The Potter Twins and the Goblet of Fire {4}

32. The Death Eaters

"We are alive here in death valley," Death Valley, Fall out Boy

Voldemort looks away from us and begins examining his own body. His hands are like large, pale spiders, his long white fingers caress his own chest, his arms, his face; the red eyes, whose pupils are slits, like a cats, gleam brightly in the darkness. He holds up his hands and flexes his fingers, his expression rapt and exultant. He takes not the slightest notice of Wormtail, who lays twitching and bleeding on the ground, nor of the great snake, which has slithered back into sight, and it circling Harry and me again, hissing menacingly. 

Voldemort slips one of his unnaturally long-fingered hands into a deep pocket and draws out a wand. He caresses it gently too; and then raises it, and points it at Wormtail, who is lifted off the ground and thrown against the headstone where we're tied: he falls to the foot of it and lays there, crumpled up and crying. Voldemort turns his scarlet eyes upon us, laughing a high, cold, mirthless laugh. 

Wormtail's robes are shining with blood, now: he has wrapped the stump of his arm in them. "My lord..." he chokes, "my lord...you promised...you did promise..."

"Hold out your arm," Voldemort says lazily. 

"Oh, master...thank you, master..."

Wormtail extends his bleeding stump, but Voldemort laughs again. "The other arm, Wormtail."

"Master, please...please..."

Voldemort leans down, and pulls out Wormtail's left arm; he forces the sleeve up past Wormtail's elbow, and I see a large, red tattoo on his forearm; a skull with a snake, protruding from its mouth - the same image we saw in the sky at the Quidditch World Cup: the Dark Mark. Voldemort examines it carefully, ignoring Wormtai's uncontrollable sobbing. 

"It is back," he says softly, "they will all have noticed it...and now, we shall see...now we shall know..."

He presses a long, white forefinger to the brand on Wormtail's arm. 

The scar on my forehead sears with sharp pain and Wormtail lets out a fresh howl; Voldemort removes his finger from the Mark, and I see that it's now jet black. 

With a look of cruel satisfaction on his face, Voldemort straightens up, throws his head back and stares around the dark graveyard. 

"How many will be brave enough to return when they feel it?" he whispers, his gleaming red eyes fixated upon the stars. "And how many will be foolish enough to stay away?"

He begins to pace up and down before us, his eyes sweeping over the graveyard. After a minute or so, he looks down upon Harry and me again, a cruel smile twisting his snake-like face. 

"You stand, Harry and Haylee Potter, upon the remains of my late father," he hisses softly. "A Muggle and a fool...very like your dear mother. But they both had their uses, did they not? Your mother died to defend you as children...and I killed my father, and see how useful he has proved himself, in death..."

Voldemort laughs again and continues pacing, up and down. 

"You see that house upon the hillside, Potters? My father lived there. My mother, a witch who lived here in this village, fell in love with him. But he abandoned her when she told him what she was...he didn't like magic, my father...He left her and returned to his Muggle parents before I was even born, Potters, and she died giving birth to me, leaving me to be raised in a Muggle orphanage...but I vowed to find him...I revenge myself upon him, that fool who gave me his name...Tom Riddle..."

I shudder, and a sob is muffled by my gag, as Voldemort continues to pace. 

"Listen to me, reliving my family history..." he says quietly. "Why, I am growing quite sentimental...But look, Harry and Haylee! My true family returns..."