Chapter 7: Port Angeles
A/N: Okay, here's the next chapter. A thousand apologies for not updating in so long. I had a lot of school work to get through, I know that seems like a terrible excuse, but it's true. Thanks for reading.
Warning: Death, also I'm not too good at describing deaths, but I think this is one of my best ones.
"What do you think of this one?" Jessica twirled around in the dress to show me. I nodded absently. We had already been here for what felt like hours, but was actually only thirty minutes. I didn't think Port Angeles would be so boring, but I had agreed to go when Angela had asked me, because I'd been free.
But, as I sat in the corner of the dress shop listening to the heavy rain and giving half thought out opinions on how Angela and Jess looked, my mind was deep in thought, something which had been happening too often to be healthy over the past week. I had forced Jasper Hale out of my head, but the whole Travers-killing-people problem still remained.
I had been in two minds about contacting Kate and Finnick. Because really, the main reason I had written two weeks ago was to ask about Jasper. Since I had dropped that matter, surely I shouldn't bother asking Finnick about it? After all, my owl had gotten hurt. But, on the other hand, I had also written to mention Travers, so… I could just casually mention the whole Jasper thing as we discussed the death-eater.
And there came the problem, which I had, fortunately, solved. I couldn't write to them, and I couldn't go over to London. The only solution was to find another way to communicate. I was looking forward to going to Massachusetts, which people confused with excitement for the Christmas dance. It was one of my better - no, best plans
"Do you think this one's good?" Jessica showed me another dress, while Angela seemed to have chosen hers. I hummed in response, then looked up at her to show I was listening. "Yeah, that's good." I said nodding with fake enthusiasm. I just wanted to get home, but I didn't want to disappoint them.
"Evvy, you said that about the last, like, three dresses." True.
"Yeah, I just think they're all pretty." That was a lie. Half of them were horrid, but I couldn't say that, could I?
"Okay, I think I'll take this one." Angela smiled and stepped back into the changing room. Good. If Angela had chosen we just had to wait for Jess.
Half an hour later, me and Angela were still waiting. Angela seemed very into it, giving opinions on each dress Jessica pulled out, smiling, nodding enthusiastically as they talked about who they were taking to the dance. I was bored. I had spent the previous time in the shop staring out of the window, but it was dark now, and all I could see were car headlights and lampposts and shop fronts.
I watched a woman and her son cross the road, the boy laughing as he jumped in a large puddle. Another car drove past, the lights showing the rain more clearly. A group of people walked past. A man crossed over. He pulled something out of his pocket and broke into a swift walk. More people passed. I sighed. I would rather be outside, in the pouring rain, than in this dress shop.
The bell on the shop door rang and a man walked in. He was dressed regularly, though perhaps a little shabby, with faded trousers and a navy blue waterproof coat, which for some reason he had unzipped, causing his clothes underneath to get soaked. He walked forward, staggering slightly. His hand reached out as if to steady himself, but he never held onto anything. He kept walking, his steps deliberate, as if he was having trouble placing one foot in front of the other.
"I have a message." He said suddenly, his voice wavering as he reached the last word. He was standing close to the front desk, but was facing the window I was next to, as if he could see someone who wasn't there. "Stop looking." My head shot away from the window as I spun around to face him, but he was already gone, the bell ringing quietly as the door swung shut.
Jessica laughed. "Drunks." She examined another dress. "Hey Evvy, what do you think of this one?"
"It's nice." I said distractedly. Stop looking. Was that referring to Jasper, or Travers? Most definitely Travers. Had that been the death-eater himself? No, he didn't match the description, and Travers would have sent someone. So where was the actual villain?
The man before. He had taken something out of his pocket. A wand? Travers could have been right there. "Hey I've gotta go. There's a, um… well, there's this thing at the… place." There's this thing at the place? Since when was I that bad at lying? "I'll see you at the restaurant, 'kay?" I stood up without waiting for an answer and flashed them a small, fake smile. Jess had gone back to looking at dresses, but Angela stared at me, frowning in confusion. I turned and walked out of the door into the heavy rain.
