The Stains of Time
The sleet gushed down relentlessly.
It was dark, freezing cold and pouring frozen strips of rain.
A round faced boy stumbled through the slushy streets, his hands in his pockets, his head down. He had grown taller over the years, lost his chubbiness. He might have appeared attractive if he had shaved the loose brown stubble on his chin, or dragged a comb through his thick mop of hair.
He had been long forgotten as the clumsy and forgetful boy he used to be.
He was a man now, a graduated wizard from Hogwarts school. He had responsibilities and a sense of duty. He was going to avenge his parents, whose recent death had affected him deeply.
The cuffs of his black pants were wet now with the cold down-pouring from above and his splashing gait below. Even though his parents had been gone for months he was in mourning still. He couldn't throw away their memory so easily, even the painful ones in the inhospitable ward at St. Mungo's that he'd always visited with his Gran.
It was because of her, the black haired devil. It was because her cruel sense of humor had lead her to torture his parents even after her master had fallen.
He would have his chance to avenge them. She would see to it. She had that sort of hunger that only tried and true killers had. She wouldn't rest until his entire line was extinguished. She would see that he would die or go insane in the process.
She was there, lurking in the shadows. Her wand was clenched in her hand. Her face was twisted in a grim smile.
She could hear the faint screams of the past, buried underneath the stains of time, the stains of blood on her hands. They would not come clean, but as she didn't have a soul it didn't matter.
She waited, as patiently as someone so intent on killing her prey can wait. He approached slowly, his senses on high alert. His wand was concealed in his robes, but his left hand was twitching closely to it. He was ready for her, around every corner he expected to come face to face with her.
Tonight would be the night.
It was perfect. The miserable weather had cleared the streets of Diagon Alley. There was not a wizard or witch in sight for miles around. There were only two people, one stalking slowly towards the other laying in wait.
She was three streets away. Every step he took was one step closer to her.
She wasn't sure which spell she would throw at him first. It might be just as fun to taunt him than to torture him. Death would be prolonged, drawn out, enjoyed for every painful second possible.
Looking ahead he could see her form through the broken shards of heaven's glass. The frozen rain would not let up. It was going to see this through, like the boy's determination. He was going to finish this tonight.
"Conjunctiva," she shouted before he had even drawn close enough to properly aim a spell.
He felt a searing pain behind his eyeballs and was squinting, blinded and hollering in pain. His already patchy vision was reduced to almost nil. "Diffindo," he countered, waving his wand around wildly.
Her lip split open and blood issued forth from the wound. "Very good boy, but do you think it will save you?"
He didn't want to dignify her taunts with a reply. He rubbed his eyes and concentrated deeply. "Finite Incantatum." He said softly. His eyes cleared and her lip stopped bleeding.
"Even playing field again?" She scoffed. "Not for long." She raised her wand again and shouted: "locomoter mortis!"
His legs locked together and refused to move at his command. She smiled cruelly. "This will be some fun. Mobilicorpus."
With a jerky motion from her wand she threw his body against the nearest building. He hit it with a bone crunching sound, enough to stop anyone in their tracks with a cringe. He wanted to scream out, but that was what she wanted. He braved it, sucking the air back over his teeth in pain and refusing to bellow out.
He managed to point his wand at her. "Tarantallegra."
She looked at him surprised as her legs spasmed out of control. Had she the concentration she might have commented on how very like his father he was, but she did not. This boy had taken her completely by surprise and in the moments it took her to calm her legs he had managed to unlock his.
While she was still distracted he worked out in his mind his next move. "Incendio," he said while pointing at her robes. They burst into flame and she yelped, once again taken off her guard.
"Impedimenta," she yelled as she tried to extinguish the flames, but he dodged it wisely.
"Petrificus totalus," he said in a voice quite unlike his own. He had never sounded so commanding and when her stiffened body fell into a pile of slush reducing the flames in a mist of smoke and sizzling sounds, he knew just what he would do. "Mobilicorpus."
Her body flew to the wall opposite and slammed full force into it. The young man knew he had broken some ribs and perhaps her arm, which was pinned to her chest from his previous spell. He let her body fall to the pavement, landing on her back.
Her black hair spread out under her like a great towel, soaking up all the moisture from beneath her. He stood over her with a dark smile. "You didn't think I was strong enough?"
She couldn't answer.
"I have been waiting for this day, preparing for it all my life. You tortured my parents almost to the point of death. They died by your hand six months ago. You couldn't wait to finish them off."
She wanted to throw every curse she knew at him, but she could not. Her wand was pinned to her side and he was wisely standing out of its line of fire.
"I pity you," he said, carefully enunciating each syllable so that she would know those were his last words to her.
He couldn't care anymore. If he wanted to do this he had to value his life above all else. Damn the consequences, he was going to kill her.
He pointed his wand at her. "Avada Kedavra."
Her eyes widened in surprise as the green light shot out from the tip of his wand. His face was cold in that green light; his jaw set in a hard line. He couldn't enjoy this moment, not like he had wanted to. Her body already stiff, grew cold and hard in an instant. He closed his eyes. It was many moments before he could open them to see what his actions had wrought.
He stepped closer and closed her eyes with his free hand. He stood slowly.
Neville looked down over the broken, burned, and bleeding form of Bellatrix Lestrange. A tear coursed over his cheek and a cold, hard knot throbbed in his chest. It might have been his heart, but tonight had changed it into something different, something alien that he could not recognize.
He wiped away the tear and let the frozen bits of rain pelt his upturned face. It had all come down to this and now there was nothing.
Nothing would wake him in the night in a cold sweat of fear. Nothing could interrupt his thoughts, driving him far beyond distraction. Nothing could stop him from being the man he had never thought he could be. Nothing.