Flesh, Blood, and Bone

As if she were launched into it, Siria crashed into the frigid mud and rolled before she could stop herself. She stumbled when she tried to stand and settled for being knelt on the wet, muddy, grass of wherever they were. She gasped. Cassius managed to land on his feet. Siria wiped the sweat from her forehead. "Full points on the landing," she joked.

"Where are we?" Cassius asked as he extended her a hand. She took it then took in their surroundings with him. Hogwarts was too far to see, even the mountains near the grounds were out of sight (B4, 636). Siria tossed her robes to the ground and rummaged her jacket pockets for her eyedrops. "You were wearing that under your robes?" Cassius asked. Siria blinked as her eyes adjusted.

"It's my favorite jacket," she informed him and patted the pocket with her eye drops.

"I—" he sighed. "Well, wands out. It's probably just part of the task— a 'true' final challenge or something." She nodded and twirled her wand in her hand.

"We've got an hour to figure out what we're supposed to do and do it," Cassius informed her. He knelt down and placed the Triwizard Cup down on a flatter spot of the muddy ground.

"Not to be daft, but…" Siria gritted her teeth into a sorry smile.

"You took a Portkey to the Quidditch World Cup, right?" He asked and she nodded. "It had a time to leave, so a Muggle didn't stumble across it later. The Cup must have been set to activate at touch, so it didn't matter when someone reached it. If that's the case, it will take us back when we touch it— but, from what I've read, it might leave without us." The two sighed and gazed around the graveyard.

"Someone's coming," Cassius stepped between Siria and a figure in the distance (B4, 637). "Maybe we've got to beat a master duelist afterall," he tilted his head in a short nod.

"Shouldn't I go first then?" Siria inquired as she poked around Cassius, to see the figure. Someone short, with a hooded cloak, headed toward them with a baby like bundle in their arms (B4, 637).

"Because you and Hermione beat Moody?" Cassius scoffed. "Not a chance."

Once the figure was in ten feet of them, Cassius started to back up. Siria shifted from behind him to beside him, while the Stargazer hovered above her. It cast the towering marble headstone that the figure stopped at in eerie dark light (B4, 637). "What's this?" Cassius barked at the figure. "We've a Tournament to complete." Siria turned, wide-eyed at him. That didn't seem like a good way to start against the only other person there.

Without the hooded person raising their wand, Siria screamed as her scar erupted into pain (B4, 637). Her hand struggled to hold her wand, but failed and it fell onto the grass (B4, 637). A voice— a cold, high voice of malice instructed "Kill the spare." Siria lifted off the ground just as green light blackened the ground Cassius stood on not even a breath ago. He ran with Siria levitated before him, toward a small house at the edge of the garden.

Once Cassius turned the corner, Siria stepped onto the grass. "What happened?" He took her by the shoulders and lifted her wild bangs to inspect her scar.

"I— I don't know," her voice trembled. The Stargazer bumped into the fascia of the small house. Siria looked up at it while she gasped for air.

"They've got some sort of cauldron. Merlin, it's huge— you could fit a person in there" Cassius poked around the corner. He growled. "They've got the Cup all tied up. Okay, Potter-Black, we need a plan."

If only she had a plan for this sort of thing. Siria pressed her hands to her eyes. She leaned back and crouched against the little home. If there was anything she knew about herself, it was that Siria Potter-Black was not a planner. Hermione was a planner— Dumbledore was a planner. "Oh," escaped her. "Of course." This was where Tom Riddle returned and where Siria, the Horcrux, died… so someone else could end "Voldemort". She placed her hand on Cassius's shoulder. "You'll need to summon my wand, but I've got a plan," she informed him.

"Bombarda Maxima!" Siria shouted as she rounded the corner and charged. Again and again she blasted at the main house. The blasts hit the ground floor and caused the second to collapse without its foundation. Her body went rigid and Siria fell, stiff as a board, to the ground. "Why?" Siria wondered while her body rose then hovered across the grounds, to the large marble statue. "Why didn't we use this on Wormtail?" were she able to move, she would have struck herself. Hermione had mastered Petrificus Totalus in their first year. Remus and Sirius had used Stupefy for years.

While the hooded figure floated Siria's body to the marble tomb, she caught the name: Tom Riddle (B4, 638). Never had she wanted to roll her eyes more. Once her body was lined with the marble, vines shot from the ground behind her and constricted her like a panicked person in Devil's Snare. "Hello, dinner," hissed a shrill voice from the ground. Her experience with snakes told her the shrill voice belonged to one. The nightmares she had told her it was probably "Nagini," not that Siria could move her head to see. Still petrified, Siria fought to move, but her body remained as still as if she were a porcelain figure.

