Avada Kedavra!
A jet of green light flashed out of Harry’s wand, flying straight at a helpless Wormtail and hitting him in the chest. The little man was blasted through the air and landed on his back a few feet away, unmoving. Snape kept his expression unfathomable as he glanced over to see that Harry looked numbly horrified, Bellatrix had an expression of mingled pride and astonishment, and Voldemort simply looked as though Christmas had come early this year. All of this was dashed, though, as they heard a soft groan coming from the “corpse”.
Wormtail slowly sat up, his hands covering the lower part of his face for some reason. Harry breathed a sigh of relief, although he couldn’t quite understand why he hadn’t been able to do it, hoping that the Dark Lord wouldn’t punish him for failing. He cringed as Voldemort moved, but the snake-like man simply stalked past him to where Wormtail sat on the floor. The others in the room watched as Voldemort grabbed Wormtail’s arm and wrenched his hand away from his face, revealing…
A nosebleed. He had been trying to cover up the blood that was currently pouring from his nostrils. The Dark Lord released his hand, waving his wand and stemming the blood flow. As Pettigrew bowed in thanks, unable to say it, Voldemort walked over to where Harry still stood watching. “That was an excellent try, Harry. Many would have gotten no effect whatsoever from that spell on their first try. Quite remarkable,” he hissed, a strange gleam in his eyes.
“T-thank you, my lord,” Harry said uncertainly, wondering what was going to happen now.
“We never really gave you a demonstration, of course, which may have been why you weren’t as successful as we had hoped,” Voldemort continued, watching Harry carefully.
“Y-yes, my lord,” he replied, wondering where this was going. Before he had a chance to consider what was happening, he watched Voldemort point his wand at the rat-faced little man on the floor, hissing the Killing Curse. Wormtail didn’t have time to even think of escaping the curse and the room watched as it hit him in the chest, sending him careening into the wall and falling into a heap on the ground, clearly dead this time. Harry stared, gulping at the sight, as Voldemort put his wand away calmly and turned to face him again.
“That, Harry, is a perfectly executed curse. With a bit more experience, you will be able to do the same, as all of us can,” he addressed him before turning to Bellatrix and Snape. “It looks like it may be time for another assignment. We failed to retrieve the Prophecy, but no matter. There are other things that are of equal value elsewhere.” Both of the Death Eaters nodded, waiting for the rest. Voldemort walked over to his seat, waiting for the other three to come before him on one knee before speaking again.
Harry wasn’t quite sure what was meant by “prophecy”, but it was apparently important. Something in the back of his mind told him that it was something big, but he couldn’t place why.
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The doorbell rang at number twelve Grimmauld Place and the house was immediately filled with the shrieks and bellows of Mrs. Black. Remus and Tonks were able to subdue her while Molly Weasley opened the door, anxiously eyeing Snape as she invited him over the threshold.
“He isn’t here right now,” Remus said to the other man when they all went into the parlour. “Dumbledore said that he had to finish up some work at the school and that he would be back soon.” Just as he finished his statement, though, the one that they had been talking about suddenly appeared in the fireplace, stepping out into the room and brushing the soot off of his robes.
Looking solemnly at Snape, Dumbledore asked, “What’s going on now, Severus?” while gesturing for all of them to sit. Snape waited for a moment, gathering his thoughts before speaking.
“Potter was able to perform both the Imperius and Cruciatus curses almost perfectly. He had more trouble with the Killing Curse, as I had expected he would in the first place,” he continued, not giving Mrs. Weasley a chance to interrupt him. “The worst damage the boy was able to invoke was a nosebleed, though that is admittedly more than most would be able to do on their first try,” he added, speaking directly to the headmaster now.
Dumbledore merely nodded thoughtfully. “Very well. Is there anything else, Severus?” Snape nodded.
“Yes, sir. Peter Pettigrew is dead.” Remus perked up at this, waiting to hear more. “He was the one that the boy was to practise on. When he couldn’t kill him, the Dark Lord decided that it was time for a bit of a demonstration to give him the idea of what the curse could do. The rat has now been disposed of, so I won’t be able to get as much information as I was before.” The older professor sighed.
“That is unfortunate, but I suppose we should have expected it from the beginning; he was of little use in the first place. What else?” There was a slight pause before…
“The first raid is in two weeks.” The other three immediately had something to say, all of them asking questions about when, where, how, what was going to happen. Dumbledore silenced them with a wave of his hand.
“Where?”
“Gringotts,” Snape replied, his face still kept expressionless as the headmaster sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose wearily.
“That was not too far in coming. Do you ha”“
“He was adamant in not giving out any details until we are nearer to the raid. I know nothing for the moment.” By the look on both Molly’s and Remus’ faces, they could have quite happily strangled the potions master right at that very moment but were holding themselves back as best they could. “I can report in the day before to give you all of the information, but that is the best I can do for the moment,” he added, speaking mostly to Dumbledore, who nodded to him.
“Thank you, Severus. If that will be all, I suggest we take the rest of the evening to relax. We can try to form a plan from what we have tomorrow. After that… all we can do is wait, I suppose.” The room nodded nearly in unison.
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Right outside the parlour door, Ron and Ginny exchanged a look before moving quietly to the stairs to tell Hermione what they had heard.
I am so sorry that this took so long! With school, finals, the RP, and a few things at home, I haven’t really had the time to do much in the way of working on this story. But I have good news: I am back and ready for action! I deserve to be slapped with a few wet noodles for the wait, so I really am very sorry… It is a short chapter, but I hope to have a better one as the raid comes up and you see just what happens to Harry. Of course, I found it rather funny that most of you figured I would have Harry kill Wormtail! Come on; he’s Harry. He couldn’t do that even if he thought he wanted to! Oh and the nosebleed thing is from GoF, where Moody says that the students in the class could all say the incantation for the Killing Curse and not even give him a nosebleed.
Anyway, thanks for reading, sorry once again, and please drop a review! Over one hundred already! Thank you so much everyone!
~Miss Moony
Cruciatus Cursed by Moony 62442
Chapter Notes: Alright, so we have established the fact that I own nothing that you recognise to be JKR’s, so let’s just skip that part. This chapter has given me quite a bit of trouble, which is why I am finally writing it after a four month hiatus. I guess I was lucky I had the other chapters already done or you wouldn’t have seen much of this story lately! Without further ado, my friends, I give you chapter thirteen!