Natsu Dragneel and the Goblet of Fire

Flesh, Blood and Bone

Natsu felt his feet slam into the ground; his injured leg gave way, and he fell forward; his hand let go of the Triwizard Cup at last. He raised his head.

"Where are we?" he said.

Simon shook his head. He got up, pulled Natsu to his feet, and they looked around. They had left the Hogwarts grounds completely; they had obviously traveled miles - perhaps hundreds of miles - for even the mountains surrounding the castle were gone. They were standing instead in a dark and overgrown graveyard; the black outline of a small church was visible beyond a large yew tree to their right. A hill rose above them to their left. Natsu could just make out the outline of a fine old house on the hillside.

Simon looked down at the Triwizard Cup and then up at Natsu.

"Did anyone tell you the cup was a Portkey?" he asked.

"Nope," said Natsu. He was looking around the graveyard. It was completely silent and slightly eerie. "Is this supposed to be part of the task?"

"I dunno," said Simon. He sounded slightly nervous. "Wands out, d'you reckon?"

"Yeah," said Natsu, glad that Simon had made the suggestion rather than him. They pulled out their wands. Natsu kept looking around him. He had, yet again, the strange feeling that they were being watched.

"Someone's coming," he said suddenly.

Squinting tensely through the darkness, they watched the figure drawing nearer, walking steadily toward them between the graves. Natsu couldn't make out a face, but from the way it was walking and holding its arms, he could tell that it was carrying something. Whoever it was, he was short, and wearing a hooded cloak pulled up over his head to obscure his face. And - several paces nearer, the gap between them closing all the time - Natsu saw that the thing in the person's arms looked like a baby... or was it merely a bundle of robes?

Natsu lowered his wand slightly and glanced sideways at Simon. Simon shot him a quizzical look. They both turned back to watch the approaching figure. It stopped beside a towering marble headstone, only six feet from them. For a second Natsu and Simon and the short figure simply looked at one another.

And then, without warning, Natsu's scar exploded with pain. It was agony such as he had never felt in all his life; his wand slipped from his fingers as he put his hands over his face; his knees buckled; he was on the ground and he could see nothing at all; his head was about to split open.

From far away, above his head, he heard a high, cold voice say, "Kill the spare."

A swishing noise and a second voice, which screeched the words to the night:

"Avada Kedavra!"

A blast of green light blazed through Natsu's eyelids, and he heard something heavy fall to the ground beside him; the pain in his scar reached such a pitch that he retched, and then it diminished; terrified of what he was about to see, he opened his stinging eyes.

Simon was lying spread-eagled on the ground beside him. He was dead.

For a second that contained an eternity, Natsu stared into Simon's face, at his open brown eyes, blank and expressionless as the windows of a deserted house, at his half-open mouth, which looked slightly surprised. And then, before Natsu's mind had accepted what he was seeing, before he could feel anything but numb disbelief, he felt himself being pulled to his feet.

The short man in the cloak had put down his bundle, lit his wand, and was dragging Natsu toward the marble headstone. Natsu saw the name upon it flickering in the wand light before he was forced around and slammed against it.