Of Cloaks and Daggers

Of Cloaks and Daggers

By: Goyana

Chapter 1

Into the Wildwood

Harry muttered to himself as he packed his trunk. "I can't believe he's gone," he said quietly, as he looked at the mirror formerly belonging to his godfather, Sirius Black, once his closest link to his parents. Not a month before, he had been he had been killed, and while he might have only been with Harry for a few hours in his life, it still hurt Harry to see him go; Sirius had represented the one thing that Harry wanted the most -- freedom, freedom from the hell that he had been thrown into.

Harry sighed, knowing that it was entirely pointless to dwell in the past and every second it was becoming more important to focus on the future, and looked over at his red-headed friend, Ron. To him, Ron was the one constant in his life-- he didn't conform to the events around him, as opposed to other people of Hogwarts. This was a good escape, but he knew that Ron's immaturity in accepting what happened around him was only a temporary bliss.

But it was more important to enjoy the bliss now, than it was to tear it down and face reality. Harry smiled, and looked over at Ron.

"Hey Ron--you got any plans for the summer?" queried Harry.

"You bet, mate!" replied Ron. "I'm gonna see the Chudley Cannons -- they're going to be playing the American team, the Fitchburg Finches. It's gonna be so wicked. The Cannons will win, I tell ya--feel it in my bones. Besides, they're Americans--they can't touch us when it comes to Quidditch."

Harry smiled at his friend. Even during a depressing time like these, Ron could still ramble on about how the down and out Cannons were going to win their next match.

Packing silently, listening to Ron ramble about Quidditch, Harry basked in the quasi-peace in the air. It was comforting in a sense, not having to worry about the war that was about to be launched into full scale, nor having to worry about grades while he listened to Ron. An odd comfort, but a comfort nonetheless. Occasionally, Harry would idly nod and agree when Ron asked a question, just so he could think--Malfoy's comment was still fresh in his mind from earlier that day:

"Watch out, Halfblood," he had sneered nastily. "My friends are coming for yours and your stupid friends' arses this evening."

While Harry certainly doubted that this was going to happen, he wasn't about to take any chances. Not with the recent death of his godfather. Silently he stuffed his invisibility cloak into the two way pocket near the bottom of the sweatshirt. 'Just in case,' he assured himself, not wanting the threat to be fulfilled. Noticing that Ron was done with his packing, he quickly crammed everything into his own trunk so he could join his friend.

Jogging down the stairs, he caught up with his friend. "Hey Ron, wait up. We need to get Hermione, Ginny, Luna and Neville so we can all have the same compartment together."

Ron got an odd look on his face and seethed out, "Luna? Do we really have to?"

Harry glared at Ron, daring him to say it. "Well..." gulped Ron. "She's perfectly fine! Really I wasn't going to say she's weird cause she isn't, and if that's what you think--well then, shame on you!"

Harry simply stared at Ron. "Yeah, I'll believe that lie when Hermione starts to enjoy flying on a broom," he said sarcastically.

"Well that can be arranged. All we need is a simple levita . . ."

"Shut up, Ron."

"Why don't you shut up?"

Harry simply mock glared at Ron, which caused him to grin widely while shutting up in a bit of a sheepish way.

Shaking his head at Ron's antics, he honestly hoped that Ron would never change. Some minor annoyances in life were entertaining and essential for keeping one's sanity, Harry deduced.

"Harry, Ron! Over here!"

Harry turned his head to see Hermione with Neville and Luna.' Why is Luna with Hermione? I thought Hermione hated Luna?' Harry thought to himself.

Considering that voicing that particular thought would be moronic and painful for his ears to do so, Harry instead asked, "Ready to go home after... well, you know--this ordeal?"

"I can't wait. I'll be able to see my parents again and even get to browse my own personal library. I really can't wait to see what new books my parents put in there. They always have interesting books that they add to my collection," said Hermione, as Ginny wandered up.

"Wow, Hermione. You must really love books," deadpanned Ron.

Ginny noticed the scathing Hermione and rolled her eyes at Ron. "This has just occurred to you now, Ronald?"

"That's not what I meant," replied Ron, looking at his sister in an annoyed fashion. "Honestly! It's just that I thought she just really liked books, not loved them," exclaimed Ron.

Hermione simply turned away from Ron, not even bothering to replying to him.

"Hermione, you should be careful of your books. The Libratus-Hoofed Jorlunks live in books and they'll eat your fingers," said Luna, as if it were normal to randomly talk about an odd creature at any given time.

Everyone stopped to stare at her for a brief second before Harry silently laughed to himself. It wouldn't surprise him if such animals did exist in the wild since the magical world had shown Harry that it was full of crazy things.

Looking down the halls, he casually noticed they had been walking ever since they had met up, but were getting close in time to the departure of the carriages. Running a head a little bit, Harry yelled back at his friends, "Oi, hurry up! We'll miss the ride there!" Realization dawned on their faces before they took off in a half-run, half-walk and reached the great door of Hogwarts. They quickly found one of the last empty carriages and climbed inside.

