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Harry Potter and the Hunger Games

Chapter 10

The Basilisk

I patch up Tracy's arm as best I can with strips of my shirt as a bandage. Our medkit was in Fleur's bag, which Draco stole after stabbing her, so I couldn't do much more than clean it and wrap it. Cedric eventually pulls himself together and we find Hermione still tangled in the vines but alive, sobbing beside Victor's body. After cutting her loose we offer her to come with us and she agrees.

As we leave the area I hear the soft whine of a hovercraft overhead and watch from a distance as it pulls up the bodies of the dead tributes. Nym is going home. I turn around, unable to watch any longer. We trudge through the swampy ground until we reach a stone wall. This wall is familiar. The moment we find a path back into the maze I know why. There, on the ground, is a sewage cover. I turn to Cedric for his leadership and but he shakes his head sadly. He doesn't have it in him to lead right now. I'm suddenly furious with him. So what if he'd fallen for Nym and lost her? He didn't have the right to mourn a week old crush. She was my sister! I should be the one allowed to grieve and be useless. I take a couple of deep breaths, pushing aside my anger. I will get my revenge, but now is not the time to lose my head. I try to figure out what we need to do, since our esteemed leader is incapable.

"We can't go back the way we came. The hill is too steep and even if we make it up, the doxies will be there. We'll just have to hope we don't come across the giant snake."

Tracy nods in agreement but Hermione covers her mouth at the mention of a giant snake. Not bothering to wait for the two grief-stricken lovers I carry on into the maze. We walk for hours without finding our way out of the stone area. I thought the days in Six were slow but this one seems to stretch forever.

Finally it's night time and we hear the Capitol Anthem. This time I know there will be faces. Fleur Delacour of District Two is first. She didn't die first but they always show them in order of district. Marcus Flint of District Two is next. Then Pansy Parkinson of District Two. Nymphadora Tonk of District Six. I almost wish her face would never fade from the sky. Victor Krum of District Seven ends the light show and then it's time to sleep. But I can't, neither can Cedric, Hermione, or Tracy. We've all lost someone today and I feel a little bad that Fleur has no one here to mourn her.

I try to take count of who all is left. 5 died today, so there are 7 left in all. Me, Tracy, Cedric and Hermione make 4. Plus Draco and Daphne makes 6. Who is the last one? Whoever else is left had been the one to kill Nym. No one else had a bow and arrows.

Make them pay! Sirius' voice insists in my head. It doesn't really matter who killed her. Everyone in the arena is going to die.

"Cedric," I begin, suddenly needing to know. He looks up at me, fresh tears in his eyes. "Did you love her?"

He clench his jaw and his eyes close, spilling tears down his cheeks. He holds his breath, obviously on the verge of sobbing. Opening his eye, he gives me a nod.

"Yeah. I think I did. It happened so fast I never expected it. She was just so... colorful," he chokes up and cant continue speaking.

I feel tears prickling my own eyes again.

"She was my rainbow in the Grey," I whisper in agreement.

Hermione starts sobbing quietly and Tracy pulls her into an embrace. It's hard to believe this is the girl who tried to kill me in training. I still remember that murderous gleam I saw in her eyes then and in her Reaping video.

"I didn't love Victor," Hermione admits softly after regaining control of her breathing. "But he was my friend. I've never had a friend before."

We laps into silence and I can't help but think of these people as my friends. I hope I don't have to be the one to kill Cedric, given how close he and Nym had gotten over the past week, or Hermione for that matter, but they cannot survive this arena. They're already broken, consumed by guilt and loss. Nothing good will be waiting for them if they return home. Only one of us can get out and it isn't me.

If anyone could survive the Games and still be happy it would be Tracy. She has a fierce fighting spirit and her Johanna to go home to. I don't want to but if I have to I will kill the others for her. Nym is gone, so I will save Tracy instead.

When the sky becomes day again we eat and drink. And then we stand to be on our way again. None of us has slept and we're all anxious to leave this area. Eventually we make a turn and I see the hedges again up ahead. I'm about to tell the others we've made it out when a shriek pierces the air. I whip around to see the owner of the wrinkled husk we encountered before, it's jaws wrapped around Hermione's shoulder, and it's fangs sinking into her heart. The cannon booms telling me there's nothing more I can do for her.

"Run!" I tell to Tracy and Cedric, before taking off towards the hedges. Surely the snake won't follow us out of its area. Unfortunately we don't make it out in time. Crashing through one of the pipe covers, the snake emerges in front of me. It coils up readying to strike at me. A gust of wind whooshes past my ear and the snake gives a squeal of pain. A hatchet has imbedded itself in one of its eyes and it begins thrashing about trying to dislodge it. I don't wait for that to happen. I turn back and motion for my companions to go back the other way and we're running again. We make a couple of turns and stop short. A dead end. The first dead end we've encountered since entering the arena, which now that I think about it makes little sense. A maze is primarily made up of dead ends. We turn back again and try a different path. Another dead end. And then another, and another. The Gamemakers are shifting the walls and boxing us in.

