Paradox, Part 1
Jul. 11th, 2005 09:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pandora_culpaParadox is the working title I have of a rather interesting (if I may say so) story surrounding Nymphadora Tonks and the events spawned by a fateful Quidditch match. It's one of the most puzzling plots I've had to deal with, which is really what makes it so compelling. Or so I think- but then again, I'm biased.
You decide. ;)
Title: Paradox
Dramatis Personae: Tonks, Dumbledore, McGonagall
Rating: Overall story is likely PG-13, or maybe R
Time Frame: Harry's seventh year at Hogwarts, amid a growing war
Squinting in the bright afternoon sunlight, Tonks hitched her cloak tighter around her shoulders even as a broad grin threatened to split her face. She arranged the bright red and gold scarf so that it hung prominently across her chest, then laughed aloud in sheer pleasure at being back at Hogwarts. It had been a long time since she’d managed to get time away from her job, much less had any opportunity to do something simply for the fun of it, but with the successful end of her stakeout of suspected artifact smugglers, she felt that she’d earned a little recreation.
It was Halloween, and Harry and his Gryffindor team were playing the Slytherins in a good old House match, and she had been terribly keen on the idea of watching it once Remus had mentioned it in passing at dinner. Not a terribly accomplished player herself, she still loved the raucous atmosphere of a good Quidditch match and was more than a little excited over the prospect of watching her old House stomp on its rival- because surely Harry wasn’t going to let his team be beaten even once this last year. And more than anything else, this match was a diversion from the deathly seriousness of her job as an Auror, and that made it worth the hassle of arranging time off.
Thoughts of the upcoming match soon merged with fond memories of exciting matches she’d witnessed during her own school days, when Charlie Weasley was the king of the Quidditch pitch, and with her mind thus occupied she soon found herself at the stands. There were already hundreds of students milling about, wearing House scarves and a variety of badges and buttons, and Tonks insinuated herself into the crowd with practiced ease. Grinning at a group of young girls who were staring at her with unabashed curiosity, she pressed up toward the top of the stands, where Albus Dumbledore had promised to save her a seat- best seat in the house, he’d said with a wink and a twinkle in his eye. It was obvious that he, too, was relishing the prospect of watching Harry secure the Quidditch House Cup for Gryffindor yet another year running.
The Headmaster was sitting with Minerva McGonagall as she finally made her way to the top of the stands, chatting pleasantly and sucking on some hard candy that he offered her as she took the reserved seat just below him. Minerva nodded a curt greeting to her, but quickly turned her attention back to Dumbledore and their discussion of Quidditch tactics while Tonks scanned the pitch with a professional eye as she waited for the game to begin. Day off or not, the habits of her occupation were hard to set aside. Finally satisfied that nothing was amiss, Tonks relaxed and let Dumbledore and McGonagall draw her into some inconsequential chit-chat until the players zoomed out of the locker rooms, rocketing over the pitch with lightning speed. Instantly, the stands were filled with a roar, rendering all conversation pointless; students cheered or jeered, teachers forgot decorum and stood up to shout for their team, and even the wind picked up and began to moan. The teams wheeled once over the pitch, red and green robes fluttering like pennants, before lining up for Madam Hooch to release the balls.
“I do wish Severus was a better sport,” McGonagall commented, her voice more smug than annoyed. “He won’t even give me a decent wager anymore.”
Tonks glanced over her shoulder at the prim old Transfiguration professor. “I thought that betting on Quidditch was discouraged,” she laughed. McGonagall shook her head, wisps of steel gray hair escaping her tight bun, and a gleam of mischief lit in her eyes.
“Only for the students,” she replied, giving the young Auror an uncharacteristic wink that made Tonks laugh harder than did her response. “I do believe that Severus has given up the fight so long as we have Potter on our House team.”
“The boy could have a career in the sport, should he decide to follow that path,” Dumbledore agreed, nodding sagely as his eyes followed the first mad dash for the Quaffle. “It’s a pity that he has so many greater worries than what his future profession may be.”
