Thanks to all the people who reviewed the last chapter. Your various permutations of the general `` What the F*** ! ? ! Update now ! '' Were most apprise. I feel kind of bad for jumping a wind like that on you after 40 chapters. Kind of deceitful. just to have it off the legal age of mass appreciated it.



"Harry ?"Padma said quietly, standing at the end of the hospital bed. Harry seemed to be sleeping, his chest rising and falling weakly. His center were red, like he'd been crying. Perhaps the hurting was worse than he let on. She felt bad for needing to awake him."Harry wake up."She reached out and tapped his leg. He jerked fitfully, but his eyes flickered open. He didn't speak though, didn't acknowledge her. He just stared off into space. What had Dumbledore said to him ?

"Harry I ‘ ve been talking to the healers. They ‘ ve run some more tests."She licked her lips."Look, it looks like a few month was actually optimistic. There ‘ s damage deep down, lots of hurt. You need to let them help you now or ... or you ‘ ll die. In a few weeks."

Harry said aught, he didn't even seem to deliver heard her.

"You won ‘ t be able to fight Voldemort."Padma tried a different tack."I ‘ m not saying you ‘ ll have weeks like you ‘ ve been going all year. You ‘ ll have weeks in this hospital bed, not capable to make a motion, eventually you won ‘ t even be able to babble. You won ‘ t be able to kill Voldemort. You won ‘ t be able to be the elect one."

Harry flinched, hurting running across his tired face.

"You see Harry, you ‘ ve got to let them facilitate you."Padma stepped up to put her hand on Harry's."Please ?"

"You do what you have to do."Harry pulled his hand away. He still hadn't looked at her.

"You ‘ ll let them help you ?"Padma tried not to be put off."You ‘ ll take off the vicious eye and let them act upon on you ?"

"Yes, why not."Harry rolled over so he was facing away from her. His respiration stuttered, he sounded like he was holding back tears. Padma backed away, she had got what she came for. The healers would fix Harry's dead body. What had happened to his mind ? That might make a niggling longer.

What had Dumbledore said to him ...
*


The boy who was once called Harry faded in his mind as the therapist entered his room. Bustling around and speaking comforting, empty words. They cleaned him up, washing his subdivision and chest. They asked him to remove the armguard. He did, letting it fall to the floor with a brassy clatter. The healers shied away from the mark on his arm. Fearful. Why should he care.

They did something that was supposed to numb him. He couldn't tell the difference. Everything was dulled already. He watched, ineffective and unwilling to handle, as they cut his skin clear. His blood seeped out, quickly staunched by a healer. He wished they wouldn't bother.

A dusty gel was swabbed onto his ruined hired hand. Ruined for what ? For the sake of what ? All useless. He wished they wouldn't bother.
*


genus Draco slapped the sore skin of his arm to try and stick awake. It had been burnt in the fight, but it was all right now. Just enough residuum redness and pain to help him ride out alert. He swung his tire out middle around the waiting room, all of the marauders were here. about of them had finally succumbed to kip, Dragon didn't pick them. It was hard to conceive of that the deadly midnight assault on the creature ship had been just last night. They had been worn out, hold out down. Draco pinched his arm again. He wondered if there was anywhere he could receive some tea. The tea shop was closed but surely the healer had a staff elbow room or something. Maybe he could ask one.

Or maybe he could just fall asleep.

genus Draco shook his heading. Some of them had to be awake when the healers finally stopped working on Harry. He shuddered, they had already been at it for hours. How many ... additions .... had Harry made ? He glanced around the way again. Everyone seemed to be asleep. Even Ginny, who seemed to have nodded off in the act of pinching herself. They had all been there all night, no one had collected them. He supposed it was only a matter of meter before a teacher or an edict member came to wrangle them up and get behind them back to Hogwarts, where they would no doubt stay. Chained to Emily Price Post like heel so they couldn't run off again.

Dragon got wearily to his fundament, maybe he could walk some of his fatigue off. He stepped carefully around the prone vulture and stepped up to the door to the ward. Harry's bed was obscured by drape but the shadow of the healers were still moving against the surface. As he watched one of them detached and stepped towards the room access. Draco stepped away to let him out, hope and apprehensiveness rebellion in his stomach.

"Is there any word ?"Dragon asked.

"Yes, there is."The therapist looked around the room."Is his mob here ?"

"Yes."genus Draco said definitely, looking over the marauders."delay a present moment ... HEY !"The predator jerked to liveliness, hands flying to wand before they realized where they were. Draco turned back to the healer."They ‘ re up. What is the news ?"

"wellspring we ... we removed respective items from the body of your friend."The poor healer swallowed nervously."We found a drop-gem embedded in his breastbone. There was also something in the bulwark of his belly. We think it may have been designed to negate poison but it seems to feature had the antonym effect. It was the source of his unwellness. We also found-"

"What about his eye ?"Draco broke in."Have you fixed his eye ?"

"His ... his eye."The healer paused."His eye had been removed too long ago, there is a great deal of scarring. Unfortunately we were unable to doctor it. We are currently looking into whether the installment he has is in high spirits quality enough to allow there."

"Installation ..."Draco stared at the man coldly."You ‘ re talking about his eye."

"Yes, I know."The healer shook his principal and turned back towards the threshold."We ‘ ll try to continue you informed."He pushed back through the doorway and hurried back towards the curtain bed.

Draco looked back over the marauders. Through their sand-filled, droopy optic he could see their sorrowfulness. Harry had fought so hard and got zilch in return but accusation of murder and a permanent disfigurement. And a dark mark, they could not block that.

"Harry might say it was worth it."Padma said softly."For driving Voldemort to ground."

"Of trend he ‘ d say that. Doesn ‘ t make it true."Ron pulled his articulatio genus up to his chest."I mean you heard him in there. He ‘ d think end was worth it."

"Is he wrong ?"Draco muttered darkly. Perhaps they didn't hear him. Perhaps it was just as well. They were all startled as another threshold was pushed open, revealing Professor McGonagall. She didn't need to say anything, they knew why she was there. They were going back. And they might never leave.
*


"Are you sure ?"Natalie asked ? Her voice admirably free of shaking."You could get a bracer like Harry ‘ s. Or perhaps there are less incursive means of removal."

"There are not, it was not made to be removed."Snape tightened the strap around his arm."And I would favour to not be dependent on an item of illegal jewelry. Just please do it, it is already beginning to burn."

Thankfully she did not contend, but instead bent down and touched her baton to the hide on Snape's arm. The slicing bother was distant, dulled by potions. There were bottles by his arm, some empty, some waiting to grow the skin back after the St. Mark was gone. He was in his flat at Hogwarts, the only when post he could suffer gained those potions without inquiry was from his own supplies. The searing began and Snape looked away, watching his own arm butchered was not what disturbed him, not after everything he'd seen. But it reminded him of what Harry was going through. Of the darkness lord as well. What would he do next ? What would his side by side relocation be ...

"He may go into hiding."Natalie answered his unreciprocated question, still spirit on his arm."Like he did fifteen twelvemonth ago."

"He will not."Snape shook his promontory."He was forced to hide then, he had no office. Now he does, it is lessened certainly, but he still has some."

"Bellatrix, Rookwood and Forneus."She traced easily around the sharpness of the skull."That is who he has left. What would he do with them ?"

"It will be savage, I am certain of that."Snape felt the cutting stop and watched as Natalie picked the petty flap of skin up and calmly incinerated it. It was done, he was free. Strange that he should feel so little. Perhaps because he knew he was not truly unloosen until Voldemort was dead. Perhaps because he knew that, without the power to spy, he was future to useless.

"Don ‘ t think that."Natalie's eyes flickered up to his as she daubed his arm with a potion soaked bandage.

"But I am."Snape shook his headland."Perhaps not useless but ... if I had not acted on instinct we would now know exactly what Voldemort was planning. We would be capable to counter him instead of stumbling around in the darkness."

"You had to."Was all she said.

"Perhaps."Snape let his head driblet back, perhaps.

"You know them break than anyone."Natalie continued."You can work out what he will do next."

"I have been trying."Snape replied tetchily."But I can not recall of anything he would wish to do that he has the manpower to accomplish. Unless he has some plan I am incognizant of. Which he almost certainly has. I always got the signified that he had something brewing."

"The ministry ? The section of mysteries ? The prognostication ?"

"He covets that no doubt. But I can see no way he could obtain it with three death eaters."

"Four."Natalie corrected."Barty Crouch is still out there somewhere."

"And if he is not utter then he is doing merlin knows what."Snape shook his head."It could be anything."

"Severus,"Natalie took his face in her hands and tilted it up to cope with her oculus."Not so low now. We won today. It may not feel like it, but we won a triumph. triumph have been few and far between this past times year, we need to hold dear them, not worry about what will fall out next."Snape was once again amazed by the way she could break through to him, whatever his mood. He smiled,

"I believe I have some wine."
*


The boy who carried the epithet Harry felt himself enter the familiar dream. He felt floorboards under his spinal column, scratchy through the thin hospital robe. He knew where he would be when he opened his eyes. And finally, he even knew why.

He pushed himself off the floor, leaning his tired frame against the bulwark. The wall painted with bears and snitch over a pale wild blue yonder sky full of flossy clouds. Harry felt like spitting but he couldn't muster the energy. He ignored the crib in the center of the room, it's shiny mobile spinning idly in the dream-wind. He shoved the door open and descended the stairs. The revulsion he always felt was still there, but he could barely bring himself to care. He knew what this place was now.

No one-year-old remembers their house. No one-year-old could retrieve every photo, or the blueprint on the wallpaper. This place was a lie, a parasitic memory that had been burnt into his brain. The creeping sickness in his skin was his intellect's way of telling him that it wasn't real, that it didn't belong.

He stepped up to the look door and stepped outside. There were street signs in the retention. No one-year-old would call up street foretoken, they couldn't even read them. He should have known, should possess realized somehow.

He couldn't feel the orchard nearby. God knows what that represented. Some metaphor for safety his creative thinker was projecting out maybe. Who knew. The river ? Some other part of his idea ... it didn't affair. Harry let himself fall to the undercoat on the grass, it was all pointless. It wasn't worth fighting this anymore, it was burnt onto the spinal column of his scull. He could never escape.

His eyes flickered open in the hospital ward. He could feel the sore new growth in his hand. It was pink, new peel, and minuscule than the former. Harry dropped it back onto the blanket. other function of his body hurt too, fiddling scratch and hurt. They had fixed him up. He wished they hadn't bothered.

The dream was still swirling in his forefront, biting at him. It was too hard. He saw his affair piled neatly against the wall, even his clothes. Suddenly he knew he had to result. This topographic point ... he just had to provide. He quietly pushed out of bed, ignoring the creaking in every muscularity and drew his bag over. He dressed quickly and disillusioned himself before slipping out the door.

The piranha were sleeping there, lying across benches or curled up on the floor. He didn't wake them. He didn't want to talk to anyone right now. Couldn't lecture, he had no idea how he would even start. He hurried away and down the stairs. He didn't stop until he was out of the building and a few streets away. A small street, not busy. Breathing hard he shoved his scepter out into the street. He found that he could barely keep his arm up for the few seconds it took for the knight bus to smear out of nowhere and squeak to a halt in front of him.

"Ere are you Harry ceramicist ?"The pimpled conductor squinted at him, his vocalisation full of amazement.

"No."The watchword was hollow in his chest.

"rightfield, right, incognito."The man tapped his nose."I never believed any of that stuff and nonsense about ya. Hero that ‘ s what I say."

"Right."Hero of Alexandria ... that cut to the nitty-gritty like a knife."Take me to Godrics Hollow."He had no mind where the approximation had come from, but as soon as he said it he knew he needed to go. It was as strong a need to go to it as there had been to leave behind in the dream.

"Godrics Hollow ?"The pustulate guy swallowed."right field, I see."

The bus moved off and the nameless boy sagged down in a hot seat. Why was he doing this ? Did he even have a reason ? He didn't seem to have ground's anymore. He remembered being full of fire and pauperism, burning rage for the fight. But now he just felt hollow, like he'd been scooped out. He didn't want anything anymore. Except perhaps to die. Why was he going to Godrics Hollow ? Why not. It wasn't like he had anywhere else to go.

The bus screeched to a freeze and he got out without speaking. The bus disappeared with a whoosh, a purple fuzz in the air. Harry looked up and down the street, it looked like any other village. It was empty this time of day, like a spook townspeople. Suited his climate perfectly. He looked forward, an derelict house, burnt and with the top floor blown off.

But he knew what had stood there. He had seen it in his dreams. This was where it had happened. It just hadn't happened to him.

He stepped forward his paw stretched out, then shied away. This theater was just More lies. The tone in his head, heartache, loss, concern. They weren't his, they weren't his loss. Only strangers had died here, two stranger. People who had nothing to do with him. The sorrow was another thaumaturgy, just another level of lie.

He spun away and stalked down the street, not looking back. He had never lived there, it meant zilch to him. Or should have in mind zilch. His animal foot brought him to the square and he lent tiredly on the war monument. He should never have come here, it was not what he needed. He raked his hand through his hair.

Not his hand.

Not his hair.

He spun and punched the pit, hissing out rage through his dentition. The lie poisoned everything. Even his real memories were tainted. He didn't even look like this for Christ's saki ! His all torso was a mask !

The Lucy Stone shifted under his fingers. He looked up just as the remembrance seemed to unthaw, morphing into, a statue underneath. Harry stumbled back. No ... no no no. Under the remembrance there were two trope, a man and a womanhood. The woman cradled something in her hands. The man ... the man looked just like him.

No he doesn't. I don't even look like me. The boy trembled with rage as he looked on the happy Potter mob. The testament in Isidor Feinstein Stone to the spirit he had never really had. His fingerbreadth went to his wand.

"Reducto !"The verge flickered out, even through the rage the spell flew true. It struck the forefront of the father statue, shattering it into matchwood. Some of them cut the boy's flesh. He didn't care.

"Reducto ! !"Lilly potter's head snapped off and crunched onto the tarmacadam. Rolling to a stop in a storm drain.

"Reducto ! !"The last shot was the strongest, striking out in a blinding bolt of lightning of light, obliterating the bundled infant. Blowing the little boy-who-lived to smithereens. Flames flickered across the statue before they died out. Flickered across the ruined ambo of drumhead and died to nothing.

The nameless boy stepped back, breathing like he'd run a marathon. His clothes wet with sweat. He dropped his wand back into his scoop and turned his back on the statue, his intimation still coming in wild bursts. He couldn't think, couldn't breath. He walked off down the street, not trusting himself to look on the statue again. It made it all too real.

His eyes found a memorial park. Both eyes, real number and charming. He shuddered, he'd got used to the shining overlay over his imagination, the x-ray view of the world. Now it was just a constant reminder. A reminder of what he'd sacrificed for the lie. He pushed the graveyard gate open and let the eye roam, in a instant it had angled in on the ceramicist tomb. He walked hesitantly to it, his scepter safely away in his pouch. He pushed a piece of ivy off the stone and read the inscription.
The last enemy that shall be destroyed is end


well that was egg. Being numb meant you had at least one other foe left, namely the one that killed you. His eye whirled in it's socket, looking straight down. The two coffins, position to side in the ground, stared back at him. But ... there was a shadow. Like a vacant domain. He drew his wand and muttered a revelation spell. faint whiffs of illusion drew out of the terra firma to play him. He waved his wand again, cutting the brumous waif away. He worked ... he didn't know how tenacious. Probably bit, maybe hour. At some pointedness the Asa Gray sky gave way to rain and the graveyard grass turned slick. Harry ignored it, concentrating on the go. It was good. It was a puzzle, breaking the phantasy. It stopped him from thinking.

Finally he was done. zero unlike showed on the aerofoil, but down underground ... Harry stood and stepped back, his heart pound in his chest. There was a third coffin on top of the other two, arranged like a Pyramid. Inside ... inside was a smaller torso, a youngster. It's tiny arms crossed over it's chest.

The nameless boy fell to his genu. There it was, the final proof. The final positive check. That poor wasted eubstance in there was Harry Potter. He could even see a tiny boodle on the bone of his scull, above his eye, in the Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe of a lightning deadbolt. The real scar had cut all the way to the off-white, his was barely to a greater extent than makeup. That was all he was in fact ... composition for a puppet. A god-damn doll.

He raised his scepter to the stone, but said nothing. The anger in him was gone. He had seen the torso of the actual ceramicist, lying together. It was backbreaking to feel anger, but he wished he did. The ire at least filled him up, filled the vacuum with flames. But now the fire was gone and he felt even vacuous for it. He found himself resting the point of his verge against the rough, wet stone.

It wasn't even his sceptre. He stared at it, thoughts skittering over the numb center of his mind. It was a wand gained from killing, killing and fighting in a war he was never supposed to be voice of. This verge was his killing wand. He had done ugly things for the saki of this war ... to others ... to himself. He found himself pressing down harder on the wood. He had pickled his mortal in blood and what had it got him ? He added his other arm and pushed harder. He had fought, and he'd been broken. The wand splintered with a loud crack, the springy wood bending almost double before it twisted into laurel wreath. A little red fluff was seeable through the fracture. It had had a Phoenix plumage core, he never knew.

"Well that makes thinks easier."

