Chapter 2
When the wind whipped tiny shards of snow over their campsite, Harry was the only one who warmed up immediately. His head was pounding and his forehead was feverishly hot. Hermione and Ron had seen him in this state before and they drew around him watching him nervously. Harry wanted to give them reassurances, but he also wanted to see what Voldemort was doing, and the more he tapped into his connection with the Dark Lord the sicker and quieter he became. Flashes of knowledge came to him when he was dazed and relaxed, but if he focused on them too much they slid away from him like water running out of his hands. He had not often tried to deliberately tap into their connection, especially after their connection had been used to manipulate him, but the visions were coming more and more easily. Meanwhile, the connection between them grows ever stronger, a parasitic growth: Sometimes, I have thought Harry suspects it himself. He had seen enough to know plenty and he tried to rouse himself from his stupor, feeling sick. “He went into the Pensieve where I put Snape’s memory, I think… I think he saw everything.”
Ron and Hermione exchanged nervous glances. Hermione said, “That’s okay, isn’t it? I mean, it doesn’t really change anything if he knows.”
“Right,” Ron said. “Actually, maybe he won’t be able to try and kill us now, because Harry’s his horcrux.”
“He’s got…” His scar pricked again painfully. He rubbed at it and kept speaking. “I’m not really sure.” He wanted to explain to his friends what it was like to suddenly be looking through the Dark Lord’s eyes, the disorientation and nausea that came with it. “I only saw little bits and pieces, and some of it didn’t make sense, but I think Trelawney stayed behind, because I saw her in front of him.”
Of the three of them, none had particularly liked Trelawney, but they took the news gravely. Harry pressed a hand to his forehead, feeling the heat seeping away and his sweat freeze. His fingers were icy cold. He didn’t want to ask whether they had anything to eat because he didn’t want to be disappointed.
“We should message McGonagall through the journal she gave us,” Hermione said. She stood close to Ron and it wasn’t just to help her boyfriend’s grief. The coat she wore had been warm enough for the forest in the autumn, but now she held herself together tightly. “We should tell her Trelawney’s been left behind.”
“Oh yeah, we’ll just let her know that we have a secret eavesdropping tool into the You-Know-Who’s mind while we’re at it, I’m sure that will be easy to explain.” Ron’s tone was harsh, but Hermione was too perceptive to take his tone personally when his eyes were red and swollen. All the energy had gone out of Ron when he had stopped pacing, and his eyes were hollow and exhausted. Soon, the three of them would have to move on from this spot. Even though they had put their defensive spells up, they weren’t far away from where Hermione had once gone skiing with her parents, and the better hidden in the wilderness they were, the better. Harry wanted to advise them both to get some sleep so that they could move the next day to make their plans, but he was too tired to offer to take the first watch. The three of them gazed into their little fire glumly, each lost in their own thoughts.
Hermione was the one who broke the silence. “I don’t think we should tell McGonagall anything.” Ron and Harry looked at her, startled. Red faced from either defiance or the icy wind, Hermione raised her chin. “I don’t think it would be safe for Harry if we just threw information around.”
Harry frowned. Surely it would be wiser to get McGonagall’s advice about the situation he found himself in with Voldemort? He couldn’t imagine how it wouldn’t be safe.
Ron took a second to think this over. He spoke slowly. “I agree. We’ve always done things by ourselves, if we drag more people into it…” He looked at Harry quickly, then back at Hermione with fierce appreciation. “Just for now, of course. Until we can start finding more information about what to do. We should find some way to get to a library.”
Hermione beamed. “Yes, exactly! We’ve got to think of a good place to go, with books that would have information on dark magic. Viktor used to tell me about the magical library they have at Durmstrang…” Ron looked stonily on as Hermione talked, obviously trying to suppress his jealousy at the mention at Viktor. Harry slumped where he sat on the ground as the two of them made plans. His scar was throbbing, and despite the cold, he wished he could take his coat off so the sweat on his back could dry. He hated seeing inside Voldemort’s head. It left him feverish and sick afterwards. Did that mean the parasitic soul inside of him was still weak, or was his ability to see into Voldemort’s head proof that it was getting stronger? He pushed the palm of his hand against his forehead and gasped quietly.
“Are you okay?” Ron’s eyebrows were furrowed. Harry nodded without speaking as the pain briefly escalated into a white hot iron to his skull. What was it that the Dark Lord was feeling? If Harry allowed his mind to wander and his defenses to lower, he knew he might catch a glimpse, but he restrained himself, and dealt with the pain in his forehead by breathing in slow and controlled misery.
Then the pain stopped.
“Harry?” Hermione asked tentatively.
Harry sat up straight. He met their eyes, as surprised as they were. Pain had been a constant background sensation in his life. It was hard to remember a time without it. The last time Voldemort had shut him out had been after the Department of Mysteries. The lingering feeling of a fever and the cold sweeping wind was the only discomfort he could feel.
“I can’t feel anything. He’s blocking me out.” It was odd and extremely disconcerting, although he couldn’t explain why.
“That’s good, though, isn’t it?” Hermione said. “Maybe he’s afraid of what you can do.”
Disquieted, Harry touched his scar. “I don’t know why he would be. I messed it up, I should have taken those memories with me.” Harry stood up, swayed slightly on his feet and then started to pace, tracing the same outline in the thin layer of snow that Ron had. His heart was beating hard. He could hear the hollow ringing in his ears as wind blew over the pine trees. He didn’t know why he was so apprehensive, they were as safe as they ever were. “I don’t know, I wish that…” He didn’t know how to articulate what he was feeling. He blurted out, “This isn’t what Dumbledore planned.”
“But there’s no reason to think we can’t still beat him.” Hermione said optimistically. “The Order, the teachers and Dumbledore’s Army are all looking for his weakness and trying to kill the snake, and after that all that’s left to do is get rid of Voldemort’s soul.” She said it like it would be simple. Harry chewed on his tongue.
“I don’t care what Dumbledore had planned,” Ron was saying stoutly. “I don’t think he ever planned for us to get this far.”
Harry scar tingled, and he tilted his head to the side, suddenly freezing up and focusing with all his might on listening and feeling for him, wondering what Voldemort was keeping from him. Nothing came to him except the sound of his own heartbeat in his ears. The tingle turned into pain, pain that Harry was used to, and he pressed at his scar, surprised. Normally, it came all at once, bursting through him as Voldemort’s emotions overflowed.
