Topic: Challenge #26
Ok, I was asked to do Challenge #26 (I really hope that I am doing this right...)
So the challenge is: Coming Home (or the opposite - not coming home after a battle or something)
There is no word limit and any character can be used, but an added challenge (though in no way a requirement) would be to try and write one about a member of the Order, because we focus so much on the Death Eaters around here. Good luck!
The Shack
Igor Karkaroff had not come home. Well now that was interesting. It seemed coming home was far too scary a concept for poor Igor. Sensible man.
Very sensible when you consider the dark haired beauty who prowled beside me.
Igor offended this dark haired beauty you see.
Not so sensible Igor. Not sensible at all.
For you see if Igor wasn't coming home, we would just have to find him.
And then he would never come home.
The shack offended me in its squalor. Rotten wooden walls barely supported its leaking roof. A wonder the screeching Northern winds didn't blow it down. They certainly looked like they wanted to.
I didn't particularly want to go inside. But Igor was inside. His new home. And when has crude décor ever stopped a hardened servant of the Dark Lord from carrying out his duty?
Especially when his duty is so delightfully personal.
The dark haired beauty purred in anticipation.
She danced round the perimeter. Silent spells flashed from her wand like butterflies. Deadly butterflies. She moved with the grace of a waltz lovers would sway to. And then stopped.
Stark still.
Dark hair flying behind her.
Not a limb moving.
But her eyes.
Glittered.
We could get in. He couldn't get out. Time to come home Igor.
I opened the door gently. Though by his reaction you would have thought I'd slammed it.
Igor jumped violently. His eyes grew as wide as those belonging to the dark haired beauty who waited just outside.
But they lacked her passion.
Instead they held only.
Fear.
"Dolohov!"
He stumbled in his haste to retreat. His back hit only the wall behind him. I barely needed to disarm him. He all but threw his wand into my waiting fingers.
"Evening Igor." I smiled graciously at him. I could afford to be gracious. I could even afford to be merciful.
My lips turned from grace to curl in indulgence as he attempted to apparate.
"Now, now Igor, you insult me. You don't think I'd be so foolish as to let you just slip away?"
He started to sweat. How unattractive.
"You're going to kill me."
It amused me to hear his raspy voice. All the moisture had gone from his mouth and was being eaked out his pores. A strange reaction. But one most common to fear.
"Igor! Why would I do that?"
His eyes darted about the room, much as I suppose he wished to.
"Antonin please!"
" I am not hear to kill you. I just wish to... tell you a story."
He looks at me as if I am mad. Though he is the one with the madman's appearance. His thin chest heaves beneath the worn, if once expensive, robes. Spittle runs in a thin line from one corner of his mouth to meet his goatee.
Water's second attempt at freedom.
Like a rat fleeing a sinking ship.
"A story?"
Oh yes Igor. A story.
"About a man. Who never came home."
The fear intensifies, though my voice remains pleasant.
"He was a dutiful man. Noble. Honourable. Pure. And he died for a noble, honourable, pure cause. He did not shirk away into the shadows. He stood and fought and died for his Lord. For all Pureblooddom. For his family. That man was Evan Rosier."
Igor's eyes ceased to drat. They fixed on my face. Full of.
Apprehension.
Uncertainty.
And Fear. Oh yes Fear.
"And some, ignorant of his noble death, tried to use his name for their own purposes. To save their own sorry skins they would have let poor Evan rot in Azkaban. Had he not already been dead. That is you dear Igor."
Slowly he began to slide down the wall. So slowly he himself did not even notice it.
"You named poor Evan, as you named me, even as he lay motionless in his grave. You know he took a portion of Moody with him. Ah yes, a great fighter Evan."
His knees cracked.
"But in dying for his blood, he left behind his blood. His family Igor, his family. How much do you know of Evan Rosier's family?"
A shake of the head. He knows nothing.
"Did you know for instance he had an Aunt? Druella. A sweet witch I'm told, though I never met her. But sweet Druella Rosier married. Yes she did. She married and gave Cygnus Black a daughter. And Evan Rosier a cousin."
A spark of recognition at the name Cygnus. But he still is unsure. Black? He has heard the name, but knows not who it belongs to.
"Oh yes, a pretty little witch she was. And desperately loyal to her family. So, as you can imagine dear Igor, she wasn't best pleased when she heard her cousin would never come home. When she heard you had slandered her poor dead cousin to save yourself. When you denied your Lord. Something Evan never did. Nor she."
Igor's legs finally collapse. He has reached the floor.
"The Dark Lord wondered who to send Igor. When you did nott come home. And then his eyes wandered to his right hand side. And found the answer. Evan's beloved little cousin is very anxious to meet you. Aren't you..."
I let the last word, a name, roll off my tongue.
"Bellatrix?"
The dark haired beauty stands in the doorway. Motionless. Like a cobra ready to strike. But twice as graceful.
Twice as deadly.
I cannot see clearly in the poor light. But I can smell. And I know.
Igor has soiled himself.
Thoughts?