped Master Romano, who was inspecting the work he’d done on Dumbledore’s portrait that afternoon and frowning.
“Sorry,” muttered Dean. “It’s only - Well, I think you’d better have a look.”
Master Romano walked around to stand behind Dean’s canvas. “Well done,” he said after inspecting it for a moment. “It has life and magic; that is the important thing. However...” He went on to point out a dozen flaws with the painting, some of which Dean had known about, some of which he thought nobody but Romano would ever notice. “It is a good picture,” he admitted at last, grudgingly. “Try again, and see if you can make it great.”
But Dean didn’t want to paint the same scene twice. He’d discovered a new and wonderful kind of magic, and he was eager to find out what he could do with it and what its limits were. He looked at the bright surface of his blue ocean and thought of the mysterious, silent world that lay beneath it; he’d often seen it when he went swimming with a Bubble-Head Charm. His second piece would be something different altogether, an underwater seascape.
He painted fan coral swaying gently with the ebb and flow of the sea, and deep trenches lined with silvery sand, and the shimmering light of the sky seen from underwater.
Last of all, he painted fish - little striped sergeant-majors, a school of blue tang, a big, gentle parrotfish nibbling at the coral in the foreground. He took particular care with the parrotfish, edging the tail with blue and bright yellow, outlining the green scales in purple, and adding a streak of neon pink over the gills.
As he painted the last stroke, the parrotfish flicked its tail and swam off among the coral. Dean drew in his breath at the beauty of it.
Master Romano’s voice made him jump. “Just what do you think you are doing?”
“Er - painting a fish,” said Dean stupidly.
“So I see. Are you completely a fool? Did you not hear me say, you will paint no people and no animals?”
“I forgot.”
“It is dangerous to forget when you know almost nothing to begin with!”
“I know a lot of things!” Dean retorted, stung. “I know enough about painting to make that fish come to life, don’t I?”
“When you make a magical painting of a person or an animal, you take away its life-force - do you understand? That fish died the minute you put the last touch on your canvas. There are binding spells you can do to prevent this - someday I will teach you, if you are not too stubborn to learn. I do them on Professor Dumbledore’s portrait every day, and I performed a Soul-Fixing Charm on Dumbledore himself before I began. The portrait will be still, frozen, until the day he dies, and only then it will come to life. But you must do this before you begin to paint, and every day thereafter. Because you did not listen to me, you have killed a fish - and you might as easily have killed a human!”
“You didn’t tell me any of this!” Dean protested.
“You should have known! Remember Fra Pandolf and the Duke of Ferrara’s wife!”
“Who the hell are they?”
“You have not been reading your History of Magic book!” snapped Master Romano. This was certainly true, but as far as Dean was concerned, it explained nothing. Master Romano, however, turned his back and walked away without saying more.
Dean tried to tell himself he had a right to be angry at Romano. The master painter could have bloody well told him why he shouldn’t paint animals, instead of giving orders without explaining them. But in truth, he hadn’t the heart to be very angry. He turned the painting to the wall, feeling raw and sick and guilty.
It was only a stupid fish, he reminded himself. He ate fish all the time, didn’t he, and he didn’t feel guilty about that. What did it matter if one had died, somewhere in the Caribbean?
But it wasn’t really about the fish. He was frightened at his power, and he hadn’t felt this afraid of magic since first year, when he’d accidentally turned Seamus into a little, wizened old man in Charms, and had to wait outside the door with his heart pounding while Professor Flitwick reversed the spell. But no spell could reverse a death.
That evening, he went looking for the story of Fra Pandolf and the Duke of Ferrara’s wife. Romano had been right; Dean hadn’t bothered to read the last three hundred pages or so of the History of Magic textbook. He’d quit doing homework for Binns after Harry recruited him for the Gryffindor Quidditch team. Between Quidditch and the apprenticeship, he just didn’t have time to study any more; he barely even saw his girlfriend except at practices, and he’d fallen asleep in Charms after spending most of the night studying.