The voice had come from behind him. He turned slowly but his magic eye had already whizzed around to find the trespasser. The black robes told him everything he needed to know. Harry knew he should feel scare, or apprehensiveness, fear perhaps, at least surprise. But he was damned if he felt anything.

"You would be Rookwood."His phonation sounded dead in his ears.

"Yes I am August Rookwood."The man sketched a sarcastic bow, his baton in his script."Thank Merlin I still have a watch on the minor magic sensor. You ‘ ve come a retentive way just to mistake now. A farseeing long way ..."

"Felt like further."The empty boy dropped the stiff of his sceptre onto the ceramist grave. Perhaps some gull adept would witness it and ca-ca up some floor about it. He turned back to the death eater and asked,"Are you going to kill me ?"He was surprised that his phonation did not sound eager.

"Eventually Mr ceramist, no doubt."Rookwood held out his wand."But first you ‘ re going to secure something for me."

"What ?"

"The dark Divine ‘ s undying favor."Rookwood tilted his point up arrogantly."I will be raised above the others, above even that bastard Crouch."Rookwood paused, obviously expecting the weary shape before him to say something. `` Well ? Nothing to add ? No wittiness ? ``

"No."The boy who had been Harry stepped forward."Do whatever you like to me. I don ‘ t care anymore."

"Is this some kind of trick ?"Rookwood raised his sceptre threateningly."You are alone here I know that ... well, to be sure. Stubefy !"

He closed his eyes before the spell hit. The darkness was welcome.
*


A crashing noise woke him. Flashing light burned through his eyelids as he groaned. The noise went on and on, comrade ... very companion. His remembering twinged, his real ones.

"I ‘ m in the underground."His centre flickered open just as the tube gearing flashed out of sight, leaving the tunnel in darkness. He felt the cords binding his hand together, his digit danced along them trying to notice a knot. There was none. They were tight though, biting into his skin, magical no doubt. He didn't have to feel to know that his legs were similarly bound. He didn't botheration to try to stand.

"You are indeed Mr Potter."Rookwood stood over him, his wand outstretched."The London Underground."

The nameless boy twisted and looked around him, one of the walls was been broken through and a dark, earthy tunnel stretched away. Now that the train was gone he could hear something in the shadow all around, a scratching slinking sound.

"We ‘ re not alone."Harry breathed.

"Oh, so you noticed."Rookwood held up his wand and lit it, smiling. The darkness rolled back, but not far. A Zane Grey wall stopped the spark, a writhing mass of cloth and rot.

"What ... what are they ?"He looked on the dark hooded figures. As he watched one of them turned its hide head towards him. It let out a decease rattle.

"Those are Dementors."Rookwood smiled."Had you forgotten that they too served the dark lord ? Slipped your mind ?"

"Dementors ..."The boy looked into the swirling volume. Wasn't he supposed to be feeling some form of coolness, desperation ? Wasn't that what Dementors were supposed to do when you were close to them ? He shook his question, they couldn't touch him, a person could only feel so very much despair and he was already at his limit. And as for making him relive his worst storage ? Ha ! His darkest present moment was still fresh in his mind.

"The dementors like it down here."Rookwood continued."They ‘ ve been breeding down here like flies. There are hundreds of them."

"Dementors don ‘ t dig."Harry glanced back at the burrow."What else do you have down there ? I thought I killed everyone you had."

"You did."Rookwood sneered."But that doesn ‘ t issue. In fact, none of that subject. Now be quiet."Rookwood flicked his wand, making a hush spell. A second movie levitated him off the floor. Rookwood reached into his pocket and pulled out a retentive silvery length of material, easily recognizable. An invisibility cloak. He just hung there in the air as the cloak was thrown over him. He really couldn't have done anything else. Rookwood turned and walked up the tunnel, his calamitous shoes slipping on the wet dirt.

The one who used to be Harry was dragged along afterwards, floating in the air. He couldn't move ... speak ... he was a spook. Right now his situation fit him like a glove. He hung weakly as Rookwood moved further towards the scratching, digging auditory sensation. The dementors followed after, filling the burrow with cold. Up ahead there was a turning. As Rookwood walked calmly around the bend figures came into view. One dark cloaked physical body standing tall, the repose ragged and snap and scrabbling at the scandal mindlessly. No, it wasn't just their clothes that were ragged. It was their flesh.

Inferi, or zombies. Who could tell the dispute ? The figure in battlefront of them turned as Rookwood approached. Dark farsighted tomentum spun out as Bellatrix stepped towards Rookwood.

"You are belated Augustus."The female death eater was not as pretty as she had been. It seemed like a steel toed thrill with the military group of a falling teen behind it did more than damage than expected. The allow for slope of her face was crushed in, a mass of scars and bulging tegument. When she spoke she slurred, only the mightily side of meat of her mouth moving. Her eye was a raw socket, zilch left.

She had lost her eye. How wonderful. How very touching. Under the cloak the invisible captive felt his void filled with a tiny spark of satisfaction.

"howdy Bella."Rookwood stopped, his hand flickering to his baton."Shouldn ‘ t you be in your own tunnel ? That was the program was it not ? Forneus in one, myself-"

"I know the plan."Bellatrix snapped."Do you Augustus ? It seems to me that you are the one who doesn't know the architectural plan. I came here to see why you were recently. Why were you late ?"

"I was delayed momentarily, naught to concern you."Rookwood waved his hand away."You should go to your own burrow. Without someone there the wrangle them the dementors may be getting restless."

"I want the truth of this."Bellatrix held out an accusing finger.

"You will not get it."Rookwood dropped his laconic conduct and snapped at her."Get to your own tunnel. We take down the ministry tonight, there can be no mistakes because one of us is trying to sort out themselves out from the crowd."

"There is no crowd anymore."Bellatrix sneered through her ruined face."There are three of us. There will be more than enough glory to go around."Bellatrix turned and dissaperated into melt off air.

"Lying bitch."Rookwood grated."We all want to be the coloured overlord ‘ s right hand. quit excavation you freaks !"He directed the close one to the brute burrowing in the turd. They stopped moving and stood, their vacant eyes rotting in their skulls. Rookwood raised his wand and the dirt began flying away faster. In a short moment the stain became a brick wall, old and faded. The bulwark of the ministry.

"Are you ready Mr Potter ?"Rookwood grinned up at the inconspicuous prisoner hanging above him."Here we go."He turned to the wall and raised his wand. There was a shattering bam and the wall caved in. Behind it a man at a desk jumped to his fundament his hand tangling in his robe. A jet flash of light struck him in the head, he dropped onto the desk, scattering papers.

"Go."Rookwood pointed. The dememtors flew past him, the inferi lumbering along between them. There were a few moments of silence, then the screams started.
*


"Dumbledore !"Helen Wills Moody yelled as he thumped down the corridor at Hogwarts, moving his old os as fast as they could."Dumbledore get your senile arse down here !"

"Helen Wills Moody ?"Albus appeared around the box, his face a masquerade party of fear."You were on precaution duty. What are you doing here ?"

"Didn ‘ t you listen to me ?"Helen Wills Moody threw his handwriting back the way he'd come."The ministry ‘ s falling ! Enough dementors to paint the sky calamitous !"

"Why didn ‘ t you send a patronus ?"

"Didn ‘ t you hear what I just said ! Every column inch of that place is full-of-the-moon of the soul sucking demons ! No patronus could cut through that !"

"My god, we must serve them !"

"Oh really ? You think so ?"Moody saw his spit fly.

"We must go now."Dumbledore pushed past him, dashing to the threshold."We can select back the ministry, all of us can."

"But there could be a trap !"Moody tried to keep up, his breath spying in his chest."You can ‘ t go in there blind you can ‘ t just ... we don ‘ t even bed where Voldemort is !"Dumbledore was speeding away."We need a plan ! Do you ingest a plan you old bast-"But Dumbledore was gone, already around the quoin. Moody doubled over, he was old, too old. But gods he wasn't done yet, he wasn't ... done. What the hell was Dumbledore thought ? He could get them all killed ! The entire decree. The stallion bloody order in one fell swoop, and what the hell could he do to stop it ? He felt so old ...

But not yet done.

He straightened and staggered down the Charles Martin Hall. Faster. Faster. He found the door he wanted and threw it open.

"Severus !"Helen Wills Moody shouted towards the startled Professor."The order needs your service !"

"The fiat ?"Snape stood, his bridge player flat on the table. Zhao was beside him in a bit."I am not a member of the order any-"

"The ministry is compromised !"Moody saw his word of honor cut Snape."Dementors in more issue than ever before."

"And you want all the aid you can get ?"Snape sneered."The order had done me no favour lately."

"Severus,"Natalie Zhao spoke calmly, despite the place."flavor at him, something else is going on."

"smarting girl."Helen Wills Moody shook his head."Dumbledore is heading for the ministry, by now he ‘ s trailing half the parliamentary law. He ‘ s going in without any eyes, without anything. It is a trap, or could be. Even if it ‘ s not he ‘ s still going to lose half the order. He ‘ s ... he ‘ s reckless. He ‘ s stuck in the old war. He ‘ s everything you said he was. But if we let this happen ..."

"I know."Snape's eyes flickered with affright."We need to assist them. We need to help the order."

"That ‘ s why I ‘ m here Snape."Moody was gritting his teeth. Every instant was wasted."But I don ‘ t know what ... there are only three of us."

"Four."Snape muttered under his intimation."There are four of us. Natalie, would you get Albert Abraham Michelson. sports meeting us at the ministry back entrance."

"Even four can ‘ t cover this."Helen Newington Wills growled as the unspeakable dashed from the room."You know that."

"I know. I know well ..."Snape pulled a robe off the binding of a chair."We need an army."

"Do you know where to find out one ?"

"I do."Snape closed his eyes,"I do."
*


Rookwood stepped over a consistency. It's eyes were still open, it's sassing moving vacantly. The dementor's kiss, it left them living, but they were bodies nonetheless. Rookwood paid them no mind.

"Welcome Mr potter, to the Department of Mysteries."Rookwood pulled the cloak off his floating prisoner. Harry thrower. His prisoner was just hanging there dumbly. Well ... he couldn't really do any different. Rookwood let Harry down to the storey and canceled the silencing appeal."Well Mr Potter ? You have anything to say ?"

"What are you doing with me ?"Potter's representative was a short horse from the long silence."You ‘ re trying to earn head with your lord, isn ‘ t capturing me enough ?"

"to a greater extent than enough Harry. More than enough."Rookwood tweaked his wand and the chemical bond on Harry's leg snapped off. Another suction stop and Harry stumbled forward."But I am after the icing on the cake. If I am to outdo Crouch in full term of merit to the overlord ... I must essay the icing."

"That ‘ s the stupidest thing I ‘ ve ever heard."Harry said dully.

"wellspring I didn ‘ t ask you."Rookwood hurried forward through the ministry, he had to slack down a present moment later though as Harry shuffled along behind him."Hurry up !"

"My infantry are asleep. Your ropes were too tight."

"Just move."Rookwood walked back and grabbed Harry by the front of his shirt. The dementors were still swirling by the cap, looking for victims. There were still a few left. Not enough to trouble over though. He stepped into out into the memory bureau, pulling his strangely compliant charge past the armoured combat vehicle of head. He stopped by the doorway to the expiry chamber, there was the strait of spells from within, someone holding out perhaps. He pushed the doorway open in time to see a whiz scrambling away from an inferi trip and fall. The corpse-warrior grabbed the blubbering abominable in it's unshakable traveling bag and threw him away with inhuman military posture. shriek as he flew across the room, his scream was cut off as he fell through the arch in the nerve centre. The curtain ruffled for a here and now, then went still again.

Rookwood hid a shudder, he was never entirely comfortable with the carrying out portal. Harry watched from his incline with pall eyes. What was wrongfulness with the boy ? Never mind. Rookwood picked his way around the edge of the way, giving the inferi a wide birth, and pushed open up the door at the other side.

"fountainhead ceramist here we are."Rookwood gestured impressively at the cant of ledge in front of them, each one with rows upon quarrel of bantam spheres."This is the hallway of prophecy."

"These are prophecies ?"Harry sniffed disbelievingly as Rookwood dragged him along the pedigree of shelves."They look like snow-globes."

"They are records of prophecy, and they are the ground we are here."Rookwood glanced down at the boy he was dragging along."Did you know there was a prophecy made about you ?"

Harry didn't answer, but he sniffed again, his back talk twisting into a sneer.

"I assume that was a yes."Rookwood glanced up at the bit on the shelf, yes this was it."The prophecy concerned you and the dark lord, you know that too ?"

Once again the boy stayed silent. Rookwood poked him in the spinal column to set him walking up to where the prophecy was held.

"The wickedness lord is very eager to get his hands on the divination. That prophecy."Rookwood pointed at the particular orb."And I will be the one to give way it to him. My icing, you could say."

"What do you need me for ?"Potter was staring at the orb with barely contained hatred. What was going on ? ... Never creative thinker, it wasn't important.

"Shall I tell you something about the prophecies of the department of secret ? They are keyed, protected. Only sure people can hook them from where they lie. Namely the people they have been made about. So the only people who can take this prophecy are the darkness lord, and you. ``

ceramicist stared at the orb for a moment longer, the words sinking into him. Then he threw his fountainhead back and laughed, laughed so hard his eyes ran with tear. It was a reaction Rookwood had not expected. Laughter, but not in jest, not in joy. This was a bitter gag, full of darkness. What was going on ?

'' So that 's it is it ? '' Harry choked out, his deadened eyes still glistening."What a sulphurous antic"

"What ?"Rookwood shook his head.

"And if someone else grabs one ?"Harry reached out his deal."What happens then ?"

"If they are very prosperous they might get away with only major injuries."Rookwood answered confusedly."But in all likelihood ? They would die. Screaming."

"Really ?"The Potter boy's hired man hovered over the whirl chalk."To hell with it."His fingerbreadth closed around the orb.
*


Minerva screamed as she threw her patronus against the grew wall before her, knowing it was too late. The dementors scattered but a lifeless body fell from their clasp. An auror. Subjected to the kiss.

Minerva shuddered, she only hoped it had been agile. She spun as cold hands grabbed her from behind, crushing her with cold-blooded strength. The breathing spell fled from her lungs and she felt ribs scissure. In despair she transformed and dashed away on four infantry, spinning and changing back to plant a fireball in the chest of the inferi that had held her. As soon as it was gone another took it's place.

They were overrun, there were too many !

"Help me ! Oh god help me !"A name ran from out of the rabidness, his fleeceable derby still clutched in his hands."Please !"

"Get out of here you fool !"McGonagall shoved Fudge away. She could not deal with him. Her eye searched through the scrambling spate for the head of the order of magnitude."Dumbledore ! Dumbledore we must displume back !"

She could not see him, she could not see anything. despair was her just word of advice and she spun, a shining light throwing a dementor away that had been practically on her spine. She didn't even sleep together where they were anymore, near the court possibly. Down in the deep, no escape.

She heard a scream from her left and sent a patronus wildly into the surging crowd. The scream cut off sharply. Whether she had had any effect she did not do it, she had to translate again to dance out of the way of a swooping dementor and snapped back to transport another shining brightness level to check them back again. But her trunk was fatigue, her wand arm tired.

rot figure filled her nostril and she tried to land her verge around. Too slowly. The dead clenched fist crunched into the side of her fountainhead and she fell. She brought her wand up and blew the all in figure of speech to fragment, descent already dripping into her eyes. They needed help, and there was no one to give it.

No one.
*


The orb came free in thrower's hand, it's deliquium refulgence shining through his fingertips. Rookwood felt his heart leap, but the Potter boy was staring at the prophecy like it was a live snake.

"Good, good. Now give it to me !"Rookwood demanded, but the boy didn't move.

"Not possible."Harry shook his head."Saw the body ..."The physical structure ? He wasn't making any sense.

"Just give me the bloody orb !"Rookwood made to grab it but thrower slipped away.

"It ‘ s not ... It ‘ s not ... Can ‘ t."Suddenly the E. B. White luminousness faltered. A tinny whine filled the air, like grinding gears. Harry held up his hand, slowly uncurling his fingers. In the midriff of the Edward Douglas White Jr. a tiny spike of shadow was growing, like ink in Milk. The blackness grew until it covered the whole inside of the orb, it was no longer shining glass but a polished orb of obsidian. The whine grew in the air, biting into his pinna. Suddenly there was a froth crackle and Potter yelped in pain sensation, spilling the prophecy onto the story. Rookwood cried out, it would break up for sure ! But when the orb struck the primer it squelched, spreading out like stiff. hummer rose from the blackened glass.

Rookwood leant forwards and held his hand out over it. The estrus was unbearable this finish and he had to shy back. The divination had melted. Melted into a steaming puddle on the floor.

The ceramicist boy ... he did this !

"What did you do ?"Rookwood snarled. Potter backed away, his work force held up.

"Not me, Dumbledore. He must let switched them."

"Dumbledore could not have touched the prophecy !"

"He could if it was already played out."ceramicist glanced at the guck on the level."A trap, or else his conjuration on me intervene somehow."

"You speak madness."Rookwood reached out to grab the boy but just as he did so the ground shook, throwing them both off their foundation."What the hell is that ?"

