Three: The Circle of Five
As I struggled to open my eyes, I found that a pair of red, beady ones was staring into mine. A whiskered, moist nose
between the eyes sniffed at my clammy skin in curiosity while I tried to swallow down the nausea and pain that
threatened to overwhelm me. The balding rat blinked, as if it was surprised I wasn't dead. I was surprised, too. As
I attempted to sit up, the rat scurried away into a crack inside the stone wall.
I didn't know how long I had been unconscious, but I figured that the graduation was already underway -
And then it all came back to me.
The screams, the black hoods, the blood - and the graduation robes. My heart leapt with one thought, which seemed impossible but at the same time so horribly real: what if whatever happened to me - call it a vision, call it luck, call it fate - would happen tonight? Why else would Lily, Alice, Remus, James, Peter, Sirius, and everyone be wearing graduation robes? Why else would I have collapsed for no reason?
"It's a warning," I breathed, wiping the sweat that was trickling over my face again. "But no, it can't be…how can it be?" Do you want to risk being wrong about something like this?
"I've got to do something," I murmured, more to convince myself than to play the hero.
Yet as I stared around in the barely lit corridor, surrounded by stone walls, my resolve shrunk.
"Wait, you're a witch," I reassured myself, nodding and digging my wand out of my soiled robes. "Seven years in a magical school should've taught you something…"
But all that my mind came up with were the awful images of my vision, the gruesome slaughter that might happen any minute…any second…. In my anguish I shouted, kicking the wall in front of me - and immediately regretting it as the pounding pain in my foot only added to the ache of my entire body.
"HELP!" I yelled, all my imaginary resolve and courage melting into despair. "ANYBODY, PLEASE, HELP!"
"You needn't scream so," a calm voice said behind me. "If I weren't already dead, you would've scared me to death."
I whipped around, clutching my wand with a trembling hand - only to face the Grey Lady, the Ravenclaw House ghost. She peered at me inquisitively, her sheer form floating through the darkness and settling in front of me.
"I could hear your screams from downstairs, but I thought it was Peeves who was attempting to make an end-of-the-year joke, as is his custom," the Grey Lady began, her placid, invisible face tilting to the left, "But I am glad it is you instead, Riona. I did not want to ruin the festivities with Peeves' shrieks of my torturing him."
"You have to help me," I gasped, "I'm lost - I need to get to the ceremony - something terrible is going to happen -"
"Shh," the Grey Lady remonstrated, holding up one thin finger. "The graduation has already started, so you are shamefully late, my dear -"
"I don't CARE!" I screamed, startling the ghost so much that she glided back a few paces in shock. "I NEED TO GET DOWN THERE, RIGHT NOW!"
"All right, all right, all you had to say was please," the Grey Lady sighed, placing an icy hand on my shoulder and guiding me down the musty corridor.
----
"Sirius Black!"
Flashing them a cheeky grin, Sirius jumped up, cracked his knuckles, and walked up to the platform to receive his diploma from a smiling Professor McGonagall. The rest of the Hogwarts professors, including Dumbledore, who was reading off the list of students' names, nodded or smiled back, while parents applauded politely - all except one stern looking man and pristinely dressed woman to Lily's left. They were sitting quite calmly, applauding with their fingers as they observed with frowns Sirius's leap off the stage once he received his diploma.
"Mr. and Mrs. Black seem lovely. Are they always so severe?" Lily whispered to James as they cheered for Sirius.
James curtly eyed the Blacks, who were sitting along a row of identically pale family members. "No, that's them being nice."
"Get an eyeful of this," Sirius whispered, sitting down and waving the elegantly wrapped parchment in his fist. "They're my free papers! I'm my own bloke! Nothing can stop me! I can finally become the man that everyone has tried to suppress in me for the last seven years -"
Arching his eyebrows, Remus, who was sitting between James and Sirius, snorted. "Oh yes, very manly you are. Say, Sirius, how are those hand-knit stockings holding up for you? You know, the pink fluffy ones you're wearing tonight because you consider them to be your lucky pair?"
Sirius scowled at him, but Remus deftly dodged the blow Sirius aimed at his head.
