Disclaimer: Della, Carrie and Gareth were created for another fanfic in another fandom and I claim all ownership rights for them. I've said before I get nervous about OC's, I hope you get on with them. Ok, it's a bit of a copout to be borrowing from my other fics but I wanted to look into the minds of some muggles who have a rather different view of magic to the Dursleys, and the characters were there for the taking.

Note: This is basically a continuation of the previous chapter, but it's told from a different POV, which is why I wanted to split the chapter into two. To reiterate, this chapter is shorter than average.

Chapter Thirty-One

An Uninvited Guest

If there was one thing that could be said in Della Jones' favour it was that she knew how to throw a party, particularly at Hallowe'en. Long before she knew of her daughter's magical potential, Della had always loved Hallowe'en. She held a professional fascination for its more traditional aspects, and her inner child loved the dressing up and copious amounts of sugar associated with the gawdy, commercialised holiday that had come to Britain from across the Atlantic. So, every year, for no other reason than because she could, Della threw a Hallowe'en party in her shop. She would drape spiders' webs over the shelves, cut gravestones and bats out of bin liners and together she, Gareth and Carrie would pick the biggest pumpkin they could find and carve it. The local supermarket's supply of food colouring was vastly depleted every time the 31st of October, with all manner of gruesome concoctions being served up at Spindles: red and green chocolate cake, purple jelly and a large bowl of potato salad in a rather worrying orange colour.

And, every year, once the guests had begun to drift away to take their children home to bed, those closest to the bookseller and her husband would settle in the backroom of the shop with the remains of the extremely alcoholic punch and talk about the true meaning of Hallowe'en. Sometimes Della would read her tarot cards, sometimes they would merely tell stories of magic, spirits and witchcraft.

This year was the first Hallowe'en without Carrie. As Della brought the half-emptied bowl of punch through to the backroom and Gareth lit candles – they were both dramatic at heart and loved 'atmosphere' – she wondered how a real witch celebrated what was ostensibly one of the most important events of the magical calendar. Della shrugged, perhaps Hallowe'en wasn't such as important date as everyone was led to believe. She would have to ask Carrie in her next letter. The bookseller couldn't help but smile at the thought of her daughter being a real life witch. Of all the people for this to have happened to, it had to have been the child of a woman with the magical capacity of a squeegee mop but enough belief to more than make up for it. Della settled herself in her favourite of the mismatched armchairs (a creaking tan leather thing with only three legs, the other corner being held up by a couple of volumes of the Encyclopaedia Britannica) and began to shuffle the cards idly.

"Any volunteers?" she asked.

"Do yourself, Della," Gareth said. "You've predicted our doom and gloom enough over the years, maybe you should try it yourself. Live dangerously."

Della shrugged and flipped over the first card. Everyone burst out laughing; it was, as Gareth had predicted in his roundabout way, Death.

"And excellent start," she said dryly. "I'll try again."

She reshuffled the cards, thinking nothing of the choice. Death never necessarily meant death. It could be a change, or a new beginning. Presently she dropped the cards, the deck feeling unnaturally cold in her fingers. As she scrabbled to pick them up, Della noticed that one was face-up, and it was with a sobering and horribly chilling sensation that she realised it was Death again. She shivered involuntarily, trying to rationalise with herself. Alcohol had made her fuzzy; her mind wasn't working properly. There was nothing sinister going on; it was all just a figment of her extremely overactive imagination. The skeletal, slightly reptilian face peered at her mockingly from the folds of the hood, red points of light twinkling in empty eye-sockets. Della had never before found the image scary, but now it unnerved her. She shivered once more and drew the folds of her cloak around her. She had purchased the item on the day that she had accompanied Carrie to Diagon Alley, a place so wonderfully magical that she could have quite happily stayed there for the rest of her working life. The witch in the shop had been surprised that a muggle would want to purchase wizarding clothing, but she had complied with Della's unusual request with good grace. A little reluctantly, Della pulled herself out of the fond memory and reshuffled Death back into the pack before dealing again.

The Heirophant. The same card that she had idly dealt that very morning when Madame Pince had visited her. Della's brows knitted together; it was not Death but it was still an unnerving coincidence. She dealt the second card, but before she'd had time to turn it over, there was a soft knocking sound from the front room of the shop. Someone was outside, wanting to be let in. A few spooky whispers passed around the group and Della smiled nervously as Gareth got up from his place to answer the summons. She listened to the rain pounding down on the roof of the shop ; whoever it was must have come on a specific quest to be here in such weather at such an hour. Either that or they were exceedingly lost and in need of directions to the station.

