Chapter 22 - Fighting Fire With Fire
Harry focused his attention on the serpent featured man before him as Hermione sprang nimbly away to chase after Bellatrix. Voldemort had returned to the ground floor with a look of supreme confidence on his face.
"Tell me, how did you manage to escape from the time chamber?" Voldemort asked politely.
"It was simple really," Harry replied. Nothing about the searing pain of the magic enhancing potion or the terror filled minutes when they thought they might not escape in time had been simple. "We knocked a hole in the side of it with a killing curse."
Voldemort chuckled, but his eyes glinted dangerously. "So Severus was right after all," he said lightly. "Do you know what he said about you Harry? He told me that you had transformed yourself into someone that even I couldn't safely ignore. I guess he was right."
"What about it," Harry replied warily.
"I knew you were impressive all those years ago when you retrieved the Sorcerer's Stone," Voldemort continued conversationally. "You are indeed someone worthy of my respect. Join me and together nothing will be withheld from us. No secret of magic will be too great for us to unravel."
"How cliché," Harry replied dryly. "You know I'll never join you. You've tried to kill me, how many times now? You tried to kill me a few seconds after you returned from the dead, or don't you remember?"
"Don't be so hasty," Voldemort said. "Things have changed since then. Now we know about the prophecy and all that it entails. We've been offered immortality. Don't tell me that doesn't strike your fancy."
"No, it doesn't," Harry said coldly.
"I see," Voldemort said. "You're above that, right? Like a good little soldier of Dumbledore."
"How could I live forever?" Harry asked hotly. "I have friends and family; living on without them would be nothing but eternal torture!"
"Together we could change all of that," Voldemort said boldly. "I've watched you and your little girlfriend from afar for some time now. We can unlock the secrets of life and death; everyone who has died in this war can be restored. Sirius Black, even your parents, if only you'll join me…"
"You're lying," Harry bit out angrily. "And even if you weren't, you can't mess with the natural order like that, no one can."
"We're wizards Harry," Voldemort said laughingly. "We create something out of nothing and then banish something back to nothingness. We defy the laws of the universe, as the muggles perceive them, with impunity. Life, death, they're only two more variables in an arithmancy formula."
Harry thought he was over his parent's death, but being confronted with the possibility of their restoration caused his heart to beat a little faster. He thought of everyone else who had died: Hagrid, Ginny, Neville, and even Moody. Then he remembered what Luna had told him in the Department of Mysteries. They were all waiting for him, just on the other side of the veil. What if their existence was far happier now than it would be if he brought them back? What would Hermione say?
"I refuse," Harry said stoically.
"Of course, you would never do something for your own selfish gain. It's so difficult for a Slytherin like myself to gauge Gryffindor nobility." Voldemort said. He changed track seamlessly. "Then do it for the good of the world. Think of all the children who die young, of all the spouses who leave widows, of all the parents who leave orphans…"
"Like my parents?" Harry asked, his voice cold again.
"Perhaps you're right Harry," Voldemort said in a conciliatory tone as he shifted again, his voice weaving a new line of thought like an elegant tapestry. "Perhaps the natural order shouldn't be overturned so easily. I would leave that to you to decide, of course. Let the old die naturally, but spare the young. Think of it as the ultimate healing. We extend people's lives unnaturally all the time with magic, muggles do it with medicine, so why not perfect this technique."
"So they could have long healthy lives under your dark rule?" Harry retorted.
Voldemort looked up to where Dumbledore was standing and indicated him with a nod of his head. "Did you ever wonder why your Headmaster placed you where he did as you were growing up?"
"To protect me from you," Harry said uneasily. He suddenly had the feeling that maybe he shouldn't be listening to what Voldemort had to say. The man had killed his parents and thrown the world of magic into war. What more was there to know?
"Perhaps, partially," Voldemort conceded. "However, why would he alienate you from the very world that he knew only you could defend? He denied you a great deal of knowledge about how the magical world works, about the very lives of the people whose champion you would become."
