December 27, 1992.
Christmas had only just passed, and Oxford Street in London's West End was a sea of humanity. Swarms of Muggles, clad in crisp new clothes, flooded the sidewalks. Children darted through the crowds with high-pitched laughter, and young couples exchanged earnest New Year's wishes, their breaths blooming into white mist. Every face carried a spark of hope for the year ahead, a warmth that even the swirling heavy snow could not dampen.
For wizards, Christmas was equally paramount, yet their celebrations bore little resemblance to the Muggle bustle. They preferred the sanctuary of the indoors, the rhythmic crackle of a hearth fire, and the quiet shadow of a silver-frosted Christmas tree adorned with mistletoe. There, they would settle in to debate Quidditch tactics or dissect the latest headlines from the Daily Prophet.
Consequently, Diagon Alley—the beating heart of wizarding commerce—always felt strangely desolate in the days following the holiday. And if Diagon Alley was quiet, the subterranean reaches of the Underworld beneath Knockturn Alley were a tomb.
Clatter, clatter—click!
Amossta, his frame entirely swallowed by a voluminous black cloak, stepped off a Gringotts-style cart. Though his stomach did a violent somersault from the erratic journey, he maintained a mask of chilling indifference. To maintain his persona, he could afford nothing less than absolute composure.
The air here was thick, a gagging stench of fermented slug mucus and rotting frog innards. The uneven ground felt slick and damp underfoot. Above, rows of inverted torches drifted in mid-air, casting a sickly, emerald glow that transformed the massive fan-shaped cavern into something resembling a ghost realm.
Amossta's gaze swept the perimeter. Two hundred feet to his left, in the 'pet' market, a fifteen-foot-tall troll sat slumped against the rock face. Iron chains as thick as a man's arm bound its limbs, and the creature remained so still it nearly merged with the jagged black stone.
Its owner, a gap-toothed old hag from Moldova, had brought the beast here hoping for a windfall—enough to pay for a cure for her worsening Dragon Pox. She had been waiting for a buyer for two years. No one had even asked the price. At that moment, she was leaning against the troll's massive toes, shrieking curses at a cluster of House-elves nearby, accusing them of polluting the air with their very presence.
These were 'Free' House-elves.
Of course, using the word 'free' to describe a House-elf was as insulting as calling a Centaur a 'beast'; you wouldn't receive gratitude for the sentiment. Most of these wretched creatures had belonged to minor wizarding families or secretive witch covens that had flickered out of existence. Left without a master to serve, they were unmoored, their purpose stripped away. They gathered here by instinct, hoping to find a new yoke to bear.
In truth, few sought them out, save for Dark Wizards in need of living subjects to test the lethality of a new curse or potion. The troll was the only one who showed them any 'affection'; Amossta had once watched the starving creature snatch several elves in a single swipe, crunching them down with a terrifying, rhythmic relish.
Beyond the trolls and elves, the market—which smelled worse than a neglected latrine—offered other curiosities: Centaurs cast out from their herds, captured Veela (always a high-demand item), vampires pacing behind silver bars, and Leprechauns sold as raw potion materials. Aside from high-risk, restricted creatures like Dragons or Unicorns, one could find almost any magical species within this lawless hollow.
To the right, the trade stalls clung to a crude, medieval aesthetic, but the wares spread out on the dirt floor were anything but simple. There were grimoires of Dark Arts dating back to Ancient Greece, potions that promised explosive power at a ruinous cost to the soul, and alchemical artifacts capable of snuffing out life on a massive scale. Compared to the inventory here, the cursed objects in Borgin and Burkes looked like schoolboy pranks. Even Devil's Snare was relegated to a mere decorative potted plant.
Amossta had once encountered an Italian wizard selling a dormant strain of the Black Death curse. According to the man, the curse had been weakened, but if released, it would still comfortably wipe out a medium-sized Muggle city. The price tag was as staggering as the effect; otherwise, Amossta might have purchased it simply for the sake of study.
This was the dark underbelly of the magical world—a true land of the lawless.
After a few moments, Amossta's stomach settled. He adjusted his cloak and wove into the thin crowd toward the center of the cavern. Most here moved like ghosts, faces buried deep in hoods. Only the truly insane or the transient foreign wizards dared to show their skin in a place crawling with Ministry informants.
Because make no mistake: the Ministry of Magic had Aurors stationed here in secret. However, they were not here to shut the market down. They were here to ensure the chaos remained 'contained.' Unless the Ministry felt like declaring war on every surviving ancient wizarding sect and Dark faction in Britain, they would never dare to strike at the heart of the Underworld.
The center of the cavern held a square courtyard cordoned off by low granite walls—the Commission Market. At one end stood a towering notice board made of snakewood. Hundreds of parchments were pinned to it, glowing with the crimson light of magical contracts, waiting for someone to tear them down.
Amossta scanned the board. Finding nothing of value, he turned and claimed a stone bench, settling in to wait for his contact.
Perhaps due to the New Year, the area was nearly empty. Only ten feet to his right, two men huddled in hushed conversation.
One was an elderly wizard in a brown burlap robe, his bald scalp a landscape of pustules and sores. Hearing Amossta approach, he looked up. He seemed to sneer at the way Amossta hid his features behind a distorted swirl of magical concealment. The old man bared a few yellowed teeth, his breath a foul gale. Half of his face was charred like burnt bark; the other half was a nightmare of pink, twitching, tentacle-like growths.
However, the moment the old man noticed the golden snake embroidered on Amossta's collar, his mocking grin vanished. He gave a sharp, respectful nod and looked away.
Amossta found the old man's face fascinating. If he guessed correctly, that was the result of a botched Horcrux ritual—the catastrophic backlash of a failed soul-splitting curse. To Amossta's knowledge, only one substance could halt the spread of such magical necrosis.
The conversation between the two men confirmed his suspicion.
"It's extremely difficult to get, and even more dangerous," the second wizard whispered. He was as thin as a reed and pulled a glass vial from beneath his robes. The liquid inside shimmered with a brilliant, silvery light that cut through the gloom of the cave. "You know where the only Unicorns in Britain are kept."
The old wizard understood the implication. He let out a sharp, cold cackle and tossed a fist-sized lump of mithril onto the table.
"Of course, of course. Even here, few care to poke the nest while Dumbledore is watching. I've waited a long time for this. You have guts, friend. I admire that."
Transactions in the Underworld were usually blunt. There was little room for haggling; if you couldn't agree on a price, you simply killed the other party.
Amossta watched with detached amusement as the old wizard snatched the vial, gave it a cursory sniff, and tilted his head back to drain it. Behind his veil of blurred light, Amossta's lips curled into a smirk.
There was a fatal flaw in traditional magical education. Wizards from specific sects or lineages often became masters of one narrow field while remaining dangerously ignorant of everything else—clueless as first-year apprentices. Modern school-based education might struggle to produce world-shaking geniuses, but it at least provided balance.
Balance of knowledge was everything.
At the very least, any student with a passing grade in their Hogwarts O.W.L.s would have recognized that the "Unicorn Blood" was nothing more than a Confusing Concoction laced with two Unicorn tail hairs and a basic Transfiguration charm.