Suddenly he felt utterly wretched. It only made matters worse that he had everything a bloke was supposed to want - a place on the Quidditch team, a pretty girlfriend, an apprenticeship that many older and more talented wizards would have sold their souls to have. Seamus had been jealous and edgy ever since he became Chaser, and he knew in his heart that things weren’t going right with Ginny either, not since the day Ron and Harry had interrupted them in the corridor.
He buried himself in the History of Magic textbook to avoid thinking about Seamus and Ginny. There it was: a Muggle Duke, in the days before the Statute of Secrecy, had commissioned a portrait of his wife from a famous wizarding artist called Fra Pandolf. The world had understood Soul-Fixing Charms only imperfectly, in those days, and she had died on the instant the portrait was completed. According to a footnote in the textbook, an Englishman named Browning had later written a famous poem about the incident from the Duke’s point of view, although since he was a Muggle, he had of course got the salient details wrong.
The following afternoon, Master Romano asked him what he had found out about Fra Pandolf, and Dean told him.
“Did you look up the poem as well?”
Dean shook his head. “The bloke who wrote the book didn’t seem to think very highly of it.”
“Browning understood more than your textbook gives him credit for. All artists do. Tell me, did your book mention what happened to Fra Pandolf afterward?”
“It said no blame attached to him, and the Duke paid him a lot of money for the portrait.” Dean thought about this for a moment, chewing on his lower lip. “I thought that was kind of strange. Weren’t those the days of witch-burnings?”
Romano nodded. “You are not completely a fool. I am sorry that I said you were.”
Dean hid a smile. “Not completely a fool” was high praise indeed from Romano.
“Come, I will show you something. Professor Dumbledore has gone away, so we have the afternoon to ourselves.”
Romano rummaged among the paintings in his studio and unearthed a particularly dusty-looking one, in a peeling and cracking frame. It depicted a city of sun and stone, dazzling white with a light that could come only from the painter’s own magic, though nothing stirred in the narrow streets or the plaza that opened on a massive baroque cathedral. “I painted that when I was your age,” he said.
“You were a lot better than I am.”
Romano shook his head. “I tried harder, that is all. Go back and work on your picture of the island, it will be as good someday.”
The sky in the painting was darkening even as Dean watched, and the changing light touched the white stones of the cathedral with rose. “That’s your place, isn’t it, sir? Like the island is mine.”
“Yes,” said Romano. “Keep that place in your heart,” he added cryptically, “and remember that your truth is worth more than money.”
Part Two: Journeyman
The war was still raging when Dean left school. Harry Potter would destroy Voldemort later that summer, leaving only scattered cells of Death Eaters to carry on the fight; but that battle was yet to come when Rufus Scrimgeour summoned Dean to the Ministry of Magic.
Dean couldn’t afford a place of his own, so he had moved back in with his mother and stepfather. He shared a room with his two younger brothers at night, sleeping with his wand on the bedside table in case he needed to defend his family. By day, he haunted the galleries in Aesthetic Alley and tried to talk the owners into displaying his work. Nobody seemed very interested. These were troubled times, and the last thing most people cared about was buying art.
So when he got the letter from Scrimgeour - delivered not by owl post but by personal courier - he thought it was a stroke of luck. To be sure, the Minister wasn’t very forthcoming; he hadn’t provided the slightest hint about the nature of Dean’s commission, but at least he made it clear that it was a commission, and that Master Romano had spoken of Dean’s abilities in the highest terms indeed.
Dean arrived at the Ministry building at half-past-eight that evening, half an hour before the appointed time, but well after most of the Ministry employees had gone home. He pinned the badge that read Dean Thomas, Artist to his robes and entered the deserted Atrium. He spent the next twenty minutes studying the art in the building, most of which was monumental in scope and theme. A pre-Raphaelite mural representing Merlin and Nenyve advising King Arthur adorned one end of the Atrium, while a portrait of Queen Elizabeth gazing at John Dee with an adoring and improbably fatuous expression hung on the opposite wall. The Fountain of Magical Brethren, of course, had been destroyed two years earlier, but Dean had seen pictures in one of Master Romano’s books, and he was inclined to think it hadn’t been any great loss. He hoped Scrimgeour wasn’t expecting him to design a replacement. Actually, he couldn’t really picture anything he had created looking at home in this building, though he knew enough to keep his doubts to himself in front of the Minister.
