“Hypothetically, Mr. Avery---”
“Gaston,” he said through clenched teeth, peering at Grey repulsively. His hands were balled into tight fists, aware that he was under intense scrutiny by the entire room. His partners were silenced and he was too tense to think before answering any of the questions.
“Hypothetically, Gaston,” Grey continued, flashing him an exasperated look, “if you were the one to murder Christian Lowe, or even if one of your friends here were, why would you have allowed the little girl to escape?” He looked up to Faraday questioningly, adding, “Alice, was it?”
Faraday nodded, boredom showing visibly in his features.
“Alice. Why would you have allowed her to escape and just take Mr. Lowe?”
Avery shrugged, shaking his head as a grimace formed. “I don’t know. Maybe they made some kind of deal with the Death Eaters.” He flashed what appeared to be a considerable look to Mathews, who kept his head down. His mocking smile stayed in its place even as he looked away from his friend. Mathews appeared to be holding back tears. Avery seemed to be satisfied with Mathews’ reaction and turned back to Grey for further questioning. Grey stood above them, confused, clicking the tips of his fingers together as Faraday had only days ago. The exchange was significant somehow.
They were finally turning on each other.
“So, a deal was made to keep the girl alive.”
“Hypothetically,” Avery said, the word used with deliberate prominence.
Taking a deep breath, Grey nodded for the Silencing Charm to be removed from Foreman and replaced on Avery. His alabaster brow furrowed from his wandering thoughts.
“Mr. Foreman,” Grey began, strutting to his usual place in the center of the courtroom. “Who murdered Christian Lowe?”
Foreman stared at him, hatred bubbling over from his insides like boiling water. He continued to gnash his teeth so hard that Grey wouldn’t have been surprised to see blood running from the corners of his mouth. His hands were also clenched behind him, twisted deep within the confines of the chains, the knuckles stark white and ghostly against his dark, frayed robes.
“I don’t betray the Dark Lord like my friends do.” An exasperated glare caught Grey dead in the face.
“You’re not betraying your Dark Lord, Mr. Foreman. You’re betraying your friends. They’re the ones that might have murdered the victim we’re speaking of.”
“Oh, please--- cut the nursery school shit!” Foreman’s face was crimson, not from embarrassment, but rage. Grey stared at him with distaste.
“Sir,” Foreman added. He then spat at Grey’s feet and clenched his fists even more, almost extracting tiny droplets of blood from the palms compressing so hard with his fingernails. “I’m sorry, but I don’t see any point in this damn hearing. You’re already going to throw us in Azkaban, so let’s just get on with it. Stop trying to get us to turn on each other.” His voice was bitter, reserved. “It doesn’t matter if we killed this person, this Christian Lowe. We’re going to be convicted no matter how much evidence is with us, just because we’ve got this Mark, here.” He attempted to throw up his arm to display the Dark Mark, but his chains resisted. His eyes were at the floor, rooted there. Grey was just waiting for him to start complaining about his limited rights.
“If you wish to go to Azkaban so much, Mr. Foreman, why don’t you just tell us who murdered Mr. Lowe?”
“Because I don’t know the story!” he yelled before Grey could even pause, spittle flying toward the Wizengamot. “I don’t know the full story!”
“Then tell us what you know,” Grey retorted in a harsh tone.
“I . . . I wasn’t there for the full thing, I don’t know.” He was clearly making things up off the top of his head.
“So you admit that you were at the scene of the crime while it took place?”
Foreman didn’t allow his shock to show through his face, but, if it was possible, his fists twisted around his chains tighter. He gave neither a nod nor a shake of the head as an answer, just stared into space. He knew he was caught.
“Who else was, Mr. Foreman? Was it Gaston Avery? Or Tyler Mathews? You know, don’t you? If you want us to solve the case, we need your cooperation.”
“You’re not receiving any damn cooperation from me, you Mudblood.”
The crowd then began to whisper in shaken tones, speaking behind hands or purses for comfort. Faraday didn’t even have to be asked to replace the charm back on the man.
The feeling of hopelessness pervaded every pore her body possessed. Her posture sagged and she suddenly had the distinctive impulse to run, to break down. But she controlled it, turning her attention back to Grey.
“Mathews . . .” Grey began again, a slight smile playing at his features. He would not allow a silly insult to interfere with the resolve of finishing his work, closing the case. He was hoping this time for more collaboration from this particular prisoner. Mathews’ withdrawn, timid demeanor made him an easy target.
“Who murdered Lowe?”
“Don’t know.” Mathews tossed the answer out there uncaringly, allowing whoever so wished to dissect it as desired. His voice blindingly showed his care. Nothing. His expression was reticent. It appeared as if he wished very much to tell the truth, but something was holding him back.
Grey was growing weary of the prisoners not cooperating, though he had quite expected it, especially because of how high profile, how sinful their crimes were. How evil they themselves were.
~ * ~
At least two hours more of futile questioning had passed, and the crowd was growing frail and jaded in their seats, as were the Wizengamot. The prisoners had been bored as soon as they had walked into the room, uncaring as to how the trial came out because they knew that they were already going to be put away for life. All hope had been lost as the Auror’s hands had grasped them from behind the day they were arrested. There was nothing left for them to do.
“It wasn’t any of us.”
“Really?” Grey asked, a mocking tone shying behind his determined voice. “And why should we, the jury, the Wizengamot, the crowd---” he said, gesturing to each one in turn, “---believe you?” he asked.
“You’ll just have to trust me.”
Grey chuckled at this. “And how are we supposed to trust a devoted Death Eater?”
