* * *

            ELARA LOOKED AROUND, BEWILDERED. she tried to move towards harry, but she was frozen in place. panic setting in, she began pushing and shoving her throwing herself forwards and backwards, but she could not move her bottom half. she tried shouting, but she could not make a sound. sensing she wasn't actually there, since harry and cedric had both already done a sweep of the place and they made no motion that acknowledged elara was there, she calmed down slightly.

            "where are we?" harry said.

            cedric shook his head. he got up, pulled harry to his feet, and they looked around.

            elara looked around as well. they had left the hogwarts grounds completely; they had obviously traveled miles — perhaps hundreds of miles — for even the mountains surrounding the castle were gone. they were standing instead in a dark and overgrown graveyard; the black outline of a small church was visible beyond a large yew tree to their right. a hill rose above them to their left. elara could just make out the outline of a fine old house on the hillside.

            cedric looked down at the triwizard cup and then up at harry. "did anyone tell you the cup was a portkey?" he asked.

            "nope," said harry. he was looking around the graveyard. it was completely silent and slightly eerie. "is this supposed to be part of the task?"

            "i dunno," said cedric. he sounded slightly nervous. "wands out, d'you reckon?"

            "yeah," said harry. 

            they pulled out their wands. although elara had a feeling she could not help the two boys, she pulled her wand out too. harry kept looking around him. elara had, yet again, the strange feeling that they were being watched.

            "someone's coming," harry said suddenly.

            squinting tensely through the darkness, elara watched the figure drawing nearer, walking steadily toward them between the graves. elara couldn't make out a face, but from the way it was walking and holding its arms, she could tell that it was carrying something. whoever it was, he was short, and wearing a hooded cloak pulled up over his head to obscure his face. and — several paces nearer, the gap between them closing all the time — elara saw that the thing in the person's arms looked like a baby . . . or was it merely a bundle of robes?

            elara, out of the corner of her eye, saw harry lowered his wand slightly and glance sideways at cedric. a wave of dread washed over elara. something was very, very wrong.

            it stopped beside a towering marble headstone, only six feet from them. for a second, harry and cedric and the short figure simply looked at one another, with elara observing.

            and then, harry began to groan in pain; his wand slipped from his fingers as he put his hands over his face; his knees buckled; he was on the ground.

            elara heard the siren call again. this time, the beautiful sound felt like it either miles away or it was echoing inside elara's head. she couldn't tell. shivers ran down her body as she watched the scene unfolding malevolently in front of her.

            a high, cold voice whispered something in a strangled sort of voice. "kill the spare."

            a bright green light shot out of the figure's wand and hit cedric, who went flying backwards. cedric was lying spread-eagled on the ground beside harry. he was dead.

            elara tried to scream, but nothing would come about. her attempts to let harry know that she was there were in vain. she could feel the nonexistent sound tearing her throat up, but she didn't care. someone had just killed cedric, and all her dreams were beginning to make sense. the death eaters, the dark mark, the goblet, harry's name being drawn, karkaroff's and snape's dark marks growing clearer...

            for a second that contained an eternity, elara stared at cedric's face, at his open gray eyes, blank and expressionless as the windows of a deserted house, at his half-open mouth, which looked slightly surprised. and then, before elara's mind had accepted what she was seeing, harry was being pulled to his feet.

            the cloaked man was dangerous. elara could feel it in her flesh, in her bones, and in her blood. his mal intent was ringing so loud in elara's ears that she had to cover them for relief.

            the short man in the cloak had put down his bundle, lit his wand, and was dragging harry toward the marble headstone. elara saw the name upon it flickering in the wandlight before harry was forced around and slammed against it.

TOM RIDDLE

            elara, again, tried making noises of protest. they fell on deaf ears as the cloaked man was now conjuring tight cords around harry, tying him from neck to ankles to the headstone. elara could hear shallow, fast breathing from the depths of the hood; harry struggled, and the man hit him — hit him with a hand that had a finger missing. harry and elara simultaneously realized who was under the hood. it was wormtail.

            "you!" harry gasped.

            although no noise came out of elara's mouth, she was screaming loud insults at the man that'd escaped from justice just a year ago. if elara could interfere, wormtail would be dead where stood.

            but wormtail, who had finished conjuring the ropes, did not reply; he was busy checking the tightness of the cords, his fingers trembling uncontrollably, fumbling over the knots. once sure that harry was bound so tightly to the headstone that he couldn't move an inch, wormtail drew a length of some black material from the inside of his cloak and stuffed it roughly into harry's mouth; then, without a word, he turned from harry and hurried away. harry couldn't make a sound, nor could he see where wormtail had gone; he couldn't turn his head to see beyond the headstone; he could see only what was right in front of him.

            elara was able to observe where he went. wormtail was struggling to drag a cauldron over. serves him right, she thought bitterly.

            cedric's body was lying some twenty feet away. some way beyond him, glinting in the starlight, lay the triwizard cup. harry's wand was on the ground at cedric's feet. the bundle of robes that elara had thought was a baby was close by, at the foot of the grave. it seemed to be stirring fretfully. both she and harry stared at it. harry winced as if in pain. elara heard the call again.

            elara looked down and saw a gigantic snake slithering through the grass, circling the headstone where harry was tied. nagini, she thought. more bitter words were filling her head. elara could hear something sloshing around, the stone cauldron was full of what seemed to be water — and it was larger than any cauldron elara had ever used; a great stone belly large enough for a full grown man to sit in.

            the thing inside the bundle of robes on the ground was stirring more persistently, as though it was trying to free itself. now wormtail was busying himself at the bottom of the cauldron with a wand. suddenly there were crackling flames beneath it. the large snake slithered away into the darkness.

            the liquid in the cauldron seemed to heat very fast. the surface began not only to bubble, but to send out fiery sparks, as though it were on fire. steam was thickening, blurring the outline of wormtail tending the fire. the movements beneath the robes became more agitated. and harry heard the high, cold voice again.