For a moment the old man looked so weary and sad that Tonks almost forgot the carefree atmosphere of the pitch; with a mere comment, he had driven back into her mind the specter of Voldemort, the very shadow she had wanted to escape if only for the afternoon. McGonagall’s face, too, had drained of some of her earlier exuberance, and now appeared pinched and dour. Giving them both a forced smile, Tonks pointed to the pitch where Harry circled well above the other players.
“Not today, he hasn’t,” she said, and Minerva flashed her a brief, appreciative smile. “The only worry he has today is that Gryffindor beats Slytherin by an impressive margin.”
“Well said,” the older witch agreed. Dumbledore nodded, but his eyes remained distracted as the Snitch was released, and the Quaffle and Bludgers sent into the air with an accompanying cheer from the stands.
“And Gryffindor takes the Quaffle right from the start; Weasley passing to Dawlish- just look at that girl fly! A great pick, fresh out of second year and showing great promise…”
The announcer chattered on, dropping bits of trivia about the players as he commentated the game, though Tonks quickly tuned out his narration. She didn’t know many of the players other than Harry and the Weasleys, so the asides held little interest to her, but she had listened in on enough of Charlie Weasley’s strategy meetings in the Gryffindor common room to have developed a keen eye for the game. Perching on the edge of her seat, she settled in happily to enjoy the game.
It was only about a half hour into the match that Tonks felt the first stirrings of intuition. It was like an itch between her shoulder blades, and for a moment she wasn’t quite certain what had distracted her from the game. But the more she tried to ascertain the source of her discomfort, the more it grew, until she suddenly realized what it was that she was feeling.
The Sense is what old Mad Eye Moody had termed the unsupported impressions that Aurors relied upon; that hunch that something just wasn’t right. It often made them seem paranoid to other folk, but they’d been taught to pay attention to that intuition, and it had saved lives on countless occasions. Once she had identified it, the Sense of danger plucked at her all the harder, goading her to some action though she had no idea what she ought to be doing. Glancing over at the two professors, Tonks saw that neither McGonagall nor Dumbledore seemed the slightest bit aware of anything amiss; the Headmaster was applauding a daring steal on the part of the Gryffindor Chasers, and McGonagall had raised a fist and was shouting that one of the Slytherin Beaters had fouled the her team’s Keeper. Scanning the crowd also exposed nothing that seemed out of place, and shaking her head, she tried to shift her attention back to the game.
But the Sense was not to be put off. It harried her, prickling along her spine and under her skin until she thought that she would scream. She fidgeted, tried to out-shout McGonagall, craned her neck until she thought it would cramp so that she could scan and rescan the pitch for trouble, and drummed her heels on the bleachers until a couple of students asked her to stop. Nothing she did alleviated the insistent thrumming in her brain. It wasn’t until the thought of leaving the stands crossed her mind that there was any relenting in the nagging anxiety.
Leave the stands; yes, I can do that, she thought to herself, springing to her feet. Maybe I’ll see something down there anyway…
Excusing herself the other two, Tonks slipped cautiously over to the aisle and began working her through the crowded stands. Instinct was driving her to the base of the stands, and she fretted that she couldn’t Apparate to the bottom instead of making such slow progress, all the while trying to ignore the compulsion beating at her brain, get to the ground, get to the ground… Gritting her teeth, she pressed her way down the steps, trying not to knock over any of the excited students in her haste.
If she had hoped that the itch would recede upon reaching the base of the stands, she was disappointed. If anything, the Sense redoubled, gnawing at her with rats’ teeth until she was ready to cry with frustration. Nothing seemed at all out of place; it was a standard House Quidditch match in one of the safest locations in all of Wizarding Britain. Students watched from their seats and cheered, or milled about on the ground between the base of the stands and the bathrooms, professors standing out amongst the milling masses like shepherds. All normal. All safe.
