𝐟𝐢𝐜𝐡𝐞 // 𝟐𝟎
The moment that she had broken the plane of the last step, Tara was met with a terrifyingly incredible sight. Laid out before her, was an underground amphitheater filled to the brim with what was easily more than a thousand different witches and wizards. Most of them were sitting on the benches below, while others were still milling about the walkways up at the top of the chamber.
Tara didn’t even notice the other people spilling out of the additional tomb entrances that lined the theater, as she had carefully made her way over to the short stone wall that separated where she stood from the rest of the room below.
Peering down at the masses, her lips parted in disbelief as the lights began to dim. The crowd instantly let out a rowdy cheer, stomping their feet and slamming their palms together in thunderous applause.
That’s when Grindelwald made his way up onto the circular stage at the center of it all.
Tara’s jaw immediately clenched in brute anger. That which was amplified upon listening to the cheers of the wizards around her. These people, whether they were aware of it or not, were cheering for the death of her family. For the attempts on her life. And for the countless other acts of senseless violence this man was the orchestrator of.
They were cheering for it all.
As Grindelwald raised his hands out to either side of himself, the crowd obediently fell silent.
“My brothers, my sisters, my friends: the great gift of your applause is not for me. No. It is for yourselves.” he began. “You came today because of a craving and a knowledge that the old ways serve us no longer. You came today because you crave something new, something different…It is said that I hate les non-magiques. The Muggles. The No-Maj. The Can’t-Spells-” each phrase was met with jeers and jabs of brutal insults from the crowd around him, but he continued on. “I do not hate them. I do not. For I do not fight out of hatred. I say the Muggles are not lesser, but other. Not worthless, but…of other value. Not disposable, but of a different disposition. Magic blooms only in rare souls. It is granted to those who live for higher things. Oh, and what a world we could make, for all of humanity. We who live for freedom, for truth, and for love.”
A woman then appeared on the stage next to him. In her hands, she was cradling what looked to be a human skull, with a long transparent tube attached to the back of it.
“The moment has come to share my vision of the future that awaits if we do not rise up and take our rightful place in the world.” Grindelwald declared as the witch handed him the skull with a reverent bow of her head.
A silence fell over the auditorium as Grindelwald took a deep breath in through the tube.
When he exhaled, a large plume of smoke poured out of his lips.
Illuminated within the vapor, that had now taken up most of the space in the domed ceiling of the theater, were bright, moving images. The faces of the crowd lit up as flashes of scenes changed with every heartbeat; thousands of boots marching down a road, explosions, men with guns coupled with the sounds of the shooting itself. There was then a large flash of light, and a boom that shook the entire theater. The petrified faces below watched the clouds of a massive, other-worldly explosion slowly rise up and into the otherwise clear-blue sky depicted within the smoke.
When the wispy images eventually dissipated, the crowd had turned to whisper frantically amongst themselves.
Tara let out a shaky breath, stepping back from the stone wall.
“That is what we are fighting!” Grindelwald’s voice boomed across the amphitheater. “That is the enemy! Their arrogance! Their power lust! Their barbarity! How long will it take before they turn their weapons on us?”
Tara suddenly heard a flurry of footsteps coming from her right. Her head whipped over her shoulder, watching as several more bodies poured out of one of the graveyard entrances. The massive form that was leading them was carefully walking towards the steps of the amphitheater, as if trying not to draw attention to their arrival. He wore an expression that was unmistakably wrought with hesitation and worry.
When his gaze was torn away from the site down below, he finally appeared to notice that there was someone else standing up there with them.
Theseus’ eyes widened in perfect unison with Tara’s.
They had found the rally, she realized. And they were there to act out Traver’s blood lust.
Fear much greater than that spurred on by the image of a world-ending explosion rocked Tara’s entire being.
She made a move to run towards Theseus, his name nearly falling from her throat, when both of her arms were suddenly grabbed from behind.
Immediately beginning to fight, Tara barely managed to steal to short glances over both her shoulders, identifying her assailants as two of Grindelwald’s acolyte-esque bodyguards. With their combined strength, they quickly managed to overpower her, shoving her forward until her stomach collided with the stone wall that she had only just been standing at.
