Marlene McKinnon groaned as she woke up on her family’s couch. In her state of panic, she didn’t understand where she was.
Her first thought was that she was back in the dungeon, the ghost of Bellatrix Black’s touch still on her.
Then, vague memories of rescue came back to her in bits and pieces. She remembered being carried out in strong arms, and vague memories of a rat and a deer. She recalled how loud it had been as the house she had been kept in had been blown to nothing behind them. She remembered opening her mouth even with the pain and screaming with all her might, "FUCK YOU SUCKERS!" She questioned her surroundings once more, she wasn’t in the flat she and Dorcas shared.
Trying to remember why, she tried to sit up and winced at the pain. Right. It had been too far for James to carry Marlene to as she bled out.
James.
James had saved her. Her idiotic, egotistic, hero-complexed, practically brother had come out of hiding to find whatever shit whole the Death Eaters had dumped her in. Along with Peter (another brother of hers) and Dorcas, the love of Marlene’s life.
She ached to talk to Dorcas, to fall into her embrace. But Dorcas Meadows, big hotshot Auror and all that had had to go file paperwork for the Auror office and then the Order. Marlene could almost remember Madeye Moody's face as he yelled at all of them, calling them everything from reckless idiots to traitors. Marlene laughed to herself, grunting at the pain it brought. Traitors? Certainly not someone from that group of four. Not her who hadn't given the Death Eaters even a small bit of information even after two weeks of torture, not James with his wife and kid in danger, not darling sweet Pete and certainly not Dorcas.
Merlin, Marlene hadn’t talked to Dorcas since she had been kidnapped two weeks ago.
But that was all fine, Dorcas would be here first thing in the morning.
Marlene was relieved that she had gotten to see her non-biological brothers again. She had brothers of her own, one older and two younger, who terrorized this house but James and Peter were different. They had grown up together laughing in Effie’s kitchen and flying in Monty’s garden.
Oh, Effie and Monty, how Marlene missed them.
She thought about the engagement ring Effie had given her a few days before her death, still sitting in her drawer at her and Dorcas’s flat. Her plans of proposing had gotten ruined by the whole kidnapped and tortured thing. She would do it the second she was back at the flat though, Marlene had gotten tired of waiting.
She forced herself up from the couch, ignoring the pain. She was a healer, she could do this. Muffling a scream, she reached for her wand, casting a few healing spells wherever (everywhere) it hurt.
Fucking Bellatrix Black and her crucio.
But she had survived it. She was Marlene Margaret McKinnon, she had bitten back her cries of pain and stuck her tongue out at Bellatrix. She had thought of Remus and the pain he must feel every transformation and of Sirius and the scars he refused to explain.
But the torture had worn her and her magic out, her spells no longer as effective as before. She still needed some muggle painkillers to keep the pain at bay.
Grabbing onto furniture nearby she was waddling toward the kitchen when—
the door rang.
Huh.
Only a few people knew of the location of her family home. It was for the safety of her parents and brothers, so they could stay out of the war Marlene had blindly thrown herself into. Though as Head Healers, Mr and Mrs McKinnon weren't far from the horrors of war, they were just safe from them.
She listed the names in her head; James and Lily were in hiding so not them. It was a full moon so no Remus and with him she ruled out Sirius and Peter as well, thinking that they would be helping Remus. Mary kept her distance from anything related to the war and the Order so it had to be…Dorcas!
Using all her strength, she sprinted towards the door, opening it in a hurry. She was shocked but not at all disappointed to see Peter instead of Dorcas.
“Pete!” she smiled. But something seemed off, he looked stressed. “What’s wrong? Come in, tell me.”
There was no need for a security question, limited people knew the location of this house anyway and Marlene trusted them, especially Peter (as well as James and Dorcas) with everything.
She left Peter to do his own thing, trusting him to know this house by memory by now and shuffled towards the kitchen once more. She was grabbing a glass of water and reaching for pain medication when she realized that there were more foot sounds than necessary and turned around only to be met with a bunch of Death Eaters.
It had to be a Polyjuice potion, it had to be. She reached for her wand and cast Expecto Patronum, to notify the real Peter to come for her, only for the silver animal to stop in front of Peter.
It was him, Peter was the traitor.
No. NO. NO!
It couldn’t be him, Peter wouldn’t.
His wand was pointed at her, why was it pointed at her?
He wouldn’t. Peter wouldn’t.
“Pete,” she begged,
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, not meeting her eyes.
She didn’t want to die. Not yet. Marlene McKinnon did not want to die. She had not survived Bellatrix Black for two weeks for this. She needed to see Lily again, hug Sirius, laugh with James, visit Effie and Monty’s graves, warn her family to run as the Death Eaters moved towards their rooms… She needed to kiss Dorcas, hug her, talk to her, propose to her. She did not want to die.
No. NO. NO!
“Avada Kedavra,”
She saw a flash of green light and heard her glass of water crash and break on the floor, feeling her toes get wet from the water.
And then it all went dark and Marlene McKinnon was no more.