Hermione was chatting with Ron and Ginny, talking about her upcoming plans to some new vacation spot. 'Maybe she'll end up in China?' he thought to himself, in an almost pleading voice, knowing that he didn't want to deal with more reminders of 'do your homework' from Hermione.

Both Ron and Ginny were listening to Hermione, judging from the quite enthralled expressions on their faces. Upon further thought, Harry noticed that Ginny usually wore that kind of face whenever Hermione talked, as if she loved her instead of having the annoying large crush on the ideal of the Boy-Who-Lived. Harry lightly chuckled at his own small joke. Ron was also seemed quite entranced with Hermione's plans for God-knows-where she was going this year, killing the popular belief that Ron and Hermione fights did not happen every single second of every single day.

'Besides, if they did that, I'd have snapped already and killed them both,' Harry thought morbidly.

Neville, on the other hand, seemed to be the queer one of the group, since he always seemed chatty around those he knew, but not when around new people. For some odd reason he was staring out the window, as though he were looking at something he had never seen before. What that was, Harry wasn't sure. He might have been watching the rain, as it had started to pour down when they got inside the carriage, but he had a feeling that wasn't it. It could have been the Thestrals outside, but he doubted that Neville could see them.

Luna was acting quite normal compared to Neville, which wasn't saying much. She seemed to be muttering to herself about what faintly sounded like green-spotted owls making Harry shake his head. 'That girl really needs a better hobby,' he mused to himself.

Sighing in defeat that maybe his friends were actually very strange, he settled on joining Neville and stared out the window, nearly falling asleep until he noticed what Neville was looking at, the Thestrals. It seemed that Neville had finally realized what was pulling the carriages of the school.

Harry sighed for the umpteenth time, realizing that he was doing that way too much as of late. Glancing at his friends again, he took note of them deciding to leave him be for the time, to allow him to think in peace and not have to deal with them grilling him with questions he'd prefer to answer at a later date. 'Maybe they realized that I just need some space right now,' he thought to himself before shrugging his shoulders and closing his eyes, hoping to catch a slight snooze before they arrived at the train station.

This proved to be futile as he was startled out of his daze when the carriages abruptly stopped. Cursing his luck under his breath, Harry joined his still chatting friends into the station to get onto the train. Luckily, the station seemed to have anti-rain enchantments over it as no water was getting inside, which looked very strange to Harry. The enchantment had created an invisible dome over the station. The water was beating off this invisible dome and sliding down around it. It looked like there was a giant half-sphere on earth that was completely dry while it rained all around it.

Slowly trailing behind his friends, he followed them through the corridors of the train, until they stumbled upon an empty compartment. As everyone quickly found a suitable seat inside, Harry managed to get one by the window, which was his favorite simply because he enjoyed watching the countryside zip by. Plus, it gave him something to lean against if he wanted to fall asleep.

As he watched Hermione, Ron and Ginny talk feverishly about various Wizarding cultures, Harry wondered idly how Ron was even able to stay in that particular conversation, let alone participate in it. Luna had resumed her muttering about strange beasts and reading the quibbler, with Neville looking out the window and just staring at the grassy fields that were slowly passing by. Unsurprisingly, he noticed that Neville was about to fall asleep, and decided to join him, resting his head against the wooden window frame and promptly drifted into sleep.

He was jolted awake by the sudden stop of the train, Harry snapped open his eyes and looked around, noting that Neville, Luna and Hermione were no longer in the compartment for some strange reason, leaving just Ron and Ginny remaining with quizzical looks on their faces.

A quick glance outside revealed that it was pitch black, with an ominous appearance. Harry noticed a tendril of lightning shoot out and whip across the countryside. He frowned, noticing the clouds gathering in an ubiquitous way. This storm would not subside soon. 'Maybe the storm is causing the train to stop,' he thought idly to himself, figuring that the weather had caused some problem on the tracks.

"Oi, Harry! Do you know what's happening out there?" asked Ron with a small hint of fear.

'Some Gryffindor,' Harry thought offhandedly.

"Yeah. Harry. What's going on?" asked Ginny, rolling her eyes at Ron again. "It's not like you've been asleep for the past half-hour, and you pay incredible attention to every thing around you," pointed out Ginny, sarcastically.

Harry mumbled something about mind-reading and people assuming he had the ability, since apparently people assumed he knew about what was happening at the current point in time.

"Where are Luna, Neville, and Hermione?" Harry asked, ignoring their questions.

"They went to visit Susan Bones in another compartment somewhere. Apparently they know each other," pointed out Ron, who did not seem fazed by Harry ignoring his or Ginny's questions.

Harry knew that the others were friends with Susan, since he'd seen them eat breakfast together once or twice in the past. A well-kept secret of Harry's was that he enjoyed spending some weekend mornings exploring the castle as opposed to eating breakfast. He chose to avoid detection from unsavory people, mostly Snape, by using his Invisibility Cloak, which happened to be one of the things at Hogwarts he thoroughly enjoyed. He had found many abandoned classrooms that he used as his own training grounds, away from the prying eyes of most of the living beings in the castle. While he did use this time to also research spells for the DA, it was mostly 'Harry time', as he preferred to call it.