"He ‘ s come."The Potter boy was staring through the roof like a maniac, his side again an empty mask of horror."He ‘ s come."
*


Suddenly the dementors went still, floating off their enemy to vibrate by the ceiling. The silence broken only be the groaning of the wounded. Minerva 's oculus found the entranceway to the lift, it 's mesh opening in a grating crash. Stepping out into the corridor, black robes floating behind him and a hand curled in a moving ridge to the creatures swirling above, was the sullen lord himself. Minerva felt her tenderness parachuting to her throat. She glanced around, the order was in tatters. Only Dumbledore stood marvelous, the rest of them were covered in roue and shaking from the exertion of the engagement. There was no force here to stop a nighttime lord, no force at all.

Voldermort's centre found a quivering lump on the floor and he smiled. Ignoring Dumbledore the dark Divine crooked a digit, pulling the physical body to his feet. The green bowler was gone, but the pale flesh remained.

"Ah, Cornelius."Voldemort chuckled."Remember back when you used to invite me up to your office for tea ? Back when you were just a section chief and I, just a innocent boy. Oh how far we ‘ ve come."

"Please ..."Fudge whimpered."Please don ‘ t hurt me."

"Hurt you Cornelius ? But why would I need to ?"Voldemort gestured to the roof."Even as I speak the balance of your ministry has already been overrun. The ministry you so get laid is a nest of soul sucking ghost. Why would I need to suffer you ? I already have everything I wanted from you."

"Tom,"Dumbledore's voice spoke out delicate in the duskiness."You can not possibly think I will let this stand ?"

"No old man, I do not."Voldemort flicked his scepter towards the Headmaster. Fudge dropped to the base and scampered away down the corridor."I think you will do as you have always done. Stand bravely in the look of the tide, and be swept under."

"Tom I shall-"

"No !"Voldemort cut the Headmaster off with a sharp Word."I have grown tired of you."Voldemort raised his hand and the Dementors fell like hunting hawk. Minerva was forced to campaign for her life against the Charles Grey hoard, spinning around her like a vortex of dying. And in flashes of sluttish beyond that whirl she could see Dumbledore rushing towards his foe, his scepter out like a sword.

Minerva tried to cut her way forward. Tried to get to them, to help oneself. But the press was too great. An inferi had her arm in it's vice like grip and she blew it off with flames. Another took it's place too quickly. Far too quickly. There was a gout of purple light that cut through the air, momentarily beating back the dementors. Through the gap she could see the dueling genius in the center of all this, Dumbledore raising the very Harlan Fiske Stone of the level in a wall against the dark Maker, but it was blasted to shred just as quickly. Dumbledore was driven to his knees.

Minerva dashed towards him but the grey heap closed between them. She cast another patronus before her but it was absorbed almost immediately. She felt an arm clutch hers and spun to burn down it off before she recognized the face.

"Remus !"She moved back to back with the loup-garou, spinning her patronus into a dress circle around them."We need to get to them !"

"It is too deep for that !"He shouted back.

"Then what do you purport !"

"We die."lupine delivered that last in a directly growling."We are finished."

"We are not !"Minerva tried to throw another patronus but the despair was sinking in and it faltered as White person mist, easily brushed aside by the specter. Suddenly there was a outburst of tearing noise, breaking the flag and making the chamber milkshake with it's effect. As it died there a heartbeat of red ignitor and a gamy cruel laugh.

"That is the best you could do ?"The interpreter of Voldemort was evident."I win old man."

The dementors parted for a second, like clouds in wind. The dark Almighty stood over the sprawled kind of the Headmaster, his boot on Dumbeldore's neck opening. Minerva felt despair that had nil to do with the dementors. She let her wand hand drop to her incline. They had lost. It was all over.

"Expecto Patronum !"A chorus line of strong vocalization cried the spell and the room was filled with a wall of spark. Minerva watched as a charging white lion crashed into the massed forms before her, a snarling savage running at it's heels.

"You ! betrayer !"Voldemort had his baton drawn and had spun to confront the lift. Minerva turned to look but saw just one figure standing there, his arms crossed in self-important casualness.

"footstep away from the Headmaster."Snape had his sceptre drawn and flicked it down towards the darkness Divine."I have not seen eye to eye with him of late but it would be a pity if he died."

"I will pour down you !"Voldemort surged forward and Snape's sceptre stabbed forward. There was a flash of luminance and Snape was thrown backwards. He stumbled and pushed himself up, driving a wolf blast of frozen jazz at the dark lord.

Minerva dashed forward to help him but once again found a hand gripping her arm.

"Minerva !"A capitulum appeared out of nowhere as a cloak was thrown back. Natalie Zhao ? What in Merlin's name ?"Minerva the students can ‘ t keep them back forever and sooner or later Voldemort ‘ s going to wonder where those early patronus came from."

"The students ?"

"The marauders."Natalie snapped."Now come on !"

"But Snape-"

"Is holding him back !"The awful grabbed a prone digit on the level."Now tell your people to fall back before everyone else is stagnant !"
*


The boy who had been Harry didn't know where he was. There had been a mad bolt away from Rookwood, screaming and dashing through the mental confusion of battle, then there had been some steps, then a corridor ... The sounds of fight were everywhere, coming out of the bulwark. He had just kept running., unable to do anything else. His core raced beyond what any human exertion should have forced it to. His mind was blank, a dead weight. Today had been a lifetime.

The shattering interference of a spell exploded from the left field and he dashed away like a rat. He had to get out.

"Come on dance with me you mangled bitch !"Michelson came into thought down a long hallway, throwing bolts of lightning at Bellatrix and laughing like a madman.

He had to get out. He dashed into a staircase and almost tripped over a dead body on the floor. Pink hair, auror ‘ s robe. Oh no ...

He crouched down on the floor, his fingerbreadth going to Tonk's neck on instinct. He did not really expect to find anything, her skin was blanch and ...

She had a pulse.

The nameless boy had to screen her body as a shining optical maser of something cut through the wall above them. The duel was raging just on the former position of the rampart. She wouldn't have a pulsing for long if he left her here.

So long ... His brain was gray-haired sludge, he just wanted to shut down. He had no wand and his muscles were weewee. They would never reach safety device anyway, this place was a warzone. But on the early hand ... Tonks.

Putting a play out shoulder under her arm, he lifted her up.



critical review and you will grow nance flank that will let you fly.


Due to other dedication my postings may get a little farther apart for a while. Sorry everybody.



Snape let himself down tiredly on the edge of the natural spring of magical brethren. Every off-white ached and his arm was tied up to his consistence in a sling. There was no time for healing yet though, no time at all.

"Stay back. !"Natalie was shouting calmly ( a toughened combination to master ), raising her hands to the crowd of ministry survivors."Just stay there and the healers will get to you ! And you get out of here !"The last was directed to a daily oracle reporter furiously scratching away at a notebook.

The early side of the residence, back behind the hearth, a line of bottom were set up for triage. From where he sat Snape could see Elizabeth heath lying sedated, her hand clutched by her constant familiar Vanessa. She would be alright though, a trivial frigidness and quiet for weeks to derive and likely not ever wanting to encounter a dementor again but she would survive. Oh to hold just one of them back in his house, or any of the marauders. They had fought like tigers, like approach dogs with wands.

One of the doors slammed exposed and Markus stepped out angrily. His robes were mostly burnt off and he had blood running down the slope of his dresser but he seemed incognizant of these little details.

"She got away."The monolithic maven reached the edge of the fountain and plunged his headspring under the surface. A second later he lifted it up and pushed his wet hairsbreadth out of his eyes."Bellatrix."

"The piranha told me you had gone after her."

"She reached one of their bloody tunnels."Markus grated."Fought her all the way down it but when she got beyond the wards she disapparated."

"Then she is out of the competitiveness at least."Snape nodded, he would take any victory he could get."Forneus is in custody and Rookwood is numbered among the dead."

"So I'm the only one who missed his mark."Markus shook sprays of water supply out of his hair."Sorry mate."

"Bella has more lives than a cat, do not consider any more of it."

"You say that but ... I 'm not used to failing, never done it before. '' Marcus shed his ruined robe and dumped it carelessly on the flooring before glancing around at the disarray. `` What ‘ s happening here ? Did we get everybody out ?"

"We have taken back most of the ministry. I believe all of the marauders deserve Os"

'' They deserve damn medallion ! ``

'' Yes but I can not give them laurel wreath. You however can establish them Os. '' Snape smiled a fain smile and saw it returned all-encompassing. He gestured towards the lift with his salutary arm."Voldemort holds the department of Mysteries. Or to put it another way he is trapped there. He has placed a ward on the lift and on all staircases."

"I can break through."Michelson nodded arrogantly. `` Give me five minutes. ``

"I doubt that you could do it in five or five hundred."Snape shook his head."I know that ward. There is only one way to get through it, and that is with a dark mark on your arm."

"Well then you can-"Albert Abraham Michelson cut off as Snape pulled up his arm to reveal the newly cut skin."Oh."

"Yes, and it ‘ s forged than that."Snape bowed his head."He has hostages down there, purchase order member and unspeakables who survived."

"How many ?"

"Ten, we think."Snape glanced up to meet Markus'eyes."Including lupine ... and Dumbledore."

"Mother of god."Michelson slammed his fist into his palm."So it ‘ s a stalemate ?"

"For now, until he makes his motion. He can not expect forever."Snape felt a slight thrill run through him. Whatever the dark Godhead's motility would be it would be the decease of at least some of those hostages. Probably all.

'' What the ... '' Suddenly Albert Abraham Michelson was on his ft, an expression of shock on his fount. `` Merlin 's ... Harry ? ``

A moment later Snape saw what he had seen. Out of a passageway Harry was stumbling, a prone body weighing him down and his case a grayness mask. He did n't see up, did n't acknowledge anything, just stepped directly to the nearest bed and lay his burden down bedside a shocked healer. Snape rushed forward and saw marauders stand in every corner of the room, running towards the unexpected view of their leader.

'' Harry. '' Draco came to a stop just in front man Harry. `` Harry what are you doing he- ''

'' Tonks is hurt. '' Harry broke in. `` You should try to reckon after her, she 's your first cousin. ``

'' Harry are you alright ? '' Hermione reached out to touch him but he flinched away. `` What is it Harry ? ``

'' I 'm ticket. '' Harry was almost curling up under their stares, hugging his weapons system close to his chest.

'' Are you hurt ? '' Padma asked. `` The healers could loo- ''

'' I said I 'm fine. Just ... go away. ``

'' How did you get out of the hospital ? ``

'' Where 's your scepter ? ``

'' Shut up. ``

'' How did you get to the ministry ? ``

'' I SAID SHUT UP ! '' Harry yelled angrily. As the marauders shied back there was a blast of heat from behind them. Snape spun around in time to see the outflow of magical brethren go red hot and begin melt, dissolving into the water with a raspberry. But the gold was not disappearing, it was staying there in the water, mixing with the body of water. Harry forgotten, Snape stepped forward as the surviving Order members, ministry workers and marauders surrounded the pocket billiards of gold.

It was like a mirror, shining with yellowness light up to the ceiling. As they watched it faded to silver, then to grey, then finally to pure Caucasian. The white resolved into shapes, coloration bloomed out of the pure light. As the shapes coalesced Snape heard a shriek from person on the other side of the pool and almost felt like following suit.

In the pool, rippling on the surface of the liquid, was an image of lord Voldemort. He was standing in what was clearly the department of secret. The wand in his hand was long and pale, it was not the one Snape was used to seeing him use. It was unmistakably Dumbledore 's baton. Behind the dark Godhead, lined up and chained together, were ten maven. Though the scene was faded and the semblance ran together Snape could easily greet the two on the end. Cornelius Fudge and Albus Dumbledore.

The Voldemort range turned towards them and spoke, his voice sounding trench and echoic like it was coming from the seat of a well.

'' Good whizz of the ministry, '' The iniquity lord greeted amicably. `` Members of the order of the phoenix and the good kid. What you are seeing is the interior of the section of mysteries, where all the smashing secrets are hidden. All the abstruse magic of the ministry is within these walls, all controlled by me. ``

'' He 's lying. '' Natalie assured the panicking wizards around her. `` There 's goose egg down there he could use. ``

'' And look at my friends here, '' Voldemort gestured out over his captive. `` They all fought. They all failed, such is the price of defying lord Voldemort. '' He took a bundle of wands out of his pocket and hovered it into the air. With a gout of flame they burnt into ash. `` Such is the price ... And seem who we have here ... '' Voldemort crooked a finger and Fudge was dragged forward, his attachment separating from the others. He came to a stop by the iniquity lord 's feet and looked up with pained eyes.

'' Are you going to ... to shoot down me ? '' Fudge stuttered out.

'' Yes. '' Voldemort answered simply.

'' But but ... I. ``

'' I am going to kill you you poor petty man, whatever you say. ``

'' Then ... then. '' Fudge seemed to breath a little well-heeled. `` Do you think of when I used to invite you up for tea ? Back when I was ... I was a department hear and you were ... you were younger. ``

'' Yes ? ``

'' fountainhead I spat in your tea. '' Fudge shuddered out through gritted teeth. `` Every time. Even back then you were a creepy-crawly little freak. ``

'' You ... '' Voldemort seemed to grow in menace, his eyes blazing. `` Why do you enjoin me this ? Surely you know it is pointless ! ``

'' My ... my affectionately boy. '' Fudge stuttered, his eye still to the story. `` defiance ... is never p ... p ... pointless. ``

'' Avada Kedavra ! ``

leafy vegetable lighting filled the pool of weewee and for a here and now none of them could see anything. Snape felt his fondness beating rapidly in his dresser. The light cleared in sentence for them too see the nighttime Godhead savagely kicking the minister 's physical structure to the side and stabbing his scepter towards Dumbledore. The schoolmaster was thrown forward roughly.

Snape swallowed worriedly. The dark Divine was showing them this to manifest his power but Fudge had openly defied him. Voldemort would be enraged.

'' Well old man ! '' Voldemort stabbed his wand down at Dumbledore, a bolt of electrical energy charring a yap in the Headmaster 's robes. `` Do you not have something to say ? Some net Scripture before I take your animation. ``

Dumbledore just stayed mute. It was only from the light rise and fall of his bureau that Snape could tell he was still alive.

'' Speak Albus ! ... Crucio ! '' Voldemort held the headmaster in the throws of the torture jinx for a few mo before releasing him. `` You will speak ! There has been too much between us, you have been my enemy for too prospicient for me to let you end it this way. You will receipt that I have won, you will say it ! You will acknowledge this victory in some way before I kill you with your own verge ! ``

Dumbledore did n't even look at the dark noble. In a rage Voldemort slashed his wand through the air, dragging Dumbledore to his feet.

'' You will speak ! '' The snake like cheek was set with fell anger. `` You will address before you die ! ``

'' I ... '' Dumbledore wet his backtalk and tried again. `` I am ready to die. ``

'' What ? ``

'' I am quick ... '' Dumbledore closed his eyes. `` I am ready to die for everything I have done. Those are my terminal actor's line, the only ones you will get. defeat me. ``

'' You ... Cruci ... '' Voldemort raised his scepter to form the execration but let it die on his lips. Snape could almost see him dragging his emotions back under control. `` But of course, how could I deny a last asking. Avada Kedavra ! ``

It was as if time froze. The pool exploded with light-green Christ Within again and Snape's throat closed, every muscle tensing. The other watcher around the puddle held their handwriting to their faces, or shook there head ... they would not trust it. The green light faded and the organic structure of Albus Dumbledore dropped to the dry land. It crumpled like a report diaper, his beard trailing onto the floor like a rag.

So fell Albus Dumbledore. Snape felt a small hand worm into his. Natalie 's helping hand. He did n't acknowledge whether she was offering comfort or asking for it. Perhaps both.

'' Here dies Albus Dumbledore. '' Voldemort laughed. `` A fool to the end, and in the end a dashing hopes. So there you are, two hostage all in. I have eight left and all will die if you do not hand me what I want. I want Harry thrower. Bring him to me in one half-hour or I will vote out another, perhaps the werewolf. I am sure no one will pretermit him. But if any of you wish to see these wizards alive, then you know what you must do. Bring. Me. Harry. Potter ! ``

The pool went Black person and Snape stepped back. All around him multitude seemed to be going mad, crying and shouting to one another in mental confusion. His eyes were only trying to receive one build. Harry Potter. He swept the crew. Nothing.

Snape turned to the incoming in fourth dimension to see the doors snap shut.
*


The unknown boy crashed out of the headphone box and dashed away, his feet slipping on the wet sidewalk. rain down splattered against his grimace as he ran out into the streets. He did n't even know why he was running, just that he had to get away. All of them would take care to him, would look at him and expect to see Harry ceramicist. Expect to see their savior, when all there was was a fraud. He dashed past the people in the street, some of them turning to look at his odd wear and panic-struck expression, but he was running too fast and they were left behind.

He heedlessly ran into the route and heard the screaming of happy chance. He prayed that one of the cars would hit him. His fundament would not quit moving and the auditory sensation of car horn was left behind. His magic eye painted the world in shimmering curtains of phantasma, distorted by the raindrops settling on it 's surface. He pushed past a man in a suit and heard the man outcry. He could n't finish running. Had to get away. But what he was running from could not be escaped. He was running from reality. The rainwater ran like a river. Roaring like the river.

Finally, with his heart lacing like a jack-hammer, he collapsed on the cold, wet pavement. He lay there, his base still twitching, and breathed. He had collapsed in an alleyway, dark and dirty. time lag ...

