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0720 Vogel
🕑 Added 2025-05-19 10:30:50 +0000 UTCIn the European magical world over the past two years, no one's radiance had shone quite as brilliantly or as intensely as that of Bryan Watson. Resisting the request of such a formidable and influential wizard was undoubtedly an extremely difficult, perhaps even impossible, thing for a house-elf to do.
Nevertheless, Hayne, still bent under the immense psychological pressure. His shoulders hunched forward, his eyes were rushing anxiously between Bryan's presence and the path leading back to his master. After a moment of painful internal struggle, he spoke with an extremely apologetic tone:
"I'm terribly sorry, most respected Mr. Watson, but my master wishes not to be disturbed in his retirement life. Except for a handful of old friends who visit on the rarest of occasions, he hasn't received or welcomed any new visitors for nearly twenty years—"
"I'm afraid, Hayne," Bryan responded with equal patience, his voice neither raised nor tinged with irritation, "that today I must insist on seeing Chairman Vogel."
Bryan didn't lose his temper or resort to intimidation; he simply repeated his request with calm determination. His tone remained courteous but resolute, and his firm posture undoubtedly made the perceptive Hayne understand his determination.
The elderly house-elf breathed heavily several times. A complex series of emotions—a flash of fear, faint despair, resignation, crossed his cloudy, eyes in quick sequence. His fingers trembled slightly with age and anxiety. He seemed to be rapidly calculating the likelihood of successfully expelling Bryan Watson from the property.
But ultimately, after this moment of intense pondering, Hayne made what appeared to be the only rational decision available to him in such a situation.
"Please wait here for a moment, Mr. Watson—" Hayne bowed deeply and with a somewhat frantically he disapparated with a sharp, cracking sound.
"Truly incredible," Kingsley exhaled with undisguised amazement once Hayne had vanished, "Anton Vogel is still alive? I thought he had long since... passed into history. How old is he exactly?"
After Hayne's departure, Kingsley couldn't contain his composure any longer. He rarely lost his calm demeanor in any situation, but now he looked at Bryan with considerable shock and curiosity.
"Hmm, he must be approximately one hundred and ten years old, give or take a few years," Bryan replied thoughtfully, stroking his chin.
Bryan glanced sidelong at Louise, whose mouth twitched in surprise at hearing this age mentioned so casually. He said with a light, knowing chuckle that contained hints of amusement:
"Since Dumbledore is still alive, it's not particularly astonishing that Vogel hasn't died either, is it?"
Despite these perfectly logical words of explanation, Kingsley still couldn't quite digest the shock this unexpected news had given him. At the same time, he finally understood why the name Jasna Vogel had sounded so familiar to him when it was first mentioned.
"Please don't forget," Louise interjected with rising frustration, her eyes darting between the two wizards who seemed to be speaking in half-understood code, "there's still a completely uninformed... Muggle present in this conversation!"
Louise looked alternately at Bryan and Kingsley, her expression cycling between confusion, curiosity, and indignation as she spoke:
"Would someone kindly take pity on my ignorance and tell me who this Anton Vogel actually is? Some context would be enormously helpful right about now."
"Approximately sixty years ago," Bryan explained, "he served as the Supreme Mugwump and President of the International Confederation of Wizards, essentially the most powerful diplomatic position in the global wizarding community, somewhat similar to a Secretary-General of the United Nations in Muggle terms."
"Wow, a retired political big shot with serious international clout—" Louise clicked her tongue again while processing this information. Then she blinked her eyes rapidly and asked somewhat confusedly:
"So, your working theory is that, um... this Jasna Vogel person we're searching for is his descendant or relative of some kind, is that the connection? Oh, but how did you possibly figure that out from such limited information? Vogel isn't exactly a rare surname. I remember having a classmate in school with that surname—"
Kingsley also turned expectantly toward Bryan, his gaze reflecting his hope for a convincing, logical explanation. But Bryan just smiled faintly.