'I'm getting sidetracked,' Harry reprimanded himself, forcing himself to focus on the problem at hand.

Harry was slightly worried. Trains stopping on track in the middle of nowhere, in a storm no less, never gave good news. It didn't take a scientist to figure that out; it also didn't take a scientist to notice that the lights had started to dim within their section of the train, until they suddenly plunged everyone into darkness. Following that was complete silence, the only noise being the rain beating against the darkened train, with various lightning strikes within the sky illuminating the train, causing its passengers to see only flashes of their friends.

Harry noticed the eerie silence almost as if something horrible was about to happen like the calm before the storm. As if on cue, the entire train shook with extreme force, almost as if an earthquake was happening. Harry grabbed onto the armrests to keep himself balanced. Everyone within the train seemed to go into an uproar, screaming, scrambling; everything else in between seemed to go on shaking as an aftereffect of the tremor. Luckily, Ron and Ginny seemed relatively calm though he knew that they probably scared. Hell, even he was a bit scared, he admitted to himself, but he refused to let the emotions that had welled up inside him assume control.

The train shook again, this time more violently than the first tremor, although this time Harry looked outside and saw a flash of a purple-white dome that flickered around the train, indicating that the wards seemed to be taking a heavy assault from some unknown assailant, though Harry had an inkling of an idea of what might be happening.

His speculation was proven true as he watched out the window and saw a long thick beam of orange magic catapulting towards the train and slam into it, indicating that the train was under attack by siege spells. Voldemort was attacking already. 'So soon after getting his arse kicked by Dumbledore?' Harry asked himself as he watched the assault with a morbid fascination. Another large thick orange beam of magic came plummeting into the wards of the train, shattering them into millions of light purple particles. They seemed to linger for a few more seconds, as the excess magic was expelled from the runes used to make the wards, before finally disappearing into the darkness.

It seemed apparent that not many of the other children had noticed this, and Harry knew that he would need to act fast if he wanted to live. He reached into his rucksack, thanking God in the process that he had stuck his invisibility cloak in there, and took out the cloak. Absently looking outside, he saw the one thing he didn't want to see - "Not today," he bemoaned internally. Several large thick beams of siege magic were hailing towards the train, and Harry closed his eyes, trying not to imagine the damage siege spells would do to a wooden train without wards. It would be like having a human and an ant fight to the death--not a pretty sight.

It seemed that he didn't have to imagine for long; a second later, each siege spell smashed into the train, shattering the wood and metal pieces of the train's roof and leaving nothing intact well, that he could see anyways. Minutes passed with a constant stream of siege spells impacting the train at an alarming rate, making Harry finally decide that sitting put was an idiotic idea.

"Ron, get your ass up and run. Take Ginny and get out of here. NOW!"

Harry watched as Ron began to react to his words while he quickly looked out the window. Not even saying what was out there, he yelled out "DUCK!"

As if on cue, a siege spell slammed right into their compartment, Harry dropping to the floor just before the siege spell hit. Covering his head with his hands, he winced as he heard a blood-curdling scream and turned to look as soon as he saw the dust and the debris settle down. Harry got up from under the bench saw something he wished that he never had looked at.

He noticed that Ginny was sobbing hysterically, while next to her was the obvious object of her distress. Ron had obviously been too slow in reacting to Harry's command of ducking, judging from the pieces of wooden and metal debris sticking out of his body, each wound letting a generous amount of blood seep onto the floor. Morbidly Harry made the comparison between Ron and a pincushion; besides the lack of blood from a pincushion, they looked surprisingly similar. Post-haste, Harry noticed that Ron was still alive--yet another difference between Ron and the pincushion. Ron's eyes watered with a surprised look on his face.

"H-h-harry... I'm s-s-s-sorry...," Ron croaked out, barely able to look straight at Harry for some obvious reason. Harry knew that Ron was going to die shortly, but he refused to believe it.

"Please don't talk. Just don't," Harry muttered weakly, while shivering a bit in the fear of what came next.

"I-I-It hurts... please, Harry... end it for me..." Ron pleaded, while trying to smile but ended up coughing up blood.

Harry sighed sadly. He didn't want to end it, but Ron was suffering and obviously was going to die. Pulling out his wand, he muttered under his breath, "Stupefy."

"There, now, you won't feel pain any longer," said Harry in a low, scared whisper.

Harry watched as Ron smiled for the last time in his life, though he could have sworn he said "Thank You," as he passed away. Horribly shaken, he spared a looked in Ginny's direction, taking note that she was crying profusely, and as if by magic, her tears looked like a small stream of water.

"Ginny, come on! We've got to get out of here. Voldemort is attacking this train and we need to survive," said Harry, in his best imitation of being calm. He needed to show her that he was brave and in control.