Now, the pain increased and increased gradually, until Harry’s wince turned into a gasp, and then he sank to his knees on the cold rocks of the mountain. It wasn’t emotions seeping out-- at least, not entirely. It was-- it was the cold press of Voldemort’s mind, his magic, that felt like dry ice, like a grease fire, a lightning bolt. And Voldemort’s cold fury and dry pleasure at hurting him. It was being leveraged against him, channeling smoothly through the link between them that Harry could not block out, setting every one of his nerves on fire.
He knew what pain was. He’d experienced the Cruciatus curse, had his bones broken, his loved ones killed. But this was not aimed at his body or his emotions, it slid past them all into the essence of who Harry was, with all the cold fury that was Voldemort’s soul, into Harry’s warm and intact one. This was an Occlumency master reaching across their connection to hurt him. Harry was screaming before he realized it, the sound ripping out of his throat.
As Harry’s pain grew, Voldemort’s pleasure and confidence grew.
It felt different-- much different than when Voldemort had sought to influence him using their connection, and his aborted attempts to possess him. Voldemort had changed, he was… He was direct and cold and calculating, in a way he normally only could be when it wasn’t Harry.
Harry. His voice, icy and calm, overlaid every inch of pain that had not let up. He twisted his hold on Harry’s mind, as his fury brightened at the mere mention of his former enemy’s name. Harry went silent with pain. I know you destroyed my horcruxes. The Dark Lord’s fury reached crescendo, and Harry could do nothing but try and hold on and endure it.
Ron and Hermione were on either side of him holding him, but Harry wasn’t aware of them. Every inch of him was in a fire so intense their grips went unnoticed. He had to fight back, he had to do something— hadn’t he rejected Voldemort’s grip on him before? But not like this, not with Voldemort calm and calculated while Harry panicked and twisted.
Voldemort stabbed into him again, and Harry had the sense that this was easy for him.
I know they destroyed my horcruxes. And Harry’s fear increased, as he understood intuitively what Voldemort meant. Someone had to suffer for what had been done, and if Harry couldn’t be killed, someone would replace him. His rage and defensiveness reared up, a bolt of love that pushed back Voldemort and the pain, if only for a moment.
He sensed Voldemort’s surprise, and then annoyance.
Harry realized what had happened, what had changed, why Dumbledore had always wanted to keep the secret of what he was from everyone, including Harry.
“He’s not afraid of me anymore.” He croaked, clutching Ron and Hermione as he struggled to stay above the surface of the Dark Lord’s attack. “He’s using our connection.”
Voldemort had come to his house when he was just an infant intent on wiping out him and his entire bloodline. He had put so much store by the prophecy that he had never heard it in its entirety but devoted himself totally to Harry’s destruction. He had gotten rid of his own wand when he had thought it would not be powerful enough to take on his great arch nemesis. He had closed off his thoughts to the boy because he thought Harry might overwhelm him. Harry was an unknown, the incalculable variable, the wild card the side of the Light kept to destroy him in the end. The prophesied, fated hero of the story.
But Voldemort wasn’t afraid anymore.
Dumbledore’s chosen one was nothing more than a boy. A pawn Dumbledore had meant to get rid of at the first available opportunity. A tool that should have been the Dark Lord’s to use turned against him. There was no threat, no danger, at least not from the boy.
And the connection that the Dark Lord had once seen as poisonous, a potential vulnerability to be exploited in himself, was now nothing more than the connection between a master and his tool. Harry’s pain increased as his fear did.
I know what you are. Voldemort said, furiously. He was savage in his anger, pushing Harry to the limits of his endurance, his sanity. His words, when they were spat out across their souls that were entwined together was a condemnation. Horcrux.
Although he had only been inside the office once while Albus Dumbledore was a headmaster, he remembered the interview with Dumbledore vividly. The silver bearded headmaster had sat across from him in a whimsically carved chair, offered him a bowl of sweets and tea, and knew somehow that the Dark Lord had not come seeking a job as a teacher. Had Severus Snape been loyally reporting to him even then? Had he had powers the Dark Lord did not know, that he had been able to peer into his mind? Had this been the place where he had been when Dumbledore had decided to keep it hidden, all the truth that he knew of the prophecy so that the boy could die, so that he could die?
He wondered if anyone else had been trusted with the truth. Had Dumbledore let Severus Snape in on the secret that there was an alternative that would allow his child charge to survive? Or was he as much a pawn of the old wizard as the boy was? No, Dumbledore would not have trusted Severus Snape, anymore than the Dark Lord would have trusted such a valuable secret to him, for if Snape had known there was an alternative, he might have chosen to save the boy. The last move Dumbledore had made after his death had been Severus Snape’s discrete message to send the boy to his death, but it had been all in vain. In the game of chess that they had been playing all their life, Voldemort finally had the upper hand, because now he knew , he had seen it all for himself, it was unveiled before him. He started to laugh.
“I could almost admire him,” he said aloud. “For the audacity of making me want to kill my own Horcrux.”
“Wh-what?” Trelawney’s voice was hoarse and her face covered in tears and snot. He wanted to kill her, but he took a page out of Dumbledore’s book instead. Her eyes were still clear, unseeing and uncomprehending, as Avery took her body to the dungeons where they kept those the Dark Lord deemed useful enough to survive. He summoned his followers to the Great Hall of Hogwarts and stood before them in the dusty wreck of the school he had once called home. There was not a twitch of a finger nor the blink of an eye as they waited for their Lord to speak. He let his eyes sweep over the best of them, the worst of them, the cowards that had joined after he had risen again and those that had remained loyal to him since his earliest days.
“It is my deepest regret that we have gathered here today in our greatest numbers yet,” he said softly. “And yet I have no opponents to offer you. For I fear that victory is closer to being in our grasp than it ever has been before.” His thin, white lips curved in the slightest smile. The wizards and witches gathered before him did not dare rejoice yet at his words, but were held still and hypnotized by his cold voice. “Yes, my dear followers… I see clearly now that victory is within our grasp. Our enemies flee before us following the guidance of a child and a small group of disgraced exiles. We hold the ministry in our palm. The goblins bend the knee to our superior strength and our inferior allies, the werewolves and the dementors, rally to our great cause."
