As her breath returned to its former complacent ease, a shadow obscured the light of the corridor, looming over the threshold of the carriage.
Aurora turned to the entrace of Carriage F, and saw a tall man, hooded in a dark top, enter the corridor. His abnormally long nails brushed the frame of the door as he moved across the hall. Face hidden beneath the deep rim of his attire, his presence felt unusually imposing.
To her surprise then, when he spotted Aurora crouched down by the concussed body of his lycanthropic friend, his body froze rigid - almost comically so.
With a gasp, he leapt in the air, and turned on his heel and fled.
Without a moment's hesitation, she chased after him.
She pushed through into Carriage E, which was suspiciously empty. Carriage D came next, and it was here that she saw the trap laid in front of her.
It was almost as silent as Carriage E, but as she hurtled across the entrance, she could hear the mild, whimpering sounds of fear emanting across one side of the corridor. The noise as regular as the frantic pace of Aurora's heartbeat.
Muggles had been lined up, on the floor, against one of the rattiling carriage walls.
Mouths sealed shut, as if magically clamped, their eyes betrayed their true sense of terror. The erratic kinetic energy of their pupils which darted from Aurora to the brutish men that had taken them betrayed their sense of disbelief from the entire situation. As if it were almost a bad dream.
They were even all still rocking their unusual attire, some even sporting jackets of pink felt and leopard print, which added a grotesque sense of jazzy merriment to the tension.
Seeing this Aurora broke to a stop, stumbling on the ruff of the carpet.
In front of her a grisly captor patrolled these thirty or so muggles, probably all the passengers from the front four carriages of the half-empty train. He was topless and as skinny as a summer starved tree. His bones covering a bare frame that seemed deprived of muscular development. He exchanged a few mutters of triumph with the man who had just ran from Aurora in in over-dramatic fear. The success of his ruse had prompted him to chuckle to himself under the confines of his hood. Meanwhile, another associate, a fourth member of this gang, leapt out from one of the cabins. He had been waiting for Aurora, and pointed his wand at her, shouting, "Stupefy".
Aurora cursed her idiocy.
They must have heard the struggle at the back of the train and had succesfully lured her out like a rat from a sinking ship.
She was lucky that, as he aimed, he had also stumbled in his stride like she had. Aurora was a sitting duck, but he missed, losing his footing on the carpet fabric.
The under-investment in rail now proving a fortuante blessing, the spell whooshed over her head. Realising. her luck, she thought as, quick as she could "Protego!" as a second cry of "Stupefy" came from the werewolves in front of the spell, she then wordlessly flicked off their continuing curses with ease. The first fight had been a confusing affair where she hadn't done her magical abilities time her adept skill with a wand came to the fore as she continued to bat away the hexes of the three men. The looks of glee exchanged by the three hostage-taking werewolves began to recede from their gaunt faces.
Sensing the mismatch, the hooded runner ducked for cover, and pulled out an antique tube of swirling black fog from his dark sweatshirt. Before Aurora could move on to the offensive, he threw it against the ground.
It smashed.
Fog crept out from glass, leaving black lines in the air.
There were cries of shock from the line of hostages on the floor, their hysteric sounds breaking through the clenched teeth. The other hooded man growled in frustration, clearly that wasn't part of the plan. He pushed his glass smashing colleague to the ground, and ran off into Carriage B, his topless friend following up in the rear.
The fog travelled quickly, and soon the carriage was filling with black mist. She could deduce it was not toxic, but instead some sort of device meant to create instant darkness. The muggles weren't to know this however, and screamed through their clamped jaws.
Muttering a counter curse, which released their chin with an awkwardly humourous sound of popped air, she said to them all, "Go, now! Through that door!"
She pointed at the entrance to Carriage D.
Duly released, most left in a panicked hurry as soon as they could, making no effort to take their things as the room filled with mist. Some squealed at the sounds of thunder, which rumbled on even louder than before outside. To her fortune, the abandoned werewolf was painfully trampled on by the onrushing feet of hysterical muggles. The knee of a befuddled octogenarian in particular, caused a significant blow as it collided loudly with his temple.
After waiting for the last muggle to leave, which fortunately happened just as the mist was reaching the door of Carriage D, she sealed it with a powerful locking enchantment.
