the last verse ; harry potter [2]

nineteen ; the locket destroyed

The next night, she was on fire.

It ripped through her body like a shredder, each nerve screaming with unbearable agony. She felt it from her fingernails to each follicle of hair to her toes, pain she only felt rarely, pain that made her want to die.

She felt this pain five years ago the night Harry Potter stabbed Tom Riddle's diary with the Basilisk fang. She felt this pain just last year on the night Dumbledore destroyed Marvolo's ring with Gryffindor's sword.

Each time she had felt the pain as new and fresh, each time her bones ripped apart as if they hadn't done before, each time her nerves screamed. By the time Dumbledore destroyed the ring, the pain didn't dull with experience; it was curse, a punishment to feel it just as much as the time before. Now, with the locket that must have been getting destroyed, this pain wasn't better now that she had experience. This was a new agony and new torture.

"Here, drink this!"

A foul tasting potion was poured gently between her screaming lips, burning her throat on the way down.

Her toes began to numb so she couldn't feel the pain, but she couldn't move them either. Then her calves, then thighs, all the way her torso and neck until only her head screamed, but it was enough eradicated that she felt the relief.

She opened her eyes. The bartender, Felix, was watching her with terrified eyes.

"What time is it?" she croaked. He handed her a glass of water and she drank appreciatively.

"Nearly two in the morning," he said after a moment. "You've been screaming for ab't twenty minutes, I'd say. Had to brew a quick paralyzing potion. It should wear off in a few minutes, I suppose."

She sunk her head into the pillow beneath her, her eyes closing with exhaustion she couldn't ignore.

"What the hell happened?"

She tried to reply, but all that came out was a strangled sigh.

"Chronic pain," she lied. "Magic can't cure everything, apparently."

"That wasn't chronic pain," he said fervently, "Me mum was a Muggle, and I'll tell you, she didn't scream like that when she was ill."

"Mine's different. I inherited it from my dad," she said, and she wasn't entirely lying.

"Unlucky mug," he mumbled to himself, shaking his head.

She needed to talk to Harry and Hermione. She needed to ask them what they had done.

"Can you hand me my bag?"

Felix nodded and scrambled around for her bag, and eventually emerged with it in his hand.

"You knocked it across the room while you was flailin' around," he told her. "Nearly impressed. You knocked it at that wall." He pointed all the way across the room to the opposite wall, a good distance from the one they were nearest to.

She gave a weak laugh and rifled through it.

"Jesus!"

She pulled her hand from it, and there was a long, bloody slice down her palm. Blood ran down her wrist to her forearm, and Felix immediately grabbed a rag from his pocket and gave it to her.

"Today just isn't your lucky day, I reckon?"

She laughed, but it caused her to give a throaty cough.

"No day is my day."

Inside her bag, the shards of the Communication Mirror littered the inside. A few were covered in her crimson blood, and like a prismatic crystal, the scarlet color bounced between the shards casing an infinite display of blood in each reflection.

Dumbledore's last gift to her when he was alive was ruined, stained in her blood. She paled, feeling sick.

"It's just a mirror, mate," said Felix. "I can lend you another if it means that much."

"No, it wasn't just a mirror," she said, though it was too quiet for him to hear.

She slapped the table beside her bed until she felt her wand.

She thought of the first night she had met Harry, the joyous dinner at Grimmauld Place a lifetime ago.

"Expecto Patronum."

Her Patronus, a snake, emerged from her wand and soared out of the window beside her.

"Christ, you can conjure a Patronus?" he said, his eyes trained on the spot where it was just a moment ago. "You're, like, eighteen!"

"I'm seventeen," she muttered, and with great strength she bit back a grunt and pulled herself to a sitting position.

He watched her with furrowed eyebrows.

"Your Patronus was a snake," he muttered. "What did you say your name was?"

"Belle," she said. It was the name she had given him when she rented the room.

"You got a last name?"

She didn't skip a beat.

"Wazlib."

He relaxed and nodded.

"You were a Slytherin, I suppose?"

"I didn't go to school."

"You didn't go to school?"

"I was home schooled," she said through gritted teeth. He took the hint and refrained from prying any more.

Something flew through the window. It was a Patronus that took the shape of an otter, and it soared into the room and onto the bed next to Diana.

It began to speak with the voice of Hermione Granger.

"Ginger's back. Sword found. Locket destroyed."

"Very vague, isn't it?"

Diana's heart sped, and she laughed a loud, victorious laugh.

"Ha!" she laughed in disbelief. "Merlin's pants, they did it!"

"What did they do?"

She turned to him, her eyes maniacal and her face stretched into a large smile.

"Saved the damn world," she told him, and her eyes glinted with a giddy-ness she hadn't felt in a very long time.

I'm sorry, I know this is really short, but since I published only yesterday this is just a little add on. Next up: Narcissa Malfoy.