Harry looked up at Dumbledore as if expecting him to shout out his response.
Voldemort continued. "I mean, whoever heard of a world's savior being someone who was completely unattached to that world…unless they were being manipulated into saving a world that they might not want to if left to make their own decisions."
"That's not true," Harry retorted fiercely. "I'm not here on anyone's errand but my own!"
"Don't tell me that Dumbledore has always been honest with you my boy. Voldemort always smells the lie," Voldemort replied in a coarse whispering hiss. Harry's eyes found themselves focused unwillingly on Voldemort's visage. A faint buzzing in the back of his skull went unnoticed.
Harry tried to focus, but images kept popping into his mind unbidden. Hermione begging him to make Dumbledore come clean. Dumbledore telling him about the prophecy that he had kept secret for years. Dumbledore going behind his back to the Ministry with the prophecy and nearly getting him killed.
Voldemort was walking around Harry in slow circles now, like a buzzard circling a dying animal. "The real truth is that the world of magic is rotting from the inside out. I'm not just one crazed individual, I'm the product of a movement, a wave of indignation over the breakdown of our ancient society." Voldemort whispered rapidly. His slit like eyes opened widely, the crimson red orbs boring into Harry's green gaze.
"You want to oppress the muggle born," Harry said weakly.
"So you've been told. Curiously convenient then, that for all purposes you yourself are a muggle born," Voldemort said. "Muggle born out number the rest of the magical world by at least two to one. Of that one only a small fraction is true pureblood, the others are mixed, like you and I, or else descended from the recent muggle born. How can so few oppress so many? It is we who are being repressed."
Voldemort pointed a finger towards Dumbledore. "You were supposed to stay with your muggle relatives for your own protection right? Why then did he, the great all knowing Dumbledore, always manage to allow you to escape to the Weasley's every summer? Why them, the greatest family of blood traitors in the whole of wizarding England." Voldemort asked, shouting now, like an advocate hammering down the final nail in his case. Harry gazed into Voldemort's eyes and began to feel a little distant, like he wasn't quite attached to his body anymore.
"That's right," Harry thought to himself. "Why the Weasleys? If I needed protection from Voldemort then shouldn't Dumbledore have kept me at the Dursleys all summer? The magical protection doesn't work anywhere else except in proximity to them."
"And then, to secure your loyalty to the muggles forever, he carefully maneuvered a mudblood as your other friend, he made you love her, but it was all a lie!" Voldemort screamed.
Harry's scar erupted in pain and his mind rebelled. His nearly seven years with Hermione came flooding back to him in a rush of emotion. With a snap his perception was fully inside his body once more.
"That's enough!" Harry yelled in rage. He realized his eyes were wet as he refocused on Voldemort. The evil wizard back peddled as Harry fired an unfocused blast of magic toward him.
"Your mind is strong after all," Voldemort hissed.
"I'll make you pay for that," Harry promised solemnly.
"You may have resisted my persuasion, but you're hardly in any position to make threats to me," Voldemort replied condescendingly. "I defeated your teacher without even the slightest effort. What can you hope to do?"
"Dumbledore was your teacher too!" Harry exclaimed as he shot out a beam of purple light. The light blossomed outward into dozens of individual attacks and converged on Voldemort from a multitude of frontal directions. Voldemort flicked his wand in response and conjured up an equal number of tiny yellowish looking birds. The birds swooped down into the path of the oncoming attacks and exploded on impact to nullify Harry's effort.
"Dumbledore was hardly my teacher," Voldemort retorted. "He teaches you how to scrub the floors and brew up sleeping draughts. A real wizard teaches himself!"
Harry sunk to his hip in quicksand as the floor changed beneath him, then when he tried to pull himself free the quicksand changed back into stone trapping him in place. He punched the stone with his armored hand, but didn't even succeed in cracking the surface.
"You're still pathetic boy!" Voldemort howled as he unleashed a series of curses. "You couldn't defeat me if you had a thousand years to prepare, let alone seven!"
