musical mood: when I was older - billie eilish

Cass was certain she was in hell.

She had died, and she was in hell, because why else was her brother standing just feet away from her? Why were they the only two people in an endless black void?

In her hell, Barty was older, as if he hadn't died at just 19 years old. Instead, he looked like he had spent many more years in his tiny Azkaban cell, wasting away, yet ageing all the same. He was just skin and bones, a gaunt face, and a large scar ran under his eye, though the spark of insanity in his dark brown gaze never faded.

"Is that you, Cassiopeia?" He was the first to speak.

She nodded, and his befuddled expression swiftly reformed into a grin.

"Come here, sister." Barty beckoned her, his raspy voice echoing through the void.

Cass took a step towards him, not afraid in the slightest. What was there to fear? It wasn't like he could hurt her. She was dead, after all.

Barty put a coarse hand on her cheek, and she let him, despite her skin crawling at the contact. If this was how she was to spend eternity, she'd have to get used to it. His brown eyes pierced into hers, his hand forcing her face to the side, examining her like a doctor might to their patient.

She felt like pushing him away, but she didn't.

"You've grown up." He said after many moments of silence, not releasing his grip.

"So have you."

"You look like me."

"So I've heard."

"Are you not afraid of me?"

"Should I be?"

Barty tutted, running his thumb down her scar, slowly, as if absorbing every ounce of detail. Like an artist might study their subject.

"What are you doing?"

A small, passive smile crept onto his lips, one Cass found far more disturbing than his maniacal one. "Remembering."

Cass glanced around at the nothingness surrounding her, then back at her brother. If anyone touched her like this in real life, she'd have punched them, and had Barty appeared in her true reality, real and alive and just as insane, she probably would've killed herself. But here, for some reason, she didn't feel the urge to. Maybe that was a perk of being dead - she lost her hot-headedness.

Perhaps, she wasn't in hell after all, if her emotions were stable. Certainly not heaven, but it could be much worse. If she was in heaven, she would've met her mother, no doubt. If she was in hell, wouldn't there be flames surrounding her? Wouldn't she be suffering an eternity of torture?

"Is this purgatory?"

Barty shook his head, then began to laugh, a cold, chilling laugh that sent a shiver down her spine. "Oh, my dear sister. You think we're dead?"

"Am I not?" She frowned. Of course she was dead. She was speaking to a dead man, after all.

His brown eyes, identical to hers, flickered up, as if he heard something Cass hadn't. Turning back to her with an unusually sombre expression, and releasing her face, he winked. "I'll see you soon."

Cass woke with a start, her eyes bursting open and gasping desperately for breath. Her lungs couldn't seem to get enough of the sweet, precious air. Her chest heaving up and down as she sat up straight in her bed, every inch of her body burning from lack of use. She felt like she had been underwater for an eternity.

Frantically, she grabbed every bit of her body she could, squeezing and feeling and confirming that she was alive. She could feel her heart beat in her chest, the blood coursing through her veins, the air going through her lungs, like every part of her body was on alert.

Glancing around through the darkness of the night, it took her a minute to figure out where she was. She wasn't in her bed in Stromness, nor was she in her dorms...she was in the hospital wing.

Memories began to rush back to her, like a tidal wave. Her birthday, and subsequent suffocation in Myrtle's bathroom. The terror, not knowing what was happening. The feeling of her body shutting down, as she struggled for air. It setting in, in the end, that she was going to die. Or so she thought. Whatever had happened, by some miracle, hadn't killed her.

Not a single other person was in the hospital wing, occupying the other beds, or working a night shift, though there was a collection of stuff on her bedside table. She felt around for her wand, and cast a quick lumos when she found it between a chocolate frog and a singular rose in a vase.

The amount of gifts from various people nearly blew her away as the light made her able to see them all properly. There were so many - did she even know that many people?

Cass stood up slowly, ignoring the sensation of the cold tile floor on her bare feet, and the pain in her legs as she took a few gentle, shaky steps, her lit wand still firmly in her grip. Her head spun, and had to take short, concentrated steps, so she didn't fall over. Her delusional plan was to wander around the halls until she stumbled upon a Professor who could answer her questions, but she didn't have to, when the door to the hospital wing burst open, and a collection of wizards swarmed in.

McGonagall was at the front, holding the most authority despite being in her nightgown. Dumbledore followed, an unusual sombre look behind his half moon glasses. Madam Pomfrey was next to two stretchers that were magically suspended, stopping at empty beds, furthest away from the door. For some reason, the Gryffindor girl Hermione Granger was with them, tears rolling down her cheeks. She was talking, but Cass couldn't understand the words. They flew through one ear and out the other.

Cass attempted to peer over, to see who was in the stretchers that Granger was crying over, but the angle prevented her from doing so.

"Miss Crouch." Dumbledore turned to her with a gentle smile, stepping away from the stretchers as Pomfrey took care of them. "I expected you'd be awake, but surely it is not a good idea to be on your feet so soon."