"No! I can still save my brother. He isn't dead!" screamed Ginny. She went over to her brother, shaking him. Blood was spilling everywhere as Ginny hastily pulled out the stakes from her brother, the blood from Ron's neck squirting all over Ginny's face and her skirt.

Pulling the invisibility cloak around himself and attempting to tear Ginny away from Ron's dead, bloody body, Harry grimaced. Ginny tried to protest by holding onto his body, which fell to the floor as Harry tore her fingers one-by-one away from the limp corpse. Blood was everywhere, covering both Harry and Ginny.

With Ginny still sobbing, Harry opened the compartment door and began to find the quickest way out, not even looking back at his best friend, knowing that to do so invited death to him, too

Earlier, Cho Chang had been sitting in her compartment alone. Normally, Cho would be with friends and or patrolling the corridors, or even in the bathroom stalls with Cedric, snogging, but much had changed in a year for the burgeoning woman.

The first change had come for Cho following Cedric's death; in addition to her sudden lack of boyfriend, rather than spend time with her friends and immersing herself in her studies, she instead spent much of her sixth year being depressed over Cedric's death, trying unsuccessfully to cheer herself up by dating Harry, but that backfired spectacularly. She had scolded herself; she should have realized that Harry had been overly stressed and had not been ready for a kiss, especially from a crying girl. Sitting alone in a compartment was the product of the excessive crying since her friends had hastily ditched her, not wanting to deal with such a mess.

'I didn't have that many loyal friends, did I?' Cho had thought morbidly to herself.

Marietta Edgecombe was probably the worst of those to ditch her, doing a complete one-eighty. She had started to treat Cho like rubbish after being ousted as a mole for the DA. Because of her choices during the past year, Cho had been sitting in a compartment that nobody would sit in, due to the annoyance contained within her. Even Cho was getting sick of herself and her attitude the past school year. A single tear had slowly run down her soft cheeks from her black eyes while she made a vow to herself; she was sick of crying and it had to stop.

"I will not cry. I will not be weak. I will not be a burden. From this day forth I will be the leader, not the one who is led. To this I swear on my magic and my blood," Cho had whispered solemnly.

So detached from the world around her, she had barely taken note that the oath had manifested itself magically, leaving a constant reminder on her right arm in the form of a tattoo. The tattoo took the shape of a sword inside a circle with a hand holding the blade, the magical rune for self-preservation.

Oblivious to her surroundings, she had failed to notice the rumbling of the train as the siege spells made contact with the train, or that it diminished the power of the wards on the train before she had finally realized what was going on.

"Oh shit," choked out Cho as she looked outside, watching the orange barrage of siege spells heading towards the train.

Without even thinking, she bolted outside, while casting the Sonorus charm. Acting as fast she could, Cho announced in her magnified voice, "Everyone! The train is under attack! Shield yourselves!"

She had but a millisecond to cast a physical shield spell and aim it up to block the splinters of wood and metal that were forced in all directions, like a nova spell, from the impact of the siege spells. As the dust cleared, she noticed that most of the children had survived the initial spell with only killed, a first year, who had been too far away to be protected by the students who knew how to block physical particles.

Eying the students around her, she identified the few that she knew, recognizing Parvati and Padma Patil, as well as the Hufflepuff boy Wayne Hopkins, and took note at the lack of known Death Eater family-spawn. That's good. I won't have to worry about distrust as much as I could have had to.

Of those she knew barely or didn't know at all, she recognized a fellow sixth year Ravenclaw, Chester Stonewall. While she didn't talk to him much at all, she knew Chester was one of the most talented Ravenclaw. Well, at least the most talented one to flaunt his abilities.

"Everyone, listen up!" shouted out Cho.

She watched as every kid that was able to move lined up in front of her. Though she was scared and knew it, and despite never having had to lead a group of people before, she knew that the train was under attack and that she had an obligation to lead these young wizards and witches to safety. No one else would.

"In case you haven't noticed, we're under attack by Death Eaters," said Cho, as whispers and muttering instantly broke through the crowd. Sensing that this would not end quickly, Cho demanded everyone be quiet.

"The wards have been shattered on this train. We need to travel in groups. Defense is vital, offense is only a secondary. Don't risk your necks," Cho continued as she watched the unrest in the crowd.

"Hey, why do we have to listen to you, huh? Why don't we just blast out this compartment?" shouted out a fourth year.

Before Cho could respond, the same fourth year blasted a hole in the wall and jumped outside. Rather than follow him, the other students gathered around the hole and watched him escape off into the night.

Cho sighed, knowing that this wasn't good. Before she had even turned around, she noticed that the tall grass was moving. Focusing in on the movement in the grass, she was sure she saw animal-like eyes.

Without even thinking, she yelled out, "Watch out! There are animals in the fields!"

The kid turned around and before he could do anything, he vanished. What had caused him to vanish, Cho was unsure, but it didn't look friendly. Within a second, Cho saw blood being sprayed up into the air and she even saw a leg go flying, before it was snatched by a huge mouth.

