Harry Potter and the War of Souls

Chapter 31

The Final Horcrux

Harry dodged a Crucio curse from Voldemort and ran into a dark corner. There were few places here to hide though, and he knew he could not dodge curses for long. From somewhere in the room, he heard Voldemort call him, almost like He was toying with him.

"You don't need to hide, Harry. I have multiplied my powers. I have the strength of every last member of my army within me. I have the cold darkness of the Dementor, the viciousness of the werewolf, the power of the giant, and the cunning of the Goblin."

Harry knew He was right just by the feel of the room. The evil in here was so thick he could touch it. It was suffocating.

"Join me, Harry, and I will end the battle."

"Why do you want me?"

Voldemort's already slitted eyes narrowed further. "Surely you understand that I already have you. We are each part of the other. What is that upon your forehead? It is no ordinary scar. For your entire life that scar has bound you to me. Simply standing before me now, you feel a burning in that scar, do you not? It's my mark, Harry. You wear my mark more visibly than any of my army."

"It's no dark mark," Harry said, determined not to let Voldemort see how much the scar was hurting now. "It's proof that you can be defeated."

But Voldemort laughed and stretched His arms out widely. "Do I look defeated? What happened sixteen years ago was nothing more than a temporary setback. And what returned me to life is what has bound me to you. Do you remember that night in the graveyard? Surely you must. I have your blood now, Harry. That which flows within you gives life to me as well. You ask why I wish for you to join me? It is because you know it is inevitable. You know we are already merging as one.

Harry ran the words of the prophecy through his mind. Neither can live while the other survives. Voldemort believed they were merging as one. Voldemort was in Harry's mind, Harry was in Voldemort's blood.

Voldemort appeared to be thinking the same thing. "You are beginning to understand your fate. Neither of us can live if the other chooses to survive separately. It means you must join me, or you will have to die. I have no other option."

"Then you'll have to kill me, because I won't join you."

"You promised you would if I defeated you in duel."

"I'm only defeated when I'm dead. I'll be no use to you then."

"Then we have come to our final option, haven't we? Wormtail, bring me our prize."

Whatever Voldemort's prize was, Harry figured it would only make things worse. If he was going to end it, he had to act now. Harry remembered the Anhillorora curse, the spell Ron had told him would blow up an entire wing of Hogwarts. Voldemort was far too powerful to overcome in a duel and His next curse could be the last Harry ever heard. He was the final horcrux and this was the only way to guarantee an end to Voldemort. Voldemort could not shield this or deflect the Anhillorora. It was bigger than both of them.

He walked out of the corner with wand out. "Anhi-" he began, then stopped. Pettigrew was backing into a corner, having just delivered the "prize." Ginny was standing beside Voldemort, almost trance-like. Her eyes were glazed over and she made no movement that indicated she was even conscious of where she was.

"No," he said to Voldemort. "You can't have her."

"I do have her," Voldemort said. "She is mine and mine forever."

Harry felt his stomach sicken. Voldemort's fingers were wrapped around Ginny's arm and if he could have, he'd have severed that hand just to save Ginny from His touch.

"You don't need to die, Harry. There is only one more death I must claim. Then my quest is complete." He looked at Harry as if He already knew the question Harry wanted to ask. "She will be the death for my final horcrux. Step aside."

"Your final horcrux? You haven't made it?"

"I intended to make my last horcrux on the night I came to Godric's Hollow sixteen years ago. I meant for it to become Gryffindor's sword, which I knew your parents possessed. I could have used your father's death, but he was merely a bump in the path to get to you. Your mother was an unnecessary death as well. I expected her to run because she must have known she would die if she did not. I only learned after my rebirth that she planned to die. It was her way of invoking the ancient enchantments that protected you from me. How ironic that had I stopped there, creating my final horcrux with your parents' deaths, none of this would ever have happened. I could have reigned these last sixteen years. But I was foolishly selfish. I wanted to use your death for my horcrux, but when I attempted it, your mother's spell protected you. The curse entered you and backfired upon me. It left me vaporized, and you, with that scar."

