Right away, Violet knew that something terrible had happened. She knew she wasn't anywhere near Hogwarts – where she was supposed to be. She was standing in a dark and overgrown graveyard; the black outline of a small church was visible beyond a large yew tree to her right. A hill rose above her to her left. Violet could just make out the outline of a fine old house on the hillside.
Violet grumbled to herself. "Dumbledore!" She hissed. "You and your stupid riddles. This is what you knew was going to happen, and you let it happen anyway."
Violet hissed out again, "Dumbledore, I hate you!"
Violet looked into the darkness and suddenly saw a figure coming closer, walking toward her between the graves in the graveyard. Violet could not make out the face, but she saw whatever it was – was carrying something.
Violet prepared her wand pointing it toward them as the figure came closer. The figure was close enough that she could see what he was carrying, something that looked like a baby. The figure stopped near a large headstone, six feet away and then the figure looked at her. Suddenly, Violet felt the scar in her forehead explode in pain. Violet pushed up occlumency barriers. She felt queasy but pulled tighter on her wand.
Suddenly, the small figure pointed his wand at her and called, "Stupify!"
Easily, Violet put up a shield. She returned fire with her own stupefy and slowly stumbled in a circle of the figure that she could not still make out.
Back and forth they shot spells. The other sweated profusely while he tried to bring her down. Violet tried to hold her head together while it tried to reach past her Occlumency barriers and black her out.
"WORMTAIL!" The high-pitched voice from Violet's dreams hissed. "Bring the girl down already! We don't have time for this!"
Violet made the foolish mistake of looking at the source of the voice which last time she had heard was herself and saw a grotesque baby. She did not see the stupefy that hit her this time.
Violet awoke with tight cords around her and herself tied to a large headstone that said, "TOM RIDDLE."
Violet saw Wormtail and knew immediately who he was. He did not look at her as he continued his preparations. Violet watched him and searched her surroundings trying to figure out a way out.
Violet searched and twenty feet away she saw the Triwizard Cup that had brought her here. She saw a bundle of robes and the baby that was not a baby at the foot of the grave she was tied to. Her scar tried to black her out again with intense pain, and Violet put up her Occlumency shields again. Then, Violet saw a snake – the one from her dream slithering past the grass and encircling the headstone to which she was tied.
Then, Violet focused on the stone cauldron in front of her. It was full of some liquid. Wormtail was heating that liquid up. When the liquid was just starting to boil, Wormtail moved as quick as he could. He grabbed the naked bundle of the baby that wasn't a baby and dropped him into the cauldron. Then, Wormtail spoke:
"Bone of the father, unknowingly given, you will renew your son!"
The grave under Violet's feet cracked, and a dust from below rose into the air in front of her and then fell softly into the cauldron. The water hissed and sent up sparks and changed into a blue like color. Then, with a whimper, Wormtail pulled out a shining, silver dagger from inside his cloak.
"Flesh – of the servant – w-willingly given – you will revive – your master."
He then lumped off his left hand and watched it drop into the cauldron. The potion now turned to a burning red and started to shine with an unholy light.
Wormtail moaned and then stepped up to Violet. He took the dagger to Violet's thigh and struck it, making blood.
"B-blood of the enemy … forcibly taken … you will … resurrect your foe."
Violet gasped as pain hit her down there. Wormtail collected the blood in a glass vial and she watched with a pained look as he took it. Then, he poured it into the cauldron.
Quickly and wandlessly, Violet used a dark healing spell on her thigh. She felt the warm trickle stop, and she was certain this spell would prevent scarring.
Then, she looked in time to the cauldron with her blood. It turned now a blinding white. Wormtail moved to the side and whimpered as the potion finished its work. After fireworks exploding from the potion, a mist appeared and then the dark outline of a man, tall and skeletally thin, rising slowly from the cauldron.
"Robe me," said the high, cold voice from behind the steam.
Wormtail hobbled over to the robes and then to the figure whom he quickly covered. Violet looked up at him, her green eyes meeting his red eyes.
