Harry Potter and the Will to Live

"It's one thing to be depressed, quite another to be depressing" -Matt Nathanson

Chapter Ten: Our Will Be Done (Notre Volonte Est Faite)

Harry Potter and the Will to Live

"You really shouldn't be missing this many classes, Harry."

The disapproving voice of his Qaiul didn't startle him. He continued to sit, his back ramrod straight, his hands placed together, fingers separated. He was, literally and figuratively, meditating. He'd holed himself in Lycander's rooms with Hedwig and a sporadic visit from Dobby. The house elf had seemed to take Harry's new rooming arrangements to heart and brought him a feast three times a day and came to clean up after him an hour later. Harry felt guilty about making the house elves have more work, but Dobby had seemed horrified when he'd spoken his thoughts out loud.

Dobby was Harry's, the elf had assured him. Harry didn't really mind.

"Harry, I know you're listening to me. You don't have the strength to disregard your surroundings completely yet."

Harry let out a long breath, his only sign of awareness.

Lycander hunched his back and settled down in front of his Qaiulee, which meant student-in-training or child of a knowledge quest. Without thinking about it, he took Harry's hands and placed them on top of his, closing his own eyes and emptying his mind. The emotions were longer in coming; Harry was getting extremely talented in blocking off those as well as his mind. The boy was advanced compared to a normal sixteen-year-old in the Gray Dimension.

But he had yet to hold the talents of acing the Herodian Decis. Of course, Harry knew nothing of that yet.

"You're friends are looking for you," he said when he felt the wave of oily black anguish and guilt. "And I do believe they aren't upset at you. You should have more faith in them."

Have more faith in them? Why should he expect that of them when he knew they should be shunning him? If they weren't, that was their own problem.

He was aware that Dumbledore was disappointed in him. Oh, he might have -and probably still would if one was to ask him- denied it venomously, but Harry knew him better than that. But instead of fixing it as Harry wanted to, he stay locked in this dull, bland room, opening his mind for visions he knew he shouldn't wish for. After all, they were just trouble, if distracting.

"And you shouldn't push yourself. You know-"

"Merlin's sake, Lycander, I know what the hell I'm doing. I've been doin' it much longer than you, remember?"

Lycander was silent for a moment. When he opened his mouth to speak, he snapped it shut again when Harry yelped and went to clap a hand to his forehead.

"Don't break the connection!"

The hands of a man were much stronger than Harry's; grasping, tightening, he knew he had no hope of getting his limbs free. But he didn't really think of that as pain rocked through his head like razor blades slicing through marinade.

...Mack's face was pale and smeared with grass. Her hair, normally so straight, was a mess and stuck to her face as if by glue. She wore her regular clothes: blue jeans, a t-shirt, and wrinkled robes that were even dirtier than her face and hands. That brought Harry's attention to the blood dried on the nails, probably from where she'd scratched somebody's face up. Her ankle was twisted and swollen.

Her hands were chained level to her ears by steal shackles.

Beside her, Snape was in the same position, his body bloody and shivering. He was in worse shape than his daughter was. His eyes were so dilated that Harry could barely spot any black and his skin was a sickly yellow color. His body spasmed suddenly, and Harry shuddered back in Lycander's room.

"Oh, Sevvy!" Lucius' voice was deep and silky. Harry felt as if Malfoy was enjoying seeing them like this, shackled to the walls. "I'm back!"

Then the blonde seemed to see Harry -was he visible, he wondered? Maybe corporeal? He didn't care, 'cause all of a sudden he felt an unearthly pull yank him back....

Harry and Lycander each flew back, Harry against the couch and Lycander against the fireplace.

"Were you there?" Harry gasped, using a trembling hand to lift himself onto shaky feet.

Oh, God, who cares if he was there! Voldemort has Mackenzie!

Lycander was still against the wall when Harry tensed, then dashed for the door. He was out of it and into one of the many secret passages of Hogwarts before his Qaiul even turned the corner.

"Harry!" he roared frantically, turning in circles. His voice echoed. "Harry, don't do this! Don't do this!"

