Harry Potter and the Legacy of the Light

Chapter Thirty-Five - Fighting Fire With Fire

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And when man faces destiny, destiny ends and man comes into his own.

--André Malraux, "The Voices of Silence"

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Even before the last echoes of Draco's cry had faded into the smoke-
choked air, the Dark's power was at work.

It was simple and sudden, a gasp of raw magic that sucked the air out
of one's lungs, a gaping silence like a thunderclap turned inside out.
All across the pitch, people coughed and struggled to breathe--even
the Death Eaters were not immune to the cruel blast of Dark magic.

And then, with the same abruptness that had made Will's appearance
so startling, Lord Voldemort materialised on the Quidditch pitch.

The students were too scared to move, too terrified to run. Some hid
their faces in their hands, squeezing their eyes shut in the childish hope
that whatever they could not see would not be able to see them. Others
fainted dead away, passing out where they stood and knocking down
their classmates as they fell. Those who had been screaming before
simply kept going--though their cries sounded louder now that there
truly was something to scream about.

The teachers somehow managed to hold firm, although many looked
as if they wanted nothing more than to start screaming, too. Poor
Professor Flitwick looked absolutely petrified. Madam Pomfrey's
wand hung limp in her hand, all concern for her patient forgotten.
The beading of sweat on Snape's forehead had nothing to do with
the pain in his arm. Professor McGonagall, with her hair tumbling
into her face and her eyes wide and dark and fretful, looked like
nothing more than a frightened little girl.

Behind Harry, Remus's breathing was irregular, fast and whistling.
Snuffles's growling sounded positively rabid.

Will was closest to the Dark Lord, standing not more than ten feet
away--well within spell-casting distance. His face was set, but he
seemed to be more frustrated than furious, more irritated than angry,
as if he had been caught off-guard by a particularly clever practical
joke.

Voldemort coolly surveyed the pitch. His red eyes burned with the
same fire that was consuming the Quidditch stands, and they missed
nothing. The huddled knots of fearful schoolchildren. The anxious
band of teachers. Draco Malfoy's twitching body. The defiant glares
of Harry Potter and his circle of protectors.

Will Stanton.

His gaze lingered longest on Will. "No words of welcome, Old One?"
he said at last.

Will's jaw tightened. Icily, he said:

"None that spring immediately to mind, Riddle."

"But I have been invited." The Dark Lord spread one arm wide with
a highly exaggerated formality. "Surely you are not surprised to see
me?"

The Old One's expression was stony. "No. But though you may have
been invited onto these grounds, your...entourage...was not."

"Ah, but they were." The paper-thin layer of skin on the Dark Lord's
skull-like face stretched as he smiled. "They were personally escorted
onto the grounds by none other than the Keeper of Keys himself."

"HAGRID?" McGonagall gasped.

Voldemort turned his head slightly, raising his voice to speak to the
wide circle of Death Eaters. "I trust there were no problems with his
conduct?"

"Such a gentleman he was, my lord." The meek, subservient reply came
in a woman's voice, the same penetrating one that had conjured the Dark
Mark. "He led us through the Forest as neatly as you please--after a
little persuading on our part."

"Where is he?" McGonagall demanded. This time, her voice shook with
rage. "What have you done with him?"

"Why, still in the Forest." The same woman spoke again, though her
submissiveness now held an overtone of mockery. "You should be able
to locate him quite easily. It's only a short walk, and he won't be leaving
anytime soon."

Harry didn't know which was worse: finally knowing what had happened
to Hagrid...or not knowing what had happened to Hagrid.

Voldemort turned back to Will.

"What could be more legitimate than that?" he declared, daring anyone
to challenge him. "You see? A most satisfactory solution all around."

"If your concept of a 'satisfactory solution' happens to require
children to play out your little games," Will said scornfully.

Voldemort's eyes flickered in Harry's direction. The Six shivered
in mixed fear and revulsion as the burning eyes passed over them.

"I see you've chosen to add hypocrisy to failure, then?" the Dark
Lord sneered. "What has the Light come to in these dark days?"

Ron started forward suddenly, impulsively, and would probably have
gone farther than was wise if Remus (with Snuffles's help) had not
collared him in time and hauled him back.

"At least we had a choice!" he shouted, struggling vainly to break
Remus's grip on his shoulder.

"Ron, stop it!" Ginny's sharp hiss was panic-stricken.

Will, however, continued where Ron's angry words had broken off.
"And that choice freely given...as others will testify."

"The fact remains--" Voldemort began haughtily, but stopped short
as a high, keening cry pierced the air.

All eyes looked up and around and everywhere, searching for the source
of the cry. Even Voldemort's gaze flickered up, and he involuntarily
raised an arm in a gesture of self-defence as if he expected an attack
to come from the sky.

