"Hogwarts."
Sirius could feel his soul leaving his body. He could feel everything around him turn into a blur. He heard echoes of his surroundings: he heard laughter and he heard crying. He heard his own breathing, his own heartbeat. He felt the blood on his hands settling down in his skin and he felt his tears making contact with his lips.
It was over. All of this had been for nothing. In the end a simple little look gave it all away. He should have slit his throat... He should have killed them both...
Suddenly he felt something slap him across the cheek. The blurriness shifted and the echoes stopped.
"Black," he heard Voldemort address him. "How do we get to Hogwarts?"
"How am I supposed to know that?" Sirius spat angrily.
"Don't lie to me," Voldemort hissed and Sirius looked away from him, before he could make eye contact, "or I will have to kill the Mudblood."
"Are you saying that if I tell you, you are going to call her the Knight Bus and wish her a safe journey home?" Sirius said bitterly. "Don't make me laugh."
"You have clearly made up your mind," Voldemort said and pointed his wand at Lily. Sirius looked away and closed his eyes. He felt his chest sinking and another wave of tears leave his eyes. Nothing happened. Why was nothing happening?
Suddenly he felt a pair of strong arms grabbing him, pulling him to his knees and dragging him towards Lily. He tried to fight them, but there was no use - he was kneeling in front of his friend - he was kneeling in front of his friend, whom he had just sentenced to die.
He felt his wrists getting tied up behind his back and the Death Eater's firm fingers on his cheeks, forcing him to look at Lily, who was still lying on the floor spread-eagle, her face full of bruises and her left arm covered with blood.
"You will watch," he heard Voldemort say calmly. He heard Bellatrix snigger and the door opening.
"My Lord," came a deep, emotionless voice from the direction of the door. Voldemort looked up.
"Severus," he said pleasantly, "how nice of you to join us."
Snape's even footsteps were approaching him steadily.
"We were just talking about how we could get to Hogwarts without that old fool noticing us," Voldemort informed him, "and Black would rather have the Mudblood die."
"I might know of a way to get to the Hogwarts grounds unnoticed," Snape said after a small amount of silence and Sirius groaned silently. Voldemort looked at Snape, signaling him to continue. "There is a secret passage, located-"
"DON'T YOU DARE!" Sirius heard Lily shout with all the energy she had left. "PLEASE DON'T TELL HIM! PLEASE!"
"- in the Shrieking Shack," Snape finished his sentence, apparently completely unaware of Lily's presence. Voldemort grinned and lowered his wand.
"The Shrieking Shak it is then," he said calmly and looked around the room. "Take the Blood Traitor and Mudblood along, they just might be of use."
"My Lord," Bellatrix said, "do you want us to call-"
"There will be no need," Voldemort said firmly and disapparated. Sirius looked around. Malfoy and Snape had also disapparated.
"I will take this one and you take the Mudblood," the Death Eater, who was holding Sirius, said and Sirius recognized him to be Dolohov. The other Death Eater - Nott - nodded and grabbed Lily, who was still crying, by the arm.
The very next moment he was being pulled through the very familiar tight rubber tube and landed on the even more familiar wooden floor of the Shrieking Shack.
Voldemort was standing in front of him, his lips were still forming a grin and Sirius didn't want to know what plan he had formed. He didn't want to be used as bait, he didn't want to witness what was going to happen to his friends, to his godson. He wanted to freeze time and leave it frozen for all eternity. He wanted to escape, to run through the tunnel and warn James, but as he looked around at the Death Eaters and Voldemort surrounding him, he knew that escaping was practically impossible. He felt his body shatter in hopelessness. He should have slit his throat... He should have killed them both when he had the chance...
He felt a dash of wind hit his face and looked up. Lord Voldemort was pointing his wand at his face and the next thing he felt were daggers setting his body on fire.
***
"What is it?" James asked, as he reached for his cloak. But before he could, he saw Remus drop the map on the ground and reach for his wand.
"Sirius?"
James felt his head snap upwards to the entrance to the secret passage of the Whomping Willow. Sirius Black was indeed standing there, still in the same clothes he had worn when he left him at St. Mungo's. His black hair was falling unneatly on his shoulders and face. He was shaking and there was a wand in his hand, pointing directly at James.
"Sirius," James gulped and placed his wand in front of his body.
