Chapter 4: Confirmation

The letters on her screen refused to rearrange themselves into any other name. C-7’s account sat exactly where the metadata had placed it, registered to a shell her father kept for eastern logistics. She scrolled through the three transfers again, each one carrying the same routing sequence that protected the pier payment. The match sat in plain sight now.

Harry waited. His right wrist remained free, though the circulation had not fully returned yet.

“Both hands,” Dracona said.

She moved behind the chair and worked the left buckle loose. The strap slid through the frame. Harry pulled his arm forward and flexed the fingers until they responded. She handed him the device once more and stayed at his shoulder.

“Closed servers,” she said. “Your uncle’s. The ones he keeps off the main network.”

Harry navigated the directory from memory, bypassing the surface folders. The screen shifted to a listing of hidden partitions, then to a single encrypted file tagged with a date from six weeks earlier. He opened an extraction tool and pulled the audio track directly to the device’s local storage without routing it anywhere else. The file transferred in less than ten seconds.

“Here.”

He tapped play. A low male voice filled the small space between them.

“The route goes through the Malfoy pier on the twenty-second. Viktor will be carrying the codes. We clear the payment through the holding account, then the sniper removes the witness. Lucius wants the eastern channel secured and the Potter line blamed for the hit. My agreement stands once the codes reach my contact.”

A second voice responded, tighter, older. Her father’s. The single word of confirmation left no room for reinterpretation.

“Done.”

The recording ended. Neither of them spoke while the silence settled back into the ventilation hum. Dracona listened to the mechanical sound for several seconds before she reached for the remaining straps. She freed Harry’s left ankle first, then the right. The chest restraint followed. He stood slowly, testing balance against the concrete.

The room contained only what they had brought in. The table, the chair, the two phones, and the single overhead light. No exit plan presented itself beyond the door she had locked from the outside each previous visit.

“We need a courier,” Dracona said. “Someone outside both circles who can leak the file without tracing it back here.”

Harry set the device on the table and kept his hands visible.

“Neutral drop point. No direct handoff.”

She nodded once. The screen on her own phone still displayed the account number linked to C-7. She copied the file path from Harry’s device to hers, then wiped the local copy on his end with a single command. The recording remained accessible through the shared link she created.