The Battle of the University
The university was a place I had only visited a few times in my life. It was a liberal arts school, befitting the culture of Salem, but they also had a specialized technical college. Of course, even though this was a town where wizards and witches were generally welcome, the university offered no courses in magic. John Proctor was the first educational institution in the United States to teach both muggles and wizards; the university was just a regular school for regular people. I went there sometimes on field trips at Summerroot or John Proctor, but they were always to learn about things like astronomy or biology or post-secondary education. Sometimes Dad took me to see football games at the stadium. The Salem Bears were one of the most popular teams in the state, and Dad was an enthusiastic fan.
The area in front of the stadium was home to a large grassy park known as the University Green. It ran alongside the south bank of the Lewis River, and was typically home to joggers and students. But that evening, it was host to the largest battle of that whole terrible day. Everywhere we looked, we saw wizards and witches engaging in fierce duels with Death Eaters, spells firing everywhere without rhyme or reason. There must have been hundreds of people on either side of the battle. I even saw a few muggles in the fray with standard firearms and makeshift weapons like bats and poles. Police officers and Aurors fought alongside one another. It was hard to tell at first what was happening in all that chaos, but I gradually realized that the Death Eaters were trying to defend the entrance to the stadium. High above, another cyclone of Dementors had appeared above the stadium walls, circling over the unseen spot where the field lay. Strangely, though there were enough of them to pose a serous threat, they never once moved in to join the battle.
Crossing the University Green proved nearly impossible. Everywhere we tried to run, a duel was taking place. Whenever a Death Eater noticed us, they shot curses in our direction, which we haphazardly blocked. Everything was mixed up. I almost thought we had an opening to run through to the entrance of the stadium, but before we’d made it more than a few meters, something struck me from the right side.
“Alan!” I heard my mother cry.
I tumbled down a short hill to the trail by the Lewis River. I’d been knocked over so many times that day that my bones were beginning to feel weak from the strain. I rubbed my arm and tried to stand up, but my stomach had other plans, and I nearly threw up. When I looked back up the hill hoping to see Mom and my friends, I was instead met with a huge black shadow.
It was Karen Blair. The woman had always been the epitome of a stereotypical “witch,” but she looked even more sinister today. She wore a flowing black dress, and her frog-like face was scrunched up in an authoritative frown of disgust. She held her long wand with the tips of her pudgy fingers. When our eyes met, mine narrowed with hatred. I remembered the sight of Emma falling slowly to the ground, Blair looking down at her with apathy after delivering the killing blow.
“You...”
“Lay down your wand, boy,” she said flatly. “Don’t be a fool.”
I stood up suddenly and sent a spell viciously careening at her face. Blair blocked it directly to the right, and it scorched the darkening ground next to her. She seemed fazed, but that only made her angrier. She spoke to me like she was still a teacher scolding an unruly middle school student.
“I’ve had just about enough of your antics, Alan.”
I shot a flurry of spells at her. Blair blocked them, but it wasn’t as effortless for her as it had been for Nick. She had to stay in formation, and paid close attention to every shot I fired. But what she lacked in power, she made up for in experience. She had still been the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher at John Proctor, and that meant she was well-versed in magical combat. Her fat, grotesque body gave the illusion that she would be a weak fighter, but she was anything but. Soon she descended the hill and faced me head-on on the trail, blocking all of my angrily-cast spells with the same indifferent look on her face.
“Pitiful. Always the temperamental one, aren’t you? Your spells are childishly conceived and hastily executed. Just like that girl at Summerroot...”
“SHUT UP!” I screamed at the top of my lungs. I was tempted to fire the Unforgivable Curses at her, and only the last semblance of my self-control held me back. “Shut up about my friend! You should have died, you fat frog-gutted toad-faced coward!”
Blair knocked me over with a strange spell that felt like I was being hit with a giant bubble. “So disrespectful,” she snarled. “Just like your parents. So defiant. So ignorant...”
“Stupefy!”
Blair blocked that spell too. Her elegant form and skill only made me angrier at her. I felt like a lion being kept at bay with a whip. I was more powerful than her and I knew it, but I just couldn’t manage to hit her, and there was no sign of my friends or any other backup.
I heard something in the distance. It was an undefinable sound, something difficult to describe. It was like a whisper, but it was loud and swept over everything. Blair seemed to notice it too. She glanced back toward the university, and frowned.
“The time has come, huh?”
Blair looked back at me one last time, and then disapparated.