I looked up and down the street and decided to go left. That was the way the man earlier had gone. I arrived on another street, equally as busy. I saw the back of a navy blue coat. The man who delivered Travers' message. He was just ahead of me. Suddenly, he broke into a sprint and ran into a nearby alley. I ran after him, pulling out my wand as I did.
I turned into the same alley and then… I tripped. That was unlike me. I was generally quite coordinated. I scrambled up, ignoring my stinging knees and looked around for the man, breathing fast and gripping my wand tightly, my knuckles white with the pressure. The alley was empty. The only sound was the rain running in small streams down the narrow space. I followed the streams, because something seemed off about them - the colour. My eyes widened in horror as I saw what I had tripped over.
He was lying on his back, mouth open, gaping. His eyes were glassy and bloodshot, adding to his shocked, scared expression. His clothes looked as if they had been purposefully soaked in blood and gore. It was impossible to see what colour they were now. The rain only made it look worse, as I saw the streams of water were coloured red with his blood. His chest was ripped open viciously and next to him… next to him lay a heart. And not the Valentines kind.
I staggered backwards and my back met the back wall of the alley, preventing me from moving any further. I stared. Memories flooded back into me, of the Battle of Hogwarts, but even there I hadn't seen anything this horrific, not even when I saw Fenrir Greyback kill Lavender Brown. Perhaps Lavender's death was like this, but we hadn't stayed to see back then. This wasn't like Sirius' death, or Dobby's, or Dumbledore's. Or Snape's. This was something else. And it was terrifying. I pulled my eyes away from the bloody mess. My heart hammered in my chest as I gripped my wand tighter, but knew I was alone. He had gotten away.
The horror of the man's death had created a new determination inside me, to find Travers before someone else died. The man's death would be easy to cover up; Port Angeles had high crime rates. I told myself I was safe, and so were the people I loved, and my friends, but I knew we weren't. I didn't even know where Travers was and he had already taken the next step.
I went to the train station early on Saturday. It was surprisingly warm for Forks, even though the sky was covered by clouds. Not many people were out, but it was the first day of the weekend. Charlie had gone fishing with Billy early morning, and they'd be out all day so I could take as long as I wanted.
The train journey was boring, the compartment stuffy and crowded even though it was early. A man swore at me when I accidentally stepped too close to him, his breath smelling of alcohol. I leaned away from him but he got off at the next station anyway. The old woman next to me was talking non-stop. I made an effort to listen to her, but she looked like Bathilda Bagshot, sending shivers down my spine. It seemed, this week, my past was haunting me.
Ilvermorny was an American wizarding school. I had heard about it once or twice, but had never seen it. They hadn't been at the Triwizard Tournament when I was in my fourth year at Hogwarts, so I was quite curious as to what the school would be like. The small village near the school was, like Hogsmeade, an all-wizarding village. I had never been there. Finnick had spoken about it on numerous occasions, but being honest, I had never been too interested. Until now.
Ilvermorny Village was similar, yet different to Hogsmeade. It was similar because of the shops, filled with magical items, decorated with colourful display cabinets, and full of wizards and witches. It was different because everything seemed slightly bigger. The bank was different to Gringotts in every way; it was run by wizards and witches, and there was no ominous message carved into the door. The whole place was so much more modern than the wizarding world I was used to. I stopped by at a small stall to buy some ink and a new eagle feather quill, and then began walking up and down, for a shop that sold Flu Powder. I thought that Flu Powder would be sold in an apothecary, along with potion ingredients, since it didn't seem to fit into any other category. It turned out it was sold in a small stall outside the apothecary shop. I bought a small bag, and began making my way home.
Before I had come to Forks, I had asked the Ministry to hook up Charlie's living room fireplace to the Flu Network. They had agreed, so I ran home after buying the small bag of powder, eager to talk to my friends and find out what was happening. I fumbled with the lock on the front door. Thankfully, Charlie wasn't home. I knelt down by the fireplace and untied the bag, grabbing a handful of the foul powder. I stuck only my head into the fireplace, and tossed the powder inside, and called out Finnick's address as clearly as I could, without breathing in any ash. My head was engulfed in bright green flames, and before I knew it I could see Finnick's living room.
