https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75IHyAIKQms

{Season 1|EP. 5}

Musa felt her feet slam into the ground; her injured leg gave way, and she fell forward; her hand let go of the Triwizard Cup at last. She raised her head. "Where are we?" She asked.

Clover shook her head. She got up, pulled Musa to her feet, and they looked around.

They had left the maze grounds completely; they had obviously traveled miles - perhaps hundreds of miles - for even the mountains surrounding the maze 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. Musa could just make out the outline of a fine old house on the hillside.

Clover looked down at the Cup and then up at Musa.

"Did anyone tell you the cup was a portal opener?" she asked.

"Nope," said Musa. She was looking around the graveyard. It was completely silent and slightly eerie. "Is this supposed to be part of the test?"

"I dunno," said Clover. She sounded slightly nervous. "Wands out, d'you reckon?"

"Yeah," said Musa, glad that Clover had made the suggestion rather than her.

They pulled out their wands. Musa kept looking around her. She had, yet again, the strange feeling that they were being watched.

"Someone's coming," she said suddenly.

Squinting tensely through the darkness, they watched the figure drawing nearer, walking steadily toward them between the graves. Musa 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, she was short, and wearing a hooded cloak pulled up over her head to obscure her face. And - several paces nearer, the gap between them closing all the time - Musa saw that the thing in the person's arms looked like a baby. . . or was it merely a bundle of robes?

Musa lowered her wand slightly and glanced sideways at Clover. Clover shot her a quizzical look. They both turned back to watch the approaching figure.

It stopped beside a towering marble headstone, only six feet from them. For a second. Musa and Clover and the short figure simply looked at one another.

And then, without warning, Musa's scar on her head exploded with pain. It was agony such as she had never felt in all her life; her wand slipped from her fingers as she put her hands over his face; her knees buckled; she was on the ground and he could see nothing at all; her head was about to split open.

From far away, above her head, she heard a high, cold voice say, "Kill the spare."

A swishing noise and a second voice, which screeched the words to the night: "Jinx Kedavra!"

A blast of green light blazed through Musa's eyelids, and she heard something heavy fall to the ground beside her; the pain in her scar reached such a pitch that she retched, and then it diminished; terrified of what she was about to see, she opened her stinging eyes.

Clover was lying spread-eagled on the ground beside her. She was dead.

For a second that contained an eternity, Musa stared into Clover's face, at her open gray eyes, blank and expressionless as the windows of a deserted house, at her half-open mouth, which looked slightly surprised. And then, before Musa's mind had accepted what she was seeing before she could feel anything but numb disbelief, she felt herself being pulled to her feet.

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

TOM RICKER

The cloaked man was now conjuring tight cords around Musa, tying her from neck to ankles to the headstone. Musa could hear shallow, fast breathing from the depths of the hood; she struggled, and the man hit her with a hand that had a finger missing. And Musa realized who was under the hood. It was Luca. Musa's 2nd to the worst enemy she's ever faced. What was her beef with Luca? Who was the first? We'll find that out later.

"You!" she gasped.

But Luca, 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 Musa was bound so tightly to the headstone that she couldn't move an inch, Luca drew a length of some black material from the inside of his cloak and stuffed it roughly into Musa's mouth; then, without a word, he turned from Musa and hurried away. Musa couldn't make a sound, nor could she see where Luca had gone; she couldn't turn her head to see beyond the headstone; she could see only what was right in front of her.

Clover's body was lying some twenty feet away. Some way beyond her, glinting in the starlight, lay the Cup. Musa's wand was on the ground at Clover's feet. The bundle of robes that Musa had thought was a baby was close by, at the foot of the grave. It seemed to be stirring fretfully. Musa watched it, and his scar seared with pain again. . . and she suddenly knew that she didn't want to see what was in those robes. . . she didn't want that bundle opened. . . .

She could hear noises at his feet. She looked down and saw a giant snake slithering through the grass, circling the headstone where he was tied. Luca's fast, wheezy breathing was growing louder again. It sounded as though he was forcing something heavy across the ground. Then he came back within Musa's range of vision, and Musa saw him pushing a stone cauldron to the foot of the grave. It was full of what seemed to be water - Musa could hear it slopping around - and it was larger than any cauldron Musa 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 Luca was busying himself at the bottom of the cauldron with a wand. Suddenly there were crackling names 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 Luca tending the fire. The movements beneath the robes became more agitated. And Musa 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. "

"Now. . . " said the cold voice.

Luca pulled open the robes on the ground, revealing what was inside them, and Musa let out a yell that was strangled in the wad of material blocking her mouth.

It was as though Luca had flipped over a stone and revealed something ugly, slimy, and blind - but worse, a hundred times worse. The thing Luca had been carrying had the shape of a crouched human child, except that Musa 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 it's face - no child alive ever had a face like that - flat and snakelike, with gleaming red eyes.

The thing seemed almost helpless; it raised its thin arms, put them around Luca's neck, and Luca lifted it. As he did so, his hood fell back, and Musa saw the look of revulsion on Luca's weak, pale face in the firelight as he carried the creature to the rim of the cauldron. For one moment, Musa saw the evil, flat face illuminated by the sparks dancing on the surface of the potion. And then Luca lowered the creature into the cauldron; there was a hiss, and it vanished below the surface; Musa heard its frail body hit the bottom with a soft thud.

Let it drown, Musa thought, her scar burning almost past endurance, please. . . let it drown. . . .

Luca was speaking. 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 Musa's feet cracked. Horrified, Musa watched as a fine trickle of dust rose into the air at Luca'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 Luca 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.

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

Luca was gasping and moaning with agony. Not until Musa felt Luca's anguished breath on her face did she realize that Luca was right in front of her.

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

Musa could do nothing to prevent it, she was tied too tightly. . . . Squinting down, struggling hopelessly at the ropes binding her, she saw the shining silver dagger shaking in Luca 's remaining hand. He felt its point penetrate the crook of his right arm and blood seeping down the sleeve of his torn robes. Luca , still panting with pain, rumbled in his pocket for a glass vial and held it to Musa's cut, so that a dribble of blood fell into it.

He staggered back to the cauldron with Musa's blood. He poured it inside. The liquid within turned, instantly, a blinding white. Luca, 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. . . .

Let it have drowned. Musa thought, let it have gone wrong. . .

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 Musa, so that she couldn't see Luca or Clover or anything but vapor hanging in the air. . . . It's gone wrong, she thought. . . it's drowned . . . please. . . please let it be dead. . . .

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.

"Robe me," said the high, cold voice from behind the steam, and Luca, 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 Musa. . . and Musa stared back into the face that had haunted his nightmares for three years. Whiter than a skull, with wide, livid scarlet eyes and a nose that was flat as a snakes with slits for nostrils. . .

Lord Vladimir had risen again.