.: I :.
"The key in the soul"
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With a loud BANG, the Knight Bus appeared on the pavement and a boy wearing a violet uniform opened the door, claiming pompously,
"Welcome to the Knight Bus, emergency transport for the stranded witch or wizard. Just stick out your wand--"
"Yes, we know, we know, it's the same old story every time." Snorted a boy with freckles and red hair, while he helped his twin hoist a trunk aboard.
Their mother threw an apprehensive glance to the bus and then turned her eyes on the girl beside her. The mother arranged a lock escaping from the girls hair clip and embraced her.
"Do you really want to go? What if there is an attack?" 'The mother' asked anxiously.
"Mum!" the girl exclaimed, rolling her eyes. "Dad and you met the McKnives last week and if I remember well Professor Moody was with you. Don't worry, nothing will happen. I'll send you an owl as soon as I arrive."
The girl gave one last embrace to her parents and brothers and as she got on the bus, a calm and hopeful smile brightened her face. Her family stood before the gate, watching the Knight Bus amble down the road and vanish with a crack.
Virginia Molly Weasley never arrived at her destination.
There was something on her face, damp and tepid, covering her eyes. Virginia moved to take it off but she found that she couldn't raise her arm. She felt weak and hot, as if she had a high fever and there was a metallic taste on her dry lips. A jolt of pain struck her body, throbbing from her temples down to her toes. She heard nothing but her own difficult, ragged breathing and a bird singing who knows where. She instinctively turned her head towards the singing and the cloth obstructing her view slipped from her eyes. A green bird was perched in a cage. The summer twilight's reddish light entered from a French window and illuminated the room she was in. Beyond the baluster she glimpsed soft hills and a faraway village surrounded by woods and pastures.
Unable to do anything else, the young witch observed the unknown bedroom. There were some landscape paintings decorating the walls and the furniture was sober yet elegant. From the vases of roses and digitalis to the porcelain dolls atop the dresser, everything portrayed a certain amount of austere and hidden wealth. Virginia turned to look at the bed's canopy. She frowned and tried to remember what exactly had happened to make her end up here.
.: flashback :.
The Knight Bus had left Liverpool and Virginia had just given up on her intention to read. She now watched three laughing children, amusedly, as they were tossed and their Gobstones rolled onto the floor. An old witch pressed a hand against her mouth, green with nausea, and her Indian blackbird repeated the words "intelligent" and "unnameable", beating its wings nervously. Three Aurors on duty had to grip onto the back of three seats that were in front of them so they could prevent themselves from falling.
The knight buses brakes screeched suddenly and Virginia fell of her seat, hitting her head against the window with a resounding crack. She was momentarily blinded by pain but was vaguely aware of people around her yelling out what seemed to be dark spells. When Virginia finally regained her senses she looked on in horror at the group of Death Eaters attacking people in the bus. Virginia reached for her wand but before she could utter a spell, somebody grabbed her arm and dragged her up the steps of the Knight Bus.
"Don't be stupid, girl, run away." A voice scorned.
"This isn't the first time that I've face those filthy bastards!" She replied annoyed. The Auror looked irritated at her and pushed her up the staircase.
"This isn't a game, girl, and they aren't your schoolmates you curse in the hallways."
"But--"
"No 'buts', go upstairs and go away with that--"
A flash of red light hit the Auror, throwing him away from her. Virginia held her wand and with an Impedimenta curse she was able to stop the Death Eater who was reaching her. She ran up the stairs as quickly as she could, throwing curses behind her every two or three steps.
"What are you waiting for? Get her!"
Some one screamed behind her but Virginia tried to ignore the battle's noises, the Apparitions' CRACK behind her. Her only thought was to reach the portkey and get away. A boy not much older than her took her hands and dragged her toward a group of people. Virginia fell, unable to move her legs, the boy cast a spell but some purplish flames hit him in the chest while the Death Eaters arrived from below. The children cried and screamed in terror; the men left the portkey and threw themselves against the assailants. Virginia dragged herself toward the fugitives, begging every deity she knew to reach them in time.