Grunting in pain, her arms were pinned down on either side of her body as she was forced to look down into the amphitheater again.
“He requests you hear him out.” one of the acolytes hissed menacingly in her ear.
Theseus had nearly jumped forward in an attempt to help her, when Grindelwald’s voice suddenly echoed up from the amphitheater below, stopping him dead in his tracks.
“Do nothing when I speak of this. You must remain calm and contain your emotions.” he said slowly. “There are Aurors here among us.”
The reaction of the crowd was instantaneous, despite Grindelwald’s apparent instructions. Heads turned to glare and hiss at the potential Auror’s around them, their locations quickly becoming exposed.
“Come closer, brother wizards! Join us!” Grindelwald invited.
Tara desperately tugged against the grips of the acolytes, turning her head to look back behind her.
“Theseus, don’t!”
The Auror stared back at her, his expression pained but ultimately unreadable. He then turned back to face his entourage.
“Do nothing. No force.” he ordered quietly before they began to walk down the staircase closest to them and into the tense air of the theater.
“No…” Tara whispered, frustrated tears brimming in the corners of her eyes as she desperately tore against the hold of her captors yet again.
“They have killed many of my followers, it is true.” Grindelwald continued seductively. “They caught and tortured me in New York. They struck down their fellow witches and wizards for the simple crime of seeking truth, for wanting freedom.”
Tara could quite literally feel his words settling over the crowd. He was playing deliberately into their agitation, to their hatred, and all Tara could do was hold her breath and watch.
“Your anger, your desire for revenge is natural-”
Almost as if on cue, there came a flash of green magic from below, immediately followed by shouts of terror as someone collapsed to the ground.
“No!” Grindelwald shouted, surging forward into the masses himself.
Wizards parted for him as he went, until eventually he had knelt down at the side of a young witch with fiery red hair. She was laying, unmoving, on the ground beneath the bench she had assumedly been sitting on only minutes prior.
A dangerous silence befell the room.
“Take this young warrior back to her family.” Grindelwald finally spoke with fake sympathy. And as the wizards in the immediate vicinity moved to do so, he stood back onto his feet in order to address the crowd.
“Dissaparate. Leave. Go forth from this place and spread the word; it is not we who are violent.”
The crowd immediately obliged, hundreds of them disappearing at once. The amphitheater around them quickly began to empty, and soon enough, some of the only souls left behind were that of the Auror’s and the small group of Grindelwald’s inner circle that bordered the stage.
Theseus was quick to nod his head at his team.
“Let’s take him.”
A muffled scream left Tara’s throat. She managed to wrap one of her legs around that of the acolyte to her right, tripping him up and causing her one arm to fall free. Before the second had a chance to react, she curled her hand into a fist, punching him directly in his masked face, completely ignoring the pain that had erupted upon doing so. Whipping out her wand, she then fired a curse forward, sending both of their bodies careening into a distant, stone wall.
“Protego diabolica!” a voice cried out from below.
Breathing heavy, Tara looked down into the theater, watching as Grindelwald drew out a circle of blue flames with the tip of his wand, creating a fearsome wall around the edge of the stage. At the same time, back behind where she stood, the entrance ways that they had used, crumbled shut under a cascade of falling rocks.
A few of Grindelwald’s followers quickly walked through the line of flames, seemingly without consequence, in order to join him on the stage. One of them, however, appeared to hesitate for a fraction of a second. And when he finally did make the decision to walk forward, the fire all but consumed him. His horrible screams of pain echoed out around the theater, bouncing off of the stone walls in a way that made Tara nearly brace her hands over her ears.
Grindelwald only laughed darkly at the sight, gesturing outwards with his hands to the small number of people that now remained.
“Auror’s, join me in this circle. Pledge to me your eternal allegiance, or die.” he said casually. “Only here shall you know freedom. Only here shall you know yourself.”
Many of the Aurors began to flee in response to his goading, but Grindelwald had been quick to send out a wall of blue flames in their direction, incinerating their plumes of smoke before they could fully apparate away.
“Play by the rules.” Grindelwald called out amongst the chaos. “No cheating, children.”
Wizards were forced to fight against the fire, some still attempting to get to Grindelwald.
