I don't own anything in the Potter universe. I would like Andrea to moderate this chapter, please. Thanks
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For the second time in Harry’s young life, he watched as Lord Voldemort rose, seemingly from death. The first time, Harry had been tied to a gravestone, forced to endure the torment of seeing his worst nightmare realized. He had begged for someone, anyone, to make that babylike creature drown in the smoking cauldron. His fear and panic had seemed to be out of control that time.
This time was different. Even as he watched Voldemort shudder and then slowly begin to get to his feet, Harry knew that this time would be different. He would defeat this evil once and for all. His mind was sharp and focused as he connected with his friends. Voldemort is alive and beginning to move. I’m tied up with an Incarcerous Curse, he explained over the link.
Harry, we are still stuck up here. We can’t get to the doors yet, Ginny responded, and Harry could feel the panic starting to seep through her. This was something he didn’t need.
Ginny, don’t panic. I’m fine for the time being, and if I can get loose it’ll be all right. Just don’t panic, because I’ll feel it if you do.
Harry felt a steely resolve cascade over her and himself. He could feel the presence of his friends, although they were so far away. Hermione’s mind, Neville’s courage, Ron’s strategies, Luna’s creativity, and Ginny’s love and passion for him, all working together with his own formidable talent on getting him unbound and finishing this fight.
“Lucius,” rasped Voldemort, who was now in a sitting position, “my wand.” Malfoy pulled a long strip of wood from inside his black robe and handed it over to his master, bowing his head in the process.
“My Lord, I have come to revive you, just as you requested.” Malfoy inclined his head a bit more.
Voldemort grasped the wand and seemed to gain energy from it as he gingerly got to his feet. “You have done well, Lucius, far better than I have come to expect.” Malfoy looked up, startled by his master’s words, but Voldemort continued, seemingly getting stronger with each step. “Are there others who have come to help you?”
“My Lord, there was no one but my wife and son who was not captured. My son was with me, but I don’t know where he is now. As for my wife,” Malfoy hesitated, “she refused to come.”
Voldemort gave a derisive laugh. “Well I hope you put her in her place.”
“Yes, my lord,” Malfoy stated, bowing again. “My lord, Potter is here.”
Voldemort looked in Harry’s direction and his mirthless smile stretched across his face. “Harry, how nice of you to join us for yet another of my revivals. Do you like my new wand?”
Harry could not have cared less about Voldemort’s wand, but he knew he had to keep Voldemort talking until he could get himself free. He was trying over and over again to cast a Severing Charm on the ropes that bound him, but he could not get them loose enough for the wand movement.
“Yeah, nice, I guess you needed a new one since Scrimgeour snapped the old one.” Harry could feel his friends were still in the hall, unable to get out.
“Is that what happened?” Voldemort replied. “I thought as much since Lucius brought this new one. No matter, I rather like it. It’s a bit of old Ollivander’s best work. Took him months to find the right materials, but after a while he came through. In fact it is the last wand he ever made.” A high-pitched, insane laugh echoed through the chamber.
Harry’s heart sank. Ollivander was the only missing person still unaccounted for and now it was clear that he was dead.
“Would you like to see how it works?” Voldemort slowly raised his wand, but instead of pointing it at Harry, he brought it to bear on Malfoy.
“Master, what””
“Be quiet, Lucius,” Voldemort cut him off harshly. “You have done nothing but fail me for many years now. Did you think that I would allow you to destroy something as important as my diary without punishing you?”
This struck Harry as very odd since Dumbledore had said that Voldemort’s punishment for Malfoy over the diary was incredibly severe.
“Master.” Malfoy was on his knees.
“Did you really believe that a few bouts of the Cruciatus would be enough? Lord Voldemort does not forgive so easily. But I relented. I wanted to see if you could redeem yourself, and then, in this very room, you failed me. You did not recover the prophecy, and you got yourself captured.”
Malfoy began to shake. “Master, please, there was nothing I could have done. Dumbledore arrived…”
“SILENCE!” Voldemort shouted. “You dare speak that old fool’s name? You disappoint me, Lucius. Still I, perhaps foolishly, held out hope for you. I sent you and Snape to fetch Potter when that foul house-elf showed up with Bellatrix. Another fiasco, and two of my most faithful servants got killed. You were captured again, and yet I still refused to believe you were completely incompetent.
Malfoy was lying, almost prone, on the floor. Voldemort towered over him. “Finally you were sent on the simplest of tasks: Collect the Mudblood, and again you failed. Over and over again you have shown yourself to be nothing but a waste of my time and energy.”
Malfoy looked up, fear etched upon his face. “My Lord, I was the one who brought the potion, the one who revived you in your time of need.”