"STUPEFY!"
"AVADA KEDAVRA!"
And the last things she saw were flashes of green and red light.
.: End flashback :.
What happened after she had lost consciousness? How had she arrived in this room? It was neither a hospital nor a dungeon…had some one, maybe, found her and brought her here? As Virginia pondered these questions, the last remnants of light slowly disappeared from her room and stars began to appear in the sky. The young witch closed her eyes and let the crickets chirping songs cradle her as her mother might have if she'd been with her.
The door opened and was slowly closed again, as if the intruder didn't want to be a disturbance. Virginia turned her head in the direction of the door with wide open eyes but let out a sigh of relief when she saw who had entered- it was a little girl, no older than twelve. She was petite and pale with a long braid of brown hair that fell onto her back from beneath a bonnet. She wore a bottle green dress and held up some clean laundry.
"Well awakened, Miss." The girl said in a small voice, placing the laundry on the easy chair and opening a dresser drawer.
The witch watched her for a few seconds and then asked,
"Where am I? What... what happened?"
"You are at the Elysian Fields and you have been asleep for three days. The Master will be happy to know that you have recovered."
"How did I get here?"
The girl froze and then she took out some towels from another drawer.
"I will prepare you a bath." she announced, changing topic. "It will make you feel better."
She entered a nearby room and after awhile Virginia could hear the sound of running water. Virginia closed again her eyes again, more confused than before. The migraine hadn't gone away and neither had it reduced and it made her unable to think, to find answers that perhaps were simpler than what she thought. She reopened her eyes only when the girl asked her if she needed help to get up. The witch nodded and she put an arm around the other's neck-the girl almost fell when Virginia leaned completely on her.
"Shouldn't you call somebody to help you?" Virginia asked worried she might crush the girl.
"No Miss, I don't want them to come." The girl said as she panted under Virginia's weight.
"They who?" Virginia asked curiously.
Virginia felt the girl tremble slightly under her weight but the girl tightened her lips and opened the bathroom door.
"Which essence do you prefer? Violet, acacia or vanilla?"
"Er... violet, thank you. What is your name?"
"Meg, Meg Flandrers. You are Miss Virginia Weasley, I know your name." Meg replied, pouring the content of a cruet into the tub.
The bathroom was bigger than that of the Burrow, tiled with sea themed mosaics. Virginia glanced at the mirror, glimpsing only her own image blurred by the steam. She let Meg undress her. Virginia noted that she still had the clothes on she wore the day of the ambush. They were still dirty with blood and mud Virginia noted as Meg helped her enter the water. The heat had a magnificent effect on her wounded body, softly easing the pain. Then she plunged, entering a hushed world. When she resurfaced, the girl had disappeared but there was a clean nightgown on the cabinet.
"If you need help, ring the bell. I am going to make your dinner." Said Meg from the nearby room.
The young witch leaned her head on the tub's edge, sighing as her muscles relaxed. At this point it was safe to rule out that she has been captured, she knew quite well how the Death Eaters treated their prisoners and surely a nice bed, a warm bath and a decent dinner wasn't included in the package. Nonetheless, it was strange that Meg had changed the topic when Virginia had asked her about her arrival at the Elysian Fields and the building's other occupant. However, it was even stranger that a girl of that age -few years older than a mere child- was a maid. She got out of the tub with some difficulty and wrapped herself in a bathrobe. Wiping away the fog on the mirror, Virginia studied herself critically. Her reflection looked none the worse for wear: Her face and arms were pale and sporting inflates and bruises, there was an unhealed cut across her upper lip with a burn on her cheekbone. Virginia tiredly ran a hand through her damp hair and dressed, surprised that the underwear was her size. There was a knock on the door.
"Er… come in." Virginia called apprehensively.
It was bit awkward- in her home no one but Percy used to knock, even if everybody complained about it. Meg appeared at the bathroom's door and smiled at her.
"Your dinner is served, Miss."
