Chapter 163: A Vow in Ash

Bertha Jorkins was buried on a grey morning in a small cemetery outside London.

Her family requested privacy. Dumbledore attended without school robes. Amelia Bones stood with three Ministry colleagues, none of whom spoke to reporters at the gate. Edward, Sirius, and Kreacher remained near the back.

The service named Bertha's curiosity, her loyalty to friends, and her habit of remembering every birthday in her office. It did not mention the ritual or the mistakes that had left her unprotected abroad.

Afterward, her cousin approached Edward.

"Mrs. Bones said you tried to reach her."

Edward could not find an answer that did not sound like a claim on the family's grief. "She resisted them. She damaged what they were doing and gave us a chance to preserve evidence."

"Did she know you were there?"

"I don't know."

The cousin nodded once. "Thank you for telling me what you do know."

That sentence followed Edward home.

The alliance met that evening, but no one began with the World Cup. Edward placed the confirmed account of Albania on the table. Sensitive details about the Horcrux cave were removed; the omissions were marked rather than hidden.

"Voldemort has returned in a weak body," he said. "Peter is serving him. A second servant remains unidentified. Bertha Jorkins was murdered during the process that formed the body."

Daphne went pale. Theodore read the page twice. Draco looked toward his father, although Lucius was not present.

"Does the Ministry accept this?" Pansy asked.

"Amelia Bones accepts the danger. Fudge accepts Peter and avoids the rest."

"Then our families need to know," Draco said.

"They need a warning, not our secrets," Hermione replied.

They drafted a short notice together. It named Peter, described the unidentified servant, advised against solitary travel, and urged families to verify unexpected visitors. It did not disclose the alliance, the Heart Prism, or the soul fragments.

Each member could choose whether to deliver it. Refusal would be recorded but not punished.

Samuel Rosier raised the harder question. "If our parents report this to the Ministry, Fudge may trace the wording back to us."

"Use your own words," Edward said. "The facts are not owned by the alliance."

Draco crossed out a phrase calling Voldemort's return certain. "My father will dismiss this if it sounds like panic. I will say there is credible evidence of a surviving dark wizard working with Pettigrew."

Hermione looked ready to object, then read the full sentence. "That is accurate."

They turned to their own rules.

Albania had exposed a weakness in the alliance's earlier enthusiasm for secret action. Members had treated discretion as a reason to solve problems without adults. Edward proposed a new boundary: no member would undertake an armed investigation, pursue a suspected killer, or test an unreviewed defensive object on a living target under alliance authority.

"Under alliance authority," Pansy repeated. "Someone could claim they acted privately."

"They can act privately," Theodore said. "Then they do not use our name, resources, or protection."

"And if the private act endangers us?" Astoria asked.

The charter already allowed suspension for exposing members without consent. They added a duty to warn the group of any personal action likely to do so.

Daphne objected to outside review. "Which adults? Our parents do not agree on anything."

"No permanent council," Edward said. "For each action, we name someone qualified and disclose conflicts."

A ward test might require Flitwick or Babbling. A legal plan might require a solicitor. A medical risk required a healer. Family rank alone did not create expertise.

Draco smiled without humour. "My father will adore that sentence."

"He does not have to join."

The vote passed.

Last came the use of force. Edward had once written that strength would make families choose the winning side. The words now sounded too close to the loyalty Voldemort demanded.

He placed a replacement clause on the table.

The alliance would seek influence through evidence, service, lawful reform, and voluntary cooperation. It would not treat ancestry as proof of merit, accept cruelty as discipline, or use fear to compel allegiance. Defensive force could protect life and enable escape. It could not settle internal disagreement.

Daphne's eyes stopped on the ancestry line. "Some families will call this betrayal."

"Some families called Voldemort tradition," Edward said. "They were wrong."

"My father will ask what separates us from Muggle-born reformers."

"Methods and specific policies may differ. Rights do not."

Astoria supported the clause first. Theodore followed. Hermione abstained because she was not a formal member, then asked that her support be entered as an observer's statement. Draco voted last.

"Yes," he said. "But I reserve the right to complain about the wording forever."

The clause passed unanimously.

When the meeting ended, Edward remained beside the cold fireplace. Kreacher gathered cups with his healed arm. Sirius read the new charter from beginning to end.

"You changed your promise," Sirius said.

Edward knew which promise he meant. After Albania, anger had offered a clean future: become stronger, find Voldemort, end him. The image still had force.

"I still intend to help stop him."

"That is not the same as swearing to kill him."

"No."

Sirius handed back the parchment. "Good."

Edward took a shallow bronze bowl from the mantel. He placed his earlier training plan inside it, the one that prescribed endless wandless spells, magical overuse, and combat against living creatures. The plan was evidence of a dangerous state of mind, but it did not need to remain an instruction.

He touched a flame to one corner.

The parchment curled and darkened. Heat moved through his palm, and Ash stirred with the memory of Peter's wand. Edward named the feelings aloud.

"Fear. Anger. Shame. Grief."

Sirius stood nearby without interrupting.

"I will not pretend they are another person's commands," Edward continued. "I will not make revenge the measure of whether I have honoured Regulus or Bertha. I will act against Voldemort with evidence, allies, and limits I can defend afterward."

The words were not magical. No mark appeared, and no invisible force bound him. That was deliberate. A vow chosen freely could be reviewed when new facts emerged. An enchanted promise could turn one frightened night's certainty into a prison.

Kreacher placed the final teacup on the tray. "Master Regulus wanted the Dark Lord stopped."

"He did," Edward said.

"Master Regulus also ordered Kreacher to survive."

The fire consumed the last line of the old plan.

Edward scattered the cooled ash into the garden rather than keeping it as a relic. The dead roses needed soil, not another family memorial.

Sirius copied the spoken vow into the family minutes as a statement of intent, explicitly non-binding and open to revision. Kreacher signed as witness. Edward added the date and the circumstances, so no future reader could mistake words chosen after trauma for an eternal command.

The next morning, he would leave for the Quidditch World Cup with Draco and the Malfoys. He would carry his walnut wand, an emergency Portkey, and the revised exit plan.

He would not carry the broken Crest.

The choice left him less certain of victory and more certain of his conduct. For Edward, that was the first vow strong enough to survive examination.