In the anti-magic stone chamber on the lowest floor of the Demon-Suppression Tower, a place that drove every wizard to utter despair, time had long since lost its meaning.
Barty Crouch Jr. had no idea how long he had been there.
An hour? Or a day?
Had his master failed?
Would his master rescue him after succeeding?
All he knew was that he had recited the bone-deep humiliation of the "Hogwarts Young Wizards' Glorious Declaration" over a thousand times, exhausting every tone and emotion he could imagine.
Solemn, tragic, furious, fawning...
The stone walls gave no response.
The look of pity and mockery that damned Weasley-that bastard who called himself a "tomb-raiding officer"-had given him before leaving replayed endlessly in his mind like an inescapable curse.
No crest.
He did not have that damned Hogwarts Crest specially made by Holmes.
So he did not even qualify to trade his dignity for freedom.
Despair, like icy seawater, drowned all his fanaticism and hope inch by inch, leaving only numbness and emptiness.
He no longer roared or pounded the walls. He simply curled up in a cold corner, like a shell with its soul ripped out.
He even began to miss the years his father had controlled him with the Imperius Curse.
At least that had been a peaceful, thoughtless numbness, rather than tasting the torture called despair with perfect clarity, second by second, as he did now.
Just when he thought he would rot away completely in this darkness.
A soft light appeared without warning in the air before him.
The light rapidly expanded, tracing the outline of a door.
A door?
Barty Crouch Jr. jerked his head up, incredulous shock showing in his clouded eyes.
He scrambled unsteadily to his feet, almost tumbling over himself in his haste.
*Had that