Virginia smiled back and finished buttoning up her nightgown. Her dinner was on a round table before a window. It consisted of carafe, tureen, roast chicken with potatoes and some ice cream. Meg made her sit down and poured her some broth. As she ate, Virginia observed the trees which seemed inky black in the night and noticed the faraway village shining brightly as if wanting to compete with the stars. A light breeze entered from the open window tickling Virginia's cheeks and making the curtains billow as if they were the sails of a galley.
"Meg, where's the fireplace? I'd like to tell my parents I am well." Virginia said off-handedly.
Meg looked at her with wide eyes, as pale as a ghost; she then smiled nervously and began to clear the table.
"I am sorry, but I can give you neither Floo Powder nor your wand." Meg said with a slight tremor in her voice.
"Why? After all I am not--" Virginia began but Meg cut her off.
"I have received precise orders from the Master, Miss. Maybe, when he will be back..."
Meg ended, placing the dirty dishes on the tray. Virginia felt too tired to insist and after have contemplated the rising of the moon; she went to sleep.
The days went by and Virginia was neither able to have a pinch of Floo Powder nor did the mysterious master make an appearance. As if it wasn't enough, she wasn't even allowed to leave her bedroom. She'd walk from the balcony to the antechamber and back, every time she would ask Meg for explanations and every time the girl would change the topic or would not reply. Then, on an afternoon in early August, Meg entered the bedroom and announced to Virginia with a bit of anxiety that the master had arrived and he wanted Virginia to have dinner with him. She helped the young witch to get ready, choosing a dress of blue linen and spurring her on to hurry. She was putting a clip in the older girl's hair when somebody knocked.
"One second, she's almost ready." Meg called.
In reply, the door opened wide violently and a woman entered the room. She had black hair, heavy lidded eyes and a pale, thin face. A cloak that was such a dark shade of violet it could've been mistaken for black draped her shoulders with a pin shaped like the Dark Mark attached on her breast. Bellatrix Lestrange glanced arrogantly with light disgust at Meg, barely twisting her thin lips.
"Are you stupider than I think? I told you that she had to be in the dinning room at half past seven, it is seven-thirty-three." Bellatrix Lestrange snarled.
"Ma-Madam, I…" Meg stuttered.
"Crucio!" the Death Eater hissed, watching with sadist pleasure as the girl writhed and screamed on the floor.
Then she turned to look at Virginia who was shocked by the Death Eater's sudden arrival. The woman grabbed her chin and stooped down on her, murmuring with an affected and sugary voice.
"I'm happy to meet you again Miss Weasley. We met last year at the Ministry but back then we hadn't had the chance to introduce ourselves properly. I am Bellatrix Asphodelia Lestrange, nice to meet you." Before Virginia could react, the Death Eater grabbed her wrist and unceremoniously carried her out of the room. Bellatrix lingered for an instance to look at Meg still under the curse's effect and unwillingly she pronounced the counter spell. "Be thankful that my Lord wants you alive, Muggle, or I would have already killed you." Snarled Bellatrix.
Virginia was so shocked that she wasn't able to walk and Bellatrix pushed her brutally. Bellatrix dragged Virginia through the hallway and the staircases as if she was an object of no value. The young witch couldn't understand what was happening; the sight of this Death Eater had been like a bucket of frozen water. The Dark Lord wasn't known to be an irreproachable guest; the rare times a prisoner's corpse was found, the mediwizards had to use complex spells to individualize the identity. Then why had she been treated like an average guest in a normal house? Why had they put her in a ladylike bedroom instead of a dark, damp cell with bones scattered on the floor? Why had they served her better meals than those of Hogwarts instead of a piece of dry and mouldy bread? Nobody had touched her, neither used violence nor hexed her; plus Meg –who wouldn't hurt a fly- had been the only other human being she had seen in those days. Bellatrix pushed her on the floor and then bowed.
"Bella, Bella, you may have spent fourteen years in Azkaban but it is not a good excuse to forget your etiquette. Remember to be kind with our guest." hissed a hoarse and asthmatic voice with an emphasis that Virginia didn't like. "Miss Weasley, I hope you will forgive me to have not been a polite guest but your friends from the Order of the Phoenix have prevented me from fulfilling my duty."