Harry summoned a cornea shield, so named for its transparency and shape, to protect him while he tried to extract himself from the floor. Finally he found a hex that worked on the stone, which was strangely resistant to magic, and pulled free. It was all he could do to huddle behind his armor's shield as killing curses whizzed by him at a quicker pace than he had ever seen anyone cast the difficult spell.
Harry twisted his wand and a dozen spears of bright light appeared to skewer Voldemort. However, before they could hit shadows seemed to erupt from the dark wizard's form. The light attacks were stopped and consumed by the shadows before they could get close to Voldemort. The shadows congealed together and reached out like a giant hand to swallow Harry up. His grip tightened on his wand as he sprang away from the fearsome looking spell.
"Its already over," Voldemort proclaimed. "I knew you would use that ridiculous spell again so I created a perfect counter to it."
Harry fired a stream of lightening at the shadow, but the energy passed through it harmlessly.
"There is no counter spell, no time limit," Voldemort continued. "Once you used the light spell you had no chance."
Voldemort's words sparked Harry's interest. The use of the light spell was apparently a prerequisite for the activation of this shadow counter. Harry groaned as he leaped away from the shadow, which was gaining on him at a steady rate. If only Hermione were here, she'd think of a way. He wished, and not for the first time, that he had taken arithmancy.
"If I can't stop it, I'll just stop you!" Harry yelled as he charged directly for Voldemort. At the last second he used an acceleration charm, intending to punch him with his armored arm. Instead he simply went whizzing past the grinning snake-like wizard. Voldemort had dodged the acceleration charm!
Harry focused on Voldemort as he ran along, concentrating on him, trying to think of some way to stop him before the shadow caught him and did something Harry was sure he didn't want to know about.
"How do I stop it?" Harry thought desperately.
The black substance split in two and tried to corner him.
"Voldemort has to be the key, the light, something about the light," Harry thought. His eyes met Voldemort's.
"Wait, he lied," Harry though as images flooded his mind. Voldemort screamed and Harry felt like his skull was going to split in half as the dark wizard repulsed the accidental intrusion.
Harry's hand seemed to move of its own accord as he rapidly drew a magical seal in flaming green script on the floor in front of him. The shadow touched the seal as it loomed over Harry and was sucked into it.
"You dare try to use legimency on me?" Voldemort raged.
"You tried to…to…hypnotize me or something," Harry retorted indignantly. "You bloody lied to me about the nature of that enchantment too."
Voldemort stalked toward Harry with an air of disdain and Harry found himself wondering what kind of demented personality led someone who was trying to kill another person to get upset over something like that.
"I've tried to save you twice now," Voldemort said sinisterly. "First I tried to allow you to join me, but you refused. Just now I tried to be merciful and kill you, but you refused that as well. The third fate, well, you can't refuse anymore."
"Oh, is that so?" Harry replied dryly. "Don't you have anymore tales about how you're being oppressed or how I need to join you for the good of the world?"
Voldemort's lips curled in a smile as he delivered his own private joke. "I have nothing more to say to you."
Harry hastily conjured his shield to absorb the hammer blows of some kind of bright crimson colored spell that he had never seen before. He had only blocked two of the beams when he realized that he was starting to bleed from random wounds. With great effort he dodged the next casting and erected a barrier shield charm. It absorbed the next shots and fortunately no physical damage was transferred to his body.
Before he could retaliate Voldemort had switched to some kind of bluish colored attack that took the form of a misshapen blob. He threw up his armor's shield to protect himself as the spell passed through his barrier shield as if it didn't exist. The blob didn't do any damage to his armor, but instead started to spread over it. Harry thrust off the metallic protection and jumped away from it just before the attack covered the entire surface of the armor. Had he not acted as quickly as he did it would have consumed him too.
Harry crouched on the ground and took out one of his spare pieces of armor. Voldemort was using magic and tactics that he had never before conceived of. Harry wondered idly if he had created these spells himself or merely gained access to a source of knowledge that was incredibly rare.
