Hogwarts Forbidden Forest, southern pine woods.
The wind howled across the rocky ridge, sweeping turf and gravel in the same direction. Fourteen Hobgoblin corpses lay scattered across both sides of the hollow. Some had fallen beside shattered rocks, while others hung from broken tree trunks.
Most of the rough, mud-caked shells covering their bodies had cracked open. Dark green blood still seeped from the edges of some fissures, following the grooves outward. Under the alternating effects of low temperatures and wind, the fluid quickly congealed into a thin film over the cracks, as though the surface had been sealed beneath a faint, dark glaze.
Draco stood at the edge of the rock shelf above the hollow. It was not very high, but high enough to give him a clear view of everything below. He was not wearing school robes, having changed into a dark gray long coat with its collar raised to conceal half his face. The hem of the coat lifted and fell in the wind, revealing a strip of dark trim. His style was becoming increasingly similar to Uchiha Madara's.
Seven or eight people stood five paces behind him, all dressed in dark coats. Their positions had naturally arranged themselves according to year, magical strength, and how long they had been members, with equal gaps between each of them. Nott stood to the side and rear, his hands in his coat pockets, his gaze resting on the pile of gradually cooling corpses in the middle of the hollow.
Crabbe crouched beside one of the Hobgoblin corpses. His knuckles paused as he examined the cracks on the inside of its shell, his fingertips tracing the edge of a fissure twice before withdrawing.
Goyle leaned against a pine tree that had been knocked crooked. There was a dark dent in