Regulus met his gaze with his amber eyes. Seeing the man's caution, he relaxed and smiled.
No wariness at all, not polite, but not quite a challenge either.
Their eyes met over the table for a second, then both looked away.
Dumbledore watched the two of them, eyes moving behind his glasses, the corner of his mouth twitching. This was going to be a headache.
When two people with similar tempers met, they either clicked immediately or couldn't stand each other.
Right now it looked like something in between, leaning toward the second. Still, it was interesting.
He glanced at the newcomer's hard face, then at Regulus lounging in his chair, and the corner of his mouth curved again under the white beard.
Was this boy actually like this underneath, or had changing his skin changed his manner along with it?
Either way, it was entertaining.
The newcomer greeted him, voice low and short, a little hoarse. "Dumbledore."
Dumbledore nodded back, mild. "Angus."
Dumbledore cleared his throat and made the introductions.
"Angus Crow," he said, looking at Crow first, then turning his head toward Regulus, tone easy. "Works in this area, tracks wizards who poach magical creatures illegally. He used to be an enforcement officer in the Ministry's Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures..."
He looked back at Crow. Crow gave a small nod, and only then did he go on. "Later he left the Ministry, stayed in the north, and went independent."
He didn't say why Crow had left, but his tone made it clear he knew the reason, and that he thought Crow had done the right thing.
Then he turned, blue eyes landing on Regulus, mouth curved and eyes teasing. "And this is Geralt..."
Regulus leaned back, his voice low and a bit rough. "Adventurer."
Dumbledore's eyebrows rose, the amusement in his eyes clearer now. His beard shook as he played along. "Geralt. Adventurer."
Crow didn't say anything. He gave Regulus a nod, and that counted as a greeting.
Regulus nodded back.
They looked at each other again.
Crow's gaze rested on his face for a moment, then moved away. No expression to it.
Regulus stopped looking at him too. He pulled his arm off the back of the chair, picked up the empty mug, looked at it, and set it back down.
Dumbledore looked at Crow on his left, then across at Geralt.
"Angus," he said, mild but serious, leaning forward slightly. "I know you've heard some of this already, but the situation has grown worse since we last met."
Crow's brow furrowed. He looked at Dumbledore and listened.
What Dumbledore said was much the same as before.
Death Eater activity was spreading, attacks were increasing in frequency, and the targets had expanded from Muggle-born wizarding families to anyone who refused to pick a side.
The Ministry's response was getting slower. Some departments had already been infiltrated, and the attitude at the top was ambiguous.
He needed capable people, especially people with real combat experience.
Regulus watched both of them without changing his expression. A recruitment session in progress.
Crow put in a question here and there, all of them short.
"Which areas?"
"Nottingham, southern Wales, Yorkshire. Recently they've started pushing southwest."
"What scale?"
"Three to five each time, sometimes more. Mostly at night."
"How many people do you have?"
Dumbledore paused, blue eyes flickering. "Enough. But not many."
Crow didn't ask about principles or positions. He didn't ask why this fight had to be fought, or how he'd be used if he joined. He only asked about things that had already happened.
When he finished asking, he was quiet for a while. Then he spoke, hoarse and flat, without much feeling in it.
"I know there's trouble out there," he said, turning his head toward Dumbledore. "Papers don't get delivered here, but news does. People pass through this area and they talk about everything."
Dumbledore nodded.
"But I've got my own work. Poaching on the moors is getting worse," he went on. "Last month someone cleaned out a Mooncalf burrow, kept them caged to harvest the dung. By the time anyone found them they'd all dried out and died."
Regulus glanced at Dumbledore, then at Crow.
Crow spoke again. "The Ministry doesn't care. The Aurors don't care. The local wizards are doing it themselves. If I leave, then nobody here cares at all."
He looked at Dumbledore, and his position was plain in his eyes.
"If Voldemort's people come this far, I'll fight them. If they don't come this far, it's got nothing to do with me."
Dumbledore heard him out and nodded. His blue eyes stayed on Crow. He didn't try to persuade him, and he didn't look disappointed.
He understood.
He nodded gently, a trace of visible regret at the corner of his mouth, but nothing more than that.
Through the whole conversation, Regulus hadn't said a word. He just sat across from them, watching and listening.
Crow wasn't short on nerve, obviously. Nobody who tracked poachers alone on the moors could be.
And he clearly understood the threat Voldemort posed. Every question he'd asked was concrete, which meant he knew how serious this was.
His refusal was clean, because he was doing something he'd decided was his to do.
Poaching really was bad in this area, and the Ministry really had nobody on it. Every point he'd made was true.
It was precisely because he had something legitimate and worth doing in front of him that he could say no so easily.
The reason was airtight, because it was real.
Crow did care about what happened on these moors. He cared about the creatures being hunted. He cared about the work he'd stuck with for over a decade.
He'd fallen out with the Ministry, resigned, stayed up here, and worked alone. No pay, no position, no help. He ran on stubbornness alone.
Asking him to drop that and go fight someone else's war, of course he wouldn't want to.
Regulus understood it.
The reasons a person joins a war come in every shape, but in the end it's a private thing.
People go to war for many reasons: justice, revenge, profit, family, belief, or simply because they have nowhere else to go. Others choose not to fight because they have family to protect, duties to fulfill, fears to face, or because they believe the war has nothing to do with them. Both choices can make sense.
But war does not care about people's choices. It spreads until it reaches everyone. During the First Wizarding War, most wizards stayed out of the conflict. They neither joined Voldemort nor the Order of the Phoenix. They kept their heads down, waited for the war to end, and most of them got away with it.
Regulus didn't see that as cowardice or wisdom. He saw it as luck. Those people simply happened to be standing where the flames never reached.
Crow thought he could do the same. He stayed on the moors hunting poachers while Voldemort's influence spread across southern England. To him, the war was someone else's problem.
But wars spread. Sooner or later, they reach you, no matter how far away you think you are. The only question is whether you still have the strength to fight back when they do.
Regulus understood that Crow's choice deserved respect, but that didn't make it a wise one.
Dumbledore preferred to plant a seed and let people make their own choices. Geralt had no interest in waiting for someone to figure things out. He simply leaned forward, fixed Crow with his amber eyes, and let his magic surge through the air.
Then he grinned.
"Don't be a pussy."