This scared a few of the travellers, who banged against the entrance, and also angered a few others who had changed their mind and wanted to play the role of a hero. They protested about being shut away, some wanted to speak to the driver, others cried that she was a coward, whilst one or two were naively convinced they could help.
She ignored their calls, shaken after witnessing the galling scene of that father being swept away by the werewolf like a fallen leaf in a storm. Another family like hers could have been torn apart in one ill-advised moment.
Thankfully, her charm worked, the creeping fog stopped at the locked threshold, unable to make further headway. Meanwhile, the heavily bruised werewolf on the floor, made an effort to get up and got as far as the sitting position before Aurora pointed her wand and said "Corprius".
The werewolf remained on the ground, but was now hunched awkwardly, panting in the emerging darkness as Aurora wiped sweat off of her brow. He was restrained by the power of her magic and though he tried to stand up a couple of times, he eventually gave in.
After letting out a wolfish keen, he locked eyes with Aurora.
She took the time to regain her breath whilst the fog turned the carriage pitch dark, only the storm broke through its smothering blackness. The only glimmer of light, aside from the semi-regular flashes of lightning, was his vividly colourful pupils, following the brown hue of Aurora's as she circled her floored opponent.
Her mind continued to race. A thought dawned on here, a hysteric one.
Maybe they were after her? She was returning with an insistent belief that something was off, that her brother's death wasn't an accident after all. The troubled times were changing everything. Perhaps the Ministry were wilfully turning a blind eye. Her father remained a thorn in the side of many of them. Her brother meanwhile always never accepted no for an answer.
Knowing she needed answers she turned to him and said "What are you?"
"What do you think?"
"A werewolf. Operating out of full moon. Killing out of your own volition."
"I want for blood. So does the rest of my kin."
"Why are you here?"
"As I just said, for the blood"
"Do you know who I am?"
"How would I possibly know?"
"I am asking the questions, beast. What was in the tube?"
"An old recipe, from an old source, it turns everything into night. Brewed correctly it turns us into true beasts"
"You don't look it to me."
"We didn't buy from the best."
"So the lightning still comes through the darkness, and you remain as pathetic as you normally ."
"Well, it caused enough panic didn't it? I wouldn't underestimate us if I were you."
"Why? Do you know the Death Eaters? Are you fighting for You-Know-Who."
"He may like to think so, but I fight for me and me alone."
"Why pick this train? What has happened to the Ministry? Why aren't they here?"
"Beats me."
"Tell me! Now! Where are they?"
"Maybe they don't care for helpless little muggles, and whiny bitches like you!"
She slashed his cheek in a rage, her wand cutting the air like a hot knife. She heard his blood splatter the wall of the carriage. The werewolf laughed.
His reaction broke her cool.
She was stuck on a train, heading into a storm with werewolves, on her way back home to the funeral of her brother, whom she had let down and not spoken to for years. His death was suspicious, and the world around her had changed beyond any recognition since she had left.
The wonder of the past few years had been replaced by a growing trauma as her family disintegrating and dark wizards broke up the world that was so integral to her identity. She openly let out a few hiccoughing gasps of air, breathing heavily in a rage, before she slashed at his cheek again and again. The man continued to laugh and more blood hit the walls and ran down to the floor.
Worst of all the Ministry weren't here, and it didn't matter if it was incompetency, corruption or worse, she was completely alone to face it all.
Hoping to intimidate him she then turned to the carriage wall and said "Expulso".
Aurora hoped her spell would to break through the wall, potentially blowing away the fog with the stormy sky outside. When the spell fired from her wand the wall vibrated, but it did not rip open. Remarking on her failure, the werewolf bared his teeth in delight. .
"That won't work sunshine" pausing for breath as he spat out blood. "Sure, perhaps a little thing might get out, like a stone, like a shoe maybe. But you're sealed in. Unless you want to physically jump out the train of course! Give us all a good favour. Looks like we weren't as weak as you thought, lollipop! The carriages are blast-proof and apparate-proof, so good luck darling!"
With a look of disgust, she made a lasso motion with her wand and from it emerged a yellow whip that fizzed through the dense mist.
Striking the beast in the face, he collapsed in a heap, his memory obliterated as he fell into a deep trance. Stupefying him afterwards for good measure, she then tried to think of a consistent way to light up the darkness surrounding her.
