The Alley went quiet before dawn. Shutters closed, nameplates vanished, ward lines dimmed one by one. Goblin crews lifted flagstones into waiting carts while two Auror squads watched the Leaky's brick arch collapse into plain wall. The last shopkeeper handed over a bronze key to a clerk from the Ministry. A parchment seal flared and died. Diagon Alley was over.
In the Ministry, the ward table hummed. Arcturus stood with his hands behind his back while threads of light crossed a map of Britain. A chime rang from the north.
Diagon Alley's dismantling was not the only thing that happened in the past months.
There was something wrong with the number of Muggleborns. Arcturus put the reports of the past ten years and the past four months next to each other. Hogwarts was getting around five to ten Muggleborns every year. Yet in their first four months, the Ministry 'rescued' forty eight of them. Either the Muggles were somehow eliminating these magical kids, or there was another organisation collecting them. He hoped for the latter, as wishing for the death of a magical child was nothing acceptable in the eyes of Mother Magic. These innocent lives were blessed by her. And he would make sure they lived happily with their blessings.
"Bring the list of families applied for the Blood Adoption Ritual."
His gaze went to the list of teens who were given a choice. The young ones, blood adopted by the willing families. The older students and those newly of age, a single signature set the path: live as mundane or remain magical. Continue your life as a mundane with a sealed core and erased memory, or live as magical with whatever you have on the Muggle side cut away, left behind. One third chose the mundane. Wands were snapped, cores bound, minds gentled to forget. Arcturus sighed. The pure loss of Magicals like that was regrettable. Though Corvus told him to keep the list ready in case he would ask for it. His heir, as usual, was doing something. For months, he was like a ghost now. Arcturus was suspicious that the recent announcements of nearly three dozen geneticists missing all over the world were somehow connected to him.
He shook his head to clear his thoughts. There was one more file for his review. Yet he first needs to approve the Blood Adoption Requests. Hence, he got to work.
--
By noon, the Defence against Muggles Department met in the Minister's war room. The new departments were working hard. Defence against Muggles and the Department of Modern Armaments. Crates lined the floors of warehouses in neat stacks. Pistols, rifles in several calibres, belt fed machine guns, Arcturus frowned. What in the name of Morgana was the meaning of belt fed? Muggles were a strange sort, he thought and continued to read the list. Rocket launchers, tripod mounts, and long steel tubes marked for testing. Photographs showed rows of vehicles with names as if someone had randomly written letters and numbers: BM‑21 Grad, BM‑30 Smerch, M270 MLRS, and a scattering of odds and ends. Avery was the figurehead of this department; in reality, it was Corvus who sent a list and orders to Avery to find the items and 'procure' them. Travers headed the Defence against Muggles department; his job was a tad easier, as he would track down the traitorous Muggleborns and map their network from bottom to top. It took him months before he was confident that the files he put together were the whole structure.
Just as Arcturus was about to start the meeting, Corvus came in from his private rooms behind his office. Without even greeting anyone, he went to the files Travers put together and read them, nodding.
Do not take any action against them. I have the perfect team to infiltrate and take care of these betrayers.
After that, he turned to Avery, "Did you arrange for the mounted artillery as I've asked Lord Avery?" The sentence was a question, but everyone close to Arcturus has already learned one thing. Even Dementors have more mercy when compared to Corvus Black. Avery gulped, "I've brought photographs of the contraptions you asked for, my lord. I did not want to cause another scene where you ask for something, and I provide something entirely different yet has the same name."
Corvus raised his head to look at Avery with a deadpan stare. Arcturus couldn't help but start to laugh again.
Two months ago, Corvus asked the Armament Division to find and procure Hawk, Sea Sparrow and Crotale SAMs. He meant Surface to Air Missiles. Only to receive confirmation of them to be ready after a week, and come to find three Hawks, named Sam by their owners. Nearly a dozen Sparrows in a cage, Avery has the gut to tell him he could name them as Sam or even Sammy, as one of his old friends has a Puffskin named Sammy. One Rattlesnake. Again, named Sam by its owner, Avery asked him why he was calling a Rattlesnake a 'Crotale', while also motioning his hands as if tying a ribbon to mock the French name and made the mistake of scoffing on top of that. Safe to say, it was not a pleasant day for Avery nor the Department.
