分卷阅读11（2 / 2）

“I’m sorry?” Pansy glared. “I’m a witch, aren’t I? This is my Ministry, is it not?” The man just tossed her pass onto the counter and went back to a Special Edition of The Quibbler on ‘The re-emergence of soul-sucking Soblipoms! Move aside vampires! By Luna Lovegood’. Pansy rolled her eyes. “And where will I find Missing Persons?”

Without putting down the flaming rubbish bin of a publication, he said, “Straight down the main hall, all the way in the back.”

“Thank you for your service,” Pansy said through a sneer. She followed the main hall all the way to the back. She saw the brass sign indicating it was the correct office, but the door was closed. Pansy watched a man pace back and forth in front of it. She cleared her throat.

The man looked up through a mess of black hair and sighed when he saw her, stress and panic etched across his features. Is this what she was to become? A heaping mess of worry over Bertrice? She took a step forward and asked if he was alright.

As if surprised, he met her stare and stammered out a quick “Fine” before he ducked his head down again and shoved his hands in his jeans pockets. For a moment, Pansy thought she’d recognized him. But the longer she looked at his face, the less she thought so.

“Have we met before?” she finally asked, unable to shake the feeling.

He fixed his green eyes on her and her stomach dropped. Blinking back the memories of another pair of fierce green eyes, and the night she’d spend her entire life trying to forget, Pansy turned away just as the door to the office opened.

A man stepped out and handed the green-eyed man a wand. “It checks out,” the man said. “But don’t leave town.”

“I won’t.”

And then, as if she hadn’t been taken back to the shadowy years of her past already, Ron Weasley burst out of the open door. If he noticed her, he didn’t acknowledge her, just quickly grabbed the green-eyed man and rushed up the hall and into another office. The door slammed and Pansy jumped. Something clawed at her, a vague thought that she’d just come face to face with the start of her reckoning. Waves of uneasiness hit her, fear, and some sort of dark, aching regret.

“Is there something I can help you with, miss?” The handsome man that had emerged from the office was staring at her with a smile.

She looked him up and down, from his delightfully fitted, well-tailored robes to his perfectly shined Ferragamo loafers. Pansy took a breath and introduced herself, watching the man’s face for when the recognition would hit.

It never did. His smile stayed steady, and a genuine warmth radiated through her as he held out his hand and shook hers. “Felix Zaha,” he said.

“Felix, I’ve just arrived from London. They named me Bertrice Zivantus’ guardian.”

His face filled with concern. “Come inside, my partner and I are working on the case.”

Pansy followed him into what looked like a typical Ministry office. The far wall had half a dozen missing posters taped across it. She finally lost it, her eyes filling with tears as the faces on those posters laughed, waved, and stared at her with hope. When she saw the last poster, of Bertrice, she couldn’t stifle her sob.

She heard Felix explain to his partner in a quiet voice, “Igora, this is Miss Parkinson. She’s been named guardian of Bertrice as per Marwan’s last will.”

“I see,” was all Pansy heard. She turned to the other person in the room. A rather beautiful older woman, wrinkled around the edges but almost timeless in her demeanor, held out her hand and motioned for Pansy to sit. Without even thinking about it, she sat in the chair across from the woman and listened. “My name is Igora Stramitz. I’ve been assigned to Missing Persons since before the First War. I have found over two hundred of my cases, one hundred and sixty four of them were alive. When I tell you right now that I believe we will find Bertrice alive, it’s not out of hope or unfounded reassurance. My experience is telling me she’s out there.”

Felix held out a handkerchief. Pansy took it, offered him a thankful look, and blotted her eyes. She hadn’t realized how many tears had spilled down her cheeks until that moment. “Thank you,” was all she could bring herself to say as she looked from Felix to Igora. She realized they were probably sincere, but they were first and foremost investigators. They were likely judging her every reaction.

Pansy figured the truth was the easiest way to get them on her side. “I’ve been in Brussels until this morning and only just heard about Marwan.” She felt another wave of emotions surface and clenched her jaw. “He and I didn’t always see eye to eye, but Bertrice has been one of the only things in this world that’s stayed pure since the War.”