“Credence!” Newt’s voice could be heard over the noise. But by then, the tortured boy had already made it down the staircase, abandoning the girl in the blue dress and walking through the cerulean blaze with ease. Grindelwald quickly pulled the boy into a rather possessive-looking embrace before allowing him to disapparate.
“Walk with me!” a female’s voice then shrieked from below.
Tara tilted her head down to watch as the man she had seen back in the Lestrange family tomb, took a singular step backwards from a blonde witch. Her expression fell in a clear depiction of heartbreak, and she was quick to spin around and move towards the flames alone.
“No Queenie! Don’t do it!” the man called out after her.
But she passed through, unharmed, and joined Grindelwald at his side.
“Queenie!”
Ignoring the second voice as well, the witch was the next to disapparate.
Someone had attempted to send a curse down at Grindelwald directly, but his blue flames rose to match it, now taking the form of violent spears. While most of the Auror’s had continued fighting, some were ultimately consumed by their fear and terror, running towards the stage instead. And those who passed through without incident, joined Grindelwald’s ever-growing ranks.
In the midst of it all, Theseus had somehow found his brother, and was fighting side by side with him at the top of one of the staircases.
“Mr. Scamander-” Grindelwald’s taunting voice boomed out across the amphitheater. “Do you think Dumbledore will mourn for you?”
Not waiting for an actual answer, he sent a massive wave of blue fire up the crescent-shaped benches. Both brothers were pushed backwards, nearly falling completely to the ground, and only managing to throw up defensive spells at the very last second to keep themselves from being consumed.
“REDUCTO!” Tara screamed, her mind snapping as she shot the curse forward.
The benches at the bottom half of the section she was standing above exploded in glorious fashion. The debris flew towards the main stage in a dangerous arc, forcing the circle of fire to rise and defend Grindelwald from the onslaught, and thus abandoning its attack on the Scamander brothers.
When the rocks were incinerated, Grindelwald whipped his head upwards. His eyes quickly honed in on Tara as she slunked down the staircase, wand still extended out in front of her.
“Ah.” the wizard cooed, sauntering towards the side of the stage that she was approaching. “The General comes marching home.”
Tara sneered back at him.
“Enough!” she barked.
“Enough?” Grindelwald repeated with a raise of his eyebrow. “I’m afraid you know not the definition.”
He stepped forward again, so that he was standing directly in the line of blue flames. The fire casted eerie shadows across his face as his expression slowly began to resemble stone.
“What I have, in fact, had enough of…is your insolence.” he spat. “Just how long do you expect to keep running and hiding behind the protection of your pathetic Ministry?”
Tara clenched her jaw so tightly she thought it might snap.
“Look me in the eyes and tell me that I’m hiding.” she hissed in response.
Grindelwald leaned over the fire now, holding eye contact with the witch for a bold few seconds.
Back at the top of the staircase, Theseus had lurched forward, but was caught quickly by his younger brother, who managed to keep him held back for the moment.
“No. You are not.” Grindelwald finally concluded in a low hum. “But you, my dear, are not moving nearly fast enough.”
Tara hadn’t even been given enough time to digest his words, for he had raised his wand unnaturally fast.
“Crucio!” he hissed, the red flash of magic hitting her in the dead center of the chest.
Tara immediately lurched forward in pain, her entire body feeling as if it had been set on fire. Her lungs burned, nearly caving in on themselves completely. And even as the pain choked her airways, she had still somehow managed to let out an ear-splitting, anguished scream.
“TARA!” Theseus shouted from the top of the staircase. He had broken free from his brother's hold at that point, recklessly attempting to make his way down to the stage, but a line of blue flames quickly appeared in his path. He was forced to skid to a halt, throwing up a weak shield of defensive magic in order to keep himself from being incinerated.
Despite near-debilitating pain still flooding through Tara’s system, she had somehow heard his voice. And with an extreme amount of effort, she turned her head back around, her eyes finding where the Head Auror was desperately fighting against the flames about half-way up the staircase from her position, clearly trying to move down towards the stage.
“Theseus!” she managed to cry out in between strangled breaths and grunts of pain. “Don’t!”
