Chapter 20 - Nora Zabel
They apparated to the same forest enclave they'd stayed at before Ron left. It must have been the first place he thought of.
Lizzie stayed on her knees and frozen in shock for a long moment while her heart pounded savagely in her ears. She turned slowly to see Hermione crying in Ron's arms. "They're going to kill her -" she gasped finally, and Lizzie's heart shattered for Luna a million times over. If she survived, she'd be an orphan, and that's a fate she'd wish on nobody.
Lizzie stood up and started muttering enchantments silently, each breath a heavy weight in her chest.
"Where do you think she is?" Ron asked a couple of times. "We can get her... get her somewhere safe..." he offered with a unconvincing shake to his voice.
"Lizzie, where do you think -" he asked again.
"I DONT KNOW!" She yelled far too harshly. "I -" she had no words, she dropped her face into her hands and cried in both grief and fear, but also frustration. "That - we can't be distracted by that. Probably Azkaban, I don't know..." her voice cracked at the end over the heartlessness, but her heart felt anything but less, it felt more, like it was growing only to explode to bits inside her body.
They stayed for two days. "You think You-Know-Who is on the quest for the Hallows?" Ron asked. "Maybe Dumbledore suspected that..."
"No, he was... this wand hunt started after he died. I think he's only after the wand. He wouldn't have bought into a children's tale. The wand is a known anomaly though based on several texts I've read that reference an all-powerful wand," Hermione explained.
"Your cloak must be it, the mark on your dad's grave and everything..." he interjected. "The stone? You don't reckon that's the philosophers stone, do you?" He asked.
"No, that's for immortality," Hermione said as she set plates of food out.
"A thestral eye, is what Xenophilious said. Those are white," Lizzie offered.
"If pulled they'd be black, wouldn't they?" Ron asked with a mouthful of food. "I think those things walk and live in the veil between earth and whatever is beyond. Should they be killed on our side, I think I remember Hagrid saying they become black like soot," he explained. Hermione raised her eyebrows impressed by the explanation.
"The ring... the black stone in the ring..." Lizzie said, standing up and pacing. "Marvolo Gaunt said it was a priceless Peverell heirloom..." she added. "That was the stone. I bet that's why Dumbledore put the ring on and cursed himself - but then..." she looked around for her pouch.
"I open at the close - he put it in the snitch," she said. "It must be..." she pressed it to her mouth repeatedly, but nothing happened so she chucked it back into the pouch bitterly. "Of course, could bring him back to tell us, but no that would be too easy wouldnt it?" She said sarcastically into the air willing Dumbledore to hear her.
"But the wand... that's his next move?" Ron asked. Lizzie nodded.
"Meaning ours needs to be making him mortal as soon as possible..." she said firmly and paced around in anxious thought.
Ron cranked the radio to a Potter Watch channel hoping to hear news of the Lovegoods but no such luck. What they did hear were confirmations of the deaths of Dirk Creswell, his wife Sadie, and Ted Tonks. Lizzie chucked the radio thinking her heart couldn't bear it. The pain was enough to stop it beating since Luna's father died, but Remus's voice came out of the radio. He spoke of news and ministry shortcomings, mentioned the inability to apparate out of the country, alas get splichched, and then paused and sighed.
"I don't know if Lizzie has a way to listen to these..." he said sadly. "But we owe her everything. She's stronger than most believe, and not ill-willed as many think. I've never met someone too righteous for their own good that would surpass her and her father. She's not given up on any of us."
Lee Jordan's voice came on. "What would you say to those doubting her? Who think she's running?" He asked. Remus sighed.
"There's more to this than any of us can wrap our minds around. She's not running, quite the contrary, she's after him," Remus said confidently.
"Some are saying if that's true then why not get caught and try to end it," Lee interjected.
"Because she needs something before she has any hope of success on that endeavor. If caught in the meantime, it is over. Rest assured that when lightning strikes - and she will - it'll be when she has a real chance of ending this," he retorted.
"Well put. Is there anything you'd say to her if you could?" Lee asked.