"Look!" someone shouted, rather inanely, because there was only one
thing that anyone could be looking at.

Fawkes was circling overhead, a splash of glorious colour against
the dismal sky and the black pillars of smoke.

The phoenix's plumage blazed as brightly as if he had dipped his
feathers into the flames consuming the stands. Gracefully, he dipped
low and swooped up, completing two wide, sweeping circles over
the pitch. Then, he flew off in the direction of the castle, gliding on
the warm air currents. Another mournful cry floated back to them,
carried on the soot-filled wind.

Harry wrenched his attention from Fawkes and back to Will and
Lord Voldemort. The Dark Lord had opened his mouth, about to
speak, but before he could get a word out the air shivered like a
person trying to shake off a chill, and suddenly--

There was no telltale pop of Apparition, or the vicious choking gasp
of magic that had signalled Voldemort's entrance. Will had neither
moved nor spoken a word. But all at once, there were far more
people on the Quidditch pitch than there had been a second before.

Over a dozen people had appeared out of nowhere.

Arabella Figg and Alastor Moody stood a few feet apart. Their faces
were grimly fierce with smiles as victorious as if they had stormed a
fortress. There was Arthur Weasley, pale but determined, with Charlie
and Percy standing strong and proud on either side of him. Mundungus
Fletcher was there, and Edward Linchley, and perhaps five or six others
that Harry didn't know--they were witches and wizards, Aurors and
Ministry officials, friends from all places. They were all there, and they
all had their wands levelled at the Death Eaters--

And Albus Dumbledore was in the middle of all of them, looking calm
and collected and entirely in control of the situation.

Harry blinked, wanting desperately to believe what he was seeing. All
around him his friends and classmates were cheering. Faces that had
been tearful and frightened moments before were all smiles at a sight
that could have come straight out of a film--the perfect eleventh-hour
rescue. The Slytherin and Ravenclaw Beaters brandished their bats
with newfound courage, and their teammates gripped their brooms,
prepared to use them as weapons if called to do battle.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that Hermione's mouth had
dropped open. He could all but see her brain struggling to process
a sight that Hogwarts: A History had told her wasn't possible.

It was the dumbfounded look in her eyes, more than anything that told
Harry that he wasn't imagining things. This was real.

"Hold your fire!" Voldemort choked out the order in a voice that had
lost much of its confidence. "Stay where you are!"

The command was unnecessary. The Death Eaters were as flummoxed
as their master. Not a single one so much as raised a wand, though this
in itself was hardly surprising. With a squadron of Aurors fully prepared
to hex anyone who dared to look at them in the wrong way, the most
sensible thing would be to hold one's fire--and stay where one was.

Dumbledore waved his hand, and the adults fanned out to form a tight
defensive ring to surround the students. The noise was dying down,
most of the cheering having been shushed by the teachers. Once the
rescuers were in place the elderly wizard moved forward, away from
the ring of Aurors.

At the same time, Will dropped back a few paces, and Dumbledore
nodded to him as the two men passed each other.

"Terribly sorry for the delay, Dr. Stanton," he said genially.

The Old One inclined his head, though he did not take his eyes off
of Lord Voldemort.

"Quite all right, Minister," he replied, taking up a position behind
and slightly to Dumbledore's right.

"And we are all here?" Dumbledore asked. "None left behind?"

"Not to my knowledge, sir."

Harry felt Snuffles tense suddenly beside.

"Padfoot, don't!" Remus murmured, holding fast to the dog's collar
and giving it a good shake. "Don't risk it!"

Colin glanced at the Aurors. "They...they wouldn't kill him, would
they?" he said fearfully.

"No, but they might." Remus gave a slight nod, indicating the teachers
who had joined the ring of Aurors that were shielding the students.
"Only McGonagall knows who Snuffles really is."

Harry dropped to one knee. "Did you hear that?" he whispered into
his godfather's ear. "Stay put."

The black dog's muscles trembled with the exertion of keeping
himself under control, but he did not move. His collar tags made
tinny, jingling sounds as they clinked and clacked against each
other.

"Everything appears to be in order, Minister," Will was saying.

Dumbledore nodded slowly, gazing at Will over the tops of his half-
moon spectacles.

"I think we may need everyone for this," he said quietly.

The Old One blinked, startled, but quickly regained his composure.
"Of course."

He raised his right arm, the five fingers of his hand spread wide, and
pointed to Professor Snape. His lips moved in inaudible, rapid speech.

Snape gasped, throwing his head back like a drowning man breaking
the water's surface. He gulped great lungfuls of air, still cradling his
left arm.

The spell completed, Will lowered his arm, letting it fall naturally
to his side.

