Chapter Sixteen: And We All Fall Down
The sleeping girl rolled over in her bed, drowning underneath an ocean of blankets. She stretched, awakening from a delicious slumber. As she slowly regained her senses, she realized she was not in her own chambers. She looked around wondering where she was and recognized the room was the Slytherin girls' dormitory. Draco…..she slowly remembered everything he had told her the night before. She yawned and sat up in her bed. Natalia put her hand on the nightstand to help her stand up. As she did this, her hand almost knocked over a vase full of pale lavender tulips in full bloom. She gasped, delighting in their beauty. These had always been her favorite flowers and were nearly impossible to find in autumn, especially in this part of the world. Lying next to the flowers was an elegant black scroll with a silver chain wrapped around it. She unrolled the parchment and watched as silver letters in a beautiful fluid hand appeared before her.
Lady Slytherin,
I hope these accommodations
are passable for you as I did not know the password to your chambers and did
not think it wise to risk waking you. I
wish for you to have these flowers as an apology and as a gesture of gratitude. I am not usually as tempestuous as I was
last night, but I must thank you for listening to my indecent ramblings and
most of all, for consoling me. Once
again, I thank you and hope you will accept my deepest apologies for my actions
over the past week.
Yours truly,
Draco MalfoyBeside the flourish of a signature was the Malfoy family crest of an attacking snake. Natalia brushed her hand over the graceful slopes of the letters, contemplating whether to reply or not. She decided on writing a brief note informing him that it was not necessary for him to apologize although she would gladly accept his apology if it would relieve his mind of its burden. She wrote the note on a thick, dark forest green Slytherin parchment and sealed the scroll with her family crest for formalities. She took a quick shower and headed for Snape's office to get Amicus to send her note.
Amicus cawed cheerfully at seeing Natalia walk into the Potions office. The professor sat at his desk planning the day's lesson. At hearing a person come in, he looked up, seeing the quarter-veela give a scroll to he dragon.
"Miss Slytherin, you were not present for breakfast this morning."
She smiled at Snape, refreshed from a full night's sleep.
"Good morning, professor. No, I was not at breakfast; I overslept this morning."
He looked at the young woman that stood before him. In a week, he knew her better than he people that he had known for years. And yet, not once had she laid herself out like an open book. Somehow, there was a quiet mutual understanding between them.
Snape gestured to the chair across from him.
"Sit, I will be back shortly."
He went into his chambers and came back after a couple of minutes covered with dust and floo powder.
"I told the house-elves to bring breakfast down for you. They should be here in a bit."
Dusting himself off, he went to the bookshelf and took down a thick musty book. The old book had a thick wooden cover that was pasted with dust and mildew. Cobwebs bound the two covers together, making it nearly impossible to open the antique. The professor walked over to Natalia and placed the book in front of her.
"Meanwhile, you can look through this. It should be sufficient in providing explanations to your questions."
The girl looked at the monstrosity that lay in front of her. It smelled like pavement after a night's rain. She read the title: Answers From The Dead.
How dreary, she thought, Even I could think of a name better than that. She picked up the heavy book, almost immediately dropping it in her lap with a thud.
"What kind of a book is this?" she asked, looking curiously at the moving designs on the cover.
"This is a very rare book from Persia. It is said that when a powerful necromancer touches it, they can draw spirits of the dead into the book to give them answers. However, I have never seen it done before, therefore I cannot assure you that it will work."
Natalia nodded, gently fingering the spider webs that clung to the covers. As she did, they parted like curtains, releasing the grasp they had on the book. She looked up at Snape in question and he nodded at her, gesturing her to go on. She gingerly lifted the cover of the book, which opened with a groan. A breath of stale air rose from the pages as if they had awakened from a deep slumber. The words "Answers From The Dead" swirled around, becoming a dark gray mist on the page. The pages rustled, flipping to the middle of the book. On an aged yellowed parchment, letters were slowly scrawled out in blood red: Whom…..Natalia looked up at Snape, wanting to close the book, but he did not look back at her as he was too engrossed in what the book was writing. Whom do you call…..Slowly, the last word was written: upon. Whom do you call upon? The girl looked up at her professor, speechless.
"Whom do I call on?" she whispered.
Snape gave her an annoyed look.
"You do not have to whisper, you are not going to scare it away."
He closed his eyes, deep in thought. After a while, he opened his eyes, knowing exactly who to call upon.
"Ask for Nestor, son of Neleus."
Natalia nodded, and looked down at the book, saying,
"I call upon Nestor, son of Neleus."
The words on the page quickly disappeared and the page became a black abyss. Slowly from a distance, a blemish of misty gray could be seen floating toward the page. Soon, the face of an old man could be seen approaching Natalia. However, he remained inside the page when he thought he had gone far enough.
"My dear girl, what questions do you have that are so dire that you must awaken me from my dreams?"
Natalia sat staring at the image of Nestor, speechless.
"Well then, if you have nothing to ask, I shall be off."
At this, she came to life.
"No sir, please, I do have a few questions."
Nestor's face formed an amused smile.
"I have seen many amateurs in my time, my dear, but none as timid as you."
She blushed before asking her question.
"May I ask, what kind of power is this that I have?"
Nestor frowned, marveling at the obviousness of the question.
"Well, it's quite simple. You have the power to raise the dead."
She shook her head quickly.
"No, that was not what I meant to ask, I apologize. What I need to know is to what extent do my powers reach?"
