Coup de Foudre [Fred Weasley] [7]

⚡️ Chapter 31 ⚡️

The old wandmaker was lying on the twin bed farthest from the window. He had been held in the cellar for more than a year, and tortured, Vega knew, on at least one occasion. He was emaciated, the bones of his face sticking out sharply against the yellowish skin. His great silver eyes seemed vast in their sunken sockets. The hands that lay upon the blanket could have belonged to a skeleton. He did not look like the man Vega had seen so often when she was younger.

Vega felt guilty over what she had done, for not reaching to him any sooner, and she wished that there was something she could do to fix it. She sat down on the empty bed, beside Harry, Ron and Hermione. The rising sun was not visible here. The room faced the cliff-top garden and the freshly dug grave. It was quiet for a moment and then Vega looked up.

"Mr. Ollivander, I'm sorry to disturb you," Vega spoke up quietly.

"My dear girl," Mr. Ollivander's voice was feeble as he spoke. "You and your friends rescued us, I thought we would die in that place, I can never thank you ... never thank you... enough,"

"We were glad to do it," Vega said as she shared a look with Harry.

Even without words, Vega knew that their scars were throbbing right now, and they both knew – they were certain – that there was hardly any time left in which to beat Voldemort to his goal, or else to attempt to thwart him in the mission that awaited him.

At the mere thought of that, a flutter of panic raced through Vega's body... yet she had let Harry make the decision when they chose to speak to Griphook first. She motioned Harry to go through with it and he groped in the pouch around his neck and took out the two halves of his broken wand.

"Mr. Ollivander, I need some help," Harry said.

"Anything, anything," replied the wandmaker weakly.

"Can you mend this?" Harry asked. "Is it possible?"

Mr. Ollivander held out a trembling hand, and Harry placed the two barely connected halves in his palm, speaking in a tremulous voice, "Holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches. Nice and supple,"

"Yes," Harry said. "Can you –?"

"No," Mr. Ollivander whispered. "I am sorry, very sorry, but a wand that has suffered this degree of damage cannot be repaired by any means that I know of,"

Harry took the wand halves back and replaced them in the pouch around his neck. Mr. Ollivander stared at the place where the shattered wand had vanished, and did not look away until Vega had taken from her pocket the wands she had brought from the Malfoys'. She held them out to him next so he could have a look at them as well.

"Can you identify these, Mr. Ollivander?" Vega asked.

The wandmaker took the first of the wands and held it close to his faded eyes, rolling it between his knobble-knuckled fingers, flexing it slightly, "Walnut and dragon heartstring, twelve-and-three-quarter inches. Unyielding. This wand belonged to Bellatrix Lestrange,"

"And this one?" Vega asked gently, although her shoulders had tensed upon the mention of her mother. Ollivander performed the same examination.

"Hawthorn and unicorn hair," Mr. Ollivander informed. "Ten inches precisely. Reasonably springy. This was the wand of Draco Malfoy,"

"Was?" Harry repeated. "Isn't it still his?"

"Perhaps not," Mr. Ollivander said. "If you took it –"

"– I did –" Vega pitched in.

"– then it may be yours," Mr. Ollivander said and Vega nodded quietly. "Of course, the manner of taking matters. Much also depends upon the wand itself. In general, however, where a wand has been won, its allegiance will change,"