Before she made any further movements, she heard footsteps, forceful and hurried, clamber up the corridor in her direction. She could hear someone deeply inhaling, quickening his pace as he did so. Clearly he had smelt the blood
Instinctively she darted into a cabin, thankful that in the pitch black, she had found one with an open door, rather than crashing foolishly into a glass wall. Tapping herself on the chest with her wand, she waited for the sensation of her body disappearing behind a disillusionment charm. The sensation, however, didn't come.
Convinced it was to do with the fog, she had no choice to lie still and hope the approaching figure didn't spot her. She held her breath, lying on a bank of seats, as the figure reached where she had stood only moments before.
Looking down at the ground he said "Poor old Rufus".
He tutted disapprovingly.
His voice was that of cut-glass Middle England, implanting an intelligence to his name that he clearly didn't deserve. As he spied upon the concussed body that Aurora had just interrogated, his feet squelched beneath the blood on the floor. Turning to his left he admired the splatter on the wall he said, "So that's where the smell came from. Is someone there?"
Pulling out his wand he cried, "Specialis Revelio"
Expecting to feel her body tingle as the spell alerted the man to her presence, Aurora had sat upright and pulled her wand from her pocket in preparation.
Fortunately, she was blessed enough to be dealing with a wizard who was less enamoured with wandlore than most others. A few sparks emitted from his wand, but no more, and immediately Aurora led down again, reassured by the matter. The figure, satisfied it meant no one was there said "I guess you butchered old Rufus and ran out that door!"
He said it like an a-ha moment had dawned on him. Pointing at the door through to Carriage D, sealed to protect the muggles, he said "Alohomora".
The door remained locked.
"Bollocks" muttered the figure. Trying the lock on the door again, he soon worked himself into a frenzy of frustration. Cursing and spitting, he yanked at the handle to Carriage D, before kicking and punching it in a rage.
Finally accepting that his magical skill was not up to the task, he turned on his heel and marched back to the carriages, calling out as he went "I think we have a problem here!"
Aurora beat her forehead in annoyance. She didn't think the others would have been as stupid as Rufus, but clearly he was a livewire amongst the crowd.
She should have knocked the door-kicker out with a curse as he tried in vain to barge through, but due to the tension of the situation and the fact she could still see barely beyond her nose. She had played it too safe in her view.
Even though, as she saw with the colour of her spell, the fog had an incomplete effect at subduing light, she needed night-vision to really go further.
She suspected that the other werewolves were back with the door-kicker up ahead, possibly shocked to find a wand carrier in and amongst their prey.
Their boldness had startled her, it was two weeks until full moon, and they didn't seem particularly endowed with magical skill. Their savagery meanwhile repulsed her.
To try and rip apart hapless muggles on a train was a toxic blend of cowardice and butchery that revolted her to her very knew that despite their incompetency, they could still kill plenty of the muggles cowering in the train behind her. She was the only person that could save them.
Theo could at least reassure them. Somehow.
Clicking her fingers in a way similar to her a magician doing a magic trick, she whispered "Boreos".
The effect was instantaneous, her eyes were now tinted green with a charm. The darkness abated, and though the density of the fog remained, she could now decipher the outlines of the walls and see the detail of the floor a few feet in front of her. Of course she imagined the werewolves could see through the abyss with their keen bestial sight, but now partially she could too.
It was a wandless spell. One that only worked if she clicked her fingers in time with the right syllable. There was no magic in a click, but it engaged her brain with the focus needed to get the required effect. She had made the spell herself. It had helped her find her way through several tombs and caves in the past.
Though she had showed it to impressed colleagues, they were unable to pull it off with any effect, even those whom had more experience and magical power than she probably did.
Despite the adulation the spell received, Aurora felt it was an incomplete work. She was sure full vision could be achieved in magically induced darkness with a different incantation - one that shared the "oreos" ending maybe, but starting differently.
She regretted the fact that after creating the magic in fifth year at Hogwarts, she had not given herself the time to improve on it. Whatever the case, she now crept through the darkness with a sense of purpose, and towards the werewolves whom had fled into the dark.
Their presence was still felt as she walked down the aisle, the smell of the werwolf's blood flecked on the wall nestled uncomfortably in Aurora's mouth.