Hastily, Snape scrambled to his feet, shaking out his left arm. He
whipped out his wand, curling his fingers around it in a death-grip.

For a horrible second, Harry thought that Snape was about to hurl
some sort of awful curse in Will's direction. But the Potions Master
only gripped his wand more tightly, and in a show of almost superhuman
self-control, he strode purposefully over to the group of Aurors.

Dumbledore waited, patiently, until Snape had joined the other adults.
Then he turned to Voldemort, tilted his head to one side, and said
cheerfully:

"Hello, Tom."

Voldemort stared at the older man with a slow-burning hatred--and,
just perhaps, a hint of fear--in the depths in his eyes. He said nothing.

Dumbledore raised his eyebrows, the picture of concerned adulthood.
"Why, whatever's the matter, Tom? Isn't this what you wanted?"

The Dark Lord let out a harsh laugh.

"Do you really imagine that I want to kill you?" he said. "If I know you,
Albus Dumbledore, that would be giving you exactly what you want."

Dumbledore asked, "And why is that?"

"Because I know exactly what will happen." One skeletal hand waved
languidly, and for the briefest of moments one could see the young,
charismatic Head Boy that still lurked within the monster's frame.
"Maddened by the prospect of victory, I make the impulsive decision
to extract my revenge by killing you--no, by having one of my servants
kill you. You, of course, will have done your research and managed to
unearth or devise some obscure but foolproof incantation that no one
living has ever heard of." His hands twitched, curving into claws at
the thought of such a spell. "My spell will backfire, thereby giving
you and your minions ample time to act."

Dumbledore pursed his lips thoughtfully. "Very clever."

But the Dark Lord was not finished. "Or better still, it won't backfire,
and your nauseatingly noble and self-sacrificing death will spark the
chain reaction that ultimately defeats me."

"You've thought of everything," Will observed coldly.

Voldemort smiled, equally cold. "But you haven't, I'm afraid."

Pain spiked through Harry's scar, but before he could yell out a
warning Voldemort struck.

Faster than a cobra, the bony hand came down, and at the same time
the Dark Lord uttered a long, guttural word in a language that no one
could comprehend.

Instinctively, Harry threw up an arm to shield himself, but something
heavy and hard slammed into his chest and knocked him off balance.
He landed on his left arm, and mud splattered across his face, and the
heavy thing had fallen on top of him and wasn't going away.

"Neville?" he mumbled dazedly, trying to get an arm free to wipe the
mud from his lenses.

"Harry! Are you all right?"

Then the pressure on his chest and stomach was gone, and he was
looking up through mud-smeared glasses at Sirius's panicked face.

The heavy thing had been his godfather, who had thrown himself on
top of Harry and had turned back into a human at the same time.
Harry didn't know if the transformation had been accidental, or
done on purpose, but Sirius was a good deal heavier than Snuffles
was.

"I don't know what happened," Sirius was babbling, his weight still
pinning Harry to the ground. "I jumped, and then something HIT me
and next thing I knew I was human but I don't know HOW it--"

"Sirius...." His ribs ached with every breath, but he attempted a
weak grin. "I'm fi--"

"ALBUS!"

Professor McGonagall's scream made both Harry and Sirius sit bolt
upright, twisting round to see what had happened.

When Harry saw Dumbledore, he almost screamed as well.

Dumbledore had been frozen, his body as unnaturally motionless as the
victim of a Full-Body Bind. His mouth hung partway open, leaving him
with a rather foolish-looking expression.

From Dumbledore, Harry looked to Will, and saw the Old One lowering
his arm--an arm that had been pointing at Harry.

"It was for YOU," Hermione said suddenly, her eyes widening in instant
comprehension. "Harry, it was a protection spell for YOU."

"But I'm--" His head spun. Will's spell had hit both him and Sirius, and
had somehow forced Sirius to change from Animagus to human form.
But Voldemort had not been aiming at him, but at Dumbledore, and
now Dumbledore was--

Voldemort laughed, pleased with the newest turn of events.

"If you try to bring him back, Stanton, he dies." He spoke very
clearly and precisely, emphasising his threat with a ghastly relish.
"My Death Eaters will ensure that."

Then he turned, and pointed to Draco. "Bring him here."

Draco whimpered loudly, but his body was already moving. Having
been struck by lightning and fallen a over hundred feet to the ground,
he was in no condition to fight. A series of muscle spasms forced him
to roll over and onto his side.

"Draco!" Madam Pomfrey reached out, prepared to grab the boy's
shoulders and hold him down.

McGonagall flung out an arm and held her back. "Poppy, don't touch
him!"