"Lizzie, if you're listening - I'm sorry. I hope you can forgive me," his voice was hoarse and sad and Lizzie found herself pressing the speaker to her heart. It ached severely, and pushed adrenaline through her bones in the process.
"Albania," she said firmly.
"What? We can't apparate out of the country," Ron said.
"Right. But we can apparate once out of the country. We travel down to Dover Straight. Hop the pond into France. Apparate to Giza, Bill has a friend there we stayed with. I'm sure he can get us to a boat to the Greek aisles. From there we can get a train to Albania."
"They're monitoring the straights, Lizzie. Passenger boats aren't leaving, only coming in, Bill already tried to get Fleur back to France to hide her family," Ron said.
"So, we smuggle out on a cargo ship. We'll leave in the morning," Lizzie said, now determined to get her hands on the next horcrux before it was Ron's family, Tonks, or Remus ended up on the death roster.
The air was thick with humidity. The day already baked the land with unbearable heat and the night took the liberty to drown it in rain, leaving village patrons to wade through, breathe, and choke on the wet air. He stopped at light emitting from a small catholic church along the stone paved street and saw fluttering movement from someone inside. The girl was not paying the slightest bit of attention as she tended to clean the pews in a hurry. She consequently startled and screamed when she saw him, her hand clutched at her heart. She laughed politely and apologized. Tom stepped in and looked up at the embellished ceiling.
"Sorry to startle you," he said with a sweet smile that seemed to calm her nerves.
"You're soaked, sit... I'll fetch you some tea and something to dry off with," she said in a hurry. He nodded and his eyes followed her as she departed into another room.
Tom sat and scanned the surroundings with his eyebrows raised in interest. The door swung open and then shut behind her with a loud click. She sat beside him and took a towel to his face. He declined the gesture, and took the towel himself, but accepted her offering of tea.
"Thank you," he said politely.
"Are you a vagrant? You don't look..." she said nervously. He chuckled and shook his head.
"No, just intrigued. Religion... intrigues me..." he said absently as he looked around.
"Alter girl?" He asked to break an awkward silence.
"I'm with the convent here. I'm destined to be a nun," she said.
"Really?" He asked, interested. "I have never understood the appeal of that."
"To be married to God. Pure and devoted. It's a great honor and duty... to give your body and soul..." she said a little defensively. He stared at her and set down his tea with an intent frown.
"Are you from here?" He asked.
"My mother was. But I'm from Britian..." she answered. He nodded. "My father met her here and brought her back to England."
"Your family is here now?" He asked.
"No. Just me. My mother ran away years ago, I was hoping I'd find her here, but..." she said.
"What made you want to become a nun?" He asked. She didn't say anything but fidgeted her fingers in her lap uncomfortably.
"Men are evil creatures, I'm sorry," he said, reading her answer without a word needing to be said. She gave him a sharp piercing look. "But you can't possibly think they'll let you be a nun with a defiled body."
She stood and turned away from him, then shot him a mean look at the sentiment.
"I'm not judging, darling. 'Pure bodies' is an absurd concept to me. The body is so fickle," he said. "God doesn't require it, why would he? You don't take it with you when you die," he continued. "They tell you to preserve your body to control you... control your impulses... own you. They tell you what you can and can't do with it, what you're required to do with it to control you. Chastity is a tool humans use to manipulate. It serves no purpose. Your body is not God's vessel, he wouldn't create such an imperfect design if it was, would he? Such a fragile one? It's so easy to die. He cares about your soul, or I would, if I was him. The body means nothing."
She sat back down silently and listened.
"I thought the body was the only thing we were entitled to. Your freedom is revocable, your life can be terminated, your property can be seized, your family can abandon you, your children stolen from you, your job terminated, your marriage nullified... the body is the only thing we're left with. Nobody is allowed to touch it. Killing has exceptions when your body is threatened. But there's no exception for rape... or for violating someone. There's no excuse..." he continued, hardly talking to her more than the air.
"But I found in time that so many ignore that premise. The body turns on itself, people are eager to defile and torture others to garner control. So, I would revise my assessment to say that the only thing we are entitled to is our soul..."
"Who are you?" She whispered.
"A wandering soul," he said with a perversive smirk.
"Who are you?" He asked.
