Disclaimer: The magnificent Harry Potter is not my creation. *Sigh*, maybe I'll
get to write a story as good as Harry Potter when I become an author... NOT! Oh well, a
girl can dream, can't she?
Warning: People die in this chapter. Please don't flame me when you find out
who dies; it's part of the story.
Chapter Twelve- The Fate of A Child
Fiona was one of the teachers supervising the Hogsmeade trip. She liked
Hogsmeade; it was charming little wizarding village to her. At this moment, she was
walking through the streets with Professor McGonagall.
"Dumbledore is starting to argue with Fudge about the dementors again,"
Professor McGongall was telling Fiona as they walked past Honeydukes. "Fudge keeps
on threatening to fire him if he interferes with his 'business'. Dumbledore isn't the one
interfering, Fudge is! If we don't convince Fudge to stop with denial, we might not be
able to stop the Dark Lord this time!"
"Uh-huh," mumbled Fiona. It was very humid outside. Her hair was slowly
coming out of its loose bun, the strands hanging out. Professor McGonagall, whose tight
bun didn't even have a strand of black hair out, didn't seem to notice...
Suddenly, Fiona stopped. "What's that?" she asked, pointing at a dark alley
nearby them. From where she was standing, it looked like...
"It looks like a body!" exclaimed Professor McGonagall. She and Fiona rushed
into the alley where they found Hermione Granger and Ron and Ginny Weasley lying
there unconscious.
"What happened to them?" asked Fiona in horror.
Professor McGonagall made no response. She simply pulled out her wand, went
over to Ron, pointed it at his chest and said, "Ennervate." Ron sat up blinking. Professor
McGonagall then went over to Hermione and Ginny and did the same.
"What happened?" Fiona asked the three urgently, as soon as they were all awake.
"Death Eaters were here," muttered Ron.
"Death Eaters?" asked Professor McGongall spluttered. "But- how...?"
Hermione looked around. "Where's Harry? He was here.... W-What happened to
him?" she asked suddenly.
"Harry?" asked Fiona, immediately fearing the worst. "He was here?"
"Yeah," explained Hermione. "The Death Eaters started doing the Cruciatus
Curse on me... and Harry must have heard me screaming because he came..." Hermione
trailed off, unable to remember what happened next.
"They took him," Ginny said in a meek little whisper. "T-They said that if Harry
didn't s-surrender to them... they'd kill us. A-And Harry gave himself up to save us!"
Ron and Hermione looked horrified. Professor McGonagall was visibly shocked.
Fiona felt as though someone had reached in and ripped out her soul. Harry was with
Tom- no, no, no, Voldemort! she told herself firmly. Tom is gone and Voldemort is what
he has become. If anything, anything at all happened to Harry.... if Voldemort killed
him...
Professor McGonagall turned to Fiona. "Take them to the hospital wing, and get
Dumbledore and as many teachers as you can. Tell them what happened. I'll round up
the students and the other supervising teachers. I'll take the students back to the castle
where they'll be safe, and then I'll meet you and the other teachers outside the castle.
Go!"
Fiona nodded shakily and led the three students away. As they left the village,
they could hear Professor McGonagall's voice, magically amplified, shouted, "ALL
STUDENTS AND SUPERVISING TEACHERS LINE UP TO GO BACK TO THE
CASTLE RIGHT AWAY!"
"Why did Harry do that?" wondered Ron aloud. "Why did Harry surrender to the
Death Eaters when he knew perfectly well that going up against You-Know-Who again
would be suicide?"
"There's a chance Harry might survive!" said Hermione angrily. "He's gone
against him before, and he's survived! What will make this time so different, huh?"
"Stop it!" shouted Ginny. "This isn't helping!" Amazed at her boldness, Ron and
Hermione fell silent. Then Ginny turned to Fiona. "What do you think, Professor
Clark?"
"I think," said Fiona slowly. "that you'll just have to have faith that things will be
okay. That's what we do in a bad situation where I come from."
After a brief moment of silence, Ron asked (in a croaky sort of voice), "And why
do you think Harry did that for us?"
Fiona looked at him intently and said, "I guess that's just how much he cares about
all of you."
***
A few miles away from Hogsmeade, where the Death Eaters and Voldemort had
camped temporally, Wormtail approached Voldemort.
"Well?" Voldemort snapped impatiently.
"It-It's done, My Lord," Wormtail stammered. "Harry Potter has been captured
and brought here."
Voldemort nodded. "Before you go, I have another command for the others... tell
them to send a little reminder to Dumbledore and those other fools about who they are
dealing with..." He smiled his terrible smile. "Destroy Hogsmeade."
***
Dusk.
After what had to be several hours, Professor Flitwick, Professor Sprout, Snape,
Dumbledore, Professor McGonagall, and Fiona had gathered outside Hogswarts, trying to
come up with a plan. Neither Dumbledore or any of the others had notified Fudge for
obvious reasons; one being the dementors. The students had been told to stay inside the
castle, with the other teachers as supervisors. At least they were safe...
