Shadowed

Harry Potter was many things: A wizard, a soldier, an emblem of hope for those who opposed Voldemort. But under all that, he was barely older than a teenager, yet he felt not 22 but eons older. The second Wizarding War had aged him.

He tried to be how he used to be. Everyone remembered the famous Harry Potter as a child who had defeated Voldemort and his accomplices time after time. Harry, who had found the Sorcerer’s Stone, killed the Basilisk, saved Sirius Black, competed in the Triwizard tournament, and survived a killing curse. No matter how hard Harry tried, he couldn’t be the icon he was expected to be. He was a realist surrounded by pessimists. Any sort of optimist he had once had was smothered by the cold shroud of death.

So many were dead. Too many. Every death, every moment of suffering by those cursed, it all fell onto Harry to the point where he felt like he had to make up for pain shouldered by his protectors. Yet, every time he tried to regain the innocent youthfulness that had so intrigued everyone, it was crushed within moments. To smile, he had to be happy. He was not.

Every memory in his mind seemed sprinkled with grins that belonged to those of the dead. Every warm moment became cold the second the face of a deceased popped into view; Harry had experienced the same joys as them, yet one lived unfairly and one died prematurely. At night, he would lie in bed and close his eyes, picturing himself in one of his memories of Hogwarts. The noise of the Yule Ball, overflowing with laughter of fourth years, the tapping of high heels as a group of sixth years ran past, and the distant orchestral piece lulling the waltzers into a state of tranquility.

If Fred and Ron happened to be out of the room the three shared, which they usually were, Harry would pull the phonograph off the shelf, along with a record stashed behind it. The record had been purchased from a muggle store for the specific purpose of helping Hogwarts students learn to dance before the Yule Ball, a lesson that went greatly appreciated.

To further bathe himself in nostalgia, he would put the needle on the record. The Blue Danube would begin to play, the familiarity of the notes surrounding Harry in a whirlwind of flashbacks. It was almost as if he was there again. Blue lighting flooded his vision, and the music was drowned out by the familiar giggling and clicking of heels. The Great Hall was transformed into a world of glitter decorations. Harry looked around in awe at the walls of the Hall. They were covered in sparkling silver frost, with hundreds of garlands of mistletoe and ivy crossing the starry black ceiling. The floor of the Hall was no longer a dull brown, but snow colored marble so pale that Harry wondered if it had somehow been crafted from snow itself.

“Come on!” A voice hissed. “We’re supposed to dance!” At his right stood Parvati Patil, her hand grabbing him frantically. She pulled him into the center of the dance floor, and he caught a giggle on her lips when he nearly tripped over his dress robes. With confidence he greatly admired, Parvati had seized his hands, placed one around her waist, and was holding the other tightly in hers. They began to sway to the music along with the dozens of other couples around them, going steadily with the tide. Parvati was very pretty, Harry noticed, wearing robes of bright pink that made her skin tone look even more vibrant. Her long dark plait was braided with gold, and gold bracelets glimmered at her wrists. When she caught a glimpse of Harry staring at her, she met his eyes and gave a tight lipped smile. His cheeks flushed. He quickly looked away, not wanting to make a wrong impression. Instead, he focused his attention on the other couples around the room. On the edge of the dance floor, Seamus and Dean were waving at him and snickering. Harry rolled his eyes in return. Neville and Ginny were nearby- he could see Ginny wincing frequently as Neville trod on her feet– and Hermione and Krum were dancing so gracefully that Harry wondered if Hermione had studied ballroom dancing beforehand. Ron was pouting on a bench, swigging a bottle of Butterbeer like a miserable drunk. Near the center of the floor, just beside a crowd of Durmstrang boys, were Cho and Cedric. Cho’s gown looked as though it had been crafted with the rest of the Great Hall decorations. The silver fabric swept around her like waves of water as she glided across the floor. It fit her so perfectly, it must’ve been custom made. Harry’s eyes lingered on her body. The dress outlined her bust and waist, creating a beautiful silhouette. Her slim pale hands were on her partner. One rested gently on his shoulder, and the other gripped his hand delicately.

Cedric was wearing a delighted grin which matched that of Cho’s. His footsteps were quick, short and precise, and Harry watched as he threw his head back slightly to laugh at something Cho had said. While laughing, his amber eyes noticed Harry staring at the two. He nodded and smiled politely, then turned back to look at Cho.