"But I can't--" The mediwitch was torn. There was no medical text
that could have prepared her for the situation, no instructions on
how to treat a critically injured patient who happened to be under
the Imperius curse. She could only watch, horrified, as Draco
somehow managed to push himself upright and into a sitting position.

Draco's bones grated with every movement, and to keep from hearing
the awful sounds Harry tried to figure out exactly which bones were
broken. The upper part of the right arm looked badly damaged where
the arm met the shoulder. One ankle was swollen, hanging at an odd
angle. The harsh breathing probably meant a number of cracked, if
not broken, ribs, and possibly a collarbone fracture.

But as Draco clambered to his feet--and here Harry could no longer
think of things as 'the injured leg' or 'the broken finger'--there was a
sharp grinding noise that set one's teeth on edge.

Draco let out a high, gobbling screech as the Imperius Curse forced
him to stand on a fractured pelvis.

"Draco, no!" A girl's wail, ragged-edged and helpless, came from
within the group of students. "Stop him, someone! PLEASE!"

That's Pansy, Harry thought dully.

Unhearing, Draco took a teetering step, and then another. He
wobbled forward on legs as unsteady as a newborn foal's, stumbling
away from his teachers and classmates and toward the Dark Lord.

"No..." Harry heard Ginny moan, close by. "Make it stop....oh, make
him stop...."

As Draco hobbled toward him, Voldemort extended a hand and
beckoned to someone behind him. One of the Death Eaters, his face
hidden by the voluminous black cowl and white mask, approached his
lord.

The Death Eater stopped at his master's side, and Draco stopped as
well. His body was hunched over and twisted, his limbs trembling like
those of a palsied old man.

In a single smooth motion, the Death Eater pushed back his cowl and
removed his mask, revealing the fine, aristocratic features of Lucius
Malfoy.

"Come to me, Draco," Lucius said as he waved his wand--as if the
Imperius Curse would not be sufficient impetus in and of itself.

Draco tottered forward another step.

"Yes, that's right." Lucius was smiling, and his eyes shone with a
light that was entirely devoid of sanity.

Another step, and a wet, rusty croak pushed its way out of Draco's
mouth. "Fa...."

Voldemort glanced at Lucius.

"Is he salvageable?" he asked curtly, without even looking at Draco.

Lucius bowed his head. "I would not presume to judge, my lord," he
said modestly.

Draco was still trying to draw a full breath. "Aaa...aath...."

Voldemort turned his gaze back to the crippled boy in front of him.
He studied Draco for all of three seconds, then averted his eyes.
"Make it quick, Lucius."

"NO!" Pansy sobbed. "DRACO!"

Draco's head jerked up, and he blinked. His face seemed to clear,
as if Pansy's cry had shaken him out of his stupor. He squinted at
Lucius without really seeing him.

He tried to move his right arm, but it failed to move, and after two
long breaths he finally managed to raise his left arm a fraction--
reaching for his father.

"Fah..." he gurgled, and took another deep breath, and tried one more
time. "Ff...Father...."

Lucius's smile widened ever so slightly, as if he was genuinely pleased
that Draco should still be able to speak. He raised his own arm in a
gesture that was a mirror of his son's, but his wand was in his hand,
and it was pointed at Draco.

"Avada Kedavra."

The green light flashed.

Draco crumpled to the ground, as if an invisible pair of scissors had
severed the string holding him up.

"DRACOOOOOOO!" Pansy's scream was a knife in Harry's heart.
He knew with chilling certainty that it would ring in his ears all his life.

Lord Voldemort made a curt gesture of dismissal. Lucius, still
smiling, bowed deeply and backed away.

The Dark Lord drew his robes closer about him and leisurely
strode forward, putting a disdainful distance between himself and
the huddled heap of green and black that was all that remained of
Draco Malfoy.

"When will you cease this tiresome charade, Stanton?" he sighed
loudly. He drew to a halt, and folded his arms across his chest.

Will gazed at Draco's body for a long moment, his expression
unreadable.

"That was a very foolish thing to do, Riddle," he said, softly.
"Very foolish...and remarkably unimaginative."

"Brave words, Stanton," Voldemort trumpeted. "Very brave words,
from the losing party."

The Old One glanced up, and raised an eyebrow in a manner that
would not have been out of place in a classroom. "Do you honestly
not understand what you have done?"

Voldemort glared at him. "The spell has run its course, and I am
still here. The tried and true methods are always best"--and he
favoured Will with a superior smile--"particularly if one learns
from a predecessor's past mistakes."

"Oh, I can see that," Will said matter-of-factly. "You are still
here. But you won't be able to leave."

The Dark Lord's eyes narrowed, suspiciously. "What?"

Will continued in the same straightforward, unemotional tone. "No
one can leave this field until the wards that protect it have been
deactivated."