"Are these the things you want, my lord?" asked Avery while also looking left and right, anywhere but Corvus' intense gaze. After confirming the photos, Corvus told the same to the former Death Eater.
"Once they are ready, rotate crews until every squad can aim and fire without thinking."
Corvus turned to Travers,
"Are the listening charms in place, and are there active personnel to monitor them all day?"
Ignatia set a ledger on the table. "Placed and masked in two hundred thirty one political and seventy nine military offices. Concealment schema borrowed from Unspeakables. Trace ward signatures mimic ambient enchantment from historical fixtures. The detection risk of them is extremely low."
--
When the meeting broke, Corvus lingered at the map, eyes on two quiet points: Vauxhall Cross and Wellington Barracks. The map did not need labels. DMLE legilimens had already walked those corridors in borrowed faces. Glenross and his cell were mapped and watched. Arcturus waited. The choice of when to close the hand belonged to Corvus.
"Which units were you talking about?" Arcturus asked as he motioned to Ignatia for tea.
When they were alone, Corvus turned to him and answered with a cold smile, "Dementors, of course."
Arcturus' brain stopped for a moment. He stood where he was, looking to his heir without uttering a word.
That afternoon, the Minister's office was filled with a different order of business. Arcturus was working hard to dismantle the old laws and raise new ones. One of the first things he did was the removal of the prohibition on sentient beings owning wands, which was struck out by roll call.
In Gringotts, a goblin elder set a palm on a new wand as a maker sealed the bond. The metal warmed under its new master's hand. Sparks stuttered, then steadied into a sharp white star. A ring of goblins thumped spear butts in a steady beat that made the marble counters tremble. A pale werewolf with careful posture waited for his turn, shoulders tight under a clean jacket. Two vampires in formal black produced permits signed that morning. No one looked away.
Across the city, a disused courtyard behind the Leaky Cauldron swallowed its last rune. A mason with a wand burned the final sigil to ash. The wall looked like any other wall. Children hurried past with schoolbags and never felt the itch of a repelling charm. That was the point.
--
The International Portkey Arrival Hall glowed cold blue. A man stepped onto the brass circle without a wobble and passed his documents across the counter.
"Name," the clerk said.
"Manard Sturmhart. Also known as Father Manard." His accent was German. The eyes were steady and moved like a craftsman checking joints.
He presented a letter from Sigibert Krafft and registered his wand. The clerk confirmed the authenticity of the seal and nodded.
"Purpose of visit?" The clerk asked.
"Service, enchanting, security fittings and armament bindings. I was told Heir Black was looking for people like me."
"Welcome to London, Father Manard. You will report to Miss Ignatia's Office in the morning."
Manard tucked the letter away. He stepped off the circle and let his gaze travel the intake hall.
The clerk sent for a runner and arranged one of the guest houses for the gentleman. He turned to the junior Auror next to him after Manard was gone.
"Did you recognise him?" he asked.
The Auror shook his head to say no. The Clerk took an older dated copy of the Prophet and found the article he was looking for.
It was talking about a young man. A Beauxbatons graduate with a mastery of Enchanting. He spent three months under Polyjuice in Altotting after a local man killed a magical child during an exorcism. Manard took the cassock. That little kid was a relative of a friend. He kept the man barely alive and killed him after three months of torture. He pretended to be the priest for the period, which stuck with him as his moniker, Father. ICW arrested Manard for unlawful confinement and the murder of a Muggle. He was confined until the schism. Released when the Confederation declared illegal. When people of Krafft verified his talent, especially on mechanised objects, he was given two letters. Both have the Krafft seal.
--
The Nest breathed like a quiet village. Glass doors sighed. White light washed over steel and stone while Druids in slate robes crossed paths with scientists in their white lab coats.
Rookwood hunched over a bench, wrists steady, eyes flat. He labelled vials taken from squibs and pureblood cousins, set them in matching racks, then pushed the cart toward a scanner the Druids had tuned to their runes. He caught Corvus' eye for a heartbeat and went back to work.
Ian Wilmut and Keith Campbell stood at the central station with their small team from the Roslin Institute. Corvus set an empty wire cage on their bench and drew a breath to settle the room.
