(Book Four) Brave {CLP SERIES}

{Chapter 37}

C R Y S T A L ' S P O V

I felt myself slam flat into the ground; my face was pressed into grass; the smell of it filled my nostrils. I had closed my eyes while the Portkey transported me, and I kept them closed now. I didn't move. All the breath seemed to have been knocked out of me; my head was swimming so badly I felt as though the ground beneath me were swaying like the deck of a ship.

To hold myself steady, I tightened my hold on the two things I was still clutching; Harry's arm and Cedric's body. I felt as though I would slide away into the blackness gathering at the edges of my brain if I let go of either of them. Shock and exhaustion kept me on the ground, breathing in the smell of the grass, waiting . . . waiting for someone to do something . . . something to happen . . . and all the while, my scar burned dully on my wrist. . . .

A torrent of sound deafened and confused me; there were voices everywhere, footsteps, screams. . . . I remained where I was, my face screwed up against the noise, as though it were a nightmare that would pass. . . .

Then, a pair of hands seized me roughly and turned me over. "Christella, Christella!"

I opened my eyes.

I was looking up at the starry sky, and Albus Dumbledore was crouched over me.

The dark shadows of a crowd of people pressed in around them, pushing nearer; I felt the ground beneath his head reverberating with their footsteps.

We had come back to the edge of the maze. I could see the stands rising above him, the shapes of people moving in them, the stars above.

I let go of Harry, but clutched Cedric to me even more tightly. I raised my free hand and seized Dumbledore's wrist, while Dumbledore's face swam in and out of focus.

"He's back," I whispered.

Harry nodded in agreement. "He's back. Voldemort," he said.

"What's going on? What's happened?"

The face of Cornelius Fudge appeared upside down over Harry; it looked white, appalled.

"My God - Diggory!" He whispered. "Dumbledore - he's dead!"

The words were repeated, the shadowy figures pressing in on us gasped it to those around them . . . and then others shouted it - screeched it - into the night -

"He's dead!" "He's dead!" "Cedric Diggory! Dead!"

"Christella, let go of him," I heard Fudge's voice say, and I felt fingers trying to pry me from Cedric's limp body, but I wouldn't let him go. Then Dumbledore's face, which was still blurred and misted, came closer.

"Christella, you can't help him now. It's over. Let go."

He wanted me to bring him back," I muttered - it seemed important to explain this.

"He wanted me to bring him back to his parents. . . ."

"That's right, Christella . . . just let go now. . . ."

Dumbledore bent down, and with extraordinary strength for a man so old and thin, raised me from the ground and set me on my feet. I swayed. My head was pounding. My injured leg could no longer support my weight. The crowd around us jostled, fighting to get closer, pressing darkly in on us.

"What's happened?"

"What's wrong with him?"

"Diggory's dead!"

"The'll need to go to the hospital wing!" Fudge was saying loudly. "He's ill, she's injured - Dumbledore, Diggory's parents, they're here, they're in the stands. . . ."