Voldemort fired off another round of bluish blobs, but Harry was ready for them. Black lightening turned the gelatinous spells into a handful of charred fine powder. Harry poured out more black lightening, but Voldemort countered it with regular lightening. Negative and positive energies cancelled each other out in a spectacular, but harmless, light show.
Shimmering silver projectiles filled the air, but unlike other attacks, which generally came in waves this attack came in a swarm. Voldemort was taking ordinary spells and supercharging them to the point where their very nature was altered in fundamental ways. Harry extended his armor's shield to its maximum coverage and used intense fire to wipe out as many of the twirling blades as he could, but he still felt them tearing into his clothes and even his flesh. Thus he was caught completely off guard when a giant ball of fire engulfed him.
A giant, jet black metallic cage slammed down on him from no where. Voldemort charged it with lightening, which jumped and tried to shock Harry. Unknown to Voldemort, Harry's wand had been treated by Hermione to protect him from lightening and so he was only slightly affected. Still, Harry felt his power draining from the constant barrage of unfamiliar and exceptional powerful attacks.
Far above, out of his line of sight, McGonagall looked like she was ready to leap down to his aid. Only a wizened hand from an elderly Headmaster held her back.
Voldemort approached the cage expecting for Harry to be at least unconscious. He smirked as he contemplated that he would be able to finish the ritual and become immortal after all.
"Foolish boy, you really should have spent your eternity in that time chamber with your mudblood instead of coming this far just to die," Voldemort said softly. Voldemort stopped his approach abruptly and raised his wand. His eyes widened with surprise as the cage melted violently to reveal Harry standing firmly.
"You're not the only one with tricks," Harry said coolly. He tossed aside a tiny vial that had contained his second dose of magic enhancement potion.
"For a mudblood Granger really is-" Voldemort cut off as Harry's armored fist buried itself in his gut. Harry spun around with the momentum of his acceleration charm and slammed Voldemort in the side of the head sending him flying onto his back.
Voldemort scrambled to his feet in time to escape the killing curse that Harry had cast at him. For the first time something approaching fear touched his inhuman features. Harry recast his shield charm and Voldemort followed suit. Instinctually Harry realized that the dark wizard was done playing.
"I take it back," Voldemort said as he blocked an evisceration curse. "You're nothing like Dumbledore."
Harry remained silent; instead giving his reply in the form of another acceleration charm based punch. Voldemort barely got out of the way in time, but he failed to block a second blow when Harry reversed directions and doubled back.
Voldemort chuckled, "And if you're not like Dumbledore then that must make you like me," he said gleefully.
"Quit trying to mess with my mind. That won't work twice." Harry replied. "Besides, Dumbledore didn't try to kill you because he knew he couldn't."
Harry concentrated to call forth all of his power, which under the influence of the enhancement potion was considerable. "Avada Kedavra," he yelled.
Instead of dodging Voldemort lifted his shield, its silver surface becoming dirty brown, and let the curse hit it. There was a flash of green fire, but the shield held. Harry didn't know how Voldemort had enchanted a shield charm to block the killing curse, though he was sure it had something to do with the color change. The room flashed with soundless lightening as Harry flicked his wand to repeatedly cast the breaker curse.
Voldemort tried to put Harry back on the defense by casting a variety of curses, but Harry just let his shield absorb them. The combination of his shield charm with the metallic shield of his armor made him immune to almost every spell type. Now that Harry had seen Voldemort's surprise spells, especially the unnamed bluish blob, he also knew which ones to dodge.
Harry felt fear radiating off Voldemort as he closed the distance between himself and the reptilian wizard. Voldemort's shield, which upon closer inspection appeared to contain a mixture of dirt and stone in addition to the mystical component, was severely degraded and Harry was making sure to give him no opportunity to replenish it. Voldemort twisted as Harry got closer in an effort to keep the battered remains of his shield between himself and the young wizard. Harry saw one of the cracks that ran vertically through the entire shield widen and saw his opportunity.