The man looked back down at her, his eyes wide with tormented madness.
“Ah-” Grindelwald cooed. He fired off another round of the curse, and Tara’s body once more curled in on itself, contorting in a way that forced her to face the dark wizard again. “So…it is not the Ministry that holds your loyalty after all. But rather…one man.”
Tara’s body continued to smolder with both pain and anger.
“If- if you touch him-” she coughed out from behind gritted teeth. “There will not be…a corner of the world- where you can hide from me.” she threatened despite the constant shaking of her body.
Grindelwald let out a hearty cackle, as if the witch had made some sort of bad joke.
“Thank goodness I will not be hiding.”
Another curse quickly left his mouth and wand.
“Imperio.”
The pain from the previous round of curses hadn’t subsided in the slightest, but under new magical orders, her weak limbs had slowly begun to move on their own. Her spine straightened rather violently, and her right leg took a single step forward, bringing her even closer to the blue flame's mere meters in front of her now.
Grinding her teeth even tighter together, Tara attempted to fight with every ounce of energy left in her to stop herself from moving, but the effort was ultimately futile, and she had already taken another step.
“NO!” she heard Theseus cry out once more, as another scream escaped her own throat.
She could feel the heat of the flames on her face now, evaporating the tears that had managed to fall from her eyes.
“Grindelwald!” another voice suddenly echoed down from the top-most part of the amphitheater.
The dark wizard was compelled to glance upwards, watching as a rather short witch began walking down the staircase towards him. And as the hold of his magic weakened ever so slightly, Tara managed to tilt her head to the side, her eyes widening in panic as she watched her best friend enter the fight.
“No-”
“This one, I believe I know.” Grindelwald mused before slowly turning back to Tara. “Always a pleasure, darling.” he spat before retreating his magic completely.
Tara had attempted to take a breath in the millisecond after the curses stopped. But just as quickly, Grindelwald had directed a string of blue flames towards her. A fiery string wrapped around her neck, not unlike a lasso, picking up and throwing her body towards the top of the theater with reckless abandon. She crashed into a short stone wall before crumpling down onto the benches below, completely still and unmoving.
“TARA!”
Leta whirled on Grindelwald, tears burning in her eyes.
“STOP THIS!” she demanded angrily.
The dark wizard simply eyed her curiously for a moment, before stepping out in front of the flames and up the three steps it took to meet her where she had stopped.
“Leta Lestrange…Despised entirely amongst wizards. Unloved, mistreated, yet brave. So very brave.” he said, as if reading it off of a piece of parchment. He then slowly extended out a hand towards her. “Time to come home.”
There was a clear and present moment of contemplation on Leta’s side, however fleeting it might have been in the end, as she slowly placed her hand on top of his.
With a smirk, Grindelwald turned back around to begin walking down the stairs again. But as he moved, Leta’s hand had quickly slipped from his. For she had not walked with him.
The man slowly tilted his head back towards the witch, his eyes beginning to narrow.
Leta glanced back up the stairs, her eyes finding the two Scamander brother’s, standing where they had finally reached Tara’s side. Theseus had already pulled her limp form up and into his arms, cradling her tightly to his chest while simultaneously fighting back the continuous onslaught of flames.
“Tell her I’m sorry!” Leta called out to them, before whirling back around, her wand suddenly brandished.
Taking aim at the skull that was still in the hands of Grindelwald’s right-hand-witch, Leta fired a curse forward. The blast of magic hit the skull, sending it flying out of the woman’s hands and crashing onto the stage below. It shattered into thousands of pieces, as if made of glass, instantly producing a violent whirlwind of smoke that was quickly flooding the entire amphitheater. The blue flames were quelled, the view of those standing on the stage momentarily obscured from the remaining group of wizards.
“Go!” Leta cried out to them all. “Go!”
The dark smoke completely engulfed the room, just as the wizards managed to disapparate back up to the surface world.
Reappearing on the outskirts of the massive graveyard, Theseus had immediately placed Tara’s body down onto the ground. He checked next for a pulse, and found a very, very faint one underneath his shaking fingers. The burn that now encircled her entire neck was a bright, horrid red color. Standing out even in the near complete darkness of the unlit cemetery.