The gold of his eyes burnt into Harry’s like molten metal, nearly making him wince. Had Cedric always been so happy? Harry didn’t remember him laughing as much. He didn’t remember much about Cedric; the tanned skin that could only be that of an athlete, the hands that seemed too large for his thin frame, the teeth that were just slightly crooked. And those eyes that had remained open even in death, dull as the ashes of a past fire.

Harry remembered how Cedric’s body had been frozen even before death, from the fear of possibly never getting to return home. His hands hadn’t shaken like Harry’s. Instead, they had been still as stone. His breathing had been faint and regulated, like he was perfectly ready for whatever the two were about to face. He was far more prepared than Harry had been. Yet, before he could even open his mouth to utter a sound, his body had collapsed in a flash of light. His body was as unmoving as before, except without the rise and fall of his broad chest. Those thin lips were slightly parted to reveal the teeth behind them, still ever so slightly crooked. His large hands were palm up against the grass, dwarfing his wand in comparison.

Suddenly, Harry was back with Parvati, spinning around the ball while Cedric danced, just a few feet away, enjoying one of the last moments of his life. Unsurprisingly, Harry didn’t feel like dancing anymore. The entire Yule Ball was a waste of time. While they had been feasting and laughing, Voldemort had been meticulously planning. If they had been focused on the possibility of Voldemort’s return instead of the hope that he was truly gone, would Cedric still be alive? How would the war have changed if Harry was one step ahead instead of one step behind? His mind began to reel as Harry tried to leave Parvati’s arms and walk over to the side of the dance floor. With horror, he realized that he couldn’t move. He was trapped in the body of his younger self, smiling and swaying like there was no danger in the world. He was paralyzed. Again and again, he tried to break free. He had to do something. Someone needed to hear that there was no point in celebrating, because at the same time, Voldemort was getting ready to kill. They needed to stop pretending like everything was alright, because it wasn’t. For every step Harry took while waltzing, he felt as if that was another step he was falling behind in the fight against Voldemort. His breathing began to quicken, and his head began to spin. The silver decorations around him rose and fell like the waves of a fierce ocean. Around him, the crowd squeezed him like bars of a prison cell.

Through the chaos, Harry could still see Cedric and Cho. Cho, while looking up at him, murmured something. Cedric’s copper hair fell back when he looked up at the ceiling and laughed, eyes closed gently. His eyes opened slightly, and he met Harry’s gaze. Harry felt his breathing stop. Cedric’s eyes were cloudy, like they had been when he had died. He was smiling and breathing with the eyes of a dead man. The music began to get louder. Every note sent a slice into Harry’s skin, like a thousand needles piercing him every second. His stomach was churning viciously, but he couldn’t move to throw up. All he could do was dance and smile and celebrate, like nothing was wrong in the world.

Harry shot up in bed. Before he knew what was happening, he was vomiting onto the wooden floor on the side of his bed. A warm tear trickled from his left eye as he continued to be sick. Once he had stopped, he quickly cleaned it up with a quick muttering of a scouring charm, and lay back in his bed. The record had stopped. The only noise in the room was that of Harry’s stifled sobs and rapid breathing. He hadn’t had a panic attack like that in a while, he thought with dismay. And he had been so sure that he had been getting better. He needed to be better. No one would follow an unstable leader into war. If he couldn’t prove that he was mentally strong, he would be trusted with a grain of salt. While his breathing slowed, he grabbed a half empty pack of cigarettes off his bedside counter along with a red lighter, and lit it. He could’ve used his wand, but a lighter seemed more practical. His hands were shaking as he put the cigarette between his lips, and inhaled. With each inhalation, his breathing became slower and his hands became steadier. After a few minutes, he was as relaxed as he had been an hour ago when he had last smoked. In the back of his mind, he fretted at the fact that he was only stable with nicotine in his bloodstream. He ignored his own worries.

Though it had been years since Harry had last had an occlumency lesson with Snape, he found that his mind had warped somehow. He had never quite mastered the technique of shielding others from viewing his memories. Instead, he had managed to master the ability to delve back into his own memories, as if he were an occlumens looking into his own head. It started happening nearly a year ago. Usually, when thinking back to past moments, it was like a dream. Everything was a blurry shadow. Only bits and pieces remained clear, and even then, they were barely there.

