Sudden in its birth, hauntingly slow in its death, the scream that the winds had scattered through the remnants that had once been a town well-loved, faltered, wavered and faded away, as if the rock-and-stone ruins it had scattered over, had shattered it into tiny pieces.

Then it was the night and Jenna, the silver tincture that shaded her eyes dark, darker than it had ever been, as she took in the scene that lay in front of her, not horrible for its sable backdrop, not horrible for the bare rawness of the ruins that spread out coldly in front of her, not even horrible because it held, today, what she had neither expected nor thought of expecting, but for the knowledge that clawed her, the knowledge that rendered her immobile – the knowledge that there was more than a mere chance, that she knew who was behind this.

That she, having decided she knew him so well, had not expected this of him.

The wolf was, in itself, not more vicious than she could imagine – she knew the Dark Arts, she knew the Creatures it could spawn and employ, and even twist; and, that considered, she could very well imagine a more brutal creature. Which did not mean that the one in front of her was a docile one. It had unnaturally large eyes, perhaps the gaze it held itself a weapon, a ruthless kind that held no emotions – not even animal or beastly emotions – and they were pure, pure scarlet, devoid of pupil or any other tincture.

The plain indifference in them was fear-provoking.

Still frozen, not by fear but by self-deception of another kind altogether, Jenna took it in. She was not a coward, never had been one, but there was no doubt that the emotionless, scarlet glint of the creature’s gaze caused a shiver to run down her spine. She took a step backwards, when the wolf tensed, fully aware that it could lunge at her any moment, and yet there was something calmly cold in her eyes, perhaps fury at her own self for being what many call an emotional fool.

The wolf, of course, did not pause for more than a second. That was the second in which it looked at her, and she looked right back, right into its viciously empty eyes, and then it had lunged out from the shadows, its beastly form deathly dark but extremely visible against the moon-illuminated skyline behind.

She did not have the presence of mind to step back, scream or run – the first should have been an instinctive reaction, though the second was something not in her nature, and the initial scream in itself had been one of surprise, more than fear; while the third, the third was so much against her own nature, that she did not even think of it. She had always believed running to be a problem itself, and never the solution to one, and she stuck to that idea even now, when she hardly had time to rummage through her ideals, and see what they were.

She only felt the rough, scratching body of the creature graze her bare arm, the fur of the animal itself hard enough to leave painful marks; only felt the sting of the vividly scarlet, tapering nails, cold and powerful and heartlessly aching, as they travelled down the length of white shoulder in one, fluid, calculatedly sharp motion. Something trickled down her shoulder, then, something that was cold against the chilly, night-air, something that felt vaguely familiar and should have been cause enough for worry, had there not been others , in her mind, right then – the fact that she could feel consciousness depart.

The fact that she could tell any wound she would walk away with, tonight, would not be an ordinary one.

Blood, she realized. It clawed me.

But, no matter what her state of mind, the wolf had yet to be done. It came at her again, backing at first, then sprinting before it finally leaped through the air. It howled, a long, ruthless noise that seemed, in its coldness, to shatter the very winds. They screamed too, as if in response now and anyone would have thought the atmosphere dark, cold, terrifying – Jenna thought it dark, cold and major cause for disappointment. Her eyes flickered, as she felt all life take leave of her left arm.

To be honest, she had not expected any of this, tonight – and she knew it was her own fault. She had not been alert today, even absent-minded as she thought of Sion, in her walk to this place. Otherwise, Jenna knew, she could have handled the thing with ease – it was only a dark creature. But sense had finally returned now, shooting up through her frame like the indescribable pain running from her shoulder to her wrist. She whipped out her wand, her sole but most powerful weapon in the face of such a situation, and the little instrument whipped through moonlight, even as the creature leaptedagain.

First burst out of the tip of her wand, a deep, dark golden that twisted upon its own flames to enlarge and multiply and rise high, high into the air; and the wolf gave a vicious howl as it retreated, clearly blinded by the light - which itself is an instrument darkness fears. The flames wrapped the creature and, though it struggled, her magic was too strong. Within seconds – though it seemed hours to Jenna – the creature had been reduced to nothingness, to dust that the wind carried away and played with and scattered, far, far away.

She looked up, chest heaving; tears of pain defiantly forced back and eyes narrowed in visible distaste.

The double-doors opposite her were open, and in front of her stood Voldemort, leaning very casually in the doorway of Mangeant Mansion.