But the paranoia wouldn’t leave her. Pressing one hand to her forehead, she stumbled toward the fieldhouse, trying to gain a good vantage of the crowd and assuage her fears. The noises around her had become unnaturally loud and crisp, and a sudden roar from the spectators made her startle violently, leaping backward into a couple of Hufflepuff boys.
“Sorry,” she mumbled, eyes averted in embarrassment. The anxiety had swelled to a sick, vertiginous feeling, and Tonks pulled her wand from its sheath with a shaky fist. This had to be some kind of Dark Magic. Despite the serene appearance, something was afoot; something terrible, else she’d not feel this dizzying disconnection from the scene around her.
The realization made it easier for her to take a deep breath, and then another, quelling the heaving in her mind and steadying her stomach. Firm resolve took hold in its stead, and in seconds the Auror was scanning her surroundings with a cool analytical stare.
Wide-eyed children, awkward teens and children on the edge of adulthood, all clad in black, with trimmings of red, green, blue and yellow; they watched her pass with curiosity and some alarm. They’d grown up, these children, in the last few years of turmoil and with the Death Eaters rising once more. Pale faces, black robes, red and silver and bronze and yellow, scarves and hats and there, some pink hair…
Stop.
Wheeling about, Tonks shouldered roughly through the crowds, arrowing in on the spot near the edge of the pitch where she had sighted the anomaly. And who do we know with pink hair, hmm? I’ll smite that bastard for impersonating and framing me!
Pushing between surprised students, she had almost reached the place she’d seen herself when a startled din rose from the spectators. The sense of wrongness rose once more, making her stomach lurch and assaulting her with a stab of nausea behind her eyes; her knees nearly buckled as the world spun in her vision. Shouts and exclamations of surprise rose all around her, and Tonks forced herself to battle down the sickness that threatened to swamp her, hearing Moody in her ear instructing her to get moving, do something! There’s danger, and work to be done- move, girl!
She opened her eyes, following the fingers pointing to the sky and saw a curious formation of Quidditch players high above the pitch. There were both red and green robes in the tight group of players circling and swinging their arms frantically, and in an instant Tonks realized that they were all Beaters, wielding their clubs furiously. The two black bludgers darted amongst them, never seeming to leave the small box the Beaters had formed while the game had stalled below. Harry was watching the scene anxiously from his Firebolt high above, well out of harms way, and so Tonks turned her attention back to the other players and the complicated dance they were performing with the bludgers.
All at once, the vertigo returned; Tonks gasped aloud, hands flying to her forehead as she dropped to her knees with a heavy thump. Her stomach leaping, she swallowed hard against the pain in her head and the ache in her gut threatening to spill her lunch across the pitch. She could hear nearby students coming to her aid, could hear their queries, but their voices were thin and eclipsed by the cacophony shrieking wrong! wrong! wrong! in her head. This is wrong! You’re in the wrong place- go!
Helpful hands lifted her as she tried to balance, steadying her until she could stand on her own once more. Her head clearing somewhat as she moved, Tonks turned to thank her benefactors when a deep scream echoed across the pitch.
All eyes turned as one to the formation in the sky. The tight crowd had broken apart, and one boy was clinging precariously to the bottom of his broom as two dark streaks shot through the air like cannonballs, aiming directly for the stands. Tonks had never seen bludgers fly so fast; they had attained what was surely a lethal velocity as they tore straight for the unprotected spectators. Screaming something- she wasn’t sure what- Tonks shook off the students who were now clinging to her for support, but even as she raised her wand she knew she had no time in which to act.
She could only watch as the first bludger swooped low over the heads of the screaming students, the second following right behind, and both of them close enough to knock hats off of heads as they flew along their trajectory. Panic was spreading through the stands, children trying desperately to escape the menacing balls, and at the top of the stands Dumbledore and McGonagall rose, wands held out stiffly before them.
