Oh yes, I'd seen the whole thing, from the very first second, to the very last moment. And I could do nothing, nothing what-so-ever. Hermione and Kelly constantly tell me that it wasn't my fault, that I could do nothing. But I don't believe them. This is all totally my fault.
I'd come home from shopping and layed Jill down in her crib and then put all the new shopping away. I went into the basement, I forget for what, but that's where it started. I was hit with the spell Stupify before I knew what happened. I fell to the bottom of the stairs and heard cruel laughter. Soon I was bound and gagged, my wand taken away, and sat in the corner, front seats I later thought bitterly.
They had Candice tied to one of the beams of the house. She struggled to even more cruel laughter. I saw one of the Death Eaters twirling Candice's wand with one hand, the other holding their own wand. Mine was being held by a female Death Eater, I soon learned from her voice. It was being thrown up into the air and caught in various ways.
"Cissy, quit showing off!" said the Death Eater with Candice's wand. That one was a female too.
"You're having fun with yours, Bella," the other replied.
"When you've stopped acting like schoolgirls..." another said. There were four all together; two male, two female.
The next was all a jumble of curses, gashes, bruises, muffled screams, and cruel laughter. They tortured her until she hung limp in her bindings. The untied her and laughed as she fell to the floor, her body lifeless. They laughed cruelly yet again.
"Too bad your precious Potter wasn't here to save you," mocked the one named Bella. They cackled again, then disapparated, leaving me to watch blood flow from gashes on Candice.
I layed there until 8:00 Pm, the watch on Candice's wrist told me. Finally I heard people shouting. I screamed as loud as I could, hoping they would hear me.
"Shut up!" I heard a voice say. I screamed again.
"It sounds like it's coming from the basement!" I recognized this as Kelly's voice.
"Alex?" Hermione called. I screamed yet again. I heard footsteps and the doorknob rattling. I was blinded by light as the door opened. Hermione and Kelly yelled at someone behind them, I couldn't see. They ran down the stairs and Hermione about cut off my circulation hugging me, and then I heard Kelly scream. I knew she'd found Candice.
"What's going on?" I heard a voice say. Two men appeared in the doorway, blocking the light and casting long shadows. One was a slow-speaking Auror, Kingsley Shacklebolt, the other, none other than the Minister of Magic himself, Rufus Scrimegour. Hermione looked over to where Kelly was looking and almost screamed, she would have if not for fear of deafening me. She quickly untied me and untied the scarf from around my mouth.
I began coughing, then I threw up. Those Death Eaters were sick. Sick and cruel. I turned my head just in time to avoided retching all over Hermione.
"Good lord, what happened?" It was now Fudge, the ex-minister, and now assistant of Scrimegour. There expressions were grim, after seeing Candice. Hermione, and now Kelly, were hugging me. I stared, still in shock, at the sight of Candice's body. It just didn't seem real. But it was.
Now, this is why I'm here, at St.Mungos, sitting at her bedside and just waiting for the poor thing to wake up. If she wakes up ...
Stop it! Shell wake up I know it!
"Mrs.Holly, someone wants to talk with you," said the nurse. She was very nice, a motherly nurse. She had short, curly red hair and a nice smile. I figured it was Kelly or Hermione, come to wish a now-sleeping Jill a happy birthday.
I was happy it was so close to Christmas. They'd finally decorated, a week before Christmas. Before the walls were just boring, plain, white. Now they sparkled green and red from the many red and green candle-filled bubbles. There were also different-colored strands of garland decorating the walls.
Candice's bed was the most decorated I'd seen yet. Tons of red and gold flowers. I had strands of purple and pink garland hung around the headboard and the nightstand. Her favorite colors. Her pillows now were red and bore the message Merry Christmas, hidden behind her head and hair. I'd replaced the hospital covers with Mom's special hand-knitted covers we'd had since I was seven and she was two. They were huge blankets to us as kids, big enough to fit a queen-sized bed, but since mum wanted us to keep them forever, she'd made them that size on purpose. Mine was green and had a snowman on it with always-falling snow. It bore sparkling gold letters reading Let It Snow!. Hers was red and had a large, glittering Christmas tree with pretty blue words that read 'Tis The Season!.
Poor kid. She was only sixteen, after all. Yeah, she was five years younger than me, only in her sixth year at Hogwarts, and those bastards stole her away from the Kings Cross station where I was going to pick her up five minutes later.She'd left for reasons I don't know now,becauseshe can't tell me. If only I'd decided to get there sooner!
"Let them in," I told the nurse. I didn't look away from Candice as I heard, who I thought was, Hermione walk in. "Hi Hermes."
"I'd forgotten you called her that," said a completely different voice. It definitely wasn't Kelly's voice, and it wasn't definitely Hermione's. It was a male's voice.