Chapter 19 - Xenophilious Lovegood

Lizzie enjoyed a short reprieve from the nightmares the locket utilized often to terrorize them, but visions from the encounter with Nagini stayed with her as though the venom from the attack had permanently sent a piece of her into Lizzie's blood stream.

"Strip," Lizzie giggled.

"Excuse me?" Cedric asked.

"Strip, birthday suit, chop chop," she said with a smirk and pulled out a pad of paper and a charcoal pencil. It was late, and she was enjoying the rest of the summer before the world cup after their narrow escape from Surrey.

"You're going to draw me?" He asked suspiciously.

"Starch bloody naked, yes," she said through whiskey-induced giggles.

"That's a hard no from me, how much have you had to drink?" he said.

"That's a hard something from you," Lizzie said as her mouth twitched into a devilish smile.

"Put on some pants," he said and tossed a pair in her direction.

"C'mon... just your shirt then," she bargained.

"You have ten minutes," he warned, looking behind him and down the hall to ensure his father was asleep. He pulled his t-shirt up over his head before sitting on the edge of his bed and leaning back on his arms with his eyes fixed on her.

"Yes, good good, stay like that," she said biting her lip.

"This is going to be worth so much money, a Lizzie Potter original," Lizzie said sarcastically. He choked on a laugh.

"You done?" He asked with mock annoyance after a few minutes.

"Uh huh, yep, almost there," she said.

"Ta-da!" She bellowed and passed him the paper.

"Alright, Picasso, the bloody hell is this?" He asked holding up some lines squiggled into something resembling and abstract face.

"Art," Lizzie said sharply.

"I didn't need to get naked for this," he added indignantly.

"That was to get the creative juices flowing, some serotonin, you're nice on the eyes..." she said between suppressed giggles.

He rolled his index finger for her to come over and wrapped hands around her hips to rest on her backside before tugging down her knickers and pulling her onto his lap. Lizzie bit her lip and leaned forward to kiss him. He pushed her hard down onto himself and pressed his face into hers assertively. Lizzie gasped and her heart pounded with adrenaline. She couldn't tell if the movement was too hard and aggressive, or if her body had forgotten who he was. Within seconds he felt her body sink into a heavy weight and her shoulders go limp. Her face fell as quickly as her eyes, almost like he'd hit an off switch.

"Liz?" He whispered anxiously, pulling her body off and lying her on the bed. "Lizzie?" His hands were on her face, and she wanted to squeeze them reassuringly, but her mind was swimming in a hazy reality. He put a hand on her thigh to make sure she wasn't hurt, if she was present in the moment, she'd hear the violent heartbeat in the wake of his voice.

The hand made her flinch, but she bent her knee automatically to push her leg up. "Lizzie," he said again rubbing the pad of his thumb over her forehead. He watched her face closely. He could see fear in her eyes through the veil of their lids. Her lower lip trembled, and a line of tears fell down her cheeks. He cuddled up behind her and wrapped her tight in a blanket like a cocoon. But when she woke up, she remembered nothing and laughed at the picture like she'd only faintly remembered drawing it in the first place. He asked her how she was feeling, and she looked confused at the sentiment. "Did I hurt you?" He asked timidly.

"What are you talking about?" She asked.

"When we - when - Lizzie - you can talk to me..." he said in bewilderment. She frowned.

"What did I do?" She asked in a faintly broken voice, realizing where it was going.

"You... turned off, like blowing out a candle. You brain just turned off... but when I laid you down you were going to let me..."

"Let you? You think I let them?" She snapped sharply with a sudden charge of rage.

"Them?" He asked with a crack in his voice, horrified at the sentiment. "Liz, please talk to me," he pled, swallowing a sob. She turned away and leaned her hands into the edge of a table until her knuckles went white.

Cedric approached and put a hand on her back. She flinched impulsively at the touch as anger rose in her body. She half expected to hear leather slide through a belt buckle around his waist even though she knew he was in boxer shorts; half expected an abrupt push into the table. He put a hand on her shoulder and before her mind could curb the impulse, she turned and flung a fist hard at his face. He caught it a few inches from his eye and stared apprehensively at her. She stared back and forced herself to stay fixed on him until she was in that room with just him and nobody else. She stared not even wanting to blink, adrenaline still pounding in her veins until an earthquake rippled through her body. Lizzie shut her eyes tight and felt like she inhaled and pushed down a cloud of dense smoke into the depths of her body. Instead, it spilled over into sadness and dread. Her lungs felt compressed, and the sobs came like hard contractions. He wrapped his arms tight around her head and she cried silently into his chest while her insides screamed.