"Finnick?" I said, unsure if I had the right place.
"Evvy, is that you?" Finnick's voice was excited, with a hint of worry. He moved so that he was in front of the fire.
"Yeah. I sent an owl but it got intercepted. How've you been?" I asked, moving slightly away from a pile of burning coal to my left.
"I've been fine, thank you. Your owl got intercepted? Who by?" The worry in his voice was stronger now, and although I was actually a little afraid of Travers, I felt a need to assure him that I was fine.
"I think it might have been Travers, but that's a good thing, isn't it? I mean, now I know he's in or near Forks."
"Finnick? Who are you talking to?!" Kate's voice called from somewhere downstairs. Ficcick rolled his eyes and turned to call something back, and then Kate was in front of the fire as well. They were saying something in hushed voices and I couldn't hear them clearly, but as Finnick talked, Kate's eyes widened slightly.
"Evvy, did anything else happen apart from Lyra being intercepted?" Kate said. I nodded. There was no point in hiding anything from them, and they might have been able to help me. I filed them in on the crash in detail, and then quickly told them about everything that happened in Port Angeles.
"I still don't understand why he'd do that. I mean, wouldn't it be a lot easier to just kill the guy?" I asked, the image of the man in the alley flooding back into me.
"Yeah, he must be really messed up to do that." Kate agreed.
"Don't you see? He's trying to scare you, Evvy. He knows you're after him and he's trying to stop you from looking any further." I realised Finnick was right. That explained the man's message in the dress shop, and why he killed him that way. He was trying to scare me. But surely, surely it would scare me just as much if he killed him with the killing curse? Why make a gruesome show of the murder?
"There's one more thing," I said but I was unsure if I should ask. "Do you know of anything, anything at all - in the wizarding world, I mean - that's really pale, has golden eyes, can move really fast, heal too quickly, and is, well, er...prettier than everyone around them?" I said quickly, my cheeks going red for some stupid reason. "This is all hypothetical." I smirked, but felt only slight guilt. Jasper Hale still hadn't told me anything.
Kate frowned as she thought, but Finnick raised an eyebrow. "That fits the description of a vampire, except for the golden eyes. Vampires have red eyes, and…" Finnick continued talking, but all I had heard was the word vampire. Were they vampires? Was that the Cullen's big secret? Jacob's story. He said they were vampires too, at least that was what the story was about. The hospital! Jasper's eyes had gotten darker when we were at the hospital. Blood. So was he threatening me when he said I was in danger? Or was he warning me, against something else? Other vampires?
A week after the dance was Christmas. I was away from all my friends, and spending the holiday without them didn't seem right. Charlie was being all happy and friendly, which was a good thing, if a little weird. We had decorated the tree together before, and underneath lay the presents. Kate and Finnick had managed to send their owls with presents for me, and I had sent the same owls back with theirs. It was only my owl that was being targeted. That Christmas had nothing particularly special to remember. Charlie was called into work at around 12:00, probably to rescue another cat, and I spent the rest of the day alone. At one point, Emmett Cullen arrived at school wearing a ridiculously small santa hat, his family smirking. Rosalie was trying to look annoyed, but she was failing badly. Apart from that it was pretty boring.
Charlie apologised over and over when he came home later than usual. I insisted it was fine, and used my spare time to get some studying in so that I could stop myself from failing in maths. Travers made no appearance during the two weeks of Christmas. I was convinced he was working with other death-eaters. He couldn't be attacking me, killing other people and keeping an eye on my owl at all times. More people were involved. I didn't know what Travers' plan was, but I was determined to foil it.
Then came the issue of Jasper Hale. I had no idea why the Cullen's had golden eyes, and I didn't care. I knew what they were.
A/N: Okay, done. I read back through this chapter, and I found it long and boring. I don't know if that's because I wrote it, or because it is. If it is, I apologise. Also, I'm going to get another chapter up this week, maybe two. Please review, thanks for reading