Harry tripped once in his haste to get out of the tunnel. Desperately, he looked to find out where he was, then took off at a sprint for the Great Hall's doors.

What was that? It had to have been the future because Harry had felt something different than usual, something that hadn't quite gone wrong. Yet. Did Lucius Malfoy really see him then, if it was in the future? Or had it just been a dream that was yet to come?

Oh, Merlin, oh, Merlin, oh, Merlin. He had to get to Mack before they could get her.

He collided with the Great Hall doors, his hands pushing at it, but it refused to budge. Harry muttered a spell and placed a hand on the left door, then slid out of the small slit that opened silently.

He thought back to the vision, trying to rack Mack's (the one from the vision) brain for a memory of leaving Hogwarts, anything remotely familiar. Then he remembered. Hagrid's old fire pit. He strained his eyes in the approximate direction, but he couldn't see anything. Not even with his heightened sight during the night. He stood there for a moment, staring, then jerked when he felt something stab him in the neck.

Harry reached up and was able to feel the needle in his neck before the world began to spin.

Trap, trap, trap, trap. You bloody idiot, another trap! Again and again, it was repeated in his head like a chant. Was he saying that out loud or in his head?

Trap, trap, trap, trap! You idiot!

His stomach churned and his hands burned. He fell to his knees, placing his hands on the ground to get some sense back, but it didn't help. It felt like hands were reaching for him, as if tiny pinpricks were pressing against every cell of his body. Then he realized it was real, and that someone was picking him up, tying wire around his wrists.

No, he tried to scream, to simply say it, but he couldn't speak. Cotton had filled his mouth. He jerked his head, his feet, but it didn't matter. He couldn't move. His limbs had been weighed down with a dozen gallons of lead. He gasped for breath, panting like a hyena. The drug had made it nearly impossible to breathe.

His last though was Trap, trap, trap, trap, trap! You idiot, another trap!

And then he felt another prick in his wrist and knew no more but a burst of sudden color and then darkness.

* * * * * *

He felt numb. For the first several minutes he was still in his subconscious world. He felt nothing but little, almost pleasant, tingles over his skin. He felt oddly cold. He twisted his wrist, not to do magic; it was more of a habit he'd gotten into. Then he hissed when fire lanced up his arms. His eyes shot open and he gasped in surprise. Memory of the night before was groggy, barely a memory at all, but he could recall talking to Lycander.

What had he done? he wondered as he struggled to sit up, using only his back as support. They'd tied his wrists together with some type of strong, sharp wire that had already cut into his skin. Small rivulets of blood, some already dried, fell down his fingers in small, curly rivers. He scanned the room, studying it. Snape, much as he had been in Harry's vision, was shackled against one side of the dungeon, his head leaning against the stone, watching Harry without emotion. The cell was mostly clean, the bars sturdy and impassible. No windows, no doors, no nothing but chains, on the ceiling, on the floor, in the corner, on the normal walls.

Using his feet, he pushed his body until he was leaning against the wall opposite of Snape.

"How long have you been here?" he asked, then cleared his throat furiously when his voice came out a silent croak of air. His mouth tasted nasty and numb and dirty. He repeated the question.

Snape pulled up a leg, then let it fall over to lie level with the ground. "Just since last night. What did you do to get caught?"

Harry's head pounded angrily and his ears rang in protest, but he shook it gently, testing it almost. "I don't really remember. I just...I had a vision and I left the school and...I don't remember. It's all fuzzy. They gave me something." Carefully, he lifted both of his hands to his neck and felt for the needle that had been there the night before, trying not to move his wrists.

Oh, weren't they smart. No wand, or wand-less magic unless he could move his wrists. A normal Mage would have been able to use their feet, but he was new. He barely knew what he was doing.

Harry forced himself to cough. It felt as if a tennis ball had been shoved down his throat.

"I'm going to die," he said quietly, then laughed, "and I don't even care."

Snape kept his greasy head bowed. "That happens to people like us, I guess. It doesn't matter, not really, if we die. Or at least not to us."