“NO! Come back!” I screamed. “COME BACK, YOU COWARDLY SLUG!”
But Blair did not return. I could still hear the sound of battle just up the hill from me. The Dementors were still spiraling in the sky above the stadium. Every fiber of my exhausted body wanted to rest, but I couldn’t stop yet. I didn’t know why Blair had retreated, but as far as I knew, Darkanoss still had Clea. The only way to be sure she was safe would be to get into the stadium, and rescue her.
The raging battle on the University Green provided an optimal distraction for me to sneak around the left flank. There was a collection of buildings at the northeast end of the park that blocked the way to the north end of the stadium, but I ran through a cluster of bushes and trees and climbed a metal fence to get to the other side. There was a small, vacant parking lot back there. I spotted what looked like a back entrance to the stadium, and ran over to it. It was locked, but with a quick spell, I got it open and ran inside.
* * *
This is the part of the battle that people ask me about most. But truth be told, I didn’t have a plan, nor did I have a clue what would happen next. From my perspective, it still seemed like Darkanoss and the Death Eaters were winning, despite the fact that they had retreated to the stadium. The big picture was not in my mind at the time. All I could think about was Clea. I thought of playing with her in our living room, making goofy sounds on a little xylophone for her entertainment, tickling her little body and hearing her laugh. She was precious to me. I couldn’t bear the thought of losing her. But even more importantly, I couldn’t bear the thought of what would happen to Mom and Dad if she died. Their hearts would be destroyed. They would never get over it. These were the only reasons – the only reasons – that I entered the stadium that evening. It was for Clea and my parents, and nothing more.
It was hard to find my way at first. The lights inside the building were all off, and even with my wand illuminating the empty locker rooms and hallways, it was eerily dark. I could still hear the battle outside, but it had become a low rumble, like the distant sound of a fireworks show. I wondered whether Silas and Peter were okay. What had happened to them after we were separated by Blair? What about Mom and Dad? Where were Liam and the other kids from Summerroot? In that moment, I was completely and totally alone. But I pushed on. Maybe it was the blind courage of a child, unable to process the full weight of all these things. Or maybe there was something about my spirit back then that was stronger than it is now, something bold and resistant to despair. But I kept moving. I didn’t give up.
I finally found a door leading outside to the football field. With a deep breath, I stepped through it.
Like Shichang, it was cold. Though it was the middle of July, the frost on the turf made it feel like early November. The stands were all empty, devoid of the cheering crowds that gathered during a game. There’s something exceedingly unnerving about an empty space that is usually full. The absence of human presence is even more palpable than the presence itself. An emptiness you can touch.
A gathering of Death Eaters stood at the far side of the field. From this distance, they were nothing but a swarm of cloaks. There didn’t appear to be very many of them; I surmised that the majority of their number were probably still on the University Green, battling against the resistance forces. These were the leaders, the chosen few who had taken shelter while the storm raged on outside. The huge walls of the stadium buffered the noise. The clouds spiraled overhead like a hurricane, the Dementors flowing along with them. I could hear a distant moaning sound, but I couldn’t tell if it was the wind, or something else.
The Death Eater in the middle of the group was Darkanoss.
As I approached, I could hear his haunting voice echoing across the field. “Do not be afraid, my children. Magic crosses the boundaries between life and death. That is the nature of Limbo. We have already ensured our deliverance. This moment shall not be our last. We will persevere.”
His huge silhouette turned slightly, and that was when I realized he was still holding Clea in his arms. My insides coiled tightly.
“This child shall come with us into the beyond. She has the blood of the Reborn, even if her potential has not awoken. She will be suitable as a vessel...”
“DARKANOSS!”
My call resonated through the whole stadium. The hooded Death Eaters raised their heads, looking directly at me. I recognized two of them as Blair and Widow. I thought they would attack me at that moment, and raised my wand in preparation for the assault. But the Death Eaters didn’t move out of formation. They stood in neat rows like a choir. The only one who moved was Darkanoss. He slowly placed my unconscious sister down on the turf, and stepped forward to greet me.
“Alan. I admire your tenacity. I sensed Nicholas’s demise... that was you, right? You are indeed a very powerful Reborn. You may be the most special of them all.”
I pointed my wand at his neck. “Let. Her. Go!”
The faceless man gestured nonchalantly back at my little sister. “She needs to come with me, Alan. I have made a promise with the Dementors that they will have a vessel. A magical soul to be their own.”
“Like hell I’d let you do that!”