His bare feet were elegant and pale against the stone floor, glowing as though they didn’t belong in the world. He strode before them, the front lines of his army, his followers, his subordinates. He saw their strengths and weaknesses as though it was written out on each of their faces. He saw their fear of him and greed for what he could offer them.
He was pleased with what he saw on the faces of some of his newest followers, the purebloods who had come over France, Greece, Bulgaria, and Russia when they’d heard tales of his growing power. These pampered scions of wealthy old pureblood families wanted more than just a return of their former prestige amongst wizarding kind— they wanted power, superiority, and the chance to enact cruelty. Their faces had a delicate but weak bone structure. Their clothes were some years out of style and slightly tattered. Just as greedy but less confident in their place in his cohort were the English wizards who had either denounced him or come of age during his exile. They were less driven by ideology than the new European recruits, but he sensed in them just as much vicious ambition. The werewolves, giants, hags, and monsters he’d recruited were already impatient for the rewards he’d promised them, and were widely disliked and distrusted by the wizards. The minority in the numbers before him were his original followers, which included Bellatrix, Avery, Crabbe, Goyle, Nott, and Luscius Malfoy.
“The time for our enemies to bend the knee and beg forgiveness is long past.” Voldemort’s clear, soft voice rang clearly across the corridors of the school for each of his followers to hear. “Our offers of clemency have been rudely refused, and I can only assume they comprehend the full consequence of refusing to swear allegiance to our cause. I consider their lives forfeit.” Fenrir Greyback could not hold back a growl of blood thirsty pleasure. One of the European purebloods spat at the ground. Voldemort smiled coolly and let his eyes once again drift across his numbers.
“Yes, each filthy traitor who has refused our new age of blood purity and strength has chosen the path of weakness and impurity. They have chosen a way of life that we cannot allow to continue if we are to build a magical society unrivaled by any other in the world or in history. They must be eliminated.” He let the moment build. “However, I see a great number of wizards, witches, and creatures before me. Far more than the other side’s numbers, and I should hope, far stronger. Even if you were all competent, there simply are not enough heads still attached to members of the Order for each and every one of you to present one.”
Reliably, Bellatrix Lestrange stepped forward. Her dark, lustful eyes seemed to feed off the energy in the room and his presence. “I’ll bring you the heads of every little student who ran and their families too, my lord, if you desire it.”
“I hope you can. Anyone capable of presenting the head of a dissident brings honor not only to themselves but to their ancestry and noble lineage as well. The new government of purity and righteousness will be built by those capable of defending it, those capable of weeding out the ingrates and impotent among our ranks, those that can penetrate our enemy forces' flanks and kill the rebels. Those among you who can’t, well…” He smiled.
He need not have made it any more clear to his followers. Fear had disappeared, and lust for power filled its place in their hearts. They looked around at their neighbors suspiciously, and imagined taking a place of high status above all of them, with rewards of gold, glory and position. The competition to take on the last of the order had begun, and only for the price of a head would any position be rewarded.
“Seek out those that have escaped.” Voldemort said quietly. “Kill them if they resist, take them alive for questioning if you can, but leave Harry Potter alive for me.”
When the pain finally let up, Harry found himself looking up at the eggshell blue sky of early dawn and wondering how many hours had passed. Ron was supporting his back on the cold stones of the mountain, Hermione was holding his head, brushing her hands through his hair and making murmuring, soothing sounds. He was suddenly aware of the cold, and the sweat, and his body, trembling slightly.
“You’re awake,” Hermione’s voice trembled slightly. “Are you… okay?”
He tried to sit up, but it took more from him than he thought it would and Ron did most of it. He was okay. As okay as he’d ever been. Only cold and frightened and weaker than he would like to admit. He wanted nothing more than to lay his head back down. He did not move further than to push himself up on his elbow, because he was afraid he wouldn’t be able to hold himself up.
“I’m okay. Sorry. How… How long has it been?”
“Hours, mate.” Ron said, relieved. He swallowed. “We were afraid to move you.” The campsite had been set up already and the large fire bounced merrily and flickered in the wind. Still, the three of them didn’t move, waiting for whatever attack would launch next. “What did he do?”
Harry cleared his throat, which was raw. “I don’t know, I think he’s gotta be using Occlumency, I can’t stop him… He’s angry, really angry. And he knows what I am now, so he’s using our connection.”
“He can’t do that, can he?” Hermione asked nervously. “You’ve repelled him before, right?”
“He can’t possess me.” Harry hoped that was still true. “He’s just trying to hurt me.”
“Why’d he stop?”
Harry thought there must have been something to distract the Dark Lord, and knew it wasn’t a good sign that he had left so casually, as if this was just him passing the time. He could return to the fun whenever he wanted. Harry just shook his head to say he didn’t know.
“What are we going to do if it… starts again?” Hermione looked at Ron and they seemed to be sharing some private conversation Harry was left out of.
“What?” He asked sharply.
“I wrote to Professor McGonagall in the notebook she gave us. I didn’t tell her anything!” She was quick to assure. “Just that…” Her voice broke down, and it hurt Harry to see how exhausted she looked. Her eyes were as red as Ron’s were, her nerves shattered. “He was attacking you. That you were in pain.”
Harry shook his head. “There’s nothing that she can do. It’s fine. He can’t kill me.”
“She suggested if it continued that there were ways in which a person could be,” Hermione bit her lip. “Put into a coma. If it becomes bad enough.”
Harry looked down at his hands. He wanted to say no, but he thought maybe that was selfish. If Voldemort could leave him shaking and helpless on the ground at any time, he would just slow Ron and Hermione down. And maybe it would be preferable to the agony that he had just endured.
No, Voldemort’s voice interjected smoothly. I don’t think so. Harry had only a moment to give Hermione a startled look before he let out a sound like a whimper and clutched his head. The pain consumed him and left him no room for any other thought. He had no idea how much time had passed before Voldemort deigned to speak again.
I’ll make it stop, he said silkily. If you ask the little Mudblood what mountain you’re on. I promise not to hurt you, Harry. I’ll even let them live, as a treat. Harry’s eyes flashed. He felt the lie through their connection, clear as if it had come off his own tongue. The waves of Voldemort’s magic became tinged with annoyance and impatience.
But Harry had woken up enough to be able to take a few gasps of fresh air and say, “He saw it. He can see our campsite. He’s looking through my eyes.”