He held her as tight as possible, stifling his own pity and anger that made him want to set something ablaze with the men that hurt her inside. She hadn't said it out loud, and he knew she never would, but it was so painfully audible regardless.

When she stepped back to compose herself, she was somewhere else. There was a boy, handsome, young, whom she didn't recognize. He held her face in both his hands. "They called me crazy for being in love with the snake girl," he whispered in a thick Irish accent, and she smirked. He was friendly, only warmth in his eyes. Cedric said something like that once, she thought, back when his house thought her the heir of Slytherin.

"If you don't pay, he'll..." she said sadly after a long passionate kiss. From the reflection in the window, she looked far from herself but rather the girl she saw in the mirror at Godric's Hollow.

"I already did, but we don't have to do anything, let's just..." he pled. He sat down on a sofa, and she sat in his arm and rested her head in his lap. He stroked her hair until she fell asleep.

She startled awake and he snorted on a laugh. "You're fine," he said and pulled her head close, planting a kiss above her temple. "You've got to sleep sometimes; I'll pay him whatever he wants to make sure you can sleep in a safe bed."

She stared at him in disbelief. "Adri, let's get out of here," he said finally, sitting up straighter and staring intently at her. "We can leave, tomorrow, I'll come get you, we leave, I'll make sure you never end up back here," he promised.

"He'll kill you," she whispered. He shook his head.

Lizzie was now running with Cedric through the alley behind Privet drive. Vernon was behind them and snatched her in a tight uncompromising grip. But it wasn't Vernon. It was the ringmaster; they were in a cluster of trees no more than a hundred meters outside the congregation of tents. They could see the lights from beyond the edge of the trees, and the hold was so tight on her arm she thought the skin would tear.

Vernon hit her but it was Adrianna who fell hard to the ground. There was a click from a gun, and she looked up in time to see the boy, eyes drowned in fear, give her one last pleading look before the ringmaster pulled the trigger. The boy keeled over and hit the grass floor, but Lizzie saw Cedric staring lifelessly back instead.

She was dragged back to the tent, screaming in pain from the anguish more than the beating she'd taken. The tent was small, there was a bed and a man waiting patiently.

"Apologies, sir, had to take - care - of - something -" the ringmaster grunted while aggressively pulling clothes off the girl's body, and pushing her to the man's feet. She didn't look at him, just at his feet. There was an exchange of coins, and she was left alone with the stranger.

"So, you can transfigure into a snake," he said finally with a hiss in his own voice.

Through stifled sobs she propped herself onto her knees and reached for the waistline of his trousers. He stopped her, crouched down and stared into her face. It was Riddle.

"I won't hurt you, Nagini, I just want to talk," he said invitingly. She stayed silent in defiance, still shaken to the core. It wasn't long before he grew impatient. "Well, I think we can call him back in, I think he's more persuasive than me, am I right?" Riddle asked.

He waved his wand and the ringmaster appeared. She thought his eyes looked different. Riddle turned away and stared into the fire as he listened to her scream into the mattress. The ringmaster fixed his clothes and left her limp on the bed. She curled into a ball and shook as Riddle approached.

"I can get you out," he said pervasively. "You just need to give me something I want," he added and pushed hair out of her face. "You kill the others, why not him?" He asked. He was sitting on the edge of the bed with a hand on the curve of her bare and bruising waist. His other stroked her head. "You're not weak, but let him do as he pleases, and you take all that anger out on the others..."

"You don't trust me," he said with a faint smile when he felt her shudder under his touch.

He repeated this most nights for what seemed like weeks until she broke and desperately gave herself to him as to not bear a visit from her master.

"You're pathetic," he hissed when he'd finished with her, half hoping she'd have tried to devour him like the others. He was no longer impressed by her resilience. He didn't return for many weeks, and she was so numb by the time another man offered the ringmaster enough money to retire forever in exchange for her, she felt it was the closest to freedom she'd ever achieve. Kill him, and be free, she thought. But the same night she had, there was a knock at the door. It was Tom. She took a step toward him as he was rather alluring in the moment but took several more backwards and darted down the hallway away from him. He seized her arm in the same grip the ringmaster had and with a loud crack they were gone. She was back in the familiar tent and screamed with terror to be trapped again.

"No, no, no, you let me leave, please," she begged and tried to push past him out of the mouth of the tent. He pushed back and they struggled until he hit her hard across the face to silence her.

