By the time Calla could come to her senses, Wormtail had robed the man before her. From the corner of her eyes, Calla could see Harry struggling, writhing against the statue he was bound to and making small sounds of pain that brought furious, terrified tears to her eyes
"You stand, Potters," Voldemort said in a high, cold voice, "upon the remains of my late Muggle father," He circled between the two twins. Every time he drew nearer, Calla felt a weight press on her chest, like it was going to crush her ribs. She seemed to drop in and out of consciousness, her visions swimming and darkening and she squeezed her eyes shut, trying to sort her thoughts. "A Muggle and a fool... much like your mother. But they have their uses, don't they?" His nail dragged against Calla's jaw and she squeezed her eyes shut, squirming, her heart beating too fast. She was sure she was going to pass out, sooner rather than later. "Your mother died to defend you two as children... and I killed my father. See how useful he has become, even in death?"
Voldemort laughed again but he drew away and Calla breathed a little easier, forcing her eyes open. If only she could do something, get a message to someone. But she couldn't do that. They were bound, they were stuck, and she was sure if she tried any magic she would fall to the ground and perhaps never get up. Her face felt cold and numb from terror. "You see that house upon the hillside, Potters? My father lived there. My mother, who was a witch 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..."
Calla heard the snake hiss by her feet, and resisted the urge to scream and cry as it slithered over her. Shivers ran along her arms, and her heart quickened again as her cheeks flushed feverishly. She didn't know what Voldemort had done, what spell, what curse, but she could feel it taking over her body. She barely felt like she was present. Something crawled and clawed inside her chest. "He left her and returned to his Muggle parents before I was even born, Potter, and she died giving birth to me, leaving me to be raised in a Muggle orphanage." The snake wound around Calla's ankles and she bit her lip to keep from screaming. "...But I vowed myself to find him, to take my revenge upon him. That fool who gave me his name... Tom Riddle."
The snake's head butted against Calla's exposed skin and her knees buckled; she scraped her palms against the coarse edges of the statue in an attempt to remain upright. She wouldn't fall here, wouldn't let Voldemort have the pleasure of seeing her so weakened. She looked desperately to her brother, who was pale and terrified, and she felt a scream of panic rise in her throat. Her gaze returned to Cedric, lying on the ground, and her chest shook as she squeezed her eyes shut. She'd never been very religious, but right now she was desperate to pray to whatever god existed to save her and Harry and to stop Voldemort.
"Listen to me," Voldemort said quietly, "reliving family history. But here they come now, Potters... My true family."
There was a great swishing of cloaks in the air. Calla forced her eyes open even as they dropped shut, seeing shapes begin to appear between yew trees, wizards Apparating cloaked in hoods and masks, just like they had at the cup. Her mind went back to that night, memories racing. The horrifying green lights, that Muggle family suspended in the air. All to happen again, countless times, now he was back. The images flirted across her mind; crumbling bridges, storms tearing Muggle communities apart, people murdered before they even had the chance to glimpse their attacker, faces still stuck in expressions of confusion. She struggled fruitlessly against her ropes. She pictured her godfather's face in her mind, praying that someone would find them, save them, and wishing he would even though she knew he couldn't. Her only hope was that Fleur had seen enough to raise the alarm, and that she hadn't been hurt, too. Her eyes stung with terrified, angry tears.
The Death Eaters in the clearing seem suspended in time, silent. She prayed they would leave even though she knew they wouldn't. Then one of them dropped to their knees, crawled forward out of the shadows, and bent to kiss the hem of their master's robes. "Master... master..." he murmured.
Each of them did the same in turn, their murmurings filling the air and stifling it. Every time Calla breathed in it felt sour and wrong, and her head felt clouded with fear. "Welcome, my Death Eaters," said Voldemort quietly. His snake unwound itself from Calla's ankles but she only felt worse, certain she was going to give in soon. Her eyes dropped and her head fell forward, lolling onto her shoulder, even as she fought to stand upright. "...We are still united under the Dark Mark, then... Or are we?"
She was sure she was only catching snippets of what Voldemort was saying now. She kept dipping in and out of consciousness, though trying her best to remain upright, for the moment when she and Harry might try to make their escape, unlikely as that seemed. She had to hope; she tried to clear her mind but was terrified that if she did so she might fall asleep and never wake.
"...They must have believed me broken, they thought I was gone for good... They slipped back among my enemies and they pleaded ignorance and innocence and bewitchment..." She felt like she was falling and then jolted back up again, stomach churning. "...They who knew the steps I had taken to guard myself against mortal death?"
Calla tried to catch Harry's eye, but he was unmoving, pale and frightened just as she was. "...Perhaps they now pay allegiance to that lover of muggles and Mudbloods, Albus Dumbledore!"