Standing before her, with a snake coiled around his body, was Lord Voldemort. Virginia felt her stomach writhe. She knew what the Dark Lord's appearance was -Harry had described him a couple of times; but what she had imagined was ten times better than reality. He was very thin and tall, like Bill but ghostlier, the skin had a clammy look and a greenish paleness, and two red reptile-like eyes glanced at her with a mix of amusement, mockery and something else she didn't want to catalogue. There were two tiny holes instead of a nose and a lipless mouth completed this creepy sight. Virginia felt the impulse to vomit there and then. Around him there were about twenty Death Eaters. A dozen of them had dark red cloaks, the others wore their cloaks like Bellatrix Lestrange did -it was a detail without importance. However, Virginia remembered that the Dark Lord's followers used to wear black (at least in the battles). If they wore shocking pink or orange robes during other occasions, Virginia did not know.
"Well, have you liked your days at the Elysian Fields?" Lord Voldemort asked (though it sounded more like a hiss).
"I have always thought that if you lived in a house every thing would have been black. I'm surprised to see that your hideout is so… colourful." Virginia snorted to hide her fear and looked around referring to the room's décor. Red velvet covered all four walls of the dining room, which was illuminated by a motley Murano chandelier. Beyond the Dark Lords shoulders she glimpsed a large and elegant rosewood sideboard on which a show of fine porcelain dishes and silverware were placed. The floral centrepiece had a vital and cheerful appearance, struggling so much with the perverse and wicked nature of its landlord.
"Tsk, some one has the gut to challenge me in my home. I am sorry for not being so obvious… they call you Ginny, don't they? What a vulgar and childish nickname. I will call you by your first name; it is Virginia, isn't it?"
The young witch froze at those words-the same words five years before she had seen written down on a page in the elegant and spidery handwriting of Tom Riddle. The dark wizard caressed the snake with his long bony fingers. Then he beckoned a Death Eater to step forward, smiling wickedly and with triumphant.
"Rabastan, go to the village's undertaker tomorrow and buy the most beautiful coffin he has, make an engraving onto the headstone, Virginia Molly Weasley: unworthy whore and useless brat or something like that and then send everything to her family."
"It will be done, my Lord."
"And don't forget to attach our most sincere condolences. Unlike those ruffians, we cannot allow ourselves to ignore formalities." he said with mocking amusement. "Don't make that face Virginia. I don't deny that perhaps you won't die; I just don't like to feed your parents' stupid hopes. Well, let's sit -we need a lot of energy for what we have to do."
Two Death Eaters grabbed her arms and raised her, they then push her onto a chair and sat down on her either side. The others also took their place at the table and when the goblets magically filled with wine, Lord Voldemort raised his. His minions imitated him.
"My Death Eaters, I have reunited you to celebrate an event that will assure our victory. A toast to my cousin Bianca, whose knowledge of ancient magic has allowed us to develop and define our plan." A woman replied with an angelic smile, barely stooped her head. "A toast for all those loyal Death Eaters who should have been here with us and had devoted their whole existence to our cause." There was a brief silence and then the Dark Wizard turned his eyes and goblet to the prisoner. "Finally, a toast to Miss Weasley." The Dark Lord smirked at her. "Who although is a stupid Gryffindor and a blood traitor, will this evening give proof of her utility."
The Death Eaters raised their goblets cheering and Virginia turned pale as a spell forced her to toast with them. Small sweat drops had pearled her forehead and upper lip.