Cass nearly dropped her wand out of shock, as Dumbledore approached her.

"Sit." He patted at the bed, before he sat down himself. She hesitantly joined him, casting a nox spell under her breath, picking at the scratchy white blanket with her fingers and ignoring his piercing gaze.

"What happened to them?" She motioned towards the two figures Pomfrey was rushing back and forth between. Her voice was raspy and raw, an octave deeper than usual, and ached from lack of use.

"Ah, that is long story, I'm sure you'll hear soon enough. Rest assured, Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley will be fine. Mr. Weasley being Ronald, of course." He added after seeing the panicked look on her face. She sighed in relief. Not that she cared an awful lot about Harry Potter or Ron Weasley, but if something happened to George or Fred...

"And...what happened to me? Do you know why..." Cass paused, closing her eyes, unsure how to finish her sentence. Her head was pounding, and somehow, all the words in the English language seemed to evaporate from her memory. She was tired, so tired.

Dumbledore tilted his head, studying her closely, as one might an abstract portrait in a museum, trying to dissect the meaning. "We don't know all the details, yet. The effects of the poison should've certainly killed you, and it's interesting that you woke almost at the exact moment he died..."

Cass had felt her conscious fading again, probably from exhaustion, but the words poison and died brought her right back, alert and confused.

Someone had poisoned her?! Someone was dead?!

"What?!" Was all she could manage to say, a crack in her hoarse voice, that ached and burned like she'd swallowed a flame.

Dumbledore opened his mouth to speak, somehow still as calm and placid as ever, but Pomfrey chose that exact moment to rush over, holding a large vial.

"Albus! What on earth are you doing?" She practically pushed him off the bed and onto his feet, and Cass bit her lip so she didn't laugh. Surely, this woman was the only person in all of Britain with the nerve to treat Albus Dumbledore like that. "Miss Crouch, it's absolutely wonderful to see you're awake, but you need to rest! Albus, you can interrogate this child later! Out!"

Part of Cass wanted to object, but when she saw Pomfrey handing her a Sleeping Drought, exhaustion hit her again, and she didn't hesitate to down the entire bottle in one sip, and enter a peaceful, dreamless sleep.

*

When she woke in the mid afternoon of the next day, Cass already felt more energised. Perhaps it was the sun shining through the window, or the abundance of people nearby, or her body aching far less than the night before. Maybe, it was just the good night's rest, due to the sleeping drought.

"She is awake!" A voice rang through her head as her eyes opened. Before she could even process what was happening, someone had their arms wrapped around her in a tight hug.

"Ana! Be gentle!" Someone - Padma, Cass thought, said from behind her, and Ana let go with an apologetic smile.

"Sorry."

Cass glanced around, pushing herself up into a sitting position. Merlin, there were so many people crowded around her, she was surprised Madam Pomfrey hadn't begun kicking them out yet. All of her dormmates plus Lavender and Parvati, of course, and also Terry and the Nott brothers, all crowded around her tiny bed.

"Here. Pomfrey said you need to drink a lot of water." Terry handed her a massive goblet, which Cass accepted gratefully, taking a massive sip.

"Good Merlin, Crouch, you scared the shit out of us." Bethany rolled her eyes, sitting down on the white blanket. "We were beginning to think you'd never wake up."

Cass frowned. If her bizarre dream about her brother was an accurate measurement of time, she couldn't have been unconscious for that long. Surely not long enough to cause worry from the ever-cold Bethany. "How long was I asleep?"

"Er...like three months?" Theodore said uncertainly, shifting his weight from foot to foot.

Cass spit out her drink, coughing.

"What?!" She wheezed, eyes bulging. That was impossible. How could she have been unconscious for three bloody months?! How much school had she missed? She'd have so much to catch up on! They had to be joking.

"Yeah, well today is June fifth, so...yeah, three months. You've missed a lot."

She gulped, glancing outside the window for the first time. What had been a cold and snowy landscape on her birthday, was now fields of green and sunshine, confirming what Theodore was saying. She truly had missed a lot.

"Merlin, we need to catch you up to speed." Lavender stroked Cass's hair, which she noticed was back to her normal brown colour.

"What happened to my hair? Didn't I dye it?" She frowned, her voice still deep and scratchy. Perhaps she had dreamed the entire thing up, now that she thought about it. It felt so real, but then again, so did the dream about Barty. Maybe she was going crazy.

"Oh, please. I fixed it ages ago." Lavender waved a hand nonchalantly. "If you were going to die, you would have to be a pretty corpse. I'd never forgive myself if you were buried ugly."

No one seemed to know how to respond to that.

The group began to explain to her everything that she'd missed over the past few months, which was far more eventful than she could've ever imagined.

Apparently, right after her coma, as Padma called it, a nonsensical rumour was spread that she had attempted suicide, though it was quickly quelled by the Weasley twins efforts. Cass reminded herself to thank them next time she saw them.

