Кассандра Клэр - Draco Veritas

"I'd rather die," said Ginny, but her voice was weak. She felt herself drowning in the plush embrace of his voice, the blue of his eyes. She imagined what it would be like to feel that way forever. It frightened her more that anything ever had.

"Never," said Tom. "You will never die, sweet Virginia. You will live forever, always at my side. You will be there to remind me of the flesh I arose from, even when the rest of the world has sunk to flame and ashes.

At the end of the universe, we will be together, and after it, together, we will rule the void."

He smiled at her like a light going out, and Ginny wanted to scream, but found she could make no sound. She held tightly to the frame of the mirror as he turned and walked away from her, the light gleaming along the silver braid on his cloak. The sound of a door opening came again -

although she could see nothing — and he vanished, without a backward glance towards her. Ginny's fingers let go their grip on the mirror and she sank soundlessly to the floor.

"Man," said Aidan Lynch, glancing around him. "Harry Potter has utterly trashed your flat, Vik."

"Don't call me Vik," said Viktor Krum, stomping irritably around the bedroom in a circle. His dark eyes took in its shambles: the closet torn open and ransacked, papers blowing around the floor in the cold draft from the open window. A blanket had been flung over the floor and was marked with the filthy prints of muddy boots. "If Harry survives whatever's happened to him, I shall certainly be sending him a large bill for damages."

"I'll give him one thing," Aidan said, lifting a coil of shredded rope off one bedpost. "Bloke knows how to party."

"So what's in here?" Sirius asked, ducking into the room. He looked haggard, his dark hair hanging around his tired face. "Any clues?"

Aidan stuffed the rope into his pocket and shrugged. "Nothing really.

Harry changed clothes, took some weapons. There's a burned stain from some liquid in the kitchen, but I don't know what it is. You find anything?"

Sirius shook his head. "Someone used the living room fireplace to communicate, but the ashes are too cold for me to tell anything specific."

He glanced at Viktor. "It was kind of you to offer Harry sanctuary," he said a bit more gently.

"It was Fleur who offered," said Viktor. "I agreed because she pressed me."

He surveyed the wreckage glumly. "My mother crocheted me that blanket," he said, bending to lift it off the floor.

He froze.

"What is it, Viktor?" Sirius asked, tensing.

"Blood," said Viktor, casting the blanket aside. The floor underneath it was stained dark with smeared, blackish blood. Aidan, kicking away papers, saw that a thick line of blood led towards the door.

"Someone was dragged," he said. "Someone bleeding — wounded — and then lifted — "

"Don't worry," Remus said, appearing in the doorframe. "It wasn't Harry or Draco." He looked at Sirius and shrugged wryly. "There's a dead body on the roof. And…"

"And what?" Sirius asked, still a little pale.

Remus sighed. "You'll see."

They trooped up the stairs, Viktor leading the way. It was almost sunset, the western sky over Prague streaked with rose and gold. The dead body was that of a man in black clothes, He lay with his back arched in a bow, his throat gaping wide open. All around him, a lake of blood spread across the roof tiles.

And there were thestrals.- five or six of them crowded around the dead body, dipping their muzzles into the blood. They looked up when the men arrived on the roof, whickering nervously.

"It's me," Remus said. "Even the horses of the dead don't care for wolves."

Viktor, looking grim, was staring at the body. "One of Voldemort's men," he said. "The thestrals, they are just vermin. Shall I chase them off?"

"I don't know what you're all on about," said Aidan plaintively.

"Lucky you," said Sirius. His eyes were haunted.

'"They're not 'just vermin,' " said Remus. Sweeping his cloak around himself, he slowly walked towards the thestrals. Two of them backed away, one taking to the air. He paused, murmured softly. Even more slowly, he approached the largest; of them. Bending, he spoke into its quivering ear. It whickered back, a thick, guttural unpleasant sound.

Remus straightened. "The boys left from the roof," he said. "They took a thestral and headed for a stronghold somewhere in the Romanian mountains. This one knows where it is, and will take us there, if we want to go."

Sirius' mouth was hanging open. "I didn't know you spoke thestral."

Remus smiled faintly. "I have mastered a number of dead languages."

"And yet your puns have not improved," said Sirius. He approached the thestral as well. Grabbing hold of its mane, he swung himself up on its back, then held out a hand to help Remus up as well. Remus clambered onto its back, and took hold of Sirius cloak to steady himself.

"Shall we follow you?" Viktor asked, eyeing a thestral with some distaste.

"No," said Sirius. "You two stay here and get hold of Dumbledore. Tell him where we're going. See what he can do about sending someone after us.

Hell, tell him to come himself. I have a feeling we're going to need all the help we can get. Viktor — thank you for your help."

Viktor nodded.

"And Aidan?"

Aidan raised his head. "Yes?"

"You're a prat," said Sirius. He dug his knee into the thestral's side, and it took off into the night sky.

"Hello, boys," Draco said, half to himself. "It's evil time."

They were standing on a ledge overlooking a shallow valley. The path dipped away steeply behind them, winding down the mountain through cruelly sharp rocks and slippery shale. The valley was ringed with mountains, their ice-covered tops lost in cloud.

In the bowl of the valley stood a fortress. Harry had been expecting something more ornamental, reminiscent of Hogwarts, with its lofty crenellated turrets. This structure had very clearly been built for defense: behind tall ramparts, its bulwarks and ravelins were of thick, roughly dressed stone; the only windows were narrow lancets high on each blank face; and a guard tower stood at each salient. Harry cocked an eyebrow.

"Impressive."

Draco indicated the fortress with a wave of one thin hand. "Ah, the memories," he said nostalgically. "I used to spend summers here as a boy.

When the servants misbehaved, the house gryphons used to carry them out to the distant mountains and drop them off the peaks. Once my mother's Pekingese was eaten by vampires. Those rosy-colored days of boyhood," he finished with an elegiac smile. "How soon they fade."

Harry scrubbed a filthy hand across his forehead. It came away even dirtier. "Nice summer place, Malfoy. Where'd you spend Christmas?

Mordor?"

"Disney World, actually, but the resemblance is stronger than you might think."

"If you say so." Harry peered into the swiftly darkening twilight. He could see guards patrolling at the base of the fortress, moving in steady black columns like ants. Fires burned atop the roof, sending black tendrils up into the dark blue air. Harry took another step forward, his boots crunching on shale — and something metallic. Surprised, he glanced down.

Something gold gleamed among the grayish shale.

He bent to pick it up. It was a cloak pin of intricate design, made of a brassy dark metal, badly dented. A dark red stone slept in the center of it, like a half-closed eye. With its intricate design he knew it instantly. "This is Ron's," he said.

Draco came to stand beside him. He had made the journey up the mountainside much more swiftly than Harry would have thought possible.

He looked tired now, but no worse than before; only the shadows under his eyes were slightly more blue. "That is Weasley's, isn't it?" he said. "I remember him wearing it around all the time. Always struck me as odd he'd wear a petrified basilisk eye as a bit of jewelry. More of a Slytherin thing to do."