"I knew I shouldn't have shown you my lucky socks," Sirius muttered, trying to grapple Remus while Peter and James started laughing.
"If you four would calm down, we might be able to hear who's next," Alice hissed, leaning over Lily.
"They just called Ira Carney from Hufflepuff, so we still have a while," Frank said, forcing down a yawn as Remus tried to lift Sirius's pant leg to show James and Peter the hand-knit stockings.
"I'm just so nervous," Alice fretted, playing with a stray blonde curl. "And Riona is coming up next! Where is that girl?"
"Something must've happened to her," Lily replied, biting her lower lip. "This isn't like Riona. I know she hates attention, but she wouldn't have missed her graduation without telling us."
"Why don't you tell one of the ghosts?" Frank suggested. "They can probably find Riona."
But Lily shook her head, taking off her witch's hat and standing up while Dumbledore continued to call students' names and camera flashes went off in every direction. "No, I'm going up to the castle. Something might be wrong."
"I'm going with you," Alice added quickly, jumping up.
"What?" Frank asked in surprise. "We're in the middle of the ceremony - just ask a professor, I'm sure they can help -"
"No," Lily insisted, pushing Frank's legs out of the way. "I have a feeling that something happened to her, and I'm not just going to sit around and wait to see what it was."
"And where are you going?" James called after Lily, giving swift punches to Remus, Sirius, and Peter so they would stop their bickering.
Lily nodded up to the castle, and James stood up as well, stretching. "Good, I was getting bored sitting here."
"Sit down!" hissed a whiskered wizard behind them. "This is no time for lollying around!"
But Alice, James, and Lily ignored the old wizard's protests as they hastened away, keeping close to the towering trees so that no one else would interfere on their way to the school.
The crescent moon barely lit their way as wisps of thickening clouds began to hide it from view.
----
"This way, this way," the Grey Lady soothed, calmly floating down yet another set of steep side stairs despite my urgencies to hurry. It seemed like she had taken the longest route just to spite me. And then she added lightly, "It doesn't matter when you get there you know, since you're already shamefully late."
If she had a neck, I would've strangled her.
Once we reached the bottom of the staircase, I looked wildly around. The smallest sense of relief washed over me as I realized where I was - the third floor, next to my Necromancy class. I sped off to the left, my torn robes billowing behind me.
"A thank you would have been acceptable!" the Grey Lady called after me, her serene voice tinted with annoyance.
But I didn't care, for at the end of the hallway were the polished marble steps of the Grand Staircase. I almost tripped over the ends of my robes as I took the stairs three at a time, my lungs gasping for air. Please, oh please, let me not be too late…
----
"You know, I'm going to miss this school," James remarked, striding after Lily and Alice's hurrying forms under the night sky. "It's been like a second home to me. A jail, but a second home nevertheless -"
"Just help us look for Riona," Alice snapped, brushing away hair from her face as she surveyed the dim grounds. The cheers and light of the ceremony had grown faint, and she could barely see her own two hands in front of her.
"Oh, so that's why we're out here in the middle of nowhere," said James. "Does Riona fancy hiding in the dark or something?"
"Maybe she fell?" Lily suggested, lighting her wand and holding it up high. "Perhaps no one could hear her cries from here…"
"Do either of you know a kind of spell that makes the moon turn red?" James suddenly asked. His voice echoed from somewhere behind Lily and Alice, but the girls didn't bother to turn around.
Alice let out a sigh of frustration. "Look, if you came with us, you should spend your time in helping us instead of trying to make up some new prank - "
But Alice stopped short as James brought his lit wand to his face, which had gotten deathly pale. James continued, his voice steady. "Because if neither of you knew how to do it, and I sure didn't know how to do it, then who just turned the moon red?"
Lily and Alice followed the direction of his lit wand - and once he lifted it to the sky, they understood what he was raving about.
The moon was blood red, set against the inky sky amongst stars whose light was being extinguished by an invisible hand, one by one. It was as though someone had flicked off the lights, and the school grounds immediately had immediately fallen into impenetrable darkness. Not even their lit wands could spark enough light. Far off in the distance, they could see that the glowing illuminations that Dumbledore had conjured for the ceremony had been snuffed out as well, instantly followed by shouts of surprise and fear that burst into the cold night air. By the sound of it, turmoil had erupted.
