As we all make our way back onto Hogwarts grounds I wonder what position I will find myself in within the next 24 hours. Will I still be standing side by side my fellow class mates and friends, will Draco still trust me? Am I finally going to come face to face with my father? There were so many possibilities and I was not sure whether I was mentally prepared for any of them.
Whilst in thought we pass Hagrid's hut and continue to a secluded wooded area near the lake. The winds whistle as they kiss the thin waves of the water. The inky blackness looked tempting. To submerge oneself into the oversized blanket of jet black ink would mean I wouldn't have to deal with whatever was about to happen, because I just knew a bad omen awaited me.
I had been blindly following Harry but I come skidding to a halt. "I… I… What is…" I wasn't quite sure how to put into words what I was trying to say. The site before me was new, it was scary and it was beautiful.
"Thestrals." Luna breathes airily. I look to her in utter confusion. "You can see them…" she states in her usually manner. "That means you have been touched by death…" she continued as she feathers a delicate hand down its elongated husk-like skull. The thestrals were unlike anything she had seen before, all bone and dark, yet it held the inexplicable stature of kind hearted omniscient being. One glance was enough to gauge that the horse like create was soft in nature. Its leathery, bat wing expanded over a far reach of its perimeter. I couldn't explain it, but I felt the need to touch it, to stroke is stunted mane, to let it know I would cause it no harm. I stepped forward with a shaky hand, I tried to steady my breathing and as I stepped closer the thestral snorts and stomps one of its hooves on the floor. I intake sharply but do not let it deter me.
"Hey… hi… I'm Ari…" I say so softly, I can barely even hear myself. I take a step closer and stoke the soft fuzz across its face. Harry had of course explained that he intended for us to ride these mystery beasts. "Is it okay if I ride you?" I ask quietly against its face. "It would be an honour to do so…" the thestral snorts much softly this time and moved his head in what I can only assume is a nod. I smile to myself and ready myself for the mounting of this beautiful beast. Once seated a thought strikes me "Hey" I say out loud, the group all turn to me, but my attention is on the thestral before me. "Can I name you?" I ask it politely. In my head I kept referring to the beautiful creature as it, and that did not sit well with me. "Reign… I want to call you Reign." I say whilst stroking their side.
"That sounds like a boys name Ari." Ron scoffs.
"It is a boy, Ron." I scoff right back. "I think it is anyway." I bend my torso down to 'get a look under the hood. "Yup, definitely a boy." I say, a little flushed from being upside down. The group laugh at my reddened cheeks but I just roll my eyes in response, smiling a little to myself for making my dear ones laugh, even in the bleakest of moments.
"Shall we go?" Hermione asks from the ground. I nod and hoist her up behind me, instructing her to keep her arms tight around my waist. As Luna's thestral launches into the sky, Reign propels himself forward too. I scream in delight at the feeling of my insides turning to jelly inside me. Eventually we're soaring through the sky, I stretch my arms out and feel the wind snipping at my finger tips as we swerve from one direction to the next. Hermione is holding onto me for dear life, squeezing the life out of my torso. I laugh out loud at the utter joy of flying through the air with London's skyline in vision.
unfortunately, the good times could not last forever. As we approach the ministry of magic, the eerie emptiness of the institute looms over us. It felt like standing in a rib cage of a ginormous beast whose innards had been carved out. I shiver and continue to follow Harry.
As we enter a chasm like menagerie of shelves which look as if they could continue for eons, we all huddle against a particular shelf, it was no different to any of the others before it, it looked no different to ones that continued after it. Yet, we all stood aghast as Harry cupped the glass sphere in his pale shaky hands. Encrypted onto the tiny spherical orb was Harry's name, next to that, my fathers. I inaudibly gasp. This must be a major piece to the puzzle, what the puzzle was meant to look like I wasn't sure, but it was slowly starting to piece together.
"You must wonder…" a slimy voice echoes from the darkness "Why he wasn't able to kill you, all those years ago…" as the voice gets louder I see a familiar flash of bleach blonde hair. Hurriedly I scramble to pull my hood over my eyes. I may have been able to fool Draco into believing I was going along with Harry to satisfy my own curiosity, but I don't think his father would be as lenient.
I turn my head and realised we were surrounded. "Well… I have wondered for 14 years" Harry replied in a strong voice. "I can wait a little longer." I see Lucius's mouth turn down in a slight frown at the supposed insolence coming from such a young boy.
"Stupify!" we all shout in unison. Those that had gathered around us were propelled backwards in a cascade of billowing black velvet and a clatter of gold masks. Not taking the small gap of escape for granted we all dispersed in opposite directions. We needed to put space between us and them.
I weave in and out between various shelved, however, a sudden gush of winds comes hurtling my way, knocking me off of my feet and into the ground. I turn my torso whilst still half laying on the floor and see a woman with long, black curly hair pouring in all which directions from her scalp. She starts giggling quietly at first, the small bout of laughter then starts to increase in volume until she is virtually cackling. I hadn't realised but during the tumble my hood had fallen down, I could feel a trickle of blood ooze down my forehead and I struggled to breathe. The impact of hitting the floor so harshly had knocked the wind out of me. I raise my own wand with shaky hands with the word "stupify" sat on the cusp of my lips, but before the word could leave my mouth the crazed women is blown down a side corridor, Fred comes rushing to my side.
"Aria!" he shouts, he pulls me up by my arm and half drags, half carries me down the opposite direction of the crazed lady. "Keep up." He seethes, his anger wasn't directed at me, it erupted more from a sense of urgency, to keep safe. To keep me safe.
I run as fast as my legs will take me until I collide with a frantic looking Ginny. I realise the group has all gathered once more and we spin around until we all stand back to back in a circle. It is deathly quiet, I can hear each and everyone of our ragged breathes.
Just then, Ginny raises her hand "Reducto" a blinding white lights swishes out of her wand and disappears into the vastness that befalls us. The world seems to slow down, just for a moment as a glass sphere from a top shelf comes falling down to its' impending doom. Then another, and another, pretty soon they're all falling down.
Harry grabs my hand "Get to the door!" he screams as we all make a beeline for the exit. Glass comes shattering down around us and all I can think of is, what is Draco doing, is he okay? If I don't make it out of here what will happen to him? I shake the idea out of my head and continue on my path of trajectory.
What follows on from here all seems to blur together. it all happened so fast that it was almost as if it never happened. I wanted to scratch the memories out of my brain. The moment Sirius's cold body touched the ground, I stood witness to every last morsel of innocence and childhood purity leave Harrys body. In that one instance, I knew he would never be the same. I tried to reach out to him, to touch him, to touch anything tangible, but the world around me was fuzzy and I couldn't understand why.
my head starts to black out and visions of darkness start to overcome me. I hear a muffled scream and I try to follow the sound, but I am struggling. Someone grabs me by the wrist and drags me into a room full of fallen rubble and debris. I feel like I may pass out at any second. But with every being in my body I fight the feeling of fatigue and utter exhaustion.
"You will never know true love, true friendship…" I can just about make out Harry small, frail figure sprawled out on floor before me. A sudden burst of black dust implodes and I hear a bone chilling whisper inside my brain say "Aria…" the voice, it sounded so familiar, so… real. I don't think my conscious can hang on for much longer, and I let my eyelids fall shut.