Rise of House Black

Family Lost

June 1981

It was a quiet night that belayed the terror that many across the country felt and in a manor in the middle of the Kent countryside a young mum was putting her son to bed in his cot.

"That's it baby go to sleep, sleep for mummy that's a good boy" she cooed.

The manor was well furnished and built from a mixture of brick, stone and wood with the wooden cot of the young boy exemplifying that this was a well to do family with a long history with the carvings on it. Indeed a muggle historian, if they could see the manor, might say it was an excellent example of a Jacobean house from the 17th Century which was two stories high and had some elegant masonry work on the four corners of the manor with some additional pieces above the main door. This was the home of the McKinnons, the Ancient and Noble House of McKinnon. Under wards that had been added to over the centuries the family felt reasonably safe despite the troubles that had spread across the land, however, as with all things in war, this does not render them totally safe and invulnerable. It was as the young mother was walking down towards her own room she felt it, a slight brush against the wards she was partially linked into. A door creaked open down the hall and a man in his 50s or 60s with slightly greying brown hair stepped out in his night robes with his wand drawn.

"Did you feel that Marlene?" he said croakily.

"Yeah, it felt like something glanced against the wards, do you think they are here?"

asked a worried Marlene.

"Probably, they know we're are against them in the Wizengamot and I'm sure one or two suspect your involvement with Dumbledore's little group not to mention who the father of your son is." Another brush against the wards though this time harder than previously. "Yes they're definitely trying to breach the wards, I can feel them probing from different sides trying to find a weak spot though they should struggle for a while."

"Father perhaps we should call for help or at least head to the floo and get out while we can before they put their own wards up?"

"Indeed, I'll wake your mother, grab your son and we'll floo out, hopefully once they realise we're not here they'll leave." With that he turned back into his bedroom while Marlene hurried back along the corridor to the nursery to grab her son. "Tipsy" she called and with a crack a house elf appeared before her dressed in her clean but ageing rags with the McKinnon crest on.

"Tipsy, pack a night bag we need to hurry before the wards are breached and the floo is blocked."

"Yes Mistress Marly" the elf replied in a squeaky voice and popped away to gather the needed items. Meanwhile Lord Andrew McKinnon was waking his wife and packing each some essentials quickly with flicks of his wand. "Come on Sophie we need to leave now, we don't have much time left!" he urged while dashing around sorting the packed bags while monitoring the wards giving a bit of his magic occasionally to shore up the wards to buy more time.

Once the family had assembled in the floo room near the elegant reception hall Lord McKinnon grabbed some powder from a pot nearby and chucked it into the fireplace and announced "Abbott's Manor!" However nothing happened, he stood in the fireplace with not even a spark of green fire showing. A sudden feeling of entrapment went over Andrew and Marlene as they felt a hostile layer appear over their wards.

"Is that what I think it was father?"

"Yes, anti-apparation and anti-portkey wards plus they have somehow blocked our floo."

"You always thought there might be a spy in the floo network department dear, this is the 5th instance we know of where it has shut down unexpectedly" said Lady McKinnon while worriedly glancing around the hall. It was then, just as Andrew was about to reply, that a crashing sound was heard ringing throughout the manor. While the baby cried, set off by the crash, Lord McKinnon desperately tried to repair what few wards were left to stave off the forces approaching his ancestral home and family. Unfortunately it was not to be as seconds later the front door was blasted open splintering into many pieces as it blew inwards. The McKinnons scattered heading upstairs to put some distance between them and the cloaked attackers with bone white masks. "There they go! Get the blood traitors!" shouted the lead Death Eater, cloaked in a black flowing robe and hood with a bone white mask, as he fired off a load of bone breakers and the occasional killing curse towards the family causing burn marks to appear on the stairs and splintering the wooden banister in places. The family ran towards the Lord's bedchamber as it was the only independently warded room in the manor other than the Lord's office. Before entering Andrew fired off a few curses and jinxes to delay the attackers, wounding or distracting a couple but three still pursued them up the stairs. With the door between them and their prey the Death Eaters began to cast heavy spells to break the wards such as 'bombarda' while inside the family has gone to the furtherest point from the door transfiguring items into walls and large objects then moving said items to shore up the door and that wall. "Marlene get Tipsy and get James out of here."

"But the anti-apparation wards?"

"Doesn't work for house elves and it doesn't stop them from taking someone with them."

"What about you then?" replied Marlene angrily, she wasn't going to abandon her family but she did want her son safe. The room shook as the force of the spells increased as the wounded and previously distracted attackers reached their allies and added their own spellfire to the attack.

"We don't have time to argue, call her and go. Now!"

"Tipsy!" with a crack the small elf appeared with some plaster and burn marks on her uniform from where the building was attacked with fire, bone breakers and all manner of other dark curses. "I need you to take me and James to Sirius at his west London flat." But before said task could be carried out by the loyal elf, the wall and door broke from the spellfire the death eaters had been casting showering the room with plaster, dust, wood and brick. Turning her back in order to shield her son Marlene gave the baby over to the elf and told Tipsy to go and come back for her however before the elf could, more spells shot across the room some shielded against by Lord and Lady McKinnon but others wrecked the bed and other furniture sending pieces flying in all directions as spells kept coming. "Tipsy just go!" screamed Marlene and the elf apparated away with a crack! but as it did so shards of the wood created by the curses and other pieces of transfigured wood used as spears by the Death Eaters hurtled towards Marlene and the elf.

With a CRACK the elf was gone and the shields created by the Lord and Lady of the manor faltered and with them down one of the black cloaked attackers, tired of the running around the house and fighting, cast the final spell that ended it all "FIENDFYRE!" With a roaring sound and a heat like the sun the cursed flame left his wand like a snake leaping towards its prey and charged towards the McKinnons who hoped that in all the confusion the elf had not been seen. As the flame devoured the room the Death Eaters backed out the room and hurried down the stairs casting Incendios and setting light to as much as they could all while screams were heard upstairs in the Lord's Bedchamber and the paintings too wailed at the disaster befalling the house. Feeling it to be too draining to keep going the Death Eater barely called off the Fiendfyre and ran out after the others leaving the remaining flames to burn. Before leaving one turned around and cast "MORSMORDRE!" and a ghastly greenish light shot into the sky above the manor creating a skull with a snake slithering out of its mouth and then with loud cracks they left the once magnificent two story manor house to burn. When Aurors eventually arrived due to the magic cast tripping country wide alarms all that remains was the ground floor with a ceiling intact in some locations but no first floor or roof, and a few fires smouldering away with the Dark Mark hovering above their heads. It was a gutted wreck which remain that way as it was sealed off from the outside world by goblins hours later.

A.N. Thanks for reading this is my first story so please review and hopefully I'll have new chapters up soon.