The Hollow Beneath Hogwarts

109. Lets Get It Started

Nobody moved.

Nobody spoke.

The silence that followed Bill's answer seemed to stretch on forever. It wasn't the comfortable silence of friends. Nor the thoughtful silence that sometimes followed difficult news.

This silence was heavy.

Suffocating.

The sort that settled over a room after tragedy. The sort that made breathing feel wrong. The group had somehow ended up sitting on the bottom steps of the Grand Staircase.

Nobody had consciously chosen the location. They had simply drifted there after leaving the Great Hall. Too stunned to continue upstairs. Too shocked to say much of anything.

Sloane sat pressed against Draco's side. One of his arms wrapped firmly around her shoulders. Neither of them had spoken since Bill's confirmation.

There didn't seem to be anything left to say.

Jack was dead.

The words felt impossible. Only hours ago he'd been annoying everyone. Arguing. Complaining. Acting like an idiot.

Now he was dead.

The reality refused to settle properly in Sloane's mind. She kept expecting someone to tell them there had been a mistake. That he'd been injured. That he'd lost a leg. Lost an eye.

Anything.

Anything except this.

A distant sound echoed through the Entrance Hall.

Footsteps. Dozens of them.

The group looked up.

Everyone turned towards the massive front doors. And what they saw would haunt many of them for the rest of their lives.

Kingsley entered first. The Minister looked exhausted. Not physically tired. Broken. Like somebody carrying a weight too heavy to bear.

Behind him came Tina. The older witch had one arm wrapped tightly around Annabella. The female Auror looked utterly devastated. Tina was practically holding her upright.

Then more figures appeared. Two by two. The rest of the rescue party.

Injured. Bruised. Covered in dirt. Blood. Exhaustion.

And floating between them...

Jack.

Or what remained of him.

The sight stole the air from the room.

Every single person froze.

Nobody spoke. Nobody breathed.

It was like staring directly into one of their nightmares. One of those horrible dreams they'd all been having.

Except this wasn't a dream. This was real. Terrifyingly real.

Jack's body floated at waist height.

The full extent of the damage impossible to hide. Half of his lower jaw was gone. Completely gone. The wound exposed his upper teeth in a way that made several people immediately look away. His face was covered in deep scratches.

Blood. Mud. Torn flesh.

One side of his face looked almost unrecognisable. One eye was missing.

Whether torn out or destroyed, nobody could tell.

Nobody wanted to.

His clothes hung from his body in bloody strips. The fabric shredded. The skin beneath no better.