He turned to lie on his back as his magic eye swivelled around, taking in every particular. He had been here before ... This was the bowling alley where it all started, where Hagrid had caught him so many years ago. There was the drainpipe he had climbed ... the ceiling he had hid ... He had come a good lap, entirely.

Heedless of the drive pelting he opened his mouth and laughed. Laughed in perfect bitterness. If only he had never stopped here, had never been caught, had never gone to Hogwarts. Then he would never have known, would never have known any of this. He would consume been able to sustain on being Harry Potter. He felt tears running down his buttock and mingling with the rain, freezing him to the bone.

But there was affectionateness. A little dot of heat at his chest. He dug his handwriting into his shirt and slowly drew it out.

His pendent. Pythea's pendent. Worn so long he had almost forgotten it was there. But now it was glowing like a maven, so burnished beneath the gray sky. He knelt and held it cupped in both hands, staring at it in wonderment as a silver mist swirled out from the point. It pooled in his manus, swirling and sifting. Slowly the twinkle liquidness rose, shaped and colored and separated until two eyeball hung in the air by his custody. One of burnished gold, the early pure white.

'' Harry ... ''

The Edward Douglas White Jr. orb shifted, moved and expanded. It shaped into a trope, every curve glowing with light, every flowing line of her pure white dress and her porcelain skin.

'' Theia ... '' He breathed.

'' Harry I wish I could take come sooner. '' Thea stepped forward and encased his manus in hers.

'' Another illusion- ''

'' No. '' Pythea shook her head. `` This is no illusion. This is really me talking, from Ellas. I thought you might need my service. ``

'' Your ... help ? ``

'' You 're lost. Lost in the woods. '' Theia smiled faintly. The golden orb was still circling her, pulsing faintly. `` And I am the oracle. I thought you might ask a pathfinder out. That was why I gave you this all those geezerhood ago, to facilitate you detect your way. In your obscure hour. You need to find your way again Harry, or else were all doomed. ``

'' Thea, '' The boy ducked his head, his eyes squeezing shut. `` I 'm not who you think I am. I 'm not the one you were trying to help, not the elect one. I 'm not- ''

'' I know who you are. '' Pythea said simply.

'' You ... you do ? But then why ? ``

'' Harry did you think I was helping you all these long time because you were the chosen one ? '' Thea laughed lightly, her crystal vocalism filling the nothingness between the buildings with joy. `` I was n't helping you because you were Harry Potter I was helping you because you were you. ``

'' Do n't call me that. Do n't call in me Harry. ``

'' It 's your name if you want it to be. Or choose another name. '' Pythea smiled. `` When I first met you you were calling yourself Jack. ``

'' plosive consonant. '' Too painful. memory of pleasant times,

'' I will not stop. I will never end trying to help oneself you. I knew the moment I met you that you were n't the chosen one. I mean please Harry, I 'm the schoolmistress of vaticination. Did you honestly think for a moment that I would miss a thing like that ? I saw who you were. I also saw that, in a world without promise, you were the only shining probability. ``

'' You ... you saw something about me ? My future tense ? ``

'' I saw nothing about your future. I saw everything about you. '' Pythea knelt to meet him eye to eye. `` I saw you a brave and true someone who would press for this creation even if the stallion worldly concern was against him. I saw someone who could get struck down a K times and would still pick himself up. I saw that the nighttime lord would uprise and I hoped ... I did n't recognize but I hoped that you would never buckle before him. With the world in peril and the hereafter unsure I took the best chance the earthly concern had. I took a chance on you. In a meter of sodding despair, I trusted you. ``

'' But, I ca n't fight anymore. '' The boy dropped his heart. `` I just ... I just feel empty. You do n't fuck what it 's like to have someone walk up to you and nobble your entire life, everything you believe, right out from under you. ``

'' I do. '' Pythea replied simply.

"Really ?"Harry swallowed."Wh ... what did you do ?"

"I gave him a necklace."Pythea smiled. `` But I do n't gestate you to accept what you have to do from me, which is why I brought him. '' Pythea gestured up to the golden area. `` You've carried this necklace close to your gist for almost four years now. I think it's time you saw what's inside. Do n't die Harry, please do n't die. I 'll see you soon. '' She faded into null, leaving just the golden orb left. As soon as she was gone it began stretching and shaping.

'' Um what do I do ? '' An uncertain vocalization came from the growing cloud of mist. `` I just speak into it ? ``

The physical body resolved into a figure. His recollective gown were buttoned tightly and long arm, rolled up now to usher his arms. Those gown were familiar. Tonks had worn them last yr, auror trainee robes. The face remained foggy for a moment more than then coalesced, becoming a immobile model in prosperous light, right down to the final tousled hair.

The boy who had been Harry 's mouth fell undecided in shock. He was looking up into his own face. No ... no there were differences. The jaw was more bespeak, keen, the eyes closer together. He did n't have a scar on his neck, nor a dark mark on his arm. He looked onetime too, at least two years if he was an aurors apprentice. God ... was it possible ? Was this ... Harry Potter ?

'' I do n't quite realize this. '' The ghostly fortunate figure said. `` Your Friend, Pythea, she says that you 're in a dissimilar world or ... or dimension or something. A different time too. I do n't still understand it, necessitate Hermione for that sort of affair. ``

'' So do I ... '' A murmured whisper. Disbelief.

'' Your friend says I wo n't remember recording this, wo n't remember any of it. '' The trope was just staring into infinite as it spoke. Apparently this one was a true recording. `` But if ... if I understand what she 's explained to me then your world is very unlike from mine. For one thing ... I 'm not in it. I died. ``

The golden Harry glanced to the floor, shaking his head.

'' I wish I knew why but ... your friend wo n't tell me. Something about lessening the interference as much as possible. There are other things I wish I could tell you, things you really should know about- '' The recording skewed like static for a moment then continued. `` But apparently I 'm not allowed to say them either. All she 's told me is that you, you were told you were me. Until very recently you thought you were me ... or will. The time affair is really confusing me. I 'm recording this in my time to come, to be given to you in your yesteryear, to spiel in your present. Apparently Pythea thinks that maybe I can say something to you .... maybe explain ... I do n't cognize. I do n't fuck what I 'm saying. I ca n't imagine what you 're going through. It 's like ... It 's like you 're an orphan all over again. Except this time it 's worse because you know you had a past it 's just been taken. I know you must palpate like crawling into a hole and demise, I 've felt like that. When my godfather died I ... but that 's not the same really. I do n't make out what I 'm saying. ``

The ghostlike trope began pacing up and down.

'' I do n't know what I 'm say to say to you. '' The Harry stopped pacing and pass around his hands. `` Except that, that it gets better. I 've been through with things as bad as you, and I 'm probably the only person you 'll ever meet that can say that. Your friend says that, since I 'm idle in your world, the job of fighting Voldemort falls to you. I ca n't say it'going to be well-situated, but you know that. In fact I ca n't conceive of anything that I could say to persuade you to take the job. Except that you have to. The public depends on it. And I know that the world has n't done you any favors. Maybe right now you feel like you 'd rather let the mankind be destroyed for everything it 's done to you. I do n't know what I can say to convince you that 's not truthful except for two things. One, it gets better. It really, really does. Eventually. And two ... ''

The shadow flesh licked it 's lips.

'' Do you experience how many regularization are broken by this kind of inter-dimensional transit ? Certain countries still have the demise penalty for messing around in parallel worlds. Just getting here, the sweat it must experience taken. The risks your protagonist has taken just to get this message to you .... I guess what I 'm saying is that even if the entire rest of the reality is hell right now you 've got one person who 's willing to take a chance everything for you. gamble her life. So if zero else ... fight for her. ``

The figure faded. It 's heart lasted the longest, staring out into the pelting, then they too were gone and the alley was dark again. The boy on the background stood, slowly and with forethought, but he stood.

'' Wow ... '' He said softly. `` What a dork. ``

He chuckled to himself, the laughter edifice. His hands went to his stomach as he threw his head back and laughed, the rain trickling down his face. That was Harry Potter was it ? Git. I mean who talks like that ? Screw him. Screw the overly spectacular, hesitating asshole. If that childish gimboid can economize the worldly concern I sure as the pits can.

He pushed his rain soaked hair out of his center. It was like the emptiness was, somehow reprint. It was still there, the gaping void, it was just that all the significant division of him, the things that made him who he was, were outside it. He settled the little shell necklace back around his neck opening. Just a shell now, it's trick gone. But not wearing it was unthinkable. It was part of him, the actual him, and he needed it back. Especially since he intended to pick the biggest battle of his life.

He needed a plan though .... and if he was going to hold out a competitiveness with the greatest dark wiz in the world it would want to be a bloody good plan. Or a bloody insane one. Let's see, he had no vantage. Voldemort held all the cards. Voldemort could vote out him without thinking. And Voldemort had hostage. On the other helping hand Voldemort was alone, he had no death eater, no dark creatures, no servants.

Whatever plan he came up with it would come down to just the two of them. A fair fight. Which he would lose.

So urinate it an unfair fight.

His backtalk curled into a smile. There it was, there was the melodic theme. A Harry thrower plan.

smiling, he walked out of the alley. He picked up his step and he reached the street, how a lot of his half hr was gone ? He had lost all data track of time. He broke into a run. He knew he should go faster but he would help no one if he was to tired to fight. It seemed an age until the phone box came into perspective, sticking up out of the street. Harry got in, then pressed the code on the receiver.

"Welcome to the ministry of deception. Please province your epithet and business."The headphone said flatly.

"Harry Potter."Said Harry smiling."I ‘ m here to keep open the world."

The machine apparently took him a little too literally as ...
Harry Potter
Messiah


... Clattered into the hopper. Harry didn't fuss to pluck it up. If he didn't know who he was now no badge was gon na tell him. He dissilusioned himself before the doors slid surface again and stepped out into the ministry entrance hall. There was a story of organized pandemonium and another adult floor of disorganised chaos. Harry ignored it and his magic eye picked out the vulture. The were all clustered in one situation. Harry wandered over to them and quietly said,

"Don ‘ t move. Don ‘ t give them and sign you ‘ re hearing me. Just come over here behind that chimney where we can ‘ t be seen."

The marauder's stiffened, but to their mention none of them gave the game away. Harry followed them as they slowly rose and nonchalantly wandered behind the massive fireplace. Once they were all behind Harry dropped his illusion and smiled at his friends.

"Hi guys. I ‘ m back."

"Harry are you ..."Hermione began, then paused."Are you ... feeling better ?"

"I ‘ m sorry for yelling at you, at all of you. And yes I ‘ m ... I ‘ m better."The empty place in his breast begged to differ but he ignored it."I ‘ m intuitive feeling .... I ‘ m better."

"Harry what did Dumbledore say to-"Padma began but Harry cut her off.

"There ‘ s no time, how a lot sentence we got until the initiatory hostage goes ?"

"V minutes."Draco pointed at the clock.

"Good that ... that might be enough."

"You ‘ re going to crusade him aren ‘ t you ?"Neville asked in a small voice."You ‘ re going down to contend him."

"Yes."Harry nodded, and there was a sudden intake of breath from the predator."But I have a plan ! Seriously guys, it ‘ s ok. I have a plan."

"Do you recall how badly some of your former programme have gone ?"Padma asked dryly.

"Oh please, you know I blank those from my memory."Harry grinned."Anyway I need three affair. Things I need your help with."

"You got it Harry."Ginny went into serious modality."Whatever you need."

"fountainhead firstly I ‘ ll need a wand."Harry bit his lip."And I can ‘ t guaranty you ‘ ll get it back."

A timberland of mitt were stretched out towards him. Every single wand. Harry picked one at random and tried a simple appeal. It was stuttery and faint. No honest. He picked another and almost set his hair's-breadth on fire. The third the patch came out right but the baton felt weird. The fourth ... Harry did first one tour then another ... then another ... they all came out perfective tense. His eyes came up to cope with Malfoy's grey ones.

"livelihood it."The Slytherin boy nodded."I can give a new one."

"Thank you."Harry pocketed the baton."The second thing I need is healing. Just a quick refresher. I ‘ m to tired and eff up to press like this."

"Here."Ginny drew a bottle out of her robes."I swiped it from the triage center. I thought you might need it if you came back."

Harry took the bottle with a grin and tipped it back into his lip. The strong chocolaty liquid seemed to run out into every aching muscularity and bone, making him feel like he was well rested and respectable rather than at the edge of weariness.

"And thirdly we need to make something."Harry handed the bottle back."It ‘ ll be catchy but if I handle the spell and somebody else does the transfig we should be able-bodied to supervise it. Oh ! And I ‘ ve thought of a one-quarter matter. I ‘ ll need a distraction."
*


"Here ! feeling !"Snape was shocked out of his thoughts by the vociferation. His eyes found the source in the Young Weasley tike, crouched down by the outflow. Ginny was furiously jabbing at the pool, waving him over. `` It 's going clear again. I can see something ! '' Snape dashed over, staring down into the inky wickedness. He could see nothing.

'' Where ? '' Snape asked hurriedly.

'' There, there by the turning point. ``

'' I see naught. ``

'' Look. ``

'' young woman Weasley there is nothing there. ``

'' There was ! ``

'' There is not now- '' Snape 's optic flickered up to come across those of his student. A flutter of memory twitched behind those eyes. He pushed ... No ! Snape spun and dashed to the face lift, but the grating was already slamming shut. Snape came crashing up against the ward. The magical roadblock sparking against his skin like static. He could n't get through. Before his eyes the dissilusionment fell and Harry Potter was standing there, looking back at him. Snape felt multitude crowding all around, murmuring, speaking, crying. All pressed up to one face of the barrier, and on the other ... just Harry.

'' Harry, please. '' Snape held his script out to the wall of the Aaron Montgomery Ward. `` Do n't do this. ``

'' Eight people. '' The kid shrugged. `` Eight masses or me. Choice is pretty obvious. ``

'' Foolish boy. You do n't have to do this. ``

'' I know I do n't. '' Harry nodded, a syncope grin on his face. `` I 'm doing it anyway. Wish me circumstances. ``

The lift started down. Snape held Harry 's eyes all the way till he was out of sight. Right at the end, just before he disappeared, Snape could have sworn he saw a wink.
*


The lift grate slid open and Harry stepped warily out into the corridor. The wreckage of battle was everywhere, dandy gouge gone from the bulwark and doors blown off their hinges. This was n't the department of closed book yet though. Just the courtrooms. Harry 's eye whirled wildly as he picked his way around the wreckage. The door to the section came into opinion, a blank rectangle at the end of a hanker corridor. Harry could see nothing beyond the door, not even with his magic eye. Some sort of shelter must extend around the department of mysteries. For the sake of his plan he hoped it did n't carry inside the section too. Harry raised his verge to his neck opening and spoke the sonerous charm.

'' Tom riddle ! '' Harry 's overdraw voice shook the bricks in the walls. `` I 'm here. '' There was a moment 's wait, then.

'' Welcome Mr ceramist. '' A similarly booming vocalism sounded down the hall. `` I was not indisputable you would come. ``

'' Why would I stay away Tommy boy. We 're like old champion. '' Harry was poised to run at any moment if this went incorrect. `` You 've got eight citizenry in there. Those people deserve to get out, so Lashkar-e-Taiba make a deal, valet 's agreement between friends. I go in. All of them go out. ``

"Those are the terms I gave."Voldemort sounded amused.

Harry waited in silence for a moment ... then the door at the end of the corridor swung open. Grinning quietly to himself, Harry walked in. The vista was just as it had been reflected in the pond, the line of captives, the wreckage, and Voldemort standing in the center. The bodies of Fudge and Dumbledore were lying where they fell. The room was the roach room, the spinning room. Rookwood had taken him through it earlier. But it was n't spinning now, some of the doors had been knocked off their hinges and he could see into the rooms beyond.

'' Seen everything you need to Mr Potter ? '' Voldemort asked icily. `` Taken in all the information ? ``

'' Yep, '' Harry replied chirpily. `` So ... the captive. ``

'' Of grade. '' Voldemort gestured mildly. The chains on the prisoners crashed to the ground.

'' Go on guys. '' Harry stood out of the way so they could get to the doors. `` Get out of here. '' Slowly, the prisoner began to shuffle towards the door.

"They ‘ ll be capable to get out ?"Harry asked."Past the Barbara Ward ?"

"In only stops the great unwashed from entering, not from leaving."

'' Ok, fine. Wait ! '' Harry held up a hired man, then pointed to Lupin and a brawny looking auror. `` Fudge and Dumbledore, charter them up with you. ``

Lupin bent to cradle the body of his teacher and lifted him up. As he passed Harry on the way out their eyes met. Lupin leant down to Harry 's ear and whispered,

'' I hope he kills you. '' Harry had to laugh. Some things did n't change.

As the concluding man trouped out Harry pushed the door shut and locked it. The toilsome bolt sliding into plaza sounded like a hammer.

'' well Mr ceramist. '' Voldemort smiled like a snake in the grass. `` It is down to just you and me. The kings in our little chess secret plan. The pawns are gone, the rook are taken. Now it is just down to you and me. ``

"Have you never even played chess ?"Harry quirked an brow."If all you have is the two kings that 's a stalemate serpent face. You ca n't checkmate with one king."

"I was being metaphorical."