His friends exchanged worried glances.
“But he doesn’t know where we are.” He couldn’t keep the triumphant relief out of his voice and felt Voldemort’s fury build like a fire with gasoline tossed on it, electrocuting his blood through hundreds of miles away.
He came back to consciousness when the sky was starting to transform into a gentle evening. His friends had grown sick of listening to him screaming, and were talking softly between themselves. Their best blanket in the backpack was softening Harry’s head and covered in his sweat. It took a few moments for him to be able to raise his head, and even that took almost all of his strength. Ron had his arms wrapped around Hermione with his head on his shoulder. Their red eyes were exhausted but attentive to him.
“Do we need to leave?” Ron asked in a low voice.
“No,” Harry shook his head. “No point. All he knows is that we’re close to a mountain.”
“And that the sun is close to setting right now.” Hermione pointed out. “He could use that to narrow down what region we’re in.”
“Don’t give him any hints,” Harry groaned. “He’s probably listening in.”
Ron seemed lost in thought. His fingers were intertwined with Hermoine's. The way they seemed to fit against each other so naturally made him ache. Seeing Ginny had ignited hunger in him, like a starving man set before a feast, and Harry wished he had some to sit beside him and hold his hand. Instead, he was sitting by himself, with only the bitter pleasure of not being in pain to comfort him.
Fear was an expression Harry was so used to seeing on his friends face, he wasn’t surprised when Ron looked over at him, alarmed. “Hey. Do you remember when we were in the vault? And you...” He looked around fearfully. “I mean, you just had a feeling about where it was in the room, right? You don’t suppose...” Hermione straightened up in Ron’s arms.
He didn’t have a good response to that. It wasn’t that simple. He had been so close to the other horcrux already, so desperate to find it, and it had called out to him… He tugged on the line between him and the Dark Lord which before might have allowed a wave of feeling to pour in across their bond without the Dark Lord knowing it. He needed to know where he was and if he was coming, but the line lay silent between them.
“I don’t know.”
They had no answer, only pulled tighter to each other.
In the quiet, Harry finally had a moment to think through what they would have to do to survive and what needed to be done. Could Harry continue to endure the pain? Was he just weighing down his friends, who would struggle to survive enough as it was, without an invalid or comatose friend with them?
The task ahead of them was simple. Dumbledore had made it clear.
The remaining horcruxes were Nagini and Harry Potter. Kill them, and they could kill Voldemort. That was the job that needed to be finished before the world could be at peace.
Selfishly, he wished he hadn’t come back to see his friends. When he was with them, it was easy to imagine that there was a world where they could all survive. Hermione would find a solution. Ron would help them fight off the Deatheaters. The Order would fight valiantly and win. They could work together to finish off Voldemort, but that was not what Dumbledore had planned, and he knew if there was a way, any way at all, for Harry to survive this, Dumbledore would have been the one to know the way.
Seeing them again had only distracted him. His task now was the same as it ever had been. He looked down at his hands, which were still covered in the dust that had been Hogwarts walls, and blood. From whom, he didn’t know. Harry touched the inside of his arm, where blue veins were visible on Harry’s pale and thin wrist.
Goosebumps raised on his arms. He wrapped his arms around himself. He could not imagine… in spite of all the heartache and fear he’d felt, he’d never considered that a possibility. Suicide by his own hands. He’d always been able to imagine a future worth living for. Even now, he could not imagine cutting himself, even though he had done and endured far worse than bleeding to death.
But he’d have to, wouldn’t he?
A wave of Voldemort’s anger passed over him. No, he said to Harry coldly. Did you think I would let you? Did you think you could do it without my knowing? I know the truth now, and you’ll never take away one of my horcruxes again. He sunk into Harry’s mind. Harry had only a moment to regret that he would have to endure it again before the pain numbed his mind to any conscious thought.
There was only Voldemort and his magic and hatred, lighting up their connection. Harry could feel it, in the feelings Voldemort couldn’t disguise, his hatred for his own horcrux.
Still, Voldemort’s voice dripped like honey, overlaying his distaste.
Poor boy.
I had no idea the ways in which Dumbledore mistreated you. To think he intended all this time to kill you. It is too cruel of him.
Harry felt his relish in saying this across their connection.
So bold, and so cruel of him, to pit you against your own master… surely he knew you’d never stand a chance.
Reveal yourself to me, Harry, and I will offer you a place in our world.
It was not Dumbledore that had killed Harry’s parents, his godfather, and shattered the peace of Harry’s world, who had haunted him and manipulated him and tried to destroy him and his friends and everything he cared about all his life. Dumbledore, for all his flaws, saw the world in a way like Harry did. Saw people as worth saving, and worth protecting, and would do what it would take to get that done. Harry felt Voldemort’s presence, sinking like claws into his soul, and pushed back. Pushed back with all his hatred of him, and his love for the world Voldemort sought to destroy. He felt Voldemort rear back, stung by Harry’s own soul.
Dumbeldore wasn’twrong. You haven’t won yet.
The words existed in Harry like he’d spoken them aloud, and he pushed harder, feeling the contours of their connection, where their minds meet and melded on the edges of their consciousnesses. He pushed into Voldemort, and saw, for only a second, the fireplace glowing hotly in the corner, the follower on his knees, Nagini slithering down his arm before their connection closed tightly around him and he was abruptly back on the cold mountainside.
“Are you all right?” The sun had painted the sky behind the mountain in a collage of purples and oranges. Once again, hours had passed without Harry knowing. Ron was asleep on one of their blankets. Hermione, keeping watch, had noticed him coming back to himself. With her legs pulled close, Harry could see how thin his friend had become in the recent months. Her hair was tangled. Harry was breathing hard, thinking once again about the thin purple lines on his wrist, and the plan Dumbledore had given him.
Who knew how much time he had before Voldemort struck again.
“Yeah.” Harry cleared his throat. He knew what he had to do. “I need to look at something in the bag. A book.” It was now or never.
She went to hand it to him, but hesitated, before his fingers touched it. “You’re sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah.” Harry said, “I’m fine.” Their eyes met, and Harry could see her fear, her concern, and it made it harder, but he made a grimacing smile. “I’ll be alright, Hermione.”
