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HP: Bloodraven Chapter 162 - What Was Stolen (I)
🕑 Added 2025-05-13 14:57:45 +0000 UTC“What a disgusting excuse for a human being…”
Inside a dimly lit chamber lined with shelves of skin and hair care products and exaggerated portraits of himself, Gilderoy Lockhart lay sprawled across an absurdly ornate bed, seemingly asleep. His golden silk pyjamas shimmered under the flickering glow of a single floating candle, and his mouth hung open slightly, drooling onto the embroidered pillow beneath him. Though his eyes were half-lidded and he muttered nonsense under his breath, he snored loudly, oblivious to the world.
And he was not alone.
The room appeared empty, save for Lockhart himself. But standing beside the bed—utterly invisible beneath the magic of True Concealment—was someone else. Maverick stood still, and his hand was hovering inches above Lockhart’s temple, with his fingers poised as if he were about to pluck a thread from the air.
Right now, he was deep inside the man’s mind.
Maverick was rummaging through Lockhart’s memories, and he was searching for anything that could serve as undeniable proof of the man’s deceit. Faces passed before him, and snippets of conversation drifted by.
It did not take long before he found what he needed. Three—no, four—wizards, whose memories Lockhart had erased. Of course, they were not the only people the fraud had Obliviated, but they were the ones whose deeds he had stolen and claimed as his own. Fortunately, the man had not killed them. He had simply left them alone, firmly believing that there was no way for them to recover what had been taken from their minds.
And he had been right to assume so, because such a brute-force Obliviate could not be reversed by ordinary means. If there was one thing Maverick could begrudgingly admit, it was Lockhart’s skill with memory magic.
Unfortunately for Lockhart, Maverick was a master of memory magic as well—better than him not only in casting Obliviate, but also in the delicate art of memory recovery—and he was confident that he could help the victims recover, at least to some extent.
Because too much time had passed, even Maverick might not be able to restore their minds to the state they had been in before the attack. But that did not mean he could not help them recover their memories—or remember who had betrayed them.
He believed he could heal them enough for the truth to return, though the deeper wounds to their spirits would likely never fully mend.
As he dug deeper, Maverick discovered another unexpected memory. It seemed Lockhart had been far too confident in his ability to cover his tracks, because he had not destroyed his original manuscripts. In those early drafts, he had not yet replaced the names or claimed the glory for himself.
The real heroes were still there—clearly described, their stories intact. Only later, when polishing the work for publication, had he rewritten the deeds with himself as the central figure. Those drafts were still hidden away, and they were exactly what Maverick needed.
Now, it was a matter of how he would use all this evidence to expose Lockhart’s fraud to the world.
Of course, Maverick could present the memories directly. But doing so would mean explaining how he had obtained them, and he had no interest in that. After all, memory magic was a highly restricted branch of magic in this world. It would not matter much to him, given his current influence, but he still preferred to avoid giving anyone a reason to point fingers at him—at least for now.
He withdrew his hand, and Lockhart’s half-open eyes fluttered shut. The snoring echoed even louder than before, but Maverick was not done just yet.
He flicked his finger at the sleeping fraud once more and sent him into an even deeper state of sleep. Then, he pointed his index finger between the man’s brows and cast another spell.
Moments later, wisps of silvery-white smoke began to curl out from Lockhart’s head as Maverick carefully extracted the memories he needed. He took out a few empty vials from his storage ring and guided the wisps inside, sealing the strands of memory for future use.
Once that was done, everything he needed for the next course of action was complete. Then, without wasting a second, he turned and walked out of Lockhart’s office.
---
With December came a biting chill that swept over Hogwarts, wrapping the castle in frost and blanketing the grounds with a thin layer of snow.
Inside the castle, the warmth of enchantments and roaring fireplaces offered comfort against the winter weather, and the school continued to function without interruption.
Midterm exams were drawing near, and although they weren’t as stressful as the year-end tests, most students had begun focusing on revision—some taking it lightly, while others approached it with varying degrees of panic and determination.
Yet beneath the surface tension, everyone’s minds were already drifting toward the Christmas holidays—the promise of going home, seeing family, and escaping the rigid routines of school life.
---
It was the second week of December, a weekend, and Maverick woke up to a pleasant surprise. He pulled open the curtains with a smile and gazed out at the clear sky. The drizzling rain that had fallen for nearly three days had finally stopped, and the clouds had parted to reveal a dazzling blue sky that contrasted beautifully with the white snow.