His announcement set an uneasy murmur rumbling through the circle
of adults as teachers and Aurors looked to each other, wondering
what it meant.

"I don't pretend to be an expert on the properties of wizarding
magic, but from what I gather countering charms as strong as the
ones surrounding these grounds would not be an easy task. It
would be quite dangerous, or so I've been told." He glanced at
Professor McGonagall. "Am I right, Headmistress?"

McGonagall started, and shook herself. "Q-quite right, Dr. Stanton."

Will nodded. "The only person who knows the proper sequence of
counterspells is Albus Dumbledore...and if you try to bring him
back, I will kill him."

"WHAT!?" Sirius's exclamation was not the only one, but it was
by far the loudest.

"Or rather, the Light will." Will continued as if no one had spoken.
"As you said--it is wise to learn from a predecessor's mistakes."

Voldemort pointed a menacing finger at him, though he was not able
to stop his hand from shaking. "And what is there to prevent me from
killing every living thing in this place before then?" he shouted.

"M-Master!" one of the Death Eaters stuttered. "W-w-we...we c-can't
possibly--"

"SILENCE!" Voldemort boomed.

The sudden, painful discovery that his leg had gone to sleep
distracted Harry from the unfolding scene. He started to stand
up, but he stumbled when he heard Will's voice ring out in his
mind:

Come closer, all of you. Form your circle around me.

Taken aback, he looked to his friends. It was clear from their
blank, stunned expressions that they had also heard the Old One's
command.

"Harry?" Sirius's alarmed voice penetrated the fuzziness that was
making it difficult to think. "What's the matter?"

Harry looked down at his godfather, and felt a rapid fluttering in
his stomach. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out.

Just then, he was aware of movement close by. He half-turned to
see Ron at his side. A second later, Hermione had joined them.
Ginny and Neville and Colin moved to stand behind the three of
them, silent and waiting.

With his friends close around him, the ability to speak came back
to him. He got to his feet, standing on legs that were no longer
unsteady.

"I have to go," he said to Sirius, keeping his voice as even and
neutral as Will's. "He's calling me...calling us."

Sirius inhaled sharply, pressing his lips together so tightly that
his mouth was nothing but a dark slit edged with bloodless white.

Remus's voice was a tremulous half-whisper. "What...what are you
going to do?"

At that moment, Harry realised--deeply and truly realised--that they
believed that he if left now, he wouldn't come back. Oddly enough,
the stark realisation didn't frighten him. If anything it made him
all the more determined to come back--if only to prove them wrong.

"Whatever we have to," he said lightly, and smiled at them.

Then, he turned and walked away, across the pitch.

No one tried to stop them. The six children walked steady, almost
marching, their feet acting of their own accord. Wordlessly, and
with military precision, they formed the circle around Will.

Harry took Hermione's left hand, and felt Ron grasp his firmly.
His friends' palms were clammy, but the grip of their fingers was
strong as ever. Ginny was so pale that her freckles stood out
like livid pox marks, but she resolutely took the hand that her
older brother held out to her. Neville reached for Hermione, and
a jolt of electricity raced through them as Colin stepped forward
and completed the circle. The last of the Six looked small and
vulnerable between Neville's solid presence and Ginny's bright
corona of hair, but he held himself as straight and tall as the rest.

Will, now in the centre of their circle, once again turned his gaze
to Voldemort.

"If you insist on ending this now, Riddle," he said mildly, "there's
nothing to stop you."

"Stop me?" Voldemort repeated, incredulous. "End this now?"

There was a pause, and then Will smiled.

His smile could have cracked ice.

"Oh, yes," the Old One said. "We shall end it now--on OUR terms."

And the world rocked beneath Harry's feet.

* * *

He was falling backward, the wild peal of bells ringing loud as alarms
in his head. It took all of his willpower to stop himself from letting go
and jamming his fingers into his ears. He couldn't see. He couldn't
think. It was all he could do to cling to Ron and Hermione's hands
as they spun out of control, falling...falling....

There was a sudden jarring thud, and he found himself on solid
ground.

They were surrounded on all sides by a thick vapour, wreathing and
swirling and oppressive, like the densest of fogs. The mist was
impenetrable; they could barely see each other, let alone anything
farther away.

"What's happened?" Colin asked. His voice thudded heavily in the
silence.

Will's reply was silent and terse, wasting no words. We are not
properly in Time now. All times are here and now, in this place.
It will prevent any of our actions from directly affecting the battle.

B...battle? Ginny squeaked.

Look into the fog, Will said. Not at it, but into it, as if you
were looking through it.

Harry looked, squinting. If he focused on the patch of grey mist
swirling in his face, he could see...he could see....