'Something is in those fields. We can't escape!' Cho thought wildly, restraining her urge to panic, all the while watching the scene in horror.

Shuddering she poked at the students. Each student seemed to be frozen in fear, as if the grim reaper himself had shown up and decapitated the boy with his deadly scythe.

"Hey! Snap out of it! This isn't the time to piss your pants and get yourself killed!" yelled Cho to the crowd.

The crowd of students all turned to her, as if they expected directions.

Cho looked at each student directly in their eyes. Thinking for a split second, she decided on a course of action, the option of escape now cut off from them all.

"All right, everyone. We're not going to go down without a fight. It sounds like the Death Eaters are beginning their assault in the front of the train, so we should move that way. I want everyone to be on the look out and keep those physical shields out," ordered Cho.

"Parvati, Padma, Wayne, Chester!" barked out Cho. The four students in question stepped forward. "You four stay in the back and keep on the lookout for a possible ambush. I'll be the lookout in the front," the students-turned-scouts nodded at her order and went to their designated position.

"Let's go!" she shouted, while the students started to march forward silently, ignoring their impending doom. Cho eyed the carnage ahead of her as they went from car to car, each student they passed dead, their corpses mangled and littering the floor. She had thrown up along the way, but largely managed to contain herself upon witnessing the gore and blood of former students and friends, while slowing down so that that her little militia could throw up along the way as they needed to as well.

Cho wiped her forehead of sweat, the blazing heat of the burning cars getting to her, while all she could see was a mix of yellows, reds and oranges as the flames danced in the darkness. The weak protection shields they were using to keep the heat away were barely working and she had noticed that every student seemed to be dripping in sweat and some even had first degree burns.

Pausing for a second as they reached the front car, she took note it was pitch black, as opposed to the brightly blazing cars behind her. She heard screams behind her and sharply pivoted towards the source of the sound, thinking she saw Wayne and the others fighting something for a fleeting second. Assuming her eyes were playing tricks on her, she went to face the front car before she heard the sound again, and this time she turned around completely, forgetting about the end of the militia line, and eyed the front car with caution. She whispered to her militia, "Pay attention for ambushes. They only took out the first three cars."

Without warning, spells flew from all directions. Cho yelled to her militia to put up their shields, which worked in the nick of time. Then the chaos began. Death Eaters and what looked like skeletal wolves burst out from all directions, from the windows to the doors and even the floor and ceiling.

Cho dove into action to fight the nearest Death Eater that had shown itself. Dodging what seemed to be a head-severing curse, she spun around quickly and cast a cutting curse at her assailant. The cutting curse impacted with the lungs of her opponent and killed him instantly.

Without having have time to recover, one of the skeletal wolves jumped onto her and knocked her down. The thing was covered with rotten flesh and blood, with foam coming from its deformed mouth. The wolf was a lot larger than a run-of-the-mill wolf. They looked almost like werewolves.

Cho struggled to keep the wolf from devouring her face, its rotten spit falling down onto her, burning her skin almost like acid. Her wand had been knocked out of her hand as she had been knocked over. Keeping one hand on the wolf's throat, she tried to reach for her wand but it was just out of reach.

She felt her hand give away as it snapped, broken from keeping such a beast away from her. Just as the sickly-looking creature was about to maul her face, the wolf ignited in flames and shrieked the most unholy shriek she had ever heard, even from dementors.

She looked over to her side and saw that Chester had saved her life. She smiled lightly, wincing slightly as she braced her broken hand, and grabbed her wand with her other, joining back into the fray.

Cho vigorously fought from grunt to grunt, taking down many of the assailants with ease. She figured that Voldemort must not have sent his best to fight. As much as she could, she watched the battles around her. She came face-to-face with more of the ferocious wolves. Even those things seemed to be taking out more students than all the Death Eaters.

Students and Death Eaters were dropping like flies around her. Wayne had already fallen when he was stricken down by a heart-bursting curse. Padma had watched as her twin sister was brutally killed, Parvati impaled by a spear from up her stomach and through the neck, killing her painfully. Blood was pouring out of her mouth and eyes.

Padma instantly broke down and was about to be killed by the same man. Something was odd about the man. He had a red Death Eater mask on and he seemed to radiate more power than everyone else in this room. He felt like the equivalent of a tank in a room full of swords.

Cho was relieved, though, to see that a Hufflepuff boy she knew to be called Zacharias Smith sweep down and pick up Padma, carrying her to the back of the train.

She focused on the Death Eater in front of her again, who had regained his vision from the blindness spell she had fired at him. The Death Eater pulled out a dagger and charged at her.

She side-stepped the wizard, who ran right past her and plunged his dagger into a little second year. The girl cried in agony and as the dagger was savagely ripped out of her almost like as if he was gutting her. The girl's intestines fell on the floor in a bloody mess. Nearby wolves were instantly at the food that presented itself on the ground and devoured the girls intestines.

Enraged, Cho cried out the only dark spell she knew. "Crour Fervitus!"