He took the lift up to Scrimgeour’s office, showed his badge to the security troll and repeated the password he’d been given in the letter to the gargoyle. The door swung open, and Dean found himself face to face with the Minister.
Scrimgeour favored him with a thin smile. “Come in, Mr. Thomas, and good evening. I’ve been expecting you.”
At a flick of the Minister’s wand, the door closed and sealed itself, leaving only solid plaster where it had been. Dean noticed a small and ugly oil painting, depicting a frog-faced man in a wig, on the wall behind Scrimgeour’s desk. Otherwise, all four walls of the room were resolutely blank; they made him feel claustrophobic. He was inclined to agree that the office needed the services of an artist, but he wondered whether Scrimgeour really wanted one.
The Minister was studying his face intently, but he had not spoken. “You said you had a commission for me, sir?” Dean ventured to ask after a minute.
“I might,” said Scrimgeour. “Should you choose to accept the terms. I believe the Ministry can offer fair compensation.”
He named a sum that was more than Dean had expected to earn in five years.
“That sounds ... very fair, sir,” said Dean, once he had found his voice again. “What would I have to do?”
“Ah. The Ministry expects work of the very highest caliber, of course - as well as perfect discretion. Have you ever heard of a man named Ludovic Bagman?”
“Yeah, of course.” Dean hadn’t been expecting this question at all, but he was relieved that the Minister had asked him something he actually knew. “He was a Quidditch player - I think he used to be Beater for the Wimbourne Wasps, ages ago - and after that he was one of the judges at the Triwizard Tournament, only then he got into some sort of trouble over gambling debts, and he hasn’t been seen in three years.”
“That,” said Scrimgeour, “is what the Death Eaters want the public to think.”
Something stirred at the back of Dean’s memory. “Wasn’t Bagman accused of being a Death Eater in the first war? I think I read that somewhere.”
“He was accused, tried, and acquitted,” said Scrimgeour. “It was a farce of a trial, as well attended as the Quidditch World Cup and almost as unruly. The spectators didn’t seem to know the difference, which isn’t surprising, because the Wizengamot evidently didn’t either. Dozens of them crowded around Bagman afterward and asked him for autographs. He signed them all gladly. It must have seemed a cheap price to pay for his freedom.”
“Are you saying he was guilty?” asked Dean.
“Guilty as sin.” Scrimgeour opened one of his desk drawers and pulled out a thick file. One after another, he placed the documents on the desk in front of Dean: a photograph of Bagman shaking hands with Augustus Rookwood, the testimony of witnesses stating that Bagman had passed on information instrumental in the attempt to assassinate Millicent Bagnold in 1979 and the deaths of Luke and Marlene McKinnon and their children. Transcripts from Bagman’s trial. A more recent statement from Dean’s own ex-girlfriend, Ginny Weasley, describing one of the Death Eaters who had attacked Hogwarts a year earlier as a large blond man who looked like Bagman. Banking records showing that Bagman’s debts had been paid by Narcissa Malfoy.
“But what has all this got to do with me?” Dean asked half an hour later.
“Ah,” said Scrimgeour again. “Bagman, you must understand, is something of a parvenu. He pretends to be interested in art, though he’s a poor judge of it, and I have heard from reliable sources that he has lately expressed a desire to have his portrait painted. I have also been informed that Bagman knows very little about wizarding portraits, and has only a vague idea of the dangers involved. His chief concern is getting it done for a bargain price, and he would be more than happy to hire a young, green painter to do it - a risk that a more informed wizard would never take because of the potential for a tragic accident. Are you beginning to understand?”
“Yes,” said Dean, rising abruptly from his chair. “I’m not your man. Keep your money.”