An altered battering charm slammed down on Voldemort from above like a huge invisible fist. He dropped his shield and went to his knees just in time for Harry's real fist to connect with his jaw. Voldemort's grip loosened on his wand and his mouth opened in a soundless scream as he heard the dreaded words.
"Avada Kedavra!"
A thick beam of green death flashed through the air at point blank range and struck Voldemort square in the chest, just over his heart, as he fell. Harry breathed a sigh of relief as he stood there, the weight of what had happened settling onto him along with the magnitude of his victory. It was over. The monster that had taken so much from him, taken so much from so many people, was finally defeated.
Harry closed his eyes as he turned to walk away. He was free of the prophecy, free of the pressing responsibility and duty that had haunted him ever since he learned of his destiny. His eyes flew open as he remembered Hermione. She might need his help.
A low noise reached his ears. A bubbling up of eerie laughter from directly behind him caused his insides to freeze and his heart to catch. He whirled around, his glasses askew, and beheld an impossible sight. Voldemort was sitting up, a look of sheer rapture radiating off of his pale nightmarish face. Three stories up Dumbledore caught McGonagall's limp form and laid her gently down on the floor before turning again to the scene below.
"You should look surprised," Voldemort said smugly. "Even I wasn't sure that this would work. I certainly never intended to test it against the prophecy."
Harry recast his shield and backed away slowly as Voldemort began to advance on him. His mind was racing, attempting to think of something, but the only thing he could do was relive the moment when the killing curse slammed ineffectively into Voldemort over and over again.
"Actually, you shouldn't be that surprised," Voldemort continued. "After all, we both survived Avada Kedavra before, you more than me though."
Voldemort raised his wand and a tiny purple whirlwind emerged from the tip as he charged up a spell. Harry winced and braced himself for the onslaught, his morale very nearly demolished by Voldemort's seeming invincibility. An immense weight of failure settled down on him.
"Harry!" a shrill voice called out as a thin tendril of fire wrapped around Voldemort's torso and sent him sprawling away.
"H-H-Her-my-onee?" Harry asked dimly. Her slight form touched down lightly right in front of him.
"Snap out of it Harry," Hermione said, her stern voice reverberating through his head.
"Hermione, you've got to get out of here," Harry said frantically. "You've got to get everyone out of here. He just took a Killing Curse and got up like it was nothing."
"I know Harry, I got here in time to see it," Hermione replied.
"Then you've got to get everyone to safety," Harry insisted.
"And where is safety?" Hermione asked. She bent down and offered him her hand, all the while keeping an eye on Voldemort. The dark wizard didn't seem to be in any hurry now.
"Look, I don' t know how he stopped Avada Kedavra," Hermione said, "But I do know that the prophecy says you can beat him. You've got to try again, and again if necessary, but there's no stopping now. I'm here, I'll help you think of something."
Harry took a deep breath and accepted her hand as he rose to his feet. Voldemort was back standing as well, his tattered cloak fluttering idly from his ambient magic. Harry and Hermione stood side by side, filled with rage and hatred for the monster that had taken the name of Voldemort. Hermione sent a series of images to Harry's mind and with a movement quicker than they eye they took action. Voldemort caught Harry's first blow, but it succeeded in pinning him to one position.
"Avada Kedavra!"
Two beams of viscous green energy slammed into the dark wizard, but he didn't even flinch. Instead he cast some kind of spell that translated its effects through energy pulses. The two teens were pushed backwards as if they had been caught in a maelstrom. As they flew back they pushed off of each other and used wand propulsion to fling themselves in opposite directions. A hail of silver disks and fiery darts intersected on Voldemort's location, but the projectiles passed through his body like a stone passing through water. Not a cut or scorch mark was left from what should have been lethal attacks.
Voldemort wasn't even trying to evade their assault anymore as everything from earthen spikes to eviscerating curses was thrown at him. The place on which he was standing had been reduced to a rubble filled crater in short order by the intensity of his foes' attacks.