It was a little like a grainy black-and-white film, without sound
and blurred around the edges. Brief glimpses of battles flickered
in the mist, each glimpse lasting just long enough to give a sense
of what was happening.

Voldemort was nowhere in sight, but the Death Eaters were everywhere.
It looked as if they had tried to charge, and their first attempt at open
assault had been broken by the defenders. The battle was one-on-one,
even hand-to-hand where wands had been broken and the combatants
scuffled with each other, exchanging blows. The deadly green light
flashed here and there, though there was no way to know if it had hit
its mark or not. If they could have heard voices, they would have
heard hoarsely shouted curses and countercurses, bursts of Dark
magic and deflecting spells of all kinds.

Hear me, all of you, the Old One said, breaking the unnaturally
empty stillness. You have some idea of what awaits; keep your
wits about you. You will be able to see much of what is happening
in your own time, but you cannot let it distract you.

But-- Ron protested.

You cannot let it distract you. Is that clear?

It was a question, but Will's tone did not allow for questions of
any kind. The children kept silent and still, waiting and watching
the battle that was raging in their own time.

Despite being outnumbered, the resisting fighters had summoned every
ounce of strength at their disposal and were giving back as good as
they got. They saw Mad-Eye Moody and Mrs. Figg fighting back to
back, throwing hexes right and left as they expertly parried strikes from
all directions. One particularly clear flash showed Arthur Weasley,
perhaps hearkening back to ancient Muggle fighting methods, using his
splintered wand as a makeshift sword to pin a struggling Death Eater
to the ground.

Harry nearly cheered aloud as he saw a sudden image of Professor
Snape, though bleeding heavily, throw a hard right hook that sent
Lucius Malfoy sprawling in the dirt. The surge of elation made
his heart beat faster, but it nearly leap out of his mouth when he
felt a pair of hands close over his own.

It was Will, and he was guiding Harry's hands, bringing them closer
together, every inch bringing Hermione's left hand nearer to Ron's
right.

Then, before they knew it, Ron and Hermione were holding hands
and Harry was standing behind them, inside the circle. Will released
his hands and laid a hand on Harry's shoulder, drawing him backward
and into the very centre of the circle.

He could still look past them and into the mist, where the glimpses
of battle were coming more quickly and lasting for longer. He saw
Sirius, in Animagus form, tackle and worry a fair-haired woman who
had raised her wand to strike Percy down. Bile rose in his throat
at the sight of Lavender Brown lying on the ground, face-up, though
it was impossible to tell for certain whether she was alive or dead.
And there was Madam Pomfrey working frantically over the body
of a fallen wizard--until a bright green light struck her in the back of
the neck, and she fell forward.

Mr. Potter. Will's voice came into his mind, pushing emotion aside.
Draw your wand, and point it to the sky.

Harry did as he was told, raising his arm straight up and holding
it as steady as he could.

Good. Now keep it that way.

Harry gulped, and nodded.

Will spread his arms wide, and his cloak flew backward, billowing
out as it was whipped by a gust of wind that had sprung up out of
nowhere. The air around him began to glow, faintly at first, then
stronger and stronger. The light spread outward until it engulfed
the Circle.

Once the five children were within the circle of light, Will raised
his arms over his head and the shimmering glow spiralled up into
the air, coalescing into a column of brilliant light that sliced through
the murky darkness.

He will come, Will said. Stay alert.

As if confirming the Old One's terse statement, Harry felt a burst of
pain in his scar. He knew that Voldemort was near.

Then, he saw him.

The Dark Lord, gliding toward the circle, as terrible and unhurried
as a walking nightmare. Tall and terribly thin, a skeleton picked
clean of flesh. The power of the Dark that Tom Marvolo Riddle
had accepted so long ago now drew Lord Voldemort toward the
burning pillar in search of a final confrontation with the Light.

Voldemort stopped short, not ten paces away. His inhuman face
regarded them coolly, impassively.

"You think you can stop me with this little conjurer's trick?"
The hiss in his words was light and deadly.

"It will be more than sufficient against a common garter snake who
thought he could become a viper." Though Will's voice showed the
intense strain of maintaining the shield of light, he nonetheless
managed to sound disdainful, almost patronising.

The Dark Lord was quick to respond to the insult. "You are as
good as alone, Old One. And without your Circle and the Light to
come to your rescue, you can be no match for me."

"You see before you a new Circle, one which will see you destroyed.
And as for the Light...." He paused, and Harry heard him chuckle
quietly to himself. "You always were one to underestimate your
enemies, Riddle."

"Children," Voldemort said, the single word dripping venom. "Children,
all of you. And naughty children must be punished severely."

He pointed a long finger at Will, and called out two words in a
language Harry couldn't understand but which sent sharp needles of
fear racing through him.