Scrimgeour was still smiling. “Your scruples do you credit,” he said. “I should hardly have trusted you if you had given me any other answer. But I must ask you to examine one more set of documents before you go.”
The Minister took the last few papers from the file. They were old records of an Auror investigation that had never led to a trial, as the evidence was purely circumstantial, but taken along with the rest of the material in the file, it was damning. The evidence linked Bagman with a murder that had happened in 1980.
Dean had seen the victim’s name before: once in a yellowed obituary from the Daily Prophet, and once on his own birth certificate.
He looked up. Scrimgeour’s amber eyes were studying his face again, unblinking.
Dean swallowed. “I’ll do it,” he said.
“I thought you might.”
* * *
“How’s it coming, hey?” said Bagman jocularly. He was a big, blond man, going rather jowly and pouchy-eyed in his middle age, but with some remnants of good looks. He didn’t look like a killer, but then, neither did Dean. “I know there’s a lot of me to paint, but you’ve been at it more than a week. If you want to save yourself some time and make me as thin and pretty as I was twenty years ago, I won’t object.”
“It’s coming along all right,” said Dean. “Only another evening or two.” The truth was that he was making a mess of the portrait. His hands were shaking, and he’d smudged his work twice and had to paint over it. What he had managed to transfer to the canvas was characterless; it could just as easily have been a painting of an overweight Gilderoy Lockhart as one of Bagman.
I’m not going to be able to do this, he thought. It doesn’t matter whether I want to or not - the work hasn’t got enough of a life of its own to capture his life-force. He would just have to go back to Scrimgeour and tell him he had failed; he wasn’t a skilled enough artist to pull it off.
The thought should have been a relief, but Dean found it a bitter blow - partly to his artist’s pride, partly to something more elemental. This man killed my father. What good am I, if I can’t avenge him?
And now, at last, he wanted to do what Scrimgeour had asked him to do. He wanted to trap Bagman’s soul, pin it to the canvas, lay it bare so that the world could see the man for what he was. He began again on a fresh piece of canvas, painting Bagman’s portrait with fast and slashing strokes. It was the portrait of a murderer - and worse than that, a hypocrite, a man who had walked free because the public loved him, who had smiled and signed autographs and made a career of seeming affable and none too bright, who had walked in the sunshine knowing all the while that Dean’s father was lying in a shallow grave. And Dean - fourteen years old, watching the Triwizard Tournament from the stands - had admired him.
It took him only a matter of hours to finish the job. As the sun set, the twisted face beneath his hands came to life, snarling and sneering; and in that same moment, Bagman went slack and slumped heavily to the floor.
He didn’t look closely at Bagman’s inert body. He had wanted it to happen, but now it made him feel sick. Quickly, he packed up his paints and prepared to go back to Scrimgeour.
“Not so fast, Thomas,” said a voice from the shadows.
Dean straightened up. His wand and his paintbrush fell from his hand and clattered on the floor.
He’d known that voice. “Malfoy?” he whispered.
Draco Malfoy, who had been missing for more than a year, was holding his wand aloft like a lantern. “Is Bagman dead?” he asked coolly, as the light flickered across the Quidditch player’s face.
“I didn’t kill him,” said Dean. “I mean, I didn’t mean to kill him. It was an accident.”
“Don’t bother lying to me, mudblood. I know what happened here.”
“No, you don’t.” Dean willed his voice to grow steadier. “And I’m not Muggle-born. My father was a wizard and Bagman killed him. You’re right, I killed him on purpose, but I’ve done what I came to do. I’m not in this war. I haven’t got any quarrel with you or the Death Eaters.”
That last was a lie, and Dean felt ashamed of speaking it; he’d trained with Dumbledore’s Army and watched the Death Eaters pick off his friends. But tonight he was perfectly happy to let Draco Malfoy - and as many other Death Eaters as he might have brought with him - go their ways. He sure as hell wasn’t about to play the hero tonight. He just wanted to get out of there alive, and it was starting to look like he wasn’t going to make it.
