Robespierre Cheyney leaned against the wall of the cave and spat onto the stony floor in front of him. He had pulled guard duty that night, and he didn't like it one bit.

Here he was, watching over some worthless trash Muggles, when he could have been out enjoying the party. The Victory Party.

But no, someone had to stay behind and keep the putrid Muggles from trying to escape. Even though there was no way they could escape, they being Muggles and all.

How sodding ridiculous.

He was still fuming at the unfairness of it all when he felt the knife slice into his throat.

His hands scrabbled frantically at whoever had grabbed him from behind, but his neck was snapped soon thereafter, ending his struggles and his life.

Clarice Starling, wearing her Invisibility Cloak, set Cheyney's dead body down by the door of the chamber where the Muggles were being kept and and cast a Camouflage Charm on the corpse. She didn't bother to search it for weapons or artifacts; she had brought with her everything she needed.

Her progress through Voldemort's cave complex was astonishingly swift; she had already surprised and killed five Death Eaters, hiding their bodies so as not to immediately reveal her presence. The Dark Lord may have had up-to-date knowledge of how to magically torment and torture, but he and his minions obviously knew next to nothing about Muggle commando tactics.

Starling doffed her Invisibility Cloak, revealing her robes underneath. She quickly Transfigured them to resemble her old FBI jump-out squad uniform, something that would at least look more familiar to the Muggle captives. When she was finished with that, she turned to the door.

"Alohomora!" she cried, and the oaken door flew open so fast that Clarice had to jump out of the way.

The room was dark and dank and stank to high heaven; Voldemort had obviously not planned, or intended, on keeping his captives alive for very long, much less keep them in anything resembling a sanitary environment. Clarice found herself being stared at by two dozen persons, men and women, tired and filthy and hungry and frightened.

"Lumos," said Clarice, pointing the wand at an unused torchholder on the wall, and suddenly there was light in the room -- light enough for two of the Muggles to recognize the woman they knew from their summer trips, in the company of their daughter, to Offhand Manor.

"Lucy!" cried Roger and Roselyn Granger, rushing forward. "How did you get here?"

"No time for that now. I've got to get you all out of here," replied Clarice, pulling various objects out of the pockets of her uniform. "I'm going to send you two first, so you can help the others get oriented. I've arranged for Dumbledore to meet you."

"Meet us? Where?"

"On the grounds near Hogwarts," Lucy replied, handing Roger Granger a small Altoids tin. The other Muggles stared, wide-eyed, hardly daring to hope they might soon be free. "Now listen to me," she said, looking first at Roger, then Roselyn. "This is a one-way Portkey. It's set up to take you out of here and to Hogwarts. Roger, you hold onto Roselyn, then open the lid when I say so. Got it?"

"Got it," replied Roger, wiping his sweaty hands on his shirt so as to get a better grip on the tin.

"Good. You'll feel a weird jerk around your navel, and then the next thing you'll see will be Albus Dumbledore." She stepped away from them, to give them enough room to cleanly disappear. "Ready?"

"Ready," they both said, trying to keep the shakiness out of their voices.

"Now!"

Clutching his wife by the waist, Roger Granger carefully opened the Altoids box -- and both he and his wife vanished.

Clarice looked around at the rest of the Muggles. She held out another Altoids box. "Okay, we don't have much time before somebody raises the alarm. Who wants to go next?"




"Are you sure about this, Doctor?" Sirius asked as they quietly stole through the dense woods near Voldemort's hideaway. Sirius was wearing an Invisibility Cloak; the doctor was not.

"Quite sure, Sirius," replied Hannibal Lecter. "It's better than waiting for the cancer to attack my nervous system. And what better way to cash in my chips than this?" He smiled, showing his fine, even teeth, and pulled from his inside jacket pocket one of the special wands Fred and George Weasley had secretly crafted for him. "As far as they will know, I will be a wizard capable of casting the most puissant spells, particularly defensive ones. I don't intend to give them time to discover otherwise."

"If you say so, Doctor. But at least wear this when you go up to the front door." The space where Sirius stood could be seen to shimmer slightly for a moment; then, a large black dog suddenly appeared from beneath the cloak.

"As you wish," said Dr. Lecter, and picked up the cloak from where it had fallen. It was one of the few magical items Lecter could actually use.

"Onward, my friend," said the doctor, and he and Padfoot set forth.



The last of the Muggles was gone from the room, so Clarice permitted herself the luxury of a small sigh while she sat and plotted her next move.

She had deliberately made sure that the hostages used up all the Portkeys; the last thing she wanted was for Voldemort to capture her and have an easy entree to Hogwarts.

At least, that's what she had consciously told herself. The real reason was somewhat more embarrassing. More shameful, actually.

Clarice couldn't bear a life without Hannibal in it. Not only that, she couldn't bear watching him being eaten away by slow degrees. So, when the opportunity presented itself, she chose to offer herself up as a sacrifice rather than spend another day watching her beloved suffer.

She hated herself for thinking this way, hated the cowardice inherent in such a thought, and resolved then and there to let herself live, to get herself out of the death trap into which she had so happily flung herself just bare minutes before, if only so she could be there for Hannibal when he breathed his last.

Unfortunately, her thoughts were interrupted by a tall man with silver-gilt hair and a wand, who suddenly filled the doorframe of the now-nearly-empty room. Clarice was on her feet, but it was too late.

"Stupefy," she heard Lucius Malfoy say, and then she fell into blackness.