"Distract him Harry," Hermione said suddenly. Harry cast a giant crystal ball with a vibrant blue hue that was in fact a dense form of corporeal lightening. Sweat stood out on his forehead while he directed the blast that should have been enough to take out a small army of wizards and instead directed it onto a single man. Voldemort spread his arms defiantly and let the monstrosity hit unobstructed. As he was momentarily obscured by the energy of the spell Hermione reached into her hat, pulled out a vial of petrifaction potion, and hurled it toward him desperately.
There was an explosion followed by an outward rush of air that nearly blew the two teens down. The light from Harry's spell died out abruptly and Voldemort came back into focus. In mid air only a few inches away from him the vial Hermione had thrown was floating harmlessly.
"I commend you on a tactic that might actually have worked," Voldemort said, still with a supremely smug tone. "But now those hats have got to go."
Voldemort's wand sprouted rigid fiery spikes that pierced through Harry and Hermione's hats. There was a bright flare as the magically enhanced objects were burned to fine ash in a flash. Hermione's light bushy hair also started to burn, but she quickly extinguished it before it could get out of hand. Voldemort hadn't intended for the attack to do anything beyond denying them the use of their hats anyway.
"You are not invincible," Hermione proclaimed coldly, her hair still smoking. "Avada Kedavra!"
Voldemort raised his hand and the flash of green light was rebounded onto her. Hermione was barely able to absorb the shot on the palm of her armored arm in time. Harry accelerated to Hermione's side and regarded Voldemort cautiously. If he could rebound the killing curse then that meant whatever power he had gained might be related to the power that had saved Harry when he was just a baby.
"How is that possible? No one died for Voldemort out of love," Hermione said, apparently following the same line of thought as Harry had. The disgust and loathing that she had for Voldemort was apparent in her tone.
"A wizard with enough magic can survive the killing curse," Harry said darkly. "That's it, isn't it Voldemort."
"Close, but not quite," Voldemort replied laughingly. "No amount of magical power can survive a killing curse. Huge amounts of magical power can make one's physical body survive through conditions that would normally kill it, but the killing curse requires the life force of its victim each and every time."
"Then how?" Hermione asked. "How can your body survive these physical attacks and the killing curse over and over again?"
"It's simple really," Voldemort replied. "I have both the life force and the magical power of over ten thousand wizards coursing through my being!"
Harry felt revulsion and shock course through his mind from across the link. He knew that he must have been sending similar feelings to Hermione as well based on her reaction. Their anger swelled as one as they imaged all the people whose lives had been snuffed out meaninglessly in the service of Voldemort's ambitions.
"Don't look at me that way," Voldemort said humorously. "It is, after all, your fault Miss Granger that I was forced to go to such lengths. When you saved Harry from my ritual last year and robbed me of the power that the prophecy would have afforded me I had to look elsewhere for the strength I needed."
"So you absorbed the lives of other wizards?" Hermione said. "But how? A holocaust of that magnitude, even if you went abroad for them, we would have known."
"Oh yes, I agree, finding enough suitable wizards would have been most impossible." Voldemort replied. "How fortunate for me it was that one of my faithful followers brought a new potion to my attention."
"The magic enhancement potion," Hermione breathed. Suddenly things were beginning to make sense to her. Harry's unnatural increase in raw power following his coming of age…it was all due to Voldemort's power continuing to seep across their mental connection. As Voldemort absorbed more power Harry also got some small fraction of it. "You used muggles!"
"Clever girl, you got it on the first try. There are countless numbers of muggles who live as outcasts in their societies. No one noticed or cared as they vanished." Voldemort hissed sinisterly. "Although artificial muggle magic is a poor substitute for wizardly magic, you know what they say about desperate times. I was fearful that the prophecy would single out my life force for destruction should Harry manage to land a killing blow, but as we've seen that isn't the case."
"You still aren't invincible," Hermione said in an enraged but determined voice. "Ten thousand or ten million, you will eventually die."
"It's close enough for now," Voldemort replied. "After I crush the two of you I will absorb Potter and complete my original plan. If he lives that is. If not, well, there are many paths to immortality. I shall just have to seek out another one."