In the bag, they had stashed the basilisk fangs they had found in the chamber of secrets. They had meant for it to be used to kill another Horcrux. Harry grabbed one in his hand, and hesitated, looking over at his friends. Hermione’s frightened, tired eyes watched the poisonous fang in his hand and her hand on Ron’s arms tightened. Ron was waking up now, his bleary eyes finding Harry in the cool mountain air.
Voldemort was inches away from the boundary of Harry’s consciousness, looking for a moment of weakness, and Harry knew he couldn’t last. Holding out mentally against Voldemort required the focus and love that summoning a fully formed patronus needed, and he would have to maintain that every second he stayed above the Dark Lord’s influence. He could hold out for minutes, but not for days.
Looking at his friends, thinking that it was the last time he’d ever see them, it was easy to keep that flame burning in his soul. It was for them that he was doing it.
He was not a coward, at least not when it came to doing what he had to do to protect them.
He smiled at Hermione, knowing what he had to do to keep everyone he loved safe. There was really no point in thinking about himself or a future he might have otherwise had. All he had to do was the mission Dumbledore had set for him.
“Harry,” Ron’s voice was gravelly, something already devastated in his eyes as he reached out with Hermione clutching his arm harder than she ever had before. “Harry, don’t! ”
Harry turned, and left them behind on the cool mountainside for the last time, knowing that Albus Dumbledore would approve of it, and that Sirius and his dead parents would understand why he’d have to do it. Apparition squeezed his already weakened body.
It was the land outside the quidditch field that Harry had chosen. It was where he’d walked with Sirius, schemed with Ron and Hermione and practiced flying in the early morning light. He could see Hogwarts in the distance, the lake, and Hagrid’s cabin. This had been the site of his happiest memories, where he had grown up with his friends. He was glad he had the chance to see it one more time. In the dusk, everything seemed clean and soft. He readied the basilisk poison above his wrist, keeping his aim steady and his head clear and focused.
It would only take a second and there was no cure for basilisk venom, besides phoenix tears.
The pain warned him first. The thin, pale white lightning shaped scar on his forehead burned as it had hours ago. The pain tried to overcome the love he felt, but he was still strong with memories and a clear focus. When Harry heard the air snap the pain had not sent him to his knees as it ought to have, and he had his wand out--
“Protego!” Harry shouted as he turned to face the Dark Lord.
He was taller and ghostlier than Harry remembered. His pale skin seemed to glow in the faint light still peeking through the Dark forest, but that was nothing compared to the way his slitted eyes glowed. Those bloody, albino red eyes were locked onto Harry without humor or fear, like a hungry snake, and his bare feet moved smoothly over the cool grass. His spell might have rebounded, but that did not matter, because that long, dark wand was moving through the air again and Harry had to empty everything in his mind except the mindless fear and rage that kept him moving.
Draco’s wand wouldn’t fight for him the way his holly and phoenix wand had. He managed to throw a curse back after dodging to the side, years of defense against the dark arts practice making it instinctual, but after the first spell was deflected, Voldemort carelessly flung another spell at him, and another one. He was wordless and frightening, his red eyes brighter than Harry had ever seen them in the setting sun. Harry felt horror welling up inside of him, and then could focus on nothing else but shield charm after shield charm, lightning quick, as Voldemort took step after step barefoot on cold grass, his wand moving faster than a fencer’s, his eyes only on Harry.
Every time Harry managed to fling a curse towards Voldemort after avoiding or deflecting five of Voldemort’s, Voldemort did not even bother to side step them. He was getting closer and closer to Harry, even though Harry had been physically retreating all the while. His stumbling steps weren’t half as long as Voldemort’s predatory stride. Frustration welled up inside of him. He wouldn’t win, not like this, there was no way, there was only--
Harry turned in that magical moment when he had a moment between Voldemort’s curses, it was less than a second but it was enough for Harry to bring a place to his mind and turn on his heels.
A snap of magic constricted Harry’s lungs and then he was at the Weasley’s house, where he’d spent days with Ron and Ginny. The family that had welcomed him in had always been moving, speaking, sending spells left and right. The house was never quiet or empty or lacking in the smell of fresh food. Besides Hogwarts, it was the closest he felt to home. Now, the gate to the house stood empty and the chickens Mrs. Weasley tended to so carefully ventured far outside the yard. The old Barren stood empty and ruined with a hole broken through the kitchen, exposing the warm interior to the cooling evening air.
The basilisk fang was pale and gleaming in the evening light, still sharp as a saber, and with a slightly wet glint on its tip. He had to do it quickly. He knew he was still being stalked, he could feel Voldemort’s focus over their connection. He pressed the tip onto his arm, where it had stabbed him when he had been just a boy, and felt its sharpness for only a second--
“Accio Fang!” The Dark Lord put all his magic into that one spell as he touched the Earth outside the Barren, and the world contracted at the sound of his voice, teacups shattering off shelves, the wooden house groaning as it moved towards him. His voice echoed through the garden and the basilisk fang whipped out of Harry’s hand to him. It gave Harry the second he needed to pull out his wand and shout--
“Stupify!” The Dark Lord had to dodge it, and then again as Harry threw out another one, but then they were back at it, whipping spell after spell towards each other, mindless of anything else but the one person they hated more than anyone.
Magic thickened in the air between them, suffocatingly hot, like sulfur and electricity. The harder they pressed against each other, the more the vast differences in their age and experience became apparent. The harder Harry fought, the more comfortable Voldemort became. There were spells Voldemort sent casually his way that he had never heard or seen before, like a curse that made a sound like a massive, ear-splitting gong next to Harry’s ear that sent him stumbling. Harry’s natural reflexes dodging Bludgers were the only thing that saved him as the muddy ground of the garden turned into steel chains around his feet.
He cast his mind around as the Dark Lord advanced, only five paces away from where Harry fought, much closer than he had been ast Hogwarts. The last spell he used was one the Half-Blood Prince had taught him, that had had simply the explanation to distract underneath it.
“Incinarea Torro!” Flames that were cold to the touch lit up around Harry and smoke exploded in the air, whipping between him and Voldemort. It blocked the enemies from each other’s sight a second before Harry dodged Voldemort’s last spell and stepped into Hogsmeade. He was panting hard. His knees had begun to shake at some point, but he was not sure when. Hogsmeade, he thought furiously at himself, the most recognizable wizarding site next to Hogwarts. He would have to leave immediately, to a place Voldemort had never been before, somewhere Voldemort couldn’t follow, a mundane place, a muggle place that he would consider beneath him, that Voldemort wouldn’t recognize and had never been--
Harry was already turning and disappearing as Voldemort stepped into Hogsmeade, a second after him.
