My Father

My Father

There he was, laughing coldly, cruelly. It sent shivers down my spine. Not just mine -- everyone else seemed affected. It was horrible. The sound. The harsh, brutal laughter that was ringing through my ears. It was merciless, emotionless. It didn't care. It couldn't care. He couldn't care.

"Torture," he was saying. I tried to listen, but it was impossible. The vivid detail, the recollection of deaths… gruesome was the only word to describe his speech. I wanted out of here as soon as possible. I couldn't stand it. I had to go. I was feeling faint. My mind was chanting four words: blood, death, dying and killing. It was a train. It sounded like a train, the rhythm of the words.

Words. That's what I always thought they were. Stupid letters making up those stupid words. They didn't mean anything. At least, not back when I was an idiotic juvenile. Now they were real things. They were actions and symbols associated with this side. His side. His side with the blood and the deaths and the dying and the killing.

It was ruling over me. The words were circling round me. They were closing in on me. I was suffocating, drowning.

I fainted.

I fainted right there and then, in front of them and in front of him. He stopped. They all stopped. He stared. They all stared. All was quiet. He wasn't talking. They weren't shivering.

I stared at what was in front of me. Damp grass. No one had caught me. No one cared.

"Up," he said softly. I wish he had shouted at me. Father always said if he shouted, he was annoyed. If he spoke in soft, clipped tones, he was ready to pounce, and that death was looming.

I stood shakily, nervously. I never used to be nervous. I was a confident boy with a sharp tongue. They always said that confidence is ignorance, and if you're feeling cocky it means there's something you've forgotten. I wanted to forget everything just now. Make him perform a Memory Charm or something. If I survived this, I'd perform a Memory Charm. It wasn't like I was going to lose a great deal of happy memories. I'd be terrible against a Dementor. Never won the Quidditch Cup, never had the limelight in a good way, always the second-best student, always degraded because I'm a Slytherin.

Let him kill me. There would be no point in me living. I want to die.

I stared at his red eyes. The colour of blood. The colour of evil. The colour of danger. Blood, evil and danger were coming my way. I knew. He knew. The ones around us knew.

He was staring at me. His eyes were narrow slits. I actually felt sorry and respect for Potter. In this position, who wouldn't? His snake-like nose, his blood-coloured eyes, his pure-white skull.

He finally spoke, but it was not a word I wanted to hear. "Crucio," he whispered, wand pointing at my heart.

Pain. The worst pain I've ever experienced. It shot through me like lightning. I was being electrocuted, burned, frozen. I was being hacked into tiny pieces. I was being crushed, torn, ripped apart. I wasn't breathing. I couldn't breathe. He didn't stop it. He didn't want to. He was relishing the fact that I was being tortured. I knew he wanted to hurt me in the worst possible form. I caught that menacing glint in his eye.

He wanted my pale face to bleed, my hair to become matted, my clothes to be torn and ripped and covered in dirt. My eyes were to be twisted out, my limbs were to be covered in cuts and bruises, and my smirk was to be literally wiped from my face. All for his pleasure.

At last, he stopped. Air swam round my face. I closed my eyes in relief, breathing in the air that had been withdrawn from me. My heart was beating unnaturally fast. My fingers kept twitching. I wanted to say something, but I couldn't think of anything. I thought and thought. Then it came to me.

"My Father …" but I faltered. I couldn't continue. They were all watching me. Even he was watching me.

And so was my Father.