"It's him," he heard Remus mutter. He was also pointing his wand at Sirius. "The map said it's him."
James allowed his gaze to fall downwards to look at the map. Remus was right. The label on the map said Sirius Black, but before James could look back up to face his friend, he saw 4 new spots appearing on the edge of the map, moving across the secret passage to meet them: Severus Snape, Rodolphus Lestrange, Geoffrey Nott and Antonin Dolohov.
"Remus, run," was all James could manage to say, before trying to reach back down for his cloak, but before he could reach it, it flew away, directly towards Sirius, who was shaking even more violently.
"Exp-" he heard Sirius shout, but then before he could finish casting the spell he let out a heart-piercing shout and fell to his knees. "RUN!"
James didn't need telling twice. He was already backing away, when Sirius shouted that word. He turned around and started running as fast as he could. His mind was focused on only one thing: Getting Harry inside the castle. Get Harry to safety. But his running didn't last long. He heard spells being cast. He heard Sirius screaming. He turned around just in time to cast a shielding charm between himself and Lestrange, who was running towards him, while throwing curses at him. James was still backing away backwards, tightening his grip around Harry, casting shield charm after shield charm. Severus Snape was also approaching him and throwing his own curses at him from the other side.
Remus, who was fighting Nott and Dolohov, saw that and threw a stunning spell straight in Lestrange's back, knocking him to the ground, but Dolohov took advantage of that and shouted a curse, that made Remus fall to his knees in pain, while Nott disarmed him.
James focused on Snape, who was mercilessly trying to disarm him, knock him unconscious and get him to bleed out on the ground. James's shield charm was just about strong enough to repel all the curses, but he only managed to let go of it once or twice to cast his own offensive spells, as he had Harry in his arms and didn't want him to get hit by anything.
"Avada Kedavra!" he heard Dolohov shout from behind Snape and James fell to the ground, ducking the curse, but at the same time he let go of his shield charm and Snape's curse hit his body, preventing him from moving and his wand flew out of his hands. He was on his knees, frozen, with Harry crying in his arms.
"You fool," Snape turned to face Dolohov. "The Dark Lord told us specifically not to kill anyone while on Hogwarts grounds."
"I wasn't pointing it at him," Dolohov defended himself. "Just did it to make him loose control and it worked, didn't it?"
James could feel the curse wearing off and tried moving his body again, but Snape noticed and casted a charm that made cords fly out of his wand and wrap themselves around James's body, with Harry still firmly placed in his embrace.
"Let me go, Snape," James growled and Snape raised his eyebrows and pointed his wand at James again.
"Silencio," he muttered, lowered his wand again and Harry stopped crying. James opened his mouth to yell at him once again, but he could no longer produce a sound. Snape then casted another spell, that dragged James back to the Whomping Willow, where Sirius was lying on the floor and where Remus was kneeling, also tied up and Nott was pointing his wand at his head.
"What I want to know is..." Dolohov said and turned to Sirius. "Why weren't they already disarmed when we got here?"
Sirius didn't move, nor did he answer Dolohov's question. Dolohov walked toward his body and kicked him in his stomach. James felt another wave of anger go through his body, as he continued fighting the chords, which were ever so firmly strangling his body.
"Useless," Dolohov spat, "couldn't even follow simple instructions."
"Well this is Black we are talking about," Snape sniggered. "He never was very good at anything."
"Almost as bad as his brother," Nott added.
"Speaking of the traitor," Dolohov said. "Has Karkaroff found him yet?"
"Not that I know of," Nott said. "Probably killed himself out of pure cowardliness."
"Wouldn't surprise me," Snape said. "Now come on, somebody revive Lestrange and let's get them to the Dark Lord."
James felt his heart descend even lower, as he felt the ropes dragging him into the tunnel. He had failed them. He had failed his son, even though he had sworn to protect him. He had led his entire family to death.
Hi!
I feel so horrible - doing this to my favorite characters in the whole wide world. I feel so bad. I felt tears gathering in my eyes writing the last paragraph.
By the way, I don't know what Nott's name is and I had to make it up. I hate making up things writing fanfiction... I like to keep it as accurate as possible, so if anybody knows what Nott's actual name is, please let me know!
Anyways, I hope you are all enjoying lockdown (ha ha) and I will see you next week with a new chapter!
Don't forget to vote and comment!
Love,
Lizzie:)