The playground in Little Whinging was empty, and quiet. Harry kept his wand drawn, thinking, scouring his memory, breathing hard. When the Dark Lord didn’t appear after a minute, he took a second to take a deep breath. His knees were still shaking. Adrenaline that had pushed him through was leaving his exhausted body wrecked, but there was no time to rest. Voldemort had hovered outside of Little Whinging, waiting for him to turn seventeen. Hedwig had died not miles from here. He was aware that Voldemort was probably listening in on his thoughts as he stood there, and that it would not take him much longer to pinpoint the exact location Harry stood. He needed time more than anything else, now that the basilisk fang was gone. He needed just a few moments to think of what to do.
He would have to find somewhere only a muggleborn would know that Voldemort would never step foot. Further away from where he stood, a young muggle boy stared at Harry, open-mouthed and aghast. Harry didn’t look back at the boy as he cast glances over his shoulder, his mind working hard.
His head ached as Voldemort prodded at him through their connection.
If he attacked Harry mentally at the same time as physically, as he knew Voldemort could, Harry knew he wouldn’t last a second, so he summoned up all the focus he had left and envisioned his parents with him, talking with him, as though Voldemort was a dementor that a stag could scare away. Voldemort’s hatred and desperation battled with Harry’s resolve.
There was one way to end this. One way for him to truly hurt the Dark Lord. Without the basilisk fang, he couldn’t think of any option that was open to him, any option that would definitely kill a human horcrux. He had no confidence Gryffindor’s sword would appear for the task. He had to find something to kill himself with.
A crack of air like lightning, and then the world shook around him with the force of Voldemort's magic as the Dark Lord shouted in the open air “Stupify!” His slitted red eyes were triumphant on Harry.
The grass ceased swaying, the merry-go-round shuttered to a halt, but Harry’s magic was there, burning just as hot, and his wand was up, the word protego echoing soundlessly into his magic as it came up just a second before Voldemort’s spell hit. The collusion of his shield and Voldemort’s spell knocked Harry off his feet and sent him sprawling through the grass.
He kicked off to the side an inch out of range of Voldemort’s next spell, and was up, with a destination barely in mind--
Pain hit him as he landed on his left foot, but he didn’t have a second to think about it.
The cafe where the pretty girl had given him her phone number was closed and dark. Across the way, a train beeped in a sedate, high pitched tone. Harry saw his reflection in the dim windows of the cafe, a much thinner and frightened reflection than he had had a year ago. His green eyes were round and anxious and his face was pale. A portly muggle woman was staring at him much in the same way the boy had, but he could not stop to worry about her. The beeping continued in a steady, slow way. The underground train would be leaving soon. Harry spelled the cafe’s door open and walked out limping on his one foot. He did not look at the muggle woman who stumbled back frantically.
Better to stay on the move. Harry knew the trains well. He’d spent an entire summer keeping well away from the Dursley’s by losing himself in the muggle’s underground maze. He didn’t look to see which direction he was going or what the station name was. If he couldn’t see where he was going, neither could Voldemort.
He felt Voldemort’s frustration and smiled grimly.
Taking in the sight of the boarding dusty and blood smeared teenager, a few muggles made a quick exit as the doors were just closing. Harry couldn’t fault them for it, and was relieved there were a few people less for him to worry about.
He sat down in a seat, because his legs wouldn’t support him for a second longer and took off his left shoe. He kept his wand in his hand and his eyes sweeping from one corner of the train to the next. He hadn’t lost any toes, he was happy to find, but he had splinched half of his foot into a bloody mess. The inch-wide line where half of his foot had arrived late went right down the middle of the length of his foot, but he put his shoe back on, wincing as he did it, relieved that it wasn’t anything permanent. The passengers who had not disembarked, on seeing this, exited quickly at the next stop.
Exhaustion weighed him down. He wished Hermoine was here to think of the next step, or Ron to watch his back as his eyes began to slide close.
If he knew Voldemort, which he thought he did better than most, he knew his first instinct would be to find and defeat Harry by himself. He was more than capable of it and he wouldn’t want his followers getting in his way and messing things up, as they so often did. He would likely be scouring the subway station by station, tearing through each train with his predatory patience.
Harry was too exhausted to line the speeding train with defensive spells. If Voldemort came, he would leave, right away. As the minutes ticked by and Voldemort didn’t show even after what must have been an hour, it became harder for Harry to keep his head up.
He hadn’t slept or eaten in days. With the energy he had left, he whispered “Augmenti” into his palm and drank, glancing wearily around as he did.
He couldn’t think of where he would go after this. A supermarket? Muggle bar? He couldn’t imagine a single one he’d been to in years. He could only think of Hogwarts and the Burrow, hundreds of miles away and empty. He wanted to go back. He wanted to see Ginny again, wanted Fred alive, and Ron and Hermione by his side.
He knew what he should have done was get out and wait patiently for a train to come and… it made his stomach twist to think about it. It seemed much easier to stab himself with a basilisk fang than to jump in front of a train. The violent image of his body being crushed made his throat constrict. Worse than that, was the dim feeling that he had no choice in the matter. Dumbledore had given him a plan, it was just that…
He didn’t want to die. Not here. Like this.
He was only seventeen and no matter what Dumbledore had planned for him, he really didn’t want to die.
Maybe if he could disembark and lose himself in the muggle’s London, he could find a place Voldemort wouldn’t know, set up the defenses and finally sleep. In the morning things would look better and he could… Harry rubbed his eyes, which had gone blurry. His scar was burning, a low thrum. He was human, and his strength was exhaustible. He wanted to lay down on the train seat and close his eyes. The only thing that kept him from complete exhaustion was the ache in his head, which stabbed at him whenever he got too comfortable.
The burning increased, and Harry let out an involuntary whimper as he clutched his forehead. The pain grew, but he didn’t have Ron or Hermione to support him this time. He clutched the metal of the seat and tried not to scream.
People had gotten on and off the train while he tried to master his emotions and drive Voldemort out, but Voldemort was cool and focused, and he intensified his efforts whenever Harry sought to regroup and focus his thoughts. His bloody foot and exhaustion were distant thoughts to the scorching fire consuming his head and his thoughts. Tell me where you are. Tell me where you are and you can rest, Harry.