None of them knew where the Death Eaters could be hiding. It seemed desperate
to Fiona. What Voldemort could be doing now, where Harry was, even if he was alive or
not couldn't even be determined right now.
I should have been there, Fiona thought, tears beginning to well in her eyes. I said
I'd keep watch on him, to make sure nothing happened to him.... and look what's
happened now! How could I have let this happen?!
Fiona could only hear the teachers talking vaguely, as though she were a million
miles away as she was thinking about this. She just stared out into the distance, into the
dark forest as though fascinated by it. If Fiona hadn't been scared out of her wits that
Harry was going to die, she would have enjoyed the sunset.
Professor Sprout noticed this and asked, "What are you staring at?" Fiona was
practically too gone to respond. Professor Sprout stared in the same direction, probably
to see what she seemed so fascinated by... and Fiona saw her face show a sudden
expression of horror.
"What?" Fiona asked absentmindedly. "What is it?!"
And then she saw... Where she could always see the outlines of Hogsmeade....
there was fire, black smoke hovering over the place. Straining her hearing, she could
make out the distant sounds of screams.
"Oh... my..." Fiona could only say.
"FIRE!" screeched Professor Sprout, waved her arms around. "FIRE AT
HOGSMEADE!"
Dumbledore and the other teachers whirled around just in time to see the emerald
sign of a skull with a snake coming out of its mouth fired into the blood-red sky. At
once, everyone knew who was responsible for this.
"Draw your wands!" yelled Dumbledore, pulling out his own wand. "We must get
to the town and save as many of the people as we can!"
He ran off in the direction of Hogsmeade, Fiona and the others teachers following
after him.
***
Harry knelt on the ground, ropes binding him so tightly that he couldn't move an
inch. How long he had been in this place, he didn't know. All that he knew was that
Voldemort would soon be coming. He had been Stunned until a few hours ago, when the
Death Eaters had Awoken him and told him to wait there, saying that their "Master"
would come for him shortly...
He was self-conscious, of course, but he knew he had done the right thing,
allowing himself to be captured by the Death Eaters. What was his existence worth
compared to the lives of his friends, anyway? Suppose he had escaped from that
situation.... What kind of life would Harry live if there was no Ron to tell him, "Don't let
the Muggles get you down!"? How would Harry live without Hermione always nagging
him about breaking the rules or being worried about how she did on the exams? And
even if Ron and Hermione had survived, how would any of them (especially Ron) bear it
if Ginny was killed?
In his childhood in the Muggle world, Harry had never had any friends. It was
lonely at first, but he after he turned ten, he figured that maybe friendship wasn't
necessary to have; if he had friends like Dudley's, then who would need enemies? But
now, almost six years later, when he had such good friends, he thought differently. Ron,
Hermione, Ginny, Hagrid, Sirius, and all his other friends were almost like a family to
him. If he was ever to lose any of them, then life for him would have lost all meaning.
Too many people had lost their lives to save him already...
And lo and behold, there he was... Voldemort was approaching him slowly. This
is it, Harry thought to himself. Hagrid said what's coming is coming... He took a deep
breath, and prepared himself for whatever what was going to happen...
But nothing, nothing could have prepared Harry for what was coming next.
Three Death Eaters approached Voldemort and Harry, each of them holding three
people who were tied up... a boy, a girl whose hair was arranged in ringlets, and a little
girl with frizzy hair....
It was Joshua, Lili, and Emily Baudelaire.
Harry stared at them in complete shock and horror, and they looked at him back.
They were all covered in ashes, though Harry didn't know why. Joshua and Lili were
scared, though they didn't dare show it. Poor Emily, however, was shaking in pure
terror. Harry couldn't blame her; after all, she was only seven years old.
"What is this?" Voldemort demanded of the Death Eaters.
"My Lord, these three were caught just outside our encampment," the Death Eater
holding Emily explained. "We can determine that they were trying to escape Hogsmeade
while we all were destroying it."
Harry's feeling of shock increased. Hogsmeade? They were destroying
Hogsmeade?
Turning his head a little, Harry could see that in the distance, there was smoke
billowing above the trees. Harry glanced at Lili Baudelaire, who shot him a helpless
look.
Unfortunately, Voldemort had seen this. He looked from the Baudeliares to Harry,
and Harry knew, judging from that look in those pitiless red eyes that Voldemort could
tell that Harry knew the Baudelaires.
"Should we dispose of them, My Lord?" asked the Death Eater holding Joshua.
"No," replied Voldemort slowly. "No... leave them here." He smiled his cruel
smile. "I shall deal with them."