After dinner they moved, laughing, into a hall and it began. A man in his mid-forties had called the show: three men and a woman –most likely Muggles- had been brought into the centre of the hall and subjected to different curses. Under the effect of the Imperius Curse, they had performed complex and dangerous circus exercises. Then two prisoners begun to fight, biting and tearing each others flesh as if they were beasts, while the third violently copulated with the woman; a Death Eater described what they were doing with the same coldness of a scientific journalist. Bellatrix and another Death Eater laughed madly, shaking their wands and spurring their own champions like Roman matrons at the gladiatorial games. Virginia tried not to watch but the spell was still in effect and all she was able to do was lower her eyes. She felt nausea rise in her throat, blocking her breath. She wanted to go into the bathroom and vomit her dinner, wanted to run away and go back home, wanted to be held in the warm and reassuring embrace of her father, wanted to close her eyes and wake up in her bedroom among her mother's yells and the noise of the ghoul in the attic, she wanted to have her usual breakfast with lots of sausages and scrambled eggs and then degnome the garden but most all, she wanted this to be only a dream, a bad dream that fades away with the morning light.
The woman sitting near Lord Voldemort took her wand out, broke all the spells and answered the wild look of Bellatrix with an angelic smile and a sugary, polite voice.
"I would beg you to not mumble, Lady Lestrange. Or do you prefer that we wait the required twenty-one years for the next conjunction?"
"Surely no, Donna Bianca. Only it is a shame that the show should end so brusquely."
"You will dispose of them once we'll have ended what we have to do. And we have to hurry, the moon is rising." Said the Dark Lord, wanting to avoid a quarrel between the two ladies.
He gave a signal for everyone to go into the garden and once more, Virginia was grabbed roughly and carried outside. She was brought through arcs of wild roses and box-trees pruned like statues, through paths of porphyry tiles and fountains. They reached the peak of a low hillock where a magical circle had been traced with a pole in the middle. When Donna Bianca gave the signal, the girl was undressed and tied. The witch drew near her, a bowl filled with a dense and dark liquid and a brush were in her hands, and she caressed the girl's cheek.
"You don't have to be afraid. At least now."
The woman dipped the brush and traced runes and symbols on her skin. The movements were light and delicate, like the flight of a butterfly, yet sure and firm. Virginia trembled at this touch and the smile of the woman (which had lost its heavenliness to become that of a seductive demon).
"What… what will you do to me?" Virginia whispered fearfully, recovering the ability of speech.
The dark witch stared at her with her brown eyes and her expression mellowed.
"My dear, it is my cousin's duty to inform you about that. It won't be a pleasant experience -at least from your point of view- but you won't die. However even I don't know if death will be a better experience than this." She slipped a hand onto Virginia's stomach, tilling to sink between the folds of her sex. "You are still a virgin, I couldn't hope for any better."
Bianca grazed Virginia's lips voluptuously with her own and then she reached the other Death Eaters at the borders of the circle. Virginia saw them grasp their wands and bringing aggression onto her, she shouted.
"What do you want from me? What do I have that is so important for you!"
"What do you have? What do you have?" hissed Voldemort, approaching her. "Virginia, is it possible that in five long years you did not notice what you guarded? Is it possible that you have forgotten your first year at Hogwarts?"
"The diary doesn't exist anymore! Harry destroyed it!" Virginia shouted determinedly.
"I'm not interested in the diary. Tell me, Virginia," he breathed in her ear. "Haven't you ever sensed him? Haven't you ever sensed his presence in your thoughts? Haven't you ever sensed his… my voice echo in your dreams?"
Virginia, her face paler than before, tightened her lips and closed her eyes. Sometimes she had felt as if there was somebody in her head, as if a hand drew away the veils of her thoughts. The psychiatric therapist had told her that it was a mere consequence of the Chamber of Secret's accident. The only thing she could do was ignore the presence of Tom Riddle in her subconscious and learn to cohabit with it.
"Aha, you are remembering. My memory had swallowed your vital energy and had fed on your soul, corroding it from the inside. When the diary was destroyed, your energy went back into your body and with it went also a part of me which was inside it. When the diary was created, I poured part of my power and soul into the diary. You will agree that I have every right to take back what is mine." he stood back, getting out of the circle. "A wise man once said that the man fears what he ignores. You have to know that we'll extract from your soul what belongs to me, then it'll be purified and finally I'll reabsorb it. You may bring our friend." This last bit was not directed at Virginia and her unspoken question as to who it was directed to, was answered soon enough.