"Should have asked Cassius to try and bring my body back," Siria regretted in silence. Eaten by a snake meant Sirius wouldn't have anything to burry. "Maybe… that might be for the best," she confessed. Death stood before her, with the hooded figure who had pushed the massive stone cauldron, to the ground at Siria's feet. Its crystalline surface blinked at Siria with mock innocence. Unparalleled pain pierced into her scar while the hooded figure lifted the creature in the bundle from the ground. Instinct screamed for Siria to close her eyes, to turn away, to run, but her body responded to nothing. [B4, 639-640]

Now she would have traded anything for some accidental magic. A nauseating, urine-like stench, from the creature the hooded figure lifted, assaulted Siria's nose. Even with her body petrified, she was shocked her nose didn't break through to wrinkle in disgust. Grey, scalish flesh stretched across what looked like it was once a child's skeleton. Its weak arms knocked back the hood of the other figure and heat Siria had never known boiled inside her. [B4, 640-641]

Steam should have erupted from her ears at the recognition of the that narrow nosed, thin lipped, ratish face. "Wormtail!" lava coursed through Siria's veins. Disgust overpowered pain. Malice Siria didn't know she had filled her. "Naturally!" Her mind snapped,"the traitorous, Azkaban-driven-mad, failed child abductor, imbecile is the one who catches me." If only she knew a spell to set the world on fire.

Wormtail dropped the grey, skeletal creature into the boiling cauldron. As its head sank, it turned to Siria. Slitted, red eyes met almond, green then dropped beneath the clear, glittering surface. Terror rose from Siria's stomach in place of vomit. "No!" She commanded. "You have to die! You know this. Tom Riddle makes his return as Voldemort today, and the Girl who Lived dies, but…" anxiety tangled with the terror and twisted her stomach. "But Voldemort will be taken down," she convinced herself. It seemed some part of her remained able to move; the part of her she hated most let a single tear push through the petrification and down her right cheek.

"Bone of the father, unknowingly given, you will renew your son!" Wormtail called (B4, 641). Beneath Siria's feet, the tomb shifted and a single bone lifted into the air. It fell into the cauldron, which hissed with sparks, as if it were ice dropped into a fryer. Monkshood blue rippled across the cauldron and washed away its crystalline features. [B4, 641] Despite its floral color, the cauldron released smoke that reeked of burnt hair and sweaty feet.

"Flesh of the servant," Wormtail started as he withdrew a knife. Shivers shot through the paralyzed Siria. Wormtail touched the knife to his wrist with the focus of someone drawing a tattoo."Willingly given— you will revive your master," He raised his right hand into the cold moonlight before the cauldron. In her mind, Siria trembled and turned, but her eyes remained frozen open. Even if she could have turned, the inhuman screech that scrapped out of Wormtail would haunt her for the rest of her life. [B4, 641]

"Not much time then," Siria tried to joke with herself. She watched the bloodied, still boned hand tumble into the cauldron. Like Moody had in their tournament practice of dueling, Wormtail's face contorted into deranged cackles of mad laughter. His wide eyes watched the cauldron change into a crimson that was somehow still more human than the eyes of the monster Wormtail had dropped into it. [B4, 642]

Wormtail looked to Siria. Were she not petrified to her full height, she would have tried to straighten up. With the same knife he used to remove his hand, he approached her. Fury knocked the terror and anxiety from Siria. If Voldemort gave a show of playing with his kill, she would use whatever time she had on making sure Wormtail burned. "Don't— don't make that— that face," Wormtail's grating voice stammered. She wanted to tell him that he'd have to unpetrify her for a different face. He wiped the knife on her jacket's shoulder. "Can't mix the blood," he explained and placed the knife on her right cheek, just past where her tear had broke out.

All Siria could think of was how, if she didn't need to die, she would Fiendfyre the entire estate. She would let it out of her with the bellow of rage trapped in her throat. Then, once all that remained was a crater of scorched earth, she would find his mother's house and burn that too. It kept the helplessness that came with Wormtail dragging the knife down her face at bay. Her wish to burn it all kept the revolting feeling of his fingers grazing her face when he pushed the vial to her cut from taking Siria over.

"Blood of the enemy," Wormtail raised the vial into the moonlit sky, "forcibly taken," Siria mentally scoffed, "you will resurrect your foe," Wormtail commanded. Siria's blood dripped into the cauldron. It flashed like magnesium and turned blinding white. Wormtail collapsed beside the cauldron in cackles of madness and sobs of pain. [B4, 642]

Diamond like sparks fired from the cauldron. It was so blinding that it pushed out the moonlight. Spark after spark shot out like miniature willow fireworks until they stopped and billows of white smoke erupted from the cauldron. Siria could see nothing but the white smoke that coated the grounds.

"Please," Siria pleaded, "Cassius, be patient." He would only have to wait a little longer and then he could run. The smoke danced before her in twisted ribbons. "Maybe turning the smoke to daggers…" Siria dreamt.

"Robe me," a high, cold disembodied voice commanded through the smoke (B4, 643).

"Rage!" Siria demanded of herself. "Fury— rage— hate— loathing, even," she told herself. "If you can't accept your death with grace, at least don't fear it. Don't fear hope for tomorrow." She had shared victory in the Triwizard Tournament, so she had proved that you didn't have to be pureblood. She had reconciled with everyone, so she couldn't have regrets— "No," Siria thought. "There are almost too many…"

When the smoke cleared, Siria was greeted with a sadistic smile. A tall, still skeleton with ash white skin examined Siria as if she were to be dissected. It had a flat, snakish nose and the same red eyes that watched her when it dropped into the cauldron. [B4, 645]

Lord Voldemort had risen (B4, 645).

AN: I tried a different approach to citing book things by using [B4, page] at the end of the paragraphs because the biggest criticism that I get is how I cite. I feel like it kind of worked with this chapter, so I'll try it more often. With "Death Eaters" it won't really work since that's pretty cannon.