by Kristine
Celia’s eyes opened with a snap. Blearily, she thought back to her dream, trying to figure out what had awakened her. The pony had been jumping the fence when, CRACK, something had happened. Rubbing her eyes, she gazed out her window and gasped. Terrified and kicking to untangle her six-year-old legs from her blankets, Celia stumbled out of bed. She could just make out the sound of the television downstairs. Her parents must have stayed up late again. Tripping down the stairs, she just caught herself on the rail and hopped quickly down the last two on one foot as she held her banged toes.
Her parents looked up at the noise, concern evident on their faces. “Celia, sweetheart, what’s the matter? Did you have a bad dream?”
Celia hopped the rest of the way around the worn sofa, still holding her toes. “Mum! There’s something yucky outside in the sky!” Celia’s parents exchanged amused looks over her head as they lifted her to sit between them.
“Dumpling, it was probably just a bad dream,” her mother assured her kindly, stroking her hair. Then, with a shrewd look at her husband, “It was probably that McDougall boy worrying her again at the playground. He’s been telling her all sorts of frightening tales. I’ll be speaking to his mother about it first thing. Now, Celia, love,” she began, turning back down to her trembling daughter,” I’m sure…”
“No, Mum!” Celia burst out, tears creeping into her voice. “It wasn’t a dream! It’s outside my window and I want it to go away! Dad, can you make it go away?”
He gazed down into his daughter’s trusting, pleading eyes and gave her a comforting pat on the shoulder before hefting himself up from the sagging cushions.
Checking his watch as he padded to the door, he stifled a yawn and turned the bolt. It was unseasonably cold again this summer, and he was not anxious to step out into the stiff breeze that had been whipping branches against the window all day. When he had moved his family to the village of Ottery St. Catchpole two years earlier, he had been disappointed when the summers had turned out dismal and foggy. Today it had been downright blustery.
Muttering about unreliable weatherman, he swung the door open and braced himself against the gale pushing him back into the house. The little town was fast asleep, with only a spattering of lights in the valley. Then, he gasped in astonishment as his gaze rested on an image in the sky, floating over the northeastern side of the village.
“Margaret, come see this!” His wife hurried out the door as the wind caught at it, nearly ripping it from her hand. Apparently, his shout had aroused the neighbors as well, and a light snapped on in an upstairs room.
She looked in bewilderment around the yard, expecting to see some vagrant animal, then gaped in horror as her eyes lit upon the image in the sky. “Robert,” she shrieked. “I’ve seen that before!”
“What?” gasped Robert, staring now at his young wife.
“Yes. I have.” He watched as fear filled her face. Margaret felt terror rise up in her as she remembered… remembered her best friend sixteen years ago.
They must have been so small, playing dolls after Adelaide’s ninth birthday party. They hadn’t known they would never see each other again. They hadn’t known that three days later Margaret’s best friend Adelaide Bones and her whole family would be killed in what the police said was some bizarre chemical accident. Margaret’s family had moved a week later.
“My father thought it was for the best,” she murmured, unconsciously hugging herself against the wind.
“What, darling?” Robert continued to gaze with concern at his wife.
“Right before we moved, when I was ten,” she said, coming back to herself. “When Adelaide died. That image was over her house. Mum said it was some freak result of the chemical explosion that killed them, but…” She let the sentence die out as a screen slammed next door.
“Mr. Diggory!” Robert shouted to his neighbor, who seemed transfixed by the image as well. “Mr. Diggory! Amos!”
Amos Diggory jerked his head toward his young neighbors, realizing with a jolt that they were calling to him.
“Amos!” Robert yelled again. “Do you know what this is about?” Robert was surprised to see his normally jovial neighbor gaping at him with terror and dread on his face.
“INTO YOUR HOUSE, MAN! IF YOU CARE ABOUT YOUR FAMILY, GET INTO YOUR HOUSE!” With surprising agility for someone nearly the age of Robert’s own father, Amos leaped over the fence separating their yards and began ushering, almost shoving them back towards their house.
Too shocked to argue, they allowed themselves to be herded roughly through their door. “Don’t come out until you hear from me!” Robert and Margaret exchanged amazed looks as Diggory leapt off their porch and back over the fence.
“What can it mean, Robert?” Margaret gripped his arm, her eyes filled with fear. He had no answer for her.
There was a large CRACK and they rushed to look out the window. Diggory was gone.
Moments later, on the far side of the village of Ottery St. Catchpole, Amos Diggory was banging on the door of an oddly shaped house.
“WEASLEY!! ARTHUR WEASLEY!” He shouted desperately as he continued his assault on the door. A light flickered on inside as a bleary-eyed man with tousled red hair and cockeyed horn-rimmed glasses peered through a slit in the door.
“Amos? Is that you? It’s after midnight. Can’t this...”
“Arthur! They’ve been here, in the village! They must have gotten the Lovegoods or the Fawcetts, I couldn’t tell which!” He thrust open the door, wrenching Arthur Weasley out by his nightshirt, gesticulating wildly at the image in the sky: an image of an enormous skull with a snake slithering horribly out of its mouth.
“No…” breathed Arthur. “The Dark Mark.”