Last Easter, Harry had been lying in bed, trying to think back to an old memory that would brighten his mood. Luna had died a few days prior. He hadn’t been able to sleep since then, and hoped that with the warmth of nostalgia, he might be able to. It was difficult, trying to think of a happy memory without Luna in it. But he couldn’t afford to cry. Ron and Fred had been asleep in the beds beside him. Even back then, Harry had still shielded his emotions. As Harry thought back to his first year at Hogwarts, his mind had gone blank. A few seconds later, sharp shapes had come into his vision, contrasting the blurred blobs that usually came with trying to remember. The shapes had come into focus, and his mind flooded with color as he was suddenly back in the Great Hall for the first time, staring up in awe at the magical ceiling.

Nearly every night since then, he had delven through his own memories instead of sleeping. Some nights, he would sleep after reliving moments when he had been happy and managing to convince himself that he still was. Most nights, especially recently, had ended with him getting trapped within his own memories. He was never able to sleep after that. Of course he had tried, and managed to occasionally. But sleeping without a successful self-legilimency left him vulnerable. He would have dreams. Visions would be better wording. At first, he really did think they were nightmares. As he slept, his mind would conjure up images of innocent people being tortured and killed in ways so groteque that Harry would wake up and get sick. However, it wasn’t until just after the Ministry was taken over by Voldemort that he realized the nightmares had been real the entire time.

When Voldemort had taken over the Ministry and the Muggleborn Registration Act was put into place, every muggleborn employee was temporarily imprisoned in cells within the Ministry. When the time came for their trial, during which they had to somehow prove that they had magic in their blood, they were tried unfairly. Those who were found guilty– which was every single person– were then either sent to Azkaban or taken to a “research facility” in Norfolk. Voldemort was curious as to how muggleborns were able to perform magic, despite having no familial history of it. So, he managed to put together a team of scientists, who were given the task to solve the Dark Lord’s question by experimenting on as many muggleborns as necessary.

As soon as the Order heard that innocent people were being imprisoned, they staged a rescue immediately. The Ministry and Azkaban were too heavily guarded to break into. The prison in Norfolk was the perfect target. Harry and a group of nineteen others apparated to the prison, and were able to get in and out easily with the few dozen witches and wizards locked away or strapped to tables. As they were getting the last few out, a swarm of Death Eaters arrived, having gotten alerted that the prison was being attacked. Most of the Order that had been sent was able to escape, except for two who were killed, and two more who chose to stay behind and try to free more people. Three of the people left behind were grieved by the Order. One was not.

Penelope Padgett was only in the Order because her fiance, Grim, had insisted on it. Grim was a talented wizard and a friend of Minerva McGonagall, and Harry had liked him. How he had managed to fall for a Slytherin, no one could figure out. Penelope was loyal and fierce, but despite that, she was still despised by most of the Order due to her Hogwarts House. She and Grim were presumed dead after the Norfolk attack.

That night, Harry had fallen into a deep sleep. He began to toss and turn as he realized he was having another horror filled nightmare. It was unusual, though, because it didn’t start in a dark room or dimly lit house, like it usually did. Instead, it began in a forest. Harry, through Voldemort’s eyes, could see that he was surrounded by Death Eaters in masks and dark cloaks. A few feet in front of him were a pair of tall trees, with an unconscious person tied to each trunk by what appeared to be thick belts. Aside from the moon and some torches, the lighting was dim. After a couple seconds of waiting, Harry felt himself say “Crucio!” A blast of light hit one of the unconscious victims, who’s eyes shot open as they began to scream. Voldemort quickly ended the curse, and repeated it on the second. Once they were both awake, Harry examined their faces, seeing if he recognized them. He never had before, because they were just awful nightmares his mind conjured up to scare him.

This time, he did. Grim and Penelope were alive, after all. Harry was forced to watch as the Death Eaters tormented the couple for hours. At one point, at the very beginning, Penelope had begged them to stop. Her cries had fallen on faint ears. Voldemort had simply replied, “The house of Slytherin was created to be the most powerful. You and your family shame us all.” The Death Eaters had nodded in agreement.

“My family has nothing to do with this! They’re Death Eaters!” Penelope cried through ragged breaths.