"Come on Hermione," Harry said. "Like you said, he isn't invincible. If we don't attack with Avada Kedavra then at least he can't rebound it onto us."
"Right," Hermione said optimistically, "Even if it takes ten thousand deaths, we can wear him out. It's our only shot."
Dumbledore sat down heavily on the edge overlooking the battle below and ran a hand gently over McGonagall's, who was still unconscious. Now that he had heard the full depth of what Voldemort had done he felt something welling up inside him that he had never really felt before…despair. He took out Fawkes' phoenix egg and looked at it sadly.
Below him, through the gloom that was Hogwarts' during the night, he saw the three combatants aglow with the power of their magic. Their spells lit up the castle as far as the eye could see like flashes of multicolored lightening. Even though Voldemort was fighting seriously again Dumbledore could pick out various spells connecting to him. Harry and Hermione were the strongest duo that Dumbledore had ever witnessed battle except possibly for himself…and Abigail…during their youth.
He would trust in them, Dumbledore decided at last. They who had the most to lose had not yet given up. They who would do all that was in their power to prevent its loss. If they, who were most affected, could still hold out hope then it was the least that he, an old man nearing the end of his days, could do to believe in them.
"Harry, follow my lead," Hermione said as she cast a long thin rope of corporeal fire. She transferred it from her wand to her armored hand and then cast another long strand that she left attached to her wand. The two whips lashed out and sliced through Voldemort in two different locations that would, on any regular person, have left his torso in three segments.
Harry did the same and suddenly there were four fiery lashes reaching out, attempting to drain as much power and life force from Voldemort as possible. Harry scowled as Voldemort caught one of his whips in his hand and did something to nullify it. The fire died and the entire strand crumbled away as it turned to ash. Hermione took the opportunity to run her whips through him again, but then he was dodging once more.
Harry was about to conjure a replacement for the whip Voldemort had destroyed when he felt the thickness of his other whip change unexpectedly. A quick fire spell turned the huge snake to ash, then two more for Hermione, who had been caught off guard by the nasty creatures. Before they could begin to create another attack an invisible force slammed into them, knocking the air from their lungs and causing them to double over in pain.
Hermione licked her lips deviously as Voldemort prepared some kind of yellow spell that Harry didn't recognized. As soon as he cast it Hermione leapt in front of it and pointed her wand, the brother wand to Voldemort's wand, in front of the spell and cast a simple curse. Phoenix song erupted and the dark chamber lit up with golden light as the priori incantatem effect took hold. Voldemort's wand began to slowly leak out phantom versions of the spells he had previously cast. Harry didn't know if having his wand incapacitated would help or not, but now that they had him trapped he would certainly try to take full advantage of it.
Harry unleashed everything he had, every hex, every curse, anything that he thought might stop him. Nothing did. Hermione's feet had left the ground and her wand was vibrating horribly, but she was still trying to hold on. There was a bright orange umbrella unfolding from Voldemort's wand. It began to rotate slowly, interfering with the golden strands, severing them one at a time. The phoenix song abruptly cut out and the effect was nullified.
"Fool me twice," Voldemort muttered as he slashed at Harry with a long bluish whip that attempted to coil around him. Harry wrapped another conjured rope of fire around it and the two spells cancelled each other out.
Hermione used the distraction to point her wand at the sky as she made a strange motion that Harry had only seen a very few times before. The spell that had been torturing them eased up instantly as Voldemort pointed his wand to the sky. There was a deafening explosion from high above the castle and the entire structure quaked violently as a massive shock wave impacted. The sound of breaking, straining stone could be heard throughout the ancient structure and dust poured down from the ceiling as cracks opened up.
"Enough," Voldemort roared as he fired a battering charm at Hermione. Harry stepped in front of it, but that only succeeded in having both of them flattened against the wall. Voldemort pointed his wand up again and a second deafening explosion followed by an intense shock wave rocked the school.
"I rather like this castle," Voldemort said. "I won't let you destroy it."
"Meteors," Hermione said weakly. Harry surmised that she must have used the last of her magic to summon such powerful spells.