Thankful that her night vision gave her an outline of the walls and an almost pencilled, sketch of the abandoned clutter on the floor, including regretfully, some forgetful muggle's diabetes medicine, she went to the door at the end, hearing voices filtering through from Carriage B.
Sliding the door open silently with her wand, she tip-toed a few steps and crouched behind an abandoned trolley of sugared treats and hot beverages.
The carriage was pitch black like Carriage C, suggesting the fog was unexpectedly sentient. It had turned from the entrance to Carriage D and had travelled in thick plumes to the front of the train.
From her position she could make out the voices as perfectly, there were two of them. Talking animatedly, they were probably sitting in a cabin at the other side of the carriage
"Seriously, what is happening here? Rufus and Red taken out and us stuck in the dark like rats! The boss said this would be a simple raid!" protested a voice at the far end of the room.
Its accent was thick cockney; the pitch was rather high for a man.
"And so it has proved. See the Ministry anywhere?" replied a more calm tone, this one with an accent more common with Rufus', his voice also betraying a rich sense of entitlement and conceited arrogance.
"Don't lie to me, this has not gone well and you know it. And I bet the Ministry will be here if we don't hurry up."
"They have a lot on their plate, and stop pretending you didn't know what you signed up for. We all thought that this would give us good practice. I want to be a beast out of full moon"
"So did I! But I didn't know witches would be involved"
"Did you catch a look at her?"
"No."
"Well, she's really pretty. Gorgeous. Flowing hair. I want something like that. She can't hide forever you know"
"Have them all for all I care! The Ministry could be here any minute. We better be off the train when they come."
"We'll see. You-Know-Who will hold them up for a while. We chose a good day for carnage."
"Yes if we make it out alive!"
"Stop worrying, we have enough time to feast on a nice bit of prey"
"That witch is on board the train though!"
"We have teeth and claws; all she has is a bit of wood and a warm body I can feed off of."
"Yeah, a body that she's probably hidden behind that magically sealed door. You can't even break through it. You tried and failed."
"Yes I failed! Alright?! But we have sealed the train. No one can apparate out and she seems like the worthy type for me. She might survive leaping off a speeding train but good luck convincing a herd of terrified muggles to do the same. The ball is in her court."
"So what do we do?"
"We get the boss. He is dealing with our little issue up the front, and we make our way back to that bloody door into Carriage D again"
"After you."
They strode out into the corridor, the outline of their looming figures were just visible to her.
She looked down at the wheel of the trolley.
With a wordless flick of her wand, she undid its footbrake.
Picking up speed, it practically flew down the hallway.
The chatting duo turned towards the noise of rattling metal, and with a gasp jumped to the side, clattering into the wall. The trolley missed them by fractions, and a heavy thud could be heard as one fell to the ground after trying to use the wall for support. Meanwhile the other kicked open a nearby door, cursing under his breath as leapt into a nearby cabin.
Pointing at the ground, Aurora emerged from entrance and said "Stupefy".
She missed the fallen werewolf by a few feet. The spell hit the trolley instead, catapulting the kettle through a window, its silvery sheen flashing in the darkness. It smashed through the glass, finding a chink in the curse fog's spell. Rainfall streamed into the corridor and wind gushed through the gap in the wall and circulated through the train, haunting their surroundings like a ghostly echo.
Getting back to his feet, the clumsier of the men flipped the trolley sideways, and used it as cover and aimed a green curse in Aurora's direction.
"Avada Kedavra" he shrieked hysterically.
A diluted green spell shot against the door, missing Aurora as she darted into the nearby cabin for protection. It collided with a rack of travel magazines and dribbled down to the floor.
It was a weak-as-milk attempt at the killing curse, shot by a panicked imbecile clearly clutching at straws. Nonetheless, the nature of the spell and its use still alarmed her.
After firing a few spells up the corridor, the other werewolf called out in his cockney accent to his moon-cursed friend "Oi, Lysander, she gone?"
"I don't know," replied Lysander, "If she can see through that powder by the way, I will kill that little git Mundungus Fletcher, cost us a dozen galleons."
Then Aurora heard him step into a cabin, perhaps to where his friend was hiding. Pulling her hair from her eyes, and cracking her knuckles so they made satisfying pop of air, Aurora peeked her head out the corridor.
She glanced down the aisle, it was empty.