"I never was a horcrux then?"

"I considered it. There was a certain pleasant irony in placing the final division of my soul within the body of the wizard born to defeat me. But I knew it could be overcome, just as you had planned to do now, by the simultaneous death of us both. But instead I intended to give you a place in history, as the murder that allowed me to create my final horcrux in Gryffindor's sword."

"Where is the sword now? You had it stolen from the school."

"Yes, waiting for the time when we would meet." Voldemort turned and looked in the corner behind him. "Wormtail, bring me the sword."

Harry used that moment to run forward, yelling, "Accio sword." Recognizing its true owner, the sword obeyed and flew into Harry's hands. He swung it toward Voldemort then stopped only when Voldemort stretched out His wand arm at Ginny.

"I can say the words before you can kill me," Voldemort said.

"I can slice off your hand before you can wave your wand."

Voldemort smiled. "Really? Shall we find out?"

"Drop your wand."

"Avada-"

"Wait!" Harry backed the sword off. "Let her go. I'll drop the sword and we'll finish this duel."

"No more dueling. No more of these games. Stand back, Harry. She will do for my final task. You'll see what watching her die does to you. You'll hate me for it, so much that in time, you will become me."

Harry circled around them, placing his body between her and Voldemort. "I won't let you do this."

Voldemort smiled. "I knew you wouldn't. You may have your father's fight, but I'm talking to Lily Potter's son right now."

"Let her go. When she's free, I'll drop my wand. You'll have me. That's all you wanted anyway."

"You'll accept my mark?"

"If you promise to free her."

"What if I don't?"

"If the next words out of your mouth are anything but an agreement to my plan, I'll kill you with this sword. I can. There is no final horcrux yet."

Voldemort's eyes lit with respect for Harry then narrowed as He began to weigh His options. "The girl matters nothing to me. Wormtail, waken her."

Pettigrew cast a spell at her and Ginny instantly shook off her trance. It took her a moment to gain her bearings and realize what was happening.

"Run away, Ginny," Harry said firmly. "Get out of here."

"Harry? What's happening?"

"Always remember I loved you."

"What?" Ginny's eyes widened. "Harry, no!"

"Remove her, Wormtail," Voldemort said.

"Imperius." Pettigrew cast his wand at Ginny again, and although she appeared to be fighting it, she began walking from the room.

"There, she is free." Voldemort turned to Harry after she left. "Drop your wand and hand me the sword."

Harry handed Him the sword first, then dropped his wand onto the ground.

Voldemort began laughing. "You fool. To have given yourself up for the love of a teenage girl! Now kneel before me and stretch out your arm."

Harry looked toward the corner where Pettigrew was staring at him with a look of horror on his face and shaking his head very slightly at Harry, as if begging him not to do it. Was this how he had felt when he accepted the mark? Was this how Snape felt? Draco?

"Kneel!" Voldemort repeated.

Harry faced the ground and fell to his knees.

"Now stretch out your arm."

Voldemort began to walk forward as Harry stretched forth his arm. He began muttering an incantation, but as He began to lower His wand to Harry's arm, Harry made a pushing motion with his hand directed at Voldemort. There were no words for a spell in his mind, but he somehow achieved the effect he wanted. Voldemort was pushed back and landed hard on the ground. Unfortunately, He still held His wand and leapt to His feet before Harry had fully understood what had happened.

"It is death you have chosen then," Voldemort screamed. "Avada-"

Harry rolled. He dodged the curse, but without his wand he knew it was a matter of time.

"Help me, Peter," Harry said. "You let it happen to James. Stop Him now!"

Another jet of green light shot at Harry, who ducked out of the way just in time to see it hit and shatter a portion of the wall.

"He's vulnerable now," Harry said again to Peter. "He can die. You can be free."

"I can't. He's my master."