His voice was glacier cold and confident in Harry’s head, like he expected the boy who lived to give up any moment. Do not try my patience.
If Voldemort got to him when he was like this, he was finished. He had to focus. He had to stay alert and ready to fight. Fear and defiance forced him to his feet. Dumbledore wouldn’t have given up.
He switched trains, to confuse things, in case Voldemort tracked down the cafe where Harry had started and worked back from there. He took only a second to glance at the map, but it didn’t matter, he had confirmed for himself that the subway was too vast and complicated for him to figure out, let alone the old wizard. There were a dozen lines, hundreds of stops, and at each location many hundreds more trains were moving constantly.
He didn’t know how long he stood on that train, swaying unsteadily, before it reached its last stop on the way. The exit doors blinked and Harry knew he’d have to move beyond the subway station. If Voldemort decided it wasted too much time to find him himself, he’d enlist his followers' support, and the subway would be flooded with wizards Harry stood little chance against. He left with another muggle, who was typing into her phone and not making eye contact with him. The stairs leading up to the streets of London seemed miles and hours away with one foot still leaving a trail of blood behind on the floor and his legs wobbly with exhaustion.
Voldemort had felt calm and focused while he was torturing Harry. He had been wearing out his prey as he searched and stalked for him, it was a matter of necessity that Harry be tortured, not pleasure, although it was that too, for the Dark Lord. Now, Voldemort’s calm was shifting into a more predatory anticipation and excitement.
How? What had he missed? Was he a second away from showing up? Should he flee, Apparate and hope Voldemort wouldn’t read enough of his thoughts to decode where the location he went to was?
A cold shiver went down his back. At how many points did London’s subway system turn into a dead end?
His wand was in his hand as Voldemort’s pleasure became a sharp, heady thing, like a gust of perfume filling Harry’s head numbly and he was whipping around, shouting “Protego!” but Voldemort was ready again, and it was all Harry could do to move out of the way of the second spell, landing on his bad foot as he did so to barely miss it. Harry stumbled, almost falling to the ground before catching himself once again. He shot a spell into the air the Dark Lord didn’t both defending against. Barefoot and pale underneath the lights, he was a figment of Harry’s nightmares, staring him down with a smile while a train roared in the background. He took a step closer, and another.
Steadily. Patiently.
He was walking right on top of the blood trail his quarry had left behind on the cold cement ground. Harry backed up to the start of the staircase, but he didn’t seem to be able to move fast enough and the gap between them began to close. Voldemort pressed his advantage, showing no sign of tiring or slowing down. His spells were coming out almost indulgently slow for Harry to deflect as his pleasure and excitement grew. He was still smiling as Harry cast an offensive spell that fell harmless to his right side.
The Dark Lord’s spells began coming faster. Harry grit his teeth and did his best to protect himself. Their duel exploded bricks from the walls and sent muggles screaming and scattering as they fled up the steps. The smell of magic was thick in the air, and the fluorescent lights of the train station flickered weakly as their duel carried on.
He had time, he thought. Time to escape still.
Until he felt locks, thin and black, squeeze down like handcuffs on his wrists, and bricks broke apart in order to reach up and grasp his ankles. They locked him in place for the Dark Lord’s approach. He had not seen them move towards him, too absorbed in trying to fend off his parents’ murderers. Voldemort had not had to speak the spell into existence and his eyes gleamed with satisfaction when Harry pulled ineffectually at the bindings. They tightened around Harry’s wand arm no matter how hard he strained against the wrist restraints, but their restraint on him wasn’t complete, as the chains were still in the process of magically growing and thickening.
He came closer. Of course the Dark Lord meant to end this without a word on his part. It wasn’t hard for the great wizard. Not hard at all. To deal with a child. He took his time, continuing to fend off Harry’s spells, drawing close enough that Harry could see the rabid excitement in his eyes as well as feel it in his bones. The restraints strengthened again.
Voldemort pointed his wand at Harry and said softly but clearly, “ Expelliarmus.” The wand he had been using clattered loudly to the floor. He hadn’t been able to move his hand, let alone his fingers, with how tightly the restraints held him.
There was something indescribably cruel about having to look into Voldemort’s eyes and stand at his mercy after all he had put Harry through. He was meant to be the one to defeat him, the one to stand up in defiance to him. This was the man who had stepped over James Potter’s body and killed Lily Evans Potter. In the attempt to save Harry from his parent’s murderer, Sirius Black had died. And then Madeye Moody, Dumbledore, Severus Snape, Hedwig, Fred Weasley, Remus Lupin and Tonks.
Did he think Harry would give up just like that?
The brief seconds of imprisonment inflamed Harry and the world exploded back into vivid, furious focus. Voldemort meant to end it like that, hunting him down like an exhausted animal, like he was beneath the dignity of being taken seriously. Like he was just some teenager. Not the enemy he’d been fighting so hard all these years that had come closer than anyone to taking him down. Harry’s temper seared, hot as a sun in his stomach, and his magic exploded out.
It didn’t come from his wand.
It was his rage and raw magic that burst open the locks around his ankles.
Voldemort was there, right in front of his face, furious and lunging for him when Harry turned his back on him and began to feel the suction of Apparition. Voldemort’s finger trailed behind him, reaching for the place where Harry’s coat was just as the boy was gone.
Harry landed hard on a cold, hard stone floor.
Instantly, the chill seeped into his bones and cooled the sweat on his neck. Harry looked frantically around, but he had managed to somehow Apparate without a wand in his hand. It was a place that existed only distantly in his memory. He had remembered how miserable he had felt as an eleven-year old, celebrating his birthday on a cold, drafty stone floor, tucked away on an island he didn’t even know the name of. He’d been able to summon it up in his mind.
The little house’s fireplace now laid cold and unused, and the door that Hagrid had busted open had never been fixed. It hung open to let Harry see the stormy night sky just outside of the door and to feel the lash of wind coming off the ocean. Leaves blew over the dusty concrete floor, and covered the old couch and fireplace. He stood shakily, thinking he might see red eyes appear in the night sky at any moment.
He had lost his wand. There was a sinking pit in his stomach, and the shadows in the cabin seemed to leer at him threateningly.