            "hurry!"

            the whole surface of the water was alight with sparks now. it might have been encrusted with diamonds.

            "it is ready, master."

            master? elara wondered to herself. the call sounded again, but this time, the call provided elara with an answer. voldemort.

            "now . . ." said the cold voice of fetus-voldemort.

            wormtail pulled open the robes on the ground, revealing what was inside them, and harry let out a yell that was strangled in the wad of material blocking his mouth. elara tried yelling again to no avail. 

            it was as though wormtail had flipped over a stone and revealed something ugly, slimy, and blind — but worse, a hundred times worse. the thing wormtail had been carrying had the shape of a crouched human child, except that elara had never seen anything less like a child. it was hairless and scaly-looking, a dark, raw, reddish black. its arms and legs were thin and feeble, and its face — no child alive ever had a face like that — flat and snakelike, with gleaming red eyes. voldemort was in a painful sorry state.

            voldemort was almost helpless; he raised his thin arms, put them around wormtail's neck, and wormtail lifted him. as he did so, his hood fell back, and elara saw the look of revulsion on wormtail's weak, pale face in the firelight as he carried fetus-voldemort to the rim of the cauldron. for one moment, elara saw the evil, flat face illuminated in the sparks dancing on the surface of the potion. and then wormtail lowered voldemort into the cauldron; there was a hiss, and it vanished below the surface; elara heard its frail body hit the bottom with a soft thud.

            elara's thoughts were darker than they ever had been before. she was plagued with every scream of every muggle, witch, and wizard that had ever been affected by voldemort's tyranny. elara screwed up her eyes shut, trying to drown out the soul-shaking noise.

            she was able to hear wormtail speaking over the screams. his voice shook; he seemed frightened beyond his wits. he raised his wand, closed his eyes, and spoke to the night.

            "bone of the father, unknowingly given, you will renew your son!"

            the surface of the grave at harry's feet cracked. horrified, elara watched as a fine trickle of dust rose into the air at wormtail's command and fell softly into the cauldron. the diamond surface of the water broke and hissed; it sent sparks in all directions and turned a vivid, poisonous-looking blue.

            and now wormtail was whimpering. he pulled a long, thin, shining silver dagger from inside his cloak. his voice broke into petrified sobs.

            "flesh — of the servant — w-willingly given — you will —revive — your master."

            he stretched his right hand out in front of him — the hand with the missing finger. he gripped the dagger very tightly in his left hand and swung it upward.

            elara realized what wormtail was about to do a second before it happened — he closed his eyes as tightly as he could, but he could not block the scream that pierced the night, that went through elara as though she had been stabbed with the dagger too. she heard something fall to the ground, heard wormtail's anguished panting, then a sickening splash, as something was dropped into the cauldron. elara couldn't stand to look . . . but the potion had turned a burning red; the light of it shone through elara's closed eyelids. . . .

            wormtail was gasping and moaning with agony. he had moved in front of harry, wheezing and whimpering.

            "b-blood of the enemy . . . forcibly taken . . . you will . . . resurrect your foe."

            harry could do nothing to prevent it, he was tied too tightly. . . . he struggling hopelessly at the ropes binding him. when elara saw the shining silver dagger shaking in wormtail's remaining hand, she began to fight so vehemently and determinately against her invisible bondage that she was able to move a slight inch forward. as she fought, elara sawthe knife's point penetrate the crook of harry's right arm and saw the blood seeping down the sleeve of his torn robes. elara fought harder. wormtail, still panting with pain, fumbled in his pocket for a glass vial and held it to harry's cut, so that a dribble of blood fell into it.

            he staggered back to the cauldron with harry's blood. he poured it inside. the liquid within turned, instantly, a blinding white. wormtail, his job done, dropped to his knees beside the cauldron, then slumped sideways and lay on the ground, cradling the bleeding stump of his arm, gasping and sobbing.

            the cauldron was simmering, sending its diamond sparks in all directions, so blindingly bright that it turned all else to velvety blackness. nothing happened. sensing what wormtail was trying to do, elara grew more desperate with each passing second. she had to protect harry, she had too.

            and then, suddenly, the sparks emanating from the cauldron were extinguished. a surge of white steam billowed thickly from the cauldron instead, obliterating everything in front of elara, so that she couldn't see harry or wormtail or cedric or anything but vapor hanging in the air. elara pleaded with whatever higher forces existed to let the fetus-voldemort have drowned.

            the call grew louder and louder again, the sound pounding into elara's very skull.

            but then, through the mist in front of her, she saw, with an icy surge of terror, the dark outline of a man, tall and skeletally thin, rising slowly from inside the cauldron.

            instead of being frozen in fear, elara fought harder against the invisible bondage. 

            "robe me," said the high, cold voice from behind the steam, and wormtail, sobbing and moaning, still cradling his mutilated arm, scrambled to pick up the black robes from the ground, got to his feet, reached up, and pulled them one-handed over his master's head.

            the thin man stepped out of the cauldron, staring at harry . . . and harry stared back into the face that had haunted his nightmares for years. whiter than a skull, with wide, livid scarlet eyes and a nose that was flat as a snake's with slits for nostrils . . .

            elara fell out of her invisible bondage, and lord voldemort had risen again.

* * *

AUTHORS NOTE

-- ahaha.....

JANUARY 22, 2020