Characters, settings, and story relating to the Harry Potter series of novels are copyright J. K. Rowling, along with Bloomsbury Publishing, et al. “Spirit of Fear” is not an officially published work, nor is it in any cooperation with J. K. Rowling or Bloomsbury Publishing. “Spirit of Fear” is entirely (with the exclusion of the aforementioned characters, settings, and story) a work by Thomas Holman.

--

Chapter Twenty-Six

Screams and Skulls

--

Chey rushed to Gabrielle’s room after seeing though a window the utter chaos which blanketed the campsite. He couldn’t explain why, but he sensed feelings of terror running through the people outside, and from the way he sensed these feelings, he knew their fear was justified.

He roused Gabrielle awake. Feeling time was of the essence, he picked her up, and she wrapped her arms around his neck. They ran out the door, immediately caught up in the swarm of people.

The screams of the crowd were deafening, and everyone seemed to be headed for the forest. Fleur grabbed Chey’s hand in an effort to avoid being separated.

With difficulty, Chey was finally able to find the cause. Opposite the tree line was a crowd of wizards, hooded and masked with wands in the air. Above them, four humanoid figures floated in midair, two of them looked like children.

Chey wanted to break it up, to put a stop to what they were doing, but something inside told him to get away. Something was trying its hardest to convince him he was incapable of providing help.

He stood in place amongst the crowd, torn between the need for escaping to safety and a desire to assist the helpless figures levitating above the crowd.

A tug at his hand reminded him that Fleur was by his side and Gabrielle in his arms, and he decided to flee was the wiser option.

They ran through the woods, constantly telling themselves not to look back. Faceless blurs of people were all around them, and each scream seemed to sap Chey’s strength. Finally, they breathlessly came to a stop deep in the woods, and mustered the courage to look back in the direction they came.

The screams of the crowd became subdued by the distance they had crossed. Chey slowly felt his feelings of helplessness fading.

To their right, they heard a voice. “Fleur!” A girl with thick, curly hair waved towards them, and they recognized her as a girl from Beauxbatons.

“Jacqueline!” Fleur called back, and they rushed over to meet her and the other Beauxbatons students.

“Where is Madame Maxime? We’ve been looking everywhere for her!”

“We didn’t really pay attention when we were running for our lives, Jacqueline.” Chey couldn’t help being short with the girl, who was never known to be the sharpest student in any of her classes.

“Well what are we going to do?” Jacqueline voiced rhetorically.

Chey searched the area desperately for an answer. Finally, he spotted a clearing where a pale light shone through the trees.

A tall, beautiful veela was surrounded by young wizards boasting about fictitious accomplishments. She seemed amused by their futile attempts to impress her. Chey decided if there was anyone fit enough to help them, it would be someone who shared a common trait. He handed Gabrielle off to Fleur and approached the woman.

“I pull down about a hundred sacks of Galleons a year!” shouted one of her admirers. “I’m a dragon killer for the Committee for the Disposal of Dangerous Creatures.”

“I’d break your nose out of spite if that was true,” Chey told him, angry that such government positions really existed. Remembering the frightened schoolchildren behind him, he reigned in his emotions and sent the wizards away with a wave of his illusionary wand. “I need a favor,” he said, turning to the woman.

“You’ve just scared off my admirers,” she responded, somewhat scorned. Now attempting to assault him with the veela charm, she said “I’m not in the mood to give favors.”

“My mother was quarter-veela, so don’t think you can charm your way out of my asking.” She seemed somewhat surprised, not so much at Chey’s heritage, but more that her charm had failed to sway him. “You’re an accomplished witch, are you not?”

“I am,” she declared, clearly offended by the thought she could be otherwise.

“I need you to watch those kids until their Headmistress finds them.”

“Why would I?”

“Because they’re scared, they’re alone, and I’m going back to the campsite to handle the situation.”

She looked at the students, and sympathy clouded her blue eyes. “All right.”

“You speak French?”

“Two years in Luxembourg, of course I do!”

“Good. What was your name?”

“Georgieva.”

“Chey. Follow me.”

He led her to the throng of students and introduced them, strictly telling them to stay with her until Maxime arrived. When they nodded in understanding, he turned to leave, but Fleur caught his shoulder.

“Where are you going?” she accused him.

“I’m going back to help. I’ll be right back.”

“How can I be sure?”

Chey wanted to tell her to just trust him, but he knew that would never be good enough for her. He knew she would never let him leave without knowing he would come back to her. “In the time we’ve known each other, have I ever promised you anything?”

She thought for a moment, and shook her head.

“That’s because I don’t make promises lightly,” he explained to her.

“Then promise me you’ll come back as soon as anything goes wrong.” She was firm, and Chey had never seen her so decided. He could tell there would be no arguing.

“A-alright.” Satisfied with his answer, she kissed him on the cheek, and he could smell a hint of her perfume, and she let him go.

The hurried escape into the woods from the chaos had disoriented Chey. This far away, people were no longer running in a single direction, and the lights from campfires failed to penetrate the trees. Remembering Fleur’s perfume, he transformed into a fox and took off, following her scent back to the campsite.

The closer to the tree line he came, the more panicked the atmosphere. Chey willed himself not to let himself be affected by the screams, though he was having difficulty shielding himself from them. Darting around people’s feet became more and more difficult as their cries seemed to pierce his very soul, and twice he was kicked hard in the side.

He’d finally reached the campsite, and changed back into himself. Immediately spotting the floating figures, he sprinted in their direction. After running around several tents, a few of which had been set ablaze by some curse or another, he finally had a clear view of the masked and hooded wizards causing the trouble.