“One success cannot make up for a lifetime of failure, Lucius. You should have died long ago.” Without warning, Voldemort raised his wand. “Avada Kedavra.”
He shows as little mercy to his friends as he does to his enemies, Harry thought, remembering Dumbledore’s words.
Lucius Malfoy was struck in the face, lifted into the air backwards, and dropped upon the dais that held the veil. Harry watched, stunned, as grisly, black arms, very similar to the arms of a Dementor, reached out from beyond the veil and pulled Malfoy’s body through it.
Voldemort then turned slowly towards Harry. It seemed that the Killing Curse had taken something out of him, for his left arm hung limp at his side and his shoulders sagged. His face, however, wore the look of a snake about to strike a particularly juicy rat.
“So, Harry, now that you have seen that my power is not diminished, what do you say? Are you ready to join that foolish little mother of yours?”
Harry’s frustration began to mount. He had no way of breaking the ropes that had him bound. He could feel his friends”they had made it out of the hall and were moving towards the lifts”but he was not entirely sure they would get there in time, and even if they did, he wasn’t sure he wanted them with him to face this.
“What’s wrong, boy, cat got your tongue? Are you so afraid to die that you can’t speak?” Voldemort jeered.
Harry smiled back, thinking of his first year. “Death is only the next great adventure, to the uncluttered mind, that is. I don’t suppose that applies to maniacs.”
His friends were at the lifts.
Voldemort laughed. “Who told you that? The old fool Dumbledore? I wonder if he would say that now. Pity he is dead so we can’t ask him.” High-pitched, humourless laughter filled the room. “Don’t go spouting stupid platitudes to me, Harry. I am the greatest wizard in the world. I have conquered death, and you sit here all alone. Your protectors are all dead. Mummy and Daddy, the stupid dog, and now Dumbledore; so much for the power of love!”
His friends were in the circular room.
“Albus Dumbledore is still the greatest wizard in the world!” Harry spat angrily. “And those we love never leave us if we hold them in our hearts.” Harry didn’t know exactly why he said all that”perhaps to convince himself that his ‘protectors’ were still with him.
“Dumbledore was killed by one of my servants”” But the rest of Voldemort’s reply was cut off as three things happened in rapid succession. First there was a blinding flash of firelight that drew both Harry’s and Voldemort’s attention to the very centre of the room: Standing in the arch that held the veil, Fawkes began to sing.
Second, there was a soft click from inside the circular room.
Third, while both their attentions were drawn away, Harry felt a warm furry presence at his back. He could tell immediately that Ginny was working on chewing through the ropes.
Voldemort began to look warily around the room. The presence of Fawkes had unnerved him. “Where is he?!” he shouted. “I know he’s dead, so he can’t be”but if his song bird is”WHERE?!” He sent a purple flame at the place where Harry lay, tightly bound by ropes. However, Harry was no longer there.
A jet of red light fired from the far end of the room, where Ron had burst in through another door. Voldemort blocked it, sending it into a wall. He was about to fire back when he was forced to block a Cutting Curse from Luna. Hermione joined in with a Bludgeoning Hex, which Voldemort dodged while sending a Stunner at her. Neville had just fired a Banishing Charm and knocked Voldemort off balance, causing his Stunner to miss Hermione.
The battle seemed to take place at high speed. Voldemort was doing everything he could to block the fire of Harry and his friends and still attack as well. Each time Voldemort fired an offensive hex, he was forced to dodge three more curses. At this point, Voldemort had been unable to connect a single curse, but Harry and his friends had not landed one either. All the while Fawkes sang on.
“Incendio!” Hermione shouted, and flames erupted around Voldemort. He quickly pronounced a counter-curse, extinguishing the flames. He emerged from the smoke, robes charred, and fired a silver beam at Hermione.
Harry reacted at once, raising a shield in front of her. The spell bounced harmlessly into the wall. Ginny launched a Slicing Hex at Voldemort that connected, sending a long, deep gash down his left cheek.
Voldemort gasped in pain and, in a rage, fired the same silver beam that had killed Dennis Creevey at the first person he saw. Horrorstruck, Harry watched Luna being knocked into the wall and collapsing.
Neville gave a great bearlike roar and transformed. He darted down the steps to the place where Voldemort stood. He was there so quickly that Voldemort barely had time to react. A large black claw came crashing onto the side of the Dark Wizard knocking him off his feet onto the stone steps.
Neville moved to strike again, but was blown back by a curse from Voldemort’s wand. He landed halfway up the steps.
Harry saw Voldemort raise his wand and knew, not knowing how he knew, that Voldemort was going to try and knock them all out with one spell. Without thinking, Harry shouted the words he’d dreaded ever having to say: “AVADA KEDAVRA!”
