The Disgraced of the House of Black - A Multi-Character Fanfiction - Part One

109. Fielty

"You returned to me, not out of loyalty, but out of fear of your old friends," Voldemort resumed, towering over the sobbing and wailing Wormtail. Ellis hadn't been able to see it before, but he now saw the man was clutching a stump of a hand. "You deserve this pain, Wormtail. You know that, don't you?"

"Yes, Master," Wormtail whimpered. "Please, Master...please..."

"Yet you helped return me to my body," Voldemort remarked. "Worthless and traitorous as you are, you helped me...and Lord Voldemort rewards his helpers..."

He waved his wand in the air, causing what appeared to be a stream of metal to stream from it. It writhed and shifted until it looked much like a human hand. Lowering toward Wormtail, it fused itself to his stump. Instantly, his crying ceased. He watched the hand flex and curl before picking up a twig and crushing it to dust.

"My lord," he whispered, turning to Voldemort with an awed look on his face. "Master...it is beautiful...thank you...thank you..."

As he scrambled forward to kiss the hem of the already so-kissed robes, Voldemort said, "May your loyalty never waver again, Wormtail."

Coming to a stop near someone in the circle, Voldemort remarked, "Lucius, my slippery friend. I am told that you have not renounced the old ways, though to the world you present a respectable face. You are still ready to take the lead in a spot of Muggle-torture, I believe? Yet you never tried to find me, Lucius...Your exploits at the Quidditch World Cup were fun, I daresay...but might not your energies have been better directed toward finding and aiding your master?"

"My lord, I was constantly on the alert," Lucius said softly, still masked. "Had there been any sign from you, any whisper of your whereabouts, I would have been at your side immediately, nothing could have prevented me-"

"And yet you ran from my Mark, when a faithful Death Eater sent it into the sky last summer?" Voldemort interrupted lazily. "Yes, I know all about that, Lucius...You have disappointed me...I expect more faithful service in the future."

"Of course. My lord, of course...You are merciful, thank you..."

Voldemort moved on. He was now facing the empty space next to Ellis.

"Your brother and sister should be standing here," he remarked quietly. "But they are entombed in Azkaban. They were faithful. They went to Azkaban rather than renounce me...When Azkaban is broken open, the Lestranges will be honoured beyond their dreams. The dementors will join us...they are our natural allies...we will recall the banished giants...I shall have all my devoted servants returned to me, and an army of creatures whom all fear..."

He began to walk on before he suddenly paused, turning his head toward Lucius.

"Your daughter," he said coldly.

Lucius stiffened slightly.

"What happened to her?" Voldemort demanded.

"She has been living in France these past twelve years," Lucius replied. "At Beauxbatons where she now works as a professor of languages and charms."

"Age?" Voldemort snapped.

"Twenty-three," Lucius replied. When Voldemort said nothing and did not move, Lucius began cautiously, "My lord, what-"

Ignoring him, he moved on, moving past Ellis and to the next Death Eater. Some he passed in silence, others he spoke softly to them. Ellis did not remember all of their names. He could hardly hear that eerily soft voice over the furious pounding of his own heart.

Vaguely, he heard him say things like, "You shall have better victims soon, Macnair."

When he had finished his rotation, Voldemort glanced at Ellis before he said, "Learn from their mistakes, Lestrange, and the triumphs. Your family will be greater teachers to you than these have proven to be."

There was a long silence after that.

At long last, Lucius Malfoy's voice came from under the mask as he asked, "Master, we crave to know...we beg you to tell us...how you have achieved this...this miracle...how you managed to return to us..."

"Ah, what a story it is, Lucius," Voldemort remarked with relish. "And it begins - and ends - with my young friend here."

Here, he slowly approached Harry as Ellis stared at him, listening intending, his brows slightly furrowed.

"You know, of course, that they have called this boy my downfall? You all know that on the night I lost my powers and my body, I tried to kill him. His mother died in the attempt to save him - and unwittingly provided him with a protection I admit I had not foreseen...I could not touch the boy." Raising one hand, finger outstretched, he resumed, "His mother left upon him the traces of her sacrifice...This is old magic. I should have remembered it. I was foolish to overlook it...but no matter. I can touch him now."

Extending his finger ever so slightly more, he made contact with Harry. Aside from the occasional muted cry of pain, Harry made no noise.

Stepping back, Voldemort turned back to address his followers as he said, "I miscalculated, my friends, I admit it. My curse was deflected by the woman's foolish sacrifice, and it rebounded upon myself. Ah, pain beyond pain, my friends; nothing could have prepared me for it. I was ripped from my body, I was less than spirit, less than the meanest ghost...but still, I was alive. What I was, even I do not know...I, who have gone further than anybody along the path that leads to immortality. You know my goal - to conquer death. And now, I was tested, and it appeared that one or more of my experiments had worked...for I had not been killed, though the curse should have done it. Nevertheless, I was as powerless as the weakest creature alive, and without the means to help myself...for I had no body, and every spell that might have helped me required the use of a wand...

"I remember only forcing myself, sleeplessly, endlessly, second by second, to exist...I settled in a faraway place, in a forest, and I waited...Surely, one of my faithful Death Eaters would try and find me...one of them would come and perform the magic I could not, to restore me to a body...but I waited in vain..."

The silence following this statement was so long, Ellis nearly despaired he would speak again, that perhaps he was waiting for another to speak. If only he would go on.

"Only one power remained to me. I could possess the bodies of others. But I dared not go where other humans were plentiful, as I knew that the aurors were still abroad and searching for me. I sometimes inhabited animals - snakes, of course, being my preference - but I was little better off inside them than as pure spirit, for their bodies were ill-adapted to perform magic...and my possession of them shortened their lives: none of them lasted long..."