Extreme Remedies ( Tom Riddle Era )

Chapter 41

The trio stopped in front of a wall with red signs painted on it.
"Here" the vampire said with a cry of fear.

The darkest hour is coming

Dumbledore walked closer to it and touched the dark red liquid.
Disgusted, Tom thought that he was mad, that liquid could be cursed.
"It's fresh blood" the teacher sentenced "Just it's unknown who does it belong to. A human for sure".
He eyed the vampire, who confirmed.
"Sir..." Tom called to gain back his attention.
"Grindelwald" Dumbledore just said.
"What? He's here? We must find Evelyn!".
"Slow down. Don't leave my side" he ordered and turned to the vampire "Give the alarm and ask for help!".
"I think you are going to the wrong side" the vampire said, making them stop "I can smell the same source of this blood. Down there".
He pointed to a narrow circular staircase that opened into the wall and that Tom didn't notice before.
"Thank you for your help. Now warn the school" Dumbledore said while Tom was already climbing down the stairs recklessly.
The wizard-made walls disappeared to leave the natural elements clear.
Tom gasped as he saw a large cave opening below the floor.
"Keep your wand up" Dumbledore warned "And be ready to defend yourself at any time".
The boy nodded and proceeded on the stairs carved into the stony wall of the cave.
There was a light by the cave floor and Tom spotted some white shadows, recognizing them as bones.
The clearer was the sight, the worse the landscape was, until Tom spotted a large flat stone that looked like an altar.
"Evelyn!" he cried, getting no answer, only the echo of his voice.

The sight killed him.
He stammered as he tried to persuade himself that it wasn't as he feared.
He forced his legs to move more quickly as he raised his wand to use some magic to free the body from whatever was chaining it at the altar and erase that bad show.
But nothing happened.
Also Dumbledore used his magic, with no effects.
Trying not to retch at the sight of her blood and her open wound, Tom grabbed the girl's arm but an invisible force kept her arm still.
He tried to stop the blood spilling from her wrist, but also that attempt was a failure.
"What's going on? What do we do?" Tom asked the older wizard.
"The curse must have some weak point. We have to take her away from here. We are not safe as well" Dumbledore pulled the boy away and raised his wand, making a blinding light explode.
Tom blinked and reacted in time to catch Evelyn's body before it could fall from the altar.
"She's still alive" Tom said hugging the body "But she lost too much blood. Can you stop the bleeding?".
Dumbledore waved his wand, but the wound didn't heal.
"Magic isn't enough. Healers can do the right job. The damages are too deep".
"There are no healers" Tom complained "We have to do something now. She can't die. Not this way".
"Then we have to hurry away from here".
"We can try some blood magic".
In front of that suggestion Dumbledore looked taken aback "That's dark magic, Tom. Did you already forget that she'd rather die than seeing you using the dark arts?".
Tom tried to stop shivering as he said coldly "I won't let her die. We need to save her. And if I need dark magic to do it, then I'll do it".
"You do it. But then how will she react when she will wake up and realize what you did? That her sacrifice was wasted?".
"I don't care" Tom said trying not to surrender to desperation more than he already was "She can hate me. Better having her hating me than having her dead and gone forever".
"You don't care. But she does. That's probably the reason she is in this status. We need help" Dumbledore raised his wand to levitate her body.
Tom resisted to the temptation to hold her body close to him and watched her floating away from his grip. He ducked to pick her wand from the floor and the two wizards hurried to run after it climbing up the stony stairs and leaving the cave behind.

"Who did this to her? Grindelwald? Where is he now?" Tom asked when he couldn't stay speechless anymore.
"No idea. We can just hope he is gone now" Dumbledore murmured.
"Gone?" Tom repeated confused.
"Do we have time for a battle now?" the professor spoke quickly "If we want to save her, we need no obstacles. So pray that whoever did this to her is gone after leaving that bloody message on the wall. But I don't think it was Grindelwald himself. It's not his style. He would conquer the whole palace, not torture an innocent girl".
"So who else could that be? How can we trust that vampire?".
Dumbledore shot him a warning glance "I understand that you've been taught that vampires are evil beings, living dead who feed with human blood. But do you think our Russian fellows are so reckless to keep a dangerous creature amongst their most valuable wizards? When the first duty of professors towards their students is to keep the save, just like our duties as adults is to protect and set an example to younger generations?".
Tom felt irritated by being reproached that way, but he couldn't deny that the professor was right.
"All I think now is that we need to hurry to save and protect her" the Head Boy mumbled and grabbed the floating body back into his arms.