“If he was a friend of yours, I’m sorry,” he added. As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he realized how fatuous they sounded.
“Oh, don’t worry,” said Draco, “he wasn’t a friend of mine.” He walked up to Bagman and turned him over with his foot. “He was an idiot and a liability. Drunk half the time, talked too much, expected the Dark Lord to pay his gambling debts. He’s only been on one mission since this war started, and he was such a poor hand with a wand that he killed Gibbon by accident.” He looked Dean in the eye. “We all wanted him dead. Don’t kid yourself - you would never have got in here to kill him if we hadn’t wanted you to.”
Dean swallowed. “The Death Eaters were using me all along?”
“How else would Scrimgeour know Bagman wanted his portrait painted? One of our men in the Ministry tipped him off. And who do you think planted the idea in the fool’s head in the first place?” Draco shook his head. “You really don’t think, do you, mudb - excuse me, half-blood?”
Dean said nothing. He wondered how he could have been such a fool.
“Why are you looking so sick?” Draco taunted him. “You were happy enough for Scrimgeour to use you, weren’t you? What’s the difference?”
Dean forced himself to look at Bagman’s body. I’m sorry, he mouthed in Bagman’s direction, though he knew it could make no difference to a dead man.
“All right,” said Dean. “So I’ve done your dirty work for you. Are you happy now that I’ve said it? I’m leaving.”
Draco spun about on his heel. His wand was trained on Dean. “The Duke of Ferrara made a mistake. He let Fra Pandolf live.”
Dean concentrated on the wordless spells they’d learned in sixth year, trying to summon his own wand into his hand, knowing all the while that Draco had the advantage of him and it was useless.
But Draco stood still for a moment instead of attacking. He looked pale and ill, almost as bad as Dean felt. His hand was trembling. Dean risked a dive for the floor.
“Petrificus Totalis!”
Dean dodged the spell, rolling almost into a ball.
“AVADA -”
Bagman sat up.
Oh hell, Dean thought, he’s made Bagman into an Inferius. What works on Inferi? Heat. Light.
“Incendio!” A wall of fire burst from Dean’s wand. He had just enough time to register, in the blaze of light, that Draco looked every bit as shocked at Bagman’s resurrection as Dean was, and then he turned and ran out of the burning house. He stumbled through the gathering darkness until he judged he was far enough away to Apparate, gathered his strength for the journey to London - and then realized that being in London wouldn’t save him. The Death Eaters would trace him if he went back to Scrimgeour, and if he went home, they’d probably attack his family...
He took a wild leap of faith and concentrated on a plaza and a cathedral he had never seen.
* * *
The evening was hot and still; hardly a breath of wind stirred in the palm trees. The restaurants around the plaza were crowded with diners seated outdoors, and a group of girls Dean’s age swept by, laughing and chattering to each other in Spanish. He barely noticed the people. He was looking at buildings, trying to calculate the angle from which he’d seen them before.
He spotted a small alley leading off from the plaza opposite the cathedral. It looked no different from any of the other side streets except that nobody walked that way, nobody even gave it a second glance, and to Dean’s eyes the street had a curious luminous shimmer. This, he guessed, was the gateway to the wizarding district. He crossed its threshold, and the chatter of voices and the thrum of dance music from Muggle clubs grew hushed behind him.
He walked up and down the street, reading the names under the doorbells, until he found what he was looking for. He rang the bell, and stood there fidgeting for a long minute until Master Romano let him into the building.
“Sir, I need to talk to you about something.”
“Welcome to Cádiz,” said Romano. He did not seem particularly surprised to see Dean. “And there is no need to call me ‘sir.’ You are no longer an apprentice. You are a colleague.”
“Julio.” The name felt strange on Dean’s tongue. “I’m - I apologize for coming here, but I’m in trouble and I didn’t know where else to go.”
“So is everyone in England. It is no place for an artist any more. That is why I came home.”