"Nora..." she said.
"What made you leave?" He asked.
"My sister, Nadine," she croaked. He stared for more until she continued.
"She married this awful man and had twins, Olivia and Oscar. They named me their godmother... but then my father died, and her husband took me in charge until I was old enough to marry off... but she got me out before then. I didn't want to leave them. She tried to give me Olivia, but he found me and took her. I jumped onto the train and never went back..." she explained in fragments that obviously pained her to admit.
She looked at him and he was in her head. She was on her knees in front of a man who paced around her. Her head was sunk in shame. "You obey... and I'll maintain your virtue," the man said. He crouched down in front of her and lifted her chin.
"You understand what happens when the church checks and discovers you're not a virgin, don't you?" He asked. She nodded with just her scared eyes. "Don't cross me, and do as I say," he growled.
She nodded with a trembling lip. She was so young. Her knees were getting red, and he stood undoing his belt. Someone pushed the door open a few moments later and shoved him hard away from her.
"Don't touch her!" The older girl screamed, then helped her up onto aching legs, but he took Nora by the hair and pushed her down in the corner.
"You stay there!" He hissed and turned to backhand the older girl to the floor. Nora screamed. "Quiet!" He shouted back at her.
The older girl was tossed onto the bedlike she weighed nothing. "Go to your room!" He barked at Nora, and she scrambled off in a hurry, shutting the door of the nursery so the little ones did not hear.
Her body was paralyzed with terror and apprehension. The door opened and she folded herself upright in a tight ball. He stared at her, only slightly coming down from the belligerent rage and reached forward suddenly for an ankle, yanked her hard flat on her back and flipped her onto her stomach with a hand firmly on the back of her neck. She knew his intentions and writhed under the grip in a futile effort to escape. He pushed hard onto the small of her back to hold her in place and released his hold only when he was panting for breath from the aggressive release. The door slammed and she laid there limply in shock.
Nadine pushed the door open, limping feebly from a and stifling sobs her chest was exhausted from. She knelt by her sister, clutching her hands and crying muffled apologies. She went to the water closet and came back with a cloth and some water to clean her up, but Nora didn't move. She laid still and unblinking and tears soaked the sheet under her face.
Nadine curled up with arms wrapped tight around her sister and shook in a mixture of guilt and fear. They heard his steps down the hall and tensed every muscle. Oscar cried and she let him continue, bitterly willing him with her mind to shut up. But he didn't.
"Nadine!" Her husband roared. She startled and slid out of the bed, crawling up onto her feet and limping painfully from the room to get her son.
Nora laid there motionless until the morning sun peaked over the horizon. Nadine came in with Olivia on her hip already dressed in traveling clothes and moved about the room to pack a bag. Nora sat up and grimaced at the pain in her groin as her sister set the three-year-old Olivia down on the floor with a doll and hurriedly undressed her still mentally absent sister to get her into traveling clothes.
"Nadine, what are you doing?" She asked.
"Leaving. The train to Dover Straight, then the next boat, here's money I took from him, take a train from there, anywhere, I think mum went back to Albania. Go there. It's worth a shot, just never come back," she said quietly.
"We're leaving?" She asked, flooded with apprehension.
"You're leaving," Nadine said sharply. "We can't both go; he'll send out the calvary."
"No, I'm not... I can't leave you here with him, the babies," Nora chirped.
"I'm pregnant, Nora, I can't leave. I want you to take Olivia," she said, her body was shaking with emotion. She scooped up her daughter while Nora stared in horror. Nadine held her close and kissed her desperately. Her eyes were drowning in their sockets. "I love you both. I love you so much, please don't let her forget me," she sobbed. Nora hugged her tight but panic was setting in.
"Go get Oscar, come with us, we can leave together. I can't leave you," she begged. Nadine backed up.
"Yes, you can, yes you can..." Nadine said, handed her a bag.
"He'll kill you," Nora whispered desperately.
Nadine shook her head "I'm pregnant, he won't," she assured her.
"He'll beat you," Nora said her face contorting in raw pain. "He'll..." Nadine took her sister's face in her hands and kissed her forehead.