She groaned, trying to twist away from the air that seemed to press in at her, stifling, but she could do nothing. It seemed something had stuck in her throat; she wasn't sure she could breathe. Her eyes burned and her chest felt tight, too tight. "Master!" One of the Death Eaters wailed, and Calla's eyes opened long enough to see him throw himself at Voldemort's feet. "Master, forgive me! Forgive us!"
Voldemort only laughed and raised his wand and Calla saw the blinding red light before it even happened and it seemed to carve open her chest as she withheld a scream of her own. "Crucio!"
And she couldn't close her eyes. The Death Eater writhed on the ground, screaming and gasping. If seeing that spider being cursed had been horrifying, this was worse. This was a person being put through the worst possible physical torture, enough to drive them insane like it had to Neville's parents. "Stop!" Calla cried around the gag, voice ripping apart her throat. "Stop! Stop it!" The sound came out muffled. Some of the Death Eaters jeered.
Voldemort's eyes turned to her for one curious moment, and then he flicked his hand and her mouth snapped shut. Her arms tingled strangely, and she still struggled. Something inside her felt like it was trying to escape. Or maybe she was just delirious. Surely someone must hear, she thought, as the Death Eater began to scream again, body wreathed by red light. Someone must come to their rescue. Anyone, Calla pleaded silently with the sky. Please, just give us anyone.
When the curse ended, Calla clenched her fist again. Her eyes were wide and she was sure she could never sleep again; yet still she felt herself falling forward, felt her mind drift. "Get up Avery. You ask forgiveness? I do not forgive. I do not forget..."
Small snatches of images rushing through the edge of her mind like snippets of film. Herself, bound and kneeling and crying, bloodied and pale beneath it all, mouth open in a silent scream. People suspended in the air, green and red curses littering the dark night. She could see herself huddled, cards and tea leaves and crystal balls littered around her. She looked older, but at the same time younger too, terrified. And when she saw Harry in her mind's eye, scared and pale and cold, he appeared no older than he did right now. Her mouth was closed but her soul was screaming. Even her magic was screaming. She couldn't let Voldemort hurt her brother.
"...Lord Voldemort rewards his helpers..."
She could hear Pettigrew whimpering and Remus' face fluttered into her mind, terrified and haunted and more scared than it was, and she couldn't see Sirius except for his hollow eyes as they had been last year. She wanted to scream but didn't think she was capable of even that. Her fingers reached for a wand that was not there and that could not help her anyway. "...May your loyalty never waver again, Wormtail..."
"No, my Lord... never, my Lord..."
"Lucius, my slippery friend." She fought to open her eyes as Lucius Malfoy stepped forward out of the circle and her gut rolled. How many more here were parents or relatives of her yearmates? "...You are still prepared to take the lead in a spot of Muggle torture, I believe?" Calla felt sick to her stomach. She wanted out now, alive or dead. "Might not your energies have been better directed towards finding your old master, Lucius..."
The stars in the night sky seemed to blink out one by one. She watched the constellations go and wondered if she was going mad. Was that what was happening? What Voldemort wanted her for? To show what he could do? To put on a display of his twisted cruelty and scare his returning supporters into submission. She struggled again against her bonds, fruitlessly. She wouldn't be used for that. That wasn't what she would let her fate be.
"...You are merciful... Thank you..."
There was a creeping feeling over Calla, like goosebumps. She struggled to turn her head to look at Harry, silently pleading with the world to let them go. She couldn't reach her hand out to him but she wished he could see her there, see the struggle in her eyes.
"The Lestranges should stand here... But they are imprisoned in Azkaban... They were faithful. They went to Azkaban rather than denounce me... when Azkaban is broken open, the Lestranges will be honoured beyond their wildest dreams. The Dementors will join us... They are our natural allies... As will the banished giants... I shall have my devoted servants returned to me, an army of creatures at my disposal... And I shall have my enemies on their knees..." Calla could feel his eyes on her and she wanted to scream, thrash, run and run and run.
"MacNair..." Terror ran through her. "You shall have better victims... we have Crabbe... You will do better this time, will you not, Crabbe? And you, Goyle?"
"Yes, Master..."
"We will, Master..."
"Nott..."
Calla's breath caught in her throat. Not - not Theodore's father? Did Daphne know, she wondered. Would Daphne be in danger? Would Theodore? She wanted to scream. "I am your most faithful..."
"...Six remaining Death Eaters... Three dead in my service... One, too cowardly to return... He will pay... One I fear lost to me forever... my most faithful servant, who has already re-entered my service."
Calla's thought were faint and faded, and yet the image of Moody's bright-blue eye whirred in her head. But no. He couldn't. Dumbledore trusted Moody, didn't he? But Dumbledore had trusted a lot of people and her reason couldn't stand up to her instinct. "He is at Hogwarts. It is through his efforts that our young friends arrived here tonight..."