“Expandra Estona!” he cried, and multiple stunning spells shot out of his wand and flew towards the troublemakers, each of the spells hitting a masked wizard square in the chest. “Finite!” and the bodies began to fall, stopping at the sound of “Arresto!”

A bright green flash lit up the sky behind him, and he turned around to see the clouds arranging to form a glowing skull with a snake slithering out of its mouth. Chey stared in shock of this spectral shape, while the masked wizards behind him disapparated from the scene.

“Get back here, you cowards!” a voice called into the night. “The whole lot of you haven’t a shred of pride in your work!” Limping into view, wand at the ready, was Alastor Moody, his face even more contorted with rage. Moody then took notice of the warlock still standing in the clearing, and spoke to him with what Chey could only guess was some sort of surprise. “Never seen the mark before?”

“To answer that,” he responded, “I’d have to know what mark you speak of.”

“The Dark Mark,” the old man said grimly.

“Not very original.”

“It’s the Dark Lord’s mark. Hasn’t been seen in over a decade. Popped up whenever there’d been a killin’ back in the days of the war.”

“And those losers were...”

“His supporters, Death Eaters.”

“Not an ounce of creative naming in this country, is there?”

“Don’t take them lightly, warlock! Many of them went free at the end.”

“You seem to take some form offense at your justice system’s failings.”

“Nothing I hate more than a Death Eater who went free.”

“Noted. Why run from the mark of their master, then?”

“They crossed him when they wriggled out of Azkaban. You’d run too.”

A dozen or so wizards Chey had not noticed before began tending to the victims, who he could now see were the campsite manager, Roberts, and his family.

“Recognize anyone, Mad-Eye?” said a wizard addressing Moody.

“Didn’t see any faces, Dawlish,” was the response.

“Who’s this?” said the wizard called Dawlish, now looking at Chey.

“Talented warlock,” Moody answered. “Cast a wide stunner at the blokes and stopped the muggles’ fall like it was nothing.”

“That was him? What’s your name, boy?”

“Chey McGonagall.”

“Any relation to Professor McGonagall?”

“Minerva’s my aunt.” Dawlish seemed impressed, and Chey was glad not to be recognized again by his six expulsions, though he was sure the man would make the connection sooner or later.

“What happened to those ladies you were with?” Moody asked, and with a pang of guilt Chey remembered Fleur and Gabrielle, still back in the woods.

“If you had no further questions, I was just about to return to them.”

Dawlish seemed to contemplate what to ask him, but decided against it.

“No, that’s fine,” he said, and Chey took off for Fleur without another word.

He found them by following Fleur’s scent yet again, and surprised the group of students by morping out of his fox shape in front of them. Maxime clearly had not found them, as Georgieva was still with them.

Catching sight of him, Fleur and Gabrielle rushed forward and hugged him as though he might be taken away should they ever let go.

Having somewhat pried himself away, he announced the trouble was over, and it was safe to return.

“But Maxime still doesn’t know where we are!” Jacqueline said, and the other students expressed similar concerns.

“So stick with me until then,” Chey offered, and they could devise no better option.

“I’ll come too,” Georgieva said, and Chey found no reason to object.

While leading them to his campsite, Chey filled them in on what had happened. They said they had seen a green flash in the sky through the trees, but could not make sense of it, and they were now frightened that the Dark Mark might signify its owner’s return.

Chey had lit another fire when they returned, and they spent several hours discussing the night’s events. Chey also cast a handful of Rocca Draconis spells, creating miniature rock dragons which patrolled the site’s perimeter. Gabrielle had fallen asleep in Fleur’s arms, and around them more and more people returned to their tents.

Finally, as dawn began to break, a student finally spotted Madame Maxime.

“Well, I guess I’d better go,” Georgieva said, and started down the path.

“Wait!” Chey called to her, and caught up after several yards. “Thanks for watching them.”

“It was no trouble at all. They were very delightful, and those boys have quite ambitious dreams.”

“Yeah...” Chey muttered, thinking they had fallen prey to the veela charm. “How can I repay you?”

“There’s no need.”

“I’m serious. I owe you one.”

She thought for a moment, glancing at the group of students. “The girl named Fleur. You two are close, aren’t you?”

“Pretty close, yeah.”

“Be good to her. That’s how you can repay me.” Without another word, she turned around and continued down the path.

Chey wondered what she could have meant. How could being good to Fleur be a repayment? After all, it wasn’t like she and Fleur knew each other. Perhaps she really wanted nothing, and just told him that to satisfy him. Or maybe she really cared about the two of them.

Either way, Chey could not be sure. If he knew anything about himself, it was that veela are hard to figure out.

He wandered back to join the others, where the students were explaining to Maxime where they had been. They must have mentioned Chey’s name, because a look of contempt was just barely visible on her face. Chey was glad the students found favor with him, otherwise Maxime might have expressed her dislike.

“Monsieur McGonagall,” she said monotonously.

“Madame Maxime, how have you been?” he replied, testing how she might react to his positive attitude.

“I have been well. Yourself?”

“You know, I’m doing pretty good. I have to thank you. That article you had published got me a lot of letters from old teachers and classmates. Really gave me a chance to reconnect with old acquaintances.”

“Nice to know,” she replied, still not having shown a shred of happiness to see him again. “What sort of coincidence could have brought you here?”

“Came here to watch a game, ended up fighting dark wizards. Nothing out of the ordinary.”

--

Author's note.

There's some video news. I have completed an Outlaw Star music video, "In Fate's Hands." There's a link on my profile.

Speculate away: Why do you think Chey was so affected by everyone's fleeing in terror?