"For my sister's freedom and my daughter's innocence, I'll bear anything," she whispered, her forehead pressed tight against her sister's. "Now, GET OUT!" She said assertively and pushed her toward the door, out the back of the house, and toward the small alleyway that led to the main road.
The station was four miles. She ran with Olivia on her hip until she couldn't carry her anymore. Olivia cried and complained about running after on her own feet for a short while, so Nora hoisted her onto her back and continued, the heartbeat in her neck pumping enough adrenaline to continue through the stitch in her side and the glass shards in her chest.
They made it to the station almost two hours later and she found the train to docks that would take her to France. She waded through a crowd of people before seeing him at the platform. An officer was with him. She backed up and ran the other direction. He charged after her, but she was cut off by an officer coming the other direction.
"Give her to me, Nora," he demanded. "Give her to me and I won't have them arrest you for kidnapping my daughter," he threatened.
"He'll hurt her!" She yelled at the officers who said nothing. "He'll hurt her, like he beats his wife - my sister - my pregnant sister," she cried hoping to elicit a response. One of the officers narrowed his eyes at the man.
"Mr. Kellis-" an officer said but he cut him off.
"She's running away from her obligations; she's running away from accountability. I caught her whoring, and the church has consequences for that. She's in my charge until married. They both come home with me - detain her if you have to," he explained evenly.
"LIAR!" She yelled, tears streaking her face. Olivia cried into her shoulder and an officer reached forward to take the little girl. "Please don't take her! Please! She doesn't deserve this. He'll hurt her. Please don't take my niece. I'm her godmother, I have to protect her. Please," she begged desperately but another was holding her arms and body back as they peeled the little girl's arms from around her neck.
"Nory!" The girl screamed. "No!"
Her father took her from the officer's arms and held her close. Planting a kiss and shushing her calmly. He waved a hand gesture and the officers reached for handcuffs to detain her. "I'd like to press charges," he said dismissively. "For whoring and kidnapping," he added. Nora slipped through a slackened grip on her arm and bolted. The train had started and was picking up speed behind her as she ran. The little girl's screams for her tore lesions into her heart but she kept running, then jumped and clutched hard at the rail as not to drop to the tracks. The officers yelled for the train to stop but it didn't. She sunk down on the small, railed platform of the train car and cried, she could never go back. Her babies were gone forever. She had no family unless she could find her mother. The freedom didn't feel earned without the little girl in tow. She imagined her sister's bruised face when he returned home with her daughter. The disappointment. No man would take her defiled. She had no home. But she found a haven in a familiar set of stones and surrendered to a convent.
Riddle was impressed. "What would they have done to you for not being a virgin?" He asked.
"I wouldn't be allowed to be a man's first wife. If I didn't bear a healthy child within two years, and a boy within five, I would have been excommunicated. Meaning nobody in my family or church would have been allowed contact with me, or me them... they check you, then question you in confession. In front of the congregation, you wear a bloodied dress, they give you a drink and if you fall ill, you're guilty of lust and sin. If you do not, you're guilty only of tempting a man."
"Are there consequences for him?" Riddle asked.
"No," she said. "You have to apologize," she added. "To him, to God, to the church."
"They poison the drink," he said as a matter of fact. She nodded and wiped her nose with the back of her hand.
"Is it like that here?" He asked curiously. There was no sympathy in his tone, just fascination. She shook her head.
"It's not the same here. I like it here. They keep me safe," she said. He nodded.
"But still you've never told them because they would still shun you?" He asked. Her eyes welled.
"Well then, sweetheart, they are no better," he said with a slight smirk. "Is mass on Sunday?" He asked. She nodded.
"Good, I shall attend," he said. He smiled sweetly and left.
"Where are you from?" She asked.
"Britian," he said on his way out and smirked to himself.