"It's just a feeling I have—"
"A feeling?" Louise repeated incredulously, wrinkling her nose in obvious skepticism, clearly unimpressed with this vague explanation from someone who had previously demonstrated such precise, analytical thinking.
"Fine... I'll accept your mysterious 'feeling' for now," She conceded reluctantly, "but what plan do we have if this Chairman Vogel absolutely refuses to see us? You wizards surely have laws against trespassing and harassment just like the rest of us, don't you? We can't simply barge into his private home uninvited."
Pop—
Before Bryan could give a response to Louise, the sound of apparition cut through the air, and Hayne appeared in front of him again. From the complex mixture of surprise, resignation, and bewilderment that hadn't yet faded from the house-elf's face, Bryan instantly reasoned that they hadn't been turned away as might have been expected.
"Please follow me immediately, Mr. Watson—"
The house-elf didn't waste words on explanations or pleasantries. He nodded to Bryan with a slight bow, turned around, and slowly raised his long arm toward what appeared to be empty air. His fingers traced a pattern, seemingly erasing or dissolving something invisible suspended in the atmosphere in front of them.
Louise observed this strange procedure with fascination, hearing only the mysterious sound of heavy chains breaking in the seemingly empty void where Hayne's fingers worked their magic.
A moment later, Bryan began walking forward, following the ugly dwarf-like creature with what Louise secretly considered to be terrible fashion taste in his tea-towel toga... oh wait, she mentally corrected herself, it was house-elf! She must remember the proper terminology to avoid causing offense in this strange new world.
"I've never been an invited guest in a wizard's home before—" Louise whispered to no one in particular.
After crossing what must have been some form of magical boundary or fence wall, Louise clearly grew increasingly nervous with each step they took deeper into this unfamiliar territory.
Her usual confident demeanor weakened as she no longer dared to look around openly, suddenly feeling that every inch of space surrounding her positively exuded mystery and potential magical danger. She nervously swallowed the lump forming in her throat and turned her head slightly to quietly ask Kingsley, who walked beside her:
"Do you wizards have any particularly strange or dangerous customs I should be aware of? Oh gods, if this ancient chairman asks me to kneel or perform some mysterious custom, I absolutely won't agree to it—"
Hayne, walking at the front of their small group, caught Louise's nervous muttering. He turned his head slightly and glanced at her over his shoulder, the wrinkled skin on his face trembled with barely suppressed disapproval, his eyes revealing a hint of contempt—
He could certainly discern that this woman wasn't a wizard at all and something far less worthy of entering his master's sacred home. A lowly, magic-less Muggle stepping uninvited into his master's house was undoubtedly an insult to his master's dignity and standing in the wizarding world.
If she hadn't been accompanying Bryan Watson, Hayne would have considered it his solemn duty to protect his master's honor, perhaps even by throwing her directly into the cold waters of the river that bordered the property.
"Be quiet, Louise—" Kingsley whispered urgently, his soft but firm rebuke also revealing some unusual nervousness beneath his usually calm exterior demeanor.
Anton Vogel, although not unanimously adored by the wizarding community during his controversial tenure as Supreme Mugwump, and even causing spontaneous celebrations in certain places when he finally stepped down for that publicly known but seldom discussed reason, was nonetheless a highly respected and formidable wizard who had left an indelible mark in pages of magical history.
He was the former President of the International Confederation of Wizards during a pivotal era, and in those turbulent days, the Confederation's President was a figure of genuine power who could influence the fate of various small nations with a single statement.
Kingsley didn't have Bryan's extraordinary magical strength and international standing, so he inevitably felt some reasonable tension and nervousness when facing the prospect of meeting such a legendary figure from wizarding history books.
Where there was a dedicated house-elf in residence, cleanliness couldn't possibly be lacking. Though the wooden house was visibly antique, it was kept clean, with not a single speck of dust on the wooden floor that bore the traces of centuries of gentle corrosion and patient, loving maintenance.