“I’m in worse trouble than everyone else in England. Let me explain.” Dean told him everything, haltingly at first, then with the feverish zeal of confession. He didn’t look up at Romano after he came to the part where he accepted Scrimgeour’s proposition; somehow that moment was harder to talk about than Bagman’s death or its aftermath. But he plunged on with the story to the end. “I’ve killed a man. Maybe two people. One of them was self-defense, but I don’t expect the Aurors to understand that. I think the Death Eaters might be after me, too. I’ll go, if you don’t want me to stay.”
“You killed no one. It was on the news, on the wireless. Bagman’s house burned to the ground, but he and the Malfoy boy escaped. They will be lucky if your Ministry finds them before the other Death Eaters do.”
“But - But Bagman died. I saw.”
Romano waved his hand. “You only think you saw. Knocked him out, most likely. You might have weakened him permanently if the portrait had not burned. It was not a great portrait, I imagine?”
“It was - I was angry. I painted it in a hurry. No, I think it was pretty much crap, to tell you the truth.”
“That is what saved him. The explanation is simple. Only a true portrait can capture the sitter’s spirit, whole and entire. You saw only the Death Eater, not the man, and you painted him without sympathy or pity. That is not enough to give life to a painting, nor to take it from a man. Consider yourself fortunate that you did no better.”
“I do,” said Dean, feeling considerably shaken.
“And you let yourself be bought and sold by men who offered you no respect. If you mean to use everything I have taught you to kill the man who murdered your father - that is your own business. But for God’s sake, make it your own revenge and not someone else’s. That is all I have to say on the subject.” Romano stood up, took two glasses from the cupboard, and opened a bottle of wine. “And now, tell me what else you have been doing. It is more than a year since I saw you.”
They talked for most of the night. Dean began to feel steadier as he sipped at the wine, although he still pricked up his ears every time the news came on the wireless. Romano translated everything that had to do with the war in Britain, though most of it did not. As the night wore on, Dean began to feel as if the world of Aurors and Death Eaters were fading away behind him.
And then the wireless broadcast cut off in the middle of a piece of music, and an excited-sounding announcer’s voice broke in. Dean caught the words Harry Potter, and then Voldemort. “What’s he saying?” he demanded of Romano. “What is it?”
Romano paced across the room to the window and drew the curtains aside. “It is the dawn.”
* * *
Epilogue: Master
“Professor Longbottom said I might want to think about doing an apprenticeship to a portrait-painter after I left school, sir.” The girl twisted one of her long pigtails around her finger. She looked very young. “I know it’s a little early, but I was wondering - since you were here to paint Professor McGonagall’s portrait - do you think you might ...?”
“What’s your name?” Dean asked.
“Rosalind Pye, sir.”
“And how old are you, Rosalind?”
“Sixteen.” Not so young, then. Dean was finding it hard to judge the ages of young people these days; he supposed it was one of the less-talked-about side effects of approaching middle age. He looked again at Rosalind’s upturned face and realized that he’d almost forgotten what it was to be so eager, and so nervous.
“Can I have a look at some of your work?”
Rosalind nodded, shyly, and opened the portfolio she’d brought with her. She had plenty of raw talent, Dean thought as he leafed through the pages. He kept the thought to himself and took his time examining her work - for no particular reason, except that was what Julio Romano would have done. The truth was, he wasn’t sure exactly what one did with an apprentice. He tried to remember, and wished Julio were still alive so he could ask him...
When he looked up again and saw that Rosalind was practically bouncing on the balls of her feet, hungry for a word or a sign from him, he began to wonder if Julio’s guidance would have been enough, after all.
“OK,” he said. “I think you have potential. Can you be here at three o’clock every afternoon, after your classes?”
“Oh, yes, sir! Thank you, Master Thomas!”
Dean smiled. “You don’t have to call me ‘Master Thomas.’ ‘Dean’ will do.” He hoped that would be all right with McGonagall and the rest of the Hogwarts staff. “Right. The first thing I’m going to teach you is how to perform a Soul-Fixing Charm, and why we use them...”