After a quick breakfast, Maverick returned to his office and checked the time. His plan for the day—no, the whole weekend—was to visit all four of Lockhart’s Obliviation victims, assess their condition, relocate them to one place, and if possible, begin treatment right away. So, without wasting another moment, he stepped out the window, flew past the castle wards, and Apparated to his first destination.
His first stop was Peru. According to the memories he’d pulled from the fraud, this was where Lockhart made his first attack. The victim’s name was Carlos Mendoza, a skilled curse-breaker who had solved the mystery of the Vanishing Village, where an entire magical community had disappeared due to a cursed artifact. Lockhart had Obliviated him and then published Vanishing Villages: My Triumphs Over Dark Magic under his own name.
But there was something Lockhart had overlooked. Maverick had matched the dates, and the event clearly happened while Lockhart was still a student at Hogwarts.
How has no one noticed this? he thought. Just from this case alone, if someone had tried to fact-check him, they’d have found so many holes. But no one had even bothered to confirm whether the man’s stories were true. Still, Maverick could use that to expose the fraud.
Unfortunately, some digging revealed that Carlos Mendoza had died five years ago—by suicide. If he had fallen into a coma, there might have been a chance to save him. But Mendoza had remained conscious. His mind had been shattered, and over time, he became increasingly paranoid until, in the end, he took his own life.
Alas... Let’s hope the other three are still alive. With that thought, Maverick disappeared and reappeared in Siberia.
Lockhart’s Year with the Yeti had actually stolen credit from a witch who grew up there—a woman who had driven off a horde of Dementors from a magical enclave using a rare Patronus variant. Lockhart had twisted the truth, replacing Dementors with Yetis to suit his story.
Maverick’s search brought him to a small magical village near Irkutsk. It reminded him of Hogsmeade. Before long, he found the house he was looking for. Sensing one person inside near the door, he raised a hand to knock, then hesitated. He thought about forcing his way in magically, but chose not to.
A moment after he knocked, footsteps sounded and the door creaked open. A woman appeared—mid-fifties or early sixties. She studied him with cold eyes.
“What do you want?” she asked in Russian.
Switching to her language, Maverick replied politely, “Excuse me for disturbing you, ma’am. I was wondering if I could speak to Ms. Darya Morozova.”
“I am,” she said, narrowing her eyes. “Who’s asking?”
His magical sense told him this was her. Her features matched the older version of the woman he’d seen in Lockhart’s memories, and her emotions had spiked when he said her name.
“I’m a private investigator,” he explained, “looking into a series of Obliviation attacks.”
Again, her emotions surged—suspicion, alarm, confusion. But she didn’t seem mentally broken, not like those whose memories had been torn apart carelessly.
Just as he began explaining more, she interrupted, “Who are you? What do you want?”
He blinked, thrown off. “I’m Maverick Caesar,” he said again. Her emotions repeated themselves exactly.
A few minutes later, she asked again, “Who are you?”
It finally clicked. She wasn’t insane. She had severe short-term memory loss.
Maverick sighed when she asked the same question a fourth time and left the house. He stayed in the village, asking around about her. She had no family, no one to care for her.
That night, he returned. As expected, she asked who he was again.
He looked at her with sympathy, then gently put her into a deep sleep with a wave of his hand. He took her to the facility he had prepared for their treatment.
By morning, he was on his way to Australia.
This time, the victim was a wizard who had made a breakthrough in the Wolfsbane Potion. Lockhart had stolen both the man’s discovery and his story, claiming the invention as his own.
How in Merlin’s name did no one suspect him? Maverick thought, flabbergasted. Is the wizarding public just blind, or do they not know how to spot a pattern?
Sadly, he was once again too late. The man had passed away just a year ago, in a magical hospital for the mentally damaged. Another life lost to Lockhart’s greed.
Shaking his head, he moved on to the final lead. Ireland. Not too far from home.
Lockhart had claimed in one of his books that he had gotten rid of a banshee just by smiling at it.
Utter nonsense.
From his stolen memories, Maverick knew the truth. A local witch had driven the creature away with a clever charm. Lockhart had watched, Obliviated her, and claimed the credit.
Before noon, Maverick reached the place: Bandon, a small Muggle town—hence the “Bandon Banshee.”
He found the house easily. Using his magic, he sensed three people inside. Hopefully, she’s alive, he thought, then knocked.
The door opened with a soft click. A girl around his age stepped out. She had red hair like the Weasleys and freckles on her chin.
“Hello?” she greeted.
Maverick smiled kindly. “Good afternoon, miss. My name is Maverick Caesar. I’m a part-time private investigator looking into a string of Obliviation crimes. I was wondering if a Bridgid Keena lives here.”