Voldemort paused, listening to the girl’s breathing. He traced a bony finger along his wand, enjoying the feeling of anticipation as the two prisoners waited to see what he would do next. “Were.” He said. “They were Death Eaters. I asked that they perform the cruciatus on you earlier. When they refused, I had them dealt with.They were simply not cut out for the task.” With that, Voldemort aimed his wand towards the sky and cast a flare up. The white light lit up branches and leaves as it made its way towards the sky. It also cast light upon two bodies hanging by nooses off a protruding branch. Their eyes were wide open and dull.

Then, before Penelope or Grim could begin to scream, they were silenced. Grim was tortured first, for nearly three hours, and Penelope was forced to watch his silent, wrathing body, until at last, he was killed. Then, it was her turn. The Death Eaters were instructed to take their time. After pulling teeth and fingernails, cutting off a few fingers, and carving a messy image of a snake into her stomach, they finally slit her throat. The first and probably the last Slytherin in the Order was dead. At last, Harry woke up. He had rushed down the hall to find Moody conversing with Kingsley in the sitting room. They were told about Harry’s dream, and at Harry’s demands, Moody apparated to the forest closest to Norfolk, Thetford Forest, and searched for bodies. After an hour, he returned, his face grim. A rule was created, to the great approval of most of the Order; Slytherins were not to be initiated, due to the danger it put them in. It wasn’t long after that dream that Harry determined that the dreams weren’t dreams at all, but actual events that were happening to Voldemort. Harry was Voldemort in his sleep. It wasn’t a pleasant thought.

He was snapped from his train of thought by the door creaking open. Fred crept in, then noticed that Harry was awake and slightly jumped.

“Sorry, mate. Just grabbing some cards.” Fred made his way over to his bedside table and pulled out a deck from his drawer. Along with it were a few prank items that Fred and George had purchased before the war with the intent of using them to cheer up others. Now, even Fred and George were too stressed to play jokes on others.

Fred turned to look at Harry like he was studying him. “You all right? You seem a bit pale.”

“Yeah, don’t worry about me. Just one of those nights.” Harry replied with a deep inhale of smoke.

With a nod, Fred approached the doorway. Then, he held up the deck. “Why don’t you come and join us? It’s just me, Ron, Sturgis, Hannah, and Oliver.”

“Maybe. We have that meeting tomorrow morning though. If I’m exhausted for that, it’ll be miserable.”

“It’ll be miserable anyways. Kingsley will find some way to pick a fight. Besides, if you can’t sleep, playing cards won’t change that any more than smoking a pack will.”

Harry blew a puff towards the ceiling. After he watched it dissolve, he reluctantly stood up and received a grin from Fred.

In the sitting room, Harry took a seat on a couch between Ron and Oliver while Fred laid out the cards. In between the two ash colored couches was a dark mahogany coffee table that had been dragged out from an upstairs room when the Order had begun to occupy the house. The problem with Grimmauld Place, Harry realized, was that it physically matched how the Resistance all felt. Nearly the entire house, except for posters that had been permanently stuck to Sirius’s bedroom wall by magic, was various shades of gray, black, and green. Ron had once described it as a “nasty bruise theme.” It had been cleaned and livened up over the years. At one point, the dark striped wallpaper in the dining room had been replaced by a soft yellow floral pattern. Most of the portraits of the Black family descendants had been covered up or removed and replaced with bad landscape paintings that an Order member had bought (stolen) from a nearby shop. Everything in the house that had a snake on it was banished. Yet, despite all the renovations, it still felt as depressing and worn down as it had the first day Harry had stepped foot inside it.

While the six absentmindedly played cards and made the occasional comment, Harry felt himself stand up and run upstairs to grab another cigarette. He saw Oliver’s mouth open for a second, as if he was thinking about commenting on Harry’s smoking habits, then close. Oliver was one of the few in the Order who had yet to touch nicotine. The former Quidditch captain was convinced that ruining his lungs would inhibit his ability to fight. At least he wasn’t overly aggressive about his beliefs, Harry thought with relief. Everyone had their own way of coping. Though Oliver’s wasn’t drugs, in some ways, his was worse. Whenever he was particularly stressed, he became particularly impulsive. A few days ago, after he returned from a recon mission, he had been running around the house aimlessly for nearly two hours. Suddenly, he had vanished. That night, he had returned with a tattoo and a buzzcut. More times than Harry could count, he had stumbled upon Oliver heading up to the hospital ward with slit wrists. Though he was worried for his friend, he couldn’t spend much time dwelling over Oliver’s life. If he spent time fretting over everyone, he would be in a state of worry for eternity. Besides, he had more pressing matters to agonize over.