The Dark Lord looked at himself, examining his hands, his chest, his face, and his eyes. Violet barely noticed the snake curl around her as she gave her rapt attention to the Dark Lord. Then, the Dark Lord slipped his long fingers into a pocket and pulled out his wand. He caressed it gently, pointed it at Wormtail, but did nothing. Then, he gazed upon Violet.
After a moment of thought toward her, he spoke to Wormtail.
"Your arm –" he said.
"Thank you, Master," Wormtail muttered as he lifted up his bleeding stump. But the Dark Lord requested the other arm. He forced the sleeve of Wormtail's robes up and touched the red tattoo on his arm. Then, the Dark Lord looked around, speaking to all:
"How many will be brave enough to return when they feel it?" he whispered, his gleaming red eyes fixed upon the stars. "And how many will be foolish enough to stay away?"
He walked back and forth in front of her while he waited. Then, he spoke.
"You stand, Violet Potter, upon the remains of my late father. A Muggle and a fool … like your mother. But they both had their uses, did they not? Your mother died to defend you as a child … and I killed my father, and see how useful he has proved himself, in death …"
Violet gulped, and spoke just quiet enough to barely be heard:
"Yes, my Lord."
The Dark Lord looked toward her, his red eyes no longer mirthful, but calculating, evaluating, and then he looked up to the hill beyond.
"You see that house upon the hillside, Miss Potter? My father lived there. My mother, a witch who lived here in this village, fell in love with him. But he abandoned her when she told him what she was … He didn't like magic, my father … "
"Just like my Muggle relatives, my Lord," she whispered quietly.
Suddenly, he turned to her. Eyes looking at her, once more. "Your Lord, you say?" He hissed. "Not the sycophant of old goats?"
Violet shook her head and was about to speak when the air was filled with swishing cloaks. In every shadowy space, she saw wizards coming in masks. And one by one they moved forward … slowly, cautiously, as though they could hardly believe their eyes. The Dark Lord stood in silence, waiting for them. Then one of the Death Eaters fell to his knees, crawled toward the Dark Lord, and kissed the hem of his black robes.
"Master … Master … " he murmured.
The Death Eaters behind him did the same; each of them approaching the Dark Lord on his knees and kissing his robes, before backing away and standing up, forming a silent circle.
"Welcome, Death Eaters," the Dark Lord said. "Thirteen years … thirteen years since last we met. Yet you answered my call as though it were yesterday…. We are still united under the Dark Mark, then! Or are we?"
He put back his terrible face and sniffed, his slit-like nostrils widening.
"I smell guilt," he said. "There is a stench of guilt upon the air."
A second shiver ran around the circle as though each member of it longed, but did not dare, to step back from him.
"I see you all, whole and healthy, with your powers intact – such prompt appearances! – and I ask myself … why did this band of wizards never come to the aid of their master, to whom they swore eternal loyalty?"
No one spoke. No one moved except Wormtail, who was upon the ground still sobbing over his bleeding arm.
"And I answer myself," whispered the Dark Lord, "they must have believed me broken, they thought I was gone. They slipped back among my enemies, and they pleaded ignorance, and bewitchment …
"And then I ask myself, but how could they have believed I would not rise again? They who knew the steps I took, long ago, to guard myself against mortal death? They, who had seen proofs of the immensity of my power in the times when I was mightier than any wizard living?"
Violet gulped. She had known this was possible all those months ago in Grimmauld Place as Walburga Black explained it to her.
"And then I answer myself, perhaps they believed a still greater power could exist, one that could vanquish even Lord Voldemort … perhaps they now pay allegiance to another … perhaps that champion of commoners, of Mudbloods and Muggles, Albus Dumbledore?"
At the mention of Dumbledore's name, the members of the circle stirred, and there were voices of rage. "NEVER!"
"It is a disappointment to me … I confess myself disappointed…."