A figure wrapped in a cloak drew near while some wizards raised their wands in a defensive gesture. Virginia felt an intense cold pierce her body as a new wave of nausea rose. The figure was a dementor. It drew near her and when it was a footstep away from her, it lowered its hood. She closed her eyes trying to think about the happy moments she had lived. She thought about her childhood games, her seventh birthday, the time Bill, Charlie and Percy gave her a new doll. She even thought all the way to the first time she had met Harry and the day she had received her letter and then to the time the Sorting Hat sorted her into Gryffindor. But inevitably, her thoughts went to the Chamber of Secrets.
"Now!" Bianca commanded.
The dementor stooped on her, aspirating the air. Then it kissed her, sucking her soul. Virginia tried to oppose but she felt weaker and weaker as the seconds past. The most horrendous memories of her life filled her mind. She felt as if she was drowning in a frozen pond, as if her lungs were unable to take in oxygen. It was as if a hook was anchored to her heart and it was being extracted through her mouth. Then…there was nothing.
As soon as the creature loosened its grasp on the young witch, seven Death Eaters tuned a litany with hoarse voices. An inhuman cry rose from the dementor as if a fire was burning inside it. The dementor's body was torn by rays of light and nothing stayed of the creature but a heap of rotten leaves and a cloud of sparkling dust. Bianca threw a glance to the Death Eaters and exclaimed.
"What are you waiting for to recite the purification charm?"
The seven Death Eaters gave the place to their fellows, who tuned another litany. The dust gathered in a sphere and the grains of dust whirled furiously forming a sphere. Lord Voldemort drew near the woman, both looked at the sphere.
"How much time will we need to finish the process?" He asked.
She tightened her lips and ran a hand through her hair.
"I don't know, a couple of days or perhaps more. You have to consider that five years have past since then, Thomas."
"I know it and you still forget that I don't want to be called that way." Lord Voldemort replied his eyes fixed on the sphere.
The witch snorted and watched as the wind swept away the dead leaves.
The Death Eaters succeeded in the spell's performance for three days and in the fourth night, a small yellowish core could be distinguished in the sphere's centre. With a neat swish, Bianca separated the two parts. She directed the core toward Lord Voldemort -who swallowed it- while the other part was put in a dark glass vial.
A sharp yellowish light wrapped the Dark Lord, who started to scream and writhe on the meadows dirt clad ground. It was as if his body could hardly retain the burning light. The followers surrounded their Lord worriedly. Bellatrix threw fiery glances to her rival -the only one to be calm. The light grew weak, showing the cloak covering the wizard's body. Breathing with difficulty, Voldemort sat on his thighs. Without raising his head, he watched his hands. Then, still weak, he got up and two Death Eaters helped him to stand up.
"Are you… are you well my Lord?"
Bellatrix whispered slightly worried. The Dark Lord curved his lips in a tired but triumphant smile.
"Yes, Bella, just a bit tired."
He replied with a different voice. It was not thin and asthmatic but virile and deep -soft like a pillow suffocating a prince in a tower. Bianca drew near him and handed him a silvery mirror. He accepted and examined his face. It was not usual his face. Yes it was pale and gaunt but he had the healthy appearance of one who was recovering from some illness. He smiled and the reflection of his youth smiled back -not a kind of man-snake but a handsome man in his middle twenties.
"I suppose that you have foreseen this too, dear cousin."
"To be honest, no." the witch answered, putting the mirror among the folds of her cloak. "But it is a more than welcome collateral effect, don't you agree? By the way, I'll try to find an explanation."
"My Lord, what do we do with the girl?" Asked a Death Eater, stepping forward.
The Dark Lord looked at Virginia, still tied up. Her cornelian-like eyes were half open without life and light and her breath was as light as a bird's. Her complexion was so pale that even the freckles on her face seemed faded. She looked like a doll of fine china forgotten by a moody child. He liked the thought.
"Bring her back to her room, she'll be my china doll."