In the dark Lily grabbed James's hand in her own, and then Alice's. "What's happening?" she whispered, almost too afraid to speak.
As if in answer, a strange rhythm - as in marching feet - began to drum over the grounds, louder than the confusion of the ceremony. The unearthly sound came from the Forbidden Forest.
-----
My ears tingled at the pounding march that was rising in volume by the second. I knew, without trying to remember, that it was the same foreboding sound from my vision. Trembling, the familiar sense of nausea and bile crept into my throat - but I walked out of the school's entrance. I don't know if it was either from shaking courage or curious cowardice, yet my feet led me to stand against one of the pillars the guarded the school's marble entrance - the pillar that held up a statue of Ravenclaw's flying eagle.
The sickest sense of déjà vu overcame me as I remembered the exact same perspective of the grounds, the same one I was looking at from this spot, in my dream. I raised a quivering hand to my mouth, shaking my head. As though I could will this all away, as though I could wake up from this as I had from the numerous nightmares of these past weeks. All the while, a part of me tried to deny the reality even as I watched it unfold.
My feet stood rooted in their spot as I watched five black hoods crawl from the depths of the Forbidden forest. Screams pierced the cold air, and a flurry of movement and noise scrambled at the center of the grounds, where I supposed the graduation ceremony was located. Flashes of green, red, and blue light illuminated the dark grounds - various glowing forms of corporeal patronuses flew left and right - shadowed shapeless figures fought blindly against each other -
"HELP, SOMEONE, PLEASE!"
My numbed mind woke up at the familiar voice, and I tried to light my wand to search for the source. But the darkness was too strong, and my small wand barely made a dint.
"LILY! ALICE!" I screamed back, forcing down tears. "ARE YOU THERE? TELL ME WHERE YOU ARE!"
"RIONA!" Lily shrieked, somewhere in front me. "RIONA, SOMETHING'S HAPPENED TO ALICE! JAMES AND I CAN'T -"
I ran down the small hill, stumbling in my haste, helplessly shouting, "STAY WHERE YOU ARE! STAY WHERE YOU ARE!"
-----
"Where the h.ell is James?" Sirius shouted, grabbing Remus, Peter and Frank by the arms amidst the wrangling bodies that pushed and pulled like hunted animals, trying to find their way in the dark. The steady marching had continued until it drummed in everyone's ears, along with spells that zoomed seemingly out of nowhere. The only way Sirius knew that he was holding his friends' arms was because the light of a random spell had briefly illuminated their faces.
"He left with Lily and Alice," Frank replied, almost stumbling over as someone slammed into his back. "They were going to look for Riona -"
"EVERYONE, PLEASE DO NOT MOVE!"
"Who's that?" Peter squeaked, jumping. "Who just said that?"
"Dumbledore, I think," Remus said over the din of human screaming. "Maybe he's trying to do something -"
A flash of white light bloomed into the night, encircling the graduation stage and the people that had not yet found a way to run. At the center stood Dumbledore, his faze ablaze, holding up his wand into the air.
Only with the circle of light were Remus, Sirius, Frank and Peter able to see the black hooded wizards standing now on the other side of the light, their wands held aloft with the intent to kill. They had stopped marching, now separated from their victims. Faceless and silent, they stood on the edge of the circle of white light, waiting.
Lifeless bodies were already strewn across the grounds amongst puddles of blood. And, to their revulsion, a decapitated head was lying next to Sirius's feet.
Dumbledore's spell had somehow calmed most of the guests, professors, and students, for their screams had faded away - only to be replaced by shock and anger as they all stared at the hooded strangers standing outside their protected circle. And yet the five strangers did nothing.
"What are you waiting for, Dumbledore? Kill them!"
"Who could they be?"
"Why are they just standing there?"
"They're not dementors, my patronus didn't work against them…"
"Be quiet!" Dumbledore commanded, striding through the crowd, his hat blown away and his silver beard and hair a mess. "They do not seem human. Do not make any attempt at contact."
"We….are not human," came a soft, unearthly hiss.