There was an ear-splitting crash of thunder, and an immense force
blasted the column of light, inches from Colin's face.

Colin let out a terrified wail, but did not let go of Neville and
Ginny's hands.

Harry glanced behind him in time to see Will drop to one knee,
his face contorted in pain and concentration. The shield of light
wavered briefly, then steadied itself.

"Will!" He started to lower his wand and turn round, but the Old
One was too quick for him.

"Stay back!" he ordered in a voice that made Harry's blood run
cold. "For the love of God, STAY WHERE YOU ARE!"

Harry tried not to flinch as another blast, much stronger than the
first, struck the barrier. There was nothing he could do--he had to
stand like a statue and keep his wand pointed toward the menacing
sky.

He kept glancing back. A thin rivulet of crimson was trickling down
Will's chin, blood dripping to the ground from where he had bitten
through his lip. The Old One's arms shook with strain, and struggle
was etched in every line of his face as he pushed himself out of his
half-crouch and back to his feet.

Voldemort had prepared a third blast, but before he could release it,
Hermione suddenly looked to her left and shouted:

"Ron, NOW!"

And as Harry watched, first with astonishment and then with wonder,
a small golden spark leapt from Ron and Hermione's joined hands.

All around the circle similar sparks exploded, too bright to look at.
The flashes of golden light solidified to five thin golden beams that
radiated outward from the five pairs of tightly held hands.

Slowly and deliberately, the Circle took a collective step forward,
directly into the column of light. The barrier that Will had created
crackled as the magic the Circle had summoned struck it and fused
with it, adding to the protection that shielded Harry from the full
force of the Dark Lord's power.

Voldemort, however, began to laugh, a wild, merciless cackle.

"Ah, so you've changed tactics, then?" he said gleefully. "I suppose
it was high time I adjusted my own--CRUCIO!"

The screams of Harry's friends drowned out Harry's own cry as the
Dark-infused magic blasted the circle.

Will gasped, absorbing what he could of the curse in an attempt to
keep the barrier up and shield the children at the same time.

Only Harry was unaffected by the Dark Lord's curse--though all he
wanted to do at that moment was bend over and be violently sick.

And Time, in its funny way of responding to crisis situations, decided
to make matters worse by slowing to a near-halt.

.......................

Harry Potter had seen many strange, peculiar, and downright bizarre
things in his life, but for sheer shock value this one topped them all.

He knew that horrible things were happening all around him. People
he knew were being cursed, tortured, murdered. The fire in the
Quidditch stands was out of control. His closest friends were in
unimaginable agony. But he couldn't see any of it.

Instead, he was standing in the centre of the circle, and directly
before of him was the full-length mirror, the same one he had last
seen in the little room off the library.

He gazed into its smooth polished surface, but it didn't show his
reflection, or the interior of a university office, or even the battle
being fought outside his bubble of sluggish Time. He was looking
through his own eyes, witnessing for a second time events he had
hoped he would never see again.

Will Stanton, turning round, the firelight dim in comparison to the
fanatical light in his eyes--

'None but the Dark can defeat the Dark, Harry. That is the law, and
Voldemort knows it.'

--and the image rippled and faded, blending into the lines of weary
resignation and exhaustion on Bill Weasley's face--

'Mum's dead, Harry. They used the Killing Curse on her.'

--which resolved itself into Ron Weasley's seething glare--

'Get away from my sister.'

--and Hermione Granger, flinging a heavy leather-bound book at him--

'Damn you, you cold-hearted bastard. Get out of my sight.'

--and Neville Longbottom, a puddle of dark blood soaking his robes
as he knelt inside a cage of blue-white light--

'Anything that comes in here'll have to deal with me.'

--the tremor of Colin Creevey's lower lip--

'Sometimes I don't know what was a dream and what wasn't.'

--Draco Malfoy, staring uncomprehendingly at an outstretched wand--

'Father?'

--and last of all Remus Lupin, his sad brown eyes wide and desperate
as he pleaded--

'Harry...what are you going to do?'

"Finish what I started, Remus." Harry replied aloud, even though
the image in the mirror had already vanished. "And fight fire with
fire."

The mirror shattered, hundreds and thousands of tiny shards
disintegrating as they exploded outward, crumbling into sparkling
dust that whirled away on the wind, out of sight.

.............................

Time gathered speed with a sickening rush until the world was moving
properly once more. He was back in the thick of battle.

Flexing his fingers, he tightened his grip on his wand and called to
his friends.

"Find your grief!" he shouted. "Find your strength! Summon it, call
it to you!"

He knew they were fighting through the pain to keep the barrier up,
and he was afraid they wouldn't hear him. He was afraid that the
torture would have brought them to the breaking point, that they
were beyond thinking of anything besides the awful pain.