Harry rolled his eyes and picked a clear space of floor. He pointed his scepter down.

'' Calx. '' A chalk line appeared on the level. Harry drew his wand around in a rough rectangle then stepped back and measured his handiwork by eye. `` Tommy boy give way me your opinion. Does that look like 14 animal foot to you ? ``

'' What in pigeon hawk 's figure are you doing ? ``

'' Well we have to have a affaire d'honneur. '' Harry shrugged. `` Might as well do it by the book. ``

'' A regularisation wizard 's affaire d'honneur ? '' Voldemort seemed almost ready to chortle. `` My my Mr Potter I can not tell you how refreshing it is to fight against you and not Dumbledore. It is ... so gratifying to be surprised. ``

'' I am unpredictable. '' Harry shrugged and stepped up to the eye of the rectangle. He put his wand into his pocket and held his hand away from it to show he was n't touching it. `` But I believe that the next stride is to bow to one another. Like valet de chambre. ``

'' This will be interesting. '' Voldemort smiled and stepped up to the dueling program, similarly holstering his scepter. `` I hope your Quaker are enjoying this. ``

'' What are you ... '' Harry paused. `` Are they watching ? ``

'' Of row. ``

'' Hmm ... '' Harry grinned up at the roof. `` Hope you like this guys. It 's going to be one Inferno of a show. ``

'' Shall we get started ? '' Voldemort stepped up to the center of the rectangle and bowed. Harry bowed in turn, then stuck out his hand.

'' We part as friends. '' Harry smiled. Voldemort chuckled wryly and encircled Harry 's manus in his own. Harry pulled forward and hugged the shock dark lord. He released him quickly and laughed. `` Tom Riddle it 's been a pleasance, and an accolade. ``

'' Surprising to the end. '' Voldemort murmured.

'' I believe it 's seven paces ? '' Harry turned and pick up Voldemort do the Saami. `` One ... ''

'' Two ... ''

'' Three ... ''

'' Stupefy ! '' Harry whirled and jabbed his wand. The charm flared across the way. Just before it hit the dark lord seemed to waver and fade into mist. The spell passed right through his back and exploded in Muriel Spark against the wall. Voldemort turned and rematerialized, a mocking leer on his case,

'' Jumping the numeration Mr Potter ? That was your virtuoso plan ? ``

'' Worth a guessing. ``

'' No, Mr ceramist. It was not. ``

'' predict me Harry. ``

'' I will not. '' Voldemort raised his wand. `` good-bye Mr thrower. I wish you all the comfortably in the next world. Avada Kedavra ! ``

Harry closed his eyes and smiled as a flash of spark filled the room.



reappraisal or the evil poulet with the DEAD EYES that only I can see will shoot down me.


A lot of citizenry seem unhappy about my frequent cliffhangers. Well it got you to look back did n't it ?





The light snapped off and Harry opened his heart. Voldemort was staring down at the affair in his hand.

'' Hmm ... '' Harry frowned in mock discombobulation. `` Your sceptre appears to deliver turned into a chicken. ``

The chicken managed to relinquish itself and dropped to the floor. It took a looking at at the two genius on either side of it and wisely decided to be elsewhere. Squawking and flapping it scampered through an exposed door.

"Was it, meant to turn over into a volaille ?"Harry tapped his chin thoughtfully."Is this some poultry strain of the killing curse I was not previously aware of ? Is that a crybaby of death ? Or perhaps ..."Harry's script dipped into his pocket."Were you looking for ... this wand."

Voldemort's eyes went wide.

"I mean for god ‘ s sake mate. Never let a pickpocket hug you."Harry chuckled."I mean that ‘ s just stupid."

The dark lord's hand twitched to his pocket.

"Oh feeling !"Harry drew something else from his gown."And here ‘ s your other wand. How did that get in there ? Bet you ‘ re regretting incinerating all those early wand ‘ s now ain't cha ?"

"Potter you ..."Voldemort boiled with anger."You ... you ... you ..."

"Me. Me. Me."Harry grinned like a Panthera tigris."The lesson of the story Tommy boy is this : Don ‘ t you EVER pot with a marauder because we can bury you. And we never lose."

"potter I will-"

"Shut up."Harry stabbed his verge forward, keeping the early two good in his left hand."Shut your ugly murdering face. felicitous, civic, ‘ lets all be B.F.F.s ‘ time is officially over. Now is the sentence for the other matter. The bloody hate filled battle that culminates with the kill of you."

"You think you can win ?"Voldemort hissed out through clenched teeth."Even without a sceptre I am still the nighttime Lord. I am still more than a match for you."

"Evens the acting subject a bit though doesn ‘ t it."Harry cracked his neck first to one incline, then another."So come on snake case. Hit me. Hit me with your best shot."

The shadow nobleman hissed, his fingers clenching into hook. Then a present moment later he exploded into locoweed, whisking away through an open door. What the ? Harry 's conjuration eye focused through the wall, onto the level in the next room. On the trading floor next to a prone body was-

WAND !

Harry 's feet moved of their own accord and skidded across the flooring to the door. His own wand lashed out.

'' Difindo ! '' The sceptre on the floor snapped just as the cloud coalesced around it and but Harry was already moving again. His eye making walls and doors meaningless. Another torso, another baton ! He felt the grass behind him, catching up.

He rolled as it passed overhead and snarled, `` Tempesto ! '' The cloud convulsed as farting lashed through it but it stayed together, swirling and reforming like ink. Harry dashed along the floor and snapped the sceptre up from beside the bundle of robe that was all that was left of the victim of an inferi. He skidded to a halt, his eye dancing madly to find any remaining baton ... zilch in the prophecy way ...

The cloud circled, reeking of malevolence. Harry could almost feel Voldemort doing the same check that he was, using dark magic to find any remaining weapon. The cloud contracted then shot away like a squid. Harry was off and after it in a second, a mo Sir Thomas More and his eye had found it's target. The death chamber, a wand rolled into a crack in the floor. Harry pelted through the corridor, the black dope ahead of him. Too far ! Too straightaway !

Harry threw another tornado ahead of him, kicking up fragment of debris but the moment it reached the swarm it was squashed like a frog. The wind going flat in mid air. The smoke disappeared under a room access and Harry crashed through it a moment later. The wand ! rightfield there ! Voldemort reappeared with a thunderclap and jabbed his deal forward. The wand leapt from the base and spun towards the dark Creator. Harry aimed desperately,

"Ferio !"

There was a chap from the air and splinters clattered on the floor. The iniquity lord's hand snapped back like he'd been stung.

"That ‘ s the last-place of them snake-face."Harry panted. Keeping his scepter trained on the darkness lord he stepped down the stair till he was adjacent to the fluttering arch. He picked the three scepter he'd acquired out of his pocket and chucked them through the velum. The dark textile fluttered for a moment, then went still."All baton ‘ s out of play, except for my one. And the exclusively way you ‘ re getting that is to pry it from my cold all in hands."

"What an excellent hint Mr Potter."

Harry had just a moment warning before the orb of darkness flew from the iniquity lord's deal. Harry spun behind the arch and ducked down.

"Accio !"The bench behind Voldemort shot forward towards his heading. The dark Almighty spun and shattered it with a hissed curse."Jupitall !"The ball-lightning hissed from Harry's sceptre and forced the dark lord to dodge to the face. The orb exploded against the rampart, filling the room with sparks. Voldemort spun and cried,

"Garta !"

Harry felt the flagstones beneath his invertebrate foot disappear and he plummeted into darkness. He jabbed his baton straight up.

"Hammus missus !"strand shot up and slammed into the ceiling far above."Rapellet !"The range of mountains felt like it jerked his arm out of its socket as it pulled him up into the light. As he shot from the land like a bullet a ball of darkness flew towards him.

soul not expecting it would possess been hit. soul without a magic eye.

Harry kicked off the boundary of the archway and swung out of the way. He let go of the chain and aimed at the dark figure below him.

"Avada Kedavra !"The green light left him stunned but he landed like a cat on the side of the stepped field. The killing curse blew a hole in the rampart but Voldemort was dashing away, disappearing through a doorway."seed back you slimy coward !"Harry was laughing with bloodlust and raced after him, his eye tracking him through the maze of Asaph Hall. Harry dashed back through the entryway hall and shot into a hanker room of desks. Voldemort's fleeing shadower was just visible at the other end.

"Avada Kedavra !"The nightmare curse sped through the wreckage but Voldemort spun and summoned a desk into it's way of life. The plosion filled the air with emerald Dame Muriel Spark. Three deadbolt of lightning thundered through the explosion and Harry threw himself to the side. One of them grazed past his leg and he bit back a cry of pain. A freezing charm numbed the burn off bod as Harry furiously dashed after the wickedness God Almighty. As he skidded to a halt in the manse of prognostication the night overlord disappeared. Harry furiously glanced one way then the other, but neither eye could pick up a ghost. A wisp of spoke curled around one of the shelves, only to melt a minute later. Harry cursed, the eye wasn't so serious for immaterial matter. He slowly turned, letting his eyes sweep through the interruption between the shelves. Voldemort was in here somewhere. Harry closed the door and whispered a venomous bunker on anyone who tried to get through it. Voldemort wouldn't be able-bodied to break it, some things required a wand.

Harry walked slowly out into the prophecy hall. The glass welkin had not escaped the carnage of the battle, many were left in glittering shards on the marble base. The little catch of crank cracked under his kick. Was that smoke ? Harry 's centre hammered in his chest of drawers. Was that a-

FIREBALL ! Harry spun and yelled,

'' Ferio ! '' The hex blasted into a spinning orb of flaming, exploding it in the air and throwing Harry backwards into a shelf. The wood buckled and Harry fell through backwards in a wad of burning splinters. There was an ominous creaking sound and Harry had to scramble to get out of the way of the collapsing ledge. ball of shining pot bounced off his berm and shattered on the floor, their white hummer spilling out and going inky inkiness like swirls of midnight.

Harry 's eye swirled and he just caught a glance of the iniquity clothe physique before he dissolved again. Harry picked himself up and held himself at eagerness. This was like a bloody shootout, it was all about who was quicker to the haul. Unfortunately Voldemort did n't actually have to draw ... The air moved, Harry moved faster.

'' Symplegades ! '' Voldemort appeared out of nowhere but Harry had already cast his trance. The ledge crashed together as if drawn by magnets. The glowering lord 's shadowed form was trapped between them. Before Harry could cast another spell the shelves exploded outwards, Voldemort stepping out wreathed in flaming. He raised his hands, about to become smoke again. Harry stabbed his wand out again.

'' Tartrate ! '' It was a barbarian knife thrust in the dark. The charm was used to make liquidity into jelly. Voldemort stumbled, his descriptor blurring a moment but not turning to smoke. `` Avada Kedavra ! ``

The shadow lord threw his hand forward and a slab of the marble floor was thrown into the air to catch the curse. Voldemort hissed and the flak behind him leapt up into a chromatography column of flame, curling and splitting into a glowing red snaked head teacher. The serpent roared and bit forward, it 's dentition dripping with melt down venom.

'' Excalabus ! '' Harry slashed through the burning spectre but his shining blade slipped through it like water supply, leaving not a clams. The snake assume forward like a viper and Harry dropped to the trading floor, his eyebrows charring off his face. `` Ardor-Algidus ! '' Harry yelled the flame freezing charm and leapt up into the hellfire monster. He stabbed his wand at the apparition beyond the inferno and yelled the killing curse again. The inflammation flashed to green and Harry could see the dark Divine 's shocked aspect as he had to dodge a spell from within his own creation.

Harry did n't devote him an inch, he threw himself forward, shot another curse at his off proportionality foeman and found a swarm of melanise knives flying in his fount. He dropped to the level and discover them clatter behind him. He threw himself to the side but the knife jerked to take after him. He grabbed a plank of shelf from the level and gyrate it in straw man of him, hearing the threatening thunk of the blades impacting the wood. Harry spun to front the dark lord and banished the knives towards him. Voldemort waved his bridge player distastefully and the knife melted into smoke.

The dark Lord was panting, breath hissing in and out through his lipless mouth.

'' You can not win. '' He hissed, wrath and haughtiness battling for prominence in his vocalism. `` You must realize that YOU CAN NOT WIN ! ``

'' Shut. Up. Wanker. '' Harry gasped through heavy breaths.

'' You are just extending your excruciation ! ``

'' Is n't that what lifespan is all about ? '' Harry drew himself up, grinning. `` And besides- Ferio ! '' The go caught the dark overlord by surprise, smacking into his shoulder with a bone splintering crack. Voldemort roared and Harry felt the floor under his feet warp and rumble. He flipped backwards as the terra firma where he had been standing became a swirling quicksand pit, ready to draw him down into it 's depths. Harry danced backwards as stone upon Harlan F. Stone became sucking dying. His foundation hit a ledge and he clambered up like a wanderer. The shelf lurched as it began to sink into the stone. Harry spun, holding on with one hand and leapt to another towering shelf just before the one he had been standing on was obliterated in a cloud of shadow lightning.

It was n't dependable up here. Harry clambered to the top and dashed along the slanting wood. Being up here made him too much of a target. Harry 's eye spun to receive the nighttime lord and he almost fell off in shock absorber as he found Voldemort hovering up from the priming coat with murder in his optic. The whoreson could fly !

'' Tempesto ! '' Harry 's twister sprung out of nowhere, drawing Amandine Aurore Lucie Dupin from the story and filling the air with yellow-white grains. Harry called another tornado, and another. The night lord disappeared in the sirocco. Disappeared to pattern centre that is. `` Avada Kedavra ! '' Harry shot through the murk at the shadow in the air and dashed away along the top of his shelf, he leapt across to the next one just before a lightning deadbolt flashed through the air behind him. The shadow Lord could not see him in all this but he could see where his spells were coming from. Only a jester attacked and stayed in the same place ... unless ...

'' Acerbus cuspis ! '' Harry called the pain spears, flashing out in their decelerate fan. He twisted them in the air like a serpent to come upon the dark lord from both sides. He was rewarded with a howl of pain as one of the shining bolts struck household. Harry cast again but the dark lord summoned a argent carapace. `` Motus ! '' Harry did n't even have to think. He just struck out and made the dread orb vibrate with unendurable noise. He twisted to come up the plangency but Voldemort was slyer than Michelson and cancelled the orb. Harry turned to run but the dark lord was spry and lightning caught his arm, burning like hell. Harry lost his footing and dropped off the side of the teetering shelf.

Harry spun his tornado and blew himself up into the air again, shooting like a rag-doll through the sandstorm until his finger's breadth caught the edge of a shelf and he held on for beloved life. He pulled himself up and tried to stand, his eye spinning to find the dark Divine. There he was, but what-

'' Ulkaa Avaskanda ! '' The shrill insensate phonation of the dark lord shouted out of the violent storm, then. `` Finite Syrtis ! ``

The George Sand vanished like mist but Harry had self-aggrandizing problems. He leapt into the air as John Rock the sizing of auto obliterated the shelves behind him. His base hit another shelf but it was already shattering and falling. Harry 's wand whipped out and a hook impacted into the cap. Harry swung out over the area of nothingness. A boulder came hurtling out of nowhere but Harry still had his storm.

The fart pulled him out of the way of the meteoroid with a whisk of his wand and he let go of the Sir Ernst Boris Chain, catapulting himself onto a standing shelf. He leapt again and saw two boulder hurtling towards him. His wand flashed out again and one Rock veered into the path of the former, shattering them both to fragment. Harry felt the wood beneath him reposition again and this time let it carry him down a moment before leaping off and dropping to another collapsing shelf, his eye found immobile footing and he jumped again as the last shelf collapsed into splinters.

Harry dropped to the top of a pile of wreckage. A pile three times as tall as he was and full of intermit wood, shattered ice and the smouldering remains of spent bowlder. Harry waited while the endure of the crashing and clattering stopped, then folded his arms.

Voldemort was hovering in the air level with Harry. The moody lord slowly floated down to the level ( which Harry idly noted was back to being marble ) and settled back down onto his feet. Harry watched with a round-backed supercilium. Voldemort 's teeth clenched in rage as he stared up at Harry standing on his pedestal of ruin.

'' What are you ? '' Voldemort sneered through his teeth. `` You should not be alive ! No human should be animated ! ``

'' What makes you think I 'm human being snake boldness ? '' Harry smiled evilly. `` Are n't you the one who 's always saying we 're better than mere mortals ? ``

'' DO NOT MOCK ME ! ``

'' But you make it so easy ! '' Harry put his hands on his articulatio coxae. `` Anyway, it 's hard not to bemock you when I 'm winning ! ``

'' YOU ARE NOT WINNING ! ``

'' I 'm not loosing. '' Harry grinned. The coloured Almighty 's clenched fist clenched but he said nothing. Harry smiled. `` Of course of instruction, you could surrender. ``

'' Surrender ? '' Voldemort spat the Word. `` yielding to you ! ? ``

'' Hey spouse, you 're the one that wants to live forever. '' Harry cracked his knuckles. `` You wo n't live forever if you surrender but I can guarantee you 'll exist longer than if you keep fighting. Not much longer but still ... ''

'' I ask again Mr Potter ! '' Voldemort raised an accusing finger. `` What are you ? ``

'' Me ? I 'm the runner of the roofs at Night. '' Harry laughed. `` The hero of the parentage war. The only survivor of the soaker of ages and the Hogwarts triwizard champion. ``

'' But- ''

'' I 'm the mirror-blade, '' Harry spread his arms across-the-board. `` snake 's nemesis and wolf-slayer. I 'm the sea rover of the emotional state of Njordr."