It took a moment for everyone to realize that the hiss had come from one of the hooded strangers.
"What do you want?" a witch asked, sobbing.
Dumbledore gazed expectantly as the strangers, his tall frame tense and alert.
"Swyn Llyfr," the five said in unison. "Swyn Llfyr."
Hesitating, Dumbledore asked, "And why?"
"We do not bow to anyone's will, especially a wizard's," croaked another of the five. "All we want is Swyn Llyfr."
"Who sent you?" Dumbledore demanded, his wand still held high to keep the circle of light. "Who sent you?"
"We do not bow to any wizard," they repeated in unison. "Now, prepare to die with your kind."
----
I lifted Alice up, her unconscious form heavy. "So are you sure you two are all right?"
"We're fine," James replied impatiently. "It seems like one of the spells flew over here and hit Alice on the back. But she's still breathing - now we have to go see what's happening down there."
"Let's go," Lily agreed, turning to head down to the screams and flashes of spells.
"Wait," I said quickly. "We can't. We're not prepared to fight what's down there."
"How do you know?" Lily demanded. "We may be all the help they can have right now."
"Why don't we alert the Ministry of Magic? The Aurors? They'll know what to do!" I insisted, flashes of my vision reappearing in my mind.
But James and Lily didn't have the same vision that I had, and they ignored my protests to run down the hill and toward the graduation stage. A spell of blinding white light suddenly blew into a protective circle around the stage, and James and Lily only hastened their pace.
"Wait! Don't go!" I shrieked, helplessly looking at their retreating forms and at Alice's comatose body in my arms. I hurried to set her against an oak tree, then hurried after James and Lily.
As I lifted my robes so that I could run better, the pulsating rhythm of before began to sound again, more threateningly. Sprinting across the grounds, I could faintly make out five black hoods standing at the edge of the circle of light, holding up their wands as they faced Dumbledore, who was standing in the middle of the tussling crowd.
"Swyn Llyfr is to be opened tonight!" the hooded strangers shouted into the dark, lifting up their wands and shattering the circle of light. Darkness settled over the grounds once more.
The hooded strangers stormed into the screaming multitudes, who were vainly trying to defend themselves. In the confusion I lost sight of Lily and James, and was immediately thrown into a rush of bodies that were heading for the castle as fast as humanly possible. But the strangers weren't human - I had known that since my vision - and they seemed to glide over the bleeding grounds, in pursuit of the fleeing wizards and witches.
I vainly tried to look over the horde of heads for someone I knew without falling down, but I found no one. Instead, I found myself facing the end of the crowd, which had already trampled past. One of the strangers was stalking toward me, and I could do nothing but stay still - it was as though it drew me towards it, unwillingly. And I knew that I had seen it somewhere before.
I didn't know what it was going to do, but what happened was something I had never expected.
The hooded stranger stood in front of me, its wand held high. But the faceless thing only looked at me, and I could not see anything but blackness inside the hood. No hands, no feet - they were clothed by the black robes.
"Swyn Llfyr," it hissed. It raised an arm to Hogwarts castle. "In there, it is hidden in there."
Then it scurried away, following the mass of frightened wizards and witches into the castle.
"Riona?"
But I stood staring after the figure, trying to understand what it meant.
"Riona, come here!"
A hand reached out to my shoulder, and I turned around dizzily. Remus's gray eyes looked at me in a mixture of relief and confusion.
"We were wondering where you were!" he said, shaking me by the shoulders gently. "Look, we're all here. Dumbledore has a plan."
"What?" I asked, feeling very cold all of a sudden as I looked back at the castle.
"Dumbledore has a plan to fight these….things," Lily said, coming up from behind Remus. I then noticed that we were standing on the eastern side of the castle, by the court yards, where there were crevices inside the stone walls big enough to hide in.
"We were beside Dumbledore when those things broke his protection barrier," Remus continued. "He told us that he would meet us here after he did something, he didn't say what, and then he would tell us how we can help."
"How'd you guys get here?" I asked.
"We found our way here after we left you," James replied, followed by Sirius, Frank, and Peter.
"Where's Alice?" asked Frank, staring at me.
"She's safe," I reassured him. "Now, tell me about this plan."
-->