"Listen to me!" He roared. "Kill him, and we will leave," he said with a suddenly calm demeanor and glanced at the floor. Her legs went weak at the sight of the person she feared more than anything in a feeble state, twitching from what she could only imagine to be torture.

Adrianna circled him on her wobbly legs as Lizzie closed the curtain around her uncle's hospital bed. Adrianna transformed as Lizzie pulled the bottle of poison from her jacket. Adrianna struck him once in the neck as Lizzie stuck a knife in Peter's. She struck him again as Lizzie squeezed the Chaplain's heart in an invisible grip. She struck him again and again, as Lizzie apparated into Damien's car and sent him hurdling off the road. She struck him a sixth time, he was now bleeding profusely and gagging on his blood, and Lizzie plunged the needle into her uncle's IV.

Adrianna transformed back, out of breath and shaking. Riddle pulled her into an embrace. "Listen to me, and your life will not be difficult, don't... and I know exactly what will break you," he whispered in her ear. Lizzie heard those same words funnel deep into her ear, but her hands were bound behind her to a bed post at Malfoy Manor.

The boy Adrianna tried to run away with entered the tent. She backed away scared as Tom left the tent and sat in a chair just outside. She screamed and all Lizzie could hear was her own labored and sobbing breath when Cedric entered that room she was tied in. He'd been dead awhile then but everything he did felt real. It broke her insides to be defiled by the first and only person at the time she trusted with her dignity. That's what broke her. That's why she remembered very little of the Manor, there was no distinguishing between the visions he created and the reality of the imprisonment.

Riddle reentered the tent, and the boy was gone, because he was never there. Nagini was covered in blood and shaking in a deranged, broken state. He held her face below her ears and hissed in a tongue she understood. "Surrender," is all he said, and if she wasn't dead already, she was as good as.

When Lizzie woke in the bunk above Hermione, she thought perhaps Nagini's imprisonment would work to her advantage. She also thought that if their endeavors failed, she'd end up the same, that he'd kill her in serpent form, and she'd join a sister in captivity as an obedient servant. She thought about the boa constrictor at the zoo, and how all any living thing wants is to be free. She thought about her motivation for all of this and acknowledged for the first time that it never had anything to do with saving anyone. She resented all of them, some more than others. Her parents for not taking her with them to the other side, Remus and Sirius for abandoning her, Dumbledore for enabling the abuse that was still killing her long after she'd killed the men who did it, the Ministry for not trusting her, Cedric for the promise he broke, Charlie and the rest of the Order for being complicit in letting the obscurial consume her, all of them for never telling her everything, and Ron and Hermione for being scared of her. She wondered if she'd listened to Riddle in the chamber whether her life would be easy as he claims. But she wouldn't be free, she'd have no purpose, and those were the reasons for all of it. Freedom and purpose. Love ran deep but it was something she felt herself needing to be reminded of, as if her mother was rapping on back of her heart, keeping her aware that there's no purpose for anything without it. She might resent them, but she loved them, and she was grateful for that simple fact.

The others woke up about an hour later and Hermione suggested a visit to Xenophilious Lovegood to inquire about the mark. "It's something Dumbledore wrote, it's something you need to be aware of, I think," she said. Lizzie agreed and they devised a plan.

The three of them apparated to the hillsides not far from the burrow a few days later. Ron took a pair of binoculars and scanned the dwellings before pointing to a settlement west of them.

"Oh, how I would kill for mum's lemon tart," Ron grumbled.

"Don't start, Ronald, you were there for Christmas," Hermione snapped indignantly.

He laughed. "You think I showed my face for Christmas?" He asked. They stopped and stared.

"Had mum and dad had known I'd walked out on you and Lizzie in the middle of this bloody war, I still wouldn't be able to sit normally. Would have gone over very well. Ginny mind you, would have gauged my eyes out, Fred and George would have shoved fireworks up my..." he explained.

"We get it!" Hermione snapped. Lizzie giggled. "Where'd did you go then?

"Shell cottage where Bill and Fleur are staying. Bill wasn't happy and Fleur barely spoke to me. But he wasn't going to turn me away. They took it over from Muriel. She died, did you know? Never thought she would. Her and Elphias Doge... even Dung is presumed dead. They went on a wild hunt for those in hiding a few weeks ago.

"Jesus..." Lizzie muttered, her heart heavy behind her chest.

