HP: Hogwarts Snake

Chapter 464 Xina's Initiative

When Sheena came in, Maggie had already put the wand away.

"Why did you suddenly come over?" He greeted her gently, adept at portraying the image of a gentle fiancé, but his words still revealed a hint of cruelty and manipulation. "Are you here to personally punish the prisoner who disrupted our big day?"

Upon hearing the word 'punishment,' Sheena visibly stopped breathing. Maggie noticed this but ignored it and continued, "Please don't feel guilty. As I said, this guy is indeed a prisoner, a fugitive from the law. We are absolutely doing justice."

Della noticed that Sheena's arm was trembling slightly and knew that she was scared. She sighed silently and realized that Maggie was not as patient with Sheena as she had imagined. She was now using a gentle approach to intimidate her.

Cruel people can choose to take responsibility, but their cruel nature will not change. They will only exhibit a new kind of cruelty after adapting to the rules, a more hidden but perhaps more powerful kind of cruelty.

However, she couldn't care less about this strange couple, because there was actually a lot of mutual consent between them—Maggie's previous impatience and subtle humiliation towards Sheena were quite obvious, and in Della's opinion, there was also a suspicion that Maggie's previous gentleness towards Sheena had changed too much.

These things were all unusual, yet Sheena still fell hopelessly in love with him, as if all the unpleasant and unusual things in the past didn't exist, and perhaps she even turned those gray past experiences into nourishment for her colorful life now.

Della was always polite to Sheena, but there was neither a bridge of friendship between them nor any shining memories to reminisce about, so she wasn't very close to her. As a result, her feelings for Sheena remained at a pitiful but stagnant stage.

With the situation so tense right now, love is really a trivial matter, and Della has no interest in helping her mold Maggie into a perfect man.

There's still something she can do, like right now. After all, comforting Sheena and giving Maggie a nudge is just a matter of a few words for her, and Della is still willing to spend this little effort to maintain peace.

Just as Della was about to speak, unexpectedly, Sheena agreed to Maggie's request.

“If it’s punishment,” Sheena said, as if she had made up her mind, “then perhaps I can help.”

Upon hearing this, everyone looked at her. Sirius looked up in surprise, finding it hard to believe that this seemingly gentle and docile girl could be such a ruthless character, especially considering she was a Muggle. Maggie and Della, on the other hand, opened their eyes slightly, their astonishment far exceeding Sirius's, because they truly knew Sheena.

Stared at by the three men, Sheena immediately became flustered. She flicked her thumb and forefinger nails and forced herself to continue, "My uncle used to be a gangster. Gangs have a set of methods for dealing with hostages."

As Sheena spoke, her face flushed and paled in turns, just like any other child from an unclean family who never comes into contact with unclean things. She was genuinely ashamed of her family background, but in reality, she had never left, nor could she leave, all the privileges she had received—the humiliation of leaving those privileges had almost driven her to her death, so keeping quiet about it was her usual strategy.

"Oh? Is that so?" Maggie became interested. He ignored Sheena's awkwardness, which he found unacceptable, and looked at her encouragingly. "What do you want to do, my dear?"

Della heard a distinct, rapid gasp and saw that Sheena's face was completely red; clearly, her love had overwhelmed everything at that moment.

“First, if there are two hostages, one should be released,” Sheena said, then, fearing misunderstanding, she spoke the next sentence in a faster tone, “because there is a primary and a secondary hostage, and the purpose of the hostage-taking is not to torture or kill. As long as we hold the primary hostage in our hands and let the secondary hostage send out the message, this is the best way to attract the person we want.”

This is a wise point, and it's a good solution given the current situation. However, Della saw through the essence of Sheena's proposal at a glance. She felt that she bore some responsibility for the two prisoners, so she wanted to release one of them if possible.

It seems that no matter how jealous she is, or how much she is blinded by love, Sheena's kind nature remains unchanged.

Such kindness is commendable, but in such cruel times, it's hard to say it isn't a burden.

Maggie saw this as a burden, and unlike Della, he lacked genuine gentleness. She immediately set about constructing the path to cruelty. "Good, good, that's a good idea!"

He first affirmed her, which sparked hope in Sheena, and then innocently asked, "Send out a message? The kind of message that forces someone to come? Like a picture of Harry Potter's godfather suffering a fate worse than death?"

The air seemed to freeze for a moment. Della remained silent as Sirius, whose fate had been so easily decided, glared fiercely at Maggie, while Sheena took a small step back in fright.

“Don’t worry, we never need to do these things ourselves. Our subordinates always have ways of making things look presentable—sometimes the actual situation is completely different.” After giving Sheena a fright, Maggie turned to comfort her, enjoying Sheena’s rollercoaster of panic.

These three Riddles hate each other, but they are all Riddles, sharing the same deep-seated desire for control, only manifested in different ways.

Voldemort represents external power, Della represents the internal self, and Maggie finds pleasure in manipulating and playing with the power that others value and her own ego.

Della may be the least wicked of them all, but when you really get to her core, she can still be described as coldly selfish.

“Yes, there are plenty of people who can do it. Your plan is indeed quite good,” Della said, trying to smooth things over. “I’ll have someone do it, Sheena.”

Sheena didn't reply immediately. She stood in the interrogation room, which consisted of chains and prisoners, for a while with her head bowed. Finally, she said softly, "Let me do it."

"You're coming?" Maggie raised an eyebrow, her gaze towards Sheena becoming slightly more serious.

“I’ve seen them, it should be possible,” Sheena’s voice trembled again, gradually losing its confidence, as she looked at Della pleadingly, “Of course, I need some manpower. If Della could lend me a few people from Miss Abend’s side, that would be wonderful…”

“Newlywed lady, I advise you not to be reckless,” Sirius, the prisoner with the least autonomy, spoke first. “What you’re getting involved in now could lead to clear punishment.”

“You’re quite considerate, Mr. Blake,” Della said, suddenly finding it amusing, because she was dealing with mutual concern between an outsider and a captive, which only highlighted how inhuman she and Maggie were.

“I don’t hold myself to the same shameless standard as you do,” Sirius said dismissively.

“You’re really hurting me, Mr. Blake,” Della replied curtly, showing no reaction to the insults, just like Maggie.

“Then…” Sheena hesitated, deliberately avoiding looking at Sirius, her gaze shifting between Maggie and Della, “could I…”

After a few seconds of silence, Maggie gave her a smile. "Of course."

That was settled. Maggie and Della left the interrogation room immediately to show their trust, leaving Sheena and a house-elf to question her current prisoners.

On the way, Della thought about Sheena's kindness and resilience, and looked at her with new respect. She felt that if they had met normally, they would have been friends, maybe even good friends, because Sheena was now thinking about Harry, whom she had only met once yesterday. She was indeed a good person and seemed like a very loyal friend.

Just as I was thinking this, Maggie next to me suddenly burst out laughing, and then she couldn't stop. She laughed and said, "Did you see that? She thinks she can find a balance between keeping it from me and making herself feel at ease. She's so arrogant, like a fool, and she thinks we're fools too."

Della could tell that there was no dissatisfaction in Maggie's tone; he was simply amused by the situation and was stating an objective fact. In her opinion, Sheena's performance was also quite clumsy.

She glanced at Maggie but didn't say anything, not wanting her words to become an excuse for Maggie to manipulate Sheena again, and felt sorry for Sheena in her heart.