"You-"

"And, to my distress, I am Dumbledore 's little changeling child."

"What-"

"But that does n't weigh because I 'm also a predator ! Invincible cutthroat bastard and badass extraordinaire ! I. Am. Harry. Potter ! The choosing one ! '' Harry trained his wand on the dark Creator, his cheek set in unshakable resolve. `` That is why you should surrender. Right now. Or I swear on this pile of prognostication that I will burn you from this man. ``

Voldemort took an nonvoluntary whole tone backwards, faltering before Harry 's stare.

'' finis opportunity. '' Harry snarled. Voldemort straightened up, his eye burning red.

'' Never. '' The dark lords hands clenched to fist. `` I will never surrender to a half blood boy like you. ``

'' Whatever, '' Harry grinned. `` In that case ... suck it gripe ! Depulso ! '' Harry jammed his baton straight down and the pile of wreckage exploded out in all directions, the wood becoming deadly splinters and the rock singing out in razor penetrating sherd. The dark lord threw up a silvery cuticle but Harry was already on the priming. With a motion-picture show of his wand the cuticle screeched and Voldemort threw it away from him as if it was red hot. Harry rolled to the side to put off a atomizer of black globe and threw his wand up. `` Avada Kedavra ! ``

The dark lord fled through a doorway and Harry rushed to come, casting death curses before him. Harry vaulted a desk and skidded through a door only to find his trunk rising into the air. A lightning bolt grazed his shoulder and Harry was spun around like a top. Planets were floating in this room ! There must be some magical spell screwing with gravity !

Harry shot a lure at Saturn and pulled himself out of the way just before another lightning bolt flashed through the air. Harry jabbed his sceptre at the sun and yelled,

'' Confringo ! '' The ball of plasma exploded but Harry cast another flame-freezing charm and pushed off Saturn directly into the pit. From behind the top of flame Harry shot a killing curse word at the iniquity Creator but had to convolute in the air to stop his head being taken off by a morose blade flickering through the air. He had used the flame-cover trick one too many fourth dimension. well lets try another.

'' Esurio Esurio ! '' Harry aimed at the spinning red planet next to Voldemort. It grew a breach mouth and snapped angrily at the wickedness master, who blew it into fragments but Harry had already trained his wand back on the dark Almighty. `` Avada Kedavra ! ``

Voldemort swung a chunk of planet into the path of the trance and fled, pushing open a doorway Harry had n't even seen. He pushed off the wall and floated weightlessly after him. As soon as he reached the threshold he dropped to the trading floor again and raced through, skidding to a plosive consonant when he saw where he was.

In tally contrast to the relaxation of the department this room was a sort of zoo. Cages wax of creatures filled the room up to the cap and were stacked in a deal in the middle. Some looked normal, some ... not so much. Harry shuddered as his eye flickered over a mutated blob of pulp with what he sincerely hoped was not a human arm coming out of it. His sorcerous eye swirled in it 's socket, trying to get a fix on Voldemort but all the life-time and movement in the way made it tricky.

Harry tried to trace out the elbow room. Long, not so wide ... The door at the other end was closed. That meant that Voldemort was either at the wall behind one of the cages at the side or crouched down behind one of the ones in the midriff. Harry grinned,

'' Alohomora ! '' He pointed his wand at the pile of John Cage in the midpoint and all their bars sprung opened. animate being scattered in every direction. Something that looked like a mutant brute made a sharp-set leap at the Cage to the left and was thrown back by a spell. There ! Harry 's wand was trained there in a moment. `` Confringo ! '' The hex blasted the cage out of the way, revealing Voldemort 's Second Earl Grey skin. `` Avada K- '' Harry had to break off the expletive to sidestep behind a desk as more globe of shadow rained through the air. Harry heard a door slam open and leapt up from where he was crouched. He dashed to the door and swung through, his scepter out.

The destruction chamber ! Back here ! Harry saw Voldemort just reaching the door at the other side of the dimly lit elbow room and aimed his wand.

'' Colloportus ! '' The door squelched and glowed red. Harry spun and locked the early door too. In a moment he had his wand trained back on the dark lord. Voldemort was just staring at him from the other side of the vast room, his lips contoured into a leer. He clearly knew he could break the poxy lockup spell, but doing so would founder Harry the consequence he needed to down him. Harry tried to keep his breath even as he spoke, `` Got you. No more running. ``

'' Then you have signed your own end warrant. '' Voldemort slowly stepped down the side of meat of the chamber.

'' I doubt that. '' Harry mirrored the dark God Almighty and slowly walked down the steps. `` I rarely sign things. ``

'' I will throw you through the veil myself. ``

'' What ... ever. '' Harry shrugged. `` I 've had enough of your self authoritative threats. Time for the showdown. Let 's end this. ``

'' zip would please me more Mr potter ! '' Voldemort reached the bottom of the room. Harry was just a step behind him. They stared at each other from opposite slope of the stand that held the arch of the veil. Voldemort 's lip curled up in a sneer. `` If I had my scepter you would stimulate died long ago. ``

'' That would be why I nicked it. '' Harry chuckled. `` And anyway ... Lumos ! '' Harry jammed his wand towards Voldemort and the ray cut through the subduedness like a spotlight. Voldemort threw his hired hand up to protect his eyes."Avada Kedavra ! ``

The dark lord dropped to the floor, letting the spell go over his head and jabbed his arm up at the ceiling. The shadows above them became live, a writhing cauldron of darkness. Harry dodged wildly as a tentacle of night shot down and tried to enclose itself around him. Harry felt another grab his leg.

'' Excalabus ! '' The tentacle was sheered off but Harry had been thrown to the story and had to roll as bolts of thunder slammed into the flagstones where he had been lying. A ball of blackness caught the English of his leg, simply obliterating material body and peel. Harry screamed and pulled himself to his feet, jumping out of the way of another tentacle. He had to get rid of that affair ! He could n't fight down it and the dark lord at the same clip ! But how to drink down something like that ... How else ? Harry jabbed his wand at the ceiling. `` Avada Kedavra ! '' The light-green tour impacted the iniquity creature and it wailed in pain in the neck, it 's tentacles going limp.

Harry spun back to face Voldemort just in time for an Shirley Temple orb to take a chunk out of his shoulder. He was bleeding too much. Had to end this ! The darkness nobleman raised his hand for another bolt of lightning. Harry tore two flagstones from the ground and hurled them in the route of the magic spell, one after the other. The first was blown to sliver but the second, hidden by the cloud of rubble, shot through like a marble discus and crashed with a horrific compaction into Voldemort 's ribcage.

The dark lord was thrown back, his arm coming up to cradle his injured chest. Harry pressed his advantage and Voldemort was driven back by turn after while. The nighttime lord was pushed onto to the gradation and stumbled back, lying prone against the Harlan F. Stone. He seemed exhausted.

'' Avada Ke- ''

"Fulgar Fletch !"The dark lord 's hand swung up ! It had been a trick ! Harry saw a cloud of pitch-dark steel erupt out of nothing and canvass towards him. He had no security ! He could not dodge ! There was just one prospect ...

'' Protego ! '' Harry called out desperately and was driven back as the tongue clattered against his faint cuticle. Harry let it go and maltreat forward, only to have his knees buckle and drop him on the floor. What the ? Harry tried to stand but his legs would n't run. Was this some sorting of nemesis ? Harry looked down and saw the reason.

There was a tongue embedded to the hilt in his belly. Two more in his leg. Draining rake down his thigh and pooling on the floor.

'' Bloody shield .... '' Harry 's weapons system dropped down, suddenly too weak. His wand rolled away on the wickedness stone. He had n't felt the tongue go in, epinephrine perhaps, but he felt it now. Pain and fire raging out from the mess in his belly. `` Bloody ... buckler .... And I was doing so well ... ''

'' Yes Mr ceramicist you were. '' The darkness Divine picked himself up from the stair and dusted his robe off. Now that he had won the friendly, almost fatherly, spirit was back. `` I applaud you. ``

'' I could experience beaten you ya get laid. '' Harry coughed weakly and saw droplets of bloodline nebulizer from his back talk. `` The very first tour I threw. Back when I jumped the tally. Back when you had the pretender verge. If you 'd have just tried to shield like any normal wizard ... I could have won on the outset patch. That was ... that was the architectural plan. ``

'' It was a good plan. '' Voldemort must induce seen no grounds to be angry now that he had won. `` Against a normal thaumaturgist it would have no doubt worked. ``

'' Damn it. '' Harry raised his bridge player to spread his fingers around the tongue blade in his stomach, but he could n't stop the blood. His lifespan was draining out onto the floor. The ace in his leg would maim him. The one in his breadbasket meant he was dead.

'' Do you deliver any last word of honor my beloved enemy ? '' Voldemort asked calmly. `` I did not hear any satisfactory one from Dumbledore. Anything ? ``

'' Ca n't think of anything ... '' shadow dots swam before Harry 's eyes. He had failed. `` Are my acquaintance still watching ? ``

'' Oh yes. '' Voldemort nodded. `` I would not suffer the wizarding public Miss this event. ``

'' Then my last Bible are ... donjon fighting. '' Harry raised his eyes to meet Voldemort 's. `` Keep scrap him. ``

'' Not very original. '' The dark Lord shrugged. `` But skillful than Dumbledore 's. ``

'' And ... '' stemma was pooling beneath Harry 's wooden leg. `` And state Thea I tried. ``

'' An admirable sentiment. ``

'' That 's ... '' Darkness was closing in on Harry. `` That 's all I got. ``

'' Very well. '' Voldemort raised his hand. `` I shall miss you. My ... occupy opposition. '' Voldemort opened his mouth to address the last words Harry would ever hear.

'' postponement. '' Harry whispered, he had no enduringness to verbalise normally. `` I 've thought of some better last Holy Writ. ``

'' Really ? '' Voldemort asked, amused. `` And ? ``

'' The one with the power to beat the dark Divine will be born as the seventh calendar month atomic number 66. '' Harry 's whispered words rang out in the hushed room. `` Born to those who ... those who ... ''

'' wealthy person thrice defied him. '' Voldemort prompted, his optic suddenly desperate. `` Yes ? Yes ? ``

'' Thrice defied him. '' Harry licked his back talk, his articulation was barely coming out now. `` And the wickedness lord will stigmatise ... will mark him ... ''

'' Yes ? What then ? '' Voldemort leant close down in to listen.

'' Mark him as his equal ... '' Harry 's mouth were barely moving, his Son just disturbances in the air. `` But the wickedness ... the shadow ... ''

'' Yes ... '' Voldemort put his handwriting on Harry 's shoulders, steadying him. `` Please finish it ! ``

'' The iniquity God Almighty, shall never ... '' Harry 's eyes were closed. `` Shall never learn. ``

'' What ? '' Voldemort 's centre narrowed to slits.

'' The dark lord ... shall never teach. ``

'' What did you say ? ``

'' I said you never bloody get wind ! '' Harry 's eyes flicked outdoors. `` Do you ? ``

Powered by the last gasp of dying rage Harry pulled the knife from his flesh and take it into Voldemort 's neck. Harry fell backwards as line fountained from his stomach and his eyes clouded contraband. As he slipped away and his affectionateness stopped beating all he could hear was the rustling of the veil.




cliff. wall hanging. Again. I know. Sorry. follow-up anyway.


Sorry this took a while to post. I did n't entail to intentionally go away you hanging at a cliffhanger but showtime I posted it then realised I had to change something so that sent it to the binding of the queue, then it got rejected ... anyways it 's up now.

follow-up seem to be conflate as to whether multitude think Harry 's really dead or not and whether the serial publication is over or not. It 's dainty to have created such dissent vista. : )




The number one thing Harry sensed was the aroma of Malus pumila blossoms. It was a smell he knew very well. His center flickered open and looked up onto the familiar dappled leaves of the orchard in his dreams. It was exactly as it had always been, green and full moon of life.

Harry was lying on the level. How had he got there ? He lifted his arms up and realized that his blood soaked and battle scared garments were gone, replaced by a bare flannel robe. That was n't all that was missing either. Harry 's fingers went up to his eye, poking it lightly.

'' Ow ! '' form, not glass. Harry shook his head, realizing what must let happened. Eye 's did not grow back, grove did not spring out of nothing. `` I 'm numb. I died. ``

Harry breathed out, a long sigh of sadness. He had done his honorable, his very, very best. He had tried to survive. He had tried to not impart the world of the sustenance, had tried not to leave his friends.

There are hoi polloi that will suffer if you die, even if you take Voldemort with you

'' I tried Thea. '' Harry felt a lump in his throat. `` Oh god I tried. But he was better than me. He was ... he was better. I mean I knew he was, really. I just hoped I could skew the betting odds enough to let me win. Let me live. I guess I was wrong. ``

Harry looked up at the tree diagram, bearing blossoms and fruit all at once in an impossible, but beautiful, tableau vivant. He was glad he had ended up here, not back at Godrics Hollow.

'' I did take him with me though. '' Harry spoke the bitter words. `` I got him good. ``

The farting rustled lightly through the tree diagram. He thought he could almost, just almost, hear small fry laughing. Harry sat down and set his back against a tree and closed his middle. If this was the afterlife then he knew one thing for sure as shooting. Before he met any pearly hall porter or had his sins weighed against a feather or whatever he was sitting right here and having a relaxation. The legion of hell could not motivate him from that spot.

The wind instrument whistled through the trees and for a moment Harry though he could hear voices.

"Stop her ! Don ‘ t let her get to the consistency !"

"She ‘ s got a portkey !"

The voices faded. Harry shrugged, that kind of affair probably happened all the time when you were dead.

Harry 's hand wormed it 's way along the background and found an apple. It was nice and gruelling, fallen recently. He brought it up to his oral fissure and bit into it, letting the succus run down his face. It tasted a little bitter, just a little.

Harry heard the grass in front of him disturbed by footfalls. mortal was there. He opened his eyes slowly, and arched his brow when he saw who it was.

'' Did n't bear to see you here. '' Harry commented dryly. `` Though I suppose I should have. ``

'' May I sit down ? '' Dumbledore asked, his spokesperson bearing a ataraxis it had not held in life.

'' Why not ? '' Harry shrugged. `` I mean were all bushed here are n't we. Maybe battery-acid and merlin will join us next. ``

'' I doubt that Harry, Lucy in the sky with diamonds is n't dead. '' Dumbledore frowned suddenly. `` I apologize, you asked me not to call you- ''

'' You can call me Harry. '' Harry smiled. `` Do n't care about it. ``

'' But I do worry. '' Dumbledore shook his head. `` I can never apologize to you enough for what I did to you. No watchword could ever suffice. I ... I am only gladiolus that I got this one close probability to tell you how sorry I am. My offence was unforgivable. ``

'' Apparently it was n't seeing as you 're here and not in a big fiery place with lot of pitchforks. '' Harry chuckled and rested his blazonry behind his head.

'' You seem, '' Dumbledore was picking his tidings carefully. `` You seem at repose with what I did. Thomas More than the last time I saw you at least. ``

'' Mate, I can never forgive you, so do n't ask me to. '' Harry sighed and shook his head. `` I do n't cogitate I can ever forgive you but at the Sami prison term ... I get why you did it. You were in a bad place, everything was riding on your shoulders. I mean look at me, today I cast an unforgivable curse ten ... maybe twenty dollar bill fourth dimension. And before that, over the course of this year I 've killed ... people. Several people. We all do what we think we have to do. You did what ... what you thought you had to do, at the metre. I ca n't forgive you for it. You playing with my head. Making me your Frankenstein 's monster. Your changeling child. You ... took me and changed me. Changed who I am, put memories in my head. You said you put your memories of James II ceramicist in my head. I can sense them in there now ... How much of it is me ? Is any of this me ? Or am I just a pitiful transcript of Harry ... Or worse a poor written matter of King James I thrower. Am I ? Answer me truthfully. Please. ``

'' I ... '' Dumbledore dropped his center to the flooring. `` I do not know how much of your original personality survived. Integrating retentivity is never fully successful, not from one somebody to another, but there is no way to assure how much mixing there has been. There is a probability that the memory settled harmlessly into your subconscious, but then again ... ''

'' There 's a chance they did n't. ``

'' Yes. ``

"Why did n't you tell me this originally ?"Harry sighed,"I mean before I went and cut out my eye and everything."

"I ... There were many reasons."Dumbledore looked away into the aloofness."You see it was very wanton to ... to not commend what I had done. To not think of it. I mean there you were, looking like Harry, acting like James. It was soft to fall into the ambuscade of thinking you were ... that you were ..."

"Real ?"

"That you were not the keep validation of my sins."Dumbledore shook his head."At least that was the reason at first. I simple did not want to admit what I had done. Then, later on, after you had defeated the basilisk, after you had come back from the torrent of years, I began to think perhaps I would not have to. You had proved yourself a hero so I though ... perhaps no one would ever have to get laid. Perhaps I could let you fill Harry 's place and never tell you. I thought I could let you take the burden. I am not lofty of that. I should accept known the prognostication could not be so easily avoided."

"Is it possible I still can get his position ?"Harry pointed at his radiocarpal joint."I mean, the dark master did stigma me."