Voldemort lifted his wand and let loose with a flashy conical shaped purple spell that twisted rapidly like a muggle drill bit. Harry waved his wand weakly and summoned a shield, but it was completely drained by Voldemort's single attack. Again Harry raised a shield and again Voldemort struck it down. Harry felt a tug and the next thing he knew he was skidding painfully across the room. He reached out with his armored hand and stopped his movement in time to see Voldemort standing ominously over Hermione. Harry whipped his wand forward and a breaker curse punctured straight through Voldemort's torso. The dark wizard whirled, Hermione forgotten, and advanced on Harry.
"It's so much fun when they twist on the hook," Voldemort said as he stepped on Harry's armored arm. Pain shot through it as the metal cracked and broke apart under the magically enhanced pressure.
"Crucio!" Hermione's voice rang out from across the room. Voldemort wailed and staggered away from Harry as the magically induced pain coursed through his body. Harry rolled over and saw Hermione limping toward him, her wand still on Voldemort. He noticed for the first time in all the chaos that her arm was badly burned and she had several other wounds as well, some of which were reopened.
"Crucio!" Hermione yelled again as the effects of her first spell began to wear off. It didn't matter though because Voldemort, who had been surprised by the pain, had already shaken off its effects.
"You do that fairly well mudblood," Voldemort said. "I'll have to have Bellatrix show you the finer points of the Cruciatus Curse in a while."
"She already did, before she left us," Hermione replied with a weak smile.
Voldemort's face twisted in rage as he saw the truth in her eyes. He looked around in bewilderment, as if he was suddenly aware of his lonely surroundings for the first time. "Where are all my followers?" he asked of no one in particular.
"They're gone," Harry wheezed. He was resisting the urge to go into a coughing fit. "Dead, unconscious, souls drained, who knows, but they're gone. I don't even hear any fighting going on in the rest of the castle anymore."
"Can't be," Voldemort said hollowly. He abruptly shook his head and shrugged. "It doesn't matter. I'll find new followers. I won't need followers after this day."
Harry felt Hermione's hand squeeze tightly around his, her eyes were still smoldering with rage, and together they raised their wands one last time. Hermione's attack was a thick green gas with extreme corrosive effects. Harry's was a strong blast of air that sent it billowing out to encompass Voldemort. The cloud exploded and dispersed outward, dissipating quickly, but not before Harry felt his exposed skin begin to be eaten away.
Harry could feel his senses being overwhelmed by the intense light that unexpectedly began to emanate from Voldemort's wand. A thick clear sheet of crystal spread out from Voldemort's feet and swept over everything in a wide proximity to him, including Harry and Hermione. Harry tried to counter the material with his magic, as did Hermione, but they had finally been exhausted to the point where they were unable to prevent their lower bodies and much of their upper bodies from being covered.
Harry twisted his wand and tried to shatter the material. There was a sharp cracking noise and then a snap, but before he could free himself his wand was wrenched from his grasp. Hermione had drawn some kind of strange symbol in the air in order to attack Voldemort rather than attempt to free herself. A burst of pure white fire unlike any that Harry had ever seen her use before seared through Voldemort. She gritted her teeth and for a moment as she maintained the assault Harry thought that they might be able to break free again. Then Hermione jerked and coughed up blood as Voldemort slammed a super dense burst of air into her.
"Filthy muggle, did you really think that you could trade enough of your life to end mine?" Voldemort growled as he backhanded Hermione across the mouth. As he collected their wands and tossed them aside Harry noticed that his body had healed itself rapidly from the horrific effects of Hermione's assault. "Just for that you get to watch what I'm going to do to Potter."
Voldemort weaved his wand in a complex patter and the floor glowed brightly around Harry. A great magical seal burned itself into the floor in such a way that Harry standing in the center. Hermione recognized it from the cottage where Voldemort had planned to perform the absorption ritual on Harry nearly a year prior. Her eyes were wet with frustration as she turned her gaze to Harry.
"I'm sorry," she whispered.
-->