✓ | RECKLESS AND BRAVE | Draco Malfoy

46 | TEMERATE

TEMERATE
(v.) to break a bond or binding promise

TESSA HAD NEVER PICTURED OUT HER FIRST HEARTBREAK OVER A BOY TO BE ON HIS DEATH. He wasn't a lover nor was he even close to one — but Cedric Diggory was her friend.

The sobs were put to a sudden halt as a faint ringing buzzed in her ears. With a lurching step forward, Tessa dropped to her knees as she blindly reached for him. Her brother was there, still clenching his eyes shut with his forehead touching the ground. "C-Cedric?" She grasped his arm, the flesh marred with dirt and blood.

His skin was cold to the touch, the effects already beginning to settle in his body as Tessa let out a broken cry. Her vision blurred with tears as she fell forward in attempt to hold him and — apologize.

"Tess," someone was pinning her arms to the side and holding her away from him. "Tess, stop it."

She was still shaking her head in disbelief, a blubbering mess as she tried to fight her way to him. She should've known — she should've stopped him. "You promised," she whispered to his unmoving body. "You promised to come back."

"Harry! Harry!" a familiar voice called out and Tessa watched as Dumbledore seized her brother up.

He grasped onto the headmaster's wrist and whispered, "He's back. He's back. Voldemort."

     Just then, another person appeared and Cornelius Fudge joined their crowd. "What's going on? What's happened?" His eyes fell on Cedric's body as he gasped. "My God — Diggory! Dumbledore — he's dead!"

     It was as though those words brought a realization to everyone else as more echoes of his death proclaimed around the field. Tessa winced, her chest caving in on her as it felt more and more real. Without bothering to check who it was, she ripped herself away from who held her as she stumbled another step closer.

     "Harry, let go of him," Fudge said, trying to get Harry away from his body.

     Dumbledore tried to convince him as well, "Harry, you can't help him now. It's over. Let go."

     "He wanted me to bring him back," Harry muttered — it seemed important to explain this. "He wanted me to bring him back to his parents . . . "

     "That's right, Harry . . . just let go now . . . " Dumbledore bent down and firmly raised Harry to his feet.

     Harry looked up, a gaze akin to one of a lost puppy, and lurched forward to Tessa who wrapped her arms around him. "It's okay, I got you," she murmured, trying her best to soothe his quivering body. She squeezed her eyes shut, unable to imagine the horrors he had face.

You could've done something, a poisonous voice hissed at the back of her mind.

"He'll need to go to the hospital wing!" Fudge was saying loudly. "He's ill, he's injured — Dumbledore, Diggory's parents, they're here, they're in the stands . . . I'll take the Potters, Dumbledore, I'll take them —"

Dumbledore shook his head calmly, albeit a look of alertness in his eyes. "No, I would prefer —"

"Dumbledore, Amos Diggory's running . . . he's coming over . . . Don't you think you should tell him — before he sees — ?"

"Harry, stay with your sister —"

Tessa could barely hear herself think through the screams that echoed around her. All that grounded her to this world was the fact that she had to stay strong and hold Harry up.