It was like a signal; the first bludger instantly shifted its course, streaking toward McGonagall’s head. She fired several bright yellow beams from her wand, but the black ball swerved and dodged as though it were alive, always returning to the course it had set for her. Even from the edge of the field, Tonks could see the Professor’s eyes widen as she realized her peril.
Suddenly Dumbledore was there, one arm flung out to push McGonagall down, onto the steps and out of the way. The first bludger swept past them both, whining as it sped just over her shoulders and missing the Headmaster’s arm by mere inches, whipping his robes wildly from the wind of its passage.
A great cheer went up, only to turn to a collective, horrified gasp as the second bludger, following its mate, struck Dumbledore squarely in the side of the head.
The impact made a sickly wet crack in the hush that filled the arena, and for a moment Dumbledore hung motionless, arms extended and head still flung back from the force of the hit. The next, he was tumbling over the side of the stands, plummeting more than forty feet to the ground as his limbs flapped mindlessly amid bright purple robes. Tonks never saw him hit, because by that time she was running full-out for the stands, the mysterious illness gone as quickly as it had come on.
However once she came within eyeshot of the old wizard, she slowed to a jog, then a walk. A new sickness had gripped her, this one all too familiar and terrible, and only the weight of her Auror training pressed her forward. Madame Pomfrey was already racing up the sidelines of the pitch, her skirts hiked well past her knees as dignity surrendered to urgency. But Tonks didn’t need the Mediwitch to assess the old man’s condition.
Dumbledore lay in a heap, his pointed hat askew across his face, arms and legs flung out in random, unnatural positions. He looked like a child’s toy, carelessly tossed aside, and Tonks had to blink back stinging tears as she knelt beside him.
“Sir?” she whispered, willing a response and trying her best to ignore the deep red stains that were slowly flooding the purple robes. Biting her lip, she lifted a trembling hand to push back his hat.
The entire right side of his face was ruined, crushed and raw from the bludger’s murderous blow. Blood made a gruesome mosaic of his cheek, and a gleam of white bone was visible through the rents in his skin. She drew in a horrified breath, and the Headmaster turned his head very slightly in her direction, his left eye focused on her face, and twinkling starlight blue one last time.
“Fate,” he murmured, and closed his eyes.
And died.
~*~*~
You decide. ;)
Title: Paradox
Dramatis Personae: Tonks, Dumbledore, McGonagall
Rating: Overall story is likely PG-13, or maybe R
Time Frame: Harry's seventh year at Hogwarts, amid a growing war
Squinting in the bright afternoon sunlight, Tonks hitched her cloak tighter around her shoulders even as a broad grin threatened to split her face. She arranged the bright red and gold scarf so that it hung prominently across her chest, then laughed aloud in sheer pleasure at being back at Hogwarts. It had been a long time since she’d managed to get time away from her job, much less had any opportunity to do something simply for the fun of it, but with the successful end of her stakeout of suspected artifact smugglers, she felt that she’d earned a little recreation.
It was Halloween, and Harry and his Gryffindor team were playing the Slytherins in a good old House match, and she had been terribly keen on the idea of watching it once Remus had mentioned it in passing at dinner. Not a terribly accomplished player herself, she still loved the raucous atmosphere of a good Quidditch match and was more than a little excited over the prospect of watching her old House stomp on its rival- because surely Harry wasn’t going to let his team be beaten even once this last year. And more than anything else, this match was a diversion from the deathly seriousness of her job as an Auror, and that made it worth the hassle of arranging time off.
Thoughts of the upcoming match soon merged with fond memories of exciting matches she’d witnessed during her own school days, when Charlie Weasley was the king of the Quidditch pitch, and with her mind thus occupied she soon found herself at the stands. There were already hundreds of students milling about, wearing House scarves and a variety of badges and buttons, and Tonks insinuated herself into the crowd with practiced ease. Grinning at a group of young girls who were staring at her with unabashed curiosity, she pressed up toward the top of the stands, where Albus Dumbledore had promised to save her a seat- best seat in the house, he’d said with a wink and a twinkle in his eye. It was obvious that he, too, was relishing the prospect of watching Harry secure the Quidditch House Cup for Gryffindor yet another year running.
