Stay - Mattheo Riddle

Flesh, Blood, and Bone

Kirra felt her feet slam into the ground; her injured leg gave way, and she fell forward; her hand let go of the Triwizard Cup at last. She raised her head.

"Where are we?" Harry suddenly spoke up from behind her.

Cedric shook his head. He got up, pulled Kirra to her feet, and they looked around.

"Some graveyard," Kirra muttered

They had left the Hogwarts grounds completely; they had obviously traveled miles — perhaps hundreds of miles — for even the mountains surrounding the castle were gone. They were standing instead in a dark and overgrown graveyard; the black outline of a small church was visible beyond a large yew tree to their right. A hill rose above them to their left. Kirra could just make out the outline of a fine old house on the hillside.

Cedric looked down at the Triwizard Cup and then up at Kirra. "Did anyone tell you the cup was a Portkey?" he asked.

"Nope," said Kirra. She was looking around the graveyard. It was completely silent and slightly eerie. 

"Is this supposed to be part of the task?" Harry asked them

"I dunno," said Cedric. He sounded slightly nervous. "Wands out, d'you reckon?"

"Yeah," said Harry, glad that Cedric had made the suggestion rather than him.

"Stay close to me," Kirra mumbled to the two of them. 

They pulled out their wands. Kirra kept looking around her. She had, yet again, the strange feeling that they were being watched.

"Someone's coming," she said suddenly.

Squinting tensely through the darkness, they watched the figure drawing nearer, walking steadily toward them between the graves. Kirra couldn't make out a face, but from the way it was walking and holding its arms, she could tell that it was carrying something. 

Whoever it was, he was short, and wearing a hooded cloak pulled up over his head to obscure his face. And — several paces nearer, the gap between them closing all the time — Kirra saw that the thing in the person's arms looked like a baby . . . or was it merely a bundle of robes?

Kirra lowered her wand slightly and glanced sideways at Cedric. Cedric shot her a quizzical look. They both turned back to watch the approaching figure. Kirra had a sick feeling in her stomach, "Harry get behind me just in case."

"What? Wh-"

"Just listen to me," she snapped

It stopped beside a towering marble headstone, only six feet from them. For a second, Kirra, Harry and Cedric and the short figure simply looked at one another.

And then, without warning, Kirra and Harry's scars exploded with pain. It was agony such as she had never felt in all her life... this life that is; her wand slipped from her fingers as she put her hands over her face; her knees buckled; she was on the ground and she could see nothing at all; her head was about to split open.

She could hear Harry crying in pain next to her

From far away, above her head, he heard a high, cold voice say, "Kill the spare."

Kirra's body moved before she could even think

A swishing noise and a second voice, which screeched the words to the night: "Avada Kedavra!"

She jumped up, managing to push Cedric to the ground, landing on top of him with a groan of pain. 

A blast of green light blazed through Harry's eyelids, and he heard something heavy fall to the ground beside him; the pain in his scar reached such a pitch that he retched, and then it diminished; terrified of what he was about to see, he opened his stinging eyes.