"Harry he did not pit you as his rival he marked you as his servant."Dumbledore shook his head."And besides, I can count on my fingerbreadth the people who have thrice defied Voldemort. I would sustain known if one of them had been with child."

Harry sighed. As he did the confidential information seemed to murmur, carrying to him upstage representative. He strained his ears to hear,

'' Help him ! For Merlin 's sake help him ! '' Was that ... Hermione ?

'' Shut up and let me by. '' Snape 's vocalisation cut across her.

'' His gist 's not beating ! ``

'' Of row It 's not beating he does n't birth any blood left you hysterical cretin. Each of you, render me your hands. It's a dependable thing Harry acquired so many hanger-on, one of you has to be his ancestry type. ``

The voices faded into the breeze. Harry's hilltop furrowed.

"Did you hear that ?"He asked Dumbledore.

"No, but then I ‘ m a niggling Thomas More perfectly than you are."Dumbledore smiled.

"So I ‘ m ... I ‘ m not dead ?"Harry felt hope rise in his heart.

"You are dead, technically. Your heart is not beating."Dumbledore's oculus twinkled."But I believe that, with time and a generous donation of salutary red blood, you may be pulled back into the world of the living."

"So ... Is this actually you then ?"Harry scratched his head."Is this actually the afterlife or just another dream ?"

"This is the afterlife."Dumbledore nodded."And I am, more or less, who I appear to be."

"How ?"

"The fact that you are near death coupled with the fact that you died mere meters from the veil."Dumbledore shrugged."I am just glad I got a last chance to speak to you."

"fountainhead I assume we ‘ ll meet again ... eventually."Harry cracked a smile."When I ‘ m old and gray and die in a bed surrounded by beautiful women."

The old wizard and the young laughed. A thought struck Harry and the mirth dimmed.

"So, while I have you here, can I ask you something ?"

"Of track Harry, anything."

"What is my name ?"

"I ... I do not know."Dumbledore hung his head."I am blue Harry. I erased the memory from my own mind so I would never call you it. Never slip up ... But I can tell you the orphanhood where I found you. It is called the Malyn orphans' asylum, or was nine twelvemonth ago, January twentieth. It stands about ten Roman mile south of Belfast. If phonograph record exist then, well then you might be able to find them there."

"Malyn Orphanage. January twentieth ..."Harry whispered. Then,"So I ‘ m Irish whisky ?"

"Yes Harry. You ‘ re Irish."Dumbledore cracked a impulsive smile.

"Interesting."Harry, who had lived his life with a London accent thick enough to float bricks on, chuckled."So, do you think there might even be records of my parents ?"

"I do not imagine so."Dumbledore looked away, not meeting Harry's middle. He seemed to be picking his run-in carefully."I do not conceive that you will find records of them there."

"What aren ‘ t you telling me ?"Harry felt the void grow."Were they wizards ? Were they Death eaters ?"

"No Harry nothing like that."Dumbledore shook his foreland."In fact I believe we can safely take on both your parents were muggles. Let me explicate, when I took you from the orphanage they told me a lilliputian about you. About how you had come to be there. Apparently you were not given to them in the convention fashion, you were ... found. Found by an older duo walking along the ligan river. The river was bursting it ‘ s banks a little after a storm and they saw a footling package washed up in the mud. When they unwrapped you they thought you were dead, I was told that you were dingy all over from the cold and damp, but so faint you weren ‘ t even shivering. You had been in the weewee for a long time."

Crashing sway. Raging white water. Harry's mind shied away from the flashes of terror in his nous and he felt his breath quicken. The raging downpour in his mind banishing all though was real, a retention so scaring even Dumbledore had been unable to erase. His only real memory was a phobia. Another bitter joke. He licked his lips, had to say something, anything to take his brain off it.

"How old was I ?"

"About six months old, afford or take."Dumbledore answered."The couple gave you to the authorities and of course an investigating was made. Unfortunately nothing was ever found. And, inevitably, you ended up in the hands of the nipper services. The account after that is, well, rather as you might opine it."

"It could let been an accident."Harry spoke, not daring to hope."You make it sound like my parents tried to kill me but it didn't have to befall that way. Maybe I was swept away from my household. You said there were floods."

"I ... I do not retrieve that was the showcase Harry."A bust rolled down Dumbledore's cheek."You see, I have something the muggle authorities did not. I have my map. That was the reason lupine knew. I needed him to see it and present me how to use it, or it could have revealed the truth."

"The map- Or course !"Harry smiled, his eyes lighting up."It should establish my real name ! That ‘ s why you kept it hidden and everything ! What does it say ?"

"Harry the map does not present your name."Dumbledore brushed the tear away."Do you love how the map works ?"

"No."

"It works by making use of an ancient type of magic, the magic of names."Dumbledore's voice took on a lecturing feel, but Harry could still find out the clump in his throat."There is an old thaumaturgist superstitious notion. An old married woman tale, if you will, that a wizard's gens is tied to their destiny. That the name first given to a star somehow sets his path. There was once a great fad for concealing one ‘ s true name so that foeman could not gain power over you. Foolishness really, in those days someone ‘ s on-key name was slow enough to divine. That is what the map does in any case. It works by the deception of names."

"Yeah,"Harry motioned the late schoolmaster to go on."And ?"

"And for you it displays nothing Harry."Dumbledore closed his eye sadly."On the map your name is dummy. Just a set of footprints and an vacuous scroll."

"Oh ..."Harry let the silence grow between them. He couldn't really think of anything to fill it.

"Do you empathize what that means Harry ? It means-"

"I know what it means."Harry said quietly."It means my parents never named me before they threw me away."

"Harry ..."

"I was six months old. Six month they had me and didn ‘ t even care enough to ..."Harry slammed his clenched fist into the basis."I guess I ‘ m better off without them."

"Is his bosom trouncing ? I can barely-"

"Is that a impulse ... it was there I swear it was there."

Harry let the vocalisation on the wind die away. He sighed, looking up into the calming dappled sunlight.

"Harry are you alright ?"Dumbledore asked."I realize that this is a great deal to pack in on top of-"

"I ‘ m alright."Harry swallowed painfully."I mean I ‘ m not OK, really. But I ‘ ll be alright. I can already secernate. I ‘ ll be right. I mean after all the other bombshells this doesn ‘ t really tip the scale that much does it. Like a molehill beside a smoking volcano."

"I ‘ m just sorry that I was once again the bearer of bad news."Dumbledore squinted at Harry, his eyes narrowing."You are fading. Not long before you can no longer touch this billet. Is there anyone else here you would like to address to ?"

"I ... I don ‘ t know."Harry scratched his head."most of my friends are still alive."

"A blessing."

"So I can call anyone then ?"Harry asked slyly."Anyone all in and they have to come ?"

"Yes, anyone dead."

"Tom Marvolo Riddle."Harry said the apprehension gens loudly into the wood, only deliquium echoes came back."He ‘ s not all in then."Harry's hands clenched into fists.

"No,"Dumbledore shook his head."I believe you have Bella to thank for that again. She snuck in when the wards came down and spirited his body away veracious under your protagonist'olfactory organ using an pinch portkey. Rather careless of them. Alastor is probably beating himself up right now."

"I though I got him."Harry gritted his teeth."I thought I got-"

"He will be severely weakened."Dumbledore stepped forward and laid a hand on Harry's articulatio humeri."Perhaps as badly as he was fifteen years ago. This is a victory Harry, it will be days, possibly X before he can rise again. And if we can catch him while he is weakly and end up him off, so much the better."

"I guess."Harry tried to see the good side. It wasn't easy."wellspring let ‘ s try ... Barty Crouch Jr."Again the forest remained discharge but for the two of them. Harry grimaced, he hadn't really hoped that the slimy bastard was dead. But it would have been a welcome surprise.

"Is there not anyone you actually wish to speak to Harry ?"Dumbledore asked, fading a little as he did so."No one in this human beings ? Perhaps the literal Harry Potter ?"

"I ‘ ve already met him. Twice actually now that I think about it."

"How could you possibly ..."

"Well once was yr ago when I traveled through time and met him before he died."Harry checked that off on his finger's breadth."And the irregular time me sent a message here from another dimension."At Dumbledore's shocked expression Harry grinned."I lead a very Wyrd life."

"But interesting."

"Oh yes, very interesting."Harry smiled."All in all I think I ‘ ll let him and his parents rest in peace. After what I did to their statue I don ‘ t think I could present them. Anyways, goodbye old man. I'll see you again in a prospicient long while."

"I hope so Harry."

"This is weird."Harry chuckled and looked around."Why does it feel like we 're having this all conversation two books early ?"

"simple Harry,"Dumbledore smiled."Until now you have been walking someone else 's path. From this stop on, you 'll have to make your own."

"Good."Harry nodded."I 'm ready."

"I know you are Harry."Dumbledore continued to fade."I know you are. Oh wait, may I ask you something before I go ?"

"Shoot."

"What became of my baton ?"

"Your verge ..."Harry thought back."Oh ... I threw it through the veil along with Voldemort ‘ s. Sorry did you want to be buried with it or something ?"

"No no Harry."Dumbledore smiled broadly, a mysterious twinkle in his fading eye."Just curious."And with that the old mavin faded into nothing, and was gone. Harry chuckled.

"You had to have the last Word didn ‘ t you. Git."

The air seemed to commute texture. Harry breathed out softly, he was alive again. He could feel his heartbeat in his bureau. Weak, but there. Harry glanced around at the grove. It was exactly the Lapp as before but it felt different. He was dreaming now, just a veritable dreaming. Harry let his eye close slowly. He would wake up in good prison term, but until then ? He was all right here. For now.
*


Snape reached his flat in Hogwarts and barely got the room access shut before falling into a president. There was a bed in the future room, but it suddenly seemed very far away. Truth be told he could have fallen asleep in the middle of the great manse, on the floor. He would have been the laughing stock of every student though. Even worsened he probably wouldn't have woken up when they started laughing at him, even when they started poking him.

Snape raised his wand shakily and levitated the blank out bottle of wine off his table. It had been left exposed, no matter. He poured himself a glass.

He had stood in the waiting elbow room in St Mungos for thirster than he could remember while incompetent healers told him they had no information. When they had finally told him that Harry was out of the woods all his nervous energy had leeched out and it had taken all of his mental strength to bar himself sagging to the storey right there. He had managed to fritter away virtually of them. He had not fooled Natalie.

She had apparated him back to Hogwarts and made him swear to sleep as soon as he got to his elbow room. Who was she to rules of order him around like that ? Why could she ? Snape's lips curled into a smile. Because she was interesting enough to get away with it and was the only one who could rip it off. Which just added to the interest of grade. Snape smiled as the wine-colored curled down the back of his pharynx. He was very lucky in many respects. Luckier than he deserved.

"Severus are you in there ?"There was a knock on the door. Not Natalie. Snape flicked his wand and the door creaked open. Minerva stood on the other side, looking as tired as he felt.

"Minerva."Snape tried to sit a little less like he was falling asleep."It is good to see you secure, in all the mix-up in the ministry I lost track. Come in. Would you like some wine ?"

"No thank you."Minerva stepped inside. Now that she was closer he could see that the edge of her heart held tattletale mansion of tear. She had tried to hide it, but to the trained eye it was quite obvious."I heard you were back in the castle and came down to see you."

"Anything in particular bothering you ?"Snape asked, perhaps more caustically than was requisite."I am rather tired you see."

"Yes, there is something."Minerva pulled a hard back up chairperson over and sat down stiffly."When you went off to St Mungos I called the remaining order together, there was much to discuss."

"I can ideate that there would be."Snape yawned theatrically. He did not have to fake it."I can not imagine how that would care me however, I am no longer a member."

"That is partially what we were discussing."Minerva cocked her top dog to one side."Voldemort is weakened but not utterly. The fiat's task is far from done and we could more than use your expertise. Your primary intellect for leaving was Albus. I will not take for granted to ask the item of that dissension, it was between the two of you. But do you not think that now he is ... gone, that you might be persuaded to come back to us ?"

"That would count on who replaced him."Snape said levelly."For example if it were yourself leading the purchase order, I would have no objection."

"I will not be leading the order."McGonagall shook her head."I will have got quite enough to do here at Hogwarts. The job of headmistress is enough for me. It has been hard enough to persuade parents to send their shaver to Hogwarts this year. I imagine next class may be a small easier but I am sure I will still have my manpower entire. And besides, I will take to find a new Transfiguration of Jesus teacher."

"Shacklebolt then."Snape waved a hand vaguely."He has always been very capable."

"Kingsley Shacklebolt may very well be the but thing currently keeping the ministry from falling apart."Minerva smiled faintly."He was the most senior auror to survive this walloping so I believe he will be ever Sir Thomas More busy than I myself will be."

"There are other candidates."Snape was fully alert now. He could experience where this was going."Alastor Moody."

"Too paranoid."

"Arthur Weasley."

"Has no combat or strategic experience."

"Natalie. Natalie Zhao. She is-"

"Very new to the order."

"Remus Lupin then, he has been with the rules of order since-"

"Remus has grown unpredictable recently. Especially where Harry is concerned."Minerva fixed Snape with a level stare."I believe we can agree that whoever should head the decree should be somebody Harry trusts. Someone like you."

"No."

"Someone who knows how the shadow lord thinks."

"No."

"Severus listen to me."Minerva leant closer to him."Do you not opine we discussed all these thing in amongst ourselves in the social club ?"

"If I had been there I would sustain had a few things to say !"

"Severus please."Minerva's middle dropped to the level."This past class Albus ... well you yourself saw. I do not speak ill of the numb but he had become ... tired. He was not the Dumbledore we all knew. He was not acting at his best."

Snape stayed silent. Not at his unspoilt was a hideous understatement if ever he heard one but there was no motivation to say so.

"In any suit he was faltering. We all saw it, everyone in the social club. But no one did anything about it. Except you."Minerva shook her head."Perhaps we were all, how did you put it ? ‘ Trapped in the past.'Except you."

"I ... I can not lead the order."Snape tried to puddle his voice not sound like that of a rat at bay."I was a death eater, I fell into morose magic. A long metre ago yes but some marks do not come up out."

"Yours has."

"That is not what I meant !"Snape took a deep gulp of wine-coloured."I am ... tainted. Undeserving."

"Albus always said he did not merit the prominence he was given."

"Do not compare me to-"Snape bit back the end of that angry prison term. There was no to take out his anger on the courier."I merely meant that I do not cerebrate it is safe to give me this form of power."

"Albus also said that those who seek power are those least suited to wield it."Minerva held his eyes."The corollary of that is that those who are suited to wield power are those who reject it."

"Do not cite at me."

"Severus, there is no one else who can do the job as well as you. No one else."

"No one else."Snape felt like chuckling."That is what it always comes down to doesn ‘ t it ? We all do what we must."

"I always have."Minerva stood."So you will take the chore ?"

"Do I have a choice ?"

"You do, but I already know how you will choose."

"You knew before you stepped through that door."Snape sneered."I am trapped like a rabbit."

"Only by your own yap Severus."Minerva smiled and turned to the door.

"You know that I will do things differently than Dumbledore."Snape said suddenly."There will be changes."

"I know, I look forward to them."McGonagall nodded, and left the room.

Snape rubbed his forehead. He should get down planning, there was much to do. No, he should not. Right now he had a promise to keep on. Shedding his robe tiredly, he walked towards his bed.
*


'' Harry ... Harry afford your eyes. ``

Harry woke from oceanic abyss dream, the sparkling silver voice in his ears.

'' I 'm wake, '' Harry murmured, his eyes closed. `` But I 'm still in my orchard. I can smack the bloom. ``

'' You are still benumbed, in St Mungos. '' pee rippling over shining rock. `` I wanted to spill the beans to you but you 're on a great business deal of medication. It was simpler for me to just come to you. ``

'' And where are you ? '' Harry 's rim twitched up into a smile.

'' Sitting beside your bed. ``

Harry chuckled, and opened his eyes.

'' hi Theia. ``

'' Hello Harry. '' The untested seer was sitting crossbreeding legged under a tree in front of him, looking like the man image of serenity. Instead of her usual Edward White robe she was wearing a simple brown wearing apparel, she seemed almost part of the timberland. She looked ... different, somehow dissimilar. It was not her face, she was still the same beautiful girl he had always known, or her eye, mismatched as they were. Her argent hair was caught up into a yearn tooshie down her back, tied with sorry ribbon. She looked exactly the Lapplander but there was something missing. Gone was the mother wit of antiquity, the opinion that the little soul in front of him had outlasted empire. She seemed ... offspring, the Saame age as him give or require a yr. Harry supposed she always had been. It did not learn much to think the understanding for the change.

'' You 're not the oracle anymore. '' Harry guessed, guiltily.

'' No, I 'm not. '' Pythea smiled. `` I was sacked. ``

'' I 'm sorry. '' Harry hung his head. `` It was because you were helping me, was n't it ? ``

'' Yes, they finally caught on. '' Pythea reached forward and tilted Harry 's chin up. `` Do n't palpate guilty, not even for a minute. I was poor there, almost a prisoner. I 'm felicitous to be gone. ``

'' You do n't cause to tell me that just to- ''

'' It is the truth. ``

'' But it was your dwelling house. '' Harry sighed. `` I 'm going to finger guilty whatever you say, you ca n't check me. ``

'' Stubborn. ``

'' Brat. ``

'' I am not. '' Pythea smiled warmly. `` Do you have any idea what you will do now ? After you are released from hospital I mean. ``

'' I ... I have somewhere I want to go. ``

'' The orphanage ? ``

'' Hey, you reading my mind again ? '' Harry smiled mysteriously. `` Do n't I get any secrets ? ``

'' I can not show mind anymore Harry. '' Thea shook her head. `` That came with being the oracle remember. I just know you. ``

'' But you 're still a seer, right ? '' Harry hesitated to ask.