"Charlie came out to visit Bill. If I needed a reason not to show my face at the burrow, he confirmed it..." Ron said cautiously, side eyeing Lizzie.

"What do you mean?" She asked.

"He saw me, didn't say a word but charged through the place looking for you. When Bill told him it was just me... he lost it. Broke my nose... black eye. Bill had to pull him off. He was furious. I tried to explain but he was... furious."

"I thought your nose was snatcher related," Lizzie said, the image of Charlie being violent gave her pause.

"Nope, just a bitter sister-in-law who decided not to mend it right... but I deserved it," Ron said.

"Here we are, this has got to be it," Ron said, looking straight up at a flock of paper birds and signs about exotic plants.

They knocked and waited for the door to open. It cracked precariously and the man Lizzie recognized from the wedding peered out suspiciously.

"Mr. Lovegood, Lizzie Potter, we met a few months ago at the wedding. I'm friends with Luna," Lizzie said sweetly. His eyes widened. "Can we come in, please. Friendly company, we're sorry to show up unannounced," she added. He took a minute but obliged silently with hesitation.

The house was peculiar to say the least and he showed them into a sitting area that was a mess. "Is Luna home? For the holiday?" Hermione asked. He nodded. There was a head dress near the window she thought looked wildly familiar but couldn't place it. Every time she thought hard the image of a hand pulling something sapphire from the dirt beneath a grave flashed through her mind.

"She's down fishing, I'll call her. What can I do for you, Miss Potter?" He asked. He noticed her staring at the headdress.

"Lost diadem of Ravenclaw, or... well a replica," he said. Lizzie shot a look at Hermione and made a mental note to research that.

Hermione gasped at the sight of a horn. "Mr. Lovegood, that's too dangerous to have inside!" She bellowed.

"A crumplehorn snorkaxe?" He asked, bemused.

"An urumpent horn! That's a class five creature. They'll explode at the smallest touch," she said, bewildered. Ron backed away. Lovegood smiled.

"Luna told me about you, narrow-minded... Miss Potter, how can I help you?" He asked again.

"Lizzie, sir, please... we well we had a question about the symbol you were wearing around your neck... the one Krum referred to as Grindewald's mark?" She asked.

"Let me, make some tea," he said with a dry mouth, and left the room.

When he returned, he stared for a long time at her face. "I assume you're familiar with the tale of the three brothers?" He asked.

Ron and Hermione nodded, but Lizzie frowned. "Liz, I have it here," Hermione said and pulled out the book.

"Yes, the original, go ahead," Mr. Lovegood said. Hermione began to read.

There once were three brothers who traveled a long and winding road at twilight.

They happened across a wide, raging river they could not pass, but being learned in the magical arts, the brothers simply waved their wands and built a bridge.

Before they crossed their bridge, they found their path blocked by a hooded figure. It was death, and he felt cheated.

He explained that travelers usually died in the river but pretended to congratulate the brothers for their cunning and offered them each a prize.

The first brother, the oldest and by far the thirstiest for power, felt emboldened by death's perceived vulnerability, and asked for a wand more powerful than any in existence. Death narrowed his eyes as the gears turned in his mind and fashioned a wand from a nearby elder tree.

The second brother, not power hungry, but too often in his brother's shadow, hoped to impress his brother and humiliate death further by asking for the capability of returning people from the dead. Death smiled as he plucked a stone from the river, turned it thrice in hand, and handed it to the second brother.

The third brother, a humble man, asked for a cloak of invisibility that would allow him to go forth undetectable by death. Death reluctantly handed over his own cloak of invisibility.

The brothers went separate ways once they crossed the bridge, the items weighing particularly heavy on the mind of the eldest brother, who feared death most of the others. He thus traveled to a village and sought out a wizard with whom he once quarreled. It was not long before he was feared by many for his formidable dealings and triumphs.

The eldest brother no sooner sought after the second brother and stole the stone as to take comfort in the idea of being resurrected should his rivals pursue his newfound power.

Much time passed, in which the youngest brother, now much estranged to his family as he grew weary of his eldest brother's quest for power, married and had a child.

By this time, the eldest brother sought to also obtain the cloak as to hide from both death and a growing number of enemies. Upon hearing the news of his brother's marriage, he sought out the second brother who he knew to be heartbroken by the news that the woman he loved now belonged to his hidden brother.

He was promised the stolen stone in return for helping the eldest brother obtain the cloak. Their endeavor succeeded, but the third brother did not willing hand over his prize. As such, the eldest slayed both him and his wife, and claimed the cloak his own.