Outside in the natural world, the sun might be shining with dazzling brightness across the pastoral landscape, but inside the thick-walled structure, with only flickering candles lit in brass holders along the walls, it was considerably dimmer.
Entering a genuine wizard's home for the very first time in her life, and the historic home of a former important political figure at that, Louise could no longer fully restrain her curiosity.
Despite her nervousness, she glanced around sneakily, taking mental notes of everything she observed. After several careful, exploratory looks, however, visible disappointment gradually appeared across her face.
There weren't nearly as many obviously magical objects or enchanted artifacts in the room as she had anticipated from reading fantasy books; everything in the house appeared surprisingly primitive and outdated, as if this were merely the retiring house of a decadent, reclusive old man who had been deliberately far removed from civilized society for many long years.
Hayne led them through the sparsely furnished living room toward an oak door that apparently opened onto the backyard of the property.
An enormous, ancient banyan tree was planted in the center of the yard, its massive trunk telling it had probably been planted when the house was first constructed decades ago. Its magnificent, spreading canopy covered almost a quarter of the backyard's area, with aerial roots hanging down from the treetop like natural columns, resembling a forest.
At the edge of the shadow cast by the canopy was a simple wooden lounge chair, and upon it reclined an elderly man wrapped in a faded but clean woolen robe.
This was indeed a very elderly man. The deep wrinkles on his face resembled the bark of a ancient banyan tree that provided him shade in the yard. His chin had an easily-maintained short beard but like his sparse remaining hair, it was completely grizzled silver-white and had long ago lost any luster or rich color of youth.
Life itself seemed to be slowly and steadily flowing out of this old man's body like water from a cracked vessel, and it was evident that he didn't have many years left.
Even Louise, upon seeing Anton Vogel, felt a realization appear within her.
The once-renowned, feared, and respected Anton Vogel of Europe's magical world, whose decisions had formed international wizarding policy for decades, was now reduced to this frail old man lying quietly on a simple lounge chair in the shade of an ancient tree.
He watched as the small group, led by Hayne, entered the backyard through the back door and approached him. Finally, Bryan stopped at a distance, approximately fifteen feet away from the reclining figure.
The gentle afternoon breeze wandered lazily through the garden, stirring both Bryan's soft gray hair and Anton Vogel's thin grizzled beard.
Eyes clouded by cataracts yet clearly seasoned and deepened by the vicissitudes of an extraordinarily long and eventful life, as still and incomprehensible as the surface of dead water in an abandoned well, met the sharp, penetrating gaze of Bryan Watson—a gaze that pierced the heavens like a mountain peak reaching for the clouds, yet remained as immovable and unshakeable as a massive reef standing firm against a violently raging sea during the fiercest storm.
Absolute silence fell—
Looking with growing awe at the two powerful wizards calmly facing each other across the garden, Kingsley, who had stopped several paces further back from Bryan, felt his heart palpitate uncontrollably within his chest.
In a strange, disorienting daze, he seemed to be witnessing two historical eras confronting each other, and a magnificent, otherworldly sound surged in his ears like the roar of a distant, approaching storm!
Louise seemed to want to follow the most basic Muggle etiquette and politely greet this old man. She opened her mouth to speak, but the inexplicable atmosphere permeating the garden made her feel slightly suffocated and overwhelmed, keeping her quiet.
"Your remarkable eyes," The old man finally spoke, breaking the silence, "remind me of an old acquaintance from long ago, Chairman Watson—"
Vogel leaned back slightly in his lounge chair, adjusting his position to better observe his unexpected visitor. His gruff voice sounding like a distant echo from history, carrying with it a faint tinge of nostalgia.
'Chairman Watson?'
This was an interesting choice of title. It seemed that since the middle of the last year, after he had expelled Clidona during the night of the Quidditch World Cup final and was subsequently elected as Vice President of the International Confederation of Wizards, this was the first time someone had addressed him using this particular formal title.
"I hope it's not Dumbledore, Mr. Vogel—" Bryan said with a smile.
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