“Why don’t you understand?” If I didn’t know him for the monster he was, Darkanoss’s tone almost sounded hurt. “I do not want to shed the blood of the Reborn. None of you should have to die.”
“You liar!” I yelled back. I pointed at Blair. “She killed Emma West! And the Death Eaters killed a bunch of kids at Summerroot!”
Darkanoss glanced at Widow, and then looked back at me. “There will always be casualties in war. It spares no one, Alan. Not even children. But I never wanted war. This battle could have been the beginning and the end. But now... it will drag on, and more innocent lives will be lost, until finally this world comes to know the truth. Perhaps next time we meet, you will begin to see what I mean.”
“I won’t ask again,” I hissed. I was prepared to use any dark spell I’d been forbidden to use just to stop this man and save my sister. “Let her go. Now!”
The New Dark Lord sighed. “I would have made you one of us. It’s truly a shame to waste such potential. But I cannot allow you to stop what has started. This will be your end.”
At that moment, the doors on either side of the stadium burst open. I heard a swarm of footsteps and yells from behind me. When I glanced back, I saw a huge crowd of people rushing inside, wands and guns raised in the air. It was the resistance. I hadn’t even noticed that the sounds of battle outside had ceased. They came streaming into the stands, descending on the field.
Darkanoss raised one of his long black sleeves, and a jet-black wand appeared at its tip. He waved it in the air, and pointed it directly at me. “Avada Kedavra.”
I looked back at him, and immediately countered. “Expelliarmus!”
It happened again. The two spells exploded against one another, the boom of their impact shaking the whole stadium. But something was different this time. When I had fought Nick, the force of our opposing spells was like a hurricane. But this time, it was like a tornado. It was as though the spells were pulling me in. A strange sensation washed through my body. Bizarre images flashed through my mind. I saw a deer. I saw a bird with scarlet wings. I saw a cave. I saw a blood-red rock. I saw fire. I saw snow.
The spells danced wildly against one another. The beam of light between us vibrated up and down, almost rhythmically. Long strands of energy arched out from my wand, and collectively pulled the core of the spells back towards Darkanoss. His robes whipped wildly, slapping against one another. The Death Eaters behind him shielded their faces, as did the crowd of wizards behind me. Darkanoss’s wand arm was trembling.
“It can’t be...” I heard him say, with the first hint of shock in his voice. “You’re...”
The spell engulfed him.
The explosion knocked me off my feet. Bright red ashes blasted high into the air like confetti. The stadium rumbled like it had been hit by a nuclear bomb. There was so much smoke and ash that I could hardly see at first. I coughed, waving my hand to disperse the smoke, and squinted my eyes to see my surroundings.
I saw a little white shape nearby. I realized it was my sister.
“Clea!” I cried.
I was immediately back on my feet, and sprinted over to her. When I was a few feet away, I dove down onto my knees, sliding the last few paces to her. Her tiny, doughy face was fast asleep, but she was breathing. I picked her up and pulled her into my lap, feeling the soft rising of her little tummy. I breathed a sigh of relief. Thank God.
Then I looked past her, at the spot in the field where Darkanoss had been.
The cloaked silhouette of his body was lying on the ground. His wand rolled to a halt out of his motionless, gloved hands, and rested peacefully on the turf. Moments later, there was a low rumbling sound from above. I looked up. The Dementors had all vanished, and the clouds were slowly dissolving. A horizontal ray of orange sunlight pierced through them, and the clear purple evening sky slowly revealed itself. A few moments later, I could see the first few stars of the night.
I saw a flickering light out of the corner of my eye. When I looked down, Darkanoss’s body had burst into flame. It was the same pure-red fire that had swept over the bodies of Nick and his goons. The arms and legs of Donovan Trackwell collapsed into ash, shortly followed by his head. I thought I saw the faintest hint of pale skin behind his mask, before everything was gone.
Karen Blair raised her wand and pointed it at her own neck. “Ad liberationem.”
A white light shot out of her wand and into her neck. She immediately fell to the ground, dead.
The other Death Eaters followed suit.
“Ad liberationem.”
“Ad liberationem.”
“Ad liberationem.”
Jenna Widow dropped to the ground, followed by another, and then another. Soon, the last of the Death Eaters were all dead, lying in a collective heap in the end zone of the football field. Seconds later, the same crimson flames lit up on their bodies, and they too dissolved into ash, until there was only the empty field and me and Clea and the other survivors of the Battle of Salem. Nobody said a word. Everything was still.