The red spell shot through the air in almost a sickly way. It hit the Death Eater with surprising force and he began to scream in a bloody, curdling way. Cho watched in odd fascination as his blood began to boil. The skin was bubbling as his body was boiled from the inside out. The Death Eater screamed and screamed until his body burst and hot boiled blood burst in every direction.

Cho turned her attention to the red masked Death Eater, with the intent to kill him.

Harry kept dragging Ginny along under his cloak, hoping to find the quickest way out.

He looked from side to side, hoping to find an exit. He kept heading to the back of the train, hoping to avoid a battle. Harry did not want to fight while carrying a distraught Ginny along with him. He was in survival mode and it told him to run as far away as he could.

For what seemed like hours, but in reality was only five minutes, Harry traveled through several cars, before he reached the back of the train. In the back of the train, he saw the mangled corpse of the trolley cart lady, with all her candy and food scattered onto the ground.

Harry quickly picked up some food and stuffed into his pockets. He had a feeling he would need it.

He looked outside a broken window, jagged pieces of glass still stuck in the frame, and watched in horror as what appeared to be the last siege spell hurled towards the train car that he and Ginny were in.

Acting as best he could, he scrambled to get out of the train car; he fired a blasting spell at the end and blasted a hole out the back. Just as he was about to sprint out with the cloak on, the siege spell hit the car with amazing force.

Harry covered his eyes with his free hand as the spell impacted, causing dust and pieces of debris to scratch his hand, saving his eyes.

He still felt Ginny in his right arm and assumed that she was knocked out. Without even thinking, he took a few steps, avoiding the debris to get out of the car, when suddenly, he felt that the weight he was pulling was lighter.

Taking off the cloak, he turned around and saw what something that should have only been in his deepest, most horrid nightmares.

Harry was holding onto the upper torso of Ginny, with a blood trail showing where he had dragged the torso. Her legs were behind a sharp metal slab of the roof that had broken off. The metal slab had completely shaved Ginny in half. Blood was pouring out of everywhere and Harry looked at Ginny's face. Her face was the one of extreme pain, felt for a split section as she was literally cut in half.

Harry just stood up straight, still holding on the arm and thus the torso of Ginny, and stared at the scene of something he indirectly caused. His mind was completely blank, like a piece of parchment.

Harry was snapped out of his shock as a figure jumped from the shadows, attempting to knock him down.

Without even thinking, he swung at his assailant with the object in his right hand, smashing the character's face. The character's mask cracked into many pieces as some of it imbedded itself into the wearer. Harry heard a distinctive crack as the attacker's neck broke, instantly killing him.

Harry took a second to recover from the shock. He hoped that was the only person nearby.

Then Harry just realized something. He had used the torso of Ginny Weasley to smash someone's face with, instantly killing the person as the force snapped the Death Eater's neck.

He walked over to the Death Eater, while still holding onto the torso of Ginny. He idly looked at the mask, noticing that Ginny's face was indented into the mask. Taking off the pieces of mask, Harry looked at the face of his attacker.

Harry had killed Lucius Malfoy with the torso of Ginny Weasley.

'She would have been pleased to have gone down fighting. The fact that she killed a Malfoy should earn her a medal,' thought Harry to himself with a bit of dark humor.

Harry looked back sadly at Ginny's death site, and then looked at his hands, which were still clutching tightly onto her torso, almost as if he thought he could still save her.

Harry turned the hole that he created. Outside the caboose of the train, it was completely dark, the sky black as crows and ravens. The area that he could see was filled with tall grass. Harry thought to himself, 'I've got to be careful. This isn't a bloody Quidditch game. This is a battle and I'm smack dab in the middle of it. There has got to be someone or something in those fields.'

Harry watched the fields with intense concentration, hoping to see movement of any kind. He twisted his head violently, noticing a small twitch in the grass. He sincerely hoped that it was just the wind.

Then Harry saw something near the twitch of the glass. He squinted and adjusted his glasses. For a brief second, he realized that he really needed to fix his god-damned vision. Glasses were incorrigible sometimes.

Gazing into the green abyss, he saw a flash of yellow eyes for a fraction of a second. Then before he could even gasp for breath, a giant wolf like creature sprang from the grass and bolted towards him at mind boggling speed.

Harry watched in horror as the wolf-like monster smashed through the small hole that he made, and tackled him to the ground. Harry screamed in pain as his body smashed through the floor of the train, and onto the ground below him.

Harry locked his green eyes to with the large dark-yellow eyes of the beast on top of him. The creature seemed to be comprised of nothing but bone, flesh and spit. Using both hands, Harry grabbed the neck of the creature, hoping it would choke.

Sadly, this plan failed as the wolf did not appear to need to breathe at all. Just as the wolf was about to turn Harry's face into a pile of flesh and bones, Harry had managed to grab onto a piece of debris. Swinging with all his might, Harry whacked the creature on the side of its head, temporarily knocking the creature off of him.