The game lasted for a few hours, and when it was nearing four, Hannah, Fred, Sturgis, and Oliver all decided to try and sleep. After they had disappeared, Ron sat silently next to Harry, eyes dimly staring at the cinder filled fireplace.

“Do you think we have any chance of winning?” Ron asked out of nowhere. His voice was faint from exhaustion.

Harry began to speak with words full of false optimism. “Of course we do, Ron. We-”

“Don’t give me that bull shit answer, Harry.” Ron’s voice sharpened. “We’re losing. You know it. I know it. The Order knows it. At this point, we have no hope. We’re all going to lose.”

Harry sighed. The downside of staying up with the insomniacs is that they usually got depressed late into the night. Ron was no exception. His eyes were half lidded, but Harry swore he could see the spark of a tear in one.

“Come on, don’t say that. We have just as much a chance of winning as Voldemort does. We just-”

“Maybe Hermione is right.”

Harry took a deep breath, and closed his eyes, letting the nicotine run its course through up to his brain. Since near the beginning of the war, Hermione had been calling for the Order to use spells that none of them had ever dared to: dark spells, such as Unforgivables. The Resistance had a strict “light magic only” policy, which was agreed with for the most part. There were times when a witch or wizard would have an occasional outburst over it, but that was rare. Harry and Ron were two of the firmest believers in the use of only light magic. To hear Ron say something like that was shocking, but not surprising. He was right, though Harry would never admit it aloud. The Order was losing. Nearly every battle they had had within the past year had ended in loss, whether by losing members or materials.

Just the other month, the Order had traveled to the Shrieking Shack, where Remus claimed he had hidden potion materials during his year of teaching at Hogwarts in case of an emergency. It was a miracle the shack was still standing. The Order arrived, and Remus led them to a floorboard in the corner that had bottles upon bottles of magical ingredients, especially those used in the Wolfsbane potion. However, Death Eaters appeared almost instantly and quickly took out the lookouts. The Order was forced to hold them off while the supplies were collected. As soon as Remus and Katie had finished stacking the bottles in their packs, they signaled the others to retreat. The Death Eaters had realized that the two were carrying valuable items, and aimed all their strength at attacking them.

The potions had arrived mostly intact. However, the carriers were not. Remus had been hit with a curse that raised the temperature of his body so quickly, when he returned, parts of his skin were melting off. Some of the bottles Katie had been carrying were shattered due to quills impaling the glass. A Death Eater had somehow conjured a porcupine into her chest. Harry hadn’t gone on the mission due to Kingsley’s orders, but he had watched as Katie apparated back, quills piercing through her front, back and sides. A few had even made it to her throat. Since then, every skirmish and mission had ended with similar injuries. Seamus Finnegan, while tasked to be a lookout for another retrieval mission, had fallen into a magically conjured pit of black mambas. George Weasley had been hit with a dark curse while dueling a Death Eater. The curse had rotted away all the skin on his leg, and had even gone as deep as the bone, so it had been amputated. Lee Jordan had dared to use a dark spell; he had tried, at least. Harry hadn’t seen it happen, but according to Flitwick, Lee had attempted to use Crucio on a Death Eater who was mercilessly attacking Angelina Johnson. The spell hadn’t worked, due to Lee’s lack of anger and sadist tendencies. Instead, the Death Eater had managed to cut off Angelina’s circulation with a quick charm, and while she struggled to apparate away, Lee was hit with a curse that liquified his brain. Flitwick had managed to get him back to Grimmauld Place, but according to the healers, Lee would be heavily mentally impaired for the rest of his life; if he lived.

Ron, still beside Harry, shot him a slow glance while Harry pondered how to reply. Usually, when a Resistance member doubted their chances, Harry would give a speech about how light would always win over darkness, and how because they weren’t being ruthlessly evil, they were sure to win. He only believed what he said half the time. With the recent losses, it was growing to most of the time. Still, he kept everyone’s spirits up. It was difficult, never being able to express his own worries. Once, Moody had overheard him talking to Neville about his lack of faith in the Resistance’s victory. Afterwards, Moody had pulled him aside and warned him to watch what he talked about carefully. If word got around that the Harry Potter had no hope in the Order anymore, everyone would soon follow suit.

