The Unbeatable Foe

Chapter 3

Albus stepped onto the stage, his wand at the ready. As Gellert turned towards him, he allowed his magical disguise to fall away, revealing his true appearance. Gellert, Albus saw, retained the handsome features and golden hair of his youth. The black robes, marked with the symbol of the Hallows over his breast, did a good job of disguising the thickening of his waist, the greatest effect time had had.

"Albus Dumbledore!" Gellert exclaimed grandly, playing to his audience. With a curt gesture, he stopped the guards who had been about to leap onto the stage. "All the way from Britain to lecture us as he does his fellows in their Wizengamot, I presume. Have they finally wearied of listening to you? Thank you, but we do not require the assistance of foreign wizards in running our affairs!"

The audience cheered appreciatively.

"The time for talk is past, Gellert," Albus replied. "You are a murderer, and you hide behind your followers from those you have wronged. You are not worthy to rule."

"We expect greater courtesy from guests, Albus, than is apparently the standard among the British."

"If you find my frankness offensive, you may try to shut me up," Albus replied. "Or do you need to have your guards do it for you?"

"You propose a wizard's duel, I see," Gellert said, with a smile. "Very well, I accept."

He drew his wand forth from his robes and turned to face Albus. Their eyes met for a moment, and both bowed at the waist. Gellert was unreadable; a condition Albus had anticipated. He was about to learn what he faced, in the Elder Wand.

With all the speed Albus had so admired in his youth, Gellert struck, and the green bolt of a Blasting Curse flew out of the end of his wand. Albus, his mind perfectly focused, released the Shield Charm he had prepared, and watched as the bolt passed through it as though it was made of paper. With a swirl of his cloak, he vanished just as the bolt reached him, and reappeared a few feet to the right of the position at which he had been standing.

It was clear enough. The spells cast by that wand were too powerful for him to block directly, with magic. Avoidance and more subtle counters would have to be the order of the day...

A wall of fire roared to life from the spot in which he had just been standing, and spread toward him. Instantly he transfigured it into a wall of rock, and dove behind it to avoid the next spell, which sent stone chips flying at him. Albus returned fire with a series of curses, which glanced harmlessly off the Shield Charm cast by Gellert in response.

Changing tactics, Albus conjured a rain of daggers behind Gellert, who spun about and transfigured them into oversized hornets that buzzed angrily as they swarmed towards Albus, only to disappear into a cloud of black smoke. Gellert did not even wait for the smoke to clear before he sent a conjured serpent at Albus. A rapid exchange of conjuration, Transfiguration, and Vanishing ensued, drawing cries of surprise and admiration from the crowd as an unlikely variety of implements, creatures, and plants made their way back and forth across the stage.

Albus could feel himself tiring. A flying shard of rock had opened a bleeding gash on his forehead. The strain of having to dodge physically what he could not block magically against that incredible wand of Gellert's was beginning to tell on him, and he felt grateful for all those stairs he was forced to climb daily at Hogwarts. Surely, Gellert, too, must be feeling his years...and indeed, Gellert halted for a moment to take a breath, and Albus observed a sheen of sweat on his face.

"I did not kill your sister, you know," Gellert's voice, carried across the stage by a spell, spoke softly into his ear. "You did."

As he spoke, Gellert flourished his wand and Albus heard an odd clicking sound behind him. He forced himself to hold still, for a moment, staring at Gellert as though frozen in shock. This was the moment in the duel he had foreseen after he had forced himself to relive his memory of the day Ariana had died. His plan to win the duel depended on it.

Albus gasped as though in horrified surprise at the news. Then, as he heard the clicking sound again, he spun around, to find himself facing a giant scorpion. One of its claws was shut, the other sweeping towards him. He ducked and it clicked shut just above his head as he stepped back.

He steeled himself as the enormous tail struck at him, and raised his left arm in a futile gesture of protection. The stinger sank deeply into the flesh of his forearm, and he cried out in pain despite having expected it. The puncture itself was as nothing compared to the burning that intensified as the beast injected its venom. His arm felt as though it was on fire. Focusing his concentration on the beast, he turned it into a jet of water and sent it at Gellert, who froze it with a casual flick of his wand.

Albus allowed his wand to slip out of the fingers of his right hand as the column of ice crashed to the floor beside him, and staggered forward, his face drawn in pain. Gellert watched as Albus neared him, an expression that might have been genuine regret on his face.

"You have given me a better fight than any wizard I have faced in decades, Albus," he said, as they stood face to face again after many long years. "What a team we could have made."

Knowing him to be wandless, Gellert had allowed him to come within reach, as Albus had hoped he would. As though kneeling to beseech his help, Albus threw himself forward and locked both hands on the Elder Wand, tearing it from Gellert's grasp. He fell heavily to the floor and rolled quickly onto his back, to train the wand on Gellert.

Glancing over to the edge of the stage to see whether the guards planned to react to his unorthodox dueling tactic, Albus discovered that the Resistance fighters had engaged the guards at some point during the duel. He was in no immediate danger from that quarter.

