The Enemy of my Enemy

The Dream

Complete and utter carnage.

Bodies lay everywhere, strewn across the hallways and corridors that were once filled with laughter and excitement, but now held nothing but silence. Blood smeared the walls, and students no older than twelve were curled up, their eyes wide open, staring without seeing at the half-blown off roof of the castle.

The Entrance Hall was no different, bodies lay here, too. Only difference was their numbers out massed the ones upstairs. Fighters from all walks of life lay side-by-side - Luna Lovegood, Cho Chang, Draco Malfoy, and Cassius Warrington among the dead - other bodies, like Colin and Dennis Creevey were on the Marble Staircase, the fear in their eyes frozen as their bodies crumpled against the banisters.

They were just children, but whatever had occurred here hadn't discriminated against young or old, adult or child, Good or Evil. Bodies of all shapes, sizes, genders, and species littered the floor. She stepped over a body, her foot nudging its arm, which fell away and revealed its face to her gaze.

Marcus Flint stared back at her, his usual dark eyes a faded grey. His wand rolled from his fingers, and she stopped it with her boot, bending to pick it up and roll it between her fingers.

Before her, on the opposite side of the Hall, the Great Oak doors had been blown off their hinges. Wood splintered the ground and the rough stone of the castle walls had two large holes in them. Bodies lay on the threshold, and beyond in the courtyard, too.

Both Hogwartians and Death Eater alike.

It was a bloodbath.

An absolute, nightmarish bloodbath.

What the hell had happened to cause this much death?

"There she is," said a familiar voice. She turned, her hand going for her own wand beneath her jacket sleeve. "The emerging victor. Congratulations."

She turned and found herself face-to-face with Avery Sutherland, a victorious grin on her face. She gripped her shoulder, fingernails digging into the skin beneath her robes so sharply she was sure they drew blood.

"I did this?" she asked. It took her a second to realise that the voice wasn't her own.

Avery's grin widened. "Don't worry, pet, the act of killing gets easier each time. Before long, you won't even care."

"But how?"

"It's what happens when you're trapped for sixteen years," Avery answered. "When you're taken away and forbidden to use your magic or told only to use it in defence of someone. You're a weapon, pet, you powers were meant to be used like this. Embrace it, learn from it, become the killer you were born to be."

She looked down at her hands, they were stained with blood. But beneath the marks she could feel a warmth, and it was spreading, coiling its way through her bloodstream.

It was powerful, and she liked it.

As a sinister grin crept its way onto her own lips. Faye looked up; her eyes almost as black as the sky outside. "What do we do now?" she asked.

"Now we regroup," said Avery, her grip loosening. "The battle isn't over yet. We may have dominated here, but the rest of the Wizarding World is waiting for us. The war continues out there..." she motioned to the open world beyond Hogwarts' gates.

Faye drew her own wand, all the while tossing aside Flint's. It clattered uselessly against the marble floor. "Then what are we standing around here for?" she asked. "Let's finish what we started. Tonight we extinguish the light, once and for all."