Yet, Harry couldn’t lie to Ron, because Ron would know. He always knew whenever Harry was lying. Harry was stuck between optimistically declaring that Voldemort would lose, despite the fact that he was winning, or agreeing with his best friend over his doubts, and possibly getting Moody, Kingsley, and who knew who else on his bad side. Harry hadn’t realized what a coward he had become until he chose the former option.

“Ron, you don’t mean that. Dark magic wouldn’t help us win any more than light magic. In fact, it would probably make us weaker. Do you know what it does to your soul? After doing a single dark curse, most witches and wizards would be left unable to perform magic for a day or more. How could that possibly work in our favor on the battlefield?” Harry retorted.

Ron propped his head up against his fist. “I don’t know. Wouldn’t we have less casualties? Wouldn’t our chances of winning be better?”

“If we used dark magic, we’d have to send over twice as many to each battle so we’d be less vulnerable. That kind of magic makes you vulnerable. We may be able to knock out more Death Eaters, but we’d get more killed on our side as well. So, no, it wouldn’t increase our chances of winning. Besides, even if it increased our chance of winning, it would make us far more likely to die prematurely. How would you like it if we won this war, but lived the rest of our lives in misery? I’d prefer to stay happy until I die. Wouldn’t you?”

God, Harry sounded like he belonged on a kids show. Kingsley, I hope you’re proud of what you’ve turned me into, Harry thought annoyedly. I’m lying to my own best friend. He wasn’t quite lying, per say. Even though he hadn’t dared to express his fears over being on the losing side, he genuinely did believe most of the things he had just said. Dark magic would make them more prone to losing. If they had used it since the beginning, it could’ve worked in their favor. But using it this far into the war would only bring the Resistance down. Even besides that, switching to the same tactics as the Death Eaters would corrupt their souls and bodies in ways that no one quite understood. However, it was well known that frequent dark magic users lived short lives full of physical pain and mental misery. Light magic seemed to be the only option they had at the moment.

Had the Order been winning, Harry wouldn’t have dared to even question the use of dark magic. He had been that way before the recent months. When someone had suggested it, the Order shoved away the suggestion. Harry especially would refuse to listen to their points. The idea of being proven wrong made him so frustrated that he didn’t ever listen to points that threatened him and his ideas. Most of the Order simply hated the idea of using dark magic and wasting away. Harry just didn’t want to be wrong. The idea that he could’ve saved dozens scared him. If he was wrong, then no one would listen to him or follow him anymore. If that happened, than the Order would disband. Besides, the point of the Order was to stick to light magic and only light magic. He had been reminded hundreds of times.

Ron reached out an open palm to Harry, who handed him his cigarette. Ron took a steady inhale, contemplating what had just been said. “I suppose so.” He paused, and closed his eyes. “Hell, I can’t even believe what I just said. I, of all people, just considered using dark magic. I guess– I don’t know– the idea of losing this war has really gotten in my head.”

“It’s gotten to me, too. I’ve considered the same things. I just keep reminding myself that we’d have the same chances of winning if we use dark magic as we do now. Why ruin our lives over something that wouldn’t even make a difference?”

“Yeah. Yeah, you’re right.” Ron handed the cigarette back to Harry, and stood up. “Thanks, Harry. I swear, you’re the only reason most of us are still fighting. How do you stay so positive?”

“I don’t know myself. I’m surrounded by people so strong, I know we can’t possibly lose.” Harry lied through his teeth.

Ron smiled. Though he was sleep deprived and starved, the smile was genuine. Harry felt a slight pang of guilt. He followed Ron upstairs, to where Fred was finally sleeping. Ron fell asleep almost instantly. In the dark, he looked nearly his age. The premature lines of stress across his face were invisible as his face lay relaxed, and the streaks of grey that had begun to stain his red hair blended in with the lack of light. Harry swore he saw a slight smile on his friends face as he slept.

Harry lay awake, staring at the white ceiling that seemed to be on the verge of falling apart no matter how many times he fixed it. Countless times he prayed to any god that would listen to not let him fall asleep. However, exhaustion finally took over, and Harry fell asleep listening to the sounds of Ron and Fred’s peaceful breathing.