Gellert threw back his head and laughed.

"You are Master of the Elder Wand despite your weakness, Albus, and it pleases me that you have achieved the dream of your youth. I salute your ingenuity. Yet not even the Elder Wand can save you now. No spell exists that can counter the venom of that beast. You have mere seconds left-"

A burst of music, a haunting, unearthly, yet deeply beautiful song, interrupted his speech. It never failed to bring a touch of joy to Albus's heart, joy and wonder, that he, of all people, had been blessed with such a friend. Gellert turned his head, to see the flash of gold and flaming crimson as the phoenix glided past him to alight on the floor beside Dumbledore. Fawkes looked up at Albus, and a crystal tear ran out of one beady black eye and dripped off the tip of his beak onto the wound the scorpion had left. The burning sensation and dizziness that had threatened to overwhelm Albus's senses began to recede. As additional tears dripped down onto it, the wound closed, leaving no mark.

Gellert gazed down at Dumbledore in growing horror, as comprehension dawned. His wild glance fell upon Dumbledore's discarded wand. As he started towards it, Fawkes swooped ahead of him and picked it up in his beak. He flew out of Gellert's reach, landing with a burst of flame atop the monumental stone representation of the Hallows behind the stage. Gingerly, Albus rose to his feet.

"The game is over, Gellert, and it is you who has lost," Albus said somberly. He looked about at the battle raging below. "Though you are not entirely powerless, even now. Many may die before the battle is won, and only you can save them. Call off your people, and you may surrender with dignity-"

"Never!" Gellert said defiantly.

With a shrug, Albus cast a spell, freezing Gellert's feet in place. Turning his attention to the melee below, Albus looked around, assessing where his help might make the biggest difference. He noted a knot of black-clad wizards who were fighting effectively as a unit. As their leader barked an order, they all focused their fire and a rain of curses belched forth at their target.

"Protego!" Albus cried, and to his delight, his charm deflected all of the curses. The tall, heavily built wizard who had been standing closest to their target fell, hit by the rebound of a pair of the curses he and his fellows had cast. Albus shook his head in amazement at the power of his counterspell. Truly, this wand he had won was a marvel.

Emboldened by this success, Albus targeted the leader, causing the air around him to harden into invisible bonds and muffling his speech. The remaining three fighters in the group, though, did not lose their heads. Recognizing him as the source of the magic that hindered them, they turned towards him and fired curses at him.

"Avada Kedavra!" Albus heard one of them cry in a high voice.

He knew better than to try a Shield Charm against that curse, and desperately waved the Elder Wand at the front row of seats, willing it to move. With an explosive crack, the bolts that had fastened them to the floor broke loose and the row of chairs rose into the air between him and his attacker, catching fire and breaking in two as the green jet of light hit. As he sent the flaming pieces hurtling towards his attackers, Albus rapidly disarmed the witch who had tried to kill him. Her companions desperately sought to Vanish the debris before it landed on them, and a resistance fighter took one down. The last one, white-faced with fear, barely avoided being hit as he Vanished the piece that threatened his defenseless fellows.

Something fell heavily to the floor behind Albus.

"Ernst!" cried Gellert, a note of incredulity in his voice.

Turning, Albus saw a young officer he had Stunned backstage on his way to confront Gellert, lying dead on the floor. Maria Herrmann was making her way up the stairs, her wand out. Albus turned back to keep an eye on Gellert and any possible rescuers from below.

"He had his wand trained on your back," she explained. "I shouted a warning, but you were distracted by the fighting."

She glared at Gellert, who looked stricken. Thin cords burst from the tip of her wand and wrapped themselves around Gellert's arms and ankles. Bringing her wand to her throat, she began to speak, and her voice carried over the din of the fighting.

"We have captured your leader, and taken the advantage in the battle. I do not want more of my people to fall, so I urge you. Surrender, and your lives will be spared!"

As she spoke, Albus released the spell, now superfluous, that he had cast on Gellert. His eyes rested still on the form of the fallen officer as surviving members of his inner circle began to throw down their wands.

"Have you decided, then, what is to be his fate?" Albus asked Maria.

"There will shortly be no shortage of empty cells in Nurmengard," she replied, her voice now back to its usual volume. "Since you wish it, Dumbledore, I will gladly spare one for him."

With a look of loathing, she turned towards Gellert. "I can only hope that you will rot in it for many decades, before death comes for you; nothing short of death will ever bring you forth from it."

With those words she walked away to join a group of her fighters, who were waving her over.

"Albus, this is your doing?" Gellert asked. "I...I would rather end it. Tell her you have changed your mind...please...for what we once were to one another."

Albus shook his head gravely. "It is why I will not see you dead. Long ago, you showed me, in a way I could not ignore, what I was making of myself. This gift to you, time enough to understand what you have made of yourself, is all I can give to repay you. For the sake of the love I once bore you, I shall hope that the time suffices."

Gellert looked at him, uncomprehending.

Albus turned on his heel and walked off the stage, extending his wrist for Fawkes, who glided down to join him. His work here was done; Hogwarts awaited him.

The End