With this brief reprise granted to him, Harry rolled out from under the bottom of the train, and pulled out his wand. Before the creature could regain its lost ground, Harry fired the first spell that he could think of. He gave a small flick of his wrist. "Incendio!"

Instantly, the entire caboose of the train was set alight. Harry watched in interesting fascination as the creature below the caboose was ignited. The creature screamed in agony, with an almost unearthly howl of terror. The creature bolted from underneath the train, attempting to take Harry down with it.

Before the creature could reach Harry, though, it burned up completely, leaving nothing but a pile of rotten bones and ash at the spot of its demise, not too far from him.

Harry, without even an afterthought, grabbed back onto the torso of Ginny, which had fallen through the floor with him.

Looking towards the grassy fields, Harry knew that more of those things could be near by. In one hand, he armed himself with his wand, ready to fire the Incendio spell again, while in the other lay the torso of Ginny Weasley. 'I can still save her.'

Zac was not in his element. He had just saved Padma from certain death, and he was looking for a way out.

Somehow, he and Padma had ended up on the roof of the train. In the front of the train, he could clearly see the forces of the Dark Lord advancing on the train and the current position of Cho Chang, who for some inexplicable reason, was heading the student resistance. He could faintly make out the flashes of spells as the students fought the Death Eaters and the undead wolves. It was still storming madly outside, with lightning and thunder ripping through the fields with little resistance.

He looked out into the grassy fields, knowing what already lie ahead in them. Those God-forsaken wolves were prowling around the train, waiting to catch unsuspecting victims.

Looking back to the task on hand, Zac glanced down at the pretty Indian girl he had just saved. She had just witnessed her twin sister's death. Magical twins were different from the run of the mill twins. They had shared a magical bond that could never have been broken, until death did them part.

If the bond was broken before the twins reach the maturity age of 17, they would absorb the magical essence of the twin who died. Pureblood twins, such as Parvati and Padma, were basically two magical essences that should have been one in the first place. Something must have gone wrong at birth. Muggleborn twins were different for some reason. No one knew why, but they weren't affected like this.

Padma was now going through the abnormal pain of taking back her other half, completing her person. Hopefully, it would not change her personality too much. Right now, though, Zac knew that she was of no use in a fight, and he had to escape with a burden. While it was an eye-pleasing burden, it was a burden nonetheless.

Zac cast a sticking charm to his back, so that the currently passed-out Padma would stick to his back as he attempted to escape. He also cast a disillusionment charm, so that she would blend in with his back. He also conjured some ropes and disillusioned those as well, just to keep her more secure.

After that was finished, Zac did a quick sweep, looking to see if any Death Eaters were watching. Certain that none where watching this particular car, Zac jumped off the edge of the train while using a quick cushioning charm to break his fall.

Casting a silence charm on his shoes, Zac stealthily moved through the tall grass, careful to keep his eye out any creatures or Death Eaters. Eyeing the green abyss with unrest, Zac slowly trotted towards the forest at the slowest pace his patience would let him go.

Finally reaching the forest's edge, he started to sprint towards the forest. Just before he reached it, he spied a figure walking through the forest. Quickly stopping, he dropped to the ground, hoping that the figure did not see him.

When the figure stepped into the light provided by the blazing train, Zac noticed that the figure was indeed a man in the typical Death Eater garb, besides one detail. The man's mask was black instead of white.

'Probably to mark him as a cut above the others; maybe this is one of those Death Eater commanders my father talks about so much,' thought Zac to himself, and hoping to the high heavens that this man did not see him at all.

Zac eyed the man and heard him mutter, "Gah! Why does the Captain want me to keep charge of the hunters in this forest? Why do I have to be the one to make sure the little kiddies don't escape this fantastic massacre?"

The man cackled a bit and continued on his patrol route, which gave Zac some much needed relief. Death Eater grunts always gave cool information away. 'Gotta love those grunt wizards that You-Know-Who picks up from lesser-developed countries,' thought Zac to himself.

Without another thought, Zac got up and sprinted towards the forest with Padma on his back. Death Eaters were hunting in this forest; he had to be careful.

Cho charged directly at the red masked Death Eater with blinding rage. She attempted to knock the man off his feet, when the man simply side stepped and chuckled softly. "You'll have to do better than that, kid."

Enraged by the taunt Cho aimed her wand and cried, "Reducto!"

The captain watched the green beam with a detached attitude. Lazily blocking the spell with a silent and wandless shield charm, the Captain took out his wand and silently caused a stunning spell, as if he was toying with the girl.

Cho kept dodging the spells he sent at her, while trying to hit the guy with every spell she could think of, but they seemed to always bounce off or back to her.

Cho looked around at her surroundings. It was simply a massacre. Dead bodies of students, death eaters and undead wolves littered the floor. The flames had nearly burned all of the wood, leaving nothing but the metal frame of the train. It was still storming violently outside, though not helping to douse the fire. Blood coated everything. There was nothing that was not red in this car. Hell, only Cho and the Captain were the only live things left in this car. Everyone and everything else was dead or gone.