Harry shuddered.

What happened next? he wondered. He had no doubt that Voldemort meant to torture him, since he hadn't been killed already. What was the point of keeping him alive when the Dark Lord knew bloody well that Harry always managed to escape. Would he be able to this time?

This felt too surreal, he realized suddenly. He didn't feel any fear or pain, except for a mild discomfort, but that was normal. How could a person be faced with death, yet feel so separated from it? Was this what Lycander meant by separation of body?

The dungeon door slammed open, and Harry jerked, then hissed when the wire cut into his wrists even deeper. Bloody hell, he was going to bleed to death this way. Well, he could always just jerk his hand and hopefully it would slit a vein and they wouldn't be able to stop it.

Oh, wait, yes they could. Ha ha, he'd forgotten they were wizards. They could keep him alive for hours; years even, if they wanted to.

"You're awake."

Harry didn't need to look up to recognize the voice. His body went taut and his teeth gnashed against the other set painfully.

Bellatrix, the nasty old bitch.

Lucius Malfoy was the one to open the dungeon and kneel next to him. With a cold, pale hand, he pushed Harry's face up, and Harry imagined his hands free, frying the git right then and there, but it didn't happen. He was helpless, and despised them both even more because of it.

Lucius' grin nearly split his face. Harry guessed some women would have found it attractive, but he thought it sort of made it look as if he was constipated.

"You'll be killed because of this," Harry said calmly as Lucius twisted his body around, putting his arms under his armpits to haul him to his feet. With a sigh of resignation, he let his body go limp. If they were going to torture him, he'd give them hell before he died or went insane.

Lucius chuckled mirthlessly. "Potter, Potter, Potter. Always feisty in the face of death, aren't you?"

Harry faced Bellatrix down with an odd gleam in his eyes as Lucius dragged him out of the dungeon. "Maybe that's because out of all the times he's tried, Voldemort hasn't managed to do me in yet, eh?"

Bellatrix's hand whipped out, small dagger in hand, and Harry yelped when it struck a shallow line across his cheek, yet burned like acid had been coated over the weapon.

"How dare you speak his name out of your dirty mouth!" she shrieked. "You stupid, idiotic boy! That name is too good for you to even think it!"

The pain had his blood boiling in anger. "Oh, yeah, Bella," he said mockingly, "it's such a great, extraordinary name!"

She slashed out with her dagger again, and Harry jerked back, but the girl laughed and grabbed his chin with tight, spidery fingers that dug painfully into his flesh. "Don't worry, boy, I'll come for you later. I'll let the Dark Lord deal with you first, and then we'll see whose yielding."

Yielding? Harry mused to himself. What did she mean, yielding, Harry thought, panicking? Yielding to what? he wanted to shout, but couldn't because the fear seemed to have caught him in the throat with its sharp, pointy teeth.

The three of them made their way through what looked like a building made of cement, which meant it had to be a Muggle establishment. Harry sought to memorize ever detail in case he'd need it for later, but the hallway was the same, no matter how many turns and doors they turned in. It was, quite literally, a labyrinth.

Finally, they came to a wooden door -nothing special about it- and entered, Harry still limp and Lucius roughly dragging him along. The blonde let him sag to the floor, and he cried out as fire lit into his arms like a firecracker bursting through his blood. He clenched his teeth even tighter, pinching his eyes shut to keep from crying. Damn, but it hurt!

"It hurts doesn't it, Harry?" Voldemort's quiet voice whispered to him from the green velvet couch within four feet of him. There was a smugness Harry could nearly smell in the rancid air. It smelled like Muggle smoke.

Where the hell were they?

"A Muggle building," Harry said, "Seems fitting, though, for you to choose to do it here. Going back to your roots?"

Bellatrix grabbed his hair in a hand, and yanked his head back, her dagger punctuating the skin of his throat.

"Bella, dear," Voldemort laughed, delighted, "I'd like to have a turn, too."

