𝐀𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐖𝐄𝐀𝐒𝐋𝐄𝐘 || 𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘳𝘺 𝘱𝘰𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳

✿ CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR ✿

"Wormtail, your arm." Voldemort commands.
"Master! Thank you, master! You are too kind, too noble." The servant worships, extending his bleeding, handless arm to his master.
"The other arm." The Dark Lord says coolly.

Wormtail visibly shudders before brandishing his left forearm, peeling his jacket back. One of Voldemorts long, slender fingers (they look more like claws) reach forward and touches the mark of a skull, a snake protruding from its mouth.

Wormtail shudders again, before slumping to the ground, clutching his handless arm.

I look up to the sky, where the clouds have formed the shape of a skull and and a snake, the same symbol that was on Wormtails arm. From both eyes of the skull come black figures that look like smoke. Around twenty of them.

The black smoke figures come closer and closer until they hit the damp earth and the smoke disappears. In its place are people with cloaks and masks over their faces. Death Eaters.

"Welcome, my friends." Voldemort says, holding his arms out wide. "Thirteen years it's been, and yet you answer my call as though it were only yesterday." The twenty Death Eaters stand around their master in a circle and bow.

"I confess myself disappointed." Voldemort says harshly. "Not one of you tired to find me. Clearly, you were able to be here tonight, which means you were able to look for me throughout the last decade."

"I looked for you, master. I found you." Wormtail squeaks from the floor.

"Out of fear, not sacrifice." The Dark Lord says. "However, you have proved yourself useful."

Voldemort grabs Wormtails handless arm, blood still trickling to the floor. With a wave of Voldemort's wand, a shiny silver hand appears at the end of his stumpy arm.

"Thank you, master. How gracious you are! How noble and ki-"
"-That's enough, Wormtail." Voldemort cuts him off, the servant drawing back to join the circle of other Death Eaters.

"My lord." A Death Eater with a particularly drawling voice says. "We crave to know... we beg you to tell us... how you achieved this... this miracle. And how you manages to return... to return to us..."

"Ah. An excellent question, Lucius. And what a story it is! It all begins with my two young friends here." Voldemort says, moving to stand between the two headstones Harry and I are bound to.

"You know, of course, they have called this boy my downfall? And this girl, his saviour?" A round of nodding came from the group of Death Eaters.

Me? Harry Potters saviour?

Voldemort continues.
"You all know the night I lost my body and my powers, I tried to kill Harry Potter. Only a month previously, I killed Ruby Weasley - or so I thought. While the curse did not rebound, it was not successful. I walked out of the Weasley home thinking Ruby was dead. Only at the beginning of the school year did my faithful servant - who is currently stationed within the walls of Hogwarts - inform me that she was, in fact, still alive."

A Death Eater inside Hogwarts? I look over to Harry who mouths a word to me a few times before I understand what he's saying.

Karkaroff.

"Only a month later, I visited the Potters at Godrics Hollow, the night I lost my powers. You see, when dear, sweet Lilly Potter gave her life for her only son, she unwittingly provided him with the ultimate protection - love. I could not touch him. My curse rebounded because of her sacrifice. It was old magic, something I should have foreseen... but no matter, I can touch him now." Voldemort extended one of his claw-like fingers and pressed it against Harry's scar.