Uncharted

I can’t handle half of my soul being in Flint. I really can’t. I should have picked death.

Oh good God. Half of his soul is in me.

FQKELUZPEAPLASDNWOP

I hate my life.

Especially since Lockhart has organized a duel to start off the year. Even though school has been in for almost two and a half months now. But hey, it passes the time, which is why Lilly and I went. I met up with Sage and stood with her and her fellow Ravenclaws while Lilly hung around a few other Slytherins. Once Lockhart became bored with demeaning Snape he announced that he needed two volunteers. Draco and Harry ended up being the two; I smiled and waved at Harry. Harry nervously waved back at me; Draco saw this and glared at him, so Sage and I rolled our eyes and suppressed our laughter. That kid must really think he has a serious chance. They dueled for a little bit, but since they’re only in the beginnings of their Second Year their skills were mediocre at best.

Snape ended up calling up Flint to be Draco’s back up. Before Snape could pick someone completely incompetent for Harry, Harry half squeaked, half shouted for me. I quickly made my way to the front and onto the table. I stood to Harry’s right and looked at Snape while he said, “This will be… interesting.”

Flint scoffed and I gulped. We tried this once before. I will never forget the pain and the terror.

I don’t have the heart to do it again. But then Flint looked absolutely evil and whispered something to Draco, who laughed, so I looked down at Harry and said almost inaudibly, “Dive out of the way the second we start up.”

Harry’s eyes widened into an impossibly large size, but he gulped and nodded anyway. Lockhart pointed his wand toward the ceiling and shot a green firework to signal the start. Harry was frozen with shock as Flint and Draco shot a yellow ray of light – the body-binding jinx – that combined into a huge ball of light. Separately the jinx would have just left us immobile, but a combined jinx like this could very well bind our hearts, essentially stopping them. Harry was frozen, so I blasted enough air at him to send him into the crowd. I drew my wand and did a fast circle on the balls of my feet to create a shield. Their jinxes exploded against my shield; their moment of frustration was my moment to take them down. I blew Draco off the table and into the crowd and then started to shoot jinxes and hexes at Flint.

Flint blocked them all and smirked again.

I gulped.

He saw my hesitation, my fear, and used that split second to disarm me.

I didn’t even flinch. I knew he would. I knew he’d make me do this again.

He slowly walked up to me and slowly brought his wand up to my throat. Snape cleared his throat to get Flint’s attention, but everyone was too focused on Flint to care to enforce Snape. Flint pressed the tip of his wand from my throat and up to the center of the bottom of my chin. I clenched my jaws while he whispered, “Opposite of last time, ehy?”

I gulped and barely choked out, “I don’t want to do it again. I didn’t want it the first time.”

The smell of burnt flesh, the sound of a soul-shattering cry, and the sight of nothing but fire filled my mind. Everything was rushing back to me. Everything I did my best to forget, to pretend was just a terrible nightmare all came back and slammed around the walls of my mind until they almost cracked. My hands ached as if they were already holding forest-clearing flames.

I couldn’t help my tears.

He sneered at me.

I whispered, “I never meant to hurt you. I didn’t know what was happening. I couldn’t stop anything.”

Rage swirled out of his heart and transformed into a roar, “THAT’S WHY MUDBLOODS SHOULDN’T BE TRUSTED WITH MAGIC!”

I slammed his hand down and away from my throat just in time to see a blinding red light erupt from the tip of his wand. He dropped his wand, so I pushed him backward. We started to physically fight, but we didn’t really hit each other, just kick around one another. I finally blasted him down with a strong breeze and locked his legs down by straddling him just about the knees. I held his throat in my left hand and tore open his shirt with the other. I hovered my right hand above the large burn mark from the accident in First Year. I whispered while fighting back some tears, “I can fix this if you’ll just trust me.”

He glared at me and spat, “Why should I? So you can pretend you’re stable and capable?”

I glared at him, but then drew in a deep breath and whispered, “Stop hating me, Marcus. We were practicing dueling. I didn’t know what was happening. I was filled with adrenaline and you were shooting strong blasts of water.”

His glare didn’t soften, so I didn’t try talking anymore. I mumbled a spell to chain his wrists down to the table while I sat up straight and calmed my entire body. I blocked out all outside sounds and focused completely on my hands and Marcus’ burn scar. The shape of the flame perfectly etched his otherwise smooth torso. At first I just rubbed water back and forth against the old burn, but it soon started to absorb into him. He wiggled around from the odd sensation, but thrashed around as the water became literal liquid magic. I pressed my hands as hard as possible into him; he screamed and shouted out, “What the hell are you doing to me?”

I gulped and shouted back, “JUST TRUST ME!”

Harry jumped back on the table so he could rush over and help me. Draco jumped up and shot some sort of serpent at him. Harry started to rush something out, catching the attention of the crowd for the short moment before Snape got rid of it and shouted at them to get off of the table. Snape told every to back up while Marcus screamed, “YOU CRAZY IDIOT!”

I rolled my eyes and ignored his comments, but he kept thrashing and screaming from the pain, but I continued regardless. Lockhart shouted at me to stop hurting Marcus and started to stomp toward us, but Snape blasted him into a near by wall while shouting, “YOU INCOMPETENT FOOL! SHE’S HEALING HIM! BREAK THEM APART NOW AND THEY’LL BOTH DIE!”

Lockhart and Snape viscously dueled while my magic stopped being absorbed into him; the deeper tissues were healed, so they started to evaporate to the surface to fix them from the bottom up. Marcus thrashed so hard that I almost rocketed off of him, but I squeezed his legs with mine in order to stay on top of him. I screamed from the painful sensations shooting out of every pore of my body. Bright blue light wrapped around my entire like a thousand little ribbons and made their way down to Marcus; they wrapped around him, too, making us connected to each other. Both of our bodies started to convulse while the blue light left my body and entered his.

I don’t know how long that took, but the second his healing was completed was the same second I collapsed on top of him. All of my senses were almost nonexistent. I couldn’t smell, I couldn’t feel, I could barely see and hear, and all I could taste was hot rust.

Lockhart ushered all the kids out of the Great Hall, the appropriate Head Boys and Girls leading kids back to their Houses, while Snape magically broke and disposed of the chains holding down Flint. I couldn’t move, and to be honest, Marcus was comfortable. I don’t know if he was just too exhausted to protest or what, but he didn’t budge me, he just moved my hair off of my sweaty face. It took me a good hour to be able to roll off of him. I turned my head to the left and whispered, “Do you feel any better?”

He nodded and whispered back, “Do you feel any worse?”

I laughed. “I feel like I put your injuries in me.”

Dumbledore’s voice surprised me so much that my body jolted up a few inches. “You did. But your body will burn it all off within four hours. You’ll be fine.”

I sighed.

Marcus rolled his eyes and said, “This shit isn’t natural.”

I laughed and looked at him again. “You’re just upset that I’m the one who—”

He groaned, “I’m a pure blood. I have plenty of magical potential, ok?”

I smirked, “I’m a muggle born, but I already have developed magic, ok?”

He rolled his eyes and stared back up at the ceiling of the Great Hall.