Thus, death took the third brother.

The second brother, mad with grief, took the stone as promised by his older brother and turned it thrice in hand as to resurrect the woman he loved. To his dismay, she grew cold. She did not love him. She was displaced without her husband and child, and she did not belong in the mortal world.

The second brother, betrayed by false promises, no sooner hung himself as to be with her.

Thus, death swiftly took the second brother, and the first reclaimed the stone.

As for the first brother, death grew worried his power surmounted his own, and greeted him with fear and warning that his fall would be soon to come. In this encounter, death took the cloak, as it was never given to this brother. The eldest obliged as to preserve his life in the presence of death but concealed the stone from reach.

Death sought after the third brother's child and gifted the cloak. The child, now grown and bent on righteous vengeance, sought after the first brother for many years. Death watched the child rob their uncle the stone, hoping he would meet his match. When he continued to evade death, the child too claimed the elder wand and slaid him for good measure.

Thus, death took the first brother.

Death looked upon this child favorably and reclaimed none of the prizes, for which he all believed to be earned. Robbed of love they could use the stone to resurrect those lost. Atune to the price of power, the wand ceased to be a threat in their hands. Not frightened by death, the cloak could be handed to generations so long as the wearer shed the cloak and departed this life willingly with death as equals."

Lizzie paused for a long time. "I'm sorry, sir, but where does..." she said quietly.

"The three brothers, keepers of each of the hallows. The wand, the stone, and the cloak..." Mr. Lovegood said in a hurry, almost annoyed that the story didn't answer everything on its own.

Ron was looking at Lizzie rather intently in thought and then took the book from Hermione to scan over the pages. Xenophilious sighed in response to Lizzie's confusion and scribbled out the symbol, a line for the wand, the circle for the stone, and the triangle for the cloak.

Hermione looked at Lizzie, remembering the mark on her father's grave and like Ron immediately associating it now with the cloak.

"Does the Peverell family mean anything to you?" Hermione asked. Mr. Lovegood laughed.

"You're not telling me Lizzie Potter doesn't know the lineage..." he said. Lizzie frowned. The Peverells were buried in Godrics Hollow. Hermione whispered as such to Ron along with the mark being on James Potters grave.

Lizzie closed her eyes and saw her father in the casket at the church with the symbol, the symbol on Dumbledore's letter to Grindewald, and knew she'd heard the name Peverell elsewhere.

"It's my lineage, and it's Riddles. Marvolo mentioned his ring, the ring Dumbledore had was passed down from the Peverell line. Rita used it as propaganda years ago that we were related..." she explained finally when the gears clicked.

Xenophilious nodded slowly. "Together, the hollows make one master of death. The Peverell brothers are said to be the creators and thus inspiration for the story..."

"Skeeters lineage was not wrong, those of us on a mission to follow the hollows found that article enlightening as to who the descendants are now. There are none known to the second brother, for obvious reasons..."

"Who were they?" Lizzie asked.

"Thestral farmers, scholars believe. The cloak is unlike any known, does not fade with time, cannot be revealed with any magic, it's a true cloak of invisibility. The cloak is thought to be woven not of demiguise fur, but of extremely fine thestral hide. The wand core is that of a thestral tail strand and elder wood. The stone is suspected to be a fossilized thestral eye. Thestrals are the embodiment of not death but the acceptance of it. Hence why the eventual keeper in the strory is able to wield all three," Mr. Lovegood explained. "Ignotis was the one buried in Godric's Hollow, the cloak keeper."

Lizzie remembered the note about Dumbledore having the cloak before her father died. Was he trying to see if it was the real cloak? She also remembered a faint engraving on the ring that she would bet was the hallows symbol. Perhaps Grindewald had the wand and that's why it was dubbed his mark, on his quest for power, one Voldemort, a descendent of the first brother, according to Marvolo, was now on the same quest for.

"The most powerful wand, that's what he wants," she whispered to Hermione. Lizzie refrained from showing Mr. Lovegood her father's cloak tucked in her jacket. "None of the others have worked on me, that would be the only way..." she added quietly.

"He doesn't know about the others, or he wouldn't have turned the stone into a..." she continued by Hermione grabbed her arm. Xenophilious was pacing and muttering anxiously.

