Prologue: Dark Times Ahead

Prologue: Dark Times Ahead

“For now we see through a glass, darkly.”

- I Corinthians 13:11

Montgomery Castle, Scottish Highlands 2200 hours local time

As it had been for centuries, Montgomery Castle was dark and abandoned that terrible night. For this was the night, Albus Dumbledore, one of the greatest sorcerers in Earth’s long history, had been murdered by one of his own. Throughout the gray stone battlements, ramparts, and the crumbling ruins of the buildings in which that population had lived, the only things moving were the rats and mice. However in the castle’s ancient keep, something wasstirring - two things actually. For in the ancient throne room, sat the dark-robed and hooded figure of Lord Voldemort, and coiled around the throne, was the green form of Voldemort’s pet snake and Horcrux, Nagini.

Voldemort waited for two reports: one from Draco Malfoy confirming that Dumbledore had been killed. The other was from the force he sent into the castle to aid Draco. Once the murder was accomplished, they were to slaughter the entire population of the castle.

A few minutes later, five Death Eaters Apparated just outside the castle walls. Three of them were Serverus Snape, Amycus, and Alecto. The fourth was a hard-faced man whom Snape had never met. The last was Draco Malfoy.

Snape looked at the group assembled before him, their grim faces shown with excitement in the soft light of the moon. Draco Malfoy was the only one among them who looked pale-faced and more than a little shaken; a direct result of the boy having been threatened with the death of his parents.

“All right,” Snape said roughly. “Let’s go! The Dark Lord waits for us.”

They followed Snape into a moss-covered outer gatehouse. Snape felt a kind of reverence for Voldemort who had left both gatehouses open so they could walk into his new domain. As they passed the decaying ruins of the buildings that had once housed the castle’s population - the armoury, the fletcher’s workshop, the squat ruins of the hovels once called home – Snape couldn’t help but contemplate the crime he had just committed in the name of the Dark Lord.

Snape was pleased with himself, for with Dumbledore dead and gone, he had eliminated a very real threat to the Dark Lord. And, depending on whether or not Harry Potter chose to fulfill his destiny, the Wizarding race would be purified, the Muggle governments would be swept aside, and Earth would pass into control of the Dark Lord.

Snape suffered pangs of guilt. After all, Dumbledore had provided Serverus with a home and a job when no one else was set to trust him for his prior activities as a servant of the Dark Lord. He cleared his head of this childishness, reasoning to himself that Dumbledore had to die.

As they moved into the vast stone keep, through the double doors that opened on command, Snape worried what the Dark Lord would think of Draco’s failure during the mission. How would he punish Draco’s childish lack of iron? How would he punish him, Snape, for radically exceeding his orders?

They approached a heavily gilded wooden door, which swung open to reveal the Dark Lord Voldemort sitting on a gilded throne, with that odd snake Nagini coiled at his feet.

Every Death Eater got down on their knees and bowed before the Dark Lord.

“Rise, Draco,” Voldemort intoned in a voice cruel with malice. Draco rose, his mouth trembling, his face growing even paler with obvious fear.

“Well, Draco,” Voldemort said in a high, cold voice, “Did you kill him, or not?”

Draco began to whimper, and then finally exploded into a cacophony of sobbing and wailing. Almost at the top of his voice he cried, “I’m sorry, my Lord! I tried to kill him but, but….” The rest of his words were drowned in whimpers and sobs.

Voldemort shouted, incensed, “You mean that he’s still alive?!” With no one daring to stop him, he whipped his wand out of the black folds of his cloak, pointed it straight at Malfoy and shouted “Crucio!” Malfoy immediately collapsed to the floor, screaming uncontrollably and trembling in excruciating pain.

Finally, after a few minutes, Snape had enough. He stood up and said, as obsequiously as possible, “With respect, my Lord, he is dead.”

This surprised the Dark Lord, who lowered his wand. As Draco stopped writhing, Voldemort looked straight at Snape and asked, “Is this true, Snape?”

“Yes,” Snape said, crashing back to the floor as quickly as possible.

“It was Draco’s job to destroy him, to prove his mettle,” Voldemort said dangerously..

“The boy couldn’t do it, my Lord.” Snape said. “So I, your most humble servant, knowing the boy’s mission, did it for him.”

“How did you know it was the boy’s job to kill Dumbledore?! You weren’t supposed to know! Speak… or die!”

He told the Dark Lord, everything; how he had sworn the Unbreakable Vow to Draco’s mother, that he had been trying to help Draco the whole last year, everything.

After a few minutes, Voldemort laughed coldly and said, “You have done well, my servant.” His gaze then turned to Draco, and his voice grew steely and his gaze hard, and said. “You, however, still failed me. You and your family will be made to suffer!” He raised his wand and was about to utter the Cruciatus Curse again when Draco shouted, his eyes full of tears and his body quivering with fear, “Please, my Lord, I have information for you, information on Harry.”

The Dark Lord lowered his wand and said, quietly, “Do you, now? Tell me and I might let you live.”

“Harry is having a romance with that Weasley whore Ginny,” Malfoy said.

Voldemort’s laugh echoed through the whole chamber. He lowered his wand and said, “Tell me, Draco, tell me everything you know about their relationship, and you and your family will live.”

Draco told him everything he knew about Harry and Ginny. When he was done, the Dark Lord sat there. Snape knew immediately that Voldemort knew everything he needed to destroy Harry and everything he ever loved. Snape also knew that Voldemort was already dreaming of a time when Harry and his allies were ashes at the feet of his Dark Order that, unless it was stopped, and soon, would destroy the world.

A/N: This quote taken from the King James version of the Bible