The Headmaster was sitting with Minerva McGonagall as she finally made her way to the top of the stands, chatting pleasantly and sucking on some hard candy that he offered her as she took the reserved seat just below him. Minerva nodded a curt greeting to her, but quickly turned her attention back to Dumbledore and their discussion of Quidditch tactics while Tonks scanned the pitch with a professional eye as she waited for the game to begin. Day off or not, the habits of her occupation were hard to set aside. Finally satisfied that nothing was amiss, Tonks relaxed and let Dumbledore and McGonagall draw her into some inconsequential chit-chat until the players zoomed out of the locker rooms, rocketing over the pitch with lightning speed. Instantly, the stands were filled with a roar, rendering all conversation pointless; students cheered or jeered, teachers forgot decorum and stood up to shout for their team, and even the wind picked up and began to moan. The teams wheeled once over the pitch, red and green robes fluttering like pennants, before lining up for Madam Hooch to release the balls.
“I do wish Severus was a better sport,” McGonagall commented, her voice more smug than annoyed. “He won’t even give me a decent wager anymore.”
Tonks glanced over her shoulder at the prim old Transfiguration professor. “I thought that betting on Quidditch was discouraged,” she laughed. McGonagall shook her head, wisps of steel gray hair escaping her tight bun, and a gleam of mischief lit in her eyes.
“Only for the students,” she replied, giving the young Auror an uncharacteristic wink that made Tonks laugh harder than did her response. “I do believe that Severus has given up the fight so long as we have Potter on our House team.”
“The boy could have a career in the sport, should he decide to follow that path,” Dumbledore agreed, nodding sagely as his eyes followed the first mad dash for the Quaffle. “It’s a pity that he has so many greater worries than what his future profession may be.”
For a moment the old man looked so weary and sad that Tonks almost forgot the carefree atmosphere of the pitch; with a mere comment, he had driven back into her mind the specter of Voldemort, the very shadow she had wanted to escape if only for the afternoon. McGonagall’s face, too, had drained of some of her earlier exuberance, and now appeared pinched and dour. Giving them both a forced smile, Tonks pointed to the pitch where Harry circled well above the other players.
“Not today, he hasn’t,” she said, and Minerva flashed her a brief, appreciative smile. “The only worry he has today is that Gryffindor beats Slytherin by an impressive margin.”
“Well said,” the older witch agreed. Dumbledore nodded, but his eyes remained distracted as the Snitch was released, and the Quaffle and Bludgers sent into the air with an accompanying cheer from the stands.
“And Gryffindor takes the Quaffle right from the start; Weasley passing to Dawlish- just look at that girl fly! A great pick, fresh out of second year and showing great promise…”
The announcer chattered on, dropping bits of trivia about the players as he commentated the game, though Tonks quickly tuned out his narration. She didn’t know many of the players other than Harry and the Weasleys, so the asides held little interest to her, but she had listened in on enough of Charlie Weasley’s strategy meetings in the Gryffindor common room to have developed a keen eye for the game. Perching on the edge of her seat, she settled in happily to enjoy the game.
It was only about a half hour into the match that Tonks felt the first stirrings of intuition. It was like an itch between her shoulder blades, and for a moment she wasn’t quite certain what had distracted her from the game. But the more she tried to ascertain the source of her discomfort, the more it grew, until she suddenly realized what it was that she was feeling.
The Sense is what old Mad Eye Moody had termed the unsupported impressions that Aurors relied upon; that hunch that something just wasn’t right. It often made them seem paranoid to other folk, but they’d been taught to pay attention to that intuition, and it had saved lives on countless occasions. Once she had identified it, the Sense of danger plucked at her all the harder, goading her to some action though she had no idea what she ought to be doing. Glancing over at the two professors, Tonks saw that neither McGonagall nor Dumbledore seemed the slightest bit aware of anything amiss; the Headmaster was applauding a daring steal on the part of the Gryffindor Chasers, and McGonagall had raised a fist and was shouting that one of the Slytherin Beaters had fouled the her team’s Keeper. Scanning the crowd also exposed nothing that seemed out of place, and shaking her head, she tried to shift her attention back to the game.