“I guess you can’t.”
“Did you murder Christian Lowe?” Grey asked, his voice more resolute and anger-filled than usual.
“No!” Mathews told him, his voice breaking from the overwhelming emotion affecting him. His eyes were petrified, moving every which way to confirm that he was not being contradicted by an onlooker’s unfair inspection. Carrie felt compassion wash over her, again, and she didn’t know why. It was something in his face, his expression, that made him contemptible, sad. Carrie suddenly realized that no matter how many life sentences any of these men received, it wouldn’t change anything. Christian would never come back.
“Did you murder Christian Lowe, Tyler?” Grey repeated, placing his hands on both ends of the chair holding the boy, almost shaking it with the rage he possessed. His voice was full of fortitude, but not yet irritation.
“No, it wasn’t me!” he said, his eyes showing his terrified expression more than his posture and face put together, even with his mouth contorted into that pitiful, trembling frown that threatened to accompany the tears that were now filling his eyes. Mathews might cry. He was going to receive rave reviews from the jury.
“Not drama class, Mathews,” Grey said, all mercy or forgiveness any normal person would offer to a boy in this misfortunate situation nonexistent. A contented smile crossed Grey’s face as he watched the scene unfold.
“Who murdered him, Tyler?”
“It wasn’t me,” he said, all attempt of keeping himself under scrutiny for the murder gone, replaced with tenacity.
“Who was it?” Grey asked, his eyes never leaving Tyler’s. He slapped the chair with both hands, lifting it off the ground for half a second as he waited for the boy to react.
“It wasn’t me! It wasn’t me! It was Andrew, not me!”
Grey’s face immediately twisted into a shocked expression.
“Don’t you dare . . .”
“It was Andrew, not me!” Mathews continued to scream, repeating himself over and over. His eyes were closed into tight balls of fury, spittle coming at Grey’s face from every which way. He dodged it by stumbling backward quickly, his expression that of someone who had just seen a ghost. “It wasn’t me!” The hollow shouts echoed around the courtroom.
Grey’s eyes were wide, his mouth hanging open strangely. His stares were fixed in a trance at Mathews as if he had just witnessed some brutal, horrible crime.
Faraday noticed Grey’s inability to continue. His eyes shifted curiously from Grey to the prisoner, confusion stamped into his face. “Andrew . . . who, Tyler?” he asked, his voice shaking with what he had just witnessed. Mathews stopped screaming long enough to answer accordingly. He breathed in deeply, trying to control himself. Mucus hung down in slender ribbons on his upper lip and tears filled his eyes to the brim. As he blinked, realizing that Faraday had spoken to him, the droplets fell slowly down his face. His tongue snaked out as one reached his lips and captured one. Grey turned his back on him.
“Grey. It was Andrew Grey.” He paused, waiting for an appropriate reaction from anyone who dared to contradict him, Grey being that person. Foreman seemed satisfied with the answer, as did Avery, whose mocking grins were the most prominent in the courtroom. Grey’s hands were on his head. He bent down onto the floor in a crouching position, terrified. Mathews then turned to look above him at Faraday. Claustrophobia was taking effect, and the chains around him were only contributing to the horrors. He squirmed relentlessly. “Let me go!” he began again. “Andrew, not me!” He started to cry. Thick, heaving sobs racked his body. Closing his eyes, he let out a yell that even the top floor could have heard.
Hate was carved into Grey’s features; the left corner of his mouth twitched violently as the muscle of his jaw clenched. Grey never averted his eyes from the front as the hooded, ghostly Dementors stepped into the room to seize their prisoners. Carrie felt the revulsion in the air that Grey possessed for the boy in front of him. Tyler Mathews screamed, the anguish in his voice echoing off the walls, then silently, fearfully went with them, led away by their scabby, rotten hands. Avery went silently, as did Foreman, though their smirks and mockery had vanished. The lights dimmed for a brief moment and Carrie felt all of the optimism she had received from Samuel’s brief visit hours ago taken away. She shivered despite the thick cloak she had draped around her shoulders. After breaking the curse of binding chains, allowing the creatures to grasp their prisoner, Grey picked up his briefcase from the desk and began to leave the room. Mathews didn’t impede the earsplitting yells even as the crowd’s confused, judgmental chatter became more noticeable than the screams themselves.
“A . . . a brief recess,” Faraday announced through shaky lips, muffled because of the hand that covered his mouth. But everyone had already guessed that that would be the next action taken as they glimpsed Grey walking swiftly from the room, briefcase in hand. No one could tell if he was frightened of the charges brought against his son or angry for the outrageousness from the mouth they belonged to.
Stepping out of her pew after Riley Grey had passed, she attempted to stop him so she could . . . well, she didn’t really know. Comfort him? That would really get through to him, a voice inside her head told her doubtfully, and she too placed a hand over her mouth to stifle her astonishment. “Riley!” she yelled over the bustle of the courtroom, over Mathews’ screams. “Mr. Grey!” Taking another few steps, she caught the door behind him and exited the courtroom.
Suddenly aware of what she was doing, Carrie stopped. He had just discovered his son’s murderer. Knowing that he would need a moment, or perhaps weeks, to come to terms with this, she decided to leave him alone for time being. She needed to speak to him eventually, needed to know what was going on. Though she knew that he could use a friend, she would have wanted to be left alone, as he probably did. She Apparated home to wander through her thoughts--- this time, perhaps, not such a bad thing.
But then she remembered that not only was Andrew Grey Riley’s son, he was now a suspect for Christian’s murder.
-*Thanks to Fresca!