Bellatrix grinned at him like a student being praised by a professor she thought was smashing. Harry gagged, then pressed his bleeding wrists together and jamming his elbow back, digging into the soft, firm flesh of her stomach. The knife scratched a line across his throat, but since he didn't feel too much fire, he thought he hurt her more than she'd hurt him. She collapsed backwards, stunned, then gave a roar of fury and lunged. Harry pressed back onto the floor, muttering, and jerked his legs into the air at her stomach. She made a wrenching noise before he tossed her, upside down, into an oak desk across the room. The desk buckled under the force. Bellatrix lay still and pale as death, her chest not moving.

Voldemort roared with laughter. "You do amuse me, Harry. Lucius, leave me -and take her with you before she starts to rot."

Lucius bowed, then went to grab Bellatrix's ankles. When they passed, Harry saw her dainty hand, scratched up from the blood, still clutching the dagger. Her fingers relaxed over it and lay on the floor, within a foot of him, and neither Voldemort nor Lucius saw it. Using both hands as one, he nudged it under his leg.

"So, Harry, how does it feel to kill your very first victim?"

It felt like nothing, except that when Bellatrix had died he had rid the world of at least one more piece of scum before he would die himself. But that would please Voldemort too much, knowing he had enjoyed the rush of adrenaline.

Of course he realized he'd just ended a life, but she'd taken Sirius'. He'd just acted in Fates' place and evened the scales.

"Excuses, excuses, Harry. The truth is, you loved wiping her off the face of the planet didn't you?"

Defiantly, Harry raised his chin. "So what if I did? She deserved it."

Voldemort pretended to be surprised. "Why, Harry, here I thought Dumbledore said death wasn't deserved by anybody, even me."

"No, he just said you deserved worse than death," Harry retorted. "Why am I here, Voldemort?" That was what it came down to, didn't it? Why was he here, still alive and well? "Can you either kill me or torture me or do whatever the hell you wanted to do because I'd rather get it over with before you bore me to death."

Anger flashed in those slit like eyes, but Voldemort smiled once again. "So pessimistic, Harry. Olean has told me that you would probably become just like your Qaiul. Damn the little traitor, he was right. You've actually become Lycander."

What the hell was he rambling on about? Harry thought, puzzled. "What are you talking about?" he asked, exasperated.

Voldemort gave a horrible gasp of fake surprise. His red eyes widened forcefully. "You mean you didn't know? Why, Lycander was Olean's Qaiul before you were even born. Old fool. Did he really think he could tame a man that has my blood?" His act completely gone, Voldemort leaned back, a hateful sneer on his face. "You know, Potter, you can never trust anyone in this world; they'll just betray you."

The flare of anger started in his stomach. Harry nearly snarled. "Sorry, you killed all my family, remember?"

A spark of blue shot out of his pointer finger, but it was completely harmless. Voldemort let out one of his bloodcurdling roars of laughter that chilled Harry to the bone and started the slow burn of fear to build within him.

"Ah, yes, I did, didn't I?" The laughter stopped after a moment, and he stared at Harry, his smile a little wondrous. "This is it, Harry," he said quietly, a dark glee in his voice that had Harry fighting down bile. "You can feel it, can't you? Nobody is here except Lucius and myself, and no one, absolutely no one, is aware of this place. So, who comes to your rescue this time?" he asked, then chuckled. "Do you think you can escape me again?"

When Harry remained silent, Voldemort suddenly lunged to his feet, jumped over the desk like a striking snake, and pulled Harry to his feet with the collar of his shirt. "Do you, Harry Potter? Do you think this is the end, at last? That your guardian angel has finally left you?" He shook Harry, who clenched his teeth against the pain in his wrists with each furious movement. "Answer me, boy!"

Answer me, boy! The bellow echoed in his head, bringing back the memories of his angry and ignorant uncle.

He clenched his teeth harder together, determined not to speak, to give him the triumph of making him talk.

Then he was flying backwards, into the strewn desk Bellatrix had died next to. One of his arms was pushed forward, the skin tearing. He screamed, cursed, and when the world stopped spinning, he bit his tongue and breathed deeply.

