'Get back here, coward! Get back I say!'
Through his cloud of misery, Neville turned round at the familiar voice and saw his grandmother jogging forwards, firing off a jink at Bellatrix but she was too far in the distance amongst the rest of the Death Eaters that Augusta's spell whistled just above head height.
'Gran!' croaked Neville, still kneeling beside the bodies of Dolohov's and Bellatrix's latest victims. 'What are you doing here?'
'Fighting, of course, dear!' she answered, sending a Stunner in the path of a skinny Snatcher, who was blasted backwards by the force of it. 'Come on, Neville dear, get up!'
He couldn't get up. He couldn't. They were outnumbered, the enemy was advancing and he couldn't even muster the strength to raise his wandarm -
But any action could be postponed for now, as that high, cold voice reverberated across the grounds and castle, perhaps across the whole world. The fighting stopped so suddenly that it was hard to believe it hadn't finished hours ago, and everyone halted to listen.
'You have fought valiantly. Lord Voldemort knows how to value bravery.'
Like last time, many fighters gasped and jumped.
'Yet you have sustained heavy losses. If you continue to resist me, you will all die, one by one. I do not wish this to happen. Every drop of magical blood spilled is a loss and a waste. Lord Voldemort is merciful. I command my forces to retreat, immediately.'
As Voldemort continued to speak, each of his followers were whisked away in a puff of black smoke, one by one.
'You have one hour. Dispose of your dead with dignity. Treat your injured.
'I speak now, Harry Potter, directly to you. You have permitted your friends to die for you rather than face me yourself. I shall wait for one hour in the Forbidden Forest. If, at the end of that hour, you have not come to me, have not given yourself up, then battle recommences. This time, I shall enter the fray myself, Harry Potter, and I shall find you, and I shall punish every last man, woman and child who has tried to conceal you from me. One hour.'
Silence filled the air again, and every burn, scratch, cut and bruise on Neville's body seemed magnified tenfold, digging into him like daggers, weighing him down. He forced himself to his feet with unbelievable difficulty, wincing and groaning. Already, students and adults around him were putting out fires with streams of water from their wands, bending down next to friends, carrying the dead in pairs.
Though nobody ordered or suggested it, the dead and injured were brought through the open front doors and into the Great Hall. Neville stood there, unmoving, watching everyone head into the smoking castle.
Someone placed a hand on his shoulder and he turned round to see Seamus there, looking as ragged and dirty as ever, but still upright, still strong, still as willing now to stand up for himself in Carrow's classroom as he had been eight months ago. In silence, they bent down and slid their hands under Professor Lupin's body before shuffling into the Entrance Hall and through to the Great Hall. It was quiet but for the solemn bustling of the alive, tending the injured or talking gently. Neville saw Madam Pomfrey tipping some potion down Michael Corner's open mouth, his leg already bandaged and resting on a bench.
The young woman with the pink hair had already been lain down near the doors, and Neville and Seamus carefully rested Lupin's body alongside hers. His face was pale and lined, but peaceful and painless. Neville gazed down at them for a moment longer before backing out the doors, hearing sobs from the broken marble staircase, and his stomach churned sickeningly; seven Weasleys were walking down, holding and surrounding one of the twins, who wasn't moving, arms draping from his horizontal frame. Without thinking, Neville strode over and helped them reach the Hall steadily, though unable to give words of comfort. They laid him down, Fred's family crying their very hearts out it seemed, and Professor McGonagall and Kingsley came over to comfort them.
Neville left the Hall again, now wondering and fearing how many more had died fighting ... the winds blustered across the grounds as he helped move the injured into the school, then back out to the grounds, and back into the school again, like a metronome, as though he was constructing a building with the bodies that were bricks ... there were more people, alive and dead, every time he returned to the Hall ... he vaguely recalled seeing Ron and Hermione join the mourning, with Luna, Ernie, Terry, Lavender ... again, he wasn't aware of the time, nor aware of how long it would be until Voldemort returned to fight, because he knew Harry couldn't sacrifice himself: he was their only hope.
Then he found himself holding the legs of little Colin Creevey, with Oliver Wood at the other end. Colin must have ignored McGonagall's orders and returned to fight ... the pain of knowing that he needn't have died, that he could have escaped through the Hog's Head safely, stung Neville as much as anything.
'You know what? I can manage him alone, Neville,' said Oliver, and he carefully hauled Colin onto his shoulder and strode into the Hall alone. Neville leant against the doorframe of the front doors, sweating, and he wiped his brow with his forehead before retracing his steps to the grounds yet again. He was about to pick up another casualty when he heard someone behind him.
'Neville.'
He jumped out of his skin and spun round. It was Harry.
'Blimey, Harry, you nearly gave me a heart failure! Where are you going, alone?' he asked suspiciously.
'It's all part of the plan,' Harry replied. 'There's something I need to do. Listen - Neville -'
'Harry!' interrupted Neville, a terrible thought occurring to him and he heard his voice step up an octave. 'Harry, you're not thinking of handing yourself over?'
'No ... 'course not ... this is something else. But I might be out of sight for a while. You know Voldemort's snake, Neville? He's got a huge snake ... calls it Nagini ...'
'I've heard, yeah ... what about it?'
'It's got to be killed,' said Harry quietly. 'Ron and Hermione know that, but just in case they - just in case they're - busy - and you get the chance -'
'Kill the snake?'
'Kill the snake.'
Neville nodded.
'All right, Harry. You're OK, are you?'
'I'm fine. Thanks, Neville,' said Harry, his brave tone sounding distinctly false. As he made to walk on, Neville grabbed his wrist.
'We're all going to keep fighting, Harry. You know that?'
'Yeah, I -' Harry broke off and swallowed - but Neville understood, and he patted him on the shoulder before turning to pick up the small student on the wet grass. He turned his head again, to tell Harry that they would beat Voldemort, that there was no need to worry ... but he had vanished.
He heaved the boy over his own shoulder and he could hear Ginny's calm voice not so far away, comforting another girl.
It seemed all the bodies had been returned by the time Neville and Ginny walked through the Great Hall doors again. Everyone, teachers, students, the Order and many other fighters, were either shifting bodies, treating the injured, mourning, or simply sitting in a corner in silence, head bowed. Luna rose from beside the injured Terry and walked over to him; she hugged him and kissed him on the cheek. He tried to smile but it must have only came out as a kind of grimace: smiling seemed such an impossible task now.
Then the clock struck one o'clock, a single chime from the bell tower ringing out across the school. All heads looked up in expectation, in fear.
Without warning, for the third time that evening, Voldemort's voice of death rang through the grounds and the school, echoing across the Great Hall for all ears.
'Harry Potter is dead. He was killed as he ran away, trying to save himself while you lay down your lives for him. We bring you his body as proof that you hero is gone.
'The battle is won. You have lost half of your fighters. My Death Eaters outnumber you and the Boy Who Lived is finished. There must be no more war. Anyone who continues to resist, man, woman or child, will be slaughtered, as will every member of their family. Come out of the castle, now, kneel before me, and you shall be spared. Your parents and children, your brothers and sisters will live, and be forgiven, and you will join me in the new world we shall build together.'