Playing the waiting game, she moved right back into her cabin, and sat as still as she could. Noting the abandoned luggage, including what looked like a vintage gramaphone, she listened for any sounds of movement over the noise the howls of the wind and the thudding of relentless rain entering the carriage. Even though she tried to stay composed, and focused on the matter at hand, her mind kept casting back to the letters.
Is this what they meant? With the talk of muggle killings on the rise, attacks on muggle-borns and the strange disappearances of ministry workers, something was amiss.
Now, at least ten minutes after a gang of werewolves launch an attack on a muggle train, with dozens of instances of recorded magic in the middle of muggle countryside, where were the Ministry? Had they not attempted to investigate? Were they snowed in, busy fighting fires everywhere? Or had they given up? Or even turned a blind eye?
The werewolf earlier hadn't been too helpful. She needed to learn more; surely the Ministry couldn't have ignored something like this? A horrible sensation came over.
Was it possible the Ministry had been infiltrated?
These thoughts did nothing to calm her, and she found it impossible to locate them which cabin they had concealed themselves in. The fog not only concealed them but fought against any locating charms.
Thankfully for her, as she rested her head against a bank of seats, they blinked first.
"Hey, Eddie, go and have a look out there now" said a voice, poorly disguising his fear with a macho rumble in his tones.
"I don't want to, why don't do you go?" replied a panicked response of protest.
"Cowardly little tosser" said the first voice, somewhat hypocritically, "go out there or I will call the boss in and we will see what he has to say"
"I hate you" snarled the cockney voice man.
Leaping out of his hiding place he shot a series of spells across the hall. Seizing her chance, Aurora crawled low. As a purple jet of light rebounded off the wall, and buried itself in an overhead locker, she turned to the hex-friendly werewolf, and shouted "Stupefy!".
A perfect beam of red shot straight from her wand, penetrating the dense blanket of darkness, hitting him square in the chest.
With a grunt he fell to the floor, knocked out cold.
Bellowing in rage, his companion drew out a knife and ran at Aurora, the silver buttons of his coat reflecting off the deep pools of rain that had developed by the far door.
Though he tried his best to be threatening, he looked in no way like a wolf, other than the deep brow which partially concealed his gaunt eyes.
Aurora swivelled, and with a flash of her coat, swept away from him, allowing him to stab at the air.
As he turned back to her, Aurora kicked him hard in the knee, before, hair billowing from the power of her curse, thought the word "Depulso" as clearly in her mind as water from a mountain lake.
The wannabe monster took off from the ground, and smashed through the wooden border of a cabin, hitting the ceiling of the train. A loud snap came from his lower back and he let out a long, unerring shriek before crumpling on the floor face down.
Slightly giddy at the thrill, and more than slightly guilty at feeling that way, she turned back to stupefied man down the corridor.
She made a clenching motion with her hand.
Ropes shot out of her from her wrist and tangled themselves around his body, her night vision detailing his limbs as she bound them. Then using the "Accio" charm with her wand, she pulled him towards her and stuffed him in an undamaged cabin.
Aware that she had perhaps paralysed the other raider; she left him untied with his grisly colleague. Uninterested in healing him or relieving his pain she simply checked his pulse before spitting on the ground by his feet.
After then rolling the two immobilised, stunned bodies against the wall, Aurora pulled open the cabin window and, wincing at the exposure to the virulent rainfall blowing in from the vengeful skies beyond, dropped both of their wands into the tempestuous abyss outside.
Then, with the use of her night vision, she took a moment to study the werewolves.
The now crippled man had long shaggy hair, and had clearly seen better days.
He had perhaps been handsome at one point with his red locks and thick eyebrows. They were the remaining vestiges of his former good looks, clinging on through his cursed affliction. She studied his arm; it had a wolf's head tattoo.
Her charmed sight had worked with an unprecedented level of success. The tool she had created for excavating ancient tombs had served her in this situation admirably well.
Aware of the morose circumstances she was returning home to, and understanding her current predicament, she only allowed a brief smile before shaming herself for being at all happy with her work or behaviour.
It was still her fault her brother was dead.
The stupefied man was groaning beneath his ropes.
She noted that he had an identical tattoo to his crimson haired fiend. As he started to groan into consciousness, she stupefied him again.
