Dream to Me

Saturday, 24 June 1995

“Kill the spare,” echoed in Harry’s head and the flash of green blinded him every time he closed his eyes.

Death had brushed elbows with Harry his entire life, but this was the first time it had shown its face.

Grey eyes that no longer sparkled with life.

Soft lips that no longer stretched into that easy grin.

Harry felt his breath leave his lungs and for a moment, just one solitary moment, wished they wouldn’t fill again.

But then his lungs inflated, and sound filtered through his ears, and sight met his eyes once more.

Whoever had spoken that curse had just signed their death warrant as far as Harry was concerned. Something in his soul answered that claim, something in the universe accepted it and wove it into the thread of fate. Not that Harry knew or understood it at that point, but his word had just become law.

Harry watched as if experiencing it from an outside perspective as he was tied to a gravestone.

Wormtail’s face brought him back to his own body.

Bone of the Father, Flesh of the Servant, Blood of the Enemy.

Something deep within Harry’s being, some part of his very soul, recoiled at the magic that was being performed. Something was happening that went against Harry’s very nature, more than just a Voldemort with a fully corporeal body. This magic was a perversion and Harry’s magic was aching with the need to undo it.

Unseen by Harry, Death stood at his shoulder. His hood was lowered but his scythe was still raised.

“Who are you?” Cedric asked, looking into a face he was intimately familiar with but eyes he didn’t recognize.

“You know,” Death said, placing a comforting hand on Cedric’s shoulder.

The knowledge washed over him even before he dared a look back toward where they’d landed, “you’re Him.”

“I am,” Death confirmed, “don’t worry, young one. You’ll see him again, maybe not the way you imagine, but one day he will call, and you will answer.”

“Alright,” Cedric said. That was easy to agree to, information that was easy to process. Cedric knew in his heart, had known for some time, that no matter what, whenever Harry called, he would answer.

“Something is going to happen when they duel,” Death said, pulling Cedric from his thoughts and gesturing toward Harry and Voldemort with his head.

“Duel?” Cedric said, suddenly scared.

“Don’t worry,” Death soothed, “in a battle of wills, our boy will win every time.”

Cedric was so comforted by Death’s declaration that he almost missed it, “our boy?”

“Yes,” Death said, but offered no further explanation on that front, “their wands are brothers,” he explained, continuing his earlier point about the impending duel, “and when they’re forced into battle against one another, an odd phenomenon will occur, something called priori incantatem.”

“Like checking a wand for recent spells?”

“Exactly,” Death said with a nod, smiling softly at Cedric, “the spell won’t be spoken, but the effect will be the same. The reason I tell you this is because it was that wand that killed you. When their wands meet, and Harry overwhelms his opponent, which I’m confident he will, your shade will return to their side of the veil, if only for a moment. You will have a chance to say what you wish to say.”

Cedric watched as Harry was cut down from the gravestone and cried out as he saw Harry writhe under the pain of Voldemort’s curse. He felt pride swell in his chest as he saw Harry duck behind a headstone and gather himself before he stepped back out to face his enemy. And then it happened, green light met red, and Cedric felt something tug at his core. Death nodded and he gave himself over to the sensation.

Harry watched as shadows of Voldemort’s most recent spells spilled into the night sky. He had only a second to realize what this meant before the form of Cedric appeared in front of him. Harry stared at him with tears in his eyes, “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice cracking but his focus unbroken. Voldemort looked momentarily terrified, and Cedric counted that as a win.

“No,” he said, shaking his head at Harry, “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry Harry. I love you so much. Get out of here alive and I promise that one day I will see you again.”

Harry tuned out what the next two shades said, his focus split between Cedric and maintaining this connection with Voldemort’s wand, but then he saw green eyes and red hair and almost buckled.

“Your father’s coming,” she said quietly, “hold on for your father. It will be all right, hold on.”

And there he was, first his head, then his body. Tall and strong with messy hair just like Harry’s. The shade of James Potter spilled from the end of Voldemort’s wand and walked up to Harry, “when the connection is broken, we will linger only moments, but we will give you time, you must get to the Portkey, it will return you to Hogwarts. Do you understand, Harry?”

“Yes,” Harry gasped, fighting to keep hold of his wand.

“Harry,” Cedric whispered, “take my body back, will you? Back to my parents.”

“I will,” Harry said, drinking in Cedric’s features as they moved and spoke like he was still alive. He wanted this to be his last memory of the boy he loved, not the lifeless eyes and cold skin he knew was waiting for him a few meters away.

“Do it now,” his father’s voice whispered, “be ready to run, do it now.”

Harry wrenched his wand back and took off toward Cedric’s body at a full sprint, he heard as the phoenix song that had been ringing through the air cut off as he reached Cedric and grabbed the front of his jersey. He pointed his wand toward the cup and yelled “ACCIO!”

And, as he felt the now-familiar tug behind his navel, he heard that sweet, familiar voice whisper, “my sun, my moon, and all of my stars.”