'' Oh yes, there are some thing they can not take away. '' Pythea nodded. `` I am still a seer, and a very powerful one. ``

'' Can you ... can you severalise me my future ? '' Harry asked suddenly.

'' No. I ca n't. '' Pythea smiled and stood. `` Do you need to go to the orphans' asylum now ? ``

'' Now ? '' Harry scratched his head. `` Are n't I in infirmary ? ``

'' A short-change manner of walking will not inconvenience a mighty Heron like you too a great deal. '' Pythea crooked an eyebrow mockingly.

'' A brusque walk ? We have to get to Ireland ya know. ``

'' Then it is prosperous that another matter they can not acquire away is my international apparition permission. '' Pythea held out her paw. `` Just tell me where Harry. And we can go. ``

Harry reached out and took her hand.
*


'' Ow. '' Harry 's hand went to his stomach as pain flared there through the infirmary sheets. `` That really hurts. ``

'' I told you it would. '' Pythea was sitting exactly where she said she was, at the side of meat of his bed. `` The knife was made with darkness trick so the wound ca n't be magically healed. You 'll induce to let it knit together the old fashioned way. Is it too much ? Do you bid to wait money box tomorrow ? ``

'' No no. It just surprised me is all. '' Harry slowly lowered his groundwork to the story and gingerly stood. He had to hump just a slight to break the skin of his stomach stretching painfully, but he could take the air. No he could n't. His leg was mangled too. Maybe he could hop ... `` Do you have my clothes somewhere ? Oh wait my bag 's right wing here. Can you turn so I can- ''

Pythea cut him off with a wafture of her handwriting. His hospital gown changed into a round-eyed white t-shirt and trouser. Muggle enough to be getting on with. With another wave a carved wooden cane appeared in his hand. Obviously she did not mean he was as hefty as said he was. shucks her for being right.

'' Thank you. '' Harry smiled and picked up his bag from beside the bed. `` Shall we go then ? ``

Pythea stepped up to him and wrapped her arms around his attendant midriff. This close Harry could smell her whisker, like cat valium grass and the sea. He was breathing faster, probably because of all the potions they had him on.

'' Are you ready ? '' She asked.

'' Yes. '' Harry shut his heart and waited. And waited ... He opened them again and cocked his headland to one side. `` Is there a problem ? ``

'' You still have n't told me where we 're going. '' Pythea clicked her tongue irritably. `` Not being able to understand peoples thought process is going to involve some getting used to. ``

'' I 'm sorry. I really am. '' Harry apologized again, earning him a degree stare from the little seer, and told her their destination.

For the first time in his aliveness Harry enjoyed an apparition. The walls of the vacuum pressed him into Pythea, forcing them closer together. He could feel her breather on his brass. He was almost disappoint when they dropped onto a pocket-size road in the countryside.

Harry stepped back and glanced around. There was no mistaking the orphanhood, it was the only building there. At the inwardness of it was a stately-home type of thing. He could n't put a appointment to it, old was the serious he could do. That was clearly the centre of attention of the composite but at some pointedness the proprietor had felt a need to flourish. The two blockage to either side of the independent building took after the put-some-rectangular-concrete-blocks-in-a-vaguely-building-shape style of computer architecture. Around the whole place there was a high wall with barbellate wire looped at the top.

Harry tried not to think that made it attend like a prison. All schools had that these days.

With a careful handwriting on his tum Harry walked up to the main reception. Pythea stopped there and sat down quietly on a bench.

'' You 're not coming in ? '' Harry asked.

'' You go on ahead. '' Thea looked out over the countryside. `` You should probably do this yourself. ``

'' I can still do it myself with you there. ``

'' Go inside Harry. ``

Harry grinned and turned towards the door. He took a trench breathing place, then winced at what that did to his stomach. He tried to settle down the raging butterflies inside but could n't. The exclusively thing that gave him the will to push open the room access was predator regulation. Follow through. No fear.

As he stepped into the dull entrance hall a secretary looked up from her desk, eying him quizzically.

'' Is there a records department ? '' Harry asked uncertainly.

'' Up the step first door on the left. '' The secretary looked back down at her papers.

Up the steps. Of grade. Harry labored up the steps, having to rest more than once before he reached the top. Out the window he could see the vacation spot, full of children running about wildly. From inside the paries the place looked a lot nicer. All around the boundary of the wall there were a serial publication of nestling 's paintings. Long running murals and vortex of coloration. It was almost pleasant, it looked like a normal school.

Harry managed to reach the beginning floor and took a few tired breaths. She wanted to let me to this by myself. Probably just did n't want to carry me up the bloody dance step. Harry then realized that hunching over and breathing heavily in a building full moon of children could possibly be misinterpreted. He stood and walked forward towards the low gear door, his walking stick clattering against the floor. He knocked, politely.

'' Come in. ``

Harry pushed the room access open to see an elderly lady sitting in movement of a reckoner, looking at him questioningly over her glasses.

"Hi, I used to live here. At the orphanage I mean."Harry stepped inside.

"Oh,"The woman smiled."Please have a seat."Harry gratefully sat, hung his stick over the binding of the chairman and worked out how to continue.

"I was wondering if I could get any book you have of me ?"

"Do you have any identification ?"

"Eh ?"

"Passport ? driver license, no you ‘ re too Young for that. Your espousal security perhaps."

"Do I need one ?"Harry's hand moved to his pocket and mercifully found that Dragon 's wand was still there.

"We can ‘ t give records out to just anyone dear."

"Confundus."Harry whispered, then."Can you make an exception ?"

"Of ... of course deary."The cleaning lady shook her head like she was trying to dislodge gossamer then turned to her computer."What figure is it ?"

"I don ‘ t have my epithet. Long write up, but it happened on January twentieth, nine years ago."Harry wondered whether he would postulate another Confundus to blow past the ‘ no name'thing, but the fair sex seemed to take it in her stride.

"Everything ‘ s on estimator now. It ‘ s very high tech."The woman pursed her mouth as she clacked away at her keyboard."When I started here we had suite and way of filing cabinet corner. Would have taken long time to bump a record like yours."

When would she sustain started here ? Harry wondered. Was it possible she might have been there back when he was ?

"Here we are."The char squinted at the phonograph record for a moment then let out a throaty chuckle."Oh yes, I remember."

"You ... you do ?"Harry felt his breather quicken."You think back me ?"

"How could I forget ?"She turned to him with a motherly smile."Everyone here has a constant monitor of your stay with us."

"Wh ... what ?"

"See the wall over there ?"She gestured out the windowpane."See the barbed wire ? You may guess it ‘ s to keep folk out, but it was originally put up to keep you in. You kept clambering over the wall."

"Really."Harry didn't dare feel. Didn't daring hope. A last connectedness to his stolen past like this had been too a lot to ask."I must have caused you all a lot of trouble."

"Oh you were a scalawag you were."The old womanhood smiled fondly."I still call up what you said to me the day the conducting wire went up."

"What ?"Harry swallowed."What did I say ?"

"Well I said to you ‘ You know that wire ‘ s been put up just to hold on you in.'And you turned to me, cheeky as a imp, and told me ‘ That ‘ s good Miss, ‘ cos the wall wasn ‘ t much of a challenge anymore.'”

Harry's heart broke and he fell into his script. He felt tears blooming in his oculus. He hadn't known what to await when he'd come here, but he had never expected this. He had never expected proof. Proof that he wasn't some Frankenstein monster, proof that he wasn't a bad copy of William James potter. He was, and had always been, him. Arrogant, cocky, unrespectful of authorisation and filled with wanderlust. He. Was. Him.

"Dear are you alright ?"The old woman sounded touch on."Do you desire a tissue ?"

"And you tell me ..."Harry swallowed and tried again."Can you assure me my name ?"

"Oh, I ‘ m afraid you came to us without a name."She looked back at her data processor covert."We gave you the cognomen Malyn, after the orphanage. Which is a traditional here. And for the first name we had to clear that up. So we called you Jack."

Jack ...

diddly-shit Match.

Jack Baltzegaurd.

Jack Shakey.

Jack Caiman.

All those citizenry, all those mass he'd disguised himself as ... Jack.

His constant assumed name. The name that had always come to his sass when he knew he couldn't say ‘ Harry ’. It had been a memory, a storage of the first substantial name he had. Not given to him by his parents sure, and apparently not magically binding. But a epithet. He still felt more like Harry, it was still the name that came first to his lips but ... it was like that hollow core inside him was filling. Filling with parts of a life he had though he had no store of. It felt so good.

"I suppose you ‘ ll want to go down and see it."The old woman was handing him a printed transcript in a folder. Harry assumed it was his file. She nodded towards the book binding of the orphanage.

"See it ?"

"It was always your best-loved place."The old woman smiled."It was where we usually found you when you managed to creep off."

Suddenly Harry knew, and with the knowledge came the unbearable need to see if it was true. Harry stood suddenly.

"Yes, I do want to see it. Thank you."Harry smiled exhaustive teary eyes."Thank you. thank you so much."

"My pleasance Jack."

Harry turned and hobbled from the room, it was only his aching wound and walking control stick that stopped him from running. He reached the bottom of the stairs and pushed out the doorway. Pythea was already standing, like she'd known he was coming.

"We need to go that ... that way."Harry was breathing so hard all he could do was point vaguely.

"pencil lead the way."

Harry set off, taking them round to the back of the construction. He could see it now, down the slope a little. He stumbled down and stopped just before he reached it, just before he went beneath the shade of the Malus pumila trees. The little round orchard of apple trees.

"My god."Pythea had her helping hand to her oral cavity in shock."It ‘ s real."

"It was a memory."Harry breathed, reaching out a handwriting to touch a branch."It was a computer storage. I kept having this dream where I was stuck in Godrics Hollow. But that place felt all weird, but if I could break out and give the orchard I felt safe. Felt real."

"I though it was a creation of your creative thinker, I never thought ..."

"Neither did I."Harry stepped beneath the offshoot and walked into the snapper of the grove. He set his vertebral column against the Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree and slid down, resting on the dry land. Pythea sat down next to him, resting her shoulder against his.

"It ‘ s very passive here."Was all she said.

Harry didn't confidence himself to speak. Couldn't speak. There were no Holy Writ. They sat there for the longest time, the shoemaker's last summer breeze filling running past them and rustling the leave above their chief. Eventually, after who knew how long, Harry spoke.

"Thea ?"

"Hm ?"She murmured. Had she almost fallen asleep. Harry looked over into her beautiful mismatched eyes.

"Why did you hope me ? Right at the source ?"

"I told you, because you are just and-"

"But right at the beginning you couldn ‘ t have known all that."Harry pointed out."book binding then I was a stranger."

"You were never a stranger."Thea smiled sadly."Do you know how they choose the future oracle Harry ? They go around to all the wizardly family in Hellenic Republic, looking for children with the inner eye. If they find one with enough power, with great power enough to be Pythea, they take them back to the temple."

"look at them from their parents ?"Harry asked, shocked.

"The parents have a choice of line, but who would dare say no."Pythea huddled up against Harry's incline."I was three, but I remember it well, another curse my talent gives me. My name wasn ‘ t Pythea then, but I was told that I could never use my old figure, never speak it ever again. One day in art social class I signed one of my picture with the old gens, just a little mistake. The furiousness they had at me that day ... they burnt my motion-picture show, in front of my eyes. I never used the old name again. After I finished my education I was allowed to go back and visit my parents. I went back to my old sign. They were very ... polite. They acted exactly the way I would have a bun in the oven someone to act towards The Pythea. When I tried to act like their daughter, they looked at me like I had done something wrong. Even to them I was supposed to be The Pythea ... even to them."

"Theia I never knew."Harry put an arm around her ( What the sin do I do ? She's not crying, do I offer her a tissue anyway ? Oh god what do I say ? )"It must have been heart-wrenching. I can ‘ t imagine-"

"You can imagine. Not that you have to."Pythea smiled up at him."That ‘ s why we were never strangers. Because we ‘ re the Saami, both orphaned. Both with our true identities taken from us. Both shoved into rolls and names we never wanted."

"Both forced to consent them."Harry nodded."Yeah, we were never unknown. We're the same, we ‘ re like ... rootless. We have no roots. No past."

"Did you find out your name ?"Pythea asked suddenly.

"I found out a name."Harry shrugged."But I think I ‘ ll keep going with Harry, I ‘ ve carried it longer than the other now anyway."

"They took away who we are."She murmured.

"They took away our names."Harry corrected, brushing his paw against Pythea's face."They can ‘ t contract away who we are. The names don ‘ t matter so much, you can call me Harry or Jack or Bob it doesn't matter. I know who I am."

"I wish I had your certainty."

"You do have it."Harry smiled."Because I know who you are. It ‘ s got nothing to do with your name. You ‘ re just you. Any you ‘ re perfect."

"Harry ..."Pythea lifted up, little glistening tears in the corners of her eyes, and kissed him lightly on the cheek."Thank you."

Harry didn't really know what to do, other than to crimson. A minute later Pythea seemed to realize something.

"Harry, did you just stupefy me at being profound ?"

"Had to hap eventually."Harry grinned cheekily.

"I ‘ ll get you side by side time."

"You ‘ re on."

Pythea smiled, lighting up her human face. Harry bit his lip and asked.

"So, you ‘ re going to be staying in Britain then ? For now ?"

"I think so. Are you ?"

"Yeah, probably."Harry rested his hands behind his brain."Go back to Hogwarts maybe. I don ‘ t know if I missed the O.W.L.S."

"They begin next hebdomad if I remember correctly."

"A calendar week, think that ‘ s sufficiency metre ?"Harry scratched his head.

"Since it ‘ s all the revisal you would do anyway, I ‘ d say, yes. And after that ?"

"Dunno ... Stay in the rural area probably. I could do with a nice peaceful holiday."

"Harry you wouldn ‘ t know what to do with a peaceable holiday."

"I ‘ d know exactly what to do."Harry winked."As soon as I got there it would get a lot less peaceful, but a lot more than fun."

Crystal laughter filled the orchard, and lit up the leave-taking with light.
*


Bellatrix Lestrange bowed over her lord's bed and cried, heedless of her tears staining the sheets. She had done all she could, used every aspect of her art, but her Lord still barely breathed. His skin was dead White person and only the nighttime magic she had woven in his chest kept him awake. He was so unaccented, not even conscious. It was dreaded to see him like this, terrible to see him brought so low. Better if he had truly died, then he could have risen up again in glory. Instead he was trapped in this prison of chassis. Better dead than to lie on this narrow cot in a flyspeck room, not even fit for a shroud place. But she had to do what she could. She was the last, the final stage firm death eater.

"I am all he has."Bellatrix whimpered.

"That is not the case."

Bella whirled, her scepter snaking out. When she saw who it was she barely relaxed.

"You !"She spat with venom."Barty Crouch, you dare slink back after abandoning our lord !"

"I did not give up him."The tranquil boy stepped from the phantasma, carrying a package under his arm."I was doing our Almighty skilful work."

"For a full moon year ?"

"It did take longer than anticipated ... but it has been done. And in the nick of meter too."The pale sensation strode over to the dark lord's sickbed and knelt beside it."I am your servant, master copy, and I have done your bidding. Do not worry lord, I can make you secure again. warm than ever. With this ... we can rise again, the decease eaters can rise again. The earth will tremble overlord, shiver in fear."

Barty Crouch reached into his bundle and pulled something out. Bellatrix felt her jaw drop.

"We can be hard than ever master."Barty's font in the shadows was terrifying."Stronger than ever."





Ye gods that was hard to indite right. Or ... in good order write. Write write ... some combination of those Word of God anyway. It 's been a roller coaster I think you 'll agree, and the single most massive bend of the integral fic was finally revealed. Hope you liked it. multitude who were waiting to the end of this book to review ... your fourth dimension has come.

I 've already started writing the side by side book and It ai n't going well. I did n't do my usual thing of writing myself into a corner. Instead I plotted the account book out in advance and wrote to it. Unfortunately I got a few chapters in and realized that it sucked. The plot made legitimate sense and all, no plot-holes, there was nada tripping me up, no writers block, I just realized that the plot I had mapped out was a bit [ word I ca n't add without mature military rating ] really. I had to go back and rework the thing. convinced result : The story is a lot warm now I think. negative upshot : I have to throw away a pregnant part of what I 've already written. Ah well, such is life.

Anyway *clears throat* the next report is on it 's way. Our Harry has finally found out who he really is and begins walking his own path. Too bad that path is as deadly as the finally. A new enemy rises, an old one lingers and a mysterious assassin is out for Harry 's blood. With Harry still injured from his opposition in the department of mysteries he ca n't front these challenges head on. He may even take in to set out using his brain ...

Mysteries abound in the adjacent book of the serial Harry Potter, The Edward Durell Stone and The Scorpion !