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GOBLET OF FIRE.
THERE were two colours Ophelia remembered. Gold and blue.
Gold like cornsilk, honeyed and shimmering, grasped in her tiny, chubby fists until she was tugging hard enough to make him laugh - a laugh full like the sun, hiding behind his figure as he cradled her in his arms. Her father. What once was her father. He was long gone now.
The blue was a far worse memory. Shards of glass, cold as ice, piercing her chest. He always stared at her. Even when his words were slightly kind, his stare grated at her spirit. He was the one to kill her, in her first life. In the life that mattered.
They asked her to focus on the blue today. She hated those kind of requests, because she really couldn't focus on her memories - just scramble through them like she was shuffling cards in a magic trick gone-wrong, desperately trying to find the card that completed it. Her mind was made up of mirrors rather than passages, and they didn't seem to understand how much it hurt her sometimes.
Ophelia wandered the passages quietly in her thin shoes made of animal hide, holding her skirts up so they didn't drag across the surface and reveal her hiding just like the old wizard had taught her. Tentatively, she pressed her ear against the wooden door. This was it.
Gyneth, what do you see? She scowled slightly at the mention of her first name and the world trembled at her emotional twitch. They insisted on using it as if it would actually help and it never did. It only served to confuse Ophelia further.
Focus, she reminded herself as she slowly brought all her attention to this door, listening to the voices slithering from the cracks.
"With his scabbard - " she could hear her half-brother saying, his tone cold and twisted. He was far cleverer than her since childhood, forever beating her at games with their pretend swords and little horses.
He continued speaking. "Is there such a way to turn it against him?"
She remembered being so hurt, so horrified by the idea of her half-brother being so evil and so huddled closer, body fully against the door and listening so intently. What are you seeing? Are you there?
"If one were to destroy oneself - " " - poison his scabbard with the very essence - " This man's voice with withering and quiet, and she didn't recognise it.
It's no use, Albus! I told you, she can't tell us. The voices only served to muddle her more and she just wished they'd be quiet.
Desperately, in both worlds, she pushed into the door to hear more. It creaked. The memory crackled, skipped backwards and forwards like a panicked movie, blurring and throwing her around.
She came to the position on her knees, hair hanging in front of her face, elbows strung up by two of his lackeys. Those blue eyes stared straight before he withdrew his sword. He could have used his magic, the one this version of her never possessed, but he chose to draw her blood. She had to remember that this was not her, these people were all dead, and this was not her time.