But the Sense was not to be put off. It harried her, prickling along her spine and under her skin until she thought that she would scream. She fidgeted, tried to out-shout McGonagall, craned her neck until she thought it would cramp so that she could scan and rescan the pitch for trouble, and drummed her heels on the bleachers until a couple of students asked her to stop. Nothing she did alleviated the insistent thrumming in her brain. It wasn’t until the thought of leaving the stands crossed her mind that there was any relenting in the nagging anxiety.
Leave the stands; yes, I can do that, she thought to herself, springing to her feet. Maybe I’ll see something down there anyway…
Excusing herself the other two, Tonks slipped cautiously over to the aisle and began working her through the crowded stands. Instinct was driving her to the base of the stands, and she fretted that she couldn’t Apparate to the bottom instead of making such slow progress, all the while trying to ignore the compulsion beating at her brain, get to the ground, get to the ground… Gritting her teeth, she pressed her way down the steps, trying not to knock over any of the excited students in her haste.
If she had hoped that the itch would recede upon reaching the base of the stands, she was disappointed. If anything, the Sense redoubled, gnawing at her with rats’ teeth until she was ready to cry with frustration. Nothing seemed at all out of place; it was a standard House Quidditch match in one of the safest locations in all of Wizarding Britain. Students watched from their seats and cheered, or milled about on the ground between the base of the stands and the bathrooms, professors standing out amongst the milling masses like shepherds. All normal. All safe.
But the paranoia wouldn’t leave her. Pressing one hand to her forehead, she stumbled toward the fieldhouse, trying to gain a good vantage of the crowd and assuage her fears. The noises around her had become unnaturally loud and crisp, and a sudden roar from the spectators made her startle violently, leaping backward into a couple of Hufflepuff boys.
“Sorry,” she mumbled, eyes averted in embarrassment. The anxiety had swelled to a sick, vertiginous feeling, and Tonks pulled her wand from its sheath with a shaky fist. This had to be some kind of Dark Magic. Despite the serene appearance, something was afoot; something terrible, else she’d not feel this dizzying disconnection from the scene around her.
The realization made it easier for her to take a deep breath, and then another, quelling the heaving in her mind and steadying her stomach. Firm resolve took hold in its stead, and in seconds the Auror was scanning her surroundings with a cool analytical stare.
Wide-eyed children, awkward teens and children on the edge of adulthood, all clad in black, with trimmings of red, green, blue and yellow; they watched her pass with curiosity and some alarm. They’d grown up, these children, in the last few years of turmoil and with the Death Eaters rising once more. Pale faces, black robes, red and silver and bronze and yellow, scarves and hats and there, some pink hair…
Stop.
Wheeling about, Tonks shouldered roughly through the crowds, arrowing in on the spot near the edge of the pitch where she had sighted the anomaly. And who do we know with pink hair, hmm? I’ll smite that bastard for impersonating and framing me!
Pushing between surprised students, she had almost reached the place she’d seen herself when a startled din rose from the spectators. The sense of wrongness rose once more, making her stomach lurch and assaulting her with a stab of nausea behind her eyes; her knees nearly buckled as the world spun in her vision. Shouts and exclamations of surprise rose all around her, and Tonks forced herself to battle down the sickness that threatened to swamp her, hearing Moody in her ear instructing her to get moving, do something! There’s danger, and work to be done- move, girl!
