A World Fading To Black - BOOK 2

Chapter 4 - Barty Crouch's House Elf

"What?" I ask, looking at him, "Who is it, then?"

Moony stays quiet for some moments, as if thinking of a plan.

"Moony, what is it?" Dad asks concerned, "Remus?" he walks to him.

"We have to get out of here..." Moony says, hurrying to pack everything.

"What?" I say, my eyes suddenly widening.

"It's not the Irish, Jupiter..." Moony says seriously, "It's-"

"Death Eaters..." Dad finishes after looking outside.

"Wait," Harry says, "aren't those...?"

"Voldemort's followers" I finish, getting anxious, "I'll go find the Weasleys"

"No, Jupiter, you're going to stay here; safe" Dad affirms.

"But what if they get caught?!" I ask, "I can't risk that!"

"I'll go with you" Moony says, "We'll go find the Weasleys, then we'll all meet back at the entrance of the campsite"

He nods at me and we run outside. It is... chaos. People are running in every direction, trying to save themselves. There's fire, burning a few tents. And then, away from us, there's a group of hooded people in dark cloaks, wearing sinister masks. All their wands are up, pointing at half-a-dozen people above them, floating and being controlled by the hooded people.

"Are those...?" I ask.

"Yes" Moony answers, "Now hurry up".

He takes my arm and runs to the Weasleys tent, just in time to see the family get out.

"Remus, Jupiter" Mr Weasley affirms, "Where are the others?"

"Getting out of here" Moony says, "And we're going with them"

Mr Weasley nods and follows us.

After some minutes of pushing through crowds of frightened people, we hear a muffled thunder-like sound and see a green light flash in the sky. I look up and see the green light; it's a skull with a snake slithering out of its mouth.

"The Dark Mark" Remus and Mr Weasley say.

Then we see Harry and Dad looking at the sky too; the Mark shining right above them. I hear muffled noises – people still screaming and running around – and kind of doze off for some moments, just looking at the Mark and imagining what would come next. Then, I heard a loud "STUPEFY!" shouted by a group of people.

I look up and see Dad and Harry on the floor, surrounded by about twenty Aurors. Moony and I run to them.

"Wait!" I shout.

Harry's hair flies with the wind and the wizard in front of him lowers his wand; he probably saw the scar.

Then Mr Crouch appears, looking very angry.

"Which of you did it?!" he screams at us, "Was it you, Black? I knew we shouldn't have freed you..."

"It wasn't him!" I say, "Honestly, there were a dozen Death Eaters here not five minutes ago, and you'll blame my father?!"

"There was someone behind that tree" Harry says, pointing at a tree away from us, "They said something... like a spell"

"Oh, a spell, you say?" says Crouch, "You seem to know a lot about this subject..."

"Mr Crouch, with all due respect, any witch or wizard who's clever enough can recognise a spell when they hear one" Moony says calmly.

"It can't be them" says a witch from the Auror group, "The girl is right; there were Death Eaters here, it was them. But we're late, they've already Disapparated"

"Well, I sent some people search the trees, we might catch them" says Mr Diggory, who had just arrived.

People seem terrorized and some even blurt some "Be careful, Amos"s.

Mr Diggory takes his wand and walks to the trees, then his voice shouts, "Yep, we found them. Right here... unconscious, but... wait, what is this?"

"What, who is it?" says Crouch's anxious voice.

Mr Diggory comes back with a little pinkish body whose clothes are a simple and dirty teacloth.

Crouch looks paralyzed for some seconds, but then he composes himself and mumbles, "No... this can't be..."

He went to the trees to search for something, even though Mr Diggory told him there's nothing there.

"It's quite embarrassing..." Mr Diggory whispers to us and Mr Weasley, who had joined us, "I mean, Crouch's house elf..."

So the tiny creature was his house elf...

"What do you mean, Amos?" Mr Weasley whispers back, "You don't think the elf did it, do you? She needed a wand to summon the Mark"

"And she had a wand!" Mr Diggory says, showing us a wand that he took from his cloak, "That's a violation of Clause Three of the Code of Wand Use, you know? No non-human creature is permitted to carry or use a wand."

"Wait..." Harry says, "That's my wand. I dropped it..."

"Your wand?" Mr Diggory asks, "Is that some kind of confession? You dropped your wand after summoning the Mark?"

"What? No!" Harry says, "I didn't cast that!"

"He didn't," Dad says, "I was with him the whole time"

"Please, Amos" Mr Weasley says, "You're talking to Harry Potter. Do you think he would do this?"

"Uh..." Mr Diggory mumbles, "N-no, of course not... I'm sorry... I went too far... So, it was the elf..."

They wake her up and start making questions, to which she tries to answer. She is shaking and stuttering so much, though, she must be terrorized. Then, Crouch comes back and argues with Mr Diggory about blaming his elf and how doing that meant blaming Crouch himself. After that, Crouch threatens Winky (that's the elf's name) of giving her clothing (which is the only way to free a house elf). That's when she started shaking and stuttering and crying so violently, she seemed as if she was going to blow up. Everyone ends up splitting apart to write someone or keep searching.

"Should we go home or stay in the tent?" Dad asks.

"We could stay here; it's already late" Moony responds, "We'll go home tomorrow, early in the morning"

We nod, say our goodbyes to the Weasleys and Hermione, and go back to our tent.

"By the way, Jupiter," Harry says as we enter the tent, "I saw Wood Disapparating with his family before the Mark showed up. Just in case you wanted to know if he was safe..."

I sigh, "Good... now go to sleep, we'll have to wake up early tomorrow"

He nods and we all go to bed. I stay awake for some moments, thinking about everything. I feel that Harry is awake too. But I end up exhausting myself up with all the thinking, and fall asleep. 

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A/N: hello my nifflers!! hope you're well and hope you liked this chapter!!

so, yeah, i don't really know what to say... again, sorry for not uploading anything; i've been having a lot of tests and stuff

anyways...

luv y'all, you're totally awesome!!

~luna loveniffler 💙