A Trail of Blood and Tears

A Trail of Blood and Tears

"Tag! You're it!" laughed Robert Weasley as he tagged his twin brother, Ron.

"Oh, you're gonna get it, Bobby!" Ron said, running after his twin. The sun was setting in the distance beyond Ottery St. Catchpole, and the two boys were having one last game of tag before turning in. Bobby started to run towards the woods. Ron followed.

"Haha, you'll never catch me!" Bobby called back as he dashed through the trees.

Ron, who was starting to get tired, stopped for a minute to catch his breath. Leaning against a tree, he watched the sun set and took a deep breath before yelling into the moonlit forest, "I'm coming after you, Bobby!" He darted between the trees for about five minutes, catcalling to his brother. It was then he started to get worried.

"Bobby?" he called, his voice a bit broken this time. "You can - you can come out now! I - I don't want to play anymore!" There was no answer. But, in the distance, Ron heard deep laughter and a pop. Terrified, Ron started to scream.

"Bobby? Bobby! Answer me!" he called, running to where he had heard the laughter. When he reached a clearing, he stopped dead in utter horror.

His brother, his beloved twin brother, whom he had been chasing around merrily just twenty minutes ago, lay covered with blood on the forest floor.

He was dead.

Ron wasn't sure how he knew it, but he did. He approached his twin's body with tears in his eyes. He took the bloody hand and looked into his brother's open eyes sadly.

"Bobby?" he whispered. There was no reply. Ron scooped up his brother, who had always been considerably smaller than he was, into his arms, and ran through the forest sobbing silently, leaving a trail of blood and tears behind him.

He burst into his house and yelled, "Mum! Mum! Come quick! It's Bobby!" Immediately an alarmed Mrs. Weasley appeared.

"Ron, dear, what is it? What ha - ha - happen - " Mrs. Weasley opened her mouth, closed it, and her eyes filled with tears.

"Ar - Ar - Arthur!" she sobbed. "Bobby - Bobby - he's - oh, Arthur!"

Mr. Weasley, who knew how his wife could be, dashed into the kitchen, Percy and the twins behind him. "Molly, what..." he trailed off. His eyes stopped on his son's dead body in Ron's arms. He shook violently as he took the corpse out of Ron's arms and placed it on the table. Percy, Fred, and George edged closer.

"Bobby?" Fred whispered, touching his brother's face.

"Gin - Ginny!" Mr. Weasley called hoarsely. "Charlie! Bill! Come into the kitchen, quick!" As the rest of the family stomped into the kitchen, Ron trembled.

"I - I found him like that," he whispered. "It was - in the woods... we were playing tag and - and he got ahead of me..."

Silence resounded throughout the kitchen. Mrs. Weasley took Ron in her arms and hid his eyes from the dead body, as though by doing this she would protect him.

Mr. Weasley gulped and took his dead son's hand. "I'll get you, Lucius Malfoy, if it's the last thing I do," he said in a throaty whisper.