Pain erupted in his scar, and with it images flashing through his mind without his permission. Harry was kneeling, holding his scar, as his own memories overcame him. “We’ll have no more blasted letters out here,” Vernon’s purple face spat out. “No, we will not have any unnatural nonsense out where they can’t find us.” Aunt Petunia’s tight face as she shepherded Harry into the car, Dudley whining the entire way. There had been a ferry, thirty minute drive from their house, but Harry had not been paying attention to the name of it, because while Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia were distracted, Dudley was using his thick fists to press Harry up against a wall and the two of them were struggling with each other. “No dinner until you’ve behaved yourself,” Aunt Petunia’s thin face curled with cruel pleasure. Harry was laying on cold cement while Dudley slept on the soft couch, drawing a birthday cake into the dust on the floor. The blessed blast on the door and Hagrid’s wide and friendly face. “What? Don’t you know? No one told you? You’re a wizard , Harry.” Harry had clutched Hagrid’s thick black coat tightly as the flying motorcycle took up off the little island, he had looked down to see it was one of three more before the islands disappeared into the clouds...
Pain that had sent him staggering to the floor let up as the memories closed themselves away. His forehead ached dully, as he was used to it aching, but the memories were the thing stinging at his eyes. Yes, everything about that night was familiar to him, as if it had happened only yesterday. Here was the place Harry had discovered his parents had not been killed in a car crash, but rather in a war. He had found out about the world he belonged to here.
He staggered to his feet. Voldemort had clues as to where Harry was, but somehow Harry didn’t think he’d be able to Apparate to this little island in the Atlantic as well as he had to the other places. Limping and wandless, Harry dragged himself over to the open door.
Night had finally fallen in the time they had been fighting, and much like the night of his eleventh birthday, a storm was rolling in over the tiny island. Wind lashed at the only ragged tree on the island, bending its thin trunk over and moving in between loose stones in the old house. Within moments of standing near the door Harry was drenched and heavy with rainwater, and shivering beneath his heavy coat. Rain pressed his black hair to his forehead and droplets started to fall into his eyes. A bolt of pain from his scar made him wince. He leaned against the edge of the door frame with his weight on his good foot, thinking and struggling with fear, exhaustion and pain. His coat was sopping wet, a heavy burden on his shoulders, which had grown thin and weak after months on the run.
The weight of it made him think and remember--
It doesn’t matter how long you try to escape, came that soft voice in his head. It was as clear as if it had sounded from behind him, and Harry looked back fearfully.
The cabin was still dark. The wind was the only thing hissing through the old wooden boards..
You’ve lost your wand, came another smooth hiss. The Golden Boy. Alone and weak. Once I have you it won’t be long before I have the rest of the Order, as well. Harry, and now a note of satisfaction was entering that malicious voice. Can’t you see I’ve already won?
He meant to distract Harry, to keep him from doing what he knew he--
Pain engulfed him like a cruciatus curse. He was holding onto his head without thinking. His messy black hair was plastered to him in the cold rain, but he could only feel Voldemort twisting all the feelings of pain he’d ever experienced into his head. His forehead was burning. He stumbled out of the doorway, tripped over an upturned stone and landed hard on one knee. His foot would not support his weight any longer, it shook and twitched viciously when Harry tried to support himself with it, and now his other knee was a bloody mess, but it didn’t matter. He didn’t stand a chance if Voldemort got to him before--
Stay right there, Harry. Soothing bliss poured out from his scar and all of his aches and pain were suddenly gone. Harry felt warm and comfortable, like he was in his four poster bed at Hogwarts with the fireplace blazing in the room and his blankets tucked tightly around him, and that voice took on a silky, singsong quality. All this time on the run fighting, when all you’ve ever really wanted was to be back at Hogwarts… rest, Harry, just for a moment.
There’s no time to rest, said a clear voice in Harry’s head, but it was distant against the exhaustion weighing Harry down and the enormity of the task ahead of him. A shamefully large part of him wanted to do exactly what that voice— Voldemort’s voice, the clear voice said— suggested and fall asleep right where he was. It’s like the Imperius curse, Harry reminded himself, struggling to rise to his hands and knees. He just had to resist it, that was all.
There is no need to fight so hard, that voice came soothingly. It was liquid with charm, and it made Harry remember a younger Tom Riddle that he had met only in memories. You don’t want to do this, Harry. I know you don’t want to, I can see it. Just rest…
But the longer he struggled to limp, the clearer his head got. It was hard to feel bliss when his knee and foot was burning with pain and the wind was whipping his face with tiny pelts of ice and rain. He had not forgotten the hatred he had seen in Voldemort’s eyes and the way his face had twisted into a grin when he’d come close to catching his quarry. The stone pathway was impossible to see in the dark, so he half-limped, and half-crawled his way up the stones. What was left of his unbroken skin was cut on the hard rocks, and he was trembling weakly by the time he made it to the top.
Below him was a twenty foot drop down to the ocean. The water looked black in the rain, except for where the wind whipped furious white waves to crash against the edge of the rock. Jagged rocks poked up from the ocean, but Harry could not make out all of their shapes as they disappeared underneath the swirling waves. He could taste salt on his tongue, washed away in moments by rainwater on his face.
I know you don’t want to do it, came that voice, but there was a hint of alarm, and his scar flared up, this time with pain. Your poor mother wouldn’t want you to do it either, Harry, think of all she sacrificed for you, just to have it all thrown away. Would he hit rocks if he didn’t jump far enough? Hermione Granger will be devastated that you didn’t wait for her to find a solution. Ronald Weasley might never recover from losing two brothers in a night. That soft, soothing bliss washed over him. The cold rain felt like a sauna under its warm, gentle influence. He swayed unsteadily on his feet. Rest now, Harry, you’ve been very exhausted for a long time. Just take a moment to sit down and think about what your mother would want you to do.
Harry opened his eyes. He had not realized they had been closed.
The dark sea was still ahead of him. His coat was still heavy as a rock around his shoulders and pain burned from his head down to his feet. He did not want to look down at the jagged rocks below him, but he made himself. If he moved forward a few steps, the jump would be there, and the cold, dark ocean as well. Those first few steps were easy. He could see clearly the waves of the ocean he was going to die underneath.
He thought about what his mother would have wanted.
She would have wanted him to be brave.
He jumped.