"Leave this room, Wormtail. I'll deal with you later."

"Let him stay," Harry said. "Why shouldn't he see this?"

"Wormtail!"

"He's not Wormtail. He's Peter. He was a marauder, a Gryffindor. He was my father's friend."

Voldemort laughed again and briefly turned to Pettigrew. "He's nothing. Nobody."

Harry glanced over to Pettigrew, and wondered if he didn't see a slight change in the expression of his face. His jaw looked firmer and his mouth was pressed tightly together. Or was he just imagining it?

"Harry, you have her eyes," Peter suddenly yelled. "Harry, the power isn't in the wand. Look Him in the eyes!"

"Avada Kedarva!" The green light erupted from Voldemort's wand and Harry heard a slump in the dark corner.

Harry barely had time to think about what Pettigrew had said. He'd heard people tell him so many times that he had his mother's eyes it meant almost nothing to him now. But it did mean something to Pettigrew, which meant it was important to Voldemort also. But why?

Voldemort swung back on Harry immediately after killing Pettigrew. "Dumbledore took me back into your past," Harry said, backing up. He realized only as he reached this corner that there were a series of steps here, which he climbed up backwards, one by one. "I saw who you were. I saw your mother. She loved you. She wouldn't have wanted this to happen to you."

"If my mother had loved me, she wouldn't have died!"

"Your mother died loving you, just as mine died loving me. I know how it hurts," Harry said, reaching the top step of a square platform. "Don't do this, Tom."

"I am not Tom! I will not accept your pity! And you will not live to see another day."

Harry took the next step but tripped and fell hard on his side. His glasses fell and his world became a blur. He stood again and as Voldemort continued up the stairs, he backed to the very edge of the platform.

"Love is not weakness, Tom. It requires strength, and it gives strength. If my blood is in you then you've got my mother's blood in you as well. You feel the love she has for me, don't you?"

"I feel nothing!" Voldemort screeched, but He was lying. Somehow Harry knew He was lying.

"You can't run from what's inside you," Harry said.

"And you cannot run from death," Voldemort countered. "You could have let that Weasley girl die but you set her free. Now death must claim you."

"If she lives, I'm willing to die," Harry said.

Voldemort's lip curled. "Love to you means death?"

"No," Harry said, more to himself than to Voldemort. "It's the greatest love. Being willing to die so another can live." Although without his glasses he could barely see Voldemort in focus, he turned and faced Voldemort squarely, looking at the narrow red slits that somehow passed for eyes. He felt a connection between them as they stared at each other, one as strong as when their wands had connected in the graveyard years ago. He wanted to look away but something inside told him to continue. And if Voldemort wanted to turn away, He still did not. In that moment, Harry understood how completely they were bound to each other. The anger and fear he'd always felt for Voldemort was gone. Because this was not Lord Voldemort, the greatest wizard of all time. He was young Tom Riddle, rejected by his father because of the crimes of his mother. He was the boy without friends, alone and abandoned in an orphanage, with powers he did not understand how to control. He was the promising Slytherin student, who was respected but not befriended, and who decided if he could not be loved, then he would be feared. He was Tom Riddle, who'd never known a moment of love in his life.

Harry looked at him and realized who he might have been without those he loved. Without his parents, Ron and Hermione, the Weasleys, Sirius and Lupin, Dumbledore. Ginny. Without them, he might have followed Voldemort's path.

Dumbledore said there were things worse than death, and he was right. Living without the ability to care for others was worse. There was nothing of Voldemort to fear. There was only pity.

"Dumbledore always told me my strength was an ability to love," Harry said, still staring Voldemort in the eyes. "Love is more powerful than a horcrux, more powerful than any spell. It's more powerful than you can ever be."

"Then your love has fulfilled the prophecy," Voldemort said coldly. "And I have won."

Harry heard the words, "Avada Kedarva," and felt himself falling backwards down the stairs as he saw the flash of green light. Then there was nothing.