Leaving them in the mercilessly cold room, she sealed it with a powerful locking charm. and nursed the ache under her shoulder caused in the rough and tumble of the past few minutes.
She then went back and checked the door into Carriage D behind her, ensuring it was strong enough to repel any bouts of heroism from her fellow commuters.
Satisfied, she stepped over the broken refreshment trolley lying across doorway, and past the sign marked "Carriage A" and into the darkness beyond.
With her wand out in search of this "boss", she entered the eerily black threshold of the next room.
After a single step, there was a swooshing sound, and a brilliant burst of light overwhelmed her senses.
Used to either hours of semi-dirge that had accompanied her journey from Dover, or the unforgiving pitch brought on by the raid only minutes before, the vibrancy of the yellow caused her to stagger. Her wand fell to the floor and rolled across the room.
The powerful glow burned through her night vision and left her completely blind, and she staggered to stay upright. Trying to fight off a fevered panic, she called out "Exitus".
It was the counter charm that made her sight return to normal and thankfully it worked.
Adjusting to the return of her vision, a voice called out from across the end of the room.
"Sorry poppet if that startled you, but I find it harder to read without the light."
His tone was gruff and his face was hidden behind the spread of a broadsheet and the thick arms of a leather backed Morris chair.
Aurora made a movement to the ground, searching for her wand on the floor. Unable to see it, her struggles were met with a coarse laughter that filled the room.
The voice from the chair lowered his newspaper and fixed his sunken eyes upon Aurora, his own wand pointing directly at her chest.
"I don't think so" he said. His tongue ran over his sharp, blood-stained teeth, saliva lingering on his pronounced canines.
He gestured to a willow wand that had trundled beneath his feet. It had rolled there as soon as Fenrir had switched on the lights.
"Accio" he barked, and Aurora's wand flew from under his boot and into his waiting hand.
Before Aurora could think of a response, he wordlessly flicked a spell, and, her legs stiffened immediately. Before she could conjure the counter curse, her jaw rammed itself shut and her arms snapped against her sides.
After a moment's struggling she toppled backwards, as stiff as a board, the sound of her back hitting the floor more humiliating than painful.
Utterly immobilised, she turned her gaze towards the man at the far end of the room, only just visible at the bottom of her vision.
"Between you and me, I never learnt how to read. I just thought it would make a good first impression," he said.
The man allowed himself to smile once more, and whistling merrily, and tunelessly, he stood up from the chair, which welcomed the loss of burdening his formidable bulk with a loud creak. The polish of his boots twinkled painfully in her eye, as he made his way over to her.
"I heard you take out all my men" he purred almost approvingly. "They meant nothing to me. Besides if there's anything I find more attractive than a fighter…."
Aurora couldn't see his face now and only felt his presence through the growing strength of his odious, rank breath.
Noticing this, the man lowered the wand to waist height, caressing it in his fingers.
Ensuring it was within Aurora's eyesight, he crudely yanked his hand up and down on its rim. He grunted suggestively as he did so.
All the while Aurora bellowed streams of hexes and curses in the back of her mind. "Depulso! Stupefy! Anteoculatia!" she screamed, unproductively.
She knew she had lost her head when she said Anteoculatia, a spell which only has the effect of giving people antlers. It was absurd, Aurora thought. She was a master of charms, exceptional at spells requiring calmness and precision, and she was even abnormally gifted at wandless magic, verbal and non-verbal.
Though, under such pressure and the looming presence of a sexually aggressive werewolf, her abilities crumpled, partly why she had never been a natural dueller, the altercation with the men in the room before being her first actual duel since Second Year at Hogwarts.
She hated how it had given her such a rush too, to fight those inept werewolves only minutes before.
It had made her arrogant and cocky, oblivious to a simple light charm. Worse than rueing her cavalier idiocy, she was unable to get over the man's voice, and from the fleeting glimpse she had just had of him, she was afraid that she knew who he was.
"I suspect you know all about me" he announced.
His voice was a rasp, unfinished burr, yet it was so distinctive.
It matched the characteristics described so frequently and resiliently in the papers for weeks and months before she had left for the Far East. When he reached her, lying motionless, he knelt by her face, his pestilent breath running through her nostrils.
He didn't need to say what he then said.
"I am Fenrir Greyback".