"Why would I do that?" Cass had asked, to which no one had an answer. Or if they did, they chose not to voice it, and instead continued informing her of everything that had transpired during her absence.

Quirrell was dead.

Her stomach clenched up at this. Something was off about the Professor, that was common knowledge as the year went by, but no one had wanted him dead, Cass least of all. Especially when she found out the majority of his actions weren't even his doing.

How much of it was facts, and how much were rumours was uncertain, but her friends claimed he was possessed by something. Some said he was under the imperius curse, or was being mind controlled by a Banshee. The most outlandish rumour, though, was that Voldemort himself had taken over his body using some terrifying and incredibly illegal form of magic. Only Harry Potter, the student who had fought him, knew for sure, and he was currently unconscious on the other side of the hospital wing.

Cass wasn't sure what to believe, but when she heard the word possession, she instantly knew The Voice was behind it. That was solidified when she was informed Quirrell was almost certainly the person who poisoned her with a Weedosoros potion, whatever that was. The running theory was that he made a slightly slower acting one, as to not alert anyone too soon, and somehow got it in one of her drinks that day.

"Honestly, it should have killed you." Ana bit her lip, Naia standing next to her, looking green. "They do not know how you survived."

Cass bit her lip, reminded of her odd conversation with Dumbledore the night prior. Sure, she was slightly delirious at the time, but if the timeline added up, she had woken up at nearly the same moment Quirrell had died. Perhaps that was part of the potion, or a mix up, on Quirrell's part. Otherwise, it didn't make much sense. She should be dead, after all, she could feel it deep in her bones, like a wound that had never healed. She wasn't supposed to be here.

When her friends left for dinner, biding her farewell, Cass had a look at the many gifts scattered on her bedside table. Most of them were from the same few people - she swore there were a dozen chocolate frogs left by Henry - which made her feel more grateful and guilty at the same time.

There were get well cards, some with long notes, and some with a simple signature at the end, like Bethany, Naia and Malfoy's. There was even a vase, with a few pink roses in full bloom from Cedric, which shocked her the most. Nothing from her father, which was to be expected, though she couldn't pretend it didn't sting.

An old, tattered book titled The History of Practical Jokes was placed under the flowers, with 'From Gred and Forge, get well soon Cassie!' scribbled on the inside cover. She picked it up with a gentle grin, and began reading. It felt nice to absorb herself into a book, and block out everything she had learned from the day. Though her immersion into pranking history was cut short, when the hospital wing's doors swung open, and in walked the person she had least expected to see.

"I heard you were awake." Percy said as he approached her, and Cass straightened her posture. Something about Percy made her want to be as sophisticated as possible, lest she seem inadequate. "I hope you're feeling better."

"Much, thanks." She gave him a small smile that Percy didn't reciprocate.

Instead, he placed down a heavy book onto her bed, his brown eyes piercing into hers with a sense of seriousness she had never seen before, even from him. "I finished the translation spell for this about a month ago. It was in Albanian."

She stared at him, dumfounded. Albanian?! That was random. No wonder she didn't recognize it. Of all the languages in the world...

Percy took a deep breath, clearly considering his words before speaking, his voice slow and thoughtful. "I don't know what happened, or how you got hold of this book, and honestly, I don't think I want to. But this is really dark magic, Cass, even from the little bits I've read. You ought to be more careful - I could've gone straight to Dumbledore with this, and you'd have been expelled."

Something clicked in her brain, so suddenly she almost jumped. That's why Quirrell did it. That's why he poisoned her. Because of this book - he knew she had it, of course he did. Whatever was in it, be it the book itself or all the unread letters and photographs, he didn't want to be seen, and if she went and told anyone, he'd be in massive shit. Maybe it was sensitive enough information on its own, that even her knowing was dangerous for him. She knew too much, and because of her inability to mind her own business, she had been poisoned and Quirrell was dead.

"Why didn't you?"

"I didn't want to get you in trouble. You're young. Besides...it didn't seem necessary. The entire school thought you were going to die. Just..." Percy took a deep breath, his gaze lowering. "Be careful. Alright?"

Cass nodded, partially grateful, and partially angry Percy would even suggest getting her expelled. Certainly, he figured out this wasn't her book! Why would she have a book on dark magic for personal use?

Instead, she pushed her furious feelings aside, and smiled again. "Thank you. Really."

"No problem." Percy nodded at her, before leaving the room, the book face down as Cass reached over to grab it, flipping through the pages. It didn't matter much now - the mystery was solved, for the most part. Quirrell was dead. But she was still curious about the contents, when was she not?

All the words were in English now - how Percy managed to do that, she had no idea, but she would be forever grateful for. There were various illustrations and diagrams, though she didn't pause to study them in detail. Instead, she flipped the heavy book onto its front, finally examining the title, and her heart dropped at the words.

Blood Magic