"Sir, are you alright? Where's Luna?" Lizzie asked. He didn't say anything but retreated into the kitchen. Lizzie climbed the steps into Luna's room and gazed upon murals painted of various creatures, thestrals, and the faces of her friends. There was a picture of her and her mother at the bedside, and when Lizzie picked it up, she noticed how dusty the room was, how uninhabited it appeared, and her heart constricted. She looked out the window toward the stream and saw nobody fishing.

Ron meanwhile moved toward the printing press and pulled back the tarp to show Lizzie's face printed as undesirable number 1.

"Liz, we need to go," he said sharply. Mr. Lovegood roared.

"No, you won't!" He screamed and Lizzie retreated backward a few steps.

"Where's Luna?" Hermione asked but he started to shake and cry, and Lizzie read pure dread in his eyes when he finally made eye contact with her.

"They took her," Lizzie said and inhaled shakily. He nodded and his eyes welled.

"They want YOU!" He roared again.

"I'll help you get her back! Mr. Lovegood, you didn't send word to the Ministry, did you?" Lizzie asked but she read the answer before he spoke.

Ron reached for Lizzie's hand, but she pulled it away. "No! If we're not here, they'll kill him! They'll kill her!" She shrieked. Hermione shook in her skin.

"Get Hermione out," she said, but Hermione shook her head.

"I'm not bloody leaving you here as bait for them!" Ron yelled.

"Get out! I'll get out! Back to the pool you found me at, I'll meet you there," Lizzie retorted harshly.

"Lizzie, no!" Hermione yelled. There was a loud crack from outside as two death eaters apparated into the yard.

"If this nut case is lying, which part of his daughter should we send back to him," one hissed with laughter from just outside the front door. Hermione hid behind a large piece of furniture and Ron crouched down to hide her under the cloak Lizzie handed him. Lizzie drew Mathelda's wand and backed up across the other side of the room from them.

"I'm sorry," Mr. Lovegood mumbled in a deranged sort of way.

When the door cracked open, Lovegood's eyes widened into saucers, and he dropped to his knees. "I've got her," he said with his hands high in the air in surrender. Travers caught eyes with Lizzie and smirked wickedly.

"Please, bring me my daughter," Xenophilious whimpered. Selwyn followed Travers through the entry way with wands drawn. Lizzie's hand shook with anticipation.

"Is she alone?" Selwyn asked, his wand now pushed deep into Xenophilious's cheek. Lizzie looked at him with pleading eyes not to give away Ron and Hermione. His eyes welled and he nodded yes to the question.

Selwyn turned to look at Lizzie with a sinister smile. Not looking at Xenophilious, eyes fixed on hers, he cast a spell in the man's direction and Lizzie was blinded by a sudden familiar green light. He keeled to the ground and the world slowed in heart pounding shock. The air caught in her chest and became the paralyzing weight of a boulder.

"Don't worry, Azalea, we have orders not to kill you," Travers said. He approached close and reached forward to touch Lizzie's ear under her hair. She flinched at the gesture.

"Travers, not here. If she gets away, we're dead," Selwyn said.

"The chances she's alone, and we're supposed to just deliver her? You're not stupid, are you, Azalea?" Travers asked. "Put the wand down, and we won't hurt you," his grip tightened on her neck, and he took satisfaction at the way her pulse beat in the vein. Selwyn laughed.

"Not going to hurt her?" He scoffed indignantly. Travers stared intently into Lizzie's face and her skin crawled. He grabbed her jaw hard and yanked her close.

"I suppose it will depend on her, won't it?" Travers said cynically. Lizzie tried to throw a fist, but he caught it in a bone-shattering grip. She jabbed the wand into his rib cage and lit a loud spark that caused him to let go of her face.

Lizzie hit the floor half a second later to hard back hand and scrambled forward. She faintly heard his rage emit through ringing ears. Selwyn caught her ankles and pulled until she was flat her back and pinned to the ground with his weight. He struck her twice in the cheek, hard in quick procession. She looked up to see Travers's wand pointed down at her face. There was a crack from behind him and he howled in pain.

With a jolt of adrenaline, she ripped the wand from his grip, and cast Selwyn off her in a swift movement. Lizzie disarmed him as he struggled to use the dark mark to call for help. Travers still writhed in pain and Lizzie realized Ron must have him under a cruciatus.

Lizzie stunned Selwyn and crouched down. "He's going to kill you," she whispered and touched his ear much like Travers had hers, her hands were shaking in rage. Travers stopped screaming and there was a loud bang from where the Urumpent Horn sat perched. Lizzie felt a hand she couldn't see on her arm and they apparated out of the house with a second to spare before the entire place collapsed on itself.