Disclaimer: I own nothing in the way of copyrights.
Coraline Clark is nine years old. Her father is a wizard, her mother a muggle, and her brother a Ravenclaw third year. She is standing in the living room of her house, and she has been dead for forty-five seconds.
Bite them young, he said. Bite them young, and raise them away from their parents. Too bad that sometimes, when Fenrir Greyback begins biting, he can't stop.
He'd taken Cora from her backyard five weeks ago. He took her home, because he liked her. Thought she was a pretty child, the kind that would look even prettier crying from fear with her hands tied to his headboard. He'd saved her for later, and when later came, poor little Cora's fragile body couldn't take it.
Cora looked about her. She knew where she was, but she was looking for her mother. She had to tell her, you see. Cora loves her mother too much to leave this earth without telling her what had happened to her baby girl.
Where are you, mummy? The train will be here soon, and I gotta get on it.
Natalie Clark enters the room. She looks so tired, her brunette hair swept into an uncaring bun, a laundry basket tucked under her right arm. She sits at the couch and begins folding. But she does not see her child standing before her. She is invisible, this faint imprint on the world, this soul who only has moments before she has to leave it.
So Cora leaves a message.
She cups her little hands about her mouth and blows, sending a current of air toward the doorway to the kitchen. From the kitchen, there is the sound of paper rustling. Natalie's interest is piqued.
She stands, setting her folded t-shirts onto the couch where she had been sitting. She glances toward the kitchen, knowing that nobody is home and that none of the fans are on. So why is there paper rustling in the kitchen?
Hurry mum, there isn't time. I have to go soon.
Natalie slowly begins to move toward the doorway, afraid. Ever since her daughter's disappearance, she's been afraid of everything. When she married Jacob, magic had seemed a beautiful thing, something to make life easier and better. This war going on meant nothing to her, until she realized the hard way that her half-blooded children were going to be the collateral damage.
Those wizarding police had said that the crime reeked of dark magic, that it was definitely a witch or wizard that had taken Cora. There were mutters of somebody named Greyback, but Natalie didn't know who he was and Jacob wasn't telling. He said there wasn't proof, and that until they knew for sure it was Greyback he wasn't going to worry his wife about it.
But the days had turned to weeks, and the Ministry of Magic had forgotten about the Clark family. There were new murders every day, new things to fret about. So the search for Coraline Clark was abandoned.
But in her kitchen, Natalie stands in the doorway, and immediately sees what the rustling noise was.
A crayon picture Cora had drawn of herself, stuck to the refrigerator with a magnet, was lying on the hardwood floor. Fallen as though someone had made it fall.
Mummy, do you understand?
And Natalie Clark knows the truth, but doesn't know how she knows or why.
"No..." she whimpers, her eyes welling up in tears. She shuffles toward the paper, defeated. She kneels on the ground beside it, picking it up to stare at it, as though looking at her girl drawn smiling in blue crayon will somehow bring her home.
Mummy, you have to promise me that you'll be happy again someday.
"Where is she?" Natalie cries out suddenly, speaking out loud to nobody. "Where is my baby girl? It's been over a month..."
I'll be in a ditch forty kilometers south of here, when he moves me from his house in a few minutes. Cora grows desperate. Please find me mum. If you don't find me soon, the mud from the coming rain will bury me there, and you'll never know what happened to me. But Cora does not know how to convey that information, and her time is short.
"Come home to me, baby..." Natalie begs the air, her voice low and soft. And though she cannot see or hear it, her daughter starts to cry.
I can't, mummy. I really want to, but I can't. Please stop crying, I can't stand to see it. Please stop, mummy.
Natalie stares at the picture. She remembers Cora drawing it, age seven, stubbornly using blue for the skin and pink for the hair. She looked like a gap-toothed, pink-haired smurf. So beautiful.
The ditch, mum! Cora grabs her mother's arm and tries to shake it, but she can't move it with all her strength. Hurry! Can't you hear the train whistle? It's coming.
"Cora..." Natalie whispers, tracing the forehead of the blue girl on the paper. She knows her baby girl is dead. But she doesn't know where she is.
The train is almost here. I'm in the ditch now, the man is gone. The rain is coming, and it will bury me in mud. Please mummy, go and find me, so you can give me a tombstone, put pink flowers on my grave, and finally stop crying.
Natalie turns her face to the right, away from the fading imprint that is her daughter.
Mummy, please, hear me! Cora begs, tears streaming down her cheeks.
Natalie's heart is breaking.
Please... Look at me. Please...
Natalie closes her eyes.
The train lights are so bright, mum. You wouldn't believe how bright they are.
And the instant that Cora has gone is the instant that Natalie begins to suddenly feel alone in the room, as if someone had just left. She knows that something has changed, but she doesn't know what or why. She slumps down on the hardwood floor and begins to sob in earnest, breath heaving, head pounding.
Overhead, a pattering sound begins to fill the little house. It's begun to rain.