She saw him on Sunday in the second row of pews, sitting by himself observing the patrons. She waved but he didn't wave back. She felt uneasy by the stare and made her way through the communion line, looking back at him on occasion. When she was handed the bread and the wine, she heard a woman coughing from the front pew, along with a small child. She'd already sipped the wine but spit it discretely back into the cup when the members all started to fall and writhe in pain. The world spun and felt uneasy, she swayed on her feet as the noise of the coughing and the sputtering grew louder. She focused on a child bleeding from his mouth and looked up at Tom who smiled with a satisfied and sinister stare in her direction. The small amount in her system made her throat start to close and she dropped to her knees last of anyone in the building. He knelt by her side and checked for a pulse he could feel. With the flick of a wand, she was still, but alive, and pronounced dead with the others when authorities arrived at the gruesome scene.
Tom returned late Tuesday after villagers came to pay their respects at the open caskets and open graves. He was alone, pushed back the sheet on her face and checked again for a pulse that had gone faint but present.
He took the liberty of burying her body before whispering the counter curse for her paralysis. She kicked and hit the casket with all the remaining energy she could muster while he siphoned dirt over her grave. She could hear the world above her slowly muffle, the weight atop the casket thickened. She screamed, touched her head and clutched at a tiara she couldn't see in the dark. She used it to try to cut through the wood but there was no use.
She could hear was her niece screaming both for her and under her father's firm hand. She closed her eyes and saw her sister Nadine, inches from her face, slap her hard with contempt. "You failed her, he brought her back," she spat. Nora sobbed in the dense air. She watched her scream in birth, lose the baby, and then vomit, shake, writhe, and convulse from blood loss and infection her husband let run its course to punish her for losing the child, endangering his daughter, and freeing her sister. Nora knew in her bones she knew she'd see Nadine on the other side, and it was all for nothing. She couldn't face her. She stayed behind and gave her soul to earth, not God. She never passed over, remained in her own grave as a ghost to punish herself for the failure. Olivia was his to give away, and he'd raise Oscar in his footsteps, who would rather pretend he buried his own future daughter, his mother's namesake, than admit she ran away like the shunned women in his family.
Lizzie dozed off behind a wall of crates, Hermione was curled up in Ron's lap. He had a bruise the size of a bludger on the side of his face, courtesy of the altercation with the muggle shipyard attendant who spotted them. Ron took a slug to the face with a metal pipe before stunning the man and buying them enough time to get on board and hidden in the cargo bay.
Lizzie had been letting herself enter a Riddle void for days hoping for information on Nora or the horcrux, but it seemed to come to her when she least expected it to.
Ron frowned curiously at Lizzie's expression. "What's wrong?" He asked.
"It's the diadem. I'm certain," she said. "Like the one the Lovegoods had a replica of in their home."
Ron nudged Hermione awake gently and she rubbed her eyes. Lizzie explained the dream, the relation, and her suspicion the horcrux would either be in her grave or at the church.
"Are we still on the theory for him hiding them in a fashion another died in?" Hermione asked.
"Right. So, if you start with Myrtle, she was killed by a snake, hence why Nagini is a horcrux. Moving to Renee, she was burned, hence why we think one might be guarded at Gringotts by dragons. Then Milly, in the floorboards like where he hid the ring at the Guant house. Then Nora who was buried. Pieces of Emily were returned to the orphanage. Nagini was killed as inferi, and the locket was hidden in a lake of inferi. So, it's either in Gringotts, but same could go for the cup. The diadem is either still buried with her or was returned somewhere - either her home at that church, or his home at Hogwarts," Lizzie explained. Hermione frowned in thought.
"You think we'll be able to find the church?" She asked. Lizzie nodded.
"It was a massacre. I'm sure it's well known, possibly haunted," she said.
"He dug it up though, didn't he?" Hermione asked, remembering the fragmented vision. Lizzie contemplated that.
"We have to check. If we jump the gun and go to Gringotts or Hogwarts before Albania, and get caught, they'll be no way to check here. I'm not willing to gamble away that lead," Lizzie reasoned.
"I agree with that. You're sure it's the diadem?" Ron asked.
"Riddle went to Albania, but why? This thing has been lost for centuries and he was hunting founders objects. There's nothing in Albania that serves him. But who else traveled there?" Lizzie asked.
"Pettigrew," Ron said. Lizzie shook her head.
"No, he could have picked up on rumors that that's where he was hiding," she dismissed. "Who else? Ravenclaw," she said. Hermione gasped.