The Death Eaters obeyed; they forced the three down to the same kneeling
position as Harry and left. So now, Harry was between Lili and Emily, while Joshua was
on Emily's other side. Harry really wanted to ask what was going on at Hogsmeade and
what had happened to them there, but kept silent. He didn't want to put them in more
danger than they were already in.
He could only guess what was going to happen next. Voldemort, with the new
knowledge that he had people Harry knew as prisoners, he would use them to get a rise
out of him. Or maybe, since he saw Emily's fear, he would sadistically torture her, or kill
her siblings... the possibilities of Voldemort's next moves seemed endless.
Voldemort paced around the four prisoners, never taking his eyes off of any of
them. Emily shivered and whimpered. Joshua looked as though he wanted to put his arm
around his sister, to comfort her, but he couldn't; his bonds were as tight as the others.
"You fear me, girl?" Voldemort asked Emily in a quiet, taunting voice. He
seemed to be amused by Emily's terror. Lili shot her a glance that clearly said, Don't say
anything. Emily seemed to get the message because she didn't speak a word.
"Do you?" Voldemort leered. When he didn't get a response, he rounded on
Harry.
"You have brave friends," he commented to Harry. Harry kept his jaw clenched.
"Nothing to say, Potter?" Harry just looked at him.
"So," Voldemort said, starting to pace again. "neither of you are keen on talking
right now. Well, that's fine with me. I'd like to get straight down to *business*." He
stopped, turned to face them, and brandished his wand.
"Who would like to go first?" he asked, his cruel smile spreading on his snake-like
face. "Would you, my dear?" he advanced on Emily. The seven year old tried to look
brave while facing this Dark wizard.
"You don't go near her," Joshua snapped boldly.
Voldemort stared at him for a moment or two. Then, he raised his wand and
shouted, "Cruccio!"
A split second after he said this, Joshua fell forward and started yelling, writhing
in pain. Lili could no longer hide her fear as she saw her brother being tortured; she
started to hyperventilate. Harry felt as though he was going to be sick; why did the three
have to suffer like this? They never did anything to Voldemort...
It suddenly dawned on him that anything that was in Voldemort's way to killing
Harry had to go. Once again, he asked himself why on Earth did Voldemort want to kill
him in the first place...
After a few moments of this, Voldemort, seeming to be satisfied with how the
curse was affecting him, lifted the curse on Joshua, who lay bound on the ground,
gasping for air. "Your cheek will cost you, boy," Voldemort hissed to him.
Joshua managed to prop himself a little by his elbows, shaking madly. "YOU
MONSTER!" screamed a girl's voice. Lili.
"Lili," Joshua said, in a raspy kind of voice. "Don't say anything...."
Too late. Voldemort raised his wand again... and now Lili was the one in pain,
screaming hysterically, rolling on the ground.
Please, Harry prayed silently, trying to get some of his ropes off. Please help
me.... help them. They don't deserve this... it's my fault...
And as though someone Up There had heard him, he felt some of his ropes loosen
a bit. With this new development, he struggled against the ropes, trying to free himself so
he could help the others...
Finally, Joshua couldn't take it anymore. Using all of his strength, he raised his
feet and kicked Voldemort right in his back. Voldemort jerked his head in Joshua's
direction, a look of pure fury in his terrible face, raised his wand and bellowed, "Avada
Kedevra!"
"NO!" screamed Lili as Joshua fell down, dead. Emily was sobbing so hard that
her shoulders shook. Voldemort, showing no expression at all, raised his wand again at
Lili and shouted, "Cruccio!", and once again Lili started screaming in agony.
Harry couldn't stay silent any longer. "That's enough!" he yelled at Voldemort.
"Leave them alone!"
Voldemort, triumphant that the torture of the Baudelaires (counting the murder of
one of them) had gotten to Harry, he said to him calmly, "Enough, you say? Funny, my
arm isn't even tired yet..." He pointed his wand at Lili and yelled, "Avada Kedevra!"
Lili fell.
In his horror, Harry finally loosened his ropes. Before Voldemort could round on
Emily, Harry freed himself from his bonds, leapt to his feet, picked up Emily, and ran as
fast as he could. His only thought was to get Emily to safety. Nothing else mattered but
that.
To their surprise, Voldemort didn't follow. "Go ahead," he said calmly. "Run
away. If Death Eaters don't kill you before you get back to Hogwarts, then some *old
friends* of mine will..."
But Harry and Emily never heard this. Looking back helplessly at the dead bodies
of Lili and Joshua, they ran off into the distance, not knowing what horrors would lay
ahead of them...
To be continued...
Okay, once again, I apologize for the cliffhanger, but if J. K. Rowling can pull that
huge cliffhanger of book 4, then so can I! I hope you all liked this chapter. Up next:
Harry hurries through the burning ruins of Hogsmeade to get Emily to Hogwarts... but
Emily isn't the only one who is in danger... be prepared, the next chapter has BIG STUFF
in it! Stay tuned!