"Do you want to answer now?" Voldemort said, leaning over him with triumph in his face.

Harry only hesitated a moment. He spat in Voldemort's face, then grinned as the snake-like man reared backwards with a roar of fury. The man stared at Harry, slowly wiping the spittle off his cheek. Harry stared back, knowing even before he spoke, that he was going to regret what he'd just done.

"Lucius!" Voldemort called quietly, the look in his eyes never depleting. If anything, they became brighter.

Harry swallowed and turned his head to watch the door open. He'd been expected the Cruciatus Curse, sure, but what he saw made his blood go cold. Malfoy wore black leather boots, shiny enough for Harry to see the fear in his own face clearly. Beside them, he saw thick wires that ended in small, metal, arrow-like spikes. There were nine wires hanging down, hitting each other and clanging lightly with each relaxed movement. Harry wouldn't have heard it if he hadn't been a Mage, but he was, and so he heard it. Ironically, it sounded almost cheery, like a wind chime being blown around by a light breeze.

"Master." Malfoy handed the cat-o-nine-tails to Voldemort, who slapped the handle of the whip against the palm of his opposite hand.

"I'm going to enjoy this, Harry," he admitted, smiling coldly. "I'm going to enjoy it immensely."

Harry, at long last, struggled against the wire around his wrist, his heartbeat nearly blocking his hearing. "I will kill you, Voldemort," he swore, panic making his voice higher than normal. "If you..." He couldn't even say it. Harry clenched his teeth. They were beginning to chatter. "I will, I swear my parents' grave, make you sorry. I will make you pay if you-"

That cold laughter filled the room again, drowning Harry out. Then, still laughing, Voldemort drew his arm back.

Harry screamed before the loud CRACK even hit the air.

* * * * * *

Harry couldn't move. He tried to, but he couldn't. He didn't have the energy to, but that didn't matter. He was against the cell in the dungeon, facing Snape, who continued to stare at him with emotionless black eyes. They hadn't talked at all since Malfoy had dragged him in, screaming and crying. Snape hadn't said a word; Harry hadn't said a word. The pain swamped around him, buzzing in his ears like a swarm of killer bees. It was a darkness that frequently dragged him under. He didn't mind; the darkness was his savior, the only pain reliever in a world of pain. He shivered, yelping a little as the raw cuts on his back scraped against the stone wall painfully. He could feel little ravines of his own blood and urine dripping down his nude legs and hitting the floor.

The stink was horrible, but he didn't care. Snape looked like he was just a shell, and Harry vaguely wondered if he'd gone insane. He could see it happening. How he was sane after being whipped a hundred times with a nine-tailed whip covered in acid, he didn't know. It was like some sort of horror story that lined shelves in Muggle bookstores. The Muggles had been punished for stealing with a cat-o-nine-tails in the older days. That he recalled from Muggle grade school. Some thieves had their hands cut off; others were hanged or whipped.

He couldn't feel his feet. Voldemort had done some sort of spell on them. Torture, he assumed, since they were bleeding horribly. They hung against the wall limply, much as his entire body did. The only thing holding him up were the chains tied to the wire connecting his wrists. He didn't want to think about it. His shoulder blades, he thought, had already snapped.

But he still had the knife. In the pocket of his jeans. Did it matter, though, since Malfoy had already confiscated all his clothes? Hell, he'd probably get another whipping when Malfoy found it.

Harry grimaced when the door opened. He would have tried to shield his body, since it was nude and horribly bloody, but he couldn't. The pain came whenever he even twitched an eye.

Voldemort came in along with Malfoy, both of them grinning in triumph, but there was another Death Eater following them. Harry blinked, then felt tears filling his eyes again. This time it wasn't of pain, but the hurt of betrayal.

"Percy," he whispered in denial as the redhead pulled his black hood off, revealing that familiar freckled face.

Percy Weasley smiled at Harry, his eyes showing nothing at the image of blood. Or the smell. Merlin knew the smell was starting to make him nauseous.