Cho was shocked out of her musings as she saw a sickly green light hail towards her. 'He's actually using the killing curse?! That takes so much energy!' screamed Cho in her mind.

Luckily, Cho ducked below the spell and hid behind a seat for cover. The seat suddenly ceased to exist as the captain vanished it into nothingness. Fear overriding her senses, Cho quickly dashed away, hoping to get away from this opponent who was insanely strong.

Before she could reach the door, the captain apparated right in front of her with a smile on his face. He kept the smile on and said in a playful tone, "Come on girl, don't run now, I am having fun. I like having fun."

Cho's eyes widened in fear, she then fired a close range Reductor curse. The man smiled and just slashed it away with a wave of his wand. Deciding that he could continue playing with this girl, he just kept firing stunners and disarming spells at an alarming rate.

Cho couldn't even think. This powerful dark wizard was firing stunners and disarming spells in succession without fail and at an insane rate. It took all of her energy and might just to dodge and use well-placed shield charms.

Cho was quickly tiring and she knew it. She also knew that this fool was playing with her as if she was just a China doll. She had to think of a way out of this disaster and fast, or her life would be over quickly.

Deciding to provide distraction, she banished a small piece of metal behind the captain, causing a ruckus.

Acting as fast as she could, she quickly banished the wooden tile and jumped through it, while casting a repairing charm on the tile, so it would fix itself. Without much thought, she disillusioned her self and hid silently next to one of the wheels of the train.

She watched as the man began to fire blasting spells into the floor, almost as if he knew exactly where she had disappeared to. Body parts and bodies fell through the holes as the man kept blasting. Blood was covering everything after the mess of having nearly the entire front car being blasted to smithereens. The head of Wayne Hopkins had rolled near her when it had fallen out of a nearby hole. Half of his face was missing with bite marks all over it, leaving a face that looked like a chew toy to a dog. She had to cover her mouth to repress the whimper that was about to escape her mouth.

Above she heard the man say, "Aww come on girl, I wanna play. I like to play with little girls. It's always fun," he cackled in an insane voice.

The spells continued to fire at a rapid pace, until suddenly, after what seemed like hours but was only a minute, the man stuck his head out one of the many holes he had created in search for the girl.

Cho stared straight into his eyes as he looked right at her, but he quickly looked away not seeing the girl. He removed his head from the hole and she could hear him from above, whining about how the pretty Asian disappeared and couldn't be part of his collection of dolls.

Cho sighed in victory, and promptly passed out from over-using her magic.

Harry inched silently towards the grassy field. He needed to be careful and he knew that. He also knew that more of those wolf things were probably out there. He paused for a second and thought to himself, 'What are those things, anyway? What are they even called?'

All he knew was that the monsters were easily killed by fire, but he was hoping to avoid using such a spell. It was still storming outside as Harry inched through the fields, dragging Ginny's torso behind him. 'I can still save her! She can be saved, I know it!' he chanted in his mind.

It was a dark and gloomy night and there was a horrific scene behind him. As he walked, and as the night darkened, his musings almost got him killed. As he looked up, he saw another one of the wolves charging towards him. Doing the only thing he could do, Harry tossed Ginny's torso in another direction, hoping that the beast would chase after it, with the smell of easier meat, instead. 'I guess she really is dead... I really thought I could still save her,' thought Harry to himself, admitting the truth finally that he had been denying.

Luckily, his plan worked as the wolf stopped, perked its ears, and charged towards the direction of Ginny's torso. He saw the wolf toss what was left of Ginny into the air as it toyed with its food.

Not wanting to watch the scene further, Harry sprinted towards the forest, to escape this horrid massacre. Looking behind him, Harry took one final look at the grizzly scene. The train was on fire in the middle of a darkened field, with the blazing heat even being felt from up here in the rain. He could just imagine the bloody mess that must be inside that train. He shuddered to think of the acts done in there.

Turning around towards the edge of the forest, Harry ran into the wildwood abyss, not knowing what might happen to him next.

A/N: Well, I hope you enjoyed the first chapter of this installment. It went through a lot of editing, betas and other such methods to catch errors. If you find any, please tell me.

If anyone is curious, Chapter 2 is complete and currently with my Primary Beta, ModernRomeo. Chapter 3's rough draft is done and is currently awaiting to be proof-read. Chapter 4 is about 70 percent written. Chapter 5 is in its planning stages and will start it once Chapter 4 is complete. My update rate will be at least once every two weeks.

On that note, I'd like to give thanks to my beta, ModernRomeo, for seeing this story in its rough format. He helped fixed a lot of errors and gave me a few interesting ideas.

I'd also like to extend my thanks to LeRob, who had the honor of being the fail safe second beta.

Last but not least, I wanna extend my thanks to Dark Lord Potter members, Stalicon, Cervus and BlueMagikMarker for helping me with some plot ideas and making sure I didn't do something stupid.

Please, if you have any questions, comments, criticism etc., please don't hesitate to leave a review. I enjoy reading them, no matter how small, large, hateful, or helpful they are.