The old man nodded his head, rubbing his chin thoughtfully.
"Hmmm…..that's very hard to say. You see, it all depends on what you aspire to be. If you plan on becoming a broom maker, it would not make any difference whether you had the power of necromancy or not. But if you take a different path….." He trailed off, deep in thought.
"Yes, yes…..I see. You will take a different path, a very grim one at that. But I can tell you that you can expect to be the greatest necromancer the world will yet see," he said with a twinkle in his eye, "and much, much more."
Natalia sat in shock. The greatest necromancer…..she could not even begin to comprehend what that meant. How would she ever be able to…..
"How do I control my powers? I do not even know when I am calling to the dead right now."
Nestor laughed a deep rich laughter. His beard shook with the booming of his voice.
"Oh my, that is the funniest thing I have ever heard in my life. My dear girl, all you have to do is want for it to happen, and the dead will come to your calling! It is really that simple."
Natalia sat there, thinking for a second.
"You mean all I have to do is will it to happen? Like if I had a corpse in front of me, all I would have to do is will its soul to come back, and the spirit will do just that?"
Nestor looked at the young girl, tilting his head.
"I think you are catching on. Now, if you do not mind, I hear the Graces calling to me. If you will excuse me."
He gave her a slight nod as if he were tipping an imaginary hat, and floated off into the spirit world again. The page became stained with yellow and age once more and the book closed itself up, interlacing the cobwebs together to seal its covers.
A variety of food lay in front of her on a silver tray.
"The elves brought this while you were having your conversation with Nestor."
Natalia looked at him, amazed at what had just happened.
"Do you think I can really do all that?"
Snape poured himself a cup of tea and looked her in the eye.
"We'll just have to see, won't we?"
The week had passed by quicker than anyone expected. Classes were a breeze and everyone was looking forward to the first singles dueling match on Thursday. Natalia had been paired with Harry for partnered dueling on Tuesdays. She had beaten him three out of four times, the fourth time, a first-year flew into the classroom on a botched broom ride, distracting her. Harry's ego was slightly injured, but he and everyone else marveled at the ingenuity in which she executed her spells. For her first attack, she used the Conjunctivitis Curse as a means of making Harry miss his aim toward her, but instead, a hand shot forth from her wand onto to Harry's face, taking his glasses off of him and placing them carefully on the ground. This caused quite a chuckle amongst the students at which Harry picked up his spectacles red with embarrassment. Things like this occurred in all of her next spells, which caused Professor Austerus to believe that Natalia's wand had a mind of its own and was using as little power as possible to carry out the spells.
The Defense Against Dark Arts class buzzed with excitement on Thursday as the professor called up the first two people for the first singles wizards' duel ever.
"Neville Longbottom and Ronald Weasley, please come up for your duel."
The two boys politely bowed to each other and turned, walking to opposite ends of the dueling table. Austerus slowly counted to three, at which Ron thrust his wand forward, yelling, "Petrificus Totalus!"
Neville was hit instantly by the spell and fell down flat on his back as still as stone. Poor Neville never got the hang of blocking the spell after Hermione had cast it on him that first time.
The list of duelers went on, and after a good forty minutes, finally got to be Natalia's turn. She faced Pansy Parkinson, and on the count of three, quickly said, "Stupefacio" at which the power that had surged from her wand turned into a pillow and whacked Pansy across the head, knocking her down. Unable to suppress her laughter, Natalia buried her face in her hands as the rest of the students snickered with her.
The Slytherin heir won all of her duels, with only Draco, Harry, and Blaise left to duel against. The rest of the school had come to watch after hearing that Natalia had beaten everyone in very original ways. Even Dumbledore sat near the back of the room, watching with a twinkle of amusement in his eye every time she cast a spell.
With Blaise, she used a Tarantallegra spell, which resulted in puppet strings being attached to Blaise's arms and legs which were pulled about by an invisible puppeteer. Natalia's Expelliarmus spell caused Harry wand to turn around and beat him on the head. When Draco finally came on, Snape gave her a deadly look meaning to say that if she botched this one up, he would have her to deal with. She looked back at him helplessly, unable to control her wand's erratic behavior. Being quick, Draco cast a Switching Spell on her and the wasp on the wall, at which she created a barrier around her, repelling the spell back to him, making him into a wasp instead.
At this, Snape countered the spell, returning Draco to his original form. The professor turned to Natalia with an irritated look on his face.
"Miss Slytherin, since you do not take dueling seriously, you will have to duel with me."
The Potions Master and the heir of Slytherin walked to the center, bowed, and went to opposite ends of the table. Everyone in the room held their breaths in anticipation.
"One….." Austerus counted.
Natalia decided to do an Expelliarmus spell to get it over with quickly, she hated it that she had to be put through all this embarrassment. If only her wand would do something serious for once.
"Two….."
Snape started to feel the Dark Mark on his arm burn, but ignored it, determined to teach Natalia a lesson before meeting with his doom.
Natalia's wand suddenly turned very warm in her hand. It was as if it took on a life of its own. She felt an immense amount of power surge down from her wand throughout her entire body.
"Three!"
Natalia's arm shot forward like lightning, pointing her now white hot wand directly at Snape's chest. Suddenly, a power came over her and forced a spell from her mouth.
"FRANGOCIO!"
A pillar of blinding white power surged forth, hitting Snape directly on the chest, shattering every bone in his body.