"Harry. How nice to see you. I see you've been here a while already." He looked at Voldemort, bowing his head slightly. "Sorry I've missed it, My Lord."

"Percy, what are you doing?" Harry hissed, his voice cracking. "Dammit, I hope you burn in hell for this! I hope you all burn in hell for this!"

Tears blurred his vision. Percy and his red hair merged with Voldemort and Lucius' thick blond.

"Would you like the honors, Percival?" Voldemort inquired.

Percy made a noise, then said, "Why not?"

Harry blinked furiously. Please, not again...Slowly, his vision cleared, and he saw Percy walking past Snape, who just stared stonily up at him. Then, without even looking at Harry, he brought the whip through the air in a furious flick of the wrist. It hit him at the waist. Harry screamed again, his body convulsing as the slick wires wrapped around his upper thigh, sinking into his skin and then were ripped out again with another, low slide of pure agony. Percy did it in fast succession, unlike Voldemort and Lucius who both liked to go painfully slow. It was, he realized, infinitely worse.

The dungeon soon echoed with Harry's shrieks of agony until all he could do was stiffen his muscles in defense in awful silence. Tears streamed and his body -was this still his? he wondered, he couldn't feel it- was trembling so violently that his back kept jumping away from the wall and falling back with a painful crash.

The next time was when the unexpected happened. Percy flicked his wrist quickly, too fast for Harry to even realize he'd done it, and it wrapped around his chest, reaching back around his spine and getting its grip in his skin, but this time Percy stopped. Harry pushed himself away from the wall, hands straining, and then he began to scream again as Percy slowly pulled the whip, tearing nine straight, deep incisions on his back until it came to mid chest. The pain was so intense that his body arched, his hands clenching, and then he was tumbling down in a heap to the floor. The pain was there, but the realization that his hands were free hit him much faster than it came to his captors. He got to his feet, whipping his hand out. Lucius and Percy were lifted into the air as if weightless and were suspended there like bugs cocooned in a spider web, and then, as if in slow motion, they crashed into the far wall so hard that one head smashed open in a splatter of blood and he heard the ripple of a spine cracking down the line. The walls trembled and dirt from between rocks fell in a rain of dust and mold. Voldemort stumbled back, unsteady.

The ground tossed itself in reflection of Harry's emotions. As if in pain itself, it groaned, rolling out from all of them in great, weaving waves. A corner of the dungeon crumbled under the unimaginable stress of Harry's fury.

"Potter!" Voldemort roared; however, it wasn't that confidant. It was more out of fury, but Voldemort didn't make a move toward him. Instead, he turned and fled the dungeon as the crumbling corner made another gurgling noise and a stone rock collapsed.

"Potter!" This time it came from Snape, who was straining against his chains, his eyes blazing. It was the first time Harry had seen him looking so normal. Well, at least in the eyes. Harry's mouth twitched with pain. Was it from his back or his wrists? They were losing blood drastically, but Harry discarded the thought instantly. Who cared? Voldemort was getting away.

Snape's shackled had fallen away when Harry's mouth had twitched. Free to move, he jumped to his feet and ripped his dirty, torn robe off and tossed it at Harry.

"Don't let him leave, Harry," Snape said in a dangerously low voice. "I've got to do something. Finish him off once and for all."

And then, he too, left Harry standing there, clutching a robe in his bleeding arms. His arms were loose and felt disjointed. It hurt to move them, but Harry did. He slid on the robe and took off at a dash, cursing rhythmically under his breath in time to the sound of his feet slapping against the rippling ground.

I don't feel the pain, he told himself. I don't feel it. Pain is a figment of the imagination. It is not real.

The pain was tossed aside, but Harry knew it would come back with a vengeance. He couldn't hold it back long. Not yet anyway.

Harry envisioned Voldemort on his knees, his intestines shrinking in upon themselves. He muttered the curse, stopped outside a door he didn't recognize. Silence reigned, except for the gurgling and tossing of the wrecked building. It was going to collapse soon, he knew. His emotions were too great for it to withstand the storm currently raging inside and out of the Muggle army navel.