Green light raced from the end of his wand and found its target. There was a great sound of rushing wind and Voldemort, who had returned to his feet, was knocked head over heels across the stone table where he had been lying before being revived by Lucius Malfoy; he toppled to the other side, lost from view.
Ron raced to Neville, who was just beginning to stir, and Hermione sprinted around to Luna. Harry, feeling sick, simply stared at the spot where Voldemort had stood seconds ago. He had become a murderer. Ginny engulfed him in a huge hug, obscuring his view of the stone table.
“Harry, you did it, he’s gone!” she shouted. Harry barely heard her. He felt numb, like all his senses were on overload and didn’t want to function. He tried to turn Ginny around so he could see Voldemort’s body, but she refused to let him go. Finally he looked into her eyes.
“Sectumsempra,” croaked a voice from the middle of the floor.
Harry watched as Ginny’s eyes widened in shock. He felt warm blood begin to flow over his hands, and could imagine the gaping slashes that must now crisscross her back. She slumped in his arms, turning white before his eyes.
“Ginny?” he whispered as she fell unconscious to the floor at his feet. He looked up and saw Voldemort standing shakily behind the stone table.
“You fool!” he breathed. “You have to want to be a killer to make that spell work! Righteous indignation won’t do it.” Harry could see how weak he was. “Didn’t anyone tell you?” A smile crossed Voldemort’s face.
All the air seemed to have been sucked out of the room. Hermione had gone pale standing over Luna. Ron and Neville looked too stunned to move as Voldemort slowly walked in front of the table. Harry’s mind refused to fathom what he had just heard. He had failed to kill him. He had used the Killing Curse and it didn’t work. What was he supposed to do now?
Voldemort began to raise his wand.
“NO!” Hermione screamed.
Voldemort turned quickly and released something that looked like a fire whip from the end of his wand. It caught Hermione across the shoulder, sending her careening over Luna into the wall. Ron fired a Reductor Curse as he bolted for Hermione’s side, but Voldemort didn’t care. The curse exploded several rows of benches behind him. Voldemort again turned his attention to Harry. He raised his wand, but Harry fired first.
Something in Hermione’s screaming caused Harry to come back to reality. He watched Voldemort raise his wand, and then the right spell popped into his mind. He jumped to his feet, made a mental connection with all his friends, and shouted, “Singulus Substantia!”
Golden light erupted from Harry’s wand, capturing Voldemort and encasing him in a glowing sphere almost as bright as the sun. Harry could feel power flowing through him”but not just that of his friends. He could feel the strength of other wizards and witches coursing through him as well. As the light in the room grew, he could feel the love that his parents had had for him, Sirius’ determination, Dumbledore’s wisdom, Hagrid’s courage and knowledge, Cedric’s loyalty…
More wizards were added to the power Harry was channeling. He didn’t even know them, but they seemed to infuse him with strength all the same. He could distinguish Luna’s dad, and Ginny’s uncles. More and more power flowed through Harry to his wand tip, until it seemed that every person that had ever stood up against Lord Voldemort, or had loved Harry, was present.
The light in the room was now so bright that everyone except Harry had turned away. Harry, however, watched as bright light began to pour from Voldemort’s eyes and mouth. He was writhing, unable to stop the spell that was literally tearing his soul from his body to destroy it. There was a great noise in the room, like a long rumble of thunder, although Fawkes could still be heard singing as well.
After what felt like hours, but was in truth only a few seconds, there was an explosion of light within the sphere. The power running through Harry felt like it was going to blow him apart, but he held the wand steady.
The light in the sphere exploded again and the sphere began to fade. The sphere dissipated and the rumble faded. Voldemort’s body fell and landed upon the dais that held the arch and veil.
Harry staggered, his knees very weak, unable to hold himself up any longer. He watched as once again, dark, menacing arms reached out of the veil and pulled Voldemort’s body through it. Harry felt something flutter past him, but could not figure out what it was, and collapsed, his head coming to rest next to Ginny, who was lying on her stomach in a puddle of her own blood.
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Harry floated in a dark area, without a care in the world. He liked the feeling of weightlessness and wondered why he hadn’t ever done this before. He looked around, but found only an empty void. He didn’t really mind that, however, because this was certainly a comfortable place to be. He enjoyed the sensation for a long while. Then, so small it was almost unnoticeable, a pinprick of light appeared.
Harry was only vaguely curious about it, however. Why should I be worried about some little light while I can enjoy just floating here? he thought. The light, however, was getting bigger and bigger.