A brown mouse sat in there.
Wilmut closed his eyes with satisfaction.
"It is possible," Corvus said. "Tag it."
Campbell clipped a tag to the tail and wrote the number in her notebook.
-
"Use the spell that shows its aura so we can compare it with a naturalborn," he was still not used to Magic being real.
He remembered the day when a knock on his door brought this young man to his office. He introduced himself as Corvus Black. Ian couldn't help but scoff.
"You have parents with a strange taste for names, Mr Black."
"Oh, you have no idea, Dr Wilmut. My whole bloodline has strange names. I even have a cousin named Draconis Lucius Malfoy."
At that, Ian laughed.
"I'm sure Thanksgiving is a show of its own in your house," he continued, laughing.
Corvus Black did not join him. "We do not celebrate such days, Dr Wilmut."
"You see, the reason I decided to visit you instead of other biologists or geneticists is quite simple. I want you to work for me. I want you to work on cloning a living being. Without the moral dilemma, without worrying about funding or any other distractions."
Ian Wilmut was the scientist who successfully cloned a sheep. Corvus did remember his name, as the man himself was from England and the local press kept writing about him day in and day out. Now that he was focusing on increasing the population of Wizardkin, he was not going to rely on natural methods.
Wilmut straightened. "That is a bold request, Mr Black. Especially considering I will do any research out of the scientifically bound moral code."
Corvus smiled faintly and asked Ian to call for his secretary. When the poor lady entered, he whipped the Elder Wand and put her under Imperius.
"Is your secretary a good dancer. Dr Wilmut?"
Wilmut was trying to understand what was happening to his secretary, who had been serving him for seven years. He called her, shouted to her, and he even stood up and shook her.
He turned to the young man, "Whatever you have done, undo it now and leave."
Corvus stood up as well. He was half a head taller; he approached the Doctor. "Watch closely."
"Dance."
A simple command left his mouth, and the elderly woman started to dance as if her life depended on it.
"Stop."
She did so. "Now, I can simply order her to stop breathing, and she will die where she is standing from suffocation. I am showing you this, Dr Wilmut, to make you understand. I can simply order you to do what I want. I do not accept 'No' as an answer."
Corvus sighed as Memory Mapping was working and transmitting what Wilmut was thinking.
"No, you are not faster than me. No, you do not possess anything that can stop me. Yes, I will leave her alone. I personally do not care about this lady. Not at all."
A tense silence stretched in the office.
"Yes, I am actively reading your mind. I can do more than that as well."
Ian's eyes were as wide as saucers. "How... Not possible..." He started to stammer.
"Human beings have one more Race, Dr Wilmut." Started Corvus. "A race that can wield a natural force known to you as Magic." He waved his wand, and multiple images appeared from the history of Wizardkin. Images started to move as time started to advance. At the time of the Spanish and Roman Inquisitions' peak, as the year was shown above the images, he paused them all at once.
"Wizardkin decided to leave Muggles alone and go into hiding instead of dealing with your ever changing religious and political tastes. So around the seventeenth century, we became ghosts and fairy tales."
Tibby chose that moment to pop in and serve Corvus a cup of tea, "do Muggle drink?" he asked Wilmut. The man was a bit shell shocked to answer.
"What are you?" Was the only sound that came out of his mouth, which had offended Tibby enough to huff and pop out.
"Congratulations, Dr Wilmut. You have offended my personal house elf. A friendly warning, they have really long memories. Not even your grandchildren will know peace now that the Magnificent Tibby is offended by you."
Corvus spoke with a serious tone, which made Wilmut change colour with every breath he took. After a while, Covrus smirked and continued.
"Relax, it was a joke. Now, let me return to my reason for the visit. I am aware of your work on 'Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer'. I am also going to give you a hint and tell you to use the cells of a lamb instead of an adult sheep. I need you and your team to move to a compound and work there on this exact subject. Do we have an accord, Dr Wilmut?"
-
Corvus slid the lamella onto the microscope stage and tapped the rim. Cells came into focus, then split, then split again. On the wall, the clock hands crawled. In the field, the rate was wrong in a very useful way.
"This time bubble will be adjusted to maximum," Corvus said.