I press up against the wall trying to find a weak spot but there isn't one. Unable to think of another solution, I try the move I made to escape the ice. Feeling my heart beat slow and bring the sword over my head and swing it down as hard as I can. It shatters. The top half of the sword goes flying back over my head, while a few smaller fragments cut into my chest and shoulders like shrapnel. My wrist is broken from the impact and I drop the handle to the ground. I let out a yell mostly in anger rather than pain and pin a glare to the stone wall. I don't need a blade for this. I take a step back and put all my strength into pushing me forward. My shoulder drives into the wall, and a wide crack splits across the surface. My shoulder is throbbing, possibly dislocated, but I step back again and thrust myself once more into the wall. Chunks of stone fly outward as I blast my way through the wall. We've made it out of the stone area.

I turn around to tell my allies to follow but the words catch in my throat. Behind Cedric the snake's tongue flicks out to taste the air around him. Cedric swivels on his feet but not fast enough. The snake snatches up his legs and slams him into the stone wall, before tossing him in the air over it. He sails high over several walls before coming down somewhere I can't see with a crunch. There is no cannon so he must be alive but I can't imagine he's in good shape. It's just me an Tracy now. I have to protect Tracy.

My right arm is limp at my side, blood soaking through the thin jacket sleeve, its wrist broken and shoulder too most likely. So with my other hand I snatch up my broken sword and sprint towards the snake, past Tracy. It opens it's jaws and lunges for me in return. Time slows again and I point my broken but still sharp blade into it's open mouth. As it closes its mouth around my arm I feel one of its fangs pierce my bicep. But I don't care because my sword has sliced through the roof of its mouth, into its brain, and out the top of its head.

Time finally catches up to me and then so does the pain. I scream in agony and try to wrest my arm from the snake's mouth. Finally the fang in my arm breaks free of it's dead owner's mouth and I pull away with it still in my flesh. I use my legs to scoot away from the carcass, both my arms dragging uselessly against the floor. Tracy runs over to me, yanks out the fang and tries to stop the bleeding. Then, before her eyes bleeding slows, and the gaping wound begins to close up, leaving a hideous round scar like the one on my stomach. I feel my should snap back into place and my wrist fuse back together. The pain ebbs away and Tracy stares into my eyes in utter confusion.

I open my mouth to explain, even though I don't understand it any better than she does, when suddenly a sword juts out from her gut. She looks down at it briefly before falling forward onto me. Standing now where she'd been is Draco, his bloody sword held triumphantly in front of his face. An incoherent yell bubbles out of me. I'm unable to form words to express my rage, regret, and grief. I try to lunge for him but I've exhausted myself and can't move Tracy's limp form from on top of me. Draco yells right back at me but it's different. He turns around flailing, showing me the knife now stabbed into his back between his shoulder blades. He's trying to reach it, to pull it out, but slowly he's losing energy. Like the trickle of blood down his back is his very life leaving his body.

He falls to his hands and knees, gasping for breath, and reveals Daphne. She's holding her stomach but she can't disguise the ugly wound there. Her skin looks sickly, pale and green like her eyes, which no longer shine like gems but rather are clouded over in her imminent death. She's so far from the regale look she had during the Reaping.

"Thought you'd leave me behind, did you? I showed you," she tells him bitterly before falling against the wall and sliding to the floor. "I showed you," she repeats, then closes her eyes and a cannon announces her death. Draco is still whimpering and sobbing, his arms collapsed beneath him and his face on the cobble stone. I feel no pity for him. I feel only a fire burning inside me. I want revenge. For Nym, for Tracy, and now most of all for me. I have nothing left but emptiness and this fire. My arms functioning once more, I free myself from Tracy and crawl over to Draco's sobbing form. I know Draco's death will bring me no peace. But it's a start.

I pull the knife from Draco's back, eliciting a ragged scream from him. Then I plunge it back into his body, drawing out another scream. I stab him again and again. His screams reducing to whimpers and then to pathetic wheezes every time I plunge the knife into his back again. Then the cannon sounds and I realize I'm the one still screaming. I dig the knife once more into his back and leave it there, continuing to scream until I have no breath left and my throat is raw.

"Harry." A soft voice says from behind me. I wipe my tear-stained face with my bloody hand and turn to the voice. It's Tracy. Her face is turned towards me but she's still lying limp against the ground. I crawl back over to her. Nym choked on her own blood before she could say goodbye. Whatever Tracy has to say in her last moments I must hear.

"Harry," she begins again, whispering because she barely has any strength left in her. "Please, tell Johanna… not to cry for me. And... make them pay."

I clasp her hand in both of mine. I'm not sure if she actually said those last words. Sirius' voice echos around my skull now. Make them pay. Make them pay.

"I will-" I don't get to finish acknowledging her request because her cannon booms, leaving her eyes staring blankly into mine.

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