Disclaimer: Not sure I'd ever want to visit St Mungo's, but this world doesn't belong to me anyway!
Warning: graphic descriptions
[Also submitted for QLFC Daily Prophet Issue 6 drabble competition]
[Written for The Houses Competition Sixth Year Round 1]
House: Ravenclaw
Subject: Potions
Prompt:
(setting) St Mungo's
Yellow is the Colour of Longing
"WHERE IS HE!" A shrill voice cut through the air with all the intensity and threat of a dagger.
"I don't know and even if I did I wouldn't tell you, you crazy-" Alice screamed back at the figure—loosely wrapped in black robes that were sheer to the point of indecency if not for her mane of black hair that tumbled about her figure in a wild mess.
"Crucio!"
Pain like that of rusty nails being pressed sharply into Alice's skin and dragged to tear her flesh into jagged ribbons covered her from scalp to the soles of her feet. Screams were ripped involuntarily from her throat till it was at the point of giving out. She could not do anything but scream, looking down at her arms in horror, her mind painting over the reality of her clear skin with that of hallucinated exposed bone and flayed muscle, blood running in tiny rivulets to form a pool of blood beneath her kneeling form. She felt the piercing glare of crazed black eyes on her, and tremors ran uncontrollably down her spine. She would never be able to escape this wretched place. There was nowhere to hide, nowhere to run; she could barely even lift her numbed feet from the ground even if she wanted to.
The air of the Lestrange Manor was filled with the piercing laughter of Bellatrix Black as she pointed her wand at Alice again, ready to cast another round of the Cruciatus.
Alice could hear Bellatrix panting with childish delight before the now-familiar red beam of the Cruciatus shot toward her. Alice needed to focus on something, anything to get away from the excruciating, nail-splitting pain. She gritted her teeth and slowly inched her head to look upwards, darting a discreet glance at her attackers, and then fixed her eyes on a large silhouette in the corner of the room. From her kneeling position on the blood-stained marble floor, she could barely make out the tall, built figure of her husband lying on his side, curled into a fetal position against the wall.
"Frank." Her whisper was barely audible; a wisp of air escaping from her lips to curl before her. Her vision was blurring; her eyelids were heavy lead, and her limbs useless logwood. Even as her surroundings darkened around her, all she could focus on was the still form of her husband. His legs twitched every now and then, and his fingers endured a constant spasm. But his eyes showed no life. They were dull and occasionally rolled to the back of his head, exposing the whites, before snapping back into their original place.
Frank's russet brown irises bore into her own honey brown ones, and they were all she could see for a long time. But before she noticed it, she was staring at the same pair of irises on a different face. These were warmer; filled with the vivacity that Frank had been missing a few moments before.
Alice was unable to place a name to the face, but it looked familiar. He—for it was a male—was so young, with a face that closely resembled Frank's in his protruding ears and rounded face. Yet she could see the familiar button nose and a bow-shaped mouth that ran in her family. From the deep recesses of her mind, she found herself unable to take control of her faculties of speech, and her movements were sluggish. Unable to express her confusion, she looked around her in a panic, only to find that she was no longer in Lestrange Manor. These clean, white-washed walls and the sterile air of antiseptic potions could only mean she was in St Mungo's. Her eyes landed on Frank in a hospital cot beside her, unconscious, and a muted sound of surprise escaped her, then she winced as her throat was suddenly aching with a burning itch. Blotches of plum purple danced in her periphery.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you, dear. Your vocal chords have suffered some...severe damage." An old woman piped up from the corner, a look of grief upon her face. Alice struggled to place a name to the face once again. It was Augusta, wasn't it?
Alice looked at the boy once again. Who was he? Wait, there is an old woman in the corner. Who was she again? Augusta, Augusta. Who was that? Her mother-in-law.
"You don't even recognise your own son, do you?" the old woman—Augusta!—said, her grief colouring her voice a deep blue. "It's Neville, dear." The colour of the air around Augusta seemed to shift into a chartreuse yellow. It wafted from the older woman to Alice and the boy beside her—Neville, she said?—curling around the pair as Alice turned to examine the boy once again.
This Neville's eyes shone with unshed tears and some glimmer of longing as he looked at Alice. She felt a deep ache within her, wanting to know who he was, wanting to know more about him, how she should know him. Glancing quickly about the room, she spotted a bowl of colourfully wrapped candy by the bed, and reached out to grab a lime yellow one. Her hands shook as she unwrapped it best she could, sliding the sweet into her mouth. Her throat burned with the acidity of the lime-flavoured sweet. Eyes blinking past the pain in her throat, she reached out trembling hands to press the candy wrapper into the Neville boy's hands and gently covered them with her own.
Words: 935
A/N: Have you ever wondered about Alice's candy wrappers? Because I have since the first time I read it, and it bugged me to no end haha.