"Quirrell," Hermione said.
"Exactly. If the lead on the diadem was in Albania and that was discoverable, it would explain why both young men went there. Quirrell was not a dark magic enthusiast until he met You-Know-Who, he probably traveled there to seek the diadem," Lizzie explained.
They landed on the coast of France and Lizzie apparated them to Giza. Menes wasn't home and they waited. He was surprised to see them, suspicious, but Lizzie only asked for two cryptic things. Hair from him and his sister and how to get to the Greek Aisles. Menes took them to the coast of Alexandria and bid them farewell at the boats departing for Greece. This was far more comfortable of a trip and there were no threats to their safety this far out of Britian. When they finally reached Athens, they traveled by train to Albania and then visited the closest library. After prying Hermione's literature deprived hands from the books, they focused exclusively on travel sites, locating, after some significant digging, a haunted catholic church near Perlat. One photo was enough to confirm it was the same from Lizzie's visions, and she apparated them there from the fabricated memory.
It was abandoned, though once obviously very beautiful. There were still blood stains on the floor that sent chills through her body. She ran a hand over the aisle arm of every pew until her palm was blanketed in accumulated dust.
The courtyard felt eerie, the graveyard even more so. They split up and wandered to find Nora's but Lizzie discovered it quickly. There was a banging noise beneath the surface. "e degjon edhe ti?" An unfamiliar voice asked. She turned to see a nun and startled.
"Everyone stops at hers, if you hold your breath, you can hear her," she said in English this time, realizing Lizzie didn't understand the native tongue once she got a better look at her. Ron and Hermione made their way over when they noticed the engagement.
"Do you still - live here?" Lizzie asked. The nun smiled.
"I've never abandoned my duty. But no, I live in the convent in another village," she explained. She was very old.
"Were you here when this happened?" Lizzie asked.
"I was a young sister, yes."
"What happened to her?" Lizzie asked.
"She died with the others. Buried here. Poison massacre. Except..." she sighed. "Nearly seven years ago, her bones and remains of all but her fingers were found in the barracks of the convent. There was a note claiming God rejected her body into his kingdom because she was defiled...They looked like they were used for some occult practices."
"You found her?" Lizzie asked.
"I'm the only one who still comes here," she said. "I often see travelers come here, or locals who want to see for themselves. Many say they've seen her ghost in the pews."
"Notice anyone odd around that time?" Lizzie asked.
"Man, from Britian, but with a turban," she said, nodding. "He had an odd demeanor, timid but also mean..."
"Was anything still left in the grave?" Lizzie asked.
"No, it was empty."
"Was anything left with her remains in the barracks?" She asked.
"No, just the note. I remember the note well. It was signed 'a wandering soul,'" she explained.
Lizzie bid her farewell but took off in a hurry to the main road where she paced feverishly.
"Liz?" Ron asked.
"It's not here," she said, grabbing a fist of her hair in frustration.
"They used her in some fashion to ensure his connection to Quirrell. He dug her up and took the diadem. I'm sure they were planning to use it once back in Britian. But Riddle still wanted inside Hogwarts, he knew I would be at Hogwarts that year and outside the blood ward protection. Then when they found out about the philosopher's stone, he had him hide it there. It must have been an alternative plan in case they did not succeed. But where would they have hidden it - buried it mind you - in or around the castle?" She asked. She was talking very fast.
"The forest? He fed off the unicorns in the forest," Ron offered. Lizzie clenched her jaw and nodded.
"The chamber?" Hermione offered. "Nobody but him could get in," Lizzie nodded again.
"Bottom of the lake, he hid the locket in a lake," Ron chimed in again.
"That would something the merpeople would find I reckon. He wouldn't risk that," Lizzie reasoned.
"So, Hogwarts. But that's a death trap right now," Ron said, ironing his face with both his hands.
"So is Gringotts," Lizzie said.
"We need to get back to London either way," Hermione said. "Without getting nabbed at the border."
Lizzie tossed on the cloak and darted toward the abandoned church. She came back several minutes later with two habits and a priest's black outfit with a clerical collar. She pulled the hair from Menes and his sister, and they apparated back to coast of France.