Walk the Shadows

he thought. Voldemort and his Death Eaters liked to use magic to play their games, to torture and eventually kill their prisoners. Through his curse scar, he'd watched enough of their meetings and the treatment of their prisoners to know. But Muggles would recognize the instruments. And it would make them afraid.

He had to admit to being scared himself, of torture by magic or Muggle devices or whatever. Though he knew he deserved to die, and that he had to, to fulfill the damned prophecy, he honestly didn't want to.

His breaths were still coming hard, each one seeming to pierce his chest. Ribs, he remembered. Probably broken. He could still taste blood in his mouth, and he wanted to spit it out, but in truth, he was too tired to turn his head. And he ached everywhere, especially at the point of his scar. Voldemort must be nearby.

So he swallowed the blood, and rested his head, waiting for the show to start. He didn't have to wait long.

When footsteps echoed outside his cell, he roused himself enough to roll onto his back and used his elbows to edge back towards the wall. The door opened inward and a cloaked figure stood framed in the space. He couldn't tell who it was at first, just squinted at them and remained silent.

'Looking a bit peaky, Potter,' a smooth, cultured voice said. Lucius Malfoy took one step into the cell and looked around it with disdain. His white hair hung loose, and Harry was just as glad he could not see the elder Malfoy's eyes; they always gave him the creeps. 'A pity, really, that your relatives left us so little to work with.'

Harry gathered the rest of his strength and levered himself to a sitting position. The wall was cold and damp against his back, but he barely noticed. One hand pressed to his aching diaphragm, he squinted at Malfoy again. 'Like I care,' he rasped.

'You will, Potter,' the Death Eater bit out. 'When the Dark Lord makes you scream.'

'Done that,' Harry told him, and had to stop to take a wheezing breath. 'Don't care.'

That seemed to take the wind out of Malfoy's sails, and Harry rewarded himself by letting his eyes drift closed. He must have dozed, for when he opened them again, the door to his cell was shut and Malfoy was gone. Good. One Death Eater down, only seventeen thousand to go.

The next visitor to his cell was not so accommodating. Harry was roused from sleep when the door scraped open and he heard a high pitched giggle that could belong to only one person, someone he hated more than anyone else in the world. 'Is widdle Potty feewing sad again?' Bellatrix crooned.

Harry tried to ignore her, but she crept into the cell like a darkling shadow. He blinked up at her when she poked his leg with the toe of her boot. As if about to convey a great secret, she leaned toward him, close enough that Harry could smell her breath, and whispered, 'Where did they go?'

Head lolling against the wall, Harry ran a dry tongue over his chapped lips and turned his face away.

'They were all gone,' Bellatrix chanted in a mocking sing-song. 'All gone, gone from home, leaving baby all alone.' She grabbed his chin and wrenched his face back to look at her. Her eyes sparkled with madness, and when she lowered her face to put them nose to nose, Harry thought bizarrely for a moment that she was going to kiss him. His stomach churned at the very idea. Instead, she went back to her crooning tone, 'They must've wuved you vewy, vewy much, baby Potter, to empty their house of everything except you.'

Startled, despite his private vow not to listen to anything Bellatrix said, ever, Harry's mouth opened of its own volition. 'What?'

Bellatrix shrieked a laugh, spraying Harry with spittle. She patted his cheek, like he was a good boy. 'Oh! They didn't even tell you! Your relatives, they moved out and left you behind to rot. Your house was empty!'

'No,' he whispered. They wouldn't have moved away without him. He knew they hated him, had always hated him, hated magic and anything to do with it, but they wouldn't have done that.

'Yes!' Bellatrix screeched. She flew around the cell like a creature possessed, arms outstretched as if she was a bird, laughing her mad laugh.

Harry closed his eyes again, willing her to leave. The Dursleys had moved away and left him for dead. It was true, had to be. They had voided the wards on the house, the ones Dumbledore was so protective of. How had the Death Eaters found him, otherwise? How had they gotten in?

'No, no, no,' Bellatrix said softly. She was back in front of him, crouched on her heels and swaying slightly to music only she could hear. Her fingertips slid down his cheek, almost gently, and he flinched. 'No more sleeping for the baby.'

When she reached for him, he batted her hand away, but it was useless. He knew that, yet he had to try. She hauled him to his feet as if he weighed nothing at all, and maybe he didn't. How long had the Dursleys been gone from 4 Privet Drive anyway? It took a few moments for him to catch his balance, and even then, he was so weak, she had to support him. With a hand on his arm, Bellatrix shoved him roughly for the door. He stumbled, and she half dragged him into the corridor. There, two more Death Eaters, these wearing masks, waited.

'The Dark Lord wants him now,' one of them said. Bellatrix pushed Harry at the pair, and one of them caught him before he fell. The man sighed in annoyance, but turned smartly and, with the other masked person, frog marched Harry down the hallway. They had to help him up some stairs and practically carried him the last hundred feet to a set of ornate double doors.

Though he'd barely put in any of the work of the journey, Harry's breaths were short and sounded wet. Behind them, Bellatrix kept up her soft singing, and it made the hair on Harry's neck rise to hear it.

'He's waaaai-tiiiing,' she sang, to no one, or everyone. 'For his special treat.'

The Death Eater who'd spoken earlier nodded, rapped heavily on the right hand door, and opened it without waiting for a response. Harry was propelled before them, into the middle of a huge room full of Death Eaters.

The pain in Harry's scar flared to an excruciating level, just as he caught sight of Voldemort, waiting on a throne at the far end of the room, like a king accepting supplicants. Harry had fallen to his knees, and the Death Eaters dragged him forward. He clutched at his head, clenching his jaws around a scream.

The crowd parted before them, making their trip to the throne rather quicker than it might have been. But Harry knew only pain, holding his head to keep it from splitting open. He barely noted when the two Death Eaters dropped him unceremoniously on the floor at the feet of Lord Voldemort.

TBC