Della stared at the back of the card that lay on the table in front of her. Gareth seemed to be taking a lot longer than was strictly necessary and, perturbed, Della stood and peered around the edge of the door into the shop. She could just make out the dark, hooded shape in the doorway that Gareth was talking to, but she could not hear their conversation. Presently the figure looked up, and Della could not help but gasp at his appearance. She was staring at Death, his eyes red and shining, sunk into a pale and bony visage, flat and blunt like that of a snake even down to the slit-like nostrils and pupils. There was a brief moment wherein everything stood still, and Della knew that he had seen her, and he had seen into her very soul. His scarlet eyes bored into her own, penetrating her skull with a gaze so intense it was almost palpable. He smiled, almost imperceptibly, a smile of vicious and hungry triumph.

"Della…"

Della had never heard her husband sound so terrified in her entire life. She needed no further prompting, the warning tone in his words enough to send her bolting back into the back room, closing the door behind her and pressing herself flat against it as she surveyed her bemused guests.

"You have to leave," she said breathlessly, indicating the back door with a nod of her head. "I'm sorry but you have to leave now."

"Have the police discovered what really goes into your punch, Dells?" Someone laughed, waving a glass of the stuff around haphazardly and spilling ruby liquid onto a moth-eaten blue sofa. Della shook her head, now horribly and painfully sober, and she wished that there was some way to bring her friends to the same state of cold awareness.

"No, please, go, for your own safety, just leave, I'll explain everything later, but for God's sake if you value your lives, go!"

Finally, the hysterical outburst bore fruit and the shaken guests, now knowing that something was definitely wrong, began to leave, looking back over their shoulders at their trembling hostess, still pressed against the awfully thin and flimsy door that separated her from the… the… the thing that was standing on the doorstep, the terrible vision of Death whose coming she had ignored despite it staring her in the face. Della swore that if she survived this visitation she would stop her dabbling and leave magic to the professionals like her daughter. Suddenly spurred into action, Della grabbed the phone and made to dial 999, but it was dead. Her blood ran cold as she heard a thud, the very real and very sickening thud of something soft hitting something solid, of Gareth hitting the floor.

Della opened the door a fraction and peered into the darkened shop. She looked around as much as she could, her stomach turning as she saw the heap on the floor by the entrance that she knew to be her husband. There was no sign of Death lurking in the shadows. Della weighed up her options. She was not so naïve as to think that he had gone completely and she had seen enough horror films in her time to know that the psychotic murderer was always extremely adept at finding his way into the most secure of havens. On the other hand…

Della's heart made up her mind for her and propelled her across the shop to Gareth, turning on the lights as she went.

"Please don't be dead," she murmured to him, and even though she knew deep down that it was a slim hope, she was still shocked when she turned him over to find his eyes glassy and staring.

"I'm afraid your pleas will be in vain, Mrs Jones. My sincerest apologies for intruding upon your charming gathering."

The voice was as reptilian as the face to which it belonged, harsh and ice-cold. Out of the corner of her eye, Della could see the hem of dark robes moving between the shelves, but she couldn't bring herself to turn around and face this madman who had suddenly taken it upon himself to attack her family. Her family…

"Where's my Carrie?" Della asked. "What have you done to her?"

"Mrs Jones, rest assured that your daughter is perfectly safe and where she should be, and she will remain so as long as she doesn't take after her mother and meddle in things she shouldn't."

At this accusation, Della spun round.

"What have I done?" she challenged the entity who was standing calmly in the centre of her shop, wand outstretched. "What did I do to deserve this? What did Gareth do?"

Della knew that she was beyond rational thought now, and as she felt the first hot tears of rage and grief tumble down her cheeks, she wanted nothing more than to throw herself flailing at this interloper, the consequences be damned.

"Guilty by association," Death said airily, brushing aside the meaning of a human life as if he was swatting a fly. "You, however, have been interfering." He pulled a book out of the nearest shelf and perused it before it burst into flame in his fingers. Della flinched.

"How such esteemed works ended up in your filthy muggle hands is beyond me," he continued, "but we may as well liberate them whilst they're here." He flicked his wand and the nearest shelf exploded in a flurry of paper, the next following until there was a domino effect working its way around the shop. It was at that moment that Della knew for certain that she was not going to see another Hallowe'en.

Carrie, forgive me, she thought as she felt cold fingers enclose around her neck and haul her bodily off the floor, bringing her face to face with Death.

"Don't interfere in things that you are not worthy of understanding, Mrs Jones," he snarled.

The chain reaction reached the back room of the shop, the door flying open as if a tornado was ripping through the building. The last thing that Della saw was an all-too-familiar tarot card flying through the air towards her.

Major arcana number thirteen.

Death.

Note2: The strange food served up at the party was actually served up at our flat Hallowe'en party this year. With the exception of the orange potato salad, which we managed to stop our flatmate from making.

Note3: I am sorry to tell you that there is going to be another pause in the C&I updating for the next three weeks whilst I'm at home on holiday. I need the time to get my head together and relax from a really hectic eight weeks of exams and tests and coursework, but I'll be working on the next chapters at the same time, so hopefully there should be less blips in the future. The final film is out on 15th July and I'm determined to have it done by then! On the plus side, C&I is now officially the longest thing I have ever written. Yay! *Lets off fireworks.*