Far in front of their position, contained in the lowest levels of the cemetery, blue fire suddenly exploded out of the doors of the many mausoleums that littered the circular courtyard. The flames quickly began to reach out, thrashing around like the many heads of a hydra. Its teeth and talons began to make for the outside world with a deadly purpose.
Seemingly out of nowhere, an old, decrepit-looking man wadeled out from the woods behind the small squadron of wizards.
“Together!” the man shouted. “In a circle, your wands into the earth! Or all of Paris will be lost!”
No one dared to question his order, nor hesitate to obey them. They scattered themselves around the edges of the circular cemetery. Shouts of “Finite!” echoed up into the air as each wizard drove their wands into the dirt at their feet, slowly beginning to build a golden wall of defensive energy. They poured all the strength they could into their magic, using it to fight back to monstrous flames, to defend everything that they had left, and the memories of all that they had lost.
With final shouts of desperation, the wizard’s combined strength won out. The flames fizzled out, slinking back through the doors of the graves they had burst through and disappearing back underground leaving nothing more than puffs of black smoke behind.
In the wake of their near-destruction, everyone left in the cemetery had fallen silent. Exhausted and defeated.
Theseus collapsed to his knees, immediately dropping his wand to the ground in order to check on Tara again. But this time, he was no longer able to see the rise and fall of her chest.
Silently, the Auror began to weep.
Newt had been quick to join his side, awkwardly throwing his arms around his shoulders in a hug that he was fairly certain he had never given him before. Theseus had immediately returned it, tilting his head to openly cry in the safety of his brother’s shoulder.
“I’ve chosen my side.” the Magizoologist whispered seriously.
When he pulled back from him, Theseus tearfully nodded his head.
An injured Niffler slowly hobbled its way over to Newt, who quickly cradled him up and into his chest. Theseus turned his attention back to Tara, quickly slipping his arms underneath her legs and shoulders before lifting her up off of the ground.
“We have to get her help.” the Auror said gruffly.
Both Scamander’s made brief eye contact, a silent conversation passing between them.
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* : ｡☆ﾟ.･ ───
The odd, disheveled group of wizards appeared at the end of a long, stony bridge. One that a handful of them had walked down not 24 hours prior. The silhouette of Hogwarts loomed before them in the early light of the dawn.
Having received their not-so-advanced notice, a few nurses from the school’s infirmary had already been waiting for their arrival. And upon their appearance, had advanced on their position with haste.
Theseus handed Tara over to them, placing her onto the cot that they had brought along. He quietly begged for them to take care of her before they quickly rushed back down the bridge and disappeared into the school.
After briefly pausing to watch the nurses race past him, Dumbledore had quickly begun to cross the viaduct. Newt swiftly stepped away from the group at his end of the bridge in order to meet him.
As he had done so, Travers had made a move to stop him, but Theseus just as quickly held out his arm in front of the director’s chest.
“I think it’s best if he speaks to him alone.” he said curtly, his voice strained and hoarse. As it sort of hurt for him to speak.
Travers had opened his mouth to protest, but one look at Theseus’ steely glare evidently made him think better of it.
Newt and Dumbledore met at the center of the bridge. After speaking for a brief moment, the professor slowly raised his arms high above his head. The metal admonitors wrapped around his wrists gleamed in the gray, early morning light.
Immediately, Theseus brandished his wand, and with a simple flick, the two tracking bands clattered onto the stone walkway.
Not long after that, Dumbledore and Newt had turned to begin walking back towards the castle together.
Travers ordered the group to follow them, which everyone except Theseus immediately moved to do. The Head Auror instead took a single step backwards, which caused the older director to tilt his head over his shoulder, shooting him a quizzical glare.
“I’ll return to the Ministry.” the Auror replied simply, not sticking around to hear Travers’ response before apparating away.
The door to Theseus’ office creaked open as he walked inside. He had made a point to lock it behind him, not even bothering to turn on the lights.
Instead, he slunk over to the chair that sat behind his desk, all but collapsing down into it.
His hands reached up to cover the totality of his face…and he sobbed.
Completely alone in the darkness.
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* : ｡☆ﾟ.･ ───