Gradually, he heard a panting noise. Quiet, and then it became louder as Harry squinted his eyes in concentration. The panting grew even louder, then changed to bloodcurdling shrieks that made his ears ring. He tracked the noise outside one door, despite the ringing in his ears, then another, and then the last one that, when he opened it, let in a powerful burst of cold, frigid air. He stalked out, following the screams like a bloodhound out for vengeance.

The building was an old military navel, he realized when he got out. Acres of black tar sprawled over green grass. In the distance, a never-ending horizon of trees were being ripped from their roots and tossed into the air. The sky was rumbling louder than the ground, lightning shooting out the color of bright blue energy in sizzling burst that stung his eyes.

Harry walked, slowly, to the body convulsing on the floor. He was the eye of the storm, he realized. He was the one at the controls. Breathing deep, he closed his eyes. Gradually, the storm died down until rain began to pour in great sheets of hail and freezing rain. But it would cause less damage, this heavy rain that bruised his skin. As he stared down at Voldemort, his waist deforming and enlarging constantly, he saw the rain washing away the blood in little pink rivers down his bare legs. His wrists were worse though, and his back. Surely, he would bleed to death if he just stood out here.

It didn't matter.

He collapsed to his knees, relaxing his mind. Voldemort's body stopped, but was still trembling from reaction. He stared at Harry with such hatred that he had to laugh.

"Oh, Merlin, Voldemort," he whispered, searching the man's robes for the knife he knew had to be hidden in there. "Look at what you made me do." Harry felt around the man's cloak for the small dagger he'd found earlier. So Malfoy had given it straight to him. Or had the men known all along, but knew he was defenseless and decided to let it be?

He pulled it out.

Rain was running in his eyes, blinding him, but neither of them blinked. Voldemort was immobilized by a spell Harry hadn't even realized he'd cast.

"I do feel it, Voldemort," he whispered, his voice hitching. "This is the end. But you were wrong to think you could get away with it all. You were wrong to choose me."

He closed his eyes and plunged the dagger into his Voldemort's abdomen, his body trembling when the sickening sinking sound reached his ears. Voldemort's shriek rode the air. Harry's eyes stayed closed, but he pulled the dagger out and plunged again, and again, again. The shrieking continued, getting louder and louder until they turned to pathetic sighs of pain. His eyes opened at last in relief, but Voldemort was staring at him, his eyes gathering rain in them. Was he crying? Harry wondered numbly. There was no way to know with the rain pouring down on them in torrents of cold ice.

Harry looked down. His hands were surrounding the murder weapon. He'd stabbed him too much. Stab wounds and blood littered Voldemort's front robes, staining and pooling even as the rain-washed it away.

Harry released the dagger, rubbing his hands across his face, unknowingly smearing his enemy's blood on his drenched face. Blood was on his hands. He saw it, the dark richness of it, the texture of it. Rain was washing it away, but it was still on his hands. He saw it, dribbling down his wrists.

No, he told himself, that's yours. Calm down. You did what you had to do.

He closed his eyes, imagining the rain stopping, and when he opened them, it had. Voldemort lay before him, the wound still bleeding so much that it fell in trails away from the body. Harry stood, backing away slowly. He had to do it. He had to finish the spell he and Mal had created.

Simialarias dou don ventres delion de reussir!

He lifted his hands to the sky, palms flat out.

"Simialarias dou don ventres delion de reussir!" he chanted, then began to repeat it over and over again in a magical chanting loop Lycander had taught him. Slowly, he closed his hands inch by slow inch, each time he finished the spell. Voldemort's body began to distort, smoke to riddle it. By the time Harry's hands were almost forming fists, he stopped and clenched his fists together, throwing them up towards the sky. The body burst into blue flame, then vanished, leaving nothing but a pile of damp ashes. Harry threw an arm right, and a fierce wind blew threw, picking them up, and separating them.

Notre volonte est faite.

In English, he repeated the French phrase Mal had taught him.

"Our will be done."