Harry’s sense of understanding, and foreboding, seemed to grow with the light. It seemed, as it got bigger, that his mind started to work again. Finally he understood he needed to move towards that light. He focused on it, expecting it to be difficult to move, but was surprised when he was swiftly caught up in the light. Then a sensation of falling overwhelmed him and his feet struck the ground.
He looked around and found himself in the Death Chamber in the Department of Mysteries. He saw Luna standing on the far end, looking confused. She seemed to be listening for something. Then, to Harry’s astonishment, a woman stepped from behind the veil and walked to Luna. She was rather thin and not very tall, with dirty blonde hair. Harry saw her face, and noticed the large, owl-like eyes and the blissful expression on her face.
Luna, having not acknowledged Harry at all, embraced the woman, and Harry could hear them both crying. “Mum, is it really…” Luna choked out. She then buried her head once again in her mother’s arms.
Harry felt like he was intruding, so he turned back to the veil. Looking around, he saw that a single door remained open. He was drawn to the door, but didn’t want to move. The thought of leaving Luna behind was unthinkable.
Harry looked back at Luna and her mother; he found that her father was with her too. They were joking and laughing and, for the first time in a very long while, Luna looked happy. In fact, this was as happy as Harry had ever seen the small blonde girl with eyes so much like her mothers. Tears were leaking from those eyes and running down her cheeks as she stood embraced by her parents, but Harry knew they were tears of sheer joy over their reunion.
As Harry stood watching, a thought began to materialize in his mind. He began to wonder if perhaps his parents were going to be coming soon to meet him. Perhaps he had died trying to destroy Voldemort and now he too would finally get to see and talk to his parents.
Head turning from side to side, Harry began scanning the room looking for any sign of his parents. He stepped towards the veil, heard the voices behind it and leaned closer. They were indistinct and scattered, but he could certainly hear people speaking beyond the veil. An overwhelming urge to step through the veil filled Harry and he climbed upon the dais.
“Harry,” came a dreamy voice from behind him. He turn, startled by the sudden clear word. “Harry, this isn’t your time to pass through the veil,” Luna said. She was smiling through her tears, and her parents stood on either side of her, both beaming at their daughter.
Harry frowned. He knew that just on the other side of the veil his parents, Sirius, Dumbledore and Hagrid all stood to explain everything to him; to tell him how proud they were of him; to tell him they loved him and that he was safe now. He could come home and rest. He didn’t have to be the savior of the world anymore. He could just be a teenager, a normal young man.
Luna’s smile broadened. “I know that you want to see them all again. You will; it just isn’t your time yet. You have a lot left to do.”
Luna’s mother took her eyes off of Luna and looked at him. “Harry, go and play Quidditch, rest; the burdens of the world are no longer on your shoulders.”
Harry turned his gaze to Luna again. “What about you? You’re only sixteen. You have your whole life ahead of you. You want to come back, don’t you?”
Luna’s smile seemed to fade, just slightly. “I’ve done my part. My adventure lies beyond the veil, Harry.”
Without realizing it, he and Luna with her parents had switched places. He was standing on the floor, while they were standing, still arm in arm, in front of the veil. “Go through the door and you will find the rest of your life,” Luna’s father continued. “And thank you for allowing our daughter to help you.”
Harry felt like his insides were being twisted. He had managed to destroy Voldemort, but it had cost Luna her life. His mind wandered back to the battle. Hermione was hurt, Neville was hurt, Ron was all right; GINNY.
Harry’s eyes widened as he realized that the last thing he knew was that Ginny had been lying on the floor bleeding terribly. “Luna,” Harry exclaimed frantically halfway from the stairs to open the door. He again didn’t know how he had got there. “Is Ginny all right?”
Luna turned. “I don’t know, Harry. Tell Neville and the others goodbye for me. Thank them for being so nice to me.” And with that she stepped through the veil, followed by her mother and father.
Harry’s mind began to race. She wasn’t here. If she were dead, she would have been in the room with us.
He was moving through the open door. I would have seen her. She would have been there.
He was floating again. The light coming from the Death Chamber was slowly getting smaller. She can’t be dead. I would know it. I would have felt it through our connection.
Voices were calling out, but he didn’t care what they said. What do I do if she’s gone?
“Harry, Harry, wake up.”
“Come on, mate.”
What do I do without her? Harry opened his eyes.
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A/N: Yet another evil cliff hanger. I would love to say sorry but… I do enjoy them so. I hope you all enjoyed the final defeat of Voldemort. Thanks always to my wonderful prebetas cableguysmom and Kerrbear. And multiple thanks to my betas Ginny Guerra and JenC. Thanks ladies I couldn’t do this without you.
Up next, we find out if Ginny survives and other important ends are tied up. Just one more chapter and an epilogue to go. Let me know what you think.