She could feel the Death Eaters' eyes on her and her brother again. She opened her own eyes defiantly, trying to hold her head up, but it fell back down, head too heavy for her body. Her ears rang and she tried not to faint. Again, she tried to scream, but Voldemort's magic was strong. "Harry and Calla Potter, at my rebirthing party. One may even call them my guests of honour. The boy's fate we know, and have known for a long time... But the girl, as Wormtail tells me, has a rather interesting party trick... At first I discounted prophecy, before as you all know, new information came to light about my fate and the boy who shares it... But I believe Calla Potter may prove herself useful to me yet... There is much we may need to know, if we are to regain our hold..." Her heart pounded, blood rushing in her ears. She hated this, all of this. Just kill her, she wanted to plead, hopelessly. No one would save them. She just wanted out. A scream tore from her even around the gag, and something sparked against her arms. Desperation and instinct forced her forward.
Voldemort turned, eyes wide in surprise as she thrust herself forward, struggling against ropes. Then his eyes narrowed to slits again. He flicked a lazy hand. "Wormtail, restrain the girl." But his eyes didn't leave her. Every second that passed she felt more and more like she was going to faint, and yet defiance forced her to remain conscious. Wormtail tightened the ropes around her and shoved the gag further in her mouth. Her eyes smarted, and though she struggled, it was even more difficult now. Her vision dimmed again, and her head felt heavy as she leaned forward.
"My master... we beg to know... this miracle... you have returned to us..."
"Ah, what a story it is, Lucius..." Calla forced her eyes open to see Voldemort walking lazily over to Harry. "And it begins and ends with our young friend here.
"You know... they have called this boy... my downfall."
The snake had returned to hiss and press itself around Calla's feet. Her knees trembled in terror. "...on the night I lost my powers and my body, I tried to kill him. His mother died... and unwittingly gave him - and his sister here - a protection... I could not touch the boy..." He raised a hand. Calla's vision swam and her ears thrummed. "...Traces of her sacrifices... This is old magic... But I can touch him now."
And Calla seemed to feel it as Voldemort pressed his fingertip to her brother's forehead, to that old scar. She felt her knees buckle, her breath hitch, felt another silent scream rip from her throat. "My curse... foolish sacrifice... rebounded upon me..." She was sure she was dying, if she was not already dead. "Aah, pain beyond pain..." But death surely couldn't be this terrifyingly painful. "I, who have gone farther than anybody along the path to immortality... to conquer death... one or more of my experiments had worked... for I had not been killed..." How? Calla was desperate to know even as her own mind swam with the terror of death. How had he survived? What experiments? How could this be possible? "...I was powerless as the weakest creature alive... still I managed to retain some power, some magic I had salvaged from the wreck of that night..." Her own scar seemed to sear with pain and her strength seemed to fade from her bones. The image of a broken, tiny skeleton flickered in her mind's eye, bloody on the floor. Would that be her? Would she be as weak as he had been, destroyed and dead? Was she already so weak, or becoming so? She couldn't, she told herself. She had to fight it. Her eyes went to the shadow of Harry's figure and she yearned to call out to him, though she didn't know what she could say.
"...I had no body... every spell that might have helped me requires the use of a wand... surely, one of my faithful would return me to a body... I waited in vain."
She did not know what was worse; the pain or the numbness or the ache in her chest begging for something to save her and to be let free. Something slipped by the edges of her mind, and when her eyes fluttered closed, she could see a strange ring, an old shack, and that green light that seemed to follow in her mind. Voldemort was still talking, but the sound was distorted; it sounded like she was hearing him from underwater. "I could use the bodies and power of others... Aurors were still actively looking for me... especially... Wormtail's slip up... inhabited animals... snakes... bodies were ill-adapted to perform what little magic I had... none of them lasted long..."
Calla could hear footsteps, the movement of the ground. She could feel him coming closer to her and she squeezed her eyes tighter shut like that would stop him. Her feet slipped and she sank towards the ground, limbs hanging from her. She could hardly breathe. "Four years ago... the means for my return arrived... teacher at Dumbledore's school... I took possession of his body... supervise him... I did not manage to steal the Philosopher's Stone... immortal life."
Calla's head felt fit to bursting as anything and everything seemed to fly through it, burning her as it went. Letters burning in fires, people falling, screaming. "That was perhaps my darkest hour... A girl who foresaw my defeat... power strangely connected to my own..." Dumbledore pale and cold, Remus lying unmoving, Harry unmoving, Sirius fading from the darkness. "Wormtail here, who has faked his own death... driven out of hiding... returned to his Master." Padma screaming, Daphne bloody and pale and a ghost of herself, shaking. "...Rats... met their deaths by a dark shadow that possessed them..." Hermione and Isobel and Terry levitated like those Muggles at the cup, glassy-eyed and pale and still so clearly terrified and still so, so young. "Hungry one night... who should he meet but Bertha Jorkins... Ministry of Magic, who were hunting him?" Ron crying over a brother, the Burrow aflame and falling apart. "...a gift beyond my wildest dreams... provided me with a mine of information... knew of a faithful Death Eater who would be only too willing to help me..."