One of the men suddenly flung himself forward, breaking the circle. Trembling from head to foot, he collapsed at the Dark Lord's feet.
"Master!" he shrieked, "Master, forgive me! Forgive us all!"
The Dark Lord began to laugh. He raised his wand.
"Crucio!"
The Death Eater on the ground writhed and shrieked. Violet looked down on the man dispassionately. She schooled herself carefully. No weakness or any emotion should be shown right now.
The Dark Lord raised his wand. The tortured Death Eater lay flat upon the ground, gasping.
"Get up, Avery," said the Dark Lord softly. "Stand up. You ask for forgiveness? I do not forgive. I do not forget. Thirteen long years…. I want thirteen years repayment before I forgive you. Wormtail here has paid some of his debt, already, have you not, Wormtail?"
He looked down at Wormtail, who continued to sob.
"You helped me return to my body," said the Dark Lord coolly, watching Wormtail sob on the ground. "Worthless and traitorous as you are, you helped me … and Lord Voldemort rewards his helpers…."
The Dark Lord raised his wand and whirled it through the air. A streak of what looked like molten silver hung shining in the wand's wake. Momentarily shapeless, it writhed and then formed itself into a gleaming replica of a human hand, bright as moonlight, which soared downward and fixed itself upon Wormtail's bleeding wrist.
Wormtail's sobbing stopped abruptly. His breathing harsh and ragged, he raised his head and stared in disbelief at the silver hand, now attached seamlessly to his arm, as though he were wearing a dazzling glove. He flexed the shining fingers, then, trembling, picked up a small twig on the ground and crushed it into powder.
"My Lord," he whispered. "Master … it is beautiful … thank you … thank you …"
He scrambled forward on his knees and kissed the hem of the Dark Lord.
"May your loyalty never waver again, Wormtail," said the Dark Lord.
"No, My Lord … never, My Lord … "
Wormtail stood up and took his place in the circle, staring at his powerful new hand, his face still shining with tears. The Dark Lord now approached the man on Wormtail's right.
One by one the Dark Lord addressed those around him. Violet saw Lucius who looked at her for a moment with care and concern, and a few others. Then, when he was done, he walked to her. Violet gulped as he approached.
"They say that this girl caused my downfall?" he said softly. "You all know that on the night I lost my powers and my body, I tried to kill her. Her mother died in the attempt to save her – and made it so I could not harm her.
The Dark Lord used his long white fingers to caress her cheek. She tried to hold fast and not show fear, anger, or other negative emotions. After a moment of thought, the Dark Lord said:
"Untie her, Wormtail, and give her back her wand."
Violet held her wand carefully as the Dark Lord looked upon her.
"I have heard of how well you have done in the Tournament, Miss Potter. The fastest to her egg against the Dragons, getting the most dangerous of them all. The fastest through the Black Lake to save Lucius' heir. The fastest through the maze as well it appears." He said as he looked at her.
Violet kept her wand down. Her eyes looked up toward the Dark Lord carefully, but uncertainly. She prepared her mind to fight or fly or kneel.
"You brought about my downfall, but Lord Voldemort can be merciful. I shall give you one chance. Will you reject the Muggle lover, Dumbledore, pledge yourself to serve me?"
Violet did not hesitate. As her memory reminded herself. If this would take place, she would submit. Quickly, to her knees she fell, her wand loose in her grasp.
"You are too young yet to carry my mark and too close to Dumbledore and his stooges, but I could use you. I shall give you a chance to earn your mark. Succeed and you shall be rewarded. Fail me, and you will suffer a fate worse than death."
"Yes, my Lord," Violet whispered. "I offer my allegiance and my wand to your service –"
"That will do," he replied.
He looked around then turned to Violet. "You are dismissed. Take the Triwizard Trophy to return. Do not speak of my return. I will know if you do."
Violet bowed, "Yes, my Lord," she whispered. She pointed her wand at the trophy, and said, "Accio."
As soon as the Trophy was in her hand, she felt the activation and she was rushing back to Hogwarts.