Wilmut bent to the eyepiece. He watched long enough to make sure. "If that drift is repeatable, we can run cohorts that take months in a day."
"That is the point," Corvus said. "I need numbers. You need throughput."
Campbell leaned on the bench. "What do you actually want from us?"
"A simple thing," Corvus said. "Cloning of zygotes. Zygotes of a Witch and a Wizard. Nothing more."
"The implications are too wide. Ethically, it is wrong on so many levels..." Wilmut started.
"How considerate of you and your ethical code, Ian," Corvus said. "I'll arrange for the Druids to create ten more bubbles in this lab. Please make use of them and proceed to work on Wizardkin cells."
"Set up the lab to your standards," Corvus said. "Your protocols. Your notebooks. I keep the field safe and the teams working. If you hit a wall, Rookwood and the Druids will work alongside your team."
Campbell looked from the mouse to the scope. "We are making history."
Wilmut folded his arms. "Yes, we are." He said, chest puffed.
-
He moved on to inspect the Time Chambers. The Druids had ringed each pod with etched plates. Runes glowed faintly where their lines met. A wind you could not feel pressed on the skin when the doors sealed. Rows of embryos under glass ticked forward at a visible rate.
Two corridors over, a second team worked on the Human Genome Project. Dr Francis Collins and Dr John Sulston were working with their teams alongside Druids. This was one of the most important projects going on in the Nest.
Corvus was comparing Sqibs and Wizards and Witches of the same bloodlines with this team in hopes of finding the reason for the situation that causes a magical to be born without the ability to wield it.
Charts hung on boards. Threads linked markers that had started to repeat across families. A druid was holding the data of a witch from the Volkov line for another one of his colleagues who traced the same pattern with a quill on thick paper.
Magicals were having troubles using Pens and Papers, while Muggles hated the Quill and Parchment. After a while, Magicals settled on using Quills and paper, while Muggles were still struggling with parchment and Quills. Corvus was enjoying the Chaos. He was considering this to be the test run.
"Keep the language plain," Corvus told them. "You will train replacements."
In a third lab, a sterile suite sat behind a double door. The project was marked only as ARTIFICIAL. Corvus stood in the anteroom and watched a burst of light wash the glass. He kept the rest of that work under lock and oath. In here, consent was inked, and the donors were the sort of men he would never let walk free.
He made a slow circuit of the floor. Workstations hummed. House elves passed with trays and clipboards. The Druids drifted in and out under silent signals. The Department of Mysteries had bled out long ago. What remained answered to him.
Back in his study, he set a stack of reports aside and closed his eyes.
Four months had gone by. In those months, he had pulled answers out of books and minds. Biology first. Then the pieces that talk to it: chemistry, advanced math, signal processing. Enough to shape good questions. Enough to hire people who asked better ones.
On the other side of the line, the political work moved. Foundations fed small stations and small papers. Councils shifted by a vote or two. Offices that mattered grew quiet and useful. He kept his notes sparse and his aims clear. The separation held as settlements grew and borders thickened.
He opened his eyes and wrote three letters. One for Vinda. One for Arcturus. One for Sigibert to pass along.
It was time to bring Gellert out. Not as a symbol. As a force with an exact job. Corvus had no interest in another man's failed war. He had a map, and he needed a general who did not flinch. His summer was going to be busy with Flamel. This was going to be the test for Vinda, Grigori and Sigibert. If they show signs of betrayal, he would not hesitate.
He sealed the letters and set them on the tray. "Tibby," he called.
Four days passed.
The elf popped in with a crack that no one in the lab noticed anymore. Tibby eyed the laboratory as it might bite him.
"Old master and the other oldies are waiting," Tibby said. "You must fire chicken to them."
Corvus rubbed his brow. "Tibby, there are many birds in the world. They are not variants of chickens."
Tibby squinted, made a small huff. "All birds are chicken," he muttered. "Black madness, poor master. Old Kreacher right again."
He shook his head. Maybe he would ask the teams to start research on House Elves next. Then he went back to work.
A/N
I am pleased to announce that Rise of Black: Volume One has reached its conclusion with Chapter 121. This marks the completion of the first volume in the series.
P.S. Happy birthday to me.