She could see Hogwarts on fire and broken apart, see the Ministry draped in the shadows of hatred and terror. "...return me to a rudimentary body of my own... essential ingredients for true rebirth... a spell or two of my own invention... my dear Nagini..." The snake unraveled from Calla's ankles and rose up to hiss. She didn't know if she'd been bitten or not, but the dread and sense of pure defeat that flooded her seemed a poison in itself. Her limbs seemed uncontrollable as she tried to struggle. The snake's hissing grew louder in her ears and she could hear words, though she didn't know if they were the snake or a memory or a vision. Mine... Soon... Feast... Magic. "...willing to embrace mortal life again, if not immortal... an old piece of Dark Magic... the flesh of a willing servant..." Calla's head burned. Her whole body burned. "My father's bone... The blood of a foe... Harry Potter... Dumbledore invoked an ancient magic... World Cup... protection might be weaker there, away from his relations and Dumbledore... yet his sister remained... and I was not yet strong enough..."
Calla was sure she could feel him getting stronger as he spoke. She could feel herself getting weaker, certainly. "...My one faithful Death Eater, stationed at Hogwarts... he told me much about the girl that I did not know, confirming her strange gifts of the Sight... May be of use to me... her weakness... and her brother's... how she would be easy to overcome... and I began to wonder about the nature of my strange connection to her... magic salvaged from the wreck of that night... used my Death Eater to ensure they were entered into the Triwizard Tournament... beyond the reach of Dumbledore... into my arms." She could feel the snake pressing and squeezing around her ankles, just as she felt Voldemort come closer. Close enough that he could touch her. She couldn't only sense his movements, but it was like she could sense him. Her breath caught, strangled, in her throat.
With the last bit of her strength, Calla forced her eyes open, watering and terrified and so heavy, just as all of her was. His eyes were red, bright red, and they seemed to burn right through her, turning everything to ash. That awful feeling in her chest rose again like a monster that would not leave her, feasting on her terror. She thought he would kill her, or torture her. But he did neither. When he raised his wand, he whispered like a snake in her ear, "Imperio."
It felt at once like she was floating. All the weight had been lifted from her and she found herself feeling quite pleasant - freed, even - as the ropes were undone from around her. She rolled her wrists around, smiling at the hazy shapes before her. Someone spoke near her, but not to her; it sounded stuck, like it was muffled by water. There was a flash of red at the edges of her vision and she felt something sharp in her chest. But the pain wasn't the worst thing. No, that was the feeling of her mind. She'd spent so much time in it that now she felt strangely disconnected from her own thoughts. She was merely swimming in its murky depths, with no direction and nothing to keep her afloat. She tried to sink back and fight her panic, but there were no visions of her own to find. The glowing red eyes returned and her chest felt heavy as she fell, but she did not hurt. She only felt numb.
The hazy figure of the man above her said something. She could not hear it; her head was too heavy, her ears seemed to burn. Something hit her cheek, a slap that stung her. She didn't make a sound. She saw a forest alight with flames, stars so bright they burned to imagine. She saw a cave, bodies reaching from the depths of a lake and ancient fire burning them. A golden cup and an ancient ring. She looked up, not understanding, but her mouth opened of its own accord and she spoke, not knowing what she was saying. It didn't feel like her. Wrong, her brain told her, and she shook her head violently. Wrong. Stop.
Her chest shook and seemed to rattle coldly. She saw a pair of glowing red eyes and it made her ache all over, and it felt wrong. And the world before her was no longer a haze, and things started coming into focus, sharp, but too sharp. Blue light, smoke swirling, rasping voices and whispers around her. A dank cave, bodies lunging out of the water, and she saw that snake again, its red eyes just like his as it struck.
She had to get out. The thought was searingly clear across her mind. She thrust an arm to the side and returned to the dark lake of her mind. She pushed herself up and out, forced herself to fight and to escape. This was her mind, no one else's. She had to push the darkness out.
She jolted and her head hit the stone behind her. Her mind cleared, but she was still shaking as Lord Voldemort, those red eyes flashing furiously, his face contorted in anger, loomed over. He raised his other hand to her and pressed against the scar on the side of her head. It seared with pain and Calla felt her whole body convulse. A part of her seemed to rip from her chest, and then she felt nothing but dread and fear. The world danced before her in all its colours, and as she turned her eyes again to the sky in one last terrified prayer for help, the stars blinked out.