She opened her eyes, following the fingers pointing to the sky and saw a curious formation of Quidditch players high above the pitch. There were both red and green robes in the tight group of players circling and swinging their arms frantically, and in an instant Tonks realized that they were all Beaters, wielding their clubs furiously. The two black bludgers darted amongst them, never seeming to leave the small box the Beaters had formed while the game had stalled below. Harry was watching the scene anxiously from his Firebolt high above, well out of harms way, and so Tonks turned her attention back to the other players and the complicated dance they were performing with the bludgers.
All at once, the vertigo returned; Tonks gasped aloud, hands flying to her forehead as she dropped to her knees with a heavy thump. Her stomach leaping, she swallowed hard against the pain in her head and the ache in her gut threatening to spill her lunch across the pitch. She could hear nearby students coming to her aid, could hear their queries, but their voices were thin and eclipsed by the cacophony shrieking wrong! wrong! wrong! in her head. This is wrong! You’re in the wrong place- go!
Helpful hands lifted her as she tried to balance, steadying her until she could stand on her own once more. Her head clearing somewhat as she moved, Tonks turned to thank her benefactors when a deep scream echoed across the pitch.
All eyes turned as one to the formation in the sky. The tight crowd had broken apart, and one boy was clinging precariously to the bottom of his broom as two dark streaks shot through the air like cannonballs, aiming directly for the stands. Tonks had never seen bludgers fly so fast; they had attained what was surely a lethal velocity as they tore straight for the unprotected spectators. Screaming something- she wasn’t sure what- Tonks shook off the students who were now clinging to her for support, but even as she raised her wand she knew she had no time in which to act.
She could only watch as the first bludger swooped low over the heads of the screaming students, the second following right behind, and both of them close enough to knock hats off of heads as they flew along their trajectory. Panic was spreading through the stands, children trying desperately to escape the menacing balls, and at the top of the stands Dumbledore and McGonagall rose, wands held out stiffly before them.
It was like a signal; the first bludger instantly shifted its course, streaking toward McGonagall’s head. She fired several bright yellow beams from her wand, but the black ball swerved and dodged as though it were alive, always returning to the course it had set for her. Even from the edge of the field, Tonks could see the Professor’s eyes widen as she realized her peril.
Suddenly Dumbledore was there, one arm flung out to push McGonagall down, onto the steps and out of the way. The first bludger swept past them both, whining as it sped just over her shoulders and missing the Headmaster’s arm by mere inches, whipping his robes wildly from the wind of its passage.
A great cheer went up, only to turn to a collective, horrified gasp as the second bludger, following its mate, struck Dumbledore squarely in the side of the head.
The impact made a sickly wet crack in the hush that filled the arena, and for a moment Dumbledore hung motionless, arms extended and head still flung back from the force of the hit. The next, he was tumbling over the side of the stands, plummeting more than forty feet to the ground as his limbs flapped mindlessly amid bright purple robes. Tonks never saw him hit, because by that time she was running full-out for the stands, the mysterious illness gone as quickly as it had come on.
However once she came within eyeshot of the old wizard, she slowed to a jog, then a walk. A new sickness had gripped her, this one all too familiar and terrible, and only the weight of her Auror training pressed her forward. Madame Pomfrey was already racing up the sidelines of the pitch, her skirts hiked well past her knees as dignity surrendered to urgency. But Tonks didn’t need the Mediwitch to assess the old man’s condition.
Dumbledore lay in a heap, his pointed hat askew across his face, arms and legs flung out in random, unnatural positions. He looked like a child’s toy, carelessly tossed aside, and Tonks had to blink back stinging tears as she knelt beside him.
“Sir?” she whispered, willing a response and trying her best to ignore the deep red stains that were slowly flooding the purple robes. Biting her lip, she lifted a trembling hand to push back his hat.
The entire right side of his face was ruined, crushed and raw from the bludger’s murderous blow. Blood made a gruesome mosaic of his cheek, and a gleam of white bone was visible through the rents in his skin. She drew in a horrified breath, and the Headmaster turned his head very slightly in her direction, his left eye focused on her face, and twinkling starlight blue one last time.
“Fate,” he murmured, and closed his eyes.
And died.