But one by one, he saw their backs straighten. Something warm and
impossibly strong swelled inside him, and he knew that he was feeling
their resolve. Their hearts were filled with understanding, and acceptance,
and desperation, and their desire to end this now, come what may.

Neville lifted his chin, throwing his head back to look the Dark Lord
straight in the eye.

"For my parents!" he shouted, and the column of light pulsed in
response as it absorbed his inner strength.

"For my baby brother!" Colin shrieked, his normally gentle face
twisted beyond all recognition in fury.

"For our mother!" Ron and Ginny screamed with one voice.

The brilliant column of light made the tears running down Hermione's
face shine silver. "For...for Natalie MacDonald!"

Harry locked eyes with Lord Voldemort, as if he could create a Priori
Incantatem with his gaze alone. Just before he opened the link, he
called out with a voice so forceful that it sounded nothing like his
own:

"For ALL your victims!"

And with all the subtlety of being doused in petrol and set afire,
the raw power of the Light's magic coursed through his body.

It was as if all the spells the six of them had ever and would ever
cast were pouring into him, fuelled by grief and anger and fear and
a thousand other emotions he couldn't and didn't want to name. He
had called the magic to him, and now it whispered to him, burned
within him, caressed him with a lover's touch, sang and screeched
and shouted and sobbed in every cell of his body.

He screamed without hearing himself, his senses too overwhelmed to
react to anything but the power. It was the power of the Six, and
the power of the Light, and more, more, so much--

Too much.

Pain, so much pain that he couldn't remember there ever not being
pain. It had always been there, just as he had always been standing
in the centre of this circle, had always had his wand in his hand and
his arm raised over his head. Always, since the beginning of Time,
forever and ev--

He couldn't see, but visions flared at the back of his mind like
ghost-images left by a camera's flashbulb. He saw Colin collapse,
taking Ginny with him. Ron, Hermione, and Neville tried to hold
on, but soon they too fell to the ground and lay still.

The column of light flickered as their magic left it.

And then--he didn't know how he knew this, but he did--the barrier
of Light was gone, completely gone, and there was a great clamour
in his head like the cheering at a Quidditch match (the stands were
still on fire) the second before his fingers closed around the Snitch.

He couldn't hear, but the quiet voice that drifted into his mind was
the calm, dry one he had first heard in a Hogwarts lecture hall so
long ago.

Mr. Potter...if you're quite ready....

His ears cleared long enough for him to hear a shout, a victorious
shout that was more like a long sibilant (but not Parseltongue)
string of meaningless, nonsense (definitely not Parseltongue) words.

His eyes cleared long enough to see a flare of something black (not
green?) blazing toward him, and the hand that was holding his wand
was blazing, like fire (Fawkes on a Burning Day) but dazzlingly blue
and blinding white and then--

The explosion blasted him off his feet.

He flew through the air like a cushion caught by a fourth-year's overly
strong Banishing Charm.

He landed with what must have been a sickening thud, though he didn't
feel it at all. He didn't feel anything--not arms or legs or hands or
feet.

He hadn't heard a crunch, either (there should have been a crunch) but
he did hear screaming.

Someone out there was screaming.

Was it him? He couldn't tell. He didn't think it was him.

It didn't sound like his mother's voice, either--that was the only
other person it could have been. But then again, his mother was
dead. Very, very dead.

And so were a whole lot of other people. Very, very dead.

Logically, he should have been very, very dead, too, but there you
have it.

He didn't think it mattered.

He heard a heart beat once...twice...yes, and there it was for a third
time. It sounded faint, feathery. If he listened too hard it wasn't
there anymore. Better to stop listening for it.

He wished that whoever was doing the screaming would stop. It wasn't
as loud as it had been, but they were still at it, and he was growing
tired of listening to it. Someone was doing a rather poor job of
imitating Lily Potter's (formerly Lily Evans's) voice.

Silly bastard, whoever it was. But then again, originality had never
been one of Their strong points.

There was that heartbeat again. He had nearly missed it, thinking
about the screaming.

There seemed to be quite a long time between heartbeats. Maybe it
had forgotten to beat all together. Or maybe he had missed one, or
two. It was quite possible.

But the screams had stopped now, so whoever it was had given up.

He couldn't hear the heartbeat anymore, either.

In its place there was a great rushing noise, like a high wind
travelling through a tunnel in the wake of a fast train.

Then the rushing noise was gone, leaving a hollow of silence where
it had been.

The train was gone, and he had missed it. He didn't know when the
next one was, and he oddly enough, he didn't really care. Everything
around him was shrinking, dwindling, collapsing inwards like (Draco)
a house of playing cards.

Then the world went dark and silent, and he knew nothing more.

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May 27th, 2003